themod53 Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 Hi all, I know questions regarding ‘Budgets’ have potentially been answered a 1000 times over, but looking for some clarification / advice from people who have previously made the move from the UK to Sydney. I have searched high and low through previous posts and found snippets of information but not enough to satisfy my curiosity. In brief, we’re (the wife and I are) moving over to Sydney at the start of September 2014, neither of us have jobs lined up as of yet, and would doubt if we would able to pick anything up before we get there. However, I have started to pro-actively make contact with a number of recruiters. ‘Hallelujah’ there is interest (always a bonus) but not until we are actually onshore. About us - Wife is Australian (33) professional Make-up artist and me (36) an ICT / Digital Project Manager. I have a subclass 100 visa. Ok back to budgeting, we've saved around $40K, which would give us in the region of $6k a month for a budgeted period of around 7 months for rent, living expenses and other bills without jobs. High on the risk register is the possibility of a couple of month’s unemployment. Though, I'm really hoping to pick up something within the first 2 to 3 months or hopefully sooner. Hoping to hit the ground running as we feel it would be easier for me from an integration perspective, wife has friends, family and social things she’ll be able to slip right back into. Will be looking at renting Eastern Suburbs / Randwick / Inner West. Flights and shipping are all paid up and all other known incidentals have also been covered off. It’s just budgeting for the bedding in period that has me a little stumped, mainly due to not having any experience of moving countries to measure and plan against. If I'm honest with myself, I’m not quite sure what I should worried about really, perhaps it’s the apprehensive nervous energy as the clock ticks closer to the move date. As a PM by profession and nature, I love to plan and have to scrutinise my budget, assess risk and make sure we have a contingency plan in the case of things not going according to plan – of which life seldom does. Moving’s not like planning for/delivering a software build project :cute: that’s easy!!! Also looking into joining a local cricket club and perhaps looking to take up some of the more indigenous sports like surfing and AFL to meet people. Guessing the purpose of this post is to hear about other forum member’s experiences, trials and tribulations with a move of such epic proportions/budgets/bedding in period, and any advice they can give to someone just about to make the move. Thanks in advance Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hoffer Posted June 4, 2014 Share Posted June 4, 2014 I landed and had a job immediately and still spent $50k (excluding salary) in the first few months. Its amazing how quickly everything adds up Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canadianaussie Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 I landed and had a job immediately and still spent $50k (excluding salary) in the first few months. Its amazing how quickly everything adds up How???? Aside from a very expensive car or home deposit I don't know how you could possibly rack up $50000 in 2 months. I'm curious! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest hoffer Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 How???? Aside from a very expensive car or home deposit I don't know how you could possibly rack up $50000 in 2 months. I'm curious! Its really not difficult. Two cars at $20k each a rental deposit of $4k and first months rent swallows it easily. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3FatCats Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 It can be done on a limited budget but it might not be very much fun! :sad: We had 1 income to start with (and a low one at that), I ended up being unemployed for 10 months. No kids, but 3 cats. The first year was dicey... we rented a crap house at $500 a week and I bought a small car on finance, OH had a company car. I rented white goods until the container arrived, and just bought a cheap sofa bed from IKEA to sleep on and a plastic folding table and 2 chairs. The Redollar stores and Kmart are good for cheap kitchen goods. You could also consider sending 2 or 3 boxes of your belongings via air freight so they arrive 3 days after you do, use Transglobal for a quote. This will save you purchasing the first necessities locally. Obviously during that first period we didn't go to restaurants or have holidays and all luxuries were banned until I managed to find a job, we dipped into savings some months when we just couldn't make the books balance. Looking back it was hard, but we pulled together as a family and really appreciated the odd treat we could afford! As soon as I found a job we served notice on our rental and moved to a better house that cost $120 extra a month, not much, but made a huge difference in living quality. We could also then afford to buy the odd bit of furniture, have a holiday break, go out to dinner and generally feel more upbeat. Once funds had been saved we also paid off the car. The big $$ will go on securing your first rental, buying a car, paying the insurance on it, paying for internet and bills and equipping yourself with any bits you may need until your stuff arrives. I am of the opinion you cut your cloth to suit, if I had unlimited funds then of course I would have spent it on better and more expensive things, but I didn't so just chose what I could afford and made the most of things until my circumstances improved. Good luck! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
canadianaussie Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Its really not difficult. Two cars at $20k each a rental deposit of $4k and first months rent swallows it easily. Ok, well I guess most new migrants won't be spending $40,000 on cars within the first few months. I got a good reliable car for about $5000. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
themod53 Posted June 5, 2014 Author Share Posted June 5, 2014 Thanks for the reply's - Wow 50K in two months, I can honestly say that we haven't budgeted 20k for a car! personally, we've made a concious decision to move close to the city so we wouldn't need a car from day 1. Only after sorting a job do I feel it would be feasible to buy a car, unless a really good deal come up and then could justify the expenditure at that point. I'm guessing the job location factor would come into play if outside of the city and not being commutable by bus / train, a car would rapidly move up the priority order. However, I would then have a job so the expenditure on a car wouldn't really be as much of an impact on the budget as not having a job, if that makes sense? The budget would then would be managed via incoming salary rather than the initial expenditure from savings. 3 fat cats - I would have to agree, its all about management of expectation over the first couple of months, we'll need to live within our means! We can't initially expect to eat out 3 to 4 times a week without jobs, I wouldn't do that in London without a job, it's all semantics really - either that, or will end up living with the in-laws if we blow our savings. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k8bug79 Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Hi all, I know questions regarding ‘Budgets’ have potentially been answered a 1000 times over, but looking for some clarification / advice from people who have previously made the move from the UK to Sydney. I have searched high and low through previous posts and found snippets of information but not enough to satisfy my curiosity. In brief, we’re (the wife and I are) moving over to Sydney at the start of September 2014, neither of us have jobs lined up as of yet, and would doubt if we would able to pick anything up before we get there. However, I have started to pro-actively make contact with a number of recruiters. ‘Hallelujah’ there is interest (always a bonus) but not until we are actually onshore. About us - Wife is Australian (33) professional Make-up artist and me (36) an ICT / Digital Project Manager. I have a subclass 100 visa. Ok back to budgeting, we've saved around $40K, which would give us in the region of $6k a month for a budgeted period of around 7 months for rent, living expenses and other bills without jobs. High on the risk register is the possibility of a couple of month’s unemployment. Though, I'm really hoping to pick up something within the first 2 to 3 months or hopefully sooner. Hoping to hit the ground running as we feel it would be easier for me from an integration perspective, wife has friends, family and social things she’ll be able to slip right back into. Will be looking at renting Eastern Suburbs / Randwick / Inner West. Flights and shipping are all paid up and all other known incidentals have also been covered off. It’s just budgeting for the bedding in period that has me a little stumped, mainly due to not having any experience of moving countries to measure and plan against. If I'm honest with myself, I’m not quite sure what I should worried about really, perhaps it’s the apprehensive nervous energy as the clock ticks closer to the move date. As a PM by profession and nature, I love to plan and have to scrutinise my budget, assess risk and make sure we have a contingency plan in the case of things not going according to plan – of which life seldom does. Moving’s not like planning for/delivering a software build project :cute: that’s easy!!! Also looking into joining a local cricket club and perhaps looking to take up some of the more indigenous sports like surfing and AFL to meet people. Guessing the purpose of this post is to hear about other forum member’s experiences, trials and tribulations with a move of such epic proportions/budgets/bedding in period, and any advice they can give to someone just about to make the move. Thanks in advance We moved last September UK to Sydney. We had $22K inc flights and shipping. We are us 2 and 3 kids and we managed. My husband got a part time job quickly as a chef, he secured a rental and paid 3 months in advance and bought a cheap car and what we hadn't shipped and needed 2nd hand. We connected internet but didn't get any other outgoings straight off. Stayed as PAYG mobiles, no medical/ house/ car insurance. We only added things in once I was working and now 9 months in we are settled have a house of furniture are fully insured for the usual bits and about to go and test drive a new car. It will depend on what your jobs as to how quick you'll find work. My husband has had 3 jobs since arriving here and got each within a day of looking for them. Mine didn't come up til December which I still consider pretty good going, I had ruled out anything til February. It's very doable and I disagree with the poster above who says it's not fun- I really enjoyed the adventure and the only stressful bit fr us was our first landlord doing the dirty and we had to move sooner than we anticipated. Good luck Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
themod53 Posted June 5, 2014 Author Share Posted June 5, 2014 Hi K8Bug79, That's great news that such a big move can be done on a budget as you expressed in your post, and your situation is totally different from our as we have no kids in tow. Congrats for making it work for you, also glad to hear you picked up a job you like. The Digital IT sector is rather buoyant at the moment, or so I have been led to believe. We'll just have to see when we arrive I guess, if it all goes belly up then back to the drawing board. Also sorry to hear about the landlord! unfortunately they seem to be everywhere! Seems to me it's all about baby steps when you first land. At first necessities and build from there once a job is secured, etc.... Actually really glad there are so many people who are willing to give good honest advice on this forum. What would people advise as real do's and don't when you first arrive? We've done as much as we can so far from the UK, like setting up bank accounts, sorted shipping, tax numbers etc... Paid off all bills and credit cards. I know this may sound like a simple questions, but do you notify government bodies like the HMRC when you're leaving the UK? It's not something physically looked into at all and only just occurred to me this morning! Apart from Friends and Family, is there anyone else I would need to inform on leaving the UK for the foreseeable future/for good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haze9229 Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Hi, I hope you don't mind me muscling in on your thread themod53, but I'm in a similar position to you and think this info will be very helpful to me too. Myself and my partner (both mid twenties) are also moving out to Sydney in September and trying to order the whirlwind of information/decisions that are flying around at the moment. We are also considering the same areas as you stated to live in, but we've got to the point in our research where we just need to get there and have a look around ourselves, and guessing you may be in the same boat? I must admit, I'm very nervous about the prospect of being unemployed for the first time but I'm trying to overcome that with the excitment of the potential prospects! Although we've booked our removals etc too, I'm still digging around for information and I'll happily pass on anything that may be helpful to you Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cathy99 Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Hi there Well this will make you feel rich, when we arrived 5 months ago we only had $800 cash and $3,600 in the bank! We're on a 457 visa so my husband started his job after a week of being here and gets paid weekly so we had a wage virtually straight away! We were lucky though his boss bought a car for us to use indefinitely, just need to pay for petrol and he paid for our first 2.5 weeks accommodation whilst we were looking for rentals, we also have two children. We managed though, did all the sightseeing etc the bond on the house was £2,100 + 2 weeks rent so $3,200, we bought stuff off of gumtree to keep us going until our shipping arrived, but like someone else said you cut your cloth accordingly, we were never extravagent at home, we hardly had take aways or ate out so it was the norm to us. We now live in a lovely house in the hills area, still one wage at the moment but doing better than we were in the uk on two wages! The two main things i would advise is get your mobile unlocked in the uk before you come then you can just buy a sim card, optus are pretty good. Also some advice I got from here before I came is get yourself a rental pack together because every property you view and want to apply for you have to fill in an application form, usually one each, and also attach a copy of passports, bank statements, drivers licence, utility bills and character references. I also enclosed my last mortgage statement as proof of up to date payments. Also as soon as you can when you arrive register for your medicare card as it's a good tool to have for id purposes. On that note, with 40K you're laughing!! :laugh: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haze9229 Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Thanks Cathy! That's really helpful. My partner is too on a 457 visa and will be starting his new job shortly after arrival. We are also lucky in the fact that he will be provided with a company car and his employers will put us up for a couple of weeks whilst we find our feet. We will have some savings but luckily won't have to pay out for a car as I will rely on public transport and then we will have my Partners company car for weekend trips etc. One thing I am keen to ask about is the rental pack that you mentioned. I've heard that the rental market is very competitive and I have been trying to prepare documents the best I can but if you could ellaborate at all on this point I's be extremely grateful Thanks, Hazel Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
themod53 Posted June 5, 2014 Author Share Posted June 5, 2014 Welcome to the thread Hazel, great to hear from other to be migrant in the same boat as us. Agreed the thought of being without a job really scares me as I've not been out of work in 13 years. Thanks Cathy - all knowledge shared will be beneficial when we touch down. Yes this rental pack sounds intereting, will take references from UK landlords? Character references from friends / former employers? When you mention utility bills do you still refering to the most recent paid up bills from the UK? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
k8bug79 Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 You can fill a form jn for HMRC which will speed ip a tax teturn. Also don't forget tv licence as you have paid up in advance. If you don't do the form for hmrc it shouldn't matter just means you won't get a tax refund til next year when tgeg do end of year reconciliation and you'd need to ket them know where to deposit money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3FatCats Posted June 5, 2014 Share Posted June 5, 2014 Just on rental "pack". As well as photocopies of all your documents, I wrote a covering letter explaining who we are, our background, why we were in Aus, that we had property in the UK/Europe, reliably payed mortgage, were also landlords etc. etc. Anything you can put in there that will make you come across as a potentially reliable tenant is a plus. If you have pets and think it will be a problem, write something about them too, offer an extra deposit for pets if you really want a particular property. You need to turn yourself into a mini marketing project and sell yourself as best as possible, so you stand out from all the other applications. Saying that, a lot of folk also secured their rentals very easily, so the strength of your rental pack will probably be more effective in places where there is high demand or you have strong competition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cathy99 Posted June 6, 2014 Share Posted June 6, 2014 Hi Hazel, yes the rental market is very competitive and also, obviously closer to the cbd you are the more expensive it is! it's nothing like back in the uk - I think I can honestly during the whole process of emigrating (we only started the process in April 2013 and moved out January 2014) the hardest thing for us was finding a suitable rental. I'll tell you how I did it. Once my husband was offered a job I knew which area he would be working in, so from that I did a lot of research on suburbs and areas within Sydney. I googled the 10 best suburbs to live, wrote them down then I would google maps the distance from my husbands work to these areas - I then wrote them down in my book (I have a note book for everything australia related that I would write everything down in from schools, to banks, to shipping, doctors etc) so that when we got here and started looking on the real estate agents websites I knew which area's I wanted to search. Next, as i have kids i researched the schools in these areas so I could narrow the search down even more, because obviously it's all very well getting the house, but if the school isn't that great then there's not much point, and you don't want to be moving around all the time! I then got my rental pack together, I made lots and lots of photocopies of all of our passports (as school will want them too), mine and my husbands driving licence, I had copies of the last 3 months bank statements so they could see a healthy bank account. If you have any friends or your new employers in australia ask them to do a reference for you either character and professional. I had one from some friends in Perth and also my husbands boss did one to confirm is place of work, a copy of last 6 months mortgage statements, we also rented a little cottage for 4 weeks before we left so I asked if they could do a reference too. I didn't include bills but wished I had so that would be a could idea anything that basically shows the landlord that you're a good tenant, will look after the place and can pay the rent (this is what one of the real estate agents told me they look for). I did a covering lettering explaining that we were landlords ourselves (we rent our house out back home) so know the importance of renting etc. The more you can do before you get here the easier it will be for you, the last think you want to be doing is trying to find somewhere to make photocopies of everything so you can include them with your application. When you turn up to view a property it's nothing like it is in England (my friends in Perth had pre-warned me), they generally have an open house on Saturdays and you turn up along with about 6 other families, all looking around at the same time, then you fill out the application form include all your paperwork which the agent submits to the landlord and you basically wait for a phone call to see if they liked you!:confused: Like I said I found this really hard as we had the kids with us (obviously no grandparents to look after them!), we had google maps on our phones and it was a case of planning when the viewings were, where and working out how many in one day we could manage, in the heat at the time, filling out application after application, knowing you need to get our of your apartment in a few days, it was very stressful - I think we were lucky and viewed about 8 before we got one! Then it was trying to find stuff on gumtree and co-ordinate trying to pick it up when my husband finished work again with the kids in tow - it was horrible:arghh: But we did it, we knew it wasn't going to be easy, but now we're in the kids are settled at school, we've made friends with the neighbours, I walk the children to school which is a 5 minute walk away and it's all worth it - especially for the children and the outdoor lifestyle x Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KLexpat Posted July 23, 2014 Share Posted July 23, 2014 I'm happy to find this thread as well. I've been putting together a relocation budget and we are concerned about how much it will realistically be to set up home. We haven't even got our visa granted yet but we want to move relatively quickly, so it makes sense to do our homework now. Good luck with your moves! We're planning a recce as soon as our visas are granted and hopeful that my OH will be able to secure work from here which would help massively with the budget. It's much easier for us to visit from here though than the UK as we live in Malaysia at the moment. However, my friends in Sydney seemed confident that we would find work fairly quickly if we had to move down with employment secured first. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cheese please Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 I arrived into Sydney under similar circumstances (Aussie partner, decent savings behind us and no kids) just under three months ago and if it helps you to hear, things are going well for us so far. We budgeted for three months in Sydney without either of us working (six months out of work in total, as we took the opportunity to travel on the way over to Australia), as we were hopeful that at least one of us would be able to pick up some sort of work in that time. I work in the Digital Comms sector and I knew it was a bit more buoyant out here compared to the UK, but I was very surprised to pick up a long term temporary contract within a month and that was despite of having a couple of initial lazy couple of weeks after arrival staying with the mother-in-law. My partner then secured a permanent role as a sales manager a month after me. I really don’t think you’ll struggle if you’ve got some good experience behind you in IT. As my work isn’t permanent, I still get the daily job emails and there really is quite a lot out there in that sector at the moment. Happily, I’m earning a lot more than I was in the UK, but then I was in Edinburgh not London, so you might not be as impressed as I was. The fact that you’re on a subclass 100 is a benefit. I’m on a 309 and that’s considered a temporary visa still, so some places, particularly government departments, won’t employ you on a permanent contract. As far as renting, we had a similar area identified to you, but found that after a first sweep we needed to reduce the area we were looking as there’s just too much distance to cover when you’re squeezing in all the viewings on a Saturday morning. Plus it all gets rather overwhelming. We ended up in Randwick, a decision that we’re really happy about as it’s got all the transport links, has lots of amenities and is a 20 minute amble to Coogee beach. It may be an issue for you to secure a rental before either of you having secured a job. We had to be a bit creative about what we said about that…. let’s say that having in laws that have their own business came in handy. We also offered to pay six months rent up front, which was accepted as we didn’t have evidence of recent income. We got a great reference from our letting agency back in Scotland and that was most definitely accepted. Good luck with your journey. It’s a very exciting, scary and crazy time. Happy to answer any more questions you have. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BadgerLady Posted July 24, 2014 Share Posted July 24, 2014 You're more than OK. I arrived with £12,000 and didn't even look for work for the first nine months Doing it on a low budget can be even more fun if you're up for the adventure! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Byrneuk Posted August 2, 2014 Share Posted August 2, 2014 We arrive in Sydney tomorrow and sound to be in the same situ as all of you. Very anxious esp after looking at the state and cost of rentals on Domain! We will keep you posted on what we find out! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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