Price of stuff

The key here is having the right balance between leveling up and your income. WE have a variety of ways we gain simoleons. First is the one that does not stop, tax revenue. At the beginning it's not much but combined with the rest of the income sources will get you enough simoleons to buy the police, fire, medical as you level up and also water, electric etc. The problem is when someone tries to rush up the level and or population ladder the hit the wall of income shortage. So you want to use coin popups and selling on global HQ as much if not more often than building upgrades. In fact it is probably better to use those two sources more than building upgrades until you have reached level 16 and have all the critical services. After that there is no concern of I have to have X thing as soon as I get to X level or population. Also at some point in the following you may be able to unlock (build) the cargo ship dock. If so I would concider pausing leveling up to gain the simoleons needed to get it and also use that income source as well. Plus the added bonus of stocking up on keys for later.

So start out with one coal power and one basic water. Then place 9 resident zones. Do the starting build for each. Produce some stuff to sell to the coin popup and in the trade HQ to supplement the tax revenue. Get at least 2,750 simoleons per level until you reach level 5. Build a basic fire. The 9 zones should fit in it's coverage fine. Get at least 3,670 simoleons per level up until you reach level 8. If you have upgraded your 9 zones to max and are not level 8 yet build a second basic water and place 3 more zones (12 is the max for the one coal power) or destroy and upgrade to max some zones again.  Buy the basic sewage for 12,000. Now use almost only coin popups and global HQ to sell stuff to build a 2nd coal power and have a total of 3 basic water. At level 12 you need to buy a police station so you don't want to end up at 12 before you have enough to buy one. These allow enough capacity to fill in the coverage of the fire station with residential zones. Place new residential zones 2 or 3 at a time from this point forward. And only place new ones when there are no more upgrades possible, there is capacity left for them, and they are within fire coverage. If no capcity or room in coverage destroy and redo 2 or 3 zones at a time. Get at least 4,700 simoleons per level up until you reach level 12. Buy a basic police. You should be able to place it and the basic fire side by side and have all of your residential inside of their coverage. If not destroy the excess 1 or 2 zones. Next up is waste management at level 14. Coninue all income methods used so far to make sure you have at least 7,500 simoleons per level up to 14. And buy one garbage incinerator. And finally get at least 11,600 simoleons per level up to 16. And buy one health clinic. Rearrange to have residential zones around the fire, police and clinic in the middle of them. You may need to destroy 1 or 2 resident zones. Figure out a plan on how you want to build your city from here.