WHERE'S BEST TO LIVE IN NZ AND WHAT DO WE NEED TO KNOW: PART 5!

[AngryBeaver]

Look at us Chatty Cathy's!
Justa oh nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
(I'm not sure )

Woo hoo xMinerva! Fingers crossed it all goes smoothly. We'll be (relatively speaking) neighbours!

yay xminerva :-) am now vicariously living through anyone that actually manages to find a house!

we even offered more money, because of the dog. they said no. i mean, how increadibly stupid is that?

Frik, where are you looking? We've seen a few that have said they'll be ok with a well behaved dog.

I was looking into getting a dog myself and a couple of dogs owners have told me that landlords tend to be more accepting if they can meet the dog, you offer an extra bond/deposit and have it written into the contract that you'll have the carpets professionally cleaned when you leave.

Oh and thank-you all. :)

What's an e valuation? Last time it sold was 12 years ago apparently.

Oh I feel hrphmmmm. I'm all hot and bothered. Packing for weekend away and I HATE packing.

Tbh I have a price in mind for that house I don't want to pay over as its not dream house. If it goes above I won't feel cheated or upset.

Why is it so hard to just buy a bloody house. I was duped in Scotland with sealed bids and over here you have to fight it out on the patio. Can they no' just put a price on it and be done?! (in scots accent)

There's a company called QV that do online valuations for houses, you can buy a report from them. Tbh though, they don't actually see the inside of the house or anything, I think they just base their valuation on CV and the recent selling price of similar houses in the same area, so I'm not sure if they are really worth getting.

Yep, I thought it was hard buying a place in the UK where we were up against cash buyers all the time. But the bays are something else. I reckon the best thing you can do is research, research, research, then decide what YOU think it is worth. We had a couple of valuations done and after a few months of looking we were pretty accurate.

tauranga xminerva, and yes, the problem is that the dog will only be joining us about a month after we arrive, so, have to rent with landlords not being able to meet the dog.

i did say to DH, what happens if people are already renting somewhere and then get a dog? do they get evicted? it seems mad. apartments i can understand, but houses with gardens?

I thought Kiwis loved their dogs - is it a big one?

Yay, xminerva, great news.

That house is nice lolly, it would be nice to feel settled somewhere.
Really frustrating though, the way they price or don't price properties!
I have been scouring property porn all nigt and the amount of times I want to scream "Just tell me the 'effin price!" is shocking.

frick, is it a huge beast? It is weird they don't like renting to dog owners.
I was trying to persuade dh to buy a szhitsu, when we first moved here and rang the owners to see how they felt. The said as long as it wasn't a big bastard that would scratch the floors with it's nails, it would be ok!
Maybe that's why? Lots of wood floors here.
Hope you get it sorted.

Browns Bay nice - went there the other day and had lovely day on the beach.

AB if you're looking at Auckland property, do you know you can look up the CV online to get an idea of the value - obviously some houses sell for much more than CV, but it gives you a rough idea.

No, dog is small to medium sized, never dug a hole, scratched a floor, eaten a carpet, messed indoors once. Ever. Even having moved country with us 4 times and she has lived with us in an apartment, and houses with gardens. Literally best behaved most politely mannered dog ever. We get complimented on her all the time, my dog is actually better travelled and mannered than many people! But obviously that's beside the point, I just don't understand the issue with renting and pets in the first place.

The only people in my house now, and until Sunday afternoon, I either married or gave birth to. AND we have absolutely no plans of any description, except perhaps to watch whatever we want on TV, not set the table properly for dinner & stay in our pyjamas longer than is polite in the mornings

I love visitors and all of mine have been very helpful. But it's so lovely and quiet even with my two crazies

Waves to AB as she passes through Cambridge

C'mere lolly! Come on in for a cuppa

justa sounds great. Have just met up with a friend who has been in Piha over the hols. She said there is such a thing as "The Piha Sprint". Apparantly,the sand is so hot,that that is what people do, when they emerge from the water!

Oh we ended up at Piha a couple weekends ago.

Totally by accident mind.

We decided to "drive west" spent 2 hours lost in the bloody rainforest, saw the beach, drove back again stopping off at a little restaurant called Elevation which had amazing views right over to Auckland City and the sky tower, then came home exhausted.

I get 2nd dibs on the dog!

Elevation has great views.

Just been to outdoor cinema at Silo Park in the city, recommended - market and food stalls there too.

Hi ladies, hope you dont mind me joining in its been really interesting reading your posts even if took me a while to get through it all :) We are a family of 6 moving over to NZ in June this year, the plan is to rent a house for around a year before we buy. I am trying to work on a rough budget for our living costs but to be honest it all seems very expensive compared to the UK especially the food! Below is what Ive come up with so far, I would be really grateful if you could give me your opinion on whether you think Im way over/under on things. We will be renting in the Warkworth/Rodney area and rentals seem to be around 600-650ish a month for a 4/5 bed house there.
Rental House 2500
Groceries 1500
Phone 40
Decent broadband 150
Mobile ph ones 100
Car Fuel 300
Power/Gas 300
Water 125
Days out etc 500
Clothing,Books, Hair etc 550
Doctors 40
Dental 50
Council rates(approx) 180
Other 300

Thank you so much for any help with this! Hope you are all enjoying summer in NZ, its wet and miserable here ;-)

Hi, Flora, ok

Rent- you could pay 650/week for a house in Rodney but somewhere like Stanmore Bay has 4 beds in the 500s.

Groceries - we are a family of 4 plus dog. I spend 700-800 a month being fairly careful with what I buy.

Phone and Internet - $85 a month plus toll calls (local ones are free). We get 50gb, I think there are some unlimited data deals around. We never run out.

Mobiles, Er, I spend about 10 a month if that, dh is on a contract, think its 39 a month or something? My dcs are too young for phones

Fuel, totally depends how far your commute(s) are. Yesterday price at our local garage was $2.02 a litre for petrol. I prob spend 70 a month, dh at least twice that so your figure of 300 is prob about right.

Power, ours averages at 170 a month, down to about 120 in summer, up to about 250 in winter. We're quite hardy though re cold houses

Water, between50-60 a month

Days out, hmm, how long is a piece of string etc. I spend nothing like 500. Yesterday I went to a big park and the dcs scootered/biked around. In the evening I went to free outdoor cinema and spent $5 on food, took a couple of beers with me to have there. Today I'm going to the beach. My dcs are quite young though so are fine with free stuff. Like th UK or anywhere - a lot of the costs depend on where you go, age of kids, do you take food with you for a day out or do you buy it there etc.

Clothing, books, hair, again nothing like 500! I get books from Book Depository in the UK or the library. I prob don't even spend 50 a month on all those things but I am a second- hand shop sort of person and hate going to the hairdressers so put it off! For my 5 yo I pay $8 a cut and my 2 yo $2 a cut but that is exceptionally cheap.

My drs is 17/visit for adult, $11 child aged 6-18, free under 5. That's at the lower end of the price scale. I have paid as much as $55 an adult at my old surgery (the care I get now is just as good)

Dental, depends if you have shit teeth like me :-). Filling is about 120. Clean by the hygienist 90. Root canal would be 1000 +

Our rates are 150/ month

Others - schools ask for a donation, technically it's voluntary, I don't know how many pay. Mine is 100/ year. Uniforms are more expensive here, no packs of polo shirts for £10 but lots of primaries don't have a uniform.

Er, what else, insurance, we pay $175 a month for house, contents and 2 cars

We have Sky for 70/ month.

I can't think of anything else for now but this is quite long enough. Where will your job(s) be? Rodney has some lovely areas and cheaper houses than closer to the city.

Hi whatshesaid thanks for the reply, thats good to know that we could probably live alot cheaper then if we tried! I bumped the days out up a bit to include things like the kids sports clubs/swimming lessons/birthdays etc which cost us a small fortune at the moment but would be good if we could reduce it down a bit more. We love the cheap and free activities too and hopefully will be able to do more outdoorsy things in nz which would be great. I had completely forgotten about insurance, I'll add that onto my list. Thank you! :))

To be fair though, prices have gone up quite a bit in the last few years. Property prices seem to be rising fairly fast in and around Auckland at the moment. It's good to be realistic too.

Sports clubs etc, I don't know, prices are maybe comparable to the UK? we pay 10/week for gymnastics and swimming lessons are about 19 I think.

Warkworth/Rodney are very nice, a long commute to the city though - better if work is on the North Shore.

Oh and you should add car regos to your list - like road tax - 280 a year per car (more for 4WDs). And WOFs which are like MOTs, need to be done every 6 months, costs about $50. Plus car services, repairs etc. AA breakdown etc cover is 120 a year for 2 of us.