Stories from the Celtic Tiger Years *Mod Warning in OP PLEASE READ*

FixdePitchmark

John_Rambo wrote: »

Some amazing stories on this thread, some really sad ones and some funny ones too.

I'm really going to have to stop perching my sunglasses on my head.

To be honest, anyone wearing sunglasses from where I am from, has notions.

Muahahaha

Musefan wrote: »

My memory is of older siblings being able to purchase property at age 23/34 with one income.

Took me a good 8 years more than that when it was my turn.

yeah same here, a sibling bought a 1 bed apartment for 85k at 23 years of age on just a single income, by the time I hit 23 the Tiger had well took off and that same property was 170k

John_Rambo wrote: »

Some amazing stories on this thread, some really sad ones and some funny ones too.

I'm really going to have to stop perching my sunglasses on my head.

Its not just the sunglasses perched on your head, its when you match that with a pink Ralph Lauren shirt that the real problems begin. From there its a slippery slope to complaining about the lack of good helicopter pilots to fly you around to buy new sunglasses and more pink Ralph Lauren shirts.

John_Rambo

FixdePitchmark wrote: »

To be honest, anyone wearing sunglasses from where I am from, has notions.

That's mad. Where I'm from anyone that wears sunglasses is in the sun. Surely you have a pair in the car? I often see people with their hands hovering above their screwed up faces breathing through their mouths trying to block the sun. A reasonably priced pair of good sunglasses could save their dignity.

Muahahaha wrote: »

Its not just the sunglasses perched on your head, its when you match that with a pink Ralph Lauren shirt that the real problems begin. From there its a slippery slope to complaining about the lack of good helicopter pilots to fly you around to buy new sunglasses and more pink Ralph Lauren shirts.

Pastel coloured faux rugby jerseys, extra belly space, collars popped, nice pleated chinos and a pair of dubarries. Sounds like my ex boss in his "Saturday" clothes.

thomasdylan

antimatterx wrote: »

It's not that hard. I'll be able to do that in about a year and I'll be 25.

It can't be fairly hard if you're not living at home and starting your career. Particularly if you have college loans to repay.

FixdePitchmark

John_Rambo wrote: »

That's mad. Where I'm from anyone that wears sunglasses is in the sun. Surely you have a pair in the car? I often see people with their hands hovering above their screwed up faces breathing through their mouths trying to block the sun. A reasonably priced pair of good sunglasses could save their dignity.

Wrinkles, screwed up faces , lack of comfort is what keeps you in your place.

When you get to the place that you have a Pink Shirt and a pair of sunglasses on your head - you are at the moment of maximum Irish Poncey modern man.

Irish pubs don't have windows for a reason - then these lads walk in with sandals and sunglasses on their head - clown alert.

John_Rambo

FixdePitchmark wrote: »

Wrinkles, screwed up faces , lack of comfort is what keeps you in your place.

When you get to the place that you have a Pink Shirt and a pair of sunglasses on your head - you are at the moment of maximum Irish Poncey modern man.

Irish pubs don't have windows for a reason - then these lads walk in with sandals and sunglasses on their head - clown alert.

OK FixdePitchmark. I don't have a pink shirt, but I do own sunglasses, I wear them in the sun, not in dark pubs. I've a few pairs of them actually. I guess, in your opinion I'm half a "ponce" or maybe my multiple ownership makes me a full on ponce.

Leaving your obsession with other peoples ocular attire aside... any interesting stories from the Celtic Tiger?

Cake Man

Would have been in secondary school during those years so can’t say I experienced or noticed much of what was going on at the time. I do recall around the summer of 04 or 05 a friend getting some summer work on a building site and making E600 a week doing a bit of labouring (he told us he basically spent the day sweeping up and general tidying. When bath tubs were installed he’d have a kip for a few hours in them when it was quiet.) The rest of us fools in part time supermarket jobs on near minimum wage.

For anyone who lives in or around Waterford will know the Waterford Crystal factory was an institution for years and was booming around the CT years. I think at the height of it the place employed over 2000 people, crazy when you think the factory is shut now. You’d have bus loads of Yanks in every week doing tours and then buying up everything.
If you’re from the area you’re either related to or know someone who worked in “The Glass” (or work(ed) there yourself). I remember being told a story recently from someone who worked there around the boom years a Chinese group of tourists came in on a tour of the place one day. They spot a lovely crafted giant glass panda in one of the showrooms and ask the tour guide “how much is that?”. Tour guide basically says it’s just for decoration and not really for sale, “yeah but how much?” is their reply. Not knowing what to do the tour guide escalated up to management and likewise, the management guys don’t really know either as it’s not something that was advertised for sale. So they do some calculations to work out the material cost, labour, overheads, profit etc to get an idea of what the glass panda would be worth and arrive at the figure of around E50,000. They go back down to the Chinese group and quote them the figure, not really sure if they were actually seriously considering buying it. Their reply: “ah ok, we’ll take three of them so”...

I know in the above it wasn’t Irish people throwing money around but it showed the money coming in which ultimately flowed outwards into properties, big cars, holidays etc.

Muahahaha

John_Rambo wrote: »

Pastel coloured faux rugby jerseys, extra belly space, collars popped, nice pleated chinos and a pair of dubarries. Sounds like my ex boss in his "Saturday" clothes.

Lol that wear describes the Tiger man so much. I remember one of those specimens skipping an airport check in queue in Faro airport by ducking under several of those barriers to get to the top.

The arrogance was truly astonishing. Most people in the queue were Irish so it was like some kind of group curtain twitching, everyone saying look at yer man in the pink shirt. He actually got away with it too, no one said a peep and he checked in quicker that the entire queue. Then it was down to the cattle holding pens and everyone is giving him and his wife dirty looks

fAzI

Bag of weed was for 50€ same as now

Plasandrunt

In Summer 2007 I'd just finished my first year of college and got a 5k loan off AIB to head off Interrailing for 2 months with repayments to begin at the end of the summer despite the fact I was leaving my part time job in Dunnes. Came back and flunked out of college, didn't get a job until December of that year and I hadn't had any correspondence from AIB at all but started to pay back the loan.

Fuascailteoir

Alan shearer was involved with some developers in planning for the development of holiday homes in a gated estate in ballyconnell. I remember seeing the brochure for it and Alan was selling the image of leaving your house and onto a luxury boat. The site work was all done and then came the crash.

MyPeopleDrankTheSoup

Sunny Disposition wrote: »

Also, know an elderly single man in Clare who sold a piece of land for €6 million. The same man could easily live on €200 a week. He was laughing at it, joking his home village was like Manhattan. Of course the land, which actually flooded at times, was never built on.

JJ?

WAW

mariaalice wrote: »

I had an SSIA, but other than that no financial institution ever offered me loans or or credit cards that I can remember, so again maybe it was only certain sections of society it was offered too?

SSIAs will they ever bring anything like them back?! Or the great interest rates on state savings? They were great.

mikemac2

Section 50 - tax breaks to get investors to build student campus accommodation. Good idea

Living over the shop scheme - invest to create accomadation in town centres. Good idea

Section 23 - build housing estates in rural villages with no jobs, no transport, not much in the way of services at all. Absolutely horrendous idea! Many of these estates were never sold and more were left unfinished to die a slow death through vandalism. There is an estate in our village, nobody ever spent a night there. I fully expect it to be torched and burn down some time. Local teenagers use it for drinking their naggins at the moment

Mister Vain

Sky King wrote: »

I did my leaving in early naughties - a load of my friends were working on the buildings from the late 90s all the way through the 'tiger'.

My abiding memory is them earning huge money and spending thousands of euro a month on drinking and boy racer cars.

Can I have 6 double vodka red bulls barman. Here's a hundred quid. Keep the change.

Ahh yes, something you never see anymore is the modified cars. They were everywhere at one stage. Guys spending a fortune on sound systems and ridiculously loud exhausts.

colm_mcm

There was a housing estate (Alderwood) in D15 where they gave you a “free” Volvo C30 with every house.

Prices starred at €480k.

antiskeptic

chops018 wrote: »

Does anyone have any good (or bad) stories from the Celtic Tiger years?

You always hear phrases about how people partied etc., was there just a constant flow of credit available to people and people actually taking the money e.g. was there actually teachers on circa €30k a year buying a house and car and an apartment somewhere.

I was in school and college during these years, graduated into the recession, so I didn't really see what was fully going on at the time bar the fact everyone was working and had money. My dad was working on the buildings on great money and my mam was working away also, we were never stuck really money-wise, also rent seemed to be a lot cheaper back then and fuel and also my college fees were only around €800 a year along with wages being fairly similar to what they are now (from what I can remember anyway, will stand corrected if I am wrong).

A €30k a year colleague went to the bank looking for a small mortgage. He lived in his family home and inherited it when his folks died. He wanted to swop from his mid terrace to the end of terrace across the road.

The bank suggested he keep his house and rent it and they'd loan in full on the one across the road.

He declined

ILoveYourVibes

I knew a girl who spend 300 quid on postcard.

Sky King

Mister Vain wrote: »

Ahh yes, something you never see anymore is the modified cars. They were everywhere at one stage. Guys spending a fortune on sound systems and ridiculously loud exhausts.

She Glanza lad. Quare quick.

ILoveYourVibes

Sky King wrote: »

She Glanza lad. Quare quick.

Translation ??

kkhornet

ILoveYourVibes wrote: »

Translation ??

Is that a Toyota glanza old chap. It's very fast.

addaword

In most of Donegal we never saw much of the tiger. Maybe a lot of old car got replaced by newer cars, but nothing wild .

colm_mcm

colm_mcm wrote: »

There was a housing estate (Alderwood) in D15 where they gave you a “free” Volvo C30 with every house.

Prices starred at €480k.

Is that the one behind the Johnson Mooney and O'Brien factory where they were all lied to about them moving site?

addaword

addaword wrote: »

In most of Donegal we never saw much of the tiger. Maybe a lot of old car got replaced by newer cars, but nothing wild .

99% of which had to have been untaxed 1.9TDI Audi A4’s with a RS4 body kit

Sky King

ReginaldSmythV wrote: »

99% of which had to have been untaxed 1.9TDI Audi A4’s with a RS4 body kit

Ah yes, 'Felt spec'.

Still a few of them knocking around.

Sultan of Bling

Cake Man wrote:

For anyone who lives in or around Waterford will know the Waterford Crystal factory was an institution for years and was booming around the CT years. I think at the height of it the place employed over 2000 people, crazy when you think the factory is shut now. You’d have bus loads of Yanks in every week doing tours and then buying up everything. If you’re from the area you’re either related to or know someone who worked in “The Glass†(or work(ed) there yourself). I remember being told a story recently from someone who worked there around the boom years a Chinese group of tourists came in on a tour of the place one day. They spot a lovely crafted giant glass panda in one of the showrooms and ask the tour guide “how much is that?â€. Tour guide basically says it’s just for decoration and not really for sale, “yeah but how much?†is their reply. Not knowing what to do the tour guide escalated up to management and likewise, the management guys don’t really know either as it’s not something that was advertised for sale. So they do some calculations to work out the material cost, labour, overheads, profit etc to get an idea of what the glass panda would be worth and arrive at the figure of around E50,000. They go back down to the Chinese group and quote them the figure, not really sure if they were actually seriously considering buying it. Their reply: “ah ok, we’ll take three of them

Hope you weren't doing a Chinese accent in your head typing that post.

A certain leader of Fianna Fail got himself in trouble for the same thing 😜

Sunny Disposition

MyPeopleDrankTheSoup wrote: »

JJ?

Not JJ, but he did okay too!

HerrKuehn

Anyone remember the developer Donal Caulfield?
https://www.irishtimes.com/news/sunset-on-the-property-boom-1.941146

"It's not so much about owning the jet. It's about having the money to give you the freedom to do what you want, to say what you want. The more money people have, the more free they are, if they have the right psyche. Having a jet means you're not queuing up for an hour in Dublin or London airports. Money is pure and utter freedom. If you want to wear shades inside, which I often do, I don't care what people say about me. My Da, Joseph, used to say that money was freedom. But he had five kids, he was a great goer, a great small builder, but he couldn't risk it because he had five kids."

They had a brochure for one of their developments that cost €750.

Nigel Fairservice

I always remember this banking ad from those times. The banks more or less saying we don't care what you want the money for.

CrankyHaus

Mister Vain wrote: »

Ahh yes, something you never see anymore is the modified cars. They were everywhere at one stage. Guys spending a fortune on sound systems and ridiculously loud exhausts.

At the time I thought it was tacky. I actually miss cars on the road being a little interesting now that everyone's crammed into blandly coloured new crossovers on PCP; barely a step above white goods in their individuality.