Their Single Income Plan Needs Some Help | Making a Millionaire

20:56Because the way you were laying out logical stuff, I was like, I was immediately drawn to you as being the financial person. And then to hear, I want an SUV, you know, it felt disconnected from the analytical side. It seemed more emotional. Is that true? Yes.

21:12Brian Preston:And I would say, yeah, definitely. I make the impulse buys. It's like, I want this. I get my mindset on something. I'm going to get it. I'm going to get it now, not tomorrow, today. So where are you in your journey, though, from being, because if you're analytical and now you're the financial person, of mine, but you were the person you got credit card debt. Yes. Where are you at in this journey on transformation from being a financial mutant versus somebody who's just general public? Probably like three, four months ago when I like for me, I'm pretty, she's very analytical and so am I and getting into this.

21:45Brian Preston:And when I, like I said, when we went down to the one income, my whole thing before was like, as long as we have this amount in our checkings and we don't go below that and I see it grow and then we can move money around there. We're good. And then it'd been a month. I'm like, okay, maybe we just spent more this month and it just kind of stayed and then slowly went down a little bit. I'm like, okay, so I need to really dive into what's going in here. And when I did that, I was like, okay, like she said, the fun drinks are going out to eat, the making those purchases and had to have the tough conversation of, do you see what's going on?

22:14Brian Preston:And like, it wasn't, it definitely wasn't easy conversation. So which is more important to you, Hannah, the lifestyle stuff, because that's also family stuff is going out to eat once or twice and doing little mini trips, even if it's camping. Is that more important or is the SUV? I think probably the lifestyle. So we can't bring you back. And do you have resentment from that though? Or is that something that, is this something, if you made this decision, you would be okay with it? I would be okay with it. I need to get that in my mind though. That's the thing. Needing a new car is pretty important.

22:45Brian Preston:First time you've said need. So I love that because you just said, hey, I really want a big SUV. I really want. And what I was going to draw you back to is there is a delineation between wants and needs because I would argue if you guys have a car that will not start in wintertime and a Tacoma, you guys, if you're going to be a family of four or five, you need a larger automobile. Is having a big SUV the need? Perhaps not. Perhaps that's what I think. Really diving into, okay, what's the bare minimum that we need? And then in a second, we'll sort of triage back into what can we afford. But I think that's beautiful that you recognize that.

23:20Brian Preston:Hey, we do need a bigger car. We do. And I think we would all agree. I think she subconsciously just did that. That's why it's great. I also feel like we're at a point where we've talked about this so many times. It's like we have so many different variables that we could take the path to. It's just making that first decision of, okay, do we want this lifestyle? Then we can't have this. Do we need the car? Then we can't do this. So we're stuck in so many different variables that we just need to take the first step of like, okay, we're going to do this and this is going to be the stuff we're going to have to sacrifice because of it.

23:51Do y 'all ever fight over that stuff or is that y 'all kind of a united front? Because that's super powerful if y 'all are united about it.

23:57Brian Preston:I mean, I wouldn't say we really fight. Like obviously we both have our feelings towards everything, but we're really honestly pretty good at trying to communicate. Like since we started dating, I come from the mindset of having those tough conversations. And then when we – like the way we look at it is it's not her and I versus each other. It's her and I versus what's the problem. So we try to be a united front on all that. And I think having the – because she is analytical, seeing that stuff. And when I bring it forth, it's not like, hey, we just need to do this. Let's talk through, like she said, of, okay, if you go back to work, this is the lifestyle we can have.

24:34Brian Preston:You might not be home with him as much. Or do we sacrifice not getting the new SUV and not making those type of decisions? And then we have that family-oriented where you get to have that one-on-one with him and any potential kids down the road. If you don't come on this show, is there any chance that your car doesn't crank up one morning because it's cold outside? And you all go, let's go to the dealership. And then you end up with a$1 ,200 car payment and a brand new shiny SUV? No. There's no chance. Because I'm just telling you, you know, you wake up one day and then you go, because they'll, I mean, you show up at a dealership, they'll put you in the car.

25:09Brian Preston:Yeah, I'm probably the emotion there. And then he's the reason. The reason. Yeah. And like, let's do this. And he goes, well, let's back up a little bit. And a husband loving his wife. I mean, there's a lot of things you'll put yourself in just to try to make you happy. Yeah. And that's why you guys, the reason I ask that is because your income, now that you're at half, you know, of what it was, it's tight. I mean, we'll go over the budget here. You're one car payment away from this dream that you're living where you get to make memories probably falling apart. And I want to make sure we have all the goals.

25:42Brian Preston:Because you said staying home, having another child, getting a family car. Were there other goals that you guys have in the intermediate and long term? Insurance for her and her son. Because with her leaving her job and the severance, they also paid her insurance up until February. Coming in just a few months. Coming in a few months. Do you have a plan yet? You don't have health insurance at work? I do. For them to add into my insurance would be almost another$600 a month. And that really squeezes to the point where it's like, again, I'm trying to work this over time to see. And I just, for me, I'm not seeing where that makes sense in that math and not really sure where to go from there.

26:24You can't go without health insurance.

26:26Brian Preston:Yeah, definitely can't go without it. And that's where I'm like. And I've looked into like. Like ACA marketplace plans, that sort of thing. I don't understand insurance. I don't even know what that means. Like I've looked into like healthcare.gov and you just kind of put in your basic information. That's right. That's what I'll say. Gotcha. That's one thing I can't figure out as an adult is insurance. That stuff is like affordable. You're also not alone in that. It's a super complicated system. So you're not alone in that. We've looked at like just like the basic plans, kind of figure out how much we can afford.

26:55Brian Preston:So I've looked in and that's anywhere from$150 to$250,$300. And that's even questionable right now because the subsidy is in jeopardy at the moment that we're recording this show. And that's also with, I think, the child tax credit, and that's$300, and that's going into it. Yeah, and wouldn't go without the insurance because they need that. Yeah, we have to have it. It's for Barrett and I. And I wouldn't even say that that's so much a goal as much as that's a thing that's going to have to happen, and we're trying to figure out where that enters. Because like car's a goal, staying home is a goal, having another kid is a goal.

27:34Brian Preston:All those are goals. Insurance is like, no, fairway, this is a pretty tight deadline. We got to have that solved. Yeah, I was going to say that's probably our first priority is finding insurance and figuring out how we can put that into the budget and how much we can afford with that. Got it. And that definitely is going to take precedent over the car. Brainstorming off the cuff. I think right now when we're earmarking stuff, we just need to know somewhere between$200 to$600. is probably going to need to be earmarked until we get this figured out. You know, so as we're thinking about how much margin you'll have in your life to look at goals, $200 to$600 needs to be kind of just corded off because that's how important this is.

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30:03Brian Preston:So go build your dream team today with Indeed. Get a$75 Sponsored Job Credit at Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Let's talk about resources that you have available to you. Because you told us that you guys, you were so kind. and you shared not only your net worth statement, but also a budget of kind of where dollars are going monthly. And it looks like your monthly budget is a little over$2 ,700 a month. For some context, what's the net pay that you have coming in? Like what hits your checking account? Are you zero-based budgeting, or is there more coming in than this$2 ,700?

30:37Brian Preston:There's more coming in with the overtime that I'm doing. So I get paid biweekly, so depending on the month, you can have two, three. But when I averaged out, it's like, I think it was somewhere like 3 ,000. And I guess the way I've tried to budget, and I don't know if this is the right way, is like if I were to only have a 40-hour work week and then anything that's over that, because I don't always have the time for the overtime, it's just kind of gravy on top. So roughly 3 ,000 in a month, but according to this, about 2 ,768 out is kind of what we're looking at. Yeah. Right. Are you guys doing any sort of saving right now?

31:12Brian Preston:I mean, because obviously we saw that you have like$85 ,000 net worth, a lot of that's in Roth and Roth 401k. Any money currently going into savings? For savings out of mine, I have with my work the 401k program. So I've just, I was for years, and the reason it is so high is because when I was at home and the Dave Ramsey thing was 15%, I, as soon as I was able to enroll, just set it to that and left it. 15%, yeah. And then they match, I think it was up to 5 % or 4 % at 5%. I forget how. It's a weird breakdown. I've now, when we did the calculations, back down to only investing 5%, which is the employer match.

31:52Brian Preston:You're doing the maximum to get the max. That's the maximum to get the max and not over in that account. And since then, I've not really invested anything into Roth for her or I. I do have the health savings account, and it's not really investing my money, but through the UnitedHealthcare that we have, They do like a tracker thing. And if you walk so many steps, so it's like 20, up to a thousand bucks that you can earn in a year. So I've just been putting that into the HSA that I have. Is there a matching formula likely if you put in five, they'll give you four? Or is it done? I think that's what it works out to.

32:23Brian Preston:Yeah, 5 % they match up for. So right there on the cuff, just doing that, like just doing enough to get your employer matched, you know, in the financial order of operations, that's step two in our world. You already got 9 % going to work for you. What's great about where you guys are is that when you start early, 25 and 27, it does not take a lot to do a whole lot of heavy lifting. So it's going to be interesting. Based on the hard work you did, when things were more comfortable, having$85 ,000 in net worth right now, a lot of that being in liquid assets, and just saving the 9%, have you projected out what that looks like by the time you get to retirement?

33:02Brian Preston:Kind of not really. I wasn't sure. I think it'll be mind-blowing. We say 25%, 25%, and we love that. But you were doing that early on. You were saving at that clip early on. You've given yourself some flexibility that if this is, perhaps this is all you can save for the foreseeable future until you go back to work or some circumstances change. I love seeing that. And I think you'd be amazed, the fact that you guys did figure that out at 25 and 27, how powerful that's going to be for you over the long term. He is such a future planner, and I love that about him. But I've needed to tell him, like we do need to figure out what we need right now.

33:37Brian Preston:Like, yes, it's super important to save, but we might need to back. Like I had to tell him to back that down. It was tough for me to go from 15. I get it. Especially watching the show. I'm like, but do you realize what it could be? Your budget doesn't look like you're wasteful. I mean, it looks. So that's, so now I need to ask you a few questions on this career you have because you make 55 ,000 in woodworking and you love it because you're working with your hands. What's your trajectory? I mean, do you get 2%, 3 % pay raises or is there a chance where you're going to make$65 ,000,$70 ,000? What's your career look like?

34:08Brian Preston:That's kind of up in limbo right now. They've done the last couple of years the 3 % track. I know that I've had leadership roles in there, and I'd like to keep moving up in that because our company's smaller family, but it's grown quite a bit to where now we're like 50 employees. And I've been there seven years. I know if I were able to make more, I would. I'd like to get something with more of a managerial type of – Well, look ahead of you and behind you. What opportunities do you see? I mean, do you think your boss is making good money to where he can pay his bills and stuff? Yeah, yeah. Because that's what I'm – now we get to the hard stuff.

34:51Don't you agree this is the hard point where we have to say, this is off the cuff. You got$3 ,000 coming in. you got$2 ,700 and we're not covering health insurance. Not a lot of waste in there. We've already blown it up with health insurance and we haven't bought the new car. We haven't saved for our house. This gets really hard really, really quick.

35:10Brian Preston:Because when it comes to changing your financial circumstances, in most scenarios, there's really only two levers you ever get to pull, right? One lever is decreasing expenses. I'm going to spend less. I'm going to have less flowing out. That's a lever. I don't know that you guys are wasting a ton of money. You've already kind of like done that part And the other lever then becomes, well, how do we increase income? How do we figure out how to have a bigger shovel so that we can fund some of these other things? And I think that's kind of, they're at the income piece. That's the other lever that you have to figure out how we can adjust.

35:44Brian Preston:And I wouldn't be like opposed to even just getting like a part-time job to kind of work around like his work schedule and then try to make a little money on the side. Like I'm not opposed to that. it's just kind of figuring out how we can do that. That's the other question I was going to ask you is because you have a very valuable skill set. I mean, because obviously, and I love the fact that you realized, I'm not gonna do this for eight years, but I could do this for two. And you immediately made yourself marketable and made a great income. I'm wondering, and look, I've used with my family and my youngest daughter, we've used occupational therapists for years.

36:19It is, and what's funny is I've seen some of them as they start growing their family, they can do some unique, it is a career that allows some uniqueness and that you could probably find a place. And I think there's such a demand and need. You could probably go backfill some hours, you know, if you had a mom's morning program, but look, I'm conflicted because I want y 'all to grow a family. Y 'all seem like a lovely family, but I think that you have to, you're kind of like our Rebe in some ways is that she's had to figure out how do you do the traditional type family stuff, but also how do you help out with the family if you have this capability?

36:55I don't know what that answer is yet, but I think that that's probably a smart path to kind of thinking you, because if we get to the point that Matt says, I'm giving it all I got, I mean, woodworking in general, what's the career trajectory? I mean, is this a six-figure type career?

37:13Brian Preston:I think if you go on your own and do something like that, and it could be, I don't know if you'll ever do six figures just in a shop honestly and the only thing is because it is so tight already I've mentioned to her before it would be kind of nice to maybe try doing this on my own but I know and that's a whole other journey I've pushed that off and off because it's a three years journey and right now we just that'd be way too scary to not know because it's like too risky. And where I'm at, like I review in February and there's an opening for leadership roles. So maybe a little more, but I don't ever see six figures at something.

37:58Brian Preston:But those leadership roles would create an increase in income. Hopefully. Yeah, it would hopefully. Because what I'm thinking is obviously we know there are some goals that you have, right? Specifically short-term goals around you have to have this insurance in place. You really want to need a new car to be more appropriate for the family. I'm thinking the work that Brian and I are going to have to do is we're going to have to figure out, okay, based on the way that you guys are spending money now and the things we know that you have upcoming, if we can't cut expenses anymore, how much more income do we need?

38:31Brian Preston:That would be a really big help to kind of point us into the direction of what I need to do and what needs to happen in the future to make these goals possible. Awesome. And I think that's kind of one of the answers we're really looking for. And it may be something where, okay, hey, if you just at your job, if you get a$10 ,000 raise or a$5 ,000 raise, it makes them, or hey, if you could work part-time and make$15 ,000, I don't know what the answer is going to be. We'll need to kind of like crunch through the numbers. But what I'm hearing is you guys are both, you both recognize and are open to the fact that's probably going to be where the solution lies.

39:06Brian Preston:How do we create more income for the family? Definitely. Love that. Yeah, and I was kind of caregiving on the side too, but that kind of – some of their family situations happened and I'm not doing that. So that was a little bit of extra money and that did help, but that's kind of not in the cards right now. Was that something you were able to do with Barrett? Yes. Yeah, I could see him. That's creative. That was pretty nice to have that where he could go along with her. Are there other families? Are there other opportunities in the area in which you live where potentially that could be an option?

39:34Brian Preston:Probably. Probably. I would just have to look for it, but that's kind of, I don't really know how to look for it in that sense. It was a family friend, kind of the opportunity arose. Yeah, it was a friend of a friend that needed some help type of a thing. So it just kind of fell under a lap. We're like, cool, we need some extra side income anyway. We can do some math, number crunching, and figure out, hey, what do we need to get them on health care at this? What's a reasonable amount on a car payment we can get them? And now you know, hey, we need to go find an extra$1 ,200 to$1 ,500 a month. and how are we going to make this happen?

40:05Brian Preston:Is there a scenario in which you could be a one-car family? And it's okay if the answer is no. I don't want to put that on you, but as we're going to think about some creative solutions, because one of the things I'm about to ask is, how much is your car worth and how much is it to come worth? They're both paid for outright, but what's the current market value of each of those automobiles? I think mine's just under$30 ,000,$29 ,000,$30 ,000, somewhere around there. Mine, it's a 2012 with 220 ,000 miles on it, so not really worth it. Yeah, that one's just the drive till the wheels fall off. Pretty much.

40:40Brian Preston:And I don't really drive it on a daily either. It's like if I'm home with Barrett, we would run to the store. We need to go pick up this, that, and the other thing. It's like we don't really necessarily need two cars. It's super nice to have, too. If it was something like, hey, I need to get up with him at 6 in the morning and drop him off at work just so we have a vehicle just in case. I would add more miles on it. Is your vehicle mostly for commuting to and from work? To and from work, going down to Ohio to see her parents. I mean, we pretty much drive that when we're not. How far is your job?

41:16Brian Preston:My job is a 15-minute drive, so it's not much. Because I want to just introduce my line of thinking here. You have a need for an automobile that can be the support for the family. But right now, the nicest automobile in your home, the one that's taking up the most wealth for you, is your truck, which is kind of like a commuter vehicle. One of the things I just, again, I'm just trying to figure out what ideas you guys are open to. If we were to determine, hey, honestly, it doesn't make sense for the nicest car to be the truck. The nicest car ought to be the family automobile. Is there a solution where we use these two vehicles that you have to get that nicer family car?

41:55Brian Preston:and we figure out some sort of commuter solution for you to and from work. Is that a viable? Here, let me put it this way. What if there was a reliable, not super expensive, but reliable minivan sitting at the house, and then you drove a beater to work every day that would get you to and from work? I was painting it a little bit. This is the reality. Let's be honest here. I was trying to put some lipstick on this. But that's what we're building if we were trying to, because you have something valuable. You have a$30 ,000 equity vehicle. Look, Tacoma's are great vehicles. I hate taking that away from you.

42:31But we got to get really creative. Just like we took away the SUV over here, we've got to get honest and say, we're going to need some sacrifice on your side too just to make this all work. Because the carpet, we got to get you health insurance. And I don't see a car payment. I'm like, how the heck are we going to do this? It's going to be tough. So it's got to be something pretty small.

42:53Brian Preston:I know I have said to her before, like, hey, why don't we let me drive your car, and then I'll let you drive the truck around type of a thing because of that and drive it as a beater. So I'm not opposed to that. But why does it have to say the truck? But it doesn't have to say the truck. I guess I've never really thought that of, hey, you know. That definitely is my baby. I get it. Oh, my gosh. Did you see how much he was smiling when we said no to the big SUV, and now the tables have turned? Yeah. I don't know if that's going to be the solution, but I just want to introduce the idea that when we're in these types of situations, we have to think really, really creatively.

43:31Brian Preston:And we have to think outside the box when there are things that really matter to us, like having another child, being able to stay home. Those are wonderful, amazing, noble things, but there often are trade-offs and sacrifices that seem intense. but again, the way that your financial life and the way your life looks today does not dictate how it must look tomorrow. So this may be something that this is going to be the solution for this season. It does not mean this will always be the solution. Right. Yeah, I wouldn't be opposed to it. It definitely would hurt because that was like that one thing younger.

44:07Brian Preston:Now you have to be. What's your favorite food in the world? Favorite food? Steak. Easy. You're going to come to a point in your life and I'll just tell you it's going to happen that your child's going to get to be four or five years old, and they're going to say, Daddy, I want some of your steak. And you're going to cut them off a piece. I watched Bo yesterday because, like I said, we saw his family out. We had picked up our two tacos, and they gave us probably six chips with our two chips and salsa. And I watched Bo because this is not a lot of food. And I watched his kids. They roll up next to us because it's just coincidentally.

44:44Maybe it wasn't coincidence. Maybe she's playing chess and we're playing checkers. They rolled on. And every one of the kids is like, Daddy, can I have some chips? Can I have some chips? And I watched him give those chips gladly to the kid. So I'm telling you, you're probably, that Tacoma, as much love as you have for it, when you see your family in that safe vehicle, you're not going to care about Tacoma. Not going to care. I feel that from just from what you've already shared with us. I think it's going to be A-OK.

45:13Brian Preston:Yeah. Yeah. I think that's definitely an idea. I've never, I don't know why I haven't thought of that, but yeah, it has more trading power and then getting a better payment for something if needed, for sure. Well, y 'all got to get through, because look, I want y 'all to not put the family planning on a shelf, but we've got to look at this five to six year period where you're going to not, and eventually you'll be able to go full horsepower, make 55,$60 ,000 a year. But it is very valuable for y 'all's family unit. This is what you've put as a priority. let's look at this five to six year period where we're not having to give up all of our future but we have to be really smart with every resource that you have because there's nothing that can be left sitting out there not utilized right well I think we've got our marching orders all we ask for you guys is to be open to the creativity and I bet we're going to find a way that we're going to do all of these things and end up in the place that you guys want to be for that great big beautiful tomorrow absolutely you guys are wonderful Well, thanks so much.

46:13Brian Preston:Thank you. Thank you for having us on. Brent, I love talking to Matt and Hannah because I feel like they are a wonderful proxy for what a lot of young people are feeling right now. They have goals of starting a family and doing some important life stuff, but man, things are tight and they just don't know the best way to figure out how to make it all fit. They are literally in the messy middle. Think about 25, 27, having a child. Now, here's the good news. They're definitely short on time. They're short on money. While they were both working, They crushed it. They did. They had a lot of money that they saved up and they were very disciplined.

46:47I think they're going to start seeing that some of these hard decisions they have to make with the health insurance, with the vehicles they drive, it's going to be made better because they had discipline at the early part of their marriage.

46:57Brian Preston:And it's not just they had discipline early on. They even have discipline now. When you look at their original budget, it was pretty reasonable. They weren't living extravagantly. They weren't living beyond. They just literally have some obligations coming their way that they aren't going to be able to meet. But it's not because they're wasting money. They're spending about$2 ,800 a month. And so we said, okay, we know we got this car thing we got to figure out. We know we got this insurance thing we got to figure out. And then you also want to live life and get to enjoy the here and now. So we said, okay, what if we began reverse engineering some of this stuff?

47:27Brian Preston:How would this look if we began trying to do some problem solving? And in my opinion, the very first problem they had to solve, like is like Pronto has to solve, is the health insurance issue. This couldn't be optional. Now, we know that he had insurance covered through his employer, but you can't have your wife and child just hanging out out there. There's just too much risk. There's too many things that could go wrong. I thought it was interesting is that they've done so good. I would have loved to get a guest on here that we could yell at them for how undisciplined they were, but they were just so good with their money.

47:57But there were several eye-opening things that I saw and the health insurance is something because I got the feeling that they knew it was important, but I think we opened their eyes a little bit more. This is a no stopper. You can't pass go without getting this done. Another one is I can't wait to when you and I can kind of talk about this car and the vehicle situation too.

48:16Brian Preston:Before we get to the car though, let's talk about, we did some research for them. We did a little bit of work. We actually went out on the healthcare marketplace looking at what coverages would be available. And we said that if they did a silver plan, because Matt is on his current insurance, but if they just put their son and Hannah on an ACA silver rated plan in their area, it'd be about$335 a month. So again, we're reverse engineering. where their budget needs to be. We would need to add about$335 a month for health insurance. Now, and if we, Matt just added them and created a family plan, wasn't it around$600 a month?

48:49$600 a month, so twice as expensive. So this is already creating well over$200 margin or differential already.

48:54Brian Preston:And look, this isn't a cost they're going to want to bear, but it's a necessity. They have to have it in there. So, all right, that's problem number one. They got to get at least enough more, at least more income to be able to satisfy health insurance. But then they did have the car issue. And it was so interesting because, man, he was, oh, we're going to drive a minivan, the big SUV, and he was all on board until we uncovered the Tacoma. Then we found out, oh, wow, we have this vehicle that has a lot of equity sitting inside of it. Didn't you see, I mean, even me and my wife, I mean, we all feel like it's just human nature.

49:28We all look at ourselves and we think that we're doing the things right. And so when Hannah was saying she wanted to drive an SUV and we were picking on Hannah about that, Matt was sitting over there going, yeah, yeah, I'm with you. But then he looked like a deer in headlights when all of a sudden we're like, wait a minute, you mean your wife's car is not very reliable and you're driving, what did he say his commute was? It was less than 15 minutes?

49:50Brian Preston:It was something quick, yeah. And you're sitting on this Tacoma that's got all this equity and like, wait a minute, there has got to be a better way to do this. And I could tell he was like, uh-oh. Look, in the most loving way possible, I think he quickly realized there's probably going to be a change coming for the Tacoma. And look, this is not a recommendation we love making. But when we're in tight time, sometimes we have to make difficult decisions. And that's exactly what we came up with. We said that, okay, if Matt were to sell his truck right now and he were to make$30 ,000 just cashing on the equity, we actually found that there are some reasonable cars in their area that he could buy for$10 ,000.

50:29Brian Preston:Now, it's not going to be the Tacoma. It's going to be a truck. It's going to be a beater. It'll be a beater that allows him to get from point A to point B. We'll call it a commuter beater. It'll be a commuter vehicle. Commuter beater. What matters for them more was not him necessarily being able to commute, but it was for Hannah and their son to be safe, for them to be in reliable transportation. So we're going to take$10 ,000 of that and get him a commuter vehicle, which leaves$20 ,000 left over for her. And we said, okay, if we have$20 ,000 for a down payment, and based on where their income is, if they want to fall inside 23.8, we determined that they could afford a car that's worth about$32 ,500.

51:05Brian Preston:Okay, okay. So then we went and did some research and we said, okay, well, based on this, what cars might be available? Brian, look at those minivans. Look at that. It is interesting because I thought it was interesting. 2024, that's pretty new. Chrysler Pacifica did have 60 ,000 miles on it, but right around 25 ,000. Now you said 32 ,000, so we're already going under. That might even cut down the car payment. right there. And then, of course, Toyota Sienna. You know, when people think of, they're thinking the Odyssey for the Honda, you're thinking of the Toyota. So we're even putting her in marquee stuff here.

51:372021, so it's a little bit older, but only 50 ,000 miles. There is going to be something that they can find in their marketplace that probably fits this need so that every morning when Hannah goes out to crank up that car, Matt can feel and have peace of mind knowing his wife and child are going to be in safe, reliable transportation.

51:56Brian Preston:So again, if we're thinking about building this budget, we've already added in some money for the ACA Health Plan at$335. Based on 23.8, we believe they can afford a car payment of about$400. Okay, so now we're up to$735 they have to increase. But we didn't want to stop there. One of the things when they were talking about what's important to them, going out to eat. Just having a little margin in the system to create memories, to have fun. Because they even said they can go camping. They don't need anything exotic for vacations. but I hate to cut them so lean that they can't at least just go out and make some memories by going out as a couple, going out as a family and eating out from time to time.

52:32Brian Preston:So what we said is, hey, let's add in a little fun money, little wiggle room budget of$200 a month. Well, if we add that, what you can see is we take their monthly budget from$2 ,768 to about$3 ,700 a month. That's the number. Their budgetary number they need to hit is about$735. So they got to figure out how do they cover an extra$1 ,000 a month or so? Well, what's great is Hannah has this skill set where she's going to be highly sought after. She's going to be very marketable. There are ways she could potentially go get a part-time job or maybe even Matt could figure out how do I make a career shift or how do I move to a different company?

53:08Brian Preston:Because they don't need a ton more. If they could just increase their income by$15 ,000 a year, I think it would change their entire living service. Well,$1 ,200 a month difference, because that's what we're talking about. That just might be an uncomfortable conversation for Matt at work. That might be, Hannah, like you said, part-time work. This is all doable. This is not catastrophic or you have to go change careers. You have to move to a different part of the country. These are all doable things. You just have to take action and start making these things, letting them happen. They laid out for us some, I'm going to say, some problems they had.

53:39Brian Preston:Health insurance was a problem. The automobiles were a problem. And not being able to have any fun money was a problem. I want to emphasize, though, one of the things they have on their side is one of the most important ingredients when it comes to wealth creation. They have time on their side. And we just think it's worth noting. We want you guys to know that just based on what they're currently doing, he was putting 5 % in his 401k, getting a 4 % match. And they had been saving really, really well up until this point. If all they did was continue on their current trajectory, not increasing their income, not increasing their savings, they already had about$70 ,000 saved up.

54:15Brian Preston:Well, just saving that 9 % into the future, not factoring in pay raises, not changing any of those numbers, they are well on their way to having a$4 million portfolio by the time they retire. So they are already in a fantastic circumstance because they did a lot of hard work really, really early on. Yeah, that's what's so hard is because we were, here we are talking about in their current situation because their budget was so lean, how do we save them on this with career and stuff? But kudos to them that they had so much already saved that it is going to help them out. If they came to us with zero, This is a completely different conversation.

54:50But because they were so good at the front end of their marriage, it's created a lot of really cool opportunities.

54:55Brian Preston:All right. So here's their homework items. These are the next steps for them. I think they got to figure out an insurance plan. They got to figure out how do we make sure that we cover that risk. And I think this is a high priority. Next, they got to figure out what to do about the car situation. We laid out an example, a scenario, potentially sell the Tacoma, get a commuter car, get into a reasonable 23-8 safe family car. and I think they can afford up to a$400 a month payment. Now, they don't have to have$400. It could be$250. It could be$300. But that's kind of where the guardrail is. And then number three, and this is probably the most important part, is how can we increase the level of income?

55:32Brian Preston:When it comes to financial decisions, we have two levers. We can either decrease expenses. They can't decrease expenses anymore. So they have to figure out how can we increase income. Yeah, but that's not going to be that bad because we have several things that can happen as we've already covered. You know, Hannah's got options. But then Matt can go have some conversations with his current employer since he likes his job. This is doable. And I think this is one that I think if you look at this, when they get this, they're gonna be like, yeah, we can do this. And hopefully they feel like a united front and there's nothing but just wins and excitement and memories that they're gonna make off of this plan that we've built for them.

56:06Brian Preston:Matt and Hannah, you guys were absolutely wonderful. If you out there would like to be a guest on Making a Millionaire, you can go to moneyguide.com slash apply. Or if you wanna play with any of our resources or calculators, you can go to moneyguide.com slash resources. Well, and I want to give a compliment to Matt and Hannah. Y 'all crushed it and we're so proud of you. And we just can't wait to see your success. So keep in touch. Guys, I'm your host, Brian Preston, joined by Mr. Bo Hanson. Money Guy team, out. Making a Millionaire is hosted by Brian Preston and Bo Hanson. Brian and Bo are partners at Abound Wealth Management.

56:40Brian Preston:Abound Wealth Management is a registered investment advisory firm regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission in accordance and compliance with the securities laws and regulations. Abound Wealth Management does not render or offer to render personalized investment or tax advice through Making a Millionaire. The information provided is for informational purposes only, may not be suitable for all investors, and does not constitute financial, tax, investment, or legal advice. All investments involve a degree of risk, including the risk of loss. The guests featured on Making a Millionaire are not clients of Abound Wealth Management at the time of recording.

57:11Brian Preston:Their participation should not be considered a testimonial or endorsement of Abound Wealth Management.