Today I'm posting my very first guest post! I asked my friend Ashley from The Nerdy Blogger to share her story about reaching debt freedom and financial peace. To learn more about Ashley you can go to her blog The Nerdy Blogger. You can also check her out on Facebook.
Here we go!
I’m an odd duck.
I always have been, but one of the things that makes me a
particularly odd duck is invisible on the outside. My husband, Ryan, and I are
debt free. No, we’re not billionaires. No, we aren’t trust fund babies with
cash coming out our ears. We’re a young married couple in our late twenties.
I’m a self-employed writer, a part-time graduate student, and I have 2 side
jobs. Ryan works as a pizza delivery driver and is a part-time student as well.
How did we get there? Well, it’s an interesting and convoluted story. We aren’t
debt free because we’re crazy brilliant and have always made the best
decisions. We are debt free because we have chosen to maintain that lifestyle
from the beginning.
Beginnings
Our journey to being debt-free began when I started driving
in high school. I had inherited my mom’s ’95 Camry, that had a non-functional
tape deck, no CD player, and this was before the advent of the mp3 player, but
it did have a radio. I tuned in to my local Christian station, which played
Dave Ramsey Money Minutes about the time I’d drive to class in the morning. I
began learning about how to be organized with money. I quickly became convinced
that debt was not something I wanted to have in my life. I started college
shortly after that. My mom worked at the college I attended, largely so I could
attend college debt free. My mom’s tuition benefits didn’t cover my textbooks,
but I got a scholarship and I worked two part-time jobs to help cover that
expense. I met my husband later in college. His school was funded by
scholarships and generous family members. We both left that school debt free. A
few years after graduation, we got married, and moved to Charlotte to start our
lives together.
Marriage and Money
One of the best ways to start your marriage is with some
solid premarital counseling. We chose to take Financial Peace University (FPU).
Ryan and I both had a fair handle on money. We never spent money we didn’t
have. We tried not to buy things beyond what we really needed with the
exception of the occasional splurge. However, even with this great start to our
marriage, FPU really helped put hands and feet on our good habits to really rev
up our savings and helped us to be mindful of our spending. Having this good
foundation has made all the difference. We seldom argue about money and when we
do, we play fair.
Rough Spots in the Road
A little over a year into our marriage, I found myself in
dire need of a job change. I was making more money than I’d ever had in my life
and I was completely miserable. My degree was in English, not retail
management, which is where I found myself. I was running 3 bookstores, had no
time for family or relaxation, and was plagued with constant anxiety. The job
was attacking my mental, spiritual, and especially my physical health. After
much prayer, counsel, and reading some great books on career (Quitter by
Jon Acuff and 48 Days to the Work You Love by Dan Miller), Ryan and I
decided the best thing I could do was quit. However, this decision was not made
lightly. Here are the main reasons we decided that we could do this.
- We have no kids.
- We have no debt.
- We had a fully funded emergency fund of 6 months’ worth of expenses.
Had any of these 3 factors been different, I would have
toughed it out while finding something of comparable income. But because we had
those 3 factors in place, I was able to quit and do something a little more
daring, something I’d desired to do for a long time—I became a writer. I
started writing freelance and gradually began to build up a steady writing
business. Being debt free allows you options. I am so grateful that we
had these options.
Stupid Tax and Potholes
While building my writing business, as with any new
business, I was underemployed. We also had done some miscalculation on Ryan’s
anticipated income, so our budget was incorrect. This meant we had to dip into
our emergency fund to cover expenses. I also made the mistake of keeping my
regular health insurance through COBRA after quitting my job. We only asked
around at one place to comparison shop—mistake number one. We were told that we
had the best deal available—mistake number two. This, my friends, is called
stupid tax. I had COBRA from October 2012 through June 2013, a mistake that
probably cost us somewhere in the neighborhood of $2700 of our emergency
savings. We finally woke up in June and realized how unsustainable this was and
visited a Dave Ramsey Endorsed Local Provider for health insurance. Our broker
helped us choose the best plan for me, saving us around $300 a month!
Once we could finally breathe on that front, we realized
that if I couldn’t find more writing work soon, I would have to pick up a
part-time job outside of my writing. I was living in a little bit of a fantasy
world, and just knew that I would never have to do that, despite the dwindling
numbers in our emergency fund staring me in the face.
I was wrong.
Murphy knocked on our door in September—pothole number one.
As I mentioned before, we don’t have any children, but we do have two cats.
Luna and Oliver, while furry, are like children to us. Oliver, our baby boy,
got really sick about 10:30pm on a Saturday night in late September 2013. With
our regular vet closed, I had to take him to the Emergency Animal Hospital. If
he had gotten sick on a weekday, it probably would have been half the cost.
Unfortunately, that’s not how it happened. In fact, if I had waited until first
thing Monday morning to take Oliver to the vet, he very likely could have died.
Oliver had a blocked bladder, something that can be fatal if left untreated for
more than 24-48 hours. The procedure saved our baby boy, but came very close to
emptying our emergency fund. The total came up to around $850. We got Oliver
home on Monday morning and noticed after a few hours that he just didn’t seem
right. We took the precaution of calling our regular vet and they said to bring
him by so he could be observed for the day. We did and later that day, they
recommended that they keep him overnight. Long story short, Oliver ended up
spending the rest of week in the vet’s office because his bladder became
blocked again—pothole number two. The projected amount for his stay and
treatment was greater than the remaining amount in our emergency fund. I knew
my parents had an account set up for me back home that they had continued to
put money into, though I had long left the nest. I had to do a pride-shattering
thing.
I called my dad.
My parents graciously wired the money to my bank account.
Thankfully, the actual cost of Oliver’s stay at the vet was much less than they
originally projected because he recovered so quickly. The total was around
$650. However, even with the lower amount due, I knew we had to quickly get our
emergency fund back in place because now I realized we were not immune to
emergencies.
Even through rough times, God’s hand has never ceased to
provide, though it’s not always in a way that I would imagine or prefer. The
day we took Oliver back to our regular vet, Ryan’s best friend Zak called me
and asked if I needed a part-time job. Zak had no idea that Oliver, his fur
nephew, had even been sick. I was able to start the job the next week. The best
part was that I was making more money an hour at this job than I did as a
manager. The Lord will provide.
Despite getting the great new job, we knew we had to go a
step further to help fix our emergency fund. The job would only help to solve
our income problem. Earlier in 2013, we had purchased tickets to attend a
conference that had changed our lives over the past two years—Hutchmoot. Total
cost on tickets for the both of us was around $579. We ended up selling those
tickets in order to give our emergency savings a boost. This was a wise
decision. About a week after that, we got another visit from Murphy—pothole
number three.
As I stated previously, Ryan works as a pizza delivery
driver. Thanks to the help of a car savvy friend, we realized that Ryan was in
desperate need of 2 more tires for his car. We were able to replace those, but
it ended up costing us around $350. Thankfully, we had the money in savings to
cover it, but still, a smaller number in the emergency fund is a scary thing.
We worked hard and kept putting money back in savings, regardless of how small.
About 2 weeks after that in late October, I was getting back
in my car after a trip to the grocery store and realized to my horror that the
steel was starting to show through on one of my tires. I went to the shop and
learned that I had to get 3 tires. This trip to the tire shop cost nearly $400
and emptied out the rest of our emergency savings—pothole number four. Remember
what I said about God providing? A friend in the bookstore business called me
and asked if I could use a part-time job. Ryan and I had been praying for more
work for me—didn’t God know that I meant writing work? However, when God
provides, it is not always what we might imagine. I took the job and it proved
to be a blessing. I hustled and worked my way through November, bringing in
more money to help boost up our savings again and completely solved our income
deficit.
Then in December, we got hit with potholes five and six.
Ryan’s car had previously been in his mother’s name. We had done the paperwork
to have the car transferred to his name, but didn’t realize it would cost us
nearly $250 to title it in our county. No problem, we had the cash to do it.
Then 2 days after that, Ryan’s car started making a horrendous noise. We took
it to our mechanic and discovered he needed new front brakes
immediately—pothole number five. We sold a few things to get the cash to pay
for his brake job. I found out that I needed rear brakes shortly after
that—pothole six. No big deal, right? I was about to be paid from one of my
part-time jobs. I had my check set up on direct deposit so it would be right in
my bank account. I go the next day to look at my account. It’s not there. I
emailed my employer and she didn’t know anything about it either. Later that
day a company wide e-mail was sent out, explaining that there was a delay with
direct deposits and I would be paid on the 12th of the month, rather
than the 10th, as usual. Because of the delay, I ended up having to
take time off from work to get my brakes done, rather than have them done on my
day off, so I had to absorb some opportunity cost.
Despite all these potholes, we were able to persevere. Even
when we had to empty out our emergency fund, we never borrowed money. We were
able to work out our problems by selling things, working extra, and waiting.
Could the expense be put off, even for just one more day? If the answer was
yes, it got delayed. Sometimes this meant we stretched things out a little
longer than we should have. We got creative with dinner and made unusual dishes
with what we had on hand. (If I had my own restaurant, it would be called the
Second Chance Buffet. Or maybe a cooking show called Luxury Leftovers).
We sold things on eBay, traded them in at our local used book/movie/music shop,
and bought nothing extra. We gathered up every bit of spare change we found in
the couch and dropped it off at the coin counter at our bank. It did get a
little scary at times, but we held on to God and to each other. He got us
through each time and it built up our relationship, knowing we can weather the
storms of life together.
We are still working to recover our fully funded emergency
fund, but we know that we will meet our goals through hard work and discipline.
You can do it, too.
