Rachel Teodoro: Modeling Money Principles To Raise Financially Wise Children

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Rachel Teodoro is a wife, mom of 3, and a full-time blogger in the Seattle area. Growing up, she was fortunate to be in a household that taught her about money & saving at a young age. Graduating college married with a 2-year-old tested their new family financially, yet she shares how implementing what she was taught about money helped get them through. Now, she's passed these lessons onto her children and has seen them implement many of the lessons she was taught. Hear this Everyday Millionaire share her journey along the way.

In this episode, hosted by Mike Swenson, we discussed:       

• How Rachel writes blogs about family, lifestyle, and mindset
• Growing up she was used to a more frugal lifestyle  
• She had a baby while she is 20 and in college, and because her parents were committed to her finishing school at Purdue University, she was a full-time student and a full-time mom
• Because of her frugal upbringing and living on a tight budget in college, she got good at minimizing expenses and stretching the money they had
• She doesn't like the word budget but rather to live intentionally 
• The importance of teaching your kids to make smart financial decisions by simple things like having them watch you make smart purchases at the grocery store 
• She talked about her sons first home purchase and how he learned to prioritize his purchases 
• Her son loved going to garage sales and then fixing things up and selling the item for more 
• One of the most important investments are in your children and a main piece of that is college 
• You need to make an intentional choice right now to help with the future 
• Traveling with the family is important to them and they are able to do so because they didn’t when the kids were younger 

 

Timestamps: If You Want To Jump Ahead To Your Favorite Part       

0:00 - Intro and overview on Rachel’s career    

5:20 – Rachel's Financial upbringing 

26:50 – How she’s making sure that her kid’s college are paid for 

42:50 – What financial freedom means for Rachel’s family 

 

Links In This Episode:

Rachels Blog Page: https://www.rachelteodoro.com/

Rachels Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/msrachelteodoro/

 

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Full transcript here:

Mike Swenson 

Welcome everybody to a new episode of real freedom stories. And I'm really excited about what we have to discuss today, which is really talking about passing on a legacy of good financial principles. And so today we have Rachel Teodoro on. And Rachel is a full time mom, full time blogger. And she has a great story to share in terms of financial principles that were taught to her when she was a kid. And then principles that she's passed on to her kids. So she lives in the Seattle area. And she's got three kids ages 2218 and 15. And so we're just going to talk about financial principles and how she was taught them as a child and how she's now taken them and passed them on to her kids, and had some really phenomenal stories. So welcome, Rachel, if you want to just take a little bit and tell us a little bit more about you.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Thanks, Mike. I appreciate it. I'm excited to be here and excited to get to know your your followers and the people that you're speaking to. I think you did a great introduction. There I am from the Midwest and I grew up in Indiana, I went to Purdue University, where I met my husband, I have a degree in child development and family studies. My husband's in mechanical engineering, he does design in the aerospace industry. Shocking around here in Seattle area, right. I was a stay at home mom for years and years. And as a form of connection with family. I started a family blog back in 2005, when we were expecting our third baby. So many of our friends and family were in the Midwest and scattered across the United States. And so that was a way to stay connected. And it was so interesting to see. As I started to put things out on the blog, more and more people started following us and I decided I didn't want so many people following us as a family.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And I started a an individual blog back in 2010, which is just my name Rachel Teodoro calm. And I've been writing just lifestyle, parenting tips, mostly a really strong focus of just really living well on less, being frugal and having that frugal lifestyle and mindset. But then also being able to do it well. And so it's so important for us to have a full life and raise our children in that way to enjoy life. But then also do the things that we love to do. And part of that was staying at home with my family. And since then, you know, my kids are bigger, and it's, it's crazy. You said 20 to 18 and 15 for my kids ages, and I sat there for a second and was like, Oh my gosh, they're that big. It's crazy. It feels like they were just underfoot four seconds ago. So it happens in a blink. And in this blog is just slowly slowly transpired into something a little bit bigger. And now like you said, it's my full time job. And so it's such a fun way to be able to share life stories and and part of myself to other people. And and it's just a fun outlet for me to explore.

 

Mike Swenson 

Yeah, and, and so, you know, just to kind of recap for those people listening, you know, you know, for a lot of people, we talk about real estate, we talk about building wealth through real estate. And so there's, there's that real estate piece, and yet I feel like, you know, eight, whether you're agents, whether you're admin, whether you're teens or you have other businesses inside a real estate, there's a lot of moms and dads out there that want to talk about money lessons, some of us have have have been raised in different ways. Like we weren't necessarily taught great lessons, or we weren't taught any lessons, or the lessons we were taught were actually bad lessons.

 

Mike Swenson 

And so I think your story is great that you you had great parents that that raised you Well, in terms of financial literacy, and then you've been very intentional in passing that on to your children. So I think that's where, you know, where can we in the real estate industry learn? It's, it's about how do we how do we teach these lessons to our children. And so in some ways, whatever we were taught, is past us now. So we need to either, you know, implement new lessons with our children or you know, really do well to raise them well. And so, so that's kind of the focus here of why we're connecting, and why you're on a more of a real estate focus podcast, is it really just talking about those financial principles? And and obviously, two, part of that is with your mortgage and doing well by that, too.

 

Mike Swenson 

So I think a lot of times, you know, people in the real estate industry might have a feeling that they have an image to keep up and sometimes, you know, people feel like I have to have a certain car, I have to have a certain house because it's going to show that I'm successful. And you know, people might choose to do business with me in real estate based on the car that I drive or based on the clothes that I wear. And you know, what we find is a lot of times that's that's just a lie. People want to work with people that they know like and trust and being you is what's most important, and so I think that's where we can highlight for you. What does that look Like, and how have you been able to live those principles and live a successful financial life? So, so that's why we're talking today. So why don't you just start by sharing with us a little bit about your upbringing and, and kind of those those financial principles that were taught to you at a young ages, as you started to grow and have a family of your own.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

My mom was always super frugal, she was the kind of person who would have me invite friends over to go grocery shopping with her so that we could stand in separate lines and she could take advantage of the deals. So like, you know, you get a limit three on on Pepsi, especially on Pepsi or whatever. And so we she would give us $5. And each of us would stand in a different line, and and purchase those loss leaders at the grocery store. But she's also was an hurt and her mom was to my grandmother was very, very frugal almost to the point where it was miserly. And I think my mom was doing a really good job of trying to change that, that pattern of just holding on so tight that you're fearful. And instead of opening up a little bit more, so that you can be generous with what you have.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And I would see her do that. Not so much in in extravagant ways. Like you were talking about that outward, showy, you know, we've got the, the fancy clothes, or the fancy car, or the or the whatever. But doing that on a budget, which I think you can do, and I hate the word budget, because I will tell you in the past 23 years of my marriage, I don't think I've one time, we've never lived on a budget, we've always lived intentionally which you brought up that intentional word, and that's how we parent, and that's how we live, we just are living very intentionally. And that was something that we learned very, very early on that I would say, was something that we did individually, not so much from our upbringing, but we did that a little bit more on our own, of making that work. And so like I said, My mom was just really frugal with not only coupons and, and that kind of thing. But she kind of instilled a love of thrift shops and grad sales in me. And in buying secondhand. And there were times where that was a little bit.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

You know, we'd go to a garage sale, and I was in high school and it was, you know, somebody that I knew from the high school, and I was like, Oh, I'm gonna hide in the car kind of thing. I don't want to go through their stuff. It was before like the whole grungier it was before stuff was cool. It was before all of that. And now I think thrift stores are getting a you know, it's cool, that vintage, and you you know, and upcycle, and all that stuff, the buzzwords that are being used. And I feel like those are things that we've been able to pass on to our kids early on, we had kids really young. And so we didn't have the advantage of, of hand me downs from other people, people that we knew that were Oh great, here's this or that it was we either buy everything new, which as you know, is really expensive for kids and family.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Or we start using you know, we buy used and in my husband, I remember that was a really hard thing for him to wrap his head around. Because for him used or garage sale items or thrift store finds were things that his dad would find in the trash bin, the scrap bin at work that people would use, and he would bring home, you know, my father in law would bring it home be like look at this shirt, honey. And she'd be like, oh, there's stains and holes all over it. And nobody wants that. And so that was my husband's mentality of what that looks like for him. And so we grew up in different households where that came from, but when you're a young parent, and you really don't have a lot of extra income to be spending, that was really the only option that we had. And so that just continued throughout, of just buying used clothing, used furniture use things like that.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And, and it was really easy for me to stop, start flipping items, you know, buying something at a garage sale, our kids would use it for a little bit of time that I would resell it for 10 times the amount on Craigslist, or offer up or whatever. And so that was that was kind of what I did when I was, you know, had little kids. My oldest son actually started a business doing that with two other friends. So he had two other friends, they would go out grid sailing together when they were about 1617. And they everybody loved having these three young boys going to these garage sales. And they would always come up with these stories of whatever it's for my dorm room, it's for so and so. And sometimes it was it wasn't always and so sometimes they get this great deal on a sailboat that they would never use. Because these guys that were selling the sailboat really connected with them in a way that was like, oh, when I was your age, I would have loved to have a sailboat.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Let me give you the deal on it. And the kids loved it. They would go out they would sail for a little bit and then they would go and resell the items. And they did this for years, the three of them and the three of them. One of them was specialising in like eBay he would look up the item on eBay. How much can I get for it the other was looking at how much can I get forward and offer up and then the other one was is there even a market for it. And my son was always the negotiator. And he still is really good about negotiating. And so he would always be the Oh, are you sure you want to keep this around and that kind of thing. And he would always be the one that would talk and get the best deals. And so that's something he actually went with me for quite some time and asking me how to do that. Because that negotiating at a grudge sale is super easy for me.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Now you take me into a car dealership, and you want me to negotiate, I'm not quite sure I would be as good at it. But I've always said more is caught than taught where parenting comes into play. And it's so important for me to then show my kids what that looks like. And that's just every day really practical things, when they're little they come grocery shopping with you, they see that you're not buying the choco cereal that's not on sale, they see you purchasing the thing that's on sale, and maybe grabbing two or three of it, or, you know, having them just run the numbers, it becomes a game almost, but in a fun way without it being you know, without feeling constricting, and, and the kids always really enjoyed it.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And I and I think they still do, I think it has given so many great skills. And now I go down the aisles, and I see, you know, I see kids on their, you know, their parents smartphone, or they're watching a video or something like that. And I'm thinking there's so many lost opportunities here that for teaching kids about money because as soon as you walk in I adore of a store your consumer and and we want to give our kids the opportunity to be the wisest consumer that they can be and teach that young so that they can take that with them as they get older. And and now the benefit of having older kids is that I'm seeing that play out now I'm seeing my kids making wise decisions, I'm seeing them put money into you know, high yield savings accounts, I'm seeing them look into investments, I'm seeing the max out 401 K's I'm just I'm seeing them do these things. And it is so rewarding to us to see that they're making really smart financial decisions.

 

Mike Swenson 

It's interesting, you know, a couple thoughts on that as for us in our kids, so we were fortunate to have three boys, right. So there's a lot of opportunity there in terms of reusing clothes. But one thing that my my wife really loves doing is is we have them here in the Twin Cities, as we have these consignment sales, you know, the good thing is, is in terms of wear and tear, is they don't allow you to have clothes that have stains, or rips or tears in them. And yet, some of them are gently worn or they're even if they were worn a lot, they're still in really good condition. And so I want to say even maybe before we had our firstborn, that was just a consistent thing. And so, you know, we she would go to these sales with her mom and, and they would pick up I mean, they would have like a garbage bag full of clothes, or toys or whatever. And it's all stuff that's in great condition and, you know, shirts might be two bucks or three bucks, I mean, it's not necessarily a quarter 50 cents at a garage sale.

 

Mike Swenson 

But it's it's it's a much better than you know, buying them at a store. And so, you know, it's it's really hard when my wife would come home with all of these items, to really scrutinise what she bought, I mean, you look at all the clothes she bought you look at all the toys she bought, but you're like, she paid $1 for that, or she paid $2 for that. And so I think we uh, we saved a lot of money on clothes, that way, we saved a lot of money on toys that way. And then now that we're in the stage where hopefully we're done with kids, she's now able to sell a lot of that stuff and so it's it's a pretty simple process, you know, the company that runs these makes makes it seamless.

 

Mike Swenson 

So you go in and you enter all your tags and you hit print and you just put them on the clothes and in for a lot of it like if it doesn't sell in that sale she picks them up and puts them into the next sale and so there's you know, five or six sales around the Twin Cities here in the fall and then in the spring and it gets to be a pretty simple process but I think about how we've been able to be pretty good stewards with that money and then to be able to turn around and make money off of it to it's been great so it's it's those things that you know, I've heard a lot of people say it's a it's a waste of time to do that or you know, my time is more valuable I understand that to a certain extent and yet at the same time if you add up how much we've paid for stuff for how much we've been able to sell for I'm I'm sure it's a significant savings for us and so it's it's doing those things and I do I enjoy you know having my wife have to go drop that stuff off and you know, take up however many hours to go do that. Not so much but at the same time it's it really is for the best and we just lucked out having three boys and so most of that stuff's getting passed down.

 

Mike Swenson 

Now the funny thing is is our oldest son blue is his favourite colour. And then our middle son green was his favourite colour but then now it's red. And so you know he's not as excited to wear the blue stuff that my oldest son war and so there's there's a little bit of that happens but yeah, those those are the little things that really make a difference. The other point that you were talking about as far as you know, kids understanding money, I think about when I was Little, I loved baseball cards, you know, baseball, football, basketball, whatever, if there's cards I was there, and I was the type of person where it would burn, you know, the money would burn a hole in my pocket when I got an allowance or I got money for my birthday was I drive to Walmart on my bike? Or should they drive I'd ride on my bike to Walmart night by you know, if I had $10, I'd spend $10, you know, and it was funny to see how over time that's changed with me, right? Like, I get more excited about saving stuff. And I probably had to go through the lesson of being the spender to become the saver.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Yeah, I just think it's so important just to again, it just as is being that example, and showing them what it is that you're doing. Because if you're doing that, then they're picking that up. And they're going well, there's no shame in this game, or there's no, okay, I'm saving this amount of money or you know, it doesn't, it doesn't become the disconnect. And, and we are really open with our kids at different times and say, You know what, we just, I understand that your friend down the street got those really nice new shoes, our priority is not those nice new shoes, we'd rather take a vacation, we would rather go on this trip together and have this experience together, then to really spend, you know, $200 every time you decide you want a new pair of shoes, and the kids have understood that. Now there have also been times where we say there's some skin in the game, right, we'll pay $50 for this pair of shoes, that's what we would have paid anyway, if you want to chip in the rest of it. Awesome. Go ahead and do that.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And the kids have to be really thoughtful about how they want to spend their money then. And that makes a real difference for them. Once once there's actual things that they have to prioritise in life then right like, you know, my oldest son is in the process of buying his first house. You know, we mentioned he's 22. He's a young kid. And he's learning how expensive things are like, this was a text conversation between my husband and him a couple weeks ago, where he was talking about homeowners associations, they have a homeowner's association in this new neighbourhood that they're in. We suggested that he read through the whole covenants, make sure he knows what's happening. And, and he basically said, nothing's gonna stand in my way of having a hot tub. And he was just so excited about getting the hot tub. And that was the one thing he was just into is this hot tub. And it was, you know, it was so funny to see just how quickly in this text conversation, his desire for that hot tub had become, once he realised he also needed to buy a new refrigerator, and they needed a washer and dryer, and, oh, wait, they need to still finish off the backyard. And so the reality of those things start to come in.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And so it's really important to start early with those priorities of deciding what you want to prioritise in in that period of time. It was also really helpful for them to also look at how much it was going to cost them, like the time and effort that it takes for them to, to be able to afford, you know, $15 or $20 of their own money. Well, you could do chores for three hours, you know, you could do all of this or, you know, it becomes a little bit more of that, Oh, well, is it worth it, that's a lot of time for me to try to make that happen. I'd have to babysit for you know, this, you know, for this amount of time, I'd have to take on two babysitting jobs or whatever, to be able to afford that. And, and so I think it's so important for kids to start making those connections of what that looks like. Because it's it's inevitable as they become adults. Once you have those adult, you know, buying, you know, things that you have to buy and purchase, it becomes a little overwhelming.

 

Mike Swenson 

I think that's a phenomenal lesson and I I haven't heard it a lot of times phrased in that way. Where you Yeah, you really talk about what what's the time value of that money for them? Because Yeah, if it's I'm gonna go shovel a driveway and get 10 bucks. Okay, well, how much time does it take you to shovel that driveway? Well, it takes you know, 30 minutes. Okay, so now if you want something that's $50 that's two and a half work two and a half hours worth of time for shovelling. So is it worth that time or not? I just had that conversation with my kids. They were I mean, they're, they're still not quite quite at that spot, especially our six year old, our six year old, like, he loves the idea of money, but doesn't have the concept of the time. And so I was telling them the other day, they were some other type of Oh, they like to pass on that for the three year old, if they ever have to pick up anything that our three year old does, like a mess that he makes, they're like, Ah, you know, Hudson, this is your mess.

 

Mike Swenson 

And I said, Hold on a second, how much time did mom and dad spend picking up your stuff, and we don't complain about it like that. So somehow the conversation turned to I told our nine year old and our six year old, I would pay them $25 a day, if they did all the dishes, all the laundry and picked up all the toys in the house. And at first their eyes lit up. They're like $25 a day, you know, and I knew where I was going with this. Right? You know, and so they're like, Oh, you know, you would pay us that much. And I started to think about it, I was like, okay, $25 a day. If they did that, for me, I would pay that all day long. And then as you can see, the the wheels start to turn up like wait, all the toys in the house, wait all the laundry, and they don't even know how to do laundry yet. We would teach them if they were interested.

 

Mike Swenson 

But you start to see that clicking in for them. They're like, Okay, I'm out, you know, it's not worth it for me. And so that is really a key concept. Because it helps them to understand that our time is money. And that's no different than when they work a job. It's, you know, the value of my time working at a job or, you know, in the case of your son, if he went garage saleing for a couple hours, like how much money could he make flipping so now he's starting to think about, it's a little bit of the entrepreneurial piece of, Okay, if I worked a job and I got paid $10 an hour, in five hours, I'd make 50. But if I would add three hours, garage saleing and flipping it and I made $75 in three hours. Now that's $25 an hour versus the $10 an hour. So you could start to see those wheels turning those being made.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And I will tell you, that did backfire on us because I wanted to him to have actual real work experience and have a job with an employer at a warehouse that I set up. And this whole thing is I knew a friend who had a warehouse to a job. And he would be you know, get a job where he's he's going, you know, nine to five, whatever. During the summer, I think he was a junior in high school and just said I need you to do this and and he was like, Mom, I can make more money flipping stuff. And to his credit, he absolutely could. He hated that job. He still tells me all the time that he hates the fact that he even did it. He doesn't even put it on his resume. And I'm just like, but I wanted him I felt like he needed to have an employer, I felt like he needed to have the accountability of clocking in at a certain time, instead of that entrepreneurial spirit that he absolutely had. Now, maybe he's gleaned some really important things from that lesson of employment, I don't know.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

But at this point, I will tell you that a depth salutely 100% backfired on us because that was his that was his rationale. A lot of times, it's like I could just buy a couch and reef and flip it. And in an hour, I could, you know, double my money. And so I guess part of that was really great for him to recognise. Because he really took on that, that role of of just being able to be a self starter and motivated, which he absolutely was. And he continues to be that way. He worked full time in college, when he was at Baylor University at a car dealership, he was one of the youngest car salesmen at the Nissan dealership there, which actually proved to be just such a great thing for him. It's all commission based, and which was great when he was in college, because there was a little bit less of that, well, if I do this and step out in a commission based, I mean, you understand real estate, right? It's commission based.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And so if you if you step out into this, there's a little bit of that unknown of what this is going to look like. And so he at least had that safety net underneath him to be able to step into a commission based position when he was in college and really get his feet wet. And now he continues on as a finance manager at a car dealership in Boise, Idaho and and that's really working out really well for him. And so managing that time, but you really have to be really motivated and have that self starter, and just be you know, and catch that bug essentially have the sales mentality, which he absolutely has and which I'm sure a lot of your listeners have as well.

 

Mike Swenson 

Yeah, I still remember it in college. We took a there was a management course that we took, and it was it was kind of the first really hard class. I was I was an entrepreneurship major. And it was kind of that first class for everybody, I think is management. 301 was the court I still remember that this this much later because it was like the big class where everybody you know, had to buckle in. And I remember the professor at that time had told us you know, if I had advice for anybody in business, it's that you should take your first two years out of college and be in sales. By the time I was like, I'm an introvert, I'm not a risk taker, like I, the reason why it took me so long to start a company is because I, I couldn't get past the, you know, a safe, stable paycheck and, and all that kind of stuff.

 

Mike Swenson 

But in hindsight, I absolutely can see that because, you know, his his point was you learn so much about all of the business, you learn so much about customer relationships, talking to people being comfortable doing that kind of stuff. And then there is the piece of, you know, a commission tech job. Now, you could have a sales job with a base plus a bonus, but, but there is a piece of, I'm betting on myself, you know, and I and I have to step up to the plate if I want to make more money. And so I think there's a lot of wisdom in that advice, I just had a hard time as a 22 year old introvert saying that I ever want to do sales, because I'm like, I'm not gonna be like a copier salesman or something like that. But now in real estate, like so many of those principles make sense. It's here I am, 20 years later, wishing I would have done that 20 years ago.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And then and again, I think it goes back to just saying there's this a little bit of a safety net under you, we know if you're right out of college to start into a position where you're doing sales for two years, you've got less responsibility, you're probably not married, you probably don't have kids, you probably don't have to worry about you know, X, Y, and Z payments that really need to come in on an on a regular basis. And so it's easier to kind of slowly dip your feet in and get wet, you know, get them wet, and then make that decision is is this for me are those life lessons that you'll continue to take with you throughout. And so as parents, that's important for us to, to be able to support our kids in that way and make sure that we are that kind of safety net underneath them of that sounding board. And that example, and it's just been the slow like tether that we've released as our kids get older, so that they can make that decision for themselves on on how they want to to live and what choices they want to make in their future.

 

Mike Swenson 

Now, one of the other things that we want to talk about here is is College in school loans. Right? And, you know, you you talked about how, you know, your goal is to is to try to really have your kids be free of that when they graduate and that and that's something that you know, is afforded to you, by your parents talk a little bit more about that.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Yeah, it's so important to me, I did not realise that this was such a controversial topic, and it has become more so. And people have really strong feelings about it in both ways, because, you know, we've gotten several people in our friend group who have said, Well, I worked through college, and I thought it really made me understand the value of my education. And I 100% agree, because there were classes that I showed up for maybe twice the whole semester, and C's get degrees, and I felt totally fine with it. And so, so I understood that, but my parents said that the biggest investment that they could make would be that into their children, and had said that they would pay for our college education. It's interesting to me, there's, there's five of us, I'm kind of at the bottom half, I've got one younger brother, out of all of us, I was the only one that saw that through with a bachelor's degree.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And so, but it was important to me to, to kind of follow that up and and to have that and it was really what helped us. My husband and I, you know, had a surprise pregnancy in college, we weren't married, it was one of those things where we had to figure out what to do with life. And so both of us were college students and got pregnant and decided to get married and have a baby. And so we're graduating with a two year old with bachelor's degrees. And so that was just a really, you know, in an interesting time in our lives, it was it was a lot but because we had our parents help, they continue to support us throughout, we were able to seamlessly continuous full time students without having to go take on jobs and all this other you know, debt that once we graduated, we would just be swimming out from underneath. And so we had this really strong foundation coming out of it that really gave us a leg up to be able to, okay, now we don't have any college debt, I can choose to be a stay at home mom, like I want to be and raise my kiddo.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And my husband could you know pursue a job in engineering and and it was such a freeing time for us to be able to have that. And to just be like, we have that extra extra step up. And so for us, as our kids have gotten older, we've always said, you know, this is kind of what if, if you want to go to college, if this is the path you want to pursue 100% we want to be able to support you. And and college has gotten really expensive. And so our goal has been to say we will pay we'll pay the same amount. If you go in state tuition, you won't have any student loans, nothing like that any to the most expensive University in our state, which is about $30,000 a year. So we've said we'll pay $30,000 a year for you to go to school for four years. We're not doing this whole you're not rounding this out. We're not taking our time. We're not doing six year process. Yours will pay $30,000 a year for you to go, our oldest son made a decision to go to a really expensive private university. And he had applied at 11 different universities, he had gotten accepted to many. He's a smart kid, he got some scholarships and things like that.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And as he was narrowing down what he wanted to do with with college education, we had to come up with a spreadsheet and said, Baylor University is going to cost you $64,000 a year, now we pay half of that, how are you going to take care of the rest of it, and they were big boy decisions that he had to make. And we took them out with a spreadsheet and said, If you choose to go to our in State University, which is a fabulous University, if you choose to go to this private university in our state, which is a fabulous University, we will pay the you know, the full lump sum, if you make a choice to choose this university in Texas, you're going to have to take on a little bit of student loan debt. And over the course of his he graduated early, he was motivated in three and a half years, he took on about $20,000, with a student loan debt on his own, that we didn't pay for, and he got scholarships and, and he works full time. And and he's been really conscious about paying that off. Now our daughter is at a university where it's a reciprocal, they call it Louis, I can't remember what it stands for.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

But it's a reciprocal university where even though she's out of state, she gets the in state tuition rate. And so by the time she graduates with her nursing degree will pay for all of it. And so our kids understand that they know what that looks like, they have choices, we don't want to limit their choices and say, No, you can't choose to do what you want, you can't choose to go to the university that you or your little heart desires. But these are the decisions that you're taking on and you're making. And, and again, it's those big boy decisions. But for us, it was really important for us to be able to pay for as much as we could $120,000 seems like a whole lot of money to cash flow for three kids, you know, over the course of time, but but to be able to take that money and to be able to say this is this is a start you have. And like I said, my oldest son's graduated, he's been graduated from with a year and a half.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And it's just been a really encouraging thing to see how he's managed his loans. His he's taking that on, we wish he had didn't have to take any on. But at the same time, it's expensive college is ridiculous right now, it's just it. But those were the choices that he made. And it'll be great for our daughter did not have any of that student loan debt as she comes out of college and to be able to start fresh. Now, because of that our son has been able to and he has a he has a big shovel, he's got a good job he makes twice as much as my husband makes, he has a lot of money to be able to, to make his choices. And so because of that he's 22. And he's buying his first house. And so if he had hundreds of 1000s of dollars worth of debt, that'd be really difficult to do. And so I think that as a parent, it was really important for us to set up that legacy of, of pain for the education as much as we could in that regard. But then as much as we can and the other in the other kiddos.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

So that they have that Fresh Start of being able to get into the workforce to get into early adulthood on the best footing that they have.

 

Mike Swenson 

And I think you know, one of the one of the things that we always tell our clients when we're advising them on buying or selling as we said, you know, we want to let you know what's at stake so that you can make an informed decision. And that's really what this conversation is about. You know, we had one of our past guests that was on, I think it was Episode 19 Kelly Blodgett, she talks about how she had $60,000 in school loan debt when she graduated, and she made the minimum payment. And she just thought, if I make the minimum payment, like it's going to eventually go away. So after eight years, she looked at her statement and saw she still had $46,000 left, and she's like, wait a minute, I pay, I paid for eight years, and it's only gone from 60 to 46. Like, you've got to be kidding me. So then she went on a mission over the next 20 months and paid off the remaining 46,000. So what took her, you know, eight years to kick down 14,000 she now kicked down the last 46 and 20 months?

 

Mike Swenson 

And it's because she understood now what's at stake. And I think that is the responsible piece here is Yeah, you can you can make a decision, you just have to be informed about what what's at stake here. And, and I think about my time, you know, my parents have told me similarly, like will pay a certain amount. And I have new and half didn't know what that meant in terms of like it felt a little bit like Monopoly money at the end of the day. You know, I chose to just live in the really nice student housing one year versus, you know, living at a house with some of my friends, which would have been like, probably three $400 a month less, because I didn't think about it and it's like, oh, I'll just get this meal plan versus this meal plan because it's I want to Be able to eat more if I need to, you know, and so I kind of understood it. But then at the end of the day I, you know, for me what, what flipped was, after a couple years, and I had the school loans, and I started to pay him down as we did an investment property that we flipped, and after the flip, we paid off the rest of the school loans at that.

 

Mike Swenson 

So, you know, there was a period then where I understood, okay, this is what's left, this is what I can do to eliminate it. And we did. And so, you know, fortunately, we were at a time where it was kind of before school loans really took off. But but that's the thing. Yeah, they, you know, each parent is able to do a certain amount of things, but you just have to have that conversation, that education piece with them. of Okay, this is what it means if you choose this school, if you choose that school, this is what your debts gonna be, you know, if we're able to pay are willing to pay for part of it, this is what it knocks off, but but they have to have those decisions now. Because if they don't understand that, going into college, you're gonna have a real hard time understanding that after college.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Well, and it goes back to that word we talked about intentional, right, you have to be intentional with how you are not only parenting, but how you're spending money, how you are choosing to live your life. And you know, as a 42 year old woman with a college, you know, a kid who graduated college already another one who's in college, we're a little on the younger side of things, we didn't have a whole lot of time to build up. Like, you know, I didn't work for a long time to be able to build up a lot of that high earner type stuff in the beginning. But our priorities as a family as a husband and wife, my husband and I had had really made it a priority to want to do this for our children. And that meant, you know, forfeiting, you know, other types of things that we would normally do or continuing to shop at garage sales for all of our clothes, or, you know, making those choices that we have to make to just say, this is how we're going to do this for our family.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Because this is more important. And for us making that decision and saying this is more important for us made it became beget became out of us being intentional, in the very beginning. And you have to make that decision. And the very beginning because it takes it takes such a long time to make those choices. And if you're not, if you're let's say you feel like this is overwhelming already, and your kids are getting close to college age or whatever, and you're going I don't know how I'm going to pay for this. Again, it's making those intentional choices right now to say, this is what I can do. And this is how I can change my lifestyle to help my my kids or help create a legacy of wealth for our family, so that we can be giving and generous in the future. And it's just making those decisions. Early on to just again, intentional is just that's just been our word for parenting. And, and as a family since the very beginning.

 

Mike Swenson 

And it is difficult, you know, thinking about where I was going into college, I knew I probably wanted to do something in business, but I didn't really know what you know. And I think that's the tricky part too, is, you know, to shoot to purposely choose Baylor, and I could be wrong. Like he probably had a good idea of what he wanted to do. And that's why he was choosing though, am I right or no?

 

Rachel Teodoro 

No, you're absolutely right. And he chose what I wanted to do.

 

Mike Swenson 

I wouldn't necessarily know like, I want to go to Baylor no matter what, because I feel like that's going to give me the education that I needed. And that is the tricky part is somebody that doesn't know what they want to do with the rest of their life when they go into college. How am I going to choose a school that works for me? And that's okay, right. Once again, it's having an informed conversation, telling them what's at stake and helping them walk through that maybe you you choose, I remember my parents had talked to me about, you know, you could choose to go to a community college for two years, save a lot of money, and then transfer to the school that you want to go to after that.

 

Mike Swenson 

And the degree is still going to be the degree right and you might save some money along the way. And I felt like a it was a little bit like Monopoly money. So I didn't necessarily have that, that relationship with that number. And at the same time, I thought from a friend standpoint, like it'd be harder to make friends after two years, you know, and so that's how I helped to make those decisions. But there's a lot of ways to slice and dice it and I think spending more time talking with your kids about that really does matter. It's it's well worth the time of the conversation for them to understand all those nuances. Because Yeah, if you don't understand that you're gonna have a big ball and chain around your ankles for the next 1015 years if you've got all that loan debt,

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And I don't know that we would have encouraged him to pursue a degree in you know, underwater basket weaving had he and take on that amount of debt or or to pay for and say, this is a great idea. It is exactly what you said he knew exactly what he wanted. He had done the research. He said these professors teach there. This is the history that they have. I mean, it's understanding that and knowing that made us feel more comfortable in his decision of knowing Okay, this is he totally understands it as much as a 17 year old kid.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

I understand it because like you said, it feels like Monopoly money. And I will say the same as a parent. It feels a little bit like Monopoly money, especially the first time you fill out the FAFSA forms, and they say, Oh, your family contribution could be $75,000 a year and you go, Oh, my gosh, what are you even talking about? Do you think I'm like Scrooge McDuck, just swimming around in dollars? Like, this is ridiculous. And so, so yeah, it just, it just feels the whole college system right now just feels like Monopoly money. But, but for us, it was so important for us to set that foundation to set that, that that strong foundation for our son so that as he graduated from college, you know, his student, student loan debt is taken care of paid for he has zero debt right now. And now he's, you know, being able to afford a house, you know, at 22, which I think is a huge accomplishment, especially in a really hot market, in Boise.

 

Mike Swenson 

I was gonna say, that sounds a lot like, in real estate, when you get the pre approved pre approval from a lender of, you know, hey, I'm pre approved up to this amount for the house. And then you look at what that house payment actually is, like, wait a minute, there's no way I can even afford that house payment. So a lot of times people get tripped up that way thinking like, Oh, well, the bank said, I'm pre approved for this. So that means I can afford up to that. Well, it's like, wait a minute, that's, that's way more than I could actually afford. But the bank says I could.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

That's the good news. The good news is that he also understood that and so he was pre approved for twice the amount that he paid for, for his house. And so he understood that this was a huge undertaking. And he also knew, you know, this is I only want to spend about 25% of my income on on a house so that I can do other things. He's, he's young, he's getting married soon. And to be able to have fun with that. And, you know, my daughter's made the same choices. She She lives at the cheapest dorms on campus, she has a cheaper meal plan is kind of what you were saying, you know, it felt like Monopoly money, but she's a little bit more mindful of, of the spending, especially because she wants to fit into our budget, too. She doesn't want to go over and spend any of her money, she wants to stay within the realms of mom and dad's money. And so that's very much like her and we appreciate her for that. But yeah, she, she's very conscientious of the finances.

 

Mike Swenson 

Now, you know, we we like to talk about freedom. It's, it's why our podcast is real freedom. So a lot of people listening to this might think, like, Oh, my gosh, this sounds like a lot of work. It sounds like, it's probably not worth it, you know, be to go to garage sales to, you know, coupon and, and live frugally, and all that. Talk a little bit about the freedom that this now affords you guys, as you look at the future, and you know, talking about the travelling because I know you guys do a lot of travelling, so talk about this is worth it, it's worth teaching your kids these great habits, because it does provide for freedom for you guys for the future.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Yeah, 100%. And I think I think the hard work was put in really early on, we were making that, that basis, that strong foundation is a one, you know, one income family with my husband's income, we were trying to save what we could and and, and he was doing the really hard part of the saving and the investment for our family in the best way possible. And I'm doing the other part of the coupon cutting and the you know, the the saving for the rest of the stuff, you know, using cloth diapers, and you breastfeeding the kids that we didn't have formula costs, and you know, clothes at grad sales and things like that. And so I was doing that part. And so I think it really is this partnership of what that looks like. And and it's great because we have very similar common goals. Now our kids were younger, they don't remember that, that we didn't take a you know, a trip to Hawaii when they were four.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

You know, my parents lived in Santa Ana, and we're really close to Disneyland for quite some time and had grandparents passes. You know, we took them a few times to Disneyland, they don't remember it, you know, the youngest one has no recollection of it. And so it for us, the travel part has been really important as they've gotten older, like taking the experiences going to Italy together. You know, going to Hawaii multiple times. We do ski vacations and things like that, it's just a really important thing for us to be able to have made that sacrifice early on so that we are financially free as we as we've gotten older. You know, this is a big milestone for us and our family this year, will finish paying off our house in May. And and that's that's a really large part of, you know, not only our investment portfolio, right, our houses is a huge investment for us.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

But now we'll be able to have that extra income then to continue to cash flow education costs for our kids, we still have three more years for my daughter and then four years for my son, my youngest and so that's important for us, but then to be able to be really generous with what that looks like to be able to give in and enjoy our money is just so freeing to not have to worry about some of that And so there's a real freedom and in just living the life that you want to live now, and making those sacrifices, and I continue to shop at garage sales, I love goodwill outlet, I think it's fabulous, I have no problem wearing somebody's used shirt or sweater. And I don't think I ever will. And I think and but I also know when it's time to buck up and pay a couple $100 for a fancy dress for a special occasion. Or, or take that vacation and stay at the nicer place, instead of doing the, you know, the motel six kind of thing, we have the ability to be able to do that now.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And there's a real freedom in that and, and, you know, like I said, with, with the house being paid off, there's just a real freedom in knowing now we've got this extra money every single month to just be able to, to do with what we on and do and it's an you know, this is not our forever home, you know, we hope one day to live on the water and and you know, maybe live somewhere warm, have multiple houses, who knows what that looks like. And it's such a such a really freeing thing to know that I don't have that huge consumer debt overhead every day. Now, I don't know, if we write that last payment in May, if we're going to feel a whole lot different. Like if we're going to do cartwheels in the front yard. Or if we're going to, you know, sit there and you know, we even do you know do carpet, you know angels in the in the living room.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

But maybe we will maybe it'll feel a whole lot different. But honestly, I think just having the lifestyle that we've had the lifestyle that we've created, we have really well on a really like unless we just live really well unless and it just works really well for us. And I think that a lot of people could do that too. And and again, you mentioned at the top, you know of our conversation about just feeling like you have to have this outward personification of this is what I drive or these are the outfits that I wear, this is how I dress. And again, I don't I don't know that there's anything wrong with that, I think it's so important to feel really confident in what you have. But you can also feel really confident in what you have and what you wear, when it's paid off when it's cheap when you found a great deal when you are in your designer clothes, and they cost you next to nothing. But you still look really great. And it feels really awesome to have that financial freedom.

 

Mike Swenson 

Yeah. And one of the things I remember you told me was it, wasn't it. You have a neighbour who's a pilot, is that right? Or? And they said that, that you guys travel more than anybody else that he knows, is that right?

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Yeah. And we actually have a neighbour who's who's an executive at one of the the airlines in our area. And he has said that, yeah, we are a family that travels more than any other person in the flight industry. And again, we just we love to travel, I just I love the fact that we can create shared experiences for our kids in that regard. And like I said, when the kids are younger, they really don't remember a lot of that our families were out of state. And so when we travelled, we usually travelled to see one of them. And so it was it was one of those, we never really took vacations when they were younger, because it was always just a trip to go see the grandparents, again, totally fine. It just wasn't anything that we were doing for fun.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

And so now we're having that option to just be able to take those vacations and you know, fly across the world and go to Italy or my daughter and I had a trip to Paris I got cancelled because of COVID. But, you know, making those choices of of travelling and again, just those shared experience, making the world a smaller place, it's really important to me, for our kids and having those experiences for them. And so everybody's may be different. Everybody's why reason is different for why they do what they do. But having those in the back of my mind are really important for me to stay focused on, on what we're doing. And And honestly, it just becomes such a part of our life that we just don't even know the difference. I just don't notice the difference.

 

Mike Swenson 

Well, it's it's it is It is amazing to see, you know, if you take a look back, you know, when when you were pregnant in college, you had so many reasons to rationalise like, why, you know, now at 42 you can't be where you're at today. And and you leaned in and you did the hard work. And now you have this freedom of, you know, no home payment. And keep in mind, you know, living in the Seattle area, like houses aren't cheap in Seattle, right? It's not like we're we're living somewhere where the average sales price is 200,000 like you're in an expensive home and to have no car or no home payment, you know, taking care of your kids college to have kids that have understood some basic financial principles and have launched themselves.

 

Mike Swenson 

You know, it's it's, it's cool to hear the story, you know, thinking back to, you know, in college thinking, Okay, what are we going to do, and it's time on task over time. Just leave doing the hard work day after day after day. And now you know, 22 years later, you guys are in a great spot financially for your future and you have freedom to travel, you have kids that will be self sufficient that you don't have to continue to pay for a lot of stuff for and houses gone, or house payments gone. You know, like now there's, there's a whole world of opportunity and fun and experience that you guys get to experience in the freedom of that because you did the hard work early.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

It just again, it goes back to just being intentional, right is making sure that you are just really intentional with those choices that you're making. And, and I think that it's just been, it's just been the the backbone of what we do and everything that we do. And, you know, we have we have been really privileged to we have families who are very generous to us, we choose to do the same thing with our kids have been very generous with them as well. But But when there's that generosity, we've also been really intentional with what we do with that. And if that meant, you know, we receive a cash gift at Christmas that's putting more money towards the principal payment of the house, it's being intentional, instead of saying, This is what I'm going to do. Instead, I want to buy a, you know, lifted truck or whatever, you know, it's just making those choices of a b there are in goals, this is what we really want out of it. And we're going to make those choices.

 

Mike Swenson 

So for those folks that have heard your story, and you know it's resonated with with them, how can folks find you and follow you and reach out to you to hear more?

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Well, I have my blog that I post on a couple times a week, Rachel theodoro.com exactly how it spells or sounds to spell. And then I'm all over social media at Miss Ines. Rachel theodoro. You can find me over there. And I'm giving lots of practical tips. Right now we're in the middle of a blog series of money saving blog series, where we're in frugal February right now. And it's a no spin challenge month and for being to be a little bit more difficult for me this month. I don't know. I don't know what the problem is amazing. Some of it is just one of those interesting things of life where, yeah, I just get sucked into boredom, maybe I don't know. So if you want to join us on that, we've got that going on, and then just just share really practical tips about how you can make this part of your lifestyle without really feeling like, like it is a sacrifice for you that you're just living well unless in the long run. So, Rachel theodoro.com or miss Rachel theodoro on social media.

 

Mike Swenson 

Awesome. Well, thanks so much for coming on and sharing the story of your family and your kids. It's been great to hear it.

 

Rachel Teodoro 

Awesome. Thanks, Mike. Appreciate it.