Financial Audit - Woman Has Everything In Collections

Episode Date: August 4, 2023

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Restrictions apply. I'm Stephanie. I'm 35. I'm based out of Austin, Texas. And this is the financial audit. All right. What do you do here in Austin for a living? I'm a nurse.

Okay. Very cool. What kind of nurse? I'm LVN, so our LPN, depending on what is. state I'm in. So the lower paid version of the nurse. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Do you enjoy being a nurse though? Yeah, I was raised in the industry, so I'm pretty used to health care and that type of stuff. Very cool. My mom's a nurse. Oh, yeah. Very cool. What do you make, I assume, hourly, correct? Yeah. What's your hourly? Uh, 32, 54 or something like that. And how many hours a week do you get on

average. It's supposed to be 40. Supposed to be. Sometimes it's a little bit more, like 45-ish. Oh, okay. Well, that was the better end of that. Yeah. It used to be like 80, 60, but not at this job, but like regular jobs.

I work at desk job now, so it's... Des job? Okay. What do you do? I'm a quality nurse. I'm a transition nurse, so I oversee, like, all the hospitals and doctors offices and try to help one of the health care plans take care of their patients. and get people all the resources and hopefully help people, like, stay healthy and out of the hospital.

Oh, cool, cool, cool. So hopefully 40, sometimes a little more. Is there overtime or is that just? Yeah, there's overtime. What's the overtime, which? Like time and a half. I think it's like 48 something. I think of one of my paystubs in that stack.

In this, okay. Yeah, so it has. Is it in this or this? It's in that, on the tablet. Okay. We're about to be doing a deep dive session here because it was a little chaotic. getting some of the stuff and they're like pictures

within a long document and then a folder I have not had access to. Well the other one I was going to send earlier but yeah this is all I don't know I've been like scammed a couple times so I was like I'm gonna wait and see

till I get like a more human response before I send I get it but yeah and the first ones didn't like come out right so then this was like a quick quickie scan okay so

let's try to find the income statement within here. This could be it. No, I think that's my HSA. So it's that one. Ah. Yeah, so we have like a lot of bonuses. Yeah. Woo.

So this is biweekly, it looks like. Yeah, biweekly. We got 80 hours an extra nine hours 38. Very good. And this came out to net. And does this feel like an average? Yeah, that's more typical because I'm usually doing a little bit more work. We just got a boss, though.

So now she's helping do the extra work I was doing. So the overtime might be gone. Oh, really? But I don't know. It depends on how much stuff she has to do. Because I've been, like, unofficially leading my team for a little bit. So I, like, do extra work on top of our work to keep our team going. Okay.

It added an extra 500 bucks. I know it doesn't. So you walked away with 2,000, meaning we're at $4,000 a month, but we would be at almost like $3,000 a month without that overtime. Yeah. Without the overtime, it is tight. Yeah, it would be about approximately, I think about $3,500 without the overtime. Yeah.

Net. Because net, you're at $4,000 right now. So that's what's sitting in your gown on a monthly basis. You have to get a lot closer than like. Sorry. That's okay. I was like trying to each mine. That's okay.

Yeah, so I try to work as much overtime as I can when we're allowed to. Like if there's a project or something, I'll take it on. I also like try to do every side hustle under the sun. So I was bartending for a couple years for like events and stuff like that. And then I do writing jobs. Like I'm freelancing for a company back home that I used to work for. Yeah, so I rewrite their curriculum. I wrote a couple of new classes for them too.

Oh, that's cool. But right now everything's getting updated, so I'm updating that. And I've tried to reach out to all the schools in Oregon to be like, hey, if you want someone to update everything, like, I'm already doing this one. So I can do you next. Yeah. Okay. Well, very cool. No, I love the side hustles.

So let's just start. Well, actually, before I jump into your checking account, I want to hear from your perspective, but especially since I'm dealing with all this for the first time in terms of the documents. I'm looking at them. What's your financial situation? Give yourself a zero out of 10. So I'm probably going to get like two. Okay. Maybe not.

I don't know. What's your financial situation? I'm comfortable. Like right now, like I grew up like in a really tough situation. Like single mom, all that. Like living in the projects, welfare services, all that type of stuff. What city? At Orville, California.

Sure. So it's like a little meth town. Who doesn't love a good meth town? Yeah. Okay. Sorry, go ahead and continue. Yeah, so I got out of there, like, pretty early. But like now I live like in the best, I guess, way that I have my whole life.

Like I live in a nice place and I'm pretty secure. What about your debts? Are your debts stacked? Oh, the debts are, yeah, they're stuck. But I was in debt before I turned eight. So, well, we'll get into that for sure. Before we do, you should hit subscribe because we're trying to get to 500,000 subscribers. Thank you to everyone who has subscribed so far.

Let's look at your checking. Okay, so savings it went from 175 to 225 within Chase, so really not that much. And checking, we went from the beginning balance of 4,631 to 5,639. So that's good. It went up. Very good. Yeah. And this month, you know, like you always hear, was one of those months that's a little bit different.

Yeah. Every month is different, unless it's strictly budgeting. And even still every month is going to be a little different. So you had a reoccurring thing, not whitewater car wash, but as you put in here, canceled. Yeah. We went to some CAFA. What's a portfolio recum? One of those debt companies.

Oh, geez. Because, yeah, $72 went to that, and $35 went to that immediately. I paid, like, $100 a month for a couple of one of the collections account. Collections. Oh, Jesus. What did I walk into? Okay. This is cursive, and I don't really read cursory.

Oh, I think I reimburse myself for that. It was, like, meds. Oh. It was, like, my med cost. Okay. Like, if I don't have, like, all my HSA money in there to cover my meds, I'll wait to, like, my next paycheck and then pay myself back. Okay. Tar-J, Tar-T.

And these are cheaper Tarzadiships. I just got out of the hospital whenever I did this, so all those are donations. This episode is brought to you by Ultima Replenisher. Health is all about balance, like a salad with fries. So why not have balance in your hydration? With six essential electrolytes and no junk, Ultima provides balanced hydration you can enjoy every day. That means no sugar, calories, or carbs. And it's not loaded with sodium.

Just delicious plant-based flavors you'll actually look forward to drinking. Shop Ultima on Amazon or in store at Target and Whole Foods Market. It's by the way. Huh? No donations. They were donations. So you purchase things to donate? Yeah, for one of the elders.

Shouldn't you be donating to your collections? I do. I was. I don't know. It was an elderly guy that has like no family here in America. I get it. So I felt like really bad for him because we were in a similar place, but I got out. Poshmark.

Yeah. 50 bucks. I know. Amazon. Making some credit payments. Okay, okay, okay. Planet K, it's expensive. Yeah.

ATT. Oh, internet probably. Okay. Ooh, lots of, this is all over the place. Oh, the turbo tax and ATM withdraw 200 bucks. Who knows where that went? Yes, okay. And Amazon, an Amazon and Amazon.

Coffee again. You're getting Zells in. Yeah. I was supposed to get more Zells and like all those Planet Ks and stuff. Yeah. Do you go to Planet K like every day? No, that was like I was hanging out with somebody from the hospital for a while. Or, well, I was hanging out with someone anyways and they were asking me to buy them.

Something they were going to are going to pay me back and then they didn't pay me back. But I did like put my foot down like and, you know, I was like, well, I have to budget and like I'm not budgeting in for your like habits. Do you budget? I do budget. Strictly budget? You have a strict budget. I have a broke girl budget. Okay, so all these coffees were in your budget?

No, but I did just get out of the hospital that month. So, like, this month is different. Yeah, I do. I've been making all my coffees in the curing. Well, like, I make tea, mainly, but. Okay. And we also were paying cards and card purchased something. Michaels again. We've gone to Michaels a few times.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm out again. We're valuing out some money as well. Web payment, Bell, that's probably rent. Yes, the big one. You live by yourself? Yeah. That's a, that's 50% of your income. 50% of your income goes to rent.

Of my regular income. Of your regular income. But the other, the sidehouses are up and down, right? Yeah, but I was working on a COVID unit whenever I moved in there. So it didn't used to be 50% of my wages. I used to make a lot more. And have you looked for other jobs to try to get that income back? In LVN land, no, but I've been starting to look at, like, personal assistant jobs and things like that. Like, I could literally do anything else besides be a nurse and probably make more money.

But, I don't know, my family did not like any other time. I walked away from nursing, so. Well, fuck for family. What? I don't care. Yeah. But, like, right now my day jobs. Why do they matter?

Why are they a part of this conversation? when it comes to you making money. I know you come from the, you said that's like the industry, but like I don't care, make more money, live the life you want to live. Yeah, I'm working on like trying to either like build something else like on my own while I'm using my 9 to 5 to like fund paying back like all my debt and then of course my insurance and things like that. Like I have really, really good benefits with my job.

So I'm hoping I can like build something and make. make money while I'm still working this nine to five for at least like a couple more years maybe okay okay make my time like more valuable hopefully and then you said on this Albert oh yeah I closed that I forgot I had that 50 bucks so that's gone yeah I just put it in my savings which well it had like the chase savings or is there another savings that I'm not aware of um no that I actually don't really use my chase savings that much I just keep everything all in one account because I'm weird. I just started like actually moving stuff to it.

But the Albert had like automatic withdrawals that it would do towards like certain savings things and I didn't realize that it was charging me like a fee for it. So I like canceled it and got, I'm getting a reimburse for the rest of the subscription fee. Okay. What is this same? That's my car payment. Oh, we'll get to that. Yeah.

Death. This is your HSA, a couple hundred bucks. Yeah. They at least give me free money from work in there, too. I think I got like $800 a year from work. That's nice. Yeah. Chains. Okay. We have Fidelity. 2189. What is this? Is this? That was a rollover. Yeah. Oh, I hope there's more than that because that's at 35. That's not the only one. But that was one I didn't know I had and then I combined it into this company.

What was the money in? government money. No, no, no, you got to start investing this. This needs to start being invested. Right now, it is sitting in cash. Oh, that one is in nothing. Yeah, that one I have to like pick something out to do. But I just, I had to move.

It took like a long time to move it because the other company that had it was like playing games and didn't have the papers that Fidelity wanted. And it took like six months just to get it there. And then $9,000 United Health Group. Yeah. 401K. Okay. So 9,000 plus that 2000. Is that it?

It's a little bit more now. That was April's statement. So like every... 10,000? Yeah, I think it's like 12 or 13 with all of them put together. Oh, all them. So you're at $13,000 in retirement? I just started it last year.

Okay, that scares me being mid-30s. I know. It's very scary. I always thought. that I would, you know, just get married and have somebody else deal with all of my life planning issues. You didn't get married? No. I almost got married a couple of times, but I didn't, and that was probably a smarter idea.

Okay. Well, it's not all about the money. But now, yeah, but, I mean, I've been trying to, like, I've been digging out of a hole since before I turned 18. What is this hole? What? Give us something. So, like, we grew up in the projects and. Yeah.

My mom was on her own. There was some bills put in my name before I graduated. From your mom? Yeah. Oh, geez, I'm sorry. But, no, it's fine. I mean, it's fun. They give you the option of, like, you can, like, put your mom in jail or you can.

You and your mom have a good relationship? She is blocked. But, I mean, she has tried to be fair. This is about to be a man. I'm sorry. We're not going to put this stuff on screen because we don't have the things, but this is about to be a mess. They are in organized stacks.

Okay. But some of them are also like zeros and stuff too. Like some of them I was just going to like look into. Oh, this one is something that just popped up. Debt collections. Better yet, do you have credit karma on your phone? Yeah, I do. Go ahead and open that for me.

Wait. Oh, that might be a much better. Yeah. Starting place at least. Yeah. All right, so we're in the low to mid-600s. Yeah. Let's go ahead and take a look.

What's up? Payment history 100% good. Drug or three marks five. Bad. Lots of bad. What did we do? Oh, collection. Oh, collection.

Yeah, there's a lot of collections. Why? Why are you doing so much collections? So I've like restarted my life a few times. And some of the stuff that's in collections, I'm like writing letters to them. because I've either never been to some of the places that are charging me, or they were like my ex. This is Euphoria Calvin Klein,

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Or other things that. Has anyone responded to these letters? No, I'm getting ready to send off the actual, like. Like saying like, oh, boo-boos. Requesting, like, the original contracts and everything, because some of the companies are coming after me for stuff that's out of the statute of limitation. So some of those ones, I won't have to worry. about but well maybe the ones on here the oldest one's three years old so that's not even that

old yeah and there's different ones on each one so waiting on which one you're looking at midland credit management what was that i'm paying a lot of those ones that's the MCM that you see come out all the time yeah but what was that um it was care credit so some dental bill of some sort why why don't you pay it because i was moving either down here or working a sales job at the time that made like absolutely no money. Okay. Why don't you pay it though? I'm confused.

Well, it was when I was barely like able to pay my rent and I was working a bunch of different jobs. Are you going out to eat and stuff? I was not. I usually like I'm lucky enough to have friends that will take me out with them, but I haven't been going out really for a while. Just because I know what the situation's like. And I know how fast things add up.

So I usually- You're getting coffee and stuff. stuff on the bills that we were looking at. But I just got out of the hospital whenever I did that month. So a lot of that stuff that month was like I needed to get back into therapy and out of being triggered. Yeah, therapy is good. I encourage that. But, okay, portfolio recovery.

What's that for? That's the PR. That's the one that you were saying is like $100. Yeah, but what was it for? Oh, it was for my laptop when I first moved down here. And then. Why did you get a laptop if you couldn't afford it? What you need it for?

For that sales job. What I was doing? We had to travel around and do stuff. If they didn't, they didn't provide work equipment? No. It was a really company. Yeah, I probably wouldn't have worked there.

Okay, the other portfolio recovery, are they for the same thing? It's for an Ashley's account. Because I had to buy my furniture whenever I came back down here. No, why did you get? Okay. But the laptop for work, I mean, I wouldn't have done that. I would have tried to get a better job.

And this was like five years ago. So. But. And the. the dental thing, okay, if we're going to pay it fine. But furniture, you did not need to buy furniture. Get a mattress, $300. $300.

On the ground, and that's all you need to survive. You did not need to go and get $1,300, well, probably more at the time. So the laptop somehow. Okay, so the other one, $6.45 was furniture? Yeah, it was just the couch. It wasn't like a ton of furniture. You didn't need a couch. Why are we buying things we can't afford?

So I wasn't sitting on the floor. I don't care. If you can't afford it, though. it doesn't make sense to get it because now it's in collections right yeah it is in collections but um yeah what's iC systems or what was it for that one is uh anesthesiology bill so that one is one that i was going to pay they it's with a debt buyer though now so they were going to give me at least half off so that was the other thing is like i have a little spreadsheet of all the different debt companies and elevate recovery what's that oh so that is i think that is this but they haven't actually

sent me a bill. Well, what's it for, though? That was when I broke my leg in 2020. Jeez. Yeah. Well, it's for 2039. Yeah. 2039 is what it's for. Yeah. And I was waiting for them to send me a letter so I can send them something back so they can confirm it or see if I can pay it off. Have you been paying these off? My hospital bills, I didn't, obviously. I wasn't able to work because my leg was broken, so I was not able to stand for a couple of months. Okay, you have a credit card, which I didn't have access to your spending on. Olo card, CV.

Yeah, but it doesn't actually have that on there anymore. What? Does it say 166 still? Yeah. So I had a battery that I had to replace last month, I guess. But I already paid it off. I just put it on there temporarily to keep stuff open. Yeah.

nursing school. Do you spend on that credit card? No, I don't use them. They usually use them for like, oh, sh** in case because I am here by myself and I don't have family or like... Where's everyone? California and like Korea, Philippines, everywhere. Okay.

What is... Where'd you go to school? I went to school in Chico and Oregon and... Why so many different places? because I started college in high school and at that time I was living in Chico, California. And then I went up to Oregon after that and waited until I got in-state tuition. But then nursing school took a while to get into and I ended up having to go back to California for nursing school. And I was supposed to get granted in-state tuition because you're supposed to get in-state tuition no matter what as a California graduate.

it and then the school was supposed to pay me back like $18,000 and then did not. Well, student loans are going to start up very soon. You're going to have to pay these $30,556, but going to be about a $400 minimum monthly payment. I know. That's what it was before. It was like $500 before I did the so-called income-based payment. No, you're on income? Yeah, so I mean, I can't even get it like lower.

It was like $500 something. No, you're screwed with that because you're, you'll, you'll, be paying a little, but it's just going to be accruing interest forever. You're not going to have that forgiven. I haven't actually paid them since before 2021, but that's what they sent me as like an option. The stack of student loans is in here. Are you on income base or are you on? It's on deferment right now.

I know, but when it starts, are you on income based? I don't know. I mean, I haven't paid them for four years. It's a scam. No, I mean, they're still with NellNet or like the original loan company. And it's like a federal company. or something. I know, but... I don't know.

Honestly, like, when we were in school, they just told us, like, hey, like, go to school, keep taking classes, then you want to pay back your student loans. And, like, I took classes. Like, I could be a preschool educator. Like, I took enough classes to, like, run my own preschool. Like, I had almost two years before I got into a nursing program. And then by that time, I had used up all my Pell Grant money. And I took out some of these student loans for nursing school.

And some of them were an ex-boyfriend that was really abusive and had me take out student loans in the beginning that he used to buy cars. Cars, I'm sorry. Yeah, race cars. But I got out of there alive, so that's important. Good. That is important. But, yeah. But, yeah, no, I know these student loans were going to come back eventually.

Well, you also have a car. It's halfway done, but you took it out for six freaking years. So we still got three. There's $10,000 left on our 9. I'll probably be done paying it off next year, though. Well, I hope so. We'll see what your plan indicates. There was a good amount of money left over in that check-in.

That's good. What's in your savings? I had emptied out that Albert account into the savings, and then it really is only sent to like a $25 a month auto. Well, it was only set to $25 a month auto transfer. What's in your savings? I don't know, like $7.25 or something like that? $725?

You have my phone, so I can't exactly. look. Your interest rate, this is the bad part, though. The interest rate on the car is high. Yeah. So you know what people do when girls go to car lots and try to get cars? Sure. Yeah, I mean, yeah.

They said, like, they didn't even show me, like, the original car that I went there for, but they just told me, like, the bank wouldn't loan me any money because the bank can recoup its losses easier on a new car than a used car if I were to not pay my car loans, but I've never not paid my car notes. So it says you have even more in collections that we don't see on the total of $6,290. A couple of different ones, depending on which one you're looking at. But some of them were paid off. Hannity presents in the red corner the undisputed, undefeated weed whacker guy.

Champion of hurling grass and pollen everywhere. And in the blue corner, the challenger, extra strength, Hannity. eye drops and work all day to prevent the release of histamines that cause itchy allergy eyes. And the winner, by knockout, is Hatterday. Padaday! Bring it on. Bye. Why what? Well, one of them that was on there was something that State Farm was supposed to pay off,

like an insurance thing, and then I had got sent to collections for it, but it was someone else's insurance that was paying for it, but they just paid for that. You need, oh my goodness. I know. You just allowed your entire life. You just, like, decided not to think about things. So, yeah, I also have a C-P-T-S-D.

So I also decided that I wasn't going to have emotions until this year, too. What's not? I'm sorry, I don't know if it is. It's complex PTSD, so it's just a form of, like, having so much trauma over time, build-up, and then, yeah. But I see now like the air in my ways And I've been getting help Like I knew like I needed help But I didn't know that I had like

I thought I had anxiety like February of last year And then found out it was PTSD And then now it is what it is Yeah But I've been dealing with like everything slowly like You know That is not a bill at least Is any of this in here

That I don't know about yet? Yeah? What? What do I not know about yet? Well, I guess you have the student loans there. Yeah. So, then this one is actually credit,

so I don't have to pay my power bill. I don't want to mess with your system. This is all the hospital bills that's coming up. Yeah, but I was going to call my insurance and talk to them and see why they're denying it. How much in hospital bills total are coming up? I think it was close to four or five grand. of the current ones.

The current ones. Yeah. I brought you a stack of my paid-off bills. Caleb chose a comment. I was my check-off list to get all my together for you. And then I was going to see what all the balances were. But yeah, actually, you might not need most of that

now that you opened up the credit karma. Okay, so this is mostly the hospital bills. Yeah, it's mostly the hospital bills because those are like just now coming. Like, I keep trying to send them for, uh, for them to hopefully charge my insurance so that I can help me and hopefully at least meet my deductible. But, I mean, I should meet my deductible with what they sent me, but it's not counting at all so far. And I don't know why.

And I work for my insurance company, so it's interesting. Right. Crap. So we need to come up with $5,000. For the hospital bills? Mm-hmm. And you have nothing in your savings? Well, $700.

dollars in your savings. Yeah. How much was in your checking? I'm like, $8,000. No. Eight grand? Okay.

Tell me your current balances everywhere. Yeah. Okay. It's a good plan. Okay. My checking is $7,422. And then the savings is $7.95. Okay.

So we have $8,000. Yeah. And then I think I saw like $50 on my Apple card and Venmo. just like my random accounts. All right. Well, from here, it just comes down to budgeting.

I needed you to budget. You didn't go crazy is the thing. I did go crazy. What? The hospital trip, but it just was a bad job. What happened? Somebody got me sent to the hospital

for saying I was doing something that I wasn't exactly doing. But it's going to cost a lot of money. Any more details? They said I was trying to commit suicide. Oh, wow. So, yeah, I kind of got, like, attacked by the cops and drugged. Oh, geez.

By the EMS. Who said this? This girl I've been trying to avoid for, like, a year or so. Used to be a friend? Yeah, she used to be a friend, but, like, you know, sometimes people have to leave your life because they remind you of other people that make. things wild. And then, yeah.

988, always an option. Yeah. Please take advantage of that, you know, for everyone out there. And then therapy and everything, that's good. Yeah, I have that. And, like, we have a lot of benefits, like, at work. Like, there's a line I can call 24-7. And luckily, I have, like, some help paying for some of my therapy through my job.

Okay. Well, if you're ever in that place, please reach out for help. You know, you said you weren't. so I'm not going to say anything. That's too much of a commitment for me, the whole death thing. Nogmettle. That's time to budget. Do you want the retirement account?

No. So let's that $1,300,000. Nah. That, we already know we're drastically behind on that. At this point, we're just trying to get out of these debts. And these collections are way too young to just say, we'll wait a few years. Well, no, some of them, on credit,

Karma doesn't show that I'm paying them off, but I am paying them off. And then the two that are the hospital bills that have like a deal with them to get them off. Payment plan? Or like I'm just going to pay them like a big chunk. So I was waiting to like a half. Yeah.

To half. So that's nice because, yeah. It was like 10 grand just to fix my foot. All right. So $8,000. I, okay, you're going to have that conversation with the insurance. You're going to have that conversation with insurance, but then after that conversation, just assuming they don't do anything, just pay it.

Pay it, just pay it. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I was paying, and I was paying some of the other ones. But we're going to go from $8,000 to $5,000. We're just paying the hospital bills. Sucks, but it is what it is. Then you have $3,000 left. After insurance, either, you know, helps or not.

You're talking about what the money you have right now? Yeah. Then what happens if something happens? Well, you have $3,000. We're going to get you in a better place, but we're not allowing this to fall into collections again. Well, not this one, but... What do you mean? Last time I was working a job where I got paid a lot less, so I wasn't able to pay the hospital bills as fast.

Yeah, I'm saying you're paying the hospital bill. What were you, what was your plan? You thought I was just going to pay like $5 grand all at one time? Yeah. Were you going to payment plan it? Yeah, they usually let you make payment plans because there's no, interest on it at least and then I could pay on the ones that were more interest like my car. Let's create your budget.

We'll see how much money you should have leftover. Your rent already takes 5% of your income. So we have that. Let's see. Rent 1800. Deaf. It's actually like 16. So that's like utilities and stuff included?

Yeah. Yeah. It includes utilities. Okay. So there you go. Car insurance. Like 164 or something. And I paid $350 on my car.

But I think it's like, three. Yeah, your debts, because the student loans are going to be there. Yeah. Again, I've been trying to get extra jobs that I've been like saving up money to start paying those back to. Yeah. I was hoping that, you're going to have to.

We're about to talk about it. But your minimum monthly payments are debt, 732. That's what it's about to be. Like any time, student loans are not going to be forgiven. Okay, gas on a monthly basis? I spend like 40 or 50 bucks. I don't really go in. A month a week or what?

A month. I don't go. I don't go to the office that much, so. Okay, and health insurance that's taken out of paycheck before, therapy, how much on a monthly basis? It's $500 a month, but I am not paying for it for the next two and a half months. Why? There's something called EAP benefits that probably everyone should look into at their jobs.

It's like confidential aside from your job that you can usually get help. So, like, there's like 10 free sessions for any. Very good. that comes up. I'm glad you take advantage of that. Okay. Oh, yeah. I have found every little thing at work.

There's, like, an app on my phone that I mark off, like, self-care activities, and it gives me a discount on my health insurance. So sometimes my health insurance doesn't charge me at all, and I get, like, extra money in my HSA. Okay. So. Cool. Okay.

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Okay, so phone. What are we looking at for phone and cell? The phone is 99, but they have been not giving me my discount for a long time for being a nurse. And I got up in fixing that for like the last year. And this time they swear that it's going to reflect on my balance or on my bill on the next one to two months. Who are you with? Verizon. But they've been ripping me off for like a year.

Yeah, if they don't give me my money back in the next two months, I'm going to like really throw a fit. But yeah, I was going to switch. But I was hoping that they would give me the credits because they've told me like a few times that they're going to give me the credit back for being a nurse. Like that's literally the only benefit for being a nurse is this one discount on my cell phone and I haven't got it.

All right. So 99 for phone and then we have gas. Therapy will start eventually again, $500 a month. But for the next two and a half months we're good? Yeah, I'll have to like, I'll probably spread it out Because, well, actually, instead of the therapy place, if we could budget, I was going to do a treatment for my PTSD with, that comes with some therapy and stuff, too, that my.

How much is that? It's, I think it's just $1,000 or $9.58 total. A month? No, no, for six months. But you pay like $1.58 for six months. And then. Is that going to start in two and a half months? No, that's going to start a lot sooner because I need to.

So $1.50. Yeah, 158 a month. It's 948 total, which I might. Well, I've been funneling a lot of money into my HSA account to pay for my health care expenses. So to at least do it tax-free. I didn't know. Yeah. Okay, so you live alone? Groceries, $300 a month. Yeah. That's all you get. Total paper money, $100 a month. That's all you get. I usually spend about $300 on both those things together. Good. Then I'm going to minimize. I'm going to do 50 for toilet paper, $250 for groceries. It's like something on my two. Okay. Any other ongoing expense that you can think of? No. It's a rent that's killing you. I know. But I like my house.

House? It's a house? No, it's not. It's like, well, it's my home, but it's an apartment. But I live on the lake. So whenever I do go outside, it's nice to, like, walk on the water when it doesn't smell. I was also getting paid like double when I moved in there, but sometimes I work a lot of extra side jobs and I make quite a bit more money, but I hope so. Because right now your minimum budget in order to survive is $3,303. So of that, you have an extra $700 bucks. This is perfect.

So yes, you are going to cut the check for $5,000 total. Then you'll have $3,000 left. And then you put an extra $300 to it. you have a one month of merchants fund that is perfect to get started while you go and attack the insanity that you have found yourself in. Yeah? Mm-hmm. What? Nothing.

Okay. I'm good. I'm fine. You smiled. I don't know. I don't smile that often. Yeah, no, it's fine. I've been like keeping it.

I think I wrote my budget was like $3,400 or something. Like I knew that's about what my thoughts was. But are you following that? That's not what you were following on what I was looking at. You were going out and doing crap. Yeah. It wasn't a lot. Like other people on the show

Because I like had just went through my worst fear ever Of getting locked up against my will Um, so You went to a lot of cafes though. Yeah, it's just the cafe that's downstairs from my apartment Because I use that to convince myself to leave once a week. Um, but I do have a normal... Go to parks and stuff.

Go on, you're looking for a husband. You said go on dates and stuff. No, I'm not looking for a husband. No. Oh, well, I thought you said you said, That was the plan. No, I mean, that's what I thought when I was growing up, because I grew up in a small town where they kind of just teach you, like, you know, the Christian idea of families and women just listening to men, tell them what to do. I got you.

Swymourner, and not a doctor. Okay. Either way. You pay off the hospital bill. There's $700 a left a month. Well, I don't know what these collections are going to look like with the negotiations and stuff, but even just assuming they're all half. I mean, you could kill that in like about five months, putting everything extra towards it. And of course, hopefully you have side hustles that you said you do and put all that extra towards it as well.

And then from there, we're paying off the car. You know, you're entering the second half where like half your payments are going to interest, half or going to principal versus like all interests and no principal towards the beginning or all principal at the end, no interest. So with the interest rate and where it's at still and with how many years are left, we want to attack it and go. crazy. So let's see. Divide that by 700. So with only $700, it's still going to take a year in a year and one and a half months to pay off. So now we're a year in about five months in after collections and everything. So year in five months. Then the student loans, it's kind of a classic situation where if they're federal, first of all, do the traditional repay payment. Make sure you are, do not do income. Do not do income. If they're income, we're going to approach it in a

different way, but make sure they're traditional, if they're not put them on traditional, the traditional tenure. What are you going to do? Anything that is over four to five percent, you're going to pay off as quick as quick as possible with your extra $700 a month. Anything that is 4% or less, maybe 5% or less, we're doing minimum monthly payments until they're paid off because it makes more sense to invest. But only if you invest that extra money that you would be putting towards the paying off versus just spending it on bull. If you're going to spend it on bullsh, no, pay off the student loans early. Yeah.

Does that make sense? Yeah. Okay. So at this point, it's probably going to be a three, two, three year process because then you want to save a fully funded emergency fund. And with where your expenses are, probably going to do about, I'm going to do about $15,000. Yeah. 15,000 bucks saved up.

So you're going to go from what the $3,000 emergency fund is that you'll have at the start of this process. Take that up to about $15,000. then you'll be okay. And then what I need you to do from there, because we're going to be like 37, 38, depending on just how crazy you go, is it's time that we put 30% of our income. Yeah. It's up 15 right now.

That's okay, but we're also maxing on to Roth IRA. So everything combined, we want to get to 30, 35% because you have fallen behind drastically, drastically on retirement. And we need to start playing catch up now. Yeah. But only when you're out of the bad debts, because again, the car at 11. 85% the collections

hounding you and stuff like this and you won't be able to get mortgages and whatever you want to do eventually because we're not waiting for these

to fall off your credit because they're also young. The oldest one's only a couple years, three years. And then, obviously in the hospital we need to take care of that

and then the student loans mathematical difference between market performance that's why we're looking like that 5% or less minimum monthly payment higher than that we pay it off aggressively.

Does that all make sense? Yeah, I can't remember what I put this student loans on. Well, we'll just look once it starts resuming, get in contact with them, be like, is this income base or traditional? Yeah. Get it traditional.

If the interest is higher on my car, though, and there's no interest on the hospital bills, because the hospital bills will take, like, I think $80 a month or something like that until I can pay them in bigger chunks. Like, I'm not sure how, like, that interest thing works. Hospital bills? The one you looked at, the $500,000, the $5,000? Yeah, the hospital. them, say I want to pay it. I want to just pay it. I want to pay it. I want to pay it.

Because you need to pay it. Don't get on this stupid interest plan. Doesn't make any sense. No, they don't have interest though. Okay. Well, still, the minimum payment doesn't make sense. We're just attacking these. We're just attacking these. Stop having your money going to minimum payments at this point because we're trying to get out of debt. So in this way, you just pay it. You have enough for a month emergency fund. I don't get why it wouldn't be better to pay. I guess I don't understand the interest with the car thing. What do you mean? Because the interest on my car is much higher.

So, but you were, like, explaining, like, at first, you're, like, you're paying more on the interest than the principal and... Well, the way we think about it in this situation, the hospital bill, that's, like, already due. Instead of trying to make it to a minimum payment or just doing what you've done in the past. And just let it fall into collections. Well, I mean, because I can set it up on auto pay now that I have an actual job. Because I didn't have a job on the first one, the first one that went to collections

was when I broke my leg and I couldn't walk for two months, so I wasn't working because I didn't, I guess I didn't know about the jobs that I have now. Like, it took somebody, like, encouraging me that I could leave bedside nursing. If you want to, I'm just trying to make it as simple as possible, but if you want to, sure, you could put it on the payment plan as long as there's no interest,

and then you pay off your collections as quick as you can, then you pay off your car as quick as you can, and then you pay off the remainder of the hospital as quick as you can. Yeah. And then the student loans anything above 5% after that. Yeah, because I was just doing the things with like the higher interest first. Because there's no, they're not allowed to charge you interest on the hospital bills. That's the avalanche method.

You're paying off high interest first. With yours, with where your debts are in terms of sitting at like a, I had a couple of like the snow 200 to a couple thousand to five thousand to 10,000 in the car. They're so close. Or it's just like, let's just go smallest, biggest. If you were sitting at like a ginormous, like huge, big thing that was just, killing you on interest and it's like, okay, we just need to take care of this right now. Yeah, it just seemed like the interest was so high on my car.

It is. But I did like take care of like a lot of like the snowball ones. Like if I would have came in here last year, you would have lost your shit. Yeah. Yes. Sounds like that would have been painful. But again, the collections. Well, okay.

But I do work quite a bit like on my own and I put all like the extra money that I get towards like debt rather than. And the Michael stuff I'm painting for art. So you're going to get paid for it? I'm hoping to sell my art for the first time. I've been sharing it for the first time, but all my friends are also artists. I encourage that stuff once the 12% age is rate. Yeah. I'm using like only the supplies of my house now.

So I'm not like going to buy any more stuff. But I needed something. Either way. There was a little bit of BS spending, not a lot of BS spending. Now there'll be no more BS spending. We're cutting it back. Just go to parks. Work as much as you can on the side.

and hustles as well. Bring this in. You can turn this from three years to two years to a year and a half, depending what you do. Probably about two years. Yeah, I had it down to two. When you're 37, though, we're investing like crazy. That's the big part that I'm scared of right now. I'm not, your debt doesn't necessarily terrify me.

The way you've thought about it in the past and the way things have gone scares me, but what I'm most scared about right now is you not being able to retire. And having to work a job nursing on your feet, stuff like that when you're older and you want to retire. just you don't have the ability right now. That's why I'm trying to like make something else on the side with everything. As much as you can make to pay off the debts quicker, the better. And then I think 35% of your income has to go to retirement. We got to play catch up 30 to 35%.

I'm also willing to sell a kidney. But just kidding. But I mean, that's where things are looking for me. That's my diagnosis and prescription. Yeah. What do you think? there is like one of my

that Olo card has a zero balance transfer fee thing and I was thinking about using that to like kind of front myself some of the money to pay off

one of the bigger collection debts like to pay off half of it and then I think it gives you like six months to pay it back they're not but I mean like just to get them off of my credit

because like I just paid off a lot that weren't mine now the thing is they range from 500 to $2,000 with what you have left and with the extra money that you're bringing in in the side households and being able to negotiate them to like 50% of the price, we can get rid of these

in just, you know, like four or five months. I think it just was like less scary, like borrowing the money at first. I get it, but let's just attack it head first now instead of just trying to finesse all this. It's going to overcomplicate it. Let's just do it. Yeah. Let's just kill it. Any final thoughts?

No. I'm honestly just a little worried with how things have been in the past, falling into collections, trying to get out on a payment plan instead of just taking care of it. I mean, I'm good with payment plans, especially at 0% interest. We attack things with other interests, higher interest, but just where things in the past, I'm feeling a bit nervous. But for her hammer financial score, spending within a budget, she wasn't going crazy. Six out of 10, it wasn't perfect.

And, you know, she wasn't strictly budgeting. She shouldn't have been spending money on fun well. you know, needing to pay all of this off, but it wasn't that bad. $6 out of $10. Debt, zero out of 10. I mean, in collections, it's pretty much as bad as it can get. Retirement, 2 out of 10. I'm glad we're at least starting, and we're contributing a good amount now,

but we are very far behind for the age. Emergency fund is a little bit there, especially after we pay off the hospital. She does it in the lump sun. Three out of 10, obviously, is still a good ways to go. Real estate, haven't even started that, not even part of the discussion. Zero out of 10.

aggregate hammer financial score two and a half out of ten. If you want a free $5, sign up for Acorns using the link in the description below. You get a free $5 by using that link, and I get a free $5 using that link. So everybody wins. And don't forget to follow my Instagram and Twitter. Thanks.