Please help if time is running out

[MJubby]

Hi all. 

I have been a long time stalker of this page but not posted often, and really need help with timing and advice. 

A bit of background to help. I have been interested in a move to Australia for most of my adult life. I am currently 43 married with 3 children. We are currently planning a trip to Australia in about a years time to see if I can convince my wife and kids to make the move. Unfortunately by the time I get back I would be 45. Will this prevent my application due to age? Would it be worth me applying before the trip and cancelling if it doesn't work out?

My eldest son turns 16 in July. Will he still be classed as a dependant?

[lothar]

You can submit an eoi. You don't need to act on it if you get invited.

You have to have that eoi before you're 45, doesn't matter if you're past 45 once invited.

If you apply on a 189 once you're invited you just need a trip to aus to activate it. You then have another 5 years before you have to live there.

So yes apply as soon as possible, you'll have a long time after that to decide.

[lothar]

Another note. Depending on your visa you'll need to provide a lot of info. And write English tests etc.

So to submit and eoi can take a few months to do. So you'll probably want to start asap.

[Marisawright]

17 minutes ago, MJubby said:

We are currently planning a trip to Australia in about a years time to see if I can convince my wife and kids to make the move. Unfortunately by the time I get back I would be 45. Will this prevent my application due to age?

Yes it will.  The cutoff for permanent skilled visas is 45.   As lothar says, you could submit an EOI now.

But honestly, if you're having that much trouble convincing your wife to move, just let it go.   Migrating thousands of miles from home is tough, even when both of you are really really keen.   If one of you feels pressured into it, she's going to end up feeling resentful and angry as soon as things get stressful -- and I can guarantee you things will get stressful, it's a huge lifestyle change which eats up thousands of pounds very fast even if things go well.  We've seen marriages break up over it.  Think carefully.

 

[Ausvisitor]

22 minutes ago, lothar said:

You can submit an eoi. You don't need to act on it if you get invited.

You have to have that eoi before you're 45, doesn't matter if you're past 45 once invited.

If you apply on a 189 once you're invited you just need a trip to aus to activate it. You then have another 5 years before you have to live there.

So yes apply as soon as possible, you'll have a long time after that to decide.

I thought the process was...

The EOI is your part of the initial request process you put in your Expression Of Interest. For almost all visas this will only be valid if you are under 45. The EOI stays in the system until one of 3 things happens...

1. You withdraw it

2. You are invited to apply for a visa

3. You turn 45

Once you are invited if you go over 45 while in the full visa application process that doesn't matter, but you won't get an invite unless you are under 45 (for most visa classes)

Edited Saturday at 10:13 by Ausvisitor

[lothar]

Ah right. Thanks for the correction. It's been a while since I did mine.

So you need to invite prior to 45 but can be over 45 when you apply for the visa. So long as you got your invite prior to 45. 

[Amber Snowball]

27 minutes ago, Marisawright said:

Yes it will.  The cutoff for permanent skilled visas is 45.   As lothar says, you could submit an EOI now.

But honestly, if you're having that much trouble convincing your wife to move, just let it go.   Migrating thousands of miles from home is tough, even when both of you are really really keen.   If one of you feels pressured into it, she's going to end up feeling resentful and angry as soon as things get stressful -- and I can guarantee you things will get stressful, it's a huge lifestyle change which eats up thousands of pounds very fast even if things go well.  We've seen marriages break up over it.  Think carefully.

 

Can go the other way as well. The person who was totally for it, hates it and the people who weren’t keen love it. End result is the same with people being miserable/torn, but just playing devils avocado. I mean obviously everyone could hate it or love it, but hell of a risk imo.

@MJubby  Yes 16 would be a dependent.

@MJubby  How much”convincing” are we talking here? A visit definitely sounds a good idea but don’t go with a holiday mindset, look at how you would live there. People work, do the housework, put the bins out same as everywhere else. What are you looking for? In that I mean what do you want to change, gain, experience? What don’t you like about your current situation and would Australia better that? 
What are your family’s doubts?

The visa process is a mystery to me so I am no use for that at all! 

Caveat: not asking you to share any more than you are happy to! I appreciate you only asked about applying for visas and age, to which I say crack on. Time is against you and it sounds a poxy, prolonged process to me with all the english tests and skills etc. All you will lose is money if you don’t go ahead. If you all come back raving about it and wanting to be on the next flight out you don’t want to miss that opportunity.

It’s a big decision made bigger by your circumstances so best of luck with it.

[MJubby]

1 hour ago, lothar said:

Another note. Depending on your visa you'll need to provide a lot of info. And write English tests etc.

So to submit and eoi can take a few months to do. So you'll probably want to start asap.

Thank you for this. 

English is our first and only language so this shouldn't be an issue. 

If an eoi is carried out before my son is 16 would he still be eligible to be included on our visa as a dependant? 

[Marisawright]

2 minutes ago, MJubby said:

English is our first and only language so this shouldn't be an issue. 

Don't assume.   The English test is not easy and requires a high standard of grammar etc.  You need to practice for it. 

It's not your son's age that matters.  He needs to be dependent on you at the time the visa is granted.  Basically that means he still needs to stay in full-time education. up until you actually get the visa.   If he takes an apprenticeship or leaves education to get a job, he can't be included. 

[paulhand]

1 hour ago, lothar said:

You have to have that eoi before you're 45, doesn't matter if you're past 45 once invited.

Incorrect … you must be under 45 at time of invitation. 

6 minutes ago, MJubby said:

English is our first and only language so this shouldn't be an issue.

You will still need to sit the test BEFORE you lodge the EOI and many native speakers do poorly unless they put in significant practice at the test process. 

1 hour ago, lothar said:

So you need to invite prior to 45 but can be over 45 when you apply for the visa. So long as you got your invite prior to 45. 

Yes, but you only have 60 days to actually apply after invitation, so this doesn’t really cover many people. 

Edited Saturday at 11:32 by paulhand

[MJubby]

38 minutes ago, Amber Snowball said:

Can go the other way as well. The person who was totally for it, hates it and the people who weren’t keen love it. End result is the same with people being miserable/torn, but just playing devils avocado. I mean obviously everyone could hate it or love it, but hell of a risk imo.

@MJubby  Yes 16 would be a dependent.

@MJubby  How much”convincing” are we talking here? A visit definitely sounds a good idea but don’t go with a holiday mindset, look at how you would live there. People work, do the housework, put the bins out same as everywhere else. What are you looking for? In that I mean what do you want to change, gain, experience? What don’t you like about your current situation and would Australia better that? 
What are your family’s doubts?

The visa process is a mystery to me so I am no use for that at all! 

Caveat: not asking you to share any more than you are happy to! I appreciate you only asked about applying for visas and age, to which I say crack on. Time is against you and it sounds a poxy, prolonged process to me with all the english tests and skills etc. All you will lose is money if you don’t go ahead. If you all come back raving about it and wanting to be on the next flight out you don’t want to miss that opportunity.

It’s a big decision made bigger by your circumstances so best of luck with it.

Thank you for your reply. 

My kids are all game for the big adventure and don't really have any ties to hold them back. My wife has a close relationship with her mum and would no doubt miss her alot but she has told us to go. 

We want a better life for our kids with better prospects. The UK doesn't seem to be getting any better at the moment. We also want the outdoors and work/life balance promised by the Australian dream. 

I have a friend and previous colleague who lives in Perth who plans on helping me set up some informal interviews while visiting and renting an AirBnB while there. 

[Amber Snowball]

4 minutes ago, MJubby said:

Thank you for your reply. 

My kids are all game for the big adventure and don't really have any ties to hold them back. My wife has a close relationship with her mum and would no doubt miss her alot but she has told us to go. 

We want a better life for our kids with better prospects. The UK doesn't seem to be getting any better at the moment. We also want the outdoors and work/life balance promised by the Australian dream. 

I have a friend and previous colleague who lives in Perth who plans on helping me set up some informal interviews while visiting and renting an AirBnB while there. 

Ah ok. Be careful the better life. It’s a different life. Could be better, could be worse. Australia has its issues no doubt. My son has been diagnosed with depression. Would probably have been diagnosed had we stayed in the UK but living in Australia didn’t change the course, so stuff is stuff wherever.

I think @paulhand has replied, maybe cross his palm with silver for a paid, initial in depth review of your situation. I don’t think you have time to t!t about on a forum. I mean that with love obviously. Free advice is worth what you pay for it sometimes.

I’m saying 16 is dependent above but yes if they leave school and go into work, it’s hard to prove their dependence on you etc.

I think you are describing normal family worries/guilt so worth exploring to “scratch that itch!”

Contact Paul, he’s kosher, all properly registered and been helping people on the forum for years.

[Tulip1]

12 minutes ago, MJubby said:

Thank you for your reply. 

My kids are all game for the big adventure and don't really have any ties to hold them back. My wife has a close relationship with her mum and would no doubt miss her alot but she has told us to go. 

We want a better life for our kids with better prospects. The UK doesn't seem to be getting any better at the moment. We also want the outdoors and work/life balance promised by the Australian dream. 

I have a friend and previous colleague who lives in Perth who plans on helping me set up some informal interviews while visiting and renting an AirBnB while there. 

It might be a bit early to think of interviews when you’ve not yet done a visa application.  They can sometimes take many months, even years to be granted.  

[Tulip1]

34 minutes ago, MJubby said:

English is our first and only language so this shouldn't be an issue. 

Many have failed it and I’m talking about people with English degrees.  You’ve got to put a lot of work in.

Edited Saturday at 11:59 by Tulip1

[Marisawright]

34 minutes ago, MJubby said:

I have a friend who lives in Perth who plans on helping me set up some informal interviews while visiting and renting an AirBnB while there. 

There isn't much point in having interviews with employers, because an employer-sponsored visa won't be suitable for you.  They are usually only temporary, and you need to get a permanent visa now, before you're too old.   No employer will offer you a job on the strength of your own visa application, because that could take a year to go through, if you get invited at all, (remember that getting a visa isn't just a case of having the required qualifications and experience.  It's exactly like applying for a job -- everyone who applies has the required qualifications and experience.  Immigration cherry-picks the best applicants, and the rest miss out).   Plus, of course, even if you get an offer, you might change your mind.  So the best an employer will say is, "If you can get the visa and if we have a vacancy at the time, we'll be happy to consider you", which isn't really worth anything. 

Work/life balance:  actually, working hours in Australia are often longer than in the UK, and you get less holidays and sick leave.  The work/life balance comes from the fact that you can live that outdoor lifestyle on the weekends, if you can afford to live close to the beach or the hills or whatever your preference is.  So I'd say your priority during your holiday is to get to know the suburbs and check out the cost of housing in the areas that would give you the lifestyle you want.  Also check out the cost of furniture, supermarket shopping, dining out etc. and see how far your money would go compared to the UK (I assume your friend can give you an idea of salaries).  

I agree with Amber -- you need to hire a good migration agent right now, and get cracking on that application.   

Edited Saturday at 12:24 by Marisawright

[Amber Snowball]

25 minutes ago, Tulip1 said:

Many have failed it and I’m talking about people with English degrees.  You’ve got to put a lot of work in.

I have heard they are designed for people with English as a second language, so native speakers can struggle. I didn’t have to do all of this when I moved and I am forever grateful, sounds like a total ball ache.

[DrDougster]

Things may also depend on your job and skill level at it. Many of the answers above aren't relevant if you're an international expert that could make use of the global talent route: if you're coming over to interview and look at options for who might employ you or if the national innovation scheme will be an option.

 

[paulhand]

1 hour ago, DrDougster said:

Things may also depend on your job and skill level at it. Many of the answers above aren't relevant if you're an international expert that could make use of the global talent route: if you're coming over to interview and look at options for who might employ you or if the national innovation scheme will be an option.

 

Fair enough … but as these options make up around 3% of the available skilled visas (4,000 vs a total of around 130,000 in this year’s plan) it’s a reasonable assumption that the OP would be following a ‘normal’ pathway. Any professional advice would obviously take outlying options into consideration if the OP presented such a profile. 

[Ausvisitor]

8 hours ago, Amber Snowball said:

I have heard they are designed for people with English as a second language, so native speakers can struggle. I didn’t have to do all of this when I moved and I am forever grateful, sounds like a total ball ache.

I tanked my first attempt as I assumed my masters in English and a job that sees me write published reports and perform almost daily presentations would mean this test was easy.

Failing it was pretty humbling and then I got serious about it

[Ausvisitor]

8 hours ago, Marisawright said:

There isn't much point in having interviews with employers, because an employer-sponsored visa won't be suitable for you.  They are usually only temporary, and you need to get a permanent visa now, before you're too old.   No employer will offer you a job on the strength of your own visa application, because that could take a year to go through, if you get invited at all, (remember that getting a visa isn't just a case of having the required qualifications and experience.  It's exactly like applying for a job -- everyone who applies has the required qualifications and experience.  Immigration cherry-picks the best applicants, and the rest miss out).   Plus, of course, even if you get an offer, you might change your mind.  So the best an employer will say is, "If you can get the visa and if we have a vacancy at the time, we'll be happy to consider you", which isn't really worth anything. 

Work/life balance:  actually, working hours in Australia are often longer than in the UK, and you get less holidays and sick leave.  The work/life balance comes from the fact that you can live that outdoor lifestyle on the weekends, if you can afford to live close to the beach or the hills or whatever your preference is.  So I'd say your priority during your holiday is to get to know the suburbs and check out the cost of housing in the areas that would give you the lifestyle you want.  Also check out the cost of furniture, supermarket shopping, dining out etc. and see how far your money would go compared to the UK (I assume your friend can give you an idea of salaries).  

I agree with Amber -- you need to hire a good migration agent right now, and get cracking on that application.   

To give you an idea on work life balance...

I do pretty much the same job I did in the UK over here. 

In the UK I worked 7:30-20:00 most week days with an hour commute added on either end.

Here I still start at 8am and often don't finish until 7pm but as housing is massively cheaper here I only have a 15 minute walk to my central CBD office, but that's only an option if you can afford a couple of million on housing - otherwise commutes are comparable with the UK

So if you are moving for shorter work hours and smaller commutes the reality is you are about 20 years too late.

Personally I think AUS is a better way of life but it's close and it's the culmination of many micro benefits as opposed to major differences 

[Quoll]

Not much point in having interviews if you don’t have a visa I would have thought. 

Ah, the old “better life for the kids” thing. It isn’t magically better - not like H&A for the vast majority of the population, most of us don’t live on the beach! It’s just another first world country but a smaller pond than UK. You still have to clean the bathrooms and put the bins out. The cost of living is rocketing up here too so unless you’re rolling in dough your life is going to be just the same lurch from both your pay packets to the next ones. Youth unemployment here is pretty high and there aren’t magically more opportunities and youth mental health is still pretty poor. On the flip side, Australia is a pretty ageist country and it gets tough to move into a new job over 50 and you will be needing to work well after that because it’ll take you about 30 years to get a decent superannuation pot.
If you want to do it, do it because you want an adventure and can drop £50k without batting an eyelid. Remember there is just one heartbeat between a Dream and a Nightmare.
Your wife will quite probably struggle especially as her mum gets older and needs more support. If she’s an only child, multiply the angst of an ageing parent x 10 as you live the “dream” on the other side of the world. If she needs lots of persuading then it isn’t really going to work - resentment can set in when only the tiniest of glitches pops up and it takes a rock solid marriage to survive.

Good luck with your decision though! Talk to Paul Hand about your options, he knows all about the visa stuff and what you are thinking may or may not be feasible so you may be worrying about something that could never happen. If you want an adventure, have lots of money and have a great opportunity then go for it.
 

[Marisawright]

1 hour ago, Ausvisitor said:

Here I still start at 8am and often don't finish until 7pm but as housing is massively cheaper here....

Worth pointing out that Ausvisitor is comparing Sydney prices with London prices.  Housing is expensive in some parts of Australia compared to some parts of the UK -- it depends where you're coming from and where you're going to.   You can get an idea of prices from realestate.com.au, but real estate agents here are shonky, and they photoshop the photos and lie about the prices, so there's no substitute for driving around and inspecting some houses while you're on holiday, to get an idea what you can really get for your money.  

[Ausvisitor]

1 hour ago, Marisawright said:

Worth pointing out that Ausvisitor is comparing Sydney prices with London prices.  Housing is expensive in some parts of Australia compared to some parts of the UK -- it depends where you're coming from and where you're going to.   You can get an idea of prices from realestate.com.au, but real estate agents here are shonky, and they photoshop the photos and lie about the prices, so there's no substitute for driving around and inspecting some houses while you're on holiday, to get an idea what you can really get for your money.  

I was doing Melbourne (as I've moved south due to better work life balance i.e. I was always travelling to Melbourne from Sydney and now I generally just stay in the CBD), that said it's true of both Sydney and Melbourne (Sydney is generally more expensive)

That said in any of the "million population plus cities" (Syd, Mel, Bris, Adel, Perth) you are going to struggle to find a decent family sized house within walking distance of the CBD offices for under $2.5m so for the majority of people the actual city is irrelevant as the "walk to work" option isn't there.

So most will be living at least a 40 minute commute to the city to make house prices work (and the associated $10 a day on road rolls and $40 a day on CBD parking).

[Note: if you think work from home will solve these costs then you will be disappointed almost every major white collar employer is moving to the minimum 3 day in the office mode and most want to be back up to full office attendance - job market is tough at the moment so they can enforce it in a way that wasn't open to them in the booming post COVID market of 2022]

[Marisawright]

19 minutes ago, Ausvisitor said:

I was doing Melbourne (as I've moved south due to better work life balance i.e. I was always travelling to Melbourne from Sydney

Welcome to Melbourne.  How are you liking it?   As you may recall, I lived in Sydney for over 30 years and have now been in Melbourne for nearly 8 years.  I prefer the climate here, as I can't stand humidity.  I do miss the beauty of Sydney and the gorgeous winters, but Melbourne is much more practical in my retirement.

[Ausvisitor]

7 minutes ago, Marisawright said:

Welcome to Melbourne.  How are you liking it?   As you may recall, I lived in Sydney for over 30 years and have now been in Melbourne for nearly 8 years.  I prefer the climate here, as I can't stand humidity.  I do miss the beauty of Sydney and the gorgeous winters, but Melbourne is much more practical in my retirement.

Similar (except for the retirement bit). Live in North Melbourne (the suburb not just North of Melbourne) Vic Market is our closest shop...