{"id":118763,"date":"2025-03-11T16:38:27","date_gmt":"2025-03-11T20:38:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/?p=118763"},"modified":"2026-02-18T15:43:51","modified_gmt":"2026-02-18T19:43:51","slug":"199-boston","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/199-boston\/","title":{"rendered":"Episode #199: \u201cI struggle w\/ cc debt but insisted on a Cartier wedding ring\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe title=\"\u201cI struggle w\/ cc debt but insisted on a Cartier wedding ring\u201d\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/-ide1sLa59Y\" width=\"100%\" height=\"400\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><iframe style=\"border-radius: 12px;\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/episode\/17qSBiJlar9KCOZtIfDaYt?utm_source=generator\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>On today\u2019s episode, we\u2019re live from Boston for my recent Money For Couples book tour.<\/p>\n<p>First, I talk with Robert (28) and Giselle (28) who appear to have it all together, but behind the scenes, they\u2019re struggling to make intentional financial decisions. Instead of planning ahead, they make impulsive decisions like committing $7,500 to a new home that they can\u2019t afford. Now, they\u2019re questioning if they can afford the wedding they want.<\/p>\n<p>Then we\u2019ll meet Sara (28) and Jay (28) who are newly married and learning how to navigate finances together. Sara is a disciplined saver who avoids debt, while Jay is a big-picture dreamer\u2014planning elaborate vacations without considering the cost. Sara has graciously agreed to help Jay pay off his debt, but was blindsided when Jay revealed the full amount post-honeymoon. Now, as they plan for homeownership and parenthood, trust and transparency are more important than ever.<\/p>\n<p><strong>This episode is brought to you by:<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>DeleteMe | If you want to get your personal information removed from the web, go to\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/joindeleteme.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0for 20% off.<\/p>\n<p>Fabric by Gerber Life | Join the thousands of parents who trust Fabric to protect their family. Apply today in just minutes at\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/meetfabric.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/meetfabric.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Masterclass | For unlimited access to every class and 15% off an annual membership, go to\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/masterclass.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/masterclass.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Facet | Facet is waiving their $250 enrollment fee for new annual members, and for my audience, Facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to\u00a0<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit\">https:\/\/facet.com\/ramit<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0to learn more about which membership option is best for you.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Links mentioned in this episode<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwt.com\/earn1k\">Start earning $1k on the side in 30 days\u2014using skills you already have at iwt.com\/earn1k<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/iwt.com\/moneyforcouples\">Order my new book: Money for Couples<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><strong>Show Transcript<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>[00:00:05]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. Welcome, Boston. How\u2019re you doing? People really think it\u2019s still the departed here. You walk around Southeast, 75% of people are drinking matcha. I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat the hell?\u201d How do y\u2019all feel in front of this crowd?<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:19]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a lot of people.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Are you guys here to support them? You wrote that you lost $5,000 when you were house hunting. What happened?<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:28]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0We left with nothing. Hindsight, bias is such a [Bleep].<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:31]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What do you spend on?<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:32]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Food.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:33]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I like to cook. I cook a lot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What kind of food are you guys eating? Hold on. No one can spend 74% on food.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:38]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019d be surprised. Obviously, we get our knowledge through TikTok and Instagram these days.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:42]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What? No, no, no. Tell the truth. Tell the truth. Which TikTok scammers do you follow? Let me give you their initials. Is it K? Does it start with a K? We calculated year to date you spent $3,400 in interest.<\/p>\n<p>[00:00:54]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm. Damn, crowd. [Bleep]. Can you see that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Even the crowd was like, \u201cGod damn.\u201d I don\u2019t even like mangoes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:04]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0We were in the PF Chang\u2019s at the Natick Mall.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0There\u2019s something weird about this. Am I the only one? Do you think this is weird?<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:13]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I\u2019ve never done this before.<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:17]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Whoa. Didn\u2019t have that on my note cards.<\/p>\n<p>[Laughters]<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:01:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, I recently spent several weeks on tour for my new book,\u00a0Money for Couples, where I had the amazing opportunity to sit down with couples, in person, on stage, in front of a live audience, totally unscripted. I love that energy in the room where you simply do not know what\u2019s\u00a0going to\u00a0happen. On today\u2019s episode, you\u2019re\u00a0going to\u00a0see me sit down with two couples live in Boston. Watch what happens. Let\u2019s get to the show.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. Welcome, Boston. How\u2019re you doing? Whoa. Love to see everybody tonight. Welcome, Boston. This is a great crowd. Welcome. What a great way to kick off 2025. I\u2019d posted the cities that I\u2019m going to, and I got a bunch of DMs from people. Some of them said, \u201cBoston? Better be careful.\u201d I\u2019m like, \u201cBe careful?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:26]\u00a0People really think it\u2019s still the departed here. Meanwhile, you walk around Southeast, 75% of people are drinking matcha. I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat the hell?\u201d I really love Boston because every time I come here, I have the best conversations about money with couples. It takes a little bit of time. I got to open people up.<\/p>\n<p>[00:02:45]\u00a0But once I do, you really never know what to expect. And that is what we are going to see tonight from real couples who are going to do something, frankly, I would be terrified to do. They\u2019re going to come on stage, and they\u2019re going to talk about real numbers, real challenges, live on stage, in front of all of us. That takes a ton of courage. That\u2019s why I would like for you to get on your feet and give me a warm round of applause for Giselle and Robert.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Welcome. Let\u2019s see them.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:25]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Welcome.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:26]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Thanks, Ramit. Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:28]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:30]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right.\u00a0Welcome. How you doing?<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:35]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0So good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:36]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>We\u2019re good. How are you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m doing great.\u00a0How do y\u2019all feel in front of this crowd?<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:41]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a lot of people.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:42]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Looks a lot\u00a0different.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:43]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Very engaged. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:03:44]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I think the crowd is here for you. Are you guys\u00a0here to support them? That is what I\u2019m talking about. Okay. So I\u2019m curious because in your application, Giselle, you wrote that you lost $5,000 when you were house hunting. Can you tell us what happened?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:02]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I was untruthful. It was $8,000.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:05]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Great. Already starting with a lie. I\u00a0love\u00a0it. Keep it coming.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:08]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0So we decided that we were going to try it out, get a town home. We did not talk about what we were going to be doing or what that entailed.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You didn\u2019t run the numbers?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0No. Why would I do that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019re in good company with the rest of\u00a0America. Okay, go on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:28]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. So we didn\u2019t realize earnest money was a thing. We also didn\u2019t know that an appraisal and an inspection\u2013 it was a lot. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So you got the house, or no?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:44]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, no. We left with nothing.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Whoa.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:48]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, zero.<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. So you\u00a0started the process of buying a house and then what happened to stop it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:04:54]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I got a gut feeling that I\u2019m like, \u201cThis is probably not the best idea right now.\u201d We were doing too much work trying to get the house, and I feel like we\u2019re doing extra work that we shouldn\u2019t be doing.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:05]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I disagreed.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:06]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:07]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I kept trying to make it work. I kept trying to make the puzzle pieces work and they just did not work.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How did you talk about this?<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:13]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0We didn\u2019t. We didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:18]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can we reenact\u00a0a conversation\u00a0that you had about the house?<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Sure. I really like this. I want this. This is mine. I think\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:29]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0There was more than that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:30]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait, is that for real?<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:31]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. I see a family in his house.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:35]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I do. I saw the wood paneling. I saw all the things. I was like, This is going to\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0The realtor must have loved you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:05:40]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0So that\u2019s the gag is, is that she was a family friend and I didn\u2019t realize that that was a bad thing to do. So it was my best friend\u2019s mom, and I had no way of telling her, do you mind fighting for our earnest money a little bit?\u00a0And she did not. So it was just super\u2013 yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:01]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Get us our money back. We put this money down. I need to see something in return. But yeah, for me it was a very different experience.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s continue that conversation. So Giselle, you said, \u201cI want this house. I can see a family here. We can make it work.\u201d And then Robert, what was your\u00a0reaction?<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:19]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I see a new deck needs to be done. I see a new roof needs to be done, a new basement needs to be done. She wants to change the master bedroom. She wants to take out all the carpet. So I\u2019m like, \u201cIf we\u2019re doing all this, we might as well pay for our house that has all this stuff already and we\u2019re putting more money into the house.\u201d And so I didn\u2019t think it was a good idea.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:37]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0The\u00a0basement\u00a0flooded on our last day of the due diligence. And I was like, \u201cBut we can make it work.\u201d I know.<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. So now that you\u2019re hearing yourselves talk about\u00a0that, what do you think hearing\u00a0that conversation playback?<\/p>\n<p>[00:06:53]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. It\u2019s embarrassing. But in hindsight, bias is such a [Bleep] I wish I listened the first time because we probably could have stopped at the $5,000 instead of keep trying to make things work. I think we ended up paying for the deck as well. I wish we spoke about things sooner.<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:14]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0For me, the biggest thing was, I probably should have brought it up earlier in the whole conversation. That we probably should be looking somewhere else or take some time to really figure out what we want to do with this.<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What roles do you\u00a0think you each played in\u00a0this conversation? If you had to name the role that you each played, what would you name it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:32]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think I\u2019m more of a dreamer, and I think that it\u2019s odd because I\u2019m a dreamer. I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, we can do this.\u201d But at the same time, I\u2019m scared to talk to him about anything when it comes to money because I just don\u2019t want to nag him. So my idea of doing that is just saying, \u201cLet\u2019s just go for it. Let\u2019s go ahead and dive in.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Because being\u00a0conscientious about your money\u00a0equals nagging?<\/p>\n<p>[00:07:56]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Nagging and stress.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Got it. Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:01]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>I don\u2019t want to stress him out. I already stress him out so much. So I don\u2019t want to stress him out more.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:04]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0The thing is she doesn\u2019t stress me out.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:05]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Aw, thanks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:08]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m very easygoing in my opinion. I think I\u2019m an open book.\u00a0If she wants to talk to me about it, she can, but I feel like for some reason, well, I notice now that she doesn\u2019t always come to me with the money problems that she might be thinking about or have questions about.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And what was your role\u00a0if you had to name it,\u00a0Robert?<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:24]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0For the getting the house?<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. That conversations that you had about money, how would you name your role?<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:31]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m a listener. I let her express what she feels. I give my 2 cents on it, and then we try to make a decision from there. But I guess the conversation doesn\u2019t come up until she brings it up, and that\u2019s probably where part of the issue comes from.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I think that\u2019s probably accurate.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:46]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Kind of sweat on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.\u00a0That helps me understand what\u2019s going on. Shall we take a quick look at your numbers?<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:54]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Sure.<\/p>\n<p>[00:08:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Okay. Thanks for supplying them. Let\u2019s take a look here. So let\u2019s quickly look what we have here. Assets, 32k. Investment, 75. Savings, 52. Debt, 30. Net worth, 129,000.\u00a0Nice. Gross monthly income, 25,000? Wow. Good job. Give it up. That\u2019s great.\u00a0Nice work. What the\u00a0[Bleep]? Your fixed costs are 26%? Is that for real?<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:43]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u00a0think so.<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0pretty low.<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:46]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0She knows more about this than I do. Trust me. But that seems pretty much accurate.<\/p>\n<p>[00:09:51]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a026% is one of the lowest fixed costs I\u2019ve seen. Just so everybody knows, typically the fixed costs are between 50 to 60%. At least that\u2019s, in my opinion, a healthy number. 26. Very low in part because you have a very high income, but probably\u2013 well, there\u2019s some other reasons.\u00a0Let\u2019s look. Oh, investments are at zero. Okay, that explains\u00a0part of it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:12]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:13]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Savings at zero. Okay. Guilt free spending at 74?\u00a0What? What do you spend on?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:20]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Food?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How much\u00a0food?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I like to cook.\u00a0I cook a lot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What kind of food are you guys\u00a0eating?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:26]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0We eat out a lot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:27]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0We do. Hey, we do.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:29]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Hold on. No one can spend 74% on\u00a0food.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:31]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019d be surprised.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:34]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m telling you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Now that\u2019s the kind of answer I like.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What else? Travel?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:40]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0We do travel a lot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:41]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0We travel and then we eat when we travel too.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:44]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh my gosh.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:45]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0It adds up a lot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Well, it\u2019s interesting. Looking at these numbers, does anything jump out to you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:10:52]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0We are very, very blessed to know that he had asked me to sell my car recently. So the asset was at a true 19,000. And that was really hard for me to do because logically I was like, \u201cOh, I can afford it. I\u2019m good. I can have the company car, and I can have my personal car.\u201d Stupid. So no payment on the transportation, which is good, but I would love to re-put that into my student loan debt because I\u2019m kind of holding us back there. But his idea is some debt is good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:27]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s talk about that.\u00a0Some debt is good. What\u00a0kind of debt is good?<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:32]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Obviously, we get our knowledge through TikTok and Instagram these days.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:36]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What?<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:37]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0No, we don\u2019t. We\u2019re talking to Ramit.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:40]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0No, no, no. Tell the truth. Tell the truth. Come on. Which TikTok scammers do you follow? Come on, tell me. Let me give you their initials. Is it K? Does it start with a K? Oh, [Bleep]. I already know this\u00a0guy. So\u00a0somebody told you that having debt is good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:11:54]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I was always under the assumption that having your credit card bill being a certain percentage helps you build your credit.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:02]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, hold on. I\u2019ve always wanted to meet someone who believed this.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:05]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. I am that person.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Now I get to ask some more questions. So having debt helps you build your credit, credit score. And then\u00a0what?\u00a0What do you get\u00a0from that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:21]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Assuming you can get more with your credit being higher.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You can get more what?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:26]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Debt.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:26]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. You get more debt essentially. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:29]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Debt, that\u2019s the question.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:29]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So what\u2019s the end goal? You have credit card debt. It builds your credit score. And then what?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:35]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019re\u00a0talking about the 30%?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:38]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:40]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0He\u2019s told me multiple times, like, no student\u2013 like when we were getting the house, the mortgage person was like, \u201cOh my God, that\u2019s great. Do you want to use your 401K too to like add towards the\u2013\u201d And of course I said,\u00a0no.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:51]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>What the [Bleep]?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:52]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:53]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Your broker? Who did this? The realtor\u00a0or the loan officer?<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:57]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0It was both. It was both.<\/p>\n<p>[00:12:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay,\u00a0I got a couple of lessons. I\u00a0need\u00a0to lay the [Bleep]\u00a0law\u00a0right now. First of all, never take financial advice from a loan officer or a realtor, ever, ever. Now, I can\u2019t say that about TikTok because I am on TikTok. My account\u2019s not that good, but I\u2019m working on that. Robert, do you have credit card debt?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:17]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:18]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How much?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:19]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Probably like 15,000 total.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:21]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right, so y\u2019all make a $300,000 income. Is that right?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:25]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0That just sounds so\u2013 yeah, we do, I guess.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait, did you know that before you came here?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:31]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0No, I did not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What did I tell you guys? 50% of the people I talk to do not know their household income. Here you go. All right. That\u2019s okay. It\u2019s very common.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:41]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I did not know.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:41]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0No.<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s\u00a0because,\u00a0why? Explain for everybody because a lot of people are like, how can you not know your household income?<\/p>\n<p>[00:13:47]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Even just bringing up his credit card statement before coming before coming here, it was hard to ask him, can I get a look at that? Because I feel like there is a nagging sense.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Why do\u00a0you have to ask him to get a look at it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:05]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Because I feel like I don\u2019t want to pry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:08]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Why isn\u2019t he\u00a0providing it instead of you asking?<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:11]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Because\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:17]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Robert?<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:18]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s a good question.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:18]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, that\u2019s very true.\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I think my personality always has been like\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:27]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0If you need something you can\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-mm-mm. Let him answer.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:29]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Picking up what she\u2019s not saying, if you need something, let me know. Then we\u2019ll get it figured out. But I guess I never go into the conversation first trying to provide the information she\u2019s looking for. But I can\u2019t read her mind though. So I don\u2019t know what she wants all the time in terms of what she\u2019s looking for.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, I don\u2019t know that I buy that. Okay, you\u00a0can\u2019t read her mind, but you\u2019re all talking about buying a house, right? It would seem to me that talking about things like credit card debt would be first.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:56]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0That should have came up probably. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:14:58]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Robert, do you know how much your credit card debt is costing you an interest alone?<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:04]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Probably roughly 200 to $300.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Per?<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:10]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Per month.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Per month? Yeah. That\u2019s about right. Let\u2019s take a look.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Before we hear how much Robert\u2019s credit card debt is costing him, let\u2019s take a second to support our sponsors.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:20]\u00a0Now let\u2019s get back to Robert and his credit card balance.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:23]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Do you know how much your credit card debt is costing you an interest alone?<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:29]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Probably roughly like 200 to $300 per month.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:34]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s take a look. 2024, we calculated\u2013 in fact, I think you sent this over to us. Your year to date from the full year, you spent $3,400 in interest.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:47]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm. Damn, crowd. [Bleep]<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Even the crowd was like,\u00a0God\u00a0damn.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:55]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Thought y\u2019all were with me.\u00a0Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:58]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I like the [Inaudible].<\/p>\n<p>[00:15:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So here\u2019s a couple lessons I take away. What do you take away from this, by the way? Of course, don\u2019t have credit card debt with a $300,000 income. Makes no sense. That\u2019s number one. But there\u2019s, to me, a couple of more deeper lessons right here. What do you notice?<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:13]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Communication is a big part of it. And embracing that conversation might be uncomfortable, but trying to figure out a way to do it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:20]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.\u00a0Love that. Meaning both of you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.\u00a0Accountability.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can\u2019t just be one. I don\u2019t love the word nag because it\u2019s so gendered. You never heard a guy being like, I feel like a nag. Never heard that. So when you feel that there\u2019s this nagging word, to me, that\u2019s actually a sign that let me step back and re-examine the dynamic. Let me take one step up. Am I asking questions? Why am I even asking this? Shouldn\u2019t he be coming with it? So there\u2019s that. And then the third lesson I learned is, don\u2019t take financial advice from TikTok.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:55]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0No, no.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:57]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Wild.<\/p>\n<p>[00:16:58]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Robert, you said you\u2019re pretty easygoing. I think you described yourself like that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:03]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:04]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You mentioned you travel. When you travel, who plans the travel?<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:08]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0A mixture of both of us, depending on, yeah, the type of trip. If it\u2019s probably more out of the country is more me. If it\u2019s more adventure, like activities, it\u2019s probably more her.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0These conversations you have about money, you mentioned that you\u2019re an open book, and what was that phrase you used with her? I think you said something about ask me whatever you want.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:33]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, yeah. I feel like I actually can ask me whatever she wanted to and I would give her the answer she\u2019s either looking for or wants to hear or\u2013 not the answer she wants to hear, but I\u2019ll give her my honest answer.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:44]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s try that right now.\u00a0Robert, I\u2019m\u00a0here. We got plenty of time. Ask me anything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:53]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Ask me anything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0No, no, no. Literally, Robert, ask me\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:56]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, I\u2019m asking you anything?<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Go ahead.<\/p>\n<p>[00:17:58]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Very literal.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:00]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0What\u2019d you have for breakfast today?<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oats and fruit.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:05]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:06]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s it? Any money questions? Ask me anything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:09]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Oh my God. Come on.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:12]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Well, I want a good question.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:13]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let him do his thing. Let him do his thing.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:15]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh. What would be your advice for why I should cancel all my credit card debt right now?<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019re paying over $300 or so per month. Nobody who has a $300,000 income with a 24% fixed cost should have credit card debt. The money is literally just being wasted. And more importantly, you\u2019re playing small.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:41]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0[Inaudible] my next today.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Do you feel the energy shift when I said like, ask me anything? What did that feel like to you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:51]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u2019re\u00a0not accepting anything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:52]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m just here like this. Like, all right,\u00a0what do you want? Let me know what you want. I\u2019ll tell you anything. Like, ugh.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:58]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:18:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0It doesn\u2019t feel good to you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:01]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Defensive, kind of.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:02]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Anyone else feel that in the room?<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:04]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:04]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.\u00a0And it\u2019s flippant. Ah, whatever. Ask me. And then I use these\u2013 I\u2019m an open book.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:11]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Just to say you did it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. But what would\u00a0be a better approach instead of me saying, ask me anything? What would it be?<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:20]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I would like to talk about this or\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Keep going. I love that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:23]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0When you have a moment, let\u2019s discuss these things.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. Amazing. I have a confession to make. I, myself, have struggled to\u00a0connect with my\u00a0feelings, especially as a young guy, Indian guy. We are not taught to talk about our feelings. If you had asked me at the age of 22, what do you feel about X, my response would\u2019ve been, I think dot, dot,\u00a0dot.<\/p>\n<p>[00:19:50]\u00a0I literally could not answer words about feelings. Let\u2019s actually hear from the guys in the crowd. Any other guys have that? Let\u2019s hear it by a round of applause. Have any guys struggled to connect with your feelings, ever? It\u2019s a tough thing. It\u2019s tough for all of us, but I think, especially for guys. I think we use a lot of techniques.<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:11]\u00a0Sometimes we say like, \u201cAsk me anything. I\u2019m not holding back.\u201d But that\u2019s not connective. And I think sometimes that\u2019s why you get these reactions. Giselle is saying, like, \u201cBabe, I feel like a nag.\u201d But if I\u2019m reading correctly, correct me if I\u2019m wrong, I think what you\u2019re saying is, I\u2019m not connecting with you. What do you think?<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:34]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think you\u2019re right.<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Have you ever said that to him? I\u2019m not connecting with you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:37]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0No. My gosh, I love him. No, I would never.<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait, you could love him and not feel you\u2019re connecting.<\/p>\n<p>[00:20:45]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>For me, at least, it\u2019s hard to critique him because he\u2019s doing so well. The money that he does bring in is so great. So I don\u2019t know why I don\u2019t do that. That\u2019s a good question.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:04]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t think that asking questions is a bad thing of a partner. I don\u2019t think giving honest, loving feedback is a bad thing. And most of all, what I hear is that the two of you right now are independent. You\u2019re in your own corners. I want this house. I don\u2019t want to do the deck. What would it look like if you had a different dynamic?<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:28]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Probably come to a solution a lot faster.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:30]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Faster, yes. But would you just do it independently and come up with it faster?<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:35]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I think we\u2019d be more accepting of it together.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Maybe as a team.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:40]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What do you think?<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:44]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0How do you mean?<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Check it out. When you went to get the house, it was one person saying, I want this, and that person was like\u2013 this was their body language.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:55]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:55]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And then the other person was like this.<\/p>\n<p>[00:21:59]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s that body language. And then you kind of just hashed it out. And you each got entrenched in your corner. You were both pulling a knot and it was just getting tighter.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:09]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What would it look like if a team did\u00a0that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:13]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Huh, okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:15]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I think we should get this house. I can see us doing this together.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:19]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You would be involved, Robert. You\u2019d say, \u201cHey,\u00a0that sounds real. I love that you\u2019re thinking about. I love that you\u2019re so family-oriented. You really have a vision for us. My concern is there\u2019s a lot of work to be done. I don\u2019t have a lot of free time. And it concerns me because I don\u2019t know about the money. I wonder if we could sit down together and talk about this and really look at some numbers together.\u201d That\u2019s the beginning of a team. Now, I understand the two of you are going to get married soon, is that\u00a0right?<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:50]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>We just got engaged.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:56]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Oh, congratulations. I love that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:56]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I love him so much.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:57]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Congratulations.<\/p>\n<p>[00:22:58]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Yay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay,\u00a0let\u2019s apply what we just talked about\u00a0to your wedding. Do you have a number for the wedding?<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:07]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.\u00a0That answers my question.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:10]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0He knows\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:12]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s fine. Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:15]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think 30, because we have savings.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, that\u2019s the same number everyone comes up with.\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a0so funny.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:22]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0It sounds good on paper.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Right.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So many couples, this is the common number, 25 to 30. There\u2019s these common numbers that float around in personal finance. No one really quite knows why, but they are ubiquitous. You ask somebody, how much are you planning to spend on a vacation? Almost nobody plans a vacation number and they just go, \u201c5,000.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:44]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>I was just going to say 5,000.<\/p>\n<p>[00:23:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Bingo, 5,000. It\u2019s like November 5th, 1955 from back to the future. We don\u2019t know why, but everything cosmic happens that day. It\u2019s the same thing for weddings. Okay, so y\u2019all make $300,000 a year. You\u2019re going to be debt free tomorrow because you\u2019re going to pay off that credit card debt.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:00]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s wild.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:01]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0But it\u2019s funny that you picked a number that so many other people of all different incomes would pick. So before we get into the number, maybe we can talk about how you\u2019re going to decide on the wedding. Right now, how do you feel when you think about planning a wedding? One word.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:19]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Accountable.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:22]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Tired.<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:26]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Hold on. Does anyone resonate with those two comments? Okay. Wow. Lots. All the married couples are like, \u201cAh, I got you, bro.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:24:38]\u00a0When I\u00a0proposed and we got engaged, I talked to a lot of friends, married friends, and I was like, \u201cWhat was it like to plan your wedding?\u201d And a lot of people said, a lot of things. A lot of dudes bond over like, \u201cOh my God, this is going to be nuts.\u201d\u00a0All this stuff. \u201cAll I care about is the alcohol.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:01]\u00a0And my brother-in-law actually said something I never forgot. He said, \u201cThat was the best year of our lives, and you\u2019re going to have a blast.\u201d I remember that. And Cassandra and I, my wife, we talked about it and we decided together this is going to be the best year.<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:19]\u00a0So we made that intention, and that was just the beginning of us connecting over probably what\u2019s the biggest project together so far. So if you did that, if you did that for your wedding, one thing that we did, which I\u2019d like to share with you, is we had an infinite number of things we could have chosen from.<\/p>\n<p>[00:25:39]\u00a0You\u2019re looking at venues and dates and flowers.\u00a0It\u2019s overwhelming. Yeah. And so we created some core values for ourselves, things that would help us cut through, just like money dials, the things we love, but for our wedding. So for us, our first was relationships. And that meant that if we were deciding between nicer flowers or flying somebody from India, it was no question. That was a done deal.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:07]\u00a0The decision was made for us because that\u2019s our number one value. The people who came from out of town, we left little handwritten notes with pictures of all of us. That was free, but it was really meaningful to us. So it helped us decide what we wanted to do and what we didn\u2019t. What would it be like for you? What would be a couple of core values for your wedding?<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:31]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Family, I think is a big part of it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Great.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:33]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019ll say it, money. I don\u2019t want to spend too much.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:37]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0My thing has always been, the wedding for me is more to see her happy and see our family bond and unite. But I never want to go into a wedding thinking that, all right, the day after, or we just had a lot of money go down the drain now because now it\u2019s all over.<\/p>\n<p>[00:26:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You\u00a0are going to have a lot of money go away, but that\u2019s okay. You had a lot of money go away after you bought those beautiful pants. There\u2019s no problem. They look great.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:02]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0They\u2019re\u00a0nice. I got them for\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:08]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0The question is,\u00a0is this important to us, and can we afford it? Nobody\u2019s telling you to go into debt to have a wedding. And in fact, I never start with cost because it constricts you. It narrows your field. What\u2019s important to you? Family?<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:24]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Family.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:25]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.\u00a0And is there another one? Family. What\u00a0else?<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:29]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Experience.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>What\u2019s that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:46]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>It\u2019s silly. I\u2019m like, \u201cOh, I care about the money.\u201d But I am also like, \u201cEveryone drinks. Everyone has a great time.\u201d I don\u2019t want anyone to just\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:40]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s too broad. You\u00a0got to narrow it down. Family is good because you can be specific about that. Experience could be applied to literally anything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:48]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Maybe\u00a0venue. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, great.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:51]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Venue is\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So venue is important.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:54]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Important. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:27:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. When\u00a0we got married, because we spent more on family,\u00a0I remember we were talking to the chefs about the food. Indians love mangoes. So they were like\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:05]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a05,000 on mangoes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:06]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. You see my reaction, why I\u2019m so bitter about mangoes. Because my mom was like, \u201cWe must have mangoes.\u201d And then I\u2019m like looking at the chef and the guy slides the price sheet over. The mangoes cost $3,000 for this wedding. I was like, \u201cI don\u2019t even like mangoes.\u201d\u00a0But that was an easy\u00a0decision because family was important. Mangoes were\u00a0not.<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:28]\u00a0So that\u2019s how we make that decision. Same for you. If family and venue is important, that\u2019s how you make that decision. Do you feel that with two or three core values, you can make a good decision for your wedding?<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:48]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, I do.<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.\u00a0Giselle? Nervous?<\/p>\n<p>[00:28:52]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. Yeah, I don\u2019t know if that\u2013 I hope it does.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You think you can do it together?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:02]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I think we could do anything together. Yeah. I do. I do.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:06]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I love that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:07]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I do.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:08]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And do you think you can have fun doing it together?<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:13]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I do think so.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:15]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>I love that answer. All right. I want to thank both of you for coming out.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:18]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Aw, thanks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m wishing you the best of luck. Thank you so much.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:21]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:21]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Keep me updated.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:23]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you so much. Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:25]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0I appreciate it.\u00a0Thank you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s give it up. They were awesome.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Before we meet couple\u00a0number two, let\u2019s take a quick break to hear from our sponsors.<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:39]\u00a0Now let\u2019s get back to the live show and meet our second couple.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:29:42]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right. That was awesome. First of all, think about the courage it takes to come out here and share that kind of stuff. I don\u2019t know what it is. There\u2019s something about money that when you say it out loud, sometimes you hear yourself and you can feel silly and you can feel embarrassed.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:05]\u00a0But to me, I heard them saying things, and I heard so many people out here saying like, \u201cOh yeah, we\u2019ve done that.\u201d We\u2019ve all done something like that. We\u2019ve made big decisions. We didn\u2019t look at the numbers. We didn\u2019t talk about it in the way that you might. That\u2019s human nature.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:21]\u00a0Now we are ready to welcome our second couple. Please get on your feet and give a huge round of applause to Sara and Jay. Let\u2019s hear it. All right. Welcome, welcome, welcome. How you doing? Hey, welcome. All right. How\u2019s it going?<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:44]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Hi.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:45]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s going good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:46]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0We\u2019re good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How you feeling?<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:47]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Excited. Happy to be here.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:48]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, this is a great crowd.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:50]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, we could tell. We could hear y\u2019all.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:53]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Who applied to be here? Just so I know.<\/p>\n<p>[00:30:57]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I filled out that application form, but I did ask Jay before filling it out and he did say yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:04]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s all Sara\u2019s idea.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:05]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:07]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I actually have to give a quick shout out to my boss who\u2019s somewhere in the crowd. I don\u2019t know where. But she was the one who got me into your podcast. And then also screenshotted the Instagram story of we\u2019re looking for couples for live on stage and sent it to me.<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:20]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Whoa. All right. Shout out to the boss. Thank you very much. Okay. I want to know when was the moment where you both really decided to get serious about money?<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:35]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0We got engaged, and there was a big turning point where she had only known that I have a lot of debt, but there wasn\u2019t really a number on it. She just knew it was probably more than 20k and less than 100k but very\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:31:55]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, yeah. I did assume that. Yeah, I did.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:00]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0But one day we really planned to go out to lunch and do some back of the napkin math.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:09]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Now I have the terminology thanks to you, Ramit. Definitely, it was a money date, but at the time we just didn\u2019t know it was a money date, but it was.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:17]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0And I just showed my cards and told her how much I had in debt. And it was around 30k, I think, in mix of credit card debt and school loans.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can we just recreate that conversation right now?<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:30]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0It actually awesome.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Tell us. What happened?<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:33]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0We were in the PF Chang\u2019s at the Natick Mall. I don\u2019t know if we planned to go there specifically, but we planned to sit down over food, not at home, and talk about this. And we got there and I was literally with a napkin like, \u201cOkay, line it up. Let\u2019s see it.\u201d He took a few minutes and then it was all out on the table, literally.<\/p>\n<p>[00:32:59]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I shared my phone with Sara and we went through all my apps, like the Discover app, the Citi app, the Chase app, Sallie Mae. And I just showed her the grand total.<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And Sara what was your reaction?<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:17]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I was really happy to hear it. I definitely am one of those people that, knowing this information was not anxiety inducing to me. Like I said, I knew that he had debt before this conversation. But for me, it\u2019s like, if we\u2019re not doing anything about it, if we\u2019re just letting this sit here, that\u2019s what\u2019s causing me anxiety.<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:36]\u00a0So for me, knowing what was ahead of us, and I forget if it was in that same conversation, or maybe like a few days later, Jay and I did then sit down and we\u2019re like, \u201cOkay, what are we going to do? How are we going to tackle this? What are our deadlines? When do we want to get this done? What needs to come first?\u201d And that felt awesome. It was really, really great.<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:55]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I love that. Who drove that second conversation?<\/p>\n<p>[00:33:58]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I believe it was Sara.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:01]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know a lot about credit cards and debt. So I can also only drive that conversation so far, I feel like. So it\u2019s funny to hear you say that. I would\u2019ve said you.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:15]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0We needed to talk about it because we already started rolling the ball and I knew like it was important to you too. But that day that we were at PF Chang\u2019s was a big turning point because she didn\u2019t react the way I thought she would.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:31]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You thought she was going to be really negative about it?<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:33]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0A little bit more negative than she was, but she was actually really accepting and loving, and it didn\u2019t change how I thought she felt about me versus my debt or separate things.<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:49]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I was fired up. I was like, \u201cCool, thanks for telling me. Now we can get to work on this.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:34:56]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m like, \u201cWhat are we planning next? Vacation?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0First\u00a0of all, I love that reaction. And I love the way you describe it, Jay\u2013 very accepting, very loving. I think that we all have a history, whatever it may be, relationally, financially, whatever. People make mistakes. People do things with money. They make certain decisions and doesn\u2019t leave an indelible mark. We can change those things. So I love this dynamic. Did you pay off the debt?<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:30]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Most of it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:32]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, most of it. So since that point, we made a game plan.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:37]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0And it worked.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:38]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0And it worked.\u00a0And I\u2019m down to $3,500.<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, good job. Whoa. How\u2019d you pay it off?<\/p>\n<p>[00:35:49]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Jay definitely paid off most of it, but we did divide and conquer. Like I said, I forget if it was during that same conversation or shortly after. That conversation happened in July, 2023, and we already knew that we were going to get married in June, 2024. So a lot of our deadlines that we created for ourselves were before the wedding or literally the week before the wedding. We were like, we\u2019re going to\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:18]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait. So how did you pay off the debt?<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:19]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0So that\u2019s kind of her to say that I took care of most of it, but it started with a big chunk of her savings to help me out.<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Huh? You two were unmarried and you\u2013 what?<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:31]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Engaged. We\u00a0were engaged.<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, you were engaged. And so you found out he had debt. Your fianc\u00e9 has 30k of credit card debt. So then what was your reaction?<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:40]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0What comes first? What\u2019s good? What are we doing?<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:44]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Meaning I, Sara, am going to pay off\u00a0how much of this debt?<\/p>\n<p>[00:36:49]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. I think the way I saw it was like, we\u2019ve already made the decision to get married. We were those people who decided to wait a year after being engaged to be able to plan the wedding. But we could have walked into a courthouse that same day and just got married. The way I see it is like his debt is my debt. My savings is his savings. And vice versa, by the way. So I was just like\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:11]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0But the actual math for it was we said, how much per month can we contribute from now till the wedding? And we added that up. And then she gave me the difference. You gave me six grand and we worked towards the rest of the other 20 something together. She matched my savings pretty much.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:35]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. I basically matched it from there.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:37]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Hmm. Okay. All right. What do y\u2019all think of this? Wow.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:44]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Thanks.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So wait, there\u2019s\u00a0scattered support. Is that a fair description? Are there people who are like, \u201cThere\u2019s something weird about this?\u201d Am I the only one? Do you think this is weird?<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:55]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I\u2019ve never done this before.<\/p>\n<p>[00:37:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Just so I understand, so PF Chang\u2019s, this memorable meeting, you then talk about it again. You make a plan. Whatever you\u2019re paying off, you\u2019re matching. And the debt goes from 30k down.\u00a0Correct?<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:19]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:20]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Is that the direction it\u2019s gone the whole time, down?<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:23]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0No.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:25]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0There\u2019s down and then flat line, maybe up a little, and then down again. But the overall trend was\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:31]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What\u2019s the up part? Why does it go up?<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:35]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0We had some trips, and we had our wedding, which was this past year.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How much did the wedding cost?<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:42]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0About $40,000. Most of that, my dad paid for, which we knew that going into it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:51]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0There were still incurred expenses for my tux and the bachelor party.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:56]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0His ring.<\/p>\n<p>[00:38:58]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. His ring? What? What was that? This ring?<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:04]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, my wedding band.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:05]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, his wedding ring.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:06]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, okay. All right. Fine.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:09]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Designer wedding band, I guess is\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I\u2019m like, \u201cMy wedding band was not that expensive.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:13]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Neither was mine, Ramit.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Whoa. Didn\u2019t have that on my note cards.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:23]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait, sorry. To clarify\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Just tell us the numbers. Now I have to know.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:26]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0We each bought our own wedding band with our own money. Mine was $500 at Macy\u2019s?<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Okay. And?<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:37]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I got a Cartier.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0What the\u00a0[Bleep]?\u00a0Hold that thing up. You might as well show it off now. Let\u2019s get in tight on that thing. Beautiful. What is that? Let me see. All right.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:47]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0The love ring.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:48]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And how much does that cost?<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:50]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s a little over 2,000.<\/p>\n<p>[00:39:52]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Whoa. So how do you decide, like, I can afford a $2,000 ring for myself when I have debt?<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:02]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019ll have the money and then I\u2019ll pay it off. Everything will be okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm.\u00a0Keep going.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:08]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t go completely blind into it, but I try to do some rough numbers, and I know that if I purchase it on the credit card and I have $1,000 cash, but I know I\u2019ll have the rest later on with the next paycheck or the paycheck after that.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:31]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm-hmm. And does it work?<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:33]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>It doesn\u2019t work 100%.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:38]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019d say every four times it works.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:40]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>It catches up.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0This is like that arrested development cartoon. It\u2019s like, is it going to work? It never works, but it could work for us.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:48]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:40:48]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it always catches up and other things come along, and I never have enough at the end of something that I thought I would. So\u00a0Sara has to come along and save the day.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:01]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Sara, how do you feel about that?<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:04]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0It makes it hard. I think I trust Jay with 99% of everything, including with our finances, but this is the thing that\u2019s making it so that I don\u2019t feel like I can trust him 100%.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:17]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:19]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Because I\u2019m so excited to talk to you, Ramit. We do talk a lot about money in our own backgrounds. We come from really different financial backgrounds and psychologies, and so we talk and talk and talk about it. And sometimes he\u2019s talking to me about his money and I\u2019m looking at him like, how is that mathing up in your head? I just don\u2019t understand. So it makes me feel confused, honestly.<\/p>\n<p>[00:41:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Okay, confused. Can you tell me a couple other ways that the debt, and not just having debt, but going back into debt, how does that make you feel? Confused. What else?<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:00]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Confused, counterproductive, or like, if we\u2019re ever going to for real get out of this, it\u2019s going to need to be my money.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Mm. So what\u2019s the feeling?<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:13]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Nervous.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:15]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Nervous.\u00a0Okay. That\u2019s it. Nervous. Are you angry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:19]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t lose sleep over this. I don\u2019t know. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Don\u2019t lose sleep.\u00a0Are you angry, or no?<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:23]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0There have been times where I felt angry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:26]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0She\u2019s been angry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:29]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I can literally remember them, two occasions where I was so angry.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Did you tell him?<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:29]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh yeah. He knows everything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:37]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Those conversations usually start with me being like, \u201cHey, I just want to let you know, maybe we shouldn\u2019t go out to dinner this week or for the rest of the month because I don\u2019t have that much money this month.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:42:53]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0And I\u2019m like, \u201cHow do you not have money this month? You make money every month. Why would you not have any?\u201d Yeah, that\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:02]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0And I\u2019m more like, \u201cI allocated already to stuff I\u2019ve already bought or to going out to drinks or something that I\u2019ve already spent money on.\u201d So then the whole conversation would really come to fruition about, well, how much do you owe, or this, and it\u2019d be a few thousand here sometimes. And she\u2019d be like, \u201cHow did that build up?\u201d And I\u2019m like, \u201cI just had my bachelor party, and I spent a little more than I thought I would be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So you mentioned that Sara saves the day. What does that mean?<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:40]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Whether you want to say, now that we\u2019re married, our money is one, a lot of\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:46]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0And we do see it that way.<\/p>\n<p>[00:43:47]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0A lot of our net worth\u00a0came together really mostly from Sara\u2019s side. So her savings are a lot more. I really don\u2019t have that much savings.<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Do we have that CSP? Did\u00a0we show that already? Let\u2019s take a look.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Before we dive into\u00a0Sara\u00a0and Jay\u2019s numbers, let\u2019s take a quick break to hear from our sponsors<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:09]\u00a0Welcome back. Let\u2019s keep going.<\/p>\n<p>[Interview]<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:11]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s take a look here. Assets, 15. Investments, 43. Savings, 33. Debt, 3.5. That\u2019s the credit card debt.\u00a0All right.\u00a0Net worth, 87. Gross monthly income is 12k.\u00a0And fixed\u00a0costs are 48%. That\u2019s really good. That\u2019s very low. That\u2019s good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:34]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s\u00a058 mine and 38 hers.<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wow.\u00a0Okay. I understand. So these are blended numbers. Great. Investments at 17%. Who\u2019s investing more?<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:45]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0We actually, as of recently, both invest the same amount.<\/p>\n<p>[00:44:48]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Excellent.\u00a0All right. Savings are at 7%, and guilt-free spending at 28%. What do you think of the numbers?<\/p>\n<p>[00:45:02]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I think they\u2019re an accurate reflection. I would say, actually, at the end of the month, I think our savings is usually higher than 7% because it\u2019s usually me who\u2019s contributing\u2013 well, it is me who\u2019s contributing to savings 100% since his fixed costs are higher than mine. And then basically, any money I have left over from guilt-free that I haven\u2019t spent at the end of the month, which honestly, I usually have nine times out of 10, I\u2019ll just dump it into savings.<\/p>\n<p>[00:45:28]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Okay. So\u00a0what do y\u2019all notice from these numbers here just by a show, thumbs up, thumbs down, or thumbs to the side? Just based on your quick evaluation of these numbers. Let\u2019s just see what people\u2013 put them up high so I can see it. We have a lot of thumb\u2013 look at the crowd. A lot of thumbs up.<\/p>\n<p>[00:45:46]\u00a0I agree. The numbers themselves are pretty solid. Let me tell you why. This is just my rapid opinion, seeing these. Income is solid, but what\u2019s even more impressive is your fixed costs are low. Your investments are really good. That\u2019s great. And savings are artificially low. But even if they were, that\u2019s fine.\u00a0And your guilt-free spending, it\u2019s probably artificially high. But even if it\u2019s not, that\u2019s still within parameters. So overall, I don\u2019t have any issue with the numbers. What do you think the issue is?<\/p>\n<p>[00:46:23]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I need more guilt-free.<\/p>\n<p>[00:46:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s the issue, but not in the way you think. Try it again. Sara, what\u2019s the real issue here?<\/p>\n<p>[00:46:34]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I can\u2019t speak for Jay entirely, but for me, the issue is that we\u2019re both really open when it comes to having these money talks that I love when we have them. Making the CSP was really easy. But like I said before, I think sometimes Jay just talks about the way he manages his money and I\u2019m really sitting there like, \u201cI hear what you\u2019re saying, but I don\u2019t understand how you got there. I really can\u2019t reconcile what you\u2019re saying right now.\u201d That\u2019s pretty much how it goes most of the time.<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:09]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s usually, for me, my guilt-free spending category,\u00a0I feel like I need to better manage that and categorize that into what I want to save for our next trip and what I am okay with spending on coffee every day to not go over.<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:35]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Jay, what did your parents teach you about money?<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:39]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Save.<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:41]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Yeah?<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:41]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Growing up, they saved everything.<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:45]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Did they have a lot or no?<\/p>\n<p>[00:47:47]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0They had a lot of kids. I\u2019m one of seven, and my parents are immigrants and didn\u2019t come with too much to this country, and they raised us. We never really went on vacation too much.\u00a0We never really ate out. I related too on that story about appetizers. I didn\u2019t really know what appetizers were until I was in my later teens. But yeah, they were really tight with me, and they were really disciplined.\u00a0They paid off a 30-year mortgage in 13 years for their first house.<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:24]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I feel like you\u2019re not giving them enough credit too. Jay\u2019s parents came from Central America in the \u201980s, and they didn\u2019t come here with not a lot. They came here with nothing. And then they didn\u2019t speak the language and they had a lot of kids. The fact that they were able to do that is insane.<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:38]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Let\u2019s give it up. Respect. Did they say\u00a0no to you when you were a\u00a0kid?<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:49]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, all the time.<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:51]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0They still do, I feel like.<\/p>\n<p>[00:48:54]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Where did the no go, Jay, in your spending?<\/p>\n<p>[00:49:00]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I think when I started working when I was like 16 and started having my own paycheck,\u00a0I started to buy my own things and feel like I was in control of money, but my mom would be like, \u201cSave, save. I\u2019ll help you open up a savings account.\u201d\u00a0And I\u2019d put some in there, put some in there, and then take some out and do things with like friends and try to keep up with what other people are doing. And I think it just went on too long into my early 20s, and I never got a good relationship with saving money like my parents did because I was really blessed.<\/p>\n<p>[00:49:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.\u00a0What do you do for work?<\/p>\n<p>[00:49:41]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I work in hotel management here in the city.<\/p>\n<p>[00:49:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay.\u00a0And does that affect the way that you see money?<\/p>\n<p>[00:49:51]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes, I think so. I\u2019ve been in luxury hotels actually since 2019, and I\u2019ve seen a lot of the lifestyle people live, and I think it\u2019s not that I want to copy them.\u00a0I know I don\u2019t have a net worth nearly close to theirs, but the lifestyle that they are around, the nicer spirits that they\u2019re familiar with, the familiarity with all of it, I think I always wanted to keep up with that, even though it\u2019s not nothing to keep up with. But it made me feel good.<\/p>\n<p>[00:50:25]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. I think we all can understand seeing something that you grew up never having access to, and then you start to touch it and taste it and you go, \u201cI want to do that.\u201d And I think the truth is, if you wanted to try some nice drinks, you could, but I can see how part of the way you grew up with money affects the way that you treat money today.\u00a0Sara, any surprises in what you just heard?<\/p>\n<p>[00:50:56]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0No, I think I know all of that. I almost feel like what I said about your parents too. You almost downplay the situation.\u00a0It does make a lot of sense. When Jay moved out of his parents\u2019 house, he went directly to work in a luxury property in the Hamptons. And then from the Hamptons to Aspen. So he\u2019s seen not just, oh, a little bit of wealth here and there, but he\u2019s been exposed to some\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:51:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, you went from one end of that\u00a0economic spectrum to the opposite\u00a0end.<\/p>\n<p>[00:51:30]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0And I was living in those places too. And I was getting paid pretty good.\u00a0And we, industry people, like to go out and have a good time. And I was just going out all the time spending a lot of my paychecks in those destinations, hanging out with, or thinking I was hanging out with those crowds.<\/p>\n<p>[00:51:52]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0So what does this mean for your relationship\u00a0when it comes to the finances? What do you think? Sara?<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:00]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0This is the first time this has ever occurred to me, so maybe we have different values in a way. We\u2019re chasing different dreams in a certain way.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, describe them.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:11]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, it didn\u2019t even cross my mind to even look at Cartier bands. I don\u2019t know how much money I\u2019d have to have in the bank to feel comfortable doing that, but last year was not the time for me. So yeah, sometimes to hear Jay talk about these things\u2013 it happened today. He mentioned some clothing brand that I was like, \u201cI don\u2019t even know what you\u2019re saying.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:32]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Which brand? Just\u00a0spit it out.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:40]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I was talking about Loro Piana.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, just the most expensive Italian brand out there. Okay.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:48]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I didn\u2019t know what he was saying.<\/p>\n<p>[00:52:51]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. All right. So I think probably you do have different values on money. Can you describe your values in a word or two? What might they be?<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:02]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Security and freedom.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:04]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Great. And Jay, what does money mean to you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:09]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Those\u00a0are good words. I would say\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:11]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Maybe we do have the same ones, maybe.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:16]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0No, those are great words. Security, I would 100% agree with. And the future. I\u2019d say future.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:24]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know if I believe that. It\u2019s a word. I just don\u2019t believe it. It doesn\u2019t map to your spending at all.\u00a0What\u00a0does it actually mean to you, not what you think you should say. But what does it actually mean to you? Loro Piana is not about future and it\u2019s not about security.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:44]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0If I can help you out, I feel like it is also freedom.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:47]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0No, no, no, no. That\u2019s one of the challenges.<\/p>\n<p>[00:53:52]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0It means\u00a0stability.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:01]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, keep going.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:04]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Necessities.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:05]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.\u00a0What\u2019s that on your finger?<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:07]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Luxury goods.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:09]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I think you like nice things.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:12]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, I like nice things. Nice things.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0How come everyone is suddenly nodding their head like, yes?\u00a0There\u2019s\u00a0wrong with liking nice things. I\u2019m not here to tell anybody to buying anything. That\u2019s not my job.\u00a0But\u00a0do you think that the numbers that you have allow you to afford things like ultra luxury clothes, etc.?<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:39]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0No. I should definitely limit them or find other nice things.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:46]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Or work towards them in the\u00a0future.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:48]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Or work towards them, yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[00:54:49]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0And\u00a0part of the reason that\u00a0maybe you are able to spend on those things and spend that way is? Sara, what do you think?<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:01]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I think I provide maybe a subconscious security blanket.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Keep going. It\u2019s not subconscious.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:09]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. Then maybe I provide a security blanket.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:11]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You literally matched his payoff.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:13]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Security blanket. And I think what I do a lot is provide the voice of reason, almost play his conscious conscience. I\u2019m definitely the one being like, \u201cWhy would you do that? Tell me how you\u2019re going to do that.\u00a0Do you have the money for that?\u201d And I\u2019m not ever like, show me the numbers. If he says, yes, my work is done. But he doesn\u2019t often say yes.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can I make a suggestion? Perhaps the\u00a0dynamic you\u2019re playing is entirely the wrong dynamic. Because\u00a0sometimes in couples\u2013 we\u2019ve seen it frequently\u2013 we have one who chases and one who avoids. And the more you chase, what does the other person do more?<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:59]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Avoid more.<\/p>\n<p>[00:55:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Again, it\u2019s like tying a knot. It could just get tighter and tighter.\u00a0And sometimes we have a variation of that. We have this parent-child variation where one person says, \u201cThat\u2019s not a good idea.\u201d And the other person says, \u201cBut I want to do it.\u201d\u00a0And the solution is not to just, both of you become more entrenched. It\u2019s actually to step out of that dynamic entirely. What do you think it would look like if you both stepped out of this dynamic that you are in today?<\/p>\n<p>[00:56:29]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I think, before coming tonight, we\u2019ve already took a big step into that direction.\u00a0We have money dates, and we talk about it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:56:39]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Did you make a plan?<\/p>\n<p>[00:56:41]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0No, we were waiting for this conversation.<\/p>\n<p>[00:56:43]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh,\u00a0[Bleep]. All right. I understand that. Let\u2019s just do it right\u00a0now. We\u2019re going to make a plan to change this dynamic. So first off, the person in debt is responsible for paying off their debt and making the plan. Jay, what\u2019s the plan?<\/p>\n<p>[00:56:58]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0The plan is to pay off that $3,500 by June, I believe. That\u2019s included in my debt payments.<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:10]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay,\u00a0I like that.\u00a0First of all, round of applause for anyone who knows their debt payoff date. That\u2019s very rare. Love that. And is that money coming from you?<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:19]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah, that\u2019s part of my fixed costs personally.<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:22]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Is there going to be any other unexpected\u00a0expenses like discretionary expenses, things like that, that you\u2019re going to make? Why are looking at her?<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:32]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0No. The answer\u2019s no, but\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0funny because there\u2019s a lot of potential for it, but I\u2019m not going to let it happen.<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:41]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0This is where I need you to, Ramit.<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:42]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong><strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Why are you talking like you\u2019re\u00a0disembodied? There\u2019s potential for somebody to charge my credit card. What?<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:50]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0No, literally, that\u2019s sometimes the way Jay talks about it. And I\u2019m like, \u201cWhy would that happen? What are you going to buy?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:57:59]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Can I give you a suggestion? So when you\u2019re doing that, you are playing the voice of conscience, and that\u2019s the wrong approach because when you say that to him, what\u2019s his response?<\/p>\n<p>[00:58:10]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Oh, I don\u2019t know. This happens to me a lot. Sometimes I don\u2019t even realize it and then it happens.<\/p>\n<p>[00:58:15]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0It\u2019s this, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I\u2019m not blaming you. It\u2019s just that you\u2019re both in an automatic pattern. You\u2019re both playing your roles, and these roles are not serving you. So maybe another suggestion is something like this: Jay, I noticed that when you\u2019re talking about spending over the next six months, you have this debt payoff plan.\u00a0It\u2019s so impressive you have that. But you just said, \u201cWho knows where my money may go?\u201d What do you mean? You\u2019re talking like it\u2019s not your money?\u00a0Hold on. Let Jay answer. Let Jay answer. Jay?<\/p>\n<p>[00:58:47]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I think it\u2019s because there are things that I know we want to do together, such as travel, and when sometimes we don\u2019t even have a figure or a number or a goal to save up for it,\u00a0I\u2019ll just think about it and not really plan it out and be like, \u201cYeah, I should probably be able to afford that by then.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[00:59:16]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. I understand that,\u00a0and that\u2019s part of what has got you in that amount of debt and has kept you going like this instead of just straight down. It\u2019s this almost simplistic way of looking at money. I make X dollars. I\u2019ll take half of that and put it towards this. But you forget about all these other things like taxes and expenses and all these things that are already pre-committed.\u00a0I get it.<\/p>\n<p>[00:59:37]\u00a0That can work for a while when you\u2019re young, etc. But the two of you are now married. You\u2019re trying to build something together. That actually doesn\u2019t work. That doesn\u2019t work for me. Especially not with the type of life that you\u2019re trying to create together.<\/p>\n<p>[00:59:55]\u00a0So Jay, if you say, \u201cwho is to know where my money may flow?\u201d\u00a0I might say, \u201cWhat do you mean by that?\u201d And then he might give you an answer\u2013 Jay, you might even come up with this, and I might say, \u201cI appreciate that, but can I ask you that again? I really want to know, we have agreed that this is what we\u2019ve committed to for the next six months. Are you feeling nervous? Are you feeling like you want to change the plan? What is going on with you?\u201d Jay, what would your answer be?<\/p>\n<p>[01:00:25]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I would say, yes, I got to buckle down and I got to answer do to that. Where\u2019s it going to go?\u00a0Allocate every dollar. I got to be like honest and upfront. And if I don\u2019t believe we can afford that or I can\u2019t really fund that, we should just not do it, is\u00a0a big part of it. Or save up until we can.<\/p>\n<p>[01:00:50]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s good.\u00a0And Sara, what role do you think you have in building a healthy relationship with money going forward?<\/p>\n<p>[01:00:57]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Not playing the voice of reason.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes.\u00a0What else? I love that.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:02]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Not coming to his rescue.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:07]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. Amazing. And\u00a0one\u00a0of the ways we can do that is by setting\u00a0boundaries.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:12]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:13]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Have you set a financial boundary ever\u00a0in this relationship?<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:20]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yes. I don\u2019t know. Do you think so?<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:23]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0No, we\u2013<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:24]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. No, I have not.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:26]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0We should set some.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:27]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I love that. Okay, can we just do one right now?<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:30]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Sure.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:30]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0All right. What would it look like for you to set a boundary with Jay?\u00a0Remember that boundaries can be loving, they can be compassionate, and they can also serve your shared vision of a Rich Life.<\/p>\n<p>[01:01:42]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Yeah. Maybe this isn\u2019t a boundary. You can tell me, Ramit. But if we say that we\u2019re each going to save a certain amount from now until whenever to then use it for our upcoming trip, my expectation is that you do that. Is that a boundary?<\/p>\n<p>[01:02:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That a good one. That\u2019s\u00a0a\u00a0good start. I like that.\u00a0I like that. It\u2019s interesting that it was a discretionary expense, but I like that you\u2019re saving for it. How about the debt? That\u2019s the burning fire\u00a0right now.<\/p>\n<p>[01:02:15]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0I don\u2019t know. I feel actually so silly having said all this out loud tonight and heard from you and the crowd. I am not worried about Jay needing me for the rest of this debt.\u00a0I almost feel like I don\u2019t need to set a boundary. I guess the boundary is, yeah, I\u2019m not going to give him any more money to pay off debt, and I don\u2019t feel like that\u2019s going to happen.<\/p>\n<p>[01:02:36]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Wait. Okay. Amazing. That\u2019s a boundary.\u00a0Great.\u00a0I like that you said it out loud.\u00a0And\u00a0another\u00a0boundary would be, \u201cWhen we talk about money every month in our monthly money meeting,\u00a0I want you to come with your plan for where your money\u2019s going next month. I\u2019m going to do the same.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>[01:02:55]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Cool. Yeah.<\/p>\n<p>[01:02:55]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s a loving boundary.\u00a0Okay, great. How do you feel about that, Sara?<\/p>\n<p>[01:03:00]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0That\u2019s exciting.<\/p>\n<p>[01:03:00]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay. And Jay, how do you feel about\u00a0that?<\/p>\n<p>[01:03:02]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0I really like that as well.<\/p>\n<p>[01:03:03]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Okay, I like that. I have a lot of confidence in both of you, and Jay, especially, I understand your upbringing, your family, you working in Aspen. I get that it\u2019s affect you. I have a lot of confidence in you being able to change the way that you relate to money.\u00a0I think it\u2019s really important as you begin your financial relationship. I\u2019m not the only one. Let\u2019s take a look.<\/p>\n<p>[01:03:29]\u00a0<strong>Jay\u2019s Mom:<\/strong>\u00a0Always save big chunk of your money. You don\u2019t need to be very happy. You don\u2019t need too many\u2013 I don\u2019t know how you say [Inaudible], but it\u2019s that extra stuff, extravagant stuff. No. Happiness come from here. Doesn\u2019t come from\u2013 all this is temporary. But if you start to set up life, you\u2019re going to be so happy when you get old. You are\u00a0going to\u00a0sit and see, I did this.\u00a0[Inaudible]. I did this.<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:11]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you very much. Let\u2019s give them a round of applause, Sara and Jay.<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:17]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you.\u00a0Thank you so much.<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:18]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Thank you so much.<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:19]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0You guys are the best. Let\u2019s give it up. Sara and Jay. Wow. Seeing his mom.<\/p>\n<p>[Narration]<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:33]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I loved hearing from Jay\u2019s mom.\u00a0What Jay\u2019s parents were able to do coming from Central America in the\u00a0\u201980s\u00a0with no money,\u00a0kids,\u00a0without speaking the language, to be able to be disciplined, to save,\u00a0and build an amazing life for their children is incredible.\u00a0And as a child of immigrants myself, I especially appreciate that.<\/p>\n<p>[01:04:56]\u00a0I have to give a huge round of applause to both of these couples for having the courage to come out on stage in front of hundreds of people to share these intimate details about their financial lives. These are not actors. These are real people like you and me who came out to share their story and to ask for help.<\/p>\n<p>[01:05:16]\u00a0You can hear the energy in that room. The Boston crowd was amazing, super supportive. You could hear the gasps, the laughing. The crowd wants these couples to succeed, and I do too. I can\u2019t wait to share more of these live events with you. I am loving them.<\/p>\n<p>[01:05:34]\u00a0I\u2019m thinking about doing another tour. What do you think? Would you like to be in the room next time I come to your city? If so,\u00a0get on our wait list, iwt.com\/tourwaitlist,\u00a0and I will let you know the next time I\u2019m in town.\u00a0It\u2019s been over a month since I sat down with both of these couples.\u00a0Let\u2019s see what they\u2019re up to now. First up, Giselle and Robert.<\/p>\n<p>[01:05:55]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Our biggest surprise, I guess,\u00a0for me was the debt conversation as well as the initiation. So instead of me being so apprehensive and I guess nervous to talk to Robert about it, I could have just asked him maybe why is he not leaning into the conversation?\u00a0So just thank you for flipping that narrative that I had in my head.\u00a0That was interesting.<\/p>\n<p>[01:06:21]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Basically,\u00a0the feedback on not paying off a credit card bill in a full,\u00a0thinking that having some credit card debt built in your name is\u00a0going to\u00a0allow you to build credit in a fast, positive way.\u00a0But hearing how essentially owing no credit card debt is more of a positive than anything. So just getting that feedback and figuring out how to now move forward from there.<\/p>\n<p>[01:06:43]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0Paying off the debt is the first thing that we should be doing,\u00a0and so we did.\u00a0I think it was three days after the show. Ramit really resonated with Robert,\u00a0and he was able to pay off $11,000 of his credit card bill, so it was his credit card bill in full.\u00a0And each month, anytime I\u2019ve used it or he\u2019s used it, he is paying off the statement in full now, which is great.<\/p>\n<p>[01:07:07]\u00a0I was able to pay off $10,800 of my student loan, my private student loan. So I still have my federal student loan to pay.\u00a0That is the next step.\u00a0And knowing that we can do that is, I guess, the biggest thing. So there are still questions,\u00a0I guess, that we both have.\u00a0I feel like you worded it perfectly before.<\/p>\n<p>[01:07:26]\u00a0<strong>Robert:<\/strong>\u00a0Knowing that my income is more of a seasonal thing as opposed to year-round. So trying to figure out what actually is obtainable in terms of big purchases.\u00a0Knowing that at some points of the year I do not have income at all.\u00a0At other points I do have a good income, but how should I be saving? How should I be putting money to the side? And I think\u00a0we have a few more questions in regards to that and hopefully it can be answered.<\/p>\n<p>[01:07:48]\u00a0<strong>Giselle:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u2019m still catastrophizing and I get excited about something in wedding plan. I\u2019m like,\u00a0\u201cOh, we can\u2019t afford it, so never mind.\u201d\u00a0The numbers make sense, but they just don\u2019t make sense, if that makes sense.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:01]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0Now let\u2019s hear from Sara and Jay.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:03]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Sara\u00a0and I have had such a better relationship, not only with money, but with each other.\u00a0We\u2019ve been able to have a few money meetings here and there and discuss exactly where we\u2019re at, and what we\u2019re saving for.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:14]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0They\u2019ve been really great. I feel like the whole mood has changed since we got to meet.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:18]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0And I\u2019ve been able to behave a little bit better and not go spending on luxury goods here or there, but just stick to what I need.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:26]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0The biggest surprise of the experience was probably how supportive the crowd was. It made it really easy to be there and to share, and to be able to feel so open\u00a0airing out our stuff.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:41]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0Since the show, I\u2019ve been lucky enough to have an\u00a0unexpected bonus here at work, and I\u2019ve taken the opportunity to actually pay off my debt sooner than expected.<\/p>\n<p>[01:08:53]\u00a0<strong>Sara:<\/strong>\u00a0So we had said that his debt payoff date was sometime in June. I forget exactly the day.\u00a0But actually it is all paid off now. So that\u00a0is\u00a0something great that\u2019s happened.<\/p>\n<p>[01:09:02]\u00a0<strong>Jay:<\/strong>\u00a0This gives me the opportunity to save more in these certain buckets that\u00a0Sara\u00a0and I have, for saving up for our future family fund,\u00a0or a future vacation fund.\u00a0And it really has allowed me to allocate my income a bit better and contribute with\u00a0Sara\u00a0towards our future.<\/p>\n<p>[01:09:21]\u00a0<strong>Ramit:<\/strong>\u00a0I\u00a0want to\u00a0thank both of these couples for joining me live in Boston and for speaking so openly with me in front of a live audience. I\u2019m wishing you all the best.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On today\u2019s episode, we\u2019re live from Boston for my recent Money For Couples book tour. First, I talk with Robert (28) and Giselle (28) who appear to have it all together, but behind the scenes, they\u2019re struggling to make intentional financial decisions. Instead of planning ahead, they make impulsive decisions like committing $7,500 to a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[290],"class_list":["post-118763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast-episodes"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"modified_by":"Nasrin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118763"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118763\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iwillteachyoutoberich.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}