Is Thailand really cheap?

[GinBoy2]

If I was to exclude housing, I could live back in San Diego at pretty much the same cost.

Disclaimers; no I don't want to live in a tin roof shack, no I don't want to eat from the local noodle shop everyday. Yes I'm an aircon junkie

All that being said, I'm still pretty happy here

[JAG]

Thats my weekly bar bill! So thats me stuffed.The trouble is the Thailand commercial mentality, when there is less customers put the price up. A beer in BKK is the same as Europe, some places are charging 100 -130bht.

100 to 130 baht for a beer in Bangkok?

You must be going to the cheap places.

350+ for a craft beer

300 for a pint of Asahi

350++ for a vodka soda in most places I go.

7000++ for a bottle of Grey Goose.

I don't think that the prices you pay reflect whether or not Thailand is cheap.

Rather they reflect that your favoured drinking establishment has big windows, so they can see you coming from a long way off!

Edited January 21, 2016 by JAG

[gemguy]

The answer is simple enough.

To live cheap in Thailand you have to live the same way that a large percent of the Thais live and do everything entailed that they do...then you can live cheap.

I once met a hippy back backer that walked all the way from Bangkok to Chiang Mai saying the bus was too expensive.

He claimed it took him 22 days to walk there and told us he had 600 plus dollars to make last for 6 months ( 2 x 90 day tourists Visas )

He had his back pack full of what he needed including a single person Pup Tent that he would pitch where ever people along the way would allow him or invite him to sleep over night.

He bought water and cooked rice and fruit and vegetables along the way while spending his money sparingly.

When coming back from Chiang Mai area he was going to walk again but claims he met some people that were bringing fruit and vegetables from Chiang Mai to Ayutthaya, so he got a free ride in the back of a pick up truck loaded with produce and walked the rest of the way from Ayutthaya.

The ultimate budget traveler and living cheaper than the Thais....

When I first came to Thailand and went to Phuket in 1979 and stayed on Nai Harn beach where only one end of the beach had any development at all having a dozen or so shack like beach bungalows that we paid 50 baht a night for and there we met a dozen or so happy, hippy budget travelers from several countries.

After a few beers and a few joints we were informed we were paying too much for our bungalow while some of the guys more or less bragged how they were paying 20 baht a night for a little beach bungalow and how they were living long term on the beach for less than 100 baht a day.

A meal was 7 to 10 to 15 baht......while a small beer was only 9 baht and a large beer was 16 baht while a bag of local weed was 50 baht or less and would last them a week while they would eat 2 times a day and drink 2 or 3 beer and their bungalow was paid for in advanced and bargained down to 20 or 30 baht a night..... so yeah...they were living for less than 100 baht per day and staying there for months on end doing not much of anything really...just living on the beach and stoned everyday.

I was bored to death after the second day and moved on after the 3 day but I remember those guys talking about how Thailand was more expensive ...too expensive as some of them had come from India and Goa area and other hippy budget traveler places that they claimed was less expensive while a person could live there for 2 dollars a day back in 1979.

If you want to live on a beach and live for cheap you can still do so in some places here in Thailand.

Cheers

[MaeJoMTB]

If I was to exclude housing, I could live back in San Diego at pretty much the same cost.

How about hookers, $250 in San Diego Vs $30 in Chiang Mai.

and happy massage, $100 in San Diego Vs $15 in Chiang Mai.

Or have prices changed recently?

[Shaunduhpostman]

Living on 30k/month in an urban area year in and year out, in most cases, your health would begin to suffer both physically and emotionally. You could easily do it for a year or two but each year it is going to get harder. You can't really eat properly, cannot get a place that allows you to rest in a relatively clean and cool environment for that budget. Year after year takes its toll. You won't have a kitchen in your apartment and will be eating out in the soi or at the food court mostly. You'll get run down by the low quality food and you'll start to look like a wreck and thus begin to have more problems with the Thais for whom appearances are very important. I could go on and on about people I have known, my own experiences living this way but I'll just drop it here, I'm sure you can look around you and find many examples of people who have or who are trying to live this way.

[willyumiii]

If you must live in Bangkok, live a plush western lifestyle and require things like taxis and someone to do your laundry for you ( can you cook?), yes, it can be very expensive.

I live in the real Thailand, in a nice community, own a car and rent a very nice, brand new airconditioned home that cost me $125 USD a month.

We also do our own laundry and cook most of our meals at home but have many nice places to eat out at if we wish.

We also own another house in the area that cost a very small fraction of building a house in California

Life is very inexpensive here compared to living the same lifestyle where I came from in California.

Maybe your topic should be titled " Is Bangkok really cheap with this kind of life style"

P.S. I have never paid anyone to do my laundry and have never depended on taxis for my only transportation...anywhere!."

Edited January 21, 2016 by willyumiii

[cewing]

If anyone is interested in exact numbers, I tracked my expenses when I lived, alone, in the country (Buriram) between Sep., 2011 and Feb., 2013. The average monthly costs of living were as follows --

Total: 19123 baht (includes "everything" -- rent, water, electricity, phone, groceries, meals, entertainment, laundry, transportation)

Rent: 4357 baht (including water and electricity)

Laundry: 140 baht

Lunch: 75 baht

Dinner: 160 baht

Phone: 250 baht

When traveling to someplace like Bangkok, the Total average was 27429 baht.

Craig-Ben

[thaiduncankk]

Living on 30k/month in an urban area year in and year out, in most cases, your health would begin to suffer both physically and emotionally. You could easily do it for a year or two but each year it is going to get harder. You can't really eat properly, cannot get a place that allows you to rest in a relatively clean and cool environment for that budget. Year after year takes its toll. You won't have a kitchen in your apartment and will be eating out in the soi or at the food court mostly. You'll get run down by the low quality food and you'll start to look like a wreck and thus begin to have more problems with the Thais for whom appearances are very important. I could go on and on about people I have known, my own experiences living this way but I'll just drop it here, I'm sure you can look around you and find many examples of people who have or who are trying to live this way.

Got to call the BS card on this one.

I live in a condo without a fitted kitchen. In this day and age they sell compact cooking machines such as convection ovens, slow cookers, George Foreman grills to name a few. I cook nearly every day for myself, whether it be a roast dinner, a curry, a breakfast, a casserole, I have all the facilities for whatever I want to cook.

Today I cooked myself a roast chicken dinner. Total cost of the ingredients came to around 100 baht, some chicken fillets, potatoes, carrots, broccoli, gravy stock. With any other meal the ingredients cost is about the same, so as I only eat I main meal daily due to lack of big appetite because of the heat, my monthly total is about 3,000 baht (30x100). Factor in bread, milk, yoghurts, biscuits, coffee, teabags and whatever else you fancy, my total bill for sustenance for the month will not exceed 5,000 baht.

Where you imply you cannot eat healthily renting such a place as I do, I can tell you, you are wrong.

When I add my cost of beers twice a week out with friends, it is cheap to live here.

My budget is well above the 30k mentioned, but I enjoy value for money, and also get great enjoyment and satisfaction cooking for myself.

[Thongkorn]

Thailand can be cheap, also very expensive, it all depends on where you are and what you do.

If your a Thai then it is expensive, most food stuff has gone up <if your an ex pat with a pension being sent out to Thailand, then it maybe cheap,

[dundee48]

You can live comfortably in Thailand on 30.000 a month if you dont do things in excess.

What fun is that though?

[Sattphalat]

I am twice a year tourist. The airfare from Northern Europe has gone down a lot the last 10-15 year. Maybe from other destinations to. I think for the tourist is one of the main reason to visit Thailand.

The prize is half from ten years back. And the salary has raised about 150 %.

Before it was a expensive trip ,not anymore.

Living expenses I have no idea of.

[StefanBBK]

It's not about where you live, but how you live.

As soon as you add little luxuries (I. E. Western food, private school for Kids, a maid, car, satellite TV and whatever else) you end up not being able to live on 30k.

[GinBoy2]

If I was to exclude housing, I could live back in San Diego at pretty much the same cost.

How about hookers, $250 in San Diego Vs $30 in Chiang Mai.

and happy massage, $100 in San Diego Vs $15 in Chiang Mai.

Or have prices changed recently?

Since I'm not a hooker or massage kinda guy, I'll take your word on those data points, lol

[trogers]

Living on 30k/month in an urban area year in and year out, in most cases, your health would begin to suffer both physically and emotionally. You could easily do it for a year or two but each year it is going to get harder. You can't really eat properly, cannot get a place that allows you to rest in a relatively clean and cool environment for that budget. Year after year takes its toll. You won't have a kitchen in your apartment and will be eating out in the soi or at the food court mostly. You'll get run down by the low quality food and you'll start to look like a wreck and thus begin to have more problems with the Thais for whom appearances are very important. I could go on and on about people I have known, my own experiences living this way but I'll just drop it here, I'm sure you can look around you and find many examples of people who have or who are trying to live this way.

If it's hard on us at Bt30k a month at this point in time, it would be impossible after 10 years when inflation reduces purchasing power by half.

[Naam]

You can live comfortably in Thailand on 30.000 a month if you dont do things in excess.

What fun is that though?

30,000 Dollars a month is fun

[anotheruser]

for the price of one tiny house in California, I can buy 50 houses in Thailand.

tiny houses on FYI channel=600'000 $

Thai house =12000$

Except that you can't actually own them.

[BudRight]

Yeah let's compare Southern California to the wilds of Isaan. Try comparing Sukumvidt to the middle-of-nowhere Montana and see how things stack up.

[NeverSure]

Yeah let's compare Southern California to the wilds of Isaan. Try comparing Sukumvidt to the middle-of-nowhere Montana and see how things stack up.

Montana is actually surprisingly expensive compared to "cheap" states. It's also colder than a witch's butt for too long in the winter, running those heat bills up.

JingThing started a good thread in the Home Country Forum about a cheap way to repatriate to the US and there are many pages of ideas on how to live cheaply in the US.

I live in Salem Oregon which I suppose is mid range. I'm debt free including house and car but I also don't pinch pennies. If I wanted to or needed to live cheaply I'd simply rent a room and bath to another retired person for about $500 a month and that would polish off all of my housing expenses including property taxes and utilities.

My experience is that almost everything is cheaper in the US except housing and I wouldn't know about bar girls. I can save enough money buying a new car to eat out for the rest of the year. I have no idea what my Ford F150 4x4 Supercrew would cost in Thailand but I'd probably choke on it if I knew. Gas for it is cheaper too.

Naam, I have to pay US income taxes the same no matter where I live so that's a push.

Cheers.

[Don Mega]

for the price of one tiny house in California, I can buy 50 houses in Thailand.

tiny houses on FYI channel=600'000 $

Thai house =12000$

Except that you can't actually own them.

Why can't you own them ?

[merlen10002]

I think 50,000 is more realistic , I don't drink or smoke and don't live the high life, live in a two story three bed room air cond house. ten minutes drive to Tesco or 15 minutes to Big C , it is 10,000 per month, it did take a bit of finding. good condition and nice living. in Pattaya. I think 30,000 in Pattaya or BKK is not realistic .

10k for the house, don't drink, smoke or live the high life.

Hard to see where the other 40k goes every month.

What about my wife , what about food, golf, the car we have and the motor bike, the traveling we do, going to BKK for entertainment, you don't have to drink or smoke or live the high life to live a good interesting great life, if fact it is much better with the drink or smokes, bit of silly comment. thaiduncankk ,,,

[merlen10002]

I think 50,000 is more realistic , I don't drink or smoke and don't live the high life, live in a two story three bed room air cond house. ten minutes drive to Tesco or 15 minutes to Big C , it is 10,000 per month, it did take a bit of finding. good condition and nice living. in Pattaya. I think 30,000 in Pattaya or BKK is not realistic .

10k for the house, don't drink, smoke or live the high life.

Hard to see where the other 40k goes every month.

What about my wife , what about food, golf, the car we have and the motor bike, the traveling we do, going to BKK for entertainment, you don't have to drink or smoke or live the high life to live a good interesting great life, if fact it is much better with the drink or smokes, bit of silly comment. thaiduncankk ,,,

Should have been ,, with out drinks or smokes, sorry.

[wow64]

I only eat rice or muma if I am on a date.

Water from the tap and 900b all included rent... Life is great...

What they hell are some of you smoking? Obviously not including that in your budgets.

Sent from my c64

Edited January 23, 2016 by wow64

[Naam]

I only eat rice or muma if I am on a date.

Water from the tap and 900b all included rent... Life is great...

What they hell are some of you smoking? Obviously not including that in your budgets.

Sent from my c64

[MaiChai]

The 300 baht a day minimum wage has probably had quite an impact on pushing prices up. Wifey tells me alot of the huge superstores hire burmese, etc because they can legally pay them less (200 baht a day). Think about it; if the minimum wage for any job is going to be 300 baht a day then anyone with some skill is going to want more; for example anybody doing building work now want minimum 500 baht a day, and typically you have to negotiate a price per job and 10 days of building work can easily cost 30,000 baht in labour alone. So a couple of years back you could easily get workers for 200 baht a day now you are looking at 500 baht a day, unless you can find burmese or Cambodian workers. So there is your inflation. This hike in the minimum wage has not produced better quality workers; on average Thai skill level is pretty low and thus makes Thailand very uncompetitive compared to neighbouring countries. Thus one of the reasons the economy is tanking?

[thaiduncankk]

I think 50,000 is more realistic , I don't drink or smoke and don't live the high life, live in a two story three bed room air cond house. ten minutes drive to Tesco or 15 minutes to Big C , it is 10,000 per month, it did take a bit of finding. good condition and nice living. in Pattaya. I think 30,000 in Pattaya or BKK is not realistic .

10k for the house, don't drink, smoke or live the high life.

Hard to see where the other 40k goes every month.

What about my wife , what about food, golf, the car we have and the motor bike, the traveling we do, going to BKK for entertainment, you don't have to drink or smoke or live the high life to live a good interesting great life, if fact it is much better with the drink or smokes, bit of silly comment. thaiduncankk ,,,

All the silly comments come from you.

Did the thread read 'Is Thailand really cheap, with my ostentatious girlfriend who is young enough to be my daughter ?'

It was a general question about the cost of living.

You don't drink, don't smoke, and you would never spend 40k a month as long as I have a hole in my arse.

Typical big deal O'Neill yank.

[Don Mega]

I think 50,000 is more realistic , I don't drink or smoke and don't live the high life, live in a two story three bed room air cond house. ten minutes drive to Tesco or 15 minutes to Big C , it is 10,000 per month, it did take a bit of finding. good condition and nice living. in Pattaya. I think 30,000 in Pattaya or BKK is not realistic .

10k for the house, don't drink, smoke or live the high life.

Hard to see where the other 40k goes every month.

What about my wife , what about food, golf, the car we have and the motor bike, the traveling we do, going to BKK for entertainment, you don't have to drink or smoke or live the high life to live a good interesting great life, if fact it is much better with the drink or smokes, bit of silly comment. thaiduncankk ,,,

All the silly comments come from you.

Did the thread read 'Is Thailand really cheap, with my ostentatious girlfriend who is young enough to be my daughter ?'

It was a general question about the cost of living.

You don't drink, don't smoke, and you would never spend 40k a month as long as I have a hole in my arse.

Typical big deal O'Neill yank.

Your cost of living is not the same as my cost of living, nor others.

Why be an A-Hole thaiduncanbkk ?

Here is the chunk of meat I had for for lunch today.. was nice.

Not all eat food cart crapola everyday or live in a fan room to meet some paltry budget.

Edited January 24, 2016 by Don Mega

[thaiduncankk]

I think 50,000 is more realistic , I don't drink or smoke and don't live the high life, live in a two story three bed room air cond house. ten minutes drive to Tesco or 15 minutes to Big C , it is 10,000 per month, it did take a bit of finding. good condition and nice living. in Pattaya. I think 30,000 in Pattaya or BKK is not realistic .

10k for the house, don't drink, smoke or live the high life.

Hard to see where the other 40k goes every month.

What about my wife , what about food, golf, the car we have and the motor bike, the traveling we do, going to BKK for entertainment, you don't have to drink or smoke or live the high life to live a good interesting great life, if fact it is much better with the drink or smokes, bit of silly comment. thaiduncankk ,,,

All the silly comments come from you.

Did the thread read 'Is Thailand really cheap, with my ostentatious girlfriend who is young enough to be my daughter ?'

It was a general question about the cost of living.

You don't drink, don't smoke, and you would never spend 40k a month as long as I have a hole in my arse.

Typical big deal O'Neill yank.

Your cost of living is not the same as my cost of living, nor others.

Why be an A-Hole thaiduncanbkk ?

Here is the chunk of meat I had for for lunch today.. was nice.

Not all eat food cart crapola everyday or live in a fan room to meet some paltry budget.

steak.jpg

OK, multiply that by 30 (average days in a month), and you are still way short of the ball park figure.

I am sure you are also one of the 'Thai food is the best' brigade, it is crap, but it is far cheaper than the picture of that burger.

[Rhys]

Funny how the 30 K marks fits many Thai/western conversions for salary and playtime..

Basis needs food, housing, internet service for TV what ever fits your fancy and makes you happy.

Play time expenses. open budget. women, bikes, cars, night travels, medical treatment, unwanted TGF expenses,,,

How long do you want to live... What type of lifestyle do you want....

That's your budget range..

[thaiduncankk]

Funny how the 30 K marks fits many Thai/western conversions for salary and playtime..

Basis needs food, housing, internet service for TV what ever fits your fancy and makes you happy.

Play time expenses. open budget. women, bikes, cars, night travels, medical treatment, unwanted TGF expenses,,,

How long do you want to live... What type of lifestyle do you want....

That's your budget range..

And how much did you allocate for women, a.k.a. shagging prostitutes, back home ?

[Rhys]

Funny how the 30 K marks fits many Thai/western conversions for salary and playtime..

Basis needs food, housing, internet service for TV what ever fits your fancy and makes you happy.

Play time expenses. open budget. women, bikes, cars, night travels, medical treatment, unwanted TGF expenses,,,

How long do you want to live... What type of lifestyle do you want....

That's your budget range..

And how much did you allocate for women, a.k.a. shagging prostitutes, back home ?

you mean the girlfriends and wives....lawyer fee for the wives...girlfriends, the high and holly, ring

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