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Cost of living for a small family

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qwerty123
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Cost of living for a small family

Post by qwerty123 » Mon, 13 Feb 2006 6:07 pm

I need some advice. I received a nice Job offer from an SG-company. They offer me about 8k SGD per month. My question is if this is enough for a decent lifestyle in SG. My wife is not working since she has to take care of our one year old daugther. Here in Germnay we have a decent lifestyle wich means we have a nice appartment in a remote area, a car and some money to spent also on useless things. It would be nice if we can have at leats the same standard of living in SG. I do know that owning a car in SG is somewhat pricy but if the public transporation is good and car rentals are not to expensive then we propably do not need a car. It would also be nice if we could get an nice apartemnt close to the Nanyang University. (I have heard that the costs for heating the appartment during winter are negligible in SG ;-) )
Thanks for your advice from the cold and snowy Germany.

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rashmi
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cost of living

Post by rashmi » Mon, 13 Feb 2006 6:21 pm

hi there.

me and my hubby have just moved from india. the cost of living is quite ok for the paypacket that u are mentioning. a good 2 bedder/3 bedder condo- fully furnished will be SGD 1700 (do not pay more). This will be in the suburbs of singapore ( 25 minutes from orchard). if u stay in orchard then be prepared to pay upwards of SGD 2000.
food and other expenses (if u cook at home) should not exceed SGD 1500 for 3 of u per month.
medical is expensive. make sure ur company covers u and family.
weather is warm, so only aircon costs will be high.

cheers

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Carpe Diem
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Post by Carpe Diem » Mon, 13 Feb 2006 6:22 pm

As long as you don't have to pay for car and school fees it seems OK. But the transportation system is excellent and you really don't need a car here. Use buses and taxis and it will not cost you too much.
Costs of heating are nil, but if you use air con (usually people use it at least during the night) you can spend around SGD 200 per month on utility bills. So it's not negligible.
Depending on the time you plan to stay, try to get your company to take care of the payment of school fees in the future, because that can be quite expensive - 1,000 SGD per month (and more) is quite normal in an International School.
Hope it helps.
La vie est trop courte, profitons de chaque instant

qwerty123
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Post by qwerty123 » Mon, 13 Feb 2006 6:43 pm

Thanks for the replys.

We will get a an education allowance but this is just for school fees. Do someone know how expensive the Kindergardens are in SG ? And another thing is how much tax one has to pay roughly.

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Carpe Diem
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Post by Carpe Diem » Mon, 13 Feb 2006 8:54 pm

For taxes please check http://www.iras.gov.sg/ESVPortal/iit/ii ... iduals.asp

You will see that the rates change dramatically after 80K, so it might be interesting for you to earn slightly less... and get some benefits in kind instead... Don't forget that all your benefits are included (with a certain %) in the computation of your total income.
La vie est trop courte, profitons de chaque instant

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