Can you afford a home in NZ?

[Snoozin]

After reading this all I can say is Sergei - decide what you want to do, get your head down and do it/acheive it instead of having pathetic epic whinges on Toyspeed.

Life is not simple and everything is not created equal unfortunately and your whole attitude smacks of "it's not fair poor widdle ol' me"

[S T E A L T H]

could always get a part time job in the evenings/weekends too. I did a few years ago - extra 300/week in hand certainly made a difference in the early stages.

Although I gotta say you must REALLY love what you do to settle for $650pw as a skilled IT worker..Most of the warehouse staff/delivery drivers that work for me earn more.

[solitaire]

You have MCSE 2003 etc?

I am Linux sysadmin, that means whole load of different set of technologies (KVM/XEN/"cloud", LVM, CFengine, Nagios, shell scripts, etc. vs whatever windows sysadmins use). To be honest, I don't even know what being windows sysadmin consists of, sure I know my way around registry and all, but I feel hopeless without my favourite set of standard tools (tail, grep, awk etc.).

I DO NOT want to get in a linux vs windows debate, but i really think you need to get into Microsoft mate... your potential pool of jobs is really limited, thats why you have trouble finding a role in my humble opinion.

Do a microsoft (or if your really keen cisco) certification and see how you go man - i'm sure you will start to find work if you diversify.

[sergei]

You have MCSE 2003 etc?

I am Linux sysadmin, that means whole load of different set of technologies (KVM/XEN/"cloud", LVM, CFengine, Nagios, shell scripts, etc. vs whatever windows sysadmins use). To be honest, I don't even know what being windows sysadmin consists of, sure I know my way around registry and all, but I feel hopeless without my favourite set of standard tools (tail, grep, awk etc.).

I DO NOT want to get in a linux vs windows debate, but i really think you need to get into Microsoft mate... your potential pool of jobs is really limited, thats why you have trouble finding a role in my humble opinion.

Do a microsoft (or if your really keen cisco) certification and see how you go man - i'm sure you will start to find work if you diversify.

I am not going to start off a windows vs linux, but I hate doing something that I am have no interest. I have no interest in windows as a job, I could as well be selling cars. I also don't really like the way cisco does things (would I recomend cisco as VoIP solution? Hell no!).
For me it is more important to do what I like and being paid little bit less, then doing job that I really hate and being paid more.

Theoretically linux sysadmins are being paid more than windows sysadmins world wide, NZ being small country does not have many positions, and everything is small business, which in turn is MS oriented, hence there is more demand for windows sysadmins.

To be honest, I deal with windows sysadmins on daily basis, and some of them are power users that seem to pretend to have skills, their lack of knowledge in certain areas (Networking 101) amazes me.

[solitaire]

I am not going to start off a windows vs linux, but I hate doing something that I am have no interest. I have no interest in windows as a job, I could as well be selling cars.

Well you can't do something you do not enjoy. Cisco? Have a look for other IT areas that play well with Linux (i was pretty sure that a MS/Linux combo was quite valuable) and go from there.

I'm afraid that there just isn't as much demand for linux admins dude - it sucks but if you want a chance of better pay you need to find a point of difference you have over other linux admins or enter a market where there is more demand for what you do.

I mentioned cisco because i know the newer call manager versions are going to linux instead of windows 2003, that would suggest that cisco makes a good combo to your current linux skills.

[sergei]

I am not going to start off a windows vs linux, but I hate doing something that I am have no interest. I have no interest in windows as a job, I could as well be selling cars.

Well you can't do something you do not enjoy. Cisco? Have a look for other IT areas that play well with Linux (i was pretty sure that a MS/Linux combo was quite valuable) and go from there.

I'm afraid that there just isn't as much demand for linux admins dude - it sucks but if you want a chance of better pay you need to find a point of difference you have over other linux admins or enter a market where there is more demand for what you do.

I mentioned cisco because i know the newer call manager versions are going to linux instead of windows 2003, that would suggest that cisco makes a good combo to your current linux skills.

I know little bit of VoIP, and cisco is something I would not recommend anyone, no matter if they are good to linux or not.

[solitaire]

I know little bit of VoIP, and cisco is something I would not recommend anyone, no matter if they are good to linux or not.

Yeah I got out of technical because I couldn't deal with all the cisco courses

[sergei]

For those that seem to thing of me as negative and whinge a lot. I admit I come as negative. Yes, but this is a public forum. I can come as negative, or positive or crazy, that is what forums are for. I don't intentionally troll, I only share my opinions and I am open to other opinions as well. We are after all having an intelligent discussion.

Definition of forum:
a public meeting or assembly for open discussion


To be honest, a lot of people use facebook/bebo/myspace, I use neither of them, I find many of TS members quiet intelligent and reasonable, hence I don't see the need to register to various different forums/social services.
For me this is the only place where I publicly express my opinions.

Although my stile of writing is somewhat negative, I should be partially taken as that Russian guy from Armageddon. Russian humour indeed is very grim.

[Alex B]

Have an e-hug sergi.

[tsoob]

After reading this all I can say is Sergei - decide what you want to do, get your head down and do it/acheive it instead of having pathetic epic whinges on Toyspeed.

Life is not simple and everything is not created equal unfortunately and your whole attitude smacks of "it's not fair poor widdle ol' me"

You could do something after hours to get the extra money sergi, what about your linux skill set can you apply that somewhere else?

I dont know d!ck all about computers, maybe there is a market for training people like me??

[Rob]

I brought my 1st home in BeachHaven on the north shore 5 years agoand now upgraded to 1 with aproximately 100 sqm garage.
Its storage at the moment as we're renting it out and living with wifes mum.

Its awesome

[Adoom]

...I should be partially taken as that Russian guy from Armageddon. Russian humour indeed is very grim.

Wasn't he the guy who used a wrench to apply percussive maintenance on part of a spaceship system...?

[S T E A L T H]

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10637798

[Timmo]

Lots of interesting articles on Gareth Morgan (as well as heaps of really interesting articles on his travels through Russia, USA etc etc)

http://www.garethmorgan.com/pages/kiwiS ... risis.aspx


The "structural imbalance" New Zealand is saddled with shows up in the large and persistent balance of payments deficit of course, but more pointedly for the person in the street, it has been manifest in this insatiable appetite households have developed, for borrowing and investing the proceeds of the capital inflows from abroad, in one asset class – residential property. Accordingly, house prices have lifted to an unprecedented extent as the graph illustrates.

Compared with the 30-year trend, real house prices have peaked 45 per cent above what we might consider a sustainable level. Or, to express it in less boffinesque terms, the average house price used to be twice the graduate‘s salary, now it is eight times. The median salary today is less than the interest on the average mortgage. Studies by the OECD and the IMF have similarly concluded that the most overvalued housing markets in the world are those of Ireland, Spain and New Zealand.

How did this happen? The relaxation of lending criteria by the finance sector during the past 10 years has been huge and it has not been uncommon to see mortgages equal to or greater than the market value of the house. The banking sector has taken the view that if a mortgage can no longer be serviced, any forced sales at or near market value would pretty well enable full recovery of their money. Less and less thought has been given to any possibility of a world of falling house prices.

It is apparent that the demand for (bigger and more expensive) housing depends on little else than a person‘s ability to finance, so any reliance on the public to be prudent and self-disciplining has been ill-founded. They will borrow all that their cashflow will allow; no house is too large or too flash. Thanks, then, to the global central bank-sponsored flood of liquidity, what has transpired in New Zealand is a speculative flood of money into housing, based solely on the expectation that prices only go up.

Inevitably, the quality (asset backing) of the lending has deteriorated as more and more loans are at or near, full market value of the property. This is how a bust gets made.

[pc]

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10637798

haha... quoting time.
"Auckland has emerged as the best-paid city in New Zealand with an average annual salary of $73,121, a survey has revealed."
"Remembering that our data is based on job ads that are placed during that period"

Awesome way of mis-representing data... the method of aquisition is flawed (generally the higher paid jobs are advertised and many low paid jobs are not), and presenting an average instead of a median also skews the result to insinuate a conclusion that doesn't reflect reality at all.

edit: word fail, I ment median.

[frost]

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10637798

haha... quoting time.
"Auckland has emerged as the best-paid city in New Zealand with an average annual salary of $73,121, a survey has revealed."
"Remembering that our data is based on job ads that are placed during that period"

Awesome way of mis-representing data... the method of aquisition is flawed (generally the higher paid jobs are advertised and many low paid jobs are not), and presenting an average instead of a median also skews the result to insinuate a conclusion that doesn't reflect reality at all.

edit: word fail, I ment median.

its the media what do you expect? the truth?

Auckland was also voted one of the best cites in the would to live in, however they didn't mention what area of auckland,
if they based it on the "super city" then im sure it would be much much lower in the rankings,
i see this kind of media spin everyday, im in media/marketing

[Miss_S]

lol you guys have some funny ideas.

A bank won't lend to you if you don't have sufficient surplus to pay for other costs.

The average couple in Auckland CAN afford a home, it is a matter of budgeting, which NZ'ers, as a whole, fail at.

I couldn't be bothered reading past page 2.

P.S. I work for a financial planner as a mortgage broker.

[sergei]

lol you guys have some funny ideas.

A bank won't lend to you if you don't have sufficient surplus to pay for other costs.

The average couple in Auckland CAN afford a home, it is a matter of budgeting, which NZ'ers, as a whole, fail at.

I couldn't be bothered reading past page 2.

P.S. I work for a financial planner as a mortgage broker.

Well, here is the thought, of course they can pay for it, but how much % they should pay. Giving >50% of combined income is not really logical. I know all about budgeting, this is why I started this thread, you don't want to dedicate half of your income to a single expense. This is insane giving the instability of job market. With this commitment it forces you to accept any jobs so the "downtime" will be less, try having kids and paying out house at same time with median Auckland salary/wages. A bank will lend you even if you are struggling because they see the property as an investment, not liability like a car, it is easier to get mortgage than a car loan.

[tsoob]

don't buy a house sergi, you will be far 2 stressed about it.

[sergei]

don't buy a house sergi, you will be far 2 stressed about it.

I will buy it when it will cost me 50% of my salary .