Am Loolah

Well, I hope they are!

We've been here 2 months now and below are a couple of hopefully helpful tips that we have noticed ...

we brought absolutely everything with us in a 40 foot container. In retrospect we will now end up with quite a bit on Trade Me! namely;

Wardrobes - all new build houses in NZ that we viewed have built-in wardrobes. Admittedly they consist of horrid plastic coated wire shelving/hanging units, but we now have 7 surplus wardrobes!

Nail planks of wood to all furniture with feet on them to assist with the shipping. A blanket box, 2 chests of drawers and a wardrobe all had damage to a foot.

Don't bother bringing kids school uniform staples like grey trousers, white polo shirts as the schools seem to have their own logo shorts/shirts/fleeces. And don't bother with Clarks school shoes for the little treasures, took our 8 year old 4 days to adopt the barefoot stylie!

Bring loads of adaptor plugs - you can never have too many.

Make sure you have lampshades for all your table/standard lamps. We were missing one and went to Mitre 10 today to buy 2 matching shades only to find they didn't sell them separately?!

We didn't need the curtains we brought with them, as the house we bought had all the drapes/curtains/wooden venetian blinds included in the chattels.

You can get wicker items in! We disposed of the good, large hampers/laundry baskets etc. But unpacked a few smaller ones that made it in no problem!

Accept that the Kiwi's have different ways and different things - viva la difference! Do NOT bemoan the standard of sausages, lack of Walkers crisps etc, life is too short and it wouldn't be worth the move if it was exactly the same!

These are just a few, quick observations, I'm sure others can add to the list to be more informative for those making the move!

annbee

Thanks for that useful information, we are moving over in october and are just in the process of sorting out what to take and what to car boot/charity shop

Happy Wanderer

Hi There,

Thank you so much for this!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We intend to bring lots of wooden furniture with feet - I would never have thought of this.

Tip: If you're taking your fridge or freezer. Once it's defrosted, cleaned and dried - put a few unused tea bags in before the doors are sealed shut.
Stops the muggy smell if there is any damp. A removals man told us this about 9 moves ago and it works.

If you've got time and are taking TV and other gadgets, use coloured stickers to colour code the wires to corresponding ports. Sounds mad and isn't rocket science, but if you've got the speakers/dvd/stereo/mp3 - it's like spaghetti junction and is a bugger when you're tired. Especially you've got moaning children and a film with picture and no sound :curse:

Same for computer if it's connected to lots of things.

Don't get your sofas cleaned too soon before moving, they take a couple of months to dry out completely and can smell damp/mouldy after being in a container for a while. (also told by a removals man)

Finally, tape keys to the back of or inside the cupboard it fits!!

Keep all remote controls together in a bag with the wires that connect your various electric gadgets and a phillips/flat head screwdriver - and make sure it goes into the TV box with the living room stuff. (and doesn't get used to 'fill up' other random boxes that might end up in the garage for unpacking as and when you get round to it)

Sorry if some of it seems obvious, but they're things that we've learned through experience - that are now routine.

jill1420

So will UK bought T.Vs work ok in NZ? I thought I read on a post that they wouldnt............can someone confirm.......ta

Nisey

My OH, who is authoirity on such matters (or he thinks he is) says that some might have problems if you plug them straight into the ariel, but if you run the signal through a DVD, Video or sky box first they will be fine. Packing the Plasma in a crate - check

Happy Wanderer

My friends dad took a new plasma tv when he retired to NZ 3 years ago. I remember her telling me that it had to be wired through the sky box - but hadn't given it any more thought than that.

jill1420

Thats good to know. Thought I would have to sell it. So you can get Sky? ............. not up on this sort of stuff ...............is it british channels?......dont know why Im asking cause Im hoping that we wont be watching much TV....................but will I need Sky or similar to use UK bought plasma. How much is it a month?........

Genesis

Only if it is a newish one...they can be switched over to the SOUND frequency in NZ that is different to that in the UK...on our older UK TV we get a great picture...but no fekking sound!!!! Cannot be changed or retuned as it is an older set. so now we just use it for the kids as a screen for their VCR. Re plugs try to find out how much UK adaptors are in relation to the ones over here..I ended up with about 25!!!!!! Got them all free as I spent over $9000 with Bond and Bond on white goods..because I gave all mine away:curse:. Bring plenty of the 4 bar sockets too..that way you will cut down on UK-NZ adaptors..make sure though if you are putting any more than 2 plugs on one 4 bar that they are ALL LOW AMPAGE..otherwise the adaptor can heat up and catch fire..some people seem to think you can have about 500amps coming off each plug

jill1420

Ta for that ................ yeh its only a year old. Thanks for the tips re. adaptors etc... Is it worth bringing new washing machine, fridge, dishwasher or is there Currys/Comet equivalent over there?

donnaf

We brought our washing machine and bought the rest in the equivalent to Curry's. There aren't many front loaders here and the top loaders are less economical to run. We didn't bring toasters, kettles etc - we bought new when we got here. There are always good sales on here if you can wait and we got decent stuff reasonably priced. Also don't forget that you barter here!!!!We saved hundreds of dollars bartering - 2 questions - "is that your best price" and "what if I pay cash".
Like Am Loolah we have loads of curtains that we won't use as the curtains all came with the house as did the dishwasher. We didn't bring any wardrobes. There is nothing that we left that I wish we'd brought and a few things that we wonder why we did bring!

BEVS

I also brought quality curtains that I have no need for . I'll either sell them or use the material for something else.

We brought over one gentlemens wardrobe.It would normally have sat in a porch for raincoats and boots but we have no sizeable porch.

Our house also has utility built in wardrobes but not all house do. Some of the villas don't.

Good tip about protecting feet on wooden furniture. Our chests of drawers , ship wright tool-box were fine but a blanket box was a bit damaged.

We are still using the adaptors we brought over, even after three years. They were dead cheap too. Got 'em from one of those 'cheapy' shops .Fiddly little NZ plugs do my head in and I'd rather be digging the garden than changing the plugs. We also brought over the 3/4 gang plug ensembles which was very useful when we first unpacked and wanted our stuff up and working with minimum fuss . Just one adaptor needed.

helinuk

Re the wardrobes... would we need them if we were buying an older style weatherboard house or do they have built in wardrobes too? If we need to exclude a large item or 3 are the wardrobes the items we leave behind?
Thanks

Andrew Cross

Re: wardrobes....

We never brought any with us, assuming they would all be fitted. We now have a four bed house with one small wardrobe in my daughters room which is about a quarter of the size of her old one. There doesn't seem to be any furniture shops here in Chch that sell them. You can have them made and pay about $2000 for a decent one. On trade-me they are mostly in the north island and will cost a fortune to ship and non of them are that special.

Cava Fizz

Andrew Cross

allow me to introduce you to amloolah

Apple13

We are making a wardrobe for one of our bedrooms at the moment. Cost of wood and materials ~$350, and we are building it to fit exactly to our requirements.

The trouble is while you are in the UK you generally have no idea as to what sort of house you will initially live in, let alone buy.
Either you bring the wardrobes with you, with the plan to sell them on TradeMe if not required, or you leave them behind and keep the space for something else. They are big and bulky really and there are no guarantees that even if needed in the new house, that they will even fit or match the rest of the house.

I think it is a gamble either way. I am glad we didn't bring wardrobes with us.