A Home Without the Hassle: How Abieshomes Made My Diplomatic Move to Vienna Remarkably Simple

The Diplomatic Life: Glamorous on Paper, Stressful in Practice

I have moved six times in the last twelve years. Six cities, four continents, countless hours packing up my life into boxes I never really unpack. Being a diplomat comes with privilege, but it rarely comes with peace, especially when relocating to a new country with a family in tow. When we found out Vienna was our next posting, I knew the drill. New city. New systems. No grace period.

A Checklist That Never Ends

You arrive, and the job starts immediately. There is no “settling in.” You need to find the right school for your kids, the one that offers the language they already speak, and ideally another they will soon master. You need to figure out how to get around: do you lease a car? Can you survive on the metro? Where do you get oat milk? Which bakery opens before 8? Which café will eventually remember your order?

Why Furnishing Another Home Wasn’t an Option

But before any of that, you need a roof over your head. And not just a roof, you need a place to call a home. Somewhere your children can sleep through the night. Somewhere you can open your laptop without hearing echo. Somewhere you are not calculating the square metre coverage of a cheap towel or wondering whether there is an IKEA to buy plates that same week.

I have furnished my own homes in Nairobi, Ottawa, and Tel Aviv. I have lost more time and money to air mattresses and emergency cutlery runs than I would like to admit.

Finding Abieshomes: A Rare Real-Life Solution That Worked

Which is why, when I came across Abieshomes, I was sceptical. A fully furnished, stylish apartment in a central Viennese location that actually looks like the photos? It sounded like the kind of promise you find on a website and not in real life.

Except this time, it was real.

From the first call, they understood what we needed. Not just beds and bedding, but a ready-to-live-in space. A functioning kitchen, full of actual cookware. A living room that was not an afterthought. Enough storage for both my children’s things and my wife’s sanity. Space to work. Space to breathe. A place that felt lived-in, not just leased.

From Day One: Ready to Live, Not Just Sleep

We arrived late in the evening. The kitchen and bathroom were already stocked with a few essentials. The towels were folded. The Wi-Fi worked. We could sleep, cook, shower, and most importantly, we could live from day one.

Because that part was solved, we could focus on everything else. Visiting neighbourhood schools. Exploring parks. Learning the tram lines. Meeting other parents at drop-off. Discovering a quiet wine bar just a street over. I could actually concentrate at work, instead of stressing about where to find our fourth cheese grater.

What Abieshomes Actually Delivered: A Head Start

Abieshomes gave us more than an apartment. It gave us a head start. And in a life where you are constantly playing catch-up, that is no small thing.

When I think back on this move, I do not remember the stress. I remember the first night we sat on the balcony, wine in hand, listening to the hum of a city we were about to call home. Because the hardest part of finding a place to call home, had already been taken care of.