We're young, single [well, not anymore unfortunately], and get paid pretty well for our ages. We have very few legitimate needs, rarely pay for our own food, and spend 90% of our lives in the office anyway... so what the hell do we spend that money on anyway? I'd be interested to see what the breakdowns are for you guys (best-guess estimates obviously) in terms of how you spend your budget.
I'll give a template as an example so we can keep it organized but I haven't seen a topic like this so it'd probably be helpful to see what the typical expenses are for the typical Wall Streeter fresh outta college. Anyway, here's mine. I'll give my estimates pre-engagement, because I think they're about to change in the most depressing way possible.
Job/Experience: 3rd Year HF Analyst
Rent: 15%
Clothes: 5%
Food/Restaurants: 10%
Drinks/Social: 10%
Hobbies: 5%
Savings: 55%
So I'm kinda simple...
You forgot to put your wedding: 2325%
How bout the divorce? 50%. Of everything.
"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." -Leonardo da Vinci
Looks like you're pretty sophisticated.
I am looking at:
Savings: 40% Food/Going Out/Drinks: 15% Rent & Utilities: 20% Transportation & Misc. Expenses: 10% Clothes and durable goods: 10% Hobbies: 5%
Pretty happy with it. Saving is almost a hobby in itself. I love investing, so a little more in my account gives me more to play with.
Louboutins: 100%
In seriousness: Rent: 33% Restaurants/Going Out/Drinks: 5% Groceries (I cook for myself): 10% Clothes/Make-Up/Shoes/Hair/Massages/Facials, etc.: 25% Utilities, Transportation: 5% Leisure activities: 3%
The other 19% goes to savings or more "splurge" items like the aforementioned Louboutin's. I also keep a little cushion since my firm is slow with reimbursements for cabs, meals, etc. Also should note that I'm a "spend your salary, save your bonus" type of person, so the savings part isn't as high of a %.
Am I in love?
Damn. Contemplating divorce even before marriage, huh?
I consider fashion items (such as Louboutins) an investment :)
Another female on here?!?!? Or is this SwagOn being confused with his sexual orientation again?
After taxes I'm averaging:
Rent & Utilities: 16% Food/Groceries: 8% Transportation/ Misc.: 10% Durables: 6% "Recreation": 10% Travel Fund: 10% Savings: 40%
I'm assuming these are all after-tax numbers.
Glad to see I'm not the only one saving... I don't feel as weird now. And ya all numbers are after-tax, which sadly I just divided by all-in comp by two and went with that. My most recent paychecks have been netting less than 50% which is very depressing to see on a pay stub.
How much are you guys paying for rent? @ BlackHat and Dwight, if you guys don't mind me asking.
I overpay for my apartment to a very irrational extent. If your guess was even 1/2 of the actual, I'd be impressed.
My guess - 5,500/month if you overpay based on my 1500 - 3000/month original assumption. You don't have to disclose the number to me. Don't care just bored.
P.S. Congratulations on your marriage (or soon to be marriage). Good luck managing your work life at a HF with an even more connected wife and possibly family.
I don't know their living arrangements but I assume safe zone is between 1500 - 3000 depending on if they have roommates and how the bill is split. I am assuming a Manhattan apartment unless these guys travel to and fro the outer boroughs or worse Connecticut/New Jersey.
Obviously it could be much higher or dare I say it lower.
Blackhat you're making me feel really poor if you're overpaying at ~15%.
Lotin I'm not NYC based and I more or less live in the ghetto.
It can't be more than $5,000-6,000/month can it? Unless you're clearing over half-a-mil/year.
According to his 15% number on rent, it would be more like $150k before taxes if his rent was $5k.
Sorry, I'm retarded. $900k before taxes... forgot rent is monthly
Ya know what, I believe it's 400k after taxes, but since it's late and I clearly am not able to function, I'm going to leave it up for debate...
Fortunately not, but in defense of my honor, I was very tired and had no business trying to do any sort of math... even something as easy as what 500012(100/15) equals...
@BlackHat Good luck with the wedding. I've always said it's best to get your starter marriage behind you as early in life as possible. I was in and out of mine by 25.
Planning budget in NYC for Summer Associate (Originally Posted: 05/11/2010)
To resurrect an old topic of overtime pay for interns -- does UBS pay summer associates overtime? My new york addendum says something about "premium pay" but zippo about "overtime pay". Thoughts? Thanks!
Ahh, now I get why people in US marry so young!! For me it just doesn't make sense. What kind of market research could you have done before that?
My grandfather told me that if he could do it all again, he wouldn't have gotten married until he was 50 years old at least.
i remember reading last week that some SA's at what i think was UBS saying that premium pay they or a friend was getting = 1/2 of hourly salary over 40hrs. seach prem pay to see if anything comes up
it's 1/2 hourly over 40hrs @ UBS.
Budget for FT Training in NYC (Originally Posted: 07/01/2014)
Can anyone speak to how much money would be needed to live in NYC for three weeks for IB training? I'm from Texas where the cost of living is relatively inexpensive and I've never been to New York. Obviously my flight and hotel room will be paid for by the company, but other than that I'm unsure what other costs I should expect to incur. I currently have ~$1600 saved up, but can liquidate my IRA if needed. Unfortunately I don't have parents who are able to bail me out if I come up short, so if anyone has a rough estimate of what they spent/what they expect to spend it would really help me out. Thanks in advance for the info!
Based on Gross Income, here is what my budget dictates. Back when I had a girlfriend, rent used to be about 6%, savings were a bit less, and food / clothing / gifts were significantly higher.
Taxes: 34% Savings: 28% 401(k): 7% Rent/Utilities/Parking/Insurance: 17% Travel: 5% Food / Alcohol: 4% Other: 5%
Am I the only one paying 51% in taxes on my bonus?
Call HR and see what the company offers for a food stipend. My bank offers all of its non-hq analysts $200/week for food during training. Otherwise, you should be good for 3 weeks with that amount unless you feel the need to live beyond your means.
You're a banker, just ball out.
wait one gets paid for training, right?
Yes, I believe I do. However, I get paid on the 15th and 30th of each month and will not reach the first pay date until training is nearly over.
credit card. chase freedom is 0% apr for your first 15 months.
Budgeting Help (Originally Posted: 04/27/2013)
Hello.
I will be a summer intern in NYC this summer and am currently trying to do some budgeting. I will make $3000 a month and am really looking to see how much (if any) I will be able to save over the course of 10 weeks.
I already found a place to live (moderately priced and within walking distance of the office) and all of my meals are taken care of on the days that I come in to the office. It is a boutique bank and I will be working banking hours so this should help significantly.
So any word from people that have more experience in the city would be much appreciated.
Thank you.
Kind of a thread jack but what do you all typically do with your bonus? Save it, new car, hookers&cocaine binge? I've been considering saving most of my salary and getting a few 12-month no interest credit cards for bills, levering up, then paying that off with my bonus. Kind of risky but I'd have adequate cash if needed.
Like I said I'm really boring so I tend to save the whole thing and use my actual salary for expenses. I'm not too materialistic so I don't own a car, have a live-in hooker to save on cost, and took on a large inventory of cocaine when prices were low to keep my free cash flow available for shareholder value-add activities
Straight BALLER.
If I get flagged at work for liking this, I would have no problem receiving a warning. +1 for the laugh
Buy whatever stuff you can (non-perishables etc) outside the city if you're looking to say some $$
in addition. If you haven't learned already either meet a girl/guy that can cook or learn how to do it yourself. If you try to teach yourself you do risk burning down your apartment, but at the same time, you'll create a valuable life lesson. P.S. most girls love cooks.
Student Budget (Originally Posted: 10/28/2012)
So there is a lot of talk about getting into school but I've got a question for those already in school. Are any of you tracking your expenses and how does it compare to the student budget estimate from the schools? Now that I've been accepted I'm starting to plan and was trying to figure out how much money I'm really going to need. It seems like the student budget is really low. Doing a fairly conservative estimate I'm coming up with numbers about $10k more than the student budget and that doesn't even include any travel expenses if I take a trip.
Granted I'm including things like cable and internet and utilities that can be flexible. I also was basing my numbers off of living alone, do those student budgets assume you'll have roommates? That's the only way I can see the numbers possibly coming close. The way it's looking to me the first year along will be almost $100k.
rent & utilities 25% golf 10% food 15% booze 40% Savings 10% (but this almost always ends up being sports betting budget, up a good amt on the year)
No commute costs is very nice Don't buy clothes here, too expensive
I'm only a few months into school, but I imagine that I'll spend about 20% (or $35K) over the recommended budget. This figure comes from me living fairly comfortable and doing a bit of traveling.
Also, I budgeted for 24 months, while my school's recommended budget is for only 18 months (it doesn't include living expenses for the summer between Y1 & Y2)
I wonder if that is how they are getting the number lower, if they don't include the summer that would make a pretty big swing in cost. 20% over is quite a lot but if that includes travel I could see that pretty easily. My hope is to live as cheaply as possible. I'm not big on living on debt, especially since I'm switching careers so my future income isn't quite as certain as those who already are coming from consulting or finance.
I also haven't factored in the income from a summer internship into my budget either. Hopefully that should net me another $15k pre-taxes and expenses.
So only 1 person actually in school?
Rent 25% Food 10% Assorted life expenses, 10-15% (sports, meals out with friends, etc.) half of the rest i save for a rainy day, the rest I save for a bigger capital project (current one is the Paris Dakar rally or a motorcycle lessons + bike). Also put around 5% away for a holiday each month. I get one summer holiday a year that I pay for, and a winter holiday that someone else pays for (I give ski lessons for free in exchange for not having to pay for it).
Dunno why w'ere bothering though, I'm waiting for IP to join this one and show us how to live off common land for the price of a smile and some manual labour.
Banking Budget (Originally Posted: 04/06/2011)
I am curious how a lot of people go about spending/saving their money during their first year as a banking analyst. I am sure I am going to get plenty of worthless responses like "models and bottles", "adderrall and cocaine", "bespoke suits" and the other dribble that people like to boost their egos with, however if anyone has anything tangible that they put together or a budget they used for their first year I'd appreciate it.
I am looking to see if there are any unexpected expenses that you may have encountered, things you spend more money on than you thought, etc.
Interested as well although most people are gonna say use the search function
Specifically if anyone created any kind of excel document for their budget, that would be great to take a look at.
I'm very interested in this as well, thanks in advance for any helpful responses.
I remember someone posted an excel file a while back, but I can't find it on search.
Hi. Resident crazy saver here.
Here are my suggestions for a $70K salary. Mind you, they are only suggestions and they come from a crazy thrifty guy, so take them with a grain of salt:
Monthly take-home pay: ~$3900 after federal, state, city, FICA, and $100/month for health insurance. 15% of salary recommended savings: $585 after tax. (But first use this to get a 401k match if your bank offers one) Rent, utilities, cable, and internet: not to exceed $1600. (Split a two bedroom with a roommate, live in Hoboken, or ideally do both if you do not work in IBD and plan on getting out of work before 10PM) Gym membership: $150/month
Monthly variable spending: $1550.
Weekly variable spending: ~$360
At the end of the year, you'll have $7K in retirement savings before bonus. In reality, it will probably look something more like $4K in bank savings, $4K in a 401K, and a $4K employer match.
^ much love to my stingy brethren. my situation is a bit diff but back out whatever you think.
monthly take home: ~$4,400
sf rent: 1200 student loans: 500 send money home to mom: 1000 savings: 1000 food: ~250 fun: ~450
basically it comes out to 700 bucks to do whatever i want and theres a good chance i dont use a good portion of it since so busy. food is pretty much only lunch since everything else the company pays for.
And IlliniProgrammer passes his title of "Thriftiest guy on the forums" to Thatch.
what do i win?
A free podcast of the Suze Orman show on your iphone/ipod.
she stole my ideas lol.
bump any other useful experiences or posts would be greatly appreciated
Megafund: take home: 180k aftertax
100k on lambo 40k on rent 20k on WINNING!!! 20K insider trading buying stock in companies we about to LBO
U JELLY?!?!
$40K on rent? Enjoy your commute from Queens.
40k a year on rent is 3333.33 a month. Maybe if you mean I fly in on a personal helicopter from queens.
$3300 doesn't make sense in Manhattan for an apartment if you're also buying a car. It buys you some dump in a pre-war walkup. Hence you must live in Queens because you're not stupid. :-)
BTW, the nasty votes on your post weren't me. Your troll posts are pretty funny when you make it painfully honest for the newbies. :-)
Monthly Budgets (Originally Posted: 07/10/2008)
Just curious, if you're willing to offer up the basic info: What is your current position and would you say you are mostly cash flow positive or cash flow negative on a monthly basis? How many of you are negative during the month and make up for it at the end of the year with your bonus?
Savings: 10% Investments: 75% Dating: 5% Housing: -5% (bought a house at an absurdly low price, renting it out to tenants for monthly cash flow, and can re-sell the house today for 140% of what i got it for considering the nature of how I acquired it) Food: 5% (I spent $8 on food last week total, mwahahah)
I don't spend money on clothes; my mom finds ways to get me 40 cent ties and $2 shirts at Kohl's. I have no idea how.
And yes, I'm asian.
When I was an analyst I lived in NYC on a $55k base and was cash flow positive basically every month for a few reasons.
1) I had a roomate so my rent was around $1200/month.
2) Work basically paid for everything else including cell phone, dinner, etc...Rothschild even had a free cafeteria back then(not sure if they still do) so you could have a free lunch if you werent sick of the food
Basically you should be able to break even or have a bit of debt (aka less than $10k not including student loans) if you are an analyst in NYC...if you're working 80-100hrs a week sometimes you can be slightly CF positive but it really depends on your spending habits and rent.
I had some money saved up from working while in college that helped keep me out of credit card debt before my first bonus, but otherwise I was cash flow negative. I would say even though my hours were on the longer side, I still managed to blow through my monthly paycheck because my rent was about 500 dollars higher than yours (even with a roommate), had a girlfriend the entire time, and my friends and I partook in alot of extracurriculars after work and on the weekends.
When I was an analyst, I was cash flow positive. Now that I am an associate, that is still the case. Reasons why this was easy:
However, I do love expensive restaurants so I was cashflow positive in the vicinity of a hundred or two hundred bucks a month back then.
1) have a roommate - my rent is slightly less than 1/3 net income which is the recommendation for budgeting
2) live walking distance from office so basically 0 transport cost (unless I'm lazy/running late)
3) don't go out to eat too much - when I have free time I prefer to cook
4) I've also realized I prefer to spend the weekend catching up with friends at parties or bars rather than doing the expensive clubbing scene (which I lived for when I was in college)
I have both savings and a little bit of credit card debt - the savings more than cover the debt.
Just be good about money - for me I don't plan to say in banking for more than a few years so I need to be prudent and save rather than living in some hot penthouse and ending up living on credit cards for the last week of each month before payday.
I'm fairly embarassed to say that I'm cash flow negative as an associate in PE now (making 35%+ more base). Seems like every month I have a crazy "one time" expense...
ditto on the "one time" expenses.
I think thats a sign I'm not good at managing my personal finances. I always seem to be in the scenario of "I would been ok, but I had to spend XYZ on ABC necessity." So you assume there won't be an ABC next time, and you'll be able to save/pay more on loans or CC etc... but there is always some big expense or another.
baby steps.
I'm with you guys on the one time expenses, every month there is some flight, technology, need a new suit, concert or whatever. I budget in substantial "savings" each month, and that always gets eaten up.
Still manage to keep it cash flow positive, partially through the wonders of paying attention to when credit card cycles are. Just put off buying that flight for one day and suddenly you are cash flow positive for the month.
Gotta love that 50 day float (buy item on day 1 of credit card cycle, pay 50 days later).
I have the Citi Professional Cash card, since I have never not paid in full each month the rewards work out to about a -2% interest rate (1% back on everything and 3% on restaurants and a few other things).
So, I get paid about 2 percent monthly on my average balance.
Personal expenses as a % of monthly income after taxes:
17.4% Rent Expense 1.7% Transport 3.0% Food 2.5% Entertainment 3.0% Clothing 3.7% Travel 4.1% Other 35.4% Total Expense
64.6% Monthly Savings
How do you guys have such low rent expenses? I'm guessing you aren't 1st years? If after tax income on typical base is ~4.5/month, how are you finding rent that is only 20% of your budget? (For those bad at math, this would be $900/month)
because we're smart and live within our means
I need a higher paying job...I am not saving a thing right now
on post-tax income 18% rent 23% spending (half clothes, half going out) 59% savings
Agreed with the rent being tough, after taxes. Im a 2nd year analyst here in San Francisco. I recently just moved up here and found it very difficult to find a studio that is not a shit hole. I dont know how the search for an apartment is on the east coast, but finding a "normal" roomate was a bit tough, especially when working and being able to couch surf for so long.
Rent 38% Taxes 31% Food Entertainment 15% Clothing/Gym 5% Student Loan 5% Other 5%
working at a boutique means my pay is a lot more volatile so I pretty much use my salaries on all the expenses* and pretty much save none of it, sometimes even cutting into savings. I save everything that I get from bonuses after tax is taken into consideration.
*working at a state where I need to have a car, where it has 1.5 more years of payment left. also includes gas, maintenance and insurance.
using last year's figure + post tax
rent: 16.5% - room in a house instead of own apartment clothes: 2.4% food/restaurants: 15% - fatty loves to eat + girlfriend groceries: 5% - fatty needs to eat some fruit entertainment: 2.4% - mostly going to the movies car: 17.4% - once car is paid off (I can pay off today if i want to but it's only 2% apr) savings: 43%
My rent is high, my income is higher. That's kinda how that works out :) But ya, it'll happen to you too once you've been out of school for almost 6 years.
Looking at your background from a prior post...I wouldn't be surprised by somebody with your position making close to $400 - 500K hence the high rent being 15%
@BH u mad bro?
Just ran it quick, all numbers are after tax ..assumed the low end of my bonus range. Rent is super high because of below average 1st year comp (boutique) and paying for a decent apt in the city. Unaccounted for (~10%) is "savings" which usually gets blown on something retarded.
rent 35.00% transpo 16.88% (car pmt 1%apr PLUS mta monthly..dumb i know) food 17.50% alc 16.25% clothes 5.00%
I am just starting out in banking and am working on determining my budget. For those who have been through the IB stints before, how large of a percentage do federal/state/local taxes in NYC take up?
Post retirement acct contributions/taxes: Savings: ~60% Rent: 12% Rest (don't know how it's distributed): ~28%
First year analyst (base salary only; percentages are pre-tax):
Taxes: 20% 401(k) contribution: 20% Rent (w/ fee): 18.5% Savings: 16.5% Food and drink: 14.5% Spending: 7.5% Utilities: 2.0% Healthcare: 1.0%
all numbers are percentage of after tax, after 401k and after medical insurance. So basically cash I actually get:
Car lease: 19% (yes I like my car) Car insurance: 3% Gas: 5% Food: 4% Random crap: 10% Cash Savings: 60%
Live rent free as parents own an apartment in City in which i work.
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