Welcome to Money Talks! New approaches to money have exploded. Yet, money remains taboo. Less than half of you share personal finance information with your friends and family.
But that’s all changing. Now more and more of you are talking about money because it leads to better outcomes.
In an effort to provide personal finance insights through transparency (and have a bit of fun), I’ve created a series titled Money Talks that showcases how real people in Charlotte approach money.
It’s an anonymous way for you to share your money experiences and insights with our city. Answers are lightly edited for clarity and privacy (ex, exact age). Want to participate? Take the Money Talks survey.
Here’s a look into a married, 33-year-old dad’s personal finances.
On your mind:
Can I teach my young kids to respect money and understand the value of saving, while not making them so fearful to spend that they just hoard it all?
Living situation:
Own. 30-year fixed at 2.75%. We made sure to keep our housing costs below 25% of our take-home pay, just in case one of us loses our job.
Our first home we decided to do a 10-year ARM because we didn’t expect to be in the house for 10 years. If I remember correctly, that saved us 1.75% off our interest rate. We moved in 7 years as we started having kids, so it worked out, but if we had gotten stuck with skyrocketing home prices followed by higher interest rates, the gamble on the ARM might not have worked out.
Job and salary:
I’m a software product manager. $226K base with a 35% bonus plus equity (illiquid and unsure on value).
Salary journey:
$77K starting salary after undergrad. I spent 7 years at my first company, taking as many roles as possible to learn. Salary bumps were just above inflation.
Then I switched employers and started off at $145K and then got to $175K before taking my current job.
I’d highly suggest reading the book Range by David Epstein. It validated the value of lateral moves early on in my career.
Work-life balance:
I’ve always focused on life at home. Until my current role, I didn’t take roles that made me travel too much.
Early in my career, I put a lot of time in at the physical office to learn everything I could. Now that I have young kids, I am pretty good about ending work by 5:30 to play with my kids, eat dinner together, and help with bedtime. I prioritize family and experiences over work.
Saving philosophy:
We save 28% of our take-home pay. 15% to retirement (401(k) and IRAs), 6% to liquid savings (emergency fund), 4% to our kids’ 529 college funds, and 3% to our brokerage account.
More used to go into our brokerage account, but kids are expensive!! For our kids’ college funds, we’re trying to achieve 80% coverage of a 4-year in-state tuition.
We will probably start saving for a new car in the next 2 years as one of our cars will likely need to be replaced in 5-6 years.
Debt:
Just the mortgage at 2.75% interest and a HVAC loan for 0% interest over 5 years.
Credit cards:
We have 7 cards, but only use 4 regularly. Each has its value with high rewards for different categories.
AMEX Blue Cash Preferred for gas/groceries; Bank of America Cash Rewards for online purchases; Bank of America Premium Rewards for everything else (with a bank account there, we earn 3.75% on everything else); we also have the Capital One Venture X because they, in essence, pay you to use the card; since we have set up automatic payments to pay off our cards every month, the rewards vs annual fees are worth it to us.
Splurge:
Vacations. We both highly value experiences with our family.
Spending time with family and friends away from the routine of everyday life is decompressing and it allows our kids to learn sometimes even faster than they do at school.
Restaurant pick:
Chapter 6 in South End near Sycamore. Order The Treatment (4-course meal) and Tipsy Treatment (drink pairing with the courses).
Money tools:
Rocket Money for budgeting (RIP Mint). We used to use Mint for budgeting, but now have unfortunately had to switch over to Rocket Money.
Empower for free tracking of our net worth.
Investment strategy:
We don’t use a financial advisor. I’ve automated all of our investments and allocations, so for now we don’t need one. I do see the value in an hourly rate advisor (not a fee on AUM) in the coming years if we want to expand our investment strategy beyond just ETFs and mutual funds.
For retirement accounts, I’ve got 75% in mutual funds that track the S&P 500, 10% in bonds, and 15% international.
Net worth:
$1M. 50% of this is paper equity in our house. 45% is in retirement accounts. 5% are investments and 5% is our emergency savings.
Retirement:
I want to be financially independent by 50. Then I have the flexibility to retire whenever I want to. Our current annual expenses are $110K per year, so we’d need around $2.9M for investment income to match expenses (using the 4% rule).
Rich in Charlotte:
Ability to own a home in South Charlotte. Anyone earning over $100K should probably be considered rich as well.
Financial goals:
- Be financially independent by 50
- Go on an international trip every other year
- Save for 80% of kids’ college fund
Money Talks is a weekly series showcasing how real people in Charlotte approach money. Participate
New to Tiny Money? Join 11,049 Charlotte money nerds and subscribe to the 1x/wk newsletter
