numbers depend a lot on "what somebody names a comfortable living".
i am myself a small business man in the Dr since 13 years passing up's and down's during that time, living with dominican wife and actually with one 5years old in a 2 bedroom/2bathroom/1 living room/1 kitchen/ rented beach front appartment in Punta cana we spend an average of $3.000.- US per month which includes the bilingual school for the Boy and the gas i burn on my daily road to work. i don't htink we are living in some kind of "luxury", but we eat what we want, we drink our wine late eve on the pier in front of the house aso.
it depends a lot on which area of the island somebody lives, costs for the same things specially in renting a appartment/house vary a lot, and the kind of daily stuff somebody names "usual".
also schools of course vary within a huge range of rates,
everybody names an other kind of car "usual/average"
and prefers a different kind of wine(sorry for that example, but i have friends who pay 50-80US$ for a bottle of wine to name it "good", i am myself happy with my copa of 250 pesos per bottle cheap imported one),
so livestyle can only be calculated after a lot of details are on the table.
basically i would highly recommend the following points:
* first of all visit the country several times to check out some of the very different spots to find out which living sourroundings would suit your family's likings. some are fine in a barrio aside a mayor city, your mentioned amount of belongings i would assume you will look more on a nice penthouse in a upper area in the capital city or a beach property in punta cana.
* after you found the area/surroundings which suit you you should first only rent, because very often after a while a specific area looks different than it has been expected just by descriptions on a bord/forum/vacation aso.
* with the time you will start to get yourself involved in the community where your new home is located, you will get your bown connections, you learn step by step how it works over here. then you can start to think about investments over here, maybe purchase your own property/house instaed of a rental home, make some business, bring your money to a dominican bank aso.
til then i would recommend to just rent a place which suits you and learn about the very different way of life in a very different contry. leave your money at home, bring just what you need for your living and don not break up all bridges to your home right away. always count on the worse, would mean you loose what you bring in and you have to go back again.
a citizenship i would not recommend until you are completely settled over here after several successful and happy years on the island, to find that out a simple residency is absolutely enough.
good luck
Mike
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