GBP/AUD Exchange Rate

[funkzig]

Hi all,

Thought I would ask for some opinions here.

We are planning on emigrating later this year.

I don't mean to sound pessimistic but I am becoming increasingly concerned with a few economic factors that will affect the value of the cash we finally take over to Oz.

Examples:
1. The pound appears to be becoming weaker against the the aussie $ - 2.12 today versus 2.4 in 2007. So on a £100k nest egg, we would lose $28k or approx £11k
2. Plus UK house prices are falling and but Aussie house prices are rising! So the longer it takes to sell we may lose money in the UK and then if we leave it a year (whilst renting) to buy in Oz, we could lose out even more!!

Any thoughts on this?

Thanks

[kaz101]

Hi Funkzig,

When we first bought property here (in 2004) it was nearly $3 to 1 GBP so yes I understand the question!

You can play one exchange company off against another to get better rates when moving that amount of money over, and also get them to do it charge free.

You can request future spot rates (I think that's what it's called) so that you can lock in a rate today so it doesn't matter what the rate does in the future.

It depends on where you are moving to as to how quickly house prices are rising, and what you can get for the pound. One of the reasons we chose where we live is that we wanted to be able to live comfortably, get out the rat race and have money to make some investments. So once we knew we wanted to live in South Australia it was do we live near Adelaide and pay more for the property or live further down south. We moved further down south, but I realise that some people have to choose where they live due to there job - we didn't have that.

Depending on where you are in the UK, and where you are moving to here you will still get more for your money in property. We have a 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom, 2 lounge house with garage, carport, sheds (sheds are very important in Oz ) for the equivalent of 132,000 pounds. I don't think that would have bought a 1 bedroom flat where we lived in the UK.

Regards,
Karen