LadyCroft

It now turns out that OH may be moved to Dandenong with his work and they were saying it will be a long journey to get from Doreen to work so they recommended looking in and around Berwick/Ringwood North or anywhere round there. I like Berwick. I don't know it at all though with respect to renting in an area with a good primary school. I won't have the car during the week so will need to walk to school and have been looking at the Berwick Chase Primary... the houses look nice and are more affordable. Also, how hard is it to secure a rental in Berwick? Only one of us working but have bank statements and our old mortgage statements to prove we owned our property and how much we paid a month as well as our Aus bank statement to prove we can pay the rent. It wasn't too hard out in Doreen as they didn't have as many applicants for one property but I have heard that in Berwick it is very hard to get a rental. We need to be out of this short term rental in 2 weeks now so are worried... Any areas around Berwick to avoid? There are some amazing houses at cheap rental prices in surrounding burbs but I know some of these areas are to be avoided... Just, which ones? Thanks

Thanks. It is scary realising just how often fires break out in the countryside even if they are small and contained quickly. It is something you just don't think about when moving over here looking for somewhere to live. I think you just look at the lovely rentals near the bay and then when you get here, you realise you can't afford the rent so end up in the stix for a while and that those snakes and spiders really DO come into your garden.... I guess I will be like you guys soon enough, keeping tabs on it all and living with it all day to day. Thanks for the advice though. I think the property we have lined up is right at the edge of the new builds (still building) so potentially bigger risk there but the people we spoke to from the more established area have been there 4 years no problems. I love this forum. It is so amazing to get sound advice from you who are living it every day.

We are moving into our long term rental in a few weeks and are trying to find excellent condition furniture including Fridge/Freezer, TVs, Bed frames (2 singles and 1 double) sofas. Anything else would also be an option for us as we have not shipped much and the container isn't arriving until early next year so we are stuck. Thanks for any replies.

Thanks. Some of the jobs on seek seem to be there for weeks or maybe even months... Will give that a shot thanks!

Hi I have been applying for every joiner/carpenter job coming up on seek.com.au and am currently heading to the northern suburbs for a chat about a potential job but it's all very worrying as I heard there was loads of work for tradies but I can not find anything that hasn't already been snapped up. We need to be out of our short term rental soon and are looking for somewhere long term but I thought we would move to where my work is and the problem is I am yet to find work. I keep hearing "Oh, try seek.com.au" but I have along with phoning building companies directly to no avail. In the UK where I worked it was all word of mouth and names passed on within the construction business but I am starting to panic here as I can't get a foot in the door anywhere. Help? How is it best to go about getting a job in construction in Melbourne? Do people really get work off seek.com.au applications? THanks

We have been searching for a rental and struggling as the areas we like are just out of budget. OH now has work in Doreen (tradie) and we are thinking of renting there for the next year as it means no major commute and it's so affordable at the moment... any advice? We are worried about fire risk and also wondering what mobile reception/broadband is like there.

Thanks. Feeling a bit more clued up now. We're in Victoria and looking at Seaford, Mordialloc and Berwick amongst others. Just trying to keep options open. It's so hard!

We are at the stage where we have been looking around a few suburbs and want to arrange viewings to actually apply to rent a house. We have been told there property is usually open for inspection for a 15 minute slot where all interested parties come to the house and ask questions or look around and decide if they would like to apply to rent the place. What do we do? Do we just turn up with our passports or drivers license for Photo ID and if we like the place we kind of make an offer to rent it or do we need to have application forms completed on the day of inspection? Total newbie to this. The last time we were here years ago we just went to the estate agents and asked them to find us a place. This time we are looking around a lot so help please! :notworthy:

Sorry - more to add. We have seen a lovely place in Seaford but it is on East Avenue and I have no idea what it is like there. Would that be recommended or not? THanks

I posted a huge reply and it's gone so here goes with a smaller one. Keeping an eye on Mordialloc and Cheltenham now. How about Frankston South? We have seen quite a few properties but they're getting further towards Frankston North and the Uni buildings... Is this still an OK area or not? Robinson Road and Lardner Road at all???

Our budget is under $400 but we need at least 2 bed and a car space. Would like 3 bed for parents coming to stay for hols ideally. Buzzy Bee - I wasn't too sure how far we could be from Mentone/Parkdale so started looking further afield. Will look at surrounding suburbs too but am looking at Geelong as an option since we've never actually stayed there and there are a couple of job opportunities there too so I'm trying to be a bit more flexible since it's me who really loves Mentone but OH is not bothered where we end up as long as it's near the coast,safe with decent schools and toddler friendly. Thanks for the replies! It's hard this!

Thanks Petals. Great advice. Went out and bought the Saturday papers and applied for a few jobs in there that weren't online at all so that is fab. OH loves having a new excuse to use for sitting in the pub on a Friday afternoon now!!! :biggrin:

Great thanks. Didn't know about the 30 days thing with the RWC. We have decided just to stick with buying from a dealer for our first car here. We have enough to deal with and budget for without ending up with an old banger that we can't even get on the road. Great thanks.

Well the title says it all really. We were here years ago when the exchange rate was high and cost of living not so high. Now we are back permanently, we had decided we would have a little house in Mentone with a small garden and the kids would go to Parkdale primary. Well, we can only afford an apartment now and although we thought "Yes! We can live in an apartment!" it is just not going to be practical. We have been in a 2 bed apartment since we arrived and it is HELL with our kids. I thought we would be fine living in the apartment and going to the local parks to run around but they are stir crazy. I SOOOOO wanted us to live in Metone by the sea with the local friendly feel to the place and the shops..... Sigh ANYWAY I digress... We have been trawling through Realestate.com.au and Highton, Geelong keeps coming up as a really nice area with a house and garden for what we were going to pay in Mentone for a 2 bed apartment. I know once we are more established and settled we can always move at the end of our rental agreement if we are not happy but if we love it there then great. I have been told to avoid Point Cook and Sanctuary Lakes as the internet and services are a bit hit and miss as well as issues with traffic stand still trying to get through to Melbourne. Can anyone help me with which parts of Highton I should be looking at or avoiding? I have also been told not to rent in GRovedale although there are some lovely houses there. I don't mean to offend anyone living in these areas as I am sure they are fine - I think the friends we have asked would like us to live in the Eastern suburbs near them as they have moved around over the years and love where they are now so are just trying to help us avoid what they went through but we have very limited experience of living in Melbourne so are open to new areas as long as they are kid friendly and safe. Also, I won't have the car so will need to be able to walk or take the bus to school with a stroller in tow so I guess I need to be close enough to PRimary schools to be able to walk. Thanks for your help with this. I didn't take into account how expensive rentals have got since we were here in 2005.

I have been looking at used cars online and there are a few things confusing me such as some cars are "drive away" price and others need a road worthy cert etc. It has made me worry about being ripped off buying a used car and being a brand new immigrant they might see coming... What do I need to know/do/take with me before getting into buying a car. They will all know as an immigrant that I will be desperate to buy a car asap so I fear being ripped off. THanks for your words of wisdom as always.

We have just arrived in Melbourne and are now looking for work. My other half is a joiner foreman/site manager and is looking for work to start asap. He has been applying through Seek and CareerOne etc as well as looking in the Age but nothing yet. I know thousands apply this way and through Hays recruitment but he is anxious to start work as soon as possible so I am here asking for your solid advice again. Any advice on how you got into construction over here? What is the best way to go about it? Where are the new builds just now? It used to be Point Cook when we were here last but that seems to be slowing down now. Any ideas on recruitment agencies to contact? Any pointers at all would be great. He knows things slow down in the UK over Christmas time so is it the same here? He is assuming so. THanks for any help with this. We are trying to hold off renting long term until we find out where we will be working but might end up renting where we like and commuting if we have to... THis is soooo hard :arghh: THanks for any replies.

Hi Thanks for the replies. I think we will just go for the go-walkabout up to 5 days one way travel insurance. The problem I have is that we have booked a holiday rental for 4 weeks and I am now thinking I might need some form of travel insurance regarding end supplier failure or something like that. We booked it through an online holiday rental website thought so maybe we are already covered there? I never thought about this stuff booking a week in Crete!!! Now all of a sudden I am all about small print! Should the up to 5 days insurance be enough as it will cover our flights from UK to Oz...

We are emigrating next week :arghh: but we have a month long holiday rental and I was all set to get travel insurance for the month to cover the flights and the holiday rental. Other half is saying we only need travel insurance for the flights to Oz and then we will be residents so it is pointless to get UK travel insurance for the holiday rental. Confused. Did you all get travel insurance if you had a hotel/holiday rental booked for the first part of the trip?

Panicking again here. Just realised I have not applied for baby's eVisitor so applied just now and am worrying. We are STILL waiting for his Child Visa 101 to be granted but have to get over there before our visas expire so we are off. I have also been having problems setting up the NAB bank account as we are at a temp address here so have no proof of address - same with moneycorp so have not been able to arrange transfer of funds and new bank account. Looks like it won't happen in time now. :arghh: We sold the car so are struggling to get around and still have stuff to get done before we go. I haven't arranged travel insurance and we have a few leaving parties to get to which were no prob with the car but now everything just seems to be eating away at the time we have left to get everything done and I am panicking! Can't sleep!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

I have to buy suitcases for our Emirates flight - we are looking at these Tripp Large suitcases: http://www.tripp.co.uk/products/2127-tripp-express-spotty-2-wheel-large-suitcase-aubmagenta 77cm x 49cm x 32cm Is this too big or OK for an emirates flight? Thanks

We need to ship over 4 power tools that have rechargeable Lithium batteries. We are not allowed to ship them according to Sevenseas so now we need to rethink and find a company who can ship them over for less than it would cost to replace them. OH says he can only get £100 second hand for the lot and he really wants to take them with us so can anyone help by recommending a company who will ship them? We have seen packsend.com.au do it but have not looked into this in any great detail as our Sevenseas boxes are currently half full since the extra boxes for power tools are now empty. I didn't even think of looking into it as we were too busy trying to work out how clean the power tools needed to be in the first place. I know some people have shipped batteries before but this was before the new legislation came into place regarding lithium batteries being dangerous goods. TIA for any help.

Thanks for the replies. Think we will make sure we carry our old passports with the visas in them and get a print out of the evisitor visa and emails from our Case Officer for our little one as his PR visa is due to be granted any time.

Our holiday rental check in is 3pm and is towards Brighton so we are thinking of attempting to book a room at the Holiday Inn next to the terminal at Tullamarine airport so we can head straight there before going to our rental. When I spoke to them they said we would likely need to book the day before arrival AND the day of arrival to secure the room... That is going to be expensive. Also, what is the best way to get to our holiday rental in Brighton from the airport when we need 2 car seats for the kids? We would need a baby seat and a child seat so do you have to pre book this? Thanks for your valued advice here. I am trying to make sure our arrival is as organised and stress free as possible after such a long flight.

Thanks. I don't know why I am desperate to shell out even more cash getting new labels put in our new passports. I just worry about being stuck in the airport in limbo - as if I don't have enough to worry about at the moment!

I have some shares in the form of paper certificates that I was given a few years ago. I am not sure what to do with them. I have sold some to pay for tickets and holiday rental on arrival in Australia but I am planning on holding onto the rest as I get a dividend twice a year which is a very small amount. What happens when I move to Australia? Is there a problem with them being in paper form? Do I need to pay tax on the dividend payments? What if I decide to sell the shares? Thanks for any advice as I am clueless.