<p>I agree with Dad II…even with the expenses he has outlined…it would total $41100 per year. </p>
<p>DadII…are these expenses for your WHOLE family?</p>
<p>BUT if you add $10K to that for “vacations”…you are OVER THE TOP…never mind any “miscellaneous” expenses. </p>
<p>I would agree that adding an amount for retirement is a good idea.</p>
<p>I’m with Dad II on this one…ONE person can live on $50K per year.</p>
<p>are we talking $50K gross pay or 50K net take home pay after deductions for 401K and health insurance and federal/state/local taxes.</p>
<p>My net pay is 1/2 of my gross pay (after taking out all those things I listed).</p>
<p>My net has NEVER exceeded $35K. Yet I seem to survive.</p>
<p>Since it shouldnt cost 50K <em>per person</em> in a family to live… if one person can live on about 50K as DadII budgeted, a family of 4 (especially if 2 arent driving cars) can easily live on $100-120K, with money to contribute to college and IRA’s.</p>
<p>We take family vacations but have never, ever, spent anwhere close to $10K on a vacation!</p>
<p>I think we’re talking net pay, Sue. In the OP…the person stated that taxes and such were not to be included (even though they recognized that everyone pays these). SO…this would be available money to spend…not gross salary. I’m assuming health insurance is covered by the employer.</p>
<p>Health insurance may be covered by employer, but most likely the employee is chipping in. </p>
<p>Does the OP realize that to have a net pay of 50K, you’d have to have a gross pay of at least 70K+ and maybe even more than that if you really wanted to put money into the 401K</p>
<p>My city tax, state tax and Medicare tax 4,3, 7.65 for a total nearly 15% oh yeah, put Uncle Sam down for 15% more, that’s 30% and I didn’t buy health insurance yet.</p>
<p>I think Dad II budgeted for 4, maybe 3 since one is in college. Our food bill is more than 300/week. Around NY area you couldn’t even get a studio for 1400. When colleges figure out FA they should definitely take cost of living into consideration.</p>
<p>If DadII’s family of 3 can live on $41,100 (after taxes) (with the 4th off at college) and still max out IRA/ROTH and retirement, and even budget a fancy vacation, why wasn’t more earmarked in savings for college?? I guess I just don’t get it…</p>
<p>T1, thanks for noting that. The numbers given are more or less for my own family of 4. However, we have situation where our actual expenses are far more than those numbers. </p>
<p>The 2000 vacation was fully funded from unloading shares of cmgi near its high. So glad we did that. The shares went from over $200 per share to less than $2 about a year later. </p>
<p>Jym626, we showed Stanford our whole story but only part of that here. That is why you will not able to “get it”.</p>
<p>I made a quick calculation. Our after tax paycheck is 48% of our pretax income. So it depends on what deductions you are claiming. We tend to be more conservative and let payroll withhold more tax because we have been burned before.</p>
<p>I think I “get it” Dad II. And with this statement of yours
everyone else probably “gets it” too.</p>
<p>jym626 – I’d note that DadII’s current contributions to his 401K and roth IRA are considered as “income” for financial aid purposes, and he probably had to disclose his net savings for retirement to Stanford and other colleges using the CSS Profile to qualify for financial aid. So those assets are taken into consideration. </p>
<p>Income is more significant than assets in terms of determining financial aid in any case. We know from other posts that Stanford was more generous than other schools – and we also know that Stanford has taken some recent financial aid initiatives that make them particularly generous – see: [url=<a href=“You’ve requested a page that no longer exists | Stanford News”>You’ve requested a page that no longer exists | Stanford News]Stanford</a> enhances undergraduate financial aid program<a href=“families%20with%20income%20under%20$100K%20not%20required%20to%20pay%20tuition”>/url</a></p>
<p>From what I read students attending Harvard/Stanford pay 10% of the parents income up to $180K. So 10% of 120K is 12K or something similar.</p>
<p>Thanks, Calmom-- I am well aware of all that.
Still, there are limits on how much one can stick in their IRA/Roth and/or Company retirement plan. I’d guess any and all opportunities through one’s company to pay things with pretax dollars (e.g flex benefits accounts, etc) would also be maxxed. It still leaves plenty over for savings of all kinds, even if grandmaII and grandpaII were being suported by the family.</p>
<p>It’s been pretty clear all along that one way or another, DadII plans to put both of his kids through college. He would prefer to see them get generous scholarships or be admitted to schools with generous financial aid policies… who wouldn’t? But it is also obvious that DaughterII got into Stanford under her own merits, happily ignoring DadII’s nagging while she stayed involved helping out backstage for the school play or procrastinated until the final hour before sending in college & scholarship essays. So I wouldn’t begrudge the family their good fortune. 
</p>
<p>Keep in mind that retirement funds and home equity are assets that can be borrowed against – so a family that prioritizes those over college savings is not necessarily making a bad choice. (Suzy Orman would probably be giving DadII a gold star for great planning). As far as the college financial aid system goes, then socking away money into assets that are not counted in the FAFSA is also good planning.</p>
<p>Calmom–
Your points are well taken, but are not the issue. That would all be well and good of not for the constant whining that they are poor and dont have 2 nickels to rub together, and can’t afford anything but the basic necessities, while then purchasing luxuries that dont’ seem to make it on teh "basic necessities " list. I don’t begrudge daughterII’s success. Good for her.</p>
<p>I am really confused by the $300 groceries expense for the family.
If you are spending that little , that you must be eating really, really unhealthy.
I can’t imagine spending only $300 a month even if it was only hubby and I. After all those laundry detergents, paper towels, cleaning products, cosmetics do add up!
Yes, I could trim my food allowance but only if I resorted to eating hot dogs and drinking soda! So, how do you guys do it?</p>
<p>Kelowna, apparently a family of two can have a monthly food bill of just $30 :eek:</p>
<p>[S</a>. California couple eats on $1 a day :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Nation](<a href=“http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/1353561,w-food-poverty-inside-edition122908.article]S”>http://www.suntimes.com/news/nation/1353561,w-food-poverty-inside-edition122908.article)</p>
<p>Not what I would want to do for my family. It will cost us more in the long run.</p>
<p>$50K/yr after deductions is very reasonable. Of course it was almost 20 years ago, but our family of 4 lived on $24K/yr PRE-TAX (and WITHOUT any governmental subsidies).</p>
<p>I’d be saving a lot more money if I had $50k/year in after-tax income. I consider that income level quite luxurious for a single person.</p>
<p>BunsenBurner, it was $1 a day per person, so $60/month for both. That is pretty hardcore! Still tough is eating at food stamp levels, around $25 a person a week. There’ve been a number of news stories of people eating at that $1/meal/person level as a way of seeing how hard it is to manage on food stamps. I recently saw a short documentary called “Food Stamped” where a Berkeley couple did this, with the added twist of trying to eat not only cheaply but nutritiously. Bottom line: it is very, very hard, even when you are a nutritional expert who has the time to shop and plan and you live in an area where there are lots of reasonably priced markets. I was stunned to learn that organic produce purchased from a Berkeley market is cheaper than conventionally-grown produce purchased from an inner-city corner store. [The</a> Jew and the Carrot Blog Archive Food Conference: Bridging the Food Access Divide](<a href=“Secret Affairs: All About Affairs, Types and Reasons”>Secret Affairs: All About Affairs, Types and Reasons)</p>
<p>Our grocery bill for 2 and even for the 4 when they were home for the holidays…is about $300 per month. We buy things when they are on sale and freeze them…and we buy in bulk when we do so. This is very doable. We do not buy prepared snack foods, or really any other convenience foods like frozen dinners or the like. We pack our lunches, use reusable containers for that. We buy TP in bulk and minimize our use of paper towels by using real cloth towels. And we don’t waste much often using leftovers for lunch and the like. We frequent off price stores like Aldi, and buy a lot of store brand items.</p>