Can you live a luxury lifestyle as a nurse?

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My question is towards nurses that have been in the field for couple of years. I was wondering can you life a nice luxury lifestyle as a nurse? My definition of luxury would perhaps revolve around the ability to own a large 5 bedroom house, the ability to drive a luxury vehicle like BMW or Mercedes Benz, and the ability to take vacations every year perhaps to a different country. Is this too much to ask for as nurse or this beyond the dreams of most nurses and would single nurses be able to achieve this over married with kids nurses?

*** Pretty much no, a nurse can not afford a $300K home. I suppose if you made it a priority and sacraficed everything else in your life, and you could find a banker willing to loan $300K to a person making $40-$60K (unlikely). A normal rule of thumb for what kind of house you can afford is 2-2.5 times your annule income. In my area that means $100K-$150K house. Obviously that is with only one income. A couple working might double that.

Pay scales vary widely by hospital. In my area most nurses never get any raises except the across the board COL increases every employee gets. Usually 1-3% a year (frozen for the last couple years). I make over six figures but I worked my way here, have special skills, work in a very high risk position, and I was lucky to get a position in a non-Magnet, union hospital that is in a fairly high income area but very close to low cost of living area where I live and commute from. In the system I work for there is a clinical ladder and a nurse can achieve merit based raises. That is not true for every hospital.

what special skills do you have? and how long did it take?

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Specializes in Peds Med/Surg; Peds Skilled Nursing.
Kinda off topic, but how did you like traveling alone? I want to travel ALL the time, but usually can't find someone who both wants to go and can afford to go. I've thought about going by myself but kinda get nervous at the thought of doing that. How long did you go for? What countries? Did you enjoy it?

I love traveling alone...a lot of my friends cannot afford to travel with me....and since i love traveling i just go alone. I do get nervous but once im there im fine and enjoy myself. This time i just went to London and Paris. I had the time of my life so much fun and met a lot of great people. Google Contiki tours. They have trips all around the world and most people that go on them are traveling by themselves. And you can go on tours as a group or you can go off by yourself. I highly recommend it.

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I have learned in my 18 yrs as a nurse that my salary doesn't matter but my credit score does. If you make what you consider "good money and have credit scores above the 700 hundreds then yes you can afford luxury cars and vacations because your interest rate would be better than those who work their buttstock off with credit scores in the 4,5,600 bracket. ..

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We did that by: a) working hard; b) living within our means; and c) living within your means

It pains me to think that people believe you need to be an MD to have a comfortable lifestyle...

So glad to hear (see) you say this! I just graduated from a community college and I don't have any loans. Was so happy and proud to get that 1st paycheck. I worked the entire time I was in Nsg school and although it was difficult at least I never had to worry about money.

A lot of people get sucked into paying big bucks to go to the local big universities and you know where they end up? Standing right next to me getting the same orientation, working the same unit, with the same starting pay. Only I don't have the crushing 60k loan debt.

OP you can totally have that lifestyle on nursing pay. It's funny, some of the same people who are in here telling you it's impossible on nurse pay are the same people who come into the salary threads each year swearing up and down that their friend who's a nurse consistently makes 6 figures EASILY with no OT and only a few years of experience. Not to mention the higher-paying specialties you can go into! It might take a while to get there but it's doable

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You can do it as a RN, a RN that has an advanced degree such as CRNA they start off like 200k/ year. I'm not sure of what a FNP makes but I'm sure there over 100k. The point is you can be an RN, but you must have some major title with that RN to see the money I think your talking about. RN without even specializing, think around 60k.

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I have a friend who works as a CCRN and lives a life of luxury.. Owns a brand new Audi as well as her winter car (her husband owns two vehicles as well), she has quite a few Coach handbags, she also owns a LV handbag(a huge deal for us handbag junkies!), she gets her nails done multiple times a month, enjoys things such as massages, shopping trips, ect, she and her husband vacation at least yearly. That being said, she and her husband have no children and she works a lot to pay for all those luxuries she enjoys.

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Specializes in OR, Nursing Professional Development.
You can do it as a RN, a RN that has an advanced degree such as CRNA they start off like 200k/ year. I'm not sure of what a FNP makes but I'm sure there over 100k. The point is you can be an RN, but you must have some major title with that RN to see the money I think your talking about. RN without even specializing, think around 60k.

Honestly, no advanced degree like NP or CRNA is required. It's all about living within your means and prioritizing where your money goes. I like to travel; therefore, I was fine with a smaller townhouse while focusing on putting money into a designated savings account for the sole purpose of travel.

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Honestly, no advanced degree like NP or CRNA is required. It's all about living within your means and prioritizing where your money goes. I like to travel; therefore, I was fine with a smaller townhouse while focusing on putting money into a designated savings account for the sole purpose of travel.

She don't want smaller she wants bigger. I agree with what you are saying that's more of how I am. However, from what she states to me seems like she wants big everything which there is nothing wrong with. But, just an RN won't give her the things she won't like that without mounds of debt she can't pay off. Unless I'm getting the wrong impression of what she wants to have and have it comfortably.

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How about this, can you clarify luxury? So, we can get an understanding and be clear. When you say Mercedes, do you mean the ones that are E class like 30k plus or the upper class series that range about 70k plus? What's the price range on this house? Over 200k?

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Specializes in Family Practice, Mental Health.

I work ten 12 hour day shifts a month and make......enough. My husband makes around what I do. We have no children, unless you count furry ones. Neither one of us are given to extravagance, and are both somewhat introversive in nature. As such that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so is the definition of luxury. My parents tried to teach me that more than enough belongs to someone else without enough. My husband and I are both perfectly happy with.....enough.

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Owning a Mercedes is very possible. Ask my tenants who live paycheck to paycheck (i know this because they have to pay rent til "payday" comes around) in a house the size of my kitchen. You can have what you want if you sacrifice other things for it.

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Specializes in ICU/ER.

Basically yes, with these:

1. Single

2. No kids

3. Excellent credit

4. $75k base & $95k w/ minimal overtime

5. Save before spending

6. No student loans

You could own a big house and a nice car easy. The issue lies when nurses have a lazy broke spouse that milks them dry or 5 kids which is super expensive. For single people, a little bit of overtime will allow you to live very comfortably life...luxurious...subjective term but luxurious to me is eating good, being healthy, happy, sleeping well, free of major drama, buying really nice things with a small dent in your savings, and traveling(if that's your thing)

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