Hi, guys! I'm new here... need some advice... (Orlando, Melbourne: mortgage, real estate)

[disneytati]

Hi, everyone!
I'm new here and I'm kinda lost... LOL I am from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. My family and I are planning to move to Orlando in January 2009, and I'm kinda worried about cost of living, etc. We have info about immigration, legalization, etc (the last thing I want is to be illegal, it's a nightmare!). We are saving money, and getting all documents ready. But I am kinda lost, I don't know which areas are good, prices of cars, and bills, like power, cable TV, errr... I don't know what else... Could you guys help me? What bills do we have to pay monthly? How much does everything cost?
Thanks a lot!!!!

[Kaci]

I'm in Florida and have lived in Melbourne, Winter Haven and Orlando. We're a family of 4. Our bills today...

Electric... including air: $120-215 for a 2000 square foot older home. But we also have a pool... ads a little more to cost. We are conservative and keep our temp around 79-80 degrees.
Water: $40-60
Taxes on home: $2000, insurance $1300
Gasoline for car: $3.13 right now
Food Bill: $80 average a week. We also have a small garden, and don't buy a lot of junk food which brings the cost up.
Cable TV with Computer hook up: $110.... expensive, but kids love the tv and we all love the computer... our main source of entertainment! But you can get cable for as low as $40.

My friend in Melbourne who lives in a 900 sq. foot apt.
Electric: $59
water: $30
Gasoline for car: $3.09

Also, average dr. bill for my kids runs about $75- $80, return visit $50
Dentist, if they haven't been there for one or two years: $125 for full check up and xrays.

We loved Orlando when we lived there. It is very easy to commute through most areas of Orlando. Yes, you have traffic. But it is still a great city to find your way around. We lived in the West area of Orlando... Winter Garden, Ocoee. But there are nice areas everywhere. Affordable for us, and expensive for those who want that too.

Let me know if you want to know more about cost of living here.
By the way, we're moving to Georgia after being here 30 years. Too hummid for me here! Kaci

[disneytati]

Hey, Kaci!!
Thanks a lot for the info!! We will be 5 adults sharing the bills, so I guess it won't be expensive. We are thinking about buying a house, with a mortgage of around 1500 a month. We'll have the power bill around 250 in our budget, to avoid bad surprises... I didn't know about the water bill. It's nice to have one, though. Here in Brazil the water bill is included in the condominium fee, and we never know how much we are paying. The same thing happens to sales tax.
About the doctor and dentist: that's the price for one appointment, right? What about health plan and dental plan?
And how much is the phone bill?

[MESETA]

which are my chances to find a advertising-publicity job in orlando?, how much can be the year salary?. I'm planning to move next year. I have a bachelor degree in advertising and graduate from publicity. Also , se habla español.

[AliceT]

Originally Posted by disneytati

Hi, everyone!
I'm new here and I'm kinda lost... LOL I am from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. My family and I are planning to move to Orlando in January 2009, and I'm kinda worried about cost of living, etc. We have info about immigration, legalization, etc (the last thing I want is to be illegal, it's a nightmare!). We are saving money, and getting all documents ready. But I am kinda lost, I don't know which areas are good, prices of cars, and bills, like power, cable TV, errr... I don't know what else... Could you guys help me? What bills do we have to pay monthly? How much does everything cost?
Thanks a lot!!!!

Much depends on where you are going to live. With five adults, would you need five bedrooms? That's going to bring the price way up. I can't think of ever even hearing of a condo or apartment with five bedrooms.

That leaves single family houses.

You can omit the water bill if you get a rural place and have your own well.

Depending on the availability of trees or other shade, the electricity can go up to $400+ per month. Mine never did, but I was frugal. I turned off the AC when I went to work and rarely left a light on. I knew several people with smaller homes who had bills in the $400-$500 range during the hottest months. How well insulated your house is plays a key role, too.

Health care is something you will have to purchase on your own unless you work for a company that includes it in the benefits package. There are too many variables to make a generalization on what it will cost. Much depends on your ages, medical history and such.

For five adults, your best bet on groceries would be to invest in a membership at Sam's Club or Costco and buy in bulk amounts. Sam's is $35/year and well worth the money.

When you buy a car, look for a used car. Look through the classified section of the newspapers before going to a dealer. Dealers usually charge way more than the car is worth. Take a look at ebay and see what cars are selling for there. You may even want to buy a car on ebay. I bought two cars off eBay - one was a pickup truck and one was a minivan. I was happy with both of them.

Currently, you can't much get even an efficiency apartment anywhere in central Florida for under $850/month in rent. It goes up from there with more size and more bedrooms.

Expect a background check before you can rent a place. That's going to be hard if you are new to the whole country. Most apartments and homes offered by a realtor or property management company require this check. For that reason, it might be better if you are all pooling your saved money for a down payment to buy a place. However, I would not recommend you buy a place when you haven't been here before. You might get here and find it isn't what you had anticipated and want to go somewhere else. But first you have to sell a house. In a housing slump, that won't be easy.

As you can see, there are a lot of variables. It's really hard to give you facts and figures with so many options. Always base your expenses to be twice what you expect them to be so there are no surprises. Can you still do it?

Your best bet to get a feel for the areas you might be interested in is to get a couple motel rooms and look it over. You can read the classified section of the Orlando Sentinel online at Orlando news, information, weather, hurricane coverage, sports, entertainment, shopping, restaurants, real estate, jobs, business, classifieds -- OrlandoSentinel.com to get a better idea of what's available.

I took the liberty of looking up a rental site for Orange and Osceola counties (Orlando and Kissimmee) and found a few listings in your price range. See link: Houses for Rent in Orlando / Orange County, Osceola County | Rental Home in Orlando & Vicinity - Florida
There are options you can choose. I went ahead and put in 4-5 bedrooms and maximum monthly rent of $1500. You can do this, too, changing the options or increasing or decreasing the amount you can afford to pay in rent.

Google is your friend.

[Kaci]

We live an hour away from Orlando. In Winter Haven. But living this far from Orlando, you'll have those high gas bills for your car. If you move to Orlando and work in Disney, for instance, I'd look around Winter Garden, Ocoee and Claremont...

I wanted to mention that our water bill includes trash pick-up. I think that you are going to be lucky in finding a house both in renting or buying. THere are so many houses/apts. on the market for rent. I had a friend who had a condo in Melbourne for rent, couldn't get it rented out at $1500 and rented it out for $850.

Our bill this time was $241 but we've been sick and it has been cold so we keep the house warmer. My neighbor right next door has a house that is 3200 square feet but they keep their house at 72 degrees even when they're at work. They keep it warm 85 when it is cold outside. I know this because, they complain about their $500 dollar electric bills. This was last year, so maybe the bills are even higher now.

My friend who lives in Veria-Melbourne rents his apt. for $900 (lakeview) for a two bedroom in a very nice area. I have another friend in Viera who rents a huge five bedroom house in a very nice ares for $1500. When they moved into it, (three years ago) homes in Veira rented for around $1300-$1600 I don't know what that hoouse would rent for now, but they are having trouble getting houses sold/rented in the area.

We always buy a used car, a year or two old,.. Check out Car-Max when you get here. We save at least $10,000 doing that. I noticed that a lot of people are selling cars/boats around town. Right now, American is in a 'can't sell the house' crunch so may be unloading their 'toys'.

[Kaci]

We have a health plan now. The prices I quoted for dental/medical were last year when we didn't sign up for my husband's company health plan for the kids.

Our health plan now... dr. and dentist bills are $15 each visit. Pretty nice!
Of course it reflects in my husband's paycheck. He works for a hospital and they often change the health plans around. But that is pretty par for the course. You have to use drs. chosen by your employer in the health plan. But since we're hospital people, the hospitals use decent drs./dentist. K

[disneytati]

Wow! Thank you for the long replies!!!
For now, we will be 5 adults sharing a house. We've decided for 4 bedrooms/2 bathrooms. We are probably buying a house. I've been to Orlando several times, and I'm sure that's the place I wanna live for the rest of my life. But I've been there as a tourist, so I don't know how life works there for real...
So you guys leave for work and the AC remains on? I had never even thought of that... LOL Here if you turn the AC every night, you power bill can go up to $600! So right now I have an AC in my bedroom, but I never use it, unless it's boiling hot. In Orlando, I intend to turn it on only when I am home.
Right now I am worried about the school for my daughter, and the purchase of the house kind of depends on this, as I'd like to send her to a public school. But I don't know if any school will take her, as to be enrolled in kindergarten, the kid has to be 5 years old on Sept 1st, and she'll be 5 on Sept 2nd!!! So I don't know which school will accept her, or if I'll have to neroll her in a private school. I'd like her school to be nearby... What do you guys advise me to do??

[**NoodLes**]

I know alot of Brazilians who went back to Brazil because all you do is work here. As a tourist everything is great but living here you will be working your tail off to get the bills paid. It seems like you have good English skills so you should find your typical $7/hr job easily. Many employers here know how to exploit Brazilians to pay them much less than normal. You will like it here at first, but you will miss Brazil really soon because the lifestyle is totally different. Cars in the USA are much more affordable than in Brazil. Most Brazilians live near the Conroy/Kirkman area close to Metrowest. But I wouldn't advice moving here because hardly anybody goes to the beach, and you will be working ALOT! Also most Brazilians can't stand all the spanish speaking people. My brazilian friends tell me spanish is "ugly" and refuse to talk any spanish even if they know some.

[disneytati]

Originally Posted by **NoodLes**

I know alot of Brazilians who went back to Brazil because all you do is work here. As a tourist everything is great but living here you will be working your tail off to get the bills paid. It seems like you have good English skills so you should find your typical $7/hr job easily. Many employers here know how to exploit Brazilians to pay them much less than normal. You will like it here at first, but you will miss Brazil really soon because the lifestyle is totally different. Cars in the USA are much more affordable than in Brazil. Most Brazilians live near the Conroy/Kirkman area close to Metrowest. But I wouldn't advice moving here because hardly anybody goes to the beach, and you will be working ALOT! Also most Brazilians can't stand all the spanish speaking people. My brazilian friends tell me spanish is "ugly" and refuse to talk any spanish even if they know some.

Well, I know a lot of Brazilians who live there and they are much happier than they were here. You know, I am not moving because of money, I am not searching for the American Dream. I am moving because Brazil is not my country at heart, you know? I just love the US, and I feel like I am in prison here... I live in Rio de Janeiro, and I hardly ever go to the beach either! LOL I'll not miss Brazilian lifestyle, that's why I'm moving. I'm running away from Brazilian lifestyle. Everything in the US is more affordable than in Brazil, and I work A LOT here too, and I don't even have the right to turn my AC on! I work 6 days a week, lots of hours per day, and cannot even pay for my daughter's school. The point is: the Brazilian people who are coming back will regret really soon, because if things are bad there, they are much, much worse down here... I know some people who came back, with lots of money they had saved in the US, and ended up living in slums here, and now they wish they had stayed there. And others came back, bought houses here and everything, but then saw they would never have the same life they had up there, sold everything and went back to the US as fast as they could. But well, thanks for the advice anyway!