Thailand Budget Living Cost Breakdown In Pattaya

I currently live in Pattaya, Thailand on just a thousand pounds a month. That includes everything from my rent to my food all the way down to my SIM card. I’m breaking down where every penny goes so you can see how I make this lifestyle work.

Plus, I’ll share some tips for those who are thinking about living in Thailand on a budget.

Rent And Condo Costs

Let’s kick it off with one of the most important expenses, which is rent. I currently live in a condo called City Garden Tower. This condo is kitted out with all the amenities you would want such as a gym, a swimming pool, sauna, ping pong table, steam room, and even has its own cafe, which is not that bad.

Location of this condo isn’t that bad as well because it’s a quiet location. It’s in South Pattaya, so walking to say like Soi Buakhao will take around about 10 to 15 minutes. And from there, you can kind of get the baht buses all around town.

And I currently pay 14,000 baht for this a month. This is a 6 month contract, which if I was to go to a year contract, I could probably get it for maybe 13,000 a month. And it’s through a private landlord.

Many of you are probably going to be asking, “How did you find this condo?

Electricity Water And Monthly Bills

Now, when it comes to the bills like electricity and water, pretty cheap. I never really go over 1,000 baht a month. Sometimes I do if I’m in here using the air con quite a lot and using my computer.

With the water, about 100 to 200 baht a month. So, with the rent and the bills, you’re looking around about 335 pounds. Not bad for living just by the sea.

Food Budget In Pattaya

Now, the second most important budget topic is food. This can go either way depending who you are. Do you like to eat cheap?

Do you like to eat farang food? Do you like to eat out all the time? Are you cooking at home?

So, I kind of have a mix of both. I love Thai food, but I am very picky, so I do still have my kind of farang style cereal in the morning. Most mornings, I have like Weetabix and a banana or something.

But recently, I’ve been getting into having yogurt with fruit such as banana, kiwis, apples. So, if I was to estimate a rough bowl of fruit and yogurt, it’d probably be around about 5 pounds or 200 baht. Although, some mornings I just have Weetabix and a banana, which would probably work out to about 60 baht.

Cheap Thai Meals And Cafes

Then, right next to my condo, as I mentioned, there is a local Thai restaurant which is just amazing. It’s open 24 hours and it serves most typical Thai dishes. I always have panang curry when I go there and that is 60 baht.

I typically get two eggs as well, which is 10 baht each. And then a water, which is 10 baht. So, the whole meal, a chicken panang curry with two fried eggs and a water is 90 baht.

So, that would be like my kind of lunch or dinner. And then at dinner, I would either cook at home, so I might have some egg on toast, or I might go to the supermarket, get some chicken, buy some rice from 7 Eleven, and make some meals here at home. So, based on about three meals a day with a protein shake, that’s on a budget of roughly around about 350 to 400 baht per day.

And then on top of that, I like to go out every now and again to like cafes, have a little coffee, and maybe once a week I’ll treat myself to a meal out. And then that could go up to around about 500 to 600 baht. So, total for my food each month, about 300 pounds.

SIM Card And Internet Costs

Now, next is SIM card. Now, many of you might think, “Well, okay, yeah, just go to AIS or something or True and just get a SIM card for 15 to 20 pound a month. ” But, I have a hack for you which my Thai friend told me and I haven’t seen any other creator talk about this.

Most Thai people with their phones have what they call a god SIM. Now, you can’t just walk into True or AIS and say, “Oh, I’d like one god SIM, please. ” They’d probably be like, “I don’t know really what you’re talking about.

” You have to order this SIM card online. And then when you have the SIM card, you go into say like True and then they activate it for you. They don’t sell it in the store.

I’ll leave a link to this in the description, but essentially this SIM card, I bought this for 2,400 baht for the year. And this SIM card is 100 gigabytes of data per month. So, this actually works out to about pound a month.

The only catch is once the year is up, you just have to buy another SIM card and you can’t keep that number. But, this does come in different options with like less data and stuff, so you could get it even cheaper than this.

Internet Installation And Monthly Cost

Similar topic is internet. So, I upload online content and I play some games here and there. So, I spend around about 500 baht per month on internet.

I went into the AIS store and got my internet with 3BB, which 3BB is basically owned by AIS, I believe. They come in and installed it and this condo room didn’t have internet, so they had to put the wiring in, which was like 4,000 baht. That was an expensive installation cost, but after that it’s around about 500 baht per month for my internet.

Motorbike And Transport

Next expense is motorbike. I get my motorbike from Pattaya motorbike rentals and I get that for around about 70 pounds per month. I get a little bit of a better bike.

I could get it cheaper if I wanted or I could just do away with the bike and just get taxis as most taxi journeys are like 30 or 40 baht. And the fuel as well, probably around about 5 pounds a month on fuel.

Nights Out And Activities

Now, what about nights out? I’m in the party center of Thailand, so you’d think I’m going to go out partying a bit. Well, I don’t really do that much anymore.

I used to when I was streaming a lot more, but I’d say over a month I’d probably spend all of 50 pounds or 2,000 baht on nights out. And those nights out would be once a week, once every couple of weeks, just going to a beer bar, having a few beers and just playing some pool with some mates. Not doing anything like buying girls lady drinks or going with girls or anything like that.

I’m just here doing my thing, enjoying life. So, yes, you can live here in Pattaya and not go out and party. Other activities I’d probably say around about 40 pounds per month I’d spend on things like going to sauna clubs, maybe the odd cinema trip, going to play pool or snooker at the likes of S1 Pool Club, which each month, yeah, 40 pounds a month on activities.

I don’t really go out too much.

Gym Subscriptions And Extras

Next is the gym. Now, my condo does have a gym, but not as advanced as I’d like. I was previously a personal trainer, so I do like a gym with a little bit better equipment.

So, I go to Sun Fitness, which is on Soi Buakhao, and this costs 1,090 baht per month. I mostly like it because it’s right in the center of Soi Buakhao, so going to have a coffee or so before the gym is easily done. And after the gym, you can go literally opposite, there is a market which sells clothes, food, snacks, and loads of Thai dishes.

The odd bits and bobs like subscriptions that I’ve got, so I spend about 10 pounds a month on that. Funnily enough, the only reason I mention this, if anyone’s got Premium and you come to Thailand, cancel your Premium and then start it back up in Thailand. Premium in the UK was like 12 pounds 99 a month, but in Thailand it’s like 5 pounds a month.

Don’t know, work that one out. Then on miscellaneous stuff like water, cooking essentials, random 7 Eleven trips, toilet roll, laundry, that kind of thing. I would estimate that to round about 50 pounds a month.

Monthly Total And Cheapest Budget

So, all in all, my expenses add up to 947 pounds per month on average. If any of you are sitting there and thinking, well, what do you do with your day? Sounds boring.

I’ll get to that in just a minute. But the funny thing is, I sat back and thought, I could actually live on a lot less, to be honest. So, what is the cheapest that I actually could try to live on?

Cutting The Budget Lower

If I was to eat two to three meals each day, having like my cheap cereal in the morning, and then the restaurant right next to my condo, which is super cheap, not go out to drink coffee or any fancy restaurants or anything like this, I could shed 150 pounds off my food bill per month. I could ditch my motorbike and then only take taxis, which would probably only be about 20 pounds a month on taxis. I could stop going to the gym and use my condo gym.

I could go on no nights out, just when I meet friends, just have a friend come round or go round theirs or just go for a walk on the beach. I could drop my subscriptions and just live with a few more ads. I could do my own laundry, just take all my stuff to one of the laundry places and it’s about 60 to 70 baht for your laundry.

And then maybe less 7 Eleven trips. So, with all of that taken off my current budget, I could live on 632 pounds a month, which would probably be quite boring with not a lot of variety going on.

Daily Life In Pattaya

But, let me tell you what a day in the life looks like for me. A lot of my time I’m thinking of ideas for online content, I’ll be editing or filming. But, in terms of my hobbies, I’m currently learning Thai.

I have three lessons a week of Thai. I study about 30 minutes to an hour a day of Thai. I watch online content quite a lot and I’m an avid gamer.

I managed to buy a computer here in Thailand with a couple of screens. I got this computer all in including the screens, the monitor arms, and the base unit itself for about 1,100 pounds from I have CPU. I’m an avid reader as well.

I love getting a new book. I love reading about psychology and various books about self development or just random true story books. I do try to practice a little bit of kind of meditation here and there and just kind of live a peaceful life.

Budget Living Advice

So, if I had any advice for you, if you wanted to come and live a kind of similar life like living abroad, working online, and being in a city like Pattaya, I think the number one advice is that partying is not going anywhere. The reason I say that is because most of the time when you’re here, you start thinking to yourself, “If I don’t go out, I’m going to miss something. I’m going to miss someone.

I’m going to miss a great night out with the boys. ” And that’s just general FOMO, fear of missing out.

Goals Gratitude And Direction

And secondly, is to practice gratitude. And that sounds so silly, but you just got to kind of ground yourself a bit and be like, “If you can manage to make money online, live in a country as beautiful as Thailand, be in a city that just has everything at your fingertips with great weather, great people, you have to kind of pause for a moment and just be grateful of where you are and what you have. ” Because if I feel you don’t practice gratitude and feel grateful for kind of where you’re at, you’ll start to get unappreciative and eventually get bored.

And what does boredom lead to? It leads to doing activities, spending money, going on nights out, and that’s not a good road to go down. So, set yourself a goal.

My goal is to get 100k followers and become fluent in the Thai language. Every day, I’m progressing closer towards that goal, so I have something to focus on. People who lose their way typically just have no direction, whether that be direction in life or work or love, whatever it may be, but have a goal that will help you.

Choosing Friends And Staying Focused

And also, choose your friends wisely. If you’re coming to a city as vibrant as Pattaya and you want to remain on a budget, then the people around you really do heavily influence how much money you spend. If you have friends that like going for walks on the beach and they’re just enjoying the sauna club every now and again, you’re not going to spend much money.

But if you have friends every two or three days poking you and prodding you, trying to convince you to come out for a few beers, that’s going to lead to be a little bit expensive. Three years ago, I tried to live in Pattaya and I failed. I only actually lasted five months.