Can you afford a child making $ 82K in north Virginia?

[MillCreek]

https://www.npr.org/local/305/2020/02/19/807424039/she-s-earning-82-000-but-doubts-she-can-afford-kids-in-arlington?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_term=nprnews&utm_campaign=npr&fbclid=IwAR0WcaL87llOI1OeW3R52a7wk-yKvFmXvCuqv7ytW-XrmvxKygRuCkJaYWw

I know we have many members in that area of the country.  When I look at her budget, I applaud her degree of saving both now and in the retirement account. Good for her.  I wonder what the cost of daycare is in Arlington?

[MechAg94]

That list of expenses includes some stuff that could be temporarily dropped if needed. 

Overall, I am guessing that having a child would involve at least one roommate (husband maybe?) who also makes a decent income. 

[dogmush]

My wife sent me that.

She mentions a boyfriend,  but not his income, but we assume he makes something.

Off the top of my head, if you add children:

$500/month for food will need to cover more than 1 person. More sales and coupons I expect.

~$250/month on fitness classes would probably need to be dropped. Go jogging.

~$250/month in going out would need to be adjusted.

$177/month in travel might need some trimming.  I know a lot of folks with kids that take a driving vacation once a year for about $1000. There's a reason you take kids camping and hiking. It's cheap.

Do that with a similar dad's budget and the $30k she expects kids to cost is pretty much saved.

There's nothing there that's unreasonable for a single adult or a couple,  but (shocked face!) having kids means you need to change your lifestyle.

[K Frame]

I live in Northern Virginia.

I've owned a home on my own in NoVa since 1996, and a lot of that time was earning a lot less than what she's earning.

I'm looking at that list of expenses going... WTF?

She's got some of her priorities screwed up. Going out, travel, and fitness classes? That's almost $700 a month. She needs to cut back on all of those drastically and put the money toward paying down her credit card debt.

It's good to see that shes is allocating money to both a 401K and savings, but she's only saving 5% on the 401k. She needs to ramp that up, too. If she's in her early 30s, that's likely not enough to reach a stable retirement income. This is the money that does the most work for her because it will have been saved the longest.


As for cost of day care in Arlington, it is expensive as hell. The average daycare cost in Virginia is about $14,000 a year... it's a lot higher in Northern Virginia.

[makattak]

I live in Northern Virginia.

I've owned a home on my own in NoVa since 1996, and a lot of that time was earning a lot less than what she's earning.

I'm looking at that list of expenses going... WTF?

She's got some of her priorities screwed up. Going out, travel, and fitness classes? That's almost $700 a month. She needs to cut back on all of those drastically and put the money toward paying down her credit card debt.

It's good to see that shes is allocating money to both a 401K and savings, but she's only saving 5% on the 401k. She needs to ramp that up, too. If she's in her early 30s, that's likely not enough to reach a stable retirement income. This is the money that does the most work for her because it will have been saved the longest.

As for cost of day care in Arlington, it is expensive as hell. The average daycare cost in Virginia is about $14,000 a year... it's a lot higher in Northern Virginia.

I'm with Mike, here. Having lived in NoVA, I see a lot of things she's wasting money on. $800 per month on food? For 1 person? Need to spend some of your time making food. 

$250 per month on fitness classes? Does she go to one every night? Find a local dance studio. You cant get a 10 week session for that amount. Get a gym membership and use their fitness classes, which will be cheaper. (IF she doesn't want to drop it totally.)

And this is all without actually cutting things, just being more efficient with the expenses she already has.

[Jamisjockey]

What dogmush and Irwin said.

Daycare in NoVA is expensive as *expletive deleted*ck. 

Actually, everything is expensive as *expletive deleted*ck.  And Arlington is the kind of place at the epicenter of expensive as *expletive deleted*ck.

Our grocery bill increased about 40% moving here from Texas.  I almost went postal the first time I paid $2 for an avocado at Harris Teeter.

Her $800 food budget is booty.  As expensive as it is, I'm feeding a family of 4 for about a grand a month and that includes school lunch budgets and keeping a teenage boy fed.

[K Frame]

"Get a gym membership and use their fitness classes, which will be cheaper."

Even better, a lot of the county recreation centers have fitness classes as well as full gym facilities, and they are CHEAP.

I missed how much she spends on food.   That HAS to include eating out expenses. Great way to cut your monthly budget? Stop eating the freak out!

I've largely stopped eating out since I went on the diet in 2018. I do occasionally go out for lunch here at the office, but 99% of the time it's to the salad bar at the grocery store while I pick up other stuff that I need for the house.

If I REALLY want to splurge on eating out at the office, I go across the street to Wegman's and hit their hot bar. Really good Asian and Italian hot food, but it's not cheap. $10 a pound...

[WLJ]

Race fees: $28

Race fees?

[K Frame]

I just ran back through my last month's grocery shopping. I pay for everything like that with my rewards card, so it's easy to track.

Whoa.

Freaking whoa.

In the past month I've spent $665 at grocery stores -- Wegmans, Giant, and Walmart.

Now some of the stuff from Walmart and Giant isn't food for me, it's stuff like cleaning products, dog food, hard goods, etc., so say.... 600.

Still more than I expected. But, I just realized how much I've eaten off the various food/salad bars over the last month. WAY too much. That probably jumped by monthly food spending by 30%.

So, that stops.

[K Frame]

Race fees: $28

Race fees?

She's a competitive runner.

[Jamisjockey]

Race fees: $28

Race fees?

It ain't cheap being the master race.

Srsly though, entry fees for events add up.  I usually do 2-3 gravel bike races a year and they're anywhere from $50-100 a pop depending.

[K Frame]

"It ain't cheap being the master race..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWF8iRCan7I

[Jamisjockey]

"It ain't cheap being the master race..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWF8iRCan7I

Shocked youtube hasn't taken that down.  Facebook is taking anything with hitler down even if it's parody.

[charby]

"It ain't cheap being the master race..."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWF8iRCan7I

Gotta love Spike Jones!

[Brad Johnson]

Something is screwy.

At $82,000 gross, take-home should be around $64,000. That's $5333 a month. Given the $4000 per month in bills shown, that's $15,600 in annual disposable income. Backing out the already-noted luxuries, she could easily recover another $3000-$5000. I'm presuming a reasonable amount of income for boyfriend. Since they will be combining living and utility expenses, there's a significant chunk more thrown in the pot (unless he's just a sperm donor, which brings up a whole 'nuther set of troubling questions about her priority choices...)

Brad

[brimic]

Its doable, but she has to realize that kids require a major lifestyle change.
Two incomes, with one mostly going to pay for child care, or one income with one person as a stay at home parent, while living very frugally.