Big Spender - 12/22/07 (2)

Here is what happened recently on A&E's "Big Spender" (I was away so I'm just catching up). The show is on Saturdays at 10:30 am.

Background:

The episode focused on Joanie, a 26 year old journalist, and her husband Josh. Joanie is a self-confessed shopping addict. They owe $10,000 on their car and $30,000 in a personal loan to Joanie's mom. They currently live in Joanie's mom's house rent and utility free, while her mom lives with the grandmother. Joanie's mom also refinanced her house to pay off Joanie's credit cards, which Josh does not know about.

Income: $3,900

Expenses: $6,300
Deficit: -$2,400

When Larry checks out Joanie's closests, he sees that she separates her clothes by designer and that there is a ton of stuff with the tags still on it. Larry approximates that she has about 200 shoes and that each cost about $300, for a total of $60,000. In her closets and in storage, he says she has over $100,000 worth of clothes.

Contract:

Here is what Larry asked Joanie and Josh to do:

• Stick to budget
• Earn extra income
• Meet with realtor, planning to be out of mom's house within a year
• Inventory closets
• Sell clothing
• Open a joint checking account and use only cash

Budget:

Here is a partial list of their new budget:

• Clothing: $800 --> $0
• Eating Out: $1160--> $0
• Groceries: $560 --> $200
• Debt: $200 --> $910
• Savings: $0 --> $450

Update:

After a few weeks, Larry checked up on Joanie and Josh. Here is how they aredoing:

• Josh was able to get some extra gigs and work some overtime to bring in extra money.
• Joanie inventories her closet. She is still working on it because there was so much. She has over 344 shoes. Estimating the total amount of clothes and shoes in her closets to be 3,000, if each item was $200, she has $600,000 worth of stuff in her closets.
• She took over 100 items to consignment, bringing in $1,590.