Sydney Salaries

[Stace]

Sooooo of course money is a large part of a big move - I've asked lots of questions on this already with friends in Aus, but would love to know what yooooou think is a good joint annual salary for us as a couple. Let's say for joint income around $170,000pa + super ? We want to be able to have kids, save for travel, have a good lifestyle

[monsta]

Visit peoplelikeu.com.au and fill in your details as if you live in a few suburbs. I always fill it in again and add 10% to my salary. If there are way more peeps earning 10% more than me in a suburb, then its a clue that that suburb may be out if my price range.

You really want to be around people like yourselvs. People differ all over Sydney. If you go to Mosman its company directors and "old money". By the time you hit Penrith you find people who pack boxes in warehouses for a living. In Mosman a good night out would be to see the local Symphony Orchestra play. In Penrith a good time can be had at the eastern creek motor speedway or you can drink the night away at the Rooty Hill RSL.

Is $170 000 enough to live in Mosman? No. Is it enough to live in Penrith? For sure. Realistically $170 000 is more Ryde, Carlingford or the hills (e.g. Baulkam Hills). Those are nice, above average neighbourhoods.

But, if you do want to buy a property and not rent, you might have to look at a very average suburb like seven hills. Seven hills is south of the M2 motorway and a lot more middle class than say Castle Hill. When people say, "the hills" they mean the suburbs north of the M2.

Unfortunately property investors have pushed up the prices of property and have forced many people into life long renting . Investors are paying huge prices for properties considering what they can be rented for.

Edited August 19, 2015 by monsta

[Stace]

Monsta that's awesome info, thanks a million for you help. I will attempt those two links you provided and see what magic I can come up with

We will definitely be renting for the foreseeable future That's how we've felt in SA too, they make it so hard to

The areas you've mentioned in your post are ones I've not even heard of or been told about, so I'm excited to check them out! Ryde would be best for us from those I think.

We definitely want to be close-ish to the city itself, as my husband will be based in Erskineville for work, don't mind a bit of a commute but not too hectic - but also close as possible to some type of water, whether it's a bay or beach.

We looooove the look and sound & lifestyle type in Manly but think it might be just too far. We have friends in such different parts of Sydney....Surry Hills, Dee Why, Bondi & Tamarama. But our thing is that we'd like to have a little house with a nice courtyard or garden, as we have two little dogs who will be joining us. Even a ground floor apartment with yard area. It's amazing how different one suburb can be from the next when they are right next door!

Thanks again for your links!

[AFreshStart]

I agree with Monsta for the most part, but I don't think the numbers give all the facts.

For example he's right, it shares Ryde for us, but a far better option for transport links, open space and family life would be Leichhardt. Likewise on picking an area with larger numbers, well that doesn't always work either. For example based on salary, gender, family make up and property, there are 35 people like us Waterloo, 60 in Surry Hills and less in Redfern, but the numbers grow daily of people are choosing to stay in the city with families. Our son's school is the fatest growing in NSW and is at capacity with over 300 students and 33 Kinys enrolled for next year already... crazy!

While the numbers suggest Ryde would be a better mix, I'd take Leichhardt in a flash, chalk and cheese, but for our current lifestyle and family make up, despite only having 1/4 the number of people like us, Waterloo is still a better fit.

So the tools are super helpful, and you glean good insight, experience trumps it.

RE the garden, loads of terraced homes have gardens and you'll find them in Surry Hills, Newtown, Erskineville, Alexandria, Waterloo etc.

But as I've shared in another post, childcare is killer, so if you earning $170k, you hack off $35k per child under 6, if you have two kids and you are down to $100k, we couldn't survive on that here in Waterloo and you certainly wouldn't in Surry Hills, Newtown or Erskinville.

That is why people choose to move further away, to lower expenses, or some scale back from a 3-bedroom terrace to 2-bedroom apartment and still have benefits of city living, it's always going to be a compromise.

Cheers

Matt

Edited August 19, 2015 by AFreshStart

[Stace]

Awesome that's so much info, my mind is boggled !! Thank you & thank you again

But like you say, so many things can make a difference eg: childcare. We don't have kids yet, but have to factor it in, as its being worked on for a year already, and par for the course. Hopefully by the time the second one arrives, we'll have PR by then Now I have lots to google this evening !

It's pretty fascinating how different it is to SA in soooo many ways!

[AFreshStart]

MrsSmith,

As a point of clarification PR doesn't help with childcare, you get a the rebate of $7,500 (though this is set to changes), but at $170k you are well over the limit for getting ANY family tax benefit.

Up until the age of 6, and then only if you make use of public school your children are your expense, PR or not, the only benefit would be not paying school fees, but even then on a 457 a year of school fees in NSW would be $4,000, a year of play school is $35,000+

Having two kids in childcare is $70k, in those cases either one parent stays home or you might hire an au pair, which is much cheaper than daycare, but has it's own issues, you need to have an extra room as they live in etc.

Hence why I shared in another post, don't rush into having kids as they change everything, spend some time settling in, get jobs, save and plan for what you'll do when you do have kids.

Cheers

Matt

[Stace]

Thanks so much Matt, that actually makes it alot clearer (and more scary), really appreciate your time and advice. Will definitely take our time settling in and saving. This move seems somewhat a heck of alot more complicated, as it can definitely be forever!

[Sassyninja]

Geez and I thought 170K was decent. Is Grade R part of public schooling?

[AFreshStart]

MrsSmith,

It is harder, but no more so than being in say London or New York with young kids, which have similar costs attached to them. This is the reality of living in a first world country where labour is expensive, where people earn and pay a living wage. It's why you need to adjust your thinking to fit in. It's been said before, but Australia is the great leveler. If you were in the top 10% in South Africa wealth wise, here you are in the top 40-50%, if you are a Doctor or Lawyer you have a privelaged career in South Africa, here a teacher in a top end private school or tradesman who runs his own Reno company can earn salaries that rival those professions. It's the joy of a first world economy.

Sassyninja, $170k is massive if you don't have young kids, or aren't living in Sydney etc. But these factors play into it and how far your money goes. We earn less than that and are on a single income, I stay home with our young daughter, and will for another 2 years before she hits Kindy and have her in a daycare 2-3 days a week, but only 1 of those days is a personal day, just to recoup and sometimes for freelance work, the others are cleaning and admin days. A cleaner costs around $25-$30 an HOUR here, so you end up doing it yourself unless you are flush with cash, so we trade the money for daycare and I get to do the cleaning.

It's a season, we live frugal lives, and don't plan to increase our costs of living and are saving money, which is more than we did in South Africa, we have also bought an apartment and own a new car for cash, so we are privelaged, but Sydney, like London or New York is expensive.

School starts here at latest 6-years old, you can enroll the year you turn 5 as long as you're 5 before end Jun, but up till then day care for the most part is private, and so you are paying these heavy premiums.

Hope that helps.

Matt

Edited August 20, 2015 by AFreshStart

[monsta]

Hey Guys,

That was some good info from Matt. I said Ryde because I don't know the suburbs on the south side of Sydney...

To throw one more complication into the mix, you will need to think about super (retirement savings). Someone who has been living in Sydney since they started working will have saved considerably more towards their retirement. It could be even worse and they bought a house at the right time and place or they invested in sensible shares.

So, you will need to play catch up with your retirement savings. It's well worth it to pay the $300 per hour to see a financial planner and get an idea of how you can catch up.

You may need to pay off your house sooner, buy shares, do a salary sacrifice (I.e. pay more into your super), etc. But either way its going to cost you

So factor in that you may need to save a few thousand extra each year.

[AFreshStart]

Again, fully agree with Monsta,100%.

You HAVE to look at the future, it's easy to get lost in the now, the joy, the excitement, but start planning for your FUTURE.

In all fairness this is something we've done most of our lives. Neither my wife nor I came from money, we've built most of the wealth we have from good investments. We got into the property market young in South Africa and before the boom and with my handyman skills and background in interior design and landscaping were able to buy and flip 2 properties for double our investment costs, which is all well and good in SA, at 35 being able to buy a 3-4 bedroom house for cash, but when converted to Aus $ it's barely a deposit on an apartment

The FIRST thing we did when we landed was acquire a lawyer, financial adviser and mortgage broker.

Lawyer? Yes, we have 2 dependents, we needed a will and needed to define what would happen to our kids in the event of our deaths. Morbid? Maybe? A reality? Absolutely! To have our will drafted in Australia cost close on $2,000, let that sink in for a moment... but worth EVERY penny.

Financial adviser? Aside from investments what about death and disability cover? In the event of the loss of you or your partner, what would be required to take care of your kids, alone, in a new country where you bleed money you don't have? Make sure you cover yourselves sufficiently. We are all going to die, it's a just a matter of when, not if, I'm at peace knowing that in either of our deaths we have covered ourselves and our growing families needs.

My wife is in Finance so in our case we knew enough about investments to know we need to make them! In our case we bought over all our cash, cashed in RA's, mutual funds and the income from property sales, incurring the tax costs (ouch), but would far rather have our money working for us on this side of the pond.

Interest rates on savings here is shockingly low, so keeping it in the bank at best is going to earn you 3-4% return, so you need to find a way to make your money work for you. See a financial planner, start investing.

In our case it's why we needed a mortage broker, he was able to get us pre-approval on our bond and so we knew what we could afford with our deposit (our savings and capital) and so when it came to investing we chose property, which depending on the suburb has 10-15% year on year growth. I won't begin to describe the process, suffice to say I looked at 30 properties, inspected 10, lost an auction to one and bought ours in a private deal with agents who pulled the property off the auction market.

We got a deal and having pre-approval helped and allowed us to make a firm offer, which was accepted and weeks later the neighbours home sold for $12,000 more than our offer (it's the mirror image of ours) and since then another in the building has gone for $40,000 above our purchase price just 4 months ago. The rental market is incredibly strong here and the weekly rent would cover our mortgage repayments and we are currently on interest only for 3-years and so this is allowing us to build back savings after wiping them out on the deposit.

My wife is ploughing what she can into her super, and trust me when I go back to work I plan to salary sacrifice it all to further build it up. The key is you get to a quality of life you are content with, where your basic needs are met and stay there, when you earn more, save, don't spend! We are debt free, outside of mortgage and have no consumer debt. It's easy enough to get into debt in South Africa, it's WAY easier here, people giving away credit, selling you crap you don't need. DON'T DO IT!

You need a LONG TERM approach to savings, use the joy of compound interest. Most millionaires didn't become millionaires overnight, they just planned well, they suffered short term for long term gains.

Sorry to have derailed the thread a bit, but really just wanted to back Monsta up on his sage advice and these are BIG factors to consider in where you plan on spending your money.

Cheers

Matt

Edited August 20, 2015 by AFreshStart

[Donovan83]

Unfortunately property investors have pushed up the prices of property and have forced many people into life long renting . Investors are paying huge prices for properties considering what they can be rented for.

Don't get too despondent... a correction to this situation is imminent. The only reason these "investors" keep buying and pushing up prices is based on the expectation of further price increases. Eventually we'll run out of bigger fools and prices will return to normal.

I'm absolutely blown away by how much it costs to have children here. $35,000 per child per year is absolutely astronomical. I now understand why some (local) friends chose for mum to stay home with the children rather than work - I think if she did work, they'd potentially actually be going backwards (2 kids and she wouldn't earn more than about $65,000 - $75,000).

I didn't know any of these figures until I read them here... I wasn't all that keen on children anyway, but now I'm really not keen. Hectic.

[rozellem]

You will be just fine. Be wise with your money, dont spend it all like there is no tomorrow (apply standard logic) and put some away for the kids pre school years. Think outside the RSA box of sticking a kid in for 5 full days of care a week. Most mums I know here in Sydney,work at least part of the week. If not for your own sanity (seriously, kids can be life-sapping), or to help with the fees, then to keep your hand in for when you go back to work at some stage. There are also loads of types of child care. Check out some Au Pair websites. When my Aussie nieces, from the Sunshine Coast, came down to Sydney to Au Pair, they earned around $200 per week. They got their accommodation and food supplied, and soon got other work (swim instructor, waitress) in their free time and saved up loads of $$$. Both stayed with the same host family for 2 years, only leaving to go to Uni.

[AFreshStart]

$35,000 is based on the assumption your child is in daycare 5-days a week, most of the year and this will differ depending on their rates.

Currently in Sydney, particularly in the city it's about supply and demand unfortunately. We know some people paying as much as $165 a day, we pay $125 and friends in Leichhardt are paying $140 a day.

The thing is with private options you have the choice of leaving your child there for 11-12 hours, we don't, but many have to with their work hours. Since they are private they get to to pick their pricing.

We had our name down at no less than SIX day cares for a SINGLE day before one opened up and in time were able to extend this to 2-3 days a week.

While there are cheaper options like KU's, they work around the school term, so you need to find alternatives for school holidays and for the most part they only have capacity to take your kids 2-3 days a week. So as RozelleM shared give up the notion of 5-days a week unless you are flushed with cash.

It's why I recommended the au pair route, particularly if you have 2-kids, but there are caveats, they can only work so many hours a week, as shared you pay for food and lodging as well, which is massive if you live in the City. If you have 2 young kids they can share a room and you another, so can get away with 2-rooms, moving from a 2 to 3 bedroom home can make an $800-$1000 difference in monthly rentals, so while cheaper, it still costly. Child costs here are expensive by comparison and it's probably a good idea to have in your mind before you make the move.

Donovan83, yip, that's day care for you and why I stay home. I'd rather have this time at home with our kids than be slaving away only to watch it all disappear and have someone else raising my kids, but each to their own.

It's a shock for those coming from South Africa because informal labour is so inexpensive, but as shared, no different from the annual childcare costs in New York City ($35,000 AUS) or London ($65,000AUS).

Cheers

Matt

[Sassyninja]

Hi Matt

I just read that the childcare rebate is not income tested.
http://www.humanservices.gov.au/customer/services/centrelink/child-care-rebate?utm_id=10

"You may be eligible for Child Care Rebate if:

• you use a Child Care Benefit approved child care service
• you are eligible for Child Care Benefit, even if you earn too much to receive payment, and
• you and your partner meet the Work, Training, Study test or are exempt from it

Child Care Rebate is not income tested."

[AFreshStart]

SassyNinja,

Yes, no contention there, it's currently $7,500, which everyone gets if eligible for Centerlink (SO PR) as stated above, but that will change in years to come.

We already make use of it, which helps, but the balance is still on you and unless your earn below $100,000k combined income there is no family tax benefit.

Cheers

Matt

Edited August 20, 2015 by AFreshStart

[Stace]

Wake up to all this info this morning - MIND BLOWN Thank you all so so much! Its very interesting, I'm sure we will be just fine. Just lots to do differently!

[AFreshStart]

MrsSmith,

You make it work, you have to, whatever that looks like, but it's best to be aware and plan for it, hence my suggestion to not rush into kids just yet.

Also bare in mind being on a 457 that all your hospital/medical fees are for your expense, if you were on PR they would be covered by the State.

It's much easier to come either before young kids or after young kids because of these expenses, it's the hardest to come when your kids are sub 6-years of age because of these added costs.

I also think of the 30 something friends that I know who have returned to South Africa from the UK or Australia it's almost always because of young babies/toddlers, they end up having 2-3 kids and they return home for family support and to be able to make use of a nanny etc. they don't realize how expensive it is and don't plan for it.

Cheers

Matt

[Sassyninja]

Yikes - we have TWO littlies, coming on a 189. Planning to come when our eldest is 5 so hoping she can start Grade 1 in Jan and youngest will be 3 when we arrive.
Guestimating if we both work full time - we may (best case) have a combined income of around 190K.

Are there many half day jobs for moms?

[Stace]

That was going to be my question too Sassyninja (many half day jobs for moms?) - if you can still make a pretty good living by working 3 days a week, that will be top shelf I suppose.

From what I've read its fairly common for moms to do that - but then is it easy to find companies that are keen to have you on board for 3 days a week, and for good pay too?

I'm 30 next year, so really want to start the "breeding process" as my loving father so eloquently put it, not saying instantly, but will be sooner rather than later. We'll just have to make it work

Its just a bit harder for us, been trying for a loooooong time, just about 18 months, and docs say could take however long, I had to have surgery for fertility and my hubby doesn't have gold medal Olympic athletes! (apologies for the amazing description, but Im quite sure you'd understand!) But we will get to Aus, settle & take it from there

[AFreshStart]

SassyNinja,

Yes, thankfully! Australia is pretty good in that way, they don't really want women leaving the workforce and accommodate them accordingly, but again it's a chicken and egg thing. Working part time you take a substantial pay cut, that pay cut might not even cover your childcare costs, but keeps you in the workforce, helping you return full-time when the kids go to school, BUT it might be more costly than just stopping work for a bit to raise them yourself, negating the childcare costs, but you might find it hard to find employment taking time off.

It's one of the many reasons that I am home with our kids, I've been an entrepreneur most of my life having started, bought and sold businesses, I have the aptitude for it whereas my wife is a high powered career business woman, the stats show that if she took time off she'd enter way below her current pay grade and even then only 9% of career woman like her are able to get back to their pre children pay grade.

BUT it's one of the things I love about Australia, the division of the labour between parents is much better and there are loads of stay-at-home Dad's like me, they have double the number in a population half the size of South Africa, and usually it's an economic issue in South Africa, here these parenting roles are shared between the sexes. Of course you'd need to have a husband who is willing to do that and I think for South African men it's not as easy compared to Australian men that have grown up with this kind of equality.

MrsSmith, I'm 35, our eldest is 5, we are the youngest parents in my son's school class, so if you work backwards we were 30 when we had him.

The majority of the parents in his Kindy class are in the early 40's, and one Mum is in her 50's. Again they grew up in this culture of working hard, saving and planning for kids, having them much later in that life than we would in South Africa and many of them have the added benefit of having family close by who can fetch, carry and spent time with, which you lose as an immigrant.

Fertility treatment centers are far more common here because of it and far more affordable from my limited understanding, there are radio and TV ads all the time for various clinics.

Again all this is MUCH easier and more affordable if you have PR, so I'd suggest you work hard, save and make a plan to migrate over to PR as soon as possible, instantly it helps with medical costs, childcare rebate etc. These costs all add up as you can see

Cheers

Matt

Edited August 20, 2015 by AFreshStart

[RedPanda]

It's good to hear someone 'on the ground' mention the older parents in Australia. I've read about it a little, and it seemed to me from what I read that it would not be at all unusual if I were a first time mom at say 33. If it's a popular age group for first time parents there then it would also mean that the medical facilities are all accustomed to it, and are not going to 'freak out' over 'older' moms (30+ for first timers) as they seem to do on this side. In RSA it seems to me that most people think having a first child after 28 is getting dicey. But from what I can read about medical research that is an old idea and things have gotten better.

Of course I am talking about the age of the mother, not the father, but the two are usually linked...

I think family on this side might be getting anxious over our move, so they have started seriously encouraging: "You shouldn't wait too long once you're on that side." With all kinds of supporting 'arguments' like:"You don't want to be the 'old' parents at your kid's school." and "You'll be over 50 when they go to university." and "Having children will quickly integrate you into the community."

And although those arguments might have a little bit of merit, we're thinking:"Woah....we want to settle ourselves first!"

• Find work
• Join groups/clubs in the community, like Walking/Hiking, Gaming etc. Get to know our community
• Build a house

Get to the point where we know where we're going when we drive, and we know how 'the systems' work, and we've settled in our house, and then start thinking about children.

[AFreshStart]

RedPanda,

Almost 60% of the births in NSW since 2013 have been to Mothers in their mid 30's, 17 out of 1000 babies born in NSW are to Mothers aged 40-44.

It's counter cultural to South African's who are primed to marry young and to have kids by age 30 because of the associated 'risks', but SO much medical research and advancement has taken place over the past decade and debunked old data.

Most of our friends in our community group are single. Forget children, they aren't in relationships let alone close to marriage, most in their 30's. We are the ONLY married couple and have 2 kids. They are focused on their careers, saving and traveling, not dealing with marriage and kids.

Back in South Africa everyone (bar 1) in our community group was married and 90% of us had at least two children, a few had three.

You just can't do that here, it's too expensive, that said NSW has record birth rates, infact the highest in 45 years.

These are the cultural shifts you'll experience here.

Cheers

Matt

[RedPanda]

It makes so much more sense! (I'm starting to think I was born in South Africa with an Australian spirit.)