Rich foreigners

How many foreigners made it in Taiwan big?

I have this in mind lately how many foreigners actually good rich in Taiwan. Didn’t recognise much opportunities for myself back in 2015. Overvalued real estate market, language and cultural barrier. Being without manufacturing skills. On another hand is small island with high concentration of capital. Cram schools business must have been less competitive in 90s and damn 600 twd was a good hourly rate. Housing was cheaper, maybe someone was smart and aquirred more houses. Taiwan produces a lot of stuff, from textile, and plastic, over bikes to chips. Heard for Canadians producing drones in South, and hiring a lot of people.

Only thing I can think for myself is outsource IT and hire, manage Taiwanese to do projects for German companies. Same job as I do now with mostly east European.

very few got rich, some got well off, but not rich.
moat of the rich foreigners I know either married rich TW family, or had a factory or trading company.
the one I meet today mostly manufacturing in CN or VN.

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I know a few who made the big money, most people just getting by like anywhere else. To be honest with your IT skills you could probably make big money in Europe aswell you don’t need to go to Taiwan to do that. Running a team of programmers in Taiwan. It’s feasible but you are going to need to be hands-on with them (like touching their knees …Their shoulders…Bad joke…But you would get it if you lived here long enough :grin:).

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I got loadza money :moneybag:

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What does rich mean? does owning a paid off apartment in a major city here make one rich or what level are you asking?

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At least 8. Gotta consider the taxes.

I know a few personally and read or heard about others. Generally I think western foreigners are worse off than their counterparts in many of their home countries , given the same background . It’s not the land of milk and honey. You ain’t getting an easy ride unless you marry into it.
The guys…And they are all guys…Who I know made mega money were almost all OEM/OEM manufacturing niche of some sort (think 5G, mass medical devices) and set up global operations. There’s also a few that provide some services related to education or finance.

Of course the next level down are your smaller scale exporters of components, parts ,machinery and service providers and local entrepeneurs with food supply , drinks, dealerships, CEOs etc. I tried a few times (with and without Taiwanese ) and either I don’t have the luck , stamina or aptitude for it.

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As someone who has tried to get this going for years, I can assure you you are better off with Eastern Europeans. Way more bang for the buck, so to speak.

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I’m not going to lie it seems like even people on here make a ton or have a ton of money. I barely make anything. I don’t understand :frowning:

To be fair quite a few people on here are married.

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That means we got less money in our pockets dude !

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You can afford nicer things with a combined income. I can’t afford 20k nt apartment but combined that’s 10k and affordable.

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i think a better term is dual income, not combined income.
when you are married, your income is combined even if you only have 1 salary :slight_smile:
if your wife works you have 2 salaries which combined together bring more money. of course if you are are single and work 2 jobs, then you can also make more money :slight_smile:

I’m not really sure what the OP is asking, and there is obviously a lot of fuzziness when you are talking about being “rich” or making a “ton of money”.

Both my wife and I work for American companies and are making roughly what we made in the US, except we’re doing it here. My wife’s company sent her here, so there are some “perks” she gets that makes her income higher like paying for school and giving a base amount for housing…but neither of those things would be necessary in the US where our standard of living would be higher even if we made less.

My company doesn’t even really want me here. I told them I was moving here and if they still wanted me to work for them asked them to accommodate me. As I said, I get roughly what I made in the US, but that money doesn’t go nearly as far here.

In short, I consider myself as rich as I would want to be, but doubt I would fall into what most people would consider rich in the US and moving here didn’t substantially help my income level.

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My family basically has one income. Key word is family…Kids. So everytime you do something you are paying 3x,4x,5x…try it …And get back to me :point_up:.

I can afford some nice things because in between posting here I worked really hard for a very long time. There were years I got no leave at all. Try it out !!!

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And here I was thinking Forumosa is your full time gig

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interesting, my major expenses are housing and education, if you have that covered by work i thought it will give a boost to disposable income.

If it paid me by post I could claim that.

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Implying the the rest of us aren’t doing the same. Hence the confusion :roll_eyes:

I know lots of teachers and folks here had easier time in terms of time off. Summer breaks, winter breaks.

Yes, but school is free in the US and the difference between what the company pays for housing and what we pay for housing in Taipei is more than the mortgage I pay on my house in the US, which is much nicer than my home here. There’s obviously an apples to oranges comparison going on here as I live in Taipei, but the fact remains my standard of living is lower here than in the US and my expenses higher.

Don’t get me wrong…I’m not complaining. Life is great here for me and my family and I enjoy living here. But if it weren’t for my wife’s work I’d be gone in a heartbeat.

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