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Ever dreamt of trading the daily grind for a life filled with adventure and the open road? Claire Fleming not only dreamt it, but she made it happen. With a determined spirit, she swapped her corporate life for van life, transforming a van into a cosy and liveable space. Get a first-hand account of her bold transition, the hurdles she faced, and the creative ways she solved problems. Claire's journey is not only about geographical exploration, but also a deep dive into financial literacy and independence. Discover how she achieved financial freedom and paid off a hefty credit card debt while freelancing and living on the road. Listen as she shares her experiences with real estate investments, managing renovations, and creating passive income streams. But the road less travelled is not always smooth. Claire opens up about the challenges she faced - from finding amenities on the road to dealing with safety concerns as a solo female traveler. She also discusses the impact of this lifestyle on her personal relationships and dating. Claire's tale is one of courage, and the quest for a life less ordinary, proving that sometimes, the biggest risks can lead to the most rewarding journeys. Join Brandon and Jessica for a conversation that might just spark your own wanderlust and inspire you to redefine what's possible.
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And I remember just looking at her being like I'm going to go drop all this money on this empty vehicle that the first thing I'm going to do is depreciate it by cutting holes in it, and I don't know if I can finish the project and I don't even know if I like living nomadically. So there was like all of this stuff where I was like I probably should have thought this through a little bit better. But I think at that point I had been thinking it through, but not in a linear way. I think my whole life probably had been some progression towards where I am now. I've always loved to travel and things like that, so was it a little rash, probably. But also I think believing that you can do something and then just fully committing is a really good way to ensure that you actually do something.
Speaker 2:Hey everyone, welcome to the Sugar Daddy podcast. I'm Jessica and I'm Brandon, and we're the Norwoods, a husband and wife team here to demystify the realm of dollars so it all makes sense while giving you a glimpse into our relationship with money and each other. We are so glad you're here. Let's get started.
Speaker 3:Our content is intended to be used, and must be used, for informational purposes only. It is very important to do your own analysis before making any investment based upon your own personal circumstances. You should take independent financial advice from a licensed professional in connection with, or independently research and verify any information you find in our podcast and wish to rely upon, whether for the purpose of making an investment decision or otherwise.
Speaker 4:Hey babe, what are we talking about today?
Speaker 2:Today we are joined by Claire Fleming. She's literally sitting in her van. She drove into town so that she would have good Wi-Fi. Because Claire lives in her van. Could you imagine living in a van?
Speaker 4:Personally never.
Speaker 2:What if it was a really big van?
Speaker 4:Still.
Speaker 2:You can just duck into your house.
Speaker 4:I'm not a small person.
Speaker 2:Not gonna happen, nope, okay. Well, claire is here today to talk all about how she left her corporate nine to five for Life on the Road, and we're so excited to hear more about your story, claire. So thank you for spending some time with us today. Thanks for having me. I'm excited, yay. Okay, let's make sure that our listeners know exactly who we're talking about. So we'll get into this bio and then we're going to dive into all things. Van life. Claire Fleming left her corporate life for Life on the Road and in 2020, she bought and converted a camper van to be her residence. Although she had never done anything like this before, with the help of YouTube and lots of persistence, she taught herself what she needed to know to transform her new home on wheels. She built the entire conversion herself and now enjoys traveling with her dog, oscar, and encouraging others to take a leap of faith and believe in their dreams. She maintains a blog where she shares about her van build, adventures of van life and other outdoor adventure travel stories. Thank you, claire, for being with us. Thank you for having me. Okay, yes, of course. Did I miss anything in that bio, or was that? Did I nail it? I think you nailed it.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:I didn't know if I left out any juicy details. I didn't want to miss anything. Okay, claire, if you've listened to our podcast, which hopefully you have at this stage you- know at least one episode, at least one. You know we start every episode with your first money memory, so can you walk us through your first money memory?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I was trying to think like how far back can I go? And I'm unimpressively able to only get back to elementary school, but my mom used to pack our lunch every day. And then she would include two quarters so we could buy. They have these like I think every school probably had these but these delicious chocolate chip cookies that were warm and like a little bit gooey. They were so good. So we would always get 50 cents in our lunchbox so we could buy our dessert. And at some point through the school year I realized that if, instead of buying my cookie with the 50 cents, I would just save it, then at the end of the school year I would have enough money to go buy something better. So I just started hoarding my quarters with one of my friends. We would just collect all of our spare change and I never told my mom this until the end of the school year that I wasn't doing anything with the 50 cents that she was giving us every day, just collecting it in a little bag. And then at the end of the school year we went and we bought so much nail polish and the thing is, I think we only had like $10, like it didn't end up being a ton of money, but I just remember thinking we went to write it and we collected all of these. Like you know, little girl stuff like lip gloss, nail polish, all the stuff.
Speaker 2:I love that. I'm so impressed because, listen, I would not have saved those quarters. I would have spent them, maybe not on the chocolate chip cookies those are not necessarily my jam but I would have found some sort of something else to spend my money on, like you, know, because you're German, and Germans don't really do desserts. That is not true. But I'm more of like a gummy bear person. Like you can keep your chocolate cookies, but like give me like a gummy and I'll spend my money on that. But I'm just really impressed that in elementary school you were thinking ahead to like if I save this, I can buy something bigger, because that's I mean that, that. I think that's impressive.
Speaker 4:No, I would definitely be impressed if our kids had done that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think I don't know that either one of our children would not spend their money. I mean, we talk about money all the time and we talk about putting money in the piggy bank and there's three and five, so we're still working on them, yeah but I mean that's especially when other people are spending their money, you know, in the school cafeteria it's like you want to do what they're doing. So that's a lot of self-control. I'm very impressed here. I'm very impressed.
Speaker 1:So do you think that's something that you think Like there's? Oh, I'm sorry. Oh no you go ahead. I think if you frame it like you're not giving up something but you're just waiting to get something better, it doesn't seem like you're sacrificing yeah.
Speaker 4:Try telling a five-year-old that I know.
Speaker 2:Do you remember in your house? So your, your mom gave you 50 cents a day. So what is that? $2.50 a week?
Speaker 4:Read up, you're right, I just laughing at the fact that you were like asking me.
Speaker 2:You made me second guess myself. Okay, I'm going to confidently say she gave you $2.50 a week. Did you talk about money at home, growing up in general, or where did the saving mentality come from?
Speaker 1:So I think that I learned more by observation. I don't, and maybe we did, but I don't recall any specific conversations when it came to savings or a typing or any kind of like charitable donations. But I watched my parents talk about their savings accounts and their 401Ks. You know like in the peripheral kind of. I knew they were talking about it, but I didn't really know what it meant or what the specifics were. So I think it was more of just like watching what they were doing and almost mimicking, but not necessarily having a direct conversation about like what you should do and education on how things work and things like that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it's so important too, even just you saying that, like you know, if they're saying whatever their conversation is in passing and you kind of overhear it, it still resonates with you to a certain level. Whereas, you know, there's some children who either are hearing, you know, their parents, guardians, whoever they're living with, maybe fighting about money, so then they have like a negative memory or experience or they don't hear anything right. And then those are the people who are like you can't talk about money, it's so taboo, it's. You know, it's not right, it's disrespectful or, you know, whatever the phrases are that people use. So it's good that you kind of absorbed it, even though it wasn't like a sit-down lesson or anything formal, right?
Speaker 4:I would say kids pick up on a lot of things that adults say around them that you don't even realize. Because if you remember, when you know, a couple of years back, when our daughter was, she was maybe two years old and she had like a little fake credit card and she already had the idea that she's gonna use a credit card to buy stuff. And she was only two, maybe three years old and we hadn't talked to her about it. But she sees us talking about you know certain things or doing things, and she had already picked up on it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, osmosis. Okay, let's talk about your life in a van and how you got there. When did this journey start for you?
Speaker 1:So the idea of van life was first introduced to me in. I was in New Zealand, so this was January of 2020. So right before everything started and I had some friends over there and they would have they were more like weekend warriors. They had these vehicles that in New Zealand, I mean, you can drive not very far and be in these amazing places. So on the weekends they'd go out and I'd get these pictures of, you know, deep blue pools and just gorgeous stuff that they were getting into every weekend and I thought like one day I'm definitely gonna do that, I would like to live that lifestyle also. But I didn't have a timeline in mind and then the world shut down and I just got really stir crazy. I went back to visit my parents for what was supposed to be two weeks at the time, so this is probably September or October Now of 2020, I go to visit them and while I'm there, I don't know what changed in my brain, but I was like I'm gonna look at vans and then I saw one that was for sale and I thought I'll just go look at it and then I bought it. So the progression happened Same day like on the spot, Not the same exact date, but this all happened within like two weeks maybe Okay. And going to pick it up. I had carpooled out with my mom so that I could drive it back and she could drive the other vehicle, and I remember just looking at her being like I'm gonna go drop all this money on this empty vehicle, that the first thing I'm gonna do is depreciate it by cutting holes in it, and I don't know if I can finish the project and I don't even know if I like living nomadically. So there was, like all of this stuff where I was like I probably should have thought this through a little bit better. But I think at that point I had been thinking it through, but not in a linear way. I think my whole life probably had been some progression towards where I am now. I've always loved to travel and things like that, so was it a little rash, probably? But also I think believing that you can do something and then just fully committing is a really good way to ensure that you actually do something.
Speaker 2:Okay, what did your parents say?
Speaker 1:They have always been very supportive of me, even when I have like some wild ideas. I think my dad probably thought that he was gonna be a lot more hands on on the bill than I ended up allowing, I guess he did offer to help, but I was kind of like no, no, I wanna do it, and my mom's always just a cheerleader. She's like, yeah, you can do it. Yeah, you can live an alternative lifestyle, yeah, you can do whatever you want, and if it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out and you pivot. So I think without them things would be harder, because I do think they take the stress out of it to just say like it's just one thing, and if it doesn't work, then you go do a different thing.
Speaker 2:I love that. I think my dad is like that. He's definitely the cheerleader that's like okay, if it doesn't work, you move on, you try something else, and I think having that mindset has helped me take some risks in life as well. But I'm wondering at that stage you're like, okay, I'm buying this van, I know I'm gonna gut it and totally change it had you already been researching how to convert a van so that it's livable, like, did you have a Pinterest board and you were ready to go? Or were you like, oh no, now I have this van and I have to start my research from scratch?
Speaker 1:So I thought that I had it figured out. I had been doing some research, like I knew the general layout that I wanted to build and I knew that I wanted to have this type of solar panel and this type of battery and that kind of thing. But when I started getting into it it gets so much deeper than that, right it's like. But then how are you gonna connect your batteries? Is it gonna be in series or is it gonna be in parallel? And I'm like I didn't even know there was options. So I did think I had it figured out. But mostly YouTube. I spent hours on YouTube. There's so much good information. I genuinely believe you can learn absolutely any skill you want to on YouTube.
Speaker 4:I have a strong disliking for people who ask me questions that you can Google. I'm like have you tried finding the answer at all on your own? You remember you fixed our dryer at the old house YouTube University Because everything is on YouTube, like this day and age, like if you have the will to do it, like you said, you could pretty much learn almost anything, or at least the basics. There's certain things that I just won't do because it's a high level of error and then not to pay for the error, you don't have to like collect and compute yourself. I mean for a lot of basic things. I mean YouTube's a great tool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, just knowing what's involved makes you more informed as a consumer. So if somebody's like, oh, this is gonna be a $20,000 job and you're like it takes three hours, that doesn't sound right, you know just, it helps to be informed too.
Speaker 2:Absolutely Okay. So you bought the van. How much did you pay for it? I'm gonna pay for it Okay.
Speaker 1:So I will say I paid $45,000 for the van. I bought it brand new and originally I was looking for a used van. But that was when the used market had started to go wild and it was just a few thousand dollars more to buy a brand new vehicle versus something that had 40,000 miles on it already. So that seemed like a good deal. But the caveat I'll put here is you can't buy a camper van, afford transit right now for $45,000. So I did get lucky. I just happened to hit the market at the right time before the prices skyrocketed.
Speaker 2:And then your conversion. Do you know how much you've put into it to make it? I've seen it online. It's absolutely gorgeous. If that is the same van we're talking about, how much more did you put in?
Speaker 1:So I put in another $20,000. So all in the build cost me about 65. But again I'll say I just didn't spare an expense. I was still working full time and tech and just I wanted everything. So I have the full battery pack, the full solar panels, I have a shower, all of it I don't use half of it is what I've learned. So I think you can get away with doing a $5,000 to $10,000 build out. But the electrical is where it gets very expensive.
Speaker 2:Okay, so let's talk about. I think what you just mentioned is really interesting, that you don't use half of it. What are you not using? Like are you not showering there every day, like you thought you would, or like just walk us through it?
Speaker 1:I want to start by saying I have good personal hygiene but I don't use the shower in the van. I thought I was like I shower every day, multiple times a day. I'm just like I'm that person who's constantly washing her hands. That has not changed. But like, the shower here because it's not hooked up to city water means I have to fill the freshwater tank and then when I shower I then have to dump the gray water tank. So there's a lot more involved to just like have the water in the system, and I realized that I don't like showering as much as is required to like fill and dump. I would rather not fill and dump and not shower than have to do all of that. So I actually just use. It's amazing to me. It's a lot easier to find showers than I expected. But truck stops, rec centers, aquatic centers will usually just let you drop in for like a shower pass. It's like three or five dollars. You don't even have to get the day pass. And then I have a planet fitness membership. All planet businesses have showers in their locker rooms. So for $25 a month I think is what it is I can come and go and work out too.
Speaker 4:So there are options.
Speaker 1:I do shower yeah.
Speaker 2:Thank you for maintaining your hygiene during this van life.
Speaker 4:You look very clean. Yes, okay.
Speaker 2:So, but you need to plan right. So that takes, unless you're just naturally and I don't know what your workout schedule is or whatever like branded could easily shower every single day, every morning, at planet fitness because that's part of his day. Anyways, are you now having to scope out where the planet fitnesses are, where the aquatic centers are, and kind of maneuvering your life around where you have those facilities available to you?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that was probably like the hardest transition was now, all of a sudden, it's not like you can just like get up, have breakfast, shower and get out the door and it's only seven 30. I'm like the time it takes me to do all of those things. Some mornings it's like 11 am, just because the shower is 45 minutes away or something, and that's a rare, rare example. But the logistics and the time required to figure out where is the grocery store, where is the shower, where can I get fresh water for my freshwater tank, like where are all these places located, and then driving to them. It's very time consuming. And last year I traveled pretty quickly so I was constantly in new places and constantly going through like the logistics checklist of where are these things. And this year I realized, if I go a lot slower and I just stay in the same place for a while, I only have to figure out where the shower is once every other week and then when I moved to a new location, I find a new shower. So slowing down has helped in a lot of different ways.
Speaker 2:That makes sense. Are there any like? I was talking to a Tesla owner the other week and I clearly knew nothing about Tesla, or at least I thought I knew, and then she like really educated me and I was like, oh my gosh, I had no idea. Are there apps like similar to the Tesla app, where you have the charging stations but for people who are on the road like you, to help navigate, where you can go, where you can plug in, where you can get fresh water, anything available like that?
Speaker 1:Yeah there are. I actually had no idea there was a Tesla and I want to go look at that. I feel like that might be helpful too.
Speaker 2:I don't know how exclusive it is. It's mostly for charging stations.
Speaker 1:Interesting. I use an app called iOverlander and there's a bunch of things on there, but you can find showers and water like potable water, phillips dump stations, even places to do laundry, that everything. So that's my favorite. I found that that one has got the most options and it's all user generated and crowdsourced information. And I also love it because it has reviews, so if I'm trying to find a place to camp overnight, I can read the other reviews from people who were there recently just to see, like, how accessible is the road, because I don't have four-wheel drive, so it's a really rough road. I can't necessarily access it. Is there anything like sketchy? Like, a couple of times I've seen things that I was like well, that's a place to avoid. If there's cell signal, all sorts of things you can find.
Speaker 2:Wow, okay. So this is a lot to just plan the logistics I'm tapping out. It's not for me. I would do it for a weekend. I definitely am not committing to this lifestyle.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I'd be more of a van person than you would.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's not for me.
Speaker 4:So what does a typical day for you look like?
Speaker 1:So I have, I feel like, two different types of typical days. There's like that I'm actually working and getting things done, so it's just getting up. I try not to drive, I try to park somewhere where I can also work the next day. But sometimes if you're passing through and you're in a cracker barrel, you know you're like, well, where's the nearest park or somewhere where there's like greenery. You don't want to hang out in cracker barrels parking all day. Get up, get like the coffee or I'm now on matcha, I gave up coffee but get that running. Kind of there's no way to live in this vehicle and not constantly tidy. So the bed gets made every day, all the clothes get put up, everything gets put away. And then I'm honestly I sit down and I have like a forever an hour a day on my computer, with obvious breaks to go let the dog out because he'll remind me if I forget. And that's what I think most of my days look like. But then occasionally if I'm near like a national park or something, I'm mostly just outside hiking and things like that. National parks get tricky because there's not great cell service. So you kind of have to like make the most of your time while you're there and optimize your non-working hours so you can get all of your outdoor fun things done and back to somewhere with service.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay. So you mentioned work. I know you left corporate. Are you freelancing? Are you back to the corporate life? What does that look like for you now?
Speaker 1:I have a couple of different things that I do. My main focus this year has been just getting my website up and running. So I have a blog where I write about van life and creating content for that has been my primary focus. I also, prior to doing that, had to learn how to do that. So learning SEO, search engine optimization, so that what I write about is actually things people are looking for and want to hear and read about. So I do that and the goal there is to have more or less of a what's the right word, something that's already built and will sustain itself. My end goal in life is to not not work, but to be able to work and then take time off and work and take time off and, when I'm taking time off, not worry about all of the income streams still producing. And the thing I like about having the website is, once you've created the content, your job is almost done. It just keeps pulling in traffic and people are reading your page. And then I have affiliate links. So that's how I make money on my website right now and occasionally some sponsorships. Last year I was doing more freelance, so my background is in marketing and I was doing a lot of freelancing for marketing clients, which is something I still do, but it's on the back burner for the time being. And the third thing that I have are a couple of investment properties, so the rental checks that I get every month for those also help.
Speaker 2:Okay, that's a great pivot because I know when we chatted originally or chatted via email, you were talking about your 50 to $70,000 a year in your, your business. You were talking about your $70,000 a year in your, your corporate, nine to five, but that you were able to acquire three condos and one duplex on that salary and then that has helped you. You know, buy the van, convert it and kind of live this road life. Is that correct? Yes, yeah, okay. How did you buy three condos and a duplex on 70K a year? Yeah, equity lines of credit.
Speaker 1:So I actually bought my first primary condo, so my where I would live in 2014. So it's only been 10 years that I've even owned real estate at all. And I was in my mid 20s. I was making. I was either making like 40 or $45,000 a year. It was not a lot of money, but it was enough to qualify for a mortgage at least then, and I remember I was pre-approved to spend up to almost $200,000. Again, I know the numbers are way different today, but I was looking at the thinking I don't like the payment on a $200,000 house. That seems like a lot of what I'm actually actually bringing home each month. So I spent less than that almost half as much as that on my first condo and I did an FHA loan. So I only had to bring I think it was like three and a half or maybe 5% to closing and at the time I remember thinking I only had to bring 5%. I always had thought I had to bring 20%. So it felt like home ownership was far less attainable for me because I could never get the 20%. But I put down three and a half percent or whatever it was. I bought a distressed property and it needed work, but it was mostly cosmetic stuff that I knew I was capable of doing myself. So I lived in a construction zone for six months while I was redoing floors and painting and all that kind of stuff and it was cheaper. My mortgage was cheaper than what my rent had been. So it was a net positive in a lot of different ways and because I had done a lot of the renovation work myself. And it was again it was cosmetic. It was like I ripped out the carbous and I put in hardwood flooring and fixtures and paints and things like that, and I did it all myself. And then at the end of a year the value of my home had gone up One it had appraised because the market typically appreciates overtime. But also there was all of this sweat equity right Things that I had done to it that I only paid for the materials but not the labor. So the whole value was higher than what I actually had contributed myself to the project. So I then took the money from that and I think maybe it was three years later it wasn't immediate, it was a couple of years later and I got a home equity line of credit from the bank for the difference between what the mortgage was worth and then what the value of the home was worth. So essentially a second mortgage on the property and I used that money. So I basically used additional debt on my primary house to buy the duplex and that was my down payment for that property. And then when I bought that property again it was distressed. So I needed to do a lot of the work myself, which I did, and it was just the cycle was you'd buy something slightly that needed a little bit of work, but not like massive walls and structure and things like that right Things I could do myself, but that other investors didn't see his turnkey and weren't as interested in. So just rinse and repeat and that's kind of how I got to where I was in 2020. I had the three condos. One of them was mine, the other two were rentals, which I was actually putting up on Airbnb. And then I had the duplex and the market was really high and I knew I want to do the van life thing. So I sold two of the condos and I did a 1031 exchange. So I used the profit from one of them to roll it into another house and then offset the taxes. So I didn't pay taxes on the profit of the sale of the condo. But I will eventually someday when I sell the property I bought with the proceeds and the second condo, I put the money into a savings account and that's what I used to help bridge the income gap when I left corporate and went out and tried to stand up my own income streams.
Speaker 2:I want to know how we went from getting 50 cents a day for chocolate chip cookies to 1031s and multiple income properties Like. Where did you learn all of this?
Speaker 4:I love the way you explained it to me.
Speaker 2:It was so great.
Speaker 4:A lot of people don't realize that you know one of the benefits of buying a slightly distressed property and fixing it up is that you obviously purchase it at a lower cost point. But then once you do the you know, you fix it up, you can actually go ahead and refi and you could be, you know, qualified for the home equity. The home equity, the equity in the home, is going to be more so for us. Like I said, it gave her money to go ahead and go and purchase another property.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah. So I have two thoughts. The home equity line of credit is great because you only pay on what you've pulled. It's just like a credit card, right? It's not an actual loan where they just deposit $30,000 into your account and you start paying interest. Today it's, you have access to the 30,000 or whatever it is right, but you're only paying interest when you're using it and then, as soon as you pay it back, you stop paying the interest. But you could pull on it again, over and over again, for usually 10 years. So it's great vehicle for investing quickly and being able to be nimble, and I think in this market that's probably a really big selling point. But yeah, I just I started. You know where it all started. I read the Dave Ramsey book. I was in debt and I wanted to get out of credit card debt, I said the first one I agree with. There's a few things in there that I think are helpful the concept that and I think this isn't just his, but like in general, that you want to. What is it? You live like nobody else today so you can live like nobody else tomorrow. All through my twenties, I was working on the weekends ripping out carpet and painting walls and my friends were sitting around pools drinking and having a blast and I was, you know, cash paying for things because I was trying to get rid of my credit card debt and whatever. So I wasn't. I wasn't doing like all the crazy things in my twenties that I probably could have been, which also maybe contributes to why I'm doing them now. But I think just the concept of your life small little sacrifices really add up quickly. And when I say that, like, I've been investing in real estate, it's only been 10 years and probably since 2017 is when I started getting investment properties. So that's only been what? Six years, and I have multiple rental checks that come in every day. So it doesn't take forever and ever. It's not like what you're doing today You're not going to see for 30 years, you will incrementally see the payback come in and then it snowballs and it gets bigger and bigger. But yeah, I just I got my feet wet just trying to figure out how do I pay off this. I think it was like $30,000 on my credit cards it was something crazy and I was again only making like $40,000 a year, so I didn't have the ability to pay it down really quickly. So that's where some of the freelancing would come in. How do I make more money without having to get like a different job or how can I sell things? How can I stop spending so much money? Like looking at where I was spending my money, and then just the mindset I think of, like you said, youtube or asking questions. I think anybody listening to this podcast is already in that mindset where they're trying to figure out like how can I be smarter, how can I do more and how can I make better informed decisions for myself, and I think just asking the question is the prerequisite to get where you want to be. Oh, I love that.
Speaker 4:One thing I want to make sure that people caught when she said that was is that she had $30,000 of credit card debt and she managed to get out of that credit card debt and get to where she's at now.
Speaker 2:You're like the poster child for where everybody wants to be right, like get out of debt, have investment properties, be work optional right. I mean you're like hitting so many points and like there's so many obviously online there's so many buzzwords and terms and things that people are like do this and you'll never have to work again and you know. But you really are showing like you don't have to make a million dollars a year to get out of debt, to live the life that you want, to take a risk to maybe have rental income, if that's what you're looking to accomplish. Like you're really hitting so many of the points that I think people are interested in, which I think is so fantastic.
Speaker 4:Yeah, because I think maybe someone that they like just heard where you're at now, present day, with your life. They're like oh, she probably was at advantage in this point. She had this given to her, this and this and that, and that's not necessarily the case. You did all you know. Obviously, we all have help in some form or fashion, but you did a lot of this on your own. So it's like the everyday common person can do this. It's just a matter of, like you said, like you know you don't want me asking what caused you to get the credit card debt bad spending habits.
Speaker 1:Honestly, I would go to home goods on Saturday morning because I was bored and I would buy a $20 thing and then I'd do that the next weekend and the next weekend. So when I actually decided I was going to get out of debt, I sat down and I went through all of the expenses that I had over the last couple of months and added up how much was I spending in this category and how much was I spending in that category. And those were the. There was two that were really surprising to me. One was like the random things for the house, you know, like Halloween decorations, things like that I don't need and I don't want and I don't have space for. Those were adding up to like $300 a month just on little knickknacks and stuff that I didn't seek out. I wasn't thinking like I'm going to go out today and buy this. I was just like I'm going to walk around and if I like something I'm going to pick it up. And then I had a small Starbucks addiction, so that was the other thing I had to get rid of.
Speaker 2:Do you feel like looking back now? That cause, you know we always say it's not the lattes, Like now. I'm sure you enjoy.
Speaker 4:It was the habit.
Speaker 2:The habit was out of the structure, because if you're budgeting for the latte, there you go, get that iced coffee, girl. I mean, if you're budgeting for it, if it's accounted for, then it you know, because otherwise it becomes that random little Halloween trinket, right, it's the same bucket of like. Well, I wasn't planning on getting it today, but I'm now getting the $7 coffee that I didn't account for, Right? I mean, you can have the latte. I think there's exactly.
Speaker 1:And the mindset around why are you? Why are you getting it? Because for me, the coffee was I don't really want to go to work right now, but I'll stop at Starbucks on the way home and then it's like I'm not really going, I'm not leaving the house and going to work, I'm going to Starbucks and then I'm going to work. So you know, there was like these little things in my brain that were more like emotional triggers and the home goods thing. I literally was bored. I think that's what it was. I was like I need to leave the house and I need to go do something. Well, once you identify why you're spending the money and like what it's fulfilling for you, you can just pivot, you know. So now I'm like, oh well, I'll just go for a walk instead or I'll plan to hang out with my friends on Saturday mornings. You know, I'll redirect the energy to something that does not cost me money. And with the Starbucks thing too, I knew that I liked good coffee and I wanted to keep having good coffee. So I figured if I'm spending $100 a month on Starbucks, why don't I just go buy a really nice coffee maker for my house? That's $100. And after one month I'll have broken even and then I'll just be making myself free good coffee every morning. So I did that. But I think when you have the mentality that like it's not that the $100 is going to add up miraculously to saving a million dollars every year, but it puts you in the habit of thinking about what you're doing and why you're spending the money and what the value to you actually is. Is it worth it or is it not worth it? And then I think it percolates beyond just Starbucks, but you kind of start questioning all of the different transactions that you have.
Speaker 4:Yeah, I couldn't have said it better. Like I said, I never think might hear that whole thing like, oh, it's all about the you know the coffee, that you buy them more. I'm like, no, it's not the coffee, it's just like you said, it's the habit. And once you start to change those small habits they start to infiltrate into other aspects of your life and it just becomes how you think about purchases in general, whether you become much better at determining the difference between a one and a need.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but there's still people and I mean, obviously you're fiscally responsible in your living. You know the life that makes you happy and if that involves a matcha or a coffee, now it's part of the plan, right? Like I follow somebody on Instagram and she has a whole financial coaching business and she had, like, grew up homeless and all these things. And now you know, based on what we see, I believe she's a multi-millionaire. But she's like I go to Starbucks every single day. She's like I'm not giving it up, it's my like happy, happy part of my morning. It sets me up, it gets my mind right. She's like this is what I need to start my day on a good foot and that's the habit that she's built. But you know she's also talking about her investments and her savings and you know how she's diversifying and all the things. So, again, it's not the lattes, it's the habit. Are you planning for it? Is it built into your budget or is it not? And for some of us, like I love getting my nails done, I mean I do love my coffees as well, but, like we all have something that is important to us, that brings us joy, and we shouldn't cut the joy out, right, we just need to plan for it. I think that's the important part.
Speaker 1:Exactly Like you just use what you want to afford. Some things are worth it and some things aren't worth it for you and they might be for somebody else, and that's kind of the beauty of all of it.
Speaker 2:Exactly OK. So you are freelancing, you are working for yourself. Talk to us about what you're doing now to save money. And what does retirement look like? You know you're no longer getting. You know I don't know if you had one, but like a company match. So what is? What is retirement planning look like for you now?
Speaker 1:So I don't feel like I'm educated on the retirement side of the world as well as I probably should be. While I was working I was always contributing to do to receive the full match, but when I left corporate America I kind of took a step back from that. The way that I see my retirement right now is in the investment properties that I have continuing to maintain and appreciate and at the same time, I'm not paying the mortgage on those properties. I never will. Somebody else's rent check pays the mortgage and what's left over is what comes to me as my profit for the month. So having properties that I purchased when I was in my late 20s, early 30s and don't necessarily need to pull the equity out of until retirement, I think those will have a long time to appreciate and luckily and this is nothing I could have possibly planned but they're all located in Raleigh, which is going nuts right as far as appreciation. So that is a very nice perk but, like I say, like you can't get lucky if you don't play the game. Real estate typically appreciates. So I had anticipated appreciation in some form not 20% year over year in some cases, but when you get that hand dealt to you, that's where the HELOC comes in, right Like the home equity line of credit. Just saying, I've got a lot of equity sitting in this property, what can I do to put it into the next thing? I know real estate, I like real estate, so for me it seems like a safer move to invest and put my resources into that, because I understand the rules of the game, whereas 401K is, and all that really just confuses me and at some point I fully plan to sit down and learn it, but I have not yet.
Speaker 2:OK, well, I think I mean multiple properties in Raleigh. You know we're constantly showing up on the best places to move, and I mean all the tech companies. Being here is certainly not going to hurt you in any way, so that's fantastic.
Speaker 4:So, with your freelance that you're doing is that under the structure of like a business as far as like an LLC?
Speaker 1:Yep, probably under an LLC.
Speaker 4:There could be some benefits there as far as setting up some type of retirement plan if needed.
Speaker 1:Yes, my focus has not been working for the last two years. So I'm working enough to pay the bills, but I have not been working enough to like refill the coffers. You know, but probably next year I'm going to need to put the burners on again, so I'll have to come replace some of these podcasts, I think.
Speaker 4:But that's nice, that you did all that work so that you couldn't, you know, afford yourself to have that timeframe and not have to work. You know you're doing things that you know you enjoy and also are bringing in money, but you didn't have to do it. And one of the biggest things I tell individuals when they say like hey, you know I want to quote, unquote retire as early as possible rental properties, the quickest way to replace your income.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Are you saving money by living in the van?
Speaker 1:Yes and no. So, the van itself does not cost me very much aside from the initial build, but like to maintain it month over month. It's not very expensive and also because it's a newer vehicle with low miles, it doesn't have a lot of maintenance costs and there's not really a lot of unpredictable expenses associated with it, which is very nice. I also live mostly off the grid, so I don't pay for campsites. I typically don't pay for water or electricity because I have solar panels, so I don't have a lot of the typical monthly expenses that are common with like a house, except for gas. So that's the wild card, because gas prices I don't control. They are different all over the country where I am. They're almost $450, maybe almost $5 here actually per gallon, and sometimes I travel a lot and sometimes I don't travel very much at all. So my gas can range from like two or 300 a month all the way up to a thousand, depending on how much I'm driving.
Speaker 2:How do you decide where to go?
Speaker 1:The weather. So I have a dog and it's a lot more difficult Like if I didn't have a dog. If it was hot, I would just go work in a library during the day. It's tricky to find a lot of places that are inside air conditioned and allow a pet, which means I have to leave him in the van. In that scenario, if the whole point is to escape the heat, that's not going to work for us. So, yeah, it's very weather related. So where is it not raining? Where is it not over 80 degrees? And wildfires are actually another really big thing, especially like in the Northwest, that we try to aim around.
Speaker 2:What about traveling solo as a woman and safety and anything you've done to accommodate the van or outfit the van for extra safety and security for yourself?
Speaker 1:So I thought I would be a lot more nervous and scared on the road being alone than I in reality I actually ended up being. There is something very comforting about being in a metal box you can lock at night, I have a security system, have several weapons and I also have very bright LED lights mounted on my roof. So if I need to leave the van at night or I mean there's a couple of times where my dog has gotten sick in the middle of the night so we're outside with that and more like I'm worried about the wildlife and I'm worried about people. But being in grizzly territory out at 3 am with a dog who's getting sick, you're like who can see us that we can't see right now. So I have those bright lights up there and then all of my windows have blackout on them, so I'm able to be in here at night and nobody can see him.
Speaker 2:Like you were about to say something.
Speaker 4:No, I was going to say like, you know what is the biggest surprise that you've had for seeing happening or occurring, you know, transition to van life.
Speaker 1:Ooh, the biggest one. I thought it would be a lot easier to find community on the road and there's a big van life community. If you look at like social media if you're on Instagram it's, you see a lot of people doing it, or at least it appears that there are a lot of people doing it. The reality is that I actually spend a lot of my time by myself and while I do have friends who live a similar lifestyle and are on the road, we're not typically in the same place at the same time or we're just ships passing in the night. So it's harder to build and maintain friendships. And I have always considered myself to be introverted and I do think that I am. But when you're out in the back country by yourself for four or five days, you start wondering like maybe I'm more extroverted than I thought I was, because I'd really love to talk to somebody right now. So I think that was probably the biggest surprise is it's just more difficult to meet up with people and build friendships and relationships, and that's hard as an adult to begin with.
Speaker 4:And I have a question to ask them. If you don't want to answer it, obviously don't answer. How would dating or anything like that work, Are you? Dating is tricky.
Speaker 2:It's like a really small apartment, right.
Speaker 1:But you have to drive everywhere, so parking is a problem in big cities and things like that. So there's that added complication. Plus, I have a dog, so I need to consider that I can't just like not everything is available to me some places I need to be a little bit more cautious that he is in the vehicle. Dating in general is tricky, obviously, but when you're nomadic it's harder. I think it'd be okay if you already had a foundation with somebody and it wasn't a new relationship to be like all right, well, I'll see you in two months. But it's not that way. You might go on a date with somebody, or two or three dates with somebody while you're in town. Then you're leaving town again and you don't have like the relationship hasn't developed to a point where you're willing to fly back to town to see that person or reroute to go see that person. So I think the logistics of it are very complicated and, to be honest with you, like I haven't been trying that hard.
Speaker 4:I feel like it works better for a female because I'm just thinking as a guy, like if I hop on a dating app and I start talking to someone, I'm like I live in a van.
Speaker 2:Yeah Red flags.
Speaker 1:But for me, if I'm like I live in a van, everyone's like oh my God, can I see your van? That's so cool. What do you think? They have a thousand questions and then I start wondering. I'm like, do they like me or do they like my van?
Speaker 2:Oh, well, you're super easy to like and your van is super cute, so I'm sure it's both Hopefully.
Speaker 1:And then it doesn't help that I have this super cute dog, and so that's the other thing I'm like me, my van or the dog.
Speaker 2:You know all three triple, triple threat.
Speaker 4:So do you foresee yourself ever you know, transitioning back to quote unquote normal life, living in a home and stationary?
Speaker 1:I think at some point yes, like 10 years from now I'll probably be in a house somewhere, but I don't know what the interim there looks like. I do know that for the next year I would like to keep doing this. I have a couple of ideas bouncing around my head of what I'd like. My van is actually for sale right now and I thought if it sells, the market's not great right now, but if it sells before October, I was going to buy another van and do another build. I really like the build process, so I thought about doing that. But if it doesn't sell before October, at least then I don't have the time to do the build this winter. I'll just maintain this vehicle for another year, and I think that's also just like a totally fine option, right, Like it's nice to know that, no matter which option it ends up being, I like all of them. And then I kind of want to do a tiny house build and get some land and live in a tiny house. So I thought, yeah, OK, we'll have to talk. But I thought that might be more of a three to five year goal for me, because at least then you have more of community and established daily routines, and as much as I love not having those right now, I do miss them and I don't think that I could entirely live like I don't know what I'm doing tomorrow or next week or I can't make a dentist appointment because I'm not sure what I'm going to be in town. It's a lot, it's amazing, but it's not like a forever thing.
Speaker 2:OK, I have a few follow up questions that I just thought about. Do you pay car insurance and home insurance? How is your insurance set up for this vehicle?
Speaker 1:This van is not registered as an RV. It's registered as a passenger vehicle, so for that reason it's not insured as an RV. And insurance debate on custom built vans is so complicated. It depends on your state and then even that certain companies will insure and certain companies won't insure. So I use eerie insurance in North Carolina and it's a regular vehicle, but it has a lot of custom added to it. So it's the base price of what the vehicle is worth, Plus I think it's another $60,000, which gets me to the point where if I totaled it, I could get another van built with what the insurance payout would be, and then all of my stuff inside is just a line item as personal.
Speaker 2:Is that the most cost effective way to do it?
Speaker 1:There's no cost effective way to do it. I did try that code, if I, because you can get the registration on the vehicle changed to an RV or in North Carolina they call it this really cool thing called a house car and you just go to the DMV. I'm thinking that weird. But you can go to the DMV and I think there's like a list of six or 10 things or something and you have to have a certain number of things on the list. So do you have a toilet? Do you have an oven? Do you have running water? Do you have heat or AC? Is there electricity in the vehicle? There's like a just a little list of things and for the most part it's not hard to qualify and then they just change the type of registration on the vehicle to an RV and then when you have that, you can ensure it as an RV. But when I priced them out and again this is North Carolina, so I think it probably is different depending on where you are they were very comparable in the monthly premiums and I was not. I was too lazy to go get the registration change to not save any money. So Okay, that's super interesting.
Speaker 2:Thanks for breaking that down for us. The next question is because you like the build so much, would you do it for other people? Like, have people approached you to do their van? Yes, you're not in your head. You're like no, I only do it for my van.
Speaker 1:I would not build for other people. I could potentially see myself helping with components of the build, and I've seen some people do this where if they're, if they know they're going to be in like Northern California for a couple of months doing their own van life, traveling but there's a person in that area who's doing their own build and just needs help with the electrical installation or building cabinets, they'll they'll stop and help and do part of the build with that person. I that sounds fun to me too. I just think the pressure of building something for other people who I didn't know exactly what I wanted when I built this so I'm very much projecting when I say this but like changing your mind constantly and then always having to like stop and pivot, it just seems a lot like corporate to me. So I'm not interested in that. I do have consulting?
Speaker 4:Yeah, I was literally about to ask you that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I have on my website. You can sign up just for like chunks of time to just ask questions, and I I liked the idea of that because there was a couple of things that were really confusing to me and I could find, for example, the electrical system. You can see schematics and things like that online, but then when it comes time to apply it to your application, there's just especially with something like that, electricity. You're like I'd love to ask somebody just to make sure that, like I am understanding correctly, before I go blow up a 3000 piece of equipment $3,000 piece of equipment because I've connected it backwards, you know. So I have that on my website as well.
Speaker 4:Let's say, if you end up, you know, selling your van and getting another one doing the build, you gotta film everything.
Speaker 2:Yeah, people want to see it.
Speaker 4:Because you can literally turn that into like a how to video and then charge people to have access to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a great idea.
Speaker 2:Also, have you thought about renting it out and making it another income property, or is that too much? Because it's on wheels and it's.
Speaker 1:I think the reason why it's too much is because of the turnover. So like when it comes in from a rental and you have to get it flipped out, the door requires some sort of permanency and location that I don't want right now. I don't trust that somebody else would like check the odometer and check the tires and just check everything when it comes back in for like that off boarding checklist before it goes out to the next person.
Speaker 2:It may just control for that. We had friends that were renting out like a true camper, and even that, they said, was just a disaster.
Speaker 1:It's a big learning curve If you haven't rented something before. I mean even just like, how does the water system work and the electrical? It's like you have to turn things off. God forbid, you have to turn anything off, like the batteries and the solar, but it has to go in a certain order, because if you do it in the reverse order, you blow the charge controller, for example. So I don't know. It just seems like A lot of work.
Speaker 2:Well, it's beautiful and I hope you get an offer soon and then you can work on the next build.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much. Okay, Claire.
Speaker 2:Oh, I'm so glad we always want our guests to leave our listeners with a piece of advice or something that you want people to know. Is there anything that we haven't talked about today that you want to share with our listeners?
Speaker 1:I think just trying things and taking small risks. I'm sorry the dog just coughed and somebody starting their car. We can't hear it at all, you're fine. Well then, I've just ruined it myself, taking and trying new things and knowing that, like, failure isn't necessarily a problem and debt isn't necessarily bad. Right, like you can try a lot of things and if it doesn't end up the way you wanted it to doesn't mean that didn't work. It just worked a different way Than what you originally thought. And something like going further into debt on your house because you've put a home equity line of credit on to take that money and use it as an investment to get something else that will produce income for you. That's not a bad thing either. Just do your research and ask the questions, and small movements will accumulate over time.
Speaker 2:Great advice. Thank you so much for being with us today. Don't forget Benjamin Franklin said an investment in knowledge pays the best interest. You just got paid until next time. Thanks for listening to today's episode. We are so glad to have you as part of our sugar daddy community. If you learned something today, please remember to subscribe, rate, review and share this episode with your friends, family and extended network. Don't forget to connect with us on social media at the sugar daddy podcast. You can also email us your questions you want us to answer for our past the sugar segments at the sugar daddy podcast at gmailcom or leave us a voicemail through our Instagram.
