Korean Job Discussion Forums

[jonpurdy]

I seem to be having a damn hard time keeping any sort of reasonable budget here. For those of you who go out more than a couple of times a week and own cars and motorcycles, is 1.5 million per month a reasonable amount of money to spend? We're talking drinking (half the time import beer, the other half domestic), eating (foreign restaurants maybe once or twice a month but Korean galbi places a lot), gasoline, gym membership, travelling to Seoul, clothes, etc. Or am I overdoing it?

[nukeday]

We all have our different standard of living and circumstances. Sounds like you have a healthy social life. If you really want to reduce your expenditures by 500,000 won or whatever per month, obviously you'll have to make sacrifices.

I don't own any vehicles, I seldom leave Seoul, and clothing is something I buy once in a blue moon. But, that's me.

[Illysook]

Food prices have increased drastically this year and I've been spending more on everyday things as well. Saving money will require more focus now. It's all about choices. You could decide to save less each month and stay in Korea longer, or you could cut back on luxuries.

I will not be taking a winter vacation this year as I've decided that there are other things that I want to do more. I also do most of my cooking and drinking at home.

[toby99]

I have a hard time too, mostly from going out all the time. I'll try to start out the night by drinking cheap stuff like soju and a mixer, but by the time I'm hammered I'm buying the 3rd and 4th rounds out with boys, so it's very easy to burn through 100K+ (and often much more) on weeknights. I tried to solve this by only bringing out my limit for what I wanted to spend, in cash, and leaving everything else at home. Usually works well.

[sojusucks]

Any money you can save, even if it's just a couple hundred thousand won, will be better than nothing if an emergency strikes.

[redaxe]

If you live in Ulsan, just cut out the trips to Seoul and you'll start saving a lot more money.

[northway]

You're a hell of a lot better off drinking wise if you try to confine your drinking to GS/your house/your buddies' houses. Those 3,000 CC pitchers are cheap until you start pounding two or three of them with a buddy on a weeknight.

[decolyon]

Having any kind of personal transportation (car or motorcycle) is def. expensive. If you sacrificed that and started using subway and the buses (occasional taxis) you'd see a dramatic difference. All my friends with cars say it helps with the social status, but it hurts the wallet.

Limit your foreign eating to once a month or every 6 weeks or so. You can fix foreign food at home from Korean stuff you buy at the store. It takes some imagination and trial and error, but it works. Eat local and eat seasonal. It's cheaper.

Having a social life is good for yourself, but going out too often can hurt. Once a week is enough. Quality over quantity.

Here's what I do. When you get your paycheck, pay all your bills. At then end of that, put 10% of what's left in your savings. Don't touch it unless you know you can give it back to yourself relatively soon. Savings is for big things i.e. emergency flights homes, emergency vacations, new computer after your old one crashes and so on. Then, sit down and seriously think about how much you need to spend on a daily basis. Do you buy coffees and snacks? Do you have to eat out? Whatever it is, minus that monthly total from what's left (Pay check - bills - savings - minus daily allowance.) After all that, if you have anything left, that's your buffer. Thats there in case you have to buy a lot at the grocery store one week or you had to take a taxi too much or whatever.

This plan served me well. I have a pretty good savings going. I've learned to live within my means, and whatever's left from my daily allowance at the end of the month, I just tack it on to my savings. If my job didn't pay me for the next two months, I'd be okay. Even at that point, I could fly myself home and still have a little left over.

[dharma bum]

It used to be much easier for me to make ends meet and put a little bit back each month, but I find myself saving less and less and having more and more trouble budgeting these days because of rising food prices, etc., and because I've stopped living as simply as I once did. If you want to save, cook for yourself or eat regular Korean food at restaurants (cut back on the kalbi) and, if you have to drink, stick to domestic beer. It's easy to live cheaply here until you try to indulge in extra stuff or live a western lifestyle; that's when you can run into problems. Even then, though, I'd say stagnating wages coupled with price inflation have made it (much?) harder for a teacher starting out to save as much as he/she could have 5 or so years ago.

[thegadfly]

[allovertheplace]

best thing I did was get a second gig. I was so tired I ended up spending less and making more. Bit jump in funds. Other than that, just get hammered once in a while but make it so bad you cant drink for a few days.

[Slowmotion]

The way I saved money so I could move and have 1,000만원 deposit money was to have the bank automatically take money from my checking account every month and move it to my savings account. They took around $1,000 out every month and I had to spend smarter and make a few sacrifices since I couldn't spend the money in the savings account.

[hallazgo]

foreigner restaurants are expensive as &*^*^. Its way cheaper to buy western food and cook it yourself than going to those places. For that matter, eating out in general is way more expensive than cooking.

Find some food you can easily make and stuff your face at home before going out. Even if you have to go to a foreigner joint you won't be so hungry you'll buy everything on the menu and spend your entire wad there.

[Yaya]

Ditch the motorized bike or car.

Go dutch while drinking unless you owe someone something. Lots of free riders among expats here.

Find things to do that doesn't require money like sports or exercise or other activities.

Start hanging out with people who don't always get trashed and also those who don't expect you to foot the bill.

[le-paul]

bike alone does it for me

really depends how you look at it - you could say your young live it up and all that - renew and save next year. Thats what a lot of people do - in that case dont worry about it.

On the other hand - if like myself, youd like to save up for something (for example a holiday at the end/during contract) - maybe you should try cutting back on those unecessary luxuries -

i always think need vs want when Im saving.