For sure !!!!!

Hi, I will be 44 when I finish unni in 2010. Hopefully as a qualified nurse, so we are going across on my visa. OH will be 38, two kids 17 and 11 and we can not wait to get there. As everyone keeps saying you only live once, grab life with both hands and live it. we are all counting down the days and hopefully soon the hours until we get there. Life does begin at 40, not that I thought so at the time, but it does. Look at me , at unni and going to aus, brilliant.:

Oh is 44.5yrs we've been here on a 457 for 8 months. Our plan was always to seek PR when we got here, and if for some reason we didn't get it we've had a great life experience.

Renting UK home out til it's all settled though so we have a route back. We have kids 3 5 7 years and they love it but wouldn't be overtly sad to go back to their old lives either. Most kids deal with it better than their parents!!!!

That said PR isn't always a done deal. Our employer can't/won't meet the terms of the ENS or RSMS without penalising us majorly on benefits, we don't have enough points for independant (not til just after our current 457 runs out!) and looks like we may be going the SIR route! Bummer but at least we're here and giving it a go!

totally agree with G if you have the oportunity for state sponsership then take it, you will get instant PR unlike the 457, as long as you get your application in before your 45 you will be ok.

we came out last year on a state sponsership visa, OH is now 48, i'm 43

We were both 45 when we moved out with an 11 and a 13 year old. I was coming on a spouse visa but age was never ever a concern. I honestly don't think there is any difference in whether you will make a go of it or not with regards age. Once you have kids, work, a mortgage etc you could be 20 or 50 - it's irrelevant.

Getting normal visas is a different issue obviously.

Cost of living is prob about the same - houses in general bit more expensive and food if you don't shop around is more expensive but then fuel, water, etc is cheaper so it evens out to about the same.

Sydney is the most expensive state though

We are better off here than we were in the UK, are a family of 5 also but both me and my OH work (as we did in the UK).

The benefits as I see them are not in monetary value but in the opportunities for the children's future and the children being able to make plans to go out with their friends without having to worry about the weather My son is out 70% more than he was in the UK where he spent most of his time on his PS2...

I am sure that you have already thought of this but writing the positives / negatives of both options should assist your decision.

Best of luck

Lau x

Funny! I thought it was a city

We flew to Brisbane on my 40th birthday. I reckoned they always say life begins at 40 so why not give it a go. It has honestly been the best thing we did, we have had plenty ups and downs but now it most certainly feels like home and we are very happy.

Hi,

We are both 54 and came to Perth 4 months ago on a 457 temp visa.
We were given the opportunity and grasped it with both hands. If everything works out and we enjoy it here, we may go for a PR, on the other hand if we don't settle, we will have had a great paid holiday and an opportunity to travel around a part of the World that most people only dream of.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained and you're never too old to make a change!

Sue

We are both in our 50s and hope to emigrate early next year, once we get the paper work sorted out

Both in our mid sixties and have been here four years.

We emigrated on a PR Visa aged 44 1/2 (me) and 54 1/2 husband. We intended to rent but have bought a house and although my job has been great my husbands hasn't and he is in the process of changing jobs.

We emigrated cos it was a bit of "now or never" and went for PR as we knew we would not have much time to do so if we left it til we got here. As it happened we emigratd 2 weeks after my 45th b'day so we were glad about that.

We love Tassie and if my husb can get his job sorted out we will prob sell our (rented out) house in UK and move permanantly - decision time next March!

Cathy

My uncle is here from WA (Wakiki) and says that I will love Port Kennedy area at my age! He suggested Wakiki because it's full of old gits ready to retire like me. Great stuff. It's good to see that 60 years of Aussie life hasn't changed his humour, even at 80-ish.

Hello all, really interesting thread.

My husband will be 51 in March and I am 37. We fly out to Australia on 22nd January with our 2 boys aged 14 and 9 heading for the Gold Coast.

OH is being sponsored on a 457 as he has no formal qualifications. After 2 years of Australian work experience he will be sponsored for a permanent visa. I know that his age is against him on that one but our agent is confident that it will be ok as the sponsoring employer is the federal government and his job is specialised.

Something that my husband is mindful of is that when he retires, his time will be much better spent in Australia than the UK. Things have been a bit "stale" for us here for a while now and we really feel that we need a big change in our lives. I personally think that making the decision a bit later in life is easier because because its a much more informed decision. We have more or less done all that we can here in the UK and are ready to make the move.

If I had done this in my 20s I can imagine that I would feel less settled as there would have been a lot more left in the UK that I had not experienced. Hope I am making sense here!

Anyway, fingers crossed all goes well for us and all the other "oldies" xxx

Not sure about that.

I am bored out of my skull much of the time and spend a lot more time indoors than in England......mainly due to the weather.

G