# IT Professional Market in Spain



## toadnz (Jun 2, 2008)

My wife and I have started planing moving permanently to Spain from New Zealand (Mid 2011, sooner if everything goes perfectly to plan).

Having looked around for information, I am not having much success in finding out what the real IT marketplace is like in Spain.

Focus is predominately in Solutions Architecture/Prototyping/Problem Solving, although I still do a lot of development work in C#/SQL Server as well. 15 Years experience, including team leader and management roles. 

Stuff like salary and actual “marketability” information seems somewhat limited.

I have also been self employed for well over 5 years now, and would like to know if it is feasible to still freelance in Spain as an IT professional with what will only be conversational Spanish. 

An opinion on how likely we would get permanent residency would be great as well. Likely to have between 25-30k Euro in liquid funds.


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## Stravinsky (Aug 12, 2007)

toadnz said:


> My wife and I have started planing moving permanently to Spain from New Zealand (Mid 2011, sooner if everything goes perfectly to plan).
> 
> Having looked around for information, I am not having much success in finding out what the real IT marketplace is like in Spain.
> 
> ...


On the subject of employment, do you speak Spanish at all?
As feelance / autonomo you will have to pay €238 a month in health / pension charges if you earn 1 euro or if you earn 1000.

There are a group of recruitment / web sites doing the round on this forum. I'm guessing though that the ability to speak Spanish will be paramount.


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## toadnz (Jun 2, 2008)

Both my wife and I will be speaking conversational Spanish by the time we get there. Obviously fluency is likely to be a bit harder, and something that comes from using the language every day.

The health / pension charges should not be an issue, as I am quite used to "planning ahead" for business costs.

It's more the marketplace that is of concern as I see conflicting information a lot of the time. Sometimes it looks that even experienced IT people only earn about 20.000 Euro, and other times, they look like they earn 40.000 even for the same time of work.

My wife will be qualified at Aromatherapy and Massage and has a recognized degree in Counseling in addition to probably having a TESOL qualification.


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## chris(madrid) (Mar 23, 2008)

Let's put it this way. You could be lucky. 

But you'll need EXTREME PATIENCE - very good language skills and be good at selling yourself if you want to compete.

There are jobs advertised - but MANY are for outsourcing companies who pay bottom dollar and charge highish rates. I've seen IT chaps fight for €1000/month jobs. Most are short term stop gap positions - many jobs don't actually exist and they're just "keep the books filled with possibles" adverts.

When I came to Spain a GOOD Systems engineer earned about twice what's now on offer. Also expect a high flexible portion to the salary. 

Freelancing could be doable - but my guess is you'll struggle unless you go through an agency. Large corp's here tend to get "temp" staff via agencies so they have a guaranty of supply. Most are over staffed anyway so are choosy. Small co's will use freelancers BUT mainly for maintenance etc. Almost noboy will pay for bespoke programming any more.

Frankly the market is saturated with cheap, young, well trained IT folk. And unless you have a skill & experience somebody REALLY wants - my feeling is you'll struggle to find anything great. 

A lot of the better jobs here are never advertised either and go via the friends network. I was part of it all until I decided I wanted not to feel obligated to put in lots of unpaid overtime. I work in a small town hall now as a general PC dogsbody. I was a senior SE manager - have about 28years under my belt. 

I wish you well - and wont envy your success. I'd rather retire.


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## avallark (Aug 17, 2008)

which forums offer job postings in spain?


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## chris(madrid) (Mar 23, 2008)

Monster - The World's Leading Career Network
InfoJobs.net - Bolsa de trabajo, ofertas de empleo

As a starter - There are others but I'll need to ask somebody still in the rat race


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