When I was in my 20s, I was a weird freak who started saving for my wedding before I even met my wife. I knew that one day I wanted to have a big, fat, huge, awesome wedding and I did not want to have to think about cost as the first primary decision. I am so thankful that I did that. Now, I know most people don't start saving for their wedding in their 20s, but let me ask you this. Do you know if you can afford to buy your dream house? Do you know what it would take for one parent in your household to stay home with the kids? Do you know how much it would cost for you to take your dream trip across the world? Most people have no idea. And so this thing just stays a dream. They don't even crunch a simple set of numbers to figure out what they can afford. And to me, it is a tragedy to live a smaller life than you have to. I want you to know how long it will take for you to be able to afford that dream house. I want you to know when you can get that beach house or that beautiful sweater. And in fact, I'm going to host a live event to show you exactly how to find the answer out for you. I'm going to show you real questions people have about big things they want. And then I'm going to show you how to crunch the numbers yourself so you know if you can do it or if not, when you can do it. It's part of my free three night live event series, sign up at iwt.com/live. These numbers are a complete mess. Your mortgage is more than your entire take home income. You each have twenty thousand dollars of credit card debt. I have probably twenty credit cards. You have twenty credit cards. Do you think this is normal? I don't know what's normal. It's not normal. Oh God. Okay. It's kind of like a little monster in a closet that we just not addressing. Is money the monster? Yes. If I say like, oh, let's go out to eat tonight. Well, I got to pay the mortgage. It's like a dig almost. I want to just go out. I don't care. Couples who are in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt in their fifties do not eat out. Ever. Pretty much ever. What happens if we change nothing on today's call? You never retired. You're always working. I have to face reality. I guess I just don't know what the move is. Right now you are on track for a very, very dangerous rest of your life. We can't end this call until you make serious substantial changes because the trajectory you're on, it's over. Have you ever spent money just because you were tired and you wanted to make your day a little easier? You don't want to cook, so you ordered delivery. Your kid wants something at the store. You don't want to hear them cry, so you say yes. But what happens when you keep making those decisions over and over even when you can't afford it? Today I'm speaking with Trevor and Lisa, 53 and 54 years old. Listen to this line from Trevor's application. Quote, she has maxed out credit cards and I don't even know if they're getting paid. Sooner or later, this issue will need to be addressed and I'm not sure if we're ready for that. It's like we're heading towards a cliff. What really caught my eye in that application was the phrase sooner or later. It's like they know there's a problem but they're putting off the conversation and I want to understand what is going on that's stopping them. But before I speak to them, let's take a look at their monarch accounts. All right, let's take a look here. We have no way. Housing is $8,000 but they actually spent $40,000. There's no way. How are they spending so much on their mortgage? Whoa. But their fixed costs were way higher than planned. 230% of budgeted income. How can you plan to spend 230% of what you make just on fixed cost? That doesn't make any sense. I'm very confused here. Is this just all wrong data? They planned on $304 in subscriptions. They actually spent $1,100. They planned on spending $1,469 on debt payments but they actually spent $5,500. So basically they're just spending more than they had planned, which suggests to me that maybe they just have out of control spending. All right, let's take a look at the months here. Whoa. Okay, so we have a highly variable income here. So we can see that few months ago, we had an income of $16,000 but expenses of $14,000. But then the next month, income of $16,000, expenses of $30,000. Wow, that's massive. This is what happens when you have sporadic income. Most people just go, "Well, I hope it works out in the end." Whoa. Debt payments are 65% of where their money is going. You're sunk. If that's the case, you are sunk. My takeaways from looking at this are there is just a lot of mess here. It's hard to even understand what's going on, which tells me if you have messy accounts, you almost certainly have messy spending. I can tell there's a business owner in this relationship. Okay, we can work with that sporadic or irregular income. We can work with that. But overall, I don't see a lot of focus and I see a lot of spending. Stick around until the end for Trevor and Lisa's follow up to find out if they put my plan into action and if they're on track to live their rich life. Let's meet Trevor and Lisa. When I say the word money, what do both of you feel about it? Lisa? Stress. Trevor? Same anxiety. Got it. Okay. How long have the two of you been together? Eight years. Eight years. Married? Married for six years. Great. And any children in the picture? Yes. I have a 14-year-old son and he has two adult children. Okay, so the two of you and one child in the house. Great. Let's think about the last, say, six months or so. Can you think about a time where the two of you really disagreed about money? Well, I feel like we argue about money almost every day. Really? Yeah. Wow. Take me to one of the bigger arguments you had in the last few months. It's not, we don't really argue per se, but I'll just say like, "Oh, it would be cool if we did this." And he'll be like, "Well, the mortgage is due in two weeks." And I'm like, "Okay." And then I just kind of shut down because I feel like it's constantly I'm being like scolded. Even though it's not really a scold, he's not scolding me. But to me, it feels like I'm being scolded. Money is like an area we don't really talk to each other about because we know that it will cause an argument and kind of avoid it. And like, there's so many responsibilities. Money has always been a source of anxiety for me because of all the expectations. There's birthdays and holidays and things that you want. And you know, you expect it to provide them. So you don't talk about money a lot. Don't argue, but then Lisa says you argue about money almost every day. Argue is not the right word. It is comments like, if I say like, "Oh, let's go out to eat tonight." Well, I got to pay the mortgage, like that kind of thing, that to me, it's like a dig almost. Okay, a little jab. And then do you end up going out to eat? Yes, because of the way we split up the money. I pay for all the food and groceries and going out stuff. And he pays for most of the bills and the mortgage. So I kind of make the decision like, "Well, I don't want to cook. I'm tired. I've been working all day. It's 30 bucks, 40 bucks. I don't care." Trevor, why'd you apply to speak to me today? Because I feel like that pattern is unsustainable. It's kind of like like a little monster in a closet that we just not addressing. And it's like, "No one wants to go in that room where the monster is, but we have to one day." Yeah, is money the monster? Yes. Okay. And what if you don't? What if we talk for a while today and nothing changes? What happens? At some point, something will break. Something will give. Maybe we'll move. We'll have to move, which we'll call some headache. We're not going to reach whatever financial goals we set. Doesn't sound so bad. Most people don't reach their financial goals. Most people don't even have financial goals. So what? When it ends up happening is you're never retired. Yeah. Lisa, what about you? I think if we don't make some changes, I mean, I'm not happy. Even though I feel like I am the cause of most of this, because I have most of the debt. I am not good with spending. I'm not good with a budget. I'm not happy with the way I do it either. I want to feel peace about how I'm handling things. And it's brought a lot of stress to our relationship as well. And we're not getting along as well as we used to. And we think about money very differently. And it stresses him out a lot and makes it so that he sort of shuts down a little bit. And I don't like talking about it. So we end up like at an impasse where nothing happens. Respectfully, because I've read all of the material you sent over. Feel like the situation that you were in financially and the way you're talking about it don't match up. You're both being very polite. We're not going to reach our financial goals. It's a bit stressful. If you continue the way you are going and you've told me you want to retire in five years, you will be able to withdraw about $26,000 per year. Can you live on that? No. Okay, end of the story. If you don't change something, you're not getting younger. You're getting older. Time is working against you now when it comes to your money. So when we're sitting here talking about like, "Oh, it's a bit stressful." And we go out to dinner and this, we're not even in the same universe right now. I don't usually cut to the chase this early on. But I'm just struck by the way you're talking about.
about. It seems like, that's like a minor inconvenience. This isn't minor. This is very serious. Right. Well, I think we take it lightly because it's depressing. So no one really wants to be depressed all the time. We have to live. So we kind of, like I said, that we leave that monster in the closet and we bust out and that's when it all comes to head. That's right. That's very perceptive. So if you are having this conversation with me today and the idea is like, okay, like, let's let this monster peek out its head and that's it and let's maybe talk a little bit around the edges about $5 here, $50 there. Y'all, that's going to do nothing. It's either bring this monster out and figure out a way to shoot it in the head. Sorry to be so visual. And it's going to make us uncomfortable. We're going to have a lot of uncomfortable conversations or we might as well not even talk. Right. That's why we're here. Great. Great. Okay. So do we all agree we are here to talk about money in the most honest way? Yes or no? Yes. Great. Okay. And do we also agree that we can't end this call until you make serious substantial changes because the trajectory you're on, it's over by show of hands. Okay. Both people putting hands up. Great. That's the kind of conversation I'm willing to have. Perfect. I want to take a look at your numbers. What was it like to do the conscious spending plan together? Terrible. How come? I don't even like listing all the things that I owe. It becomes more real. And I also don't want Trevor to know every single thing that I have going on. Why? You're married. I don't want him to just be like, okay, I'm done. I can't do this anymore. I'm going to take the money that I make and I'm going to deal with what I need to deal with and you can spend for yourself. Trevor, are you at that point? No. No, I'm not at that point. All right. What was it like for you Trevor doing the CSP together? We did it together but we were uploading our own things. So she's uploading her stuff and I'm uploading my stuff. You know, I'm not an angel either. But like I said, we've always had this habit or poor habit of mismanagement, I guess. And so we're both dealing with our own monsters and we're just trying to figure out a way to fight them together. Well, did you sit down physically together to do this? We did sit down physically but we were sitting next to each other while entering our own separate stuff. At least my noticing is it nasal or are you tearing up? Yeah, I am tearing up because it's just hard to talk about this stuff and it just feels to be like this and be causing this much stress for both of us. So I don't mind if you cry. It's going to be some challenging conversation today. That's how it goes. But that's why you're here. You came here. You went through a lot to get here. So cry if you have to cry. Tell me if you need a break. I'll give you a break. No problem. We're going to do it. Okay. All right. When I think about the two of you sitting down for your CSP and filling it out separately and then going, okay, Rami, like do some magic. I think that you fundamentally misunderstood the entire point of the CSP. What is the point? What is the point that you thought of putting your numbers in the CSP? I don't think Trevor even doesn't even know what the CSP is because I did it. I mean, he sat there and I said, okay, let's, I need this amount and this amount and this amount and I typed it up. That's surprising. He applied, but you did it. Yeah. Why? When it comes to administrative stuff like that, I take the lead. I usually take the lead. You all are proving my point. You thought the point of this was to type numbers into the conscious spending plan. That's not the point. What's the point of doing it together? Why did we specifically say do it together? Why? So that we're more aware of of what's actually happening and what's really going on. Yeah. Remember when you were dating? What if I said the point of going to a restaurant is to provide sustenance for each of you. Each of you is going to get a balanced meal. What the hell are you talking about? That's not the point of a date. What's the point of a date? Get to know each other. What's the point of a CSP is actually to connect over money. You thought it was to enter numbers and be right. I need you to fundamentally rethink the point of showing up today. If you come here thinking I need to be right or I want to prevent myself from looking bad or being told I was wrong, this thing is already over. I don't want to prevent it. I'm just scared of it. Nobody likes to hear that they're the problem. They're the ones that are messing things up. They're making terrible decisions. Nobody wants to hear that. I'm anxious because I know that's what I need to hear in order to get things right. No, wrong. How much of your life have you gone through by saying I know that I was wrong. I know that somebody needs to tell me to do better. How much of your life have you gone through thinking that, believing that? My whole life from it. Exactly. Did it work? No. You believe that somebody needs to come in here and tell you Lisa, you've been bad. And you know that it's going to feel bad, but you think that's what's going to change you. As if I tell you you've been bad enough ways enough times, it's finally going to sink through wrong. That's not how it works. Some very confusing things going on here. Trevor applied to speak to me. He's obviously concerned about what's going on. He didn't even fill out the CSP. Lisa did. So already I'm like, what's the dynamic here? But then they really did not take this seriously. The way that they envisioned the point of this was, all right, we got some homework from this fucking guy. Check, check, check. Let's just put some numbers in. I don't understand this. Whatever. What you can see here is that Trevor and Lisa did not think about the point of the CSP. If they had taken even 60 seconds to say, what is the point of this? What do we want to get out of this? They might have said, gosh, we should probably connect. That would have totally changed the dynamic. But because they walked in having made the incorrect decision miles ago, they already lost. This is going to be a difficult conversation. The numbers that you are about to see are hard. The ages, the situation they are in, even the communication, there's no easy answers today. And I want you to know that going in. This message is sponsored by Kindred. When people tell me their rich life is to travel more. I always push them to get more specific. Where are you going? Where are you waking up? What does the morning look like? Are you walking to a corner cafe? Are you picking up fruit at the market? Are you wandering around a local neighborhood that most tourists never see? 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I've come close to burnout twice. I wasn't sleeping that well. I started skipping my workouts. I felt like I was getting sick all the time. So now, when I am stressed out, I take it seriously. And the holidays are one of those times where it's easy to slip into old patterns. Suddenly, you have less time. You have a lot of obligations. Sometimes holidays can bring up painful memories. And there's a lot coming at you all at once. Sometimes the answer is deciding what to stop doing and to start setting boundaries. That's what growing feels like. Growth therapy is built to provide therapy for big decisions and for small. Sometimes people think they have to wait to see a therapist until something is going wrong. But we would never do the same thing with our physical fitness. Why do we do that with our mental health? Using Growth Therapy's platform, you can find licensed therapists based on what matters most to you. Everything from mental health specialties, availability, and what insurance they take. Book your first session in minutes and start in as little as two days, sessions average $21 with insurance. Some pay as little as $0 depending on your insurance plan. Prepare for holiday glimmers instead of holiday stress, visit growtherapy.com/remeth to get started today. That's growtherapy.com/remeth availability and coverage vary by state and insurance plan. I'm going to look at the numbers. I'm going to pull them up on screen and we're going to see what happens as we go through these numbers. Okay. All right, Trevor, can you read off the words in bold and the numbers in full for this entire box, please? Assets. 620,000 investments through on 82,000, 627, savings, 1,400, debt, 43,900.
I don't know what to think about the numbers because I don't fully understand them. That's honest. I appreciate that. Okay. Most people say, "Looks okay. I wish it was more." Like, that's kind of the level that most people are and I think that you're saying something really honest. Hey, I don't know. Good, bad, whatever. Yeah. We'll get to that. But I'm just trying to get an understanding of your comfort with these numbers. Yeah. What do you think of the combined gross monthly income? What number is that? 2226. Okay. The two of you make $242,000 per year by a show of hands who knew that? I see no hands going up. Okay. Interesting. What did you think you made per year, Lisa? I think Trevor makes 120 and I don't know how to consider my pay. Like if I paid whatever my income is or if I'm taking away all my expenses, that's part of my big issue is that I don't really understand it fully. Okay. That's fine. Trevor, what did you think you made per year? I know that I felt like I brought about 120 a year, but I could not have fathomed how much Lisa blocked to the table. What do you guys think hearing that you make $242,000? The number sounds good, but the reality of it is we don't manage it well. So Trevor, you make $8,000 a month, is that correct? It's around there. Yeah. Okay. So somebody makes $12,226 a month. Is that Lisa? No. That's Trevor. The $8,000 is me. What's happening right now? We don't know our numbers well enough. Not only do you not know your annual income, Trevor, you don't know what you're making per month. Yeah. This is a problem. How much you make? So Trevor makes $12,226, Lisa makes $8,000 and that's in your business. Is that correct? Yes. And then how much do you take home? Probably $1500 or $2,000. Okay. Make sense. It says $2,000 here. All right. Trevor, why is your take home $5,700? That seems pretty low. We'll pay in 12% for 401K and then there's like maybe 401K low. Huh? You took a loan out? From 401K. Yes. Okay. Why'd you do that? Hey, bills. Yeah. All right. So you have that going. That's deducted. All right. Okay. So your combined take home is $7,700 a month, considerably different from $20K to $7,000. That's a big difference. Normally, we would see this number at something like, I don't know, 12K, 13K maybe. So then let's go to the fixed cost number. Lisa, what's this number you see here for fixed costs? $230%. What does that mean? I believe it means that we are spending more than we're making. Correct. You are spending more than double what you are making every month just on fixed costs, just to keep the lights on. You have a mortgage or a rent. Mortgage. All right. More than you make every month. What does that tell you, Trevor? Tells me that I didn't put the numbers together well enough to get it when I got into here. Yes. And what else? If these numbers are accurate and your mortgage is more than your entire take home income, what does that tell you? I don't even know how we're sustaining it. We somehow goodbye and I don't know how we're doing it. What it really tells me is just a bit off more than we can chew. And the arguments, you know, we had in the beginning where the conversation was like, Oh, I'm not sure the monster in the closet, like those days are over. I don't really care about that anymore. I care about this. I care about math. If you're spending more than you make just on your mortgage alone, that's the end of the story. How we feel about it is less relevant now. We will talk about your feelings, but we need to solve this. Otherwise, you all will lose your house and all of it will be gone. That's it. We have talked about selling the house and renting and I feel like we are kind of waiting for this to happen before making it like a final decision because we don't know the steps to take or if that's the right choice. Okay. We'll go through it. Let's continue on. I want to look at the rest of your fixed costs here. So we have 230% which is the highest number I've ever seen of anyone's fixed costs. You have car payments $2,170 per month. What's that? I'm a mobile dog groomer, that's the vehicle payment for my van. That's why I don't take home as much money as I could be because I have so many expenses with the business. Okay. Debt payments of $1,469. What's that debt? Credit card debt. How much do you have in credit card debt? Me, I probably have pretty close to $28,000. $20,000. What about you, Lisa? About the same. Okay. That's at $2,100 a month. What's that? I don't know if that included eating out. We eat out a lot and yeah, I spend a lot on groceries, a lot on food with my son also. That's, you know, he constantly wants to eat out and- You have trouble saying no to your son? Yes. Almost every single person I've ever met who has credit card debt struggles to say no to their kids. What do you make of that? It makes sense. I mean, you want to do- you want to make your kids happy? And it's more about not adding to the stress that we already have. I don't want to have arguments with my kid every day. He'll, you know, I get home from work. I'm tired. I'll make dinner and he'll be like, I don't want that. I want McDonald's or I want this and- You want me to handle this for you? No, because I already know what to do and a lot of the time I do say no, but a lot of the time I just don't want to deal and I get in. How come you didn't just accept my offer to help? I don't know. You do that a lot? Yes. I'm half joking, but if you FaceTime me and you go, hey, talk to my son and he goes, hey, my mom made this meal and I don't want it. I want McDonald's. Do you know how much joy I would take in telling him no? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Let's continue on. Miscellaneous at $2,319, I actually think that's probably true. I think you do spend money on uncategorized stuff. We're going to look at that. If we look at your investments, we have $1,430 going towards investments. Savings at 18%. I don't believe this. I don't believe you're putting $1,400 a month towards a savings account. Is this true? No, that might be the balance. That's the balance. Right. All right. And then you have negative $12,000 left over. I'm going to be very honest with you. We're screwed. No, don't use humor to try to escape the reality of the situation. You did not actually do these numbers properly. I don't mind if you get the numbers a little bit wrong. Most people get 20, 25% of the numbers wrong. I don't mind. I don't think you actually took this seriously. I don't think you respect money. You certainly didn't respect me enough to do this and do it even semi-correctly. I want to help, but I'm not sure where to go if your numbers are so wrong that you are negative $12,000 per month, which is obviously impossible. I don't know how we're wrong, though, because I feel like we put in everything accurately. Yes, where I'm confused, too. I'm going to walk you through it. Okay. So this is zero. Post-tax retirement savings. This suggests that you are investing $1430 per month. That's incorrect. Okay. We'll look up what it is, because we have your accounts connected through Monarch, but I'm going to put that at zero as well. Okay. I don't know about your income, but I want to go and I want to take a look. So let's go through some of your numbers and let's see what we have here. All right. So here off, I'm going to go last month. You actually had a really good month. You planned to make $7,000, but you made $17,000. Did you know that? No. Even when things are good, you don't know it. No, we don't, because we don't discuss it together. I told Trevor, I used to get bills in the mail, even in my 20s, and if I didn't have enough money in my account, I would put the bills aside and just pretend like they didn't exist. That's kind of how I've always been, and I continue to do it. Does it work? No. It doesn't work. Why not? It works. You all have what appears to be a beautiful house, eat out a lot, have a van, have a visit. Why not? It seems to work. No. It's because Trevor has good credit. That's why we have the van. That's the only reason I wouldn't have been able to get it without him. And I fly by the seat of my pants when it comes to money. Like instead of paying my two credit cards that I have the biggest balances on, I haven't made payments in two months, and instead we go out to eat. And I don't tell Trevor that it's less stressful for me to not think about it, not deal with it. Sounds like it's working great. Yeah, clearly it's not. What do you mean? You're getting exactly what you want. You get to eat out. You get to have a business even though you yourself could not afford to have it. You get the house. What's not working? It's working exactly the way you want it to. I mean, it's not the way I want it to. I want to be better at handling all this, and I don't want to have secrets. I don't want him to be so stressed about money and retiring and all this stuff. Are you telling me that you would rather downsize to a small apartment, give up the business.
out except once every two months in order to, "be better and be less stressed about money." I'm not willing to do all of those things just to, quote, "be better." No. Okay, that's an honest answer. I agree with that. Would you be willing to do those things for anything? I'd be willing to do those things in lieu of losing important things like my husband or so yeah. Great. Now we're getting somewhere. Trevor, have you ever had an honest conversation with Lisa about money and your concerns? Well, I've tried. Yes. I've tried to have these conversations, but it's tough without maybe a mediator. I've never seen one. Therapist, mediator, anything like that. Yes, actually. Oh, good. You did it together. We have good. How did go? We didn't continue it. It's tough to find the fit, like the personality conflict, like the cultural differences or something. All right, Trevor, so do you want to have the conversation with Lisa about money right now? Sure. If you could say anything to Lisa and she would listen, what would you say to her? Well, well, I don't know what to say to her. I really don't know. I'm like, I'm at a loss because I'm like, I said, I'm the angel either. It's kind of striking to me that, you know, I asked, have you ever had a serious conversation about money? You said, no, but it's because we couldn't find a counselor because of fit, et cetera. But now I'm giving you complete carte blanche that the opportunity to say anything you want and your response is, I'm not sure what to say. Is it possible that you haven't talked about money because you actually both don't know what to say about money. Maybe even you don't really want to talk about it. Maybe even. I'm a very emotional person. Trevor's very unemotional. So whenever we talk about these things, I will start crying and he'll immediately shut down and say, I can't talk to you if you're crying. And then that's kind of the end of the conversation because I can't control it. I'm having an emotional response to it and he cannot deal with the emotion. Okay. So we end up not talking about it. Let's say that my wife and I spend 230% of our income on fixed costs. Let's say that we had close to no savings. We were in our 50s. It was a pretty dire financial situation. And she says, I can't talk about this because I start to cry and then I say, yeah, and I shut down. What advice would you give us? I would say you both have to suck it up and just deal with it and and talk about it. But she cries and I shut down. So what would we do? She'll have to cry and you'll have to not shut down. Great. That's pretty honest or we could write a letter to each other or we could record voice notes or we could see a therapist or or or there's a thousand different ways we could do it. But I'm not going to let crying stop me from one of the most important conversation. I'm not going to let my inability to stay present in the conversations. I'm not going to let those speed bumps get in the way of a rich life. Are you? I don't want to. Okay. Then let's not. If you're going to cry today, cry. I don't mind. Crying is fine. It's normal. I don't mind. Trevor, you could cry too. Everybody could cry on this call. Let's do it together. Trevor doesn't cry. I know. I also have a difficulty crying. This is messy. I was right. The numbers themselves are messy. But when I see messy numbers, messy account structure, it usually reflects something else messy in a relationship. You know, it's kind of like messy mind, messy office or messy whatever whatever the phrase is. I don't know what it is, but it's messy here. It's messy everywhere. I want to tell you that when you are dialed in with some part of your life, it could be money, it could be fitness, it could be parenting, whatever. You know what it feels like. It feels like we all are on the same page. If you think about it with money, if I'm going out to eat, I don't have to check something to be like, is it okay for us to buy a salary? I already know because I have a system that handles it. Fitness, am I going to work out today? It's already dialed in. I'm going at this time these days and I know exactly what I'm going to do and I'm going to track it. This is what I want you to be working towards. And it's okay if you're not there with money yet. Most people are not. That's okay. But there is something in your life that you are really good at. And it could be you individually. It could be you and your partner. I want you to start asking yourself if I was that competent, that dialed in with money. What would it look like and feel like? It would not look like this. I can tell you that. One of my challenges today is going to be to take all this messy information, numbers, contradictory accounts and try to find out what matters and what we should do first. Common questions I hear from couples who are about to retire. Are we going to be okay? How do we know if we have enough and what if the market takes a downturn? Now, these are good questions to ask. You definitely want to plan for the worst. But I noticed that very few people plan for the best. That's why it's helpful to explore all scenarios with the help from a flat fee planner like our friends at facet. Financial planning is changing and facet is helping make that happen. Instead of taking a percentage of your portfolio, facet charges one flat membership fee for financial planning. Never a percentage of your assets, never a commission. And facet gives you access to a team of CFP professionals, always a CFP, always a fiduciary, who help you create a personalized financial plan that meets you where you are. Your team is there for the decisions that are going to come your way, maybe buying a house, tackling debt, managing investments, saving for kids college, traveling in retirement, estate planning, all of it. Plus, their mobile app makes it easy to do everything in one spot like tracking your goals, checking balances out, messaging your planner, seeing monthly action steps, and more. As of the date of this recording, facet is waiving the enrollment fee for new annual members. And for my audience, facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to facet.com/remete to learn about which membership option is best for you. Facet is an SEC registered investment advisor. I'm not a member of facet, and I have an incentive to endorse facet as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement. All opinions are my own, and not a guarantee of a similar outcome. Y'all follow these people on TikTok? Somebody will post a picture of them behind a blade of grass and a white background, and they go find me. And then this person on TikTok will locate them, geo-map, Google map, all this stuff. They go, this is where you live, this is the angle of the sun, this is who you are. I'm watching this stuff like what? This pretty scary. If someone can find you online from just a little bit of information, imagine the damage that a scammer with your actual personal data can do. That is why I pay for and use Delete Me personally. Delete Me is a subscription service that continually searches for and removes your data from the internet. I'm talking about things like your full name, email, phone number, address, even your parents' names. Gone. They've been the leading expert in personal information removal for the past 15 years. They use their own technology, so your data is never outsourced to third parties. And they were named Wirecutters Number One Data Removal Service for a reason. That's why I personally use this service, because I care about my privacy, and I think you will love it too. You'll get 20% off all consumer plans when you go to joindeleteMe.com/remet and use promo code "remet@checkout". That's joindeleteMe.com/remet code "remet" for 20% off. I want to do a debt breakdown. You have $44,000 of debt. You each have $20,000 of credit card debt. What's the rest? The 20 was an estimate, so it may be a split between the two of us. That's it. Two different credit cards. That's your total debt. Not two different credit cards. I have probably 20 credit cards. You have 20 credit cards? Why? 20? I didn't know 20. I mean, it's a lot. I'm exaggerating. I'm exaggerating, but it's a lot. Okay, stop that. It's a lot. Yeah. Okay, at least 10, at least 10. Okay, so yeah, so I'm no different. I have maybe 10 credit cards. You each have 10 credit cards. Yes. I'll tell you. I guess not the way you're saying it. It's not normal. Okay. What is normal? Two credit cards. Two? Wow. Okay. Okay. Okay. All right. Let's go ahead and take a look at some of your accounts in monarch. So last month, you made $10,000 more than you had planned. So you told me that between the two of you, after taxes and all that stuff, you take home $7,000 a month. That's this, $7,731. You actually made $6,000 more than you had planned. Okay. So what we're looking at here, I see a lot of payments from your pet business. Payments of roughly $5,600 bucks. Yeah. And I also see a lot of money coming in. That's where Trevor works. Oh, great. Okay. So there's a, you have paychecks coming in from there. Great. Okay. How come you pay yourself like every few days, Lisa? I used to have an accountant, I'm not an accountant, a bookkeeper, and I don't anymore. So now I don't pay myself unless I need to pay bills. So that's another big issue I need to get another bookkeeper again so that it's more under control. Okay. Let's look at transportation 3,100 last month. Interestingly,
A lot of Tesla charges, what's that? Charging, $145. - That's probably insurance. - All right, I'm looking at quite a bit of gas. I'm assuming that's for the business truck. - It's the van, yeah. - All right, 2,169, that's the van. - That's the van payment, yeah. - Yeah, all right, let's look at the rest of it. Debt payments, 3,063 in a month. We have two loan 90. We have freedom that looks like a credit card. - Freedom is mortgage, also, isn't it, honey? - Freedom is free to mortgage, yes. - How do you have it? Two mortgages. - I don't know what that top one is, but I know the other one is the mortgage. - All right, phone, $553, how's that possible? - That's my business phone, my business line, and the iPad that I used for my business, and my son's phone is on it too. - Okay. - Everybody feels like low energy right now. Am I the only one feeling that, or are you two feeling it as well? - I'm feeling it. - Money does that. - Yeah. - You let it do that. - Right. - How do you think I feel when I talk about money? - You probably are excited about it, 'cause you know what to do with it. - Yeah. - True. What else? - I'm assuming you like it. I'm assuming you like this. You love it. I mean, 'cause. - Miles, would you be doing this for a living? - Right, you're good at it. - I appreciate the compliment. Let me ask you two of you. Let's, what is something that each of you is good at? - Being creative, doing creative things. - Great, an example, what would it be like? - I'm artistic, I do a lot of crafts. I'm a dog groomer, that's a creative profession. - Perfect, Trevor, what's one thing you're good at? - I wouldn't say there's an actual thing, but I would consist of it. - Okay, all right. Think about how you talk about the thing you are good at, and the way you feel about it. Okay? Now, if you apply that to money, how would it look and feel when you worked through money? - Probably a lot better. Like, if I went to a class on learning how to knit something, I'd be like super into it. If I go to a sci-fi movie with Trevor, I'm kinda like, okay, when's this gonna be over? And that's how I feel about talking about money. - Okay, now tell me what it would feel like if you felt the same way about money, what would it look and feel like that you feel about being creative? - I feel like I know what the hell I'm doing, and I'd be, it would make more sense to me. I wouldn't be making these mistakes that I'm making. - You notice that whenever I ask you these questions, you're going into the negative. - That's kind of what I do. - Yeah, it's not working for me. - It's not working for me either. - Then let's change it. Stop doing that, and instead, try to stick with me and answer my question. What would it look and feel like if you had the same skill and approach with money as you do with creativity? - I feel like I'd be a lot wealthier. I feel like I'd have more money coming in, and I'd be using it for better things and not things that are just wasteful. - What else? When you saw all these numbers, like if I walk into a yarn store as a guy like me, I'm like, what is this? This is overwhelming. I don't care about it. I don't understand it. That's how you're talking about money. Now, when you walk into a yarn store, what do you see? - Potential. - Yes. - Yeah. - You see possibility of things that don't even exist yet. - Correct. - That's what I see with money. I look at these things, it all makes sense to me. I see this, I see that. I go, yeah, okay, some mistakes here and there. We could fix this, and I can see the end result. You can see a blanket. I can see the equivalent with money. That is how you might feel. I need you to get there. I need you to even visualize that the same way you walk into a yarn store, you could do that with money. That's what I'm talking about. Trevor, do you see what I'm talking about here? If somebody says, hey, can you do that for the next 45 days straight? You go, yeah, of course, consistency. No problem, this is given. Done. That's the same way you can be about money. Hey, can you figure this stuff out? Yeah, of course. Yeah, it might take some work. I don't mind putting the work in. I can figure this out. That's the same way you both can feel. But if you don't allow yourself to unlock, you'll just be sitting here living in the past. Oh, it sucks, I don't know. We're not doing that. Okay. Lisa, I can see that you're getting this. Yeah. Just by the tone of your voice, you're like, oh, I could just see a slight upturn. Well, it makes sense. That makes sense to me. Great. Yeah. I'll tell you honestly, I've always been fascinated by people who are creative and can see things. Like you have people who walk into an empty apartment or house and they can just see it. That's me. I want you to apply that same principle. You might have to work a little harder with this, just like I have to work harder to do what you're naturally good at. Yeah, I want to. I want to see money like that because I feel like that would be life changing. Yes. That is a breakthrough. Great. Now stick with me. Let's go through some of these other numbers. Some of them are going to be messy. Some of them are going to be depressing. Great. It's all helping you get better at the skill of money. Okay, Trevor, come along. Let's watch. All right, I'm putting some more up on screen. Subscriptions. You planned at 304. It was actually 1118. Let me look into this. Oh my God. That's a good reaction. You surprised Lisa? Yes. All right, let's look at it. Actually, you read it off, Lisa. Read off these subscriptions. Just go right down the list. Go ahead. Apple Adobe Amazon. That's a huge one. Ring, Duda website, Patreon, Google, Intuit, Netsal, that's my website stuff. Apple again, Amazon relay, Tesla, Netflix. Oh my gosh, Hulu, Amazon, everything. It's everything in the world, basically. It's a lot, right? Yeah. Just looking at that, what do you think? We spend too much money on bullshit. Okay, would you be willing to make a change on that? Yes. Great. Love it. All right, let's look at some other stuff here. And now we're starting to get a picture of what's going on here. Let's take a look at miscellaneous. We have a lot of bank stuff. What is this? Those are my credit cards. Minimum payments? Yes. Yes. I'm going to fix that. Yeah. Discover 41 dollar. You paying the minimum on all the credit cards? Yes. And discover I owe over $7,000 and I'm paying minimum. You know how much you're going to end up paying in the end? I do. I do know. You still do it. Why? Because I tell myself I can't afford to pay more because I'm not willing to give up other ****. Okay. Trevor, what about you? What are you spending money on here? Bill's credit card payments. Okay. What else? Goes, memberships. Those are yours. Some of me are. All right. Let's look at dining out for just a second. Whoa. Yeah. All right. This year, $7,300 on dining out. Let's just take a look here. So a sighy, $36. That was yesterday. What did you all get? Two-assignables. We eat their way too often. I can see that you ate their yesterday. You ate their two days ago before that. You went to Boba, Taco Bell, In-N-Out, Coffee Bean, McDonald's. A lot of that is my son and I need to change it. Okay. Do we want to get your son here? I'll lay down the law right now. Hey, is that school? Please go. Yeah. Yes. It's interesting. I actually think you would want me to talk to him. I totally would. Yes. Because it would mean you wouldn't have to talk to him. Correct. Yes. 100%. 100%. So now that I have taken a look at this, I have one more thing I want to look at and then I think I will have a full picture. Okay. We're going to look at your accounts. So we have in your checking and savings, I see maybe 15 accounts here. You have more accounts than I have. Let's take a look at credit cards, which by the way have $36,000 on them. The number of credit cards here, including B of A, Coles, Wayfair, TJ Maxx, Apple, City, Nordstrom, and on and on. Why do you need 10 cards? I guess it just kind of worked out like that. Somebody will offer you balance transfer for zero percent interest and you take the offer and then you get another one and there's zero percent interest. So you're just moving the debt around until why you do that though? You try and save money and try and slowly hit off. Do you ever pay it off doing that? In the past, I have had zero debt, but there's no defense against the debt coming back. The way you both talk about money is as if it happens to you. What you have is something called an external locus of control. It means that you believe control is external of you, that you react to whatever life throws at you. The car is going to break. Sun's going to ask for food. Dog grooming client is going to disappear, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I just got to figure out a way to react. And there's a lot of convenient phrases I would be willing to bet you grew up with, you know? Money comes, money goes. These kinds of phrases that indicate, you just got to put your nose down. You got to nose to the grindstone. You just got to work hard as if we just have to react versus-- Neither of us are proactive. Correct. Yeah. Thank you for a long time. You all are in your fifties until it stops. And when it stops, especially for people that spend hundreds of thousands of dollars like you do, it hits like a brick wall. Because you will be forced to go from where you are to a place you do not want to be. And you will not have the skills to know how to downshift. There will be a very dark future.
just look at these numbers. They are catastrophic. What we like to believe is that if they truly understood what these numbers mean, they would be here. We're ready to do anything. Tell us. We'll do it. We know this is a ticking time bomb. We know we're in trouble. Tell us. We're ready. But that is not how humans behave. As you can see here, the situation is not just difficult. It's dangerous. And I'm going to tell you right now, there's only so much that I can do. A lot of people in the last 30 or so episodes have been frustrated that people come on the show and their CSP is kind of messed up. And what people really want is for my team to help them fix their CSP before they come on here. That is the wrong approach. And I intentionally do not do that. First of all, I want to see how people fill in the numbers. I don't really care if it's a little bit wrong. But second, as you can see here, we actually went a step further. We had them connect all of their accounts. And it is still totally wrong. So getting more information is not going to solve a psychological or emotional problem. You've got to understand that in America, we have this deeply held invisible script that we need more information that's going to solve it. Not true. More information is not solving their problem. They have all their accounts connected together. They don't even know what to do with it. They can't talk about money because this is not just an information problem. It goes far deeper than that. I want to thank our new partners at Monarch for setting up our couples on their platform to see their exact conscious spending plan categories. Monarch is a private personal finance app that brings all of the households accounts, checking credit cards loans and investments into one clean dashboard on your phone or computer. One of the biggest reasons I chose to partner with them is that Monarch is built for couples. You can add your partner or even your financial planner at no extra cost so everyone can see the same financial picture with shared goals. This turns your monthly money meeting into calmer check-ins where everyone is on the same page. One thing I love about Monarch is it allows you to save up for your rich life goals. If you want to save for a wedding or an amazing vacation and emergency fund, a house, a baby, college, retirement, Monarch makes it really easy. You set your goals up, you tell it how much you want to save towards that goal every month, Monarch lets you see your progress visually along the way. Try Monarch for free today and get 50% off your first year of Monarch's core tier with code
[email protected]/remit. And when you sign up with my link only, you'll get your Monarch account customized with my exact CSP categories so you can see how you are stacking up to your plan each month. That's Monarch.com/remit with code remit. Lisa, when you think about your childhood, what do you remember your family saying about money? It wasn't really talked about. My dad brought in the money. My mom didn't. She was like a separatorial, didn't have a whole lot of money coming in and then things would happen. She couldn't afford something and I remember us living out of one of those igloo coolers because our fridge broke and she couldn't afford to go buy a new fridge. And then she would ask my dad to help us out, basically. Ask your dad to help out his wife and kids? X-wife at that point. They got divorced. How old were you when they got divorced? 10. What was the effect that it had on you? I don't feel like he was a big part of my life anyway, so I don't feel like it affected me that much. What about financially? Yeah, it was very different because even though I grew up in upper middle class and my dad was a doctor and made good money, it sort of was all gone because he didn't really, he wasn't part of our lives anymore. What did that feel like? It just felt like we were on our own. There's no one to help. What happened as you got into your teenage years in early 20s? I was reckless. I did reckless things because I didn't want to be without and I just wanted what I wanted because I was used to not getting what I wanted. So when I would want something, I would figure out a way to get it and I didn't care what the consequences were. Were you the same way before the age of 10? I don't think so. So what happened? I think we were living in a way that was upsetting to me and I didn't like it. I didn't like being put in a position where if I needed something or I guess wanted something that I couldn't have it. Does that show up for your expenses? Because when I'm looking at your food, for example, I'm seeing a saye boba taco. It's similar in my thinking where it's like, yes, I want to eat a saye today. So I'm going to go get it and I don't think like, oh, I shouldn't go get it because it's 40 freaking dollars. It feels like I'm giving something up that I want and I don't like that feeling. Do you think your son has the same feeling? Yes. And what do you think about that? He has a lot of same qualities that I have that I don't perceive as good qualities and I know that I've created it. I don't like it. I don't like seeing it in him and I don't like seeing it in myself. So is your conclusion like yes, I see some of those qualities that I don't love in myself in him and it sucks. Yeah, because I don't follow through and I don't fix it. Okay. I appreciate the honesty. I would rather hear the honesty than I need to do better when people say that I just disregard it because this is just words. But I appreciate you just being like, yeah, I don't follow through. Okay. Yeah. Trevor, is there anything that Lisa did not mention about her upbringing as it relates to money that you think is important? She's being very open about her upbringing. I mean, if she wanted the money, she like asked her mom, right? And I think like you also mentioned that surpassed down behavior, you know, like she's like on my son, you know, mom, I want and he gets. How does he do it? Does he text you? I've seen teenage kids that just text their mom like a link. That's it. No context. Nike shoelink. No, no, no, I'm not like that. I disagree. I disagree because he does do exactly that. He's not. He's seen you of Amazon link. Say, mom, I want this shirt. Mom, I want these. I need these. I want that. Can we just look at the text? Open them up. Okay. Yeah. Why not? You'll send you a link. I'm like, I want it. Okay. So like Sunday, he said he wanted Taco Bell. I said, fine, text me what you want. A state case of EA, a season chicken, Caesar, blah, blah, blah. I want a large bohob last and a small bohob last. And I said, why do you need two drinks? Because the big one is not big enough. And I just said, okay, two drinks for a kid. I never got one drink. I know. This is insanity to me. And your answer, okay. I don't know. I'm not here to lecture a 50 year old mom of a 14 year old. That's not my job here. I know. So Lisa, what's going on when he sends in his order to his mom and you go, okay, what's happening there? I'm just getting in because I don't want to fight, I guess. What else do you get out of saying, okay? Him being happy. Which means what to you? It makes me feel good that I'm getting him something he wants. You feel loved when you are buying him something. Yes. And if you say no, it feels like what? Feels like how I felt. It feels like somebody's not giving you what you want and it sucks. Yeah. Let's just fast forward 20 years from now. What does his future look like based on the current trajectory? I am scared for his future. I am. I mean, there's a lot that you also don't know about, which is his father and that's a big problem regarding money. His dad just gives him whatever he wants. Okay. What happens when your son is 34? He's not going to be able to fend for himself. He's not going to know how to survive. He's going to be begging me to help him with things and I don't want that for him and I don't want it for me. He's not going to know how to get an apartment. He doesn't want to work for money. He doesn't do any chores. That's a huge thing that we constantly are arguing about. You arguing as in you're trying to convince him and he's saying no. He's not saying no, but I don't follow through and it's that's my pattern. I don't follow through and I don't make it happen. I should say you can't have these things because you're not doing this and this and this and I don't do that. I still give him the things even though I shouldn't. I think you find comfort in beating yourself up. I notice you do it a lot. It's not comfort. It's just what I'm used to doing. But despite my many attempts to get us to focus on the positive, on the things you can do, you take me right back there. I know I'm not very positive. Do you want to be? Yes. Would you be willing to change things to do it? Yes. Okay. What's the first thing you should do? Make changes with how I deal with my son and tell him no. Okay. So next time you
text you, you're going to just say no. Yeah. All right, I'll pretend to be him. Mom, get me a quarter pounder with cheese plus three drinks plus McFlurry plus 32 piece chicken nuggets. That's a dog like that to me, but okay. He nailed the McFlurry. God damn it. No, you're not getting any of that. I want 32 piece now. Well, now you're not getting anything. You don't talk to me that way. Please. No, we have food in the house. I want that. I'm so hungry. I was running at school in PE, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Oh, God. This was very realistic. Oh, God, are you home? There's food in the house. I'm not getting that for you. I'm tired of you asking me to spend money on junk food. You tried to reason your way out of it. I think Lisa, you're probably not going to be successful in doing this on your own, but I do think you could get help. There's a lot of things we're not successful at on our own. I need help with many things, even money, and I'm good at it. So, if you can't do this on your own, as we can see from this very quick simulation, then what could you do? My therapist helped me. Beautiful. I have a therapy appointment on Monday. Really? Yeah. I think this would be a great topic to bring up because your ability to set boundaries with your son is table stakes for your ability to set boundaries with yourself and your ability to set boundaries with money. They all actually are very similar. So, they'll be a great topic to bring up. Good for you. Okay. I love hearing that. Trevor, what do you remember of your family saying about money when you were a kid? My parents never married. I was a weakened kid with my dad. I lived mostly with my mother. We kind of struggled financially. We moved frequently. There are several times when we move and we don't have any lights. Sometimes no heat. Sometimes no foam. We didn't really talk about money other than the fact that it was always a shortage. What did they say? What phrases? Like, we don't have it. We don't have the money. Or raw Peter to pay Paul. And so, we hear that. I heard that a lot. And I asked for money sometimes, but I didn't like to because I didn't want to be a contributing factor to the stress. Okay. So, you were living with your mom with your dad on the weekends. And did that go on for your whole childhood? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, my dad seemed to have more money, but I didn't want to ask him for it. I didn't talk to him about money often. Is he still alive? Yeah. You talked to him about it now? No. Okay. And mom? Yes and no. I talked to her about her money, but not much now. How she doing financially? It's not great but it's okay. Do you think that you'll end up taking care of her as she gets older? As long as she's able to take care of herself, she will always try. We wanted her to move into an assisted living, but as we got closer to that, she backed away and I wasn't going to push. All right. Lisa, anything you want to add on Trevor's behalf? Like I said, partner sometimes knows best. The only thing I would add is that they're not very open. They don't talk about a whole lot. And Trevor doesn't like to push anybody to divulge anything like we went to Vegas and spent the entire day looking at all the assisted living places there. And then she decided like a week later, oh, I don't want to do it anymore. And he was just like, okay, and didn't ask any other questions. So there's hesitancy in getting deeper and asking more questions and Trevor, you and I are very different. I love to ask the questions. Huh? You did what? What? Why? I live in another state. So the time we spend together, I don't want to spend it in conflict. Ah. Notice that. The idea that if we're talking about money, it's conflict. It will lead to conflict. Okay. Maybe my dad will get angry. But look at the worldview you have. It shows up in this relationship. Yeah. If we talk about money, it results in conflict. It will result. If that is your worldview, then it will happen. Like if I walk into a yarn store, I'm going to feel stupid. And then I leave because I feel overwhelmed. That's not how Lisa walks into a yarn store. She goes, I know I can build something here. I don't even see it yet, but I can make this stuff work. When I talk about money, I go, we're going to talk about money so that we can live our rich life. If that's the North Star, then how we get there, yeah, there's going to be some tough conversations. There's going to be some tears. There's going to be this in that. Okay. But we're going somewhere positive. We always want to go towards something positive. Even if you're in the middle of a conversation, it's really tough and somebody's fighting and yelling and whatever. It's okay to just be like, Hey, wait a second. I feel like I haven't done a great job in this conversation right now. I just want to call it my goal here is so that we can get towards this rich life. I don't know how to do it alone, but I know that right here, I feel like we're fighting. I don't want to be a part of that. I want to just take a time out, come back in 10 minutes, and we go towards our rich life. That's how you have those difficult conversations. Okay. These are the kind of things you're going to learn over time. Okay. Here's the deal. Now that I know a little bit more about how you were brought up with money, I have a better understanding, but I think it's time to make some changes. Right now, you are on track for a very, very, very dangerous rest of your 50s and rest of your life. You simply can't sustain it. And there are so many different ingredients that are coming together. We have just a lot of debt. We have a lack of money management and a lack of basic understanding of numbers. All of these can be changed, but we also have the attitudes that are keeping you from even confronting these things. We don't like to talk about money. It causes conflict. I'm not good with money. Then on top of that, we have these very conflicted roles from childhood. We never talked about money. Money felt like deprivation. I give my son things so that he stops bugging me. And also I know that I am loved when I do that. There's a lot here. We need to fix the money stuff right now. What changes are you both willing to make in order to fix the money situation? And when I say fix, it means you will get control of your finances. It will be clean and simple. Yes, you will still have debt, but you will have a plan to pay it off. You will stop being stressed about money because even if you have debt, you can feel good about it knowing you have a plan to pay it off. What are you willing to do in order to get there? Whatever it takes. Wow. Two people saying the same words independently, whatever it takes. I love it. Okay. I'm going to throw your conscious spending plan up on screen. And we're going to start there. We're going to try to simplify things. And then we'll look at some transactions. We are at your fixed cost and this number is 230%. It needs to come down to approximately 60%. So that's a vast drop. So we cannot be sitting here talking about one or $200 changes. We need thousands and thousands of dollars of changes. I would like for you each to just look at these fixed costs. And before we get started, I would like you to just think about what are we willing to change in this category alone? Trevor, you want to go first? My first thought was the mortgage would be the biggest impact. We could somehow sell it, move it to a apartment. Yeah. How much would the apartment cost that you would move to? About 3,400 bucks. 3,400. Great. Let's see what happens. 3,400. Watch the number. Drop to 160%. I think one of the biggest hurdles that we have with moving forward with that plan is that we're upside down on your house. Yeah. How can you be upside down when your asset says 620,000 and your debt only says 43,000? Where's the mortgage debt? Oh, I guess we didn't put mortgage debt there. Oh, yeah. That should be a lot higher. How much is your mortgage? How much is left on it? 696. 696. Okay. You have $739,000 of debt. You have $620,000 in assets that's the equity in your house. So yeah, you're upside down. Yeah. You're in a bad position there because you can't afford the house obviously. So yes, it's time for you to call the bank and ask them what your options are. You need to tell them we cannot afford this house. Why don't you guys buy this house out of curiosity? Because our other house was sort of it was in a bad neighborhood and sort of falling apart and we wanted to be on the other side of town where it was newer and it was a brand new house. Why don't rent? Didn't occur to us, I think. I just didn't. I mean, we thought we can make money off of our old house. Let's move in and we moved into this new place. All right. Not a good financial decision. No. And I think what is very clear now is the two of you need to get seriously educated about money. Coming on here is not enough. I need you to read the book. I will teach you to be rich. You need to read it and you need to understand it and it might be hard and that's okay. You actually have to understand it because for the biggest financial decision of your life, a house, you just didn't even occur to you that maybe we should rent even for this.
Smallest financial decisions of your life like McDonald's, it's not occurring to you that we need to actually radically change and part of it is you need to get educated bottom line. Okay, moving along. In this case, I'm going to assume you can sell your house. Are you going to end up having to pay the remainder? Maybe, maybe not. But for the purposes of right now, let's just look at it and see. We're down to 3,400. What is a $3,400 apartment gets you by the way? A nice enough to 3 bedroom apartment. 3 bedroom. Why do you need 3 bedrooms? I don't know what the prices are for a 2 bedroom. So let me tell you how I would think about this. If I'm in your financial situation, I'm getting the cheapest place I can get. That's it. 3000 bucks. Okay. You're at 154%. At least we're going in the right direction. Lisa, you're up next. What do you want to change? The eating out. Okay, how much? It's 2100 a month right now. How much should you spend eating out per month? Zero dollars. I have no idea. I really don't. Should we not be looking out at all? Lisa, can I tell you something? Yeah. This sort of what I call the innocent dough, innocent dough technique. Me? Lil old me? I have no idea how much other people spend. I just I couldn't even reason it out loud. It's not working for me. It's a technique that people use consciously or unconsciously to allow them to evade difficult questions. I really don't know though I can only base it on what I do. I don't know what everybody else does or what I should be doing. I just know that what we're doing is way too much. And it needs to be cut drastically. So what's the number? $500 a month. Okay, so you're eating up five times a month, $500 total. So each time you eat out for fast food is going to be $100. That's unreasonable. No, it doesn't. It's not what I meant. I was thinking like if we went out to dinner, not just to like fast food, I'm saying of like the three of us went to dinner, we would probably spend at least $75 every time we went depending on where we go. You know, so it'd be like $375. I would say that a couple who is in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt doesn't eat out. I think this is especially painful for you to hear because it almost takes me back to when you told me how it felt at age 10, 11, 12, 13. There's other issues at hand, which is if we don't eat out, it's on me to then prepare food. And that's an issue because I don't I feel like I'm I am the only person that would prepare food. And so it just means more responsibility for me. And I know that that hasn't been working. So I'm willing to make changes, but it is hard to imagine never eating out again for the foreseeable future for any of us because it feels like a lot more work for me personally every single day. I know that I have to be willing to do more work to make this happen. I get that. Yes, as you are talking about this, I think you make some really valid points. It probably will be more work. It will probably be more work for you. I would like to get Trevor involved in this so that he can take on some of the burden as well. But Lisa, it feels like when we are starting to talk about real changes, what you are doing is saying these changes feel too big, so I can't do them. I think I won't do them and I'm not saying I can't do them. Great. I love that. I love that pushback. Hey, that's not what I'm saying. I'm thinking about it. Okay, let me suggest something to you. I love what you said. If you think about it as all changes we make are going to make my life worse, then they're not going to last more than seven days. It's difficult for me to see positive in this other than like the big picture outcome and I get that that's huge and I should be thinking about that at all times when making these changes. But I think on a daily basis realistically when I'm, you know, been working all day and I'm exhausted and I come home and now I have to think, oh, okay, we don't, can't go anywhere. I'm going to make something and we're all going to eat it and enjoy it. Because you're spinning yourself up right now. What you are doing is you are taking your current way of life and just making it worse. You actually need to create an entirely new way of life. Do you think everybody's coming home from work after so many hours and they're just like looking around and saying like, what should I make for dinner? A lot of people are, but a lot of people are not. What are they doing instead? Exactly. That's a completely different way of life than you live right now. You don't do that. I don't. I need you to be open to the idea of changing your entire way of life. Otherwise, what are we doing here? There is no tweaking. Let's cut down by 50% on our eating out when you have 230% fixed cost. It doesn't work. Okay. I'm not going to waste my time and I'm not going to lie to you. I'm going to tell you the truth of what you need to do. That's fine. I need to hear it. They do not take vacations. I hate to be the one to deliver this message, but you need somebody to tell you your groceries that a thousand is going to be very difficult. We'll make it 1400 and the two of you need to meal prep together. You probably need to get your son involved, but that's for another conversation. So when are you going to meal prep where you both decide, you prep it, all that stuff. When's it going to happen on the weekend? Sunday. What time? Noon. Great. Are you going to have the food ready? Is it already going to be in the fridge or where's the food coming from? We'll have to go grocery shopping and get it. Great. The two of you going together or separate. I'm trying to get into the details here together. We're going to go together. And then you're going to come back and you're going to what? We're going to come back and we're going to meal prep together and plan what we're going to eat for the week. Trevor, get in on this. Notice that she's taken on all the burden herself. Get in. Okay. Yeah. Sounds good. I'm meal prepping. I'm all for it. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever done this in your entire relationship together? No. Okay. Okay. This is like the connective tissue that makes other things possible. It's like the equivalent of like when you go in the bathroom, you have toothpaste in there, right? Yes. Yeah. You just have toothpaste all the time. And if it's running low, somebody goes and gets some. It's the connective tissue that makes it possible to brush your teeth every day. Now imagine doing that in other parts of life. The parts that happen to cost you 2000 plus dollars a month. You're always going to have the equivalent of toothpaste. You're always going to have food. Keep it simple. Make the same stuff. Start there. Make sure you get your son involved and tell him, hey, this is something you were going to be doing. We actually do not have money to be able to eat out. We are making changes so that we are in a better financial situation. Notice it's not just saying we can't afford it. We can't do that. We're in a horrible situation. No, here's a situation. Then you talk about what you are doing. Okay. We have made a plan. From now on, we're going to be meal prepping. This is how much we are going to be spending each week for grocery shopping, which is approximately like 350 bucks. This is our plan on what we are going to get. This is what the meals are going to look like. If you would like to change something, you're welcome to make a suggestion for up to, I don't know, two of the meals or whatever, but it's got to fit within this amount of money. And when he complains, what are you going to say? Sorry, this is how it's going to be from now on. Love it. Yes. He doesn't have a job, right? No, no, amazing. So you have the golden rule, which is he or she who has the gold makes the rules. He has no money. He's 14 years old. He's going to eat what mom and daddy. That's it. Okay. That's it. Putting it back up on screen here. What's next? Trevor? I would point at the utilities, but if we're moving, the utilities are still unsure about. Let's drop him down a bit. They'll be less 150. And moving also will not the HOA fees away. If we moved, we dropped 1200 from that. 1200. Great. All right. Let's leave 300 on there. All right. Nice work. We're at 126%. What's next? We do have a lot of subscriptions. Yes. And I think this isn't accurate because you said that you came up with 2100 or something. Some crazy amount. Look at that. Yeah. You did spend a ton. Just look at all these. So what do you want to do about all these subscriptions? We can definitely consolidate some of the subscriptions. The way to do this when you have this many subscriptions is to pick one and everything else goes bye-bye. Okay. What's the one you want to keep? Think Hulu or Netflix? Only one of those services has a hit show called How to Get Rich. Which one are you going to pick? Which one is it? I love that my own guests on my own show haven't even watched my Netflix. I do. We just have so many channels. We don't know which one it's on. Yeah. All right. You're keeping Netflix and everything else is going bye-bye. Wonderful. I'm going to drop that number to let's just say 30 bucks. We're down to 123%. I think we need to talk about something important here. You've made some big changes. The debt payments probably need to go up because you are paying the minimums on a bunch. It's not acceptable. The fact is you're still at 123%, so what do we need to do in addition to this? Increasing income? Yes. Okay. So let's look at the income. This is the gross, these numbers here. This is how much you make at the top line. And then once you have all your taxes and expenses and stuff taken out, this is how much you take home every month. What do you notice? It's not enough.
Who's not enough mine. Yes. Lisa, you currently take home $24,000 per year. What does that tell you? It's not enough. It's not enough to live on correct. You could make more working any job First of all, why do you think that is and then what needs to happen? I Know why it is because I've chosen to Not work as much as I could What do you mean you work? How much do you work? I work four days a week. Why? Because I want to I guess and that's the only reason Because I'm not busting my ass and I should be I just think you don't have a reason to I do have a reason to I just It's it's like a thing that I do where it's like if I don't want to do something I Don't do it. I don't look at the way it should be I look at what I want versus How it should be and I give into that it's something I've always done and I continue to do it and It's just a habit that I need to break. I do it when it comes to how I eat it I do it when it comes to how I spend I do it when it comes to You know doing things that I should be doing every day Like I should my habits should be very very different and they're not because I do what's Easiest and what's lowest stress it doesn't pay off anyway because This is the situation that we're in and this is very high stress Trevor are you okay with this? Well, I'm not okay. I mean like I feel like I feel responsible for it. No, you don't you don't feel responsible like I like I got you the business like thinking it was great. It's not about the business Trevor It's about the fact that Lisa herself just spent five minutes explaining. She doesn't follow through her habits around food Her habits around business wraps around finance and instead of taking this opportunity to say hey I'm actually not okay with this. This is important to you. I mean my fifties. I can't go on like this You're starting to apologize for her and provide yet another example of saving her I don't even think she wants you to save her. Why are you doing it? I don't know. I guess I got stuck on the You said she could make more and my mind started going Wait a minute. I thought I thought this was a pretty good business to start who told you it's a good business Why did you think that what calculations did you run? He didn't run any I didn't run any calculations. What's calculations Lisa? I did a lot of research on how much money I could make and It could be a very profitable business. Is it but I'm not running it properly Yeah, you're using your business expenses to pay personal You don't have a bookkeeper Etc etc etc. Yes There's a business inherently That or is it just it doesn't matter. It's not working. It doesn't matter Why are you also insistent on doing a history lesson of what happened 10 years ago you guys are heading towards in your own words a cliff Yeah Guys this conversation is over in a little bit. I want the best for you, but you are heading back to your own lives You have Very not enough in retirement. You have an inability to talk about money I've tried multiple times to get you to talk about money I really want you to and we are stuck on wait. Is this a good business? What about the profit margin? It's not working. Why are we not being decisive and making decisions right now? So how do we get out of it? Do you want me to tell you what I would do? Yeah, yes, I would shut this business down I would sell the car Lisa would get a full-time job working five or six days a week The net income the amount you take home would go way up. It would double probably And immediately that would make major changes. I would eliminate Almost everything when it came to your expenses the food all that stuff we talked about I would call up the credit cards and I would say look I can't pay this the way it is We need to make an agreement on it and see what they would come back with they may or may not agree at the same time I hardly ever suggested, but I would look at a way to consolidate the debt all of it and start making aggressive payments You will never pay the minimum amounts on these credit cards anymore. You will be aggressive about them And so you would take all the extra money you make all the extra time would go towards paying off the debt It will take years, but that's what you would do and the two of you would have a mission You would know the exact month and year. I can't calculate it here because it's so messy But it would probably be several years There wouldn't be a lot of fun But you would have a mission and you would be accomplished and you would be building savings and investments That's what I would do now. Let me tell you the reasons that might not work Because that is not as fun as the life you have today the life you have today where you get to go out eat go on dates and Live in this big house So why would someone willingly choose the way where you have to move you have to get rid of your business You have to work more hours you have to start communicating about why would you choose that Lisa? What's your reaction? I feel like it's Almost been a waste I guess and I don't feel like I'm Even capable of going yet going and get a full-time job right now because I'm not qualified anymore to do What I would get a full-time job for what did you do before you started the business? I was a graphic designer and I decided to change everything I was doing and Become a groomer because I wanted to work with dogs and have my own business and I did a ton of research and people were making hundreds of thousands of dollars and in the beginning of the business I was making a lot more money than I am right now I you know a lot of things changed I chose to take three days off instead of the two I was working Saturdays in the beginning and I'm not anymore Like I've just been lax about it and I don't want to get rid of the business. I'm happy doing this but if it's not working and it's putting us in this situation Then I have to face reality I guess I just don't I don't know what the move is what the right move is How could you find out by making changes and seeing if it works better what changes be specific Work a more days during the week work on the weekends or work more hours in during the week and Increase my rates and what so what's the plan there are definite things I could change so here's the deal Lisa I like that you are pushing back a little and you're saying hey, I like this business. I could Probably make it run better. I love that. I love when somebody disagrees with me and says this is what I want This is what I do. I love that and if that's the case amazing I want to point out to you that you would need to make every decision correctly And you would need to follow through on every single decision in order for that to work Or you would need to make one decision sell the business get a full-time job I understand that in my experience from talking to you It would probably be more likely for you to succeed with a full-time job But it's your life. It's not mine. If you go I'm going to make this work I'm going to get a level of conviction and follow through that maybe I haven't had before but there's a reason I'm going to work six days maybe seven days a week. I'm going to work more hours than I've worked I'm going to control my costs. I'm going to learn how money in a business works and get control of all this Okay, but that requires you to be right about all of those things if she got a full-time job How much would she need to make for it to be better than what she's doing with the business? Excellent question now we're asking great money questions So right now she's taking on two thousand dollars a month or twenty four thousand dollars a year Let's say she doubles that Okay, we can see that number drops to 98 percent Still not enough on your fixed costs. You're still spending more than you make So it need to be more. Trevor you might need to make more as well. Let's actually play it out Let's make it she take some five thousand now we're 89 percent still not enough your fixed costs are just too high with your debt The two of you would have to make three hundred thousand dollars a year and that's with selling our house Yeah, and if you sold your house you may have that debt as well. Yeah Wow, so it feels a little I mean, I guess because I helped invest in the business and she's been doing it for For years and I guess it's hard to let go because like you've poured so much into it Just clientele look at Lisa's face. What she's saying right now She's like throwing in a towel No, I'm not throwing in the towel. I want you to stop talking about all that stuff I don't want you to list all the reasons why I'm gonna be sad I want to figure out what I either need to do to make it work Or have to face facts and or if it's not gonna work then I have to make some major changes Trevor are you hearing this? Yeah, you are co-creating this dynamic Something has changed just now Lisa's like I'm ready stop talking about all this And you are still living in the I feel bad. I don't know. I contributed. What about she's like stop it You see this Trevor the same way that Lisa said she's speaking to her therapist is something you actually need to do as well Because your inability to actually have honest, candid conversations Even ones where you confront reality is actually a huge part of this dynamic. Did you know that? No, it is Again, I will
I want to take you back to what you wrote to me. You wrote, she has maxed out credit cards. I don't even know if they're getting paid. Sooner or later, this issue will need to be addressed and I'm not sure if we are ready for it. You might as well have written, I'm not sure if I'm ready for it because Lisa seems to be ready. Are you? - Yes. - Okay. Get help, both of you from a therapist. Individual and couples, is it expensive? Yeah, it's gonna be pricey. Take this to them and tell them. We realize we are in hundreds of thousands of dollars of debt. I, Lisa, have been living in the clouds and unable to confront the fact that I'm paying minimums on tens of thousands of dollars of credit card debt. I have an inability to say no to my son. Literally, he texts me and I go buy him whatever he wants. He's now taking on the same characteristics I've taken on. I hide things from my husband. Now, I, Trevor, won't bring things up with Lisa, even though I feel that it's not good and when I went on this podcast with Rameet to talk about money, Lisa actually was ready to make changes and then I started talking about the past instead of talking about what we should do going forward. What do y'all think about that? I'm not usually this direct, but you need it. - I guess this is what our previous counselors weren't doing. - Okay, but did you go in there asking them exactly, here's the problem. - I feel like maybe I did with my counselor. - Okay. - But again, didn't follow through. I didn't keep going. I didn't, it's like I give up when things get too hard. - Exactly. Nothing changes if that doesn't change. Everything from the business to the food to all of it. It stays exactly the same if you don't change Lisa. And Trevor, I'm discovering that that's the same for you. If I were in your position, Trevor, I would be saying things like, look, this isn't the way I want to spend the rest of my life. We don't have enough money. I want to be able to retire. I feel anxious all the time about money. We don't talk about it. It's not the kind of relationship I want. I want us to get better. But in order for that to happen, Lisa, you have to get better at money individually. And so do I. That is my expectation for what we need to do as a family. That is gonna be our number one priority for at least the next three years. We're gonna talk about it every week. Each of us is gonna have numbers that we own. One of us gonna be responsible for the grocery. The other is gonna be responsible for XYZ. We're gonna talk about this all the time. And there will be no secrets. It's gonna be difficult. We're gonna have to change everything we do. We're gonna have to move to a smaller place. The business is gonna have to go. All this stuff, this is what we need to do. You know, it's funny. When you talk like that and when you set a big bold vision, people actually often want to come along. - What is your opinion on bankruptcy? - That's a great question. People choose bankruptcy because people who get into consumer debt, they usually get into it because they make bad decisions over and over again. That's what's happened here, okay? So what they will do is they will then start grasping for straws. They'll do 0% balance transfers, which you have done. They will do everything except the only thing they need to do which is to pay off the debt. And because they will do anything except that thing, they will then look at bankruptcy and often resort to it. And sometimes they get it granted. It's not often but they get it. - And then start over doing the same thing. Because they never changed the actual root cause. You cannot be successful if you can't eliminate your fast food spending to zero. It just won't happen. You cannot be successful if you cannot change your relationship with each other and with your son. Bottom line. Oh, sure, you might be able to declare bankruptcy, but three years from now you'll be back in $20,000 of debt. It was an excellent question. Should you consider it? - Yeah, you should consider it. But. - Only after making significant life changes. - Yes. Lisa, I don't know what's going on, but I'm really enjoying this. You're asking awesome questions. You're even telling Trevor, stop it with that old (beep) we're onto the new. Like you have come alive in a way that I did not anticipate. I'm so impressed. Can you tell me what changed for you just in the last few minutes? It's a reality check. I need to make significant changes. And I knew it was going to be hard to hear it and I kind of knew this was coming. I don't want to feel like this anymore and I don't want our lives to continue like this. - Great. I love hearing that. Some people would look at somebody crying and saying, I don't want our lives and they'd be like, oh, this is so sad. I think this is awesome. Sometimes you need to feel sick of this. See, I'm done. I've been doing this. It's old. So I like it. Trevor, you look proud of Lisa. What's going through your head? - Yeah, I am. I'm happy that we've made it through this and it's been a long time in the work, but we're here. - Yeah. - And I'm happy for it. - I like that. - I'm happy for it. - Lisa, I got a question for you. Do you think Trevor needs to change his relationship with money? - I do. - Okay. What expectations might you have for Trevor? Because this is too big of a problem. Neither of you can do this alone. I feel like his changes need to be more than just with the financial. - Well, first of all, let's start there. What changes does he need to make financially? - What I want financially is also what I want in our relationship. I want more help. I feel like I do everything alone and I'm in all the situations by myself and I'm left to figure out everything. - Okay, let's start with food. What do you want? - He does already go grocery shopping with me, but I think we need to figure out how to eat healthfully at a lower cost and meal plan and figure out what we're gonna eat through the week and not just me planning it. I want him to sit down and plan it too with me. Right now that doesn't happen. - What else do you want? If I'm you and I'm being asked, God, I can ask for anything I want. I would like for I want us to go grocery shopping together 'cause that's actually kind of a fun thing we can connectively do, et cetera. I want us to share the meal prepping, but honestly, I would like him to cook on Thursday night and I would like him to cook on Saturday, whatever the thing is. Point is like, why does everything have to be done together? You're doing stuff solo, shouldn't he do something solo as well? - Yeah, I mean, our biggest thing is that he doesn't really take a whole lot of initiative to do something on his own, he waits for me to tell him, I need you to do this. - Okay, let's just fix this right now 'cause this (beep) can't go on. You cannot be successful if someone is not replacing a garbage bag or something like that. Come on, Trevor, I don't even want to ask Lisa, tell him what to do. You tell me what needs to be done. What are you gonna do differently? - I'm very willing to help. - No, be specific. - What I need from Lisa. - No, what are you gonna do for Lisa? - What I'm gonna do for Lisa? I'm going to, I don't even know where to start. First things, first, make calls. We got so much to dismantle right now. We got so much to take apart right now. I don't even know what to start taking apart first. We got to take apart a mortgage. We got to take apart our business. We got to take apart our food spending. We got to take apart our subscriptions. - Okay, so how are you gonna do that? - We gotta make calls. - I'm talking about you. - I got you. Yeah, first thing is first, call the mortgage company. Look, again, do this anymore. - Nice. What's next? - Next is, I gotta call the apartment complex. Hey, we need an apartment. Can we set a move-in date? - Nice. First things, first, calling the mortgage company, figuring out that out. Then, once you understand that, then you can go and figure out the apartment, but I like where you're thinking, good, it's all about sequencing. How about all these subscriptions? That's easy. - That's next. - Boom. Cancel that today. How about Lisa? Okay, pause here. What do you need from Lisa? 'Cause you're talking about, hey, all these action items from this call. I'm gonna start taking the lead on some of this. And I will update you, Lisa, so you know what's going on. Of course, Adobe's canceled, et cetera, the mortgages in process. I gotta talk to the bank and blah, blah, blah. - I would say support, but that's not specific enough, is it? - Nope. - I think we need to make a list of everything that needs to be handled. - It's a big piece of cake, it's a huge-- - It's a big list, so maybe when you have a big thing to do, you can't do it on your own, right? So how do you do it? How do you break it up so that you can tackle this massive project? - I could usually, at least, help making his list. - There you go, Lisa. - 'Cause neither of you can, it's so big, you can't even make it. So you do it together. Each of you can come, hey, here's what I think we need to do. Here's what I think. Let's combine them. What do we duplicate? What are we missing? Well, this, first of all, you just pause and give each other a high five. Damn, we did this together. That's actually awesome. We haven't even taken a step, but this is a big accomplishment. We're gonna start giving each other a high five and a big hug, because we're gonna feel good doing this process. We have to find a way to feel good, because it's difficult to move out of a house. It's difficult to x, y, z, but we're gonna feel good every step of the way. We're doing it together. We're doing it intentionally. Okay, next, we got a whole list of 45 action items. Let's pick who's gonna do what? I'm gonna take these. These ones, we don't even know yet, 'cause first we got to do this one before we find out, but we put each other's initials next to them, and at least we know, okay, what's next? We're gonna update each other on Friday. Here's what I got done. This one's still in process. I didn't get to this one. What does this sound like? Plan. Teamwork. Yeah. Yeah, both of them. That's how you do it. And it's beautiful. Yeah. Here's what I wanna propose to you. Do you notice that sometimes if you get it from a chair, you go like, "Ugh."
When you get after edge, yeah, it's just like kind of like a grunt or a moan or you notice either you do that or people we know do that. Yeah. I notice both of you do it with money. Have you noticed that? A lot of, I've been doing it for decades. I know. I want to propose that the two of you show up differently with money because I bet you Lisa, you don't show up like that at the yarn store or at work because you love it. I bet you don't go, oh god, another dog. Why would you? You like it. I never show up like that when I get the chance to meet couples like you. I love it. I love this. So I want to encourage the two of you to notice that and to explicitly say I'm not doing that anymore. This whole, it's very somatic. It actually tells your body get ready to eat shit. Yeah. Not anymore. It already puts you in a negative space before you even started. Yes. So we can do anything. We can beat theatrical. Yes, I get to talk about personal finance, whatever. Oh my god. You decide. I don't care how crazy it is. Yeah. But we are going to change from the outside in. Okay. This shows up everywhere. The text messages with your son because when I text no, I love you, but that's not part of our plan. Then inside you start to realize, I'm the kind of person who follows a plan. Yeah. You're going to make the plan. You're going to have a to do list. You're going to work your way down and you're going to adapt as time goes on. You're not going to have the perfect plan. That's okay. I'll tell you what to do next. All right. I want you to go back through the conscious spending plan and I want you to go back through monarch and I want you to fix it. This time I want you to do it together and I want you to do it right. Okay. Take your time. You don't have to do it all at once. It's going to take a while. Don't worry about it. Yeah. Get it right. Get a handle on your finances. Simplify it. Start to realize, why do we have all these credit cards? It's not serving us. And you're going to have a lot of reasons. Well, this, this, this, this. We want a simple financial system. All of those things we have to do seem like a big, big jobs. Like I've never had just two credit cards, but it's possible. You can like, you could have no credit card. Yeah. Yeah. Taking it apart is, it's hard. Yeah. It's easy to add on random to a financial system. It's really hard to have a simple financial system. That's why I say you have to fight for simplicity. Fight because the world wants you to have all this stuff, freaking wayfare card, coals card, all this. No. We are not the kind of couple who does that. We have a couple of credit cards. Simple. Now, all the information you need is there. There's two books. I will teach you to be rich and money for couples. Get them. Read them. Do them together. We have money for a couple. Perfect. Start there. It's going to make it really fun. You know, there's going to be times you're going to have uncomfortable conversations that book will show exactly what to say. Okay. So use it. It's there for you. I'm not a magician. Nobody could have fixed this situation in one conversation. That's actually not my expectation when I see numbers like this. When you have consistently made decisions that have put you in a financial place as precarious as this, there are no good options. There's a lot of work. I do believe there's hope, but it's going to be incredibly difficult. Maybe the most difficult thing they have ever done together. In the past, I used to want to wrap it all up with a nice bow. But that's actually not realistic because in life, there are problems that are so big. They cannot be solved easily or sometimes they cannot be solved at all. But what we can do is we can start to make progress. We can start to have them work together as a couple. And that at least provides hope for doing this as a team. Now, they have a lot of work to do, but I was very pleasantly surprised by Lisa's awakening. If I could see that energy from her and from him, that's two people rowing in the same direction. Wow. You can make huge changes in a year if two people are aligned. So that is my hope for what they accomplish starting today. And now, let's check out their follow-ups. I would say the biggest surprise from the interview was how much the reduction we needed to make, how many fixed expenses we needed to cut, and how the percentage was way over. Biggest takeaway is how important it is. And I guess the thing we decided, the biggest changes we're going to be making soon are we're moving. We're going to have to cut our housing expense in half. So that's going to be one of our biggest changes and better at accounting, better accounting of the funds we're using. My biggest surprise from the conversation with Remete really was how emotional it made me to talk about it. I didn't realize that just bringing up these topics was going to be so difficult. I'm glad I did. And I guess it needed to be done for a really long time. My biggest takeaway is along the same lines. It's more, you know, how much of an impact all of this is making on my life and my family's life. Every decision that I make regarding money is affecting us. And it's basically, you know, destroying us. And we need to make a lot of changes. The ones that I have decided to make, the biggest ones are to focus really on why I'm doing certain things, why I need, feel the need to do certain things regarding money. And to really do things with more intention and think about everything before I do it. It's been about three weeks since we had our interview with the Remete. It's been a while roller coaster ride. And we've had so much to do. Still have so much more to do. What stood out the most in our interview is we had so much to cover. We were both on opposite pages and not really working from the same plan of on finances. We had a lot of spending that we weren't even aware of. So going forward, we have to, we've made a lot of changes in how we spend and we've cut a lot of expenses. We have many more expenses ago. We make, we make dozens of calls all the time every weekend. And it's an ongoing process. And we really appreciate Remete and his team with, with the help and advice he's giving us. Thank you so much.
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