Jack
Working in Upcountry
Monthly Earnings 140,000 baht
Q1. How much do you earn from teaching per month?
I earn around 60,000 a month from my job here at a Thai university and I do a lot of online teaching (Including dissertation advising) which brings in another 80,000 baht or so on average - so around 140,000 per month
Q2. How much of that can you realistically save per month?
Not as much as you would think
Q3. How much do you pay for your accommodation and what do you live in exactly (house, apartment, condo)?
We live in a fairly large house and the rent is around 15,000 baht per month.
Q4. What do you spend a month on the following things?
Transportation
See comment section below
Utility bills
See comment section below
Food - both restaurants and supermarket shopping
See comment section below
Nightlife and drinking
See comment section below
Books, computers
See comment section below
Q5. How would you summarize your standard of living in one sentence?
Life is pretty good. We live fairly simply and have enough saved to avoid intense money worries, but having expenses outside of Thailand while living in Thailand eats away income pretty quickly.
Q6. What do you consider to be a real 'bargain' here?
Housing. We live in a fairly large house with a large yard and pay about the same as my daughter is paying for a student sized place back home.
Q7. In your opinion, how much money does anyone need to earn here in order to survive?
Survive? When I first came to Thailand I was supporting a wife and two small children while only getting 220 Baht an hour in Bangkok. If one is Thai or lives like an entry level Thai worker one can live on between 10-15,000 baht a month, but quality of life at that wage is not going to be very high
Phil's analysis and comment
Jack chose not to answer the expenses questions in the usual way but had the following to say in terms of a summary.
"I will use slightly different categories than the ones posted. My wife has a budget of 35,000 baht to take care of all household (including food) and her personal expenses. For gas and car usage, eating out four times a month, lunch and other personal expenses for myself I spend around 15,000 baht. So you could say we live on around 50,000 baht a month here in Thailand.
However, I also have a daughter in university in the West and I send her around 35,000 baht a month (although she graduates in a little more than a year and that money will get cut off), and also I was supporting my son until recently while he was going to university and I also have to pay a long-term student loan of my own of around 20,000 a month.
So my income covers everything and we have some savings from my working outside of Thailand for a few years. If I can keep up the income stream from a few more years our expenses will decrease significantly and we can save up a bit more for retirement"
There's something quite incredible about Jack's survey. Here's a guy working out there in upcountry Thailand. Not Bangkok! - but out in the sticks. And he's earning enough money to put a daughter in The West through university and did the same for his son as well. Unbelievable!
I keep hearing stories of teachers making great money from online teaching. Surely this has to be the future.
Jack also had the following to say on the topic of how much does one need to earn to survive in Thailand.
"The answer really depends. If you are single and wanting to spend a year or two on an overseas adventure, one can get by on a pretty basic (30,000) salary but if one goes through a normal life cycle of marriage, kids, the demands on your earnings go up. What you "need" is not really an important question, the question you should ask is what can you get and decide if the total package of money and lifestyle is better than one's other options.
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