Budgeting our Lives

Discussions have been ongoing w.r.t the details of the move, specifically whether or not to bring everything all at once or to do it in stages (see previous post). Right now we're leaning towards the staged approach. This is probably for the best regardless of what we decide on, for the simple reason that it forces us to look at our current lifestyle and see what activities are important to us. Listing what we like to do is one thing, but when you have to weigh enjoyment vs. space required for equipment to do that pass time, things start to look a little different.

For example, rock climbing is a big part of my life right now, with a very small requirement for equipment. A pair of shoes, a chalk bag and a harness and i'm good for bouldering, sport climbing, gym climbing. In sharp contrast to it however stands miniature wargaming. In order to rightly enjoy that, I need to bring my army(ies), paints, possibly terrain. Wargaming probably takes up more of my free time now, because the part I like most is the painting / modeling aspect, which can be done in small chunks, but the equipment necessary to do so means i likely will either not be bringing it on the first shipment, or else making some very difficult decisions about my collection.

Collections in general pose a problem. Comic collecting will probably all but cease, as getting North American comics in NZ will be difficult, so we'll probably be making quarterly orders to The Comic Book Shoppe to have it shipped.

Like everything else about this move, it comes down to budgeting.

Should It Stay or Should It Go.

(Humming The Clash)

In my line of work, it's critical that you look at all the risks involved, figure out what level of risk you can live with and mitigate all others to a point where you can live with them. Applying this mindset to the move has brought up some scary "what if" scenarios:

What if we hate it and want to head back in 6 months?

I like having backup plans. I like knowing that I can salvage something from a situation that doesn't work out as I expected.

With the move, there's a lot of what I'd consider sunk costs. That is money that I will be spending on this thing, regardless of the outcome. Plane tickets, costs associated to selling the house, hotels once there all fall into this category. Usually, you would add "cost to ship all our worldly possessions over" to that list, but lately I've been concocting a plan that would avoid / delay that. See, my current hypothesis is that we'll either really like the change within the first year or we'll be ready to give up and come back. The packing / shipping is the single largest cost associated to the move (in the 10000$ range) and that's not an amount of money I'm willing to throw away. Combine that with the loss we'd take selling all our stuff over there so as not to have to move it back and we're easily looking at 20000$ for the whole transaction. Not life altering by any chance, but it'll definitely put a big dent in our budgets for years to come.

So my current plan is to split all our stuff into 4 categories, depending on when we'd like to have access to them again:

1. Essential stuff comes with us on the plane, in 1 or 2 extra suitcases.
   
2. Close at Hand stuff would be stored with trusted people in Canada that could send it to us if need be later (6-8 week surface shipping)
3. To be Stored stuff would only come over once we've decided we're staying long term
4. Junk is just that, crud we've accumulated that we can easily live without.
   

I figure if I have to spend 2000$ in storage fees and another 1000$ shipping stuff from categories 1 and 2 over for the first year to avoid losing 20000$ that's a pretty wise investment.

Of course, all plans have downsides:

• We'll be living w/o many of our creature comforts we've grown accustomed to.
  
• Storage may damage many of our things.
• There's going to be some unplanned costs (insurance, inconvenience etc)
  
• How much of our stuff are we going to have to buy short term to go about our day to day in NZ?

I can't really tell where this leaves us to be honest... I'll have to talk to family and friends for opinions...

Unresolved Questions

With any major planning, there's bound to be some questions you can answer right away (do we want to do this?), some that can be worked out through research and some that you just can't plan around, that will need to be taken care of once you hit the ground.
These last questions are the ones that keep me up at night:

• Can I find a job in NZ?
• Can Carly find a job in NZ?
• Where are we going to live?
• What expenses have I missed in the budget?

Those are all pretty huge questions and they all break down into a series of smaller questions. You can come up with all the questions in the world that you don't know the answers to but at the end of the day, if you try to plan for all eventualities, you'll run out of time, money, patience, courage or some combination of all 4.
What we've done so far is to figure out the most "likely" scenarios and plan around that. So for us, our landing plan looks something like:
Arrive in NZ. Spend first month taking care of as much of the above as possible (apt. to rent, get in touch with recruiters / potential employers, bank accounts, cell phone(s)? car? etc) We've budgeted for this step, and we'll need to make it work. Knowing myself, I know I'll be passed out for at LEAST 3 days to a week on jet lag.
We've been saving up all our pennies for the better part of a year, but sadly, with the plane tickets, the cost of shipping our crap over, the first month(s) may be much tighter then we expect. The likelihood of heading into debt (something we haven't done in years) to make ends meet seems pretty high. This also keeps me awake at night.
At least, if we sell the house, we'll have some working capital...

The Waiting Game

Now that we've been selected by the NZ Gov't as potentital candidates for the skill migrant process, the next step is the long wait. In order for our application to move forward, it needs to be assigned to an immigration officer. For reasons unclear to us, we've been assigned to the London (UK) branch of Immigration NZ. From reading online (resources at the end of this post) for people selected, but without a job offer in NZ, this wait can be anywhere between 3 and 6 months. What's not entirely clear is how much longer it will be once we get an officer.
The role the officer has is to go over our application, make sure we provide all the proper proofs and paperwork, make sure our assumptions on the application process were valid (e.g. were speeding tickets to be documented as a criminal offence?) and then see what our updated score will be.
In our particular case, this may end up giving us MORE points rather then fewer (though we're already overqualified) because Carly will have her Teacher's Certificate by that point.
Interestingly enough, one of the stumbling blocks a lot of people seem to be hitting is the Medical Certificate. A lot of the rejections I've read about lately are people who don't qualify because their BMI is too high. NZ seems to want immigrants with a BMI of <40. To put this in perspective, a BMI of 40 on a 5'10" person means they weigh 279lb. for me, a BMI of 40 would be 295lb. Yikes.

resources I've found useful so far:

• http://www.move2nz.com/ (specifically the forums)
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Expats-in-New-Zealand/ (great crowd, anoying interface)
  
• http://immigration.govt.nz (obvious, but all the information is there and it's a fairly well designed website)

I'll post up some blogs of other NZ immigrants at some point once I sort through the ones I really like.

Step 1 Complete!

I'm happy to announce that our application for Immigration (a.k.a the EOI or Expression of Interest) has been accepted! Here's the email!

EXPRESSION OF INTEREST: SELECTED FOR CONSIDERATION

We are very pleased to confirm that your Expression of Interest (EOI) was selected from the Pool on 13 March 2008 for further consideration. Your EOI was selected from the Pool because you claimed a points total of 140 or above.

Your EOI has been forwarded to the London Branch for consideration. You will be contacted when an officer has been assigned to your case. We will conduct some preliminary checks of the information provided to determine whether the claims in the EOI are credible. Following this checking, you may be invited to apply for residence in New Zealand. For more information about the likely timing of this process please go to the London Branch page on our website
http://www.immigration.govt.nz/branch/londonbranchhome/

From what I hear though, this next step, actually being contacted by the Immigration officer, can take anywhere from 6 weeks to 4+ months. But at least there's some serious forward momentum. Which is good, because I was having a low faith day.

The Ups and Downs of a Life Changing Move

One of the hardest things about any major life change is the length of time it takes. We're currently waiting to hear back from the New Zealand Gov't about our initial selection. It's taken us close to 4 months to get to this stage and based on my latest research, we've got at least another 4 months to go.
When we think about this move, the mood rapidly oscillates between "It's totally going to happen, it's all just a formality" to "There's no way this is going to work, we're going to end up homeless between countries". It's a lot of work, there's a huge amount of risk (financially, for our careers, even for our social networks) and there's the ever looming unknown that can get so oppressive it's hard to think of anything but.
Keeping morale unnaturally high hasn't really worked for us so far. We've been riding out the waves keeping the small goals ahead of the big ones. It's easier to focus on smaller goals, like getting the housework for the top floor done, then to look at the big picture.
It's all too easy to get wrapped up in big plans and far away details when you don't even know if you're going yet.

Things I won't get to do.

To go with today's other post, here's a list of things I won't get to do before July:

• Go to the November 11th remembrance day ceremony
• See the ice sculptures at Winterlude.
• Do the Ride For Dad (need a motorcycle for that one, sold it last year).
• See the Christmas lights on parliament.
  

Of this list, really the only one that I feel strongly about is the first one. Having family in the military has really changed my perceptions on serving. I think the least anyone can do, regardless of their current political views, is remember and show respect for those who died in the last wars.

10 things to do in Ottawa before we leave

In no particular order, some things that have been on my todo list that really need to get taken care of before we leave.

• Go see a Senators game. update: Got to do this in the Corporate box no less! great game, the Sens sent the Bruins packing. I don't know that I'd pay for the good seats to see a game, but Hockey loses a ton in the translation to TV.
  
• Go to the National War Museum.
• Bicycle the entire Canal Bicycle Path.
• Visit Parliament.
• Go the Museum of Natural History with Carly.
• Go to the National Gallery.
• Throw one hell of a going away party.
• Climb in Gatineau Park.
• Go the National Aviation Museum.
• Go Sailing on Lac Deschenes. done and will continue to get done until the end of the summer
  

First Steps

Wow, these bullet point posts sure are exciting!

So here's where we're currently at. The decisions (see previous post) were definitely the most difficult part. The more we plan, the easier it'll be to execute, right? (that's what they always say about software, though I don't quite buy it)

• Expression of Interest form: New Zealand, like Canada, is a very welcoming country for potential immigrants. Basically, you fill out a form for your family and if you qualify (e.g. have enough points in their form calculator) you're invited to immigrate. What your status is when you arrive isn't 100% clear to me yet, but i do know that you're allowed to work like a Kiwi, buy property, etc. without any restrictions. I'll have to look into this more. This form was sent in last week, my understanding is that we'll be hearing from an Immigration Officer soon to walk us through the rest of the process.
  
• House Prep: We're in a constant state of renovation, but now we actually have a goal and a deadline. So we're finishing up all the projects we started, patching, repainting, tidying etc.
  
• The Purge: This has to be one of the most difficult and necessary steps. Because we need to sell the house and bring only what we actually need with us, we're going room by room to toss all that accumulated cruft that's been cluttering up our lives. Gone are the heirlooms, the dish sets, the computer bits for computers long gone, the vintage and / or so cool to own but not actually use toys, the tools you have 3 of etc. I can see why the TLC shows are so popular.
  
• The Sell Off: Anything we can't bring (120v appliances) or don't need anymore (2 desktop computers, a small laptop, a bunch of networking gear) is being sold off. This is an ongoing process that so far is going pretty well.
  

Doesn't seem like much so far, but it's all we can do until some of the key steps like selling the house, picking a moving company etc are taken care of.

Some of the Defining Decisions

So where are we up to? It's absolutely amazing the number of decisions that need to be made when you're planning something this size. Some of them are entirely practical, others philosophical but all of them will end up having an impact. Most also require a ton of research to make sure you're not getting yourself into a jam. Here's some of the things that have been tossed around and preliminary decisions reached:

• Where: Wellington was picked for a few reasons. We'd really liked it when we were there, it's the hub of IT and Government work in New Zealand (jobs for me!). It's central, so we can go from one place to the next fairly easily. It's also the city we found that had the most metropolitan feel to it. Auckland struck us as very Toronto, Christchurch was a little more... British then we were looking for. Wellington had a great Montreal'esque vibe to it (will make sense to anyone who has been to Montreal).
• When: July 2008. Gives us (just) enough time to get everything going, let's us extend if required and takes care of all of our obligations here in Ottawa (weddings, graduation etc.) This is probably the most flexible bit so far.
• Rent or Sell: The house that is. We looked into the various options quite in depth, but in the end, the fear of having to pay mortgage in Canada + expenses while living in NZ were the biggest factor. We'd end up losing a fair amount of money by renting anyway, as our mortgage payments were greater then the max we could get for rent without taking in to account the costs of property management.
  
• The Car: Hopefully we'll be able to find someone to take over our lease. Leasing was probably a mistake, but I was blinded by the promise of low low payments. Won't be doing that again.
• The Cats: Definitely the hardest decision so far, we have two wonderful cats, one about 7 the other 14, who have grown rather accustomed to us and to each other. We need to find them a home, hopefully together, maybe apart. Moving them to NZ would cost an exorbitant amount (3000+), the airline wouldn't guaranty their safety during the flight and they'd have to spend a long time in quarantine. It just doesn't seem to be fair to them at this point, and I wouldn't be able to live with the idea of only bringing one.
  
• Bring it all or sell it here: Bringing it all, be it furniture, bicycles, electronics that are 120/220 compatible, computers etc. Basically, given that everything is more expensive over there and that there's a thriving second hand market, we're better off bringing everything we might need, and getting rid of it over there if necessary. This requires a larger investment in the move, but it should save us some cash in the long run.
• Jobs: It's looking very difficult to arrange jobs in advance from Canada. For a variety of reasons, this is just a fact to be accepted if you're planning a voluntary move to New Zealand. So we've planned on two to three months of job hunting (worst case scenario) once we get on the ground there. Setting up as many contacts before the fact is going to be key here.

We've been using a wiki to track all the information about the move, phone numbers, todo lists etc. It's been invaluable so far. I think that's key to setting up a project of this size: put some project management into it. Get some sort of organizational system together, and the discipline to properly close every issue as it comes up.

The story so far.

So here's the deal so far (the raison-d'être for this blog and the adventure if you will):
We're a Canadian couple, who since our honeymoon in NZ (three years ago) have been talking about moving to New Zealand. In fact, the original plan was to get married, say goodbye to our jobs and head out there after a short delay to organize our lives here in Canada. So that didn't quite work out as planned, and here we are 3 years later.
A couple of big events happened during our "delay"

• We bought a house. More out of necessity then anything else, but we are home owners right now.
• I started working for a large software company here in Ottawa.
• Carly decided it was high time to follow her (now obvious) true vocation and enrolled in Teacher's College.
• We got very comfortable in our lives, but more then a little complacent and definitely more bored then we thought we would be.

At the back of our heads, the potential for immigration was stewing. In November 2007, a couple of things happened more or less all at once that got our juices flowing.

• The company I work for got acquired, by a large 3 letter company. This put my job in a state of limbo where I didn't know if I was going to stay employed, for how long etc. This also meant that all new work for me dried up pretty much instantaneously.
• Carly confirmed that, well, in Ottawa at least right now, there's really not much opportunity for an Elementary School teacher just out of college.
• We definitely weren't quite ready for kids. (at least, I am not, I'm sure Carly will voice up with a differing opinion)

So, faced with some major upheavals and the prospects of having to find new gainful employment, we figured, well, since we'll likely have to move anyway, why bother limiting ourselves to Canada?
In January 2008, things got confirmed with my job... my position was labeled "Transitional", which in essence means I'm more then welcome to stick around until April 2009. Now, truth be told, there's all sorts of incentives etc. that could be interesting to stay, but honestly? This was the catalyst I'd been looking for.
So there you have it. We're shooting for a July 2008 move date, we're planning on moving to somewhere around Wellington, New Zealand. We're scared shitless.