Hoping to get PR visa. Looking at WA or SA. Husband Heavy Duty Diesel Mechanic - 20yrs experience. Have been advised he could earn in region of $50k min - more if mining related
Uk property valued £200k (no mortgage) plus cash deposit £90k approx. Hoping to rent UK property short term (£5000net pa). Aware of CGT implications if we buy in Australia before selling UK house however would like to know:
how much we could borrow ?

Can Uk rental income be taken into account when calculating gross income?

Would be looking to repay mortgage in short term once we decided to sell Uk property. Is a special type of mortgage required for this?

Would we be able to get approval in principle before leaving Uk based on current property valuation and Uk incomes?

Could we afford one ??!

Any info or advice would be much appreciated
Thanks

Why do you not want to sell up straight away and buy a house here for cash ?

If you rent it out you will also have to pay tax on the rental income here in Oz - so your 5000 GBP would become $11,500 here. So even if one partner was the overseas income earner and earned nothing else, you would then have to pay tax on $5,500 ($6000 is tax free). Of course if you had an income of your own then you would pay tax on all of it and potentially at a higher percentage tax band.

Plus you have the hassle of managing the rental of the property from the other side of the world - believe it is not as easy as it seems and you need to be very careful how you chose to manage it - been there, done that, felt the pain and couldn't wait to dump the house !

Hi Colin
Thanks for your reply.
I can see where you are coming from and am aware that we will be taxed on rental income.
I'm afraid that we have the 'what if it doesn't work out' syndrome!
We have a nice house which my OH has put a lot of time and hard work into and would hate the idea of having to return to the Uk and not have the house to come back to. On the other hand we both love Australia and want to try something new. We may see things in a different light if we get our visa approved.
Would you like to expand further on your misfortune with your house in order to put us off the idea of renting out?

Hi there,

We just had very bad luck when it came to tennants and agents.

The first tennant did a moonlight flit owing us 6 weeks rent, left the place like a tip and had a big dog there who had damaged some of the doors.

The second tennant left in a similar manner but at least the house was a bit tidier.

The agent we used initially, got taken over by another bunch claiming to provide a much better service. They never paid us the rent on time and also missed a payment completely which we took them to court over. We won the case but they have never paid us.

Our last tennant was pretty good generally but even she got difficult when we asked her to leave so that we could sell the house.

Dealing with estate agents was hard work due to time differences and you really had to trust them that they were not pulling a fast one on us.

Some of the solicitors forms for the sale had to be signed by us - which delayed the completion as they had to get here by post and then be posted back. If we had signed a power of attorney to someone we could have avoided a lot of this hassle.

Anyway we were glad in the end to get rid - we now have our own house here in Sydney.

I think sometimes you have to make a big step and decide that you are going to do everything to make it work. Perhaps if you did not have the house to come back to, then you might not make the decision to come back so soon, and give Oz more time.

Hi Colin
Thanks for the advice. Even some of the estate agents that we have had around to put a value on the property were saying things along the same lines and thought it would be best if we sold it in the condition it is in now (the OH is a bit of a perfectionist!)
We are starting to take the same point of view as your last comment so now all we have to do is keep everything crossed that we will overcome our medical issue and get that elusive visa!
thanks again