13 August 2026
The first month is not about settling in. It is about appointments, in a specific order, where each step unlocks the next and getting the sequence wrong costs weeks.
Week one
Get a Spanish phone number. Almost every appointment system sends confirmations by text and some will not accept a foreign number at all. Then book every appointment you can see, even the ones you are not ready for, because the appointment date is the constraint rather than your readiness. Cancelling is easy. Finding a slot in three weeks is not.
Week two
Bank account, if you did not open one on a scouting trip. Then start on the padrón the moment you have an address, because school and healthcare both sit behind it.
Week three
Residency card appointment, health centre registration, and school paperwork. This is the week where the padrón certificate starts earning its keep.
Week four
The unglamorous ones. Utilities into your name. Internet, which can take longer to install than anything else on this list. Home insurance if your rental requires it. A local doctor for each family member.
Build in the slack
Expect at least one thing to go wrong that is nobody’s fault. A closed office, a missing stamp, a form that changed last month. Leave room in the schedule and do not make your first day of work the week you land.
And take an afternoon off in the middle of it. It is genuinely common for families to spend a fortnight so buried in paperwork that they forget they have moved somewhere worth being, and children notice that before adults do.
