Buying a house: realistic or are we overextending ourselves?

Tip: keep a household budget book. When I read the estimate, I would guess that you haven't been shopping for a long time

I can only agree with that. The numbers are okay; with the good equity, a coherent financing is feasible. What strikes me personally, however, is the missing savings rate for a replacement car as well as the high media costs.

I would estimate groceries at about €250-300.

That is certainly more. However, an excessive evening full of delicacies can be balanced again with basic groceries in the following days. A bread with cheese or a pasta salad as the main dish has never harmed anyone. That is why the advice with the household budget book for the coming months or a year, where everything is recorded. This helps as an overview. Because medications or gifts can also put a strain on the budget.

I claim that anyone who eats normally and not bread with cheese and noodles with ketchup every day cannot get by with less than 300-350 EUR per adult person.

Besides the type of diet (brand products vs. own brands / lots of meat vs. little meat / restaurant + canteen + delivery services vs. homemade / tap water vs. other drinks), it perhaps also depends on how one compiles their costs. I use the account transactions for grocery stores and the complete cash withdrawals for our income and expense overview (mainly used for the canteen and bakery). Certainly, other things that are paid for in cash but are not food or non-food items in the supermarket might slip in there, but on average it should be fine. We are roughly at 900€-950€ for 3 people for groceries, drinks, school kitchen, canteen (with work group subsidy), restaurant, and including drugstore items. However, anyone who maybe eats out a lot and includes that in the leisure category or assigns the food in kindergarten to the kindergarten fees will automatically get different values without giving up anything. For me, the vacation months distort my statistics when we have food included at the accommodation/hotel or when we eat out more frequently there and then I have to consider whether to assign that to vacation or food.

That's a good point. The €250-300 were just my expenses when shopping. Of course, my wife also goes shopping, so €400-500 is more realistic. I'll go through the last few months again and calculate an average from both accounts!

Are you both financing and both becoming owners? Then of course all expenses must be taken into account.

By the way, I also don't really believe that the car costs are accurate. It only takes one set of new tires or a major repair in the year, and the €12x140 for the repair alone are gone.

300 euros for groceries? 2000 euros for vacations?
Are 80% lying here or am I spending way too much money and is that the standard?

Are you both financing and both becoming owners? Then, of course, the entire expenses must be taken into account.

By the way, I also don’t really believe the car costs are accurate. In a year, it only takes one set of new tires or a major repair, and the 12x140€ for repairs alone are gone.

We are married and will both become owners, although I’m not sure if there are smarter arrangements? The meeting with the bank is scheduled for next week.

I track all costs for our cars, but car number 2 is relatively new and hasn’t had any repairs yet; I still have to increase the value there for a plausible expense overview, you are right about that.

300 euros for groceries? 2000 euros for vacations?

We already established the groceries. The vacation amount seems about right: 2100€ for 10 days in a holiday park in Holland, 2 couples, so 1050€ per couple. On site, we are self-caterers.

Regarding groceries: we bake bread ourselves and therefore eat a lot of bread accordingly. My wife loves pasta, rice with vegetables, etc. I simply believe we eat cheaply... but as already mentioned, I set the grocery budget higher.

I would also like to edit my #1 post but can't find an option for that here... is that not possible in this forum? Or do I somehow lack enough posts/permissions for that?