La di da, bored waiting at the doctor's office...
In order to live in your area, how much income would you need to be comfortable, with a kid? (By comfortable I mean not living paycheck to paycheck, saving some money, et cetera).
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According to this article, for my area, it would be $156k.
http://www.businessinsider.com/salary-to-live-in-major-us-cities-2015-8 -
@catlady: my city says 130k. I live in the suburbs though. Sounds about right for the city. I have a friends whos rent just went up 25%.
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@catlady: interesting, thanks for that link that sounds about right to be modestly comfortable, but not living IN the city. I feel like housing should be more.
Apparently around $160,000 according to that.
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@Foodnerd81: Yes, I agree. I just realized that the article is giving the "take home" income. So I guess it would be more like 200k gross income.
Wow.
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@catlady: yeah that makes more sense! And assuming the "metro area" is pretty broad. I think you could be more comfortable in someplace like JP than beacon hill on that. I'm actually surprised how close some of the other cities are to us. Also we've been house hunting and wondering who is buying all these houses!?
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$122k according to that article. Sounds about right.
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According to the article 122k for Houston. I actually live an hour south in a rural area and would say around 100k would even be cushy.
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About 156k according to the article for Boston. I'd say that's about spot on, i think we came up with 150k on our own before as minimum salary for dh for me to be a stay at home fairly comfortably.
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$170,000 for NYC. I would think more.
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I'm in Toronto so it's a pretty big range. My guess is between $50-$100k a year.
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Like have no worries? A million, with at least 10 in savings, lol.
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$170k take home (prob about $250k gross) according to the article from catlady. Sounds about right, my husband and I gross what would sound like a lot for most other parts of the country but we rent and drive 15+ year old cars. I couldn't dream of owning a home here anytime soon. I always wonder how people who make less survive here or on the flip side, what it is that people do for a living that they can afford the absurdly high housing prices.
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70k for Charlottesville (central) Virginia, although this doesn't include savings (I looked at the cost of living link in the article). That seems pretty spot-on to me- my husband makes less than this, but we don't spend any money on childcare.
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@stiletto_mom: the globe and mail says $209,000. There is no way we could live on $100k here. Childcare alone would take half of that.
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That article says 122K take-home which is probably about right. Probably closer to 100K take-home if you live in the 'burbs.
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For Los Angeles it lists $141,000 takehome. That seems somewhat accurate. However what really had me laughing was the $1,400 months the chart estimates for housing. You can't even rent a storage unit for that amount, much less appropriate housing for a family.
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The housing and childcare amounts for my city in that link seem really low (like, housing should be at least doubled and the childcare amount would not get you full-time care for one child at any daycare I've ever seen, let alone two) but the overall amount ($133k take-home) seems fairly accurate. I guess we just have less discretionary spending than it assumes?
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@oliviaoblivia: I was thinking child-free and single income. XD
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Says $133k for Seattle. I would have guessed around $150k so sounds about right
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$400-500k a year, just based on real estate prices.
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The article said $125K for where we live. I think that's about right IF you don't have heinous student loans like we do and stay out of the expensive "it" neighborhoods. We live in the burbs so it's cheaper but we have student loans up the wazoo (thankfully we paid mine off this year and are hacking away at DH's).
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@Alba4: Agree. We know people with kids making that much or thereabouts and they don't struggle but they aren't super comfortable. Like probably aren't saving anything and in some debt.
Honestly, I think in NYC (Manhattan) to be legitimately comfortable (with kids) it's more like $300k MINIMUM. -
@PurplePeony: The housing and childcare seem really low to me too- they are probably twice as much as the estimate (where can you even get full time daycare for 2 kids for $1000 a month total?)
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@looch: yep. Haha. I feel like no matter how much we put in savings it will never feel like enough.
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@looch: haha ditto.
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Do people actually make this type of money?! This is blowing my mind.
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@stargal: haha yeah someone already posted for my area and we aren't even making close to that and I actually feel fine. If something were to happen we still have several areas in which we could cut back, to me that sounds comfortable. But maybe I'm just simple lol
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@stargal: I looked up ave household income for our city and it was about 65% of what the website says you'd need to live comfortably. So at least in our city there was a big difference in what people were actually living off of, though I guess savings takes a hit for most people.
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@stargal: This sounds terrible but it blows my mind that people pay so little in other parts of the country. Here, yes, you do need to make that much to afford housing + childcare and still put a good amount towards retirement. That said, I think many people around here don't make that much and they just don't save for retirement. It's a problem.
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I'm betting you can live comfortably with around $60-80k where I live. You'd have to live modestly, but definitely comfortably.
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@catlady: Yes, I think that's the case, that they don't save. It's not that they don't want to, but I have lived in NYC (20 years ago) making $35,000 a year and after rent and expenses, there just wasn't anything left to save for retirement.
I have severe money anxiety, though, it's not healthy either. I even feel if we were making a million, I would be unable to relax.
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@stargal: @catlady: I think you also have to remember this is talking about the actual city. If we want to live in the city, or someplace close without a huge commute, yeah. It takes that much. It's insane. We pay so much for housing to live in the city with a short commute and our local park has broken glass in it on a regular basis.
Yet when DH suggests we move to a lower cost of living area I balk.
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@stargal: my answer was super high, but that's what it would take (or more, honestly) to buy a 3 bedroom in my city, and since we have two kids, I would feel way more "comfortable" in a 3 bedroom. So I put the number that would get us a 3 bedroom, and where I would finally feel like we're comfortable financially. Comfortable is better than "surviving" or "getting by" or "doing okay with a strict budget" in my mind.
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