We bought a car today. Now before I tell you which car it is, let me explain why we chose this particular car. First of all , most cars around here are white Japanese cars and for a good reason : They're cheap, white doesn't attract too much heat and they are very reliable. You'll see plenty of Honda, Toyota, Mitsubishi, Subaru and Mazda's ( sorry if I forgot a few makes ). Holden here is considered a "younger generation car" ( read : Pimp car ) and European cars are exclusive cars, mostly driven by ignorant European immigrants who buy their favorite European brand and then find themselves locked to huge service bills and garages refusing to help you.
So that shortens the list quite a lot. If you're 25+ , you really don't want to be seen driving a Holden, and you certainly don't want a Peugeot or Volkswagen or something like that unless you're a millionaire and you import your own spare parts. So the choice over here is pretty much limited to Mazda / Toyota / Subaru / Mitsubishi / Honda. All of them are good cars, they're pretty much all the same in fuel consumption ( their smallest models will have a 140 hp 1.8 engine, their top models anything like a V6 or V8 ).
Now here's where the sheep-technique comes in. Ever been sent to the shop to buy wine for anyone, and found yourself lost in the choice of different wines ? My tactic is simple , just pick the wine that is almost sold out ( the one that everyone else took ). It's guaranteed to be the best ( or at least : a very good ) wine. If you transpose this onto the car market, you'll find that Toyota is a winner. Not by a mile, only marginally more than the others, but still there are clearly more Toyota's on the road here than anything else. ( about 20% of the cars on the road here is a Toyota ). So that choice was made : We will buy a white Toyota. But what make ?
We went to the Toyota dealership and asked if we could test drive their models. To our surprise, they had EVERY possible car available for test drive, and no fuss was made about driving one. You wanna drive a V6 400 horsepower truck, no worries. You'll need to sign a quick insurance waiver ( a A4 that basically tells you that you will be liable for a certain amount of damage if you crash, usually anything between 500 and 3500 dollars ). TIP : This can be an indicator for how good the dealership will be for you by looking at those numbers, the higher they are, the more scroogey they will be and the more expensive your car will be. So if they ask you to sign a waiver at 3500 at one dealership, and 1000 at the other ( for the same car mind you ) then you should try and talk to the dealership with the 1000 waivers.
We sat in a few different models : The Aygo, the Yaris, the Corolla and the RAV4. Anything beyond the RAV4 will cost you serious bucks and also costs a lot to drive ( 17 liters of petrol per 100 kilometers etc ). The Aygo and Yaris are way too small to even consider, if the potholes don't kill you a rampant road train certainly will. So Aygo and Yaris are a big no-no. The choice was really between a Corolla and a RAV4. In other words, the heart versus the head choice. The RAV4 obviously is a lot more expensive than the Corolla and will use more petrol, but then again the RAV4 fits the Australian lifestyle better ( remember : 50% of cars here are SUVs and the cars that aren't SUVs are the big commodores and Aureons with big V6s or V8s ). Compared to the "average" vehicle on the road, a 4cylinder RAV4 would be quite economical , a good trade-off between lifestyle and cheap and green driving. The RAV4's are very popular here , the corolla's are "the wife's car". Also when towing anything of reasonable length or weight ( a boat, a horse trailer, a big trailer for home renovations etc ), the Corolla would not be sufficient whereas a RAV4 would do a good job with ease.
So... we bought the Toyota RAV4 4cylinder !! It's an "Edge" model which includes a lot "dooblies" as the salespeople call them : Roof rails ( not racks, the rails look a lot better and are welded on the chassis and therefor can only be fitted at production of the car) , Luxury steering wheel ( hey , you're gonna be using that about all of the time in the car, it might as well have a good feel ! ), parking sensors in the back ( a little beep that tells you if you are driving back into something ) , tinted glass ( looks cool and IS cool = keeps a lot of heat out of the car ) , 17" alloy wheels, Air Conditioning , Cruise Control etc etc...
We added a Nudge Bar on the front ( like a bull bar but only the middle bit ) and a tow bar at the back ( for our boat trailer, one's gotta have dreams you know ! ) and an integrated SatNav on it since our little Garmin is dying.
All in all it's a super luxurious car that would cost about 50.000 euro's in The Netherlands and which we certainly would never have bought there. We paid a total of 40000 dollars for it : That's 20.000 euro's ! You can buy a second-hand Hyundai Getz with 200.000 mileage on it for that price in Europe, if you're lucky ! Ok , that was exaggerated, realistically you would be able to buy a new Hyundai Getz for that.
We're very happy with the deal, and it only took us two garages and lots of internet research to get this price. On the internet we saw a second-hand RAV4 from 2005 listed for 34900 ( didn't even bother looking at the mileage ) and in another Toyota dealership ( The Toyota dealer in Mango Hill, don't go there ! ) we got a quote of 50.000 for this car.
At Toyota Maroochidore ( good one, go here for good deals ! ) we got a good deal and he threw in a pair of "Bush-tucking lights" on the nudge bar too ( these will cost you 500 dollars new mind you ) so we do some bush driving with it.
The only thing we couldn't get was a WHITE RAV4, which we initially set our mind to. The Edge model is a bit of a sold out model and only red / black / blue / graphite / metallic silver were available. We took the graphite one, it looks real good with the black tinted windows and the nudge bar and roof rails. We actually tested the white versus black car theory by sitting in cars that had been standing in the sun for hours outside the dealership. First we sat in a black car : HOT ! Then we sat in a white car : JUST AS HOT ! No difference at all , apparently it's the interior ( which usually is black ) that attracts the heat more than anything else. So it wasn't a big issue and I must say that graphite grows on you. It's a bit like a light-black ( huh? ) metallic color. Some people call it "carbon" or "charcoal" but it's a bit lighter than that, it's a nice color and we are happy to have chosen it. It's also a metallic paint which in theory is a lot more expensive than the plain white paint.
We decided to fit some extra's in the car which will help protect it from the Queensland sun :
- An electronic rust protector
- UV window protection tint
- Paint protection
- Interior protection
Now whether or not those things work doesn't really matter, I've always been sceptical about it and never really thought they were much use. However, if you buy those items, you will get 10 years ( lifetime, but in reality it's 10 years ) warranty on your paint, your interior , rust. The window protection is also helpful because it will make your car glass darker which looks cool, and it will make it cooler inside when you first step in. Obviously there is no reason to have it past that because you have air conditioning anyway, but it also blocks some UV which is linked to cancer etc. The tinting is also an interesting one. The Queensland law says that all window tinting fitted by a dealer prior to delivery to the customer is street legal. So although we will have a very dark car it will be street legal anyway. There is 10 years warrantee on the tinting, so if there are any bubbles forming after installation ( due to sun, heat or whatever ) then they will fix it for us at no charge. Also , the resale value of the car will go up as will the trade-in. Everything together this cost 2000 AUD dollars but for 10 years warranty on literally everything in your car : You can't really go wrong. Also , I won't get mad when someone spills any coffee on our seats , because I know it will be fixed by the Toyota dealer.
Another great deal that Toyota offers is their 3-year fixed price servicing, which can be ( and we did ) lengthened by another 3 years, so 6 years. You will pay 300 dollars per year to service your car, no matter what's wrong with it : This is what you will pay for 6 years. This is well worth taking up , some other manufacturers also offer this so it's not unique to Toyota here, but it sure isn't the same in Europe. So that's 6 years service and warranty at a fixed price without worries. Good on ya, Toyota !
The average mileage of our RAV4 ( which we will pick up next week, just as our rental expires ) is 9.6/100 , the Corolla had a 7.6/100 so we're using 2 liters more per 100 kilometers. Seeing as the fuel over here is 1,10 dollars ( that's right : about 60 euro cents ! ) and doing 20.000 kilometers on average per year, it will cost us 440 dollars extra ( at current fuel prices ) to drive the RAV4 compared to the Corolla. The insurance ( full comprehensive, which means that if ANY damage is caused by ANYthing , you will be insured for it ) costs 550 dollars per year ( corrolla = 450 dollars ) and the "Reggo" ( taxes etc etc ) cost about 400 per year, about the same as the corolla ( it's calculated per cylinder not quite sure how exactly though, but both have equal cylinders = 4 ).
So, long story short : We'll pick up our new Toyota RAV4 with lots of gadgets up next week ! We'll try and put some pictures up during the weekend. We're still very busy at the moment getting a rental, but that's a separate post.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
We got our driver licenses !
Today we crossed a big line : We got our driver licenses ! Now you might think this would be a simple thing to get ( after all, the driver license is nothing more than a piece of ordinary paper printed by a dot matrix printer and your photo next to it, and then plastified with the most normal machines. In other words : It's not a very secure document , in European standards.
However, all is not as it seems. In Australia, your driver license is worth equal identification points to your passport ! This means that you can use your driver license for almost any form of authentication. In fact, your driver license is NEEDED in most cases because without it you will need a proof of settlement in Australia, which is basically a document ( not any document, a legal one ) like a rental agreement, or a home ownership document. These documents are obviously very hard to get initially when you settle in Australia, but here's the good part : The driver license IS SUCH A DOCUMENT ! Your address is printed on it so people readily accept this as a formal proof of settlement in Australia.
Obviously the driver license is THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT document that you will have to get once you settle in Australia, we knew this so we tried to get it asap when we got here. The second day we got here we went into the Road and Transportation Association customer service center ( what a long word that is ). If you have trouble finding them , here's a listing of the addresses of all the RTA offices in Queensland. We went inside and got told that we didn't have enough points to authenticate ( you'll get used to the point system , it's very easy : driver license = 40 points, passport = 40 points, 18+ card = 20 points, medicare card = 20 points, Visa ( which is inside your passport ) = 20 points or something etc etc ). We told her that we just arrived and that we didn't know where to get our points. She said that a Bank Card with our name on it and our signature would be sufficient together with the Visa and the Passport and a Credit Card or foreign Bank Card. You will realize soon that the requirements are flaky at best : In another RTA office we were told completely different things and that lady would accept another document but not the one that the first lady accepted. We found out later that the only REAL authentication you need is a bit of personal charm and flattery towards the person behind the counter, this will get you a lot further. Something like "We just moved here and we love it, (fill in the town you're in) is really beautiful ( doesn't matter if it is or not ) and what lovely beaches and friendly people over here, Queensland definately is the best place on earth !" will be worth a lot more points than any document you can come up with. It took us two days to find this out.
So the first day we failed. We got the application forms with us though, and ended up with this magical combination of points :
- Commonwealth "Change of Address confirmation" that we got when we signed up with commonwealth bank and which states your "new" address which in our case was our B&B for three weeks. TIP: If you're staying in a hotel you're screwed, you won't get anything done since you don't have a real address and the bank ( and everyone else ) DO NOT ACCEPT A POSTBOX ADDRESS. Remember : To get a bank account you will need a telephone ( prepaid, since you cannot get anything else ) and an address. The bank told us they don't use the points system anymore and they will happily help you with just your passport and some flattery-points ( plus the phone number and the address )
- Credit Card ( if you have any ) or your old bank card from your European bank as long as it has a signature on the back ( very important : no signature = no legal document )
- Passport
- Visa ( in our case it's a 175 visa which is in our passport but this is not always the case )
- B&B Booking confirmation + payment slip ( important ! )
Those 5 things will get you a driver's license : But not everywhere.
We went back to Maroochydore RTA customer centre, went in armed with our documents, and here comes the surprise : The classes are different ! So let's say I have a A+B license in The Netherlands ( same as in the UK btw or any other european country ) then that means that I can drive a Motorbike ( A ) and a Car ( B ) without trailer.
In Australia however, that would equate to a C ( Car + Trailer ) and R ( rider = motorbike ) ( you also get RE which is 250CC or lower, make sure you get the full R one , not the RE !! ).
Since I filled in AB in the driver license code on the application form, I got told that they don't accept untranslated driver licenses. I gave her the International Driver License which is a translation of it in english and 50 other languages, after which they got irritated ( our flattery points turned negative right here ) and they
said that that was not a legal document. I told them it was, they looked it up , they said "it's only for driving, not for requesting a driver license" and that was basically it. So we asked what we could do and the lady told us we had to go to the consulate to ask for a translated driver license. A young Danish guy stepped in and told us he had to do the same and showed us his version of his Danish translated driver license. This would take weeks !
But I don't give up that quickly. I had learned and I knew exactly where it went bottoms up : My non-Australian knowledge of their license classes. After all we're talking about the single most important document you'll ever get in Australia : Your driver license. It was late and we had other things to do ( see next post ) so we called it for the day. We did however take a new empty license request form with us, which would come in handy later.
Next day, we decided that we'd note down the addresses of some of the nearby RTA offices ( of which there are many ) and use the GPS navigator ( an old , outdated Garmin Nuvi which doesn't really work well but better still than reading paper maps ) to drive to all of them : If they would decline us the driver license, we'd just move to the next one until we would learn enough about the Australian way to get it without hassle. At home we filled in the empty forms and this time we put "C + R" in them , not "AB".
It proved we're fast learners : The first RTA customer centre we went to was Redcliffe ( Kippa Ring actually ). We came in to the RTA office and there weren't that many people there ( there never are in Australia, but a queue of more than 10 peopls here is considered VERY busy ) I think there were 3-4 people there and after waiting less than a minute we were greeted. Now this is the absolute critical moment in Ozzie socializing behaviour : The greet. It will make or break your entire conversation. If you respond like a Pommie then that's how you will be treated. If on the other hand you respond like an Indian they won't take you seriously.
They have different variations of greets ( to fool the immigrants obviously ) and the game is played like a chess gambit. On opening E2-E4 , the correct response would be D2-D4, but you could also use a E2-E4, after which the horses will come out. If you try and move your rook , they'll figure you out, if you move the A2-A4 pawn they'll think you're a beginner.
"Hi, how are you today, and how may I help ?" ( Whaaaa she played the shrude Sicilian opening, clearly advanced and long-time Australian. )
"Very well thank you. It's lovely weather, what could possibly go wrong today ? We really love this town and love the friendly people over here. How are you ?" ( carefully parried that first move there, if you answer "I'm ok, I need you to convert my driver license" then you just lost the game )
"Fine thanks. Now what can I do for you today ?" ( the original question again, but this time they expect you to answer it )
"We just migrated to Queensland six days ago and we hope to convert our current license into a Queensland driver license. We have read up on the application process and have the completed forms right here, we also brought along the needed documents" ( we're on a win here )
"Let me see that. Oh... wait you have a Commonwealth Change of Address form, but you don't have the Commonwealth Bank Card yet, we'll need some other form of proof of residency from you" ( now, this is a very tactical move, she just moved her Queen and your king is checked. Ofcourse we knew the commonwealth bank documents were sufficient without the bank card, after all we used them in the other RTA office where they were no problem. However, if you play that card it's a check mate and you'll never get your license here. )
"We have the rent agreement with us, will that do ?"
"Hmm... lemme check all that. I'll just copy these documents right here and be right back"
YOU WIN ! She's just been check-mated and will now be open for requests.
15 minutes later and 200 dollars lighter ( 75 for a 5-year driver license and 25 for an 18+ card , times two people ), we got our driver license , and used this driver license to complete the application form for our 18+ card which is also valued at 20 points.
A big job done, especially since we just bought a car ! ( and you need your driver license to buy a car over here, there's no other way )
However, all is not as it seems. In Australia, your driver license is worth equal identification points to your passport ! This means that you can use your driver license for almost any form of authentication. In fact, your driver license is NEEDED in most cases because without it you will need a proof of settlement in Australia, which is basically a document ( not any document, a legal one ) like a rental agreement, or a home ownership document. These documents are obviously very hard to get initially when you settle in Australia, but here's the good part : The driver license IS SUCH A DOCUMENT ! Your address is printed on it so people readily accept this as a formal proof of settlement in Australia.
Obviously the driver license is THE SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT document that you will have to get once you settle in Australia, we knew this so we tried to get it asap when we got here. The second day we got here we went into the Road and Transportation Association customer service center ( what a long word that is ). If you have trouble finding them , here's a listing of the addresses of all the RTA offices in Queensland. We went inside and got told that we didn't have enough points to authenticate ( you'll get used to the point system , it's very easy : driver license = 40 points, passport = 40 points, 18+ card = 20 points, medicare card = 20 points, Visa ( which is inside your passport ) = 20 points or something etc etc ). We told her that we just arrived and that we didn't know where to get our points. She said that a Bank Card with our name on it and our signature would be sufficient together with the Visa and the Passport and a Credit Card or foreign Bank Card. You will realize soon that the requirements are flaky at best : In another RTA office we were told completely different things and that lady would accept another document but not the one that the first lady accepted. We found out later that the only REAL authentication you need is a bit of personal charm and flattery towards the person behind the counter, this will get you a lot further. Something like "We just moved here and we love it, (fill in the town you're in) is really beautiful ( doesn't matter if it is or not ) and what lovely beaches and friendly people over here, Queensland definately is the best place on earth !" will be worth a lot more points than any document you can come up with. It took us two days to find this out.
So the first day we failed. We got the application forms with us though, and ended up with this magical combination of points :
- Commonwealth "Change of Address confirmation" that we got when we signed up with commonwealth bank and which states your "new" address which in our case was our B&B for three weeks. TIP: If you're staying in a hotel you're screwed, you won't get anything done since you don't have a real address and the bank ( and everyone else ) DO NOT ACCEPT A POSTBOX ADDRESS. Remember : To get a bank account you will need a telephone ( prepaid, since you cannot get anything else ) and an address. The bank told us they don't use the points system anymore and they will happily help you with just your passport and some flattery-points ( plus the phone number and the address )
- Credit Card ( if you have any ) or your old bank card from your European bank as long as it has a signature on the back ( very important : no signature = no legal document )
- Passport
- Visa ( in our case it's a 175 visa which is in our passport but this is not always the case )
- B&B Booking confirmation + payment slip ( important ! )
Those 5 things will get you a driver's license : But not everywhere.
We went back to Maroochydore RTA customer centre, went in armed with our documents, and here comes the surprise : The classes are different ! So let's say I have a A+B license in The Netherlands ( same as in the UK btw or any other european country ) then that means that I can drive a Motorbike ( A ) and a Car ( B ) without trailer.
In Australia however, that would equate to a C ( Car + Trailer ) and R ( rider = motorbike ) ( you also get RE which is 250CC or lower, make sure you get the full R one , not the RE !! ).
Since I filled in AB in the driver license code on the application form, I got told that they don't accept untranslated driver licenses. I gave her the International Driver License which is a translation of it in english and 50 other languages, after which they got irritated ( our flattery points turned negative right here ) and they
said that that was not a legal document. I told them it was, they looked it up , they said "it's only for driving, not for requesting a driver license" and that was basically it. So we asked what we could do and the lady told us we had to go to the consulate to ask for a translated driver license. A young Danish guy stepped in and told us he had to do the same and showed us his version of his Danish translated driver license. This would take weeks !
But I don't give up that quickly. I had learned and I knew exactly where it went bottoms up : My non-Australian knowledge of their license classes. After all we're talking about the single most important document you'll ever get in Australia : Your driver license. It was late and we had other things to do ( see next post ) so we called it for the day. We did however take a new empty license request form with us, which would come in handy later.
Next day, we decided that we'd note down the addresses of some of the nearby RTA offices ( of which there are many ) and use the GPS navigator ( an old , outdated Garmin Nuvi which doesn't really work well but better still than reading paper maps ) to drive to all of them : If they would decline us the driver license, we'd just move to the next one until we would learn enough about the Australian way to get it without hassle. At home we filled in the empty forms and this time we put "C + R" in them , not "AB".
It proved we're fast learners : The first RTA customer centre we went to was Redcliffe ( Kippa Ring actually ). We came in to the RTA office and there weren't that many people there ( there never are in Australia, but a queue of more than 10 peopls here is considered VERY busy ) I think there were 3-4 people there and after waiting less than a minute we were greeted. Now this is the absolute critical moment in Ozzie socializing behaviour : The greet. It will make or break your entire conversation. If you respond like a Pommie then that's how you will be treated. If on the other hand you respond like an Indian they won't take you seriously.
They have different variations of greets ( to fool the immigrants obviously ) and the game is played like a chess gambit. On opening E2-E4 , the correct response would be D2-D4, but you could also use a E2-E4, after which the horses will come out. If you try and move your rook , they'll figure you out, if you move the A2-A4 pawn they'll think you're a beginner.
"Hi, how are you today, and how may I help ?" ( Whaaaa she played the shrude Sicilian opening, clearly advanced and long-time Australian.
"Very well thank you. It's lovely weather, what could possibly go wrong today ? We really love this town and love the friendly people over here. How are you ?" ( carefully parried that first move there, if you answer "I'm ok, I need you to convert my driver license" then you just lost the game )
"Fine thanks. Now what can I do for you today ?" ( the original question again, but this time they expect you to answer it )
"We just migrated to Queensland six days ago and we hope to convert our current license into a Queensland driver license. We have read up on the application process and have the completed forms right here, we also brought along the needed documents" ( we're on a win here )
"Let me see that. Oh... wait you have a Commonwealth Change of Address form, but you don't have the Commonwealth Bank Card yet, we'll need some other form of proof of residency from you" ( now, this is a very tactical move, she just moved her Queen and your king is checked. Ofcourse we knew the commonwealth bank documents were sufficient without the bank card, after all we used them in the other RTA office where they were no problem. However, if you play that card it's a check mate and you'll never get your license here. )
"We have the rent agreement with us, will that do ?"
"Hmm... lemme check all that. I'll just copy these documents right here and be right back"
YOU WIN ! She's just been check-mated and will now be open for requests.
15 minutes later and 200 dollars lighter ( 75 for a 5-year driver license and 25 for an 18+ card , times two people ), we got our driver license , and used this driver license to complete the application form for our 18+ card which is also valued at 20 points.
A big job done, especially since we just bought a car ! ( and you need your driver license to buy a car over here, there's no other way )
Maroochydore -> Noosa
Yesterday we drove from Maroochydore to Noosa over the coastal highway. The further north you go , the prettier the places get. Noosa being the "Hollywood of Australia" it's a very pretty place, loads of hills and VERY expensive looking houses ( and they are probably even more expensive to buy than they look ). It's a very touristic place, a bit like Caloundra but instead of highrises they have hills and smaller unit-blocks.
There's nature all over in Noosa and the views to the ocean are priceless. It's not a place that is easy to reach from the civilized world though, it will take you about 40 minutes from Maroochydore to Noosa over the coastline roads, more when there are roadworks ( and there are quite a few roadworks in Queensland : a good thing ). Noosa is too far from the Bruce Highway, and too far from the Sunshine Coast CBD ( Maroochydore ) so it's a place where you retire, not a place you go to work, unless ofcourse you're lucky and work with retirees or in tourism. We liked Noosa. A bit southeast of Noosa you get Sunshine beach, they're pretty close together and you get lovely views over there on the David Low way. Sunshine beach has been developed over the last few years and looks well maintained and there seem to be proud people living over there : Proud of their boats that is, because everyone over there seems to drive boats instead of cars ( boats are all over the carparks / driveways there ). More south is Sunrise beach which has hill tops looking over the ocean and reasonably big houses but fewer boats. The roads get a big bigger over here, people drive a bit faster and this is really the furthest that most Australians will drive to Maroochydore for work. South of Sunrise beach, along the David Low way there is Castaways (beach) which is like a small settlement next to the big open road. However these people have the best views over the ocean that you can imagine, it's a tradeoff between having a "cliffside" house and being next to a busy traffic road ( the David Low way looks more like a motorway here ). Marcus Beach and Peregian beach are nice but didn't impress us as much as the northern suburbs. If you like old original Queenslanders then this is the place to buy one though. You won't have much views but the prices are lower in these area's ( still very unaffordable though, which says less about our financial situation than the dire overpriced housing market in Australia ). Overpriced is ofcourse relative to what you get. Yes you do get a nice view, you get a reasonable plot and the houses are reasonably built, but the wages here don't allow the prices, it's really as simple as that. Jobs here will pay anything from 30.000 AUD ( cleaner / mechanic etc ) to 50.000 AUD ( real estate agents / government jobs / car salesmen ) to 70.000 ( Senior IT with 10+ years experience / Managers / Senior Bank staff ). These wages don't warrant houseprices of more than 250.000 for small worker homes to 500.000 for luxury manager homes. The prices of homes here START at 500.000 for very small and run-down places, and they go anywhere to 3 million and more for the reasonably luxurious places. The very expensive places in and around Noosa reach 5-15 million each, private tennis court included of course.
So, we have decided to rent. You see, the math is quite simple :
A house on the beach ( literally ON the beach ) costs about 500 to rent. This equates to about 26000 per year in rent.
Now, this same house would be on the market for 1 million. That would be about 60000 yearly interest repayments. In other words, we'd be saving 34000 by renting the EXACT same place. And then I'm not even calculating the yearly repairs, the yearly taxes, the insurances, the ACTUAL REPAYMENT OF THE LOAN ( I just calculated the interest repayments, the loan will stay the same unless you pay EVEN MORE than 60000 ).
Yes, the housing market in Australia is in an interesting era. How long will the housing market survive ? I think about 1-2 years, then we'll see a substantial correction either in rental prices ( inflation of wages basically ) or a correction in houseprices ( 50% off at least, a bit more than in the USA ).
There's nature all over in Noosa and the views to the ocean are priceless. It's not a place that is easy to reach from the civilized world though, it will take you about 40 minutes from Maroochydore to Noosa over the coastline roads, more when there are roadworks ( and there are quite a few roadworks in Queensland : a good thing ). Noosa is too far from the Bruce Highway, and too far from the Sunshine Coast CBD ( Maroochydore ) so it's a place where you retire, not a place you go to work, unless ofcourse you're lucky and work with retirees or in tourism. We liked Noosa. A bit southeast of Noosa you get Sunshine beach, they're pretty close together and you get lovely views over there on the David Low way. Sunshine beach has been developed over the last few years and looks well maintained and there seem to be proud people living over there : Proud of their boats that is, because everyone over there seems to drive boats instead of cars ( boats are all over the carparks / driveways there ). More south is Sunrise beach which has hill tops looking over the ocean and reasonably big houses but fewer boats. The roads get a big bigger over here, people drive a bit faster and this is really the furthest that most Australians will drive to Maroochydore for work. South of Sunrise beach, along the David Low way there is Castaways (beach) which is like a small settlement next to the big open road. However these people have the best views over the ocean that you can imagine, it's a tradeoff between having a "cliffside" house and being next to a busy traffic road ( the David Low way looks more like a motorway here ). Marcus Beach and Peregian beach are nice but didn't impress us as much as the northern suburbs. If you like old original Queenslanders then this is the place to buy one though. You won't have much views but the prices are lower in these area's ( still very unaffordable though, which says less about our financial situation than the dire overpriced housing market in Australia ). Overpriced is ofcourse relative to what you get. Yes you do get a nice view, you get a reasonable plot and the houses are reasonably built, but the wages here don't allow the prices, it's really as simple as that. Jobs here will pay anything from 30.000 AUD ( cleaner / mechanic etc ) to 50.000 AUD ( real estate agents / government jobs / car salesmen ) to 70.000 ( Senior IT with 10+ years experience / Managers / Senior Bank staff ). These wages don't warrant houseprices of more than 250.000 for small worker homes to 500.000 for luxury manager homes. The prices of homes here START at 500.000 for very small and run-down places, and they go anywhere to 3 million and more for the reasonably luxurious places. The very expensive places in and around Noosa reach 5-15 million each, private tennis court included of course.
So, we have decided to rent. You see, the math is quite simple :
A house on the beach ( literally ON the beach ) costs about 500 to rent. This equates to about 26000 per year in rent.
Now, this same house would be on the market for 1 million. That would be about 60000 yearly interest repayments. In other words, we'd be saving 34000 by renting the EXACT same place. And then I'm not even calculating the yearly repairs, the yearly taxes, the insurances, the ACTUAL REPAYMENT OF THE LOAN ( I just calculated the interest repayments, the loan will stay the same unless you pay EVEN MORE than 60000 ).
Yes, the housing market in Australia is in an interesting era. How long will the housing market survive ? I think about 1-2 years, then we'll see a substantial correction either in rental prices ( inflation of wages basically ) or a correction in houseprices ( 50% off at least, a bit more than in the USA ).
Monday, September 28, 2009
Caloundra - > Maroochidore
We visited Caloundra today. It's a touristic place, it's busy and a bit hectic in the centre, but near the beach it's wonderful. Dickie beach is really nice, it was reasonably busy ( only 100 people on 2 kilometers of beach go figure ) and a bit further along the coast there are views of the ocean to kill for. A very nice place but there are better places along the coast, like Coolum Beach for instance, or Yaroomba Beach. We haven't been to every place yet, and Noosa apparently is very pretty also. Between Caloundra and Maroochydore there are a lot of industry parks, a lot of new-builds and it's basically 1 big building pit. Too bad, the region really looks poor there. I'm talking about Wurtulla and the likes, they are being built in by massive building projects, it really ruins most of the landscape so we quickly passed by there and went to Maroochydore. If Caloundra is the tourist centre then Maroochydore is the shopping centre and business centre. Most big companies have settled in Maroochydore and this made the town grow to be the biggest suburb in the Sunshine coast. There's a buzz in Maroochy that just isn't there in Caloundra. Ofcourse, this is our personal opinion only and we never liked highrises and busy area's.
Tomorrow we will do the upper part of the Sunshine Coast : From Maroochy to Noosa.
Tomorrow we will do the upper part of the Sunshine Coast : From Maroochy to Noosa.
About the spiders
So far, after 4 days, we have seen 0 spiders. They either hide very well or they are just not as abundant as people wanted to make us believe. No white-tails, no red-backs, nothing. Not 1 spider anywhere to be seen and believe me we looked for them everywhere. We did however see whales in the sea and a wild kangaroo in the middle of a field, many birds and some friendly bugs. No snakes, no spiders, no nasties.
I will keep you updated if we spot any :)
I will keep you updated if we spot any :)
Medicare, Bank, Driver's License, Tax file number etc
On the second day we started to get organized. Most shops are open on saturday and sunday over here, but they close around 17:00. We went back to the Sunshine Coast and this time we went to the Sunshine Plaza in Maroochydore : A fantastic shopping centre that has it all. We first went to the driver license office where we couldn't get our license because we needed an Australian bank card for identification purposes. We went to the bank ( Commonwealth or CBA in short ) and couldn't get a bank card because we didn't have a phone number. So we went to the phone shop and couldn't get a phone because we didn't have a bank account. Chicken and egg.
So after some thinking we bought a prepaid phone which didn't require a bank card, got a bank account from the CBA using our prepaid phone, got our medicare arranged too and filed for a TFN ( which we will need to give to the bank still ) which will all pretty much arrive in 2-3 weeks except the CBA which should arrive in 4-5 days.
The only problem we had is that all of these required an address, but they will happily use the address of our rental ( B&B room ) so we used that. We told em to use a "paperless" account which means you get all your mail online, saves the hassle.
Then we went to the Woolies ( Woolworths ) and got our first things :
- Notebook to write down things in ( should have brought this from Europe... doh )
- Some bread + muesli + milk ( "Light White" milk tastes good we think )
- 2 Australia -> Euro converter plugs for 220 volts ( laptops / music etc )
- Danish Cheese ( Arla : The best cheese in the world , round and red )
- Meat ( burgers + Steak )
- Mayo
- Butter
And some more stuff. We bought 3 small peanutbutters ( all different ones ) but we threw them all out because they tasted like american / english peanutbutter. We might have to buy some Calve in the Dutch Shop in Brissie or Caloundra.
The day was over quickly and we had a cookie for dinner and some bread, still jetlagged from our travels.
So after some thinking we bought a prepaid phone which didn't require a bank card, got a bank account from the CBA using our prepaid phone, got our medicare arranged too and filed for a TFN ( which we will need to give to the bank still ) which will all pretty much arrive in 2-3 weeks except the CBA which should arrive in 4-5 days.
The only problem we had is that all of these required an address, but they will happily use the address of our rental ( B&B room ) so we used that. We told em to use a "paperless" account which means you get all your mail online, saves the hassle.
Then we went to the Woolies ( Woolworths ) and got our first things :
- Notebook to write down things in ( should have brought this from Europe... doh )
- Some bread + muesli + milk ( "Light White" milk tastes good we think )
- 2 Australia -> Euro converter plugs for 220 volts ( laptops / music etc )
- Danish Cheese ( Arla : The best cheese in the world , round and red )
- Meat ( burgers + Steak )
- Mayo
- Butter
And some more stuff. We bought 3 small peanutbutters ( all different ones ) but we threw them all out because they tasted like american / english peanutbutter. We might have to buy some Calve in the Dutch Shop in Brissie or Caloundra.
The day was over quickly and we had a cookie for dinner and some bread, still jetlagged from our travels.
Coolum Beach + Yaroomba
After we left the Toyota dealership, pretty amazed by the prices of new cars over here ( positively surprised that is ) we went to Coolum Beach where we saw our first glimpse of the ocean.
IT IS BEAUTIFUL ! It's amazing, the water is so clear that you can see 10 meters deep and it's a beautiful light blue color. Beautiful white sandy beaches complete this picturesque image. It's truly amazing. Kim says it looks like Capetown in South Africa ( a place she loves ). We spotted whales in the distance, it really is like living in a dream. This is when we remembered what we all did it for and it was like getting our reward for all our hard work and 1.5 years waiting.
After Coolum Beach we went to Yaroomba where went to see this home which proved to be a real dump. It would take at least 100.000 to make it liveable and we didn't like the neighborhood. The electric wires in the middle of the ocean view are terrible and there were some other issues with a homeless man living under the house ( we went to see the house without notifying the owner or the real estate agent ). We decided not to proceed with it and not even make an offer because quite frankly the property ( if you can still call it that ) was worth more in the region of 100.000 than 629.000. We decided to rent for the first 6 months and we would look for some nice rental places on the internet before we would even consider buying a place.
Quite frankly, Ozzie houseprices are completely out of synch with reality. Houses here start at a minimum of 400.000 ( a complete dump in a reasonable neighborhood or a new house in a complete dump ) but if you want anything nice, you'll be spending around 750.000. Now, that 750.000 dollar house, you can RENT for 300 per week.
Quick maths tell anyone ( except an ozzie ) that renting is MUCH better financially than buying. The root of this problem is CGT and GST tax returns and some other things like the "australian dream of owning your own home".
TIP : Don't buy a home until the houseprices dropped at least 50%. Or buy it now at a 50% discount, whichever suits you :)
IT IS BEAUTIFUL ! It's amazing, the water is so clear that you can see 10 meters deep and it's a beautiful light blue color. Beautiful white sandy beaches complete this picturesque image. It's truly amazing. Kim says it looks like Capetown in South Africa ( a place she loves ). We spotted whales in the distance, it really is like living in a dream. This is when we remembered what we all did it for and it was like getting our reward for all our hard work and 1.5 years waiting.
After Coolum Beach we went to Yaroomba where went to see this home which proved to be a real dump. It would take at least 100.000 to make it liveable and we didn't like the neighborhood. The electric wires in the middle of the ocean view are terrible and there were some other issues with a homeless man living under the house ( we went to see the house without notifying the owner or the real estate agent ). We decided not to proceed with it and not even make an offer because quite frankly the property ( if you can still call it that ) was worth more in the region of 100.000 than 629.000. We decided to rent for the first 6 months and we would look for some nice rental places on the internet before we would even consider buying a place.
Quite frankly, Ozzie houseprices are completely out of synch with reality. Houses here start at a minimum of 400.000 ( a complete dump in a reasonable neighborhood or a new house in a complete dump ) but if you want anything nice, you'll be spending around 750.000. Now, that 750.000 dollar house, you can RENT for 300 per week.
Quick maths tell anyone ( except an ozzie ) that renting is MUCH better financially than buying. The root of this problem is CGT and GST tax returns and some other things like the "australian dream of owning your own home".
TIP : Don't buy a home until the houseprices dropped at least 50%. Or buy it now at a 50% discount, whichever suits you :)
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