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mantonas wrote:

Hi all,

I used to live in Dublin previously but I have moved to Malta about 3 years ago and at the moment, I am seriously thinking in going back to Dublin but I wonder if any of you could give some sort of advice about the actual cost of life over there.
I work for a big company with offices in Dublin too and therefore, I would keep the same job I have here in Malta, so, I would not be looking for another job.

My average salary in Dublin would be between 30-32k per year gross. I know the cost of life in Dublin it's much higher than here in Malta and that's why my questions comes. Do you reckon that with this sort of salary would be ok for a family of 4 (me, my partner, 6 years old son and 2 years old daughter) to live decently?

My partner would not be working initially but eventually, she would also be looking for a job. My work place would be around Cherrywood area but I would be willing to live further away and to spend between 1-1.30 hours to commute from home to work. Also, any suggestions of areas within 20-30 kms distance from Cherrywood that would be cheaper to rent and with easy access to public transport?

Would be great if someone could give me some tips and advice, if possible

Thanks in advance!

Cheers,
Antonio

Hi mantonas,

We just moved to Malta last month to 'escape' Dublin so I had to give my 2 cents on this topic

First of all, your salary isn't too bad considering most salaries have gone down in recent years. For example it used to be easy to get jobs in customer service paying 40k+ a year for language speakers. Now it's more like 26k to 32k max. During our last year there we lived on one salary (exactly 32k actually) and lived in Dublin 7.

We survived but had almost nothing extra and both had no health insurance for over a year. It was scary and I wouldn't want that again. Going to the GP is expensive, a specialist costs a fortune. If you're lucky your employer pays for a private insurance but even that benefit has been removed with lots of companies. You pay on avg €50 for each visit and even with insurance most plans only give €30 back. Dental is not covered in 90% of those insurances and is also pricey. I do recommend Smiles Dental on O'Connell Street, they were very good with fair prices. There are excellent health clinics and private hospitals but you need a very good plan to be able to go there.

The main cost will be rent. We paid €1400 a month excl. bills for a 2 bed. This was considered CHEAP. I've been monitoring prices since 2012 and 2 beds have gone up from 1200-1400 up to 1800-2000 for a nice standard. Not luxurious by any means but somewhere that doesn't have disgusting carpets and mould! There's been a housing crisis in Dublin for a while and rents have been rising every year - in our case 10%!

The government is now addressing this and put a freeze in place. For the next four years I believe there can only be rent increases every two years. It's still bad but better than nothing. In general I found the standard of housing to be pretty bad and I lived in the Docklands, in Dublin 15 (Blanchardstown) and Dublin 7 (close to Parnell St).

I know a few people that lived in Sandyford and really liked it. There are nice apartment blocks with a decent standard, an Aldi supermarket and Lidl in Stillorgan is close, too. You'd be on the Green Luas line (just a fancy word for a tram basically ) which makes for a pleasant and efficient commute. It goes directly to Cherrywood (last stop). Sandyford to St Stephens Green can be done in as quickly as 20min. The bus system - whilst not as bad as Malta - leaves a lot to be desired. Lots of employers in Sandyford as well: Microsoft, Salesforce, Sage (fairly new and supposedly creating 300 jobs) and many more.

In terms of your rent budget - I think 800-900 is quite low but it depends how long you want to commute. The further out you get the less buses there are, often just Bus Éireann with perhaps one connection every hour. Plus sometimes these properties are even more expensive - especially if they're in desirable commuter towns.

Food wise Ireland is so much cheaper than Malta. We're spending a ridiculous amount of money since we got here and we eat crap. Ireland we lived healthily and for two people our food shopping was between €220 - €250 per month. We ONLY shopped in Lidl + Aldi though except for meat - there are great butchers in Dublin with better prices than the supermarkets.

Utilities were expensive, too, and now with the water charge will be even more. If you rent a house expect to pay a lot if you heat with gas. We lived in a very well insulated apartment and still paid €100 per month when we heated the place for a few hours every day. In the end we switched to electric fan heaters in two rooms and that was considerably cheaper (only about €15 a month). For our 2 bed we paid about €120 utilities per month.

School-wise it depends where you live really. I've heard good things about it from ex work colleagues who lived in County Wicklow.  On the other hand the few schools I've seen in the city centre always looked like prisons - even primary schools... I can totally understand you though not wanting to have your kids speak English with the Maltese accent!

What really made us leave Ireland (for me nearly 4 years, my partner 9 years!) was the increase of prices everywhere, the reduction of salaries and the weather. Sorry, it had to be mentioned everyone knows of course that Ireland isn't Ibiza but it's so much worse than even the UK e.g. London. It got me down, made me depressed, anxious, you could never plan anything and had to take umbrella + wear lots of layers, no bbq or strolling outside after dark without a thick jacket, etc..

Last summer was the worst - most of July was spent indoors, it was rainy, windy with a feels like temperature of 6 degrees.... not joking.. Now in Malta I'm slowly getting active again, not dreading to leave the house, enjoying the warmth of the sun... it's done wonders for my health, complexion and mood

Sorry for the long post, I hope there's some information in there that could be useful. Let me know if you have any questions