Quote:
Originally Posted by mufi_02
How much do you need to make (monthly) to lead a comfortable life in Dhaka?
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Depends on age, family situation, etc.
IF you are single and in your mid-to-late 20s, have no dependents, if you can live and eat at baap er hotel, then 100,000 Taka/month should be A LOT MORE than enough. People in that age range and in that situation can do very, very well for even 50,000 Taka/month. In fact, I have friends who do that.
IF you have dependents, or if you are over 30, then it gets tricky. Even 150,000 Taka/month is not enough. I will tell you why.
You don't want to rent your whole life, right? At some point, you would like to own your own place, be it an apartment or a house. If you want to find a 1,000 sq. ft. for less than 5,000,000 Taka, the apartment has to be in the far reaches of the city (like Mirpur or Bashundhara) or even worse. Want to buy a house? It is cheaper to buy real estate in most parts of the United States than it is to buy in Dhaka. A 7.5 katha plot (that's about 4,500 sq. ft. of space per floor) in Mirpur 11 is going for 325,000,000 Taka and the owners still don't want to sell. That's about FOUR MILLION DOLLARS, if my calculations are correct.
Want to buy a car? The government just jacked up the taxes. A RAV-4 costs over 4,500,000 Taka. Most of you have probably never heard of Allions or Premios, which is why I've mentioned about Rav 4's price. Anyway, I hadn't heard of Allions or Premios either, before coming back to Dhaka, but those are all the rave now amongst the city's burgeoning upper-middle class)
Want to put your kids in school? Any decent school, at least the English medium ones, will charge you north of 100,000 Taka just to admit the student, and then charge 30-50 thousand taka per year for readmission fees. Need healthcare? Took a friend to a hospital (Apollo) the other day for a minor cause, and was charged over four thousand taka.
In any case, I am thinking of switching jobs, and the one I am gonna apply for is supposedly going to pay in the range I mentioned earlier, and trust me, I still don't feel comfortable.