# Compensation advice



## SahilMalik (Oct 17, 2014)

Hi All,

I am from United States, and now moving to Singapore for at least 15 months, along with my spouse.

I have few questions in before accepting this offer
-what is a normal cost of living in Singapore.
- Should i go for Local plus compensation package or balance sheet approach.
-Which area do I prefer to live

Thanks in advance for all your suggestions.

Regards


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## BBCWatcher (Dec 28, 2012)

It'd be much more accurate to say that if you try to replicate a foreign lifestyle in all aspects in any new country then it can be quite costly. It really has nothing to do with "Western" and "Asian." That's much too oversimplified and consequently quite misleading. McDonalds hamburgers are quite affordable in Singapore, for example. (The McDouble is only S$2 every day. So is the coffee and scone set at KFC.)

Yes, it would be very expensive to ski on snow every day in Singapore, to pick another example.

As mentioned many times -- does anybody use the search function here any more? -- there are three major lifestyle cost components in Singapore that are "surprising" to some. They are, not necessarily in order, housing, private automobiles, and (with some exceptions) education. If you are demanding and fussy in one or more of those three areas, you will pay, probably a lot. If you are willing to be flexible and moderate in those three areas, you'll spend less.

Singapore is small and densely populated, but so are many other places like Tokyo, London, Manhattan, Hong Kong, and elsewhere. Space costs money, quite simply. In all those places. If your frame of housing reference is rural Argentina (to pick a random example) then you'll need to adjust your frame.

Singapore may be the most expensive place in the world to operate a private automobile. It is vanishingly unlikely that having a private automobile will ever make _financial_ sense (with very rare job-related exceptions). It is a pure and very expensive luxury. If you cannot possibly imagine taking (clean, safe, convenient, pervasive, and affordable) taxis, public buses, and/or public trains, then be prepared to pay an extraordinary amount of money for the "privilege" of the work of driving.

Then we come to education for your children. If you want your children to go to exclusive private schools with foreign curricula, you'll pay, a lot. (As you will most places.) If you don't mind having your children attend (still high quality) public schools with local curricula and with admission behind citizens and PRs (and thus possibly several kilometers away), then it's pretty affordable (though not free).

Pretty simple, really.


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