believe there are four kinds of people who say they wanna live here.
[1] There is the person whose line of credit is longer than the word beroepsaansprakelijkheidsverzekering, who will pick up a 17th century canal house on the Herengracht the way other people pick up a quart of milk. And whose love of Amsterdam may or not outlast the milk.
[2] The person who's pleading with their asylum advocate, "Please don't let them send me home — if I go back there they'll kill me."
[3] The person who pops up in the AOL "Amsterdam" chat long enough to say "420. Where da bud at? When I get out of high school I'm moving to Amsterdam to open my own coffeeshop."
[4] The person who is standing rueful in a darkened hotel room tonight, whose airline ticket, job, spouse, kids, pets, mortgage, or some combination of the above, say they must go home on a plane tomorrow. Every better instinct in their soul is screaming no. They did not have time to do and see everything they wanted to do and see here. But they have fallen in love with Amsterdam. They are looking out the window right now at the bicycles passing in the street below. And they are seriously bummed.
Type 1 doesn't need any help. Type 2 is very difficult to help. Type 3 is beyond redemption. So let's think about type 4.
Before I say one more word I'll tell you this: Google "Amsterdam immigration lawyer." I'm not one, so please hold me harmless. The immigration laws here are not the same for everyone, and they're subject to revision, interpretation and improvisation. So it really helps to have someone hold you hand. And with that disclaimer I'll now tell you what I think.
I think you can come here if you really wanna.
There I said it.
Much of what you read about Amsterdam will leave you convinced that coming here is either impossible or way more difficult than it's worth. You'll be told that residence permits are begrudgingly granted, work is impossible to find, and housing is incredibly scarce and expensive. All those things are true for someone's experience. But ask yourself who they think they're talking to. Are they really talking to you?
One night last fall I visited the rental housing advice page on the web site of the Gemeente Amsterdam. I was greeted with the words "Finding rented accommodation in Amsterdam sometimes seems an impossible task. Generally speaking you should expect a waiting time of over 5 years." Poking around on the same site I found a list of licensed apartment brokers. Clicking through to one of those, I found a list of 27 apartments available now within a price range of EUR 800 - 1000 per month.
Five years huh.
Well maybe the guy who wrote that first paragraph just forgot to mention that those five-year waiting lists are for cheap rent-controlled apartments you'll probably never be eligible for anyway — but that free market housing is available here just like in Boston, New York or LA if you're willing to pay for it, and that housing costs have even gone down in the last year.
Or maybe he wrote the whole truth in his first draft, but then his boss told him "you really must make it sound worse than that. Try again."
Friends, they are trying to discourage you on purpose. The truth — that yes it is at least distantly possible to move to Amsterdam — is supposed to be a guarded secret. I've betrayed them all. Sorry guys.
There are two reasons why they make it sound like you can't come here. One is that they're afraid all of you will come here. The second reason is that the harder you think it is to move here, the cooler those of us who did it will look. Why spend money on a new wardrobe when I can just make you think I live someplace too sexy for your shirt? If I were to confess that my hairiest challenge moving here was overcoming an irrational fear of Dutch bank tellers, that doesn't make me look too hip does it.
But let's talk about how easy it's not.
If you come from a poor country with relatively low education standards and lots of people who are not pale-skinned, you will have a harder time moving here. Cruel but true. That's because Nederland is now trying to make up for years of loose immigration policies drawing crowds of needy people. People from those countries have to apply in writing for permission to even visit here. At least that's what the rules say.
If you're from certain privileged countries, among them the United States, you're allowed to stay for 90 days just on the strength of your passport. Then you have to go someplace else for 90 days before you can come back. If you want to legally stay longer than three months, you have to apply for what's called a verblijfsvergunning, literally a "license to stay" or residence permit.
If you're from within the European Union, you should find it relatively easy to get a verblijfsvergunning. You should also have a somewhat easier time if you are coming enrolled as a student, and your university may even help with the formalities. If you work for a big multinational company, and can persuade them to transfer you to their Amsterdam office, then you too should have a comparatively easy time.
But from what I learned from my beautiful lawyer, nobody is allowed to live in Holland without some source of income, even if it's unemployment or welfare. They also have no legal provision for fabulously rich people who just wanna come hang out and spend money. Then again I've never heard of a millionaire getting expelled from Nederland for overspending.
If you're just Joe non-EU guy coming here looking for a job, then that could be tricky. In that case you'll be obliged to prove that you serve an "essential Dutch interest" in business, culture, education, the arts, technology, or something.
There's pretty high unemployment among the Dutch these days. So if a local company wants to hire a non-EU foreigner, they need permission from the government. To get that, they have to prove they tried real hard to find a Dutch person who could do the job, then threw their hands up in despair and 
settled for importing you. To make that work, either you need some kickass qualifications for which demand exceeds supply here, or you need an employer who's willing to pretend as much. Sounds like a long shot doesn't it. But heck, maybe you have kickass qualifications. What do I know?
What Nederland is trying to avoid today is a continued influx of people who may not be able to provide for themselves and their families. Unlike some countries, Nederland has a tradition of at least trying to ensure a reasonable quality of life for its residents. But they didn't count on so many newcomers being such fruitful multipliers. New Dutch people are constantly being generated for whom an "essential Dutch interest" is hard to discover. And yet because of that implied social contract, Nederland still feels responsible for their survival. So they're a little overextended lately.
However, if someone is happy to come here and try to make their way entirely at their own risk — without burdening the social support system — then the Dutch state isn't threatened.
That's what happened to me.
It was called the Nederlands-Amerikaanse Vriendschapgedrag or "Dutch-American friendship treaty". Under this treaty, Americans can apply for residence to start a business in the Netherlands. Then they don't have to prove they will serve an essential Dutch interest. The proof is in the pudding: if your business survives, it has served some kinda interest. Meanwhile you take on all the risk, and Nederland has nothing to lose. The Dutch economy can only benefit from any work you generate.
My beautiful lawyer's unhesitating advice was, in essence, "Do it this way. Don't be a fucking idiot. Do it this way." Those were not her exact words, but that was the message, and she was right. At the moment I elected to flee the US, I was already a smalltime freelance filmmaker, familiar with the vicissitudes of being on my own. So I wasn't giving up any job security. I would just be relocating. If they'd have me, that is.
The treaty gives you an excuse to apply for a residence permit — it doesn't guarantee you'll get one. That's up to the nice people at the Immigratie- en Natuuralisatiedienst (IND). And it literally takes them several months to make up their minds. In some ways that's the coolest thing: as long as you've done your bit on time, you're allowed to sit around as long as it takes for them to figure their shit out. It does help to have all your paperwork in order the first time. Again the magic words are immigration lawyer.
Here's how the process went for me.
First I needed a roof over my head in Amsterdam. I got lucky. On an exploratory holiday here, completely by chance I stumbled into two old friends who were on the verge of moving to New York, and needed someone to rent their flat in suburban Osdorp. I wasn't thrilled by Osdorp, but the private connection would be a coup. Finding a flat through traditional channels would be more expensive and difficult, especially as I did not yet have a residence permit or a Dutch bank account. I'd just been paid for a pretty big job, so I offered to rent their flat for at least six months. They agreed.
Now I needed an immigration attorney. Still sitting in my hotelroom I found the Amsterdam Gouden Gids (yellow pages), made two calls, and found my beautiful lawyer. I flew back to Boston. My beautiful lawyer sent me an agreement to sign and return. I went to the bank and wired some advance money to the firm she worked for. She started emailing me advice.
Before leaving the States I needed to get hold of an official copy of my birth certificate with what they call an "apostille" stamp on it. I'd never heard of that, but the people at Massachusetts Vital Records had.
Next I needed an airline ticket, three big suitcases, and a ride to the airport.
Both my ex-girlfriend and my ex-wife agreed to house some of the props of my ex-life. Some possessions I just gave away. What was left I packed into the suitcases. I said my tearful goodbyes and got on the plane. I got here on the morning of 3 January 2003.
About a week later I met my beautiful lawyer face to face, and she told me what my next steps should be. Within three months of arriving, I needed to write a business plan, register my company, then apply for a residence permit.
My business plan had to include an opening financial statement prepared by a recognized Dutch bookkeeper. My lawyer hooked me up with a nice lady in a southeastern suburb, who went on record as my financial administrator. My financial statement had to show that I'd already invested several thousand euros in my business. I wrote down what I'd spent on my computer, software, video camera etc and gave that to her. She also made a modest forecast of my earnings and profit. I think the Dutch term for this is uit z'n duim zuigen — to suck a story out of your thumb. I also needed to show the lease to my office (which was my apartment).
One rainswept morning in March, my beautiful lawyer and I walked the short distance from Centraal Station to the Amsterdam Kamer van Koophandel (chamber of commerce) to register my eenmanszaak or one-man business. I was glad she was with me. One significant little catch 22 is that I was supposed to have a bank account before registering a company. But banks wouldn't give me an account without a SoFi number, to get which I needed a residence permit, to get which I needed to first register a business. My beautiful lawyer talked Dutch to the guy at the desk, and he agreed to shrug his shoulders at this problem. I gave him my paperwork and some money. He gave me a piece of paper saying I was registered as a businessman in Amsterdam.
Finally I got some new pass photos shot at one of the many photo stores in town. Then my beautiful lawyer packed up all my evidence and mailed it with a cover letter to the local Vreemdelingendienst or foreign police on Johan Huizingalaan. I went on with my life.
A couple months later, the foreign police invited me to come over to show some original documents, sign some new ones, and pay an application fee of EUR 430. Once the foreign police decreed that I was cool, they passed my dossier along to the IND. A few months later the IND agreed that I was cool. They authorized Register Amsterdam to give me what I wanted.
That thing had started out in the literature as a Vergunning tot Verblijf, license to remain. In the process it was shortened to verblijfsvergunning. Now they were just calling it my pasje (little pass). The closer I got to getting it, the more trivial they made it sound. Finally one warm morning, 11 August 2003, I showed up at a building on the Stadhouderskade, and a Muslim woman behind a service desk handed me a little pink and gray plastic card. This thing in which I'd invested so much sweat and dreaming, was at last rendered unto me with all the ceremony of buying a pack of gum.
But armed with that little pasje, I could now go to the tax people and get my SoFi (sociaal-fiscaal) number. And with that, I could start a bank account. And with that bank account, I could finally be human. Without one, it's difficult to do anything else here — like start any other accounts of your own, even electric or telephone.
The pasje is good for one year from the date you applied for it, not when you receive it. If you wanna stay another year, you're supposed to apply for renewal at least 8 weeks before it expires. The main criterion for renewal is that you stayed out of trouble with the law, and earned a small profit. I have been approved for a second year, and my second year is half over now. They've changed the rules so that the IND is now directly responsible for producing the residence permit cards, and they've been having some trouble ramping up. By the time I receive my second pasje, it will be time to apply for a third. Meanwhile I have a letter from them saying I'm still cool. So I'm cool.
In principle, this "Friendship Treaty" approach is a way of solving the problem by throwing some money at it. You have to save up to do it, and then if you do okay the first year, maybe they'll let you stay for another year. I think they have a similar policy for some other nationalities as well. The guys from Artery, a Bulgarian heavy-metal band, told me they got legal by starting a "self-standing" enterprise just like me.
The fees for my beautiful lawyer, my bookkeeper, my registration, and my application all came to less than the cost of the G4 laptop on which I am writing this. Not a bad deal. The lawyer said that if I get renewed for five years in succession, then they'll offer to let me stay forever.
Will I wanna stay in Amsterdam forever?
I dunno. Will you?
Wapen vs kraakwapen. Above, Amsterdam's traditional coat of arms, with the three x's denoting St Andrew's crosses. Then, a new version dreamed up by some krakers — squatters who occupy unused buildings without permission. Some people first moving to the city have started out living in a kraakpand before finding a more legit place to live. Squatters have enjoyed some degree of albeit squishy legal rights in Amsterdam, but sometimes they are violently evicted in raids that go down in folklore.
