Reply to In your opinion, how much salary would a person need to make per year to life comfortably in DC?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]No one is struggling at 200 unless you have massive debt you are paying off. Otherwise, you are doing something really, really wrong. Our HHi just hit the 220K mark and we feel like we struck gold. And we were doing just fine at 150.[/quote]

We make $170K and have 2 kids in preschool. We have a nice life, but no extra for savings (outside of 5% for retirement) or vacations and I keep to a pretty strict budget. We both just got raises to a total of $200K but are also having our 3rd child, so childcare/diapers/etc will cut into any extra salary. [/quote]

But obviously you have  some extra money, or I imagine you wouldn't feel comfortable adding a third child, I presume.

At 150k, we had a boat, car, and house payment. We paid for one child's preschool, saved a little each month, paid off some debt, ate out, and went on one vacation a year. Some fun purchases, too. All in addition to 401K and healthcare contributions.

If we hadn't lost 40k on an underwater house and occasionally lived above our means (frovoulous purchase) admittedly, we would have had no debt to pay off and would have been totally fine.  As it is, we weren't too bad.

At any rate, what you describe is not struggling at all. It's perfectly comfortable. I really can't imagine how you don't have enough to  save unless your pre-k and mortgage costs are astronomical.[/quote]

Our take home is approx $9000 a month. Expenses are:
$2400 mortgage ($2100 is mortgage and $300 is a repayment of a loan to our 401K for the down payment)
$2150 tuition
$800 student loans
$500 utilities/internet
$1000 food (includes all eating out)
$650 shopping (CVS & Target/activities/clothing)
$200 charity
$300 weekly house cleaning (cheaper than marriage counseling!)
$300 gas/parking/car insurance for 2 cars - no car payments
$100 life insurance
$100 medical (drs/prescriptions)
$30 gym membership
$250 saving for a minivan

So while we certainly dont have any extravagant expenses, the money does go very quickly and there is not much left over at the end of the month.  [/quote]

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