bobrho

We are a retired couple, former Primary school head teachers and now caring for our two grand children, aged 1 and 5 full time. Their mum, our daughter is married to an Australian passport holder. We are all thinking of moving to NZ and are looking at living within commuting distance of Wellington. Paraparaumu looks beautiful and we are wondering if anyone has any experience of the town, schools or the commute.
Our younger daughter by the way is married to a kiwi and lives in Auckland. They too would like to move to live near all of us.
We all want sea views but although we've visited NZ we have only on-line information so far about the Kapiti coast.
Any thoughts or help regarding the best place to live would be appreciated.

MOSO

The Kapiti coast would be a great choice. There are lots of retirees here due to its climate being much better than Wellington's, particularly in Waikanae. It is usually 5 degrees warmer than Wellington with a lot more sunshine and less wind. It takes an hour from Waikanae to Wellington along a very scenic route, down the coast.

Paraparaumu has the largest shopping centre (Coastlands), main stream cinema, and the airport, the downside I see is that a lot of the housing is away from the station. You could also look at Raumati Beach which has a nice small centre, good school but no station.

Waikanae has the largest population of retirees, it also has 2 large primary schools (both 500+ kids), with another supposed to be being built. The beach is the best and it has a great outdoor pool and a large park where kids hang out after school. The station is close to a lot of housing and the schools. It has 2 supermarkets, a small cinema, bowls club, sports pitches, golf course, tennis club, GP, dentists etc. etc. The ground is flat and excellent quality soil if you're into gardening. Paraparaumu is built on sand.

Sea views from any of the towns should be no problem, although they come at a premium of course and then you might be looking at buying on the hills or the opposite and be right on the beach.

I'm a teacher on the coast, so if you want any details/advice on particular schools let me know via PM. As your daughter will know, schools have different focuses so definitely visit them first, and make sure you're in the right zone. Both schools in Waikanae (Waikanae and Kapanui) are excellent. Kapanui has a strict zone in place, but Waikanae doesn't, so you can get a place out of zone.

Finally the new expressway (dual carriageway) is in the process of being built and goes through the centre of Raumati, Paraparaumu, Waikanae and will go up as far as Levin and down to Wellington. Make sure you check out houses and noise implications. There are plenty of council maps online showing the route and then you can see how the noise will affect houses. They have purchased and knocked down the affected houses they need to as far north as Waikanae so far, but some houses left are very close.

escapedtonz

I'd say you've a lot more to worry about before deciding on the Kapiti Coast and whether to go for Waikanae over Param or head further South and look at Raumati Beach, Raumati South or even Paekakariki.
Hopefully you have already looked in to this and don't expect that you can just come to NZ to live just because you have a daughter already living here with a Kiwi husband and another daughter that is married to an Australian citizen.

I have one question.......

Which visa do you intend on securing that will allow you to live in NZ ?

Bear in mind, Immigration NZ only allow people in to NZ permanently that are going to provide a long term benefit for the country, whether this be by their qualifications, work, special talent, their high $ investment or otherwise. If you have nothing to offer, it will be difficult to obtain the all important permanent visa.
Since you are retired you will be unable to go for a Resident visa via the skilled migrant category and also any temporary work visa is out of the question.
Also, a visitor visa is out of the question as it doesn't allow you to live in NZ permanently....only for 9 months in any 18 month period for a UK citizen.

I'd say one option is to apply for Residency as the Parent of a New Zealand Resident or Citizen, so your adult child and husband will in effect be sponsoring your visa application.....but the issue here is the daughter that you wish to help out is neither a Resident nor citizen as you all currently live in the UK.
You would have to wait until your daughter, son-in-law and grandchildren moved over to NZ and your daughter gained Residency and was a Resident for a period of 3 years before you could apply via either the Tier 1 or Tier 2 options.
To speed this up and assuming your other daughter that already lives in NZ is already an NZ resident or citizen and has been for at least 3 years then you could state that daughter in your application so long as that daughter will support your application.
In terms of this application route, there is a lot more demand than there are places. There are long waiting lists for both Tiers.

Expressions of Interest

You must satisfy the requirements in order to apply for each Tier system.....so the question is, which one, if any do you satisfy?

Tier 1 applications are taking 12 months + to be allocated to a Case Officer for processing.
Read the additional info here :-
Tier one requirements

Tier 2 applications - 7 years!!!
Tier two requirements

The only other way I see for you is the Parent Retirement Category where you do not have to meet as many of the criteria as in the Parent of a New Zealand Resident or Citizen category, but the investment you must make in order to satisfy Immigration will be higher and needs to remain in NZ for a longer period.

Requirements

Acceptable investment - New Zealand Immigration Service

Sorry. By your original post I feel I may have just completely thrown a spanner in the works.....Hopefully I'm wrong.

bobrho

Thank you so much for two very helpful replies. Really kind of you to spend the time and effort to assist our thinking.
We had a family 'summit meeting' last night including our daughter and son in law in NZ on Skype! We decided to engage a company to support our visa applications. Our target date is August 2017. Our daughter has lived in Auckland for 3 years. We are aiming to apply for our visa on tier 1 of the family parent category with our daughter as sponsor. We can only remain positive about our chances. We appear to meet the criteria, although we appreciate its a lengthy process.
Your views on the Kapiti coast have cemented our desire to live there if all goes well. The choice of school seems paramount to give us an area to head for, even at the beginning when we have to rent property to start with. That way the school our grand daughter is enrolled in remains constant as we all purchase permanent houses. Next year, if the visa application process is going well, we intend to make an exploratory visit. Thanks again.

BEVS

No-one can support any application except for yourselves.


No immigration consultant can improve the chances nor speed an application- unless you or your family have something within your health or character criteria.

I suggest you do the homework on the visas so you know where you stand. We are happy to guide with that .

You need to look at Tier One as retired family. Ensure your NZ daughter can sponsor you. Ensure you have the funds.

Your other daughter and husband will need to see to themselves.

elaineesther1953

Hi , We submitted out EOI at the end of May this year as we opted for our son who is married to a kiwi girl to sponsor us. He like us is from UK but has PR and lived in Auckland since 2009.
We are also approaching retirement age and would be anticipating looking after their baby and hopefully more to come!
Reading the post above by escapedtonz now doesn't offer us much hope as the part which says ' nothing to offer' could appertain to us as we will not be able to offer skill etc to benefit NZ although I would say that sounds a very cold way of being eligible.
Surely helping with your kiwi family by assisting with child care to allow your adult children to continue in their careers whilst feeling totally relaxed knowing a family member is looking after their child/chi;ldren and helping with daily tasks etc is of a great value to all.
We would also be selling our property and hopefully buying a property in NZ but nonetheless the money would be taken to NZ!!
Comments on this would be appreciated.
THanks

bourbon-biscuit

Hello there, I too cringed at escapedtonz using the phrase "nothing to offer" on a thread written by grandparents, but he doesn't mean it to be as cold as it seems. It's also not true because NZ does have ways that family can join Kiwis here but apart from the immediate family visas (spouse, child), they are all a long process. Take heart though that extended family (whanua) are very much valued here in NZ; immigration is just a process but not a reflection of the values of Kiwis.

On a personal level, I would love to have grandparents come and join - all of you considering it have very lucky children and grandchildren; you have so, so much to offer your grandchildren. I know this because I see lots of expat children who grow up without much contact with extended family and they miss it. Some of them go through long grieving processes.

BEVS

Did you submit your EOI under the Tier One category ?
If so I believe the wait time is around a year.

Yes. You are right , the NZ family must sponsor you in this.

Your son in law is an Australia citizen so in theory will be granted NZ residency on arriving into NZ. However you haven't said what residency status your UK based daughter has. Is she a British citizen? Does she have Australian PR or citizenship?

I will ping someone Oz based with knowledge of this to perhaps comment on this for you.


With regard to this , it is the only practical and sensible way for a country to go with regard to immigration matters. Countries seek to attract those with the skills the country needs. If it doesn't need the skills it clamps down on immigration. If it has a shortage of a certain skill set it will open up immigration to help with that .

However, the country is also mindful of people's ability to settle so does offer something for parents to join their children if the wish is there. You say you have submitted an EOI. If that is Tier One then it will likely be about proving independent income, wait times and also selling your property.

escapedtonz

Correct. I didn't mean it to sound as cold as some may have interpreted, but it is true and a reality check, albeit a blunt one.

Just to take the example of a situation where grandparents who look after their grandchildren full time......Important in my eyes and I wish it would be possible for our parents to come and live here doing that, but unfortunately this just doesn't cut it with Immigration NZ for a permanent visa. If you add in to the mix, adult children with permanent status for minimum 3 years, sufficient funds/salary to sponsor the grandparents and the grandparents coming over with a high $ investment, then you meet the criteria and the $ investment is something to offer. If you are not utilizing qualifications or skills to increase the future prosperity of NZ then a high $ investment does offer something and is a potential way in to the country. It can take a while as there are other resident visa application categories that are more of a priority.
It's no consolation to you or anyone else wishing to migrate to NZ for that matter but it is so refreshing that Immigration NZ follow strict processes and have restrictions on people wishing to live permanently in NZ and quite rightly so.
I'm so glad it isn't like the UK who seem to let anyone and his dog in to the country and with handout benefits to boot when British citizen aged and ex. service personnel are struggling to make ends meet and get little to nothing. It is so sad and one of the many reasons I don't live in the UK anymore.

So long as you meet the criteria of a visa you'll be fine.

BEVS

We know a pal whose retired parents have been accepted under the Tier One policy. They are in their 70's. He is their only son.

I will ask him what the wait times actually were if I can remember to.

The problem they are having is in selling their home.

For anyone else looking in =Tier One parent category.

BEVS

Anyway, along with the chat about visa and wait times....

....what else does anyone have on the Kapiti Coast ?

Once you have arrived will your Auckland based family scoot on down to be closer to you ?

Pollyana

Yes, the Aus citizen would have no issues going into NZ as an Aus citizen.

The UK Spouse could apply for an Australian Spouse Visa (from the UK) - if they've been married for 3 years(or 2 with kids) then she would get Australian Permanent Residency straight away but she would have to fulfill the normal criteria to get Aus citizenship after that (in a nutshell, that would mean living in Aus for 4 years).
If she just got PR then went to NZ and didn't get Aus citizenship first then after 5 years she would lose the ability to enter Aus on that visa, and would get into the realms of either needing a Return Resident Visa or another Spouse Visa from scratch - so really moving to Australia first and getting citizenshi here before going to New Zealand would be the best idea.

Unless of course they qualify to get into NZ by some other route, but hats where my knowledge comes to a full stop

bourbon-biscuit

My understanding is that Australian PRs do indeed have route to NZ citizenship. The caveat is that they need to remain in NZ (I think it's two years) to get access to NZ PR first. I know it is not the same vice versa but Kiwis are much kinder to their Australian cousins than vice versa

See: Can Australians get a New Zealand Permanent Resident Visa? - Immigration NZ Knowledgebase

BEVS

From this I feel that the UK based daughter would be able to remain in NZ under a partnership visa provided the Australia Citizen has his NZ residency approved.

Sorry OP.

We have gone off topic somewhat.

Kapiti coast? Heck. Wherever floats your boat NZ wise if you will not be working.

bourbon-biscuit

I think Pollyana and I were talking about the UK daughter getting Oz PR while in the UK on the basis of partnership. Now I had thought that getting a partnership visa to Oz meant a temporary two year one that was only turned into a proper PR partnership visa if you live in Oz for two years. However, it sounds like Pollyana might be saying that marriage and kids for X many years is a short cut to a permanent visa without needing to go onshore to Oz for 2 years. If this was the case, then that partnership visa might be enough to get the daughter into NZ and start the 2 year clock here to getting NZ PR.

Is that what you were saying, Pollyana?

It all sounds exhausting - defo worth getting a competent immi advisor but one who knows their stuff re Oz also. If I were the poster I would hop along to the Oz forum and ask there about partnership visas.