In partnership with
2 minutes. Your URL. A customer profile worth using.
Most founders can describe their product. They can't describe their customer. Not in a way that actually changes how they sell.
HubSpot for Startups built a free tool to fix that. Paste in your URL, answer a few quick questions, and it generates a structured profile of your best-fit customer. Firmographics, buying triggers, the works.
Takes 2 minutes. No spreadsheet required.
Germany ranked 30th of 31 countries for foreign residents in the 2026 Expat Insider survey.
If you've had the quiet thought lately — is it me, or is this harder than it should be? — you're not imagining it, and you're not alone.
In July 2026, the InterNations Expat Insider survey (nearly 8,000 respondents across 162 nationalities, ranking 31 countries) placed Germany 30th out of 31 — second-worst in the world for foreign residents. Only Norway scored lower. For a country that spent the last few years actively recruiting skilled workers, that's a gut-punch of a headline.
But the headline isn't the whole story. Germany is a genuinely good place to earn a living and a genuinely hard place to build a life. This piece breaks down what the numbers say, who is actually leaving, and — more usefully — the five practical traps that turn a hard first year into a decision to leave. Avoid these and you skip most of the pain the survey is measuring.
What the data actually says
The gap in the survey isn't about money or work. It's about friction and belonging.
I'm Retiring With $1.5M. Can I Spend $10K A Month?
You've saved $1.5M. Now the real test: can it generate $10K/month, or will it run dry? Most retirees find out too late.
It's not about spending too much. It's about spending in the wrong order. Sequence, taxes, and the 4% rule all matter.
If you have $1M+, don't guess
Where Germany scores badly:
Digital life: dead last (31st of 31). Slow internet, cash-only shops, and paperwork that still arrives by post — the single lowest category score in the whole survey.
Bureaucracy: 61% say dealing with German authorities is difficult. The Anmeldung, the Finanzamt (tax office), the Ausländerbehörde (immigration office) — the machinery that runs your legal life is rated hardest.
Making friends: 57% struggle to build a local circle, and only about 42% find Germans generally friendly, versus a 61% global average.
Language: 62% found learning German difficult, and roughly half say you genuinely need it to get by — including to advance at work.
Where Germany scores well (and why people still come):
71% say they have enough disposable income to live comfortably.
66% are happy with their working hours and work-life balance.
60% are, overall, happy with life here.
Read those two lists together and you get the real picture: people aren't leaving because Germany is poor or overworked. They're leaving because the daily friction of being a foreigner — the offices, the isolation, the sense of never quite arriving — wears them down faster than the good salary and the six weeks of holiday can build them back up.
Who's actually leaving
The exit isn't hypothetical anymore.
Roughly one in three immigrants in Germany say they've considered leaving. Among second- and third-generation migrants — people born or raised here — it's about 37%.
EU workers have been leaving faster than they arrive since 2024 — the first time in about 15 years.
Berlin alone lost around 161,000 residents in 2025, close to 4% of the city, as people priced out of housing moved on.
By profession, two groups feel it hardest. The first is the self-employed — freelancers, solopreneurs, small business owners — who run headfirst into the tax and bureaucratic load. One Irish business owner, eight years in, said he "got absolutely fed up with the German government" and cut his tax bill by roughly 30% by relocating. Another, 13 years in, put it bluntly: it's "simply impossible to do business here as a solopreneur or freelancer." The second group is skilled employees who don't speak fluent German — hired for English-speaking roles, then blocked from promotions and daily life by a language wall nobody warned them about.
And then there's the quieter reason, the one that doesn't show up cleanly in a chart. As one new citizen who naturalized in 2025 said: "I'm tired of being an immigrant here. It's exhausting."
The 5 traps that push people out
Here's the part you can control. Most of the friction the survey measures gets front-loaded into your first year, through a handful of specific, avoidable mistakes. Get these right and you dodge the worst of it.
Most first-year friction is housing — have your document folder ready before you apply.
1. WG vs. whole flat — pick the right battle
A WG (Wohngemeinschaft, shared flat) and a whole flat (Wohnung) are two completely different games. A WG room is rented to you as a person — the existing flatmates choose you, often without a credit check or proof of income, and you can usually move in within weeks. A whole flat is rented by a landlord who wants a SCHUFA score, proof of income (typically ~3× the rent), and often German-language paperwork.
💡 The move: Start in a WG for your first 6–12 months. It solves your address problem (you need one for the Anmeldung), builds a local rental reference, and buys time to build a SCHUFA record before you compete for a whole flat.
2. SCHUFA — the invisible gatekeeper you can't skip
The SCHUFA is Germany's credit-scoring agency, and landlords treat a SCHUFA-BonitätsAuskunft (credit report) as a hard requirement. The catch for newcomers: you arrive with no score at all, which reads to a landlord almost like a bad one.
💡 The move: Open a German bank account and get a local phone contract early — these start building your record. Request your free annual SCHUFA report (Datenkopie) so you know what it says. And guard it: late or missed payments damage your SCHUFA and can block future rentals for years.
3. The deposit (Kaution) — know your rights before you pay
By law (§551 BGB), a rental deposit is capped at three months' Kaltmiete (cold rent, excluding utilities) — no more. You also have the right to pay it in three monthly installments, not all at once. It must be held in a separate, interest-bearing account in your name, and returned within 3–6 months of moving out, after the final utility reconciliation (Nebenkostenabrechnung).
💡 The move: Never pay a deposit in undocumented cash, insist on the 3-month cap, and if cash flow is tight, ask for the legal installment plan or use Kaution insurance (Mietkautionsversicherung, ~3–7% annual premium) to free up your savings.
4. Housing discrimination — real, and you have legal protection
Multiple studies and endless lived experience confirm it: applicants with foreign-sounding names get fewer viewings and fewer offers. It's one of the ugliest parts of the search, and pretending it isn't there just leaves you unprepared.
💡 The move: Volume beats vibes — apply to far more listings than a local would, and lead with a tidy folder (payslips, SCHUFA, previous-landlord reference) that removes every excuse. The Allgemeines Gleichbehandlungsgesetz (AGG) prohibits this discrimination; the Antidiskriminierungsstelle can help you document and act on clear cases.
5. Temp contracts (Befristung) — your visa is attached to this
A fixed-term contract (befristeter Arbeitsvertrag) is common and not inherently bad — but for a foreigner it carries a risk locals don't face. A contract without a stated reason (ohne Sachgrund) is legally capped at two years, with up to three extensions inside that window; break those limits and it automatically converts to permanent. A contract with a valid reason (mit Sachgrund) has no hard limit.
💡 The move: Your Aufenthaltstitel (residence permit) is tied to that job. If the contract ends and isn't renewed, your right to stay can lapse within weeks. Know your end date, start job-hunting well before it, keep a savings buffer, and read your permit's rules before you sign.
📌 The Bottom Line
Germany's low ranking is real, but it's measuring friction, not doom — and most of that friction is concentrated in the first year, in exactly these five areas. The people who leave often hit these traps early, stack the losses, and conclude the country doesn't want them. The people who stay treat year one as an obstacle course they were handed a map for. Go in with your eyes open on housing, contracts, and paperwork, invest early in the language and the friendships, and the salary and work-life balance are already on your side.
Was this useful? Forward it to someone navigating Germany — it means more than you know. Got a question or a topic for a future issue? Hit reply. I read every email.
Bis bald,
Germany Diary · Study, Work & Live in Germany
Sources: InterNations Expat Insider 2026; The Local; §551 BGB; TzBfG; AGG. Germany Diary is written by an immigrant who lives it — not legal or tax advice. For anything binding, check the official rules or a qualified advisor.