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I'm due to close on a condo this week. I'm buying at around 40% of what I was preapproved for. I'm not home much during the warmer months, have a lot of other hobbies, and finally found a remodeled townhome with garage for below $100k. I don't need a huge or expensive home. It has a lot of stairs, but that's fine by me, and I have a large garage for storage, 2BR/2BA, with a "loft" with a skylight on the top level. It's a good layout for what I want and do.
A high school buddy of mine posted a pic on Facebook of his kid and others bicycling behind my unit tonight. I sent him a message that we're going to be neighbors. He replied and we started talking.
He splits the mortgage on the ~$90k-$100k condo with his mom and girlfriend, and he says they barely make the bills. He runs a couple of pawn shops locally. He has a son that's 11-12, and a girlfriend as well. All together, they're struggling to keep the place paid for and all the other bills paid. The girlfriend has some fairly significant medical issues. He admitted he makes around $25k.
I couldn't believe that. $25k is a $12/hr job. He runs and manages multiple pawn shops. I told the guy he could make better at the local Citi debt collection call center, and at any number of jobs. He says he likes the pawn shop because it's flexible around what his kid does.
This dude is really barely scraping by. He has no slack in his life, and likely no luxuries. Compared to him, I'm doing incredibly well. Compared to most of the people on this board, I'm dirt poor.
In sum, I'm doing better than the vast majority of my peers. Did you, and when did you realize you did better than those of a similar background?
When I saw people protesting in the streets demanding $15 an hour and then realizing my pension would be better than a $15 job, plus I don't have to wake up for it.
After our kids finally graduated and struck out on their own. Suddenly we had discretionary income. What a feeling that was.
That we are where we are is partially due to luck, and partially due to planning. We have done better than some we know, and less well than others. I am grateful for the security we feel now.
I don’t know how we will feel in a recession; we are about due one, I think. But now, I think we are OK.
When I saw people protesting in the streets demanding $15 an hour and then realizing my pension would be better than a $15 job, plus I don't have to wake up for it.
That's what underpinned my whole retirement. I realized that I was just fine with my relatively undadorned, de-complicated lifestyle. I'd be a de facto "Millionaire" if I could maintain the same lifestyle just without the getting out of bed everyday for it. Voila! That seemed like a pretty easy number to hit. My pension was 1/2 of my take-home pay but in my last few years of work I was living on 1/2 of my take-home pay. I had my stash and investments to cover any shortfalls, emergencies, and other vicissitudes.
Compared to most of the people on this board, I'm dirt poor.
Didn't you say recently that you make $60,000 per year? That is not considered 'dirt poor' in this forum (or 'on this board') nor is it considered 'dirt poor' anywhere else in the U.S., as a person can live fine and better than fine in the U.S. on that salary, and the average salary in the U.S. among a number of groups and categories is really low, something like $25,000 or $35,000.
Last edited by matisse12; 09-08-2019 at 10:05 PM..
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