Reply #161: I live in the Keys. My husband and I combined make close to 80.

[tinfoilinfor2005]

We live on a boat because very few houses in the Keys start at under six hundred grand. Anything under that is pretty much a condemned trailer. I pay close to a thousand dollars a month in order to just keep my boat in the water and tied to a dock. Our boat is not yet fully paid for so of course payments to the bank are separate. But both payments combined are still cheaper than if we tried to rent. Now let's talk about insurance on the boat especially after Katrina and Wilma last year. Then there is sky high health insurance, because ninety nine percent of the companies have left the Keys. Next add in the cost of living here at tourist central. We have to pay the same overblown prices at most of the stores that they rip the tourists for, and when we go to the mainland once every couple of weeks to stock up on cheaper items at the Costco, we have to drive an hour there and back on overpriced gas. And let's not forget all the other regular bills such as car payments, electric, phone, cable, etc. etc.

Even so, I don't feel poor, in fact I feel very blessed and fortunate. But I'm not in a mansion and I don't buy store bought nails and facials and my Gucci designer purse cost $14 at the flea market. All things are relative.