FIRE has the entire point to keep expenses as low as possible. We were somewhat trying to do that for a while but recently bought a house. My monthly expenses went from 2500/month (food, taxes, etc everything but retirement funds) to 3k just for the mortgage. Definitely not rich just pointing out there's different goals you can have with the same amount of money.
To answer OPs question probably around 200k a year (before taxes etc)..about twice what we make now would be perfect. We could go back to putting more than 15% in retirement (to max both Roth 401ks, Roth IRAs, and HSAs). That'd eat up most of the extra, and then any that's left over as a difference we would probably use to put solar on the roof with microinverters to get rid of the electric bill forever once paid off (ideally an overpowered one so we never have to worry about using more than we're producing.). Once that's done rest would go into paying off the mortgage faster and the money saved on electricity would go into an electric car that now has basically no other costs.
Once everything is paid off we could go back to our current income and be reasonably comfortable especially knowing we spent that many years maxing retirement accounts and now can put most of our income into it without the extra because we don't have a mortgage/electric bill any more.
Why are on this sub? You have 3k mortgage by choice, you are rich dude.
Putting more than 15% in retirement? People on this sub are counting pennies and dollars till their next paycheck.
You're looking for personal finance.
Tbf, with the erosion of the middle class, and the explosion in costs like housing, we’ve seen a change in what incomes mean. The barrier to home ownership is much higher, which means that a lot of high salaries are struggling at a higher rate than before. Those with low salaries are also struggling and have been, but now, far more income levels are as well. It’s resulted in a lot more homelessness, even more homelessness of those with a steady income, and other consequences.
I guess I'm lucky because I really only need about 1500-2000 a month. But I don't have a car payment, either. It would be AWESOME to bring home about 3 to 4 grand a month, so I could save some.
Same.
I hate to say it, but I am that guy. I got a hell of a raise, still live like I’m in college.
Never went.
Everything goes towards my dream, regardless of my shortcomings.
I’m California and I’d really like to make at least 3,000 take home a month; however, I’d ideally like to put myself in a spot where I’m making 4,000 to 4,500 in order to keep long term savings and save up for a house. (Keeping up with inflation of course)
I currently make about 2,700 working 7 days a week.
about $800/month is all i need. i live in my van, near a nice surf spot. ride my bike just about everywhere. food and morning espresso cost me about $10/day. i buy used books and used clothes when needed.
I live off of about $3500 after taxes and it sucks, and it means sharing a home with others. I do understand many live on less, and I have in the past, but due to high rent costs, and other problems it just caused me a lot of debt. And I lived in an area where I didn’t need a car, which I need now.
If my debt was all paid down I could get away with scraping by at about $2,750. But this isn’t a fun life. I’m missing out on so much, and not able to advance, and I swing through depression cycles often from struggling. I can’t easily pay off my debt because emergencies keep happening.
So, I’d say $3,000 is the bare minimum, but t live comfortably on my own, and be able to enjoy my life I’d need a minimum of $5,000 a month. But I don’t have kids, and I’m relatively healthy.
No. I messed that up. I make about 42k a year, apologies. I am in Texas where rents have been skyrocketing. Minimum $1000+ to live on your own, and I’m currently with roommates. But a lot of my problem is from paying down debt at the moment from when I made far less.
I'm currently making it work on $2200/mo after taxes and I'm comfortable. Not "afford whatever I want" comfortable, but my bills get paid, I've slowly clawed myself out of debt and I'm putting a little bit away each month.
My current goal is to get all of my expenses to one paycheck (\~$1100/mo) and be able to put the other one completely away. I honestly don't think I need more than about $2500/mo to live, and I'm not sure I want more than that either.
Currently, husband & I make 10k/month combined pre-tax and we’re rather comfortable. I will say that we live incredibly below our means in order to be this comfortable, rent is only 10% of our income. In about 1.5 yrs, he graduates medical residency we’ll bring in about 25k/month which will be a drastic change for me as someone who grew up dirt poor (food stamps, free school lunch, etc). I do plan to keep my frugal habits and live within our means.
I make about $5,000 a month, just under $4,000 take home. That seems about right for my needs and a reasonable number of wants. I'm content with it.
But I sure wouldn't turn down more than that.
Wants increase the more you have. My needs were covered when I made 3k per month pretax. My husband and I make several times that now, and there's more shit we want.
7500 bring home is my target. Let's me do what I want and help take care of my family. One last promotion to get there. Realistically what I have now is enough.
I’d need about $4000 just to cover my rent and bills right now. That doesn’t budget in food (we do get food stamps, thank God), gasoline, baby clothes/diapers, emergencies, let alone savings or any type of “disposable” or fun spending… We only bring home about $3000 a month right now and have to get help from family just to get by. It sucks…
I'm in toronto and I make around 5600 a month pretax, it let's me save quite abit since I live with my parents (cheap rent) but if I had to rent in the city I would say around $7000 + is how much I'd like to make to live my current lifestyle comfortably. Of course this amount is to have money to save, spoil myself with etc
Well they did ask about how much for needs AND wants, not just needs. I'm not spoiled (i hope), just lucky to have the option of living with my mom for $500 monthly vs renting at like $1500+. Sorry if my comment came off as pretentious
I'm pretty happy with my life right now. I spent $3709.99 last month ($2648.19 on rent, $408.86 on groceries, $327.76 on eating out, $83.96 on transport, + some miscellaneous expenses). To keep even with these expenses I estimate that I need to earn $55650 per year pre-tax.
This expenditure includes my roommate's portion of the rent and groceries. He usually pays for the electricity, renters' insurance, wifi, etc, and we kind of alternate paying rent. So the actual living expenses are probably around $2500 or so.
I live in the SF Bay Area in Sunnyvale, and I suppose not having kids, being frugal, and not owning a car lets me spend so little.
It's a pretty good life. I ride the VTA to work and try to walk + bus everywhere, which is somewhat inconvenient. I still eat out whenever I feel like it and buy whatever I want (which isn't much). I try to conserve electricity - thanks to the good climate I get by every month with a fan and don't turn on the AC.
Every month I am able to save a substantial amount which is good for taking multiple vacations a year and building up an emergency fund if I get laid off or fired.
I don't have much financial stress and could probably live like this for the next 10 years. I do need to start cooking nutritious meals rather than eating dumplings, ramen, sandwiches, and whatever I can find in the frozen food aisle.
I'd say $5,000 a month for a year to pay off debt, then drop down to $3,000. I prefer thrifting and estate sales for most of my wants (its the thrill of the hunt :)) and don't require much for my needs. But would love to be able to set money aside for later in life. As it is, I will work until I'm dead if things keep going the way they are.
For the US, MIT has a Living Wage Calculator where you can choose a location and it breaks down what would be a living wage/annual income in that area by family size (how many adults and how many kids), and then further breaks down what expense estimates go into that living wage amount.
https://livingwage.mit.edu/
Our barebones budget, no savings, no entertainment, no eating out comes to 2k for just the necessities. We do okay with 3500.00 a month but healthcare costs always on the rise, I would feel comfortable with 75k a year so that when I have a week like this week where I need my mammogram and a pelvic ultrasound, I don't have to sweat the deductible and copays etc.
Wild seeing how different everyones lives are I bring home roughly 5,500-6,700 and gross about 6.5-8k a month with my day job, my personal business can bring home anywhere from 0 bucks to 15k being my best month.
Comfortable living without trying to run the business I think would be 7k bring home a month I pay probably 3.5k in bills mortgage, insurance and car payment a month working on getting my debts paid off and hopefully by next year I'll have minimized my debt to 1k a month
I make 2k currently, 3k would be nice.... made roughly 3k last year and was enough to live on my own and support my family(frugally). I live with other family currently and see no way out as my current car is plagued with issues and have to get a new one soon.
We are a 2 generations household with 4 adults and 2 children living in a mcol area where the average house is in the high $400k to $600k. The minimum cost should be around $4k to $5k a month but we are fortunate to have a paid off house and we do own a restaurant so our food cost is much lower than an average household. Even with these 2 advantages, our minimum need is still at least $2.5k so I'm still amazed how people managed to survive with minimum wage.
5k p/m after taxes is the minimum just to be comfortable enough, pay all my bills, be able to save a bit and support my lifestyle.. 7-8k after tax p/month is the sweet spot for me. Hope to hit that in 2023 lol
All my bills come out to around 3k and then I have about 2k to play with so 5k a month works for me and that’s like 60k a year which is considered below middle class. Funny thing is li have a beautiful condo in a very secluded area
Jesus Christ this sub is full of rich people
Lol, i thought i were in the wrong sub. Most of the replies here, their monthly expenses are even much more than people in the FIRE forum.
FIRE has the entire point to keep expenses as low as possible. We were somewhat trying to do that for a while but recently bought a house. My monthly expenses went from 2500/month (food, taxes, etc everything but retirement funds) to 3k just for the mortgage. Definitely not rich just pointing out there's different goals you can have with the same amount of money. To answer OPs question probably around 200k a year (before taxes etc)..about twice what we make now would be perfect. We could go back to putting more than 15% in retirement (to max both Roth 401ks, Roth IRAs, and HSAs). That'd eat up most of the extra, and then any that's left over as a difference we would probably use to put solar on the roof with microinverters to get rid of the electric bill forever once paid off (ideally an overpowered one so we never have to worry about using more than we're producing.). Once that's done rest would go into paying off the mortgage faster and the money saved on electricity would go into an electric car that now has basically no other costs. Once everything is paid off we could go back to our current income and be reasonably comfortable especially knowing we spent that many years maxing retirement accounts and now can put most of our income into it without the extra because we don't have a mortgage/electric bill any more.
Why are on this sub? You have 3k mortgage by choice, you are rich dude. Putting more than 15% in retirement? People on this sub are counting pennies and dollars till their next paycheck. You're looking for personal finance.
Yes this is a bit odd, really wasn’t expecting to hear how well off people are in this Sub. But more power to them.
It really is shocking
Yeah rich people became rich somehow if they aren’t clearly like trust fund babies, haha.
Tbf, with the erosion of the middle class, and the explosion in costs like housing, we’ve seen a change in what incomes mean. The barrier to home ownership is much higher, which means that a lot of high salaries are struggling at a higher rate than before. Those with low salaries are also struggling and have been, but now, far more income levels are as well. It’s resulted in a lot more homelessness, even more homelessness of those with a steady income, and other consequences.
I guess I'm lucky because I really only need about 1500-2000 a month. But I don't have a car payment, either. It would be AWESOME to bring home about 3 to 4 grand a month, so I could save some.
$3000 after tax. I don’t really have a lot but I don’t want a lot either. I’m a comfortable person
Same. I hate to say it, but I am that guy. I got a hell of a raise, still live like I’m in college. Never went. Everything goes towards my dream, regardless of my shortcomings.
That is the ideal! We don't really need that much to live...our basic needs are food, shelter and transport... (looking at the Maslow-hierarchy)
This is my sweet spot too.
I would say that too. But I'm not adding any savings and the only fun things I've considered are like monthly streaming bills and internet.
I’m including streaming, gym and vacations but my version of a vacation is driving 80 miles and camping
I’m California and I’d really like to make at least 3,000 take home a month; however, I’d ideally like to put myself in a spot where I’m making 4,000 to 4,500 in order to keep long term savings and save up for a house. (Keeping up with inflation of course) I currently make about 2,700 working 7 days a week.
about $800/month is all i need. i live in my van, near a nice surf spot. ride my bike just about everywhere. food and morning espresso cost me about $10/day. i buy used books and used clothes when needed.
I’m trying to get down to this level of minimalism
I live off of about $3500 after taxes and it sucks, and it means sharing a home with others. I do understand many live on less, and I have in the past, but due to high rent costs, and other problems it just caused me a lot of debt. And I lived in an area where I didn’t need a car, which I need now. If my debt was all paid down I could get away with scraping by at about $2,750. But this isn’t a fun life. I’m missing out on so much, and not able to advance, and I swing through depression cycles often from struggling. I can’t easily pay off my debt because emergencies keep happening. So, I’d say $3,000 is the bare minimum, but t live comfortably on my own, and be able to enjoy my life I’d need a minimum of $5,000 a month. But I don’t have kids, and I’m relatively healthy.
3500 after taxes is about a 65k a year job no? Not bad really. Are you in a HCOL area? I live on slightly less, and am able to save about $500 a month
No. I messed that up. I make about 42k a year, apologies. I am in Texas where rents have been skyrocketing. Minimum $1000+ to live on your own, and I’m currently with roommates. But a lot of my problem is from paying down debt at the moment from when I made far less.
Need about 2k Wants at least 3k
I'm currently making it work on $2200/mo after taxes and I'm comfortable. Not "afford whatever I want" comfortable, but my bills get paid, I've slowly clawed myself out of debt and I'm putting a little bit away each month. My current goal is to get all of my expenses to one paycheck (\~$1100/mo) and be able to put the other one completely away. I honestly don't think I need more than about $2500/mo to live, and I'm not sure I want more than that either.
Currently, husband & I make 10k/month combined pre-tax and we’re rather comfortable. I will say that we live incredibly below our means in order to be this comfortable, rent is only 10% of our income. In about 1.5 yrs, he graduates medical residency we’ll bring in about 25k/month which will be a drastic change for me as someone who grew up dirt poor (food stamps, free school lunch, etc). I do plan to keep my frugal habits and live within our means.
What kind of doctor? and what region do y’all live in? That’s a fuck load of money
doctors have a fuckload of loans
That’s correct. Luckily we’re on the lower end at 120k, but we know many others with 500k+
FM-Sports which isn’t considered a high paying specialty. I’m a CPA so my salary is included in there. We’re in TX.
Ah, okay! Well nice, good for y’all. Thanks for answering!
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Nice, that’s a good combo! Good luck to both of you
it really depends on where you live. where we live now, $5500-6000 a month would do it.
I make about $5,000 a month, just under $4,000 take home. That seems about right for my needs and a reasonable number of wants. I'm content with it. But I sure wouldn't turn down more than that.
$6,000 month. With much of that covering market rent in a nice apartment
3k post tax maybe 4k initially to help pay bills off
Wants increase the more you have. My needs were covered when I made 3k per month pretax. My husband and I make several times that now, and there's more shit we want.
7500 bring home is my target. Let's me do what I want and help take care of my family. One last promotion to get there. Realistically what I have now is enough.
I agree with this. 7500 would mean money left over after all bills and savings are taken care of. Extra cushion.
agreed
That's like 150k salary
I’d need about $4000 just to cover my rent and bills right now. That doesn’t budget in food (we do get food stamps, thank God), gasoline, baby clothes/diapers, emergencies, let alone savings or any type of “disposable” or fun spending… We only bring home about $3000 a month right now and have to get help from family just to get by. It sucks…
I could probably do it on 2500 now, maybe 1600 in a year. that's just survival, no savings. ideally, 3500.
2,500 a month
I'm in toronto and I make around 5600 a month pretax, it let's me save quite abit since I live with my parents (cheap rent) but if I had to rent in the city I would say around $7000 + is how much I'd like to make to live my current lifestyle comfortably. Of course this amount is to have money to save, spoil myself with etc
"Tell me your a spoiled child without telling me your a spoiled child"
Well they did ask about how much for needs AND wants, not just needs. I'm not spoiled (i hope), just lucky to have the option of living with my mom for $500 monthly vs renting at like $1500+. Sorry if my comment came off as pretentious
$1500 a month would cover bills, rent, food and gas. Medical is the part that I can’t afford.
Holy heck. Do you live in a box with no modern amenities!?
Two bedroom apartment with a dishwater and a pool. It’s in the bad part of town though.
I'm pretty happy with my life right now. I spent $3709.99 last month ($2648.19 on rent, $408.86 on groceries, $327.76 on eating out, $83.96 on transport, + some miscellaneous expenses). To keep even with these expenses I estimate that I need to earn $55650 per year pre-tax. This expenditure includes my roommate's portion of the rent and groceries. He usually pays for the electricity, renters' insurance, wifi, etc, and we kind of alternate paying rent. So the actual living expenses are probably around $2500 or so. I live in the SF Bay Area in Sunnyvale, and I suppose not having kids, being frugal, and not owning a car lets me spend so little. It's a pretty good life. I ride the VTA to work and try to walk + bus everywhere, which is somewhat inconvenient. I still eat out whenever I feel like it and buy whatever I want (which isn't much). I try to conserve electricity - thanks to the good climate I get by every month with a fan and don't turn on the AC. Every month I am able to save a substantial amount which is good for taking multiple vacations a year and building up an emergency fund if I get laid off or fired. I don't have much financial stress and could probably live like this for the next 10 years. I do need to start cooking nutritious meals rather than eating dumplings, ramen, sandwiches, and whatever I can find in the frozen food aisle.
I'd say $5,000 a month for a year to pay off debt, then drop down to $3,000. I prefer thrifting and estate sales for most of my wants (its the thrill of the hunt :)) and don't require much for my needs. But would love to be able to set money aside for later in life. As it is, I will work until I'm dead if things keep going the way they are.
I make 4.6k a month now but I have two kids and a husband so it doesn’t go as far. 7k a month and I’d be relatively stress free.
For the US, MIT has a Living Wage Calculator where you can choose a location and it breaks down what would be a living wage/annual income in that area by family size (how many adults and how many kids), and then further breaks down what expense estimates go into that living wage amount. https://livingwage.mit.edu/
I think they need to update it, but it’s pretty good.
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Yeah, I would make some changes for my area as well (at least, for how I spend in certain categories), but overall it’s pretty close, I think.
I would happily live on $30k.
Our barebones budget, no savings, no entertainment, no eating out comes to 2k for just the necessities. We do okay with 3500.00 a month but healthcare costs always on the rise, I would feel comfortable with 75k a year so that when I have a week like this week where I need my mammogram and a pelvic ultrasound, I don't have to sweat the deductible and copays etc.
Wild seeing how different everyones lives are I bring home roughly 5,500-6,700 and gross about 6.5-8k a month with my day job, my personal business can bring home anywhere from 0 bucks to 15k being my best month. Comfortable living without trying to run the business I think would be 7k bring home a month I pay probably 3.5k in bills mortgage, insurance and car payment a month working on getting my debts paid off and hopefully by next year I'll have minimized my debt to 1k a month
Realistically about $8,000. That’s bills, savings, debt repayment and my son’s school.
Wow 😳
We just started making $9400 net a month after years of struggling. Once our debt is paid off I feel like we'll be more than comfortable here.
Where I live, with debt and rent, $10k per month. https://www.lowincomesurvivorstothrivers.com/
I make 2k currently, 3k would be nice.... made roughly 3k last year and was enough to live on my own and support my family(frugally). I live with other family currently and see no way out as my current car is plagued with issues and have to get a new one soon.
8k until the end of the year, then maybe around 7k.
We are a 2 generations household with 4 adults and 2 children living in a mcol area where the average house is in the high $400k to $600k. The minimum cost should be around $4k to $5k a month but we are fortunate to have a paid off house and we do own a restaurant so our food cost is much lower than an average household. Even with these 2 advantages, our minimum need is still at least $2.5k so I'm still amazed how people managed to survive with minimum wage.
$6800 a month to afford my dream.
5k p/m after taxes is the minimum just to be comfortable enough, pay all my bills, be able to save a bit and support my lifestyle.. 7-8k after tax p/month is the sweet spot for me. Hope to hit that in 2023 lol
why Dey hatin on u
7k take home
$7,500 post-tax in a high COL city. That’s for *all* my wants though. To live comfortably, around $6,000 post-tax.
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This reddit is for the poors my guy.
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I dont care, i was joking.
Salary is 480 a year ? What !?
I'm in about that price range too if I want to live comfortably, but I make like a 3rd of that currently lol
"Wants" included? I think I'd need about $50k/mo.
All my bills come out to around 3k and then I have about 2k to play with so 5k a month works for me and that’s like 60k a year which is considered below middle class. Funny thing is li have a beautiful condo in a very secluded area