Monday, October 15, 2007

Update to "The Price of Milk"

Okay.

I haven't made this decision lightly, we have been mulling it over for a couple of years and with the ability to own a home out of our reach here now until the kids go to school, we think why the hell not have an adventure?

We will be moving to the Sunshine Coast, probably Nambour or surrounding districts. We have friends living in Nambour, one in Maroochydore, two in Mooloolaba, and about 8 in Brisbane, not to mention my brother who is living in Brisbane with his girlfriend and my other brother and his fiance are moving there in 6 months from Perth.

Blair is a carpenter and they are in high demand in Queensland.

We have been in contact with Centrelink and if Blair was on $25 an hour we would be entitled to nearly $750 a fortnight in family assistance, not to mention the subsidised childcare, whether I'm working or not. He is hoping to be on more but you still get rebates and family assistance at much higher incomes than you do here. We have seen all our friends who have left for Queensland go ahead in leaps and bounds since they departed our fair land.

Couple in Nambour have gone from nothing to owning their own joinery company, building and selling three homes, investment properties and now are living on 3/4 acre on their dream home - nearly freehold by the way, property being worth in the vicinity of half a million.

Other couple have set up business and both are earning double they could here.

Mate in Brisbane left here with not a cent, now he has bought a home in north side of Brisbane, this is a guy who struggled to get enough for the pub most weeks. As a builder here was earning $25 an hour, over there is getting $40 an hour with vehicle and phone to build stairs!!!

Those of you who got into the property market before the boom are sitting pretty. EG my sister and husband, one income, bought a three bedroom home in Christchurch worth $123,000. Mortgage $177 a week. Five years later, post boom, their property is worth $350,000 and they are on a fixed mortgage for next five years only paying $265 a week and at 7.8%. So yeah, sweet if you got in before prices shot through the roof.

I definitely want you to all know that there is no way I do anything without weighing up the pros and cons, doing the figures and mapping it out way in advance. Australia may seem like it has faults to those of you that live there, and granted the cities are diabolically priced, but for us, there is no comparison purely from a financial point of view.

And then there is lifestyle factors. Blair has shocking psoriasis and whenever we have visited Sunshine Coast his skin clears up due to the moisture in the air. My nose is sweet, usually have dried up nose that becomes booger infested every night due to a swelling in my turbinates (nose lining). When in Sunshine Coast that goes. And three of my kids get asthma and my doctor has told me we are living in the worst place for it, being polluted in winter and windy in summer. He told me about four years ago that the best place in the world we could go for asthma would be the Sunshine Coast of Australia.

And at the end of the day, as darling Becks says, home will always be there.

15 comments:

Kate said...

Wow, huge news on your blog today!!

Sounds like a great decision for your family, and as you said.. home will always be here.

At first when I read the news my heart sank.. I felt so sad thinking you were moving away and I wouldn't get to see you anymore.. but then I realised, I don't even see you now, lol.

And OMG, I hear you about mortgage prices. And childcare prices. People keep going on at me about not taking handouts from the government etc, but there is little incentive to work when if I went back to work 2 shifts a week (the most i am willing to do with preschoolers), we would lose all our family assistance, and have to pay petrol and childcare, and then I would only earn what we get a fortnight in family assistance anyway so we'd be far worse off. Crazy!

We've been looking at buying a new house for a while, and we've found one we really like, but even with stretching our mortgage out to 30 year term etc, it's still more than what we can afford. Kinda crazy, considering we need a bigger house, but it's out of our reach at the moment. It's quite scary actually!

Anonymous said...

Oh Jules! It is clear that you are not in need of any other incentives...but Wavey Davey and I are moving to Queenieland in the next couple of years!

G'day neighbour!

Cazzie!!! said...

Cool, we can come visit you up there if you move there, in our bus :)
Yes, asthmatics do it better up there for sure girl. You can always visit home for school holidays too :)

Lynda said...

I totally get where you are coming from. Did you know that 30,000 NZrs go over to Australia every year? The government says "never mind, we replace them all with immigrants"... yeah right. I live in Auckland and I see every day what NZ is looking like now. Good decision.

Anonymous said...

When you mentioned you were moving to Australia I was going to ask if it was Queensland. I work within the employment industry and QLD is desperate for hard workers and you can get it now before house prices go up to much.

And I am a former Queenslander, it really is God's country :)

Name: Lynise said...

Hi Jules,

I am not surprised to hear another kiwi is heading over the ditch. Most of my family have lived there for years, and three lots of friends have moved in the last 2 years.
The cost of buying a first home here seems to become more unlikely
as each year passes. I have several friends (around my age) who are regreting not knuckling down and securing a home when they were a little younger and it seems their only option is to reside themselves to the fact that they will probably rent forever. Its crazy as one friends hubby is in a management position for a huge multinational company and is earning a six figure wage, but after paying Auckland rents of $485 a week, plus having three children to provide for, they can't save fast enough to keep up with the house prices increasing.

As you say, its ok if people had there own home before prices whet through the roof, but I would HATE to be a few years younger and missed getting onto the property ladder when I did.
I have owned my own place for a long time (16 years) but I'm now thinking I need start thinking of my daughters future and look at buying something for her. (rent it out until she is old enough to take over the mortgage as statistics predict that she will be among the generation of NZ'ers who will never be able to afford their own home which is really scary.

Steph said...

Hooray! Ditch New Zuland and come frolic down under!

There are so many Kiwis down here anyway you'll feel right at home :)

Wanna_B_slimmer said...

Oh bummer... I thought you might like to live in sunny... *cough* lovely warm Tasmania....
The scotch is good here!!!

Jenn said...

Wow! That's a big move - good luck!! I'm really impressed that you guys thought about it and decided to do it. We can't even get the guts to move to another state!

JustJo said...

FANTASTIC!! I'm jealous in a way, but excited for you! GO FOR IT are the first 3 words that spring to mind :)

Apple2Hourglass said...

Come on over baby the weather is great!! Yihar.

Mary said...

WOW sounds like you know EXACTLY what you want and need to do! A friend of ours suffers from psoriasis quite badly and we were talking about it on the weekend. We had been out in the sun all day and he was saying how great it was for his skin. You have more than enough reasons to come on over. I imagine QLD would be much cheaper than Sydney too :-)

danzer1986 said...

wow.. a move.. well it can be a great expierience for the family...

nice hun

**smooches**

Spiky Zora Jones said...

Jules...yay! Good times babe...good times.

The move sounds fab. I was thinking of moving also...my job may relocate me, I want to move to Oregan, Washington, or any north-eastern state of the USA. I have to be within 2 hours drive from the sea...I'm made that way.

I may have my first ever trip to Sidney in the next few weeks. If not Sidney...it's to London. I'm crossing my fingers for London, but it is not my decision. I have friends there and Paris and Rome are not too far from there.

New things are exciting...aren't they?

Middle Child said...

Pleased for you all. My sister livs in Brisband and another not too far from Nambour...she has trouble with the humidity, so be prepared for that... it is very humid from about October through to March... but if you can afford to lash out, even if it is just for one main room in your house an air conditioner will make it bearable.

Yeah I know all about the environment folks, but just try it for a summer or two and you will walk over cut glass to have one.

I wish my youngest sister would give up on NZ... they are right down the freezing bottom end near Milford Sound because she married a Kiwi. Darn it and he still likes the place - hence I am missing out on three lovely little kids I would love to get to know better... can you get her to come back too?