How much do you need to make in order to live comfortably?

amother

Feverfew

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 9:24 am

The question needs clarification. What city? What hashgafos (MO schools tend to be more expensive then yeshivos)?

I live in a larger OOT community. We make combined low 200k. We own our house with a relatively low mortgage. We have 5 kids and pay full tuition (ranging from ~6k to 17k per kid). We should have enough to live, but recovering from when my husband was out of work for months during covid.

4g01o

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 9:50 am

amother Salmon wrote:

We are in Israel and even here we need a lot. I would say comfortably we need at least 15,000 a month and sometimes up to 20,000 and that is dollars. I definitely more when there are vacations and big purchases like construction for sure. I'm just talking about month to month expenses not and there's something extra.
Editing to add that we have five kids.

You spend 15,000 dollars a month??

amother

Mulberry

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 9:59 am

I feel like we spend so much more than others do but I don’t know how we can get around it. We a family of three currently renting a small two bedroom for 2000/month. Car insurance is around 600 a month (!) due to an accident my husband was in. Babysitting group is 1200/month. Health insurance is around 1500 for the three of us together. Food is around 200/week but here I can definitely cut down if I wanted to ( I work 30 hours/week and I definitely use some convenience foods like checked lettuce, and we host shabbos meals often). We are making around 15,000/month after taxes and I feel like we are living comfortably but we also do not yet own a home so it may pay to be more frugal. We live in Brooklyn.

ETA: I did not include gas/transportation and misc items like clothing, wig maintenance (every 6 weeks), baby items like formula, wipe and diaowes and the occasional manicure. My husband has a spreadsheet of expenses that breaks everything down.

amother

Blueberry

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 11:07 am

amother Blueberry wrote:

$40k a month net is comfortable for us.
Would like more to save/invest more.
Family of 9.
NYC

For a breakdown:

Let me first say that I understood comfortable to mean we’ll set up and not “needs” only. If I’m wrong my number is less.

I want to pay a mortgage of $8,000 (with todays rates that’s on about $1 million) and that will give me a decent but not oversized house in Brooklyn.

I want to give Chomesh maaser so that’s $8,000
Car, insurance gas etc $700
Utilities $1,000
Life insurance and investment $5000
Health Insurance $2000
Copays dental etc $500
Tuition $2500
Food and groceries $4000
Cleaning help $1400
Exercise $400
Cash and gifts $3,000
Clothing $1000 (divided by year)
Misc $4000

amother

Mimosa

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 11:19 am

amother Blueberry wrote:

Only $2500/month to tution?

Food doesn't have to cost $1000/week. Even if you're eating very well. Unless you're hosting 50 ppl every shabbos.

icedcoffee

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 11:21 am

It obviously very much depends on the location. I promise I'm a very frugal down-to-earth person and always laughed at the people who insist you need half a mil to feel comfortable, but right now I live on the Upper East Side of Manhattan and we are barely feeling comfortable with one baby and low $200k household income. We're paying the absolute lowest we possibly can be for both rent and childcare in the area, and while it's fine for now, I definitely can't say it's comfortable. It only works because we're in a small 1-bedroom apartment, and that won't be sustainable for much longer. And the moment we have a second kid and childcare costs double, it's going to be a real issue.

Obviously we don't have to live here. We could move to another neighborhood and get a 3-4 bedroom for what we're paying for 1 bed, and we can find childcare that's a third of what we're paying now. But we absolutely love it here and will make it work while we can. It's not going to be our forever neighborhood but it's the right place for us right now. When the time comes to move, we'll find somewhere else that makes more sense for a growing family. But my point of this ramble is, for the UES, I can now absolutely see why people would say with a straight face that you need in the ballpark of $500k to feel truly "comfortable" if you have multiple kids.

amother

Blueberry

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 11:23 am

amother Mimosa wrote:

Only $2500/month to tution?

Food doesn't have to cost $1000/week. Even if you're eating very well. Unless you're hosting 50 ppl every shabbos.

Well my butcher bill is about $150 $200 a week.
My fish bill I’m not even sure but let’s say $30
Grocery orders are at least $600 $700.
Takeout and ready food $100 at least.

amother

Apricot

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 11:37 am

Wow, the other Israeli posters here make me look like a pauper, so I'll go anon for this. Even though day to day I do feel we are getting by reasonably. We have a combined net income of about 11 (eleven)k shekels a month, most of which I earn with a part time job. 3 kids, we bought our own rather small house with pre-Aliyah savings, 2 oldish cars, living in a yishuv. Suppose our lifestyle could be called frugal though we don't feel that way. We are both not from the US, therefore no temptation to live the American way.

amother

Canary

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:03 pm

Four kids in large OOT US city.

We need 17,000 a month for bare basics.

Anything extra like tutors or extracurricular or travel or YT expenses, that come up once in a while, is above that 17000 figure.

Our income varies because we both have our own businesses. Sometimes BH we can save, and sometimes we can’t pay all the bills in full n

amother

Slateblue

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:04 pm

Our annual income is $85k, we have 4 kids in school, and are living comfortably with some money put in savings every month.

How, you may ask?

We live in a small US community where there are very low housing costs, low tax rates, state vouchers, and no chances to splurge on restaurants or take out, because there are none. For 4 kids, our tuition comes out to under $2.5k/month with vouchers. Our housing cost is under $1k/month. Insurance is 50% covered with dh's employer. Groceries we buy in bulk. We only eat meat/chicken on shabbos, and even then, very little. "Cleaning help"? Nope. My dh is the cleaning help. In our town there is ZERO pressure to keep up with anyone else, so all of us can wear basic, no-brand clothing, and hand-me-downs without any "nebach" looks.

We used to live in a bigger city, with bigger salaries, but let me tell you: We were definitely more stressed out then, and our quality of life is dramatically better now.

amother

Mimosa

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:14 pm

amother Slateblue wrote:

I also live in a small US city with low housing costs. And my income is slightly higher than yours, but we aren't making it. Our tuition is 3000/month and that's only because our 2 youngest are homeschooled (not entirely by choice). We used to eat eggs quite often as our backup supper but even that has gotten expensive.

Our community has changed so yes, we get nebach looks but I sincerely do not care. BH I have good friends who share my values. What hurts me is getting angry calls from the school administrator about late tuition payments. Do you not see how hard we're trying?

I'm the ima who started a thread about lowering the thermostat at night because I can't afford $500/month heating bill and got slammed for it.

amother

Moonstone

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:15 pm

amother Lightpink wrote:

So where does the other $13K go?

First of all I said between $25 and $30.
Other things :
Extra curricular
Outings
Clothing
Shoes
Toys
Tzedaka
Restaurant
House hold products
Cleaners
Shaitel
Gas
Doctor
Dentist
Therapy - almost $4000 a month
Savings

And lots more things .

amother

Cornsilk

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:18 pm

amother Lightpink wrote:

So where does the other $13K go?

Clothes and shoes
Dry goods like diapers, wipes, cleaning supplies
Water bill, electricity, phone, cell phone, internet, gas, tolls, car repairs, household repairs, personal expenses (mikva, haircuts, waxing/electrolysis, manicures),
Jewish expenses- shul fees, arba minim, Pesach, purim
Simchos
Camp

amother

Dandelion

Mon, Jan 02 2023, 12:40 pm

amother Mimosa wrote:

Only $2500/month to tution?

Food doesn't have to cost $1000/week. Even if you're eating very well. Unless you're hosting 50 ppl every shabbos.

I buy basic food lots of sale items don’t buy luxury and my food bill a week for 8 is $700 around food prices went insane