Financial Audit - He Has $2 In His Checking Account!

Episode Date: June 30, 2023

Check out these fun things: Patreon: ⁠https://www.patreon.com/calebhammer⁠  My socials: ⁠https://linktr.ee/calebhammer⁠  Do you want to be in a Financial Audit and you're in the Austin area? Email [e-mail] Sponsorship and business inquiries: [e-mail]  _______________________  Timestamps: 00:00 No one likes you 02:22 What's up? 04:14 Paycheck to paycheck 05:36 $2 IN CHECKING ACCOUNT!!! 08:00 Giving everyone money, when you have no money... 10:45 So-called "savings" 13:00 Credit card debt... 18:55 It's time to get help! 21:33 Let's build a budget 27:40 CLEAN THIS UP 31:20 This is going to take a long time... 34:45 You need to sacrifice to get there! 43:45 Hammer Financial Score --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/calebhammer/support Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

My name is Jamal. I'm 24 years old. I live in Las Vegas, Nevada, and this is financial audit. What do you do for a living in Las Vegas? I'm actually a debt collector for Nordstrom. So I've been doing that for... Nordstrom. That's what I'm saying. A debt collection for Northstrom? Before you say anything, you'll like the numbers. Before you say anything, you'll like the numbers. Because I only say that because it's actually the best job I've worked in financially. And I'll explain a little bit more if you want me to. Yeah, but I don't like debt collectors. I'm going to be honest with you. Neither do I.

Neither do I. It was the only remote job that I can find at Nordstrom. I mean, not in Norseum, but in Vegas in general. Really? Yeah. Well, wait, why didn't it have to be a remote job in Vegas? So I moved from Ohio originally, and I needed a job in Vegas. And so I originally started with Yelp for like six months just to transition so I can get an apartment in Vegas. And then once I did that. Guys, I didn't scrunch my hair. I'm so sorry. I wasn't looking beautiful for you. No, you're good. I'm sorry. Continue your story while I scrunch. It's okay. So basically what happened was once I moved out, I liked the fact that I was working from home. It was easier, good on my car, and not only that, I kind of lived alone. So I needed something that can financially handle my expenses and also, you know, live day to day a little bit easier. So what do you make now in this position? On a monthly base, I make roughly $2,600, but I also make incentive as well. So that boosts me up to $5,000 a month, close to $5,000. Average?

On average, let's just say $4,200 to play a safe. Okay. Is that before taxes, after taxes? After taxes. Okay. Yeah. And the incentive is you get in that debt closed? Pretty much, yeah.

So depending on how much I make on a monthly base in terms of like collecting debt, that's how much, that's how my incentive gets tracked. Okay. Yeah. Now, if you want to not get hounded by debt collectors, I mean, I can't help you unless you're on the show. but you can subscribe and maybe that'll just give you good luck a good luck button to not get called by debt collectors like you in your evil position of work i'll be helping these people okay i help i help i really off that's stupid no let's not say that come on well i'm glad you're doing better what were you making uh what was i making like before northrum or and i'm gonna just

yeah so before northship i think i was making like roughly roughly $2,200 after taxes a month. Yeah. Do you enjoy this position? No. No. No, not at all. No, this job isn't fun at all.

But at the same time, it's helping me build a dream that I want, which is getting into real estate. And I make just enough money to I can pay my bills and my expenses and still save enough funds to get into real estate. What is this getting into real estate? You're trying to get a personal residence, you're trying to get some rental. So I'm trying to get a residence and then also rent it out. So trying to become a landlord. Running out as in house hacking, like you live there and then you get some roommates? No, no, no.

So I live there. Fixed out the place a little bit. And then I'll get like a tenant to like live there. And they'll pretty much be paying me the rent situation. Okay. So you can do like the burr method? What's that? All the hours.

Let me make sure I get all the ours. It's like buy rehab rent, refunds. finance repeat? Something like that. Okay. And the reason I say it like that. So basically my process, or at least the way I'm going about is I'm going to get the place. And then once in I get the place, I'm going to keep it for about two months.

If it needs fixing, give it fixing. If not, move a tenant in. I have a lot of friends and also mentors that are in the real estate business so that have a way better idea on how to go about this. So my only goal right now is to save $10,000. And then once I save $10,000, that's pretty much an emergency fund for Lord, whatever might happen, and then from there, get into real estate and, you know, start building, I guess, get into investing as soon as possible, if that makes sense. Sure.

Well, we'll certainly talk about that a little more, but we need to go through your financial situation and see what's up. I want to hear from your perspective before we go into it, and everyone is a little more optimistic usually than it typically is when I go into it for some reason. But I want to hear from your perspective, what's your financial situation? If I had to rate on the scale, I wanted to 10, I would say it's seven. And I say seven. And I'm only saying that because my financial situation was horrible last year. I was living check to check. A lot of times I ended up owing more than I had coming in. So I had to fix that. And then it was just last December when I'm like, you know what? I'm really serious about getting into real estate. And I kind of don't want to bull to get myself. So let me at least, you know, make some sacrifices right now and try to make as much fun. as I can. So that required me buckling down on my job at Northship and Ashley paying attention.

So that way I can hit top incentive per month, which I've been doing great so far. And also living frugally, meaning I'm only spending money on groceries and just my rent. So I've been trying, but I think I've been doing a great job so far. So what do you need my help with? Honestly, I need you to see if you can call me on a bullshit or not. It's just especially with the last couple or the last statements I've been sending. you, I just want to see if you can spot the bull, or if it actually looks like there's improvement.

Well, let's take a look. So we have checking account with hunting. We started with, this doesn't make sense. What is the point of this? So what is this checking account? Okay, so this is my primary checking account, right? So as you can see. And it balanced $2.45.

But listen, though, but listen, if you look at, if you go through the transaction history, majority of that money went into savings account. No, that's fine. but that's still a dangerously low balance to have on our checking account. You have automatic payments, right? Not on my checking. No, not on my checking. No?

All of my automatic savings are on my credit card, and I use my checking to pay off my credit card. And then whatever I have left on my checking, I normally send that over to my savings. You don't have auto pays on your credit card of like an auto pay the full balance or anything like that. I do have. Okay, so then yes, your credits are.

So this is a very dangerous low balance to have. It is. It is. You want to me going on your bull? There's some bullshit immediately. I mean, okay. So, yep, there's your deposits. You have some sales coming in.

You're transferring money in from savings. $109, $87, $26. Okay, the $109. What day was that? $250. Okay, what days are those? Because this was from January, January, 2530.

1724? 1724, 2530. Okay. So January, I was moving. I was moving to a new apartment. So the only funds that I can think of that required me to pull money out of my savings, the first one, I really hate saying this. But I think there's like one for like close to 130, maybe 190 in there. Valentine's Day was coming up.

And I couldn't find my credit cards because I lost pretty much my wallet. And I needed cash to buy some things from my girlfriend. So I took some money out of my savings to cover that. but then I put it back roughly my next check, so the money was back in there. And then I think there's another one in there for like 300, if I'm not mistaken, that got pulled out. That one was towards my brother. He needs a help. He does a little truck driving business or whatnot, but he needs help with gas.

But he paid me back literally that same weekend. That same money went right back into my savings. Okay. Yeah. You did send out cash of $180 or $180 cash app. That one, what's the name? There should be a name on there, I think. Shul?

Shul. Dahabo. Oh, Dahabo. Yeah, that's my mom. She needed money. My mom doesn't work, and she needed some funds to pay some bills, so I gave her what I could. How old is she? She's almost 70.

Okay. And she's Social Security and? No. My mom is, well, so my mom brought us over here. So I was originally born in Kenya. My mom doesn't have the whole, like, you know, money stayed up or anything like that. So it's just me and my siblings that are working. And my, it's not all me to financially help them, but I help out where I can if I have funds available.

So that's where that money went straight to. And Renew Ross? Brianna Ross, my girlfriend. Yes. Okay, you're sending her a good amount. How much was that? 249, 1049, 101. The 249.

Her, sorry, 149 and then 109. The 149. I know the 249. She needed some help with something. I couldn't remember what it was, but this was towards me when I was moving to my new apartment. She needed help with something, so I gave her that much. And there was another 149 that was we split Costco groceries as well. So we used her credit card for her, so I paid her my portion on. So you just gave her some money for the helper with something? Yeah, I couldn't tell you what it was. It was a busy month on January. I mean, I don't know, but I mean, you're giving your girlfriend money. It's okay, as long as it's just a gift. You're not expecting it back?

No, no, I'm not expecting it back. No, no, that's gone. The rest of the stuff is mostly just like Casco, some gas. There was a U-Haul moving thing and that's fine. And so most things are good. I mean, you went out once with this. It was just Wendy's, but then resume now, are you looking for a new job still already? No.

So, like I said, January was a very, very hard month. I was just looking at a job at the time, but I stopped. And plus, I haven't had like a new resume like forever. So I just wanted to polish it up a little bit. And resume now, I think took like a couple dollars, but I gave it back because I forgot to counsel the membership. And then there was to your mom, another $70. And then yes, a lot of money, uh, was sent to the credit cards. I assume that's where a lot of the spending is going to be. But yeah, credit cards, credit cards, and then also to your savings, yeah. Yeah.

But again, dangerously low balance, you started with $8 and $9 and ended with $2. I have no explanation for that. I just, to be honest, I kind of just wanted to, I don't like seeing money in my checking because my brain automatically thinks, okay, we have some money, let's spend it. So the savings that you transfer to, is it just a Huntington? It's the same one. I know it sounds dumb, but I've been trying to, so what I have. But is that the savings that you transfer to?

Yes, that's the same. There's only 1,644 in there. That's, it's actually updated right now. Let's look at it. One second. As right now, there's 2,02 on there. So, okay, it's gone up $900. Roughly, yeah.

Okay. Well, that's not an emergency fund. Is this your only savings? Yes, and correct. It's not an emergency fund just yet. Okay, so the goal, you're trying to get to real estate, but you're really far from there. Yeah, exactly. So which is why I'm trying to fill that one.

I thought maybe we were a little closer when you were talking about that. No, no. Like I said, I literally just started getting my stuff together in December. I'm like very new at this. So I'm trying to understand a little better. Yeah, because clearly you don't fully have your. Together because there's two credit cards that looks like you pay off, two capital ones that you pay off.

But there's definitely a balance being held on the Discover card. Yes, that one is a problem card. And I'm only saying that because that was like my first, first ever credit card I got. And at the time, I didn't really understand how credit cards worked. So I tend to hold a balance. I got it down to a very great balance December for like $800. But my birthday was coming around, and I will admit to this, I got me a pretty expensive gift, which is starting to pay itself off.

I got myself MacBook Pro because the one that I had originally got broken due to water damage. So I got a brand new one. And then what happened with this one is I'm using this one to like edit my videos and You make content? Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So it's been doing great so far.

I managed to, on Facebook, I managed to make roughly $600 back so far within the month and a half that I've been working on making content. Kind of content are you making? So right now I'm just, I'm just solely focusing on like on short films. So like gym workout videos and stuff and trying to make it like fast. still motivating. So I'm just making those type of content as right now. Okay. Yeah. Now, we have two credit cards that you pay off first. We're going to look at those to start with. So we're in 4200 after commission. You know, a lot of that money went out of the checking account,

but then we also have purchases of $918. So almost $1,000 on Capital One, Save Your One. Yes, that was around. And you paid it off, which is good. So very heavy. to see that. Groceries, Wendy's, Ubering, Sunrise, International, and Uber. Mostly Walmarts and stuff, they're really cheap Walmart trips,

I'm very curious. And multiple on the same days. These, that's, like I said, I was moving in January, so I was just getting a lot of news. Yeah, some house stuff. Fitness stuff, okay, that's good.

We always encourage that. Amazon, lots of Amazon's. That's also probably new house stuff. I'm assuming around that time. And we have a Hulu house. the subscription Wendy's. You love Wendy's. No, it's not me, actually. It's your girlfriend? Yeah, I get her food every

now and then. Yeah, every now and then, yeah, a lot. And PlayStation Network and Grubhub, Grub, Grub, McDonald's, changed it up a little bit. So, good amount of BS spending on here, and then also just some new house spending as well. But we also have that other credit card where you made an additional $500 rounded

of purchases, so now like $1,500. Plus, what we saw in the checking account, go to things like gas and groceries and stuff like that. And here we have some ongoing payments like your T-Mobile subscription. We have Apple payments, not T-Mobile subscription, but, you know, the ongoing payments. Smith Foods pops up a crazy amount on every account. It's just popping up Smith's Foods. It's just boom, boom, boom.

Lots of Amazon again, then another Apple thing and more Walmart. So, I mean, you're certainly spending a lot of money. Yeah, yeah. It's a, I'm trying to carry myself a budget. And this January was not a great time to start for that. I think I did a little bit better in February, but January was not a good month. Yeah, I think you're like the perfect person that's like built for my new resources section that I've made for everyone. So I'll hit you up with some of those either after the video.

We can talk about them for a second, but good budgeting and good stuff like that. Okay, perfect, perfect. And then the bad card. Also, it says your credit score. It's only 606. Yeah, it went down drastically, and that's because of the purchase that I made towards the MacBook. It took like 90. When was this?

The MacBook was purchased like December 11. Oh, geez. Yeah. Dude. You only made $650 of purchases of payments and then $7.73 of purchases of purchases you made on here. So interest, $58.18. Total interest charge this year so far, $117. That's what I'm trying to bring it out.

What I'm confused about immediately is you talk about this. You want to give yourself a 7 out of 10, which makes no sense anymore. Why are you in a position where you're only making $650 payments on a car that has already made you lose over $100 early in this year so far? And yet on this other car, we're going to Wendy's constantly. We're doing Amazon. We're getting things for our new place on Walmart constantly. We're spending all this money, all this bullf-all-all-this-all-all-this crazy stuff. when we're only putting $650 towards this.

Would you put $1,500 towards your other two cards that were spent on mostly crap? Okay. So with Discover, yes, I'm trying to pay it off. And yes, I see that the interest is really high. But so. Not trying very hard. Well, I paid the $650. That was one payment.

And I also made another payment two days ago for another $250. And I'm making another one again. I'm doing to where. What's $250 when you're doing $1,500 on those other cards? Which are not all groceries. or necessities. There's a lot of BS in there that you do not need right now. Need specifically. You're right. I mean like- So what? What is this priority? This is not a priority to you? Are you talking about the discover? Yeah. It is a priority. I want to get rid of it. But yet again,

I'm I guess just like anybody else, I'm kind of scared in terms of like, okay, if I put this much money towards it while I have anything in my savings. I had a weird mentality. Is that even just about putting a certain amount of money towards it? It's about not putting all the, that certain amount of money, $1,500 towards the BS. It wasn't all of the $1,500 just towards BS. There was some groceries in there, but let's just say, like,

even the extra, let's just say it will only $500, which I'm pretty sure more of it went to things you did not need. Actually, I promise you. But let's just even say $500 for an example. What if you just cut that and you had an extra $500 to put towards this? This pays it off probably a month and a half earlier at this

rate. What's the point? I can't tell you. I don't know. My goal was to pay it off slowly and have it paid off by May. I'm trying right now, like I said, I put 250 tours at some point in another 250. So I'm trying to put at least 500 tours every month so I can get it down to a $0 balance. Now, seeing how it is at a high balance, I stopped making purchases on it other than I think the most recent purchase that was like $20. And that was for my Adobe subscription for Premiere Pro. But other than that, I'm not making any other purchases on it. You have a Hulu on here?

I took it off. I took it off. I switched that over to the Sabre one, seeing how I get cashback on that. So there's no other reoccurring purchases on there. So this is where I think you should take advantage of a couple things. I formed partnerships with good resources, and this is where it would be good for you. Rocket money would be fantastic for you. You know Rocket money?

Ever heard of them. Budgeting. And it's my favorite. That's what I switched over to from Mint. So rocking money is good. You know, I'll get you set up with that after this video. And then also Fizz is another one. It's a card that you use where I think you should put the primary you're spending.

It's a debit card that, one, helps you budget. It helps you not spend over on certain categories. And two, it also helps to build the credit score, which you will need to for this real estate game you want to get into when you're sitting at 606. A debit card that helps with credit scores, it's fantastic. So you need to get on both of those immediately. Okay. So I'm not against it. I'll definitely get onto it.

I know right now. No, no, I'm saying I'm not against it in the sense. I'm open to suggestions because I never knew that existed. So right now, my cut is going up by like another 20 points, but my main priority is trying to get that discover on. And that sounds like bullshit seeing how I've only been putting a small amount of balance. But the way to get there is to budget. The way to stop spending money on all this extra crap is,

one, just don't do it, to budget. Because you clearly just don't know how much is going to there. Or if you did, then you would put it. towards the Discover card. And if you do know how much money is going there and you're choosing out to put it towards the Discover card, then you're literally just prioritizing Wendy's over your Discover card. You're right. You're right. So which one is it? I mean, I'm seeing how we're so, like I said, horrible financial decisions that I made and this is the first time I'm getting my together. Seeing how we are within like this is month three of the new year,

I want to get rid of it as soon as possible. And yes, I will stop going to Wendy's for my girlfriend and, you know, start eating in a little bit more. But it's just like one of those things where I just kind of assumed if I can just put like a little 500, maybe 600 here. And then then it'll go down and if I just stop making purchases. Just kill it, dude. I can kill it today. I don't know if I'd want you to 100% kill it today with because that would be all of your money. Basically.

Pretty much all of them, pretty much. And that would put you in a risky situation, which could put you in a worse situation than you're in now. So what I was going to do was because I'm making a little bit of money from Facebook, I was going to get whatever I'd get from that because I made the purchase from the MacGrow. Yeah, I was going to put it towards the discovery. Yeah, it's not even a question. Yes. Okay. How much will that be and when?

Right now, there's a total of $600 that's still pending. Last time I checked, Facebook gets pays out every 20th of each month. Let me see. So this is, it's going to be paid out the 23rd of March is when my proceeds get paid out. You want to see it? No. Okay. Good.

Then yes, it goes to that. And then from here, you know, I want you to open up an account with rocket money, preferably just because that's my favorite, but obviously use whatever works for you. But that's just my favorite than what I use now. and time to budget, dude. What's your rent on a monthly basis? My rent right now is that $12.03. Minimum of monthly payment on this card is $79.

What's your vehicle situation? Paid off. I know. What is it, though? It's good, 2012 Toyota Camry. Okay. Yeah. Very cool.

How many miles? Last time I checked it was like $150K, but it still runs smooth. Yeah, I mean, that's a pretty good car. As far as I understand. I'm not a car person. But as far as I... I only had like one issue. And that was like three years ago.

Well, we definitely want you going to have an emergency fund for a car. Even when it's getting up there, even if it's a good car, you know, just making sure you're in a safe spot. Of course. Okay. What's your desired grocery spending on a monthly basis? I try to keep it under 300. I feel like 300 is not too much. And then different insurances and stuff.

like that what are they looking like insurance right now runs me at like 180 that's your car um yes but yet again health insurance is taking from work health insurance yeah it's taken from work from work yeah and then your wrenches insurance my renters insurance uh that's through my job and that's at $10 so do you know no no sorry not my job my um my property management and that's uh so what's your car insurance one more time uh my car insurance runs me at 180 but i split that with my uh my brother so he's on why do you split it with your brother Oh, because if I do it myself, it's extremely high. But why is you splitting it with your brother? Do you share it with your brother?

No, no, no. So the car is insured under his name, and it's my car. And I try to put it under my name and it's like 500 a month just for... Why is he subsidizing you, though? Why is subsidizing me? Yeah. What do you mean? He's not getting any value of the car.

Why is he paying for half the insurance? So I pay for my portion, and he pays for his portion. So my portion is... Why doesn't he have a portion, though? So I'm curious, if he doesn't use the... car if he has no ownership on the car, why does he have a portion? I'm going to be honest with you. I honestly don't know.

And I'm only saying that because when I first got the car in order to get it out, the lot, it had to have covered insurance. Yeah, that makes sense. I just don't understand why you're not paying for the full thing. That 180 is the amount that I need to pay. So I'm just like, all right, cool. So that's the amount I pay.

And I pay him that amount. So, yeah. You pay him 90, though. I thought. You said nine. No, half of 180. So when you pay him half of 180 or is 180 half of it? No.

180 is half, so that's 90. Sorry, I apologize. Okay, so 180 is half. You give him 180 bucks. I give him 90. Sorry. It's a long flight. I'm so sorry. It's a long flight. I'm just waking up. Just want to make sure I have your numbers. Yeah, you got it. Okay, so we got rent. We got our insurance. We got our grocery spending, a card spending. I'm going to call it total paper money, all the extra little things you would need. Give you an extra 100 bucks there on a monthly basis.

Gas. Vegas. It is a very car dependent. $45. I don't go out a lot. We'll call it 50. Yeah. I feel like my tank like once a month. Yeah, car dependency in cities is definitely a tax we don't talk about enough. It's expensive to essentially own a car in order to participate within the American economy.

And then gas and then insurance and then. Which is why I'm happy that we're from home because I know that we'll go very high. Any other. their monthly expenses? I mean, other than my phone, which is at 106 right now, that's actually getting cut off next month to $30 a month. Your cell service is only going to be $30? I used to work at Walmart, and I got a discount with them on unlimited talk text and everything

for $30 a month. Forever? Forever, yeah. As long as I keep the plan rolling, then, yeah. So that's getting subsidized with $30 a month next month. All right. have your necessities at $1,852 a month if you actually follow the strict budgetary guidelines for gas, for your total of paper spending, and for your grocery spending.

Let's include my electricity as well. Oh, yes. What is that? That one right now runs me on average. Let's just say $65 and then internet as well, seeing how we're from home. That's another $75. And then 65.

Monthly wise. I mean, I don't think we should include the gym. The gym's only $10. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a necessity. Okay. So now we have you at $2,000 a month. Let me check my capital one.

That's 47% of your post tax, which, if we follow the most basic budgeting guideline of 50, 30, 30% on needs, 30% on wants, 20% on savings and retirement. That 47% is just 150%. We'll essentially round it to 50%. So boom, that would literally be everything you just said there. Again, rent $1,203. Your credit card minimum monthly payment is $79.

Your grocery spending $300, your insurance of $90. Your total paper spending, anything you need for your place, essentially, $100 a month, gas $50 a month. Your phone will be $30 a month in utility, $6. $65, $10,000, $2,000 on a monthly basis, which is $48% of your 48-rounded-up percent of your post-tax, which is 50%. So you did that. Well, what that means, though, is you cannot really increase any of those categories within that budget or else it just becomes too much.

Okay. Does that make sense? That makes sense, yeah. Now, you can't do it yet, but really this next month, it's as simple as this. You should not go out there once. You should not spend money on fun once at all for the next month. And the remaining $2,200 that you get on average should pay off the card and it's done. It's done.

I should hit max incentives so I can, I'm pretty sure I can pay that off by the end of this month. You should. Just don't have a single ounce of fund or anything until it is paid off. and boom, now that's done. It's done. It's as simple as it's done. That's fantastic. Now, what do you do from there?

You can't have fun because you don't have an emergency. You're not having an emergency fund. It has an emergency. So, again, this is your entire budget that we laid out here. You don't spend money anywhere except for that. You don't. For how long you have $2,000 in your emergency fund now? $2,500.

$2,500. That's great. I say we get you to do about with your rent situation. about $15,000. Also, I'm adding a little bit more money in there, so it should bumping up close of $3,500 button this month. I'm only saying that because I didn't pay rent for this month, March. Well, end of this month, we're just going to talk from today.

Following this budget, so putting basically $2,200 towards it on a month after this month because everything extra this month is going to paint off that card, then it's done. Okay. So in five and a half months of sacrificing completely, not spending money on fund, go have a lot of free fun. I don't care. Walk on the strip, watch junk people go crazy.

Like, that's entertainment. That's not bad. That's not wrong. A little bit of gas money, but it's free. Okay. And there you go. Five and a half months, you have a fully funded emergency fund. And then we can start talking about saving for retirement, saving for property.

Yeah. And actually, you know, being able to go to work. Wendy's again, getting anything for Amazon again, being able to get nice things from your house for Walmart and stuff like that. So, but we can't do any of that for the next six and a half months because it's going to take a month to pay off the card and then five and a half to build the emergency fund. Does that make sense? It makes sense. Yeah, it's extremely doable, especially if you talked about being frugal. You're not being frugal. You talked about wanting to get called on your bullshit. Here's your bullshit. You weren't budgeting. You were being, you started to make some

progress, but you haven't actually done what's necessary because right now you're in a dire situation. when one literally bad thing happens, you get laid off, or something medical happens to you, or anything family members, you're taking care of your mom, essentially, if you need to sometimes, anything needs to happen, you are wiped out, you're done, you're back into even worse debt. Exactly, which is why I opened my eyes in December, and I'm glad that I came over, because, like I said, I felt like I was living frugly, apparently number-wise, I'm not living frugly, and I'm okay with being caught out in my book. It's one of those things where I want to get this done as easily and effectively as possible.

And the discoverer was really pissing me off. But yet again, I'm 24 years old and I'm making dumb mistakes. That's really all it is. And I'm trying to get better before I hit 25. So I'm at least in a better situation, even if real estate doesn't work out. If that makes sense. Yeah. Real estate is going to take quite a bit on your income.

Yeah. What kind of percentage did you want to put down? On real estate? I'm not going to lie to you. I feel like at best I was looking to put down anywhere from 3 to 7%. I don't know that number just yet, only because I haven't really talked to my mentors and my friends that are in real estate because I wanted to at least come with being prepared.

Well, it sounds like you might take advantage of an FHA at the lowest. And then maybe you'll put down. more than that and just have some PMI for a bit. When I'm a little nervous with your income right here in what will be, what is obviously a trending city in general, obviously the market is down right now for real estate because I had a huge boom during the pandemic. And at some point it's likely to recover.

I think it's going to be one of the major American cities, you know, within the next century probably. Beautiful. Just where things are looking. $4,200 a month, even after your incentives on. average? I think it's going to be a little bit of a struggle with your needs category and everything

saving. Well, I don't, the only reason I don't feel like it's going to be much of a struggle. And that's only because, like I said, like with groceries that you saw me paying to my girlfriend, stuff like that. So we go half on groceries. And not only that, I can definitely, you know, make a shake if I need to. Yeah, but if you were to get even just a basic average place with 20% down in Vegas, and I know you're not going 20% down. And I know you're not going 20. percent down that's 100,000 dollars. It's going to take a long time to get to $100,000. Yeah. And that's if you have absolutely no fun. Well, yet again, I'm not 100% sure if I'm going to do it in Vegas or if I'm going to do it in Columbus. And I'm only saying yet again because it's one of

those things where I don't plan on living in Vegas for a long time. And not only that, I know people that already in the business in Columbus so they can guide me a little bit better. Well, it's certainly cheaper there. That definitely changes the story. Yeah, that does. So, okay, that's fine. Essentially, it just comes down to priorities because right now, Now, you also have nothing for retirement, right? I do. How much? Last I checked, I think it was close like $4,000.

Okay, so you have nothing for retirement. Okay, then you have nothing. Yeah, okay. Not really, you have something, but it's just like, you know, $4,000 itself. I had no, I had no financial literacy before this year. Yeah, most Americans don't. Yeah. So I got in, I bumped up my retirement just by 6, 7% and a descent.

in the December, it helped. And also did, I was watching one of your videos where you talked about something about like splitting your eggs throughout across different ventures that you can invest your 401K in. I didn't do it myself. The system allowed has this software where you can split up your retirement into different things. And it helped.

I jumped from 2100 up, well, 26. Where my main concern is, I would love you to get into the, obviously Columbus will help. I'd love you to get into the real estate game. I'd love anyone and everyone at some point as long as you can afford it comfortably. Yeah. And really, your mortgage and taxes and everything combined within, if your income stays about the same, cannot be above $1,200 a month. And that's hard to find as well, especially not putting $20% down.

So you're going to have PMI, you're going to have extra things. So it's a difficult situation in all. I don't want to be a Debbie Downer. But what also makes me a little nervous is once you get back to fund spending after you save a member of the merchandise, after you pay off the credit card. You're also behind in retirement, and we cannot stay behind the retirement.

You can't just put, you shouldn't just put everything for real estate. That would just be bad, because you're not taking advantage of the best tech hit of your life for compound growth in the overall stock market. Well, it's then divvying up the priorities, but what I'm nervous at,

when you divvy up the priorities, not much is going to be going into the stock market, and not much is going to be going into the house. So it's like we just will barely be making progress in any of them. You might have, the thing is you don't have a, it's not like you have a bad income by any means. You don't have a bad income. But to hit the goals you want to hit at, I think the pace you want to hit, it might be worth checking out something like course careers, which I work with a lot.

Okay. And a lot of people who have been here have taken advantage of, you know, getting certified in a good program. And then, you know, looking for that $75, $80, $90,000 a year income, which is really boosting up, you know, finding something that you. you're interested in it because you said you don't even like your job necessarily but you like the income that's you know what I mean but to get closer to your goals it might just make more sense as a non-married person as a single household income

to make uh to build that income okay I'll say this um like I said the whole moving expense got me messed up but regardless we're out of there um I'll definitely try out that plan the one that you wrote right here and try out that card that you also talked about because I know I know credit is a big thing and I'm

working on getting that as as high as possible. Right now I'll definitely cut down on the fun expenses because mainly I'm I stay home for the most part other than Wendy's which is my girlfriend but I can't really blame it on her is more on me because I'm yes. It's 100% yeah. Yeah. So I'm going to work on it. I'm going to work on it because I'm, I'm, I'm trying to trying to hit this emergency funds of 10K as soon as possible. And five and a half months isn't bad at all. 10K? You should go 15K with where your needs are at.

15K? Yeah. Okay. What? That's like what? Another two months? Not bad? Oh, I told you.

If you do it, it's five and a half months, right? Correct. Isn't that what we had? Yeah. Yeah. So two months. My goal is to get it done by the end of the year, so that's more than enough time. Oh, it should be done by the time our entering fall.

It's doable. It's really doable. It is doable mathematically. Emotionally, can you? Will you? I can surprise you. I can surprise you. We just got to find out.

That's all I can say. I wouldn't be surprised if you did well, honestly. I feel like you're someone that could. It's just being able to actually budget, just getting the discipline down that is necessary is like the first step. So that's where you take advantage of something like Rock. Okay. So the median sales price in Columbus, though,

falling, or it's falling a little bit, and below the national average, 40% below the national average. Is that a good thing about, below? I mean, it's just, you know, mid-sized Midwestern city. It's not going to be super expensive. I own a rental property in my hometown of Kalamazoo, Michigan, and, you know, it's not bad that. It's cheaper. But 230, let's say you just even put 10% down. Oh, I mean, that's easy that. That's 23,000. How long is it going to take you to get to 23,000 if off of $4,200, you spend half of it on needs, you're going to have some wants because wants exists. But let's say you do your wants at 20% and saving at 30%.

Where does that keep us? So you need $23,000 to put just 10% down, rather you do 20%, but 10% down. So that's $1,260 a month, which would be good. But that's if you're putting all that towards the house. So really, you'd probably be putting half of it towards the house, half of it towards towards like a Roth IRA. Okay. Because again, you're falling behind in there.

So that's $630 a month. So at $23,000, that's 37 months or three years. And that's not terrible. But I can tell in your eyes and your reaction there, you want this all to be a lot quicker than it's actually going to be. Not really. Because I'm going to be honest with that. I'm not worried so much about the time.

Because right now I'm being realistic. It can happen tomorrow where it's actually going to cost me a lot of money to, like, repair or fix. I'm looking at it more in the perspective of, okay, well, if it's going to take me three years to get to these goals, where can I cut out, like, where can I cut out some fun or maybe some necessities that aren't really necessities? Now, remember what we did here is we switched to your fund and savings category. So you're actually putting 30% towards savings. This is with 30%. If you did 20%, this would probably be like four or five years.

Okay. So this is where you really budget and prioritize, and that's why I think to get to your goals where you want to get... Saving for three years to get a house, that is not a bad thing. That is not a bad thing. That's actually a really good timeline.

I can just tell with the speed, you want to get to some things. I think increasing your income is going to be a big player because your rent is not crazy for a place like Las Vegas. No, it's not. Your grocery spending is not crazy. Your car insurance is not crazy.

Your gas is low. Your phone bills, going to be, or your cell coverage is very low. Your utilities are fine. Your internet's normal. All these things are normal for where you're living and where you are in life. Which is. It comes down to where you prioritize your money and how much money you bring in at that point.

And that's what I'm saying. Like so right now with me getting into the, uh, the whole Facebook bonus program, which is why I'm, I'm very excited because my income is getting better. But if I don't have any financial literacy, it's going to be another income that I spend down the drain. So right now, like, I'm not really worried about. It had taken me three years. I also got accepted into YouTube's program as well.

So it's just a matter of working hard and I can... His YouTube is linked in the description below. Thank you. So right now, best case scenario will take me two years. Worst case scenario, three and a half years. And either or sounds still great because I'm going three years off of that. Three years off of that, but there's also saving up for the emergency fund and saving up for, you know, want a little more money than that too for closing costs and stuff like that and also

paying off the card. I think realistically we're looking more four years but okay which is still not back because I'm trying to do all this before 30 if that's your timeline then you're on a good track for it. You just have the budget that's where I want you to get with rock and money and also I want you to have a better credit score and actually manage your spending so I think that's where it is good for you as well. Okay. So I will set you up with those and that's that will be good because we need to get your credit score up in order to, because you're going to take out leverage on this house and you don't want good credit to get the best interest at the time of this. Hopefully interest rates will be in a better place, by the way, by the time you're

three, four years from now when you're actually doing this. But let's build the credit from there. Paying off those credit cards is going to help with the credit score. Okay. I will. All right. I'll get it done by the end of the month. Just follow this budget. Maybe increase your income. That's up to you. but definitely follow the budget, figure out what your priorities are, make sure you're investing into like a Roth IRA, stuff like that as well. I have one, but I haven't really touched it. I know it's time to, though.

Yeah, I have it on Robin Hood, but I didn't know what, not what to do, but what's like the appropriate amount to put in with the income that I'm making. Because I'm already putting... The appropriate amount for the Roth IRA for anyone is as much as they can and trying to max it out at $6,500 a year. You're the proper amount of $6,500 a year. Okay. Easily.

All right. Okay. All right. I think I can do that once I get my foot together. Yeah. Clean it all up. You'll start that in about six months, six and a half months. Okay.

Not bad. Will you actually follow the budget? Will you actually do all this? Will this actually work out? Yeah. Yeah. I have no doubt. I really am doing better so far.

All right. So in six and a half months then, we're going to talk and the credit card will be done. You'll have $15,000, $1,000 in emergency fund. You will start in saving investing, correct? I'll have the credit card down, correct. 15,000 will get very close to that for sure. I'm being realistic. I'm being realistic myself.

Why? I'm saying, what's realistic versus what I talked about? I'm saying realistic because I'm thinking in the sense that anything could happen, but I know for a fact I'll be over 10K. If not at 15, I'll definitely be over 10K for sure. I'll say that much. Okay, your right things happen. The only thing that will excuse it for me are like actual.

emergencies, actual emergencies, but not wants. I will not excuse wants. Okay. That's fine. And I can take up on that. That's fine. Then we will see in about six and a half months. Gorgeous.

All right. That works for me. For Jamal, he thought he was going to be a seven out of ten for the hammer financial score, but actively choosing to put fun overpaying off the credit card faster, not having even close to a fully funded emergency fund. And pretty much having nothing saved for a retirement at this point, he's going to have to be about a four out of ten right now. So check out all the fun things in this.

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