[AlexUK]

Hey,

I was wondering by looking at these threads what type of wage level should various people be looking at, in order to not have to worry about being in debt since some costs can be higher:

single people
couples
couple with 1 child
etc etc

It would be good if you could post up your situations and how you do on your income levels.

[Familyofmonkeys]

It would be good if you could post up your situations and how you do on your income levels.

I think you should also include in this how much money people brought over with them...this makes a HUGE difference to how well people manage here.

Personally, we are a family of 5. OH is on an above average salary (like most other forumites who work in IT here). I don't work, but we brought over not far off $300,000 with us. We have no problems managing...in fact we have probably spent more than we intended in initial set up costs here i.e. car etc. If we hadn't got our capital we would find it much harder to get on property ladder.

[AlexUK]

Well ive looked and i can expect $50k+ from a job in NZ to fall back on if my business fails, as a single person im guessing this should be way more than enough with rent at like a few hundrred $ per week?

[Familyofmonkeys]

Well ive looked and i can expect $50k+ from a job in NZ to fall back on if my business fails, as a single person im guessing this should be way more than enough with rent at like a few hundrred $ per week?

Depends on whether you want to rent or buy somewhere? Won't go far if your looking for a morgage, but you'll be fine if you are renting somewhere small.

[AlexUK]

Renting, i thought it might be best to share a house/flat that way its easier to socialise :D

[holland]

this amongst other things is our big concern,we hopefully will have about $450,000 to bring with us in hawkes bay,my job would pay about 35 to 40 a year jades similar with no kids and were still worried,i think you always could do with abit more than you have human nature i think

[wiki]

There really are so many variables to this question - what you earn, where you plan to live, what sort of capital you're bringing with you, the local rents and other costs, and where you're prepared to economise.

We're coming to Southland (cheapest housing in NZ) with a single salary well above the NZ average but very little capital, but I know we can survive on that fine, and when OH gets a job it will all be bonus savings for when we eventually buy a house (or build one)

But certainly, a house share is the cheapest option for a single person as you're only paying part of the daily/monthly static charges for phone, internet, electricity etc.

[welwynrose]

we like the look of Southland but weren't sure what the job situation was like there

[wiki]

we like the look of Southland but weren't sure what the job situation was like there

It depends on what your field is. Southland is a huge growth area in practical skills - they've just announced a major new dairy factory, there's a lot of farming, and they are currently exploring for oil under the western southland basin - even if you're not in these areas, the new workers for these projects will in turn need doctors, lawyers, plumbers, sparkies etc.

But, if you're coming to NZ for climate, then Southland probably isn't for you - it's much further south so temps are lower and we get the brunt of the southerly winds off Antarctica which can be icy. Snow is pretty rare in winter, but can happen.

People find they either love or hate Southland ... it's probably best to visit, if you can before tying yourself into a big commitment.

But for me, it's my "state" and my family is there and luckily I'm in a specialised industry and knew who to annoy until they gave me employment.

Feel free to ask any questions - or to Kat&bob who are also down south.

[emotony]

We are a couple and will be earning between us about $10,500pm after tax, and plan to bring over £450K. Most of that though will be used for a deposit and although house prices are cheaper than here, we would be looking at buying a property in Auckland at around £700K. Food seems to be just as expensive as the UK, and I did an online shop at Woolworths to check out the prices and a weekly shop came to £240.00 - that equates to £12K pa. Our mortgage would cost about $3k per month, and then there are all the other costs, so I think we would not be well off, but not struggle either. Of course the proof is in the pudding when we eventually arrive in November!!

[AlexUK]

We are a couple and will be earning between us about $10,500pm after tax, and plan to bring over £450K. Most of that though will be used for a deposit and although house prices are cheaper than here, we would be looking at buying a property in Auckland at around £700K. Food seems to be just as expensive as the UK, and I did an online shop at Woolworths to check out the prices and a weekly shop came to £240.00 - that equates to £12K pa. Our mortgage would cost about $3k per month, and then there are all the other costs, so I think we would not be well off, but not struggle either. Of course the proof is in the pudding when we eventually arrive in November!!

Jesus a £700k house, you could buy a nice place with that! Id go for one next to a lake personally, jet ski off the garden straight in, woo!

[welwynrose]

It depends on what your field is. Southland is a huge growth area in practical skills - they've just announced a major new dairy factory, there's a lot of farming, and they are currently exploring for oil under the western southland basin - even if you're not in these areas, the new workers for these projects will in turn need doctors, lawyers, plumbers, sparkies etc.

But, if you're coming to NZ for climate, then Southland probably isn't for you - it's much further south so temps are lower and we get the brunt of the southerly winds off Antarctica which can be icy. Snow is pretty rare in winter, but can happen.

People find they either love or hate Southland ... it's probably best to visit, if you can before tying yourself into a big commitment.

But for me, it's my "state" and my family is there and luckily I'm in a specialised industry and knew who to annoy until they gave me employment.

Feel free to ask any questions - or to Kat&bob who are also down south.

well after this years weather in the UK anything is an improvement :laugh - hubbys' a painter & decorator & I'm a bookkeeper/many other things so I was hoping one of use would be wanted somewhere in NZ

[Familyofmonkeys]

We are a couple and will be earning between us about $10,500pm after tax, and plan to bring over £450K. Most of that though will be used for a deposit and although house prices are cheaper than here, we would be looking at buying a property in Auckland at around £700K. Food seems to be just as expensive as the UK, and I did an online shop at Woolworths to check out the prices and a weekly shop came to £240.00 - that equates to £12K pa. Our mortgage would cost about $3k per month, and then there are all the other costs, so I think we would not be well off, but not struggle either. Of course the proof is in the pudding when we eventually arrive in November!!

That is way more than most people earn...you will be fine on that salary!

[Familyofmonkeys]

Jesus a £700k house, you could buy a nice place with that! Id go for one next to a lake personally, jet ski off the garden straight in, woo!

Did you mean £700k or $700k? The former would buy you a mansion here.....the latter would buy a newish large 4 bed in some areas of Auckland, and very little in other areas....price varies enormously depending on suburb.

[Belmont Babes]

We will be arriving with $540K approx and OH will be earning $45000 per annum which will increase once exams are sat. I hope to earn also but not too sure how much. Will we starve?
Don't drink or smoke but have healthy appetites. Family of four

[IanW99]

We will be arriving with $540K approx and OH will be earning $45000 per annum which will increase once exams are sat. I hope to earn also but not too sure how much. Will we starve?
Don't drink or smoke but have healthy appetites. Family of four

There have been people on this forum who have earned a lot more than that and struggled and although it is the average wage in NZ it is definitely on the low side if you want to be comfortable. IMO You would definitely have little left over for those emergencies.

That said, sure plenty of others would say no problems.

I can tell you that after being in NZ for a year, checking the finances showed that without any loans (mortgage etc) we could easily survive on one wage of $45K for a family of 4.

You are bringing over enough capital to not need a mortgage (or a very small one), so don't think you will starve :) but it does really depend on your lifestyle.

Ian

[mclarity]

We are a couple and will be earning between us about $10,500pm after tax, and plan to bring over £450K. Most of that though will be used for a deposit and although house prices are cheaper than here, we would be looking at buying a property in Auckland at around £700K. Food seems to be just as expensive as the UK, and I did an online shop at Woolworths to check out the prices and a weekly shop came to £240.00 - that equates to £12K pa. Our mortgage would cost about $3k per month, and then there are all the other costs, so I think we would not be well off, but not struggle either. Of course the proof is in the pudding when we eventually arrive in November!!

Maybe an idea to not buy the £700K house and instead buy a £350k house (which still translates to a lovely house) and use the rest of your money to buy what you need and invest with? Surely then you will be mortgage free and with those big salaries you will be well off? Or am I missing the plot?

[emotony]

I got my £ and $'s mixed up and couldn't find a way of editing the msg. :o

All the references should read $'s and as Family of Monkeys mentioned $700 does not necessarily buy you a lot of house in some areas. I do see your point about being mortgage free, on the other hand if we have an property in a desirable and popular area and I'm thinking of Ponsonby, Parnell, Freemans Bay, Grafton, central and Titiranga, then I think we would see an appreciable increase in value over time.

[stu70]

I do see your point about being mortgage free, on the other hand if we have an property in a desirable and popular area and I'm thinking of Ponsonby, Parnell, Freemans Bay, Grafton, central and Titiranga, then I think we would see an appreciable increase in value over time.

Don't count on the NZ property market to keep going up. Be very careful, it takes only a bit of something to throw the market off the balance. Look at America, NZ realestate is not safe from correction either. As an immigrant I would be careful with my investment. Unlike the locals, you do not have the same comfort zones in a new place and overexposing yourself to risks can have a very negative impact with not much to fall back on (in terms of support systems and network). Cheers

[swissmissdesigner]

Don't count on the NZ property market to keep going up. Be very careful, it takes only a bit of something to throw the market off the balance. Look at America, NZ realestate is not safe from correction either. As an immigrant I would be careful with my investment. Unlike the locals, you do not have the same comfort zones in a new place and overexposing yourself to risks can have a very negative impact with not much to fall back on (in terms of support systems and network). Cheers

Stu77: you so right! My 3+2 bedroom condo property value US $550,000
was last year.
I just replaced all windows/doors (doubble glazed and tinting) I also remodeled the bathrooms. After the "big crash" my property value is only $490,000!

[Familyofmonkeys]

Don't count on the NZ property market to keep going up. Be very careful, it takes only a bit of something to throw the market off the balance. Look at America, NZ realestate is not safe from correction either. As an immigrant I would be careful with my investment. Unlike the locals, you do not have the same comfort zones in a new place and overexposing yourself to risks can have a very negative impact with not much to fall back on (in terms of support systems and network). Cheers

Prices have dropped very slightly in some areas already in the last 2 months. There will be a price correction at some points. Also, if you have a british accent while house hunting...they seem to think you are stupid and don't realise how overinflated marketed prices are in Auckland. We have seen things on the market in our area that were there 3 months ago....and the prices have dropped significantly. This occurs even more so in desirable areas....beware before you buy, and go and look at alot of houses.

[AlexUK]

Prices have dropped very slightly in some areas already in the last 2 months. There will be a price correction at some points. Also, if you have a british accent while house hunting...they seem to think you are stupid and don't realise how overinflated marketed prices are in Auckland. We have seen things on the market in our area that were there 3 months ago....and the prices have dropped significantly. This occurs even more so in desirable areas....beware before you buy, and go and look at alot of houses.

So the moral of the story is: Enquire about all properties online first, if you give them a current NZ address they wont know your british, and by the time you go to view the properties you still find are interesting, you will find that you already have the prices and therefore they are unable to take advantage.

[swissmissdesigner]

So the moral of the story is: Enquire about all properties online first, if you give them a current NZ address they wont know your british, and by the time you go to view the properties you still find are interesting, you will find that you already have the prices and therefore they are unable to take advantage.


Good point Alex!

[AlexUK]

Good point Alex!

TY, with more and more house listings online now its much easier to do this and it will save you quite a bit!

Doesnt mean though you still cant try and haggle the price.

[Nick88]

I'd be inclined to rent for at least 6 months, there is no substitute for local knowledge in the property market. Plus if prices are going to ease you will be well placed to take advantage. Renting is cheaper than mortgage interest rates, anyway, by as much as half. You might as well have the landlord subsidise your accommodation for as long as you can.

[TheLanes]

Hi

For your information, my OH is a carpenter on $20 per hour (seems to be average for trade) this pays our rent of $300 per week, food/wine (!) of approx. $250 which leaves approx. $150 per week for all bills (whilst renting this is only electricity/phone) - so as you can see wages are unrealistic if you do not have a substantial amount of money in the bank earning at least 7.5% interest.

THIS IS WHY THERE ARE SKILLED SHORTAGES IN NZ AND EVERYONE HAS LEFT FOR AUSSIE

PS This is a lovely country though and we are pleased to be here!!

[AlexUK]

I suppose higher interest rates help, stick a few hundred k in the bank and it will certainly add to the income!

[Familyofmonkeys]

So the moral of the story is: Enquire about all properties online first, if you give them a current NZ address they wont know your british, and by the time you go to view the properties you still find are interesting, you will find that you already have the prices and therefore they are unable to take advantage.

Most property seems to have Open Homes here, rather than advertised in Estate Agents sites as in UK. Many do not have set price, but are marketed by tender or negotiation or auction. This happens after lots of people have viewed property at open home. This means that it can be hard to get a feel for true value unless you have looked at enough to get a feel for local market. Also some people are happy to leave an over priced property on market for a long time and wait for some poor mug from abroad to buy it at overinflated price, that a local would not pay:( We have also found that when you enquire about property online, the agents end up phoning you back anyway to try and do hard sell....so they hear your accent!

[AlexUK]

Just dont tell them your phone number.

[Familyofmonkeys]

Just dont tell them your phone number.

That would be fine, except the form that pops up to fill in your contact details for further information often has this as a required field, so it will not submit rest of request for info without this....you just get error message. Also, it is probably alot easier and less time consuming to pick up the phone and call someone than responding to an e-mail. We have found that you often do not get replys from messages very quickly. This is not to say all agents work like this, but we have found alot do. I suppose you could always make up a number, but this is where it starts getting silly:roll . I think they do this so that only serious buyers go to open homes i.e. less work for agents, especially if they are after a quick sale.They also do not always put address of property on their marketing stuff, so you cannot always go and sus out an area before you go to an open home. I suppose this is so that you only see a property at its best, at sunniest warm, quiet time of day etc.

[AlexUK]

Look if it saves you thousands of dollars trying to get the information by email is worth it.

[John Z]

I don't understand why you would have to act like being someone else.

If you don't want to pay the price they're asking, you don't buy it.

I'm from the Netherlands and sure I don't need an accent (although I was told my english sounds like being native-english... :cool: ) to suggest I'm not a Kiwi. When I see property that I'm interested in, I make sure to know what the going price is for the same kind of property in different areas and then decide whether or not that property is worth it for me in that place or not. You have to investigate yourself, be informed.

Who's the boss?

[AlexUK]

You dont pretend to be someone else, you just dont tell them who you are.

[swissmissdesigner]

I think Alex's point is more to protect himself as a buyer in a situation like that..Not to pretend that he is someone else, as he already wrote.

A lot of realestate brokers deserved being called evil!

Anna

[John Z]

I think I would be the last to doubt that Anna!

:cheers John Z

[Familyofmonkeys]

I think Alex's point is more to protect himself as a buyer in a situation like that..Not to pretend that he is someone else, as he already wrote.

A lot of realestate brokers deserved being called evil!

Anna

In our experience so far, there are some reputable agents out there, who work very hard for their money...but there are also those who try every trick in the book. I think you just need to be aware of their little ways. We have looked at some houses, and turned round to the agents and said we liked the house but the asking price is not realistic. Now some will actually agree with you, but admit the vendor wants them to try and get more than they realistically are likely to get ....and there are other agents that will argue black is blue and try and convince you the house is priced at market value.

[swissmissdesigner]

In our experience so far, there are some reputable agents out there, who work very hard for their money...but there are also those who try every trick in the book. I think you just need to be aware of their little ways. We have looked at some houses, and turned round to the agents and said we liked the house but the asking price is not realistic. Now some will actually agree with you, but admit the vendor wants them to try and get more than they realistically are likely to get ....and there are other agents that will argue black is blue and try and convince you the house is priced at market value.

Absolutely, I agree with you. They are some very nice agents out there. (Not that many. :o ) The best to go with recommendation.

[Nick88]

I'm beginning to feel like a broken record.....

You need local knowledge to make a huge commitment like buying property, and you can only get this by living locally for at least 6 months. Many agents are frankly incompetent, and make up for it by being a bit sharp, so do not trust them. They do not work for you or the vendor, they are looking out for No1. The only possible way to get the services of a good one is to get recommendations and then approach the agent to act as a buying agent, and they split the commission with the listing agent. This is still far from perfect, but it might give you a bit more control over the buying process.

Take the emotion out of it, and make it a business transaction.

[willsken]

I'm beginning to feel like a broken record.....

You need local knowledge to make a huge commitment like buying property, and you can only get this by living locally for at least 6 months.
I agree about the local knowledge but I don’t think it has to take 6 months to get it. I would never buy a house in an area I hadn’t been to. Example, when we were still in the UK I saw a property on the Internet that I fell in love with. 2 minute drive from town, 2 acres, stables, lots of trees everywhere etc etc. I wanted it so much and was quite cross OH wouldn’t hear of me putting in an offer. I emailed the estate agent and they were really positive about the property. OH wouldn’t budge and the property ended up selling. I was so disappointed. Anyway a while after we arrived we were at a BBQ and I was talking to someone, telling them about this property I’d fallen in love with and lost. Turns out, the place was a lemon. Sectioned off by a farmer because he couldn’t use it due to flooding problems. Also when we drove down to see it, it wasn’t as stunning as it looked in the photos.

[moppet]

Very interesting reading and a little scary when we will have to buy a home in the not too distant future.

Does anyone have any recommendations of good agents or very bad ones for that matter it would be very helpful to have so advise from people who have been through the buying process already. Please feel free to pm me if you’d rather not post the details on the forum. We are looking at Auckland, Howick and anywhere within a 45-minute drive of Auckland Airport.

Thanks

[gil]

Hi Moppet,
We live in Bucklands Beach and bought our house through Bayleys, specifically Kevin Barber, who was excellent. Be aware that currently, each person who acts under the umbrella name of a realty group is acting as a self-employed individual. My understanding is that there is legislation in the pipeline that means estate agencies will only be allowed to employ people, not act as umbrellas for the self-employed. That will be a different kettle of fish! So, just because we had a good experience with Bayleys via Kevin Barber, doesn't mean that ALL Bayleys guys are of the same ilk.

We know an estate agent here (NOT from Bayleys, I hasten to add!) who, when we were viewing a property through an agent from the same group (OK, it was Ray White's) that was not listed with her, appeared with one of her clients and came up to us, took us aside and said "If you're interested, don't ring XX who it's listed with, ring me". :eek: Even if we had been interested, we would not have rung her!!

Point being the one that has been made many times on this forum: it's the individual, not the company.

Howick is a great place to live, so happy hunting,

Gil

[Silverwing86]

I agree with you Willsken that although you definitely need to go see for yourself, it doesn't necessarily have to take 6 months to get to know an area. There is much research you can do before getting here so that once you are here, you're well informed on most of the non-emotional things. From there you check it out for yourself to get a 'feel' of a place and talk to as many people as you can. It can be done.

Now I won't suggest doing what we did (although it wasn't in any way our plan, believe me :eek:!!), which is to buy within the first three weeks of arriving ! However, due to the research we had done beforehand, we knew most of the important things we needed to and didn't need much time to add the missing pieces that could not be found out from afar.

And yes, the vendor did try to pressure us into paying his asking price (wouldn't budge initially), so we walked away from it (twice !). We knew how much we were prepared to pay as we didn't want to overstretch ourselves in any way (never a good idea IMO as you can never look into the future and we felt the strong need to have contingency plans in place), and stuck to that religiously.

In fact, since the vendor was so reluctant to 'play the game' that is called 'negotiation', we actually ended up offering him less than we had initially decided upon, just out of frustration with him ! If he had played the game nicely, he would have gotten a better deal from us !

As it happens we were lucky, the vendor eventually changed his tune, I guess he really had to sell, and we managed to agree on the (lower than planned) price. For all his macho attitude of not wanting to budge on his asking price, in the end we managed to negotiate $ 22.500 off of that !

Point of all this being of course, that if you've done the research and know the value of a property in relation to the current market, location, school zones etc. (if you know your stuff, you're also less likely to be bowled over by an agent), and what it's worth to you, decide on your maximum price and stick to it, no matter what ! There are plenty of houses out there, if it's meant to be, it will happen. If not, there's always another one around the corner...

And if you get a feeling that an agent is not being straight with you, there's no reason not to say something about it and walk away, is there ?? It's not like they have the power, after all they want the sale to get their commission and you have the money in your pocket to make the deal happen, so IMO that puts the power with you !

By the way, we actually had very good experiences with our agents. They were very accommodating and ended up sacrificing a substantial percentage of their commission just to make the deal work. There were also other costs involved because the vendor didn't play nice (he behaved abominably in fact !), but they took those upon themselves as well, without us having to ask for it ! We were suitably impressed !

Silver

[Silverwing86]

By the way Alex, I just went back to your original post and realised that we've digressed considerably from you original question :o. Oh the intricacies and intrigue of housebuying, sooo distracting :laugh !

To answer that original question; we are a couple with no children, a sizeable mortgage (> 400K) and a joint income of just over $ 100K. The budget shows that we are doing very well financially, however I must mention that we have changed the way we shop for consumables quite considerably. If we hadn't changed our set habits I think we wouldn't be as comfortable as we are.

Hope this helps...

Silver

[AlexUK]

Lol thanks silverwing

[moppet]

Thanks Gil that's great

[hoffenberg]

in my case we got a place to stay in new zealand. it is a frind of our family and she said its ok if we come to stay by her. what is the required amount for us in this case

[immortal167]

we are just about to leave, but we found that with a small mortgage and a combined salary of $130k we did ok. Not great, but ok. Didn't need to budget or anything but weren't driving new cars or buying Gucci.