What do you consider a comfortable annual salary?

Groundswell

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VaB said:
It's relative to location but in general $50k or the ability to cover the minimum expenses without worry about food or rent will get that stress off you. After that, it's not until $5,000,000 that you really see a difference. In between you just buy nicer versions of the same sh!t.
This. Nicer car, nicer house, better schools, etc. It's all a variation.
 

rice

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Jul 2, 2002
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To me, it's all about your mortgage. You buy your house for $150K? Or $750K?
 

bird.LA

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Jul 14, 2002
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VaB said:
It's relative to location but in general $50k or the ability to cover the minimum expenses without worry about food or rent will get that stress off you. After that, it's not until $5,000,000 that you really see a difference. In between you just buy nicer versions of the same sh!t.
Not even close to accurate here
 

Kento

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Jan 11, 2002
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Muscles said:
Kento said:
Throw a few family ski/snowboard trips (a weekend in Mammoth runs into the thousands) and a solid vacation or two in the mix, I'd say closer to $200K/year, at least living in SoCal
It's insane how much Mammoth trips cost. My wife and I went for two nights and spent almost $1500.
Yep. $300+ for lift tickets, $700 for lodging, $200 for food, $150 for gas to get there and back, lessons for kids a few more hundred, it adds up really fast. I guess I should be thankful I got as much skiing/boarding in as I did because as much as I'd like to pass it on to my kids, it's looking pretty grim.

Pretty much in the red every month without ski trips and now wife is insisting on all these home repair projects which cost way more than we can really afford.

But right now, it's not even about the money. It's about peace of mind and even just a little free time to myself. I would kill for a solo surf trip but never happen. Hell, I haven't even surfed double digit days so far this year and it grates at my soul. And because my sessions are so intermittent, when I do surf, it's far, far off my potential, which is frustrating. Even just one 3-hour session in even marginal waves with no people (this is the key) would be a godsend at this point. Even just a couple hours of solo outdoor time where I can just chill without any sensory interference (no kids screaming, no TV, no phones ringing, no phone notifications, no fluorescent office lights, no drones overhead, etc., etc., etc.), just taking in nature would be huge for my sanity. On the bright side, if I know I'm going crazy, I must not be insane. :shrug:
 

Subway

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VaB said:
It's relative to location but in general $50k or the ability to cover the minimum expenses without worry about food or rent will get that stress off you. After that, it's not until $5,000,000 that you really see a difference. In between you just buy nicer versions of the same sh!t.
wut? i started at my current job 12 years ago at $56 K per year (yes, in NYC...yes, it's brutal, but do-able)

I make far, far more now, and have for many years, but i also make far, far, far, far less than $5 million. I promise you there is a significant difference in comfort making more than $50K, but it doesn't have to be anywhere near $5 mil.

i would agree with your claim if it was like "the difference between making $400K and $500K"

But there are HUGE leaps in comfort even in increments of $20K per year, especially using $50K as your baseline

And that doesn't even factor in the number of, and quality of, the adventures and experiences you can purchase.

You ain't going to Tavarua making $50K per year, but it doesn't take $5mil to stay there either
 

Bob

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Apr 23, 2001
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" Buy a house where you'll like to live long term early and gain equity. "
Isn't this the problem? :shrug: :rock:
Place you like to live equals expensive to begin with
Early means you don't make a sh1tload of money
for a downpayment which you will need to make the mortgage.

great sounding advice though :jam_on:
 

bird.LA

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Jul 14, 2002
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Bob said:
" Buy a house where you'll like to live long term early and gain equity. "
Isn't this the problem? :shrug: :rock:
Place you like to live equals expensive to begin with
Early means you don't make a sh1tload of money
for a downpayment which you will need to make the mortgage.

great sounding advice though :jam_on:
I guess it worked pretty well for those born before 1975 or so?
 

Boneroni

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Mar 5, 2012
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Bob said:
" Buy a house where you'll like to live long term early and gain equity. "
Isn't this the problem? :shrug: :rock:
Place you like to live equals expensive to begin with
Early means you don't make a sh1tload of money
for a downpayment which you will need to make the mortgage.

great sounding advice though :jam_on:

Ugh, too true.


For me, a comfortable salary is what I get, which is only about $50K
But, it's only as comfortable for as long as the rent stays the same.

Comfortable enough to afford a house here? More like $400K per yer. :bricks:
 

GromsDad

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rice said:
To me, it's all about your mortgage. You buy your house for $150K? Or $750K?
Bought mine for under $70K in 1994. My housing costs are very very low. Having housing costs (including mortgage, taxes and insurance) under $1k per month is largely what makes the rest of my lifestyle possible. Buying a fixer upper beach house at 25 was the best financial move I ever made.
 

bird.LA

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GromsDad said:
rice said:
To me, it's all about your mortgage. You buy your house for $150K? Or $750K?
Bought mine for under $70K in 1994. My housing costs are very very low. Having housing costs (including mortgage, taxes and insurance) under $1k per month is largely what makes the rest of my lifestyle possible. Buying a fixer upper beach house at 25 was the best financial move I ever made.
How much do fixer uppers cost in your neighborhood now?
 

Subway

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fixer uppers up to half a million bucks here

nearly every home i see for sale in LB needs some or much fixing up, and they are all 500+

We SCORED 4 years ago and found a home on the market that was built in 91, making it virtually brand new by LB standards
 

SlicedFeet

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Dec 17, 2004
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I always trip out on how much money you guys make.

Case in point, the wife works in the healthcare industry, has a masters degree (almost all of her colleagues have advanced degrees) and makes peanuts compared to what you guys do. :socrazy:

I know sales is a different beast, but outside of that...

What even crazier is hearing about people employed by the city/state. When I hear them bitch about $$$, I just get reminded how hacked this whole place is. A lot of the city/state workers make way more than people in healthcare with tons of education behind them...not to mention their pensions. :D

If I could go back in time, the ONLY thing I would tell my younger self, get a job with the city/state...Wooderson tried to tell us from the getgo.
 

GromsDad

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Boneroni said:
Bob said:
" Buy a house where you'll like to live long term early and gain equity. "
Isn't this the problem? :shrug: :rock:
Place you like to live equals expensive to begin with
Early means you don't make a sh1tload of money
for a downpayment which you will need to make the mortgage.

great sounding advice though :jam_on:

Ugh, too true.


For me, a comfortable salary is what I get, which is only about $50K
But, it's only as comfortable for as long as the rent stays the same.

Comfortable enough to afford a house here? More like $400K per yer. :bricks:
The best advice my father ever gave me was to buy a house as soon as possible when I got married. We bought a fixer upper and put a lot of sweat equity into it. We rented a hole in the wall 1 bedroom apartment for two years while we both busted our asses and saved up for a down payment and paid off my wife's student loan. We never ate out or did anything extravagant those two years. We had scraped together $13,000 by the time we bought our house. Our combined income at the time was probably about $52,000. This was in 1994 and two years after graduating college.
 

casa_mugrienta

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SlicedFeet said:
I always trip out on how much money you guys make.

Case in point, the wife works in the healthcare industry, has a masters degree (almost all of her colleagues have advanced degrees) and makes peanuts compared to what you guys do. :socrazy:

I know sales is a different beast, but outside of that...

What even crazier is hearing about people employed by the city/state. When I hear them bitch about $$$, I just get reminded how hacked this whole place is. A lot of the city/state workers make way more than people in healthcare with tons of education behind them...not to mention their pensions. :D

If I could go back in time, the ONLY thing I would tell my younger self, get a job with the city/state...Wooderson tried to tell us from the getgo.
Very well put.

In addition I'd say if you're going to self employ in whatever way do something somehow associated with the federal government. Most people I know who are heading in the direction of being very, very well off financially are involved in business where they are either selling products to the fed gov or using federally owned/maintained resources in their enterprise.

And pensions? On the East Coast, from what I understand, are even crazier. NYC bus drivers retire and develop small real estate empires, etc.
 

GromsDad

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bird. said:
GromsDad said:
rice said:
To me, it's all about your mortgage. You buy your house for $150K? Or $750K?
Bought mine for under $70K in 1994. My housing costs are very very low. Having housing costs (including mortgage, taxes and insurance) under $1k per month is largely what makes the rest of my lifestyle possible. Buying a fixer upper beach house at 25 was the best financial move I ever made.
How much do fixer uppers cost in your neighborhood now?
Just hit Zillow and the lowest priced 3 bedroom single family in my town is listed for $289,900. Its a fixer upper similar to how mine was when I bought it. In my town these days its unlikely someone will buy it and fix it up though. A developer will probably buy it and tear it down and build a house they can sell for $650,000 to $1,000,000. Here is a picture from the listing. Take note of the monstrosity next to it. That's the norm now in my town. Given the nice corner lot this house sits on there is no doubt a developer will grab it and tear it down for the lot.

 

casa_mugrienta

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GromsDad said:
bird. said:
GromsDad said:
rice said:
To me, it's all about your mortgage. You buy your house for $150K? Or $750K?
Bought mine for under $70K in 1994. My housing costs are very very low. Having housing costs (including mortgage, taxes and insurance) under $1k per month is largely what makes the rest of my lifestyle possible. Buying a fixer upper beach house at 25 was the best financial move I ever made.
How much do fixer uppers cost in your neighborhood now?
Just hit Zillow and the lowest priced 3 bedroom single family in my town is listed for $289,900. Its a fixer upper similar to how mine was when I bought it. In my town these days its unlikely someone will buy it and fix it up though. A developer will probably buy it and tear it down and build a house they can sell for $650,000 to $1,000,000. Here is a picture from the listing. Take note of the monstrosity next to it. That's the norm now in my town. Given the nice corner lot this house sits on there is no doubt a developer will grab it and tear it down for the lot.


Bold added for emphasis.

How do you figure out the value of a teardown property?
 

Sharkbiscuit

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casa_mugrienta said:
And pensions? On the East Coast, from what I understand, are even crazier. NYC bus drivers retire and develop small real estate empires, etc.
My Dad worked for the NYC Transit Authority for 35 years, and then did some commercial driving, principally cement mixers, for 13 years in Florida.

His pension from the cement mixer more or less pays the taxes on his NYCTA pension + Social Security. I am under the impression the combo of all of that is around $50k

I don't buy this develop small real estate empires thing, per se, at least not anymore. My Dad knew lots of people who had a grandparent somewhere in the 5 boroughs, and that's where they claimed city residency, but they actually lived in Rockland County, aka BFE relative to NYC.

So I flatly reject they were doing this in the Tri State area.

But Florida, 20-30+ years ago?

I could see it. Real Estate is still pretty cheap and when we moved in the 1980s, it was basically free. My mom had a good job working in a large pharma's auditing department after going to Deloitte out of college. My Dad dropped out in the 8th grade so he was at ground zero. We lived in a shitbox house in far Northwest Passaic County, New Jersey, and when we had the house under radon testing before we moved out, we had all the doors and windows open, at elevation, in North Jersey, after Christmas.

But with Dad cleaning pools and mom with an accounting job, plus NJ housing vs FL (30 years ago) housing, we could afford a house on the barrier island, and while that's easy in North Florida, it's not anymore on that income where this was.

Currently, 32963,median household income is 117, average household income is 175, per capita 90, median home 658, average home, 944.

So I would say that while NYC bus drivers could do that in Florida 30+ years ago, that had more to do with anyone who had a pot to **** in and a window to throw it out of in the Tri State area immediately became Florida-rich when they sold a pile of burnt bricks in Mott Haven and drove on down, than it did with earning riches driving NYC buses.
 

CutnSnip

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Probably dropping in on you, California
its just a different time than it was even 10 years ago. $ just isnt going that far.

I make about 175K annually. Not bad for LA - wont get me a house in a good location but I can rent and save until one day it might.

I would be super comfy with 250K here and a house in Central LA would be in reach in a very short time.