Well just 7 weeks on Monday and I will be taking a one way ticket to my wonderful new life in Cyprus.
I'm going to start this diary as I think they are so useful to others who are making the move.
As I said it's 7 weeks to go and I've already done loads in preperation for the move. At first I was going to ship everything but the kitchen sink over, then I changed my mind (this mind changing has become a frequent event!) The reason: My car still has some finance outstanding and after contacting the finance company I was told I wasn't allowed to take the car out of the UK while they had a financial interest in it, which is understandable, so the car stays, my son has recently passed his driving test so he has now inherited a car which he is extremely happy about! As for the furniture, well as I am giving Cyprus 12 months before I make a final decision whether to stay or not (although I really don't think I'll be coming back to the UK) I thought it would be silly to pay a couple of thousand pounds to ship everything over only to have to ship it back / sell it should something drastic happen and I did have to come back. So the decision was to rent furnished for 12 months and take it from there. I am bringing personal items but just small things, I found a great website that will send boxes over to Cyprus, takes just 3-5 days to arrive and their prices are really competitive, the company is we deliver the world. Its cheaper to have your boxes collected from a business address rather than a house but I have my own business here in the UK so that works out fine for me. So thats that part sorted.
I booked a holiday let through holiday lettings for the first 2 weeks so that I could have a look around for a place to live when I arrived. I contaced lots of letting agents by email and gave them a "wish list" of areas of preference etc etc. I found the agents to be extremely helpful not just with the apartment finding but also with other valuable information like their views on some of the areas I had mentioned, public transport, healthcare, utilities etc. However just before Christmas I thought I'd pop a request on Anglo Info, again I stated my wish list. A couple of days later I was contacted by a couple who have an apartment that had just come empty and had all but 1 of my list requests... My friend who lives in Cyprus (who has been a god send!)went to have a look at the apartment for me, took some photographs for me to have a look at, I rang the owner and we negotiated rent etc, they agreed to hold the apartment for me until I arrive, the contracts were signed and deposit made, all within 2 weeks. I can't express what a relief it is to have somewhere permanent to live sorted out, I would have waited had I had to but this is much better. The owner of the holiday let has agreed to just let me have her apartment for 1 week instead of 2. I am still going to use the holiday let so that I can sort out the transfer of electricity and telephone line and internet installed in the permanent place before I move in.
As I said I have my own business here so I've had to employ and train new staff etc but the main gripe with this has been sorting out my tax situation, I'm sure they make tax affairs as confusing as possible on purpose, why can't they just explain things in plain english that we can understand? Anyway I think i've got a vague idea of how it all works now after hours of internet searching and I'm off to see my accountant on Monday o see if I am correct so I will update on this when I know for sure.
Just now I'm trying to decide what to bring with me and what to sell and what to store and what to donate to charity(this is another one I keep changing my mind about) I bought some double walled packing boxes from a business on ebay, they came the day after ordering them, I have decided how many boxes I'm bringing so now I have to decide whats going in them, this could take a while!
Arranged a car boot to do in the middle of March to get rid of the last bits that I don't need, my tenancy here ends in the middle of March too when I will be moving in with my parents for the last 2 weeks before flying out!
Well I've just read that back and it doesn't seem much but, I can tell you so far there has been lots of ups and downs and no doubt lots more to come.
This is all I can think to write so far that may be helpful to others, I'll keep updating as things progress and if anyone can think of anything else that maybe useful to me or anyone else please add
I'm also a member of another forum so I'm going to post this on there aswell....
Looking forward to Cyprus see you all soon
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I have used we deliver the world when I've been shipping back from the UK (think shopping expeditions 
) and I have found them to be very good. 
)
and it still hasn't quite sunk in!
Anyway I got a reply within a couple of hours actually from the delivery company in Cyprus saying that my postcode wasn't remote and there wouldn't be an extra charge...phew....sorted!
