Parents Joining You in Australia: The Hard Truth About the Parent Visa Wait

News · 2026-08-31 · 5 min read

You have settled in Australia, the work is steady, and now you want your mother and father close by. Before you spend a cent on a parent visa, look hard at the timeline. The non-contributory Aged Parent visa queue now sits at roughly 33 years. The contributory option, the one families pay extra for so it moves faster, costs close to $50,000 per applicant and still takes around 15 years. For many households, that is longer than the reason they wanted their parents here in the first place.

These are not abstract figures. Senate estimates data for the 21 months up to 31 March this year recorded more than 1,500 parent visa applicants who died before their case was decided. Many of them had paid tens of thousands of dollars and handed in every form asked of them. Time simply ran out before the system moved.

So the honest question for any family is not only whether you can apply. It is whether this pathway will deliver in a timeframe that still matters to you. Below is a plain look at why the wait is so long, what reform might bring, and what you can do right now.

What is clogging the parent visa system

The delay is built into the settings, and it has been for years. Two things keep it that way.

Too few places for too many people. Each year the government sets a ceiling on parent visa grants. That ceiling has dropped, from 8,500 places to 7,060 this financial year, while the number of people waiting has grown beyond 157,000.
An onshore side door. Some parents arrive on a visitor visa and then lodge a parent visa application from inside Australia. They can stay on bridging visas for as long as their case takes, and they are often dealt with ahead of people who applied properly from offshore. Abul Rizvi, a former deputy immigration secretary, has described this as the loophole regulators now want to shut. It also explains why offshore applicants feel they keep sliding further back.

A government-commissioned review of the migration system in 2023 did not soften its language. Holding out a visa that will probably never arrive within a person's lifetime, it said, is both cruel and unnecessary.

The coming overhaul, up close

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has been expected to announce a wider migration overhaul, and family visa settings are reportedly part of it. One idea on the table would stop spouses, children and parents of Australian citizens from lodging visa applications while they are in the country as tourists. That aims squarely at the onshore route described above.

If you have followed the rules and applied from offshore, closing that gap could in theory reduce some of the queue-jumping. The catch is that nobody yet knows whether newly arriving parents will be able to use the onshore pathway at all. If they cannot, families lose one of the few tools they have to keep a parent physically in Australia while the permanent visa is pending.

None of this is final. But if your plan depends on a visitor visa followed by an onshore application, keep a close eye on announcements over the coming months.

When a parent keeps the household running

For plenty of families this is not about sentiment. It is about keeping daily life going. Skilled migrants on long shifts, such as a Sydney-based surgical trainee whose situation came up in consultations, often rely on a parent for childcare and help at home while they build a career. When that help only comes in six-month stretches on a temporary visa, and the parent must then leave Australia for long periods, the pressure lands everywhere: on work, on the budget, and on the health and stability of the older person travelling back and forth.

South African families planning a move with a partner and children face the same questions. Decide early who will help with the kids, what happens in the months a grandparent has to be away, and how often you can realistically pay for flights home.

Your to-do list if an application is already lodged

Check the stream. Contributory and non-contributory parent visas differ hugely in price and waiting time. Look again at whether the one you chose still suits your family.
Keep every visitor stay clean. If your parents travel between Australia and home on visitor visas while the permanent application is pending, make sure each entry follows the rules. A breach could put the main application at risk.
Follow ministerial directions. These decide which applications are processed first. They can change the real order of the queue a great deal, no matter when someone lodged.
Plan on today's figures. Processing estimates shift. If your plans rely on a visa landing inside a set window, test that against current data, not against a figure somebody quoted you years ago.

Where this leaves your family

The parent visa system is under serious strain, and a likely overhaul could change the rules for people already waiting as well as for new applicants. For now, families in the queue are stuck with a setup that the government's own reviewers called unsustainable. If you are about to start, or you are partway through and unsure how reform could affect you, get advice that fits your situation before your next step. Choosing the wrong stream or the wrong moment costs more than money. It can cost years your parents may not have.

For South Africans building a life through jobs in Australia, the lesson is simple: treat a parent visa as a long-term project, keep your paperwork tidy, and have a backup plan for family support in the meantime.

#australia parent visa #parent visa backlog #contributory parent visa cost #non-contributory parent visa wait time #australia family visa delays #aged parent visa australia #parent visa processing time 2026 #australia migration overhaul #tony burke migration reform #onshore parent visa application #australia visa queue #parent visa australia 2038 #bringing parents to australia permanently #australia migration agent advice #family reunion visa australia