Category: Debt Free Stories / Podcast

Crushing $400k of Debt in 5 Years

Tim and Andria Church join Tim Ulbrich to talk about their journey paying off $400,000 of debt in 5 years. They share their motivation behind such an aggressive repayment strategy, how they did it and their plans now that they are debt free.

About Today’s Guests

Tim Church is the Director of Getting Things Done at Your Financial Pharmacist and a clinical pharmacy specialist at the West Palm Beach VA Medical Center.

He is also the author of Seven Figure Pharmacist: How to Maximize Your Wealth, Eliminate Debt, and Create Wealth and When Eating Right Isn’t Enough: The Top 5 Medications to Control Your Type 2 Diabetes.

Andria Church is a pharmacist and Assistant Professor of Pharmacy Practice at Palm Beach Atlantic University. She specializes in neuropsychiatric pharmacy. She is a native Floridian and an alum of the University of Florida and Palm Beach Atlantic University. Andria is also the one in the relationship that made sure fun money was set aside in the budget.

Summary

Tim Church, YFP’s Director of Getting Things Done, and his wife Andria join Tim Ulbrich on this week’s episode. Tim and Andria are both pharmacists and had a combined debt load of $400,000 in student loans. On this episode, they share their journey of why paying off the loans was important to them, how they paid it all off in 5 years, the hardships along the way and what their plans are now that loans are gone.

Tim and Andria expressed being on the same page financially was crucial for the success of their marriage. They had a lot of conversations about their finances before they were engaged. While Tim expresses that he may have not had the best approach to talking about how to tackle their debt, they found a balance that worked for them.

Their why behind paying off $400,000 so quickly came back to other financial goals they had with wanting to give generously, save for a house, have a family in the future, plan for retirement and be able to provide for their children and future generations of their family. When they had a difficult time with the sacrifices they were making to take down their debt, they would come back to their why to keep them motivated.

In order to achieve such an audacious goal, Tim explains that they had to pull every lever they could. To start, they minimized their expenses and didn’t make any big purchases. Andria and Tim lived in a one-bedroom apartment for the first 3 years of their marriage, didn’t have car loans and didn’t acquire any new debt. Then, they looked at how they could earn additional income. Tim took on overtime opportunities at the VA when it was available, worked special projects and had a moonlighting position for a year. All of this additional income was thrown at their loans. They also took advantage of whatever windfall money came their way, like bonus checks, and put it right toward their debt. Finally, Andria and Tim refinanced their loans multiple times over the course of 5 years locking in a lower interest rate each time. Of course, they also had to make sacrifices along the way. Andria explains that they didn’t take lavish trips, eat out a lot, or buy new clothes and accessories. While this was trying at times, Andria said that they had to check themselves to make sure they weren’t playing the comparison game with others in their field and had to remind each other that they were doing what was best for their future together.

Now that the debt is paid off, Tim and Andria feel like a giant weight has been lifted. They are focusing on padding their emergency fund, saving for a house and are hopeful they can give to those in need.

Mentioned on the Show

• Refinance Your Mortgage with Credible
• Refinance Your Student Loans
• First Republic

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to this week’s episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. It’s an honor to have joining me Tim and Andria Church to talk about their debt-free story and their journey of payin goff $400,000 of debt in five years. I’ve been waiting for this day to come for some time. Such an awesome story of persistence, of working together and how a clear why can help be the necessary motivation when you have such a big, long-term goal such as paying off $400,000 of debt. So Tim and Andria, welcome to the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast.

Tim Church: Hey, Tim. Thanks for having us.

Andria Church: Hi. Yeah, we’re excited.

Tim Ulbrich: So glad. And Tim, I don’t even know if welcoming — it’s your own podcast. I don’t even know if that’s like the right term. But excited to have you on.

Tim Church: Well, it’s nice to be on the other end sometimes.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s right. So Tim Church, take us back to the beginning. You graduated from NEOMed College of Pharmacy, you start residency training. What type of debtload were you looking at then? And had it hit you yet how significant this would be in terms of the repayment journey?
Tim Church: It just kind of felt normal at that point. I mean, everybody else was in a similar position. And I think right when I hit residency and the grace period had ended, I had accumulated debt from undergrad, three years of undergrad, and then also at NEOMed for the PharmD degree. And after all the interest had capitalized, it was pretty close to about $200,000. So like I said, it didn’t really sink in right in the beginning. I was kind of like, OK, everybody else has this debt. This is what everybody faces starting out, you know, no big deal. It will get paid off eventually.

Tim Ulbrich: And so Andria, when you meet Tim as I understand it if I remember this story right, you are still finishing up pharmacy school.

Andria Church: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: Two years of residency still ahead of you. Were you thinking about the weight of the loans at this point in time?

Andria Church: No. I was a third-year pharmacy — well, no. I was in between my second and third year of pharmacy school when I met Tim and he had just finished residency. And so no, I wasn’t thinking about it because kind of like Tim said, everybody had — well, not everybody — but the majority of people had student loans. It was just something that you “had to do” to go to graduate doctoral school. And I remember in undergrad getting this advice. We had some professional financial person come and give a talk at a student organization geared towards students going into the healthcare field. And he had said something that just always stuck with me, which is probably why I didn’t worry about it. He said, “You need to continue to live like a student for the first couple of years after you graduate because you’ll get this massive paycheck and want to live the bigger lifestyle. But you’re going to have these student loans.” So in the back of my mind, it was always the thought, yeah, I’m going to continue to live below my means. So I didn’t feel the weight of it yet, but that’s also probably because I was still a student and I’m like, I just need to focus on graduating, I need to focus on getting a residency. So I wasn’t really thinking about the full weight of what it was going to feel like when I actually had to start paying it off.

Tim Ulbrich: And I know Tim’s good looking, but my gosh. You signed up for this. You said, I’ve got a lot of debt, he’s got a lot of debt, we’re in this together. But I want our listeners to hear, like how did you guys handle this conversation before you got married? And why was that so important to ultimately get to a point where you really treated the debt as ours versus it’s just my debt?

Tim Church: Yeah, it’s a great question, Tim. And I’ll be honest and say, before we got married and when things started clicking for me in terms of wanting to get into a better position and thinking about how I was going to pay off my loans and just making better decisions overall, I thought about this question very hard. And I knew it was going to be very important that if we were going to get married that we — even before we got married, we had to be on the same page with how we were going to look at finances and how we were going to make decisions together to reach those goals together. But the problem was is that in the beginning, I didn’t say it very nicely like that. I wasn’t thinking about oh, let’s look at our goals and dreams together. It was more like, hey, this is what’s going to happen. And are you on board? So I’ll admit that I had the worst approach that you can have with finances and being in a relationship in terms of how to figure out how to be on the same page and know that that’s going to work together because as you mentioned, like it’s a really important part of a relationship. And a lot of marriages and things like that suffer because people cannot come to agreements.

Andria Church: And we were doing — we had that conversation before we were even engaged. We knew that we were on the path, we wanted to get married. And so we started doing a prep for marriage at our church, and there was a financial component. And then we wanted to also take a finance class. And so that very eloquently delivered line from Tim happened before we were even engaged. And it was — it was a large argument that at the time was very frustrating that now we can laugh at because we ended up being on the same page. But yeah, it was just kind of at the time, he got more on board with it first before I did. I, again, I don’t think I had full understanding and I’m thinking, oh yeah, I’ll have to make sacrifices. But I’ll still be able to have some fun and buy things that I want whereas Tim’s like completely gung ho and is ready to just give up everything.

Tim Ulbrich: So Andria, to that point, in all seriousness, we talk — and I give Tim a hard time — but we talk on the show about he’s the all-in kind of person, right? I mean, Tim Church operates at one level, and that’s full speed, you know, whether that’s the awesome work he does with YFP, paying off student loans. And I want to talk about this for a moment because I think, you know, both sides of this, it’s really important to understand how to effectively work with the other person. And what advice would you have, Andria, for those that are listening that are trying to work with this, on this financial piece, whether it’s student loans or another part, and they’re doing it with somebody esle that is all-in, kind of one speed? What advice would you have to make that work from your perspective?

Andria Church: Well I think just reminding the person that it’s about striking a balance. Like it took me some time to realize that we were — we wanted the same goals and we both agreed that being on the same page about our finances was critically important for the success of our future marriage. But I think it’s coming to a middle ground, somewhere in between there, realizing that I needed to get a little bit more on board with his point of view but that he also needed to do the same with mine, that if we were just so gung ho all the way in that direction that we were not going to have any enjoyment or celebrate things throughout the course of those first couple years of our marriage that were worthy of being celebrated, you know, that maybe didn’t — we weren’t going to have a big blowout celebration and go on a big trip, but maybe splurge a little bit on a fancy or something like that versus if we would go all the way to my side, we would not have paid off the loans in five years. So we needed to both reach a middle ground. And it took awhile, a lot of conversations, a lot of really meaningful and long discussions. And over time, honestly just through practicing and just having open communication with each other, we reached that middle ground. I’m way better and more in line with the finances than I was when we were having those initial discussions. And Tim will also be one to admit that he’s glad that I forced us to have some fun and take a moment to pause and really celebrate those small victories that we were having, whether it was getting the student loans off, celebrating our anniversary, or just those things that were really important during those first five years of marriage that we can’t go back and redo. So it was just, honestly just having open communication with each other and expressing frustrations and how we feel about the situation to really ultimately work together and be successful.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I’m so glad, Andria, you know, the word that I took away from there was really balance. And I love how you framed that in the first five years of marriage. I mean, obviously there’s strength in being in the position you are now going forward. But making sure — I mean, that’s no short period of time. It’s not like you guys were paying this off for three months. I mean, five years. And it’s a lot of money. And we’ll talk about more of the numbers and the x’s and o’s. But I think striking a balance. So Tim, as you reflect on this journey with that word balance in mind, you know, when you look back, what are some of the things that helped you get to that point of finding that balanc? And perhaps what would you go back and tell yourself to maybe be more balanced even early on?

Tim Church: Yeah, I think one of the things that we did was after we paid off about $10,000 in student loan debt, we tried to have little celebrations, like Andria said, going out to dinner, maybe even doing like stay at a hotel down in Fort Lauderdale, not too far away, or something like that. And I think the other thing that really helped is one thing that we tried to still do during this time is go and visit family and friends but do it in a very frugal way I’ll say and just be very tactical about how we did that. So I think that was really important, like reflecting back. If I could say what is the one thing that I would not have changed was that and probably should have even considered doing more of that because those are the things that really, we’re never going to regret because we can’t get the time back.

Tim Ulbrich: Love it. Love it. So let’s transition, Andria, to the why for the two of you. We talk about this on the show all the time, the importance of having a why and motivation behind your financial plan. And here, we’re talking about paying off a massive amount of debt and, again, no small feat, five years, lots of difficult conversations. So so important to have a why and a purpose. For you and Tim, what is the why? What’s the motivation behind so aggressively paying off this debtload and getting to the point of being debt-free?

Andria Church: I think the why was just that we had other financial goals and desires that we have for our life together. We wanted to be able to give generously and abundantly to all of those around us and even people that we didn’t know. And in order to do that, we knew that the debt needed to be gone. And it also just was this constant weight that we felt on our shoulders that it was there and felt like we couldn’t really fully enjoy things or take certain luxuries because we would look at it and say, “OK, is this a need to or a want to?” You know, a have to or a want to. And we had to make some of those tough calls that if it wasn’t a have to and it wasn’t a true need, you know, putting that money then towards the debt in the long run, that was going to help us get to those goals quicker. Aside from being able to give abundantly to others, being able to get a house and plan for our future family and retirement, I mean, really long-term vision goals and just also being able to want to provide for our future children when they go off to school and even thinking about grandkids and like just the future generations of the family that we would be creating together. So all of those things was really the long-term vision, even though sometimes on the day-to-day grind, it was hard. You might lose sight of those and think, why are we doing this? Maybe we should just spend a little bit more money. Is it really going to make a big deal in the long run? And I think what really kept us on track was that big why and the fact that we both were on the same page about it and felt the same way and wanted to achieve that goal together.

Tim Church: Even though we had disagreements along the way.

Andria Church: Yes. Not to paint a rose-colored vision of it because yes, there were disagreements.

Tim Ulbrich: And I hear there’s a cat in the future? Is that true? Now that we’re debt-free, is that happening?

Andria Church: Yes, that was the long-term promise that I was going to be allowed to get a cat once we were debt-free, even though despite my best efforts to convince Tim that we needed a cat much earlier on in our marriage. Yeah, that is a goal that is happening.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome. Tim, let’s talk x’s and o’s for a minute when it comes to repayment. You know, you’re the student loan expert, and we’re going to talk a little bit in a moment about the book that you have coming out. And we talk all the time on the show about there are so many options in the federal system. You’ve got forgiveness, non-forgiveness, income-driven repayment, standard 10-year repayment. Then you’ve got the whole host of options in the refinance market. And how overwhelming this can be. So when we talk about $400,000 of deb tin five years, what was the repayment strategy? And as you look back, was that the best one?

Tim Church: Yeah. In the very beginning, I didn’t really know what all my options were. And unfortunately, we didn’t — I didn’t have a strong background with my family, friends or people that were very knowledgeable about this area nor did I have a very strong capstone or discussion, really, on student loans and what those options were. So you know, for the longest time in my mind, it was just kind of get rid of them as fast as possible, you know, however you can make it happen. When I look back at this point — and I talk about this in the book obviously with my story — that not considering forgiveness given my situation was a big mistake. I mean, it really costs — there’s a huge opportunity cost to not doing that. It’s great that the debt is paid off and it’s no longer here, but I probably could have been in a better financial position after 10 years than after being in — after the five years that we were married. So there were definitely some things that I reflect on and would say I wish I could have went a little bit of a different way. However, being intentional about trying to get rid of the student loans as soon as possible, you know, we basically utilized, pulled every lever, used every tactic that we could. So obviously the biggest thing is how do you cut back on expenses? How do you minimize those? So one of the key things I think that really helped for us is really looking at those big purchases. So we lived in a one-bedroom apartment for the first three years of our marriage. And you know, we live in south Florida, so it’s definitely not cheap to live here. It’s not as expensive as some other areas, but it’s certainly not cheap. But we made that big sacrifice and definitely got a lot of questions about why we were doing that based on our income. But I think that was actually really huge because we were able to save on those costs. We never — once my car was paid off really early on in the first year of marriage, I think it was right around there, we didn’t really have any car loans, so we had no debt coming from there. So I think we were very fortunate that beyond — really, we just had the student loans that we were working with and didn’t acquire any new debt with credit cards or other things like that. So starting out, those were kind of some of the big tactics. And then I would say the other one along the way was just looking at ways that I could earn additional income. So I did work overtime when it was available through the VA. I took on different special projects that came up. And then I eventually did a moonlighting position for about a year and a half. And that really helped accelerate things because I was just chunking all of that additional money towards the loans, so just making as big of payments as possible. And then I would say — so if you look at those as being kind of the top big strategies, then there’s a couple other things that I think really were in our favor during this time. So what do I mean by that? Well, one of the things is really taking advantage of windfalls. So you don’t know exactly when you’re going to get bonus checks. You don’t know when you’re going to get unexpected money like cashing out a life insurance that you might not necessarily need or stock options you didn’t know that you had that are not in retirement that you don’t really want anymore or for the time being it’s more important to pay off the loans. So all of these things that we never expected were going to be given to us, we really took those and just threw it right at the debt. We never even thought about it as well, how could we spend that money? It was just like, let’s put a massive dent in this student loan — in these student loans. So I think that was key. And then finally, one of the things is obviously refinancing for us. We did that multiple times throughout the five years. And when you look at it, the amount of interest that you pay can be pretty massive. I mean, looking back for awhile, federal student loan interest rates were anywhere in the 6-8% range. And that can really tack onto those payments that you’re making every month. So it makes it hard to really attack the principle. So we were very fortunate that throughout that five years, we continued to find better rates each time that we refinanced. So even though it wasn’t I would say as huge of a lever as some of the other things that we did, it was still really important and really helped us accelerate.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, one of the things, Tim, I love that you said in that was having clarity on where windfalls would come. And you gave some great examples of that. And to me, that goes back to being crystal clear on your goals and having a prioritized list of goals so when that windfall comes, you know exactly what you’re trying to achieve with that and then it feels like you’re hitting the accelerator on that goal, which I think just further provides momentum, obviously. One of the things I want to pull from the book, Tim — and we’re going to talk about this on an upcoming episode in much more detail — so for those that don’t yet know, we’re getting ready to release “The Pharmacist’s Guide to Conquering PharmD Student Loans: How to confidently choose the best payoff strategy that saves you the most money” written by Tim Church. And in there, you say — and this comes from the introduction — you say, “but once that highly anticipated moment had come and gone,” referring to hitting submit on that last payment, “feelings other than happiness and relief set in, ones that I didn’t necessarily expect or want. I was angry and frustrated. I had some major regrets.” What I love about that as I read through the book is I feel like you’ve evaluated and understand all of the options that are on the table. And obviously here you are on the back end, you’ve got an awesome success story and certainly a bright future ahead. But I think by navigating this, by understanding the ins and outs of all of these repayment options, you’ve been able to package that in a way that is very easy to understand for a topic that is not so easy to understand. And so we’ll talk more about the book in an upcoming episode, but I think you’ve got some great wisdom in there. I’m excited to share that with the YFP community. So Andria, $400,000 of debt in five years. So I want to break this down for a minute. That’s $80,000 per year on average, $6,667 per month on average, $1,538 per week on average, and $219 per day on average. I had to triple check my math when I did that because I saw those numbers and I’m like, oh my gosh. $219 per day on average over five years. That’s really incredible when you think about how accelerated that is and obviously how much of that was ultimately going to principle to be able to minimize the interest that was accruing. So question here is when you’re doing that, even on two pharmacists’ income, it doesn’t matter. That is big sacrifice. We’re talking about $6,667 per month, which essentially for many pharmacists is about the equivalent of a full pharmacist’s salary net income going towards student loan debt. So talk to me about the sacrifices that you had to make to be able to pay off that much debt and obviously free up cash flow each and every month to get there.

Andria Church: Well as Tim mentioned a little bit ago, both of our cars had been paid off. So we did not go out and get new cars. We’ve had — my car is, she’s going to be 11 this year. And Tim’s is a little bit younger but also getting up there in age. So we still have the same cars that we’ve had all this time. So didn’t buy new cars, didn’t go and buy a condo or a house, didn’t go on big lavish trips, even though it’s a goal of ours to travel throughout the United States and internationally. As Tim said, we would take trips to visit family and friends, those critical moments that we didn’t want to look back and miss out on. But taking a dream trip or a trip for extended periods of time, that didn’t happen. For me, buying clothes or accessories or other things that I wanted, that didn’t happen either. And same for Tim, although Tim is less into stuff. I will admit that I am a stuff person. I like things, even though I like experiences too. And you know, also just simple things like cutting back on going out to dinner. We realized so quickly how expensive food is. Not just groceries, but just eating out. And also for me too, I love going out to get coffee. So also having to scale back on that and realizing I can’t be going to buy coffee every day outside of the house. And so something as simple as that, which is just a couple of bucks, right? But that adds up. And Tim would always say something to me that sometimes would resonate and kind of snap me back into reality, you know, death by a thousand cuts. Like I would say, “Oh, it’s only $5. What’s the big deal?” But $5 over multiple periods of time, you know, that could really add up. And so it — it was thinking about the why, it helped stay motivated, helped us stay motivated and helped keep me on track. But there were definitely days where I had the fear of missing out, the FOMO that I would look at our friends or other people who were pharmacists that were friends or other healthcare professionals, people making equal salaries or more to what we were making and just feeling like are we ever going to get there? How old are we going to be when we finally — what I felt like was really start our life? Like are we just going to be in this one bedroom, one bathroom apartment forever? We couldn’t have people stay with us. It was always a challenge and having grown adults sleeping on an air mattress just at a certain point just seemed ridiculous. So it was hard. I’m not going to pretend like even though we were on the same page that making these sacrifices wasn’t a challenge. And we had to constantly remind ourselves to not play the comparison game. And certainly in the day and age of social media, it doesn’t help. And you really have to put yourself in check and just say, “OK, but this is what Tim and I are doing. This is what we’ve decided together that we want to do for our marriage, that we want to do for our future. And in the long run, isn’t that what’s more important than the outfit that I really feel like I need but that I don’t really need?” You know? Is that more important than throwing money towards the student loans. So those were just definitely some challenges that we had to really look at and face and talk about. And we shared that with each other, frustrations like ah, I wish we could go do this or buy this or have this. And OK, yeah, but babe, remember we want to stay on track. And ironically, there were moments where I was the tougher one, reminding Tim and saying, “OK, babe, we can’t be spending that money on that. We need to put it towards the loans.” So yeah, it was tough.

Tim Ulbrich: Such wisdom there, and I hope our listeners are encouraged by that and hear the reality of obviously the excitement and the joy but also the challenges along the way. Now, being in south Florida before and having been able to experience the famous Pub Sub from Publix, I honestly — I don’t think I could control myself to cut that out of my budget. So kudos to you guys if you were able to do that. But for those that haven’t been to south Florida, haven’t been to Publix, it may be worth the trip just to go there and get the Pub Sub from Publix. So Tim Church, let me ask you about kind of handling the debt in the context of other goals. So obviously I’ve got a little bit of an insider view in your story and I know that you were ultimately able to refinance to a really, really low interest rate with First Republic and that offer. And so I think some people may struggle with should I — if I have a really low interest rate, should I be going all in on the debt? Or when I get to a fixed interest like that that’s so low, should I be prioritizing other goals like saving for the future? So talk to us about how you found that balance and ultimately came to that decision.

Tim Church: Yeah, I think early on when we first started paying off the debt, it was kind of like, forget retirement, forget everything else, we’re going all-in. And you know, once we kind of realized how long we were going to be in this, we really didn’t want to go five years without putting any money towards retirement. So one of the things that I think was great along the way is we were still saving for retirement. So we both have matches at work, so we made sure that we contributed enough to get our matches. And then we also did a fully funded Health Savings Account every year that we were able to and that I had it because, you know, really looking at that as another retirement account but also some of the tax benefits. So that worked for us. And I know everyone has a lot of different opinions about how aggressive to kind of be on that timeline. You know, you have a lot of people that will prolong the time to pay off their debt because of the other things. And you know, we wanted to kind of find a balance that worked for us. So we were still doing something but also really after that being as aggressive as we could. You mentioned in that final year, so we didn’t even know about First Republic, and they’re a bank that’s in very specific locations, so New York, south Florida, California and some other areas. But they offer ridiculously low interest rates. So we actually — it was on Andria’s loan, but we were obviously as you talked about were paying it off together, that her loan for a five-year fixed interest rate was down to 1.95%. But what’s crazy is not only that, they will pay you back up to 2% of the interest that you pay if you pay it back within four years, which is like unheard of. So that was actually a struggle. We actually had quite a few discussions about that, like look, we could start saving, getting a down payment on a house, going let’s let these ride for four years, pay it back over four years because the interest rate is so low. I mean, that really was a tough decision. I mean, to go, still go all-in and pay that off. And I think what we ultimately came to the same conclusion is, yes, there are certainly benefits there. But that emotional weight and that anxiety that the loans were still having on us, getting rid of that outweighed any potential mathematical advantage behind it. And obviously sometimes it’s tough for somebody from the outside to look at that, but that was really kind of where we were.

Andria Church: And we just felt like we could see the end of the finish line. And so like what Tim was saying is just knowing OK, yeah, we could hold onto it. But we’re so close. And we’re just like, let’s just get this out of our lives, that that meant more to us than yes, possibly being able to prolong the loan payoff and save for a house, for example. We just, we had put it in our mind that this was something that we were going to do, that we wanted to definitely have it paid off before we had any kids, which of course we’re like, OK, we might not have control over that, but that was like a goal we really wanted. And so it’s like, let’s just meet this goal. We want to get this over with.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think, Tim, you do a nice job of this in the book, you know, talking about obviously the x’s and o’s and strategies but layering on top of that the emotional part, the things we talk about: How do you feel about the debt? And what’s the momentum and the velocity of that momentum worth? And it’s hard to put a dollar amount to that, but it has to be evaluated as one is considering the repayment strategy. So Andria, we have the class of 2020 that is coming out as we publish this episode. And I think they’re coming out in very unique times obviously with what’s going on with COVID-19, some uncertainty around the job market and obviously just the challenges and the times that we’re in, high debt loads, all the variables we know that they’re facing. And certainly we know they’re going to do great things with the opportunities they have as well. What advice would you have — looking back several years when you walked across that stage, what advice would you have for those students that are coming out in the class of 2020 as they get ready to make this transition into new practitioner life?

Andria Church: I would say to definitely consider all of their repayment options, kind of like Tim alluded to that he feels — has regret over not making certain decisions. And I was in the same boat. You know, we both were like, let’s just get it paid off, which there’s nothing wrong with that but just really researching and kind of digging down to figure out what are their options depending on what career that they are stepping into. Is it the private sector? Are they going to be working for the government, etc.? And then two, just also being willing to make some sacrifices that you’re going to step into a job that has a huge salary and it’s going to look very glamorous. And when you get that paycheck because it’s going to be more money than likely you’ve ever made, and the pull, the lifestyle tug is going to be there, the FOMO, you know, maybe peers that didn’t have loans that are living it up a little bit bigger because they’re financially able to. That tug and that temptation is going to be there. But that — just to think about what are your long-term financial goals? Do you want to have this debt hanging around for decades? Or are you willing to make some sacrifices? You know, yes, celebrate this huge victory that you just did, that you earned your PharmD, that you’re getting your first big adult job or maybe it’s your second one if it’s a second career. Celebrate that. There’s nothing wrong with that. Treat yourself a little bit. But be willing to make some sacrifices and not compare yourself. As long as you are on the right track and you feel like you are being a good steward of your money, then that’s what really matters. And if you’re in a relationship with someone that you and the other person are also on the same page with your finances. So to me, it doesn’t matter if you’re — it’s just you or it’s you and another person, that you’re making the best and smartest decisions for your financial future.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. I love that. Tim Church, so we go back to the numbers here. $6,667 per month on average over a five-year period to pay off $400,000 of debt. You hit submit on the last payment, you no longer have to send in on average $6,667 per month. So what’s the game plan going forward? What goals are ahead as you guys look at kind of this life after being debt-free?

Tim Church: Yeah, I mean, like I said, I had some bittersweet thoughts after it kind of happened. But I mean, it definitely just feels like an immense weight is off of us. And it’s just nice that that payment’s not automatically drafted out of the bank account. And so I mean, one of the things is obviously we let loose a little bit. You know, Andria wanted to have a little bit of a shopping spree, so we made that happen. You know, we’ve done some things that we wanted to do that weren’t as intense. So that was really nice. And then really padding the emergency fund was our next big goal that we wanted to do. And then really right after, as we kind of finalized and get that buttoned up is really the next thing is going for a house is one of our big goals.

Tim Ulbrich: Time to be on the offense, right? It’s exciting times.

Tim Church: Yeah. And I think the other thing — and Andria mentioned this a little before — is just the ability to be more generous. I mean, I think that everyone is coming from a different position. But I think that when you have a sound financial plan and you’re in a position to give and help others, you know, that’s something that we truly believe in. And sometimes that may be something that’s planned for and that is continuous, but there’s also going to be opportunities that you may not even know that are going to come up, whether that’s family members, friends or complete strangers you don’t know. And that’s something that we’re looking forward to, to be able to do that.

Tim Ulbrich: I love that. And thank you both so much for taking time to share your story. I know it’s been an inspiration to me and it will be to many in the community, whether those that have achieved that journey or are in the midst of it or students that are listening and thinking about what’s ahead. So proud of you guys for the journey that you’ve had and excited for what lies ahead for your family and those that are going to be positively impacted by your generosity. So thank you so much for taking time to share your story.

Tim Church: Thanks, Tim.

Andria Church: Thank you.

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How Two Pharmacists Paid Off $214k of Student Loans in 17 Months

Levi Ellison, PharmD, shares how he and his wife paid off $214,594.55 of student loans over 17 months. Levi talks about the motivations behind such an aggressive repayment strategy, how they were able to do it and what they hope to accomplish now that they are debt free.

About Today’s Guest

Levi Ellison has been married to his loving wife, Jessica Ellison, since the summer of 2018 following their May graduation from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College of Pharmacy in Little Rock. While in pharmacy school Levi was a winning team member of the 2017 Good Neighbor Pharmacy National Community Pharmacy Association Pruitt-Schutte Student Business Plan. Immediately following graduation he received a $20,000 sign on bonus for a 2-year commitment to work in his hometown of Mena, Arkansas as a staff pharmacist at Walgreens. He serves as a Sunday school teacher for young adults at Salem Baptist Church, Treasurer of the Polk County Republican Committee, and served as a Financial Peace University Coordinator. He enjoys running, traveling with his wife, spending time with his family, and being debt free!

Summary

Levi Ellison shares his remarkable story of how he and Jessica, his wife who is also a pharmacist, paid off $214,594.55 of student loan debt over 17 months. While in school, Levi and Jessica were pretty aware of how much money they were taking out and knew that they didn’t feel good about taking out more than they needed. That mentally paired with some scholarships allowed them to both graduate under the average debt load that most pharmacists carry.

They were motivated by Joe Baker’s personal finance class in pharmacy school and by Dave Ramsey’s book Total Money Makeover. Following the Dave Ramsey approach, they knew that they wanted to attack their debt in a gazelle-like fashion so that they could move on to other financial goals that are important to them. By following a strict budget and using a budgeting app called EveryDollar along with a homemade allocated spending budget, they were able to pay off $214,594.55 in 17 months while tithing 10% of their gross income to their church. This payoff breaks down to:

$151,478.51/year

$12,623.21/month

$2,899.93/week

$414.28/day

Levi discusses how they worked together as a team to accomplish this goal and what their plans are now that they aren’t spending over $12,000 a month on student loans.

Mentioned on the Show

• PolicyGenius
• Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey
• EveryDollar
• I Will Teach You to Be Rich by Ramit Sethi
• Compass Money Map
• Financial Peace University

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to this week’s episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist. Excited to welcome Levi Ellison onto the show to share his debt-free story. Levi, welcome and thank you for taking the time.

Levi Ellison: Thank you, Tim. It’s great to be with you.

Tim Ulbrich: So grateful that you reached out to share your incredible story of paying off a lot of debt, a lot of debt, in a really, really short period of time. When I first heard about your story, you and your wife Jessica tackling over $214,000 of debt over 17 months, I thought to myself, wow, what an amazing accomplishment. And I can’t wait to hear exactly more of the details about how you accomplished this and why you were so aggressive in your repayment. And I’m excited to share this with the YFP community as well. So let’s start. Can you share a little bit of background about you and your wife Jessica, where you went to school and then ultimately the work that you’re doing now?

Levi Ellison: Yes. So my wife and I, Jessica, we went to the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. And that’s in Little Rock, Arkansas. We met in school there, pretty much simultaneously there and our church and in Sunday school. So we were in the same classes, we were in the same church, so we’re doing everything together and ended up getting married the summer following pharmacy school. And on our honeymoon, we got a — I received a sign-on bonus from Walgreens and that was a substantial figure and if you don’t mind me sharing, I’ll just tell the YFP community, it was $20,000. And that sounds awesome and it sounds great. It’s like, wow, you could put $20,000 straight towards loans. But once it hits your bank account, it suspiciously looked like $13,000.

Tim Ulbrich: The tax.

Levi Ellison: Yeah, yeah. It was terrible. But that day it hit our account on our honeymoon. As soon as we got home, we put that all towards loans. And that really got the ball rolling. And we were, you know, obviously very intense with the way we paid off loans just from the get-go and never looking back I think really set up a strong foundation for us.

Tim Ulbrich: So and I want to make sure our audience understands, so two pharmacists, obviously.

Levi Ellison: Yes. Right.

Tim Ulbrich: But nonetheless, as people start to translate this to their personal situation, something I mentioned to you before the show, is I did that for me, two pharmacists’ income, there’s only so much take-home pay. So when we talk about, you know, figures like $12,600 roughly per month over that 17-month period on average, that means there was a lot of sacrifice, a lot of cutting of expenses and obviously now you’re on the back end of that, and we’ll talk about the journey between, but nonetheless, two pharmacists’ income does not necessarily just mean that this was an easy path. And so I want to re-emphasize that. Now, one of the things, Levi, I often wonder is we don’t talk much about the accrual phase of the debt. You know, we talk about the debt paydown part of it, but for someone who clearly had very strong motivations right after school to get this paid off, I’m wondering, I’m guessing many of our listeners are wondering, well, what did you think about this while you were in school? Did it really dawn on you? Did it bother you? And as you look back, what strategies did you take or could you have taken to mitigate some of that damage rather than obviously what we’re going to talk a lot about as the payoff part?

Levi Ellison: Tim, that’s a fantastic question, no kidding. I love to answer that. So for me, during school, you know, the first time I signed up for a student loan was my first year of pharmacy school. I took out $20,000. And I thought, phew, this hurts, as I’m sure most of us experienced. I don’t think I like this. And I didn’t. And it started to wear on me. You know, your first year, you’re thinking, I’m just excited to be here.

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: But as you — if you log in maybe once every couple years during pharmacy school and you look, you’re kind of shocked. And I was. And so they did a few small scholarships while I was in school, and I applied for those. Got $1,000 here, $1,000 there. But when you’re talking about the kind of numbers that pharmacy school costs, that’s just not a huge percentage. Every bit helps, but my fourth year of school, they have like a — I don’t know what you would call it — but an ultimate scholarship. It was $15,000 from UAMS that they give away to one student. And I applied for that, had to write an essay, and I got it. And that was really helpful, you know? I could have been more in debt than I was. And so I got that, and then I also applied for a rural scholarship where our Arkansas State Board of Pharmacy, if you’ll go and work in an area of I think it’s 15,000 or less people — I forget all the details. But I know my hometown qualified, and so I was like, I’m going to go back home anyway if they’re going to pay me to do it. I’ll take $15,000 for that and go. And so — it was $15,000 for the scholarship. I got $7,500 from the state board. And so that was over the course of a couple years of pharmacy school, so that helped mitigate some of my own student loans.

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: And then my wife, I think she was fiscally conservative too. And I know she’s going to be listening to this. But I was able to get some of those things, and so that helped on my side. So it wasn’t like I just came out of school and suddenly noticed that I had debt. I mean, I was realizing this and had I known it while I was in undergrad — because we both came out of undergrad debt-free completely. And so that was helpful. But if I’d have really thought this through, I would have started earlier.

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: So if there’s aspiring pharmacists out there that are listening to this show and wonder how they can get through school debt-free, be smart is going to be some of the things I’m sure we’re going to talk about as far as budgeting and saving and I wish I’d have done more of that earlier.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and you and I both know from personal experience just how interest accrues on those loans, especially when you’re in graduate school, unsubsidized loans. And I think what you said is really profound — I felt the same way. You’re in school the first year, you’re excited about the opportunity, you’re not really thinking much about it or what this will be at the end. And what it sounds like, though, what I heard there, Levi, is that you guys really did some things in terms of scholarships and you mentioned the rural piece that allowed you to be in less debt than you could have been.

Levi Ellison: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: I mean, if we look at the averages now, graduates today roughly $170,000. So if we’re going to multiply that by two, obviously you guys worked with a lot of debt, but you were for two pharmacist graduates, you were below the average when you combine the two of those together. So but I think wisdom there, you know, students that are listening, you know, that’s what we kind of always preach is hey, anything that you can be doing to minimize the amount that’s borrowed, even if it seems insignificant, you know, if it’s $18,000 a semester instead of $20,000 a semester, that compounds because of interest and multiple semesters over time.

Levi Ellison: Right. Yeah, if I could add one other tidbit to that, Tim —

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: We both worked while we were in school. I think that’s important not only just financially but just learning. If you want to be a good pharmacist, I don’t think your first day behind the counter ought to be the day you get your license. And so that was helpful as well, clearly, for both of us.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. Yeah, and I think that’s another good reminder, even if that hourly wage doesn’t seem super significant in the scheme of things, it adds up. I want to talk for a moment about the education piece — and a shoutout here to Joe Baker, who we’ve had on the show, has been long in the financial education space at UAMS I think teaching that personal finance elective course since 1999 and has had what I interpret to be a very profound impact on many students coming out of that program and his teachings. And I sense the same here. So tell me a little bit about that class, the personal finance elective that he taught. And what were some of the big takeaways and ultimately what impact that had on your own personal journey?

Levi Ellison: Yeah, so Joe Baker is a tremendous teacher. He gets in there and really makes the class engage. And that was a big reason I guess why I learned so much in there. And I do owe a lot of influence and credit to him for our story. That’s where we picked up the book “The Total Money Makeover” by Dave Ramsey and I’m sure we’ll get into kind of the steps of how we got out of debt, and that was very influential and we followed that to a T. But Joe, he — I tell you what, Tim, I mean, he cares about students and he cared about me and he still checks in with me from time to time. You know how you can sort emails on your phone or on your computer?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Levi Ellison: And I’ve got a separate little inbox for him and so I can read through all his financial stuff that he sends out, updates and things to do and not to do and just staying engaged with money. And it’s not like something that you read 24/7, but as long as you’re staying up-to-date on stuff, you can really make big differences. And we did, anyway. Yeah, love Joe.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. I sense he’s a great teacher and he’s actually working on a book right now and as I’m reading through it, I feel like it’s just spewing with wisdom of multiple years of experience and his teachings to many students along the way. One of the things you said in the email that you and I had connected prior to the interview was the impact of learning things like Time Value of Money and other things. And so I think this is again just a great reminder for students listening, if you have that opportunity like an elective if you’re in college, taking advantage of that. I think it just brings the topic front and center and develops that passion hopefully towards learning. But if not, going out there and finding it. You know, podcasts, blogs, sites that are out there, courses that are out there that can help you learn more about this. So let’s get into the x’s and the o’s. So I’m going to break down the numbers again of what you guys were working with. Total debt load — or excuse me — a total payoff of $214,594.55, but who’s counting, right, with the $.55?

Levi Ellison: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: And if we average that out a little bit more about $151,000 per year, a little over $12,600 per month, $2,900 per week, over $400 per day. That per day is the one that my gosh, when you see that number, you’re like, holy cow.

Levi Ellison: Yeah, that floored both of us because we didn’t realize because you don’t write that check every day.

Tim Ulbrich: Yes.

Levi Ellison: We wrote it every two weeks when we got paid.

Tim Ulbrich: So as I alluded to already, I see that number, $12,600 per month. Even on two pharmacists’ salary, that is incredible. There is only so much take-home pay to work with. So talk us through how you did it. It sounds like the baby steps were a big part of this. But even more details about the budget and kind of how you and Jessica worked together, really each and every month, and I’m sure it was even more often than that.

Levi Ellison: Sure. So I think budget is the key as far as how we were able to do it. More importantly when you get into kind of the nitty-gritty of how we budgeted, is we learned something called an allocated spending plan. And so every two weeks, I have a little Excel chart. I’m a big nerd, so I love looking at this thing. We, you know, just put the money in our checking account in the top line and then we subtracted everything else that was essential, you know, from electric bill, water bill, all your normal stuff, wherever your money’s going to go for the next two weeks. And then whatever money was left over, we immediately, as soon as that hit our checking account, we would put it towards the loan because we knew every day that was passing was about $30 in interest being added. And so if you do it one day sooner, you save $30. I mean, it’s not a full $30 because you’re not getting it all, but that mindset. And so that was how we did it is we just, we said these things are what we have to have. And I can tell you, Tim, over the course of those 17 months, we can count on one hand how many times we ate out on our dime. Our parents took us from time to time, her family would take us, mine would, you know, that sort of thing. But as far as just going even fast food, no. We planned very carefully. I can remember — and we bought a few things that we had to have or at least we thought we did like Jessica’s phone broke, so we went to the AT&T store and I can remember it’s about an 80-mile drive from where we are out in rural Arkansas. And we get there to the AT&T store and we’re like, should we eat lunch before we go in or after? We’re like, well, the food will probably get hot because it’s in the car in our lunch boxes. And so we’re sitting there, eating a sandwich in the AT&T store. We’re like, this is going to be worth it.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Levi Ellison: And I can tell you, it is so worth it now. We look back on that, we laugh, like that was so funny. And now when we go there for traveling, we can go out to eat and have all the chips and salsa we want, you know.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s right.

Levi Ellison: It’s fun.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think there’s something fun about the journey, right? I’m sure for you and Jessica, that brought you guys together in a different way and obviously I can tell just as I hear you talking, you’re reflecting on that together. It was something you accomplished together, and I think that’s a piece we don’t talk enough about is you know, from a marriage standpoint, two people working on something like that and making some sacrifices and working together, that has long, long-term effects, you know, obviously for the good. So I think that’s worth noting as well. Talk to me more about the budget. I’m guessing — I’m wondering, I’m guessing our listeners are wondering as well, it sounds like more of a zero-based budget kind of model.

Levi Ellison: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: Accounting for every single dollar that you’re earning each and every month. You talked about an Excel spreadsheet.

Levi Ellison: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: So was this something that you were leading the charge on? You guys were working together? Was it just staying in Excel? Were you utilizing any apps or tools to help you along that process?

Levi Ellison: Oh, those are all good questions. So we used EveryDollar, Dave Ramsey’s budgeting app. And we had the Premium version, and so it would sync with our phones as far as our — of course, we don’t have any credit cards. But it syncs with our debit cards and we could keep track of every single dollar that came out and came in. And that was kind of the goal for the month. And it gets a little confusing. Anybody that’s ever done a budget, you’re like, well, I still have money left over at the end of the month and I haven’t gotten paid yet for the next month. And so like if you’re sitting here, we’re recording this in March and I’m not going to get paid until April such-and-such date or whatever, you’re like, well, how do I budget for that? Because I’ve already got the money in my account, and so that’s where the allocated spending plan really came into play. And so we were on a two-week budget, even if we have goals for the monthly budget and we can throw that into that allocated spending plan, we can just say, OK, let’s spend a couple hundred dollars on clothes this month because we can now or whatever it is. And you take that and say, we’re going to spend it on this check here or you can do it over the course of a couple ones. And so that’s how we managed to keep track of everything. And as far as us doing it together, it was me doing the math and doing all the charts and stuff for the most part. But what I never did was make that finalized. We would come in together for sure every two weeks, and she would look at it and say, OK, I like this, don’t like this, and she would change a few things. But I’d have it ready for her to look at — at least I would try to. It doesn’t always work out perfectly.

Tim Ulbrich: So to that point, I mean, obviously to be able to pay off more than $200,000 in a very short period of time, two people have to be on the same page.

Levi Ellison: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: But you know, I’m guessing that that doesn’t necessarily mean it was always perfect. Maybe it was.

Levi Ellison: No.

Tim Ulbrich: What was — yeah, what were some of those challenges? And for those that are listening that, you know, may be of a more extreme situation where instead of just a challenge here or there, it’s two people that philosophically — you know, maybe they don’t agree on the goals or the intensity of it. Any words of wisdom there you can share about either challenges you all had or words of advice for others?

Levi Ellison: I don’t think you could have asked a better question. So for two people to be married, you have to be on the same page about money. I don’t know how you couldn’t be. And so this is not something that I just sprung on our honeymoon. We had talked about this beforehand as part of our premarital counseling. And so we were on the same page. And so one thing about us as far as motivation and why would you be so intense about this is we want to be good stewards of what we’ve been given. And so to understand our worldview or our framework that we work in, we’re Christians, and so we’re very involved in our local church. And so along the way, I think this is important for your listeners — we weren’t misers, we gave 10% of our gross income. And so if you factor that in to —

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Levi Ellison: — how much money we paid back on loans, we could have been out of debt a lot sooner. But we also lived a lot cheaper than some of your listeners are probably thinking, now realizing that we factor in that we make average pharmacist salaries, $120,000-130,000 a year and there’s two of us. And we tithe 10% of that. We gave a lot of money to the church, and that’s not a bragging issue, but it’s something we believed in. And so that’s one of the reasons why we did this so quickly and aggressively and we were on the same page is because we both had the same faith and we both are on the same page about money, and we knew that we wanted to do this. And you’re right about strengthening marriage to go back to the previous question is it surely did. When we look at stuff now, we say, “Yeah, we could do that. That won’t be a problem.” Like we know we can. We’ve done a lot harder stuff together.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think it goes back to you guys had that common thread, you had that common viewpoint, which even if there were moments of maybe month-to-month, you didn’t see eye-to-eye on everything, obviously in a short period of time, you did see eye-to-eye on a lot. But nonetheless, you still had that common lens in which you’re working from. And we always talk about I think the importance of starting with the goal, starting with the why, and then getting into the nitty gritty of the budget because if you can agree on the philosophy, if you can agree on the direction, it’s much easier to agree on OK, in light of the philosophy, let’s talk about this one expense or this one issue.

Levi Ellison: If there’s no why, you’re never going to get to the what of driving a beater.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Levi Ellison: And I don’t really consider our cars beaters, but they’re probably worth about $3,000 apiece. And they run just fine. They don’t break down. They’re just little cars, and they do great.

Tim Ulbrich: So speaking of cars, a famous Joe Baker quote, there is not a parade watching you on the way to work.

Levi Ellison: Yes, I love that.

Tim Ulbrich: Which takes me to, you know, this concept of what decisions you guys made in terms of things to forego as you’re talking about making massive student loan payments or $12,600 a month, you’re talking about tithing, giving 10% of gross income throughout this, obviously you had to give up on some things, car being one I’m assuming. But home, other things, talk us through what were the areas that you decided not to spend money on that, you know, might have been difficult as you think about some of the challenges with kind of the peer comparison and keeping up with the Joneses.

Levi Ellison: Yeah. So I guess you could say we gave up on the car, you’re right about that. I’d love to be driving a brand new GMC Sierra. I would love it. But I’m not, and that’s OK. We’re going to pay cash for something like that one day or a slightly used one. And that’s fine because Joe Baker is 100% right. If you can get in the mindset of there’s not a parade watching you go to work, it doesn’t matter. And it’s kind of funny, people notice. One of my coworkers, one of the techs, her daughter asked her, said, “Why is Levi still driving that?” And she was sharing that with me, and it just made me laugh. Like they don’t get it. But you can share with them, say, “There’s a whole goal behind this. We want to be debt-free.” So that was one of the things that we gave up was car. As far as our housing situation, we haven’t bought a home yet. We’re renting, but we’re in a very good, quiet neighborhood. I love running, and so the streets are great for that, very little traffic. So I don’t really feel like we gave up much there. We’re living in a lot better place than the apartments that we both lived in Little Rock over the course of pharmacy school. You know, we have a backyard, a place for our dog, stuff like that. So we gave up a little. We don’t have a tremendous mountain view, we’re kind of in the mountains over here in Western Arkansas, and we look forward to that very soon. That’s one of the things that we’re saving for now. But I don’t feel like we gave up just a whole lot. We just didn’t have extensive dates.

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: I was talking to my wife and said, “Do you want to share anything about that from your perspective on the show tomorrow morning?” And she said, “Well, we didn’t spend any money on dates.” I said, “That’s not true. I went to Redbox multiple times. I remember that $1.75.”

Tim Ulbrich: I was going to say, it started as a dollar, now it’s $1.75, right? So yeah. But there’s creativity there, right? I mean, again, those are moments that are created together. And I think I want to reiterate some of what you said. I mean, you know, used cars, renting, I think those are probably — if I had to pick two areas, no judgement here, but two areas that I would say often get in the way of being able to achieve other goals, here whether it is student loan repayment, but it could be any other goal, saving for retirement, saving for kids’ college, being able to give whatever, I would say it’s often the home and the car. And I think it’s shifting perspective that renting is not a bad thing. Renting is not evil, you know. You’re not necessarily just throwing money down the drain, and we talked about that on a previous episode with Nate Hedrick and really running the numbers objectively. And used cars, I mean, I think really changing your perspective on Point A to Point B, and one of the best things I heard on this was Ramit Sethi, who wrote a book, “I Will Teach You to Be Rich.” He talks about this concept of money dials. And identifying the things that mean most to you and align with your why and dialing those up. So let’s say for you and your wife Jessica, maybe it’s shared experiences together now that you guys have obviously a little bit more margin, spending money on that, not being afraid to spend money on that if that’s what means most to you. But if a car doesn’t mean a whole lot to you, then dial it down. Like you know what I mean? And find those things that really aren’t that important at the end of the day to you and really challenging yourself to think through those, each of those individually. So what do you say in response to, you know, some of the typical objections to the Dave Ramsey baby steps, right? So things like, you know, often only having $1,000 in emergency fund until you’re fully out of debt, and is that realistic, is that prudent. is that wise, you know, not to have a full 3-6 months? Or not establishing credit or building credit? Delaying retirement savings, perhaps? So what do you say? And I know your journey’s a little bit different because it was a shorter time period of 17 months, and I think where some of those challenges come in, especially on delayed retirement and emergency savings, is when you’re stretching it out say 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 15 years. But talk to us through how you all reconciled that that was the method, the steps, the path that was best for you and your plan.

Levi Ellison: I would say first off, if you’re going to follow the Dave Ramsey plan, you can’t be Dave-ish. You have to either do it or don’t. And so we decided we were going to do it, and we were going to be gazelle-intense, as he likes to say. We’re running away on the plain from the cheetah, and we’re going to make it. And so we did. And as far as like the emergency fund, that’s a temporary emergency fund of $1,000. We now have 6 months of expenses and with a very real coronavirus running around right now, that makes us feel better. I mean, it truly does. And so to have to owe no debt to anybody and to be as prepared as you can be for a crisis like this or a pandemic to not want to be fear-mongering, but we feel good about that piece of our plan. And pausing retirement for 17 months, I mean, the stock market just lost the biggest loss in 30 years. I guess I think we’re OK for now. You know, it’s not like we’re not going to buy a house. It’s not like we’re not going to ever fully fund our emergency fund, those types of things. It’s quick. I mean, if you’re going to do it, you need to do it. And so for us, we knew each other well enough, we were in the same study group, we were very good friends before we got married or even started dating. And so I knew her, she knew me, we both knew if we said we were going to do something, we were going to do it. And so we just had that resolve. That’s kind of the way it went for us. But as far as like credit goes, we have a goal of having no credit. And that may sound crazy to a lot of people, but you actually don’t need it. I went down to my local bank, said, “Hey, is this going to be a problem if we have no credit?” And they said, “No.” And so it’s almost laughable how the way people think that you have to have a credit score. You don’t. I’ve rented plenty of cars without a credit card. I’ve done all the things that you need to do. I’ve booked a $12,000 cruise celebrating getting out of debt, and it got canceled because it was the Grand Princess that was quarantined off the coast of California.

Tim Ulbrich: Oh my gosh.

Levi Ellison: Right. Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: Oh my gosh.

Levi Ellison: So there’s that. And that’s not a laughing matter, it’s a very serious thing.

Tim Ulbrich: Sure.

Levi Ellison: They’re going to reimburse us. We’re still waiting to hear back from flights, and so one thing I would change about my financial plan is buying insurance on flights.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Levi Ellison: I’ve never done that before, but I will be in the future because you never know what’s happening.

Tim Ulbrich: Although what are the chances of something like COVID-19, right?

Levi Ellison: Right, right, yeah. That’s what I said.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. So one of the things too that I heard there and I think often doesn’t get talked about, whether it’s the Ramsey framework or something like the Compass Money Map framework or another framework, I think a framework is very helpful, especially when you have multiple competing priorities that you’re trying to work through, debt repayment, retirement savings, emergency funds, and you’re looking at a way for two people to get on the same page. I think sometimes it’s a little bit more difficult if it’s one person’s idea and I want this other person to implement it, but I think sometimes a framework is a nice third party that gives you both an idea of something you can work towards together and hopefully have those shared goals. Last question I have for you is here you are now on the backside of this, and I think we often don’t talk about life after paying off debt. And what was $12,600 a month going towards student loans is no longer is no longer going towards student loans.

Levi Ellison: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: So what is the game plan now? What are the goals? And how have you adjusted to loosen up some of those things like hey, it’s OK to go out to eat, you know, every once in awhile, and it’s OK to enjoy those things. So talk to us a little bit about life after having the debt paid off.

Levi Ellison: Right, so this is a whole goal, right?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Levi Ellison: You don’t want to live below the federal poverty limit for 17 months and continue that until I retire. It’s not — that wasn’t the plan, so it’s exciting to be here and to like the cruise thing, we were spending $12,000 a month on loans and repaying that. We can book a $12,000 cruise, and it was going to be a really nice one, 11 days.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, yep.

Levi Ellison: And those things will work out in the future, and so we plan to take some trips. We want to go to Washington, D.C., want to tour the Capitol, do all the things that we wanted to do while we were in debt. And things, as far as having a framework, you are nailing it there. It is so important to have a plan. And so what we decided to do was to come up with like an annual budget. I know that sounds a little crazy for a household, but we have a year’s worth of plans and just kind of rough estimates, this isn’t as intense as our allocated spending plan as far as I know where every single penny is going. But we have plans in place to get us both vehicles, to have a certain amount of money in place to put a down payment on a home if we don’t end up paying cash for a home, which we might do. It depends on some different circumstances here at home, but having that annual plan in place I think is really going to help us, it’s already informing our decisions as far as when we get this money back from the cruise, what are we going to do with that, are we just going to go blow it anyway because it’s like it’s already gone or are we going to put and speed up the plan as far as well, if we go ahead and do this, we can get me a truck before summer, we can get her an SUV or whatever we want to do, which is a much more fun conversation than, ‘OK, it’s Friday again. Man, was that only two weeks ago that we paid $6,000? OK, here we go again.’

Tim Ulbrich: Another Redbox.

Levi Ellison: Push submit. Yeah, again at Redbox this week, that sort of thing. So it’s exciting to be able to talk about what we’re going to do with it versus we know exactly what we’re going to do with it.

Tim Ulbrich: And you know what I love, Levi, I know my wife Jess and I felt this, I sense the same for you and also a Jess is that when you are so used to grinding it out, I mean, $12,600 a month, for a 17-month period, it’s hard to measure, but there is such a long-term benefit of that beyond the 17 months. You know, yes, you’re going to loosen up the reins, yes, that’s OK, you guys should do that, you should enjoy it. And there’s balance and all that. But you’ve shifted that perspective on what really is important and where happiness does and does not come from. And I think that has such a long-term benefit beyond that 17-month period of how you’re utilizing your money. And I love that for you guys, I know you guys are teaching some of this now with Financial Peace, obviously giving is still a priority and really giving back and sharing some of that as you are doing here on the podcast as well. So really excited to see where this goes for you all and the impact you’re able to have on others because of obviously the margin that you have now to work with and the ability to share that. So thank you for coming on the show, thank you for taking time to share your journey. Congratulations. It’s really, really an incredible journey. And excited that you were willing to come on and share it with our community.

Levi Ellison: You’re very welcome. I enjoyed it.

Tim Ulbrich: Thank you.

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