Irish guy interested in living in Argentina...

Hi dalyvilla,

have you read the Argentina guide?

Where in Argentina will you live ?

All the best,

Julien

Hi dalyvilla, as Julien says, Its important to know where you will live, as Argentina has losts of places very different from each other... do you have an idea of were you want to move to?

is it hard to get work?

Tougher than Australia for sure, and pay is a lot less (but then so is the cost of living). Your best bet to try and work as an English teacher and thats tough without a TEFL cert (a decent one will cost you at least 1500 USD). If you PM me I can put in contact with some people who might be able to help you out. I know a guy who owns a wine shop for instance. You will need SOME Spanish though.

do u need to know a lot of spanish?? Educated people always speak English but if you want in any way to immerse yourself in the country and get to know the place properly take some cheap Spanish lessons  (you can do 20 hours of group classes for as cheap as 120USD with a good school..)

I run a community website, [img align=www.catchthelingo.com]www.catchthelingo.com[/img] which will allows you to easily compare and book Spanish courses across Argentina and make informed decisions.

is the quality of life good... hmmm depends how you value your life..social life is great and cheap. BA is polluted and noisy but other parts are very amicable.


PM for if you want any more advice.. im irish too btw!

cheers
eamonn

Hi! Did you find a job? Because for us is very difficult to find one. Good luck!!

Hi there,

A new member to the forum here. I've been living in Buenos Aires for about a year now. I came here last December after Christmas. I had met some expats here on vacation a few months prior who had jobs working at international companies, and they said that for them it was relatively easy to find a job.

Well, when I got here in December, that was just not the case. I guess the people who I met were too optimistic! I came here, looked in Clarin and on Craigslist, and I could not find a THING in Buenos Aires. I applied for so many jobs, and I heard back from one person.

That one person was looking for an English teacher. I didn't have much experience teaching, but I essentially begged her to hire me. She gave me a chance, and I started working. The pay was miserable, though. I was getting paid 25 pesos an hour, and it was only part-time. And in February, I was getting pretty much nothing in hours. January wasn't so bad, but then come February it was nearly impossible. Everyone was on vacation and whatnot.

So, I went back to the drawing board. I met an American woman who was doing telecommute work for a company out of New York. She was writing eLearning courses or something. In February, I started looking for telecommute jobs.

Telecommuting is honestly the only way you can work here and survive. The wages here are too low, and if you telecommute out of the U.S. they'll at least pay you something livable. Thus, I recommend checking out the sites below:

craigslist.com - This site often has good telecommute job offers if you click "telecommute". There are a lot of scams, though.

monster.com - If you search "telecommute" there are a few that popup.

newtelecommutejoblist.com -- arguably one of the best resources out there. They only post legitimate (ones that appear legitimate anyway) telecommute jobs.

careerbuilder.com -- again, has a few.. just search "telecommute"

Anyway, good luck with your search! If you can't find a telecommute job, then I wouldn't even suggest coming to work here. Come here on vacation or something, but don't work here. It's just not worth it..

I would immediately ignore the earlier information regarding work and pay, Spanish classes, etc. 

There is work to be found here and one can get competitive wages, certainly high enough ones to earn a living down here.  However, as the one person correctly advised - telecommuting is the very best option if you have some marketable skills in that area.  Writing, designing websites, graphic design, data entry, etc. are all fields where one can find a lot of work telecommuting. 

In addition to the sites listed above, elance.com is a great one to find freelance jobs.

As to teaching English, the post near the top could not be any further from the truth. I have known literally a hundred people who have worked teaching English without TEFL certification.  For the most part TEFL certification is worthless.  To me it seems a scam to get money from unwitting persons who think it actually provides some credentials when in fact any language institute can offer their own certification (some offer great courses, most of them offer nonsense). 

However, in any case teaching English down here is a dead end.  I have lived here for nearly 4 years now and have not known one single person who could earn enough money teaching English here.   The bottom line is Argentines can go to the Universities here and study English for free so the only real reason to go to someone outside is to work with a native speaker, however the current wages support around 45 pesos an hour and you will not be able to find anything near full time. 

Working for corporations is the only way to find a decent volume of hours per week, but there are a few problems associated with that field of employment.  For one thing, most of the corporations only contract out to institutes and they only pay their teachers between 15 and 25 pesos an hour on the average.  For another thing, many of the corporations are downsizing now with the economy faltering as it has been and English classes have been one of the first things to go.  Lastly, most of the large companies still offering their employees English classes are in the northern suburbs making commuting there a nightmare and one cannot even begin to think about living out there without a very high income.

As to learning Spanish, I think the very best and most cost effective way is to find a private tutor (look at craigslist, etc.).  The prices will typically be less than those for group classes on sites like the one listed above and the experience of working one-on-one will be very beneficial.  If interested in working in groups there are plenty of conversation groups that meet virtually every day of the week somewhere in the city and are either free, nearly free, or you have to purchase a beverage or something as most of them meet in cafes.

Hi maolivera,

Do you have any information to share on the forum that can help other members who want to move to Argentina?

Thank you.