Most "cost of living in Da Nang" posts are written by people who spent two weeks here. The numbers look great in a table. The numbers also conveniently leave out the things that actually catch you by surprise.
This is what we paid in the last twelve months, as a family of three living in Da Nang full-time. Currency is USD; conversion was around 24,500 VND to the dollar through most of the year.
The number people quote
The headline figure for a single nomad living in a "good" area: $1,100 to $1,400 a month. That covers a small one-bed serviced apartment, eating out most days, a coworking membership, a basic motorbike rental, and a SafetyWing-style health policy.
That number is technically correct. It's also incomplete.
What "$1,100 a month" doesn't include
If you're staying long-term, here's what gets added on top:
- Visa run twice a year, usually $250 to $400 each depending on which border you cross and how rushed you are. ($500 to $800 a year amortized.)
- Annual road tax and motorbike maintenance if you bought instead of renting. About $150 a year for a five-year-old Honda Wave.
- Utility deposits when you sign a long-term lease. We were asked for two months' rent upfront, plus electricity and water deposit refunded "later" (it took eight months).
- The address problem, which gets its own post, but cost us about $80 in the first month before we figured it out.
- Healthcare beyond a basic policy: we used Vinmec for our daughter's birth. The bill was reasonable by Western standards. It was not zero. Closer to $1,800 all-in for a normal delivery in 2024.
Real line items, last twelve months
A full breakdown for a family of three (two adults, one toddler), in our specific Da Nang neighborhood (Son Tra side, walkable to An Bang and a fifteen-minute scooter to the city center):
- Rent: $620/mo for a furnished two-bed with a small office. Long-term lease, twelve months upfront paid as six-month tranches.
- Electricity: $35 to $90 depending on AC use. Higher in April–July, lower in winter.
- Water + internet + gas: $30/mo combined.
- Groceries: $400/mo at Lotte and the wet market. Heavy on local produce, less so on imported.
- Eating out: $250/mo across both adults. Mostly local, two or three "expat restaurant" meals a week.
- Coffee shops + remote work cafes: $90/mo. Coworking is overkill for us; cafes do the job.
- Motorbike: $40/mo rented (we don't own). Plus about $25/mo gas.
- Childcare / preschool: $280/mo for half-days, three days a week, at a Vietnamese preschool with one English-speaking teacher.
- Healthcare insurance: $135/mo for the three of us, mid-tier policy.
- Transport (Grab + occasional taxi): $35/mo.
Total: about $1,940/mo for the family, before visa runs and one-off bigger expenses.
What we underspent on
- Health and fitness: gym memberships are $25–$40/mo. Rooftop pools are everywhere. We swim at the beach.
- Entertainment: between the beach, motorbike trips, and cheap karaoke, we genuinely struggle to spend more than $50 a month on "going out."
- Clothes: we mostly stopped buying. Da Nang's heat and our laundry rotation killed any urge.
What we overspent on
- Bringing things back from Bangkok or Singapore. Specialty foods, certain coffee equipment, kid stuff. Easily $200 a year just because they didn't sell it locally.
- The "we just got here" tax in our first three months. We paid tourist rent, used Grab for everything, ordered foreign delivery food because we didn't know the local equivalents. Maybe $800 we'd never spend now.
The number to plan with
For a family of three living comfortably in Da Nang, in a long-term apartment, with kids: budget $2,000 to $2,400 a month including the things blog posts forget.
For a single remote worker: $1,300 to $1,700 a month is realistic if you settle in for at least six months. Less if you eat local and skip coworking.
Both numbers are higher than what cost-of-living calculators will tell you. Both numbers are also still significantly less than what equivalent comfort costs in Western Europe, Australia, or anywhere on the US west coast.
The real surprise isn't the cost. It's the timing: most expenses cluster in the first month and the month before any visa run. Plan a buffer for both.
If you want the spreadsheet we use to track this every month, it's the free Vietnam Monthly Budget Template on the home page. Drops the categories, the formulas, and the line items above into something sortable. Edits without breaking. We use it. You should too.