Dropping Out Of School To Become An Actor Making $0

0:00My name is Campton Kump. I'm 20 years old. I'm originally from Colorado and this is Financial Audit. But you live in Austin now? Well, I live in San Marcos. San Marcos. Okay. What do you do there? I'm an aspiring actor. So right now, my main job, I dress up as Spider-Man for birthday parties. Really? Yeah. It's been a while since we've had an aspiring actor on here. So this is pretty exciting. What do you do to pay the rent? Surprisingly, that birthday party job pays a lot of money. It pays$75 an hour. And then my gigs are usually two to four hours long. and then sometimes they'll be inclined to give me a tip, sometimes not.

0:38How many hours a month do you work on average? I usually get like three or around three, sometimes four if I'm lucky. Bookings. Four hours? Oh, four bookings? Yeah, so I'll get like four birthday parties, usually three a month, and then each birthday party could be anywhere from two hours to four hours long. um and so um but that's not my only source of income that's like what else do we have we have about 900 a month on average from that with those numbers um what else brings in that cash so obviously if i book anything i get paid from whatever that is whether it be a commercial or just like a short film student film what do you get on average on a monthly basis it that's the thing about acting sometimes you get work sometimes you don't so like are there months you don't get work there's months I get work so like there's good months I'd say and then there's bad months a good month is where like I book a commercial and then a bad month which is still kind of a good month but like financially speaking a bad month is like I just did like a student film or something like that so something on a much smaller production size would you like a thousand dollars would i like a thousand dollars yeah well all you have to do to get a thousand dollars is being one of the first 50 000 subscribers here and one person will win it so make sure you subscribe you'll get it sorry not to tease you too much yeah so yeah make sure you're subscribed what else brings in that monies um i thought i saw target yes i was gonna say so for a while I've worked at a target maybe like over a year and close to a year and a half.

2:16Um, I'm on demand now. So basically they don't schedule me unless I tell them they can schedule me. So if like work to dry for me and I'm not getting any birthday parties, I can be like, Hey, I'm free to work this week and this weekend. And they can work me into the schedule. I can also pick up shifts that are posted. And so just kind of when work's dry, I'll pick up target shifts. Okay. So let's think on a monthly basis. What is your goal of the essentially the minimum amount of money that you force yourself to earn in order to survive, to bring in, whether that be picking up through target or whatever else, what is your just normal income that comes in on a monthly basis?

3:01It's a little dangerous that you don't know. The one that I want. What do you bring in normally? Oh, what do I bring in normally? Yeah. I think close to like a little over a thousand. Okay, so it's mostly the Spider-Man thing then. Yeah. How'd you get into that? I just applied and then I did like some audition where I read a monologue as Spider-Man. It felt weird, but it was fun and then I got it. You do have that like Twinkie Spider-Man voice. The Twinkie Spider-Man voice. That's cool. Yeah, I think. I could see Tom Holland is under that If there's a mask right there I think, I don't know But a thousand hours a month It's not a lot to live on I don't need too much Why?

3:48I used to work two jobs And I'd work like 60 hours a week And that was close to a year ago And I was just not really having it It was my first year of college too And I just found myself not very happy Well sure, but how do you not need that much to survive right now? Oh, because my only expenses are my rent and my food. What's your rent on a monthly basis? $600. Okay, so there goes 60 % of your money before taxes. That's a lot. Right, right. And then food is the other$400? Is that how you do it? How does it work? Well, kind of. A lot of, some of that goes to gas, but it's also most of the work that I do for acting, they cover my gas at this point.

4:30And so most of it is just for the groceries slash fast food if I want to eat out. Yeah. I don't know if I'd be eating fast food on$1 ,000 income, but we'll get into that for sure and how this budget breaks down and what your entire picture looks like. But first,$600 a month, 60 % of your income. Okay. Now, bringing in$1 ,000 a month on average or just over, are you setting 30 % aside? for taxes? I used to, I'm not anymore. Why? Um, right now I've just been, um, happy to pursue acting and then break even slash come over a little bit each month. If you know what I mean? Like, I know that's not very, but what about the taxes you're going to owe in a few months?

5:21in a few months well I have money set aside in like my savings um but as far as like this last month I have not been doing that starting I think there's the beginning of November that I went on demand it's been November up until now so this acting things really picked up just recently yeah so I started and then it was kind of slow and I was like I was at Target 40 hours a week as well as full-time college. And so it was hard to get into anything that was like not just extra work. And I really wanted to take time and pursue it while I'm still young and I still have the ability to do that. So instead of setting any money aside, because essentially you wouldn't be able to afford it if you did, because I mean, you're rented 60 % of your income and then you have to afford other things to survive.

6:06So instead of setting money aside for taxes, we're just, we're pulling from savings come tax season? For right now, yes. For right now. What do you mean for right now? So you are going to be saving in the future? Well, I plan to, of course. Okay. When? What's like stopping you from doing that now? What is the thing that in your mind you need to hit in order for you to flip that switch? Are you talking like money-wise? Like how much I've lost? Anything-wise. There's a reason you're not doing it now versus doing it at some point in the future. Well, the reason I'm not doing it now is because I wanted to take just a little bit of time and really focus my all on trying to become an actor.

6:43Yeah, but the IRS gets its money. Right. But that's why for right now, I'm just like when it comes up this, when is it, January? It's throughout the spring. I forget the last file date. And it's been extended these last couple of years due to the pandemic. But off the top of my head, I don't remember them. Okay, well, whenever it comes up, that's when I'll be pulling for my savings. I don't plan on doing that every time. I plan on going back to putting aside money for taxes like I used to. Um, right now you used to, yes, I used to. Um, cause like I said, I used, I used to work two jobs and set meaning aside, but this, um, pursuing acting has been kind of like a time consuming and it also takes a little bit of money to get started as well.

7:31It does now. No offense to San Marcos. You're trying to become an actor. Yes. Is San Marcos the city to become an actor in? San Marcos is not the city to become an actor in but Austin is and I'm only like 30 minutes away and like I said most of the work that I do they do cover my gas and so I don't mind driving out if it's for work um I mean as someone who loves Austin speaks really well on Austin I know we're getting one of the larger film studios being built here we're getting a really cool thing and South by Southwest is here so there is certainly a scene but if you wanted to make it make it wouldn't it be like Atlanta wouldn't it be LA wouldn't it be New York so um yes and no uh my thoughts on that are one it's definitely more expensive to live in New York LA Atlanta well I don't know about Atlanta no I think here's more expensive than Atlanta yeah here is Austin's definitely more expensive than Atlanta okay so I was right to bring that back um I feel like in New York and LA and I guess maybe Atlanta I'm not so sure about Atlanta the still not a cheap city I mean yeah um the market for like people who want to make it it's so oversaturated oversaturated in those places and so you're gonna find so many people that are like just give me a chance just give me a chance whereas right here in Austin the market is like the industry is getting bigger as we speak and I feel like it's a good starting point for me obviously um if I continue to progress and I continue to make it, I guess.

9:07I would pursue things in New York or LA, but for right now, I figured I'd start in the Austin market just because it's 30 minutes from here. I can still attend Texas State for college. Well, this is, okay, this is a development. You go to college. Yes. Okay, yeah, that's, what do you study? Right now, I'm undecided. It's business exploratory technically. Okay. Um, I, I have a deal with my parents where they're going to cover the first two years and I'll pay for the second two years. And so, although I don't know exactly what I'm there for right now, um, I'm assuming you're within that first two years then this is the end of my third semester.

9:49So I have one more semester that's covered for me. Yeah. Um, would you say you're 19? I'm 20 years old. Okay. So like, uh, when my parents split, But part of the agreement was that my dad would cover that. So what happens a semester from now when you owe, what is it, like$6 ,000? Then I reevaluate. Because right now I'm, like, I don't have to, like, I know I should probably be setting money aside for that right now. Are we talking reevaluate in terms of maybe dropping out to become an actor? Well, it kind of depends on how things go. So if I, I don't know, say I get like a series regular role and I'm doing really well and it's starting to take off, that's definitely something I would do seeing as how this is like, it's my dream to be an actor.

10:34But like if it's not working out at all and it's not bringing in what I need it to bring in, then I kind of drop that as the big thing and it becomes maybe like a side thing or just a hobby. So are you saying you're giving yourself a hard deadline of six to seven months to make it? then if not make it it depends on like how you look at or what make it means make it for me in something like youtube for me when i officially decided i was able to do this full time or make it in any industry where there's a very small percentage of people that want to do it right that end up making it and it's very competitive to get into you being able to at least sustain what you need to survive will that's the cusp of making it because then you can grow from there you can grow similar to how what i think making it is i don't define making it as like i'm a movie star now if i can bring in what i need to like cover my expenses for living then i'm fine and if i feel like recently i've discovered that uh although i'm not like a big name actor that anyone knows yet I'm having much more fun in life and I'm just a lot happier doing that than I am in college and so sure well fun and happiness is good but sacrifice temporary sacrifice for future happiness forever is also very important which is a conversation we have on this channel a lot a lot of people and I'm not saying this is you necessarily we'll look at the full picture but they'll do the yes I'm much more happy right now this is great it feels great right now in the moment, but they're putting off temporary sacrifices that will produce them being happy for the rest of their life.

12:18Right. You think that sounds like something you might be doing or? Oh, that's something I'm definitely doing. I think most actors do that. I wouldn't sit here and be like, oh, I'm not doing that. I think I'm just kind of fully aware that that's what I'm doing, but that's why I want to just give it a shot while I can. And then I figure I'm young. I have a little bit of time to figure some stuff out. and if it doesn't go my way, then I have a couple backup plans that I can fall back on as far as career-wise. Okay. You know, I definitely don't want to poo on anyone's dream by any means, but I am real world when it comes to the conversations on this channel.

12:56So let's talk about that money. The money that came in, so we had$100. The first transfer was$100 from your savings to your checking account. Not a great sign. then 103 this was a venmo cash i assume you get venmo paid a lot for your gigs because i see lots of venmo cash app um and then half of them i'd say over half of them they're cash and some zelle some zelle yeah um so you got zelden that looks like uh a thing and then a cash app that also uh venmo again that looks like oh boy i just saw something that i didn't see previously but Okay, so far those were probably from gigs. I think so, yeah.

13:40I don't see exactly what that is. $115.23 was transferred over from your savings to prevent you from going into overdraft. Can you define overdraft? Overdraft spending, if you have$1 in your checking account and you spend$2, that's overdraft. Gotcha. Yeah. Did you not know what overdraft was? I did not, no. Okay. No, that's okay. That's good. Well, it's a good thing to learn. I had an idea, but I wanted to make sure, so I was fine. No, I'm glad I could give you that right now because that's very important to know. Fun fact, you typically don't and shouldn't spend more money than you have. Right.

14:21As a general rule of thumb. And that's usually what I'm glad that savings is connected because it saved you. You could have got hit with like a$25,$50,$75. Who knows what it is for USAA? I don't have it. But they could have hit you with a fee. Right. It still isn't good, though. Not good. It's forcefully transferring money from the savings because of that. That's a mess. $160 of Venmo. So, again, getting paid. And then here's a target payroll,$346. So, that's by far the biggest you've had. And it's still, unfortunately, not that much in terms of surviving in a pretty expensive area. Right. $12 came from a Venmo cash out.

14:57$600 from savings. Transferred over to my checking. To survive. So far, the majority of the money has been transferred over from savings for you to survive. Yes. $500 from savings. Now it's not even a competition between earning versus savings. Then$35 was transferred over. And then$15 was a Venmo cashout. $187 from Target. I'm probably going to bleep your name, but who's... Oh, that's my mom. What does it say? Does it say that there's money she gave me? Yeah. Okay, so I can explain that. Like I said, you know how most of my, or over half, are paid in cash? My mom would prefer, well, not my mom, my stepdad likes cash.

15:46And so when I have cash, I go and give it to... They live in San Marcos? They live in New Braunfels. But I go and, like, I see them, like, once a week when we eat dinner or something. I'll give them the cash, and then they just move money from their account to my account because they'd rather have cash. But are they subsidizing your lifestyle in any way other than your college tuition? No. Okay. $12 cash out. $12 cash out from Venmo. Okay, cool. Yeah, that's not just her giving me money for free. Good. And then$52 cash out. Good, good, good, good. That's good. Very good to know. So again, you survived off of you transferring from your savings.

16:27One of those transfers was because I was waiting to give cash so that um still not a good sign if you're waiting well that's there's also you could just go to a usaa which are everywhere and deposit it i know but they prefer that they have cash and i i have i can just transfer back and forth and so i just i just did that for that time started with 159 scary balance for a checking account ended with 196 3 000 came in 3 000 went out again majority of that$3 ,000 was savings. And then, so you're barely surviving, my dude. You're barely surviving. And then we're doing app, sorry, Faith Array, and you're sending Venmos out, and you're making a credit card, which I don't even have the savings for.

17:15You're making a credit card payment, and you're paying for Google Storage. You have a subscription, Microsoft subscription, making another credit card payment, sending out a Venmo payment, an Xbox bill, looks like maybe Xbox Live, and an Apple subscription, sending Venmo out, Hawaiian bros, credit card payment, credit card payment, Venmoing out money, tribal chimp and pay. Hair stuff. Okay, well, shop, some shop that uses PayPal and sending Venmo out and credit card payment, credit card payment, Hawaiian bros, Apple subscription, Hawaiian bros. That's pretty expensive Hawaiian bros stuff that you've been doing as well.

17:53You're spending a lot of money when you don't have a lot of money. Now, these credit card payments, is this your credit card? Yes. All right. I pay it off. Can I see it on your phone? My credit card? Uh-huh. Oh, my account? Yeah, I just want to see where the money's being spent. Yeah. I don't have the statement, so we're probably not putting it on the screen, but I'll give it a call out. So right now, it's been paid. I don't think there's anything in there. Oh, good. Okay. So you don't have a credit card balance? No, I pay it off. Beautiful. Just to build credit, I guess. Disney just emailed you.

18:29Gotcha. Mill Street Market,$150. Garcia's Mexican restaurant, Sonic. So here's all the fun. Mill Street Market, Chick-fil-A. Mill Street Market. You should cash in your rewards. You have a good amount of rewards. Yep, building it up, saving it. Airport, parking. You're getting texts, too. Talent show thing. Mills Market, The Root Seller,

19:00Creekside Concession. Dude, you're spending so much money on here. There's a lot of text coming in. So I'm just going to hand that back. I barely looked that far. But for some of that, you spend more than you make, which is why you're sending money over from checking, from savings, I mean. Yes. I don't know if November is a very accurate representation of the money I make, though because normally I get a lot more than 340 from Target um I've just yeah well now you're like on demand so are you gonna be getting more than 340 from Target you had two targets in there so it was like 500 in total or something but oh well one of them was from before I mean my brother came in from Colorado and I only see him like once a year and so I think it's it's the last two years as well I've I've had to work all like holidays Black Friday Christmas Eve so I've kind of just taking off a little bit of time and the week or week and a half he was here I was not working at all I was just hanging out with him you can't afford to not work well I was just doing it right there what do you mean what but I I didn't work and you couldn't afford it you transferred money from savings just hang out with my brother I know but you couldn't afford to do it I guess so yes it was a choice you made it was a choice I'm okay with still hanging out with brother but that doesn't mean you can't hang out with brother after you come back from earning some money to pay for your life instead of draining your savings.

20:20Not to be a hard but... You're right. You couldn't afford it. You made a choice and you chose to take money from your savings. I'm happy you have savings and we'll talk about that right now. In your savings,$5 ,933 starting. $170 went in. Okay. Not much but $1 ,200 out. Ending with just under$5 ,000. That's not a trend that can continue. If we pretend this month is the average month and we never know, it's impossible to say within some 30 days, some you're making more with the acting gig, some you're spending more, some you're spending less, some you're making less, whatever. If that trend continues in four and a half months or four months, savings is zero.

21:05Checking account is zero. What does it say that it's at right now? $4 ,900. Oh, yeah. It's higher than that now. How much? I can pull it up right now. I was going to say that sounds... Because I stay right under$6 ,000 with my checking and my savings combined. And so with it... So$5 ,500 is in there. So we put in about$600. And it's still a pretty scary balance of$137 in your checking. Right. Well, I'm glad it's back up because it's essentially something you have to do. When you couldn't afford to live that month and you were just taking money out, bad choices are being made, but it looks like you're kind of correcting from them.

21:46So that's a good thing. Glad to see that. Now, do you have the Credit Karma app? No. I'm going to get you to download it. Okay. Credit Karma. Just under 700. Ooh, why'd this recently drop 13 points? Let's see. What has changed? Balance increase on your savings? Why would that... well i'm really confused i don't check that out so i don't really know well you drop below 700 but pretty much at 700 okay so payment history 100 credit card use 24 that's probably why so your credit card balances or well even with 118 your your balance is actually zero we just looked at it but it just takes a bit to update right but 500 credit limit that's very small and I mean you put a good amount on it for such a small limit that's gonna hurt your credit if your credit is something you care about if not then whatever but so you mean I put a bunch on it you mean like I spent a lot on it for the 500 limit right so the utilization goes up but you always pay it off which is good uh sorry can you unlock this yeah is that your girlfriend it is yes oh another thing I can't put on screen sorry it's the lock screen uh okay so yeah so So that's something to just think about when it comes to credit.

23:08Maybe request an increase if it doesn't cause a hard inquiry. Maybe get another credit card. It looks like you are being disciplined on that, even if you're just not making much money, but either way. Total accounts, one, so that would be the credit card. So it looks like you don't have any other kind of debts. No. Okay, good. Hard inquiries. Looks like we've applied for quite a few things, though. We've applied for something like Capital One, Ally Financial. This was all this year. Oh, yeah, we were going to get another credit card at Capital One. You just got denied for them all? I'm not entirely sure.

23:39You must have because it was just opened. What do you mean they're opened? They're not opened, so you must have been denied. Oh, okay.

23:50Calic Enterprises, American Credit Financial, Capital One, Ally Financial. I think those, so basically a while ago, I say a while ago, maybe like half a year ago, I had some issues with my car and we've had a lot of issues with my car recently so I was talking to my parents and I was like should I just keep paying for this car or should I look at getting a new one and um what do you mean paying for this car paying for this car by that I mean like repairs and stuff because it just something new would come up every other day and then I went and I applied for like a bunch of loans and stuff so I could I don't know exactly I did it with them I was confused I won't pretend to know what I'm talking about.

24:35But we couldn't find a good, like, payment for the car that I wanted or the cars that I wanted. Oh, so you were applying for car loans. That's usually what Ally is typically. Yes. I'm sorry, that's what I meant, car loans. Because I remember we applied for it a lot, and then we couldn't get any good, like, we couldn't get a number that was low enough that I could pay with my rent. Yeah. Oh, yeah, you make no money. So that, I'm kind of happy you got denied instead of going into a car payment that would have been drained. There's not a single, but you're spending more money now than you make. There's no wiggle room.

25:11If you had car debt, this would be a mess. What is your car that you have right now? A 2008 Ford Edge Sport. Yes. Okay. Yeah, we need to get that replaced. So if this has been a conversation with your parents, like, uh-oh, car bad, car costing money, what is the conclusion Benson's saying? because time has passed since applying for those. What has the conclusion been? So far, it's just been me still with the 2008. Suck it up, essentially? Yeah, because I can't afford it. And this one I have paid off. You can afford it, but some things would need to change. Right, some things I don't necessarily want to change right now.

25:50Ah, there it is. Because I also like my car as well. But what happens when this car doesn't work anymore or the repair costs more than the car is worth? At that point, I'm not exactly sure what I would do at that point, to be honest with you. That's scary. It is. That makes me want to throw up. What would you do? What would happen? I'm not sure for right now. Okay. So you'd be sitting without a car in San Marcos, a car-dependent city in the middle of two car-dependent cities, San Antonio and Austin. Do you take the bus to gigs? Do you Uber around? So at that point, obviously, I wouldn't be acting anymore.

26:25and I would just come off from on demand. My roommate was in a similar situation and I gave him rides to work all the time, so I'm sure he wouldn't mind doing that. How many hours a week do you work in total across everything? Across everything? I'm not sure. Give me the rough estimate. Think of your last couple months. How many hours a week are you working on average? I'd say probably still close to 40. All right, very skeptical. There's some pretty long shoot days. then you're not getting paid for those well that's how it is when you start you have to start small and do student films and stuff like that until you can get an agent and then you can start auditioning for the bigger stuff that's going to pay you a little bit more but then again there's also like i said the commercials that like they pay me 10 times as much for like two or three hours in comparison oh man okay i've had this conversation a couple times already It comes Down I mean I know in your mind You think it's 100 % worth it And it's pretty much no convincing otherwise It's the Americans told Washington what they want Lower costs Yet Brandon Carr's FCC Is considering a merger between TV station Giants Nexstar and Tegna If approved millions of Americans Will pay even more to watch TV They'll pay more to watch the news, entertain their kids, or cheer on their favorite team.

27:54Thankfully, President Trump knows what Americans want, and President Trump can stop this. Spending car needs to reject the Nextar Tecna merger and protect Americans from higher TV bills. Paid for by Keep It Local Media. Man, okay. Because you're in such a privileged position, you're only able to survive because of that. and you're getting two semesters or two years of colleges paid for and then your in-state tuition isn't crazy at Texas State for the remaining two years that you have to do it. And I could sit down with you right now and I could get you to a way where you have money saved up for an emergency fund, you have money saved up to buy a car in cash when that car inevitably breaks down in however long, and cash flow college.

28:37But none of the, I don't think you're willing to do anything that would get you to those amazing places because it would give up the ultimate dream. Yes, yeah. I was going to say that's the one thing. It's a risk. It's pretty big, but it's something I'm willing to do for now. For six months, right? For the time being. Like I said, we'll see how it goes. What do you need to look like six months from now in order to say that you've won, essentially? Be in a position where I don't have to do as many birthday parties to make rent. Or how about fucking transfer from savings? Right, that too, obviously.

29:27Who cares about them? Work as many birthday parties as you can. That's money. There's nothing wrong with working for money. Right. But what's the financial figure that you have to be bringing in from this acting thing in six months to say, okay, this has paid off and now I can just do this. And at that point, I assume you drop out of college. Right. If it takes off. So what does taking off look like? What are we hitting? What is the goal that you have? The goal that I have is kind of similar to what I said earlier, booking a role that's kind of like a series regular. Tell me the finances. The finances.

30:04What are you making? I don't know what the finances for that looks like. You need to know what you're... Well, I haven't gotten the job like that. No, no, no, no. You need to know your goal for the financial figure you are making that says, okay, I can commit to this full-time and I can drop out of college. Okay. That's fair. That's fair. Off the top of my head, I don't have a number for you. I don't think it needs to be necessarily a specific job that you land before then. I think it's a specific goal working the jobs in the field that you want to do. Hitting the figure on a monthly basis. And then you can say, okay, I did it.

30:43Now, allow me to be the bad guy and let's just talk the statistic likelihood. I sound like such a dick. Is it less than 1 %? Yeah. Is that what it is? It is, yeah. Okay, well that's worse than I thought. Less than 1 % chance that you make it within 6 months. Then what are we looking at? We're looking at, you don't have money saved up for a car replacement. You're still baking, barely making rent. And then all of a sudden you have to start paying for school. Right. What, what do we look, what does, what are you willing to do at that point? Well, at that point, like I said, um, I pulled back on that and I will say that my car has had no issues at all.

31:24I thought you kept saying, oh, since what? It was. So that was like four or five or six months ago, something like that. I can't remember exactly. What happened? Um, something about like the fan and the having issues, like it was leaking coilant, coolant constantly. It'd boil over. I don't know cars very well. So I don't know cars either, but it, it was, uh, it was like a thousand dollars. And since then I haven't had any issues. It was just up until that point before that there were other issues and it was like maybe like two to three months where there was just issue after issue after issue.