NOTE: As of October 2011, we found a house for 10k baht/mo. = ~~$315 rent per month. We will write a new post with new expenses when we have more time. 
Now that we’ve lived in Chiang Mai since July 2010, we feel we can share solid information about the living expenses for our family of three. Perhaps this could be helpful for those families interested in coming to Chiang Mai and making it a home-base as well
We are estimating about $1200 per month of living expenses for the three of us.
Here’s the break-down of our monthly expenses:
Rent (one bedroom apartment) – $300 (12 month contract).
NOTE: As of October 2011, we will be moving to a new place so that we can begin our new project. It’s a secret. There maybe food and smoothies involved! The rent may be higher by then. We’ll update this when we cross that bridge.
Electricity – $32 (avg)
Water - $6.67 (fixed)
TV- $1.67 (basic cable, fixed, only 2 English language channel
Internet – $11
Cell Phone – $6 (Will your phone work overseas Sim cards)
Petrol (That’s gasoline for you Americans) – $25 (estimate) Yes, that’s for one month!
Motorbike Maintenance – $59 Total, from Sept 2010 to April 2011 (included 1 oil change, 3 flat tire repairs, replaced 2 tires & front brakes)
Food – $300 (generous estimate – includes groceries, cooking at home, dining at street markets/stalls, mom/pop shops – no 5 star dining).
Leisure/Entertainment/Fun/Misc– Your Miles May Vary here, depending on your budget, tastes and lifestyle. As a frugal family, it was typically dining out with friends (see Food exp.), day trips in town (parks, street markets, festivals), short and extended trips within Thailand. We also do our own laundry and pay for cleaning services occasionally.
Above picture was taken during Songkran (Thingyan in Burmese) aka Water Festival aka New Year which is in April.
Service Related Contributions/Temple Visits and Donations including FEEDING Team Chiang Mai every chance we can– *Yes, haven’t you heard?, We feed people we like whenever we can.* Assisting with fundraising for and donations to Community Based Orgs within CM. We also sponsor purchase of raw rice bags enough for 25+ monks for at a local temple. We will resume this when we return later this year.
Want to volunteer in Chiang Mai? Find out more here first and we’ll do our best to connect you!
We admit some months are lower than $1200. We’ve come under $1000 during months we don’t venture too far out of Chiang Mai!
Not included in monthly expenses above:
School Expenses for M – $645/mo (tuition only) for an international school, paid upfront each term. Considered on lower end in Chiang Mai’s handful of international schools. Not including first year, one time enrollment fees. We saved by passing on school food (we pack M’s lunch, which we have always done even in the US ) and bus fees (no bus, Daddy’s motorbike). (This is a dream compared to what we paid for M’s Montessori school in Texas),
Uniforms – $30 (M’s White shirt are no longer white. We’ll be buying new shirts in the new year!)
Costume rental and misc. purchases for school activities - $50
Travel Visas and Transportation – Will vary depending on your visa needs. Here is our expenses: Since J needed to renew his visa we made an excursion out of each trip to Laos. J now has a shiny-new one year non-immigrant O visa with multiple entries for the coming year!
$210 Laos ($35 Laos Visa entry fee per American. Total is for 2 trips)
$20 Myanmar for J (Visa entry fee by land)
$800 Air, bus, boat, tuk-tuk, red bus and lodging
Motorbike - $916.67 to own. (We bought a used motorbike, Honda Click, because we knew we’d be in Thailand long-term!)
Above picture was taken outside of Luang Prabang, Laos at the beautiful Kwan Si Waterfalls.
If you’re thinking about heading to Thailand, specifically to Chiang Mai, be sure to contact us. We always look forward to welcoming another family!
Happy Planning!
Other posts you might enjoy or find helpful!
Be a Gracious Guest, Not a Pest.
Do’s and Dont’s in Buddhist Temples
How we got itchy feet to Travel and see the World
Colorful Markets and delicious food in Chiang Mai
Related posts on Chiang Mai living expenses from friends:
How Much to Live in Chiang Mai from Shannon of A Little Adrift
Living in Chiang Mai from Christine of Almost Fearless
Chiang Mai on the Cheap from Sally of Unbrave Girl
We Say NO to Status Quo.
Live Green. Live Small. Give Large. Take Little.
Take Notice. Take Action.
Wow. M’s school is very expensive! Is it because it’s an international school? Do they speak English at the school?
Hi Maggie,
Thanks for stopping by. Actually we used to pay close to $1000 a month to a small Montessori school in Texas so we feel this is pretty good. It is an International school (British) and English is spoken at the school.
What a great resource. Thanks so much, Avril.
My husband will find this very helpful. It’s getting closer to the date we nominated to leave Singapore and he’s got cold feet. He’s worried about money and wants to defer our dropout for a while. We won’t need to pay school fees for a while and we’ll probably hire a motorbike, so I think we could easily live comfortably for $1,000/month.
I hope this post means we’ll see you in Chiang Mai sooner rather than later!
Barbara, I’m so glad to hear that my post will help you make the leap, perhaps a little faster. Truth is my husband was the same way. Until I brought him to CM in 2009 on our summer trip. That’s when he decided that it was doable.
If you have additional questions, shoot me an email or post a question on Team CM FB page. Hope to see you soon! Also, we anticipate our move in October will cost a bit more in rent, but we’ll see! (We’ll update it when we get to that point).
Thanks Avril. One of the problems is that we may very well be screwed by Singapore’s tenancy laws. If we lose the deposit on our place here, I will have to work for a few more months. Sigh.
Barbara, hang in there. It will happen! A few months from now, we may be sitting across from each other reflecting on this in Chang Mai!
Hi- I found your site on marriedwithluggage. we are a family of four living in Guangzhou China. I recently did a post on cost of living in Guangzhou. I love your post and look forward to reading more. Cheers to family living abroad.
Paz
Hello Paz, Great to find you here. Thanks for stopping by. I made my way to your blog… full of great information and stories. Yay.. to families living abroad and making travel education and experience a priority over material things.
I soooo want to go and visit Thailand, and this shows it really is affordable. I may have to see about putting Thailand on our stop after Peru and before….Japan/Ireland/Somewhere else
Come visit, soon!
Avril,
I have recently returned from Chiang Mai and really loved my experiance there to the point that i’m considering a permanent venture there I am a 52 yo aussie male not into the bar/sex scene and was wondering if my 24000 baht weekly income (derived from property investments) would support me there. I am also extremely interested in some form of volunteer work if it is available there for brain stimulation and help being that I feel to young to retire. Your post on CM are extremely well detailed well done
Phil, thanks for your comment. I don’t see a problem living in CM on 24,000 baht weekly income for ONE person. Then again it depends on your lifestyle and how you manage your money. You do mean 24,000b a week, yes? That’s a jumbo budget. You’ll be able to live quite luxuriously. As for the volunteer work, please go to the Volunteer tab above, third from the left, take a look at the positions and shoot us an email with one you are interested in. Good luck!
This is really cool to see.
I actually have a similar expense report coming out on my site in a few weeks about my cost of living (solo) in Bangkok. It will be cool to compare both of our budgets.
Mate, I would love to see your report the cost of living in Australia is enormous and we are over governed and over policed, cant even have a beer on the beach now
I read Shannon’s post on this topic a month or so back – and reading this one, I will say again…wow.
Yep. I can afford to live there on my projected writing earnings. I need a little work to push them higher, but when I do…
I might be saying hello, one of these days.
Thanks for your comment, Mike. If you already have an stable income stream (work from anywhere set-up), you’re already one step in the game! You could probably get a teaching job, to supplement, much quicker than we could in CM if needed. Good luck. Give us a shout when you are ready to make the move!
This is a great article. I’m always curious to see how others budget overseas. Chiang Mai certainly offers great value for those who decide to relocate there.
Hey Nomadic Samuel,
Thanks for coming by, and yes, it’s not just low cost of living, but relatively high standard of living, too. I don’t mean creature comforts (which can be had), but the accessibility of fresh food everywhere…
I remember paying for Montessori Academy in Florida for my son and it was pretty expensive. I’m not sure if I would really one a one bedroom though are you planning getting a one bedroom again (is it that big of a price difference versus a two?). $1200 sounds like a cake walk compared to what I pay here in the US.
Hey Kirk!
We’re house hunting this fall, and will reveal what we find later on…
We have a higher priced, large 1 bed room (not a studio), but we can find similar larger homes in that price range, too.
Kirk,
Part of our philosophy in moving is to live with LESS THINGS, and LESS can be more. And just because we live in smaller space does not mean we live poorly (quality wise). We were in a two bedroom, actually cost less, in the same building! We needed more living space and the one br had the living space we wanted. It was a personal choice we made also to stay in this building because we didn’t want to take our daughter away from her friend (neighbor) soon after we moved here. We used to live in the US as well. We still have a 3 br/3baths home in the US that we realized had way too much space filled with useless “things!” We too had our daughter in a small Montessori school in the US since she was 2. We made a choice to live small for the past year. And we don’t regret it.
Nice blog, love the quality photos. Sounds pretty close to my costs when living in Chiang Mai for three years until 2009. Although the £/€ have taken a hit since then. I spent more on travel as I didn’t risk death by motorcycle and stuck to tuk-tuks… that said they’re not that much safer! Internet was costlier, otherwise the service from bottom rate offers is pretty flaky. Paid more for a tv package that had a few more English language channels.
Sticking to Thai food, avoiding the foreign eating-places, makes a big difference. International schools are not cheap, taking into account the overall cost of living in Thailand, but it’s money well spent.
It’ll be 2013 before we’re back in Thailand on a permanent basis, can’t wait. In the meantime, looking forward to a four month stay this winter. Will probably drop by ‘home’ (Chiang Mai) sometime, although we’re looking to spend a fair while in other regions of LOS.
Hi Frog!
Thanks for the kind comments.
I bet CM has changed a bit since ’09. Definitely look us up when you’re in town.
Cheers!
we need help we want to stay in chiang mai for a year where do we start
That’s a loaded question. Maybe we should start with specific questions you might have. Please email us directly with your questions, and we can start there. thanks.
Seeing your costs was very enlightening. It helps to know what people in other countries are spending to live there. We are traveling in an RV for the year which is not really cheap. Recently we have settled down in an apartment in Fethiye, Turkey for 2-3 months and have seen our living expenses plunge dramatically by not moving around. On our next trip, I think we will do what you are doing and rent an apartment for a while. Maybe even in Chiang Mai… we love it there. Thanks for sharing the info.
Nice to meet you, Mark.
The thing with posting cost of living stats is that they can vary so much depending on one’s preferences. We tend to be quite frugal (unless we’re hosting family!) on a day to day basis, and have modest needs when it comes to creature comforts. At this point, we still don’t have a TV, have basic furnishings, and am careful not the get in the consumer mode of filling up our house with unnecessary things.
Yes, we’re enjoying the cultural immersion by living here long term, as opposed to jaunting across the globe in a rush.
Cheers!
J
Hey Avril,
I really enjoyed your article on monthly expenses in CM, since I am planning to move there this year. Even though CM wasn’t my first choice, I figured it would suit my budget (which is $1000 / month) much better than other cities in the land of smiles.
I totally agree with you on your “less is MORE” point, as I feel the same way.
Thanks again!