It is hard to believe we are in the last month of our Year 1 Travel Plan, which over a year ago didn’t seem real.
Back then, we only knew what was theoretically possible. We certainly had no direct experience in making all of this work!
But now we’ve become hardened long-term international travelers.
Our spending patterns are predictable.
We know how to get from point A to point B as cheaply as possible if time isn’t an issue.
And we know how to avoid the financial pitfalls that get so many other travelers into trouble.
That said, let’s take a look at our June 2023 budget report to see how everything turned out for our second full month in Panama!
Accommodation: $706.58 USD
A pretty normal month of accommodation expenses for Panama. It is a little lower than May 2023, but that is only because there are fewer days in June than May.
This includes 22 nights in Boquete, Panama ($511.05 USD) and 8 nights in Bocas del Toro province, Panama ($195.53 USD), for an average daily spend of $23.55 USD.
Aside from the higher average cost of Airbnbs in Panama, nothing really controversial to see here.
Eating Out: $301.14 USD
Pretty low compared to past recent months, but perhaps we shouldn’t have been surprised.
Most of this expense is from our frequent “menu del dia” lunches in Boquete (at around $5 USD each), plus a handful of more expensive dinner outings. But during our time in Boquete, we rarely ate out more than one meal per day.
Sometimes less.
Here in Bocas del Toro province, there aren’t many opportunities to eat out. But the one time we did get lunch in Almirante while shopping for supplies we spent about $17 USD for average quality Chinese food.
At least the portions were huge!
And seeing that we will be living in relative solitude for most of July, we expect this expense to stay low.
Groceries: $441.88 USD
Significantly higher than our “eating out” expenses. But again, not entirely a surprise, considering we scaled back eating out a little.
Groceries are not exactly cheap in Panama. And this is especially true for produce!
But we like to eat healthy when we cook at home, so sometimes you have to spend a little more to eat the way you want.
Adding fuel to this fire was the fact that we went to the weekly Farmer’s Market in Boquete, which catered primarily to expats and their specific tastes. German pretzels, kefir, goat milk yogurt, and the like aren’t cheap at these events.
You can find many hard-to-find hand made/grown food products at the Boquete farmer’s market, all catered to the tastes of expats and tourists. And you’ll pay dearly for them.
But when you haven’t seen some of these things in nearly a year, it is fun to splurge.
General Supplies: $46.18 USD
We didn’t have to buy many day-to-day supplies this past month.
Our Airbnbs were generally well-outfitted, and we were fortunate to have many bathroom and kitchen consumables covered in our rent.
So really this expense came from basic things like mosquito candles, aluminum foil, laundry detergent, and the like.
Transportation: $77.70 USD
We took collectivos and buses a TON in May!
But you wouldn’t know from how much we spent on transportation.
For local collectivos, <$1 USD per trip was the norm for most short trips. And trips ~1-hour long cost around $2 USD.
So at $77.70 USD for the month, you can get a sense of how many rides we took!
All in all a pretty reasonable month for doing touristy things.
Alcohol: $29.77 USD
We were absolute saints during the month of June!
But when your favorite bottle of wine in Latin America (Gato Negro FTW!) is only $6, you can indulge and still look like a Puritan.
I wouldn’t be surprised if this expense goes down even more next month. We are in a jungle now, after all.
Utilities/Upkeep: $16.35 USD
Another low-expense category!
Aside from a haircut ($6 USDwith tip), the rest was made up of public bathroom fees and recharging our +Movil LTE data plan when needed.
Since we were around Wifi much of the time, we really didn’t need to recharge our LTE plan often! Google Voice really is awesome at reducing the need for LTE data for basic communication.
Medical: $171 USD
This total is from our final month of travel/medical insurance coverage.
Not much to see here.
And this expense will likely go down to near zero as we plan on self-insuring from this point forward.
Miscellaneous: $104.50 USD
Most of this expense category is made up of souvenirs for our families when we visit the USA in September. But it also includes the purchase of 3 t-shirts ($30 USD total) to replace some that were getting a little long in the tooth, or were poorly suited for tropical weather.
Total Expenses for June 2023 = $2,007.10 USD
Here is a summary of our June 2023 Budget Report, for those who love pie charts:
Considering we are in the most expensive country of our Latin America travels, we are pretty happy!
And it is our hope that for July it will be much the same, seeing as we will be in the jungle for the majority of it.
But we do plan on blowing off some steam for a couple of days on the popular islands around here, as well as spending more time in Panama City.
So we’ll see.
Things are really looking good for us to come in below our $2,500 USD/month average budget for our first year of slow travel (or $30,000 USD per year). At 11 months in, our average monthly spend is now $2,280 USD.
Maybe we’ll live it up a little for the final month of our first year of slow travel!
But knowing us, probably not.
Although we do have something a little out of character planned. 🙂
Until next time…
Thanks for reading!
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We were able to score direct business class tickets on Copa Airlines from Panama City to Boston for $141.20 and 76600 United points. A little rich on the points side than we would like, but we are happy with the direct flight/business class combo. Panama City is the hub for Copa, so it has by far the best international flight options back to the NE USA.
Hi Mark, I have a question about you medical “self-insurance going forward” comment. What is the thinking behind it? I would be scared to have some huge medical emergency to pay out of pocket…
How do you plan to deal with this hypothetical problem?
Travel medical coverage is a huge consern for me when I retire as it is very expensive as we are getting older…I am very interested how you are dealing with this.
This is tough for a lot of people to figure out, and the answer does vary from situation to situation. For us, we self insure when our income situation does not allow for affordable “Affordable Care Act” healthcare options from the United States.
First off, we don’t bother with travel medical insurance anymore. The cost was expensive and the one time we tried to use it our coverage was denied. $2200 USD for coverage that we may or may not end up receiving? No thanks.
So we decided to move forward with a combination of self-insurance and Affordable Care Act coverage (a USA health insurance option) to fill the void.
What does self-insurance mean? We were both in medically-adjacent career fields before we retired, so lots of minor things others would seek treatment for we can resolve ourselves. And since we both know how to read and respond to blood test results, we just get blood screens every year (for general and specific things) at labs in lower cost countries (like Mexico) and respond accordingly. Dentists and physician screenings (dermatologists in our case) are affordable overseas too. We also have for many years focused on our fitness as a form of self insurance for our early retirement travels. So we are in good shape and are low risk for many lifestyle diseases that start to cause problems for others in their 50s. Finally, many medications are extremely cheap overseas and often don’t require a prescription depending on what country you are in. And even if they do, a doctor visit to get their blessing is usually inexpensive.
Were something significant (but not critical) to arise, like a broken arm, we’d just pay out of pocket at the local clinic or hospital. Prices are always significantly cheaper in the places we go, and we are professionally savvy enough to know if a doctor or hospital is of decent quality. Seriously, the costs for something like this are usually far cheaper than insurance in most countries.
If something critical were to arise and we had advance notice, we’d fly ASAP to a place that could deal with it at a high level of care for the least amount of money (Malaysia comes to mind) and pay directly. So if I found that I needed quadruple bypass surgery or something like that, this is what we would do. The financial cost would sting, but it wouldn’t wipe us out like it would in the USA.
Of course a random traumatic event that requires immediate hospitalization could always arise. The short answer would be to simply pay out of our pocket from our reserves. But so far so good on that front. Not taking unnecessary risks, being aware, or not getting ourselves in foolish situations has always served us well.
This all said, when our income situation for a given tax year allows we can use a Affordable Care Act Insurance insurance plan for emergencies at many hospitals globally. Most ACA plans do not allow for this, but if you read the fine print on some, they can. We can’t rely on this in every country we go to, but we would have been covered in a number of hospitals during our travels (Panama City, Panama and a whole bunch in Spain, for example). But for non-critical clinic level problems, we would still just pay out of pocket. Our ACA deductibles are too large to cover them anyway.
So you can see that having emergency funds, as well as being in shape, is important for us. But the funny thing is that once you get on the road, you realize how affordable (and easy) health care is overseas. It is nothing like what you see in the USA. And once we experienced going to pharmacies, doctors, ophthalmologists, and dermatologists ourselves, we realized that most of our fears were completely unfounded. We honestly don’t worry about this anymore. But we did in the beginning, so we empathize with you!
Last, if you ever decide to get residency in another country, there are usually super cheap insurance options available for coverage in that country.
Loooong term, we may decide to pursue that option if we ever decide to settle down outside the USA.
Thanks Mark.
This makes total sense. Travel medical insurance is very expensive, especially as you get older.
We had some medical treatments in Mexico when we slow travelled there. It was nothing major – filling for broken tooth, antibiotic prescription for UTI, home doctor and blood test visit for treating high persistent fever – and it was not expensive at all. We have not even tried to submit for insurance as it was pretty low cost.
My biggest concern is if something critical / urgent happens and we have to cover a huge cost out of pocket. We are very fit and healthy as well but still had a scare when my husband was just 46. He had a ruptured aneurism in his brain and had to have 6h brain surgery next day with 2 weeks in the hospital. I guess it all depends on the cost in other countries…but I was happy it happened in Canada!
Living in Canada we are not used to pay for most of health care as it is covered by our provincial insurance so it is different for us than for US.
Although it looks like there is an option for 2 year provincial coverage for emergencies for travellers, so maybe we will explore it.
Thank you for sharing your process with me, it is very thought provoking.
I hope you are enjoying your time in Albania!
Having a great time in Albania! Will be posting about it soon.
I can understand how the potential for paying significant costs might be really off-putting for a Canadian, or anyone from a country with socialized medicine. In the USA, we always have the specter of having our life savings taken away at any moment due to a medical event…even with insurance. Perhaps this is why ~$80K USD for an all expenses paid quadruple bypass in Malaysia doesn’t throw me so much…which isn’t to say that it isn’t a lot of money. But compared to the USA out of pocket costs, it is cheap. It is just that we are used to living with a medical system where costs are the highest in the world, you never know what the costs will be until AFTER the procedure, and insurance is no guarantee that you will be protected.
Probably what I would do if I were you is price out the cost of the procedure for the condition that scares you the most (especially if it is potentially chronic) on a medical tourism website from a country that appeals to you. At least that way you would know what you are getting yourself into in a worst case scenario with self-insurance. And then plan from there.
Brain aneurisms are no joke though. We hope your partner is well and has been able to figure out the root of the problem, presuming it wasn’t some random event that fell from the sky. Life is like that sometimes.
6 thoughts on “June 2023 Budget Report – Better Than Expected For Panama”
Great news!! You actually did it for 11 months!! Let’s see for July. How much is your travel back to the States for August? Happy Fourth of July!!
We were able to score direct business class tickets on Copa Airlines from Panama City to Boston for $141.20 and 76600 United points. A little rich on the points side than we would like, but we are happy with the direct flight/business class combo. Panama City is the hub for Copa, so it has by far the best international flight options back to the NE USA.
Hi Mark, I have a question about you medical “self-insurance going forward” comment. What is the thinking behind it? I would be scared to have some huge medical emergency to pay out of pocket…
How do you plan to deal with this hypothetical problem?
Travel medical coverage is a huge consern for me when I retire as it is very expensive as we are getting older…I am very interested how you are dealing with this.
Greetings and a great question!
This is tough for a lot of people to figure out, and the answer does vary from situation to situation. For us, we self insure when our income situation does not allow for affordable “Affordable Care Act” healthcare options from the United States.
First off, we don’t bother with travel medical insurance anymore. The cost was expensive and the one time we tried to use it our coverage was denied. $2200 USD for coverage that we may or may not end up receiving? No thanks.
So we decided to move forward with a combination of self-insurance and Affordable Care Act coverage (a USA health insurance option) to fill the void.
What does self-insurance mean? We were both in medically-adjacent career fields before we retired, so lots of minor things others would seek treatment for we can resolve ourselves. And since we both know how to read and respond to blood test results, we just get blood screens every year (for general and specific things) at labs in lower cost countries (like Mexico) and respond accordingly. Dentists and physician screenings (dermatologists in our case) are affordable overseas too. We also have for many years focused on our fitness as a form of self insurance for our early retirement travels. So we are in good shape and are low risk for many lifestyle diseases that start to cause problems for others in their 50s. Finally, many medications are extremely cheap overseas and often don’t require a prescription depending on what country you are in. And even if they do, a doctor visit to get their blessing is usually inexpensive.
Were something significant (but not critical) to arise, like a broken arm, we’d just pay out of pocket at the local clinic or hospital. Prices are always significantly cheaper in the places we go, and we are professionally savvy enough to know if a doctor or hospital is of decent quality. Seriously, the costs for something like this are usually far cheaper than insurance in most countries.
If something critical were to arise and we had advance notice, we’d fly ASAP to a place that could deal with it at a high level of care for the least amount of money (Malaysia comes to mind) and pay directly. So if I found that I needed quadruple bypass surgery or something like that, this is what we would do. The financial cost would sting, but it wouldn’t wipe us out like it would in the USA.
Of course a random traumatic event that requires immediate hospitalization could always arise. The short answer would be to simply pay out of our pocket from our reserves. But so far so good on that front. Not taking unnecessary risks, being aware, or not getting ourselves in foolish situations has always served us well.
This all said, when our income situation for a given tax year allows we can use a Affordable Care Act Insurance insurance plan for emergencies at many hospitals globally. Most ACA plans do not allow for this, but if you read the fine print on some, they can. We can’t rely on this in every country we go to, but we would have been covered in a number of hospitals during our travels (Panama City, Panama and a whole bunch in Spain, for example). But for non-critical clinic level problems, we would still just pay out of pocket. Our ACA deductibles are too large to cover them anyway.
So you can see that having emergency funds, as well as being in shape, is important for us. But the funny thing is that once you get on the road, you realize how affordable (and easy) health care is overseas. It is nothing like what you see in the USA. And once we experienced going to pharmacies, doctors, ophthalmologists, and dermatologists ourselves, we realized that most of our fears were completely unfounded. We honestly don’t worry about this anymore. But we did in the beginning, so we empathize with you!
Last, if you ever decide to get residency in another country, there are usually super cheap insurance options available for coverage in that country.
Loooong term, we may decide to pursue that option if we ever decide to settle down outside the USA.
Make sense?
Thanks Mark.
This makes total sense. Travel medical insurance is very expensive, especially as you get older.
We had some medical treatments in Mexico when we slow travelled there. It was nothing major – filling for broken tooth, antibiotic prescription for UTI, home doctor and blood test visit for treating high persistent fever – and it was not expensive at all. We have not even tried to submit for insurance as it was pretty low cost.
My biggest concern is if something critical / urgent happens and we have to cover a huge cost out of pocket. We are very fit and healthy as well but still had a scare when my husband was just 46. He had a ruptured aneurism in his brain and had to have 6h brain surgery next day with 2 weeks in the hospital. I guess it all depends on the cost in other countries…but I was happy it happened in Canada!
Living in Canada we are not used to pay for most of health care as it is covered by our provincial insurance so it is different for us than for US.
Although it looks like there is an option for 2 year provincial coverage for emergencies for travellers, so maybe we will explore it.
Thank you for sharing your process with me, it is very thought provoking.
I hope you are enjoying your time in Albania!
Hello again,
Having a great time in Albania! Will be posting about it soon.
I can understand how the potential for paying significant costs might be really off-putting for a Canadian, or anyone from a country with socialized medicine. In the USA, we always have the specter of having our life savings taken away at any moment due to a medical event…even with insurance. Perhaps this is why ~$80K USD for an all expenses paid quadruple bypass in Malaysia doesn’t throw me so much…which isn’t to say that it isn’t a lot of money. But compared to the USA out of pocket costs, it is cheap. It is just that we are used to living with a medical system where costs are the highest in the world, you never know what the costs will be until AFTER the procedure, and insurance is no guarantee that you will be protected.
Probably what I would do if I were you is price out the cost of the procedure for the condition that scares you the most (especially if it is potentially chronic) on a medical tourism website from a country that appeals to you. At least that way you would know what you are getting yourself into in a worst case scenario with self-insurance. And then plan from there.
Brain aneurisms are no joke though. We hope your partner is well and has been able to figure out the root of the problem, presuming it wasn’t some random event that fell from the sky. Life is like that sometimes.