What percent of your take-home income do you save?

[Anonymous]

Not including retirement or college accounts. I'm trying to figure out what percent to save from our take home pay to add to our general savings account.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not including retirement or college accounts. I'm trying to figure out what percent to save from our take home pay to add to our general savings account.

0.0
I'm terrible, though my savings rate is pretty common for an American.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5s11NAM7vI

I'm told 5% of take home is a good number.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Not including retirement or college accounts. I'm trying to figure out what percent to save from our take home pay to add to our general savings account.

Pre marriage and kids, I saved 50%. Post-Marriage and kids, we save 25%.

[Anonymous]

our net is around 16k/month and save around 10k/month. yeah, we don't spend much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not including retirement or college accounts. I'm trying to figure out what percent to save from our take home pay to add to our general savings account.

Pre marriage and kids, I saved 50%. Post-Marriage and kids, we save 25%.

PP here. I just noticed you said to exclude retirement and colleges savings. Pre-marriage and kids = 25%. Post-marriage and kids = 10%.

[Anonymous]

I'll chime in before the regular DCUMers chime in to say that they save 50% outside of retirement and everything else would be living on the razor's edge...

It turns out to be somewhere between 15-18%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:our net is around 16k/month and save around 10k/month. yeah, we don't spend much.

That's incredible!

We try to save 10% of our net take home, but then some big expense or purchase (big vacation, downpayment, new car) comes up and wipes it out. So realistically its 10% short term, but 3% over the year.

[Anonymous]

Well, saving for what? I use a zero-based budget which means every dollar of my income is allocated. I have sinking funds for auto repair, clothing, home repair, and medical expenses that I regularly “save” but intend to spend within a calendar year. I save after tax for college and my IRA as well. I also invest $1,500 into a taxable investment account monthly for long-term savings. Hopefully for retirement.

[Anonymous]

If you don't count retirement and college savings, we save about $2500/mo. on about $12500k "take home" pay.

[Anonymous]

Net ~15k, save ~7k. First kid next year, so some of that will be rerouted to a 529, which apparently doesn't count as savings in this equation? But that doesn't go to a general savings account, a fraction of it goes to a sinking fund for the house and the bulk if it goes to brokerage.

[Anonymous]

We "save" for retirement and college. Everything else is operating expenses - reserves for car repairs, vacations, home repair, etc. Stuff you don't know how much it is going to cost or exactly when it is going to happen, but year in and year out, it does.

So to answer your question - 0%.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Sorry if I wasn't more clear. I mean savings for operating expenses (car repairs, vacations, home repair, landscaping, etc).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Sorry if I wasn't more clear. I mean savings for operating expenses (car repairs, vacations, home repair, landscaping, etc).

or in other words...how much are you diverting to your emergency fund on average.

[Anonymous]

I don't know the percentage, but I take home $4k a month, and save $1500 a month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Sorry if I wasn't more clear. I mean savings for operating expenses (car repairs, vacations, home repair, landscaping, etc).

or in other words...how much are you diverting to your emergency fund on average.

None of that comes out of our EF, which is kept separate for issues like huge medical emergencies or job loss. Operating expenses like repairs and landscaping come out of cash flow and vacations/car replacement have sinking funds.