Could you do it?

[norsegirl]

Today on Oprah... Suze Orman's Recession Rescue Plan.

Step 1: Live on half
Prepare yourself for the worst by living on half of your income and banking the other half. This will help you to establish an emergency fund and help you to look at your budget and spending now, before something traumatic happens like losing your job.

I look at Jason's take-home pay and at our current expenses and I don't think there is any way we could do it. I mean yeah, if we lost the income and had to reduce we sure could, and I do have a plan if it comes to that, but it would be by giving up stuff that I'm not willing to give up now on a six month trial "just to prove we can do it" basis. Why do I say that? What would we have to give up? The house. If I add up just the mortgage, taxes, insurance and basic utilities (electricity, water and gas, not cable, internet or phones) and we're left with $65 less than half of his income.

It amuses (and somewhat scares me) that to live on half on an experimental basis we'd have to give up:
- food
- one of the utilities (electricity or water)
- the car (we wouldn't be able to pay the insurance much less the gas)

To hell with all the luxuries like eating out, new clothes and hobbies, we'd have to give up FOOD and we'd either have to live in the dark or stop drinking!?!?! Maybe in 10 years when Jason's income has gone up a little, and maybe I'm back working again, and the impact of the mortgage payment has been reduced by virtue of inflation we could do it. Heck, it might even be possible in 5. But right now, not a chance.

I'd love to know if there is anyone out there reading this that could do it. Could you live on half your income? Is it even possible for you?

Comments

[eve-the-just.livejournal.com]

I'm sure you could do it if you had to. And of course it would be unpleasant. No one likes to give stuff up. But you are strong and you could survive if you had to.

My question isn't about whether you'd enjoy the experience but whether you could actually do it or not, even on a temporary basis without some DRAMATIC shifts in lifestyle. Like I said in my post, we actually CANNOT do it and still keep the house. We'd have to starve and live in the dark to keep this place on half the income. And I'm not willing to move just to participate in a 6-month experiment, so we can't do it. I'm interested in knowing for how many other people the basics (mortgage/rent, utilities and groceries without any perks or frills) are greater than half of what they bring home.

So ignoring the unpleasantness of giving up things you enjoy and crapping up your lifestyle, could you do it? Are your bare-bones expenses more or less than half of what you make?

[bridgeoutahead.livejournal.com]

no, I'm saying I really couldn't do it. I couldn't afford to pay the bills, period, and keep the house and the car. And without the car, I couldn't get to work.

And my original reply was intended as such -- but I left out a lot of the detail I guess. :) it's a long story :)

[eve-the-just.livejournal.com]

Ah, so you're in the same boat as us then. Single income living is hard. It does really highlight the need to be able to live on a single income even if you are paired up though, so you're learning good money skills.