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How to pay off your credit card and get out of debt

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How to get out of credit card debt

Before we moved over to Ireland, we were living paycheck to paycheck and both of us had massive credit card debt. It’s not like we had an extravagant lifestyle in South Africa, we were both earning good salaries – we were just terrible at budgeting how to spend what we earned each month.

We both come from fairly conservative, budget conscious families so I am not really sure why we were so bad at managing money. I can only put it down to the fact that we just ignored the issue, and thought about living in the now, without much consequence for the future. But the truth is, the lack of a good budget and the fact that the last week of the month was always the hardest – it really did worry us. We spoke about it a lot in private, we lay awake at nights plotting how we could get out of debt. Looking back, we never really made the necessary sacrifices to budget properly and we never honest with ourselves about how we were spending money.

How we got into debt

A couple of things happened which I think caused the debt to spiral out of control, the biggest being that we bought a house. We used our credit cards to finance some of the hidden costs that come with buying a home (transfer fees and legal fees etc). Being in so much debt, especially credit card debt, was a hard lesson to learn. I don’t regret buying our first home together, but I do think I would do it differently if I could do it all over.

We both can be people pleasing, so often when people invited us out for dinner or to go away for the weekend – we said yes, even though we knew we couldn’t really afford it. We wanted to have a certain lifestyle, one were we went to great restaurants, bought things for the house and ourselves, and went away on nice holidays. Before we sold all our belongings, and packed up to come to Ireland, we had both maxed out our credit cards. The money we were paying into our credit card each month was basically paying off the interest only, and by the time the end of the month rolled around, we had maxed our credit cards again.

How we got out of debt

Fast forward to the decision to move to Ireland. Although we didn’t realise at the time, this was the second chance we had been waiting for. Selling all our belongings, including our cars, helped us pay off some of the debt.

We came over with 2 suitcases each, 3 boxes that we shipped over (which we probably didn’t need), and some savings that we got through our last paychecks, paid out leave, and selling our belongings. This fresh start meant that we had to do things differently. We both agreed that once over in Ireland – things would be different. We didn’t know it at the time, but we ended up living on one salary for a year – and yet we still managed to pay off the outstanding credit card debt and start saving properly. This is how we paid off our credit card and got our of debt:

Stop using your credit card

We started with our credit card debt first because that was the biggest, most obvious debt we knew we could tackle. It was an obvious move, but we stopped using our credit cards – we took them out of our wallets and put them safely away in a cupboard at home. This meant that when we were out, we didn’t have the convenience of using them.

Pay off debt each month

Each month we paid back our credit card debt, and at the end of our first year in Ireland we paid our last lump sum to the credit card on Black Friday of all days. I guess that shows you how our mindset changed over that first year abroad. We saw paying off the debt as more important than buying something new.

Know where your money is going

We both have credit cards here in Ireland. I actually haven’t used mine at all – it is still in the envelope it arrived in. We use Rob’s credit card only to rent cars, but we pay off the car rental costs as soon as we book a car. The credit card is now only used to hold deposits, or to buy something we intend on paying for in full at the end of the month. We prefer to stick to our budget each month, and have carefully consider all the things we spend money on each month – everything is accounted for. From obvious bills and food costs, to getting my nails done and paying a small fee for my blog maintenance. Every euro we spend is accounted for. At any given point in the month, we know how much we have left for groceries (we do a weekly shop now) or our entertainment budget – yes, we now have an entertainment budget. We also have a travel savings pocket that we use to save up for holidays we plan to do. Once you get used to sticking to a budget, it becomes habit.

Prioritise how you spend your money

Living on one salary forces you to prioritise. You quickly discard the things that are not essential – like eating out, coffees, even things like hair appointments, and a big one for me was that I stopped buying clothes. I started realising that we were trying to buy our happiness, but that being in debt made us unhappy – so we learnt to say no to things we couldn’t afford and through that – we started to pay off our credit card debt. We used bonuses and tax refunds to further pay off our debt. In the past that money would have been spent on some big thing we really wanted – but what we really wanted now was to get out of debt.

Stick to the Budget

I am not saying that sticking to a budget is easy. It is still really hard. In the early months of getting out of debt, we struggled saying no to things. We missed important weddings, skipped out on meeting friends for dinner, said no to concerts and events others were going to. It was really hard to say no to all of it, but we knew we didn’t want to go back to the way we were living back in SA. We figured in the bigger picture, if we stick to the budget, we can do the things we really want to do later. Not everything has to be immediate.

Have a rainy day fund

Once we paid off our debt, we took the money we put into our credit cards and started putting that all into savings. The reality is there might be unexpected costs that crop up during the month that your budget hasn’t planned for. Like one of us could lose our job and we could go back to living on one salary. We now have a nice rainy day fund set up – its not where we want it to be, but we are getting there slowly.

Now that we don’t have credit card debt, and we have a budget we stick to – we don’t live paycheck to paycheck any more. January is not a hard month for us. We have learnt our limits, and we have learnt to focus on the future, by saying no to things right now, or holding off on big expenses until we can actually afford it. Slowly managing our money has gotten easier. I didn’t realise at the time, but getting out of debt was not the end goal – staying out of debt is.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE WAYS YOU STAY OUT OF DEBT?

Live Simply & Travel Slow,

~Meg~

p.s. If social media is your thing (snap! It’s my fave too!), you should totally follow me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or join my exclusive Facebook Group. And because I seriously am an open book, if you ever want to bounce ideas off me, or just chat and connect send me an email (I really love chatting!)..

p.p.s. I try post varied content 2 -3 times a month, to be sure you don’t miss out on the new post you should sign up and get all the news straight in your inbox – Sign up now!

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How to pay off your credit card and get out of debt

The Ultimate Checklist to Move Overseas

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The Ultimate Checklist of things you need to do before you can move overseas!

The Ultimate Checklist to Move overseas

I decided to write this ultimate checklist to move overseas to help you identify things you need to do before you move abroad. Is this the year you are moving overseas? It can be overwhelming when you think of all the things you need to do before you move over. Creating a checklist is something we did before we moved, but I have added some tips that we learnt along the way. Truthfully in hindsight there were a lot of things we would do differently if we had the chance to do it all again. We learnt the hard way through trial and error, but hopefully with this checklist to move abroad in hand, things will be easier for you and your family.

BEFORE YOU DECIDE TO MOVE OVERSEAS

Before you start the moving abroad process there are some things you should consider and research. This is a key step and it should not be skipped over. Moving overseas is a big step, it should not be decided on lightly. There will be lots of things you will need to weigh up and decide, and it’s important to get all these areas covered and figured out before you take the giant step forward into becoming an expat and living overseas.

  • Research the new country. I have spoken about this in previous blog posts, on why we chose to move to Ireland. For us, Ireland ticked a lot of boxes for us. For starters, my husband got a job offer and work permit sorted out before we leave our home country. Secondly, we found out that I would be able to apply for my own work permit, and find a job too. Third, we knew our dog would be able to make the move with us.
  • Have a job offer before you leave. The reality is looking for a good job takes time, and if you leave it till you are in the new country to find a job you could land yourself in trouble. If you are looking to move to Ireland, then I suggest you figure out if you need a work permit, and research job opportunities in your field. 
  • Get an idea on cost of living. If you managed to find a job then before you accept the job offer, figure out if you will be able to afford to live on the salary they are offering you. Cost of living in Ireland is at an all-time high – rent is scarce and expensive, and cost of living is generally quite high here. I written two posts on cost of living in Ireland; one blog post compares costs between Dublin and Johannesburg which I wrote when we first arrived. More recently, I wrote a post about how to figure out how much you need to earn to live in Dublin.
  • Save as much as you can. As much as your new job will keep money coming in, there are some unexpected costs to moving overseas. When we first moved over we never fully realised how long it would take for me to find a job and get my work permit sorted out. So we were left with over a year on living on one salary. Thankfully we managed to cut our grocery costs, and we had a small savings to fall back on when times got tough. People often ask how much should they save, and the answer is never going to be a rounded figure – the answer is: save as much as you can, then try save even more than that. We also knew that moving over, our lifestyle would have to change. There will be sacrifices you might need to make when you first over, and we learnt a few tips on how to save money when you first move overseas, maybe these tips will help you too.
  • Get your important documents updated and filed. Before we moved over we made certified copies of everything. Things like marriage certificates, insurance policies, wills are important to keep and file copies separately. Later on in this post I will suggest a few other documents that are important to get in order before you move overseas.
  • Update your passport before you leave the country. If your passport is expiring in a year then it’s worth updating it before you leave the country. Rob is in the process of updating his South African passport through the embassy here in Ireland and he has been told it takes 6-7 months to process!! Besides if you want to travel, you will need at least 6 months left of your current passport to be able to visit most countries. Another thing to consider is that if you decide to move to Ireland and you require an Immigration Residence Permit (IRP; formerly called GNIB), you will need to get this yearly, and they will make it valid for as long as your passport is valid. So if you move over with less than a year in your current passport, then your IRP card will be valid for the same time. Save the stress, get your passport updated.
  • Get your driver’s license updated. The same goes for your driver’s license. Ireland allows certain countries the option to swop out their existing driver’s license for an Irish one. This option is available for South African driver’s license holders. However, if you arrive with an expired driver’s license then you will not be able to swop out your driver’s license. So make your life easier and get it updated before you leave.
  • Do you own a house? You will need to decide if you will sell your house or put it up for rent. Since we only recently bought our house before we left, and for the fact that we were not sure how long we would be overseas; we decided to rent our home out. We went through a company called Just Letting in South Africa. In all honesty, they are a pretty shit company to work with. But they do make it easier to live here, knowing that there is someone managing our tenant and home back home. I think the reason I get so frustrated with them would be the same with most companies you decide to use – not proactive, slow to respond, plus they were slow to find tenants even though when we first spoke to them they told us that we would have no problems renting out the place. They were filled with lots of promises at how easy the process would be, but in truth it was a long and trying road to finding a tenant. 

Right so all of the above took us about a year to research and find jobs etc., we had been planning and talking about the move for a year prior to actually starting the process too. This work can’t be rushed, take your time doing your research and making sure that a move overseas is best for you and your family. 

Once you have decided on the move, and you have a job offer and work permit is being processed… then the checklist to move overseas really kicks into full planning and doing all the things mode! Take a deep breath, and let’s dive in.

3 MONTHS BEFORE YOUR MOVE

  • Book hotels or flights that you might need. If you know when you start date is, then try to arrive a bit before you start work, because you may need some time to find a place to rent. In our case, my husband got a relocation package with his job, which meant that the company paid for him to stay in corporate accommodation for a short time while we looked for a place to rent in Ireland. Not all companies offer this to new employees coming from overseas but it is worth asking about. If that is not something that is available, then you will need to book into a hotel, hostel, or Airbnb when you first move over. Perhaps you have some family or friends you could stay with until you are on your feet. Some people are lucky enough to secure a rental before they arrive overseas but I have found that in Dublin, it is better to be in the country and with a letter from your employer before you start looking for a place to rent.
  • Check your pet relocation requirements. Although there are no quarantine requirements in Ireland, you do need a blood test and certificate that your pet has no rabies. You can only leave 90 days after this blood has been taken, as well as your pet needs to move over with you (either 5 days before or after you arrive). I have heard of people bringing their pets in later once they are settled but I believe there is a different process if you send your pet over at a later date. I wrote a post about how we moved our pet over to Ireland which covers off some other points you will need to consider.
  • Find a moving company you like the look of and ask for quotes. And organise a moving date. If you plan to ship over your belongings then you will need to get an idea on what furniture and number of boxes you think you might send over. We sent over 3 boxes and then just 2 suitcases each when we flew over. The 3 boxes we shipped using a company called Seven Seas. They were the most affordable company we could find at the time, and our stuff arrived in perfect condition, barring a plate I didn’t bubble wrap properly. Just a note that we opted for the boxes to be delivered in 3 months (it worked out cheaper) and another thing to consider is that there will be a customs fee you will need to pay when it arrives in your new country (over and above the fee you pay the couriers. Seven Seas did give us an estimate on what this would be so we weren’t surprised 3 months later). Another point I would like to make about sending over belongings, in hindsight we probably didn’t need to ship those 3 boxes. The stuff we shipped ended up not being so essential when it arrived 3 months later and we hadn’t really missed too much of it. Also most rentals here in Ireland come furnished already, and houses here are a little different in terms of size compared to back home – so your furniture might be costly to send over only to find it doesn’t fit in your new home.
  • Label and pack boxes up with things you won’t need to use until you move. I started this process very eager to pack everything and get rid of the rest; we ended up the last few weeks living with only our camping chairs as seats! Just make sure what you pack away or get rid of, is everything that you won’t actually need for a while. Another good tip is to make a checklist of all packing boxes and what will go in each one. This would have been handy to have on the other side, because when our boxes did arrive, I had forgotten what we had actually sent over!
  • Put your house on the market if you’re selling it or start finding a tenant. We only started looking for tenants a month before we left and we really left it late because we ended up with an empty house for a few months which was less than ideal.

2 MONTHS BEFORE YOUR MOVE

  • Depending on your existing work contract, you will need to choose the right time to resign. For us, we wanted to give our employers enough notice that we were leaving, and in the end this notice period worked in our favour because my company asked me to stay on working remotely for a few months which was helpful to keep me busy while we moved over and looked for a job overseas.
  • Cancel subscriptions and direct debits you won’t carry over with you. If you are leaving the country it is best to cancel these subscriptions while you are still in the country. I had a phone contract that would have costed a lot to cancel, so I just notified them that I want to cancel at the end of the subscription period. We still have our bank accounts open in South Africa, but since we don’t have many debit orders still left (just house stuff), it was easy to see if there was any debit order we forgot to take care of. If you close your accounts, you will need to make sure all your contracts are cancelled beforehand.
  • Sell or give away items you don’t want to take with you. We sold, donated and threw out most of our stuff. We used it as a great way to declutter and let go of all the stuff that served no purpose for us anymore. We sold most of our stuff online too, which was very easy to do.
  • Sell your car. We decided to sell our cars online, you can choose to sell it privately yourself. We just found it easier and less hassle to sell it through an agent who handled all the paperwork for us. We used webuycars.co.za and they even arranged for our cars to be picked up as close to our move date which was convenient for us. Another benefit of using webuycars is that they paid the outstanding cash for our car loan direct to the bank, so we didn’t have to stress about transferring that ourselves.
  • Arrange travel and health insurance for your move. You never know if you might need emergency care when you first arrive, so rather be safe than sorry.
  • Visit the doctor for a final check-up and arrange for vaccinations if you need them. We didn’t need any vaccinations to move to Ireland, but we went to the dentist, doctor, gynae and Rob got his eyes checked. It’s helpful to get these down before you leave because it will take a while to settle and time to find doctors over in your new country.
  • Get copies of your medical records for yourselves, children, as well as your pets. This is especially important if you are on any existing medication, so as to show your new doctor overseas.
  • Get a stock of your prescription medication. Find out what the local names and equivalents are for any prescription medication you or your family are on. Make sure that it will be available in your destination country. If not you will need to arrange to take a supply with you, together with proof of your need for the medication in case you are stopped at customs. I carried 6 months of my own medication with me, together with my script and letter from my doctor. I wasn’t stopped at customs, and just went through without any problems.

1 MONTH BEFORE YOUR MOVE

  • Begin packing up your home. Normal people can wait till one month before to pack their home, I guess I am not like most people because like I said I started this as soon as we decided we were moving – absolutely zero chill! But really, one month is more than enough time. Especially considering you hopefully won’t need to send over too much stuff. 
  • Make sure your house insurance is due to be cancelled on moving day. This is something some people forget to cancel, or cancel too soon – but if you have household insurance, remember to cancel it on the same day everything is getting picked up to be shipped off.
  • Contact utility companies and cancel. Or you can change the names on the bill if you’re renting out. We actually kept it in our name, as it is through the body corporate of the complex we lived in. It just made it easier for us to manage this direct with body corporate as we still handle levies etc. with them. These are accounts that you don’t necessarily think about, but it’s good to cancel/ settle before you leave the country.
  • Pay any bills you have outstanding. The last month before you leave is when we really felt like money was coming off left right and center. We settled all our outstanding bills; we also treated ourselves to dinners out at our favourite restaurants, and met up with friends for last drinks etc… This month really flew by.

1-2 WEEKS BEFORE YOUR MOVE

  • Get currency for your new country. Because we didn’t close our bank accounts we didn’t have to worry about getting Euros before we left. We took a few over but not too much, the rest we used our SA bank cards in Ireland when we first arrived. It was quick for Rob to open up a bank account in Ireland, because he had a job and needed a place for his salary to be paid into. For me, it took a while longer, so I used my SA card a lot more.
  • Start packing suitcases. Make sure you have the essentials in your suitcase. You will be living out of these cases for the immediate future until your shipment arrives. I packed extra toiletries and make up etc. as I knew money would be tight when we first got over there, so I made sure I went with a stock to keep me going. 
  • Empty your fridge/freezer. Since we lived with family in the last weeks before we left, empty the fridge/freezer happened earlier for us. However this was still a sensitive point for us. About a month or two before we decided to move over to Ireland, our old fridge died. So we went out and splurged on a nice big fancy fridge and then a month later had to put it up for sale – ouch! That really hurt as you never really make your money back on reselling purchases like that. 
  • Moving Day. If you are shipping over some items, confirm the date they will come collect the boxes. We scheduled this for 3 weeks before my husband left, just because we wanted to stay with family and make the most of our time left in South Africa. Make sure you keep an inventory list for yourself of items you intend to ship over. Also, now is a good time to confirm when you expect items to arrive in your new country.

ON THE DAY OF YOUR MOVE

  • Triple check the house to ensure nothing is left over. This was a surreal experience for me, walking through our empty home, not knowing what our new home would look like. 
  • Keep your jewellery and important documents with you. We carried these on us in our carry on. Rob had a set, and I had another set of copies as we were flying at different times. If you are the spouse of someone who has a work permit and you are arriving after them, then it’s best to keep the following documentation on you for when you go through passport control: copy of your Spouses work permit, letter from their employer, your marriage certificate. 
  • Say goodbye to everybody. Tears, all the tears when we were at the airport saying our goodbyes to our family. It’s important to remember to take your time and be kind to yourself today. It’s a big deal; there will be a lot of emotions!

AND THAT’S IT, THE ULTIMATE CHECKLIST TO MOVE OVERSEAS! I HOPE THIS MAKES THE MOVE EASIER FOR YOU!

Live Simply & Travel Slow,

~Meg~

p.s. If social media is your thing (snap! It’s my fave too!), you should totally follow me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or join my exclusive Facebook Group. And because I seriously am an open book, if you ever want to bounce ideas off me, or just chat and connect send me an email (I really love chatting!)..

p.p.s. I try post varied content 2 -3 times a month, to be sure you don’t miss out on the new post you should sign up and get all the news straight in your inbox – Sign up now!

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The Ultimate Checklist of things you need to do before you can move overseas!

How to figure out how much you need to earn to live in Dublin

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In this post I am going to share an estimate monthly budget for Dublin, which will give you insight into how much you need to be earning in order to comfortably live and pay your bills in Dublin.This is a question I get a lot, how much should I be earning if I want to live in Dublin? So many people compare their salary back home to the salary here and then forget that the monthly budget you would need in order to live over could be very different to the monthly budget you had back home. When we first moved over, I wrote a post on the cost of living between Johannesburg and Dublin although that was a couple of years ago, it gives you a general idea on my perception of costs between the two cities. In this post I am going to share an estimate monthly budget for Dublin, which will give you insight into how much you need to be earning in order to comfortably live and pay your bills in Dublin.

First thing you need to do is to work out what your take home salary will be every month. Just a note that companies will give usually give you a salary offer per annum, not per month. So if you got a job offer with a salary of 30 000 euros, that’s probably per year – not per month! You also need to remember to deduct tax. The tax rate is high here, but it is fairly similar to South Africa, so for us this wasn’t a jump from what we were use to. Our friends from Dubai did not have the same experience! A handy online calculator to work out your salary after tax is this website.

Once you have a monthly take home salary, you should work out what your monthly costs will be. Just a note that these are estimates, and largely based on our own experience. Everyone has a different budget and way of living, so this is purely what we have found costs to be like here in Ireland. I think when you are deciding if moving to Ireland is going to be good for your family, you should always over-inflate your costs of living. The last thing you want is to move all the way over here, only to find you are not able to afford the lifestyle you had back home. A move as big as moving overseas should always be an improvement to living back home – or at least the same, but never worse. You don’t want to have to cut your costs and battle to make ends meet in a foreign country – moving countries is hard enough as it is, who needs the added stress of not being able to afford to live month to month too!

Rent

Once you have a job offer, then you can start looking where you would like to live, and what rent is like in the areas close to your work. Finding a place to rent is one of the hardest thing to do here in Dublin. There is a huge housing crisis and the demand for rentals and people looking for places to live makes it tough. We had the added stress of finding a pet friendly rental, I wrote a post about how to find a pet friendly rental, but the same process could equally be applied for finding any kind of rental. The average cost of rent in Dublin varies, but on average if you plan to live close to the city the average rent is 1800 upwards for a two bed apartment. Some people choose to move out of the city, which means the rent is slightly more affordable. But moving out of the city has pro’s and con’s to it, and in some cases you would need to buy a car if you plan to live far out of town and commute into work. Depending on where you work and where you plan to live, that commute might be just as bad as living closer and paying a higher rent.

Utilities

Then you need to consider gas and electricity costs. On average these costs for us have been around 75 euros a month. The cost of gas and electricity will depend on how frequently you have the heat on in your home, and what kind of rating your home has. BER A1 means it is a highly energy efficient house, the rating goes all the way to G which would be the lowest rating and least efficient. The higher the energy efficient the house is, the lower your utilities costs should be. Currently no one pays for water in Ireland, but this could change in the future. For now, it is not a cost you need to account for.

WIFI / Broadband

We don’t own a TV, but we do have internet at home. We went with Virgin because they had a good deal at the time, but you can go with anyone really – most service providers have competitive prices, so you can shop around. For internet at home we pay 55 euros. If you own a TV you will need to TV license to get the national channels, and if you want something similar to DSTV or cable TV, then there are providers like SKY TV etc. We have found that internet is fine for us, with YouTube, Netflix etc you might not feel the need to own a TV.

Mobile phone

Your company might offer you a company phone as part of your package, or you can just buy a new SIM and buy prepaid. When we first arrived, we brought our phones over from SA (make sure your phone is unlocked so that it is able to accept a new SIM!). We were on prepaid/top up for a while before moving to a SIM contract. Since moving here, we are hesitant to get into phone contracts and paying ridiculous fees for new phones. We both pay on average of 25 euros a month for data/minutes each month. We have never had to top up our data or run out of data since we moved here which is a serious novelty for South Africans!

Groceries

This is a really personal thing, how much you eat might be half as much as what we eat. We had to live off one salary for over a year so we got really good at cutting our food bill and buying cheap. I find fruit and veg that is in season to be very affordable, and you can get a frozen pizza for 1 euro that isn’t half bad (especially if you are on a tight budget!). When we are saving and trying not to overspend, on average we can spend as little as 50 euro a week on food for two of us. We both drink, but not a lot and when we were struggling on one salary we lived off 50 euro a month for beer and wine that we consumed at home.

Entertainment/Travel

Drinking and eating out falls under entertainment for us, which even though we both have jobs and two salaries coming in, we limit to once or twice a month. We find eating out to be very expensive, especially dinners. We often look for early bird specials, or opt for lunch or coffee and a treat over a full meal. We would far rather spend our money on travel and doing cool activities over eating and drink our money away. There is a lot of free stuff you can do in Dublin, plus free museums you can visit – the city has loads of budget friendly activities you can do for the whole family. We do find walking in the park or going to the beach or mountains to be a good way to get out the house and not pay for it.

Transport

This will largely depend on where in the city you live, whether you use bus/train/luas or if you choose to buy a car. There is a monthly cap on public transport so I highly recommend getting a LEAP card which will mean that your daily/weekly/monthly trips will get capped. Right now the cap is 7 euro a day if you use the bus only, or 10 euro a day if you use a combination of transport or luas/train. The weekly cap is 30 euro for busses only or 40 euro for train/luas and bus. Rob is currently study which means he has a student card, this is a cheaper rate for public transport (not to mention entry fees and other deals!). If you decide you want to buy a car it is important to remember to get a car insurance quote before you purchase a car – we haven’t gone down this road yet but when we do, I will write a separate post on it. I do know that insurance as a foreigner is very expensive!

Once you have added up what your monthly living expenses will be, and if you know what your salary each month will be, then you can work out if you can afford to live in Dublin. The above doesn’t take into account things like: savings; retirement funds; medical aid; additional costs for children like school etc which are all super important too! Plus this is just a guide, or an estimate – everyone will have a different set of priorities and costs that they will need to consider, but I do hope this posts makes you think about what those costs might look like and for you to consider whether, with your monthly budget, you can actually afford to live and work in Dublin.

WAS THIS POST HELPFUL? WHAT ELSE WOULD YOU LIKE ME TO COVER – COMMENT BELOW!

Live Simply & Travel Slow,

~Meg~

p.s. If social media is your thing (snap! It’s my fave too!), you should totally follow me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook or join my exclusive Facebook Group. And because I seriously am an open book, if you ever want to bounce ideas off me, or just chat and connect send me an email (I really love chatting!)..

p.p.s. I try post varied content 2 -3 times a month, to be sure you don’t miss out on the new post you should sign up and get all the news straight in your inbox – Sign up now!

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In this post I am going to share an estimate monthly budget for Dublin, which will give you insight into how much you need to be earning in order to comfortably live and pay your bills in Dublin.

How to make friends whilst living abroad

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Making friends, wherever you are in the world, requires a lot of putting yourself out there. It means you have to keep trying different ways to make friends. Here are my tips on how to find friends living abroad!It is easy to make friends whilst living abroad, right? I have found that if you look hard enough, it is easy to find other expat friends from your home country. So if you really wanted to make friends, you could make friends fairly easily with fellow expats from home. But should you rely on only making friends with people from the same country as you? If you were to look at your current circle of friends, how many of them are from the same country/culture as you? This is something Rob and I are pretty conscious about, and only really since we moved over to Ireland has it really become an obvious thing we want to stay away from.

I get the attraction to making friends with fellow expats, but why would you want to recreate exactly what you have back home, in a new country? Being South African, I have found a whole heap of South Africans who have made the same move as we have and are living in Ireland. The problem I have found is that so many South Africans choose to only be friends with South Africans – even when they are living abroad. But it is not just an SA thing though, it is a people thing. People generally stick to what they know, so you will generally find expats sticking together with other expats.

The reason Rob and I try to avoid only being friends with South Africans is that when we are among other South Africans, it is very easy to start talking about the differences between Ireland and South Africa. The ‘when we lived in South Africa’ mentality is pretty easy to latch onto when you surround yourself with people who are just like you. The other thing is (and I know I seem to harp on about this!) is that we never left South Africa because we thought it was a bad place, because we felt unsafe, or because we thought Ireland would be better for our family. We left for an adventure, and to experience what living overseas was like. This might or might not be a forever adventure but I hate being around all that negativity that seems to follow people who have left South Africa for all those other reasons. I hate being around people who seem to complain about what it was like in South Africa but also who tend to complain about what it is like to live here in Ireland. Honestly, living abroad is a struggle as it is, it is not easy to fit in and work things out, but if you spend your days comparing and judging and complaining – who really wants to hang out with people like that?!

There are tons of South Africans in Ireland – honestly, I was a little disappointed that we were not the first and only South Africans to ever think of moving to Ireland. But just because we come from the same country does not mean we need to be friends. I am sorry if that comes off rude, but hear me out… Friendship should be a little deeper than just the fact that you come from the same part of the world as someone else. The trap most expats fall into, is that it is easy to fit in with a group of people who are from the same country as you, but the risk is that you will never fully learn or understand the new culture you are living in if you don’t try to make friends with locals and perhaps other expats from other parts of the world.

So after my ‘I don’t want to be friends with only South Africans’ rant, I have to say that the South Africans we have found here have been lovely. Yes, we do have friends who are South African, ones we never knew before coming here and who we get on with really well. But we purposefully choose to not only rely on South Africans to be our friends. Our goal is to have more local and other expats as friends than we do our tiny select South African network. We want to get to know the real Irish, the people who have lived in Ireland all their lives. Just like we want to make friends with expats who have come from all over the world and who can relate with our struggles to fit in. We want to try to make friends abroad that will make this whole living abroad vibe work for us, but also who enrich us and make the adventure all the more authentic. Here are my tips to finding local friends whilst living abroad:

  1. Be selective with your friends. Just because you are both from the same country does not mean you have to be friends. Having a friendship with someone else requires time and energy, you need to be available to meet up and keep in touch and so honestly my advice is quality over quantity.
  2. Join local groups or volunteer. Think of things like joining the gym or running club or even search Facebook for local groups. I recently joined a few expats in Dublin groups, plus I joined a local yoga studio. This way might take a bit longer, but if you are seeing people regularly every week, you are bound to make a friend or two.
  3. Make friends through your friends. This is actually a tip my mom gave me when I was looking for Rob. She always said I would find the guy of my dreams through friends, and she was kinda right! So once you have made a new friend, ask them to bring their friends to the next event.
  4. Get a hobby: There are clubs for absolutely anything and everything if you look hard enough for it. Things like photography, painting, pottery; are great place to find people with similar interests. A website I regularly use is meetup.com.
  5. Say yes to anything, and try anything twice. You need to have a yes attitude, just say yes to doing things and getting out, even if it makes you feel uncomfortable and even if you feel like a complete stranger at first. Also, sometimes people need a second chance, so if you go to an event and it was awkward and awful, try go a second time – who knows, maybe things will be better the second time around.
  6. You need to learn how to share more of yourself and be prepared to be a little vulnerable. The only way you make friends is if you open up and tell people how you are feeling. Another hard truth is that finding friends whilst living abroad takes a big knock to your ego, and unfortunately not everyone will want to be friends with you. You need to learn to let that go, and move on.
  7. Get to know your work friends. The quickest way to make friends is with people you spend most of your time with! Rob and I are lucky that we both work in environments where our work colleagues are actually fun to hang out with. Set up after work drinks, join the social club, go out for lunch – there are plenty of ways to make friends with people you work with.

So full disclaimer, finding friends in Ireland is still a work in progress for me. I have been here for nearly two years and I still find it really tough. Making friends, wherever you are in the world, requires a lot of putting yourself out there. It means you have to keep trying different ways to make friends. Finding friends is a little like finding a partner – you have to find people who get your sense of humour, have similar interests to you and who you actually like hanging out with! And finding those special people is never going to be an easy, quick thing. It requires time and patience and little bit of hanging out with a few frogs before you find your new BFF. Hang in there, it does get easier… At least I hope it does, I will let you know!

IF YOU WERE TO LOOK AT YOUR CURRENT FRIENDSHIP CIRCLE, HOW MANY OF YOUR FRIENDS ARE FROM A DIFFERENT COUNTRY/CULTURE TO YOU?

Live Simply & Travel Slow,

~Meg~

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Making friends, wherever you are in the world, requires a lot of putting yourself out there. It means you have to keep trying different ways to make friends. Here are my tips on how to find friends living abroad!

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