Thank you!

Yes, I completely understand that my path is not viable among many career options. Yet, I see more and more opportunities of remote offices across many fields.. I’d encourage fellow DREAMERs focus of fields that have such flexibility, it could be your safety net in the future.

Travel is by far the highest expense (I don’t count investments such as properties or businesses) really depends how much travel you want to do and where. Inside of Mexico is pretty cheap 100-200 flights super cheap Airb&b’s and delicious cheap food everywhere! Across the Atlantic is another story... Mexico to Europe is around $800 -$1200 depending on the time of year, destination, and how far along you plan. A lot of EU cities are expensive but I’ve found Easter Europe not only architecturally and socially beautiful, but a lot much more affordable for long time travel. Wife and I decide to budget about $12-15K a year for travel and we do 2-3 overseas trips and as many Mexico trips as we want. This is not a fixed budget but we don’t really got over that.

Housing - ($350 - as much as you want) given that our location (Bahia de Banderas) is significantly more expensive than most of Mexico. You can still find relatively cheap housing (when compared to US housing) if you opt to not live on the beach or right in the heart of town. A nice condo (not beach front but close enough to smell it) fully furnished can run $900-1,000 a month, beach front in Nuevo Vallarta or Punta de Mita? $3.5K-$5K/month - but you can also go 5 minutes inland and rent a house in nice gated community with a pool, palapas and 24/hr security for $400-$600/month - its easy to find cheaper housing than this. I am just pointing to options that most of us would be comfortable with.

Groceries - ($400 month couple) tons of big supermarkets to choose from, we have Wal-Mart, Sams, Cosco, Mega Soriana, Chedraui, La Comer, all within the same area and they are each as big as those crazy super Walmart’s you find in the midwest. Of course you also have your farmers markets, fish markets, fruit markets, etc.. overall the food cost is cheaper other than the imported products which the are relatively close to US pricing. Pro-tip, super stores have a deal with car washers, basically they keep the parking lot clean and in exchange they are allows to offer their services to customers. Nothing better than getting groceries and your car is sparkling clean hand washed and polished by the time you get out, all of 50 pesos $2-$3 (I always give them double, 100 pesos because it’s so cheap!) I’d say we spend less than $100 a week in groceries.

Utilities - ($40-90 month) most places you rent at include trash, water, and even gas within your monthly rent. Some even come with WiFi included. Electricity is your main cost. We run about $80-95/month during summer and $40-60 during winter. Keep in mind that we work from home and thus we have multiple computers, monitors, phones plugged in at all times. We also run the A/C almost all day during summer so that we can comfortably work.

Phone/internet- $70 a month for 2 phone lines, Apple watches data, and home internet.

Gym - ($155 month) You can get regular memberships to a local gym for like $6-$20 dollars a month depending wether you want A/C or not.. Ours is significantly higher as it is not just a gym but also a “personalized training center” you can get a semi personalized membership for about $50/month or a private 1-1 certified trainer for 5 1hr sessions a week plus diet plan from a certified nutritionist and monthly measurements for only $155 a month per person. You’d never get this value in the USA so it’s well worth it for my wife a I. Country club memberships are hard to value as the ones we have are only available to property owners of the complex. Not sure if others offer them and at what cost for non property owners.

Entertaining and Dinning - if you like cinema then you are in luck, Spanish or English movies at about $2.5 a ticket at cinemas that are in my opinion better than any I’ve been to in the USA. Also don’t skip the popcorn, they have like 5, yes 5 flavors and only about $2.5 for the BIG box! You can also go to super fancy VIP cinemas for about $6 a ticket and it’s huge button controlled reclining leader seats with waiters, USB ports, and a full menu including alcoholic drinks. As far as restaurants, hard to pin down a price range. Wife and I can go to our favorite taco restaurant and have a full meal with fresh fruit water for about $10 and that’s when a $2.5 tip! Or we can go to a nicer Italian restaurant for pasta and wine for about $25-30 or go get sea food for about the same price range with drinks and their more expensive items. We can also go ultra fancy and spend $100 on a 4 course meal with a bottle of wine at a very fancy French restaurant. Point is you can find delicious food for just about any price range, it’s just up to you to decide how much you want to spend.

I’d certainly like to think so!