Hi, I am hoping to move to australia however despite my husband visiting the country many years ago we cannot decide on the best areas to look at. Ideally we need somewhere close to the sea with family attractions that is not too expensive. We will be looking to rent for the 1st year so any suggestions on finding a rental property would also be much appreciated. Melbourne seems to have good reports but trying to find info on specific coastal towns is proving quite difficult-any help would be great!
thanks

You might want to take a look at this thread on the best town to live in Australia.

I would first be looking at which towns/cities have the jobs available for your profession. It you are involved in high finance, or have special skills in IT you probably won't be able to look much outside of Sydney/Melbourne. Perth and Western Australia obviously for mining jobs.

Trade skills are pretty much in demand in both cities and country areas.

I am from Melbourne and spend a lot of time overseas. Each time I go back I realize how beautiful the city is. Sydney gets most of the attention overseas, but Melbourne has done a great job preserving its past while constructing new buildings/sports stadiums etc.

Public transport isn't great though, with problems of overcrowding and little new infrastructure being built. If you like the beach, Frankston and the Mornington Peninsula is nice. Geelong is also a nice alternative to Melbourne, but prices are rising.

Perhaps if you could post a few more details of your requirements, we could suggest a few more places.

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It kind of depends on what you mean by coastal and how far from what part of Melbourne you would want to be for Melbourne is a sprawling metropolis at the head of Port Phillip Bay as you would have seen from a map.

There's true coastal areas down the Bellarine Peninsula past Geelong and also down along the Great Ocean Road but that's getting a couple of hours drive out of Melbourne proper.
Similar if you head down the Mornington Peninsula over to Western Port Bay side and Flinders or down to Phillip Island and the south Gippsland coast.

Bass straight, PPB AND WP have a certain chilly water factor about them too compared with further up the east coast.

Combine map and www.domain.com.au looking.