tracey2511

Hi

Sorry if this has been asked lots of times before, only discovered you all here this morning. Envy all of you that have either made the move or are about to, well done for going for it!

Never been to Australia, so how would I decide what part would be right for my family and what are the first steps to put the emigration ball rolling? A family member emigrated there a few years ago but unfortunately we seem to have lost touch over the last year.

Its all I can think about lately so I need to seriously start thinking if it would be the right move for us, always felt drawn to the country for some reason.

Big thanks for anyone who can put me on the right path!

Phil & Chele

Hi

Welcome to the site.. Im a newbie too - discovered this place about a week a go!! It's a great site and you will find as i have done that the people are really friendly and helpful..

Can't really offer you any advice, just keep reading the different threads on here as they are a good insight... Good luck

GinaUK

Do lots of research (internet) on the different states/cities/regions in Australia, thinking about:

1. Job opportunities (you'll need to earn). Look on the job web sites to see how many jobs there are in your occupation.
2. Climate (Do you like it hot/dry, hot/humid, or prefer cooler temps)
3. Do you prefer city, beach, rural living (what do you like doing in your leisure time)
4. If you have children you want to think about schools and what is there to do for kids after school.

The above will help you narrow it down quite quickly.

Go to http://www.immi.gov.au

Go to the visa section, download booklet 6 and read it carefully.

Getting a visa is a two-step process: skills assessment first and then the visa application. Booklet 6 explains it all.

You may also want to read posts in the Immigration Forum: http://britishexpats.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=32

Good luck.

Gina

MANDS14

hi

We have never been to Aus and we were in the same position a couple of weeks ago but the BBC program Wanted down Under has helped a lot! Also looked at the state websites for WA, SA, Victoria, Queensland, and NSW. have spent ages on the immi.gov.au site and have bought a few books! Have now decided to try for Adelaide (nice climate, cheaper housing, cost of living, by the beach, good schools, lovely parklands, enough going on for families and not too remote). It depends what you are looking for and also which state you have the best chance of getting into depending on which visa you are applying for.

I think you have to spend quite a bit of time on research but thats half the fun! And this site is brilliant full of really helpful people and loads of info!

Good Luck!

wanderingwombat

Factors will be:
Career /job potential
Lifestyle expectations
Housing affordability (either renting or buying)

WW

Issie

Hello and welcome

Read and watch anything to do with Australia. before we started we bought tons of books from Amazon. One partiular one called living and working in Australia by David Hampshire, has been brilliant.

We search all the areas in Australia and the internet gives you great information www.aussiemove.com was helpful too.

To get the ball rolling start by reading this dimia website, you will need to look at all the different options for visa's and then decide whether you do it alone or go with an agent. We used www.gomatilda.com They were highly recommended to us by many people from this forum

Anyway good luck and keep us posted to how you get on

tracey2511

Hi

Thank you all for your replies. I'll get reading all those links tonight. I'd go tomorrow if I could, don't have any family ties here (only family really is hubby and kids who would be coming with me anyway). It's more to think about as the older two children are teenagers. I've thought about the climate, would like nice weather but not too hot! Looked at a few websites for the sort of industry hubby works in so I guess we need to be looking at areas around these.

I've been glued to Wanted Down Under too, not too keen on the spiders that were on this morning but don't mind the SMALL snakes and lizards!

tracey2511

Hi, well we're still sitting here a year later and have made no attempts at emigrating.

BUT..... I am still so keen on the idea, OH seems to have come round to the idea a lot more (he didn't seem very keen this time last year) our son said this morning if we don't go then he'll see about moving when hes older older daughter doesn't want to go (we think it would be the best move for her though due to a few issues we have) youngest two are 50/50.

So, here I am again wondering if I should maybe contact an agent to see if we stand a chance at all. We don't meet the points test, quite a way off due to OH being in his trade for over 20 years and working his way up rather than through the qualifications route.

Just had a look online at a few job opportunity sites and there certainly seems to be a demand for his knowledge and experience. There are a couple of companies I've found that are exactly his sort of thing. One was in Perth and the other in Sydney and that was just after a couple of minutes of looking.

So, do I take this any further or sit here regretting not making a move?

Other concern is, the older children are nearly 14 and 15 so IF WE DID manage to get visas, is this the worst possible time to be moving them or will they be ok education wise? One of them (the 14yr old) is on course to get really good GCSE levels so I'd hate to mess that up

If we don't have enough points for the skilled visa then I can't see anyway around our situation.

Sorry to go on, just needed to discuss this with someone other than immediate family and I am so dreadful at making decisions.

NikiL

One option with the 175 skilled independent is that you have to validate the visa within at most one year - but you can do that by going on holiday there. You've then got (as far as I'm aware) up to 5 years to actually make the move - that gives your kids time to finish their GCSE's.

If it would take until the end of the current/start of the next school year to get the visa, then that gives you plenty of time.

tracey2511

Thanks for the reply

That would be great to get everything sorted out then have up to 5 years to make the move. The ideal situ would be to go after he sits GCSE's in 2 years time, then they could continue study wherever we may be.

Maybe I need to get OH to go to college and get an extra certificate or something, he did a general business diploma some years ago at college one evening a week for a year but I don't think that counts.

Its annoying cause I've just found a few more companys on the internet that are after people just like him. More annoying is I started a childcare course some years back, did 1 yr then we moved house and I never got round to completing it. If only we'd know then.....

scotlandtooz

I would just go to a few agents with all your details, and see what they say. At least you know where you stand then, and most don't charge for the initial consultation. They could probably give you a few pointers about what qualifications you need if you don't have enough at the moment as well. Good luck!

Lee&Jade

Hi there,
First off welcome to British expats.
Have a look at this http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/search/...ted+down+under
If you can try a holiday down under it will give you a much better outlook on it, if not just do loads of research. hope this helps
Lee

ozzydreamer

Im in a similar situation, never been to Oz but just keep being drawn to it for some reason.
Were about to have our first child, and Im already worrying about the type of school etc. it will go to hear, and Australia keeps popping into my head.
I see it as: you only live once, try what you can to improve your lifestyle and quality of life, you can always move back.

Were not actually going for a few years, but I started researching what climate suits us, best places for work etc. and then I ended up doing a full circle as there are pro's and con's to every area! So Id recommend doing a lot of research - but trust your instinct and take other's opinions with a pinch of salt - they may love it or hate it and you may be the opposite!
Ive started keeping a book to write down the info about different area's.

Here are some sites I found usefull:
https://assessments.visabureau.com/a...d/default.aspx
http://www.realestate.com.au/
http://www.lse.co.uk/currency-converter.asp
http://www.whereis.com/whereis/home....A747.server1-1
http://www.bbc.co.uk/cgi-perl/weathe...ralia&x=8&y=14