Organize Your Cash, Automate Your Life with the Budget Besties

Had the opportunity to chat with Shana and Vanessa of Budget Besties to turn the “B-word” from scary to simple, showing how a one-page plan and digital envelopes make money feel clear, kind, and doable. We also unpack theme days, automation, and dreaming with your partner so finances support real life.

• reframing budgets as permission to spend 
• celebrating year-end money wins and setting goals 
• data over drama mindset to reduce anxiety 
• the one-page budget: income, debts, bills, spending, savings 
• separate accounts as digital envelopes for clarity 
• automating transfers to make saving effortless 
• smoothing inconsistent income with a steady paycheck 
• budgeting on what is, then improving with guardrails 
• involving spouses to dream and decide as a team 
• time management with theme days and strategic focus 
• hiring, systems, and saying no to protect capacity

Right now you can get 30% off with my discount code. You simply just go to share.honeybook.com forward slash Shana Star. That's S-H-A-N-N-A-S-T-A-R. 
You can try it for free with my code and get also an extra free month when you upgrade to a paid plan. Link is going to be in the notes, or you can head to Davistaphotography.pick dash time.com slash referral. You can head right to the notes and click on the link so you can start your beautiful galleries today. 

The boot camp is for you. It’s for free and it comes after Christmas. budgetbesties.com/bootcamp
budgetbesties.com/shaNna

Chapters

• 0:00 Meet The Budget Besties
• 2:55 Reframing The “B-Word”
• 5:55 Year-End Money Wins And Goals
• 9:40 Data Over Drama: Facing Numbers
• 13:30 Gamifying Savings With Buckets
• 16:50 Why A Budget System Beats A Budget
• 22:40 The One-Page Budget Layout
• 27:30 Who This System Helps Most
• 33:50 Disorganization, Not Overspending
• 40:20 Separate Accounts As Digital Envelopes
• 47:10 Taking Ownership And Dreaming Together

Transcript

Shanna: 0:08

Welcome back to the Shine Podcast. I'm your host, Ashana Starr. In today's episode, I get to have the immense honor and pleasure of speaking with Shayna and Vanessa from Budget Capacity. And before we get right into the conversation, which I cannot wait for you to listen to, they have so much energy and life and so much abundant wisdom for you guys all surrounding the B word, but more so a system for you guys. Something we found out at the end of the conversation is they're in Navarre, Florida. They're only like an hour and a half from me. I'm in Panama City Beach, and this was so exciting. So stay tuned. Hopefully we get to work and do a lot more exciting things together in the future. Yes, I'm holding them to it. But these two are best friends, moms, master financial coaches, who build a multi-sex figure business, debt-free, all well keeping, and families and fun, front and center. Their method helps women who make good money but never quite see it turn into the life they want. It's all about the straightforward budget systems with zero shame, practical habits, and making room for all the good stuff, like beach trip and court side cheering. Their podcast also has reached over 1.3 million plays and 25,000 fans. And honestly, they said one of their favorite things is making the big scary B-word feel judgment-free and doable for real women. Let's get right into it. So money is a topic that so many women, especially, tend to hear and immediately zone out. And also to have the grasp of not money, but not not only what's coming in, but spending. And we get to talk all things money today and what y'all like to call the B word, the budget word here. And also a great thing of telling where it's coming from, coming in, but then telling it where to go can be so empowering for women. So let's get right into it. And welcome. I'm so excited to have you both here. We've already been chatting and talking all the things.

Budget Bestie: 2:04

Oh, thank you so much, Sean. This is gonna be so fun because we're excited to help you not make the budget word taboo, right? We want it to be fun and give you the permission to spend. Yes. And we're gonna take the budget, the B-word, like budget, and we're also gonna put a bougie. We're gonna be bougie on a budget. That's what we're gonna get to, guys. So stay tuned. Hopefully, that's don't you agree with us?

Shanna: 2:24

Because, like, exactly. People are like, budget, bye.

Budget Bestie: 2:26

No, don't do that. Don't do that.

Shanna: 2:28

It is. They kind of gloss over immediately. Uh, it's funny you even have said that when we were having conversations back and forth through email. A friend of mine once we were at a table and it was all women and one guy. And the guy was like, I'm gonna point around who's bougie and who actually just looks bougie. And he went to me and he goes, You look super bougie, but you're not. I'm like, Okay, good, I'm already there. I'm bougie on the budget. So this is for me as well. I'm excited. And yes, yeah. And this is a great time. I know some people might not be listening near the end of the year, but it's a great time to be talking about this. Uh, it's a great time to talk about like recap for the year and goals for the year. So let's start there. What are some tips that you have for clients and people who are coming in and want to know how can I start off the year fresh, get clear with goals, all the things. Well, okay, I'll go for that.

Budget Bestie: 3:23

So we were just recording our year-end and year-end checklists and and goal setting podcasts. But listen, the best thing to do, I think, is to look back on this year and go, what were all the awesome things that my money was able to accomplish for me? Right. We don't want to sit there in shame. We can all sit there and do that, but we want to go, what was I so excited about that my money was able to do? So that way you can take that into that whole fun mindset into the new year. Yeah, I and I think, you know, it's right now, we may not want to, we may not be able to avoid some of the holiday hangover that comes with the spending of the season because it's right now, it's happening right now. That's okay. You're in the thicket of it. That's okay. Because what we want you to think about is we want you to have a great holiday season. But what how can I set myself up in 2026 to not, what did my client say the other day? Not feel poor or broke during Christmas. I was like, girl, don't, we're not there. Okay, we don't want that for you. So, what you can do is what we want people to do is get everything on one page. And look, don't check out again. We are it's gonna be great. We have a paper that you can do it on, it's pretty, and it's gonna do the math for you, right? So just stay there, stay with me. But we want you to put all of your numbers on one piece of paper because that's how you're actually gonna know what you what you started off saying, Shauna, was the uh knowing where your money's gonna go. That's what we want for you is is for you to be able to see here's all the money I make, here's all of my debts, here's all of my bills, here's what I want to spend my money on, and here's what I want to save money for. And then when I have all of that on one piece of paper, this then I can really truly be in control and start to get excited about what my money's doing.

Shanna: 4:54

I love what you said already about what did you love that your money did this year. And as somebody who writes down everything in the whole world, in front of my journal, I write down, of course, the goals, money spending, saving, um, but I also write what do I want more of. And that's my time, paddle more time, that you know, whatever. And then I also write what did I get to do so that year after year I can flip back and go, oh, I went there that year. Oh, I spoke at this event this year. And so I love that you can then maybe look back and go, these are the things that I was able to do with my money and what excited me, and then hopefully what I can set up to do in the in the future in the coming year. So I already loved that. That was fabulous.

Budget Bestie: 5:29

Yeah, and uh honestly it kind of spawned from conversations we have with our husbands. Yeah, absolutely, because they will be like, oh, where did all of our money go? And it's like, um, hello, here's this car that we bought our son, here's uh the vacation that we went, here's the travel sports that we paid off, like all of these different things that your money did, which you should be really excited and proud of. And because what what we all will tend to is be like, Well, I just have nothing, I have no money. That's what I'm looking at. But no, actually, your money did some things that were really important and you need to celebrate that. Yeah, my husband gets a good chunk of his annual salary in the end of the year. And usually when it comes in, we already have it planned and it goes because I know ourselves, and if we leave it there long enough, it'll get blown and spent on stupid things. So we plan it and it goes strategically where we want it to go. And I remember, I think it was last year or the year before, my husband goes, Where did all of our money go for the year? And I was like, Oh, I should probably list this out so it's not a negative. So I did, I listed out our kids went to private school. Like you did that. We were able to give and tithe all of this. We went to these vacations, we went to Portugal, we sent our kids here. And I think put like putting that data on paper removed all the drama in our heads, and it allowed him to be really proud and excited about what we were doing with our money.

Shanna: 6:43

Yeah. It was so funny you said the date over drama, because that was something I wrote down that I heard you speak about on another pack podcast. So I was like, yep, we have to hit that with the date over.

Budget Bestie: 6:53

Because it's a lot of people have a lot of wrecking balls in their heads because it's all up here and I think it's certain a certain way. It's just math. Like, let's just put the math on the paper and stop associating all of these negative emotions and drama and anxiety with it because that's what the wrecking balls are causing is anxiety because you don't really know. And you think that that's better. Like, I don't know if you heard us talk about. I have a client that came to her first session with a bottle of wine. She's like, I don't want to look at these numbers. I am scared. I'm I don't want to. And so I'll bring wine, it'll make it better. It's like, well, will it? Because we have to do math. I don't know. But either way, it is worse in your head than if it's on paper. And at that point, you can just look at math, look at numbers, and then you just have to tweak the numbers. It's just data. And what it what you revert to as being this ostrich with your head in the sand and you don't want to see anything, it's like you're covering your ears, see no evil, hear no evil, like blah, blah. And what we want you to do is take your head out, be tall, stand confidently. So that way when you look at your numbers, like Shayna said, it's just data because you've put it on one piece of paper. So it's now easy to look at and you can make a plan and you're excited about what is what's coming.

Shanna: 7:57

Yeah, absolutely. And you know what's funny is I never used to feel that way. I or I felt that exact same way, where it was I didn't want to see it. And I um had the privilege at the time I was previously married, and I didn't have to look at it. And so then I came to a place where after divorce, I had to look at it. I had to look at those numbers, and now it's almost become fun. And I am one who's gonna say I hate math, but I love money and seeing where it goes and gamifying it. And I know you guys feel the same where it's like now it's it's fun. If I put these into savings, it's like, ooh, okay, I put a little into savings. How much more can I put into savings? Can I push that envelope too? Because you see it grow, you see the in um interest grow. And so I want to encourage them to, it can be fun eventually once you get kind of through the nitty-gritty having to open those eyes to it.

Budget Bestie: 8:42

Yes, and you know, hopefully we'll get into it. But we teach you to put your um whatever you want to save for, have a separate high-yield savings account for each each different sort of envelope of what you're saving for. And then you, like you said, gamify it. And it does become fun. And I and I love how you said you didn't like math, but you love money. I'm like, yes, you're speaking to our people. They love that's exactly what they think too. And so when you can look, you can just pull up your phone and be like, look at all this money. And then it automatically, um, two weeks on my next paycheck or whenever it grew again, it just keeps growing. And you can set all of that up to do it automatically so that you don't have to rely on your willpower and then you're winning, you're not having to do math in the moment, and you it is fun, it's gamified. And what we've realized is that people actually spend less money when they have a plan and they have it automatically transferred into the different accounts and they're watching their savings grow, they're watching their spending accounts being funded. They have the freedom to spend over here in their spending accounts, knowing that their savings is doing what it needs to over there. And it is one big game, kind of as you watch your bank account throughout the month.

Shanna: 9:44

Yeah. So let's get right into that system because I know you're we're skipping the B word and going right into the system word. And they, I'm sure people listen go, great, like it's just another worksheet, or do I work with you? Tell us about the system that you guys have built and what that looks like.

Budget Bestie: 9:59

Listen, you don't need another budget. We we understand that. You don't need another budget, you need a budget system. So, what we found when so quick backstory. We uh used to teach Dave Ramsey's financial piece university. I don't know if your listeners have heard of that, and nobody knew how to budget. So we had to pause the class because it was an expectation that people know how to budget. And we realized nobody knows how to budget. And then once we started teaching people how to budget, we realized people can write numbers and words on paper, but that doesn't, nothing actually happens. You have to know what to do with your hands. So we created our own budget and we turned it into a system so it'll do it for do it for you. Yeah, and we actually wanted to partner with somebody who had already made a budget, right? That wasn't our forte, that wasn't in our vision, our dream. Writing like Excel formulas. Right. We had no idea that, but when we went out looking at all these budgets, we realized it was a lot of tracking, right? A lot of charts and pretty weird and ugly words. And ugly words and colors, and and it makes it, it was really complicated. And again, it was very time consuming. And we did not want that. We did not have time for that as a as coaches. We didn't want our clients to have time for that because everyone is busy. We have big dreams, big goals, big jobs, or big, you know, parents have with kids that are involved. And so we wanted something different, and so we created our simplified budget system. It's on a template, and it's yes, it's um online, but it doesn't require you to check in all the time or track every single expense. And that's what Shana was saying, as far as you know, you we needed something different, you needed a system because you can write words and numbers on paper, but then what? What do you do with it after you make a budget and you bringing it to life? So our automations, our system has brought your budget to life. And what we saw was the budgets that we were using with our clients until we came up with our own, it doesn't match what you do with your hands. So that's why we came up with our our very simple one-page budget. We feel like if it's on one page, it can't be that scary. It's only one page. You only have to one page. And it's it's it's different. Like Vanessa was saying, there's words like fixed in variable expenses, like, no, thank you. Here's what you need to know to budget. You need to know how much money you make, your income. You need to know your debt minimums. You need to know your bills. Now, listen, that's gonna be a little tricky because you probably have them coming out of every which way and possible. It's credit card that you can have, and so many subscriptions, it's fine, but we want to have one list of just your bills. Then what we figured out is really spending is a whole column. It's its own column. People get this confused because maybe it's a need or a one. No, no, no. It's just spending. That's gas and groceries and and your personal pocket money, and maybe you're going to restaurants. And then the last column is savings, and that and that's what you want to start saving for. We were talking about those savings buckets. That's it. That's your simple budget. It's it matches what you do with your hands, it matches how you used your money. And there's no weird words. Like everybody knows what those things mean. And that's why we created that is just the budget. And then, like Vanessa said, there's all kinds of other fun things that we like to do to make it your budget. When you put that, when we talked about the words and number on paper, we want those things to happen automatically, is what we call it. They can go do it all automatically automatically, magically, so that you don't have to.

Shanna: 12:55

Yes. No, I love that too, because I feel like now, until you love the budget part or you love that money part, looking at a budget feels just negative because you'll come to it once a week, once a month, whatever that one worksheet normally looks like, and you're like, okay, all I see is money out. And I'm not sure, like you said, if you're not doing it with your hands, it's just negative. And so I love that you guys have something way beyond that and are using words that actually mean something, like you said, the fixed income. You gotta, you can spice it up a little bit, like y'all said.

Budget Bestie: 13:24

So we have a lot of people that come to us and they say, Everything you said just finally clicked. I've tried all these apps, and that's the other thing is there's a lot of apps out there, a lot of online quote unquote budgeting things, but they're all tracking and they're yelling at you or beeping at you or notifying you if you go over or you go under or you're doing this or you're doing that. And that is not what we want for you. We want you to have your money organized and separate, and that is really what's gonna be bring clarity to your finances. Yeah, and we wanted the budget to match your real life because we know um when Vanessa's talking about the words that we say, you don't want to live on beans and rice. You don't want to give up your pumpkin spice lattes, right? That's what we've learned. And but yet you feel like you make good money, but you have nothing to show for it. We get it. And so we want your budget, you know, to match your real life. And that's why we want to break out the spending and break out the savings because a lot of times people's budgets get derailed because they haven't thought about these unexpected expenses, like the fact that their vets, their dog's gonna need to go to the vet, right? Or every year. So we want to think about those. Some of them are fun, some of them are not as fun, but we also want to plan for your spending. So many times people try to make a budget that's unrealistic and then they wonder why they fail. Well, it's it's because you're you you didn't give yourself any fun money. You didn't you didn't allow any wiggle room for your fun life that you want to live and to pay your bills, right? So that's one of the main things that we wanted to make sure is that we're budgeting and we can be pushing on a budget if we want to be.

Shanna: 14:46

So, who is this system for? Like, who do you guys target and love and work with, and who is it for?

Budget Bestie: 14:52

Um, working moms.

unknown: 14:54

Okay.

Budget Bestie: 14:54

I mean, really. I mean it anyone. So let's let's be it's funny because we have a guy, he's local. We have a husband who he's like, your budget is so pretty, and I love it so much. But and he's a husband, but really it is for our budget is for anyone. We actually have entrepreneurs that use our budget because it works in so many different ways. Yeah, it's really just for anyone who makes good money but has feels like they have nothing to show for it. That's where I mean, and and really anybody who makes money, because to your point, when you said that when I look at money, when I look at my budget, everything's going away. We don't want you to feel that way. We want you to be like, like we were talking about before. I'm looking at my budget. Look at all the things I'm affording. I'm affording to be able to do my hair and nails, I'm affording to save for that vacation, and I'm also paying off my debt. Like, and that's what that one page looks for. And so, really, it's for anybody who doesn't want to have to do budgeting manually, who doesn't want to have to track, like Venice said, we are not for that. We, our system will allow you to separate things so you don't have to track. It's your your bank accounts will do all your actually your bank becomes your personal assistant, and you don't have to do any of it. So that's really who it's for. And and really quick, I want to backtrack because you you asked me who we speak to. And I, you know, our podcast, we speak to women, we speak to moms, but our system itself, everyone buys it. I mean, we have people buying it in Australia and we have single moms buying. We have young teens buying it because it works for so many people, because it's so simple and it allows you, like Shana said, it allows you to see your money and work with you as you grow. You don't have to be in a certain stage of life to use it.

Shanna: 16:23

Yeah. And I would love to like hit on the point too. I know a lot of people are struggling right now. They sometimes feel like they can't even catch up with bills at all. They can't get ahead of if they have credit card debt and they can't catch up on that. And I'm sure you've had clients and people come to you and be like, I can't even catch up, let alone maybe start that savings account or start thinking about saving for the future. And how do you like speak to them? What are some things that you can kind of reach out and give them tips or just some advice to as well?

Budget Bestie: 16:54

Well, I think one of the things that we've learned as we've been doing this is that people think they have an overspending problem, but really they have a disorganization problem. That's really what it comes down to. And so if you can separate, and when you're looking at one one bank account that has a thousand transactions and trying to figure out, well, I can't, it's not working, I don't have enough money. Well, that's not the that's not correct. So that's not their all the information that you need to be able to feel confident, right? Yeah. So the this organization has been, it's interesting because like Shayna said, they have usually everyone has one account. We were 18 years old, we went and opened up a bank account, our first job, and we that's what we ended up using for the rest of our lives, right? And what we want to tell you is that things have evolved, right? We have so many more bills, there's so many more things happening in our life. Your bank account can look different. So, what we've taken is this cash envelope system. Everyone's heard of the cash envelope system where grandma had envelopes. Yes, right. So, like grandma had envelopes in the underneath the uh the mattress, and they had one for groceries and one for your utilities and one for this and one for that. We've taken that concept and bring it in, brought it into the modern world and put it digitally in your bank account. And so by you separating your money into separate accounts, that your budget is now into those in that the budget line item that you put for those things is now in those in those bank accounts. So you have the freedom to spend and you don't actually have to constantly be tracking that one account with all these endless transactions that you get lost in. And and putting it all on one paper, like we alluded to in the beginning, is what's going to help you know if you're really struggling or if there's some very simple steps that you can do to improve, right? I remember I have I had a client and he wasn't working, she was working, and um, and anyway, she she did what we asked and she said, Oh, I realized that we were spending four thousand dollars a month eating out. And she said, I wanted to throw up. And I was like, I also want to throw up, let's all throw up together and start over and we'll start. Yeah. But anyway, um, and so not that you're not that your listeners are doing that, but really you just want to be able to see it. And and and like we said, data over drama. Like, oh, okay, so I could just improve if I don't actually, if I have everything on one page, that's when I can see. Oh, I have five TV subscriptions and I barely have time to watch one. Like, let's be real honest. And just having everything on one paper, then you can actually start to see. A lot of times, honestly, um, our clients, their kids, their kids are kind of the reason that they feel like they have no money and the real that they feel like they're struggling. Like, let's be real honest. So we need to be able to see those things all together so that we can see what what we might want to improve on. Well, and you know, the first time you make a budget, you really want to make a budget on what is. So, what am I doing? What is happening? Because you, if this is the first time you're doing it, you don't want to make a budget that you don't know how to make because it's it's all these numbers and realistic, um unrealistic, yeah. Yeah, unwell, these these unrealistic uh guard rules that you're gonna put on your grocery budget or going out to eat budget that you don't even know if you can hit yet because you need to look at what is. So, with that person that was doing $4,000, I had a similar story with a client who had six kids. And what we realized was she said, Oh, I think I want to bring that down to a thousand dollars next month. This is month one of coaching. And I said, Yeah, I'm not putting that in your budget because there's no way realistically that you're gonna do that. And then you're gonna say, This fails, this isn't right, budgets don't work, I can't do this. Like you're gonna shame yourself. So once you make a budget on what is happening, then you need to make if you don't like it, then you need to make a budget on, okay, what is the realistic budget that I want to make based on what is happening so that way I can be successful. Otherwise, you're gonna set yourself up for failure.

Shanna: 20:23

Yes, yeah. There was a couple things I was writing down, is one, I know it's an easy thing to say, like when I didn't have any money and that, you know, freshly was divorced at the time, that was something that I cut out, was going out to eat. And I know that that's not for everybody, but at the time groceries were a little cheaper too. And I could do like $50 a week just on food. And that's not for everybody, but that was a huge chunk where I could see that coming in. And then the other thing was I love the separate accounts, especially like you said, now in the day of subscriptions that are on overload. And I think there's people walking around on like TikTok to be like, How many subscriptions do you think you have? You know, it's an ad, but they ask and they're like, oh, four, and they'll end up having like 29. And of course, somebody who owns a business, like, I know how many subscriptions I have. They're written down. I have very few personal subscriptions, but like 17 or 18 um subscriptions. And it's true, it also helps with those separate accounts to know if there's a fraud going on, to see maybe, oh, I don't need both of those subscriptions. So that's also a probably a huge point, too. It is a lot easier to track if money is going out and you know it shouldn't be. Right.

Budget Bestie: 21:32

And that that's why we say you don't have to track. So we want you to have an account for your bills, specifically only your bills, and you'll be able to see, just like you said, if fraud happens, you'll be able to see it. There's only 20, 30 maybe transactions going on for the whole month, right? And then you're gonna have your separate account for your spending money for gas and groceries, for example, right? Those are gonna be two separate accounts. And I love this for me. You're right that that groceries is a lot of times the one of the most um one of the budget line items that you can really kind of tweak the most. But either way, what used to happen is we get to the end of the month and I have no grocery money. And people still want to eat like every single day. All of my kids, they want to eat it. They're hungry. That's so it's a mystery. That's yeah, it's a mystery. But when I have money going into this grocery account um every so often, I only I just have to live there. I'm like, okay, we got $200 for the week or whatever it might be. Um, we can, I can do that. And I don't have to track anything, like you said, because all I have to do is be like, oh, I'm going to the store. I have $200. Done. I've done tracked everything that I need to track, right? Yeah. When you were talking about the fraudulent charges, I had a client who did get fraudulent charges on his account, but luckily it was his spending account because we don't use the bills account when we're out and about. That account only pays bills. You're only using your spending account. So his spending account got uh fraudulent charges on it, but you know what? It did not affect any of his mortgage payments, his utility payments, his subscriptions, his auto insurance. None of that was affected because it was in a separate account doing its thing where you're not using that debit card out, you know, while you're spending money. So it really has been beneficial to have these accounts separate. And when we're talking about having those guardrails around like groceries, for instance, the other week my son was like, Mom, I want something. It was Wednesday night. All of our accounts replenish on Thursdays. And I said, Well, there's 20 bucks in the grocery account. Here's the debit card. Good luck. Have fun. Like, have a good time. See what you can do with it. It replenishes in 12 hours.

Shanna: 23:21

Yeah, that's great. I love that. What if somebody is listening? I know, you know, we've talked about I I love this system and I kind of love working with money and gamifying it. But there's a lot of people, and I know it tends to be the women, not always, who take a back burner to money financially, just because for whatever reason, the man tends to be ahead of that. I know I used to be in that situation as well. So what if somebody is listening and they have a business or not? And if they have a business, they need to be taking control anyway. But what is a reason that you tell your clients or people listening, like, even if things seem to be working out, it seems to be okay, you seem to be having enough money. Why a system now and why having a hold of your money is so important? That's a good question.

Budget Bestie: 24:05

Yeah, I I think that I I I do agree that it's a good question. And we think that you we want one thing that we say is we want you to be your own bank. And so it's kind of in alignment with what you're saying. You like you need to know your numbers all uh whether you're a business or not. We want you to know your numbers, and we I don't I we're not sure that like it's kind of working is the best way to get ahead, to bring to set your goals, right? And and so we want to take the guesswork out of it. So even if it's kind of working, you still might sometimes be like, hmm, did the mortgage payment go through? Or hmm, do I have enough money for that trip? Like we want to take all the guesswork out of that, right? And and and to the point here, if you use the system and set it up, it's not like I always say, like, if you're going, if you're gonna have a goal in the beginning of the year to get fit or whatever, you have to go to the gym January 1st, January 2nd, January 3rd, probably January 4th, even. It's awful. Like you have to keep doing the thing. For our system, what we want you to do is like set it up January 1st, and then you can just stay in bed January 2nd because it will run automatically. And so your big vision version of yourself needs to set this budget, set the automations, and then your goals are gonna automatically happen because they're all gonna be do happening automatically. Well, and this idea of like, oh, well, I make good money, I don't need a budget, or things are working, it's fine, or my husband takes care of it, I think everything looks good. Like, I think that mentality is, yeah, but what could it be? So we have people that come to us in a very different spectrum. So we have people that come to us that making $30,000 a month, and it's so fun because there's so much money and we can do a lot with it. And then we also have people coming to us, like I have a sweet couple right now, they have no kids, and they know coaching monthly is a sacrifice. And it's they are they're investing in themselves right now and they're not paying a lot extra on debt because they're taking the time to get everything set up, get everything organized, get their mindset shifted, get their habits changed so that way that when they graduate coaching, that they can be on the right trajectory. So I just think it it the the big question is is what could it be if you did have somebody else looking at it? Because that third person coming in if you're married, that second person coming in if you're single, um, that bird's eye view, that different perspective makes a huge difference. And the the other thing I want to say about the spouses is we want you guys to dream together. So we do together. We do work with a lot of people post-divorce or something like that, because they they like to your point, they hadn't they hadn't been able to be in on the conversation, so they have to learn. But if you are together, you both should be shouldering the burden. One of you can be more nerdy than the other and actually doing the math and actually like setting things up. That's fine. But you both want to be dreaming together. And and one person doesn't need to be like deciding everything because that's very heavy. Even if they like it, even if they are a nerd, you should need to both be doing it together. And then as the woman, um, we want you to also know your numbers. Again, just because um your husband might be taking the lead role doesn't mean that you don't know it. You guys aren't setting goals, you aren't reaching them, you aren't looking at your bank accounts, growing, you aren't um helping decide how much the grocery budget or the spending budget or how much the kids cost or whatever. You want to be in on all of those together because you are a team. Because otherwise, what we see is it becomes a parent-child relationship, unintentionally, but it does become that. And then there it like friction enters. And so being on the same page, like Shannon was saying, together as a team, making decisions together, showing each other the budget, the budget saying this is what I want, but this is what I want. Let's compromise and what does that look like for us? And using all the us we words, right? Um, it makes a difference when you're when you're planning your money.

Shanna: 27:29

Yeah. And I I really love what you said too about just that togetherness and dreaming together, because that's that's part of the fun in marriage as well, is being able to dream together. And even if I'm just using if the man is the one who's normally in charge of the money, he might not know, like, oh, but the kids have X, Y, and Z coming up. Suddenly, and the doctors that cost this much. And so it also is working together in a very functional way. And I love also to, I know you said, oh, well, maybe it's kind of working, and that's true, it might be kind of working, but that's also then like you said, can I go to Italy? When can I go to Italy? And rather dreaming it can be this is when I can, because of the systems we set up. So that's yeah.

Budget Bestie: 28:14

It's interesting that you well, I was just saying, it's interesting when we were talking about like who's handling the finances, because I think it's it's usually split. As much as we see the men handling it, we also see the women handling it and not trying to burden the husband while he's you know being the breadwinner and all that. And um, it ends up being one of them is racking up all this debt because they don't want to burden the other one with what's really happening. Yeah.

Shanna: 28:42

No, you're absolutely right about that. And I know with your system, there's so many like facets and fun points. Is there something that you guys love to talk or teach about, or maybe a couple tips, tricks, whatever that looks like that you would love to give advice right now to that we haven't touched on? I know there's so many things. So that's such a broad question, but yeah.

Budget Bestie: 29:01

I guess the first thing that comes to my mind is the is the automate part. Um, and how you know, one of the things that we really love to talk about is that we don't want your budget to feel like a roller coaster. So entrepreneurs are really big on this. Like, well, I'm an entrepreneur, my budget, my income isn't consistent. How does that work? Well, it can be. You can make that decision and you can make your your paycheck consistent. You can make your but your bus business budget consistent, you can make your personal budget consistent. So that way when you're planning for what an actual month looks like, how much you cost, you have the full picture instead of just what's happening right now.

Shanna: 29:38

And then I kind of wanted to shift. I know you guys talk about so much, which I it's my people for sure, is time management and what that looks like in y'all's business because I know you have even these fabulous like theme days that you guys do, which you guys already have like the CEO Mondays. I know you call it that. I like to call it like bum crumb day where I just am not gonna look at it.

Budget Bestie: 29:59

Yes, that's why. We have them. I'm not wearing makeup on Mondays. My hair is up and looks like a hot mess. Like it's pajamas if it's cool.

Shanna: 30:09

I've told friends recently, like, I don't even answer the door because I look that not good. I avoid answering the door.

Budget Bestie: 30:16

I wouldn't answer the door because I don't want to talk to anybody. Love you. So I have noticed, I just I've noticed that with our business, we talk a lot to our clients, to wonderful, lovely humans like you. And then I have three kids, and I'm like, I don't want to talk to anyone else. I'm all done. I'm done talking. And so, yes, but time management. Okay. Love that. So let's rewind here. One year ago, Shane and Vanessa were like, okay, it's time to set your 2025 goals, girl. Yes, girl. And we're like, hey, um, noticing our schedules, we have no time to do anything other than barely survive your business. Okay. Okay. So we decided our word was going to be steady. We're just going to be steady. What a weird thing to do for business, right? Because you're supposed to grow and like have set these. What are the BHAG goals and everything? And we're like, okay, if our if we survive our business, that is winning. But we wanted to be realistic. We started, you know, we love, I don't know if you if you follow them, we follow like Jenna Kutcher and we follow Alex Ramosy.

Shanna: 31:11

And we know the full podcast they listen to. Yes.

Budget Bestie: 31:13

Yeah. Whole difference. We want to be lifestyle entrepreneurs, is what we realized. We didn't know that was a thing. And so we wanted our our business to match or to be able to um exit coexist with our family life, which is very, very busy right now. Yeah, I think it was we have this hustle mentality, not like that we mean to, but we're just we're very hard workers, we'll work all the time, we'll be up at three in the morning on the computer, we're up till midnight, just and just getting small things done. Because as you know, as an entrepreneur, it's never done, right? It never stops. And but the reality was is our children's schedules was really running our lives, which was fine, but we had to find a way to make that our business work around that and also under make the children understand like you get to do what you do because we do what we do, right? And so it was just kind of like this coexist being able to coexist in all of it, but being present, you know, we our kids are our boys will be seniors next year, and then my daughter is on our way, and then she's got two more after that. And and you know, we we don't have that much time left. So be able to be present with them in their lives right now, because we're never gonna get this back, yeah. But also have a business that's able to fund that, but work around it in the time management, like the time that we want was really helpful. So some of the decisions we made, remember we were back in we're back in the future. I don't know what we're doing, we're backwards, whatever. But um, we decided we're going to, as you said, we're gonna have theme days. We're not gonna set new goals, we're gonna try to do what we've already done and do it better. So we're not gonna recreate any wheels. That's a rule. It has to be a rule. Don't recreate any wheels. And um, so we do have theme days. So on Monday, we have CEO day. This is when we're able to look at our business bird's eye view and actually work on our business, not in our business, right? And then we have four days a month that we coach one-on-one only. That's it. Four days that we work directly with clients. We have four days where we do podcast recording only, podcast recording only, which is internal or external with interviews, whatever it is. We that's all we do. So those are the days like you just we just mentioned you have to put makeup on and like probably put on an actual shirt and real clothes. But you can still keep pajama pants on. Okay, I just need you to know or spandex shorts on. And and so, and and then we have project days where we can batch those work that work too. And so we and then we decided everything else, everything that we can, we're gonna automate. We have Zapier. I don't know if your clients have or your people have heard of it. Everything that can be automated is automated. Um, we don't do, we decided not to do a lot of things, um, and we're focusing only on certain things. So, those are some of the things that we did so that we can we work four days a week from nine to three while the kids are at school, and then it's like today we will leave, our boys have a basketball game in another state, which is fine. So we will hang up the phone with you, um, and then we'll go to start traveling to that. It's fine. And so we just had to make it work, and and and and but we did find new or spoiler alert when we did that, when we got super focused, when we were um intentional, our business grew. Yeah, God blessed us. Like our us being intentional and doing the thing that we said we were gonna do, we almost derailed. I'm gonna say at the beginning of the year, we almost derailed and decided to write a book. Because when you write down the word steady, writing a book is obviously that's next. And then we realized not exactly. No, that was really um interesting conversation. Yeah, so anyways, we decided to table that. But we have three chapters done. So there's three chapters we don't have to write later, right? That's fine, yeah. But it we did. We so our summer we were able to travel and do things and our business grew. And it was really it was really awesome to see all of our hard work that we put into place to make uh this year be steady for us that it it was able to grow. In July, we worked four days total and we made the more money in our business than we ever had. Um was like what? Wait in July, which is normally a like a slower month, and so we were trying to figure out where how did this happen?

Shanna: 35:07

I love that. It's so interesting because one of the I I just spoke at this little network marketing thing, and it was something I brought up too. When I'm intentional about working on myself or my heart or my relationships or just anything inward, that's when I've noticed that the business grows. Of course the business grows when you're working on the business. I'm not trying to say that otherwise. But the biggest changes are when I change, and so it sounds like a good thing for you when you guys can reflect and look back and are you ready to streamline your business and elevate your client experience? I have been using HoneyBook for over two and a half years, and it transforms the way that I work. With Honeybook, you can manage all your projects from start to finish, all in one place. In fact, this is how I scheduled these podcasts episodes today. To say goodbye to scattered emails and unorganized files with its user-friendly interface, Honeybook allows you to create professional proposals, contracts, and invoices that impress clients and make you stand out in your field, automate your workflows, and spend less time on a task of springing up time to focus on what you do best. Honeybook's client management tools help you to keep communication clear and consistent, ensuring that every client feels valued, informed through the entire process. Plus, with the ability to accept online payments that you get paid faster and more securely. Right now you can get 30% off with my discount code. You simply just go to share.honeybook.com forward slash Shana Star. That's S-H-A-N-N-A-S-T-A-R. It will also be in the notes for you. I love Honeybook and can't wait for you to use it too. I know that you also have talked about having flexibility within the time management. And that's something that most of us start businesses because we want flexibility. And there was a time when I first started where I didn't allow that flexibility. You know, it was if I'm waking up, I'm working, and I need to work till midnight every single day because that's how you have to do it in order to work. And yes, guilty. But what I found is like I started this business so I can enjoy the sunshine. So my lunch breaks when it's warm enough, I'm gonna go take an hour in the sunshine or on the beach quick or whatever that looks like. And so it's part of time management. I know I know you y'all have talked about is flexibility. I still have to get these tasks done and I write those tasks done, and then there's the extra ones. If I have time or there's always extra ones. Yeah, of course. Yeah, of course. Don't ever go away. As long as you get those ones done, your day can be done. If you feel like you have the capacity or a little more time than you expected, then you can do more. So I love that you guys talk about flexibility within like structure, because I feel that that's me as well. And I love it.

Budget Bestie: 37:58

Yeah, I think we've just, I'm sorry, I was gonna say really quick. I just think we've learned to roll with it, right? I think we've just like it is okay. Our OCD eight, uh like type A personalities at the beginning, it was really hard if things didn't go if they went away. But I think we're we're good now. Well, and we're we're encouraging each other. So whereas before it would be like, hey, are you up working at midnight? Yep, I am, aren't you? Yep, here we go. We're got we're doing all these things that we're like, hey, why are you working at midnight? Go to bed. Or, or hey, go take the day off with your husband because he happens to be off. Like, flexibility is key and it can wait because the main things are the main things we those are gonna get done. And like you said, all of the other big things, you know what? They can wait. Um, this time is precious, and so yeah, we we it's been a journey though. Like let's be real honest. We were just like you. We did we had like 13 businesses, we were doing it all. We did a lot of things wrong at the beginning, yeah. And so, the more, as you said, the more we work on ourselves, the more we listen, the more we do the things that all the smart people say to do, the better our business goes.

Shanna: 39:00

Weird, weird, very strange. Like they have experience and wisdom in it or something. That's yeah, yeah. So, what is this? One might be a come to surprise as far as I didn't ask you ahead of time, that might be mean, but what are some things that maybe you guys are working on now or some goals that y'all have for yourself? And then is there anything that you guys have been like deep diving into another podcast you love or some books you love that uh might be helpful to listeners as well?

Budget Bestie: 39:27

Okay, wait, give me the first question. I I started to answer the second one in my in my head again. Yeah, I'm sorry.

Shanna: 39:33

Just some goals that y'all have had that way when people are listening, you're like, oh, these women are have these amazing goals and businesses. Like, what are they looking to next? I would love to hear things that are on your horizon.

Budget Bestie: 39:44

No? Okay. Well, I was thinking business. We we do have something up in the future that we're we're looking at implementing. And again, it's gonna be to simplify, it's going to be to uh allow our business to scale, and we're really excited about that. Um, but I think for right now, we have a wonderful boot camp coming up, and we'll talk about that. So I think with all the kids of sports and everything going on for me, like, okay, what's the next couple of months gonna happen? What would what do we need to focus on then? Well, so we we again we were very intentional with our goals. This is how many clients we want this year, how many budget, because we sell a budget system. We talked about that a little bit, right? How many of those we want? And like all the things that we're doing are leading to that or nothing, or we're not doing them. And so we have actually hit those goals in in in large part. And and the other part was our time. So we used to coach whenever they wanted. That's what we used to do. Like during dinner time with my family. Well, now we're just we're like sitting in like the weirdness of like we only coach these days, and God brought us all the clients to fill those, and then we're done. And so, like, that was a huge goal for us to stop having this crazy schedule and be able to do that. I would say that's one goal. Um, and then the other goal is we're we have hired out everything. We have a wonderful graphic designer who's rebuilding our sales page, which we are so excited. We have a person who is we hired and we recommend them. His name is David, find him, um, for Zapier. He is making all the things that we used to do manually um happen automatically for our business, which is amazing. Who else? We hired um We hired a social media person to do a couple things for us that we uh didn't get a chance to like tap into. Yeah, we also hired yeah. So maybe that's our big goals is like what what can we just delete? What can we um hire out and then what can we systemize so that it's so simple and easy and brain and brain, and so that way we can just show up and do stuff like this and and talk to you with your beautiful like background and you're beautiful, and like this is so fun. And and and there's no like nagging things in our mind of what we need to do because it's it's all kind of systemized.

Shanna: 41:48

Yeah, that's fantastic to hear too, just because I think so many people, especi especially when you're first starting, small businesses are like, nope, no one can do it like I can. I have to do all the things, the tasks belong to me. And then as you grow, you're like, Nope, I only need to show up where my face and my hands need to be, and those other things can be automated or, like you said, out to somebody else.

Budget Bestie: 42:09

I think that's something that we should have learned sooner. I will say, I've the more I listen to people that are way more successful than us, or in the stage of the stage of their business, um, they did that quickly at the very beginning. They hired smarter people to do things that they didn't understand. And I think for us, we just were like, oh yeah, we can do it. We obviously can do that. We know how to do that. And so, but we we didn't, we try we did to our ability, like we figured it out and we learned. But if had we just hired a very smart person at the very beginning of our business to do the things, we would have got there faster. But you know what? You live and you learn, and we are here strategically for a reason. So and and then one little last nugget I want to say, because you asked, Who are we learning from? Um, we've kind of consistently learned from the same people over and over in our business. And I what one thing and that we're listening to, like I mentioned, uh, we listen to Alex and uh our personal mentors like her name is Stephanie Gass, and she kind of coaches us. But what we have learned is a lot of different programs want your business to fit their model, and we've learned no our business fits us and what we want, and we will gladly take some pieces of what you teach and see if it applies. But if it if if it if it requires us to change everything about who what we're doing or who we are or or all of that, it's not for us. And so just having or eventually learning to discern what to listen to and what is just noise and what is something that worked for one person, and and it and I don't have to believe or I don't have to make that make change my business and form it into their mold, like that's actually been a big blessing too. I'll even say too, listening to people um based on the stage of life that they're in too. So not necessarily how their business is run, but if they're single, if they're married, if they have kids, if you don't have any of those things, if you're completely different, I mean, if you look at how they tell you to run a business versus how you want, like Shannon was saying, how we want to do it, maybe start finding other people who are you want to mimic their lifestyle because they're they have their parents and they have kids in the same age and they're going through it with you and see how they maybe they're eight-figure businesses, but they have figured it out already because they've been doing it a little longer. So I just think like we love Alex so much. He's just in a different stage of life than we are, which doesn't make it wrong, but we've learned what to take and what not to take and what to mold and from other people to form it into, like Shannon said, what we want to do and what's gonna make us successful.

Shanna: 44:38

Yeah. And so kind of moving with that is I know you've mentioned a couple people that you've been following. Are there some books or podcasts that you guys go to again and again that are loving that you have found helpful to get encouraged with time management and budgets and just business in general?

Budget Bestie: 44:58

Oh my gosh, um, yeah, I mean, I like like Menace said, I personally go back to Alex. I just love the clarity in what he teaches. Um, that's kind of one I I've actually been liking Dan Martell too. Have you have you ever listened to him? Yeah, he's really good for like um time time management and and hacking your life or whatever. Um, do you have anybody else? I so I do I love leadership podcasts. So Craig Rochelle, he's one of my favorites as far as leadership. I do I love Alex. Uh at listen, Amy Porterfield is a good one. We Stephanie Gush, she was talking about our podcast mentor. She has some good ones um as well. When, you know, again, not everyone's podcast is gonna pertain, like their topics are always gonna pertain to you. So it's always good to have those couple of ones that you can dabble into.

Shanna: 45:45

Yes, absolutely. Well, I would love to know. I you mentioned a little bit earlier about talking about your boot camp. So I would love to know how everyone listening can find you, follow you, work with you, and get this uh boot camp that you guys are gonna be having.

Budget Bestie: 46:00

Okay, well, let me caveat this. There's we have two pathways, okay? It's like choose your own adventure. So if you're like, look, right now is not the time, ladies, you're kind of crazy. It's holidays. I don't want to talk about budgeting, um, whatever. Then the boot camp is for you. It's for free and it comes after Christmas. So you should come to that at budgetbesties.com slash bootcamp. That's where you can get that. The second choose your own adventure option. Really quick, I'll say you can sign up now when you know you're gonna need it after Christmas and know that that you'll get the email and all you have to do is click the button and join us. So that way, like you don't have to remember to do that later. Yeah. Okay. And then the second choose your own adventure is if you're like Vanessa and I, which is like, I need to do this right now and I'm gonna do it this weekend and get it done. Like, or you know, you're like, I need to take action. I hear what they're saying, it makes sense. I don't want to wait. Then you need to go to budgetbestice.com forward slash Shanna, um, Shauna, sorry. Um, we have this whole discussion about how to say names and I totally messed it up. But anyway, it's S-H-A-N-N-A, right? And you can go find out about our budget system and and and maybe buy it and go ahead and get started. We are the kind of people that that just take take it the information and run with it, and that's what that offers for you. Or if you're like, I still want to know a little bit more, that's what the boot camp is for. Yeah, the DIY version of like you just know you're ready, you heard it, you're like, yes, that's for me. I mean, there's so many resources, it's a walkthrough course, it's awesome. And so, yeah, forward slash Shauna. Shauna, Shauna. It's okay.

Shanna: 47:24

Our names are, I mean, it's tricky, it's fine, you know.

Budget Bestie: 47:29

Well, and for the listeners, in case they don't know, you spell your name one in different than me. I'm Shayna, you're Shauna. It's S-H-A-N-N-A. It's fine. Like it all makes sense. But there's like 300 different ways to say the name.

Shanna: 47:41

English language is easy. That's I always say I don't mind being called the wrong name by somebody who does it purposefully. Cause to me, I'm like, oh, it's fine. They know me. Or obviously you haven't met me enough. There's like a weird thing where if somebody's known me for a few years and now they're saying it and you know they don't know it, I'm like, that's weird. It's been that is weird. That is weird. But all of that will be yes, all of it will be in the show notes with links. So even if they don't know how to pronounce it, they'll know how to click. So that's fine. That's right. Right there. You guys are like budget besties on, I was looking on all platforms basically, if they want to follow you. Is that right?

Budget Bestie: 48:16

Yes. So they can come over to our podcast. Um, and it is on all podcast platforms. Yeah. And it's financial coaching for women. We're at, are we at my my budget besties? My budget besties on social media.

Shanna: 48:26

Okay. Yes, perfect. I'll put that in there as well. Um, I know we were gonna wrap it up, but I also want to know how long have you guys been besties?

Budget Bestie: 48:33

Oh, okay. So our boys are 17.

Shanna: 48:35

Are you gonna call us old after this? No.

Budget Bestie: 48:40

Our boys are 17. They were four when we first met at the YMCA during a workout class together.

Shanna: 48:45

Oh, I love for a while.

Budget Bestie: 48:47

Yeah. And they've all been besties for forever too. So it's just really fun.

Shanna: 48:51

I love being able to, as soon as we started speaking, I was like, love your email format. Then I started stalking you. I'm like, love them. You're so cute, you're so vibrant. And along with all of your systems, too. Like I said, I downloaded one earlier because I wanted to check it out, and it is super cute and fabulous. So I just appreciate you both so much.

Budget Bestie: 49:09

Well, we had a wonderful time, Shauna.

Shanna: 49:11

Yay.

Budget Bestie: 49:12

See, we didn't keep doing it. Um, because you are amazing. Your your energy is also amazing. And so this is a privilege for us to be able to come and talk to you. And we know your audience loves you, so we really um honor, we we appreciate that you would share them with us because they, like you said, you never know. But we are definitely who we are, and and that's our last bit of advice is just be who you are and you're gonna have a good time, you know, like it's it's much easier and more fun.

Shanna: 49:36

Absolutely. Thank you so much. I just have enjoyed it so much. And y'all have the best smiles and energy and love how you guys look at each other for like your turn, it's adorable.

Budget Bestie: 49:44

So well, thanks for letting us talk about the B-word. We really did have a good time.

unknown: 49:49

Of course.

Shanna: 49:49

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