[Brian Griffin]

The investment community has many members who live in the suburbs of NYC where property taxes are absurdly high.

These might be typical for Middle America:

Medicare premiums $2,500/year
out-of-pocket/supplemental $3,000/year
drugs $3,000/year (varies a lot)
dentist $1,000/year (on average)
food $2,500/year

phone & internet $1,500/year
lawn $1,500/year
house maintenance $2,500/year (varies a lot)
electric $2,000/year (varies a lot)
heat $3,000/year (varies a lot)
property tax $5,000/year (varies a lot)

That’s about $27,500/year for basic living costs.

Add about $12,000/year for each additional person.

Add about 20% for a margin and for luxuries.

Subtract out 80% of yearly Social Security [expect a 20% reduction come circa 2032].

Figure for 30 years if healthy.

[Brian Griffin]

I left out car costs.

[Brian Griffin]

I also left out water & sewer.

[Brian Griffin]

I also left out house insurance.

[spokeshave]

Spokeshave is going to sell his 3BR house and take out a 2 year lease on a smaller property with another 2 year lease paid up front after a year (with adjustment for inflation)

Waiting to see how cancer changes my lifestyle year by year before checking into a Hospice.

[TexasGator]

“lawn $1,500/year”

I see able bodied people paying for lawn service.

I an almost 80 and still do my lawn. Only one on the block to do so.

Yesterday in the Florida heat I cut the grass and did the trimming without taking a break.

My wife dud upgrad me to a self-propelled mower last year!

[fatboy]

I’m that guy at my workplace that everyone comes to for a quick explanation of the company 401K (without having to ask HR) or something to do with investing however I don’t give advice but will tell people what I do with my money. My wife and me have been zero-dollar budgeting for 10 years and know our expenses to almost the dollar. We are also debt free and have a paid for home and a savings rate north of 50%

Having said all that and as we are in our career glidepath phase we know that our retirement expenses for the basics will be $3,000 per month or $36K per year. Of course we have to pay some income taxes but our worse case fixed income (assuming one of us passes before the other) will be twice our expenses, we have more as long as we are both alive and a decent nest egg that we really don’t need but are happy to have. The main thing is to save all the time and live below your means. Most people I have found don’t plan for retirement even at the point of leaving the workforce they have no idea what their expenses are or how much income they will have to spend in retirement.