Live the good life on $20k/year - retire in your 20s or 30s? (income, savings)

[mathjak107]

Originally Posted by Ellise

20K, just like the OP is talking about.

are we talking 20k pretax or after tax. ? I am figuring 20k magi in kaiser. If you are talking a gross amount of 20k then i can see your insurance as being way less.

[Hemlock140]

Originally Posted by Teddy52

The OP's scenario sounds doable to me.

MANY paces in the US those figures would work.

I think some posters are basing their naysaying as if he was living in Ne York City.

Perhaps, but hopefully much of the "extra" income is saved for things that are sure to come up.

New Roof on modest house: $5,000
Rebuild transmission on car: $3,000
New tires on car $600
Gas goes back up above $4
Washing machine/Dryer/Dishwasher/Fridge needs replacing
Paint outside of modest house:$2,500

[Teddy52]

Originally Posted by Hemlock140

Perhaps, but hopefully much of the "extra" income is saved for things that are sure to come up.

New Roof on modest house: $5,000
Rebuild transmission on car: $3,000
New tires on car $600
Gas goes back up above $4
Washing machine/Dryer/Dishwasher/Fridge needs replacing
Paint outside of modest house:$2,500

I painted my 1955 farm house 3 times and the total never came to $2500

[mathjak107]

Sure you can do every single thing that needs to be done to your house yourself.

But then your retirement time is actually spent working.

You switched careers to maintaince man is what changed.

Between maintaince,longer term projects,gardening,snow removal ,painting and preventive maintaince i could have been busy every day on my homes.

Most folks just end up letting things go until they can't anymore but the fact is doing things yourself is still working.

[Parsec]

Originally Posted by Teddy52

I painted my 1955 farm house 3 times and the total never came to $2500

Depends where you live I guess. I got several quotes to paint my 2-story house and they all came out to $5-7k. It would've been at least $2500 even for a small 1-story home.

[Teddy52]

Before I would ever pay that much for a house paint job, I would make sure my house had permanent siding ( vinyl, aluminum, or steel ) on when I purchased it.

[Parsec]

eddie: If your income is $20k/year then you still need to pay federal income taxes right? Federal income tax should be around $1k/year after your personal exemption and standard deduction.

[mathjak107]

They are talking doing it themselves.

The issue is where do you draw the line if supposedly retired.

You can farm your own food ,make your own clothes and build your own house.

If you call that retiring i will take working, thank you

[Teddy52]

Originally Posted by mathjak107

Sure you can do every single thing that needs to be done to your house yourself.

But then your retirement time is actually spent working.

You switched careers to maintaince man is what changed.

Between maintaince,longer term projects,gardening,snow removal ,painting and preventive maintaince i could have been busy every day on my homes.

Most folks just end up letting things go until they can't anymore but the fact is doing things yourself is still working.

Get real !

Most folks who retire on $20,000 a year expect to do their own.............gardening, snow removal, painting, and preventative maintainance.

In fact , most people that I worked with did that in their working years plus held down full time jobs.

I question why someone who has no concept on how common folk live give their views thru the eyes of a multi millionaire!

[mathjak107]

First of all i grew up in a nyc housing project so don't tell me about common folk.

Yes those with limited income do all those things themselves . But many folks have well paying jobs that allowed them to at least farm out those more intense projects.

But instead they retire by choice poorly planned on very limited income and end up swapping one time consuming job for another as well as adding financial stress to their lives now as they try to survive on a limited budget that counts on everything going as budgeted.