Is $70k/year "enough"?

I make 55k as a teacher. I recently was offered a 70k / year job to be an admin ....I turned it down. Why?

Because of the stress

As a teacher, I get summers off and am on a consistent schedule. As an admin..I would be working summers and staying late many week nights.

To me..less stress is worth 15k less.

I think 70k per year is plenty to live a great life off of.

Whether you reach your goals will depend on if your spouse works.

If she works a job making at least 30k..then you will have 100k combined and that is well above the average family income in America. Kids are expensive. Each child costs 100k to raise to age 18. Big sacrifice

So to answer your question: If you love your job ..then do it. Otherwise you will hate life and only look forward to weekend 5k races and retirement, ha ha

Should be no problem in my opinion. I base that on the fact that you're already looking at income & spending and understanding that keeping up with the Jones's ain't at all what it's cracked up to be.

1 big factor I see is cost of living (rent/mortgage, necessities) where you live. Obviously $70k can go plenty far in a lot of locations but it isn't much in NYC, San Fran, etc. And big factor #2 is your spouse: do they make a little, a lot, or stay home and raise the kid? They may even come from family money, you never know who may fall in love with.

But thinking about this stuff and prioritizing is important part of finding a happy life, you're headed in the right direction!

It all depends where you live.

In NYC - no.

In bf egypt, likely yes.

I couldn't (actually wouldn't want to) do it but plenty of people could. It sounds like you would be one of those people.

whyohnow wrote:

It all depends where you live.

In NYC - no.

In bf egypt, likely yes.

/endthread.

totally depends on where you live.

70k in Kansas is doing OK, enough to raise a family.

70k in San Francisco, LA, NYC or DC is barely subsistence living and you could never have kids.

mellow seeds wrote:

I couldn't (actually wouldn't want to) do it but plenty of people could. It sounds like you would be one of those people.

What do you spend money on? Leisure stuff or a vacation house? Or is it just a generally more expensive lifestyle?

Yes, you can afford shoes and food to run 100 mpw.

Yes, 70k is way more than enough.

Tabitha Wheelwright wrote:

Yes, you can afford shoes and food to run 100 mpw.

Well I have hobbies that just happen to not be wine-collecting, trophy-hunting, etc. My potential life is relatively cheap because of the things I like (the next Xbox console I buy will last for 5-7 years and will be far less expensive than a jetskii, trailer, and gas) not because I want to sacrifice anything. I'm not going to be a monk.

asdfg34 wrote:

totally depends on where you live.

70k in Kansas is doing OK, enough to raise a family.

70k in San Francisco, LA, NYC or DC is barely subsistence living and you could never have kids.

I would assume that a PT living in LA, NYC or San Fran is probably making more than a PT in Kansas. Probably works out about the same.

If you live a simple, yet enjoyable, life and focus more on saving than spending then 70K is plenty. Just make sure you ALWAYS have an emergency fund on hand to keep you from going in debt by life's little surprises.

To the people calling my plan "simple" etc, I'm not responding because I feel insulted but rather because I'm trying to figure out what exactly I'm skipping in my life.

The things that I think you're suggesting I'm missing out on are big fancy houses, lakeside cabins, sending 3 kids to med school, jetskiis, etc. Is that about right or am I missing something?

Also, my future wife will hopefully be making 30k or more. I feel like if she has her own debt finished off by 35, her income can go to that kind of stuff. 5 years of saving most of her income and we get a 2bdrm, 1bath lakeside cabin, and our kid is only 6-12 years old. The next year we buy a boat OR save for long vacations to Europe. If my income covers the family, then hers, whether 30k or 100k, pays for a BUNCH of fun stuff on a yearly basis.

For myself as an individual, it would be about the highest goal I could ever set for myself to make that much. Maybe, just maybe I could do it. And then the gov't would take a huge chunk of it away from me like the piece of shit that it is.

you won't make 65 starting

Just super immature wrote:

What do you spend money on? Leisure stuff or a vacation house? Or is it just a generally more expensive lifestyle?

Travel, gear/clothes that I like, date nights/concerts. But mostly travel. While I love backpacking and camping, I also love traveling through major cities and seeing other parts of the world.

Have you said what part of the country you'd be earning 70k? I earn 210k in NYC and I could not acquire all the things you want. And I'm 35 (and this is my final year paying off loans.)

WTFBBQ wrote:

Just super immature wrote:

What do you spend money on? Leisure stuff or a vacation house? Or is it just a generally more expensive lifestyle?

Travel, gear/clothes that I like, date nights/concerts. But mostly travel. While I love backpacking and camping, I also love traveling through major cities and seeing other parts of the world.

Have you said what part of the country you'd be earning 70k? I earn 210k in NYC and I could not acquire all the things you want. And I'm 35 (and this is my final year paying off loans.)

The northern midwest. MN seems nice. Duluth, Mankato, Rochester or some other college town in the region like Superior or LaCrosse. Might coach a hs team on the side, who knows.

joho wrote:

asdfg34 wrote:

totally depends on where you live.

70k in Kansas is doing OK, enough to raise a family.

70k in San Francisco, LA, NYC or DC is barely subsistence living and you could never have kids.

I would assume that a PT living in LA, NYC or San Fran is probably making more than a PT in Kansas. Probably works out about the same.

Definitely not. Let's suppose that same PT makes 90-100k in SF. They're still living in a shitty 1 bedroom and riding the bus to work with the other poor people.

I purchased my 3 bedroom townhome when I was 29yo for $170K when I was making $50K a year in 2003. I always rented out the two extra bedrooms and I paid my home off in 2013. I currently make $90K at IT job and I make extra $15K on Airbnb. I am not family type so do not plan on getting married. I do go on vacations for about 30-40 days every year mainly to Vegas. (I use Southwest Credit Card reward points to always fly for free and I do gamble enough to get free rooms hopping around various hotels)

Depends where you live. I'm in San Diego. To raise a family on that would be tough but if you have a wife that brings in $50K or so it would be doable. And if you wanted to own a house, it would be way inland.

But I'm sure in plenty of other states it would be a different story. I have no kids so it's much easier for me out here.