<blockquote rel="persephone30">I am planning to move to Melbourne next yr. I opened this thread so that we can share our plans/preparations prior to the move. Those who are already in Melbourne naman hopefully can share their experiences arriving/living/working there so we can have insights kahit papaano in Melbourne Living.. 🙂</blockquote>
Melbourne is an expensive city. Bring sufficient money, I say at least $12,000AUD. Based from my experience, we spent almost 10K nung wala kami pareho work ng wife ko for 3months. Tumira kami sa CBD (across Flinders st) para kahit rush yung schedule ng interview we can go immediately. Mahirap kasi magpalagpas ng opportunity.
To give you a rough estimate we spent on the <b>FIRST</b> month alone:
1,310/month sa studio unit + 1,310 for bond payment (in Pinas we call it as deposit para kung may masira sa unit dito nila ibabawas, if wala problem ibabalik nila at the end of lease) and mga $180/week for food, utilities, etc.
Total = 3.3K on the first month alone (nakakaiyak talaga, lalo na pag sa savings binabawas kasi wala pang work).
Succeeding months total expenses = 2K.
I highly suggest na kung meron kayo kakilala, tumira muna kayo sa kanila. Kami kasi we risk it all before pumunta dito. We underestimated this city kaya hindi namin naanticipate yung buhos ng gastos. We both resigned from our work when we we came here kahit na alam namin wala kami matitirhan kamag anak.
Sa mga nagplaplan pumunta dito, may mga kakilala ako nag initial entry muna and then nakahanap din ng work nung pagbalik. Yung iba risk taker, eventually nakakuha din ng work after.
May mga nabasa ako forum posts from other nationalities experiencing hardships as well here in Australia. They said that "this country has a unique way of humbling its people" which I find so accurately described.