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The only thing I find kind of odd in the contract, is that resignation requires 3 months' notice... If someone doesn't want to be there, why keep them for so long?! This kind of makes looking for the next job difficult. Typically employers don't want to wait that long, right?
A permanent position? No way. We have 3 young children and I would be a very unhappy camper if my husband moved away for work. It just wouldn't fly. How hands are you now with the kids? My husband doesn't get home till 8pm every night and let me tell you, I am counting the minutes till he walks in the door. I can't imagine doing this by myself every single day.
My kids would go into a deep depression if their dad moved away. So hard to comprehend this, Your kids need you. My vote is, no. Not that I have one...but if I did....
USD 100k tax free, right at the foreign tax exemption, is decent depending on the Asian country's cost of living and the local exchange rate. 150k is taxable and suddenly not a lot of money.
The main concern is the foreign country and rights to employment, local laws and enforcement etc. Being a foreigner in another country gives you a feeling of vulnerability, at the mercy of the country, their basic rights, and their treatment of outsiders, especially if something goes wrong at work or elsewhere. Don't buy a bunch of stuff, always have your suitcase ready, and make sure you know where the embassy/consulate is.
That's a risk you might accept when you're young and adventurous, but not when you're more interested in settling down for retirement that starting out.
Long story short, I'd do it if I was younger. Actually I did do that when I was younger. But now I can't really handle that kind of stress and anxiety.
With "permanent" I was only stating a fact about nature of this post; I have no intention to stay permanent. When I feel like hanging it up I can just resign, like any other permanent job in US.
Wife has her career and job so she won't move. Giving up one income and moving kids there -- you are correct SG is super expensive -- would defeat the purpose which is to make money.
I intend to rent just one room in a flat and keep rent to under USD750. No beer, no entertainment (except chatting on C-D), no social life to minimize expenses. Public transportation all the way. I expect my living expense to be under USD 1200 per month.
My major expenses would be the 4 plane tickets back to US.
I don't know your relationship, of course, but if you and your wife love each other, I can't understand why such a separation, for an indefinite period of time, is even on the table.
Do you have a specific financial goal this will help you attain, and some kind of time frame for how long you would be willing to live this way to achieve it, or is this just an open-ended, possibly permanent arrangement?
Whether you can save money during your expatriate days in Singapore depends on the way you choose to live: local style or American style.
If you choose to live like some expatriates do, i.e. buy a car and drink some beer after work, then your salary won't be enough. Both car and beer are outrageously expensive in Singapore.
But if you choose to live like locals do, i.e. commute by public transportation and go dine at those hawkers center, then you can save a lot.
What was the outcome of your situation? Did he follow thru on it?
If I can get US$450K... I think I would pretty much do everything listed except maybe bribery... =)
He went for a month. Within a few days he had met enough other foreign coworkers scheming, frequently for over a year, on how they could move back to their respective countries that he immediately (second day) contacted his former boss and told him he had made a mistake.
It worked out well in our case. He says that it negatively affected his career, but he was able to go back to his former employer and pursue other opportunities within the company. Funny, enough, the same thing (with the same salary) nearly happened again a year later.. but with a company in Dubai. Now that one we turned down not because of the company, but because we've reached a point of no return with the kids (they're going into middle and high school). We simply don't have the heart to rip them from their communities like that.
Maybe if in 7 years another one of these adventurous opportunities arises we will gladly go. I don't like to think to often about the kind of money we've turned down... twice...
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