Going to respond to 2 things in this. First talking about committed expenses and then about home warranties.
This "committed expense" view is exactly how I've viewed my expenses. Bit it is sort of freeing to think "discretionary" if I eliminated some of the committed expenses. After all, I could reduce my $1535 / month home costs to $800 if I rented a 900 sq ft apt if I wanted to. I could then spend $9k / year on travel instead. OR get my WR to 2.5% ! It may take a year or two , but it is possible to reprioritize and reduce the committed spend so that it equals the non-discretionary spend.
I agree that something that is a committed expense may not be one someday in the future (I just registered my kids for spring college classes yesterday so this is uppermost on my mind at the moment - college is one of those committed expenses I look forward to going away in the future).
To me, though, the key thing is that while you've committed to that expense you have it. It isn't discretionary at that moment without major upheaval (think of pets) but it something that over time you can make a different commitment.
A point to me on this is to realize that some expenses like that are part of what makes life worth living. It might technically be "discretionary" to have pets. But, I am absolutely sure that if I was in dire straits I would cut virtually any other expense (including moving to somewhere cheaper) before I would give up having a cat. So for me - cats just aren't very discretionary...
Home Warranties - I started on a post last night but didn't want to beat a dead horse, but jazz4cash's post caused me to decide to post again on it briefly.
FWIW, our home warranties haven't been horrible purchases. With a couple of exceptions (that plumbing nightmare I mentioned) we had decent results with the home warranty and I think over the several years we had them at 3 different houses we broke even. The virtue of home warranties is that you get a very predictable number to budget for the types of appliances and home systems covered by the home warranty. (plans vary on what appliances and systems are covered). You have to estimate your service fee as that varies with numbers of claims but overall this is a more predictable way of budgeting for those expenses. It is not necessarily a
cheaper result, though. You may save money on the deal one year, while other years you lose money. I think it basically averaged out even for us.
We didn't renew the most recent home warranty because we didn't fine that predictability valuable enough to put up with the negatives of a home warranty. Others may indeed value that predictability more than we do. In which case, I could see sticking with the home warranty.
However, the main point I want to make (this is general and is not directed specifically to Alex) is that there are lots of home maintenance and repair costs that are not covered by a home warranty. The home warranty is limited in the types of things that it covers (as I discussed in my earlier post). So, even with a home warranty there is a need to budget for regular home maintenance, repair of things that are not covered by the home warranty, and reserves for things that might go beyond the max limit of the home warranty or for major things that will need to be done to most houses (roof replacement, repainting, recarpeting, etc.)