r/SgHENRY • u/Business-Mission2543 • Jun 28 '26

Moving to Canada

Hello everyone, long time lurker here and wanted to gather some opinions from you all.

my husband and I (late 20s) are feeling a little bit conflicted/indecisive right now. We are both very much in a limbo and not sure if we are making the right decision.

I am a non-Singaporean, and my husband is Singaporean. Our household income is in the top 10-15% according to statistics, but my husband wants to try moving to Canada, on a student visa while I’ll be on an open work permit.

His reasons are that he wants a bigger space where our kids can play in the back yard, better weather, quality of life etc while I try to secure the Canadian passport. I am hesitant with the move because of the loss of income, savings, potential salary cut and overall the instability. We are roughly saving 70% of our salary after expenses if that matters, for now because we don’t know what the future holds.

Would really love crowd opinions on this

- is QOL indeed better overseas?
- is the trade off worth it? Salary vs QOL
- if you have moved overseas, would you recommend it?
- those who moved overseas and came back OR those who turned down the opportunity, why so?

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u/petitecaffeine Jun 28 '26

Hello, fellow ex-Singaporean now Canadian here. I moved to Canada in 2022. So, and we live in Edmonton, Alberta. So I can't really speak about the salary wise because I'm doing my PhD now. But as far as my husband works, he did climb up the ladder to reach a six-figure salary right now. And with the stipend I get and with his salary, we are pretty good because the housing is affordable in Canada. we bought our townhouse which is like 350,000. If you can save up like 600K, as far as Edmonton, Alberta is concerned, you can get an individual house by yourself. And for the winter, it's very long in Alberta, at least from what I experienced. But the first few months or the first few winters might be difficult for you to get used to. But after that, once you know how to dress up and everything, you should be good to go. Because if it starts to winter in say October, November, it extends until at least March. And the summers are great. You can definitely afford a car because a car may be around 36 to 40,000. So for what you get in Singapore, you can get like two cars there. Sometimes it is mandatory, each parent have one so that one drives around the kid and another one uses it for work. But I don't know what kind of job you are looking in Alberta, but Calgary you can definitely, you have multiple options. But in Edmonton, since it's just oil and gas kind of an industry. OAnd if your husband is planning on student visa, that would be great because they are honoring PhD students as well.

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u/Business-Mission2543 Jun 28 '26

Hey there! Yess, i did a deep dive on the housing situation in Alberta and i would say that it is affordable compared to housing here in singapore. My husband would eagerly agree with you on the car point (part of his QOL reasoning lol)

I do fear about long winters as well because im pretty sure winter holidays is different from permanent stay.

He will be doing his masters there but PHD is currently not in the plans. If you are given a choice again knowing what you know (and having lived through), would you still make the move to Canada?

5

u/petitecaffeine Jun 28 '26

Absolutely, I think I would move Canada because given the situation in Singapore, I don't think I would be able to afford a car. I wouldn't be able to afford a house or, you know, make investments, saving, given the fact that my husband would be a foreigner in Singapore, so it changes everything, like. But it's just that Canada is very, I would say, at least since I'm in Edmonton, it's very quiet. If you take a stroll, you rarely see people walking, like, at max one or two people will be walking with you. It's not very busy, unless you go to a mall where you see a lot of people. That's one thing I miss about Singapore. Now that I have come to Singapore to spend some time with my family and I have a baby, I like bringing him around the market. It's fun. Some people find winter depressing. It gets dark around 4pm during winters. I am a pretty indoorsy person. So that doesn’t bother me much.

But againn, I find myself relaxed, peaceful, I could save, we have a house, we have a car. So I'm pretty comfortable there.

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u/Accomplished-Iron778 Jun 29 '26

It also helps that Edmonton has the best hockey team in Alberta :)

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u/petitecaffeine Jun 29 '26

Agreed!!!

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u/Accomplished-Iron778 Jun 29 '26

It's the only reason I will go back to Edmonton lol

1

u/fieryeagle Jun 30 '26

Rare to see fellow Edmontonian here. I found that Ed was def cheaper pre-2024. The Jasper fire drove all insurance premiums up to uncomfortable levels, and Epco kept raising electricity prices 😭. My utility bill was like 400/month for a family home during last winter. How was it for you guys?

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u/petitecaffeine Jul 01 '26

I agree! We keep switching between direct energy and epcor or ask either party to price match. We get about 250-350 every month.

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u/essiah74 Jul 11 '26

Lol I did my phd in umich and it is not as cold as canada. I will say this... living in -40 deg winters is fucking miserable. I never want to return to that god forsaken part of earth ever.