I have debated posting this as I am sure many of you will want to reach through the screen and shake some sense into me. However, there are too many brilliant people who post here to ignore their opinion/take/advice on things.
It has been a lifelong dream of mine to design and build my own house. I would like to do this in 5 years. This will be my final house I will not move out of it till they carry me out feet first. I will NEVER SELL THIS HOUSE.
A little background to better inform your thought process. I am 28, married, single income, 2 kids (1 and 3), just found out we are having another (very excited), and have a very supportive wife. I make 94k a year.
Now on to my question. How do I save for this? Do I forsake my retirement and save for the next five years (short term investments) to have as much cash on hand as possible? Remembering that I will sink all I can into the house so I have a minor mortgage. Attached is a pie chart of my spending (as you can see there is a piece of the pie for taxes so this is gross). 4% is the max I can put in for employer match in my 401k. So basically I can continue what I am doing and put 14.1% (13k) to retirement accounts and 18.7% (17.5k) to savings goal (87.5k saved in 5 years). The alternative is to put 4% (3.7k) to retirement and 28.8% (26.8k) to savings goal (134k saved in 5 years). Obviously I could meet in the middle but I was just giving the extreme examples.
Let me know what you think.
PS - Couple of notes on the account starting at 12 and going clockwise.
"Main" is our account which we pay variable bills and general spending cash (gas, electric).
"Wife" is our house account; that is what we spend on groceries, clothes, and home consumables.
"Me" is literally my lunches and a dinner out with the wife.
"House & Non Var" is our non-variable expenditures, house, cell phone, internet, gym, netflix, school loans, and gas (I have this one account further broken down into 10 more categories).
"Gift Savings" is our account we use basically for weddings, birthdays, and Christmas, so we don't have any tough months (this is a hold over from leaner times; however, the wife really likes it so we keep it).
"Tithing" is self explanatory.
"Savings Goal" again is self explanatory; however, we basically use this to fund emergencies such as car repair, replacement, and other such items. So while I say I am saving at 18.7% (17.5k) now it is deceiving as we will spend money from there so our saving on a good year may be 16k on a bad year it may be 12k.
"Wife Roth IRA", "Me Roth IRA", and "401k" would be our investments.
"Taxes & Deductions" are what the Gub'ment garneshes from my wages.
"Healthcare" This is what my premiums are. I am getting boned on these and will be changing next year. Live and learn.
"(Over)/Under" is basically my cushion in the "main account" I have 3.2% for bills that come in higher, items that aren't necessarily emergencies (like the wasp exterminator we had to pay for), and other random acts.