Cost of Loving in The Philippines (Monthly Expenses)

How much does it cost to love a woman in the Philippines? That’s what I want to talk about today, and there are many considerations.

I am going to talk about heating expenses, electricity, communication, insurance, entertainment, and savings. Affordability, Location, availability, newer or older, and renting or owning are significant decisions when looking for love in the Philippines.

Being married to a Filipina for over four years now, I have some knowledge I can share with men who are considering marrying a Filipina and men who are married to a Filipina who just want to hear other men’s experiences.

I can tell you that the cost of loving a Filipina is the same no matter the country you are living in. There are many couples where the husband is not “loaded” or rich, but his Filipina wife is happy.

Affordability-Can you afford it?

One consideration for a westerner and Filipina relationship is the affordability-will I have to give up too much? That’s an important question because many men have raced to the Philippines or gotten involved with a Filipina, without realizing that they weren’t prepared to sustain the romance once the initial excitement wore off.

A better question might be-can you afford not to? I was single for decades before I decided to look for a woman from another country to marry, something that I had never given a millisecond of thought to, but was at a time in my life where I knew I had to try something different.

At 53 I met Aiza online and married her 53 days later in the Philippines. Whatever it has cost me has been worth it. Before I look at some budget expense categories, here are a few things to consider before investing your heart into a Filipina, and they are location, newer or older Filipina, and renting or owning.

Location

This comes down to the provinces or the cities. A fair question to ask is which location affords me the best opportunity to find a quality Filipina? I will let my wife give you her opinion as someone who knows the lay of the land, so I take hers as more important than my own.

 My wife  answered this important real estate question in a recent live stream

​She disagreed with my opinion by the way. Of course, good women can be found anywhere, but she told where she thought a man had the best chance, thus making the relationship less costly.

Availability

There are ups and downs in any market, but availability of Filipinas to marry is very high right now. It’s a buyer’s market. I personally know a half dozen Fil-Am couples right here in town and have communicated with others I have gotten to know on YouTube. Men are interested in marrying Filipinas.

To my surprise, even though it was made over a year ago, the most viewed video, and the one I have getting the most view minutes the previous 28 days is How I met my wife on Christian Filipina. It’s a short 6-minute video (shown below).

This tells me looking for a wife in the Philippines is still something men from around the world are wanting to invest in. In my channel, I want to talk about many practical ways to make it work.

Foundation

Sticking with my house analogy, I believe the most important factor in keeping maintenance costs low is a strong foundation. Personally, this was a woman who was a Christian, who had character, who was going to continue to grow in character. I believed it was this kind of woman I could decide to marry sooner than later.

As I have stated in previous videos, commonality is good, but there are some that are more significant than others, and that’s what you need to decide. You should find things to do together after you are married but before that, you need to think about what will be undergirding your relationship.

Newer or older Filipina

Another factor for a man trying to decide on a Filipina to pursue is knowing if he should marry a newer model or one who has been around the block. I was looking for someone 20-30 and found someone in between that range.

She seemed mature and had borne responsibility and it was a pleasure to chat with her in those early and exhilarating days, around four hours a day during the work week. It can be a mistake to only desire a newer model home, I mean Filipina, because while she looks great on the outside and has high market value, it’s what’s on the inside that you have to live with, so character matters.

You can gauge this by the questions you ask and by her replies. At some point when you are ready to make a proposal and close the deal, you’ll want to know what her values are, her relationship to her parents and family in general, what’s important to her, basically anything you need to trust her. 

You won’t know everything until you are together under the same roof, but once you’ve made a commitment, you should stick with it and stop shopping for houses after that, even stop looking at other places to live.

Having said that, there are Filipinas who are 30 + who may already have the maturity and life experiences you want. Honestly, the choices are plentiful in both categories. You may have a difficult time deciding because I do believe you have a lot of options.

I discuss age gaps quite a bit on my channel

 Also, depending on your overall health and wellbeing, intimacy is critical to a relationship, and I think you should consider how long you can please her, so having an enormous disparity in age likely yields diminishing returns. I am pro-age gap however, and have a playlist devoted to that topic I invite you to look at.

Renting or owning

I want to keep this brief, but I believe statistics show that renting tends to be more costly emotionally and financially than owning. There is something to be said for making a commitment and sticking with it, rather than renting, where you can check out any time you want.

In case my dry sense of humor and wit is confusing, I am referring to being intimate or not before marriage. Filipinas are used to westerners and their thirst for young women, but she wants someone who will commit to her through thick and thin. Why not show her you want to marry her because of the person she is, then you can have all the intimacy you can handle later? I realize it is common to “taste before buying”, but that really isn’t necessary. 

Now onto some basic budgeted expenses-

Heat

I have already alluded to that in renting and owning and will be more specific here. No, I am not referring to the monthly utility of heat since that isn’t necessary in the Philippines where heat is ever present until the evening, thankfully. What I mean is sexual heat, intimacy.

How is this an expense item? Because in this area one needs to invest to acquire, and that is very rewarding! If you are marrying a younger Filipina, she has the needs of a younger Filipina. 

She is young and pretty and has needs. Do I believe sex is a need? Yes, I do. I know, no one has died due to complications from not having sex, but the emotional toll is great. I don’t know why this is so controversial. Sex is a gigantic need! Whatever you need to discuss about it before marrying a Filipina please do. 

For the best heat, the westerner will need to invest heavily in time, kindness, forgiveness, gentleness, being considerate of her, things like that. If you can afford this, it makes for the healthiest environment for intimacy with ANY woman. A marriage counselor will tell you that sexual health in a marriage is a sign of overall relational health. A high heating bill is a good thing. On to the next expense.

Electricity

Let’s substitute the word sparks, sparks for electricity. There can be a tendency after getting married, for a man to slow down his pursuit because he just got married.

While it is natural to breath a sigh of relief after pursuing her for a number of months or years, you most likely will be shifting from a long-distance relationship to the closest of ones. Biblically, where it talks about people getting married having troubles in the flesh, it is referring to the husband and wife’s natures, which are sinful, being exposed on a daily basis.

They say in dating it all changes on the first meeting, and likewise in marriage, it all changes when you are together. Sparks are going to fly sometimes. 

To have good sparks, to have improving chemistry, will require an investment of sacrifice, being willing to yield to her in many situations, especially initially in my opinion, investing quality and quantity time with her especially considering how very far in distance she is from her family. I would encourage you to allow her plenty of social media time for as long as she needs as she adjusts from the Philippines to your country. 

Other things you can do is tell her you are thankful for not just what she does for you but thankful for her. Compliment her regularly, listen to her carefully, be patient with her, take an interest in her family back home. This will cost you time and effort but I believe you get what you put into this relationship

Communication

This is where “phone bill” would come in under a real budget. Let your Filipina know that you value her opinion and want to hear what she says and listen carefully. Learn to not be distracted when communicating with each other.

Often you might have to politely say “please set your phone down for a minute”. Either on an as needed basis or regularly scheduled, I think it is a good idea to talk about what’s going on in your lives; what both of you are thinking, feeling, believing and experiencing. Talk about the future. Like the above, spending more on these areas will yield better results.

Insurance

In case the whole thing falls apart, should you get some kind of insurance called a pre-nuptial agreement? There isn’t enough time for this here, but many say they may not carry any weight legally. I know why this is done, I am realistic, and I won’t consider it a wrong thing to do if you feel that strongly about it.

It seems like practical protection against the high divorce rate. At the same time, it doesn’t shield one from a painful marriage. Here is where we have to acknowledge that marriage is simply costly. Sure, money is involved, but there are difficult circumstances to work through, personal weaknesses to deal with, in-laws, cultural differences etc.

What I personally do is work and pray for the health of the marriage. One day I hope to do a video on the various things to pray for in a marriage. I get what I consider sound advice, I try not to be selfish, I try to put my wife above myself, and I’ve made some big sacrifices which I consider my responsibility.

I want my marriage to succeed more than I want to be personally successful or even healthy. As you watch my videos, old and new, you’ll see topics that go beyond the surface of a relationship. I don’t live in fear of our relationship failing but I do try to do whatever it takes for it do go well.

That is enough insurance for me. You do the best you can. Having insurance doesn’t mean that the house won’t burn down or get damaged in a tornado, but I take responsibility for keeping it together.

Entertainment

I’m not exactly “good time Charley” but I realize it is important to invest in some kind of entertainment. It may be getting used to some karaoke (see some of my videos in the Just Us playlist), maybe some travel, perhaps it’s going to the movies, or watching her favorite series, it may even be her watching the ball game with you.

My wife loves theatrical musical plays and we have gone to see Cinderella, Beauty and the Beast, and Moses in Branson Missouri which is a 7-hour drive. We even have tickets for The Phantom of the Opera for my wife’s birthday.

I know I am forgetting one for some reason, it was at an outdoor theatre. It is very satisfying for me to see her happiness. It is an investment, a cost if you will, but like all the others, are worth it, in other words, you don’t want to be cheap or stingy. You will reap what you sow.

Savings

My attitude when married is to go all out. That is quite different from a typical dating relationship where both see each other, and from the typical LDR where being in person is not very often.

In those, there is no compelling to go all out because you don’t know if you’ll be getting married, and you still are evaluating the direction and health of the relationship. After a proposal is accepted, a marriage has been enacted and you now have an obligation to take care of her emotionally and physically, I don’t see the need to hold anything back or to keep score.

I believe when she sees that her husband is all in, the likelihood is she will do her best too. I would expect that one or the other is doing more for the other at different times but it tends to equal out. Early on I am investing much care in my wife. At the end of my life, I think my wife will have her hands full with me more than the early days, as my needs will change over time.

The costs of loving are well worth it when you find your love beyond the sea.