Budget Frustration
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Anonymous
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So we live in an old sheet shack w/addition close in to be close to spouse's work, which has a big mortgage because of that "premiere" location.
Spouse's job has taken a nosedive under new management, and looking for new work but likely would take a paycut from $250k to $100k; I make $150k, so this is not a hardship except for huge mortgage. We have about $100k in cash/stocks we could apply towards mortgage, but I liked having cash around for emergencies. Here's our budget, is there anyway spouse can take new job without necessitating us moving? I don't think so, but let us know if our budget could be tweaked in a way I'm not seeing. We travel a bit, 1 week to see family at holidays (flights), one week to the beach, and usually some other kind of vacation, like a national park trip or a new city like Denver or something. Income: Self $6,200.00 Spouse $14,400.00 (would drop to $4500 I think) Expense House -$5,100.00 ($1.2M house) Daycare -$1,688.00 (ends Sep 2022) Insurance -$400.00 Internet -$50.00 Mobile -$300.00 (Pay for our phones and our parents) Beach Week -$416.67 Home Repair -$1,166.67 (Old house, we expect 1% repairs a year) Streaming -$40.00 Groceries -$1,500.00 Family Trip -$250.00 Vacation -$666.67 Camps -$500.00 (3 kids 8 weeks, mostly academic enrichment) Med -$133.33 Shop -$625.00 Kids Activities -$166.67 (rec sports and academic enrichment) Cleaner -$300.00 Cars -$200.00 (Paid off, this is just maint and gas for short commutes) Utils $375.00 The albatross around our neck is mortgage. We already financed down to a 2.75%. I wish we had known spouse would need to change careers before we moved here, but what can you do; I guess better to own now than to have been renting still and dealing with pandemic price spikes. Any options here, I'm beyond frustrated to have to disrupt kids and move to some far exurb to something we can afford after the year they had, but I think that is our only play. |
Anonymous
All of this is per month??? You have a ton of extras in your budget. I don't know how you afford all of this now on current salaries. If you feel you need to keep the kid's camps and activities, then get rid of all the travel. And cut back on anything but absolutely needed repairs on the house until you can get your income back up. |
Anonymous
+1 OP you should probably move because your mortgage is very high for your anticipated income. Some families could make it work, but the budget you've laid out doesn't make it look like you're one of those families. $1.5k on groceries a month, with an additional $625 for "shop"? $11k/year on vacations? |
Anonymous
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Saving money by cutting expenses is something to start doing right now, of course, although that is only going to buy some time (which you should do). Your family can put up with some discomfort and missed enjoyment in the short term. Don't forget that this is why you have savings. Don't be afraid/ashamed to use it.
Longer term, I see one option as moving AND cutting a lot of these expenses. Is everyone on board with this downshift in your lifestyle? People do it all the time. The preferable option is to figure out one/both of you will make a lot more money. Cutting costs will only get you so far. There is no limit to how much more you can earn. The DC area is so swamped with high paying jobs it makes my head spin. This is so painful but I will say it again: Ask for help in finding new/better work. Every job I've gotten since my 20s has come from a direct connection. People want to help you. |
Anonymous
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Cut the $16k in annual trips/vacation. You can't afford it right now.
Clean your own house. Grocery bill can be cut by 1/3. Stop buying organic. More beans, less meat. Replace some name brands with store brands. |
Anonymous
Yes, per month, but large costs are spread out over the year. For example: Beach week: this year we rented a full house near the beach, for $4k/week. Normally we spend $2k or less, but pandemic has made beach vacations harder to find and more expensive. It just us at a house, take out meals, and swimming every day. That monthly cost is dividing what we spent this year over 12 months, so sure it could go down to $200/month. Home repairs, last year we had to replace the roof, this year we need to waterproof the basement, so I see a $10k+ job every year, on top of normal maintenance expenses. Family trip: this is annual Xmas vacation to family, have to fly, and its usually $500/person for airline tickets and we have to rent a car while there. Family cannot travel to see us. Vacation: One big trip of variable expense, could probably drop this for several years. Camps. 3 kids, 8 weeks $250/week for camp. Some will be less, but if you look at academic orientated camps with actual instructors (rather than just activity camps supervised by high schoolers), that is pretty much the rate. Should be somewhat less, because some weeks will just be random sports camp, but want to budget a bit high since academics have suffered the last year. Shop: This is higher than I would like, but includes things like yard equipment, clothes, home furnishings, etc. We moved in 3 years ago and are still settling in, so this would decrease. How much do most people spent on non-grocery Target and Costco spending per month? Activities: RSM, rec soccer, so most people aren't paying for this? Cleaners: We have 3 kids and a every two week cleaner. Is this high for cleaning a full house? |
Anonymous
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If your HHI drops to 250k, then your 14k /month expenses will be about 67% of your gross. That is not sustainable. Once daycare goes away, things might be ok, but it will still be tight.
The mortgage will be 25% of gross. That is a perfectly reasonable number. If you paid off 100k, it would be even more reasonable. The 16k a year for travel works out to about 6.5% of gross. That is on the high side. Coupled with the 8 weeks of camp, you could cut someplace there. You can do everything and not save a lot. You you want to be able to save, you need to move, cut your travel down and watch your smaller expenses, OR have DH keep his job. I personally would use up the 100k buffer and not save for a year or two while trying to cut expenses and see what happens. |
Anonymous
We eat vegetarian and eat mostly store brands, but yes lean towards organic. Will clean house, will let you know if that ends in divorce 
Travel will be tough after this year, but maybe spouse will be more open to it when in happier job... |
Anonymous
This is what is puzzling me, the rule of thumb was 1/3 of gross income, and we are well below that, but once we add everything up its crushing. I wish we could boot spouse's parents off mobile plan, that would save $100/month right there We should look at Cricket I think or something...
Travel is like our one splurge, I will try to talk spouse into more camping... and when kids are older I think a beach vacation where we have a longer walk to beach would be more feasible. Spouse won't keep job, that is clear. Either change jobs or eventually will be pushed out. How could we use the $100k to reduce our mortgage payment, is that refactoring? |
Anonymous
| What are most people's camp budgets for two full time working parents? |
Anonymous
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Okay - so as I see it, your take home pay would drop to 10,700, and your expenses are currently 13,879. So you need to cut $3,179 from your budget.
I would not touch the $100k - to me, that's your emergency fund. You've got to be able to cash flow out your expenses. I'm also assuming that $10,700 is after generous retirement savings. How old are your kids and how's your college savings? That's the big thing that's missing, IMHO. Even at a $250k income, you're not going to get much of anything in aid, so you need to be able to shell out for college. Putting that aside for a minute - seems to me that if you want to stay where you are, you'd have to cut the following budget items: Mobile - Cut this in half to $150 a month. Get something cheaper like Mint or Boost and decrease your data plan Beach Week - Cancel. Saves you $417. Vacation - Cancel. Saves you $667. You still have your "family trip" budget, but that's all you get. Shop - Cut this in half to $312. This is way too much. Cleaner - Drop to just a monthly cleaning, drop this from $300 to $150. That would save you $1,696 a month. If you wait until you're done with daycare, that saves another $1,688, for a total of $3,384 in savings. So, if you wait until the daycare years are done, this is doable. BUT there are big sacrifices. How do you feel about a dirtier house, crappy cell service, less shopping, and way fewer vacations? Is the new job and the current house more important than those things? This plan is NOT VIABLE if you don't have a plan for college though. Because if you don't yet have aggressive college savings, that $1688 in daycare money has to go towards 529s. |
Anonymous
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Beach Week -$416.67
Family Trip -$250.00 Vacation -$666.67 Shop -$625.00 Cleaner -$300.00 If you cut these you will save around 2K until the new job is stable. Then you need to move probably. Anyway, that's what I would do. |
Anonymous
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OP, I get the impression that the spouse who is downsizing job is the one who wants the clean house, kid's activities, the shopping and all the travel. They can't have it both ways.
Make more money, move or significantly cut expenses as itemized above. Can you, at 6K/month, bump up in pay? It seems as if they have been carrying the weight of the expenses with their higher income. Perhaps you can do something to offset their cut?? |
Anonymous
It's crushing because most of your other expenses are those of a family making $400k/year. We probably spend around $15k on travel too, but we make $500k. If we made half that, we wouldn't have a beach trip PLUS a big family vacation PLUS out of state holidays. The simple reality is that people who live in SFHs with additions close-in either bought a long time ago, bought in unsafe areas and made a grip on the property ladder, or are high-income and can afford the large mortgage. |
Anonymous
| I bet you would be happier in a less expensive house. You have a lot of kids and your income will be high but not high enough to live in CCDC or wherever this is. |