Rebecca and Joe have two young kids, and a third is on the way. They are renting at the moment and love the neighborhood they live in—but they both think they need more space to match their growing family. Should they keep renting? Buy a home? Move in with his parents? Their lease is up soon and the pressure is on (or so they think).
To complicate things, we find out that their fixed costs, alone, make up for 105% of their take-home pay. As a refresher, I recommend spending no more than 60% on fixed costs. But they’re spending more than they make every month. Something’s got to give.
They feel frustrated. They feel overwhelmed. They feel like failures as parents because they can't provide for their kids. There are many layers to this on both the financial side and the psychological side. Let’s dig in.
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140. “He put our $1M into one risky investment. Will we lose it all?” (Part 2)
139. “I’m afraid he’ll leave if I don’t stop stressing about the budget” (Part 1)
138. “My wife doesn’t want me to take a $720k job offer”
137. “MLMs, crypto, real estate—I can’t stop falling for get-rich-quick schemes” (Part 2)
136. “We have $500k in debt. Can I retire early?” (Part 1)
135. "It could cost us $50k to have a baby. Can we afford it?"
134. “I make $24K a year but my truck costs $1,600+ a month” (Part 2)
133. "She has $7k in cc debt—just 3 months after I paid it off for her" (Part 1)
132. “We’re $520k in debt—and he hid it from me”
131. “We’re worth $5.5M but I feel like it doesn’t belong to me”
130. “I don’t trust him with spending. Do we have a future?”
129. “We spend 154% of what we make, but I refuse to get a salary job” (Part 2)
128. “We have $285k in debt. Can we achieve financial freedom in 5 years?” (Part 1)
127. “Our financial advisor almost cost us $800k. How do we fire them?”
126. “We have $30k of CC debt. Why did we buy a $10k timeshare?” (Part 2)
125. “He’s so afraid of money he can’t log into his own bank account” (Part 1)
124. “We make $113,500. Why do we feel poor?”
123. Ramit’s travel tips, real estate FOMO, and talking to kids about money
122. “I shouldn’t have to ask for $20 to get McDonalds for the kids”
121. “He wasn’t supposed to have student loans. Now he has $157k.”
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