$14k net HHI - Budget Input
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Anonymous
What are your assets? Retirement savings? College fund? Emergency fund? Other investments? |
Anonymous
+1 Big hat, no cattle. There is a huge loss of opportunity here, OP. At your ages you could be socking away a lot and still living very comfortably, so that you don't have to work forever. |
Anonymous
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^^^Also - have you not started saving for college? Because you will definitely not get financial aid.
Do you want your child to be burdened with lots of student loans because you felt the need to drive those cars and use Hello Fresh? |
Anonymous
We bring in around $13k net after maxing retirement, so I fit the bill of people you're looking for responses from. The things that are out of whack, IMO, are bolded above. The good news is, your mortgage is really a good amount for your income, and you make enough to cover almost anything you could want in life. But not everything-everything, which is where you seem to be running into problems. I know some people really like cars, but maybe cut back to one awesome car and one perfectly reasonable Honda/Toyota/not-luxury-boat? $1200/month on car notes is the craziest thing in your budget, as far as I can tell. You're spending a heck of a lot on take-out/restaurants for people who pay for HelloFresh for weeknight meals -- can you cut back to going out half as much? Additionally, you've got $1100/month earmarked as what amounts to "miscellaneous". You're not spending $650/month on toilet paper and soap, I promise. Nor do you need $500/month of home décor and clothes. This is going to be the easiest place for you to cut: instead of buying whatever catches your eye (no judgment; I've been there myself), consider putting it in your cart and switching to another screen. If you come back to it a couple of hours/days later and still feel like you want to make the purchase, go for it. Also, check your email because the store has probably sent a coupon to entice you into buying it. But much, much, much more often than you might believe, you will no longer care about whatever it is. Putting things on wishlists instead of buying when the urge strikes saves me thousands a month. Your medical bills seem pretty high to me, but the fact that your prescription meds have a line item makes me think that might not be somewhere you can make changes. |
Anonymous
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I echo a lot of PPs about the waste that is in your monthly expenses - and the "$200 cash" is just icing on the cake - so I won't repeat.
I do want to suggest bringing down the mortgage payment (I didn't see anyone suggest this) and consider re-financing. Do your homework/shop around and keep an eye out on the interest rates. All the other wastefulness makes me cringe. |
Anonymous
This is great feedback - thank you. Appreciate your time and tips. Helpful to hear feedback from someone with a similar income. |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
There's a lot to go after here, but Hello Fresh costs about the same as takeout. It's not really an excessive luxury, especially at their income level. That's not even remotely their big problem. |
Anonymous
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What does this work out to be as gross income?
Just curious. |
Anonymous
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Your grocery/food budget is the most obvious issue to me. $1000 a month, but not including eating out, entertaining, or normal household supplies?? That's crazy! I have an 18 month old and spend about $750 a month on all of those items combined. I buy my lunch about half of the week, and eat out for dinner once or twice a week. I don't even try to use coupons or read sales newspapers, but if I did I'm sure I could save another $100. But your hellofresh delivery on hold and evaluate the rest of your food shopping habits. Does your nanny cook or can she follow recipes? Try having her prep your dinners once a week. Or make casseroles and ask her to put them in the oven before you get home.
The rest of your budget is a little troubling, but this is the easiest place to cut back. |
Anonymous
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Good lord. You spend more on "personal care" than you do your cleaners!
Sweet jesus. If you can't see what is out of whack here you are really, really spoiled. |
Anonymous
OP here- Our base without bonuses is $280k, works out to ~ $14k after retirement/taxes/etc |
Anonymous
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You're spending $3,000 per year on medical expenses. You should be running all of that through an FSA. It will save you about $1,000.
Your non-essential expenses are entirely too high for your income. |
Anonymous
But it doesn't cost the same as groceries. Hell, it *is* groceries, because they still have to cook. Expensive, unnecessary groceries. |
Anonymous
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I suggest getting rid of the nanny and just put the DC in full-time daycare/preschool.
We are at one of the more expensive preschools and we pay $1700/month for full time care (compared to the $3k you're spending on nanny plus p/t preschool. |