If you’re making 150k and are living paycheck to paycheck you either live in a crazy expensive area or are a total fucking idiot when it comes to managing your money.
Rent in NYC where I live is insane. My partner and I recently toured a place where they broke up the basement of a building into 4 apartments, none of which had a real bedroom, and were asking for $3k each
This is a trend everywhere, I just recently moved to different apartment and I’d say 8/10 apartments I saw on Zillow and the other sites were these “open concept” or whatever 1 bedrooms and hallway kitchens. It’s depressing
Try making $150k in a “reasonably priced area.” It can be done, but is not the norm. The problem is that to make a good salary, you have to be in a place that pays those wages. Obviously, this attracts more people, so real estate is more expensive.
The trick is to make $150k in some kind of sweet spot where housing does not compensate. But it’s always a moving target and is extremely difficult. Then in you lose your job? Start all over again.
Yeah, my job went remote in 2020 and this year I moved out of the city and just bought my first house in my home state where the cost of living is almost 1/2 of my former city. I could’ve would’ve never bought a place where I was before. I’m sure someone would have loaned me the money but that felt like a death sentence for my small amount of disposable income.
I make $150k and learned to manage a very strict budget living in the city. Now I have some disposable income and my own house with a yard.
I started working remotely and then left America. Now I live in a very low cost of living city and haven’t owed more than 1-2% taxes in years… It blows my mind that more people don’t do this.
Qualifying for the FEIE (stay out of America for 330 days per year) means you don’t pay taxes on the first $120k you earn. Maxing out the 401k ($22,500) will reduce taxable income as well so it’s really like the first $142,500 is tax free.
Because in your world, mobile home trailer parks are free or even exist in urban areas. Come on. A studio apartment around here starts at $1600/mo. The average home sale price in this area in 2022 was $580k. At 10% down, 30 year fixed, at 6.5% interest, after taxes and fees, that’s a mortgage payment of about $4000/mo. Plus about $300-600/mo if you have an HOA/COA. Plus repairs as needed.
Your net take home pay at $150k, after taxes only, is about $9k, making your mortgage 45% of your income. That doesn’t include health insurance, retirement, or any other paycheck deductions.
It doesn’t include transportation: payments, gas, repairs, tolls, or insurance.
That doesn’t include utilities: gas, electric, water, trash, phone, or internet.
That doesn’t include food, supplies, clothing, or personal care.
And it sure as shit doesn’t include medical issues. God help you if you’re a diabetic.
And kids? What are you, fucking Rockefeller? Daycare, schooling (yes, even public schools cost money because of all the extras they ask you to provide like supplies, lunch, etc), and all their needs. At at least 16 years before they might be able to pay rent, that’s a long time for a free tenant sharing your resources.
Plus all of life’s extra costs.
And looking at Zillow, I can’t find any properties within 10 miles of me going for less than $600k. They got townhomes for 1.2 million just down the block. $580k for a house is gonna be hard to find, and probably not in the best condition. Doable, possibly, but not easy.
Hmmm you’re not going to be making 150k a year in a shit fly over state.
I moved from the Bay Area to the East side of Washington near Seattle, folks here don’t make as much as I do for sure, at least not on average. We both have good salaries so we can afford a lot of things. We essentially got to keep most of our bay area salaries.
But even then if we need a big repair we still have to sit down and plan out the money.
I can’t even imagine what it’s like for folks around here.
I’m a level 2 Engineer and I make close to what you’re making TC. Hopefully maybe more come next year. And I don’t work for the big 5. I work for a hospital group. Seniors make well close to double that in TC. Principals make slightly more.
Also there are more jobs for higher levels than in non tech hubs. Career wise you’ll probably be making more complex systems too.
You have it good for sure, but you’re the outlier my guy.
I know that, I was just refuting the claim that “your not going to make that kind of money in a flyover state”, it is possible, and you don’t have to work the big 5 here either, and the cost of living is way less.
Hi, this is pretty much me, and I concur. If you can’t live on $150k then you are definitely making some questionable decisions. That’s around $8k/m take home. Even if you are spending $4k on rent/mortgage, you should have plenty left over to live on.
Yeah, if you’re a single man who doesn’t have anyone to take care of and has no physical or mental health problems $150k is great. If you’re part of a house with two incomes you’re probably OK. If you’re on a single incoming supporting parents with disabilities, kids, partners with disabilities, or any combination of similar things, you can maybe get by on $150k as long as you never fuck up and everything goes perfectly in your life and you don’t care about or try to help anyone else.
Edit: and I say man, because men are less likely to take on caregiver roles that cost large amounts of money.
My wife is disabled FYI. I get what you are saying, but there is still a good amount of wiggle room in our budget. I also still don’t really like the idea of lumping kids, which are a choice with a very clear financial impact, in the same category as dealing with illness and disability. That doesn’t seem to be a good faith argument.
A society where having kids is an unsustainable financial decision is a society that can’t continue to exist, and a society where caregiving for someone with a disability or having one yourself makes life impossible is also a society that can’t continue to exist.
There are also a ton of other factors that can easily push someone over the edge. “We have lots of wiggle room” is great for you but lots of people don’t… And even if someone did make a mistake, why should some small mistake put someone in inescapable debt?
I just think the idea that $150k is fine and everyone who can’t make it is an idiot isn’t taking in to account the obvious data that shows the opposite.
It does always strike me as ridiculous when we live in a world where continuing the existence of the human race is considered bad financial planning. No wonder birth rates are declining massively when the incentives are all on personal productivity and streamlining your life rather than having/raising a family. I don’t plan to have children for a number of reasons, but the fact that society is filled with active disincentives certainly doesn’t help persuade me otherwise.
In California, a new mortgage payment is 8-15k/month. Rent on an apartment is 3-4k/month. $150k salary isn’t enough for the mortgage and will struggle to cover that cost of rent.
Or you only consider your expenses after savings and think that you are “living paycheck to paycheck” because you use up all your non-invested money by the end of the month.
If you’re making 150k and are living paycheck to paycheck you either live in a crazy expensive area or are a total fucking idiot when it comes to managing your money.
Rent in NYC where I live is insane. My partner and I recently toured a place where they broke up the basement of a building into 4 apartments, none of which had a real bedroom, and were asking for $3k each
This is a trend everywhere, I just recently moved to different apartment and I’d say 8/10 apartments I saw on Zillow and the other sites were these “open concept” or whatever 1 bedrooms and hallway kitchens. It’s depressing
Look at the positive side. When sea levels start rising, you’d be first to notice that!
Try making $150k in a “reasonably priced area.” It can be done, but is not the norm. The problem is that to make a good salary, you have to be in a place that pays those wages. Obviously, this attracts more people, so real estate is more expensive.
The trick is to make $150k in some kind of sweet spot where housing does not compensate. But it’s always a moving target and is extremely difficult. Then in you lose your job? Start all over again.
You just explained how work from home jobs will transform how people buy housing and where they buy it.
Let’s pump up the flyover real estate market?
Yeah, my job went remote in 2020 and this year I moved out of the city and just bought my first house in my home state where the cost of living is almost 1/2 of my former city. I
could’vewould’ve never bought a place where I was before. I’m sure someone would have loaned me the money but that felt like a death sentence for my small amount of disposable income.I make $150k and learned to manage a very strict budget living in the city. Now I have some disposable income and my own house with a yard.
I started working remotely and then left America. Now I live in a very low cost of living city and haven’t owed more than 1-2% taxes in years… It blows my mind that more people don’t do this.
Where did you go? And how do you not pay fed taxes working for an American company? Or is it a foreign company?
Georgia (the country) and Turkey mostly.
Qualifying for the FEIE (stay out of America for 330 days per year) means you don’t pay taxes on the first $120k you earn. Maxing out the 401k ($22,500) will reduce taxable income as well so it’s really like the first $142,500 is tax free.
I work for an American company as a W2 employee.
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Because in your world, mobile home trailer parks are free or even exist in urban areas. Come on. A studio apartment around here starts at $1600/mo. The average home sale price in this area in 2022 was $580k. At 10% down, 30 year fixed, at 6.5% interest, after taxes and fees, that’s a mortgage payment of about $4000/mo. Plus about $300-600/mo if you have an HOA/COA. Plus repairs as needed.
Your net take home pay at $150k, after taxes only, is about $9k, making your mortgage 45% of your income. That doesn’t include health insurance, retirement, or any other paycheck deductions.
It doesn’t include transportation: payments, gas, repairs, tolls, or insurance.
That doesn’t include utilities: gas, electric, water, trash, phone, or internet.
That doesn’t include food, supplies, clothing, or personal care.
And it sure as shit doesn’t include medical issues. God help you if you’re a diabetic.
And kids? What are you, fucking Rockefeller? Daycare, schooling (yes, even public schools cost money because of all the extras they ask you to provide like supplies, lunch, etc), and all their needs. At at least 16 years before they might be able to pay rent, that’s a long time for a free tenant sharing your resources.
Plus all of life’s extra costs.
And looking at Zillow, I can’t find any properties within 10 miles of me going for less than $600k. They got townhomes for 1.2 million just down the block. $580k for a house is gonna be hard to find, and probably not in the best condition. Doable, possibly, but not easy.
Hmmm you’re not going to be making 150k a year in a shit fly over state.
I moved from the Bay Area to the East side of Washington near Seattle, folks here don’t make as much as I do for sure, at least not on average. We both have good salaries so we can afford a lot of things. We essentially got to keep most of our bay area salaries.
But even then if we need a big repair we still have to sit down and plan out the money.
I can’t even imagine what it’s like for folks around here.
I live in Nebraska, and all comp included make around 155k per year salary + bonus. You can make that kind of money even here in the “shit”
What’s your title?
I’m a software architect, though even when I was just a senior java developer I was making 130k, software pays well even in the fly overs.
I’m a level 2 Engineer and I make close to what you’re making TC. Hopefully maybe more come next year. And I don’t work for the big 5. I work for a hospital group. Seniors make well close to double that in TC. Principals make slightly more.
Also there are more jobs for higher levels than in non tech hubs. Career wise you’ll probably be making more complex systems too.
You have it good for sure, but you’re the outlier my guy.
I know that, I was just refuting the claim that “your not going to make that kind of money in a flyover state”, it is possible, and you don’t have to work the big 5 here either, and the cost of living is way less.
Go look at a mortgage or even rent in any major city.
Hi, this is pretty much me, and I concur. If you can’t live on $150k then you are definitely making some questionable decisions. That’s around $8k/m take home. Even if you are spending $4k on rent/mortgage, you should have plenty left over to live on.
Do you have kids?
I’m pretty sure I covered the questionable decisions.
Yeah, if you’re a single man who doesn’t have anyone to take care of and has no physical or mental health problems $150k is great. If you’re part of a house with two incomes you’re probably OK. If you’re on a single incoming supporting parents with disabilities, kids, partners with disabilities, or any combination of similar things, you can maybe get by on $150k as long as you never fuck up and everything goes perfectly in your life and you don’t care about or try to help anyone else.
Edit: and I say man, because men are less likely to take on caregiver roles that cost large amounts of money.
My wife is disabled FYI. I get what you are saying, but there is still a good amount of wiggle room in our budget. I also still don’t really like the idea of lumping kids, which are a choice with a very clear financial impact, in the same category as dealing with illness and disability. That doesn’t seem to be a good faith argument.
A society where having kids is an unsustainable financial decision is a society that can’t continue to exist, and a society where caregiving for someone with a disability or having one yourself makes life impossible is also a society that can’t continue to exist.
There are also a ton of other factors that can easily push someone over the edge. “We have lots of wiggle room” is great for you but lots of people don’t… And even if someone did make a mistake, why should some small mistake put someone in inescapable debt?
I just think the idea that $150k is fine and everyone who can’t make it is an idiot isn’t taking in to account the obvious data that shows the opposite.
It does always strike me as ridiculous when we live in a world where continuing the existence of the human race is considered bad financial planning. No wonder birth rates are declining massively when the incentives are all on personal productivity and streamlining your life rather than having/raising a family. I don’t plan to have children for a number of reasons, but the fact that society is filled with active disincentives certainly doesn’t help persuade me otherwise.
Kids are not always a choice, especially now that abortion is illegal in so many places.
In addition, the idea that if you don’t have enough money then you just don’t get to have a family seems abhorrent.
In California, a new mortgage payment is 8-15k/month. Rent on an apartment is 3-4k/month. $150k salary isn’t enough for the mortgage and will struggle to cover that cost of rent.
Terrible assumption
Student loans
Or you only consider your expenses after savings and think that you are “living paycheck to paycheck” because you use up all your non-invested money by the end of the month.
100% agree
PS: porque no los dos?
It’s both. People try to always live above their means. Inflation causes that to catch up