Paying off $78,000 of Debt | Jen’s Debt Payoff Story

We have not shared our own I mean, we've shared bits of our own stories, but never dedicated individual episodes to each other. So this episode is for me and next week's episode will be Jills. Well, I think this is like, why haven't we've done this for more than

four years? And certainly if someone's been binging us or following along for the last few years, you you kind of know you, you know our stories that comes out in bits and pieces, but to have it consolidated and almost like a reintroduction for those who might just be finding us, here's a little bit about us. And I'm excited to play the role of interview or with you. Jen. I'm sure there's going to be things I learned. I'm always learning new stuff about you. So I'm excited, I know,

and I am excited for you to interview me. I have shared my story on quite a few different podcasts, I guess, never on my own and never from someone who I know, uh and knows me so well. So it's always really good to be interviewed by someone who knows you really well, because they are definitely going to ask you about the things that you would not think you or want to share. Maybe. So, are you nervous? I don't know. I guess we'll see if I need to be nervous, I'll be kind to you. Thank you. Well.

Before we get into that, we need to tell you that this episode is brought to you by Adult Summer Camp. Never imagined this would be a thing. Never fought you could relive your days of not showering for a week, eating marshmallows for dinner, and singing nonsense songs with your friends. Well, thanks to our overly nostalgic millennial generation, Adult summer camps do exist, and we will be hosting our version June

through our two Frugal Living Summit. While it is virtual, you will get all the camaraderie, new friendships, and learning on everything frugal spending related and of course the no showering, eating camp fire meals and singing songs is totally up to you. For living summit dot com, it's free, get your free ticket. I will personally shower. That's a decision that I have made. Um last year I decided not to shower, just to like live in it, and Travis

really requested that this year. That's one of the changes we make to the itinerary. So anyone's guess what all might be an any other day thing. Yeah, but the eating hot dogs is definitely goingly. We will for sure be eating hot dogs. That's a no brainer. So if you love debt payoff stories, which I think if you're listening to this one you might, I have a few

other episodes for you to queue up after this. So we've got episode one, which is paying off debt and your mental health with Melanie Locker, and it's not paying off your mental health, but it's how the two combine. Episode one seventy nine paying off thirty three thousand dollars of debt and living on half of your income with El Martinez. And then we have episode one forty three, how our friend Lydia paid off thirty six thousand dollars

of debt on one income. So those are a few good ones to queue up, and hopefully this one will be a good one to queue up. In later episodes, we'll see taken away Jill's before we get into the story of your journey out of debt. Let's back up and walk us through your journey into debt. Yes, so I grew up in a family where we actually never

had debt. We just lived paycheck to paycheck, and that was kind of enough when never saved, never went on vacations, um, kind of never had enough money when an emergency came up. It was always like a scramble. Um. My mom used to say, we don't have bad credit. We have slow credit me and it just takes us some time to pay our bills, but we do. So that was what I grew up thinking about debt. And so when I got to college, I was like, I'm smarter than my

parents because I'm seventeen and I graduated year early. So I am going to get a credit card and be smarter about money. And thank god that card was only a five limit, because I actually had to wait until I was eighteen. Obviously, to get the card, but I did wait that whole first year of God, but I thought I was smart so that I so I was going to have good credit. And what it really did was it set me up to kind of have a

revolving credit on that card throughout college. And I went to grad school and I got another credit card because they offered a free free companion flight on it, and I was like, oh, I'll take my friend in New York City because that's wise. I can afford that, right, and ended up actually putting more debt on that card than I could pay off. So that was like my first foray into debt. But my biggest debt was the student loans from my graduate program. I got. My undergrad

was completely paid for by scholarships. But when I went to grad school for acupuncture, an oriental medicine, that was completely out of pocket and it was a private school so there wasn't like any other options for there, and so that was fifty thousand dollars and it ballooned up to fifty four thousand dollars by the time I got serious about paying it off. And then I had a car that I got right out of college that also

gave me. I think it was about ten thousand dollars, but I tried to pay as much of that off before I got married, so I think that added to like part of it. But so I spent a lot of time ignoring that debt because as a community acupuncturist, So we worked on a model that was like kind of pay what you can afford. And I love that. I love serving people who with things that they may not be able to usually afford, but like serving them

in that way just kind of reaching more people. Like low cost, high volume sort of thing that's always been my jam um, not necessarily nonprofit work, but just like in a kind of a low price, high volume business type of things. So, but it didn't pay well because of that, and uh so I had more debt than

I made in a whole year. And what started this whole thing for me in paying it off was that when I got engaged to Travis, he brought twenty four thou dollars of student loans and was like, I want to pay this off immediately as soon as we get married, and I was like, I was not not into that. But so that's how the journey into seventy eight thousand dollars of debt came into plan, and honestly, the two credit cards by that point weren't even factored in. Because

this is a great story. I somebody hit my car in a Starbucks parking lot and I came out and I didn't know about it. I came out and saw it and there was a note on the car, but it was just like a dent in the back bumper, like it was totally drivable, and their insurance paid for it obviously, And instead of using that money to get my car fixed, I used to pay off the credit cards. Those were tippy Starbucks accident, right, and I just drove around with a dent in my bumper four years. Maybe

I should go to Starbucks more. Yeah, make sure the parking a lot of small though. So that was our journey into debt. I don't think that I realized eyes that it was comprised of more than student loan debt. That is that is knowledge for me today. Part of the I mean, the car loan was just like maybe

four thousand of it by the time, like we got shamed. Yeah, right, But I think it is interesting to recognize that sometimes our debts and our journey into debt, and our comfort level with debt does have to do with more than just the decision we made for higher education and some of what we might do around that lifestyle. When you are going to school full time, a lot of times it does mean that it's then also paired with credit card debt, because we still want to live life and

maybe even maintain a lifestyle that we can't afford. So that's it's good to look at that reality. Even if you're able to pay it off or you're just floating a little bit of a balance, like you're still interact ing with debt and utilizing it to maintain a lifestyle. Yeah.

And then the part about this is something I've been hearing a lot from people with student loan debt, is the increase on it, like they've stopped going to school, but the interest is accruing, and you know, you might have graduated with like, like you said, fifty dollars of debt, but then by not taking it super seriously, it balloon to fifty four. And that is like stab in the heart to realize that reality. Yeah, I mean, so it was I And I don't think I think debt is neutral.

I don't think there's good debt or bad debt. I think it is all in how you use it. And because I had a car loan that I had to pay and the Federal Student Loan Agency allowed me to pay less than interest every month on my student loan, it didn't force me to focus on my student loan, even though it was higher interest than my car loan. So having that extra debt prevented me from paying off

my student loans. So it does have to do with like, if you're in debt one place, it kind of can snowball to debt other places, and then that just like compounds on itself to make it harder to pay off the first debt, like kind of essentially robbing Peter to pay Paul almost but in debt. So Travis knew exactly how much your husband how much debt he had, and was very convinced he wanted to pay it off quickly.

You weren't as convinced. So what was that moment when you realized, Oh, here's how much we have and I want it gone. This is a pretty pivotal moment because I had always said, like, oh, when I get married, then I'll pay off my debt because I really can't do it on my own income, which is my own limiting belief for sure. And I look back now and I see I was never more positioned then I am

now to pay off debt. So I was waiting, and then the time came when we were engaged and Travis said he wanted to pay off his debt, and I was like, actually, I'd like to live a little bit, Like I've been on the edge of paycheck to paycheck for so long. I'd really like to enjoy this new income and not live under a rock. Is literally how I put it. I could see you saying that it's either I pay off debt or I live under I am living extremes. I am definitely the person who lives

in extremes for better for worse. It's my own like thing that I deal with. But yeah, like I didn't have the concept of the radical middle there, like that you could pay off debt and still have the things E value. That never occurred to me. So what Travis did was he and he didn't even know he was doing this, I guess, but he just like he tried to get to like my deeper Yes, like what is it that makes other things easier to say no to because, uh, the yes is deeper. And for me, it was foster care.

So like I have been I've had a heart for foster care for over a decade now, I guess it was definitely before I met Travis, I was working in a group home, and because I didn't want to volunteer at a group foster home, because I wanted more responsibility and more access to the lives of um kids in care. Uh. So, like I just decided to work there on the weekends. Uh. And so that that took up every weekend of my life, and I wanted to I knew that that wasn't sustainable,

but I wasn't ready to foster myself. So I really want to be able to do that. But with that comes a lot of responsibility, like a lot of visits and doctor's appointments and kids acting out in trauma and stuff like that. And so I knew having a full time job and being beholden to debt payments would make being accessible more difficult. And so he opened my eyes to how much easier could it be for you to fulfill your dream in life if we were debt free.

So that was my deeper yes and obviously it didn't work are of the time, but it was the catalyst that I needed to change my perspective on debt. And I've since learned that you don't have to like put your life on pause to pay off debt. You can do it and do it, you know, in a balanced way. But yeah, that was really the moment. And I knew my number already gave me anxiety, like gave me an insane anxiety to look at my debt number, so I knew how much it was hanging over my head. Tried

to ignore it. But when Travis really inspired me to look at our entire lives and he made it about my dreams, not just his, that was when I got on board. M isn't that It's so true for so many of us, though, This need to have it connected to something, and it can't just be arbitrary. You know. You hear some people who say, Okay, there's this number, and it was overwhelming, so I knew I had to

do something about it. But oftentimes that's not enough. Just seeing a really big number on a piece of paper or on your computer isn't always enough to say, let me make drastic changes in my lifestyle to get this gone. Yes, it's anxiety producing. You knew your number, you knew it was a lot, but it still took more to connect it to that thing, to tether it to something, to anchor it to something for an actual reason, not just because I just don't want to see this number on

this computer screen anymore. And so you said it's a it's a big number, seventy eight thousand dollars of debt. And now we've heard so many people's stories of six figures, nearly half a million, like it's you know, it's not a race to the bottom. Everybody has their own story. But that is a lot. Most people would not be able to pay that off in a matter of months or even a year or a few years. How did you stay on track? How did you stay motivated to

get this large sum of money tackled? So we didn't have big incomes we um by the end of it, we were making up to eighty eight thousand dollars gross,

but we did. We started. I was making maybe thirty five at my acupuncture job, and the I guess the Foster home was maybe bringing in eight or ten extra a year, So like forty five in a good year is what I was making gross and Travis was unemployed when we started, So we literally started our debt free journey UM thousand dollars, which is less, I mean, gosh,

almost half of what our total debt was. Like it on paper, it looked like stupid, but we worked on it together and so I can confidently say, like everyone said, everyone says, the budget is what does it for them, And it wasn't the budget for me. I have never been a great budget or I still don't budget often. For me. It was about the accountability, having the accountability between Travis and I and wanting to do this for him and him wanting to do it for me made

this journey sustainable. And and that's exactly why we've created our our community, our private community, is to give people a place to do that, because that's really what did it for me. And when we had that, then we were more motivated to create the budget, to stick to the budget, to have the budget meetings, and we were motivated to have open communication about our expenses without judgment, with grace, all of these things, and it it came down to having a community, and not just in my home,

but outside of my home too. Because I realized a lot of my friends just wanted to spend money. They were not trying to get their finances together like we were. And I had to find new friends for a season, which thankfully became lifelong friends. But and I'm still friends with some of the people. I had to kind of unfollow or mute on social media for a few years.

But yeah, I had to kind of I had to shift the community outside of my home too, to be one where people were more conscious about their money and okay, doing free things. And so it was really the people around me that had a huge impact um in my motivation to stick with it. And then the second thing, the second thing that was most important. A year into

our debt payoff, we were making good progress. We had went down from thinking it was going to take us five years to knowing that we were going to do it into and we were a year and we knew we had a year left, and I was miserable, Like I was, I was miserable, I was hopeless. I was like, I don't know how I'm going to do this for another year. And I know now that some of that could have been avoided by having a a more focused

life plan. I think and um kind of a little bit more of a balance between the goal and the life, the immediate goal in the long term goal. But I started writing about what I was learning, what I had learned for the past year. I started teaching, trying to teach other people the lessons that I had learned in a difficult way, and that shifted the journey for me.

When I stopped dwelling on what the journey was taking from me and started focusing on how I could give back as a result of this journey, everything changed and the last year was like non existent to me, Like I didn't even realize it was happening. I was just doing it and then we were done. So those were the two biggest motivators for me. Yeah, it's so interesting.

It's almost as if you're describing in order to get you motivated to begin, you needed a deeper y and purpose, and in order for the motivation to keep going, you needed another why and purpose attached to it. Again, I think that's really similar for a lot of people. But something that stands out to me about you. One of the things I really admire and I think drew me to you when we first met. I met you in the midst of your debt payoff journey towards the tail end.

Is your authenticity and transparency in this process, not without protection you're not sharing anything that's that you don't want to be sharing, but even to be able to talk about your salaries, what you did make, what you then were making by the end of it, and how you journeyed through this, some of the ways that you would have done your debt payoff journey in a more balanced way.

I think all of this it's so relatable. I think sometimes we can talk really cryptically about our debt payoff journeys and we don't really know what's available to us because it always seems like everybody else's story is there's something unique about it, and so I couldn't do it. But like, your story is very I would imagine there's a lot of people in debt who are in better off positions than you were in right, who are making

more money and maybe have less debt. Like, there's so many things about what you're described ban that's so relatable in a lot of ways, and I just so appreciate you talking through also what was really difficult, but then some really tangible tips in that that when it is difficult, go deeper, connect to deeper reasons of why is this? Why is this so heavy on me? Why do I feel like I can't bear another year? What could shift here? And because there is freedom and permission to shift it?

And your debt payoff journey did take a toll on you. I mean to start out with forty five, making forty dollars in a good year and paying off seventy eight thousand dollars in two years, Like I am a little bit like, how the heck did that happen? And maybe you could have taken a little bit longer to do that and not have gotten shingles. Oh yeah, the shingles story. Um yeah, And we bought a house in those two years, So there were there were a lot of we could

have taken in a little extra time. For sure, I think we glamorize and I did. I glamorized these stories of I paid off this much debt in this time frame. It's so much, it's so fast, and we hear the same stories. There are ratios to a certain limit of if you make above this amount, you will pay off your debt in this many to this many months. You can almost calculate it and I never have. But to me now, numbers and time frames are arbitrary because I've

heard so many of them so many different times. What interests me is the story of the journey, Like how is the journey unique? And there are so many things that are the same, and we do talk about those on the podcast. You know, get on a meal plan, make a budget, increase your income. There are so many

things that are the same. But like looking for those unique things and I think that so what Like I left acupuncture and started writing full time and finance and I was an s c O writer, which means I was literally just like writing outlines that were very educational and writing those right, really informational articles to this website that really wanted me to be a journalist, a financial journalist,

and I learned. I learned storytelling, like and it was it was really great because I heard so many stories, I heard so many people say the same thing, and to hear the thing like the one thing that made it different, um was always so refreshing and the thing

I tried to hold onto. And that's why I want to share so many of the unique things about my story so that more people can see different sides of paying off debt, so more people can see themselves paying off debt through these stories, and it's why we try to tell unique stories here on the show from unique and diverse perspectives. I think the thing that's standing out to me in your story is how you found joy

and purpose through it to help you keep going. Uh. And then and then the learnings of what you would have done differently, how you might have given yourself more permission to way out living life alongside paying down debt that maybe it could have taken a little bit longer. But I am also curious to hear what your thoughts are on how your life has shifted since debt payoff. Uh. It certainly sounds like a lot shifted in the midst of debt payoff. What have you seen since that time?

I have been able to do like so many more things, so much more freely, and re follow those people on social media because I can do all the things they're doing now, And then they're coming to me talking about how much debt they have and the like the burden it's putting on them. And I'm like, well, I have a podcast, you should listen to it. So yeah, I mean I am able to go on vacations which I could never do as a child, Like again, no debt, so like no vacations at all when I was a kid.

Like we had our son and didn't worry about if there was going to be complications like with the pregnancy or with the labor, because we knew, like we can handle like medical bills, were prepared for this, and like, thank god we didn't. But like that that's a huge ease for somebody who's like pregnant and hormonal. There are

we just I can officially say it. We just bought another hot We bought a second home, and so we are going instead of buying an investment property, we bought another house to live in, and we use our current house as an investment property. So these are things I would have never known were possible, because my family and the families I grew up around, never did this stuff. They were like shopping was a hobby and people were

spending all of their money. And I had a friend who in the housing crisis, her family was like living on raman essentially because they bought this huge house at the height and couldn't get rid of it, and they were living in this beautiful house by the beach, like living on you know, essentially Ramen. So like these were

the people I was, I was around. I didn't know it was possible for somebody without a ton of money to like get into rental real estate or to have a six figure investment portfolio to take trips just because it's a good idea, not because like you're desperate or anything. So it's changed my perspective and life. And that's a gift that I'm going to give to my son that more is possible and you don't have to be super rich to achieve it or quote unquote rich, but anything

is possible. Well, I think it's a gift to the larger community too. I mean, yes, absolutely, as you teach your son, But it's a gift to me. It's a gift to the frugal friends community. It's a gift to all the people that you interact with because of your transparency and honesty and encouragement of people. I mean, I remember I have a vivid memory of watching you and Travis. I joined virtually before even the pandemic and all that

virtual stuff happened. But you you all paid off your debt, live on Facebook live and celebrated and it was a little weird to me to be so out in the open about finances, but yet unashamedly, unapologetically, and there was a celebration with you, and there was an encouragement and motivation for me of I could do that too, like you and your journey has been a gift to me, and my journey to understand what's possible, and the things that you have built in skill set and understanding through

the debt payoff journey is what has afforded all of these other things, right, it's not just about, oh, I paid off debts, so now obviously my life is better. It's better because of the journey, because of what you learned and gained along the way that you're now able to implement on the other side of the pendulum. It's great to get out of debt, and then you just

translate all that over into the next step. What do you want to do next with your finances, which for you it's income, property trips, sharing and encouraging others, raising your son well, not living in fear and anxiety for financial concern. It's like there's so much here and and the way that you're choosing to give back out of that and along the way, not just oh I've arrived, so now let me tell you about it, like you've

been honest throughout the whole thing of this was really tough. Yep, still in the middle of that, and it's it's real. It's what drew me to you. I think it's one of the reasons that our podcast is where our podcast is. So you keep doing a gem Yeah, I mean, I think I've just written so many articles that are so surface level and so like I've written the same article so many times to be able to tell a story

that's unique and relatable. And I mean when we started Frugal Friends, it's like when we decided to like take a chance on it, which neither of us was like super keen on, but I said, if I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna I'm gonna make it so different from everything else that's out there that is pretty much investing centric. It's for people who already have a handle on their finances. It's for people who have already paid off debt or don't care about paying off debt. I want something so different,

and we created something that helps people. Yeah, no matter where you are, but like, definitely of average income, dream bigger and have bigger financial goals because that's I think more important than trying to pay off debt is to like expand your thinking of what's possible. Because I had to pay off my debt to get there, but the greatest gift, like I could still have debt, and now that we have this new investment property, I definitely do.

But like knowing what is possible, knowing assets, liabilities like unlimited income, stuff like that, like building a business US. It's it's stuff that I wouldn't have thought about if I hadn't started at the very bottom. And and all the podcasts out there were already for the big thinkers. But yeah, like we were just talking to um Angie and r J from Rich by Intention and how they started with their you know, negotiating bills, like just negotiating

bills to lower their expenses. They took those skills and negotiated raises and new jobs promotions. But they wouldn't have even thought about it or had the skills to do it without starting like quote unquote at the bottom, And like that's where I want to be for people at the bottom. Yeah, yeah, started from the bottom. Now we're still here speaking of things that are not at the bottom. They all the way on the top is the we. That's right, it's time for the best minute of your

entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage. Maybe your car died, and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. Tough bills, Buffalo bills, Bill Clinton, this is the bill of the week, So I will share my bill of the week. But since this is like a duo episode, I do want to share somebody else's too, So I guess I will go first and no one will be surprised by my bill. Jill could tell you

my bill. Oh my gosh, it's Bill Curtis from Wait, Wait, Don't tell Me, and the narrator of Anchorman and famed newscaster in Chicago Anchorman in Chicago. I think, yeah, that is my bill of the week always, because I my dream is to one day have Bill Curtis do my voicemail message. I'm just I'm always too nervous to call into Wait Wait, don't tell me, but I do listen

to it all the time. I love his bill puns Anchorman is one of my favorite movies still to this day, like I'm still stuck in like I'm a college frat boy. I guess yeah. So that is forever and always my bill of the week. So let's hear from somebody else's Hi, fe gool friends. This is Becca. I'm from Rogers, Arkansas, and I just always give you my the is the week.

So this month was actually supposed to be a no s bit challenge for my fiance and I and we were doing really good until our sweet dog group Is decided to eat rocks the other day, so we took him to the vet and it ended up being an incredibly expensive fifty bill, but we are grateful that as that was able to help him and he passed all of the rocks. So unfortunately we hadn't been to our savings a little bit rather than increasing our savings this month, but we are so grateful that Rufus is okay and

I'm happy to pay this bill. I love you guys, Thank you so much for all of your advice and just fun times on the podcast. Thanks a good oh wow, Becca, and thanks congratulations Rufus like eating rocks and yeah you Rufus, you went through something, and this one's for you too, y Oh. I love hearing the stories of unexpected large bills that are able to be paid and not stressed

about because of the intentionality with finances. Well done, that you could sustain your rock eating dog groups is weird addiction. And thanks for all the love. We're we're happy for the fun times here too, and celebrating with you that Rufus is still with us. Hopefully he doesn't have a taste for non edible things anymore. And well done with

your finances. If you all listening, want to submit your bill of the week, if you've got a pet that enjoys eating things that shouldn't be eaten, or you have you know someone named Bill in your life who is really just crushing it in some way or something related to finances. Because Jill doesn't believe that anybody feels the same way for him that I do. Maybe you're just abshist, you know, nobody else says that because you're the Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash Bill. Leave us here, Bill,

We're moving on. It's time for round the lightning round, all right. We will both answer this just like a traditional lightning round, but I'll let you ask it since you're you're leading the episode today. Oh yes, this is Goldie put this question in here for us. It's a good one. I don't people don't ask each other this question. So here you go. Hot take in this lightning round. Is there anything you would be willing to take on

debt to have or buy? I think you know my answer because I have just done it um for a house. Because it is an asset, it will be slightly cash flowing. So here's the honest truth. You're never gonna hear me on bigger pockets. I'm not. I'm not the person like it's not me. Real estate investing not for me. Tried it, did it, didn't enjoy it. So that's my hot take, and I'm you know, it's I know people who love it, and I tried it once and I was like, Nope,

not for me. But we did buy a second property because originally we wanted to get a place for my mom because she rents, and we wanted to just get something that she could live in and pay us rent and we could control her rent. But that didn't happen because prices in our area are so unreasonably high that we literally couldn't find anything that she could live in and we could afford to have her live in it.

So but we did get a house um and we will rent out our current home and we will Our hope is to either eliminate our mortgage altogether, so not make any profit. Just either eliminate the mortgage or just cover the two mortgage payments, and we'll use it for the tax benefits annually and in twenty years or something when we sell something, use the appreciation because the appreciation in St. Petersburg is higher than average stock market returns.

So it was a wise financial decision. It was not the ideal real estate you know, thing you look for, but our our market is weird, and we did it, and I'm not here for it again. So yeah, there you go. I you learned through it for sure, and this will benefit you all in many ways the owning of these two places. I'm excited for you. This is a big celebration. Really, you just signed yesterday. I know,

and I don't want to to. I know. I don't want to deter anyone from investing in real estate because I think it is a super viable way to diversify your income and has a lot of income and investment and tax benefits. It really does, but it is really something like it is a process, and try it once. You don't have to love it, but you don't know until you try. I didn't know that. I didn't love it until I tried, and I don't regret it yet,

but I don't want to. I would never steer anyone away from renting, or from rental real estate or anything. So I think even if we continue to do real estate, we would consider doing like syndications, which is like way higher level. So yeah, that caveat. How about you, Jill, Well, I know that you love being super vulnerable on this lightning round, so so I'm going to do that for you. Jen, I think you know the obvious answer is likewise housing. Most of us have a mortgage. It's a decent aim

to pay off your mortgage early, but I don't. I don't mind having that. It's an asset. I have to live somewhere, pay less on my mortgage than I wouldn't rent. So yes, that that's obvious. Something else and I will So I'll process this out loud with you. Feel free to give me your feedback and I'll be a little bit vulnerable here. We have been cash flowing renovations on our current house, which has been awesome. It's one of the things that our debt payoff has opened up the

door for us to do. I'm beginning to realize, however, that cash flowing things is only so good in a time limited way, similar with with debt. Like as you say, debt is neutral, we could use it in a way that is beneficial. And so something that Eric and I have just started to begun thinking about is Okay, we wanted to cash flow renovations, get them out of, get them done, and then just live in our home and

go hard at savings and investing and all of that. Well, now we are nearly two years into being in our home having cash flow renovations, and it's causing me pause to say, cash flowing is awesome, but when does that stop? Like, when does it stop when you're just going hard at Yes, I don't have debt, but am I still making a wise financial decision with the money that I have to keep throwing large chunks of money at these massive renovations.

And so it's making both of us consider would it be more beneficial for us to take a small loan with a low interest rate and invest the money that we're now spending on all of these other areas so that we're not continually pushing off. We we don't make a ton of money, right and so we're going to do best in retirement if we start early in putting money towards retirement. And we are doing that, but we are doing it in really small ways wall cash flowing renovations,

because again we're not independently wealthy. But it's starting to make me think is it worth considering. I've not done it yet, and I'm not saying that I don't. I don't know what that decision will be. But to this question like would you consider it, sometimes I do wonder would it be better to take out a low interest loan to be able to put money into investments, because I don't think it's wise to cash flow large sums of money for years, and so that's that's where my

mind's at. Yeah, so there are few things to consider in that. Definitely would never advise taking out a low interest loan to invest that money in the stock market, which is we if it was just going into your house would kind of be what that is. It would just have, it would go through like an intermediary first, because I'm coming at this from the perspective that your primary home is not an investment, it's an asset. It's growing,

but you will always need someplace to live. So your primary home where you live is not an investment unless it cash flows. And what you're trying to do part of your renovation is an airbnb that will cash flow.

So if you can do the math and figure out how much you'd be paying in interest every month on this small loan compared to what you could be making monthly on the airbnb and the number and there's profit in the airbnb versus the cost of the loan, then it does make financial It makes numerical sense to finish up the renovations with a loan, as you know, obviously as low the interest you can get so that you can start cash flowing the air airbnb, because that numerically

makes more sense. If you were just wanting to get finished with renovations and there was no cash flow component to it, and you're like, how should I cash flow renovations and invest, it would be a slowing down of renovations to balance with investing. That would be the solution, and so your situation is unique to a lot of homeowners, but it would just be doing the math on that on what the loan is going to cost you versus what you're going to make from the airbnb, and if

it's more, then the loan makes numerical sense. Mm hmm. Thanks j absolutely well, Yeah, this was great and thanks so much for listening to my story, y'all. I please tune back in next week to hear Jill's story. Very excited to record that one. And in celebration of our summit June Adult Summer Camp, we want to share some of the comments you guys made about our event, like this one from Mariella. She says, thanks, the summit was

so well organized with an amazing lineup of speakers. Thank you once more for everything you ladies do for this community of frugal friends. Yes, it's a free summit. There's literally no reason not to come. Yes, thanks so much, mary Ella. So thanks for listening again. If you want your free ticket to this year's summit June, head to Frugal Living Summit dot com. Don't forget to check out

the Spending Mastery bundle while you're there. It's jam packed with so much awesomeness and we can't wait to see you guys there yeay see you next week By You Frugal Friends is produced by Eric Sirian