June 4, 2025 • 27 mins
What does the path from financial despair to freedom actually look like? In this deeply personal conversation, Certified Master Financial Coach Elizabeth Ramos reveals her remarkable journey from accumulating $300,000 in debt as a single mother to completely eliminating it—and now helping others do the same.
Despite being naturally gifted with money management from childhood (creating budgets at age eight!), Elizabeth found herself spiraling into massive debt after her divorce when trying to build a new life for her son. The emotional weight of this financial burden created feelings of shame, regret, and isolation that many listeners will recognize from their own experiences. "I was consumed with just regret, just loneliness, just shame," Elizabeth shares, describing the dark place where financial struggles led her.
The conversation explores not just the practical aspects of financial recovery but delves deeply into the emotional toll that money problems take on relationships, mental health, and self-image. Elizabeth articulates how financial stress creates relationship strain, parenting challenges, and even health problems—a cascade of consequences that extend far beyond bank statements and credit scores.
What sets this episode apart is Elizabeth's straightforward explanation of her three-step coaching process that helped her climb out of debt and now guides her clients: understanding money habits and personal history, establishing accountability, and creating concrete action plans. She emphasizes that financial recovery isn't just about spreadsheets—it's about restoring hope and envisioning a different future.
Whether you're facing overwhelming student loans, recovering from gambling debt, dealing with pandemic-related financial setbacks, or simply want to optimize your savings, Elizabeth's message offers both practical guidance and emotional reassurance. Her approach bridges the gap between crisis management and wealth-building, preparing clients for the next stage of their financial journey.
Ready to transform your relationship with money? Visit ElizabethRamos.coach to learn how financial coaching might be your first step toward true financial freedom.
Did you know you can now Help Us Continue Making Awesome Content for Listeners Affected by Grief!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to Real Talk with Life After Grief Chris,
where we talk about relevantissues as it relates to
individuals in grief as theynavigate finances and the
advisors who help them.
We help clients in griefnavigate financial matters.
We also teach advisors how toemotionally and financially work
with clients in grief throughan unparalleled process.
This week's episode issponsored by Life After Grief
(00:24):
Financial Planning and LifeAfter Grief Consulting.
Hello and welcome back toanother episode of Real Talk
with Life After Grief Chris.
In this episode I have a veryspecial guest.
Her name is Elizabeth Ramos and, as I have indicated on
previous podcasts, the peoplethat I seem to attract on the
(00:47):
podcast seem to be very welleducated and very well versed
and have a lot of wisdom.
Liz fits that mold to a T andI'm going to boast up Liz a
little bit here in regards toher formal education.
She has a master's of scienceand management and leadership.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
She also has an MBA and she is also a certified
master financial coach.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
All that being said, she is a real life person that
has come from some humblebeginnings in regards to where
she has come with finances, andshe's traveled the journey like
many other folks, experiencingdebt, hardship.
She was a single mother andshe's reached the other side in
(01:34):
regards to being successful andshe is now kind of dedicated the
next steps in her career tobeing a financial coach.
And I'm gonna to let her kindof go into some details, but
I've known Liz for probablythree, four years Is that right,
liz?
About four years.
So it's been a very, very yes,about four years.
(01:57):
I'd say a pleasure on my part toget to know Liz and her family,
especially her husband who's ariot.
So I'm going to let you kind oftake it, liz tell us a little
bit about yourself and then Iwant to highlight what you do
and the good that you do.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Okay, hi, chris, hi everyone.
Thank you so much for having meon your podcast.
I'm so excited to be here andto share a little bit about me.
So I came from, like you said,a humble beginning.
I have always hated math, whichI think is very ironic.
Math was always my weakestsubject in school.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
But you're very good at math now.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
But I've always been drawn to numbers.
So at a very young age,thinking back, I think I was
around eight years old when Idid my first budget, which I
know people are like how couldyou?
You're so young, how did youeven know?
Well, obviously, at eight yearsold, you don't know that you're
doing a budget.
But what I was doing is takingall of the money I was getting
(03:02):
from allowances or birthdays oranything I was getting like that
and I was sticking back theninto either a piggy bank or my
little pocket in my mattress andthat would be my savings
account.
And I have four older brothersso they knew I always had a
stash of money.
So they'd be like, oh, can Ihave a loan, can I borrow this,
can I borrow that?
I had already allocated for theyear for every occasion
(03:24):
Mother's Day, father's Day,birthday, christmas what amount
or what portion of my savings isgoing to be allocated to each
one of those things?
So I was very, very strict interms of my spending habits,
even at a young age.
Having said that, as I gotolder, one of the things that I
experienced in life, like manyother people out there, is I got
(03:46):
married very young and I endedup in a divorce.
My son was relatively young.
He was under three years old.
I decided to wipe the slickclean and have a brand new start
, so I jetted to a brand newstate.
I left New York for Florida andwith that I wanted to give my
son a brand new life and a lotof different things.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Can I just interject real quick, Liz?
So in New York, when you gotdivorced, I think there's a
turning point that probablyhappened in your life
financially.
Oh yeah, Can you just touch onthat as well?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Well, I was not financially secure but I had
just secured a really good job Iwas working at American Express
and I saw that to be theturning point for something good
in my life.
So that kind of empowered me tosay, ok, time to make that move
, try to buy a house, try togive my son that puppy he wanted
(04:42):
, all those different thingsthat I wasn't able to do in New
York, and also just get awayfrom the negative situation that
I was in for the last few years.
So I was not in debt at thatpoint in time I was kind of just
neutral in a neutral place.
But once I came to Florida andI started wanting to start my
(05:03):
life anew, that's when Iactually encountered it and I
got myself into a lot of debt$300,000 worth of debt.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yes, on a very, very single mother income and trying
to want to do everything at thesame time for this little boy.
Because I thought you know asmuch as I was very strict in in,
in disciplining myself in termsof my money and my finances.
I was like, okay, got a greatjob, I'm going to make this
(05:34):
happen, I'm going to pay it back.
You know that, the mentalitythat we have, we want everything
now.
Um, my, my son's going to haveeverything that I wasn't able to
give him before or I didn'thave.
So I went ahead and in aboutseven years, had about $300,000
in debt, and that didn't includemy mortgage, that was just
everything else.
So at this point in time, Ispiraled into, I would say, a
(05:57):
very dark place.
I was consumed with just regret, just loneliness, just shame,
and I was thinking like how am I?
Speaker 1 (06:07):
going to ever get out of here?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
How am I going to face my son?
How am I going to be able togive him that life that I wanted
?
Eventually, I had to just stoplooking for excuses.
I just dusted myself off theground, picked myself up and
said you know what?
It's just time for you to justmake a change.
I just went on and startedlooking on the internet, start
(06:29):
researching, reading books andstart putting together plans for
myself.
Every little thing that Ilearned I put into my little
goals and my little plan.
I started creating budgets thatwere on paper this time, that
were using Excel or Access sodifferent, different tools and
then the most important thingwas just holding myself
accountable.
I, you know, I started makingreally hard goals.
(06:50):
I'm not going to spend or thisis going to be what I'm going to
spend this month or this week,and slowly after after, I would
say, another seven years, I wasable to dig myself out of that
debt.
So I'm happy to say where I amnow that 300,000 debt has been
completely paid out, and I'mactually my husband and I are on
(07:11):
a two year plan to becompletely debt free.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Well, congratulations .
Speaker 2 (07:15):
That's tremendous.
Yes, thank you.
That's a long journey.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I want to touch on a couple of things that kind of
stood out to me.
So an early age you have beengood innately with money and a
lot of people can't necessarilysay that they are good with
money kind of from childhood.
And then you said that lifehappens, so you go from
(07:41):
basically you as an individual,being very, very good with money
.
All of a sudden you have thisother person.
You have to care for your sonand you want to give them the
world and do things for them.
That you may not haveexperienced because you can have
the ability to do that.
But what it did in terms ofthat, it kind of let your guard
(08:01):
down and it let you exceed yourboundaries, so to speak, all in
good nature for your son and forthe benefit.
But then on the other end ofthat, you experienced in what I
would consider some grief inregards to the spending habits
and the spending patterns andthe regret that you had spoken
(08:23):
about.
So you finally reached to a Iwould say a pinnacle where you
realize that this was kind ofout of control and you needed to
fix it.
And what I've seen is that mostpeople aren't able to realize
when it gets out of control orto put those boundaries back
into place.
And you have the ability again.
You're a brilliant lady and youhave the ability to do that.
(08:45):
You have a strong mind to beable to do that.
A lot of other people aren'table to do that and they just
kind of continue to spiral orthey just ignore it and kind of
hope it goes away.
And you now have gone throughthat experience and realized it
and now are on the other sideand now you can coach people to
(09:07):
better themselves or kind of seethe light.
Am I correct?
Then?
Kind of that journey for youwas about 14 years, is that
right From the beginning to whenyou finally realized that you
were kind of out of the debt?
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Yes, that's right.
It took me seven years toaccumulate that huge mountain of
debt and it took me anotherseven years to get out of it.
Yes, that's right, it took meseven years to accumulate that
huge mountain of debt and ittook me another seven years to
get out of it, so that 14 years.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Okay, that's a long time.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
It's a long time.
You don't really think about itwhile you're doing it.
You know you're like, oh, it'sseven years.
You start making excuseswithout really rationalizing you
know your actions.
You start thinking, no, I'mgoing to pay it off, I have a
really good job.
You know it's bringing my childpleasure and he's happy.
And you start putting buffersin there right and blinders on
(09:53):
because you're always thinkingthe next paycheck, I'm going to
pay a big chunk of it off andI'm not going to spend anymore.
And then you want to take thatchild on a vacation or you see
this other thing that you thinkwill be great for them, or this
kind of you know lifestyle, andit quickly adds up.
So, even though 14 years seemslike it's a really long time, it
goes by so fast and before youknow it that amount can really
(10:17):
swallow you.
It can be, you know, dependingon everyone's got different
situations.
Even a a $10,000 amount.
If you can't afford, it willfeel like a mountain on your
shoulders.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Sure, yeah, without a doubt.
And what I know of you now soif you were your coach back then
, I'm sure you would haveshortened that timeframe
dramatically.
And that's what you're able todo for folks now is you're able
to take your experience, yourpersonal experience, your
professional education whichthere's a lot of it and really
(10:50):
help people in a really, reallygood way.
So I'm going to ask you youtake that experience, you take
the fact that you're a certifiedmaster financial coach.
Now how do you turn that intoconcrete steps and how do you
actually help people?
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So the first thing I want to do and if I can just
take one step back, it should bethat seven years because I was
doing them myself, I didn't knowthat there was someone out
there that could help me.
So as I was building, puttingtogether building blocks for
myself, you know, I wasuncovering different things and
different avenues and differentservices that I can, you know,
(11:27):
implement myself to help mysituation.
What I can do today is takethat whole wealth of information
and break it down into very,very specific and strategic
action steps.
So the first thing I would dois have a complimentary
consultation.
I really want to get to knowwho is this person right Before
(11:47):
you even you don't want to lookat someone based on their
situation.
I want to get to know who youare.
Who is Chris based on theirsituation?
I want to get to know who youare.
Who is Chris you know before hegot into this situation.
The next step is tounderstanding how they got into
this situation.
And the third part of thatconsultation is okay, are we a
good fit for one another?
Right, I want that person tofeel comfortable and be able to
(12:10):
be themselves and be transparentwith me.
Comfortable and be able to bethemselves and be transparent
with me.
And I want I want them to beable to trust me and be able to
open up, because if you can'tbuild that rapport, then there's
no sense working with a personif they're always going to feel
like they can't come and betransparent.
So that's what thatconsultation part of it is is
just to kind of assess that,make sure that person's
(12:32):
comfortable, the client iscomfortable, I'm comfortable,
it's a really good fit.
And then from there on, what Iwould do is then put together a
schedule and start putting sometactical efforts in there and
say, okay, this is the schedulethat I'm seeing, based on your
unique situation.
I'm thinking we're going to bemeeting for this amount of time
(12:54):
right off the door and thenafter that, the third step to
this process would be we wouldkick off the planning and
development stages when weactually put an action plan
together to take that personfrom point A to point B, from
where they are now to where theywant to be, and then we
(13:15):
continuously work on thatprocess and those tangible
efforts to make sure that we'remaking progress.
There's things that we'realways going to be fine-tuning
through the process, making sureit's working.
If something's not working, wecan fine-tune and make sure that
we're looking at alternatives.
So that's kind of, in anutshell, the plan that I have
(13:37):
in store to get someone frompoint A to point B and make sure
that they're making tangibleand relatable, I guess, progress
on what their life looks nowversus what's going to look
maybe three months from now.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
So I like to paraphrase, because I'm not as
smart as you are and so I wantto make sure that I've got it.
And so and I paraphrase it inthree steps I'm probably going
to add a fourth step.
So the first step is reallyyou're getting to know the
person but you're figuring outtheir money habits and figuring
out kind of where they came fromand what is kind of putting
(14:16):
them into this situation and inthe life.
And I liken that to you.
You had very good money habits.
Maybe you encounter someone thathas very poor money habits, but
it's important for you tounderstand that up front so you
can further develop thatrelationship and see if it's
going to be a good fit for you,because a good fit for me and my
practice would not necessarilybe someone that has extremely
(14:40):
poor money habits, no matterwhat advice that I give them.
And then the second step one ofthe things that really stood
out to me is accountability.
You are making this individualand they're allowing themselves
to be held accountable.
And then the third step is youare putting together concrete
(15:02):
action plans to get them from,like you said, point A to point
B.
And then the fourth step Idon't know if it's necessarily a
step, but it's kind of allencompassing.
You're giving these individualsa vision of how life can be
after they get out of debt.
Is that a good kind of synopsisof what you described?
Speaker 2 (15:25):
It is.
It's a very good depiction ofthe process.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Okay, so I wanted to give you a little bit more
airplay, so to speak, and talkabout some of the feelings that
were associated.
You just touched on it, but Ithink it's very important to
touch on the feelings thatsomeone has when they're
developing the bad money habitsand or they're accumulating debt
(15:50):
and then they realize that thisis an accumulation of things
that have happened over time andthen you know you get involved
in how the feeling changes.
They've kind of realized thatthere's a light.
Just kind of go into some ofthat information, if you will.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So while you're spending money it's I mean, you
can have an adrenaline rushbecause you're not really
thinking.
You're just thinking of thethings you're getting out of it,
whether it's, you know, it'smemories or it's you know it's
actually physical items.
You're just kind of goingthrough the adrenaline rush, so
you're not really thinking ofthe consequences.
(16:30):
So at that point in time, whenyou're spending the money, you
might have a little bit ofconcern or kind of like oh,
guilt, I shouldn't be spendingthis.
You know this is bad, I shouldstop.
But you're letting your desirefor this type of lifestyle is
overtaking the guilt or any kindof reluctance that you have or
(16:51):
resistance.
So you continue that behavioruntil it kind of gets you into a
place that's not happy anymore.
So now, for instance, if you'rein a family and you have a
spouse, there's things that youcan't do.
Maybe you can't pay themortgage, maybe you can't pay
the rent, you're missing carpayment, the credit card is
(17:13):
turned off because you're notpaying your bills on time.
The creditors are, you know,blowing up your phone.
Your wife can't go shopping inpeace because there's no money.
You know now she's ending upwindow shopping versus actually
going for items and you start toget a strain on your
relationship and as you start toget a strain on your
relationship, your kids arehearing the fighting that's
(17:35):
going on between mom and dad, oryou know, or whatever your
situation is, and it's causing areal strain in the household.
Is the core, you know,contributor to this situation.
(17:56):
You're starting to feel angrywith yourself, but you're also
angry at these people that arearound you.
So your spouse oh, you're angryat me and you start yelling.
So there's resentment, there'sanger, there is shame, there is
loneliness, right, because youfeel like no one understands.
(18:16):
You have no one to speak to, noone's going to understand your
situation.
Yes, you made a mistake, butwho can I tell?
Like I made this mistake over along period of time and I
didn't stop myself.
I should have known better.
So you start going through allof those feelings of it ends up
being despair.
It starts affecting your healthand I think a lot of people
(18:36):
don't really realize the effectsthat this type of stuff has,
not just on your day-to-day lifebut your mental, emotional
state of mind.
You cannot go to work focusing,you cannot be the kind of
parent that you need to be.
You know the employee, thebrother, the sister, the friend
that you are accustomed to being, just because now you're
(18:57):
consumed with, like you said, alevel of grief grief because of
the life that you once hadversus the life that you have
now.
So there's all those feelingsof sadness and and some people
just end up being isolatedbecause they feel like that's
the best place for them to be.
It's less complicated for me tokind of just, you know, withdraw
(19:20):
into my own little world.
Versus dealing with thatsituation, what I want to do is
offer hope.
I want to be able to injecthope in them and let them know
they're not alone.
You know, I went through allthe same feelings.
I want to reach my hand and sayif you're ready to reach back,
we can work on this together.
There is hope and once I takepeople through this journey of
(19:42):
mine, this program, if you will,they start to feel some of that
weight on their shoulders lift.
They start to believe that, ohmy God, they might be real hope.
I can probably salvage mymarriage.
I actually have an extra $20left this month that you know.
I can maybe take my wife todate nights for a movie.
(20:03):
It's the little things thatstart to build and start to
become bigger things right.
So the first thing is is justshowing them that don't give up.
If you're ready to be committedto this effort, there I can
definitely help you pull you outof that darkness that you're in
, and together we can get you onthe other side of this and you
(20:27):
can take control of your lifeagain and once they go through
that, they're able to smileagain, they're able to engage in
their whole authentic selves.
Right, they don't have to hidebehind the darkness or isolate
themselves.
They're able to start feelingjoy, start being able to embrace
(20:47):
the world, start envisioningwhat their life can be.
I start taking that vacationagain.
I can, you know, become ahomeowner again.
I can get that car that I want.
I can pay for my kids, uh,college.
Those things start becomingmore of a reality versus a
distant, uh past.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
You know memory that they had so I want you to tell
us who your ideal person thatyou would work with, and I'm
going to give some, um, verydistinct qualities.
And so folks that know me knowthat I am a certified financial
planner and basically I have aclient that is in grief and I
take him through the whole gamutof finances and Liz is
(21:30):
basically the person if you werein debt you would come to help
get out of debt in advance ofthat process.
And so I want you to just youknow, quickly, tell us what your
ideal individual or situationis that you would work with so
my ideal client would be someone, like you said, that is in debt
(21:51):
.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I don't care how they got to that debt, as long as
they're willing to move past it,they're willing to form a
commitment and a partnership tomove forward.
So that person would be theywould have a job, they would be
able to get support and have thewillingness to just move past
this so that person can have,you know, $5,000 of debt, or
(22:15):
they can have $100,000 of debt,it really doesn't matter, as
long as they're willing to admitthat, they are ready to get off
the floor, they're ready tomove on and they're ready to be
open to feedback and they'rewilling to be a participant in
this journey.
(22:35):
If they're, that's all I'masking for.
I want someone that is you know,I don't care if COVID knocked
you down and you lost your joband therefore you were in a lot
of debt because you had to takeloans from family members.
I want to get you back into ahealthy place.
It could be a person that was agambler and now that you know
(22:56):
they're not a gambler anymore,they they saw the light and they
want to clean up their act andthey want to get back into a
healthy state of their finances.
It could be a single personthat is overwhelmed by student
loans.
It could be someone that losttheir homes but want to rebuild
their credit.
It could be someone that, justyou know, has a little bit of
(23:19):
savings, but they want moresavings.
In terms of understanding a goodpath, I can save a little bit,
but I know I can squeeze alittle bit more out there.
What are some other things Ican do to help to build my nest
egg, my nest egg being mysavings?
So I want to get a college fundfor my kids, I want to plan for
(23:41):
that big house, I want to planfor a new vehicle.
What are the things I can do?
How can I get those?
How can I realize thoseobjectives?
I help those people go fromwhere they are today to the next
step of their journey that theywant out of life.
And, chris, the way that I woulddo it, I would be that step
(24:02):
that would prep people to gettheir finances to a good place,
a healthy state of mind, whenthey're at a really good place
now.
The next step is okay, now Iwant to build wealth, I want to
build a retirement fund, I wantto go into stocks and bonds and
I want to look into a largerinto when I'm 60 or 55, I want
to go into stocks and bonds andI want to look into a larger
into when I'm 60 or 55, I wantto retire.
(24:24):
That's at that point in time iswhen I would say, okay, now
it's time for you to work with,let's say, chris, chris Dale,
and he would take that step andhelp to take what they currently
have in their savings account,in their 401ks or whatever they
have, and then take it to thatnext step.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
That's perfect.
I think you did a great jobexplaining exactly what you do
and who you help and kind of howyou help them.
I would be remiss if I didn'task you to tell us how we can
reach you specifically on yourwebsite.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
So it is Elizabeth Rommels, so the traditional
spelling of Elizabeth RommelsR-A-M-O-S dot coach.
That is my website.
All right.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
So in the description for this podcast I will put
Liz's email address as well.
I will also list again herwebsite address so you can be
sure to contact her.
Liz, thank you very much foragreeing to be on the podcast.
It was a pleasure and I hope Ididn't bite you.
(25:32):
I hope I didn't scare you toomuch.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
Thank you so much, Chris.
This was a lot of fun.
I appreciate you having me on,and it's always a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Appreciate you and for any and all the listeners
out there, please feel free topass this podcast on this
episode to any friends, familymembers and we'll see you on the
next episode.
Cheers and be well.
Thank you for listening to ourpodcast.
(26:07):
If you are a client and arelooking to work directly with me
, chris and or my firm head onover the fp is for financial
planningcom.
If you are an advisor lookingto emotionally and financially
work with your client in grief,or if you are a client looking
(26:28):
to get your advisor's head inthe game, head on over to life
after grief consultingcom, thatis, life after grief
consultingcom.
Any information referenced inthis week's podcast will be
located here in the podcastsection and, as always, please
feel free to share this week'spodcast with any friend, family
(26:50):
member or colleague.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week on the nextepisode.
Welcome to Real Talk with Life After Grief Chris,
where we talk about relevantissues as it relates to
individuals in grief as theynavigate finances and the
advisors who help them.
We help clients in griefnavigate financial matters.
We also teach advisors how toemotionally and financially work
with clients in grief throughan unparalleled process.
This week's episode issponsored by Life After Grief
(00:24):
Financial Planning and LifeAfter Grief Consulting.
Hello and welcome back toanother episode of Real Talk
with Life After Grief Chris.
In this episode I have a veryspecial guest.
Her name is Elizabeth Ramos and, as I have indicated on
previous podcasts, the peoplethat I seem to attract on the
(00:47):
podcast seem to be very welleducated and very well versed
and have a lot of wisdom.
Liz fits that mold to a T andI'm going to boast up Liz a
little bit here in regards toher formal education.
She has a master's of scienceand management and leadership.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
She also has an MBA and she is also a certified
master financial coach.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
All that being said, she is a real life person that
has come from some humblebeginnings in regards to where
she has come with finances, andshe's traveled the journey like
many other folks, experiencingdebt, hardship.
She was a single mother andshe's reached the other side in
(01:34):
regards to being successful andshe is now kind of dedicated the
next steps in her career tobeing a financial coach.
And I'm gonna to let her kindof go into some details, but
I've known Liz for probablythree, four years Is that right,
liz?
About four years.
So it's been a very, very yes,about four years.
(01:57):
I'd say a pleasure on my part toget to know Liz and her family,
especially her husband who's ariot.
So I'm going to let you kind oftake it, liz tell us a little
bit about yourself and then Iwant to highlight what you do
and the good that you do.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Okay, hi, chris, hi everyone.
Thank you so much for having meon your podcast.
I'm so excited to be here andto share a little bit about me.
So I came from, like you said,a humble beginning.
I have always hated math, whichI think is very ironic.
Math was always my weakestsubject in school.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
But you're very good at math now.
Speaker 2 (02:40):
But I've always been drawn to numbers.
So at a very young age,thinking back, I think I was
around eight years old when Idid my first budget, which I
know people are like how couldyou?
You're so young, how did youeven know?
Well, obviously, at eight yearsold, you don't know that you're
doing a budget.
But what I was doing is takingall of the money I was getting
(03:02):
from allowances or birthdays oranything I was getting like that
and I was sticking back theninto either a piggy bank or my
little pocket in my mattress andthat would be my savings
account.
And I have four older brothersso they knew I always had a
stash of money.
So they'd be like, oh, can Ihave a loan, can I borrow this,
can I borrow that?
I had already allocated for theyear for every occasion
(03:24):
Mother's Day, father's Day,birthday, christmas what amount
or what portion of my savings isgoing to be allocated to each
one of those things?
So I was very, very strict interms of my spending habits,
even at a young age.
Having said that, as I gotolder, one of the things that I
experienced in life, like manyother people out there, is I got
(03:46):
married very young and I endedup in a divorce.
My son was relatively young.
He was under three years old.
I decided to wipe the slickclean and have a brand new start
, so I jetted to a brand newstate.
I left New York for Florida andwith that I wanted to give my
son a brand new life and a lotof different things.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Can I just interject real quick, Liz?
So in New York, when you gotdivorced, I think there's a
turning point that probablyhappened in your life
financially.
Oh yeah, Can you just touch onthat as well?
Speaker 2 (04:22):
Well, I was not financially secure but I had
just secured a really good job Iwas working at American Express
and I saw that to be theturning point for something good
in my life.
So that kind of empowered me tosay, ok, time to make that move
, try to buy a house, try togive my son that puppy he wanted
(04:42):
, all those different thingsthat I wasn't able to do in New
York, and also just get awayfrom the negative situation that
I was in for the last few years.
So I was not in debt at thatpoint in time I was kind of just
neutral in a neutral place.
But once I came to Florida andI started wanting to start my
(05:03):
life anew, that's when Iactually encountered it and I
got myself into a lot of debt$300,000 worth of debt.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
Yes, on a very, very single mother income and trying
to want to do everything at thesame time for this little boy.
Because I thought you know asmuch as I was very strict in in,
in disciplining myself in termsof my money and my finances.
I was like, okay, got a greatjob, I'm going to make this
(05:34):
happen, I'm going to pay it back.
You know that, the mentalitythat we have, we want everything
now.
Um, my, my son's going to haveeverything that I wasn't able to
give him before or I didn'thave.
So I went ahead and in aboutseven years, had about $300,000
in debt, and that didn't includemy mortgage, that was just
everything else.
So at this point in time, Ispiraled into, I would say, a
(05:57):
very dark place.
I was consumed with just regret, just loneliness, just shame,
and I was thinking like how am I?
Speaker 1 (06:07):
going to ever get out of here?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
How am I going to face my son?
How am I going to be able togive him that life that I wanted
?
Eventually, I had to just stoplooking for excuses.
I just dusted myself off theground, picked myself up and
said you know what?
It's just time for you to justmake a change.
I just went on and startedlooking on the internet, start
(06:29):
researching, reading books andstart putting together plans for
myself.
Every little thing that Ilearned I put into my little
goals and my little plan.
I started creating budgets thatwere on paper this time, that
were using Excel or Access sodifferent, different tools and
then the most important thingwas just holding myself
accountable.
I, you know, I started makingreally hard goals.
(06:50):
I'm not going to spend or thisis going to be what I'm going to
spend this month or this week,and slowly after after, I would
say, another seven years, I wasable to dig myself out of that
debt.
So I'm happy to say where I amnow that 300,000 debt has been
completely paid out, and I'mactually my husband and I are on
(07:11):
a two year plan to becompletely debt free.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Well, congratulations .
Speaker 2 (07:15):
That's tremendous.
Yes, thank you.
That's a long journey.
Speaker 1 (07:18):
I want to touch on a couple of things that kind of
stood out to me.
So an early age you have beengood innately with money and a
lot of people can't necessarilysay that they are good with
money kind of from childhood.
And then you said that lifehappens, so you go from
(07:41):
basically you as an individual,being very, very good with money
.
All of a sudden you have thisother person.
You have to care for your sonand you want to give them the
world and do things for them.
That you may not haveexperienced because you can have
the ability to do that.
But what it did in terms ofthat, it kind of let your guard
(08:01):
down and it let you exceed yourboundaries, so to speak, all in
good nature for your son and forthe benefit.
But then on the other end ofthat, you experienced in what I
would consider some grief inregards to the spending habits
and the spending patterns andthe regret that you had spoken
(08:23):
about.
So you finally reached to a Iwould say a pinnacle where you
realize that this was kind ofout of control and you needed to
fix it.
And what I've seen is that mostpeople aren't able to realize
when it gets out of control orto put those boundaries back
into place.
And you have the ability again.
You're a brilliant lady and youhave the ability to do that.
(08:45):
You have a strong mind to beable to do that.
A lot of other people aren'table to do that and they just
kind of continue to spiral orthey just ignore it and kind of
hope it goes away.
And you now have gone throughthat experience and realized it
and now are on the other sideand now you can coach people to
(09:07):
better themselves or kind of seethe light.
Am I correct?
Then?
Kind of that journey for youwas about 14 years, is that
right From the beginning to whenyou finally realized that you
were kind of out of the debt?
Speaker 2 (09:21):
Yes, that's right.
It took me seven years toaccumulate that huge mountain of
debt and it took me anotherseven years to get out of it.
Yes, that's right, it took meseven years to accumulate that
huge mountain of debt and ittook me another seven years to
get out of it, so that 14 years.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Okay, that's a long time.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
It's a long time.
You don't really think about itwhile you're doing it.
You know you're like, oh, it'sseven years.
You start making excuseswithout really rationalizing you
know your actions.
You start thinking, no, I'mgoing to pay it off, I have a
really good job.
You know it's bringing my childpleasure and he's happy.
And you start putting buffersin there right and blinders on
(09:53):
because you're always thinkingthe next paycheck, I'm going to
pay a big chunk of it off andI'm not going to spend anymore.
And then you want to take thatchild on a vacation or you see
this other thing that you thinkwill be great for them, or this
kind of you know lifestyle, andit quickly adds up.
So, even though 14 years seemslike it's a really long time, it
goes by so fast and before youknow it that amount can really
(10:17):
swallow you.
It can be, you know, dependingon everyone's got different
situations.
Even a a $10,000 amount.
If you can't afford, it willfeel like a mountain on your
shoulders.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Sure, yeah, without a doubt.
And what I know of you now soif you were your coach back then
, I'm sure you would haveshortened that timeframe
dramatically.
And that's what you're able todo for folks now is you're able
to take your experience, yourpersonal experience, your
professional education whichthere's a lot of it and really
(10:50):
help people in a really, reallygood way.
So I'm going to ask you youtake that experience, you take
the fact that you're a certifiedmaster financial coach.
Now how do you turn that intoconcrete steps and how do you
actually help people?
Speaker 2 (11:05):
So the first thing I want to do and if I can just
take one step back, it should bethat seven years because I was
doing them myself, I didn't knowthat there was someone out
there that could help me.
So as I was building, puttingtogether building blocks for
myself, you know, I wasuncovering different things and
different avenues and differentservices that I can, you know,
(11:27):
implement myself to help mysituation.
What I can do today is takethat whole wealth of information
and break it down into very,very specific and strategic
action steps.
So the first thing I would dois have a complimentary
consultation.
I really want to get to knowwho is this person right Before
(11:47):
you even you don't want to lookat someone based on their
situation.
I want to get to know who youare.
Who is Chris based on theirsituation?
I want to get to know who youare.
Who is Chris you know before hegot into this situation.
The next step is tounderstanding how they got into
this situation.
And the third part of thatconsultation is okay, are we a
good fit for one another?
Right, I want that person tofeel comfortable and be able to
(12:10):
be themselves and be transparentwith me.
Comfortable and be able to bethemselves and be transparent
with me.
And I want I want them to beable to trust me and be able to
open up, because if you can'tbuild that rapport, then there's
no sense working with a personif they're always going to feel
like they can't come and betransparent.
So that's what thatconsultation part of it is is
just to kind of assess that,make sure that person's
(12:32):
comfortable, the client iscomfortable, I'm comfortable,
it's a really good fit.
And then from there on, what Iwould do is then put together a
schedule and start putting sometactical efforts in there and
say, okay, this is the schedulethat I'm seeing, based on your
unique situation.
I'm thinking we're going to bemeeting for this amount of time
(12:54):
right off the door and thenafter that, the third step to
this process would be we wouldkick off the planning and
development stages when weactually put an action plan
together to take that personfrom point A to point B, from
where they are now to where theywant to be, and then we
(13:15):
continuously work on thatprocess and those tangible
efforts to make sure that we'remaking progress.
There's things that we'realways going to be fine-tuning
through the process, making sureit's working.
If something's not working, wecan fine-tune and make sure that
we're looking at alternatives.
So that's kind of, in anutshell, the plan that I have
(13:37):
in store to get someone frompoint A to point B and make sure
that they're making tangibleand relatable, I guess, progress
on what their life looks nowversus what's going to look
maybe three months from now.
Speaker 1 (13:53):
So I like to paraphrase, because I'm not as
smart as you are and so I wantto make sure that I've got it.
And so and I paraphrase it inthree steps I'm probably going
to add a fourth step.
So the first step is reallyyou're getting to know the
person but you're figuring outtheir money habits and figuring
out kind of where they came fromand what is kind of putting
(14:16):
them into this situation and inthe life.
And I liken that to you.
You had very good money habits.
Maybe you encounter someone thathas very poor money habits, but
it's important for you tounderstand that up front so you
can further develop thatrelationship and see if it's
going to be a good fit for you,because a good fit for me and my
practice would not necessarilybe someone that has extremely
(14:40):
poor money habits, no matterwhat advice that I give them.
And then the second step one ofthe things that really stood
out to me is accountability.
You are making this individualand they're allowing themselves
to be held accountable.
And then the third step is youare putting together concrete
(15:02):
action plans to get them from,like you said, point A to point
B.
And then the fourth step Idon't know if it's necessarily a
step, but it's kind of allencompassing.
You're giving these individualsa vision of how life can be
after they get out of debt.
Is that a good kind of synopsisof what you described?
Speaker 2 (15:25):
It is.
It's a very good depiction ofthe process.
Speaker 1 (15:30):
Okay, so I wanted to give you a little bit more
airplay, so to speak, and talkabout some of the feelings that
were associated.
You just touched on it, but Ithink it's very important to
touch on the feelings thatsomeone has when they're
developing the bad money habitsand or they're accumulating debt
(15:50):
and then they realize that thisis an accumulation of things
that have happened over time andthen you know you get involved
in how the feeling changes.
They've kind of realized thatthere's a light.
Just kind of go into some ofthat information, if you will.
Speaker 2 (16:10):
So while you're spending money it's I mean, you
can have an adrenaline rushbecause you're not really
thinking.
You're just thinking of thethings you're getting out of it,
whether it's, you know, it'smemories or it's you know it's
actually physical items.
You're just kind of goingthrough the adrenaline rush, so
you're not really thinking ofthe consequences.
(16:30):
So at that point in time, whenyou're spending the money, you
might have a little bit ofconcern or kind of like oh,
guilt, I shouldn't be spendingthis.
You know this is bad, I shouldstop.
But you're letting your desirefor this type of lifestyle is
overtaking the guilt or any kindof reluctance that you have or
(16:51):
resistance.
So you continue that behavioruntil it kind of gets you into a
place that's not happy anymore.
So now, for instance, if you'rein a family and you have a
spouse, there's things that youcan't do.
Maybe you can't pay themortgage, maybe you can't pay
the rent, you're missing carpayment, the credit card is
(17:13):
turned off because you're notpaying your bills on time.
The creditors are, you know,blowing up your phone.
Your wife can't go shopping inpeace because there's no money.
You know now she's ending upwindow shopping versus actually
going for items and you start toget a strain on your
relationship and as you start toget a strain on your
relationship, your kids arehearing the fighting that's
(17:35):
going on between mom and dad, oryou know, or whatever your
situation is, and it's causing areal strain in the household.
Is the core, you know,contributor to this situation.
(17:56):
You're starting to feel angrywith yourself, but you're also
angry at these people that arearound you.
So your spouse oh, you're angryat me and you start yelling.
So there's resentment, there'sanger, there is shame, there is
loneliness, right, because youfeel like no one understands.
(18:16):
You have no one to speak to, noone's going to understand your
situation.
Yes, you made a mistake, butwho can I tell?
Like I made this mistake over along period of time and I
didn't stop myself.
I should have known better.
So you start going through allof those feelings of it ends up
being despair.
It starts affecting your healthand I think a lot of people
(18:36):
don't really realize the effectsthat this type of stuff has,
not just on your day-to-day lifebut your mental, emotional
state of mind.
You cannot go to work focusing,you cannot be the kind of
parent that you need to be.
You know the employee, thebrother, the sister, the friend
that you are accustomed to being, just because now you're
(18:57):
consumed with, like you said, alevel of grief grief because of
the life that you once hadversus the life that you have
now.
So there's all those feelingsof sadness and and some people
just end up being isolatedbecause they feel like that's
the best place for them to be.
It's less complicated for me tokind of just, you know, withdraw
(19:20):
into my own little world.
Versus dealing with thatsituation, what I want to do is
offer hope.
I want to be able to injecthope in them and let them know
they're not alone.
You know, I went through allthe same feelings.
I want to reach my hand and sayif you're ready to reach back,
we can work on this together.
There is hope and once I takepeople through this journey of
(19:42):
mine, this program, if you will,they start to feel some of that
weight on their shoulders lift.
They start to believe that, ohmy God, they might be real hope.
I can probably salvage mymarriage.
I actually have an extra $20left this month that you know.
I can maybe take my wife todate nights for a movie.
(20:03):
It's the little things thatstart to build and start to
become bigger things right.
So the first thing is is justshowing them that don't give up.
If you're ready to be committedto this effort, there I can
definitely help you pull you outof that darkness that you're in
, and together we can get you onthe other side of this and you
(20:27):
can take control of your lifeagain and once they go through
that, they're able to smileagain, they're able to engage in
their whole authentic selves.
Right, they don't have to hidebehind the darkness or isolate
themselves.
They're able to start feelingjoy, start being able to embrace
(20:47):
the world, start envisioningwhat their life can be.
I start taking that vacationagain.
I can, you know, become ahomeowner again.
I can get that car that I want.
I can pay for my kids, uh,college.
Those things start becomingmore of a reality versus a
distant, uh past.
Speaker 1 (21:05):
You know memory that they had so I want you to tell
us who your ideal person thatyou would work with, and I'm
going to give some, um, verydistinct qualities.
And so folks that know me knowthat I am a certified financial
planner and basically I have aclient that is in grief and I
take him through the whole gamutof finances and Liz is
(21:30):
basically the person if you werein debt you would come to help
get out of debt in advance ofthat process.
And so I want you to just youknow, quickly, tell us what your
ideal individual or situationis that you would work with so
my ideal client would be someone, like you said, that is in debt
(21:51):
.
Speaker 2 (21:51):
I don't care how they got to that debt, as long as
they're willing to move past it,they're willing to form a
commitment and a partnership tomove forward.
So that person would be theywould have a job, they would be
able to get support and have thewillingness to just move past
this so that person can have,you know, $5,000 of debt, or
(22:15):
they can have $100,000 of debt,it really doesn't matter, as
long as they're willing to admitthat, they are ready to get off
the floor, they're ready tomove on and they're ready to be
open to feedback and they'rewilling to be a participant in
this journey.
(22:35):
If they're, that's all I'masking for.
I want someone that is you know,I don't care if COVID knocked
you down and you lost your joband therefore you were in a lot
of debt because you had to takeloans from family members.
I want to get you back into ahealthy place.
It could be a person that was agambler and now that you know
(22:56):
they're not a gambler anymore,they they saw the light and they
want to clean up their act andthey want to get back into a
healthy state of their finances.
It could be a single personthat is overwhelmed by student
loans.
It could be someone that losttheir homes but want to rebuild
their credit.
It could be someone that, justyou know, has a little bit of
(23:19):
savings, but they want moresavings.
In terms of understanding a goodpath, I can save a little bit,
but I know I can squeeze alittle bit more out there.
What are some other things Ican do to help to build my nest
egg, my nest egg being mysavings?
So I want to get a college fundfor my kids, I want to plan for
(23:41):
that big house, I want to planfor a new vehicle.
What are the things I can do?
How can I get those?
How can I realize thoseobjectives?
I help those people go fromwhere they are today to the next
step of their journey that theywant out of life.
And, chris, the way that I woulddo it, I would be that step
(24:02):
that would prep people to gettheir finances to a good place,
a healthy state of mind, whenthey're at a really good place
now.
The next step is okay, now Iwant to build wealth, I want to
build a retirement fund, I wantto go into stocks and bonds and
I want to look into a largerinto when I'm 60 or 55, I want
to go into stocks and bonds andI want to look into a larger
into when I'm 60 or 55, I wantto retire.
(24:24):
That's at that point in time iswhen I would say, okay, now
it's time for you to work with,let's say, chris, chris Dale,
and he would take that step andhelp to take what they currently
have in their savings account,in their 401ks or whatever they
have, and then take it to thatnext step.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
That's perfect.
I think you did a great jobexplaining exactly what you do
and who you help and kind of howyou help them.
I would be remiss if I didn'task you to tell us how we can
reach you specifically on yourwebsite.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
So it is Elizabeth Rommels, so the traditional
spelling of Elizabeth RommelsR-A-M-O-S dot coach.
That is my website.
All right.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
So in the description for this podcast I will put
Liz's email address as well.
I will also list again herwebsite address so you can be
sure to contact her.
Liz, thank you very much foragreeing to be on the podcast.
It was a pleasure and I hope Ididn't bite you.
(25:32):
I hope I didn't scare you toomuch.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
Thank you so much, Chris.
This was a lot of fun.
I appreciate you having me on,and it's always a pleasure.
Speaker 1 (25:44):
Appreciate you and for any and all the listeners
out there, please feel free topass this podcast on this
episode to any friends, familymembers and we'll see you on the
next episode.
Cheers and be well.
Thank you for listening to ourpodcast.
(26:07):
If you are a client and arelooking to work directly with me
, chris and or my firm head onover the fp is for financial
planningcom.
If you are an advisor lookingto emotionally and financially
work with your client in grief,or if you are a client looking
(26:28):
to get your advisor's head inthe game, head on over to life
after grief consultingcom, thatis, life after grief
consultingcom.
Any information referenced inthis week's podcast will be
located here in the podcastsection and, as always, please
feel free to share this week'spodcast with any friend, family
(26:50):
member or colleague.
Thanks for listening.
See you next week on the nextepisode.
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