Escondido

A typical Thai service worker's monthly salary is 6000. A frugal farang can live on 30,000 baht/mo. On this forum there will be howls from those who say they can do it for less or it can't be done. If your monthly disposable income is 60,000-100,000 you will live large. What kind of visa do you plan to apply for?

The research I have conducted has indicated that there are a few types of visa's I can obtain each with pros/cons. A double entry tourist visa seems to be the best course of action initially, however, the type B multiple entry might be the way to go for the long term. I still need to do some research about the legalities/taxes of what direction to go. I own the companies I work for and all of my clients are in the United States. I have no desire to target the Thailand population as another revenue source, but that might change down the road if an opportunity presents itself and I get a good ROI.

Your food budget will be double what you plan. Even eating Thaifood every single meal will run a minimum of 100 a day, add fruit a few bottles of water and what not a minimum of plain eating for 150 a day. So that is more like 4,500 a month eating simple. Not to mention your dog will cost another 1000 a month.

Your internet if you want dependable non busy traffic you will need to spend more like 3000 baht a month, but for average good download speed 1,500 baht is ok.

The rest of your budget seems about right. You could do it for half as much but only if you know the right people and the right places. But for convenience sake your higher budget is better. Don't have to spend days searching and looking and haggling.

I always get a chuckle about how people claim thai workers get paid 6k and we could live comfortably off 30k. Have you actually seen the slums those people live in. Come on no middle class person could live like that. Middle class Thais make at least 30 and the upper middles make a lot more than that. Think like this there are 4 private schools in CM that charge at least 5k baht a month for school each kid the international schools and the English programs are even more than that. There are over 20,000 kids at these four private schools so there are plenty of people living off a lot more than 6k a month. Stop comparing low income poverty lifestyle to what westerners are accustomed to. If you want to live like a dirt farmer than go ahead but most westerners couldn't do it for the long run.

50K + for what his needs are would do him well less than that if you know the language and the area.

Thanks for the feedback. What is considered middle to upper class income in Chiang Mai?

You didn't budget for a girl/boy friend. I don't see how anyone could live here without wanting one and the average cost of that will set you back about 10,000/mo. A hot, well educated one will be much more. If you find the right one you'll be happy to pay it.

Your biggest problem will be the visa/ work permit.

Most definitely that would be a girlfriend at some point, although I very much enjoy being single and not tied down.

I will be traveling to Thailand later this year to for a bit of R&R, as well as to figure out what town I want to end up living. My first trip will be 1-2 months and I'll be spending the majority of my time up north. Based on my research Chiang Mai is at the top of my list. Some things about me that might help.

- Single, 31 years old male

- Work from home as an Internet Marketer (I work about 100+ hours a week although I'm thinking about going down to 60 hours when I move)

- Have a male Jack Russell Terrier I plan on bringing over

- Prefer to live in a good neighborhood with similar demographics (age, income, low crime, etc.). I'm not one to flaunt money, so I prefer hanging out with people who are modest.

- Reliable internet service in neighborhood is a must. I need the best internet that money can buy and I will move anywhere to make sure I can get this requirement.

- Monthly Range of 60,000-100,000 baht (of course, cheaper is always better in my humble opinion)

- 2-3 bedroom house, 1.5+ bath, yard with fence are my basic housing requirements. 1500-2000 square feet is more then enough space for just my dog and I.

- Close enough to city, so I can walk around and explore. This isn't very important, but would be nice. I prefer my privacy, so I have no problem moving farther out of town if the house meets my basic requirements.

I'd appreciate any feedback the locals might have about my approximate budget listed below, as well as any neighborhoods that might be recommended. I prefer to work with other business people, so if somebody has recommendations for a local real estate agents who speak English/Thai please feel free to let me know. I assume they work on commission although I'm not sure entirely sure how flexible pricing is when it comes to rentals/commissions. Thus far, my approximate budget is as follows.

Baht US Requirements

House 15000 $500 1500 square feet

Electricity 2000 $67 air con/fans/computers, television,etc.

Water 1000 $33 estimated monthly average (does not include drinking water)

Gas 1500 $50 cooking

Telephone 3000 $100 estimated local telephone line/iphone

Internet 1500 $50

Food 4500 $150

Laundry unknown unknown need pricing on outsourcing laundry or doing in house

Car Rental 10000 $333 monthly car rental estimate

Health Insurance 2500 $83 buy annual-save money

Flight TBD TBD TBD

Motorcyle TBD TBD TBD

Car TBD TBD TBD

Misc 12000 $400 flexible

Monthly Total 53000 Baht or $1767 US

I apologize about the format of this post. There seems to be some discrepancies between the text editor and the final version. Thank your for your time and consideration.

OK, so you already have a VoIP service provider, and presumably an ATA/IP phone, I guess it would have helped if we had known that up front? So what you are really asking is, "How can I get DSL service for my stay?"

Maybe ask yourself if a foreign tourist could go to your home town, get a phone line installed, turn up voice service, add broadband all without any credit check, socsec, bank account, previous address, employer, etc.? My guess, the answer would be "No".

Without local assistance you may find it challenging to get DSL service. Typically the name on the telephone line and DSL account needs to match the name associated with the residence. Obviously landlords may be reluctant to have a tenant with a phone running up calling charges, without some sort of controls (deposit).

Anyway, you may want to look for a sub-let where the owner already has installed, reliable DSL . At a minimum, you'll want a place with an installed fixed telephone line, to which the landlord is willing to add DSL.

I don't see much of a problem after midnight unless I'm missing something.

Only all the 'boiler-rooms' here in Thailand using VoIP to call other countries and BT torrent traffic and FTP traffic and ....

I don't use Magicjack for business calls because the call quality is horrible compared to other companies I use in the states. I was primarily interested to see what services people use over in Thailand for extended periods of time. Foreigners can easily set up phone/internet service in states. Sometimes, they even get some nice tax perks and free cells phones, , but that's another story. I appreciate the info

I appreciate the time everybody has taken to make recommendations. I have been using magicjack for a numbers of years and can vouch that it's a pretty good deal for the price. I have yet to test out Skype, however, that is on my to do list.

I'm currently using Ringcentral and my internet connection is about 20MB download/ 10MB Upload. A bit overkill for most phone services, but it does help with other things I do. Due to the timezone difference I will be using the phone primarily from 8pm-8am. Obviuosly, internet services will probably be at their peak during the early evening hours, however, I don't see much of a problem after midnight unless I'm missing something. From my research is appears that True (sp??) offers the most reliable/faster internet connection. Does anybody have other recommendations? Paying $100-$300 a month is fine. Thanks again.

I will be coming over to Thailand later this year for 1-2 months for a bit of R&R, as well as deciding what city I want to live in. I will primarily be visiting, Phuket, Bangkok, Pattaya and Chiang Mai with a few other places in between. At this juncture I'm strongly leaning towards moving to Chiang Mai.

One of the most important things I require is access to a reliable phone service that will allow me to make international calls back to the US at a reasonable rate. I'm on the phone 9-11 hours a day, so it's important that call quality is excellent and that I can display any number I want and/or a local number based in a specific state. I heard read that internet speeds are not very reliable in Thailand, so that is a concern of mine. Does anybody have any recommendations? Thanks

If you have 100,000 a month - go and live somewhere decent, unless you're planning to save 75,000 a month!

There are so many people that mix up "Quality Of Life" with "Spending Money" !

If you like to walk in a forrest or see a waterfall, you have to travel 3-4 hours (BKK), 1-2 hours (CM) or 15-20 minutes (CR).

If you want to live and see the real Thailand with ricepaddies, farmers, old villagelife, you cannot find that within 200 km from BKK but you find it 10 minutes outside CR.

If you like to ride/drive in the mountains on bicycle, MC or in a car, you have it just outside CR and the whole province is full of beautiful roads in and to the mountains, beautiful people in interesting villages.

But if you looking for High Spending Shopping then you will like Emporium etc in BKK.

And if you like to spend 1485 baht for a breakfast together with your wife/gf, you can find the place in BKK.

If you like spending a lot of time in rushhour traffic you got it 15 hours a day in BK, 10 hours a day in CM and 2-3 hours aday in CR.

And you can rent a very good house here in CR for 10 - 15 000 baht per month, probably same in CM will be 25 - 35 000 baht and in BKK, just forget it!

Rent a house in CM for 2 weeks and then same in CR and see if you want to go back to CM!

But we all wish you a good time here in Thailand!

How would you describe a very good house based on the price ranges you gave? Thanks.

There's three kinds of replies you will get from this

1. You're not Thai, you cannot own land. Why purchase something you cannot own. That's just nuts. If and when Thailand graduates to the league of sane countries, I can look at house ownership again.

Then there is:

2. Prices of land, and building are quite high compared to rents. You can easily find houses that the owners want millions and millions of baht for to buy, but well under 10K to rent! With price levels as they are, it just doesn't make sense to buy unless you plan to live until age 150 or so.

Then there is:

3. While you cannot 'own' the land you can definitely lease it. Also if you have children you will leave them something valuable. Instead of giving your money away to a house owner, you are investing it for your own family. And there's a very different feeling to living in a place you 'own': you get to live in exactly the place that you want to live in, every baht spent increases your living experience.

All replies below will fall into one of these. As for the actual building process, it's a full time job for about a year just to overasee everything and make sure it happens right. I will PM you a link to a topic about a guy building a house and posting weekly updates, it's incredible and shows very well what you can achieve buidling your own place to your own tastes instead of a cookie cutter development home. (Needs to be PM because not alowed to post links.)

I'd appreciate it if you wold PM the link to the site you mentioned. Thanks

I am strongly thinking about moving to Chiang Mai and looking at various properties.

Does anybody here know how much something like this might cost to build? I'm not sure what the average price per sq. m is in the area. Thanks.