Comment by asib

16 hours ago

1 mil is not generational wealth in the US. It is a big chunk of money, no doubt. It’ll buy a reasonable 2-3 bedroom house in the city I live in, with nothing left over. No one’s definition of generational wealth involves not touching the money for two generations…

The median home price is around $400K. You don't have to live somewhere stupid expensive.

  • Sure, but that's not generational wealth.

    • We must be operating on different definitions. Generational wealth means you have enough money to meaningfully improve the lives of your kids and give them a leg-up on life. A million dollars is enough to buy a house for each of your 2.5 kids.

      If getting a million dollars wouldn't affect how much money you can leave your kids, you already have generational wealth.

      7 replies →

I have to agree, yurishimo's assumption of returns is wildly optimistic.

At a more sane expected return of 5% annually, you get $50k a year to live off of to just keep what you have (or rather, watch it slowly erode in value due to inflation).

That is basically a one person income, maybe two adults if you pinch pennies and live in a crappy apartment or a low-end house in a midwestern suburb.

You can get a lot more lucky with a million bucks than you can with 10k if you gamble, but there are no guarantees. Risk tolerance is the most impactful variable. For those in the low risk tolerance group, I think you'd need at least 2 mil these days. And that's with being frugal, as well as probably not having much left over for kids.