Found the article very interesting and read some articles on the referenced blogs. More about her husband for those interested:
https://www.thefrugalgene.com/husband-became-rich-young-no-m...
I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
171–180 of 226 posts
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#172Not sure what to make of this. Marrying a rich man was the deus ex machina. I thought the talk about breaking the "cycle of poverty" was pointing towards a heroic use of frugality to overcome, but no, solution was marriage. And then the extremely/uncomfortable frugality, as opposed to healthy frugality, after becoming rich points to pathology more than anything else.
This. Her brand is called "Merry for Money" (intentional pun?).
I'm disappointed and feel slightly bait and switched. Her husband's income enables her take on ephemeral gigs and run a blog full-time instead of working at a regular 9-5 job. Also, her extreme frugality is just a fun thought experiment, blog topic and hobby for her. It is impractical and an ineffective use of time for non-hobbyists --- if she had to work a full-time job, she would be better off spending more time developing her career and less time being extremely frugal.
Additionally, I like reading about 1st/2nd generation immigrant stories but she appears to also solve the integration and cultural challenges of her immigrant background by marrying an all-american rich white guy.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#173A family of three living off of $1,000/month in Seattle? What decade was this actually written in?
It's $1000/mo plus rent which she excludes.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean, I’m in a similar boat. I did the whole “make it rain” thing for a few years by dripping in designer clothes, fancy restaurants, etc. But that lifestyle made me way more anxious as impostor syndrome kicked in. Having money doesn’t really solve problems; there’s always someone with more who will make you feel poor. Buy a Gucci bag and it’ll feel like half the world is dripping bespoke Hermès. You can’t win. I l…
> Buy a Gucci bag and it’ll feel like half the world is dripping bespoke Hermès. You can’t win. This is fascinating. I suspect 99% of people simply don't care and can't even tell a $50 purse from $5000 one, and this Gucci vs Hermes rivarvly is only relevant for a tiny minority of sad snobs. Like the other poster said, good for you for ditching this.
You would be surprised how many people care deeply about this. And they can tell a lot about the purses and their owners. Those that care put in a lot of time to research them - like some people do cars.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean, I’m in a similar boat. I did the whole “make it rain” thing for a few years by dripping in designer clothes, fancy restaurants, etc. But that lifestyle made me way more anxious as impostor syndrome kicked in. Having money doesn’t really solve problems; there’s always someone with more who will make you feel poor. Buy a Gucci bag and it’ll feel like half the world is dripping bespoke Hermès. You can’t win. I l…
> Buy a Gucci bag and it’ll feel like half the world is dripping bespoke Hermès. You can’t win. This is fascinating. I suspect 99% of people simply don't care and can't even tell a $50 purse from $5000 one, and this Gucci vs Hermes rivarvly is only relevant for a tiny minority of sad snobs. Like the other poster said, good for you for ditching this.
Reminds me of a story I read once about a woman who had finally gotten the purse she wanted.
She was walking down the sidewalk an a woman coming the other way had an even more expensive purse which she turned toward her.
The expensive purse woman took a subtlety diagonal path to gradually force her to the side until she had to step behind a light post to avoid a collision.
Quite the power move hahaha.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#176Earlier quoted context omitted.
The ROI from vacations when your younger vs much earlier retirement seems to favor early retirement.
...and then you die at 35. Live while you're alive. You don't know when the bus is going to come around that corner a little too fast.
Humanity has been having this debate for thousands of years, e.g. the fable of the Ant and the Grasshopper. It's a virtue to work hard and plan for the future. Delayed gratification is a foundational building block of civilization. There's a balance that each person must strike but I'm hesitate to criticize unless someone has parked at one extreme end of the spectrum or the other. The secret may be to more carefully measure and unnderstand experiential ROI from money spent which our traditionally materialistic focused consumer culture does not make very transparent.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#177She comes from a poor background. Now she is no longer poor, but pretends to be.
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#178Earlier quoted context omitted.
As Paula Pant of Afford Anything [1] would say, you can afford anything, but not everything. The author here is house-hacking [2], which certainly isn't everyone's cup of tea, but it is one way to get around high housing costs. I've listened to enough financial independence podcasts to know that it's absolutely possible to hit a 90% savings rate. There are guests on the show who have done it on much less income than…
Sure, pretending that your rent/mortgage payment isn't an expense, and calling it "house hacking", makes it easier to claim a 90% savings rate.
I see your point, but I also don't think it's crazy to calculate effective savings as net wealth contribution over net wage income, which seems to be how she's thinking about it.
Actually, to me, savings percentage isn't important as a bottom line number. It's just a helpful intermediate number for understanding cash flow. I'm much more interested in net wealth contribution and how that dials up to future plans involving large sums of money (e.g. moving or expanding house, education, letting go of wage income, major philanthropy, estate plans, risk management).
Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#179The article misses out on the math though. She saves 90% percent of her income? So does she earn 80k after taxes? She would need to earn about 130k+ after taxes to save 90% of her income, given that she is the one who pays all the expenses, which at 1000$ per 3 people is hard to imagine. Even in a small German town, where things are dirt-cheap compared to Seattle, 1000$ for 3 persons is almost impossible. I don't lik…
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Re: I’m not saving ninety percent of my income for myself
#180I just went to a talk by a software engineer in SF who was talking about effective altruism and how he personally donates 33% of this income to charity every year...
The one thing about personal finance blogs that consistently bother me is that they always feel incredibly selfish. How much do they donate to charity every year? Given the attitude of scrimping every penny I’m guessing very little to none.