AdamK

Hi UK Expats in NZ!

I am 36 (London born), married (to a New Zealander) with a 26month old daughter. We live in London and are considering a move to New Zealand for that cliched 'new start' as we feel like we are just 'surviving' in London (despite earning £100k between us) and not 'living' if that makes sense.

My wife works as a business manager in the NHS and I run my own promotional gifts company. We are considering areas such as Christchurch or Auckland (Wife's hometown) but leaning more towards Christchurch at the moment mostly based on the housing market prices.

Having read a million forums/threads (that are quite dated, which is frustrating) I flit between wanting to get on a plane tomorrow and thinking I am going to hate it and want to move back quickly.

I am looking for some honest feedback/advice on life in NZ for a young family (anything specific to Christchurch would be useful) and recommendations for potential areas to live based on the following:

Young family with 2 yr old daughter (education, lifestyle etc)
Any pro's, con's and expectation-setting would be great
Job market/salary expectations for my wife in the healthcare sector
Job market/salary opportunities for myself as a generalist business manage/director. I am worried about finding work seeing as I am not a "skilled worker"

Anyone who has been in our position or has a young family recently emigrated to NZ from UK it would be great to hear from you.

Cheers.

A.

spouse of scouse

Hi Adam, welcome to BE

The Welcome Inn is just used to say hello and for site orientation, if you repost your thread on our New Zealand forum I'm sure you'll get plenty of advice https://britishexpats.com/forum/new-zealand-83/

A bit of housekeeping - please have a read of the site rules https://britishexpats.com/site-rules and if you have any site related problems, one of our lovely moderators will give you a hand. Moderator details for each forum are in the lower right hand corner, bold font, on each forum's index page.

Best of luck with your research into beautiful New Zealand.

Bo-Jangles

You would probably have to be prepared go wherever the work is and I have no clues what a 'Business Manager' role entails or if there are similar roles here but wondered what sort of skills / or qualifications does this involve. Presumably it involves skills that could be transferred to another sector or into variety of other management roles if need be. Have a look at https://www.kiwihealthjobs.com/ and https://www.trademe.co.nz/Jobs to see what sort of things might be around.

Edited to add: https://www.seek.co.nz/jobs-in-healt...cal/management

Justcol

Based on the wanting to "live" comment I would recommend avoiding Auckland at all costs
Unless you bring a wedge with you, housing costs will be a huge hurdle so you may well find yourself no better off, miserable, and half a world away from any support

escapedtonz

Ha Ha! Must have been a small dog.

Sorry for my flippant comment. Seriously people, don't move to NZ as we apparently have huge spiders that will frighten you to death, make you pack your bags and buy ridiculous priced air tickets to return back to whence you came!

scrubbedexpat094

Yep don't come here, the spiders in NZ are bigger and deadlier than any that can be found across the Tasman Sea

Justcol

What a dumb arse comment. . . . idiot !!

scrubbedexpat094

I'd say it's a spammer gearing up looking at their pattern of random posts.

Justcol

Oooh. . . bring it on

desmondo84

We emigrated 4 years ago when our kids were 2 and 4. Glad we had the kids in the UK, with the family support and parental leave etc. We have settled really well here but we were lucky in terms of finding jobs and finding good neighbours and friends. In some ways having young kids is easier as you'll meet people through daycares, schools and sports. In fact, if we didn't have kids we would probably have really struggled.

I'm not particularly career orientated. I like the slower pace, I don't care about nightlife, shopping, celeb 'culture' etc. I love the outdoors, the water and rugby so it's pretty much paradise for me - except for the high cost of living.