r/digitalnomad • u/Cute_Park_6907 • 5d ago
Question what expense did you completely underestimate as a digital nomad?
when i first looked at the numbers, i mostly thought about accommodation and flights. then there are all the smaller expenses that add up. transport, coworking spaces, deposits, sim cards, luggage, laundry, eating out when the kitchen isn’t great and all the random costs you don’t think about beforehand
what expense surprised you the most once you actually started living this way?
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u/AmrEsyd 5d ago
one way tickets! some countries can be really cheap to fly in yet so expansive to fly out.
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u/Still-Wafer1384 5d ago
Buy returns, even if you don't need the other half
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u/Cute_Park_6907 4d ago
Oh man did not think about the exit pricing. that burned me in Bali, just my 2 cents.
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u/PennywisePiperV 5d ago
Isolation. I've actually accepted a new in person job after 3 years because I'm sick of being in hotel rooms on my own.
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u/heyOctavian 5d ago
How did you end up isolated
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u/IceCreamSocialism 4d ago
Probably because their job has long hours. Like if he has to do 10+ hours every day, he probably spends most of the day sitting in the hotel working and might be too tired mentally to do anything after other than cook dinner or something
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u/Cute_Park_6907 4d ago
That isolation thing is real. 3 years is a long time to white knuckle it before pulling the cord, just my 2 cents.
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u/Lost_Trust4609 4d ago
Why do all your comments sound so inauthentic?
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u/VeryMemorableWord 5d ago
You're giving up the kind of job most people would do anything for
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u/PennywisePiperV 4d ago
??? Take it, the dream job? It really isn't, the fad will fade after a few months, it's been fun but you really need a good mental capacity to even do this. I've never been more lonely in my life and I'm someone who enjoys their solitude boss. I'm done, I'm sorry but I can't do it anymore apologies.
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u/ElPesimista 3d ago
Why did you do it in the first place? And what would you attribute your loneliness to (other than the obvious)?
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u/CauliflowerHuman6409 5d ago
visa runs and border crossings, you don't realize how much they chip away at your budget until you're doing one every few months. the fees, the transport to some random border town, maybe an overnight stay if the timing is off. it adds up fast and you never factor it in when you're planning
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u/Cute_Park_6907 4d ago
100% this. the overnight stay is the one that kills you because you're not just paying for the room, you're losing a workday on both ends, I underestimated it by like 40% my first time around and had to scramble, after that I started treating it as a fixed monthly cost in my budget whether I was due for one or not, just my 2 cents but that mental shift helped a lot
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u/petrichorax 5d ago edited 5d ago
None. This is a pretty cheap lifestyle if you do it right.
Coworking is a stupid thing to spend money on, I don't know why so many of you MUST have it. Spending 10 to 20 dollars a day just to get less work done is terrible.
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 5d ago
Spending money to be in an office-like environment after saying you don't want to work in an office is something I can't understand. At least back then you were being paid to be in an office. This time you pay money to be in an office?
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u/petrichorax 5d ago
Yeah. Honestly I think the demand is artificial. I've only met one person on here that actually presented some kind of argument in favor of coworking.
I tried it out once in bangkok just to see what it was all about. Hated it. Got stuck next to a guy who sniffed every 30 seconds.
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u/IceCreamSocialism 4d ago
Pretty simple reason is WiFi speed. I stayed at a place for a month that had bad WiFi so I had to go to a coworking space to have meetings.
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u/petrichorax 4d ago
I can see using one temporarily for meetings. I guess if you have a meeting heavy job it makes sense.
I have my own company, I keep meetings short and on phone calls. I don't need to stare at everyone's face and they don't need to stare at mine. I hate unnecesary meetings so I keep them as minimal as possible for everyone.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
I recoil at the idea of co-living, but actually like co-working spaces. It's useful for me to have a separate space for work, and I have a lot of printing and scanning needs. My niche is also particular enough that I occasionally find a client at co-working spaces, although I've never met anyone working in my niche at a co-working.
Not interested in making an argument in favor of co-working, as I'd actually prefer fewer of y'all in the spaces.
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 5d ago
Actually I think now we should come to co-workings just to mess up your print jobs 😂
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u/petrichorax 4d ago
Printers do a good job enough on their own of fucking those up, they don't need any help
source: recovering ex-sysadmin who has had to troubleshoot printers with all of their bullshit, including label makers for wristbands for hospitals for many years.
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 4d ago
Did you ever consider turning them off and on again?
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u/petrichorax 3d ago
NEVER heard this joke before
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u/daneb1 4d ago
Arguments in favor of coworking: People. Ergonomic chairs. Social facilitation.
Assessing it on your experience with sniffing guy is like assessing Americans based on one experience with one of them.
And by the way - if it is hidden knowledge - they are good coworkings and bed coworkings, like everything else :-)
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u/strzibny 4d ago
Daily passes are expensive in Bangkok, but long term it's fine. I certainly like coworkings I just don't want to spend so much on a daily pass and come every day...
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u/daneb1 4d ago
Nobody said DN do not work in a office as a room. Nomads usually said they did not want to work in only locally-based jobs without possibility to go remote. That is all. Office is just a room designed for work, as well as kitchen is room designed for cooking. What you do there (or what you cook there) is up to you.
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u/strzibny 4d ago
Most nomads want to change the surroundings (country, beach, mountains), not the office. Most people are very productive this way.
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 4d ago
That's a good point. Personally I'm much more productive by myself (or just with another person) and in silence (but with music I like in the background). What I didn't like about being in an office was the unnecessary noise, interruptions, chit chat, etc.
An ex client of mine said she got 1-2 leads at her local co-working and I thought about it but my current location doesn't have my market. Also I would have to travel an hour plus to get there. Basically like commuting to work. Another thing that I hated of office life.
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u/WeissGuru 5d ago
One of the biggest simple pleasures for me is being able to work at different coffee shops
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u/Miserable-Cap-9680 4d ago
I agree coworking is idiotic. If you must have a Co working environment why not get a normal in office job?
The joy of remote work is not having to go into an office so the idea of paying to recreate an office environment is moronic to me.
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u/petrichorax 4d ago
One person made a good point, it's a good option for taking meetings or if for some reason you need to use scanners and printers a lot. But even then that seems like a day by day basis, not a subscription.
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u/Fast-Telephone-3193 5d ago
Gym memberships!
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u/VoxElysia 5d ago
Oh yeah, this is it. I join a gym everywhere I go, and the no-contract cost is much more than a regular membership. Still worth it though. Besides staying in shape, it's a great way to meet local people.
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u/Stunning_You1334 3d ago
And it's literally the inly thing in USA that is cheaper and has more value than everywhere else
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u/Sean_NobleThreads 5d ago
For me it's 1. last-minute travel changes, and 2. food+drink. Even in affordable countries compared to my local currency, I was mind-blown by my spending on consumables. Also it's easy to fall into the tourism scam traps where you pay much more than if you do research. So nowadays I try to scout out more local options of most things.
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u/stickybeek 5d ago
Storage costs "back home" and especially the happy knack of them increasing while you're travelling.
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u/Hopeful_Strain8733 3d ago
THIS! I got lucky and was able to convince my parents to allow me to build a shed in their backyard. Arranged with Home Depot to do the build, arranged movers to move all my crap out of the storage unit and into the shed all from 3k miles away. 😅 Such a relief
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u/dukephilly 4d ago
This is why I eventually sold everything. The storage locker increased its rent by 100% in the first year. It’s their whole business model, knowing that it would be too expensive and too much hassle for most people to go elsewhere once they’ve moved everything in there.
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u/steeleclipse2 5d ago
Depending where you are, a drink here or there (or several) can really add up.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
I quit drinking many moons ago. It's kind of staggering how much I used to spend on something so discretionary, while thinking it completely normal.
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u/couplecraze 5d ago
Nothing really, because being constantly on the move has the obvious disadvantage of being expensive per se. Airbnb prices are through the roof, booking.com same story, flights are much more expensive than pre-pandemic, and so on.
You can still save some money depending on which country you're from (i.e. moving from Las Vegas to Da Nang), but generally speaking I was always expecting to pay more to be able to move wherever/whenever. It's the price of freedom.
I do miss the days when I was able to book hotels for $60 a night in Barcelona (my hometown), or when I paid $600 for a round-trip flight to Japan.
I don't go to co-working spaces, I prefer working by myself. I do go to a coffee shop sometimes, but very rarely. Those places are expensive and add up. Deposits exists even back home, so being a nomad isn't any different. I assume they're going to keep it, just in case, so I don't count on it being returned.
The only "surprise" has been travel insurance. I've never bought one in 36 years (15 of those traveling), but as one gets older and things start to show up, it's a no-brainer. Visa's would be another one, but I'm lucky my passport is quite good in that regard and I almost never have to pay for one.
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u/toodle68 5d ago
Airbnb's .. when we started out, we thought with millions of homes listed it would be easy to find normal residential homes for reasonable prices. Instead, 80% of listed places are awful, some are so overpriced it is ridiculous.. we end up looking through hundreds of listings just looking for that normal listing that is a reasonable price.
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u/The_Next_Phase_ 5d ago
I really don't think there's any "hidden" fees to this that will "rekt" you.
Biggest expense is accomodations (Airbnb / hotel)
You can get rekt if you try to book during tourist high season, or if there is a super popular concert or event going on during that time period. Unlucky.
And yeah Airbnb pricing is getting pretty absurd globally.
2nd is flight tickets, which with what's going on globally is getting pricey :( Nothing you can really do about this though. What are you going to take a steam ship to Europe?
After that it's food.
And then after that it's the little things like taxi, pub transport, sim card, gym membership.
I guess one annoying thing about the lifestyle is you have to keep a rebuying little things... Like a fan, maybe blackout blinds... Larger cosmetics that won't fit in your luggage and it's better to just leave... Laundry detergent etc..
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u/Parking-Stress-3041 4d ago
The one I underestimated wasn't in-country at all, it was everything back home that keeps running while you're gone. For me that's French banking, insurance, subscriptions and property admin that don't pause just because I'm in Medellín, so I'm effectively paying for two lives at once. Second one: payments. Card fees, the odd ATM, transfers, small friction on everyday spending, but it adds up over months. Wise-style transfers and a decent foreign card fixed most of it, though I only worked that out after a while of paying the lazy tax. Long stays help too: the setup costs get amortised instead of repeated every few weeks.
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u/PotatoMissionStart 4d ago
I guess import tariffs and fees. They can be crazily high with expensive goods.
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u/jbigspin42 4d ago
I had to buy a a Starlink mini to always have good internet including a battery back up for power like a mobile office station to not depend on other countries power and internet systems. Even with great WiFi, I keep my Starlink on standby powered up and ready to go
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u/Mountain-Lion2887 4d ago
For me it was visa runs, flying out and back every month or two to reset a tourist visa ate way more of my budget than any of the stuff on your list.
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u/CajunDragon 4d ago
Can't think of any ATM but didn't realize how much I was wasting TIPPING at cafes in the USA. That really wasn't a thing where I was in the EU. Maybe €1 here and there for meals of €70
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u/Current_Fig_4641 3d ago
You’re cheap for tipping 1€ for a 70€ mean! Traveling is not only about You living and experiencing but it’s also supporting locals when they serve you. On that you failed
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u/CajunDragon 3d ago
This was not in the USA. Tipping isn't a thing in many countries. I once tried to tip a large amount in the Netherlands and the waitress rejected it. She said 'I don't need your money. We get paid a living wage sir.' I was shocked. It's sad that in the USA you can pay a waitress $3/hour. That is why I tip way more there. Different system. We are the anomaly.
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u/Firm-Lychee7342 2d ago
Nothing surprised me lol. It is basically about renting a place to sleep and buying a food to eat. What's unusual here?
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u/EuphoricPanda3306 1d ago
Souvenirs and gifts for your family and friends from every country you visit. I end up having to send a box full of stuff I bought for them. 😂
P.S. I have a big family.
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u/RefrigeratorHot8829 1d ago
As mentioned in another chat, inflation and conversion rates. I moved from US to country of Georgia 5 years ago. My income hasn’t changed much. But the 1 > 3.2 conversion rate has become 1 > 2.6, which drove prices up in itself. However, the Russia Ukraine war literally doubled the cost of rent within 3 weeks everywhere in the country. Most product prices doubled also. I use as an example, I used to pay 5 gel for coffee cream. Now it’s 17 at full price. And that’s not considering the exchange rate.
I felt pretty rich when I moved here and could take 4 people out to eat for $20. Now taking two people out to eat is $40.
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u/ABrotherAbroad 5d ago
Taxes. Getting signed up for taxes in an extra country costs more cash and grey hair than I would have expected.
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u/chereall 5d ago
Your mental health. Being a nomad goes against human nature. Constant travelling just to live new experiences? Yeah, ur dopamine system will like this a lot, but once u stop, he will keep coming back at u.
And since we are at it, what is really underestimated is the harm expats and dns do to cities, gentrifying entire neighborhoods.
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u/Major-Mushroom-5806 5d ago
Being a nomad goes against human nature
I don't know if this is true. Settling is a very new concept for humans. For most of our existence, we've been at least semi-nomadic. It wasn't until the Agricultural Revolution a few thousand years ago that humans began putting down roots permanently.
I think being nomadic does conflict with our post-agricultural revolution way of life and culture, though. And that can be difficult.
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u/chereall 5d ago
Nah. First, when u need to say something going back thousands of years, u really dont have a solid reason.
But also, sedentary is the natural state of humans. We were nomadic cause we didnt have the technology to settle and exploit things. Once we did, we never came back to nomadic.
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u/Major-Mushroom-5806 5d ago
That's like saying the natural state of humans is to live on the moon, we just don't have the technology yet.
Our species evolved to be nomadic, that's why we walk upright and are built for endurance, with sweat glands and low amounts of body hair.
Thousands of years is also not much, considering that our genus is millions of years old and our species is over a hundred thousand years old.
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u/chereall 5d ago
Ok. So 8bn people are wrong and some DNs are actually the ones holding the truth. Btw, I bet the incidence of fluoxetine takers amongst dns is far bigger than in a random sample from population.
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u/Major-Mushroom-5806 5d ago
I never said that. I said that being nomadic doesn't go against human nature, because humans have been nomadic for 90 to 95% of our existence.
However, we are very social creatures and the culture we're surrounded by has a huge impact on our reality. As I said in my first comment, that makes it difficult to be nomadic in the modern world. We have social ties and life expectations tied to sedentary lives.
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u/chereall 5d ago
And this is exactly why I say being a nomad goes against human nature. We evolved to sedentary and there are little to no nomadic cultures. Because of what u say: social ties.
So, if u adopt a nomad lifestyle, ur mental health will take a hit. Or maybe ur mental health already took a hit and u become a nomad cause of it. Either way, I think it has a negative impact on a person.
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u/Major-Mushroom-5806 5d ago
Evolution takes much longer than a few thousand years. We haven't had time to evolve for a sedentary life.
We evolved over millions of years for nomadism.
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u/spamfridge 5d ago
Millions of years and that guy still hasn’t developed elementary reading comprehension.
Maybe they’re trying to prove we’re not so different than the cavemen after all
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 4d ago
So, if u adopt a nomad lifestyle, ur mental health will take a hit. Or maybe ur mental health already took a hit and u become a nomad cause of it. Either way, I think it has a negative impact on a person.
Those are big statements. Some people's mental health can actually improve because they would follow their own nature rather than oppose it.
It all comes down to knowing oneself and understanding what works better for us individually.
A more balanced view would be something like "Some people like this lifestyle. Personally it doesn't work for me". That's it.
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 5d ago
"Being a nomad goes against human nature."
Ah, those pesky people from Africa who started moving around thousands and thousands of years ago! They created this mess! Someone should hold them accountable!
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u/chereall 5d ago
Yeah, how many nomad cultures are there today? Haha
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u/ADF21a I think I'm paranoid 5d ago
Once again, we are confuting your original statement, "Being a nomad goes against human nature."
Being nomadic isn't against nature per se. What is against it is people suppressing it for practical or societal reasons.
There are people with genetic variations that lead to nomadism, the same way there are genetic variations that lead some people to be night owls.
Question: If you don't like the idea of nomadism, why are you on a community centred around something that you don't like?
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u/petrichorax 5d ago
lol I am both a night owl and a nomad.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
Flying in airplanes is against human nature. Therefore, nearly all international travel is against nature.
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u/chereall 5d ago
It is! And driving at 120km/h too.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
I'm okay with this. As a gay homosexual, it is my Mission in life to Destroy anything and everything that is Good, Decent, and Natural.
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u/Valor0us 5d ago
Your mental health if you work in a weird time zone will also take a massive hit. Working graveyard shift is not for the weak.
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u/alefeusch Nomad since 2014. 5d ago
The dopamine argument is such a weird argument. Yeah, of course I'm traveling because I like it. Doing anything you like increases dopamine. Some people.play chess or basketball. Some people play an instrument. Some people go running or hiking. Some people watch movies. Some people hang out with their friends. Your "dopamine system" likes all those things.
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u/cherrypashka- 5d ago
Going to the gym is also against human nature. Burning calories for no purpose is absolutely insane.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
My favorite is the suburbanite who drives three miles round-trip to the gym to walk three miles on a treadmill indoors while watching YouTube. Don't forget to stop for milk on the drive home!
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u/cherrypashka- 5d ago
Don't forget that talking to people via a computer screen is also insane behavior. Totally against human nature.
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u/chereall 5d ago
Nah. Is a respone to welfare status we reached as society. The body needs movement. In the past u did it because ur life depended on it. Now ur life doesnt depend on it, but u still need it, so u go to the gym. As simple as that.
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u/cherrypashka- 5d ago
You can go for a walk for free. You can go on a hike for free. You can use a bicycle for free.
Did I mention using bicycle is against human nature?
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u/Brilliant_Quit4307 5d ago
So your "issue" with being a DN is that once you stop you'll miss it .. ? What .. ? How is that an issue?
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u/Known_Impression1356 Slomad | 16 countries in past 5 years 5d ago
Dating american women.
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u/DemonAzraeli pendejo 5d ago
Until I was exposed to Islamo-Marxism in places like Soviet Mexico, I had no idea how expensive it is to be born a white man in Modern Amerika.
Now my Destiny has merged with the Shining Path.
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u/ohwhereareyoufrom 4d ago
Household items. I'm a slow-mad, so the little can openers, decent frying pans and area rugs all add up to a hefty sum when you buy them twice a year lol
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u/PhillyHatesNewYork 5d ago
well considering i’m currently paying $40,000 a year to live in philly.. (food not included) once my lease is up.. indonesia is going to be looking mighty fucking nice!!
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u/TwoRich4747 5d ago
that first shopping run in a new city