Australian pension

Welcome to the forum James, love the wakwak name, Oz it's drop bears.

Yes you can live here if you already receive your Australian aged pension but you will receive a reduced rate, no power rebates etc. think all up it mounts to a couple of K. per year.

I would suggest you visit the Australian gov website or drop into one of their offices and get the info straight from the horses mouth, go from there.

Good luck.

Cheers, Steve.

         Welcome to expat.com.  Steve is from Australia, he will be glad to fill you in on all the particulars including health insurance.  Good luck!!!

Steve as I understand it the Aussie pension is means tested. So if the OP qualifies he is going to struggle financially for the first two years?

Thanks mugtech and hope your wife is recovering, never good when crook.

Yes to James and his question it can be done, I looked at this subject long and hard and for me it was all sad news. Firstly if I was already living O/S meant I would need to return to Oz and live back there for 2 years and limited to 6 weeks O/S travel per year for those 2 years.

Turned out after 45 years paying copious amounts of tax for a supposed pension????? Means tested and because I worked my tits off and made money and assets, sorry mate you are too wealthy, I don't nor ever will qualify for what turned out to be a lie.

Aside, for you if you already receive then as said go ask the powers that be and find out where you stand.

Good luck.

Cheers, Steve.

Lotus.

The OP already has his pension and wondering the possibility of transporting that to a foreign country, (Philippines) yes but at reduced benefits and the OP needs to weigh up the cost difference. including as mugtech mentioned, health care. Medicare falls away when you live in a foreign country unless you still pay taxes in Oz but have to return to take advantage. For us we simply self fund and only have PhilHealth, it works.

For me it's a no brainer as the Philippines for us is half the cost or less than Australia, we want for nothing here, car, motorbikes, live in full time worker and watch the waves roll in every day, things we never had in Oz.

Australia is one of the most expensive places to live in the world and S/E Asian countries offer an affordable life with nice people and cultures are a bonus.

OMO.

Cheers, Steve.

@bigpearl

The value of the Australian & UK state pensions is about the same. UK is about £11.5k.P.A (less generous than the US state pension) Personally I could not survive on that even in the Philippines. I qualify for my UK state pension in a few weeks when I hit 66. As I am still working and due to my tax band half of it will go in taxes but the whole lot I will put into my private pension so will more or less get that back in tax relief. I do feel for our Aussie friends though. One of the few western countries where the state pension is means tested. As an illustration to receive £11.5k (US$ 14.5k) in a private pension you would need at least £150K invested.

Couldn't agree more Lotus, If I relied on an Aussie pension I would be living a somewhat frugal existence, I never wanted that and over 15/20 years maxed out my contributions into my private super company, was around 1.6M several years ago but I think now it's 1.75M capped but that's for contributions and earnings simply keep the principal rising. Aside it has grown to over 2M as now the maggot government can't tax my earnings since I started drawing a pension a year or so ago, My age I take the minimum 4% and the rest grows and should give my kids a tidy sum when I'm pushing up the daisies and the excess pension goes into an investment account and yes the 5% return is taxable by the maggots that tell lies.

The 10/15% return not taxable is surplus as we only drawer 4%. Thinking and planning wins at the end of the day.

Pensions are needed as a safety net and on reflection after being bitter for a while consider my 45 years of tax are helping those that need it/have no choice because they never planned and they can eat.

OMO.

Cheers, Steve.