Saturday, June 14, 2025

Expenses of a middle-classy Singapore uncle with family

I don't know what exactly is considered middle-class in SG, but I figured its the fat range in the middle section if we were to line people up based on income. There will be a steep drop off from the bottom 5% and a steep surge from the top 5, and another galactic surge from the top 1%. Uncle is pretty sure I am in that middle chunk of 90%, and based on my estimation, should be in the front 30 percentile in this chunk.

Now, this is how my expenses look like for myself (excluding what my wife contributes). The numbers are on per month and in SGD


Car expenses (loan, insurance, maintenance, tax, fuel) = $2,500

Insurance premiums = $800

Utilities bill = $350

Mobile lines for 5 = $90

Home internet line = $30

Services (Netflix, Spotify, iCloud) = $60

Condo maintenance fees = $350

Property tax = $250

Groceries and take out meals = $1200


Allowance for my parent = $1000

Allowance for kiddos = $200

School fees for kiddos = $150

Tuition fees = $270

Piano, and music classes = $900


Sub-Total for above : $8,150


Uncle still have a mortgage, of which I pay my portion of $5,500 in cash

Income tax is around $4,000

Total of cash outlay per month for Uncle = $17,650

Uncle not sure how much Uncle beautiful wifey per month cash outlay is exactly, given her random haul of bags and clothes every week plus lots of bubble teas. But I can estimate it's max $10,000 including her share of mortgage payment. 

So there you go, if combined as a household, that would be $27k bleeding of cash per month.

Sibei Chor 

But that's the lifestyle we adopted based on our income and budgeting. Maybe you can say we spend a lot, but based on the breakdown above, I don't think so. The big tickets are mortgage, tax, and car. Mortgage can be paid off, car can sell or pay off, so those will go away. Large tax for income will go away when we retire. 

So minus all these extras, its probably $10k per month bah when we retire 

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