Moving to Portugal's already reduced my basic cost of living expenses by 60%!

in LeoFinance3 years ago

The main reason for my moving to Portugal was to cut my cost of living expenses by at least 30%, and having been here for only two weeks, I’m going to declare 100% success.

At least in terms of my basic cost of living expenses - shelter and utilities, I've managed a 60% saving!

I’ve managed to find a nice cabin to stay in with a friend for the winter, and I’ve decided to gift her 260 EU a month for the foreseeable future, completely unrelated to staying in said cabin, and then another (estimated) 40 EU on top for bills.

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It’s a pretty basic cabin - it has a double bed, which I’m going to collapse into a single bed, a sofa, a table with kitchen stuff on it, and just about enough floor space to do some yoga stretches, but it’s enough for one person, more than sufficient.

Then there’s a large decking area outside, twice as large as the cabin space, with a nice table, which is going to be my work table for autumn, although I imagine by late November I’ll be mostly inside. Now I’m thinking it’s a damn shame I couldn’t fit my folding desk in the car, it would have been perfect for this cabin!

I’ve also got an outside kitchen area, which will probably need covering for the coming winter, powered by a portable gas bottle (covered in the bills contribution).

I’ve also got a fridge freezer outside, so yes, there is electricity, so no need to rely on my solar set up just yet.

And I’ve got a separate compost toilet a suitable distance away from the cabin, and a a nice separate shower and washing up area next to the cabin, water from a borehole, but not drinkable, so I have to fetch my local water from a font in a nearby town, which is a bit of a pain, but if I get two 25 litre water canisters and make early morning trips once a week/ fortnight, that won’t be too much hassle!

So that’s 300 EU all in for my housing, electric, gas, water. No tax.

That compares to…. 650 mortgage/ mortgage insurance, 90 council tax, and almost 100 EU in total bills.

So That’s 850 EU in total I was paying this time last month

Now I’m getting housing, gas, electricity, water, all for 300 EU a month!

So that’s a massive 60% saving on what I was spending.

I’m being a little cautious about calculating my savings - I’m hoping to negotiate getting a wood burning stove installed, which the cabin needs, and paying for it myself, and wood is quite expensive, but I just really really like wood burning stoves!

And I’ve got to buy a gas heater in the meantime (it is necessary) and some water butts for the water, so there are some capital expenses, but nothing too expensive!

Obviously I have other expenses too: car, internet, maintaining my rented out house back in the UK, but in terms of pure basic cost of living expenses, I’m winning, and I haven’t even begun to look for my own land yet!

There's not a lot I can for now about cutting down my other living expense - food, car, insurance, but even if that holds steady, shaving 60% off my shelter and utilities should give me an average overall saving of around 40%, which is pretty good going!

As a final note, more important than the money is my quality of life, I really like the person whose land I’m staying on, I’m at the foot of a mountain range, the climate is superb, it’s just so damn chill around here!

And the 4G connection is BETTER than in Hereford in the UK where I came from, which means I can spend as long as I like dicking about on Hive!

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Gasheaters work great - they have become much more efficient in the last years.

That is good to know!

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If you got water and electricity, why not get a RO (reverse osmosis) unit rather than head to the public font every so often?

Exactly what I was going to add until I saw your comment at the bottom!! You may also find its initial cost is offset by the cost of your time and fuel driving to town to fill up your water bottles!
Really proud of you for going for it and nice to see you settling in and sounding chilled and happy :-)

That's an interesting idea, I hadn't considered filtration, it might be necessary once I get land, but for now I think the font will do me, it's very tasty water!

You could of course also get one of those rucksacks with water canister built-in. Then make the font trip a part of your jogging. :)

Hmm that's actually a great idea! I certainly may aim to finish at that font, I guess 3 litres wouldn't be too much to carry back either!

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Portugal is nice, and well done on realizing the savings! I'm presuming you're at least breaking even on renting out your house back in the UK? And then, it's all but impossible to put a number on better quality of life... and the well-being that goes with not being stuck in the dreary UK in mid-winter. I lived my teen years in the south of Spain, so definitely thumbs-up for the climate.

Oh I think it's a similar climate to the South of Spain, wonderful!

The rent I've got coming in doesn't actually cover the cost of the mortgage, once agency fees are taken into account, but I have got the mortgage on a 10 year term rather than 25 years!

I can afford to sub it for a while, how long depends on how much I spend on my intended land purchase!

Often, the reason a location is cheaper is that the wages are lower. My parents moved to the Midlands (UK) long before I did. On one of my numerous visits from down south while looking through the local paper I exclaimed: "Wow, the rents up here are nearly half what I'm currently paying!" a couple of months later I handed in my notice, packed up my belongings and made the move it was only a few weeks later I found out the reason for the low rents, the wages were a disgrace!

Mind you, the interview process for the most basic of manual jobs was interesting: "What's your name? When can you start?" LOL

I shared this post on Twitter to try and get your work in front of more people.
You can find your post and me on Twitter if you like? https://twitter.com/dick_turpin
I've also upvoted you and shared your content on Hive.
I read your post. No Bots were used this was all done manually. Hope That Helps.


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Hey cheers, no problem with the Twitter thing.

I sold my flat in Surrey two years ago and bought a house in Hereford - nearly the Midlands!

I think these days with minimum wage, there's a bit more uniformity.

Something I don't understand is why there are ANY nurses in the South East - I mean you earn the same wage anywhere in the country (although there's probably a London weighting), so why they don't all move west and north is beyond me!

With teachers I get why you might want to live in a richer area - less behaviour issues, but with nurses, it's not as if caring for the poor is going to be harder than caring for the middle classes! Just different I would have thought.

I dunno, I suspect you get a better class of scumbag in richer areas?
So I have Twin daughters, wait for it, one is a Nurse and the other is a Teacher. LOL

The problem with Nursing is not the lack of funds, there's plenty of money and it's not the lack of vacancies there are 44,000 Nursing vacancies as of 2019 https://fullfact.org/election-2019/ask-fullfact-nhs-vacancies/

The problem is retaining (UK) trainee nurse this is why they actually did away with the bursaries. Lots of people sign up to train as nurses (Or did should I say?) but once their practical started where they had to wipe bums and mop up puke while someone was trying to stop their half severed arm from falling off the trainees started dropping out like flies. My daughter's course started at a hundred or so by the end there was five yep five that qualified out of her set so the bursary paid out for all those places which only produced five.


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That's one hell of an attrition rate.

I know they employ a lot of people from abroad the NHS!

That's why they have to trawl abroad. I think we lost our backbone on Flanders fields. 😉


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Glad you find a place that accomplishes your expectations. Your plan is being very well executed.

It's going pretty smoothly so far - I might come up against a few hitches once I try out my language skills to get my residency, but that's for next week!

Sweet!

If Spain wont have me then Portugal is on the list!

It's VERY cheap around here! Even in the local larger towns I've got options to rent for around 300-400 EU, pretty nice looking apartments.

The bottom end is around 250, so my strategy is to usually go 25% above that, so you filter all the real shit!

Yeah, on a UK salary that is top notch. We shall see :)

Looks like a cosy place. Hope it's comfortable for you over the winter. Have fun.

It's very comfortable - 11.00 a.m. and it's almost T shirt weather outside already.

Will need a heater for winter, but I've got a little while to get that sorted!

Awesome!!! I have to admit im suoer jealous.. but also stoked this plan has come to fruition!!!

Hey cheers! I'm pretty happy, but in Australia it's quite easy to off-grid isn't it?!?

I mean you don't have to move to a different country to make it financially viable?!?

Seems like a good set up and savings too! I'll be honest, I don't know the area very well and was wondering how cold it will get in winter? I guess that will dictate to some degree as far as what you'll need.

It gets down to zero in late December and January at night, and around 12 in the day, but it rapidly picks up in Feb and stays quite warm into late November, so it's not too bad!

Ah ok, about like the city I live in here in Australia although zero is rare, it's more 1 - 3 at night.

Given the above I think your plan is good, logical, and that you'll be fine. It sounds pretty cool actually...I'd love to do similar, and have plans to do so but for now, with Faith's mum's situation, we're locked in. I'm sure you'll keep us informed. Loving it. :)

Hey cheers,

Life can lock you in sometimes, you just have to get out when you can!

I've just had a chat with Faith about taking a year off, we're both keen. It's not 2021, but will happen. We'll travel Australia (it's a big country so a year won't cover it all, not thoroughly). We're pretty keen and already set up to do it with out off-roader and off-road camper trailer. I mentioned you and what you've done and she has since read a couple of your posts...She's not jealous, just motivated to start our own adventure.

Good to hear it! I spent ages planning my exodus, still not quite long enough, I could have been better prepared, but I don't think you can cover everything!

Sounds like a great plan travelling Aus, will you rent the house?

I'll probably sell mine as by then I think my mother in law may not be with us anymore so we will have hers. I think we'd retain the house though, lock it up and pay the bills a year in advance. If we decided that we wanted to settle down somewhere we would be able to sell up at that time and relocate as needed.

Congrats on finding such a sweet looking cabin for the winter. It sounds like you're all set, now you can lean back and enjoy the long journey of finding the land you want to buy.

Hey yes cheers, although I'll probably find that more stressful than fun! I'm in no rush, lots to do first online and offline!

Great to see you got yourself a nice and cozy cabin for the winter while saving money!

Hey cheers, I think I'll be very happy! Sorting out a heater is the next chore on the list!