Total TC (pretax) is 550k~600k (half is base), and about 35% goes to tax. Monthly costs of 3.5k for mortgage, 3k for daycare and afterschool programs (so we can work), 3k for grocery, gas, bills, etc. We don't really save much at the end of the month from the base salary, although we seem to earn a decent amount on w2. Any tips for more saving? P.S. We don't waste money on things we don't need (we cook at home, don't buy coffee from Starbucks, etc.) Update: 1. 600k is not my TC. It's the household income (mine + my spouse's). 2. That 3k for grocery, gas, etc. also includes 1k for our annual international trip to visit our families. Just the tickets cost 7k (for 4 people) and we have to stay in hotels for those 2 weeks (because the country we go to doesn't have Airbnb, and because we have to go to that country due to providing easy visa to all of us and our families). And no, 7k is not first class, it's economy class, but because it's in the summer (tourism season) it's that much. And no we can't go in a different season because of kids' schools (not ours, our families' kids). 3. No, we don't have cable for TV, Netflix or any other entertainment subscription. We don't buy brand clothes ($20 jeans, $10 shirts). 4. Yes, we buy organic food and fruit, but we never waste it. Any leftovers goes to the freezer and we eat it over the next week. 5. Sending the little kid to a cheaper daycare? No, we both work and we don't want to lower the quality of where she spends 8 hours a day, just to save more money. This is important for us. The older one goes to public school, but still has afterschool programs' expenses. 6. I never said we're not saving the stock. My question is simply "how to save on the base too?" It seems crazy to me that with a total base of 300k, we're not saving much.
Why do you want to save more?
For many reasons: helping out with family (old parents), saving for kids' college and future, retire earlier, etc.
You are already saving a lot. You have 390k/yr after tax. You spend let's say 150k a year (I'm taking an upper limit here). You still save 240k. That's your kids entire college tuition and you save that in 1 year. I'm hoping your parents don't lead an exotic life and are healthy. You can work another 10 years and happily retire especially because your don't spend much and your kids would be out of the way. Your house would be pretty much paid off by then and your house value would have also gone up.
Aren’t you still saving 243k
Go into consulting so you won’t have daily living expenses. My TC is low at SAP but I’m travelling for work every week and I’m banking easily 50% of my TC
If you earn $600K, and after tax you'll have around $32.5K a month. You spend let's say, around $20K, double of what you stated, still you'll save $120K a year. Is that not much savings ?
1. I'm talking about the base (~300k pretax). 2. You didn't count 401k and other deductions. 3. What comes to our bank account (after tax and all the deductions) is about 12k a month, which after 9.5k of monthly costs, we're left with 2.5k of monthly saving. This is really really low, when you compare it to 300k base.
Lol you can live off your base fucking clown! Save from your options / RSUs
3k for grocery, gas, and other bills seems very high. groceries shouldn’t exceed 800/mth by being more price conscious. Car ownership (gas/insurance/registration/maintenance) can be limited to $100/mth per car by running slightly used high reliability vehicles. Phone bills and utilities should be another $200 max together. That brings it to around 1.2k. Maybe there’s a few minor things missing or you’re including property tax and home insurance here, but it think there’s a lot of room to save in that category.
Just the tolls and parking are about 500k per month (200 for my car and 200 for my spouse's and 100 for tolls). This is not something we can change or save on. That's the fixed parking rate for where we work. Gas is about 100. Grocery: We do it all from Costco (which is supposed to be cheaper for bulk purchases). Once a week it's about 150-200. I also counted for our annual international trip to visit our families which costs at least 12k (just the tickets are 7k and because we're staying at a hotel for 2-3 weeks). So that's 1k per month. As I said we're not really wasting money on things we don't need. We don't have cable for TV and our phones' plans are paid by the company. We only pay 50/month for our house's internet.
This cat spending $100,000 a month on gasoline... baller.
Take a look at https://engineerseekingfire.com/our-2019-expenses-and-tips-for-cost-cutting/ with tips on how to analyze your expenses and ideas about how to reduce each category
Thanks
I'm not sure what the issue is here. Your stocks are an extension of your base. You're complaining about not being able to save on the base but you have 300k pre tax per year in stocks 🙄
Op all are in the same boat in the Bay Area due to SALT deduction removed .. it’s the new norm of the Bay Area. Business are moving out of California as it is not affordable to employ here. Your Apple stocks have atleast gone up. Saving in 401k is saving.
You need to avoid the tax in the first place. That’s what’s killing your savings. Also, 3K for food per month is extremely high. Most people incomes are tied up in housing, food and cars. Fade the public and lower those 3 categories then put the rest in an annuity not 401k
How many kids do you have?
Two
Yea... not a great strategy. The rate of return will make you worse off.