Have you ever felt trapped in the cycle of endless bills and financial confusion? Join us as we navigate the path to biblical financial freedom, blending time-tested wisdom with actionable steps.
We discuss some key takeaways from Kevin's upcoming book and explore the true essence of debt-free living, arguing that money simply amplifies who you already are. Stay with us to the end as we share five transformative books that guided us on our journey to financial success. We hope this episode encourages you on your journey to financial freedom!
Subscribe and tell a friend!
Get my new book "The Seven Disciplines of Uncommon Freedom" on Amazon!
Visit bekandkev.com today to sign up for our email newsletter.
Access our Free health assessment HERE
Have you ever felt trapped in the cycle of endless bills and financial confusion? Join us as we navigate the path to biblical financial freedom, blending time-tested wisdom with actionable steps.
We discuss some key takeaways from Kevin's upcoming book and explore the true essence of debt-free living, arguing that money simply amplifies who you already are. Stay with us to the end as we share five transformative books that guided us on our journey to financial success. We hope this episode encourages you on your journey to financial freedom!
Subscribe and tell a friend!
Get my new book "The Seven Disciplines of Uncommon Freedom" on Amazon!
Visit bekandkev.com today to sign up for our email newsletter.
Access our Free health assessment HERE
Hey friends, welcome to the Uncommon Freedom Show. I'm Kevin.
Speaker 2:And I'm Becca, and we're your hosts, here to help you reach your potential and maximize your impact in every area that matters. Let's get started. Two weeks ago, we talked about how you can't do it all. Last week, we talked about saying no. This week, we're going to talk about saying yes. To quote, unquote doing it.
Speaker 1:That's right, babe. One of our favorite topics is sex, and I always like to joke that I get to sleep with the hot boss and the HR department doesn't care. But even though we're teasing people this episode with the idea that sex is best when you aren't in debt, which is absolutely true what we're really talking about is how life is so much better when you don't have debt. We're pulling from my soon to be released book entitled the Seven Disciplines of Uncommon Freedom. Specifically, we're going to be talking about discipline two from chapter four, which is master yourself, master your wealth, kind of like master of your domain, from Seinfeld Clever title.
Speaker 1:Stay with us to the end, though, to get to our top five list of books which helped us become multi millionaires by the time we were 40 years old.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all right, finances, or the lack thereof, is a leading stressor in marriage. I think many people are aware of that. So more money doesn't guarantee less stress if you don't have good habits, and many times more money means your problems have more zero zeros behind them. So we talk about, you know it can be broke at a higher level or more money, what's the same More money more money more problems.
Speaker 2:But everything is better when you own it. Vacations are better when you don't have to pay them off after. Cars are more enjoyable when you own them and to your credit. Sex is better when you own the bed and you don't have to worry about the repo man stealing it out from under you.
Speaker 1:Absolutely Bottom line is, folks, when you go on a vacation and you're stuck having to pay the bills for it other than paying off the credit card. But if you're not gonna be able to pay that credit card off, if you're gonna be making interest payments on a vacation, number one, that vacation is costing you way more than you thought it was. But number two, it just decreases from the enjoyment that you can have. Everything is better when it's paid for, when you don't have debt. So we just really wanna encourage you. The house is more enjoyable. Like Dave Ramsey says, the grass under your feet feels better when you own the grass and you've paid off the mortgage.
Speaker 1:That's why he talks about having a barefoot backyard barbecue when you pay off your mortgage and, let's face it, if you're renting your bed from rent to center the sex Do people really do that? Yes, they do.
Speaker 2:When I was a police officer, Did they rent their mattresses? Please tell me now. That's really gross.
Speaker 1:People can rent just about everything.
Speaker 2:Ooh, that's sketchy, I mean.
Speaker 1:I've just even seen there's these clothing services where you're basically, have you ever looked into these clothing like wardrobe type services where they?
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I'm sure they clean stuff in between people.
Speaker 1:I'm sure, but I don't do that no, I don't. Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 2:That is just way too personal and but I know people that do rent the runway and it works out great. But they probably, I'm sure they clean everything in between.
Speaker 1:They're not renting underwear, are they?
Speaker 2:I don't think so. I hope not. I mean, the only people that wear underwear on the runway are the models at those sleazy shows. So average people are yeah, if you can't afford your underwear. We need to have a different discussion.
Speaker 1:I would agree. Yeah, All right. So what we wanna encourage you folks and this is something that we really had to do and but is to get over your poverty minded concepts of money. We were guilty of this for many years. Yes, I think a lot of it has to do with how you're raised, and we're not blaming our parents. It's kind of how our parents were raised by their grandparents, and it's something that probably goes back at least to the depression in many ways, but poverty mindset. So we're gonna talk about some things that are an abundance mindset when it comes to money. So the first thing is, money makes you more of who you already are.
Speaker 2:So lots of times. It was quite an epiphany when we heard that yes, but it made a lot of sense.
Speaker 1:But you'll hear people criticize oh so and so became such a jerk when they whatever won the lottery. Well, that's cause they were jerk before they won the lottery, quite likely, or you know so and so, whatever criticisms you hear of people, what we found and what we've heard a lot of other people agree with, is that money just makes you more of who you are. If you're a generous person with a little bit of money, you're gonna be a generous with a lot more money.
Speaker 1:If you're a selfish if you're tightwad with a little bit of money you're gonna be a tightwad with a lot of money, which actually isn't necessarily as bad of a thing. But if you're a spender with a little and if you're in debt all the time with a little bit of money, you're going to be Broke at a higher level, Broke at a higher level. In fact. You're probably better off not having the money, because the debt that you're gonna accrue at a lower net worth is a lot less than what people accrue at a higher net worth Less damage exactly.
Speaker 1:Absolutely so. The other thing is that money is a moral right, money. There's the Pink Floyd song, money, which is a great song, but they got the Bible a little bit wrong, which isn't really surprising. It's not. Money is the root of all evil. The love of money is the root of all evil.
Speaker 2:Did you hear that Pink Floyd?
Speaker 1:Yes, well-.
Speaker 2:If you're listening to our podcast.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So they're not likely to but-. Not likely If so we wanted to give you a little course correction there, Correct?
Speaker 1:It can be used. Bottom line is money can be used for good or evil, right, it's all about the user. We had a good life without money. We have a better, more enjoyable life with it. Yep.
Speaker 2:So money gives you options and this is something we have seen so much in the last 10 to 12 years and just for ourselves and then many of the people that we work with and do life with but the best education and environment for your kids, the right healthcare versus what your insurance plan covers and money is really good at helping you create memories. Some of our best experiences as family, our memories that we go back to on a regular basis, were the trips that we took with our kids, and many of them cost money. Now we started out small. I think we did camping trips and things that- yeah, paid $2,500 for a camp.
Speaker 2:We cost money to have an investment, but a small amount of money and we built on those memories. But being able to travel, go places, get away from it all and do it in comfort so there's just less headaches when you can do something in comfort those have created some really awesome, lasting memories for us.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and we talk about options, we talk about margin. I remember when we took that trip with the boys, that train trip, we took the train up to Tacoma, washington I think there was a motor crash motor cross show, not a motor cross Motor cross show up there and took the older boys Dylan was younger and I know we still have lots of pictures from that. It was a good family time. And I remember we checked in it was you and me, three boys. We checked into a hotel room that had two queen beds and we looked at each other like this is gonna suck.
Speaker 2:Are we gonna get any sleep? No, because they were little, I mean, they were probably seven and under.
Speaker 1:Yeah, maybe eight and under. So eight, six and five, something like that.
Speaker 2:And listen. If you've ever had young boys elementary age, they have a lot of energy.
Speaker 1:And honestly, the bigger and older they get, the more they screw around with just bigger bodies and smaller brains and you and I I mean, we didn't go on lots of vacations, but I stayed at a handful of hotels with my parents growing up, and we were a family of six.
Speaker 2:One hotel room, I'm guessing.
Speaker 1:Packin' the sleeping mat, sleepin' on the floor and six of us. One hotel room, one bathroom. It can be done, and we know that third world people live in houses that big. But boy, if you don't have to live like that, it's a lot better to not. And I remember we checked into that hotel room. It was like a Holiday Inn Express.
Speaker 2:I don't even know how you guys could last with one bathroom with as much as boys go to the bathroom. It's crazy, it's crazy, it's tough, girls' primp, but boys go to the bathroom and they're in there a long time.
Speaker 1:Yes. So we checked into this hotel and we like, let's go get a second room, and that was like oh, I don't remember that we did that oh yeah, like I remember, and it was a big step. First, taste of freedom, I mean I was probably the first Tinter slash McBrayer to ever have two rooms for the family. I mean just realistically, I bet my grandparents probably didn't do it. It just I'm sure that your parents didn't do it?
Speaker 2:Probably didn't do it. Yeah, we didn't go on a lot of vacations to hotels.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but it was a game changer to just have some margin in our budget, to be able to have a second room, and really it added so much to the quality of enjoyment that we had on that trip. The other thing that we've we've had a lot of conversations, we've been there, but I think when it's easy to settle, when things are okay, but when you hit a crisis, is when you realize, boy, I really wish I had more margin and we were there when I had my back injury in 2007. We've where it was like we didn't have, we couldn't afford, we didn't have options, and we've had so many conversations with people with whether it's you know, healthcare is very common where it's like well, my insurance, I want to go to this counselor, my insurance only, you know, throughout a network. I want to go to this dentist. The one I go to is an absolute, you know cold jerk and he's not good with kids.
Speaker 1:Well, the one you want to go see is out of network and it is such a blessing to be in a spot where you just pay for the care you need. If insurance covers it, great. But let's face it, a lot of you know we're all about holistic, natural options as well, and most of that isn't covered and having the option to do that is a huge blessing. So we don't encourage you folks like get out there, create the margin, do the side hustle whatever it takes, so that when bad things happen cause most likely they will you're not stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Speaker 2:Exactly so. We want to go over the four steps towards uncommon financial freedom, and they're simple but not easy. So step one is to get out of debt. No debt except your mortgage, ideally 25% or less of your income.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so debt is a bad thing. I would recommend, like Dave Ramsey you're gonna hear me talk about him a lot- Well, time out.
Speaker 2:We got to plug this because it's just so cool. So, if you are listening to this, very soon Kevin Tinter is going to be on the Entree Leadership Podcast with Dave Ramsey.
Speaker 1:He just does a call and guest.
Speaker 2:In December and.
Speaker 1:I don't know when. And the weird yeah, I don't know when and the weird, but at some point that will exist, which is just pretty cool.
Speaker 1:So Pretty excited about that, yes, but Dave Ramsey talks about the fact in the promise with debt is that it's like a snake and if you play with snakes long enough, you're going to get bit. So there's a lot of people who are able to use other people's money and there's a lot of billionaires that mortgage things, but I think for the average human, the average American, it's a risky way to do things is to leverage things, to invest and to try and make money. Bottom line is if you don't have debt, you can't get bit by that snake. So the debt tends to assume that things will say the same or approve right.
Speaker 1:I remember hearing about these people buying $600,000 townhomes in California when I lived there in 2004. And they're not putting any down payment or minimal down payment. They're doing interest only loans and then they're flipping them two years later, making money until they're not. And that's the risk is that debt just assumes that things are gonna either stay the same or go up until you have some type of crisis, and then that's when you end up getting evicted, having to do short sales which can haunt you for years, if not decades.
Speaker 2:So Absolutely so. Under the getting out of debt step one, the other thing, besides just assuming that debt is not going to be good for you, is to build up an emergency fund of three to six months of expenses, and you can do this little by little. The compound effect is real. But what we find is when people don't store up in the good season, they struggle in the lean seasons. And I mean this is biblical. You think about Joseph and how he, yes, used God's wisdom based on the dreams that he had to lead that household, lead that country, by storing up during the profitable seasons and then, when the famine came, they were prepared. And a lot of people are in a famine right now financially, with the job market, with the economy, with the cost of goods right now, and unfortunately, many people have debt. And then they also have not created us an emergency fund.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so when it comes to your emergency fund, get to $1,000. I mean, set aside $50 a month, $100 a month, $200 a month, get it to a thousand, then get it to $5,000 or $10,000. I mean we were not making a lot of money when we had a $10,000 emergency fund, but I sure the statistics on how many people have a $10,000 emergency fund is a very small percentage and then we built from there. So, and the other thing is, I would encourage everyone, every time you get a raise, increase your emergency fund. You will never regret having a bigger emergency fund than you need.
Speaker 2:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:And then the other reminder here is Dave Ramsey says that your income is your biggest wealth creation tool, especially when you aren't in debt. So you know if you're. This is why you know if you're a teacher or a police officer or a fireman and you've been a great steward and you don't have debt, that's great. But this is why we talk about a side hustle business or doing something else, because you can't. It's very difficult to build wealth if you're only making $60,000 or $80,000 or even $100,000 a year. If you can increase your income significantly, you know, go from 100,000 to 200,000, because there's some type of side business that will really accelerate your wealth building. And well, the reason to build wealth is so you have more options, you have more margin and also so that you can have more fun with it but also bless others with it Be more generous.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so step two is to get rid of what you cannot afford. Oh, my goodness, the number of people that we have talked to who are in financial debt and struggling, but they have car payments and they own things that they, honestly, they don't have the money for. So if you wouldn't finance to rent something, don't finance to buy it. You want to go on that anymore that was.
Speaker 1:I learned that from a great conversation I had with my friend, high school friend, Chris Kamel, and we were considering a large purchase several years ago and the only way to do it was going to be to finance it. And it was something that we could rent or charter. And he simply asked me he's like, would you finance it to charter it? And my answer was an instant, obvious no. He's like if you wouldn't finance it to charter it, then why would you finance it to buy it? I was like bam. All of a sudden had tremendous clarity, even though there's all kinds of brokers and other people you know internet gurus saying finance it, blah, blah, tax, write it off, so this and that and this and that. And when he asked me that question it was like a light bolt of clarity, lightning bolt of clarity and instantly it was like duh. That's the correct decision and we are so glad that we made the decision. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Chris, yeah, hey, friends, here's a quick reminder that if you're finding value in this show, would you do us a favor and subscribe, share with someone that you think would benefit and give us a five star rating? We make nothing from this show and invest a lot of time and money producing it. All we ask is that you help us get our message to more people.
Speaker 1:All right. Step three use cash and track your spending. So a lot of people are resistant to a budget. But a budget is merely deciding where your money will go ahead of time. It sounds restrictive, but really, if you think about it, it's actually kind of mapping out your finances, just like you would if you're going on a long trip. Map it out, don't just leave it up to chance. So what it really should do is should increase your feelings of freedom, because it allows you to prioritize what's most important as well as what's essential.
Speaker 1:It's really like scheduling your rocks in your calendar. So we talked about this just recently. If going on a date is important, if having dates with our kids, spending time with that, is important we take three trips a year. At least we get those in the calendar. That is what a budget really is. It's like putting those rocks in. There's always ways to spend the money. There's always ways to blow the money, but if you don't prioritize savings, retirement, saving extra for health, the mortgage and things like that, that's where you're going to end up in trouble.
Speaker 2:And if you want something to improve, you have to track it. So we've talked a lot about this when we've talked about physical health, nutrition, fitness, things like that sleep but it's very true with our finances as well.
Speaker 1:So do you remember the fact that tracking everything works to improve it?
Speaker 2:Yes, are you asking me that for a specific reason? You have a very accusatory to it in your face, so going back to the title of this.
Speaker 1:Do you remember that we actually tracked how many times we had sex one year?
Speaker 2:We did that one time.
Speaker 1:We did.
Speaker 2:I don't even remember what the number was. Do we even?
Speaker 1:want to tell the I do. Maybe we can tell that it was a lot. It was 2005.
Speaker 2:Oh, my gosh, you remember the year and I do. I'm good with numbers and dates.
Speaker 1:We lived in Okinawa.
Speaker 2:Japan. I'm sure of that. I thought it was ridiculous because we kept a little note card in a tally sheet.
Speaker 1:It was yes, we did, we did.
Speaker 2:Why did we do that? I mean, was it just for bragging rights for you, for fun?
Speaker 1:But hey, god created marriage, god created sex. If you read the song of Psalms, he's all about it be fruitful and multiply. So we are just getting all practiced up for the three kids in four years that we would have.
Speaker 2:That was cutting our sex back a little bit, but and it was 2005.
Speaker 1:We were apart because I was still in the Marine Corps and I had several different deployments. We were apart for three months out of that year and we still had sex 166 times.
Speaker 2:So I can't believe you just shared that on air. I did because we are. I'm blushing on the video version of this.
Speaker 1:Healthy married sex. Yes, back for God Preach, right. So. But bottom line is we tracked it.
Speaker 2:Hey friends, here's a quick reminder that if you're finding value in this show, would you do us a favor and subscribe, share with someone you think would benefit and give us a five star rating. We make nothing from this show and invest a lot of time and money producing it. All we ask is that you help us get our message to more people.
Speaker 1:That's why we keep trying to tell our kids it is worth waiting until you find someone and get married people.
Speaker 2:It is so much better, and I'll just tell you it gets better as you age.
Speaker 1:What are your thoughts on public accountability? No, okay.
Speaker 2:Nice try. No, we're not going to have create a tracker on the website for people to track.
Speaker 2:There's I don't want to know when everyone else listening to this is having sex. Sorry, we wish you the best. Please do not share those details with us, okay? So let's see what else we got here. Oh, cash is great because you can't spend what you don't have. It's so funny when I pull out cash. I think it's so rare people like especially the younger generation. They do not know how to make change People. Let's help our children learn how to make change. It's so pathetic. Even when the actual register tells them the amount of money, it's like they don't even know how to count it. I'm just thinking to myself have we lost all sense of practicality? But yeah, we like to pay with cash and the biggest thing is cause you can track it.
Speaker 1:Yep, yeah, actually.
Speaker 2:I mean you can and the government can't. So there we go, we'll leave it at that.
Speaker 1:Pros and cons. The other thing is we're not staunch anti-credit card people. We use a lot of cash, we use credit cards quite a bit, I think and we get massive reward checks, and so there's definitely some benefits Statistically. They say that you're gonna spend about 8% more. If you and you can fact check me on that that's fine. You spend about 8% more if you're using a credit card or debit card.
Speaker 2:I will be that.
Speaker 1:Bottom line is we're gonna spend what we're going to spend and we get literally thousands of dollars worth of rewards checks. The one thing I just like to point out to people is, if you own a business, never use your rewards whether it's miles or trips or cash for business expenses because you lost the write-off. Yep. Always cash in that check, use it for personal stuff, go have some fun with it, buy some guitars with it or something like that. But bottom line is if you can't pay it off, if you make a single interest payment, get rid of that credit card.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and if you are not disciplined and do not have the finances to use credit cards, then use debit cards For the same convenience. Use a debit card where, when the money is gone, the spending stops.
Speaker 1:Yep, and that's what our kids are doing. Yes, and they frequently run it down to under learning along the way, yep. Some of them are bombing it. The bottom line is make mistakes when you're a kid.
Speaker 2:that won't kill you when you're 12 to 15 to 16, like make those mistakes at home where we can work through that? Yeah, cause once you get charged some of those overcharge fees, it is painful, it's a way to call and you already don't have a lot of money? All right, let's move on to step four Leverage your time instead of trading time for money. So we've already talked about this a little bit. But delegate tasks that you don't like if you can for less than you earn and you can work extra to make money. So if you make $50 an hour and you can pay someone to clean your house for $20 an hour, work an extra five hours and you make an extra $150, and you come home to a clean house.
Speaker 2:This was a game changer for us when I finally said, hey, I want to pay someone to clean, like deep clean the house once a week or, excuse me, once a month, is how we started. And there was someone that we knew that you know $12 an hour and she would come for two hours and she would just clean the toilets and do like the deep cleaning stuff. And that's how we started having housekeeping. All the way to now we have weekly housekeeping and we have for years, and but with that and in parenting our kids, so that we don't raise spilled brats. Our children clean their own rooms, they have weekly chores, and so the housekeepers are for us, not for our children 100%.
Speaker 1:The other thing is, when it comes to leveraging your time, remember that owning toys can be expensive. Consider renting or our memberships, if you can afford them. I recently talked to a friend a couple of months ago who's got a membership with Polaris or something like that, so he has access to like razors and side-by-sides and four wheelers and stuff, but he doesn't have to trailer them, he doesn't have to maintain them. You know, theoretically is it maybe a more expensive way to go? I don't know. Like we joined a bull club this year, we sold our boat. We were able to have unlimited access to a boat that we used twice this summer for less than half of what we were paying just to have a slip. So just think outside the box. And the great thing is we had no maintenance, no hassle, no fuss. I mean it really is a much better way to do a lot of things.
Speaker 2:All right, talk about tools. This is not my department and I don't normally take care of the outside of the house, not because I can't, just because that was always your department before. A little bit of our rules, you know inside, outside.
Speaker 1:So what do you mean by this?
Speaker 2:I think there's a delicate balance between, you know, having some basic skill sets I mean, I think every man should be able to swing a hammer and a woman a woman could swing a hammer too, true, but if she's got a good husband, if she doesn't want to break a nail, I mean, let's face it, I don't want to break a hammer properly Sometimes.
Speaker 1:Not normally 50%. We've built houses in Mexico. Okay, Well, you stick to painting. I was, I don't even do painting. Well, there and there's lots of women who are great with it.
Speaker 2:I'm also okay not being good at some of these things. Maybe that's my problem is, I don't really want to be good at them, but some women are really good with this.
Speaker 1:I believe that every boy, every man should be able to swing a hammer and change a tire and change your way, but people should know the difference in screwdrivers, because I know that. I totally agree.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you should not change light bulbs, and what was the other thing we taught the kids?
Speaker 1:So a button, that's more of a life skill, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Write a check, even though they're pretty much outdated, but you probably still need to know that. Write a check, balance your budget or checkbook. That's old school.
Speaker 1:That is old school, so when it comes to tools, I understand the drive to do it yourself. My dad did everything himself. I think your dad did a lot of stuff, yeah for sure, that's how our parents raised. But we had this epiphany. I did when we lived in Okinawa.
Speaker 2:This was yours, yeah.
Speaker 1:And saw that number one. They lived in much smaller apartments than we were used to and they didn't have garages, they didn't have storage sheds, they really didn't have tools. I mean, they had a very basic toolkit and that was because they paid the plumber, the electrician, the carpenter to do everything that they needed to be done. The tradesmen had all the tools they needed for the job and what that did is it kept us from having to spend money Like, if I get it honestly, a tool as a gift to me is like giving you a vacuum or a pan.
Speaker 1:It's not a gift, it just means like, oh great, now I have my own thing to do, work with. It's not enjoyable, and I realize some people do enjoy that. But to me, tools are something you typically use to do work and there's other things I'd rather do. Cancel the power saw. So the great concept was just like wow, pay a pro who's really good at it. This way I don't have to manage it, I don't have to go get a storage shed, organize it. You know I have basic tools. There's a lot of people with more than me but I pay the pro and then I don't have to deal with the hassle and I also don't have to deal with the liability of fixing it.
Speaker 2:So it's just Now. People listening might say we don't have the money to pay pros for everything, Like you need people or like other people.
Speaker 1:What would you say to that? Well, I would say, start where you can't, because we also did a lot of things ourselves. We painted the first house we bought. We painted it inside and out. We did it. I mean, you were on second story ladders and we were pregnant I don't even know if we knew it yet, but we did everything so and then we did the first sprinkler system. We've talked about this a little bit.
Speaker 2:It was a disaster. Oh yeah, that would be a big story about that.
Speaker 1:And we learned okay, this is not worth it, you can find someone to do it, Go work extra. This is where we go back to the delegating and go work overtime, pay someone else what you make or less, and you're still putting money in the bank and you come home to a job that's complete. So we know that you're not gonna be able to pay people to do everything, but if you're looking at doing something that requires an expensive tool, then that might be the job that you say huh, instead of me going and buying this unless you can buy it and then sell it, buy it used and sell it after you're done with the job, pay someone else to do it.
Speaker 2:We know people that own multiples of the same tool.
Speaker 1:We do, we do there's a lot of people.
Speaker 2:Those people are very handy. There's a lot of people, but that's a lot of tools that they store. Own multiples.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2:They're poor spouses. All right, you take the next one.
Speaker 1:Get into the business quadrant. So great book that is on our list is the Cashful Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki, but he really just talks about the fact that having some way to generate income with a business where you can leverage tax write-offs is a huge way to get ahead financially. So-.
Speaker 2:But not in a sleight of go into debt to do this type of a job?
Speaker 1:Correct, correct. Yeah, spending, you know, taking out a $300,000 small business loan so you can open up a restaurant that is likely to close in two to three years is not what we're talking about. It's a great book, but just understand, you know we're not accountants here. But there's tons of advantages financially if you can leverage the legal tax deductions that are out there for businesses, and so that's just something to be thinking about and looking into, and if you read that book, that will give you some great guidance.
Speaker 2:Yes. So then we wanna talk about giving generously. So we started by tithing 10% of our income and sponsoring a child through Compassion International when we were newlyweds and in college. We were, you know, in college living on we call it living on love, also living on some school debt, both working hard. And we still decided to tithe early on and do a Compassion Child. $25 a month, which would be nothing now, was a lot to us back then.
Speaker 2:But we just felt like we wanted to do something beyond our tithes to really contribute to society.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think our blow budgets were about, at best, $25 a month each.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it was barely a pedicure or anything like that.
Speaker 1:It was kind of like a month at a time, every other month for me, if I saved up my money for three years, I could buy a really cheap gun.
Speaker 2:You would buy a gun and I got pedicures every month.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yes, and you know, I think you mentioned our school debt. We did end up taking out some loans. It was something we actually sought counseling for because we were definitely I was against the debt, Debt averse yes.
Speaker 1:And ultimately the guidance we got is listen, you two are driven towards very specific careers that will allow you to pay off the amount of debt that we were taking out very quickly. And the commitment we made was we would live off of my income and use 100% of your income to pay off that debt. So we had, from the time that we had to start making payments, we were paid off in one year. So we don't wanna come across as hypocrites or anything like that to people.
Speaker 2:No, we don't have it all figured out. We're just telling you some of the journey that we've taken, and in all honesty, that was the right decision for us At the time. I don't regret it, but Might have taken us 10 years to get through school if we'd done it a different way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it could have, and time is a well time is a huge asset. So, anyways, all right. So this year we are tithing. So we started at 10% back in 25 years ago and this year we're actually tithing roughly 50% of our gross. So that was something we started small. We've increased it every year for the last about seven years and we're super blessed, but we wouldn't have gotten to where we're at if we didn't start small, and I remember hearing stories about people living on they're very wealthy, living on 5% of their income, and I remember saying I want that to be me. So it is really fun. It's much fun. It is to spend money on things that you enjoy and to take trips that are memorable and a lot of fun. It is also really fun to Radically fun.
Speaker 2:I think it's Jodi Gelley who calls it radical generosity. Is that what she calls it?
Speaker 1:Well, I know, I mean, I think it's Dave Ramsey talks about ridiculous generosity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and this isn't to pat ourselves on the back guys, we're just really trying to awaken everyone to what is possible when you create enough income to not only live on but then to give in radical ways, and it's just really fun.
Speaker 1:When you can see a need, you know that's a significant need A tangible need and significant, not just pick up the meal. I mean this is awesome if you pick up the meal for the person behind you.
Speaker 2:Yes, start somewhere. Please Start somewhere.
Speaker 1:But we're talking about. You see, a significant need and you just cover it.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:You just take care of it. Or you hear of a ministry that needs to fund something and you don't contribute to it. You cover the cost of it. It is. You know it's more blessed to give than to receive Like we've experienced that and we really want all of you to experience it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of our favorite things is the last couple of years for Christmas We've taken foster group home kids shopping and just literally said whatever you want, like we're going to be at the mall for a few hours. It's literally like we hate going to the mall at Christmas time but we love doing this and just letting them buy clothes, shoes, bedding, whatever their needs are, whatever the foster home says that they are allowed to have. Basically, we fill their needs and we don't even give them a budget. We just let them go and it's just. We don't do this with our kids.
Speaker 1:We've never done this with our children and they buy things that our kids are like you're going to let them buy that and like, yes, we're going to let them buy that Brand new pair of really nice, expensive ton of shoes and it's like absolutely this is their one pair of shoes they get to buy.
Speaker 2:They can pick out whatever pair they want and it's just been really, really fun to just spoil these kids that have a really hard home life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. All right. So last thing is our list, our top five books that helped us become multi-millionaires by the time we were 40. So once again, this is not a get rich quick talk here, folks, we are not overnight millionaires. Basically, it took us 19 years to become overnight millionaires, you know, just like it took me 25 years to become an overnight success. But at the very top is the Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey Bec. Do you want to take number two?
Speaker 2:Yep, the automatic millionaire by. Is it David Bach? Is that his last name?
Speaker 1:Yep, and for the record, folks, I'm the financial group in the family.
Speaker 2:So Bec, I guess I will fully admit that I have not read. I've read or listened to some of these, yes, but I've not read all of these?
Speaker 1:Yeah, Rich Dad's Casual Quadrant by Robert Kiyosaki Deduct.
Speaker 2:Everything by Eva Rosenberg.
Speaker 1:And Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill and Rosalie B Land. That's a famous legendary, you know old book. It's a classic, but it's a great book.
Speaker 2:Talks about the mindset 50% of these are making my eyes roll back in my head. So I just want you to know, if you're not the financial person in your family, if someone is perfect, but if you are by yourself or you neither of you are financially motivated or interested in financial education, do it anyway. I just get to be lazy in this department. I don't like Kevin. Take it because he likes it and he's good at it, and I take other areas of our life, but yeah, all right, everyone.
Speaker 1:So, as a quick recap, get a healthy mindset about money. Money isn't bad. It only makes you more of who you are. So if you don't like who you are right now, get that figured out before you build wealth.
Speaker 2:Oh good, Get out of debt.
Speaker 1:Get out of debt. Get out of debt. No more financing your cars, no more financing your furniture. No your mortgage Okay, as long as it's 25% or less, but please, folks, stop making interest payments on students.
Speaker 2:No more immediate gratification. Allow yourself that delayed gratification.
Speaker 1:Get rid of what you can't afford. If you can't afford that boat, that car, whatever it is, it's okay. Paid used. You know paid for used is a great thing. Used cash and track your spending. And learn to leverage your time instead of trading hours for dollars. That's a huge thing. And then give generously. Please do not think that you're gonna be a super generous person when you're a millionaire if you are not a generous person, right?
Speaker 2:now Absolutely. How you do one thing is how you do most things. Bam, and that is something we have seen in life so often. I'm sure it's true about us as well. But again, how we do most things is how. How we do one thing is how we do most things. So it just means that you generally have habit tracks in your life that you follow, and so if you think you're just gonna be drastically different when you have a lot of money, it's quite unlikely. Yep All right, everyone.
Speaker 1:We hope you enjoyed this episode as much as we did. If you wanna make a commitment to tracking how many times you're gonna have sex with your spouse this year, make a commitment. Don't share with us. Make a commitment and share with us at the end of 2024. And because we want to reclaim sex for the way that God intended it right. But leave us a comment about what area you need to focus on financially the most. And then remember my first book, the Seven Disciplines of Uncommon Freedom is our blueprint for success and will be available on Amazon and Audible on November 7th. By the way, just finished recording the Audible version this week. It was a ton of fun. I hear some people hate doing it, but I actually really enjoyed it and we will be highlighting more topics from the book over the coming weeks. So make sure you subscribe to this podcast to ensure that you never miss an episode. See you next week.
Speaker 2:Take care.
Speaker 1:Thanks for listening to the Uncommon Freedom Show. We believe freedom isn't man's invention. It was created by God. If you are enjoying this show, please give us a five star review on the platform for listening to us on. Then subscribe and share with friends and family that you think will enjoy the show. You can connect with us at beckandkevcom for more resources to learn biblical principles, essential disciplines and the winning habits that help once average people lead the life they want instead of accepting the life they were given.