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Moving to a municipality

If you receive a positive decision on your asylum application, you get to move to your own apartment. After an apartment has been found for you and you have moved out of the reception centre, you will no longer be a client of the Finnish Immigration Service. From that day on, you will be a resident of a municipality. Your home municipality will organise basic services for you, such as health care, and a school place for your children.

After you receive a positive decision, you may do any of the following:

  • You may apply for a municipal place near your reception centre. A ‘municipal place’ means that you get an apartment in a municipality, you immediately become a resident of that municipality, and you receive integration services that the municipality organises for immigrants. A municipal place is the preferred way of moving to a municipality because it ensures that the immigrant receives the services he or she needs. Your reception centre will help you find a municipal place.
  • You may ask your reception centre to help you find an apartment.
  • You may find an apartment independently. In this case, you must ensure that the rent is affordable, so that you will be able to pay it.

When you get a residence permit, you should immediately contact the employees of your reception centre. They will give you more detailed instructions on how to find an apartment and other practical matters that you need to take care of.

If you have lived in private accommodation, your reception centre will unfortunately not be able to help you find an apartment. After your reception services have ended, you may contact the municipality and ask for help for finding an apartment.

Further information about living in Finland: Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment

Quota refugees’ placement in municipalities

A quota refugee is a person whose resettlement has been proposed by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and to whom Finland has granted refugee status. If you are a quota refugee, we will first find you a home municipality and an apartment. Then you can move to Finland. In other words, you will not live at a reception centre in Finland. Instead, you will move to an apartment of your own.

Remember to apply for an extended permit in good time before your first residence permit expires. Read more about applying for an extended permit.