ramot

We did, but our daughter was very independent as we had lived overseas away from UK for a long time. She had traveled and lived on her own in other countries, she was in her mid 20’ and living in England, when we retired and decided to live in Australia. The unexpected bonus was she followed us to live in Australia. You never know how things will turn out.

Well I have probably my fair share of change, new experiences and adventures since my early 20’s in the swinging 60’s in London, best keep quiet about much of what went on then!!! Went solo to Cairo, Stayed in an oasis, and troglodyte cave hotel in Tunisia, before going to Zambia as a trainer to be one of the only 2 non local air hostesses in the National airline. Never stopped moving , having yet more amazing experiences till I moved to the Sunshine Coast almost 19 years ago. Much as I love living here it cannot be described as having much potential for new experiences, however when you scratch the surface of where you live, you find more going on to suit you than is obvious, whatever your personal preference is. Caloundra Entertainment Centre has many top class international and local artists performing there, at very reasonable prices. I saw the Ten Tenors there yesterday. Going to a ballet gala in the new year with world class ballerinas. We are lucky so many artists bring their shows to the regional areas. Between shows and art exhibitions in Caloundra and Brisbane, we aren’t in a cultural back water. Seen ‘Come from Away’ and ‘Westside Story ‘ recently both fabulous shows. So I don’t think it matters if where you live has less opportunities due to its size, if you can still find it sufficient for your needs. The most important thing is if you are happy there.

My husband has just had a skin cancer on the tip of his nose removed recently and had plastic surgery. He looked as though he had gone a couple of rounds with Mike Tyson after, but recovered quickly. It’s important to use the oil on the scar afterwards, if you are advised to. All the best

Luckily my son who was affected by the retrospective overnight visa changes by the labor government to correctly lodged student visa applications for PR, did stick it out on a temporary bridging visa for 31/2 years, after studying up to a masters degree for 3 years, He did get PR. it took 61/2 years on a temporary visa of insecurity with not much chance to gain PR,. So people do stay here on temporary visas for a long time, hoping possibly unrealistically to gain PR. I appreciate that the OP sadly might not be in a position to get PR, and it’s ok to to point out that PR is not possible, but there was nothing wrong in him reaching out to seek any help, and it never hurts to show understanding to someone’s situation, when offering advice.

I sympathise as although my son was in a different situation to you it was in some ways in a slightly similar position. This was several years ago when the labor government changed the rules retrospectively for International students overnight. Like thousands he was on a bridging visa for 31/2 years having done everything right when he lodged his visa application. He was one of the few who did get PR,. I know different circumstances, but he had lived here for 61/2 years, studying and working and paying taxes with the constant insecurity of his position, and threat that he could be told to pack up and leave within 28 days. Although the reality is sadly that it was always extremely unlikely that you could stay here, I understand the underlying hope that you could. I wish you all the best for next phase of your life.

I came to Australia for one week in 1990 from UK when my husband was working here. I can’t believe the amount of travelling people I Know here have done, eg Norway, Africa, Iceland, painting holidays in Italy, chartered sailing yachts to sail round Greece, so much more adventurous, but many do also go on cruisesThere is absolutely no comparison to my UK friends of a similar age have bothered to do, most only go on cruises or 2 weeks desperate for some sun to the continent.

Same here. I don’t hanker for the past, I live in the present. I’ve always been up for new experiences, and had some amazing experiences and adventures, including taking a job in Zambia in the 1960’s, and finding I had family there and in Zimbabwe, that I had not known about. How great was that, and the most unlikely thing then, was we have all ended up in Australia!! I do appreciate that we are all different, but it’s so sad to hear how unhappy some posters are, I have lived in some quite difficult countries, far harder than Australia, but have always managed to make the most of the experience and time spent there, so I’m used to adjusting, but the difference is that they were always temporary, although 10 years in a Muslim country was long enough, but made so many long term friends there, that that is the important memory. We then retired to Australia nearly 19 years ago leaving our 3 children in UK, we are completely settled here, 2 of our children followed us and settled here, but our only grandchildren are in UK, yes we miss them, but we accept that, our children have to live their own lives, as do we. Pre covid we went to UK most years for 3 months, loved seeing our son and grandsons, caught up with friends, but know it was all a bit unrealistic to expect the same sort of excited get togethers with friends to be the same if we moved back there, as experienced by many of our expat friends who have found that out, been disappointed, and had to build their lives up from scratch again. I hope that some of the deeply unhappy posters can find a compromise or solution, seems so sad to spend so much of your life unhappy. I wish you well.

As I am one of the few posters who retired here, nearly 19 years ago, the reality of moving to Australia as retirees, is that the cost of living becomes more and more expensive, and your income doesn’t necessarily keep up. This fact has caused many people we know to go back to the UK, the main driver being free NHS. Not everyone’s personal pension is index linked, the difference in the amount of the frozen state pension becomes so much larger as the years progress. I would be surprised if retirees only needed Medicare as they age. Almost everyone retired that I know has private health cover. I don’t know how easy it is now to get a mortgage as a retiree, so a large amount of cash might have to be used up to buy a property? A new retiree here has no access to any state funding for 10 years after moving here. Should you need to go into care, which is a serious possibility as you age, then a very serious amount of money has to lodged, plus high weekly fees. The cost of some medication is not covered by the PBS and can cost thousands of $.

I’ve wondered if the reason the two long term self funded temporary retirement visas were closed to new applicants was because lots of people ran short of money and tried to get government support that they weren’t entitled to. On the basis they had lived here for many many years, bought a property and contributed to the economy. You had to re apply for both visas and still meet the conditions of the visa, otherwise it wasn’t renewed and you had to leave. If those were the reasons, then I think it would be doubtful that the government would consider changing the 804 visa conditions. There has been an enormous increase to the number of people who are now applying for parent visas, since I came nearly 19 years ago. The few people I know who came on the 804 visa, in the early 2000’s, seemed to only wait 6/7 years for their visas. I can’t help but feel that the 804 visa will be reviewed, as it must become unsustainable for the country to provide Medicare for 30 years plus to the large number of people on this very long term temporary visa, who will cost more and more as they age,

Perhaps different payment conditions in different states. In Qld, Mammogram free, x rays free, ultra sound free, cortisone injection free, plus 5 visits to various health professionals eg physiotherapist annually, and my Dr. doesn’t bulk bill. That’s all I’ve accessed since I got PR and Medicare. Pay the gap for heart specialist, which I also paid on my health fund before I got PR.

Doesn’t seem to help on the return way though. I averaged 6 long haul flights a year when living in Brunei, sometimes I felt dreadful for 10 days on returning, occasionally I was absolutely fine, I just wished I could work out why I was fine, as I could have made a fortune out of the answer.

Guaranteed not to be cheaper!!!! I know the cost has gone since we got PR a couple of years ago, and we paid $11,000 annually for top cover.

Having been expats, we had strategically placed friends en route, so always had a stopover on our annual trip to the UK, and caught up with friends, for a couple of days each way. Made the journey much easier. Sadly so many have lost their jobs due to covid, that is no longer an option, so I have decided I will only travel business, my husband might be in economy though as he doesn’t want to spend the money !! We have used the airport hotels several times and can’t fault them.

Reference health providers covering the cost of private prescriptions, this might need checking, It might depend on the provider of overseas health cover?, but ours was with Medibank and covered private health prescriptions. I met with a friend who is still on the 410 retirement visa last week, we we’re funnily enough discussing the cost of prescriptions, and she is definitely covered. Possibly different levels of health cover depending on the visa type, but worth checking

I’m glad you’re mother was well treated and recovered, but I suppose you can’t help judging a system by your own recent experience. II’ve had an appointment to see a Dr a couple of times on my annual visits, but have been seen by the nurse instead, on one occasion antibiotics were consequently delayed for a chest infection that got very serious. and it took 2 different courses of antibiotics to clear. last time I was there I had to go to A&E and wasn’t impressed with my visit or follow up clinic visit. Perhaps I was just unlucky, but the nurse? couldn’t get the needle in even after several attempts to take blood, and had to call someone else, and even though I went to a follow up clinic, I was dismissed as no problem found. I will give full praise to the GP I saw later, who was more switched on than the clinic, but if I hadn’t gone to see her because I had been dismissed by the clinic I would have been in trouble. I like that I am not tied to one Drs practice, it makes sense to stay with your Dr if satisfied, but no problem here moving Dr. There are several 7 day Drs surgeries locally for drop in and a 24hr Dr. So far we have been lucky here, with very little disruption to face to face appointments, but of course unless you go to a bulk billed Dr, most of us have to pay. I’m sure there are good and bad stories from each system, so stay well everyone. Sorry if this has gone off subject after a comment about the NHS in my post, it wasn’t my intention to go off topic.

We would probably be better off retired in UK, the free NHS, might still need private health though if it’s as bad as people say, plus unfrozen state pension. Still own property there and could sell our house here, which is worth silly money because of the buying frenzy locally. However nothing will tempt me back to the UK, as money isn’t everything, and we both want to live in Australia, it’s more important that you are happy where you living, hard if you aren’t on the same page, so decisions have to be jointly made, with the person who is prepared to make the least compromise, perhaps giving way to the more unhappy partner. I had to put up with living in a country that was very difficult to live in at times, due to my husband’s job, but knew it was temporary, not a life sentence, and would never again live somewhere I was unhappy.

Having been an expat and lived in several countries, I know that retiring to live in Australia 18 years ago was the right thing for us to do. Pre covid We went back to UK most years for about 3 months, and caught up regularly with many friends of a similar age to ourselves. We definitely have a different mind set to most of them, hardly any of them have traveled much, and still seem to only go away for a two weeks annual holiday, rather than taking advantage of being retired. I remember meeting up with a couple of our UK friends in NZ, and saying what a shame they hadn’t come and stayed with us in Qld, to be told ‘Oh we can’t stay away longer than 5/6 weeks as we have family and village commitments’. This was a once in a lifetime holiday, Our friends are all well educated and had responsible jobs, reasonably well off, but their lives revolve around their families and village or local life. I’m not criticising them, they are happy, but I find their life a bit boring. A get together is usually arranged at a local pub, when we visit our old village and everyone has a great time, some of them haven’t seen each other since our previous visit, and they all say they must meet up more regularly, but they don’t, it seems to take a visit from us to instigate it. We are of course all different, and want and enjoy different things in retirement. There is absolutely no point in saying one country is better than the other. There are clubs and activities in both countries to suit most people, I prefer where we live for many reasons, I have an interesting mix of friends, for instance in my bridge group, English like me, 3rd 4th generation Australians, South African, Zimbabwean, Danish, Canadian, New Zealander,, such different backgrounds, had interesting and different lives to me.There are so many clubs and activities and U3A here that I can join if I want to, I prefer warm weather to cold weather, yes it’s hot and humid for 3 months, but you put the aircon on, just as you would put heating on in winter in UK. Finances of course influences your retirement decision, but wherever you end up, enjoy your retirement.

I seem to remember you live in Eatons Hill? My son has lived there, for at least 6 years, has all Australian neighbours and has no problems with his neighbours They live in a cul de sac get together for a street party at Christmas, like many of us do, and the occasional chat over a beer. The same for us after 18 years here in the same house. We don’t socialise, apart from Christmas and Christmas in July, but we do the normal neighbourly things, chat when we are outside, we look out for each other, take in the post for each other if away and keep an eye on the house. Our Australian neighbour even watered the garden unasked while we were away as it was so hot. there are good neighbours and bad neighbours everywhere, certainly not Australian specific, I’ve never forgotten some neighbours when we were in RAF quarters, who thought it was fine that they climbed the small fence between our gardens and walked straight through our garden, because it was quicker than walking round the street to get to see a friend!!!! PS we moved from Nottingham, definitely the Midlands, some good neighbours, some not so good, same as here

I can’t answer as it was 20 years ago, all I know is that she had a full pension, care allowance, and money from the sale of her house, and every penny went apart from the 23.000 pds left when she sadly died. Nothing else left, no refund, . She was not in a very expensive care home, it was in the Yorkshire, very rural, but can’t fault her care there. I’ll leave this thread as I don’t want this to become an argument about.something so personal.

Should have said my mother was in UK.so a different system to Australia.

Well the state took more than that from my mother, a single parent who had worked hard all her life, did without lots to manage to buy a house, with a special mortgage from the council, and had to sell it to fund her care, she was allowed to keep her last 23.000 pds!!! The new rules might benefit some ordinary people like my mother?

The old self funded temporary retirement 410 visa was exactly that. It was for everyone, over a certain age, no need to be a parent. It was canceled for new applicants in 2005, replaced by the very expensive 405 investor retirement visa, which also closed to new applicants in 2018. As both those visas that fit your idea were stopped, I wonder if a similar visa would ever be introduced? The 410 visa apart from being a long term self funded temporary visa, was exactly what you suggest, so there must have been a reason they were canceled. We were on the 410 visa for 17 years, before we got PR, we cost the country nothing, bought a house with FIRB approval, and spent our money here, so you have to wonder why it was stopped. Perhaps people were rorting the system? or too many retirees were running out of money and trying to get the government to support, even though not entitled to it? Who knows!

I won’t be watching Annika again, I usually rate rate UK crime series highly, but this first episode left me cold. I don’t watch reality programs, have better things to do with my time, The only one I do admit to watching was the farmer wants a wife, but was disappointed with the last series.

A friend who was on the same 410 visa as us, applied for the 864 parent visa at about the same time as us2017, her husband sadly died, and she definitely kept her 864 application. I don’t know who the main applicant was, or the circumstances of her keeping or changing the application, but his death was very unexpected. Logically, but not that that applies to immigration!!!) it would be extremely cruel, to refuse the existing partner’s application.