Not yet retired (3 years to pay off the mortgage). We tracked all our expenses in 2021. After the mortgage and extra principal, the largest expense was travel. We travelled A LOT in 2021 so it was 13% of our overall expenses. Thanks in part to you Josh, we are dialed in on expected expenses in retirement (yes, including healthcare OMG!)
I'm tempted to say that my property taxes are by far my highest expenses but it occurs to me that they come in 2 parts. They largest is school tax at the end of September and the property taxes at the end of January. I realize that if I look at them on the spreadsheet as a monthly expense, they might not be my highest expense. It's been quite a while since I've looked at that sheet and high time that I do! Like getting gas, you aren't buying all that much per fill up but compare it the month or to a fuel oil fill when you're getting a minimum 200 gallons and the total will be memorable. With Sniffy Joe's energy policy, my last 200 gallons in the beginning of summer when it's usually the cheapest and I fill 2-330 gallon tanks, costed $1150! That's more than I normally pay to fill the 2-330's. And I better check that gauge cause I probably need more!
1st Health insurance through my former employer. I could go to Obamacare and pay a little less and have no coverage. 2nd Food 3rd Housing expenses, property tax, insurance, Maintenance 4th Utilities
Retired almost 3 years. Housing for me by far the highest! Even with NO mortgage or debt: property taxes, homeowner insurance, small HOA dues, utilities (gas, water, electric) plus on going annual home maintenance and repairs, etc. Not much on transportation ($1000-1200/yr)..2015 car & insurance.. not much daily driving since retiring. Healthcare (prior to Medicare) plus LTC premium is next at less than half of housing, then food in third. Food would be 2nd if you took LTC premium out.
Far and away- the credit cards. That includes groceries(600), medical/dental (1k), alcohol (150) gasoline (100) and odds and ends like clothing and gifts. Housing is a distant second- no mtg and the utilities, HOA, taxes and insurance don't add up to 500. I paid over $3K on the cards last month. Retired, no debts.
Food. Amazing how many of the credit card transactions are grocery store or restaurants. My wife and I share a car while our three young adults each have one with insurance running around $400 per month.
Josh, love your show, been watching for several years now. I recently retired…debt free but I rent. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area. My rent is $2070 per month – my largest expense followed by medical ($500/mo), food @ 400/mo, my vehicle (it's paid for but total care/$340/mo) at
Retired. #1 expense = Federal Taxes due to Roth conversions up to 12% tax bracket. Next year our highest expense will be Health Insurance when hubby becomes Medicare eligible & I will have to find coverage (currently on his employer coverage). Will continue Roth conversions through 2025. No mortgage & no debt.
Over last 12 mos. My biggest expense is "merchandise" which includes most groceries. Then travel (paid for an upcoming cruise), then restaurants then supermarkets. Gas comes in 5th. Then property tax and insurance. Then health outlays. No mortgage. No car payments or other debt. Probably pretty typical going forward.
Wife just retired this year ad a public school teacher. Biggest expenses are health care ins 26%, travel/vacation 18%, food 18%, utilities 14%, prop taxes 11% in GA, house maint 9%, auto ins 6%. Those are the big hitters
Still working but out soon. Our largest spend is on travel. We spend 15 to 20 K a year on that. Then 10 to 15K a year into non retirement investments. But just looking at what it takes to run our household without the big trips / investments and our largest expense is our entertainment. We blow several hundred a month on going out with friends, concerts, festivals, etc. 450/month for groceries, 200 car insurance, 150 to 170 for electric, 186 cable/internet , 150 phones and plans, and property taxes are low. works out to 53 a month for the house and land and about 300 year on the cars. Home owners insurance is 900 a year. So really. not a whole lot in household expenses for day to day, month to month living. Everything else like clothing, fuel, yard stuff, is small fry and hardly worth mentioning.
1. Investing / IRAs / Savings – 5k-10k per month (earnings apex years) 2. Food – 500-1000 a month (family of 5) 3. Insurance – Auto (350 for two 9 year old cars (two teenage kids)) and Health (400) 4. No mortgage (Property taxes 1200 year)(Home insurance 1450 a year) 5. No car payments 6. Electricity due to ridiculously hot summers 100-200 a month (Thanks Hurricanes) NOT retired yet but I am already setup to go in the next few years.
I retired Jan 2022. Paid off my house with lump sum pension. Rv note 675$ is biggest expense . Health care 600$ is second highest. My biggest take on retirement is you have lots of time and less money. Was working 50 to 80 hour weeks. When you work you have more money and less time to spend.
57 and married with two boys in HS. Retired from COJ in January after almost 32 years. Pension and part time job provides more income now. Biggest expenses are mortgage/property taxes/insurance at 23%. Food 19.5%. Car loan and gas are about 9% each. Nothing else really close, even healthcare.
Insurance. We are retired but still have 2 daughters in college. We own 2 homes, 6 cars, and a boat. All with insurance, mostly just liability. We have an umbrella policy. Housing. Property taxes, upkeep, etc. Healthcare. Just under $12k per year. Food purchases are minimal because we grow most of our own food and I don't accurately track that. We very rarely go to a restaurant. We are a bit different with the kids still on the payroll and that will change in a couple of years. We have planned for high expenses through our first 10 years of retirement. Once we get the kids off the payroll I think healthcare and insurance will still be the most. I would need to separate homeowners from other insurance to get a truly accurate figure. One of our houses is a rental so those expenses are cancelled out. I set our first 10 years expenditures at the amount we "brought home" the year before I retired. At age 70-72 those figures are cut by 75% because kids are gone and SS/Medicare will be in play.
Living in NJ with no mortgage and no debt of any kind. Our largest single expense is property taxes (over $17K) with close to 70% of that property tax bill being the portion for schools.
Pre-retirement: Housing 2100 (will be paying off mortgage soon though), Food 1200 (1 senior, 1 adult child at home), Charity 1000, Autos (insurance, fuel) 900. My housing will be dropping after I pay-off the mortgage (probably next month).
Biggest single expense is property tax, welcome to New Jersey. It is equal to our actual mortgage payment of pricipal/interest. We are paying for bloated schools, bloated state government, and Democrat policies accross the board.
Not yet retired (3 years to pay off the mortgage). We tracked all our expenses in 2021. After the mortgage and extra principal, the largest expense was travel. We travelled A LOT in 2021 so it was 13% of our overall expenses. Thanks in part to you Josh, we are dialed in on expected expenses in retirement (yes, including healthcare OMG!)
I'm tempted to say that my property taxes are by far my highest expenses but it occurs to me that they come in 2 parts. They largest is school tax at the end of September and the property taxes at the end of January. I realize that if I look at them on the spreadsheet as a monthly expense, they might not be my highest expense. It's been quite a while since I've looked at that sheet and high time that I do! Like getting gas, you aren't buying all that much per fill up but compare it the month or to a fuel oil fill when you're getting a minimum 200 gallons and the total will be memorable. With Sniffy Joe's energy policy, my last 200 gallons in the beginning of summer when it's usually the cheapest and I fill 2-330 gallon tanks, costed $1150! That's more than I normally pay to fill the 2-330's. And I better check that gauge cause I probably need more!
Housing and food
Taxes – not retired.
1st Health insurance through my former employer. I could go to Obamacare and pay a little less and have no coverage.
2nd Food
3rd Housing expenses, property tax, insurance, Maintenance
4th Utilities
Retired almost 3 years. Housing for me by far the highest! Even with NO mortgage or debt: property taxes, homeowner insurance, small HOA dues, utilities (gas, water, electric) plus on going annual home maintenance and repairs, etc. Not much on transportation ($1000-1200/yr)..2015 car & insurance.. not much daily driving since retiring. Healthcare (prior to Medicare) plus LTC premium is next at less than half of housing, then food in third. Food would be 2nd if you took LTC premium out.
Far and away- the credit cards. That includes groceries(600), medical/dental (1k), alcohol (150) gasoline (100) and odds and ends like clothing and gifts. Housing is a distant second- no mtg and the utilities, HOA, taxes and insurance don't add up to 500. I paid over $3K on the cards last month. Retired, no debts.
Will be retiring in Jan, 1. Property Taxes 7000, 2. food 5300 3. Medical insurance 3800. Annual amounts given. Western NY south of Buffalo.
Food. Amazing how many of the credit card transactions are grocery store or restaurants. My wife and I share a car while our three young adults each have one with insurance running around $400 per month.
I am 58 and single I owe 210,000 on house, 10 year loan paid off in 8 years.
For me so far it’s groceries. But we have no house or car payments. No longer working a FT job.
I have estimated that if I retire early, it will be healthcare since I will not qualify for Medicare.
Hi Josh, happy to help support your research. Feel free to reach out if you want.
Josh, love your show, been watching for several years now.
I recently retired…debt free but I rent. I live in the San Francisco Bay Area. My rent is $2070 per month – my largest expense followed by medical ($500/mo), food @ 400/mo, my vehicle (it's paid for but total care/$340/mo) at
$ 1,085 month – Property taxes and HOA fees; $600 month-cable, phone, utilities; $500 month-food; $350 month entertainment ; $265 month car related expenses- gas, maintenance, insurance.
Retired. #1 expense = Federal Taxes due to Roth conversions up to 12% tax bracket. Next year our highest expense will be Health Insurance when hubby becomes Medicare eligible & I will have to find coverage (currently on his employer coverage). Will continue Roth conversions through 2025. No mortgage & no debt.
Taxes and wine. I wonder if there's a hidden meaning behind that?
insurance is my biggest expense. vehicle and home insurance
Josh, feel free to reach out if you want more info….
1.) Medical – $1500 month premium with 14,000 out of pocket annually. On ACA
2.) Property Taxes – $6,000 annual
3.) Food/Electric/Natural Gas have all increased significantly
No debt, both kids cash flowed through college, 52 and ready for the next chapter.
Over last 12 mos. My biggest expense is "merchandise" which includes most groceries. Then travel (paid for an upcoming cruise), then restaurants then supermarkets. Gas comes in 5th. Then property tax and insurance. Then health outlays. No mortgage. No car payments or other debt.
Probably pretty typical going forward.
My home. I am a late first-time purchaser, so at 60, I have a mortgage.
In order of high to low: health insurance $710, Mortgage $620, charity about $600
Wife just retired this year ad a public school teacher. Biggest expenses are health care ins 26%, travel/vacation 18%, food 18%, utilities 14%, prop taxes 11% in GA, house maint 9%, auto ins 6%. Those are the big hitters
Still working but out soon. Our largest spend is on travel. We spend 15 to 20 K a year on that. Then 10 to 15K a year into non retirement investments. But just looking at what it takes to run our household without the big trips / investments and our largest expense is our entertainment. We blow several hundred a month on going out with friends, concerts, festivals, etc. 450/month for groceries, 200 car insurance, 150 to 170 for electric, 186 cable/internet , 150 phones and plans, and property taxes are low. works out to 53 a month for the house and land and about 300 year on the cars. Home owners insurance is 900 a year. So really. not a whole lot in household expenses for day to day, month to month living. Everything else like clothing, fuel, yard stuff, is small fry and hardly worth mentioning.
1. Investing / IRAs / Savings – 5k-10k per month (earnings apex years)
2. Food – 500-1000 a month (family of 5)
3. Insurance – Auto (350 for two 9 year old cars (two teenage kids)) and Health (400)
4. No mortgage (Property taxes 1200 year)(Home insurance 1450 a year)
5. No car payments
6. Electricity due to ridiculously hot summers 100-200 a month (Thanks Hurricanes)
NOT retired yet but I am already setup to go in the next few years.
I retired Jan 2022. Paid off my house with lump sum pension. Rv note 675$ is biggest expense . Health care 600$ is second highest. My biggest take on retirement is you have lots of time and less money. Was working 50 to 80 hour weeks. When you work you have more money and less time to spend.
57 and married with two boys in HS. Retired from COJ in January after almost 32 years. Pension and part time job provides more income now. Biggest expenses are mortgage/property taxes/insurance at 23%. Food 19.5%. Car loan and gas are about 9% each. Nothing else really close, even healthcare.
I am still working. Taxes are my greatest expense. Federal, state, and property taxes are well over 40% of my income.
Insurance. We are retired but still have 2 daughters in college. We own 2 homes, 6 cars, and a boat. All with insurance, mostly just liability. We have an umbrella policy.
Housing. Property taxes, upkeep, etc.
Healthcare. Just under $12k per year.
Food purchases are minimal because we grow most of our own food and I don't accurately track that. We very rarely go to a restaurant.
We are a bit different with the kids still on the payroll and that will change in a couple of years.
We have planned for high expenses through our first 10 years of retirement. Once we get the kids off the payroll I think healthcare and insurance will still be the most. I would need to separate homeowners from other insurance to get a truly accurate figure. One of our houses is a rental so those expenses are cancelled out.
I set our first 10 years expenditures at the amount we "brought home" the year before I retired. At age 70-72 those figures are cut by 75% because kids are gone and SS/Medicare will be in play.
Property taxes are the biggest expense for everyone
Living in NJ with no mortgage and no debt of any kind. Our largest single expense is property taxes (over $17K) with close to 70% of that property tax bill being the portion for schools.
Prior to 65 I feel like it will be health insurance. Then probably property tax and insurance. Especially carrying flood and windstorm.
My biggest expense is definitely insurance.
Pre-retirement: Housing 2100 (will be paying off mortgage soon though), Food 1200 (1 senior, 1 adult child at home), Charity 1000, Autos (insurance, fuel) 900. My housing will be dropping after I pay-off the mortgage (probably next month).
Biggest single expense is property tax, welcome to New Jersey. It is equal to our actual mortgage payment of pricipal/interest. We are paying for bloated schools, bloated state government, and Democrat policies accross the board.