Now that the moving portion of the adventure is more or less complete, it’s time to start examining life in Valencia!
If you’ve ever moved countries, you probably carry a certain emotional scar tissue, inflicted not by the packing, not by the flights, but by the paperwork. Forms you didn’t know existed. Appointments that need to be booked weeks (or months) in advance. And always – always – the one missing document that sends you back to the beginning like a bad roll in a Monopoly game.
After our experience in Portugal, we braced ourselves for the worst. There, getting bureaucratic things done was like catching a fish with a shovel: it was theoretically possible, but harder than it needed to be. It seemed like nothing ever progressed until you managed to stumble on the one person who’d woken up that morning and thought, “You know what? I think I’ll help someone today.”
Despite the horror stories we’d heard, it turns out that Spain is almost exactly the reverse.
Here, things mostly work. Not perfectly, not instantly, but smoothly enough that the absence of friction feels borderline miraculous. And the people? Not cheerleaders, but not obstructionists either. Civil servants who (dare I say it) seem to enjoy being competent.
Let me walk you through the miracle.
We got our NIEs (foreigner ID numbers) quickly and painlessly before we arrived permanently, thanks to Laurence at our relocation service. From there, we opened bank accounts. After dealing with Portuguese banking logic, the Spanish process felt almost suspiciously easy.
Getting listed on the padrón (the municipal address registry) was also straightforward with Laurence’s help. Although people on the local Expat site were complaining about delays of weeks, Laurence got us one within days. Friendly staff, a correctly stamped form, and two certificates later, we were official residents. No drama, no “come back tomorrow,” no mysterious missing number from the wrong department on the wrong floor.
Registering as autónomo (self-employed) is another one of those steps that people warn you about in online forums, often in the tone of someone describing a minor surgery with no anesthesia. In our case? My accountant’s office took care of it in one day. All I had to do was sign and return some forms. The hardest part is that it was before I had my printer hooked up, but the nice staff at the Only You hotel printed the forms for me, then scanned the signed versions and emailed them to me so I could forward them to the accountant. A slight hassle, but no drama. Done, dusted, filed.
The permanent residency cards (the prized “tarjeta verde”) came next. Once again guided by Laurence, we showed up to our appointment a full 30 minutes early, hoping just to sit in the waiting room without getting scolded.
Instead, they saw us immediately.
Now, here’s the kicker: the appointment was only booked for me. But Kristie was there with all her documents, and without batting an eye, the officer processed hers as well. No fuss. No grumbling. Just a calm efficiency that almost felt … supportive?
Healthcare is where we expected the wheels to wobble. Registering with the Sistema Nacional de Salud involved the usual checklist: my autónomo registration, NIE, and passport. Easy enough.
But for Kristie, things were a little more intricate. She needed to prove she was married to a functioning, tax-paying human being (me), so we brought multiple supporting documents:
- A certified U.S. original marriage certificate, apostilled
- An official translated version
- And the official Portuguese certification of our marriage (leftover from our adventures in citizenship)
What we didn’t have yet was her Spanish social security number, which meant they couldn’t issue her health card until she had one.
We sighed. We shuffled our expectations lower. Laurence made an appointment for us with the INSS, the official registry organization for Spain. The good news is that it was only a week delay.
And then, bam! INSS appointment: in and out in under 20 minutes. Documents verified. SSN issued. Back to the clinic we scurried.
Now, it’s August in Europe. This means everything in Spain runs at half speed, especially public offices. The health clinic’s line for new registrations is currently operating on abbreviated summer hours and was already closed when we arrived at the clinic. We figured we’d have to come back.
But the same woman who’d helped us previously recognized us, waved us over, and processed Kristie’s application on the spot.
Well, almost. We had been a little too fast. The system hadn’t fully updated with Kristie’s new SSN yet, so the records weren’t syncing. Did she sigh heavily and send us away? Nope.
She handed us a temporary health card and said, “This is completely valid, you can use it now. Come back next week for the permanent one.”
I don’t want to overstate it, since bureaucracy is still bureaucracy. There are still forms, and appointments, and the low-level dread of not having the right proof of blood type. But here in Valencia, things just… work. People are helpful. The systems are computerized, and they seem to be connected to each other – something that was a continual problem in Portugal, where every department in every government agency has their own system that doesn’t communicate to anyone else. And instead of that creeping anxiety that you’re stuck in an administrative maze, there’s something almost reassuring about it all.
The last piece of our adventures in bureaucracy will be our car registration, which I’ve heard more horror stories about. But I’ve got five months to get that sorted, and based on everything else so far, I’m cautiously optimistic. I might even show up early, just for luck.
After years of wrestling with red tape, we came to Spain expecting a fight. Instead, we found a well-oiled filing cabinet.
It’s public service with a shrug and a smile.
And possibly, a little hope.
A Modern Odyssey - Expatriates in Iberia 