[Maggiemoo]

This is such an emotive topic isn't it? ?I think its very refreshing to have some real debate about what makes NZ work for some people and not for others. ?I am sure most of you here are aware that we have made the decision to head back to UK early next year, and one of the main reasons for us is that financially it doesn't make sense for us to be here. ?We are really struggling financially, which we never really did in the UK. ?Before anyone weighs in and tells me I should budget more carefully and drive 30km to save 50c off a bag of apples, can I please say that I am very very careful with what I spend at the supermarket, but I am just not prepared to compromise on certain things (like decent nappies and wipes for my kids - the cheap ones bring them out in the most hideous rash, and I am not prepared to inflict that on my kids for the sake of a couple of dollars). ?I did a small shop at New World the other day, just for things like milk, bread, baby wipes, household cleaning products etc etc, and it came to $115. ?I came home and "did" the same shop on Waitrose online, and it came to ?50. ?

Before we came over here, my husband (who works in IT) was earning approx ?300 a day, and only worked 3 days a week. ?Now he brings home the equivalent of about ?350 a week working 5 days, so we are much much worse off, and he is on a very very good wage compared to many others I know here, both ex-pat and kiwi. ?

Obviously we knew that wages were lower, but we have been surprised by how much an everyday shop costs - wine is now a treat rather than a normal addition to the shopping basket!!! ?The other thing that has really hit us hard is the high mortgage rate here, we have a smaller mortgage than we had in UK, but pay more than we did in the UK, again when you relate this back to the wages we get, its hard to make ends meet. ?No wonder the figure of 70% of income being used to pay mortgage is not uncommon here.

Also going back to something MB said in one of her posts - there are an awful lot of smart new cars being driven by New Zealanders, this does not necessarily reflect on their ability to actually be able to afford them!! ?When we went to trade in our lovely estate car for one of those people carrier things that I always told myself I wouldn't ever have (!!), the guy at the garage said that it was very very unusual for someone to pay cash for a car, 99% of the ones he sold were to people who were financing themselves to the limit, and he couldn't give us a discount for cash as they don't make money on them!! ?I can well believe a previous poster's comments that some Kiwis owe around $50k on credit cards and the like, I know a lot of them!! ?We too could go down that route, but for the sake of my kids and my sanity, I'm not going to!!

Anyway, enough of my rant and rage about money!! ?

I'm off to eat cheap chocolate!!

Maggie