{"id":107901,"date":"2019-02-25T00:02:04","date_gmt":"2019-02-25T07:02:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/renewsblog\/?p=107901"},"modified":"2023-04-26T22:48:00","modified_gmt":"2023-04-27T04:48:00","slug":"biggerpockets-money-podcast-61-repeatable-path-financial-independence-reshawn-rob-learn-hustle-grow","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/biggerpockets-money-podcast-61-repeatable-path-financial-independence-reshawn-rob-learn-hustle-grow","title":{"rendered":"The Repeatable Path to Financial Independence with Reshawn &#038; Rob from Learn Hustle Grow"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Reshawn and Rob got married nine years ago, joining their lives, families and bank accounts. Premarital counseling revealed two different views on money\u2014and they knew if they wanted to stay married, they needed to get themselves on the same page.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Reshawn and Rob implemented a modified version of Dave Ramsey\u2019s Baby Steps program to get themselves out of debt so they could start investing. Their team approach to their finances, focusing not on who\u2019s debt it is but instead focusing on paying it off together strengthened their marriage and their desire to attain financial independence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">They stepped away from the corporate world to pursue passion projects, Rob in real estate and Reshawn in travel planning. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Are you looking to get your spouse on board with your financial independence plans? Listen to this episode together.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/biggerpockets-money-podcast\/id1330225136\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Click here<\/a>\u00a0to listen on iTunes.<\/p>\n<h2>Listen to the Podcast Here<\/h2>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"200\" scrolling=\"no\" src=\"https:\/\/playlist.megaphone.fm?e=BIGPOC7633302982&#038;light=false\" width=\"100%\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2>Read the Transcript Here<\/h2>\n<div style=\"overflow-y: scroll; max-height: 400px; background: #eee; padding: 20px; border: 1px solid #ddd;\">\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>Welcome to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast, show number 61 where we interview Reshawn and Rob from Learn Hustle Grow.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>But once you\u2019ve earned a certain income, you have lifestyle creep in, you build a lifestyle around that income, it makes it very difficult to pull out and now start and to entrepreneurially make nothing.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>It\u2019s time for a new American dream, one that doesn\u2019t involve working in a cubicle for 40 years barely scraping by. Whether you\u2019re looking to get your financial house in order, invest the money you already have or discover new paths for wealth creation, you\u2019re in the right place.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>This show is for anyone who has money or wants more, this is the BiggerPockets Money Podcast.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> How\u2019s it going everybody? I\u2019m Scott Trench and I\u2019m here with my co-host Miss Mindy Jensen. How are you doing today Mindy?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Scott, I\u2019m doing fantastic. It\u2019s another beautiful day in Colorado like always. I\u2019m super excited for today\u2019s show. I feel like I say that all the time, I\u2019m super excited. But I am, look I\u2019m always super excited. But I really love Reshawn and Rob\u2019s story about figuring out financial dependence. They\u2019re in their 40s, they have quit their corporate jobs but they still have jobs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">They just want to do these passion projects now. And spoiler alert, they\u2019re getting ready to travel forever around the world which just sounds like super awesome fun.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> And what I think is so great about this episode is both of them come from low income backgrounds. Both of them had shouldered really early in their adult lives, both of them accumulated a lot of debt. And then over the course of a 20 year career they were able to make some consolidated incomes, pay off that debt and then really go after in what I believe is a really repeatable fashion for a lot of people. If they can do it a lot of people can do it, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> What I think is so amazing about this story, as I\u2019m listening to them tell their story and I don\u2019t mean this in a negative way, but I\u2019m thinking to myself, you know what there\u2019s nothing special about this story. There\u2019s nothing like unrepeatable for most people about this story. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And what it really is cement the fact that yes this is doable. Yes this whole like financial independence thing is doable, it is repeatable and it\u2019s not that hard. You follow these steps; don\u2019t spend as much as you make, save. You know what, it\u2019s like that Richest Man in Babylon book.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah. I mean it\u2019s 2019, this is the American dream, this is how to do it, right. Pay off your debts, pay off your house, build a modest amount of cash flow, travel the world and do whatever the heck you want. They\u2019re going to travel the world while being location independent entrepreneurs. Worst case scenario, they\u2019re going to be fine and continue to have their portfolio grow and sustain itself. Best case scenario they\u2019re going to have a tremendous amount of fun and make a ton of money doing it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah. Near the end of the show, Rob says, anybody could do this, it just takes discipline. And that\u2019s why nobody does it because it just takes discipline. This is not a difficult thing, and what people do is they ask me and I\u2019m sure they ask you, \u201cOh how did you do it?\u201d well here\u2019s what I did, oh and you can watch their eyes kind of glaze over.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">What they want to hear is well walked up to this wall and I pushed a button and money just rained down on me and now I\u2019m financially independent. And that\u2019s not how it is. You want to know how it is, listen to Rob and Reshawn\u2019s story because that\u2019s how you do it. Before we let you listen to Rob and Reshawn\u2019s story we\u2019re going to hear from today\u2019s show sponsor.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>Taking financial risks might make sense at the time but when they turn into big mistakes we end up stressed and scrambling. Being good with money and inherent processes can be tough especially if you\u2019re running a business. For business owners it\u2019s important to avoid financial mistakes and a simple accounting solution like FreshBooks can help.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>FreshBooks is a cloud accounting software that ensures your financials are properly tracked, organized and your business is compliant come tax time. Here\u2019s how FreshBooks helps. First it keeps you organized with smart and simple time tracking for you and your team. Second, when it\u2019s time to collect, you can create and send super polished invoices in about 30 seconds or less.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>It lets you record and organize expenses with a tap of your mobile camera and finally gets you paid in a snap by accepting credit card payments directly on those invoices. Best of all FreshBooks keeps you compliant with helpful reports you\u2019ll need for tax season. Right now, we\u2019re offering our listeners a free 30 day trial of FreshBooks, no credit card required.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>Go to FreshBooks.com\/bpmoney and enter BiggerPockets Money in the how-did-you-hear-about-us section.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>Okay if you know anything about BiggerPockets you know we love business books. And our guests give us so many great recommendations it\u2019s hard to find time to read them all. This is why I recommend you use Blinkist. It\u2019s an app that takes the need-to-know information, thousands of non-fiction books, it condenses it down into just 15 minutes of reading or audio.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>I really like using Blinkist when I\u2019m on the go to read basic classics like Rich Dad Poor Dad or The 4Hour Work Week. Or I can check out new titles like Business Marketing by Seth Godin. Blinkist has a ton of books recommended by the smart people you hear on this very show. And right now for a limited time, Blinkist has a special offer for you.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><i>It\u2019s a free seven-day trial. Just go to Blinkist.com\/biggerpockets to start now. That\u2019s Blinkist spelt B-L-I-N-K-I-S-T.com\/biggerpockets.<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay, huge thanks to today\u2019s show sponsor. Reshawn and Rob, welcome to the BiggerPockets Money Podcast. How is it going today?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Fantastic, thanks for having us.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I\u2019m so excited to talk to you. I haven\u2019t seen you since FinCon and I was so happy that I got to meet you at FinCon.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> FinCon was an awesome event. This was our first time and we loved it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah it\u2019s a great event, I make sure that I have babysitters for that event and then every other event is just bonus.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Got to find your work ties.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yes, that is absolutely the best event. So why don\u2019t you walk us through where your story with money begins?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Okay, I guess I\u2019ll do that. So nine years ago we joined our lives and our money, we started out when we go married using the Dave Ramsey Model because we were just trying to figure things out. And we got married in the authorities and we just didn\u2019t want to fight a lot, just getting into a new marriage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So we were paying off our debt, started paying off our debt and then we started investing in real estate and we basically paid down mostly all of our debt and we decided to start looking to our entrepreneurial dreams. We both were working day jobs by the way and eventually I became a real estate agent while working my day job. And Reshawn became a travel agent and this year we both just quit our day jobs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> So it sounds like you combined your finances right at the very beginning. I like that you said we joined our lives and our money. And I have a friend Derek Olsen who wrote a book called One Bank, One Bank Account and I totally subscribe to this, but not everybody does. Can you share a little bit about why you decided to share your finances together or combine them together?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So initially two thirty-somethings both independent and living our own lives financial, it was hard to figure out exactly how we were going to manage money. We had a convoluted plan before we got married, right. We were that couple that looked at credit reports before we got engaged. You might not think it\u2019s romantic but it was super important for us based on where we were in our lives, what the other person came to the table with.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So we\u2019d already looked at credit reports and knew that there are some things we needed to do there. So we just thought we\u2019d have a percentages model, we had this very convoluted model where you do this percentage of your income and I\u2019ll do this percentage of my income. And then we\u2019ll pay these bills and these bills and it was a mess honestly Mindy and Scott.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">We would have been divorced had we stuck with that. So immediately after we got married, we had a destination wedding, in Mexico no dance for joy. So we came home and the roof needed to be repaired, or actually needed to be replaced. There was a storm. So by then that was one of big expenses. There were just a couple of things that just snowballed right away and we were looking at each other-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Who\u2019s going to pay for this and that\u2019s-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right exactly, how is this going to happen based on our plan that we had before this was not going to work out. So Mr. Wonderful here, that\u2019s what I call my husband, he actually-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Hold on, did you use like 30% of the roof and he used his 70%?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Exactly. How do you do that? And he was like, \u201cWe need to look at combining our finances and understanding what that would take. So we learned about Dave Ramsey, got the Total Money Makeover audio book. We were married April 26<\/span><span class=\"s2\"><sup>th<\/sup><\/span><span class=\"s1\"> and our finances were joined by June 1<\/span><span class=\"s2\"><sup>st<\/sup><\/span><span class=\"s1\">. We would not have been able to do it without Dave honestly.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Dave is fabulous, I love Dave.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> What was your kind of like savings rate and what were you kind of doing with your money after you joined finances? What was your approach there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So when we first got married neither of us were saving anything well outside of retirement accounts.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah retirement accounts 401K right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Let me rephrase that, we were both saving in our 401Ks. I was almost debt free with the exception of my car note which I paid off a few months into the marriage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And the house.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> And of course the mortgage on that initial home. And then babe had his car loan and some student loans. So we really more focused on paying off the debt than we were saving at that point. We were just very fortunate that we had taken into consideration, College. So we both to the table with one kid each we\u2019re a blended family two boys now 23 and 18 soon to be 19. But we said, \u201cAre we going to have a baby?\u201d you got to kind of talk about that, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We had to talk about it quickly because when we got married I was 36 and already high risk. So we decided not to, after visiting with some friends who had a similar trial. No shade on the kids but at that point in our lives we realized we just couldn\u2019t handle it the same way we would have been had we been younger.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah. Because I know guys I was looking for a wife that was going to guarantee me a baby by the way. But that changed after I realized I didn\u2019t have the tolerance anymore for a break\u2026 <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> It\u2019s really cute to discuss expectations in your marriage. There\u2019s a lot we know now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> You know what, I want to go back to that. It\u2019s really cute to discuss expectations in your marriage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob &amp; Reshawn:<\/b> Yes<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> How much fun is it to go through a divorce? 0% fun.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I\u2019m assuming, I\u2019m not divorced. But I could just imagine that it would really not be awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> So you guys said before you discussed credit reports, that\u2019s awesome to do that before you get married.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah. We were in our thirties. We felt that we had to prepare. And I was already married before so and it didn\u2019t work out. We were divorced in a year and in my 20s, right. And then after that I was like, \u201cI got to do this,\u201d I didn\u2019t know if I was going to get married again. But I was like if I do we got to do this right. So I got all the information I could and she was with it and yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Obviously that was a big help. If I got to give you single girls a tip, marry a divorced guy. He came with some knowledge.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You guys said you weren\u2019t saving but you were paying off debt. But that is saving, right. You\u2019re taking a percentage of your earned income and you\u2019re not spending it, you\u2019re applying that to build your net worth, in this case paying off, getting back to zero. At least getting some of your debts down to zero. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">What percentage of your income would you say was going towards that in some capacity building your net worth or savings or paying down debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> So you mean like the 401K plus paying off the bills?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah exactly?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We made a 529.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> And the college loan yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Well that\u2019s where I was going with the having a kid thing. When we decided not to have a child we decided to take the cost of daycare and put it into a 529.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Which is about $1000 a month. So we knew that number was specific. So that $12,000 a year plus we were maxing out or 401Ks, which were at 18 each.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah $18,500, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah. So if we did the numbers there so that\u2019s 50 grand.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We\u2019ve never really counted it up, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That\u2019s 50 grand yeah we never really have. So 50 grand between the 401Ks and the 529, maybe that\u2019d been 20% of our income.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Oh that\u2019s saving. That was just savings that was not paying off the debt. And then maybe another $1000 a month towards debt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah and everything then yeah the rest-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Till we paid that off so we had the $12,000. So yeah I\u2019d say maybe 25 to 30% of our incomes going towards that. We were high income earners.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You\u2019re high yeah you\u2019re very high income earners that allowed you to apply that. So when you were accumulating this debt, maybe the story starts maybe even before the marriage. How did you kind of accumulate some of this debt that you brought into the marriage in terms of that since you were earning these high incomes?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So honestly, I was professional salesperson and I didn\u2019t start off very high earning. But I did it for over 20 years, and my debt accumulated from undergraduate. I graduated from college with a few thousand dollars in debt, maybe about $11,000 or so. And then I graduated seven months pregnant. So I came out of college with our oldest.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So immediately acquired debt from becoming a single mum so all the bills that come along with that. You don\u2019t get to owe on daycare, they want their money now. So once you pay that then you probably accumulate some debt in other areas like credit cards and the like. I also built up some credit card debt just from being a college student who wasn\u2019t wise enough to turn down the free credit cards.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The offers with the candy bars and they t-shirts and things like that. And I asked my son, \u201cDo they still let them do that on campus?\u201d and he said, \u201cThey don\u2019t do it as much now.\u201d But it was a big thing 20 years ago when I was in college. So that\u2019s where mine came from.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Ron: And mine, so I was in the Marines. And all the marines, we love nice cars and trying to show off for the ladies and so I bought a new car. I was running a credit card debt constantly dating and stuff, that then I had a son. And I was living in California too by the way, San Diego. That in itself was a killer and then I had the school loans.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">I had about $28,000 in school loans after I got my IT degree. So just yeah, all that the car, the kid, the school loans. And it\u2019s my fault because just as soon as I started making any kind of money, then I actually was out spending. I\u2019d never had any money and I was excited and getting cars.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> He was making it rain guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So what was that moment where it changed, where you decided to change that pattern of spending and begin paying off the debt? Was that because your income shut up suddenly or was that because you decided to go and approach your money differently or how did that kind of work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Well so before I met Reshawn, what happened was I got divorced. That\u2019s what changed. I got divorced, everything was in my name, the majority of it was in my name and I was in the whole deep guys, really hole deep. And I was getting denied for everything at that point. I said, \u201cSomething\u2019s got to change.\u201d So I was really hustling trying to pay off all the separate cards and separate debt and whatever. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And I had like several charge offs and just when I actually looked back and paid attention to everything, got my credit report back on and all that. And then after that, that\u2019s when I realized that I got to make a change and get myself together. And then in the midst of it then I met her.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Okay. So you\u2019d already made the shift to begin paying these debts down I assume, rebuilding credit score. Dave Ramsey is mixed in there somehow I imagine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Not yet.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Then okay. And then is there an acceleration point once you guys meet and you get working towards it?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Okay. And that\u2019s spurred by Dave Ramsey to some degree or alignment on that kind of thinking or how does that kind of work?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So like he said we both came to the table a spender and a saver, for coins. So at that point I\u2019d already discovered just as a single mum debt wasn\u2019t going to be acceptable as far as being able to manage our lifestyle just for me and my son. I relocated from Chicago to Dallas which was a much lower cost of living.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">That was a big help on my side of things as far as getting my stuff paid off sooner. He relocated from Virginia to Dallas so neither one of us are Texas natives. And once we met and had to combine our own money, that\u2019s when Dave Ramsey kicked in and we had a bigger plan. We understood that there was a bigger picture beyond just managing day to day balances.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Okay. Did you cut back on like going out or anything like that or did you change anything in your lifestyle besides that move? Or was that move to Dallas kind of the big catalyst there? What are some ways you kind of cut back on spending in order to increase that savings rates I guess?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I was really in debt when I first started listening to the audiobook. And we were like really on board and we still went out and stuff. We just kind of made sure we watched everything we did and we kind of said, okay we\u2019ll go out like twice a month or whatever, and we\u2019ll use the both of our money to pay down whatever goal we started.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">We had a whole listed of them we started off with small cards and kind of went just to get a couple wins like he says couple wins and pay off a card and just like 500 bucks. And then eventually build up to the bigger bills. And we kind of did it that way and we kind of held back on just spending.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah so we actually created a budget.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah we did create a budget.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We actually created a budget after going through Dave Ramsey\u2019s Total Money Makeover. And we got together to talk about the budget.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And we still do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> And then we got together every quarter to talk about bonuses being a professional salesperson I receive quarterly bonuses. Which is why as seniors though we didn\u2019t spend at where we had a smaller percentage because of the quarterly bonuses. You never know what they\u2019re going to be, right. So we were able to purchase our cars in cash and things like that once we realized that we didn\u2019t want to have long term debt.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">But all that came from starting with a budget and creating a plan to pay off the debt we had over a period of time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Got it. So how long did it take you to pay off all that debt?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So we paid off the-were your student loans the last thing we paid off? Before we paid off the house. We just paid off the house this year, but the last debt we paid off-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> You didn\u2019t have any arears.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Were your student loans. And were we in this house at that time?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> When we paid the student loans?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah or was it before we got it?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah I think it was before.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So four years, to pay off all the debt. And at that time we\u2019re still saving in our retirement, we\u2019re still saving in the 529s.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah,<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Got it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> You\u2019ve mentioned 529 a couple of times. Can you talk a little bit about that?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So there are two vehicles from our college savings, one of which and the 529 there\u2019s no limit on how much you can invest in it. So we chose the 529 college savings because it not only was it limitless as far as what we could put in, it could also be reassigned to any family member. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So once the oldest one is done and he is, he just graduated, we can now assign the funds in that 529 to our youngest to use when he\u2019s ready to go to college. And we also get a tax write off depending of course on what your income is and whether or not you qualify for that. But you get a tax reduction for that as well.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Awesome. Once you started paying off these debts, what was your kind of investment philosophy? How were you planning the funds that you were saving then?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So we were focused on paying off our first home because we were on Dave\u2019s plan. But Rob had a vision of being a real estate mogul. That was his vision.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I was listening the BiggerPockets guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah he was listening to BiggerPockets long before I knew what BiggerPockets was.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Like for like five years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So he wanted to be a real mogul and I thought well let\u2019s worry about this house. Well we\u2019d gone out to start looking for a real estate investment, we were going to use our emergency fund. We\u2019d actually accumulated six months in our emergency fund, six months expenses. And now it was time to go shop for a rental property\u2026 going to hope David buys it no, but this is what we decided to do. We paid off our mortgage to the point where it was only $70,000 left on the primary residence that we had at the time. We went shopping for a new place and interest rates were down but the prices had started to go up in our market.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That\u2019s when the interest rates were like 20% guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah so.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So what year is this?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That was 2013.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> 2013.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We were looking into it like when at first the market crashed and everybody was terrified till 2009-2010 and we waited and then as it started kind of rising back up we were like, \u201cOh we got to get it this is several thousands.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> No when he says we were looking in 2010 he means he was looking at it in 2010. Let\u2019s be clear now. I was not yet on board with this vision.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I was like here\u2019s four houses that are foreclosed on our block.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> And I said aha, oh those people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Look like what\u2019s his name- Buffett says- jump on it when there\u2019s blood in the streets. And that\u2019s when I saw blood in the streets guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah and what I saw was fear. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> No more fear in there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So in 2013 we went out to look and prices had gone up in the market. And I said, \u201cOh wow these prices have gone up so much maybe what we need to do is actually look for our next primary residence and see it.\u201d Based on what I see with these interest rates, we can get a great rate on a bigger house and get the nicer home.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Because when we got married he moved into the home that I already owned, which initially he wasn\u2019t comfortable with the idea but we paid, that\u2019s one of the things we did, we upgraded the home. We had it freshly painted.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> She let me do it all.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We purged the closets, we did the kitchen and the bath all that to try to make the existing house seem new. For couples who are making that decision as to whether or not they should buy a house when they get married, we just upgraded the one we had.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And we stayed there for four years, went out and looked and found our new house, a house that we just paid off now. We found that house and we turned our first primary residence into our first rental. That\u2019s how we got into the real estate thing. That was the beginning of our real estate investing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Okay let\u2019s dive into that. So when you decided to keep that first home as a rental, what did that look like? Did you do anything to especially do that? Did you analyze it as if you were purchasing a rental property or you just kind of just took a tenant in there?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So honestly it was a dream because we had just done all those upgrades two years prior, we literally got to live in there with some of the upgrades, right. A lot of times when people get their house ready to become a rental they do all this fixing up and then they move out of it. So we got to appreciate it for a couple years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">The market was really good for tenants in that space we lived and it was a Class A neighborhood. The elementary and middle school are walking distance, our son walked to both of those. And then he ran cross-country so he kind of jogged to high school when he was late for the bus. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So it was a great local humor, you want a great public school system and all that good stuff. So we just found a property manager and put it out there. So we already owed 50% of the mortgage at that time, so it was cash flowing like crazy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right about $70,000. Yeah it was at 150 when she bought it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Down to $70,000.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> You\u2019d been on it for 10 years, right. Five years it was her and then when I moved in five more years. And then it was down to 70 and we refinanced it at 3%, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> With VA refinance package. So being that we\u2019re both veterans at the time there was a refinance package with no closing costs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> That\u2019s awesome, so this is awesome. This is a huge leverage point. See it sounds like at this point you hadn\u2019t accumulated a lot of liquidity with which to invest, right. So you take your house which you\u2019ve been building liquidity on, you fix it up, you reappraise it at a higher valuation, you cash out re-fi. And now you have a chunk of change that you can go out and invest.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Actually we didn\u2019t cash out Scott.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You didn\u2019t cash out. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We re-fied at 70 grand and we just had cash flow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> I see.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We didn\u2019t know about cash out re-fi then.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Got it. Yeah either way though is that you turned a significant chunk of your net worth into an income producing asset, right which is now capable of sustaining more financial freedom. And so it was\u2026 to say a lot of people are unwilling to do that, right but that\u2019s kind of I think a major step. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">If you\u2019re thinking about doing this and you\u2019re well into your career and you\u2019ve got a house, redeploying that equity. I usually think that a house doesn\u2019t really count toward financial freedom, unless you\u2019re willing to do what you guys did and kind of go in fort that. So what happens next?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So like I said, that house was cash flowing like crazy once we re-fied it at a 15 year with a 3% interest rate. It was only $70,000 and the house rented for $1,600 a month. So we got great cash flow, what we did is we kind of reinvested that in the real estate account, so that we would have money that would build up for repairs and things like that if we needed it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Then also we purchased our new primary residence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Which I didn\u2019t want to do by the way, because that was double the price, $300,000 by then. I wanted to stick it to 150 and just get small rentals but it worked out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Exactly. He didn\u2019t want to but-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Newer house, it was you know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> He down on making me happy was what it really boiled down to. So we purchased our larger home at another 15 year mortgage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Is this your current home?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> The home we\u2019re in right now. A lower interest rate, 2.85% yeah something like that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> It was insane.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> And then we did 10% down, and we just decided it was time to buy our next rental. So we moved into this house in 2013 and then that same year, did we buy another rental or do we wait to 2014?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I think it was next year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We bought another rental, maybe the next year yes because we kept our primary. And in 2014 went shopping for another rental. Over that period of time after we purchased this home and between purchasing our next rental, we replenished our \u2018emergency fund\u2019. And every time the emergency fund reached six months, we were out to go shop for a new rental property.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You\u2019re using the term real estate fund and emergency fund very interchangeably.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes. They are, for us they were interchangeable. So actually 20% down was the requirement for single family homes that we were purchasing at the time. Right, and we were looking for houses that were at 150.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right, so we needed 30 grand, right. So we would save this money, go shopping for the next rental.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We were aiming for that\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right and we were able to do that successfully four times before the market changed.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes in that area.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah, the market changed, prices went up and I was like, \u201cBabes, time to get your real estate license.\u201d We were paying too much money in realtor fees and everything else, but based on our goals.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> No what you said was, \u201cYou know what, it\u2019d be great if one of us got our license.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> I see.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> You know what that means, right Scott.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> One of us that isn\u2019t me. Well Scott you sold-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Or maybe Mindy knows, Scott doesn\u2019t, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right. But Mindy is a realtor and Scott was in sales, right, you spent some time in sales before you came. So you know if you\u2019re a professional salesperson you got your hands full with everything you\u2019re doing in your corporate gig. There really isn\u2019t a lot of time to go out and sell something else on the side.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Well Rob, was your profession performance based?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> No, I was an IT guy for a hospital. My schedule was pretty set so I\u2019ve been doing it for a long time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So I think that is an important point, right is if your work is performance based and there\u2019s just total upside, then you can theoretically pour in lots of extra work and that\u2019s going to reward you. But if you\u2019re just like earning a straight salary and the next raise is going to be 10% next year versus 7% depending on your performance, then that is just simply not as effective lever to pull putting all that extra effort.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Oh I think my parents would be mortified to hear me saying this. But that\u2019s to earn that little bit of extra salary just isn\u2019t going to drive you towards your goal of financial freedom soon.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And that\u2019s why I studied at home and got the books and got my license.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah. So well congrats to getting your license.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That\u2019s what we could do too Scott, I was like hey if I kill it this year we can bring home a big cheque, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> I love how you\u2019re saying we.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah it is all we, goes into the same account.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That\u2019s the people we are.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah so he was at this time already listening to BiggerPockets and he was pushing me to listen to it. But I was struggling even though we were already investing in real estate I was struggling to listen to the podcast because I worked for some really great companies. And which is why we were so fortunate to have the incomes that we had. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">But with those incomes they\u2019re very demanding, so you\u2019re giving blood sweat and tears to these jobs in order to accomplish your goals. And I\u2019ve been a salesperson for over 20 years and I am driven to be successful. And which means that I just very little downtime or time to myself in order to listen to the podcast.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">I went through a company transition I left one company and moved to another in 2017. And that\u2019s when I found the time to listen to BiggerPockets. I was in a hotel the night before I had client meetings, and I said let me listen to this podcast my husband keeps talking about. And I started to text him, \u201cOh my God this is amazing, we can do this stuff. This cash out re-fi thing have you heard about this?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> At least that\u2019s not illegal.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> I was like, \u201cWe could so amp up on our real estate business if we started to look at some of these principles.\u201d And then from there everything changed and like I said we\u2019d already been investing for four years at that point and it still made a huge difference.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> So how many rentals do you have now?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So as part of the strategy we\u2019ve learned from BiggerPockets and Brandon and Josh and you guys, we actually converted one of our single family homes, we did a 1031 exchange and converted it into a small six unit mostly family out of state.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah so we completed that. We recognized that we needed to focus on the number of doors first as the number of units and that was a change in strategy really.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We had about five at first.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We had four in our primary residence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Oh yeah four.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah we had four in our primary residence, we sold one and went to this 10-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> 1031 exchange.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> 1031 exchange and did a six unit out of state. Then we did a cash out re-fi on our first property which at this point was-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We did on our first one yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Which at this point was paid off.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> This is the single family home.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> That you guys lived in previously.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes. It has gone up in value significantly, it has appreciated.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We did a cash out re-fi for the original 150, and paid off our current residence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Not anybody would agree, we know.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We know, but they\u2019re like, \u201cYou could use that later to buy more properties.\u201d Well we just wanted the opportunity to go down the entrepreneurial route without the stress of having a primary mortgage.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So that\u2019s really interesting. So you guys in your separate debt on your primary residence versus in your rental properties.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> And you chose to pay off your primary residence and treat the other one like an investment, right. That\u2019s fascinating to me.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Well our rental properties have never been vacant. Outside of a month maybe two on that first property. So we have been very fortunate, we have a fund to cover vacancies if we need it. We do have that money in an account. But they cash flow and they pay for a property manager.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And they\u2019re good areas, really good areas.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So the mortgage is always paid.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right next to schools, but they\u2019re never empty.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So since we haven\u2019t had any of those issues we thought well we don\u2019t have to worry about homes as much as we do our own residence.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right. It\u2019s just the biggest liability and it was like coming out parking with that big chunk of money every month and we were like, man.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> But you\u2019re still coming with that same amount of money but it\u2019s coming right out the rental but it\u2019s coming out of the business now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes it\u2019s coming out the business account.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Okay I see.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay so well there\u2019s this huge argument on BiggerPockets the website biggerpockets.com about should I pay off my mortgage or should I not? I am in this should not pay off my mortgage because I have such a low interest rate, but I can sleep at night with having this mortgage. I mean my mortgage is $1,100 a month because I bought this cheap house that I then fixed up and made big.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">But I think it\u2019s really important to point out that you guys are approaching this in a systematic way, it doesn\u2019t sound you\u2019re overleveraging yourself even on the rental properties. Your rent coming in more than pays all the expenses and the mortgage of the property. And I think that\u2019s really important to point out because a lot of people will hear this kind of story and say, \u201cOh I can just mortgage myself to the hill.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Well what happens if that school burns down or whatever? And now nobody wants to live in your area and you\u2019re stuck with all these mortgages. It sounds like you can still foot those bills for a long time before you would have to really scramble. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And I think that that\u2019s really important to point out that you\u2019re doing this intentionally. And look if you want to pay off your mortgage, if that helps you sleep at night, if that helps you pursue entrepreneurship, then go for it. Anybody who tells you different is wrong, you tell them I said so.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So how much cash flow is your portfolio producing? Is it enough to live off of at this point?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> No, it\u2019s not enough to live off of. Our mortgage for this primary residence was $2,600 a month because we had a 15 year mortgage on a $300,000 home. So that\u2019s $2,600 less that we worry about.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah covering each month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That\u2019s what I mean yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> And we call it cash flow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> No I think that\u2019s great. And that\u2019s coming out now and you refinanced I assume with a 30 year mortgage so that had a lesser effect on your cash flow from your rental or is that also 15?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That\u2019s correct, it\u2019s 30.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> The move was designed to free up a lot of cash flow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> And you guys are now leveraging that cash flow to make a lifestyle change, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You left your jobs, right. So can you walk us through that process? How did you feel comfortable with that? Was that a combination of cash flow, savings and low expenses or?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So all of that. So after over 20 years of being in sales you can\u2019t certainly get burnt out. If you\u2019ve done it for any amount of time, I know people who he\u2019s hang in there for five years or less before they make career changes if they started out in sales. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So after over 20 years I wanted a career change but I did not want it to impact our family\u2019s lifestyle to the extent that we have to leave our home or sell our home. That\u2019s always possible, there are people in the FI movement that are selling everything, we weren\u2019t at that point. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">In our 40s we\u2019re comfortable where we are and we need to be able to stay where we are but still make the change. So paying off the house allowed us to do that. So as a travel agent you actually don\u2019t make any money until after the person takes a trip. So just a hint. So if you want to become a travel agent, there\u2019s no upfront money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Makes it sound like it\u2019s hard to get in and then hard to leave.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Exactly. So I enjoyed doing it and I have an opportunity to help people plan the vacations of their dreams. I get a lot of travel perks and we like to travel. So that was a big break.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We love it, to stop everything yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right, that was a big driver for us. What we looked at was what are we working for now that the oldest one in out of college and the youngest one is still trying to figure out what he wants to do? So now why would I stay in this job that\u2019s very stressful, physically stress wise taxing? Why would I stay now? What is the motivation to stay? And that was it. Once we figured out that we could get our bills low, because the rest of our bills are about $500 a month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah really next to nothing, so.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We haven\u2019t had car notes in eight years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> You spend 500, so wait hold on, your total expenses to fund your lifestyle are what?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> No, that\u2019s for our household expenses. For our utility bills and car insurance and things of that nature is about 500 a month. And if you look at our grocery bill and restaurant, are the biggest expenses.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Those are the biggest things now, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> But you can do that because you live almost for free.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> And you get around almost for free.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right. So that\u2019s probably between groceries and eating out we\u2019re still living at between three and $400 a month. But there are plenty of people who do it for less.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Plenty of people who do it for more.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah it\u2019s $800 a month are your living expenses?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> 12,000 right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> That\u2019s $12,000 a year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> This is brand new to us though guys, it\u2019s just as\u2026 but we\u2019ve been calculating like what? I mean it changed from here to here.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah it doesn\u2019t include any vacation or anything like that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right and that\u2019s what we\u2019re working on now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Any travel expenses, just to live if we didn\u2019t go anywhere that\u2019s what it would cost us to stay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Well but I think that\u2019s important. Travel is extra. If something happens catastrophic, you could work at Starbucks and get health insurance and pay all your bills. I mean maybe you don\u2019t get a lot of travel out of it but you can still pay all your bills. I love that your expenses are less than $1,000 a month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> No, and let me add something to that because there\u2019s somebody from Texas who\u2019s going to listen to this and go, \u201cThey have high property taxes.\u201d And we do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes, we do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Our property taxes are about $8,000 a year. So add that 8000 to the 12,000 we\u2019re more like $20,000 a year in expenses.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> It\u2019s more like about $2,000 a month in expenses which does seem like a minimum threshold that you can relate to like in essence what you probably need to do to live a baseline there. And it sounds like you guys are able to do that very happily. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah. Now looking at the fun stuff.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Well thank you for clarifying that because if you had not, somebody would have called you out on that because like we\u2019re addressing that in advance. I can\u2019t promise that nobody is going to call you out anyway. So do you consider yourselves financially independent? Where are you on the FI path in your mind?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Oh yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So for us it was just the ability to leave our leave our corporate jobs to pursue the careers that we wanted. Right, I\u2019ve always wanted to do something more entrepreneurial. But you earn a certain income, you have lifestyle creep and you build a lifestyle around that income, makes it very difficult to pull out and now start to entrepreneurially make nothing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">So the real estate investments we\u2019ve made and the properties that we\u2019ve sold even have helped us tremendously. So you asked us earlier what we have left, and what we have now in real estate investments, we have two single families and a six unit apartment complex. So we\u2019re at eight doors. We went from four doors to eight doors in one year.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Awesome.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That was awesome, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> The goal was 15.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> His goal was 15. You know what, I like the modest goal because on the real estate podcast I have co-hosted or guest hosted I guess is the right word to say that, a couple of times and on the BiggerPockets real estate investing podcast which is available wherever podcasts are, people there seem to have this most people have this like giant goal.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I want to own 1,000 doors. I don\u2019t want to own 1,000 doors.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob &amp;<\/b> <b>Reshawn:<\/b> No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I think10 sounds great. 15, totally doable. You\u2019re not going to go crazy unless you get terrible tenants, you\u2019re not going to go crazy with 15 doors. Whereas 1,000 doors just like seems so overwhelming. And I think a lot of people who hear that who maybe aren\u2019t just so crazy about real estate like all of us are, might be like, \u201cOh forget it, I can\u2019t do real estate if I don\u2019t have 1,000 doors and I don\u2019t want 1,000 doors.\u201d You can do real estate with one door, you can do real estate right now you guys have eight doors and it allows you to live the life that you want.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And in the meantime I\u2019m still a real estate agent. So that still pretty decent money.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah, you\u2019re an active agent that\u2019s like you do that with other people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah. So I was working in IT and I worked at a hospital. And I was selling houses to the nurses, by mistake.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Not by mistake. He talks about real estate to everyone.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Anybody who will listen, he is telling the real estate story.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Especially if they want to be an investor. So I mean I was like, \u201cI am your investor real estate agent.\u201d And they\u2019re like, \u201cWait a minute, have you invested?\u201d \u201cWell as a matter of fact I have, I have this amount of houses.\u201d \u201cWhat, you must be rich.\u201d \u201cNo, I\u2019m not rich but I can help you get there.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> You would never believe he\u2019d never sold anything before.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah that kind of lines, when I was reading over your bio, I thought he was the salesperson.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That\u2019s funny.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So to kind of recap your whole story here, it sounds like you started off in this position of debt. And then big fundamental thing is you have a budget and you start sticking to that budget, and applying everything I a systematic way that is growing net worth. You don\u2019t call it saving but it is saving. You\u2019re contributing to your 401K, you\u2019re maxing out 529 plan, you\u2019re paying off debt. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">But you get to zero and then you redeploy your biggest asset which is the home equity, right and you turn that into an investment property. Now it\u2019s producing cash flow. Right you buy another house but you continue with that savings rate and then you use that to buy more and more real estate.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And within a couple more years, you now have all of this flexibility and freedom with your jobs and you can kind of go round the world, live wherever you want, take the real estate job and start this entrepreneurial journey, because of this kind of few simple leverage that you\u2019ve tweaked in your financial position.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We couldn\u2019t believe it. We couldn\u2019t believe that it was possible.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah until now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Fantastic. It\u2019s not repeatable. A part of that suppose I\u2019m listening to this and I\u2019m earning good income and I\u2019m starting in your position. Why couldn\u2019t I do what you\u2019ve done?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I\u2019m going to jump in here and I\u2019m going to answer or make a comment or this and say as I was listening to their story I\u2019m like this isn\u2019t rocket science.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> No it\u2019s not.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> This isn\u2019t some crazy set of circumstances that would never happen again. This is so easy isn\u2019t the right word I know there\u2019s people-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> But doable, how about doable.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Totally doable.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Worth it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> There\u2019s people who have like crippling medical debt and made really bad decisions their whole life and whatever, but this isn\u2019t that hard to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> It just takes discipline guys. That\u2019s all it needs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> It just takes discipline that is an excellent quote.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> I will say and teamwork. If we hadn\u2019t both been on board it would have made it a lot more difficult.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah because we know people and it\u2019s hard sometime to get both people on board.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Well I will also say I\u2019ve picked up that you guys had had some disagreements about how you want to kind of approach the major decisions like building of the home or whatever. And what you\u2019ve done I think that\u2019s really great is you said, \u201cHey I\u2019m going to back off my position.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And I\u2019m going to go and do what you want. And do what the other side wants.\u201d And that hey maybe there\u2019s different ways you could have gone about it but that\u2019s what worked for you guys. And that\u2019s gotten the result and it\u2019s within a five year period, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah. And we\u2019re married. If there are married people without disagreements, they don\u2019t even like each other. You got to have some fire in the relationship, if there are no disagreements they\u2019re on the road to divorce.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> And the truth is that the very first one and you probably picked up on was I didn\u2019t want to buy the $300,000 house and move into it. I was thinking at the back of my mind, I\u2019m still going to get a rental out of this because if I don\u2019t agree with this, then we\u2019re not going to move and if we don\u2019t move then I\u2019m not going to get my first rental. I mean she\u2019s not going to see how great this whole situation is.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> It was a win-win.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> So it\u2019s going to be right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Love it. Anything we should ask you about your journey or any other topics you want to cover before we move on to the famous four?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Well what are going to do next, right?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah. Are you going to tell them?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yes there we go, what\u2019s next?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> So right now we decided we\u2019re going to take a sabbatical and we\u2019re going to take a year off. So we quit our day jobs, Reshawn is still going to do the travel agency thing because she can do anywhere.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Location independent.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah, I\u2019m going to pause on the real estate because I won\u2019t be able to do it while I\u2019m here. We are going to Argentina and we\u2019re going to travel few months, come back home for a couple of weeks. And we\u2019re going to just travel and we\u2019re going to do it and hit all the different continents for the whole year of 2019.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> So do you know anybody that can help you plan those kinds of trips?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I think there\u2019s one to try.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Travel perks.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> That\u2019s awesome. That sounds fantastic.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We\u2019re going to travel for the whole year yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> That\u2019s the ultimate, is spend 20 years learning all the ins and outs.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah become a travel agent.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We knew we were going when she got good at it so we\u2019re doing it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> So a few weeks ago on episode 55 we interviewed Christie and Bryce from Millennial Revolution and I actually had a chance to meet them in person a few months ago in October I guess. And I asked them how do you deal with all these different languages because you can\u2019t speak everything?\u201d and she said, \u201cWe use Duolingo and it is fabulous.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I use that, yeah I\u2019m learning that right now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah it is fabulous for learning the key phrases for travel and do you speak English in whatever language they have. So I wanted to give you that tip but you already know it so never mind.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That\u2019s okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> They had some great tips as well for health insurance, which if you\u2019re going to be traveling to other countries, you may find a lot of that to be like a very pleasant surprise on how to handle that and the cost of all that kind of stuff.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Okay we\u2019re going to have to go back and listen to episode 55.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> You can find that at biggerpockets.com\/moneyshow55.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Apparently health insurance is this huge deal if you\u2019re trying to earn a huge income and live. But if you don\u2019t have a high income there\u2019s a lot of really good options. And then if you want to travel the world, they were getting away with murder with that. That was yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Honestly, what we have discovered is the less money you make the better deal you get on health insurance for sure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> We\u2019re actually going through that right now, we\u2019re trying to figure out what we\u2019re going to do as far as that after leaving corporate right now. It\u2019s not cheap out there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yeah we have to pay more now but we\u2019ll pay less, later, because our income will go down so much in 2019.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Well once you\u2019re travelling, they have this plan that\u2019ll cover you if you\u2019re in the United States less than six months, you can get a plan for the United States. If you\u2019re going to be all over the- and I think they were paying something like $20 a month.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn &amp;<\/b> <b>Rob:<\/b> Wow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> For their insurance outside of the US.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Wow.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> So yeah definitely go back and give that episode a listen, there\u2019s lots of travel tips in there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Definitely have to check it out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay it is now time for the famous four questions. These are the same four questions and one command that we ask of all of our guests. What is your favorite finance book? And you guys can each answer separately.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I got so many. Can you go first?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Finance.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Set For Life by Scott Trench.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I love that book.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Plug yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> We gave that one to our 23 year old.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> He\u2019s reading it right now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> He\u2019s reading it right now.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> And one to your 18 year old too.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Right? So we\u2019ve actually told everybody about Dave Ramsey\u2019s Total Money Makeover, we\u2019ve given that one away actually in the audiobook. With Dave that\u2019s a great place to start if you\u2019re in the beginning. Love The Millionaire Next Door and the Millionaire Real Estate Investor.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I thought we only get one.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Sorry guys. You read a lot of books when you\u2019re-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Those are all great books.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> When you\u2019re researching financial independence, we\u2019ve gone through quite a few books.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah every month we would get out of it. So yeah if I had to choose one, wow it would probably be The Millionaire Real Estate Investor.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Nice.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> That one lit a fire under me years ago.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Love it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah that\u2019s an excellent one, that\u2019s by-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Right, Scott you\u2019re in my top three though.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Alright I\u2019ll take it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Seriously man.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> I appreciate it thank you. What was your biggest money mistake?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I know mine.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Go for it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Mine was blowing my GI bill money on living expenses. Instead of paying for college out of the military, they were sending me cash money and cheque right which I think is a bad idea personally. But as that money came in, I didn\u2019t use it on my actual school expenses, I just used it for living in San Diego because it was so expensive to live there.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Balling out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I should have lived more modest and then paid off the debt and I would have been done, I would have been doing this way ahead of the game at least five or 10 years ahead of the game. And I swear if I can go back and tell my young self, don\u2019t do it man. Start saving immediately and start investing immediately.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Five or 10 years.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah that\u2019s how I feel.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Wow, that\u2019s something we haven\u2019t really covered yet on this show Scott is the opportunity cost concept.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> At least five yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Was living large in San Diego worth five years? I\u2019m not ranting-<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> You should have seen your face by the way. We turn off the video from our side.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> It was good, but now that I\u2019m older and I\u2019m 43, I would give it up. I would because I believe that I think my opinion in the end, all the fun stuff come, the earlier you get done with it and the earlier you\u2019re out of debt and the earlier you invest the more fun you can have early. Like our kids think we\u2019re super young they\u2019re like, \u201cYou guys are way too young to be travelling around the world and doing this in your 40s, right. Now imagine if we could do it our 30s, right.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Our son\u2019s best friend told us that we were going through a midlife crisis.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Everybody thinks we\u2019re crazy like everybody is used to status quo, right. Go to work, work, work till you\u2019re 60-something, but no.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So biggest money mistake trying to get us back on track sorry guys. Biggest money mistake for me I\u2019m sure was the credit cards in college. Becoming a mom early helped me to avoid a lot of money mistakes honestly. So people advice you not to become a young parent, outside of getting married to my husband, becoming my son\u2019s mom, single best decision I have ever made, guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> I know, I\u2019m a mom. You need to have kids.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So whatever foolish mistakes I would have made were cut off quickly because now I\u2019m somebody\u2019s mom. So not only did I have to get my life together financially, you\u2019ve got to do everything different when you become somebody\u2019s mom if you want to do it right. So credit cards, worst mistake, mom thing best thing ever done.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Awesome. What is your best piece of advice for people who are just starting out?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Stop creating debt immediately. Don\u2019t spend anything. Pay off the stuff that you have and try to save so you can invest. That\u2019s just my opinion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Love it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> The earlier you invest the better your life will be sooner.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Research. Be open to learning something new. The sales environment is full of type A personalities and that means oftentimes you\u2019re probably not the most open to learning new things, which is why it may have taken me a little time to listening to the podcasts. So the biggest lesson I\u2019ve learned is just be open to learning new things and receiving new information.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Because without all of the testimonials that were shared via podcasts like BiggerPockets, Journey to Launch, Paula Pant\u2019s Afford Anything. Without all of the people willing to share with us via those vehicles we would certainly not have had the courage to explore and to get to where are today much faster than what we\u2019d originally planned.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Love it. Yeah we didn\u2019t really cover that a ton today. But this sounds like that was a very integral part of your journey as well is just the relentless consumption of information or at least it became a part of your journey. And we hear that every single time, from every single story there\u2019s no change. Right it\u2019s always the change and the rapid acceleration toward financial freedom or a significant financial result always comes from that relentless accumulation of knowledge.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> that\u2019s how we came up with Learn Hustle Grow because essentially that\u2019s what we were doing accumulating as much information and knowledge as we could from the vehicles that were available.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Can\u2019t believe this stuff is free man. I mean it\u2019s like it\u2019s an amazing gift from God.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Feel free to send us a cheque. But no, it\u2019s all free.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> That\u2019s Mindy Jensen J-E-N-S-E-N.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Alright well what\u2019s your favorite joke to tell at parties?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Oh man, joke no.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So we don\u2019t have jokes but we are observers. So if we have something funny to say it\u2019s an observation that we\u2019ve made about the environment and maybe some of the people in it. So probably not good to ask us about jokes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay I have a joke, Rob do you know the joke?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I don\u2019t.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay. How many apples grow on a tree?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> How many?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> I don\u2019t know, hundreds.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> All of them. Did you hear about the restaurant on the moon?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob &amp;<\/b> <b>Reshawn:<\/b> No.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Great food no atmosphere.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Oh Mindy with the jokes today, I love it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> I think I\u2019ve listened to this before usually Scott\u2019s got all the jokes. You\u2019re doing great Mindy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah it\u2019s a great contest. Okay.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Great keep going.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Want to hear a joke about paper?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Yes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Sure.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Never mind it\u2019s tear-able.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> That was good, I like that.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Alright. I love it. I have a pointless pencil joke but we\u2019ll that some other time.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Oh God.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Pointless pencil.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Okay now it\u2019s time for the command. Tell us where people can find out more about you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> So we have a blog learnhustlegrow.com, they can also follow us on Instagram @Learn Hustle Grow. And we\u2019re in the process of starting a YouTube Channel. So we haven\u2019t gotten it launched yet but we\u2019re working on it.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Even though we hate being on video.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> learnhustlgrow.com and Learn Hustle Grow on Instagram. Reshawn and Rob, thank you so much for coming on the show today. I really appreciate your time and I hope you have a lovely trip to Argentina and the other five continents.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Rest of the world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Thank you guys.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah thank you.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Reshawn:<\/b> Thanks for having us on.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Rob:<\/b> Yeah same here.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Alright that was Reshawn and Rob from Learn Hustle Grow. Mindy what did you think?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Oh I love their story. I love that their story is not exciting. It\u2019s not and then I won the lottery and then I got a zebra and then I got like they don\u2019t have all that. What they have is this- I don\u2019t want to say boring because it\u2019s definitely not boring- they have real estate rentals.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And I love real estate and it\u2019s exciting but they have a very clear path to their financial independence. And it is pay off my debt, save some money, save some more money, become financially independent, oh and invest. There\u2019s invest in there too. But I mean it\u2019s not hard.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> No, I agree. And I\u2019m a bit of a video gamer. Right, so if anyone out there plays video games will relate to this but in some of these games you need to like maximize your guy. Get really powerful and do every single thing perfectly and then go out and kind of figure things out. And the term for this is called Man Maxing.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">Right and that\u2019s what a lot of people we hear about on the show here do, they\u2019ll literally just go all out, cut everything out. And then invest in the most optimal way that they possibly can with a few very minor variations on it and go after it, right. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And they didn\u2019t do that, they made solid decisions one after the other, they made tradeoffs based on what the other partner wanted in terms of what they want in their life. And they got there, and they\u2019re in a golden situation and extremely happy. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">And it didn\u2019t really make that big a difference because they got the few big things right with their housing choice, with saving their incomes and with focusing on producing some sustainable cash flow. Like why do we make it so much harder than it has to be with some of these other episodes? I don\u2019t know. I talk about every time that man their path just again seems so repeatable for so many people.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> Yeah. It\u2019s not rocket science. And I like what you said, I like that you brought up the fact that they had compromises. If you go into a marriage thinking I\u2019m going to get my way all the time, you are so wrong. It\u2019s just not how that works, and they talked about money, which is huge. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\">They talked about money before they got married. They make mutually beneficial decisions and they talk about their money. Did you hear them say that they have a money date every month still even after they\u2019ve gotten their finances fixed? I mean it\u2019s so repeatable.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Scott:<\/b> Yeah. Should we get out of here Mindy?<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s1\"><b>Mindy:<\/b> We should. From episode 61 of the BiggerPockets Money Podcast this is Scott Trench and Mindy Jensen and we are out the door dinosaur.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Watch the Podcast Here<\/h2>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The Repeatable Path to Financial Independence with Reshawn &amp; Rob  | BP Money 61\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/IynNlRME3bI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h2>Help Us Out!<\/h2>\n<p>Help us reach new listeners on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/us\/podcast\/biggerpockets-money-podcast\/id1330225136\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">iTunes<\/a>\u00a0by leaving us a rating and review! It takes just 30 seconds.\u00a0Thanks! We really appreciate it!<\/p>\n<h2>Podcast Sponsors<\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-medium wp-image-74647 no-display appear\" src=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/freshlogo-300x225.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" title=\"\">The all-new\u00a0<strong>FreshBooks<\/strong>\u00a0is accounting software that makes running your small business easy, fast and secure. Spend less time on accounting and more time doing the work you love. For a 30-day unrestricted trial, go to\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/freshbooks.com\/bpmoney\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">FreshBooks.com\/bpmoney<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>Second Sponsor<\/h2>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-102654 no-display appear\" src=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Blinkist-Logo.png\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 275px) 100vw, 275px\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Blinkist-Logo.png 3000w, https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Blinkist-Logo-300x72.png 300w, https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Blinkist-Logo-768x184.png 768w, https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Blinkist-Logo-1024x245.png 1024w\" alt=\"\" width=\"275\" height=\"66\" title=\"\">Almost none of us have the time to read everything we\u2019d like to read. Yet we lose countless hours to activities that bring us little joy such as commuting, chores and staring at our phones. What if we could turn these little blocks of unallocated time into precious and rewarding moments for learning and reflection? Founded in 2012 by four friends, Blinkist now connects 6-million readers worldwide to the biggest ideas from bestselling nonfiction via 15-minute audio and text.<\/p>\n<p>Blinkist has a special offer for YOU. It\u2019s a FREE 7 day trial \u2014 just go to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.blinkist.com\/biggerpockets\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Blinkist.com\/biggerpockets<\/a><\/p>\n<h2>In This Episode We Cover:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Their <strong>money background<\/strong> story<\/li>\n<li>The reason they decided to<strong> combine their finances<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Their <strong>savings rate<\/strong> and what they did after they combined their finances<\/li>\n<li>Ways to <strong>cut back<\/strong> on spending<\/li>\n<li>How <strong>Dave Ramsey<\/strong> helped them<\/li>\n<li>How they <strong>paid off<\/strong> all of their debts<\/li>\n<li>The <strong>529 college savings plan<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Their i<strong>nvestment philosophy<\/strong> after paying off debt<\/li>\n<li><strong>Redeploying their home equity<\/strong> and turning it into an investment property<\/li>\n<li>Replenishing their <strong>emergency fund<\/strong> after purchasing a new rental property<\/li>\n<li>Their property <strong>taxes<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>On being <strong>financially independent<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>The importance of having a <strong>giant goal<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>Having an agreement on how to approach <strong>major decisions<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>What their <strong>next plan<\/strong> is<\/li>\n<li><strong>And SO much more!<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Links from the Show<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/finconexpo.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">FinCon<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/podcast\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">BiggerPockets Podcast<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"\/renewsblog\/biggerpockets-money-podcast-55-quit-job-travel-world-millennial-revolution\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">BiggerPockets Money Podcast 55: How to Quit Your Job and Travel the World with Millennial Revolution<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.millennial-revolution.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Millenial Revolution<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.duolingo.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Duolingo<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.journeytolaunch.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Journey To Launch<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/affordanything.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Afford Anything<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/forums\/12\/topics\/464435-should-i-pay-off-my-mortgage-or-buy-rentals\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">BiggerPockets: An argument about should I pay off my mortgage or not?<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Books Mentioned in this Show<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2Eu667o\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>Richest Man in Babylon<\/em><\/a> by George Samuel Clason<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2BLhaLB\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>One Bed, One Bank Account<\/em><\/a> by Carrie Olsen and Derek Olsen<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2EuJTGh\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>Total Money Makeover<\/em><\/a> by Dave Ramsey<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/setforlife\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>Set For Life<\/em><\/a> by Scott Trench<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2BPEWGk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>The Millionaire Next Door<\/em><\/a> by Thomas J. Stanley<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/amzn.to\/2XkzGDw\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><em>The Millionaire Real Estate Investor<\/em><\/a> by Jay Papasan &amp; Gary Keller<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Tweetable Topics:<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>&#8220;There is no upfront money.&#8221;\u00a0(<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/home?status=%22There%20is%20no%20upfront%20money.%22%C2%A0BP%20Money%20Podcast%2061%20%40biggerpockets%20biggerpockets.com\/moneyshow61\" target=\"_blank\">Tweet This!<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;It takes discipline.&#8221;\u00a0(<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/home?status=%22It%20takes%20discipline.%22%C2%A0BP%20Money%20Podcast%2061%20%40biggerpockets%20biggerpockets.com\/moneyshow61\" target=\"_blank\">Tweet This!<\/a>)<\/li>\n<li>&#8220;Every time our emergency fund got to six months, we went out and bought a new rental.&#8221; (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/home?status=%22Every%20time%20our%20emergency%20fund%20got%20to%20six%20months,%20we%20went%20out%20and%20bought%20a%20new%20rental.%22%C2%A0BP%20Money%20Podcast%2061%20%40biggerpockets%20biggerpockets.com\/moneyshow61\" target=\"_blank\">Tweet This!<\/a>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Connect with Reshawn &amp; Rob<\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/learnhustlegrow.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Learn Hustle Grow Website<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/learnhustlegrow\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Instagram Profile<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reshawn and Rob implemented a modified version of Dave Ramsey\u2019s Baby Steps program to get themselves out of debt so they could start investing. Their team approach to their finances and focusing on paying it off together strengthened their marriage and their desire to attain financial independence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":353007,"featured_media":107918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6473],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-107901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-biggerpocketsmoney"],"acf":[],"comment_count":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/353007"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=107901"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/107901\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/107918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=107901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=107901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.biggerpockets.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=107901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}