120K year Lifestyle

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cxr133

Dryer sheet aficionado
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Hi Guys i thought i saw a post similar to this along time ago but my search of 120K and the word lifestyle i could not locate any such post.

I know posters on this forum are different socioeconomic background and most have different nest eggs. But, we ran a Monte Carlo simulation and my 4% WD rate was right at 120K.

My question is for those living on or close to 120K a year . what's the lifestyle like?
i think my biggest concern with retirement is i dont know what the spending will look like and will want to do some slow travel.

we will need healthcare from the exchanges because my wife has asthma, i dont expect a mortgage because we can downsize our current house that is pad for , but planning on moving from Calif. probably to Florida, and then slow travel asia, europe 3-5 months at a time we had kids young so besides summer vacation to cancun, florida we never really got a chance to travel.

we are planning retiring Mid50s so this is the amount we have to live off until 67 when SS kicks in.

i was reading the post by

@[B]mountainso[/B]st he stated how he was getting by on 55K. I was thinkin got myself there is no way we could survive on 55K​


Thanks so much

​

 
Alex The Great said:
$120K annually for a couple here in SF Bay Area is just to be barely alive. Property tax, health care and food.
Click to expand...

I'm sorry, but that made me laugh. Fellow CA here, so I get it. :D

To OP - I'm in Coastal S. CA, an area a bit less pricey the the SF Bay Area, but still very pricey. We do not, but could definitely, live on $120,000 a year, and quite well. In playing with my budget numbers, it would allow for all necessary expenses such as taxes, insurance, utilities, and food, plus a good $20-$30,000 to play with.

Have you made a budget and tested it yet? Otherwise it seems a bit pie-in-the-sky of guesswork.
 
Depending on where you live, slow travel in areas such as Asia may yield a cheaper lifestyle than living in a high cost area in the US. 120k should be fine.

I agree, I live a six figure lifestyle now, so it is essential I plan accordingly.to continue. I have no desire to live below this.

Enjoy.
 
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Property taxes are high in FL. I know someone near Orlando, paid 550K two years ago. Their property taxes are $6500. But with a homestead exemption they are capped at a 3% increase per year after the initial hit. When looking for a home, don't go by what the current taxes are --that homeowner may have bought their home decades ago. The taxes will adjust when a new homeowner buys it.

Oh, and also homeowners insurance is crazy but you are probably used to that in CA.
 
I retired in 2017 at 55 and $120k was our annual budget. It was quite sufficient and we don’t really watch our spending. Granted, there’s lots of variables in the equation. We have no mortgage, cars are paid for and well maintained, live in a no income tax state, and generally live below our means. We’ve since increased our expense budget because we can, but $120k afforded us a very comfortable lifestyle, including travel.
 
I am in the greater LV area and our cost of living is higher than in N. Ca where we had moved from (not bay area). We cannot live on $120K a year. I just went back and visited my son who still lives in N. Ca and restaurant food is cheaper than where we live. We live on double that amount and feel that we are "comfortable". We do eat one meal out at a nice sitdown restaurant a day as we have for decades. We travel 3 months a year, but mainly to drive-to locations, we still golf when we are away from home. When we do travel to Europe and Asia, we spend another $30K or so as we only fly business class. Golfing is one of our large expense items. Country club membership is about $20K a year. Our HOA fees which don't cover anything for us (single family home) is another $7K a year. I pay full freight for health insurance just for me is $20K a year. Spouse's medical is about $10K a year.
 
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We snowbird between two paid-off homes in Texas (winter) and Vermont (summer), two cars, a pontoon boat, a jet ski, golf cart, play golf 1-2 times a week each, meals out every now and then, travel a bit and IMO live pretty well and spend ~$100k a year.

The big items for us are property taxes, income taxes, health insurance, utilities, travel, dining, food, golf, home and vehicle insurance. YMMV.
 
I live in Tampa Florida. Our budget is in this area. We like our lifestyle a lot. No mortgage. Our travel budget is around 20k yearly as is food and dining out. Our total discretionary is around 34%.
Yeah could spend more.
 
$120k would be just "ok" here in the Chicago suburbs, especially if the entire amount is fed and state taxable and you're trying to live an active lifestyle with travel, etc. And housing would be a major factor. If you're renting or paying a mortgage (on top of our sky-high property taxes), or living in a paid-off home which requires some regular maintenance expenditures, that would be a problem.
 
pb4uski said:
We snowbird between two paid-off homes in Texas (winter) and Vermont (summer), two cars, a pontoon boat, a jet ski, golf cart, play golf 1-2 times a week each, meals out every now and then, travel a bit and IMO live pretty well and spend ~$100k a year.

The big items for us are property taxes, income taxes, health insurance, utilities, travel, dining, food, golf, home and vehicle insurance. YMMV.
Click to expand...
Small world. We had a 2nd home in Sun City but sold it a couple of years ago. And I spent most of my career with a company based in Burlington, VT, so I traveled there often. Absolutely wonderful place during the summer!
 
You will need to elaborate a bit more on the 120K. Is it before or after taxes? If before, then is the 120K all taxable or only partly taxable? The answer to that changes your actual spendable income and also leads to the answer regarding health care. For example, if the 120K is all after tax $ (because you have lots of cash in your brokerage/bank accounts), then your HI may be inexpensive. If it is all before taxes, then your HI may be in the range of ~20K->30K/year (even if ACA continues to be around). Then, kids' related cost will need to be understood. You will need to know your spending picture after RE. If not, you have homework to do before FIRE.
 
cxr133 said:
Hi Guys i thought i saw a post similar to this along time ago but my search of 120K and the word lifestyle i could not locate any such post.

I know posters on this forum are different socioeconomic background and most have different nest eggs. But, we ran a Monte Carlo simulation and my 4% WD rate was right at 120K.

My question is for those living on or close to 120K a year . what's the lifestyle like?
i think my biggest concern with retirement is i dont know what the spending will look like and will want to do some slow travel.

we will need healthcare from the exchanges because my wife has asthma, i dont expect a mortgage because we can downsize our current house that is pad for , but planning on moving from Calif. probably to Florida, and then slow travel asia, europe 3-5 months at a time we had kids young so besides summer vacation to cancun, florida we never really got a chance to travel.

we are planning retiring Mid50s so this is the amount we have to live off until 67 when SS kicks in.

i was reading the post by

@[B]mountainso[/B]st he stated how he was getting by on 55K. I was thinkin got myself there is no way we could survive on 55K​


Thanks so much

​

Click to expand...
Depends.

Imagine you have a $1M mortgage on a home in Florida, with rising property insurance costs (especially post-hurricanes), HOA fees, and possible flood zone premiums—it can feel like you're barely staying afloat.

Now imagine you own a paid-off $1.5M condo in a low property-tax area like ultra expensive Cambridge, MA, where you’re insulated from climate risk, and the area offers walkability, excellent healthcare, and low carrying costs—you’re likely living quite comfortably.

The same $120K/year can feel either tight or abundant, depending on location, housing, healthcare needs, and lifestyle expectations.
 
We’re close to that. $125k ish/year. Western Colorado.
We still have a mortgage and plan to keep it, the rate is so low. That spend covers everything. We alternate buying new cars every 3-4 years. We travel freely, mostly road trips because we have dogs, but we book suites. Drink good wine. Buy all the sporting/photography equipment we want. We have land we pay property taxes on. We pay $500/year for HOA. Cell/internet/cable is less than $100 a month. We pay $1100 /month for health insurance.
Without trying, what helps us is we eat cheap, $600/month. Cook a lot at home, but still go out 2-3 times a month. Our utilities are low. Our taxes and insurance haven’t blown up yet. There really isn’t anything we go without.
 
When I retired, the only expense that changed was healthcare. We pay full price for it now. Otherwise, we are spending the same. We dress the same. Eat the same. Same hobbies. Our lifestyle did not change. We are the same people.

If you look at your current annual spend, look at what might change. Make sure you have a plan for health insurance and taxes. Then go through the categories and see what will change in retirement. If you have to buy 10 suits a year and commute 3 hours a day, then that should change in retirement. Will you pick up expensive hobbies in retirement? You just need to think through it.

If you are not tracking your expenses, then start. Expenses is one of the main factors in retiring.
 
cxr133 said:
My question is for those living on or close to 120K a year . what's the lifestyle like?
Click to expand...
Our spending is right around there. What is it you want to know exactly? We are in south Jersey just across the river from Philadelphia. We own our home outright, have no debt at all, 2 cars, do mostly domestic travel (only due to family circumstances, not financial restraints), enjoy dining out regularly, have ACA insurance, and really want for nothing. We are 60 and 61 and I retired last year at 59.
 
Luvdogs said:
Property taxes are high in FL. I know someone near Orlando, paid 550K two years ago. Their property taxes are $6500. But with a homestead exemption they are capped at a 3% increase per year after the initial hit. When looking for a home, don't go by what the current taxes are --that homeowner may have bought their home decades ago. The taxes will adjust when a new homeowner buys it.

Oh, and also homeowners insurance is crazy but you are probably used to that in CA.
Click to expand...
Unless you are in Nevada. Property taxes do not adjust when homes are resold.
 
Is the $120,000 before or after taxes?
I live off approximately $120,000 after taxes and I live in California. I find that I have enough to do what I want or need to do.
If you are only relocating for COL I would do a comparison of costs for property taxes, housing etc.
My mom pays $1300 a year for her property taxes in California. For a house that sits on around 1 acre of property. Of course she’s lived there for 56 years.
 
imjustawarrior said:
When I retired, the only expense that changed was healthcare. We pay full price for it now. Otherwise, we are spending the same. We dress the same. Eat the same. Same hobbies. Our lifestyle did not change. We are the same people.
Click to expand...

Sounds like us; premiums (and deductibles!) went way up, taxes went way down, the rest is roughly the same.

OP,

What's your spend (excluding federal and state taxes) now? That will give you a better idea of what the lifestyle is like compared to yours right now.
 
If we did not have a mortgage, we would be within about 10k of the spend you mentioned. I'm including travel, taxes, and health insurance in that spend; those are our three biggest spend categories other than our mortgage. There's just 2 of us, no kids or pets. I stopped w*rking mid-40s and DH retired in 2021 in his low 50s. Most years we do slow travel overseas, 1-3 months depending on the destination and our schedules, plus other shorter domestic trips as well. Travel is the largest spend category we have, so we can cut that quite a lot if it ever came down to it. We pay out of pocket for pre-ACA health plans that we've had for a couple decades (no subsidies & it's pricey but it's accepted by all the doctors we prefer to go to). We live in the Phoenix metro area so not super high cost of living but not LCOL either, more like middle of the road. We have just one car, which we bought used so no payments. One other difference to your post is that our WD rate is less than 4% (make sure you run FireCalc and consider any lumpy spend, like replacing cars/a roof, etc). Like others mentioned, it's helpful if you track your expenses now and projected expenses in retirement (if you expect them to change). But based on my experience the lifestyle you describe in the OP is completely do-able if you are living in a low to mid-cost area.
 
I'm single in the Boston area and have a fair amount more than $120K per year gross income.
Not quite sure what the question is but I still have weekend season tickets to the Red Sox (30+ years) and am going on a European river cruise shortly and a Mediterranean ocean cruise in October, after my road trip to New Mexico.

I have a negative withdrawal rate so I could spend more if I choose...
 
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