labus

Is it £? I was asking in euros.
Yes, considering I own a house and a car.

Mitzyboy

As regards eating out .... it doesnt cost that much once you get past the eating in posh restaurants stage

We usually eat out at lunch time now and it costs us maybe €8 each including 3 course meal and drink.

I can only speak for the CB North, but supermarket bills are far less than the UK where we shop, as long as you steer away from UK brands

Dick Dasterdly

There's still a few doing full menu del dia at 5 euro down my way, however you can get a fairly good one for 7 euro.

HBG

I think you'll find there's not much difference between pounds and Euros. At the beginning of the year.there wasn't any.

jackytoo

I agree with this. Not everyone pays about 50 euro IBI, can run to a 1000 on the CDS. The electric bill quoted was incredibly low. I would say if you could live comfortably on that amount in the UK (not sure you are from the UK) then you would be OK in Spain. It is more or less swings and roundabouts now. There are a lot of previous threads to look back on on cost of living.

labus

I am not from UK, so it's not quite clear how cheap/expensive it is.

Would 350 euros/two people/month for food be enough, without eating out.

To be sincere I would prefer eating something that we prepared than not knowing who touched our food and the hygene in the kitchen.

labus

Sorry for my ignorance, but what do IBI and CDS mean?
I went back a few pages and I didn't notice any previous posts on the subject, but now that I know there are I will go back more.

jackytoo

IBI is the local Town Hall taxes, municipal taxes. CDS...Costa del Sol

Fred James

Yes, I am sure it would if you shop locally and avoid imported foods..

I have detailed records of expenditure for the last 10 years and looking at the last 2 years, €350 a month is fine (excluding booze) and we are not trying to economise on a strict budget.

That figure includes normal non food housekeeping items.

labus

Thanks Fred, very useful information.

elspeth sinclair

I live in the Xativa area and do my shopping there. I can buy all my fruit very cheaply usually bananas, plums, pears, apples, grapes and some vegetables cost me 5 euros a week and I do the rest of my shopping at Mercadona for 35-50 euros a week which includes food for 4 cats a dog and 4 canaries. Since we don't run a car the rest of our bills which are paid by standing order are normally 1,500 euros a year and lets add 2000 euros for dentist, meals out, the odd taxi and air fares which adds up to 6000 euros a year and we eat well and always have booze for our guests although we don't smoke and only drink a little if at all when we are alone. My husband has a campo about five minutes walk from the house where we have oranges and keep hens and grow most of our vegetables. You should live like kings on your income and property has never been cheaper. Good luck.

labus

Thanks a lot Elspeth. It almost sounds too good. I mean too cheap. I bet the canaries eat the most.
Do you by chance have a real estate site I can use?

Do you need any air conditioning over there please?

elspeth sinclair

I have air conditioning in our dining room which is really a small sittingroom also and in my studio where I teach English and paint and find it very cheap for heating and a little more expensive for keeping cool in summer. However we don't need it on very often and in winter I dress as if I were still in Scotland so don't get cold. In my big sitting room we have a greedy woodburner but it's rarely on and we have free firewood from our campo. Google estate agents La costera which covers Xativa and surrounding towns and villages. I never used one myself.

labus

Great help, thanks Elspeth.

elspeth sinclair

Try Actibrok this is an estate agency where one of my students works. He's called Tony. google it.