Every new arrival wants to know if they can survive or live well in Thailand on X thousand baht a month?
It's a difficult question because each person has different needs. However, the following surveys and figures are from teachers actually working here! How much do they earn and what do they spend their money on?. And after each case study, I've added comments of my own.
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Approximate Thai Baht (฿) conversion rates as of 19th April 2024
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฿24 to one Australian Dollar
฿0.64 THB to one Philippine Peso
Peter
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.
Abraham
Working in Bangkok
Monthly Earnings 20,000 to 60,000 baht.
Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?
I have worked at a private language school in Bangkok for one year and teach 12-18 hours a week. I supplement my language school hours by teaching business English classes for another school. Over the course of this first year, my average month has been around 30,000 baht but my earnings vary dramatically. In October last year, I made just over 60k. This month (January) I will be taking home just over 20k. In December last year, I took home 27K.
Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?
Honestly, my savings are non-existent. Whatever money I bank at the end of a good month, gets spent in quieter months. I am half way through a non-immigrant visa and work permit, but my first few months cost me a lot with all the visa runs etc. Last month was a little unfortunate as I had to renew my passport.
Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?
My accommodation saves me. I currently pay 6700 for a spacious studio apartment in Bearing. I have a huge balcony with enough room for a kitchen and table; which ultimately makes up for it being a studio.
Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?
Transportation
Due to my school being next to a BTS station, I always buy a BTS Rabbit card (50 trips) at 1,100 baht. I have to add 10 baht each time though, so it totals to about 1,600 baht by the time I've finished. My travel expenses for business trips are covered in each contract. On days off, I usually get a bus or songtaew to where I need to go. The occasional taxi to Mega Bangna costs me about 200 baht there and back. My total monthly spending probably works out at around 2,200 baht.
Utility bills
I use the air-con occasionally, but being in a low-rise area, my balcony gets a nice breeze, so my water and electricity usually tops out at about 2,500 baht each month. I pay 100 baht for WiFi.
Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping
I always eat out. I have kitchen space, but I haven't managed to accumulate the same facilities that I had when I lived in the UK. I would love a place with a proper kitchen and an oven, but for now, I mainly eat at restaurants. I often end up paying for my girlfriend's meal, so dinner costs are almost doubled at about 150 baht. Lunch is relatively cheap, ranging from around 50-100 baht per meal.
Nightlife and drinking
I am not a drinker at all and Bangkok's nightlife scares the s*** out of me.
Books, computers
I brought my laptop with me and so I rarely spend money on books or films. I go to the cinema occasionally, but cinema tickets aren't too expensive so I'd say that I rarely spend more than 500 baht on techy/entertainment stuff.
Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?
I am fortunate that my room is comfortable for just 7k a month but I wouldn't say my standard of living is great. Life is uncertain due to inconsistent monthly pay. This stops me buying things I want as I am never sure if I'll need the money later. I spend a lot of time taking photographs (which is free) so that helps. There are many things I would like to buy but just don't have the spare money. I enjoy teaching but wish I had more hours and maybe a monthly salary.
Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?
Food. Utilities. Basic survival costs. I also had to take a recent trip to the dentist and that worked out much cheaper than back home. Transportation is also relatively cheap, but taking the bus can be painful if you're on a busy route. If you want to live a Western lifestyle or purchase Western goods, or even technical goods like TVs, phones or games consoles seem to work out more expensive, generally because of the difference in wages.
Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?
To survive, 30,000. To live and be comfortable with an opportunity to save, probably more around the 50,000-60,000 mark.
Phil's analysis and comment
I begged Abraham to do this cost of living survey because when I chatted to him on Twitter about his teaching work, it took me back to the ten or so years when I worked in the private language school business in Bangkok.
For most months of the year, I would earn in the region of 30-35,000 baht a month (more than enough to survive on back in the mid-90s) but then along came December and January and students would cancel lessons left, right and centre. My Japanese business students and housewives would return to Japan for Christmas and New Year and Thai students would do whatever they had to do. Suddenly your monthly earnings plummeted to 20K a month.
And this is exactly what we are seeing with Abraham's figures above. The private language school game hasn't changed - and it never will. As Abraham points out, you can never truly enjoy your peak earning months because there's always a low earning month just around the corner.
Fortunately, I've always been pretty good with handling my finances and I always kept a bit back for the lean periods. I remember plenty of other teachers who didn't care though. Then when December came, they found themselves living on pot noodles for half the month. Not a good situation to be in at all.
Stefan
Working in Bangkok
Monthly Earnings 50,000
Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?
I work at a large Thai private school in North Bangkok and I've been there almost five years. I started on about 32,000 baht a month but seen my salary rise by over 50% in the last five years to 50k.
Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?
It depends. You have a month where you feel like you're doing well and you might save 20K but there's always an expense around the corner. This month is a prime example when my mobile phone stopped working and I had to buy a new one.
Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?
I rent a very nice studio apartment near where I work for 12,000 baht a month. That might sound a lot for a studio but it's a lovely building with a gym and swimming pool. And even though I don't have a separate bedroom, I live alone and the living space is huge because it's a corner unit.
Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?
Transportation
Next to nothing. I can walk to work in less than 10 minutes. I might catch a taxi for 50 baht if it's raining but that doesn't happen very often. I sometimes take the aircon bus into Bangkok if I crave somewhere a little more lively, but that doesn't happen all that often either.
Utility bills
Water and electricity are billed by the apartment building and usually come to about 3,000 baht. I use the air-conditioning quite a lot because I'm at home most evenings and at the weekend.
Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping
I have about four Thai restaurants that I use in my neighborhood. I get on well with the staff at each place and they know what food I like. I rarely eat Western or fast food. I guess about 100 baht a day - so 3,000 baht a month.
Nightlife and drinking
I'll occasionally go out with friends into Bangkok or we'll find a bar locally and just chill out. This isn't a big expense for me - probably 2,000 baht a month at most.
Books, computers
I do a lot of reading and buy about 3-4 books a month for my kindle. That comes to about a 1,000 baht. And my three-year old laptop is still going strong. I keep thinking about upgrading it but why spend money when you don't have to?
Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?
It's extremely comfortable but I live a very quiet life. I gave up on Bangkok's 'bright lights' some time ago. I would rather just relax at home with a good book after doing a few laps of the pool (which is totally empty in the early evening)
Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?
Thai food from local restaurants. I can get a huge plateful of food and maybe an ice cream dessert for 50-60 baht in my local neighborhood
Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?
It's funny but I feel I have less disposable cash now I'm earning 50K than I did five years ago when I was earning about 30K. Bangkok has got more expensive. No doubt about that. I'm just glad I don't live in the real heart of the city where there would be far more temptations to spend money. But to answer the question - I wouldn't like to survive in Bangkok on less than I earn now.
Phil's analysis and comment
Interesting. This is a teacher who doesn't feel any better off than five years ago - despite the fact he's earning 50% more than he was five years ago. Is this an indication of just how much prices and the cost of living have risen in Bangkok? Could be.
Here's a teacher who has taken my past advice on board as well. Always rent the nicest apartment that you can afford. That way you don't mind spending time relaxing at home and you're less likely to want to spend time outside. Walking around shopping malls and frequenting entertainment areas too often can play havoc with your budget if you're not careful.
If you would like to do a cost of living survey and let other teacher's in on your lifestyle, I would love to hear from you. E-mail me your answers to the questions and I'll do the rest.
Dutchboy
Working in Bangkok
Monthly Earnings 45,000 - 50,000 baht a month
Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?
I earn 35.000 Baht a month at a private school on a 10-month contract, with an end-of-year bonus which is a bit more than my monthly salary. I also earn anywhere between 12.000 and 18.000 Baht a month teaching Dutch to private students.
Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?
I try to save at least 10.000 a month and often manage to save more than that. It all depends on how many extra classes I teach.
Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?
I live in a studio apartment and I pay 6.350 Baht per month rent. It’s a relatively new apartment and it’s safe and quiet. I would like to move to a larger apartment, but my ideal location is too expensive.
Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?
Transportation
The bus to school costs about 400 Baht per month and I spend around 800 Baht on taxis and the BTS. Add the costs of an occasional flight or minivan out of town and I think it is about 2500 per month.
Utility bills
Water is cheap, only about 150B per month. Electricity is about 1.500B and internet 350B per month. I rarely make calls so my phone bill is about 200B per month.
Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping
I almost never cook. If I do, it’s spaghetti bolognese as Thais can’t seem to get it right. Around my school I can only buy Thai food so at night I fancy a nice western meal. I can’t eat rice all the time! I spend about 350B on food during the week and 600B at the weekend. That’s about 11.000 Baht in total.
Nightlife and drinking
I like my beer and meeting up with friends, only I try to take it easy during weekdays. I think I spend around 10,000B per month.
Books, computers
People send me e-books and I don’t play video games.
Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?
I’m pretty comfortable at the moment but I don’t have any kids to take care of.
Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?
Transportation in Thailand is amazingly cheap, as well as food (supermarkets not so much) and clothes. Here I can go to an Indian tailor and buy a shirt, trousers and a tie for 1600 Baht. I could only buy a shirt back home for the same amount.
Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?
For a single young teacher in Bangkok 40,000B per month minimum and for someone with a family 80,000B per month.
Phil's analysis and comment
How nice to have a Dutchman complete one of our cost of living surveys. I've been lucky to travel around The Netherlands several times and it's easily my favourite country in Europe. Amazing country and fantastic people! And if there's a nationality on earth who know how to enjoy life - it's the Dutch.
One of the things that blows my mind about The Netherlands is the standard of spoken English there. Ask a road-sweeper for directions and the information will be given to you word-perfect!
Before I make some observations about Dutchboy's figures above, here are some more words he had to say on the topic of his future in Thailand.
"In my opinion the salaries are not high enough. I'm still young, don't have any kids and don't have student loans to pay off. My girlfriend also has a job and earns 21.000.
I'm doing alright at the moment but I have to teach extra classes on top of my full time job. This costs me time and energy which would be better spent focusing on my full time job.
But I also think about the future and ask myself; do I want to live in a studio apartment for the rest of my life? What about retirement? If I had kids to take care of, I wouldn't have enough money to offer them a bright future. Let's be honest, would you put your kids through the Thai education system?
So I have to make a decision, either move away from teaching, or go back to university and get some proper teaching qualifications and try to find a job at an international school. But even then, most of them don't offer great salaries. I would be on a higher wage teaching back home compared to my salary here. You can earn much more money elsewhere"
I've got my trusty calculator out and factoring in bonus and private students, Dutchboy earns somewhere between 45 and 50K baht a month.
I think here we have a guy with his head screwed on (to use one of my Mother's favourite expressions) Dutchboy admits that his current lifestyle - although enjoyable now - probably can't last forever, especially if he decides to raise a family. There's nothing wrong with contemplating the future and being prepared.
I like the ratio of rent to income. 6,350 baht plus bills is less than 20% of his total income. And although 10,000 baht a month on beer sounds a lot (to me anyway) he doesn't spend extravagantly in other areas. Oh, and there is of course a partner bringing in another 21,000 baht a month. A couple with no kids will always live well enough in Bangkok on 70,000 baht a month - especially when rent is such a good deal.
What's also refreshing to hear is that there is clearly plenty of private work around for a teacher of Dutch. Things may have changed, but in the past I worked alongside many a French, German and Italian teacher who could always find private students, but never enough of them to make ends meet and provide them with a decent monthly income.
But in all fairness, often those teachers' command of English was not good enough to hold down a full-time job teaching English as the target language. Dutchboy obviously doesn't have that problem.
Alec
Working in A small Thai town
Monthly Earnings 32,500 baht
Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?
I work in a government secondary school and earn 32,500 thb/month. I have been approached about giving private lessons at the rate of 500 thb/hour here, but the money isn’t worth the sacrificed time to me
Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?
It all really depends on the month and how much effort I put into saving. A good month for me is saving about 12k whereas a bad month means I’ll only save about 5k or so. For the sake of full disclosure, I also do a bit of freelance work (website design) which nets me an extra 5-10k/month, which goes a long way in helping with my savings.
Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?
I live in basic studio apartment. However it’s pretty large, and has a cooking/washing area on the balcony; I also have an incredible view of sunrise over the mountains every morning. I pay 3,500/month
Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?
Transportation
I have a new Honda Shadow 400 that I am paying 2,800 per month for. I’m also very centrally located so I can walk to 7-11, food places, etc. On the rare occasion I take a tuk-tuk (usually when I go out drinking) I pay 50 baht per trip.
Utility bills
I pay 200/month for water and my electricity bill is anywhere from 1,600-2,500 per month (I love my A/C and X-Box). My phone bill is about 750/month.
Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping
I rarely cook at home. I do eat breakfast at home every day (muesli, milk, banana, peanut butter) and keep snacks, beer, etc in my fridge. I probably spend about 2,500 a month on groceries (3,500 if I happen to be buying alcohol that month). I usually spend about 140/day on coffee, lunch, snacks, and dinner.
Nightlife and drinking
I’m not too big on partying, so I don’t go out often. On the occasions that I do, me and my friends usually do it Thai-style and get bottles of whiskey. There is usually 5-7 of us splitting the cost, so I rarely spend more than 250 on a night out. I prefer a beer or bourbon at home, which as I mentioned early runs me about ~1000/month. A case of Beer Lao will last me about a month and costs 1000 at the Makro, a bottle of Kentucky bourbon (also lasts me a good couple weeks) costs about 800.
Books, computers
I brought a lot of books with me when I came, so I’m still working on reading through those. WiFi is included in my rent. My biggest “tech” expense is probably video games. I’ll occasionally buy a new X-Box or 3DS game which costs anywhere from 300-2000 baht.
Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?
Very comfortable. I rarely “try” to save and I am still able to put some savings back every month. If I want to take off for a weekend or something I can without worry. Living in a small town really limits the things you can spend money on which took some adapting too, but I really enjoy living here. If I were in Bangkok or another large city I’d probably spend far more on eating Western food (all we have here is KFC and Pizza Co) and other entertainment options.
Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?
Everything honestly. The eating out is cheap, goods are cheap (i.e. water, medicine, milk, etc) there is a gym in town that doesn’t charge for use (as opposed to my 40 USD/month gym membership at home), and a night out is far cheaper than back home. Things like tailors, dentists, doctor visits and other services are far cheaper here than at home as well.
Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?
In my town you can do quite fine on 32,500 and I have friends that also do quite well on 30,000. In a place like Bangkok I’d probably want to make at least 45,000 a month because I know I’d have a much harder time saving money.
Phil's analysis and comment
This is the story of the young, single guy living the Life of Riley in small town Thailand. He's got a brand new motorbike. He parties with friends whenever the fancy takes him, unless he's drinking at home while playing games on his Xbox. The air-con's blasting out. He can't be bothered to cook at home because he doesn't need to. He doesn't take on private students because he values his free time too much.
Hey! This was me twenty years ago before married life and responsibility came a-knocking. Alec I hate you! (only joking of course, Alec is a good pal of mine on Twitter and he knows I'm only pulling his leg) Seriously though, if it ain't broken, don't fix it. I hope you can't keep up this lifestyle for too long though Alec because it wouldn't be fair on the rest of us.
On a side-note, what surprises and encourages me about these cost of living surveys is that MANY English teachers are clearly living WELL. The cynics who often look down on the humble English teacher and brand teaching as 'slave labour' and 'poverty line' earnings etc might well have half a point, but when you delve deeper into some teacher's earnings - as we do in this cost of living section - no one is going hungry. Far from it. In fact, one of the themes that runs through these surveys is the fact that many teachers have far better lifestyles and enjoy far more disposable income than they perhaps would back in their homeland.
Showing 5 Cost of Living surveys out of 426 total
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