Hi Reader,

We ALLLL joke about how expensive this sport is AND ALSO, if you're like me, your natural tendency is to avoid knowing exactly HOW expensive it is.

But, friend, we can do hard things.

We can budget for today, plan for the unknowns, and still try to save for the big stuff down the road - college, retirement, all of it.

But how? How do we actually juggle all of that at once?

Enter: An expert.

Grace Speckman, a hunter/jumper rider for almost 30 years and a financial planner joined me on the podcast this week to offer practical (and non-judgmental) insight how to balance all of these budget pulls.

😳 She's not wrong.

We dig into the expenses that sneak up on us (shipping costs, farrier bills, that saddle you didn't know you'd need), how to actually build an emergency fund around horse life, and the uncomfortable math Grace shares on what it costs us down the road every time we skip a retirement contribution to make room for horses right now.

Ep 28: The Horse Family Money Juggle with Grace Speckman

🎧 Listen on Apple​
🎧 Listen on Spotify​
🎧 Listen on the Broke Horse Moms site​

Grace is also offering us access to The Thoughtful Equestrian's Guide to Protect, Grow, and Pass on Wealth, which I signed up for months ago!

Check that out and definitely give her a follow on her Dollars and Horse Sense Instagram channel, YouTube and LinkedIn.

🤷🏻‍♀️ Are We Supposed to Know This?

Each week, I'll share a question that we should all PROBABLY know, but likely don't. Meh. We'll figure it out together. I’ll share the answer in next week’s newsletter.

*Think you know it? Hit reply and tell me before 5pm THIS Friday. I’ll give a shoutout and drop a Broke Horse Moms sticker in the mail to one of the (surely many) correct answers. No googling allowed!

😌 What's Saving Our Barn Life This Week

• ​YNAB - The app I mentioned in the interview, short for 'You Need a Budget,' which you DO. There's an annual fee but it's been a super helpful tool for our family for almost 10 years now. You create categories for spending, it interfaces with your accounts, and has an app that makes it easy to make spending decisions in real time.
• ​Ally Bank - A totally online banking platform that we use to keep our emergency fund in. The rates for savings accounts are much higher than traditional banks and the money is easy to access in, you know, an emergency.

One quick request: I'm working on a directory of lesson barns for horse families and am currently gahtering input from trainers and barn owners. If you fit that category, I'd love your input. If you do not fit that category, could you please text this link to your kiddo's trainer/barn owner and ask them to complete it?

​Broke Horse Moms Barn Directory: Barn Owner Interest Survey​

It'll take 5 minutes, maybe, and will give me solid insight into what trainers need.

Alright, that's all for this week, friend.

Keep on bending!
Angie

P.S. Love what we're doing here at Broke Horse Moms? Pop on over to ​https://buymeacoffee.com/brokehorsemoms​ and contribute as little as $1 to support us.

P.P.S. Missed a newsletter? See previous posts here.​