Law / Why is US $ getting so high or Polish zloty falling? [60]

Too many pub numbers being used on this thread but you are both right.

The deficit is about EUR 9bn - but this is the total per year mismatch between govt spend and income.

But the total public debt is much higher - you are correct it is circa USD 252 bn. In PLN its 790 bn. This is the accumulated overspend plus interest and the amount that has to be paid back at some point in the future, just like to Irish and the Brits and the Spanish need to. Make no mistake its a serious problem, its got worse under PO which really surprizes me and it need to be fixed soon - not all of the anti zloty sentiment is caused by Euro issues.

Just the debt service cost on that is circa EUR 10bn per annum.

Obviously the first step to getting the public debt down is to have no annual deficit.

Does it really cost 60m usd for a roundabout ? The whole 20km stretch that the Chinese were arguing about was only EUR 200m.

And by billion I mean of course 1000 million - I don't think anyone in Europe uses the million million version anymore except in France it once caused me some confusion.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

At 24.000 a month I would want champagne flowing out of the taps. You could have the best suite in the Intercontinental for that and be right in the middle of town ! How big is this place ?

News / 4th Polish Republic may re-emerge [244]

OK so there are plenty of negative reasons to vote against PiS - are there any positive reasons to vote for any of the rest of them ? Don't assume that the don't knows are going to support PO, I think many of them will simply not vote. I'm surprized that my wife who was a strong PO supporter, is very civic minded and always took it seriously in the past has said she will not vote this time.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]


You can get a bit of korepetycja or bar work to help pay day to day bills but the kind of cash from that will never buy property at these prices - besides to get a mortgage you generally need income that it documented and contracted for.

Affordability is the issue - Milky is quite correct, with the banks being stricter about deposits and loan to salary ratios then the amount of people who can get credit must be drastically reduced.

Surprized that nobody mentioned the long article on this in Gazeta W last Monday which talked about reasons why young couples can no longer afford flats. It had plenty Milky's sentiments but was backed by plenty of numbers.

As for investing in smaller towns then developers would be mad to do that at the moment - there is so much good vacant property there as many towns have shrinking populations as young people head for cities or abroad.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]


Why ? rents will move according to supply and demand. The rent I get for one of my flats which is good and well located has been stuck at 1300 for 4 years but wages have increased 30% in that time. I have not been able to fill it at a higher price - the times when I offered it for higher it just sat around unoccupied for a couple of months until readvertized and I would rather have reliable tenants paying 1300 than take a risk on someone new.

There are plenty of examples of rents falling in all sectors - housing, retail, office space, warehousing - I would say they are all going down at present or static at best.

Language / Simultaneous translators in Poland [5]

Thanks for replies - would be within 50k of Poznan in some hotel/conf centre and we would either provide transport each day or the person could stay over if they have no family commitments.

Reason I went for an agency is because I did what most people would do if their boss asked them to find a simultanaous translator - stuck it into google and went for the ones who looked most experienced. It does of course protect you again being let down by an individual who gets sick etc.

So if anyone has any good contacts PM me and I will wing a bottle of vodka or wino over.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

If the house is your home and not an investment then it doesnt have an effect. For that to work however then you would need the total of mortgage payments to be less than the total of rent payments you would pay if you rented.

Rent is generally subject to inflation so when inflation was say 5% then a home purchase should pay off provided that the property was not overpriced and that interest rates do not go crazy.

But if you purchase for an investment and intend to resell the house to cash in that investment then you need to get a real return that is higher than the inflation in that period. Otherwise generally you would have been better off with some other form of investment - German shares Buy Buy ! :)

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

Bit bizarre being ranted at for not being glued to my computer on a Sunday night. I did a few other things - put the kids to bed, watched telly, had a beer with my in laws.

Yes the stock market in Germany has fallen by now 15% but I'm willing to measure my prediction over 1 year, 3 years, 10 years or 20 years. Somewhere here you still have my prediction made in 2010 that Polish property prices would be down 30% by the opening game of Euro 2012 and I'm prepared to stick with that and meet you outside the stadium with a bottle of good scotch if I am wrong.

I dont think I have ever slagged Poland off in economic terms - maybe on specific issues like the infrastructure or debt or bureaucracy but in general I'm positive about the place and with a few ups and downs have made a good living over here for 10 years.

Regarding Ziemowits point - I worked for 3 years in Germany with many listed companies in a financial role so I do have some knowledge. On the Polish property point then I have 3 properties here and rent another one (because I dont want to buy !). The last one I bought was in 2006 so maybe I have missed a trick - time will tell.

And I am certainly no socialist !

A crucial part of my point was that Polish property is illiquid at the moment. If German shares start to fall then you can sell them for small brokerage fee and with only mild tax consequences. Or you can sell SOME of them and keep the others. With a flat you cannot sell the kitchen and keep the living room and when you sell it you absorb lots of time and costs.

The other thing nobody has mentioned is that if like many expats you are paid in Euro then a Zloty denominated house has lost 4% of its value in the last 12 days and if you are unwise enough to have Swiss Franc mortgage then the cost of the house has just gone up 10%.

Certainly the events of recent days will not be positive for the Polish housing market - the Polish stock market has seen heavier falls of circa 18%, the falling zloty will drive inflation and possibly interest rates and the threats to big Polish mortgage lenders like Unicredit and Millennium will result in more difficulty for Polish punters to get credit.

On Kamienicas then a good question - they are well built and you will always find people who want to live close to town but quite a few town centers are moving their office space and even restaurants and bars into other areas but the lack of parking and the amount of idiots in hoodies walking around is always going to deter families and I think the DINKY demographic is not so strong in Poland as it is in the West. I think with underground parking and the whole kamienica being renovated then they might work well.

Off-Topic / When do you teach a Polish \ English child a second language? [8]

It is not as easy as people think. In about 40% of cases the child picks up both languages well and is fluent in both by say 5. At this stage they may start to ditch the one they are not using in the playground or to consciously answer that parent in the playground tongue.

I would say anther 60% do often have struggles, delays which you will need to manage and in some cases better to stick to one language depending on circumstances. My own son just turned 5 but speaks both like a 4 year old which is a huge gulf at that age. English went better because it is so much easier. Some kinds will mix languages in a sentance "I'm going to the sklep" and others will rigidly not mix. I know plenty of expat parents with similar problems. What people with older kids have told me is that sometimes they are 8 or 9 before they are perfect in both, at which stage they are well set up for future life.

And there are some whose dads are workaholics who tend to never pick up English - I read you need about 30% exposure to a language in order to get childhood fluency so if you want your kids to be bilingual make yourself available to them, turn off the telly, put your iphone down and talk to them.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

But rent is far lower than mortgage payments at the moment - rent for a 50 sqm place is about PLN 1400 here in Poznan and the cost is at least PLN 300k.

Assume a 10% deposit and 6% APR over 20 years and that leaves a mortgage payment of PLN 1.900. The PLN 500 gap to renting is circa 20% of an average wage earners disposable income. On top of that then Jan Q Pole would also have to find PLN 30.000 for a deposit - 18 months disposable income.

The numbers for property prices just do not add up at the moment. Apart from dishing out personal abuse to Milky and quibbing about a crash v a correction then there's not a lot rationale behind your statements.

As a final point none of the price data shown seems to take into account the incentives given now - free parking space or garage, holidays etc which make the actual prices lower

Work / Polish attitude towards promotions at work [11]

This is typical in any society - worked in UK, Germany and the US and the same reaction anywhere.

What is a bit strange in Poland is the attitude to career advancement - people care very much about titles (wanting to be called specialist, manager or director etc) but do not often have the application and desire to work patiently to a promotion - instead they come and ask for pay rises out of the blue - and do the gun to the head that they will go to a competitor (which 70% of the time it is best to ignore).

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

One that gave you real growth in your income and did not involve lots of transaction charges and currency risks.

Polish govt bonds are as good as any at the moment. Or German if you are worried about PO's deficits. Or German stocks or hundreds of other things I would choose before Polish property.

If you want to live there then fine but with price to rent ratios what they are you would need to live there 20-25 years to pay it off (comparing the cost of a PLN 300k apartment to say 1500 per month rent).

Work / Got a job offer (involving Hungarian and Romanian languages) in Krakow. Potential salary? [28]

despite their reputation, Biedronka are now actually one of the top payers in Polish retail. Avg for a store asst in the sector is about 1.700 gross and a bit more in Warsaw.

For your job then if you dont have any skills or experience other than your language then I think about 2500- 3000 is what you could get. If you do have some other marketable skills then more like 4k depending on what it is.

Real Estate / Poland's apartment prices continue to fall [1844]

er nobody - there is oversupply at the moment hence the falling prices. Its also part of the reason lots of Poles still live in extended family units - because they can not afford a flat or at least can not get credit now the banks have started to be more strict about salary ratios in their mortgage applications.

I think a few years ago I predicted a 40% drop by 2012 - so we are not at that level - above drops are 13% or so, but there is a still a year to go so lets see who ends up correct. Certainly would consider property an unwise investment in Poland at the moment.

Life / Rich man, poor man - today`s Poland [80]


whats with all those strange burgundy trams with German adverts on - look like they have come from early 1990s Leipzig !

Travel / Traveling around Poland - our photo stories with very personal commentary [225]


I can think of at least 350k of motorway in Slovakia - to Trnava, Banka (with a few breaks), Brno, Vienna. Per head its a lot more than the Poles have and it is not always down to one lane like the Polish ones or, nor does it cost 5 euro to do a 100k like I paid a couple of days ago between Konin and Lodz.

Real Estate / WOODEN HUNTERS TOWERS ON MY LAND in POLAND.....is it legal....? [59]

Hang on - so there is no way you can object to hunters on your land ?

I once came out and told some hunters that they were not welcome on my land, that if they fought the board or deer with their bare hands it was acceptable but otherwise they could find somewhere else to hunt. I don't have huge moral objections but I dont want it done on my land. These guys accepted it, did tell me that they had right to do it under law but didnt want to upset me and went away - so maybe dialogue would work.

Work / The Goal: 3000pln a month, Lets make it happen! [13]

If you have an American CPA license surely you can put up with doing some accounting work for a week and sititng around doing nothing for the other 3 weeks. Might be boring I'm sure that would give you 3000 and wouldnt involve showing any tourists around in the rain.

Travel / Plusbus Poznan-Lodz [8]

No it does not.

A similar service does exist called polskibus.com - they have just started - times are not so convenient, in fact it is late at night, but the price is about PLN 15 and sometimes PLN 25.

News / Wal-Mart coming to Poland? [146]

Its simple - its a free country since 1989.

If you want to shop at a mom and pop shop then do so. It has some advantages - no petrol cost being the only one I can think of. And it has some disadvantages - surly slow service, stuff not put in the fridge, people brushing your arse all the time in the aisle, drunks outside etc. Until they fix those things they can't really complain about unfair competition - on Sunday I waited about 15 minutes behind a bunch of old biddies fiddling with their coins and all I wanted was a liter of milk and some bulki. Walmart's till line time is about 1 minute per person and they have self check out too in the US.

If you want to shop at Walmart then do so. Its bigger choice and cheaper but yes sometimes a waste of time and a long way and not a good place to buy a chess set.

News / Poles in work-life balance crisis [22]

Did an interesting exercise at our workplace - people were complaining about overwork and unpaid overtime so we started to properly measure, recorded everyones time and paid out those who were working extra.

But the actual average amount of overtime in a 1000 person company was only 4 hours per head, so circa 3% extra and 1 hour per week. If you were to take out the time employees spend tossing around on facebook, talking on their cellphones for personal business, making coffee, smoking etc then I'm not convinced they are working themselves to death.

Travel / Food Delivery past 8pm on a fri/sat night in Warsaw? [4]

roomservice.pl - pretty much all you need. they speak english and you normally wait about 45 mins for your food.

Travel / Why so many Indian Restaurants in Poland? Which one is the best? [42]

Not been to the old town namaste - mainly because I am too lazy. I always stay in Polonia Palace in Warsaw so Ganesh is just round the corner. Will try Annapurna sometime though as an Indian friend also recommended it.

Bit of a forgotten place but India Curry in Zurawia is not bad, but its a bit more expensive and more like "British Indian" than the others. I have a mate who always wants to meet there so have been 4 or 5 times over the years.

Travel / Why so many Indian Restaurants in Poland? Which one is the best? [42]

In Warsaw I always go to Ganesh on Wilcza - service can be slow but food is great and a long menu plus the food is not too greasy there. Up until I discovered Ganesh I was a Namaste regular and still get the odd takeaway from there.

Work / Chartered accountant from India joining a company in Poland. Cost of living in Poznan? [29]

Nonsense - there are surely no qualified accountants - either KIBR or ACCA willing to work for such cash. If there are then I most certainly wouldn't want their advice on my own money ! Maybe some very old KIBR people with no English skills but that is not the norm at all.

I'm interviewing for a post at the moment and the 4 on my shortlist have current earnings of 10-12k. And these are newly qualified people. If you want someone with 3-4 years experience after qualifying you have to pay more.

Of course there are people with lesser qualifications like diploms working for 6k but that was not the question.

News / Poland's Lost Generation [172]


With respect they are more reliable than anecdotal evidence from your brother. Lots of food prices actually fell last year as did many imported goods as the zloty got stronger. As for cigarettes well there is an obvious answer to that problem and one I took painfully several years ago - stop paying to kill yourself.

There is no reason why wage increases should outstrip inflation - the rationale for wage increases should be increased productivity.

News / Poland's Lost Generation [172]


wages are not stagnant - on average they are up by 4% this year and 6-7% in bigger towns.

I think more of an issue is that inequality is growing - i.e. some skilled people are getting very good wages and unskilled workers are indeed seeing stagnation.

Real Estate / Poland house prices recovered faster - Summary of 2010 [89]

I'm confused - the price would fall but your yield is unchanged - in fact your yield relates to what you actually paid for the place.

And where would you get the cash to pay for these other flats ? You would still need some deposits. Maybe OK for you but have you any idea how hard it is for a Warsaw citizen with a monthly avg wage of 4000 to scrape up a 50.000 deposit ?

PLus your yield figures exclude repairs, management and tax (which I presume you are not declaring but you should !). Take those out and it is more like 5%. Better than the bank but a lot worse than the stock market.

Travel / Why most taxis in Warsaw cheat foreigners to get more money? [38]

They are not nearly as bad as they used to be. And much better than in Prague or Budapest.

But there are probably 20% who will try and rip you off. So

1 Use whatever Polish you have when you get into the cab - even just show that you can use numbers in Polish.
2 Where possible use one of the main firms - there are more than 3 but less than 10 that I trust !
3 If leaving a pub or restaurant ask the waitress what would be a fair price and tell that to taxi driver before you start.