Can anyone help with general information or websites to research what it takes to move from the United States to Australia?

Interested in employment possibilities and requirements, legal paperwork necessary. Could be for a limited 1-2 year stay, or permanent citizenship.

Forgive the vague nature of my post, I'm helping a friend get started. I am an active Fodors forum poster on Mexico and Europe, but don't know the 1st thing about Australia.

Any kick in the right direction will be most appreciated. Thanks.

Hi Suze,
I guess the place to start is with the Australian Govn't immigration dept:
www.immi.gov.au/
I am from UK so it may be a little different but requirements are probably basically the same.
They no longer want to accept convicts from any country.
Search the internet for 'migration to Australia' there are several conpanies that will assist your friend with the Visa application.
Normally it will ask to fill in a questionaire that will calculate if you have enough 'points' to achieve your goal and they can tell you for a small fee if your goals are realistic and if not how you can make them realistic.
I think they know all the best methods for migrating.
Hope it helps a little
Good luck with your search

Muck

Permanent citizenship is extremely tough to come by unless you have family members that are Auz. citizens. I speak from experience - my now husband is Australian & I am from the US. I tried to get a de-facto visa, and that was going to take nearly a year w/ no guarantee of entry. We got married, which made things easier but didn't guarantee anything. We now have a baby which has sped up the process a bit, but I still only have a temporary visa for the next 2 years. Fortunately I was able to get company sponsorship in the interim - as the above poster said, that is your best bet. It will help if your friend is in a 'desired' field of employment (nurse/doctor, for ex). The website has all the info & forms needed.

I hate to be cynical about this but the barriers are high.

It helps to be young,bright and beautiful or

have a spare A$500,000 and a good immigration agent (business migration)

I'm so glad someone posted this question as I"m interested in doing the same. John-I"m kind of young, not ugly, and am pretty smart so what are my chances??? Sorry, I don't have that kind of money just yet. Also, can anyone please help me start a search for a job position? I work as a high school guidance counselor and would be interested in finding a position at a school in or around Sydney. I could do career/college counseling and personal counseling. I have no idea where to start and what schools to look into. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you! Cheers.

Guys,

The basics are as follows:
* If you're trying to emigrate and get permanent residency (ie not sponsored by a company) then you'd do so under one of two ways - a general skilled or business migration. The former is based on a points system and can take up to 2 years for your application to be processed. In terms of points, unless you are in one of the highly desired job fields (there are about 10, and most are accounting or medically related) OR you have very close family here, you cannot get enough points if you are over 30. The business migration is if you are planning to start up a company here and have significant funds, and you have to "reprove" yourself in 4 years.

To get sponsored by a company for a 4-year Temporary Resident visa is a bit easier, but note that Australian companies are often reluctant to do so for three reasons: it costs a fair bit, unless the company has spent significant money on becoming a "pre-qualified business sponsor" it will take time, and most importantly there are significant resources here in Australia to fill jobs (which is something the company has to prove - that they couldn't find someone in Australia similary qualified). That doesn't mean it can't be done. It just means that certain professions are more likely to find jobs here from overseas: medical and business/IT.

You would have to get your job offer from overseas and provide an offer letter for the Temporary Residents visa to be an option.

The other option is to come down for holiday and search like hell for a job, and then try and get the company to agree to sponsor you. Very difficult given the timeframe, but doable if you get an extended holiday visa (6 months).

Now before anyone says I'm an anti-american who doesn't want our jobs taken away, let me note that I am a 34 year old American in Oz on a Temp Res visa and have done all the research and jumped through all the hoops to get it, which is why I know all this stuff!

Good luck.

Thanks Pixie Chick. I actually wanted to write you as I saw another posting you did and you had your email address on it (which now I cannot find). If you are comfortable could you please send me your email so I can ask you more questions. I really appreciate the help, esp. from an expert! I'm at [email protected]. Thanks heaps!

Thank you my fellow Fodorites! For your kind and thoughtful responses. You're the greatest and I appreciate the information, to pass on to my friend.

If I can pay back the favor see me on the Latin America branch helping with Mexico info. Warm regards to all, Susan in Seatle

Is it easier for those from certain countries to migrate over to Australia? Like perhaps the UK? What if you have family that live in Australia, but they are only first cousins? Could that help?

I seem to recall that it is easier to immigrate to NZ (and NZ may have a special relationship with Australia).

Hi,
In answer to Tammi's question, the UK is just as difficult to migrate from, considering 40 yrs or so ago people were going for pennies and being actively encopuraged to do so.
When I consider that Australia as we know her, derived from UK as part of the commonwealth it amazes me when I consider the population of UK is 60million and the population of Australia is only about 16 million.
There's plenty of room for us there !!
I looked to migrate and could satisfy the points criteria, I have no family there but can you believe my kids don't want to move !!!!!!
by the time they move out I will be too old to migrate, unless I get a small fortune that is...

Muck

We may change our plans for next August's vacation and got to Melbourne and Tassie instead of Japan to visit my parents!

My husband wants to go in PERSON to visit the immigration office ---he thinks it will look better! ;-)

MY biggest concern is MY DOGS. I don't want them in quarantine for 1 yr...does anyone know how that works? IS there an office to contact about it?

I think we qualify on my husbands job skills (SAP) 5+ yrs experience and a masters degree.

I technically qualify with my 5+ yrs as a QA test analyst as well BUT I am in the process of going to school for Respiratory Therapy and from what I can tell....Australia doesn't recognize that field as a separate medical area.

NOT sure who does the respiratory side--ventilators, breathing treatments, O2 therapy etc.....might just have nurses do all that. ??? However there is a local company here in Pittsburgh that makes Respiratory equipment and they say there are in 117 countries...I am guessing AUSSIE is one of them and maybe I can work that angle since I will have training and the background to run/train/use their equipment.

When they say you need $500 AUD does that mean liquid CASH or can it be in stocks/funds etc??? Depending upon the exchange rate....and how much we could sell our house for in 2 yrs....we wouldn't be that far from that # but most of it is retirement (401k/IRA).

Anyone with any details...feel free to email me...

[email protected]

I took the little qualifier test....my husband and I get 135 pts.

and in my post above I meant 500K not $500 ;-)

also found the quarantine info...I must have been given erroneous information before....but it appears to only be about 30 days for dogs from the US (minimum 30 days) I have inquired with the AQIS what it means by MINIMUM and how long it normally is....I can handle a month without the doggies but would hate to torture them much longer than that!

Migrating to Australia is a hit and miss affair sometimes. However you have been given some good information on the points system and sometimes that will pleasantly surprise you particularly if you are in the young child bearing age group.
With regard to the Respiratory Therapy question you don't say what your qualifications are i.e. Nurse, Physio, Nurse practitioner, Medico, etc etc. I think you would find that even if there are not exactly the same qualifications it would not be hard to top up to qualify though another medical field anyway. In other words, if you were a Occupational Therapist and you were doing a special course for that type of therapy, you would be given points for the OT side and further ones for the extra study. If in fact it is a seperate study issue in the US it most probably would not be hard to incorporate a compatable degree in Australia which would see you in the same position in the end anyway. Gee, that babble doesn't seem to make sense does it but I hope you can understand what I mean.
Mucky: You lot decided that you didn't want us when you started buying from Europe that which you used to get from NZ and Australia - then added the extra indignity of having us go through UK Immigration in the "Foreign" section. So just because you now buy from us our most dreadful TV series doesn't constitute being family anymore.
PS I would divorce your kids if I were you.

Where did you take this qualifier test to see if you qualified?

Alise-

Be careful about the qualifier test...it is actually impossible to get 135 points if you are over 30 and don't have family in Australia. Specifically, the most you can get for your work is 60 points (remember that) and, more importantly, you can only claim the 5 "bonus" points once...ie you can't claim because you speak another language AND have 500K funds AND have a tertiary degree, etc.

Additionally, showing up in person does nothing. The application has to be submitted from overseas and takes between 1-2 years for approval (occasionally less, occasionally more). If you are really keen, I suggest speaking to a REPUTABLE immigration agent in the US that specialises in Australia.

If you are coming to Australia then check out some of the specialist Lawyers who look after Immigration applicants.

What is the max # of points possible?

How do you find a reputable immiagration lawyer?? I wouldn't even know where to start.

A classmate of my dad (high school) has been living in Aus for a good 20+ yrs now and is currently in Canberra. I thought he would be a good start/contact.

From what I can tell they have Nurses doing Respiratory therapy. Here Nurses learn Head to Toe and we only really study Nose-Lungs and general anatomy and physiology. We specialize in Cardio-Pulmonary areas. Both of them are minimum 2 yr studies (associate degrees vs 4 yr bachelor degrees).

I will just have to hope that Bayer works out for my husband! I know they have offices in both Sydney and Melbourne.

I know I must be missing something. I'm looking around the www.immi.gov.au web site but somehow I'm not finding the point system that people are mentioning.

Tired eyes, I guess. I'd like to see where I fall, as my wife would like to see us move there (she's Aus, I'm not).

Why go to the trouble to emigrate down here. Just move to the west coast...there isn't a hell of a lot of difference.