Life is so expensive for young adults these days

[CathyA]

I have kids in their mid-late 20's. Expenses for them are so much higher than they were for DH and I when we were their ages. Apartments are expensive......unless they are dumps in a bad part of town. Then there's utilities/internet/computers/cell phones/health and auto insurance, etc., etc. Oh.....then there's paying back student loans.

Are your kids in their 20's-30's having trouble making it completely on their own? My kids are working themselves silly......but still, not enough money to cover everything.
Sometimes DD doesn't have much to eat. She does live alone, so that's a bigger expense than if she had a roommate.

I was pretty financially independent in my early 20's.........but back then, a used car was really cheap. I lived in $80/mo apartments. Life was so much simpler and cheaper then!
And it seemed like everywhere I worked, I got incredibly good medical insurance.

It's a struggle today, for sure.

[razz]

I had very minimal $$ in my 20's and rented a room in a home with a hot plate and shared bathroom. Into my 30's, we were slowly building up our assets bit by bit with a really tight budget and two small children. Actually, my kids had a better time of it in their 20's than I ever did but they are in their 40's now and comment that there are few great jobs to be had. I wonder if the expectations are simply higher.

[sweetana3]

In our 20s even with two incomes, we lived in a converted garage, a mobile home and a 900 sq foot home. We could not qualify for most home loans even with two incomes and almost zero debt and it took begging to get a credit card with a $200 limit.

How many kids today live in a one or two bedroom apartment instead of the cheapest (safe) studio they can find? Of course, I am from the Midwest and life is cheaper here.

Life was simpler back then I agree.

[iris lily]

OP, I don't buy your premise that "expenses for them are so much higher." Sorry, nope.

I rented my first apartment in my first professional job for around $245 /month. I was paid a salary of $15,500 annually.

Today I could rent a similar apartment in Las Cruces, NM (same city) for $450 - $500/ monthly. That job pays easily $33,000 annually.

The rent doubled, the salary doubled. All the rest of it--cars, clothing, phones, I-devices--it's all a choice.

[catherine]

My kids are doing fine, with some reservation..

Three of them are able to live a pretty simple life in Burlington, VT.. none of the three have a car! They zip-drive if they have to. One son was able to buy a home through the fantastic Burlington Land Grant program. None of them make over $33k a year, and they have really rich, balanced lives doing what they love to do.

My NJ son just rented a nice apartment for himself, wife and baby for a rock-bottom for Jersey $1100 a month. He's the one who will struggle a bit until he starts getting a footing with his law career.

I do think it's very difficult to keep a family on one income, but I'm sure it can be done with a decent income from one person, and a lot of good budgeting (a la Amy Dacyzasdkfls (I'm not even going to try to spell her name--you know, Tightwad Gazette lady). Frankly, I don't know if I would fit that category, but I agree with iris lily... it can be done.

[awakenedsoul]

When I was 19, I got my first big show: Hello Hollywood, Hello at the MGM Reno, NV. My pay was $440. per week, and I made an extra $100. a week teaching dance. I also worked my night off a lot of the time. My rent was $212.50 per month. I shared a 2 bedroom 2 bathroom with a roommate. My car was a used VW convertible bug. I think I got it for around $2,500. cash. (My great aunt had left me $3,000. in her will.) The job had full medical coverage. I didn't have any student loans or credit cards.
I don't have kids, so I'm just remembering what I spent. Jitterbug phones now are really inexpensive. That's what I use. If I had to cut the Internet, I could bike to the library. For me, when I got into debt is when I had money troubles. Once I got out, I felt comfortable again, financially. The interest and mindset are what really got me. Living beneath your means and having an emergency fund makes a huge difference.

[Songbird]

I got married quite young and we struggled very much financially for several years. We had school expenses and rented a studio apt. up on the top floor of a very old house in a small college town. It was charming with the sloped ceilings, basically a nice attic space but tiny, and something that most kids today would probably find beneath them. We didn't own a car for many years and couldn't afford medical insurance either. I remember scraping to buy food. We ate very sparingly. Even after we graduated and found 'good jobs' we still struggled to make ends meet despite being very frugal. We were married 10 years before we were able to buy our first home, a 750 square foot bungalow. We never had any help from our parents either. We did it ALL on our own. I don't see that very often with kids today.

Most kids today seem to have to have the latest and greatest, and want to live a lifestyle that I wouldn't have dreamed of at their age. Many things are beneath them, not to mention the smart phones/cellphone bills and cable TV that is a must for most. I'm not saying all, but most. A lot have parents funding their lifestyles. But then there are the truly poor young adults who grew up in poverty and will always struggle to get ahead. Some have it worse in these times, but most kids are better off than I could have ever imagined at their age. I definitely don't think they are having a rougher time of it than we did back in the day... Most just need to cut down on their unnecessary expenses and they would be better off. Smart phones, cable TV, manicures and pedicures, abundance of high priced clothes, high priced hair styling, larger high priced apts./houses, and newer cars really aren't necessary. I see my own kids wasting money on these things. *sigh*

[ApatheticNoMore]

Costs are higher than they used to be in some parts of the country (especially housing costs and healthcare costs - ok the housing costs being higher may be area specific, healthcare costs more everywhere). I don't think it's all that debatable really.

[mschrisgo2]

Well, I think it's all relative. My first full time job was 50 hours a week/$100. My rent for a one bedroom fully furnished nice garden apartment was $135, so a third of my take home pay. I had saved and paid cash for my first car, a 5-year-old hotrod Mustang for $2500; that lasted several years. Gas was only 23 cents a gallon, now the gas Tax is more than that! Groceries were way cheaper. And the semester fees for the state college were $32!! You can't buy even One text book for that price now!! So I was able to work and put myself through school, and live on my own.

I just had the car conversation with my grandsons, who are 15.5, 17 and 19. They don't see themselves ever buying cars-- just too expensive. As we talked, I realized that in the 43 years that I've owned a car, I've only made car payments for 5 years, i.e. most of them I was able to pay cash for, including the one I have now.

So some of it is how one chooses to spend the money, and some is more expensive, but a lot of it is relative, IMHO.

[Tradd]

I've seen a number of young folks who have a big SUV, all the gadgets, full cable satellite package at home, constant stream of new clothes, continual eating out/going out with friends. One young person once was very demeaning about my (then) 8 year old car. I simply told him he might eventually find out that the payments and stuff were too heavy a burden.

On the other hand, I know a handful of young folks in their 20s who are doing well, very little school debt, paid for cars, all in all pretty frugal.