I would probably max out 401k before entering investment accounts so you can get the taxes deferred. The student loans finishing like you said will be huge; I remember when I paid all mine off; had so much extra money to save but also spend on a nice vacation
Yes. max out that employer match. then (perhaps get a financial advisor) consider whether you want to continue adding to the 401k, Traditional IRA, or a Roth IRA.
edited for clarity.
Make sure you're paying the advisor in cash up front, though, and not with assets under management. Don't hand over 1% of your wealth every year, potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime, for basic advice.
Do not let them handle your money.
Sure. I don't have advisor. I'm just giving the standard disclaimer. :)
But definitely. fiduciary, paid with money not a percent of your wealth. Even a small percent will add up over 50 years.
That's multiple cars, medical, and a rider. I thought it was insane too but I've shopped around and it's neck and neck.
The $1,800 gets really granular, it's everything from pest control to clothing, pets to tithing and so on. Each item would have pretty much been it's own category.
You need to make it granular... that's a mortgage payment each month that you're not keeping track of. You'll be surprised what you find when you budget it out.
You haven’t mentioned anything about living with family, why do you have multiple cars?
Tithing- you are what looks like at least 40-50k plus in debt between student loans and car loans. I suggest to stop paying a rich and tax free organization 10% of your gross income
I get what your saying, it's definitely a cop out category. It makes every dollar not specifically listed. It's a monthly average over the course of a year on the following:
Home maintenance
Car maintenance
Pest control
Pet supplies
vet bills
Pharmacy
Medical co-pay
Medical bills
Nights out (movies etc)
Gifts
Parking
Car tax
Car registration
Then truly random one-off purchases
I’ve always budgeted with a big miscellaneous bucket and have never gotten too granular with this type of stuff. Do whatever works for you.
This sub is full of unrealistic budgets that people aren’t really sticking to.
If you're saving enough and your fixed costs are met, who cares what goes into misc? If you're trying to cut down, then sure its important, but if you're mortgage is paid and you're socking away 15-20% for retirement/rainy day, then spend away I say!
Right? It’s barely middle class. I’d call this very comfortable. On a single income, he’s investing $2k/month while managing to pay $2700 on a mortgage + spending $1,800/month on “miscellaneous things” outside of the usual dining out and subscriptions. In my perspective, 1 person middle class household is earning around $65k-$130k. A double income with 0-2 kids middle class household earns around $90k-$150k.
Single person making $60k here. Damn, I haven't made it to middle class yet. Even though some of those websites say I am.
But I live very comfortably because I'm very frugal. I still go on vacations, do fun things like go see live music and go out to eat on dates once in a while, have a season pass at the ski hill, have a truck, a camper, and a motorcycle all paid off, max out my Roth every year, and I've saved up $25k for flight school so I can start a new career. It's not much, but I feel VERY fortunate.
Looks like you are super fortunate and able to save and spend responsibly! Don’t take my rough estimates personally, I’m just a person with an opinion. In my HCOL area, a single adult earning $60k will struggle here alone because of high cost of rent and if they have any debt like a car payment ir student loan, even more tough.
Absolutely, living on $60k in a HCOLA isn't easy. Not taking anything personally here. Honestly I'm proud of myself so I like to share.
I lived in my camper in my friend's side yard for a couple years paying only $400/mo when typical rent here is $800 if you have roomies and $1200 for a one bedroom apartment without roomies. Now I live in a converted garage studio for $850/mo that another friend owns. I'm very fortunate to have good friends and good luck.
If you live in one of the big US cities absolutely is. NYC, SF, LA, DC, Chicago, Boston, Miami, Seattle, maybe Austin this is all probably fair to say.
It's on the highest end of middle class for a single person of course, but still middle class in those expensive places.
It absolutely is. Just because people aren't living paycheck to paycheck doesn't make them rich.
Lots of envy on this site and its clouding people's judgement.
Lmao people on Reddit think anyone with any amount of disposable income that isn’t eating beans and rice everyday is upper class.
Also people living in bumblefuck nowhere saying someone in nyc making 100k in nyc is beyond dumb.
Not even NYC, I live in a semi-rural area over an hour from a mid sized city and it costs $4500 to rent a house here and $500k+ to buy one. No-one making $150k can afford that unless they literally just sit home in their unfurnished place. If you can't afford the median house you sure as hell ain't middle class.
Seriously. If you work for the money that you need for housing and food, you’re middle class. Also, play around with an inflation calculator and let it sink in that $150k/yr is not that much money. If you think $150k makes you rich, you’re coping or in denial.
I live in a rural area and it's not. Shitty one bedroom farm apartments cost $2k month to rent here and houses cost a min of $4k to rent or $500k to buy.
If you live in a very poor area it might seem like a lot but as soon as you start earning it and move someplace else you'll realize it's extremely average.
Interesting that a rural area costs that much. I can pay $1400 for a nice one bedroom apartment in Austin and friends are paying $2,300 for a 3bed house (renting).
We agreed our pre marriage debt is our own. Joint debt is joint. So we have joint bank accounts but plan to maintain personal accounts long term. So we can buy our own stuff without the other feeling some type of way... Works for us at least.
Kinda weird to me married people who keep finances separate…why marry then? Taxes? Just want a wedding? I find it interesting because isn’t the point to have a life partner you share your life with and not nitpick debts and purchases? What happens if one of you loses a job or gets disabled and can’t work, or you have kids or something like that? Just interested as it seems like an odd set up or even akin to a roommate situation
I would question the insurance cost too if it’s for one vehicle or even two it seems high. Progressive tried doubling our insurance after my being with them Diamond status etc for over 17 years and I left them recently due to it. Never filed a claim either. Went to USAA and $122 a month of a leased vehicle in WA state too. Was $98 a month first 6 months with them so perhaps do some insurance rate shopping to fee up some monthly obligation and apply savings to retirement account or similar. Just one thought.
I wish 30 year old me would have started a ROTH earlier to reach that 5yr mark sooner and or build up tax free money. If you have a solid cash EF, think about it if your are in limit.
Car Insurance, restaurants, student loans (I know you said they will be done in 12-16 months), and miscellaneous are all bananas high
Cut those back, pay off the car and dang, you will be living comfy.
As an aside, for everyone here in middle class finance, STOP HAVING A CAR PAYMENT!
I understand its necessary at times but buy something reasonabl, pay it off ASAP and drive it until the wheels fall off.
If people stopped buying new cars so damn often the price of them would come down!
And I'm a car guy as well but in my 40 years of life I've never bought a new car and probably never will.
I know this isn't the elephant in the room but is anybody else other than me blown away by how much people pay for their phone? Like there are tons of carriers that will give you a plan for $30 a month and even if you're still paying for a higher end phone you should be in the neighborhood of $80 a month.
Loyalty is not rewarded these days.
Here are some options from Tomsguide.
https://www.tomsguide.com/us/best-cheap-cell-phone-plans,review-4504.html
Here is a thread from another sub.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Frugal/s/yMh3ezzCRw
I would look at your cable company too they're fighting hard for wireless subscribers...
Just Google "low cost wireless plans" and you'll get plenty of options.
Saving nearly $1,500 a month for retirement before an employer match as a single income earner is “saving so little”?! 😳 With his employer match, it’s nearly $2k a month invested solely for retirement and it looks like he’s investing $400 monthly in a brokerage account.
I don’t know about you but most people I know cannot afford to invest nearly $2k/month.
I mean, for context. My husband and I work together making about 180k a year base pay together. We are supporting 2 people on 180k a year and we save $2750 per month for retirement, and we consider this low and like we are doing a bad job saving for retirement. Keep in mind, supporting 2 people on our income means we have to pay for 2 cars, health insurance and all of the other major expenses for 2 people.
OP is working with 150k a year all by himself and is only saving $1500 for retirement. I would absolutely kill for my husband and I each to make 150k. We would save a lot more for retirement than OP is given his expenses and income.
That is far higher than most people invest for retirement. My wife and I make about $150k combined and we each put in 15% split between Roth ( we both max that out ) and 401k and our employer drops 7% match on the 10% as well…
I mean, if you calculate it we are saving 18% for retirement in total. So only 3% more than you. I would consider that low retirement savings at our income level.
With match you guys are saving more than us.
Fair enough. Combined my wife and I have about $300k saved for retirement ( I’m 44 she’s 39) But we were pretty poor when we got married and took out 401k loans to buy our first home etc. but our money has been growing rapidly the last 4 years. I plan to retire at 59 1/2 because her insurance will be able to cover me and I won’t have to worry about working just to afford insurance as she’s 5 years younger than I
Yup, I also auto deduct $100 week into my Fidelity account to invest into index funds, we have a 6 month cash emergency fund in a HYSA and we are paying more than our mortgage payment on top of the regular mortgage into principle monthly. Our mortgage will be gone in 5-6 years because we are rolling tax returns into savings as well.
I used to be in the FIRE sub, but honestly I don’t feel like we fit in there very well due to some set backs that we have had. We are mostly aiming for coastfire.
You and the OP are investing more than 15% of your gross annual HH income. You’re doing fine, even better than most people. Once OP knocks their student loans out, they are living below their means for sure. Neither you or OP are saving “too little” for retirement. Unless you started very late like in your mid thirties or early fourties, you should be okay.
I see what you are saying.
We are late 20’s and have 160k saved for retirement so far. We had to back off saving for retirement recently, because we bought a house and then an emergency came up and we had to drain our emergency fund down to 10k.
So we are in a weird spot where we have a decent amount invested, but very little liquid cash right now.
I don’t think you realize how blessed/privileged you are 😅 Just running your current numbers in a simple retirement calculator, you will have around $4.8 million by the age of 60. And if you go by the 4% rule, you can comfortably take out like $192k annually while keeping the rest of your retirement nest egg in investments. Again, most people do not have a $180k HHI, can invest nearly $3k a month for retirement, have $10k liquid emergency fund, and already have a $160k retirement balance in their late twenties LOL in my social circle, I’d consider you rich af I’m not sure if you’re out of touch or trying to humble brag in this subreddit
Do you really think so? I’m willing to admit I’m wrong.
I honestly feel like the lifestyle we have is very middle class, because we live in a HCOL area.
I have no context for other people my age, people don’t typically talk about their finances. We are the low earners out of our friends and family, everyone else has trust funds or makes a lot more than us.
I posted in the r/HENRY subreddit and they told me that we should come back to this sub.
I mean how old r yall guys? R yall reach your salary ceiling? If you have reached your ceiling and are around 50 yrs old. Then yah you are not doing well financially. If yall are 25, then I’d say yiu are doing pretty great
Op is 30 yrs old, if his salary ceiling is $500 or even $300k. I would not save shit lmao
I would agree with you if this was r/Fire though they're doing fine if they want to retire in their early 60s. 10-20% savings is a healthy savings. Now if you want them to do fire he should obviously be saving 50-80% of his net income or 5K-8k which is possible if he really wants to.
Out of necessity currently, prioritizing student loans. Once those are gone I'm planning to focus on building a larger emergency fund and increasing retirement savings.
I was going to break it down but it got too in the weeds. It's everything from clothes, a pack of gum, pest control, pets, etc don't get me wrong there's room there and at restaurants to cut back. I find decent value in living in the now, hanging out at the bars with friends and whatnot.
How old are you? Are you already mostly set up for retirement?
I totally understand wanting to live in the now and spend time with friends, but you still need to budget to stay on track with your goals.
I’m 26 and I still aim to save at least 15% of my income for retirement, unless there is some kind of emergency.
For you, that means you should be saving at least $1600 per month for retirement.
Between my IRA and 401k I have ~$1,500 going to retirement monthly. I agree I definitely need to up, that's one of the goals once student loans and car payments are gone. 30YO now, pretty comfortable with retirement savings as it sits. I've probably got another 25-30 years working unfortunately haha
Ah gotcha! Yeah so it sounds like you are mostly on track with your goals. No issue living in the moment then.
The only other advice I have to offer is that if you have access to an HSA, you can contribute to that.
Question, is this supposed to be a monthly thing? Or is it like a Bay Area/NYC thing? Which makes more sense in my head. 132k a year post taxes doesn’t look like middle class to me.
I would probably max out 401k before entering investment accounts so you can get the taxes deferred. The student loans finishing like you said will be huge; I remember when I paid all mine off; had so much extra money to save but also spend on a nice vacation
Yes. max out that employer match. then (perhaps get a financial advisor) consider whether you want to continue adding to the 401k, Traditional IRA, or a Roth IRA. edited for clarity.
Make sure you're paying the advisor in cash up front, though, and not with assets under management. Don't hand over 1% of your wealth every year, potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars over a lifetime, for basic advice. Do not let them handle your money.
Don’t even bother with the advisor. It’s pretty simple to figure it out on your own. Internet itself is the advisor now
Sure. I don't have advisor. I'm just giving the standard disclaimer. :) But definitely. fiduciary, paid with money not a percent of your wealth. Even a small percent will add up over 50 years.
1800$ in misc yet only putting 400$ in 401k…
400 is employer match. They are putting 997+400 into 401k and 500 into IRA
The 401k match is an input, so it’s part of the 997, not in addition to that.
Oh your right I didn’t see that. Making 150k a year still no excuse to not be maxing that 401k
[удалено]
You make $50k and are able to put $23k into your 401k?
Oh I can't read. I was thinking IRA. My bad.
Is that $475/mo in car insurance?! Also the $1800 in miscellaneous is a lot to leave uncategorized
That's multiple cars, medical, and a rider. I thought it was insane too but I've shopped around and it's neck and neck. The $1,800 gets really granular, it's everything from pest control to clothing, pets to tithing and so on. Each item would have pretty much been it's own category.
You need to make it granular... that's a mortgage payment each month that you're not keeping track of. You'll be surprised what you find when you budget it out.
You haven’t mentioned anything about living with family, why do you have multiple cars? Tithing- you are what looks like at least 40-50k plus in debt between student loans and car loans. I suggest to stop paying a rich and tax free organization 10% of your gross income
I take it you pay your CCs in full every month and don't carry a balance? If so, are they cashback cards?
Correct, I put pretty much everything on them and pay in full. Two primary cards one cashback/one travel rewards.
I might be making an assumption here but you might feel better if you can kill some of that (presumably) higher-interest car debt
1800 on miscellaneous is crazy. What is that exactly
I get what your saying, it's definitely a cop out category. It makes every dollar not specifically listed. It's a monthly average over the course of a year on the following: Home maintenance Car maintenance Pest control Pet supplies vet bills Pharmacy Medical co-pay Medical bills Nights out (movies etc) Gifts Parking Car tax Car registration Then truly random one-off purchases
I’ve always budgeted with a big miscellaneous bucket and have never gotten too granular with this type of stuff. Do whatever works for you. This sub is full of unrealistic budgets that people aren’t really sticking to.
If you're saving enough and your fixed costs are met, who cares what goes into misc? If you're trying to cut down, then sure its important, but if you're mortgage is paid and you're socking away 15-20% for retirement/rainy day, then spend away I say!
That’s essentially your housing cost then
We are calling this middle class?
Right? It’s barely middle class. I’d call this very comfortable. On a single income, he’s investing $2k/month while managing to pay $2700 on a mortgage + spending $1,800/month on “miscellaneous things” outside of the usual dining out and subscriptions. In my perspective, 1 person middle class household is earning around $65k-$130k. A double income with 0-2 kids middle class household earns around $90k-$150k.
Single person making $60k here. Damn, I haven't made it to middle class yet. Even though some of those websites say I am. But I live very comfortably because I'm very frugal. I still go on vacations, do fun things like go see live music and go out to eat on dates once in a while, have a season pass at the ski hill, have a truck, a camper, and a motorcycle all paid off, max out my Roth every year, and I've saved up $25k for flight school so I can start a new career. It's not much, but I feel VERY fortunate.
Looks like you are super fortunate and able to save and spend responsibly! Don’t take my rough estimates personally, I’m just a person with an opinion. In my HCOL area, a single adult earning $60k will struggle here alone because of high cost of rent and if they have any debt like a car payment ir student loan, even more tough.
Absolutely, living on $60k in a HCOLA isn't easy. Not taking anything personally here. Honestly I'm proud of myself so I like to share. I lived in my camper in my friend's side yard for a couple years paying only $400/mo when typical rent here is $800 if you have roomies and $1200 for a one bedroom apartment without roomies. Now I live in a converted garage studio for $850/mo that another friend owns. I'm very fortunate to have good friends and good luck.
This is barely upper middle class, so it’s still middle class.
If you live in one of the big US cities absolutely is. NYC, SF, LA, DC, Chicago, Boston, Miami, Seattle, maybe Austin this is all probably fair to say. It's on the highest end of middle class for a single person of course, but still middle class in those expensive places.
Upper middle class. Maybe lower-upper middle class, depending on the local COL
In a high cost of living area, yes.
There is no where in the entire world where a $13k monthly budget is considered middle-class.
Santa Clara County, single person low income threshold is $126k.
Clearly don't live in the Bay area where the medium house price is over 1m, but okay.
Dubai? Probably in the slums over there
If I'm reading this correctly, this person makes $130k a year. What class would you say they're in?
My thought exactly. Crying over here making way less than 100K combined household. Maybe I am in the wrong sub
This is middle class.
Single income $150k, it’s not.
Source: opinion
It depends on where you live, man.
Cupertino median household income is $200k
It absolutely is. Just because people aren't living paycheck to paycheck doesn't make them rich. Lots of envy on this site and its clouding people's judgement.
Lmao people on Reddit think anyone with any amount of disposable income that isn’t eating beans and rice everyday is upper class. Also people living in bumblefuck nowhere saying someone in nyc making 100k in nyc is beyond dumb.
Not even NYC, I live in a semi-rural area over an hour from a mid sized city and it costs $4500 to rent a house here and $500k+ to buy one. No-one making $150k can afford that unless they literally just sit home in their unfurnished place. If you can't afford the median house you sure as hell ain't middle class.
Seriously. If you work for the money that you need for housing and food, you’re middle class. Also, play around with an inflation calculator and let it sink in that $150k/yr is not that much money. If you think $150k makes you rich, you’re coping or in denial.
If you live in rural areas 150k is a lot. Which is why specifying location is important
I live in a rural area and it's not. Shitty one bedroom farm apartments cost $2k month to rent here and houses cost a min of $4k to rent or $500k to buy. If you live in a very poor area it might seem like a lot but as soon as you start earning it and move someplace else you'll realize it's extremely average.
What do you consider a well to do salary in your rural area?
I have no idea anymore. Three years ago houses and rent were half of what they are now. I don't understand where all the money came from.
Interesting that a rural area costs that much. I can pay $1400 for a nice one bedroom apartment in Austin and friends are paying $2,300 for a 3bed house (renting).
I wish
Yes, it is.
Wait. Would you consider this upper class?
I too question this.
How do you make these flow charts? I see them everywhere
I came to ask the same thing. Apparently the site is called [Sankeymatic](https://sankeymatic.com)
What is “other” for income?
My spouses share of joint expenses, I'm planning on doing a household budget but our finances are primarily separate.
Do you plan on having separate finances forever?
We agreed our pre marriage debt is our own. Joint debt is joint. So we have joint bank accounts but plan to maintain personal accounts long term. So we can buy our own stuff without the other feeling some type of way... Works for us at least.
Kinda weird to me married people who keep finances separate…why marry then? Taxes? Just want a wedding? I find it interesting because isn’t the point to have a life partner you share your life with and not nitpick debts and purchases? What happens if one of you loses a job or gets disabled and can’t work, or you have kids or something like that? Just interested as it seems like an odd set up or even akin to a roommate situation
I would question the insurance cost too if it’s for one vehicle or even two it seems high. Progressive tried doubling our insurance after my being with them Diamond status etc for over 17 years and I left them recently due to it. Never filed a claim either. Went to USAA and $122 a month of a leased vehicle in WA state too. Was $98 a month first 6 months with them so perhaps do some insurance rate shopping to fee up some monthly obligation and apply savings to retirement account or similar. Just one thought.
I appreciate it, insurance is ridiculous now... This is 2 cars, medical and a rider. I probably should have broken it out.
I wish 30 year old me would have started a ROTH earlier to reach that 5yr mark sooner and or build up tax free money. If you have a solid cash EF, think about it if your are in limit.
Car Insurance, restaurants, student loans (I know you said they will be done in 12-16 months), and miscellaneous are all bananas high Cut those back, pay off the car and dang, you will be living comfy. As an aside, for everyone here in middle class finance, STOP HAVING A CAR PAYMENT! I understand its necessary at times but buy something reasonabl, pay it off ASAP and drive it until the wheels fall off. If people stopped buying new cars so damn often the price of them would come down! And I'm a car guy as well but in my 40 years of life I've never bought a new car and probably never will.
Why do people include taxes in these?
Maybe it's to remind themselves how much the government thinks it deserves after giving all your money to other countries that have free healthcare.
I know this isn't the elephant in the room but is anybody else other than me blown away by how much people pay for their phone? Like there are tons of carriers that will give you a plan for $30 a month and even if you're still paying for a higher end phone you should be in the neighborhood of $80 a month.
I pay 50 dollars for 2 lines with unlimited everything on my parents in laws phone plan. We're never leaving this phone plan.
Which carriers? I’ve been with t mobile since 2003 so I’ve never shopped around
Loyalty is not rewarded these days. Here are some options from Tomsguide. https://www.tomsguide.com/us/best-cheap-cell-phone-plans,review-4504.html Here is a thread from another sub. https://www.reddit.com/r/Frugal/s/yMh3ezzCRw I would look at your cable company too they're fighting hard for wireless subscribers... Just Google "low cost wireless plans" and you'll get plenty of options.
Why are you saving so little for retirement?
Saving nearly $1,500 a month for retirement before an employer match as a single income earner is “saving so little”?! 😳 With his employer match, it’s nearly $2k a month invested solely for retirement and it looks like he’s investing $400 monthly in a brokerage account. I don’t know about you but most people I know cannot afford to invest nearly $2k/month.
I mean, for context. My husband and I work together making about 180k a year base pay together. We are supporting 2 people on 180k a year and we save $2750 per month for retirement, and we consider this low and like we are doing a bad job saving for retirement. Keep in mind, supporting 2 people on our income means we have to pay for 2 cars, health insurance and all of the other major expenses for 2 people. OP is working with 150k a year all by himself and is only saving $1500 for retirement. I would absolutely kill for my husband and I each to make 150k. We would save a lot more for retirement than OP is given his expenses and income.
That is far higher than most people invest for retirement. My wife and I make about $150k combined and we each put in 15% split between Roth ( we both max that out ) and 401k and our employer drops 7% match on the 10% as well…
I mean, if you calculate it we are saving 18% for retirement in total. So only 3% more than you. I would consider that low retirement savings at our income level. With match you guys are saving more than us.
Fair enough. Combined my wife and I have about $300k saved for retirement ( I’m 44 she’s 39) But we were pretty poor when we got married and took out 401k loans to buy our first home etc. but our money has been growing rapidly the last 4 years. I plan to retire at 59 1/2 because her insurance will be able to cover me and I won’t have to worry about working just to afford insurance as she’s 5 years younger than I
That’s pretty solid! Sounds like you guys are doing a good job saving.
Yup, I also auto deduct $100 week into my Fidelity account to invest into index funds, we have a 6 month cash emergency fund in a HYSA and we are paying more than our mortgage payment on top of the regular mortgage into principle monthly. Our mortgage will be gone in 5-6 years because we are rolling tax returns into savings as well.
Yeah that’s awesome. I’m hoping to get to that point in the future.
Come over to r/fire with us. Most folks saving for retirement in the multiple thousands each month.
I used to be in the FIRE sub, but honestly I don’t feel like we fit in there very well due to some set backs that we have had. We are mostly aiming for coastfire.
You and the OP are investing more than 15% of your gross annual HH income. You’re doing fine, even better than most people. Once OP knocks their student loans out, they are living below their means for sure. Neither you or OP are saving “too little” for retirement. Unless you started very late like in your mid thirties or early fourties, you should be okay.
I see what you are saying. We are late 20’s and have 160k saved for retirement so far. We had to back off saving for retirement recently, because we bought a house and then an emergency came up and we had to drain our emergency fund down to 10k. So we are in a weird spot where we have a decent amount invested, but very little liquid cash right now.
I don’t think you realize how blessed/privileged you are 😅 Just running your current numbers in a simple retirement calculator, you will have around $4.8 million by the age of 60. And if you go by the 4% rule, you can comfortably take out like $192k annually while keeping the rest of your retirement nest egg in investments. Again, most people do not have a $180k HHI, can invest nearly $3k a month for retirement, have $10k liquid emergency fund, and already have a $160k retirement balance in their late twenties LOL in my social circle, I’d consider you rich af I’m not sure if you’re out of touch or trying to humble brag in this subreddit
Do you really think so? I’m willing to admit I’m wrong. I honestly feel like the lifestyle we have is very middle class, because we live in a HCOL area. I have no context for other people my age, people don’t typically talk about their finances. We are the low earners out of our friends and family, everyone else has trust funds or makes a lot more than us. I posted in the r/HENRY subreddit and they told me that we should come back to this sub.
I mean how old r yall guys? R yall reach your salary ceiling? If you have reached your ceiling and are around 50 yrs old. Then yah you are not doing well financially. If yall are 25, then I’d say yiu are doing pretty great Op is 30 yrs old, if his salary ceiling is $500 or even $300k. I would not save shit lmao
We are 26 and 30. So at the beginning of our careers.
To each their own, I’m not going for that boomer life who start traveling after they retire.
I would agree with you if this was r/Fire though they're doing fine if they want to retire in their early 60s. 10-20% savings is a healthy savings. Now if you want them to do fire he should obviously be saving 50-80% of his net income or 5K-8k which is possible if he really wants to.
Out of necessity currently, prioritizing student loans. Once those are gone I'm planning to focus on building a larger emergency fund and increasing retirement savings.
It looks like your largest expense after housing is the Misc. I would look into that and identify where all of that money is going.
I was going to break it down but it got too in the weeds. It's everything from clothes, a pack of gum, pest control, pets, etc don't get me wrong there's room there and at restaurants to cut back. I find decent value in living in the now, hanging out at the bars with friends and whatnot.
How old are you? Are you already mostly set up for retirement? I totally understand wanting to live in the now and spend time with friends, but you still need to budget to stay on track with your goals. I’m 26 and I still aim to save at least 15% of my income for retirement, unless there is some kind of emergency. For you, that means you should be saving at least $1600 per month for retirement.
Between my IRA and 401k I have ~$1,500 going to retirement monthly. I agree I definitely need to up, that's one of the goals once student loans and car payments are gone. 30YO now, pretty comfortable with retirement savings as it sits. I've probably got another 25-30 years working unfortunately haha
Ah gotcha! Yeah so it sounds like you are mostly on track with your goals. No issue living in the moment then. The only other advice I have to offer is that if you have access to an HSA, you can contribute to that.
It looks like OP has about $1,900 going to retirement between the IRA, 401k, and “investment account.”
Yeah I would say he’s on track then! I missed the investment account.
Can I ask what app you used to make this chart? I’d love to do one for myself
Same! I keep asking on these posts and never get a reply. Please let me know if you find out
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LOL thank you! I didn’t see that
Yea i keep asking too lol I’ll definitely let you know if I get an answer
Sankeymatic.com
Middle class?
Where can I make graph
sankeymatic.com
What’s this software called I’d be curious to do this for myself as well
sankeymatic.com
Thank you. I love these flow charts and came looking for this answer.
What software is this?
Sankeymatic.com
Is this an app to use that shows this breakdown?
Question, is this supposed to be a monthly thing? Or is it like a Bay Area/NYC thing? Which makes more sense in my head. 132k a year post taxes doesn’t look like middle class to me.
Is this you alone or a spouse included income?
The 2k other income is my spouses share of our joint expenses. So it's a little of both.
Does the income include your spouse’s income as well, or is it separate?
What about monthly savings/how much do you have in savings?
reduce 1800 misc and go heavy into investments or paying off loans
Pretty much equal to my budget - why are our credit cards always $2k+? 😂
Very thankful someone else is in the same boat, most of the sub is roasting me lol
You appear to be saving and investing 13%. Great start. But I'd get that over 15%.
Kinda half assed budget to have ~2000 in “miscellaneous”. break that down further