Sample Budget - Feedback?

[jkeenan213]

Hi all.  Moving to PI at end of 2015.  I have a sample budget below and am looking for feedback.  Too much, too little, did I miss something?

Some notes:

This is province living, southeast Bohol, Anda area.  Local shopping, no malls, local groceries mostly.

We (my wife) own the land and are building a house, those costs, furnishing and relocation costs are separate and not included.  Land is about .25 hectare, house is 200-250 sq meter, 3/4 enclosed.  Some air con.  Dirty kitchen and smaller one inside, two CR.  Will have a car, also budgeted separately.

Myself, wife, two wee ones then will be 4 and 1 yrs old.  Education savings for them also budgeted separately.

I am healthy, do take medication daily for BP.

Some air/ferry travel to Cebu and around PI, back to US 1x yearly.

More than occasional beer, some dining out local, no girls.

Domestic help is a maybe, weighing live in/out maid now and PT driver.

 

At 44 PHP/USD, this is about 1700 USD/month.  Am I safe with this?

 

 

ONGOING EXPENSE     Utilities     Electric 3,750 month Propane 450 month Tap water 500 month Internet 1,500 month Cable TV 800 month Telephone 1,100 month Bottled water 500 month Generator fuel 150 month Garbage 200 month Banking     Taxes 800 month Bank fees 300 month Transportation     Auto expense 2,200 month Transportation other 1,000 month Medical 12,000 month Travel     Travel (US) 4,500 month Travel (domestic) 700 month Postage/shipping 675 month Housing     House, maintenance 1,500 month Household 10,000 month Domestic/driver 5,000 month Groceries 15,000 month Clothing 1,500 month Leisure     Entertainment 4,500 month Dining out 2,500 month Misc 1,500 month       Uh-oh contingency 3,631 month       TOTAL EXPENSE 76,256  

 

[Dave Hounddriver]

Generator fuel 150 month

 

Each person's budget will be different and yours will surely work for you as there is enough money there to adjust expenditures to suit yourself later.  The Generator fuel has me scratching my head.  When I ran a generator that would have been enough fuel for 3 hours a month.  Is that all you plan to run the generator?  Why even have one for that little use?

[fred]

Budget looks good from my point of view on average.. Some items are a bit low..But then some are a bit high!

BTW..If you need a builder give me a shout..Our 3 guys are nearly finished and ready to go home to Manila..

They love it here so much they asked me to help them find work..

They are damned good IMO.

[Scruffydawg]

 

Hi all.  Moving to PI at end of 2015.  I have a sample budget below and am looking for feedback.  Too much, too little, did I miss something?

Some notes:

This is province living, southeast Bohol, Anda area.  Local shopping, no malls, local groceries mostly.

We (my wife) own the land and are building a house, those costs, furnishing and relocation costs are separate and not included.  Land is about .25 hectare, house is 200-250 sq meter, 3/4 enclosed.  Some air con.  Dirty kitchen and smaller one inside, two CR.  Will have a car, also budgeted separately.

Myself, wife, two wee ones then will be 4 and 1 yrs old.  Education savings for them also budgeted separately.

I am healthy, do take medication daily for BP.

Some air/ferry travel to Cebu and around PI, back to US 1x yearly.

More than occasional beer, some dining out local, no girls.

Domestic help is a maybe, weighing live in/out maid now and PT driver.

 

At 44 PHP/USD, this is about 1700 USD/month.  Am I safe with this?

 

 

ONGOING EXPENSE     Utilities     Electric 3,750 month Propane 450 month Tap water 500 month Internet 1,500 month Cable TV 800 month Telephone 1,100 month Bottled water 500 month Generator fuel 150 month Garbage 200 month Banking     Taxes 800 month Bank fees 300 month Transportation     Auto expense 2,200 month Transportation other 1,000 month Medical 12,000 month Travel     Travel (US) 4,500 month Travel (domestic) 700 month Postage/shipping 675 month Housing     House, maintenance 1,500 month Household 10,000 month Domestic/driver 5,000 month Groceries 15,000 month Clothing 1,500 month Leisure     Entertainment 4,500 month Dining out 2,500 month Misc 1,500 month       Uh-oh contingency 3,631 month       TOTAL EXPENSE 76,256  

 

Yours and mine look fairly close.  I plan to move in the summer of 2015 also . I have my rent a little high and other may be a bit low. Gives me a 30K P cushion

 

Elect 6000

Food 14000

Auto Fuel 5000

Water 600 Internet

1000 TV 1000

Misc 4000    

Phones 2000

Eating Out /Ent 5000

Clothes 2000

Medical 900

rent 28000        

Expenses Total-  69500

Edited October 31, 2014 by Scruffydawg

[jkeenan213]

Thanks all.  This is a first run after taking about ten other folks' actual expenses in various provinces, some highs/lows/averages and my wife and father in law input as well.  If I'm OK at the bottom I can shift between items.  As for the generator, it's for backup, and I think the cost of x gallons of fuel is spread over 12 months.  So if you say the monthly budget is about 3 hours run time, that would be 36 hours annually.  Water and CR are gravity fed, I'm thinking cold showers, cooking is gas and in a long outage may need to charge phone or fire up computer briefly now and then.  The rest I can rough.  Too little?

[robert k]

To me, driver is skilled work and if he wasn't worth more than that, l wouldn't want him driving me. Rather than firing up a generator, get a car charger for the phones and laptop. I also have a couple of high quality phone charging banks that l brought with me, one is 6k mah and will charge a high capacity phone battery twice and the other is 10,400 mah for extended power outages. They don't cost much and hold charge for a year or more. One of mine acts as a fairly powerful flaslight for 72 continuous hours on a single charge. Easyacc is a decent low cost brand. Save the generator for the fridge / aircon and make the most of it. I would probably start my vehicle every other day and let it achieve full operating temp if l were not driving it frequently, motorcycles every day. Diesel is great if you drive it, if you don't drive it enough beware the black sludge that grows in diesel. I think you have a pretty good working budget. Another thing about vehicles and islands is that you will drive more at first and it will taper off over time when you have seen all you want on the island. I used to fill up my van on St. Thomas evert 3 weeks whether it needed it or not, usually not.

[pokermike]

Well unemployed for two days now , weird feeling. Hope you guys are correct, i am worried about having enough money to live there. hope ican find a place i like to live. If my royality checks start coming again in February i know i will be in good shape an extra 100,000 pesos , otherwise with out touching my nest egg i would like to get by with 120,000 pesos per month, just me and my wife.  i am going to have to accept that i cant have the condos i want to live in their and settle for less. Maybe try to find something i like for around 32,000 pesos a month. When i was there before i would look and the landlords would see my kano face and i dont think i was getting good prices , but now its different its the real deal.  I hope my wife can put this part of my life there together for us and find a place.

I cant play cards now have to get this all sorted out first, i have won for over forty years straight now  ,  but you cant play good unless your mind is in it 100%. Right now i am worried,  i do have nest egg of over over 22,000,000 pesos but i am not going to touch that, for emergencies only.  Poker Mike should i be worried?

[robert k]

Mike, they say good worrying is never wasted. You are going to be fine because you are keeping your eye on the ball.

[John Mogusar]

 I'm thinking cold showers

When I was in the Philippines, I bought a very cheap device to heat water. Just had to stick it in a bucket of water for a short time and it would get as hot as you'd like it. It was nice to have a quick source of a little bit of hot water.

 

I got it at a hardware store, but don't know what they call them.

[pokermike]

Cold showers,  i can handle that, i swim a lot even when the water is n_t freezing. Thanks Robert K i am used to making quick reads and adjustments, i will keep my eye on the ball. Told my wife i got laid off could not beleive her responce , she said great honey, you dont need to work anymore. She said might not want to come to US now, she says just wants to be with me. Her first desire is to visit her sister in Chang Mai , i told her no problem pack your bags. She laughed and said, "do you mean pack my hiking boots, hat, shorts, tennis shoes and flip flops and bikinis because i know thats what like to see me in." One time i threw a bunch of stuff in my camelbac when i was there went to the airport with her and we were gone for 5 days. She knows me well!

Would like to hook up with some of you guys when i get there.   later Poker Mike