Their Single Income Plan Needs Some Help | Making a Millionaire

Summary

Podcast Summary: Money Guy Show - Their Single Income Plan Needs Some Help | Making a Millionaire

Date: January 19, 2026
Hosts: Brian Preston and Bo Hanson
Guests: Matt & Hannah

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Main Theme

This episode dives into the financial challenges and choices faced by a young couple, Matt and Hannah, as they transition from dual to single income following the birth of their child. The Money Guy team evaluates their situation, offers practical strategies, and helps them prioritize goals, balancing immediate needs (like health insurance and a reliable family car) with long-term aspirations (homeownership, growing their family, and building wealth).

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The "Messy Middle" Season of Life

• Hosts’ Message: Life comes in seasons; current struggles don't define the future.
  • "How your life looks today does not dictate how it’s gonna look tomorrow. Meaning, we are gonna have seasons… We often call that the messy middle. And that’s exactly where you guys are." – Brian (00:00)
• Matt & Hannah’s story:
  • Started dating in 2021, married in 2023, and welcomed their son Barrett a year later.
  • Ages: Matt (27), Hannah (25).
  • Considering a second child soon for a two-year age gap.

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2. Financial Background and Debt Pay-Off Journey

• Matt’s experience:

  • Started college (Computer Information Systems), realized it wasn’t the right path, racked up ~$30k student debt, lived at home to pay it down in 3–4 years (03:03).
  • Now works in custom cabinetry/woodworking.
  • Credit: Parents encouraged rent money be used to pay debt (03:17).

• Hannah’s experience:

  • Began aiming for a doctorate in occupational therapy, quickly shifted to an associate degree.
  • Ended up with ~$30k in student loans and $6k credit card debt post-graduation, juggling basic expenses (05:45).
  • Matt helped her address the high-interest credit card debt immediately after marriage.

• Joint Approach:

  • Viewed all debts as “our debt.”
  • Methodically paid off student loans, credit cards, and a $32k car loan.
  • Benefitted from a severance package ($30k+) when Hannah’s job ended (09:20).

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3. Transition to Single Income—New Financial Reality

• Current Situation:

  • Matt earns $55k/year in woodworking. Hannah stays home with Barrett to save on childcare, with plans to return to work after children are school age (~5 years away).
  • Net worth: ~$86,000.
  • Monthly expenses: ~$2,768; monthly take-home (with overtime): ~$3,000.

• Lifestyle Shifts:

  • Eating out and discretionary spending are reduced (10:40).
  • Struggle with balancing frugality and life enjoyment.
  • Sacrifices are “worth it” for the ability to stay home with their son (11:00).

• Internal Conflict:

  • Matt: Sacrifices time with family due to overtime; feels they're “just surviving” (12:54).
  • Hannah: Wants to provide stability and meaningful experiences for her child, hopes for future homeownership (14:23).

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4. Prioritizing Goals—Wants vs. Needs

• Main Goals Identified:

  1. Hannah staying home for 5 years
  2. Having another child soon
  3. Acquiring a reliable, larger family car (SUV/minivan)
  4. Securing health insurance once severance-paid coverage lapses in February
  5. Eventually buying a home

• Lifestyle vs. Vehicle Debate:

  • Hannah initially wanted a large SUV, but through guided discussion, recognized the distinction between a “want” and a “need.”
  • "There is a delineation between wants and needs. Because I would argue if you guys have a car that will not start in the wintertime and a Tacoma, if you're going to be a family of four, five, even, you need a larger automobile. Is having a big SUV the need? Perhaps not…” – Brian (22:00)
  • Both partners are open to compromise; communication is a strength (23:12).

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5. Upcoming Health Insurance Dilemma

• Hannah and Barrett’s coverage ends soon; adding them to Matt’s employer plan would cost ~$600/month, squeezing their budget (25:21).
• ACA marketplace plans researched; may be $200–$600/month, depending on subsidies (26:06).
• Insurance is the top immediate priority (26:54).

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6. Budget & Savings Situation

• Still saving via Matt’s 401k (5% employee, 4% match; was 15% in past) (28:38).
• No current Roth IRA contributions, but past discipline has left them with significant early savings.
  • Power of early saving acknowledged by hosts:
    "When you start early, 25 and 27, it does not take a lot to do a whole lot of heavy lifting." – Brian (30:17)

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7. Income Constraints & Options for Progress

• Budget is already lean; little room for expense cuts (32:15).
• Solutions must focus on increasing income:
  • Matt exploring promotions (managerial roles), but woodworking may not pay six figures unless he starts his own business, which is too risky now (31:24, 34:28).
  • Hannah open to part-time work (33:12), possibly caregiving or using her occupational therapy assistant credential in flexible settings.
  • Sale of assets (Tacoma truck) considered for car goal.

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8. Creative Problem Solving: The Car Situation

• Current reliable vehicle (Tacoma) is Matt’s commuter; family car is old and unreliable.
• Hosts’ recommendation: Sell the $30k Tacoma, buy a $10k commuter for Matt, and use $20k as a down payment on a $32k-ish reliable family vehicle (minivan/SUV) (47:22–48:21). This maintains safety for Hannah and the children while controlling debt and cash flow.
  • "There has got to be a better way to do this… you’re sitting on this Tacoma that’s got all this equity… There is probably going to be a change coming for the Tacoma." – Bo (47:06)
• Payment structure to fall within $400/month.

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9. Reverse Engineering Their Solution

• New monthly needs:

  • ~$335 for health insurance (ACA plan for Hannah and Barrett)
  • ~$400 car payment
  • ~$200 in “fun money”/lifestyle
  • Total increase needed: ~$1,000/month in income (49:26–50:31)

• "If they could just increase their income by $15,000 a year, I think it would change their entire living service." – Brian (50:31)

• Practical options: Hannah works part-time, Matt negotiates for promotion, both keep focused on long-term career development.

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10. Long-Term Outlook & Encouragement

• Retaining early savings discipline puts them on the path to a ~$4 million retirement, even without increasing their current rate of savings (51:39).

• Focusing on health coverage, safe transportation, and modest lifestyle upgrades can happen with moderate income increases—not drastic life changes.

• Final Advice:

  • Secure health insurance first (urgent).

  • Solve the car need creatively.

  • Plan a targeted, modest income boost.

  • Leverage time and teamwork for long-term wealth.

  • "You only have two levers: decrease spending or increase income. You’re already as lean as you can go. The answer lies in generating more income." – Brian (52:27)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Perspective on Struggle:
  "How your journey starts does not define how it ends." – Brian (43:45)
  "The way that your financial life and the way your life looks today does not dictate how it must look tomorrow." – Brian (41:00)

• On Marriage and Money:
  "If we can share bed, we can share finances. That’s part of marriage. It’s all together." – Matt (07:08)

• On Communication:
  "It’s not her and I versus each other. It’s her and I versus what’s the problem?" – Matt (23:12)

• On Sacrifice:
  "As much love as you have for [your truck], when you see your family in that safe vehicle, you’re not going to care about that." – Bo (42:28)

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Important Timestamps

• 00:00: Introduction; “Messy Middle” context
• 03:00–06:00: How Matt and Hannah paid off ~$100k of debt
• 11:00–15:00: Shifts after moving to single income; Sacrifices made
• 16:35: Prioritizing goals: staying home, another child, car, insurance
• 25:03–26:54: Health insurance as an urgent issue
• 32:15–34:28: Income constraints, career progression possibilities
• 37:40–41:00: Selling the truck, considering vehicle options
• 44:51–50:31: Hosts’ step-by-step problem-solving: insurance, car, and lifestyle expenses
• 51:39–52:27: Projecting retirement and long-term financial stability
• 52:55–53:33: Final action steps assigned to the couple

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Episode Takeaways

• Early discipline set the foundation—but single income requires new choices.
• Open, communicative teamwork is essential for navigating sacrifices and tough financial decisions.
• There are always trade-offs. Wants must sometimes be set aside for needs.
• With creativity and moderate extra income, big life dreams stay on track.
• Time, continued teamwork, and focused problem-solving are their greatest assets.

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Hosts’ Parting Words:
"This is all doable. You just have to take action… and when they get this, they're gonna be like, yeah, we can do this. And hopefully they feel like a united front, and there's nothing but just wins and excitement and memories that they're gonna make off of this plan that we've built for them." – Bo (53:16)

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Transcript

[A]

How your life looks today does not dictate how it's gonna look tomorrow. Meaning we are gonna have seasons. There are gonna be times when life feels hectic and crazy and tight. And it's not our dream life necessarily. We often call that the messy middle. And that's exactly where you guys are, so.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

I want you to just pause for a moment and take a deep breath and just go, okay. It's alright. Other people are here. We're not alone. Other people have navigated this. Who are you? How old are you? Said you have a one year old little boy. Give us a story. Give us the backstory. How'd you guys get to where we are today?

[C]

Oh, yeah.

[B]

We started dating in 21, we got engaged in 23, married in 23, and then we ended up having Barrett a day after our one year anniversary. So it's like we went out to.

[D]

Eat and we're like, what is it gonna look like as parents in this next year? And then literally the next day was go time.

[B]

Yeah, I called him and it was actually a little scary because I'm like, I haven't felt him move. I was two weeks away from my due date.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

I was like, I haven't felt him move. I said, what do I do? Do I call the doctor? He's like, call the doctor. And we go in all this stuff and they're like, yeah, you're halfway through your.

[A]

It's go time. Let's go.

[B]

She's like, yeah, you're having a baby today.

[A]

Oh, wow, that's awesome.

[B]

All right, let's do this.

[D]

How old are you now?

[B]

I'm 25.

[D]

I'm 27.

[A]

Okay.

[D]

Now with the children getting in that messy middle, starting to get a little bit older and feeling like, are we on track? You know?

[B]

So, yeah, we're getting to that point where we kind of. We're starting to think about having the second because, yeah, we do like that two year age gap. That's why I was asking, because it's like we like that him and his brother are just under two and my sister and I are just over two. Okay. So it's like that two year age gap we think is like absolutely perfect. So we're kind of. That's. We're getting to the point where it's like, all right, let's start thinking about the next one and have the second and then, I don't know, maybe have a third.

[D]

Even the journey getting to the first kid. And before that we definitely, like, before we even met my finances, like, I grew up, my parents did the whole like Dave Ramsey thing and never do the credit card. That was the big thing that they went through and went off to college, did two and a half years and racked up some debt. And then I came to the conclusion of what I was in. I was like, do I want to stay with this program?

[A]

What were you studying in college?

[D]

I was studying computer information systems originally. I just kind of remember looking around in my classroom and seeing everything. I was like, I don't know if this is really what I want. And I knew I wanted to work with my hands. So I work with your hands, but not with my hands. Not. But, but not typing. I thought it'd be more hands on, like working, actually modifying stuff. But it was not that. Which hopefully I would have figured that out sooner, but you know, life happens.

[C]

How far into your education before you had that? This isn't for me.

[D]

Yeah, I was two and a half years into that program.

[C]

So were you. You were a junior.

[D]

Yeah, okay, I was a junior. And then.

[C]

And how much student loan debt did you build up during that period?

[D]

It was about all said and done, probably 50,000.

[C]

Wow.

[D]

Between.

[C]

I didn't see that on your net worth statement. Am I missing it?

[D]

Or maybe it wasn't 50,000. It could have been less.

[B]

We knocked out all of our students debt beings.

[D]

And Dave Ramsey thing when I dropped, it was. It probably wasn't 50,000. Probably more like 30.

[C]

Okay.

[D]

Now that I'm thinking about it, because I don't. I did not get out. And it's been a couple years, so I don't remember. I just knew like when I. Because I made the decision, wait till.

[C]

You get to be my age.

[D]

I dropped out, moved back home and then of course it was like, all right, these loans are gonna kick in. So that was weighing on me. And we hadn't met yet, so I was still living at home with my parents. And they said, take whatever you're gonna do for rent, try and pay that down. Love that. So I mean, I was living for free and then just pretty much knocked that out before we met. Took me probably three, four years.

[A]

Three or four years to knock out 30,000 is impressive. Yeah, it's super impressive.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

What do you do professionally now?

[D]

I do woodworking for a custom cabinetry shop in Michigan.

[A]

So that is working with your hands.

[B]

Yes.

[D]

Very different than computer information systems.

[B]

What he makes is beautiful. He sends me pictures all the time of what he's making and all the jobs he's doing. And he does really really good work.

[C]

I love that.

[B]

Got a couple cutting boards in our house that he's made for me too.

[D]

Yeah. So when I go in here and see the studio and seeing all the stuff, I'm like, oh, this is really nice. I have the eye for all that.

[A]

Did you know that me and Brian actually built most of the stuff?

[C]

No, don't make it. We did work with people to make customers say, like, you can tell we didn't do any.

[A]

We did not swing any hammers in the making of this set.

[C]

Probably nobody but you have noticed this table is not shaped like a normal table. It's. So it was custom made.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

Our conference room tables that y' all were sitting at were custom made. Could you tell that there's a real wood when you're sitting at.

[D]

Because I do the countertop. I've done countertops at my place that we work at.

[B]

He's like, yeah, you look at this seam right here.

[A]

I know exactly what you're talking about. And you said you had student loans too. What was your school background coming into adulthood?

[B]

When I graduated high school, I went to the University of Toledo for a semester, and that was the four year university. I was planning on getting my doctorate in occupational therapy. And then I got a semester and I was like, oh, I don't want to go to school for eight years. So I got.

[D]

Since the theme with us too.

[B]

So I ended up deciding to transfer to a community college and I got my associate, so I'm an occupational therapy assistant.

[C]

Okay.

[B]

So I went from that eight year program down to a two year program. So that one semester cost me as much as my two years and my associates. So I got. I don't even know the total. I was probably pushing 30,000 too.

[A]

Okay.

[B]

And once I graduated in 21, I graduated in spring of 21 and I was like on my own, living in Toledo, away from my family. I was all on my own. I had been in my own apartment, paying rent, working, and just kind of like literally just making ends meet right there. Kind of just paying for my immediate expenses. Hadn't thought about student loans. I think at that point, student loans were still in deferment, maybe.

[C]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[B]

They were in. They were pushed off. So I didn't even have to worry about that. So when I met Matt, I had credit card debt. I had student loans.

[A]

I had how much credit card debt.

[D]

I think when that was one of the. Like we had the talk before getting married and going through the marriage classes. And then it was, you know, after the honeymoon we got back, and. All right, I sit down and look at this stuff. And then I was like, oh, we got, like, $6,000 on a credit card. That's not.

[B]

Yeah. So, yeah, that's literally, like.

[D]

It was like, a total.

[B]

Pay all my rent. It's like, all right, do I want groceries? Yep. Put it on the credit card.

[A]

Oh, that's what I went.

[B]

Did I make a few. Couple stupid purchases? Sure did.

[A]

Do I want groceries and some new shoes, right? Yeah, just put on the credit card. That's the way that goes.

[B]

Yeah. That was kind of my downfall. There is like, yeah, I had the. My dad is super, super smart with finances, but I didn't take that from him, unfortunately.

[D]

It's more of he just kind of did it, and you're like, okay. Type of thing, right?

[B]

Yeah, pretty much.

[C]

Yeah.

[B]

So I kind of wasn't financially smart in my younger years. So, like, meeting Matt, he definitely took charge of the whole financial situation. He's like, all right, you have a 30% interest on your credit card.

[D]

We paid that off that day. Yeah, we had enough saved up. It's wild.

[A]

So you guys come together, you start dating, you meet each other. You've got $30,000 in student loans. You've got $30,0000 in student loans. You got another $6,000 in credit card debt, and you're just like, all right, hey, we're gonna attack this. How'd the conversation go between you guys about, hey, this is where our money is gonna go right now?

[D]

It was pretty easy. I mean, for the. For the most part, she's been very good about, like, she said, I don't know, so just teach me. And more so the trust. The way that we talked beforehand was, if we can share bed, we can share finances. That's part of marriage. It's all together. So that made it super easy for us of, like, we're on the same page. So this isn't just your debt, my debt. This is all our debt.

[A]

Our debt.

[D]

And even before that, like, when we were dating, because I was in Detroit and she was in Toledo, so it was an hour drive for us to see each other. And I was driving my car at the time, and it was getting to the point where it kind of took a crap. And I was needing a new car, so I ended up purchasing a Toyota Tacoma, but it wasn't with cash that was also financed, so we ended up with another $32,000 of debt on top of that.

[C]

Holy. I'm missing something here, because, Bo, I want you to kind of pull up the net worth and the income. I'm hearing all these things and look, we come in here and I know what your income is. I've seen your net worth statement and on paper, you guys, you look great. I mean, that's what right now you.

[A]

Guys have a total net worth of just under $86,000. And you have a household income right now of 55,000. So for all intents and purposes, I mean, you have more than 1x your household income in terms of net worth at a pretty young age at 25.

[C]

And 27, I don't see enough time to have passed. I mean, because 27, 25, y' all are young and you're already over one time, your net worth is higher than your income is, which is your age. 30 goal. I've just heard 30,000 student loan. 30,000 student loan. I've heard $6,000, 66 of credit cards. I've heard then another $32,000 of like $100,000. We've got $100,000 of debt that is gone. So what happened?

[B]

I was working at the time, so. So I had a full time job. I was making good money from. I had just started a job when we started dating. So I was working all the way up until this past June.

[A]

Okay, cool.

[B]

So my contract got bought out at my company and they pretty much paid me the six month severance and I was making really good money there. So we kind of took that and paid off our debts.

[C]

So how big was that severance?

[D]

It was about a little over 30,000. Okay. Cause I guess my debt too with the 30,000 school loans was pretty much paid off before we got married.

[C]

You extinguish it just from living alone?

[D]

Pretty much. I didn't. Especially during that time you couldn't go out and do stuff. So I was like, well, I might.

[A]

As well, might as well pay off some debt.

[D]

Pay off some debt. I can't go and do it.

[C]

Look, I'm not even going to pick on the the because normally we do this whole interest rate arbitrage thing. But if your parents told you, hey, you can live at home, not pay any rent if you pay down the debt, I'm not even going. Behaviorally, I'm like, no, that's very noble, you know, because now maybe you know. Cause if you'd gone and said I want to go fund my Roth, they'd have been like, probably okay. But I just think that it's good to be focused on what the goal was. And it sound like you accomplished the mission.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

What was the household income when you were both working?

[D]

It was about double, so.

[C]

About double.

[A]

So about 110.

[D]

Yeah. She was making a little bit more than I was. So going from six figures to cut.

[A]

That in half because obviously making that kind of money, you were able to do some, like, intense things. You're able to, like, knock out a bunch of debt, get that all knocked out. But then you make this decision to go down to one income. How's that been?

[D]

It's tough.

[B]

It has been tough. But we make. We're kind of based that off of me staying home and taking care of our son. So we're not paying for childcare. I've been a little bit more diligent.

[D]

On not going out to eat as much, making the meals at home, which is something we used to do quite a bit before.

[B]

Yeah, I go out shopping and get a fun drink here, fun drink there, and there's 30 bucks a month, if not more.

[A]

Real easy.

[B]

So definitely had to change our lifestyle a little bit. But. But making the sacrifice and being able to stay home with our son has definitely made it so worth it.

[A]

So even though it's been hard, it's been a worthwhile hard. Is it likely that income is going to stay at the place it's at right now, or is it likely you'll go back to work?

[B]

I would at least love to stay home until our son, if not more kids are in school. So maybe like a five year thing. I would love to go back to work eventually, but I want to make sure our kids are taken care of. That is my number one priority. I even told him, like when we were kind of determining if we wanted to, if I wanted to go back to work, I said, if we don't find a safe place for our son to go, I said, I'm not working. I said, he is our number one priority.

[C]

Sure.

[B]

No matter what, I would love to stay home. It's. If we do kind of have our. If we have a second kid here soon, maybe five years before I go back to work. So I guess one of our main goals is how can we make that possible.

[D]

Because for me, like, even with the paying off the debt, like, I had some financial backing with the Dave Ramsey, but I didn't find you guys until probably, I don't know, six months, seven months ago on YouTube type of thing, and with my job, since I'm working 48, 50 hours a week and with that I can listen to music, listen to podcasts. So like, I've gone back and I mean the way I like to say it is I've gotten a second education over the last seven years between different podcast interests that I have. And I mean, going through, I'm like, oh, like, Even with the 30 thousands on the severance, I'm like, why did we pay off the low interest debt we could have? I just. You don't know what you know.

[A]

You don't know any better. That's right.

[D]

And after that, now sitting down and crunching these numbers, I'm like, oh, man, it feels like we're really squeezing. Like, unless I'm missing something. But, like, I know we're in a good spot. I know we're building up our emergency fund, we're doing all the steps to get through, but it feels if we were to add another kid into the mix and move on with just life, like, how much are we actually enjoying our life versus, like, squeezing out of it?

[A]

Well, answer that question for us right now. How much are you enjoying life? Or do you feel like right now in this moment you are just surviving?

[D]

I myself feel more of the just surviving. Like, we do have our moments and I grew up not having a lot anyways with my family. We're a pretty middle income family, so I learned to make the fun memories out of the stuff. So I know what to expect. And I just. It's hard for me because I'm very family oriented. Like when we got married in our vows, I was like, the one thing I know is I'm not always career driven. Like, I've never had that thing that I knew I really wanted to do, but I wanted a family, right?

[A]

Yeah.

[D]

With that, it's tough when I come home and after working 10 plus hour day and then only get to see him because he's got to go to bed early. Being young for a couple hours, like two hours maybe, if we're lucky, if he's up. So that's, you know, because I've tried to make up what we've lost by working the extra overtime, time and a half and all that. To me, I'm like, how much enjoyment am I getting if I'm not being with them as much?

[C]

I do want to, I want to make sure I understand when you say survive because you say you're family oriented and in a minute we'll bring up what your budget is. Do you feel like you're only surviving because you also know what you should be saving and other things? You sound like you've loaded yourself up. But if we actually boil it down to just the life that you're living like you come home and you sleep on the weekends and you think of it and you look at your life around the holidays. Do you feel like there's anything you're missing from. Not savings goals, like the 25% or anything, but just from your family, family nucleus. Is there, like, memories or things that you're missing, or do you feel like you're sustaining and living a good life right now? I think that's really what Beau's asking.

[D]

Yeah. Okay.

[B]

I. At the end of the day, I do love where we're at. I do feel like we're in a good spot and I don't feel like we're missing too much. Like he said, at the end of the day, as long as I'm home with him and Barrett, that's all. That's all that matters. But do we want to go out and be able to take, like, many, like, little trips here and there? Do we want to be able to buy a house? Cause we're renting right now, so it's. I guess we're kind of looking more into the future at that stuff too.

[D]

Yeah, that's probably my biggest downfall. I know, like, we've jokingly talked about and seeing the future, the life that we want to have for our son and for our family. For me, I think it's probably harder. Like, yes, we are doing good. And I think it's more of just a reminder to myself that I need to, like, take a second, like, live in the moment and it's for a couple years and. Cause in my head, I thought she was saying originally when she was like, yeah, I don't think I want to go back to work. I'm like, forever. Forever.

[B]

No.

[D]

Which if I was able to do that, I'd love for her to be able to do that. But like I said, with the things in the future, the house and trying to do those things, I need to realize, like, we are good where we're at and I do get to do the things, like, especially him being one. He's young. He's not gonna know. If we don't go on a vacation for a week long thing at this point, like, we can suffer through and like, we grew up tent camping. So, like, for me, that's pretty cheap and easy and he can still do that. And I think it's probably more of the reminder for myself to. It's okay for this time in our.

[A]

Lives, I want to hit on some of your goals. She said one of the things is, how can we make that Possible. You just said something so great. And we say this on the show all the time. How your journey starts does not define how it ends. Right. That's a thing we say. But another thing we don't say, this is often, but it's in that same vein, is how your life looks today does not dictate how it's going to look tomorrow. Meaning we are going to have seasons. There are going to be times when life feels hectic and crazy and tight. And it's not our dream life necessarily. We often call that the messy middle. And that's exactly where you guys are. So I want you to just pause for a moment and take a deep breath and just go, okay, it's all right. Other people are here. We're not alone. Other people have navigated this. And then I want us to calibrate. Okay, what are your goals? Because I heard, I want you to listen for me, but I heard like we're renting, we want to buy a home, we want to have more kids. Walk us through some of like the goals both personally and then financially that you guys.

[C]

And give us a priority list on that too because I heard from your heart it sounds like staying at home for the next five years is. Yeah, that's probably. Is that one.

[D]

Yeah, number one. And having another kid.

[B]

Having another kid, definitely. Because yeah, we're getting close to that two year age gap that we really like. And with that getting, getting me a new car and with that being kind of like our family car. Like, yeah, he got his Tacoma but that's not necessarily big enough for what we want.

[D]

It barely fits with the one car seat and like she's like up in the dashboard and it's not as big a room. When I got it, it was just me. And even with her car like starting to have some starters, it's starting hard.

[B]

Because it's cold out now and I.

[D]

Want to make sure that they're not driving something where it's not reliable and something that will, you know, help us grow our family too.

[A]

Yeah, help me, give me an idea of what does a family car mean for you guys?

[B]

We would like a bigger suv, which.

[D]

We know those are like a minivan. Really anything family oriented.

[C]

Do you sign off on the minivan?

[B]

So the newer ones with the built in vacuum, those would be super nice. Yeah, something with more room. Cuz it's like when we travel down to Ohio to go see my family, we obviously we take his truck, but we're packing, we're packing to the brim. So it's like something we can do a little bit of traveling with and be comfortable, fit that second car seat. So it's like we don't know if we should buy new, buy used. How much can, like, we afford in that sense? I know at this point we are going to have to finance a car, but we would like a bigger SUV to fit the lifestyle that we want to have. And if we're going to invest in a newer car, it's going to be something we exactly want. Like, we're not going to get something we kind of want if we're going to put the money into it.

[C]

Now, if it was just a. Okay, though, I'll just say you can put a visual. If it was like a Chrysler Pacifica minivan, would that. See, see, that's. That's why I. Because, look, I'm going. I'm just going to straight up tell you. You gu. Because Bo and I are going to do the same thing. We're trying to build this vision of what y' all are trying to accomplish. But there's a push pull system that's going on. And when you have big goals, like I want to stay at home for the next five years and we already know your earning potential is just as much as Matt's.

[B]

It is.

[C]

That's a big ask, and it's very important. And we're perfectly fine with the big ask because I think life wise, this is something that's very worthwhile. But there's going to be a sacrifice if you make this. You have to go into it knowing to get everything we want, I'm going to have to give up something. And so vacuum cleaner isn't even showing up anywhere on the radar. And then that's what I'm trying to understand is the attachment to the suv. Look, I have one of. This is in my household too. And we've had lots of conversations. Now, I think you've heard us talk about how Beau got the third child. Part of that was a minivan in the negotiations. That's the way it went, you know, And I just saw her yesterday. I saw Beau's wife yesterday. We were out walking to go to lunch together and his wife plays chess.

[A]

I play checkers.

[C]

Rides by with all the kids loaded up and, you know, and she's like, brian, please help me get out of this minivan. And I'm like, I'm not. I'm not the one you need to be talking to on this. Do you see why I'm trying to get context for you? Because you're giving me mixed signals in some ways, Hannah, because I was very impressed. My first impression of you is you're like, okay, we met this year. You start. You gave me the list in a very analytical type way. And I was like, okay, I've got a calculator brain here who probably can see how you move parts on the table. And I was able to ask you guys, who's the financial personality of this household? Because the way you were laying out logical stuff, I was like, I was immediately drawn to you as being the financial person. And then to hear I want an suv, you know, and it felt disconnected from the analytical side. It seemed more emotional. Is that true?

[B]

Yes. And I would say, yeah, definitely. I make the impulse buys. It's like, I want this. I get my mind set on something. I'm going to get it. I'm going to get it now. Not tomorrow, today.

[C]

So where are you in your journey, though? From being. Because if you're analytical and, you know, you're the financial person, but you were the person got credit card debt.

[B]

Yes.

[C]

Where are you at in this journey on transformation from being a financial mutant versus somebody who's just general public.

[D]

Probably like three, four months ago. When I, like, for me, I'm pretty. She's very analytical, and so am I. And getting into this. And when I, like I said, when we went down to the one income, my whole thing before was like, as long as we have this amount in our checkings and we don't go below that and I see it grow, and then we can move money around there, we're good. And then it'd been a month, like, okay, maybe we just spent more this month and it just kind of stayed and then slowly went down a little bit, like, okay, so I need to really dive into what's going in here. And when I did that, I was like, okay, like she said, the fun drinks, the going out to eat, the making those purchases, and had to have the tough conversation of, do you see what's going on? And like, it wasn't. It definitely wasn't an easy conversation.

[C]

So which is more important to you, Hannah? The lifestyle stuff, because that's also family stuff, is going out to eat once or twice, you know, and doing little mini trips, even if it's camping, Is that more important or is the suv?

[B]

I think probably the lifestyle.

[C]

So we can bring you back. And do you have resentment from that, though, or is that something that. Is this something. If you made this. This decision, you would be okay with it?

[B]

I would be okay with it. Okay, I need to get that in my mind, though. That's the thing. Needing a new car is pretty important.

[A]

But first time you've said need. So I love that because you just said, hey, I really want a big suv. I really want. And what I was going to draw you back to is there is a delineation between wants and needs. Because I would argue if you guys have a car that will not start in wintertime and a Tacoma, you guys, if you're going to be a family of four, five, even, you need a larger automobile. Is having a big SUV the need? Perhaps not perhaps that's a way. And so I think really diving into, okay, what's the bare minimum that we need? And then we're in a second, we'll sort of triage back into what can we afford. But I think that's beautiful that you recognize that, hey, we do need a bigger car.

[B]

We do.

[A]

And I think we would all agree.

[C]

I think she subconsciously just did that. That's why it's great.

[B]

I also feel like we're at a point where we've. We've talked about this so many times. It's like we have so many different variables that we could take the path to. It's just making that first decision, decision of, okay, do we want this lifestyle? Then we can't have this. Do we need the car? Then we can't do this. So it's. We're. We're stuck in so many different variables that we just need to take the first step of, like, okay, we're gonna do this, and this is gonna be the stuff we're gonna have to sacrifice because love that.

[C]

Do y' all ever fight over that stuff, or is that. Are y' all kind of a united front? Because that's super powerful if y' all are united about it.

[D]

I mean, I wouldn't say we really fight. Like, obviously, we both have our feelings towards everything, but we're really, honestly pretty good at trying to communicate. Like, since we started dating, I come from the mindset of have those tough conversations. And then when we. Like, the way we look at it is it's not her and I versus each other. It's her and I versus what's the problem? So we try to be united front on all that. And I think having the Cause she is analytical, seeing that stuff. And when I bring it forth, it's not like, hey, we just need to do this. Let's talk through, like, she said of, okay, if you go back to work, this is the lifestyle we can have you might not be home with him as much. Or do we sacrifice not getting the new SUV and not making those type of decisions and then we have that family oriented where you get to have that one on one with him and any potential kids down the road if.

[C]

You don't come on this show, is there any chance that you car doesn't crank up one morning because it's cold outside and y' all go, let's go to the dealership. And then you end up with a $1200 car payment, brand new, shiny SUV? No, because I'm just, you know, you wake up one day and then you go. Because they'll, I mean, you show up at a dealership, they'll put you in the car.

[B]

Yeah, I'm probably the emotion there. And then he's the reason.

[A]

The reason.

[B]

Yeah, I'm like, let's do this. He goes, well, let's back up a little bit.

[C]

And the husband loving his wife. I mean, there's a lot of things you'll put yourself in just to try to make you happy.

[B]

Yeah.

[C]

And that's what you guys. The reason I ask that is because your income, now that you're at half, you know, of what it was, it's tight. I mean, we'll go over the budget here. One, you're one car payment away from this dream that you're living where you get to make memories probably falling apart.

[A]

And I want to make sure we have all the goals. Because you said staying home, having another child, getting a family car. Were there other goals that you guys have in the intermediate and long term.

[D]

Insurance for her and her son? Because with her leaving her job and the severance, they also paid her insurance up until February.

[C]

This coming in just a few months.

[D]

Coming in a few months.

[C]

Do you all have a plan yet? Do you don't have health insurance at work?

[D]

I do. For them to add into my insurance would be almost another 600 bucks a month. And that really squeezes to the point where it's like, again, I'm trying to work this overtime to see and I just. For me, I'm not seeing where that makes sense in that math and not really sure where to go there.

[C]

You can't go without health insurance.

[D]

Not. Yeah, definitely can't go without it. And that's where I'm like.

[B]

And I've looked into like ACA Marketplace.

[A]

Plans, that sort of thing.

[B]

I don't understand insurance. I don't even know. Like, I've looked into like healthcare.gov and you just kind of put in your basic Information. That's one thing I can't figure out as an adult is insurance. That stuff.

[A]

You're also not alone in that. It's a super complicated system. So you're not alone in that.

[B]

We've looked at, like, just like the basic plans, Kind of figure out how much we can afford. So I've looked in and that's anywhere from 150 to 250, $300.

[C]

And that's even questionable right now because there's. The subsidy is in jeopardy at the moment that we're recording this show.

[B]

And that's also with, I think, the child tax credit. And that's $300. And that's going into it.

[D]

Yeah, that. And wouldn't go without the insurance because they need.

[B]

Yeah, we have to have it. It's for Barrett and I.

[A]

And I wouldn't even say that that's so much a goal as much as that's a. That's the thing that's gonna have to happen. And we're trying to figure out where that enters because, like, car's a goal. Staying home is a goal. Having another kid is go. All those are goals. Insurance is like, no February. This is a pretty tight deadline. We gotta have that solved.

[B]

Yeah. I was gonna say that's probably our first priority is finding insurance and figuring out how we can put that into the budget and how much we can afford with that. Got it. And that definitely is going to take precedent over the car.

[C]

Brainstorming off the cuff. I think right now when we're earmarking stuff, we just need to know somewhere between 200 to $600 is probably gonna need to be earmarked until we get this figured out, you know. So as we're thinking about how much margin you'll have in your life to look at goals, 2 to 600 needs to be kind of just corded off to because that's how important this is.

[A]

Let's talk about resources that you have available to you. Because you told us that you guys, you were so kind. You shared not only your net worth, but also a budget of kind of where dollars are going monthly. And it looks like your monthly budget is a little over $2,700 a month. For some context. What's the net pay that you have coming in? Like what hits your checking account? Are you zero based budgeting or is there more coming in than this 2,700?

[D]

There's more coming in with the overtime that I'm doing. So paid bi weekly. So depending on the month, you can have two, three. But When I average out, it's like I think it was somewhere like 3,000. And I guess the way I've tried to budget and I don't know if this is the right way is like if I were to only have a 40 hour work week and then anything that's over that because I don't always have the time for the overtime, it's just kind of gravy on top.

[A]

So roughly 3,000 in a month. But according to this, about 2768 out is kind of what we're looking at.

[D]

Right.

[A]

Are you guys doing any sort of saving right now? Because obviously we saw that you have like $85,000 net worth. A lot of that's in roth and Roth 401k. Any money currently going into savings for.

[D]

Savings out of mine, I have with my work, the 401k program. So I've just. I was for years. And the reason it is so high is because when I was at home and the Dave Ramsey thing was 15%, I as soon as I was able to enroll just set it to that left it.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

And then they match. I think it was up to 5% or 4%. At 5%, I forget how. It's a weird breakdown. I've now when we did the calculations back down to only investing 5% which is the employer match, you're doing the maximum, the maximum to get the max and not over in that account. And since then I've not really invested anything into Roth for her or I. I do have the health savings account and it's not really investing my money, but through the UnitedHealthcare that we have, they do like a tracker thing if you walk so many steps. So it's like 20, up to a thousand bucks that you can earn in a year. So I've just been putting that into the HSA that I have.

[A]

Is their matching formula likely? If you put in five, they'll give you four or is it four?

[D]

I think that's what it works out to.

[C]

Yeah.

[D]

Five percent, they match up four.

[A]

So right there on the cuff, just doing that, like just doing enough to get your employer match. You know, in the financial order operations. That's step two in our world. You already got 9% going to work for you. What's great about where you guys are is that when you start early 25 and 27, it does not take a lot to do a whole lot of heavy lifting. So it's going to be interesting to see based on the hard work you did when things were more comfortable having, you know, $85,000 in net worth right now. A lot of that being in liquid assets and just saving the 9%. Have you projected out, like, what that looks like by the time you get to retirement?

[D]

Kind of. Not really. I wasn't sure. I think.

[A]

I think it'll be mind blowing. We say 25%. 25%, and we love that. But you were doing that early on. You were saving at that clip early on. You've given yourself some flexibility that if this is. Perhaps this is all you can save for the foreseeable future until you go back to work or some circumstances change. I love seeing that. And I think you'll be amazed. The fact that you guys did figure that out at 25 and 27, how powerful that's going to be for you over the long term.

[B]

He is such a future planner, and I love that about him. But I've needed to tell him, like, we do need to figure out what we need right now. Like, yes, it's super important to save, but we might need to back. Like, I had to tell him to back that down.

[D]

It was tough for me to go.

[C]

No, I get off.

[D]

Especially watching the show. I'm like, but do you realize what it could be?

[C]

Your budget doesn't look like you're wasteful. I mean, it looks so. That's. So now I need. I need to ask you a few questions on this career you have. Because you make 55,000 in woodworking and you love it because you're working with your hands. What's your trajectory? I mean, do you get 2%, 3% pay raises? Or is there a chance where you're gonna make 65,000, 70,000? What's your career look like that's kind.

[D]

Of up in limbo right now. They've done the last couple years, the 3% track. I know that I've had leadership roles in there, and I'd like to keep moving up in that because it's a. Our company's smaller family, but it's growing quite a bit to where now we're like 50 employees. And I've been there seven years. I know. I. If I were able to make more, I would. I'd like to get something with a. More of a managerial.

[C]

Well, look ahead of you and behind you. What opportunities do you see? I mean, does your. Do you think your boss is making good money to where he can pay his bills and stuff to.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah.

[C]

Because that's what I'm. Now we get to the hard stuff. Don't you agree? This is the hard point? Where we have to say this is off the cuff. You got three grand coming in, you got 2,700. And we're not covering.

[A]

Not a lot of waste in there.

[C]

Yeah, we've already blown it up with health insurance and we haven't bought the new car. We haven't saved for a house. This gets really hard, really, really quick.

[A]

Because when it comes to changing your financial circumstances in most scenarios there's really only two levers you ever get to pull. Right. One lever is decreasing expenses. I'm gonna spend less, I'm gonna have less flowing out. That's a lever, I don't know that you guys are wasting a ton of money. You've already kind of like done that part. And the other lever then becomes, well, how do we increase income? How do we figure out how to have a bigger shovel so that we can fund some of these other things? And I think that's kind of. They're at the income piece. That's the other lever that you have to figure out how we can adjust.

[B]

And I wouldn't be opposed of even just getting a part time job to kind of like his work schedule and then try to make a little money on the side. Like, I'm not opposed to that. It's just kind of figuring out how we can do that.

[C]

That's the other question I was going to ask you is because you have a very valuable skill set. I mean, because obviously, and I love the fact that you realized I'm not going to do this for eight years, but I could do this for two. And you immediately made yourself marketable and made a great income. I'm wondering. And look, I've used with my family and my youngest daughter, we've used occupational therapists for years. It is. And what's funny is I've seen some of them as they start growing their family, they can do some unique. It is a career that allows some uniqueness and that you could probably find a place. And I think there's such a demand and need. You could probably go backfill some hours, you know, if you had a mom's morning program. But look, I'm conflicted because I want y' all to grow a family. Y' all seem like a lovely family, but I think that you have to. You're kind of like our Rebe in some ways is that she's had to figure out how do you do the traditional type family stuff, but also how do you help out with the family if you have this capability? I don't know what that answer Is yet. But I think that that's probably a smart path to kind of think. Can you. Because if we get to the point that Matt says I'm giving it all I got, I mean, what's woodworking in general? What's the career trajectory? I mean, is this a six figure type career?

[D]

I think if you go on your own and do something like that and it could be. I don't know if he'll ever do six figures just in a shop, honestly. And the only thing is, is because it is so tight already, like I've mentioned to her before of like, hey, it would be kind of nice to maybe try doing this on my own.

[C]

But.

[D]

I know.

[C]

But that's a whole nother journey.

[D]

And that's a whole nother journey.

[C]

And that's why I pushed three years.

[D]

I've pushed that off and off. Yeah. Because yeah, it's three years journey and right now we just. That'd be way too scary to not know because too risky. And where I'm at, like got review in February and there's an opening for leadership roles. So maybe a little more. But I don't ever see six figures at some.

[A]

But those leadership roles would create an increase in income hopefully.

[D]

Yeah, it would.

[C]

Hopefully.

[A]

Because what I'm thinking is obviously we know there are some goals that you have, right? Specifically short term goals around you have to have this insurance in place. You really want to need a new car to be more appropriate for the family. I'm thinking the work that Brian and I are going to have to do is we're going to have to figure out, okay, based on the way that you guys are spending money now and the things we know that you have upcoming, if we can't cut expenses anymore, how much more income do we need?

[B]

That would be a really big help to kind of point us into the direction of what I need to do and what needs to happen in the future to make these goals possible.

[A]

Awesome.

[B]

And that's. I think that's kind of one of the answers we're really looking for.

[A]

And it may be something where, okay, hey, if you just at your job, if you get a $10,000 raise or a $5,000 raise, it makes them. Or hey, if you could work part time and make $15,000, I don't know what the answer is going to be. We'll need to kind of like crunch through the numbers. But what I'm hearing is you guys are both, you both recognize and are open to the fact that's probably going to be where the Solution lies. How do we create more income for the family?

[D]

Definitely love that.

[B]

Yeah. And I was kind of caregiving on the side too, but that kind of some of their family situations happen and I'm not doing that. So that was a little bit of extra money and that did help, but that's kind of not in the cards right now.

[A]

Was that something you're able to do with Barret like you were able to?

[C]

Yeah, I could see that's crazy.

[D]

And that was pretty nice to have that where he could go along with her.

[A]

Are there other families or are there other opportunities in the area in which you live where potentially that could be an option?

[B]

Probably I would just have to look for it. But that's kind of. I don't really know how to look for it in that sense. It was a family friend kind of the opportunity arose.

[D]

Yeah, it was a friend of a friend that needed some help type of thing. So it just kind of fell under her lap like cool. We needed some extra, you know, side income anyway so we can do some.

[C]

Math number crunching and figure out hey, what do we need to get them on health care at this. What if, what's a reasonable amount on a car payment? We can get them. And now you know, hey, we need to go find an extra twelve to fifteen hundred dollars a month. How are we going to get make this happen?

[A]

Is there a scenario in which you could be a one car family and it's okay if the answer is no, I don't want to put that on you. But I'm just as we're going to think about some creative solutions because one of the things I'm about to ask is how much is your car worth and how much is the Tacoma? They're both paid for outright. But what's the current market value of each of those automobiles?

[D]

I think mine's just under 30,000. 29, 30 somewhere on there.

[B]

Mine, it's a 2012 with 250 20,000 miles on it. So not really worth.

[D]

Yeah, that one, it's the drive till the wheels fall off typically pretty much.

[B]

And I don't really drive it on a daily either. It's like if I'm home with Barrett, we would run to the store. We need to go pick up this, that and the other thing. It's like we don't really necessarily need two cars. It's super nice to have two. If it was something like hey, I need to get up with him at six in the morning and drop him off at work. Just so we have a Vehicle, just in case I would add more miles on it.

[A]

But is your vehicle mostly for commuting to and from work?

[D]

To and from work. Going down to Ohio to see her parents. Our drive, I mean, we pretty much drive that when we're not, you know.

[C]

How far, how far is your job?

[D]

My job's a 15 minute drive.

[A]

So it's not much because I want to just introduce my line of thinking here.

[D]

Right.

[A]

You have a need for a automobile that can be the support for the family. But right now, the nicest automobile in your home, the one that's, that's taking up the most wealth for you, is your truck, which is kind of like a commuter vehicle. Right. One of the things that just, again, I'm just trying to figure out what ideas you guys are open to. If we were to determine, hey, honestly, it doesn't make sense for the nicest car to be the truck. The nicest car ought to be the family automobile. Is there a solution where we use these two vehicles that you have to get that nicer family car and we figure out some sort of commuter solution for you to and from work? Is that a viable.

[C]

Here, Let me put it this way. What if there was a reliable, not super expensive, but reliable, like minivan sitting at the house and then you drove a beater to work every day that would get you to and from work.

[A]

I was painting it a little bit.

[C]

No, this is the reality. Let's be honest here. This is. I was trying to put what you're building on this, but that's what, that's what we were building if we were trying to. Because you, you have something valuable. You have a $30,000 equity vehicle. Look, Tacoma is a great vehicle. So I hate taking that. Wonderful. But we got to get really creative. Just like we took away the SUV over here. We've got to get honest and say, we're going to need some sacrifice on your side too, just to make this all work. Because a carpet. We got to get you health insurance. And I don't see a car payment. I'm like, how the heck are we going to do this? It's going to be tough. So it's got to be something pretty small.

[D]

I know I have said to her before, like, hey, why don't we let me drive your car and then I'll let you drive the truck around type of a thing because of that and drive it as a beater. So I'm not opposed to that.

[C]

But why does it have to say the truck?

[D]

But it doesn't have to Stay the truck. I guess I've never really thought of that. Of. Hey, you know that, that definitely is my baby.

[C]

Oh my gosh.

[A]

Did you see how much he was smiling when we said no to the big suv? And now the tables have turned.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

I don't know if that's going to be the solution, but I just want to introduce the idea that when we're in these types of situations, we have to think really, really creatively and we have to think outside the box when there are things that really matter to us, like having another child, being able to stay home. Those are wonderful, amazing, noble things. But there often are trade offs and sacrifices that seem intense. But again, the way that your financial life and the way your life looks today does not dictate how it must look tomorrow. So this may be something that this is going to be the solution for this season. It does not mean this will always be the solution.

[D]

Right? Yeah, I wouldn't be opposed to it. It definitely would hurt because that was like that one thing. Younger.

[C]

What's your favorite food in the world?

[D]

Favorite food? Steak. Easy.

[C]

You're going to come to a point in your life and I'll just tell you. It's going to happen that you, your child's going to get to be four or five years old and they're gonna say, daddy, I want some of your steak. And you're gonna cut them off a piece. I mean, I watched Bo yesterday. Cause like I said, we saw his family out. We were walk, we had picked up our taco, two tacos. And they gave us like probably six chips with our chips and salsa. And I watched Bo. Cause this is not a lot of food. And I watch his kids, they roll up next to us. Cause it's just coincidentally they roll up. Maybe it wasn't coincidence. Maybe she's playing chess and checkers. They rolled on. And every one of the kids like, daddy, can I have some chips, Can I have some chips? And I, I watched him give those chips to the kids. So I, I'm telling you, you're probably that Tacoma, as much love as you have for it, when you see your family in that safe vehicle, you're not going to care about that. As, as, as I feel that from just from, from what you've already shared with us, I think it's going to be a. Okay.

[D]

Yeah. Yeah, I think that's definitely an idea. I've never, I don't know why I haven't thought that, but yeah, it has more trading power and then getting a better payment for Something if needed for sure.

[C]

Well, y' all got to get through because look, I want you all to not put the family planning on a shelf. But we've got to look at this five to six year period where you're going to not. And eventually you'll be able to go full horsepower, make 55, 60 thousand dollars a year. But. But it's, it is very valuable. As for Yalls family unit, this is what you've put as a priority. Let's look at this five to six year period where we're not having to give up all of our future, but we have to be really smart with every resource that you have. Because there's nothing that can be left sitting out there not utilized.

[D]

Right.

[A]

Well, I think we've got our marching orders. All we ask for, you guys is to be open to the creativity. And I bet we're going to find a way that we're able to do all of these things and end up in the place that you guys want to be for that great big beautiful tomorrow.

[C]

Tomorrow.

[D]

Absolutely.

[A]

You guys are wonderful. Thanks so much.

[C]

Thank you.

[D]

Thank you for having us on, Brian.

[A]

I love talking to Matt and Hannah because I feel like they are a wonderful proxy for what a lot of young people are feeling right now. They have goals of starting a family and doing some important life stuff, but man, things are tight and they just don't know the best way to figure out how to make it all fit.

[C]

They are literally in the messy middle. Think about 25, 27 having a child. Now here's the good news. They're definitely short on time. They're short on money. While they were both working, they crushed it. They did. They had a lot of money that they saved up and they were very disciplined. I think they're going to start seeing that some of these hard decisions they have to make with the health insurance, with the vehicles they drive, it's going to be made better because they had discipline at the early part of their marriage.

[A]

And it's not just they had discipline early on, they even have discipline now. When you look at their original budget, it was pretty reasonable. They weren't living extravagantly. They weren't living beyond. They just literally have some obligations coming their way that they aren't gonna be able to meet. But it's not because they're wasting money. They're spending about $2,800 a month. And so we said, okay, we know we got this car thing we gotta figure out. We know we got this insurance thing we gotta figure out. And then you Also want to live life and get to enjoy the here and now. So we said, okay, what if we began reverse engineering some of this stuff? How would this look if we began trying to do some problem solving? And in my opinion the very first problem they had to solve like is like pronto has to solve is the health insurance issue.

[C]

This couldn't be optional. Now we know that he had insurance covered through his employer, but you can't have your wife and child just hanging out out there. There's just too much risk. There's too many things that could go wrong. I thought it was interesting is that they've done so good. I would have loved to get a guest on here that we could yell at them for how undisciplined they were. But they were just so good with their money. But there were several eye opening things that I saw and the health insurance is something because I got the feeling that they knew it was important. But I think we opened their eyes a little bit more. This is a no stopper. You can't pass go without getting this done. Another one is I can't wait till when you and I can kind of talk about this car and the vehicle situation too. Yeah.

[A]

Before we get to the car though, let's talk about. We did some research for them. We did a little bit of work. We actually went out on the healthcare marketplace looking at what coverages would be available and we said that if they did a silver plan because Matt is on his current insurance, but if they just put their son and Hannah on an ACA Silver rated plan in their area, it'd be about $335 a month. So again we're reverse engineering where their budget needs to be. We would need to add about $335 a month for health insurance now.

[C]

And if, if we, Matt just added them and created a family plan, wasn't it around $600 a month? So it's wide. It's already creating well over $200 margin or differential already.

[A]

And look, this isn't, this isn't a cost they're going to want to bear, but it's an assessment. They have to have it in there. So all right, that's problem number one. They got to get at least enough more, at least more income to be able to satisfy health interest. But then they did have the car issue and it was so interesting because man, he was going to drive a minivan with the big SUV and he was all on board until we uncovered the Tacoma. Then we found out, oh wow, we have this vehicle that has a lot of equity sitting inside.

[C]

Didn't you see? I mean, even me and my wife, I mean, we all feel like it's just human nature. We all look at ourselves and we think that we're doing the things the right. And so when Hannah was saying she wanted to drive an SUV and we were picking on Hannah about that, Matt was sitting over there like, yeah, yeah, I'm with you. But then he looked like a deer in headlights, when all of a sudden we were like, wait a minute. You mean your wife's car is not very reliable and you're driving. What did he say his commute was? It was less than 15 minutes.

[A]

Something quick. Yeah.

[C]

And you're sitting on this Tacoma that's got all this equity, and like, wait a minute. There has got to be a better way to do this. And I could tell he was like, oh, and look, in the most loving way possible. I think he quickly realized there's probably going to be a change coming for the Tacoma.

[A]

And look, this is not recommendation we love making, but when we're in tight time, sometimes we have to make difficult decisions. And that's exactly what we came up with. We said that, okay, if Matt were to sell his truck right now and he were to make $30,000 just cashing on the equity, we actually found that there are some reasonable cars in their air that he could buy for $10,000. Now, it's not going to be the Tacoma. It's going to be a truck.

[C]

It's going to be a beater.

[A]

It'll be a beater that allows him to get from point A to point B.

[C]

We'll call it a commuter.

[A]

It'll be a commuter vehicle, commuter beater. What matters for them more was not him necessarily being able to commute, but it was for Hannah and their son to be safe for them to be in reliable transportation. So we're going to take 10,000 of that and get him a commuter vehicle, which leaves $20,000 left over for her. And we said, okay, if we have $20,000 for a down payment and based on where their income is, if they want to fall inside 23, 8, we determined that they could afford a car that's worth about $32,500.

[C]

Okay. Okay.

[A]

So then we went and did some research, and we said, okay, well, based on this, what cars might be available? Brian, look at those minivans. Look at that.

[C]

It is interesting, because I thought it was interesting. 20, 24, that's pretty new. Chrysler Civica did have 60,000 miles on it, but right around 25,000. Now you said 32,000, so we're already going under that might even give a little bit of margin, the car payment right there. And then of course, Toyota Sienna, you know, when people think of, they're thinking the Odyssey for the Honda, you're thinking of the Toyota. So we're even putting her in marquee stuff here, 2021. So it's a little bit older, but only 50,000 miles. There is going to be something that they can find in their marketplace that probably fits this need. So that every morning when Hannah goes out to crank up that car, she.

[A]

Knows it's going to crank.

[C]

Matt can feel and have peace of mind knowing his wife and child are going to be in safe, reliable transportation.

[A]

So again, if we're thinking about building this budget, we've already added in some money for the ACA health plan. At 335 based on 23, 8, we believe they can afford a car payment of about $400. Okay, so now we're up to $735. They have to increase, but we didn't want to stop there.

[C]

One of the things when they were talking about what's important to them, going out to eat, just having a little margin in the system to create memories, to have fun. Because they even said they can go camping, they don't need anything exotic for vacations. But I hate to cut them so lean that they can't at least just go out and make some memories by going out as a couple, going out as a family and eating out from time to time.

[A]

So what we said is, hey, let's add in a little fun money, little wiggle room budget of $200 a month. Well, if we add that, what you can see is we take their monthly budget from 2,768 to about $3,700 a month. That's the number their budgetary number they need to hit is about 735. So they got to figure out how do they cover extra thousand dollars a month or so. Well, what's great is Hannah has this skill set where she's going to be highly sought after. She's going to be very marketable. There are ways she could potentially go get a part time job or maybe even Matt could figure out how do I make a career shift or how do I move to a different company because they don't need a ton more. If they could just increase their income by $15,000 a year, I think it would change their entire living Service.

[C]

Well, a $1,200 a month difference because that's what we're talking about. That just might be an uncomfortable conversation for Matt at work. That might be, Hannah, like you said, part time work. This is all doable. This is not catastrophic or you have to go change careers, you have to move to a different part of the country. These are all doable things. You just have to take action and start making these things, letting them happen.

[A]

They laid out for us some, I'm going to say some problems they had. Health insurance was a problem. The automobiles were a problem. And not being able to have any fun money was a problem. I want to emphasize though, one of the things they have on their side is one of the most important ingredients when it comes to wealth creation. They have time on their side. And we just think it's worth noting, we want you guys to know that just based on what they're currently doing, he was putting 5% in his 401k getting a 4% match. And they had been saving really, really well up until this point. If all they did was continue on their current trajectory, not increasing their income, not increasing their savings, they already had about $70,000 saved up. Well, just saving that 9% into the future, not factoring in pay raises, not changing any of those numbers, they are well on their way to having a $4 million portfolio by their retire by the time they retire. So they are already in a fantastic circumstance because they did a lot of hard work really, really early on.

[C]

Yeah, that's what's so hard is because we were here, we are talking about in their current situation because their budget was so lean, how do we save them on this with career and stuff. But kudos to them that they had so much already saved that it is going to help them out. If they came to us with zero. This is a completely different conversation. But because they were so good at the front end of their marriage, it's created a lot of really cool opportunities.

[A]

All right, so here's their homework items. These are the next steps for them. I think they got to figure out an insurance plan. They got to figure out how do we make sure that we cover that risk. And I think this is a high priority. Next, they got to figure out what to do about the car situation. We laid out an example, a scenario potentially sell the Tacoma, get a commuter car, get into a reasonable 23, 8 safe family car. And I think they can afford up to a $400 a month payment. Now they don't have to have $400. It could be 250. It could be 300, but that's kind of where the guardrail is. And then number three, and this is probably the most important part, is how can we increase the lever of income when it comes to financial decisions? We have two levers. We can either decrease expenses. They can't decrease expenses anymore. So they have to figure out how can we increase income.

[C]

Yeah, but that's not going to be that bad because we have several things that can happen as we've already covered. You know, Hannah's got options. But then Matt can go have some conversations with his current employer since he likes his job. This is doable. And I think this is one that I think if you look at this, when they get this, they're gonna be like, yeah, we can do this. And hopefully they feel like a united front, and there's nothing but just wins and excitement and memories that they're gonna make off of this plan that we've built for them.

[A]

And Matt and Hannah, you guys were absolutely wonderful. If you out there would like to be a guest on Making a Millionaire, you can go to moneyguide.com apply or if you want to play with any of our resources or calculators, you can go to moneyguy.com resources.

[C]

Well, and I want to give a compliment to Matt and Hannah. Y' all crushed it, and we're so proud of you, and we just can't wait to see your success. So keep in touch, guys. I'm your host, Brian Preston, joined by Mr. Bo Hanson. MoneyGuide team out.

[A]

Making a Millionaire is hosted by Bryan Preston and Bo Hanson. Brian and Bo are partners at Abound Wealth Management. Abound Wealth Management is a registered investment advisory firm regulated by the securities and Exchange Commission. In accordance and compliance with the securities laws and regulations, Abound Wealth Management does not render or offer to render personalized investment or tax advice through Making a Millionaire. The information provided is for informational purposes only, may not be suitable for all investors, and does not constitute financial, tax, investment, or legal advice. All investments involve a degree of risk, including the risk of loss. The guests featured on Making a Millionaire are not clients of Abound Wealth Management at the time of recording. Their participation should not be considered a testimonial or endorsement of Abound Wealth Management.