What Does Financial Coaching Look Like With Denzel (Patience & Purpose)
Denzel Rodriguez coaches a couple through their finances, tackling income, debt, and family dynamics. They work through budgeting, debt payoff priorities, and whether to sell property. The session shows how financial stress affects relationships and what it takes to fix both.
So I appreciate you also giving me a little overview about yourself and your family. So family of four, Right. You work in construction. You mentioned that you're from New York, but do you live in Florida now, or. Got it. So this is our primary residence right here. And you mentioned that wife is a cosmetology student, so. So she's still studying. Correct. Okay. So not. Not making any income at the moment.
Okay, got it.
So these are our paychecks that you get. And then you mentioned a rental income. Is that on your primary residence or is that a separate. Okay, so you're, like, renting a partial of the house? Pretty much. And then you have put, you know, side hustle, Uber, Lyft, extra income. The extra income part. What does that typically come from?
Right, right.
That's.
Gave him how much I think it will cost. So he paid me in that occasion, $400 for that service and things like that, you know?
Mm.
That's what I consider.
Got it. Okay, great. So for now, as it relates to the income that you got coming in, we'll just use the. The base of what you're making, which is just looking at your income, the rental income, any side income. And when it comes to Uber and Lyft, is that something you're doing as well?
Yeah, I started doing Uber last year because they. For some reason, something happened with my property taxes. The lender didn't send their money to the county when I purchased a house in 2023, and they reimbursed me a check. They issue a check to me. I use it to do some rental work in here. And when everybody checked, they noticed that my escrow account was in. Didn't have enough funds to pay off the taxes, so they had to readjust my monthly income, mortgage payments from 3200 to 3700. So that throw me off. And I had to do some. Started doing some Uber and Lyft, I was able to fight through the storm until I got a. It's called Home line refinance, where they allow you to do the refinancing without any paperwork. And they brought it down to 3,084. So in the month of Jan. That happens in December. So in the. In the month of January and. And February, I took it a little easier because I didn't do any Uber and Lyft. But for example, this. This month, I did Uber and Live last weekend and I made like 408 hours, which is not shown here on the spreadsheet.
Right, right.
Yeah. So, yeah, I'm going to Start cracking, bringing in some income from the Uber and live side on the weekends and as much as I can to bring down my. My debt and stuff.
Got it.
Would you say 400 on a weekend is typical?
Or my. My. No, it's not typical. My. My goal, my base goal is 300.
Okay.
Or per week. That's an easy number, an easy target. But I can. If I push myself, I can get up to 500.
Yeah.
So 300 times four. So it's 1200 bucks. Okay, got it. Now, when we look at the numbers, according to your spreadsheet, we've got with all the debt payments and the living expenses, we're coming in at a total of $8,738.52. So that puts us in a negative cash flow of $1,690.33. So that assumes no extra money was made.
Right.
Whether it's extra income or Uber and Lyft. So my assumption, and correct me if I'm wrong here, is the way we make up for that difference is simply increasing more income coming in, whether it's through Uber, Lyft and. Or extra income. And that helps us pretty much fill that gap. And whenever we're not able to fill that gap, one month, that's where we get all the credit card debt, I'm assuming.
Yeah. So. So, yeah. Where do you get the 8,000 monthly expenses?
So that's monthly living expenses and debt payments altogether.
Right.
So if we take that number of the 5744. 23. And then we take that number, total living expense, 2994. 29. You should get the 8738 number. And it looks like you pretty much accurately listed all your living expenses here.
Yes. Let me see. That is spreadsheet. I don't have the same spreadsheet that you have open. Let me see what happened here, because I put it in a folder.
Yeah. So let me see this folder here.
Okay. It's right here. It's right here. Okay. All right. Yeah. Okay. Now we are on the same. We should be on the same.
This should be the same spreadsheet.
Yeah, Yeah, I agree. I have it open.
Yeah.
Because you see my.
Did all this over here as well, and I think you got this number. There's 6270 and 18.
Yeah, but that. That includes the mortgage, and I think the mortgage should not be included in this.
Right.
So.
This, I think column L all the way through R, just for the averages, so I can.
Yeah, it shows the history.
Right?
Yeah.
Yeah. So if you take away that mortgage payment, you should be left with that number. And then. And then just tally up all the debts over here.
Okay.
Yeah.
So in addition to your home increasing last year because of the escrow shortage, that created a wedge in the finances overall. But also we've got all this credit card debt over here that totals about 1500 bucks. Can you give me a, give me a summary as to how all these credit cards, you know, how we accumulated that debt. Was it pretty much the negative spread or when did it start? If you can give me kind of like the origin, did it start last year as well?
Okay, let me give you a quick.
Yeah, go ahead.
Overview of the situation that we have. Right. So my. My wife and I, you know, we not married, we have two kids, and we. We not really in relationship. And how you say we, we are together because, you know, of the situation. She. How can I say it properly? We are together, but we are not together.
Okay, understood. And you said you're not married, Correct?
We're not married.
Correct.
Got it.
So. So the situation was she. She lost her job last year in June.
Okay.
And. And she was covering some of the expenses. Right. So she was covering the, the car insurance, which was $261. Now, because she don't have an income and there is no, you know, funds for her to cover that. I had to jump in and cover for that. The other, the other situation that we have is that my. My wife may. I'm going to call her my wife so we can.
Right.
She made a bad move, a really bad move recently. She. She had a. She had. She had a car, a Kia Sorento. It was a 2017 Kia Sorrento. It was paid off. And the car was on the dashboard. There was a maintenance light turning on that looked like, you know, oil maintenance or something, or the engine. I told her, you know, typically I like to take the car to the dealership because they know what they have to do and fix it. Somebody in the cosmetology school gave her an advice of a local mechanic where she took the car for. To check the car. Then she came back to the house. She told me she wanted me to come to the mechanic. I say, okay, let's go and check. The guy say, okay, we had to do this, this leave the car and I'm going to send you an estimate. So the guy fixed the car. He sent us the bill. The estimates was $800. So I say, okay, let's take care of that and we don't have to Deal with that. So what happened after we went to. She went to, we went to get the car the next day. She drove the car, she went to school and the light turned on again. She got through.
She was better after, after already paying.
After already pain.
Okay, okay, got it. So like, like comes on again. Got it.
Yeah. So we pay the mechanic and she got frustrated and she, she, she. Her school is right across from the Ikea Leader dealership. She went into the dealer looking for a solution and she walked out of the dealer with a new car without consulting with me or without telling me.
And that's the, the Hyundai car?
Yeah, that's the Honda. No, that's not the Honda Kona. There's another story after that. It was Ikea Forte. But then when she took the car and she brought it here, I don't know, she didn't notice. But the car was smelling like cigarette, like somebody was, it was a smoker using the car and it was impregnated into the carpet. I told her sister, told her the issue and then that was another issue that was bothering her. We took the car to the dealership numerous times. They, they did a car wash detail washing in the interior didn't remove the smell. We took it another day. We left it for the whole day and the thing persisted. So it was bothering her, it was bothering me. So at one point I took my car. My personal car is a Hyundai. Took some. I took my car to another dealer that I bought the car on and I was doing the maintenance. She drove me over there on the Kia Forte and we spoke to the manager there, the dealer, and we walked there. I decided, okay, I don't want to deal with this anymore. Let's see, we can change the car here. And we walked out with this car. The, the, the Hyundai Kona.
Hyundai Kona.
Kona. It's, it's almost brand new, like a thousand miles plus. Doesn't have any smell. I don't have to deal with that. But the only thing that at that point I had to co sign in order for her to get the car. I want to support her. I want to help her. I don't, you know, I want her to be okay and comfortable. And I just signed. I didn't really. I asked the guy to show me all the numbers, but we didn't have a chance to. We went straight into the financial department and we signed and we walked out with that car. Now we have, we, we had to come up with $643 I believe is the car payment.
Yep.
And that was not part of my plan. It was not in my original original the way I was planning on doing things. And the. The car payment is going to start in May 1st. So we don't have no car payments until May 1st. So no car payments this month or April. The other thing is I also always find myself fighting, not fighting with her, but dealing with the tax money. Every time we had to do the taxes, she wants to claim the kids because she will get refunded and so on. And I learned that I don't want to neither be dealing or fighting with her on that scene. So our plan is, or was this is why we walk out of the dealership with the car is we estimate that we're going to get about 4,000 plus from tax money. We already did the turbo tax, but we didn't proceed because I'm doing my taxes and I want to check if I'll get more money than what she will get. I put it somewhere here under the assets tab, line item 44, it says expected reform taxes. Why 4,000.
Yeah.
Come April, right?
Yeah. And then it's highlighted in yellow. And then the other one is since we, the dealer from Hyundai paid off the first car, the Kia Forte, we got refunded or she got refunded about 6,820, which is highlighted in yellow here as well.
Have that money, right?
Yeah, she, she just got the checks and, and also we got another check for 400 yen plus for the taxes amount because she added some services like oil change. You don't have to come, you just bring the car and they change your oil. Anything that happens, it was like, you know, selling stuff on top of the car basically. And that's when she walked out of the first car, the Kia. So they refunded this money. But the issue is, and the plan was, okay, we're going to take this money, we're going to put it in an account and that's going to cover the car payments. I don't have to deal. I don't. We don't have to deal for the car payments or the. For a while. Right?
Right. Yeah.
Until it give us. I don't know. Let's say we take this and divide it by. Where are the car payments? 643 and 9. It's about 16 months of payments. But is it like, like a year plus? Okay, so that's, that was the initial thought on our strategy. Okay. We can walk out with the car and this money will be saving a place in an account to. So we can hold on, you know, and don't stress out about, oh, where's the money for the car payments. That was the strategy. Then. The second thing is the hard credit cards were not in the picture neither. So you can see anything that's harsh is in parentheses, it says wife. So on the, on the, on the debt tab, there are two cars that she has. They're highlighted in red that says wife in parentheses, nine items, 39 and 40. Her minimum payments are about 285 per month. And that's probably something that I'm going to have somehow jump in and help as well because I don't want to, you know, I need to step up, I need to help. And that's the situation I am with this thing that I have right now. And the last thing is I told her the deal was also that if we walk out with a car from the dealership, Hyundai Corner, we were going to work with you because I wanted to work with you and bring some funds in the beginning. That's why I was trying to reach you so many times via email because, you know, I know that the program that I'm in is like for 50 hours per month, but, you know, I have allocated maybe $600. Well, I told her to, to help me with that money to, to put the money for that. So at least 600 or 900 so we can have multiple meetings and get things cranking quickly. And that's why. And then, you know, jump off back to the $50 per month normally so we don't stress out.
Yeah.
And, and that was the, that like the deal I made with her, but now she's backing out again and again. She's not, she's putting me some pushing back a little bit. But yeah, she's been asking me, did you meet with Densel? When are you meeting with Densel? You know, to, to find out what can we do? Definitely, you know, I'm going to, I have the money to pay you for you every time we meet and, and you know, and then we, we can go from there.
Yeah. Okay. So what we'll do is you'll just stay at the, at the 50amonth, no extra, no extra charges. And as long as we can get wife on board to maybe either participate in the meetings or we give her the notes of our meeting and really just get clear as to how we're going to solve all these little problems as it relates to the finance part. But now we also need to keep in mind long term, what is, what does this relationship, what is the relationship's direction going in. So just to be clear, you guys are. Are not legally married, Correct. Okay, so we're not legally married, but you guys do live together and you have two kids together.
Right. Okay.
So in, I guess, at the current state that you're in now, where do you see this relationship going? And then what do you want for this relationship long term? Let's say debt's not a problem. Let's say finances are not a problem.
Right.
So if we removed these financial worries, that wasn't an issue. And you're making enough money to take care of everybody in the household. Does this relationship or are there other things that is still up in the air that needs to get solved? Give me your take on that so far. Just so I have an idea. So, okay, we put in all this work.
Yeah.
And can it. Is there a possibility that it ultimately gets wrecked by our partner or. Or they end up, say, leaving anyways?
Right.
For other reasons.
Yeah.
So I want to get a good idea there because just so you know, I've worked with so many families and I work with a lot of divorced couples, and I work with a lot of clients that are on the brink of divorce or they're going to be splitting up, or they've already decided that they're going to separate, but they're still living together, they have children. They're trying to, you know, have peace in that separation. So that, that totally changes whatever we do with the finances, because now it's a matter of, you know, getting through that particular season. And that may involve selling a home, selling car, moving, downsizing. So in. In many cases, we end up not trying to pay off anything right away, and we actually try to preserve as much cash as we can. So I'm going to reframe the question again just to help you. So, so we got one question here is the. The longevity of the relationship. Where do you think it's going as of right now as it sits, do you see yourself potentially separating ultimately as like, that's the finale. That's where we're at. Or is there a possibility this relationship can thrive by fixing these financial obstacles and challenges? If that's, you know, the main route right now?
Yeah. So. So we. We have. Our older son is 12 years old.
Okay.
And we've been dealing with our situations since maybe after he was like six months or not even a year or we started having a lot of situations as a couple.
Okay. So this is nothing new. This is nothing new.
No, it's nothing. It's nothing new. We've been dealing with this for a long time. The first mistake, I don't know if it's a mistake, but when I was here, when I moved to Port St. Lucie in Florida, I was working at the nuclear power plant in Washington Island. And I met her. She was a cashier at the Bravo supermarket. We started our relationship here when we have our first son. I didn't want to travel anymore because the company I was working for is called Bechtel Power. I wanted to settle down, but I didn't have a. I felt like I couldn't find a job here that will support me or I'll be able to generate the same amount of income that I was doing back then. So I moved to New York with her and my son and we move in my mom's house. And I think that move created a lot of issues in the house between my family and her was really complicated. I think that's what all the pain came from in the beginning. Because she was disrespectful to my mom. My mom also was dis. Disrespectful to her. And that's from. Everything started after that. We even. I. I moved her to. We separated. I. I move her to. Closer to her parents. I lived in. In Jersey, In New Jersey. I was renting an apartment for her. We went to the court and I had child support back then. Then after a few years, me traveling back and forth between New York and New Jersey, we decided to get back together again. Maybe let's try it again. And we had our second son, Samuel. And then we move into an apartment in Queens. And we were having many issues. He was not happy because of the cold weather, because of the little rats and coca roaches that you see sometimes in the New York area. And then I decided to move her back to Port St. Lucie. We got the help from her sister and her sister husband and they had a house here. And we were able to move her in until I figured it out, how to come. So I stood in New York, I brought her here and then we stood like that for two or three years. Then I saw my kids growing. I said, I need to find a way to move. I can be away from them. And thank God. During the pandemic I met a friend of mine who owns a construction company. And now I'm working with him as a construction estimator. And he told me, you know what, if you need to do that move, you can do what you doing from anywhere. Go over there, take care of your family and work that way. So now we move here, we moved to another apartment, and eventually I was able to buy this house. So my, My plan is. Because I don't think we get along. I think we try many times and, and we don't have anything. Things in common. Right. So my, My biggest situation is that she's not an independent person. Self independent, like she can't. She can produce or take care of herself. I need to be always helping either until the kids are grown and they leave, I can maybe move on. Or if I may, if I progress in life, you know, I can maybe find another place or my, my strategy is or was and is. I think you see what I'm doing here. I'm doing a house hacking.
Yeah.
So I'm renting a room already. And my second plan is to renovate the garage and turn it into efficiency space. And I'll be able to rent that space and generate income from. From the master bedroom and the garage. That will offset most of the. The monthly payments I had to make to pay the mortgage. And I think if she finds a job, you know, she'll be able to. To cover her expenses and I will probably be less stressed and maybe I can find another place after I do that, those. Those things. So. But I want her to be comfortable. I don't want to be that guy or that person that leave.
Yeah, yeah.
And leave everybody, you know. You know, you deal with the kids, you deal with that. No, I. I want to be responsible. I want to, I want to help make sure that she's stable. But she needs to come up also on her end with something. Right. Get a job, bring. Bring some money to support yourself, and I'll help you with a house payment. You don't have to deal with that, you know, and, and something that's, that's the plan I have in my head. I think I told her that already. She knows. And I don't know. We've been trying, and I, I don't think it's gonna work. Yeah, I can sit down. I can sit down with her again and talk about this topic. You know, where are we heading as a couple? Just to make sure. Double check. But that's, that's the situation.
Yeah. So what, What I'm thinking here is the likelihood of the relationship where you guys stay together. That scenario is very low when you take into account the exact story you just shared where you're like, hey, this is nothing new. You know, we've been at this for over a decade trying to, you know, make it work. We never got married in that time, you know, but we do share two beautiful children. So it's like, okay, the best thing that came out of this is we have two beautiful children together. They're good kids, we're raising them. And from your perspective, you're like, okay, I want, I still have the desire, even though we may not make it long term, but I want to still make sure you're okay financially and the kids are okay. And we figure out a healthy way to continue to raise these two boys.
Right.
Whether that results in bringing in the state of Florida to decide what that contribution would be from you to her or what I always recommend couples to do because I've experienced it as a son dealing and seeing, observing how child support ultimately works and it's not fun whatsoever. As well as custody.
Right.
If we're able to come to a peaceful agreement where the courts are not involved and we can come up with a way that you're able to contribute a consistent certain amount for the children. And then with my help, not only can I be coaching you directly, but maybe I have calls directly with your wife. Does she speak English?
No, no Spanish.
Okay, so I have, do you, do you speak Spanish? Not enough to like have a full on conversation. But I have a client and we're business partners together. He speaks full Spanish. I could bring him in to help wife develop the financial stewardship skills that are going to be needed regardless whether I have a man taking care of me for my, for my life or not. You know, I try to. I work with a lot of single moms, divorced moms, widows and even married moms. And I encourage them to learn the financial stewardship because I tell them, look, your husband or ex husband, regardless, no matter how long you live on this earth, at some point it's going to be very difficult for them to continue to take care of you if you receive the help from them. But you mismanage the funds or you spend, or you always, you're always spending more than what they're giving you and they're always getting you out of a financial debt or an issue.
Right.
It's different when the woman is a homemaker, makes no money at all, and husband takes care of everything else. And so therefore she doesn't have the ability to put herself into debt because she doesn't have access to anything.
Right.
That's different. But it's when, from what I hear here is we have, you know, you have your partner, your wife that is not working, but is also making financial decisions like buying a car.
Right.
It was supposed to be a simple fix. And then we took it upon ourselves to just get this vehicle. And we also got into credit card debts that she has. And then I don't know what her, you know, spending habits are like, but that ultimately puts pressure on you eventually to the point where you're like, I quit, I can't do this.
Right.
And then you feel like the bad guy because how is she going to fend for herself?
Yeah.
With previous couples I've worked with, what ends up happening, that mom is backed up against a wall and I end up being her client. They find me on the Internet, they start to improve, they start making changes, they go find a job, they go figure it out. And it comes with. It comes with a lot of pain, comes with a lot of stress. But ultimately if we can get wife before that happens, before we go down to go up, so to speak, if we can just stay where we're at right now and ultimately build a plan to help her just elevate in her finances while you and her figure out, okay, these are the things that I'm going to make sure is covered. Anything regarding the boys, school clothes, food, you know, school trips. Yeah, that's me. I have the ability to do that. When we really look at the numbers here, and I'm going to. I'll put it on the, on the board here is if it wasn't for the car, the 64390 payment, her credit card debt 88 and the 197. If we take that off the board, so that's 92890 cents. That takes our total living expense 873852 minus 92890 brings us down to 7809 cost of living. And if all you did was make minimum of 250 a weekend with Uber Lyft, that's a thousand bucks.
Right.
And that brings your income to 8,000 or more. And now you're at a positive spread.
Right.
And from there, if we're operating out of a positive cash flow spread, then in terms of your own credit card debts, we're going to be able to knock those out, you know, one by one by one. And looking at the property that you have, you put that the value of the home is 372,000.
Right.
Or three based on silo number. It's not. It's a ballpark number, I think.
Yeah. So it could be higher, it could be lower. But say it's around that number. 373 minus what you owe.
Right.
What did I do? 373 minus. I'll just round up. So it's about say 40,000 of equity, times that by 80% LTV over time we could get you a home equity line of credit for say 30,000 at around, at around 8% plus or minus. Then we would be able to consolidate majority of all this credit card debt that we have.
Right.
If we minus wife's credit cards, that's 10,000, almost 11,000. So you only have about 39 of credit card debt. We could wipe out a really significant amount of credit cards which instantly increases your cash flow, ultimately puts you in a better financial position.
Right.
And if we're able to continue to live under the same roof, Right. Then that's going to help with, you know, her having a roof and you not worrying about paying a roof for you and a roof for her.
Right.
So if we can, you know, get on the same page and say, okay, look, we understand, you know, maybe we do a three way call, figure something out in that regard or if it's just a matter of you just, you know, sharing information, say look, long term, I don't, I don't see us being, being together lifelong. We've, we've had our run together. We have two, two beautiful children. I want to make sure that we, that they have mom and dad in the picture, there's peace between us so that they can have the healthy upbringing of mom and dad in the picture, preferably under one roof, ideally for as long as we can until you are in a better financial position where we could then do what you said with the current property, creating more cash flow out of that and eventually move out so that, that can, you know, create more cash flow for yourself, move out. And at that point we go our separate ways. Wife is living somewhere else with a job, able to cover say her own personal living arrangements. But then anything regarding the children, you would be more than happy to cover all that and even possibly help cover a percentage of the utility costs. You know, you take the square footage of your children's room in that new place that the mother of your child would, the mother of your children would be and say it's you know, 20, 30% of the total apartment space and that equals, you know, you contributing $400 a month to, to the rent of some sort.
Right.
And making sure that that money doesn't get abused. So anything that you contribute is never cash, but it's always paying directly to something.
Right.
Whether it's this is going directly to the School. This is going, you know, this payment, this check goes directly to the landlord, right? This way, the chances of that money being mismanaged and then you getting a call, you know, three, four months later, I'm about to be evicted. You know, like, we don't want any of those problems being thrown at you. And then again, always making you feel like the bad guy that doesn't take care of his kids or whatever the case may be. So we want to be able to avoid those potential arguments, try to have as much peace as possible. All right, the other option here to consider, right, so this is, this is a longer term approach, right? It's slower.
Okay.
And with the available cash that we have, my, my personal goal is not to try to pay off any debt, but rather continue to service the debts because we do have this big negative spread and the only way we close it is by, you know, Ubering. And even when you Uber, it only closes it, but it doesn't typically put us in the positive. So we, we do need wife to really, you know, get back to work at some point. We, we need that because that's going to help with her own debts. And then that car payment. All right, so until May 1st, then that car payment comes in. But for right now, your actual cost of living is right here, the 8094. So that puts you at about 1000 short. And so when you're doing Uber and Lyft, if you're making 300 times 4, then you're able to bring in that extra $1200, which closes the gap, puts you in a positive. And that positive we want to apply towards debt payoff, right? And let me just give you the order in which we pay off that debt. So even if I'm able to, even if I'm able to cash flow, you know, 100, 200, $300 a month between now and May, right? What we can do is this would be the first card that we pay off city. And the reason why is because of my formula, the cash flow index formula that you might have heard me talk about on my YouTube channel. And if not, the formula is you take the monthly balance, the total balance owed on the debt, and you divide it by the monthly payment, right? And then you get a number. That number you should get 5.99. The lower the number is, the more attractive it is to pay off that debt from a cash flow perspective. So the goal is lowest number to highest number. And what I did here on column J is put all the cash flow index scores, right?
Okay.
And we would go in order from lowest number to highest number. So 5.99 is the lowest number. These are the numbers for the cars. The next lowest number is the 26.51. All right, so that would be debt number two that you pay. This is the first to pay off. So 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6.
Right.
So that's the order that we want to be able to pay off debt coming back to the board here, we're simply trying to buy as much time as we can. So if we can get wife back on board in regards to saying, look, let's. So that we're. We're pre paying, that car payment is covered.
Right.
And if we look at the 4K and the 6008 20, that's $10,820. And divide that by, let's just say 1690. That's our negative spread. We have about 6.4 months of negative cash flow covered. So in that six months, my goal is to try to eliminate as much credit card debts that we have, which will, which will close the gap of your negative cash flow position. Keep doing the Uber and keep doing the Uber lift. And that's going to, you know, give us a boost for, for right now.
I think we will, we will cover more than six months.
I think so too. This is being worst case scenario for sure. This is, this is worst case.
Okay.
So I definitely believe that it's more that it could go longer. And so what I would want is in the next six months or a little bit longer that we're able to eliminate a few credit cards which would recover a few hundred dollars a month in cash flow. But then also in this time frame, maybe six to nine months. Wife is working right now. I don't know how much longer she has for cosmetology school, but if that's something that she enjoys.
Right.
Or if we can get her into something that she actually enjoys, wants to do, this way she's not stuck in the house all day.
Right.
Like, this is actually something that brings fulfillment in her life. All we really need. She doesn't even need to work full time.
Right.
She could be part time. And even if she only brings in a thousand to two thousand bucks, that puts us in a very good position. That thousand to two thousand, she could cover her car payment and she could pay her credit card payments. That's all you really need.
Yes.
Because that was, that was the nine. That was the 920 number, right?
Yeah.
And if we eliminate 920 from that end and we're able to pay off about $500 worth of payments, you're going to be in a very healthy cash flow position. And then if you keep excelling in your, in your workplace, right. You maybe get a raise or bonus or anything like that. That's, that's the play. That's the move right there.
Right.
Now let me give you one more option that is more of a cool, quick, it's a quicker fix, but it's also a reset.
Right?
So it's going to, so this option, we'll just call it option two. This here that we just discussed, all of this is option one, for some.
Reason that the camera goes blurry on and off sometimes, not always.
Yeah.
Okay, don't worry, you know, on.
Okay, don't worry. I have it all recorded. So I'll send this to you. And it's, it's much cleaner on my end. Much, much better. Okay, so sorry about that. So I'll still say it to you so you can follow along.
Okay.
So option two is quick fix, reset, clean slate.
Okay.
That would involve either selling the property and the proceeds that you get from the sell, you would move into an apartment where you rent for less than what it costs to maintain the house.
Right.
And the utilities.
Right.
So you recover quite a bit of cash flow there. And you have, you'll have some profit in the sell of, of the home. And that obviously puts you in a better financial position, period. No doubt about it.
Okay.
So selling the property and then the proceeds, you would simply hold on to, to, you know, move, being you're going to downsize in a smaller apartment, get only what you need, maybe a three bed, two bath, kids share a room, or each kid has a room, or you do a 2, 2 where kids share a room and then you and partner in one room, right. Or three, two. And you would be able to find something definitely in Port St. Lucie around that area for less than what you pay now for your mortgage payment, property taxes, insurance and utilities on that, on that home.
Right?
So that would be option two. Option three, which is something I would personally consider if the math makes sense. Where option 3 is, you move out to increase the rental income on your property. So if we were able to replace you as your own tenant and put someone in there, and that rent would more than cover the mortgage, insurance, taxes and utilities of that property. And then you move into, you downsize completely, say into like a two, two, and you rock it out, right? Where you, you just completely downsize. You rock it out, you and the kids. And maybe that kind of change because everybody's different that I work with, right? Some people. Let me see why. Okay. Some people really need that push to be backed against the wall and then they do something with their life, right? They go make something of themselves when they like, they crash and burn. Or they put themselves in a very humble kind of situation, such as downsizing from their current lifestyle into something way more humble, super affordable, according to your numbers. And you're renting for super cheap and it's smaller space, but you're able to make it work. And maybe you only do that for, for like a year, right, or two years, because it just motivates the heck out of you to make more money, be more productive, and then change the living arrangements after that. You know, some, some people are really good at doing that. So I'm someone that if pushed, I really react and I turn the pressure up and I'm able to produce. I'm able to do really well under pressure. When I'm not under pressure, I tend to get a little more comfortable and I'm a little bit of like, I'll coast and I'll just, I'll do the right things, but I don't take on more risk. But if I'm backed up and I'm under pressure, I perform very well. So sometimes I need to put myself under pressure intentionally to perform very well. So depending on how you are, option three might, might make a lot of sense. Talking about earlier what you were saying about being able to like, you know, get another tenant in the home that, you know, you house hack it, able to create more cash flow. Well, what would it look like if you just completely got out of there and if you were to get, you know, more money, that again, more than covers the mortgage, but also gives you more cash flow to like cover a majority of your rent in that new apartment that you would ultimately be in. And then that now puts you in this healthy, positive cash flow position that allows you to perform better in your overall life. So do you have an idea, right, just to try to run quick numbers here on, on option three, do you have an idea if you weren't living in the home? And give me the dimensions of your house.
Right?
How many bedrooms, how many baths, how much you think you could rent what you're currently taking up?
Right.
You're collecting a thousand dollars a month for one bedroom, which is the master, and then it has its own entrance right into the home?
Yes, in the back.
And do they have their own bathroom as well?
Yes, inside and a walk in closet.
Walk in closet, their own bathroom. And, and do they have a, a kitchen space or is that being okay?
I, I put, I, I put, I.
Put like a small kitchen, like a.
Little, small, small refrigerator, a microwave and a kitchen table. Kitchenette table, but not stove. You know, he, the guy who's renting, he works at Amazon and he has like a little burner, electric burner, and he uses to do soup or something that he wants to cook.
Gotcha.
Something major.
Gotcha. Okay.
Yeah, look, so, so the rent around here based on silo is. I'm looking at 2750. I said I share the link there.
Yeah, so, so two. So $2,750. And how much are, how much space are you covering in the home? What's the dimensions of the home? How many bedrooms, how many baths in total?
Three. Two.
Okay, so it's a three, two and one bed. One bath is currently making a thousand a month. So the other two bedrooms and one bath, you're saying could maybe bring in about 2,000, 7:50, about 18.
No, I will say maybe about, maybe 2,000. I will say because total here, one of the properties, three bedroom, two bath, 2750.
Okay.
Or 2,800 if you subtract a thousand from like we, we left off with the rest. Remaining portion of the house is like 1,800, but I think maybe maybe 2,000 to round it up. Yeah, so maybe about 3,000 total.
Right, so 3,000 total. So in this example, option three is not going to make sense because you're mortgage payments 3084. So you're going to be operating out of, out of a negative. So the only way this works is if we can get that rent, say around 2500 or more where it more than covers the mortgage payment.
Yeah.
So that reduces your expense.
Right.
And then the, the additional cash flow gives you the ability to now redirect that 2000 toward renting an apartment.
Right.
And if we could, so continuing this example here, if we could get you a, if you're able to rent two bed, two bath. You said a two bed, one bath, maybe 2,000. So a two bed, two bath around your area, what do you think that might cost to rent?
2 bath?
Yeah, if you wanted to rent a 2 bed, 2 bath in your area, what do you think? Nothing fancy, of course.
You mean two bed or one one bath because the other bath is in the master bedroom.
No, no, I'm talking about you moving out of your home. Renting, renting an apartment somewhere that's like a two bed Two bath would be like the minimum you would need for your family of four. Just a ballpark. Doesn't have to be accurate.
2,400 on the high end, maybe 2050.
All right, let's use those numbers for now. So let's say we're bringing in 7,048 19. Let's say you're making, we'll be conservative, 1,000amonth with Uber. And let's say at the very least we, we could get $3,100. So that just increased this to 100.
Right.
2,100 for a two bed, one bath in your home and then 1,000amonth for the one bed, one bath.
Okay.
Rental income. Let's see what this ends up looking like. 7,048 19 plus 1,000 plus 31. So you'd be bringing in 11,148 19. And I'll use the 8,738 52 number, expenses plus say 2,200 for rent. Kind of like right in the middle of 24 and 2050 for rent. So you would be here 10,009 38. Total cost of living 11,148 19 - 10,938 52 leaves you with positive cash flow without paying off any other debts, right? Puts you in a positive cash flow position. And that ultimately relieves some stress. And with some tax strategy, now that you'd be turning that investment, that primary residence into an investment, pretty much a full investment. Maybe there's some tax moves there. You know, if we're able to rent it for more, then obviously, you know, you can increase the rents over time. That, that creates more cash flow. And then obviously if I'm operating out of a positive position, then that ultimately allows me to slowly but consistently pay off debt. And in about a year from now, this 209 could become an easy thousand or more. Right, Because I lowballed the different income streams, right? If this was 31, but what if you got, what if you got total 3,300 and Uber, what if you're bringing in 12? So I just added two and two is four. So now you're at 600 cash flow, right? And instead of a rent at 22, what if you are at 2100 or 2000 or less even that ultimately puts you in a really good, solid position. And option three doesn't have to happen right away, but it could be like in conjunction with option one, because as of right now, we're okay. Everything's being paid on time, right? Nothing's late we have six months or more of expenses covered.
And for the car.
Right, for the car, but also for the gap, the negative spread that we're operating out of that we, we pretty much have at least a minimum of six months just looking at that 10 grand to cover 1690. And that's assuming you only make 7,000.
Right.
If you're doing Uber, which I know you are, then it obviously closes the gap and it extended, it extends this timeline.
Right.
And technically, right now we only have expenses of 8,094. So our negative is only about a thousand. Right now we're only about, about a thousand negative, which can easily get closed by you doing Uber and bringing in a thousand a month. You're able to close the gap. Any excess, we already spoke about it. In terms of which debts you pay off in order, and you're just making an extra payment of whatever cash flow you have at the end of the month. And then you're recovering $50.
Right.
You then recover $67, you know, when you start paying off these credit cards one by one. Okay, so what I want to do is pause here because that's a lot of information I want to get, I want to get this recording to you that you can go back and watch your action steps is to really share this with, with wife. Let's see if we can get her on board. Say, look, this is, this is the best option for peace now. And long term, this allows us to ultimately grow. It's clear that, you know, we've been at this for over a decade. But also get from her perspective, maybe she sees, maybe she does want to be with you for life, but figuring out what is it that's actually blocking us, what are the top three things that's actually preventing us from having a healthy relationship long term.
Right.
And if she's on the same page with you where it's like, yeah, you know, we, we had a good run. We, we, we've been at this for over 12 years. We got two beautiful children. But in terms of us, I don't see it long term, but I do see a world where we can be respectable, peaceful adults that have a desire. We have a shared love for each other on a level of, yeah, I don't want to see you fail in life. I want to see you, you know, do well and I want to continue to help you. And that goes both ways. And then you also have a shared love for the two boys that we want to make sure their mom is in their life, their dad is in their life, despite mom and dad not ultimately being together, but that's going to. The chances of your boys not ending up in prison, jail or dead increases dramatically when the father is in the picture.
Right?
So that's you, you being in the picture, mom staying in the picture. Even if it's shared households, you know, back and forth, you figure out that peaceful arrangement.
I'm, I'm, I'm happy, I'm happy to, I'm happy to bring her on. I'm, I'm, I'm happy, I'm happy to, I'm happy to bring her on board and I think it will be very helpful for both of us, her and I, and, and, and also see if, if you can help her as well through the other member who speaks Spanish. The thing I, I want to make you aware of also is that in her case, her frustration in life, I think she, I, I know she has manifested that is that she's not able to express herself like she will like to. So let's say, for example, her not, not being, being able to express and speak how she would like to. Well, let's say all the previous jobs that she had in the past is, you know, in the Bravo supermarket as a cash register. She wanted to do better in life. She wanted to move forward. She took a blood vitamin course that is to be able to extract blood, you know, blood for blood work. But she had a hard time finding a job on that area after she got a certificate. Apparently when she goes to the interview, her interaction and the way she speak, you know, doesn't project confidence maybe on the person who's interviewing. And that's causing a lot of stress in her mind. She had another job in a local school called Sunlight Christian Academy. And she was working as in the facility area, helping with everything, like cleaning the bathroom, helping in the lunchroom. And she even got the opportunity to help the teachers with the kids. But she, she eventually got. She was coming late to work, you know, she was not. And she was getting tired of the whole process, so. And now she left the job or she got fired back in June. I don't know. I think she got laid off in June. She was there like for a year plus, and now she's doing the cosmetologist course. And she's having issues in there too, with other students, even with the teachers because of her personality. Her personality. She thinks people are thinking maybe bad about her or criticizing her. She has a lot of issues internally in that sense. And I, I'm looking for a solution to help her, you know, Maybe she, she needs to find a job somewhere where she, she can, she don't have to deal with people like data entry or things like that where she can do it maybe from the comfort of her home or something. Bookkeeping. I'm, I'm starting to work ideas on my end to see if I can come up with something so she can work and, and do it. So just letting you know, you know, those are some of the situations that will come up eventually if you get into helping her and through the, you know, the coaching section with the other member who speaks Spanish.
So, so yeah, I think in addition, like if she had someone she could confide in with those feelings and emotions like a coach to help her overcome that, you know, that, that, that, that confidence, that social aspect because that's, that's either past trauma, that's you know, belief systems that are not helpful for us to have as individuals. So those are things that we can simply overcome. Also the, the opportunity of possibly learning English could be a really, really big confidence building.
Yeah.
Tool for her over time. You know, not something right away because I know it's a big undertaking, but you know, being able.
Reading a book, you know, reading a book or looking for a way to self educate yourself. I even told her let's, let's see together once every two weeks and let's read our book together so we can grow right. And develop. Looking for ways to improve. But I, since I asked her, she haven't, we haven't done it. But yeah, I want to help her.
Yeah, it definitely sounds like she has a lot of fear, you know, and it's something that just simply we have to overcome at some point. You know, we're so, you know, we're adults. You know, we're adults. She's not a, she's not a child. She's not. So at some point we're gonna, we're gonna build that. So that's, that's, you know, not something right this second. But I think over time can definitely be the case.
So I know time is limited and we want to, you know, work on other stuff. There was a, a few other options that I have in mind. I didn't know if he's.
How about, how about you on the.
Under the, under the notes sections on the Excel sheet regarding P. Lack Business like. Or he like. Okay. So my wife, I believe she has better credit and I, if I am not 100%, you know, based on their criteria, I need to be on the right, we need to be on the right spot in order to apply for a personal line of credit to consolidate all the debt in one place instead of having so many credit cards at once. That's, that's, that was another option that I was thinking. But we, we need, I need to, we need, I need to ensure that she's on board with that idea. If you think that is appropriate or it will work. That's one option that I was thinking. And also I mentioned in here that I have a credit card from Mid Florida Credit Union that I have like about $5,000 in and they allow me to use it as a line of credit. I can, every time I withdraw, I can withdraw up to 5,000, but they'll charge me like 3% or something like that or, or 1%. So I don't know if that will be able to be used in order to do velocity banking.
Yeah. So honestly, those are easy no's for me.
Okay.
Not things I want to look at. It's, it's not going to solve the root issues of what we have here. Also, I don't even think velocity banking is something I want to do right now. I think it's too complex and you have, you have too many variables, especially with wife not necessarily being on board with everything or on the same page that can throw a wrench into anything you try to do. It could throw a wrench because it's like, oh, then this came up and now this comes up and this. So we have to, you know, kind of solve that issue first. And my goal is stabilize first. I want to stabilize the finances in your household. I want to get on a consistent positive cash flow per month and I want to have some sort of financial security or foundation like money saved before I implement, you know, say velocity banking. So I want to be a little more patient with that. That's just my suggestion.
Okay with that. Okay, yeah, sounds good.
Awesome. So I think we can, I think we can close here. And we did.
Good.
