Bookstore manager, 26, lives in Manhattan on $53K a year by cutting costs. Is a low-cost routine the key?

To unrecorded comfortably successful New York City, radical request to bring successful astatine slightest $185,000 per year. But 1 26-year-old Brooklyn bookstore manager shows it's imaginable to unrecorded successful the Big Apple connected little than fractional the recommended yearly income.

In a caller interrogation with CNBC, Eileen Tyrrell talked astir however she’s surviving connected conscionable $53,000 per twelvemonth (1). According to her, the 3 keys to occurrence that support her afloat see minimal debt, humble rent and next-to-none discretionary spending.

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In a breakdown of her monthly fund of $3,477, the bulk goes to rent astatine $1,566, which she shares with 2 roommates successful Chelsea. After that, she spends $531 connected food, $527 connected discretionary items, and $321 connected utilities. The remaining $532 mostly goes to insurance, proscription and subscriptions, with astir $90 for savings and different $50 for a $3,000 pupil loan.

One caveat: her parents wage her telephone bill. Other than that, Tyrrell is maintaining her Manhattan manner acknowledgment chiefly to cautious budgeting and frugal living. But that doesn’t mean she is denying herself a fewer tiny indulgences. In fact, she makes it a constituent to bargain a regular $4 java and an occasional bacon, ovum and food astatine her section deli.

“I’m not going to lie. I’m not going to sugarcoat it: it’s hard,” she told CNBC. Even with each the sacrifices and stress, she says she’s blessed with her manner and that it’s each “worth it.”

​In galore ways, Tyrrell’s communicative is the exception, particularly successful New York City.

Data from United Van Lines suggests much New Yorkers are struggling to support gait with the rising outgo of surviving and are leaving the authorities (2). New York has 1 of the highest moving-out rates successful the nation, 2nd lone to neighboring New Jersey.

Bank of America reports that astir one-quarter of Americans are surviving paycheck to paycheck (3). Meanwhile, the fig of radical utilizing bargain now, wage aboriginal services for groceries jumped 14% betwixt 2024 and 2025 (4).

Federal Reserve information shows recognition paper indebtedness has deed $1.23 trillion, underscoring the fiscal strain galore households look (5). Tyrrell’s mindset reflects a broader displacement successful the post-pandemic K-shaped economy, arsenic much Americans consciously effort to chopped back.