Online Mesila lecture – advice for family budgeting

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About a year and a half ago, I contacted the community organization Mesila, to discuss the possibility of volunteering with them. I had a great conversation with the head of the program,a program that is geared towards helping people get out of debt and learn to live within their means. We were both very positive about my intended involvement – but their training for volunteer counselors was delayed. And by the time they contacted me to ask me to actively get involved, I had to tell them that I was busy with my plans to move to Israel and just couldn’t do it.

Recently Mesila sponsored a community-wide lecture in Baltimore, in which three prominent rabbis of the community spoke. I began watching this with ds13, but for some reason my computer stalled after the first rabbi, Rabbi Hopfer (who is a jewel of a person), spoke. I found his message so encouraging and validating – it was great to hear him telling the community how against the Torah way of life debt is, that having limits and learning to live within your means are actually positive values…You might say this is logical and obvious, but we live in times that are so focused on everyone having as much materially as they can, even if they don’t have the money for it, and sometimes the obvious isn’t so obvious.

I plan to try to listen to the rest of it another time, but like what I read about the rest of the evening. I especially appreciated that Rabbi Hauer recommended the book The Millionaire Next Door, a book that I’ve read several times and found to be helpful because it gives you a sense of how people really get rich – and it’s not by trying to look like they have more than they do! I found this book helpful for myself as a frugal person, because it encouraged me that I was on the right path and affirmed for me that living rich is being frugal.

Since I saw that the gist of the comments of the evening were written up, in addition to the online posting of the video of the event, I wanted to link it for others who might be interested. Here it is.

If you watched this presentation or read through the basic overview, I’d love to hear your feedback! What did you find to be the most important messages? What did you agree or disagree with most?

Avivah

Comments

14 responses to “Online Mesila lecture – advice for family budgeting”

March 5, 2012

Orthonomics

I enjoyed the presentation, especially the first presentation which outlined what I believe deep down, that an erlich Jew cannot live a “lifestyle” of debt. I also was glad The Millionaire Next Door was referenced. It should be mandatory reading and, furthermore, I think that living with wealth b’tzniut is something beautiful.

I took issue with trying to emphasize just how different we are by commenting on Dave Ramsey’s belief (he wasn’t named by name) that anyone can live on 40K or below if necessary “laughable”. That wasn’t a statement by any of the Rabbis. A frum Jew can go into austerity mode if need be. And it IS validating to know that if need be, we can downsize and live on a lot less, even while we enjoy whatever financial blessings we are currently experiencing.

I always find the question and answer sessions at such events a bit of a let down.

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1. March 5, 2012
  
  Avivah
  
  Thanks for your feedback, Ortho!
  
  I didn’t yet get to the part where the ‘laughable’ comment was made. I can say from personal experience that one can live a frum life making about 40K, even with a large family, and have a decent standard of living. (Living at 25K was austerity!) But when you believe something is impossible, you won’t even try it, and I dislike that dismissive attitude (this isn’t the first time I’ve seen/heard someone say how unrealistic Dave Ramsey’s suggestions are for the frum world).
  
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March 5, 2012

Anne

Thank you for the book recommendation – I was waffling on getting The Millionaire Next Door but I keep hearing good things about it and it’s $2.99 this month for Kindle.

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March 5, 2012

Orthonomics

The comment is from the introductory remarks. I believe that the Jewish community is actually at an advantage in many ways to exercise thrift because we are close knit and have a network of gemachs for borrowing and such.

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March 6, 2012

Shoshana Z.

The invisible elephant in the finances conversation is school tuition. It almost doesn’t matter what measures a family takes to control their spending, etc. An insane amount of income will be consumed by tuition. It almost seems insulting to throw people a rope and tell them not to overspend, etc. and then send them the school bill. I would love to hear what you all think.

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March 6, 2012

Orthonomics

Shoshana makes a point I’ve heard many times, and I do agree in many aspects. I think that there are those who can make the huge tuition bill and even save, but they can’t have any holes in their budget. For those for which paying tuition is the hole, well, then there is a big problem.

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1. March 7, 2012
  
  Avivah
  
  Shoshana, I totally agree with you, and have been saying the same thing for years. For the majority of people, tuition is the hole. And no amount of cost cutting is going to do anything to help that. And not only that, but it’s not encouraging to people to know that no matter how much they cut back and save, it won’t move them forward financially – it will only allow them to pay more tuition. Which is a worthy goal, but not so inspiring for the kind of committed action it would take to achieve those savings.
  
  I know that as frugal as I am, there’s no way we could have paid even the most discounted tuition for a family our size and stayed financially afloat. All my great strategies and commitment to living debt free wouldn’t have helped me (unless it led me to homeschool, lol!).
  
  I think the comments about living within ones’ means, though, are applicable to many people – even a large number of those struggling are trying to finance things that shouldn’t even be a consideration. (Eg – since when did expensive sleepaway camps become mandatory?)
  
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March 6, 2012

michal

Shoshana,

Because I only have two teens in schools currently ($40K) we can do it by really living on a Dave Ramsey budget, but it’s challenging. With more children in the system we could not do it and be full-payers. If we could not do it, we would not do it, as I believe Hashem wants us to live by Proverbs 22 (debtor is slave to the lender). The most wonderful reasons to hschool do not include financial for me, but no doubt it’s an added bonus. I agree with you that most people accept extreme debt/tuition as a necessity and don’t even question it.

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March 7, 2012

shuli

What do you people think about using maaser money for tuition? That was mentioned on the video as a possibility. (for non-jewish readers: maaser= tithe to charity)

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1. March 7, 2012
  
  Avivah
  
  It’s really a question for a rabbi; I personally think it’s fine if a rabbi has been consulted and agrees it’s a proper use of charity dollars. But even this is going to be limited in scope – most people don’t make enough money that their tithes are going to pay for private tuition for several children (and those who do make that kind of money aren’t generally the ones struggling to pay the bills).
  
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  1. March 8, 2012
    
    Shoshana Z.
    
    Exactly.
    
    Reply
March 11, 2012

LN

Before tuition came about, I was easily able to live off of way less than 40K/year…and still put a bit into savings.
Now, we still live on less than that, but we’re not paying full tuition. And saving money is harder than ever.

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March 11, 2012

LN

I watched the presentation a week or so ago. I felt that the “hashkafah” was good, but there was no practical solution or solid advice given which is what I would have wanted.
I would have liked to know how the rabbonim felt about how much to give to things like tuition vs putting in savings…they said savings was minimum hishtadlus, but I wanted more concrete information: this is the percent you should save without feeling guilty that it should be going to something else…

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May 13, 2012

esteeberk

thanks for posting about this avivah. i listened to the lecture a while ago and while i was inspired that these were frum rabbis talking about budgeting and living within one’s means, i still see the cost of sending our children to jewish schools a bit outrageous. making ends meet for a young big family is tough as it is with just the necessities, i cant even fathom the amount of debt i’d be in if i had any of my kids in school at 14k a year (which is what it would cost in my area, and then some, because you cant forget the $20 bucks here, the $10 bucks there, etc…) i had a non-frum family over or shabbos yesterday. all three of her kids are in the chabad hebrew academy. the mother went there in her youth as well. her husband is a lawyer and comes from a wealthy family, but she still works in the school to offset the cost a bit (and when she told me, i was disappointed because i know frum families who get better deals). needless to say, she is very thrifty, shops only at thrift stores and does not go on lavish vacations or remodels her home. they live below their means and support her parents (she said her parents spent so much money sending her to private school and never saved a penny). anyway, i live in a small orthodox community and she lives in the area- she said to me she doesn’t understand how these frum families live so luxuriously, with the nice cars, homes, $700 strollers, fancy clothing, etc. she said it very much feels like keeping up with the joneses. i told her i agree and it has been one of the most difficult things about living in our frum community. she is probably going to put her kids into public school once they’re in 6th grade. her oldest son is very smart and he’s not getting challenged enough academically. when she told me i was compassionate and supportive. i said it’s amazing you sent your kids there from preschool through elementary school and when 6th grade comes around- i’m sure you’ll try to do what’s best for your kids. she was surprised i didnt argue with her. she told me the rabbi of the school called her when he heard of her 6th grade thoughts, and lectured her on the phone for an hour about how she has to do what’s best for her kids by keeping them in the academy and it takes self sacrifice, etc… i loved reading the millionaire next door and am so glad they recommended it in the lecture. i think a lot like you in terms of finances so often when you write about being frugal i feel validated 🙂

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