I'm 40, had a very tough life to get from way below poverty line and psycho family and harsh conservative society to where I am right now. I'm married and have 2 kids. My husband also works in tech. But we only have 8 yoe (as I said really tough life before that). With the current stock prices, our household income is about 600k. After tax, mortgage, child care and school, 401k and those sort of deductions, we end up saving only the stock part of the income (200k/year). We don't live a luxury life (never brand clothes, basic Toyota cars, no first class flights, etc.). The only high expense is our annual international trip to visit family which is about 20k (plane tickets have been crazily high for the summer, and we have to stay at a hotel there, as it's not our home country. Again another life-threatening restriction) With all of that, I feel so tired that I don't want to work anymore. My husband feels the same. It's like both of us have exhausted all of our energy to get out of our previous life and flee to the U.S. and build a life here from negative (not even zero). If it was just us, without the kids, we would have gone to a LCOL area, getting out of this rat race and living a basic life. But with kids that doesn't seem like a good choice. Good education and opportunities are in HCOL areas and we already lived a miserable life before that we don't want our kids to experience that at all. Any ideas on what to do? Update: NW is about 600k. We started from new grad level and had to pay off international student loan which was a lot. Thank you
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there are definitely great education opportunities in LCOL. safer too. I had a great education in LCOL. less competitive too so your kid can stand out with less stress.
Where? A place that's also welcoming for brown immigrants.
Agreed. A lot of misconception that you need to live in the Bay, send your kid to Stanford/Berk, and have a engineering job with a tech company. There are so many more opportunities out there where a single married person can raise a family on a single income. You will need to move to a LCOL area and find a F500 company who can sponsor you. It’s not a glamorous life but it’s a lot less stressful.
Is moving abroad an option?
It is. But where?
Are you from the US or do you have home countries?
What’s the net worth ? Net worth is important. You can do the math based on that.
There are great education opportunities in a lot of LCOL/MCOL areas. You can live in a LCOL/MCOL city with art, science, and good schools.
Great minds 👍
Ca you give us examples? Places that are welcoming for brown immigrants
There’s lots of MCOL areas with great opportunities for your kids, the suburbs of most big cities have good to great schools and most anything you could want to do.
Examples please? (That are welcoming to brown immigrants)
Consider New England - central MA, Rhode Island, southern NH.
> good education and opportunities are in HCOL Get out of this mentality
Well, both of us experienced it (and experienced the opposite too). So I think it's reality not just mentality.
Mmmk well have fun slaving away in hcol cities!
Don’t know if I agree on the good education part only being in HCOL. But hard to say without knowing what qualifies to you as good education, in addition to public vs private schools.
Saving 200k/year from 600k income in a HCOL area with kids is very good, you're doing something right.
Are we?! The problem is we're exhausted. So I think we're doing something wrong.
You are exhausted because you have kids 😀 it will get bette tinge they grow up and need you guys less . But then again it depends on how much of a helicopter parent you are?
Educational quality is way overrated a metric. If two people who are seemingly competent enough to work in tech can’t raise happy, successful individuals, that’s on you and not the people you paid to raise your children.
You can't raise happy successful kids if the school they go to every day and the neighborhood they live in, are not welcoming or bullying or promotes aggressiveness and stuff like that. Happiness and satisfaction is not measured by mathematical intelligence and leetcode.
If your kids have high IQs, chances are it doesn't matter that much where they grow up in
Can’t give advice without seeing your net worth
And expenses.
NW is about 600k. We started from new grad level and had to pay off international student loan which was a lot.