Messy Money (BA Q&A)

have question, I have some answers. Ish. What that means is I'm not your accountant, I'm not your mama, I'm not your financial advisor, your attorney child. I'm just your cute internet financial cousin that knows a thing or two about money and financing, etcetera, etcetera. Well, that means, though you are going to lead to these people that you pay for the final say on this advice. Okay, okay, okay, so your grandma not us? All right? Do you have questions? The best way to do it is you can email

us at Brownambition Podcast at gmail dot com. You can go to Brown Ambition Podcast dot com and click the contact us button or really just sliding our dms on ig Brown Ambition Podcast. Okay, we got some questions today, Honey, I'm not the let me see. I'm gonna call this. I'm gonna I'm gonna call this messy. Okay, we're gonna call miss messy. Hi, Hope all is well. I'm a fan of your podcast. I absolutely love it. Learned a lot about it through Tiffany. I've been following her for

some time and I love her too. Thanks girl, She said, I have a question. It's messy. Ooh child. You know you know me. I like a little mess man. Okay. So back in spring twenty twenty one, my sister asked me to borrow my Instacart account to make deliveries and I gave it to her. My boyfriend at the time then told me to tell her to stop using it because he's knowledgeable. On ten ninety nine and said I'd have to pay the irs come tax season. So ten ninety nine basically, it is this tax paper that you

get that says this is what you made this year. Right, So the employer said, this person is not my employee, but I did pay them on behalf of the business. So because they're not my employee. I didn't pay taxes for them. They have to pay taxes for themselves. But basically it's the employer rule telling the irs, go ahead and get your money, because here's the ten ninety nine, the proof that this person was paid but not no taxes were taken out. That's what a ten ninety nine is.

Fast forward to tax season in the winter. I received my annual income of about thirty five thousand dollars, as well as a ten ninety nine that said I earned about twenty one thousand dollars. Knowing well, knowing good and well, I did not work instacart. I was shocked and confused. I had already filed before for opening that envelope who for the ten ninety nine, and my tax person said I received a three thousand dollars tax return, so she was ready. I was excited and have plans. Of course

you did. Then I brought the ten ninety nine and he said I would actually owe the three thousand dollars. And then some Jesus, I know, my sister continued using my account even though I asked her not to. After learning about the ten ninety nine, I told her, hey, you're going to have to pay me about three thousand to pay the r ar rest. No, she okay, we're gonna finish with my stuff. Technically it didn't come out of my pocket because they just took it from the

return I would have gotten. Sad face. I know I'm not wrong for asking her for that money, because it was supposed to be mine. She should have been setting money aside. She's forty two and I'm twenty six. I'm gonna say that again. She's two and I'm twenty six, so I feel taken advantage of. She only zelled me two hundred and fifty dollars. I don't know what to do. Just pretend it didn't happen. I'm not gonna call you MESSI.

This is I'm calling MESSI is your sister. Tell your sister come, Tell her to come to the phone right now, twenty six, Go get your forty two yearld sister because I'm forty four. So we're gonna talk as peers. Go get your sister. Now, pause the podcast and go get her and bring her to the podcast. Hey, bea fan.

We're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back. Sis, your little sister told me that you asked to borrow her Instagram account, her Instacart account, which I'm not sure why you would do that, Like, are you not allowed to make money on your own either way? Where you first messed up because you should not have been using

her instacart account to do deliveries. So that's one, okay. Two, she asked you to stop Sis, and obviously you continued almost doubling her income, and she was supposed to get three thousand dollars back. Not only is she not getting three thousand dollars, she also owes another three thousand, So that's six thousand dollars that baby Cys is in a deficit for because of the choice that you decided forty two to make. Now, mistakes happen, I know this, but

now she's asking for it to be righted. And I know you love your baby Sis. You've only zeld her two hundred and fifty dollars. What is going on? And now baby sisters feeling taken advantage of it because quite honestly, as the big sister who is nearly twice her age and I'm not an age's becausist. I'm forty two, I'm forty forty four, I mean forty five two, I'm big sis to Yeah, why go ahead and run this girl back up? Dag on money? What is going on? Here's

the thing. You shouldn't have used an instacart, but you already did that. Okay, we're here now, two Like, I don't know if you understand. See the thing is, I find it hard to believe that you didn't understand how ten ninety nine work. Not at forty two, you don't, Like I could see if you was twenty six like your little sis, because I get it she probably didn't understand her boyfriend put her up on game about ten ninety nine. Girl, you knew that at ten ninety nine

was gonna get issued. Why would you do that? Honestly, that's you. You. I have three younger sisters. You know that one of the roles as an older sister is to educate, to protect, and honestly sometimes even provide for our little sisters. We're not here to take advantage of them. But now we're here. Girl, not only do you owe her that three thousand, you owe her another three on top of that. You do because she was gonna get back three thousand dollars. So now that we know all

that is true. We know this is true. Now it's time for solutions. I like to be a paper towel person. When I was a kid, I used to spill something. If it was my dad, he would get mad and be fussing and fuss and fuss and fuss and fussing, and then finally hand you a paper towel, which I just did with you because I'm still my daddy's daughter, and my mother would just say, just go ahead and get a paper towel. Well, you need a little fussing first, So now let's go to paper towel. The solution. We're

gonna clean this up. So you've only zeld her two hundred and fifty dollars, maybe more by now because you wrote this a little while ago. Okay, now, what is the payment plan to give this girl her six thousand dollars. Let's map that out. What does that look like? Because

it's not a matter of life. You're going to you know, like cause one twenty six, little sis, here's the thing that like, you are not going to pretend that it didn't happen, because even if you pretended it did, and you're going to feel some kind of way because you're supposed to feel some kind of way because your sister made a mistake. But sisters make mistakes. I've got four sisters. Lord knows that we've been up down, side to side. We made mistakes. But it is her job to remedy

that mistake. It is her job to remedy that mistake. And so now we're gonna map out a payment plan of what it looks like to pay her the six thousand, the three thousand that the IRS took already, and the additional three thousand she's had to pay. So what does that look like? Can you do? Is that five hundred bucks a month? Okay, let's do a little math. I'm taking my calculator right now. Okay, I'm gonna do a little my calculator. Calculata. Calculata six thousand dollars divided by

five hundred dollars a month is twelve months. So you can pay back little Sis in about a year. Because if you can do fifty two fifty every two weeks, can you do that? Can we get little Sis whole in about a year. I think we could do that. I think you should make that your your your business to do that. You know absolutely now here's the thing, little sis. I'm not gonna say you shouldn't trust people

so easily because that is your older sister. Of course you're supposed to trust something who are supposed to trust is not your sister. But when things like this happen, I want you to something that my dad taught me early on, even when it came to my sisters, is that you can let people borrow money, but never your name. So he said, you are not to co sign, you are not to write your name down. You are not to be a joint or whatever for anyone, like when

you get married, because legally you already join anyway. But he was like, if your sister comes to you says I want to buy a car, can you co sign for me? Now, not your not your boyfriend, not your sister, not your friend. It's better for you to say, I can lend you fifteen hundred dollars and if they don't pay it back, they don't pay it back. But lending your name means that they could do irreputable like damage

like this. Do you understand, little sis, that this is a really valuable lesson for you Never to lend your name like this again, and allowing her to have access to your insercart like like this, that was you lending your name. You didn't know, So I'm certainly not getting on you, but you're learning now just how important that is because the IRS does not care about oh my sister yea yea yeah, they're wah blah blah, we want

our money. And the thing is, I don't know how long it's been and if you've been able to pay the IRS, but Big Sis know that you got to pay that interest too, because if little Sis doesn't have that additional three thousand dollars, they might be charging her interest. You have to pay that, you know. And quite honestly, little Sis, y'all got the same mama, you black and if you not run, tell your mama. That's right, Big Sins.

She's telling them like you, not only your mama, tell your grandmama too, right, So if Big Sis don't give your money back, tell your mother because what they heal like, no, you need to confront her. I'm not saying that you guys shouldn't talk anymore. I'm not saying you're supposed to cut her off. I'm not saying that at all. But little Sis, this is when you put your big girl pants on, and you're gonna woman up and you're gonna

confront her and say that's not okay. Let's work out a plan like okay, and then I need my money back because that's not okay. And if she refuse to stay engaged, I'm talent because I'm gonna be a little Sis. I'm gonna be a little siss all the way. Okay, Yeah, but don't ever pretend that something bad did not happen to you. That's no no, because something did, you know, and Big Sis, like you know, we're gonna forgive you,

but you're also gonna get it together and make it right. Okay. Now, y'all hug and make a plan on the first and the fifteenth, pick those days if you want to open up a joint and well, no, I don't even do that because at this point Big Sis might not be able to be trusted. You're gonna send her that money every two weeks, five hundred dollars two fifty every two weeks until you pay it off. All right, all right, child, that was messy. Anyway, we're gonna take a break on.

I'm about to get a little gulp of water. Take a break and hopefully the next question won't be as messy. But y'all go ahead, big sins. I know you got a little attitude. Go ahead. It's okay because we're both grown women. I had to get you together. Girl. I still love you, but don't do that. We'll be back and blacker than ever. All right. I am refreshed requests and I'm back and black and brown. All right. Next question is for real. This is kind of the opposite

of the spectrum. Rielle said, Hey, ladies, question for you. I just got married in October. Congratulations girl, And I'm trying to combine finances. Okay, Now this is different what I just told little Sis, Big Sis. Combining of finances, no, no, no no, But in marriage is different because quite honesty direct looks at you the same. Anyway. I already have

almost two decades of good credit history. Okay, my cards would only let us My cards would only let us open new ones, or I can add my spouse as an authorized user. I thought I'd be able to add him on the existing account as joined. Any idea is what to do with my three credit cards? Now? We want a joint cash back card, which I already have with my city with city on my own, which is the same card we'd be opening as joined. I'm so bummed that I really wouldn't have a need for my

cards anymore. I don't want them to close. Any thoughts would be much appreciated. Thank you, Okayrym. Here's the thing. I believe in mine and hours when it comes to money and marriage. Ooh, I like that. Did you know what I said? I believe in mine and hours when it comes to money and marriage. So I don't think you have to close your card if you don't want to, you certainly keep. I mean I literally have my first card.

I mean, you know, I was married to Jirell, and I have my card from when I got when I was in college. It's my Bank of American card that I barely use. You know, I want to say, when I got married to Jerrell, I had two credit cards, maybe more, maybe three, maybe like you, but definitely two that like I kind of was using. And then when we got married, I kept them. I didn't really use them much, but I kept them, and they I was able to keep my credit history because I understand you

want that credit history. So you don't have to close those cards. You can put like one small little bill on it and pay it off automatically. If you want to keep that good credit history, do that. So but if you want to have a card that both of you guys can be using, maybe you're using it for bills or whatever, then you can open up a new card with City while keeping your old card. Because like my husband and I'm at the time, we were using like Wells Fargo, So he had a Wells Fargo card

and account. I had a Wells Fargo card account, and then we had a joint one. So I don't think like it's not that when you're married you throw away your whole exists and l now and you can literally keep all the accounts and the cards you had before and then just open new joint ones and then navigate with new rules. So this is what Jerell and I the rules that we had for me and Jerrem so

I had a checking account for spending for myself. He had a checking account for spending on himself, almost like allowance, right, that was one one checking account each for ourselves independently, and then we had a joint checking account for I called it family slash house bills. So that was like groceries, gas, you know, any like we don't have a we didn't have a mortgage, but like PC and G water, like the electrical bill blow but any kind of joint expenses

that affected the house. Even what we started to do, we started to do date nights out of those bills, Like like we had that card and like when we would like every Friday, we would have a date night, and each one of us could choose what date night

looked like. And so because I made significantly more than Jirell toward the end of his life, we started to say, okay, then you can just we just used that card, you know, for date night, so we can kind of have like equal footing when it came to planning date night, and so you can make up your own rules. But that's what we did. We had this joint account where it was like this is where we literally called it the bill's account. And it's crazy. It's just funny because I

just came back. Not funny, but I just came back from the bank. Now, I don't know drug. I mean, he's been gone for about two and a half years now. It seems so so real and crazy. Anyway, he's been gone for like two and a half years now, but I got a check in the mail from the hospital where he passed away, or maybe it was his health plan, whatever it was. It was like one hundred and sixty dollars check that they said, and I was like, uh,

what is this for? It was a refund and I have an estate trust bank account like like I that I opened up, you know, as the administrator Darrell's estate. But the check said Jerell Smith, not the estate of Drel Smith. So they wouldn't let me deposit in the estate account. I was like, what am I supposed to do? They're like, do you have any account with his name on it? And I did. My bill's account still has his name on it, and so they're like, we can

put it there. I'm like, well that seems stupid. So why'd you make me go through this whole estate creating a whole estate account if like you're just gonna like he's not even here. And so either way, I was able to deposit this account, this check with his name on it, into our bills account because it still existed

and it still had his name on it. So it just had me thinking I just told my sister or the other when I came home, I said, all of us, like I have a joint account with one of my sisters when I used to help her, and so I think I told her, I said, all of us should have a joint account with one sister, just in case something like this happens, because even if we have a state account for you, apparently you can't even use it.

Really that if you have a joint account, we would still be able to deposit and withdraw money if it were to come and trickle in some years later. Anyway, So I just share all that to say that even now I still have a joint account with him, you know, even though he's not here. And so we also had independent savings accounts and then joint safets account. We had independent and retirement accounts, and then joint investment accounts. Does that make sense? So everything that we had joined we

also had independently as well. And so I'm not saying that's the way to do it. I'm just saying that's the way we did it. We sat down, we talked through it, how do you want this to go? And I believe in mine and hours. So it's like the vast majority of the money that was brought into the household wanted to be our bucket. But I also believe that adults should have some autonomy. If he wanted to buy some Jordan's, should he'd be like, hey, Bib, you know I'm gonna use the bill money for it. No,

he has his own checking account. We started that because that's what we were doing. We had all of our money in one thing, nothing independent, and that we were always checking in for these small things. Hey I'm gonna get my hair done just so you know it's gonna be one hundred dollars. Hey I'm gonna buy some sneakers

just so you know it's gonna be two hundred dollars. Now, So we started were like, you know, we need to have some separate money where it's not affecting the household budget, so you could do whatever you want, because we already had agreed upon the amount of money that was going to go to our household budget, our household savings, our household investing, and then outside of that you could do what you wanted, so you still have autonomy as an

adult to navigate financially. That makes sense and that worked best for us, and because I made significantly more than Jirell, We didn't do fifty to fifty. Instead, what we did was Darrell contributed the majority of his check to the

bills account. So because he really was he really wanted to pay the bills, and I said okay, And so I didn't really put anybody didn't put any money into the bills account except I helped my parents, and so I would put the money into the bills account that I was sending them every month, because the bill's account would generate an automated check and still does that sends money to my parents every month. So that money I

put into the bill's account. But all the other money that went into the bills account was Durell because he was like, no, I want to pay the bills. I said okay. And then the majority of the money that I made went into our joint savings and investment account. So he funded the bills account. I largely fund did our joint savings and investment accounts. Does that make sense? And so it

just worked for us. So even though we had these joint accounts, we funded them quote unquote financially unevenly, but in a way that was equitable and fair to us. And so you know, I'm sharing that candidly, you know, because and y'all I've shared this before that you know that Jerrell never made over sixty thousand dollars a year. But as a result of navigating that way, when it was time to buy a house, it was like, okay, he's like, I want to still pay all the bills.

I'm like, okay, well, the kind of house that I want to get is not going to be available at that at you know, at his income level. But we, because of how much money I was making what was in our savings, was able to buy us the house. It was a foreclosure cash the house was one eighty so it was like, okay, we could buy this house one eighty, which we did. And then it allowed him to still pay the bills because we didn't have a mortgage. So it was like the taxes he paid, the electrical bill,

the water bill, whatever. But do you see, it was like that's what marriage is. It's this dance between how do you want this to go? You want to manage all the bills and pay all the bills, great, but a mortgage would put us outside the range of you paying the bills. Oh well, I'm doing most of the savings and investing on our behalf, okay, so we can use that money to buy the thing. So it still puts us in range that you can still pay all

the bills. So I'm sharing that because I want you to understand, like as you are in partnership, there are no rules that you can make up whatever rule you want. I mean, certainly you can get rid of all your personal financial stuff individually and just only do like a you know, collective financial stuff. That's okay. You can say we don't want to blend any money, that's okay, But it should be a conversation, a collective decision, a willingness to both be on the same page. So whatever that is.

So that's what Jirell and I did. But I tend to believe in having some our money as well as some our money. So my money and our money and most of the money is ours, you know. But I think it's important for adults to have some autonomy. But

you might not think that, and that's okay. But I'm just saying all that to say, you don't got to get rid of all your credit cards if you don't want to, but you can still open joint cards and you could just keep your credit cards open, put some light bills on them so they don't get canceled, and you can maintain your good credit history. All right, realm, I hope that was helpful. All right. Well, if you like, if you like this ey, and you think your sex

to come on, baby, share me now. If you like the episode and you thought it was cute or whatever, go ahead on and share it with a friend. Leave us a review, you know, like I don't know, like, tell the girls we're trying to blow up around here, all right, man, I be back next week, so you know, be kind and gentle to me, all right until next week, y'all. Bye,