@Flyhigher- I am sorry to hear about your loss! Your parents are looking at you and smiling! What wonderful kids they have raised! So glad to learn that you and your husband started your journey as MS/ PhD- graduate school in general. A lot of people say that it is impossible to save on a grad student salary but you two are a shining example of that anything is possible if you put your mind to it. It is important to have a life partner who shares similar life goals. My husband is like your husband. He influenced me to be a better saver. When we met he was doing PhD and was already saving in ROTH IRA. I didn’t even know about optional retirement plans. I started reading about personal finances when I realized how much I didn’t know. Keep writing! I would love to hear more from you!
Who needs a boat, a summer cabin, and a winter hunting lodge; all one needs are good friends who have those.
We have purchased private health insurance through health insurance market place at full price for 780$. Because I need to visit doctor regularly and have blood tests due my chronic dermatographic urticaria and autoimmune disease. We don’t have eye and dental insurance. Once in 3 moths medicine costing me 15$+20$doctor office visit+20-30$ blood work out of pocket. For blood works we look for cheaper diagnostics places other than quest. During our last India visit we got our eyes and dental checkups and got new glasses in India. Anyways annual health checkups and flue shots are free of cost.
As long as you are aware about spending, you are already ahead of the curve! My reasoning is that if one has a year worth of expenses in cash savings (emergency funds), good retirement savings, well funded 529, and a reasonably stable job- a few borderline thoughtless spendings aren’t going to cause much harm. Our house is 2800 sq ft and it takes our cleaning lady 6 hrs to clean both floors. I feel fortunate to be able to afford the service. When I started my first TT job, my mentor’s only advice was to hire a cleaner. In her words-“You don’t need any my advice regarding research, teaching, and mentoring, only thing I would suggest you is hire help- especially a cleaner. You can thank me later in a few years.” She was spot on. Over the years, our cleaning lady has became our emergency nanny/ babysitter and cook.
Asian grad students (Indian and Chinese are the two major groups) are a different lot. They hardly have any life outside their academic departments. And they can go miles and miles on a big bag of Thai jasmin rice, onions, and a few other things.
Sorry to say that you haven’t met the grad students then. May be some fit your description but most graduate students have an exciting life. At least most of my friends and now my trainees do!
Retirement does cross my mind, though i am not ready for it anytime soon. I love my career and hopefully i will continue the same for another 2 decades. But me & H share same views about our retirement; hence we are discussing about it these days. Roughly, the idea is to buy a large coconut estate in a coastal area. Build our retirement home with simplicity, yet with all kinds of basic facilities. Hire helpers and make them a family. Have proper insurance plans & establish other life saving support networks. Financial independence is, when you can handle your expenses without having to earn an income through a salaried job. After retirement, we hope to have solid income through our coconut estate.
can someone also share here about the college savings that is recommended for kids college fund. What are the different options, pros and cons of investing in the fund? For now we are planning to settle in USA until kids finish college? But there are some unknowns with emergencies for parents in case we have to move back. In that case, if we invest on college savings, are there any issues with that?
I too don’t agree with this. Recently I saw YouTube videos of a Asian who is a phd economics graduate from Texas having a joyful life other than her regular schedules, travelling, diy’s and other stuffs. I think it’s just a misconception people who are into it they don’t have any life outside. I have seen lot of DHs friends and my friends they maintain a schedule same like other jobs reset of the time they do fun activities.
