[JeremyD]

Hi All,

My family will be coming over to NZ for a short recci trip of about 8 days at the end of May 08. We have settled on Auckland and that is about it..

This may seem like a strange question, but I would like to know what you guys wanted to accomplish with your recci trips.

I am not sure were to start so any feedback will be great.

Thanks

Jeremy

[theSingsons]

Hi Jeremy,

Welcome to the forums. My wife and I are all set on migrating to Wellington, and at the same time are planning a trip down under. What we plan to do is:

1. Talk to the recruitment firms. More or less they can give you a "head's up" on what the business or work culture is like should you decide to migrate.
2. Look at some real estate properties or go to some suburbs to see what daily life is like.
3. Visit some of the nearby schools as our children will need to be schooled.
4. Check out prices of common house commodities.

and last but not least we will try to get job offers to boost our EOI.

my 2 cents worth...

hope all goes well with your recci trip!!!

[Carey]

We went to see if we felt that same way we did when just OH and I lived there for a year before kids. We did! Looked at areas we hadn't seen before and looked at them with family eyes. Looked round a couple of schools and liked what we saw. Talked to local people. Grilled our friends to get a realistic picture. And the whole way round, kept asking ourselves, " Could we live here?" Went shopping and compared prices. Picked up freeby newspapers with house prices in. Tried to take off the rose tinted glasses that we were aware we had on.

[vixxann]

we spent 3 weeks in NZ travelling around a bit as we weren't (and still aren't!!) sure where to settle. One of the main aims was for hubbie to speak to some people about work and see how easy it would be to get work when our time comes. He did very well and got a couple of contacts (he actually got a couple of instant job offers but thats another story!)

Personally I wanted to see how I felt about the place and tried as much as we could to see the "real" untouristy side of NZ . We went to loads of playgrounds, shops, library - even a post office! We spoke to families out there and gave our kids chance to speak to their kids about schools and other things.

All in all - we loved what we saw and cannot wait to get back. I am so glad we did our trip as I can close my eyes now and I'm back there - I remember it vividly and that helps whilst I'm waiting for everything to get sorted.

[JeremyD]

Thank you very much for the valued info, that is similar to what we thought we should be doing...

We hope to get a slight feeling of NZ and Auckland on real terms and to put some queries to rest.

Thanks once again.

Jeremy

[Bozeman]

Our #1 focus was schools. We made appointments (after we arrived in Christchurch) and visited many (and were impressed with what we saw). After that we cruised around neighborhoods - those that matched up with the schools we liked - and on the weekend checked out a number of open houses to see what kind of money would be required to buy a house to our liking. We also visited supermarkets, furniture stores and other shops to get a feel for how much things cost (a lot!). Plus, dined out at the kind of restaurants that we would be likely to frequent as local residents.