They live in cardboard boxes and dumpster-dive for food since that's what's left when you can't afford $1m houses.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You don't have to live on that, OP. You can be a government employee - I know many that make at least $150k each and they are not that qualified. Look up the salaries, it is all public information.

Their household makes over $300k, and they both work from home!

I’m a fed with 25 years service and PhD and make 140k only now with this year’s raise. Please stop spouting nonsense that it’s easy to get a 150k federal job.

Yes, what is this myth govt employees make at least $150K? All of them? I make half of that. 5 years ago I made even less and still managed to raise three kids in this area.

Anonymous wrote:
We're a family of four living on 100K a year in close-in DC burbs. Kids go/went to public school. One is in college.

This board is a bubble.

Lol! This board has to be the most out of touch space i've ever seen.

Anonymous wrote:You don't have to live on that, OP. You can be a government employee - I know many that make at least $150k each and they are not that qualified. Look up the salaries, it is all public information.

Their household makes over $300k, and they both work from home!

I’m a fed with 25 years service and PhD and make 140k only now with this year’s raise. Please stop spouting nonsense that it’s easy to get a 150k federal job.

We're a family of four living on 100K a year in close-in DC burbs. Kids go/went to public school. One is in college.

This board is a bubble.

My DS and I live on $81k or so plus around $3-5k of my second job earnings (I'm a teacher). He's a college student who got a lot of FA so that helps a lot. Don't discount private colleges since many are very generous. He also earns around $5k from summer earnings and he's going to look for a job at school this semester.

It’s easy. Cheaper neighborhoods with lower tier public schools (typically more immigrants with more ESOL students pulling test scores down but not really worse educational opportunities)

People have such a hard time living off 200k because of lifestyle inflation, not because of high cost of living. Many people with that income have two new SUVs, live in an expensive area and travel internationally once a year, and can't imagine anything less than that. At the same time, they look up to multimillionaires who drive luxury cars, live in mansions located in even more expensive areas and probably travel several times a year to more lavish destinations, so they feel average in comparison.

The truth is, the median household income in the US is around 75k and the majority of households survive on less than 100k a year. The majority of americans live in condos and smaller houses in cheaper areas, many of them aren't homeowners. They drive used cars or use public transit. International travel for them is a once in a lifetime experience or something they do once every a few years. Real life isn't a DCUM bubble.

We did it for years and had it wasn’t hard. One stay at home parent (with a little freelance income), free DC PK starting at 3 years old. Low housing payment (bought when prices were low, but could instead have bought later somewhat undesirable — that’s still an option). One car, no car payment. Were frugal.

It’s been about 5 years now since our income went up and there’s been considerable inflation. I think we’d need $120k for the same, relatively comfortable, life now.

It all depends on your expenses and housing is the biggest.

Budget groceries, one parent stays home so no childcare, no extras.

What I don't understand is how most of the country has $1500 a month car payments.

As stated: cheaper housing, cheaper school, managing expectations of what you can buy.

Probably much cheaper housing and public schools (or private if one spouse is a teacher there). That is the biggest chunk of household expenses.

I don't know why people ask these questions. You absolutely can, but you have to be "reasonable" with your wants and needs. When I made that, I didn't live in a house (but was aggressively saving for one). I had no car payment, no debt, and still took nice vacations. I was very happy.

You don't have to live on that, OP. You can be a government employee - I know many that make at least $150k each and they are not that qualified. Look up the salaries, it is all public information.

Their household makes over $300k, and they both work from home!

I keep seeing people here complaining about how tight their budgets are when the make more than 200k, so we're not the only ones. I can imagine how a family of two can survive on 100k or less.