Hi Guys,

Well Sat was our 3 month mark, and so far all is going well.

We are now settled in a flat, close to the city.

Both of us are working, it took me 4 weeks to get a job - couldnt believe it and at Xmas too. Mr HB got a 3 month contract and Last week they made that permanent.

We are realy please with the flat - sorry unit - we are renting, it was hard to decide where to look but we ended up in East Perth, so easy to get to work as we are both working in the city.

We bought a car the first week we arived - we couldnt have got by with out it. The car dealership we went to even gave us a loan car to use till the one we wanted was ready, so we realy were able to start getting out and about on day 3.

The shipping arived with only a few breakages and no extra charges - insurance is being dealt with for the breakages.

We started looking at land as soon as we could as i had already been looking in to building before we left the UK and had already spoken to a couple of builders via the web sites. We chose The Grove Estate in Ashby.

We took the first trip to our plot on Sunday and were thrillled to find the walls and utilities are in already. We found out house to be after looking round more show homes than i can ever remember - we finaly picked Dale Alcock to build with.

As for Dark days well - not to bad, My Father was taken in to hospital 5 weeks ago, and that had me paniced, also my mother was made redundant at the same time . Both are back on track now, but that had me worried that i could not have been there.
But with an Alpha card i speak to them as often as i did in the UK. (I did not live near anyway).

As we are working 'normal' life seems to have come very quickly, but we try to use weekends to get out and about, the only thing we miss is a circle of friends - we have met people at work who are all great, but it takes time to make friends.

All in all it has seemed to be easier than we prepared ourselves for!!!

Thanks to all those who helped with my questions, and if i can do the same for any one fire away!!!

Hope i have not missed to much out.

HBGirl

Hi HB Girl

Great post. Hopefully we will be in Perth sometime this year all going well. We also were impressed with Dale Allcock but not sure if we will go that way yet.
Have you seen much of Perth yet. We were there last year for a reccy. Did Rottnest Is, Freo Prison, Caversham Wildlife Park all of which we thought were excellent.

Cheers

Gazza

Hi there,

We have not realy done any of the touristy stuff yet, My mums over for a visit in April so were are waiting to take her round, most of out trips out have been trying to learn our way round!!

Thought of one more thing to add to the story

The one thing we would have done differently is to have shipped more sftuff, we just brought personal things and wedding pressies ect with us, we were quite looking forward to choosing things again, but when we did not know when the next income would be we realy underestimated the cost of setting up house again.
We bought a fridge, TV, Washing machine, bed, bedding, kitchen essentials, and Ikeas cheapest sofa in one shopping trip and it realy was hard parting with the money. Not to mention the car!

HBxxx

Well done!!!

We are hoping to arrive in Perth ASAP although we're probably still looking at 18 months as only just applied recently! Hoping to move to Morley area as this is where relatives are and loved it when visiting Christmas 2002.

Good luck for the future!!

Lucy

Hiya HB Girl.

We are coming to perth in December - we were there in January to validate - we think we may be settling around the secret harbour area - stayed in Mandurah & loved it. Did not manage to look at the north so will have a look when we get there to make sure we decide after looking at all the options.

Have you gone for a standard design or have you changed things on the house you are getting built? Do they sting you for anything other than the standard! How much did you pay for the block? (don't mean to be nosey but curious as we are looking to do the same when we get there.

Who did you use for removals?

cheers

pockygoes

Glad things have worked out for you - keep the progress reports coming.

I noticed you said you stayed in Mandurah and loved it . we have relatives in Halls Head just outside Mandurah have not been yet ourselves but are thinking about it can you give anymore info regarding Mandurah,Please houses Schools etc if you can
Regards Gaynor

Hi, glad to hear all is going well for you, especially as we hope to be out there ourselves in early July, so its a comfort to hear new people out there ( yourselves that is) are finding it ok. Is work hard to find, I'm a beauty therapist & Steve is in credit management. Although we have agreed that we will do anything at first. Did it take you long to find a place to rent, as we will literally have to start looking as soon as we get off the plane or did you set it up before you went. We would look at close to the city at first to rent before deciding to buy. Did you get a good price on a car. Sorry about all the questions but any help you can give would be great. Thanks very much & hope it continues to go well for you both, take care Dee & Steve

Hello

Its nice to know you have settled in well so far, we are arriving in East Perth next weekend so your post was very reassuring.

Having now bought a car would you recommend buying from a dealer or would you have prefered to go for a private sale? We have a rented car ready and waiting for collection but will be looking to buy asap.

I could go on all night asking you questions but I won't but if you have any last minute tips then please fire away!!

Sorry another quick question - what car dealership did you use??

Hey all,

Hope i remember to cover everything....

Shedu...
Well, one of the first things we noticed with cars is that unlike the UK, there is not such a big difference between new and old cars. Although Mr HB knows his stuff and always buys privatly in the UK we dicided to go for our first ever new car.
After looking through the paper The West Australian on Sat $2, has a car pull out as well as the bigest job section.
We went to Osborne Park (Big area with all the Car dealers, sofa stores Ikea ect) and test drove the Kia and Hyundai, picked the Hyundai accent, ($17000) we got a $1k off the list but then you have to add in window tint ect - you NEED that.
Our dealer was Giant Autos they do Hyundai, Dihatsu, and a couple of others. Great Service!!!
The other advantage of a new car is the guarantee (Hyundai give 5yrs) and the fact that the Rego ect is included.


Dee & Steve...
The unit we choose was the 3rd we looked at, and it only took us a couple of days of looking to find. I guess it depends on the area you are looking at as to what you will find, and how much you want to pay


Our place is 2 bed, wood floors, shower and bath, laundry room, balcony and we pay $200 a week. The agent we go through is great, PM me if you want her name and number.

As for jobs well we too said that we would do anything at first, and aviving on Dec 6th, we didnt expect to work for a couple of months. But it just didnt seem to work out that way.
Goverment jobs seem to be the most highly prized but they are slow to come back to you. Agencies were the best for us and we both got jobs in our fields (me-finance and Mr HB in IT) with in 4 weeks.
My biggest tip is to get out there and look for it, i know it seems obvious but the jobs wont come to you.
I found some changes to my CV helped too.

Umm think that was all i had to cover.......PM me if there is anything spacific!!!

HBxxxx

HB Girl

You mentioned you made some changes to your CV - what sort of changes did you make? We will be sending off some on spec applications in the next few months & it could be useful.

cheers
pockygoes