For this week’s Let’s Talk Money interview I am very happy to introduce you to Ashley. Ashley is the author of the well known PF blog Money Talks which just celebrated its first anniversary on March 24, 2012.
Ashley began learning about money when she was six years old. Her father explained to her how people make money by purchasing properties and then renting them out. She was fascinated and knew that one day she too would become a landlord.
Let’s take a look at what else Ashley has to say about money...
Please provide a brief introduction about yourself and your personal finance blog including when you created your blog. If comfortable, please share if you are married and how many children you have.
Hi, thanks for the opportunity to be featured on your site. I’ve been married for 7 years and we have two kids, ages 10 and 6. I started Money Talks Coaching just about a year ago on 3-24-2011.
I wanted to offer help out there to those who are struggling with money due to lack of education or motivation. I’ve always loved personal finance and I know I was put on this earth to help people with their money.
How was money handled in your family when you were growing up, and how did that affect you?
You know, I actually just wrote an article about this. We had good times and we had bad times in my family. But the bad times didn’t affect me negatively. I was always confident that the bad was temporary.
Maybe it was lack of understanding as a kid or something my parents did to shield me but even when we almost lost our house due to my stepdad being laid off I always had the attitude of “eh, we’ll be fine!”
Since writing the article a few weeks ago I talked to my mom about our finances while I was growing up and learned that my step dad was terrible with money and wouldn’t pay the bills he was responsible for and my mom would have to make it up. I also found out there was a lot of credit card debt when I was a kid that I didn’t know about. My parents definitely kept me in the dark.
If you want to read more about this topic you can head over to my recent article. There are also questions for you to consider if you want to explore this subject in your own life. You always learn something!
What is your view point regarding money? Money is meant to be saved? Money is meant to be spent?
For me personally, I like to save my money. I really dislike spending money. I know others feel differently and I respect that. I used to think there was only one “right” way to handle your money but clearly that’s not true. Both spending and saving are part of a healthy financial plan.
Do you own or rent your current living accommodations? Why?
We own our home. It was important for me to own for two reasons. One, the payment is fixed. The longer you live in a home the cheaper it becomes due to inflation. While our mortgage payment was slightly higher than rent when we moved in, now 7 years later it’s several hundred dollars a month cheaper than we would pay in rent. Two, someday it will be paid off. I don’t want to have a mortgage payment or rent in retirement so it’s important for me to have it paid off by then.
If you had a friend or a co-worker that was in debt come to you for financial advice on how to get out of debt, what are the first 3 steps you would suggest for them to work on?
Easy one. I love the Dave Ramsey baby steps for this.
1. Baby Emergency fund of $1,000.
2. Debt snowball. I think the method of the debt snowball is great as far as attacking one debt at a time and then rolling that payment to the next debt. The order that you pay off the debts is less important to me. I think you should pay off whichever one is bothering you the most.
3. Fully funded Emergency fund. Getting 3-6 months of bills into savings is an important step to making sure your journey out of debt is a permanent one.
If someone is struggling with building the baby emergency fund then they should start with tracking their spending and then move on to making a budget. One of my favorite articles that I've written was about the financial process in a nutshell. It breaks down the entire financial planning process into 4 steps.
If you suddenly won, inherited, or received $100,000 as a gift and you were already debt free, what would you do with it?
I’d buy a rental property. My goal is to own 4 paid off rental properties by the time I retire. I have one so far (not paid off!). You can read about that adventure here.
When it comes to money what stresses you out? For example, not enough money, no fun money, too much debt, no retirement money, have so much money I don’t know what to do with it all.
Income stresses me out the most. I want to make more money!!! I worry that I’ll never make a "good" income. I feel like my income is a direct relation to my personal worth, which I know logically is not true at all but I can’t seem to break that connection emotionally. My income is something that I think about every single day.
Ashley, I know you have a very busy schedule and I would like to thank you very much for taking the time to do this interview with me. You've had a very successful first year with your blog and I wish you many more!
Please drop by Ashley's blog and say hello.
CultOfMoney 03/28/2012 1:51 p.m. #
Ashley, thanks for sharing your story! I think that your childhood is typical, that there were likely problems but your parents did their best to protect you from those issues. Obviously some parents do a better job of this than others. There seems to be a balancing point in there somewhere, protecting kids from money problems versus teaching them how to act with a limited amount of money. Good thing I have cats, because I don't know the answer. :)
Modest Money 03/28/2012 2:35 p.m. #
I agree with CultOfMoney. It is good that parents shield their kids from financial troubles, but at the same time they are avoiding the opportunity to teach them a valuable lesson. I too have cats. So I don't really need to think about that decision.
Ashley I like your goal of having 4 rental properties when you retire. That sounds like an awesome way to still have a source of income when you stop working. Also if you ever find you need more cash flow, you could always sell off a property or two.
WorkSaveLive 03/28/2012 3:12 p.m. #
Nice to meet you Ashley! Karl, you're funny - you could try to teach your cats how to manage money.
See if they can work to pay for their own food. :) Or, set them free to go hunt and they can kill and eat their own food! Boom...just saved you like $10/month!
I think my childhood was very similar to yours Ashley. My mom always hid what was going on in her financial life but I never really remember going without. Years later did I learn that she had a miserable time managing money and limiting spending.
I think it's really important for parents to teach their children and try not to hide everything. I think we shelter our children enough and they're really unprepared when it comes time to step out into the real world.
Tackling Our Debt 03/28/2012 3:52 p.m. #
I wonder if perhaps our parents were so stressed out trying to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table that they didn't think about talking about money with their kids or even more so, they didn't want us to worry, or perhaps they were embarrassed to talk about money.
I come from a middle class home. Looking back I can see that there were many things that my mom did to save money, although it was never spoken of in those specific terms.
But my parents always bought new cars with cash and then drove them for 12 to 14 years, until the cars gave out.
They owned our home. I remember when they paid it off and back then people had a deed burning party. We did too!
They never used credit cards! They never travelled except to take us camping, and sometimes we had elaborate dinners, and other times we just had potato pancakes or homemade perogies for dinner.
Michelle 03/28/2012 4:11 p.m. #
I understand about the income stress! I've actually been depressed about it before. Even when we were both working full-time, we never made enough for me to feel secure. I don't need to live like a princess, but I would love to be able to know that everything is going to be okay, and that my kids will always have everything they need.
Katie 03/28/2012 5:08 p.m. #
I worry about the income too. I've been working at a job for the past few years and I know I'll never make more money than I what I'm currently making. So I've stepped outside my comfort zone and landed a new job that I will start here in a couple of weeks. It won't start out making more, but there's potential to grow there. I just want to be able to make enough money so that I know I can save for the important stuff - retirement and for my kids college.
Shilpan 03/28/2012 9:02 p.m. #
Money is almost invisible in our daily chores as credit cards have taken its place. Yet money gives us lots of stress. I think the only way to overcome and win over money worries is to learn how to handle it wisely. And you are doing that well Ashley.
Karunesh @ chase-a-dream.com 03/29/2012 5:07 a.m. #
Very well covered interview. Thanks Ashley for sharing your wisdom with us
My Canadian Finances 03/29/2012 6:06 p.m. #
Wow, This is a great idea!
I haven't talked to my parents, but I am also sure that they sheltered me from their money problems when I was younger. Although at the time I didn't see the problem, I can remember them stressing out over issues with their rental property.
Great post! Please keep these up.
Jai Catalano 03/29/2012 6:25 p.m. #
Ashley your story is great. I am glad I got to read it. I feel like my income is my personal worth too but it's the farthest from the truth. I have done, seen and experienced things that people can only dream of. Money can buy a lot but it can buy everything. Thanks for the story.
Ashley @ Money Talks 03/30/2012 8:33 a.m. #
Hi everyone, thanks for you comments. Yeah, it's fine line when it comes to kids and money. While you want them to learn about money you also don't want them to be stressed out about family finances.
It's not an easy answer when your finances are stressful. How much do you share? I don't know. I guess it depends on the kid. I've shared our expenses with my daughter. I don't know if she "gets it" but its a start.
And I'm glad I'm not the only one worried about income. Not that I want others to have concerns but I'm glad I'm not alone... sigh. We just have to keep working on it!!
canadianbudgetbinder 03/30/2012 9:34 a.m. #
Very well written Ashley and inspiring to so many people. I too learned about money young and both of our parents had rental properties as well, this is where we learned about real estate.
My parents still have 3 fully paid properties which they live off of the money earned from rent. They said they would do it again in a heartbeat.
We are currently talking rental properties for us and hope one day we get the same satisfaction as our parents did.
Not everyone was lucky to learn about money and finances when they were young like we were so fortunate. I think it's important to spread the word and help as many people as we can.
Truly you can feel the relief just through emails from others who want help or even a bit of guidance.
Cheers,
Mr.CBB