I've started tracking expenses again cos I'm in Paris and it's going to be interesting to see how much I spend when I'm here.
Note that this month's expenses will be quite messed up cos I've been here for only half a month but some of the expenses here are also from my fixed expenses in SG. I've stopped tracking my SG discretionary expenses so I don't have those numbers.
So the expenses this month will be just a feel/estimate of what my expenses will be like the next few months.
So let's just look at the Paris expense for this month ONLY, cos that's pretty accurate for these past 2 weeks.
Food was EUR134.19
Quite high, cos we went out to eat a few times.
Most notably a steak at $53 and a burger at $21.
If we remove this, the total drops to EUR60.19.
This includes some supermarket shopping for some basic groceries (salt, pepper, etc), and some days of light eating out.
Nonetheless, there's a good chance that this will drop next month, cos I won't be buying much more groceries cos I've stocked up already and chances are we won't be eating out at expensive places much as well cos... Somehow it just doesn't taste that nice at that price.
Toiletries was EUR21.50
Not too bad, needed to get some shampoo, knife, battery, detergent.
Again, this should drop once my shipment comes over, cos I already have detergent and other toiletries on the way.
Transport was EUR55.50
This is purely my transport expenses. My wife's transport expense is covered by her company.
This is like a top-up card so this EUR55.50 can probably last me the rest of July as well.
Misc expense was EUR179.
Quite expensive. We need to do an inspection of the gas heater in the apartment every year at EUR176. It's mandatory to do an inspection once per year. We could probably do it at a cheaper rate but the landlord was using this company so we just engaged the same company to do it for us.
Another EUR3 was spent on taking photos for her resident application. Quite cheap. EUR3 for 8 passport sized pictures. In SG we get 4 pictures for S$8.
Paris Home Internet is EUR43.90
EUR14.90 per month, but there is a set up cost of EUR29 for the first month.
I signed up for the cheapest connection. ADSL, not fiber. It's good enough to stream movies so... no complaints yet.
I haven't signed up for my own mobile line yet. It's likely going to be EUR4.99 per month for 5GB data and a EUR10 charge for the SIM card. This should show up in July bill.
Paris utilities is estimated at EUR75
This was taken from online sources. Cos I haven't gotten my bill yet. This pays for electricity and gas.
Water is part of the rental contract. It's part of the building costs apparently.
My wife eats at her office canteen at EUR26.24
She gets really good stuff, like restaurant steaks and pasta and even dessert. It's highly subsidized for staff. Cos eating out around her area is ridiculously expensive.
She can get a meal with dessert for around EUR3-5, but eating out at her office area is going to cost around EUR8 for a sandwich/sub, for EUR20+ for a sit down meal.
In Singapore most of my fixed expenses are still running.
I closed my M1 home internet cos there's no way to pause the contract.
And my SP services is also still running cos my fridge is running and my mother in law goes back to my place to turn on the air conditioning every few weeks for a short period to make sure that the appliances don't spoil in my absence.
My wife's rent, transport and mobile plan are covered by the company.
I've included it in the table so that by the next few months, we can see how much it costs to live in Paris as a fairly normal frugal person. Note that we could get a cheaper apartment further out of the city if we were paying rent for ourselves. But since it's covered by the company we got a place as close to her office as possible within the company budget.
Note, all these numbers are in EUR, I've given the SGD equivalent using the exchange rate of EUR1=SGD1.60. This is a bit high, but since I'm using my Singapore credit card to pay for most of my stuff, that's the exchange rate that I'll be facing.
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