"How much are you budgeting?", someone asked.
"About $1,000 per month, plus the anticipation that my salary still has room to grow and cover anything extra."
"That's not enough.", pretty much everyone said, laughing.
"Okay, how much does it cost to raise kids?" I asked, eager to get more data and update my model.
"I don't know, but more than that." seemed to be the consensus answer.
No, they're right. Just the payments on the full size, 3-row-seating 4WD SUV you're going to neeeeeed when the little ones come along will eat up 3/4 of that all by itself.
Seriously, this exchange is revealing all by itself. They admittedly don't know how much you'll need except to say that whatever you have won't be enough. Even though you, like most Mustachians have actually done the math- and they, like most non-Mustachians- haven't.