- Next is an amazing story about a couple
who did something radical, you guys.
They sold their house to pay off debt.
So let's take a brief look at their story
before I have them come on.
- [Steph] We were poor when we were first married.
- [Taylor] My card had got declined
at a fast food restaurant one day.
So we met in college.
- We got married in October 10th 2009.
I didn't really have knowledge about what that meant
to have student loans, so we lived off of student loans.
- We went through Financial Peace University
within six months of being married.
So we finally got on a budget, and we've been budgeting
for seven years.
Well one of the things we never talked about was
how much debt we had.
And I would try and present it to Steph
and she'd just—brick wall.
- Yup. - Just, "No.
I don't want to know the number."
- Mm-hmm.
I felt a lot of shame because I was the one
that carried the bulk of this debt.
- With student loans we had $137,000, and then
last fall our daughter was having trouble breathing:
ended up being a three night stay in the Vanderbilt ICU.
And so that racked up about $5,000 worth of medical debt.
- Even though I was obviously very present with my daughter,
in the back of my mind I was still thinking, oh no.
I know this is going to be an expense,
and we already have this huge amount of debt.
- A couple months later we were looking at how we
were gonna debt snowball this thing.
What could we sell? What do we do?
And then she came to me.
- I just had this, I don't know if it was vision
or what it was, but just this thought of,
what if you sold the house?
- That would leave us with like $35,000 in debt.
We could snowball that quickly.
And that presentation of the question was
what got me on board.
- Wow. What an incredible story.
I love these kinds of stories where people do something
that's so difficult and so different than what the world
says they should do.
And it pays off, literally.
So here I brought in Taylor and Steph to join me
because I just want to dive more into their story.
So thanks, you guys, for being here.
- Yeah. - You're welcome.
- Seriously, I mean, you all sold your house
to get out of debt.
- It's crazy. - We did.
- It's crazy, yes.
Okay I want to dig into that 'cause that's just huge.
But first, majority of your debt was student loans, right?
- Yes.
- And how much total again was it?
- 137 - 137,000 dollars.
So when you when you signed up for student loans,
I'm just curious, what was your thought
as you were going into it?
Like did you have any idea the repercussions later in life?
- Yeah so the majority of those student loans were mine.
(Rachel laughs)
- It's okay, Steph, you're gettin' through it.
(Steph laughs)
- Yes, I chose to go to two private schools
for my bachelor's and my master's degree.
And my parents owned a farm and just couldn't afford
to pay for that.
So that was the majority of our debt.
I didn't understand, I mean, you're brain's not even
fully formed at 18; let's be honest.
- Right, right, I've heard that.
(Steph laughs)
So I didn't even understand what that looked like
later on in life.
Once we got married we had to live
off some of those student loans.
- Yes, yes.
- So we took out even more than actually was was paid
for just through education.
- Yeah, totally, which is so normal.
Like I'm hearing that more and more people are doing that.
And the repercussions of it, they don't know at 18.
You guys were great because you guys budgeted together
pretty early on, right?
- Mm-hmm.
- So were you always on the same page, do you feel like?
- Ah no.
(all laugh)
My card got declined.
We had no idea what we were gonna do.
So we called my parents, and
they bought us a Financial Peace University kit,
sent it to us.
It took me a while still to kind of get into it.
- So you guys have been married a little over 8 years.
- Yes.
- So what year was this?
- This was six months in.
- Within six months. - Okay.
So you're newlyweds.
- Yes.
- Yeah, we're newlyweds. - It was 2010.
- Don't have any money, have no idea
how we're gonna pay for anything.
- Mm-hmm.
- Did you guys start budgeting more together after
Financial Peace University?
- I did it after Financial Peace University.
I am the, let's see, he's the free spirit.
And I am the planner. I did a lot of the budgeting.
- Yes.
- At the beginning.
We had some conversations, but not until fairly recently
did we get really serious about where we were
as far as debt snowballing goes.
- Yes, because you guys budgeted together,
but you weren't necessarily talking about the debt.
Which I think is so interesting. So what prevented both
of you, because I heard a little bit of
shame because you were like,
"All the student loans were mine."
You already just confessed to that.
- Yes.
- Was that a lot on your part, or why didn't you guys
talk about the debt?
- Any time I would bring up debt snowballing
and kind of starting to tackle that amount,
I would go to tell Steph the amount
and she just, she would shut it down.
Didn't want to even know what the number was.
- Because why?
'Cause it was so overwhelming?
- It was so overwhelming, and I'm the type that I want
to achieve, and I was afraid; I just didn't see an end.
I didn't see an end, and if I can't see an end,
then I don't even want to know what it is.
I just didn't want to know the number.
And there was a lot of shame associated with that amount for me.
- Yes. Yeah.
- So you guys shifted, though, the conversation obviously.
And so when that shift happened, it really was
a cause because of your daughter
being in the hospital, right?
- Mm-hmm.
- So tell me a little about that.
- Well, Annabelle got really sick to the point where
she was struggling to breathe.
- Which is so terrifying anyways.
- Yes, it was awful.
- And how old was she?
- She was 15 months, I believe.
So we took her to the pediatrician,
pediatrician sent us to hospital, and then we eventually
got transported through ambulance to Vanderbilt.
- All of these things were happening, and we had started
the discussion at that point of . . .
- Selling the house.
- Yeah.
- Just came to the point where we like,
we have to do something.
We have to do something.
We can't just sit here with this mountain of debt.
- Yes, okay, so the discussion of selling the house came up.
- Mm-hmm.
- Which is like A, amazing of what you guys did.
But it's extreme, right?
A lot of people may be watching and thinking like,
"I'm not gonna sell my house to get out of debt."
But talk about the benefits of it.
I mean talk about when you first had the idea.
I know one of you was not on board, right?
You weren't, right? - Yeah.
(Rachel laughs)
Because it was so extreme in your mind, or what was it?
- Yeah, so the first time she asked the question,
she asked, "Do you want to sell the house
and move to an apartment?"
- You're like, and no!
(Rachel and Steph laugh)
- Absolutely not.
- 'Cause you had two kids at this point.
- Yeah. - Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
- Yes.
- So we were . . .we just didn't even talk about it.
I shut it down.
That's not even something we're gonna talk about.
- Yeah. - Mm-hmm.
- So a few months went by, and she asked it again.
- Yeah, I think it was just the presentation of:
hey, we have this much in equity.
We had about $100,000 in equity.
And we had, at that time, $137,000
in student loan debt.
So if we sell the house, we still would have some to pay off
but that is a ginormous mountain
that we would have conquered,
and we can rent a place.
And that's when the wheels started turning,
and I could tell Taylor was like, "Okay, you know what;
you might be onto something here."
- So when it came to actually selling, I'm just curious,
did it sell quickly?
- Yeah.
(Steph and Rachel laugh)
- He's like, yes.
- Yeah, we were under contract in thirty hours
for 5,000 above asking.
- Oh my goodness.
Okay so when that happens, and you get the offer in,
you're like: we're about to sell our house.
Emotionally, like, is that sad for you?
'Cause I always think about moving out of the house
that you brought your babies home to?
Is that the same place?
- Yes.
- All these memories, and you know you're about to do
this amazing step, but it's an emotional thing
to sell your home.
- Mm-hmm.
- So how was it? Were you guys just like gung-ho about it
or what?
- We had to find a place to live.
- Yeah.
(laughs)
- We didn't have anything lined up.
- I had an emotional moment after we accepted the offer.
But it was a moment because I knew just what the ending
would look like.
And I knew at that point that we just had so many
confirmations of peace throughout that process
that that's exactly what we were supposed to do.
- Okay, so what have been
the biggest changes so far?
- Well on March 7th we walked out with a check of over
$100,000, and that was incredible.
(Rachel claps and laughs)
- That's so crazy.
- We would just like check our bank account and be like,
oh my gosh this is awesome.
We have this amount of money.
(Rachel laughs)
That will probably never happen again.
Well, maybe we will.
So we paid off a substantial amount.
We completely paid off Annabelle's medical bill --
- Wow.
- which was over $4,000, and then
we paid off, how much in student loans now?
Probably $100,000 in student loans.
- Mm-hmm.
We paid off $105,000 total.
- Okay, so I have to ask.
Was it worth it?
- Absolutely. - A hundred percent.
- A hundred percent.
- And the relief you felt,
is it everything you thought it would be?
- I think it's been more.
- Yeah, we were looking at 20–30 years to being debt-free,
and now we should be totally debt-free
within a couple years.
- I mean absolutely incredible.
I'm not kidding you—the amount of sacrifice you did,
and just to think of how quickly you're gonna get out
of debt, and your kids' lives, and everything around it.
It's really a decision that not a lot of people
want to make because they're scared and probably intimidated
by the idea, and you guys stepped into that even with
a little bit of fear, maybe even a little bit of uh.
And you did it.
For you guys out there watching, maybe some of you
are hundreds of thousands dollars in debt.
And you're sitting there thinking, you know,
it's gonna take us 20–30 years to pay this off.
And maybe you choose to make a decision
from being inspired by their story of like, hey,
we are gonna sell our house to do this.
Or maybe for some of you, it's just sacrificing lifestyle,
but no matter who you are, if you're looking to sell
your home make sure you find someone in your area
that you trust.
And I have agent all over the country that I recommend.
And these agents can get you close to five thousand dollars
more at closing, and your home is only on the market
for 10 days on average.
I mean, seriously, these people are amazing.
So make sure to click the link in the description below.
Well thanks, you guys, again, for being here
and sharing your story.
I mean absolutely incredible.