Best place to live for little money?

[CairoCarol]

@Shagnasty

The kids thing changes things a whole bunch.

It sure does. I withdraw my suggestion of Indonesia pretty much entirely. This it not to say that foreigners shouldn’t raise children in Indonesia, (heck, I raised my son there for 11 years of his childhood), BUT you should be married local; possessed of substantial economic, psychological, and/or linguistic resources; planning to stay only for a few years; or home-schooling – preferably several of those characteristics.
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[nearwildheaven]

@RivkahChaya

If you want to stay in the US, look at college towns that have state schools. There are cheap places to live, including people who rent rooms in a house, and people who collectively rent large houses together, so that your rent might only be $200, and you share a bathroom, kitchen, living room, and laundry room, but you get a bedroom to yourself. Sometimes the landlord is cool about signing separate leases, but sometimes you have to depend on everyone to come up with their rent every month, or you all get into trouble. There are cheap apartments. They have wall unit AC, and are walk-ups, but they go for less than $450 for a one bedroom, and you can get studios with kitchen areas and bathrooms for $350, if you know where to look. There is good, cheap entertainment, acute care clinics that are sometimes cheaper than seeing a regular PCP, and usually free food pantries and kitchens for tight months. They usually need volunteers if you want to sing for you supper.

They tend to skew liberal, but they have conservatives in them, so wherever your loyalties lie, you should be able to find like-minded people.

You can probably even find a very part-time job that won’t earn you enough to lose your benefits, and you can pick up and extra $3-400/month.

Much safer than inner cities, too.

Don’t go to Iowa City if you have this in mind. It’s the most expensive city, rent-wise, in Iowa, and it has some bad pockets, which was not the case when I lived there in the early 1990s.

The rural Midwest can be very cheap living if you’re able to drive distances for necessities, or be able to order them via Amazon, etc.

[control-z]

I think much of the rural Southern US would be ideal. Heating expenses in the winter aren’t too high and smaller houses can be had for $100,000 or less.

You also have to balance the exact location with what goods and services you need though. If you need hospital visits and the nearest hospital is an hour away then it might not be ideal.

[John_Mace]

@CairoCarol

Just curious - I assume the recommendation against Boulder is cost-related? I’ve only been there once, but thought it was quite charming. I could definitely see living there.

Yes. I specifically listed that one because it would be very desirable, but not cheap.

[John_Mace]

@Shagnasty

For an area of the U.S. you might want to think about, consider the general Fayetteville, AR area. It is one of the most underrated areas of the country IMO and it isn’t the hillbilly shithole that most people imagine it to be. In fact, it isn’t very poor at all and the cost of living is very low. Wal-Mart (and all of their associated vendors) are headquartered in the area as well as Tyson chicken.

So, you’re saying a person can eat hormone infused chicken every night on cheap, crappy dinnerware from China? Sign me up!!

[carrps]

My brother retired to Costa Rica about 3 years ago. However, he and his wife bought land several years before they moved. Land and lumber prices were lower but have steadily increased since. The universal health care is a nice bonus. They’ve both obtained permanent residency status so no more quickie trips to Panama. They both come back to visit (and to stock up on supplies they can’t get there) at least once a year. In fact, my brother just left to go home this morning. They typically plan ahead and get good airfares so it’s not a big cash drain.

There’s a not a ton of things to do, but my brother’s biggest hobby is cycling, so he only needs halfway decent roads for that. He has acclimatized though – he was freezing until our recent heat spell and the temps got over 90 F.

[Siam_Sam]

As for Costa Rica, I had an Anthropology prof who loved the place, so much so that he moved his 80-something-year-old mother down there along with his girlfriend. And I’ve heard good things about Belize myself too, with Belize City making it to at least one top-15 list of places for Americans to retire.