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A Week In Brooklyn, NY, On A $66,000 Salary

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Photo: Getty Images.
Welcome to Money Diaries, where we're tackling what might be the last taboo facing modern working women: money. We're asking millennials how they spend their hard-earned money during a seven-day period — and we're tracking every last dollar.
This week: a grants manager who makes $66,000/year and spends it on tickets to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival.
Occupation: Grants Manager
Industry: Nonprofit
Age: 31
Location: I live in Brooklyn and work in Manhattan.
Salary: $66,000
Paycheck (Biweekly): $1,694
Monthly Expenses
Housing Costs: $1,100 is my portion of rent, shared with my partner, M.
Loan Payments: $590, mostly from grad school. (This is on income-based repayment.)
All Other Monthly Expenses
Transit: $121 (taken out of my paycheck, pre-tax) IRA savings: $101.50
Health Insurance: $10 for medical, $11.18 for dental, and vision is covered by my employer
Phone: $69
Internet: $60
Credit Cards: $645. I am on track to pay off my credit cards by 2018 after several years of living in expensive cities on bare-bones nonprofit salaries, mixed with no-so-great spending habits in my early 20s. (Apparently, I subscribed to the "YOLO" mentality.)
Spotify: $9.99
Hulu: $9.99
New York Times: $7.50
Charity: $25
Savings: $150, plus whatever I earn from my freelance gigs and teaching yoga.
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