mary67

Posts

EW NEWBIE

Latest post on 09 May 2016 - 19:00

Its a great question to ponder but one only you and your family can answer. Each person and situation here is unique. For us, we have been here for 7 years. I mean my husband has.worked here for 7. Prior to this last year, I have traveled back and forth from our 'dream home' in San Diego. My husbands company directly pays for all housing and car allowances so we have never considered buying anything here. No real need to. The RE market is not stable and we have heard horror stories from other investors and friends who bought here and with a country sorely lacking any legal recourse, it's not worth it to us to risk our money in this market. My husband is a resident, so we could if we wanted; we just wont. With our son out of college and out on his own, we actually SOLD our fancy dream home in San Diego this past January and now I gave up my real estate finance job and live here full time. With that decision came no debt, no liabilites and no stress anymore and I am happy to be here with my husband as just a 'housewife' full time with the freedoms to come, go and damn well do as I please. We figured we are here for maybe 4 more years at best and our goal all along, unlike some of our other spendthrift friends here, has been to bank and save as much as we can each month. So when that day comes when we move back to US or retire to another country of choice, we can have the freedom to either buy another place or rent a house and let someone else deal with the headaches. The investment we make each month, is in our complete freedom from any debt and a stress free lifestyle here and in the future. That's a huge value to us personally. It's why we agreed to come here in the first place. A 4 to 1 increase in annual salary means he can retire earlier. But if we just spend ourselves silly buying into a lavish lifestyle here complete with a big fancy new villa and sports cars, just to impress strangers, to us, it defeats the purpose of giving up our comfortable life in beautiful San Diego in the first place. That said...if a house here will make you happier and fill that void your feeling then it may be worth it to YOU. It's not always about the money, unless it is. Quality of life has to play a factor in the decison as well. But you also need to be willing to make a financial sacrifice if markets go down as expected or your jobs happen to end or change. Again its something only you and hubby can decide. For us, right now, we are living our dream. What are both your dreams worth? If its that dream house here in Dubai, then I say just go for it. Live those years happy and content because they are gonna keep passing either way you decide. You are absolutely right in the sense that each persons life story is different. You are possibly where I see myself in about 8-10 years time, when the kids leave for college and you want to down size and be more mobile. My dream has never been to have a nice house in "Dubai" per se, but this where I ended up, where I moved to right after graduation following my husband and where I have been working for 8 years already. Actually I used to live in Montreal and we were planning to move to southern CA, but here I am, and want to make the best of these years...just to impress myself actually ;)

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mary67

Posts

EW NEWBIE

Latest post on 25 October 2014 - 10:15

Thanks, I have already looked into couple of jumeirah park villas, but even with. 5 bedrooms, they have a open kitchen directly opening into the common area of formal living dining room, no separate family room attached to kitchen with a dinnet area, where I think the whole family spend its time and is very useful to have Our budget for jumeirah island will not be enough, Unfortunetaly :( I have heard Al Furjan us nice too

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