new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Hi everyone,first of all sorry for my english spelling but hope to improve it by learning from you all on this really great forum
We are a family of 4 people, Robin age 3,Annika 5,Jeannette 37 and myself 38 years.
In july we hope to make our move to the Northern beaches :)
My working place will be at terrey hills.
We are looking for some nice family areas with good school and child facilities .
Are there people over here who live in the terrey hills area?
We would like to have some advice about good schools .
Is it better to choose a private or a public school and what are the costs of these schools
We don't want to comute further than 25 minutes from Terrey hills or the beach.
For the first few months we are looking for some afordable accomodation ,any suggestion is welcome.
Hope you can help this dutch family regarding their questions.:)

Kind regards Markus

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Nothing wrong with your English mate,you could probably teach a lot of Brits some things.Don't know anything about where you're heading I'm afraid,but you're the first Nederlanders I've come across making the move,good to see it's not all Brits going.Why the move?

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

25 mins travel from Terrey Hills gets you to many of the suburbs on the Beaches... :) Don't know about schools, no kids, but living wise you can get a decent 3 bed semi to rent for ~ $650 per week... Collaroy, Narrabeen, Warriewood, Mona Vale, Newport... All great places to live... Have a look at Domain to get some ideas... Good luck and welcome to the site...! :thumbup:

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Hello Markus, unfortunately I cannot help you directly reagarding the area, as I don't personally know that area you are looking at, but what I have found very useful is Google Map. I do not know if you are familiar with Google map, but just in case you are not, I will explain in more detail.

Once you have done a search and opened Google map, type in an area you are interested in for e.g., Terry Hills, then a map of the said place will open up, you can then zoom in or out at leisure and find the names of suburbs within your traveling limit. Google the names of the suburbs you are interested in and you will come across various and hopefully useful links.
This might sound like a long-winded way of finding out about certain places, schools, ect, but you will be surprised at what you can find out. Best of luck, hope MY post makes sense.:D

All the best, Gilly.

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

"Nothing wrong with your English mate,you could probably teach a lot of Brits some things."


Just what I was thinking!:lol:

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

2 rite M8 Only joking,Fred.

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

:lol:


Wat U meen u only joking? I fought it was the norman to tipe like this it's 2008 ya know! Git with it!:lol:



I apologise in advance Marcus and Jeannette, we aren't all illiterate in Britain. :blink:

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Marcus,
This area of the north shore/northern beaches are all good areas. St Ives, Pymble, etc are not far away from Terry Hills and may be worth considering.

Your biggest issue I think may be what you consider to be "affordable accomodation" for a family on that side of Sydney.

WW

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

We live in Frenchs Forest and its only 10 mins to Terry Hills. I think this a great area for families. Close to the beaches, schools etc. This area is preferable to St Ives which is very upmarket with housing very expensive. Feel free to PM me for more info.
Heather

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Agree with HeatherandTim, Frenchs Forest is a great area, easy to get to Terrey Hills and the northern beaches, also close by Forestville, Killarney Heights. Good schools state and public in those areas. Lucky you, I used to live there - would love to be back!
Good luck - and yes, agree with OP's your English is excellent.

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Hi everyone

Thanks for the reply's so far.
I have my own reed thatching company but after 20 years working outdoors I am tired of the dutch climate (wich I think is almost similar like the one in England).
And it seems the older I get the more I hate the many cold and rainy days :(
In january 2007 we went on holiday to OZ and fell in love with the beautiful nature ,beaches ,climate and friendly people.
Back in Holland we decided to start the visa traject and we are in the final stage now.
We have a Case oficer and Tuesday ,march 11 we have our medicals.

By affordable accomodation we are looking for a rental house up to AUD 700 for the first few month's.
In that period of time we will look to buy a house in the Terrey hills area .
We will be looking for a house with four bedrooms and I promised the kids a pool.
We hope to bring AUD 750000 with us to OZ and a little morgage up to 200000 won't be a problem.

Google earth is fantastic ,installed it some time ago but never used it before .
The people I'm going to work with are living in Elanora heights.

I also have a joboffer running at Yatala (goldcoast) where house prices are much cheaper .
Does anyone know if the cost of living on the goldcoast is cheaper than the northern beaches ?
Our first choise as we look at it now would be the northern beaches but we would like to hear also your opinion about these two places.

Regards Markus
(ps, Heather I will send you a pm in time :thumbup:)

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

What are the state schools like in Frenchs Forest? We are hoping to move to the area in June and with kids aged 16, 14 and 12 we need to be sure that the schools are ok.

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Yatala is south Beenleigh which is south of Brisbane. It's a commercial area more than residential. Calling it Gold Coast has a bit of artistic licence.:D You could live in either the southern suburbs of Brisbane (commute against the traffic) or the Gold Coast and go with the traffic.

WW

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

The three main state schools in the area are Forest High, Killarney Heights High and Davidson High. Killarney Heights High School scored very highly in recent statistics published and Davidson also has a good reputation, which leaves Forest High which is the least highly thought of.

I don't know how the system works but "brighter" children have the option of Manly Selective School, (probably a 20 minute bus ride as opposed to 10 mins max for the others depending on where abouts exactly in Frenchs Forest you set off from).

I hope with those names that I have thrown at you, you can now google for more information. Good luck!

Re: new here,questions about northern beaches
 

Hi
We live in Mona Vale, we moved here 18 months ago. Lived in Manly to start. Husband works at airport, I teach in Warriewood. We love Mona Vale, lots of shops, has a village feel. Beach is stunning. We looked at Terrey Hills but found it to be too dark and country like at night, we had a 14 and 16 year old when we started looking. They are now 17 and 19 and we feel not moving to TH for their sake was the correct decision. We came from London. Public transport is not great in TH but you can be really close to TH and in a more accessible area (shops, buses etc).
TH is great if you drive and have a reliable car. Especially with young kids. You will probably shop in St Ives, Frenchs Forest or Mona Vale (all 10 mins drive). Schools are great all around, esp primary. Personally we were mortified by the public secondary schools and chose a local Catholic school. We rejected Manly selective (info for the other person who has asked on this thread). All the teachers I work with thought we were crazy for doing so. The closer to the beach the dearer it gets for rental. Warriewood has some nice rentals that are new properties. My friends love Belrose and Frenchs Forest, rent is cheaper there. Personally we chose to spend a bit more and live 15 mins walk from the beach. I would suggest that Avalon and further up is too far for you to go. If you would like an opinion regarding a particular rental, PM me and I'll have a look.
Good luck. This is a very, very special part of the world a great place to live. My serious advice would be to visit TH at night. I felt like I was in the middle of the country, a bit spooky for a Londoner.
Tara