r/stayathomemoms • u/Consistent-Credit423 • Dec 19 '24

Question How much does your husband make

Does anyone have any advice on how we can save money? We make 100k a year, but it feels like we're struggling to make ends meet while saving to purchase a house. Additionally, we need to kickstart a college fund for our child and plan to have another child in a couple of years.

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24 edited Dec 19 '24

Hey obviously I don't know where you live, but where I like $100k isn't that much, so I feel you that it's a struggle!

Admittedly my husband makes a bit more than you (900k), but we had a lot of years of struggle before we got here! This is the saving system we use, and from what I've read it's the easiest saving system for most people. It's called a 50 30 20 budget.

50% of your budget is going to go on your needs. Needs are bills, food, rent, transport etc.

30% is going on your wants. Wants are new clothes (outside of winter coats etc which are needs), eating out, subscriptions etc.

20% is savings and debt. That's oaying off your car, saving for college, etc.

Now you can switch to 20% wants and 30% savings if you prefer, but for a lot of people that begins to feel really hard and austere.

I prefer to do this as a weekly budget, but you can do it per pay period, or whatever makes sense to you. But at the end of each 'period' ALL extra money in your account goes into savings.

Choose a high yield savings account, and money that goes in there stays in there. It only comes out for emergencies.

Agree a spending threshold between you and your partner, any purchases above that number must be discussed and agreed upon. For us that number is $1000, but pick what makes sense for you.

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u/lemonflowers1 Dec 19 '24

900k?! holy moly, do you guys own a business?

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24

Yes, my husband created a successful online commerce company. But we had a lot of years of struggle before that - 10 years of me doing shift work at the hospital and him working 80 hour weeks to get it off the ground!

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24

I'm really confused why I'm getting down voted?

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u/_PeachyCloud Dec 19 '24

“…my husband makes a bit more than you (900 k)…”

That’s 9x her household income. So, unless it was a typo, it seems like you are “humble bragging”.

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24

She asked how much our income is, though? Im autistic so this may be a social cue i missing, so I apologize if I was rude. Until about two years ago, we were on 80k a year, and the 50/30/20 budget worked for us then as well.

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u/_PeachyCloud Dec 20 '24

Please don’t use autism as an excuse. I am pretty sure you know the difference between a little and a lot.

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 20 '24

Autism isn't an excuse, it's an explanation. I know the difference between a little and a lot, of course. But I also know it would be rude to say 'we make a lot more than you.' What i am/was unclear on is why it's rude to tell OP our budget/income, when she asked for our budget/income.

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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '24

Everyone on Reddit is autistic these days...

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u/Temporary_Layer_2652 Dec 19 '24

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24

No criticism on my end, though? I live in a HCOL country (house price averages are $1mil+), and as I said - we lived for many years on my 80k hospital salary. We used the same budget then as we do now.

OP asked people how much income their family has, and asked for budgeting tips. So I gave her both.

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u/Temporary_Layer_2652 Dec 19 '24

You asked why you're getting downvoted. That's probably why. I think if you can affford to put 30% of your salary toward "wants," you're probably pretty privileged, no matter where you live.

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 20 '24

Well, I appreciate you explaining.

I suggested the 50/30/20 budget to OP because from a quick calculation of the expenses she listed, right now, they're actually spending more than 30% on 'wants' like a cleaner, hair and nails, takeout etc. And that's not factoring in her husband's credit card spending, which she doesn't know the cost of.

So bringing the spending down to 30% of her budget will already feel like a budget squeeze as they adjust. Realistically, if they go straight into austerity saving - OP will likely find the number of changes all at once unmanageable, and revert back to how they previously spent their money.

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u/Temporary_Layer_2652 Dec 20 '24

Yeah, if it's advice specifically to OP, that makes more sense. It comes off a bit differently if it's meant more as general advice. Sometimes it's hard to tell with online comments like that.

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 20 '24

Yeah tone is always hard to tell online.

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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '24

900k? You can relax.

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u/knitknitpurlpurl Dec 19 '24

I would be interested to hear some more of your perspective. My husband is up there too (around 700 is expected for next year) and you don’t meet many sahms in that range on this thread!

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 19 '24

I don't think my life is wildly different than many of the people here from what I've seen, tbh!

Our monthly expenses are probably a little less than OP's, I don't get my hair or nails done with any regularity (maybe once a year), and I'm lucky enough to grow a good vegetable garden, so our food expenses are probably a bit less (my dream is to have a big enough yard to get chickens haha). My husband works from home, so we save on fuel as well. We eat out maybe once/twice a week, and I sew most of my/my daughters clothes. We are living in a rental right now while our house gets earthquake repairs done, so we have those dual costs of rent + mortgage.

Our main priority atm is to save as much as we can in a high yield account and to pay off our mortgage ASAP. We still use the same 50/30/20 budget that we did when we had less money, it's always worked for us. We are planning to get a financial advisor next year, and we do have an accountant just to make sure we're doing the right thing with saving etc, and to look into where we can invest.

Obviously we are incredibly privileged to be in the position we are, and I'm hugely grateful for it.

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u/knitknitpurlpurl Dec 20 '24

The work from home must be so nice! We just moved to have my husbands commute go from 1 hour to 7 minutes and our mortgage is 5.5 times what it used to be. That’s pretty much our biggest expense. Are you finding you actually only save 20%? are you planning to go back to work ever? That’s something I struggle with. Many sahm talk about going back once their kids are in school but i don’t think it makes sense for our family and I feel judged for it

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 20 '24

The work from home is a huge luxury, although he does lock himself away in his office from 8.30-4 most days haha. I usually only see him during bathroom breaks and when i being him lunch.

No, we save more than 20% in general, but 20% is the minimum we save. On a Sunday night (pay hits out account Monday morning), I usually transfer any remaining money in our account into our high yield savings, so we start each week fresh. Otherwise, the temptation to spend extra money is too much.

Right now, my plan is to stay at home forever. I have the luxury of choice, and it makes our lives a lot smoother to have me at home running errands, looking after the kids etc. We don't have to worry about what we will do when someone is sick, and as the family gets older it frees me up to pursue my hobbies (I garden, sew, cook etc, nothing crazy.)

I DO feel judged for it, but I'm a staunch feminist and believe that it's each woman's choice about what is best for her/her family. And I have the privilege to actually action those choices.

I've never felt strongly that work was my passion, I worked in healthcare and left after covid because of burnout. But some people thrive in work - I have friends who absolutely adore their job and would hate my life. But equally, I think their life sounds horrible.

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u/knitknitpurlpurl Dec 20 '24

I have wanted to try that!! You quickly end up with too much cash and not really knowing what to do and then getting comfortable. I’m glad to see that’s a real strategy. Do you invest any of the extra or is that all hysa? Every year we have had a big thing, but now we’re updated on cars and the forever home, so I think we’ll start trying something along those lines!

We sound very similar! Home cooked meals every meal, I sew and knit a lot, and were rather old fashioned in a lot of ways. I get judged but yet if this is my choice, isn’t that enough to be ok?

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u/chopstickinsect Dec 20 '24

It's absolutely okay! Look, if your husband was forcing you to be this person, then it's a problem. But if this is who you are, then just let yourself be who you are!

For us it's worked great as a strategy. My husband in particular has ADHD, so adding an extra step of annoyance (having to withdraw the money from another account) cuts out a lot of his impulse spending.

We invest some of it, typically if we have a large or unexpected windfall. I'd definitely recommend a getting financial advisor who can help you understand how to best invest for your goals (slow but reliable growth vs risky but quick strategies, for example).

We typically also do one 'big' trip a year. I put big in quotation marks because we work it around our daughter and what she can handle - as she gets older they will likely get more elaborate. Again, I'm really aware of how lucky we are to be able to do this, and don't take it for granted.

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u/[deleted] Dec 26 '24

Nobody should judge you for it...they aren't paying your bills.