The Notary Appointment

The hour in which the house becomes yours: which deeds you sign, what it costs, which part is tax-deductible, and what to check before you walk in.

The notary appointment — het passeren — is where ownership moves from the seller to you. In the Netherlands a house cannot change hands privately: the transfer must be recorded in a notarial deed and registered in the public Land Registry. The notary is a public official, not either side's lawyer, and is legally obliged to be impartial between buyer and seller.

The appointment itself takes around 45 to 60 minutes and is mostly reading. Almost everything that can go wrong has already gone wrong, or not, before you sit down.

You choose the notary

Because the buyer pays the notary under kosten koper, the buyer picks the notary. This is worth using. Fees are not regulated and quotes for identical work vary by several hundred euros, so ask two or three offices for an all-in quote covering both deeds, the Land Registry searches and the registration fees.

Ask for the total, not the hourly rate. A low headline price with searches, registration and disbursements added afterwards is not a low price.

Before the day

• The draft deeds. You are entitled to receive the drafts in advance and to have them explained. Ask for them a few days ahead rather than reading them cold at the table. Check the spelling of your name, the address, the kadastrale description and the purchase price.
• The settlement statement (nota van afrekening). This arrives a few days before and lists every euro: purchase price, transfer tax, notary fees, mortgage arrangement costs, and the apportionment of service charges and property taxes between you and the seller. Read it line by line and query anything you do not recognise — corrections are easy now and awkward later.
• Your money must arrive first. The notary cannot pass the deed until your own funds are in the firm's client account (derdengeldenrekening). Banks are not instant for large sums, so transfer at least two working days ahead and confirm receipt. Missing funds is the most common reason an appointment is postponed.
• Valid ID. Passport or ID card, not a driving licence, and it must not be expired.

The two deeds

If you are buying without a mortgage there is only one deed, and the bill is correspondingly smaller.

The notary explains both before you sign, then all parties sign in sequence. The seller's existing mortgage is redeemed out of the proceeds at the same moment, which is why their bank's redemption statement has to be in place beforehand.

If you cannot attend

You do not have to be there in person. If work, travel or illness makes the date impossible, you can grant a written power of attorney (volmacht) authorising someone — usually a member of the notary's own staff — to sign on your behalf. The notary prepares it, and it is routine.

What this does not do is remove the requirement that you understand what is being signed. The notary must still be satisfied of that, so allow time to go through the deeds beforehand rather than treating a volmacht as a way to skip the explanation.

If you do not speak Dutch

The deeds are drawn up in Dutch and the Dutch text is the legally binding one. If you do not command the language well enough to understand them, the law requires a sworn interpreter (beëdigd tolk) to be present. This is the notary's obligation, not a courtesy you can waive to save money.

Budget roughly €300–€600. Some offices will also provide an informal English translation of the deed for reference, which is helpful but has no legal standing. See Notary Interpreter Requirements for how this works in practice.

What it costs

For both deeds together, expect roughly €1,200 to €2,000, plus Land Registry registration fees. The spread reflects the office and the complexity of the transaction, not the quality of the outcome — the deed is the same document either way.

Transfer tax is settled through the notary on the same statement but is not a notary fee. If you are under 35 and buying your first home below the exemption threshold, the startersvrijstelling may reduce it to nothing; see Transfer Tax and the full breakdown of buyer's costs.

Which part is deductible

A genuinely useful distinction, and one people routinely get wrong: the costs of arranging the loan are deductible in your tax return for the year of purchase; the costs of acquiring the property are not.

• Deductible: the notary's fee for the mortgage deed, its registration, mortgage advice and arrangement fees, the valuation report, and the NHG premium.
• Not deductible: the notary's fee for the transfer deed, transfer tax, the buying agent's commission, and the structural survey.

Keep the settlement statement. It is the evidence for that deduction, and you will want it again years later. How mortgage interest relief works covers the rest of the picture, including the eigenwoningforfait that offsets it.

After you sign

The notary registers the transfer deed with the Land Registry (Kadaster), normally the same day. Ownership passes on registration, not on signature — a distinction that matters only if something goes wrong in between, which is exactly why the notary runs a final search for seizures or bankruptcy immediately before filing.

The deed records that the property is at your risk from the moment of signing, so your buildings insurance (opstalverzekering) must be live from that date. Once registration is confirmed and the money has been distributed, you get the keys — see The Key Transfer.

A copy of the registered deed follows by post within a few weeks. File it with the settlement statement; between them they answer most questions you will have about this purchase for as long as you own the house.