DanLindsey Posted April 2, 2016 Share Posted April 2, 2016 Hello All!! My names Dan, I have a wife and a little boy who is 2. Were looking for a change and I would LOVE any advice...were very new to everything...so excuse all the questions! I have various qualifications including experience as a lead climber; Tree Surgeon / arborist.I have spoken to a company that would be willing to offer me 457 visa, how long would this usually take to apply and clear? Also does anyone know rough costs for this??!! Relocation - we have a flat here in the UK and have been planning on selling. Is it worth selling most of our belongings before coming over or would you suggest anything thats best being shipped? Food allergies - My son is allergic to milk and egg - can anyone help with how clearly packaged food is? Does it highlight any allergy foods in bold like in the UK? We would be looking at one of the suburbs outside of Sydney - merrylands / campbelltown does anyone have any other suggestions for good family friendly locations? On the cheaper side - 2 bedroom to rent for under $500-600... Budget - Its been suggested I will take home around $1400+ pw after tax. Are we being realistic to imagine we can all live on this budget (with my wife being a SAHM). As ive said we want to rent a 2bed for around 550 pw / food budget for around 400 pw? Then other bills including running a car of $150 pw...?? Any tips of bits we are missing please highlight :wacko:!! I cant help buy feel like it sounds to good to be true!! To be able to live off my wage alone. Cant wait to hear any feedback! Thanks Dan :wink: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JockinTas Posted April 2, 2016 Share Posted April 2, 2016 Hello All!! My names Dan, I have a wife and a little boy who is 2. Were looking for a change and I would LOVE any advice...were very new to everything...so excuse all the questions! I have various qualifications including experience as a lead climber; Tree Surgeon / arborist.I have spoken to a company that would be willing to offer me 457 visa, how long would this usually take to apply and clear? Also does anyone know rough costs for this??!! Relocation - we have a flat here in the UK and have been planning on selling. Is it worth selling most of our belongings before coming over or would you suggest anything thats best being shipped? Food allergies - My son is allergic to milk and egg - can anyone help with how clearly packaged food is? Does it highlight any allergy foods in bold like in the UK? We would be looking at one of the suburbs outside of Sydney - merrylands / campbelltown does anyone have any other suggestions for good family friendly locations? On the cheaper side - 2 bedroom to rent for under $500-600... Budget - Its been suggested I will take home around $1400+ pw after tax. Are we being realistic to imagine we can all live on this budget (with my wife being a SAHM). As ive said we want to rent a 2bed for around 550 pw / food budget for around 400 pw? Then other bills including running a car of $150 pw...?? Any tips of bits we are missing please highlight :wacko:!! I cant help buy feel like it sounds to good to be true!! To be able to live off my wage alone. Cant wait to hear any feedback! Thanks Dan :wink: Just be careful with the suburb of Merrylands. At one time it was a lovely suburb for families. Over the past few years however, there have been instances of drive-by shootings. Middle Eastern crime gangs are mostly responsible. http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/100-shootings-and-counting-merrylands-tops-driveby-list-20120911-25psc.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amibovered Posted April 2, 2016 Share Posted April 2, 2016 I see you are planning to sell up in the U.K but you do realise that the 457 is a temporary visa? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanLindsey Posted April 2, 2016 Author Share Posted April 2, 2016 Thanks for that, I am still doing research now into the best places to locate - that's definitely a downer!! I can see your located in Tasmania but is there anywhere you do recommended to look into? Thanks !! Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanLindsey Posted April 2, 2016 Author Share Posted April 2, 2016 Yes, were planning on selling our current property anyway - even if we didn't end up going to Aus. Thanks for the anyway! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LKC Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 Hello All!! My names Dan, I have a wife and a little boy who is 2. Were looking for a change and I would LOVE any advice...were very new to everything...so excuse all the questions! I have various qualifications including experience as a lead climber; Tree Surgeon / arborist.I have spoken to a company that would be willing to offer me 457 visa, how long would this usually take to apply and clear? Also does anyone know rough costs for this??!! Relocation - we have a flat here in the UK and have been planning on selling. Is it worth selling most of our belongings before coming over or would you suggest anything thats best being shipped? Food allergies - My son is allergic to milk and egg - can anyone help with how clearly packaged food is? Does it highlight any allergy foods in bold like in the UK? We would be looking at one of the suburbs outside of Sydney - merrylands / campbelltown does anyone have any other suggestions for good family friendly locations? On the cheaper side - 2 bedroom to rent for under $500-600... Budget - Its been suggested I will take home around $1400+ pw after tax. Are we being realistic to imagine we can all live on this budget (with my wife being a SAHM). As ive said we want to rent a 2bed for around 550 pw / food budget for around 400 pw? Then other bills including running a car of $150 pw...?? Any tips of bits we are missing please highlight :wacko:!! I cant help buy feel like it sounds to good to be true!! To be able to live off my wage alone. Cant wait to hear any feedback! Thanks Dan :wink: I can't help you with the visa costs because it has been seven years since we applied for ours and I am sure that things have changed. Likewise with the timeframe, our visa was granted within 4 days, but I understand that that is extremely unusual. With respect to the 457, please bear in mind that it is a temporary visa, and if you happen to lose your job you will have 90 days to find another sponsor or leave the country. This may not bother you particularly, but as someone who also has children I can imagine that such a situation would be very stressful for me. Also with the 457 you will only get reciprocal healthcare, and won't get any help towards childcare (or schooling once your little boy gets to school age) and you would have to pay for those things privately. Long daycare is very expensive (upwards of $90 a day), and even if your wife doesn't intend to work you may find that she needs childcare occasionally - it is hard when you don't have family support nearby and you need a break. School fees, even at public school, would be around the $5000 per year mark. I think that Catholic schools can work out cheaper, but I don't know for sure. You would have to balance up the cost of shipping with the cost of replacement. If you look at the Aussie IKEA site (for example) it would give you an idea of what it would cost to replace your belongings. There are other furniture stores, of course. IKEA is just one that most people are familiar with and could compare to the UK IKEA prices. Food allergies, no problem. Allergy info is labelled clearly on packets in my experience. I would probably mirror what has been said above about the suburbs you mention. Merrylands and Campbelltown are often in the news for shootings, drug busts etc, although to be honest drugs seems to be an increasing problem everywhere. I don't know if you have mentioned those particular suburbs because that is where the job is, or whether you have just picked them because they are a fair way from Sydney, but there are probably better suburbs to look at. I don't know that area well (other than what I hear in the news), but I would always recommend Sutherland Shire to people as a lovely place to live. It can be expensive (particularly in the beach/river side suburbs), but you would be able to find an apartment or small villa in a complex for that sort of budget around Sutherland or Miranda. Budget-wise you may struggle a little bit on that salary in Sydney. I would say that your food budget is about right (ours is similar, although we are a family of four), car costs will vary but to give you an idea I have a Nissan X-Trail which costs about $500 per year in rego, $600 per year in compulsory third party insurance (CTP or green-slip as it's known) and then about $750 in comprehensive insurance (female, over 40, never had an accident/fine). It is used during the week for the school run and occasionally for my OH to go to work, and at weekends it is used for day trips and also for holidays. It costs about $70 a fortnight/three weeks in fuel. We manage with one car, although we used to have two, and if you were living in a fairly central area you would probably be fine with one car, although other people will tell you otherwise. We don't have finance on the car, but you would need to factor this in if you needed it. Other costs include $500 per quarter for electricity, $300 per quarter for water, $120 per month for two mobile phones and $135 per month for Telstra phone/internet package. Your electricity costs would likely be lower than ours (we have a pool pump running and a big fish tank with two pumps and a heater), although we do have solar hot water and solar electricity to offset some of that. To be honest a huge amount depends on you and how you live your lives. We managed on OH's salary of $65k to start with, but we had savings behind us to help if we needed a boost. We certainly couldn't manage to live on that little now, the cost of living has increased hugely (and thankfully so has OH's salary). If you are like us, happy to cut your cloth to fit I think you would be okay. However, if you like to eat out often and like to take exotic holidays you might find it a bit more of a challenge. I made a spreadsheet of costs before we came which helped me to see whether we could afford to do it, and I would advise anyone considering the move to do the same. You can use online shopping sites etc to compare what you spend on things in the UK to what you would spend here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
amibovered Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 One other cost to bear in mind is schooling for your lad when the time comes, as a temporary visa holder you will have to pay, I think it's $5000 a year in NSW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DanLindsey Posted April 3, 2016 Author Share Posted April 3, 2016 I can't help you with the visa costs because it has been seven years since we applied for ours and I am sure that things have changed. Likewise with the timeframe, our visa was granted within 4 days, but I understand that that is extremely unusual. With respect to the 457, please bear in mind that it is a temporary visa, and if you happen to lose your job you will have 90 days to find another sponsor or leave the country. This may not bother you particularly, but as someone who also has children I can imagine that such a situation would be very stressful for me. Also with the 457 you will only get reciprocal healthcare, and won't get any help towards childcare (or schooling once your little boy gets to school age) and you would have to pay for those things privately. Long daycare is very expensive (upwards of $90 a day), and even if your wife doesn't intend to work you may find that she needs childcare occasionally - it is hard when you don't have family support nearby and you need a break. School fees, even at public school, would be around the $5000 per year mark. I think that Catholic schools can work out cheaper, but I don't know for sure. You would have to balance up the cost of shipping with the cost of replacement. If you look at the Aussie IKEA site (for example) it would give you an idea of what it would cost to replace your belongings. There are other furniture stores, of course. IKEA is just one that most people are familiar with and could compare to the UK IKEA prices. Food allergies, no problem. Allergy info is labelled clearly on packets in my experience. I would probably mirror what has been said above about the suburbs you mention. Merrylands and Campbelltown are often in the news for shootings, drug busts etc, although to be honest drugs seems to be an increasing problem everywhere. I don't know if you have mentioned those particular suburbs because that is where the job is, or whether you have just picked them because they are a fair way from Sydney, but there are probably better suburbs to look at. I don't know that area well (other than what I hear in the news), but I would always recommend Sutherland Shire to people as a lovely place to live. It can be expensive (particularly in the beach/river side suburbs), but you would be able to find an apartment or small villa in a complex for that sort of budget around Sutherland or Miranda. Budget-wise you may struggle a little bit on that salary in Sydney. I would say that your food budget is about right (ours is similar, although we are a family of four), car costs will vary but to give you an idea I have a Nissan X-Trail which costs about $500 per year in rego, $600 per year in compulsory third party insurance (CTP or green-slip as it's known) and then about $750 in comprehensive insurance (female, over 40, never had an accident/fine). It is used during the week for the school run and occasionally for my OH to go to work, and at weekends it is used for day trips and also for holidays. It costs about $70 a fortnight/three weeks in fuel. We manage with one car, although we used to have two, and if you were living in a fairly central area you would probably be fine with one car, although other people will tell you otherwise. We don't have finance on the car, but you would need to factor this in if you needed it. Other costs include $500 per quarter for electricity, $300 per quarter for water, $120 per month for two mobile phones and $135 per month for Telstra phone/internet package. Your electricity costs would likely be lower than ours (we have a pool pump running and a big fish tank with two pumps and a heater), although we do have solar hot water and solar electricity to offset some of that. To be honest a huge amount depends on you and how you live your lives. We managed on OH's salary of $65k to start with, but we had savings behind us to help if we needed a boost. We certainly couldn't manage to live on that little now, the cost of living has increased hugely (and thankfully so has OH's salary). If you are like us, happy to cut your cloth to fit I think you would be okay. However, if you like to eat out often and like to take exotic holidays you might find it a bit more of a challenge. I made a spreadsheet of costs before we came which helped me to see whether we could afford to do it, and I would advise anyone considering the move to do the same. You can use online shopping sites etc to compare what you spend on things in the UK to what you would spend here. Thank you so much for taking the time to write this up, you have been unbelievably helpful! So many things you have mentioned have given us food for thought! My employer has suggested it would be a 457 visa with the intention of extending to a perm visa after Ive proven my skills set ect. We looked into the daily cost of childcare (with the thoughts of our little boy going 1 day a week but as you've said the cost of it would be too high based on our budget. 'Also with the 457 you will only get reciprocal healthcare' Thanks for the heads up - any ideas where I can search to work out healthcare cover costs for the 3 of us, does it work like medical insurance? We will do a dummy Ikea shop ! Again thanks for the tip. Also the breakdown of costs around running a car are useful!We only plan on using the 1 car and like you had, we will have some savings that we bring over with us to pay for upfront costs e.g. car & coverage for a year and a bond on apartment. We do not plan on eating out much at all (we want to make the most of the outdoor BBQ's) and were not big drinkers - currently we both work full time and feel we dont have much quality time with our son. The main reason we look to move is to give my wife time with our little boy and we are well aware we will need to make some cutbacks to adjust to 1 wage and the cost of living in Sydney. Well - the biggest Thanks needs to be for pointing us the right way to take a look at Sutherland Shire. I hadn't been looking so close to the coast as I didn't expect our rental budget to allow it. One of the reasons we looked into the 2 towns mentioned was because they seemed to have apartments to fit our budget but Sutherland Shire looks so much nicer and is the same prices. The company Ive been talking to are based North of Botany Bay - so thats only 30 minutes in a car from that location. We have a running list of costs - I will transfer over to a spreadsheet with comparison! The guide you provided on costs will help with that. Thanks! Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LKC Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 Have a look at Janali and Kirawee too, again pretty nice suburbs and should be affordable. You could also look at Engadine, although prices there are getting more expensive and it is a little bit further out it is a great suburb with a real family-friendly feel to it. It has a lovely shopping area with cafes, banks, post office, supermarkets etc, and is surrounded by national park. Great schools and lots of playgroups etc too. With the health insurance, I can't be ever so helpful because we don't have it and it wasn't a requirement when we had our 457. It is pretty expensive, you should be able to get an idea of cost if you do quotes on the insurance company websites. Reciprocal Medicare will cover you for necessary stuff, I am sure I've heard of people taking insurance for the 457 visa grant then cancelling it once they get here and just using Medicare but I don't know if you can still do that. In my opinion medical insurance here is a huge waste of money, you still end up paying the gap over and above what the insurance company pay for, so you're better off putting your money into a savings account and paying privately from that if need be. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LKC Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 Oh, forgot to say that if you are working in the Botany area Sutherland Shire is a good option. It might take you closer to 45 minutes to an hour during rush hour though, if the traffic is bad and depending on where exactly in Sutherland Shire you are. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Patphillips47 Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 IKEA costs in Oz much dearer than the UK mind so look as prices on IKEA Australia to get an overall idea Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bungo Posted April 5, 2016 Share Posted April 5, 2016 Thank you so much for taking the time to write this up, you have been unbelievably helpful! So many things you have mentioned have given us food for thought! My employer has suggested it would be a 457 visa with the intention of extending to a perm visa after Ive proven my skills set ect. We looked into the daily cost of childcare (with the thoughts of our little boy going 1 day a week but as you've said the cost of it would be too high based on our budget. 'Also with the 457 you will only get reciprocal healthcare' Thanks for the heads up - any ideas where I can search to work out healthcare cover costs for the 3 of us, does it work like medical insurance? We will do a dummy Ikea shop ! Again thanks for the tip. Also the breakdown of costs around running a car are useful!We only plan on using the 1 car and like you had, we will have some savings that we bring over with us to pay for upfront costs e.g. car & coverage for a year and a bond on apartment. We do not plan on eating out much at all (we want to make the most of the outdoor BBQ's) and were not big drinkers - currently we both work full time and feel we dont have much quality time with our son. The main reason we look to move is to give my wife time with our little boy and we are well aware we will need to make some cutbacks to adjust to 1 wage and the cost of living in Sydney. Well - the biggest Thanks needs to be for pointing us the right way to take a look at Sutherland Shire. I hadn't been looking so close to the coast as I didn't expect our rental budget to allow it. One of the reasons we looked into the 2 towns mentioned was because they seemed to have apartments to fit our budget but Sutherland Shire looks so much nicer and is the same prices. The company Ive been talking to are based North of Botany Bay - so thats only 30 minutes in a car from that location. We have a running list of costs - I will transfer over to a spreadsheet with comparison! The guide you provided on costs will help with that. Thanks! Dan Just see what kind of assurances you can get with moving to a permanent visa if this is your desire. Although to be honest, even with it written down it doesn't mean that the employer will have to sponsor for a permanent visa or is even able to. So there will always be a risk attached to a 457 visa for those wanting to move for good. But I would still rather have something writen down than not! Have you looked into a skills assessment for your occupation? If the employer is to sponosr you for a permanent visa within the first two years you would need a skillls assessment, without a skills assessment you would need to spend two years on the temporary visa. Health insurance will probably be $200 a month or so, well ours was just under that for two adults, yours could possibly be more because of your visa. It seems that not all 457 holders have private health insurance anyway and rely upon the reciprocal cover, if you are all generally healthy it might be something you would want to consider in view of the tight budget. It doesn't really work like UK health insurance, sometimes you can be worse off for having it in financial terms anyway, although obviously it helps to beat queues if required. As you are being relocated, I would see if the employer provides any relocation assistance. Replacing all your belongings is likely to be more expensive than shipping them. Glad you have been steered away from your initial suburb choices! They are cheap for a reason. Sydney suburbs are sort of grouped together into areas like Eastern Suburbs, North Shore, Northern Beaches, Sutherlandshire etc. Sutherlandshire is a good lower cost option compared to the others that I have listed there and seems like a sensible place to start looking. But I am drawn back to a comment in your first post about it sounding too good to be true. Actually this is a really low salary for a family to be living on in Sydney and you might find it very hard. Do you really need to move to Sydney in order for your wife to give up work? It sounds kind of unusual to be honest as Sydney is more expensive than just about anywhere in the UK except London. So perhaps you are currently in London? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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