N.ireland V Ireland As A Place To Live

dj9928

I live in Co,derry much to my disliking we are still under Tony Blair, I can't help but think you guys below the border are so much better of than us up north, The vast majority of us up here are on or are slightly above the min wage at £5.15 per hour for 22+, we can't get anymore due to poles etc pricing us out of the market, we can't afford houses as the average 3 bed semi is now at £130k, we can;t afford to put petrol in our cars as thats at 95p per litre, and they talk about rip off Ireland, Not to mentions benefits being amongest the lowest in europe roughly £45 per week for a single person on JSA. Move across the border, Not to mention car insurance, the highest in the UK dispiye having the lowest level of crime in the UK.

They say there is now no middle class in Northern ireland, just upper and lower

Sand

130K sterling for a three bed house? Might just about cover a 2 bed lean-to in West Meath, a mere 4 hour commute through Dublin traffic.

dj9928

Sand wrote:

130K sterling for a three bed house? Might just about cover a 2 bed lean-to in West Meath, a mere 4 hour commute through Dublin traffic.

I don't know what min wage is in Ireland but i bet its more than £5.15, So £130k is alot, only teachers doctors etc will get a mortgage for that

Dave!

We have the same complaints down here buddy!

lodgepole

Based on xe.com's current rates, our minimum wage is almost exactly the same as yours.

£5.15 is €7.64520.

That said, if a lot of people are earning that amount I imagine getting a mortgage is very hard. I'm on well above our minimum wage and I won't be getting a mortgage anytime soon.

KdjaCL

Least you have a decent football team to watch.

kdjac

pred racer

I visit Derry quite a bit and I love it, but I think Id rather live in the south.
As a southern prod I get abuse (mostly good natured) from all bloody sides:D

dj9928

Lodgepole wrote:

Based on xe.com's current rates, our minimum wage is almost exactly the same as yours.

£5.15 is €7.64520.

That said, if a lot of people are earning that amount I imagine getting a mortgage is very hard. I'm on well above our minimum wage and I won't be getting a mortgage anytime soon.

Hmm i thought u guys were better of, obviously not, i do know u have higher rates of benefits

dj9928

pred racer wrote:

I visit Derry quite a bit and I love it, but I think Id rather live in the south.
As a southern prod I get abuse (mostly good natured) from all bloody sides:D

l'm actually from Liverpool, Moved over here 10 years ago, think I should of stayed over there

KdjaCL

dj9928 wrote:

Hmm i thought u guys were better of, obviously not, i do know u have higher rates of benefits

How many homeless in the north ?

kdjac

dj9928

KdjaCL wrote:

How many homeless in the north ?

kdjac

Don;t have a clue

darkman2

The problem with the North is that the economy relies on the public sector. Your basically paying your own wages!!

smashey

I went to the Doctor yesterday and was charged €40 for the pleasure followed by another €11.50 for tablets. I'm moving to Strabane soon and will get free medical. I will also be able to buy a new car a lot cheaper than I can now.

Snowbie

KdjaCL wrote:

Least you have a decent football team to watch.

kdjac

Anybody who beats the brits and spanish are friends of mine.NI cough

Snowbie

dj9928 wrote:

l'm actually from Liverpool, Moved over here 10 years ago, think I should of stayed over there

I say you have a very funny accent now.

You're way better off in the North. You might think it's expensive but it's nothing compared to most of the South. 130,000 for a 3 bed semi is much cheaper than most places in Ireland, and almost all of England. I lived in a 3 bed house near Liverpool as a child and that house is now worth about 400,000 sterling. I find food and clothes significantly cheaper in the North. I'm not saying NI is a cheap place to live but the Republic is even more of a rip off.

Padwick

I've just moved from the south up to Tyrone after being practically living there for the past 6 months anyway and I find it so much better.
My wages are the same and I've gonr from paying €275p/m to share a house in Dublin to paying £400p/m to rent my own and I'm still better off.
The biggest difference is that the government in NI look after people in need of help so much better. Not that I'm looking myself but I see it with people I know. Groceries, mobile phone costs, and general entertainment would be the biggest differences I'd see. There's a huge leap in prices down south.

pred racer

dj9928 wrote:

I live in Co,derry much to my disliking we are still under Tony Blair, I can't help but think you guys below the border are so much better of than us up north, The vast majority of us up here are on or are slightly above the min wage at £5.15 per hour for 22+, we can't get anymore due to poles etc pricing us out of the market, we can't afford houses as the average 3 bed semi is now at £130k, we can;t afford to put petrol in our cars as thats at 95p per litre, and they talk about rip off Ireland, Not to mentions benefits being amongest the lowest in europe roughly £45 per week for a single person on JSA. Move across the border, Not to mention car insurance, the highest in the UK dispiye having the lowest level of crime in the UK.

They say there is now no middle class in Northern ireland, just upper and lower

Why dont you move down and see how you get on?

shane86

dj9928 wrote:

l'm actually from Liverpool, Moved over here 10 years ago, think I should of stayed over there

Feckin Poles/Scousers/whatever tAking our jobs/benefits/women.

In fairness, move back to Liverpool. The upside of Engand is you can buy a gaff in whats considereda a bad area for an affordable price.

Gaffs in the roughest most notorious estates in Blanch dont go for under 220,000. Its affordable if yiv a fairly good job, but only just. **** Bertie

Black Swan

When it comes up in discussions, the general image of NI in So Cal is that it's unsafe. They still think of The Troubles.

uberpixie

shane86 wrote:

Feckin Poles/Scousers/whatever tAking our jobs/benefits/women.

In fairness, move back to Liverpool. The upside of Engand is you can buy a gaff in whats considereda a bad area for an affordable price.

Gaffs in the roughest most notorious estates in Blanch dont go for under 220,000. Its affordable if yiv a fairly good job, but only just. **** Bertie

Move to Limerick, you can get a house in Moyross for €30,000 last I heard :-)

luckat

Not all about money, eh.

faceman

As beautiful some parts of NI are i wouldnt live there. Cost of living is cheap but salaries are low too. I had 2 mates who married northern girls and laughed at us "paddies" paying out on high mortgages.

one of those friends has been unemployed a few times due to poor construction industry opportunities. The other mate is a knob but thats not anyone from NI's fault i guess! lol

dj9928

Pay up here is awful, the lowest in the UK, apparantly we earn on average £100 per week less than our English counterparts and food etc is more expensive here than in England, infact houses are the only thing that is cheaper here than the rest of the UK

Catney

Sand wrote:

130K sterling for a three bed house? Might just about cover a 2 bed lean-to in West Meath, a mere 4 hour commute through Dublin traffic.

Wrong way to look at this. Firstly wages in the north are about a third less than in the republic. Secondly their interest rates are currently running at 1.75% above ours. This would reduce their ability to borrow the equivalent of about GBP 40,000. ie we can borrow EUR 60,000 more and actually have the same mortgage payment. Mix these 2 facts together and basically they have it harder up there. Relatively speaking houses are less affordable.

By the way NI house prices were one of the highest risers on the planet this year, double the growth of the republic. Which always makes me laugh considering everytime I talk to a Ni person they say how crazy we free staters are paying so much for houses.

Catney

Lodgepole wrote:

Based on xe.com's current rates, our minimum wage is almost exactly the same as yours.

£5.15 is €7.64520.

That said, if a lot of people are earning that amount I imagine getting a mortgage is very hard. I'm on well above our minimum wage and I won't be getting a mortgage anytime soon.

I dont think this is right, our min wage is EUR 10.50, could be wrong though

Catney

Catney wrote:

I dont think this is right, our min wage is EUR 10.50, could be wrong though

dammit i am wrong!!! anyway GDP is a better measure. We earn about 50% more

LundiMardi

dj9928 wrote:

Not to mention car insurance, the highest in the UK dispiye having the lowest level of crime in the UK.

Oh, i'd love to hear some car insurance quotes... I really would.

dj9928

So we can rap this up by saying its rip of Northern Ireland rather than rip off Ireland

dj9928

LundiMardi wrote:

Oh, i'd love to hear some car insurance quotes... I really would.

Its because of the troubles in the past, Look at the UK adverts on TV for car insurance, at the bottom it always says (Not available in northern ireland)

dj9928

Catney wrote:

dammit i am wrong!!! anyway GDP is a better measure. We earn about 50% more

A rough stab would say Ireland is on par with mainland UK in terms of wages and costs of living

philologos

faceman wrote:

As beautiful some parts of NI are i wouldnt live there. Cost of living is cheap but salaries are low too. I had 2 mates who married northern girls and laughed at us "paddies" paying out on high mortgages.

one of those friends has been unemployed a few times due to poor construction industry opportunities. The other mate is a knob but thats not anyone from NI's fault i guess! lol

then live on border and go shopping or whatnot in the North. Like Lifford and Strabane, or Dundalk and Newry

lodgepole

Catney wrote:

I dont think this is right, our min wage is EUR 10.50, could be wrong though

Been a while since I was on the miniumum wage, but as far as I know it's €7.65. I took a quick peek at oasis.gov.ie to get that figure too, so unless it's been changed recently. Certainly I know people earning less than 10.50.

Sangre

Get a job thats not minimum wage?

Zillah

There's also the fact that you're still just the bitch of a foreign empire.

Oh yes. I went there.

Mmmm, sovereignty...

Capt'n Midnight

In Derry you can nip across the border to get cheap petrol. You could even commute to a job in the south, or visa versa.
But down here you would need to budget for health cover and education and other services that provided up north but aren't down here or only after a very long time.

if you pass your test up north you are a restricted driver for a year, but you only have to wait six weeks to do the test. down here it the best part of a year and half fail ..

1huge1

uberpixie wrote:

Move to Limerick, you can get a house in Moyross for €30,000 last I heard :-)

it was 70,000 and no one would want to live there
its giving us limerick people a bad reputation which is so unfair
i hate all those media people who dont have a clue what there talking about
bringing the whole cuty down with moyross
and i thought this stab city crap was over

i know you wernt going on about it but i just thought id say it

1huge1

would you still condsider it foreign? like the UK are all one no one in it is foreign to each other
maybe thats just my view

il gatto

Catney wrote:

I dont think this is right, our min wage is EUR 10.50, could be wrong though

€7.65 last I heard. Maybe €10.50 is minimum for the civil service. It'd be typical if it was. Overpaying civil servants, of whom there's too many, has helped artifically inflat our average industrial wage to €30,000. There's too many jobs which pay minimum wage in Ireland. It was concieved to stop fast food employees and casual students from being ripped off. What's happened is that it's been paided (or a little above it) to full time employees who need to pay bills and mortgages. Because it's so common to pay €8-€9, it's hard to escape. That's why many people work so much overtime and highly unsocialble hours. They can't survive otherwise. It affects family life and social life. Minimum wage was supposed to be just that. Not a guideline for employers to see if they can get staff to work for as little as legally possible.
With regards to the North, food's cheaper, cars are cheaper (no VRT) and healthcare is cheaper. That's a good place to start.

greenkittie

I moved from Belfast to Dublin a few months ago and so far I'm finding it alot more expensive to live here. I'm getting paid more than my northern contemporaries and yet they still end up better off just by general all round savings. Always have to stock up on alcohol every time i go home!

cujimmy

dj9928 wrote:

Pay up here is awful, the lowest in the UK, apparantly we earn on average £100 per week less than our English counterparts and food etc is more expensive here than in England, infact houses are the only thing that is cheaper here than the rest of the UK

But you folk in the north dont pay council tax, everybody else in the UK does

Naked Lepper

Apart from the financial aspect of things, would you really want to live in N.I?

I know for sure that I definetly would not!

fireblade1

min wage is 8.08 euros i know cos im on it unfort!
and i seriously doubt im getting more than it considering who i work for!

dlofnep

Average price of a house here is about 250k. I'm not going to spend one cent in Ireland on anything long term. I'm outta here after college. I can't afford a house for 250k, especially when there aren't the jobs here for what I need to do to make that kind of money to pay for it.

Either I marry a rich man's daughter or I get realistic. My parents bought their house for 20k 24 years ago. It's now 12 times that.. Inflation isn't enough to justify that. You think you have it bad up north, it's even worse here.

Students can't afford car insurance, end up living on diets of beans on toast. It's no fairytale.