Sub-Dividing Your Property

Is the land that your house is on getting too large for you to handle? But you LOVE the area and you don’t really want to move to another house … Why not have your cake and eat it too? Instead of moving, sub-divide the land build yourself a new smaller house on a much smaller piece of land.

I’ve done just that … My house currently sits on 845 sqm of land and I HATE gardening with a passion. What better way to kill 2 birds with one stone. So I set about getting approval to sub-divide the land. That was the easy part – getting the paperwork was relatively painless (well, it is if you know what you’re doing).

Now for the REAL fun.

Rather than opt for the traditional double brick home, I’ve decided to go for the new alternative building material – Energy Lite panels to be precise. I’m told it will be a much quicker build time than with brick and with much higher energy rating.

Journey with me on my trials and tribulations with the building – and read all about the frustrations (I’ve been told that building a house is grounds for divorce!), the costs (I expect my pocket is going to suffer from this!) and hopefully the celebrations when I get to move into a brand new home.

Refugees or Just Illegal Migrants

How any country deals with asylum seekers is a hot topic that arouses the righteous across both sides of the political fence. In the battle over border protection, our political leaders offer up quick fixes, stunts and slogans to prove that they are “right”.  This is a debate that splits a country.

On the one hand, we want to be compassionate and look after those who cannot look after themselves. On the other hand, we are perceived by many to be a soft touch. Is it fair that a group of people can land itself on a country with no papers and no money and expect to be granted permanent residency in a country whilst many others “do the right thing” and make sure that they apply for migration properly. Then when they arrive, they get a job and contribute their skills to their new country.

The boat refugees to Australia has certainly made this a hot topic for the forthcoming election.  On a personal note, I would have to question why some of these illegal boat refugees throw their paperwork overboard so that their identity cannot be proved. Do they have something to hide?  Tony Abbott’s suggestion of “no paperwork, no visa” would certainly put an end to this!

Another question – if these refugees are so desperate to leave their homeland because of persecution, why is it that when they arrive they insist that their host country must now conform to THEIR rules. As a migrant myself, my desire was to integrate into the way of life of my host country as quickly as is possible – to my mind, if I didn’t wish to integrate then I should not have migrated!