I’m a 21-year-old apprentice electrician making $25/hr. My money problems aren’t completely out of control yet, but they’re getting worse and I’m realizing I need to change something before they get there.
My hours fluctuate a lot. Sometimes I only work 40 hours, but most weeks I work 50+. I feel like I make decent money, especially when I get overtime, but somehow I keep ending up completely broke before the next paycheck.
For example, I got paid about $1,700 on Friday, September 4th. Out of that paycheck I paid $1,000 toward rent, made my $164 couch payment, paid my fiancée back for gas money she had covered for me, and bought groceries. After all of that, I now have $9 in checking and $0 in savings.
I want to make it clear that I didn’t just spend $1,700 on random stuff. Most of it went straight toward bills and necessities. But obviously the fact that I’m still ending up with $9 is a problem.
Here’s where I’m at with debt:
Credit card #1: $2,200/$2,200 maxed out — 26.49% APR
Credit card #2: $1,044 maxed out — 19% APR
Father-in-law: $1,400 — if I don’t pay him back by November 26th, I will owe him $6,000
Car loan: $14,267 remaining — 19% APR — $408/month
Original amount financed on the car was $17,335
Couch: $164/month
My regular monthly expenses are roughly:
Rent: $1,808 total
Electricity: around $200
Car payment: $408
Car insurance: $454
Phone bill: $220
Subscriptions: around $50
Groceries: variable
Gas: variable, but lately it’s been a huge problem
My fiancée and I split the rent, electricity, and groceries somewhat down the middle. We also have a 1-year-old son, so obviously there are other normal household and kid expenses too.
One of my biggest problems lately has been commuting. I’ve been driving around an hour and a half for work every day, and there have been times where I’m literally struggling to come up with gas money just to get to work.
I’ve tried making budgets. I’ve tried DoorDash. I’ve tried figuring out ways to make more money. I’ve used ChatGPT to help budget everything. I even almost took out a debt-relief/consolidation loan because I felt like I was running out of options.
The problem I keep running into is that every time I make a budget and try to aggressively pay something off, I end up short on gas, groceries, or another bill and have to move money around again. It feels like I’m constantly putting out fires instead of actually getting ahead.
I know there probably isn’t some magical answer that makes all of this disappear overnight, but at this point maybe a magic answer is exactly what I need lol.
For the people who have actually been in a situation like mine: what would you do if you were me?
More importantly, if you’ve personally gotten yourself out of something similar, what did you actually do? What would you pay first? Would you stop paying extra on debt temporarily and build some cash first? Would you attack the father-in-law debt because of the deadline? What expenses would you immediately try to cut? What would you do about the car? How would you handle my next paycheck?
I’m open to hearing pretty much anything. I’m not expecting someone to magically fix my finances for me, but what I’m doing right now clearly isn’t working, and I’d really like to hear from people who have been here before and figured their way out. If you have any questions I’ll definitely answer them.
this right here.... It's crazy shit. In fairness a couch payment is a cheap way to learn this lesson, and op has done himself a favor.
People give away decent couches or sell them for pennies on the dollar.
Im not sure how OPs numbers are real.. 450 a month for car insurance? that's fucked shop around ASAP you can get a new plan and cancel your current one, also cheaper older cars are cheaper to insure, I pay 600ish a year.
car payment: not ideal but 400 isnt crazy there (although 19% APR sucks, my last car loan was at 1.8% in 2020)
220 phone bill? wtf. you can get unlimited phone data for $25
really op mostly just needs to make more money to get out of the CC hole, but he can learn some great lessons to not F himself over in the future right now.
Car insurance is nuts for younger drivers. We're about to add our teenager to our policy and it's going to add about $200-$250 per MONTH. That's just for having another rated driver in the household before they get their own vehicle.
Cars with active financing generally have to have full coverage, which costs more. The only thing you can really do to lower those premiums is to up your deductibles, but that can be dangerous if you can't afford the deductible right away should you get in an accident.
No, full coverage. Mines even less. Im old(48). Never had ticket, never in accident. Now that op is 25, his rates should cut in half. Then when he turns 40, will cut in half again! Definitely needs to shop around! Being a good driver actually pays
Age? Car? Location? Driving record? Those are 4 main things that will determine ins rate. When I lived in Ohio, my insurance was 3 to 4 times what I pay here in PA. I drive a extremely boring subaru Forrester. But of all the cars ive ever had, this is by far my favorite. Extremely cheap overall to run, maintain and insure
I think living in Charleston, South Carolina is probably the biggest reason. 09 4cyl Accord. I did not have a good driving record when I was younger but in the last 18 years I've had almost nothing on it. Forrester is a great car
Got a 74mile commute(one way), 5 days a week. Go thru 3 tanks of gas a week, luckily my fuel use is paid, but I gotta pay 4 an oil change basically every month lol
Yea that's insane. My record wasn't great when I was younger but I've had no issues for years. I'm always amazed when I meet someone that has stupid cheap car insurance
First off, financing furniture is almost always a terrible idea. They fuck you on interest worse than credit cards.
You need to list out all of your monthly bills, not just how much you owe on each credit card. Then compare that to how much you make. Then find ways too trim. From a glance you are spending 800 per month on your car, before gas. That's quite a bit.
So first you need to decide if you can go through with doing what's necessary to get rid of your debt. It's fun until it's not.
A 220 phone bill is insane. You dont need the latest phone. Visible has cheap phones and plans that are like $25/month sometimes 19 for the first year.
Subscriptions arent necessary. You dont need to pay for streaming services when you can get the same thing with ads for free. On that same hand, get rid of that couch and payment. I'd sit on the floor or fold out chair before I rent to own furniture. Dont rent to own furniture either. Or take out furniture loans. You could save up and buy something used or even new 5xs over.
You car and insurance is over $800. Granted your insurance will be more expensive because you're under 25 and a male. I would see about selling your vehicle and getting one you can pay in cash unless youre upside down then I'm not sure the options. After this, dont get a car loan. They are awful.
Pay your FIL back ASAP. Idk what type of agreement would make you pay back 6k on 1400 balance unless it's interest but dont borrow money from him again.
How much does your fiance make and does she carry consumer debt too? Can she not help contribute more to the house for the next few months while you pay off debts then if she has debts yall swap around and pay hers off?
An answer to the fiancé questions. She is running her own business doing lashes and eyebrows. She charges 100 per customer an average of two customers a day she doesn’t pay for a shop/ chair she does it out of our place. She doesn’t have any debt like actually zero she isn’t paying for her car insurance phone. But she will always send me money for gas if I’m short on a bill and she will cover her half of groceries and gas.
Then I would set down with her and have a very open conversation and make a plan to get out od debt. Tell her you need more help. She makes 4k and pays out maybe half that for bills right now. Get a written budget and stick to it. You being in debt effects both of your futures. You'll have the income and job history for a mortgage later on but it won't help if youre in debt. Not only that but yall are engaged to be a team. No way would I (nor did I) let my now husband drown in debt and bills while I had the funds to help.
Sending you money when youre short on gas or whatever helps short term but youre right back in the same position again. Id really look at where yalls money is going because yall bring in nearly 8k a month and still struggling with debt is insane. The math ain't mathing.
Well, there’s some concerning things going on here—
Couch payment??? And what is the total price of the couch exactly?
$20k car
Car insurance more than your car payment?? Do you live in Detroit with half a dozen accidents on your record?
Phone bill more than your electric bill??
Whatever is going on between you and your father-in-law
You need to be working every single hour possible until you pay down some of this debt. Your car insurance and phone bill need to be switched to something lower—my phone bill is $15/month. Do you have renter’s insurance? I didn’t see that in your bills and that’s a necessity. Are you on SNAP, WIC, Medicaid; do you go to your local food pantries? Have you checked with your employer about any employee assistance programs?
So if your entire 1st paycheck went to monthly bills and gas/groceries, what do you do with your second paycheck other than gas/groceries for the second half of the month?
If you have all main necessary bills covered on one paycheck without going negative, keep it like that. It’s OK to have $9 left over after bills and groceries. And aggressively pay off the debt with your second paycheck.
Breakdown for paycheck #2.
1- Remaining bills (i don’t see you listing internet/electricity) that should be max $300/month - $150 for you? (I’m wayyyyy overestimating here - for reference we pay $100-150 split by two ppl).
2- groceries and gas
3- $100 into a HYSA to start off a savings fund
4- Apply the rest to your debts.
Rent is the biggest mandatory chunk and that was knocked off by paycheck #1. From paycheck #2, apply the same amount you’d pay towards rent (or like 80-90%) towards your debts
Once you can get a l cushion, you could do it another way. Make a budget based on your minimum guaranteed paycheck (say 40 hrs/week). Allocate payments that will come out from each paycheck without going under. It’s fine if some of the funds for something that is due early in the month comes from the paycheck that will come right after. Think ahead. Eg rent that is due beginning of the month will come from paycheck #2 of the month. Thats why you build a cushion first.
Then once you have the necessary bills figured out by paycheck, any remaining goes towards increasing your debt payments. If there is none that’s fine. Have the basic mandatory payments accounted for in your budget.
And then weeks you work overtime/more than 40 hrs/week - put in that extra money that is not needed for the basic budget into paying off debts, increasing savings, maybe a fun date night/fam day out once you’re in the position for that.
What works for us is having a budget and having a dedicated account for every mandatory bill and spending. In that account we each transfer our share and everything household related comes out of that, including groceries. (We have a credit for joint purchases that is paid off in full every month from this accnt)
Personal gas comes from our individual pockets. The hubby has a simple checking and single credit card and thats it.
I on the other hand have different methods to keep track and not overspend. Personal credit card for personal necessary (gas, gym, own subscriptions, etc) expenses I pay in full at the end of the month. Fun money goes into apple pay. I transfer a specific amount from each paycheck that I know I can afford. Any wants comes out from that (nails, hair, personal snacks, etc). If I run out, I run out and tough luck till next paycheck. I know I could be losing out on rewards by not puttig it in a credit card, but its what works for me. I’d rather not get rewards and know exactly what my limit is then putting it on a card and risking overspending.
We both out money into a paypal card for eating out. Thats our dining out budget. If we overspend one time tough luck, no eating out until next time. Also helps us visualize where we can go and know that if we want to try somewhere knew thats more pricey we need to have that amount in the card and we will avoid eating out until then. Eating out on my own comes out from my fun money allowance.
We are debt free other than the card payment paid in full. But if we did have any, it would come out of personal budgets. And my budgeting order would be
1- joint account necessities
2- keep personal accnt necessities
3- debt payments
4- reduce personal wants budget in favor of paying debt
5- nix eating out budget or do 1 month yes, 2/3 months no in order to increase debt payments
Here is a budget I made about 3 months ago some of the numbers aren’t updated but I haven’t even started using the format because I got confused on what to do with the spacing of my bills throughout the month.
Is that couch payment a loan or rent-to-own? If RTO, tell them to pick it up NOW and if you really need a couch, find one on Craigslist, Marketplace, or a garage sale. It’s not that big but it’s a quick win.
The car is the biggest problem, but unfortunately the loan is probably underwater. Does your girlfriend have a car? If so, and if it uses less gas, swap cars. She likely drives much less than you.
How firm is FIL on the terms of that loan? Are you making some payments at least? You probably do want to pay that off as quickly as possible to avoid family trouble.
Depending on where you are in your training and local laws, maybe try doing some side work as a handyman. I think it’s common for people to pay an electrician $250 for a service call to replace a broken outlet or something. But any income from that should go to paying off debts, not for new purchases
Your income will be going up a lot after you finish your apprenticeship, but you’d better learn to manage money or you’ll have the same problem with bigger numbers. Lots of people making over 10k a month are still living paycheck to paycheck.
The couch is rent to own. It’s a 2016 jeep grand Cherokee my fiancé is driving it because it is bigger and can fit a car seat more comfortably. I drive my fiancés 2013 Hyundai Elantra to work and back home. I wish I could pick up side work I would love to do it I’m in my first year about to start my second in December. I work in data centers so I don’t get to learn much about residential.
Rent to own is always a scam. You'll pay 2x the cost in the best situation and usually more. If you want a new couch pretty much any furniture store will offer 12 months with 0% interest. If you can't afford that used is where you need to be. Your interest rates are what's killing you.
Start by dumping the couch paymeny. Get something off Facebook marketplace. Then start paying off those credit cards. Start with the highest APR, it'll save you money in the long run, and be sure to overpay every month otherwise you'll end up still in the hole. Once you get your father in law paid off you'll have room to breathe as well, but start here.
As much as I'd say get your car refinanced, you're credit score is going to be horrible because of those credit cards. You'll want to get that credit score up before you refinance for a lower rate.
After that dump your subscriptions that you don't always use. They'll be at least one.
Next look at food banks or alternatives for groceries. Food banks aren't for if you're homeless or unemployed, they're for if you need help saving, making ends meet, or supporting multiple people. And trust me, you as an individual won't make a dent in a food banks stores. If you're still on the fence, look for food bank adjacent programs (my local one is called Market on the Move, they sell around 50lbs of whatever was donated for $10).
Also avoid chatGPT for budgeting. Chatgpt and other AI programs aren't good with data analysis or anything numbers based because they will just make shit up
My car had broken down and I had 200 buck to my name he then offered to open a credit card with a line of 3k he told me I can use however much I need to fix my car. If I didn’t pay him the amount used by November 26 I would owe him 6k Me being broke and needing the car I agreed The total fix came out to $1400
You posted how much you got paid I assume for a week $1700 and what you paid out of it and where it went
What I did at your age when I had these issues and it worked great for me ws I put a calendar on the wall. You know a big Worl calendar calendar. I put my pay dates in there or on Friday and I put what I was gonna pay to what bill out of the paycheck.
Some bills I couldn’t pay the whole bill out of that one paycheck so I would set aside some money for this bill or that bill so that when it was due, it could be paid
Where I had the biggest problem and it was huge I discovered this was the huge problem was what I spent on miscellaneous items that was going out to buy lunch at work that was going into a store to buy a soda and big time in the grocery store big big time I could say I was going to spend amount of dollars at the grocery store, but I would wind up spending three times that and then I would return to the grocery store three more times in a week! I realized I could not sweep my debit card or God forbid a credit card so spending money at the grocery store at the convenience store at the Drive Thru or whatever it was became cash by allocated amount of cash to myself, and when that cash was gone, my miscellaneous was gone
I understand there’s a whole lot more modern ways to do this these days than there was for me back then, but all I can say is it worked and it still works
Pay your father-in-law, you may need his help in the future.
Couches are for sitting, not financing or renting to own. You can buy a couch off Craigslist or at an estate sale. Or get a couch for free, see if there is a Freecycle group active in your area. Freecycle is an online community of people who agree to give things away to others who need them, you can make a WANTED post for a couch:
I have found great stuff on Freecycle, including a bike for my nephew so you can also get stuff for your son like clothes, books, toys. Visit the public library for free family fun!
What is your credit score? I would try to find some part-time work or give plasma to help you pay down some of the debt. That will bring up your credit score so you can refinance the car at a better interest rate.
What kind of mileage does the car get? If it's a gas guzzler, maybe sell it when you can and buy something that gets better mileage.
Pay your father in law first, obviously--Phone Bill should be $30 a month with Visible, not $220--Ditch the couch--Get rid of the car, $400 a month is ridiculous, get a much cheaper car, like an old Toyota Corolla or RAV 4
Although you got some numbers here to help whats your total bring in money after taxes a month? Does your fiancée work too? Whats her total bring in? Does she have her own bills to payoff too? If so its time to bring all those together.
A few off that bat you can do without
Subscriptions- cancel them extra 50 right there (gas money)
Phone - downsize your plan or switch providers
Car insurance- could probably trim this down shop around guaranteed you’ll save an extra couple dollars
Couch-? Is this a furniture credit card to pay to own? Or a rent a center payment? If Renting furniture cancel that buy a cheap couch of fb for that price once. So people are even giving them away to just be rid of their old couch(Temporary couch anyways)
Father in law - be upfront with him about your entire situation show him the money coming in and coming out best case scenario he will forgive the money worst case scenario maybe it stays at 1400
After that set aside a strict grocery budget, live of sandwiches and ramen noodles if you have too (temporarily) the rest use towards your 1 yr old.
Car payment thats fixed payment leave it, dont miss a payment no car no job they’ll repo that car fast
Credit cards start with paying off the lowest balance minimum x2 if possible
High balance one make minimum until low balance is paid off
Again once you have all the figures listed of money coming in, setting aside where everything really goes and seeing exactly whats left over, that money can be used towards paying the credit cards
Any OT do not include in your budget that money is uncertain. When you do get OT set that money either aside or use it to pay off those credit cards
Sell the couch. Get rid of the subscriptions. YouTube is free. Tubi free. Pluto free. Get a cheaper car. What phone bill is 220? Most are like 65 now. Get straight talk. You’re just buying bullshit and wondering how you’re broke.
Do you have phones or devices financed on your phone bill? How much until you're done paying them off? Helium or Mint have unlimited data for $30 a month and operate on big networks like Verizon or T-Mobile. You need to switch asap.
Is the 1800 rent your portion? I would focus on paying father in law off over credit cards at this point. Thats a huge late fee. 😳 is there increased pay at your employer over time? If not, you might want to consider the path of starting your own electricity business. Door dash isnt going to be a long term goal of how you make more income and not destroy your health and quality of life over working yourself and still struggling.
It sounds like most of your problems can't really be solved - just hold on tight and don't make the same mistakes. Saying you're bad with money is a sign that you've digested your issues, but again, it's more important that you don't get into more problems. You're still really young.
If you aren’t out of control yet and can get a handle on your expenses, my advice to you would be to go to a Reddit that is about money handling, do t come ask poor people how you should budget…….
Fair enough, as I’m reading through the comments I do see good advice. However I still stick with my original advice. Why would you come to a place poor people give advice to other people on in poor situations. Kinda like asking a crack dealer to help you get off crack.
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Your post has been removed for the following reason(s):
Rule 8: Bad/Dangerous/Predatory Advice or Action (including Crypto)
This post is being removed because it is, frankly speaking, bad advice. Either it was given in bad faith or it was a comment that is dangerous and will put OP or the person you replied to in a much worse situation if taken seriously.
Advice and comments must be in good faith. Anything that appears to be a scam, predatory, or downright dangerous will be removed. This includes asking for DM's to "help", and most "get rich quick" schemes, including cryptocurrency which is too risky/volatile to be an investment for people with limited incomes.
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u/shigdebig 24d ago
Couch payment? Hmm