Robert Söderström has moved country eight times since 2000: Sweden to New Zealand, on to Tonga and back, home to Sweden, to Spain and back, then to Canada in 2022 and back to Sweden in 2025, with his family for most of it. Several more moves stalled for want of one thing: certainty about whether they would qualify.

Canada was the hardest. His wife held an employer-backed work permit and he an open one through her, and permanent residence through Express Entry looked near-certain after a year in an executive position that carried 200 points. Then a rule change removed the points for an existing job, and the chance went from near-certain to next to none. It took a long while even to understand that.

Advice was no help at that price. He was quoted up to US$40,000 to help with an application, with no outcome guaranteed, and US$5,000 for a task that turned out to be simple enough to do himself for about $500. The best and cheapest lawyer he found charged $250 an hour, was honest about what he could do alone, and even then one consultation did not give full clarity.

So he built the check he wishes he had had first: answer a questionnaire, see which pathways are open to you, and know what would need to change, before paying anyone.