07/22/2021
So what’s my story? Why should you trust me as a financial coach or listen to anything I have to say about personal finances?
The honest truth is fifteen years ago, I was the guy doing everything wrong. My wife, Paige, and I had a mortgage, two car loans that combined together the payments were almost as much as our mortgage payment, a home equity line, credit cards, etc. You name the debt and we probably had it. We looked good from the outside but no one knew we were putting groceries on a credit card as we didn’t have any money. We had a newborn and money was a major stress in our marriage.
And what was our financial plan to clear up all the mess we had made? We went on a vacation over Labor Day weekend in 2006 that we put on a credit card because we had no money. Before we left, my Sister-In-Law Leah gave us some CDs by some guy named Dave Ramsey to listen to as we were driving on vacation.
By the end of that vacation, we finished the CDs and I was convicted over my poor money management, my poor leadership to my family and I was determined to change. We went home and did a budget for the first time. I added up our non-mortgage debt and found out we were over $56,000 in consumer debt alone. We got angry at ourselves and said ‘No more and never again.’ We sacrificed. No more vacations. We found ways to cut our budget down.
And 22 months later, we paid off every single penny of that $56,000. We were consumer debt free. Fast forward 10 years later and we paid off our house in August 2018. We have made a monthly budget every month since September 2006. We just faithfully followed the process.
That’s our personal testimony on where we started and where we are at currently. It was not easy. We weren’t perfect. We made mistakes. But it was completely worth it.
And now I’m coaching because I know it was worth it and I want others to win with their personal finances.
