Thursday, February 27, 2014

2 March Shymbulak & EXPO 2017 Event



Shymbulak Ski Resort & EXPO 2017 event! 

Various competitions and different activities. 
Gifts from GK Shimbulak, Marrone Rosso and Expo 2017. 

Monday, February 17, 2014

Kimep present WTO and Trade agreements discussion

On Feb 21 you are invited to the Open Master Class by Dr. Zhenis Kembayev on 
"WTO and Regional Trade Agreements: Conflicting or Complementary" hosted by Kimep University. 


The master class is presented in English 
Entrance is free
Registration required: http://goo.gl/8iN27n 





Tuesday, February 11, 2014

What happened to the Tenge?

For those of you that didn't know the Tenge (KZT)  is the local currency in Kazakhstan. 



Today came as a surprise to many when the Central Bank of Kazakhstan decided to stop supporting the local currency at the 155 to the $ mark. 

"Not to allow destabilization of the financial market and the overall economy, the National Bank sets a new fluctuations corridor at 185 tenge for USD1 plus/minus 3 tenge with some measures to level fluctuations in the short term" said the Tenrinews.  

But today the sudden devaluation must have created a panic as it fell to 212  just hours after opening trade.  

I truly hope that the exchange rate will stabilise close to the recommended 185 mark in the coming days and not stay above 200. 
 
Kazakhstan's economy was hailed by many as the  strongest in the region,  but now I wonder how this devalued currency will affect the economic outlook for the rest of 2014.  It will definitely have a great impact on all residences as large amounts of every day products are imported, and we can expect price increases across the board.


Either way ....in the end ordinary citizens, and especially foreigners that want to send money home, have  just received a 20-30% cut in salary ... even worse is.... if you where saving money 20- 30% of that is gone too!!!





Lets pray tomorrow is a better day for the KZT



For more information see:http://en.tengrinews.kz/finance/Currency-devaluation-in-Kazakhstan-25939/
Use of the Tengrinews English materials must be accompanied by a hyperlink to en.Tengrinews.kz

Monday, February 10, 2014

18 February


Jambyl Kazakh State Philharmonic 
Address: 23, Tole bi str., corner of 35, Kaldayakov 
Telephone: +7 (727) 291-80-48

Friday, February 7, 2014

Real Estate Agents in Almaty

In some previous post, the topic of accommodation was covered, however,  I thought I should just create an additional post about real estate agents, as this question is asked quite frequently by visitors to this blog. 

There are quite a large number of Real Estate agencies available in Almaty. 
My personal experience is that some agencies are more interested in the higher end of the rental market, so if you find that you are receiving poor service just move on the next agency... I am sure someone will value your business. 

Here is a list of those that I am familiar with... there are many more but they tend to be smaller agencies. 

Almaty Property Solutions 

Almaty Real Estate  http://www.are.kz 

Cores Group http://www.cores.kz

Luxor Realty  email: luxorealty@mail.ru Tel: +7 727 3179996, 2324233

Mayor Mr http://major-mr.kz/en/Home.aspx

Scot Holland http://www.are.kz

Solomon Real Estate http://vipflat.kz/

Umex http://www.umex.kz/


The Real estate agencies don't update their websites frequently and I have found that some apartments and houses has been on some of these sites for years. They also tend to "recycle" the photos, using one apartment's photos to advertise a different apartment. So, it can be really hard to judge an apartment based on their websites. The only way to know what you are getting is by viewing the actual apartments. 

However, if you really want to do your research, I have a solution. 
Krisha is a local website where agencies and individuals can post their properties for sale or for rent  http://krisha.kz/
This is a good site if you just want to get a realistic idea of what is available at what price at this moment in time, as individuals post on this site on a daily basis. Many locals and those fluent in Russian use this site to find their apartments in Almaty and skip the real estate agents all together. However, if your company will not be assisting you with all the legal paper work etc. in renting accommodation in Almaty, I would not suggest this option to you. 

http://krisha.kz
Google chrome to translate the website in to English - if your Russian is bad or non- existent, at least this site will give you a better idea of what you could find in your price bracket.