The low cost of living in Thailand is one of its biggest draws. This is no secret, after all it is consistently ranked as one of the top countries for expats, considering quality of life and economic opportunities. But even still, the money can quickly add up and you might find yourself exceeding your monthly budget if you’re not careful. After living in Thailand for nearly 9 months now, we’ve become so relaxed with our spending that we’ve ended up over budget in the last few months. If we want to stretch our savings for as long as possible and keep living this “Un-American dream“, we realized we need to reevaluate our spending and see how we can get ourselves back on track. We’ve discovered numerous ways to save some baht during our time here, our problem is actually being conscious of them and applying them. In an effort to start enforcing these ourselves, we’ve decided to write them down and share with you here.
How to Cut Costs in Thailand
Do your own laundry
While its a nice change to be able to drop your laundry off and pick it up the next day washed, dried and folded for just a few dollars, it can quickly add up! After moving into our house in Chiang Mai, we started doing our own laundry and are now saving close to 1000 baht/month ($30 USD). I should also mention that includes going from two to three loads of laundry per week since we joined the gym.
Use Water Dispensers
While buying a bottled water at the 7-11 is shockingly cheap compared to most Western prices, this is another item that can quickly add up. Your best bet is to invest in a few jugs of water and refill them at one of the many dispensers you can find on almost every street. 10 baht will fill up 3 of the jugs as shown in the picture. Compare that to 7 baht you would pay for a small bottled water at the 7-11 and you will be surprised how much you will save in a month’s time.
Take Advantage of Free Wifi
This may depend on your line of work and how often you need to stay connected. Since we work online, we are attached to our iPhones and opted for the 3G plan at 399 baht/month ($12 USD). Additionally, we have WiFi at our house since most of our time is spent working there. However, free WiFi is abundant throughout Thailand. You can take your work to almost any cafe or coffee shop and make use of their WiFi. It might cost you a coffee, but chances are you were going to buy that coffee anyway! 😉
Use Apps for Talk & Text
Technology has made it so easy, and cheap, to stay connected these days. With apps such as Line, Viber, Whatsapp and Facebook, you may never have to pay for a text message or phone call again, so long as you have WiFi connection that is. Between FaceTime and Viber, we stay connected with all of our local friends in Thailand, as well as our family and friends back home and it doesn’t cost us a dime.
Watch Your Tipping
It took a while for us to get used to the fact that tipping in Thailand is not customary and we would often over-tip. Although tipping is not required, it is still appreciated and we have learned that the norm is to just leave the small change. If at a more upscale place, we might leave a little more. That being said, you should not feel obligated to leave a tip.
Cut Back on the Beer
We often find that one beer costs more than our entire meal, and this can quickly add up. If you are trying to cut back on spending, you might want to first consider how much alcohol you are consuming. Just cutting back on drinking alone can save a good chunk of change in itself. However, if you don’t want to cut out drinking completely, just be more aware of the prices you are paying. Grab a beer from 7-11 before you head to dinner. Most restaurants mark up the price of a beer quite a bit, some even doubling the price.
Eat Like a Local
This doesn’t necessarily mean you have to stick to street food to eat cheap. However, its easy to get caught up going to cafes and restaurants that cater towards tourists and expats. The prices at these places are often 2 to 3 times the price that most locals will pay for the same food elsewhere. Additionally, eating Thai food will almost always save you money compared to Western food. While its nice to splurge on a cheeseburger or pizza every now and then, try to find places that might offer specials certain nights a week. It is also wise to set a goal for yourself, for example, only eating Western food on Friday nights.
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150 THB for 3 Thai meals vs 145 THB 1 Western Dish
Rent During Low Season
If you are looking to stay in one place long term, its best to lock down a house or condo outside of high season. Not only will you find you have more options, but prices usually drop and you have more opportunity to negotiate. When we arrived in Chiang Mai during high season to look for a house, we had very limited options. Now that we are approaching rainy season, we are seeing all kinds of places for rent at prices much lower than we found during our house hunt. This also applies to hotels and guest houses.
Save on Electricity
First of all, if you do decide to rent long term, find out ahead of time what you will be charged for electricity. You should be paying the government rate which is between 3 and 4 baht/unit, however, many condos will charge upwards of 9 baht/unit. This makes a huge difference and you could end up paying more for electricity than rent. Another way to cut back on electricity is to use a fan rather than the aircon as much as possible. This might be out of the question in the hot summer months, but during the winter we barely ran our aircon for nearly two months. We didn’t realize how much we were saving until March arrived and our bill nearly tripled in price.
Become a Local
And by becoming a local, we mean get your driver’s license and learn some of the language. Charlie got his Thai driver’s license three years ago and it has saved us money more than a few times. Although this doesn’t work 100% of the time, quite often he will get away with only paying the Thai price for park entry fees and such, saving close to 200 baht at times. This also comes in handy when getting stopped at police checkpoints. Usually they see his Thai drivers license and send him right on through. Learning the language, or at least some key words and phrases, can help save money as well. Often, if you speak Thai, vendors won’t try to jack up the prices like they do for most farangs because they assume you’ve been here long enough and know what you should be paying.
Avoid Trips to the 7-11
This is one of those that we really need to work on. We will head up to the 7-11 for a drink and leave with a few bags of chips, a soda and beer and before we know it we are out 150 baht. We could have eaten two meals for two people at that price, and now we’ve just blown it on junk food. Although falling into the 7-11 trap is easy to do, try to avoid it! You’re better off heading to the closest Tesco Lotus and stocking up on whatever it is you might need, especially toiletries and cleaning supplies.
20 Baht Stores
Ever see any of these stores around town? These are the 20 baht shops, much like the dollar store that we have in the US. While you are not going to find anything of quality in these stores, they are cheap and convenient for buying plastic cups, plates, cleaning supplies, etc.
Travel Light
You can find extremely cheap flights in and around Thailand, particularly on Air Asia. The catch here is to pack light and only bring a carry-on. You’d be surprised to find that checking your bag is often nearly as much as your plane ticket, so we always stick to our backpack if at all possible.
Track Your Budget
One of the best ways to save money is to always be aware of what you are spending. Keep track of your expenses – write down how much you spent for breakfast, lunch and dinner. If you see you spent way over your budget in a given day, then you can figure out how to cut back on the following days to balance yourself out. When you have all of the numbers in front of you, its easier to see where your money is going and what can be adjusted to keep yourself on track.
Do you have any money-saving tips to share? Let us know in the comments below!
