Last month, I introduced you to a blog called Daily Hope which is written by Pastor Rick Warren. I keep many of his articles and go back and read them when I need a little inspiration and motivation.

I subscribe to a blog called Daily Hope which is written by Pastor Rick Warren. Pastor Warren is the founder and senior pastor of megachurch Saddleback Church. He has a dozen or so blog articles regarding the Bible and money.

Many times people are unaware what they are spending. This video will explain how to download bank and credit card transactions, upload them to Google Sheets, and categorize and sort them. This will give you a quick way to determine your past spending to create a budget.

I’m going to start with the punch line… don’t consolidate your debt!

Before I get into the reasons why this is a hugely bad idea, let’s get on the same page with what debt consolidation is. Debt consolidation is combining separate non-secured debt into one loan with one payment to one company.

Many times to get out of debt quicker, or make ends meet, people need to get a part-time job to supplement their full-time job or family income. One of the excuses people have is that many of the part-time jobs available don’t pay enough. Presumably, they don’t think it is worth their time, or they don’t think it will make a difference.

Car dealers will make you believe that you have to get a new car and roll that negative equity into another loan. Oftentimes this not only increases your payments, but increases the amount of time you are paying for the car. This will continue to happen each time you want to get another car.

If you follow Dave Ramsey, you know that 78% of Americans live paycheck-to-paycheck. So what happens when there is a pandemic and many people aren’t getting paid, there are fewer jobs available because restaurants and businesses are closed, you have kids at home because schools are suspended, and people are literally running around Costco to get toilet paper?

You dog paddle.

Although this post is a few weeks past the time many Americans received their stimulus money, there is rumor that another round, or several, could be coming. Depending on your employment situation and your progress in your debt-free journey, what you should do with that money differs.

The premise of the seminar was how to communicate and understand each other, and then use that understanding to begin a money conversation. During the seminar, Dr. Les Parrott spoke about Love Talks, while Rachel Cruze spoke about Money Talks. I’m going to focus on the Money Talks in this article.

A financial coach can help you make a plan to get out of an immediate crisis, become debt-free, reach your long-term and retirement goals, provide accountability, and establish good habits that you can use forever.