For the past three months me and my wife have recorded every penny we have spent using a combination of a Google form and sheet, and I will share the data so that those interested to learn about the expenses associated with raising a child in Taiwan can get a better insight.
So the data is actually contextually useful, I will first give some key information about our life:
- Two adults and one child (almost 2 years old)
- We live in New Taipei City, in one of the more expensive districts
- We rent; apartment is 14 years old, <20 ping, in a managed building with an elevator
- My wife stays at home and looks after our daughter, so no kindergarten costs
- On weekdays my wife cooks dinner for everyone
- On weekdays my wife cooks breakfast and lunch for herself and my daughter
- On the weekend we eat out or order in for every meal
- I don’t work from home, and I travel for about an hour each way every day
So far we have recorded all expenses for May, June and July.
May: $58,749
June: $83,805 (high because my mom visited from the UK)
July: $51,973
Excluding June, where our expenses were higher because we ate out at fancy restaurants, our average monthly expenses are $55,361, which includes $21,252 in rent and management fees.
Excluding rent, our average monthly expenses are $34,109.
In July, our monthly expenses were broken down into the following categories:
Rent & building management fees: $21,252
Supermarket food and household items: $8,589
Eating out/ordering in for lunch: $5,184
Eating out/ordering in for dinner: $3,923
Public transport (mainly going to/from work): $2,680
Eating out/ordering in for breakfast: $2,421
Other bills (Netflix, VPN, etc): $1,732
Snacks & drinks: $1,533
Unexpected one off expenses: $1,391
Utility bills (water, electricity, gas): $1,288
Baby items (mainly diapers): $813
Other random stuff: $662
Taxis: $465
Bank transfer fees: $40
It is worth noting that in these calculations I did not include labor and health insurance contributions because these are automatically deducted from my salary, and since the amount paid for these items is based on salary amount, the contribution amount would be different amounts for everyone. I also did not include our private insurance payments in the above calculations because we pay once per year; it comes out to about $75,000 or $6,000 per month.
We are actively trying to reduce our costs, and we could save a lot more if we ate out more instead of cooking, but we are trying to eat healthy, and that is very hard to do when eating out.
Hope this helps someone!
