Reply to Ok can we stop saying $300k is "rich" in DC?

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Reply to "Ok can we stop saying $300k is "rich" in DC?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This whole debate feels similar to a thread earlier this year where people debated whether when they travel they tell strangers they are ""from DC."  When they actually live in the far suburbs.   If you don't actually live in upper NW DC, then you really have no idea how expensive it is to live here.  It's not just housing that is 50% more expensive than the burbs. It's also child care, insurance, parking, food. You name it.    Yes it is obviously a choice, no one is debating that.  But from a mathematical COL perspective, $300k is not rich here.  [/quote]
But the fact that you can afford that choice does make you richer than the vast majority of folks in this country.[/quote]

Seriously.  You could take your $300K and live a whole lot higher on the hog somewhere else, but you're choosing to spend it on location -- and that's FINE, but it doesn't make you poor, it makes you someone who prioritizes an expensive location over other things.  And you may live among people who make substantially more than you, but that's just a relative perspective.

And I always love the "unless you live X, you have no idea Y".  You don't have to live things first hand to have some knowledge of them.  It is possible to have researched (a lot) of real estate and COL expenses in NW and decided, you know what, this isn't worth the premium cost.  It's not like you move in, and [i]then [/i]they tell you exactly how much it costs to live there.  Every significant expense can be identified and researched in advance.  People failing to do that doesn't make them poor, just bad planners.  Do small things pop up?  Sure.  but if you don't know with pretty good precision how much your house, insurance, parking, child care, and utilities cost before moving in, you need a better spreadsheet and Google-fu next time.[/quote]

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