Renting a house as a new settler

[Rabeah]

Dear members,

 

i'm new here at this great forum. first of all, thank you members for all your information. now i need some piece of advise: my partner and me are going to immigrate to adelaide february next year. we're read a lot how to rent a house/flat. all agents want to have so much things immigrants like us don't have, for instance, 2 references of former landlords, the last 4 utility bills and the last 4 rent receipts from the former flat in europe. i want to knwo if this is really necessary as a new immigrant? are australian realestate agents or landlords really interested in pieces of evidence from Europe? i'm asking because we are located in germany, our landlords do not speak a word english!!! and our utility bills are all in german and bank statements as well. it's very expensive to translate our required rental documents. as foreign speakers we had to translate documents for TRA and DIAC and now i develop that we may have to do it again in order to get a roof over our head. i would appreciate to get advise from someone here who can provide us with information.

thanks.

regards, Rabeah

[Toni]

I don't think you'd need to get your paperwork translated. A utility bill is a utility bill it wouldn't really matter if it was written in another language. They just want to see something about you that proves that you pay your bills. The same with your bank statements - they just want to see a current one that shows you have money in the bank and can afford to pay the rent. You wouldn't need that translated. Even if it is written in another language it's not that hard these days for people to translate it themselves. They may not necessarily contact your referees from previous landlords but it is good to have someone. They may have someone who speaks German in their office. For agents particularly they have to be seen to do the right thing by the Landlord because if for some reason there is a problem then it will look like they haven't done their checking properly. Private landlords might be a bit more flexible but even they would need some sort of history from you to show that you have paid your bills and have looked after previous property.

[Guest ovel]

I don't think you'd need to get your paperwork translated. A utility bill is a utility bill it wouldn't really matter if it was written in another language. They just want to see something about you that proves that you pay your bills. The same with your bank statements - they just want to see a current one that shows you have money in the bank and can afford to pay the rent. You wouldn't need that translated. Even if it is written in another language it's not that hard these days for people to translate it themselves. They may not necessarily contact your referees from previous landlords but it is good to have someone. They may have someone who speaks German in their office. For agents particularly they have to be seen to do the right thing by the Landlord because if for some reason there is a problem then it will look like they haven't done their checking properly. Private landlords might be a bit more flexible but even they would need some sort of history from you to show that you have paid your bills and have looked after previous property.

 

However, what if there weren't any landlords in my previous history? I have my own flat here in Moscow, so they wouldn't find any referee if they wanted to. Regarding bills, yes, I pay my utility bills accurately, but they are written in Russian as well as my bank statement is also written in Russian, so I deeply doubt they'll be able to read that.

[Guest ebstar]

Hi there,Don't worry too much as don't seem as strict as it may sound.If you find a place you like just explain your circumstances.Most of the agents we spoke with seem to run a points system.I can't find our letter with it on but it's like 10 points for your passport,medicare card etc.40 points for a bank statement etc. We showed our driving licences and passports,we also had (they did'nt ask to see these) our bank statements and the number of the lady that owned the holiday let that we stayed in for the first couple of weeks.They knew we had just moved from the Uk and that my husband was already working and that seemed to satisfy them that we could pay up. Good luck

[Rabeah]

Thanks a lot for your information. Now I'm a little bit more relaxed.