And welcome to the money mindset podcast, where you will find the inspiration and motivation. You need to manage your money better than you can stress less and live the life you want. It's Ashley with budgets made easy and the money mindset podcast today I'm interviewing Nicole Babel. Who's a financial coach that helps women work on their money mindset so that they can pay off debt and live the life they want.

We're going to discuss the mindsets that you can improve and tips for staying on track, paying off debt and focusing on your goals, even when you are attempted to get distracted by all those things that you want. Now, before we dive into today's episode, I do want to remind you that if you are looking to pay off debt, I do have a debt starter kit.

So just go to budgets, made easy.com/debt so that you can get the free guide and spreadsheet in worksheet to get started on paying off debt. Now let's dive into Nicole's interview. Thanks so much for being with us today, Nicole. Oh, absolutely. It's my pleasure. So we're going to talk a little bit about your money journey and how your money mindset really,

you know, kind of influenced, you know, you're not having a ton of debt, but you paying off debt and kind of how you have been able to, you know, really stay focused on your financial journey. And you know, that whole process, because it's easy to go into debt is not always to get out of it and to stay out of it is just a whole nother journey in and of itself.

Right? So we're going to kind of talk about how you've been able to do that kind of the processes and your mindset and how all of that has influenced you, being able to do that. So can you just quickly introduce yourself and kind of let us know a little bit about yourself? Sure. My name's Nicole people, I LA relatively new financial coach in Columbus,

Ohio currently I'm 49. So I feel like that's important because millennials today have, I feel like a different environment than a gen X, like I would have had growing up, but I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. The child of two parents have very modest means growing up, which instilled in me a certain money mindset, which we can talk about more,

more later and how that kind of works with your family. But, you know, I was able to go to college. Lucky for me, my parents had saved from the moment I was born, if not sooner for me and my to go to college. So I actually was able to graduate from college without any debt, which I know is like almost shockingly unheard of in these days,

but I did work and I did pay my, I know I did my own rent and you know, managed my own money. And, you know, I had a credit card and, and back then credit card companies would come to two universities. And on the first day of school or in the spring, they would set up tables and they would give away stuff that college kids would want in order to get you to sign up for a credit card in hopes that you would charge it up,

get into debt and hopefully mom and dad, or somebody else would bail you out. Right? So they not only get their debt repaid, but probably was half the amount of interest. So I had a credit card and it, I absolutely used it to help bridge the gap between, you know, food and paydays and everything else that comes along with,

you know, maintaining a roof over your head and feeding yourself, but was lucky. I didn't have any debt there. Fast forward a couple of years, you know, I, I had my, my own apartment and it had been about four years after going to college, I decided to go to grad school and for grad school, I did not have anyone to pay for it.

So what I did then is kind of interesting. I think I worked for a company that didn't have a tuition reimbursement program. I was an it sales, so there were not a lot of women. And I went into the sales manager's office and I said, Hey, I want you to pay for me to go to grad school. You don't have this,

you don't offer this and I want to do it. And I think you should pay for it. And long story short, we worked out a deal and I was able to get them to pay for me to go to grad school. However, at the time I didn't have an emergency fund. I was living paycheck to paycheck and I had some credit card debt like everybody else.

And I decided to take out a student loan, even though I had somebody to pay for my school. And the reason that I did that was student loan money was so cheap back then, then I decided I would borrow that and I'd only borrow half so that I would then have an emergency fund ready to go, that I could, you know, chip away at and pay off over time at a pretty low interest rate.

So it was out in the working world, went to graduate school, got my MBA, continued working around 30. I got married and the person I married, I actually met in graduate school and he had a lot of debt. He had student loan, multiple student loans, he had credit card debt. He had a car payment, I had a car payment,

we ended up with a mortgage. So then things got a little bit more serious because there was more life and just, you know, figuring out how to manage two people who think about money maybe a little bit. And you know, really focusing on getting rid of that high interest debt was super critical. So I worked on that and then we got divorced.

So we get divorced and it was in the middle of the housing crisis. So we sold a whole house for a loss, which is fun. The only good thing about the timing was I got to split the loss with someone else, so I didn't take it off. So I went into a whole new home with a whole new relationship with, with the,

with debt, right. I had a mortgage that I still had to work on paying off. I still had a car payment. I still had some credit card debt. So for me at this point in my life, I kind of felt like I'm going to be single forever. Like I'm never doing this again. And so I need to be able to take care of myself financially and make sure that I can only rely on me for retirement and for emergencies.

And I had been laid off in the past. So like I'd gone through that. So I knew that wasn't a thing. So I just got really disciplined about and really clear on what things were important to me, what things were not. And I aligned my money in such a way that I had a low overhead, right? So I bought a house,

but I didn't buy the most expensive thing I could afford about a nice safe house in a nice safe area. But the smaller house, I didn't buy a new car. I drove a Camry for 10 years and I bought it used. So I managed to not have a car payment and I had always saved for retirement. So I was used to, and I'd built the habit of putting 20% of my pay away and working with what was after that.

So fast forward, you know, another 15, 18 years, you know, I've since remarried, before I got married, I was completely debt free except for my mortgage. Cause I don't really count that. That's pretty good debt. Now that I'm married to somebody who is very similar with me financially and the way we think about things, we're to the point in our lives now where we can afford to buy,

you know, second homes and neither of us have car payments and our kids' college is paid for. So just was able to really with the mindset focused on the things that were important to me and I won't lie driven in some part by fear. You know, I was able to really put away a lot of money, pay off a lot of debt without,

you know, being, I mean, I had good jobs, but I wasn't, you know, knocking down six figures like my entire adult life. So that was a lot. So hopefully I didn't go overly detailed. No, that's awesome. So thank you for sharing all of that. And 20% into your retirement, even from the beginning is amazing.

Like even 20% for just most people is amazing. So what I'm curious, kind of how your parents influenced your money mindsets because you know, you talked about the RD had, had saved for your college and if you're already putting 20% in, did they play a major role in those decisions? Oh, absolutely. So I'm very intrigued by the psychology of personal finance and I follow Dr.

Klontz and his money scripts pretty closely read all the books. Love it, love it, but your family of origin and even your grandparents and the lessons that they taught you about money, that they didn't come out and just teach you about what you observed by the way people talked about money, the way people handled money, the way maybe they argued about money really influences the way you think about it.

And it's unconscious and it starts super young. So most people start to have their money scripts ingrained into how they think about money before they, you know, leave elementary school. So it's really, really early. So on my dad's side, the lessons that I learned, because there were steel mill people and the steel mill part of Ohio was that money to be was to be respected.

So in that came across, as you finish your food, you don't leave it, you don't waste money. And if you loan money to somebody, they better pay back, which I won't go into lots of details. We that one, cause it's a little embarrassing, but anyways, so money was really to be respected is what I learned on that side of my family.

And then on my mom's side, my grandmother was a single parent at an ridiculously young age, ridiculously young. She had six marriages before I think I was even born. So that gives you an idea of, there was a lot of tumult. My mom had to be very independent at a very young age. She had to, you know, help raise her brother and make money any way a teenager could.

And so on her side of the family, I got a little bit more of a what Dr.<inaudible> would call a money vigilance mindset, which is you have to save for a rainy day because bad things can happen and you need to be prepared and you need to be able to, you know, jump in and kind of save yourself. So when you combine those two things together,

and then my dad actually was a football coach when I was little and then went into selling insurance. So he learned a lot about money and investing then. And so, you know, he kind of beat into my brain from a young age, you know, two things, right. Pay yourself first because no one else is going to and start really early because the earlier you start the money you really need to put in order for it to grow so that you can retire at an early age.

He also didn't love his job. So being able to have freedom of choice at some point about what you do and who you do it with was kind of very highly influenced by him as well. And then on the other side, I had my mom who was like a little fear-based with money, right? So she's got 20 money and she doesn't like to spend it.

So she'll never ever go through her money because she still has that money vigilance where she's afraid to spend it. So there, you know, there's good and bad sides to all money scripts. Luckily for me, when he vigilant wires, you save, but it also wires you to maybe miss out on some opportunities to use your money in a fun way to have a good life,

which is the point of the money anyways. So there's always a balancing act between the good and the bad sides of your, you know, your, your ingrained money mindset. Yeah, absolutely. So your parents, you know, obviously had a big influence on you and, you know, tried to get you to save and do all the right things.

And you know, you still, you know, took out the student loan and had credit card debt and things like that. So can you tell me kind of maybe your thought process on moving from, you know, your parents with their, with their money scripts and the things that they've taught you into debt and then getting yourself back out of it and doing,

you know, and staying out of it now, because you know, we all do things that we, you know, even though our parents probably told us not to, or that we know we shouldn't and we do it anyway and really turned it around and I'm sure you probably have a lot saved in retirement from saving 20%, you know, from the get go like that is just still blowing my mind right now.

That's awesome. Because you know, if you do it from the beginning, you don't miss it. Like you don't even like that you're missing it because you have it, you know, increased your lifestyle based on that amount. So that I'm just like blown away by that. That's awesome. Yeah. No, I think you're exactly right. It is.

It's part of it is developing a habit and creating the mindset that, that, that money's going to you, it's just not going to today. You it's going to future you. So really I think developing a, a future mindset of, and you don't like, you can't know everything about who you're going to be at 60 when you're 25, you know what I mean?

But you do know that you're going to need to live and that there's a good chance. You might not want to work it's by kind of focusing on the benefits of the future and getting those habits together early. I think that is a big thing. And then too is it's hard when the people around you are buying things that are super nice or using their credit cards to go on really great trips or their student loan money.

Like let's be real people do that and you're not going, or maybe you're going, but you're not staying at isn't as nice of a place. So for me, it was really just being able to build up almost a guard or a resistance, or like a little shield against the culture and what the Joneses are doing, right? Because the Joneses might be broke today,

or the grownup version of the Joneses might still be paying off their own student loan debt while they have kids going to college. And just being able to, to, to know that, you know, what's happening on the outside and what things look like, aren't always concurrent with how people feel on the inside. So just really knowing your own values and goals around money and what it is that you want to do.

And what's important to you, I think is crucial. Like I had to like remind myself about a lot of things, especially being a woman. I feel like there's a lot of money sucks out there. Like, I'll give you one example. Like you can see my nails, no one else can, they're not done. They're never, they're never done.

And that was one thing when I was younger, that when I envisioned myself like as a professional woman, like I envisioned this like super polished lady with cute, super cute suits. And like, my nails were going to be impeccable and like just always done. And I started down that road. I started going to get like the acrylics back in the day.

And then I was like, man, I'm going every two weeks. And I'm spending like 30 bucks, which is probably super cheap now. And I hate going, like I hate finding the time. And at the end of the day, like, am I closing more business because my nails are done? No, like, am I like dating more people because my nails are done.

No, it really not. So is this really a place that I want to put my money in my, my physical and mental effort to worry about and go do. So I think I just did like a decent job of like balancing what mattered and what didn't. I have curly hair, curly hair requires expensive product, right? So like, I probably spend more money on hair product,

a lot of people, but it's worth it to me, but you know, the nails and eyebrows and lots of other things just weren't. And I don't think it's had a negative effect on my life in any way, shape or form other people would disagree. That's their thing. So like as a money coach, one of the things that I do is I make a conscious effort not to make everyone into me unless they want to be me.

I can help you be anything. But if you're like, I would never work with someone like that because my, like my outward appearance is key to who my identity. Well, okay. That's great. So we'll work with that and we'll, you can always work within your budget and within where your money's going to do you, right. You always have to be able to do you,

but you can't do you and everybody else. And sometimes you can't do all of you all at the same time. Right. It's all about, you know, making choices. Yeah, absolutely. And I love how you have focused on making the choices for, you know, what's really important to you right now and kind of weighing, you know, the nails versus the hair and that kind of thing.

Because, you know, we get stuck in this cycle of feeling like we have to do it all and pay for everything and we just can't get out of that cycle. And you're right. It does take sitting down and deciding what is important to you. Do you have any advice for somebody? Like if you could go back and tell your younger self something,

you know, to, to maybe avoid or embrace about your money mindset or anything like that, what would you do? Is there anything I would do? I would not. I wouldn't change anything about cars. Don't care about cars. I wouldn't change anything about my housing, but like, that was good. The way it was, I would maybe have gone on a trip or two more.

I think I would have maybe done a few more experiences, nothing crazy because I did go at a girls trip to Mexico in my twenties, in my thirties, I did a trip to Oktoberfest in Germany with some girls, but I maybe would have done a little bit more there. Yeah. Now where can people find more information about you? So my business is from Brooke to baller.com

all about mindset, right? It's not, we're not talking about dollars in the bank from broke to vault. We're talking about how you think about it, but it's the number two. So it's from broke. Number two, baller.com. I also have a Facebook page and you can find me on LinkedIn under my business name or Nicole<inaudible> B E L.

Awesome. And is there a book that you would recommend? I know you're all about. Is there anything that you can recommend for us? Yeah, I, I loved the millionaire next door and they've actually updated that and come out with a 20 year later version to find out if the way that self-made millionaires think about money and things that they do is changed.

And it hasn't. And then the newest one that I read recently was money mammoth, which was by Dr. Klontz and it talks about it gets into the cultural reasons and kind of the, oh gosh, I'm not going to think of the right word, but sort of the, I'm going to say biological, but it's probably not right. Reasons why people have a certain money set and how human beings as a species are not white they're to save.

So it's a really interesting book about the different money scripts. And then also, how, if you have a part of your money script is not allowing you to make the right behaviors, how you can change it because money scripts are not there. They're not set in stone, you can change them. So Awesome. Those are two I'd recommend. Well,

thanks for being with us today and sharing your story and your journey. Thanks for having me. It was a lot of fun. Thank you so much to Nicole for sharing her journey and her tips for changing our mindset so that we can live the life we want. Now, if you love today's episode, please leave us a five star review and don't forget to go get your free debt starter kit.

So you can get started today@budgetsmadeeasy.com slash debt. And I will see you guys in the next episode.