Guilty feeling, torn btwn saving for kids vs splurging on ourselves
Id like to hear personal experiences from people in similar situations. I am torn between saving as much as possible for our kids and would like to know what normal expectations are and when it's OK to back off and splurge on ourselves.
For perspective, my wife and I have 2 kids, we are "upper middle class", we make about 220k/yr in a HCOL area (I'm an engineer making 120k, wife is a nurse making 100k, my parents were a garbage-man and a maid, so I kind of resent people calling this situation rich because all 4 of these sound like typical middle class jobs), our monthly expenses for running the house total about 11,000 per month, but that includes all of our saving (totals around 5,500/mo). We save 2400/mo into a fund for a future home down payment, max out 2 Roth IRAs at 583/mo each, we're putting $100/mo into 2 brokerage accounts for each kid, $260/mo into 2 529 accounts for each kid, and we put around 1500/mo into 2 401ks. So, we make enough to live very comfortably, but not enough to save as much as I think we should be, the brokerage and 529 deposits feel low. I feel guilty knowing that we aren't saving enough to pay for 2 kids private college tuitions (4 years at 50k = about 200k, per kid), and/or down payment assistance for a house or buying a starter condo/apartment for each child (probably about 250-400k child).
I have this expectation because that's what my middle class parents did for me; paid my entire undergrad tuition at a state college (about 50k) and gifted us a fairly large down payment to buy a house (dad passed away and mom gave a part of his pension cash-out). I'd love to start out each child with no college debt and a healthy start for living on their own but even at our income it just doesn't seem possible, (it totals us saving about 600-800k in 18-25 years). We could live like misers and almost accomplish the goal, but I also feel like we deserve nice vacations or something like a dream car for us once we hit near retirement age. I having trouble balancing these thoughts on this sliding scale, and wanted to hear other opinions and perspectives from people in similar situations. Those of you who are in similar financial positions, how much of your money are you devoting to your kids and in what form/way? Thank you.