Your monthly Budget-How Low Can YOU Go? (vacations, community, federal)

[AZDesertBrat]

Originally Posted by newenglandgirl

Is it a national provider and if so can you hint its name???

Sure...it's State Farm. I've been with them for many years. They've always done right by me.

[RiverBird]

Originally Posted by isabella20

If were not for health expenses, which are almost a third of our total, we would be around $1,500 per month. Here's our breakdown...

Electric 17 wow, that is amazing
Gas (heating) 72
Phone (landline) 26
Cell phone 10 cell phone for $10/mo??????
Internet 44
HOA 218
House Insurance 61
House License Fee 17 ??
Auto Insurance 60 For both of you, together? That's all?
Auto Registration 10
Auto Maintenance 75
Auto Smog Inspection 2
Gasoline 130 At today's gas prices, with a truck?
Auto Club 8
Health Insurance 450 That's all, for both of you?
Prescriptions 194
Doctor Co-pays 7
Food 400
Misc 250
Toal = $2,034

My questions, above in green

[earlyretirement]

Wow, I'm really blown away by how low some of you can go. That's great! Unfortunately we have young children so that will keep the expenses up. Even planning to have no mortgage our expenses will be hard to get down as we plan to buy a 5 bedroom house so I'm figuring utilities will be high. Also, in San Diego they have Mello Roos taxes in most nice neighborhoods that are newer and property taxes on expensive homes adds up. As well as HOA. Here is my monthly budget below.



Mortgage or rent $0
Phone $35
Electricity $250
Gas $100
Water and sewer $150
Cable & Internet $150
HOA $250 to $450 (depending which house we buy --- Areas like Santaluz are really expensive)
Maintenance or repairs $100
Supplies $100
Cellphone / Blackberry (me and wife) $200

Vehicle payment $0 (we are buying 2 cars with no loan)
Bus/taxi fare $0
Insurance (2 Cars) $275
Fuel $400
Maintenance $50

Home Insurance $175
Health Insurance $1,200 (It could be more but quotes online for a family of 4 come out to at least $1,200 per month)
Life Insurance $100

Groceries/Fresh Fruit, etc. $2,000 to $2,500 (I can't for the life of me figure out how some of you get your budget down so much)
Dining out $800

Misc. School Fees $100
Toys $100
Clothes for kids $200

Hair cut/nails $150
Clothing for me and wife $200
Dry cleaning $150
Health club $100

Video/DVD, Movie Theatre, etc. $200
Sporting events/zoo/ Seaworld/etc $150
Live theater/concerts/shows/etc $150

Mellow Roos (Estimate) $400
Property Tax $1,500

Misc. Charity $400

I didn't include travel expenses/vacation/airline which currently is our biggest expense. I'm not sure we'll be able to travel so much once the kids start school. We do home exchanges which is GREAT and eliminates hotel bills but we still have airline tickets for 4 people (wife and 2 kids) so just about any international trip these days is $6,000 just in airfare. Then add on rental cars, and tourist type stuff and by far this is our biggest expense each year.

Also, I'm not sure how some of you are budgeting so little for food/dining? I read a few posts where people post they spend only $100 a month on food. How is this possible? What does your diet consist of? Even not having kids my wife and I spent quite a bit on food before we have kids but now with kids we spend a small fortune. That's one thing we don't put any budget or limit on and eat steaks/fish/seafood quite a bit.

[modhatter]

earlyretirement. Your expenses are high cause you are calculating a large expensive house in an expensive area with kids. I assume you are still working, or am I wrong on that? When the kids leave the nest, it is doubtful you will continue to want to maintain a large 5 bedroom house, unless money is no object for you. Right now you are (hopefully) enjoying all the good luxuries in life without depriving yourself of anything.

This is fine, if you are still socking away enough for retirement, or you have secure pensions. If any of those things don't apply to you, then you need to start trimming your expenses and start "practicing" for retirement. My guess, however, is that you have the bucks to live your life the way you do, and still have a comfortable retirement. A lot of people on this thread are not in that position, so they have figured out ways to live a satisfying life on as little as possible. When you know you won't have a large comfortable nest egg to retire on, you have to plan ahead, and figure where you can live where you think you might be happy, for the least amount of money. That's what we"re doing here.

We're comparing notes of different retirees from different parts of the country. Once again, I urge those who feel comfortable doing so, if you post your living expenses, give us some idea what state or least vicinity you live in so it can have more meaning to us.

[earlyretirement]

Originally Posted by modhatter

earlyretirement. Your expenses are high cause you are calculating a large expensive house in an expensive area with kids. I assume you are still working, or am I wrong on that? When the kids leave the nest, it is doubtful you will continue to want to maintain a large 5 bedroom house, unless money is no object for you. Right now you are (hopefully) enjoying all the good luxuries in life without depriving yourself of anything.

This is fine, if you are still socking away enough for retirement, or you have secure pensions. If any of those things don't apply to you, then you need to start trimming your expenses and start "practicing" for retirement. My guess, however, is that you have the bucks to live your life the way you do, and still have a comfortable retirement. A lot of people on this thread are not in that position, so they have figured out ways to live a satisfying life on as little as possible. When you know you won't have a large comfortable nest egg to retire on, you have to plan ahead, and figure where you can live where you think you might be happy, for the least amount of money. That's what we"re doing here.

We're comparing notes of different retirees from different parts of the country. Once again, I urge those who feel comfortable doing so, if you post your living expenses, give us some idea what state or least vicinity you live in so it can have more meaning to us.

Modhatter,

Yes, absolutely we realize our expenses are much higher as we chose to settle down in a relatively expensive area in a large home (San Diego). I'm still working but only part-time now. I recently sold one of my companies. But I still do some consulting and investing for some of my clients but I've scaled WAY back the number of hours I'm working recently as we are planning a sabbatical and traveling around the world non-stop the next 5 months. I've been turning away a lot of business to spend time with my family.

Money definitely is an object for us but fortunately we are in a good situation financially as we have absolutely no debt at all. We don't believe in it. I know my situation isn't the norm for my age. I'm still in my mid/late 30s and we have 2 small children so we plan to be in the home for at least the next 17 years until they are both out of school. (Our youngest is 15 months old).

Definitely when they are out of the house we will downsize. We will sell it and move into something smaller or possibly move into one of the rental properties we own.

We were fortunate enough to have purchased several properties over the years and we generate enough rental income from them and cash flow to cover our expenses each month. Definitely I could keep working but I'm debating whether to take early retirement so young. I do enjoy working so probably will work at least part time but I don't even want to think about what I'll do for another year or so.

When I sold my company, I got offered several great positions to run some companies but all of them were in cities that I didn't want to move to (New York City, Sidney Australia, Hong Kong and a few others). So I'm making the family a big priority. And the kids are the most important thing for me so that's why I decided on San Diego. Housing is still expensive here and the cost of living is higher there. But great weather and we are moving into a great school district and will move to a nice area. Great for lifestyle but bad for budgeting as the darn taxes, and HOA is so high in that area.

I realize that many on the forum are on a limited budget but I think it's good to get a diverse group of people in different financial situations on these boards. I just found this section and it's really great!

I realize that many have very limited budgets but I still can't see how people can spend that little on food. But I applaud it as long as they are getting enough to eat each month.

I really find some of these discussions fascinating.

[RiverBird]

EarlyRetirement,

Why are you even spending time reading this thread?
You aren't even 40 yet. You are very well heeled with no debt and do not need to get monthly expenses under control. Five bedroom house in San Diego? Traveling around the world for 5 months? With all due respect and a little envy, I just wonder why you're reading this thread.

[modhatter]

Cause she's considering early retirement, and is interested in what others are doing. She may not need to scale back now, but some day she/he may need to.

San Diego is great, and the weather there is hard to beat. I really liked the time I spent there, and almost bought a place but got out bid. (many years ago)

I agree, the food budget that some are able to manage with blows me away too. I have worked hard to bring my food budget for two down to $500 a month, so I have a ways to go. Hard to break those habits and food tastes from when you could afford it without any sweat. What no lamb chops tonight! But I'd like to learn how to do it, so if I really needed to cut back that much, I could do it.

I think LiveContent is correct when he says it is something that has to be learned growing up and it is difficult for someone not used to living so frugal to all of a sudden change their ways. But one can always give it a shot. It is as much a choice as habit.

When I was shopping at Costco last week, I went over to the isle that houses my gluten free little crackers that I enjoy so much. They were $8.00 for a not so big box.
I thought to myself, "LiveContent would not approve of this". Then I went over to the cheese department and picked up a nice slab of my favorite imported Camembert cheese, and thought to myself, "I'm hopeless."
But on a positive note. I did buy a big container of rice.

[Bette]

Often, in my work, I have to sit with young couples and work out a budget. Recently, a young couple just bought a home and planned for it. However, they had never paid housing before.

So, we sat down. Number 1 - one month only (mostly fast food also) - $923 just for this cost!! They were stunned. Number 2 - since they are closer to work now, they will save over $350 to $400 on gas.

It just really adds up no matter if you're young or already retired!!

It's good to see the cost comparisons. It's never too early to start. I have a lot of catching up to do but we'll get there. The last 3 years have been brutal but we've never missed a payment and definitely gone without to make the payment.

As long as my FIL is living in his home and not needing more care, it makes us happy at this point. He's our only parent left and we appreciate that he is still with us.

[earlyretirement]

Originally Posted by modhatter

Cause she's considering early retirement, and is interested in what others are doing. She may not need to scale back now, but some day she/he may need to.

San Diego is great, and the weather there is hard to beat. I really liked the time I spent there, and almost bought a place but got out bid. (many years ago)

I agree, the food budget that some are able to manage with blows me away too. I have worked hard to bring my food budget for two down to $500 a month, so I have a ways to go. Hard to break those habits and food tastes from when you could afford it without any sweat. What no lamb chops tonight! But I'd like to learn how to do it, so if I really needed to cut back that much, I could do it.

I think LiveContent is correct when he says it is something that has to be learned growing up and it is difficult for someone not used to living so frugal to all of a sudden change their ways. But one can always give it a shot. It is as much a choice as habit.

When I was shopping at Costco last week, I went over to the isle that houses my gluten free little crackers that I enjoy so much. They were $8.00 for a not so big box.did
I thought to myself, "LiveContent would not approve of this". Then I went over to the cheese department and picked up a nice slab of my favorite imported Camembert cheese, and thought to myself, "I'm hopeless."
But on a positive note. I buy a big container of rice.

Modhatter is 100% spot on target. I'm here because I want to learn and grow and take information. These boards shouldn't only be for people that are on $100 a month food budgets. I've found in most forums that I'm in, the best results is when you have a broad and diverse group of people.

Just like many on this board I'm considering early retirement. That's why I'm here. It doesn't matter if you are 38 or 78. Retirement is retirement. And before you try to judge... I've worked insane amounts of hours in my lifetime and proud of what I've accomplished. As Modhatter mentioned, my situation could change in the future. These message boards is about information. I think everyone can learn to work to get their monthly expenses down if they can.

While I know I will NEVER go down to a $100 a month budget, I'm still learning from many comments on this board.

[RiverBird]

Originally Posted by modhatter

When I was shopping at Costco last week, I went over to the isle that houses my gluten free little crackers that I enjoy so much. They were $8.00 for a not so big box.

Haha, funny--so I'm not the only one who sees LiveContent shaking his finger at me as I start to pick up something in the store--