Living In Greece For 3 Months on $5,000 CAD

We are not your typical travellers, as we prefer to travel for longer periods of time and live in the country. Seeing everything from its people, culture, the food and nightlife. While saying that, we do do some of the typical tourist attractions as well. Just not in your typical two week vacation fashion. We tend to have a bit more time, so we pace ourselves and spread it out.

We do a lot of research before we go, one thing we look up "best places to travel on the Canadian dollar" into google search. It is always interesting to see where it comes up on this list and how it changes every year. Of course Thailand, Vietnam, Mexico and some other European countries came up, however we were surprised when Greece was on this list. We did more digging and found that Greece was actually pretty budget friendly.

When we agreed on Greece as our destinations for our 2022 winter. We started looking more into how much money we might spend a month. Planning out our budgets for 3 months away including our accommodations, groceries, attractions, eating out, etc. The goal is to spend less than what we would spend a month back home in Canada, worst case we projected a budget of $1,700 CAD/month best case $1,200 CAD/ month.

I have listed some tips after doing the research online, compared to actually being there. Here is what our monthly budgets actually turned out to be (in Canadian dollar).

Tip #1 - Wifi

Most of what we do is online and since we planned on hanging out at our AirBnB Monday to Friday which had wifi. When we went out on weekends any restaurants we went to offered free wifi. Another interesting thing we found was the grocery store (My Market) offers free wifi too, so if we needed to translate a product name while in the grocery we could.

We have also figured out that the Iphone Map app still works without wifi. As long as you leave the app open while you walk around it loads the maps (even if your phone goes to Lock Screen).

Budget: $0 CAD

Tip #2 SIM Cards

We found in Athens, every major street corner, roundabout, city square or tourist spot there was someone selling SIM cards. Also every block has a phone store or a phone service provider as well, so fixing your phone or finding a service provider was really easy.

We did end up getting one SIM card with a data package. It was 15 Euro for 1 month.

Budget: $30 CAD

Tip #3 Booking Your AirBnB

When booking our AirBnB we always put in the max of our monthly budget. The app then removes all the really expensive places from our options. Once we put that budget in (ex. $650 CAD/ month), the app will show us places that are normally $700 CAD/ month but at a discounted rate because of the longer stay.

We also check a few other things out before booking, the wifi speed, a laundry machine in the AirBnB, what attractions are within walking distance, is there a grocery store or market close by, neighbourhood safety, etc. Normally this is all listed in the ad and you can look up the neighbourhood online (TripAdvisor and Google), while also reading all the reviews on AirBnB (people tend to be really honest).

We also compare Facebook groups for that area, that normally show apartments or houses for rent. The other website we use is HousingAnywhere.com, which shows apartments and houses with roommates or privately for rent.

Monthly budget: $600 - $800 CAD

Tip #4 Sight Seeing

We look up what free attractions and events that are happening while we are in that area. We use TripAdvisor and Google search, as they show a lot but not everything. Example, every first Sunday of the month during the winter (December to March) in Greece all museums and tourist attractions are free entry, some museums in the winter months are free entry every Thursday between 4pm and 6 pm.

TripAdvisor does not always list all the viewpoints or free things to do in the area. Meeting local people or reaching out to our AirBnB owners is also very helpful. They know everything going on in that area or nearby, viewpoints and great places to eat.

Monthly budget: $100 - $200 CAD

Tip #5 Restaurants

When we do decide to eat out, we try to eat local food as much as possible. Looking at TripAdvisor and on Google can tell you a lot about what is around you, price points and show other's reviews on the spot. We also do a walk by, scouting to see if it is busy with lots of locals or tourists. Lots of locals normally mean good food and well priced. Lots of tourists normally have higher prices and more Western or less authentic food.

When we order we generally get an appetiser to share, a beverage each and an entree (they tend to be a bit big for one person).

Monthly budget: $150 - $250 CAD

Tip #6 Groceries & Cooking At Home

We found going to the grocery store (My Market) can be a bit pricey if you purchase EVERYTHING there. We tend to only buy our meat, coffee, snacks and alcohol here as they are well priced. We always look to see what is on sale or if it is a 1+1 deal (meaning buy 1 get 1 free).

When it comes to produce we try to find a local market or stall on the side of the road, they are normally half the cost. Same goes for the bread or pastries, we find a local person and a loaf of bread can be $1.30 CAD instead of $3 CAD.

Monthly Total: $500 CAD

Tip #7 Water

The tape water in Greece is not safe, unless it is boiled. They recommend on every site if you go to any of the Greek Islands, to bring water with you (it tends to be more expensive on the islands). The quantity of water and where you buy your water is important. At the My Market you can get (6) 1.5L bottles of water for 1.25 Euros ($1.83 CAD), at the corner store (1) refridged 1.5L bottles are 1 Euro ( $1.46 CAD).

Convince comes at a cost.

Monthly Budget: We include this in our grocery budget.

Tip #8 Flights

When we book our flights we try to look for the cheapest way to where we are going. We look for night flights, which are normally cheaper and normally have an arrival time in the morning hours in that country. Flying to Greece cost $417 CAD/person (with 1 short layover) and to fly back to Canada was $614 CAD/person (with 1 short layover).

We do not book a round trip because we have found it to be cheaper to only book one way. Also we sometimes move around while we travel, we may not be in the same area as the initial airport or even the same country. Leaving it open ended for a return flight home, we can make sure we get the best deal and stay within our budget.

Budget: $1,200 CAD / person round trip

** Extra cost for date change $500 CAD

Tip #9 Getting Around

Getting around Greece, we try to walk everywhere as much as we can. Grocery stores, attractions, going out for dinner does not cost us anything and we get great exercise as well. When we do have to get a taxi, we do look at Grab and Uber's pricing to make sure we are not getting ripped off.

Budget: $100 CAD

Monthly Spending Break Down

After using all the tricks above here is what our monthly budgets actually came out while we stayed in Greece for 3 months. December to February we stayed in Saronida, which is a tourist/beach town, February to March we spent our remaining time in Athens. We both work remotely so we do spend Monday to Friday normally hanging around the Air BnB and going for walks in the evenings.

If you eat out you can up your monthly budget quickly, we typically eat out 3 times a week and some weeks not at all. You can also double your budget quickly with souvenirs, sightseeing and going out to bars. We always pick and choose what we REALLY want to do, instead of trying to do everything.

So here are our final numbers below.

December 2021

AirBnB in Saronida - $478.74 CAD / 3 weeks

Groceries & Alcohol - $445 CAD

Restaurants - $21 CAD

Transportation - Free - included in AirBnB

Total: $944.74 CAD

January 2022

AirBnb in Saronida - $638.32 CAD /4 weeks

Groceries & Alcohol - $668 CAD

Restaurants - $122 CAD

Transportation - Free - walked everywhere

Total: $1,428.32 CAD

February 2022

AirBnB in Saronida - $319.16 / 2 weeks

Transportation - Free -included in AirBnB

AirBnB in Athens - $548.52 / 2 weeks

Transportation - Free - walked everywhere

Groceries & Alcohol - $434.89 CAD

Restaurants - $145.15 CAD

Sightseeing - $39.01 CAD for both (Temple of Zeus and Panathenaic Stadium)

Total: $1,486.73 CAD

March 2022

AirBnB in Athens - $548.52 / 2 weeks

Transportation - $48.46 CAD taxi to airport & free we walked to all the sights

Sightseeing - $27.86 CAD both (Acropolis)

Groceries & Alcohol - $146.66 CAD

Restaurants & Bar Hopping - $274.02 CAD

Souvenirs - $4.18 CAD

Covid Rapid Tests - $75.48 CAD (4 test)

Total: $1,125.18 CAD

Total Living Cost $4,984.97 CAD

What's not included in these numbers is our flights, flight change fee and travel insurance with those being $7,717.80 CAD for two of us.

Due to VISA issues we did end up leaving Greece a full month earlier than planned and did end up paying an additional $500 CAD to change our flights. By this point in our trip we were both ready to move on and see something new. We ended up booking a flight to Mexico to visit friends for March 2022.

Cheers!

**Please note that all opinions and views expressed in this post are my own, from my own experiences. If you would like to see more pictures follow me on Instagram vikki.gray **