Wow! It's all happened so quickly. We have just been granted residency in New Zealand after starting the process in January. So many questions... any advice on renting while we wait for our possessions to arrive from the UK? We are moving in October and were wondering bout renting a furnished place for myself my parTner and the 2 young children. Also we have an idea that we want to live in the Devonport area of Auckland and if anyone could offer some opinions on the district that would be great. do we have to live in the area if we want our children to go to primary there and if we moved out of the catchment do we have to move our school places as well? So many question but incredibly exciting and some great advice on the forum already...

Mark

Wife finished work
Me - notice handed in
need to sell my VW camper
Need to book flights and have a stop over
Need to finalise job offer
Need to decide what to bring with us
Need to book removers
Need to find accommadation
need to find a school
All before end of september

No pressure then!!

mark and Ali

Hi Everyone
We booked our flights today and arrive in Auckland to start a new chapter in our lives on the 25th of October. One question, has anyone got advice about one way travel insurance for our trip via Singapore, Bali and Sydney. Do we book with a UK or NZ company. Not sure how to sort it. Any advice or experience would be very helpful. Not having traveled long haul for a while we were a little shocked that the prices one way were as dear as return prices. You live and learn, but we are very excited!!!

Mark and Ali from Bristol

Flights booked, arrive Auckland 25th October (watching world cup in Sydney). Any advice about short holiday lets until our stuff arrives. Also advice on good hostels with family rooms for first couple of nights would be helpful

Mark and Ali de Hora

Can't help with your questions but just wanted to hi & good luck with the move

Devonport is a nice looking area, my hubbies cousin lived there overlooking the water for a while and they loved it but didnt have any kids. its quite an 'old' area - not necessarily in people's age, but housing from what i can see. there are lots of 'new' areas around Auckland but i dont think this is one of them. Not necessarily a bad thing - but the housing could be a bit basic on the rental scale. It does have a nice feel about the place with a lovely street with cafes and little shops but not sure how far you would have to go for a supermarket - probably not far. It has a lovely park on the waterfront for the littlies and the ferry ride across the water is lovely when the weather is good - but a little hairy in the wind !!
If you get your kids into a good school that is close by to your first property then even if you move they should be able to stay at the school. I havent found one yet that would make the kids leave if your address changed - regardless of how strongly the catchements are enforced prior to them getting accepted initially (if that makes sense).
We live in Tauranga and are very happy here but if i had to live in Auckland it would be one of the few areas i would consider to take my family to live in.

hope this helps and good luck with the move x

Psycho xx

Hi Mark Devonport is really nice just down the road from me I am in Takapuna.Its mostly old villas look on Trademe (NZ version of ebay) for rentals, but its not cheap and make sure you get a place with a heatpump or some sort of heating as the villas get really cold in the winter.

Also I don't know if you will be commuting into the city but there is only one road in and out and it can take you up to 1/2hr just to get onto the motorway during peak time traffic.If you don't need a car there is a ferry right in Devonport which takes you straight to the city in 10mins.

But apart from all that it is a lovely place to bring up children,good schools and very safe.Its very quiet everything goes dead at night, (so great if your a pyjama and slipper man by 8pm) but if you wanted abit more life Takapuna has lots of bars and restaurants and has more life.But then Takapuna goes dead at 9pm/10pm thats just NZ.

Just ask away if you want any more info.

I used these for my men when they made the ow journey to NZ.

http://www.duinsure.com/sites/duinsu...pages/homepage

Good luck JH2, let us know what the northshore is like as we'll be settling there as well. Our kids are 8 and 5 and we'll traveling via Bali and Sydney. Maybe our kids may end up at the same school!!!

We arrive on the 25th October. Decided to wait until the world cup was over. Am trying to work out what to do about accommadation until our container arrives. Getting a short 1-2 month furnished tenancy doesn't look easy, but hopefully it will all work out!!

When do you leave the UK?

Just wanted to wish you the best

It IS exciting isn't it! Good luck!

Good luck - hope everything goes well
Luckybird

Our one-way trip insurance covered the stuff we brought on the flights from the UK and ran for another 30 days when we arrived as I recall.
We got it from a company recommended by Letton Percival (brokers who placed our container cover):
http://www.lettonpercival.co.uk/contact-us/
I could find out who we contacted but the contact at Letton's was Brian Naughton (as I recall). Cheers, Ian

Not sure if you are still looking for Ins ??

If you are, one of the very few UK based insurance companies who will touch one way insurance is PJH on 0845 230 0631. Or http://www.pjhayman.com/about.asp

We've used them and they have been a great help and good value.

Hope this helps.

J

Good luck

Hi
We arrived in May, we booked insurance in the UK, worldwide cover.
We are living in Howick/Whitford area really nice. Cockle Bay primary school is near by...my niece attends there.

What to bring......everything, things are a bit more expensive here, especially washing machines and dysons....

Anything else i can help u with just mail me....

Good luck and I hope you haven't used Bonner to ship your goods.
We are still waiting for our goods and they picked up early April and sat in the UK for 7 weeks doing nothing until we mailed and phoned them from NZ...

Good Luck...