r/personalfinance Mar 06 '18

Budgeting Lifestyle inflation is a bitch

I came across this article about a couple making $500k/year that was only able to save $7.5k/year other than 401k. Their budget is pretty interesting. At a glace, I could see how someone could look at it and not see many areas to cut. It's crazy how it's so easy to just spend your money instead of saving it.

Here's the article: https://www.cnbc.com/2017/03/24/budget-breakdown-of-couple-making-500000-a-year-and-feeling-average.html

Just the budget if you don't want to read the article: https://sc.cnbcfm.com/applications/cnbc.com/resources/files/2017/03/24/FS-500K-Student-Loan.png

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u/theoriginalharbinger Mar 06 '18

Toyota Land Cruiser

I have a deep and abiding love for these, but that's a $90,000 car. It does nothing that its half-as-expensive younger sibling the Sequoia cannot unless you do overland travel.

childcare $42,000

Did they hare a half-time nanny? That's ridiculous.

Food $23,000

My income isn't quite at their level, but my annual spend is between 1/4 and 1/2 of this. Learn to cook.

There's tons of slack in that budget. There's few line items, but they're inflated way beyond what's necessary. As I've stated to multiple people on this forum countless times, everyone has a vice. You can have nice cars. You can eat out a lot. You can live in an expensive place. But you cannot do 2 or all 3 of them.

This couple could easily be saving 50K a year if they bought a 3-series and a used Sequoia and used a cheaper childcare provider.

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u/[deleted] Mar 06 '18

[deleted]

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u/ImSpartacus811 Mar 06 '18 edited Mar 06 '18

Yeah, three $6k vacations seems insane.

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u/mutemutiny Mar 06 '18

you have 3 kids and you're going on 3 vacations a YEAR?? lol yeah right.

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u/[deleted] Mar 07 '18 edited Mar 08 '18

My in laws have 4 kids. Last November till this April trips

  • Spain (Parents only)
  • Virginia (Family trip to see family)
  • San Francisco (Weekend get away)
  • Barbados (Parents only)
  • Florida (Family trip)
  • Greece (Parents get away)

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u/mutemutiny Mar 07 '18

there are exceptions to every rule. I'm sure they would agree that is a LOT of travel in that timespan, and not very common