I took my first sip of coffee at 11 AM today and immediately scrapped my plans.
I had a money-making gig lined up—something practical that would put some money in my account after more than a week of zero income. Instead, I sat down and started writing this.
That right there is the whole point of this article.
Let me back up.
I’m Not That Kind of Gringo
I don’t live in Condesa, Roma, Polanco, or any of the other neighborhoods foreigners are constantly told to move to. I’m not staying in some luxury Airbnb pretending I’m on an extended vacation either.
I actually live here.
My utilities are in my name. I have permanent residency. I pay taxes. I speak fluent Spanish. And I’ve spent more than 25% of my life living in Mexico.
Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s talk about the real economic benefits I’ve experienced living in Mexico City as a former gringo.
This isn’t going to be another article about the price of tacos, rent, or Uber. There are already a million cringey gringos making TikToks and Instagram reels about how “cheap” everything is and pissing off the locals in the process.
If that’s what you’re looking for, this isn’t your article.
This is for the young and hopeful entrepreneur who needs a little economic breathing room to give more time, money, and energy to the business he can’t stop thinking about.
If that’s you, keep reading.
I Never Really Knew Why I Moved Here
As I explained in I wanted to become a writer. So I moved to Mexico., coming to Mexico—specifically Mexico City—never really felt like a calculated decision. I decided to follow my calling, and somehow the universe brought me here.
For years, I kept asking myself: Why?
When other people asked, I’d cycle through the usual answers. I didn’t like the direction the USA was going. I wanted to learn Spanish. I liked the culture. I liked the weather. Mexico City was less expensive than other gigantic world capitals.
And, since I’m being honest, I also appreciate the accessible corruption. I like jaywalking and driving fast on toll roads while listening to Blink-182.
Sorry.
All of those answers were true. But none of them felt like the answer.
Then, almost nine years after moving here, something finally clicked. Exactly one month ago, I published my first article here at Excel & Compel—the blog for badasses.
And suddenly I understood why I needed to be here:
Mexico gave me the space I needed to tell my story.
Mexico Lowered My Survival Threshold
Which brings us back to the coffee.
I was supposed to work one of my money-making gigs today because I haven’t earned anything in more than a week. I’ve been working several hours every day—just not on anything that currently pays me.
I’ve been working on E&C.
And right now, E&C makes me exactly:
$0.
That’s perfectly fine. I don’t need it to be profitable yet. But vague inspiration doesn’t pay the bills, and I still have those.
Fortunately, I’ve deliberately designed my life around something I call a low survival threshold. It means I don’t need very much money to keep my life running.
Because I don’t live in one of the gentrified USA-lite neighborhoods, my cost of living is roughly $1,000 per month. If I didn’t care about living alone and eating well, I could probably get that down to $600–$700.
At $1,000 per month, my life costs roughly $33 per day.
I’ve mentioned before that I have a gig capable of paying me around $350 per day when I decide to work. Do the math.
I can theoretically cover an entire month of living expenses with roughly three days—or around 18 hours—of work.
Everything else is mine.
And that’s the real economic benefit.
Cheap Living Isn’t the Benefit. Time Is.
Most articles about living abroad focus on what your money can buy.
I think that’s the wrong way to look at it.
The most valuable thing my money buys me in Mexico City is time.
When you need less money to survive, you need fewer hours of your life to acquire that money. And those hours become available for something else.
Over the years, that freedom has allowed me to become fluent in Spanish as an adult, travel through 26 of Mexico’s 31 states, start and fail multiple online businesses, and build a physique that’s somehow gotten me referred to as the “Greek God of Mexico.”
It’s also given me enough room to make some spectacularly stupid decisions. I invested $30,000 into a meme coin I thought was going “to the moon.” I lost basically all of it. I’ve experimented with unconventional ways of making money—including internet stripping. I’ve had relationships blow up in my face. I’ve made terrible decisions. I’ve taken risks that worked and others that absolutely didn’t.
Some of those experiences were incredible. Some were horrible.
But I’ve stopped dividing them that way.
Data = good.
Every experience gave me information. Information became self-awareness. And self-awareness, combined with skills and experience, made me considerably more capable than the guy who arrived in Mexico almost nine years ago.
That’s What Runway Actually Buys You
Think about an airplane. It doesn’t magically leap into the sky. It needs enough runway to build speed before it can take flight.
Businesses aren’t much different.
If your life requires $6,000 every month just to stay afloat, whatever you’re building needs to start producing money relatively quickly. You’ve got a short runway.
But lower your survival threshold and something interesting happens.
Suddenly, the business doesn’t need to work immediately. You can experiment. You can fail. You can learn. You can start over. You can spend a month writing articles that don’t make you a fucking dime because you’re building something you believe might become valuable later.
That’s runway.
For me, the equation looks something like this:
Lower survival threshold → more runway → more experience → more skills → greater earning potential.
That’s the economic benefit nobody puts on the spreadsheet.
The Point Isn’t to Live Cheaply Forever
I’m not trying to become the world champion of living on $1,000 per month.
I like money. I like nice things. I want E&C to become a successful business. I want ___________.
The point isn’t to live cheaply forever.
The point is to make yourself expensive.
I’m keeping my survival threshold low while increasing the value of my time—learning, writing, building, experimenting, developing skills, and accumulating experiences worth talking about.
Eventually, when I decide to turn E&C into a profitable brand and release ___________, I’ll be drawing from almost nine years of experiences I actually had enough freedom to accumulate.
That’s why I believe I was brought here.
I Didn’t Move Here to Recreate America in Pesos
I wasn’t brought to Mexico City to rent a luxury Airbnb in Condesa, eat at trendy restaurants every night, hang around exclusively with foreigners, or recreate the American lifestyle using pesos.
And despite what my younger self might have believed, I wasn’t brought here to hump every attractive local woman either.
Mexico gave me something considerably more valuable:
Space.
Space to fail. Space to experiment. Space to learn another language. Space to travel. Space to make stupid decisions and recover from them. Space to figure out who the hell I actually am.
And now:
Space to write.
Mexico isn’t my finish line.
It gave me the runway.
If You Want to Try This Yourself
I talk a lot of shit about the typical gringos who move to Mexico. But if this is your first time traveling or living abroad, I’m actually going to give you permission to be one for a little while.
Enjoy it. Rent the ridiculous apartment. Eat at the trendy restaurants. Travel around. Stay out too late. Blow some money. Live like a king for a few months if you can afford it. Hell, chase some women if that’s what you want to do.
Get it out of your system.
Because eventually the palm trees stop looking exotic. The tacos become cheat meals. The novelty wears off. And wherever you moved stops feeling like a vacation and starts feeling like home.
That’s when the real opportunity begins.
Move somewhere you can comfortably afford long-term. Befriend locals—and not just the ones you want to sleep with. Learn the language. Lower your expenses. Build a real life.
Then take all that time, money, and energy you’ve freed up and put it into the business idea that’s been living in the back of your head for years.
Don’t move abroad just to consume a cheaper version of the lifestyle you already had.
Use the leverage.
Develop skills. Build things. Take calculated risks. Create something you own. Make yourself more valuable.
Because this may be your one big opportunity to give that thing enough runway to finally take flight.
The Real Economic Benefit
People always want to know what it costs to live in Mexico City.
I think they’re asking the wrong question.
A better question is:
What does living here allow you to do with the money—and time—you don’t have to spend surviving?
For me, the answer has been almost nine years of experiences, mistakes, skills, freedom, and self-discovery that eventually gave me something worth writing about.
And today, it allowed me to do something incredibly simple.
I woke up. Made some coffee. Looked at the money-making work I was supposed to do.
And decided to write this article instead.
I’m not making a dime from it.
And I can afford to do that.
That’s the real economic benefit.
Not cheap tacos. Not cheap Uber rides. Not living like a king because your dollars go further.
Runway.
The runway to take a chance on yourself before life becomes expensive enough that you can’t afford to.
If you’re young, ambitious, able to earn your money online, and sitting on a business idea you can’t stop thinking about, that opportunity could be worth considerably more than whatever you save on rent.
Use it.
Your life doesn’t have to be expensive while you’re building something valuable.
Give yourself enough runway.
Then take the fuck off.
— Uncle Blayde