If you’re a military family...

[Anonymous]

... are you saving for retirement and kids’ college? My DH is an active duty military officer, and I’m a teacher. I don’t make a ton of money but have managed to be employed everywhere we’ve been stationed. The vast, vast majority of my husband’s colleagues are men with stay at home wives. We are constantly baffled at how these families seem to have tons more disposable income than we do. Trips (yes, even through covid), bigger houses that they seem to buy at every duty station, luxury vehicles... Don’t get me wrong, we live comfortably, but we take minimal vacations, have old cars, and a small rental house everyplace we go. We are diligently saving for retirement and kids’ college. But I blown away when I see how our day-to-day lifestyle is so much more low cost than these contemporaries... when I know (due to the fact that the military pay is about even and I work and most wives don’t) that our HHI is considerably higher. My husband says he is certain that none of his colleagues are putting away the $1500/month college tuition we are. And that the others are probably just counting on the military pension plus making $$$ working for a contractor after retiring from the military.

I’m posting this here because I obviously can’t directly (and rudely) ask this if our military friends and aquaintances in real life. I’m genuinely curious. I’d love to hear about your savings if you are a military family. Thanks!!

[Anonymous]

I don't get your post. It almost seems like a brag. Between an officer and teacher you both do very well. You have low cost to free health care and a large housing allowance. And, low cost child care. Try being enlisted. Most aren't saving tuition and they are using their max housing allowance. And, sometimes luxury vehicles from what I learned aren't that much more than a regular one. You make officers wives look really bad.

And, if you are enlisted the pension is a joke. My enlisted retired spouse gets about $1K a month. Minus the annuity, taxes, and health insurance its pretty much nothing. And, yes, now he makes more than most of the officers who are retired as he planned really well for retirement as we didn't have the pension to live off of.

[Anonymous]

Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

[Anonymous]

That's a huge amount of college savings. I'd say few people are putting that much away unless they have significant disposable incomes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

So, you are comparing yourself to making $350k to other families making $60-100K... and you need $10K a month in retirement. You sound very high maintenance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

So, you are comparing yourself to making $350k to other families making $60-100K... and you need $10K a month in retirement. You sound very high maintenance.

Who makes 60-100K? Most of the military families we know in the DC area are making 200K+

Not sure what you mean by high maintenance. We are 20+ years from retirement so 10K won't be worth what it is today.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't get your post. It almost seems like a brag. Between an officer and teacher you both do very well. You have low cost to free health care and a large housing allowance. And, low cost child care. Try being enlisted. Most aren't saving tuition and they are using their max housing allowance. And, sometimes luxury vehicles from what I learned aren't that much more than a regular one. You make officers wives look really bad.

And, if you are enlisted the pension is a joke. My enlisted retired spouse gets about $1K a month. Minus the annuity, taxes, and health insurance its pretty much nothing. And, yes, now he makes more than most of the officers who are retired as he planned really well for retirement as we didn't have the pension to live off of.

This is a mean spirited snd unhelpful response. Your response is mean spirited and you sound very insecure.

Yes, many military families don’t save heavily for school or retirement and live paycheck to paycheck regardless of rank. Good for you and your husband for saving for kids education and continuing to work. Many military families end up retiring to a lower cost of living and don’t provide significantly for kids education yet qualify for a lot of financial aid due to lack of savings/income in retirement. Many kids go on to get rotc scholarships or attend state schools etc or mom can finally go back to work near retirement and financially help out. But many just go on to have second careers and few are able to retire in early 50s etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't get your post. It almost seems like a brag. Between an officer and teacher you both do very well. You have low cost to free health care and a large housing allowance. And, low cost child care. Try being enlisted. Most aren't saving tuition and they are using their max housing allowance. And, sometimes luxury vehicles from what I learned aren't that much more than a regular one. You make officers wives look really bad.

And, if you are enlisted the pension is a joke. My enlisted retired spouse gets about $1K a month. Minus the annuity, taxes, and health insurance its pretty much nothing. And, yes, now he makes more than most of the officers who are retired as he planned really well for retirement as we didn't have the pension to live off of.

This is a mean spirited snd unhelpful response. Your response is mean spirited and you sound very insecure.

Yes, many military families don’t save heavily for school or retirement and live paycheck to paycheck regardless of rank. Good for you and your husband for saving for kids education and continuing to work. Many military families end up retiring to a lower cost of living and don’t provide significantly for kids education yet qualify for a lot of financial aid due to lack of savings/income in retirement. Many kids go on to get rotc scholarships or attend state schools etc or mom can finally go back to work near retirement and financially help out. But many just go on to have second careers and few are able to retire in early 50s etc.

Its not mean spirited. OP made a shameless brag given how high their incomes are and don't realize that's not realistic for most military families. OP lives in a very different world than other military families who have much less. There is a huge difference between high ranking officer and low and enlisted.

Providing college is not really optional in our family as its the only way to make sure they don't have to join the military/enlisted as its not an easy or great life. But, we are fortunate how well my husband has done after retiring.

[Anonymous]

How many kids do you have that you’re saving 18000/year for college?

[Anonymous]

Op, fellow military family. I think you knoe the truth here and that a lot of officer families have a pressure to fit in. I am sure some get family help and some plan on giving kids their GI BILL as a solution. Maybe cashflow kids college after retirement with job plus pension. We both save 15% just in case something happens with pension. It never hurts to be prepared!

[Anonymous]

Older military mom here. For most of our marriage and Navy years, we lived off one income. My income wasn’t as steady and we never got used to my income.

DH retired at the 22 year point and got a job in the DC area. We are living in the same house we bought in the mid-90s. (We only own one house).

DH retired after 9/11 but before the great GI Bill that many currently have.

We had our kids later, so we had a good financial foundation by the time they were born. Oh, yeah, we also paid a lot out of pocket for 5 IVFs.

*lived on one income (and saved some of that one)
*We shopped at the Commissary pretty consistently
*Sold kids stuff on eBay whenever they outgrew something
*second income was invested and paid for college tuition, etc
* most of the last 10 years, I’ve made $40k-$50k/year, so nice to have, but not a huge sum
*we took long term care insurance (no physical required) before military retirement, so we have less worry about funding that in our later years
*We only owned one property at a time. We didn’t have the mind set to be long-distance landlords.

For years, our only vacations were when we PCS’d.

Retirement pay has been the driving force behind 2 kids’ great college experiences (so, no financial need). They are both launched.

[Anonymous]

I've noticed that military with a SAHM wife tend to go back to their hometown(s) or somewhere with low COL after leaving the military.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

So, you are comparing yourself to making $350k to other families making $60-100K... and you need $10K a month in retirement. You sound very high maintenance.

Who makes 60-100K? Most of the military families we know in the DC area are making 200K+

Not sure what you mean by high maintenance. We are 20+ years from retirement so 10K won't be worth what it is today.

Then they don't have SAHMs, they have working wives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

So, you are comparing yourself to making $350k to other families making $60-100K... and you need $10K a month in retirement. You sound very high maintenance.

Who makes 60-100K? Most of the military families we know in the DC area are making 200K+

Not sure what you mean by high maintenance. We are 20+ years from retirement so 10K won't be worth what it is today.

Then they don't have SAHMs, they have working wives.

+1. Many of our neighbors are both officer and enlisted with working spouses and seem to be doing well. However, their spouses probably make 75k+.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes! We make about 350K per year and max out everything. That's sound financial planning. His 5K pension is only about half we'll need in retirement.

So, you are comparing yourself to making $350k to other families making $60-100K... and you need $10K a month in retirement. You sound very high maintenance.

Who makes 60-100K? Most of the military families we know in the DC area are making 200K+

Not sure what you mean by high maintenance. We are 20+ years from retirement so 10K won't be worth what it is today.

Then they don't have SAHMs, they have working wives.

+1. A four star general's base pay is like 197K. So you are clearly hanging out with military with spouses with well-paid jobs, not military with SAHM wives.