flogmad

It's swings and roundabouts Harry. $18K for Medical Insurance but savings in other areas in the general cost of living compared to the UK. It will probably even itself out overall. It's not going to stop us pressing ahead that's for sure. Thanks for your suggestions.

Bob

CoL isn't all that different though, some things are less, some are more...it's not as cheap living here as Eastenders portrays.

flogmad

Never watched Eastenders but am expecting that overall things will be roughly similar in terms of the cost of living. The big difference on the negative side will be Healthcare and it looks like there will be several smaller differences on the plus side such as lower sales taxes (with the rise to 20% in the UK today), lower cost of fuel (motoring and heating) and generally lower tax rates. We're not coming out expecting to make money on the reduced cost of living. Sunshine will be pleasant though after this and last winter in Scotland where we've lived for the last 24 years.

Bob

Thing is, you'd be surprised how the tax works out generally being much the same. Property tax tends to be much higher than council tax for instance, especially anywhere that has half decent schools.

Petrol might cost less, but you're driving many more miles with no alternative here and the insurance tends to be much higher.

Sunshine gets old when you factor humidity crippling the ability to enjoy the warmth outside, or the insects, and the cost of AC can be stupidly huge....and heating, well houses don't tend to be as well insulated, so if you have to heat the place you tend to spend much more on heating here.

It's not all doom and gloom though, but you do get nickle and dimed far more over here without it being apparent on the surface and just something that needs to be considered.

flogmad

Calm down Bob, it'll be fine.

scrubbedexpat099

I think they are probably better insulated, if less substantial in the construction techniques on average.

What you have to deal with are much more extreme weather conditions. You simply do not get 20 below in the UK.

I saw a bit about Condensation Boilers freezing up because they were installed with drip lines outside, not something anybody would do here.

meauxna

You need to talk to the Americans here. The expats hate the place.


I don't think he'll have to worry about 20 below in Tampa.

Giantaxe

True, but insulation is just as important in a hot climate as it is in a cold one, unless you want your air conditioning bills to run amock.

christmasoompa

Ahem. This was our local town 3 weeks ago...........http://www.buckinghamshireexaminer.c...4018-27857166/

Things then got even colder across various other places in the UK.

scrubbedexpat099

That is Centigrade, I assure you Fahrenheit is very different.

Jerseygirl

I'm thinking he means -20 F....which is about -29C.

flogmad

We had exactly that before Christmas. There's an oil level indicator pipe which allowed moisture to get into the oil tank filter which froze and stopped both the AGA cooker and oil fired boiler. Without heating, some of the internal plumbing in the house froze.

christmasoompa

Ah ok! It's still been colder than the -20C I gave the link to in the UK recently though, that was just our local town. Temps elsewhere (particularly Scotland) have been colder.

Newsreaders keep comparing the UK temps to those in the North Pole and telling us how much colder we are - not quite sure how they think that helps!!

Jerseygirl

I don't think most of us hate the US...we just compare it to what we are familiar with. I don't look in on the UK Yankee forum...but I have a feeling Americans probably look at it from the other end of the spectrum.

scrubbedexpat099

I just looked, when it gets down to -40, which it can with the wind chill, it does not matter whether it is C or F.