Living Costs in the Dominican Republic

sayanora

Silver
Feb 22, 2012
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I also doubt you are budgeting gas, oil, and seasonings in the 50-120 pesos estimate, that's extremely low. Not everyone has a solar cooker and cooks without sazon :)
 

SantiagueroRD

Bronze
Apr 20, 2011
766
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In Santiago I give my amazing housekeeper 2000 pesos a week for three adult big eaters. It covers two complete meals and fruit snacks. Every day is a different meat (chicken, beef, pork), eggs, starch, beans, vegetable, fruit and there is usually two types of some of them. I am not sure where she shops but I think small shops. I did find a foot in my fried chicken last week which kinda threw me off!
 

bronzeallspice

Live everyday like it's your last
Mar 26, 2012
11,009
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In Santiago I give my amazing housekeeper 2000 pesos a week for three adult big eaters. It covers two complete meals and fruit snacks. Every day is a different meat (chicken, beef, pork), eggs, starch, beans, vegetable, fruit and there is usually two types of some of them. I am not sure where she shops but I think small shops. I did find a foot in my fried chicken last week which kinda threw me off!

Wow, that's pretty good.If you can stick to eating local produce,you'll be fine living in the DR.
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
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In Santiago I give my amazing housekeeper 2000 pesos a week for three adult big eaters. It covers two complete meals and fruit snacks. Every day is a different meat (chicken, beef, pork), eggs, starch, beans, vegetable, fruit and there is usually two types of some of them. I am not sure where she shops but I think small shops. I did find a foot in my fried chicken last week which kinda threw me off!

Great post - sounds about right.
Some good recepies for a healthy diet - lentil soup anyone? mock duck?


http://1940sexperiment.wordpress.com/100-wartime-recipes/

yapask1
 
Last edited:

bronzeallspice

Live everyday like it's your last
Mar 26, 2012
11,009
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Great post - sounds about right.
Some good recepies for a healthy diet - lentil soup anyone? mock duck?

yapask1

What's the point in making mock duck when there's no duck in it?:rolleyes:

I've never been able to understand recipes like that!:D
 

MikeFisher

The Fisherman/Weather Mod
Feb 28, 2006
13,896
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Punta Cana/DR
www.mikefisher.fun
150-200 a day per person buys a good European diet in the DR.

Main meals can cost between 50 and 120 pesos per person to prepare with local ingredients.

French wines are extra.

yapask1

200 pesos per day per person would make the 18K for 3 months per person,
but we've been talking feeding a family, which usually contains more than one person,
a small family of 2 adults with just one child would cut your 200 pesos calc by 1/3rd for the day,
and such 1/3rd relly would not even pay the daily needed Pampers for my BabyGal.

Mike
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
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Santia seems to have good ideas. 80- 100 a day per person could well be possible but would be without prawns, steak, tuna, brocoli, good salami, fresh french bread and other expensive items. Small children generally need smaller portions. Lentil or mixed bean soup with side dish pasta followed by pancakes with fruit puree, sugar, is a good nourishing budget meal at about 25 pesos a single meal. Lentils, beans of course are dried. Cook in pressure cooker.
yapask1
 

DRob

Gold
Aug 15, 2007
8,234
594
113
Again, the point of this thread is to provide folks with general, mainstream living costs.

Yappy, loading it down with a dozen posts a day on nourishing lentil soup cooked in solar ovens is NOT helpful to the vast majority of readers.

There are a number of "live CHEAPLY in the DR" threads on this board, where talk of using your personal nuclear reactor to slow cook coconut and seaweed soup would be welcome.
 

MikeFisher

The Fisherman/Weather Mod
Feb 28, 2006
13,896
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Punta Cana/DR
www.mikefisher.fun
Santia seems to have good ideas. 80- 100 a day per person could well be possible but would be without prawns, steak, tuna, brocoli, good salami, fresh french bread and other expensive items. Small children generally need smaller portions. Lentil or mixed bean soup with side dish pasta followed by pancakes with fruit puree, sugar, is a good nourishing budget meal at about 25 pesos a single meal. Lentils, beans of course are dried. Cook in pressure cooker.
yapask1

small children and Babie need smaller portions, that's correct,
but as fact they also need the much more expensive diet than a adult person, they need their vitamins and specific bsic Baby Diet Stuff, which costs per day without any unnecessary luxuries well more than the average non luxury diet of a adult person.
Diapers, whipers and baby formula only(and of course they are not all what a baby needs on daily bases) cost per day more than I need for myself to have 3 good average meals per day(bot talking restaurants or fancy crap, just healthy good tasting Food). and those lil ones need more med attention once in a while than we ole folks on average need, so under the line a additional Baby/small child in the family adds more than the cost of just one adult to the needed budget for a family.

of course I am talking small children/Babies only, once they start to go to school you can throw all the above into the trashcan and multiply your prior budgets by well significant multipliers.
we have 3 Boys (17,11,9) and a Babygal(2), we raised almost 2 dozens already, bet your Solar Azz that I know what i am talking about when we talk ''simple daily living costs in the DR''.
200 pesos per day per person my ....

Mike
 

MikeFisher

The Fisherman/Weather Mod
Feb 28, 2006
13,896
2,486
113
Punta Cana/DR
www.mikefisher.fun
Again, the point of this thread is to provide folks with general, mainstream living costs.

Yappy, loading it down with a dozen posts a day on nourishing lentil soup cooked in solar ovens is NOT helpful to the vast majority of readers.

There are a number of "live CHEAPLY in the DR" threads on this board, where talk of using your personal nuclear reactor to slow cook coconut and seaweed soup would be welcome.

you forgot to mention that they can smoke da Grass from the Sea, and it is provided here for Free, as the Sea throws it up on da Beaches in huge amounts on daily bases.
Weed-Light,
you can light that smoke with the flame of a Solar Cooker and the private nuklear powerplant life will be all fine, lol.

I grew up in the late 60's/early 70's,
been big Fun,
but aside of the smokes we had nothing in common with today's Caribbean Ex-Pat Solar Cookers.

Mike
 

belgiank

Silver
Jun 13, 2009
3,251
103
0
200 pesos per day per person would make the 18K for 3 months per person,
but we've been talking feeding a family, which usually contains more than one person,
a small family of 2 adults with just one child would cut your 200 pesos calc by 1/3rd for the day,
and such 1/3rd relly would not even pay the daily needed Pampers for my BabyGal.

Mike

Mike,

Somehow you do not think like Yappie, and this when you live in the prime location for his kind of lifestyle.

Let me educate you, the Yappie way...
- you are a fishermen, who lets customers pay for the gasoline of his boat, and you get to keep at least a couple of fish. Eat fish a lot (good for you), and trade others for chickens, a pig or even a cow. So no expenses for protein.
- after a trip, take your customers to the local bar, and let them buy you beers. This saves you another couple of hundred pesos a day.
- you must have access to plenty of seaweed. You can stew this, or make a soup out of it, together with the fish.
- you must have access to plenty of driftwood. Use this for cooking your food, or for grilling your fish. You might want to park your car in the full sun, as this will enable you to fry your fish, or eggs on the hood. This will safe you on collecting driftwood.
- meet your customers early, and let them buy you coffee and breakfast.
- as for the diapers. Go back to the old-fashioned cotton ones, and wash them in the ocean right in front of you. I admit they will be a bit rough on the bum of your little girl, but this will teach her at an early age that life can be tough.

If we look at all of the above advice, Yappie is actually a big spender, as you could live almost for free.

And the best news of all, I gave you this advice for FREEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!

BelgianK
DR1 consultant for Yappie living.

PS: when do we meet for some good bludwurst, pate, german salami and schinken? Somehow, I do not follow my own advice... lol
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
477
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0
Many people buy one months supply baby food from Heinz etc. Find out what baby likes etc. They sterilize the jars and refill with their own cooked food. Also well cook portions of family meals.

Older children can be partially self-sufficient given access to a plot of land. Looking after chickens and growing veg is great.
Many children of 9 up help with allotments in the advanced world.
Family Gardening | kidsgardening.org
There is much information in books and on the internet.

I know from my own experience that producing food for the family gives a sense of accomplishment.

yapask1



I was talking about food only at 200 per day per person.

Paper diapers are not only expensive but are bad for the environment.

small children and Babie need smaller portions, that's correct,
but as fact they also need the much more expensive diet than a adult person, they need their vitamins and specific bsic Baby Diet Stuff, which costs per day without any unnecessary luxuries well more than the average non luxury diet of a adult person.
Diapers, whipers and baby formula only(and of course they are not all what a baby needs on daily bases) cost per day more than I need for myself to have 3 good average meals per day(bot talking restaurants or fancy crap, just healthy good tasting Food). and those lil ones need more med attention once in a while than we ole folks on average need, so under the line a additional Baby/small child in the family adds more than the cost of just one adult to the needed budget for a family.

of course I am talking small children/Babies only, once they start to go to school you can throw all the above into the trashcan and multiply your prior budgets by well significant multipliers.
we have 3 Boys (17,11,9) and a Babygal(2), we raised almost 2 dozens already, bet your Solar Azz that I know what i am talking about when we talk ''simple daily living costs in the DR''.
200 pesos per day per person my ....

Mike
 

MikeFisher

The Fisherman/Weather Mod
Feb 28, 2006
13,896
2,486
113
Punta Cana/DR
www.mikefisher.fun
Mike,

Somehow you do not think like Yappie, and this when you live in the prime location for his kind of lifestyle.

Let me educate you, the Yappie way...
- you are a fishermen, who lets customers pay for the gasoline of his boat, and you get to keep at least a couple of fish. Eat fish a lot (good for you), and trade others for chickens, a pig or even a cow. So no expenses for protein.
- after a trip, take your customers to the local bar, and let them buy you beers. This saves you another couple of hundred pesos a day.
- you must have access to plenty of seaweed. You can stew this, or make a soup out of it, together with the fish.
- you must have access to plenty of driftwood. Use this for cooking your food, or for grilling your fish. You might want to park your car in the full sun, as this will enable you to fry your fish, or eggs on the hood. This will safe you on collecting driftwood.
- meet your customers early, and let them buy you coffee and breakfast.
- as for the diapers. Go back to the old-fashioned cotton ones, and wash them in the ocean right in front of you. I admit they will be a bit rough on the bum of your little girl, but this will teach her at an early age that life can be tough.

If we look at all of the above advice, Yappie is actually a big spender, as you could live almost for free.

And the best news of all, I gave you this advice for FREEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!

BelgianK
DR1 consultant for Yappie living.

PS: when do we meet for some good bludwurst, pate, german salami and schinken? Somehow, I do not follow my own advice... lol

that's what I am talking about, that's my Boy, You da Man,
heck, who wanna care about Diapers???, for that I have a wife, 8 Ex-Wifes, 2 Nannies, a swwet Maid and even my darn Gardener is a good looking Female taking care about da Flowers and she sure can wash a Diaper, too.
let's cut da crap out and continue to talk about the valuable Living Costs Stuff, for example the Blutwurst, how much per pound and when do you bring the first quintal down here???(I pay the Beers). my Weisswurst(from Sosua) runs for 270 pesos per libra, you don't need to bring that one, as I always have several dozens of those sweet lil thingies in the Freezer, unfortunately all of my Gals in the househeld love them, too.

Mike
 

MikeFisher

The Fisherman/Weather Mod
Feb 28, 2006
13,896
2,486
113
Punta Cana/DR
www.mikefisher.fun
Holy Crap.
o.k., here's the short version of my answer to the Seagrass smoking generation:

* I will not discuss Diapers with you, as I leave that stuff to the Mrs and her Gals-Gang
* I will never ever allow that my BabyGal wastes her valuable growing up time with raising chicken to get a plate of food on the table, hopefully I will get her into a good school where she can explorer and learn by her own abilities, the more the better but without high set bars, as I would not push her to something which would not suit her abilities. if she finally cames out as a simple Captain of a offshore fishing yacht not making more than 100 grand per year, then I will accept that, important is that she will feel fine on what she does. as for the chickens, she loves our Ranch and all the animals there, including the chicken, as most children do, but the heck would I tell her that the plate she eat an hour ago was her Sweet "PiepPiep" she played with yesterday, after I told her that the bad Cat of the neighbour took it. yeah, you may have realized it already, she HATES Cats, as the chicken are not the only animals who once in a while disapear.
* I was also talking about food of 200 pesos per person per day, in case it wasn't clear in my prior postings, My BabyGal would Starve to DEAD with 200 pesos per day, and she does still not demand to smoke any kinda grass or such.

Mike
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
477
0
0
Sorry DRob for overposting.

Many times I meet gringos that have arrived with many coins in their fancy designer pants - in 2-5 years they depart with few.
Budgets such as generally displayed on this thread that involve trailing round supermarkets picking expensive imported goods, huge power bills, gasoline bills, eating out frequently at fancy restaurants etc. etc. are often to blame. They meet their very own fiscal cliff!

Some months their income may not be enough but they spend anyhow.
"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen nineteen
six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty
pounds ought and six, result misery."​
Dickens.

Personally I think in one thread it is good to give a range of budgets and ideas for spending money to best advantage, ssometimes lavish, sometimes economical. We are in an austerity era.

Dominican Republic: Black Bean Soup | Caribbean Recipes

Who knows - even those on $2,000 a month might enjoy bean soup.

Advertisers on this site have property starting at 40k$

yapask1









Again, the point of this thread is to provide folks with general, mainstream living costs.

Yappy, loading it down with a dozen posts a day on nourishing lentil soup cooked in solar ovens is NOT helpful to the vast majority of readers.

There are a number of "live CHEAPLY in the DR" threads on this board, where talk of using your personal nuclear reactor to slow cook coconut and seaweed soup would be welcome.
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
477
0
0
Hope their are still fish in the sea in 30 years time through overfishing. Hope as a good sports fisherman you let everything swim away......

And you use a sea canoe or yacht for fishing to save fuel, pollution and churning the ocean floor.

Sea kayak fishing

yapask1



Holy Crap.
o.k., here's the short version of my answer to the Seagrass smoking generation:

* I will not discuss Diapers with you, as I leave that stuff to the Mrs and her Gals-Gang
* I will never ever allow that my BabyGal wastes her valuable growing up time with raising chicken to get a plate of food on the table, hopefully I will get her into a good school where she can explorer and learn by her own abilities, the more the better but without high set bars, as I would not push her to something which would not suit her abilities. if she finally cames out as a simple Captain of a offshore fishing yacht not making more than 100 grand per year, then I will accept that, important is that she will feel fine on what she does. as for the chickens, she loves our Ranch and all the animals there, including the chicken, as most children do, but the heck would I tell her that the plate she eat an hour ago was her Sweet "PiepPiep" she played with yesterday, after I told her that the bad Cat of the neighbour took it. yeah, you may have realized it already, she HATES Cats, as the chicken are not the only animals who once in a while disapear.
* I was also talking about food of 200 pesos per person per day, in case it wasn't clear in my prior postings, My BabyGal would Starve to DEAD with 200 pesos per day, and she does still not demand to smoke any kinda grass or such.

Mike
 

Criss Colon

Platinum
Jan 2, 2002
21,843
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39
yahoomail.com
It has been my experience in life, that those who preach the benefits of a very frugal (CHEAP) existence, do so, because that's all they can afford!!!!
I preach,"Conspicious Consumption", because that's what I can afford!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Therefore:..."Nanny Nanny Foo Foo, Wash Your Hair In Poo Poo, Wash It Out With Pee Pee!!!!!!!"
Supermercado National has imported "Gourmet Foods" on "special" this week!
"Gotta Run!"
CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC
 

yapask1

New member
Jul 23, 2012
477
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I, along with many other people must be exceptions. Consumption is not in vogue.

BBC News - Jose Mujica: The world's 'poorest' president

yapask1

It has been my experience in life, that those who preach the benefits of a very frugal (CHEAP) existence, do so, because that's all they can afford!!!!
I preach,"Conspicious Consumption", because that's what I can afford!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Therefore:..."Nanny Nanny Foo Foo, Wash Your Hair In Poo Poo, Wash It Out With Pee Pee!!!!!!!"
Supermercado National has imported "Gourmet Foods" on "special" this week!
"Gotta Run!"
CCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCC

yapask1