Why we built this
Before our move, we did what most people do. We read blogs, watched vlogs, trawled through forums, and tried to piece together a picture of what life would cost. The estimates were everywhere - but they were rough, generic, and almost always incomplete. Nobody talked about the real weight of tax on your take-home pay. Nobody factored in school costs, medical expenses, or the lifestyle adjustments that come with a new country.
And there was another trap we kept falling into: converting amounts into our home currency. When you're coming from a second or third-tier economy, the numbers can look large in absolute terms - and it's easy to misjudge. What matters is not how it converts, but how far it actually goes in the country you're moving to.
Only after we arrived did reality set in. The numbers we had in our heads before the move and the numbers on our actual weekly bills were very different things.
That gap is what Costeva exists to close.
What Costeva is - and what it isn't
Costeva is not a financial advice tool. It does not tell you what to do with your money or whether a move is right for you. What it does is give you a realistic, structured starting point - one that accounts for the factors most sites leave out.
We built it for people who are seriously planning a move and want to stress-test their assumptions before committing. You can adjust for your household size, your city, your lifestyle, your transport preferences, whether you have children in school, and more. You can try different combinations and see how each decision affects the overall picture.
Friends and family can give you a rough sense of what life costs. Costeva gives you the flexibility to model it yourself - across cities, across scenarios, across household types.
A note on the numbers
There is no single authoritative source for cost-of-living data. Rent figures come from property listings and national housing surveys. Grocery costs are benchmarked against major supermarket pricing. Utility and transport costs draw on government statistical releases and public tariff data across NZ, Australia, Canada and the UK.
Because these inputs come from multiple sources with different update cycles, the figures on Costeva are best understood as structured ballpark averages - closer to reality than a generic global index, but not a substitute for independently verifying key costs before you commit to a move.
We review and update our assumptions periodically. Each calculator page notes when assumptions were last reviewed.
Who this is for
Costeva is designed for anyone in the planning stage of an international or interstate move - migrants, skilled professionals, international students, families, and remote workers who want to compare options before deciding.
If you have ever been surprised by the real cost of living somewhere after arriving, this tool is for you.
Get in touch
We are a small team and we genuinely read every message. If you spot something that looks wrong, want to suggest a missing factor, or just want to share your own experience - we would love to hear from you.