It Seems Condo Rental Prices In Cebu Rival Those In The Usa....

[jpbago]

   More onto what Robert has said about the population count being inaccurate. a man here has been the mid-husband (mid wife) of 13 kids from his wife all born at home with no registration at either city hall nor NSO.

   Also, there is a law about so many people allowed per sq m in a house, so when the census does come, they say some in the house are just visiting.

   The tourist board counts all flight arrivals as being a tourist whether they are returning Filipinos or OFWs or tourists. Accuracy is not a big thing here.

[Thomas]

Another thing that I am going to start considering much more carefully is finding an adventurous Filipina girlfriend and moving to Thailand with her, something more and more Ex-pats living in Thailand are doing.

Why a Filipina in Thailand, instead of Thai if you aim at Thailand???

Then you don't get the LOCAL KNOWLEDGE and LANGUAGE covered by your wife...

[Albert Russell]

I personally know several expats who live in Thailand with Filipinas...it is a very popular thing to do.  Filipinas make great wives, and are culturally more in tune with Americans and Europeans.  They are also not as materialistic (at least most of them) as Thais. The odds of find a young attractive and faithful filipina are much higher for a foreign guy than finding a Thai with those qualities.

 

I worked for a GIS company specializing in demographic studies.  The Philippines was a customer of ours.  Regarding the population of any city in the philippines... all you can really do is take the latest numbers put out by the government department that is responsible for this and has mathematical models in place.  The overall population of the philippines is listed at 96,000,000, based on the total population of each province. Every major city has slums similar to cebu.  Almost every child has birth or baptismal records that are counted, along with an estimate as to the number that do not (all part of any GIS modeling s/w package)...    No country would willingly allow their population to be grossly underestimated .  People migrating to cities are included in population estimates which are prepared by experts in demographics, and based on sophisticated models which try to take into account all pertinent variables (including unregistered births and migrants)...yes....even in the Philippines.  

 

I think that to say the real population of Cebu City is much greater than the listed population of the entire island is incorrect, but I seem to be in a minority in thinking this.

Edited March 19, 2014 by Albert Russell

[davewe]

 

Just a FYI. The entire island of Cebu had 2.6 million people in 2012. so I am pretty sure your Cebu City population estimate is off.  The Chiang Mai metropolitan area had 960,000 people living in it as of 2008.  I find it far more cosmopolitan than Cebu City.  It has 1100 different hotels and literally thousands of restaurants with every type of food imaginable. It is a fascinating place.

 

Yeah the population thing is a bit confusing. I just looked it up again and found that Metro Cebu is about 2.5 million, with Cebu City just under 900,000; Cebu province was listed as 4.1 million. Chiang Mai province is 1.5 million, with the city at 170,000. Certainly my impression is that Cebu City is much bigger than the city of Chiang Mai.

 

As to why costs are what they are, I am not an economist, but I suppose it still comes down to supply and demand. I just went looking for hotels in Dumaguete for my upcoming trip. I found a bunch of nice places in the $20-40/night range. I think the cheapest I have ever stayed in Cebu City is $40/night. Of course we are also gonna spend a week in Alcoy, Cebu in an apartment with a private pool for P 500/night! YMMV.

 

Your reasoning for being in Cebu to meet a new woman is reasonable, just not quite as economical as a smaller city. Of course you could easily make the case that other smaller cities in PI have just as many nice women and possibly less foreigners. I was in CDO with my wife (then fiancée) a year and a half ago. It's a very nice city; I liked it better than Cebu, honestly. I saw many lovely women there and my being a foreigner certainly got me many glances; a foreigner was a little more unusual there. So from a female perspective, any city or even town will have some very nice Filipinas. Therefore all you have to do is pick a place you like that meets your budget - the women will be there.

Edited March 21, 2014 by davewe

[Albert Russell]

 

 

Just a FYI. The entire island of Cebu had 2.6 million people in 2012. so I am pretty sure your Cebu City population estimate is off.  The Chiang Mai metropolitan area had 960,000 people living in it as of 2008.  I find it far more cosmopolitan than Cebu City.  It has 1100 different hotels and literally thousands of restaurants with every type of food imaginable. It is a fascinating place.

 

Yeah the population thing is a bit confusing. I just looked it up again and found that Metro Cebu is about 2.5 million, with Cebu City just under 900,000; Cebu province was listed as 4.1 million. Chiang Mai province is 1.5 million, with the city at 170,000. Certainly my impression is that Cebu City is much bigger than the city of Chiang Mai.

 

As to why costs are what they are, I am not an economist, but I suppose it still comes down to supply and demand. I just went looking for hotels in Dumaguete for my upcoming trip. I found a bunch of nice places in the $20-40/night range. I think the cheapest I have ever stayed in Cebu City is $40/night. Of course we are also gonna spend a week in Alcoy, Cebu in an apartment with a private pool for P 500/night! YMMV.

 

Your reasoning for being in Cebu to meet a new woman is reasonable, just not quite as economical as a smaller city. Of course you could easily make the case that other smaller cities in PI have just as many nice women and possibly less foreigners. I was in CDO with my wife (then fiancée) a year and a half ago. It's a very nice city; I liked it better than Cebu, honestly. I saw many lovely women there and my being a foreigner certainly got me many glances; a foreigner was a little more unusual there. So from a female perspective, any city or even town will have some very nice Filipinas. Therefore all you have to do is pick a place you like that meets your budget - the women will be there.

Hi Dave,

 

Good comments about smaller cities.  I have been to CDO many years ago, and did stand out there.  It is another reason why I don't want to get tied into an expensive lease on a condo in Cebu...it would severely limit my travel budget and investigating other cities.  

 

Dumaguete appears to be a good bargain all around.   I will say that hotels in the $50 range in Cebu are nicer than their counterparts in Dumaguete.  It is a matter of supply and demand.... I am just surprised that hotels can be so overbuilt and condos so underbuilt in downtown cebu as to reflect the pricing that they do.

 

I guess my population figures were wrong for Cebu...Mea culpa.

Edited March 23, 2014 by Albert Russell