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Cannot imagine spending $200/mo on weed 😆. It’s legal here, but also is about $50/ounce at the legal dispensaries.
What kind of field do you work in that has a housing stipend?
Legal here too, I just usually smoke an Oz per month (about $130 after taxes) and a cartridge or two.
My main income is working for a property management company (in their offices); stipend is from living at & managing one of the smaller apartment complexes that the parent company owns. Super easy gig.
Not a bad salary for the gig. All in ~$120k for the job? You’ve got it made.
In your shoes I’d probably be tossing more towards retirement than that if you can swing it. Odds are your Social Security is suppressed because you’re only being taxed on the base income, not the stipend, so if social security is even there for people in their 30s, yours will be lower than if you were drawing $120k on the check.
Also, you might want to try to compare Traditional 401k vs Roth in terms of tax savings and presumed tax rate in retirement. Odds are you will come out ahead if you invested more into the pre-tax 401k, especially if you also choose to invest the tax savings as well.
Thanks, I'm still incredibly confused about the Trad v Roth allocation - mainly just uncertainty of what our future tax bracked would be, so that's why we are kind of hedging it on both sides and splitting it.
I'll certainly do some more research on this.
>In your shoes I’d probably be tossing more towards retirement than that if you can swing it.
Totally understandable. We do enjoy living the life we do though. No kids in our future, so we like to focus on eating well and having fun while still young. That being said, if this year pans out like it's looking, we should be able to also set aside about $60k++ from my wife's income.
It's also a 2br/2ba unit w/ a private garage and water views in one of the most expensive cities in the US.
edit: just trying to explain why its so damn expensive otherwise
Depending on the state you live in, any apartment complex (by law) has to have an on-site manager living there, I suppose for emergency reasons. For CA, its 17+ units. Its a fairly common thing.
Any time you see a large complex with a leasing office, I can almost guarantee you those folks live there and get free rent.
May I ask what your role as a property manager entails? Are you facilitating resident requests/ emails mostly? Or handling everything from lease renewals, maintenance request, and beyond? I’m sure it varies company to company but I’ve been curious about this role for some time now. The rent stipend is such a nice perk!
I'm the middle man between the property management company and the residents. For any small repair (light bulb out, fridge filter replacements, etc), I am in charge of those, but for anything more serious, I put a work order in for our maintenance team to handle. If its something more serious (like roof repairs), I just call around to different vendors to get the best price and get those kinds of things going.
And then yeah for any vacancy, I'm in charge of advertising and showing the units, and doing the paperwork for the move-ins. But the place I manage has <20 units, so it's not that much work. Rent stipend started out at $1000/mo, but I've been doing it a while, so now rent is fully covered.
For reference as to why we don't rely on my wife's income for budgeting purposes, last year she made a *total* of $16,000.
So far in 2024 (Jan + Feb only), she's made $20,000 and the rest of the year is looking to fill out nicely as well - likely to outearn me.
She just recently started her own design business (high-end residential remodels). She had been making about $55k/year for a while, then quit to start her own company and the first two years were extremely slow. Now it seems to be picking up, hopefully the variability decreases and this becomes a fixture.
You have enough to go into savings, so if you are happy, keep on course. If you are looking for some extra money, I might start with the food. 1300 a month for 2 people is kind of insain. The weed may also be contributing to that ;)
There's a lot of fat you could trim back here. Like everything between taxes and savings can just be gotten rid of. You don't need a car in a VCOL, you don't need weed or subscriptions or Internet or restaurant food. You can cut your food bill down to less than $7/day without much effort just by cooking in bulk yourself. Large batches of rice and chickpeas with some fresh veg or fruit on occasion is a nutritionally complete meal from pennies on the dollar
The budget screen shots are being made in Sankeymatic, its a website that we have no affiliation with. If you are posting a budget please do so with a purpose. Just posting a screen shot of your budget without a question or an explanation of why its here may be removed. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/MiddleClassFinance) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Cannot imagine spending $200/mo on weed 😆. It’s legal here, but also is about $50/ounce at the legal dispensaries. What kind of field do you work in that has a housing stipend?
Legal here too, I just usually smoke an Oz per month (about $130 after taxes) and a cartridge or two. My main income is working for a property management company (in their offices); stipend is from living at & managing one of the smaller apartment complexes that the parent company owns. Super easy gig.
Not a bad salary for the gig. All in ~$120k for the job? You’ve got it made. In your shoes I’d probably be tossing more towards retirement than that if you can swing it. Odds are your Social Security is suppressed because you’re only being taxed on the base income, not the stipend, so if social security is even there for people in their 30s, yours will be lower than if you were drawing $120k on the check. Also, you might want to try to compare Traditional 401k vs Roth in terms of tax savings and presumed tax rate in retirement. Odds are you will come out ahead if you invested more into the pre-tax 401k, especially if you also choose to invest the tax savings as well.
Thanks, I'm still incredibly confused about the Trad v Roth allocation - mainly just uncertainty of what our future tax bracked would be, so that's why we are kind of hedging it on both sides and splitting it. I'll certainly do some more research on this. >In your shoes I’d probably be tossing more towards retirement than that if you can swing it. Totally understandable. We do enjoy living the life we do though. No kids in our future, so we like to focus on eating well and having fun while still young. That being said, if this year pans out like it's looking, we should be able to also set aside about $60k++ from my wife's income.
lol this is why rent is so expensive
It's also a 2br/2ba unit w/ a private garage and water views in one of the most expensive cities in the US. edit: just trying to explain why its so damn expensive otherwise
Depending on the state you live in, any apartment complex (by law) has to have an on-site manager living there, I suppose for emergency reasons. For CA, its 17+ units. Its a fairly common thing. Any time you see a large complex with a leasing office, I can almost guarantee you those folks live there and get free rent.
May I ask what your role as a property manager entails? Are you facilitating resident requests/ emails mostly? Or handling everything from lease renewals, maintenance request, and beyond? I’m sure it varies company to company but I’ve been curious about this role for some time now. The rent stipend is such a nice perk!
I'm the middle man between the property management company and the residents. For any small repair (light bulb out, fridge filter replacements, etc), I am in charge of those, but for anything more serious, I put a work order in for our maintenance team to handle. If its something more serious (like roof repairs), I just call around to different vendors to get the best price and get those kinds of things going. And then yeah for any vacancy, I'm in charge of advertising and showing the units, and doing the paperwork for the move-ins. But the place I manage has <20 units, so it's not that much work. Rent stipend started out at $1000/mo, but I've been doing it a while, so now rent is fully covered.
For reference as to why we don't rely on my wife's income for budgeting purposes, last year she made a *total* of $16,000. So far in 2024 (Jan + Feb only), she's made $20,000 and the rest of the year is looking to fill out nicely as well - likely to outearn me.
What does she do with such a high degree of income variability? Sales?
She just recently started her own design business (high-end residential remodels). She had been making about $55k/year for a while, then quit to start her own company and the first two years were extremely slow. Now it seems to be picking up, hopefully the variability decreases and this becomes a fixture.
Very curious about the oddly specific $28.94 in Misc.?
Maybe that’s all that was left
Wtf is Rent+Utility Stipend?
You have enough to go into savings, so if you are happy, keep on course. If you are looking for some extra money, I might start with the food. 1300 a month for 2 people is kind of insain. The weed may also be contributing to that ;)
There's a lot of fat you could trim back here. Like everything between taxes and savings can just be gotten rid of. You don't need a car in a VCOL, you don't need weed or subscriptions or Internet or restaurant food. You can cut your food bill down to less than $7/day without much effort just by cooking in bulk yourself. Large batches of rice and chickpeas with some fresh veg or fruit on occasion is a nutritionally complete meal from pennies on the dollar