The Cost of a Month in Taipei

We recently returned from a month in Taipei which was great. Since I’ve provided the costs of living in Lisbon, Tainan, and a 3rd tier Chinese city so here is another one for the record.

Housing

We split our time between an Airbnb and a hotel. I still had a final 7-night Marriott certificate from the not longer lucrative travel packages. You can get monthly rent from $1000 up to $3000. Our Airbnb was $63 a day which felt a bit pricy for its condition.

Food

We didn’t have a budget for food, but we definitely spent more than I would have guessed. Being the capital city prices are more expensive but varied widely. One night we had $5 hot pot and another night $35 hot pot. We did not cook any meals and in all we spent $1100 which comes out to around $20 per day per person. An example of a day’s meal would be local stall for $2 breakfast, then a cafeteria style $4 lunch with a $2 drink like boba, and then $10 for dumplings for dinner and of course a dessert like soybean pudding or shaved ice for $2.

Transportation

Transportation was cheap. Rides on the subway were 50 cents and bus rides even cheaper. Taxis were also quite affordable. The only expensive thing was getting to and from the airport. If we were able to take the subway it would have been affordable, but we had 6 checked bags and therefore needed a driver. We prearranged a van on the way there and a hatchback on the way back for a total of $80. It was around a 40 minute ride, so similarly priced to what you would pay in America. In all we probably spent around $250 on transportation which is more than we spend at home, but then again probably not since we own cars.

Conclusion

Our month totaled around $3,000 when you add in the random stuff like trips to the claw machine and 7-Eleven. That means if we lived there we would need a portfolio of $900,000 using the 4% rule. I really enjoyed the trip and we’ll be back soon.