I was talking to BF the other day, and this was the story of his friend.
It’s kind of sad, but a bit telling of the kind of attitude that gets many of us into trouble.
But then I caught myself feeling bad for them and thought: But wait, they REALLY put themselves there. They’ve consistently made BAD decisions over and over again, and refused to take the advice that they have asked of their friends. Instead of breaking the cycle, they’re making it worse!
Short rant:
That’s what I don’t get. People feel sad for themselves and they feel like they can’t do anything, earn more money, cut back..whatever. They have limited income, I get it.
But if you feel really pissed off at your situation, you do something about it, not sit around and hold a pity party.
Believe me, I’ve been there and done that. I sat around, had a pity party, felt like the world was conspiring against me, felt mad at all my friends who supposedly made me spend all that money… but hey, I made those decisions that got me there.
And now, I have to make decisions and take action to get me out of the situation now, instead of sitting around and whining about it.
Sure, the situation sucks. Recession sucks. Losing your job sucks. Not making enough money sucks. Working 100 hours a week to break even sucks. Now, you have a problem. What are you going to do about it?
Get out there, try to find some interim jobs at minimum wage to bring in some income and make ends meet, shovel snow for $10/drive way, sell your stuff… WHATEVER. Or become a census taker.
Just brainstorm and be resourceful, and even if you fail at the ideas and don’t make any money, at least you tried instead of whining about it and feeling resentful or jealous.
Anyway, listen to this sob story.
Background:
He’s a financial consultant who is married to a woman who doesn’t work.
She tries to pass it off like she’s some great photographer, but the truth is that she’s an amateur. My nephew takes better pictures and he’s 4.
And I’m not being sarcastic or condescending, I am being truthful (okay, I’m being a bit bitchy). I saw her pictures – blurry, out of focus, amateurish and incredibly mundane shots – not anything I’d pay any amount of money for. If I could show you these pictures………….
Where they started
He started off in Houston, Texas after moving there temporarily from Mexico where they lived for about 11 years after being married (they’re Mexican), for a company he was with.
He made very good money in Mexico, around $90,000 USD as a financial advisor, and she stayed at home (no kids, NO KIDS!!!). Cost of living was low, and they both came from pretty well off families which meant they lived with servants to do everything like cook and clean for pennies a day.
She also didn’t work.
He was paid $300,000 a year to move to Houston for a project, then he’d come back to Mexico.
In the year or two that they stayed there, EVERYTHING was paid for him. I’m talking the expensive apartment with the fancy pool and sauna downstairs, the cleaning service that came with that fancy apartment, the food, the cars.
They had everything that we’d consider ‘basic needs’ covered, and the rest was disposable income.
At $300,000 a year.
Let’s just absorb that.
His wife wasn’t working (she has never worked a day in her life….. literally. ), so she racked up major credit card bills, shopping all day in Houston and eating out like she was a queen.
All… ALL of his disposable income that he ‘saved’ from not paying for any rent or food, and making $300,000 a year, went to clearing her credit card bills to make them debt free.
Where they went
In the mean time, while he was there working that job, he had a chance to stay in Houston, Texas and live there at the same salary, but his wife pouted and said she wanted to move to Quebec in Canada because she wanted to get in touch with her QUARTER of European origins.
It was something about her feeling insecure about being Mexican in the U.S. and feeling like the stereotype.
So she focused on the 1/4 of her blood being from Europe and claimed to be more exotic than she was.
Please. I am not trying to be racially insensitive, but that all comes internally.
If you look down on yourself because you’re of a certain race, then it perpetuates and you become that stereotype.
Plus, I think the people they associated with were hard working and were focusing more on the fact that she didn’t work when she was able to, and tried to show off by shopping with money she didn’t really have or earned.
I heard that and almost laughed off my chair.
I understand that you want to get in touch with your roots and your background, but you visit Europe in that case!! Or you start reading history books or something.
By the way, they didn’t even speak a word of French, and very bad English.
Although I should note that it’s not to say you can’t really work without knowing the language – I worked in a French environment only knowing English…… but to willingly move to a city without even visiting it or checking it out to make sure that it would be a good place to move to, they accepted the job.
Anyway.
They got a job (luckily) at $85,000 a year and moved to Quebec City. After taxes, they earned $4000 net a month.
Keep in mind, all the money that he had earned before, was WIPED OUT. He had literally NO savings, and was living off credit cards when he left Houston. So this job was a godsend to them, and since they were relatively debt free, it was a perfect time to save and get back in the black.
When he moved into an apartment there, he and his wife (more his wife because she’s into image), decided to pick an extremely beautiful, but totally EMPTY apartment in the middle of downtown. A big one with a view, and 4 bedrooms – yes 4 bedrooms for 2 people.
No appliances.
Let that sink in for a bit.
NO APPLIANCES.
Which meant he immediately went out, bought a microwave, oven, fridge, dishwasher, washer and dryer, air conditioner… you name it.
Oh, and furniture on top of that.
See, the job had promised to be a permanent one, so they decided to splurge on getting everything for their new, shiny life in Quebec City.
So instead of picking a fully furnished, kind of smallish apartment to live in while they saved money and kind of settled into the city and stabilized themselves, they immediately thought of all the riches pouring into their pockets and splurged on future, expected income.
They were taking trips to Mexico, having the time of their lives.
Then she got pregnant. With twins. And after she gave birth, he was fired.
The job wasn’t so permanent after all. They just wanted him there to do the project and then they fired him (that’s why they were so eager to grab him and pay for the moving costs up to Quebec City).
He was out of a job. In an expensive apartment, with a lazy wife who never worked a day in her life to help out, got them into major credit card debt, and finally deigned to have twins after a supposed 15 years of trying to have children.
Did I mention that? They supposedly “TRIED” for 15 years. I find that to be a bunch of crock because she was definitely using the pill or SOMETHING to not have the kids or they just weren’t serious enough about it.
They never saw a fertility doctor, and sounded kind of laissez-faire about the whole situation .. which is completely fine IF you don’t want kids. But if you are trying to have kids, don’t lie to me and tell me you tried for 15 years and then in another breath tell me you never saw a doctor for it until the end.
For me, if you try for 1-2 years and realize you can’t seem to get pregnant, you see a fertility doctor IMMEDIATELY if you really want to have kids.
They didn’t. They just kept “trying” for 15 years, by which, we understood meant “not trying to have kids” for 15 years.
She was too busy shopping it up.
Anyway, he got fired and he ended up being unemployed for a year.
Along with his wife.
They both started taking French lessons at the local college, and NEITHER OF THEM WORKED FOR THE ENTIRE YEAR. No income, no real comfortable savings to speak of and 2 kids.
You can STILL work in Quebec City, even if you don’t know French you can still stack shelves, or learn some passable French to work at a cafe or a grocery store. You just need the basic run down of the language, or to have someone quickly teach you a couple of basic words, and off you go.
Many jobs don’t require you to know the language and if you are willing to work without thinking that you’re better and you deserve better, you can always make money some how.
But they refused to even try to find a manual labour job to make SOME income come in because it was below them.
Below them.
I was in disbelief at this point. If I had a family to feed, I’d be out there in any damn job I could take to bring some cash in because living a life on credit just because you’re proud is no way to live.
So the money they saved in the second year, after the first year of paying off the appliances, went to their living for a year without working at all.
Part 2 coming up. And it’s a doozy!!!
Just a girl trying to find a balance between being a Shopaholic and a Saver.
I cleared $60,000 in 18 months earning $65,000 gross/year.
Now I am self-employed, and you can read more about 
