Young, Dumb and Broke.
Emily: While we didn’t know each other in high school, the chorus (not the verses) of the Khalid song “Young, Dumb and Broke” pretty much sums up the beginning of our relationship: so much love to give, but we had no plans.
Joel: We had it figured out. Newly married, I had my first full time teaching job, grad school for Emily, a move to a new town, and a new apartment. With me teaching and coaching my salary was $35,000. More money than either of us had ever made.
Our new apartment bliss lasted exactly one night. Emily woke up and said, “I cannot live here.” It was cheap, in the middle of nowhere, and had stinky water. We moved out at the end of our first month. She was right. It sucked. Another reality, we had $100k in student loans, and that number was growing with Emily in grad school.
Emily: Looking back, we can laugh at this, but at that time, it was hard. Really hard. New life, new jobs, starting a graduate program, new marriage, and two moves within the first thirty days of our marriage. Little did we know, that stress would be present often.
I did not work at the start of my program because I was not certain what I could handle with the coursework. At the end of those first few months, with paychecks coming in once per month (yuck), we were left with $50 in our checking account to get us through the last week of the month. We only used debit cards, so that meant we had to be careful to not spend anything that last week before the next paycheck landed in our account. This created a lot of stress, worry and tension. Joel and I both worked in college and we both were frugal by nature, but we still struggled to make ends meet.
Joel: We even dumpster dived one night.
Emily: Nope, that was at least a year after this period after watching the documentary, Dive. And it’s dumpster dove, unless you live in the UK, then dived is an acceptable form.
Joel: I went to the UK once. Note to all readers, don’t dumpster dove in a small town. They sell expired food all the time. It was not a bountiful harvest but we did feel like gangsters that night.
Emily: OK - let’s get back to it. The silver lining was we had to have a plan to make it to the end of the month. We weren’t on a budget yet, but we knew what we were doing was not sustainable and wasn’t working.
Joel: Emily hates banks. Or at least the idea of banks. The thought of loans would send Emily into a fit of rage and she would go on a tirade about how banks are evil.
Emily: I hate interest. I hate deception. I hate predators. I hate liars. And for those who do not have a basic understanding of financial management, who have poor financial literacy (like us at age 22), banks do what they do to build the fancy buildings they work in. I spent four years in college taking out loan after loan with at least a 7%, one with 11%, interest, not really understanding what that meant. Then I signed up to do it for another 3 years. The weight of that was incredibly heavy and real. The financial aid counselor at my undergraduate college even recommended I take out as much as possible and use the excess to pay for books, food, rent, etc. I would later learn that was absolutely terrible advice.
Joel: See above as proof. We never really fought about money (except tipping after going out to eat).
Emily: (eye roll) I worked at a restaurant through college and some in graduate school. Service industry peeps - I get you. Tips matter.
So one night, we went to a college friend’s house for dinner and he was telling us about this guy named Dave Ramsey. He read his book and was now following his plan. He loaned us his book to read.
Joel: The stars aligned and we suddenly had a plan. Everything in the book made sense! Just like grad school, Emily never read the book. She only listened to the Spark Notes version I gave her.
Emily: But really, since I had 5 million text books and articles for my graduate studies to read, I never actually read the book. Joel gave me the summary and I was all in. The only sticking point for me was the stance on giving, but that ended up being a major motivator or long term goal as we continued on this plan.
So here we are, still broke, but older.
Joel: We’re not… we just live like it sometimes.
The end.
Key Takeaways:
We all start somewhere, most of us young, dumb, and broke. The key is not to stay there.
Dave Ramsey’s plan for getting out of debt works really well.