This is my first year earning 300k and I finally feel like a comfortable member of the middle class

The flaws in this post start with the $2000/month in dining + the $1500/mo in groceries. A. Restaurants aren't really 'open' B. $1500/month in groceries Are you a family of Olympic swimmers? $3500 in food monthly??? That's like $42,000 annually, which is much closer to the average income of those on this site. $1500 in transportation? Do you fly to work? At $4/gallon and 25MPG that's close to 10,000 miles driven a month. REALLY Entertaining as always...

hombre3000 wrote:

OP, you must not live in CA. Our HHI is 600k (Bay Area) and we're barely scraping by. Definitely don't feel solidly "middle class"

And to the haters who think 600k is middle class in Bay Area, here is rough breakdown of our monthly expenditures: (family of 5):

$6500 (primary mortgage)

$1500 for transportation (car payments, insurance, gas, repairs, Ubers, etc)

$2000 for dining

$1500 for groceries, other household consumables

$1200 / month for vacation fund

$3000 / month for retirement

$2000-$3000 for misc or unexpected expenses (braces, deductibles, fines, taxes, whatever)

$2500 for 2nd mortgage (ski home)

After taxes that leaves us about $1800/month leftover to spend or save. how the hell can you survive on $1800/month in California?

I mean, the points in here are good but you're almost a 1%-er. I think the capitalist message to people like you is that you should think of yourself as a Bezos versus someone making minimum wage but the reality is $300k is nothing compared to the super rich. You've still got bills & feel pinched. But it is a lot to 98% of Americans so maybe consider taking a step back and understand that you're living cozier than almost anyone living in this country.

It is real that housing and renting costs are simply not the same for 20 & 30 year olds compared to what people were able to do in the 70s/80s. & now those people can't seem to understand why people can't buy houses and aren't having kids. It's because wages haven't moved as drastically as expenses. It's because of student loan debt that didn't exist in the same way years ago. It's not because of insert your favorite stereotype (avocado toast). Too much money has to go from paychecks towards necessities. Meanwhile, there are some very, very wealthy people/corporations. Maybe we can find some parity in between someday.

I feel like it's also people who were in their 20s/30s in the 70s/80s that don't care about CEO pay and income inequality even though things were way more equal for you when you were getting going in the working world. Union density was higher for ya'll. You paid less for college and rent (proportionally). But now some of ya'll are in way too deep with the hard work/bootstraps argument. You worked hard and made a decent living. A lot of us could do that now under the same conditions you had.

runningwiththetrolls1212 wrote:

(good luck with your software engineering career goals in omaha nebraska)

Companies don't care where you are now, everything is remote (and will likely stay that way for a long time).

hopping on this train wrote:

Even when I lived in NYC, I wasn't paying anywhere close to 2k a month eating out, that would take some work (or you're definitely not going to "middle class" restaurants).

I don't know bro, Red Lobster and Chilis for a family of 5 can get pretty pricy.

haha YOYO wrote:

hopping on this train wrote:

Even when I lived in NYC, I wasn't paying anywhere close to 2k a month eating out, that would take some work (or you're definitely not going to "middle class" restaurants).

I don't know bro, Red Lobster and Chilis for a family of 5 can get pretty pricy.

The 25 year old teachers I work with buy $14 salads and $6 coffees everyday and complain about their $60,000 a year salary

4,420sqft home cost was just under 600k on a 200k salary and I am a milinial. Depends on where you live and how modest your life style is. If you want a lot of toys it will cost you if you are modest you can afford a nice home and travel alot.

My primary point was to live on your normal monthly income such that any bonus or stock grant can be saved or used for extraordinary things like major home improvement projects or college tuition. I have not been particularly smart about Tax planning so although I may have had a very high gross income, I also had a very high total tax burden so that the net income is quite a bit smaller. Federal Taxes paid in 2019 alone were $126K. We had been spending $2,400/month on groceries and dining which I think is insane for a family of 4. Dining out was only $580 of this so the issue was more about being stupid in buying groceries. Being smarter means not having $400 dinners at the steak restaurant in addition to smarter grocery shopping. Our new budget is $1,000 month for meals out and groceries combined. We aren't there yet

I spent $462/month on average for running shoes, clothing, and any gels or powder. What "should" I be spending (since this is a running related site) more like $100/month if I replace shoes every 6 weeks or 300 miles. My point in focusing on those spend categories is that they were the least defensible and easiest to cut back

Private college tuition at full price can be debated ad-nauseum but my daughter did at least pick Duke Law where a merit scholarship reduced the net cost to $50K vs. Columbia and NYU where it would have been close to $100K/year knowing that it would hurt her SCOTUS Clerkship chances

I'll give my stats even though nobody asked.

We live in Portland, OR on a combined $225k. We're able to add $40k to our 401k accounts per year (includes employer match) plus another $12k in post-tax backdoor Roth, and finally started being able to add to a taxable account.

529s currently have $45k in them for 2 kids age 4 and 6. The 6-year old is finally old enough for public school so the $11k we spend for him on pre-school (and we added his kindergarten year during Covid) will now all go to his college fund. Same for the other $11k on pre-school costs for child #2 once she is old enough.

The house we bought for $690k in 2018 has appreciated to over $800k. We are a 20-minute bike ride from downtown where I work.

I should be able to retire by 50, but may push it another 1-3 years after that for a larger buffer.

I don't see how anyone in a medium to high cost of living area making $200k+ combined could be hurting financially unless there are extenuating circumstances such as caring for an aging parent or something.

We are very fortunate.

You are very smart to live in a blue non-hillbilly state where you can make $300K.

Wow. Really insightful.

Just curious about those mortgage payments. Does that include taxes and insurance?

I know you put down a section for misc and put taxes in there.

Bay Area? So like 1.5m house?

Then what, like a 600k vacation home?

Fill me in.

I live in South Florida, so I'm just trying to gauge.

Most people spend money on a bunch of stuff they don't need and I would consider a waste. Wife and I are tech business owners that have cleared over $1M annually for almost the last decade. But we spend about $30-40K per year on personal expenses. We do not have kids. We live in a very modest home (if we had a mortgage, it would add about $12K per year in expenses), take inexpensive vacations, eat out occasionally, share an older, inexpensive vehicle, etc., but still treat ourselves to nice things sometimes.

Some may say we are frugal nutjobs, and maybe they are right, but I don't have much sympathy for those that claim "middle-class" starts at $200K or whatever amount.

I compare that to our neighbors whose pre-tax income is probably about $150K. They have three vehicles less than a few years old each of which was $40K+ new, an enormous RV, and 4 new snowmobiles. They are probably living paycheck to paycheck, but simply because they choose to.

Like I told a buddy once, if you are buying Starbucks, you should either consider yourself wealthy, or you're an idiot.

I really don't understand materialistic people who make decent money but decide to blow it all just to keep up a certain lifestyle or image. These people must have some deep seated paycological pain and issues. They run lines of credit on anything they can as well, everything maxed out. I hate using my credit card, only use it when I am forced to and I know it's a bank scam associated with businesses which require a credit card payment for service.

Naperville Runner wrote:

I spent $462/month on average for running shoes, clothing, and any gels or powder. What "should" I be spending (since this is a running related site) more like $100/month if I replace shoes every 6 weeks or 300 miles.

I'm curious how you spend that much without actively trying to. Especially if you're only running 50 miles/week as implied. Do you buy a new pair of shoes and running outfit every other week? Train only in alpha flys? Buy $200 gold-infused protein powder?

Cost per month to run 50 miles/week can be $70 without compromising anything. Buy previous model shoes for $80, wear them 400+ miles and you're under $10/week. Only use gels/powders on a long run once per week, $4-5/week max. Each piece of clothing can last 3-5 years of regular use if properly cared for, call clothing $2-3/week. That's $16-18/week, $70/month. You can go well under that if you really try.

Have you considered that perhaps he likes running shoes and has the money to buy different pairs just for the sake of trying them?

Hate to break it to ya but you aren’t in the middle class lol. Not even close.

What is the point of your life? No kids and no fun. Frankly you don’t sound like a nut job, you sound boring as hell.

You appear to be griping, claiming victim status.

Who are you upset with? Boomers? Democrats?

You are so manly. All hail your hot dog.

0/10

I make 38k and my wife makes 42k in Ohio. We are getting by but we don't go anywhere because she's afraid of the virus.

300k? Most people making 300k are working 90 hours a week and aren't on LRC ;)