Bali is one of my favorite places in the world and is where I call home with my budding family of 3. I’ve been here for many years now off and on and it offers a lifestyle that is hard to find anywhere else in the world. It’s an absolutely wonderful place to raise a family from its beautiful family friendly villas to wonderful daycare centers at a fraction of the cost.
I’ve seen Bali when it was super packed (yuck) and during the Pandemic when it has more or less been closed off to the outside world (not great for the locals but nice as a foreigner looking for a more chilled time). I’ve spent some extended time in Bali in 2021/2022 because I would be foolish not to after spending $300 on a business visa and 10 days in a hotel quarantine, all requirements to enter Bali during the pandemic.
For the purposes of understanding, I have listed my expenses in Indonesia Rupiah (IDR) as well as US Dollars since this is what all my finances are in. As of the time of writing, the exchange rate is $1 USD = 16,400 IDR and inflation was going up all over the world. All cost of living figures are monthly figures.
Bali is Relatively “Cheap”
Have you dreamed about living in Bali as well? I don’t blame you. This is one of my first big stops after reaching financial independence. I had budgeted around $40,000 a year to fund my lifestyle which is less than a 4% withdrawal rate from my current portfolio. Throw in the money I earn through this blog and it is more than enough money to live in Bali.
Bali was cheap. Nowadays, it’s still relatively cheap if you make an effort to live cheaply. However, it’s not as cheap as it once was. Prices, especially for accommodations, have risen substantially post COVID (like the rest of the world). The thing that really stands out for Bali is not that it’s just relatively cheap, but it’s cheap and you get so much for it. The quality of the food, restaurants, and facilities in Bali combined with its cost makes it one of a kind.
Even when I was in Thailand for a month right before coming to Bali, it was cheap but I could still notice that Bali was a little cheaper. However, the restaurants, vibe, natural beauty, accommodation options, and just overall ambiance is just better in Bali (personal opinion of course). Compared to the island life in Thailand, I just thought Bali was more upscale but at a lower cost.
Cost of Rent In Bali For A Family – 40m IDR (~$2,500)
Like all places around the world, accommodation is likely the largest expense you’ll have. Bali is no exception.
In fact, Bali might have an outsized percentage of your budget allocated to accommodation cost simply because of the amenities you end up seeking out because of wanting to live the “Bali lifestyle”. In Bali, your rent as a family is expensive because you’ll likely want a nice spacious 2-3 bedroom villa with a pool. In most other parts of the world, you would be content settling for a spacious apartment or small house without a private pool.
In Bali, I want all the amenities that make it a “Bali villa” and my budget increases since I look for nice villas with a pool. While the price for a nice villa is “expensive” by Bali standards, you’re actually getting some serious good value because a similar villa somewhere in Europe would be 3-4x the price.
Prices of villas in Bali vary wildly. For the purpose of this post, I’m specifically speaking of the Bali villa market in the Canggu, Pererenan, Seseh areas. I rented a beautiful 3 bedroom 3 bathroom villa in the heart of Seseh just 5 minutes walking to the beach.
It’s a family friendly villa which means the entire structure is enclosed. Many of the villas in Bali often times have an open living room which fits the tropical Bali vibes but is unpractical for life with a child (mosquitoes everywhere). A lot of villas also have separated bedrooms with entrance from the outside. This is great for groups of people sharing a villa for a few days but again, it is unpractical for families with kids because it’s just a mosquito party.
It’s actually very difficult to find a nice villa with the bedrooms located inside the main house (entrance into the bedroom from the house itself). You’re essentially looking for a standard house with a private pool.
As of 2025/2026, the market varies wildly for villas. In general, I’ve seen that for a 3 bedroom 3 bath villa, you’re looking to pay around 35-50m IDR on a month to month basis. If you rent a villa for a year, you’ll pay something in the 350m to 500m IDR range.
You can of course pay much more for a 3 bd/3 ba villa if the construction is of super high quality or the land space is much larger than normal.
Rent a villa monthly or yearly?
As Bali is such a tourist driven economy, many villas will offer a monthly rental or yearly rental option. The standard discount for a yearly rental is roughly 2 months. So this means your yearly rental price would be about 10x the monthly rental price.
Payment upfront is standard in most villas for a long term contract. Yes, this means you’re expected to pay the entire year’s rent upfront. Of course, everything is negotiable and I’ve known of people that worked out an agreement with the landlord to pay monthly or quarterly. However, it is absolutely not unreasonable for the landlord to want the entire year’s rent up front.
Everything is negotiable
Bali is a very informal market for villa rental and everything is negotiable. Depending on the location, villa quality, and general need of liquidity from the landlord, you have room for negotiation. Do not make lowball ridiculous offers but something in the 5-10% range is totally reasonable, especially if you’re looking to rent long term (landlords prefer longer term leases).
Do keep in mind that while there is a lot of inventory in Bali, the amount of good villas are far and few. Most of the villas in Bali are plagued with mediocre construction and you’ll quickly find problems shortly after moving in. Most villas are made with the fast and cheaply as possible mentality. While they photograph very well for Instagram, they are in reality bad villas.
If you find a good villa where the construction quality is top notch, the owners seem to be very on top of things, and where there is minimal construction around you (which is important as this can get super noisy), you may consider not negotiating as strongly as with other places. Good villas in Bali rent very fast!
Where to stay in Bali
Bali is very region by region. Some parts are definitely more “hot” than others so you can expect to pay more or less depending on how central you want to be. It’s just just like any other place in the world.
For families, I think the most popular locations right now are near to the schools. There is a contingency of international schools in the Kerobokan and Umalas so this attracts a lot of families. The villas in this area are older and generally less expensive than villas in newer areas like Pererenan and Seseh.
There are also many schools in Ubud which attracts plenty of families. Real estate in Ubud is considerably more cheap than in the Canggu areas.
Seseh has quickly become one of the hot spots for families. Seseh is still relatively new with rice fields intact, quiet streets, no traffic, with plenty of growing cafes. There are no big schools here yet (although there is a great day care center), but that is bound to change in the coming years.
Make sure to read my Bali Neighborhood guide to better understand all the different areas of the island and how to choose which is best for you!
Where to find accommodation in Bali
The best place to find accommodation in Bali is through Facebook Groups or WhatsApp groups. There might be better sources but I think if you’re staying for multiple months or a year, the best options are to use Facebook groups. There are a ton of groups in Facebook so I would just join the ones with the most people.
Bali’s real estate market is so decentralized that there are still no central real estate search websites. This makes it incredibly annoying to know exactly what’s in the market. Sadly, I don’t see it changing any time soon.
If I click into the Bali House Apartment Villa for Rent group with 50k members, I can find some really good deals like the following:
This apartment (they actually called it that finally) is 7m IDR for one months rent (slightly under $500). This price also includes all the drinking water and regular cleanings.
Use Airbnb to find long term stays in Bali
Airbnb is a great option if you’re staying for a month or two. You can almost always expect to find great discounts if you are search for monthly rentals and most of the places you’ll find on Facebook will also be on Airbnb. However, you will need to pay the Airbnb service fee which is another 10%+ on top of the listing price. It’s often times easier just to message people and do it direct to avoid these booking charges.
I’ve had success looking at Airbnb listings, finding the one I like, and messaging the host to do an Off-Airbnb deal to avoid paying the hefty Airbnb fees. A lot of hosts are open to this. While Airbnb listings are by nature short term as that is more profitable if occupancy rates are above a certain percentage, a lot of hosts are open to long term rentals if they don’t feel like taking on this risk.
Mobile Service in Bali – 100,000 IDR (~$7)
Having cell service is imperative no matter where I live. Bali is no different. While there is ample wifi in every restaurant or cafe you visit (some of the local warungs even have wifi!), you just can’t substitute having good data.
Thankfully, data is very cheap in Indonesia. I got a sim card with Telkomsel which is the fastest and most comprehensive network in Indonesia. I won’t even begin trying to explain the seemingly endless data packages and options on the platform. To summarize, I purchased a pre-paid sim card as these are only allowed for tourists and short term residents. I top up my phone with cash credit every month and buy data when I need it.
On average, I buy a 10-15GB data plan for a cost between 70,000 and 80,000 IDR. Sometimes, there will be deals on Telkomsel’s app which offers something like 16 GB of data for 50,000 IDR. The best I’ve found was a 30GB deal for 75k IDR. It’s hit or miss and I still haven’t really figured out Telkomsel’s offerings at all.
If I was working and traveling to more remote parts of Bali, I would consider buying more data as often times wifi can be spotty in places in Sideman for example where I stayed in the amazing Camaya Bamboo Houses.
Otherwise, if you’re staying in a developed place like Canggu or Ubud, you’ll find wifi everywhere.
Gym Membership – 7m IDR (~$450)
I’ve always been into living a healthy lifestyle and a gym has always been integral in that piece. I’ve worked out at some really nice gyms in my life and my search for the perfect gym in Bali was quite difficult.
I’ve written a post about all all the best gyms in Bali where I essentially went to like 20 different places to check what was on offer. There are many gyms in Bali but not that many really nice ones. If you are looking for top end luxury fancy type gyms like Equinox or a Virgin Active Classic, you’re choices are limited.
In Canggu, Body Factory used to be the only gym that provided that luxury upscale environment. In recent years, new gyms have popped up in Canggu and Pererenan like Elite Fit and the Wrong Gym. The costs are much higher for these gyms however given they come with beautiful pools, hot tubs, and the “scene” that comes with higher end gyms. The prices of course drop depending on how long of a commitment you make but holy crap are the gyms in Bali expensive. It’s on par with the Equinox gyms I went to when I lived in New York.
Of course, I catered to these gyms and ended up with memberships to Body Factory before switching to places like the Wrong Gym. I’ve since also tried Obsidian gym, as well as the newest and greatest Omni.
We both go to Omni gym now where the membership is a steep 3.5m IDR per month on a longer term contract. For two people, this is a whopping 7m IDR which is more expensive than most gyms anywhere in the world. However, Omni gym is absolutely stunning, close to our villa in Seseh, and is a splurge we are willing to pay for.
Dining and Restaurants – 32m IDR (~$2,000)
Without a doubt, eating out is the biggest and most variable expense I have in Bali. I don’t cook much, and I don’t know many other expats in Bali that regularly cook. There are just too many delicious options all over Bali at cheap prices and there aren’t that many large supermarkets.
Local Warung serving Indonesian food
Eating out in Bali is cheap by any comparison to Western countries. However, you can eat cheap or you can eat super cheap. Warungs (local restaurants) are the best options to eat cheap Indonesian foods. These local warungs can range from roadside shacks to well lit restaurants. You’ll find the typical dishes in these restaurants like Nasi Goreng, Mie Goreng, Beef Rendang, Nasi Campur etc. You can expect to pay between 25,000 IDR($1.6) to 40,000 IDR ($2.5) per dish. If you’re a fan of suckling pig, then you must eat the local Babi Guling at the countless Babi guling shops around the island.
There are not as many night markets in Indonesia. The culture is not like the buzzing street markets of Thailand but you can find cheap delicious foods all over the place. Indonesian Sate’s are the street foods of choice and you’ll find people grilling pork and chicken satays all over the place around night time. One of my favorite places in Canggu grills the best Babi Sate’s and it is 20,000 IDR for 10 skewers ($1.3).
Western Restaurants
One of my favorite things of Bali and staying in a neighborhood like Canggu is the incredible diversity of different food options you have. I’m totally okay just eating local Indonesian food all the time because I just love the flavors and spices. However, there are times where I want to mix it up and eat something else. Or if I’m going out with friends, it’s more likely we’ll pick a place with a nicer atmosphere which often times mean Western restaurants.
What sets Bali apart from other places is the quality of the food and the prices. The quality is absolutely top notch with restaurants having super inviting ambiance. The prices are of course much more than warungs but not that expensive given the quality of food. I’ve traveled all over the world and often times I find that eating Western food in non-Western settings means paying prices that are almost on par with the West.
In Bali, you can go to a Greek restaurant like Santorini in Canggu and pay 100,000 IDR (~$8) for a big plate of souvlaki in a restaurant setting that feels like you’re back in the Greek islands.
Cafes for breakfast
Bali has no shortage of amazing cafes and breakfast spots all over the island as you can see from my detailed post of the best cafes in Bali. This is the island for digital nomads so you can expect the finest cafes perfect for working, drinking coffee, and just being one step removed from a co-working space.
I went to numerous cafes almost every day for breakfast when I first arrived in Bali. I just loved the vibe and the food. However, after some time, you realize you can’t take down French toast every morning and feel good about it. A meal with coffee at a trendy Bali cafe will run you 80,000 IDR to 120,000 IDR ($5 to $8).
Therefore, I normally visit cafes for breakfast 2-3 times a week and the other days I will eat my go to breakfast meal of oatmeal with oat milk, peanut butter, and honey. This is pretty much the only thing I buy from the grocery stores.
Adding it all up
If I add it all up, we spend about the following on average:
- 250,000 IDR ($16) on breakfast: This is a nice cafe with coffee (2 people). We don’t go to cafes every day as it’s unfeasible with a child. Most of the week, we eat breakfast at home so 200k is the average price for breakfast over the week.
- 300,000 IDR ($19) on lunch: This is usually a meal at the gym, local Ayam Bakar, or another cafe. Slightly more than breakfast. Averages out to be around 300k a day for 2 people
- 400,000 IDR ($24) on dinner: We used to go out a lot in Bali before kids. However, with kids, this usually involves picking something up and eating at home with the baby. Every week, we try to go for a nice dinner out once or twice a week.
- 100,000 IDR ($6) on groceries: This is for all misc. groceries and food for the baby. This budget of course would increase the older the child.
In total, that’s around 1m IDR per day for our food and groceries. We probably spend a little more than that but I’m not one to track our expenses to the dollar.
Childcare in Bali – 15m IDR
As we’re a family in Bali, one of our major costs will be childcare and schools. Depending on the age of your child(ren), you will pay very little to quite a lot.
The cost of a nanny in Bali
Our child is only a year old which means we only need a nanny for now. Our nanny is a live-out nanny that comes to our villa Mondays to Fridays for 7 hours during the day. This allows us to go to the gym, socialize with friends, and get work done throughout the day. On some days, we asked the nanny to stay longer so we could go out for dinners with friends. Other times, we asked her to come on the weekends.
Depending on how long you’re staying in Bali, you can hire nannies through agencies where you pay by the hour, day, or month. Typically, the nanny agencies charged somewhere between 70k to 80k per hour with a percentage of this amount going to the agencies. We’ve gone down this route and negotiated a rate for one month (9m IDR) which is slightly cheaper than just paying by the hour.
As we are staying in Bali long term now, we have a nanny on a long term basis (without a nanny agency). There are no standardized prices to pay nannies in Bali and the industry is largely unregulated as far as I am aware. I know of people that pay their nannies 6m a month for 6 days of work a week (they are live in nannies). I know others that pay less and some that pay more.
Our nanny is well trained in first aid, cooks for the baby, speaks good English, and looks after everything baby related. We definitely pay her more than the average nanny and settled on a rate of 6m IDR per month. She works only 4-5 hours a day since our child is at the daycare most of the day. She stays later on Fridays so we can go out for the night. We agreed that she would work 1 Saturday a month.
Daycare in Bali
While our nanny is great at taking care of our child, we felt she needed interaction with other kids. We found an amazing young child day care center (1y to 6y) in the Seseh/Cemagi area that is absolutely amazing. They have a 3 to 1 child to teacher ratio, a huge playground, great homemade food, and various activities for children.
We decided to send our child there for the majority of the day and our nanny would be the one that takes her there. The cost of this daycare is between 6m and 10m IDR per month depending on the time commitment.
We enrolled our baby in the daycare program at Bloom Boutique School in Cemagi which has been incredible. With the combined cost of daycare and a nanny, we pay 15m IDR in total per month.
Schools in Bali
If you have older children, you’ll want to send them to one of the many international schools in Bali. There are a ton of options of high caliber ranging from the Green School in Ubud to the Canggu School.
Prices range depending on the age of your child but expect to pay somewhere in the 150m to 250m IDR per year range. It’s not cheap, but is far cheaper than private schools in other parts of the world.
Drinks and Entertainment – 3m IDR (~$200)
I decided to separate my drinking and going out budget from my food budget just to write more about this.
Alcohol in Bali is expensive. Sure you can find local Bintang beers for 25k IDR at a bar but if you want to drink anything else, you’ll have to pay up for it. Trust me, after some unnecessary nights with too much Bintang, you’ll want to drink something else as well.
Cocktails at a decent place will run you between 75k to 150k IDR (~$5 to $9). You can find very good cocktails in a few places but you just need to know the spots.
Wine is also prohibitively expensive. You can expect to pay 90k to 100k IDR (~$7) for a glass of below average wine. The pours in Bali are not generous either like the huge pours of wine I became used to in Germany and the rest of Europe. Almost all the wine is imported so you’re paying for that. Having traveled all over Europe and drinking the best wine on offer in countries like Greece, Portugal, Spain, Italy, France etc. it is hard to justify these prices.
I also drink significantly less when living in Bali. If you’re short term traveling Bali, you might party a lot but when I live here, I always trend towards a healthier lifestyle that involves much less alcohol consumption. Instead of beers while at the beach watching the sunset, I opt for a coconut instead. Every now and then I will go to a cocktail bar for one drink but overall, my consumption of alcohol (and the expenses associated with it) go down a lot.
There are the odd nights you go out to beach clubs like La Brisa, El Kabron etc. where you end up spending much more but these are rare.
I could easily spend more than 3m a month and probably have in many of the months but it’s just not a budget you can really account for on a regular schedule.
Transportation via Scooter – 500,000 IDR (~$30)
Bali is an island of scooters. There is no public transportation to speak of or at least I’ve never come across any. Everyone, foreigners and locals, get around with scooters. During rush hours, you’ll find just hundreds or thousands of scooters on the roads cruising down the streets.
Scooters are very cheap to rent in Bali. For tourists coming for just a few days, you can expect a scooter rental to run about 70,000 to 150,000 IDR a day depending on the bike. A scooter like Scoopy or Vario are on the lower end while the coveted NMax is on the higher end. The prices can fluctuate wildly but generally once you live here for a long enough time, you’ll know the right people to rent scooters from. If you rent long term, the prices are always cheaper and you’ll find a good deal eventually.
Buying scooters in Bali
As we are living in Bali, we actually purchased our own brand new NMAX scooters. The cost to rent an NMAX is 2m to 2.5m a month for a new model. Often times, scooter rental companies will ask for a deposit and make up whatever excuse possible to keep that deposit including even the most minor of scratches.
The cost to buy a brand new NMAX is 34m. This means that after 1.5y of renting a scooter, we could have owned our scooter outright. It’s a no brainer for those planning to stay in Bali long term.
With that said, it was a one time cost which we are happy to pay and no longer a monthly ongoing expense. If I were to amortize it over a monthly period though, I would add about 3m IDR for two bikes per month. For the sake of this post, my ongoing monthly costs are simply the gas prices.
Gas Prices in Bali
Gas prices are very cheap in Bali. Indonesia has their own oil reserves around the country and gas prices are subsidized accordingly. The price per Liter is 10,000 IDR (~$0.6 to $0.7). There aren’t many gas stations in the island however. Most of them are concentrated in denser parts of the city like Denpasar, Kuta, and Seminyak. I stay away from these areas mostly because the traffic is horrible.
Don’t worry, you will find gas in almost every road side shop. You’ll see the signs for petrol and you’ll see gas filled into 1L Absolute Vodka bottles or into a makeshift gas pump. Prices here are usually 2,000 – 3,000 IDR more than the official gas stations.
Anyone who has ridden a scooter knows that you don’t need much gas. For a month, I normally take about 10-15 liters of gas.
Visa fees – 1.2m IDR ($75)
To live in Bali, you’ll need a proper visa beyond that of a standard tourist visa. The standard VOA visa allows you to stay in Bali for 30 days with the option to extend for an additional 30 days. This means you can stay in Bali for 60 days before needing to do a visa run.
The VOA costs 500k and to extend it, you’ll need to pay another 500k + visa agent fees (you can do this yourself but it’s more complicated than it’s worth). Usually the visa agent will charge you another 1m meaning you’ll pay about 2m for 2 months under the VOA.
To extend the visa, you’ll also need to visit the immigration office in Denpasar which is always a half day affair.
As a family, doing a visa run every 2 months is awful. Literally couldn’t think of anything worse. Thankfully, if you plan on staying in Bali for longer than 2 months at a time, the best visa to get is the D1 or C1 visas. The C1 visa is a single entry maximum 6 month visa. It’s not a flat 6 months but instead it grants you 2 months in Indonesia with the option to extend for another 2 months two times for a total of 6 months.
You’ll need to enlist the help of a visa agent to complete the applications for these visas. It’s not worth trying to do it yourself because you’ll be stonewalled on your own since the whole process is designed to grease the pockets of the officials and visa agents. For a C1 visa, you’ll need to pay a one time fee of about 1.8m IDR to a visa agent, every subsequent extension will be another 2m IDR so you’re looking at a monthly burn rate of about 800k-1m for visa costs in Indonesia.
The D1 Visa is the same thing as the C1 but it is multi entry meaning you can leave Indonesia as often as you want. It costs more since it is multi entry but might be worth it so you aren’t constantly applying for visas. This is also the one I ended up getting for my family. For 3 people, the cost will be 4.5m x 3 = 13.5m IDR.
Like the C1 visa, you are allowed to stay 2 months on this visa and then you must file an extension (if you don’t leave the country) of 2 months. You can extend twice for a total of 6 months. Each extension will cost 1.8m IDR. At the end of the 6 months, you’ll need to leave the country no matter what. When you return to Indonesia, your 6 month counter resets (2 months initially, pay for 2x extensions).
Let’s do the math. If you stay a year in Bali on the D1 visa, extending four times, your total cost will be as follows:
- 4.5m – Initial D1 Visa cost
- 1.8m x 4 = 7.2m – 4 extensions
- 11.7m IDR – Total cost
Therefore, the maximum cost for a D1 visa assuming you never leave the country will be almost 12m IDR a year. In reality, we leave Indonesia at least a few times a year for travel, visiting family, weddings etc. We extend our visa perhaps once a year. Therefore, as a family of 3, we pay about 1.2m IDR per month on a prorated monthly basis.
KITAS Visa
The only way to avoid leaving the country after 6 months is to apply for a KITAS (residence permit) which is more expensive than the C1 or D1 option.
The KITAS is a proper residence permit and allows you to stay in the country for the entire duration of your visa. You can also legally buy a scooter and open a bank account (which comes in super handy when paying people). It’s the best way to settle into life in Bali without worrying about visa runs. The cost of a KITAS is also significantly higher. Expect to pay about 20m IDR for two years per person. It’s about twice the price of the D1 visa in my experience.
Personal Maintenance – 4m IDR ($250)
Living in Bali inevitably means succumbing to the countless beauty and wellness treatments the island has to offer. Initially, I estimated this budget to be about 1m IDR (I was just factoring in a massage or two) but my wife quickly scolded me and took me back to Earth.
Turns out, there are a lot of things she needs and after living in Bali, it’s not even that unreasonable. While it’s way cheaper to do in Bali than anywhere else, it still adds up. Here is a breakdown of how we spend money.
- 150k – Men’s haircut
- 4m every 6 months (650k per month) – Women’s color and cut
- 800k – Mani/Pedi
- 600k – Lashes
- 1m – Massages
- 4m every 6 months (650k per month) – Botox
In total, we pay roughly 4 million IDR a month on a prorated basis. Sometimes, this budget might balloon to 5m or 6m depending on the amount of massages we get.
Misc. Charges – 3m IDR ($200)
This section is just for everything else that adds up over time that is not appropriate for the other categories. For example, top water is not safe to drink so unless your villa provides you with unlimited drinking water, you’ll have to go out and buy this for yourself. Water is inexpensive and you can buy a large 20L tub of water for 20,000 IDR which lasts the week.
Anyone that has kids knows that there are always random expenses that creep up. Whether this is medication, toys, clothing, or other random things, costs add up. 3m IDR is just a simple estimate on my behalf. It could be more or less in certain months.
Health Insurance – 5m IDR ($300)
We have a monthly health insurance plan through Hallesche, a large German insurer. Our plan is a comprehensive health insurance plan (not travel insurance) and covers all outpatient, dental, pregnancy, etc. There is a deductible of $500 per year (since we opted for the cheapest plan) and I don’t think we even hit this deductible because cost of care in Bali is so cheap.
I think this insurance is an incredible deal for 2 adults and 1 child. We were able to get this plan as we jumped on a larger group plan that our friends told us about. This plan does not include coverage in the USA.
Adding it all up – 107 IDR ($6,500) a month
Adding all of these categories up, we get the following expenses:
- Rent: 40m
- Dining and Restaurants: 32m
- Childcare: 15m
- Drinks and Entertainment: 3m
- Gym: 7m
- Transportation: 500k (scooter and gas)
- Phone plan: 80k
- Visa fees: 1.2m
- Personal Maintenance: 4m
- Health Insurance: 5m
- Misc Expenses: 3m
In total, We spend about 107m IDR a month or roughly $6,500 USD. I would add an additional $100-200 USD to this budget just as a buffer room to keep me honest. I didn’t track everything to the dollar but rather estimated my budget especially for eating out and drinking.
I don’t think you need to spend this much if you’re more budget conscious as I know plenty of other families who spend less. I also know families who spend considerably more with some spending as much as our entire monthly budget on the rent alone!
Whatever life you do decide to live, hopefully this article gives you a general idea of what to expect with costs in Bali with a family!
Trips around and outside of Bali
If you’re spending an extended period of time in Bali, you’ll likely take many trips around the island and to islands nearby to Bali. I did many of these trips because you just have to experience some of these places.
For example, a visit to Nusa Penida to visit the famous diamond beach and Kelingking beach is an absolute must. Lombok is an amazing getaways for a few days outside of Bali with their main town (Kuta) being a mini Canggu from 10 years ago. The beaches are also much more stunning in Lombok with almost no traffic.
If you’re feeling more adventurous, you can take trips to places like Komodo National Park which is famous for some of the best scuba diving in the world as well as Raja Ampat which is equally as amazing for diving and an absolutely stunning above water scenery.
In addition, staying around Bali is also a must. Visiting Ubud and the famous rice fields is a must do as well.
Taking trips around Indonesia will undoubtedly eat into any monthly budget. I spent a lot of money traveling around Indonesia but these trips are not added to my budget since they are variable and not something I can have a definitive plan for.
Is Bali right for your family?
I hope this post helps you brainstorm your own plans to potentially make the move to Bali! Our monthly budget is just one of many different lifestyles so by no means do you have to spend as much as we do.
A monthly budget of $6-7k USD in Bali as a family of 3 is a very comfortable life. Aside from a bigger and better villa, I don’t really see much room for improving our already wonderful life.
