Yorkiechef

So now we are almost fully established here, as far as we can be 6 weeks on. I thought I would share the rough costs we incurred in moving for 4 of us.

Immigration lawyer £5000. We needed him, he has a bad reputation, but without him we would not have made the quota back in 2011. No complaints.

Medicals £1000

CIC fees £2000

Recce costs £6000 We checked out several cities before choosing where to live.

Landing flights and Hotel to initiate PR £3500

Flights on final move, hotel costs for 3 weeks, grub £4500.

Removals £6600

Photos, courier postage, Lang tests, getting stuff signed, police checks, travel to London to get stuff done, driving licence fees here.....maybe £500.

Various registrations to have qualifications recognised £500.

Uni course and books for Mrs Y to covert her qualification to Canadian. £6000

All in all - £36,000 or thereabouts.

No mention of emotional costs, selling the house, taking a bit less for the car so we could use it right to the end.

Was it worth it, yes I think so. Time will tell.

On another note though, during that time my house went up considerably, the exchange rate moved in our favour and i'm still sat on a pot of gold awaiting the right time to invest in property here. I remember having to state what our net worth was on the application, in the intervening years it more than doubled due to the factors above. So all seems well....

scrubbedexpat091

That is a lot of money...


I cannot recall what I paid, 2,500CAD maybe, bulk of my cost was just CIC fees or something related to them for one, I had a spouse so already had housing in place, and of course I only had to travel 1,500 miles....

I could be off on the cost, its been too long to know 100%...

Aviator

Tax filing begins in the new year. Any gains in property or currency coul dbe subject to CGT. Keep good records.

Yorkiechef

Yes, I had no idea the cost would be so high when we embarked on this adventure. We could have continued on the life path we were on, but our lives are richer for the experience, perhaps the wallet though is lighter.

I should add that Mrs Y is also unlikely to work for a year whilst at Uni. Any prospective immigrants should not take this undertaking lightly, there is considerable risk, both financially and emotionally. I suspect most on here that have made this move recognize this.

Yorkiechef

Thank you, I shall.

christmasoompa

Sounds about right to me. You've not mentioned things like rental deposits, buying a car etc, so does the figure above not include the costs of setting up your new life in Canada yet? There's a thread I often refer newbies to when they ask about the cost of moving which has similar costs in, it's about 5 years old now but still full of useful info including things that people often don't think about.

Now I can refer them to this one as a more up to date version too!

Shakyuk

Great thread for people considering the move to be honest. You have everything clearly written down so it's easy for those unmotivated to research and investigate for themselves to read the headlines.

I think some things could have been done cheaper, but when you factor in deposits and cars as Christmas said it cancels those savings out. Not a light undertaking! That's why it blows my mind when people do it then don't even give it two years!

MillieF

That figure resonates with me. We had put aside 25,000 euros for the move, for paperwork, air tickets etc, and used the lot. We didn't include our reccce trip in that fund, but we had animal transport for three cats and a dog. It's not a cheap move in any respect and certainly not for the faint hearted.

Howefamily

I don't recall ours costing anywhere near that much but it was 2011 so a while back now.
Our recce trip was about GBP3000 (no pound sign on this keyboard)
Our flights over GBP2000
Cat GBP250 (flight, varikennel off ebay, vet)
Costs of gaining putting through paperwork - GBP2000 (?)
Medicals $400 (we were here)
shipping GBP3500
First three months when we arrived $150 per week accom costs


We sold our car for the remainder of the loan on it. Used it to the last day. Got a good price for the house. Exchange rate was a terrible 1.54


First year was tough in that we had a stack of outgoings on new cars and new electricals. I recall spending 4 hours and $8000 in future shop

SchnookoLoly

This is a great breakdown.

I'm trying to think of our costs. We were lucky and able to save a bit. Let's see. This was in 2012 and mostly in GBP, providing the CAD equivalent using today's exchange rate.

CIC PR fees - $1100 / £650
Medicals, photos, postage, etc - $850 / £500
Landing flights (only Mr S was landing but I went with) - $3000 / £1700
Recce trip for interviews etc - $3000 / £1700
Move, 2x one-way flights: $850 / £500
Removals: $4350 / £2500
Bike shipping on the one-way flights: $85 / £50
License exchange fees, OHIP card fees, and so on... not sure, estimating $200 / £120

Total: $13,435 / £7770

Now, we were able to save a LOT of money by having family here. We were able to stay with my family on all the trips to Canada, and we lived with my parents for a year (!) before we bought and moved into our current house. So no hotel or rent costs were a massive help for us. An extra year of saving a bucket as well really helped with our down payment when we did buy.

There are other costs associated with getting set up like buying a car and such, but a lot of that just depends what you decide to buy. We didn't want to faff in the beginning with trying to find a used car, we just wanted to get a car and have it so we bought brand new, and we decided to be a bit splurgey so bought a brand new 2013 Hyundai GT Tech in an end of season sale. That set us back about $30k. When we did get a second car about a year later, we went for used and hunted for awhile and then bargained hard and got a 2010 VW Golf Wagon for $12k.

Insurance, as we all know, is insane in Ontario/Canada. The two cars together run us in the range of $3k. Can't remember offhand what the additional is for homeowners insurance.

We only shipped two pieces of furniture, a bookshelf and a dresser, so all our furniture in our house we've had to buy. We've managed to get some things second-hand, but we've bought a new fridge, new dishwasher, mattress, pillows, sheets, dining room table and chairs, wing chairs, 2x sofa, 3x televisions, and so on and so forth.

Being able to live with my parents for a year really helped fund all of that... hopefully that all helps, though!

viajero

Well you're in the right province when it comes to housing.

I'm a "buy the dip" kind of guy and think now (well, maybe give it another 6 months) is a good time to buy in southern Alberta while everyone else is wringing his/her hands. Just be smart in selecting location - some of the more distant (from Calgary) subdivisions probably won't recover any time soon.

Yorkiechef

Totally agree, we are looking for something in SW, it suits us here on the high ground. Springbank hill, to cougar ridge is the area we are looking at. LRT near and not SO Ostentatious that your embarrassed to send photos back to UK.

Yorkiechef

I excluded deposits, car rent and so on as these are part of everyday living, we received nearly £10k for our car in uk, so this was ploughed into the new car we bought, but could have comfortably bought a good second hand car with this money outright, with the winters here being brutal, I went for safety and reliability and spent a bit more.

Tirytory

Honestly I don't even like to total everything up but it sounds about right.

Like you, with the winters, snow and kids we opted for new 4x4 which we would never have bought in the UK and spent far more. I feel like that's where a lot of different more expensive costs come in, things you buy here/differently than you would have back in the UK..

R I C H

I think that over time the perceived need for a 4x4/SUV/truck or whatever you think is most appropriate for winter weather lessens, and you just buy something you'd like to own.