Category | $ | Notes |
Net Take home (Taxes/medical/401k/etc) | 4290 | Used to be much lower, but now I only do bare minimum for employer match to get more money for house |
Roth IRA | -500 | I pay (max of year)/12 ever month |
Car (Standard and Principal) | -520 | Done 03/23 |
Credit Card (Medical + failed business) | -500 | Done 11/20 No Interest |
Show/movie subs | -19 | Hulu + Disney Plus |
Groceries | -250 | I also chip in for my family |
Eating out | -100 | May adjust this |
Gas | -100 | Building up endurance to bike right now |
Misc Necessities (paid yearly or every 6 months) | -300 | Amazon/Car Insurance/Car Registration/etc |
Entertainment/Fun?? | -200 | Not sure what this should be yet |
Amazon is not a necessity; that is not debatable. For the vast majority of items, you can get free shipping by waiting a few days.
Why are you taking the average new built home, rather than the overall average for SFH in SD?
Have you considered townhomes or condos? What is it about a SFH that appeals to you? Are you aware that a rent/buy calculator in SD will tell you that renting is better?
Even if you don't intend to FIRE, the general recommendation is to put at least 15% toward retirement. Are your 401k + IRA contributions getting you to that level?
1. Why do you need an 'average' house? You're 1 person. You don't need an average house. Just get something small, either buy or rent depending on what's best.
2. You have 3 more years of car payments of $520/month. That sounds like either an incredibly expensive car or a really bad interest rate. Can you get rid of the car and get a cheap 2nd hand car (<$10k) without debt as a replacement? As you state that you're working on endurance to bike, would this be for your commute? If you can manage that, you can even ditch the car completely and go car-free for a while (that doesn't mean it's a long-term decision, but you can go car-free for several months until you need a car regularly again).
My take: It would be absolutely bonkers to spend $500k+ on a house with an income of $120k.
But then again, I live in the midwest. We tell stories about west coast real estate prices to scare children when they are misbehaving
My take: It would be absolutely bonkers to spend $500k+ on a house with an income of $120k.
But then again, I live in the midwest. We tell stories about west coast real estate prices to scare children when they are misbehaving
I live in San Diego with about twice that income and don't understand why people fall for it. But hey, it leaves a few more options for the rest of us.
My take: It would be absolutely bonkers to spend $500k+ on a house with an income of $120k.
But then again, I live in the midwest. We tell stories about west coast real estate prices to scare children when they are misbehaving
I live in San Diego with about twice that income and don't understand why people fall for it. But hey, it leaves a few more options for the rest of us.
Haha it's a small nightmare for me. I've even just considered maybe I should just live with my parents forever. I don't think the rental life is for me yet since... well I live close to work and they don't bother me... But it would be nice to have my own place... At this point I don't know what to do with my money if I'm not saving for a house. I guess I could invest? And retire early while living with parents? Not sure if that's ideal. I'm probably just lost right now
My take: It would be absolutely bonkers to spend $500k+ on a house with an income of $120k.
But then again, I live in the midwest. We tell stories about west coast real estate prices to scare children when they are misbehaving
I live in San Diego with about twice that income and don't understand why people fall for it. But hey, it leaves a few more options for the rest of us.
Haha it's a small nightmare for me. I've even just considered maybe I should just live with my parents forever. I don't think the rental life is for me yet since... well I live close to work and they don't bother me... But it would be nice to have my own place... At this point I don't know what to do with my money if I'm not saving for a house. I guess I could invest? And retire early while living with parents? Not sure if that's ideal. I'm probably just lost right now
When we first got to the point where we were earning more than we were spending, we grasped at any straw to justify saving it. We were going to add an amazing back yard swimming pool to DH's house (the only way he could convince me to give up my condo), then we were going to buy a brand new 40+ sailboat. In the end, we moved to SD, bought an old sailboat, lived on it for several years, and started dreaming about when we would get to sail it around the world.
BTW, if you can handle the commute, living on a boat is a great option in SD!
If you are happy living with your parents, up your 401k contributions and look into mega backdoor Roth. Leave your money sit while you contemplate your options. That is what being a person of independent means really buys you: options. Maybe that will end up being a SFH in Southern California, or maybe it will be something you haven't even contemplated yet.
Haha it's a small nightmare for me. I've even just considered maybe I should just live with my parents forever. I don't think the rental life is for me yet since... well I live close to work and they don't bother me... But it would be nice to have my own place... At this point I don't know what to do with my money if I'm not saving for a house. I guess I could invest? And retire early while living with parents? Not sure if that's ideal. I'm probably just lost right now
Haha it's a small nightmare for me. I've even just considered maybe I should just live with my parents forever. I don't think the rental life is for me yet since... well I live close to work and they don't bother me... But it would be nice to have my own place... At this point I don't know what to do with my money if I'm not saving for a house. I guess I could invest? And retire early while living with parents? Not sure if that's ideal. I'm probably just lost right now
Are you willing to move?
Home ownership can be a lot of fun and very rewarding, but I don't think it would be either paying those kinds of prices.
Maybe live on the cheap with folks for a few years and build a good 'stache and then move someplace else? Take a look at what $670k would buy in my neck of the woods: http://www.joshsteinland.com/search.php?featured=1&sort=1
Haha it's a small nightmare for me. I've even just considered maybe I should just live with my parents forever. I don't think the rental life is for me yet since... well I live close to work and they don't bother me... But it would be nice to have my own place... At this point I don't know what to do with my money if I'm not saving for a house. I guess I could invest? And retire early while living with parents? Not sure if that's ideal. I'm probably just lost right now
Are you willing to move?
Home ownership can be a lot of fun and very rewarding, but I don't think it would be either paying those kinds of prices.
Maybe live on the cheap with folks for a few years and build a good 'stache and then move someplace else? Take a look at what $670k would buy in my neck of the woods: http://www.joshsteinland.com/search.php?featured=1&sort=1
First: If saving for a home is what motivates you to save, then save for a home.
Second: Slow down. You say you have had a goal of owning a home by 30. When did you come up with that idea? 22? Then you spent the next however many years living a lifestyle that was inconsistent with that goal. That's ok; we all do things we regret. But the result is that you are actually further away from that goal now than you were at 22, because you borrowed from your future to pay for present consumption.* So the first thing to do is get back to zero. Get the CC paid off ASAP. Pay off the car loan -- either by selling it and downsizing the vehicle, or by cutting elsewhere to speed up the payoff. This is where you really evaluate what is the right balance for you between current lifestyle and future goals, i.e., how much are you willing to cut your lifestyle to have that house?
When you are back at zero, now you can really start building toward the house goal. But you need a reasonable timeframe. If you came up with this idea at 22, you had 8 years to earn and save and prepare; it's therefore not reasonable to expect that you can get there now in 3 years, even once you get back to zero. What is reasonable? Well, this is where that lifestyle choice comes in. The first thing you need to figure out is how much you are willing to pay toward a house every month -- including not just mortgage, but taxes, insurance, utilities, maintenance, etc. You can find some estimators for properties in your area to give you a handle on some of that. Take that total and subtract out everything but mortgage to figure out the monthly mortgage payment you can afford. Then use some calculators to tell you how much house that will buy you. Note: that number is going to be much less than the average SD home! But that's ok. Now you do some more analysis and make some more tradeoffs. Are you willing to live in a condo or townhouse? If so, what do those cost? Are you willing to save longer? Because even if you can only afford a $100K mortgage and homes cost $600K, you can still get there if you save up $500K as a downpayment. Start doing that work and figuring out what those tradeoffs will be.
Example: Maybe you decide you're willing to buy a townhouse, and the ones you like are running around $400K. And maybe your financial analysis says that you can afford a $300K house. So the answer is that you need to save $100K for a downpayment (plus closing costs, moving expenses, wow-the-house-doesn't-have-any-drapes fund, etc., of course). Now you look at your current income and expenses and the lifestyle you want to lead. How much does that leave left over for the house? That will tell you how long it will take you to save the $100K you need to afford the house.
One note: all of my analysis assumes that you continue to max out your 401(k). That is non-negotiable. You have already learned the dangers of funding current consumption by borrowing against your future earnings -- that's exactly why you're in this situation. So you need to flip the switch on that and start prioritizing saving for future you, so that you don't have to worry about your future financial stability. So max that 401(k) back out. If you need to to balance your goals, drop the Roth -- you will have more money in your pocket now if you put your investments into a traditional 401(k) that gets you the immediate tax deduction.
This is really, really, really important, because the money you are putting away in that 401(k) now is the very money that is going to give you the greatest return. If you get around a 7% average return, your money will double every decade. That means that if you put $20K toward your retirement today in 401(k)/Roth, by the time you're 70, you'll have $40K at 40, $80K at 50, $160K at 60, and $320K at 70. OTOH, if you save for the house first and cut the retirement savings for a decade until you have all that figured out, by the time you're 70, you'll have only half as much, because you miss an entire doubling.
And that is why maxing retirement now gives you the most flexibility. It may well be that if you really focus on maximizing retirement investments now and buy only the (town)house that you can afford while still maxing out your 401(k), then 10 years from now when you decide you really want that $650K house, you will have enough in retirement accounts to cover you in the future, so you can cut back on savings and take on a bigger mortgage. OTOH, if you do it the other way and throw that money at a house now instead of putting it in your retirement accounts, you're going to need to keep your retirement contributions maxed out for a long time in the future, and the only way you'd have money to afford the upgrade to that $650K house is if the market for your @$400K townhome went crazy while the market for more expensive homes stayed flat, so that now you can upgrade for very little difference. And that's not a good bet.
One final thought: buy what you need, not what you think you might need at some undefined point in the future. Bigger homes come with bigger mortgages and bigger carrying costs, all of which take away from other things you could be doing. There's no sense buying a big house because you might get married or have kids and find you need that space 10 years in the future; even if all that happens, who's to say your spouse would even want to live in the same house, or indeed that you want the same house once you are looking through the eyes of a parent? Don't inflate your lifestyle and expenses before you actually need to to live the kind of life you want.
*I am ignoring the retirement accounts for these purposes -- you've done well there, and I'm not trying to minimize that. But IMO that is an untouchable area that should be ignored for purposes of figuring out the lifestyle you can afford.
I definitely think you can afford a home in SD on $120K salary with your current debt load. A few things to think about:
1) Your description of your cash flow/budget is a bit, uh, not-so-precise. It sounds like you're just getting your financial house in order, so using an online tool like Mint or Personal Capital could help you out.
2) It looks like you plan to put 10% down on a $650K house + closing costs. I think 10% is reasonable. But I'd definitely consider something in the range of $350K -- maybe a condo or a less desirable neighborhood. Until you're ultra high net worth, you're going to have to compromise on housing -- it's just a reality. I know from experience it can be hard stepping down from wealthy parent lifestyles, but over time you can work your way up the housing ladder from entry level and hopefully that experience will be rewarding for you.
3) Along the same line as #2, you should be maxing your 401K and saving on top for the property. You need to maintain a balanced financial plan. I'd turn back on max 401K contributions, but switch to traditional versus Roth in your case.