A data guy's analysis of the Perth Housing market - Nov 2015

As a renter in Australia who lived nearly 10 years in a Canadian house that we built, cared for and loved it's nearly (no, it's fully) impossible to ignore the property market in Perth. If you've read any of my posts you know that Perth in 2012 was absolutely booming.  Ex-pats and their companies were paying extreme sums per week for rental properties and at the lower end you could have up to 30 family's bidding for a single rental property...

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Getting a permanent residence visa in Australia

I've been away from the blog for a long time....and funny enough people keep reading so I thought I'd write about the topic that I get the most questions about: getting that coveted visa for Permanent residence in Australia. My disclaimer, I'm nowhere near an expert on the topic, I'm not an migration lawyer and this is purely my experience so yours may be different.  The other thing to mention is that Australia are extremely serious about...

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Ant killing time - Dealing with our ant problem

Expats come to Australia with the worry of spiders, snakes, sharks, jelly fish and other animals / pests that will mess you up.  In Perth my experience is that you need to worry about ants.  Ants are everywhere in Perth...I might go so far as to say that Perth is one gigantic ant hill. The last house we were in, a company provided McMansion that was only 3-5 years old really never had any issues on the inside.  They were brutal...

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WASO's Symphony in the City (photos and mini review)

Last night we went down for the Western Australia Symphony Orchestra's Symphony in the City.  The annual event held outdoors in Langley Park is a free event and had an attendance over 20,000.  I've seen a number of WASO concerts of late (including a concert with the brilliant Ben Folds) and continue to be blown away by the quality and this event was no exception.  In fact, given the setting, the inclusion of the entire WASO choir this...

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Getting stranded on Rottnest Island

Back in early September we decided to take a short 4 day trip to Rottnest Island.  Rottnest for those who don't know is an Island off the coast of Western Australia which takes approximately 30-45 minutes by ferry. A couple of key points about Rottnest: There are essentially no cars on the Island outside of support vehicals and a bus that runs the length of the Island.  The main method of transport is bicycle which you can rent...

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My ongoing list of favorite Perth cheap restaurants

We quickly found out, after being in Perth for a day or so that it's not an inexpensive place to eat out.   Let me rephrase that: it's mind numbingly awestrikingly outrageously expensive.   But... there are exceptions to the rule.  Here are my faves.   I'm going to keep adding to this list it as I find more.  I'll only add restaurants that I have tried and would appreciate any suggestions in the comments. Sept...

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Great mobile apps for Expats - Part 1 the basics

I spend a serious amount of time using my three mobile devices.  My current setup is a Samsung Note3, a 4th generation full size Ipad, and a reasonably new Dell Lattitude laptop.  I also have a trusty Windows PC I built around 5 years ago which still gets a tonne of use.  At this point I'm going to focus on the apps for the phone and tablet but you'll see that many are also available via webapp (usually via the Chrome Web Store). This...

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