I’m going to shift my focus to writing Malaysians living/working in Singapore (for a few weeks?)

I’ve been a tad quiet – apologies. I’m back now with a new “series” that I’d like to run, and here are the reasons why I’m doing this:

• There are huge numbers of Malaysians in Singapore – estimated to be 600–700k. I know these are maybe not the best sources, but from what I’ve read about this, this isn’t exactly a statistic that is readily available
• I believe the demographics of Malaysians in Singapore are more likely to be the type that would be likely to be looking at ways to save on cost of living.
• This is due to the cost of living they are used to in Malaysia, relative to the likely cost of living in Singapore
• This is also due to, perhaps, lower wages than other foreigners from other countries
• This is also because I believe Malaysians, relative to other foreigners, are probably more likely to be able to understand my writing, given that it is in English
• As I frequently travel between Singapore and Malaysia (anywhere between once-four times a month), I have developed a pretty sound understanding of what it “means” to travel between the two countries

Some of the points above are not necessarily able to be statistically proven, but are more based on a gut feel and intuition.

These are some of the topics I hope to cover:

• Sending money from Singapore to Malaysia (M1 Remit, DBS, Transferwise, Instarem). Ideally, I’d like to look at it the other way round too, but I have not been looking at it the other direction so much.
• Maintaining/choosing a mobile plan on both sides of the causeway that suit your needs. Just to throw a few ideas out there, Digi Postpaid, UMobile Postpaid RedOne, Unifi, Yoodo, TPG are the telcos that come to mind.
• How to save money on flights between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur (Jetstar Price Beat Guarantee)
• Catching a bus between Singapore and Kuala Lumpur (Redbus)
• Which Credit Cards are particularly good/useful for someone who frequents both countries. The main two that come to mind at present are BigPay and YouTrip.
• E-wallets and the differences between the ones that exist on both sides (GrabPay, FavePay)

These are the main topics I have in mind at present, primarily based on what I already know and have experience with. Some other topics I hope to cover in the future are along the lines of investments, insurance and bank accounts.

Treat this as a teaser for now – I’ll be back shortly with a proper post on one of the topics above and I aim to tackle them one by one. In the meantime, you can treat the summary above as a cheat sheet to cover a few topics. You’ll have to look up the details yourself for now until I come back with a proper post on my experience and a little bit more detail on these options!