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Thread: Permanent residence via "Establishing a base in New Zealand"

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    Question Permanent residence via "Establishing a base in New Zealand"

    Hello there - I'm new to the forum.

    My family and I have 2 year residence visas under the Skilled Migrant program and we may not manage to live in New Zealand for a full 184 days over 2 years, so I am asking forum members if they could tell me what they know about the criteria for earning permanent residency via "Establishing a base in New Zealand". In particular, there is a criteria whereby if one purchases a home within the first year of residence, and family members are in New Zealand a total of 184 days over a 2 year period, and they occupy that residence, then they are granted permanent residency.

    My question is, can this home be a condominium? Does it need to be a single family detached house? Can we live in temporary lodging (RV or trailer, say) on a section we purchase which we will build a home on later? Can it be rented to others while we are away? Do we have to be living there at the time of our PR application (what if we are overseas, say)?

    The PR operations manual states that one must occupy the home and prove it via property tax statements, insurance, utility bills etc which we surely will be able to do, but it's the details relating to the other issues I'm worried about.

    Anyone been through this or done any research or know any stories?

    Thanks for the feedback

    John

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    Hello and welcome.

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    Hi, I have never heard about the "Establishing a base in New Zealand" PR before and it sounds interesting - could you please post a link to NZ immigration site where do they mention it?

    BTW I've asked google but the only hit is this thread, jeez he is fast

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    Yes 70M45, there are 5 ways to qualify, listed in the link provided by eassae. I should note, it is an option for those who have received resident visas via the Skilled migrant category, as we have, but I don't know if it is a stand alone or an option with other visa categories.

    "Established base" is one of the ways to obtain PR. It's pretty much the same as others in that one must be present in New Zealand for a minimum amount of time, (along with a few others minor requirements,) but it is a lower limit with the caveat that one have purchased and occupy a home also (the part of the established "base" presumably.)

    I'm hoping there are people out there who have answers to the question, or experience with whether or not a condo qualifies as a residence, or if we have to be occupying it at the time of application for prv, etc...
    Last edited by jmac; 28th October 2011 at 08:12 AM.

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    Have you tried actually asking NZIS? They are the ones who will have the answer

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    <Can this home be a condominium?>
    I don't see why not. There is not even a mention of the minimum value of a home.

    <Does it need to be a single family detached house?>
    I don't think so or it would have been stated in the policy.

    <Can we live in temporary lodging (RV or trailer, say) on a section we purchase which we will build a home on later?>
    My view is that I don't think NZIS will approve an RV as a "home" becausee it is not permanent. An established base needs to have some form of permanent feature. You have said it yourself that you will build a "home" on it later. It's difficult to argue you have a home until you've built it.

    <Can it be rented to others while we are away?>
    NZIS won't know that it is rented to others if you can show your name on bank statements, utility bills etc. with the address.

    <Do we have to be living there at the time of our PR application (what if we are overseas, say)?>
    This has been discussed on other thread before. You can only apply your Permanent Resident visa when your current resident visa has expired. When that happens and you apply for your PR visa within NZ, assuming you have fulfilled the requirement to get a PR visa, you will be get your PR visa. However if you apply for your PR visa from overseas with an expired resident visa, even if you have fulfilled the requirement to get a PR visa, you may not be granted PR visa. What will happen in this case is up to the decision based on NZIS judgement I guess.

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    Udang is thinking the same as me on points 1, 2 and 3.

    On point 4, I'm not sure that INZ wouldn't know - or, let's say, couldn't know, in some circumstances. If you had relatively long-term tenants, they could also show up in official records as resident at 'your' address. And remember that the immigration computer shows exactly whenever people enter and leave the country. This 'established base' qualification depends on everyone of the family apart from the principal applicant living in NZ, at the purchased home, for the qualifying amount of time, see below. You'd have to be very careful not to give INZ reason to doubt that this was happening.

    RV2.5.20 of the Operational Manual says this (my bolding).
    For the purpose of these instructions applicants are considered to own and maintain a family home in New Zealand if:
    they have purchased a residential property in New Zealand within 12 months of their first day in New Zealand as a resident and still own that property either solely or jointly with members of their immediate family who were included in the application for a resident visa; and
    they and/or members of their immediate family who were included in the application for a resident visa occupy that property.
    http://www.immigration.govt.nz/opsmanual/index.htm

    Point 5. Here are the regulations about applying for PR. http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migra...quirements.htm
    http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migra...teps/apply.htm
    And there's more information here, for if you apply from outside NZ. http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migra...quirements.htm

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    Thank you so much for the replies. I needed some feedback from the forum. John

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