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Good:
- easy to find a job (at least a temporary one)
- plenty of restaurants, clubs, shops
- the Irish are native speakers of English so they can speak English, if you are a foreigner then it matters, it is easier to have everything done, like shopping etc. I lived in places where just some people spoke English so sometimes it was hard, believe me!
- not many serious crimes

Bad:
- prices, prices, prices! Almost everything here is sooo expensive!
- weather here is not the best
- there isn't good public transport here during night hours, not many buses etc, so you need to take a taxi home if you happen to stay out late at night, and you have no car, which is.... guess what... very expensive :-)
- sometimes some people can be really loud, drunk or rude, especially at the weekends when they go back from pubs etc, so you just need to stay away from such places if you dont want to get in trouble.

I hope I helped!!! :-)

Thanks! Where are you from, if you don't mind me asking? How long have you stayed in Dublin?

Hi RiN,


In all fairness, prices are quite debatable. Rental costs are very expensive and medical costs can also be very expensive but for the rest, in the vast picture that would highly depend of your job and incomes. If you work in Childcare or sectors that do not pay much like this one, yes you will be struggling because those jobs in those sectors  do not pay off a lot at all. Talking about jobs that pay you off most of the time way under the 1st tax layer (33.8k).

If you work into IT, Sale, Medical/Lab, Engineering, Management even school (high-school/university teachers), Energy, you can get paid very nicely depending your experience and skills set.

Pro:

- People are easy going, friendly mentality and mindset. You can chat with pretty much everyone (good level of English would obviously help).
- Tons of jobs.
- Dublin is wide. You have the city side, the country side and even the further beach side
- Lots of places to visit and to go.
- Criminality has nothing to be compared of the UK, France, Germany, whatsoever. Most crimes happens if you're into wrong stuff. If you're not involved in anything dodgy, you're fine.
- Food wise, you can find good deals in lots of place. It is not that expensive if you know where to look at. Quality has a price indeed but there are some deals from time to time for them as well.


Cons:

- Rental costs are getting very expensive so everybody tend to do sharing and even local stick to their family place well over their 30's until they manage to save enough money to buy as it's still cheaper to buy than renting at this stage as long as you managed to save for enough deposit and initial first big cost (furniture, solicitors, insurance). Your monthly payments through mortgage can be a lot cheaper than rental costs and well at the end the property is yours if you end up paying up without any issues when rental cost go to waste unless you intend to stay for short term, otherwise no point renting).

- Transports (but that really depends where you plan to settle). Some areas are better served than others.

- Search in the forum for topics for the not recommended areas to live in Dublin. That may be helpful to give you an idea (i.e: Avoid too noisy/rough areas to avoid sleepless nights). That will usually be where you find the most of vacant accommodation because they're very cheap but there is always a reason why (a little bit dodgy or too noisy neighbor or sometimes simply extremely far and isolated despite being very safe and sound).


Kind regards,

Portgas D. Ace
(R.)

hello RinOreyva, I am from Poland. I have been in Dublin for almost half a year. If you have more questions about this place, just ask me, I will be happy to help. Do you come from Singapore or are you there just temporarily?

Hello Portgas, thank you for a very interesting post. Yes, many things are here like you described them but I wrote about the high prices because I compared Dublin with other places that I know which have similar salaries to those in Ireland and Dublin is really the same or even more expensive (even though it is not even such a big city, and typically, the bigger city is the higher prices are (towns and villages are usually much cheaper). I was here almost a decade ago, just on a short holiday, and it seemed more affordable then (again, comparing to other developed countries with similar salaries). Now my jaw dropped when I came here in summer and when I saw how prices went up (and in these other places they didn't go up that much). I am not the only one who noticed that, and many foreigners living here will tell you the same. Have a nice day!

Thank you for sharing, Portgas.
ewka, I'm actually Indonesian but have been working in Singapore for the past 10 years. It's getting tiring to live here, everyone is so grumpy and competitive. I can't see myself settling down here.

It's good to here that there's a lot of jobs in Dublin. I hope I can find one that would hire a foreigner (that is, me ). I will be visiting Dublin in Dec. Maybe we can catch up in person!

Hey !

You're welcome RiN.
I definitely agree with ewka and thanks a lot for your inputs. You have no idea how I understand you. That must be even more shocking compared to a decade ago LoL
The difference in price must be so huge it would even make believe an proper Irish that  the Celtic Tiger was not already dead 10 years ago (but it was dead already by that time) ^^

@RiN: Sure no problem at all for a catch up around a pint or tow ha ha ! As long  as it's before the 20th, that's fine by me. Later than  that, I'm back to Paris for Christmas and New Year Eve to visit back my family

Kind regards,

Portgas D. Ace
(R.)

Thank you for your comments, Portgas. And have great Christmas with your family back in France!