pe7e Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 Having been trapped in the UK for a couple of years due to a health problem, I have now recovered sufficiently to resume my plan to move out to live in LOS. Since I have not been in LOS for a few years, I would like to get some idea of current costs I'm likley to face in PTY. #1 monthly electricity and water charges for a studio condo? #2 monthly maintanance charges for a 30m - 40m studio condo View Talay 1/2 or similar ? #3 monthly food costs, 1 person eating thai food a couple of times a day from local type restaurants (not high end)? #4 any other regular essential costs I have missed (excluding entertainment)? I know it's a bit like asking the length of a piece of string, but it's just 'ball park figures' I'm after, any help would be appreciated Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mekong Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 #1 Depends on condo owners mark up, I pay less than 1.500 / month for utilities #2 Jurisic fees are included in rent, if you own approx 500 Baht per SQM / Annum #3 Call it 100 Baht a meal max and 6 K will cover it #4 Satellite TV approx 1500 depending on package, Internet 1000 baht max for Hi Speeed, Mobi phone, just for calls pre paid is dirt cheap, I pay more on post paid since I use 3G a lot and international roaming. As long as you live reasonably 60K / Month should give you a good lifestyle, I live just off Sathorn in middle of Bangkok, buy a lot of western food to cook at home and go out for dinner at least twice a week and live comfortably on 60K / Month. Now when you add nightlife costs to your expenditure then obviously costs multiply, I have been out of nightlife scene for over 10 years now so I cannot give you a figure on that. Glad to hear you have regained your health and are able to consider moving on with life. Kong Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flashermac Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 Thaksin came up with the figure of 65,000 baht a month as what a Farang needed to live on. (That's the income you need for a retirement visa.) However, for some reason Brits only need 55,000. Go figure. When Takky came up with that, the Farangs at the university all got interested, since gummit lecturer pay is only around 30,000. When Takky realised what he'd done, he immediately excluded teachers of all levels and foreign journalists from that figure, the SOB. Anyway, 60 K provides a very comfortable life, if you don't go wild. I rent a big 2 bedroom, 3 bathroom house in the suburbs for 8,000 baht a month. I pay my own utilities, which is much cheaper than the fixed rate condos and apartments charge you. I just received my electric bill - 249 baht for last month. Mind you it was cool and the a/c hadn't been on a single time. My water bill was about 140 baht. If you want to be within walking distance of the nightlife, rents will be much higher. You can get around that by finding a place close to the skytrain or the underground. I had a colleague a few years ago who lived in Lardprao, an easy walk to the underground station and lots of dept stores, restaurants and shops around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
think_too_mut Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 Thaksin came up with the figure of 65,000 baht a month as what a Farang needed to live on. (That's the income you need for a retirement visa.) However, for some reason Brits only need 55,000. Go figure. When Takky came up with that, the Farangs at the university all got interested, since gummit lecturer pay is only around 30,000. When Takky realised what he'd done, he immediately excluded teachers of all levels and foreign journalists from that figure, the SOB. The government did that pricing to make foreign workers incompetitive, by ordering the minimum salary they have to be paid. Not to their benefit but to kill them off, to price them out of the market. When they (Thaksin) realized that foreign language teachers can not be replaced by competent Thais, they were excluded from the rule. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gobbledonk Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 1. Filipino teachers are paid even less than (white) Farang teachers. 2. I asked this same question a few years back, and the answer comes down to 'how many nights a week can you stay away from the bars ?'. At first, I laughed at the suggestion that alcohol could completely blow my budget, based on the pattern I knew in Oz : one decent hangover and I dont go near it for at least a month. The difference was that I had other things to do in Oz (mainly work) - in LOS, all I had to look forward to were nights on the town. Sure, its stupid to try to be 'the man' and buy that bottle of Johnnie Walker for all your newfound friends to enjoy, but that's a judgement we can all make sober. Flash forward to my last two trips, and I found it a lot better all round to just take two girls and a few bottles of beer up to my hotel room. Chicken-on-a-stick, some crap Thai soap on telly and just relax with gals I have known for about 3 years : yep, your classic cheapskate sex tourist and proud of it. Getting back to the budget, if you can do the majority of the week spending no more than 300-400 baht a day (I've lived on less ...), the balance definitely tips in your favour for Friday/Saturday night, but it requires more discipline than I have shown to date. Even in an apartment costing 8K a month (I think thats cheap, but others may have more insight), I cant see how teachers make do on 30K a month. Anything less than 1K a day 'play money' would make a 6k night in the bars completely out of the question : it just isnt going to happen without support from a partner, and what self-respecting woman would fund that kind of drunken excess ? Feel free to PM me with her details - I dont care what she weighs ... Someone who doesn't drink, smoke or pay for sex would, potentially, still be able to live in Bangkok for very reasonable money, but that is about the only way I could see anyone 'enjoying' themselves with, say, 500 baht a day to spend. I know the Thais do it for a lot less, but that's great when you have an extended family to share the cost of meals etc, not to mention loan you money when times get hard. Personally, holiday mode (<31 days) is at least 6K baht a day but folk with more discipline could easily halve that. Stick detailed the barfines paid by one guy on NY Eve in his latest column, and estimates that our free-spending friend must have disposed of ~100K baht in a single night. Personally, I've blown 20K in a night and I was in a Soi 33 bar when a Swedish guy rang the bell for a total of 40K, but 100K still blows my tiny mind. 100,000.00 THB = 3,070.99 AUD Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
zeitgeist Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 Depending on where you live and what you planning on getting up to, you may need to factor in transport costs. Admittedly not much if you travel by motorbike/moped or songteaw/bus but it adds up over a month. If living here long term you should think about health insurance costs. Also any visa renewal/extension costs over the year. It may well be a case of working out what you can afford to live on each month and working backwards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Munchmaster Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 #4 any other regular essential costs I have missed (excluding entertainment)? Just some suggestions: Cable and internet which Mekong has already mentioned. Groceries for your apartment, e.g., water, milk, coffee, tea, cereal, eggs, bread, butter, etc Stuff for the bathroom, e.g., toothpaste, soap, shower gel, bog roll, etc Transport, e.g., taxi, bus, etc Activities, e.g., golf or other sports Medicines Daily newspaper Going to the movies A weekly massage Lots of little things that can all add up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flashermac Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 The government did that pricing to make foreign workers incompetitive, by ordering the minimum salary they have to be paid. Not to their benefit but to kill them off, to price them out of the market. When they (Thaksin) realized that foreign language teachers can not be replaced by competent Thais, they were excluded from the rule. I had never even thought of that! Sounds right though. Thaksin also increased the visa and work permit fees considerably, and also doubled the amounts needed for a marriage or retirement visa. For all of his talk about improving education, Thaksin did absolutely nothing about teachers' salaries - Thai or foreign. The foreign lecturer's basic pay has not changed since 1992! The name universities have to add to it to get people to apply, and even then you do your best to get extra classes (i.e. the international classes at from 1,200 to 2,000 baht an hour). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Flashermac Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 << I asked this same question a few years back, and the answer comes down to 'how many nights a week can you stay away from the bars ? >> Gobble, when I first moved to Bangkok - after years up north - I settled into a routine of going to the Chawala MP once a week. I had regular girls there who seemed glad to see me or at least were happy to get out of the fish bowl for a while. (One of them proposed marriage to me.) The Chawala then was a real MP, with a real massage provided. But when you knew the girls, rules went out the window and I got "extras" that supposedly were not allowed. The MP was cheaper and more convenient than picking up a BG and taking her to an ST hotel. Wise expats do NOT bring them home, not if they are working in Thailand. It can cause all sorts of problems if the BG becomes possessive. I know at least 3 Farangs who had to move to get away from a BG. I'd go to the bars maybe 2 or 3 Saturdays a month and did have a very cute BG girlfriend for a time. I was teaching 5 days a week, which kept me busy enough to behave myself. I lived so close to work that I walked, and in those days you could get around the city quickly and cheaply by bus. No traffic jams and taxis were for only when you were in a hurry. My uni pay in 1980 was 8,550 baht a month. But comparing prices of food, rent etc then and now, that had a purchasing power of about 65,000 today! In effect, teachers' pay has gone down drastically over the years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Horneytorney Posted January 10, 2012 Report Share Posted January 10, 2012 65k as mentioned by Flashy is on the modest side as the year has usually 13 months and sometimes one or several leap days, round it up to 1 million per year! that's if you do not have any excessive hobbies (regular whoremongering ok but a mistress will implode your budget!). as for this: #1 monthly electricity and water charges for a studio condo? there is usually a hefty mark up for this; if you let aircon on up to 5k (otherwise 1-2k) for electricity and #2 monthly maintanance charges for a 30m - 40m studio condo View Talay 1/2 or similar ? 10 - 25% of rent #3 monthly food costs, 1 person eating thai food a couple of times a day from local type restaurants (not high end)? 6k for one person is survive on the minimum; never anything fancy; thai food looses it's appeal; farang food in Patters is lousy or expensive Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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