Cost of Living???

[Guest Viksta]

I was wondering if people would mind commenting on this thread for me!! all I keep reading on here is how much things in oz have gone up and that its loads more expensive there now than it was!! Was reading that $90k and living on beans thread and it made me slightly worried!! Are people saying its loads more expensive in Oz than in England/Britain or is it just they've noticed things rise since they've been out there. Everything over here has gone up by ridiculous amounts in the last 2 years over here, so is it just what you are used too?

Food shopping is ridiculous over here, especially since the VAT went up to 20% and obviously petrol is crazy, we pay £1.36/7 per litre at the mo so just wondering if people would mention the cost of some basic things!!

Family of Four weekly shop?

Loaf of bread?

Pint of milk?

Pint of beer?

Bottle of wine?

Baby formula???

Not expecting loads and loads of things or even the big things, but just wondering as it seems to be being talked about a lot lately!!

Thanks everyone!!

[Guest purplerdt77]

Hi If you go on to Coles and Woolworths website and put in an adelaide postcode ie 5000 you can do a pretend on-line shop like you would with adsa tesco here

[Guest Viksta]

thanks for that!! will have a look!!

[Guest rachb1]

Hi

 

I was having a mini panic the other day........started to worry my husband! It is just I know where I stand here, yes it is crap and expensive and we are never going to be living in some million pound pad, but is the grass greener or at least a better shade? Then I think........I am sick and tired us working every single hour of the day to have an ok life. I really do want to go to oz, and have fought tooth and nail for nearly 5 years now, however I looked at that article and had thoughts....... But how is that person really living, what is their mortgage etc, I justified to myself.

 

It seems that there are alot of people who no disrespect to anyone come from a terrace 2 bed house in xville, (not really a place just giving an example before anyone says!!!!), work hard but barely get by here and want a 4 bed detatched house with a pool in 1000m2+, complete with guest annex, and not have to put that many hours in. Oh and maybe the return flights back to the uk every year. A mortgage for that would be big.....and therefore you would need to earn some good $$$$ for that, and could they afford to go to oz every year from the uk? So going back to the uk is no different!!!! I knew of someone like that and they did not last in oz to say the least. However I feel their outlook was totally wrong!!

 

I have always said that if we did the same hours, but have the weekends and a better standard of living and the weather, then we are alot better off than we are here. Live by your means and not beyond them. I have a friend who I have known from school who now lives in Sydney (so that is expensive compared to SA!!). I have been through what she pays for elect, petrol, food etc and it is lower than what I pay here. There maybe the odd thing more expensive......eg beans!!!! However there seems to be the farmers markets which are very popular and the more 'local' shops, that have all gone here because of the big boys, but there seem popular.

 

I for one feel that it is in the longrun a better option, and the prospects are better in oz. Sorry to go on but I am only going from my own experiences and would like to share them!

 

When we went wine was def cheaper. HIck...... That was WA though, I imagine SA esp would be cheaper as that is where most of it is from. Wolf Blast here is nearly £12 a bottle!!!!!!!! Beer and cider was expensive, but buy the wine instead, unless that has now changed!! I imagine some things will counter others, but overall with the projections for the UK and what lies ahead, oz is def cheaper to live. My family is also a family of 4. I was amazed when we did go shopping in oz how much cheaper it was, as at the time my daughter was 18months old so still needed some of the baby things. Meat was def a better deal....here I don't buy lamb chops anymore as they are expensive, in oz they were alot better price!

 

It has to be better than here!!!!!! I know this won't help but at least you know there are others thinking the same! :-D

[Guest Guest5035]

I was wondering if people would mind commenting on this thread for me!! all I keep reading on here is how much things in oz have gone up and that its loads more expensive there now than it was!! Was reading that $90k and living on beans thread and it made me slightly worried!! Are people saying its loads more expensive in Oz than in England/Britain or is it just they've noticed things rise since they've been out there. Everything over here has gone up by ridiculous amounts in the last 2 years over here, so is it just what you are used too?

Food shopping is ridiculous over here, especially since the VAT went up to 20% and obviously petrol is crazy, we pay £1.36/7 per litre at the mo so just wondering if people would mention the cost of some basic things!!

Family of Four weekly shop?

Loaf of bread?

Pint of milk?

Pint of beer?

Bottle of wine?

Baby formula???

Not expecting loads and loads of things or even the big things, but just wondering as it seems to be being talked about a lot lately!!

Thanks everyone!!

 

 

here's my reply in red

Loaf of bread? $2 on special

Pint of milk? $1litre

Pint of beer? $5 Australian Pint

Bottle of wine? $7+ or $12 a 4litre cask

Baby formula??? don't know been 18 years!!

Petrol this morning $1.35 a litre

family 4 shop, 4 adults 18+ $275

baked Beans $1 a tin

Stevo

[Guest Squareman]

Cost of living is high but everyone seems to manage. Not too many people begging in the streets and the pubs are full most of the time lol

[Guest Guest5035]

and the pubs are full most of the time lol

and so are the takeaways and the restaraunts.

 

Stevo

[tinkertailerdog]

To be honest it's all relative - if you earn more then it's gonna be more affordable - like anywhere you live i guess. I find i work longer hours but that's because i want to cause i enjoy my work (when you work on the 27th floor of the tallest building in Adelaide and your outlook is the hills on one side and the coast on the other it certainly helps!). Rent in the immediate surrounding burbs are certainly more expensive than those a little further out - like anywhere. Food? Perhaps slightly more expensive for some things, but cheaper for others. We find fruit and veg lasts so much longer cause it hasn't had the airmiles/shipping miles like it does in the UK.

 

If someone says they can't live on $90k here then they're simply living beyond their means.

[Guest shella_n]

It is defo way more expensive. My weekly shop is about $ 250 but many people manage to do it on A LOT less by shopping around, going to markets etc. I dont gave time for that so get all my stuff in the one place. It was tough to get used to but now it's just normal and I don't convert into £ which helps.

 

Prices have gone up slightly in the year that we have been here by about 10% Id say on some things.

 

The thing I can't really get used to is cost and quality of clothes and shoes. I do try and buy from uk on internet - much cheaper even though u have to pay postage.

[Anne B]

I was amazed when we did go shopping in oz how much cheaper it was

 

When were you last in Australia Rachel? What exchange rate were you using then for comparison? When the pound was strong it made Oz seem cheaper, but I don't think it is any longer.

 

Food prices are going up all round the world, so if they have gone up a lot in the UK then it is the same here, although without the VAT hike (there's no VAT on food but I suppose supply chain costs have risen). Some things are cheaper here, like meat, petrol, wine, fruit and veg in season, but some things are more expensive, especially things like biscuits, cakes, bread, fruit and veg out of season, sweets and chocolate. Coles is definately getting better these days, apparently they have hired some ex-Tesco guru and the influence is noticeable - 3 pizzas for $10, bags of 4 leaf salad for $2, $2 for 2 litres milk (but that is controversial).

 

Don't come over expecting life to be easier, but don't let the high cost of living put you off. For people coming over now I would be more worried about getting a job!

[Pesty650]

On the whole I find grocery prices similar to the UK. Some things dearer, some cheaper. In terms of quality, you get what you pay for. The farmers markets seem to increase the price by cutting out the middle man! I don't find the fruit & veg here any better or worse than the UK and was quite disappointed with central markets. No better than UK markets and probably less choice of produce. I was expecting something like the French & Spanish markets which really are fresh. As for food air miles, much is grown in Queensland - no different than the UK importing from Spain, Italy etc. You can of course by locally grown in season produce, but you can do that anywhere.

Bringing over Tesco gurus from the UK will not be a good thing. Tesco have been instrumental in destroying British farming and I wouldn't like to see that happen here. The $1/ltr milk thing here is just a loss leader, aimed at getting you in to spend money on other overpriced goods.

You buy what you can afford, and what you consider reasonable value for money - $13/Kg for bananas, I could afford that, but I'm not that desperate for bananas.

Wine is a strange one, not as cheap as I had hoped. Much the same as I paid in Sainsburys for a bottle of Oz plonk. Wines from outside Australia are more expensive & there is much less choice than the UK. Aussie beer is not that great, it has to be really cold as it tastes awful & a pint is not a pint down the pub.

Petrol is cheaper here, but if you drive around in a 4ltr Commodore you won't see the saving so buy a sensible car & as a bonus you won't look like a bogan.

Clothes are expensive for what you get, books are extortionate and are best bought online from Amazon, and CD's and DVD's are usually dearer here too so Amazon again.

It takes a while to find where to buy things from to get the best price and quality and once you stop converting things into £ and look at it as a percentage of your Australian dollar income it will make more sense.

[Diane]

On the whole I find grocery prices similar to the UK. Some things dearer, some cheaper. In terms of quality, you get what you pay for. The farmers markets seem to increase the price by cutting out the middle man! I don't find the fruit & veg here any better or worse than the UK and was quite disappointed with central markets. No better than UK markets and probably less choice of produce. I was expecting something like the French & Spanish markets which really are fresh. As for food air miles, much is grown in Queensland - no different than the UK importing from Spain, Italy etc. You can of course by locally grown in season produce, but you can do that anywhere.

Bringing over Tesco gurus from the UK will not be a good thing. Tesco have been instrumental in destroying British farming and I wouldn't like to see that happen here. The $1/ltr milk thing here is just a loss leader, aimed at getting you in to spend money on other overpriced goods.

You buy what you can afford, and what you consider reasonable value for money - $13/Kg for bananas, I could afford that, but I'm not that desperate for bananas.

Wine is a strange one, not as cheap as I had hoped. Much the same as I paid in Sainsburys for a bottle of Oz plonk. Wines from outside Australia are more expensive & there is much less choice than the UK. Aussie beer is not that great, it has to be really cold as it tastes awful & a pint is not a pint down the pub.

Petrol is cheaper here, but if you drive around in a 4ltr Commodore you won't see the saving so buy a sensible car & as a bonus you won't look like a bogan.

Clothes are expensive for what you get, books are extortionate and are best bought online from Amazon, and CD's and DVD's are usually dearer here too so Amazon again.

It takes a while to find where to buy things from to get the best price and quality and once you stop converting things into £ and look at it as a percentage of your Australian dollar income it will make more sense.

 

Central Market takes a while to get to know - if you go there regularly you get to know the best stalls to go to for the cheapest and best stuff. There are definitely a couple that I wouldn't ever buy from!

 

Wine - same thing - I rarely buy from bottle shops now, get a lot of stuff through GetWinesDirect which has some really good offers, or buy cleanskins: again a matter of getting to know your regions well and shopping intelligently.

 

Books - apart from stuff for my new Kindle - I rarely use Amazon: http://www.thebookdepository.co.uk is much better value when you take the free postage into account.

 

Clothes are only expensive if you want to wear classy stuff, but let's be honest, you'd stick out like a sore thumb here if you did that, and personally I quite like the freedom of not having to worry about the labels on either my or my kids' clothes - and Op Shops are great!

 

As for beer - OH is running his own little micro-brewery now so can brew exactly what he wants and again, we rarely buy stuff from the bottlos!

[Guest Adelaide_bound]

Having done online shops with Coles for many weeks now, for us shopping will be far far cheaper (apart from this week - a weeks shopping for £3.50 from Tesco but then that was only two bags (we are running down the freezer) and we paid with our saved up vouchers, so not a realistic shop imho) - we probably will not be using the supermarket, so hopefully our weekly shopping will be even less than its coming out at online - but I think this is beacuse of what we buy/eat/use compared to other people, as loads of other people go on and on about how expensive food is over there, but we are finding it ultra cheap tbh for us. For eg, we don't drink - perhaps we drink a bottle of wine every other month when we are entertaining, or if we go out for dinner with others, so booze isn't a consideration at all for us.

 

Bills seem to be a winner for us as well - we are planning on renting, I don't know if we will ever own a place or not, thats way way down the line if we will, and whilst the actual rental cost will be higher a) we have had rent that high before on the same wage (we used to live in London, but as I taught outside London and was a lower pay scale point I was earning the same as I am now) so are used to high rent cost and b) all our other costs look like they will be lower as we won't be paying council tax or water charge, after we have factored in what I have calculated will be 'average' costs based on our family size etc using other people's figures on various websites.

 

Add on top of that my wages (if I do stay in teaching) will rise by quite a lot (I'm on £29K here, I will be on $65K there) and OH will also get a job (he currently doesn't earn anything), so that should be at least $30K (before tax obviously) as well, all in all we will be better off. Even worse case scenario we both get jobs in a supermarket, we should be on $60K before tax together, which is way more that we have been on here, in on the ground terms (not just £ vs $ terms) so should be enough to get by on.

 

The real deal breaker for us, all things considered (we don't have family/friends etc like most people do, we don't love or even like the UK, I have SAD etc etc) we would rather be somewhere where I am less ill and the sun shines more, in the same position, than somewhere it is raining all the time and we feel like life is passing us by.

 

Money is not the be all and end all of life, and if you really want something, you will do what it takes to get the money to do that - even if it means working two jobs or up-skilling yourself to be in a better earning job or whatever. Different people will get a happy heart in different ways. For us, that will be Australia (as long as there aren't too many Huntsmen in the house that is lol). For others it may well be in the UK and just need something to point that out to them, however imho those people know in their heart anyway, deep down, which is why they return to the UK - for us there is just no option of return in any way, sense or circumstance (parents have even said if something happens to them not to bother coming back for it - we are planning on getting insurance though for that just in case). It's a very personal thing imho and only one you will know if you are being completely honest with yourself and your family.

[Guest pixie7]

Thanks for all this useful info.- great help.

Viks you read my mind! I was saying to OH last night when we were talking about Oz again(!) that I would put on a post about cost of living etc- as I want to be realistic in what rentals we can afford etc.

Anyway off to Coles online!

Thanks again everyone

[Guest pixie7]

Hi guys- I know it would be hard and varies massively but what about utilities? Gas/elec, telly etc I believe you dont pay water usually when renting, but what do people generally pay for 2 bedroom apartment/ 3 bedroom house etc? Any generaisation would help- thanks

[Guest Adelaide_bound]

Hi guys- I know it would be hard and varies massively but what about utilities? Gas/elec, telly etc I believe you dont pay water usually when renting, but what do people generally pay for 2 bedroom apartment/ 3 bedroom house etc? Any generaisation would help- thanks

 

You don't pay the standing charge generally, but sometimes pay the actual water usage charges (although sometimes the landlord pays this if they want you to water the garden or something) - bank on paying water usage, but not standing charges and then if you don't have to you have more money than you thought - yeah!

 

I'll fish out my spreadsheet for you and update this with what I've researched, but thought the water comment might be useful for you now

[Guest moonraker1959]

Check out the rentals on realestate.com.au,you'll get a good idea of whats going.As someone else said its all relative.Before I returned to the UK,I lived in the country(Sth Aust)and knew well off people and poor people.Some people were clocked up to the hilt in debt others like myself tended to live a more simpler life.Yes we had a good life,but I do here as well,no different.Some people think Australia is paradise,some people hate it,and me?Well I love both countries.Both countries have things I like and dislike,nowhere is perfect.So for me Australia is'nt better,its just different.Live within your means.

[Guest Viksta]

here's my reply in red

Loaf of bread? $2 on special

Pint of milk? $1litre

Pint of beer? $5 Australian Pint

Bottle of wine? $7+ or $12 a 4litre cask

Baby formula??? don't know been 18 years!!

Petrol this morning $1.35 a litre

family 4 shop, 4 adults 18+ $275

baked Beans $1 a tin

 

 

Stevo

 

Thanks for this one!!!

[Guest Viksta]

It is defo way more expensive. My weekly shop is about $ 250 but many people manage to do it on A LOT less by shopping around, going to markets etc. I dont gave time for that so get all my stuff in the one place. It was tough to get used to but now it's just normal and I don't convert into £ which helps.

 

Prices have gone up slightly in the year that we have been here by about 10% Id say on some things.

 

The thing I can't really get used to is cost and quality of clothes and shoes. I do try and buy from uk on internet - much cheaper even though u have to pay postage.

 

Thanks for that! To be honest our weekly shop isn't far off that anyway, so not that much more expensive!

[Guest Viksta]

Thanks for all this useful info.- great help.

Viks you read my mind! I was saying to OH last night when we were talking about Oz again(!) that I would put on a post about cost of living etc- as I want to be realistic in what rentals we can afford etc.

Anyway off to Coles online!

Thanks again everyone

 

haha, its that parrallel life again!!! how are things going with you have you booked your medical yet? are you on the facebook page? glad it was helpful for you too, I had a quick look at the coles website last night but found it a bit long winded as i kept going to a converter and exchanging it!!!

keep us posted on things x

[Guest Viksta]

Thanks everyone for all your helpful hints and tips!! i was hoping for these answers as it all seems to be common sense to be honest!!

think it seems to be swings and roundabouts on lots of things!!!

cheers again everyone!

[Anne B]

Well, we haven't been imagining that groceries have been getting more expensive.....

 

Grocery prices jump 16pc in two years

 

FAMILIES are paying $1300 a year more than two years ago for the same groceries - and it's about to get a lot worse.

 

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/money/money-matters/average-household-food-bill-nears-200-as-food-inflation-tipped-to-surge-as-high-as-5pc/story-e6frfmd9-1226082508075#ixzz1QTBW2Yvw

[sueoc]

Well, we haven't been imagining that groceries have been getting more expensive.....

 

Grocery prices jump 16pc in two years

 

FAMILIES are paying $1300 a year more than two years ago for the same groceries - and it's about to get a lot worse.

 

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/money/money-matters/average-household-food-bill-nears-200-as-food-inflation-tipped-to-surge-as-high-as-5pc/story-e6frfmd9-1226082508075#ixzz1QTBW2Yvw

Yep,i,ve noticed this also,prices in Coles and Woolies are creeping up noticeably month by month(and the Choccy Bars are getting lighter and lighter but the price stays the same!:goofy:I think we are not supposed to notice!

[Guest Adelaide_bound]

Yes, but prices are rising in every country around the globe - so the prices would be higher whether you were in the UK or Australia - in the UK there's the VAT increase as well as just the rise in costs of things (which may or may not be the same cost overall as just the rise of prices in Australia) - things rise everywhere, that's inflation for you (shame it doesn't do anything for money in a bank in the UK)

 

It would be nice if nothing ever got more expensive, but then there would be no fun in ribbing grandparents about how things cost ha'penny, or a grote...

[Guest pixie7]

haha, its that parrallel life again!!! how are things going with you have you booked your medical yet? are you on the facebook page? glad it was helpful for you too, I had a quick look at the coles website last night but found it a bit long winded as i kept going to a converter and exchanging it!!!

keep us posted on things x

 

 

We have been in touch with Manchester panel doc and will be booking on Friday- so expensive, I think it will be about £570 for the 2 of us!

 

Im not on the facebook page- yet- would love to join you, whats it called?

 

Yeah i had a look at Coles too- I prices a few things but really nothing seemed mega expensive compared to here- swings and roundabouts i think as someone on here said!

Keep us updated on everything x