Comment on Americans say they need to earn $186K to live comfortably — but is it enough?

wesker@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

• dariusj18@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Housing prices have gone insane

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  • SquishyPandaDev@yiffit.net ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    But my housing prices in Bum Fuck Nowhere are fine, so that must mean it’s true every where else. /s

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    • wesker@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      That’s the whole point; location. The amount necessary to be comfortable is very dependent on your location.

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      • Mojave@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Yeah and I’m not getting this fat ass cloud SE job while living in fucking Yoder, Wyoming

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• jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Here’s my experience. I make $180,000/yr. Family of five. Wife stays home and has a consulting gig she does when she wants to. We live in Northwest Arkansas. Far from the most expensive place in the country but experiencing massive growth and becoming increasingly expensive. Our only debt is our mortgage and a loan on our minivan. We own our other vehicle outright.

  We live reasonably comfortably. Definitely not extravagant. We’re also tightwads and I stay in top of our finances. We paid $345k for a fixer-upper home. Average home price in our area for similar homes is probably closer to $450k. It’s liveable but ultimately needs a full remodel. I figure it will take about 5 years doing most of it myself. If I had to pay contractors to do all of it, it would not be feasible. Most of them are so busy they don’t even give you the time of day anyways.

  Material costs are insane. I mean absolutely bonkers. I would guess I’m spending double what I did for the same materials I used for my last remodel project on our previous house, four years ago. The five year plan is partly because we can’t afford to go any faster.

  If I made $100k/yr, we would never have bought a house. Wouldn’t have even been able to save enough for the down payment. I also seriously doubt we would have had our last two kids.

  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I’m pretty fortunate. I have things I worry about but money isn’t one of them. I know where my next paycheck is coming from and if it doesn’t come, we have enough money in the bank to get by for a while.

  The same cannot be said for the vast majority of Americans, even ones making $100k/yr, which is not nearly as good a salary as it used to be.

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  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I mean… lots of people would refuse to live in Arkansas even if you straight up gave them a house.

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• ShepherdPie@midwest.social ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I’ve come to the conclusion that a good chunk of Lemmy users either live in Seattle, or have no actual concept of money.

  More likely that most of the people making 6 figures are living in moderate to high cost of living areas plus the inherent draw of tech-minded people on a platform such as this.

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• return2ozma@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  cries in Los Angeles

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  • gravitas_deficiency@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    hides the inner pain in Boston

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• FoxyFerengi@lemm.ee ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I live in an extremely rural part of the US on about $65k/yr. It’s absolutely not enough. I moved here specifically so I wouldn’t need roommates to pay my bills, but I’m looking at that after only two years into my mortgage anyway.

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• themeatbridge@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Where most people live. That’s how averages work.

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• shalafi@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  or have no actual concept of money

  Right here.

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• fishpen0@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Population of top 10 most expensive cities

  • New York City, New York: 8,467,513

  2. Los Angeles, California: 3,849,297
  3. San Francisco, California: 815,201 
  4. Honolulu, Hawaii. Population: 1,000,890
  5. Washington, D.C. Population: 670,050 
  6. Boston, Massachusetts: 654,776
  7. San Diego, California: 1,381,611
  8. San Jose, California: 983,489
  9. Seattle, Washington: 733,919
  10. Miami, Florida: 439,890

  Total Poulation: 18,996,636 Total US population: 33,300,000 Minimum Total percent of US population living with this issue: 57%

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  • skyspydude1@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Uh, you’re off by a factor of 10 there. Population of the US is closer 330 million, so it’d be 5.7%

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    • fishpen0@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Oh fuck me I missed that zero. Thanks, this is what I get for doing all that math on my phone scratch pad

      Well, I’ll just grab the top 50 cities and it’s the same point.

      The whole point is a shit load of people live in a very tiny space relative to the total size of the country as a whole. This drives online conversion around how expensive things are since online we actually interact with people from all over.

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  • auskast@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Did you drop a 0 on US population?

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• LazerDickMcCheese@sh.itjust.works ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Nailed it

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• scoobford@lemmy.zip ⁨4⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I agree, but a significant portion (maybe even most) of our country’s population do live in very high cost of living areas such as the west cost, DC, Boston, and Miami.

  The situation is vastly different in most of the country’s less remarkable cities, like San Antonio, Minneapolis, Oklahoma City, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, or Nashville, and I think articles like this only ever account for one side of the equation or the other.

  To someone living in DFW (my home), “needing” almost $200k is insane. Honestly I doubt I’d know what to do with that money unless I just bought a bunch if shit I don’t want.

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