You are reading a Localyze quote on your phone in Heathrow Terminal 5. €4,800 for what they call the Starter Package. The flight to Berlin boards in 90 minutes. Across the gate a Crown Worldwide consultant is selling a couple a €9,200 family relocation that includes the school search. Behind you a guy in a Patagonia vest is doing the same thing on a Google Sheet with three browser tabs open. He is going to spend €0. He is also going to lose his next 14 weekends to ImmoScout.
There is no universally right answer. The wrong move is paying for what you would have enjoyed doing yourself, or DIYing the thing that needs a German speaker on the ground in Berlin.
What a relocation package actually covers
The market split into three tiers around 2026: full-service enterprise, mid-tier startup-friendly, and à la carte. Pricing comes from published rate cards (Localyze, Bluespace, Move Stuff Easily, Farawayhome) and Crown/Santa Fe enterprise quotes.
| Tier | Typical price (single) | Typical price (family of 4) | Coverage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Enterprise (Crown, Santa Fe, Move One) | €8,000-€15,000 | €15,000-€35,000 | Visa, home, school, full move, settling-in, ongoing 6mo |
| Mid-tier (Localyze, Bluespace) | €3,500-€6,500 | €6,000-€11,000 | Visa or immigration, home search, Anmeldung, bank, GKV, utilities |
| À la carte (Farawayhome, AmazingPlace, Move Stuff Easily) | €1,200-€4,000 | €2,500-€7,000 | Pick: home search, Anmeldung, bank, school. Pay per item. |
Service-by-service street prices (à la carte, all incl. 19% VAT):
| Service | Typical fee |
|---|---|
| Home search (3-6 viewings + contract review) | €600-€1,500 |
| Visa/immigration accompaniment | €830-€2,500 |
| Anmeldung booking + accompaniment | €110-€280 |
| Bank account setup | €95-€220 |
| GKV signup | €95-€180 |
| Utility registration (Strom, Gas, Internet) | €95-€280 |
| Orientation tour | €110/hour (2-hour min) |
| School/Kita search | €530-€1,200 |
| Tax registration | €120-€280 |
Add a temp-housing stipend (often included): €80 to €200 per night for 14 to 28 nights = €1,120 to €5,600. This line item alone exceeds the savings from DIY for most people.
What DIY actually costs in hours
Each item in the first-30-day sequence has a real time cost, ignoring the language penalty.
| Task | DIY hours | Out-of-pocket | DIY pain level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Visa/permit appointments | 4-8h | €0-€110 | medium |
| Home search (the heavy one) | 20-40h | €0 | very high |
| Bürgeramt slot hunt + Anmeldung | 3-6h | €0 | high |
| Bank account setup | 1-2h | €0 | low |
| GKV signup | 2-3h | €0 | low |
| Utility setup (Strom, Internet) | 3-5h | €0 | medium |
| Steuer-ID retrieval | 0-1h | €0 | low |
| Mail forwarding (Nachsendeauftrag) | 0.5h | €31-€72 | low |
| Orientation | 5-10h | €0 | low |
| Total | 38-75h | €31-€292 | mixed |
Plug in your hourly rate. At €40/hour after tax, 50 hours of admin = €2,000 of opportunity cost. At €80/hour, it is €4,000. The DIY case is strongest when your time is flexible and weakest when you have a job starting in 3 weeks.
The five services worth paying for
Across hundreds of expat moves, the consensus on what is genuinely worth paying for shifts the same way every time.
1. Home search (€600 to €1,500). The single biggest time-and-money win. Local agents have WG-Gesucht alerts, ImmoScout pro accounts, and landlord relationships that DIY cannot match. Saves 3 to 8 weeks of Airbnb at €100/night = €2,100 to €5,600 of housing cost avoided. Net positive almost always.
2. Immigration/visa (€830 to €2,500). Worth it if your case has any complexity: dependent visa for a partner, Blue Card with prior denials, family reunification, or refugee/asylum context. A bad first filing can cost 4 to 8 months. For straight Chancenkarte or simple Blue Card, DIY is fine.
3. School/Kita search for families (€530 to €1,200). Berlin Kita waitlists run 12 to 24 months. Local agents know which Kitas have spots, which require Bezirkskindergeld registration, and which prioritize foreigners. Worth every euro if you have a child under 6.
4. Tax registration (€120 to €280). Worth it if you are a freelancer (Fragebogen zur steuerlichen Erfassung is 9 pages of German) or have a non-standard situation (US citizen with FATCA, founder with shares). Employees can DIY.
5. Temp housing booking (often bundled). Inside a package, the bundled rate sits 15 to 25% below booking on your own. À la carte, not worth a premium; just book Wunderflats or Airbnb directly.
The five things to never pay for
1. Bank account setup. N26, DKB, Wise are 10-minute phone apps. Paying €95 to €220 for this is theatre.
2. GKV signup. TK or Barmer online signup is 24 to 48 hours, in English, free.
3. Steuer-ID retrieval. It comes by post automatically. There is nothing to outsource.
4. SIM card. Walk into a Rossmann. €15. Done.
5. Bürgeramt accompaniment for English speakers. The Anmeldung interview is a 15-minute form fill. Paying €110 to €280 to have someone hold your passport is silly unless you have zero German and the Bürgermeister is unusually strict (rare).
Decision lines
Use a relocation company if:
- Your employer pays for it (use the full benefit; do not leave money on table)
- You are moving with kids under 12 (school/Kita search is a multi-month pain)
- You have less than 4 weeks before your start date
- You speak no German and zero local network
- Your move budget is over €25,000 and the package fee is under 5% of total
Use DIY if:
- You have 6+ weeks before your start date
- Single or couple without children
- You are comfortable reading bureaucratic German with translation tools
- Your hourly opportunity cost is under €40
- You enjoy the process (some people do, no judgment)
Use à la carte (pay for one or two services, DIY the rest) if:
- Most cases fit here
- You can DIY the easy stuff (bank, GKV, SIM, Steuer-ID) and pay for the hard stuff (home search, school search, complex visa)
- This is the cheapest path that still saves the weekends
Three real moves, three different answers
Maria, marketing director from Madrid, single, joining a Frankfurt fintech.
- Employer covers €6,000 of relocation
- Used Bluespace mid-tier package: home (€1,200), Anmeldung accompaniment (€180), tax registration (€220), 21 nights temp housing (€2,940), orientation (€350)
- DIY'd: bank, GKV, SIM, utilities, Steuer-ID
- Total spent: €4,890 of €6,000 employer cap. Pocketed €1,110 difference as taxable bonus.
- Operational in 21 days.
Karthik and Priya, software engineers from Bangalore, two kids, moving to Munich.
- Employer covers €4,500; family budget added €6,000
- Used Localyze immigration (€1,800), Farawayhome school search (€1,100), Crown shipping (€4,200), home search (€1,300), Anmeldung (€220)
- Total: €8,620
- Operational in 38 days; both kids in Kita within 9 weeks (vs. 14 to 24 month DIY waits)
- DIY would have cost less but at least one parent would have taken 2 months of unpaid leave to handle it.
Sarah, freelance designer, self-funded, moving from Toronto to Berlin alone.
- Budget €1,500 for services
- Used Move Stuff Easily home search (€890), DIY everything else
- Lived in Wunderflats for 8 weeks (€2,640), then signed a 2-year Mietvertrag
- Total: €890 services + €2,640 housing = €3,530
- Operational in 47 days. Lost 4 weekends to bureaucracy but learned the system.
What to ask before signing a relocation contract
- Exactly what is included (item-by-item list, in writing)
- Cap on accompanied hours per service
- What happens if the home search yields no flat in 8 weeks (refund, rebate, additional fee)
- Whether the company has an on-the-ground German-speaking agent in your destination city
- Tax treatment of the benefit (most are taxable as wage; some moving costs are tax-free under §3 Nr. 13 EStG)
- Reference clients: ask for three names of recently relocated people in your industry
What to do this week
- If your employer offers relocation, pull the package details now and check the cap.
- Get à la carte quotes from Localyze, Bluespace, and Farawayhome on the two services you would pay for (home search + one other).
- Block 4 to 6 weekends in your calendar for DIY admin if you skip the package. Realistic, not optimistic.
