Just shoot me

[hfojvt]

78. I think people should always be encouraged to save

I have no house payment - because I planned it that way when I bought the house in November 2001. I got a 5/1 ARM planning to pay it off in less than 5 years. Then I got fired in March 2002. By March, though, I had already paid an extra $2,200 on the principle of my loan.

In early August 2002, I got a part time job, making $235 a week, gross. That was about all I made until May 2004 when I finally got hired full time.

My earnings report says
1999 - $14,520
2000 - $16,153
2001 - $17,464
2002 - $10,617
2003 - $13,891
2004 - $19,704
2005 - $24,120

So, yeah, $38,000 does sound like a fair amount of money to me. Even for two people. One thing about two people is - I could fit two more people in this house where I lived. Again, I wanted this biggish house because I was planning to get married.

More of a hope than a plan, but a second person would not double my expenses, not even close.

If somebody has a $2,000 house payment, then presumably they are living in a very nice house. They are then richer than somebody who only (like myself) had a $225 house payment.

It seems to me that people often do that - spend their money to live well. Which is their right, of course, but then they complain 'I don't have enough money'. (Note I am not talking about the OP, just your example of a $2,000 a month house payment, which to me sounds like somebody is buying the Taj Mahal.)

Finger wagging or not, I happen to believe in this Kantian absolute - people should have a fair amount of savings to weather the storms of life.

It's not always possible. Sometimes people get hit and hit and hit again, and some people simply do not make enough money, but it's still, I think, an absolute. Important to try, to plan, to keep safe as much as possible.