Dear readers

My partner Jane and I have just been granted Skilled-Independent Mirgration visas and will arrive in Oz early June 2009. We are in our late thirties and will be migrating with our son George who will be 15 months old by then.

I'm a qualified pipe fitter, recognised in Australia as mechanical plumber. Jane is an administrator/personal assistant. We both intend to get jobs as soon as possible.

We are open minded but not sure where we want to go as yet, so I'm going to check out a few places in January. I'll be visiting the cities and surrounding areas of Perth, Brisbane, Adelaide and Melbourne. We know these cities are really diverse but our preference is to live in the suburbs, close to the coast and have relatively easy access to the city. Initially we want to rent a place to live, three beds with a pool, if affordable. Hopefully we will settle ok and decide to buy property later.

Our considerations are quality of life, housing and jobs so we are looking for advice from anyone about good areas to live as well as those to avoid, reputable property agencies, recruitment agancies and information about where the work is.

We are also interested to hear about shipping companies, banking and any other advice on what needs to be checked out and sorted before and after we arrive in Oz. Already got some advice for our migration agent and will be attending expos and fairs etc but it would be great to hear from those who have already been there and done it!

Kind regards

Glenn

Hi Glen let me be the first to welcome you to B.E and also congratulations on getting your visa, I cant help you with areas in oz as we have never been ourselves but we have decided to head to Brisbane / Gold coast, if you are looking for information on banks and shippers there is loads of info on here for you to check out, at the top of the page there is a search button if you click on that and put in shipping companys and the same with banks in oz that should help to give you most of what you want to know, but what I must say once you have started reading these post you wont stop so welcome to your new addiction

Welcome to BE!
Having just arrived 8 weeks ago, there was a lot to be done. Get reading on the forums here- there are a lot of useful threads which will help you with your questions. Make lots of lists and be organised!
I am in Sydney, and it is pricy here. Lots of people go to Perth or Brisbane, but I don't know how they will be affected by the financial crisis- prices are falling for houses in Perth so you might be able to get something reasonable, but prices were overinflated there, and there are rumblings of job cuts.
Buying a house is a bit different over here- rent something until you know where you want to be. Start with holiday accommodation whilst you look, as you don't want to be tied into 6 months rental of a place you haven't seen, and it is easier to book holiday stuff from 12000 miles away.
Caroline

Hi Glen,
We are based near Brisbane on the South Side.
We used Ozforex for banking, Doree Bonner for Shipping, and Concept Australia for migration.
As someone said previous key in your questions on search posts and this should bring up all relevent previous posts. Hope all goes well