The Comparator Conundrum

[Anonymous]

I am perplexed by the overall "messages" about money and finance that I pick up from DCUM. It seems that everyone is shopping for a house in the $2-2.2M range, yet they all have mortgages that are under 3k a month. They all fully fund their retirement accounts and pay big bucks for child care and/or private school, yet they have no disposable income and feel "poor."

Is there a lot of puffing going on here? Do different people post in different forums? I read these threads to get a sense of whether I am being too aggressive in my spending (I've seen a financial planner, and I frankly found it useless) and I'm left more confused than ever!

[Anonymous]

Your mistake is using DCUM as any kind of facsimile of reality. It's not. People make up crap all the time. But even if they didn't, it's an enormous, diverse group of anonymous people. You have no idea whether any of them have anything in common with you at all. Finally, when it comes to finances, you need to look at your own situation and your family's priorities and figure out what works for you. Comparing yourself to others --fictional or real-- is a waste of energy.

[Anonymous]

At times you can find helpful financial strategies, that is, after you weed through the muck.

[Anonymous]

Different posters post on different threads. Different threads appeal to different demographics.

[Anonymous]

You're taking bits of information from a multitude of different posters and merging them into a confusing heap in your head.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You're taking bits of information from a multitude of different posters and merging them into a confusing heap in your head.

ITA that it's lots of info from lots of people. I also think many people exaggerate. Also, many people will post about their successes (e.g., tell you about their very low grocery bills), but will keep quiet about their guilty pleasures (e.g., the fact that the grocery bills stay low because they're ordering take-out 3 nights per week). The actual marketplace is relatively efficient -- few people know of secret ways to earn substantially more or spend substantially less -- so on the whole. everyone is faced with the same tradeoff decisions. But the information people post to DCUM are just carefully staged snapshots of little facets of their lives, so it doesn't seem to resemble our own real lives.