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In looking forward to the New Year, it would appear that we can – unfortunately – expect a dramatic increase in the cost of living in the U.S., Costa Rica and everywhere else.
So far this year in the U.S., corn prices are up 31%, soybeans are up 28% and the cost of red meat is up 20%.
Here in Costa Rica ICE’s electricity is going to be on [url=http://www.nacion.com/2012-12-22/ElPais/hogares-ticos-pagaran–13–mas-en-tarifas-de-electricidad.aspx]average 13% higher.[/url]
The [url=http://www.fao.org/worldfoodsituation/wfs-home/foodpricesindex/en/]FAO Food Price Index[/url] – in the image below – is a measure of the monthly change in international prices of a basket of food commodities.
You may also find this video below of interest:
[b]If any of you have some good money saving tips for healthy living in Costa Rica, it would be great if you could share them here with me and the rest of our VIP Members here… [/b]
Scott
MEDICARE..In case retirees have not received your Christmas Present from Congress and Obama OurMedicare went to 152. plus 14.9 for prescription coverage..
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Money-saving tips from the Food Fascist:
Stop buying packaged food. That means no cookies, cakes, chips, crackers, soda, ice cream, pasta sauce, orange juice, sugared cereals, or anything that is not in its original, true form.
Stop shopping in the grocery stores and start shopping at the farmer’s markets. Don’t buy paper towels, aluminum foil, or plastic zip-lock bags. Re-use plastic bags that veggies come in for other purposes. Compost all your veggie scraps. Burn all your paper. Recycle or re-use all glass containers. Then you won’t have to buy the expensive 50-gallon trash bags.
Give up meat. Switch to a veggie-based, whole grain and legume diet. It will save you money and save your life.
Make your own bread and yogurt. All bread and yogurt here have HFCS, sugar, or preservatives.
Buy your milk and butter from a local farmer – it’s cheaper and it’s not pasteurized.
Give up gringo food that has been imported. Learn to love local cheeses. Buy fresh oranges from the feria or plant some orange trees.
Plant a small garden – grow your own herbs, lettuce, hot peppers, etc. We spend about $50 a week for everything we consume and that includes fresh meat/chicken for the dogs, fish or shrimp for us, olive oil, coconut oil, butter, etc., rice, beans, legumes, whole grains, pasta, plus all the veggies and fruit we consume.
Stop eating out. The restaurant food isn’t that great here anyway. Soda food is mediocre at best. Learn to cook what you like at home.
You’re retired; you have plenty of time and the internet has recipes for everything under the sun.
Last week at the feria I spent $33 and this is what I got.
1 kilo of organic strawberries, 2 avocados, 1 bunch of basil, 1 kilo of shucked corn, 3 large tomatoes, 1 papaya, 5 big sweet pottoes, 2 k regular potatoes, 1 cauliflower, 1/2k green beans, 1 bunch of criollo garlic, 4 plantains, 10 carrots, 10 bananas, 3 liters of fresh raw milk, two fish filets, 4 boneless chick thighs, livers, and gizzards (chix for the dogs; fish for us!).
That was all I spent on food for last week — $33.00 – and we eat really really well.
Put your water heater on a timer. Ours is on for 1 hour in the morning, and 1 hour in the afternoon. We have plenty of hot water. Our lights are on timers, too. ICE runs us about $64 a month, a little less or more depending on how much I use the dehumidifier.
We don’t have cable TV – biggest waste of money in my mind. Hubby gets local channels on his little TV – not a problem for him because he speaks fluent Spanish.
We have a small garden behind the house where I have 2 kinds of parsley, chives, lettuce, arugula, turmeric, ginger, spinach, and hot peppers.
We have fruit trees for lemons, limes, oranges, mandarins, clementines, bananas. The citrus trees produce all year it seems, the bananas not so much. I probably don’t save more than $5.00 – $10 a month NOT buying those things, but if your mission is to save money then every little bit counts. And this is how we live on under $1000 a month.
Money isn’t the issue for us – I am very conservative (some might call me cheap – hahaha), or frugal, and have been all my life. We actually save more than we spend every month. So when i hear that people spend $500 – $700 a month on food, I cringe because I can’t even imagine eating what they eat!
And the added benefit is that we are totally healthy — no problems whatsoever, so no money to spend on meds, etc.
Thanks, this was great information as I am planning my move to Costa Rica and this information gives me what I need to know how affordable I can live there. I am so excited about my move, now, I am just trying to figure out how much money I should have for this move to happen. 😆
Check out residency websites, The Real Costa Rica and [url=http://www.residencyincostarica.com/]Residency in Costa Rica[/url] which explains things, pretty well.
While [b]maravilla[/b] admittedly spends little, there is always the other basics required, such as flours, coffee, sugar, pastas, rice, oil,cereal and other grains, etc so you must be prepared to spend/have more funds available.
[quote=”costaricafinca”]Check out residency websites, The Real Costa Rica and [url=http://www.residencyincostarica.com/]Residency in Costa Rica[/url] which explains things, pretty well.
While [b]maravilla[/b] admittedly spends little, there is always the other basics required, such as flours, coffee, sugar, pastas, rice, oil,cereal and other grains, etc so you must be prepared to spend/have more funds available.[/quote]
Maravilla
great post!!! question
I have never took the plunge with drinking reg unpasteurized milk reading on some of the bacteria can make you sick
any issues????
The $200-225 a month we spend on food also includes those things such as sugar, flour, cafe, etc.
The safety of pasteurized milk is overrated. I haven’t consumed anything but raw milk for the last 30 years and i have never gotten sick. Don’t believe the FDA about everything. Pasteurized milk isn’t that good for you since any reason you would drink it has been destroyed by the process. Raw milk is loaded with vit A, D, and CLA. and it has also been known to cure allergies and indigestion problems that are caused by drinking an unnatural product like homogenized/pasteurized milk. we use whole milk — the kind that has 6″ of heavy cream floating on the top of the 3 liter bottle.
I agree with [url=http://www.naturalnews.com/020374_cows_milk_dairy_products.html]Mike Adams[/url] on this:
“It always amazes me to discover just how many consumers have been brainwashed by dairy industry advertising into thinking that milk from cows is some sort of essential food for humans. In reality, cow’s milk is perfect nutrition for baby cows, but nutritionally incompatible with humans, most of whom are actually allergic to the substance.
Humans are the only species that will drink the mammary gland extract of another species. And we didn’t even choose a species close to us like monkeys or gorillas. No, we’ve chosen to drink milk from furry, four-legged creatures mostly because they’re the easiest ones to control and dope up with synthetic hormones that turn them into milk-generating machines for profit-motivated dairy operations.
I won’t include the part where he says that all “commercial milk from cows contains pus and blood…”
Jee! Jee!
Scott
[quote=”maravilla”]Money-saving tips from the Food Fascist:
Give up meat. Switch to a veggie-based, whole grain and legume diet. It will save you money and save your life.
[/quote]Do you eat fish Maravilla?
Scott
PS. I don’t have time to make my own bread by hand but used to have a terrific Zojirushi bread machine which I used for about 15 years until it just died on me …. Don’t supposed there’s a good bread machine store you know of …. ??
the key here is COMMERCIAL MILK — from factory cows, raised in unsanitary conditions, knee-deep in cow shit, with mastitis in their udders that drip pus into the milk. THAT is why it has to be pasteurized. RAW MILK is a whole other animal! (JAJAJA) I agree sometimes with Mike Adams, but he’s not always right. I only use milk to make kefir and yogurt and that changes the entire structure of the milk. Sometimes i put it in my espresso to make iced cappuccino and my husband uses it in his morning coffee. If you put a gun to my head i wouldn’t drink commerical milk or eat anything that had been raised in one of those ghastly factory farms.
we eat fish about 2x’s a month, shrimp once a month, chicken once or twice a month. i’ve never used a bread machine so i have no clue how one would even do that. i do all my breads by hand, the old fashioned way.
We, too, drink unpasteurized milk and have done for years, even before moving here. Although, now in many places it is considered illegal to do so.
Up until recently we had goats, so enjoyed goats milk and making some cheeses and of course yogurt but this is not easily available if you live ‘in town’.
When purchasing unpasteurized milk, you should try to see first, hand that the facilities are clean…. and the animals appear to be healthy.[quote=”davidd”]
Maravillagreat post!!! question
I have never took the plunge with drinking reg unpasteurized milk reading on some of the bacteria can make you sick
any issues????[/quote]
There is no problem at all drinking milk fresh out of the cow (if the cow is healthy off course, and the farmer does not contaminate the milk with cow poop while milking). Even kept in the refrigerator it is still fresh the next day (I rinse the bottle with water + clorine before using it for fresh milk). When I make cream cheese, I pasturize the milk first = heat it to 72 degrees celsius and keep it there for a couple minutes, then cool it down to 35 degrees and start the process (adding cultures etc.). Pasturized milk keeps several days in the refrigerator. Never cook / boil milk !! It tastes burned and is not healty.
Since I started reading the labels on canned and packed food at the supermarket I barely buy those products any more. Reading the list of ingredients sometimes makes you think you buy a bucket of paint or some kind of weed poison.
I agree with Maravilla, check out the local veggie stores and organic farmers, almost everything can be bought fresh.
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