More Money Podcast - 267 Budgeting Your Way into Millionaire Status - Sarah Wilson, Founder of Budget Girl

Episode Date: February 24, 2021

I’m so excited to have Sarah Wilson from Budget Girl on the podcast! I got to know Sarah when we met at FinCon in 2019, and since then we’ve become friends and are even in a mastermind together with some other amazing women in the personal finance community. It was high time I had Sarah on the show because she has crushed some major milestones since our first meeting. As she shares in this episode, she started out her personal finance journey with five-figures of debt while living on a very low income. But by learning more about the fundamentals of money management, living frugally, and taking on some side hustles to earn extra money on top of her day job, she not only paid off all her debt in 3 years, she was also able to buy a house that she partially rents out, and has just reached a $100,000 net worth. Sarah’s story should serve as an important reminder that where you start doesn’t determine where you’ll end up. It may not be easy to crush your debt and grow your wealth, but it is possible if you stay strong, consistent, and don’t give up! For full episode show notes, visit https://jessicamoorhouse.com/267 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello. Welcome back to the More Money Podcast. This is Episode 267 and I'm your host, Jessica Morehouse. Welcome back to the show. I'm so excited for this episode because I'm interviewing a friend of mine, someone who I've admired for a long time, but also someone... It's been very, I don't know, very cool because I only got to know her really in 2019. And since then, it's been amazing to see all the things that she's been able to achieve in just a few short years. But also, she just has a super inspiring story. So if you're ready to get motivated and inspired on how to improve your financial life, how

to pay down debt, how to grow your net worth? Well, I've got a real person who I know personally who is able to do it. And also she documents the whole thing on her blog and her YouTube channel. So I'm talking about Sarah Wilson. She's the founder of Budget Girl, which is a blog and a YouTube channel dedicated to teaching others how to budget, destroy debt, start a side hustle, and improve your financial life. And through her YouTube channel, she was able to document how she was able to crush $33,000 in student loans in only three years on a tiny reporter's salary of only $26,000 per year. And then of course, earning some extra money by doing side hustles and whatever she could to crush that debt. And now, fast forward, she's not only still debt-free, but she has been able to

get out of the red, stay in the black, and grow her wealth to $100,000 net worth. So if you need to hear someone's real story, and again, she's a real person. I know her personally. And that's why I think we had so much fun on this episode. She really is proof that you don't have to be have this crazy like, oh, you know, there I see stories all the time that drive me bonkers if I was able to crush, you know, $100,000 in debt in six months. And I'm like, well, what, how on earth how? And usually it's because you find out they were earning like $200,000. It's something like, okay, well, we cannot relate. Sorry. Sarah has a very similar story to me as she grew up or not grew up, but she graduated rather during the recession, just like me. She worked at a newspaper, just like me. She earned a very tiny

salary, just like me. The parallels are crazy. But she was able to accomplish a ton, like pay off her student loans and then continue to grow wealth after debt, which is also very difficult to do when your sole focus for years and years and years was just debt repayment. And so it's possible. It's not easy. I mean, we talk about that. It's simple math, really, but it's not easy. It is a lot of sacrifice. It is a lot of frugality. It is a lot of having to say no to things so you can work a second job or whatever you got to do. It's not easy, but it is possible. And then when you get on the other side of it, you know this, when you're in the thick of it, it seems impossible or so hard, you're like, oh my gosh, I don't know if I can keep going. But then once you're on the

other side of it, you can look back and you kind of forget how, wow, that was like a lot of work because you can just look, we're always looking forward, aren't we? And so now she's kind of living her best life and she's, you know, a homeowner and a landlord. And she still has kind of an average salary, which I think is also kind of inspirational that, yeah, you could achieve some great things on just a regular salary. That's nice, right? We don't all have to quit our jobs and be an entrepreneur and try to make $10,000 per month. Like, come on. No, that's not something that you have to do. You can work your job and achieve some great things. And isn't that amazing? So you're going to love this episode with Sarah Wilson. Before I get to that episode with her, just a few words I want to share about this episode's

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JessicaMorehouse.com slash TurboTax or by checking out the special link in the show notes for this episode. Once again, to save 20% off with any TurboTax assistant review or full service product, visit jessicamorehouse.com slash TurboTax. Welcome, Sarah, to the More Money Podcast. So excited to have you on the show. Thanks so much for having me. I'm thrilled to be here. You're so welcome. And I'm very excited to have you on just because I know you personally, but also I've been able to follow kind of your success and progress over the past few years. Like, cause we for like officially met, I think in 2019, September, 2019. Yeah. FinCon. Yeah. FinCon. And, uh, and so it's been so exciting to get to know you more and to, to see how like so many

things have happened in your life since we first met. Um, but especially now, I mean, you know, obviously following you on Instagram and everything like that. And it's so cool to see where you're at specifically now. You just hit a net worth number, which is like something to be very proud of is you hit $100,000 in your net worth, which is amazing from where you started. Yeah, I am officially a hundred thousandaire or the way I like to think of it, a tenth of a millionaire. There we go. Yeah. Just a little over six years ago, I was negative 33K in debt. So yeah, that's a comeback. Yeah. Sometimes it

would take people just that long just to get out of debt because that is a substantial amount of debt and that you got out of debt and then continue to save and build your wealth. And you're also a homeowner now. And so, and it's, it's how you're, uh, you bought your place. It's, you also rent out part of it. So I know your mortgage, like yours, you have like basically no mortgage. Like you're doing so many smart things. I think so many people are going to learn from your, like you just did so many great choices that I think it's inspirational because people could be like, oh, I am where Sarah used to be. Maybe I can end up where she is now. So I want to kind of go back a little bit, rewind a little bit back. You were in debt. How did that happen? And then what was it that sparked, I guess, in you, I need to take care of this? Oh, Jessica, it's an age old story. Girl goes off to college with bright eyes and weird hair and she graduates and nobody wants to hire her.

When did you graduate, actually? I graduated in 2010 from Mississippi University for Women and I got a degree in journalism and communications. Oh, I'm sorry. It took me six months to find a job as a secretary for a newspaper that I used to work at while I was in college as a reporter. So I did the thing that a lot of people do. And this was upon the advice of my very dear college friends. I took out more money to live on. So I had some scholarships. I had some financial aid. I was completely on my own paying for college. So I figured it out and I was advised, hey, you can take out more student

loans than you need in case you need to live off of them. So I did a few thousand dollars each semester and I bought Taco Bell and I bought like sorority stuff and all of that jazz. And then when I graduated, I had $27,000 worth of debt. And I was like, no problem. Journalists make a ton of money because apparently I hadn't Googled yet. And yeah, six months later, I got a job as a secretary for a newspaper. And then I was able to find a job as a reporter for another newspaper. And during all of this, I was deferring my student loans because the government said that the amount of money that I was making was not enough for me to be able to afford my student loans.

And I believed them. So I essentially didn't pay my student loans for three years. They ballooned up to $33,000. And then I lost my job at a newspaper and I was on unemployment and I was terrified. Wow. Yeah. I, yeah, I was absolutely terrified. I was on unemployment. I was under the impression that I was probably going to have to get a job as like a waitress, which is fine. But I had all the student loan debt that a waitress salary was never going to pay for. And I was like, I went to college. I got a degree. I should be able to get a job. Yeah. We did all the right things. You studied hard. You got your degree. What the hell?

Yeah. And so when I was unemployed, I decided that as soon as I got a new job, I would figure this money thing out and I would get out of debt because I was unemployed, I decided that as soon as I got a new job, I would figure this money thing out and I would get out of debt because I was okay making the amount I was making on unemployment to just live. But there was that student loan debt looming over me constantly. It was just the most terrifying thing. It was like an ax over my head or like a chain dragging me down. And so I got a job in Louisiana.

I was living in Mississippi when I graduated, got a job in Louisiana for $26,000 gross a year. And I found a cheap apartment. I made a budget. I didn't know anyone in town and I started budgeting my way out of debt. I picked up every single side hustle I could. I figured out how to cut my expenses to the bone. And I paid off $10,000 the first year making 26k. So FYI, that was $1,600 a month in a paycheck. I didn't have health insurance. So I was doing absolutely everything I could to get out of debt. I called it scorched earth, which described it. And then about a year and a half later, I got an opportunity to be an editor of a newspaper in a very tiny town in Arkansas. So I took that and that brought me up

to $30,000 a year. And I continued doing the same thing. I threw everything at debt. I figured out how to cut even more expenses to make even more money. And while I was doing this, I of course started my YouTube channel, Budget Girl. And I just exposed all of that to the internet, including my budgets every month. And yeah, three years and three months later, I had all the debt paid off. And then I started growing wealth. And it took me three years and three months to pay off 33K. And then it took me about three years to save and earn up a net worth of 100K. So if nothing else, that'll tell you what interest working against you versus working

for you will do. That's crazy. I think, do you think part of the reason you were able to build your net worth so, I mean, to $100,000 is significant in such a short amount of time? Well, obviously, I think maybe I'm assuming you probably found better work that helped you earn more money. But do you think part of it was it's more exciting and fun to be building your wealth as opposed to paying down debt? Or I don't know what like you now you have experience really aggressively paying down debt and also kind of aggressively continuing to save and invest and grow your wealth. What's the difference in terms of how you felt when you were doing either? So when I was paying off debt, it was very much a fear-based motivation

and an anger-based motivation. Every single day, I was trying to come up with new ways to make more money, to cut expenses. And I almost gamified it, which definitely makes it sound more fun than it was. It was fun some days, but most of the time, no. Now, there's a lot more excitement, I would say. So yeah, at the end of my debt-free journey, in fact, the month before I paid off my debt, I got a much better job in Texas where I now live at Texas A&M University. And the pay was $44,000 per year. So I got, yeah, that's a very nice income bump. And I currently, they currently pay me $50,000 a year.

It's just a few years later because once you stop working for newspapers, sometimes people can pay you money and give you raises. I learned. You know, it's funny. We've never talked about this, but I mean, I was never a journalist, but I also worked in newspapers and like we have kind of similar timelines. Like I graduated in 2009, my first job at a university and I was unemployed for eight months. And my first job at a university full time was at a newspaper. That's crazy. And, and my, uh, my income was very similar to yours. My first, uh, salary was $30,500, but it was in Canadian dollars and higher cost of living city in Vancouver.

So wow, we have kind of similar paths. I did not know that. I don't know. We've never talked about it. I just never thought about it. And I'm like, wow. I don't think that's ever come up. No.

What did you do for newspapers? I was in sales and marketing. So I did the advertising side of things, which I actually loved. Looking back now, I mean, because that was, gosh, I started working there in 2010 and I left in 2013. I actually learned a lot of great, because it had nothing to do with, I had a film degree, also useless. But now looking back, I'm like, wow, I actually learned some really great skills like sales, customer service, organization. I learned a lot.

Yeah. Oh, definitely. My journalistic education working for various newspapers, including a very yellow rag where I had to carry around a police radio all the time and respond to active fires and shootings and the like. Yeah, that'll teach you some stuff. I bet. I bet. Well, and also, I mean, very much helpful with like your current job, obviously, but also you as a content creator now, like you're a story, you know, I think that's the kind of cool thing. It's like no matter, you know, where you came from, lots of the skills you can kind of develop from like your education or kind of weird jobs. You're like, I don't know why I'm doing this

just for the money, but I don't know how it's relevant. It's like, oh, this actually helped you in terms of becoming a storyteller on your YouTube channel and your Instagram page. Cause that's why, I mean, people flock to you. I know your YouTube channel is just kind of blown up. Like you're almost at the 100,000 subscribers. You're like, you're getting there. I know you're going to hit that this year for sure.

Which would be really cool. Yeah. Oh yeah. That's definitely going to happen for you. For sure. For sure. We're just at the beginning of the year. It's definitely going to happen, but it's because you're so good at telling your story. And, and, and I think also being honest and transparent, I think that's why people are so drawn to you. You're just like, I mean, kind of like me. And that's, I think why we click and get along. It's like, you're just yourself and people are attracted to that. Well, I, I also agree. That's probably one of the reasons why I was attracted to you too. And you're super sweet as well. Uh, well you're sweet too. Aren't we nice? I couldn't, I was listening to like a gossip channel earlier and I'm like, I could never do this kind of YouTube channel. Oh, no. Oh, I love that garbage. But yeah, I could never do that.

Never, never in a million years. I'm curious because I find your story very fascinating because you were able to pay off debt and then switch gears to the wealth kind of building avenue, I suppose. And that's honestly very difficult to do because they are very two different streams. And I know a lot of people have difficulty switching gears. Once they've paid off debt, they don't know how to actually save and invest because they don't have those tools or those habits. And a lot of them get back into debt because debt is all they know. If you only learn about debt and debt payoff, that's all you know. So it's very difficult to know where to even start in terms of saving and investing for your future. How did you like, I guess, were you just spending time researching

and learning about this? So you were like preparing as you're paying debt to what was next once you were debt free? I was not. I was all consumed by the debt payoff. I got the question all the time, like, what are you going to do after? And I'm like, I'm going to save a really big emergency fund so I don't have to be scared about, you know, a job loss again. And then I literally could not think beyond that. Like, if you asked me three years ago, like, where are you going to be in five years? I don't know, but I'm going to be debt free. And it had to, in my head, that was what kept me going was I didn't let anything distract me from the debt payoff, which I think has its place for some people. Like I, personally, I can go really hard on something and just get it done. And that works for me. Other people might have done a lot more research into investing during that time. But I think that probably would have distracted me from the debt payoff. And I might have gotten really heady to start investing, which would have potentially offset me a little bit. Not that I think you can't invest while

you're also paying off debt. But for me, that was the path that I had to take. Yeah, fair enough. And I'm kind of the same way. When I set a goal, I find I need to really focus on it. I can't, just a couple of the things that I've been able to, projects that I worked on, for example, my husband would be like, hey, what do you want to do this week? I'm like, I literally can't even think about that because I'm working on it. I'm very tunnel vision sometimes. And I think that's very normal, especially when it's such a big, lofty, and also life-changing goal of becoming debt-free. That might be difficult to kind of look towards the future. So then it seems like though, when you became debt-free, you were still

making good decisions. You didn't kind of get back into debt or didn't flounder. So what kind of was that, I don't know, guiding force or anchor for you? So this isn't going to be super relatable, fair warning, but I had a YouTube channel to fill with videos. And I had people who had been following me as I worked my way out of debt who were then saying, okay, what's next? So I felt a real responsibility to people who are doing that and also to myself, because this is my life. And so after, while I was saving up my $10,000

personal emergency fund, I hit the books and I was reading and I learned as much as I could about investing. And if you've been in that place, you know that at a certain point, your eyes are going to cross and you have to just actually start doing it to figure it out. So I did that. And I tried a few robovisors and I finally just opened up an index fund brokerage account and started investing really heavily into index funds and then started saving up for real estate because I decided at that point that I was not sick of paying rent, but I knew that buying property was going to be the next really good money decision that I could make for myself, both as kind of an entrepreneur and just as a person who had more money than she needed to live off of, which is such a blessing in itself.

So I wanted to be a good steward of that. I learned about house hacking. I learned about multifamily real estate, and I started saving up for that too. So after you get out of debt, you have to figure out how to diversify yourself and figure out what your goals are. I keep a big honking money goal at all times where if at the end of the month, I don't have any, you know, insistent or urgent need for any cash that I have left over, I throw it at that. And that makes decisions a little bit easier. Yeah. And I guess it's kind of exciting because whenever you do, if you do ever have some like extra cash, which I'm like, do I ever? Yeah. That's always

a nice place to be in when you have some extra cash. It's, it's nice if you can throw it towards one of your saving or investing goals, because then you know that you're actually going to reach them sooner than you planned, which is always very thrilling. I'm curious though, since the, the, cause I, I mean, I was kind of there when you're just at the beginning of like, Hey, I'm thinking about buying a real estate property. It's like a house where it's like you live in half and then there's another half of the property that you rent out. So you're a landlord as well, which is really cool. For me, this is something I totally want to do.

And I've been talking about it for years and years and years. But it actually terrifies me more than investing a ton of money in stocks, which is crazy. Is that just because it's like you, maybe you get more comfortable with it once you do it. Like I'm a homeowner, but I, the landlord thing scares the crap out of me. So what kind of helps you kind of, I guess, get comfortable, you know, becoming a first time homeowner and a landlord at the same time. Yeah. So investing is kind of boring to me. Like I'm not one of the YouTube guys that, you know, loves to chase the stocks and figure out what's going to rise VT Sachs and chill over here. So I was like, I have,

you know, I'm, I'm investing to the level that I'm comfortable with. I wasn't at the beginning, but I'm now maxing out my Roth IRA and I have a little money left and I'm like, okay, well, a responsible thing to do would be start investing in real estate. And people are always, homeowners are always shocked when I say this, but I was more scared of purchasing just a single family home than I was multifamily because a single family home, like I'm the only person on the hook for that mortgage, that investment. There's no way that I can really make money off of a single family house. It's just going to be a different bill.

It's just like rent. And so I'm like, okay, how could I leverage this money that I'm paying for rent or eventually could be paying for a house one day to make myself more money? And being on the lower income side, yes, now I make $50,000 a year. But when I started, I was making 26. So when you're making $26,000 a year, there's very little and food, housing, shelter, or food, clothing, shelter are pretty much the things you feel like you're always going to have to pay for. Once I learned about house hacking and multifamily property investing, I realized that I could potentially not have to pay for my housing. And that was the biggest motivation I've ever heard

in my life. Yeah. Well, especially too, I know where you live. Because it depends on where you live, if this makes sense or not. Not right now. Because you live in a place where the numbers make total sense to buy. I mean, you know, we talk about this and I'm like, how much is property where you live? Like, it's insane. I mean, yeah, I bought a $230,000 duplex, which is three beds, two baths on each side and has a yard and three parking spaces each. Housing is very affordable in Texas. Yeah. But rent is like on average, like what would rent be for something like that? So I have someone moving in in April in the duplex unit that I'm renting out who's going to be paying $1,200 a month.

So like that makes sense. That makes total sense. Like it just is kind of a no brainer. And yeah, so that's awesome. Yeah. And I also, my boyfriend lives with me and he didn't pay anything for the house. I bought the house by myself. So he also pays rent a month. My mortgage I just refinanced is about to be $1,585 a month. So I'll actually be making about $100 a month to live in this house. I mean, come on. Like, that's how you do it. Like, that's amazing. That's so smart of you.

And also, like, props to you for being an independent woman buying your own house under your name. I love that. Thank you. I cannot tell you how many times, every single time in the mortgage paperwork, which I've gone through twice right now because I had to refinance, every single time I had to sign my name, it said, Sarah Wilson, an unmarried woman. And I got to tell you, that smarts a little. Not because I want to be married, but just like, why is this necessary in these legal paperwork? How have they not updated the paperwork? It's 2021. Like, hello?

That's literally not there if a man is purchasing a home by himself. That's absolutely ridiculous. That is wild. Yeah, it's a little weird. But yeah, I thought multifamily properties, A, I am 33 years old. I don't need my dream house right now. And I honestly don't even have a dream house. I have things that I would like in a home that I would, you know, to own one day, lots of windows for my plants, et cetera. But I have been living in apartments since college. I am literally just trying to make my

money work the best for me. And the best way to do that was to purchase a duplex unit close to the college in my town and live in one side, rent out the other while I saved up for the next place. The next place might be another duplex or a quad or even potentially a single family home, but more likely another multifamily property. And then I'll be making $600 to $800 a month off of this first property after all expenses. Yeah. That's so amazing. Yeah. That makes sense. I think a lot of people, I mean, I was like this too. And I feel like part of your journey, like part of the reason why you have this mindset of like, this is why I don't need the biggest or nicest place right now. I want to do it this way because it just makes financial sense. It's going to help me build my wealth long-term. You're really thinking forward thinking, but I think a lot of people, especially in the US,

it's just crazy whenever I go on real estate websites in the US just to like fantasize about a different life because I live in Toronto and it is impossible to buy anything here. Oh, you're going to love this. I saw there's a house locally. It's from the 50s, but it is the duplex, a top floor, bottom floor duplex, one bed, one bath, about 600 square feet each one. It is for sale for $94,000. Oh, my God. I think my parents bought their rancher that was in Coquitlam, so 30, 40 minutes outside of Vancouver, in the 80s for that much. And then they sold it for, I think, triple that. And now it's probably worth a million dollars. It's stupid.

Canada's dumb. Canada's kind of dumb. But what was the point? Oh, yeah. I think a lot of people get caught up in the idea like, oh, well, we can, you know, our money can stretch so much, like especially when you watch like all those HGTV shows or their home reno shows or whatever. The houses are just crazy. People think about getting their dream home right away instead of doing something like you, which means you're building your wealth so you can, you know, maybe buy your dream home in cash or something

like that. We have a friend who... Yeah, we do. We have a friend who bought a huge gorgeous house in cash. Gorgeous in cash. So I think what you're doing is amazing. But do you find it difficult sometimes, I think, in that most people don't quite understand what you're doing? People in the personal finance nerd community do. But right at the very first, they're like, I don't get why you're doing that. People in the personal finance nerd community do, but right at the very first, they're like, I don't get why you're doing that. That doesn't make sense to me. Yes, but it's actually because here's the thing. I've always gotten that question. Why? Why are you doing this? Why are you paying off your debt early? And why are you paying your debt off early, making your life almost what they considered to be like unlivable. I still had a pretty good time, but you know, uh, that was a harder question to,

to answer now when people are like, why, why are you doing that? And I'm like, all right, let me teach you this because it's super exciting. And as soon as I explained the concept, they're like, that's really cool. You've essentially bought yourself another source of income. And I actually just had to explain this again to my boyfriend the other day, where he was like, why real estate? Why not just put in the stock market? I'm like, because real estate grows in three ways. Real estate, if I purchase this house, it is going to appreciate in value. The mortgage on it is being paid down by other people on my behalf. So I'm earning money that way. And then I'm earning

money on top of that with, yeah, I'm actually going to be making an income from this property. So there are very few investments you can make that are going to grow in three different ways to just make you wealthier and wealthier. It's just the coolest freaking thing. And honestly, real estate investments, people, I thought this, I thought this before I met like the bigger pockets guys and all that. I didn't realize normal people, normal income people were purchasing real estate. A lot of people become accidental landlords. They buy a house, they move, they can't sell the house, they end up renting the house, and they end up with an extra income source that way. If you do it intentionally, and if you purchase smartly, it's actually a pretty accessible... And if you do something like me or house hacking, I got a FHA loan. I only put 3.5% down on this house.

It's pretty accessible to the lower and middle class, especially if you're going to be purchasing a home anyway. It's actually, I don't even have very good tenants right now and I'm still having fun being a landlord. It's a really cool thing to do that I feel like it's just kind of a secret that I get to tell people about all the time. And I, a lot of people who watch my YouTube channel are like, I'm going to do this now. Why would I not? Well, I think it's because here, here's my opinion. Cause I do like the idea of real estate investing. There's a lot of dodgy people out there that are selling this dream of real estate that I'm like, I feel like you're muddying the water because I know buying real estate, especially as a long-term investment is like,

historically, yes, it is a good investment, but there's just so many people that are so dodgy out there talking about it that I'm like, I don't trust you. And it makes me feel like I don't trust this whole system. Oh yeah. They've got like millions of dollars in debt and like 80 houses. And they're like, and I make this much a month. And I'm like, your amount of debt really scares me. I made sure that I could afford. Exactly. Yeah. Leverage too, too much. But I feel like you, like, that's why I'm like, but you're, I feel like you're doing it right. Cause number one, you got out of debt first. Number two, you had the emergency fund. You made that a priority and you're also investing in index funds. So you have that. So you are diversified.

And then you have real estate. I think the thing is lots of people are just trying to leverage to the hills. Or yeah, they just are not diversified at all. They're like, oh, I'm just investing in real estate. Well, you know, that is one type of asset. That's just one. Even if you have eight houses, that's still one asset class. And so if something happens with the real estate market, especially if you're buying in the same

area, then all of your assets will be affected. So maybe you should diversify that portfolio a little bit. So I have a theory where the relationship that we start out with money with is going to stick with us in our core basically forever. And the way I started my relationship with money was terrified that I was never going to have enough. So I currently have not only an emergency fund, but an emergency fund for my duplex. Oh, as you should, for sure. Just hordes, not hordes, a small goblin horde of cash. Just there, just sitting there that I like to look at just in case anything happens because I don't want this house. Well, because yeah, things happen.

Yeah. I don't want this house to ever be a burden. How much have you had to replace anything or fix anything? I'm sure since you've been a landlord. Yeah, I have. And I do actually, I have a home warranty that I got the sellers to pay for. So I've had to fix several things, like an entire toilet, a bunch of plumbing stuff, washer, dish disposal, all sorts of stuff like that, that I've only had to pay like a little service fee to get fixed. And there's been other stuff like upgrades that I've just paid for and cash flowed myself, which was, it's been really, really nice. And I think it's because I have the money saved for it. I also, and this is so key, I can pay the entire mortgage myself if I have to. Like I break up with my boyfriend tomorrow, my runners move out or they

squat and there's something like that. I can cover the entire mortgage just for as long as I need to. I purchased under the level of what I could afford and I can sleep really well at night. Yeah. Well, that's the other kind of mistake I think lots of people do is they buy more house than they can afford, whether they're going to rent out the part of it or just live in it. And then something happens like a pandemic and then you're a real hot water if you can't afford those payments because you don't have specific savings for catastrophe because catastrophe can happen at any point. So again, I think you're just doing all the things right, which is nice. Thank you. Thank you. And I still make a fairly normal income. I have co-workers that I work with who are at or above the same income level that I am that we end up talking about this kind of thing.

And I'll end up telling them about it. And they're like, I just would have never thought to do that. I just bought a house and we moved into it. And I have those bills every month. And if something goes wrong, then X, Y, Z. I think the more you kind of get into this space and the more you're interested in learning about money and your options with money, the better off you're going to be. Because yeah, maybe landlording isn't for you, but you might get into this space and learn more about something else that could potentially change your financial life. Yeah. That's the kind of frustrating thing is as much as like the whole reason, like you and me both create content that is about personal finance and bettering your financial life. We can only help people that are seeking out that information. Like people will

only know the information and the, you know, helpful resources we put out if they are seeking for it. So there's so many people out there that I'd love to help, but they may never discover my podcast or my blog or my YouTube channel or, and same with you. And it's, there's so many people out there that I'd love to help, but they may never discover my podcast or my blog or my YouTube channel. And same with you. It's one of those things where it's like, I think it has gotten so much better since... I mean, I've been blogging for almost 10 years and it's definitely gone. It was so niche when I got into it. No one knew what personal finance even meant. And so it's really exciting to see that there's more kind of mainstream avenues that people are talking about money, but still there's a long road to go because it still does seem kind of like a,

not a hobby, but yeah, like a niche, like, oh, you're into that. Whereas it should be for everybody, you know, like more people talk about the bachelor than personal finance, you know? And it's like, why? We should really be talking more about money because we all earn it and spend it. Like, it's crazy. It's a lot less exciting when it's not your money. So I get it. Like, I'm crazy jazzed to talk about money because my money is doing so many cool things. It's less fun to talk about money when you're like in debt and you're barely making ends meet. And that's a really hard place to be. Yeah. Or earning a low income. And if you're starting from that place, you're not

going to make huge progress for a while. But, and I come from a place of experience here of making $1,600 a month, and my bills were about $1,400 a month, that if you actually get into it, I really consider frugality and learning about money to be kind of like a muscle. You get so much better at it the more you work at it. If you actually budget and you start putting money towards goals that you've set for yourself, you will hit them. Money is not that tricky. It's really not. It's so simple, but it's not necessarily easy, you know? Because like you said, it is 100% like a muscle that you have to work. It is like working out, which isn't sometimes fun. And the other kind of thing that I always tell people is you have to remember this takes

time and it's hard to be patient. We're all very impatient in this world of instant access and technology. And so it's, I tell people, it's like, I, you know, I wasn't dead, you know, in 2009 with a very, I mean, only had $5,000 in a student loan. So it was very little, but I had like no money. Like that's, you know, I was in the negatives. And so to, to be where I'm at now, which I'm very happy about, it took like fricking 11 years. And I think when you're just at the start, it literally seems impossible. But it is one of those things where it's like, if you just keep doing whatever plan you put in place consistently for a long time,

you will see the fruits of your labor. It's just sometimes so hard to see that far ahead. Here's a question for you. I've talked to thousands of people about their money. Have you ever once heard a story of it taking as long as people originally thought to get out of debt or make a big money move? No, not unless the only times that I've heard, or even when I work with financial counseling clients. And my biggest fear is always that. We work together. Here's the plan. You just need to do this consistently for like a year, and then we can talk again. And my fear is always that they're gonna do it for a bit and then, you know, kind of get off the plan, and then they're gonna not make any progress. Luckily, that really hasn't happened. Even for some of the

clients where I'm like, Oh, gosh, I, I don't know. But they've all everyone's been better. And I think that's, that, like you said, we always kind of, I think, think that we're not going to make it or do it or succeed. But if you just kind of also believe in yourself, that's a huge component is that self-confidence aspect. You will. Like there's so many, yeah, I don't know. Yeah. Like to answer your question, I don't really know anybody who set a big goal and started working on it. And then they're like, Oh no, it didn't work out. It only works out if they stop trying. Yeah. It always, it always goes faster than you think. My first calculations for being able to pay off my debt, you know, the paltry salary I was bringing in was that it was going to take me eight years on a, you know, normally loans are

50 student loans are about 15, 10 to 15 years long. I think mine was the 15 year kind, mostly because I had like ignored it for four. I thought it was going to take me eight years. It took me three and three months. So can you tell me what happened to make that big jump? That's several years that you were able to cut off your kind of due date. What happened? Well, when I started and when I ran those numbers, I was working off of the budget that I was in in that month. And you don't think about, well, every single month you're getting better at this.

You're figuring out more ways to cut costs. You're figuring out you're to cut costs. You're figuring out, you're getting, you know, higher paying side gigs. And across those years, I got better jobs, better day jobs, better side jobs. I got much better at things like not wasting food and finding great deals and negotiating down my bills. And it just, you get better at it and it gets shorter. And kind of like you said, you gamified it. So it was almost kind of exciting. Like it reminds me, I was just talking to someone, they're like, oh, you know, a while back, I think it was a year ago, I had someone on my show who wrote a book called Cashflow Cookbook. It's a Canadian book about, you know,

ideas to cut costs. And one of them, and we all know this is like, you know, call your like cable and your phone providers and see if you can negotiate your bill down. She's like, you know, I heard it on your show, but I wasn't really sure if it would actually work. And then I did it and it worked. And I literally have saved hundreds of dollars per month. And it's one of those things, right? That's exactly what you did. You don't think about that.

And that's like a one time thing that you had to do to negotiate that cost down. All of a sudden, that extra money every single month is going at your debt. And it's shaving weeks and days and months off of your payment, your total debt. And you do that 10 times, 15 times. After a year, you get a better job with a slightly better income. Yeah. And then you continue doing that as your income grows too. I think that's the other thing too. As our income grows and we see our wealth grow, it's really important to not get lazy. And I know I'm guilty of it sometimes really important to not get lazy. And I know I'm guilty of it sometimes. I'm not as diligent or as frugal as I used to be, but it's important.

That's how, again, you continue to grow your wealth is by continuing with those habits that you built, which is easier to do when you have done it over time. Yeah. Yeah. Just every single month, you're going to get a little bit better at it and you're going to have a little bit more to send at that debt. And you're going to figure out because you're motivated, you're going to get a little bit better at it. And you're going to have a little bit more to send at that debt. And you're going to figure out because you're motivated, you're going to figure out how to get to that next milestone even faster. So I also did a thing during my debt payoff journey, just so you know, my life wouldn't, you know, looking forward, it wouldn't just be more of the same hustle. Every time I paid off $5,000 worth of debt, I gave myself a little reward, like 50, 100 bucks. And I could really, really look forward to those rewards. And I would hustle so much harder to get

to that next little breathing spot where I could reward myself. At the halfway mark on my debt, I went and visited a friend of mine in California and that trip costs 400 bucks, but it was worth every single penny. And I hustled so much harder to get to that halfway point so that I could take that little break. Just things like that are so key to keeping yourself on that type of journey. And then once you're out of debt, things get so much lighter and so much easier. And it's crazy how much when you have assets, they grow even when you have like a lazy day or lazy week or things aren't going that well for you. Every single month I'm flabbergasted at how much my net worth goes up now because I have things that are making me money behind the scenes.

And that's just the coolest thing in the world because it means that I can kind of take the pressure off of myself a little bit and just get to enjoy and live. And I enjoyed and lived a little back then, but I was stressed about money all the time. And now I get to not be. Yeah. That's the thing. It sounds like you hustled really hard for those good three years, but you didn't burn yourself out. And that's the other key thing. I think, especially with lots of the debt-focused content creators out there, it's all about paying off debt. And it can seem like, oh my gosh, it's just debt, debt, debt. You need to treat yourself. You need to give those personal bonuses to kind of give yourself a break and also to treat yourself or just like celebrate those little wins to carry

you through. Otherwise, you're going to lose steam. And that's when it goes off the rail. So I think what you did was amazing. But yeah, like you said, once you are out of debt and then you are in a position to slowly be building your wealth, it is kind of wild how much it can compound and grow. Like it doesn't actually, like to me, I'm like, I know it mathematically makes sense, but it doesn't make sense. You know what I mean? Like, honestly, I tracked my, me and my husband have been tracking our spending and our net worth for the past four years.

I really, my biggest regret is not doing it sooner because I have no evidence of what happened. I don't even, you know, I have some, I have budgets, so I kind of knew what my income was, but I didn't track my spending or net worth. So I have no evidence of what happened. I have budgets, so I kind of knew what my income was, but I didn't track my spending or net worth. So I have no idea what my money was doing. And so just in those four years, it is actually wild. Honestly, all together, and I've never shared this before, is we've pretty much doubled our net worth. Makes absolutely no sense. I mean, to be a fair part of it is our home. We kind of feel lucky in that sense that we bought a place that was undervalued in a market that was just about to kind of take off a little

bit. But most of it, I'd say, was actually our savings and our investments. And again, we do boring investing like you, just in index funds. So it is really cool to be like, oh my gosh, that works. But it takes years. It does kind of take a few years to really see it kind of snowball, which is exciting. I actually really wish I had tracked my net worth during my debt payoff. It seems a little counterintuitive because I wasn't exactly in the positives until about two-thirds of the way through. But I think that would probably be really good motivation for people. I think, well, that's the thing. Whenever I talk to someone, they're like, oh gosh, I don't want to track that. Because when you track those numbers, it's like you can't ignore it. And it's like, I don't want to look at it. Right? I get it. It's like, I don't want to ever go on

the scale because I never feel good about myself after the scale. But that's different. When it comes to money, I know it's painful at first, but it's so helpful later on. You're going to be really glad you did it. And even I say, if you don't even want to track your spending, and I get it, it takes time to really be comfortable with that, track your net worth so you can see your growth. Because I think a lot of people in debt, they're like, listen, I'm just trying to save up some money for an emergency fund and pay down debt. What's the point of tracking my net worth? I'm not investing or anything. Your net worth is going to grow as you pay off debt though. And that's the motivator to see your

net worth grow, getting out of the red into the black. If you track your net worth, you will have evidence that this is actually working. Your strategy of paying off debt is working. Yeah, I agree. And I think it'd be a really good task. It takes a couple extra minutes every month, but it's, it's honestly one of my favorite things because it, it's very different than your monthly budget. And you can get easily get very discouraged by how a month went. And then switch, if you switch over to like, I have a spreadsheet, uh, budget and a spreadsheet net worth tracker. So first at the end of the month, I go through the spreadsheet budget and I calculate everything out.

I figure out where all my money went and I'm like, oh, I went over on groceries again. And then at the end, I deal with my stuff and then I get to flip over to the net worth tracker and I'm like, I didn't even have a very good month, but my net worth still grew because of my assets. And I come away from the computer every single time, every single month, just being like,

yeah, I'm so glad I did all this. 100%. The net worth, the spending is not always the most fun because you're just like, what did I do wrong this month? Even me, even me. But the net worth, that's the thing that's going to make you feel good. Even if your net worth hasn't gone up, it stayed the same, that still means, huh, okay, we're still like, that's still okay. That's still better than you going backwards, your net worth decreasing. You mentioned spreadsheets. So I want to kind of mention this because I love all the kind of stuff that you've got going on besides the YouTube channel. You also have some really cool resources, including some spreadsheets. You want to kind of share what some things if some people are looking for some ways to get started, you've got some stuff. What do you got? Absolutely. So I have an Etsy shop called Budget Girl Goods and I sell my budget spreadsheet that I use to pay off $33,000 worth of debt and

now save up and slash earn $100,000 worth net worth. And I also have a net worth. And it, and I also have a net worth tracker spreadsheet. Both of those are in my Etsy store. They're under $10. I do also have a free version of my budget. It's a much older one. It doesn't come with like all the resources and tutorials and stuff like that, but I do have one at budgetgirl.com. And yeah, I also have a budgetgirl.com slash free page where I have a lot of printables. I just put in a millionaire. I saw that. Yeah. I don't say debt.

I just put in there a millionaire tracking chart. So you can, once you get there, you can color in your way up to millionaire status. The very first line is $20,000, which is a little bananas. But yeah, that's all at budgetgirl.com slash free. And there are tons of other stuff on budgetgirl.com resources for people who are trying to get their finances together and everything on there is free. Amazing. Yeah. I love those visuals. I think for me, I'm such a visual person. I love going on Instagram and just seeing all the different people I follow that have those kind of visual like trackers where they color in something.

I'm like, I love that. Cause also you can put that in your house and it's a reminder of like, look at the progress, you know? Cause I think sometimes when it's in spreadsheets, we forget, I mean, I'm always on my spreadsheets, but it's nice to have some kind of visual fun thing to also color in like a nice check. You know, I love a good like crossing out something or checkbox. Yeah. Oh, I destroy the lines on my to-do list. Like once, I love a good like crossing out something or checkbox. Yeah. Oh, I destroy the lines on my to do list. Like once once I'm done with it, like scorch it. And on the charts, I have I have tons of those in my Etsy store, too. I even have like bundles where you can get ones for paying off your car and your credit card. And you know, saving up your emergency fund, all that, because those were really key for me when paying off debt.

I had a debt-free chart on my fridge. And anytime I looked at it, yeah, I had a lot of way to go, but I could kind of see how far I'd come already. And then I did the same thing when I was saving up my six-month emergency fund. And yeah, now I'm saving up for a millionaire status. Love it. And you're gonna make it soon.

One last thing that I wanna mention, because I also loved it. And it was just kind of like, for me, I'm like, for a millionaire status. Love it. And you're going to make it soon. One last thing that I want to mention, because I also loved it. And it was just kind of like, for me, I'm like, that's so smart. When you, and this was like earlier in the year, they talked about your vision board, because you have a video on your channel about it, which I love. But you're just like, I just make my vision board in Canva, which is like, again, a free software anyone can do. And then you make it into the size of like your phone background and your computer background. So you always have your vision board in front of you. How smart is that? Like, it's just kind of like, duh, what did I think of that? I would have never

thought of that. I've done that for the past two years. And it's, it's a really good way to keep your goals and your resolutions or whatever you're working towards in the front of your face, because I will forget things if they are not in front of my face on a semi-regular basis. I like setting big goals and resolutions, and I'm very much like a shoot for the moon, land under the stars kind of person. So I set a lot of goals and resolutions, and then I'll put those with some little graphics in Canva on my vision board. It sounds a little derpy, but I like it. And yeah, then I have it as my phone lock screen and I have it as my computer background.

So it keeps it in front of me enough that I see those and I remember what I'm working towards and maybe make some slightly different decisions to make sure that I can reach those goals. Love it. I love it. Well, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me on

the show. I'm so glad that we were able to do this. Where can people find you on social media? I mean, I'm obviously a big fan of your Instagram. So where can people find you? Okay. So youtube.com slash budget girl is where the YouTube channel is, is hopefully approaching 100,000 subscribers very soon after six years. Yeah. I just hit 85. So that's really exciting. As someone who has like 7,000 subscribers, I think what you're doing is amazing. It'll literally take me a decade to get like to 15.

So you've been, you've been so killing it in other avenues. So that's how we first met because I attended your really, really cool session on how you just absolutely kill it with websites. Thank you. Well, I aspire to be at your level one day with the YouTube channel. So that's where they can find you on YouTube. Where else can they find you? So I am on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter at GoBudgetGirl, like you're rooting for me because budgetgirl was not available. And I am now on TikTok at budgetgirl. And you can also find me at budgetgirl.com. Perfect. Well, thank you so much, Sarah, for joining me on the show. Thank you so much for having me, Jessica. It's always fun to hang out.

And that was episode 267 with Sarah Wilson of Budget Girl. You can find her at budgetgirl.com and you can find her YouTube channel, her amazing YouTube channel at youtube.com slash budget girl. Of course, I'm going to include links to all her social media profiles so you can follow her because I love her Instagram. Quite honestly, it makes me very jazzed. In the show notes for this episode, so just go to jessicamorehouse.com slash 267. I'll also include links to some of the resources that she mentioned, like she has budget spreadsheets and those kind of diagrams that you can kind of color in as you're trying to achieve your goal, either building wealth or paying down debt, which I also love because I'm a very visual person. So I'll include that all in the show notes, jessicamorehouse.com

slash 267. Again, if you want to check out the show notes for any episode, you can either go to jessicamorehouse.com slash podcast or jessicamorehouse.com slash the number of the episode. So yeah, got some things to share with you. So do not go away. Just want to share a few words first about this episode sponsor. This episode of the more money podcast is supported by TurboTax Canada. Oddly enough, the most popular videos I have on my YouTube channel right now are about taxes. And I think a lot of that has to do with the fact that so many Canadians received income through benefit programs this year, like the CERB, or they've started a side hustle or became self-employed because of the pandemic. And wow, is there a lot of confusion about what to do about all of this when filing your tax return?

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accurate expert approved guarantee. And their audit defense puts a tax expert in your corner who will represent you, defend you, and handle all correspondence with the CRA on your behalf. To learn more and to start your return today and to get 20% off any TurboTax assist and review or full service product, visit jessicamorehouse.com slash TurboTax or check out the link in the show notes for this episode. Once again, to save 20% off with any TurboTax or check out the link in the show notes for this episode. Once again, to save 20% off with any TurboTax assistant review or full service product, visit JessicaMorehouse.com slash TurboTax. First, like I mentioned in last week's episode, I'm doing a giveaway. I always do one just to remind you because you may have forgotten.

I'm giving away a ton of different books that have been featured on the season of this show. If you go to jessicamorehouse.com slash contests, you'll be able to find out all the books I am giving away. You know, for instance, like last week's episode, The Money Plot, giving away one of those books. So, you know, enter to win a copy of one of those books, jessicamorehouse.com slash contests. Another thing, just in case you do not know. So I have an email list I send out. I think, well, it's usually biweekly, but sometimes it's once a week. It's a bit of a sporadic thing. Basically, if I have something important to say, I'm going to let you know. But that is where you can find out all the information if I'm doing a virtual presentation or launching something or something

exciting, or if you just want to keep in the loop of all the different blog posts and podcast episodes and videos that I put out, I always include them in my newsletter. So just go to jessicamorehouse.com slash subscribe to get on the list. You may also want to join me on the gram. Does anyone still say that? I don't know. I think that ages me, but whatever. Jessica Morehouse or at Jessica I Morehouse is where you can find me. You can also find the show at More Money Podcast. But I frequently do polls or AMAs. I'm going to continue to do those. So join me on the gram and be part of one of my Ask Me Anythings. Ask me your questions. Those are always fun. So join me on Instagram. You can also find me on Twitter.

And honestly, if you could, that'd be so great. Because honestly, I swear, my Twitter has been at a weird standstill where it's like I gain followers, I lose some. And so I've been at like just on the cusp of reaching, I think, 14,000 followers for like a year. So if you could just like be a follower, it just drives me crazy that I'm at like 13.9. I'm like, can we just move it up to 14? It's so frustrating. But speaking of Sarah's YouTube channel, obviously my channel does not compare in the least to hers because she has almost 100,000 subscribers. But I am putting out more videos now that the investing course, my Wealth Building Blueprint course is out. So make sure to follow me on YouTube, but I am putting out more videos now that the investing course, my wealth building blueprint

course is out. So make sure to follow me on YouTube. JessicaMorehouse.com slash YouTube is the best way to get there. But also if you just go into YouTube and type in my name, I'll come right up and let me know. Also like shoot me an email or a DM. Like what do you want me to make videos about? I have a ton of videos that have come out recently that are focused on taxes. And that's not because it's a tax channel. It's just I kept on getting questions like, hey, can you make a video about this on taxes? So there's a lot of tax videos, specifically like self-employed taxes. So I'm not always going to do tax videos. I'm going to make more videos about like investing and budgeting and all these different things. But it always helps to get an idea of what would

you like to see on my channel? I think that's it. I think that's all I've got for the moment. I think that's enough, don't you think? I think that's it. So thanks so much for joining me. Once again, I will be back here next week with a fresh new episode of the More Money Podcast. Thanks for joining. See you next week. Have a good rest of your week. This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.