What Is Your Monthly Expenditure In Bangkok?

[theufo8mycow]

Hi there, thanks for reading my post.

I might be relocating to Bangkok due to work but I am unsure about the monthly expenditures in Bangkok city. I'd like to know what's your average monthly expenditure in Bangkok because the info would be very helpful when I review the salary package given to me.

How much do you roughly spend monthly on:

- Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station.

- Electricity, gas, water, etc.

- Home phone

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet

- Groceries

- Mobile phone

- Transportation (taxi, train, etc.)

- Insurance, if any

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc)

- Any other things that I may have missed out

Also what's the taxes imposed on foreigners working in Bangkok:

- Taxes (how many percent % of gross/ net salary)

- Any other taxes

Any inputs, comments and opinions is very much appreciated. Thanks again.

Best,

ufo

[BygonKeaw]

- Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station. 0

- Electricity, gas, water, etc. 1200

- Home phone 200

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet 570

- Groceries 8000

- Mobile phone 100

- Transportation (taxi, train, etc.) 4500(petrol)

- Insurance, if any 0

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc) 15000

- Any other things that I may have missed out 9100(car)

Edited May 20, 2009 by BygonKeaw

[filingaccount]

Anything from 7500 to 80000 - Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station.

2000-3000 - Electricity, gas, water, etc.

0 - Home phone

1170 - Home Broadband/ Cable Internet

9000 - Groceries

1000-1500 - Mobile phone

500 - Transportation (taxi, train, etc.)

200 - Insurance, if any

12000-20000 - Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc)

1000-1500 - Laundry

Misc expenses adds up - Any other things that I may have missed out

Also what's the taxes imposed on foreigners working in Bangkok:

depending on income - Taxes (how many percent % of gross/ net salary)

7% VAT - Any other taxes

All in all you might require around 30000 baht minimum to pay expenses. Comfortable living I would say 60-75000 at least.

[spacefruit]

About 200,000.

And thats just her Emporium bill.

I dont know how to stop it, ever since she found out about the No 2 Mia Noi.

What about a Pattaya divorce?

Now come up to the roof dear and have a nice big drink....

That should reduce the expenses a bit.

Should turn off the aircon more often too, but I was a bit pissed, Like now.

[wasabi]

Anything from 7500 to 80000 - Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station.

2000-3000 - Electricity, gas, water, etc.

0 - Home phone

1170 - Home Broadband/ Cable Internet

9000 - Groceries

1000-1500 - Mobile phone

500 - Transportation (taxi, train, etc.)

200 - Insurance, if any

12000-20000 - Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc)

1000-1500 - Laundry

Misc expenses adds up - Any other things that I may have missed out

Also what's the taxes imposed on foreigners working in Bangkok:

depending on income - Taxes (how many percent % of gross/ net salary)

7% VAT - Any other taxes

All in all you might require around 30000 baht minimum to pay expenses. Comfortable living I would say 60-75000 at least.

My expenses are almost identical to yours. My entertainment expense is much lower but I do send my wife to private English lessons which brings me to the same total. when I came here I planned to live on 30K a month. I did for a few months and found I had to sacrifice fine dining and doing just about anything fun. Doubling that amount provides for a pretty good life except for the fact I'm living in a 3rd world country with the attendant pollution and crumbling infrastructure. Not a very good value in my opinion when I could live in the west for less.

Edited May 21, 2009 by wasabi

[ninjat]

My expenses are almost identical to yours. My entertainment expense is much lower but I do send my wife to private English lessons which brings me to the same total. when I came here I planned to live on 30K a month. I did for a few months and found I had to sacrifice fine dining and doing just about anything fun. Doubling that amount provides for a pretty good life except for the fact I'm living in a 3rd world country with the attendant pollution and crumbling infrastructure. Not a very good value in my opinion when I could live in the west for less.

How would you be able to live in the west on 30K/60K baht a month?

[thaicbr]

"Not a very good value in my opinion when I could live in the west for less."

And if you can why don't you go back.

[Briggsy]

24,000 Baht.

[Moonfruit]

To live a comparable life to that you would live in a big city in the west, i.e decent car, nice place to live, health insurance, a little saving, some small investments, life insurance, fuel costs, Cable TV, Internet, yearly holidays back home, a few new clothes every month, dining out once a week etc etc it cannot be done for less than 100K per month, and a lot more than that if you stay in a premium apartment in the center of town and want to drive any car which is not a grey Toyota. (I drive a grey Toyota by the way!)

Of course you can survive on 20 or 30K per month or something, but that is not comparable living to a major city in the west. That is what some people want of course.

[kurnell]

- 2 bed house bank loan repayment 60,000

- Electricity, gas, water, etc. 4,000

- Home phone - 200

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet - 700

- Groceries - 15,000

- Mobile phone - 3,000

- Transportation 16,000 car repayment

- Life insurance - 2,500

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc) - 30,000

- Nanny x 2 - 16,000

- True UBC - 1,900

- Misc car insurance, car expenses etc - 3,000

- Gasoline - 12,000

- Home maintenance - 5,000

- School fees - 5,000

- Clothes - 5,000

- Sport - 3,000

- Travel - 3,000

- Holidays - 10,000

I don't know where to stop

[phaethon]

My first 100 days have seen me spending an average of 2150Baht per DAY (ouch). Of course that includes a two month deposit and initial capital purchases - high-end computer gear, domestic white goods (fridge/microwave/iron/fan etc.) and all essential domestic knick-knackery from linens to cutlery and laundry baskets to mops and buckets. That's according to total drawn from UK by transfer/ATM - balance in Thai bank.

At some point I'll do a detailed analysis, but pretty confident it will settle down to 40-50,000/month without noticeable hardship.

So I've moved here from a full-time London job, took a 50% income cut, enjoy a better, more relaxed standard of living, and still be able to save as much (about 40kB/month) as I did in London living on a canal boat and doing NOTHING but work.

[HardenedSoul]

Rent 2 bed gaff Sukhumvit (between sois 10 and 20) - 25,000

Electricity and Water - 5000

Internet including TOT line rental - 1600

Food - 8000

Taxis - 3000

Mobile - 1000

Health Insurance 4000

Entertainment - 20000

Good Lord that's the first time I've done that since I got here a year ago. Quite a result if I don't mind saying so myself.

Binned off the Notting Hill shoebox and a well-paid but oh-so-dull McJob finding work for avaricious financial trading system software developers to come here, earn similar money but with infinitely smaller outgoings. If there was a way of getting my beloved motor here without gettin' hosed by the customs crooks, I wouldn't go back for a good few years.

[MJP]

I have spreadsheet in .xls or .xlsx to help you on this. Just PM me.

[Datsun240Z]

I got one golden tip: improvise.

[BFD]

I’ve been keeping pretty detailed records this year to see where my money keeps disappearing to, so I can answer your cost of living question pretty accurately.

I make 85,500 baht/month.

22000 Rent

20000 Luxuries

14000 Drinks

11000 Food

4000 Transport

That leaves me with about 15000 baht to send home every month to pay off various debts.

Let me explain the categories a little better:

Rent = Rent (duh) 14k, utilities 3-5k (depends on season), laundry 800B, maid service twice a week 2600B, ADSL internet 1k. This is for a one-bedroom apartment (meaning it has a separate room for sleeping in) in a pretty ‘Thai’ area of town. It is 54 square meters. There are folks that don’t mind living in studio apartments of roughly 30 square meters, and they usually will pay in the 10-15k range (including all the stuff above). I like being able to walk to the skytrain, but if you’re willing to live further away and hire a motorcycle dude every time you want to go anywhere, you can start to cut back on rental costs.

Luxuries = various ‘pleasures’ that Bangkok has to offer. This includes gifts for the girlfriend, new clothes, hotel accommodations, etc. I usually put major purchases into this category, too (ie. new phone, computer/musical equipment). I could probably cut down on this one a lot, but I am a creature of comfort.

Drinks = dam_n Irish heritage. This is almost always from drinking in the semi-expensive areas of town. You can get away with drinking for much cheaper, or you can blow 20,000 baht in a night, if you so choose.

Food = I am one of the few creatures on the planet that doesn’t like Thai food. Therefore, I usually buy very expensive, imported food from specialty stores or order from expensive restaurants. Many people eat for less than half of this, and are very happy with what they get.

Transport = I don’t own a car (since I’m not suicidal), so this is taxi and skytrain money only. Gas is cheap, if you decide to buy a bike or car.

What is your budget going to look like? You can basically construct a lifestyle that will fit any budget. For instance, my girlfriend makes 10,000 baht a month as a hairdresser. Accommodations, food, rent, even sending 1000-2000 baht home every month is very do-able for her. It all comes down to your personal habits and comfort levels.

BFD!

[babuhavas]

- Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station. 0

- Electricity, gas, water, etc. 1200

- Home phone 200

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet 570

- Groceries 8000

- Mobile phone 100

- Transportation (taxi, train, etc.) 4500(petrol)

- Insurance, if any 0

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc) 15000

- Any other things that I may have missed out 9100(car)

AND FOR EVERYTHING ELSE THERE IS MASTER CARD

[Soutpeel]

- Apartment rental 1 bedroom or 2 bedroom near train station. 0

- Electricity, gas, water, etc. 1200

- Home phone 200

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet 570

- Groceries 8000

- Mobile phone 100

- Transportation (taxi, train, etc.) 4500(petrol)

- Insurance, if any 0

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc) 15000

- Any other things that I may have missed out 9100(car)

AND FOR EVERYTHING ELSE THERE IS MASTER CARD

[Livinginexile]

24,000 Baht.

Agreed

As long as the night life is kept to a bare minimum Me and my family can live very comfortably on 25-30k/mth, but that is living in a country town.

When I was single and living in Bkk I was spending no more than 50k/mth and that was living well.

After a while you get used to living cheap like buying food from the street, shopping where the locals shop etc.

It helps a lot if you can own your own home.

[Monokuro]

I think it can entirely depend on what kind of a life you want to live.

Everytime I've stayed in BKK for a month or so (a few times each year) I've never spent anything near the amounts listed here.

I like to stay in the Thai district though, near thailand cultural centre mtr where a nice studio room costs about 5000-7000 (inc internet and cable), eat at the local restaurants (anything from 50baht to a couple of hundred) and just go party at the weekends, perhaps going to meet some friends in Kohsan during the week (taxi is about 250 to get there).

I don't feel I am compromising anything, this is exactly how I want to live and get to save oodles of money in the bargain.

(I guess the disclaimer is I dont have a family to look after, nor drive a car (do you really need one in BKK??) so this keeps costs down quite a bit)

[Bangyai]

20,000 a month.

I live with my gf and she also has her own income of 7000 a month.

Its enough but more would be nice. The car is an expensive luxury but she refuses to do without it.

[Norrad]

- Apartment rental (1 bedroom) - 8000

- Electricity, gas, water, etc. - 2500 ( I like AC at night)

- Home phone - 0 ( I use my mobile)

- Home Broadband/ Cable Internet - 300 Baht for 2Mbit (shared with my neighbor)

- Groceries - 6000

- Mobile phone - 250

- Transportation (taxi, train, etc.) - 1500

- Insurance, if any - 1200

- Entertainment (movies, eating out, drinks, etc) - 5000

- Any other things that I may have missed out - 2500 (Clothing etc.)

Also what's the taxes imposed on foreigners working in Bangkok:

- Taxes (about 7% of your salary) - 2200 a month

- Any other taxes - 0

I spend about 30K a month for living expenses but I often spen alot more than that. Last month I spent well over 50K because of a small medical emergency in the family.

[Phil Conners]

About 80,000 month/avg.

[Soutpeel]

About 80,000 month/avg.

When staying in BKK for business usually go through about 150k/month....wifey is a professional shopper...

But glad to say while in BKK, the company provides me with k100,00/m per diem, so dont come out of it so bad

Edited May 26, 2009 by Soutpeel

[MJP]

24,000 Baht.

Agreed

As long as the night life is kept to a bare minimum Me and my family can live very comfortably on 25-30k/mth, but that is living in a country town.

When I was single and living in Bkk I was spending no more than 50k/mth and that was living well.

After a while you get used to living cheap like buying food from the street, shopping where the locals shop etc.

It helps a lot if you can own your own home.

Yes 25-30k is bang on the mark. That's all costs averaged over the year.

[chiang mai]

History teaches us that when we are asked to estimate our monthly costs we tend to come up with a figure that is anywhere from one third to one half below our actual spend - repeatedly this has been true in my life and the validity of this rule was confirmed yet again last month when I sat down and went through all my bank statements at the detail level. Oh well!

[theufo8mycow]

Thanks for all the replies everyone. Your replies and comments are extremely helpful!

[Livinginexile]

History teaches us that when we are asked to estimate our monthly costs we tend to come up with a figure that is anywhere from one third to one half below our actual spend - repeatedly this has been true in my life and the validity of this rule was confirmed yet again last month when I sat down and went through all my bank statements at the detail level. Oh well!

Speak for yourself chiang mai, whenever I set myself a budget I allways stick to it.

If it blows out one mth I will make it up the next. I tend to underspend most months and then have a great month on my savings down the track.

Maybe you should learn to manage your money a bit better.

[chiang mai]

History teaches us that when we are asked to estimate our monthly costs we tend to come up with a figure that is anywhere from one third to one half below our actual spend - repeatedly this has been true in my life and the validity of this rule was confirmed yet again last month when I sat down and went through all my bank statements at the detail level. Oh well!

Speak for yourself chiang mai, whenever I set myself a budget I allways stick to it.

If it blows out one mth I will make it up the next. I tend to underspend most months and then have a great month on my savings down the track.

Maybe you should learn to manage your money a bit better.

I think it's a fact of human nature that we do this. There's absolutely nothing wrong with my budget it's just my estimations that are off - when someone asks how much money did I spend in a certain period my guess is almost always way under the actual. Fortunately the controls and safeguards I have in place work just fine, my money management skills are just fine but thanks for your concern.

Edited May 26, 2009 by chiang mai