That London.

[Colin]

I left London as Fuse lived too nearby and was responsible for starting the riot in Ealing.

[briareos_kerensky]

All of QC's links seem straight out of dodgy advertisment from 3rd-rate blogs

[Mayhem]

As noted, it's going to be all down to how close to the centre of London you want to live, and how much commuting you are willing to put up with if you have to travel into an office each day.

I share a 3 bedroom flat with my brother out in zone 5 and the mortgage is currently 860 quid per month (total). The bird I've been on some dates with who lives out near Langdon Park pays a grand mortgage per month for a 1 bedroom shoebox (probably about half the floor area, if less). So you can see the wide divergence there!

At a minimum, I'd say you're probably going to want to be earning at least 30k if you want to live reasonably well by yourself in London, rather than the suburbs, and even then, it might be a push.

[QualityChimp]

Make sure you move into Zone 2, so that your "I don't do Zone 3" friends are able to come and visit you:

[endo]

Well, to be honest freelance is not enough to support me fulltime at the moment so will need a main job. People say Tokyo is expensive but rent averages around 100,000 yen (550 pounds) (p/m) for a reasonable one bedroom place, but I guess by the sound of things London is more. Anyway, thanks for the comparison.

I take it you're talking about translation (as in text) rather than interpreting? There are quite a few translation companies in London, but there are lots outside it too. Also, your salary in-house wouldn't be that amazing at first, especially if it's one of the bigger outfits, unless you have loads of experience. Even then, pay for in-house translation positions tends to top out at relatively low levels, unless you move into project management or other managerial roles. Obviously there are exceptions and you can find pretty well-paying agencies. They tend to be specialised though.

How much experience do you have? If you're good, freelance is extremely lucrative. I worked as an in-house translator for 13 years in and around London, getting into management by the end, but I've now been freelance for 2 years and my earnings now eclipse what they used to be. Like massively significantly more.

[tokyochojin]

Thanks for all of the feedback guys, it's definitely opened my eyes to what's in store. Commuting is not an issue for me as I am more than used to that in Tokyo. What will be is paying my own train fees (in Japan almost all companies provide a train pass).

I was thinking a flat share might be the way to go initial while I get to know the city and will hopefully make it easier to meet people but I know what a lottery that can be.

Salaries I have been looking at have all been rather on the low side for London (I was offered a job with Hori for 25-30k but couldn’t take it as I couldn’t start when they wanted) but I figure I will get myself in the door and try and find something better in the future. It is pretty hard to really know though until you are there and sitting interviews. Anyway, once again thanks for all the info, much appreciated.

[randombs]

Wait, you can get a 1 bedroom flat for ?550 p/m in Tokyo?

Yep! Ours is a 3-bedroom flat(one is a Japanese room which we sleep in) with living-room/kitchen and long balcony for 850/month. It's right opposite a well-connected station on the Yamanote line and on the ground floor we have restaurants, a convenience store, clinic and even an optician. The building is a bit old(not by London standards!) and the windows are quite thin but otherwise it's lovely. Rooftop garden, too.

When we were flat-hunting, we even saw a 2-floor detached flat... thing for 750/month. It was brand new with modern fittings, one bedroom upstairs with a large walk-in closet that could be partitioned, and a large kitchen(with huge cooking surface and huge sink), bathroom and toilet downstairs. It looked like a house, but it was quite thin. Negatives for us were that it was up a short hill, quite small, and the house opposite looked like something from a horror film.

Bear in mind that Tokyo still has its sticks. My company is right on the Northern edge of Tokyo and it looks just like where I was living in Saitama before now. Still, even that place has everything you'd need by way of facilities.

[wakka]

That's awesome! Yes I remember the Yamanote from when I visited a few years ago.

In London ?850 would get you one bedroom in a flatshare in zone 3 lol.

[randombs]

Jesus. When I was in London I did a flat share in Angel for 6 months at ?550/month not including utilities and council tax.

It was nice being a few minutes from the station but really noisy because we were next door to a pub and the windows were rubbish. Friday/Saturday nights weren't much fun thanks to the live bands but I usually spent weekends with my parents.
[MENTION=1211]tokyochojin[/MENTION]: shame about Hori. I'm on 25k right now and it's 4 more than I was getting in the UK doing the same job but when I go back I'll be looking for more than whatever I'm on when I leave. I'm not sure how useful Japanese would be back there unless I find work that needs it but you never know. Luckily for me all our servers are in English so I won't have to relearn anything!

[kryss]

2LDK I rented between Shinmatsudo and Mabashi was 64k/month and twice the size of my 1k/month 1 bedroom here.
Why are you going back to the UK?? Crazy.

[Mayhem]

I was just driving back from dropping my brother off at a job interview, and I saw a new build advertised. One bedroom apartments, 336 sq ft, from ?205k. I have a three bedroom flat that's twice that size, and the initial mortgage ten years ago was 10k less. And I'm in zone 5! Just shows you how much the house market has recovered.

[Jaz]

London sounds cheap. 3 bedroom apartment in Singapore, at the low end, the equivalent of 1800 pounds a month.

Fortunately, none of that is paid by me.

[wakka]

You would have to be very lucky to pay less than that for a 3 bedroom flat in London tbh.

Although at least our beer is cheaper I remember pints being ?15 when I visited Singapore a few years ago!

[J0e Musashi]

London rocks. It's the greatest city in the world.

[randombs]

Agreed.

I'm wondering what to do. I just want to live in the UK. My company's UK office is near Manchester but my gf wants to live in or close to London. If she gets a decent job then it should be fine. Her company's HQ is in London and you can transfer after a few years so maybe we can manage ok if she stays with them. Otherwise, I doubt her chances of finding a decent job there but you never know.