Did you change your mind?

[Kazmac72]

Just curious to know how many people actually research/visit and decide on an area to settle, then change their minds, perhaps for a job?

We would love to settle in Northlands, near to Whangarei if jobs allow, but are willing to go as far south as BoP for the right job/house/lifestyle etc.

I'd love to know your stories....

Karen xx

[Duncan74]

I guess I'd fall into this category. Although only in part. I assumed that I'd only be able to get a job in Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch, so on the recce we just looked at Wellington and ChCh (ruled out Auckland as it didn't sound like what we were after). And based on that I decided on ChCh. Well instead I got offered Tauranga, with the possibility in the future of a move. But now I'm here, and have actually worked out where the heck Tauranga was (I'll be honest, when they said that on the phone interview I was grateful I'd got googlemaps open) then I think we'll be here for a while. Can't say it will be for ever, but definitely a while.

[Carey]

We did a recce trip but didn't look at Cambridge which is where we've ended up due the first job I was offered. The irony is that one of our reasons for emigrating was so we could live on the coast and that's not Cambridge for sure!

[1979vanessa]

I had my heart set on Christchurch as I had a good feeling about the place when I visited. I was devastated when I had a job rejection from there. But, within a few weeks I was offered a job in Napier, which I accepted having never even heard of the place!! I've been here 9 months now, and absolutely love it! I'm so glad I didn't hold out for another job in Christchurch. Sometimes you just have to take a leap of faith into the unknown!

[M-Squared]

Before our recce, just from our research, we'd set our hearts on Wellington. I had interviews there and in Auckland and got offered the one in Auckland. I turned it down as they offered too little by a loooong way! After a few months I got an offer from Wellington and have never regretted it, I love it here!

[benandclare]

We'd kinda settled on Nelson as our fave place to move to but had to go to Christchurch cos that's were the job for Clare was and it's been great for us .

Again when were still in UK we'd pretty much decided that South Christchurch was for us but now live North of the city

[Familyofmonkeys]

We'd originally planned on settling in Christchurch, based on our lifestyle aspirations. We didn't do a reccie however, as we went through the emmigraton process while I was heavily pregnant so couldn't fly. OH then got a job offer from a NZ expo and had a choice between Auckland or Wellington...neither of which we knew that much about. Basically after some brief research we decided against Wellington as we couldn't face the idea of living slap bang on top of a load of fault-lines with small children so we opted for Auckland instead. We had a fab 2 and a half years there, using it as a base to see much of the North Island and meeting some lovely people, but ultimately we decided that we would stick to our original plan so OH got a work transfer and we finally relocated to South Island. We are not living in Christchurch itself though, instead we are living half an hour outside the city in a quiet rural area.

[Kazmac72]

Loving the stories.... I suppose if it feels right, you do have to take a leap of faith eh?

[JandM]

That's one way of looking at it. Then, if you desperately need a job that will let you stay in NZ, you take the one that's going, knowing it can be your foot in the door to bide your time and perhaps later on get nearer where you originally planned. In the meantime, of course, you may find that you make friends and find out good things you'd never suspected about where you happen to have landed, so maybe you never move! (This last is more or less what happened to us in the UK - we came to this town, 'to get a foot on the property ladder', in 1973, and we're still here. We did move on, in the sense of buying a house that was more to our taste than being on an open-plan new estate.)

[Mickfin]

We did not have a place in mind except New Zealand as a whole. We are moving where the job offer came from. So like most people, the job was the deciding factor for us.