clanwylie

Hay was down that way yesterday...best Fish and Chip we had had since getting here. It was even a wee sit in chippy!

bridie

Which chippy?

steve99

Id imagine they'd be pretty incomparable to life in WA and you'll enjoy them for what they are and why your going there, (you'll still probably be glad to come back though)
I was more comparing against other places in Aus id been and how I couldnt imagine living there over Perth. (Adelaide,Brisbane,Melbourne,Sydney)

chrispy

It is great to see so many people who like Perth, i guess like most things in life there is less incenitive to write your views when you are content and happy than when you are angry, depressed and hacked off. Unfortunately history seems to be made by mobs of unhappy unsatisfied activists, those that are happy with their lot and are content let them get on with it...

landing in Perth in just over two weeks, hopefully we will fall into the quite content brigade

Cheers

Chris

Amazulu

This is a genuinely great place to live. If you are used to spending Sunday shopping at Bluewater or want Next and Tesco and cheap holidays to Tenerife then you might hate it. On the other hand, if you want a safe, clean, prosperous place to raise a family then you will love it.

Come and get your slice of it.

clanwylie

it was at a shopping centre just after a wee roundabout. There was an old looking place that i think sold teddy bears? It was near the water front and there was a petrol station right across the road...not very good at directions. We had been at Preston beach (really nice beach) then headed down and took the road for Australind(probs spelt that wrong).
Does that help? Would like to know the name to tell others.

bridie

Yes, in the Australind shops then, was it Sandy Shores?

clanwylie

Cant mind the name...nothing fancy ...there was a wee deli shop next to it. The meal was on nice plates etc and the fish was really nice. Would have been better if real chips and a wee pot of tea to go with it. Was a nice run down that way though....saw my first wild kangaroo skip across the road!

Amazulu

Yeah. I would only live in Brisbane, Sydney or Adelaide if you paid me.

A lot.

Exile

Just out of interest Steve, how do you think you'd feel about Perth if you were just arriving with roughly the same money you had when you landed and had to pay the current market value for your house? I'm sure a lot of your lifestyle things apply to City Beach and that area, but I think it can be very different in the outer suburbs.

I'm not speaking out of bitterness, as I've been here over three years and benefited from property too, but a lot has changed in five years. It really is expensive these days, even if you earn shed loads.

worzel

No one would argue that it is a lot more expensive than even when we arrived 18 months ago but it is still cheaper than the UK. Our house, even at today's prices is 30% less than we sold for in the UK and this one is a bit bigger + pool. What does make a difference is where you came from in the UK because of the way house prices vary there. If you come from an expensive place in the UK, especially the south east, you will come over with much more equity if you had the house a few years.

somme

Are things looking up for you now?

Exile

I came with zero equity but a fair bit of cash and bought my first house in Perth.

One of the reasons we came to Perth three years ago instead of going back to Dorset (after five years in Japan) was that I couldn't have bought much of a house in Dorset, where I come from. Now I could sell up here and buy a pretty nice, detached house in a decent area of Dorset, Devon, or Hampshire with very little mortgage. That's not the way it's supposed to be! Perth is failing miserably in its duty to be cheap.

And it's not just property. We were working it out the other day, and life was cheaper in Tokyo, believe it or not (lower taxes is a big factor, and we'd be living on a 200 sq metre block, but that would feel big in Japan).

It makes me question my reasons for being here. There are many things I like about the place, but I'm not sure if they will be enough to keep us here long term.

thpinkpussycat

Why should Perth have to be cheap!!

Being mortgage free would be nice for a lot people but its not possible, just like there are very few people who can claim to be mortgage free in the UK. Being happy is about lifestyle, friends and so much more than the property prices.

NKSK version 2

Exile you echo many of my thoughts (Jesus I'm a parasite today - agreeing with everyone).

This is exactly how I feel - I really like Perth but I don't like it enough to keep on paying inflated grocery prices, inflated housing prices and private school fees because I don't have faith in the public sector.

If things don't change - and I have no reason to think they will - I suspect we will leave also. (But we won't go back to the UK)