Job Discussion Forums

[advice]

Hello,

I would like to ask for advice. Which good German universities are located in comparatively cheap cities?

I mean "cheap" as for the cost of buying real estate. My good friends are thinking in a few years to send a child to study to Germany and they are thinking to buy some inexpensive property there.

They think that they can buy some apartment (studio or 1-bedroom) and lease it until their child goes there and then the child will live in that apartment.

Now they can afford this, who knows what will be in a few years?

They thought about Karlsruhe but it is too expensive. They do not want to rent. They want to invest and at the same time avoid spending on rent in the future.

In the USA, very good universities are often located in affordable towns. I would be able to advise them about the USA but I have no idea about Germany.

They are also thinking about Austria.

Please, share your ideas.

[Deicide]

[scot47]

Leipzig, Dresden, Rostock.

[Hod]

I�d second Berlin. It�s unbelievably cheap and attracts all the arty sorts with no money. The unemployment in Berlin and around is horrendous. We�re talking 25%, but if you�ve got a job or are studying there it�s great.

Unless someone is planning to stay anywhere in Germany long term, i.e. over ten years, buying property would be a big mistake. Decent Berlin apartments, for example, start from as low as 50000 Euro, but there�s a reason for this. Apart from the economic problems, there are huge taxes to pay when you buy or sell property. It�s also not in the German culture to buy property, and only about 30 to 40% of Germans ever do so. That 50000 Euro place would still be worth the same or less in a decade, and unless something major happens, it would be nigh on impossible to sell it anyway. Not to mention all the maintenance costs. Do as the Germans do and rent.

[misterkodak]

How about Halle/Saale or anywhere in Sachsen Anhalt? I'd reckon real estate is cheap there and there are a few uni's around.

[Deicide]

[nabakow30]

better education in the uk

us

canada

that's borderline hilarious

kudos to you sir kudos to you

i do love an unanticipated guffaw

[Deicide]

[advice]

Thank you for everybody. As for the quality of education... Well, I have a very prestigeous education from the university in the USA but I am not elligible to stay in America. In my country this education means nothing.

I have Ph.D. from my home country and my salary there is $200 per month:))) In the real life all that "quality of education" does not matter even though we, teachers, would like something else.

To go to study tp Germany means an opportunity to stay there. I cannot afford four-year tuition and living expenses in the USA for my child. I can immigrate to Canada, but it does not make sense to have all those hardships for at least 10 years only to give my child an opportunity to study there.

Thank you for everybody for advice. Just keep in mind that this is a question from a person without any Western citizenship we have different opportunities and different approaches. Besides, our people buy property in Germany. What are people supposed to do when they have a pile of money in their hands after having sold apartments in their home country? They buy apartments in the new country:)))

Earning $200 per month we often live in the apartments which can be sold for $100,000 or 200,000.

We often have wealthy parents who send kids to become Au-pairs thinking that after a year she will find the way not to come back. In my country the real estate which was $2,500 only 5 years ago is now $30,000.

Everything changes in life, nothing stays in the same place. And this is in the country where people do not want to live:))) American $ falls down in terms of buying real estate around the world.

Germany consists not only of Germans:))) Plenty of people come there and they bring money, so in the case of increasing of the EU the prices may change.

[advice]

Also, for my friends and I when we discuss these opportunities for our children having the real estate property in Germany means getting tourist visa to Western Europe without problems at the embassies.

Americans or Canadians just pay for vizas, we have a lot of additional paper work for which we often pay in order to prove that we will come back to our homes.

So, this is one more additional value. Many people take this into account. I paid recently $ 3,500 only to make my legal stay in the USA 5 months longer.

My friends, relatives and I are discussing all those options and we take many details into account. The quality of education is important but it changes after a while, I mean what education is better and which is worse. It depends on many factors.

Education loses its value when the person is not elligible to work. Germany is close to my country, it is possible to go there in the affordable way.

[Hod]

I don�t wish to be rude, advice, but I read both of your entries three times, and what on earth are you writing about? If someone asked me to summarise your words in a couple of sentences, I�d still be scratching my head in 2009.

Who are �our people�? You sound like some sort of alien from the planet Vogturin. All I can gather is that you�re poor but rich and whichever place you come from has property value increases of 1200% in five years, and it�s quite near Germany.

Is it Dublin?

And one last piece of advice � when the seagull follows the trawler, it is only waiting for a fish.

[Deicide]

[advice]

If you are travelling around the world teaching English you should understand that the world is very diverse and complicated.

OK, my apartment which I bought in a medium-size city in Ukraine in 2001 for $2,400 is now $30,000, for example.

In Germany it did not changed for this period of time.

Banks started to give mortages and many Ukrainians are overseas working illegally without right to stay there forever. They may sleep on the mattress on the floor in Canada which they got from the trash but they bring US $ to their home country and it's becoming very cheap, I mean US currency.

Who is speaking about the rich people? ))

However, even live-in illegal caregiver in 2000 could earn $ 500 a month anywhere in Canada and buy the property at home after 6 months.

Many people did that.

For you, in America, you bought Ceasar salad for the same price in 2000 as now, but for Russians and Ukrainians who kept money at the bank or at home they just melted. Those who bought apartments have now apartments.

I am not going to teach anyboby politeness, I asked a question.

I am thankful to everybody who conveyed his or her opinion. That's it.

It is now too late to buy something in my country, Germany is cheaper. It may make sense or not. I do not know.

That is why I asked what Americans/Canadians think about Germany in terms of universities and real estate.

It is interesting for me to read answers.

[advice]

Also about summarizing. We have different traditions of writing in America and in Russia.

It is impossible to summarize the Russian authors. I have Ph.D. in linguistics from my country and M.A. in journalism from the USA, I could have given a long lecture on this topic...

It is very complicated for people thinking in Russian to summarize in the American way. Our reality is different and we survive in it differently that other people in their countries.

However, I am interested in a very different subject right now. I am sorry if my writing pushed somebody to scratch his head for years:))

[advice]

I am so sorry for my another annoying message:)))

However, a question: what is "poor" and "rich"?

How old are you? Do you think that only black & white color exist?

I had a part of my life when I earned US $50 a month but I had a housekeeper/babysitter/cook as one person whom I paid $12 per month and I had time in my life when I earned $1,000 per month and had to pay for apartment $1,120 per month.

Well, all that was in different countries at different time. What is poor and what is rich? When you live in the same apartment it does not matter if it costs $2,000 or $200,000, because it is the same roof.

However, the price may jump between these numbers depending on the political situation very fast in Eastern Europe.

If you sell it for 2,000 you cannot buy even a decent car nowadays.

However, selling it for 200,000 one can pay for the immigration process to Canada and buy 2-bedroom near Toronto:)))

Ukraine is now very important in the American political games but it may change one day and the prices may fall down very fast. Germany is more stable. America has never subsidized revolutions in Germany:))) But it did in Ukraine. Come and look at the quantity of American offices there and the quantity of Americans in the capital city.

About Dublin:))) I am not interested in Dublin. I have no more knowledge about Dublin than Dubliners have about Ukraine.

As for geography, Germany is close to Ukraine. Poland is between us. That's all. Not the Atlantic ocean. Plenty of cheap vans go to Germany from Ukraine, because hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian Jews have immigrated to Germany and many of them still have relatives in Ukraine and they often travel. So, there is a developed cheap transportation between us.

I had an American teacher in my life years ago. He was planning to go to Ukraine, but he considered my ideas boring and, perhaps, not logical, that is why he said, "I will buy my tickets to Ukraine without your help, I know how to buy tickets."

As a result, he bought a ticket via the Internet betwen 2 Ukrainian cities for $100 and the real price was $5, he paid a price which is special for foreigners:(((

Yes, it is our life. In our hotels Ukrainians pay one price, Russians another and the Americans - the most expensive. However, I do not think that we live in a different planet.