Before they...I can't continue to refer to myself in third person so SURPRISE!!! It is about us.... Before we took Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class when it was offered through Pape-Dawson Engineers when I still worked there, I couldn't imagine the words "financial" and "peace" in the same sentence. The thought of talking about finances or money made me ill, defensive and sometimes terrified. We were a mostly one income family and our priorities about how we spent our money were not in line. To discuss it usually led to a not so civil debate about the value of poker night, NFL network and extra tech compared with dinners out, nice cars and nice clothes. This might scare you, but it turns our we didn't need any of those things and decided that until we could pay for everything with cash, we needed to stop spoiling ourselves.
We didn't deserve that break. What we did deserve was four walls and a roof over our head (with utilities), food to feed our family, clothing (not necessarily fashion) and transportation(not necessarily a car). When we took the class we were at the end of an era where we were paying for everything on our credit card to collect reward points and "paying off the balance" at the end of every month. But that plan wasn't really a plan. It was a way to not address the problem. We had credit, so the card ALWAYS worked even if the check at the end of the month didn't cover it. Little by little our debt racked up and in the meantime WE BOUGHT A HOUSE!!! Yay us! right?!
Not including the house, we had over $30,000 in debt. Ours wasn't the highest in the class and the class total debt to begin was over $1,000,000 for 40 families. It was a good place to start, with a real interest to improve a real problem with a room full of other financial delinquents. After just one class I knew our life would be different forever. After two classes we had money in a savings account, you know for emergencies. It was the first time we had any plan for an emergency rather than to just put it in with all the other debt on our credit card. Are you surprised? Did you have us pegged, as people who are good at math, to be people who should have been better about balancing outcome vs. income? Well we are human and chances are so are you. THINGS are so tempting. And also STUFF. We liked stuff and we like to go out to eat more than we liked to eat at home.
Things changed. Again I don't know what really turned it around the most. Was it the fear that we would never start a college fund for our kids, or never be able to stop working to death or were we just ready to finally grow up. The Dave Ramsey baby steps are simple. His presentation is both intelligent and hilarious! His fame is not because he is smart. In fact I bet you already know 80% of the things he teaches that pertain to getting out of debt. He is a riot of a speaker. I still laugh every time I listen to him at FPU or entreleadership and I have heard both spiels multiple times.
If you practice what he teaches it take the average family between 2-3 years to get out of debt everything but the house. Can you imagine that? Kevin and I are exceptional so it took us 5 years.
We facilitate the class together at Journey Fellowship. It is a volunteer position. No Dave Ramsey does not pay us nor have I been paid to write this or fill the class. This is just my personal testimony. The class changed my life and perhaps saved our marriage and I highly recommend it even to people who aren't in debt. You can register for the class by clicking here and following the directions there. We have had many great friends go through our class and have made more great friends as facilitators.
So now my (not necessarily) The Top 6 reasons you should sign up for the Force led FPU class at Journey Fellowship this Fall:
6. If you and your spouse ever fight about money,
5. If you regularly pay for things with Visa, Mastercard or American Express,
4. If watching an episode of Hoarders prompt some frightening self reflection,
3. If the word "budget" terrifies you,
2. If you want to understand why and how to invest for your retirement and lastly,
1. If you are ready to live like no one else so later you can LIVE like no one else and also GIVE like no one else.
And finally, as a somewhat related aside. I never gave up my desire to get nice things. I just really redirected my expectations and now I find what I want on a regular basis at Texas Thrift Store on 99 cent Mondays with a 30% off coupon. If I buy items that are the color of the Monday which is generally blue I get them for 99 cents. If they aren't blue I get them for 30% off of the thrift store price and then kids books are buy 4 and get 1 free and the 30% off coupon works for them too (regular price is 69 cents). Look what I scored today. These are just a couple of photos I thought I would share. I also got gymnastics leotards for both girls and a few small plates because I liked them. I still like stuff. This purse was less than $5
And then I got all of these books, 15 of them for $5.76
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