concretepump

i agree, on food prices,

we pay in tesco about £100 per week for three adults, we don't eat out maybe once a year , when we were in nz our shopping from pak & save was about $200 a week for two ,
i know things have gone up since then, but the weather is way way better than uk, we are looking to come back end of this year early next, but we will have a grow your own plot i realize not every one wants to do this but you can grow enough in summer to last over winter, and after the first year you can save seeds ect for next summer, just think that more people who go to nz will have to rough it a bit more than say uk rather than buy juice buy sachets, not so much suger but cheaper ect not trying to start a war just my own thoughts

_0v0_

$70,300 after tax seems quite a lot for a median household income. What's the basis for that figure I wonder?

_0v0_

Back in 2008 we (family with 2 kids) had before-tax household income of $52K, including WFF tax credits: that meant disposable income of about $45K.

The weekly grocery spend was $170, including a lot of tinned fish and cheap cuts. Rent was $280 for a horrid, draughty place in the crap end of town.
After bills for heating ($150 per month) and telephone ($130 pm) and miscellaneous other expenses there was normally no money saved at all. On the other hand, we did keep up our medical and life insurance of $230 per month: if we'd been on that income for an extended period and wanted a holiday, we'd have had to scrap it.

westie1234

I am not sure how many british expats grow their own vegetables but we always did and friends families etc. Also had various fruit trees in the back yard as well.

concretepump

that's what i mean about the weather, even when it rains in nz its still warm so if you have a green house things will still grow, they will here as well but not for long , and like you say with fruit trees as long as they are looked after they will keep producing year after year, we looked after a friends house and they grew potato's in bucket, only had a small garden

TommyLuck

It pours ... ?

I'm comparing Auckland with London again, but only because that's where I'm moving to and from;

On average, the driest month in Auckland (Feb/Mar) are still wetter than the wettest month in London (Nov).

This would suggest to me that with the sunlight hours and rainfall, space permitting, this is a great combination to grow your own produce at home, if you're so inclinded.

concretepump

ah yes , you probably are right, but cost of food is cheaper than nz so not always worth growing your own , here at the moment there is so much of it especially, now they have leaned how to make beef bugers last longer lol

TommyLuck

We've also mastered Spaghetti Bologneighs ...

_0v0_

Because you can't buy My Lidl Pony.

BEVS

No they don't. People here will have friends and relatives back in their home country and will be well aware of how things are for them there.
It isn't quite the black hole that is sometimes painted on some of the country specific forums.

My husband has a young cousin, she just turned 30. 2 kids. He works for local council and has just done the fight against the proposed pay cuts. He studied for his degree whilst working. Fair play to him. She is a dental nurse on maternity leave. They have saved & bought their own house. Yes. They groan about things there but their lives are moving in the right direction. If they came here they would certainly not be able to attain the same.


What is being said is that NZ is not a cheap place to live in for Joe Average. It has become worryingly expensive for most and that brings worry.

It has nothing to do with comparisons back to the UK. That's a peculiarity that happens on expat forums such as this one. Although Kiwis will sometimes compare to Australia. Mostly we just concern ourselves with what is happening on the ground around us. Our wages. Our bills. Our lives.

Many, many people back in the UK still think of NZ as some sort of everlasting picture book with extremely cheap living and it just ain't so. Not when you live and work here . Not these days.



_0v0_

My husband has been on the same hourly rate for about 5/6 years now. At one pointthe hours were cut but seem to be back to 40 thank goodness.

AndyEvs

Well said Bev.
Quite a lot of dummy spitting going on round these 'ere parts isn't there.
When people are talking about the high cost of living here they are immediately labelled whinging poms. What does that make John Campbell and his team then? $75 dollar difference on a small shop, whinging kiwis?

Bo-Jangles

Bizarre really that anyone is naive enough to think that in emigrating to NZ that we have have removed all contact with the world and cut all ties with families and friends, so that we're no longer aware of the state of affairs overseas.

I don't even hear the likes of my own mother, a woman on the state pension 'whinging' about the difficulties of affording the basic necessities, the power bill or the price of fish. As far as I can see, for our families and friends it's still business as usual, holidays abroad and so forth without any struggle.

NZ didn't just get more expensive this past few weeks or months or even years, its always been way more difficult for us to make ends meet and I'll bet you could go back many many moons on this forum and see the same story repeated time and time and time again.

Apart from a very few jokers, who do like to spin a yarn and for reasons only known to them, will try to portray a somewhat contrary and stoic viewpoint; you'll not find very many that come here and say they found it cheaper or easier to get by. If folks are 'downgrading' from big city life in the UK to small city / provincial town in NZ then it stands to reason that they might be onto a 'one off' benefit or 'saving' in terms of buying a house but the same would happen if they did a similar move in the UK or anywhere else in the world.

I wouldnt mind a dollar for every post that I have read on here that starts 'it was way more expensive than we expected'.

TeamEmbo

How far do our wages stretch? Not very far at all! Especially now that OH's employer is no more. Before that I would say we were doing OK. Initially we really struggled when we first came to NZ (2007) but we grew our own veggies, only bought what was on special offer and I worked two jobs (one day, one night) which was a necessity. Things improved after a couple of years. I started working from home (car crash=neck injury meant I had to give up my other two physically demanding jobs) and OH got pay rises and we were managing to stay in the black, just each month but the pay rises don't keep in line with inflation/rising food, fuel, insurance costs. I've not had a pay rise since starting my current job in 2008. I had to go back to UK late in 2011 as my mum was terminally ill and tbh I was amazed at how cheap (in comparison) things were. Two (silly) examples, a bottle of alcohol I can rarely afford to buy in NZ as it's $52 (on offer), was £12 in UK supermarket. A 1kg tin of Quality Street £4.99, here 850g tin in Warehouse was $24.99. I stocked up on clothes, esp underwear for the family as it is much better quality in UK for a fraction of the price of shoddy stuff here. And as for comparisons of school uniform quality and costs...don't even go there!! The upside is we have a much bigger house in NZ than we could ever have afforded in the UK, albeit with a huge mortgage. It's an older style house that needed much upgrading and isn't in the 'sought after' end of town. In fact, it was the cheapest we could find when we came. We do far more outdoors stuff and have access to so much more countryside and there are always free events going on to go along to. We've never been able to afford a family holiday abroad since we've been here whereas in UK we went abroad at least every 2 years (twice to Florida), although I did manage to get a really cheap deal for me & OH for a short break in Fiji, no flash hotel or anything just someone's basement flat. I've just paid for driving lessons for both kids (16 & 18), a block booking of 24 hours + 2x restricted tests cost just over $1,600. One child is still waiting for braces as I'm still saving up towards the $6,000+ required. All that said, I still wouldn't move back to the UK though. Here's home

BEVS

I do. Many , I might even go so far as to say, most do. Hereabouts anyway. I've the fruit trees too

There again I grew my own back in the UK too & had fruit trees. It wasn't a large garden or owt like that but it worked for us.
I have hens here which I could have had a couple back in the UK but didn't get round to. I used to buy organic in the UK for many other things but can't afford to do that here . Mind you it is hard to find.
You can be offered to buy half a cattle beast, a lamb etc but again , not necessarily organic.
Closest I've come to with that is duck in duck season.

marblep

I agree with how much food prices have gone up in the past few years. I posted on another thread - FMCG - that is the industry that pays $$$$.

Having been in the industry for 20+ years (7 years in another industry in the UK), I can also say, turn your focus on the suppliers that provide the goods, don't just blame the supermarkets. Sadly, they're all multi-nationals. I doubt Coca Cola Amatil USA gives a shit, nor Nestle Switzerland, nor Kimberly Clark Aust.