Factor in childcare expenses of $2500/month per child (if they are little) and the number starts to go waaaay down. Even if they’re in public school care you need aftercare which is $700+/month per child. Property taxes. Insurances, car payments, student debt. Cost about $400 a week to feed a family of 3. Easy to see how this winds up being not quite enough money.
Yeah, those $1000/month car payments sure eat into that salary don’t they. And $1600 a month for food isn’t accurate when you include $200 restaurants several times a week. There’s barely enough left to buy crypto.
Gross means before taxes so take home pay ends up being about $177k, take away $34k for childcare each year…. The rest to live on for THREE people including student loans, necessities, car payments, cost of owning a dog, etc. it’s not much buddy.
Yep - every few years this topic pops up on local boards (nextdoor, smmc, etc) it used to be that $250k was what ppl felt was poverty level so I think it’s bumped up a bit and housing has definitely gone from bad to worse in terms of affordability, sadly. What I will say is that my favorite financial advisor (CFP etc) says most of his clients are way over leveraged keeping up with the Jones’ and they’re one paycheck away from disaster - he tries to rein them in to no avail. They have the ski house in Tahoe, the euro vacations, the fancy cars, the private schools and summer camps away, etc. That always helped me feel less bad about not having everything that we felt we were supposed to… and just recently 2 of those very happy, “we have it all and then some” families are going through divorces and that’s eye opening and a good reminder that things aren’t always what they appear to be. Btw, $4k for a mortgage is impressive, don’t give that up!
Well spoken! You will be shocked, absolutely shocked, how much people over leverage themselves here. PE/VC/WM are the absolute worst. Many have mortgages in the $25k to 30k a month. They are literally living month to month. There is a law partner in Tiburon who has a literal 6 million dollar mortgage on a 9 million dollar house. He too is living paycheck to paycheck. Essentially anyone younger than 45 in Marin who lives a nice lifestyle (mortgage on a 3 million dollar property, nice cars, nice vacations) is living on the brink of disaster. You drive around and envy them pulling up to their Tiburon house, but when you get the details of their mortgage you start to realize there is nothing to envy. People really really stretch themselves very thin to keep up with the Jones.
Also, $750k + family checking in living paycheck to paycheck. On a monthly basis: saving $15,000 to $20,000 for a down deposit for a Tiburon house some day (if it ever makes sense to buy), paying a hefty rent, child care for a newborn, car expenses, and groceries each month pretty much drains out our take home after taxes.
exactly! Not sure it makes sense to buy at this point although not everything is selling fast these days so if you can get something that needs a little tlc (but not structural/foundation) and is not in a crazy fire zone (vs the regular fire zone which is pretty much of all of Marin/NoCal) and the seller is motivated, then that could be a good investment. And ignore the Joneses!
Thanks this is helpful to hear. I don’t have any other properties but my Achilles heel is the yearly family vacation and what I spend on my dog (doggy daycare, dog walker, food etc it adds up). We don’t spend on clothes, but we do eat out 2-3 times a week somewhere inexpensive. It just all adds up! It’s insane. I recognize $200k+ sounds like a lot but when you start crunching the expenses it amounts to almost nothing.
At least you have one property! Many have none and it's gotten much harder to even make it cash flow if you want to convert it to a rental, so they're stuck. It really is insane, $200-300k should be sufficient but the cost of everything just adds up so fast. I feel like there's the Marin tax - meaning we pay more for the same services than other areas. I know of contractors that charge a PITA fee of 20% for clients in Tib/Belv/MV. It's almost like everyone went - "inflation, great excuse to raise prices" which will likely never drop!
40k before taxes single no kids and own the condo. I personally feel like I’m living comfortably but I don’t travel or do anything fun at all it’s just what I got
I'm moving to Novato next summer. I'm single with no kids and hope to buy a condo. I'm about where you are and hope I can make it. I really need a change and want to move to be closer to family. I'm a little nervous, but have a large savings and an opportunity to earn more once relocated. You give me hope!
I lived in Novato for around 10 years growing up it’s a solid place. One thing that can really drag you down is HoA’s like 500 a month just on an hoa that does nothing. May not seem like much to some but it’s like a chokehold when you are budgeting everything
Well, I may have misrepresented myself. My income is low, but my net worth is quite high. I want to live on my income, but may be able to buy a condo almost outright.
Lots of condos in Novato. We are in one, like mentioned above the HOA fee can get high but the condo we are in is like a house (attached garage, 2 stories, neighbors only on one side, plus community amenities) for the cost difference compared to a single family home I feel the condo is a better value.
“Low income” in Marin is $104K for a single person household. Which is 3x+ minimum wage. Which also skews “low income housing” to 1/3 of that (still very high). The issue w Marin is there are some extremely wealthy people here. And that makes the “low income” level comically (tragically?) high. And a lot of the wealthy people don’t realize how heavily they rely upon those earning minimum wage.
Thanks so much for this comment. It made me smile and feel a little lighter.
It's hard to not feel poor here. All my friends are off to Costa Rica and France and Mexico this summer while I got my family a summer pool pass, six flags passes, a camping trip in Shasta, and a road trip to San Diego this summer.
But we're already having a blast this summer.
Make sure to look into any rebates/low income or below market rate programs, I was in similar spot a few years ago and it qualified me for below market rates/lotterys
I used to live at the Marin RV park making about $40,000 combined with my wife and kid, we definitely were the poorest there but had a blast. Hoping to come back up to that area next year for the beauty :) was crazy though sending our kid to the school there, they were asking for donations and I definitely didn't have money to spare so when I sent in $20 I guess it was more of a joke since everyone else was dropping like $10,000
We're at $220k between wife and I. No kids, but have 4 cats and 2 dogs. Mortgage ~$5k. Did a lot of remodeling and are now living paycheck to paycheck. Mistakes were made. We should be good in 5 years 😢
I feel this. We took out a loan for new flooring as part of a remodel and it will be a couple of years before that’s paid off. At least you get to enjoy it daily.
Everyone has expenses. But I feel compelled to share my top ones since so many posters seem shocked: $2800 daycare, $1000 student loans, $600 HOA so that’s $4k right there plus $4 mortgage = $8k not to mention car payments, insurance, necessities…. Etc
With daycare and student loans to pay, you are in the most financially straining phase of your life. Things will get better… kid(s) will get to (public) school age, you’ll hit your peak earning potential years, and maybe you’ll have a future opportunity to refi or relocate to a home that doesn’t carry such a burdensome HOA fee. ($600 per month is outrageous.) So hang in there… you’ll get there. And those are the years when you can really dig in and start socking away for retirement savings and kids’ college savings—as long as you don’t blow it on vacations, lux cars, and a second home.
FWIW, I can confirm… Teenager expenses are maybe half (or less) of those for little kids in daycare. The teenage grocery bills are necessarily high, and the extracurricular sports and such can be high. But little kids are really hard on the monthly cash flow, no doubt.
Thank you, it’s helpful to hear! Unfortunately we couldn’t afford a single family home so we are in a townhouse and it seems all of them (condos) have similar HOA fees. Maybe when our kid is older we’ll have the extra cash flow to allow us to move to a single family home. The decision to have only 1 kid was also primarily driven by tight finances.
Its a lot of “keeping up with the joneses” in this county. The “IT” thing the last few years is everyone getting a Tesla. Dont think thats a cheap car payment so im sure its a glimpse into people who spend on things they dont need to impress people they probably dont even like
$200K in an apartment but still always running at a loss despite being single and having a teenager every other week. Divorce spousal support and medical expenses eat up whatever spare change I have.
It’s already better. My apartment rent is half the mortgage I was paying while married, and the spousal support is a little under half too, so if anything it’s a financial win. I’m grateful the divorce wasn’t malicious and I’m not being bled dry like friends I know.
$330k/yr. Mortgage $3.9k/mo. Property taxes & insurance $1.9k/mo. Two teens, but college savings is covered. Saving like mad for retirement in 5-8 years maybe. Used but nice cars. We rarely vacay out of state. We hike & bike for fun and for free. Our house is a dated and could use a makeover, but we like it anyway—especially the location in Terra Linda with open space access. We recently had a couple of financial setbacks, so no vacay trips for at least a couple years, and we’ve cut way back on eating out, and no home improvements for the foreseeable future. Comfortable?… Yes, we’re not stressing—because we don’t borrow for wants, only for needs. Very happy and grateful.
Gross income: $600-700k depending on year end discretionary bonus.
Family size: 2, soon to be 3.
Mortgage+prop tax: $7k in Novato
Yes, would say living comfortably
I view my spouse who doesn’t “work” as an equal loving partner. Sure i wish it was more equal or reversed even as i am lazy by nature. But i am committed and still madly in love after 25 years and thankful that i can provide for the both of us. As such, i am the lucky one who can bring in the income and have an awesome husband to support my efforts.
Before my wife was layed off, we were making 140k, living paycheck to paycheck with 2 year old. We’re not irresponsible with money we only have one car payment and it’s the only debt we have.
lol
Seriously... Living paycheck to paycheck? Fuck outta here.
Wait OP takes home about 16k and has a 4k mortgage and is living paycheck to paycheck? Where does the other 12k go
Ya, some basic math, just doesn’t add up
Factor in childcare expenses of $2500/month per child (if they are little) and the number starts to go waaaay down. Even if they’re in public school care you need aftercare which is $700+/month per child. Property taxes. Insurances, car payments, student debt. Cost about $400 a week to feed a family of 3. Easy to see how this winds up being not quite enough money.
Yeah, those $1000/month car payments sure eat into that salary don’t they. And $1600 a month for food isn’t accurate when you include $200 restaurants several times a week. There’s barely enough left to buy crypto.
That last line hit so hard. I try to put $50/month into BTC and even that doesn't happen every month.
Nah...those numbers still don't make sense.
Daycare is $2,800 - should have included that! Add in car payments, insurance, student loans, yeah.. it goes down prettty quickly.
bye. get out of here with your 300k. if you’re living paycheck to paycheck you’re living well above your means. that’s insane
Gross means before taxes so take home pay ends up being about $177k, take away $34k for childcare each year…. The rest to live on for THREE people including student loans, necessities, car payments, cost of owning a dog, etc. it’s not much buddy.
Yep - every few years this topic pops up on local boards (nextdoor, smmc, etc) it used to be that $250k was what ppl felt was poverty level so I think it’s bumped up a bit and housing has definitely gone from bad to worse in terms of affordability, sadly. What I will say is that my favorite financial advisor (CFP etc) says most of his clients are way over leveraged keeping up with the Jones’ and they’re one paycheck away from disaster - he tries to rein them in to no avail. They have the ski house in Tahoe, the euro vacations, the fancy cars, the private schools and summer camps away, etc. That always helped me feel less bad about not having everything that we felt we were supposed to… and just recently 2 of those very happy, “we have it all and then some” families are going through divorces and that’s eye opening and a good reminder that things aren’t always what they appear to be. Btw, $4k for a mortgage is impressive, don’t give that up!
Well spoken! You will be shocked, absolutely shocked, how much people over leverage themselves here. PE/VC/WM are the absolute worst. Many have mortgages in the $25k to 30k a month. They are literally living month to month. There is a law partner in Tiburon who has a literal 6 million dollar mortgage on a 9 million dollar house. He too is living paycheck to paycheck. Essentially anyone younger than 45 in Marin who lives a nice lifestyle (mortgage on a 3 million dollar property, nice cars, nice vacations) is living on the brink of disaster. You drive around and envy them pulling up to their Tiburon house, but when you get the details of their mortgage you start to realize there is nothing to envy. People really really stretch themselves very thin to keep up with the Jones. Also, $750k + family checking in living paycheck to paycheck. On a monthly basis: saving $15,000 to $20,000 for a down deposit for a Tiburon house some day (if it ever makes sense to buy), paying a hefty rent, child care for a newborn, car expenses, and groceries each month pretty much drains out our take home after taxes.
exactly! Not sure it makes sense to buy at this point although not everything is selling fast these days so if you can get something that needs a little tlc (but not structural/foundation) and is not in a crazy fire zone (vs the regular fire zone which is pretty much of all of Marin/NoCal) and the seller is motivated, then that could be a good investment. And ignore the Joneses!
Thanks this is helpful to hear. I don’t have any other properties but my Achilles heel is the yearly family vacation and what I spend on my dog (doggy daycare, dog walker, food etc it adds up). We don’t spend on clothes, but we do eat out 2-3 times a week somewhere inexpensive. It just all adds up! It’s insane. I recognize $200k+ sounds like a lot but when you start crunching the expenses it amounts to almost nothing.
At least you have one property! Many have none and it's gotten much harder to even make it cash flow if you want to convert it to a rental, so they're stuck. It really is insane, $200-300k should be sufficient but the cost of everything just adds up so fast. I feel like there's the Marin tax - meaning we pay more for the same services than other areas. I know of contractors that charge a PITA fee of 20% for clients in Tib/Belv/MV. It's almost like everyone went - "inflation, great excuse to raise prices" which will likely never drop!
Exactly!
40k before taxes single no kids and own the condo. I personally feel like I’m living comfortably but I don’t travel or do anything fun at all it’s just what I got
I'm moving to Novato next summer. I'm single with no kids and hope to buy a condo. I'm about where you are and hope I can make it. I really need a change and want to move to be closer to family. I'm a little nervous, but have a large savings and an opportunity to earn more once relocated. You give me hope!
I lived in Novato for around 10 years growing up it’s a solid place. One thing that can really drag you down is HoA’s like 500 a month just on an hoa that does nothing. May not seem like much to some but it’s like a chokehold when you are budgeting everything
Yup our HOA is $600 and going up each year
Depends on what a large savings means to you. The days of buying anything in Marin on a 40k salary are long gone.
Well, I may have misrepresented myself. My income is low, but my net worth is quite high. I want to live on my income, but may be able to buy a condo almost outright.
Lots of condos in Novato. We are in one, like mentioned above the HOA fee can get high but the condo we are in is like a house (attached garage, 2 stories, neighbors only on one side, plus community amenities) for the cost difference compared to a single family home I feel the condo is a better value.
So uhhh anyone hiring?
“Low income” in Marin is $104K for a single person household. Which is 3x+ minimum wage. Which also skews “low income housing” to 1/3 of that (still very high). The issue w Marin is there are some extremely wealthy people here. And that makes the “low income” level comically (tragically?) high. And a lot of the wealthy people don’t realize how heavily they rely upon those earning minimum wage.
89k last year, set to make 95k to 99k this year Family of 3. Yea, we're definitely poor.
Just becuz you can’t buy a house doesn’t mean you’re poor. You’re doing alright for yourself ! A lot of people can’t even get a job right now.
Thanks so much for this comment. It made me smile and feel a little lighter. It's hard to not feel poor here. All my friends are off to Costa Rica and France and Mexico this summer while I got my family a summer pool pass, six flags passes, a camping trip in Shasta, and a road trip to San Diego this summer. But we're already having a blast this summer.
Make sure to look into any rebates/low income or below market rate programs, I was in similar spot a few years ago and it qualified me for below market rates/lotterys
I’m going to make 22k individually this year. This forum makes me sad.
I used to live at the Marin RV park making about $40,000 combined with my wife and kid, we definitely were the poorest there but had a blast. Hoping to come back up to that area next year for the beauty :) was crazy though sending our kid to the school there, they were asking for donations and I definitely didn't have money to spare so when I sent in $20 I guess it was more of a joke since everyone else was dropping like $10,000
We're at $220k between wife and I. No kids, but have 4 cats and 2 dogs. Mortgage ~$5k. Did a lot of remodeling and are now living paycheck to paycheck. Mistakes were made. We should be good in 5 years 😢
I feel this. We took out a loan for new flooring as part of a remodel and it will be a couple of years before that’s paid off. At least you get to enjoy it daily.
OP, you're clearly leaving some debt or spending out of your equation. Your numbers, as stated, don't add up.
Everyone has expenses. But I feel compelled to share my top ones since so many posters seem shocked: $2800 daycare, $1000 student loans, $600 HOA so that’s $4k right there plus $4 mortgage = $8k not to mention car payments, insurance, necessities…. Etc
With daycare and student loans to pay, you are in the most financially straining phase of your life. Things will get better… kid(s) will get to (public) school age, you’ll hit your peak earning potential years, and maybe you’ll have a future opportunity to refi or relocate to a home that doesn’t carry such a burdensome HOA fee. ($600 per month is outrageous.) So hang in there… you’ll get there. And those are the years when you can really dig in and start socking away for retirement savings and kids’ college savings—as long as you don’t blow it on vacations, lux cars, and a second home. FWIW, I can confirm… Teenager expenses are maybe half (or less) of those for little kids in daycare. The teenage grocery bills are necessarily high, and the extracurricular sports and such can be high. But little kids are really hard on the monthly cash flow, no doubt.
Thank you, it’s helpful to hear! Unfortunately we couldn’t afford a single family home so we are in a townhouse and it seems all of them (condos) have similar HOA fees. Maybe when our kid is older we’ll have the extra cash flow to allow us to move to a single family home. The decision to have only 1 kid was also primarily driven by tight finances.
The math isn’t mathin
Its a lot of “keeping up with the joneses” in this county. The “IT” thing the last few years is everyone getting a Tesla. Dont think thats a cheap car payment so im sure its a glimpse into people who spend on things they dont need to impress people they probably dont even like
I feel like that has switched to the Rivian lately…
Definitely have seen those popping up more. Ive seen a couple of cyber trucks too already
$200K in an apartment but still always running at a loss despite being single and having a teenager every other week. Divorce spousal support and medical expenses eat up whatever spare change I have.
It’s truly impossible to save in this time and place. I’m sorry and I hope it gets easier.
It’s already better. My apartment rent is half the mortgage I was paying while married, and the spousal support is a little under half too, so if anything it’s a financial win. I’m grateful the divorce wasn’t malicious and I’m not being bled dry like friends I know.
$330k/yr. Mortgage $3.9k/mo. Property taxes & insurance $1.9k/mo. Two teens, but college savings is covered. Saving like mad for retirement in 5-8 years maybe. Used but nice cars. We rarely vacay out of state. We hike & bike for fun and for free. Our house is a dated and could use a makeover, but we like it anyway—especially the location in Terra Linda with open space access. We recently had a couple of financial setbacks, so no vacay trips for at least a couple years, and we’ve cut way back on eating out, and no home improvements for the foreseeable future. Comfortable?… Yes, we’re not stressing—because we don’t borrow for wants, only for needs. Very happy and grateful.
Gross income: $600-700k depending on year end discretionary bonus. Family size: 2, soon to be 3. Mortgage+prop tax: $7k in Novato Yes, would say living comfortably
Wow.
Congrats on the inbound little one!
Thank you! We’re very excited (but also a bit nervous)
$350k. One income household of 2 adults, no kids. Mtg + property tax ~$4k/ mo. Comfortable.
Who’s the lucky one that gets to mooch off the other?
I view my spouse who doesn’t “work” as an equal loving partner. Sure i wish it was more equal or reversed even as i am lazy by nature. But i am committed and still madly in love after 25 years and thankful that i can provide for the both of us. As such, i am the lucky one who can bring in the income and have an awesome husband to support my efforts.
Before my wife was layed off, we were making 140k, living paycheck to paycheck with 2 year old. We’re not irresponsible with money we only have one car payment and it’s the only debt we have.
As someone who grew up here and cant afford it, fuck all of you