[Livi]

Hi
We are wanting to move to NZ as soon as poss (when we can finish off and sell our house, and me to get a job).
We decided to tell my parents about the move at the weekend. They were of course full of doubts, and also posed us a few questions. :uhoh
What would we do if we didn't like it, wanted to come home, and were unable to get back on the property ladder.
They think we should sell our house, buy a small flat here which we could rent out. Then, if we decided to come back, we'd have a base, also it could be an investment.

Or, we thought, maybe we could keep a good, £10,000 in an account here as a back up plan, instead of a house.

What do you all think. All advice would be gratefully received!!!

[Lara Croft]

Hi!
There are usually 2 schools of thought here:
(1) - leave a 'back door' open, in case it doesn't work out, and you want to come back to something
or
(2) 'burn the bridges' - then you 'have' to make it work in NZ

We felt that if we left a 'back door', it would make it harder for us to commit to a new life here - it would be too easy to give up and go 'home' at the first signs of trouble.

But that is what we hope will work for us, it might not be the right approach for you!

J

[JandM]

Yes. What's your instinct on this? What do you feel you WANT to do?

One thing - if you leave behind a property, it will continue to give you income over the years, at UK rental rates. This may be very useful if your NZ earnings will be at a lower level than your UK ones (which depends on people's line of work).

[ellenmelon]

my mum and dad sold all properties here (our family home and holiday home/crib in central otago) but a couple of years back bought a house just outside of christchurch. they havent been back since they left but will probably/maybe retire to NZ so they have somewhere to live. Doesn't mean they havent been making a go of it in Ireland..if you know what I mean?

[Red Devil]

... yep, we're probably going to go with the idea of 'burning our bridges' completely in the UK and give NZ our 100% commitment.

Having said that, we still have to sell our French property and more than likely may be 'forced' into renting it out whilst giving NZ a go... in theory this will be our 'leaving a back door open' but would rather not go down this route.

Good luck with your plans :nice1

PS
Isn't it wonderful when you mention your plans to parents for the first time :eek: :D

[Livi]

Sorry to say Livi, but I really do feel deep down we need to sell the house & go asap. As the way the way things are in the UK its dog eat dog, & I'm ready to go now.
Also can anyone help on me setting up my buisness as a Surfboard Manufacturer?
Where is the best places are(not saturated in shapers)?
Any Idea's?
Dale (Livi's other half)
www.ecticshortys.com

[CJ22]

Well I tried managing a property in Leeds from London and it was a nightmare. Running it from the other side of the planet doesn't bear thinking about! Or were your parents volunteering?

[themilkybarkid]

We are thinking of making the move to NZ too so the answers are interesting/helpful.

Obviously if people have loads of money they can do all sorts - but most of us don't and the idea of constantly juggling with business 'back home' would surely be a stress and importantly make it more difficult to create a new home in NZ (psychologically) as you'd constantly be returning to the UK (in your dealings).

But am I missing something here? Because surely it's possible (in the worst case scenario) to sell up in NZ and return home. That's my thinking - we give it a go and leave the UK for NZ for say 3 years and if it don't work out we return to the UK - okay it's likely that if we returned we will not have made any money or profit and will have lost money, time and momentum in the move:o . But on the hand we can say we had a 3 year adventure in NZ:laugh . We will have had the bottle/courage to take a risk and do something, try something (which we'd thought at the time would genuinely be for the better) - but surely we wouldn't be in real financially difficulty returning to the UK??:confused:

cheers

[Red Devil]

Well I tried managing a property in Leeds from London and it was a nightmare. Running it from the other side of the planet doesn't bear thinking about!

... my feelings exactly, that's why we'd rather sell up and go!!!

themilkybarkid... I don't think you would face finanical difficulty should you have to return back to the UK after 3 years... besides the property market bubble in the UK is going to burst big time ;)

Nothing ventured, nothing gained... give it a whirl :D

[Kerry and David]

We have got to sell up and go as we need the money for NZ! If it doesn't work out I guess we would struggle to return to the UK as I don't think we would get the same type of house again but we would have to cross that bridge if it happened (which I hope it wouldn't!)
K x

[shakyle2906]

Hi Livi

Tricky situation............


We sold up, we needed cash also, but i think that its good in one way, as if your feeling uncertain about things when you get here, its easier to say, oh well lets go home, after a while.............on the other hand, i guess its security for you if you dont settle.

We had toyed with renting it out, but its all the added finance to pay as well as getting settled here..........

We are lucky that we felt settled very early on in, which could have gone the other way. I think, as we bought a house within 2mths of getting here, that helped, instead of staying in rented accomodation for ages, but everyone adapts differently.

Again, if we ever decide to go back, we would have to start from scratch like we did here, and know we would never be able to afford the house we had back in the UK. It was my pride and joy and although i was excited at the prospects of coming to NZ, i was gutted at selling it, even though hubby said its only bricks and mortar! Men eh!!

Parents in law had given us a mega hard time when we told them our plans, and they told us to keep house, guess its their way of keeping a hold on us and that we would return asap...........

Good luck with your plans, i am sure things will work out for you both.

Sharon
x

[napiers]

Have been reading with thread with a huge amount of interest. I'm in the sell up and go for it camp but OH puts his sensible head on and thinks we should either try and rent the house - which means a fair amount of work to do first & we aren't exactly Mr and Mrs Fixit, so more money... - or buy a relatively new apartment to rent. I can see where he's coming from but the thought of moving here before moving to NZ doesn't appeal and spending months doing the place up is also fairly unappealing!! And we would have significantly more cash behind us too. Will be following the thread and the views of those with experience, or those able to make a decision. :cheers

[Carey]

We hope we are in a win-win situation; it works out in NZ and we live there happily ever after, or we try it for a few yrs and decide we'd rather return to Uk. Either way, we 'll have tried it and won't be old & sitting in our arm-chairs saying 'I wonder what NZ would have been like'.

[incredible hulse]

We sold up but in hindsight I wish I had bought a rental in the UK. The main reason for that is I see the UK market being more stable than the NZ and whilst the extra income from the rental would have been a bonus it's the protection from uk house price rises and the fact that it gives a way back in to the uk if it does not work. I'm all for the view that you need to give your move a good go but I can think of nothing worse than having to stay in NZ if the sole reason is because you are trying to save face.

[nickydwuk]

We have to sell up to be able to finance our new life in NZ. So we know when we move it will be for good. Hope fully this will make us more determined to make a go of things. I know we could always return to the UK but without jobs & a roof over our heads I doubt it would be a viable option. My thoughts are that if we leave a 'back door' open we are almost saying that I don't expect it to work and plan to return, and could be less willing to ride the pitfalls that are likely to occur.

[Livi]

Thankyou for all your input guys.

It's such a big step, and the thought of having a property back here in the UK is a bit daunting.
As its been mentioned, we would not really want the extra stress of managing a property here as well as getting on our feet over there.
Maybe getting a good savings account set up once we're there would be a plan.

[Familyofmonkeys]

It is interesting how people seem to consider th UK the best place to return to if things don't work out in NZ. In our case, if things didn't work out (but actually things have worked out really well) well for us, we would have considered Canada or a number of other countries as opposed to returning to UK. There is a whole world out there and some fantastic opportunities to be had!

[Livi]

That is a really good point. Thankyou.

I think we've nearly decided what to do!!!

[Red Devil]

... I couldn't think of anything worse, the thought of having to return back to the UK having tried a new life abroad. We had to do this after things not going according to plan in France last year and believe me it's not easy adjusting... the UK for us is only a temporary stop whilst we get matters organised for NZ.

Familyofmonkeys is right, there's a big world out there to be discovered and I think people only return back to the UK for some sort of security after things not working out elsewhere.

Good luck with your plans :nice1

[bob_the_engineer]

It is interesting how people seem to consider th UK the best place to return to if things don't work out in NZ. In our case, if things didn't work out (but actually things have worked out really well) well for us, we would have considered Canada or a number of other countries as opposed to returning to UK. There is a whole world out there and some fantastic opportunities to be had!

I couldn’t agree more with the above.

If I wasn’t so happy in NZ I would be looking somewhere else, and it wouldn’t be the UK. I guess that’s something that comes from experience, either your completely tied to the UK (be it family or whatever) or you’re a globetrotter. There is a big wide world out there and a lot of places can beat the hell out of the UK as far as a great place to live goes.

The one piece of advice I will offer, with all sincerity, is don’t take advice from your parents when it comes to leaving. They love you, they don’t want you to burn your bridges and they will always cling to the hope that one day you’ll come back and live near them.

:laugh the truth is if you do, it won’t be as you remembered it, and they may well pack up and go to live in Spain for some sunshine anyway.

Bob

[Livi]

Thankyou Bob,
Thats good advice,
I think that they're concerned because
a) they put up the deposit originally for our current house
b)they'll miss us
c)they have it in their head that being on the property ladder in the "bee all and end all!"
d)they think we're making a rash decision

I suppose this is to be expected....

[IanW99]

...
c)they have it in their head that being on the property ladder in the "bee all and end all!"
....


But won't you be on the property ladder in NZ?

Ian

[Livi]

We'll probably rent first, then look into buying.

[incredible hulse]

It is interesting how people seem to consider th UK the best place to return to if things don't work out in NZ. In our case, if things didn't work out (but actually things have worked out really well) well for us, we would have considered Canada or a number of other countries as opposed to returning to UK. There is a whole world out there and some fantastic opportunities to be had!
Very true. I would be off to Oz (again) in a heartbeat and must say Singapore, Japan and Canada are on the list

[Lara Croft]

Just out of interest, are there any statistics available for the number of people who migrate to NZ, move back to UK, then realise why they wanted to leave in the first place and move on again?

Jane

[IanW99]

Just out of interest, are there any statistics available for the number of people who migrate to NZ, move back to UK, then realise why they wanted to leave in the first place and move on again?

Jane

Not sure, but when we were flying to NZ there was a woman on the flight, who had emigrated to NZ with her family, shipped all her belongs etc but not settled. Six months later she moved back to the UK again with all her belonging and as you may already have guessed, she then decided that actually she did prefer NZ after all, and was moving back again.

So certainly people do move on again.

Ian

[JandM]

Two doors away from us here in the UK, there is a woman who was NZ born of British parents (so she has no difficulty about being allowed to live in either country). She tells us she has changed her mind several times about where she'd rather live, selling up to relocate each time. (I don't know her well enough to know how she afforded all this. She's retired now.) Her Siamese cat has apparently flown half-way round the world FIVE TIMES at the last count.

[Red Devil]

Not sure, but when we were flying to NZ there was a woman on the flight, who had emigrated to NZ with her family, shipped all her belongs etc but not settled. Six months later she moved back to the UK again with all her belonging and as you may already have guessed, she then decided that actually she did prefer NZ after all, and was moving back again.

So certainly people do move on again.

Ian

Blimey... some serious shipping costs there :eek:

[benandclare]

Not sure, but when we were flying to NZ there was a woman on the flight, who had emigrated to NZ with her family, shipped all her belongs etc but not settled. Six months later she moved back to the UK again with all her belonging and as you may already have guessed, she then decided that actually she did prefer NZ after all, and was moving back again.

So certainly people do move on again.

Ian

Ah a " Ping pong Pom " then ....:laugh :laugh

[JandM]

:laugh Ping-pong Pom!:laugh :laugh

[Nick88]

I don't think this is a bad time to be off the property ladder completely for a while. This (the link) is only an opinion, but I believe there is alot of truth in these figures

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/466/story.cfm?c_id=466&objectid=10500252

[holland]

We we're chatting about this the other night...it is a purely personal thing...but we are so glad we don't have a property being rented out in the UK...we took the money and ran!! That said, we are making our money work for us having invested it...so we still have a lump sum and it is accruing interest, that we don't touch. Thus if we did go back to the Uk at any point, we would still have the lump sum.

We are renting at the moment, and when I was in the UK I thought we would buy fairly quickly, however, I wouldn't want to invest my money in a NZ house at the minute...i'd rather rent...although that has its disadvantages aswell!!

I agree with all the comments...ie..if it doesnt work in NZ..just sell up and go back/elsewhere...you could still be a property owner in NZ...my experience with family has been that they tend to think very 'matter of fact...and black and white'...but when you go through this whole process and get over here, you realise that there it's lots of 'grey' in between...I don't know about others but I have certaintly 'grown' through my experience and things that may have daunted/worried me in the Uk as far as doubt are concerned...just don't anymore as I know I can deal with any situation!!

Ive rambled...does this make sense??? It does to me!! ha ha

[Livi]

It does make heaps of sense!!!
I ramble too so can understand you perfectly!!!
:cheers

[themilkybarkid]

..oops wrong place ... doh!:exit

[themilkybarkid]

Just out of interest, are there any statistics available for the number of people who migrate to NZ, move back to UK, then realise why they wanted to leave in the first place and move on again?

Jane

The grass is always greener on the other side :laugh

even when you've swapped sides ... a one of life's conundrums!

It's like when we constantly change lane's in motorway queues (a UK thing??)

It looks quicker than the lane your in ... but guess what happens when you change ... the lane you were in now looks quicker than the one you are now in.

And the moral of the story.....

...ermm

[incredible hulse]

It's like when we constantly change lane's in motorway queues (a UK thing??)


:D Definetely not just a UK thing .... wait till you get to Auckland :laugh

[Livi]

Hi again
We're now toying with the idea of renting something out over here in the UK.
Anyone have experience of this? Is it a real faff (from the other side of the world), or worth doing??

:confused:

[Janey]

Hi Livi
welcome from a fellow Kernow chick! have you sold your house yet? I tend to agree with everything said on this thread if you do not like NZ would you return? the question possed my a family member to us was if you sell your house and then get refused entry what will you do? doh! one is a good time not to be in the UK market (so far we have knocked our house down £50k) we want to leave the UK so if not NZ then OZ or Canada both have relis that would sponser us. you must follow your own heart do you really want the worry of a property from the other side of the world?
good luck:nice1

[horrobles40]

We are in much the same boat, but have just told the kids of our plans to move to NZ.......good response tho.........my gut feeling is that if you are planning to move to the other side of the world.....which take guts,......you haven't taken that decision lightly...would it make your move easier with the extra money from the sale of your house......that extra financial cushion???? At the end of the day if you can do it from here to NZ you can do it the other way round....and if it doesn't work would you come back to old blighty anyway....there's a whole world out there and only one life.......got for it we are!!!!!!!

Sue & Phil