One Paycheck, Two Kids, and 10% to the Church

SPEAKER_1 (0:01)

A heads up before you listen.

We are not financial advisors. Please note that all income, financial information, and expenses in What We Spend are self-reported.

Lloyd Lochridge (0:14)

How are you feeling about your spending right now? Under control, out of control, tenuous?

Alyssa (0:20)

I feel like it's pretty under control. I might be a little dramatic. I feel like I am spending too much right now, but I think that's a feeling and not reality, if that makes sense.

Lloyd Lochridge (0:34)

This is Alyssa. She is 26 years old, and she lives in a small town in Wyoming. Alyssa is married with two kids, a toddler and a newborn. I spoke to Alyssa during her maternity leave from the post office where she works full-time. While both kids napped, she walked us through some of the challenges and anxieties she deals with when it comes to her spending.

For Alyssa, budgeting is serious business. She is her family's sole provider, and to put it mildly, she runs a tight ship. And when it comes to stretching your dollar, she has a lot of experience.

This week, we'll follow Alyssa as she balances her budget with the shifting needs of her growing family. Before we continue with this episode, and this entire season, I want to let you know that our amazing Season 1 host, Courtney Harrell, has moved on to other exciting projects. If you miss hearing her voice on this podcast, that makes two of us. But our amazing team and I will do our best to pick up right where we left off. We hope to make Courtney proud, and if you're a return listener, we hope you continue enjoying the show. My name is Lloyd Lochridge, and I'll be your host for Season 2 of What We Spend.

It's hard to say where exactly Alyssa is from. She was born in Nebraska, and lived there until she was about eight. And then because of her dad's job, she moved to France, Hungary, New Jersey, and then Utah. But this transient lifestyle Alyssa's family was living became a little untenable, because Alyssa is the oldest of 11 children. She has 10 little brothers and sisters.

Alyssa (2:10)

There's a lot of clothes at my parents' house. They've been passing it on to me, so my boys are mostly in hand-me-downs.

Lloyd Lochridge (2:16)

Your children are getting the hand-me-downs from your youngest siblings.

Alyssa (2:19)

Yep, precisely.

Lloyd Lochridge (2:21)

Amazing.

Back when Alyssa was growing up as the oldest in a massive family, she would occasionally receive small amounts of spending money. And her approach to spending was not what it is today.

Alyssa (2:34)

As a kid, I was a very impulsive spender. If I got sent to school with lunch money, they have snacks and stuff, so I'd always come home with a snack, and I wouldn't have any money left over, whereas my next younger sister would go and get like a half portion, because she wasn't that hungry, really. And then she'd have like $4 left over, and she'd just tuck it away in her piggy bank. And my mom was like, you know, if you just got that under control, you could be saving money like your sister. And I was like, I know, I can't, I can't not impulsively spend. I'm 13, and I have no significant frontal lobe development to control any of my impulses.

Lloyd Lochridge (3:13)

This tendency to spend was not aligned with her family's philosophy towards money. You might call it a culture of frugality.

And this culture was rooted in stories that her father would tell about how he pulled himself up by his own bootstraps.

Alyssa (3:26)

He really taught me like these different ways that he would scrimp and save, you know, with smaller paychecks and stuff like that, and really instilled, I guess, a nervousness with money where I didn't trust myself.

Lloyd Lochridge (3:42)

These days, Alyssa works for the post office in small town Wyoming. She's been there for about five years.

She likes her job, which may come as a surprise to some, evidently.

Alyssa (3:52)

It's funny, I was listening to What We Spend, an episode of it. And I don't remember who it was, but they were talking about how they could never work a job like the post office because it was just too boring.

And I was listening to it while I was at work, and I just about cracked up laughing, because I was literally, I had mail in my hands listening to this episode. And they're not entirely wrong, but I like the predictability of it and the stability of it.

Lloyd Lochridge (4:22)

Let's get into Alyssa's numbers. Alyssa makes a little over $58,000 a year. Her monthly rent is $868.49, and she averages $110 per month in utilities.