Cost of living in Thailand

[JAFO]

41 minutes ago, Airalee said:

 

What is "US style food" and what exactly can someone buy to have a small basket (I'm assuming you're referring to one of those hand held baskets) to have a ฿13,000 bill?

 

When I'm in Chiang Mai I shop at Rimping and Tops (Tops when in Bangkok) and I would be hard pressed to run my bill up to ฿13,000.  Imported striploin steaks are around ฿1200/kg so I would need 10kg of steaks to get the tab up to ฿13,000

 

vegetables and fruit of course are more expensive than the wet markets but not enough to warrant such a bill.

 

I'm guessing that the guy you saw had a bottle of Johnny Walker Blue or the Wagyu beef at ฿9000/kg.  Not really a valid comparison.

 

 

No he had a metal push around cart full. While I didn't pay detailed specific attention to what he was buying he had a lot of packaged meat or fish and canned foods and boxed cereal along with a lot of brand name house hold items. Things you can easily buy at Big C for a fraction of the cost. He did have some bottles of wine.  I do remember he had a few tubs of Ben and Jerry's ice cream as I thought how good it sounded  LOL. That's what really caught my eye initially but shit that's expensive and Swensons from time to time fits the bill LOL.

 

As for US food, I reference it to your typical Boxed Kellogg cereals, Ben and Jerrys Ice Cream, Hormel chili Washington delicious apples, Olive oil Starkist Tuna and Clorox toilet cleaner  Crest Tooth paste.  I have cruised Villa Markets numerous times, Most of their products are imported from the US.  It's like walking down an aisle at Safeway except the check out is 3x as much

[Strange]

12 minutes ago, Don Mega said:

 

I dont doubt you at all, luckily I dont eat any of that lot, infact I dont any Thai food as it is all rancid <deleted>.

 

Yup, same same. I don't know about the price of food in AU, and I know you bros have some good beef, but as it pertains to Thailand, its gonna be cheaper in AU/US for a good quality plate. 

 

Thai food is some junk for the most part. 

[jpinx]

3 minutes ago, Strange said:

 

Yup, same same. I don't know about the price of food in AU, and I know you bros have some good beef, but as it pertains to Thailand, its gonna be cheaper in AU/US for a good quality plate. 

 

Thai food is some junk for the most part. 

The un-adaptive farang....   If the food is so bad, why do people come to Thailand to experience Thai Cuisine?  Really sad to read such narrow-minded views. 

[JAFO]

And here goes the thread as expected  LOLOLOLOL.  "All Thai is bad"  "All US food is better and cheaper"  

 

Many factors one doesn't take into account, especially if you don't have a wife that cooks from scratch.  I eat way better now then I did in the US and I don't eat beef so it doesn't really have any impact on me. I do understand we all have different tastes and expectations. Why the COL here is quite affordable for some and outlandish to others.  

 

Cheers

[Don Mega]

9 minutes ago, Strange said:

 

Yup, same same. I don't know about the price of food in AU, and I know you bros have some good beef, but as it pertains to Thailand, its gonna be cheaper in AU/US for a good quality plate. 

 

Thai food is some junk for the most part. 

 

Amusingly Aussie rump steak from Foodland is only 52 baht more per kilo than Coles supermarket in Aus... go figure !!

 

Whilst I do agree Thai food is junk sort of, the stuff my missus makes me at home is edible I guess but as I eat nothing spicy that really limits what she can cook for me.

 

Much each to just throw a slab of dead cow on the BBQ  whilst some veggies are in the steamer.

[lostinisaan]

1 hour ago, Don Mega said:

Uggh, I'll take my chances with Thai street food rather attempt a hotdog, rancid things they are.

 

 Uaagggghhhhh  I prefer my noodle soup to a hotdog. 

 

      P.S. Please don't watch the movie before any meal.

 

         

 

[Airalee]

34 minutes ago, JAFO said:

No he had a metal push around cart full. While I didn't pay detailed specific attention to what he was buying he had a lot of packaged meat or fish and canned foods and boxed cereal along with a lot of brand name house hold items. Things you can easily buy at Big C for a fraction of the cost. He did have some bottles of wine.  I do remember he had a few tubs of Ben and Jerry's ice cream as I thought how good it sounded  LOL. That's what really caught my eye initially but shit that's expensive and Swensons from time to time fits the bill LOL.

 

As for US food, I reference it to your typical Boxed Kellogg cereals, Ben and Jerrys Ice Cream, Hormel chili Washington delicious apples, Olive oil Starkist Tuna and Clorox toilet cleaner  Crest Tooth paste.  I have cruised Villa Markets numerous times, Most of their products are imported from the US.  It's like walking down an aisle at Safeway except the check out is 3x as much

Ahh...ok...yeah, I guess when you're talking about Ben and Jerrys at ฿400/pint the difference is quite large.  Cereal from what I remember seemed to be pretty expensive too.  Wine is about 3x the price.  I guess it's a good thing I don't really drink and also eat a low carb diet.  You'd be surprised at the cost of steaks here in the US now.  Basic striploins (NY) here in LA are $16.99/lb and grass fed organic are $19.99 Prime NY are about $25.  So surprisingly, it makes them more expensive than the imported steaks in Thailand.  If you eat healthy, it's not that much more expensive but if you're buying junk food the price is much higher.

[fleur3]

interesting topic but using examples of chosen items as pineapple etc for pricecomparisions ihas not many value.

I believe that using inflationrecords of thailand do have more value although the expenses of foreigners will not quite be comparable with the of the thai people. But do have more meaning then pinaapples etc.

[transam]

1 hour ago, jpinx said:

The un-adaptive farang....   If the food is so bad, why do people come to Thailand to experience Thai Cuisine?  Really sad to read such narrow-minded views. 

Heeeeeey, I didn't come to LOS to eat Thai grub, and I can tell you Thai folk do NOT go to farangland to eat farang grub.........

[JAFO]

1 hour ago, Don Mega said:

 

Amusingly Aussie rump steak from Foodland is only 52 baht more per kilo than Coles supermarket in Aus... go figure !!

 

Whilst I do agree Thai food is junk sort of, the stuff my missus makes me at home is edible I guess but as I eat nothing spicy that really limits what she can cook for me.

 

Much each to just throw a slab of dead cow on the BBQ  whilst some veggies are in the steamer.

 

I think the "What is Thai food" is very interesting.  I think I posted before I BBQ a lot of chicken and pork ribs and sometimes fish.  I usually toss on the veggies in some aluminum foil with chilis and cook right along side. My wife and FIL love the BBQd corn.  But I do like my extremely spicy food and eat it almost every day for lunch.  I don't eat pork balls or any processed meat of any kind and  didn't in the US either.  I watched a video of it some 15 years ago and it made me sick. But back to cost  you can buy a slab of ribs a Makro for very low cost  same with Chicken.  

 

 

[Don Mega]

1 minute ago, JAFO said:

 

I think the "What is Thai food" is very interesting.  I think I posted before I BBQ a lot of chicken and pork ribs and sometimes fish.  I usually toss on the veggies in some aluminum foil with chilis and cook right along side. My wife and FIL love the BBQd corn.  But I do like my extremely spicy food and eat it almost every day for lunch.  I don't eat pork balls or any processed meat of any kind and  didn't in the US either.  I watched a video of it some 15 years ago and it made me sick. But back to cost  you can buy a slab of ribs a Makro for very low cost  same with Chicken.  

 

 

 

All the food I cook is purchased and prepared in Thailand hence I regard it is Thai food, none of it is based on a Thai recipe though (bangers, Bacon, Fried Tomato, baked beans and fried egg this morning was lush).

[TPI]

4 hours ago, Naam said:

by spending 118,000 Baht a month a bachelor can have in Thailand a very comfortable lifestyle and not a frugal one

On 100,000 + a month you can live like an eastern potentate! Rent a house for 5K utilities another 3K and the rest is jam!!

[pkspeaker]

5 hours ago, Berkshire said:

 

BKK has about 8.3 mil, so yeah, NYC is the only US city that's close.  LA is around 4 mil, Chicago under 3. 

When you include greater LA, with orange country, pasadena etc.  The population is more like 20 million, spread out over a much larger area with way to big freeways connecting it all together..and it is way more expensive than bangkok.

 

overlay bangkok on top of LA on googlemaps with a 5km legend, the entire bangkok pretty much fits between downtown LA and carson.  no highrise or even lowrise apartment housing and endless suburban sprawl makes cost of living much more when you consider transportation expenses on top of the expensive rents

[lostinisaan]

2 hours ago, Strange said:

 

If we are honest here, pork balls, blood soup, bologna type meats are just as bad, if not worse, than an american hotdog. 

 

 

 Pork balls sounds incredible. You gotta have balls to eat them. 

[Don Mega]

1 hour ago, lostinisaan said:

 

 Uaagggghhhhh  I prefer my noodle soup to a hotdog. 

 

      P.S. Please don't watch the movie before any meal.

 

         

 

reminds me of the AGB I backed out this morning !!

[lostinisaan]

1 hour ago, transam said:

Heeeeeey, I didn't come to LOS to eat Thai grub, and I can tell you Thai folk do NOT go to farangland to eat farang grub.........

 

 

Trans, have you ever even tried sticky rice with mangoes and coconut milk? That's also Thai food. 

 A lot of great vegetable dishes, fried chicken ( not KFC), fresh fish you won't find back home, plus a lot of other good stuff. 

 

Even mother in law's silk worms are healthier than all the KFC and MAC junk. 

 

     There's an old German saying: Farmers don't eat what they don't know. 

 

    I agree that there's plenty of fried junk food around with enough Formaline to keep our bodies young forever, but also some good stuff. 

[lostinisaan]

5 minutes ago, Don Mega said:

reminds me of the AGB I backed out this morning !!

 

   Aromatic Garbage of Babies, perhaps? 

[transam]

Just now, lostinisaan said:

 

Trans, have you ever even tried sticky rice with mangoes and coconut milk? That's also Thai food. 

 A lot of great vegetable dishes, fried chicken ( not KFC), fresh fish you won't find back home, plus a lot of other good stuff. 

 

Even mother in law's silk worms are healthier than all the KFC and MAC junk. 

 

     There's an old German saying: Farmers don't eat what they don't know. 

 

    I agree that there's plenty of fried junk food around with enough Formaline to keep our bodies young forever, but also some good stuff. 

After a couple of years l found out that grub here was not for me....I did try....NOW, my food regime is sorted and am happy, no more hours on the big white telephone, no more visits to the pharmacy,  unless it was self inflicted, soooo, l am a happy bunny, except there are no Indian restaurants where l live....Damn, they would be well worth an hour on the lav...

[Don Mega]

7 minutes ago, lostinisaan said:

 

   Aromatic Garbage of Babies, perhaps? 

 

After Grog Bog.

[Grubster]

If you eat at home everyday, and drink beer at home. It is much cheaper in the US.  But rent, utilities, public transport, legal drugs, eating out, drinking out, are all much cheaper here. And ladies well you know.  

                 As for cost going up, I haven't noticed much in my five years up here in the jungle,  I must say I was shocked at the food prices back home last year, now they went up a lot. I still get my local Thai meals here for under 50 baht with a soda. Cant save anything eating at home here as I end up with spoilage. Beer has gone up 50% in these 5 years and again you save little to drink at home as most places here only add ten baht to the store price on the big bottle. Rent same, utilities same, hotels same, fuel cheaper but world market anyway. overall I think up but not much.  I wouldn't be saying that if my retirement was not in dollars though. But thats another issue.

[vukovar77]

11 hours ago, james1995 said:

I am surprised at the prices now.  50 baht food carts are now the norm.  Used to be 30-40?  Things are also going upscale pretty fast.  You have harbor mall in Pattaya and all these pricey gogo places and it's not cheap anymore for mr cheap charlie expat on his 40,000 baht a month income.  I wish the baht would crash like the other currencies but it doesn't look likely at this point.  I think you can live cheaper in Malaysia or Vietnam than you can in Thailand because their currencies are now weaker than the baht.  That being said, you can still find bargains in Thailand if you look outside the tourist cities.

Malaysia is far more expensive than Thailand.Vietnam about same or even cheaper!!!

[Naam]

2 hours ago, TPI said:

On 100,000 + a month you can live like an eastern potentate! Rent a house for 5K utilities another 3K and the rest is jam!!

only brain-amputated persons rent and live in homes for 5k if their income is 100k+ monthly.

[khunPer]

Compared to Northen Western Europe, Thailand is still cheaper; howeer it's always a question of living standard, adjustment to local life-style – i.e. eating local dishes instead of imported home-land food – and knowledge of where to find the right shops.

 

The Cost of Living Index is probably the best comparison, even it may count different for various kind of life-style. The index set Praque (Czech Republic) as 100, Bangkok has index 114...

 

For comparison:
New York 292
San Fransisco 285
Washington DC 269
London 252
Oslo 245
Copenhagen 231
Singapore 229
Los Angeles 227

 

I'm an economic refuge from Copenhagen area, and it fit quite well to my own feeling, that I in general average have a "double-up", living here.

 

If you look for cheap places to live, then the best quotes, based on Cost of Living Index are places like Kiev (Ukraine) 70, or Madras (India) 68, or Cairo 53...

Alternatively you may prefer Colombo (Sri Lanka) with 81 only...

[HampiK]

38 minutes ago, khunPer said:

Compared to Northen Western Europe, Thailand is still cheaper; howeer it's always a question of living standard, adjustment to local life-style – i.e. eating local dishes instead of imported home-land food – and knowledge of where to find the right shops.

 

The Cost of Living Index is probably the best comparison, even it may count different for various kind of life-style. The index set Praque (Czech Republic) as 100, Bangkok has index 114...

 

For comparison:
New York 292
San Fransisco 285
Washington DC 269
London 252
Oslo 245
Copenhagen 231
Singapore 229
Los Angeles 227

 

I'm an economic refuge from Copenhagen area, and it fit quite well to my own feeling, that I in general average have a "double-up", living here.

 

If you look for cheap places to live, then the best quotes, based on Cost of Living Index are places like Kiev (Ukraine) 70, or Madras (India) 68, or Cairo 53...

Alternatively you may prefer Colombo (Sri Lanka) with 81 only...

 

Interesting... according to this site.. chiang mai is only 75% of the cost from Bangkok....

Bangkok 114

Chiang Mai 85

[chiang mai]

3 minutes ago, HampiK said:

 

Interesting... according to this site.. chiang mai is only 75% of the cost from Bangkok....

Bangkok 114

Chiang Mai 85

 

At least that, why are you surprised?

 

I was in the UK three weeks ago, up in the "norf",  cost of living there is similar, 70% of prices in the South - it's all down to property prices and rent per square foot.

 

[ukrules]

4 hours ago, lostinisaan said:

 

 Uaagggghhhhh  I prefer my noodle soup to a hotdog. 

 

      P.S. Please don't watch the movie before any meal.

 

         

 

 

Tasty hotdogs !

 

[HampiK]

Just now, chiang mai said:

 

At least that, why are you surprised?

 

I knew, that Chiang Mai is cheaper than Bangkok but wasn't aware that it's that much... I was only expecting like 90%.

Because in my thinking (I only spend 2 times 2-3 days per year in Chiang Mai) condos are much cheaper, but food is not that much cheaper... and because of that i am little bit surprised.....

[chiang mai]

Just now, HampiK said:

 

I knew, that Chiang Mai is cheaper than Bangkok but wasn't aware that it's that much... I was only expecting like 90%.

Because in my thinking (I only spend 2 times 2-3 days per year in Chiang Mai) condos are much cheaper, but food is not that much cheaper... and because of that i am little bit surprised.....

 

Rent and real estate in general is cheaper, food is also cheaper, especially at local markets (we're talking Province not city). But wages are lower because rents are lower, gasoline is more expensive because it's shipped further from the ports.

[borrfors]

EvenSteben!

 

You state that the cost of living and food is almost the same as in America. Well I do not know what prices you have in amrica by personal knowledge, but when I check for rental- and condo/house prices on the Internet they seem way higher than here in Thailand.

 

In Hua Hin, where we live, you can rent a condo (small 1 room) for as less as 3000 Baht a monts, wich is under 85 Dollars. It would be interesting to see what you can get for 85 US$ a month in the states. 

 

Me and my Thai wife have built a 210 Square meter (2260 Square feet) housxe with a land plot of about 3800 square feet which set us back 74 000 US$ (And this was in the more expensive areas in Hua Hin). Considering then, that you don´t have to pay any house or property tax for a house in this size makes it way more interresting.

 

Internet, electrics and water bills cost an average of 75 US$ a month (High speed fiber Internet of 40/mBit). Me and my lwife have a comfortable living, including a nice car (Nissan Juke) for about 23 000 Baht or 650 US$ a month. Could you live on that sum in America?

 

The food, compared for examnple my homecountry Sweden, which is one of the cheaper countries in the Eu, is about a fourth chepaer here in Hua Hin. If I don´t cook by myself I can have a nice meal at a streat vendor, or a small outdor restaurant for about 1.5 US$. But If you go to restaurants and eat fancy european meals, they are of course more expensive, but still much chepaer. The price I pay for a regular McDonlads menue in Sweden can give me a nice dinner for 4 - 5 people here in Hua Ahin.

 

So If you think the prices in Thailand is to high, maybe you have looked at the wrong places.

 

Good luck on your new price hunting in Thailand.

[connda]

This week's cost of living is 10x less than the US, UK, AU, developed EU.