Newbie looking to move to Adelaide

[Purplesparkle]

Hi all!

 

Just thought that I would introduce myself and also ask for some advice/support/ help!

 

We are a family of 4 hoping to move to Adelaide hopefully in around 12 months time (all dependant on jobs/visa etc) We are still at the very beginning of our adventure and any help is most definitely welcome!

 

I originally trained as a Learning Disability Nurse but then did my health visiting degree a few years ago. I am hoping to carry out with my health visiting or Child and Family Nurse i believe in Oz. My husband is a Parts Supervisor for a commercial truck/van garage here which we think is titled as a Parts Interpretor in Oz. If anyone has any advice re agencies/job websites that would help us find out what is out there we would be very grateful! We would ideally like to look to get a 457 visa. Any advice re nursing registration etc would be fab!

 

My son is 12 and my daughter is 6 so any advice re schools / childcare would be really valuable.

 

Also any advice re cost of living / nice areas etc please let us know!

 

Sorry for all the questions!

 

Thanks and hope to chat with some of you soon!

 

Purplesparkle

[Blossom]

Welcome to the forum. It sounds like you would probably be coming over on your occupation. Were you hoping for employer sponsored or an independent visa?

[John Browning]

if you have a choice:

 

- you might want to aim to arrive in the cooler months and acclimatise gently (-refer threads on AirCon; staying cool etc)

 

- rent before you buy (refer Household and Accommodation tags)

 

- line up (-some-) work before you arrive... paradoxically, it's always easier to switch jobs than find one when you are unemployed.

 

- get your head around Medicare (-it is different to the NHS), and try not to get spooked by stories about waiting lists and out- of- pocket medical expenses.

+ Do your elective treatments, vaccinations etc while you are waiting for visas

 

- line up a holiday break within the first three months, (- you will need it) but avoid going back to the UK for about three years,if you can ....( Refer: PingPong Poms)

 

- line up a visit from relatives when you are settled, in the meantime get them all used to Skype and internet contact

 

-get the kids involved with their full range of after- school activities asap

 

- SA has a common language, a common culture and a common political / legal history. That said, it is likely to take you a while to work out what people are really talking about, what Australians value , and how things actually work

 

.....this is not the same country -never was

 

 

 

happy hunting

 

JB

[philkin]

Hi,

 

Welcome to the forum,

 

We are new here and hope to be heading out to Adelaide in April. I think this forum is the best place to get the answers to all we need to know.

 

Good luck with your visa process.

 

Regards

Phil

[Blueskytoday]

Hi purplesparkle,

We are in similar situation to your family, we are just starting the process. We have never even been to aus on holiday but I'm so excited at the thought of having an adventure.

 

we are hoping to visit family in Gawler near Adelaide this year.

i am also a health visitor and hoping to apply for skilled migrant visa with this qualification.

my husband is a joiner. We have a 15 yr old daughter and 11 yr old son and two dogs.

 

i have booked the IELTS academic test for 27.02 16 to get the process started.

[snifter]

Hi purplesparkle,

We are in similar situation to your family, we are just starting the process. We have never even been to aus on holiday but I'm so excited at the thought of having an adventure.

 

we are hoping to visit family in Gawler near Adelaide this year.

i am also a health visitor and hoping to apply for skilled migrant visa with this qualification.

my husband is a joiner. We have a 15 yr old daughter and 11 yr old son and two dogs.

 

i have booked the IELTS academic test for 27.02 16 to get the process started.

 

Hello and welcome

 

Just wanted to mention the age of your daughter in relation to her GCSE's and then Aus schooling. I'd guess she will complete these before moving? It would perhaps be a good idea to as transferring across slap bang in the final couple of years of school here may be tricky in terms of the not being familiar with the system, subjects, exams being taken and so on. Of course there is the IB to look in to also if need be. But just wanted to mention it as it is an area that would concern me if making the move with a teen that age.

 

A visit would be good if you can manage it. Gawler is a town north of Adelaide but you should be able to check out plenty of places if you are over on holiday and have access to a car. Its almost an hour into the CBD from there I'd think and a bit longer if you wanted to head to say the western beaches of Henley or Glenelg though Semaphore and a couple of others are closer. There is so much to see that being based north there you may not get to it all. Also if you wanted to check out other potential areas to live and were looking elsewhere you'd have a few day trips to take them in. Not a bad thing as you could check out the coastline down south, the hills and the small towns up in them and the hills suburbs, the eastern area, western beaches and so on. They would all be good day trips on their own anyways.

Edited January 3, 2016 by snifter
added a line

[Blueskytoday]

Thanks snifter for your reply,

yes we have thought about our daughters GCSEs, she is doing very well in school and we don't want to disrupt that. She is in year 10 now and will be in her final year sept 2016, taking exams may 2017. She is very academic and is hoping to do a levels. We will need to look in to the I.b.

She is quite happy to come after GCSEs as all her friends are going to different colleges etc.

 

thats 18 months from now which seems ages but will give us time to hopefully get visa etc in place.

[Wanderlust]

Hi,

 

We are new to the forum,too. We are a family of three,y hubby,me nd our 2 yr old husky boy.

We are hoping to make the move in February, if all goes to plan. We have never been to Oz, but are very excited about this move and starting a new chapter in our life.

Any advice on petfriendly rentals, best practice on job hunting or generally anything with regards to how to make the move as smooth as possible will be much appreciated.

 

Thank You All.☺

[Jessica Berry]

Hi,

 

We are new to the forum,too. We are a family of three,y hubby,me nd our 2 yr old husky boy.

We are hoping to make the move in February, if all goes to plan. We have never been to Oz, but are very excited about this move and starting a new chapter in our life.

Any advice on petfriendly rentals, best practice on job hunting or generally anything with regards to how to make the move as smooth as possible will be much appreciated.

 

Thank You All.☺

 

Welcome to the forum. You might be best starting your own thread then people can respond specific to your circumstances.

[Wanderlust]

Welcome to the forum. You might be best starting your own thread then people can respond specific to your circumstances.

 

Thank You Jessica.

[snifter]

Hi @Purplesparkle

 

Welcome to the forum I somehow missed replying to you the other day, my bad.

 

Anyways, exciting times ahead. A 457 visa is a temp visa and often you'll hear expressed its better to try to get a PR visa if you can. I tend to agree with this sentiment, more as its more security for those moving over in terms of not being tied to the job or if the person sponsored lost their job having the stress of finding another sponsored one within a short timeframe to enable you all to stay in Aus.

 

Being tied to an employer can also have its downside if you really hate the job or there are issues with it for whatever reason. Also I have read on occasion the non sponsored partner finding it hard to secure work on a temp visa too. I'd say go for a 457 if you didn't have kids but as you do, it kind of does make me nervous for you. Having said that, the nursing route may be ok to go down on the 457 if you can gain PR asap should you wish to remain in Aus long term.

 

School wise it will really depend on where you end up working, how far you want to commute and where you settle for the longer term. Some move right down south, areas which also include towns in their own right and quite a ways from Adelaide itself if say down in Aldinga, others not quite so far, lots settle in the metropolitan area, some north, north east... Adelaide is a big sprawl and you could end up anywhere that suits you wants/needs. Personally, I love where we are, I guess south eastern hills region it is, but would also happily settle in a few of the outer eastern suburbs or more up in the hills further out so being a bit more rural. I also love Clarendon and a few small towns up in the hills. Take your time, look at realestate.com.au and put suburbs etc in to check out property in each one and see what the prices are like. Certain areas are going to cost a lot more to buy in than others though good priced rentals can be found but the state of the house may be dubious.

 

Childcare for the ages you say is easy IMHO. OSHC is the out of hours school care attached to most schools. They are usually well run, popular and start around 7am in the morning and go till 6pm ish Mon-Fri in term time and then all day during school holidays apart from a week or two around Christmas when they tend to close for a break. Also public holidays etc they close. Its not expensive and my son loves it there and the day trips they do in the holidays as well as the on site programme. Its good as he goes to his school one so kids he knows including a fair few of his mates are also booked in after school and over the holidays. They have a blast. Cost wise we pay about $20 for after school and about $50 for a full day of vacation care. We get a rebate and elect to have this in a lump sum at the end of the tax year but I think you can also opt to pay less over the year if you prefer. If we did this we'd pay $10 for a school session and about $25 for the day.

 

My suggestion would be to sit down and think about what sort of lifestyle you have now and if it suits you, in terms of do you live in a built up area or on the outskirts, rural or right in the middle of a city. Is living closer to the beaches and coastline important to you when you move here (fwiw we live more inland in the foothills and its a 10-15 minute drive in the car to get to any number of beaches as they are not a priority for us and we are happy just visiting whenever we feel like it). Do you want to be closer to the actual city for work or social reasons? Do you want to be more on the outskirts of it all? What do you like to do with your family time? Play sport, go hiking, days out, cycling? Cinema, shopping, theatre, make a list and see what you all come up with

 

Nursing wise I'm going to point you to our sister site, Poms in Oz an suggest you have a browse of the more recent posts in a few threads and read some replies to questions over there. Feel free to sign up over there if you've not already and post asking any nursing stuff if you don't get replies here (not sure we have many nurses active on here atm but there are one or two around).

 

There is this big nurses thread over there that might be of use to post to and ask questions

 

http://www.pomsinoz.com/forum/jobs-careers/30382-official-nurses-thread.html

 

Also the search feature there gave me these threads when I put in 'nursing'

 

http://www.pomsinoz.com/forum/search.php?searchid=4947586

 

Job hunting wise, no clue but I'd figure they'd know over on PIO and be able to point you in the right direction to employment sites or nursing agencies etc.

 

Good luck with it all and hope to see you around here a bit more

[Purplesparkle]

Thank you for the warm welcome and sorry for not replying sooner. We have been sorting out paperwork and getting documents verified to send off to AHPRA and ANMAC which has taken much longer than we thought! Also we have now put our house on the market and are keeping our fingers crossed that we can sell which will be a huge weight off our minds!

Thank you for all the suggestions!