On a blog called Frugalwoods people provide their story and seek advice from the author and the many people who comment. It takes a bit of effort to get through it all, so I usually stick to the story provided by the advice seekers. I’m always fascinated by people who are willing to bare their naive view of life for the world to see.
Here is a quick summary of what two women want in life IN THE NEXT TEN YEARS. You can get the full affect of their dream world by going to the blog and reading their case study, including current spending.
Where Kayla and Lauren Want to be in Ten Years: (currently age 26 and 30)
Finances:
No debt aside from our mortgage.
Able to finance our pregnancy process in cash with no additional debt accrued.
Adequate savings for our children’s primary and college educations.
The ability to pay for family vacations and travel in cash.
Be on track to both retire somewhere between age 50-55.
Not worry about money at all.
Not have parental arguments about finances be something our kids ever experience.
Lifestyle:
We want to be long done with the pregnancy process and have our children as part of our family unit.
We have a family cabin in the NC mountains and would like our kids to spend a ton of time outdoors, swimming at the lake, exploring around the cabin in the mountains (we are very lucky to have ownership in this property with no expenses currently).
On the flip side we also love living in an urban space and want to take advantage of the public transport available to us in addition to the art, culture, and food scene of our town.
We want to be able to travel both domestically and internationally to historic and/or beautiful places.
Source: Frugalwoods
Talk about wanting it all, in ten years mind you and currently saving 6% in a 401k…and retiring at 50-55. What dream world is this?
They don’t need to focus on their spending, or budget. They need to up their saving first for a emergency fund and then retirement. That’s at least 15% of income, at least.
What they spend needs to be cut to what is left after the saving percentage substantially increases and NO use of credit that can’t be paid in full each month.
In other words a realignment to a realistic lifestyle given their goals.
Kids, college, vacations paid in cash, travel, not to worry about money … retire at 50-55. Wouldn’t we all‼️
QUINNSCOMMENTARY 
HAHAHAHA… well, the question was what they WANT, not what is actually possible. Good luck to them.
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This utopian dream couple probably won’t even be together in ten years…”too many financial issues is a symptom of another problem.
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I actually admire these two. They know what they want and they wanted it debt free. They would like a plan to get there. Whether or not they will find a working plan is the rest of the story to be written.
However, compared to people who call into shows like Dave Ramsey, that have over $500k in student loans, got divorced, living with their girl friend who owes $35k in credit cards, work at MacDonald’s and whom just got back from the Bahamas needing to find a new place to live. They want to know if they should pay the IRS or get their car fixed so they can get a better job?
But it would be fun to watch these two women on HGTV House Hunters. I want a 6 bedroom 4000 sq ft house with 8 bathrooms, a large open concept floor plan for all our guess for $100K in in the middle of downtown near the bars with a large yard for kids and dogs to play.
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I don’t watch house porn but I’m familiar with Dave Ramsey and his 7 Baby Steps. It’s simplistic advice, yet that’s what a lot of people making a lifetime of bad financial decisions need. They have to start somewhere.
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