RockDr

Who did you talk to?

Having waited until this close to your deadline to sort this out, I strongly suggest you talk to a registered migration agent for advice.

We sat down last night and itemised our house contents for insurance purposes. It is definitely better value to ship than to try to start from scratch. At the very least I would be shipping all your personal effects.

kangaroo or crocodile leather items (doesn't have to be tourist tat, you can get good quality belts, wallets etc)

This is the point. Moving somewhere on your own is an completely different situation. It's hard. and that's just with th normal day to day stuff. If you're not liking it now, just think how much less you'll like being on your own in a country you're not particularly happy in if anything happens to yourself or to your family and friends back in the UK. Been there, done that, never again moving alone to a place where I don't have close family or friends within a couple of hours drive. (Not that it's an issue at the moment, since I've got my OH to move with wherever I go)

It'll be the water. Try getting yourself a water filter and use filtered water in your kettle. It won't taste the same as what you're used to, but the same applies if you move from one area of the UK to another.

I wouldn't worry too much, you'd just have been shown houses that look good on TV anyway, not necessarily ones that fit where you need to live or your budget.

a very talented procrastinator it would seem

If you are cutting it fine, speak to the agent dealing with the 457. It is possible to get the 6months restriction lifted if you've applied for a visa that will allow you to continue working full time. Your agent will know how to deal with this (I was in the same situation and my agent at the time told me it was trivial to get it sorted if necessary).

Sounds like a great idea, with no family tying you to the UK, I wouldn't hesitate... One thing. Although NZ citizens have rights to live and work in Australia, if you want to live there long term, I would recommend looking into PR visas, as this then gets you the full rights for health/benefits/pensions etc etc. If you qualify for a skilled visa, then great, otherwise I guess it'll be a case of apply for a partner visa if/when that becomes a possibility in the future. In the meantime, it's definitely worth familiarising yourself with the differences in rights between the special NZ visa, and a full PR visa. Just so you don't run into any unexpected hurdles along the way...

I always book direct with the airline so that I don't have a middleman to deal with if there are any issues. sky scanner can be good to see which airlines have decent prices atm.

because the BVA exists, even though it's not active, if you leave the country it gets turned off, so you need to get it turned back on in order for it to activate when your 485 expires.

China southern, and Air France are four star airlines, like Emirates, BA and Qantas Malaysia is a five star airline, like Singapore airlines I wouldn't hesitate to book with any of them. Malaysia would be my pick out of those four, but only because they fly direct to Adelaide, and that's where I live.

If you want more knowledge, you really need to talk to a migration agent. Try George Lombard who posts on this forum, as he's quite experienced with medical cases and will be able to advise you.

Yes, if you apply for a partner visa onshore, you will be issued with a bridging visa A which will kick in when your WHV expires and keep you legal until the partner visa comes through.

http://www.immi.gov.au/migrants/family/child/101/ this visa

Just a thought, but how big a deposit do you have? might actually be worth renting and saving for those few years I ran the numbers a couple of years ago, and it took fewer years to rent a luxury city townhouse and save enough to buy the suburb property outright, than to buy the property now and pay off the mortgage. (this was in Adelaide, which has a very flat market at the moment, but it wouldn't surprise me if the numbers work out similar in Perth)

Sounds like you might be ok then, there's a big difference between "getting stuff done to your house" and getting mates rates.

You are not on a BVA, you are on a 485 until next october. If you do travel on your 485, you'll need to pop into a DIAC office just before your 485 expires to get the BVA re-instated.

I was told that you're financially better off looking for something that needs minimal work unless you're a tradie and are certified to do a lot of the work yourself. So basically I would look for places that don't need all of the above doing to them, one or two of bath/kitchen/floors/aircon andor heating/painting, unless you REALLY like the place enough that you don't mind throwing money away to make it liveable for yourself, knowing that it won't add much to the re-sale value of your house.

You can apply whenever you want for PR, provided you meet the requirements. There's no "minimum time" to be on a 457. The only time related thing is that after two years on a 457 you can apply for employer sponsored PR without a formal skills assessment

here you go then http://www.occupationalhealth.co.uk/WeightConversion.htm no excuse now

so reclaim the BBQ. it doesn't just have to be red meat. fish, prawns, chicken, veggies, there's loads of really tasty but healthy recipes that can utilise a BBQ... this page has a few http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/collections/barbecue

I'm wanting to buy new plates, and having issues finding ones that don't have about three times the eating surface of my existing ones. Also apparently quite difficult finding ones that aren't bright lime green or some other colour that really clashes with just about every type of food...

That's not entirely true. If you have a full time job, once you've applied for the partner visa and before the WHV expires, then you can apply to have the 6month restriction lifted. see "extending the work limitation" the bottom of this page:http://www.immi.gov.au/visitors/working-holiday/417/obligations.htm I've not done this myself, but the agent who was dealing with my 457 visa very close to the 6month deadline on my WHV said it was trivial to sort it out if my 457 didn't come through in time. The important thing is to not confuse this with the "applying to work on a bridging visa" form.