Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 If I might summon the IB Forum Executive Committee to order: I'm trying to get an idea of the difference in the cost of living between my country and the homelands of my friends here on the Forum. I realize that prices can and do vary enormously from place to place (city to city, county to county, province to province, state to state, etc), so pls note where you live. Firstly: What is the avg size (metric's fine, I can convert the figguhs myself) of a home in your country? How many bedrooms? How many bathrooms? Are garages normally a part of the house? Are back yards (or front yards) typical? Is the typical home usually what we call "single family" (i.e. detached from any other building; stand-alone) or are they normally townhouses or apartments (flats)? Secondly: What is the avg price where you live for the typical home? Thirdly: If one were to rent the "typical" home in your area, what would it go for? (And if you know, how what's the percentage of people who own their homes? In the US, for example, it's 70%.) Why am I asking? The price of a house is one of the best ways to determine the value of of the national currency (since they are floating) and what it takes to be "middle class". Thanks for answering.
kevdriver Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 Country: Canada Province: Ontario City: Ottawa Suburb: Nepean Avg House Size 3500 sq.ft ( avg. for Canada ) 3 bedrooms 2 full bathrooms Double car garage part of house ( attached ) Both front and backyards always. Sizes dependent on year of house construction. ( older house, big front medium back.... newer home, medium front, large backyard. ) Single family homes 95% of time Avg Price 700,000.00$ ( going rate in present neighbourhood ) Rent: 3000/month + utilities ( no homes rented in current neighbourhood ) 70% give or take here in Canada as well.
Jerseyguy Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 country.. usa state.. new jersey county Middlesex avg house size, many different sizes my main house about 3000sq ft 3 bedrooms 1 bath 1 garage property size 100x150 price now about $400,000,00 no mortgage on this one tax per year $4500 utilities about $500 a month other house i own about 1700sq ft 2 bedrooms 1 bath no garage property size 40x70 (townhouse) price now $300,000,00 tax per year $4700 i rent it out for $1500 per month (no utilities) in a word if you move to nj your gonna pay!
lfcrule1972 Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 Country - England County - Hampshire Avg house size - 3 bedroom in our area Our house size - Not sure, sorry. 4 bedrooms 2 bath 1 garage Large back garden, Smaller front Garden Price now about ?255,000 Council tax per year ?1551.07 p.a Gas/Elec/Satellite TV/ Phones etc about ?200 a month Semi Detached House (Two houses joined together)
blutach Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 And I had you pegged in the Council Flats LFC Regards
Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Author Posted October 4, 2006 (edited) Thanks to every one who answered. I forgot to include my own neighborhood. State: Nevada County: Clark City: Henderson (20mi S.E. of the Vegas Strip) Avg price: $425K Avg size: various hugely but probably 2500 s.f./230 s.m. Clark Cnty avg price: $350K (8 yrs ago when I moved here, the avg price was $115K (!) ; the market has cooled a bit, but it's still one of, if not, the hottest in the nation). My place: $265K (bought for $145K 3 yrs ago) 3Br, 2.5 Bath, 1550 s.f/145s.m not incl. garage; townhouse, tri-plex Property Tax: $1750 (JerseyGuy we had a huge tax increase two years ago, only your state's had a higher increase in taxes per household ; however we do not have an income tax) Utilities (Gas, Electric, Phone, Cable [incl. cable modem]): $300/month; summer: $450 [electric alone runs $250 in the summer given the avg summer temp is 103F/39.5C) Car insurance is nuts: we pay the same rates as Down Town Los Angeles: $1200/yr for two cars, one 9, the other 12 yrs old, tho' the latter's a 4X4 which is always more expensive. Sales Tax: 7.75% (we do not have VAT tax--thank God!) Had to pay $31 for my new iPod! Edited October 4, 2006 by Pain_Man
Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Author Posted October 4, 2006 @blutach: Am interested the figguhs for Australia... Since y'all are, I've heard, the most urbanized First World nation (correct me if I'm wrong) with 1 out of 4 Aussies living in Sydney, my guess is that prices in Sydney are comparable to prices in NYC, Los Angeles, & San Diego, i.e. insane (my former home town; as an example: my grandmother's 120 yr old 1200s.f./110s.m. house sold for $450K little less than two years ago). And I had you pegged in the Council Flats LFC Regards
Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Author Posted October 4, 2006 Question for those of you burdened with the VAT tax... Do you have to pay it on a house/condo? What about capital gains when you sell a place? (In the US, it's 10% if you make less than $250K/yr and 20% if you make more; its more complicated than that, of course, they can't just make it one simple rate, or better yet, get rid of it). I assume everyone pays property tax. That's a legacy of our English origins. The land tax was the primary tax in England until an income tax was introduced during WWI (tho' I believe one was temporarily levied during the Napoleonic Wars by the Younger Pitt, just as Lincoln introduced one during our Civil War which lapsed with it's end).
lfcrule1972 Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 We have bastard stamp duty Pain_Man just another way to get fooked by the Government when buying your house..... Look here for info if you're really interested.... http://www.direct.gov.uk/MoneyTaxAndBenefi...&chk=5VuatH
polopony Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 first time I ran in to VAT it was 18% .I thought what I was buying was a reasonable price and then got hit with what was basically another 1/5 to the price all of a sudden it wasn't such a bargain anymore. here in West Palm beach the average price is $400,000 for a house , 1500 -2000 sq. ft. in Palm Beach a site just sold for 10 million ,land only great view the Intercoastal waterway on one side and the Atlantic ocean on the other . Probably the most expensive postal code/zip code in the US The bubble burst on those investing in real estate a couple of months ago foreclosures were up 34% because people were paying 2 mortages balloon payments ,adjustable int. rates and couldn't flip the house make some money and move on lots of property for sale here and people taking losses just to get out from under the payments
Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Author Posted October 4, 2006 Thanks for the link. I find nothing is duller and more confusing than the regs of the Interntal Revenue Service (I believe the Brit equivalent is called Inland Revenue, the Candian, logically enough, Revenue Canada; have no idea what the name of the Australian government's official thugs are named). Unlike any private citizen, government collects at gun point and uses prison to punish refusal, or sometime sheer inability, to pay. My favorite IRS horror story: woman works for a guy for 25 years as secretary, assistant, right-hand, etc. During those 25 years the guy cheated on his taxes every year. The woman knew nothing about that. But during those 25 years, she signed two checks to pay vendors when the owner wasn't around. Well, after she'd retired, the IRS caught the guy. The guy couldn't pay because he'd either hidden or spent what he'd made. So they went after her. They took her house, her two cars, and every penny she'd saved for retirement. They also attached her Social Security (retirement pension although that's a ). She was left penniless. To get her stuff back she needed a tax lawyer. To get a tax lawyer you need $20, 30K up front before they'll do anything for you. Of course, how do you pay that when the government's taken everything you own? The answer is, you don't. If you're lucky, they'll settle with you and leave some crumbs of what was yours--even tho' you did nothing wrong, like this lady. It's a true story and they're are endless one's like it. We have bastard stamp duty Pain_Man just another way to get fooked by the Government when buying your house..... Look here for info if you're really interested.... http://www.direct.gov.uk/MoneyTaxAndBenefi...&chk=5VuatH
Pain_Man Posted October 4, 2006 Author Posted October 4, 2006 (edited) I just paid VAT on a DVD I ordered from Amazon UK. The price was 14.14 pounds, incl. shipping. By the time they added the VAT, it was over 20 pounds. My $28 dollar disk ended up costing me $40. (roughly). What pissed me off, is that the check out screen for Amazon UK didn't tell what the VAT was going to be. So I had no chance to turned it down. NOT cool. Limbaugh's got a $30M estate in Palm Beach, if memory serves. If you mean the most expensive zip code in the US in terms of average house price, that's probably in Manhattan. Apartments in places like Trump tower routine sell for eight figures. If you mean the zip code with the highest avg income, that's probably Fairbanks Ranch (yep, named after the famous movie star Douglas Fairbanks, Sr). The average house price is not much less than those Manhattan apartment. My mother's boss lives there. His house was worth $7 million ten years ago. It's more than double that now. As for counties I believe either San Diego or San Franciso have Palm Beach beat cold. San Diego's avg house price at least $500 to $600,000 (the last place my parents lived, a suburb of San Diego, the avg house price was over $1 million); their 1000 s.f. condo sold for $365,000. Had they sold it about six months before they did, they would have probably gotten $420K for it. For a one bedroom, 2 bath 1000 s.f. condo with no garage!! The same kind of unit was renting for $1800 to $2000 a month. The market's definitely cooled off, more so than Vegas. first time I ran in to VAT it was 18% .I thought what I was buying was a reasonable price and then got hit with what was basically another 1/5 to the price all of a sudden it wasn't such a bargain anymore. here in West Palm beach the average price is $400,000 for a house , 1500 -2000 sq. ft. in Palm Beach a site just sold for 10 million ,land only great view the Intercoastal waterway on one side and the Atlantic ocean on the other . Probably the most expensive postal code/zip code in the US The bubble burst on those investing in real estate a couple of months ago foreclosures were up 34% because people were paying 2 mortages balloon payments ,adjustable int. rates and couldn't flip the house make some money and move on lots of property for sale here and people taking losses just to get out from under the payments Edited October 4, 2006 by Pain_Man
Kenadjian Posted October 4, 2006 Posted October 4, 2006 Thanks for the link. I find nothing is duller and more confusing than the regs of the Interntal Revenue Service (I believe the Brit equivalent is called Inland Revenue, the Candian, logically enough, Revenue Canada; have no idea what the name of the Australian government's official thugs are named). Simply called the TAX DEPARTMENT. Am interested the figguhs for Australia... On average, 200 to 300K, (in Melbourne) but if you move closer to the city, anything up to 5 to 6M, and you've got the Sydney bit right, you'd strugle to get any kind of housing for under 500K. Most housing in Australia are stand alone, with front and back yards, however this is getting smaller and smaller every day.
dbminter Posted October 5, 2006 Posted October 5, 2006 Well, over in the UK, everyone lives in police boxes. So, they're bigger on the inside than outside, so, these kinds of questions might be moot.
Kenadjian Posted October 5, 2006 Posted October 5, 2006 Fuck DB, you're at it again, what the hell does that mean?
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