It may seem easy to say I'm broke but to say and feel that burden of the debt that I have and the understanding that I am not getting ahead by working my butt off can be depressing. I look at the FI or Financial Independence/ FIRE Financial Independence Retire Early and wonder if it's possible at 38 years old if this might still be possible.
Why did I get to this point and what happens? I have 9 revolving credit accounts. I have interest rates from 9.99% to 22.5%. It's when you see that interest per month accounts for easily $3500/month... that means before I decrease me debt I have to make greater than $3500. Even at a higher level of earning that, I have to make 42K/year. Granted in the world of advanced practice nursing that pays that amount... it becomes overwhelming. To have that amount after taxes I have to consider it takes almost $84K to pay that $42,000 if I were W-2.
This doesn't begin to include my real estate business. I own 6 homes outright in Kansas. One completely needing a full rehab and one needing minor rehab. Two are full time rented, and one is Airbnb rented or long term rented separately. These start at $6000 to $42K on initial buy price and needed anything from $5000 to $40K in fix-up expenses. Although these are paid in cash, they don't bring in the cash-flow, at this point, that one might expect. If you are wondering where the money came to take care of these... I put expenses on the credit cards until I could pay that money back. Is this what made it all so bad? Not exactly.
We started a journey of surrogacy. The surrogacy process was expected to be $48,000 and was going through Mexico ... we started this process just over 3 years ago. We started out so excited and then two egg donors, multiple surrogates, a miscarriage, and 7 embryo transfers we finally had a pregnancy that resulted in our daughter. Then I was stuck in Mexico for 7 weeks attempting to get out of the country legally with our daughter. Over $150,000 in lost wages and fees for surrogacy later we had our daughter back in the US and then started the Legal work that one year later resulted in the 2nd parent adoption for my husband. More lost wages, and legal expenses later we had everything done. Is that all... No.
Given the length of time working for Elizabeth, we decided to start the surrogacy journey for a sibling and decided that the US would be a better option. We found a surrogate, moved our home to Virginia with the purchase of a new home. That was $7000 down on 379K in home debt but you have to live somewhere that is good for school, and a safe neighborhood right? So, one would think we had it all together getting to Virginia and having found the Surrogate, did the legal documentation, found the surrogacy agency and found our egg-donor. We made four embryos and went through two failed embryo transfers and found ourselves not pregnant... we had effectively lost approximately $51,000 and we have to look to starting over in this. I had contracts set-up to be able to work and due to inefficiency the contracts didn't start. They failed to do their due dilligence in making sure I could start work.
Now I'm traveling states away while the family is in Virginia. I spend weeks away trying to make sure I'm able to provide for family and bills. I look to the FI possibilities and the amount lost each month and cringe. Despite being able to cover the bills... this is not what I anticipated as a Travel independent Nurse Anesthetist. I always looked at being a highly skilled provider and said I was good for the funds. I'm looking at the future and wondering how I can dig my way out of this.
I'm putting this here, not to get sympathy or to get comments.... I put this here so I have the accountability in getting the debts paid down. Oh, I didn't mention that I have a paid off Jeep, a very high car payment on a truck, and finally I acquired a personal loan to help pay for things at some point along the way. Did I forget that I didn't pay taxes yet for last year... yup it's tax time and I have only paid in $10,000 in the taxes for last year and have about $40K to come up with over the next few months.
So, If you are interested in continuing to follow my journey to FI... you're going to notice on this blog that I will also add updates on when I pay off credit or loans and where I'm putting $$ earned each month. I hope it's ok to use you guys for some accountability and making sure I get my life back to healthy on the financial concepts.