I don't know what it will add to the conversation, but I thought it was worth adding in my two cents.
My family of five is supported by my income (~$100k / year).
I get paid weekly. Every Friday, I go into my bank account amd transfer anything in excess of $2000 into the stock market.
Some weeks that's quite a bit of money, some weeks it's not so much money.
As of a week ago when I did the math, we had $65k more to our names this year than we did one year ago.
Probably half of that was money we saved directly, and half was stock market gains, so I guess from a debt payoff perspective maybe that's closer to $30k.
But I guess my point is, I don't think it's unreasonable to think a two income household in a higher-income metro than where I live could have $80k/yr in excess income to pay down debt with.
It's certainly not unreasonable or even uncommon. But, it's still way above the norm in the US. Median household income in the US is somewhere around $65k/year (before taxes and expenses).
Side note - You're only holding $2k in cash for a family of 5? That seems low. Your efforts to invest for the future are commendable, but if you get caught on the bad end of a 2008-style recession, is it enough to keep paying bills?
My family of five is supported by my income (~$100k / year).
I get paid weekly. Every Friday, I go into my bank account amd transfer anything in excess of $2000 into the stock market.
Some weeks that's quite a bit of money, some weeks it's not so much money.
As of a week ago when I did the math, we had $65k more to our names this year than we did one year ago.
Probably half of that was money we saved directly, and half was stock market gains, so I guess from a debt payoff perspective maybe that's closer to $30k.
But I guess my point is, I don't think it's unreasonable to think a two income household in a higher-income metro than where I live could have $80k/yr in excess income to pay down debt with.