Moving to Portugal from the UK | What I Wish I Had Known

Moving to Portugal | What I Wish I Had Known -- Are you a soon-to-be expat in Portugal? Everyone talks about the good things, but not many share the challenges that you might encounter when moving to this wonderful country! I love living in Portugal and wouldn’t change it for the world, but today I want to talk you through all the challenges & share my strategies for how I tackled them -- Filmed in Lisbon, Portugal by Liz Sharma, a Portuguese teacher in Lisbon and founder of Talk the Streets.

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VIDEOS MENTIONED:

Moving to Portugal from the UK | Why I Left London for Lisbon!

Liz Sharma is teaching Portuguese on YouTube | #UKinPortugal

Diz olá on social:

#learnportuguese #europeanportuguese #talkthestreets

[andrewbrown]

True about the electric blanket, but I can't believe you didn't mention the single most important electrical item - the dehumidifier! If there's one thing that makes a cold damp house feel warm, dries my clothes, stops the mold and damp and just generally makes life tolerable, our desumidificador is that thing.

[fabiorodrigues]

I'm Portuguese and bureaucracy is really one of the most delicate issues we have in Portugal. Even for us who have always lived here it's quite the struggle.

[TheRealPhilGold]

Your remark about the bureaucracy - “It depends who’s at the counter …” Oh, so true! If you get someone who feels like being helpful, it can be so simple. A corollary - if they don’t know the answer, there’s a good chance they’ll just make something up, so you get to go down some pretty interesting dead ends. But like you, I think the wonders of being here far outweigh the inconveniences!

[mariusferreira]

I moved from Portugal to Florida (US) 7 years ago. I currently work has a construction manager in Naples area and I also do encounter incredible amounts of bureaucracy here too dealing with permits and inspections. We also experience substantial delays in our construction projects due to global supply chain issue. So having experienced dealing with bureaucracy in Portugal prepared me well dealing with bureaucracy overseas 😀.

[dianabernardo]

I'm Portuguese, lived in France, the UK, and now Hungary. A part of me really wants to go back to my country but then the other part just can't deal with the issues you mentioned in this video. Very accurate description of the most annoying things about living in Portugal!

[angeliquemechel]

I’ve lived in several southern parts of the world and there seems to be a lack of knowledge that insulating a home is NOT just for cold climates. The whole point of a well insulated home is to keep the inside temperature constant no matter what the temperature is outside, including 40!! I am grateful that our place in Portugal has some insulation, but I just want to bang my head when I think about all the properties here that lack it. To anyone who has a property or is going to buy one, please do yourself a favor and have someone add styrofoam insulation to your outside walls ( you don’t need to do the internal walls). You will be very happy you did!

[krisgrotowski]

I lived in Japan for 15 years and never seen central heating or cooling. The house insulation is also almost non existent. Houses are hot in summer, cold in winter. Remember waking up in the morning and the temperature in the bedroom was just 4C. I could see my own breath. Constant problem with mold, etc., etc.
Anyway, thank you for a great video and looking forward to the next one.

[marie-jeannejoiris]

I did it!!!
I left Belgium for Portugal one year ago.
We live now in the center of Portugal, between Tomar and Abrantes, near the river Zèzere.
And BLISS.... the best decision we ever made!
PS : We have a stove. 😉

[sarahbeach]

I've never had a problem with bureaucracy in Portugal, but you are right that you need to accept things take longer and will probably be more complicated than they would in the UK for instance. I've heard from a lot of other foreigners that they get angry or complain and I don't think that helps anyone. Smile, keep calm, use any Portuguese you know (even if it's just olá and obrigada) and at least you'll start off on the right foot.

I think the other thing that people need to know before moving to Portugal is that it can REALLY rain here in winter, especially in central/north Portugal! We might have long hot, dry summers but winter months can be horribly wet.

[FilipeDiogo]

Watching these videos makes me want to go back home.

Having lived in Lisbon for 25 years, lived in London for another few years and currently being on the other side of the world.... I must say there's no place like Lisbon, it has everything... food, quality of life in summer or winter, beaches.... why the hell did I leave? 😔

[elaineguerreiro]

Lived in the Algarve for almost 9 years, the one thing I don't want to live without is a dehumidifier mold and damp in the colder months is horrible as is the continual smell of bleach, from cleaning it!!!! The dehumidifier really helps a lot. Please do a 'part 2'.

[kristenwilkinson]

Absolutely, a part 2 would we awesome!! We are planning on moving to Portugal. My husband is 50% Portuguese and has family living there and he is working on getting his citizenship before we go over to Portugal. We are trying to prepare as much as possible. :)

[everybodywants]

I had never felt so glad about being Brazilian as when I moved to Portugal because bureaucracy in Brazil is also a pain, so it almost felt like a preparation course. I could also relate to the lack of heating system overall. Being from the South, temperatures commonly drop below zero in winter and a proper heating system is virtually nonexistent, especially in older buildings and houses, unless you're willing to spend LOTS of money on it.

[Evmahalo]

I personally, really appreciate THIS video. The fairytale life is a nice distraction that is so motivating to get moving, but the realities and struggles are real, and should be spoken about with the same amount if passion and earnest assessment. With that said, please continue the dialogue and the journey Liz. I am a true fan and hope to utilize all the wisdom offered when the time comes. Saúde!

[joypinto]

I moved 4 years ago from Dubai and I can surely relate to the cold homes and patience needed! Now I can smile (mostly) but back then it would frustrate me. More videos on this please!

[NSG]

A big shock to us was that an appointment is not what we know as an appointment in the UK. We got caught out in both the bank and at the Financas offices where we thought being given an appointment for a certain time meant that when you arrived at the given time you would be seen by someone expecting you. In both cases all it seemed to mean was that we were ok to visit that day but we still needed to take a ticket and go to the back of the long queue that had formed because we had arrived at our 'appointed' time rather than opening time.

[markiesmith]

Excellent video. I moved to Braga from London 2 years ago and I agree with everything you have said (I have made a note to buy a washer/dryer!). I am glad that my experiences in governmental offices have been similar to yours- and you are fluent in Pt! I love your videos BTW - thank you so much for creating them x

[zuchs]

This was great. I think it's important to touch on these experiences of moving here.Yes do a part 2! My husband and are here in Porto. We were watching and nodding our heads at everything you talked about lol. We are learning the practice of patience.

[markmarz]

Definitely Part 2! Thank you for Part 1, very helpful.

[jetfowl]

You don't need a heated towel rack or a dryer in the winter in Portugal. You just need a dehumidifier.

Put your drying rack in front of a dehumidifier and it'll dry in less than 24 hours. (That includes a towel and sheets.)

This was my experience living in Braga (northeast of Porto, where there's a lot more cold and damp compared to Lisbon). And as an added bonus, it produces white noise, which helps a bit with the city noise... especially at night.

As for apartment temperatures, I put in an A/C system (just like you did). But I made sure to have a wall unit in each bedroom as well as the living room. So I just needed to heat whatever room I was in. At night, that was just the bedroom. Which wasn't very expensive to heat, as it's not that many square meters.