Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Spouse with the lower salary? What about families with a stay at home parent, or one parent who has a much lower paying job or a job that pays low but they truly believe in (academic researchers saving lives, social workers, etc.) Should they all live in shacks even if the other parent has a good salary?

I know, right? Big law is really a scourge on this area.

The majority of biglaw lawyers in this area are not going to stay in biglaw unless they win the partnership game and are going to have a significant salary drop when they leave biglaw. Many will either go to government, in-house (though this really only applies to lawyers with the right skillset to go in-house, and many DC lawyers don't have that skillset), government adjacent, or small firms.

Anonymous wrote:Spouse with the lower salary? What about families with a stay at home parent, or one parent who has a much lower paying job or a job that pays low but they truly believe in (academic researchers saving lives, social workers, etc.) Should they all live in shacks even if the other parent has a good salary?

I know, right? Big law is really a scourge on this area.

Spouse with the lower salary? What about families with a stay at home parent, or one parent who has a much lower paying job or a job that pays low but they truly believe in (academic researchers saving lives, social workers, etc.) Should they all live in shacks even if the other parent has a good salary?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check your privilege.

Most couples don't have the typical DCUM HHI. They afford townhouses in the exurbs on TWO salaries so they can raise their children. Most Americans can never aspire to DCUM salaries.

Shame on you. I despise posters like you.

Relax hombre. They didn't voice their opinion..they simply asked why people buy on the basis of 2 incomes..And they are not wrong. A lot of us can't see ourselves living in normal "basic" homes.

PP was correct. Most people buy their homes on the basis of 2 incomes because they truly need both incomes to buy a home. The DCUM privilege really shows in posts like the OP. Most people don’t have two biglaw or physician salaries and don’t have their parents giving them a downpayment in the name of “preserving generational wealth”.

So out of touch.

I'm a single parent and bought a very modest house on my income during covid. Think a townhouse way out in the burbs fo $350,000. My house is now worth over $500,000 and there is no way in hell I would qualify or be able to afford the same house. And I make a decent income ($130,000). So these tone deaf posts are just gross. A young family buying a very basic home these days simply can't afford a house on just one income. My commute is hell, but hey at least I own, right.

Yes, and it would also be better if we had a year's salary in an emergency fund, and if we had fully funded 529s and we were maxing our 401(k)s and also if I had a pony.

I make $110k. Husband makes $120k. We both have secure jobs. We have three kids. We wanted three bedrooms in DC proper, in a walkable neighborhood that we liked. That's not possible to do if we were pretending our HHI was only $120k.

Everyone has to make choices. We chose to stretch a bit on our house ($860k) but we don't own a car, we never take big vacations (visit family or Great Wolf Lodge is it for us), we almost never eat out, we don't pay for expensive extracurriculars, and we buy all our clothes at thrift stores.

Surely you can understand this.

Anonymous wrote:We bought on the basis of one salary but each of our salaries was more than double the median HHI in the US. It would be easy to pat ourselves on the back for being so frugal and farsighted but the truth is we were just well off.

And since we have been fortunate enough not to have suffered a job loss, we have certainly wondered since then if we were too conservative because we now have to wonder if we're in the right school pyramid, if we have enough room for our growing family, if interest rates will ever be that low again, etc. So it's not like there's one right answer and OP and OP alone has found it.

Same. We were WAY too conservative. Now navigating if we renovate, teardown + rebuild, or take the loss and buy a larger house (bought at peak prices so we likely can't get what we paid). There's a balance between being extremely conservative on one end and really pushing the DTI / HHI multiple on the other end.

It depends on people's risk tolerance. And because not everyone has the same risk tolerance, there will be different outcomes. My uncle never invested in the stock market and kept his savings in CDs his entire life. Everyone is different.

We bought on the basis of one salary but each of our salaries was more than double the median HHI in the US. It would be easy to pat ourselves on the back for being so frugal and farsighted but the truth is we were just well off.

And since we have been fortunate enough not to have suffered a job loss, we have certainly wondered since then if we were too conservative because we now have to wonder if we're in the right school pyramid, if we have enough room for our growing family, if interest rates will ever be that low again, etc. So it's not like there's one right answer and OP and OP alone has found it.

We bought our current house based on two incomes. We do not consider it a forever house. It’s for the next decade with room for our growing kids, home offices, guests, au pairs, and potentially grandparents.

We both plan to work for the next decade and have savings that would cover the unexpected. We bought in a desirable area and put enough money down that we can always sell if we need to. Our last home was easily doable on one income but didn’t work for our lifestyle. YMMV

Anonymous wrote:Also, why do people even *have* two salaries in the first place? Don't they know it's less stressful for everyone in the household if only one parent works? Someone should tell people this.

I mean, you jest, but women entering the work force en masse drove up prices on everything. This is not a matter of opinion. The rise of two-income families is actually the reason most families now need two incomes. It’s kind of ironic.

OP is trying to be sarcastic and make fun of the people here who cry poverty on $500o HHI, trust find and "g-e-n-e-r-a-t-i-o-n-a-l wealth "

We bought on the basis of two salaries because we were very young. Our salaries are much higher now and we've covered the mortgage on one salary since about five years after we bought the house.

Having bought a house young (and in a less highly valued area) was a great idea. We've got the mortgage almost paid off while our kids are still at home.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check your privilege.

Most couples don't have the typical DCUM HHI. They afford townhouses in the exurbs on TWO salaries so they can raise their children. Most Americans can never aspire to DCUM salaries.

Shame on you. I despise posters like you.

Relax hombre. They didn't voice their opinion..they simply asked why people buy on the basis of 2 incomes..And they are not wrong. A lot of us can't see ourselves living in normal "basic" homes.

If they really need a forum to answer that question, they’re either not very smart or a troll.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check your privilege.

Most couples don't have the typical DCUM HHI. They afford townhouses in the exurbs on TWO salaries so they can raise their children. Most Americans can never aspire to DCUM salaries.

Shame on you. I despise posters like you.

Relax hombre. They didn't voice their opinion..they simply asked why people buy on the basis of 2 incomes..And they are not wrong. A lot of us can't see ourselves living in normal "basic" homes.

PP was correct. Most people buy their homes on the basis of 2 incomes because they truly need both incomes to buy a home. The DCUM privilege really shows in posts like the OP. Most people don’t have two biglaw or physician salaries and don’t have their parents giving them a downpayment in the name of “preserving generational wealth”.

So out of touch.

We are lawyers and did buy based on 1 salary. But I completely agree with that PP, this is the dumbest and most out of touch post I have ever seen. I hope it's a troll.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Check your privilege.

Most couples don't have the typical DCUM HHI. They afford townhouses in the exurbs on TWO salaries so they can raise their children. Most Americans can never aspire to DCUM salaries.

Shame on you. I despise posters like you.

Relax hombre. They didn't voice their opinion..they simply asked why people buy on the basis of 2 incomes..And they are not wrong. A lot of us can't see ourselves living in normal "basic" homes.

PP was correct. Most people buy their homes on the basis of 2 incomes because they truly need both incomes to buy a home. The DCUM privilege really shows in posts like the OP. Most people don’t have two biglaw or physician salaries and don’t have their parents giving them a downpayment in the name of “preserving generational wealth”.

So out of touch.