Mallorca, the island of emigrants
It is now 6 years ago that I asked myself the question "Emigrate to Mallorca?". Especially since Corona, energy crisis and war in Central Europe, I get more messages or calls from old acquaintances with the same questions. After an awkwardly mumbled "Man you! I haven't spoken to you in 15 years. How are you?" then comes the actual reason for the often not entirely sincere interest in my whereabouts. "I heard you emigrated to Mallorca. We're thinking about it now, too. What do you think, is that a good idea?" My answer is always the same and that is a clear, unambiguous and absolutely unmistakable: no idea!
Basically, anyone who is toying with the idea should be told: Even though the island likes to be portrayed in the media as the 17th state of the Germans, emigrating to Mallorca means burning the vast majority of bridges at home. It means moving to a foreign country with a different set of people, different customs and a foreign language. (Plus, there's nothing more annoying than Spanish bureaucracy, but that's another can of worms we don't want to open right now). So whether this is a good idea for you and your family? As I said, I have no idea.
Moreover, I am the wrong person for this question. I never wanted to go to Mallorca because German television had managed to suggest to me that this sensational island was a grubby juggernaut of drunkenness. But it is not! I came here because of a job. I stayed for many reasons.
My TOP 3 reasons that speak in my opinion for emigrating to Mallorca, I would like to tell you now.
Yeah, fuck you! Is this great here!
Per 1 Emigrate to Mallorca
On the island, the beautiful, the one who looks, really shows itself at every corner. Mallorca is a pearl in the Mediterranean Sea and who does not see it, simply does not want it. The island has 250 bays & beaches with an average of 300 days of sunshine a year. Granted, great weather and beaches can be found elsewhere in the world. But if you narrow the search criteria a bit, you will find out: Mallorca is something very special. Or do you know another island that offers 550 kilometers of coastline and at the same time a mountain range worthy of the name? An island that has a real big city with 400,000 inhabitants and yet a multitude of picturesque villages and unspoiled nature? A place that is fundamentally different in climate from the old homeland and yet is only a two-hour flight from Germany? You see, that's where the choice becomes more difficult.
Per 2 Emigrate to Mallorca
The fact that there are a lot of emigrants from all over Europe on Mallorca is also a huge plus, at least for us emigrants. For example, if you're standing at the bakery and hear someone speaking in your language, you're looking at a potential new acquaintance. Because automatically you have one thing in common: you are foreigners in a foreign country. I imagine the same situation very funny in a city like Berlin. "Na kommste och von hier? Koofste och Schrippen, wah?" "Quatsch ma ni blöde von de Seite voll, Keule!" Well, networking here in Mallorca with other Germans, Brits or Swedes is a big plus anyway.
Per 3 Emigrate to Mallorca
As a third point that absolutely speaks for emigrating to Mallorca, I would like to stay with the people who live here. Even if the Mallorcans are generally considered to be quite idiosyncratic, most other Spanish-speaking people on the island are a dream. This starts with the cashier in the supermarket, who briefly forgets her job because she has a huge joy in making nonsense with my son, and continues with the police officer, who usually feels called to help rather than punish, and ends with the countless everyday encounters that always show me how much joy of life and sunshine is in the hearts of the Spaniards. Exceptions confirm the rule here, too, of course.
We have already checked off three points, but because island love always goes through the stomach, it should at least be mentioned that the Spanish, Mallorcan or more generally Mediterranean cuisine is mostly delicious, healthy, varied and sometimes unusual. No compelling reason to move to the island, but at least one that I wanted to have mentioned for the sake of form.
3 reasons against emigrating to Mallorca
Emigrating to Mallorca is a bit like your relationship with your partner. In the beginning, everything is super great. The island sun shines brighter, the Mediterranean is bluer and the beer on the beach seems to be the tastiest ever. And then, also like in any normal relationship, comes the moment when everyday life knocks on the door and makes you find the fine hairs in the "sopa mallorquina", the Mallorcan vegetable soup.
The (wage) level is dropping!
Contra 1 Emigrate to Mallorca
I once read that Mallorca, in terms of population and its land mass, should have a higher density of millionaires than the Principality of Monaco. No idea if this is really true. However, the island attracts money and its owners almost magically. Curious here, however, is the flip side of the one-euro coin, because the wage level is on average significantly below the earnings of an employee in Germany for all the dough that is on the road in Mallorca.
Of course, I do not know every pay slip of every emigrant on Mallorca, however, I can write here from my own experience. In 2016, I came to the island with a completed journalistic training and earned at my first island employer only about one hundred euros more than during my training in Bavaria. If I had stayed there, in the thoroughly beautiful Bavarian Oberland, and had not necessarily wanted to swap the mountains for the sea, then after a short time there almost double the narrow island salary would have accumulated in my account at the end of the month. A former work colleague once said to me, "In Mallorca, you get paid in sunshine." With which he is not entirely wrong.
Contra 2 Emigrate to Mallorca
This is also about money and the number 183, which is the maximum number of days that part-time emigrants are allowed to stay on the island per year. If especially island lovers exceed this number, they become fully liable to pay taxes to the Spanish state. Then emigrating to Mallorca has suddenly become a fact.
Of course, in the international tax jungle, this is not quite as simple as Spain would like it to be. Fortuny explains this in more detail by saying that it depends on many factors. It is about the family's center of life, the business's center of life and generally where which activities are located. In the end, the previous tax residency and the nationality is one of the factors that the authorities check.
Spain and Germany have a tax treaty, which means that it not only depends on what happens here on the island, but it likewise depends on whether the client is additionally still rooted in Germany.
Despite all this, it makes no sense to act here on the "principle of hope. After all, in case of doubt, both countries could file claims first. This would then have to be clarified internationally. But probably not with a particularly high priority. And until then, in case of doubt, the taxpayer would first have to shoulder the double burden ...
I always advise my clients to keep assets and real estate in Germany if possible. This can be a great advantage in case of doubt.
He recommends that emigration, or even a second home with a significant length of stay, should only be undertaken with expert prior tax advice.
Contra 3 Emigrate to Mallorca
This point is about Spanish bureaucracy. And although in most cases it's already a pain in the ass in Germany, the authorities here on the island are usually even worse. Yes, that is indeed possible. This quote comes from a good friend of mine:
The Germans may have invented the bureaucratic apparatus, but the Spanish have perfected it.
You often have to fight your way through an opaque jungle of forms that you would only understand half of in your native language. As a cherry on the cake, the official Mallorcan language is Catalan and not Castellano.
With your painstakingly learned Spanish you won't get an inch further here.
As if that weren't bad enough, the right hand often doesn't know what the left is doing. It happened to us more than once that we were sent back and forth between counter A and counter B because the respective employee simply didn't feel responsible. If the counters are not only in different buildings, but also in different parts of the city, we were really happy. We were even sent by officials to the neighboring island of Menorca, because an application would supposedly be processed faster there. Not only did it not go faster, the Menorcan official could not do anything with our paper. Oh boy!
Neither better nor worse. Simply different.
I think it is important to understand that Spain and especially Mallorca work differently than Germany in many ways. For my part, I have given up my acquired German virtues such as the much vaunted punctuality at the check-in counter at the airport in Germany. Not only does no Spaniard demand this from you. It's also much more relaxed to adapt to the "mañana" mentality on the island, at least to a certain extent.
