$20-25k in cash, although we’ve definitely had less in our 20’s and early 30’s.

$0

2 income home, but we basically live off one income and invest the remainder. We keep about 2k in our checking in order to avoid an overdraft. When we go to buy a car or anything else expensive we sell off some investments over a year old to avoid short term gains taxes. We invest ever 2 weeks so we always have something old to sell whrn needed. We hate keeping any cash on hand when it can be out working.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m posting from a different perspective but I need to brag! I just paid off the last of my medical bills and I have $1400 in savings! And all my bills are caught up AND I’m scheduled for 10 hours of overtime for the next 3 weeks.

I feel like a massive weight is off my shoulders.

Cool! Debt free is a big relief! And med bills is the #1 cause for bankruptcy. This is major!

Congratulations!

Anonymous wrote:I’m posting from a different perspective but I need to brag! I just paid off the last of my medical bills and I have $1400 in savings! And all my bills are caught up AND I’m scheduled for 10 hours of overtime for the next 3 weeks.

I feel like a massive weight is off my shoulders.

Cool! Debt free is a big relief! And med bills is the #1 cause for bankruptcy. This is major!

I’m posting from a different perspective but I need to brag! I just paid off the last of my medical bills and I have $1400 in savings! And all my bills are caught up AND I’m scheduled for 10 hours of overtime for the next 3 weeks.

I feel like a massive weight is off my shoulders.

We are a single income household. When we bought our house, we were down to about $50k. I might have gone a little lower but we needed to do some immediate stuff to the house. Generally speaking we like to have 18 months minimum of expenses saved, but we had to make an exception to buy this house because we were not selling our previous home (became a rental.) It was nerve wracking though! Building up our savings again was a priority for a while.

We keep about 3 months expenses in cash.

We're a 2 income home with pretty stable jobs. And we spend way less than we make -- the lower salary alone would cover essential expenses.

We keep 3 months of bare essential expenses in checking/savings
An additional 1 month in CDs
An additional 3 months in Ibonds


Taxable investing accounts for optional upcoming expenses (e.g. vague ideas for home renovations or vacations) that we could tap if need be are usually around 30k or so.

I also keep a small "cash drag" in a Roth IRA account that I invest when there's a particularly good opportunity, but it also doubles as a back-up emergency fund in my mind since you can take up.

Family of 4.

We keep 3 months full expenses. We are a 2 income home and both have similar income, so either one can support the full household on one income. At this point all extra income goes into investments.

At least 3 months of expenses. Just the essentials:

mortgage
utilities (heat, water, electric, internet)
enough gas to get to job interviews
metro fare
property taxes
car and homeowner's insurance
double or triple what we currently pay for health insurance (COBRA is expensive!)
condo fees
food

I figure if both my wife and I lost our jobs simultaneously, at least one of us would get unemployment, we could pick up some odd jobs to help bring in money while we looked for other things, and between the two of us we should be able to find enough work to meet our bare minimum expenses within 3 months. If things really got dire beyond that, we could use home equity loans, credit cards, or withdrawals from retirement savings until we were able to reduce our expenses further (move somewhere cheaper, sell the car, etc.)

When we bought our house we had literally zero in savings the day after closing. We've built it up over the years and now have plenty. We were both young and with no kids. Emergencies could have gone on credit cards (thank god we didn't have to).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So people saving large amounts is why Trump got elected? Yet, Trumps policies are very much those of Paul Ryan, where if you lose your jobs it’s all up to you....maybe the govt will turn your food stamps into a box of dried beans, powdered milk and peanut butter.

That’s logically incoherent.

My husband and I save cash aggressively. We could probably get thru 6 months on a bare bones budget. I’d love to get up to a full year of bare bones budget, but expenses have necessitated some dipping into reserves. We leave the market for our retirement accounts....and are both contributing 15%.

People in jobs that afford them a large savings are not stupid enough to think ANY administration is obligated to feed and house them if they lost their jobs. That's loser logic and a recipe for a lifetime of failure.

Alternatively we could choose to live in a society with a real safety net. But that doesn’t look likely. I’m well aware of what a heartless society we live in, hence my aggressive savings. We could weather a job loss, it’s a medical crisis that I fear. But you gotta do what you can.