How Much To Live There – Monthly Expense

[BKK90210]

To all you ranchers out there,

OK I have just one question

What is the realistic monthly expense of living in the ranch there – marriage to a thai – don’t have any kid.

Will own house and car out right. I don’t smoke or drink, no bar scene, can eat 80% thai foods + 20% farang foods, and don’t have any thai relatives to support.

Thanks in advance

BKK90210 family

[ray23]

40K a month will leave you extra money, if you don't change your life style

[tyler2uk]

Will own house and car out right. I don’t smoke or drink, no bar scene, can eat 80% thai foods + 20% farang foods, and don’t have any thai relatives to support.

Where in the same situation as that, the only difference is we do drink and we have about two or three meals out per week.

We easily get by on 30,000bt..normally less.

Its hard to put a figure on as everyone has different lifestyles.

Now if you have a house and a car, no kids and just want to get by (survive) then this figure will come down greatly.

I know of one guy who has a family with two kids and he swears he never spends more than 10,000bt a month,

Depends how you want to live.

But for me, to go to the city every second day, have a day out everyweek and a beer when i like will certainly be under 30,000bt. And this includes putting money aside for running the car.

[costas]

To all you ranchers out there,

OK I have just one question

What is the realistic monthly expense of living in the ranch there – marriage to a thai – don’t have any kid.

Will own house and car out right. I don’t smoke or drink, no bar scene, can eat 80% thai foods + 20% farang foods, and don’t have any thai relatives to support.

Thanks in advance

BKK90210 family

am married with no kids, renting and paying off a car.

dont drink, and it all amounts to less than 30k/month, but of course as others have pointed out, it can vary greatly!

[bergen]

Costas

Can't see where you can spend much money. No smoke/no drink and a modest wife?

Here are some rough figures baht/month

Electricity 1000

phone 1000

(UBC 1500)

diesel 4000

food 4000

car insurance 1000

road tax 500

U can use less or more - depends on.................

pluss for investments/maintencnce

welcome to join

[jayenram]

Costas

Can't see where you can spend much money. No smoke/no drink and a modest wife?

Here are some rough figures baht/month

Electricity 1000

phone 1000

(UBC 1500)

diesel 4000

food 4000

car insurance 1000

road tax 500

U can use less or more - depends on.................

pluss for investments/maintencnce

welcome to join

Generally I agree with your amounts, however, I would clarify a little from my perspective.

We have two handphones and one housephone but the bills very rarely exceed a total of Bht 700.00 per month. Diesel obviously depends upon how much mileage (kilometerage (?)) you do per month. I usually w*rk on Bht 10.00 per kilometre. My car insurance costs Bht 25,000 per year without "no claims" discount and my tax (2 door pick-up) is Bht 1050.00 per year. None of the figures include depreciation/repairs on either the house or the pick-up.

However, for a non-drinker who does not party, Bht 40,000.00 is very adequate.

[BKK90210]

Hmm....electricity expense seems low to me. I thought it would be like around 4000 baths.

What about the live-in housekeeper....how much? My wife is not a spender but she has to have a housekeeper. She's from Bangkok and never been to Isaan area before. She had only seen lots of pictures on the net while studying in the US. She doesn't know anything about issaan dialect , but thinks it might be nice to live in a simple and laid-back lifestyle with less pollution and traffics. She does love foods and many unique festivals from that region though. So we think it would be nice to try it out for couple of yrs....to see if we can live there for a longer period.

How do you all spend your times there?....when not eating or sleeping

[Ken]

Ok. It's beena rough night, big wedding and all and there was a lot of drink. So, you don't drink and smoke. I'm impressed. What the F ... do you do. You can live on "peanuts" if you want. What was the point of your question again?????

My "budget" is 40K a month and I do "drink". Works for me. But that "budget" does not include traveling the world or anything like that so depending on your plans you must consider into the equation whatever entertainment you do enjoy.

[BKK90210]

I don't know why I don't drink or smoke. May be no one in my family does it, but my brother smokes occationally though. I'm a structural engineer and spend most of my times running my own company for 16 yrs. May be I just didn't have so much times left over in a day or a week to do that sort of things...or may be I didn't like the bitter taste of it...I just don't know.

The only yellow thing I like to drink alot is "nam tan sod" palm/coconut flower juice while in thailand....got to have it all the times.

[dutch]

What about newspapers/magasins and cloths.

What about medical costs/dental costs

car insurance:23.500/year

electricity between 2500-5000/month

freetime activity for me golf:8500/month

SPA:2500/month

I can think of a few more I suppose.

I understand however it all depends on lifestyle and needs

[jayenram]

Oops, missed the 'live-in' housekeeper. In my case Bht 4,000.00 pm. Also missed internet costs, Bht 1,600.00 pm. As far as electric costs, if you do not use aircon, Bht 1,000.00 pm is adequate. If you have 2 or 3 aircons running 24 hours a day your bill will spiral. At a guess, each 13,000 BTU unit will cost in the region of Bht 6.00 - Bht 8.00 per hour. Does anyone know a more precise figure. I appreciate that the cost per electricity unit increases, the more you use.

[Gary A]

I drink and smoke. I don't go to the bars so that is not that expensive. Maybe 2,000 per month. Phone bill about 700, electricity 800, diesel 2,000, UBC 1600, Ipstar Internet 2,600, water 100, food 3500, car insurance 2000, health insurance 1800.

I give my wife 20,000 baht per month. She buys all the food and household needs. She pays all the utilities including UBC and Ipstar. I know she usually has about 5,000 left over to put in her bank account. I pay the big ticket items like car insurance, health insurance and capital purchases. My wife is low maintenance.

Costas

Can't see where you can spend much money. No smoke/no drink and a modest wife?

Here are some rough figures baht/month

Electricity 1000

phone 1000

(UBC 1500)

diesel 4000

food 4000

car insurance 1000

road tax 500

[ray23]

What do we do here, that is strictly up tp you, you can find things here that Bangkok offers as well, but they drive living costs up. For us it's bowling, motorcycle trips, gardening, obvioulsy internet, movies. I don't golf but it's here, several Gyms in town, Swimming pools. The national ladies past time shopping. More then likely your wife will be understood here, just minor differences in Issan. Plenty of fishing around if you enjoy that. There is even an ultralight flight club in the area.

Now those are just the things that I have found, it's here but not in your face like Bangkok, your first year will probably be spent just finding things if not longer.

As you can see it is up to you, you want to watch the grass grow no one will bother you. Decide what you want to do then go find it and do it.

My wife has a 60K budget, but she pays for the house and the pickup out of that, which is abut 20K a month. We enjoy farrangs foods about 50% of the time and enjoy having dinners for friends. The wife has a housekeeper three times a week 450 a week, but that what she wants. Haven't seen the big aircon bill for the new house but it's gong to be a lot more then 1K, probably more like 3K, but most of the day two uniits are running and there is one running about 20 hours a day. So it's going to be high. Now I don't have to aircon at all, but that waht I like and I didn't work all my life not to be comfortable in my retirement.

Our water bill is high, but we have a lot grass, which I water, so 350 a month is no surprise.

You can go rent a apartemnt here for 1500 a month or you you can pay a high a 25K for a rental, house depends on what you want and how you want to live.

So maybe a better question instead of what do, what do you like to do? You sound like most of us before we came here a workacholic, so I doubt that you even know that yet, go experiment and find your nitch thats what the most have had to do, because we really didn't know either.

I go to Bangkok and ocassionaly to Pattaya to blow off steam and shop for foods I can't get here. It's not Siberia, you can be in Bangkok in a 45 minute flight.

Oh I forgot camping if you like that, plenty of beautiful national parks around. If I want a three or four hour break I get on the bike and go village hopping. I just pick a road I haven't been on before and just see where it goes. Now thats how you can learn the real Issan, the people are friendly and they enjoy the break in the boredom having you in the village as much as I do going. But thats my cup of tea, maybe not yours.

Maybe raising cattle would make you happy, or a fish farm, or rubber trees, or exotic birds there all done by farrangs here . Or maybe just sitting down and reading a good book without all the traffic.

Don't drink, a lot of us here don't. If I want to hang out in the farrang or Thai bars, I drink water or coke, up to me. Unfortunately I do smoke. The bottom line is if you can afford to live in Bangkok, then you will have no problem here at all. But it's up to you to decide which life you want.

I have three motorcycles, wave 125. phantom 150 and Yamaha 750, the two latter ones seem to be in the shop most of the time, those are my hobby and I pay for those not from the household budge.

[johnny blaze]

I live in KK with my wife and stepdaughter

HOUSE: My wifes bought and paid for so no mortgage.

UBC: 2200 a month

POWER: Hot season with 2 aircon units = 2000 baht

Cold season = 700 baht

WATER: 3 people showering and watering the garden = 170 baht

HOUSE TELEPHONE BILL (usually internet) = 400 baht

LAUNDRY SERVICE FOR 3 PEOPLE (unlimited pieces) = 1500 baht per month

HOUSE CLEANER = 250 baht per day

RUNNING A CAR: About 2000 baht a month in fuel for each vehicle

EATING OUT: Decent Thai restaurant for 3 people = 500 baht for everybody

DINNER AT SOFITEL = About 500 baht per person

STREET FOOD = 25-35 baht per dish

If you rent a property

Townhouse =3500 baht

Apartment with cable, laundry etc. = 4500 baht

Detached bungalow 3 bedrooms = 5000-7500 baht per month

Some places are rented by expats working here with the company buying but I consider them overpriced.

HUGE HOUSE IN A TOP DEVELOPMENT =25-50000 baht per month

Hope this helps.

[BKK90210]

Thanks for all your replies and inputs…..very much appreciated!

We’re planning to move to Thailand in 2008. I’m still a bit confused and overwhelmed of choices of where to live in Thailand. Rayong, Hua Hin, Kanchanaburi, or Sri Racha. Since we’re only 44 and 42, there are still so many things in life we want to do or try out, but for sure we’ll be done with the regular job at that time!....YIPPI!

We have made some lists about diff things we want to do while in Thailand, but would like to spend the first couple yrs at least kicking around a bit. My wife is an architect and there is a big possibility we might try to develop a resort or housing development…..just a small one at first. Her family is in BKK mostly….but is too polluted for us!

Another reason as why she wants to live in Isaan for awhile is to do research on many small villages nearby on: Why and what make them successful as a community and how did they sustain their uniqueness throughout this past few decades. What’re some reasons why existing people are happy and didn’t want to emigrate to another place. And what’re also some reasons for others might want to immigrate there. Basically what makes a successful village.

In order for her to do these she thinks she will have to live in the area to better understand them. So that we will be successful in developing a good, unique and sustainable development project using existing resources of the site at best to our own advantages.

Thanks kindly again for all your helps

BKK

[tyler2uk]

Another reason as why she wants to live in Isaan for awhile is to do research on many small villages nearby on: Why and what make them successful as a community and how did they sustain their uniqueness throughout this past few decades. What’re some reasons why existing people are happy and didn’t want to emigrate to another place. And what’re also some reasons for others might want to immigrate there. Basically what makes a successful village

You are kidding

I can just imagine someone going to a village and asking why they are unique or why they dont emigrate.

Good luck.

[wrongway]

Hey,

Just asked my (Thai) wife how much we need to live a month. This is a nice city, Ubon Ratchathani, and the house's paid for. She says we need at least 50,000 a month, 40,000 if we don't drink. Our big cost is our daughter. Those diapers and powdered milk. . . The shiny new pickup is included, 10,000 a month. We don't have air cons or cleaners. I've lived on various budgets in Bangkok, Hua Hin, Krabi, and have some experience in a villiage that I'm not at liberty to discuss. If you don't drink and don't smoke, 30,000 will still give you change for toilets at the bus terminals. If your wife gambles, get out when the going is good.

Watch out about judging how some villiages can survive. They may be OTOP (One Tambon One Product) on the surface, but it "may" be the concientious young daughters who are providing that sense of affluance.

Though I live in Ubon, my wife is from Surin. The Ubon people, anyway, haven't got a problem about "outsiders." They assume you are here because Ubon has something special. It does, I just can't pin it down yet. If your wife is a well-educated, sophisticated Bangkok-girl, she may or may not fit in. I know that's a "no help" comment. It's really about who she is and how she interacts with people. If she's in a villiage in "East Bumf##k," and somebody tells her about the black dog that is bigger than an elephant and has been killing people left and right at night, she might be wise to thank them for the information and let it pass. I can't recall how many times I've asked for names and addresses of the victims of that big black elephant-sized dog. I think they made it up so I wouldn't go out buying more beer after dark.

Anyway, you've got time. Take your time and make a well-informed decision.

Cheers!

[BKK90210]

"If your wife is a well-educated, sophisticated Bangkok-girl, she may or may not fit in"

She’s well educated, and sophisticated if she needs to be. But not the girly Bangkok-girl type who has to be perfect from head to toe 24 hrs a day….living their lives with papa monies……and acting like the untouchable, high manner HI-SO girls…. YUCK! She said her acting ability is not that to their level. She’s the type who loves to eat at small food shops, market stalls and sidewalk stalls. She’s not the show-off type by wearing as many jewelries as possible…..but only wears the wedding ring and a watch. I know all these qualities because I’ve been married to her for 20 yrs this year.

It’s difficult to explain what’s she planning to do and how. In order to understand her research, you have to understand a bit about social studies and urban planning. I’m an engineer and only work with numbers……. and heck…she’s been trying to explain those to me I still don’t get it much in all these 20 yrs together.

All I know is there are diff ways to do the research. You don’t necessary have to go up to them or in your face actions, you can also do it based on observations. Her final goal is to be able to understand the central market, community center locations, area natural amenities - and their importance to those living in the area,…for a better site planning & design....for our future development project.

[wrongway]

Hi,

Sounds like your wife has a very good head on her shoulders. As the Isaan people are generally very friendly, you shouldn't have any trouble. I suggest, however, you tie yourselves loosely to a good provincial university. Find a professor who is sympathetic to your interests and get advice. Even if you could simply tell the locals you chose their community to live in based on the recommendation of professor ?? at ?? university, they will likely respect you more and forgive your foreigness (by this I mean your wife, too). Stay somewhere within an easy drive of the provincial capital so you can shop, get together with some of the friendly farang residents, etc.

Good luck!

[ray23]

Wrong way great advice.

This is a very classest society. A good example try to find a school that teaches the Issan language. Although the language is used here everyday, schools only want to teach formal Thai, this includes the public schools. I go to Bangkok and people understand what I say, not always the same around here. But if you use some Issan phrases the locals think you are the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Personally I enjoy the Issan people more then the sophiticated Bangkok folk, but thats just me.

Just out of curiousty, it sounds like yuo guys are going to get involved in a very big operation. What is your target market?

Although it sounds like a great project, I'm not assure I understand what it is your trying to accomplish. I live in a essentially a Thai nighborhood, with several really nice parks in it. The builder is still maintining the common grounds at this point. But eventually he won't. So efforts have been made to form an association, to care of everything when the builder leaves. The truth 70% of the Thai owners won't even come to meetings. I can only aume that a a general rule they don't think of property values in the same way as farrangs, not all. The people who live her that busine people certainly do, they are the ones who attend.

My neighbor a good single lady and a teacher paid a huge amount for landscaping, never waters it or attends to it the result is she might a well left it dirt. The money spent is lost now. I don't understand it. But it's not mine to understand it's her home and up to her.

I think the idea of hooking with an acedemic would be a great way to ease into the community and really understand it.

Good luck with your adventure

[jrc1]

Wrong way great advice.

This is a very classest society. A good example try to find a school that teaches the Issan language. Although the language is used here everyday, schools only want to teach formal Thai, this includes the public schools. I go to Bangkok and people understand what I say, not always the same around here. But if you use some Issan phrases the locals think you are the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Personally I enjoy the Issan people more then the sophiticated Bangkok folk, but thats just me.

Just out of curiousty, it sounds like yuo guys are going to get involved in a very big operation. What is your target market?

Although it sounds like a great project, I'm not assure I understand what it is your trying to accomplish. I live in a essentially a Thai nighborhood, with several really nice parks in it. The builder is still maintining the common grounds at this point. But eventually he won't. So efforts have been made to form an association, to care of everything when the builder leaves. The truth 70% of the Thai owners won't even come to meetings. I can only aume that a a general rule they don't think of property values in the same way as farrangs, not all. The people who live her that busine people certainly do, they are the ones who attend.

My neighbor a good single lady and a teacher paid a huge amount for landscaping, never waters it or attends to it the result is she might a well left it dirt. The money spent is lost now. I don't understand it. But it's not mine to understand it's her home and up to her.

I think the idea of hooking with an acedemic would be a great way to ease into the community and really understand it.

Good luck with your adventure

This post re Cost of Living has been extremely informative. A lot of people have given costs for electricity etc and have provided a basic cost of Monthly Expenses if you drink or don't drink etc. A lot of people have also given estimates of Monthly Expenses and have quoted a cost if you own your car and house. My question is how much is it for the cost of a modest three bedroom house with a western kitchen and bathroom - toilet and also the cost of a new dual cabin car ? Also is it more costly to build a house for instance say in Roi Et than having one built in an out lying village.

I was also after some guidance regarding the purchase of the House and Car, I have read that some people get loans to pay them off, how easy is it to get loans ? can I have them in my name or does it have to be in a Thai name ? Also what are the going interest rates. If anyone can provide me with some actual figures it would be appreciated.

Regards

John

[cooL_guY_corY]

ok i didnt read this whole thread, just answering the question how much to live there..

I have a house in kk and its easy to live on 13 or 14 grand a month (bahtz). I used to live in Phuket (patong) off the same amount except up north everything is so much cheaper.. song taews are like 7 bahts, taxi bikes are like 1/4 price of phuket at least and all the food is wayyy cheaper. Depending on if you own a place or renting, say 5 thousand a month max for power and rent (i dont use aircon so my elec bill should never be over 2000, if even 1000) 5 thousand for transportation and food (still a high number) 4 thousand bahtz for drinking, case of sangsom yai's is around 2200 at bigc, and thats 12 bottles, so if you get 2 cases thats 24 bottles for a month so you should be able to get drunk every 2nd day and then maybe a week everyday. Buy your mix in bulk m150, coke or whatever floats your boat, and your liqour should be taken care of. Cheap cheap cheap

[wrongway]

JRC1,

Paid for this three-bedroom house in a nice (great neighbors) new development about 5km outside of the center of Ubon Rathchathani, 1km from BigC, about six months ago. We actually moved into another house, one of the first, in the development (now 50 total) a year ago, but just before they finished that one we learned from one of the carpenters that the foreman had made a mistake and that house was 10cm lower than the others. Never would have noticed, and it hasn't seemed to cause the new owners any problems, but I used that as leverage and sort of demanded that they build us another house. The only lot left was the corner lot that I originally wanted but, because it's 20% larger, and more expensive, we didn't go for it initially. I convinced them to give us that extra 20% of land for free for our trouble. They accepted. So, we stayed rent-free in the other house until this one was finished. That gave us the advantage of staying on top of their work. Also, by then, we'd learned which teams were better at what, such as tiling, and would ask for the best team to perform particular construction. Worked out pretty good. Also, we knew what design improvements (our cost) we wanted having had the experience of living in one of the homes. We had the house widened by about a meter and the front roof extended (see photo) to make a covered patio. That was my idea and the developer did everything he could to convince me it wouldn't look good. When they took photos for their brochure for their next development, guess which house they chose! Anyway, three-bedrooms, large living room, two bathrooms (one attached to the master bedroom), and an acceptable kitchen; the original house would have cost us nearly 900,000 baht. This one, after all the changes, cost us almost exactly 1 million baht.

The shiny new pickup in the photo was purchased on credit (Chevrolet's). This was tough to pull off as my wife is unemployed (but soon she will be the owner of a restaurant) and I'm here visa-on-entry, earning money from work I do over the internet for a company in Japan. Also, on paper, my wife is a "single mother." The total price for the pickup, a Chevrolet Colorado with a 2.5l commonrail engine, was 520,000 baht. The first downpayment we made was 70,000 baht. The guy in charge of credit here sort of fudged my wife's application for credit, making her the proprieter of a small shop selling clothes outside of BigC. We'd been putting 30 or 40 thousand in her account monthly to give her some credit standing. Also, the house was paid in cash (put in my daughter's name), and her brother, who has a small metal fabrication/welding business here co-signed. They told us not to worry and just follow that storyline if anyone from the head office in Bangkok calls. In fact, even before being approved, they brought the car over. Then the head office called. They noticed in her bank book copies that rather large transfers of cash from the United States were made. They new the "shop propieter" story was bogus. I thought we'd have to go through the extreme embarassment of having to return the car, but it turns out that another 50,000 deposit settled things. The "published" interest rate is 3.35%, but WATCH OUT. It's actually much higher, something like 7% if you do the math. They calculate it as if you borrowed the entire amount for, in our case, 4 years, and then paid it all back on the last day. In other words, you are paying interest on money you've paid back. For a 48-month loan, we pay 9,300 baht a month. The first year's insurance is expensive, full coverage, 20,000. I was surprised to learn that there is a guy who poses for us for insurance purposes because neither I nor my wife have a Thai driver's license. We had to pay him 1,500 baht recently for taking care of a broken latch and a dented (drunken) fender. This was cheaper than paying ourselves, I was told. This bit sounds somewhat dodgy, so be careful. Hope this information has helped.

[jayenram]

the original house would have cost us nearly 900,000 baht. This one, after all the changes, cost us almost exactly 1 million baht.

Oi! What are you doing living in my house?

Btw, mine cost around Bht 750,00.00 excluding land and European style kitchen, 6 years ago.

http://www.thaivisa.com/gallery/building-in-issan/IMG_0894

[wrongway]

the original house would have cost us nearly 900,000 baht. This one, after all the changes, cost us almost exactly 1 million baht.

Oi! What are you doing living in my house?

Btw, mine cost around Bht 750,00.00 excluding land and European style kitchen, 6 years ago.

http://www.thaivisa.com/gallery/building-in-issan/IMG_0894

Jayenram,

You're up early mate! Nice looking house. Probably cheaper to do it in a development as we did, but all the houses look the same. Nice to have a big piece of land an the only house of it's type around, maybe. Here's what a view down the street looks like back when a lot of them were still being built:

[jayenram]

You're up early mate! Nice looking house. Probably cheaper to do it in a development as we did, but all the houses look the same. Nice to have a big piece of land an the only house of it's type around, maybe. Here's what a view down the street looks like back when a lot of them were still being built:

I'm virtually always up at the crack of dawn.

Yes, it is the only house of this type in Amphur, at least as far as I know. Regarding having a big piece of land, I would have preferred less. The house and front/side garden occupy around 250 tallang wah. The whole plot is 1.00 rai therefore I have 150 talang wah which I really don't know what to do with. We tried a number of "crops" but either the 'soil' isn't good enough or we both have 'red fingers'.

C'est la vie.

[wrongway]

You're up early mate! Nice looking house. Probably cheaper to do it in a development as we did, but all the houses look the same. Nice to have a big piece of land an the only house of it's type around, maybe. Here's what a view down the street looks like back when a lot of them were still being built:

I'm virtually always up at the crack of dawn.

Yes, it is the only house of this type in Amphur, at least as far as I know. Regarding having a big piece of land, I would have preferred less. The house and front/side garden occupy around 250 tallang wah. The whole plot is 1.00 rai therefore I have 150 talang wah which I really don't know what to do with. We tried a number of "crops" but either the 'soil' isn't good enough or we both have 'red fingers'.

C'est la vie.

Jayenram,

Having had a few (too many) beers, in regards to your problem about growing anything on the 150 talang wah that you've got no other use for, have you tried picking your nose to cure yourself of those "red fingers?" Seriously, I don't farm but having two brothers who are successful organic farmer in the US, I guess I have a strange attachment to it. Question: Are your neighbors able to grow anything useful? Have you thought of a European style swimming pond (50% swimming area and 50% fairly attractive water plants that clean the water without chlorine or other chemicals, one pump circulating the water through a gravel bed? That would be a 75 talang wah swimming area, not including the barbeque pit. When's the party?

Okay, I'll shut up and sleep. I wake up a the crack of dawn too. An Isaan life malady that I've no cure for. . .

Cheers!