I'm somewhat amazed on what people say they live on. I saw one guy said his annual budget is $15k!? How is that even possible in America.
Even after I pay off my mortgage, my property taxes, HOA, insurance and light maintenance will still run $20k/year. I'm sure my expenses will drop considerably once my kids are grown and hopefully financially independent but I can't see how DW and I can get any lower than 80k/year including health care costs and that is with cutting travel to the bone.
I'm not interested in a retirement where we have to live with roommates and live off ramen. I already did that in college.
For those couples living on less than $60k/year, how do you do it? What does your budget look like?
I think it is also personality type. Some people view it as some sort of wierd game of “how cheap can I be”?
These are the sorts of people that will go into a restaurant, get extra lemon wedges with their water, use 8 sugar packets, just to avoid spending $3.00 on a lemonade. They seem to take great pride on things like that. To each his own, but I have no desire to live my life that way...