Hi Folks,

I got my documents certified by a Notary Public (easy money for them - 10 documents, 15 minutes - £120!) and sent off just before xmas, so thats the ball rolling.......

The company have been fantastic and if this is anything to gauge Canada and its people by I am very happy so far! Very much a contrast to how my efforts to move to Australia went....

I have been doing a fair bit of homework and have looked at the price of various things (is petrol really ~66p/litre and does ANYONE not drive a large petrol guzzler?!?!) on Kijiji.ca etc and have read a good few helpful threads on the forum to get an idea of cost of living

Can anyone confirm how much a typical rent should be as thats what we`ll do initially until we find our feet. I know this question is hard to quantify as there are a million variables but I will be looking at reasonable quality homes with 3 bedrooms, detached ideally in a decent area

I`m looking at Calgary, Camrose, Red Deer, Medicine Hat and Edmonton and I`ve been seeing figures of between $1000 and $1600 per month

Is this typical? Whats the supply and demand like - is the price quoted generally the price you pay or is there room to negotiate a little "movement"?

Any help would be appreciated

In Calgary, yes. The higher figure would be what I would expect to pay.

Hey there,

We've been in Red Deer 4 months today and it is a really lovely place to live, has everything a city needs but is still quite small.

We set up a rental from the UK as I didn't want to live out of a hotel with 2 kids and pets/furniture following in 2 weeks. We struggled to find a rental company that would entertain us and couldn't email private rentals via Kijiji from the UK so that was really difficult to sort out, also having pets didn't help as most don't want to take them on even when you're offering extra deposit/rent. Luckily a lady from Red Deer Property Rentals picked up an email we'd sent and came up with a great house for us in a lovely area (detached, 4 bed, playground out front and takes pets).

Since we've been here and speaking to Red Deer locals they've said that the $1850 we're paying is too much but everything we looked at in the area was roughly this much and rentals are very hard to come by here. Although i'm told that in 2005 people were moving here and living in tents due to the lack of rentals so not as bad as it has been

Petrol is 99.9c currently which I think is quite cheap but having said that we got a Dodge Caravan which is a V6 engine () so it drinks it pretty quickly.

I wish gas was 99C here (grumble grumble) its anywhere between $1.11 (lowest) and $1.45 a litre

I imagined as much, although the lower figure is what I had hoped to pay...

yes gas is circa 96.9/litre (liter) here, but you do a lot more driving than in the UK generally!

there's plenty of non-gas guzzlers about, but Alberta being the redneck province it is...everyone drives Heavy Duty trucks they have no use for

If you come to Calgary be aware that the rental market is very tight (ie lots of people looking and not so many properties available - I think the vacancy rate is around 2%). It was similar when we moved over last summer, and we missed two properties by not making a decision as soon as we saw them, but asking for a few hours to think about it. You may want to make sure you have hotel accomodation for a couple of weeks, so you have time to get orientated.

Good luck

Sounds like Red Deer would fit my bill too - I want something with decent amenities but with a small town feel

Sounds like my figures were roughly right if your paying over the odds at $1850 for a 4 bed, I cant see my wife considering a tent somehow

That actually works out at 62p/litre - Jeeez!

Out of curiousity whats the closest International airport to you? And how far are you from the Rockies?

Thats still not bad - even driving something thirsty I would imagine my fuel bill will be less than the UK

I fancy something "meaty" when I get there - no doubt that idea will pass once it gulps its way through half my wages every week

Imagine how small your running costs would be with something frugal

I havent made any decisions yet but I dont think it will be Calgary - probably a little too big/busy for me but I imagine your sentiment could carry over to anywhere that has a lot of new arrivals

The company have stated that they will be including a couple of weeks accomodation so we can find our feet

i went for a compromise with a Honda Ridgeline....truck bed with SUV comfort and a relatively moderate 3.5 V6 engine (i see about 12L/100km, or 23mpg)

as for rentals, i'm just moving to a new place in NW Calgary, its a townhouse which was completed 2 weeks ago, i saw it 2 days after it was on the market and there had already been 6 applicants!

luckily because i'm a total banter merchant and have a decent paying job here, i landed the place and move in next week!

I think we're equal distance from Calgary and Edmonton airports but Edmonton doesn't get that many flights from the UK currently. Calgary is the usual one to use and is straight down the highway from Red Deer, we can do the journey in an about an hour with your foot down.

As for the Rockies, you can get into Banff National Park in about 2 hours from Red Deer on highway 11, it's an amazing drive and when you get to the mountains you can then go north or south for Jasper or Banff. I don't know the exact distance in km or miles to the mountains but we can see the Rockies in the distance from our bedroom window which will do for us for now.

I must reiterate Red Deer is really lovely. Out of interest what job will you be doing here??

We rent our 3 bed townhouse (terrace house) for $1350/month in Red Deer. Had a ton of people interested, and could have probably got more... You might struggle to find something to rent until you arrive though.

I don't drive a gas guzzler, and it's nice to see the litres go up faster than the cost on the gas pumps!

hell yeah it is!



no so nice when its the company F250 you're fuelling, and its got like a 130L fuel tank though