I would be concerned primarily with rent. Getting utilities well below $150 should be doable; food for $200, $300 tops; transportation would depend on specifics, but all said I’d expect under $1000 to be sufficient, barring expensive rent or absurdly high bills (I don’t know how expensive house/car payments are, and how this varies with location). To be safe regardless of location, I’d go with $2000, although I could manage on $600 in my current location if not for college debts.
So I suppose the cost of living in the location in question is the important thing; average cost of living is going to be well above a comfortable minimum, I’d expect (or at least, the average cost of living in my area is over $2000/month; I believe it was a little over $2400 last I checked.).
I wouldn’t recommend getting a car if your city has good public transportation/bike paths. The cost of updating a monthly pass for a bus will be exceeded once and half again by cost of your car’s insurance, never mind gas, maintenance and parking. No, a car is a liability in most cases, unless you have a dire reason to visit rural areas on a regular basis.
For houses I’m not so sure- on the one hand your money will be going back to you in the form of equity, but on the other hand you’d be losing a lot of said payments to interest, unless you really pumped money into the mortgage payments.One year out of high school may be too early to consider conventional housing.
No, a car is a liability in most cases, unless you have a dire reason to visit rural areas on a regular basis.
Or if you live in a rural area, but I suppose you covered that with “if your city has good public transportation/bike paths.” (I live in a rural area, but physically couldn’t drive if I could afford it. gotdistractedbythe doesn’t seem to have mentioned eir location, but judging by the way the beach was mentioned, I’m imagining one of the coastal cities that generally have decent public transportation, so I don’t expect ey will need to worry about cars. However, said areas also tend to have some of the higher end costs for renting living space, as I understand it.)
I would be concerned primarily with rent. Getting utilities well below $150 should be doable; food for $200, $300 tops; transportation would depend on specifics, but all said I’d expect under $1000 to be sufficient, barring expensive rent or absurdly high bills (I don’t know how expensive house/car payments are, and how this varies with location). To be safe regardless of location, I’d go with $2000, although I could manage on $600 in my current location if not for college debts.
So I suppose the cost of living in the location in question is the important thing; average cost of living is going to be well above a comfortable minimum, I’d expect (or at least, the average cost of living in my area is over $2000/month; I believe it was a little over $2400 last I checked.).
I wouldn’t recommend getting a car if your city has good public transportation/bike paths. The cost of updating a monthly pass for a bus will be exceeded once and half again by cost of your car’s insurance, never mind gas, maintenance and parking. No, a car is a liability in most cases, unless you have a dire reason to visit rural areas on a regular basis.
For houses I’m not so sure- on the one hand your money will be going back to you in the form of equity, but on the other hand you’d be losing a lot of said payments to interest, unless you really pumped money into the mortgage payments.One year out of high school may be too early to consider conventional housing.
Or if you live in a rural area, but I suppose you covered that with “if your city has good public transportation/bike paths.” (I live in a rural area, but physically couldn’t drive if I could afford it. gotdistractedbythe doesn’t seem to have mentioned eir location, but judging by the way the beach was mentioned, I’m imagining one of the coastal cities that generally have decent public transportation, so I don’t expect ey will need to worry about cars. However, said areas also tend to have some of the higher end costs for renting living space, as I understand it.)