Reply to PSA: $250K family of 4 in the DMV area is not middle class

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Reply to "PSA: $250K family of 4 in the DMV area is not middle class"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]How exactly are you saving $ for retirement and down-payment on a home on that income? Even a townhouse in not such a great school district is half a million now. [/quote]

If you can't save on a $250k salary and a $500k home, I don't know what to tell you.[/quote]

It tells me that you are old and out of touch with reality or live in Oklahoma.  Let's say that a dual income family with 2 small kids are saving for a home. Their HHI is $250k. After paying their taxes, healthcare cost (average of 23k contribution for a family of 4), and contribute some to the 401k, they come home with around 10k/month. They have to pay rent while saving for a house, right? So that's 3.5k average for a 2 bedroom apartment in DC area (kids are sharing a room). They also have to put the kids someplace while working,  right? So that's another 3k at minimum, assuming one is in preschool.  They also have to eat, pay for transportation to work, buy clothes and laundry detergent ($20 right there, and there's so much laundry with kids), pay for utilities, car repairs  (assuming they drive old, paid cars).They probably have student loans, because you can't make 250k as a family and not go to college,  and these don't seem like the people with parents who paid for college. They probably want to see their families for Christmas and Thanksgiving,  have you checked the airplane prices recently? 
So how exactly are they saving $100k cash?  This is a family who doesn't take any vacations or saves $ for college for their kids. 
[/quote]

DP but while we make $250k combined now (kids are upper ES), we didn't make that much during most of the daycare years.  But yeah, I guess we were "old" when we had kids in our mid-30s because I had paid off my student loans by then and we had saved for a down payment.  Also, your healthcare costs seem really high so maybe that's affecting your finances.  There are certainly places in the burbs where you can rent for less than $3500k per month too.  I think the problem is that you're trying to do too much at once.  You don't have to max out your 401k right now, we didn't during that time.  But my actual middle class parents were barely saving anything so I have some perspective that we are relatively privliged.[/quote]

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