Did u visit first?
 

Did anyone start the emigration process before visiting Canada?

I know it's crazy :eek: but all of our money is tied up in our house. We just can't afford holidays! If we saved up to visit first it would take at least a 18 months - probably more (there is 6 of us!) and then it would be another 2+ yrs to get PR which means at least 3 yrs in limbo - and that's being optimistic! The whole point is that I want my children to grow up with a better quality of life so waiting seems so pointless!

We have considered getting a temporary work visa and renting our house out but with 4 children who need schooling it's not really practical.

Also, we didn't qualify until the points were lowered, and I am concerned that we may not qualify again in the future!

We have thought about getting a loan to pay for a visit which we could then pay off once we sold our house (assuming we got in!) or we could apply now to get the ball rolling and have our first visit when we land and then come back to the UK to sell up etc.

Has anyone else done this or are you all too sensible? :D

I'm moving with my boyfriend. He has been to Canada a few times while I have never been. I would have been quite happy to apply without going to visit (and so we could have had our forms off many months ago) but my boyfriend insisted it was only sensible for me to visit first.

Therefore we are going (I think) in March for 2 weeks and so we won't have our forms off before then. I think there are pros and cons of both ways (ie visiting first or not) but you obviously want to move there for a reason and visiting is not likely to put you off (is it?!) so going there first would only be to cement your decision whcih is good if you're not sure.

Does that make sense?

Alex

My thoughts
 

I can only speak for what myself and my wife are going through.....we did all the research for emigration, looked at social/economic/lifestyle factors. Chose Canada 100%. Discussed over and over, thought through the reasons why, and then reaffirmed it was Canada. Decided that BC was perfect destination, did loads more analysis, info gathering etc.

We submitted our PR application and my wife who is an OR nurse sent off her BC nursing application. Our timescales indicate that she'll need to do a course over here in UK to obtain BC nursing registration, which puts us nicely to the end of 2004 before she can even apply for work over there.

So we plan to visit in July this year for a 2 week recce - strictly not a vacation, time to get around, look at areas, see a few hospitals and hopefully fix up some informal interviews there. This gives us the chance to really assess what we're looking for over there and hopefully, if CIC need to interview us we have the background knowledge of actually knowing where we want to live and work.

Like you, all our assests (well 99% of) are tied up in our home but it's been easier for us as there's only the two of us, so a visit isn't so expensive. I would say that there is no way we would plan to land and ship stuff over there without paying a prior visit, it would be just way too much of a risk. Have you thought of using up some of your property capital to pay for the visit and making it a real good one for you all ? Remortgaging etc needn't be so expensive and it would only be for a reasonably short while until you make the move ?

Hope this helps. Like you, it's tough having to wait but it does give us that amount of time to save up for hols and make the necessary visit. And it means that if you're really serious about it you'll last the course of time. Someone advised us to use as much time investigating and researching stuff via the internet, books, etc. Which is what we are doing. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it makes things worse and we tend to 'switch off' from things over here, like the news, current affairs, doing stuff we might usually do or even spending money (why bother, do we need it, can we take it with us, etc).

Perhaps there should be a forum for 'moral support' ;)

We came to Canada over 30 years ago having never visited. I think that the trouble with taking a holiday is - its just that - a holiday - it never really gives you the complete idea of what its like to live somewhere. Kind of like a holiday romance - not the real thing!

I think nowadays you can do lots of research on the Internet. From reading this board it seems like the most important thing is to research how easy it will be to get a job in your own field where you are moving to. After all, nobody is going to be happy anywhere if they cannot get employment. After that - I would say go for it. You don't really need to visit. Get in touch with people over the Internet and save your money for when you emigrate.

We started the application process before visiting.

All the paperwork has been sent, but we won't actually be visiting until April this year.

We just felt that it was the right thing to do. If you wait around and do everything in the most logical order, you could end up waiting forever or not doing it at all.

Go for it, you only live once!

We didn't visit first either, it seemed like an unecessary expense, looking back I dont think it would have made any difference to our decision anyway, although maybe if when we visited it had been -40............................!?

Besides, we know someone who visited first, sold up, moved here and went back after 3 days!

Good Luck
Pammy

Re: Did u visit first?
 

You are way braver than I was!

People do land without visiting first, although not many from UK :) Could the two of you come over and have a friend mind the kidlets?

Check out fares with http://www.flyzoom.com/ or Canadian Affair http://www.canadianaffair.com/

Either way, where abouts are you thinking of moving to?

Clare

My wife , two children and I came to Canada in 1963.

At the time we hadn't even considered Canada. Australia was the destination for most Brits, mainly because it only cost 10 pounds for each family member. However I had talked to a number of returnees and felt it was too far and too remote at that time.

The only reason we are here in Ottawa is because of an Add in the Sunday Telegraph by a High Tech company ( Computing Devices of Canada) that wanted drawing office people. I applied and 6 months later we were here. I sold every thing up in that 6 months and within a year we were well established in a new home. The improvement in our life style and the fact that my wife didn't need to go out to work, made the decision to stay so much easier.

I'm the only one in the family that has ever returned to the UK for a visit and that was only 3 times to visit my mother when she was alive. Been almost everywhere else in Europe in the last 40 years, but really have no attachment to the UK now.

Ottawa is our home, even though it has some pretty wild winters and humid summers. None of our children have left for other countries. My son lives locally and my daughter is in Montreal.

Re: Did u visit first?
 

Crazy!
Then we must be as well. We have sent our application in November and a job already approved.
We haven't set foot in in Canada yet but we are planning on a trip in June. :scared: :scared:


But we think we will be surprised if we hate it, but if we do so what we have lost nothing except a few quid.
By the way we have 3 kids as well ages 3,6,11



Remember don't wait for your ship to come in! swim out to meet the bloody thing! :)

Thanks for your comments guys - some interesting points have been made.

We were originally interested in Calgary but we are now thinking Ottawa. I would pack up and leave tomorrow if I could!

Am I right in thinking that once you have applied for PR you are no longer eligible to visit Canada until your application is processed?

Were did that come from?
As I said we are going in June and I actually stated this on our cover letter to CIC when we applied.
So I would be very surprised if that was correct.

Oooops! :o

Hello,

I think those that are moving without visiting are very brave!

I know that I couldn't do that.

It might cost you a bit to visit in the short term, but it'll cost you even more if you get here, hate it and then return to the UK because you didn't check it out to begin with. Its a bit like buying a house by looking at pictures.

However Canada is a great country and I love living here! Even if it never seems to stop snowing!!!

Int.

Just to offer my thoughts, I've got to say that I couldn't contemplate such a big move without at least a visit or two beforehand. As was suggested earlier perhaps just the two of you could take a short visit just to get a feel for the place.

Having said that, I've noted that there are quite a lot of people on the "Moving back to the UK" forum who found that living in a place was totally different to actually just being on holiday there and indeed they couldn't settle. That's no surprise really so perhaps that's the argument against visiting beforehand. Visiting maybe gives you a view through rose tinted glasses.

Visiting Toronto in January 2000 when it was about -18 or something certainly put us off going there. If we had been there in the spring then we wouldnt of really appreciated how cold it gets and what it was like to live through a proper canadian winter.


So visiting first especailly in the winter definately has its merits.

we came ove for a visit in march 99, piles of snow everywhere. i remember filling my car up with petrol and knowing that i have never ever been so cold in my life, the wind was freezing. but we still liked everything else so we put in for our papers. we then had another visit in july and it was just the opposite.........roasting hot.
the thing is youve got aircon in the summer, and in the winter the houses are so well insulated you dont feel the cold at all; our house always felt damp when it was cold in england.
if you cant make the visit prior, just look at it as one big adventure into the unknown; and you know, you can always go home if you dont like it.

This is our 3rd move and for the 1st time we did visit but more of a tourist type visit (although we did see the school my son was going to go to while we there). The second move we visited but didn't do much touring, more looking at schools and houses. I'm now naffed off as we spent good money to fly to the States and spent all our time house and school hunting and didn't enjoy ourselves (touristically speaking) and we ended up moving to a different part of Nashville so my son went into a different school than we ones we'd selected anyway and due to various problems we never did buy a house so it was a complete waste of time and money - ah well! Next time, we're not visiting first BUT I would suggest to anyone doing that to do masses of homework. Firstly check out loads of websites on tourism on the area that you want to go to - they provide photos, brochures and sometimes quick time movies to give you a taster. Also check out places like http://www.virtualtourist.com/vt/530/ where you can check out tourist reviews from people who live there and visited. Next check out real estate sites for ideas on house prices and get an idea of what you can get for your money (someone else suggested http://www.webview360.com and that's great for looking inside as well as outside Canadian houses), also check out what the federal and provincial taxes will be like, find some schools homepages as often they have pictures of the school and you can get an idea of school timetables and can even look up the curriculum for each year, and then look up job prospects in your area by going to http://www.jobfutures.org and finally check out some information from censusses in your new area as they usually provide info. such as average house size, cost, ages of family members etc. Do a google search for census or ward map and the area. Lastly, it's really handy if you can't get to visit to have someone already there that can take photos for you or offer advice in the area you're going to. That means it can take the stress out of not visiting first. :)

One final tip is to keep a favourties folder for all the stuff you find when web browsing, for instance the root folder can be Canada with sub folders for accomodation, immigration, schools, pets, jobs and general info. (ie weather, statistics etc.). ;)

CrazyDaisy - that http://www.jobfutures.org/ is an amazing link! Thanks :D

Clare

Got to love Canadian government statistics; best in the world, hands down.

By the way, I hadn't visited Canada before moving here (Calgary). I had visited the US many times before, and assumed it would be the same but colder. And, with some exceptions, I found that assumption was right.

We moved to Canada 3 years ago without a test visit.
 

Mywife and I are originally from Eatern Europe but lived in Epsom, Surrey for well round 15 years. We were very happy with our semi and genuinely loved England to bits. We had two doughters (1,3) and like many of you we were just getting so tired working and wanted better quality of life for our children. We landed in Calgary and saw that apart from monotonous plastic houses all was o.k.It seems to me that Calgary is where British people tend to assimilate better. Maybe because of low taxes or (I will be blunt!) least amount of French culture to get used to out of all provinces. Not that it is a bad thing it is just that Canada is very removed from Britain culturally.1 visit is not enough to grasp the depth of it. Oh no it won't affect your in your 1st year quite so much - you will still find everything new and exciting.your pounds will buy lots more food and petrol. If you do not mind shopping in Peacocks?
It will become more tangible when you are ultimately going to start working. Canada is basicaly a socialist country with a very high standard of living. So what? - you say. This is what: Red tape everywhere.One office tells you rules are like this another office tells you something else. The respect for members of public is much lower here than in U.K. Managers in all companies are, by U.K. standard at least, incompetent and have almost no bidding authority within their company. There are rules everywhere and yet alomst half of what you do is treated as an exception and flouts them. Have you seen a Canadian Highway Code? I havn't and yet I passed the test. If there is one anywhere I bet you you will see many road signs which are not in it. Or are different.Canadians do not like things to be simple or transparent. It scares them. If you write a letter to any local authority like I did in Calgary the chances are no one will respond to it or even remeber that they got one from you when you ring. Your neighbours kids may cycle on your lawn in front of their parents (who are nice to you) and only you will think something is odd. You ask a workman to visit you and he may come several hours later or say it is hard to say how much it will cost. You may be his only client asking for an estimate up front. You have good experience in your trade and wish to work here.Well a lot of jobs are not posted only you get them throgh a friend of a friend. In any comapny you will find pressure here is not on saving comapny money or beating any competition,or even on custommer satisfaction. There is no pressure. You just sit there mostly on irrelevant meetings and do the work in a steady fashion usually in the most inefficient way conceivable. Canada is really not that great for any kind of career unless you wish to setup in business or become a salesman as commissions here are huge. Estate Agent get 7 % of house value. And guess what there really only 1 or two so there is a cartel and you can not get it sold for less.

Now the good bits?

In all provincess except BC 100k pounds will buy you a nice house without mortgage. Crime here is virtually none except for BC. Food is very nice (I found) and very affordable. Most British food items are in supermarkets. Hospitals here are very good too. Public washrooms are everywhere and are kept clean. Parking is very rarely controled and costs only coppers. The air and water here are just beyond comparison to England. I recently just out of curiosity brought a bottle of Dannone Spring water in a petrol station and found it tasting worse than water in my garden tap.

Please be aware that what you are doing many people have done before you. If you think now that you will never consider returning to U.K. Ther is probably 80% chance that only after 2 years in Canada you will be ready to go back. Say your house in U.K. is now worth 200k pounds in two years time it will be worth 250k. That is 120k Canadian Dollars. If you sell up and buy any house in Canada after 2 years you will be very blessed to gain 60K Canadian. That is only 25K U.K. After 2-4 years you can no longer afford your old house in England. See? And so on. I can not count how many Brits here have told me: "I would love to go back but can no longer afford it". One way to deal with it is to buy 2 properties here with a mortgage on both and rent one out. Banks here are very happy to lend for 2nd houses to rent out and are even more willing to give you mortgage on that basis.
So I am told. Lodgers here are much less troublesome than in U.K. Japaniese students are the best. Do not be scared to buy two properties. And when you chnage your mind in a few years time your family savings will be on U.K. level. Trust me it makes a world of a difference to know that. And your feelings about U.K. are not permanent.

Anyway very best of luck to you all & I hope it helps a little.

Gezza.

Pretty sweeping statements. I imagine then that you have lived in every provinve in Canada inorder to of come up with both of them statements, or do you have the statistics to prove them.

Buying a house in BC can be just as costly as buying a house in Ontario especailly if you are comparing say Toronto to Vancouver.

A 100K is about 240000 canadian, you can get a reasonable house for that here in BC, even nicer if you go further out from the main cities. I beleive the average house price here in BC is about 240-250000. Cheaper in calgary, probably, Toronto I dont think so.

As for crime, I get mugged going down to the shops everyday living here in BC, or so some people might think.

I quote what Canadians tell me about house prices being highest in BC. I myselft have not had a chance to visit Eastern provinces.
If you find I wrote exagerrated then all the better for new U.K. immigrants. However I am a dedicated reader of the Going Back to U.K. page and many comments seem to vindicate my opinions.

You are not wrong about crime in BC. I don't suppose you live downtown Vancouvere.?


bets wishes,

Gezza

True I dont live in down town vancouver, and I know that the east side has a very bad reputation for crime, but not everybody in BC lives in the Eastside of vancouver.

Regards

Phil

Compared to London, crime in BC is very low. It has its roots in poverty and drugs in 90% of the cases ( I work in this field). Downtown Eastside is unique by the concentration of drugs, HIV, Hep C and poverty in that one postal code. In certain other areas of Vancouver and Surrey, crime is Asian on Asian or Indo Canadian on Indo Canadian i.e. ethnic gangs. Not racist statements, but fact. Further out into the valley crime is drug related and poverty related. There are also disproportionate numbers of sociopaths and psychopaths, but this may be the reporting mechanisms in place that catch them in a small population, as opposed to a demographic skew. The UK is too populated to find these people the way they do here. Most of you know I am no fan of BC, but the crime pattern is way different to the UK. In the UK I detested the outright opportunism and basic lack of respect for property, people and community. These factors I will say are far better in BC. I work with the most disadvantaged and despised sectors of our society and the "culture" of crime is very very different. Dear oh dear. I have said something nice about BC. Pass the Guinness.

Hi Dingbat,

I drive through that area every day twice and it is pretty gutwrenching really to watch those folks.Ain't no getting used to it. So young. I think sometimes like the other day looking at this fair haired girl in a pale blue anorak hugging a lampost and shaking all over. Where are her parents? Do they not care?
It is just awful.I give them money sometimes but I wish I could do more, only what?

Bless you for doing such a noble job, Mate!

Gezza

Lobby the government, become loud and politically active. Protest the lack of socially affordable housing and the never ending stream of so-called "businesses" down there that feed off the local population like parasites. They make me sick to my stomach, and I would name and shame, but for the fear of being sued from here to high heaven. There will be an upsurge in crime and problems after April 1st when they cut welfare for a lot of the people you see. The young kids down there have often lived a life of hell from day one; those that drift into it are pimped into the life by the nice guy driving the new Lexus who lives next to you and I. Every time I sit and interview a 13 year old who has been hooking to feed his/her jib habit I could just scream....this could be one of my kids. I don't see it as noble (but thank you) - they have to have someone who cares, especially those that get written off by everyone else. One kid or adult who turns around their lives is worth the sadness of seeing all those who never make it. I'll never be rich, but I love my work. That is enough for me.

Thanks for all of your posts - the links have been brilliant!

We're still undecided but knowing we can visit between applying and being accepted (hopefully!) makes things easier. I really don't know where I got that from! :rolleyes: I've read so much information over the last few months about lots of different places it's all starting to roll into one!

I'v lived in B.c for 40 years, always worked, always owned a house always can afford trips, Never lived downtown in any country inc the U.k who would want to.....
If I was to do it to day, I would go far from the madding crowds. This place needs people in the smaller towns I have a friend who moved to a small town in Alberta the first week she had two part time jobs and bought a lovley house. (she got part time to be home with the kids)..... oH yes I forgot... in my city we have lots of crime........ the local kids broke into the local coffee shop and stole the candy machine !!!!!!!!!!!! there is crime in every part of the world for goodness sake...................

We arrived in Vancouver on Monday 26th jan. We have in the first week, bought a condo, got our bank accounts sorted etc! We now feel as though we are starting to live here and are not just tourists!

We visited Vancouver back in June 03 for a month, but this was a holiday. So we have taken the decision to stay here for a year, to live and research whether this is the right place for us. My partner also visited Vancouver/Victoria for 6 months a while back!

Once we arrived at Immigration we had to explain why we wanted to stay longer than six months (as permitted), i.e researching business opps and general living experience. We have a visa for 1 year. However, we have our own internet based company so we can support ourselves from the UK therefore i suppose it may be harder to convince the Immigration officers that you can support yourself for one year, without working ( you could always apply for a temp work permit).

Ultimately, i think it is better for you to test the water before making the big decision and selling up. However, as some people have said, just hopping on the plane and arriving has been the best decision they have made. It is all down to your own personal circumstances!

We are about to submit our PR application by the end of this week.