Living Costs So Far

[Nickleback99]

On 4/7/2022 at 11:37 AM, Greglm said:

AfCar expenses about 14000/yr which includes petrol, registration and insurance [its a 2005 but only has 60kKM].  

We are trying to plan out a rough budget prior to our impending move back to PI.  I take it if less that $300 per yr for all of that, including gas, you don't drive very much then??     Here in US (Washington State), we probably fill up 5x per month on average for about $75 a tank, and I'm retired; so, it's not like we drive a Lot here anymore.   Anyway, wanted be sure I'm reading that right while I try to figure it out, as expect we'll have a car and scooter once settled.   

[BrettGC]

5 hours ago, Nickleback99 said:

We are trying to plan out a rough budget prior to our impending move back to PI.  I take it if less that $300 per yr for all of that, including gas, you don't drive very much then??     Here in US (Washington State), we probably fill up 5x per month on average for about $75 a tank, and I'm retired; so, it's not like we drive a Lot here anymore.   Anyway, wanted be sure I'm reading that right while I try to figure it out, as expect we'll have a car and scooter once settled.   

From my perspective, we live very close to everything we need here in Dumaguete and without either of us working the car is only really used for shopping once a week, the odd errand and going out for meals etc.  The cost of fuel has gone up from 40-44PHP/ltr to around 80 now so that's almost doubled.  Registration is very cheap here compared to Australia where we paid about $700AUD a year with compulsory 3rd party insurance included and add to that about $400AUD a year full comprehensive insurance as well.  We do a drive about 3 hours north every 2-3 weeks to go visit the family but even then that doesn't have much of an impact as you're chugging along at a sedentary pace of about 70-80kph due to road conditions, traffic and cautious driving due to idiots on the road.  Our car's engine is only 1.5 litres so very economical - couldn't see the point in anything bigger as you're limited in speed anyway due to the previously mentioned conditions.  There's no NLEX or SLEX in Negros so it's very stop/start driving.   

Edited July 13, 2022 by BrettGC

[Mike J]

4 hours ago, Nickleback99 said:

We are trying to plan out a rough budget prior to our impending move back to PI.  I take it if less that $300 per yr for all of that, including gas, you don't drive very much then??     Here in US (Washington State), we probably fill up 5x per month on average for about $75 a tank, and I'm retired; so, it's not like we drive a Lot here anymore.   Anyway, wanted be sure I'm reading that right while I try to figure it out, as expect we'll have a car and scooter once settled.   

It will depend a lot on where you live to take care of shopping, travel, etc.  Currently in Moalboal the price of unleaded gas is 90 peso per liter (about $6.20 per gallon at the current exchange rate).   We have a Suzuki multicab van (3 cylinder) and a Honda scooter (117 cc).   The multicab gets about 45 miles per gallon and the scooter is over 100 miles per gallon.  Insurance and registration are both inexpensive.  Initial cost and maintenance on a multicab is quite reasonable compared to a vehicle that requires a dealer shop.   So multicab and scooter are both, in my opinion, good choices for vehicles here and would be the most "budget friendly". 

[BrettGC]

12 minutes ago, Mike J said:

It will depend a lot on where you live to take care of shopping, travel, etc.  Currently in Moalboal the price of unleaded gas is 90 peso per liter (about $6.20 per gallon at the current exchange rate).   We have a Suzuki multicab van (3 cylinder) and a Honda scooter (117 cc).   The multicab gets about 45 miles per gallon and the scooter is over 100 miles per gallon.  Insurance and registration are both inexpensive.  Initial cost and maintenance on a multicab is quite reasonable compared to a vehicle that requires a dealer shop.   So multicab and scooter are both, in my opinion, good choices for vehicles here and would be the most "budget friendly". 

We're about to buy a scooter of some sort for those quick errands to areas that parking is a pain eg BI in Dumaguete. 

[Possum]

On 7/14/2022 at 2:06 AM, Nickleback99 said:

We are trying to plan out a rough budget prior to our impending move back to PI.  I take it if less that $300 per yr for all of that, including gas, you don't drive very much then??

We fill up about every 45 days. Everything we need is pretty close to us though we make about 5 trips a year to Manila 100km. We do try to combine errands to reduce driving. Not so much due to expense but to reduce stress. There are no known traffic rules in the province and near zero law enforcement. Haven't seen a traffic enforcer in over 2 months, not that they did much anyway but now they are apparently are working from home. Fil/Am friend of mine advised me before moving here about driving. He said,"When you leave home assume you are going to see someone do something completely stupid and dangerous. You will never be disappointed. Luckily the roads are so bad the speeds are low so you will likely survive any accident and should be out of jail within 48 hours."

[hk blues]

39 minutes ago, Greglm said:

We fill up about every 45 days. Everything we need is pretty close to us though we make about 5 trips a year to Manila 100km. We do try to combine errands to reduce driving. Not so much due to expense but to reduce stress. There are no known traffic rules in the province and near zero law enforcement. Haven't seen a traffic enforcer in over 2 months, not that they did much anyway but now they are apparently are working from home. Fil/Am friend of mine advised me before moving here about driving. He said,"When you leave home assume you are going to see someone do something completely stupid and dangerous. You will never be disappointed. Luckily the roads are so bad the speeds are low so you will likely survive any accident and should be out of jail within 48 hours."

Crazy if true! 

[stevewool]

Hi Brett , just going through this thread and it’s well over a year ago since you added your monthly bills , so what are your bills now , lower or higher or the same , that’s if you have a spare hour or so to tell me .

[BrettGC]

12 hours ago, stevewool said:

Hi Brett , just going through this thread and it’s well over a year ago since you added your monthly bills , so what are your bills now , lower or higher or the same , that’s if you have a spare hour or so to tell me .

Hi Steve, we've moved and the household has grown so many changes.  We have our 7yo niece with us full-time now, MiL and one of my BiL live with us as well.  BiL contributes when he's home, he's on the road a lot as a truck driver.

Rent is gone:  We own the place.

Another dog so annual vaccinations etc as well as monthly food/Nexgard/deworming has gone up. 

Fuel has gone down; my observation is surprisingly that fuel is 10/15php cheaper/litre here in our area than major metro areas like San Carlos or Dumaguete.  We generally pay anywhere between 55-65/ltr. 

Car insurance is about to go down as it'll be over 12 months since my little at fault incident, servicing at Toyota is still the same price.  We're still on the same 3 years free LTO deal as when we bought the car new. 

Internet and TV are the same despite being with different providers here.  This includes Netflix and Prime subscriptions... Or did Netflix go up a little recently? 

Cooking gas about the same but it varies depending the suppliers' cost but no more than +/- 200php per bottle.  A bottle lasts us about 4-5 weeks. 

Electricity is about 3.5k/month in the warmer months, about 1.5-2k moving into the "cooler" season.  Price per kilowatt has actually dropped with NORECO 1, but it's still one of the most expensive on the island of Negros and those areas just across the straight.  

Town water is cheaper, so that's dropped from about 1500/month to 600.

Visa fees remain the same.  

Groceries, the same as everywhere, have gone up significantly even taking into account the extra mouths to feed and the lack of more expensive western type foods here in the province.  If I had to estimate I'd say about a third more expensive than when I started this thread.  This includes toiletries and wife VER. 2.0's lotions and potions.  It's slightly offset by us buying a lot more things online and that's cheaper but it's a definite cost of living increase overall.  

Entertainment costs have dropped, there's just not that much to be entertained by that you have to pay for around here.  Beer is cheaper at my local watering hole and the 3 or so resto's that we frequent have risen to about the same as Dumaguete was when we left for a similar style resto.  I can only guess that prices have gone up there.   Just as an aside, the local restaurants now take our drink order, come back with our drinks and take our meal order and the mains all come out at the same time... I can't say if this applies to everyone but it does when we arrive.  Granted, the meals aren't always all hot but baby steps....

If you take rent out of the equation overall yes, it's more expensive mainly due to food prices.  As for a hard number? If I had to estimate I'd say 45-50k varying monthly either side of those numbers. 

 

[stevewool]

Thanks Brett 

[Lee]

7 hours ago, BrettGC said:

Cooking gas about the same but it varies depending the suppliers' cost but no more than +/- 200php per bottle. 

Perhaps we are speaking of two different things here but 2 weeks ago we bought a 11Kg bottle of gas and it costs us 1070 Php.