Reply to I know why Millenials can't afford houses and pay off their student loans..

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm 35 almost 36 and am told that I am the oldest of the millenials.  I didn't get a cell phone until law school, and even then it was a prepaid.  To me, it's not generational differences.  Everyone says the same things about whoever is young right now.  It's socioeconomic differences.  I grew up blue collar working class and am very financially conservative and boring as a result.

I have an ipad and an iphone, but not the latest of each.  We have children, and childcare, and a house we bought 10 years ago when I worked in biglaw and we bought well under budget.  Served me well when getting laid off from biglaw.  The difference between the savers and the spenders was very apparent then!

Many younger millenials I see spend plenty of dining and bars, but they are all single and I can't say I wouldn't be doing the same thing.  To me, the big, big difference is all the travel.  Anything other than backpacking is, to me, a luxury--a life-altering, worldview-expanding luxury, but a luxury nonetheless, and to a t, all the younger millenials I know who do it are either subsidized by parents or have 10K+ in credit card debt to finance those trips.  [/quote]

I'm a couple months older than you (just turned 36) and I agree it must be something about upbringing, but I don't know if it's socioeconomic per se. I grew up upper middle class but my spending habits sound the same as yours. DH and I each have 3 year old iphones that we will not replace until they die; my computer is 5 years old and DH has a new one only because he killed his old one by spilling coffee on it. No ipads. One TV that is 7 years old. One car that is 4 years old and we hope it will last into its teens. Expensive but small, crappy house in a good school district. We both spent just enough time in biglaw to frantically pay off our law school and college loans (about $150k each, took 3 to 5 years), amass a down payment for the house and enough money to pay for our wedding, then jumped ship to government attorney jobs which pay well but nothing like Biglaw. I am a GS-15 and even if I eventually reach the top of the scale, it won't pay what I made as a second year associate! We took one international vacation a year while in Biglaw, and did the backpacking/youth hostel/cheap B&B route. Even in Hawaii. Now we have kids and don't travel. We definitely eat out and get takeout too often -- I was doing the budget the other day to prepare for daycare for kid #2 and was horrified to see how much money the food comes out to! Gotta cut back on that for sure.

When I was a young kid my parents worried about money all the time, drove crappy old cars, lived in a crappy old house, etc, so that even though they made good money -- dad a doctor, mom a teacher -- my sister and I grew up with a strong sense that we needed to economize and work hard. We both worked babysitting and camp counseling jobs as teenagers, worked summers in college, etc. My parents prioritized school and academic accomplishments and sent us to camp, but we were also expected to earn money for spending -- by getting a job or doing extra chores. My cousins' kids, who are all  teenagers now, don't work at all as far as I can tell. And take uber everywhere. And go out for Starbucks with their friends. And see movies every weekend -- which, to be fair, I did as a kid too, but it cost $5 and I paid from my own money that I earned. Etc. Oh and they all have iphones. It's a different world with different expectations technologically, but I also think my cousins are not adequately instilling a sense of what things cost. My kids are toddlers still so I can't say I will do any better. But I hope to.[/quote]

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