Reply to Is this a reasonable amount of spending money per month based on our income?

Forum Index » Money and Finances

Reply to "Is this a reasonable amount of spending money per month based on our income?"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]OP here this is our current monthly budget

$2200 PITI
$575 groceries & consumables
$500 car & house maintenance 
$300 subscriptions (incl gym membership) 
$350 utilities 
$450 transportation cost (mostly insurance & VA car tax)
$1000 vacation saving
$2400 personal spending

Total is $7775. Our take home is over $17k so it leaves us with almost 10k going into savings every month (more like 11-12k if you count pre tax 401k contributions and match + paying down mortgage principal).

Are we really going wrong here? Seems crazy how you could make double or more our income and barely enjoy any of it for yourself. 
[/quote]

Yes you are really going wrong here. Start saving more to get to a good school district and realize that when you have a kid, it’s going to cost you $3k a month for daycare. Cut back now. [/quote]

The thing is if we cut back to 600/person vs 1200/person it’s only going to be a difference of ~11k vs 10k/month in savings, I don’t feel like this is going to make a major impact a long time from now. We aren’t going to think when we’re 60 “thank god we saved that extra $1200”. My philosophy with money is take a balanced approach and spend to enjoy life now but also be responsible and save plenty for the future, I feel we’re doing that. I think people here are biased towards one extreme based on the responses. IMO it’s crazy to make 30-50k a month after taxes and think you can’t spent a little over 1k on yourself. What’s the point of working and making so much if you can’t have some nice things?

Of course, we are planning to reevaluate once we have kids and budget needs change. We won’t have as much time for ourselves anyway so hobbies are going to be reduced. We already have a good chunk saved for the new house as well as retirement savings. Current NW is 1M in late 20’s/early 30’s so we’ve been saving (mostly coming from me). [/quote]

If you cut back in half, you would be saving an extra $1200/month. That's $14k per year. Keep investing that amount every year for 30 years. At a conservative 8% return, you would have an extra $1.9M in retirement.
Are you going to poopoo over $1.9M when you are 60?
Believe me, you are going to say "thank god we saved that extra $1200 every month".

[/quote]

Sure but you need to include what the OP would have if they saved “only” 10k a month for 30 years, which in your scenario is $13.5M. Now the difference at age 60 between $13.5M and $15.4M is not a lot.

The value in becoming rich is diminished if you have to wait until you’re a senior citizen to enjoy it. Once you hit a certain level of financial security and get “on track” to continue making a high income it’s silly to prioritize hoarding as much money as possible until you’re old when you can finally spend it.

What most are missing here with this focus on compound interest and wealth generation at all costs is the fact that your time left on this planet with a healthy and youthful body and the experiences you accumulate, in the end, is more important than how much money you end up with. It’s also silly to try to amass a huge pile to leave to your kids because chances are they won’t be grateful and will end up squandering it. [/quote]

it is a LOT.  It can allow you to retire 5-10 years earlier if desired. 
[/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