Last modified 01/26/2024

Requirements to obtain the permanent residency in Australia: 

The permanent residency is the required step before obtaining the citizenship in Australia and it can be obtained through skilled work, business, and sponsorship and through many other reasons that have been established in the Australian Migratory Program by the Australian Government.

Researching is the key to decide where to migrate and Australia is one of the few friendly countries towards any kind of process, despite of all of its official information been in English, which turns it a little bit tough when one wants to find out if he or she has a good command, or not, of the English language.

The sensible thing about the Australian Migratory Program is that it allows citizens from other countries accessing to the right information through the Australian Government’s official web site: www.inmi.gov.au, given to the continuous variations in the immigration laws; however, finding what you are looking for among all of that useless information could be really rambling, for which many times, it is necessary to look down for information in other, non official, web sites and with the obtained information, look for it in the mentioned web site.

The first thing that you should know is that the process and presentation of the applications for permanent residency of professional immigrants and with occupations, is performed in the Skilled Processing Centre (ASPC), a processing center of the Australian government, which is located in the city of Adelaide.

The Australian Migratory Program, for the period 2008 – 2009, has considered delivering 135 000 permanent residency or immigrant visas, for those people who have profession or occupations until July the 31st of the present year (2009).

The permanent residency or immigrant visas are subdivided in various categories such as skilled visa or immigrant visa as a specialized worker, skilled independent regional visa, visa for business owners, visa for senior executives, visa for businesses established in Australia, visas for regional businesses established in Australia, business visa for the investor, sponsored permanent residency visa for those immigrants who have been sponsored by their employers, sponsored permanent residency visa for immigrants who have been sponsored by a family member, permanent residency visa intended for former citizens, permanent residency visas for been a family member of a New Zealand citizen, permanent residency visa for having a distinguished talent, permanent residency visa for been humanitarian with refugees and permanent residency visa for been retired.

The main condition for obtaining any of the permanent residency or immigrant visas is obtaining the minimum score needed that are indicated in the immigration laws according to each type of visa; because, in the case of the professionals, they require 120 points, and in the case of the other visas, the score is less than 120 points, inclusively, in some cases 100 points.

But we must not forget that this qualification goes according to the fulfillment of the age requirements (having less than 45 years old), the work capacity (studies and work experience), as well as in approving the IELTS exam on the good command of the English language (the requested score goes from 7 points for skilled professionals to 5 points in regional visas).

In the case of the businesses visas, there is an additional request: they are demanded on minimum amounts of earning in their previous businesses’ experiences, a minimum percentage of actions that show ownership of the business (10 %), minimum sales volumes and experience in business management inferior to 18 months.

In other cases, in order to give the visa, the immigrant is also requested to be sponsored by his former employer and when he or she is acknowledged by the Australian Government and has qualified his or her job offer for immigrants in the Department of immigration and Citizenship; or can be sponsored by his or her family, spouse, boyfriend, girlfriend, parents or children.

Summing up, the permanent residency in Australia is given, mainly, to those immigrants who are professionally skilled or that have an occupation that is required by the Australian work market, by businesses, by work or family sponsorship, as well as for been humanitarian.