I just wanted to introduce myself. My name is Bill and I'm seriously thinking about moving to the Philippines. Dumaguete, Davao City, and CDO are 3 cities that I've been looking into. I'm retired military ( Go Air Force) from the United States. I'm 54 so to young for SS so I need to live on my military retirement. I already live a basic life style here in the USA for about $ 1500 per month. I've lived above my means before and choose not to go that road again. I do eat out a lot usually twice a day not nothing fancy. My goal is to live on 1,000 a month. To do that I Think the following expenses would be in line: studio apt. 100 to 200 USD/mth, food 150 to 200, electric 75, travel 150 ( plan to buy a scooter and use trikes, etc., For health insurance I plan to have emergency air fare to US saved as I get medical through the military, Phone/internet 75, misc whatever is left. Any thoughts, suggestions, snide remarks please let me know. Salamat Bill
1K / month is an easy budget to do here. You aren't ballin' but once you get settled in, you could figure out how to get by with a lot less. Depending on your eating habits, the food budget is a little on the low side. That would work for simple and cheap meals. If you can eat that cheap back home, then you can eat that cheap here. If you can't eat that cheap back home, then you will probably spend more here also. Eating out here is probably cheaper than it was back home though. You should be able to find something on that budget for a place to live. There are tons of places at the $150 / month range. There are studio's which cost more or less. The number of rooms isn't necessarily an indicator of rent. You'll just have to take your time to find a place. Ask any locals that you know. Your travel budget is a bit high depending on where you live. If you move close to downtown, you could drastically cut this budget. If you live far from downtown and makes lots of trips, then you could get up to that amount. You could also take the time to use pedicab terminals and multi-cabs to drop the budget even on longer trips. This assumes you don't have your own motorcycle. If you buy a motorcycle, then gas won't eat up much of your budget. Your electric is about right if you go with air-conditioning. If you can get by with an electric fan, then you could drop your electric budget nearly in half. Phone and internet should cost no more than half of what you have budgeted for it (1K / month for a 3mb connection and use a cell phone to make calls and text.) Add the extra from categories you over-budgeted to your food budget and you are about right.
Welcome to the forum. I would cross CDO off of your list, replace that with Iloilo. CDO is a big dirty city from what I hear. 1k a month is going to be tight but it is doable. If you plan on living off that you will be going paycheck to paycheck and won't have much of anything left over each month. It would be wise to come over with a pretty good chunk of cash in savings in case of emergencies. Last thing you want is to have a medical (or any other type of) emergency and get stuck with a huge bill that you can't afford. Life can get miserable very fast in the Philippines....there are absolutely no social safety nets for us expats here.
If I could live on that I could save a couple of hundred a month. I was thinking about Davao city but the terrorism threat is too great. Don't have a set time or plan just need to sell some property then try a 3 week look at. Appreciate everything everyone has added so far. Thanks. I try to live my life with no regrets so I may to see if kano Bill works out. Bill
I would think that your chances of being a victim of a terrorist attack would be greater in Manila...statisticly speaking. I could be wrong though. I know there are many expats living happy lives in Davao and they perceive there to be less crime there.
I found out my health insurance will work in the Philippines if they are a certified provider. Both Silliman health center and sacred heart (I think ) are certified. I find most people seem to have a less stellar opinion of other cities. People from Cebu talk bad about Manila. People from CDO don't like some other city. Etc. I think spend a year in a city like Dumaguete and explore til I find the city that best suits me. I really enjoy the forums about the Philippines as people are very stark about their comments which I appreciate.
