Reccie to Melbourne in April and moving in October....any advice?

Hello,

After dreaming for 6 years and waiting for my visa for 2 years I got my 175 visa granted in June this year. We decided to wait till October 2012 to go so that we can go crazy saving money between now and then.

I have been watching 'wanted down under' and have made a note of the places they have been looking at in melbourne: sandringham; werribee, dandenong and port philip. Ideally we need to be in a close commute to the city, but don't want to be paying city prices for mortgages. Am i hearing correctly, that the bubble might be bursting over the melbourne property market and prices might be dropping soon. We don't own a house in this country and will have just about enough to put a deposit down on a 2 bedroom house in the outer suburbs. What are the extra costs involved over there when buying a house? I know there is stamp duty...

I lived in Melbourne for 5 months in 2005 so I know my way round the city but I am pretty clueless when I go out a bit. Any suggestions on places to live/look at? Would be much appreciated.

Thanks G:biggrin:

Anywhere within 10 km from the city is expensive, both to buy and to rent and even though prices are dropping they are not going to be that significant in areas close to the CBD.

Dandenong I do not recommend because it may be too far out however there is not a lot of nice property around the city of Dandenong. You need to go further out to Narre Warren, Berwick, Cranbourne and these areas are over an hour on the train to the city in peak hour

You could look at Point Cook a lot of Brits are moving to that area however the commute is a bottle neck one so not sure whether you would consider it suitable.

You really need to wait until you arrive, get something temporary and then when you have jobs you can decide what is best for you.

Good luck

And Sandringham, Dandeonong and Werribbee are all very different places-very different styles of housing, environment etc...

Yes wait til you get here as you may be surprised. Some of the places you mention are remarkably horrible. We loved Wanted Down Under at first but then realised it was basically a load of rubbish. Its just a TV show not based on any sort of reality of moving to Australia. They seem to send everyone to the same place and dont really give any information on the important parts of moving other than the fact that you miss people (true). But to suggest anyone would want to live in Dandenong is an absolute joke. The DANDENONGS? Now thats different thing altogether, an astoundingly beautiful area.