Calorie intake for sedentary people

There are many reasons why one may not "hit the gym", as you put it. I personally have a very serious heart condition that prohibits my exercising. I was even discharged from cardiac rehab because the stress was too great for my heart. All calculators (including the one suggested by JossFit) calculate my caloric intake TOO high and suggest that I eat between 1450 - 1750 calories a day. If I did, I would balloon up even more. Under my doctor's advice and monitoring, I now eat around 1300 calories a day. As far as weight loss, it is very, very slow but it is not safe to eat fewer calories than I do. If you don't know for sure or are uncertain, you may want to consult your physician or a nutrition specialist.

Most calorie online calculators say my BMR is 2000 to 2200 calories per day and that I will lose weight on 1700. My weight has been up and down a lot over the past 8 years and I have figured out that my BMR is actually about 1700 calories per day. I will maintain at that intake, gain above it and lose below it. I actually need to eat between 1200 and 1400 per day to lose weight. Everyone is different and you will have to either undergo expensive testing to have someone tell you this information about yourself, or do a lot of experimenting like I did. My wife also finds the online calculators to be way off for her. I am sure that they work for some people and may work for you. But you are going to have determine the number of calories you need to eat to lose for yourself using the info on this website as guidance only. BTW, my mother at 5'2" and 200 lbs used a walker due to multiple sclerosis, lived a very sedentary life and maintained her weight on 900 calories per day. She decided that living with the weight was better than eating a lot less than that.

I calculate my calorie goal based on my TDEE with my activity level set as 'sedentary' because I have a desk job (or I'm sitting most of the time) and when I'm not working out I'm relaxing (read -->watching Netflix).

I log my exercise calories and eat mostly all of them back.

My TDEE as calculated by this site: http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/
It's ~1700 -->My calorie goal is 1400 but like I said I eat back my exercise calories so if I go for a run/bike ride and burn 250-300 cals I'm really eating like 1600-1700 cals/day.

This is what I've found works for me. I think if I was going strictly by the numbers and most common advice of using the TDEE-% method I'd be shooting for a bit more than 1400cals/day but I'm losing weight and feel great.

I use the Interactive DRI professionals use. I haven't heard of the one above but that doesn't mean it isn't any good. I like the DRI. I used it to set my goals here on MFP.