Anonymous wrote:We have a 320K HHI (one is a fed salary so half of gross goes to pension and insurance etc).

Help me figure this out which of these can I reasonably expect to be able to do? Trying to get a reality check.

One international vacation
One child in private school
One child in daycare
Max out 401K
Max out 10K for 529
Max out IRA
Have a new Subaru car
Go out to eat at restaurants
Two stateside flights to visit family for holidays
Cleaners once a month
Organic groceries

I like personal finance so let's do the thing:

I plugged your info into ChatGPT 5 assuming married filing jointly, live in VA, and that the Fed made $120K and $60K of that went to insurance and pension contributions.

It spit out an annual net income of ~$159K or $13,250/month.

Now it's just a matter of what your other expenses look like - how much is your mortgage/taxes/insurance? How much is private school? Figure daycare is $2,000-2,500/month but temporary. Cars at $1,000/month if you're not saving up to pay cash? You could get that average number much lower if you drive them into the ground.

I like doing these exercises but we need more actual numbers to help sort it out.

Our 2 kids go to private because of learning disability + our public HS/MS suck (but commute and lifestyle wise, we would kill ourselves if we moved out of our hood)..

So - HHI $400k -

- Cleaner weekly (but we've had her forever and she's $100/wk which is really the same as I'm guessing paying someone every 2 wks to clean)
- Pvt school x 2 = $7500
- Eat out a lot + Whole foods/Traders/Safeway groceries
- 1 spring + 1 summer vacation annually but not always int'l + sometimes a short holiday or added summer getaway
- tutoring for both kids as needed = 200-400/month
- Max 401k contributions x2

All this being said -
- Our mortgage could not be lower
- We have drive 2 cars of which 1 we have a payment for
- The biggest thing is that we do not have to worry about paying for kids stuff which adding it all up is our biggest $$$ for years: their summer activities, club soccer + piano lessons, college savings and anything related to health ie therapy for 1 of our kids as needed because our kids have a trust that we can tap that kind of stuff for as needed (NOT vacations, school now or buying them a car so it's not like we won the lotto or anything but all that kids spend is huge and really is prob more than what we would pay for their pvt school tuition now)
- 2 cats
- we do not have a lawn service, we make our kids take turns to mow and once every spring, we hire pros to do the big landscape yard work

With how $$$ everything is now, it's still just really getting by..

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My brother sends his 2 kids to private but they have a $2M HHI and a net worth in multiples of that. We make $400k and my kids go to public. Never even considered anything else. We’d rather save the money for college. I’d only have considered private if the public school wasn’t meeting needs, and it definitely would have been a sacrifice.

Our HHI is $750k+. Although we could have afforded private, both out kids went to public K-12 schools and went on to graduate from Top 20 Universities and are crushing it in their careers. Unless your public schools are severely lacking, private school is a complete waste of money. So many people in the area are sold on the idea that private schools are better and give your kid an advantage for getting into top colleges. It doesn’t.

Blah blah blah. We love sending our kids to a private school and when you can easily afford it there’s no reason not to.

OP, what are your priorities? Eating out? Private school? New car? International vacations?

It might help you to prioritize your wants (since all of these are wants) and go from there.

Our HHS is closer to $250K (and only in the past few years); I'm a fed (GS-13) and my spouse has always made within $10K of my salary.

Our #1 priority was retirement, and we've mostly saved ~10% a year for that. Some years we maxed out, some years we put in 5%. We're now mid-40s and have over $2M between us, so it's a fallacy that you have to max out every year or you're screwed (unless you are going to spend a LOT during retirement).

Our #2 priority was a house, and we struggled for a few years to get the down payment for our current house; we put only 5% into retirement for a few years to save for the down payment.

Our #3 priority was to put our kids through private (religious) school (not Catholic). We got financial aid from the more expensive school (it actually brought the price below the cost of the cheaper religious school).

Things on your list that were not a priority for us:
One international vacation - we drove to Canada this year but mostly it's been cheap trips (we didn't even take trips for probably a decade; if I had a do-over, I would have done more vacations and saved less for retirement)
Max out 10K for 529 - we put in $25/month for each kid (Maryland 529) but will probably do $2500 per kid this year since we are spending down for our older kids; just do what you can; if you can pay for private, eventually you can cash flow part of college for them, too
Max out IRA - we did put $ into Roth IRAs when we first started out but only for about 8 years; that money has quintupled over the course of 20+ years
Have a new Subaru car - we only buy used and keep them forever (lots of rust on my car, but also lots of cash in my bank account)
Go out to eat at restaurants - we eat out maybe 1-2 times a month, but this is just something we don't really care about
Two stateside flights to visit family for holidays - our family is local
Cleaners once a month - my spouse cooks, I clean
Organic groceries - the wind blows pesticides from one farm to another so I don't see a point in this

Obviously YMMV. But first, list your priorities, and then find the funds for your top priorities.

Good luck!

Anonymous wrote:My brother sends his 2 kids to private but they have a $2M HHI and a net worth in multiples of that. We make $400k and my kids go to public. Never even considered anything else. We’d rather save the money for college. I’d only have considered private if the public school wasn’t meeting needs, and it definitely would have been a sacrifice.

Our HHI is $750k+. Although we could have afforded private, both out kids went to public K-12 schools and went on to graduate from Top 20 Universities and are crushing it in their careers. Unless your public schools are severely lacking, private school is a complete waste of money. So many people in the area are sold on the idea that private schools are better and give your kid an advantage for getting into top colleges. It doesn’t.

Anonymous wrote:OP - again but isn’t that insane?! Pare down restaurants …on 320K?! I know it’s accurate but at what HHI do I not do this? I’ve done it all my life and I STILL have to do it with 320 THOUSAND income. At one point don’t I nickle and dime and scrimp credit card points because I have to? Anyway, vent over. Everyone is right here and this was helpful.

When your budget has enough $$. $320K is higher than most incomes. But it's definately not high enough to "do everything". I you blow thru $2K/month on just dining out you will need to cut elsewhere

My brother sends his 2 kids to private but they have a $2M HHI and a net worth in multiples of that. We make $400k and my kids go to public. Never even considered anything else. We’d rather save the money for college. I’d only have considered private if the public school wasn’t meeting needs, and it definitely would have been a sacrifice.

Anonymous wrote:Those PP saying they do “all those things” with HHI in the 300-400k range and mortgages over 4k need to have several seats. No position to give any financial advice unless they have a trust.

Not a single poster has made that claim

Even with a 2K mortgage private school would not be on my radar.

I think you can do the rest, but you need to be on a budget and watch your other expenses.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Remove private school, and make the international vacation an every few years thing that you save and/or accumulate miles/points for. The rest should be doable unless you have housing costs or debt that are out of whack.

I was gonna say why the need for private school?

OP - I saw the school boards here but the kids in private school get fancy lunches, amazing field trips, top notch education, STEM exposure, a ton of extracurriculars and work on soft skills like speeches. My kid told me another boy keeps saying the F word and threw a chair at him.

I guess that’s why the private school (we’re on east coast but not DC).

Ummm…. You get all those things in public school where I live. And trust me private school kids swear all the time as well.

Drop the private school. Doesn’t make a difference for your kids especially within the same socioeconomic class (but don’t tell that to parents who send their kids to private school though). If they have the aptitude they’ll perform well wherever they go. Save the money for college.

Those PP saying they do “all those things” with HHI in the 300-400k range and mortgages over 4k need to have several seats. No position to give any financial advice unless they have a trust.

I would not send a child to private school. If you are planning to send the second eventually I think there are too many uncertainties in life at your income to spend that much on private school.

If you mean by "drive a new Subaru" always have a car payment, I would not do that either. You could drive a new Subaru until it won't run anymore and then buy a new one.

I think my current grocery bill for a family of 4 on conventional groceries is staggering. I would not want to imagine what it would be if I bought all organic food. I think there is little evidence that organic food is better for you.

Finally, not sure what is meant by eating out. Spending $50 per week on take out? Sure. Eating out twice a week for $100 a pop? I would not do that.

You sound like you have a lot of high tastes, OP. You make a lot of money, but you would be wise to be more frugal. Your spouse works for the federal government. Maybe they are in a safe position. But just look around. I work in industry and see many people's careers end involuntarily in their 50s. I would save more and not be taking international vacations every year and sending two kids to privates. But that's me.

We have a 320K HHI (one is a fed salary so half of gross goes to pension and insurance etc).

Help me figure this out which of these can I reasonably expect to be able to do? Trying to get a reality check.

One international vacation
One child in private school
One child in daycare
Max out 401K
Max out 10K for 529
Max out IRA
Have a new Subaru car
Go out to eat at restaurants
Two stateside flights to visit family for holidays
Cleaners once a month
Organic groceries

We make around 340k, but our mortgage is closer to 4200. We do everything on your list aside from privates/daycare. However, we do cleaners bi weekly, about to buy a new car, and have a lot of ongoing medical bills. We spend a fair amount on kids activities/camp, and an after school driver that adds up to what daycare likely costs. We cover all expenses, put 70k/year away in 401k and college, and don't want for much, but we are not rolling in leftover money either. I think you need to just make a budget and see how it goes if this income level is new for you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - again but isn’t that insane?! Pare down restaurants …on 320K?! I know it’s accurate but at what HHI do I not do this? I’ve done it all my life and I STILL have to do it with 320 THOUSAND income. At one point don’t I nickle and dime and scrimp credit card points because I have to? Anyway, vent over. Everyone is right here and this was helpful.

Not your fault. The goalposts have moved and now you need $500k+ to maintain the lifestyle you want.

Check out an inflation calculator, OP. Our HHI is almost double what I once considered an income at which I wouldn't have to make trade offs, in a mid-cost of living area. That income today has half the buying power it once did.