Depends on how you want to live here, if you expect to make life like it is in your home country, then that will run about $1000 a month. I spend about $500 a month to run my car, rent, food and travel. Rents, depending on what kind of place you want, can be as cheap as $100 a month or as expensive as $3500. I would buy a car and leave it here, or buy it and sell it after 6 month as rentals will cost from $25-40 a day, usually.

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Hi! thanks for the reply.

500/month.....WOW!! where abouts? in a small town? I could consider buying a used vehicle and just storing it everytime I would go back home (Canada).

Could you elaborate a little more please. Assume doing some traveling in and around the country. eating out once a day (sometimes 2), renting an apartment or house with furniture (in a half decent area outside of san salvador with no gangs), cost of high speed internet (very important, as I might be doing some part time online work), cell phone, cable tv, utilities, etc.

I will not be looking at finding any type of work at all as I will be doing online work.

Thanks again for any info.

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From what you're describing, you'll be at around $1000-1500 a month I imagine...

I live at the beach, a bit different from city lifestyle and I rarely drive because gas is so expensive (and I have an SUV). If I travel I take the bus or my motorcycle with costs no more than $5 a trip (either/or).

The only area outside of San Salvador with little gang influence that I can think of (and some will even disagree with me here) would be Santa Tecla. Let's be honest, there is no place in El Salvador that isn't permeated with gang or pandilla activity.

All of the other stuff you're asking for is highly subjective. Are you eating out 1-2 meals a day of typical food or the delicious fare available in the city? Most foreigners quickly tire of fried food and beans and rice...so you could be from $3 a day to $35 - a big difference to your budget, so I'm having a bit of a hard time with your request!

Cell (depending on how much you talk) can be from $15 on up a month - incoming calls are free. I've had cell bills as high as $100/month

High speed internet and cable TV I'm not sure about - I've never paid for it myself. Utiilities depend on where you live, where the water is coming from and electrical rates are also different depending on where you live.

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Hi Kirk! We are Canadians as well. Some costs that we had:

$300.00 per month for a bachelor pad in Escalon - this is the priciest area of San Salvador - where ex-pats live.
$4,000. 00 purchased a nice Mitsubishi used in great condition.
$3-5.00 per meal at the Comedors. We found it was the best food - full meals cooked on the side of the road or in little restaurants. The prices of food at Malls and grocery stores and the chains (Quiznos, McDonalds, etc are the same as Canadian prices.
As the previous post says - everyone has a cell phone - very very cheap to buy down there.
I would highly recommend the area around Metro Centro Mall. We learned a little too late how cheap it was and safe. We walked at night around there all the time and you are a skip and a hop from the Mall and strip of restaurants. You can rent a whole house there for about $350.00 - perhaps share it with someone? We stayed at Ximenas Guest house - just in front of Metro Centro - super cheap - we paid $20.00 a night for a nice big room and breakfast every morning. There is also plenty of work at Call Centres if you are looking for something and they are a skip and a jump from that mall. You can stay at the beach for cheap as well. El Tunco is a great surf village to visit. The most expensive hotel right on the beach charged us $70.00 per night but you can also find dirt cheap places to stay ($10.00 communal). Hope you enjoy yourself!

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