bourbon-biscuit

The trouble with trying to gauge cost of living is it's all so subjective. For example I could tell you that in Britain we earned less than 20k GBP, lived in a rental a stone's throw from the town's drug dealing street and never went overseas. Whereas here:

• Our family income is a little over $80k and for that we:
• Holiday in Oz annually
• Service a mortgage in a top suburb on a 4 bed place with large garden
• Bought a laptop last year
• Had a UK trip last year
• Have one child in private school and the other in decile 10
• DH is member of a fab tennis club round the corner- in Britain he went across town to a shite 'leisure centre'
• We ski annually
• We run two cars

But that wouldn't give you the whole picture and if you ask another day I might tell you:

• Husband works 50-60 hours EVERY week
• We stay with my ma in Oz who loans us her car and feeds us
• We have a massive mortgage, which we only managed to get by having inlaws sub us with deposit
• We live in smaller town an hour from the coast
• The laptop was bought with student loan
• The UK trip was a gift
• One kid won a massive scholarship and rellies pay the rest- she is defo the poor kid without mobile phone etc
• Everyone at the tennis club is 20 years older then my dh
• We're that hand-to-mouth that when my husband's cheap-as mobile phone broke his co-workers had a think and produced their kids' cast off phones, which he now uses
• We try to get to the slopes once a year, which means getting up at 5am, wearing all manner of borrowed and stolen and cobbled together shite on the slopes (no matter, heaps of other are), eating sarnies kept in pockets and driving back the same day- 3hrs each way.
• One of the cars has trim held on with parcel tape, a window that doesn't really shut and is affectionately called "the car of shame" by our teen.

My relationship with NZ could be described as 'love-hate'. I recognise we have a lifestyle here we couldn't afford in the UK but also that we make sacrifices and priorities many wouldn't want to make. If I think about the future here, I worry. If I think only on day-to-day, I'm happy. If I'm realistic, the bright lights of Oz will prolly tempt us again- the older daughter is planning uni there.

The key to whether you can afford a decent lifestyle here is to cut your cloth accordingly and enjoy what you get from that. On $80kish for a family with a massive mortgage we're not going to Fiji and weekend bach hols and I do currently have holes in all my bloody socks and a washing machine that has to be siphoned as the pump has knackered. But I am happy. And I do think my life here is better on almost all the measures that matter to me than it was or could be in the UK. Very subjective though.

whitesand

That's one of the most honest, entertaining posts I've read here for a long time! As they say, Good On Ya!

BEVS

I wholeheartedly agree. In fact, I think it's 'Post of the Year'.

RobDon

That post is spot on.

cappuccino

So true.... the same situation but viewed from both directions. Good on ya for telling it like it is!

Debbie2NZ

Very interesting post, very honest too. Thanks.

bourbon-biscuit

I'm glad you found it interesting or useful

Persephone

Great post B-B

luvwelly

Deffo 'post of the year'. Yeah for Bourbon.

dubstar

bourbon your post made me chuckle, we have just got rid of our ute of shame, it was the most embarrasing motor we have ever owned.

I am thinking that your story reflects many of us, I used to listen to people chatting at work of their hols to Oz, building houses, going away for the weekend to the bach, skiing etc and I used to think how do they afford to do all these exciting things? I am now wiser and realise, alot of my colleagues have a boarder or live with extended family and even parents, have relatives in oz and dont give a shit what they look like on the piste and like to max the credit card.
xx

I am just pricing a hol up for ozzy in late january for 4 of us inc 15 and 17 year old and the cost is about $5000