Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

Depends on what you mean by these. Do you mean that you want to have 400k per kid by the time they are 18? Somewhere between $5-10 million by retirement? That's what "fully funded" means to me. If that's what you mean, you will need at least 1 mil per year. Less than that, you will not b e saving as much as you should be with the other expenses you want to incur, particularly with private school.

ski trips out west are really expensive. like 10-15k for family of four, assuming you want ski in/ski out (why do it otherwise).

Assuming you are asking about a family getting no help from parents/others, I would say $600k, having been making that for a number of years leading up to having 2 kids (to have grown financially into that $ house). You don't need 1M to have that lifestyle unless you have other unmentioned goals (retiring early, building significant additional wealth outside of retirement vehicles, etc)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My 67-year-old parents did all of this on a single $225K salary (except for the car – they used to have Toyotas and only now have Audis). Retirement was accomplished by their $225,000 pension, private school was 75% paid for by the job, etc. Home was purchased for $300K but is now $1.5 million. Amazing how much easier things were 30 years ago.

$225 was a lot 30 years ago.

Yes, it was. Equivalent to $464,400.

So there’s part of your answer. You’ll need more than that unless you also have a fully funded pension, private school paid for by work, SAHP, and drive Toyota’s.

Anonymous wrote:My 67-year-old parents did all of this on a single $225K salary (except for the car – they used to have Toyotas and only now have Audis). Retirement was accomplished by their $225,000 pension, private school was 75% paid for by the job, etc. Home was purchased for $300K but is now $1.5 million. Amazing how much easier things were 30 years ago.

$225 was a lot 30 years ago.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

You don’t need $1m. This is us exactly, living in Vienna, and we do it on $500k. Slightly less travel spend, but we also have a nanny

We do it on $500k too. 1.5 million house plus $100k tuition plus all the rest. However, we are not wealth building beyond funding 401ks or putting $12k a month into a brokerage like an previous poster mentioned. Many high income people ($500k, 600k,
800k) people say "they can't afford it" but it's because they're saving really aggressively off the top. The "we can't afford it" means a lot of different things to different people.

Housekeeper, cook and cleaning woman?

My 67-year-old parents did all of this on a single $225K salary (except for the car – they used to have Toyotas and only now have Audis). Retirement was accomplished by their $225,000 pension, private school was 75% paid for by the job, etc. Home was purchased for $300K but is now $1.5 million. Amazing how much easier things were 30 years ago.

Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

Define “fully funded college funds.” In other words, how much should the FFCF contain at the start of your child’s senior year of high school?

Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

Which zip codes/neighborhoods are considered desirable in DC, MD and VA?
DC: WotP only?
MD: Bethesda, CC and Potomac?
Not sure about VA because I don’t spend much time there.

Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

You don’t need $1m. This is us exactly, living in Vienna, and we do it on $500k. Slightly less travel spend, but we also have a nanny

Anonymous wrote:And the other question is how do you travel internationally? Do you go first class to Japan or coach to Mexico? There is a huge difference. My guess is 800-900k to be comfortable, but it CAN be done on less.

Paying for F class to Japan would be like $10,000 per ticket.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:1.5 mil house in a desirable zip code
Private school for 2 kids
2 cars, one should be luxury: think bmv or Audi
1 internal trip per year; skiing trip in the winter for the whole family
Fully funded 401k and IRAs
Fully funded college funds for the kids

1 mil?

Naw. This is us, to a T.

House is 1.7M
2 kids both private
2 cars, one a porche, one a Toyota
Christmas trip is to Aspen every year $15K
Max 401Ks
Fully funded college hard to say, but $200K in each and the kids are 6 and 8.

We did it on $400K with difficulty and by the time we got to $600K with room to spare.

How did you save up for the downpayments for your home?

Did you *pay* $1.7M for the house, or did you roll over equity from an appreciating house? And what is tuition?

We rolled over. But most people buying a $1.7M are. That’s not a starter home.

Tuition is $55K for one kid and $42K for other.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would say you need a 800k income.

We used to have a 600k income and would not have been able to do all that. We travel more though.

We are at $500k, do most of the things on this list except we live in a $1M house and use public schools, and put $12k/month directly into a brokerage. We could ostensibly put another $2k into a bigger mortgage and the rest to 2 private school tuitions. I would not choose to do so, but it's certainly economically feasible.

I’m sure you could but I would not say comfortably.

Many private school kids have family money. Grandparents pay tuition or inheritance is coming.

And the other question is how do you travel internationally? Do you go first class to Japan or coach to Mexico? There is a huge difference. My guess is 800-900k to be comfortable, but it CAN be done on less.