Andrews2oz

Hi All,

What to do regarding selling/renting out etc of our house in the U.K.

My dilemmas are these:
We love our house and it's probably worth as much as it's ever going to (excluding property rises etc). We have an End of Terrace that has a large garden which is quite rare in our area and have had several people enquire as to buying it; a neighbors friend is dead keen to buy it and has their house on the market.
My wife is very unsure whether the whole "Emigration" to Oz is the right thing to do; we visited Perth in 2006 and both us and our 2 daughters loved it, we also hate what is happening to the U.K. our view is that the U.K. seems to spends too much money on people who want to sit on their backside all the time (Vicky Pollard's and Oik's on the long term sick) and with the constant stream of Illegals strapping themselves to trains and boats to get in and reap the benefits of our welfare/medical etc (a system that i have paid into since i've left school)
All this and the knowledge of knowing that when/if i retire their won't be anything left to give me and my wife. My wife is a carer and looks after the elderly; so is well aware of how shocking it is that even after paying so much into the system, their is very little they can get out of it.
Sorry i'm going on a bit too much...i'll climb off the high horse now and continue with the reason for this message.
Anyway, if we have a house left in the U.K. to come back too should the OZZY dream not work, then my wife has less of a worry; this itself produces another dilemma; because we have a house to come back to, will it be all to easy to give up and come back without really giving it a go?
I'm worried that if we rent the house out, it might get trashed, what if the tenant refuses to budge! i know at the end of the day its only bricks and mortar, but not only would it break our heart if it got ruined, it could cost a lot of time and money to correct.

My solution to all this was this:
Sell the house now, but leave the money in a high interest account here in the U.K. that way the wife still has a safety net of having some money back here if we came back and also if/when we decide that Oz is the place we want to live; the money would be easier to transfer over. No trip back to the U.K. to do the house up and sell.

I have another dilemma now after reading one of the messages; should we leave the money in a high interest account here in the U.K. or take it with us and leave it in a high interest account in Oz?

To cap it all; i look at the exchange rates each day and the amount of A$ to the £ is dropping every day...whens it going to stop, the cost of our Dream Home has a difference of approx £30,000 from when we first looked at House prices (houses of around £200,000).
The House prices in Perth; our chosen destination; although slowing now have also gone up heaps since our visit 2 years ago; put these 2 scenarios together and it amounts to hell of a lot of dough.

Has anyone else had these thoughts? anyone got any suggestions, maybe a scenario i've not yet thought about?

We have got all our Visa Application in now, and are just waiting for the "YES" or "NO". Our Agent (GoMatilda) who have been great throughout thinks we should hear in 2 - 3 weeks so fingers, toes, eyes are crossed

If successful i hope to drag my wife on to a plane in the summer of this year.....wish me luck.

If you are still reading this message then thanks for persevering.

All the best

Mark

egghead4

hi

firstly good luck with the visa, we used go matilda and got ours on 18.12.07, so fingers and toes crossed for you

i dont think you are alone with all these thoughts, we at some point have thought about similar stuff. when you get your visa, go matilda will send you some paper work in respect of transfering money and so forth, so take advantage of their knowledge too.
As we have only just got our visa we are also looking into the best ways to store and transfer money so I will benefit from this post too
the exchage rate is daunting, i hope things improve
best of luck bec

DEEDEE01

Hi Mark,

Just reading your post pushes so many of my and my hubbies buttons. We had the same discussion when we decided to apply. The only thing that made our minds up for us was the fact that if we didn't sell the house, we would have no money to go with, a dog in tow and a MASSIVE worry about the ties we had left behind.

I think what you have to remember here, is the reason you applied in the first place, was your wife thinking differently back then about the house situation ?

It does'nt matter where you go, whether it be Oz or where ever, if this is something you want to do, you have to do it, simple as that. Everybody has worries, me especially !!!, but this is something WE have to do. Better to have tried and failed than to have never tried at all.

If your wife and you are having SERIOUS doubts, them maybe you should put the move off until you are defdefinitelyre what you both want. You have to take the risk, whats the worse that could happen; you decide to come back !

Many people don't and want ever get the opportunity to do something like this, so embrace the opportunity if you get it.

In my opinion, if you can keep the house as a back up, great, you will only have the lost the cost of the process, I think the worries of tenants trashing the place should be a minor concern considering your planning to move 12,000 miles away , this can always be sorted out.

I'm sure your wife has got the jitters which is only natural in the situation, I hope this passes and you and your family get the chance to experience something exciting and new, regardless of whether it is forever.

I'm sure your all feeling very mixed up at the minute, so I will send lots of hugs and kisses

Donna.
XXX HUG XXX