What a family of three actually spends in Bangkok

The move that set the budget

We used to rent a condo. We now rent a two-bedroom, two-bathroom townhouse in Bang Na, five minutes from the nearest MRT station, at 30,000 baht a month. Renting the cheaper unit was the single decision that made the rest of this budget possible, and it cost us nothing except distance.

Bang Na is east of the centre, past On Nut. If you're picturing a Bangkok move, it probably isn't the postcode in your head — which is exactly why the rent works. What you get is a two-storey house with a kitchen instead of a 55-square-metre condo. What you give up is walking out to a restaurant strip at 10pm.

The five minutes to the MRT is the part that makes it liveable. Without a station nearby, the same house would mean a daily negotiation with traffic, and the money you saved on rent would go to Grab. If you're comparing Bang Na against somewhere cheaper with no rail access, compare the whole month, not the rent.

The month, line by line

Rent is 39% of the total and school is 20%. Together they're more than half, which tells you where the money actually is. You can shave 2,000 baht off food by eating differently, and it's worth doing. You can change 180,000 baht a year by choosing a different school, and that's worth thinking about for a month.

School, and the cheaper option

Our child attends an international school at 180,000 baht a year, and meals are included in that. Families budgeting for international school usually assume a long tail of extras — bus, lunches, activities, technology fees. Ours has been short: the uniform is the only meaningful addition, and it isn't expensive.

Bilingual school is the real alternative, at roughly 100,000 to 120,000 baht a year. That saves 60,000 to 80,000 baht annually, or about 2,500 to 3,400 AUD. Whether it's the right call isn't a money question. Bilingual schools teach substantially in Thai, which is an enormous advantage if you're staying a decade and a complication if you're leaving in three years.

One thing to be clear about, because it changes the arithmetic for anyone reading this with more than one child: these are per-child fees. Two children in international school is 360,000 baht a year, and that would take schooling from 20% of our budget to roughly a third of it.

Food at 20,000

That's about 667 baht a day for three people — roughly 22 AUD, or 7 AUD per person per day. It covers groceries, market food, street food and the occasional delivery.

The reason it's achievable is the spread. A street meal and a restaurant meal can differ by a factor of five within a hundred metres, and the cheap end isn't a compromise. If you're arriving from Australia, the thing that takes adjusting isn't the price, it's that eating well and eating cheaply are not in tension here the way they are at home.

Transport at 5,200

No car. The MRT five minutes away does most of the work, with Grab for the gaps and the occasional tuk-tuk. At 5,200 baht that's 219 AUD a month for the household, which is less than most Australian families spend on one car before insurance.

This is the line where the Bang Na decision pays for itself twice. Rent is lower and transport stays contained, because the station is close. Move further out for a cheaper house and this number is the one that climbs.

Laundry at 100 baht a kilo

We don't own a washing machine. Local laundry does wash, dry and fold by weight, and it's one of those services that sounds like an indulgence until you price it against the alternative.

The standard rate is the one that matters for everyday use. At 100 baht a kilo, five kilos a week comes to 500 baht a month, about 91 AUD. Ten kilos a week is roughly double that. An Australian household sending a family's washing out weekly would pay several times that, which is the whole reason this is normal here and unusual there.

The other two rates are for specific jobs rather than routine. Express, at 180 baht a kilo, is what you use when you're flying out tomorrow and everything is still damp. Hot wash, at 120, is for anything where cold water hasn't done the job.

Ironing is priced per piece rather than by weight, and the spread between 45 and 250 baht is entirely about the garment. A shirt is not a lined dress. If you're used to a flat rate per item at home, per-piece pricing will feel unfamiliar and, on ordinary clothing, quite cheap.

How we book things

Accommodation, flights, activities and eSIMs all go through Trip.com. Not because it wins on every route — it doesn't — but because everything ends up in one place, prices display in Australian dollars, and most rates carry free cancellation until close to the date. With a child, the cancellation policy matters more than the last 200 baht of saving.

The counter-case, since a booking recommendation without one is just advertising: for a long stay, or a hotel we know we'll return to, it's worth checking the property's own site first. Direct rates sometimes beat the platform on weekly stays. We don't do it every time because it means another login, another card entry and another cancellation policy to read, and at some point the admin costs more than the difference.

The one genuinely worth planning ahead is the eSIM. Buying it before you fly means data works the moment you land, rather than after the queue at the airport SIM counter with a tired child and a suitcase.

Book through Trip.com

What this budget leaves out

Five things, and I'd rather name them than let the total look complete.

Health insurance. Not in the table. If you're insuring a family here, it's a real monthly cost and you should price your own cover rather than take a figure from a page.

Laundry. The rates are in the section above, but our spend moves with how much we send in a given week, so I've kept it out of the 76,205 rather than pick a number and present it as fact.

Entertainment. Cinema tickets run 200 to 260 baht standard, more for first-class, and Wednesday is about half price at most cinemas. Topgolf out at Megacity is 550 to 1,250 baht an hour for a bay that holds six. We do these occasionally; they aren't regular enough to be a line item, and your family's version of "occasionally" is the variable.

The irregular costs. Visa renewals, flights home, a deposit, a dental bill, replacing a laptop. None of these fit a monthly table and all of them arrive. Take your annual total for these, divide by twelve, and add it — that's the honest version of this budget.

School fee increases. International school fees in Bangkok tend to rise annually. Budget for the direction, not just this year's number.

If you're planning the same move

The advice that actually transfers is about sequence, not numbers.

Decide the school first, then the house. School is the line that decides whether Bangkok is cheap or expensive for you, and it's also the one that constrains where you can live. Pick the school, then find a house you can reach it from. Doing it the other way round is how people end up with a commute they resent.

Pay for the station, not the square metres. A bigger house in a soi with no rail access is a daily cost in taxis and patience. Five minutes from an MRT is worth more than a room you'll use at Christmas.

And the counter-case, because this budget works for us and might not for you: if you have two children, or you need to be central for work, or you want to walk everywhere, none of these numbers survive contact with your situation. Two children in international school alone adds 15,000 baht a month to what's above. A central two-bedroom condo instead of a Bang Na townhouse can double the rent. The structure of the budget is the useful part; the totals are ours.