Is Australia expensive?

[tracy123]

Now at the minute I take it people would say yes, but is it really? Is Australia expensive or is it just that the UK has fallen on her arse?

How do people work out the figures, is it done on the exchange rate? You look at a loaf of bread, gee in England a loaf costs £1.30 so anything over $2.60 in Australia is expensive! Or do you work it out well in the UK I got paid X amount, spent x amount and have x amount left...... In Australia I earn X spend X and have X amount left over?

When the exchange rate was £3 to 1 Australian dollar was Australia expensive then? Was Australia expensive when British houses were selling above what they were worth and the £ equalled 2.5 Aussie dollars?

When I came over to the UK (the exchange rate was about 2.6) and I fond the UK cheap, even fuel!!!! But when I worked out the exchange rate I knew just how expensive the UK was.

I still think the UK is more expensive than Australia! Not due to the exchange rate but life in general, what my UK wages can buy compared to my Australian wages. I feel that I know where to go in both countries to get the best deals and I’m not comparing warehouse bargains to shop bought, but like for like.

I’m interested in what others think and how they are working out where is cheaper to live? Also the longer you are living in Australia are you finding where to shop cheaper?

[Guest Guest31881]

Hi Geoff,

 

I don’t think you can realistically compare prices in the UK with Australia because the exchange rate is now so bad, it gives a false impression that Australian prices have risen. Of course as with all countries prices go up but to compare with UK at the present exchange rate does not really work. Its far better to compare % of wage spent on Mortgage, food and such like.

 

Been here nearly 7 months now and find that on the whole I get more for my money here, I spend about 15% of my income on food here (just two of us), In the UK that would have been around 20%.

The same goes for Electricity as a % of my income it is cheaper here (but price rises have been announced).

[tracy123]

Hi Geoff,

 

I don’t think you can realistically compare prices in the UK with Australia because the exchange rate is now so bad, it gives a false impression that Australian prices have risen. Of course as with all countries prices go up but to compare with UK at the present exchange rate does not really work. Its far better to compare % of wage spent on Mortgage, food and such like.

 

Been here nearly 7 months now and find that on the whole I get more for my money here, I spend about 15% of my income on food here (just two of us), In the UK that would have been around 20%.

The same goes for Electricity as a % of my income it is cheaper here (but price rises have been announced).

 

Agree and that's my point, thank you......... But it's very hard not to work out how much you would of paid in the UK at least for a few months :wubclub:

[Selah]

Geoffrey,

 

You completely hit the nail on the head! You cannot actually compare using exchange rate - it's got to be proportion of income that you normally spend on food, etc. It drives me crazy the continual discussions of expense as it is so relative!! We first applied in August 2007 and expected to be here in April 2008. Unfortunately, we were one of the 6000 applicants caught up in a fraud scandal where our applications were frozen for 13 months so subsequently arrived in November 2009. If we had come in 2008, we would have been almost mortgage free, etc. With the delay, we lost £60,000 on our house, the exchange rate plummeted to the high $1.70 and we are now looking at a mortgage significantly higher for a smaller house here. We are also realising that because most AUS banks count a non-working spouse as a dependent, we both need to be working in order to qualify for a mortgage right away which was not what I would have hoped. Would I change it? No. What right do I have to be mortgage free anyway? After all, we have worked hard - but no harder than anyone else here or in the UK. I, like you am in a cross cultural marriage (US but married a brit and been in UK for 14 years.) I learned to stop making those comparisons almost as soon as I arrived in the UK because it will drive you crazy and make you forever discontented. It really comes down to the basics - Are you happy where you are as a family? Can you afford to live? What lifestyle choices do you want to make and what do you want to compromise on? It appears to me that the family issues (people missing family/friends) are often the bigger reasons for expat non-settling than finances. We are spending more time as a family. We play games, go to the basketball court, take walks, etc. My kids are thriving in the outdoor life and I'm learning that Sunshine really seems to make people friendlier! Yes, I'm learning where to shop more cheaply. I also laugh when people talk about choice and availability as I think sometimes we all forget how far the UK has come in those areas in the 14 years I was there. My kids are privileged to have seen three different continents. Most of us parents didn't get that opportunity. Finally, my husband thinks its good for me that there are virtually no 24 hour grocery stores....and sales that start at 4am...

 

Sorry - I've ranted!

 

Liz, Andrew, Charis (13), Josiah (11), and Daniel (5)

[Guest Guest31881]

Agree and that's my point, thank you......... But it's very hard not to work out how much you would of paid in the UK at least for a few months :wubclub:

 

Agreed, when you first come you always look at the prices and think how much it was in the UK. I now look to see how much money I have left at the end of the month and compare that with the % of money I would have had left in the UK. I am on the winning side.

[JayBone]

Unfortunately for me the exchange rate really is going to be a big factor!!

 

I will still be paid in UK pounds when we live in OZ as i will be keeping the job i have now, working overseas in the Middle East.

 

The collapse in exchange rates has been a 30% paycut for us, not ideal!

[Eera]

Completely agree with the above, exchange rates are only there for the initial movement of money, if you have it, after that it's proportion of what you earn. For the first few months you can't help but compare prices with the UK, but after that you just forget them and look at what you what the comparative prices are around you.

 

Just out of interest I started comparing the relative cost of a grocery load in the UK from Sainsburies online, with Coles yesterday, some things cost more, somethings cost less and it worked out comparable, but from my perspective Aus is way cheaper as I get paid three times what I could expect in the UK.

 

And there's a tip - I see heaps of CVs come through from very experienced people asking for stupidly low salaries, all they've done in times their existing salary by the exchange rate when realistically they could be asking 50% more if they did a bit of research and found out what the going wage actually was (might have limited application outside of geotechnics and civil eng, people will have to check for their individual circumstance).

 

However, expectations have to be kept realistic; you're not going to get a beachfront five bedroom house for $150,000. Ten years ago, maybe, not now.

[Guest Guest31881]

Unfortunately for me the exchange rate really is going to be a big factor!!

 

I will still be paid in UK pounds when we live in OZ as i will be keeping the job i have now, working overseas in the Middle East.

 

The collapse in exchange rates has been a 30% paycut for us, not ideal!

 

 

That is very true, Like a lot of members on here i live off a pension paid from the UK, and yes I have lost around 30% of my monthly income. If it was back to its origional rate, Life would be a lot easier. But I still feel better off here, just had to learn to shop properly and not just use the 'big two' to do my shopping. :notworthy:

[The Bray Family]

The sooner you stop converting dollars to pounds the better. i spend more on food here but we earn double what we did in the uk.you really can not compare until your here earning dollars.Some things are cheap went to the garden centre the other day found that cheaper than england. cars are expensive furniture you can get some good cheap deals.You have to shop around more here there's no asda that sell everything under one roof.

[Guest PommieLady]

I earn far more than I did in the UK but my oh earns far less, our outgoings are different, we don't need so many holidays and we don't go to the pub, something we did all the time in the UK. We have a property we couldn't have afforded in the UK, living on 4 acres with views of the mountains etc. All up I think we are financially better off.

 

When we emigrated five years ago the cost of living was the same as the UK, since then prices have gone up just as in the UK. I think the big difference is the amount that people are coming out with. House prices have declined in the UK whilst the general house prices in Australia have increased since we moved over, even the recent fiscal depression has left properties more expensive than they were five years ago, something you can't say about British property market. As a result people are ending up with large mortgages that are not affordable on a single none professional income.

 

My advice to those preparing to emigrate would be to be aware that without knowing the financial details of anyone giving indications about the cost of living here in Australia the information is pretty meaningless. There are so many variables, visa status, mortgage or renting, location, income, dependents and age of and choice of schooling, life style choices and general expectations etc that makes it specific to that person's experience and difficult to relate to what it might be for you.

 

Migrating is a bit like having children, there is never a right time. Follow your dreams.

:wubclub:

 

 

[olly]

With Costco opening here in Melbourne we are finding that sharing some of the shopping items with another person helps - i.e. we bought a huge pack of toilet rolls and shared them, and there were heaps of other things. I now shop between Aldi, Costco, NQR (Not quite right - dinted stuff, out of range etc) and Safeway. There are all sorts of ways to shop. Now some of these stores are not good for everything or certain things of course, but you can juggle a bit. (I drink soy milk sometimes and like a certain brand which isn't always at some of these stores). One thing which is really expensive in Safeway at the moment is washing powder, it's ridiculous, they made the packaging smaller and didn't alter the price. I go to Aldi for washing powder where I can get much more for less.

 

Also, I have just come back from shopping in 3 major cities in South Africa and I can tell you many things are much cheaper there, but there is no use in coming back to Australia and complaining about the price differences there, as while supermarket prices were really a lot cheaper in some items and the packaging huge, other shops had low quality goods. (clothes and shoes)

[heyyu]

you'll find that by shopping in so called deprived areas that the prices are nearly always cheaper than the affleunt suburbs