Quote:
Originally Posted by finnianp
Ok I'm booking flights tonight, coming to Phuket in early June and staying for three months. I'm just wondering about how much money I'm going to need to live off per week? I'm a student so I can do things pretty cheap, I survive on around €130 a week ($200) in Ireland excluding rent, is it possible to spend the same and live an ok lifestyle in Phuket? From reading the thread the average seems to be about $1500 a month which seems pretty expensive to me, from what I've heard about Thailand from friends that have visited. Is it just the fact that you are all living a baller lifestyle that it seems so expensive?
It's low season so that is in your benefit.
I'm gonna run off some #s making some assumptions.
Some of them could go up or down depending upon your prefs.
OK, a quick and dirty appraisal. (all in THB)
Housing: 15K/mo Stick you in the Kata Beach Studio (In low season they do some pretty decent monthly deals) This is excellent location in heart of 2p2 land and <300m from nice beach. Walking distance to a bunch of restaurants.
Transpo: 5K/mo. You gots to rent a motorbike if you want to stay in teh Phuket. (4K/mo for rental ~1K/mo on petrol) The petrol estimate is purposely VHigh becuase you are not coming here to sit in your room all day. You want to ride around and see paradise, like everyday)
Interwebz: 9K all in for up to 6mo. The KBS has free wifi but since you be grinding you'll want to lay out the 9K for the aircard plus its 6mo prepay.
Foods: 10K/mo. This assumes ~330/day which is tight but doable. If you only ate at "Red Chair"(formerly "Guay Jab") which is a fast, good Thai restaurant like 100m walk from KBS, you'd be full of delicious Thai food at around 90THB/meal. The slack in the 330/day assumes your gonna want an occasional Farang meal like a Burger or pizza or pasta or whatnot. So you could prob splurge on that like 2-3 times a week at ~300/meal(farang food).
Going Out ~10K-30K. This really depends upon you and how often. GOing to the kata Night bazaar which a few of us for a few drinks/beers can bee 300-1K. GOing out in Patong can get expensive depending upon where you hit. Prob a decent assumption to expect to spend around _500/night on a low key chill some drinks night and at least 1K/night on a clubbing crushing Patong night. The best way to get value on big nights is to go with a group and bring your own bottles. Most clubs let you bring in your own bottles and charge a ridiculously small corkage fee that also includes mixers. Doing it this way is ridic cheaper than just buying single drinks.
Womenz No estimate available. Totally depends upon you.
Seeing stuff If you are here, you might as well do some one off trips like Phi Phi Island. 1 day trip there ~1.5K. Maybe a Full Moon Party if you are young and into beach raves with scandis and aussies. A 3 day trip there on the cheap would prob be ~10K.
So adding up:
15K housing
5K Transpo
10K Food
10K going out (using low end of range)
---------------------------------
Monthly nut = 40KTHB ~ $1200
BUT you still have the 1 off aircard cost + any 1 off trips (which i hae to assume you'll make at least the Phi Phi one)
You could squeeze on the housing with a concerted house hunt but at the 3mo and less stay time it's hard to get too much discount. Perhaps you could find a significantly less nice place for 12K/mo.
I think you couldn't really go much lower on the food w/o cooking a ****on of your own meals which is silly when a great Thai meal is only 90THB.
Also, you need to add some more discretionary THBs on there esp for the unknownz like womenz.
Hope that helps.
EDIT: Thinking about it. You can def do better on price but not necesarily on value on the housing. I could prob find you a 6KTHB/mo place in Phuket Town, but is that extra 9K worth it to be much, much farther from beaches/nightlife/2p2 community?
Last edited by NewTeaBag; 02-21-2010 at 03:25 PM.
Reason: added a further thought on housing.