# Price changes?



## Orfin (Sep 26, 2016)

So i have seen the timeline charts for currency value changes and i see its gone between 16&20 to a $. throughout this year. A steady up trend with a brief peak to 20.
Looks like it will be around 18 during the time i plan to be there.

What local price changes have come about? Have the basics like raw food at the market or cooked street food changed?
What are the going rates for the decent street food favorites like the tacos and such? 
It was around 10MXN to a dollar last time i was up on Mexico. I could get a simple restaurant sea-side meal of a fried fish(plate size) with some rice and beans and a drink for 50MXN which was $5 back then. And i think i recall spending around $10usd for a big meal in a nicer restaurant in the main tourist area of Puerto Vallarta when it was 
MXN-10 to a $..

Anyway, i am simple and trying to stick to a budget, so price awarness lets me know what i am in for. 
I love basic mexican food -even the street tacos. I stop short of the places that stand out as stomach problems waiting to happen.
So Any price run down on simple eating-out places and market fare to cook at home.? I can't really cook ,but will boil eggs and potatos , grill meats and cook up veggie mixes and i love cooked leafy greens like spinach or so. 
Lodging pricing is not important because that is a very wide price range depending on where i settle and i have spent lots of time looking at online listings. 
Don't quote me prices on the top end restaurants unless they are cheaper than US restaurants, but you can quote em if you really want to for general info. Even in the US i can manage feeding only myself on $500 a month ,eating well with mostly home cooking or ready made off the grocery shelf. And no i don't shop at Walmart except for very few things like organic juices and organic canned soups. They have very little Organic selection. I shop at places with lots of organic options. I know Mexico organic will be market bought unprocessed to cook at home.

Just basics, i come to mexico for mexico style food and simple living. 

Thanks.


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## perropedorro (Mar 19, 2016)

> Just basics, i come to mexico for mexico style food and simple living.


 I'm not into ostentatious lifestyle either---no five star hotels or restaurants in the travel plans of me and my wife, even though they are a lot cheaper than their U.S. counterparts. I was able to take early retirement because we restrained consumerist impulses and managed to save some money. Still, we wouldn't be able to live in SoCal on the reduced income. The food budget goes a lot farther in Mexico as long as you have somewhere to cook and some minimal skills in meal preparation. 500 dollars a month for meals? I know big families that _live_ on less: all expenses, not just food. You'll only need that much if you're eating out most of the time. The local tianguis will have better prices and quality than WalFart or any of the big supermarkets, but if they have organics they're probably not labeled as such. In any case it's more likely to be local produce, which is a good start. Fresh juice is far better, more available and cheaper than in the U.S. Meat, it depends and price/quality vary greatly from place to place. I got spoiled by getting on good terms with some shirt-tail relatives who have a small ranch outside Guadalajara. Beef, pork, goat, chicken---they breed, feed, slaughter and cook them. Unparalleled in flavor and texture. Now it's hard to look at store-bought meat of mysterious provenance.


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## eastwind (Jun 18, 2016)

I've just moved to Cancun, so don't have historical reference points.

A haircut at an English-speaking fancy/trendy/stylish air conditioned shop at the intersection where the road to the Hotel zone starts is 240 pesos. On the other hand if you ride the bus the tourists use to the end of the line in town there's a street around the corner that has a row of about six hole-in-the-wall barber shops (15 feet of store front each open to the air with a roll-up metal door and one or two chairs), they all ask 35 pesos. In that same area there's a taqueria that asks 50 pesos for 4 tacos. I ordered the bistek, I got 8 small tortillas, two lime wedges and a pile of bistek, and it was very good. They provided a green and a red but no chopped tomatoes and onions salsa, and no chips. I think a bottle of spite was 25 pesos (it would be 15-20 at oxxo). The tacos were very good, I've been back once. 

The big buses are 10.5 pesos, the minivans are 8 pesos. I can pay to ride the bus to those non-tourist zone restaurants and save a lot, but the variety of food is more limited.


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## perropedorro (Mar 19, 2016)

> I've just moved to Cancun, so don't have historical reference points.


Can't speak for Cancún, only been there once, 20 years ago. But by your description of the two-level local economy, it sounds similar to Puerto Vallarta, which I know well. Pretty high prices, at least by Mexican standards, in the tourist zone, but far cheaper in the less fashionable areas where the hotel staff lives. People living on 1000 pesos a week, if that, won't be paying 400 pesos for a lunch or a haircut. Me, I can't afford to live like a well-heeled tourist that goes through a few hundred dollars a day, yet I know a few that could but who still enjoy "slumming it" in far more modest surroundings. Even touristy places in Mexico have something for everyone, and kudos to you for hopping on a bus and exploring where regular Mexicans live. Many visitors would be horrified at such a "dangerous" adventure. Everyone has their socioeconomic comfort zone, yet seems that a lot of tourists visit Mexico but consciously avoid seeing most of it.


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## Gatos (Aug 16, 2016)

Our Mexican experience covers the whole range from low-end to high-end. My haircuts cost 100 pesos (plus 20 peso tip). Probably as good as any haircut I have ever had and the shop is in a very well to do neighborhood. My wife pays about 400 pesos per cut but they really pamper her. We pay 56 pesos for four lamb tacos on blue tortilla shells every Saturday after our morning walk. The owner takes such pride that we eat at his stand. Last weekend HE inspected what we were about to be served and sent it back. We tried the local butcher a couple times but the quality was pretty spotty. We get our red meats at Costco. With INAPAM we can take an executive bus to Mexico City for about $7 USD for the two of us. The metro is free to the Angel. Things are rather expensive at the moment if you buy anything imported from the US or if you buy ANYTHING from any company that does. I'm sure that our Japanese built auto purchased in January is a good bit more expensive today. We would probably walk away from purchasing our solar system today because that would be much more expensive. CFE's rate increases are causing cost increases. IMSS was substantially more expensive this year than last. Interestingly, our property taxes were lower(slightly). But, over-all, if we were pinching pennies, things are constantly getting more expensive.


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## Gatos (Aug 16, 2016)

Today we spent : 1200 pesos to the mechanic who changed the oil/filter, replaced the rear axle oil, air filter etc (we visit the mechanic 2 times per year or so) : 100 pesos to the Cruz Roja - I got bit by an abaja the other day and my ring finger is larger than my thumb : 300 pesos at the super market : 1300 pesos at Costco (but 500 pesos of that was for a pavo which should make four meals) : 700 pesos at Pemex and finally 300 pesos to fill the prescription from Cruz Roja...


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## Orfin (Sep 26, 2016)

Sounds good that 50-60 pesos is still enough for basic street food, even after the currency going from 10 to 18.5 for a $ over the years. 
Its safe to say that $5 a meal in a basic sit-down restaurant is easy to find.
I will have my car ,so my transport cost will be whatever my gas and maintainance adds up to. I am expecting it to be the same expense as i have in US but with a higher gas price in Mexico. But i won't drive daily and will rarely drive far except for moving location after staying in one place for over a week or over a month.

I am flexible with lodging. I usually go for the more reasonable of the cheaper and do all i can to save and then let fustration send me looking for better once i get familiar with the area. 
But i plan to move around a lot which makes me new to an area every time i move, and thats bad for knowing the best options for lodging. Its a gamble between paying more than i want for relative satisfaction or being as cheap as i want with risk of frustration. 
I once moved to a town so bad for me in Peru, that i rented in two areas in one month. Put $400 for a place and left after 8 days and never wasted time to explain, try to work things out or try to get some money back. I Walked away and spent another $300 in the same month for another place and i lasted only 4 days there as it was even worse, but i got a refund for unused days -from a kind Dueño.
. So a $250 plane ticket got me out of there and i ended up paying $10 a day for a room on the beach and $240 a month there after. 
The first month is always expensive and tumultuous in a new area of strange countries. But staying at the $400 place would have been $1600 over 4 months while all my moving around landed me in a better place for $240 a month plus the added cost of moving and forfeits. 
So between the two, my seemingly expensive moving around and forfeiting rent, ended up being almost the same total cost as staying put in the first place.
I Ended up in a cheaper more satifying place which offsetted the unplanned running around. If i had stayed 6 months rather than 4 months, the expensive first month of running around would have actually turned out cheaper than staying 6 months at the first place. 

I have a feeling i may have some issues finding short term places quickly in Mexico ,but i am a single man, driving and can always just rig a tent to camp out at non tourist coastal areas for a couple days. Hold out for a cheap decent rental or else eventually get tempered by the camping to make me happy to accept a cheap hole in the wall because its better than being out in the rain with all my stuff.:bounce: 

Adventure is the name of the game for me -i guess. With Caution & Quidado along the way.


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