Stories from the Celtic Tiger Years *Mod Warning in OP PLEASE READ*

chops018

Does anyone have any good (or bad) stories from the Celtic Tiger years?

You always hear phrases about how people partied etc., was there just a constant flow of credit available to people and people actually taking the money e.g. was there actually teachers on circa €30k a year buying a house and car and an apartment somewhere.

I was in school and college during these years, graduated into the recession, so I didn't really see what was fully going on at the time bar the fact everyone was working and had money. My dad was working on the buildings on great money and my mam was working away also, we were never stuck really money-wise, also rent seemed to be a lot cheaper back then and fuel and also my college fees were only around €800 a year along with wages being fairly similar to what they are now (from what I can remember anyway, will stand corrected if I am wrong)


Mod warning: Any further discussion of Financial institutions in depth will result in a thread ban. Do not derail this thread with that form of discussion.

Threadbanned users:
Randy Archer
ShatterAlan

L1011

I was offered a 100% mortgage on a house in Kilbeggan when I was on 31k. Its affordability was based on assuming I'd rent rooms out to the rent-a-room max amount.

My parents talked me out of it.

Sky King

I did my leaving in early naughties - a load of my friends were working on the buildings from the late 90s all the way through the 'tiger'.

My abiding memory is them earning huge money and spending thousands of euro a month on drinking and boy racer cars.

Can I have 6 double vodka red bulls barman. Here's a hundred quid. Keep the change.

double jobbing

If anything people seem to be more freely spending now than they were then. You didn't see 17 year olds going around in 2006 in 600 euro jackets like you do now with Canada Goose now (albeit plenty of these are knock offs). It was pretty unheard of for working class people to wear the likes of Ralph Lauren, Lacoste, Hugo Boss etc on a night out like they do now (myself included).

For all the free credit the vast majority of people didn't even have a credit card back then. The few people who did spent half their lives booking Ryanair flights for their friends who didn't have them.

I'd say the biggest difference is people went out drinking more. Town on a Thursday or a Sunday night would be quite busy, it's dead these days.

Old cars disappeared off the streets almost overnight when the scrappage bonus came around 2000. Up to 2009 you essentially never saw a car older than 2000 yet today half the cars on the road seem to be 15 years plus old.

Aside from that I think pre Covid most people seem to have more disposable income than they did back in the mid 2000's. A pint in town has went up by what, 1.20, but the minimum wage must have climbed about 3 quid per hour in that time, so younger people are definitely better off.

But looking back to my school days I can only recall one family that seemed to go from average to ridiculously well off over night (few holidays a year, new car every 18 months etc).

Plenty of brickies made a fortune but sure plenty of them were too fond of the sniff and a gamble for it to matter.

antimatterx

My family did well out of it in hindsight. My parents were able to build up a portfolio of about 5 properties on 1 normal income. They sold one just before the crash, and looking to sell another one at the moment, but my dad is smart and didn't over extend himself. Me and my brothers wanted for nothing.

My uncle lost a couple of million attempting to become a big shot developer. He had 10 rental properties, and his house was worth 1m+. He put a couple of hundred thousand in Anglo thinking it was easy money. That wasn't enough for him and he lost nearly everything.

eviltwin

I had a great time. I was working for a company that loved to spend money. Our Christmas parties were in Marbella and Dubai. We got paid a lot and I was at an age where I could enjoy it. Even after buying a house and the day to day expense we seemed to have lots of disposable income. It all seems a bit surreal now tbh.

Lots of stories of 'characters' becoming property developers, investing in property or starting recruitment companies.

Montage of Feck

We've drank the "easy" credit Kool-Aid and there no going back now! We are just as worse now.

antimatterx

I hope I get to experience a boom (maybe post COVID?). I'm 24 now, so I was a kid during the tiger.

branie2

We built our house extension during the period, in 1996

FixitFelix

Yep lived it up earning good money working construction sites, changed my car I think 6 times in 18 months for newer and shinier, work Xmas parties all paid for hotel room drink 4 course dinners, presents and taxi home next day. Plenty of foreign holidays through the year.
Spent stupid money every week on drink and the rest but enjoyed it.
Didn't get sucked into the 100% mortgage trap even though I was offered one.
Seemed everyone no matter what job they were in had money to burn

completedit

I literally did not see any of the boom. I live in a nice part of Dublin but it's like a safe middle class suburb, double glazed windows are all I remember from the boom. That's what the lads from the council houses used to slag us about. I didn't have them till 2006 and they were second hand.

Rodney Bathgate

branie2 wrote: »

We built our house extension during the period, in 1996

Does it have a pool?

Better Than Christ

When we ran out of logs, we'd burn bundles of fifty euro notes instead. Seems wasteful now, but they were different times.

branie2

Rodney Bathgate wrote: »

Does it have a pool?

Sorry, it doesn't

antimatterx

Better Than Christ wrote: »

When we ran out of logs, we'd burn bundles of fifty euro notes instead. Seems wasteful now, but they were different times.

Can that still be used as legal tender? :pac:

whisky_galore

Ghost estate stories?

double jobbing

Montage of Feck wrote: »

We've drank the "easy" credit Kool-Aid and there no going back now! We are just as worse now.

Credit is doled out just as easily now for everything bar houses. I used the AIB app a while back just to see how much repayments would be if I were to add another grand to my loan, a day later they call me up saying they noticed I was looking for a loan top up on the app and were wondering if I was still interested in following through :rolleyes:

L1011

double jobbing wrote: »

Old cars disappeared off the streets almost overnight when the scrappage bonus came around 2000. Up to 2009 you essentially never saw a car older than 2000 yet today half the cars on the road seem to be 15 years plus old.

Cars are so incredibly better built since the early 00s which is the main factor there.

In 2000, a 1985 car would be rusting to bits and failing constantly and also have basically no features at all. Plenty of 2005 cars are still going strong now and still have a decent bit of modern comforts (aircon, power steering etc).

NIMAN

The boom meant little to me, I had a property in Donegal and had considered upgrading, kinda glad I didn't.

Didn't make or lose anything.


Anyway, one thing I do remember from the time was being in Balbriggan around 06 or so in a Supervalu I think, and seeing a bottled water with a crystal or something round the neck of it for €50.

El_Duderino 09

There have been some great threads a out Celtic Tiger stories.

Some real classics like a bloke going to cinema on his own buying 3 seats so he'd have free seats beside him.

Or my favourite was a lass who said his uncle gave him €50 to mind her counsins while the uncle went to the toilet.

Some people just don't know what to do with money except spend it right now.

Sky King

IM GOING TO BUY A HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT AND USE THE RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT THAT OUT AND USE THAT RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT

Capt. Autumn

The years from 2003-2007 were surreal.
There seemed to be so much money sloshing about , huge money being made and not just by white collar workers.

This was reflected in many of the uber-swish establishments that were opening all over town. HQ on Abbey Street was table service only when it opened, seemed to make sense at the time. It was soon more of a sawdust on the floor type of venue until post the bust, it was no more.

It seemed all the ballsy guys were buying and flipping property, further inflating the bubble, but nobody cared once they had their snouts in the trough and were making easy money. Suddenly buying property off the plan in places like Poland and Bulgaria was all the go. Nobody, it seemed, stopped to ask themselves what the average wage was in these places, rather using our own vastly inflated house prices as a yardstick as to what was good value.

The day the penny really dropped for me was when my wife took a call from her bank manager when we were doing our weekly supermarket shop. 'What was it she wanted?' the moneyman intoned, 'A new car, house extension or a holiday...' He had reviewed her bank accounts and arrived at the conclusion that she was under-borrowed. I wasn't aware that such a term existed. Things were obviously barmy.

You know the last thing an engine does before it explodes? It overheats.

antimatterx

Sky King wrote: »

IM GOING TO BUY A HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT AND USE THE RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT THAT OUT AND USE THAT RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT

That worked for my dad, although it ****ed my uncle.

Trigger Happy

I had a decent job with a decent salary during those years. Sold and apartment before the crash too which set me up for buying a house post boom.
But dont remember going particularly mad apart from a first class trip to Fiji via london, Los Angeles and Auckland.

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater

Did the LC in 2003, did a couple of years in college, then worked in Centra for 2006 and so was on just over minimum wage for a year when most of my friends were coining it on building sites. Like a few previous posters, for those lads it was all weekends away, nice cars, out for pints and falling out of nightclubs 4 nights a week. I got a job in the Civil Service at the start of '07 and while it was a bit of a pay rise which I was delighted with (we're talking maybe 40 euro a week here), most of them would have laughed at what I was earning. It was literally a fraction.

2 or 3 years later and they're all saying what a lucky so and so I am in my big, permanent job.

road_high

I think there was a lot of "there must be something wrong with you" if you're not taking home 2 grand a week...
For the majority of us not in construction or conspicious type spending that's how it was/is.
If you're lucky enough to earn a decent salary now you're rode senseless with taxes anyway

I used to pay for chicken fillet rolls with fresh 50s and throw the change in the bin on the way out the door.

davo2001

First day of college in 2002/2003, rep from AIB walks up to me on campus and says I can get a loan of €10,000 if i want. Said i'd no saving and didn't have a job to pay it back.

"no problem she says"

Thank Christ i didn't take it, although i was very tempted.

Madness altogether!

NIMAN

Sky King wrote: »

IM GOING TO BUY A HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT AND USE THE RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT THAT OUT AND USE THAT RENT TO BUY ANOTHER HOUSE AND RENT IT OUT

Are you a taxi driver?

Think I heard a taxi driver on liveline many moons back who was a million in debt cos he did something like that before the crash.

Also remember a prime time or similar show on rte during the financial crisis when a single woman in the audience said she bought a property on her own and got a mortgage 13x her salary.

road_high

davo2001 wrote: »

First day of college in 2002/2003, rep from AIB walks up to me on campus and says I can get a loan of €10,000 if i want. Said i'd no saving and didn't have a job to pay it back.

"no problem she says"

Thank Christ i didn't take it, although i was very tempted.

Madness altogether!

I graduated end 2006 so tbh i kind of missed out on the whole thing work wise- the economy was on the verge of collapsing then so never saw a big benefit from the Celtic Tiger (the opposite in fact as I lost my PS FT contract in the coming years of reccession).

CrankyHaus

Neighbour bought a helicopter and had a pad in his back garden. Annoying and you never knew when it was safe to toss off in your own gaff before you'd be interrupted by the sound of rotors and worry about being seen through the bedroom window.

dirkmeister

There was a certain bank giving out €800 loans to students interest free back in 2005/6.

Crazy stuff, lads used it to get through RAG week.

paddydriver

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

There have been some great threads a out Celtic Tiger stories.

Some real classics like a bloke going to cinema on his own buying 3 seats so he'd have free seats beside him.

Or my favourite was a lass who said his uncle gave him €50 to mind her counsins while the uncle went to the toilet.

Some people just don't know what to do with money except spend it right now.

That'll be coming back soon when cinema's reopen..

BrianD3

A relative made several million selling his farmland for housing developments and didn't put the proceeds into bank shares. The houses were built and the development completed and it is fairly nice. But I also know of people who made big money selling land just before the crash, the developments never happened or became half finished ghost estates. The land may have been bought back later for a relative pitttance.

I could have made a few million myself from selling property for development if circumstances had been slightly different.

Leaving aside talk of making millions, I remember radio ads for property in Kusadasi. Then there was a terrorist bombing there in about 2005 which got a lot of publicity The radio ads for the development continued but now it was being described as "the Aegean coast" :rolleyes:

Strumms

I lived it up.. I was out 4/5 nights a week consistently, making decent cash through work plus another avenue . Be it pub, cinema, cinema and pints, gig and pints whatever I was having a good time although burning the candle at both ends a bit.. I was driving a nice car, two foreign holidays a year, interspersed with weekends away for football in Manchester, London to see a band, Kilkenny for the Roots festival.

I just enjoyed myself. Nothing really that involved ‘excess’ per say just being able to enjoy life, and I did for sure.

In the intervening years I’ve been curtailed a little by a medical issue but that’s thankfully 90% sorted and rehabilitation successful with 100% the aim...

Hopefully that ‘might’ tie in with covid being and having less of a chokehold on us all and a normal life again.

Ubbquittious

I was in college during the boom and all I saw was the sandwiches were gone up another 50 cent every term. A lecturer in 2006 or 7 told the class to drop out of electronic engineering and become plumbers.

Nobody in my family had anything to do with the Irish property market so never got to see any of the real madness apart from Cork City being much busier for nights out. I did go on 2 trips to Korea for the craic in 06 but it wasn't funded by building boom money

The recessionary years were much better for me than the ones before it

clintondaly

I found out what a Tracker Mortgage was and I still have it

enricoh

Went for and got a business loan in 2005, the guy in the bank lost interest when I only wanted 100k, tried to convince me to take 250k and 'do the job right'. (And help his commission!)
Was putting up part of the farm as collateral and would be shot if it went sour so I stuck with the 100k thankfully!

Sunny Disposition

Knew a property developer who can barely drive a car but he bought a helicopter and tried to learn to fly it. He lost it along with a lot else when the economy turned.
The competition among some of the builders on this side of the country was pretty stupid and quite funny if you didn't buy into it. We'd have conventions and social events and things like that and the big talk was hilarious.
If one started a project building 120 houses everyone else would want to build 130. Fellas bought new cars and rivals would respond with helicopters. Holidays were an odd one, everyone wanted to go somewhere exotic but you didn't want to give the impression your company could do without you for any length. In the summers a lot of them were going for dinner and pints at a certain exclusive golf club every night but then others started going to London and Berline for weekends and doing cocaine.
Unsurprisingly the more competitive and less intelligent guys did lose their very fleeting wealth. Lot of bad health and very hard lessons learned.
I got out of construction altogether for a spell shortly before the top of the market, best move I made, but for a fella with a bit of experience of earlier booms it was fairly clear it was going to end in tears. The problem was Ireland didn't have the history that the UK would have had. I don't think the country as a whole would be caught as badly again, there is a folk memory of boom/bust now.

road_high

CrankyHaus wrote: »

Neighbour bought a helicopter and had a pad in his back garden. Annoying and you never knew when it was safe to toss off in your own gaff before you'd be interrupted by the sound of rotors and worry about being seen through the bedroom window.

Helicopters! Jesus I hardly ever see one these days apart from the odd army or state ones.
Have private users really died a death? Lived in a rural area during the tiger era and several would pass each day.

chrissb8

I used to put wads of cash in my shoes to give me an extra 2 inches in height.

whisky_galore

Shopping trips to New York was another one.

antimatterx

whisky_galore wrote: »

Shopping trips to New York was another one.

As was holiday homes in Bulgaria

duffysfarm

Attended a meeting one day and was told before it that we were meeting an up and ckming developer. After the meeting i remarked that the developer wouldnt know kne end of a shovel from the other and i got an awful bollicking for saying so. 2 years later developer was in nama

Got a letter from friends first to say i was pre approved for €20k loan. All i had to do was send through payslips. Applied for€10k and got cheque frkm them in the post in three days, couldn't believe it.

I remember working in an accountant office and they used to prepare letters of service ability for bank of Scotland. Basically it says that the accountant believed the mortgage applicant could make the repayments anx there was no comeback on the accountant . He was charging €300 to €500 a pop for each signature. Some of the people getting loans were repaying €5k a month interest only and i often wonder how they ended up

Have a relation sold a field for over a million to a developer in small village. Developer went bust and they bought it back off back for fraction of price they got for it.

jack of all

I worked for a substantial developer during the Celtic Tiger years; I didn't see any helicopters but there was a lot high living for sure- nice cars, fancy holidays, holiday homes and the rest. It didn't end well for anyone (I was made redundant before the whole thing folded- a blessing in disguise) and a lot of people were stung in the finish. I was a mere employee but I knew it could never last. I didn't enjoy the whole crass consumption that went on during the boom and was relieved when it ended. I thought we'd learned a lesson or two but wasn't so sure when things had started to ratchet up again in the past 2 years or so..except this time no one could have forseen Covid 19. Hopefully the country can recover economically but I never want to see a building boom like that again- it's so destructive and ultimately end in a lot of pain- just like a bad hangover after a "great" night out.

Homelander

I was quite the opposite. Was still in college leading into the recession so hadn't gotten to the point where I was living it up. I did get an OK paying job though, and there was no end of work, chance for extra hours regularly, etc all throughout the recession. I could've saved a fortune and actually used it sensibly but I blew it all on drinks and partying and senseless spending for years.

I think living in a city kinda insulated you from the true reality of the recession as well.

I was out several nights a week and the clubs we went to were always busy, all my friends held onto jobs as did my family, there was just never a sense of things actually being that bad in my social circle.

Gruffalux

A handy thing about not experiencing anything different during the Celtic Tiger was that I also did not experience anything different when the world apparently melted in 2008. Really felt like a vaguely disinterested onlooker to both cycles.

Ok. There was one thing I remember just now about the Celtic Tiger - the child allowance kept going up and up. I was fairly surprised but that didn't stop me accepting it.

mikemac2

Can I add the often used Galway raceweek like Vietnam with the helicopters flying around. The Radisson had a helipad, maybe it still does, I’m not sure.

I went to an ATM machine in Renmore and the guy ahead of me took out €800 and well he didn’t alone empty the machine but I couldn’t use it as it went out of service

I worked in a hotel and €200 was cheap for a room those days. People falling into reception at 5am, barley using the room you paid for.

As a hotel night porter I learned a lesson that the “new money” often treated me like dirt but the true wealthy didn’t feel the need to impress or put others down

I often met one of the largest developers in the country Bernard McNamara. I’ve no doubt he was ruthless in business but to me he was always kind and his wife was lovely too. He later went into NAMA I think

I also worked at the racetrack in the infamous Fianna Fáil tent. People were nice to me, never a complaint at my side. I don’t recall Bertie Ahern drinking much at all but he was great for chatting to everyone. They had a comedian from Bull Island a politcal satire show who mocked them all so fair play, they could laugh at themselves. Brendan Grace did his routine also, the FF tent was good fun

Sunny Disposition

Also, know an elderly single man in Clare who sold a piece of land for €6 million. The same man could easily live on €200 a week. He was laughing at it, joking his home village was like Manhattan. Of course the land, which actually flooded at times, was never built on.
Pubs were always packed, the country definitely had a major drink problem. Went to my physio lately, a French guy here about 20 years. He said that one time people would frequently tell him about drinking double figures of pints the night before. Not being used to the Ireland of the time he was stunned at the alcohol culture, but he says he never hears that sort of thing now.
When I look back at the boom and bust it really shows the value of common sense. So called ‘experts’ were telling us the boom was sustainable, but many ordinary people knew better.
Because of the years I spent abroad I knew what a property crash was like and that it could happen despite predictions it wouldn’t, but there were a certain amount of people who simply did not believe that house prices possibly could decline. It was a hard lesson.
It has changed politics here, FF and FG combined don’t do much better than FF alone was doing during the Tiger years.

Badly Drunk Boy

My life seems to be very lukewarm. I didn't really benefit from the Celtic Tiger (even though I own my house now, since 2017). But I also didn't suffer much during the recession (apart from the extra taxes). Or do great in the resurgence. And I haven't suffered financially during the Covid thing either, since I've been working away.