Is it really so hard to secure long term rental on arrival?

[samandcraig]

Now that our moving is getting closer We were just wondering if We could ask for people's opinions on securing a long term rental?

We don't have jobs lined up, so won't be able to show we are working, we will have bank statements showing that we do have a reasonable amount of savings, and we do have references that could act as character references off previous employers, we do also know a family out in Adelaide that will give us a reference, will this be enough? As we are starting to worry about this.......

any advice appreciated,

thankyou

 

sam&craig

[Blossom]

Yes that will be fine. If you can show funds in the bank you are a safer bet, but they see this all the time.

[Guest Guest75]

Getting a decent rental can be quite hard. Recently with our guests we have had a real mixed bag. Some have walked into a long term rental from us easily - other have really struggled and been on full panic stations.

Fortunately most guests have listened to the advice I have offered and done OK by it.

 

4 bed rentals are at a premium!!

[samandcraig]

Thankyou for the comments.....we do have a four week rental for when we arrive so I suppose all we can do is see what happens ?

[minimel2710]

I'm sure you will be fine... I think it's harder to decide which area you want to settle in. We had our long term rental secured within about 10 days and showed bank statements to the estate agents. There seems to be hundreds of properties about and I love going to the open houses. Great fun! Have you got a rough idea where you wanna stay? X

[Devonair]

We are doing this at the moment having arrived in Adelaide exactly a week ago. It has been pretty hard in my opinion. We have looked at about six properties in a week and have applied for two now. The first one we applied for there weren't that many people at the open inspection and it was through the owners and not an agent but we still weren't successful with our application. We even offered to pay six months rent up front but sadly without jobs lined up or local references, it is a lot harder to secure rentals in decent areas. Having said that, we are after a four bed and have been looking in pretty expensive areas. We went to an open in Millswood the other day and there were about 50 people queueing up the street waiting to view the property - all the locals couldn't believe what was going on and kept popping over to ask us what we were all queueing for! The house had enormous cracks running through it and would not have been big enough for us but some people had already pre-submitted applications before even viewing it!

 

We looked at a house yesterday in Flagstaff Hill and again, there were cars parked up the street all waiting to view. The agent had to open the inspection early to let everyone in! The house, again, was not all that, and would have been too small for a family of five. I asked the agent if it was usual to have this many at an open inspection and she said that, for the area, the house was quite cheap and so attracted a lot of families.

 

We looked at another house yesterday which was really messy - (cluttered, all curtains closed, clothes on floor, Xmas tree still up!!.. ) It was quite embarrassing for the agent I think who stood by the front door without venturing any further into the property - however, the house had potential if you looked through the clutter. I am hoping that the mess put other applicants off and we may just get lucky however, I am not sure what I might find lurking behind the curtains/clutter as you couldn't really get a decent look around in the dark! we submitted an application anyway as again, the area is good.

 

My advice would be to go to all of the open inspections you think may be suitable - you can search on realestate.com.au and put in SA and filter by no of bedrooms/price etc.. and it will list all the inspections for that week in date order.

You can always ask the agent how much interest/applications they have already received to gauge interest - if it is a property you really like then we have been told by one agent (unofficially) that you can always offer over the asking price per week and offer to pay a lump sum in advance. Also, we have taken to up-loading professional references with the application - a lot will need 100 points of ID ( passport and driving licence will do) and these need to be uploaded/sent in with the initial application. My husband has a police reference which we have also uploaded with our latest application-basically anything that helps. Tyke on here also advised us to add a bit of detail within the application form itself - e.g we have put that we are all citizens ( bar me who has PR), who are here permanently, as a lot of agents are a bit wary of poms in case they have visa restrictions or decide they want to go home.

I have read on this forum before that people have even shown agents their previous property sale details - to show the agents that they have looked after and maintained a home before. To be honest, we haven't done this yet as our old property details are still on the ship waiting to arrive and there has usually been so much interest in the properties that the agents are a bit busy at the opens but I guess you could always upload/email in a copy.

 

Like everything though, a lot is down to luck. At one of the opens we went to where there were loads of people, we met a couple in the queue outside and started to chat to them. Before you know it, my husband has a contact to submit his cv in, as the lovely guy works for a recruitment company in the city, (albeit not in our fields) but he still offered to forward it on to the relevant department - so we may not have got the house but, you never know, we may have found a route into a job!

 

Finally, my advice would be to try and enjoy yourselves along the way. We have three kids and they have had a pretty boring first week, trailing around opens and looking for cars, so today we are off to the beach!!

[samandcraig]

I'm sure you will be fine... I think it's harder to decide which area you want to settle in. We had our long term rental secured within about 10 days and showed bank statements to the estate agents. There seems to be hundreds of properties about and I love going to the open houses. Great fun! Have you got a rough idea where you wanna stay? X

 

Hi, we are looking at port noarlunga/ christies beach/ hallet cove areas ( which could change once we arrive ) ha ha.....

[samandcraig]

Devonair Thankyou for that reply, very useful information and tips, I will get together as much paperwork as possible x

[minimel2710]

I liked the idea of Christies beach when we were still in the UK but when we got here we found it was just a little too far out from the city for us... It may suit you guys though and it really is a beautiful part of the world. We ended up in brighton which is about 20 minutes from the city. I went to Henley last week and that's a lovely area too... Keep your options open and just see what feels right when you get here.

[samandcraig]

I liked the idea of Christies beach when we were still in the UK but when we got here we found it was just a little too far out from the city for us... It may suit you guys though and it really is a beautiful part of the world. We ended up in brighton which is about 20 minutes from the city. I went to Henley last week and that's a lovely area too... Keep your options open and just see what feels right when you get here.

 

Yeah to be honest we haven't been atall so we will have a good drive round and get a feel for the areas, schools will also play a big part in where we choose.....it's just all abit scary really!!

[minimel2710]

We hadn't been before either. It's a massive leap of faith when you haven't been, have no jobs lined up and don't know anyone...We've been here about 4 months now and it feels like we've been here for so much longer...

My 2 children go to Brighton Secondary. It's a zoned school so you have to be in catchment. They have special interest areas in volleyball and music so if you go into one of those programs you don't need to be zoned. My friend has her 2 in Henley which is also a great school. I'm pretty sure they are quite sports focussed. These are the only 2 high schools that I know about really...

Anyway, if I can help you with anything else, feel free to PM me.

[samandcraig]

We hadn't been before either. It's a massive leap of faith when you haven't been, have no jobs lined up and don't know anyone...We've been here about 4 months now and it feels like we've been here for so much longer...

My 2 children go to Brighton Secondary. It's a zoned school so you have to be in catchment. They have special interest areas in volleyball and music so if you go into one of those programs you don't need to be zoned. My friend has her 2 in Henley which is also a great school. I'm pretty sure they are quite sports focussed. These are the only 2 high schools that I know about really...

Anyway, if I can help you with anything else, feel free to PM me.

 

Thankyou very much......I may just take you up on that

[RachaelOs]

We looked in the same areas as you are thinking of and found it pretty easy to be honest. We went with Hallett cove as it's that bit closer to the city and was affordable - we had to find a house before we'd found my husband a job - it turned out he started work 2 days after we moved in so it all worked really well. I really like it here although you may need to consider the schools as well?? there's definitely 5 you can choose from (one of which is private) all within a 5 min drive - there may be more.

 

Feel free to give me a shout when you arrive, you can come check out our area and the boys can have a chat about carpentry in oz!!

[Tamara (Homes Down Under)]

Now that our moving is getting closer We were just wondering if We could ask for people's opinions on securing a long term rental?

We don't have jobs lined up, so won't be able to show we are working, we will have bank statements showing that we do have a reasonable amount of savings, and we do have references that could act as character references off previous employers, we do also know a family out in Adelaide that will give us a reference, will this be enough? As we are starting to worry about this.......

any advice appreciated,

thankyou

 

sam&craig

 

H there,

Last minute nerves!

Don't worry you will be fine. There is quite a lot of rental stock around and you have a month in your furnished rental so you should be fine. Even if you discount the shockers that are up for rent it will still be ok. You can get your admin sorted out in a morning...bank at Colonnades, drivers licence at Service SA in Christies and Medicare in Noarlunga...no worries the forms are in the cottage.

I would recommend that you do contact Rachael when you get here. Great family. You will have a friendly support base right from the beginning. Agents often phone me for a reference so don't stress!

[samandcraig]

We looked in the same areas as you are thinking of and found it pretty easy to be honest. We went with Hallett cove as it's that bit closer to the city and was affordable - we had to find a house before we'd found my husband a job - it turned out he started work 2 days after we moved in so it all worked really well. I really like it here although you may need to consider the schools as well?? there's definitely 5 you can choose from (one of which is private) all within a 5 min drive - there may be more.

 

Feel free to give me a shout when you arrive, you can come check out our area and the boys can have a chat about carpentry in oz!!

 

Thankyou so much for the post, it really has made me feel a lot better.....it is simply the unknown I think, I would love to meet up that would be great.....xx

[samandcraig]

H there,

Last minute nerves!

Don't worry you will be fine. There is quite a lot of rental stock around and you have a month in your furnished rental so you should be fine. Even if you discount the shockers that are up for rent it will still be ok. You can get your admin sorted out in a morning...bank at Colonnades, drivers licence at Service SA in Christies and Medicare in Noarlunga...no worries the forms are in the cottage.

I would recommend that you do contact Rachael when you get here. Great family. You will have a friendly support base right from the beginning. Agents often phone me for a reference so don't stress!

 

yeah we are on count down now and the unknown is kicking in! Thankyou so much for all you advice, these posts are definetly settling my nerves!! Thankyou

[Guest wen66]

We're in Port Noarlunga, so can help you with what we know and have experienced here, albeit only a few months. You'll have plenty of contacts from different locations, so don't worry:-) x

[samandcraig]

We're in Port Noarlunga, so can help you with what we know and have experienced here, albeit only a few months. You'll have plenty of contacts from different locations, so don't worry:-) x

 

This support is really great.....Thankyou xx

[Devonair]

Just as an update to my last post which was a bit gloomy.....we have since heard that we have secured a rental!! So, actually, after all my panicking, it took exactly a week! It is the rental that we had to view with the curtains closed though, full of clutter, so who knows what we might find behind the mess! However, it is in a great catchment area for schools and when I looked up which school it was zoned for it came up with Burnside primary. I emailed the school last night, got an almost instant response from the Headmistress and went in for an appointment this morning to meet the teachers and get the uniform. The school looks great and I was very impressed with the response from the Head and all of the other staff we met today who have bent over backwards to accommodate our children. So, we have secured a rental and sorted schools in a week so it can be done with a bit of perseverance. I think uploading extra references helped with the application also. Good luck with your move, I am sure it will all fall into place in the end.

[samandcraig]

Thankyou so much for this update, and that is brilliant for you, I hope your children settle in really well, I'm sure everything will come together for you now you have a house to rent, good luck for your future xx

[etch123]

Yeah to be honest we haven't been atall so we will have a good drive round and get a feel for the areas, schools will also play a big part in where we choose.....it's just all abit scary really!!

 

Hey @samandcraig, We too are in the same "boat" as you, and will be arriving mid April, looking at the same areas as you too. Good Luck!

[samandcraig]

Hey @samandcraig, We too are in the same "boat" as you, and will be arriving mid April, looking at the same areas as you too. Good Luck!

 

Good luck to you too, I will post on here once I have arrived and let you know how I got on, not long now!!!!!

[Guest Sea Change @ Semaphore]

Try to contact some rental companies like Century 21 or Turners Real estate in Adelaide look on web sites and email these questions

Good luck

[pete11]

We have been in Adelaide for 18 months. We arrived with two weeks holiday accomodation and a vague idea that Brighton and suburbs were good for closeness to beach, city etc. We stayed in Somerton Park found on www.stayz.com.au Audreys secret, was a three bed wth two rumpus and large garden, our landlord from there provided a reference for our long term rental and together with a reference from our rental agent in UK and our bank statement showing that we could afford it we got our place. We Used Susan Majeric at Harcourts on Brighton Road, she was so lovely and as she understood our position, she did everything she could to persuade the landlord that they should choose us over the other hoardes wo were queing up to see the property. They were realy good at sorting out any problems with the property and when we left, got out Deposit back within no more than two weeks.

 

We did our research on the schools we wanted our kids to attend and then found a house in that area. We did drive around the Northern suburbs, Hills and coastal areas and did look at properties, but felt that the proximity to the school we wanted was the main thing. If your kids are going private, then you can live where you like.

 

We found that the best way to find somewhere, was not to trawl the papers and websites- most of those properties had gone before we even got to the viewing. We spent hours online and then when we called or turned up found it was a waste of time. If we could do this all again, we would go into a good Letting agents Century, Harcourts, LJ Hooker, Elders etc and have a chat about what you want. They will call you when something comes up. If they can complete the rental, without having to do an open inspection, it is easier for them. Just be nice and polite!

 

Norlunga is lovely, Christies- not so great - its very surfy, so that means, kids hanging out, skiving school and bongs at the beach...just what I have heard from the locals........Hallet Cove, has some really great properties, good value, great parks and fast links to city via road & train- and a lot of expats.

Hope this info helps. Good Luck

[samandcraig]

thankyou so much.......brilliant advice