Of course. It's more than most people make in a month. I mean, we typically spend more than that but we COULD do it if we had to. Anyone could.

Not with 85K of student loans, 400K mortgage and a 2 yr old in daycare. No way.

Anonymous wrote:



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.

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.

Anonymous wrote:



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.

Please dont tell me your 3K mortgage comes out of your 6K

I would have to scale back a lot.

yep. that's pretty "middle class" around here in DC...

Anonymous wrote:This is net after-tax, meaning every month on the first $7500 is deposited into your checking account. With two caveats one your kids went to public school and to your more gauge was $1900 a month.

Family of 3.

We are a family of 4 and we live on less than that. Quite comfortably for us, but I doubt "the Jonses" would agree.

This is exactly our situation. We have 3 kids. Our average take home income is $7500 per month and our mortgage is approximately 2K.

We don't take many vacations but we splurge on other stuff. We have lots of hobbies. Our vehicles are paid off. We have no credit card debt.

I don't feel broke or wealthy; just sort of average.

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.

Yes, but comfortable is relative. Our net is $10k after retirement, health insurance and taxes, but we have a $3k mortgage, $500 in utilities, and spend a lot on enrichment (piano lessons, dance classes, pool membership, family vacations). We could do without those things if we had to, but they do add up. We try to save around $2k/month.

Anonymous wrote:No, we spend 11k a month, mortgage is 1800 a month. No child care expenses.

Then yes, you COULD live on that. You just don't want to.

We live on less than half of that amount so....yes.

No, we spend 11k a month, mortgage is 1800 a month. No child care expenses.

since our mortgage is about $5600 (20 yr loan) and our childcare is our next biggest expense (2 kids/nanny), we couldn't. but if we had only $1900 for mortgage and no nanny expenses, then definitely could live comfortably on that.

How bad is your commute relative to the $1900 mortgage? DH and I decided to live in N. arlington for the convenience to both of our jobs (his is 15 minutes) and mine is 20 to 25 (but I drive into DC, and I'm counting all the traffic lights) and the good public schools.

I think you need to define comfortable.
DH and I had a life altering event in 2007 and depleted our life savings. He was making about 100k from 2008-2013 when he lost his job. We had nearly $300k saved. Our mortgage is $2600 a month. We don't usually eat out, go to the theater, movies, or bars nor do we ever pay for a sitter. We trade weekends with friends to host slumber parties so everyone gets a chance to have a kid free night.
Through a year of unemployment we haven't had a huge shock to our lifestyle since we lived simply to begin with.