Reply to Could you live comfortably on $7500 a month?

Forum Index » Money and Finances

Reply to "Could you live comfortably on $7500 a month?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]

We live on $6K a month after tax and our mortgage is nearly $3K.

Montessori preschool - more than $10K a year
Older child goes to public
After-school activities total about $10K a year
We save to visit close family in Europe and Asia, but can't afford to go every year.

[/quote]

I'm confused.  You have 3k in income after taxes, and mortgage, so 36K.  Of that you pay 20K for school, and activities, leaving 1333 a month for insurance, utilities, food, transportation, retirement savings, etc . . . And you still save enough to travel to Asia and Europe every few years?

I know it's probably possible to live on 1333 a month, but it's got to be tight. Health insurance, food, and utilities would eat almost all of it. I don't think I'd choose to spend that much on after school activities if it meant making major sacrifices elsewhere.[/quote]

I apologize: the house maintenance (mortgage + insurance + utilities) are nearly 3K and I left retirement and college savings out of the stated "take home" income. So 6K is after tax and after savings!

We DO invest a lot in education considering our income.
However, for the older one, I calculated he was getting a cheaper and better education with his special needs at a public school and with the appropriate extras, instead of paying for private school. The Montessori preschool is run by a teacher we adore and as Montessoris go, is actually cheap.
We trade visits with our parents and siblings in Europe and Asia.

I have learned to economize and live on a budget, and I have learned to like it. Scoring a designer outfit on eBay for a fifth of the price gives me a thrill. Our furniture is vintage Victorian from Craigslist, to go with our tiny Victorian house. I shop unprocessed and mostly organic at Whole Foods because that's actually less expensive than prepackaged stuff. However, there are 0 impulse buys and near 0 consumable experiences purchased, like Starbucks or eating out or going to a movie. We have Netflix, not cable; pay-as-you-go flip phone, not a smartphone with an expensive plan. You get the idea.

[/quote]

NP here, let me understand this again, you live on $1333 per month for food, utilities, insurance and transportation? And not to mention countless other things that might pop up including home repairs, hair cuts, running out of soap/shampoo, doctor visits, car taxes, clothes, bedsheets...? For a family of 4 in DC?  You never ever eat out/take out or got for ice cream or go on field trips, like even once a month? I am not even talking designer outfits or vintage furniture or Whole Foods.

Can you please breakdown how you spend the 1333 per month? I am really curious. We are a family of 3 + 2 pets, and spend 4K for food, utilities, insurance and transportation and other misc expenses that are mostly essential. Childcare and mortgage is another 4K. And I consider ourselves fairly frugal with maybe only around a 20% of the expenses a splurge.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics