How to Pay Off $3,000 in Credit Card Debt and Fix the $3 Gas Budget Problem with Coach Michelle | 535

0:00I remember one time I sent my husband, he works at a grocery store. So I think it was like, I don't know, 10 years ago, I had sent him a screenshot of how many times he swiped his card in a week. And like not trying to be ugly, but just aware. Like, hey, I don't know if you're aware of how many times you swipe. And he was like, I had no idea that I was doing that. It was just impulse. But until, like Shayna said, they have to be bought in. They have to see what's happening. They have to be part of the conversation to know that it's affecting their money. In fact, affecting their finances. And it's affecting their relationship.

0:31It is, whether they think it or not. Do you make good money but have nothing to show for it? Are you tired of living paycheck to paycheck? Do you have big dreams for your financial future? Do you want to get debt-free, but you don't want to live on beans and rice? Or you don't want to give up those pumpkin spice lattes? Hey, it's okay if you don't already know how to budget or if you're using credit cards to get through the month. Hey, it's okay if you want to seem like you have your finances all together or you're not on the same page with your spouse when it comes to finances. We know what you're doing probably isn't working, but guess what?

1:03You're in the right place. We're Shana and Vanessa. We're best friends, business partners, and master financial coaches trained by Dave Ramsey. We've been in business since 2019, helping hundreds of amazing people like you create budgets, get out of debt, stop living paycheck to paycheck, and know exactly what to do with their money. In this podcast, we'll share with you everything we know plus everything we're working on with our clients so that you have the best chance at reaching your financial goals. We want to help you take the guesswork out of your budget, improve your marriages, and even bring your kids in on the conversation.

1:35We can help you no matter where you're at, whether you're the single mom who's never had$500 in her savings account, or the millionaire who's paid off four real estate workers. And we're not going to shy away from the tough love. We'll tell you what you need to hear and encourage you at the same time. This is the Financial Coaching for Women podcast. We're excited to have Michelle back. Coach Michelle is back on Financial Coaching for women because she's been coaching and we got some things to chat about. Yeah. So she holds office hours every Wednesday for everyone to come and just ask their questions.

2:05And just really, she allows you guys to, if you have the budget system, if you don't, we just really want to help you budget the right way and allow you to hear all the information you hear on the podcast and you have questions about it. Michelle is your go-to to get those questions answered.

2:20Coach Michelle:So love it. Thank you guys for having me here. Yes, we love office hours. It is a very encouraging group. We run through all sorts of questions, whether it's just the little semantics of how to get the system running, or sometimes we talk about your particular situation and what you're working on and how you can achieve those goals and play what if using your budget system to figure out what the best plan is for you to make those next steps. Yeah. And you also, the ones that come and say, listen, I don't have the budget, but I want to, and you help them, you show them how to save up for it and you show them how to use their budget and take their numbers.

2:57That way they can eventually buy it. So if that's a goal for you, Michelle can help you with that. All right. So we really want to dive into some of the specific questions and things that you get asked at office hours. We think that's the best way to serve our audience. So talk about, well, let's start with a win. Okay. You had a client or we have a lady on there. She said she paid$3 ,000 off on her credit card in just a few minutes. Talk about that.

3:19Coach Michelle:Oh my goodness. She just started in November, right? So that was just a minute ago. It's about to be March, just so for context. So November, December, January, February. And I talked to her in December. And by December, at the end of December, she had paid off$3 ,000 on her credit card because she used the system, separated out those accounts and got things in a really nice format. And it was easy for her and got all of her automation set up. She was just absolutely thrilled because it felt this is what she said it felt so good because they had leftover because there's enough and it helped to create some discipline for her and her her family so that they could do all the things they wanted to do yeah it's just it's it's the separation you guys like obviously seeing what your money can do with the math on the budget system is really important.

4:14Right. And just that that's eye opening for a lot of people. But then separating it. And so that you clearly know, like you can clearly the discipline, I think, comes by having those accounts where I can spend out of these. And if I just stick over here, everything else that I plan in my budget, paying off three thousand dollars in debt, by the way, that's one of those things. Everything else will happen as long as I just stick over there and you can say discipline, but it really the separation, I feel like, is what really helps you get that discipline. and I think it allows you to know that it's okay.

4:41So some people will say, I would love to be able to pay off$3 ,000 in debt, but if they have all this money going into one account, it's a black hole of transactions. There's no clear separation of what's going where and when and how, all that. You can't answer that question. You have no idea if you can put any money on debt. We just had a free call yesterday with a couple and just explaining all the different accounts and you can kind of see the husband kind of go like, but why the different accounts, you know, but it really does make a difference And every single person who takes that first step and opens up those separate accounts to be able to do this, they say, I'm never going back.

5:17Because they now exactly know how much they have for bills, how much they can spend, how much they can save. And then also, after all of that is said and done, they're saving for Christmas. They're saving for travel. They're saving for this. And, hey, you can also put$3 ,000 towards debt. But you can't answer that question if you don't know. You don't know your numbers. Exactly.

5:33Coach Michelle:I think of it as like looking at your pantry. And if your pantry is organized, you'll know what you have in your baking section and whether you can make those chocolate chip cookies. You'll know whether you have your pasta ready for dinner tonight, you know, or if you're going to have to go hit the grocery store. So we talk about that, that having that organization in these different categories, it really makes their life better. yeah we were talking on a podcast yesterday to some we we guessed it on someone's podcast and it's we were saying that this system makes sense to women because of what you just said you think about how you organize your closet you think about how you organize your pantry so that you can like have an idea of what's really happening in your life what you have what you don't have and it's very it's all separated and organized and and for that we you know we think that's really why this makes sense for women finally they'll say a lot of times it's the first thing that finally clicked yeah exactly okay let's talk about this girlfriend listen that had three dollars left in gas okay like we i feel you like this is this is supposed to be the after though so i want you to tell the story but i want to say that the gas budget is personal to me because like you don't want to be like i was which is like looking for coins in the couch when i was younger like can we get some gas money together you know what what do i have left i have to like make it like i'm You're digging around in the glove box or under the car seat, right?

6:55Coach Michelle:Just in case. You don't want to steal gas money from your kid's piggy bank. Like, that's not where we're at. So tell us what was going on with this lady. Yeah, you don't want to take a loan from your kids, that's for sure. So when she was setting up her budget, you know, we have a lot of gals that will join us that are super detailed. And that is a beautiful thing, but it can also be the thing that hurts you when you're in the weeds too much, right? and so they want to nail down those numbers on those categories and so what happened with her is her first month or so month or two she was really tweaking those numbers on her gas in her groceries and she literally had only three dollars left to spend at the end of the month in her gas and I said no no no you can't you can't do that because that will add to the stress that will add to the anxiety that will keep you up at night thinking about okay so did did I have a quarter paycheck hits.

7:50Coach Michelle:That's the place where you need to have a buffer and you need to have enough so that it is okay if gas prices went up 20 cents a gallon, or if you had to drive, you know, 20 extra miles or whatever, you're not going to panic because you had to get yourself an extra tank of gas. And the same with your groceries account, because she was, she was getting those dialed in as well. And we talk about it being getting into the weeds, right. And, and being super detailed. And I said, you need to back up a little bit, put a buffer in there so that you can go in with confidence that it's going to be there when you need that money to go buy groceries to feed your family.

8:33I think that's so important because we have a lot of people that are so used to being in the weeds, in it all the time, feeling like they have to track, track, track down to the dollar of how much they spend on where and when and how. and like just like no you don't have to put all that pressure on yourself anymore and back up and also i think people don't put enough because they feel like they hear others saying well you should only be spending this much on gas and groceries you should only be spending this much on going out to eat so they put this arbitrary number in there and it's not correct and then they feel strapped and they feel like they're not good at this they can't do it it's not working right and And so, but like you said, they're trying to get down to like that very last dollar.

9:13And in a category like gas and groceries, you can't do that because you need a little bit of a buffer to be able to allow you to do the extra things that you need to, if you need to go to the grocery store and buy them. Yeah. We have, again, yesterday. So, you know, we're doing back-to-back recording days where we record all day. So we've been talking about this. And, you know, I think personally, I understand it. So you guys will too. as women, we feel like where we can manipulate the budget the most is the gas and groceries, like these little moments where, and for whatever reason, we want to make that as frugal as possible.

9:46And that's hard. And so many conversations we've had lately are, gas is way more expensive than it used to be. Groceries are way more expensive. Stop making this a struggle. It's not that you don't have the money, right? Stop it. Give yourself some breathing room, like you said, Michelle. It doesn't need to be so tight, but we and you know and we go on other podcasts we're like well what's the first thing you tell people to cut no we're not here if you want to hear about how to like drive your bike take your bicycle so you don't waste gas or how to have five dollar meals that are based on maybe they're not the most healthy ingredients we're we're not the girls for you okay we want you to have a nice comfortable gas and grocery budgets like this should be comfortable the other stuff we can worry about but you shouldn't have that white knuckling trying to get through in this very important area of life.

10:34Like this is part, like one big part of why you work, why you make money is to feed people. Okay. We're not the frugal besties. We are the budget besties who want you to be bougie on a budget. Those are two different things. We want you to create a budget in abundance. Like we're excited for you to have this life, this life that you love and that you can fund it all. But it takes you taking like a bird's eye view at it and go, is this bringing me joy? Is this really like, do I love this? And if you don't, or is it, these are the numbers that I pulled from somebody else who told me that this is how I'm supposed to be budgeting.

11:06No, it needs to be around your life and what you have going on. And also listen, maybe you're in a season of life like Shane and I right now, all of our money is going towards travel sports pretty much and other other sports. That's like, it's just, it is what it is right now. We know that's not going to be forever, but we know that this is what's happening at the moment. And then we're going to transition out of this season and then the money will be for something else. And that's also okay.

11:28Coach Michelle:Exactly. And we do get lots of questions on how do I cut back here? How do I cut back there? And really it's, it's more about, well, do you need to cut back? You know, I mean, is, is that really what you want to do? Can we build your budget around the things that, that, that make your life the way you want it to be? Right. Really? Right. So, and I think it's partly because, you know, when you talk about budgeting in general, a lot of folks have heard over the years whether it's through other podcasts, other people that have developed budgeting apps or whatever it is. It's all about cutting back and making what you spend as small as possible.

12:09Coach Michelle:And I don't necessarily think that that's a good life to live. And I don't think that's where the people that are coming to us and talking to us are wanting. Not sustainable. Right. It's not sustainable at all. And that's what we call the B word. And it doesn't bring you joy. yeah it's making it restrictive and it's the b word but to vanessa's point bougie on a budget we're changing trying to change it budget doesn't mean automatically no restrictive like white knuckling that's not what it is we want it to it can it can fit your real life and you can have some breathing room there so you know yeah just to say that we had another lady who was talking about her car insurance and she was trying to figure out how to pay for it but because she didn't have her savings bucket set up.

12:55Right, Michelle? I'll let you speak a lot. Right, right, right. Exactly.

12:58Coach Michelle:So she was working on funding her semi-annual, her every six-month payment on her car insurance, which was going to be$3 ,000, which was a lot, a big payment for her. And she was wanting to know if I can't get it funded, what do I do, right? And she was a little worried because it was coming up and it was going to be due in a few months and she wasn't quite there. So we talked about different strategies on how to get there, you know, to take what the balance would be. You know, how much do you have now? And she said, I think it was$1 ,000. So she had$2 ,000 she needed to make up between now and a couple months.

13:36Coach Michelle:I said, so you're going to need to maybe pull back on some of those other savings buckets for a short period of time or pull back on some of your extra debt payments because she's been working very, very hard on her debt. Pull back a little bit back to your minimum so that you can fund this car insurance account and have it ready when it's time. And then as soon as you get that six-month car insurance paid off, then go right back to doing what you want to do with the debt payoff. Yeah. Well, theoretically, once she gets to that six-month point, she'll still have to fund it, but it won't be as heavy.

14:11Right. Right. Yeah. Well, and I think like, listen, trying to fund a$3 ,000 auto insurance payment every six months is really stressful. Yes. Every six months. So imagine taking$3 ,000, dividing it by six. That's 500 bucks a month. That's way more manageable. So this girl is literally in this situation that we always talk about that we don't want you to be in, which is every, they're all in it. Right. Because if you don't have an annual savings bucket, yeah, annual bill savings bucket, excuse me, to fund all this, then you are stressed every six months or probably every five months trying to figure out how the heck am I going to pay that bill.

14:47So, yeah, so, you know, you did awesome with her trying to figure out what do you have already in there and then how do we cut back right now just to make it work? Because that's a bill that you cannot pay. You have to pay it. Yeah. But maybe another savings bucket can go down for just a short period of time while we get that. And then now we're constantly now funding that$500 a month consistently. So you're never going to not have it after that point. But it's just that first time sometimes can be a nuisance.

15:14Coach Michelle:Well, and that acknowledgement, that realization of, okay, so I might have it funded the way I wanted to have it funded this year. But guess what? Next year, I'm going to have that$500 a month. I'm on it. I don't have to pull from anything else. It's automatic. that realization when that hits that it's going to be all set up that's that's a real breakthrough right it's a beautiful moment and like she said she's not going to have to magically find three thousand dollars somewhere well and i think this is an important thing to think about in this step like the order of operations here right so like vanessa always say everybody wants to get right to the savings buckets everybody wants to get right to paying off debt but the first step is to make sure, like this lady we talked about, get your gas and groceries, your spending column figured out.

16:04Figure that out first. Then let's work on the savings buckets. And then once we feel like those are good, then let's go to paying off debt. And it's okay because as you kind of alluded to, or funding this is going to allow me to not put it on debt. So we are still in the debt category by not adding to it, by making sure that we're taking the steps that when these things pop up. We don't have to add the debt later. But it really, you know, you know, again, if you want how to not live life and how to not be allowed to go to restaurants and how to live on rice and beans and so that you can pay off debt, there's someone out there that you can listen to here.

16:39We want you to be able to live your life, to feel like you know what's going on with your money. And like I said, there's a step. Get your spending, figure out your savings. Then let's go hard on that debt, you know, right? There's just like there's a couple of steps you got to get to before all of this. And then we like to tell people, look, we know you heard the podcast, you heard all of our steps. You're so excited. You want it, you want it all tomorrow. But unfortunately, building the whole system isn't going to, it doesn't work that fast. It's not a quick fix. It is a lifelong change of how your mindset, your habits, all of that is how you handle your money.

17:12And that's, what's going to make you successful long-term. It's not just, we're not just putting words and numbers on paper and calling in a budget. It's literally a whole different way that you handle your finances. And so being able to implement one part at a time, yes, it may not happen as fast as you want it to happen, but you're going to be successful longer. Right.

17:31Coach Michelle:And what the most beautiful thing that I see in office hours is those folks that are committed to making this progress a little bit at a time and realize that it's a marathon, right? And they are committed and they keep coming back and they keep asking questions and they stay engaged and they know that they will do things that are going to turn out to be a lesson for later, whether it's good or bad. And they're treating it as a way to relearn some things that they learned previously and they're just kind of resetting and that mindset. So I see beautiful things happening over periods of time. And you talk about this being a lifestyle change and it's going to happen forever.

18:18Coach Michelle:But I see people starting to make progress within a few months. Oh, sure. That's what's that's what's fantastic. And those are the ones that are you can tell that are making the biggest progress because they're committed and they're in it for the long haul. Yeah. Yeah. I think that that's a really good point. And like, really, it's giving yourself permission to be a beginner and like just do this. And like you said, it's new. We're going to have to take a minute. It's new stuff. All right, budget besties. It's time for some real talk. You don't need another budget. You need a budget system. Our simplified budget system is what you've been looking for.

18:55It's going to allow you to be bougie on a budget. You'll be able to easily set up a system that runs automatically and shows you exactly where your money is going. And it's going to give you permission to spend. Everybody loves that. Yeah. It's straightforward, pretty, and packed with walkthrough videos that break down the exact methods we use with our clients to get out of debt, set up a bills account, separate spending, build savings buckets, and end the paycheck to paycheck feel. If you're new to budgeting, this is the perfect way to jump in. And if you're already a budget nerd like us, you're about to meet your new obsession.

19:28This is the upgrade to your finances that you need right now. Yeah. So head on over to budgetbesties.com forward slash budget and grab yours. Now back to today's show. So, okay. We have two more lessons that we kind of want to get to two more highlights here before we, we wrap up today's coaching with, with Michelle. And I want you to give us the down and dirty here, Michelle, tell us what, what were, what was going on with this person who's trying to get her husband on board with spending? Cause believe me, we've heard it all.

19:59Coach Michelle:Oh, my goodness. So he just, you know, was swiping, swiping, swiping. You know, if there was money there, he spent it. And so she was terrified. Sounds wonderful for her. Right. So she was terrified of going into that negative territory or getting hit with some overdraft fees. So she just kept funding it. She just kept transferring money. The addict. No. You know, she had had those discussions with him about, please don't do that. What is going on? You got to talk to me. But, you know, it just, there was a little bit of a wall between them. They didn't quite get there. So, you know, this was going on for a very, very long time.

20:45Coach Michelle:and so she just kind of came up talking to him about it and just made sure that there was always money there and so she internalized that stress she took it all on herself she quit talking to him about it and just you know did the what do we call it rob peter to pay paul right it's just just whatever she had to do to make sure he always had money for when he was wiping for whatever and some of it was just what she felt frivolous, just buying stuff at the gas station, snacks every time he stopped in or was, you know, going out for lunch like four times a week instead of twice like she thought he should, you know, that sort of thing.

21:27Coach Michelle:And so what really ended up happening to really help that was she did the separation of accounts and she gave him an account and she said, here's your account. This is for you and whatever you want to do, I'm not going to judge you, but here's your limit and we need to agree on it. And he said, all right, here's the dollar amount. This is how much I think I need. And she says, okay, that's what we're going to do. And she said it really was eye-opening to him because she made him responsible for that account, right? And made him look at it and tell her, you know, what needed to be done to make any sort of adjustments.

22:02Coach Michelle:So that was very, very helpful. It was hard. It was hard for both, I'm sure. Well, I think, again, it goes back to separating the accounts. Like, that is literally the game that came here in all of this. It's the key. We see it all the time. We've heard so many people. And I want to say, too, if you do this, take off overdraft protection so that way that card doesn't pull from anywhere else. Like, that is literally your limit. But I love that. I love how what she decided to just do in the end was just give him his own account and just say, how much do you want, babe? Okay, that's all you get. But the reason she did that was because she bought the system and she was like, oh, well, here's the answer to this problem that I've been struggling with.

22:46Coach Michelle:Right. And the struggle is women are, you know, and it's so funny because sometimes they come in and the men have been doing it all. Sometimes the women have been doing it. There's no one or the other. It's just split across everybody. But they're internalizing it. This is why we also want a kid's envelope. We want the kids to make those decisions. You're it's not all on your shoulders to figure it all out and solve it all. And especially with your husband, like and that's where women need someone to come alongside them and like give them the ideas, give them the permission. If I was in a coaching session with her, that would also we would also be saying, you guys need to sit down and look at this together.

23:24It sounds like they made an amount together, but you need that. He needs to feel some of the weight. I've been spending a thousand dollars a month and look at our budget. that's really kind of or whatever or maybe that's plenty or whatever so there's a couple different ways to look at it there but separating it's first a lot of times just like with anybody like let's let's start with that like liberal amount maybe give him that much and he might feel a little bad especially once he looks at the budget and you're doing 200 and he's doing a thousand or whatever that's fine because he needs to he'll he'll taper it down himself as long as he starts getting involved in the conversation which is it's not all on you girl you should be you can be setting it up.