Moving to Norway — Oslo

Mov­ing to anoth­er coun­try can be chal­leng­ing. It is a big deci­sion, and the hours of research and prepa­ra­tion will pay off lat­er for you. So, what you are doing now is the key to your suc­cess later! Oslo, This remark­able city is the cap­i­tal and most pop­u­lat­ed city in Nor­way. You will accom­mo­date in right away because Nor­we­gians are one of the most hos­pitable peo­ple in the world. The scenery of the coun­try is impressive! Oslo is known as one of the best places to live in Nor­way. Expats liv­ing in Oslo enjoy the beau­ty of nature, ski­ing, skat­ing, hik­ing, and fish­ing, pub­lic safe­ty and pre­mi­um qual­i­ty of health care in the country. But Noth­ing is per­fect in this world; every­thing has its pros and cons; below, we’ve gath­ered some of those pros and cons based on some expats expe­ri­ence, hop­ing to make the pic­ture clear­er for any­one look­ing to move to this remark­able city.

1- Lifestyle in Oslo

- Pros:

Oslo is one of the health­i­est and best places any­one can live in the world. The city hap­pens to have the low­est unem­ploy­ment rate and the high­est Human Devel­op­ment Index in the world. Over­all, Oslo’s pop­u­la­tion enjoys excel­lent health con­di­tions; a life expectan­cy of 81.53 years is above the Euro­pean aver­age of 80.14. The gap between over­all life expectan­cy and healthy life years is around half the EU average.

- Cons:

Weath­er is hard to bear; you have to get pre­pared for freez­ing weath­er! In Oslo, they do not believe in bad weath­er; they only believe in not dress­ing right (lay­ers). So, gath­er on all your warm cloth­ing because you are going to need it.

2- Food and Eating style in Oslo

- Pros:

The Scan­di­na­vian diet is based on a healthy approach, less sug­ar, more fish and too much bread. Be pre­pared to eat bread for break­fast, lunch, and an after-din­ner snack. The qual­i­ty of the bread is great, rich in grains, and nutri­ents and you can find it fresh in almost all the gro­cery stores.

- Cons:

Din­ing out is expen­sive, you have to put a bud­get if you are a fan of din­ing out, it is time to con­sid­er chang­ing this habit!

3- Accommodations in Oslo

- Pros:

The hous­ing qual­i­ty in Oslo is high and fur­nished accom­mo­da­tion is avail­able. As get­ting new fur­ni­ture in Oslo is pri­cy, many expats regret­ted not mov­ing their fur­ni­ture with them. With the help of a spe­cial­ized mov­ing com­pa­ny, the actu­al move will be orga­nized, and you can focus on the oth­er issues that must be set­tled before you leave. Majoren­fly­tt mov­ing com­pa­ny can help you with your move to Oslo, Nor­way. This gives peace of mind. So, you can soon fur­nish your house in Oslo with your per­son­al belong­ings from your home country.

- Cons:

With high real estate prices, Oslo was the Nor­we­gian city with the most expen­sive apart­ments and hous­es in 2019. The aver­age price per res­i­den­tial prop­er­ty in the Nor­we­gian cap­i­tal was approx­i­mate­ly 5.3 mil­lion Nor­we­gian kroner.  

4- Safety in Oslo

- Pro:

Oslo is a safe city; Nor­way has a rel­a­tive­ly low lev­el of crime com­pared to the U.S. and most of West­ern Europe.

5- Working in Oslo

- Pros:

The econ­o­my of Nor­way is rel­a­tive­ly sta­ble, with low unem­ploy­ment rates and high salaries. you will enjoy short work­ing hours and lots of hol­i­days and days off.

- Cons:

If you are going on a job offer, that would be great as find­ing work in Oslo can be extreme­ly tough. With such a high­ly skilled and edu­cat­ed pop­u­la­tion, it’s hard to carve out a place for yourself.

6- Cost of living in Oslo

- Cons:

The cost of liv­ing is rel­a­tive­ly high in Oslo. Still, peo­ple also get ben­e­fits as the qual­i­ty of life is suf­fi­cient in the country.

- Pros:

If you are going to have a job offer with one of the big com­pa­nies over there, so you are lucky to enjoy being a part of a boom­ing econ­o­my, Greater Oslo is one of the world’s most expen­sive cities. The econ­o­my of Oslo plays an inte­gral part in Norway’s nation­al econ­o­my. Oslo is a gold­en cen­tre of mar­itime knowl­edge in Europe. It is home to approx­i­mate­ly 980 big com­pa­nies and 8,500 offi­cial employ­ees with­in the mar­itime sec­tor, mak­ing a liv­ing there eas­i­er in many ways.

7- Education 

- Pros:

Nor­way has free post-sec­ondary learn­ing and high-qual­i­ty pub­lic edu­ca­tion. If you are relo­cat­ing to Oslo with your chil­dren, you should get informed about Norway’s edu­ca­tion­al sys­tem to get some knowl­edge for the enroll­ment process.  

8- Healthcare system in Oslo

- Pros:

The health­care sys­tem in Oslo is super­vised and con­trolled by the gov­ern­ment. All cit­i­zens and legal res­i­dents have the same access to health­care ser­vices in Oslo regard­less of their income.

- Cons:

Pro­ce­dures are lengthy, for some elec­tive surg­eries, it might take a few months to con­sid­er putting your name on the wait­ing list.

9- Driving in Norway 

 

- Cons:

Dri­ving in Oslo can be tricky due to numer­ous tun­nels, high fines and severe road con­di­tions in win­ter. Park­ing in Oslo is gen­er­al­ly chal­leng­ing and expensive.

Last but not least

Mov­ing to a new coun­try is a tough deci­sion, and you need to think twice before every sin­gle step you are plan­ning to take. There are too many ques­tions to ask before pulling your­self up to Oslo. Our advice is to make a list of every­day things that mat­ter to you / your fam­i­ly and things that don’t mat­ter as much, and see where Oslo fits in this all. Don’t rely only on oth­ers’ expe­ri­ences; Every­one is dif­fer­ent- do your research and think your way to ensure Oslo is a great place to live for you!