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by JamesPeterson 5332 days ago
It depends on a bit on both luck and work done to reduce living costs. For example, in my city home prices average ~$500,000 (AUD is currently roughly on parity with USD). Yet I, renting, live off roughly what you describe.

Yep. I spend ~$380 each week total; ~$380 includes (shared) rent, food, (considerable) entertainment, health care & cover, gym, mobile, broadband, travel and whatever miscellaneous expenses come up (well-chosen presents, broken crockery (!) etc).

I live in a beautiful house that's just a little more than a mile from the city centre and don't have any shared expenses with my partner (who still lives with her parents). I do not, however, have any dependents.

I live a great life on next-to-no money (mostly out of necessity; I plan on returning to my studies next year). We had to find a landlord willing to give a discount for quality tenants, and I had to give up buying luxury items (my last watch cost just $20). Most of the work really is just tracking receipts and making sure there aren't any surprises (and if there are, lose those habits).

Oh, and we eat very (!) well, but only have take-out a few times a week.

1 comments

Wow, that's some really good numbers you gave me! Your costs per week doesn't seem very high at all considering you have things like gym membership, mobile and broadband, entertainment, and eating out. I'm starting to think it's very hard not to be able to live on 20k a year unless the person had a large medical problem.
I think it also very much depends in what 'tier' you do your spending. For example, I bought a Samsung laptop. It's great. My housemate bought a Sony laptop that's slightly shinier but has similar features and a pricetag 2.5x higher. I buy $30 shirts. Provided they fit me properly, they look great. A friend of mine frequently spends $200 on each shirt. His are a little shinier, but for a price tag of 6-7x more. And I still look great ;)