What do you mean you moved to Spain without speaking Spanish?

Whooooo boy has it been a hot minute since I've sat down to write about this journey. Thank the chaos that comes with moving to a new country, finding a rental, figuring out schools for the hijos, and doing it all while still speaking the most basic of basic Spanish.

So what's happened since the last time I checked in?

1. We figured out where we wanted to land (just outside of Sevilla in beautiful Espartinas) and found a long term rental. 2. I took a two week intensive ballet class where no one spoke English. 3. We moved into said long term rental and had workers in and out for the first two weeks (all of whom also did not speak English) to fix the various things that need to be fixed when a rental turns over. 4. We survived the heat dome. 5. We enrolled the kids into school AND they started!

There's definitely too much to cover in just one post, so today I'm going to talk just about finding our rental. Reddit posts, blog posts, Facebook posts abound of people frantically looking for long term rentals and sharing stories of landlords refusing to rent to them because they don't have a Spanish work history, haven't had a Spanish bank account for 6+ months, and don't have a Spanish work contract. According to those same stories, the only way to find a rental is to pay thousands of dollars to an agency to find a rental for you, and then you might have to pay 6 months of rent as JUST a deposit.

Honestly, though? We didn't really face any of those issues.

But why?

There are a few things I've picked up on that make a big difference on being an immigrant (immigrant not expat) here in Spain, the biggest one is trying your bestest to speak Spanish, even if it's through a translate app. So when we saw the perfect house come up as available on Idealista, I reached out to the company - directly on WhatsApp as well as via Idealista - with a message in Spanish where I:

- Introduced myself and the family - Shared that we were immigrants coming in looking for a long term rental - Shared that we can provide proof of financial solvency

And I got a response almost immediately. Would we have gotten the same response if I'd have reached out in English? Probably not. People here want to rent to people who WANT to be here, and respecting the basics like speaking their language makes a big difference.

I was also clear that we were still waiting for our visa approval, but that we are planning on staying in Spain (and would love to rent this house long term for the duration of our first visa) if we were approved.

We had to jump through a few hoops. I had to provide a lot of the same things that I provided for our visa application: my work contract stating I could work in Spain and what I made per month, bank statements showing income, and lots and lots of using the translate app to review everything. But in the end we landed in the perfect house for us.

It's still a challenge - as I write this, we have two workers here (Juan is fixing the irrigation system and Pedro is installing new ceiling fans), and we still stumble through our broken Spanish. Yesterday a neighbor stopped by to let us know there was water flowing out (hence Juan fixing the irrigation system), and the communication barrier had me blushing with feeling like a toddler put into a college class. But every day we continue to try: we speak only Spanish when we go out to restaurants and shops, we do our lessons at home, and we watch our favorite shows in Spanish. And every day it does get a little bit easier.

We also get the local pour of wine because they love that we're trying as hard as we can.

So if you've immigrated or are thinking of immigrating and worried about renting, just know that you can find something without a broker. Maybe take a look at the suburbs of the bigger cities - the trains and buses make it so easy to get around. And practice your Spanish, because that's what will make a very real difference in getting a response.

Xoxo, homeacasa