Make Property Taxes Easy, Stop the HELOC Habit, Let Kids Pay Their Own Bills & Budgeting Amazon Categories (Lessons From The Sessions) | 538

0:00When you go back to quote unquote track how much you spent in the month, you're looking at a whole number and you're like I can't believe we spent that much money. Where is it all going? Okay, that is a problem. If you have one account, you're having all these transactions come through. You don't know what's going where, why, how, whatever, okay? So then you're shaming yourself now for all this money that you quote unquote spent on Amazon when half of it was needed because half of it was food and clothes and maybe some things that the kids absolutely needed for school. But you don't know that because it's bunched in all together.

0:28So this is why setting up the separate accounts, separating your money is so important because there is no tracking required. you are now attaching the right debit cards to Amazon to be able to pull from whenever you need things. And you don't have to go back and feel bad about how much money you spent on Amazon, because as long as you've stuck to your budget in those mini budget categories, right in the, in your spending section, then you're good. Today, we're bringing your real life stories and lessons from our private coaching sessions. If our clients are dealing with it, chances are you are too.

1:00So we're breaking it down to help you avoid the same mistakes, feel less alone, and walk away with some quick wins for your budget. 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.

1:33We know what you're doing probably isn't working, but guess what? You'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.

2:08We 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 markets. 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. This isn't the most exciting lesson from the session that you've ever heard. It's like grown up. But yeah, it's very adulting. and I like this idea that property taxes shouldn't be a jump scare. But look, property taxes come at the end, at the beginning of the month or the year.

2:40Some people at the end of the year, whichever way it is, but it still can be a lot and can be scary. So we want to make sure that it's not. And I actually had two clients. I had two different situations with clients. The first one we had been saving, they have a lot of properties and we've been saving all year. And it was the, I think the second year in a row, So she was just able to pay them whenever all the different bills come in. She pays them out of the account. And it's really great. And hey, that money was making her money all year. That's important. And then my other client, she got so much cleaned up last year.

3:14I'm not going to lie. She's been with us for a minute. Okay. She's been with us for a minute. I love her. I love her. And this is going to be another phenomenal year. But she was not able to save for them yet. But what we have done is in the same month that she's paying for them in full, because she's another entrepreneur, so she has more than one, We are also saving in the annual bills to be able to do it next year. So it's a big month for her. She's paying a lot. She's sending a lot of money in a lot of places. But she's not only paying the three different property taxes that she has, but she is funding to be able to pay them in full next year as well in her savings bucket, which is really exciting.

3:46Yeah, I think that's good. And I love how you were saying that property taxes shouldn't be a yearly jump scare because a lot of times it is. And I also believe a lot of people roll it into escrow. So it's like an out of sight, like monkey, no monkey see, no monkey do, right? So it's like they forget about it. They don't want to think about it. Their bank takes care of it. Voila. Okay. But what we want you to realize is that you could do this on your own. Shana is setting up her clients to be able to pay their property taxes on their own, saving monthly for it. When you have it rolled up in escrow, your bank is making all that money for you that you're putting in that bank account, okay?

4:19Where you could be making all that money for yourself and interest by having a savings bucket, an annual bill savings bucket, and being able to pay your property taxes on your own. I think that this is huge and people forget that property taxes go up, then your escrow goes up, your mortgage goes up, and it's this huge thing. Or you can do it on your own and just be more on top of everything. So I have this lovely client. They are entrepreneurs as well. They have three small kids. They have a beautiful home. They just moved. They're very young and they have a lot going for them. And they're going to end up being multimillionaires someday.

4:50I really, truly believe that is in their future. We just have to get a couple of things straightened out. They are so used to, though, Shana, having a plan B, something to fall back on. And I think it was her mom was so gracious and helped them get the business set up. They loaned them a decent amount, almost a half million dollars to be able to get her business going. And it seems every time they get ahead, if they end up spending more on their budget than they thought they were going to, they ask mom for some money and she gives it to them. And again, this isn't just about mom. This is if you have a HELOC, if you have your emergency fund that you're constantly dipping from, if you're constantly using credit cards as your backup plan.

5:32When you have a crutch like that, that you know that's always going to help you out, that is really hard to stick to plan A, okay? So what we want you to do is say, no, like I can do this on my own without dipping into anything and anywhere. We want you to take the bull by the horns and we want you to do your budget and stick to it the way that we know that you can. and it's going to force yourself not to fail. Yeah. Okay. I have a lot to say about this. I know that you are shocked, but I have a client that also this lesson could be about because they have been relying, her parents are wealthy and they've been really smart with their money.

6:08I think she tries really hard. They're just, they're two teachers. So their income level doesn't, she's now an entrepreneur, but there's only so much you can do on a teacher's salary, unfortunately. And they have borrowed from mom a lot and mom is always trying to help. So recently, I don't know what's happening, but I know I had clients that had their health insurance go up okay oh so many and there's so much going on so her mom knew that and her mom said let me give you some money to help with that and she I'm very she did it all over on her own she said mom we don't I appreciate that but we have to figure out how to make this work on our own and and I was like that's amazing good job she's she weaned when we she weaned herself off from getting mom's help monthly last year which was wonderful and now we are going to stop relying on mom for these big moments we got to figure out how to, like Vanessa said, how to make it work without being, going back that way.

6:54Now, the other flip side of that is just as her mom is enabling, was enabling her, she has to make sure she's not enabling her kids what these clients' parents are doing. And so it's not that you don't love them. It's not that you don't want to help them. It's not that you don't want to help bail them out, but is that actually helping them long-term? So in this case, she has a son that's living with them and he's paying rent, but he has paid it late. He's not paying it. What if I do this tour, then I don't have to pay it. And so it's what lesson are we actually teaching him? So we need to be really holding him to that standard.

7:27And there has to be some consequences because if you're trying to help them, then you have to actually help them because the real world, there are consequences, right? So just think about as a parent, which way I go about this, what is it actually helping? What is it actually teaching? What is the long-term effect here? and what do I want the long-term effect to be? Yeah, because I think if you're just going to prolong your progress, like that's not, nobody wants that. You want to get there. You, if you're, especially if you're a coaching client, you hired us to go further faster and we can't do that.

7:55And you can't do that if you're constantly relying on either a HELOC or your mom or your aunt, an uncle, whoever to help you out. And so we just, we want you to, and if you're listening to this and you're like, oh my gosh, I find myself dipping into my credit cards just because, or dipping into my emergency fund just because, because I know that it's there. you have to know that it's not there it's not an option cut those ties cut those cards or whatever you need to do so that way you can stick to your plan a yeah and we want you to be your own bank that's where this is we want you to borrow money from yourself if you actually have to which would be in your savings buckets hopefully because you're planning ahead but we or we want you to have the money all there that you can use yeah because you saved it because you did stick to your plan and you've been saving for it?

8:38I will say when the day I got my license, when I was 16 years old, my parents didn't pay for a dime, like nothing. They never, they didn't, I didn't ask, but they didn't give me like money for a down payment on a house or anything like that. And I truly believe that the success that I have today with my finances is because of those hard lessons. And I remember being very angry back then and very like internally frustrated because I saw so many of my friends at Shana that were given everything. And I don't know if they're as successful financially as I am today because I had to work for it and I had to do everything on my own.

9:08And I am now at 39. Gosh, I'm 39 now. Happy birthday to myself. I had to do that by myself, but I am so thankful as an adult because of all that. Yeah. I think that's what we want. We want to, they're going to, you're going to have to learn the lesson eventually. Sooner the better. Okay. I have a client speaking of these young, I guess we're, I'm on a tirade against kids right now because we have, I've had this conversation so many times. My client, they have a very conservative budget, but they have at least five different Apple charges that we can't really figure out what they are. And it's been a theme, right?

9:44So I've, and I feel like even if we find one, then there's a new one the next month. What we want to do here is identify all of them is what I told her, but actually everybody can pay their own. So these are, she's got three kids. And I really think that's where it's coming from. And she is setting, sending money to their accounts for them each month. And then there's the older one that lives with them, right? He's in college. And I said, you know what? You don't need to be paying all of these. And yeah, it's only$127 when you add it up. But the point here is one, you don't know what they are.

10:12Two, they, it does add up. That's money that you could be putting in savings buckets. And three, they need to pay for their own things. If they're getting money from you and they're charging their Apple thing to you, uh-uh, I don't care what it is. I don't care if it's an app. I They can pay for it. That's part of them learning to budget money, that stuff costs money. And if I have to make the money, if I want it, like Vanessa was just saying, I have to make the money if I want to spend the money. Yeah. I love this because my daughter asked me the other day if she can order something online. And she said, mom, can I order this?

10:39Can, you know, and I said, yeah, you can order it. And then she proceeded to ask for my debit card or my PayPal account. And I said, you get money every week as an allowance. And yes, it was supposed to be for gas and food, but she doesn't have a car right now. So I told her, I was like, I don't care what you spend it on, but this is your money to be able to spend. And so I said, no, you get your debit card, sweet girl. And you attach your debit card to that and buy it. And she was like, oh. And I'm like, yeah, you don't need mine. So that was a good moment for her to realize, okay, do I want to pull it out of my account to watch my account go down to get this?

11:11Is it worth it? Yeah. My new favorite line is, you have money. Oh, there. This thing. You have money. And then so interestingly, it's not necessarily as urgent when it's like their money. It's so interesting. But this is just the whole point here is we want to empower our kids to start learning these lessons, start thinking about this by giving them money and just bailing them out. That's not necessarily what's going to do that. So that's the whole point there. Yeah, you can't give them money in their account and then give them money elsewhere. And then pay for everything. Right. Yeah, Ayla, my youngest, was really sad last night.

11:45She said, how much money do I have left? And I said, like 10 bucks. And she said, oh, I didn't realize I was paying for her friend's birthday tomorrow. And I was like, yes, that was the whole point. We've talked about this. You get to pay for all the fun things that you want to do. I'm not going to tell you no, but you got to decide what you want to do. And so when you decide that you're going to a birthday party, then maybe there's some other things that you can't do and that's, or you can't get, or you can't buy, which is fine. But that's part of the decision making. And here, this is something Vanessa said before.

12:13None of this is because you can't afford it. That's not the point. If you could want to afford it, you could. That's not the lesson. So much more important than affording the thing is the lesson to learn how to budget and manage money. Girl, and I love this. When we were in New Orleans, my son was so sweet, walked like a half a mile down the road to get my daughter chocolates at like this really good chocolate store. And he didn't have her card with him, so he used his. So then he called me and he's like, can you please transfer$32 from her account to my account because I use my account to pay for that?

12:42And I was like, yes, I will do that for you. Accountability, baby. Yes. And I will make a note that says chocolates for Catalina. So that way, but I think it's so good. Like they are learning and when they go to Tropical Smoothie, maybe they are splitting it between their accounts. They know the importance of being able to track their own expenses or knowing what, how much they're spending the benefit of using their own money for stuff and not using her money for his stuff and vice versa. They're boundaries. They're learning boundaries. Yeah. That and also the unlimited fund of mom. No, that's over that.

13:10There's none of that. There's a fund that's limited. You're welcome. Absolutely. It's time to enter your coaching era because making good money should feel like making good money. Yeah. Imagine six months of private coaching where we'll tell you exactly what to do. No guesswork, no confusion, and absolutely no judgment. It's a done-for-you system that actually works. You don't know what you don't know, and that's not your fault. And that's why we're here. Financial coaching with us looks like two coaching sessions a month, personalized recaps, and after-hour support, you can text and email so you're never stuck wondering what to do next.

13:47Together, we're going to build your budget, set up your system, and tackle any challenges that come up along the way, which, by the way, they always do. If what you're doing isn't working and you're tired of trying to figure it out on your own, sign up for financial coaching at budgetbesties.com forward slash coaching before all of our spots fill up, and we will help you go further faster. Six months from now, you'll wish you started today. Okay, I have this sweet new client. She, we were on a call the other day and she said, I need to, I went on Amazon and I found out how much I spent in 2024.

14:20And then I also went on and found out how much I spent in 2025. And I said, hold on, is that, do they give you like a report? And she said, no, I just went through and I added everything up. And I thought, oh, don't do that. And so she said, I was depressed when I did it. and I thought, hold on, you're shaming yourself now. And she said, some of that was food and some of that was clothes that were needed and other things were like some sports stuff. And so I thought, this is the problem with tracking. When you go back to quote unquote, track how much you spent in the month, you're looking at a whole number and you're like, I can't believe we spent that much money.

14:54Where is it all going? Okay, that is a problem. If you have one account, you're having all these transactions come through, you don't know what's going where, why, how, whatever. Okay, so then you're shaming yourself now for all this money that you quote unquote spent on Amazon when half of it was needed because half of it was food and clothes and maybe some things that the kids absolutely needed for school. But you don't know that because it's bunched in altogether. So this is why setting up the separate accounts, separating your money is so important because there is no tracking required. You are now attaching the right debit cards to Amazon to be able to pull from whenever you need things.

15:28And you don't have to go back and feel bad about how much money you spent on Amazon because as long as you've stuck to your budget, in those mini budget categories, right, in your spending section, then you're good. If your budget's working, you're saving money, you're paying off debt, you're paying your bills, everything's getting transferred to your spending accounts, then why does it matter? Like, I am never going to go back and ask myself how much I spent on Amazon. I'm not, for what, how is that going to serve me? And it's going to make me feel bad because then what I really want to do, if you're going to do it right, you need to go back and say how much of it was actually needed, like food and different things, and how much of it was just fun spending, but that doesn't matter.

16:03I still don't care. Exactly. It doesn't matter because I spent the right money out of the right categories. Yeah. I was thinking when you first brought that up, because I just did go through everything for the taxes. And I was like, how would you even do that? Because you can pull it up by year. But OK, half of this is food. Half of this is cleats or whatever for the kids. And then there's almost no personal spending from Amazon because I like to do my personal spending in person. OK. But I was just thinking that it would be very difficult to figure that out. And like I said, a lot of times you guys shame yourself about how much you spend on Amazon.

16:35And it's silly because it's usually not. Maybe it is. And you guys need to be really honest with yourself. If you're just buying frivolous stuff, which I'm sure you can do, but usually it's on purpose stuff. So that is all categories, though. So you have your groceries. And if part of you, I use Amazon subscriptions, you save a lot of money. That's part of your grocery budget. So it doesn't come out of your personal. And it should be spent on groceries. I'll put it that way. and then if you have your kids stuff like Vanessa said if I buy stuff for the kids it's coming out of the kids account so it's not and that's budgeted monthly and if we don't if we don't budget for we don't get it what I will say is I talked to or I put something in the Facebook and it reminded me of one of my clients and she wanted to make her house a home right and that required house like decor money or whatever you want to call it not necessarily decor always but different things that make your house a home and we put that in her budget and it was a specific line item because that was something that she wanted to do.

17:31And so if that's what you want to do, if you know that's something that you're doing, budget for it. Don't shame yourself. Set a budget, like Vanessa said, that's on purpose, that's in your budget. Like she said before, a guardrail, right? I want to know that I can spend a hundred bucks a month on decorating or maybe getting new hooks because these are not the right ones or whatever it is. That's fine. There's nothing wrong with that. We just want it to be in your budget and you want to be on purpose about it. We have a lot of people that even make like an Amazon account, right? And they're like, I don't understand the Amazon account.

17:59I know they do that, but I don't know what they're doing. What are you with? So they're just making one generic thing. But again, if you're budgeting for a category, again, this is why budgets are very specific to what you have going on and what you want. But what we're saying, again, all of this to say, just put it in the budget and then you can feel good about spending it however you want. Yeah. And not shame yourself. That's the main thing. So we hope that these lessons have helped you. We love working with our one-on-one clients. It's really fun. We have limited spots available. If you are interested, you should book, a free interest call with Vanessa.

18:31She's ready to talk to you. Hello. It's so fun to be able to hear people's new situations and just have them come on as new clients. We have so much fun with them. So go to budgetbesties.com forward slash coaching to check it out. If you're tired of feeling like your finances are all over the place and you're ready for a simple, set it and forget it way to budget, we have something special for you. Watch our Automate Your Budget Masterclass at budgetbesties.com forward slash automate. We'll show you step-by-step how to finally organize your money, how to set up your accounts, and put your budget on autopilot so your bills, saving, and spending run like clockwork.

19:06Imagine less stress, more savings, and the freedom to spend money without having to track every dollar or babysit your bank account. Go to budgetbesties.com forward slash automate to start today.