Hi all

I thought I would open up an Introductions post for everyone new and old to Introduce themselves.

I will start the ball rolling.

I am a married mother of 3, daughter aged 23, son 19 and yougest daughter of 14 going on 25. I have a wonderful grandson who will be 2 in Feb.

I am an Insurance Underwriter and live in Surrey.

My love for Egypt started a couple of years ago with our 1st visit to Sharm. We are now well and truly hooked.

I try to go as often as possible and managed 5 holidays last year.
We have now bought an apartment in Sharm on a resort called Sierra in Nabq Bay which is alot quieter than Naama but is up and coming. The handover date at the moment is Feb 08.

I have quite good knowledge of Sharm so please dont hesitate to ask any questions. I have also been to Luxor a few times, Cairo and Hurghada once. I have contacts such as a great guide and taxi drivers that I would be more than happy to put you in touch with.

Queenie.

I am also married and have been living in Spain on the Costa del Sol for 11 years; my father is Egyptian and I have a brother in Atlanta who is a management consultant and a cousin who is Europes No 1 Plastic Surgeon, based in Harley St in London. I have many other cousins in the USA, in England and in the UAE. My wife and I have been married for 40 years and our son and his wife and our two grandaughters live opposite. We have six more grand children in the UK from our youngest son who was unfortunately killed in a motor accident 10 years ago.

Following many years in senior sales and marketing positions in a number of top FMCG companies I joined Watney Combe Reid in London in the 80's as major account director and later became Operations director for the Clifton Inns Division of Grand Metropolitan Group running 180 pubs, wine bars and night clubs in the Midland and South of England.

In 1992 I became Managing Director of a company operating cellulite and weight loss centres all over the UK; in the following three years we began franchising this operation and built up 154 franchisees in 29 countries. Later I joined a Manchester based research group as MD. We developed machines for non surgical face lifts using electrical impulses which were marketed to the beauty industry. Having floated the company in 1996 I had the option of remaining as MD with a substantial shareholding or taking a one off payment and bowing out. I chose the latter and moved to Spain. In the early years we ran a successful mail order company, followed by several years in a consultancy role for MacDonald Hotels and for Gibraltar Nynex (the telephone company in Gibraltar). In 1992 I formed a real estate brokerage and the rest you know!! The photos are now and one of me in 1987 so you can see the degeneration of just 20 years!!

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PROPERTY SHOP INC. International Property Brokers
EGYPT REAL - Your One Stop Shop for Hurghada Property

I am also happily married for 13 years now.
We have 7 Children between us due to previous marrages.
Very confusing
Step Daughter 24 with grandson 3 year old, Son 24 with grandson 5 weeks old, both married.
16 year old stepson that lives with us
15 year old step daughter and 14 year old stepson live with there mother but come to us alot.
and we have 2 children together son age 11 and Daughter age 8.
Go on say it Gluttons for puishment.

Our love for Egypt came 4 years ago when I suprized my husband and for his 40th birthday booked a trip to see the Piramid's and the vally of the Kings. I only told him 2 days before we flew Fantastic time.

For the next year we booked Sharm for my 40th birthday odviously I booked it not a surprize too 12 months to pay for it. Had to go back the next year and decieded to buy a propertie due to bereavment we could afford it.

Sharm was our first look but not happy with the 99 year lease we looked at Hurghada and the rest you all know having had 3 trips there last year and 1 the year before and god knows haw many times this year only time will tell.

Also very happily married, 18 years now, and we have one son aged 14. I'm English, my husband is Egyptian and at present we live in Bahrain, returning to Wales every summer. My husband is a geneticist, I'm a housewife. We're on the verge of buying a property in Hurghada, though neither of us have been yet. Naturally we'll visit before we part with any money! I have English friends, with Egyptian husbands, actually living in Egypt - one in Hurghada working as a teacher, and the other in Cairo. We're not ready to live in Egypt yet but we will when my husband retires - 7 or 8 years time. We're trying to get a small portfolio of properties together before that time to finance our retirement. Not sure where we'll eventually live, though all my husbands family live in Cairo. I'm still not a huge fan of Egypt, though I think the people are great. Maybe seeing it from the side of nationals rather than us ex-pats - life can be very hard even with a good job. My husband's sisters and his neices and nephews are all graduates in excellent jobs but salaries are low in comparison to the cost of living and property prices.
Anyway, it's really interesting to read everyone's profiles and I very much enjoy the whole Egypt Property Thread. The amount of information is fantastic and without out I'm not sure we would have chosen Hurghada.

Hi All!!

I am a newly wed (well 18 months, stills feels like it!!) and have a 16 year step son. My husband and I currently live and work in Belfast (and are sitting under 8 inches of snow at the moment).

I am a civilian trainer for the Police and teach everything from Law to Search and also Personal Safety Training and Conflict Management. I am also a part-qualified accountant and also a human resources manager.

About four months ago my Step dad mentioned he was thinking of investing some of his pension in Egypt, never thought much more about it. Two months later my husband suggested selling up in the UK (Belfast house prices have gone through the roof in the last 2 years) and moving to Egypt, I thought he was nuts!! A couple of bottles of wine later, and he had me convinced.

So here we are. Patiently (or not so in my case) waiting for our house to sell and as soon as that happens, we will be moving straight out and hopefully never looking back.

Fingers Crossed

Lyndsay

I am 43, newly single again, no kids and will be moving to Hurghada on 31 January.

Many years ago I worked in the UK in the film and video business as Marketing Director for a company that released such movies as Terminator 2, Basic Instinct, Dances with Wolves, etc.

The company opened a division in Eastern Europe in 1992 and I went over there in order to set up offices in the major territories, and liked it so much I never went back to the UK. I started my own business with a local partner which was a medium-sized magazine publishing company in the Czech Republic.

After we got ripped off by our General Manager and the company went under, I got heavily into the Internet (which, 10 years later, I am addicted too as much as when I first got online in 1997) and set up a few different sites. In 2004 I moved from Prague to Riga, Latvia and got involved with more projects, one of which was a portal for investors in emerging markets real estate - Propertastic!

It was while making the research for the site that I discovered what a great deal Egypt is and, in October, I headed over there to do a market report for the site. I only meant to make an overview of the market, but I got a bit carried away and ended up writing a whole book about it by accident!

I got a few enquiries from the book for people asking for help in buying properties and this led to my forming a sales agency, Egypt Real at the start of December.

This in turn led to my realizing that there's a lot more happening in Hurghada at the moment than in Latvia, so I'd be better off living there. So I am just tying up loose ends at the moment before embarking on my new life on the Red Sea Riviera.

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EGYPT REAL - Your One Stop Shop for Hurghada Property

Author of: Propertastic's Complete Guide to Hurghada Property and Egypt's Red Sea Riviera Real Estate

We sound rather boring in comparison to all you interesting people and can only say we are a middle aged , middled classed couple who have decided what the heck and have taken a chance on investing in our future buy purchasing property in Hurghada.
We have only ever visited egypt once and fell in love with the place and eventually hope to move permanently to Egypt but in the meantime will continue to live in good old Wales
Carol works as a family lawyer whilst i have taken early retirement and am currently head chef in the family kitchen !
We would love to meet up with everbody soon and woud like to thank all who have given us so much advice and information. Keep it coming !!!!

Hi People,

Yes it's me again. I have been married for 25 years,I have one son aged 17 and I live in West Yorkshire in the UK.
I am self employed,and previously was a trainer in a very well known energy companies call centres.
I have myself purchased a property in Hurghada and have been there many times over the last few years.
I am hoping to retire to Egypt in the near future (I Hope),I have a great love for Egypt and find it fascinating.

hi everyone
what a good idea! have been looking on here for a while now but only joined recently.
i am 53 [but i dont look it....ha] am happily divorced with 2 sons 27 and 24 who have blessed me with 3 lovely grandchildren who are 6, 4 and 15 months. i live in hampshire and although have had many jobs in the past including hairdressing, pubs, clubs, civil service, cleaning, factory assembly line etc. i now am not working since the death of my lovely mum who i was full time carer for the last 4 years of her life as she had many strokes and suffered with dementia.
it was from her that my love for egypt began as she was stationed there with the royal navy for 2 years prior to suez. my father was egyptian although i never knew him as mum was shipped back to uk as soon as was possible. things were different then. we always had pictures, photos and artifacts around the home when we were children and her love and knowledge of the country was naturally passed on. even at her worst with dementia she always remembered her beloved egypt so it seemed only natural that before she deteriorated too much that i would take her back to where she was happiest, so it started with 2 weeks in sharm 4 years ago, then progressed to a month or 6 weeks in the winter, eventually spending at one time 6 months all but 9 weeks continually in sharm. i immediately felt at home and promised i would return as often as possible so buying property was the obvious thing to do. the basis of buying in sharm did not appeal so that is why i chose dp. i intend to visit often but also hopefully to receive some income for the future to prop up my meagre pension!
i am flying out on 18 jan for 2 weeks staying at alf leila wa leila so i can see how close the neighbours will be for myself! if anyone wants anything let me know although photos and info posted so far is so good i dont expect to do any better.
looking forward to meeting you all when dp is up and running even if i am sat in the dark!

Hi everyone,

We're celebrating 25 years of happy marriage this year by going on as many holidays as possible!!! We have two children, a girl 23 and boy 21 who have both recently moved out, so very much an empty nest now, which gives me plenty of time to "surf", apart from when my husband and our beautiful golden retriever demand my attention!

Our first introduction to Egypt was around 15 years ago, when I worked for a company that did scuba diving training. My boss set up one of the first dive centres in Sharm and it was my job to arrange holidays there for divers to complete their open water dives! At that time it was only the backpackers and divers that went there. A couple of tour operators tried to open it up for package holidays, but eventually the flights got cancelled due to lack of interest! Needless to say I had to visit the area to know what I was talking about! Can't believe how its changed. When we first went there the airport was a tiny place and although there was a "dual carriageway", on the way to our hotel, the other side of Naama Bay, we only passed a few cars plus a couple of camels!!! The original hotels on the beachside of Naama Bay were there, plus a few shops, but nothing much else. We went back a few years ago and couldn't believe the "mini las vegas" that greeted us. Unbelievable how its changed.

We then visited El Gouna for a holiday in 2002 and decided to look at a lagoon front detached villa that was in the process of being built. I remember saying if only we were brave enough I felt sure it would be an excellent investment. But needless to say we weren't! A few years on we visited again, looking for property. I was still expecting to get a beautiful villa for our money, but prices had risen so dramatically that all we could get was a basic small one bedroom apartment for the same money we would have got the villa!! Thats why when I heard about Sahl Hasheesh we decided to buy an apartment in El Andalous, site unseen, and we haven't looked back since.

The company I have worked for for the last 11 years have recently opened an international department, and due to my love of all things international, I got a transfer and persuaded them to start selling in Egypt, which has been very successful.

I think these forums are an excellent source of information and maybe a list could be started for the main developments everyones buying on, so people could list their names and apartment number and maybe that way we would get introduced to your neighbours early!

Anyway, keep up the good work!