rickmarsh

Hello,

We are a couple with 2 kids in our late 30s, both IT professionals and doing well in the UK. We have family in Melbourne and have just completed our VISA process mainly on their influence. We want advice if it will be a wise decision to make the move. We have 5 years to make the move. As the pound to dollar exchange rate is on an all time low, we are skeptical on the benefits as we want a better standard of living and not sure if that can be achieved.

Thanks for any inputs.

Bermudashorts

I think whether it would be a good move really depends upon your motivation. We moved in order to have an adventure and experience living in a different part of the world, so that has obviously delivered for us.

Some people will say if you have a good life in the UK why upset the applecart, it is a fair point but we had a good life in the UK and made the move anyway. I don't think it has to be broken at home in order for the move to be worthwhile.

It is not a wanted down under fairytale though, we didn't get the dream house with a pool and sea views. In fact we are unlikely to be able to buy a house in Sydney for a long time, we are even talking about perhaps not at all. We have an extremely comfortable income, but we chose not to sell UK house and move capital in the current financial market and property prices here as simply out of reach without that. We would rather rent a good house in a nice area than live in a shoebox in a dodgy area.

You mention the exchange rate and better standard of living in the same sentence so I assume when you refer to better standard of living you are referring to those things in life that need to be paid for. I think it is possible you would come over and find you have a better standard of living, but I think it is far from a given. We came over to the same type of jobs, our income in dollars is about 2.6 x our previous sterling and things feel pretty much the same.

We are overall very happy with our decision to move and we do live a comfortable life here. We think the move has been beneficial for us in many ways, but financial gain is not one of them.

Good luck with your decision making.

Buzzy--Bee

I also work in IT in Melbourne.

The exchange rate is irrelevant unless you are planning to bring lots of money with you.

BB

monkeyalan

Having family already here will make things easier if you decide to give it a go.
Everything else you can pretty much get used to and adapt but being isolated from friends and family can be very difficult.

Jensanco

What are your pre-requisites for better standard of living then?

If you are doing well in the UK and are happy here, are you solely moving to be near family?
Speaking from personal experience you should never do anything solely just for other family members!

Personally - I love Melbourne, to me its somewhere I instantly feel at home.
You will probably want to compare all sorts of things £-$ I think it's a natural response but a huge waste of time once you've moved.
Yes there is some food more expensive than others, we've found some food stuff in Oz cheaper than UK, the more we looked into it the more we found it's really just swings and roundabouts and you could spin in circles for ages not getting anywhere.
I also think if you're prepared to shop around you'll find some good deals and don't forget to haggle for appliances etc.

Probably be easier if you had more specific questions you wanted answering.

Would you tell a stranger than riding a skateboard is safe or dangerous? on the basis you don't know if that persons ever ridden one before?

rickmarsh

Thanks to all for taking the time out to reply. I am overwhelmed with the responses.

I guess at the end of the day, it is up to us on how comfortable we are with the move. Our priorities would be to ensure we get jobs to our expectations and to get the kids sorted in good schools. Housing is a big concern as they look on the higher side and this is where the conversion rate comes in to play if planning to buy. Our family lives in and around East Bentleigh.

My approach would be to take it a step at a time as thinking of all the things associated with the move is very daunting. Is it wise to keep things running in the UK with renting the current house, are there any tax implications and gotchas to be aware of?

Buzzy--Bee

Actually the conversion rate doesn't matter if you are going to rent out your UK house. Your wages will reflect the market here, your house price will reflect the market here, neither is related to the AU/pound rate.

Only if you are bringing lots of cash does it really matter.

BB