Cost of living

[DukeNinja]

Hi ladies and gents,

 

I wanted to pick your brains please. I've managed to secure a job in Brisbane for around £101k. I know this is a "how long is a piece of string" kinda question, but would this be OK for myself, spouse, and newborn child to live on? We're not an extravagant family.

 

Thanks in advance,

DN

 

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

 

 

[Skani]

1 hour ago, DukeNinja said:

 

H. I've managed to secure a job in Brisbane for around £101k.

 

 

 

Do you really mean pounds...or dollars?

[DukeNinja]

Ah, good spot! I mean dollars (wishful thinking...)

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

[Gbye grey sky]

1 hour ago, DukeNinja said:

 

Hi ladies and gents,

 

I wanted to pick your brains please. I've managed to secure a job in Brisbane for around £101k. I know this is a "how long is a piece of string" kinda question, but would this be OK for myself, spouse, and newborn child to live on? We're not an extravagant family.

 

Thanks in advance,

DN

 

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

Maybe not a question of extravagance but more a matter of the lifestyle you are looking for and whether you have some money to get you started.

Rent will be your biggest outgoing for sure so perhaps look at realestate.com.au or Domain to get an idea what sort of home you are looking for and how far out you are prepared to live.  Whether you need two cars.  Establish what your net take home will be and what you will have left to live on after rent is paid.

That is a good salary but how does it compare with what you are used to?

[DukeNinja]

Thanks for the quick response! Well I'll be the sole bread winner, working at the RBW hospital, and we're thinking of living close to work (at least for the first 6 months) to get me settled in. That'll save us the expenses of cars/insurance/fuel. I'm currently locuming here, so my salary is inflated, but if I had to compare it like for like, my UK salary would have been around £35k (and I do mean GBP this time [emoji3]). We're thinking of Fortitude Valley/Spring Hill, and looks like for the type of property we're after (newish apartments, 2 bed) the average rent is around $450. From the Salary Calculator app, my take home pay is $5596 (super of 12%). So I guess that leaves us with around $3500 for everything else.

 

I'm hoping to have around GBP15K to get us started, however, we do want to have the option to buy, if we decided to settle down, so we may not want to eat into all of it.

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

[Guest263228]

While above the median and average wages/salaries, hardly lavish. Certainly enough to survive but many questions come to mind. Such as sole earner? Amount prepared to pay to rent? Security of position? What is deemed appropriate lifestyle? And so on. On the face of it enough to get by certainly.

[Keith and Linda]

Is that $101K base salary or total package?

[Collie]

Yes, is that base salary or does it include super (manadatory 9.5% for pension).

$101k base salary is about $6,100pm after tax, medicare levy.  If it's package, it's about $92k base salary which is about $5,700 after tax.

Brisbane will be a bit cheaper than Sydney or Melbourne.  I think you could live comfortably but not extravagantly on that, you won't be saving a lot each month for a rainy day fund or holidays.  It really depends on accomodation costs.  

Your non accomodation costs should be about $3 - $3.5k per month, this allows for some leisure stuff but with a new born, don't think you'll be going out on the town every weekend.  Then it really depends on your accomodation costs.  I would have thought that you could get somewhere ok in Brisvegas for $500 pw but have a look at Domain.com.au

Will your partner go (back) to work in time?  If so, then you will have shown that you can live on 1 wage and use his/hers less childcare as saving, luxury money etc.

I track all my spending (the beancounter in me  ) so have a fair handle on my costs.  I have recently moved to Perth and spend about $5k pm, for me & my daughter (part time).  My rent is about $2k.

 

 

[bane01]

With $101K its the decent package for normal living. Accommodation will be the major cost the other all depends upon your lifestyle patterns.

[DukeNinja]

Hi guys, thanks for the overwhelming response so far. The salary was advertised as so: "Remuneration value up to $121 797 p.a., comprising salary between $99 205 - $106 750 p.a., employer contribution to superannuation (up to 12.75%) and annual leave loading (17.5%) (HP4)", which leads me to think that super is on top of that. I've been lucky enough to secure a full time permanent position as I'm on a 189, which should give us security. We're not sure whether the OH should go back to work yet, so we had assumed worst case scenario. I guess it depends on whether childcare costs are less than her going back to work salary. As Collie has pointed out, we won't be going out with a newborn. Over here we tend to go out for walks, or visit free attractions. The OH is very good with money, so she keeps me on check. What we spend money on is the occasional takeaway. We will be renting out our UK property, so may be able to get a small income from that.

Sent from my XT1635-02 using Tapatalk

[Collie]

Ok, so call it $100k cash/salary to be prudent (any more is a bonus), so about $6k pm into your hand.  Super will be on top but you can't touch it so ignore it for now (12.75% is good though).

I somehow missed your earlier post when I wrote mine so missed the details you posted so apologies for not referencing it.  Say $2k on rent, leaves you $4k for spending/saving.

I live a comfortable lifestyle on $3k-$3.5k pm (ex rent).  Now that's just me and my daughter part-time, but spending for 1 adult to 2 shouldn't vary too much, a little more for food, leisure, travel maybe and I spend a bit on child support which you won't have plus drinks are more expensive in Perth  

You should be ok and probably could save $500-$1000 per month towards a house deposit or luxuries (or a rainy day fund).

Best tip, I ever heard or could give is Pay yourself first - ie set an amount to go to a separate savings acoount direct from your employer that you don't touch (except ICE).  People adjust their spending to what they have available..

Eg. Say you are getting $6k pm, have your employer pay $500/$1,000 to a high interest savings account (ING Direct is probably best in market at the monet at 3% including bonus interest) and $5,500/$5,000 to your everyday tranx account to live off. 

With your lump sum, you should be able to have a nice lifestyle and continue saving towards a property deposit.  Probably no harm in renting for a year first so you get to know areas.  Also a lot of opinion that the property market in Brisbane is forecast to stablise or possible even fall a little as there is a lot of apartment supply due to hit the market in the coming months.

[harrystyles]

Sorry to interrupt your thread and I don't mean to sound rude but what do you spend $3-3.5k on per month?  

I have been trying to plan for our outgoings and have found it really hard as we are a family (2 adults 2 kids 14 &10) who have always lived within our means but still enjoyed what we feel to be a good standard of living without spending nearly as much per month.  I must say that neither of us smoke or drink and we very rarely eat out due to child food allergy once per month very maximum.  I to have been trying to ensure that we can survive on around a similar salary in Perth.  

Our UK house will be rented out and we will be arriving with approx £40k

 

[Cappuccino99]

See if you are eligible for salary packaging where you can have all kinds of items inc rent/car payments etc taken from your gross salary so you only pay tax on the remainder. Hospitals have excellent salary packaging schemes. 

[ScottieGirl]

I spent around 2K a month on living costs. $500 on insurance, car, house and health. If you  earn over a certain amount you pay extra tax if you dont but health insurance.  The threshold is around 85k from memory. Utility bills and rates came to about $300 a month. The rest was food shopping, alcohol, petrol and other bills such as the dentist and vet. At least $100 a month for flea, tick and worm treatments none of which are required here. That was for a 1 person and 2 dog household

I probably ate out twice a month.  Rarely had take aways. I also spent about a $100  a month on hobbies.  For me choir membership but you need to factor in sports club and gym fees if that is your bag. I suspect kids  school activities also need to be budgeted for but parents can better comment.

Edited May 17, 2017 by ScottieGirl

[Skani]

12 hours ago, ScottieGirl said:

 If you  earn over a certain amount you pay extra tax if you dont but health insurance.  The threshold is around 85k from memory.

The threshold for the Medicare Levy Surcharge is $90k for singles and $180k for families if you don't have private hospital insurance.

[Collie]

21 hours ago, harrystyles said:

Sorry to interrupt your thread and I don't mean to sound rude but what do you spend $3-3.5k on per month?  

I have been trying to plan for our outgoings and have found it really hard as we are a family (2 adults 2 kids 14 &10) who have always lived within our means but still enjoyed what we feel to be a good standard of living without spending nearly as much per month.  I must say that neither of us smoke or drink and we very rarely eat out due to child food allergy once per month very maximum.  I to have been trying to ensure that we can survive on around a similar salary in Perth.  

Our UK house will be rented out and we will be arriving with approx £40k

 

Sure,

This tax year (excluding large 1 offs) is roughly

Car expense c$500 - Rego, insurance, fuel, repairs (may be artificially high as I had a few repairs and changed car so 2 lots of rego)

Utiliities & bills c.$330 (includes professional fees of c. $1300, say $100 pm)

Groceries/Household Stuff c$800 (probably a little high as I moved house, includes lunches, coffees etc)

Health Insurance $215

Leisure $1,000 (meals out, drinks, gigs, leisure activities)

Pnone & Web $150

Travel (public transport & ubers) $80

I could probably trim $500 pm if I really had to and it's been a bit lower since I moved to Perth as I'm not out as much for drinls/dinner/gigs etc.

 

 

 

[harrystyles]

On 18/05/2017 at 09:32, Collie said:

Sure,

This tax year (excluding large 1 offs) is roughly

Car expense c$500 - Rego, insurance, fuel, repairs (may be artificially high as I had a few repairs and changed car so 2 lots of rego)

Utiliities & bills c.$330 (includes professional fees of c. $1300, say $100 pm)

Groceries/Household Stuff c$800 (probably a little high as I moved house, includes lunches, coffees etc)

Health Insurance $215

Leisure $1,000 (meals out, drinks, gigs, leisure activities)

Pnone & Web $150

Travel (public transport & ubers) $80

I could probably trim $500 pm if I really had to and it's been a bit lower since I moved to Perth as I'm not out as much for drinls/dinner/gigs etc.

 

 

 

Thank you.

With 2 children in tow our meals out, gigs and leisure activities are pretty minimal.  My 2 are at the stage where a BBQ or a picnic at a different park every week is what they enjoy.  Totally forgot about health Ins thanks for reminding me on that one