DH brings home about $1000 per month after child support and our paper route is about $900 per month. Depending on whether I have puppies or dog shows I get about $500-800 from the dogs and the rest has to go back into dog food, travel expenses, etc. for them. We are planning to homeschool our dd & ds so I can't have a normal full time job for a long time to come. In just a few months my student loans and our car will be paid off (SL-Nov & car in Jan) so we will have more money to save up for emergencies.

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Mom to Caitlyn 4-1-03
Mom to Michael 9-1-05

It really depend where you live too! Even the cost of living here is rural MN is way lower than the cities, but the pay is way lower also. I don't care how much we make, I think we are destined to always live paycheck to paycheck

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~Happiness is a large family~

We are in the 3-4000 I am a SAHM and we are just making it... we could be doign better if DH didn't spend spend spend... I lie to him about how much money we really have so that I can buy food. Student loans are making things rough and his debt prior to marrage.

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We bring home just over $3,000, have a house payment, car payment, three kids with one on the way and the normal monthly bills. Yet, we aren't living paycheck to paycheck thankfully. We have budgeted in a certain amount that goes directly into savings each month and so it's there if an emergency comes up. We also put a certain amount in the kids' savings each month so we have it if we really get desperate. It all comes down, in my opinion, to seeing where you spend your money and then coming up with a budget (cutting out the unnecessary stuff) and sticking with it. We even budget for fun stuff so we know what we have to spend and plan accordingly.

I forgot to mention that the family insurance & contributions to 401K plans are also taken out of the monthly money.

We are in the $3 - $4000 range. We have a mortgage pmt, two truck payments and one cc plus monthly expenses. I am a sahm, but my dh works two jobs. It's really hard. If he doesn't make a bonus at work, we wouldn't be able to pay our bills and we currently have no savings at all. Things will be easier next year, one of the trucks will be paid off and the other one the following year. If things keep going the way they are financially, I will probably have to go back to work.

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formally~momof2crazyboys

We live paycheck to paycheck and no matter what DH brings home it seems it's always that way. I am a SAHM but if I were to work, after childcare, clothes and gas, I'd be paying them to work. It would be close to $500 a week for child care, I would need a whole work wardrobe and gas would be over $100/ week. I'll wear rags and eat boxed mac&cheese (yuck ) if it meant I could stay home. We are getting ready to sell our house and we will pay off our $5500 debt and rent while we look for a new house.

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~*JAMI*~ GO RED SOX! WORLD CHAMPIONS!

we at almost 3k a month and still live paycheck to paycheck. on one income. if we didn't have the loc or the visa card it wouldn't be paycheck to paycheck we would be pretty comfortable.

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Kimberley

"there is nothing to worry about, just plenty to think about" from an episode of Extreme Makeover House edition

check out my blog:
http://mommysavers.com/boards/journa...owjournal&j=21

Before DH lost his job in February, his monthly income fell any where from $3-5k. Now with the new job, he makes almost half of what he did last year. He is salaried at $34,000.00 so there is no overtime even when he works 70-80 hours a week which is every single week. Because of the income drop, I had to go back to work so now between the 2 of us, we are bringing home about $3600/mth. We live paycheck to paycheck. Our rent is $1400.00, we don't have any car payments but dh could really use a new car/truck since his is 18 years old. But hey it runs, if ain't broke don't fix it, ya know? We do have cell phones which is a big luxury at $140 a month for 3 of them, but with my oldest heading off to College next month, there is no way I am sending her 3 hours away with a phone while traveling. It has been 3 years since we had a vacation and since we always came to Florida on vacation, we will have to find a new destination.

Wow. I feel that we don't make much after reading this. Dh makes about 3000/month + bonus. When the bonus' come in, we put half in my college fund and the other in savings. We are the most frugal people you will ever meet. We don't live paycheck to paycheck but can't afford luxuries or insurance, most of you know that we are waiting on insurance allowance from my DH's work. Then we will purchase it.

Our budget is about half our income. We don't have cable, internet (wireless from outside source), only one car (saves on gas/insurance), go out to eat at DH's restaurant (free), we have a duplex that is way cheaper than we needed (still nice) and don't really buy frivelously or use CC's. We are very simple, I swear we came from the 50's. (But i love my Computer too much) Even though we don't have the newest things, we always have back up for unexpected things or can afford to splurge once and awhile for something. That way, we can buy something REALLY nice.