Tirytory

JS... Sorry for derailing your thread I will bow out now. I was feeling in a practical sort of a mood... So was hoping to offer practical advice. I agree with Oink though.. Just do it if you want to, most things can be figured out in the wash. Too long dead..

Paul_Shepherd

Very true bekiwoo!! Always count what you do have and not what you haven't!

JS - However that said, if you are that unhappy and your wife is on board, there is only the two of you to think of, so it may well be worth strongly considering......your a long time dead as they say.

JamesM

Just amending for true value.

MillieF

I think that's a very positive statement from raining, still cold, NB. I am thoroughly in agreement with Oink on this.

JS, I think in your situation I would give it a punt. It doesn't sound like you have too much to stop you? Living with regret is terrible, and you evidently aren't happy now. Maybe also you just feel trapped and stagnant.... sometimes a move of any kind will be a positive one, as it's you who have chosen your own destiny and are not just sitting there reacting.

I really do wish you the very best of luck, and you could always come back.

Completely irrelevant, but my neighbour told me last night that the population of California is equivalent to the whole population of Canada! I bet they've got and IKEA

Oink

I think its very difficult to envision such a move when you are a lower income earner, even more difficult when you combine this with dependence on medical assistance. Getting affordable medical treatment in the US, especially when its longer term care, is terrible expensive and worrying, even for higher income earners. Hopefully Obama's initiative has made that less of a worry. That said, such a move is still an understandably daunting prospect. But one, with support that can be overcome. It may help to think about a move as a temporary one, give it a go and that if it doesn't work out, one can always move back.

We have IKEA's here and not to exaggerate, they're the scourge of modern civilization.

scrubbedexpat091

Ex-wife.

It's really no worse then where we are now cost of living wise, some things cost more, some the same, some cheaper, but it's not worse then here in San Diego. Obviously some places are pricey like the Bay Area but it wouldn't be a place considered anyhow.

I've always struggled to make friends, even as a child I had few if any friends. People tend to not like the odd folks like me...

Problem I am running into where we are now, is lack of common ground with people who live here, and a lack of places to actually meet people, and with most people our age having kids and in a totally different chapter of life, it's quite a long up hill battle to make friends on top of the general difficulty I have making friends in the first place...lol

I've looked at places like meetup website, but there simply is nothing, there is 1 group but it's geared towards young professionals and business owners, and I am neither, so not likely to have any common ground with anyone there.

The biggest obstical is of course immigration, not sure how it would work getting my wife legal status in the US, not sure if I'd have to move first and then find a job and have income coming in or if we could move together, also have to look into if I could even make enough to sponsor, unless things have changed the US has min. income requirements.

If the immigration hurdle could be dealt with the only other actual hurdle to moving is money, and then once there healthcare, but since our income would be low to non-existent on arrival, we could probably qualify for California State medical, but their income cut off is I think 18,000 ish, and then it would be coming up with the money to pay for health insurance, deductibles and co-payments, looking online at the state health exchange, we would be looking at minimum 300-400 per month just for the insurance and then have to also come up with co-payments and deductibles, not sure it's doable on 11-12 per hour, chance we could get healthcare through work, but I don't like to assume that since it wasn't the norm when I lived there for the jobs we would get, the norm in those jobs was to keep you just below full-time, but not sure with the new rules, maybe companies are offering it now in low wage jobs, or maybe they just cut back hours to not provide insurance, hard to say.

You didn't do or say anything wrong, I appreciate you comments.



I'll freely admit that I hate Squamish, I don't like anything about this town, and certainly don't fit into the main lifestyle of the town, combined with lack of opportunity and no way to further education or training here since there is no viable school option for adults (Quest is a private 30,000K a year liberal arts college, not somewhere a working adult goes to gain work skills or training.)

The only way to make any sort of decent living here if you don't happen to be a manager of Wal-Mart or another large box store is to own a business, but this town is hard to have success in, businesses tend not to do well here mostly due to high taxes, and a lack of population, you really need to have a unique niche idea to do well and need to be in touch with what the urban hippies wan't, they make or break a business in this town.

It's just really hard to be successful in this town, its not business friendly, and the district does nothing to make it such, which has turned the place into a bedroom community for Vancouver.

If you can find a niche, you may find success, but chances are you won't and will close up within a year like all those before you have.

Pay wise I cannot go any higher, I already make more then what most of the private employers are paying (Wal-Mart, Home Depot, London Drugs, Marks, Dollar Store, gas stations etc.) and I don't have the necessary skills to get hired with the school district, health authority, or municipal district.

Top employers overall are the health authority, school district and municipal district, if just counting private employers, Wal-Mart takes the top spot with 150 employees, followed by Save On Foods with 130, Squamish Terminals (deep sea port) with 100 along with Home Depot, and Nesters Grocery with 78.

The rest of the employers are small companies which most seem to pay min. wage or just above, so they are not viable options.

scilly

I think you need to set down on paper the pros and cons of living in BC and living in south Cal ............

you might well find that some of the cons you see here are the same as the cons that will apply in SD

For example ............ you say you can't make friends in Squamish, but then say you've always had difficulty making friends. Is it going to be any easier to make friends now in SD ......... people are much the same everywhere. People are getting married and having children, so you may well find that people your age down there are like the ones up here .......... busy with jobs and young families and just hunkering down to get through the next few years.

Then you have your serious medical costs.

Start a spreadsheet and see which place looks as though it REALLY might be better.

Is there somewhere else in BC that would be a better fit than Squamish? I can certainly think of small towns that I would much prefer to live than where you are!!

scrubbedexpat091

As long as its not a small town, and offers medical services without having to drive to Vancouver or another larger city, I'd consider pretty much any place in BC within a 3 hour commute of the border.

It gets pricey and time consuming to always have to drive into another city for medical services, as it is we do quite regular treks into Vancouver for medical stuff because it's not available here, along with clothing shopping, and other basic stuff because we either have poor selection and high prices locally, or it's simply not available locally at all which is common.

I am not a small town kind of person, I really dislike small towns because of how little they offer, I don't need a huge city, but I prefer larger city's, 80,000+ usually brings a city that offers most of what one would need in life without having to drive 1+ hour for it.

Would also need to have a college so we can further our education and gain some sort of work skill.

In the Lower Mainland Abbotsford and Chilliwack meet most of the criteria including potential to own something someday (Condo in Abby, potentially a house in Chilliwack) but nowhere else in the LM does due to high housing costs.

On the island places like Nanaimo and Cambell River seem to meet what we would need, but I have not looked into those places too much yet.

Kelowna and Kamloops seem pricey housing wise based on the limited research, but I am not familiar with those places and could be looking at the wrong areas.

I need to stay within a reasonable commute of the border as I still have the need to cross from time to time, and in the event I need to get to California quickly, living up north means no access since it costs so much to fly from those places.


The pro to SD is family, I likely wouldn't make any friends there, but I would have family around, so I would not be so isolate as I am now. My wife has a small family, and only her mom and dad live nearby, and she is estranged from her dad, so only her mom nearby. Her brother lives on a small island off of Vancouver Island, and more or less has limited relationship with my wife and their mom, and is also estranged from the father.

Steve_

If you're married to a Canadian you keep PR status, although it might be worth applying for citizenship before you move back to the US.

You can file an I-130 for her while you're in Canada, it's just the I-864 you've got to worry about but you've been filing your 1040s and the income requirement is very low for the I-864 so I don't see that being a huge problem.

From the sounds of it, you're not subject to departure tax either. So it's pretty straightforward really.

The only major issue is healthcare. This rather handy ACA rate map shows average premiums: Manhattan Institute - The ObamaCare Impact

Seems to indicate Oregon or Utah would be a better bet than California.

Steve_

Actually it's substantially larger. Why I'm not a big fan of southern California.

I've got family in San Diego too, I'm close enough thanks. I don't mind visiting but I wouldn't want to live there.

Tirytory

Could you stay with your family to get established and reduce monetary costs? Would the job market be better there?

scrubbedexpat091

Most likely stay with my dad until we were settled. Job market for me would be better and education would be easier to obtain for both of us so we could get better jobs, education is cheaper and more accessible in California.

Tuition at a community college (you can do a lot more there then in Canada with a community college, paramedic, nursing, most trades, and so on) is only 46 per unit with 12 units full-time so 550 per semester + books and fees, which means about 1,200 a semester, can't get that value at a Canadian school.

The whole education system there (California) is more easily accessible as well.

BristolUK

Remind me...what was it brought you to Canada? So when that was over, what made you stay?

Or did you meet the new Mrs Smth before you had a chance to go back south?

Tirytory

Well that sounds positive... You know that it would be short term pain for long term aspirations. How does the visa thing work? Could your wife get a job there as her way in or do you have to sponsor her? Can you start to save a little now?

scrubbedexpat091

I think part of the issue is our work schedules don't mesh so we don't see one another much, and rarely have the same days off.

I am off generally Friday to Monday, and she works those days, I work Mon/Tues overnight so I am sleeping during the day Mon/Tues/Wed which only leaves Thursday but can't go anywhere with just 1 day off together so we end up stuck in Squamish.

It would be nice if I could get Fri to Sun shifts and not overnight but that won't happen.