madscots

hi there,

what do you think is it easier bringing my own furniture over or just as cheap buying new in dubai. i will be getting an allowance to ship or furniture over there (circa £5k).

bank accounts for pay, how best to do it, UK account or a local account.

thanks again.

alan

arbroath_abroad

Are you paid in AED or GBP?

I would recommend opening both an offshore account and a local one. Get paid into the offshore one and transfer your beer tokens into the local one.

There are lots of ok furniture places around here mate (despite what some may say)

Depends of course how much you want to spend

MataHari

well....if the shipping is paid for anyway...bring it over if you like the stuff...
in our case, we took everything with us, but the house here being much bigger than back home, I had to buy things here as well...I'd say prices are roughly the same as in Europe...there are cheap furniture stores and top of the range ones...and everything in between, so that will not be a problem.

madscots

hi there,
would be getting paid in AED. which banks do offshore?

we would poss bring over a few things - tv and the like but get the bulk over there dependant on the size of place we get.

thanks

arbroath_abroad

HSBC international do an offshore account.

There are a few financial types on here, so im sure they will advise a bit better than me.

Thats what i do anyway (pay offshore and transfer)

I think the key is to have as little money as possible in the UAE accounts...

It is the middle east after all!!

arbroath_abroad

thats a good idea mate, there is not shortage of household goods or electrical appliance stores here.

Not like it was 15 years ago when Dubai was the cheap place for electronic goods, i would put it on a comparison with the UK for most things

good luck

Dago

five k is a huge allowance and the cost of shipping a container will be half of that if there is a toothpick or a household in it. So there is the balance. The compromise is airfreight at about 6.5 pounds per kg (sorry - don't have a sterling symbol on the ckeyboard) plus 100 quid either end or half of that for sea freight plus plus. - as a rough est.

I airfreighted a few personal goods and used my allowance to buy the rest - stuff is cheap in GCC countries.

It may be worth taking a long weekend here just to check out the options as well.

If you are looking to save your allowance then seafreight the select stuff and get a skip for 120 and bin the rest. After all you are moving into a new life.