Cost of Living in Manila

[dothe101]

I'm about to move to Manila after being recruited by a conglomerate. How much does it cost to live "decently" in Manila?

[KiTTY2babe]

If you have a car and live by yourself, it's around 250 pesos (parking, gas, and a good meal out twice a day). If you do public transpo and live with relatives, a 150 pesos (commuting fare alone eats up 50 pesos already) will suffice.

[raven23]

P250 a day for two 'good' meals a day with parking and gas? Well, depends on your definition of a 'good' meal I guess.

Say you live an hour away from where you work. Gas should come around to P50 a day. Parking for 8 hours, say, in Makati would be around P100.

An average "white collar" meal in Makati will be anywhere from P100 to P200. So, two of those is P200.

I guess on average that's P300-P400 a day (P9,000-P12,000 a month -- let's just consider weekends the same as weekdays).

That, of course, doesn't include rent, maintenance of the car and the apartment/house, clothing, utilities, basic necessities (toiletries, laundry, etc), hobbies, gimmicks, dates, etc.

Rent (in Makati) would be, on average, I'd say P15,000 to P20,000. There will, of course, be places cheaper, and many places more expensive.

Gimmicks? Say, another P500 a night. Dates? Depending on the type of date, say, P1000-P2000 a night.

All in all, for a truly independent, "decent" lifestyle I'd budget at least P40,000 or $800 a month.

[JENSIE_G]

For myself:

Php 500 daily allowance: food and toll fee (wala pa kaming E-Pass eh)

Php 500-1,000 for gimmicks depending on its nature and location.

For the whole family:

Php 5,000 (average): monthly gasoline allowance

Php 5,000 (average): weekly grocery allowance

Php 4,500 (average): monthly Meralco bill

Php 2,500: monthly internet bill

Php 6,500 (average): monthly cellphone bills (3 kaming naka-line sa family)

Php 280 (average): monthly water and association bill

Php 3,100: cable fee (every 6 months)

Php 1,200: monthly maid salary (we only have 1 maid)

I didn't include our credit card bills and other incidental expenses. I dunno eh kaya I can't give an estimate...

Haay buhay...

[BadGiRL]

Originally posted by dothe101
I'm about to move to Manila after being recruited by a conglomerate. How much does it cost to live "decently" in Manila?

By decent I would assume you mean safe neighborhood ( you better insist upon this, manila isn't exactly the safest place to live) , clean facilities, good food and a comfortable place to live plus all those miscellaneous like internet, cable, phone, utilities and night outs? 100,000 to 150,000 would be enough. That's roughly 3,000 dollars a month.

:beam:

[pinkmoon]

Originally posted by raven23
All in all, for a truly independent, "decent" lifestyle I'd budget at least P40,000 or $800 a month.

Definitely not something one can afford on an entry-level salary!