[Poll] Real household income

[Loco_local]

What I would like to know is where those 3 homeless people are living.

I hear there will be a place opening up in the Great Park for them.

http://www.solairaliving.com/

 

[usctrojancpa]

Its less about income and more about savings.  There are high income earners that spend every dollar they make and there are low to mid income earners that focus solely on saving.  My gut says the vast majority of Irvine buyers are savers and not spenders. 

In our early 20s, with combined incomes of under $150K, we were saving $50-60K a year and this only went up as our salaries went up.  By the time we bought our first house in our early 30s, we were able to put down well over $500K+.  This opened up houses that otherwise might be out of our price range based solely on our income.  Remember, the loan amount is capped by your income but the purchase price is your loan amount plus your down. 

My goal is to make my money work for me as well buy trading and buying rental properties directly from clients.  As Gordon Gecko said...."money never sleeps"

 

[AW]

What I would like to know is where those 3 homeless people are living.

I hear there will be a place opening up in the Great Park for them.

http://www.solairaliving.com/

If you can get in. Waitlist is like 2 years long now.
Anton Portola is also full.

 

[nyc to oc]

What I would like to know is where those 3 homeless people are living.

I hear there will be a place opening up in the Great Park for them.

http://www.solairaliving.com/

Solaira is low income housing restricted to age 55+. A different type of demographic than the general affordable housing population.

 

[homer_simpson]

Its less about income and more about savings.  There are high income earners that spend every dollar they make and there are low to mid income earners that focus solely on saving.  My gut says the vast majority of Irvine buyers are savers and not spenders. 

In our early 20s, with combined incomes of under $150K, we were saving $50-60K a year and this only went up as our salaries went up.  By the time we bought our first house in our early 30s, we were able to put down well over $500K+.  This opened up houses that otherwise might be out of our price range based solely on our income.  Remember, the loan amount is capped by your income but the purchase price is your loan amount plus your down. 

My goal is to make my money work for me as well buy trading and buying rental properties directly from clients.  As Gordon Gecko said...."money never sleeps"

Exactly... I respect the hustle brah

 

[usctrojancpa]

Its less about income and more about savings.  There are high income earners that spend every dollar they make and there are low to mid income earners that focus solely on saving.  My gut says the vast majority of Irvine buyers are savers and not spenders. 

In our early 20s, with combined incomes of under $150K, we were saving $50-60K a year and this only went up as our salaries went up.  By the time we bought our first house in our early 30s, we were able to put down well over $500K+.  This opened up houses that otherwise might be out of our price range based solely on our income.  Remember, the loan amount is capped by your income but the purchase price is your loan amount plus your down. 

My goal is to make my money work for me as well buy trading and buying rental properties directly from clients.  As Gordon Gecko said...."money never sleeps"

Exactly... I respect the hustle brah

Gotta keep the hustle going to keep the car addiction.  haha

 

[woodburyowner]

Single vs. Married makes a huge difference in this poll.  Shouldn't there be 2 distinct options for this?

 

[rkp]

Its less about income and more about savings.  There are high income earners that spend every dollar they make and there are low to mid income earners that focus solely on saving.  My gut says the vast majority of Irvine buyers are savers and not spenders. 

In our early 20s, with combined incomes of under $150K, we were saving $50-60K a year and this only went up as our salaries went up.  By the time we bought our first house in our early 30s, we were able to put down well over $500K+.  This opened up houses that otherwise might be out of our price range based solely on our income.  Remember, the loan amount is capped by your income but the purchase price is your loan amount plus your down. 

My goal is to make my money work for me as well buy trading and buying rental properties directly from clients.  As Gordon Gecko said...."money never sleeps"

Exactly... I respect the hustle brah

Have the same goals.  Unfortunately, most people don't know where to start outside of the basics like dividend stocks to make additional income.  Even something simple like RE isn't that easy, especially if you want to do it properly with LLCs and other liability limiters. 

Going back to topic, IHO should poll how much people save annually.  And wasn't IrvineRealtor tracking down payments for Irvine purchases?  Outside of all cash purchases, most people were putting down 30%-50% IIRC. 

 

[Loco_local]

Can household income also include everyone who lives under your roof even if you're renting a couple of rooms to UCI students or if your wife's brother's uncles godfather and his three sons live with you?

 

[Ready2Downsize]

Its less about income and more about savings.  There are high income earners that spend every dollar they make and there are low to mid income earners that focus solely on saving.  My gut says the vast majority of Irvine buyers are savers and not spenders. 

In our early 20s, with combined incomes of under $150K, we were saving $50-60K a year and this only went up as our salaries went up.  By the time we bought our first house in our early 30s, we were able to put down well over $500K+.  This opened up houses that otherwise might be out of our price range based solely on our income.  Remember, the loan amount is capped by your income but the purchase price is your loan amount plus your down. 

My goal is to make my money work for me as well buy trading and buying rental properties directly from clients.  As Gordon Gecko said...."money never sleeps"

Exactly... I respect the hustle brah

Have the same goals.  Unfortunately, most people don't know where to start outside of the basics like dividend stocks to make additional income.  Even something simple like RE isn't that easy, especially if you want to do it properly with LLCs and other liability limiters. 

Going back to topic, IHO should poll how much people save annually.  And wasn't IrvineRealtor tracking down payments for Irvine purchases?  Outside of all cash purchases, most people were putting down 30%-50% IIRC.

If you start a poll about savings, include (or exclude) 401K savings.

It would be nice to know what percent of income people save.

 

[paperboyNC]

Yes, net worth important too

 

[Paris167]

True wealth is determined by net worth. Most people haven't even calculated their net worth which is the first step to building it up. Everyone should know and track their net worth.
IHO why don't you create a poll on that?  I agree that annual gross income means nothing and expenditures vs cash flow has everything to do with determining who the true 1%ers are.

Igonore the above suggestion - I see you beat me to it! 

 

[irvinehomeowner]

I didn't create the savings poll.

Additionally, I was trying to determine wealth with this one.

I was trying to see if the data gathered in our small sample of Irvine residents (I think some who answered the poll don't even live in Irvine) justifies the high prices of Irvine real estate ($800k for an attached product?).

Obviously people have to have some savings (or FCB gifting) for a down and then based on that, income could be lower to cover the mortgage (if there is one). But I'm trying to consider what the majority of TI is, conventional buyers, 20%+ down and financing the rest.

If there are any FCB TI members... GET OUT OF IRVINE!!!

Just kidding. It's a double-edged sword, you guys keep real estate stable, but then you also make it expensive.

 

[morekaos]

That's true...I moved away years ago. >

 

[Ready2Downsize]

That's true...I moved away years ago. >

They could have lower income if they bought a long time ago or if they got their down from stock option grants (one time windfall type of thing) or maybe your poll includes renters and homeowner wannabes.

Also possible some people are answering just to mess with you. Seems like a high percentage of under $100K for Irvine.

 

[rkp]

True wealth is determined by net worth. Most people haven't even calculated their net worth which is the first step to building it up. Everyone should know and track their net worth.

100% agree.  We use Personal Capital to track our net worth and there are many products out there.  It took a few weeks to track down every account and login but its well worth the effort. 

I would add that net worth is just half the equation.  You have to understand your monthly spend and your long term big ticket items so that you know how much you truly need per month.  Monthly spend is fairly easy to figure out.  Just see how much your average credit card bills are and look at regular recurring debits from your bank account like rent and mortgage.  On the big ticket items, think items like children's college.  For example, we wanted to have $250K per child for college and our timeline was 15 years.  That meant that we needed to save ~$800 per month per child.  Once we had our regular expenses and then our long term big ticket items turned into monthly amounts, we had our minimum monthly needed to keep our current lifestyle and meet our long term goals.  Frankly this helped more than net worth.  Increasing net worth is great but you need clarity on how much you really need and gets you out of the rat race of chasing higher incomes. 

 

[Paris167]

Very true. I'm not too much of a Dave Ramsey fan because he's too conservative for me but assigning every dollar you make to something and knowing the daily cash flows in and out of your household is a must for ultimately building up your net worth. Getting out of the unnecessary debt cycle and sitting with your spouse to go over overall financial goals is what active personal financing is all about. My husband and I sit together at least every 3 months to re-evaluate financial goals in an effort to actively manage our finances. It helps to constantly re-tweek the plan, see what alternate moves we can take to improve it. But I'm surprised that much of our social network of friends and family think this is "odd behavior". And even with our kids money is a regular conversation. I want them to be fluent and confident in this topic early on because I want them to know money is important and that they can learn to make it work to their advantage.  It's a life skill every parent should instill in their children. I wish my parents did this for me - I had to learn the hard way.