If you're new here, you may be interested to know that you can receive all of our latest articles directly to your inbox. Click Here for more info. We promise to keep your email safe and will use it for only this purpose

I’ve written recently about the little poll we’ve been running and the interesting results that it’s showing us (615 votes at time of typing).

However identifying the state in which you want to live is one thing, choosing which suburb you want to move into is another.

Getting first hand advice from people living in your shortlisted suburb is going to be a great way to get a view of what living in a suburb is really like.

A quick post in our Australian Real estate and where to live forum might well be a good start however there’s a lot of suburbs out there and waiting for someone who ‘just-so-happens’ to live in the same suburb may not be the most effective use of your time, especially if your looking to settle in one of the more remote areas.

It was whilst doing some research on Suburbs in an attempt to help out a couple of our forum members that I stumbled upon a pretty useful site.

The guys over at Domain.com.au have a handy little section on their site which provides suburb profiles of every suburb in Australia (well, I’ve not been able to find one which isn’t profiled yet).

They provide details of public transport, surrounding suburbs, house price data and a handful of other demographics which are compiled from a variety of sources including the Australian Bureau of Statistics and research by Australian Property Monitors.

So, to search for what might be your future Suburb then Click Here (Link opens in a new window).

Hopefully you’ll find the info pretty useful

Article Popularity: 28%

Australian Migration Agents and whether or not to utilise one as part of your migration process is a question that will be at the forefront of many people’s minds when they decide that they want to make a better life for themselves down under.

Where the hell do you start is often the very first question though and having a migration agent guide you through the complexities of moving to Australia might be seen as a must have for some.

Although when we made our own move down under we organised everything ourselves, for some the Australian Migration agent path may be a preferred option.

What is important though is that if you go down this path then you are strongly advised to use a Migration Agent that is registered.

Outside of Australia not all agents are registered. If they are not registered they are not accountable. Some call themselves Migration consultants or similar!

Back in October I wrote about a paper I’d read which detailed some of the antics of some of the more dodgy migration agents out there. It’s fair to say that you need to be careful when choosing your agent as choosing a bad one will waste both your time and your money!

So, if you’re looking for a Migration Agent how do you find an agent who’s officially recognised and registered? Continue Reading

Article Popularity: 42%

Once you finally made it down under the next thing that many folks will want to do is gain their Australian Citizenship so that they can become a ‘real aussie’

Getting Australian citizenship has recently got a little harder, not only do you need to be a permanent Australian resident for four years instead of two, from the 1st of October 2007 you also need to take the Australian citizenship test.

To help support this, The Australian citizenship website has launched a number of resources that will help those in preparing for and taking the new test.

The first is a new resource book

The resource book, creatively titled; ‘Becoming an Australian Citizen‘, is supposed to help you prepare for the citizenship test. Continue Reading

Article Popularity: 6%

The ASPC have published Information on making telephone or email enquiries to their offices.

This system has been established to provide consistent and efficient responses to email enquiries and you are requested not to send enquiries to individual departmental officers regarding an application unless specifically requested to do so.

The new section on the ASPC Site provides advice on how to:

Continue Reading

Article Popularity: 6%