Hey Jake..Im a bit curious! What business did you start? Obviously you dont have to answer that if you would rather not as that is personal stuff. Anyway..I give you enormous credit to start and succeed with only 120k.You don't necessarily need loads of money to get going here. 120,000 pesos was what we started with. Locals dont have a bigger advantage than you once you learn how things are done here. If anything i would say foreigners have the advantage once they are fluent in the language. Can see your point as have watched many a foreigner come here and fail but most of the time it was there fault. Sometimes they think they no better than the locals. Big mistake!
I think the reason a lot of people fail here is due to the fact that even though they have never run a business in their home countries they truly believe that becoming a businessman here will be sooo easy due to the fact that they have a few grand to invest whilst local need to borrow capital from 5/6 lenders etc.
Another big reason why they fail is because they trust their in laws to help them run it!!