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What I quickly figured about being older is that debt is your enemy. How do you service debt without a deep emergency fund and for how long? My rationale is to

What I quickly figured about being older is that debt is your enemy. How do you service debt without a deep emergency fund and for how long? My rationale is to be debt free by 40.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
m0zg 8y ago
Even with zero debt it's expensive to live in the US. Consider a family of 2. Real estate taxes alone are $1k/mo. Health/dental insurance: $1.3k/mo (thanks, Obama), but really more like $1700/mo once you factor in the out of pocket costs. Utilities and gas: $600. Food $1k+ (can be way more than that if you eat out a lot or eat organic). Various other spending is another $1k/mo. Compared to all of this, the cost of gradually paying down mortgage or car, while not insignificant, is not a dominant factor.
- scarface74 8y ago
  This is very much HN bubble thinking. I live in wealthiest county in a major metropolitan area and one of the 25 most affluent counties in the US and my property taxes plus insurance is about $5000 a year. No I’m not bragging, any software developer with 5-7 years of experience could easily afford to live here. If you’re paying $1000 a month on food for just two people, “you’re doing it wrong” and “organic food” is just a yuppie thing that has no proven health benefits and is largely just a marketing thing.
  - m0zg 8y ago
    $1k is not "organic" mostly, but it does buy you a good diet. Lots of veggies (expensive!), not a lot of carbs, that kind of thing. Organic would be $2k or so. If you think you're spending less on food, you probably don't watch how much you're actually spending. I thought I was spending less than $1k until I started actually tracking how much I spend. Turned out it was $1700-1800/mo before we cut down. This included eating out several times a week. Now we eat out once or twice a month. We were able to get our "food" bill to almost exactly $1k/mo, which is only like $33/day. It is mind blowing to me that some people have to live on like $2k/mo around here. Do an exercise for a couple of months, or better yet a whole year: record all your expenditures and classify them. I can guarantee the results will be eye opening.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      Fair enough. And you are right. Our budget for “Household” which goes into a separate account is $900 for the three people. That includes groceries and household supplies. It doesn’t include my “spending money” which includes breakfast (egg white patties, fresh cut Deli meat, low carb wraps) and lunch so that would be an extra $200 a month by myself and my wife probably spends an equal amount out of her “spending money”. Our eating out at a restaurant is part of what we set aside for “date nights” which is probably another $150-$200 a month. And then my son usually picks up something if he has to work. But, I understand those are extravagancies that we could cut back on if we needed to. But my wife works and has a part time “working hobby”, and I spend time “leveling up” to increase my income.
      - m0zg 8y ago
        $900 for three including supplies would not be doable in Seattle area without significantly degrading quality, I'm afraid. I'm sure it's doable in areas with lower cost of living though.
- christophilus 8y ago
  $1k / mo for real estate tax? Where do you live? South East here, and I pay maybe $1k / year. I am in walking distance of a nice little downtown. 1600 square foot house on a 1.5 acre lot. Utilities and gas is in the $300 / mo range, and that’s without any attempt to optimize. Food is around $800 / mo, almost all organic, but I’ve been thinking about cutting that price down using mrmoneymustache techniques. Health insurance is nuts, though. I’ll grant you, and I have no hope that it’ll improve. I’m currently generously covered by my employer, but if I wasn’t, I’d look at medical tourism for anything serious. I’ve been thinking of expatriating to France or Spain for a variety of reasons, healthcare being one.
- sys_64738 8y ago
  Real estate at 1k$/month is like a second mortgage and generally only occurs in the DC coast and north through NYC metro into NE. If you're paying that then your mortgage is likely 3x so whatever way you look at it your mortgage is still your largest outgoing until you own outright. Paying such is your choice from then on. Healthcare is a separate animal and small potatoes if you can afford to pay 3k$/month mortgage as you'll have health coverage via employer.
  - m0zg 8y ago
    Nope. Suburbs of Seattle. Mortgage was partially paid down (to obtain a lower APR) and refinanced. But I don't consider the principal balance on my mortgage as "expense". I consider it basically free money that I can keep in index funds and make money. Whereas the amount for healthcare that we pay for two reasonably healthy adults is just obscene IMO (and it goes up 20% in 2019).
    - scarface74 8y ago
      So you’re living in one of the most expensive areas in the US and think that’s normal? You could easily move to a lower cost of living area and probably find a job that made it worth the move.
      - m0zg 8y ago
        Sure I could move. But there's no well paying work there, so it'd be counterproductive. And of the places where there _is_ work, it is by far not the most expensive place to live. NYC or Bay Area are easily 1.5x of Seattle, and that's in addition to state taxes, which WA doesn't have.
        scarface74 8y ago
        There are plenty of places in the US where the “well paying jobs” vs cost of living makes sense - for most people it makes more sense than the west coast.
- chrisbennet 8y ago
  Health insurance is the killer. It doubled last year (thanks to Trump not reimbursing insurance companies). Even with insurance, one emergency room visit could wipe you out due to 1 in 5 visits resulting in out-of-network charges.
  - m0zg 8y ago
    >> Trump not reimbursing insurance companies I think we're all "reimbursing" insurance companies quite enough, thank you very much.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]

What I quickly figured about being older is that debt is your enemy. How do you service debt without a deep emergency fund and for how long? My rationale is to be debt free by 40.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

m0zg 8y ago

Even with zero debt it's expensive to live in the US. Consider a family of 2. Real estate taxes alone are $1k/mo. Health/dental insurance: $1.3k/mo (thanks, Obama), but really more like $1700/mo once you factor in the out of pocket costs. Utilities and gas: $600. Food $1k+ (can be way more than that if you eat out a lot or eat organic). Various other spending is another $1k/mo. Compared to all of this, the cost of gradually paying down mortgage or car, while not insignificant, is not a dominant factor.

scarface74 8y ago
This is very much HN bubble thinking. I live in wealthiest county in a major metropolitan area and one of the 25 most affluent counties in the US and my property taxes plus insurance is about $5000 a year. No I’m not bragging, any software developer with 5-7 years of experience could easily afford to live here. If you’re paying $1000 a month on food for just two people, “you’re doing it wrong” and “organic food” is just a yuppie thing that has no proven health benefits and is largely just a marketing thing.
- m0zg 8y ago
  $1k is not "organic" mostly, but it does buy you a good diet. Lots of veggies (expensive!), not a lot of carbs, that kind of thing. Organic would be $2k or so. If you think you're spending less on food, you probably don't watch how much you're actually spending. I thought I was spending less than $1k until I started actually tracking how much I spend. Turned out it was $1700-1800/mo before we cut down. This included eating out several times a week. Now we eat out once or twice a month. We were able to get our "food" bill to almost exactly $1k/mo, which is only like $33/day. It is mind blowing to me that some people have to live on like $2k/mo around here. Do an exercise for a couple of months, or better yet a whole year: record all your expenditures and classify them. I can guarantee the results will be eye opening.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    Fair enough. And you are right. Our budget for “Household” which goes into a separate account is $900 for the three people. That includes groceries and household supplies. It doesn’t include my “spending money” which includes breakfast (egg white patties, fresh cut Deli meat, low carb wraps) and lunch so that would be an extra $200 a month by myself and my wife probably spends an equal amount out of her “spending money”. Our eating out at a restaurant is part of what we set aside for “date nights” which is probably another $150-$200 a month. And then my son usually picks up something if he has to work. But, I understand those are extravagancies that we could cut back on if we needed to. But my wife works and has a part time “working hobby”, and I spend time “leveling up” to increase my income.
    - m0zg 8y ago
      $900 for three including supplies would not be doable in Seattle area without significantly degrading quality, I'm afraid. I'm sure it's doable in areas with lower cost of living though.
christophilus 8y ago
$1k / mo for real estate tax? Where do you live? South East here, and I pay maybe $1k / year. I am in walking distance of a nice little downtown. 1600 square foot house on a 1.5 acre lot. Utilities and gas is in the $300 / mo range, and that’s without any attempt to optimize. Food is around $800 / mo, almost all organic, but I’ve been thinking about cutting that price down using mrmoneymustache techniques. Health insurance is nuts, though. I’ll grant you, and I have no hope that it’ll improve. I’m currently generously covered by my employer, but if I wasn’t, I’d look at medical tourism for anything serious. I’ve been thinking of expatriating to France or Spain for a variety of reasons, healthcare being one.
sys_64738 8y ago
Real estate at 1k$/month is like a second mortgage and generally only occurs in the DC coast and north through NYC metro into NE. If you're paying that then your mortgage is likely 3x so whatever way you look at it your mortgage is still your largest outgoing until you own outright. Paying such is your choice from then on. Healthcare is a separate animal and small potatoes if you can afford to pay 3k$/month mortgage as you'll have health coverage via employer.
- m0zg 8y ago
  Nope. Suburbs of Seattle. Mortgage was partially paid down (to obtain a lower APR) and refinanced. But I don't consider the principal balance on my mortgage as "expense". I consider it basically free money that I can keep in index funds and make money. Whereas the amount for healthcare that we pay for two reasonably healthy adults is just obscene IMO (and it goes up 20% in 2019).
  - scarface74 8y ago
    So you’re living in one of the most expensive areas in the US and think that’s normal? You could easily move to a lower cost of living area and probably find a job that made it worth the move.
    - m0zg 8y ago
      Sure I could move. But there's no well paying work there, so it'd be counterproductive. And of the places where there _is_ work, it is by far not the most expensive place to live. NYC or Bay Area are easily 1.5x of Seattle, and that's in addition to state taxes, which WA doesn't have.
      - scarface74 8y ago
        There are plenty of places in the US where the “well paying jobs” vs cost of living makes sense - for most people it makes more sense than the west coast.
chrisbennet 8y ago
Health insurance is the killer. It doubled last year (thanks to Trump not reimbursing insurance companies). Even with insurance, one emergency room visit could wipe you out due to 1 in 5 visits resulting in out-of-network charges.
- m0zg 8y ago
  >> Trump not reimbursing insurance companies I think we're all "reimbursing" insurance companies quite enough, thank you very much.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]