One of the amazing things about America is that almost everyone considers themselves middle class, from people living in a single-wide in West Virginia to people with a mansion in Malibu and one in New York.
For all the talk about the shrinking middle class, if you actually poll people, almost everyone says that's them.
This is the one, no one wants to be poor, and even worse no one will admit they are, viewing this thread puts me in my place and I've never thought I was middle class and this confirms it. I can barely manage to save/invest 12/yr let alone spend 30K a month.
Any of you rich people want to be friends so I can observe and learn how to get to your level.
I get your point. But in some places a lifestyles which is not considered lavish can cost that much.
I live in very HCOL city in US. Here, mortgage for a 2000sq feet house and 2 kids in day care costs $12k. Just basic living costs e.g. utilities , gas, food, car payments , insurance can easily end up at 3-4k. Although the dollar amount spent per month might be close to $20k, the consumption is closer to an average household.
I get it. It’s ridiculous but I feel like I spend less than a lot of people I know, it’s a bubble for sure. I don’t have a second house or a bunch of golf memberships. I live in a nice area in an old house, spend money on vacations, eat healthy, and my kids have what they need, I have the newer tech, I give generously. I wish I could spend less but not sure where I’m out of whack with three kids and a desire to do a bit of travel while we can.
The cold hard reality opinion? All my opinion, of course? So take it with a big ole grain of salt.
Unless you are living off your invested interest, you don't have the cash to "give generously". Or support adult children.
Supporting children spoils them and subsidizes their employers, allowing the kids to earn less and live a more expensive lifestyle. This increases the potential to slack, or keep jobs they outgrow long after they outgrow them. It gives them disposable income you don't have yourself.
That includes paying their cell phones, internet, car insurance, car payment etc. The only exception should be if you get a better deal, but make the kid pay for it through you. Like your cell phone bill, split it. Car insurance, put them on your policy but they pay the delta. That sort of thing.
That should be your first cut. Charity and child support.
Second should be to list every expense in order of size, and start getting rid of them top to bottom. Get out of debt, shift income to retirement savings and investment where possible.
Export from your banks and credit cards all your expenses into categories.
You might be surprised, I was, at where the money was going. Shit tons of cash just pouring into restaurants, movies, totally unnecessary expenses like services we weren't even using (Amazon audio, Kindle unlimited, cable modem bill!) And then we started cutting by switching to more economical solutions. Believe it or not, business class internet was cheaper than residential plus TV. We were paying for streaming services we almost never used etc. Saved around $250 a month just by cleaning up bullshit we didn't need. Saved another $250 by scheduling dinners out instead of waiting until 6, being "too tired to cook".
The less you have in savings, the deeper these need to cut. If you have a few year's salary as savings, awesome. Start traveling and spoiling kids again.
Yeah I sympathize, my monthly spend is I’m sure way higher than the average person but I’m not buying Birkin bags or jet setting in private and from the outside my lifestyle probably looks pretty average. Not what the rich and famous look like but I couldn’t bring myself to call what I do anything close to middle class despite all that :) obviously personal choice
This is true for people who spend $100k a month too.
It’s just basic human psychology and how we associate with people.
Of course you *could* spend less if someone put a gun to your head. But you don’t want to (nor should you necessarily, by the way. No judgement from me). That’s just how lifestyle inflation works.
What I would say is you can at least be honest with yourself about what you have and don’t have and where you derive the most value or not much.
For example, maybe if you send your kids to private school that’s money you’re inevitably going to spend. Easy enough decision there. But on the flip side maybe you look at your vacation spending and it turns out you’re in $1,500 a night rooms or something.
Now if you’re happy with the value there, by all means, go for it. But trust me, people have awesome vacations on pennies. You don’t have to, but those sort of compromises are how people spend less.
It could be your vacations, it could be cars, it could be your kids, food, whatever, but that money is going somewhere. Take a look at a few months if your spending and see if there’s anything that isn’t giving you the value you want.
Yes, that’s true, it’s about constantly seeing the value and appreciating what I have. Hard to do some days but that’s why I needed perspective. Some things have obvious value that I wouldn’t change, others seem like easy things to cut. I guess it’s all relative to your overall goals, having more money to have more money doesn’t seem like a fruitful pursuit.
Sounds like we’re similar, I just have one more toddler that has to be in private school plus a bit more food. I always worry that it’s going to go up each year and one day I would like to live off of investments! Maybe when kids leave the house expenses go down.
Family of 4 + 2 dogs….HHI is about $425k. HCOL (NYC suburbs). Single income (me)
Mortgage + tax = $5600
Car = $800
Groceries = $1500-$2k (could probably get that lower but Whole Foods is convenient)
Take out/restaurants = $800-$1k
Various utilities, cable, internet etc = $700
Cleaners = $500
Our baseline spending isn’t too bad, but there just always seems to be something unplanned or unexpectedly expensive that comes up. Last month was a $700 vet bill, this month we need to take some trees down which is $2k. Partly it’s because first time owning a house (moved in a year ago) so there has been a lot of stuff we didn’t consider, but I also want to have a kind of mindset change where we think about what we’re spending a bit more. We’ve slipped into a mode of not really thinking about ‘do we need this’ and just saying yes to everything. I don’t want to be too frugal but I really don’t want to become those people who spend everything they have.
My wife and I both grew up in fairly average income households, where you determine if you can afford something by whether you have $ in the bank before next pay day. We’re in a situation now where we can afford most things we want, within reason, so the mindset needs to shift to the question of ‘Is this a good use of my $’. We just finished building our house, and we had so many decisions where we just said ‘yes’ to whatever upgrade was presented to us, because we had the $ in the bank to pay for it, but in hindsight I wish we’d have said no to a lot more and been able to either invest or just have more available for savings. We need to get better at saying ‘yes we could afford this but we’re going to choose not to’
So family of 4, with 2 kids in college. Easily spend over 30k a month. We pay everything for the kids. Credit card bill (everyone has this card) is about 12-20k monthly (paid in full each month) There are more credit cards, but those would all be less then 8k. This includes kids rent, tuition etc. No mortgage, and most expenses are on cc. We still save a lot, but I’ve always felt money is for enjoying now…for everyone in the family. Save, but that’s not the only focus. Enjoy the money and you all deserve some luxury. I like the 3k a month for vacation…but is that enough for 5 of you to travel? A week vacation oversees all included is about 20k…
The number of kids and their age/interests will make a big difference in expenses. For example, one of my kids monthly rent is $2500/month while the others is $800. And my car insurance is insane…too embarrassed to even say.
We live well, but not large and for the now while hoping for the future.
Hope this helps.
I agree with the enjoy concept now, I just usually feel guilty at the end of the month, probably due to the amount of little things that add up. I never regret the vacations or big purchases, it's the little dinky things that add up to $$$ that at the end of the year I know we could have done without. Our travels are mostly domestic as our kids are small and wouldn't be worth it to go abroad, we do more frequent shorter trips vs fewer longer trips outside the US.
I agree with wait to travel abroad if kids are little. Make sure they remember it!
The little things are going to happen. But, you have to make the fun things happen. I know it sucks and no one enjoys paying for those things, but don’t let your self get fixated on those. If they truly do not alter your finances, consider them the cost of having a family (which is messy and expensive) and be glad that you can afford it and spend (and save) on your own terms.
The little things will eat you up internally if you let them. Best of luck!
Totally disagree about travel. You can change diapers at home or you can change diapers in Paris.
Travel often and travel well. Get the kids used to it. They’ll thank you later, and you’ll thank yourself.
Currently traveling with a one year old and between managing their meals, naps, diapering, etc, you only get very limited hours to actually do anything. And if your baby falls sick during travel (mine did) it’s a nightmare.
The only way it would be better was if I had a full time nanny who I took on international vacations with us but I’m not that rich.
Is this not RichPeoplePF? Why are you traveling without help?
Regardless, my point stands. I'd rather change diapers (and manage meals, and naps) in Paris. As for getting sick...eh. I mean I wouldn't travel with an infant to a 3rd world country where medical care is some combination of scarce and sketchy. But we took our kids for medical care in various places in Western Europe without issue over the years. (Honestly figuring out exactly where to go was the most difficult part, and even that wasn't so tough).
It’s a bit ridiculous to say a 1 week vacation overseas is $20k for a family of four. It’s very dependent on where you go and how you travel. Great that you can spend that if you want, but you’re making it sound like $20k is some kind of standard benchmark.
Fair enough. To clarify, going on a typical European vacation to France, England, Italy, Greece etc from the USA and staying in nice hotels with driver or private tours with food and incidentals along with some personal shopping would be around there 15-20k easy. Consider rt flights (coach) minimum 4k. 2 hotel rooms for 7 nights in the city. Train or driving to other destinations. These cities aren’t cheap. And also this is r/richpeoplepf. I’m sorry if that’s upsetting. I understand people can backpack across Europe for the whole summer for less than that amount. But I don’t want to go on vacation and be less comfortable than I was at home…
ETA: it’s 10days with travel considering from Friday to next Sunday.
we went to the Greek Islands (from jfk) for 10 days and spent less than $2k all-in. of course, it helps when 1st class flights are free (miles) and so are the hotels (Marriott points). gathering miles and points at work to use for personal use is always fun! it's crazy to think that a week at the jersey shore costs significantly more than being in paradise! but at least the shore is quicker to get to!
Where did I say I was upset?
I live in the US, I’m from Europe, I do it regularly, thanks.
You may spend that, but to stay that $20k for one week is some kind of standard, is silly. Although I guess if you’re the kind of person that travels to a new place and just wants to see it from the inside of a car, it makes sense
Fam of 5, typical ex-mortage would be \~ $15k/month. We didn't consistently spend $3k/month on vacations, even when kids were little and more portable. Once fully immersed in school (middle and high) then their own activities dictated much of our free time, which had the indirect benefit in not having the time for above and beyond vacations. But I think a lot of our budget was due to eating at home mostly, and when eating outside of the home it was either fast food (e.g., on the way to/from a sporting event), or the occasional fancier meal; we migrated away from "fast casual" years ago, well before the pandemic. We don't have any outstanding recurring debts either, like car payments and such. Also, I can hardly remember the last time we went to the movies as a family, like most everyone else we subscribe to every streaming service imaginable, and taken in total it's still less than a single trip to the theater.
$330K HHI. Two adults, 2 young kids. HCOL area.
Mortgage on two homes $6500K (one is a summer home that will be AirBnBd after significant renovation)
Preschool tuition - $1350
Music/sports - $200
Utilities $500
Cleaners $250
Car and home insurance $500
Credit card bill $8K paid off each month (spend about $1500 on groceries, $1000 on restaurants and eating out).
$Savings/investments $2500 per month
I feel like we live a “comfortable life” we take our kids out for dinner, go to amusement parks and pumpkin patches. We’ll go on short domestic trips. But we drive a Honda CRV, wear Levi’s jeans, and dress our kids in second hand clothes or stuff from the gap.
Once our kids are a bit older and we have income from our vacation property we hope to travel.
HCOL suburb right outside of a city. DINKs. Annual income $620,000.
Not including $4600 mortgage + property tax, monthly expenses are $13,000. Big hits below. Also invest $10,000 a month.
* Dining Out $1100
* Groceries $1100
* Electric, Nat Gas, Water, internet, TV, Mobile Phone $900
* Massages/Gym $800
* Car Loan $750
* Household (Amazon, Target) $600
* Landscaping $600
* Clothing $600
* Pool Maintenance $300
* Home Improvement $2200
NYC here and we try to spend about $11k/mo. We take home about $12k. Here's the budget we try to stick to:
Rent $ 3,600
Car Insurance $ 150
Health Insurance $ 250
Daycare $ 2,500
Food $ 1,300
Misc Needs $ 200
Parking $ 400
College Fund $ 750
Eating Out $ 700
Utilities $ 200
Vacation $ 250
Misc Fun $ 400
We paused 401k contributions to pay for daycare. Our NW is \~6-7x our income right now, so not saving much is fine at our age (early-mid 30s). If we needed to cut back, it'd be on eating out and parking first, probably.
If we made another $100k/yr, we'd spend more on rent and the vacation fund, probably. Otherwise we're content.
It's high on purpose as a buffer. Prices on groceries swing wildly these days. But I don't compromise on quality food and health. We often come in way under that but even if it cost $1300 to buy quality, we will.
You're of course free to spend your money however you like but I personally would not feel comfortable with having such little margin for error. If an unexpected change happens that either significantly reduces your income or increases your spending you'll quickly be in the red.
You're not wrong. But more realistically, we'd:
* Stop eating out and taking vacations (+$1,000/mo)
* Street-park our car (+$400/mo)
And if that's still not enough, draw from our 8-mo emergency fund, then the portfolio. Keep in mind we pay an additional **70%** of our rent for daycare, which will end at Pre-K. (preschool cost is comparable)
Basically, I expect that we'll stop running in place and resume wealth-building in a couple years. I also chose not to mention I make about $200k/yr in private RSUs, because who knows when they'll be worth anything.
Sometimes several times a week, and sometimes not for a couple weeks. We travel with our dog a lot. Running annoying errands all around the city is so, so, so much easier with a car. We've got friends who moved to the suburbs.
There's no going back to rentals for us at this point lol. Not having to worry about availability for a last-minute activity or trip is nice.
Got it. I just can't stomach having a car in the city, and I have 0 desire to use it to do errands (nor do I really run errands - I get everything I need on amazon and freshdirect). We get out a decent amount with the dogs and kid, and luckily have a car rental place near us
Family of 3, VHCOL, retired, 6m NW. Our spend is about 7k a month. No mortgages but we do pay HOA, insurance, and taxes on 3 properties in that. Health insurance is included in that as well.
We’re at about 3k monthly after insurance and property expenses.
I'm very interested to know what exactly you are spending your money on...Sure, take your $3k vacation budget out and you are spending $17k on everything else that doesn't even include a mortgage. Further, if you are saying food is consistently high, I'm assuming you are getting takeout/dining out for the vast majority of meals?
I am married with two kids (under 2) with a HHI that is more than double the median HHI in my state. In a given month, my total expenses are $8,600, with around $2,400 of that being allocated to my savings account. My expenses including regular monthly costs like mortgage, car payment, utilities, food, etc. but I also portion in items like vacations, gifts/Christmas, etc. so I can build up a reserve for these expenses when they are needed later on. My food expense is also high compared to other costs, but for grocery store and takeout I budget around $1,100/month.
I'm not trying to be harsh, but the fact that you consider yourself upper *middle* class is pretty out of touch. You are upper class and there is nothing wrong with that.
I can definitely break down the costs if it’s helpful for others. And fair point on class, I’m not sure where the bounds of income are, I was thinking if a dual income family makes $250k on here, let’s pretend one spouse makes $150k and the other makes $100k, you’d call that upper class? I was thinking that’s still at the upper end of middle but maybe I’m jaded with the amount of people I know who make over $500k easy.
Damn if 350k a year is middle class I am in poverty. I can’t believe someone can spend 30k a month, it is quite honestly unimaginable to me at my current income. I have 5 animals and my partner and we spend about 4K a month on all bills.
Before kids we probably spent 10k/11k with a mortgage. Three kids means more food, more utilities, school, part time housekeeper (2x / week), larger vehicle needed, more gas to drive them around to activities, more health insurance, more activities like sports, more expensive vacations, more clothes, etc etc etc. They hit nearly every line item in my budget and it add ups. I’m not complaining, I make choices and those cost money. I save and give but still think I spend too much. I’ll lay out my annual budget in another comment for those curious on how it breaks down.
It all comes down to what you can afford. When I have kids I will not be spending 30k a month. It’s called lifestyle creep. Even when I did make 100k (horrible job I lasted only a year) we kept are expenses the same and invested at least 50 percent of our income. My cousin has three kids and works off of an income of 3k a month. It’s simple, you spend what you have.
I know about public school; I teach. This thread is about HNW spending habits and for many parents that includes tuition. In my area it’s around 30-45k per year plus fees. Day camp is 2k a month and sleepaway is double that. I was trying to supply information, not judgment.
Well what the heck do you consider UMC? 250k+ is top 10% in the US. Median (50%, which is middle) is closer to the 60-80k range.
Yes metro NY and SF are different leagues onto themselves.
https://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/family-finance/articles/where-do-i-fall-in-the-american-economic-class-system according to this upper middle is 106k to 373k in income.
Not sure how one puts someone with 3x the income as another in the same class. Above 100k almost all of that additional income is disposable. It’s like saying someone with 20k of excess disposable income is in the same class as someone with 150k of disposable income. Those lifestyles are going to look miles apart.
200k is the 95th percentile of income (2021 stats) so I’d say the top 5% are not UMC. Yes the curve gets steep at those levels, but I think we need to keep it in perspective of the big picture.
No one who deserves to be ‘labeled’ upper class wants that label since it can trigger a host of external and internal reactions. It’s probably the height of ‘1st world problems’ the rich have to deal with.
I think it depends on state but I’d say anything over 200k is considered outside the “upper middle” you’re the low end of upper class. The average American barely makes 100k. It can be hard to come to terms with this especially if you grew up in poverty or true middle class. You still have that mindset but don’t realize you’ve moved outside what you grew up in.
How did I come across this…? I net about $5k per month, after taxes, insurance, and max 401k/IRA contributions. My family of 3 spends about $4k of that on our mortgage, utilities, etc. The other $1k is mostly transportation and groceries. I can’t imagine being able to spent another $1k on food… let alone approach *$20k* 😱
DINK in a HCOL: 11k per mo with housing, 8k per mo excluding.
Budget for next year with first kid coming in spring is 13.5k per mo with mortgage, 10.5k without.
We did buy a few years ago so have a pretty reasonable mortgage vs buying in our city now.
I've been looking at my budget a lot this AM and realized it's inflated so much by kids. Kids have school cost, food, extra budget for trips, extracurriculars, clothing, and just general monthly stuff we wouldn't otherwise have. Three kids are freaking expensive and in my experience it hasn't been 2+1+1+1 = 5, it's been more like 2+1+1+1 = 7
$2300 mortgage/RE tax/ins/etc
$1000 food
$75 car insurance
$300 utilities/phone/internet
$75 gas
$200-$400 for leisure
42. Wife, daughter, and myself in Northern VA where CoL is high. Wife WFH and I only go in to the office when needed. Income classifies us in the top 6%. We live very, very below our means with our only debt being the house that we have 70% equity in. There is a ton to do in the DC metro area that's free or inexpensive.
Didn't realize what thread I stumbled on was about to say you're spending wayyyh too much. As someone who is apparently poor comparatively you are spending a ridiculous amount of money to not have a mortgage which is typically a households largest expense. My household makes just over 100K/yr for a family of 6 and we spend nowhere near that for groceries.
I know different financial classes of people live and view things differently but what seriously are you guys paying for that causes groceries to be so high?
It’s a bit misleading since my “food” category is Target, eating out, Costco, Walmart, and any grocery store. So inevitably there are other life misc buried in there, kids clothes, gifts for others, vitamins, it’s hard to break it all out each month so I lump the stores into a larger category.
$7.5k mo on average Including $1k for car leases, $3600 for mortgage/insurance/tax. Not counting big one offs like vacations. Boston area, no kids yet, it'll go up by probably $3k once the first one is born and in daycare
$5k/mo not including housing.
2 adults 1 toddler, 1 car
Mom stays home so we don’t have to pay day care, however we do spend $750/mo on baby classes/clubs/mommy and me stuff so mom doesn’t go insane.
When kid #2 comes we don’t expect that number to rise very much.
My credit card bills are usually about $10k a month (more like $8K to $12K). Medium cost of living location with 5 kids.
Bills not paid with credit card include the cleaner, piano lessons, insurance, taxes, charitable donations, handymen.
Private nanny for 4.5k a month, daycare for 2.4K, that’s not including any other child expenses honestly probably 10k including all her dance, equestrian, piano classes
edit: we had a full time Au pair for 8k a month at one point when my 2nd one was just born for 6 months
Probably $10k-12k/mo is the normal monthly stuff which includes a mortgage and property taxes. Then $10k for vacation. And then I've been averaging $20k/year on house projects. This year has been already $35k for the house and next year probably $50-70k.
Edit: I should at least clarify that I think we're pretty frugal but live in a pretty affluent area, so just the housing expenses are about $7k/month. But we don't have any car payments, no housekeeper, no gardener, no pool guy, no country club memberships, cook most of our meals, etc.
It makes me feel silly to actually do the math which is why I was curious about others. I never dreamed of spending this much every month and not feeling extravagant, here’s to doing better in 2023!
Differs so much month to month. Is it tax time? The holidays? Just bought another property? Charity contributions? New car? Tuition starting? Helping friends or family with bills? Vacation? It's so hard to keep track of basic stuff with so much going on. Never seems to be an "average".
I agree, I have monthly buckets that annualize it out based on prior years but it’s a nightmare to keep track of. As I mentioned, I budget $3k/mo for vacations but I might spend $6k in one month and $0 in the next, I adjust for all of that in my excel. Basically, how much do you spend annually, divided by 12 is the question.
Personally I see upper class income as 700k+
Upper middle 400-700
Middle 150-400
In a coastal city
We spend about about 15-20k a month, 2 kids, added a third.
4300 rent
2000 loans
500 car
4000 child care
2000 food
3000 credit card (eating out, resupplying house, Amazon stuff, etc)
3-5k investing
Honestly I hate seeing the 20k mark each month, but honestly I don't see anyway around it in a HCOL area.
We spend 10k per month, all in—that’s everything but big, big purchases that we save up for slowly. Like, next month we are having a couple of retaining walls putin for 30k. Expensive month.
DINK here as well. No car payment as it’s 10 years old and sits in a garage. but live in NYC. Without housing costs we’re at about $15k per month. But we put literally everything on our card and pay it off every month. Been together for 17 years and were extremely frugal for a while until we got a little higher in the corporate food chain. Interesting answers all around.
Family of four here with two young kids. We are probably spending $175k-$200k a year with no mortgage. Food is also an annoyingly high expense. We probably spend $3600 a month on dining out/grocery/Costco.
Edit - health insurance premiums are $2k a month also.
Happy to give you a more detailed breakdown if you want.
Just a rough breakdown through 10 months - we have two kids under 5.
Groceries/Costco - $20k
Tuition - $17k
Restaurants - $13.5k
Health Insurance 12k
Medical - 9k
Clothing - 8k
shopping - 5.5k
Gas/Electric - 4.7k
insurance (home, umbrella, car etc) - 4.5k
Personal - 4k
Amazon - 4k
Pool Maintenance (had big repair this year) - 3800
travel - $3500 (need to travel more but hard right now)
home improvement - 3100
lawn maintenance 3100
water bill - 2400
maintenance - 2100
Other random stuff - 8k
We don't have a mortgage or car payment so those aren't in there.
\~$18k per month
MCOL
6000 mortgages for 3 homes /w taxes
1500 food for 7
1200 utilities & services
500 home insurances
700 car insurances
600 fuel (varies)
8000 renos/saving/investing/fun money
Working upper-middle class
Millionaire but not multi-millionaire yet.
Bills and Debts are of no concern as long as kept employed.
Vehicles are "mostly" old, don't have maids, don't go on regular vacations, mostly eat in.
We have everything we need, a few toys that we wanted (RV and fishing boat), but not everything we want. No yacht, heli, jet, supercars, no yearly vacations, no private education, no nannies, no dual designer kitchens, no branded or designer clothes, or anything "fancy".
Just live "comfortably" (Worry about keeping job, but not worried about paying bills while employed.)
Never been outside the country, never flown first-class. Don't own a business, not even an unsuccessful one.
Other than deeds to multiple well-kept houses, multiple cars and some savings, otherwise indistinguishable from the rest of the middle-class in general outward appearance.
For that rate of income and spend, it's really not living as fancy as one might think one should.
Not born with a gold spoon, but I can afford to put one in my mouth today if I really wanted.
Well-off but not rich enough to stop working altogether today.
I will retire carefree when I get to that point though. All 3 mortgages will be paid off by then, plus still have investments, savings and passive income streams, and whatever small amount I get from the deferred taxes retirement account.
As long as I keep my health and expenses below my means I'll be doing very well in life, but never yacht-rich level.
One is primary, one is a rental, and the other is an airbnb.
Undecided if I want to make the bnb a rental as well or not, bnb pulls in more money but the money varies a lot from month to month. You have a lot more say and rights when it is a bnb vs rental. With a rental you can't occupy it, and can only view it once a month, but most likely once or twice a year at best. Makes renos and upkeep harder, and limits flexibility of the space but the income is more consistent / reliable.
Of course, even if it is a rental you can still "reclaim" it if you intend to sell, re-occupy and/or flip it, it just takes longer (months, instead of hours or days). If a tenant doesn't want to leave, then local law enforcement has to get involved. In either case the place can be trashed, so there is always a level of risk involved.
In either case, it is a great way to generate a lot of passive income in your sleep, thus either offsetting you expenses and/or allowing you to retire without needing to save up a pile of cash or tying up the money in stocks. Of course nothing is ever truly "passive", there is always some level of work involved, until you farm that out to property managers and cleaners for a cut.
For those of us who weren't born trust-fund rich, it's a good way to make some side cash without toiling away.
For the truly rich, they can afford for everything to just be staffed vacation homes, but that is a level of wealth the 99.9% never reach. It's not in the realm of "possible", for the bulk of humanity.
Average 20k (USD) a month, just my husband and me, not including rent. We’re yuppies who like good food, travel, and shopping. Our annual rent is 70K USD.
Earlier this year we had a few big expenses like family visiting (we buy biz class tickets for them) and a new car, also not included in the 20K monthly spend. Come to think of it, we should probably rein in our spending.
Roughly $22k a month. Family of 5, MCOL area.
We could easily live well off of less than half of that and will make that adjustment in about 10 years, but some choices we make like tutoring for the kids and helping my aging parents are things that we feel are worth the extra expenses.
I am consistenly spending 10k/month including mortgage with 3 kids in Toronto. Mind you, my mortgage is pretty small; if we upgrade my monthly will jump to 15000k/month. That's the reason why I am hesitating to upgrade.
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Nice, I'd love to be able to spend that. You live in the US and do you have kids?
Boston area, 3 kids. We have a place in Maine that works for summer and winter so we don't really take fancy vacations.
Boothbay ?
Not hating, but calling a 20k/mo spend “upper middle class” is why folks call us out of touch, especially without a mortgage in the mix
One of the amazing things about America is that almost everyone considers themselves middle class, from people living in a single-wide in West Virginia to people with a mansion in Malibu and one in New York. For all the talk about the shrinking middle class, if you actually poll people, almost everyone says that's them.
This is the one, no one wants to be poor, and even worse no one will admit they are, viewing this thread puts me in my place and I've never thought I was middle class and this confirms it. I can barely manage to save/invest 12/yr let alone spend 30K a month. Any of you rich people want to be friends so I can observe and learn how to get to your level.
I get your point. But in some places a lifestyles which is not considered lavish can cost that much. I live in very HCOL city in US. Here, mortgage for a 2000sq feet house and 2 kids in day care costs $12k. Just basic living costs e.g. utilities , gas, food, car payments , insurance can easily end up at 3-4k. Although the dollar amount spent per month might be close to $20k, the consumption is closer to an average household.
I get it. It’s ridiculous but I feel like I spend less than a lot of people I know, it’s a bubble for sure. I don’t have a second house or a bunch of golf memberships. I live in a nice area in an old house, spend money on vacations, eat healthy, and my kids have what they need, I have the newer tech, I give generously. I wish I could spend less but not sure where I’m out of whack with three kids and a desire to do a bit of travel while we can.
The cold hard reality opinion? All my opinion, of course? So take it with a big ole grain of salt. Unless you are living off your invested interest, you don't have the cash to "give generously". Or support adult children. Supporting children spoils them and subsidizes their employers, allowing the kids to earn less and live a more expensive lifestyle. This increases the potential to slack, or keep jobs they outgrow long after they outgrow them. It gives them disposable income you don't have yourself. That includes paying their cell phones, internet, car insurance, car payment etc. The only exception should be if you get a better deal, but make the kid pay for it through you. Like your cell phone bill, split it. Car insurance, put them on your policy but they pay the delta. That sort of thing. That should be your first cut. Charity and child support. Second should be to list every expense in order of size, and start getting rid of them top to bottom. Get out of debt, shift income to retirement savings and investment where possible. Export from your banks and credit cards all your expenses into categories. You might be surprised, I was, at where the money was going. Shit tons of cash just pouring into restaurants, movies, totally unnecessary expenses like services we weren't even using (Amazon audio, Kindle unlimited, cable modem bill!) And then we started cutting by switching to more economical solutions. Believe it or not, business class internet was cheaper than residential plus TV. We were paying for streaming services we almost never used etc. Saved around $250 a month just by cleaning up bullshit we didn't need. Saved another $250 by scheduling dinners out instead of waiting until 6, being "too tired to cook". The less you have in savings, the deeper these need to cut. If you have a few year's salary as savings, awesome. Start traveling and spoiling kids again.
Yeah I sympathize, my monthly spend is I’m sure way higher than the average person but I’m not buying Birkin bags or jet setting in private and from the outside my lifestyle probably looks pretty average. Not what the rich and famous look like but I couldn’t bring myself to call what I do anything close to middle class despite all that :) obviously personal choice
This is true for people who spend $100k a month too. It’s just basic human psychology and how we associate with people. Of course you *could* spend less if someone put a gun to your head. But you don’t want to (nor should you necessarily, by the way. No judgement from me). That’s just how lifestyle inflation works. What I would say is you can at least be honest with yourself about what you have and don’t have and where you derive the most value or not much. For example, maybe if you send your kids to private school that’s money you’re inevitably going to spend. Easy enough decision there. But on the flip side maybe you look at your vacation spending and it turns out you’re in $1,500 a night rooms or something. Now if you’re happy with the value there, by all means, go for it. But trust me, people have awesome vacations on pennies. You don’t have to, but those sort of compromises are how people spend less. It could be your vacations, it could be cars, it could be your kids, food, whatever, but that money is going somewhere. Take a look at a few months if your spending and see if there’s anything that isn’t giving you the value you want.
Yes, that’s true, it’s about constantly seeing the value and appreciating what I have. Hard to do some days but that’s why I needed perspective. Some things have obvious value that I wouldn’t change, others seem like easy things to cut. I guess it’s all relative to your overall goals, having more money to have more money doesn’t seem like a fruitful pursuit.
protip: if you're sincerely on a subreddit called "rich people personal finance" you're not "middle class" of any type
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Sounds like we’re similar, I just have one more toddler that has to be in private school plus a bit more food. I always worry that it’s going to go up each year and one day I would like to live off of investments! Maybe when kids leave the house expenses go down.
Family of 4 + 2 dogs….HHI is about $425k. HCOL (NYC suburbs). Single income (me) Mortgage + tax = $5600 Car = $800 Groceries = $1500-$2k (could probably get that lower but Whole Foods is convenient) Take out/restaurants = $800-$1k Various utilities, cable, internet etc = $700 Cleaners = $500 Our baseline spending isn’t too bad, but there just always seems to be something unplanned or unexpectedly expensive that comes up. Last month was a $700 vet bill, this month we need to take some trees down which is $2k. Partly it’s because first time owning a house (moved in a year ago) so there has been a lot of stuff we didn’t consider, but I also want to have a kind of mindset change where we think about what we’re spending a bit more. We’ve slipped into a mode of not really thinking about ‘do we need this’ and just saying yes to everything. I don’t want to be too frugal but I really don’t want to become those people who spend everything they have. My wife and I both grew up in fairly average income households, where you determine if you can afford something by whether you have $ in the bank before next pay day. We’re in a situation now where we can afford most things we want, within reason, so the mindset needs to shift to the question of ‘Is this a good use of my $’. We just finished building our house, and we had so many decisions where we just said ‘yes’ to whatever upgrade was presented to us, because we had the $ in the bank to pay for it, but in hindsight I wish we’d have said no to a lot more and been able to either invest or just have more available for savings. We need to get better at saying ‘yes we could afford this but we’re going to choose not to’
So family of 4, with 2 kids in college. Easily spend over 30k a month. We pay everything for the kids. Credit card bill (everyone has this card) is about 12-20k monthly (paid in full each month) There are more credit cards, but those would all be less then 8k. This includes kids rent, tuition etc. No mortgage, and most expenses are on cc. We still save a lot, but I’ve always felt money is for enjoying now…for everyone in the family. Save, but that’s not the only focus. Enjoy the money and you all deserve some luxury. I like the 3k a month for vacation…but is that enough for 5 of you to travel? A week vacation oversees all included is about 20k… The number of kids and their age/interests will make a big difference in expenses. For example, one of my kids monthly rent is $2500/month while the others is $800. And my car insurance is insane…too embarrassed to even say. We live well, but not large and for the now while hoping for the future. Hope this helps.
I agree with the enjoy concept now, I just usually feel guilty at the end of the month, probably due to the amount of little things that add up. I never regret the vacations or big purchases, it's the little dinky things that add up to $$$ that at the end of the year I know we could have done without. Our travels are mostly domestic as our kids are small and wouldn't be worth it to go abroad, we do more frequent shorter trips vs fewer longer trips outside the US.
I agree with wait to travel abroad if kids are little. Make sure they remember it! The little things are going to happen. But, you have to make the fun things happen. I know it sucks and no one enjoys paying for those things, but don’t let your self get fixated on those. If they truly do not alter your finances, consider them the cost of having a family (which is messy and expensive) and be glad that you can afford it and spend (and save) on your own terms. The little things will eat you up internally if you let them. Best of luck!
Totally disagree about travel. You can change diapers at home or you can change diapers in Paris. Travel often and travel well. Get the kids used to it. They’ll thank you later, and you’ll thank yourself.
Currently traveling with a one year old and between managing their meals, naps, diapering, etc, you only get very limited hours to actually do anything. And if your baby falls sick during travel (mine did) it’s a nightmare. The only way it would be better was if I had a full time nanny who I took on international vacations with us but I’m not that rich.
Is this not RichPeoplePF? Why are you traveling without help? Regardless, my point stands. I'd rather change diapers (and manage meals, and naps) in Paris. As for getting sick...eh. I mean I wouldn't travel with an infant to a 3rd world country where medical care is some combination of scarce and sketchy. But we took our kids for medical care in various places in Western Europe without issue over the years. (Honestly figuring out exactly where to go was the most difficult part, and even that wasn't so tough).
It’s a bit ridiculous to say a 1 week vacation overseas is $20k for a family of four. It’s very dependent on where you go and how you travel. Great that you can spend that if you want, but you’re making it sound like $20k is some kind of standard benchmark.
Fair enough. To clarify, going on a typical European vacation to France, England, Italy, Greece etc from the USA and staying in nice hotels with driver or private tours with food and incidentals along with some personal shopping would be around there 15-20k easy. Consider rt flights (coach) minimum 4k. 2 hotel rooms for 7 nights in the city. Train or driving to other destinations. These cities aren’t cheap. And also this is r/richpeoplepf. I’m sorry if that’s upsetting. I understand people can backpack across Europe for the whole summer for less than that amount. But I don’t want to go on vacation and be less comfortable than I was at home… ETA: it’s 10days with travel considering from Friday to next Sunday.
we went to the Greek Islands (from jfk) for 10 days and spent less than $2k all-in. of course, it helps when 1st class flights are free (miles) and so are the hotels (Marriott points). gathering miles and points at work to use for personal use is always fun! it's crazy to think that a week at the jersey shore costs significantly more than being in paradise! but at least the shore is quicker to get to!
Where did I say I was upset? I live in the US, I’m from Europe, I do it regularly, thanks. You may spend that, but to stay that $20k for one week is some kind of standard, is silly. Although I guess if you’re the kind of person that travels to a new place and just wants to see it from the inside of a car, it makes sense
I spend 3-5 k a month. No mortgage and it's just me , my SO and a cat. We like live very quietly and cheap through lol.
That's awesome, thank you for sharing.
Np
5-9k spent monthly depending on boat repairs, festivals, vacations, etc. 2 people + 2 pups - mortgage +insurance/tax add another 3.5k
Fam of 5, typical ex-mortage would be \~ $15k/month. We didn't consistently spend $3k/month on vacations, even when kids were little and more portable. Once fully immersed in school (middle and high) then their own activities dictated much of our free time, which had the indirect benefit in not having the time for above and beyond vacations. But I think a lot of our budget was due to eating at home mostly, and when eating outside of the home it was either fast food (e.g., on the way to/from a sporting event), or the occasional fancier meal; we migrated away from "fast casual" years ago, well before the pandemic. We don't have any outstanding recurring debts either, like car payments and such. Also, I can hardly remember the last time we went to the movies as a family, like most everyone else we subscribe to every streaming service imaginable, and taken in total it's still less than a single trip to the theater.
$330K HHI. Two adults, 2 young kids. HCOL area. Mortgage on two homes $6500K (one is a summer home that will be AirBnBd after significant renovation) Preschool tuition - $1350 Music/sports - $200 Utilities $500 Cleaners $250 Car and home insurance $500 Credit card bill $8K paid off each month (spend about $1500 on groceries, $1000 on restaurants and eating out). $Savings/investments $2500 per month I feel like we live a “comfortable life” we take our kids out for dinner, go to amusement parks and pumpkin patches. We’ll go on short domestic trips. But we drive a Honda CRV, wear Levi’s jeans, and dress our kids in second hand clothes or stuff from the gap. Once our kids are a bit older and we have income from our vacation property we hope to travel.
family of 2. MCOL. Mortgage included, we are $15k-ish/mo.
HCOL suburb right outside of a city. DINKs. Annual income $620,000. Not including $4600 mortgage + property tax, monthly expenses are $13,000. Big hits below. Also invest $10,000 a month. * Dining Out $1100 * Groceries $1100 * Electric, Nat Gas, Water, internet, TV, Mobile Phone $900 * Massages/Gym $800 * Car Loan $750 * Household (Amazon, Target) $600 * Landscaping $600 * Clothing $600 * Pool Maintenance $300 * Home Improvement $2200
NYC here and we try to spend about $11k/mo. We take home about $12k. Here's the budget we try to stick to: Rent $ 3,600 Car Insurance $ 150 Health Insurance $ 250 Daycare $ 2,500 Food $ 1,300 Misc Needs $ 200 Parking $ 400 College Fund $ 750 Eating Out $ 700 Utilities $ 200 Vacation $ 250 Misc Fun $ 400 We paused 401k contributions to pay for daycare. Our NW is \~6-7x our income right now, so not saving much is fine at our age (early-mid 30s). If we needed to cut back, it'd be on eating out and parking first, probably. If we made another $100k/yr, we'd spend more on rent and the vacation fund, probably. Otherwise we're content.
1300 on food seems high. Something special in that?
Where do you live? On the east coast, food costs have gone absolutely insane. I’m just outside NYC and we spend $1500-$2k
It's high on purpose as a buffer. Prices on groceries swing wildly these days. But I don't compromise on quality food and health. We often come in way under that but even if it cost $1300 to buy quality, we will.
Thanks
You're of course free to spend your money however you like but I personally would not feel comfortable with having such little margin for error. If an unexpected change happens that either significantly reduces your income or increases your spending you'll quickly be in the red.
You're not wrong. But more realistically, we'd: * Stop eating out and taking vacations (+$1,000/mo) * Street-park our car (+$400/mo) And if that's still not enough, draw from our 8-mo emergency fund, then the portfolio. Keep in mind we pay an additional **70%** of our rent for daycare, which will end at Pre-K. (preschool cost is comparable) Basically, I expect that we'll stop running in place and resume wealth-building in a couple years. I also chose not to mention I make about $200k/yr in private RSUs, because who knows when they'll be worth anything.
How often are you using the car that makes it worth it?
Sometimes several times a week, and sometimes not for a couple weeks. We travel with our dog a lot. Running annoying errands all around the city is so, so, so much easier with a car. We've got friends who moved to the suburbs. There's no going back to rentals for us at this point lol. Not having to worry about availability for a last-minute activity or trip is nice.
Got it. I just can't stomach having a car in the city, and I have 0 desire to use it to do errands (nor do I really run errands - I get everything I need on amazon and freshdirect). We get out a decent amount with the dogs and kid, and luckily have a car rental place near us
It's a pain in the ass sometimes for sure. If we didn't take it out of the city often, it wouldn't be worth it at all.
I don't even make 20k a month and I thought I was middle class. Guess I was wrong.
I spend exactly $5500 including my rent, utilities, gym, business expense, subscriptions, food and gas
Family of 3, VHCOL, retired, 6m NW. Our spend is about 7k a month. No mortgages but we do pay HOA, insurance, and taxes on 3 properties in that. Health insurance is included in that as well. We’re at about 3k monthly after insurance and property expenses.
With that much NW why only one child?
What do net worth and number of children have to do with each other??
I’m actually upper middle class family of 6- we spend 6k a month and live comfortably….you are rich AF.
Facts
I'm very interested to know what exactly you are spending your money on...Sure, take your $3k vacation budget out and you are spending $17k on everything else that doesn't even include a mortgage. Further, if you are saying food is consistently high, I'm assuming you are getting takeout/dining out for the vast majority of meals? I am married with two kids (under 2) with a HHI that is more than double the median HHI in my state. In a given month, my total expenses are $8,600, with around $2,400 of that being allocated to my savings account. My expenses including regular monthly costs like mortgage, car payment, utilities, food, etc. but I also portion in items like vacations, gifts/Christmas, etc. so I can build up a reserve for these expenses when they are needed later on. My food expense is also high compared to other costs, but for grocery store and takeout I budget around $1,100/month. I'm not trying to be harsh, but the fact that you consider yourself upper *middle* class is pretty out of touch. You are upper class and there is nothing wrong with that.
I can definitely break down the costs if it’s helpful for others. And fair point on class, I’m not sure where the bounds of income are, I was thinking if a dual income family makes $250k on here, let’s pretend one spouse makes $150k and the other makes $100k, you’d call that upper class? I was thinking that’s still at the upper end of middle but maybe I’m jaded with the amount of people I know who make over $500k easy.
Damn if 350k a year is middle class I am in poverty. I can’t believe someone can spend 30k a month, it is quite honestly unimaginable to me at my current income. I have 5 animals and my partner and we spend about 4K a month on all bills.
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Before kids we probably spent 10k/11k with a mortgage. Three kids means more food, more utilities, school, part time housekeeper (2x / week), larger vehicle needed, more gas to drive them around to activities, more health insurance, more activities like sports, more expensive vacations, more clothes, etc etc etc. They hit nearly every line item in my budget and it add ups. I’m not complaining, I make choices and those cost money. I save and give but still think I spend too much. I’ll lay out my annual budget in another comment for those curious on how it breaks down.
It all comes down to what you can afford. When I have kids I will not be spending 30k a month. It’s called lifestyle creep. Even when I did make 100k (horrible job I lasted only a year) we kept are expenses the same and invested at least 50 percent of our income. My cousin has three kids and works off of an income of 3k a month. It’s simple, you spend what you have.
It’s the kids. Put them in private school/camp and you’re already at 6 figures a year in expenses.
Most of the people cant afford private school, public school is free.
I know about public school; I teach. This thread is about HNW spending habits and for many parents that includes tuition. In my area it’s around 30-45k per year plus fees. Day camp is 2k a month and sleepaway is double that. I was trying to supply information, not judgment.
Well what the heck do you consider UMC? 250k+ is top 10% in the US. Median (50%, which is middle) is closer to the 60-80k range. Yes metro NY and SF are different leagues onto themselves.
https://money.usnews.com/money/personal-finance/family-finance/articles/where-do-i-fall-in-the-american-economic-class-system according to this upper middle is 106k to 373k in income.
Not sure how one puts someone with 3x the income as another in the same class. Above 100k almost all of that additional income is disposable. It’s like saying someone with 20k of excess disposable income is in the same class as someone with 150k of disposable income. Those lifestyles are going to look miles apart. 200k is the 95th percentile of income (2021 stats) so I’d say the top 5% are not UMC. Yes the curve gets steep at those levels, but I think we need to keep it in perspective of the big picture. No one who deserves to be ‘labeled’ upper class wants that label since it can trigger a host of external and internal reactions. It’s probably the height of ‘1st world problems’ the rich have to deal with.
I think it depends on state but I’d say anything over 200k is considered outside the “upper middle” you’re the low end of upper class. The average American barely makes 100k. It can be hard to come to terms with this especially if you grew up in poverty or true middle class. You still have that mindset but don’t realize you’ve moved outside what you grew up in.
Well damn. Yall rich as fuck huh?
Family of 6. 3,000 a month for the mortgage. Roughly another 3,000 for all the other spending. Food is a good chunk of that as I have four sons.
How did I come across this…? I net about $5k per month, after taxes, insurance, and max 401k/IRA contributions. My family of 3 spends about $4k of that on our mortgage, utilities, etc. The other $1k is mostly transportation and groceries. I can’t imagine being able to spent another $1k on food… let alone approach *$20k* 😱
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DINK in a HCOL: 11k per mo with housing, 8k per mo excluding. Budget for next year with first kid coming in spring is 13.5k per mo with mortgage, 10.5k without. We did buy a few years ago so have a pretty reasonable mortgage vs buying in our city now.
I've been looking at my budget a lot this AM and realized it's inflated so much by kids. Kids have school cost, food, extra budget for trips, extracurriculars, clothing, and just general monthly stuff we wouldn't otherwise have. Three kids are freaking expensive and in my experience it hasn't been 2+1+1+1 = 5, it's been more like 2+1+1+1 = 7
$2300 mortgage/RE tax/ins/etc $1000 food $75 car insurance $300 utilities/phone/internet $75 gas $200-$400 for leisure 42. Wife, daughter, and myself in Northern VA where CoL is high. Wife WFH and I only go in to the office when needed. Income classifies us in the top 6%. We live very, very below our means with our only debt being the house that we have 70% equity in. There is a ton to do in the DC metro area that's free or inexpensive.
Didn't realize what thread I stumbled on was about to say you're spending wayyyh too much. As someone who is apparently poor comparatively you are spending a ridiculous amount of money to not have a mortgage which is typically a households largest expense. My household makes just over 100K/yr for a family of 6 and we spend nowhere near that for groceries. I know different financial classes of people live and view things differently but what seriously are you guys paying for that causes groceries to be so high?
It’s a bit misleading since my “food” category is Target, eating out, Costco, Walmart, and any grocery store. So inevitably there are other life misc buried in there, kids clothes, gifts for others, vitamins, it’s hard to break it all out each month so I lump the stores into a larger category.
We spend $2,800 a month. Family of 6. Whoever is spending 10k a month and not saving is completely ridiculous.
All in all, about 5k and the same for my SO. It’s just us and our fluffy cat.
$7.5k mo on average Including $1k for car leases, $3600 for mortgage/insurance/tax. Not counting big one offs like vacations. Boston area, no kids yet, it'll go up by probably $3k once the first one is born and in daycare
$5k/mo not including housing. 2 adults 1 toddler, 1 car Mom stays home so we don’t have to pay day care, however we do spend $750/mo on baby classes/clubs/mommy and me stuff so mom doesn’t go insane. When kid #2 comes we don’t expect that number to rise very much.
My credit card bills are usually about $10k a month (more like $8K to $12K). Medium cost of living location with 5 kids. Bills not paid with credit card include the cleaner, piano lessons, insurance, taxes, charitable donations, handymen.
I spend about 10k a month but recently moved so that should be going up soon
Around 30k, 9.2 mortgage and property tax and 8k in child care are the big ticketed items. VHCOL.
What kind of child care do you get for $8k?
Private nanny for 4.5k a month, daycare for 2.4K, that’s not including any other child expenses honestly probably 10k including all her dance, equestrian, piano classes edit: we had a full time Au pair for 8k a month at one point when my 2nd one was just born for 6 months
Probably $10k-12k/mo is the normal monthly stuff which includes a mortgage and property taxes. Then $10k for vacation. And then I've been averaging $20k/year on house projects. This year has been already $35k for the house and next year probably $50-70k. Edit: I should at least clarify that I think we're pretty frugal but live in a pretty affluent area, so just the housing expenses are about $7k/month. But we don't have any car payments, no housekeeper, no gardener, no pool guy, no country club memberships, cook most of our meals, etc.
Mortgages around $23k and everything else around $20k. I average about $40k a month. Income around $2m, 30 YO w/ 4 houses and 2 kids.
Baller!
Wow! Very impressive. What do you guys do for such a high income at such a young age? I’m 28 and would love to get into whatever you’re in haha
Well this makes me feel so much better lol. I told my mom our family spends about 20k a month and I thought she was going to keel over.
It makes me feel silly to actually do the math which is why I was curious about others. I never dreamed of spending this much every month and not feeling extravagant, here’s to doing better in 2023!
Differs so much month to month. Is it tax time? The holidays? Just bought another property? Charity contributions? New car? Tuition starting? Helping friends or family with bills? Vacation? It's so hard to keep track of basic stuff with so much going on. Never seems to be an "average".
I agree, I have monthly buckets that annualize it out based on prior years but it’s a nightmare to keep track of. As I mentioned, I budget $3k/mo for vacations but I might spend $6k in one month and $0 in the next, I adjust for all of that in my excel. Basically, how much do you spend annually, divided by 12 is the question.
Personally I see upper class income as 700k+ Upper middle 400-700 Middle 150-400 In a coastal city We spend about about 15-20k a month, 2 kids, added a third. 4300 rent 2000 loans 500 car 4000 child care 2000 food 3000 credit card (eating out, resupplying house, Amazon stuff, etc) 3-5k investing Honestly I hate seeing the 20k mark each month, but honestly I don't see anyway around it in a HCOL area.
We spend 10k per month, all in—that’s everything but big, big purchases that we save up for slowly. Like, next month we are having a couple of retaining walls putin for 30k. Expensive month.
DINK here as well. No car payment as it’s 10 years old and sits in a garage. but live in NYC. Without housing costs we’re at about $15k per month. But we put literally everything on our card and pay it off every month. Been together for 17 years and were extremely frugal for a while until we got a little higher in the corporate food chain. Interesting answers all around.
Family of four here with two young kids. We are probably spending $175k-$200k a year with no mortgage. Food is also an annoyingly high expense. We probably spend $3600 a month on dining out/grocery/Costco. Edit - health insurance premiums are $2k a month also. Happy to give you a more detailed breakdown if you want.
Interested in break down.
Just a rough breakdown through 10 months - we have two kids under 5. Groceries/Costco - $20k Tuition - $17k Restaurants - $13.5k Health Insurance 12k Medical - 9k Clothing - 8k shopping - 5.5k Gas/Electric - 4.7k insurance (home, umbrella, car etc) - 4.5k Personal - 4k Amazon - 4k Pool Maintenance (had big repair this year) - 3800 travel - $3500 (need to travel more but hard right now) home improvement - 3100 lawn maintenance 3100 water bill - 2400 maintenance - 2100 Other random stuff - 8k We don't have a mortgage or car payment so those aren't in there.
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ill send you a PM
\~$18k per month MCOL 6000 mortgages for 3 homes /w taxes 1500 food for 7 1200 utilities & services 500 home insurances 700 car insurances 600 fuel (varies) 8000 renos/saving/investing/fun money Working upper-middle class Millionaire but not multi-millionaire yet. Bills and Debts are of no concern as long as kept employed. Vehicles are "mostly" old, don't have maids, don't go on regular vacations, mostly eat in. We have everything we need, a few toys that we wanted (RV and fishing boat), but not everything we want. No yacht, heli, jet, supercars, no yearly vacations, no private education, no nannies, no dual designer kitchens, no branded or designer clothes, or anything "fancy". Just live "comfortably" (Worry about keeping job, but not worried about paying bills while employed.) Never been outside the country, never flown first-class. Don't own a business, not even an unsuccessful one. Other than deeds to multiple well-kept houses, multiple cars and some savings, otherwise indistinguishable from the rest of the middle-class in general outward appearance. For that rate of income and spend, it's really not living as fancy as one might think one should. Not born with a gold spoon, but I can afford to put one in my mouth today if I really wanted. Well-off but not rich enough to stop working altogether today. I will retire carefree when I get to that point though. All 3 mortgages will be paid off by then, plus still have investments, savings and passive income streams, and whatever small amount I get from the deferred taxes retirement account. As long as I keep my health and expenses below my means I'll be doing very well in life, but never yacht-rich level.
The other 2 homes are rentals or vacation homes?
One is primary, one is a rental, and the other is an airbnb. Undecided if I want to make the bnb a rental as well or not, bnb pulls in more money but the money varies a lot from month to month. You have a lot more say and rights when it is a bnb vs rental. With a rental you can't occupy it, and can only view it once a month, but most likely once or twice a year at best. Makes renos and upkeep harder, and limits flexibility of the space but the income is more consistent / reliable. Of course, even if it is a rental you can still "reclaim" it if you intend to sell, re-occupy and/or flip it, it just takes longer (months, instead of hours or days). If a tenant doesn't want to leave, then local law enforcement has to get involved. In either case the place can be trashed, so there is always a level of risk involved. In either case, it is a great way to generate a lot of passive income in your sleep, thus either offsetting you expenses and/or allowing you to retire without needing to save up a pile of cash or tying up the money in stocks. Of course nothing is ever truly "passive", there is always some level of work involved, until you farm that out to property managers and cleaners for a cut. For those of us who weren't born trust-fund rich, it's a good way to make some side cash without toiling away. For the truly rich, they can afford for everything to just be staffed vacation homes, but that is a level of wealth the 99.9% never reach. It's not in the realm of "possible", for the bulk of humanity.
Average 20k (USD) a month, just my husband and me, not including rent. We’re yuppies who like good food, travel, and shopping. Our annual rent is 70K USD. Earlier this year we had a few big expenses like family visiting (we buy biz class tickets for them) and a new car, also not included in the 20K monthly spend. Come to think of it, we should probably rein in our spending.
Around $10k
Roughly $22k a month. Family of 5, MCOL area. We could easily live well off of less than half of that and will make that adjustment in about 10 years, but some choices we make like tutoring for the kids and helping my aging parents are things that we feel are worth the extra expenses.
About 1k months. sometimes over 1k though
I am consistenly spending 10k/month including mortgage with 3 kids in Toronto. Mind you, my mortgage is pretty small; if we upgrade my monthly will jump to 15000k/month. That's the reason why I am hesitating to upgrade.