MUCH MUCH more than that. There are literally shacks in Dharavi which charge 1 lakh pa rent. The housing market is Mumbai is legalised extortion. In my case I am working from Chennai because I found Mumbai to expensive. My thinking is that if I want to spend so much then I might as well migrate abroad. Also, Mumbai is overrated. A chicken sandwich at the Hyatt in Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Chandigarh or Jaipur isn’t very different from a chicken sandwich at the Hyatt in Mumbai!! They don’t put diamonds and gold inside chicken sandwiches in Mumbai!

1 crore pa before tax is the bare minimum needed in Mumbai to lead a dignified life. Anything less makes you lower middle class. I’m not exaggerating. Prices in Mumbai are more than Europe in many cases. Also, we need to spend on health, transport etc because the govt doesn’t spend our taxes on these (our taxes go into the pockets of politicians instead).

1. 2 BHK in a decent / good locality (Bandra, Parel, Dadar, etc.) but not top notch locality will cost you around 2-3 cr. So expect around 160k a month in EMI.

2. Assuming you change cars every 10 years, a 16L car would cost around 20k a month in EMI plus around 5k a month in maintenance. Not considering the germans, which would cost manifold on both counts.

3. Maid plus driver would be around 35-40k a month (can increase depending on your work hours ofc).

4. Foreign holidays in Asia would cost around 150-300k each for 2 people. So around 35k a month at least.

5. Each good meal should cost around 5-7.5k for 2 people, so around 15-20k a month.

If you look at the above numbers, you are already out around 270k a month (for a family of 2), on top of which you need to add fuel, food, maintenance, clothes, health insurance, life insurance, misc. expenses, etc., which should take it to at least 300-350k a month (around 40-45 LPA net expenses).

If you want to save on top of this for retirement, you would need to make at least 75 lakhs to 1 cr a year (pre-taxes) between you and your partner.