Aurora wrote
Hi all. I have been reading this forum on and off for the three years I have been coming to Bali. Lots of helpful hints and tips that I have already seen found very useful. After 7 visits of mostly 1 month (4 in the last year) I am starting to feel like I live here. Or. at least, I have a second home. I spend my time time mostly in and around Ubud, love the music and cultural scene. I do quite like Sanur too for different reasons. I hang around the open mic scene and play music with locals a lot. Am ready for a longer stay and looking at a Sosial Budaya Sept/Dec 2019. My other home is in the Sunshine Coast hinterland of Australia. I am 9 months into a serious attempt to learn Bahasa Indonesia, with classes in Aus, some private tuition in Bali, a good book and three internet resources, I love the response from Indonesians when you have even a fingernail grasp on their language. So am researching a small non-fancy home I can rent as a more permanent cheaper-then-tourist price option. I am aware that doing this on site yourself in Bali is a good way to do this and have looked a fair bit in June/July. Being retired in theory I qualify for a retirement KITAS but not sure that's the best solution for me as I still like having a base in the Sunshine Coast for some of the year, and the transition from spending up to 6 months a year overseas to full time has many complex and expensive ramifications!
I will be scouring the forums for more nuggets of Bali wisdom and thank everyone involved for this resource, (DJ) Aurora.
Hi DJ Aurora
You don’t [I]seem[/I] to be asking any [I]specific[/I] questions, more like weighing up your options for what you’d like to do.
As in:
1 [I]Stay 4-6 months/year [B]or[/B] 1+ years at a time (with a retirement KITAS)?[/I]
If you have a retirement KITAS you don’t [B]have[/B] to stay here “full time”. A MERP (Multiple Entry Re-entry Permit) takes care of that.
Having said that, the KITAS [I]might[/I] appear to be more costly initially (Rp 7-10 million), and needs to be extended annually (ie, visit Indonesian Immigration office). A sosbud gives you 60 days initially and then you (or your “agent”) needs to extend it every month for the remaining four. There is no MERP I know of for a sosbud. If you leave, it’s cancelled and if you want to come back, you have to start the whole process all over again.
2 [I]Renting a small non-fancy home? [/I]Good luck with finding one. How you pay for it depends on the owner. Most houses are usually rented by the year (you pay the full rental in advance, but this [I]might[/I] be negotiable). You also need to pay close attention to its location. Is it near a mosque; are there local “cafes” (discos, karaoke bars, etc) nearby; how “secure” does it seem to be; what’s the traffic situation like; is it prone to flooding when it rains, etc.? If you move into a dud you’re unlikely to get a refund on your rental.
Getting around Sanur these days is still (so far), much easier than Ubud. Of course, I am biased (but lived up that way for many years). I dread going to Ubud now but sill do, occasionally.
What instruments do you play? I mean are you actually a musician, “DJ” or both?
Happy hunting and open micing.
:cool:
