Thinking of moving to Melbourne - advice and help please

[jazal]

We are thinking of moving to Melbourne but have no idea what to do or where to start! Help!
DS1 is 10 and DS2 is 7 and I was wondering about the school system in Australia - state v private, etc. Any advice would be very gratefully received :)

hi. Any Aussie mumsnetters out there who can help? The other thing I can't quite figure out are which suburbs to investigate. There are soooo many!!! :(

Hi
I live in Melbourne with DC 13 and 10. They both go to private schools. There is a bit of a flight to the private sector in Australia. Mine started off in the state system but we found their needs were not being met very well so have bitten the (very expensive) bullet and sent them private.

Do you have jobs lined up?
Feel free to pm me and I can give you some opinions about suburbs etc.

Oh, thanks saffronwblue. I will pm you (err.... Once I figure out how to do it on an iPhone....!]

Job is nearly lined up but I'm kind of panicking now cos' we know so little of what we may be getting ourselves into. How expensive is expensive in terms of private schools? Websites vary from 25k to 40k

Just want to say that I don't want to be blanketly negative about the state school system. It just didn't work for our kids.

Two words - do it!

Melbourne is fantastic!!! I lived there a year 12 years ago and have missed it since.

In terms on suburbs - it depends what you're after - they are so different.

Toorak and south Yarra are your Kensington and Chelsea, Malvern and hawthorn are nice middle class suburbs (that's where we were - loved it). St kilda, fitzroy and Brunswick your shoreditch/islington equivalent, carlton and areas around lygon st are quite Greek and Italian. Brighton is nice as well, on the waterfront

Don't know much about western suburbs. The east side is generally nicer, more affluent and the challenging areas tend to be in the western suburbs

It's a fabulous city - really friendly and cultural, and really European in feeling... I didn't get any home sickness living there.

Good luck

... And the restaurant scene is a-mazing! Everytime we go back (which is only every couple of years sadly - DH is an aussie), we struggle to make it round even half of the new openings..!! Too many great restaurants, too little time!

You'll find the primaries in middle-class areas are fine, just as they in the UK. State secondaries are often strictly zoned, the very high-acheiving ones with house prices to match.

Some of these schools, like the private ones, have a winnowing at Year 10 before the VCE starts, and ditch those who will mar the school's ATAR score.

The big difference between state and private is the class size, homogenous intake, fabulous facilities, and their ability to turf out all their problem kids into the state sector. I doubt the teaching is different, as they all train in the same places, and have been told so by a number of ex-private school children.

Catholic schools are not fussy about taking non-Catholics, and the fees are less than non-denominational schools.

Suburbs for living? Central and south east. Northern and western suburbs are, ahem, more challenging.

Do pm me if you want to know more. I live and teach in Melbourne.

aw, thanks FSB and echt (i have PM you)

malvern and hawthorne sounds lovely. i think we are less chelsea kensington sort of people and i am not sure if we are cool enough to be islington people so malvern and hawthorne may be more us (not saying that you are not cool FSB ).

i've heard brighton is nice but quite expensive. someone mentioned camberwell and berwick. what's that like?

when i used to live in london, i was in maida vale and i loved the broad leafy lined roads. this was when rental costs there wasn't phenomenal i should add!

are you back in the UK FSB?
echt, "northern and western suburbs" - not east...?
x

Berwick is the fastest growing suburb in Melbourne, so I hear. I just did some work at Berwick Fields Primary and it was amazing. But massive. I would recommend it though. It is faaaar from the city but it is next to a freeway. It took me exactly 21 minutes to get from the tunnel of the Eastlink to the school in traffic.

I don't know what else is 'out there'. I think the nearest shopping centre in Fountain Gate which is where Kath and Kim shop.... Melbourne is massive geographically.

The houses looked nice though. Like the stereotype of what you might think a house in Australia looks like.

I am definitely not cool!! We are in London at the moment (queens park - so very similar to you), but just about to move to San Francisco..!! Far too international for our own good!!!!

You'll love Malvern and hawthorn. If you're looking for slightly more central suburbs then armadale and prahran are your best bet. The houses aren't cheap, but by London standards its not too much of a shock!

I only went to camberwell a couple of times... There was a good vintage market there from memory.

They are lovely leafy areas with parks and tree-lined streets, and each area has a lovely local high st (glenferry road, chapel st, high st Armadale etc).

I also remember Richmond being quite nice but only visited a handful of times.

thanks savoycabbage. i think we would actually like to live away from the city. somewhere where we can commute in if needed (say 30 minutes or so). we moved out of london awhile ago and much prefered it that way.

FSB, good luck on the move to SF. We went there last year for hols and that would have been our number 2 choice after melbourne (funnily enough!). it kind of have the same kind of feel and we loved it. speaking of richmond, are there suburbs kind of like richmond (as in richmond, london) in melbourne?

savoycabbage, i am starting to figure out that melbourne is massive geographically! how far is a drive from say central/south east to east?

Thanks jazal, I think the two cities are quite similar in their appeal.

I think the name Richmond is the main link between the two - the Melbourne one is not far from the city and so isn't a mini town in the way the uk on is.

Melbourne is quite sprawling - 30 min drive would get u to Malvern, which is considered an inner suburb.

Richmond is trendy inner city; great location, small houses, lots of apartments, diverse community. a bit of a drug/junkie centre. Lots of Vietnamese restaurants and a market which is a small replica of one in Saigon.
Berwick is quite far out and would really put you deep into suburbia.
Just have to speak up for the inner north west - Ascot Vale, Moonee Ponds (really) and Essendon have lots of leafy streets, big houses, parks, river views and walking tracks and good cafes and restaurants.
Melbourne really is massive geographically and continues to sprawl with ugly housing developments at the fringes which are really underserviced in terms of schools and transport.
If you want to live a bit out of the city, ie somewhere a bit rural you would be looking at a 45 to 60 minute commute, in my opinion. There are beautiful hills to the east of Melbourne, but that can start moving you towards fire risk areas.
Have a look at Eltham, in the north east. Hilly, green, a tiny bit hippy, great community and lots of village character.

Jazal I will pm you.

thanks saffronwblue and everyone. this is really useful and i think we have a really good list of ideas of potential suburb areas now
i had not considered the potential fire risk element at all so that is a real good reminder. x

jazal 30 minutes away from the city by rail is still quite close. Not a bad thing, just a more expensive thing.