The Vault with Financielle - My Parents Are £50,000 In Debt! How Do I Help?! | The Vault Episode 15

Episode Date: June 5, 2024

Send us a textWelcome to The Vault with Financielle. Hosts Lucy, Laura and Holly delve into the world of money dilemmas from leechy friends, getting the money ick, the benefits of budgeting and much much more! Nothing is off limits but everything is safe in the Vault. In this episode of The Vault, we're talking about comparing ourselves to our parents, the pressure to buy a house, how to help people in debt, and budgeting as a family. -Visit https://www.financielle.co.uk to join our community!Chapters:00:00:00 - Introduction00:04:15 - Economic Misinformation and Financial Milestones00:08:06 - The Pressure to Buy a House00:12:04 - Financial Vulnerability00:16:18 - Addressing Family Debt00:19:59 - Dealing with Overwhelming Debt00:23:42 - The Importance of Communication in Financial Difficulties00:27:35 - The Importance of Budgeting and Shared Responsibility00:31:33 - Managing Finances as a TeamThe Vault is an entertaining yet thought provoking podcast that answers our community’s dilemmas and confessions surrounding women and money.Visit https://www.financielle.com to download our app.Watch the podcast on YouTube.Follow Financielle for more:▶︎ TikTok▶︎ InstagramAbout Financielle:Financielle is a female focussed finance app helping women to take back control of their money, ditch debt, increase savings and invest in their future.Recorded and Produced by Liverpool Podcast Studios▶︎ Web ▶︎ Instagram▶︎ LinkedIn

You have to act like you haven't read the letter first of all because that will not go down well. If you have that relationship with your family you could be like look I did not go snooping for anything but that it was on the tabletop and I couldn't ignore it. Did you leave it for me then? I really care about you and I was in debt as well and I found this method and this is a really good way to get rid of it like are you planning on keeping it forever like is this becoming a problem do you need any help whatever it might be. Welcome to The Vault with Financial. This is a really good way to get rid of it. Like, are you planning on keeping it forever? Like, is this becoming a problem? Do you need any help? Whatever it might be. Welcome to The Vault with Financial. This is a safe space where we talk all things life and money and no topics are off limits. How are we feeling today? We're good. Ready to go. Ready to go. I feel like there's been so much

excitement recently about The Vault from people that have never heard of us, especially if you're listening from the States. You must think, who the hell are these three british and this is a british accent by the way we're from the north in case in case we don't sound kate and william enough for you but um welcome and hopefully you enjoy our cozy chat which is just a bit of bit of debate bit of discussion nothing serious but um yeah we had quite a few pop-off this weekend from the States. We're here to workshop your problems. I'm proud of us for getting to episode 15. Oh my gosh, that's really done.

I wasn't expecting you to say that. It's our paper anniversary. Like what we do? We need milestones. Chocolate. Okay. I'm going to say controversial opinion. And I'm going to need to explain it a little bit.

So hold fire. You don't have to compare yourselves to your parents' financial decisions. Okay. So what I mean by that, just picture this. You're sat in your grandparents' house. You're sat in your parents' house. For me, anyway, as a 25-year-old. Lucy, why aren't you thinking about getting on the property

ladder are you thinking about buying a house anytime soon you know renting is really it's dead money we bought this house for 10 pounds and one button why are you not doing the same um and there was also a really good TikTok trend which made me laugh quite a lot and me and my brother actually really related to it and it's so say your parents waking up on the 25th birthdays or like um 25 year olds waking up on christmas they're in their own home they've got their own children the mounds of presents whatever that was their life yeah me and my brother sat 25 and 28 waiting for our christmas presents mom can we open our stockings yet please did he eat any of the carrots yeah

footprints footprints in the snow so what are we thinking about this that's such a funny trend by the way I think

aside from the financial side this this wanting to not grow up is a big part of the non-financial bit I like I would

love to go and be in fact I still am looked after by the parents ridiculously cups of tea come

we go look in the fridge we are literally wrapped in cotton all by our parents still like we've got our own families but my mum has a treat box

we were there last night and the adults 34 year old 30 what are you we're going over anyway ages but your number

you walk in and you are catered for and looked after and molly's husband was like this this isn't a very good treat box when you buy the treats you can criticize the tree i can sympathize with this trend so do you tell me about that then lucy so how do you feel your brother may have a similar view? Where your parents were at when they were your age and like, you know, the life that they have now, but when they were your age, do you feel like they had it together and you don't? Like what's controversial?

I think so. We also talk about like how differently we view life and like my parents' goals were like to have a family and like as soon as they everyone seems to be like I left high school at 16 and I walked straight into a job and I was this and this and this um and obviously it's a bit different like we now have to stay in education for longer uni's like more common yeah um to go to uni straight after sixth form or college, whatever. So I think we all just kind of like,

we finish school into a mindset of like, yeah, just stay as young as you can forever. But also they are also saying that to us. They're like, enjoy your youth. Yes. So on the one hand they're telling you to be more financially responsible and you should have it a bit together. But actually they didn't enjoy the aspect of that

and can see your freedom it is funny they can be quite judgy not your parents in particular but might be Jen yeah

parents can be poor Jen there's a lot of economic misinformation isn't there so in a lot of the parents defence there's this perception

that you know um on a spending scale oh will people just spend all their money down nowadays and and there's an absolute truth in that if you think about all the things that we can buy versus what our parents could like there's literally you know you used to have like four seasons that you get clothes drops and now it's like every week there's new drops the fast fashion element there's always something new there's always something new to buy the world's opened up

yeah travel the world's much more smaller now people used to go to Spain once a year and that was like a massive treat whereas now that's like for our friends

that's their like mini holiday until they go to Dubai or they go to like Thailand the world's much smaller now so there is more spending and so you know maybe people younger people are sending their money there.

But the other macroeconomic stuff at play here is house prices to income ratio. So when a baby boomer, which is kind of our parents' generation, would buy a home, the cost of a house was three times your income. So save your income was £20,000. You're talking £60,000 for a house typically. Whereas for people buying now, it's seven minimum. And so that seven is, you know, 20 to 140. It's a massive, massive difference. And so it's not as easy as saying, you know, why haven't you got a house yet? You shouldn't have a house yet. For those people listening haven't hit those particular goals you know the don't feel like you're behind because it was a different generation the numbers are different now never mind the wider society and I kind of love now I think there's something

British about wanting property property ladder join the program property ladder Kirstie and Phil I love Kirstie and Phil I mean right move we're all addicted to Rightmove like in picking but it's kind of I've always said at the moment us three should not be on Rightmove the only person that should be on Rightmove

is the one that's actually buying a house oh I'm not I've kind of lost momentum with that you changed your acting it's overwhelming give it to the least

as you can play but it's because what we do it's our castle it's our place it's roots it we do it's our castle it's our place it's like a status thing it's the goals it's whatever financial goals you've got and I feel like I see a lot of people your age really struggling because they're not hitting those financial milestones that their parents did and that's the point isn't it it's comparing yourself to other people and everyone's

on their own journey like when you said people left higher ed people didn't go into higher education they went to a job and generally for life as well so like the pension was much better for them it was um what well the defined benefit ones you well it's much more lucrative for workers to be able to do that whereas now people don't want to say jump from job to job but there's just much more freedom and much more understanding that you're not just going to stick to a job forever you can't compare is one thing I would say. I love it that careers aren't like the jobs for life now like there's a really good concept of like earlier in your career it doesn't really have to be bound by age but it's your learning phase and so sometimes you might take not the highest paying job but the one that you're going

to learn more in because the next phase of your career is your earning phase and you capitalize on the skills that you've built up and if you've stayed in one place and you've stayed a bit safe and in that space you've never you've not continued to learn um you're only going to be able to capitalize on that so much in the earnings phase whereas typically years ago you would pick a career like at 16 and go this is what i want to be earlier probably and do it for life so I think yeah a lot of um older generations are kind of jealous of the freedom of choice that I think the digital nomad space where you can work from anywhere um depending on what you do so yeah don't put pressure you think it'll just keep carry on carrying on like will I be like 60 with my like cats like 20 year old children i took some maths um being like i had this job

probably yeah just move older and older i just feel like the world is moving at such a fast pace and and everyone says every age group acknowledges no matter when you were born the chaos that is ensuing and the the life goals are so mixed up it's not in chronological order anymore things can happen at any one time people are having children later getting married later like they're finding the career that they want the millennial generation there's there's like a and and gen x which is the one above the older the millennials before boomers um massive issue with divorce so people that had run into yeah the what society deemed as the successful thing you know you want the engagement ring you want to get married you want to have children you want to buy a house you know you want to tick off these things and you've just been doing what everyone else says you should do

and then one day you look up at each other and go is this what you know is this what we want actually are there other options for us and and and had we been given more freedom to not you know just follow what everyone else thought we should do you know you never know where those people could have been so there's a there's this there's definitely a balance it's good to have goals and and if a house is for you then great but also the big thing we teach is cash so cash is getting cash will teach you know if you want to invest it if you want to um put it in a savings account if you want to buy a house one day i've said this before like don't feel pressured to buy a house but don't do nothing yeah when you when and if you want to you don't want to go i think i'll start saving for a house now i think that's the point isn't it get yourself into that position

so when you do want to make that decision you're ready it's a house now I think that's the point isn't it you just want to get yourself into that position so when you do want to make that decision you're ready it's freedom of choice I think that's so right when people get to 28 they go I really want a house I better start

and then they look at it and they go Jesus it's going to take me you know starting from now you're literally talking about me no you're just a young girl Anna

it's a controversial opinion about Lydia we've got you back we know you're prepared you'll be ready to go but you're so share with the nation and the globe actually right now do you feel that you it's just the thing you should do or do you actually think it's a good step for you next i think it's really huge thing to do on your own like all the risk I don't know it's it's so much riskier to do on your own um I'm just pretty knackered because it's so competitive like the first time buyers thing there's a lot of people in couples there's not that many houses in

this like bracket and people just offer way over and like people have help from their parents and stuff I don't think most people can buy without help from the parents um but yeah it's exhausting you're doing it I am doing it like I think it is a good idea but also I am just there's so much pressure to not rent and you know make the investment but it's like the detriment of what though isn't it sometimes yeah if you've got the worry over your head every month and making those mortgage payments like you said it's really it's just such a big commitment but then versus a rent rent payment which they're going over the good thing about mortgage and houses you can control it i feel like um you just you are doing the right thing though you're stocking away trying to save on your own which is not easy

and at the moment it's giving you options to go on a viewing yeah they might not sign you up yet but at some point there will be the right property for you and you will be able to buy it rather than you just worrying it but actually doing nothing about it financially yeah I am like I'm saving every month for it so I'm like a like a little bit better better off each month for it but I'm saving every month for it, so I'm a little bit better off each month for it. But I'm not rushing it because... When people rush buying a house, they generally put themselves into a... The wrong one. Yeah.

Or a bit more financially vulnerable because they've offered way over just because they want to get the house, and then the hangover hits of, I've got to pay this mortgage every month, and the house actually isn't worth that. It's because we bought in a market where everybody was throwing money at the problem so you're doing the right thing and you also you're saving the deposit but it's also so expensive just to buy it as well with the solicitors yeah like people forget about that like save for your deposit but actually save another like three grand on top minimum because

you've got to pay if you move in that's really like movers removers solicitors estate agent fees all the stuff that you just don't think yeah we'll come with a van we know a few people okay this moves us nicely onto our first dilemma. I have uncovered my parents' debt. Hi, girls. I'm 35 and I'm an only child. I live in the town I grew up in as a solo homeowner. How can we do this? Flex.

Flex. Just around the corner from my parents. Because of this, I'm always round at their house on one of my usual... Sorry, I'm like... She's a fridge. She could afford to buy a house because she goes round there to eat. She goes for the branded items. Writing stuff on the shopping list, like, I need that.

On the fridge. On one of my usual visits, I popped round to take their dog on a walk as they were out for the day. I saw a stack of open letters on the kitchen top stating that they were in just over £50,000 worth of debt and that they needed to pay it off ASAP in order to avoid court action. Oh, I mean, it's just so awkward that she read the mail. Like, it's just a rule. Like, it's just a rule. It's really taken me by shock as they have never given off any inkling of not being in a good financial position. They have always lived a good life, going on holiday every year, enjoying lots of dinners and trips with their friends, so I assume that they were relatively

well off when it comes to money. We have never talked about money as a family, so much so that I managed to rack up £10,000 worth of debt using credit cards frivolously in my 20s, but since I found Financial, I'd paid off my debt and bought my first home but my parents had no idea about my debt I felt ashamed and hid it away so I understand why my why they might be doing the same to cut a long story short I just want what's best for them thanks to financial I know exactly the process that can help them pay off their debt and get back to living their best lives stress-free but I have no idea how to talk openly about money with them, let alone tell them I know about their debt.

Please help me. We hear this all the time. This is the secret debt. I say secret, but whose business is it? You know, it's their business. But this, like, huge, chunky sums like that, completely normal, and it's not getting talked

about enough in the wider space there is it's so easy for it to build up like that especially if um you know she doesn't give any um she doesn't give any insight on earnings obviously leverage is is how much debt you have but like leverage to earnings ratio is important because some people think, well, I earn enough, so it's okay. The problem is the minimum payments can be handled by an okay salary. I mean, it's obviously bad if you've not got a good salary, but if you have, you're just tempted to look at things on a monthly basis. So they don't have, this could be car finance, there could be like loans, oh, we'll just do a conservatory or we'll just renovate. And people, people are being offered loans by banks all the time in the app, in letters and stuff that they, it's, it suddenly creeps up.

And I've seen it often where these are still on lot, not percent, like low percent deals. This isn't where suddenly it starts to crank into a 28 29 interest rate so i think i want to share that first because to some of us that's a shocking number but this is very very common especially in a couple or a family setting as well like she sounds like she's enjoyed the fruits of their labor a little bit going on these family holidays and being looked after and that's such a nice place to be and your parents look you know it's a privilege isn't it to be able to look they looked after your parents but it sounds like in the background they've been scrambling to try and keep up with this lifestyle

that they've kind of created must be really difficult we talk about keeping up with the joneses all the time it sounds like they're in the social group of people and they just want to provide for their family but like laura said it can just creep up 50 000 pounds might sound quite shocking to some people but in a couple with a family that's probably quite normal. That could hold around for years as well you know that you kind of play the game where you switch the cards and you consolidate some big thing we see old get consolidation loan and then it just literally the credit cards don't get cut open it like the same thing happens again and you know well it's really hard without knowing the

income numbers um because this is either a problem or a really big problem um what can she do because the big the big issue is when you're the child you can't be like I think you should go do this or I've just found this out or I've read your letter I mean let's talk about that first like where did it go ah just accidentally read I would definitely i would just say would you read and tell oh no no lucy and i are definitely on the same page like i'm i read so quick as well like i'm so if you're not gonna tell them that you read, how are you going to workshop it? So she has already said that she found herself in debt as well. So I think we always say, use yourself as the example and be like,

so. It's a sacrificial lamb. Throw yourself under the bus. So I messed up. No, I think it's saying, oh, do you know, I was in debt. I got a credit card and I think.

Have you heard of financial? Yeah. And it's so. It's the leaflets. You don't want to brush the leaflet across the table. You have to act like you haven't read the letter, first of all, because that will not go down well. You shouldn't be doing that, even though I would. But if it's right there on the counter.

Yeah. Open. If you have that relationship with your family, you could be like, look, I did not go snooping for anything, but that, it was on the tabletop and I couldn't ignore it. Did you leave it for me then? I really care about you and I was in debt as well. And I found this method and this is a really good way to get rid of it.

Like, are you planning on keeping it forever? Like, is this becoming a problem? Do you need any help? Whatever it might be. Really difficult. You don't want to be patronizing towards your parents because they will just, I imagine, you can... My seven-year-old was like,

Mum, your investments are not looking very healthy. Which you might well do because we've talked about him before, Wolf of Wall Street with his gizer, adding cash into it at any given opportunity. I can totally picture that. Yeah. I would feel judged by your kids.

I imagine you just shut down like shut the conversation down which you I think position it as oh do you know I was in 10 grand of debt and I managed to pay it off by doing this

it's like you said sacrificial lamb the other thing is because she knows the journey the other side so when if someone's not been able to handle it

but they've not asked you for help they're just cracking on the last thing they want to really know about is the pain that's involved in paying down debt and it effectively means you have made bad choices you know small minority of cases it's been out of your control but majority of the cases with with consumer debt it's been choices so a choice you know and so especially because she's absolutely benefited from some of these choices that could be a way that she could lean into this, which is, I've seen,

and I think that's a probably good point. If it was there and if it's out in the open, maybe being honest and going, I saw the letter, I couldn't help but see it. Like I'm surprised that you're in that much debt. Like I've played a part in that. I know I've benefited from years of treats and stuff. And we've never been, we've never talked about money. I've been on my own journey. Would you like some help and I think Holly you said something there really

important is this going to be here forever because I think what's really hard is as people are approaching kind of 50s 60s early retirement stage it's kind of like they give up a little bit in terms of oh I'm not going to be working forever and I want to be enjoying myself. And quite frankly, yes, because... The timing's not on the horizon for people that age now. Well, it's not. And what else? So you're just going to... Is the plan to carry on because, you know,

our pensions are not going to pay that debt off. You don't want to get into a bankruptcy situation. Like it can get quite serious. But with the help of family and with the support of family, to that point saying, like, do you want to pay off or is this is your plan for it just to be here because there's no like lottery win they're probably paying postcode lottery um you're always saying no one no one is coming like that's my favorite thing no one is coming and if they come wonderful yeah what a lovely holiday then you know what i mean it's but but i think yeah

saying i'm willing to help you with it the big thing will be if you have that amount of debt, I mean, think about that. That's like paying 50 grand, 10 grand off a year for five years. That's pretending it's not a percent interest. This is a slog. So this is not going to be I'm going to cut a Netflix subscription. This is not going to be I'm going to meal prep. This is some serious looking at where we're at in our life,

what things can we sell, you know. But again, as she said, and I love that, she knows how to do it. She knows the plan because she's a financial member. She knows she's going to snowball or avalanche it with them, build up some emergency savings, teach them how to build a budget, do all the things. I love that at least she's got the tools because she can go, I know what we're going to do. It's just how they're going to receive it.

Yeah, it's how it's presented for sure. And what about just going back, the letter says, that they need to pay ASAP in order to avoid court action. So does that mean it's been like, that must mean it's been there for a while. Festering. Absolutely. It could mean they've kind of become overwhelmed

and stopped paying. So it might not be that the whole debt is absolutely due now, but when you stop paying a lender, like that's the case, you know, sometimes under the contract it's due and payable. In fact, and on that basis, it's a really good idea to speak to a debt charity. So speaking to, you've got Citizens got citizens advice in the uk but you've

also got organizations like step change national debt headline loads of places that they can help you with the legal side of that letter there's lots of things that you can do if you are in a particularly difficult situation and i think sometimes like in like ivas and stuff in the uk but i feel like people jump into them before they've even, like they've still not changed the habit. And so there's an element of if it can be saved without drastic action, it's a really good way.

And they've got their daughter who's brought home on her own. Like that's just amazing. She knows her stuff. I was speaking to a community member the other day who'd been in a lot of debt with various people and she'd really done amazingly well and was kind of coming out of

it and noticed that a friend was struggling and doing the same thing and got a car on car finance and she said it was quite out of character for this person to do that they were they were really struggling financially and she kind of sat her friend down and was like I'm going to email them and I'm going to tell them that you made a big mistake and that you're going to um give the car back and they need to come up with a solution for you and kind of put it in their court. And they did it. They did it, the company. And she was like, and I was like, oh, it's true.

You don't ask, you don't get, but it's true. I think if you can prove to a company that you have got a plan in place, you could say, look, I've got this budget-stamped subscription. I'm following this course. I am reading these blogs. And I cannot afford this car yeah i can't afford i made a mistake yeah um i've come to my senses or whatever whatever it is um

they were really understanding i think they if you can put your point across it's not this will not work for you if you are consistently lying to these companies saying that you're going to pay something and then the next month you're not saying you're going to pay it you know the the regulator wants all these companies offer finance quite rightly with all the money they make off the back of it to provide provide teams that help and there's particularly like it could be mental health situation it could be um it could be particularly distressing could be regular health and just struggling making payments the worst thing you can do is not speak to them they have teams that aren't just like your random

customer service dude it is they're trained to help. They are trained not to be predatory. They're trained to help support you. I love that the friend did that. That was like, that's an intervention. She's a community, she's a financial community member. She's aged.

Well done. She listens to the pod as well. So she'll love it that I'm mentioning. And she did the same thing with her debt. She had a Barclay card, a credit card, and it started to include loads of interest. It had jumped up massively. And she just started doing financial and she was like, the math wasn't mathing. Like

I'd done everything I could, I'd decreased everything here and I'd squeezed my budget here and I'd tried to bring as much revenue. And she was like, but this was detrimental. This, this rising interest rate meant that she was knocking minimal amounts off. So she rang Barclays and they, they were like we can see that you're really making an effort I think she sent her budget over and she was like look screenshot just just I think it was just to show willing and intention that she was going to take control of her money and they reduced it back to zero percent because they could see that she was in a position to pay it off I know so I think the message here is she will be able to go

and she could help her parents see that by speaking directly to these companies, there might be some sort of compromise or a plan that will help them pay this debt off rather than going down the court route. And rather than ostriching, just la la la la la. Yeah, la la la.

Let's pretend it's not happening. Good luck, though. Yeah, and well done. She's done amazing. So, time for a little community win win sharing a big win for me on my long and painful road to debt freedom i just wiped out half of my remaining debt in one go so now i have just three months to go the countdown is on oh my god i can see the end think about the bougie christmas you're gonna have it's uh nearly there well done that's amazing yay um if you'd like to send your community

win in please post it to the community in the app or email it to the vault at financial.com okay ready for the next dilemma yeah my partner won't get on board with our family budget hi ladies i'm in need of some desperate help. My partner constantly complains that we spend too much money as a family. He doesn't get involved with the family money organisation. He couldn't tell you how much a pint of milk is in the shops and he definitely wouldn't know when our child has grown out of his shoes. But he constantly complains that we are overspenders. We don't create a family budget, I just know roughly how much we should ideally spend on

groceries, our son's hobbies, direct debits and household bills. But other than that, as a family, we kind of spend mindlessly. A takeaway here and there, a night out with friends, cinema trips, etc. It's frustrating. Because I do most of the spending for our family, I feel personally attacked when he says this. He genuinely doesn't understand how expensive it is to live anymore and leaves it for me to sort how can we tackle

this together budgeting is a team sport and he's been a shit player oh she went there yes but he

no it's true I was actually I was actually worrying that Lydia was going to ask us each how much a pint of milk is I've got no idea and I do the I couldn't tell you what size of milk I don each how much a pint of milk is. I've got no idea.

And I do the big job. I couldn't tell you what size of milk a pint was. I don't know what a pint is. Like a pint? A bit. That's my biggest fear. I've got no idea. Yeah, you're right.

He is shit. But it's like she's having to make all all the decisions and you know even if even if she is the person suggesting we have a takeaway suggesting we got for a meal like on what basis is the overspending how does he know they're overspending like is he not hitting a financial goal that he wants to or that they want to like i, I don't know if she's not shared that, but you cannot outsource or like, it's not even outsourcing. You can't pass the book to let one person do the, it's the both. Like everyone has to be involved in the plan. So even if one partner owns the spending of the plan,

you have to set the plan together because I tell you what, he doesn't know what a milk costs and neither do i so we're not going to judge him on that and i also probably don't know when my children have grown out of this year so we're not going to judge you on that but um lots of like things add up and actually the the beauty of doing a budget and then tracking your actuals is we all undercut it generally, but it's a collective we. So we overspent this month.

We didn't set that budget high enough. We came under budget this month and there's wins to it. So everyone has grand ideas of the budget at the beginning of the month. The first time you ever- Do you remember on TikTok when people roasted my expenses?

Oh my God, yeah. I was like- That roasted my expenses oh my god yeah and I was like that was so brutal and it was I was like what did I put maybe like 600 on groceries in a month where it was

family of five and it was a party that we were hosting so I upped it for that and I made this clear and they're all like oh my god that's so unrealistic

this is made up and I was like oh my god it's definitely not and we overspent and didn't stay to budget like that's what you get for being honest yeah but we set that together so I didn't undercut it knowing I was gonna blow it and even then you still mess up we had a community interview do you remember with that lady and her her husband was really judgy about her spending

and was and she did the budget and he was like, you overspend, you don't do it properly, blah, blah, blah. And she was like, okay, then you do it for one month. And he was like, oh God, when he realized how expensive things were. This is really like going back a couple of years, but he was really being quite judgy of her. But the life admin, by the way, that that lady is carrying is enormous because I do the budget with my husband

and I still find it quite overwhelming sometimes when we've got a lot on that month. It takes a lot of planning. I think I wrote in the community the other day how we did it. So we sit down, we get the calendar, there's birthdays, there's school parties, there's school events, there's village fates,

there's all this stuff going on. It's a hell of a lot of life admin. And it's quite stressful to be the person that feels like you're constantly spending money all the time. Even if it's not on yourself, that person is not obviously going buying loads of clothes and beauty products and stuff. She's buying stuff for the family. And it's really stressful to constantly see money going out of your account on one person. So to then criticize that person, she's already carrying the weight of that. And then to go on top, you are not in the good books, my friend.

No, it's not. And listen, like if she is spending, if she's spending more than perhaps the budget can afford, doing a budget together will reveal that. And it's not to catch her out. But if there's no plan, it's very easy for all of us to overspend.

So if she's ordering stuff on Amazon, if she's ordering stuff on TikTok shop, if if she's if they're getting takeaways or whatever it's not her job to police it um but she may be the person that is choosing to spend on non-necessities that's you know she may be that but you can't kind of call it out without doing the work up front it's it's it's so good for your relationship to put it together. It's amazing because it's also respecting that we're different kinds of people. So there's the life admin or not who's carrying the burden, but there's the who's the detail and who's not

and appreciating that the person that doesn't, you know, may get, you know, I have friends who, some people in the couple have had historic money issues to the point where budget is actually triggering. Yeah. And for mental health reasons, they kind of trust the process. And so I've seen that work really well, as long as that person does not come in and criticise.

Yes. And overspending, you can't have your cake and eat it. Yeah. You have to understand what your role is and have visibility of it. And so a really good way to do that, for example, is the pots pots so if you've got a shared bank account for expenses for example and you have a bank account with pots if the one person that helps to organize the budget and choose everything puts all the like divides all the money up into pots and you've both got access to it then it's very clear what is and isn't out of budget that's a good way sometimes if the actual budget's doing your head in um but you can't can't escape all of it i'm afraid it's like childish

it's a difficult one only because it's just it's left into the hands of many women and i feel i feel the pain because we see it every day in our community women trying to bring these families up and take control of the money and make sure it stretches far and feel guilt for spending like especially on things like maternity leave it was quite triggering for me on maternity leave because I just felt really bad all the time going you're meeting a friend for a coffee or whatever because you're not contributing to the household you're like oh would you mind if I oh I'm really sorry that it was a bit more expensive than I thought and I remember my husband being like what are you talking about like it's fine but it can be quite

triggering for people um and tend to be criticized on the back of it. It's quite difficult. So yeah, doing a budget together, doing an autopsy of the month before, that's always the best, I think, because you can see and prove or highlight where there could be a problem in the budget or where there's overspending.

And you can be like, look, we do this as a family. Yeah, those golf clubs are quite expensive. There'll be something. Give us the autopsy, we'll find it. Let us know what it is. We're like forensic accountants, like, show me. I want to get into the weeds and be like, got your massive magnifying glass?

Yeah, just drop it on the table. Exhibit A. Yeah. It's a team sport. But we'll set you some homework. Money date night, that doesn't have to be done right at budget time. You can get ahead of the next one

or you can do sometimes a halfway through the month budget whenever you hear this and want to take action. Get together, get all your documents out, get some no phones other than for using it for... Calculator. Calculator. Who wants one of those anymore? And looking in your bank account and make a plan together and tell us how you get on because i think it'll improve his respect for the process

um and if you are overspending as a family and i say define overspending set your goals as a family and then what you've got to do is every single budget is an opportunity to move closer to those goals every single one you've just got to be mindful of that goal and work towards that. If you're just mindlessly like moving through, there'll be money slashing around, being spent, overspent, but define overspending

if you don't know what it was meant to go to otherwise. If you don't have a goal in place, it's technically not overspending. I'm not using credit cards. It's the money that you've got. Exactly. Good luck. Live your best life.

I'm watching you, mister. Okay. Any final words? I'm watching you, mister. Okay. Any final words? I think we've had some good wins. I feel like keep them coming. Make sure you send them to us and share them because they really inspire other people. This is like normal people doing superhuman stuff.

It really is. The odds are stacked against us every time we're trying to navigate keeping our marriage together or trying to navigate managing debt managing debt buying homes as we've talked about every time one of you sends us something and we can share it not only do we love it um but someone else is listening going maybe i could do that one day yeah amazing so that's all for this episode the vault is now closed and just a quick disclaimer the vault is just a chat around life and money topics. We are not giving financial advice.