# $2500 USD/mo NOT enough for a couple to live on in Mexico City?? Huh?



## socks (Apr 24, 2009)

Hey everyone, I'm new, very nice resource you have going on, congratulations!

I just read in another thread about $2,500 US a month not being enough, and I'm just wondering what I'm missing here. 

My wife and I have been seriously considering moving to Mexico City where she's from, and obviously my situation is different as I have tons of family there now, however from all the people I know who work there, $2500 USD is a lot of money for 2 people.

So what am I not understanding? If I compare costs to Toronto, I struggle to think of one thing that's more expensive there.. Big TV's... That comes to mind, I paid way less for my big LCD here. One thing!

My rent in Toronto - $1,315/mo for a nice 2 bedroom apartment, including water, electricity and parking. In DF I'd be paying $4000 pesos for an entire house, plus utilities. 

My cellphone and internet bill come to around $175 a month here. There I'd have cable and skype, for maybe $60+ a month. 

I own my car, and gas is a bit cheaper there. Plus I'd be driving less, as Toronto is very sprawling, and who wants to be stuck on the Viaducto all day. 

Car insurance.. I was spending $270 a month last year for car insurance, for one driver, on a 10 year old 4 door sedan. Never had a ticket, never had an accident. That was my "first year penalty fee" for being a newly insured driver.. I'm 28, but just didn't have my own insurance before. Now I pay $135 a month and that's an absolute steal. I'd even save money from that in Mexico, probably by half.

Taxis are $4.00 just to step foot in the car here, and every few seconds it seems the meter lops on $0.35 or so. I remember a few years ago we travelled a very long distance throughout mexico city for $10. I can't go to the closest local store in a taxi for $10 here. 

Daycare... Since my wife is Mexican we'd qualify for free daycare in DF. Here? Wooooo.. It's about $200-250 a week. Unless you have TWO great jobs here, it's absolutely normal for one person to stay home with even one child, because you end up going to work to... pay for daycare.. Even makes less sense since if you only have one person working, you can claim them as a dependent on your tax return for significant tax savings. 

Eating out? Forget it.. Even nasty McDonald's can easily run you $10 each here with tax, usually around $8+ for a combo.. Plus I've vowed to never eat anything at or even like McDonald's again. A big part of my love of Mexico is real food, McDonald's is the opposite of that. 

Anyways enough about that greasepit, but eating out is not cheap here.. We went to The Keg here the other day with 3 people, I had one beer, a decent prime rib, desert and a desert wine.. My cohorts did much the same, and the bill was $200. Similarly, at one of the nicest places I've eaten in DF was half the bill for 6 people, eating more, drinking more, and the food was better. 

In Toronto, we literally spent 15 minutes trying to find our waitress to pay the bill. In Mexico at the same place I mentioned, I felt weird that two waiters stood and practically watched us eat.. They were always there to help. 

You can't get a cheap thing to eat on the street here. It's probably $4 for a street-vendor hotdog, maybe $5 with a drink. A slice of pizza often costs $4.50 with a drink now. That's the absolute cheapest warm thing you can find to eat here. I can't describe what a difference that kind of thing makes to one's quality of life.

Then there's the fees.. Ohhhh the fees! The bank fees (monthly and incidental), cellphone system access fees, crazy parking rates, electricity "smart meters", provincial vehicle licensing fees, city vehicle licensing fees (together about $150 per car per year), drivers license renewals..

If you own any kind of home here, expect at least $2,500 to $3,000 in yearly property tax too. I've heard numbers of around $100 a year in Mexico. 

Maybe people can't live on almost no money like they were thinking, I understand it costs money, but I'm having trouble seeing how you'd need to have a decent Canadian salary to live in Mexico, when there's lots of couples living on a combined income of around $1000 in DF. I mean that's normal, one person makes $6,000 pesos, the other makes $4,000 pesos, with free daycare and cheap rent, they can get by - even have a car.


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## Rodrigo84 (Mar 5, 2008)

Curious, where in D.F./Edomex are you finding $4000 pesos/month for a house?

That's possible, but it depends on the area and also the size of the house. My cousin had the option of getting something about that amount for an apartment, but the area was not very nice and it was in Del Valle, which is of course where there is more pollution as opposed to traditional expat areas such as Santa Fe, Interlomas. 

Electronics are always more expensive in Mexico.

As long as you don't make long distance calls on a Telmex line (it will eat you alive), you'll do fine on a landline and Skype. Internet prices are not bad at all in Mexico.

With cars, you also have to remember in Mexico there is the annual tenencia, emissions testing 2x a year, and the vehicle is 8 years old, you can no longer drive the vehicle every day in Mexico City, Hoy No Circula - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

As far as I know, nowhere in Canada or the United States is there a program like hoy no circula.

My cousin found car insurance 2x that what he paid in the U.S, as he had to bring his vehicle down from the U.S.

Yes, taxis are a bargain here compared to the rest of the world.

Yes, you can't be daycare costs here in D.F.

McDonalds, Burger King, etc. have gotten more expensive in the last year or so. There is no such thing (there never has been) as a value meal. It's all overpriced and they always mess up my order. You can make food at home and prices for food are cheap here.

True, restaurants for the most part are cheaper in D.F., but again it depends on where you go. My cousin used to take us to some nicer restaurants and would comment it was just as expensive as in the U.S., often more, but taco places, you couldn't beat the prices.

Waiters here, although not the same as professional waiters in Europe, do an outstanding job of serving. 

Yes, the predial or property tax is cheap here, usually just a few thousand pesos if that. However, keep in mind the car tax, known as tenencia is a killer and you will pay way more than you would in Canada or the U.S. You will pay several hundred to a few thousand dollars per year in car tax. If you don't pay it, you can't have car go through emissions testing, which is obligatory.

Yes, electricity is cheaper, gas (about the same I have heard from most expats), water is cheaper.

Going back to housing, keep in mind that expat housing, for most people I know is roughly 8000+ pesos per month for a decently located living unit. Not every place in Mexico City is pristine and keep in mind that a lot of expats want security and safety in this city, especially if they have children.


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## jlms (May 15, 2008)

*Nitpicking*



Rodrigo84 said:


> Curious, where in D.F./Edomex are you finding $4000 pesos/month for a house?
> 
> That's possible, but it depends on the area and also the size of the house. My cousin had the option of getting something about that amount for an apartment, but the area was not very nice and it was in Del Valle, which is of course where there is more pollution as opposed to traditional expat areas such as Santa Fe, Interlomas.
> 
> ...



Del Valle not very nice? You are surely joking. There are lots of flats and houses there that cost top money, and the amenities are hard to beat. If you want an urban lifestyle the Del Valle is hard to beat.

Of course you could try to pay the overpriced prices for housing in the "expat quarters" in Santa Fe and other Mexico City suburbs an lead a life isolated from the rest of Mexico City by aping an US lifestyle, but other people want to experience the real thing. 

As for pollution, if you really think you are better in Santa Fe or Interlomas you are really naive. The Metropolitan area of Mexico City share a common fate regarding pollution given its very peculiar geographic situation, you need to get really far away, behind any of the big hilly areas surrounding Mexico City, to scape the pollution.

Why would you bring your car from the US? Buy a cheap local car! No wonder insurance was expensive (foreign cars are very desirable to thieves).

As for food, you don't need to eat tacos in order to get a bargain. There are plenty of Vips, Toks and Sanborns chains, which offer set menus (soup, main dish, dessert and a drink) for US$10 or $15 a head at most. Of course if you go to luxury places you pay luxury prices, that is hardly a surprise.

Well, there are expats and there are expats. I know plenty of expats that don't need "security" and leave a happy life in Mexico City.

Safety in Mexico City is certainly a problem, but people are not in a state of siege, taking just common sense approach to life should be enough for normal people, expat or otherwise.


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## RVGRINGO (May 16, 2007)

Any city of some 22-25 million inhabitants, plus the surrounding areas, will have any variety that one could imagine. Prices follow not only the quality of the homes, but also the distance from the sources. No need to argue about it; Mexico is perfectly normal in that respect.


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## Rodrigo84 (Mar 5, 2008)

jlms said:


> Del Valle not very nice? You are surely joking. There are lots of flats and houses there that cost top money, and the amenities are hard to beat. If you want an urban lifestyle the Del Valle is hard to beat.
> 
> Of course you could try to pay the overpriced prices for housing in the "expat quarters" in Santa Fe and other Mexico City suburbs an lead a life isolated from the rest of Mexico City by aping an US lifestyle, but other people want to experience the real thing.
> 
> ...


I agree and disagree.

Del Valle is way overpriced. It's one of the biggest ripoffs in the city, perhaps the biggest.

Basically, they take older buildings, gut them, and then put some fresh paint and call it a luxury apartment and charge $$$. However, they can't remove the pollution or some of the bad elements that trickle in from areas immediately east of there. In fact a lot of these 'luxury buildings' are often stuck next to a drabby, old building.

I wouldn't argue with it if someone had their business or place where they worked was close. Might be an easier commute from Aguilas or areas further south like Pedregal (there are a few apartments down there, but mostly houses).

However, the economy is taking its toll on these so-called luxury apartments and the people who built them are getting bitten in the rear.

I live above the pollution line in Cuajimalpa and I can see the smog downtown. It is definitely much worse downtown and anywhere near the Periferico or Circuito Interior along with industrial areas in the south central and especially north central areas and in areas like Tlalnepantla and Naucalpan. I know people with kids who would never live down the mountain for precisely that reason. In addition, I don't wake up with soot on my face, whereas friends who live further down wake up with it every morning.

As far as cars, the cost/tenencia/insurance on a vehicle is much more than the same vehicle in the U.S. Tenencia is the real killer here. I don't know how people can overlook this.

In addition, if the vehicle is 8 years or less, one can test voluntarily a foreign-plated vehicle for about $25 each time (once every 6 months) and get a cero sticker with which you can drive every day and at all hours.

Whoever said foreign cars are desirable to thieves. If you have a foreign car that doesn't exist in Mexico, no thief is going to want it. They can't strip it of parts and they certainly can't resell it, because there would be no value in the market for a vehicle that doesn't exist here. For instance, Saturn, Buick, Lexus, etc.

Most of the vehicles getting stolen are cheap vehicles like the Nissan Tsuru, VW Jetta/Golf, the compact Chevy.

So better to bring a vehicle down.

The only way I could see one getting a vehicle down here is if one were going to stay down here permanently or if a company were taking care of the costs of the vehicle.

I 100% agree with you on Vips, Toks, Sanborns. They clean the clocks out of any Denny's in the U.S. with their prices and quality. Plus, you can find them anywhere and it's always service with a smile.


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