4) If you really, really like it there, is there a good way to stay?
Find someone who really really likes you and marry them? The bulk of easy permanent residency visas go to migrants with skills Australia has decided it needs more of; followed by refugee and humanitarian visas—if you have either of those going for you it should practically be a rubber-stamp residency application.
To be more specific about the permanency residency visas, these days Australia is mostly looking for engineers, computer scientists, and the like. If you’d come last year you could have gotten in by being a hairdresser or chef.
Oh and the marrying? I know it was intended partly as a joke, but the immigration people are very suspicious of people trying to claim residency that way. Be prepared to jump through lots of hoops to prove that it’s not a scam to be allowed to stay in the country.
Do note that being an American (fellow first-worlder) and having already been in the country for some time won’t set off as many alarm bells as the typical case. But yes, an obvious sham marriage wouldn’t work. I would expect that a rationalist would be more than capable of deceiving the officials in this case.
You can not automatically get a work-visa through marriage. There are options available for family of an Australian resident, but you still have to apply, and there are caps in place. Read more on the immigration website
However—there are options to extend your holiday-visa for a second year, at which point you can then apply for sponsored work-visa, after which you’ve been around long enough to apply for residency. Again—the above website covers the gamut of what you can do. I suggest more research there :)
Find someone who really really likes you and marry them? The bulk of easy permanent residency visas go to migrants with skills Australia has decided it needs more of; followed by refugee and humanitarian visas—if you have either of those going for you it should practically be a rubber-stamp residency application.
To be more specific about the permanency residency visas, these days Australia is mostly looking for engineers, computer scientists, and the like. If you’d come last year you could have gotten in by being a hairdresser or chef.
Oh and the marrying? I know it was intended partly as a joke, but the immigration people are very suspicious of people trying to claim residency that way. Be prepared to jump through lots of hoops to prove that it’s not a scam to be allowed to stay in the country.
Do note that being an American (fellow first-worlder) and having already been in the country for some time won’t set off as many alarm bells as the typical case. But yes, an obvious sham marriage wouldn’t work. I would expect that a rationalist would be more than capable of deceiving the officials in this case.
You can not automatically get a work-visa through marriage. There are options available for family of an Australian resident, but you still have to apply, and there are caps in place. Read more on the immigration website
However—there are options to extend your holiday-visa for a second year, at which point you can then apply for sponsored work-visa, after which you’ve been around long enough to apply for residency. Again—the above website covers the gamut of what you can do. I suggest more research there :)