Cost of Living in Indonesia in 2020

Shill88 wrote:

Forgot to mention, what some people do here is rent out rooms for extra cash. As our area has a lot of offices and schools and a university, it makes sense to earn a little extra money by renting out rooms. In the house next door we have split it into a 2 bedroom house with a studio pavilion and four kost rooms. The rooms rents from Rp800k to Rp1 million each per month and the studio for Rp2.5 million per month, while the house rents for Rp65 million per year. If we were to rent the house out we could probably earn only Rp65 - 70 million per month but by splitting it up during the latest renovation we have almost doubled our income. Renting out rooms to students and working staff is a good way to earn some good extra cash and it pays for most of our living costs.

We found out that somebody in our street converted his house to have 15 kost rooms and earns Rp15 million per month for basic rooms with shared bathroom. He is trying to sell that house to us for Rp4 billion so I think he must be dreaming. Another is charging Rp1.2 million per room inclusive of WiFi and Aircon and private bathrooms.

My kids school is quite far away, takes half an hour to drive there and 30 - 45 minutes to return home depending on the traffic, so petrol which costs somewhere between Rp10k - 12k per liter is a lot and a full tank costs me around Rp600k+. My father in law has a smaller car and he normally takes the kids to school as he has free time while I pick them up in the afternoon.

Like Fred, our kids also follow a Cambridge curriculum. They have extra-curricular activities but we pay for private music and art lessons in addition to those offered at school. There are always plenty of choices for this kind of activities outside of school and usually the costs are not all that much.

We pay Rp50k per month for security, Rp50k per month for garbage collection, and we both teach English in the local community hall once a week since the Chairman twisted our arms to do this.

Eating out can be really cheap especially if you like local food. You can get really nice local food for around Rp30k - 50k per person and if you like street food then you only need to spend around Rp10k - Rp20k for a big meal.

We don't smoke or drink alcohol so we definitely save there.

So need to consider also the big investment u faced to set up a company to rent out rooms, at least around USD 178.000 paid up capital for PT/PMA.
Im thinking also about the cost of rentals, probably dipend from the area, cause I see u rent a studio for 30 Milion Rp/year and Fred pay for his 3 rooms house 18 Milion/years, both still less than in Bali where I live.

Fred wrote:

Bali prices have, as I understand it, gone even crazier than Jakarta's. I moved from Jakarta because I refused to pay the nutcase rents out there. I get twice as good for half the money in a smaller town.

Indeed Im seriously thinking to leave Bali and move to another island out there, Im doing my reaserch, so many options!!!