Dinnaefash
24th November 2005, 02:51 PM
I'm online at home at last, so here's our 2 month update!
After a few days in Auckland then a week in the midst of a murder investigation in Taranaki (see previous update!) things have been a little more normal. We moved into a holiday let near Cambridge to start property hunting and wait for our animals and possessions to arrive. We spent about 5 weeks property hunting full time - the length and breadth of the Waikato, plus the Bay of Plenty, the Coromandel, and King Country - before realising we really liked the Cambridge area. (I'd initially only picked the holiday let in Cambridge because it was so central, and being so horsie I knew I'd be able to find somewhere to keep my horse.) We must have looked at around 60 properties, from lifestyle blocks to farms; it was interesting and exciting, but also extremely tiring and frustrating. However, it just goes to show how much there is available here (and the agents say there isn't much on the market!); we'd have been hard pushed to look at a handful of comparable properties in Scotland. We have subsequently bought a small farm about 10kms from Cambridge and move in mid December!!
We were very impressed with the way real estate agents work here (for purchasers, anyway - vendors pay higher fees here). On numerous occasions we were driven around prospective areas for an hour or two so they could get a feel for our requirements. It meant that we got a really good introduction to the various areas we investigated and saw places we probably wouldn't have otherwise. Plus they are happy to answer most non real estate based questions too! We also got loads of free advise from a variety of other professionals during this time; road contractor, surveyor, energy company, lawyer, accountant etc. We pretty much walked off the street and asked to speak to someone, and hey presto!
So far neither of us has suffered too badly from homesickness, it's been too hectic for that plus I keep in touch with Mum by texting which is cheap and easy. We're also online at home at last - though too far from the exchange for broadband unfortunately. It has been - and will be for a while I think! - an interesting experience, much more of a learning curve than either of us anticipated. So many things are just subtly different enough to cause you to have to investigate or think more than you're used to. Our first couple of grocery shopping trips were hilariously mind boggling (not least because prices per kg seem so huge)! I'd wander round the supermarket in a quest for something specific like chutney, and when I finally found it I'd have no clue which one to pick - how do you know which is good??!! Thankfully we seem to have settled into a routine now and know where to find the things we like.
Animals: Our 2 dogs and the horse all travelled and settled really well, they all seemed to have been very well looked after. The horse was delivered to my door, and we went up to Auckland to collect the dogs, which went smoothly. We had also air freighted some stuff we either thought we might need short term, had bought since shipping the household, or hadn't fit in the 40ft container. We picked that up from Auckland too, relatively easily.
Container / MAF:
Our container arrived safely, although we didn't receive the relevant paperwork until a couple of days afterwards which put us at loggerheads with The Moving Company as they then threatened to charge us for storage! We got that sorted, then had another drama when they realised that hubbie had a .22 rifle in the container. (I'm fairly certain that if we hadn't declared it on their paperwork it would have gone unnoticed!) The problem was that he doesn't yet have an NZ gun permit; after a lot of tooing and froing and stress we got our landlord to accept delivery of it instead, which kept everyone happy.
We had a vast amount of outdoors stuff (garden benches, ornaments and tools, plus horse stuff). When we got notification of the arrival of our container, there was a list of 76 items MAF wanted to inspect!! eek. The Moving Co delivered the container and their guys unloaded it, and we kept to one side all the items for MAF; they must be opened in front of / by MAF. The MAF guy camed later that day, and though it was time consuming it was a doddle really. He looked really closely at all the outside stuff, scraped some tiny missed bits of dirt / mown grass or whatever off, which he sealed in a ziploc bag; that gets taken back with him and destroyed. He also found a couple of snails hidden inside one of our hose reels! But apart from scraping some bits off he was quite happy and didn't require anything to be steam cleaned / fumigated. Hubbie had steamed cleaned everything himself and the MAF guy was happy with that.
Jo b: we shipped our duvets, pillows etc without cleaning them - they didn't mention them at all.
With regards to extra shipping charges: we used White & Co, and it was a door to door all-inclusive price - except "taxes, duties, demurrage and warehousing if incurred, and any quarantine / fumigation costs at destination". For our 40ft container, we were charged £5387 by White's, then an additional $390 at this end by The Moving Company ("quarantine clearance inspection and handling incl supervision"). The MAF guy who did our inspection at this end said that is about double what their charge actually is so it beats me what the $390 covers. I've complained to White's but had no reply as yet.
Rentals: we stayed in the holiday let for our first month, which gave us a very pleasant start - plus the family who owned the place were terrific, a great support system helping us out in all sorts of ways! If anyone wants a recommended place near Cambridge, pm me! Rather belatedly we started looking for an ordinary rental, but there was very little available in Cambridge and NOBODY wanted dogs. We looked further afield at Putaruru - suffice to say they were cheap but you would want to wipe your feet on the way out… With only a few days to go we really thought we might be homeless, and lined up another holiday let, when at the last moment something came up via a real estate agent we'd dealt with - it definitely pays to make friends with people who have contacts! We lucked out because the landlord is renovating the place but ran out of money, so he doesn't mind the dogs, and it is furnished.
Other stuff: we are driving very sensibly, as it would seem you can't afford not to here - there are traffic cops everywhere. It makes it a little puzzling that the number of road accidents is so high.
I've never used public loos so much in my life, seems it's not compulsory for café's to have their own loo here.
We get loads of junk mail, American style - and you have to pay to recycle in Cambridge.
Everyone is friendly!!
Had a couple of nice days out, at the Hamilton Home and Garden show, and Ellerslie Flower Show - and Cambridge Armistice parade. So, things are going pretty well so far, no complaints. Looking forward to being in our own place for Christmas!
After a few days in Auckland then a week in the midst of a murder investigation in Taranaki (see previous update!) things have been a little more normal. We moved into a holiday let near Cambridge to start property hunting and wait for our animals and possessions to arrive. We spent about 5 weeks property hunting full time - the length and breadth of the Waikato, plus the Bay of Plenty, the Coromandel, and King Country - before realising we really liked the Cambridge area. (I'd initially only picked the holiday let in Cambridge because it was so central, and being so horsie I knew I'd be able to find somewhere to keep my horse.) We must have looked at around 60 properties, from lifestyle blocks to farms; it was interesting and exciting, but also extremely tiring and frustrating. However, it just goes to show how much there is available here (and the agents say there isn't much on the market!); we'd have been hard pushed to look at a handful of comparable properties in Scotland. We have subsequently bought a small farm about 10kms from Cambridge and move in mid December!!
We were very impressed with the way real estate agents work here (for purchasers, anyway - vendors pay higher fees here). On numerous occasions we were driven around prospective areas for an hour or two so they could get a feel for our requirements. It meant that we got a really good introduction to the various areas we investigated and saw places we probably wouldn't have otherwise. Plus they are happy to answer most non real estate based questions too! We also got loads of free advise from a variety of other professionals during this time; road contractor, surveyor, energy company, lawyer, accountant etc. We pretty much walked off the street and asked to speak to someone, and hey presto!
So far neither of us has suffered too badly from homesickness, it's been too hectic for that plus I keep in touch with Mum by texting which is cheap and easy. We're also online at home at last - though too far from the exchange for broadband unfortunately. It has been - and will be for a while I think! - an interesting experience, much more of a learning curve than either of us anticipated. So many things are just subtly different enough to cause you to have to investigate or think more than you're used to. Our first couple of grocery shopping trips were hilariously mind boggling (not least because prices per kg seem so huge)! I'd wander round the supermarket in a quest for something specific like chutney, and when I finally found it I'd have no clue which one to pick - how do you know which is good??!! Thankfully we seem to have settled into a routine now and know where to find the things we like.
Animals: Our 2 dogs and the horse all travelled and settled really well, they all seemed to have been very well looked after. The horse was delivered to my door, and we went up to Auckland to collect the dogs, which went smoothly. We had also air freighted some stuff we either thought we might need short term, had bought since shipping the household, or hadn't fit in the 40ft container. We picked that up from Auckland too, relatively easily.
Container / MAF:
Our container arrived safely, although we didn't receive the relevant paperwork until a couple of days afterwards which put us at loggerheads with The Moving Company as they then threatened to charge us for storage! We got that sorted, then had another drama when they realised that hubbie had a .22 rifle in the container. (I'm fairly certain that if we hadn't declared it on their paperwork it would have gone unnoticed!) The problem was that he doesn't yet have an NZ gun permit; after a lot of tooing and froing and stress we got our landlord to accept delivery of it instead, which kept everyone happy.
We had a vast amount of outdoors stuff (garden benches, ornaments and tools, plus horse stuff). When we got notification of the arrival of our container, there was a list of 76 items MAF wanted to inspect!! eek. The Moving Co delivered the container and their guys unloaded it, and we kept to one side all the items for MAF; they must be opened in front of / by MAF. The MAF guy camed later that day, and though it was time consuming it was a doddle really. He looked really closely at all the outside stuff, scraped some tiny missed bits of dirt / mown grass or whatever off, which he sealed in a ziploc bag; that gets taken back with him and destroyed. He also found a couple of snails hidden inside one of our hose reels! But apart from scraping some bits off he was quite happy and didn't require anything to be steam cleaned / fumigated. Hubbie had steamed cleaned everything himself and the MAF guy was happy with that.
Jo b: we shipped our duvets, pillows etc without cleaning them - they didn't mention them at all.
With regards to extra shipping charges: we used White & Co, and it was a door to door all-inclusive price - except "taxes, duties, demurrage and warehousing if incurred, and any quarantine / fumigation costs at destination". For our 40ft container, we were charged £5387 by White's, then an additional $390 at this end by The Moving Company ("quarantine clearance inspection and handling incl supervision"). The MAF guy who did our inspection at this end said that is about double what their charge actually is so it beats me what the $390 covers. I've complained to White's but had no reply as yet.
Rentals: we stayed in the holiday let for our first month, which gave us a very pleasant start - plus the family who owned the place were terrific, a great support system helping us out in all sorts of ways! If anyone wants a recommended place near Cambridge, pm me! Rather belatedly we started looking for an ordinary rental, but there was very little available in Cambridge and NOBODY wanted dogs. We looked further afield at Putaruru - suffice to say they were cheap but you would want to wipe your feet on the way out… With only a few days to go we really thought we might be homeless, and lined up another holiday let, when at the last moment something came up via a real estate agent we'd dealt with - it definitely pays to make friends with people who have contacts! We lucked out because the landlord is renovating the place but ran out of money, so he doesn't mind the dogs, and it is furnished.
Other stuff: we are driving very sensibly, as it would seem you can't afford not to here - there are traffic cops everywhere. It makes it a little puzzling that the number of road accidents is so high.
I've never used public loos so much in my life, seems it's not compulsory for café's to have their own loo here.
We get loads of junk mail, American style - and you have to pay to recycle in Cambridge.
Everyone is friendly!!
Had a couple of nice days out, at the Hamilton Home and Garden show, and Ellerslie Flower Show - and Cambridge Armistice parade. So, things are going pretty well so far, no complaints. Looking forward to being in our own place for Christmas!