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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)

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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!

[Deleted User]

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

[Deleted User]

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.

buried

Yeah I had a great time of it but I stayed well away from the ridiculousness. Was making money, was plenty of work but never went above my station whatsoever. Was offered all the crazy bribes by the banks but kept well away. Knew it was a bag of trouble. But apart from that had a great time. Loads of gigs, bought loads of books and records that I still have and treasure. The wallop didn't really affect me only all the grimness elsewhere that came with it so I just stopped watching television.

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater

Myself and a friend did a couple of weeks driving across Europe in summer of 2007 and we stopped off in Frankfurt for a night, ended up in a random bar chatting to two lads from Cork who were probably in their late 30s.

The story went that their wives were going to Rome for the weekend, so the two lads drove them to the airport and when they had left, on a whim the lads booked themselves onto the next flight to wherever for a weekend on the piss without telling the women.

Sky King

Dr. Kenneth Noisewater wrote: »

The story went that their wives were going to Rome for the weekend, so the two lads drove them to the airport and when they had left, on a whim the lads booked themselves onto the next flight to wherever for a weekend on the piss without telling the women.

So they went to Frankfurt - possibly the most boring city in Europe (after Luxembourg)?

[Deleted User]

Did not affect me much as I trying to bring up two children mostly by myself, non of my family really affected by it either have one brother in the construction but his is shrewd and careful and by the time it all collapse he was in a position where it did not affect him.

It was much harder for my second daughter to get a job as a teen when the downturn came whereas her older sister always had jobs as a teenager and no problem getting a job either.

Maybe it was a very narrow section of society it affected, it would be far more interesting to see how many bounced back and are doing well now.

valoren

The payouts from the SSIA scheme matured around 2005/2006. It was the second stage of a credit fueled rocket kicking in for many. Equity releases, thousands received from a government top up saving scheme, 100% plus mortgages, loan offers from credit unions, preapproved credit cards, unsecured bank loan offers. All Hat, no cattle. How did it all go wrong?

[Deleted User]

n 2007, a property developer booked Girl Aloud for his daughter's 21st. The group were reportedly flown by private jet to Dublin and performed on stage before mingling with guests. According to event planners, the cost of the band alone could have been anything up to €400,000.

Found this online, be hard to top that but I am sure some did.

[Deleted User]

Its easy to forget a thing like this, but because of the downturn we were able to buy a house in a very nice area in other words an expensive and sought aftre area for a great price, so some did very well out of the down turn.

pgj2015

enricoh wrote: »

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!

I read that as went for and got a guinness loan in 2005.:D you probably could get a loan for guinness back then.

pgj2015

Sean Quinns daughters wedding cost 1 million euro.

howamidifferent

pgj2015 wrote: »

Sean Quinns daughters wedding cost 1 million euro.

And we are still paying for it with the insurance levys. :mad: