The story so far then .
Inlaws have sold up and moved to southern Ireland,county tipp .
They are retired,and have small pension income plus will have nest egg from sale n purchase of house (brought cheaper house).

My Dilema my Mrs wants to follow,thinks we should sell up and buy property cheaper so we could be mortage free ,(nowt wrong on that line ) but ,one of us would still have to work ,that would be me .
Thats not a prob ,inlaws say theres loads of work in my field (support work) but i see limited amount advertised on nett.

Why the high unemployment rate out there.
cost of living is higher?
car tax higher?

Why isn’t everybody doing the same then if lifes so rosy out there.
and property so cheap?

So the Mrs keeps the presure on to follow her parents !!

There are no jobs.

The economy is going to the dogs.

Are you English?

We at present live in west wales and English yes,so my thinking is they will favour the locals over me in employment ,pretty much like the welsh do round here.
Plus i have a good job at present and enjoy it too.
Do waking nights 7 on ,7 off so gives me time to ride and do lots of other things too.

I think (though I am prepared to be corrected) that bridleway legislation in the ROI is much more restrictive than in the UK; end result is that there’s much less MTBing but more roadies.

Andy

One of my collegues did this a few years ago. he lost his job and now spends all week working in London and has to expence his own travel. Sounds like he has a nice place he built himself though, although its worth about half of sod all now…

Outer Mongolia would be higher on my places to live than Ireland…

first tip is to stop calling it “Southern Ireland” to avoid getting glassed in certain parts.

Anecdotal – based on 2 trips there to photograph weddings….
Beautiful place. (but, so is much of Blightly)
‘Friendly’ locals… ‘ish…. – fair play, the ‘Olds’ at the weddings struggled to understand, quite vocally, why a local could not have done the job….
Driving – roads are terrible (hire car firms ask if you would like to insure tires and rims – I kid you not!) …. add farm traffic into the equation and it just gets slower…
Expensive…. last trip (March this year) – Chinese meal for two – nothing flash, restaurant in the local village, no big drinks expense, £70… (that’s £, not euro..!)
Local village pub – 1 x Guiness, 1 x lager, 2 bags of crisps £11……
Wedding venue (march ’11 trip, golf club) – 2 pints £10. 2 pints of coke – £10…..
FWIW – the weddings we covered were both young couples – One Irish lass, married a brit and one for a young (southern) Irish couple. Both had done Uni in the UK, both had ‘come home’ from Oz to marry….

I think (though I am prepared to be corrected) that bridleway legislation in the ROI is much more restrictive than in the UK; end result is that there’s much less MTBing but more roadies

this could also colour my judgement then ,must be MTB friendly .

Way wetter than UK, full of religious nutters / paedos. Economy pretty much a complete train wreck for next 15 years, mass emigration of young / skilled – why on earth would anyone want to go there?

My brother lives north of Dublin. He’s managed to keep his job but it really ain’t pretty. He had to take a 20% pay cut.
House prices have dropped 30%, his estate is half derelict when they stopped building when the crash began
The country may still need a bailout from the EU
Emigration is increasing – the young in particular are leaving because they don’t believe there’s anything for them.Emigration on the rise again
It’s not a cheap country to live in at all
Correct ^^ about land access, there are very few rights of way, nothing like the access we take for granted in England and Wales.

IMO don’t believe people who say it’s alright, the facts don’t support it. They’re probably being self-deceptive to try and pretend it’ not screwed…

full of religious nutters / paedos

A spectacular example of bigotry against the Irish there. You must be proud of yourself. And to think some people wonder the Irish fought for their independence.

For me…….Against – the country is skint. In favour – it’s full of really nice people.

I have some family in Tipp, (Cahir, to be precise)

Having spoken to them, there’s bugger all work.
Cost of living is high.
Trail access is rubbish (although there is a national level DH in Cahir apparently)
Generally beautiful scenery (just avoid the glue factory at Clonmel!)
Very wet.

Would I live there? No.

quick answer – if you have a permanent job there, go for it.

Long answer – I’m typing it now.

Englishman who has lived here for 10 years.

It’s not a cheap country to live in at all

another perhaps more ‘real life’ example than my ‘beer and crisps’ – also based on the March 2011 trip. We mentioned cost of living to the Dublin locals, more than one mentioned they regularly drove ‘North of the border’ to take advantage of the cheaper ‘like for like’ prices in ‘Northern Ireland’….

Nice to see racism alive and well.

I miss the old sod – but wouldnt go back now. All my family are there and I visit regularly but the overall sense of doom, negativity and denial of the downfall being of our own making are doing my head in.

If you do go and have a firm offer for a job in a rising industry then go for it. And your salary covers the cost of living. One point is – there is no council tax on your house – they just moved this over onto your car. That gives you an idea of what car taxes are like.

Nonsense ernie. If ever I consider emigrating, I check the paedo count. It’s one of the things that really could put me off visiting somewhere. I’ve cut back my trips home in recent years. The bastards are on every street corner.

Why is employment so high? Well for the last decade of the celtic tiger everything appeared to be based on building, from a house for everyone to hotels to some ace motorways, yet strangly bugger all railways and the motorway system isn’t particularly well connected. Everyone knew the bubble was madness, but a lot of people bought into it – not helped by the incredibly low interest rates that the ECB had set for germany and france.
When the international house of cards collapsed it battered Ireland. Banks here had loaned billions for stuff that’s worth nothing now – I know people should be sensible about borrowing but a lot of people trusted the banks and bought into the ever increasing house prices. The government has taken on a massive amount of this debt and PAYE employees are going to be paying that off for a long long time, taxes have gone up (under other names). I say PAYE as nixers (backhanders) are rife, tax office here reckons it loses 2-3 bill a year on that type of stuff.
As banks have no money and 1/3 of people were connected to the building trade it’s all gone a bit pete tong. As banks are not lending money because they think house prices are going to drop further they are actually helping the prices drop as some people have to sell their houses. 7% of all mortgage owners here are 90 days or more in arrears. House prices are in free fall in areas >60 mins travel from Dublin (but as an outsider they were mental prices anyways) back in line with what feels more right.

Prices are expensive for 2 reasons

1 – it’s an island and everthing has to be imported except kerrygold.
2 – People try to gouge for as much as possible, ruin the good of a lot of things with the crass ott money grabbing.
Reading that back makes Ireland sound really bad.

On the good side….

There is loads of mtb trails – there is no bridleways or legal footpaths, but if you see a big hill there will be loads of stuff on it. There is a cycle to work scheme here and that’s helped but people here like to get out and see the great outdoors. You might need to join a club to get the best trails but there are loads around.
High streets are a bit battered but each one is different with character and even my small town has 26 pubs, and as the beer is stronger in general I’ve never managed the pub crawl.
Life is slower – it can be a little maddening at first, but once you roll with it, it’s all good.
White pudding.
I live 5 mins cycle from the sea, 50mins commute from work and everything I need is short walk away in a lovely setting. Education standards here are higher than the UK, rough areas are tiny in comparison to places like wythenshaw/hulme.

White pudding.

I think this on its own, makes up for the high paedo count.