RachelGreep

Yup! I got the Crimebourne reference when I mentioned it. I guess it must have been earned somehow. I was in the new shopping centre. The new part looks great. What part of Langwarrin is 'leafy Langwarrin'? I'm not sure. The house we went to see was just along from Elisabeth Murdoch College. Thanks

Yes, our budget means we can't live in a desirable area as such. Some have asked us why we moved to the other side of the world and end up in Langy. Well, it's a million times better than the life and area we left behind. I just don't want to buy a house somewhere that people know is a bad area only to find out too late. Langwarrin is affordable, has shops, primary and secondary school and we can afford a house there. We have 2 cars so that's OK. We're just trying to keep our options open as the houses in our price range are snapped up fast and rented out by the looks of it. So if we don't look in more areas we might miss out on our own place. It is getting our own place but making sure our kids have a safe neighbourhood with a decent primary/secondary and a garden.

OK, so Langwarrin doesn't sound great then. I thought we'd be OK renting but it is not for my other half so he really wants us to get our own place. He's happy to get a house that needs some work done so no problem there. I just can seem to get an idea of where to avoid (apart from the usual don't live in Dandenong) so when I see properties in our price range they're either somewhere not so nice, too far away or in the middle of nowhere. Don't know how new build estates work anyway because we couldn't afford to rent and pay mortgage while waiting however long for the house to be built. Gone off topic now. So, Langwarrin not so great? Don't like Frankston really either Apart from the parts we can't afford!!! Some amazing houses with that view. We do go round for a look in the evening but most places seem pretty quiet. Kids are usually at the skate park.

Our budget is below $380,000. We can't go over that amount is what I mean. Do you know what the area is like? Any advice on this part of Langwarrin would be really helpful. The house we saw today is around $350,000. Thanks.

As always, I know this is a tricky question but I need honest answers on which areas of Langwarrin to avoid. We only have a small budget for a house - $380,000 tops. We have seen a lot of houses in Langwarrin and I know this is a mixed bag but the ones we like have been towards Langwarrin South but still closer to Centre Road, North Road and Warrandyte Road area. Are these ok areas for a family? Is there trouble with groups of teenagers in this part as I have been told the parts of Langwarrin towards Karingal are to be avoided if buying your own place. Can anyone give me some honest answers/opinions on the area? We saw some really cheap, good houses in Cranbourne but when we spoke about them to Aussie friends they were flat out no way unless it's an investment property to rent out. Shame really as Cranbourne could be a great place to live if it didn't have such a bad reputation.

I am a permanent resident in Australia and have been here just over a year. I still have some UK shares in a UK online trading account that I want to sell but I don't know what to do re the minute amount of CGT that may be incurred. The shares are in the UK and when they are sold, the money would be transferred into my old UK bank account and then I could transfer them to my Oz account. What happens with the CGT? Do I need to do anything other than declare it on the next Tax Return? The CGT is minimal and would not be taxed if I were still in the UK as it would be well under the £11,000 allowance. I have no idea what to do. I kept the shares as they were worth less than they cost before we left so no point in selling them then but they have recovered slightly since we got here and I need the cash now. I can't be bothered with all the stress of worrying over tax but I also need to keep the UK address (it is my brother's address and we were living there before we left so he just forwards any mail re the shares) as the company I have the online account with say I can't change my address to an Australian one - I need to be resident in the UK to use their sharedealing service. AAAAARGH!

Thanks for the replies. Really loved Lysterfield lake but didn't realise just how big it was! Saw a lot of wildlife and the bbq's smelled amazing. Jells Park is lovely too. Can get quite busy but I suppose that is to be expected due to where it is situated. Thanks for all the suggestions. Will try out the others too.

Thank you so much for your reply. So it is definitely worth going directly to them and talking about getting finance through the developers? Good to know. I am so lost in everything and the more I try to find out, the more confused I am getting. Good luck with it all. Sounds like you have it sussed! I am actually feeling a little less defeated now. Maybe there is a way to own our own place. Just need to find a credit card deal like yours! Fantastic. Well done. Great to hear some positive news.

We were talking to our bank about the ins and outs of getting a mortgage and buying our own place. Obviously they were very pro us taking out a 95% mortgage even though it means mortgage insurance and the fact that interest rates are likely to rise again sometime in the not so distant future. They obviously want their commission. Anyway, we had not realised just how much is required up front when it comes to fees etc. We though saving a substantial deposit was the hard part but now it seems that even if we save up a 20% deposit (unlikely at present) then we will likely need the same again to pay for legal fees and all the other cr@p that we had not thought about. For this kind of money we could have had a big detatched 4 bedroom house in a nice area where we used to live in the UK (I know, I know, I just mean we couldn't afford that kind of lifestyle before we left so we are a bit fecked now). How do people afford to buy a house? Are we just going to have to rent forever? I really can't see us being able to save up for a house where we want to live. Anybody able to tell me I am completely wrong and that I have totally got it wrong and that I was not paying attention? Also, does anyone know of the deals where you pay a typical rental price for a property that is newly built and then after so long you own it? I am wondering if the catch with this is high interest rates plus a very long term. Maybe you are still paying 80 years later. They are advertised like this on realestate.com.au http://www.realestate.com.au/property-house-vic-clyde+north-414125907 Thanks for any advice on this. For now we are better off renting as we could never afford to buy the house we are currently renting and then there are rates on top of the mortgage.

I am looking for more what you would call a "park" in UK terms. When I ask about parks I tend to get pointed to play parks for the kids or recreation grounds for footie, cricket. I am not sure what to ask - somewhere like the Royal Botanical Gardens in the city but it is just such a PITA to go to the CBD on the weekends down the *@!!ing Monash. We are in South East suburbs and stumbled upon the National Rhododendron Gardens in Olinda which were exactly what we wanted. Beautiful park type place with a walking track that we can take the pram while still getting to go for a walk through beautiful scenery. I know there are loads of walking tracks down where we are but it's not the bush walk kind of tracks. They are much easier to find and we've walked loads but a nice, pretty, pram friendly park type place. Oh, we have also been to Australian Garden in Cranbourne lots too and it is stunning but we want to find some new places. Thanks

Hi I hope you can help. A family member gifted me shares a few years ago. I am not a market trader or anything like and know nothing about stocks and shares. I just know that the shares are worth a few thousand pounds and pay a small dividend twice a year (under £100). I had forgotten about them until I noticed a dividend payment recently and it has made me realise that I have no idea what happens with the shares now I am a permanent resident of Australia. We moved here about 9 months ago and they have dropped slightly in value since we emigrated. What if I want to sell some? In the UK I could sell some each year without going over the capital gains limit for an individual so never had a problem. I now don't know what would happen if I sold some as the shares are UK shares so what are the tax/capital gains issues that may arise? I am not sure if I want to sell them yet but they might help us save for a house deposit in the near future if we decide to stay but I don't want to sell them and then owe the taax man a whole chunk of the sale of the shares. THanks for your help with this. I have had a look on the ATO pages but it just baffles me further. I need a clear, straight forward piece of advice as I go blank when it comes to all this. Thanks

Hi everyone. Thanks for the clarification. I am scared either way because I don't know exactly what the deal is with gaps and all that stuff. I suppose we will learn as we go along (like everything else ) We had a look at the different levels of hospital cover and even the basic is a bit too expensive for us at the moment. Hopefully we will have our heads together a bit better in a while and we can look again before we get to our 1 year miilestone. Everything costs so much money! I wish I had realised everything we would need to budget for but it is impossible isn't it? It's not really til you get here that you realise exactly what you need to get sorted... unless you are mega organised before you leave the UK and know it all. I sure didn't and I thought I had done so well with my silly checklists!!! Thanks for the replies. We are sticking with Medicare for now and are going to look into at least basic hospital cover just in case but are going to put away the cash each month for now as you suggest.

Maybe I am really stupid but I am struggling with this. We recently arrived in Melbourne and signed up for Medicare with a view to private healthcare insurance if/when we can afford it. Recently we got a letter from Medicare reminding us that we need to take out private insurance to avoid "loading" as we are over 30 so must do so withing 12 months of arriving in Oz otherwise face loading. I have looked at the govt website and I am still confused. What kind of private healthcare do we need to take out to avoid loading? Also, I naively thought the private health insurance vs Medicare was kind of like the UK where if you pay for private health cover, you go private. Everything included, none of this "gaps" etc business. It is very complex. I have looked at Hospital Cover with Medibank and a few other companies that add on "extras" for dental/optical but then go on to mention things like Chiro, OB/GYN etc so my head is spinning. Can anyone explain things simply for me? My husband keeps saying we will "get it sorted" but then nothing happens so I am being left to wade through it all myself and I am totally lost. When I searched on here for help, I got even more confused because a lot of people seem to have private health insurance (not sure what level/kind) but choose to use it only if they really need to as they can end up running up massive bills when you can just get treated on Medicare in a public hospital. Also, you can have private insurance but end up in a public hospital having to pay through the nose for it... Help! :arghh: I honestly want to scream!

Thanks for all the replies. I haven't been back on here for a while as we have all been ill with some horrible virus and then I forgot my password. Pom Queen - thanks for that. I have replied to Trudy and I hope I don't scare her off with my waffling! After posting on here and kind of admitting to myself how I am feeling about everything, I have found that I feel a little bit better. Most likely it is because I have realised that there are so many people on here that have felt the same way and it is NOT just me. Then again, it doesn't help me turn into an outgoing, easy-to-like person who can talk to anyone which is what I feel like I need to magically transform myself into. I am trying to get my head together and take on board that things ARE very different here, people talk about different things etc and that I am not going to be able to talk about stuff that I talk to my UK friends about which I think I was taking for granted as well. I didn't realise that I would be a complete stranger to everyone and vice versa (which sounds stupid but is the truth) like back in the UK if I met my friend for a coffee, you would just talk about anything and everything because you have known each other for 30 years!!! Or even the Mums from nursery... we may just have been acquaintances but our kids went to nursery together for a couple of years and even though it was just a few words each day it was 2 years worth of chat here and there so they were almost friends... Having no one at all that you know is harder than I thought - I actually didn't even think of this side of things. I worried about how much I would miss everyone we left behind but I didn't think for one minute about how much it would affect me when I don't know a single soul. I actually said "Oh! Hello!" to someone the other day and they did smile back with a confused expression. I thought it was my neighbour.... from our old house in the UK.... Woops! Looked just like her and by the time I realised it can't be her - I am in Australia! I had already given her a sunny Helloooooo!