I find allhomes good (I like the house map search facility) but very restrictive in its areas. www.domain.com.au is very good for house searches and also has a viewing planner, also has online application facility for some agents.
If its a popular house (location + price + sales photos) it will be busy, if its not busy, then you need to ask yourself why?? being new to the area you may not have the answer to that, hence a relocation agent!!

I've got the message! It does make perfect sense, thanks for stressing that point .

Now all that's needed is to find a well-recommended one .

lol..sorry fella, wasn't being pushy about the Relo agent there!!! Just the lack of local knowledge will be a hindrance to you. You may find that once you get there and start working your new colleagues will be able to help you with a lot of stuff like that.

I would suggest working out where you need to live then emailling all the agents in those particular areas! you could do it through www.domain.com.au (use the "radar" facility it is "way cool" ) ................www.realestate.com.au there is also http://property.com.au/ connected to them

allhomes is actually far better for ACT than domain especially for rentals - however if you want to go outside ACT then yes, realestate.com.au or domain will be the ones to go to. There will also be the Canberra Times on Friday and Saturday for the private rentals that never make it to the net. Just tried my suburb on domain - not one rental listed vs 9 on allhomes. I think allhomes is a very Canberra thing.

Thanks for all the tips, everyone

Regards,

Paul

The Riot ACT (compulsory reading for anyone aspiring to be a Canberran IMHO) has a thread on this for you http://the-riotact.com/?p=24930#comments

Hey Paulry - just a bit of advice is to always have a completed application with you when you got to a viewing - make sure you also have good references from the UK. The agents don't want to know you when you are mailing from the UK - I tried that and they basically said not here don't try it!!! I had friends who came over and they weren't working straight away and had to pay 6 months rental up front to secure a house so you may have to do that. It is a mare trying to find a house and sometimes it is already a done deal - there is normally 10plus couples looking at the houses and as Quoll has said the timing is really important. We looked in September and it was still vvv busy I think that on the 1st weekend my hubby came to view the house we were in and there were 20 couples here! I think like someone said on here I would try not to limit the suburb quite so much I know you want your boys into LHS and Dickson but you will be up against the students etc in the inner north area. I wish you all the very best in the hunt and wow November is not long away now!!! I hope you love it here as much as we all do!

Just read the 1st quote on this about dressing smartly and we were given the same advice from quite a few people - not necessarily a tie but defo smart trousers and shirt!

I've been trying to manage my wife's expectations about the chances of us finding a rental in the Inner North but she's adamant that is where it has to be. All we can do is try our best . We're prepared to pay six months up front. I still need to get a set of references suitable for property rentals - thanks for the reminder

Looking forward to becoming a Canberran ...But so much to do

After the first weekend of open house viewings we made sure we got an application form in advance for all further visits. Actually two application forms as you will need one each. We always dressed smart for viewings, husband did a few by himself during the week and he wore chinos and a tweed jacket.

We also put together what we called our rental pack. This started with a covering letter which we titled "About US"; we mentioned that we were a professional, non smoking couple, no kids, mentioned our ages, that we were homeowners in the UK and had been for many years. We said that we took great pride in our home and that we had a letter of reference from the letting agent that was managing our home in the UK. As we have two cats, we mentioned them and offered to pay a pet bond; we didn't offer to pay rent up front as we both had jobs so we also mentioned our income in the cover letter.

I also cut and paste this letter when I send queries over the internet and I am sure it did the trick as all the agents got back to me really quickly and offered to help.

In our pack, we put our cover letter, passports, driving licences, our contracts of employment and a couple of UK bank statements showing savings. The only reference we provided was the one from the agent in UK letting out our property and that was two sentences long.

I think the thing is here is that the rental market is just sooooooo highly in demand that the estate agents don't entertain you until you are here - this is a great pack to take with you but in Canberra they really will not help. My OH came to look at houses himself before we came out here and because I wasn't here they wouldn't entertain him!

I wasn't suggesting that it is a good idea to look for a house before you are here, this was what we did when we arrived. Sydney rental market is pretty competitive too, so it is about finding a competitive edge.

My husband viewed loads of houses without me and I didn't see the one he took until after he paid the bond! But it is nice, I saw it yesterday. Phew.

Ahhhhh sorry I misread your post Glad you got something it is one of the worst things trying to find a house - my OH saw some horrors - we were lucky to get the one we are in now and also managed to extend the lease for another 12 months at the same rental price yay Bet that was a relief to find that the one he had paid the bond on was nice!

If you have a job lined up, use your contract offer as a reference. Totally agree with 2 sets of applications, you have to apply for every adult in the house. Be positive, dress is ok but not essential, just use your savvy. Hang around after the viewing a bit and talk to the agent, befriend them a bit, it honestly helps and that way you can get your own salient points and circumstances across. Worked for me every time and its just being affable.