Living Costs So Far

[BrettGC]

Forgot to add Netflix and Amazon Prime in the calculations, still paying AUD for these as when I did the currency conversion, they're almost exactly the same price here as back in Australia.  

[RBM]

23 hours ago, BrettGC said:

All figures are in PHP/Month.  We’ve been in our rental for about 6 weeks now so costs have settled down now compared to the expense of being in transit for a while. 

 

Rent – 13500 – Modern 2^nd floor,2 bedroom/2 full bathroom apartment, one AC in the bedroom, secure covered car parking, 5k, from the city centre, 2km from the nearest major supermarket (Hypermarket) and 2.5km from Robinson’s.

Electricity – 2500 – We only run the AC at night, we actually get a nice breeze most of the day.

Gas – 600 – For cooking only.

Internet – 2099 – Globe fibre 150 plan (hasn’t missed a beat yet).

Phones – 1000 – I’m on 500/month prepaid, AM is on 500/month postpaid.

Pay TV – 500 – Sky TV basic package, it’s mainly for the news channels, anything else we can stream or download.

Groceries – 10000 – obviously this varies but this is the monthly average.  We live mainly on Filipino style food with some Western luxuries (decent bread etc).  I quite like Filipino  food but we spice it up or blend it with other recipes a bit and trim the fat, brown or black rice rather than white. 

Water – 600 – water bill, our drinking water is included in the groceries.

Car – 4000 – this is a projection, only had it a week but includes annual insurance (comprehensive) and LTO.  Again, this will probably vary depending on how much we road trip.  We still walk a lot locally; we enjoy it and it does have its benefits. 

Dog – 1200 – includes quality kibble, quarterly worming and monthly de-lousing (Nexgard) which we’re buying ourselves now.

Entertainment – 10000 – Dinner out once or twice a week, a few drinks out, cinemas when they open up again.  AM’s beauty routines. 

Miscellaneous – 3000 – For that stuff you forget when you go shopping etc

We’re still looking at medical insurance, probably going to go with Pacific Cross at this stage, just have to investigate who actually accepts them here.  We both wear glasses and I have some minor dental work I want, rather than need, done. 

I've probably forgotten something... 

Nice post Brett sounds about average to me.

We did some bulk shopping at Belcrest last week, their new shop, most impressive and cost saving. Sure is much more western foods available in Dumaguete compared to Bacolod.

[RBM]

21 hours ago, OnMyWay said:

The Magic Data 399 for 24 gb is the best deal per gb, but they have some other Magic Data (no expiration) for less, if you want to trial it.

Not so, we just loaded Globe gomo, 25 kg cost P300 and never expires.  Very reliable, its not fast how ever we do stream some live sports with it, plus down loads movies at night fast.

[BrettGC]

8 minutes ago, RBM said:

Nice post Brett sounds about average to me.

We did some bulk shopping at Belcrest last week, their new shop, most impressive and cost saving. Sure is much more western foods available in Dumaguete compared to Bacolod.

We intend to do the same once we get a chest freezer - bulk shopping that is, nowhere here to save by bulk though, more that we both aren't fans of grocery shopping.  At the moment we're doing it every two  weeks.  

As to the availability of western foods, yeah, it's actually pretty good here.  And for those hard to get items Shopee has become my friend.  

[OnMyWay]

1 hour ago, RBM said:

Not so, we just loaded Globe gomo, 25 kg cost P300 and never expires.  Very reliable, its not fast how ever we do stream some live sports with it, plus down loads movies at night fast.

I meant for SMART Magic Data.  I have an extra SIM card slot in my phone.  Maybe I will try out the Globe as a backup.

[hk blues]

7 hours ago, Youngster said:

I’m envious. My rent and car loan alone are 54k, and the rest for our family of four are..way up there. I need to reevaluate our budget.

I wouldn't be surprised and don't doubt it.

I quickly realised once I arrived here that if we wanted to live more of a local life we could do so for a bit less than our living costs in Hong Kong (where we were living) but if we wanted a more "Western-style" life it would be even more expensive than Hong Kong - accommodation excepted. 

[Snowy79]

I have a couple of friends that could do with lessons in budgeting, one just spent 250k peso for 4 nights in the Shangrila on Boracay and another who moved to Boracay at the start of the pandemic to avoid the Manila restrictions has been paying 45k per month for accomodation. 

At the beginning I advised him to buy a titled condo here and it would pay for itself. So far he has burnt just short of 1m peso.  1/5th the cost of a condo which he had the option of paying just over 20k peso per month after an initial 200k deposit and the book price of the condos have increased over 1m peso. They will shoot up if covid becomes a lesser concern as a casino is being built within walkng distance. 

[BrettGC]

1 hour ago, Snowy79 said:

I have a couple of friends that could do with lessons in budgeting, one just spent 250k peso for 4 nights in the Shangrila on Boracay and another who moved to Boracay at the start of the pandemic to avoid the Manila restrictions has been paying 45k per month for accomodation. 

At the beginning I advised him to buy a titled condo here and it would pay for itself. So far he has burnt just short of 1m peso.  1/5th the cost of a condo which he had the option of paying just over 20k peso per month after an initial 200k deposit and the book price of the condos have increased over 1m peso. They will shoot up if covid becomes a lesser concern as a casino is being built within walkng distance. 

Each to their own I guess but some things do leave you scratching your head...

Edited April 7, 2022 by BrettGC

[Possum]

After reading Brett's expenses madam and I totaled ours up. Thanks Brett!

We have about the same monthly expenses but our food cost is higher, roughly 20,000/month for 5 people, we could reduce that if we bought more at the wet markets. We don't because parking is hard to find, its a jeep journey with all those tribulations so we buy at SM. House is paid for so no rent, we have PLDT for internet, TV and phone, so far so good at 3099. We have Amazon Prime, Netflix and other subscriptions that we pay for thru my US account and use via a VPN. Water is 200/month, electric varies from 1400-2000 with 24/7 AC BUT we have solar panels with net metering to help with that. Car expenses about 14000/yr which includes petrol, registration and insurance [its a 2005 but only has 60kKM].  After our calculation we came up with a figure of 55,000 php plus or minus. I budget $1500/month. We live well and often have a few peso for savings each month.

[hk blues]

17 hours ago, BrettGC said:

Each to their own I guess but some things do leave you scratching your head...

It's the age-old rent v buy debate.  I've only ever rented for a shortish period of 4 years when I was in Hong Kong but can understand why some enjoy the flexibility of being able to move on relatively easily.