Navigating Financial Freedom

Speaker 2
so you guys hit your early 30s you're like 32 years old been married a little while at what point were you married uh we got married in uh 2012 right yeah okay this is pretty deep into marriage and you guys woke up four years ago and said let's just go ahead and knock out the house what started that journey for you uh we uh one of my co-workers at my first job
Speaker 8
he said the best 12 he ever spent was on the total money makeover so um i ended up buying it and it was the best $12 I spent. Wow.
Speaker 6
Thank you. I don't necessarily always agree on this journey. I would be lying if I said that you weren't a swear word at times in our house. It's a gift. It's a trigger when I hear the word spreadsheet still.
Speaker 1
I've been a trigger now. I've thought of myself as a trigger. I did think of myself as a swear word, but yeah. I like it. Were you dragged,
Speaker 2
and then as you made progress, you went, get it and what
Speaker 8
happened here yeah
Speaker 6
i definitely um it
Speaker 8
took a while to win her over it's still it's still a work in progress so the
Speaker 1
engineer nerd yeah is coming in nerding out your life and you're like i want to have one a life that is yeah and you're trying to steal my life i hate dave ramsey that sounds good i like that is that kind of how it went yes yeah that's what i
Speaker 2
would have gone with that did he walk in with the spreadsheet going babe we could save so much time and money if we just paid it up early yes
Speaker 1
wow 12
Speaker 2
years
Speaker 1
you're married to an engineer you didn't know that he thinks spreadsheets are sexy
Speaker 6
right i know that now it's his love language wow
Speaker 1
it Was your goal four years or was it
Speaker 8
more aggressive? Did you do it slower, faster? Well, once we decided to pay off the house, it was around two, two and a half years, but we had two kids in that amount of time to add to our three kids we already had. Party. Yeah. So it took a little bit longer. Wow. Got the gang here. Look
Speaker 1
at that. And the dog. And the dog. Yeah. Wow. Beautiful. Well done, y'all. Well done. Life is good huh? It is. We're very blessed. The number one career in the millionaire study that we did, the one most likely to be a millionaire is an engineer. So there you go. So stuff all pays off after all. So
Speaker 2
stereotypical.
Speaker 1
Yep. There it is. Just like. You guys are doing it. That's perfect you guys well done what do you tell people the key to getting out of debt is it's
Speaker 6
communication for sure you have to be on the same page and it's also important just to have a village around you that supports you and make sure and what was your village we have our parents for sure and then we got our friends over here that are with us too so made
Speaker 1
the trip down for the debt free screen. They did. All right. Very good. Cool. So what was the thing that drove you to what, what's your, why, why, why do this? I was, I was more worried when
Speaker 8
we started having kids and trying to pay for college and stuff. So we, I just wanted to get out of debt because I had student loans and I didn't want my kids to have student loans. So that was a big motivator for me. Yeah. It's
Speaker 2
a change in the family tree. And you've got a lot of kids. That's a lot of college to pay for. Yes. I know where that freed up mortgage payment's going. Straight to the 529 plans. Yeah. Wow. What's the first big thing you guys did or are going to do? Well,
Speaker 6
our trip
Speaker 2
to Nashville.
Speaker 6
We're calling it our yes year now. So now we can say yes to things. Yep. As
Speaker 1
Dave said earlier, you got to say no a whole lot. We did. We did. Say yes. You did it. You did it. You did it. So, Samantha, what was it that actually did, all kidding aside, you actually did join the crusade here at some point. What caused the change that allowed you to do that?
Speaker 6
Just for me, my heart's always been forgiving. And just one, making sure that our kids see how important that is and really just being able to be generous and let our kids know the importance of that.
Speaker 1
Yeah. Yeah. And you get yourself in a real strong financial position. You can do giving at a different level.
Speaker 6
100%.
Speaker 1
Yeah. And you're there now. Way to go. And you're only 36. You're going to be so wealthy, so generous, so out of control. Well done, y'all. Very, very well done. Very good stuff. So now that you're there, when you flipped the switch and you paid off the mortgage, did you notice a change in the way it felt?
Speaker 8
Yeah, Yeah. It definitely feels different, especially every first of the month when that money doesn't come out of your account and you can see your account growing.
Speaker 2
Budgeting gets a lot more fun when you get to just delete the mortgage payment out. You got property taxes and insurance, but man, that principle and interest not being there, that frees you up emotionally, mentally, financially. Yes. Yeah. It's huge yeah
Speaker 1
way to go you guys i'm proud of you thank you was cheering you on along the way your friends and your family and who else co-workers
Speaker 8
yeah my my parents were we were we were actually in a race to see who could pay off our house the first and we won so so it was a little competition i love that were the kids aware of what was going on? The older
Speaker 2
ones? Were they like, okay, we can see the sacrifice. We're feeling it too. We got to beat grandma. I
Speaker 6
wouldn't say that.
Speaker 2
Cutting the snack budget. No, they weren't going along with it. If anything, I
Speaker 6
take away his snack money. Ooh.
Speaker 1
So. Well, there you go. There you go. And now if you snack like no one else later, you can snack like no one else. So there you go. Good stuff Well done, you two. Proud of you. Excellent, excellent job. All right. It's Kyle and Samantha, Manchester, New Hampshire. $130,000 paid off. That's house and everything. They're debt-free. No mortgage, America. You know what their interest rate problems are? None. They don't have one. That's right. They did this in four years, making $130 to $150, and it's hard. But is it worth it? Yes. Definitely. Count it down, Kyle and Samantha. Let's hear a debt-free scream. Three, two, one. We're debt-free. Yeah.
Speaker 2
This is how it's done. I like the irony because New Hampshire's motto, live free or die. What better way to live free than knowing nobody anything? Is it really? That's it. That's about as rock and roll as it gets. How did you know that? I'm from Massachusetts. I was always jealous we didn't have a cooler state motto. Yeah,
Speaker 1
wow. Okay.
Speaker 2
Apparently from adopted by the state in 1945. It was from a letter from General John Stark in 1809.
Speaker 1
The live free or die. Live free or die. There's your history lesson. That's good. All right. I got my trivia lesson. But yeah, I'll go with that, though. I mean, here's the thing. All I can hear about when I'm doing media interviews and you're doing media interviews is that there's a whole generation that feels stuck. There's a whole generation that doesn't think they can get ahead. There's a whole generation Gen Z that says and Gen X and Millennia, I mean, millennials and Gen Z that says they can't make it. And then you meet Kyle and Samantha. And we get to meet them every week. You know how stuck they are? Not stuck. No excuses. That's how stuck they are. Not stuck! Not stuck!

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