\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:00]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Previously on\u00a0Money for\u00a0Couples.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:02]\u00a0What do you think about this debt?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:03]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0I’m angry at Michael. I’m angry at myself. Michael has 10, 12 laptops.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:12]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0What the\u00a0[Bleep]? 12 laptops?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:15]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0Yeah.\u00a0He’s at the point now where he should be able to retire, but he can’t.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:19]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0This is my vision or my goal, someone to manage the money and make sure that it goes in the right places. I don’t have that knowledge to do that.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:29]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0If this doesn’t work, what does it mean for you?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:32]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0To be honest, I’m tapping out. I can’t keep doing this.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:39]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0To be truthful, after our conversation,\u00a0I\u00a0got [Bleep] off.\u00a0I got the fever to start selling stuff.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:46]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0How do we wipe the debt out so that our net worth continues to rise?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:49]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0How much debt have you paid off since we last talked?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:54]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a06,000.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:55]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0$6,000 since we last talked?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:00:57]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0If we had no debt, if we had just the mortgage, we’d be well over a million today.<\/span><\/p>\n[Narration]<\/span><\/p>\n[00:01:03]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0When couples have a lot of debt, one of the most common phrases they say is,\u00a0“We’re just\u00a0going to\u00a0die with this debt.”\u00a0But virtually none of them has ever run a simple debt payoff calculation. They’ve basically just given up. When will their debts be paid off?\u00a0What happens if they pay more or pay less? What levers can they pull to speed things up?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:01:25]\u00a0They don’t ask these questions because it’s uncomfortable,\u00a0and people don’t like to feel stupid about money. No wonder they feel so bad about debt. They’ve never even taken five minutes to figure out a plan to get rid of it.\u00a0But that’s exactly what we do here on Money for Couples.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:01:42]\u00a0Today we’re back with Imani and Michael. They’re 52 and 65 years old, and after 20 years of marriage, they finally combined their finances just four years ago,\u00a0and everything fell apart.\u00a0Last week, we left off with Imani in tears because their\u00a0Rich Life\u00a0visions are so different.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:01:59]\u00a0Imani dreams of a life full of travel and experiences. Meanwhile, Michael says he wants to just declutter and sit with a book. She wants bigger.\u00a0He wants smaller. And honestly, when your\u00a0Rich Life\u00a0vision is that small, it’s no surprise that Michael has not thought about retirement. When the bar is set so low and you’re carrying over $600,000 in debt, retirement just feels like a fantasy.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:02:25]\u00a0That is why I called in our partners at Facet to help us today. Michael is 65 years old, but with high debt and a high income. Their financial picture is fascinating and complex. Facet has provided real scenarios today to show exactly what Michael needs to do to retire.\u00a0You can learn more about how Facet can help you at facet.com\/ramit.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:02:47]\u00a0Can Imani and Michael bridge their worldviews and come around to a shared\u00a0Rich Life\u00a0vision? Can they repair the wedge that has been driven into their relationship?\u00a0I recommend you go back and watch or listen to part 1 for all of the important background on this fascinating story.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:03:04]\u00a0Now let’s do a quick recap of their conscious spending plan,\u00a0the same tool that I use in every episode to go through their actual numbers. Assets, $603,000.\u00a0Investments, $770,000. Remember, Michael is 65 years old.\u00a0Savings, $8,500. Debt, $601,000, including over\u00a0100k\u00a0of high interest consumer debt.\u00a0Net worth,\u00a0$780,000. Annual income, $268,000.\u00a0Let’s see if we can help Imani and Michael rewrite their story and their future.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:03:40]\u00a0Facet is an RIA with the SEC. The Facet provided scenarios discussed are based on inputs provided by Imani and Michael\u00a0and are based on industry-standard assumptions. This information is my opinion,\u00a0is for illustrative and educational purposes only.\u00a0Investing involves serious risks and past performance is not a guarantee of future performance or success.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:03:58]\u00a0I’m not a member of Facet.\u00a0I have an incentive to endorse Facet as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement.<\/span><\/p>\n[Interview]<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:11]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0So your Rich Life is to declutter.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:15]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0Declutter, get rid of this debt.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:21]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:22]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0And just have a simplified life. Just really have a simple life. I have more than I deserve.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:30]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Okay. I’m going to help you come up with an even more powerful vision of a Rich Life. Imani, I see you nodding over there. How come?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:04:43]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0Because I feel like everything that he says, I don’t know if it’s because he’s looking at the effect of things on me. I want Michael to have a vision of his Rich Life. You talked about I want to travel and all that, and he didn’t say that. And so for me, it feels like he’s like, “Oh, I’ve lived my life and I’ve traveled the world. You go do that by yourself.”<\/span><\/p>\n[00:05:07]\u00a0And I don’t want to do life by myself. If I want to do life by myself, then I’ll just go do life by myself. I wouldn’t have wrote into this program. I would’ve just said, you know what? I’m over it. I’d have cashed out of my 401(k), paid off my debt, take my children, and just go. And then he says he has more stuff than he deserves. So what are you not deserving of? Of a Rich Life? To me, that’s an issue. I deserve the best of everything.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:05:41]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Keep going.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:05:41]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0And I’ll be damn if I won’t go get it.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:05:44]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Say more.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:05:46]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0I feel like I work hard. I give, I give, I give. My family probably wants to smack me. I’m always somewhere volunteering and giving and giving and giving. I feel like that is my mission, like I’ve been put on this earth to serve. But I also deserve to live that Rich Life, to travel, to do all the things that God put in my heart to do. And for him to say he doesn’t deserve that, I’m like, “God.” So there’s a disconnect there.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:20]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Yeah. Are you too religious?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:24]\u00a0<\/span>Imani:<\/b>\u00a0Absolutely.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:25]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:25]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Both are. Okay. I have more than I deserve. Familiar phrase. Michael, where’d you pick that phrase up?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:36]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0I just look around me when I’m in the house and that’s like, I got this piece of equipment. I got this. It’s just too much.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:49]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0Hold on. Finish the sentence. I have this. I have that. And?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:06:58]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0So if I have 10 computers and I have 15 computers, I can only be on one computer at a time. Why do I need 14 other computers?<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:05]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0But yet, you just bought an SSD, another one.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:09]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:10]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0And you had a very good reason to explain it to Imani.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:13]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:14]\u00a0<\/span>Ramit:<\/b>\u00a0So in a way you’re saying, “I have more than I deserve, and why do I have all this?” But then you just buy another one. Explain it.<\/span><\/p>\n[00:07:22]\u00a0<\/span>Michael:<\/b>\u00a0Yeah. It is just, I would say, a bad pattern of doing that.<\/span><\/p>\n