½ûÂþÌìÌÃ

Sorry for butting in on this.  I do not have an answer on banking but will be very interested to hear what others have to say on this matter.  My wife and I were recently visiting family in the PI and and looking for a place to retire.  We cut a few places we had in mind but really liked Bohol, a place we had never considered not having ever lived there previously.  Our problem is that we have no relatives or contacts in Bohol to help us work through finding a place to live and look after it while we work out the details of over here.  If you can recommend reliable, responsible, and trustworthy people and organizations that you have worked with, it would be appreciated.  Also would be good to know who you had problems with.

Hi and welcome on board toproll

Maybe this article from our guide might help. Otherwise i hope you will get the help needed from other members


------------------------------------------------------------
Hi Palasky17022

I would recommend you to create new topics on the Philippines forum if you have new specific questions. It should increase your chances of obtaining more responses.

Regards
Armand

same question...how to transfer money to philippines....but for a canadian..any cunucks on here that can advise?

Anyone have much experience with buying a car in the Philippines?  I heard a couple of stories about "flood" cars and also rebuilt vehicles. (thats like buying a car which has been put together from 2 wrecks)  What can I expect to pick up for P500,000?

Banking here has become some what costly.  If you have a out of country issued card, all banks are now charging a p200 fee per transaction. Also, most banks limit withdrawals to p5000 or p10,000 per transaction.

toptroll wrote:

Anyone have much experience with buying a car in the Philippines?  I heard a couple of stories about "flood" cars and also rebuilt vehicles. (thats like buying a car which has been put together from 2 wrecks)  What can I expect to pick up for P500,000?

I would not buy a used car, especially if claimed to be imported. Too many right hand drives are coverted to left hand but not very well. If your in Manila, pre 2009 are assumed to have been flooded as 70 pc of city was flooded.

You can buy a small new car for 500k, just google it.

leave your money in USA bank if  you have  a wells fargo account  you can transfer funds  to  BPI for  very little , PNB is  good  also open account  in LA

Hi, I don't know about US banks but my Aust Bank (NAB)has international transfer facility, monies takes about 5 days
the exchage rate is a little below the quoted rate but is acceptable and charge is about $25AU
my wife & I have joint account with Allied Bank here
I tranfer monies as needed as Phillipino bank pay very little interest.
My tip is buy a new small car (we bought at Hyundai Accent about $17000AU) after a bad experience of second hand car with speedo wound back (also petrol is very expensive here)
Pete

If your in the provinces and dont need to work, then prob no need for a car. If need transport, then a small motorcycle is best.

Also, Citibank is convenient if you have access to a branch. Transfers are $10 and its immediate.

YES YOUR RIGHT  I BOUGHT  A  NEW  HONDA 155 WHEN I CAME,AND  ME  AND  MY BROTHER IN LAW  WENT  TOGETHER  AND  BOUGHT  A  MULTI CAB WE  USE  ONLY TO HAUL RICE  AND  PIG  FEED, AND  IOT  IS  ONLY p10 TO TOWN FROM MY HOUSE IN MOTORCAB, WE  HAVE  USED THE  MOTORCab TO HAUL CEMENT  BLOCKS LUMBER  AND  HARDWARE  BEFORE WE  BOUGHT THE  MULTI CAB

Hello Okieboy!

Could you please lower Caps lock when you write on the forum?

Thank you,
Harmonie.

If you are interested in retiring in Cebu I have a website called retiringphilippines and it is all about retiring in the Philippies, I try to cover all aspects of making the big move including your money matters. I or one of my expat friends can answer most if not all your money matters questions, especially those about social security.
Also consider Medellin or San Remigio areas on the west coast of northern Cebu for your retirement, they is real cheap land up there like 200 to 400 pesos a square meter on the ocean. We already purchased 5 hectares in Medellin. These areas are only about 2 to 3 hours drive to Cebu City the second largest city in the Philippines. And Bogo City is only minutes away and you can get just about everything there.

I have been going back and forth for the last 3 years, the worst thing to do is use the atm and leave your money in the US.  They kill you on the exchange rate, and fees. What I have been doing is bringing my cash with me to last, I exchange my money as I need it that is the only and best way as far as getting the best for your money you do not lose anything that way. And another probaly best thing to do is open an account here but i think you need an ACI CARD AND PASSPORT. If you ever send money through western union or money gram make sure you send it in dollars and not peso's thats another way they rob you over here if so who ever receive's it could exchange the dollars them selfs and get the best exchange rates.

mdm13262 wrote:

I have been going back and forth for the last 3 years, the worst thing to do is use the atm and leave your money in the US.  They kill you on the exchange rate, and fees. What I have been doing is bringing my cash with me to last, I exchange my money as I need it that is the only and best way as far as getting the best for your money you do not lose anything that way. And another probaly best thing to do is open an account here but i think you need an ACI CARD AND PASSPORT. If you ever send money through western union or money gram make sure you send it in dollars and not peso's thats another way they rob you over here if so who ever receive's it could exchange the dollars them selfs and get the best exchange rates.

The worst thing you could do is bring over a suitcase full of cash and then disclose it on the Internet.  Having cash lying around in your residence is bad.  Open an account and pay the transfer fees. Its safer and convenient.

My neighbor is from Bohol an American, and knows the Island well. I bet if you compensate him a little he can take you there and show you around.  His name is Dan Brennan let me know on my site retiringphilippines.org , then I can give you his email and Facebook address.

MONEY MATTERS: You can have your social security sent to several different Banks in the Philippines Go to a call center where you can call the US or find someone like myself that has a MagicJack internet phone and call them and have it switched over.
LIST OF APPROVED BANKS AS OF DECEMBER 2010
1. Allied Bank
2. Banco De Oro (BDO)
3. Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI)
4. Bank Of Commerce (BOC)
5. China Bank
6. China Bank Savings
7. Development Bank of the Philippines (DBP)
8. Land Bank
9. May Bank
10. Metro Bank
11. Philippine National Bank (PNB)
12. Philippine Veterans Bank
13. Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC)
14. Security Bank
15. United Coconut Planters Bank (UCPB)
16. United Overseas Bank

Hi guys.. our experience with my Ukrainian husband, we owned a company located in US, all earnings from clients directly goes to our US account.We have house in Negros but we go out of the country most of the time for business trip. We left money in US bank,for the fact that we can't bring big amount of money without paying tax,so we brought credit cards with us.In Philippines, we opened Peso and we also have dollar account in Banco de Oro (BDO). We use XOOM to transfer  our money from US to Banco de Oro, maximum money transfer is 3,000USD per transaction,with a minimum service fee.Only disturbs us when we often do transactions like money transfer, it needs confirmations from US. It works fine but there are times that they blocked our cards,but we solved it anyway... my husband calls them and confirmed that he's the one transferring money, so they do a little interview and after a minute they solved the issue of our credit card.
When we withdraw money from BDO ATM machine we're free of charge. Because when we transferred our money from US bank to BDO it automatically does the conversion to peso.BDO gives a very good rates.And now we just managing our account remotely. It's very bad Idea to use western Union for money transfer, I payed a lot it's 10% with XOOM it's like 3% service charge.And every time I travel abroad I intentionally bring my small daughter and purchased gold bars to the maximum amount of 10,000USD, and I brought cash of 10 thousand dollars in the pocket.This way I avoid paying tax. But the amount of gold you bring out is also counted to the limit amount that you could just carry, that's why i have to bring my small baby just to charge the gold for my baby. Lying cash beside you is risky so some i invest for gold and save in the vault.We bought land and farms.To get rid of service fee and tax. You may  better to keep your money in USA, and withdraw only small amount if in need.

Another way to get rid of that service fee charge use only US credit card for groceries, or for shopping in the mall that's what we do.

I don't know what kind of car it will be for the amount of 500K probably 2nd hand, I bought before Mitsubishi car 5 years old for a half million price and I regret so much it cost more than the brand new because of maintenance, it breaks down every time. We bought it from Cebu I got tired of that maintenance so I sold the car 25k pesos I was so mad. I bought brand New from Mitsubishi Motors In Bacolod. It was Mitsubishi Grand Sport it cost more than 1 million but they gave us discount because it was payed once. Until now that Grand Sport SUV still very active and still like just new even already 11 years we use. Recently I got enticed by a Galloper SUV 1 year use from Manila it's cheap more than 600,000 php and looking good, it serves me well in the first few months I thought I was lucky for that, but now it's just staying in garage it needs to be fix. So i guess the best option is to buy brand new just make sure the car is not a victim of flood.

protogama wrote:

The most reasonable way to waste your hard-earned cash over here in my own experience, is to transfer online from your home account to a local one - have your local spouse to open the account first, since banking laws turned harsh towards foreigners recently.
And I mean online banking, not branch-in-person one, since it is much cheaper in terms of bank charges at most banks, in my case it takes a staggering 50% less. Don't forget to check with your bank also on particular amount bracket charges they apply, say £1-4999, then £5k-9999 and so forth, it differs from bank to bank.
Be aware too, that it is not wise indeed to use your home-based credit or debit cards as your bank does charge per single transaction (add also interest rate charge for credit card use), which unpleasantly increases your purchase cost, in my case by eye watering £1 (P68).

If you live in QC (or Metro Manila), then its easy to open a Citibank or HSBC account and do online transfers. From my US Citi o PH Citi, it costs $10 (limit up to $3000). Thats for a USD transaction. Citi PH has both a USD and Peso account. To transfer from USD to Peso, its best to go the branch as they have better rates than online.

I'm still using my home ATM card and my home bank for ATM transactions they are only charging me $1.00 per transaction. Been kind of slow getting things switched over to a Philippine bank.