Please tell me why you moved to Australia? I am so sick of hearing about how many have moved & continuing to move and wonder what the great attraction is about moving to Australia. If some of you could answer the following questions it would provide those left behind in New Zealand with the answers. Maybe they will all join you!

Do you love it?

Are you better off?

What do you like better about Australia than New Zealand?

What do you prefer about New Zealand to Australia?

Are you working in Australia?

Was it easy to find a job in Australia?

Have you bought a property in Australia?

If so how much Stamp Duty did you pay?

Have you bought a car in Australia?

Are cars cheaper in Australia than New Zealand?

Do you see your move as permanent?

Are you returning to live in New Zealand?

If so When?

Was moving to Australia a stepping stone to further afield like UK, USA or Europe?

Do you love it? - Yes

Are you better off? - Yes

What do you like better about Australia than New Zealand? Developed country. Proper jobs with proper opportunities and chances of progression. Westernised economy. Not as parochial. People in Oz (Melbourne anyway) accept that there are different ways of doing things rather than the way it has always been done.

What do you prefer about New Zealand to Australia? Nothing.

Are you working in Australia? Yes

Was it easy to find a job in Australia? Yes, had 3 interviews in first week here.

Have you bought a property in Australia? Yes

If so how much Stamp Duty did you pay? Can't remember but built house so stamp duty on land only.

Have you bought a car in Australia? yes 2.

Are cars cheaper in Australia than New Zealand? Can't compare as bought 2 new cars here but could only afford 12 year old car in NZ.

Do you see your move as permanent? Yes.

Are you returning to live in New Zealand? I would rather stick knitting needles in my eyes.

If so When?

Was moving to Australia a stepping stone to further afield like UK, USA or Europe? Nope.

BB

Do you love it? - In some ways yes and in others not really (like anywhere), I lived in London for 6 years before coming here (Sydney) and Dublin before London and Auckland before Dublin. I prefer London to Sydney.

Are you better off? In what way?, I have a good job here but I also had good jobs in the places mentioned above.

What do you like better about Australia than New Zealand? Economy is better, weather is better.

What do you prefer about New Zealand to Australia? People are better, landscape is much more interesting,

Are you working in Australia? Yes

Was it easy to find a job in Australia? Yes, pretty easy considering the global economy.

Have you bought a property in Australia? No

If so how much Stamp Duty did you pay? NA

Have you bought a car in Australia? Yes

Are cars cheaper in Australia than New Zealand? Cars are much more expensive in Australia than New Zealand.

Do you see your move as permanent? Who knows what will happen in the future?

Are you returning to live in New Zealand? Possibly.

If so When? We will see.

Was moving to Australia a stepping stone to further afield like UK, USA or Europe? The opposite, it was somewhere to move after the UK but I see it as a stepping stone in possibly moving back to NZ (less of a shock after London as Sydney is still a big place).

Thanks for responding, interesting to see your answers.

Thanks for responding, interesting to see your answers.

Let's hope a few more Kiwi's reply and it may provide the reasons that the Kiwi's left behind are asking.

How very Kiwi of you choose these two very loaded questions to derive some negative content about another country, in order to make yourself feel better about NZ. The tired old stamp duty issue always arises when you talk money and taxes with a Kiwi, why do you have such a big issue with it?

Surely the other tax 'benefits', such as the ability to earn AUS$6,000 tax free, per person per year, for every year of ones working life would soon outweigh what is essentially a one off cost of buying a large asset, such as a house.

Should we still need to make up a bit of slack in the cost of capital, we could also go down the VAT 10% in Aus versus GST 15% in NZ route because for sure as eggs is eggs in NZ you will pay tax on them, along with GST on top of your household rates and every other expense that comes out of one's NZ pay packet.

I didn't bother to check but have to say I did assume these were loaded questions in some way.

....tax free I think you meant to add.

Plus all the tax offsets you get for education, investment property, etc.

BB

It is not NZ and thank f&** for that. And the accent is not as silly.

This surprises me. It's hard to see why cars would be "much more expensive" in Australia. Can you provide some like-for-like examples?

One of the big advantages of living in Australia over NZ - your kids don't grow up with that wanker Kiwi accent

There's some truth in this. Because they don't have luxury car tax, I found that a lot of Mercs, BMWs etc are cheaper in NZ

Yes, exactly what I meant thank you, I have amended.

I am only just starting to detect the difference.