afterbang

Hahaha. Saw that one coming ;) Although I feel differently about a lot of things Canberra I remember you from a few years back, just because it is good to have a counterweight to overly optimistic messages. And you lived through a big drought, although the signs aren’t great atm either. Fingers crossed for cool summer days and some decent rain! Hang in there!

We did our Reccie trip in 2012, then the GFC hit us in the Netherlands so we were stuck for a while (mortgage/house issues) but arrived Jan 2017. The last few weeks have been a hard (smoke) but can't complain compared to what the coast gets. We (couple in their 40's) love it here, could be a bit warmer in winter, bit colder in summer. But hey, the last few days reminded me of NL (Fog/Rainy weekends locked up in your house - Here it is smoky/hot) But the previous summers were good. So apart from the bushfires and politics in general in Australia, we still love Canberra after 3 years.

You are the only name I remember Quoll. I don't come here a lot (never) but good to see you are still alive and kicking ;)

OK, they do not ask for a Security Clearance... But asking Australian Citizenship for this?!?!

Hi Tim, we're moving to Canberra in 3 months from now and I'm more or less in the same spot as you are. It is no issue to find work in the Netherlands as an IT Infrastructure Project Manager/Service manager but up till now 99.9% of the advertised jobs in Canberra fitting my skill set require Australian citizenship/basic/nv1 clearance. We're moving anyway as the missus already has a job secured and I will just see how it goes. Worst case scenario I will do something else entirely or look into Sydney to get at least some experience in Australia. (everything else has been said already, local government is OK, private sector is relatively small or works for federal gov...) Will keep you posted on my adventures as soon as I'm arrived! (what's your area of expertise?)

Hi Andy, thanks for the info. FYI we're not in Canberra yet, we'll arrive end of January. Hope it will not be to crazy in the rental market but it seems a busy season. As we're not planning to go to Gungahlin we'll be fine. Think we'll end up in Belco or Weston by the look of things. I'm guessing I won't have job from day 1 and the missus has a job but puts it on the backburner for a few weeks so we should have time to arrange stuff. Thanks again for for the info, always to hear some real life experience!

Thnx BooBooBear for the extra info, by searching for Pet resume Canberra I came across the site of the local RSPCA with some helpful tips and a site with a Pet resume example. Fixing up my own resume for the Australian job market. Might as well do one for the cats And yes, we also need to find a way to protect local wildlife (and the cats themselves) Night curfew is a given I guess to protect native wildlife. And maybe an enclosure during daytime. At least they can go outside but won't be in harms way or catching of local wildlife. Although they are not really predators anymore, more lazy ass opportunists, they are still cats.

hahaha, Yeah cats can be very.... lets call it, unimpressed with a lot of things. In our garden they ignore about everything. Hedgehogs pass through our garden with the cats not blinking an eyelid. Even the blackbirds can steal the cat food right in front of them. They cannot be bothered But this means you have cats... in a rental? Or is it your own property? Very interested how it works for you, if your cats can roam free in the garden, or even outside the garden? Or are they indoor? Do many people have cats or is Canberra more a doggy town? Our cats are currently outdoor cats and enjoy the 'lifestyle' very much, they do not tend to roam much outside the garden, way to much work But they like to sunbath a bit in the grass or look for shade under a bush. Any advice or experiences with cats in Canberra are welcome!

Thanks. We start the first week in Chapman at a place we've stayed before with a really lovely and helpful owner. This gives us a bit of familiarity when everything else in our life changes Sadly we cannot stay there when our cats arrive so we looked around and found something not to expensive just outside Canberra. (Bywong) Maybe slightly less convenient due to the distance but in the end still only 20 minutes to the City. At least we will be surrounded by Roo's. Curious what the cats will make of them

Have secured a cat friendly property for the first 4 weeks, let's hope we will find something by the time that contract runs out.

Hi Quoll, Don't worry. We noticed quite a lot of properties on AllHomes are pet friendly. They will be on the top of our list!

Thanks all. Having around 4 weeks of temp. rental seems OK if I take your experiences. We visited Canberra December 2015 and noticed there were many houses available, it seems to have dropped off by now. So this is in line with your remarks. When we were over we had an informal chat with a real estate agent. We touched upon the cat topic and here advice was roughly the same. Do not declare them and park them at the neighbours during inspection time or sign a pet clause/offer to pay more. She even declared she took her cat somewhere else during inspection time when she was younger The first option sounded (and still sounds) so weird. (the concept of inspections is also weird for a Dutchy by the way) But if that is how it works... :wacko:

Hi, after years of chasing a visa and then waiting for the house market to recover again we are finally planning the leap to Canberra (from the Netherlands) mid January. As we will take our cats with us but no kids (as in, we do not leave them behind, we just don't have any kids ) We might be a bit limited in rental homes. Plan is to rent a short term rental for the first 4 weeks and by then move to a 12 month rental somewhere. Our questions: - Would 4 weeks suffice to find a nice 3 to 4 bedroom house in a quiet location in that time of year? - How much time (in General) passes between a successful inspection, granting you the house and receiving the keys? This would give us an indication of how long we should rent the (rather expensive) short term rental. - Any other (cat specific?) rental advice you want to you share? As said, as we move closer to the date we might have some more questions but for now any help in regards the above is welcome. P.s. We've visited Canberra twice in the last 4 years and had a look into different areas and suburbs and are still open minded as to which suburb suits us best. I do not have a job lined up so far and the missus will work from home office.

Thanks for the offer VERY much appreciated! Any help, even if it's just a chat about life in Canberra, is more than welcome. Sure we will be in touch closer to the date. If I look at what you are telling me about the factual work and which skills are needed; man it sounds like...like me! I did a few projects in the last few years which were all about (often crappy old applications) migrations to Windows or Linux virtuals (ESX 5.x) Interesting, one such project was the application which took care of all the cases which were handled by the High Court (isn't there something like that in Canberra Damn that NV1...) Other similar project were migrating different apps of a semiconductor factory and a BIG migration/consolidation of the core system of same factory to Unix. I understand more or less everything what people tell me, vendors, architects, engineers, on a conceptual or better level. I have never ran into an environment I didn't head my head around pretty quick. And when with a vendor or customer I often smell the bullshit quite early (if there is any) And I have experience on the BAU/Operations side and Project Management. So I can understand both parties/views (keeping the show on the road vs. changing the road ) In regards certification, that's all taken care of Prince2 Practitioner: Check ITIL Foundation V2 & V3: Check ITIL Inc. Mgmt: Check MCSE: Check (NT4.0...) MCSA: Check (W2003) Will be doing a problem/incident/crisis management course next two months. Really interesting stuff, will share in more detail with you if you like at a later stage. All in all: I hear options Thanks again for your reply, nice to receive some positive news on jobs on Australia Day! (also received a 260 A$ speeding ticket today so was in need for some good news Our trip to Canberra & Sydney last December is getting an expensive afterbang...) Cheers!

Yeah, everything is setup for mid January 2017, this would allow us to enjoy the second half of summer before winter kicks in My experience is from being a system engineer on Windows Servers and Juniper and Checkpoint firewalls to teamlead of a team of engineers which administered those systems to Operations Manager of multiple teams (Windows, Networks, AS400) in the financial world. After that I moved on to a global IT service provider with a relatively small presence in Australia but 80.000 people globally.... Australia options are thin on the ground but it is a small lead which I will follow up shortly. Did Project Management in networks, storage, servers area (windows, linux, unix) Note: being a project manager I am not always knowledgeable on the systems itself. I do understand all technical concepts being a former engineer though. From that I transitioned to Service Delivery Management (again: networks, servers, storage, databases) And since a few weeks manager of an Incident Management team which services all our national customers. I might move more in the team lead/manager area as it probably translates easier to other jobs without clearance issues(?) Hope this paints the picture Thanks for confirming that I can work for local government without the citizen thingy, I was aware of that. But confirmation is always nice! Looking at Seek.com.au the Federal/security clearance needed jobs outnumber the non-clearnace jobs by 99 to 1 though

Yeah, thought so. (that they might not be inclined to go through the hassle) The working home/Sydney option also crossed my mind and seems like a viable option as long as there's nothing in Canberra itself. Again happy the missus at least has her job secured. Saves us a lot of sleepless nights I guess If someone has more/other/same experience please do share. I prefer to have the reality check now instead of over there

Just like the OP we are almost in our last year of our 176 visa and still in The Netherlands but are now finally preparing the move. Two visits to Canberra over the last 3 years didn't scare us away So we are now preparing everything to move in 12 months. The wife has secured her job with her current employer (working from overseas) so that's a big plus but I am slightly worried about my chances. I'm in IT since 2000 in multiple roles but mostly as Project Manager and/or Team Lead (mainly in IT Infrastructure if anyone is interested Think along the likes of Atos, HP, Fuijitsu, Telstra) Looking on Seek I have of course noted al the NV1 and other clearances requested. Not being a citizen that seems to throw a bit of a spanner in the works... If I read the offical statement about getting a clearance it leave s a bit of wiggle room. But has anyone real life experience of this wiggle room being used? Or does it sounds nice on paper but it never happens in real life? How exceptional do I/the circumstances have to be? Any advise is most welcome! [h=4]Q5. Do you have to be an Australian citizen to be eligible for a security clearance from the Australian Government?[/h]Australian citizenship is a condition of eligibility for security clearances. Only in exceptional circumstances can the head of your employing agency waive this requirement.

I share your interest

Great update, nicely written up. Looking forward to the next one

Do you mean this one maybe? http://www.stayz.com.au/accommodation/act/act-canberra/canberra/147166 Hope they can make a better deal for long term

You beat me to it

Thanks for sharing your experience. Intel on ACT is scarce and it's good to hear some real life experiences. Me being in IT might bring the same issues about the security restrictions as you had. I will be relying on the misses I guess

Holy Mother of.... How on earth did you do that. I'm a fond snowboarder and mountainbiker and broke a few things in my life, had some stitches here and there and the casual scratch mark. But your back, 9 ribs and two shoulders.... Man that IS a freak accident. Hope you heal soon though. Hang in there so we can ride together (when I finally move over...)

Not in Canberra at the moment (sadly) but a bit strange the NBN isn't synchronous? The thing about fiber is that it is a synchronous medium... And on iinet. IT friends of mine really like them.

Thanks guys. A lot of info And with so many things in life (and work) there seems to be a large grey area. Maybe after you have gained some experience for local government and a CV with some Aussie experience you are probably more likely to get something done in APS. Slean, fyi, The last 2 to 5 years I'm more into Project management then Operations (sadly) but PM is better for ACT if I understand you correctly. I'm ITIL Foundation and Practitioner (in Version 2 as in Version 3) and have Prince2 Foundation 2009. Will start Prince2 Practitioner later this year. (thanks for the link to Freckleface's CV tips) @Pfirsch, sounds like what we've heard when we were over for our reccietrip in December. Good to get that 'confirmed'. Again, I won't be counting my chickens before they hatch! And this is the current situation, while I expect that it could take up to another two years before we arrive. So...maybe everything has changed again by then...