[CobsterLock]

there's a ton of information missing here, but my simple way is to not really stop living paycheck to paycheck, but instead hide the money from myself before i can spend it. To me this means high contributions to retirement accounts, auto transfers in to brokerage account, and auto transfers into a separate "large spending" account. That way I'm free to spend guilt free anything left in my checking account.

The automation is really the key for me, move the money before I can spend it. But NYC is also an expensive place to live, and I could easily see 110k not being enough to live there. but maybe someone else has more relevant experience

[bkanber]

This is the exact technique I used to save up and pay for a wedding and a house. Consider your savings/investments as one of your monthly bills. Set a maximum balance for your checking account, everything in excess of that goes into investments or retirement fund.

[CobsterLock]

a max balance is a cool idea, i gotta try that out!

[CobsterLock]

and i also have the mental block that if i have less than 1k in my checking i should be wary. and also tons of credit card alerts for large transactions going in and out