Y'all have a really inflated sense of how expensive Manhattan is. Don't get me wrong, it is expensive, but when I made $75K while living in Manhattan, I was able to not only get by but also save somewhere in the ballpark of ten grand between my 401K and bank account. And that was while I was eating out all the time, getting delivery food, smoking, going out and drinking like a normal 20-something, spending money on entertainment, etc. So my conscious efforts at saving money were pretty low. My apartment (my share of a 2BR) on the Upper East Side of Manhattan cost $1,250 a month. So clearly, that's a lot on the grand scheme of things, but there's no need to spend $3,000 if you don't want to. On the other hand, I probably spent only about $200 a month on transportation-related expenses. Cars are fucking expensive, and if you live in New York, you don't need one. The median American pays about $7,000 in car-related costs annually, whereas I was paying a third of that.
He lives in a fairly pricey city. I pay a bit over that for my 1 BR in Chicago, and while my apartment is nice, and I like my neighborhood, I'm not living in luxury. You can't really compare Ohio and a major city. That state is notoriously cheap. The rents my friends pay in Cleveland and Cincinnati make me want to punch myself in the face. Get a 2-3BR house in Chicago for under $200K (house, not apartment) is not going to put you in a nice area. Point being, its not all apples to apples. I'm above $75K (by a bit, not a mile) but between high rent as mentioned, and saving to make up for the years in which I was making less than $40K and saving nothing, and student loans, I'm not swimming in excess cash. I'm assuming they have 2 smart phones with data, that's not a wildly inflated number to me.
This is one of the biggest reasons why I would move to another country in a heartbeat! Plus I believe we get fewer holidays than our friends in the north. I love to travel. I think I'm on an airplane going to another location for pleasure about 6 times per year. This is where much of my money goes, and its worth it to me. And I live in a "cheap" city (kansas city) and you can't' get a decent house for $100K around here. There is very little public transportation, so factor in car, insurance, gas, parking, etc. I have to pay $60/month in parking and basically work in a not great part of town (on Troost for any KC folks)
Yeah, you must be spending like an asshole, my wife and I were living off of about $80k combined in Boston and still had plenty for savings. Edit: To be fair though, we didn't own a house, so we weren't buying furniture or repairing shit.
If you ever want to make yourself unhappy, add up what you pay for insurance in any given year. Between auto, homeowner's, flood, life, and health, it's an appalling amount of money.
I used to be a buyer in the dart industry so we dealt with the UK a lot. It seemed like every other Monday they were on a bank holiday. They also didn't have lots of air conditioned buildings. The guy was always commenting about how many fans he had in his office. When he came over to visit he was tickled pink he had a car with air conditioning. Talked about it quite a bit. And their work ethic is much different. "Oh, didn't we ship that? Huh, looks like we didn't make them. We'll get them to you next week. Have a great day!" (Would also NOT get them the following week.)
Where in Boston though? Im guessing either in Allston/Brighton or South Boston, couldnt have been anywhere near downtown. And that goes the same with any city. You can live on the outer edges and pay much less than you would as the closer inward you get. Unless you live in Hartford. I lived in downtown Hartford for 1.5 years and paid $900 a month for an awesome 3-bedroom split between me and 2 other guys. The surrounding city? Not so awesome.
Yeah, it was Brighton, which is cheaper than living in Back Bay of course, but I was comparing it to Midwestern suburbs.
Man, y'all are rich or just retarded with money if you think $75k isn't a lot to get by on in any city. Some places really do suck for cost of living though, now after a couple months of tracking my money I realize why I'm getting all this extra money just for being in Germany. Oil heating is retarded expensive and they have 19% tax on everything here. Still though, I'm making almost double what I was making stateside simply for doing the same job I do, but in a different country so that extra that goes into savings is nice.
I can say for certain, since we've been looking for apartments, you aren't going to find a great one bedroom for less than $1,300 - and that's the 'teaser price.' You have to remember, the renters market is tough because it's still tough to get a mortgage, so more people are renting. In Philadelphia, if you live in Old City (like I do), Center City, or Fairmount Park, you're going to pay for that privilege. Why? Because everything's accessible. You go to Queen Village, South Philly, or Fishtown, you'll pay a lot less, but then have to pay to get anywhere, and public transportation is tough from those areas. I hardly think my wife and I are 'retarded.' We eat out once a week (pizza, for $26). I pay for car insurance, parking ($165 a month, which is cheap as shit), and as said earlier, our combined phone plan is about $180, for two phones, data plans, etc. I cook most of the time, we don't go out drinking, we dump money in savings, take one nice vacation a year. We have pet food bills, vet bills, etc. My point isn't that 75K isn't a nice income, it is, but it is not a windfall by any stretch. I live in the Northeast, which tends to be one of the more expensive areas in the country. There are plusses and minuses to this, of course. But you're not on easy street by any stretch with 75 K in decent parts of Philadelphia. I suspect that's true in any Northern City. Our combined income is more than that, but we're both very finance conscious, and plan for emergencies. Could we live more extravagantly? Yes, undoubtedly. But we don't, and that's just a choice we make. Others might make different choices, and that's perfectly fine. You factor in a couple of kids with food, clothes, and other expenses, and you'll run out of money quick if you're not careful at 75 K. While 75 K might be the magic number in the midwest (and I lived there for years, and thought it was a decent place with decent folks) on the East Coast, if you plan on emergencies, or have kids, 75 K will get you by, but you probably won't get ahead.
I think we are also conflating single to married. Splitting 75k in a big city can be a stretch. A single person or a couple that each make 75 are going to live quite a bit nicer.
Oh Christ, single and 75K? Say you don't need a car? Yeah, you're going to be doing ok at that amount.
Yeah, I thought this is what the whole discussion was about, either a single person without kids making 75K or a couple without kids making 150k combined. Both are going to be fine anywhere. I agree with what VI said though, 75k family income with kids in a Northeast city isn't going to cover much more than what most of us view as the basics.
2 people on 75k would be hard enough, adding kids into the mix must be really tough. 75k even in rural areas is not easy.
Rent is the biggest factor here, cause its kind of an overhead cost. Provided, for this discussion, you're not escalating your housing with more money, then the "comfort" factor comes into play. If I made another $5-$10K, id likely stay in my same apartment and all of a sudden, my savings would ramp up and my comparative "comfort" would as well. For me, getting the significant raise to get me where I am now, also coincided with moving into my own place and the 50% increase in rent that brought, as well as student loans becoming due. If I was still with roommates, then yes, I'd probably be living like a king.
As many people here have already said, what Sack wants to do is entirely doable in the right part of the country. My wife and I bring in about $60k total. We pay extra each month on our mortgage. We will have our car paid off next year, 1 yr ahead of schedule (our other car we own outright). We both still have student loans. We have 0 credit card debt, and live as if we go paycheck to paycheck, but in reality we save (both to my 401k and to a savings account). Also, my wife insists on a tithe to our church (which we do post tax). And, we have a child (3 days of daycare a week). Right now, and until I get a raise (possibly in the next month) we live a little boring, but I don't think I would have it any other way. It helps that we have family around - my mom and her mom both watch our son for us - so that allows us to live more comfortably. Another 15k/yr total for us would be so enormous I don't even know where it would go. Definitely a big chunk to the 401k. Maybe a bigger vacation 1x per year.
me working full time and The Husband in the army, we don't make that combined. Bleh. That said, DFW is ridiculously cheap to live.
My girlfriend and I have a $1600/month mortgage on a 1400 sq. ft house about 15 minutes away from downtown Seattle. She and I gross close to 100k combined with no state income tax. While we aren't exactly struggling, we aren't rich either. We have oceans, mountains, deserts, wine country, a rain forest, legalized marijuana, Indian casinos, and microbrews out the buttocks. I love it here and would have to be paid an exorbitant amount of money at a new job somewhere else comparable to even consider leaving.