So many people hesitate to start working with a money coach because they fear their short-term progress will disappear once the coaching container is complete. But that’s not true! I work with clients to make long-lasting changes in how they manage and think about their finances.
In today’s episode, I welcome Jeanine back to the podcast. She recaps how she has been managing her finances since working with me. During this client check-in we review Jeanine’s current financial mindset, recent money wins, and permanent changes she has noticed in how she thinks about and manages her money. From candid stories about leveraging health insurance to pare down medical bills to thrifty tricks Jeanine adopted to help curb spending, this client recap is inspiring and relatable!
If you’re considering hiring a money coach but wonder about the long-term value, this episode is a must-listen. Jeanine’s journey speaks volumes – she’s bought a house and paid off debt while maintaining a healthy money mindset. Her story is a testament to the fact that the tools acquired through financial coaching are not just for the moment – they last a lifetime! So, let’s dive in and discover the transformative power of investing in your financial well-being.
Stay tuned to hear insights on these critical topics during this episode:
[02:30] Reflecting on Jeanine’s money mindset after coaching
[05:25] Which money management tactics Jeanine tried before coaching
[16:55] Big financial wins for Jeanine
[23:25] Brining financial coaching tools into a relationship
[25:15] Paying for coaching on a credit card
[28:15] Impact of getting a financial coach’s perspective on spending and budgeting
[30:22] How Jeanine’s made her money back from buying coaching
Tune into this episode of Money Files to learn the lasting impact of financial coaching!
Are you ready to start asking for help with your finances? Apply to work with me, and let’s start working towards your financial goals.
IF YOU LOVED THIS CONVERSATION ON, THREE YEARS LATER WITH JEANINE: WHAT DOES LIFE LOOK LIKE AFTER FINANCIAL COACHING CHECK OUT MY EPISODE ON HOW LAYRA INVESTED IN HERSELF & INCREASED HER INCOME!
Transcript for “Three Years Later With Jeanine: What Does Life Look Like After Financial Coaching”
Intro: Hi, and welcome to Money Files. I’m Keina Newell from Wealth Over Now. I work every day with professional women and solopreneurs to help them get out of financial overwhelm and shame so they can experience more flexibility and ease with their finances. Are you ready to gain confidence and learn to manage your finances intentionally? Tune in and grab financial tips that will help you master the way you think about and manage your finances.
Keina: Hello and welcome back to another episode of Money Files. So today I’m here with a former client, Jeanine, which she has a past episode with me, which when you reached out to me, Jeanine, I remember you had just paid off credit card debt and you wanted to stay out of credit card debt. And I also just told you, don’t worry about it, we’re just going to press record because they’re going to get all of like the nitty gritty. But I have been wanting to go back and really just really thinking about like creating this drama free lifestyle of spending, but also like what does it look like to build wealth? And I know one of the number one questions I feel like I have to answer for people is like, yeah, Keina, but what happens after I work with you for five months? And I don’t think that people believe that they can sustain the habits that they build with me. I think they think that they’re only for the container in which we work together. And I mean, yeah. So I hope that we get some candidness in this conversation, which I’m sure we will. But if you want to go ahead and introduce yourself, we can go from there.
Jeanine: Yes, thank you so much. It’s so good to chat with you again today. And yes, my name’s Jeanine Finch. I own a photography company called Finch Photography, and I also work a nine to five job as a community liaison for corporate America, so super excited.
Keina: All corporate?
Jeanine: Just corporate America specifically in the healthcare field. But yeah, so I have a lot of things going on. I’m also very involved in my community, so I do a lot. I’ve like got a list of my to do items for today that are all volunteer based so always a lot of things going on.
Keina: I love it. I’m curious, I’m just going to dive in with this question. In no particular order, were you thinking when you started working with me, like, oh my goodness, what’s going to happen afterwards?
Jeanine: Absolutely. Yeah. So you were totally correct, like I followed you. I was a self-identified Keina lurker for many, many, I think years. And I was connected through you. You had done a workshop that I wasn’t able to attend, but I started following you and everything you said, I was like, yep, that’s me, that’s me, that’s me. This woman must be stalking me because she’s always talking about the issues that I’m having. So during the pandemic, I took an opportunity to really get rid of all of my luxury expenses. I canceled my gym membership or was paused or what have you and a bunch of other things that I was participating in. And I was like, I really need to funnel that money towards debt. But I knew at some point the pandemic was going to end and I was scared because I had gotten out of debt before.
I was scared that I was going to get myself back into a cycle of debt after a few months or when the world opened back up. And so I paid off all the debt, filled out your application online, listened to all your podcasts and did have that fear going in that I would have and made this investment in working with you and then just gone back to old habits. And so it’s been, I don’t know, going on two or three years.
Keina: I think three years.
Jeanine: Yeah. And I can proudly say that I have not come back into debt of any kind.
We financed windows, but that was a strategic, like, let’s save this money in a high-yield savings account so we can earn money and then pay it off like towards the deadline of the 0% interest. So we’ve been able to, we, and I saw we because I’m talking about my partner Ivan. We have combined finances since working with Keina, which had some ebbs and flows of just doing something differently and having two different people’s expenses come together. We did not work together with you as a couple, but at every kind of challenge that we interface with, like combining accounts or trying to figure out to do something, I was like, it’s okay. I know I can do it because Keina has given me this set of tools to continue to apply.
So it might have been over one thing one month or a surprise with like when we bought our house, which also did, after working with Keina. We had to buy a new refrigerator and I was like, it’s okay, like this was a surprise expense, but we’re going to get back on track and figure it out. Whereas before I would’ve just been like, oh, well we’ve lost it all. We’re just going to be broke forever or we’re going to have to finance everything for the rest of our life. So there’s been so much positive and I just always know that things might get a little bumpy, but I’m going to continue practicing, continue having my money dates and the numbers that go in might look a little bit different, but it’s still the same practices that you taught me way back when.
Keina: Yeah. Because I’m like, what tools had you tried in the past before you started working with me? Because that’s one of the other things. It’s like I’ve tried the envelopes, I’ve tried the no spin challenges, I’ve tried the pay off my debt with my bonus. And I know a lot of people can even relate to like I did a lot of work during the pandemic and then the world opened back up and so did my wallet. So I’m curious for you as someone who’s like, gone through the process with me, like the contrast in between the things that you’ve tried in the past and like why was this different, like working with me?
Jeanine: Yeah. It was really the structure and the non-judgmental grace that you gave. Like sharing with you how much money we spend on our dog a month. I don’t know a lot of your other clients have dogs or just like the things that we spend money on, you were not ever judgemental about it. You’re just like, okay, so this is what it is. And another anecdote that I remember is I was traveling a lot when we started working together because my mom had injured herself. So I was back and forth between Virginia and Massachusetts and I was like, oh, I’m going over on my gas budget, but it’s usually not this high. And you were like, but if it’s not gas, there’s going to be something else some month because that’s just life. And that’s helped me so much.
We’ve had a pretty busy season the last few months with my partner. Ivan graduated from getting his bachelor’s at George Mason University. So we had a big graduation party and then we just attended a wedding this past weekend. There’s always something that isn’t normal. And whatever it is that’s not the normal expense should be the normal in my spending plan. So giving myself kind of that grace and that buffer of knowing like, okay, well this is going to be high, but next month it’s going to be something else that’s going to be high or off from my spending plan and how do I move that around? And to also answer your question about what you asked about, what I had done in the past is I would just write down all my bills, but there were all the reoccurring bills. So it was like my rent, my cell phone bill, my gas bill, whatever.
And then I’d need to go buy a pair of pants or something for work and I’d be like, oh, my budget’s blown because I didn’t know how to account for the things that don’t happen every day or were reoccurring on a monthly basis. And so that was the biggest change and the biggest shift. And so now I think I mentioned to you just in passing and Keina never goes away too. I just want to say that before I forget. Like you’re in it, like we are constantly chatting on social media and things. So you’re always a part of everything and I love that about our relationship and about having worked with you in the past. So yeah, I just didn’t do anything that was effective to really capture what actual expenses are in my life.
Keina: Because I remember, I don’t know if this is a good or bad thing, but I was just actually looking at some of our chat conversations and I was like, I have to talk to Jeanine because I mean, one of the things that you told me, like in our chat back and forth is like you were in Nashville and you had like a freak accident.
Jeanine: Oh my gosh. Yes, yes.
Keina: Go ahead. I’ll let you explain and let me preface this, I’m bringing it up because you also talked about like, if it’s not this, it’s this, which hashtag adulting. That’s just what we’ve got to do. And it’s like how do you learn how to manage your money in that hashtag adulting thing? Go ahead. I’ll let you tell your story.
Jeanine: So I won’t get into the details, but you’re dying for them, like just find me on social media and I’ll share them with you because it’s a very long and not so fun story. But I had ended up in Nashville, I had to go to the emergency room. So healthcare has always been a very like scarcity thing for me. I didn’t grow up having reliable healthcare. And so it was like the first thing as an adult that I was like, I need to get a job with healthcare benefits because I was terrified of going into medical debt. I thought that would just have been like the end all be all. So yay. I have a job with healthcare benefits and I’m in Nashville, it’s late night and I am have participated in a very fun night of adult beverages and I end up in the emergency room. It was a very minor thing, nothing like life or death, but I had to go in an ambulance.
So knowing what I know now as an adult, I’m out of network. I’m in a strange city to me. Like the paramedics were like, oh, do you want to go to like hospital A or hospital B? And I was like, I don’t know, like I have no idea.
Keina: Let me yelp it. Give me a second.
Jeanine: Yeah. Right and they’re both like, it wasn’t even like whichever one’s close. It was, they’re both like, we were in the middle of two. Like I said, I’m not severely injured, but I needed to go get some stitches and I am laying in the back of the ambulance and I start, immediately like all the adrenaline caught up with me. I started crying and then I was like, I’m fine, I’m fine, like this is going to be okay. I have health insurance, I have an HSA, I have emergency fund and I literally started talking myself down from this like bawling tears, like, oh my gosh, the world’s going to end. So be like, it’s okay. I don’t even care like what the bill is because I know that I’m going to be able to figure it out whether that’s calling the hospital and arranging payments if it’s substantial because I haven’t been to the emergency room in like, I don’t know, 25 years.
So I’m just like, oh, it’s going to be like a million dollars because that’s how healthcare works. So it was not a million dollars and I was just being lazy on like paying it because I got like an initial bill and it was like really high and more like insurance went back and forth and it ended up lowering. And so I was like, oh, just going to wait and figure it out. And so I finally was like, okay, I haven’t gotten anything in a few weeks, this must be the final. So I went online to pay and I couldn’t pay, like it wouldn’t even pull up my account information. So I had to call and they were like oh, something just happened yesterday with your insurance. And it ended up being like a third of what I even had to pay. So it went from like, $1,500 down to like $500. And I was like, I would like to pay that right now. But it was just so like, I mean even at $1,500 I was like, well, whatever. I mean like do I want to pay this? No. Like this is a stupid accident, but I can and it’s not going to kill me.
So my HSA covered most of it, but it was just a long process, like in addition to the emergency room, I had to go to some specialist when I got back to the DC area and I had to go to like a plastic surgeon at one point, not to get anything like nipped or tucked, but just to make sure.
Keina: Not even anything fun.
Jeanine: Right. Yeah, no, nothing fun. But it was quite the adventure. But the thing that kept me grounded and from spiraling was just like, this is why I worked with Keina. So like I didn’t have to worry about like if I were going to put something on credit cards, it would be just to play a points game, not like a survival game.
Keina: And I didn’t know that part of your story about like not having like healthcare when you were younger. And I’m going back to highlight that because I think that there are so many things that we fear or you used the word terrified as adults because of our childhood experiences and just thinking about the work that I do with clients, like it literally can also help calm your nervous system or events that you don’t know are going to happen. Like I couldn’t tell you like, hey Jeanine, guess what? My magic eight ball says you’re going to be in Nashville. We don’t know what’s going to happen but when you have this level of preparedness or even just confidence with how you’re managing your finances, it allows you to just breathe.
Jeanine: Yeah. And literally that is what it allowed me to do. I went from like ugly bawling in the ambulance to like, it’s actually okay, like this is a bump in the road but it’s actually really fine. And was able to breathe and then by the time I got to the hospital I was on a girl’s trip and so by the time I got to the hospital my girlfriend that came with me was literally like taking silly pictures of me like in the hospital and sending them to our friends who were like freaking out back at our Airbnb. And we were like, we’re fine, we’ll be home soon. And when we got back we all like split up like the expenses. And this is just funny, I was waiting for my friend that had come with me to send me like a Venmo request for whatever expenses she had and I was like, hey, like you didn’t include the Uber back from the hospital. And she was like, it was like $11. She was like, oh I got it. You paid for the trip there in the ambulance I was like, oh fair.
Keina: That’s so funny. I mean what a beautiful gift to give yourself. Just to note and also, I mean I know you said you ignored the bill.
Jeanine: Not because I couldn’t pay it, but just because I was like, insurance is doing things.
Keina: But also having the peace of mind to be able to do that because when you’re not worried about like, oh my goodness, what are the financial implications on my credit score? On like the amount of money I do or don’t have in the bank. You can actually be thoughtful about how you want to handle something. Like, no I am going to send this back to insurance 18 times because you haven’t done it or I’m going to call the doctor’s office, like you can use your energy if you so choose for something that can significantly impact the situation versus not being able to take care of yourself because the financial barrier is so great.
Jeanine: Yeah. And immediately when I came home and like per the ER doctor’s orders in Nashville, I immediately came home and made all the appointments that I needed to make for myself and for what the doctor wanted me to do. And I don’t think if I would’ve had money on my mind, it’s not even I don’t think, I know I would not have made those appointments. And again, it wasn’t anything serious, it was mostly cosmetic. Like I had damaged one of my tooth so I needed to get a root canal. I would not have done that if I was worried about money because I would’ve been like, it’s going to be and literally I remember getting the bill for the root canal and in my head I was like, I don’t know, a root canal must be a million dollars. And I don’t even remember how much it was, but I was like, oh that’s it. So it was just so nice just not to have to worry about it and just be able to take care of the things that I needed to take care of post shenanigans in Nashville.
Keina: It’s like those are things that will never be on your list of bills.
Jeanine: Yeah. They were all, yeah, we intentionally, like I said, we play like credit card points games now because we pay our credit card off every month. And I’m not worried about going into credit card debt, so I was like, well I am going to put this couple hundred dollars bill on the credit card to get these points because there’s no fee for most of the services that I was using. And then I’ll reimburse myself with my HSA into my high yield savings account and it worked out.
Keina: I’m curious like what other significant wins you’ve had or shifts you’ve experienced in the last couple years that have just blown your mind because of our work together.
Jeanine: Yeah. So when the world started opening back up again or at least when we started participating more in it, I will say that I used to love eating out. And when I see the prices now with inflation on even getting like Cava or some like fast casual like restaurant and it’s like close to $50.
Keina: It’s on DoorDash?
Jeanine: No, just even just to pick, I don’t know, maybe it’s not $50 but it feels like the prices are just insane. And I’m like, do I really want that? Like is that really how I want to spend my eating out budget this month? And I also, another big thing that I did, especially, I think I’d gone into it like shortly after we worked together, but buy nothing groups on like Facebook. And I don’t know if they exist anywhere else, but I use them on Facebook. I love borrowing stuff from people. Like when we bought our house, I was the queen of, I’d be on there all day like, does anyone have a ladder I can borrow? I can pick it up this weekend and return it like the same day. Just all the random things, oh you’re getting rid of like a cabinet or whatever and I could use that in like, we have a bigger space now and I could use that for storage.
I am so addicted to it. I love it so much. And if I literally can find a way to buy a new, like we don’t have like a knife set, like a chef knife set, we have just a bunch of random ones and I like them all. But they’re hard to store and I didn’t want to like throw them in a drawer because that doesn’t seem safe. So I wanted to get one of those like magnetic racks and I was like, they’re $8 on Amazon for two. And I was like, but maybe somebody has one they’re not using anymore. Nobody did. But I love it and I give things away and I get things from people and I borrow things that I don’t want to even store in my house. And I love it so much and I don’t know how to calculate how much money I’ve saved doing that, but I feel like it’s very significant.
Keina: You’ve made a significant dent in your savings adding to it by not taking out.
Jeanine: Yes.
Keina: You mentioned that you and Ivan bought a house, which I can’t remember if that happened right as we were ending.
Jeanine: I think we were starting to look.
Keina: You were starting to look. Yeah. I’m curious like how that experience has gone. I think that I have a number of clients who are thinking about home ownership and home ownership opens up a whole other host of, but you guys owned your condo though too.
Jeanine: Ivan owned this, Ivan owned the condo.
Keina: Ivan owned the condo. So like you knew the cost of like, oh you have to fix these things yourself.
Jeanine: Yes. We had done a lot of work on the condo too.
Keina: But just like, yeah, like how was that buying a house and especially buying, like combining, like even just having the ownership piece in it for yourself. Having just finished working with me and what did that feel like for you?
Jeanine: Yeah, so that was probably like the hardest transition was like going through from buying a house. And I was very adamant with Ivan that I did not want to play that Venmo game back and forth of like, oh here’s half the mortgage because you paid it or whatever. And so it was really important to me for us to have joint accounts in that way. And we talked about a lot of different scenarios and so we were able to set it up and this was probably the easiest for us so that we have one account, one joint account where we figured out how much money we need to put into it for our mortgage, like escrow taxes, all that stuff comes out of one payment to our mortgage company. And then all of the utilities and other house expenses all go into that.
So that’s like when we get paid the first chunk of money that we need to put in every two weeks to cover those expenses goes into that account and we don’t even look at it, ever. But I mean, I look at it to make sure like bills are coming out and I look at it to make sure that like why is our gas bill higher this month or electricity or whatever. But we don’t have to worry about it getting paid. And it took some adjusting to get used to, but that was the easiest for us. And then thinking about how much mortgage we could afford or how much house we could afford, especially living in the DC area where houses are very expensive, we figured out a number that would keep our, like the total mortgage payment with like taxes and everything, the same as what our condo mortgage plus HOA fees were.
Because when Ivan was making the payments to him and I was just paying him rent, we knew we could cover that number comfortably. So between the two of us buying this house and we actually, because of the low interest rates at the time were able to, it’s like a hundred dollars cheaper for us to own this house than it was for us to pay the condo mortgage plus the HOA fee because The HOA fee was just so high.
Keina: Oh yeah. These like $700 fees, you’re like, we never recouped that. Okay.
Jeanine: No, I’ve never, never. And that was one of our big, like the first thing on our list for looking for a house was no HOA fee. I don’t want a HOA fee. I don’t care what color you paint your shutters. I don’t want any of that. So that worked out nicely and our bills, like the electricity, gas, water, we had accounted for them to be a little bit higher. But for the most part, I mean we didn’t have to pay for water at the condo, I don’t think but for the most part, like the gas and electricity bills are relatively the same. Depending on the season, they might go up or down a little bit. And then we have a water and sewer expense to the county but that’s quarterly. So again, like before working with you, I would’ve totally forgot about that expense.
It would’ve come up and I would’ve been like, how are we going to, our water’s going to get turned off because we don’t have this extra money to pay at this quarter. But now I’m like, oh no, it’s usually around $250 every month. So I need to put X amount away so when it does come, I’m not surprised.
Keina: I’m curious, I remember us talking about the dog because I feel like that was kind of like the biggest shared expense or maybe you were paying more for the dog and Ivan wasn’t paying as much for the dog until we started looking at the dog numbers and you were like, oh, this is an equitable. But I’m curious, like also in your relationship, how like our work together has helped you. Do you feel the same amount of confidence or more confidence talking about money, but like what has that created for you?
Jeanine: Yeah, I definitely have a lot more confidence talking about it. And it took a little bit, there was no resistance from Ivan, but why are we writing down all of our expenses, like for this money date. And I was like, because it is what we’re supposed to do. And he was like, but I can just export them from my credit card statements. And I was like, that’s not how Keina taught me. So we’ve made some modifications on how we do our money date to meet kind of like in the middle, but we do have, I’m like, oh, we really want to like eat out or like the beginning of this year when we were like moving everything over for like a 2024 tracker. He was like, let’s order food or something. And I was like, is that how you want to spend the remaining like whatever hundred dollars we have of our, and it was only the second week of January and he was like, where did we eat out?
And I was like, well we were with friends on New Year’s Day and so that all counted for January 1st. And he was like, oh. And I was like, oh yeah, seriously like we’ll just eat at home. So it’s nice to kind of have those conversations like, oh is that really like do we really want to go over the budget on that this month or should we just make our frozen pizza in the fridge?
Keina: That’s so funny. And I will say in every relationship there’s always one person that’s questioning why.
Jeanine: Yeah. I would’ve happily ordered out, but the numbers say this and we must do this.
Keina: How did you pay for coaching? I can’t remember.
Jeanine: Oh, I put it on a credit card.
Keina: I want to talk about this irony. I just paid off all my debt and now I want to work with Keina and I’m putting it on a credit card. How do you walk someone through that process?
Jeanine: I had listened to, like, you never said this to me, it’s not written anywhere or at the time it wasn’t I don’t know if you changed your website. It was not written anywhere that there was any prerequisite to listen to all of your podcasts. But I was like, what if she quizzes me about them? I self-assigned listening to all your podcasts. And someone had said, I don’t remember who it was, but I can like hear the recording in my head. Like, you’re going to make your money back is what the quote was. So they’re like, whatever the investment is for working with Keina, you’ll make your money back plus more. And so I was like, well just for the record, I am currently out of credit card debt, but when I pay for your services, that will be different.
And I don’t remember even if I got like a tax refund or a bonus or something at work, but I definitely paid it off before we finished working together and I would do it all over again in a heartbeat and have encouraged lots of my friends to come work with you. And some of them are like, that’s way too expensive. And I’m like, well then keep doing what you’re doing. But like for me, I needed someone to show me a different plan because I could not figure it out on my own. And it’s like, if you didn’t know how to change a tire and someone just handed you like a tire wrench and a carjack and were like, figure it out. So I think we’ve created this taboo in our society where it’s, oh, you should just know how to do it with money and my parents never taught me, I never learned in school. And so had I have not made this investment, where else would I have learned? Like maybe I could have self-taught on YouTube, but I was never going to do that.
Keina: And I think that like, I work with a lot of smart, mainly women. There are some men that creep in and couples as well, but they’re smart. Nobody’s not smart and it’s not a math issue. It’s not people not adding, but I think it’s being able to get to even the piece that you pointed out about of like, wow, you’re telling me that if it’s not one thing then it’s another, like how does that shift in thinking help you see the financial hiccup you experience, the financial setback or you’re like, oh right but it keeps you in this forward momentum, especially when you can have this objective set of eyes on your numbers.
I don’t care if you’re eating Cava, like it doesn’t impact me. And so I can be really neutral about what’s happening in your financial space. And so I think that’s the power of having a coach, like I have paid for a lot of coaching and it’s like having an outsider. It’s not that I’m maybe not doing it right, but could I be optimizing something? Could I be doing something better?
Jeanine: Yeah, exactly. And like I said before, like just the total like non-judgmental. Like I never sat down with you and you were like, Ivan and I bought two cars. We were spending crazy amounts of money on our, it’s not like we just bought new cars. We had zero car payments and we planned to buy one and did not plan to buy the other because life happens. We were spending crazy amounts on doggy daycare and other like bandanas for our dogs. Like Opal’s the most privileged puppy in the world. And it’s like we did all these things and now we just have like a context to look at it in. And anytime I came to go through our expenses, you were just like, okay, well you’ve got this much more to balance or to put into your plan, where is it going to come from?
And that was just so, it happened so quickly too, which I know I talked about the last time we spoke, but I was just like halfway through our sessions and I can remember just being like, actually I’m good. You’ve taught me everything and now I don’t know where to go but I know there’s more to uncover. So we talk about, Ivan was in the military so he has the VA loan, we’re utilizing right now. So we’re talking about what that looks like for investing in properties in the future. We did travel hacking last year. So we got within like two months or three months or whatever of just regular spending we were able to get the companion path with Southwest.
So basically now we have a buy one get one free for flights that we take and we primarily fly Southwest because that’s the easiest to get to our families. And it doesn’t exactly change, like save us any money because we still have to board Opal when we fly. But at least it offsets the cost a little bit.
Keina: Opal needs a job but Opal doesn’t have a job.
Jeanine: Opal needs to bring me some money.
Keina: Well I wanted to circle back because you said that you heard you’ll make your money back and just to make that tangible for listeners, how do you feel like you’ve made your money back from working with me?
Jeanine: Yeah, increased confidence in my business, in talking to other people about money in general. Like instead of giving my older nieces whatever they want for their Christmas or birthday, I literally put like a hundred dollars into their Roth IRAs that I literally like held them down and was like, open this account, this is how much money it’ll be when you turn 65 if you don’t touch it, if you never do anything else with it, which is something like they’re in their mid to late twenties and I wish somebody would have put held me down. So hopefully they appreciate it one day. And hopefully, I mean I hope it grows as big as possible for them. So just being able to kind of pass that education and knowledge down and then just not having to worry about opening our bank account. I mean in December, like things were unhinged and I was opening my account and I was like, I don’t want to look at that.
But for the rest of the time I get excited to open it. And that weight of that, like if you’re somebody that’s listening to this and you cringe at the thought of opening your bank account or are afraid or just don’t, letting that go just releases so much. So I look at it now and I’m like, oh cool, look how many points we’re going to get because that was triple something, I don’t know. We even took a trip last year, we had some, like a flight credit and a bunch of points and so Ivan and I went to Puerto Rico for four days and literally only had pay for like Ubers and food. Everything else was paid for by these spending we did months ago on things we needed anyway. And that was, I don’t know, maybe that’s common for other people. That was the first time I had done something like that. So I was like, it’s like roadmap. It’s like free, but it’s actually like free. It was great. It was so nice.
Keina: And coming back from a trip and not wondering how you’re going to pay for the trip that you just went on.
Jeanine: Yeah. And it was over Thanksgiving. So we did not do a family Thanksgiving this year, but I was like, if we would’ve gone to see his family or my family, we would’ve spent the same if not more. And I mean I’m sure there’s a way to do that with points, but I haven’t figured that out yet.
Keina: Or maybe you just didn’t want to.
Jeanine: Yeah, we needed to like just have some, we did a lot of family travel in 2023, so it was very nice to just be the two of us. I love it. But we had to board Opal. We weren’t able to do that with points.
Keina: That Opal. How is your photography business going?
Jeanine: It’s good. I slowed down a little bit last year just from capacity with a lot of this volunteer work that I added to my plate. But it leaves rooms for me to say yes to the projects I want to say yes to and no for the ones I don’t. And I feel like before working with you, I used to have this thought on photography that I needed it to survive, like financially survive and it kind of took away from like the passion that I had for photography because I was giving it too much. I was putting too much pressure on myself for it. And so now I feel like I had all my finances melded together when we first started working together. And now I have a little photography bank account that’s only for photography and it’s really nice because it just does its own thing. And I can pay myself when I need to and pay for all the expenses that I have when I want to and buy fun things if I want to upgrade an equipment or something. And it’s all self-supporting. So even though it’s not like turning into my full-time, primary source of income, it’s still serving me so well and I love that.
Keina: I love that for you because yes your photography business, it was doing a lot when we were working together initially. I’m like, so how much do you want to pay yourself?
How much are you charging people? Let’s get this all cleaned up.
Jeanine: I don’t know, I don’t know anything and I don’t know where the money goes, it just disappears.
Keina: No, I love to hear that. Well is there anything that I should have asked you that I didn’t or anything else you wanted to share?
Jeanine: I don’t think so, but thank you for spreading this joy to me and to all the other clients I’ve worked with. This is one of the best decisions still and I think I will say that for years. I know I will say that for years to come because it’s just made such an impact in my life. So thank you.
Keina: Well thank you for trusting me. I am always appreciative because I know, like it’s a risk to let someone in your life and then money is like one of the most vulnerable areas of your life. And recently I was sharing with another client. I was like, it’s like going to the oncologist, you know? I was like, I see vaginas all day like the same. And it’s like if you can get over that initial like vulnerability, I think it’s totally worth it. So that’s in my analogy as of late.
Jeanine: I love that.
Keina: Girl Power. Well thank you again Jeanine for being my guest today. I appreciate it.
Jeanine: Yes, thanks for having me.
Outro: Thank you so much for listening to Money Files. If you’re ready to take the next step to reach your financial goals, head to www.wealthovernow.com/appointment and let’s get started.
