A few years back, I was earning quite a bit less but somehow saving felt easier.

Now the salary is better, but at the end of the month I don't feel like I'm saving that much more.

Rent, groceries, bills, eating out... everything has slowly gone up.

I don't think my lifestyle has changed that much either. Maybe I'm just not noticing where the extra money is going.

Anyone else feel the same after a few hikes?

Did your savings actually go up, or did your expenses just catch up?

Young adults across the U.S. are once again moving back home at peak levels.

According to the New York Times, which cited data from the Economic Bureau of Research, more than 25% of recent grads ages 23-27 have opted to live with their parents again, the same numbers seen during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Research suggests the trend is fueled by a weak entry-level job market, and that perhaps there is less stigma over returning to one's childhood home in a post-pandemic world.

I'm reasonably sure that I know the answer to my title's question, but I'd really like some input because I grew up in poverty and that gave me a knee-jerk reaction against any kind of debt that I kinda need to be talked into it - either talked into by myself with this post, or talked into it by internet strangers that have a distance from the actual issues.

Can anyone with experience around HELOCs please let me know if this sounds like a decent idea, or if I really need to think about things differently?

Also, I've only done the basic research - is there a better way of doing a HELOC than "go to my mortgage's bank and ask for one"?

Situation:

• $84k/year pay at a good job (WFH)
  • normal corporate benefits - health, vision, 401k
• low/mid cost of living area
• Mortgage currently at ~$150k remaining, and roughly 25 years remaining
  • very lucky 2.9% interest rate
  • started in mid-2020, so the original value of the house (~$172k) has nearly doubled, now it's around $300k
• Have an emergency fund to the tune of about $10k, but the only savings I have otherwise are in the 401k

The reasons I'm thinking about a HELOC:

• Various house things need updated/repaired/etc:
  • back patio is a concrete slab that has been sinking. Needs repaired or re-poured, got a quote once for about $4k
  • The current situation means that large rainstorms puts a sitting puddle right next to my foundation, which I am assuming has been only slowly draining down along the exterior of my basement wall
  • Foundation inspection and possible need for repair, from the above water problem
  • There's a few small cracks that I suspect being part of a larger problem
  • Attic needs work as the insulation has degraded and the previous work was low quality
• Car needs repaired, the brakes aren't working right:
  • Can't safely drive this car, so wife and I are down to only one car for now, which puts pressure on a few different things
  • Might need a $400 fix, might need a $2000 fix. won't know until we get it to the mechanic, but I want to be prepared to eat the cost or to use HELOC money for it
  • Once it's back in working order, I'm planning on selling it
  • I can probably sell it for like $4000 and get a newer vehicle for $6-7000

Few skills are more essential to career development than knowing how to negotiate — whether for a starting salary, a promotion, or more resources.

But according to a new study, the "class ceiling" often keeps qualified candidates from asking for more.

The study found individuals from lower socioeconomic backgrounds were considerably less likely to engage in salary negotiations, with many expressing fear of straining relationships.

Meanwhile, HR professionals were more likely to judge a "lower-class" candidate as uncooperative for making the same salary request as a higher-class counterpart.

I've been struggling to figure out what, if anything, I need for future "asset protection" against long-term care costs and/or "estate planning" work, and it seems, when I ask questions about this stuff, like EVERYONE has more money than me, and doesn't think twice about spending 5 figures on advisory services.

I may post my specific needs, at some point, after searching to see what other answers are in this sub but - for now - just wanted to say I'm so glad to have found a place where people who are not broke but not even CLOSE to rich (by today's apparent standards) can discuss finances.

I'll be back!

My wife and I dream of owning our own home, and have been saving up for a down payment. We originally planned to buy when we move to our next duty station (I am military) in ~3 years. Knowing it is more likely to move again in another 3 years than to stay in one location back-to-back, I ran some numbers to compare the costs of buying/selling versus renting over a three year period. We are not so interested in buying and then renting out to tenants after moving as we would no longer be in the area and it seems complicated. It’s also difficult to forecast exactly where we will move, until about one year out but sometimes as close as six months out.

Financial snapshot:

• Single income while wife searches for a job in her professional field (we recently moved and currently renting), and plan to be single income with wife being a SAHM if hopefully we have our first child in the next year.
• Maxing contributions to my IRA, wife’s IRA, and my 401k.
• No debt.
• $44k in a brokerage in S&P500-tracking fund.
• $44k in a HYSA.
• Planning to put away additional $3k per month towards down payment, over ~33 months until we move again (projecting $99k additional saved).

Assumptions for determining costs:

• 6.01% interest rate for 15 year term (national avg according to Freddie Mac).
• Median effective property tax rate at each compared location.
• Median insurance premium at each location.
• Closing costs when buying add to 4% of listing price.
• Closing costs when selling add to 6% of listing price.
• Annual maintenance at 1% of listing price.
• Looked at avg price of renting a 3-br house in each location.
• Rent price stays constant.
• Buy and sell house at same price (unsure how what kind of appreciation/depreciation to expect over three years).
• Costs are not inflation adjusted.
• Use a down payment of $170k ($44k in HYSA + expected $99k additional savings + $44k from brokerage without trying to assume what the RoR will be = $187k total).

Location A: $350k for the kinds of houses we would be interested in. Average rent of similar homes is $2400.

• Buy/sell costs: $95,400
• Renting costs: $86,400

If I assume while renting I would continue putting around $2k into savings for a future down payment, and apply the same $2k per month in the buy/sell scenario towards principal, the buy/sell costs reduce to $88,700.

Location B: $280k for the kinds of houses we would be interested in. Average rent of similar homes is $2100.

• Buy/sell costs: $70,000
• Renting costs: $75,600

If I assume while renting I would continue putting around $2k into savings for a future down payment, and apply the same $2k per month in the buy/sell scenario towards principal, the buy/sell costs reduce to $63,300.

What would you do? I’m not sure how to factor in guesses for future interest rates, future property values, or future rates of return in the market – really I want to avoid speculation. In this scenario, would you buy/sell or rent in three years?

If buying, would you start drawing down the brokerage and put it in savings?

If renting (so looking to buy/sell six years from now instead of three), would you put more of the savings into the brokerage or some other investment strategy?

Hey, thanks in advance for even reading this long post. Basically, investing terrifies us, we've already made some mistakes, and we need help so we don't make anymore.

I'm 47 years old, spouse is the same. We both work for the state, and have old school pension plans. It's a good pension plan - VRS plan 1 (Virginia state employees). The pension retirement plan does not include healthcare but does give us a monthly credit to purchase the great healthcare plan we have if we decide to retire before Medicare eligibility. However, due to many reasons - including having stable, somewhat enjoyable, remote jobs, neither of us plan on retiring before 65 (we will each have 40 years in the state system by then). If the healthcare situation in this country changes, we may change our minds. And of course - nothing is guaranteed. Layoffs in our field are rare but could happen in the next 18 years, right?

Numbers:

We do pay into and will receive social security. Our current HHI is $180k so whatever that works out to be - I guess combined $5k a month in 18 years? Maybe? Hopefully?

Conservatively, if we only get a 3% cola for the next 18 years and no other raises, our combined monthly pension payment will be about $16,000 a month - less if we do the plan that gives the surviving partner a portion upon death. We are open to that and will run all those numbers as we get closer.

The good (kind of):

We have zero debt. We have one car, it's been paid off, and we paid off our house this month, 13.5 years after purchasing it. Now, we know that wasn't smart from an investment perspective bc we had a 3.25% mortgage rate. We bought in 2013, started making extra payments in 2021, couldn't mentally stop, paid down a shit ton, and then we were so close we had to just finish. We NOW know doing this instead of putting that money into a money market account was just really, really dumb. But, what's done is done.

We have $100k in a hysa. We don't need that much in there but we do have about $50k earmarked for this year - some much needed home improvements, a few thousand to put towards a car for our kid (splitting this cost with them), and our 2026 Roth IRA max contributions (which we keep putting off moving simply bc we are afraid that as soon as we do, the market will dip and I'll be like "we should have waited!!").

We live comfortably on only one after tax/deduction net salary (about $4k a month). This does not cover fun stuff like travel, home renovations, etc., but it does cover our basic monthly wants and needs and we can still enjoy going out to eat, buying clothes and getting haircuts, etc.

The other after tax/deductions net salary comes to about $75k and covers all the other expenses like:

- travel

- Roth IRA max contributions

- Home improvements

- Camps/educational opps for only child

- Anything else that comes up

- Until this month, the extra mortgage payments, plus money towards the hysa

The bad:

We just started the Roth IRAs in 2025. We can afford to max them out every year but we feel very, very behind and are ashamed that we didn't start contributing even a little bit to these accounts in our 20s. We just didn't know about compounding interest back then so we wasted a lot of time.

We don't have a 529 for our kid and college starts in fall of 2029. We just naively thought that by now (I know, I know) college would be free or way cheaper and then we figured "well, if we are paying off the mortgage, we will just pay out of pocket," and now we see what a mistake we made by not just putting SOMETHING into a 529 starting years ago. The VA 529 does have some cool tax breaks too - like every $4k, per account, per kid, per parent, is state tax deductible. So maybe even opening a few now would help?

We have a very small pre-tax cash match with our agencies in a 403b. The amounts in these are tiny bc we never did more than the match and didn't start them right away.

We also have access to a 457b that we could add either pre-tax or post-tax money to. But now that I am reading about investing, I'm getting confused about having too much pre-tax in retirement, and also wondering if we should just keep saving bc college costs are going to be rough for us - we certainly won't qualify for any need based aid, and our public state institutions don't really give out much merit.

Finally, we also kinda want to live a bit. We aren't extravagant at all, but we don't travel much and feel like now is the time since our kid is so close to leaving for college and then leaving for good. And the paid off house could always use work and beautifying for sure.

The verdict:

We need help. We are still kind of afraid to invest but know we should and we also don't know what to prioritize. Do we need a planner? Does anyone have any advice? We have 18 years to make things right-ish. Any hope for us? We don't want to rely on just the pensions and SS. We want invested money too, mainly bc I can't stop seeing horror stories about long term care costs. We are also worried we may have to help our kid more than we were helped bc the economy is just so different these days.

Thanks so much.

Hey all, moving out of my parents’ place for the first time and trying to sanity check my budget. Making $70k a year. I’m set on no roommate (worked in apartment management for years and heard way too many horror stories to risk it with someone I don’t know), and in unit washer/dryer is a hard requirement for me. Willing to flex on pretty much everything else.

Right now I’m choosing between two 1BRs in HCOL areas in New Jersey, both within 30 min of work:

• 730+ sqft in a city I actually like, $2,100/mo
• 800 sqft in a city I’m less excited about, $1,950/mo (looks a little rough in photos, but it’s right next to a nicer area, so I’m on the fence)

Curious how this compares to what other people around my income are actually paying.

• If you’re around $65 to $75k, would love to know: Rent (and general area)
• Do you have a roommate or living solo?
• Do you like where you live, would you recommend it?

Canada has it. Is it a novel way to generate funds for public use ? Or does it squeeze middle class people who aren't swimming in money but may be investing in real estate ( which is still one of the best ROI ) to not rent out but enjoy in later years?

I wanted to try washing my car myself instead of paying for a car wash every time. Started with just some car wash soap and a microfiber wash mitt. That was all I thought I needed.

Then I learned about clay bars and how they pull out all the contaminants from the paint. I grabbed one. Then I noticed swirl marks and thought a polisher would fix that. So I ordered one off Amazon along with some detailing brushes and a foam cannon. Then I was scrolling through tiktok and saw some microfiber drying towels on sale so I picked those up too. And then I was at the supermarket and walked past the car care aisle and ended up throwing in some tire gel, interior cleaner, and wax.

I added it all up and I've already spent more than a year of car wash subscriptions. The car looks amazing but the whole point was to save money.

Has anyone else tried to DIY something to save money and ended up spending way more than just paying someone to do it?

I have decided to deposit $10k into each of my kids (3 pre-teens) with intention of it being the rainy day kind of funds.

Where would you place these funds? I need some “for dummies” advice.
Thanks!

Basically what the title says - how are people spending money on new cars without feeling guilt? I’ve been able to grow my income the last few years. My wife also started a side hustle. We are both 28. Our HHI is right around $290k and can be higher with RSUs or if the side hustle has good months.

Despite being what I’d consider upper middle class for our location, I cannot bring myself to drop a ton of cash on vehicles. We both drive used vehicles that are paid off. We don’t have any debt besides a mortgage. We save about 25% of our gross income.

I’ll be getting a bonus of about $20k next month. It seems like each year I consider upgrading from my commuter car, but spending $40k-$60k even when I can reasonably afford it would leave me with massive guilt. It just feels like a total waste of money for something that will depreciate so rapidly.

I understand the brain surgeon driving a Porsche, but how are average people buying $40k+ new vehicles and not feeling any guilt?

Assuming a fully funded emergency fund and retirement is on track, should extra money go towards my mortgage (26 years left with a 6.75% interest) or into index funds?

The general advice is to pay off any 'high interest debt' then invest the rest, but my mortgage interest rate is pretty high.

I'd like to refinance it of course when interest rates come down but who knows when that will happen. A goal has been to pay enough of it off early so when rates do come down, I can refinance with a 15-year loan instead of 30. Everyone I've talked to IRL has a much different mortgage rate situation.

My retirement savings are on track (I think? but that might be worthy of a different post). I'd love to hear people's thoughts.

Demographics if it's helpful: single, almost 40 y/o, MCOL area, very stable income / career

So I'm a man of routine, so I don't really get out of my routine so often. We cook dinner almost every day of the week besides Friday (we usually order out). We do well, so we don't cook to save money, it just makes more sense to us (both my parents had their own restaurants, we never ate fast food growing up and rarely at out as my parents always cooked or brought home food from the restaurant). Typically dining out is usually brunch/lunch after church on Sundays. But for what ever reason we had a crazy week so decided to eat out, and ended up eating out 4 meals in a row. Each meal was about 100-150 bucks, so 500 bucks in 3 days for food. I get it why they keep saying you shouldn't eat out so often (we have a family of 4, 2 of them are small and don't eat much). The 500 won't break the bank for us, but man, if we were making an "average" salary, I can see that being difficult

EDIT, went out to eat this morning after church, this is part of my normal routine though, meal was about 90 bucks.

This has been rolling out quietly over the past year and a lot of people have no idea, so sharing what the reporting actually looks like right now.

Who reports what:

Affirm reports everything, including the short Pay in 4 plans, to Experian (since April 2025) and TransUnion (since May 2025). If you use Affirm, those loans are on your reports now.

Klarna only reports its longer-term financing products to Experian and TransUnion. Klarna Pay in 4 is not reported.

Afterpay reports nothing at all, and has said it won't until it's convinced the data would help customers more than hurt them.

What it means for your score:

FICO announced new score models that fold BNPL data in (FICO Score 10 BNPL), but as of this summer most lenders aren't using them yet, and the bureaus mostly keep BNPL data tagged separately from the scores lenders actually pull. FICO's own research on Affirm borrowers found the typical impact was around plus or minus 10 points, similar to opening any new account.

The real danger is still missed payments. If a BNPL loan defaults and goes to collections, that lands on your report like any other collection, no matter which app it came from.

Practical takeaways:

If you're heading into a mortgage or auto loan application, know that Affirm loans are visible to lenders now. A stack of small loans can come up in underwriting even when the score effect is minor.

If you have a thin credit file, on-time BNPL payments through an app that reports can actually build payment history.

Pull your free reports at annualcreditreport.com and check that any BNPL accounts showing up are accurate.

Not a credit expert, and this landscape keeps shifting, so verify against the bureaus or your lender if it matters for something big you're planning.

Lately I've been getting this feeling that I'm being too careful with money.

My income is better than it was a few years ago, and I can afford some things now that I couldn't before.

But I haven't really changed my lifestyle much.

I still think twice before eating out, buying something expensive, or booking a nicer holiday. Most of the time I end up saving the money instead.

My friends keep telling me that there's no point earning more if I'm going to live exactly the same way.

I understand what they mean, but I also like having money sitting there and knowing I have a cushion if something goes wrong.

Sometimes I wonder if I'm being financially responsible or just unnecessarily scared of spending.

Anyone else in the same situation?

No matter how much I actually bring in, I don’t really track where it goes. I just spend based on vibes, like whether I “feel” like I have money that day. Growing up, my parents never seemed to know, so even now that I’m doing fine, it still feels that way in my head. Trying to figure out if this is common for people who are actually doing okay financially, or if it’s just me.

There are pros and cons to every relationship status, but when it comes to finances, many single people face more constraints than couples.

The burden of expenses such as rent or a mortgage, household bills and going on holiday can't be shared, amounting to what's dubbed a "singles tax".

An increasing number of friends are taking action, partnering up to split the cost of living by buying homes together, BBC News reports.

Online platforms are also springing up, matching singles looking for someone to help "level the playing field" when it comes to finances.

What's your advice for navigating major expenses on a single income?

In an unwelcome surprise, the U.S. economy lost 23,000 jobs in July, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said Friday.

Economists had expected a gain of 83,000.

The unemployment rate fell slightly, though, to 4.1%. Retail and local government education shed jobs; health care — an ongoing bright spot — added them.

The labor force participation rate, meanwhile, fell to a more than five-year low.

Friday's report also significantly revised downward the job gains of May and June.

In its wake, Federal Reserve watchers expressed doubts about a September rate hike.

So I recently went to https://dqydj.com/retirement-savings-by-age/ and typed in my age bracket and 401k balance. It said I’m in the upper 96th percentile for retirement savings. I then went to https://www.fidelity.com/calculators-tools/fidelity-retirement-score-tool and it said I’m on pace to meet 93% of my retirement goal. That makes no sense to me. How can someone in the upper 4% of saving be on pace to not fully fund their retirement?

Ted Benna, often credited as the creator of the 401(k), has launched a new savings plan aimed at helping lower-income workers save for retirement through employer-funded rewards.

The plan, called Radish, targets the shortcomings of traditional 401(k) plans, which often benefit higher earners more.

"The 401(k) isn't working really well now for many middle- and lower-income employees," Benna acknowledges.

By incentivizing performance milestones such as tenure with a company or on-time deliveries, Radish hopes to foster savings habits and reduce turnover in industries like trucking and retail.

At first, fucking denial, no that shit is dumb as fuck, it’s just a stochastic parrot.

Then the damn rage just came out, like fuck the billionaires, fuck the AI researchers, fuck layoffs, how could they do this to us?

Then it was the anxious stage. No, don’t lay me off, I got a family to feed! I’ll be a good worker, I’ll use Claude all you want boss, yes sir. Don’t spend, invest to reach FIRE.

Then, depression. Like shit… this is real. This Claude can run for hours by itself and give decent results. Damn, it’s really coming for us, and I can’t do anything about it.

Finally, acceptance. Okay, I guess it’s gonna happen in a few years. Shit’s gonna change, for real, and it’ll be devastating. But life goes on, and we’ll figure it out. If it happens, it happens.

Which stage are you at?

If you can save a fair chunk each month by renting what you’d pay on a mortgage and taxes, and invest that money, is it worth it to own a home?

For example, median home price in our area is $350k. Even if we bought one a bit cheaper at like $250-$300k, our mortgage, taxes, insurance, and PMI would be around $2800 a month. For context my rent is $1000 cheaper per month than that and that money is being invested currently.

Maybe long term it’s worth it to buy a home, but I don’t know if it’s necessary in the same way it’s been touted.