What I learnt bootstrapping my startup from Thailand for six months

I've lived and built two companies in Thailand over the last 14 years. Before your pop your Macbook Air in a backpack, read my points.

1. Bangkok is not cheap. If you want to have a life that resembles anything you're used to coming from a Western country, you're going to live in Bangkok and you're going to live in a relatively expensive part of the city.

Yes, you can live in a concrete block with plastic furniture and eat noodles on the street every day. You can probably get by for not much more than $1k doing so. When you can no longer stomach that, you'll find the city is quite expensive.

A decent apartment in a favorable part of town will cost you $1300 - $2000 per month. I don't mean a family-sized place, I mean a 1 bedroom with a "livable" amount of room and furniture that doesn't give you the willies.

Once you're sick of your local noodle vendor you'll find food prices quite high as well. My wife and I spend more on groceries than we did when we lived in SF (we shopped at the Safeway in the financial district). As for restaurants: We grabbed two meals outside yesterday. One was dim sum that came to about $30 for the two of us. The other was a tonkatsu place and the bill came to about $25. While that's probably cheaper than the US (for the same quality) that's hardly a meal for $1. We spend over $100 for a meal often. I don't know anyone (Thai or foreign) that would consider that overly expensive.

Wine and imported beer are expensive and the taxes are going up. American craft beer is going to go up to $10/bottle direct from the distributor. If you can stomach the local swill (think Budweiser without the quality control) knock yourself out.

When you're sick of taking taxis and the BTS/MRT, have fun buying a car at 50% - 300% above US prices.

2. Visas are not easy. If you really want to fake it here it means constantly traveling in and out of the country. The problem with that (beyond the fact that it usually means traveling to the least interesting parts of the surrounding countries) is that they limit it to a certain number of tourist visas for every six month period or something similar (I can't remember the actual rules, sorry).

The common way around this is to use a "visa service" which basically means you're paying someone to bribe someone to look the other way. It's not only illegal, the rules for it change seemingly month to month, based on whoever ends up in a position of power in what embassy.

To do it properly: a) register a business with the requisite capital and Thai shareholders, b) get the appropriate visa c) get a work permit. I've been through it. It's not cheap or easy.

To not do it properly means breaking the law in a country where you most likely don't speak the language. Have fun with that.

3. Sex isn't everywhere. My wife and I go out for drinks 1.5 times a month and I can't remember the last time I saw a prostitute. If you're going somewhere with a free flow of hookers then you're probably seeking that out. I see young people do this quite often -- the only difference between these young people and so-called "sexpats" is that young people often go "ironically". They're all equally as stupid.

4. The local talent pool is mixed. The entrepreneurs here are generally managers, not doers, so you're probably never going to find a technical co-founder. Programming/technical ability on the whole is quite low. Try browsing the website of any publicly traded Thai company and you'll see what I mean. It is possible to find good graphic designers, administrative types, etc. Salaries are low here so that could possibly be an advantage. Having said that, I know people who have built large tech companies (100+ employees) and the consensus is that the disadvantages here outweigh the advantages. Most people I know in tech here outsource to Eastern Europe or somewhere else.

Investors are hard to find and mostly unsophisticated in relation to tech. Tech-savvy ones do exist, but they generally buy companies outright and keep you on as a glorified project manager.

5. When you're ready to put down roots, you'll find doing things legally is an expensive pain in the ass and -- here's the kicker -- you'll have to give up 51% of your company to one or more Thai people. If it's not someone you've known for a decade then, well, good luck with that. Yes, there are ways around this but they require you to put your company in a legal gray area.

6. Inflation isn't rampant. Cost of living has gone up considerably on the scale of decades but it's pretty hard to notice in a few months.

Thai national here, and as a fellow bootstrapper I would have to agree with most of the points of the OP. The reason why I left my well-paid job in Singapore and come back to Thailand to bootstrap my startup is due to the much lower cost of living and un-tapped talent pool.

I'd like to add that the quoted figure of $1,000 USD a month is rather high. Most Thais can get by with $500 USD. That is the current starting salary for undergraduates. Now, keep in mind that if you are a foreigner, there will definitely be a surcharge since it is expected that you are able to afford more. As a local, I can cheaply rent an apartment outside of Bangkok (granted without a pool) for $100-150 USD a month. If you include utilities, phone, and internet you might need around $250-$350 USD, and you will get air conditioning.

EDIT: As for food, his mentioned price of 40 Baht for a bow of chicken rice which has now supposedly increased by 25%. It feels slightly over priced to me, but not by much. The average cost of a bow of food is still around 30-40 Baht ($1 USD to $1.33 USD) per serving and have not increased, as far as I can tell, for the 2 years that I have been back. So if you're pretty frugal, you can definitely get by with $5-7 USD a day for food + drinks. If you really want to go for "ramen diets" then you can definitely get by with lower IMO.

The current going prices for co-working spaces in Thailand are around $7 - $10 a day, net, and most of these places open 7 days a week. But if you can work from home, you can ignore that cost.

Regarding the OP's point about the startup scene, he is correct. It's very much in its infancy and the local work-force are not as familiar with the startup ecosystem and are very risk averse. To add to that, most employees will not understand how equity work and will prefer to work for a safer and more secure jobs. This is a cultural thing so pushing the startup mentality is still a big hurdle that the great people at Launchpad and HUBBA are trying their best to overcome.

Overall I'm quite optimistic about the way Thailand is moving with regards to startups, but it is very much in its infancy and founders are not as well-informed. A lot of incubators and "startup schools" are in it for the fact that it seems like the cool thing to be doing, but most have no idea how to run one and no experience in the space. IMO, there isn't much right now that the founders can gain from the partnership since both sides are basically feeling their way around.

In the end though, I can't recommend Thailand enough as a place that you should come and bootstrap just for the cost of living, wonderful culture, and an assortment of holiday locations. Although, as a Thai, I may be completely biased.

EDIT: Of course, I'm not exactly familiar with the visa situation since I don't actually need it. Based on the OP, it seems pretty complicated, but still worth the hassle.

On one hand, it's a great article. On the other hand, it's really misleading! Lots of commenters in here would agree with "levels," but that's only because they are like-minded.

You can easily live on 500-600 euros per month, stay in beach bungalows, rented houses, or amazing bamboo houses where the owners bring you fruit every morning, and that includes unlimited 3G internet, the wireless internet they already have on site, and your bus and plane tickets around Asia.

No offense, but it's a little bit of a shame to accidentally mislead people on how much the costs are (a pool??!?!?!), and it's also a shame that the author didn't check out Malaysia, which is far less touristy, has almost no sex tourism, and has some really incredible places (with internet).

Shop at the markets. Eat at night markets, food stalls, and normal thai restaurants (but proper restos... not all stalls)... we went out with some local friends in Bangkok, ate famously, and the bill came to like 8 dollars (three different restos). Look for places like Chiang Mai... but also, move about yo! We did 3 weeks at a time in each place, moving down through sukhothai, ahyuthaya, etc., worked with laser focus, and spent way, way less money.

Really not much need for an incubator if you're confident in what you're doing.

One qualifier to: "Thailand’s government is wholly responsible for this situation" (viz. rampant sex tourism).

I would clarify that it is fully but not uniquely responsible. Sort of like if two men set out to murder a third and they both poison his drink on the same night, they are both fully but not uniquely responsible for his death. Analogously, sex tourists share responsibility, as perhaps do other governments whose actions influence the kind of governments that Thailand is likely to have.

Just a minor point of mine on a side-observation! Otherwise, lots of insights I enjoyed. I hadn't given much thought to start-up culture in SE Asia. One thing that doesn't get mentioned is the language: Did you get by exclusively with English (and Dutch, lots of ex-colonies being out that way)?

If you're serious about growing a start-up over a long stretch of time in Thailand it seems like you would want to have some Thai, if nothing else to draw from a greater pool of local talent when recruiting.

The article seems to imply that it is impossible to live for less than $1000 a month (internet included) in the US in a remote area where you can focus.

I regularly travel out to Eastern Washington (close to the border by Montana) and the area is very rural and prices relatively cheap for rent (and house prices are not unreasonable if you're looking to buy). No one will come bug you if you live in the woods, and Satellite internet (while not perfect) is decent as long as you're not doing anything too bandwidth intensive. You can also always live near a bigger city and get Cable internet.

As far as food costs go, if you can fish, hunt and grow a vegetable garden, you can be self-sufficient most of the year.

I'm not saying everyone needs to go out and live that lifestyle, but I just wanted to challenge the assumption that you couldn't live for less than $1000 a month in the US. A lot of people do, and aren't necessarily poor or bad off either.