JP1

Hello,

I am British with Australian PR and am now living and working in Sydney. It's a great place but I am considering moving to Melbourne or Brisbane - the main reason being so that I can afford a house rather than a 1 or 2 bedroom apartment.

I know that Melbourne is a great place but I think I might miss the blue skies of Sydney. Those people there - is it really that grey? I have to say, when I've been there the weather's been pretty good.

I don't really know much about Brisbane and so would be keen to hear what people think of the place. I enjoy the cafe culture of Sydney (Balmain, Glebe etc) and its bars and the fact that there is always something to do. I am a bit concerned that I would find Brisbane extremely quiet by comparison.

What do people think? FYI, I am 31 year old professional. I know that I could find work in Brisbane or Melbourne paying approx. the same as in Sydney (as could my girlfriend).

Thanks in anticipation.

Megalania

Here yer go mate, pick the number of sides on yer dice and Roll Them Bones

ABCDiamond

Hi

I spent quite a few years in Sydney, and moved up to Brisbane. If you moved up to my area, you probably would find it too quiet when compared to Glebe etc, but closer in to the City, should be no problem.

I'd suggest at least a weekend in Brisbane to see what it's really like

gedge

In the last 18months in Sydney, we've been up to Brisbane 5 times for long weekends etc.
To begin with we said no way would we consider swapping Sydney for Brissie. With each visit we've come to like it more. It's missing that immediate 'gotcha' that Sydney has, but given time I could come to like it.

We are still not considering to move there, but can understand why lots of our friends have.

Un-Co

Hi there,

Personal opinion - I've lived in Sydney for coming up on 3 years now and have spent extended periods in both Melbourne and Brisbane for work. Please noone from Mebourne be offended but I would never want to live there. I go every year for the Comedy festival and have a great time but I just don't gel with it as a city. Brisbane I love. I could definitely live there for a while (ultimately I'd love to live in the country) .
There are Pros and Cons to each. Much more music, culture and arty stuff in Melbourne but I've always felt its a bit too much like London (Grey and frantic) Sydney is a great fun city but has a bit too much attitude sometimes and Brisbane is warm and very laid back but some may find it a bit on the slow side.
I think JulesandChris is right - spend some time checking them out before making any decisions.

Yorkshire

Hi,

So dont you think Adelaide would be nice for you.

The weather is nice most of the time and is only a 2 hour flight from Sydney?


Yorkie

JP1

Thank you for all the information. Can anyone suggest places close to Brisbane city centre where there is a good selection of bars, restaurants etc?

jaswebpics

I've lived in Melb and Newcastle (NSW) and have spent some time in Bris... Bris is too hot/humid for me half the year and just too small. There's so much more happening in and around Melbourne.

The weather isn't that bad and when it is you just plan indoor activities or put on the woolies and head up the snow!

JohnAndNetta

After 6 reccie trips to Oz we think we've finally cracked it. When we first had a look around we thought we'd never move anywhere other than Sydney. We are city people at heart and Sydney just had everything we wanted. But then time moved on and prices shot up and we thought what on earth can we afford in Sydney? We didn't want to live too far out. So on trip no. 3 we started looking at Brisbane (we'd already checked out Melbourne and Perth).

We didn't want to live in an apartment, so we found some great places with small land in the western suburbs that were really affordable and very nice. Then we thought, do we really want to have to drive into the city to get to the pub or the local restaurant or cinema? So we started looking around Paddington, Rosalie, Kelvin Grove, Milton, Toowong, and other suburbs v. close to the city. We were looking more for the cafe / restaurant chilled out precincts. We'd dismissed places like Kenmore and Pullenvale as being really nice, but you need to drive to the shops / pubs / etc.

Then we found our perfect patch on the other side of the river. Balmoral. Oh My God its lovely. We have just bought a fantastic queenslander house with amazing city views, within a couple of minutes walk of Oxford Street. Oxford Street has got everthing we need. It is a superb cafe / restaurant precint with small shops. Its very trendy. There's a city cat at the end of the road that goes straight into the city. There's an excellent bus service going into the city or straight into Brunswick (Chinatown) We haven't got kids, but apparently the schools are really good around here. There's no through traffic going through Balmoral, yet its really well located to get into the city (which is only about 5k away), or to get on to the main highway for sunshine coast, or gold coast. Plus its about a 20-30 minute drive to Bayside. There's a massive shopping centre about 15 minutes away (Cannon Hill).

Yet despite all this I would call Balmoral a quiet leafy suburb. Its one of the nicest residential areas we've seen. Over the river you've got other lovely residential areas like Ascot (great for racing of-course) and Hamilton, Clayfield etc.

When we started looking at property we dismissed these areas as being far too expensive, but if you start looking at houses that aren't perched too close to the river, then they suddenly become more affordable. Plus the capital growth of these areas has been phenomenal.

A lot will depend upon your budget of-course, but we've seen sizeable properties, (in need of a lick of paint perhaps!) around the 600k mark (and less).

Naturally there are some mega-expensive properties around here too, but I think that keeps the area quite exclusive and a bit up-market, but I certainly didn't find it snobby.

This isn't everyones idea of heaven - lets face it - we're still in the heart of the city and we could have bought a much bigger/flashier house on acreage, but we think it will be perfect for US, and that's the important thing.

We got a lot of information from the expat site when we were searching for our house, and in fact it was Mrs. Dagboy that told us about Balmoral / Bulimba / Hawthorne area. We move in on Sept 9th.

Good luck in your search. It would be nice to find out where you land up!

JP1

Many thanks for all your posts. It sounds to me like they are both great places to live and ultimately it will be the job-availability that dictates where we end up. We've only been in Sydney for a few months and so we will give it at least until the end of the year before moving on but in the meantime we will definitely make a trip or two to see both cities again.