"I Want My Money, Now!"

[Music] brought to you by the Every Dollar app. Start budgeting for free today. I got a uh question. It's kind of a rough situation. Um I need to know the best way to buy um a used car going through a pretty nasty divorce. Uh my car finally just bit dust. Uh my buddy said it can't. It's uh the transmission's out, the frames rusted, and I'm the type that just drives them until they're dead. Uh, the problem is, um, I don't know what my soon tobe ex did with the finances. She split up everything, left me with almost nothing. My lawyer's been trying to work on finding that out, but she's not um, working with a lawyer. So, I just need to know the best way to do this. If we had combined everything, we have the money to do that. But, she's basically tell me to either get a car loan or, which I don't like doing because we finally got out of debt. Uh, but I just need to know the best way to uh approach this um without having to go out. How long have you been separated, Nathan? Uh, about uh five or six months. And where has your paycheck been going, son? Oh, I have my I have my own new uh uh bank account. Oh, how much is in that together? Um, right now about $2,000 because I'm paying for um lawyer fees are really taking a a good chunk of my money right now. Okay. Um, and you're saying, Nathan, you guys had a combined savings? Combined about we had about a combined $50,000 cash available. Okay. And I don't know what he's done with that. The first thing you do is you call your lawyer and you say, "Okay, I need half of our savings account transferred to me by the end of the day. This is asinine." Okay, I want my money. Now, is there a judge involved, Nathan? Not yet. But but the lawyer picks up the phone and calls her lawyer and says, "You have 24 hours to transfer $25,000 or we're going to get before a judge." Um, now the problem is she's not working with a lawyer right now. Good. We're going to go before a judge if you don't listen, lady. Okay. Okay. So, you've been real sweet and stand back and trying to let the lawyers do it. And the lawyers aren't doing their job. They're not working. Yeah. I'm thinking you gave him money and she still sits on your money for six freaking months. Light a fire under some people, buddy. So, yeah, that's I need a car. I want my 25,000 now. We'll negotiate the rest of it later, but I want my money now. Okay. You hear what I'm doing? Yes, sir. I'm creating urgency with my voice. You've been pushed around and you're about to push back. Your only other option is take your car, which is a piece of crap, and sell it for whatever $500 or $700 to the local salvage yard, right? Yeah, pretty much. And then put $2,000 with that and go get you a $3,000 car to drive until for until you light a fire under these people on the other side of this discussion. Okay. But this tells you that you've been tolerating this too long. Yes. Yes, sir. You're right. Yeah. So the the a friend of mine that does divorce recovery work says that what what people have the most trouble with in your situation and you're struggling with it and most it's human. It's not you're a bad guy but most people forget this. You get all tangled up with the emotions and the grief and the anger and everything else regarding the actual marriage coming to an end. But what what in reality is happening is when a divorce occurs, it turns a marriage into a business transaction. Yeah. And if you were in a business partnership and the partnership was closing down, you would not allow your business partner to sit on $50,000 when 25 of it yours. Yeah. For five freaking months. The problem Yeah. I think the other problem is she's currently pregnant. It's not mine. Uh, so that kind of throws No, it it doesn't throw it doesn't doesn't affect anything. Okay, that's her problem. Okay, that's not your problem. Her problem is she's got $50,000, 25 of which is yours, and she's getting ready to get a judge to give her a little slapping if she doesn't get their money turned over. That's what's going on. That's her problem. Okay, she's got other issues like getting pregnant with other people while she's married to you. That's going to be another issue. And that pisses you off and hurts your feelings and you know I absolutely if she had a lawyer he'd be like going crazy right now trying to defend this situation. Oh my gosh. And so yeah, you you've got to bring this thing to a head. Yeah. And for your peace of mind, Nathan, like for this just to drag on in general, whether you need a car or not, for this to be sitting in such limbo for so long, I think yeah, it needs to be its here's the thing. If you don't get this done, you're going to reach over there to get the money. It's going to be gone. It may already be gone. Yeah, that's what kind of concerns me. Yeah, I'm I'm kind of worried about that right now. So, uh, but you know, she's on the hook for it cuz you have you have some kind of proof or can get proof that that money existed when you left the house. Oh, yes, sir. Yeah. And so, she definitely spent marital assets illegally. No question. Now, whether she'll ever be able to pay it back, probably not. Doesn't sound like this is the smartest chick on the planet. So, um, anyway, yeah, you dude, you got to you you needed to have moved on this four months ago, but now you get to move on it. And if you do find out bad news, there's no money and it's going to take a while and your attorney won't jack them up, then you get to go buy a $3,000 car with cash. Uh, because the one you're driving wasn't $3,000. So, it's not like you're moving down like you got rid of a $80,000 vehicle or something. So, you know, that that's where you are. So, stay stay calm. But here's the thing. Treat this now as much as you can. And it's hard to do because we're all emotional beings. I'm emotional just talking to you about it's not even me. So, um, but I mean, treat it like it's just a a transaction, the everything having to do with the the the uh closing up of this marriage, the wrapping up of this marriage called a divorce. It's a transaction. And it needs to happen efficiently, smoothly, and quickly. Yeah. And your lawyer will know. I I've always just been shocked, and I feel like I still learn this, how different state-to-state handles the law when it comes to divorce from communal assets, marital assets, like like all of it. It is like it is, it can get very complicated very quickly. And so, making sure it's as cleancut as possible and quick and fast. That's the thing. It's like wrap it up because and especially since she doesn't have any representation like I don't know. I don't know if that I don't know if that makes it you know it's going to make it worse for her probably but also I don't know if it's going to string along. Well, what makes it worse for the rest of you out there is she probably thinks she's going to get away with this cuz she's not got anybody in in her corner as a lawyer advising her telling her it's telling her this is dumb. You can't do that. Yes. Yes. Yeah. And um she's probably like well yeah I think this is my money and I'm having a baby so I get to keep it. That's not how it works, darling. So, you know, she's got nobody there talking sense into her. And she may be getting her best her best advice from her friend on Instagram. Um, which is, you know, probably not a good idea. We don't know. Probably not a good idea. Just saying. Like, for sure not a good idea. Create your free every dollar budget today. The simplest way to budget for your