What kind of salary would you need to be comfortable in Sydney?

[marialuisa]

DH has been encouraged to apply for a job in Sydney. The salary would be approx $100k which is less than he's on in the UK when I converted it to £. Is that a reasonable amount of money to live on in Sydney or would it mean having to live in a bad area etc.?

[ninedragons]

That's a pretty good salary for Sydney - I think average for Sydney is in the region of about A$60,000, and Australia-wide it's about A$52,000. In my experience, most things are the same number as in London but in AUD rather than GBP, so a bottle of wine that's A$20 would be GBP20 in London. A smallish house in a perfectly decent but not amazing inner suburb would be A$500,000, rather than GBP500,000.

You certainly won't be slumming it!

[marialuisa]

Cheers, I work f/t here but obviously no idea if I'd be able to find anything out there.

[hannahsaunt]

ML - is it $100k hard cash or is it actually $60k in salary and the rest made up in benefits? If the former, should be ok I think depending on what standard of living you are used to here...

[marialuisa]

$100k salary + benefits, pension etc. As I work f/t we have a reasonable but not extravagant lifestyle. It is quite a bit less than he gets now but we're not sure how much lower the cost of living is out there.

[SweetyDarling]

Will he qulify for a "living away from home allowance"? Can make a big difference.
How many in your family?
What do you do? Do you know if you are allowed to work?