Working in Bangkok

Monthly Earnings 65,000 - 85,000 baht

Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?

I work at a large private Thai K - 12 school with a base salary of 65k . In addition to this, we have the opportunity to work extra hours (both during the regular school hours as well as Saturdays) and so this nets me an additional 5k to 20k baht per month. This is only possible during the periods of the year where we have regular instruction time so only about half of the year.

Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?

On average on the base salary I'm putting away about 30k, with a little more during those extra working periods. I caution the reader on this in that I haven't made significant purchases here such as new laptops, iphones, etc. Flying home costs about 35,000 baht if I get a decent deal on the flight and that certainly cuts into the savings.

Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?

My monthly rent for a studio condo is 8,000 baht. The condo has a pool, small exercise room, 7-11, laundry, coffee, and a restaurant. It's in Onnut and about a 15 minute walk to the nearest BTS. Size is about 30 sqm. The condo itself came with most everything I need, although lately I do wish I had a better kitchen set-up. I think at some point soon I'll splurge and get a bigger place with a kitchen to do some cooking at home.

Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?

Transportation

I spend about 2,000 baht a month on this. If I recall correctly a 40 trip BTS rabbit card is about 900 baht a month. In addition, I typically take taxis a couple of times a weekend when I'm with the girlfriend.

Utility bills

These are dirt cheap here and a real bargain in my opinion. Electricity is billed directly, and I never go without air-con when it's hot. This runs me anywhere from 700 to 900 baht. Water is 150 baht, internet and basic TV channels 750 baht, mobile phone plan 200 baht. I just assume between rent and all my utilities it's 10,000 baht total, which is pretty good in my opinion.

Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping

This one gets a bit expensive. I do like my Western food, and without a kitchen I'm at the mercy of the restaurant and pubs. During the week I typically don't spend more than 200 baht a day on food and a latte in the morning. Weekends I'm apt to spend about 500 baht a day on average, though this also includes my girlfriend eating too. In total, 8000 baht a month for food.

Nightlife and drinking

This one's also a bit expensive. A night out with the lads would run me anywhere from 1,500 to 2,000 baht about. We do this I would say twice a month, with that number going up for birthdays and other celebrations.

Books, computers

I spend on average about 3000 baht a month on books and 2000 baht on PS3 games. The books honestly aren't a necessity as one can often get them on Kindle and ebook from download sites, however I still like wasting a few dollars on Dungeons and Dragons and Comic stuff (nerd).

Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?

I feel that I live better in many ways than my teaching colleagues back home, in that I don't take work home and can afford to go out and do things if I feel the desire to do so. I feel I can get around the city pretty easily, eat what and where I want, see movies, play games, enjoy a few beverages with the lads and enjoy warm weather and still put a few bucks away for a rainy day.Sometimes however it does still feel as if I'm living a university life, in that I live in a studio and such.

Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?

Hmm, well I think transportation is amazing. Back home between car payments, petrol, and insurance you could be looking at a solid quarter of your income. This is simply not the case for me here. Also, rent CAN Be had for a decent price, but to an extent you get what you pay for. Finally, hey c'mon who can argue with those utility bills I stated. Back home I was paying about 2,500 baht...just for mobile phone service per month.

Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?

In Bangkok I'm going to echo what others are saying at 35k to 40k baht. If we break down the numbers, one could live on 20k I suppose. However, I don't think most of us came from Western nations to live poor in Asia. Even at 40k baht it's a struggle to fly home and visit family and friends, which should be considered a necessity in my opinion. Saving for a rainy day, enjoying more luxury and such quickly pushes this amount towards or north of 50k baht.

Phil's analysis and comment

Anyone who earns at least 65,000 baht a month and spends just 10,000 of that on rent and utilities is always going to have plenty of money left over for treats. And that's exactly what we see from Aaron's figures above. He clearly enjoys his lifestyle in Thailand.

A couple of points I'll comment on though.

I'm not sure by cooking at home that Aaron will particularly save money on food but as a colleague of mine once said - "When you cook at home, you don't save money but you do eat far better'. I totally agree with this. For the 60-100 baht you would spend on an average meal in an average Thai restaurant, you can cook a fantastic meal at home for that same money. And I really started to enjoy cooking once I got into it. I think it's a very important skill for a man to have.

The annual flight / trip home to see family and friends is always an interesting discussion point because as Aaron says, it can really eat into your savings. I also agree with Aaron inasmuch as the flight home once a year is just something you have to do. 

I think there are two ways to handle the trip home. You can look for the cheapest flight possible and spend 12 hours or more cooped up in economy class. Then when you get home, rely on the generosity of family and friends to provide you with accommodation and meals, etc.

I did this myself several times in the 90s. I remember paying 17,000 baht for a return flight with Bangladesh Biman (are they even still in business?) and then for the two weeks I was back in England, apart from the odd round of drinks and a bit of shopping, I hardly got my hand in my pocket. I think I did the whole trip for about 30,000 baht. There's no shame in it. Let's face it, when you're a 30K a month teacher, it's all you can afford. Family have to understand this.

Now I'm a bit older and with perhaps a little more money around me, I can't do the economy class thing anymore. I can't afford business class either so I tend to shop around for those airlines offering 'premium economy' with a better seat and a bit more legroom. And once in England, it's nice to meet up with friends and 'pay your way' and take your family out for a meal or two, etc.

In conclusion, nowadays if I did the annual trip to England and went the Cheap Charlie route, I could maybe get away with doing it for about 70,000 baht. But as it is - premium economy ticket, gifts for the family and not being particularly thrifty while you're there - that figure has risen to easily 110-120K a trip.

Either way, it's still a significant amount of money.    

Mae

21st January 2015

Working in Sattahip, Chonburi Province

Monthly Earnings 18,000 baht

Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?

18,000 baht. Yes, eighteen thousand baht.

Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?

I have saved around 5,000 per month for the last two months. I came to Thailand last October 2014 and have been teaching for two and a half months. I have managed to save but I know there is always something around the corner that I have to spend for in the future.

Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?

I live in a condominium owned by the school. It's free for their foreign teachers. I am very happy with the accommodation. It has a large balcony, it's air-conditioned, with hot shower and fridge. Our place is new, spacious and well-ventilated. That makes us save some consumption of electricity. "Us" because I share it with a co-teacher. It is the school policy to share (and I like it that way because I am afraid to sleep alone, haha!). Just no TV.

Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?

Transportation

About 500 baht a month. I can only go to Pattaya City every weekend and the means of transportation is van or sungtaew. Van costs only 30 baht while sungtaew is only 20 baht. Our condo is inside the school campus. Just need to walk to my classroom.

Utility bills

Our school charges 60 baht per teacher for water. Electricity costs me and my roommate between 500 to 800 baht a month, but then we split it equally. Cellphone load costs only 50 baht, I don't use it for international calling. My laundry is unbelievably 200 baht a month. Wifi is free.

Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping

We have two free meals at school - breakfast and lunch. I just need to take care of my dinner and my foods on Sundays and holidays. For groceries I spend around 2,000 baht a month. I treat myself to western- style foods on weekends so restaurant bill is around 2,000 baht also.

Nightlife and drinking

I've already quit drinking and I'm done with nightlife. My money would go to healthy fruit shakes on the beachside with a relaxing massage and a nice manicure or pedicure. I spend around 2000 baht for these too.

Books, computers

I don't spend buying books as I already have everything that I need in teaching. I do most of the reading and research on line. I have my laptop I brought from back home. Other things to where my money would go is sending it to Philippines to pay my credit card which I don't use it here in Thailand. That's 4,000 baht monthly. Few more months and I'm done with it. Oh yes! Im a Filipina.

Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?

I am satisfied and comfortable with my life here.

Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?

The cost of food and clothes. It's cheap.

Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?

Hmmm, if you are single or you don't have a family to support and you eat Thai foods and you have what I am enjoying from my school, then that 18k baht will make you live and survive decently. But it still depends on the needs of every person.

Phil's analysis and comment

To quote Mae in her survey - "I am satisfied and comfortable with my life here". At the end of the day, isn't that all that matters? 

I'm sure there are going to be plenty of teachers reading this who are thinking 'Oh my god, 18,000 baht a month!, how is it possible to survive?' (and I'm probably one of them) but you have to delve a little deeper and factor in a few things. Firstly, Mae's accommodation is paid for by the school and her utility bills are quite low. She can also just walk to school so there are no daily home to school transportation costs. What else? She gets two free meals a day and only has the evening meal to pay for. I reckon we could easily put a figure of about 4,000 - 6,000 baht a month on that little package. So we're up to a more respectable 22K - 24K a month straight away. 

So we come up with a total of at least about 22,000 baht. Probably enough to survive on though you do have the temptations of Pattaya not too far away :)

I got some interesting feedback from Steve, who enjoys these cost of living surveys but felt that I was way out for once with my analysis of Mae's figures. Fair play Steve and thank you for taking the time to e-mail me with your thoughts. Steve felt that the shared accommodation was only worth 2,000 baht at most. He also felt the utility bill being low just meant that Mae never used the air-conditioning. Steve hardly saw that as a benefit and again that's a fair point. Steve also saw the free school meals + transportation saving as coming to only around 2,000 baht as well. So in conclusion, he feels Mae's total teaching package is worth around 22K I guess  

I'd love to get more surveys from Filipino teachers if you're out there reading this. Send your answers to me by e-mail please.

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James

19th January 2015

Working in Bangkok

Monthly Earnings 65,000

Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?

I take home around 60,000 baht a month from my job as an English support teacher in an international school in Bangkok. With a month’s pay as a bonus at the end of the year that works to around 65k I guess.

Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?

My savings are pretty fluid. With a baby, a dog and a wife there’s always something to spend money on. Pre-baby I could save 15k a month but haven’t got anywhere near that since she was born. Probably around 5k lately due to fixing the house up a fair bit.

Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?

We own a 3-bedroom house in Bearing with the mortgage payments being around 13,000 baht a month

Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?

Transportation

My school is a 5-minute drive and my wife has a company car for her work so we don’t pay for that. I guess we fill our car up twice a month as we don’t use taxis or the BTS so let's say about 2,000 baht. We are still paying the car off but the wife pays for that.

Utility bills

We have the doors open and fans on most the time downstairs and only use AC at night in the bedroom. Normally around 2,000 baht at the end of the month. Water is a couple of hundred, phone is 1,000 baht. I have no idea how much we pay for the basic True internet/tv package, 600 baht-ish?

Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping

We eat at home a lot, especially since the baby. Wife eats Thai market food but I normally have some meat and potato variation. When we do eat out it’s normally western but nothing expensive. The killer is the baby milk formula, 700 baht every few days.. I’m guessing around 15,000t baht a month (including the dog food…)

Nightlife and drinking

I don’t really go out but I do have couple of beers after work, a sneaky sangsom and coke in the evening and a lot more at the weekend. I started working it out but got scared, so I’m guessing around 6,500 baht a month.

Books, computers

I use my computer a lot to download a lot of television and movies. Luckily the school library has a great selection of books which I can borrow from for free. So zero, yay for piracy!

Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?

Pretty good, My wife also works, so the bills are shared and we both prefer to stay in than go out. We find ourselves not wanting for anything (within reason) but as a foreigner in Thailand I should probably be saving more.

Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?

Compared to the UK, the rent. I could never afford a house like I have here on the equivalent wages in the UK. Beer maybe, 100bht for a pint. Can you even get a two quid pint anymore in the UK?

Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?

45,000 baht for a singleton in Bangkok. If they could swallow the start-up costs of getting a cheap, decent place near the BTS, a laptop etc. then life would be great.

Phil's analysis and comment

I think James lives well within his means and despite having an expensive baby and dog to take care of, he has a property to his name (or he will have when the mortgage is paid off) 

It would have been interesting to know how much James' wife earns, but perhaps that's being a bit too nosey. I was just interested in the fact that James and his wife 'split the bills'

I generally earn about 50% more than my wife does and we have the weirdest system for splitting costs. I pay all the utility bills and for the weekly supermarket shopping. When we go out for a meal together, we take it in turns to pay the bill. My wife pays for her own car and phone, etc. 

We love travelling abroad and holidays account for about 40% of our monthly spend. My wife pays for her own air ticket and I pay for mine. But once we get to our destination, I bear all the costs of accommodation, eating out, car hire, etc.

The laugh is that we have never actually sat down and planned this system - you pay for this and I'll pay for that - it's just sort of happened this way. But it seems to work.

I'm far more careful with spending money than my wife. That's not to say she's reckless, but she has much more of a 'money is for enjoying' attitude. I often wish it was an attitude I had more of. 

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Peter

18th January 2015

Working in Samut Sakhon

Monthly Earnings 81,000 baht

Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?

My take home salary per month is 81,000 baht. I work at a private Thai school as a mathematics teacher that runs a substantial English program. The school is approximately 30kms out of the city in Samut Sakhon. The school only employs teachers that are qualified as teachers in their home country.

Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?

I am coming to the end of my first 12-month contract. My average savings per month are 30,000 baht.

Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?

The school runs minivans to and from Bangkok for foreign staff and depart from Surasak BTS - so I chose to find a condo in this area. I pay 20,000 baht a month for a spacious condo in a modern apartment building with full size pool and running track. If I stayed for another year, I would look for something about 15K because I am not at home all that much.

Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?

Transportation

Transportation to and from work is free and I have a bike card for hiring the green bikes located on Sathorn Road. The first 15 minutes of each trip is free and the card only cost 320 baht which included 100 baht credit. I use the BTS a lot, taxis occasionally, although I always share with someone else, and scooter taxis extremely rarely. Overall, about 1000 baht on transport a month.

Utility bills

Water is super cheap. I normally pay about 60 - 80 baht a month for water. My electricity bill is normally about 1600 baht a month. I have a 3bb router which costs 630 baht per month.

Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping

I cook western food at home at least three to four times a week. I also eat cereal for breakfast like I would back in Australia. I know I could eat at the local Thai restaurants much more cheaply but I like to know that the food I put in my mouth isn't laced with sugar and oil. My supermarket bill is about 1500 baht per week. Lunch is provided free of charge for all staff at school. I also eat at mid range restaurants. I guess my monthly food bill would be about 10k per month.

Nightlife and drinking

I rarely drink. When I do it is normally just large bottles of local beer which are very cheap. I might spend 500 baht a week on drinks.

Books, computers

I bought my lap top from home for personal use. The school provides all secondary teachers with a lap top for school use. I also have an ipad from home. Touch wood I haven't had any expenses as yet.

Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?

I live an extremely comfortable life in Bangkok. The daily commute to and from work is a grind. I leave home at 6.50am and if the traffic on Sathorn Rd is bad, some evenings I don't get home till 6pm. I have enough money to do whatever I want in this city within reason. Even pricey Sunday brunches or cocktails at some of the more expensive roof-top bars are within reach. At 37, saving is important to me. If I were ten years younger and wasn't worried about saving, I really would be able to go wild.

Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?

The real bargains are the price of water, the cost of Thai food at local restaurants, the cost of beer at the smaller Thai bars, and the cost of seeing local sport. I can go and watch a football match between two of the teams in the Thai Footall League for 100 baht.

Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?

If saving isn't important, I personally could survive on 50000 baht a month. That would include living in a less expensive condo and eating out less.

Phil's analysis and comment

A very 'safe' and sensible survey from Peter there. As he says, earning over 80,000 baht a month means he could 'go wild' if he wanted but he definitely prefers playing sports to propping up bars. And that's always going to cost you a lot less.

I get the sense that now Peter is hurtling towards the big four-oh, he's starting to think about planning for his future and financial security. I'm no financial planner but I don't see why he shouldn't be able to achieve his goals on the kind of money he earns, especially if he downgraded his accommodation or better still, invested in a property. Not sure how long he wants to stay in Thailand though.

Oh, and I don't think that commuting 'daily grind' is all that bad. 6.50am is a reasonable time to have to leave for week and I bet there are thousands of employees in Bangkok who would love to be home for six in the evening.  

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