[Editor's Note: This is a guest post from Timothy R. Ulbrich, Pharm.D., R.Ph, a regular reader who is starting his own financial blog for pharmacists. You can follow him on Twitter @FinancialRPh. We have no financial relationship.]
The journey to $350K in Debt
I was 17 years old and did not have a penny of debt. My parents had done an awesome job of teaching me the importance of work and managing that income in a responsible way divided between giving, saving and spending.
Eight years later, I had obtained my pharmacy degree, was married, had finished residency training, and had bought my first house. I was now over $350,000 in debt. I had borrowed money I had no business borrowing for things I didn't need to buy. It all seemed so normal and manageable. “I had it under control,” I thought. I was making a six-figure salary and never thought twice about taking out that much debt.
“Good Debt.”
‘It wasn't even stupid debt,' I rationalized in my mind. No credit card debt. No fancy cars. No extravagant ‘toys.' A modest home under $200,000 that was well under what the bank told us we could afford. My wife and I seemed to be living a normal, reasonable and responsible life.
By societal standards, it was all ‘normal.' The problem is, we as a society have over $890 billion in credit card debt, over 1 trillion dollars in student loan debt and a population with a median retirement account balance
Timothy R. Ulbrich, PharmD
of $3,000 for all working-age households and $12,000 for those households near retirement. Using society as a measuring stick is probably not a good idea.
So the humbling moment had arrived. I was broke. I was making a six-figure salary but was broke. When everything was borrowed, I didn't in fact own anything.
The Moment of Truth
It was just over two years ago that the light bulb went on and the scales fell off my eyes. The first thought that came to mind was a humbling one. It was accepting the reality that I was broke. I was making a six-figure salary but, in fact, was broke, owning almost nothing I had. The second more uplifting thought was what would I do if I had no debt? What would that look like? What would that feel like?
It was during that moment that we decided we would begin to attack and attack and attack until we had paid off all of our debt. We got serious about putting together a budget and scraping up every dollar we could to throw at the debt. We grinded this out for some time. What was the result? It was paying off all of our debt with the exception of our balance on our mortgage in October 2015. We had taken $350,000 in debt and whittled it to down to less than $150 in mortgage debt. We had paid off $200,000 in debt in 7 years. I'm here to encourage you that it can be done. We did this through residency training, making 1 pharmacist salary with my wife staying home to raise our 3 boys. It can be done.
Budgeting To Get Out Of Debt
So, what was the breakdown of monthly expenses during the time we were focused with the most intensity on getting out of debt?
- 30% to non-mortgage debt. This was predominantly our student loans but also included a couple cars and a kitchen remodel along the way.
- 15% to our mortgage. One of the keys to getting out of debt and winning long term financially is to avoid having too much of your monthly income tied up in your housing expenses, whether that be rent or owning a home. In our case, having a mortgage payment at only 15% of our take-home pay allowed us to pay more towards the debt and now is allowing us to save more towards retirement.
- 10% to the local church. I’ll be honest that we didn’t start this way but in our journey to getting out of debt became convinced of the importance of giving to our local church.
- 10% to groceries and household items. This was by far the hardest budget item for us to predict and keep consistent from one month to the next.
- 5% for auto gas, insurance, tolls, etc. We live approximately 3 hours from both of our parents so we are on the road a lot!
- 5% to utilities.
- 25% was divided into very specific categories. We found that being as specific as possible allowed us to track the expenses and gave us the best chance of winning with our plan. Having too many broad categories would leave too much room to spend without enough accountability. This included categories such as our TV solution (Netflix and Sling TV), hair cuts, date nights, family entertainment, saving for vacation, clothing, personal spending, and gifts for family and each other to name a few.
On The Way To Financial Freedom
When we hit the submit button on last debt payment, the feeling was one of pure joy. No more car payments, student loan payments, or any other payments. We had previously been dedicating approximately $2,500 per month of our income to payments, and now we were free to use that to pay off the mortgage early, give, and save for retirement and college educations for our kids. What an incredible, freeing feeling!
So here we are now, without a penny of debt except the mortgage. Think through this with me for a minute. If we took the amount being paid towards debt ($2,500 per month on average) and took 40% of this, or $1,000 per month, and put it in a good investment earning approximately 10% growth per year (near the historical average of the S&P 500 Index) for 35 years, we would have almost $4 million at retirement. Wow! I would argue that is a pretty conservative estimate since a good mark for savings for retirement is 15% of your income. A pharmacist making $115,000 per year and putting away 15% of her income (approximately $1,400 per month) would have over $5 million dollars at retirement. That assumes she never gets a raise the rest of her life.
How about for physicians? According to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, the average physician salary in 2012 was equal to or greater than $187,200. If we run the same assumptions as above (15% of income saved at 10% growth for 35 years), the result is almost $9 million. Make more than that? Run the savings calculator yourself. It is good.
If we play out my story further of freeing up $2,500 per month that was going to debt, we would still have $1,500 per month left after putting away the $1,000 for retirement. If we took $600 of that and invested $200 per month for each of our kids over the next 16 years for college, there would be approximately $86,000 per child ready for college. We still have $900 left to give, go on vacation, etc. Freeing.
[Editor's Note: I have to interject briefly at this point as I just had visions of trees growing to the sky. While Tim is mathematically correct that investing $12K per year at 10% for 35 years would give you a sizable nest egg, I find that estimate far from being a “conservative” one. This is what I call the “Bad News Of Retirement Planning.” It is simply that your money is probably not going to grow at 10% no matter how many times Dave Ramsey repeats it. Keep in mind the assumptions that must come true for this to actually play out over your career:
- You invest in nothing but risky high-returning assets such as stocks. No bonds allowed.
- You stay the course through 3 or 4 serious bear markets. You can't sell out, even once. No behavioral errors.
- Returns are distributed evenly. If you get all the good years early on when you don't have much invested, you're not going to get to the same place.
- You pay nothing in taxes or investment expenses.
- Inflation remains 0% over the next 35 years.
- The future resembles the past with regards to stock market returns.
You can decide for yourself how likely all of those assumptions are to come true. When running your own numbers, I highly recommend you use a number like 5% (and Bill Bernstein thinks that's optimistic.) My actual after-tax, after-expense, after-inflation returns over my entire investing career on a 75/25 portfolio are about 6%, and that's 6+ years into a bull market. At 5%, that $12K a year only gets you to just over $1 Million, $420,000 of which is money you saved. If you want to become wealthy, starting early and investing wisely are important, but you'd better plan to save like a maniac too. 80% of my first million was simply money I earned but did not spend.]
If you haven’t already, spend some time thinking about and writing down your long-term financial goals. It will make the day-to-day grind of paying off debt and saving for retirement that much better.
What do you think? How much debt did you graduate with? How long did it take you to pay it off? What was the key to doing so? What percentage of your income did you dedicate to debt pay-off? What do you assume your investment portfolio will grow at over the long run? Comment below!
That’s an inspiring story, though I’m struck by the fact that the budget for 7 years of paying off debt did not include any investing for retirement. That’s 7 years of lost tax benefits, market gains, and compounding interest. That hurts to think about. I would have cut spending in other categories (and perhaps done some moonlighting) to put at least 10-15% in tax advantaged retirement accounts.
Hi Louis – great point! I was running out of room for this article but retirement savings was definitely not left out of this equation and I would never recommend that, especially with a match. I am employed by a state university and am currently contributing 22% of my salary into a 403b between my contributions and the match. I also had some Roth IRAs that I was contributing to prior to getting serious about debt repayment. Those were on hold but I will now be moving back to those on top of the 22% while also thinking about other goals (kids college, paying off house, etc.)
Thanks for sharing your story. Your mortgage debt was included in that $350,000 debt, right? Do you plan on attacking the remaining mortgage debt next?
I’m impressed that you gave 10% to the church while in serious debt and not saving for retirement. I’m all about giving to charity, but I think giving a little while you’re strapped and making up for it with generous giving later would be more sensible.
There’s usually a religious motivation behind people paying tithing- that God expects it of you or that He will bless you (if not temporally, at least spiritually) if you pay it no matter what your financial circumstances. Waiting until you’re rich to give is a bit like the rich man in the story of the widow’s mite.
At its extreme, some people don’t give anything until they die. Well, in reality at that point they’re giving someone else’s money away-their heirs.
While it might seem a big deal to give away 10% of your money, I assure you there is someone down the street making 10% less than you and living just fine. Live like him and you can afford to give away 10%.
Agree with the WCI on this one. This was a priority for us and really put everything into perspective. Regarding the $350,000…yes, that included the mortgage. Now that we have paid off the $200,000, we are left with just under $150,000 on our mortgage. We are going to focus on balancing paying off the house with kids college, additional retirement savings and additional giving.
Good for you, Tim. I didn’t mean to sound critical of your tithing. It is a personal choice and clearly has been a priority for you and your family. It’s not easy to have the conviction to make that sacrifice while trying to climb out of debt simultaneously.
I choose to donate to our church, but admittedly nowhere near 10%. We donate to numerous other charities that do good works that were largely the purview of the church in biblical times. We’re helping feed the hungry, clothe and shelter the poor, etc… through organizations like the Salvation Army, local soup kitchen, food shelf, etc…
I was thinking a tithe was 10% off the top, i.e. salary. Giving 10% of take home pay is no doubt easier on the budget, particularly for the high earning professionals who frequent this site. A well-compensated professional in a medium or high tax state might have take-home pay (after taxes, tax deferred retirement, and insurance deductions) of about 60% to 65% of salary. Take the deduction for the tithe and get nearly half of it back at your marginal tax rate and the “10%” tithe sets you back about 3% of your gross salary. I completely agree that a physician earning $400,000 can spare about $12,000 without difficulty. Unfortunately, the math doesn’t work out nearly as well for a resident making $50,000, which makes tithing more of a hardship then. Perhaps that’s the point, though.
Exactly. That is the point. As MMM has pointed out, we’re all living in a volcano of exploding wastefulness. Since we probably only need something like 10% of our gross income, it isn’t that big a deal to save 20-30% of it, pay taxes on 20-30% of it, and piss away the other 30% on whatever. For some people, that’s charity. For others, it’s a Tesla.
I agree with WCI. I have found that no matter how hard times are, the first check that gets written every month regardless of my financial situation is my tithe check. This is my personal biblical belief, and obviously you don’t have to follow it. However, when you view it from a psychological angle, it forces you to budget, and you don’t (can’t) buy things you don’t need because you don’t have the money. It forces you to live significantly below your means. And if you follow the mantra that your money is God’s, and not yours (again, sorry for the religious interjection), you will automatically become a better steward with your own finances.
I completely agree. I view it as it’s all God’s money anyway; before it’s mine or the government’s, it’s His first. In that light, I’m happy to give him back what he asks for, as an act of worship and faith. It’s easy to give in the plentiful times, but it takes faith to continue to be obedient during the tough times. If we can’t be responsible with a small amount of money, we won’t be responsible with a lot of money, so we’ve always tried to give in every stage of our lives.
Your story is, indeed, inspiring and I am sure will motivate many of the lurkers on this site to take a look at their own plans. 7 years may seem like a long time to some, but, in retrospect, did it seem to drag on or pass quickly?
You had no allocation to income taxes in your budget. Where did they fit in? At a salary of $115k and even with 5 exemptions, you were still in the 25% marginal tax bracket. This is using the standard deduction and I’m sure you itemized, just on your tithes and mortgage interest deduction, but still…
I look forward to reading your blog!
I’m glad to hear you found this inspirational! To be honest, a little bit of both in terms of time dragging on and passing quickly. I think my wife would agree that it felt like a grind to be living that tight on a monthly budget for that long. While time passed quickly with the business of life, it became harder if I found myself comparing to others that weren’t focused on paying off the debt and therefore had more discretionary income. However, it was humbling in a very good way to have a decent income and be ‘forced’ to watch expenses so closely. I’m convinced this will put my wife and I in a good position long term as we worked on this together.
The budget you saw in this article was after taxes take home pay (and also after retirement contributions to the 403b). Yes, we did itemize each year and the refund we received went towards the debts and some vacation expenses. Does that answer your question? If not, feel free to shoot me an e-mail at [email protected] and we can discuss further.
Yes, that answers my question. It helps to know that your budget was based on after-tax income. Thanks!
WCI – I appreciate your comments about 10% returns. I have to say that since writing this article several months ago, I have backed off that assumption significantly and agree with your comments and assumptions. The main reason is a lot of the fees with mutual funds as I have dug a little bit deeper in that area (some upwards of 3%). I certainly have many mutual funds that I’m investing in that have a track record of 10%+ since inception within retirement savings and a 529, but when accounting for fees and inflation, I think it is better to be conservative in assumptions and if they outperform those assumptions, bonus!
I usually look at a range of real (inflation adjusted) returns when doing projections, ranging from 0% to 8%. If I’m only using one number, I’ll use 4% to be somewhat conservative. This would be equivalent to 7% nominal with 3% inflation. I’m invested 90 / 10 stock / bond.
Many funds have done really well if inception was 7 years ago, but then you’re not seeing 2 massive drops in stocks that occurred about 8 and 15 years ago. The S&P 500 has averaged about 10% over the very long haul, but many intelligent investors who spend far more time than me studying the data (Warren Buffett for example) expect lower returns going forward.
Mutual fund fees should be nowhere near 3%. I don’t own any funds with an expense ratio of above 0.15% and a weighted average of my investments show my overall fee to be less than 0.10%.
If you are hands off, paying an AUM fee with an advisor buying load funds with 12b-1 fees and high expense ratios, you could probably approach or exceed 3%, particularly if your “advisor” is doing a lot of trading within your account. Don’t let that happen. Let the market returns be yours, not split 50 / 50.
I agree. It isn’t hard to find a mutual fund that has had 10% returns IN THE PAST but that has little if any bearing on predicting future returns.
[Personal attack removed.] You know better than to leave a comment like that on this website, especially directed at a guest poster who is a regular reader.
Life isn’t all about math – there are intangible benefits from the church donations. Be it psychological, spiritual, or social. [Comment modified.-ed]
[Response to comment-deleted. You all can take that discussion somewhere else if you want to have it.-ed]
[Comment removed. This post is about getting out of debt, if you all want to discuss tithing from a moral or religious perspective, take it to the lounge on the forum.-ed]
I agree with removal if the post had a personal attack. However, in a post about getting out of debt; a 10% tithe is fair game for evaluation. If he had instead put 10% of his money towards gambling, cocaine, or hookers you wouldn’t object to people making comments about it.
It’s his money and if he wants to give 10% to a church or whatever, so be it. The bigger issue is the journey of debt eradication.
Congratulations on seeing the issue, instituting a plan, and executing the plan to get out of debt!
I don’t mind you evaluating an expense. Insulting someone’s religious beliefs crosses a line however and requires moderation on this website. The discussion was going in a bad direction so I put an end to it.
Agreed. However, I think you can shorten that up; “Insulting someone crosses a line.” Since I didn’t see the original posts, I defer to your good judgement the discussion was going in a bad direction.
I really enjoyed the guest post. Interesting and inspirational in much the same way the Dave Ramsey ‘debt free’ stories are.
I missed the personal attack but I am glad WCI removed all of them. There is no reason to make fun of someone’s choices. In the words of my deceased mother “if you don’t have something nice to say then just don’t say anything.”
A very inspiring story. I cannot imagine being $350k in debt and clawing your way out of it! Nice work. I agree with the editor that the 10% assumption is wishful thinking :-).
Congrats Tim on excellent financial management. The point I see and that was similar to our path was your initial choice of a house. By keeping housing costs low, your budget was freed up for many other goals. Could you expound a little on your decision to keep housing costs low?
Thank you Dr. Mom! While my wife and I were intentional about buying a house that was well within our means, I wish I could say we were doing it with the foresight to be able to maximize our debt repayments. At the time, we were not that focused on becoming debt free and if I had to do it all over again, I would have rented for one more year to have a bigger down payment. I’m going to be writing an article in the future about “5 Financial Decisions I Wish I Could Have Back” and purchasing a home without 20% down will be included in that. In just one more year, we could have had at least 20% down, avoided PMI and been in a position to be more flexible with a move if the need were to arise. Our mortgage payment with property taxes and insurance is currently at 15% of my take home pay. I would like to keep it like that in the future to free us up to save more for retirement and to have more available for giving. One last comment here. I’ve seen it over and over (as I’m sure many others have) where with the nice house comes the desire (perceived need, whatever you want to call it) to have the nice car, nice toys, etc. I don’t feel that pressure in my neighborhood and I am thankful for that.
Great insight. Our “Get Out of Debt House” was not intentional either. In retrospect, it was a large part of our success in getting rid of student loans. I loved that house and neighborhood. I would have stayed there longer, but we just outgrew the space with kids and animals. Not rushing to buy the big fancy pants doctor house helped our finances in many ways. In addition to helping us get rid of student loans, it helped us decide what was and wasn’t important to us in buying it and furnishing it. Best wishes for further success.
Another insight Tim into future wealth building is trying to avoid the temptation to constantly trade up houses. Fancy new neighborhoods keep springing up and dangle all sorts of new fancy pants innovations to attempt to divert you from the path to financial freedom. I personally have lived in the same house since 1992. I have have admittedly renovated the kitchen with expensive granite. I will continue to live in this house until I completely retire since it is one mile from my hospital and office.
Great article, very inspirational. Just wanted to say I really enjoyed reading about other healthcare professionals, hope to read more in the future!
I think it’s inaccurate to group your mortgage debt with your student loan debt, and say that you are “350k in debt”. I have 330k in student loan debt, plus a mortgage that I owe 160k on, but I don’t say that my total debt is 490k…as my home is worth 230k. Your home is an asset, and can be sold for several hundred thousand. Your loans cannot. I am wondering what your actual debt was (credit card, student loan, etc) not including the mortgage debt.
Hate to break it to you, but your total debt is 490K. Home equity is great, but your mortgage debt certainly goes in the “Liabilities” column on your balance sheet, regardless of whether the debt is secured or not.
The reason I included that is at the time when we bought our house, we put very little down and had almost no equity in our home (a decision I would like to have back). Yes, I could sell it at any time unlike my student loans but didn’t have much equity at all. Of the $350K, $200,000 was in non-mortgage debt. Of that, approximately $155,000 was for school loans, approximately $30,000 was for two cars and the balance was for a loan we took out on a kitchen remodel.
Very impressed with the dedication to paying off 200k while on one income and 3 kids! Having someone at home saved a ton for daycare costs too, kudos to your wife for doing that. Great choice on keeping your mortgage low so you weren’t consumed by that too. Now that you paid off 200k, and going on to paying off your mortgage, will you be investing a bit more now?
Thank you Financial Nirvana Mama! Yes, now that we have $200K paid off, we are evaluating how we are going to balance our other priorities (additional retirement, kids college, paying off the home early, and some fun!) All thoughout this journey of becoming debt free, I had been contributing 20+% to retirement b/c I am a state teacher and we have a forced contribution (approaching 14%) with a nice match (~9%) since we don’t pay into social security. Therefore, additional retirement (specifically in a Roth IRA since my salary is under the limit for contributions) will be a focus along with the others. Right now, it looks like we will have approximately $2,000 per month (just over 25% of my take home) to balance between additional retirement, kids college, paying off home early, additional giving and enjoying life. My wife and I are talking through right now how to divide that up.
That’s great to hear! You have choices other than slaying off debt! Great to see a burden lifted and building some great conversations with your wife about what to do wih leftover money:) nice place to be in.
Congratulations Tim! How did you decide to buy a house worth 200k? Usually people feel the pressure to buy more, and bigger and more expensive.
We bought a house 1/3rd that of what the lender qualified us for. I was looking at him and thinking if his brain was working fine or not. According to Money ratios, even Bernstein has similar numbers- your house should not be more than twice your salary. And we bought less than that.
However, it is an ongoing thing for others/colleagues/friends to compare and indirectly hint “So when are you moving to another house” while they don’t realize how carefully we chose our house for our needs and how happy we are in it.
And don’t worry about the people who have centered on your tithing like a heat seeking missile. Giving comes from an abundance mind set. You are giving away your story too to inspire others. Thanks for doing this!
Thank you for the encouragement! Congratulations on keeping your housing expenses in check. My reply to Dr. Mom above in this sequence of comments eludes to our decision about buying a house under $200,000 (our purchase price was $176,000). Our mortgage plus taxes and insurance is at 15% of our income and I hope to keep it that way moving forward!
Great post. Certainly gives hope to those of us who also have a debt challenge. A big key component was your wife and you being able to be on the same boat. Well done. Here’s to staying mostly debt free and getting that mortgage paid down.
cd :O)
Far too many liberal assumptions on the return rate of investments. Not accurate as WCI says.
Kudos for deciding and sticking to your 10% donations (regardless of the organization). My grandpa, who ended up being quite wealthy, always said that if you wait to give until you feel that you are at a comfortable place financially, you will never start giving. I believe it is healthy to donate to a cause you believe in that helps others regardless of your financial situation. It may be rather insignificant on a monetary basis early on, but it creates a habit and benefits self and society beyond the monetary value.
Tim, you’ve done a great job getting expenses under control. I think your greatest challenge going forward is avoiding lifestyle inflation — at least that’s the challenge and inflection point I am at right now. It’s certainly possible with you and your wife on the same page it won’t be easy, though you reference some of the challenges of the sparse budget you followed for awhile. Once the debt stress is gone a lot can change in a mindset.
I am 3 years out of training and debt free apart from my mortgage. Our mortgage payment is 10% of our take home pay (purchase price under $200k on a 15 year loan), though that % isn’t the prism I usually view it in. We have a pretty cheap life overall and we’re fairly cheap with our day to day life (though I got in trouble for buying the generic cereal today).
However we need a bigger house with access to better schools, and a minivan to transport the new addition due to join our family (kid #3 due in the fall); I know MMM wouldn’t approve but we’ll be buying one. Suddenly I’m facing the spectre of my low cost life and big monthly cushions eroding because all the houses that fit our criteria (space, schools, and avoiding a 35-40 mile round trip daily work commute for my spouse and me) are far more expensive than I ever thought I would buy.
I’m quite likely to have a new mortgage that’s double our gross income to get the house we want. It’s technically in out budget and probably what we’ll end up doing but it makes me feel icky. We’re saving towards the 20% down and my wife even convinced/forced me to lower our work retirement contributions this year to speed that effort (trying to avoid the doctor’s loan).
Lifestyle inflation isn’t always a slippery slope. Sometimes you fall down the slope quickly, and sometimes you meander down and don’t realize you were walking down a mountain until you turn around and see how far away the peak is. My wife claims she’ll drive her 9-year old sedan long enough to give it to our eldest kid (who can’t drive for 10 years), so maybe we can climb back up quickly. 🙂
Reasonable lifestyle inflation is your reward for working so hard and doing so well with your finances. Don’t let frugality trap you. Read WCI’s post on Loosening the Purse Strings. Saving and Giving is important, but so is Spending. Sounds like it’s a lesson you are facing as a couple. Listen to your wife. My husband helps me battle my unreasonable desire to save. It makes us better as a couple together. Good luck. Loosen up the finances. Enjoy this stage with your kids, it goes by far too fast.
Point is targeted frugality, not to be miserly or die with the highest money:annual expenses ratio possible. People seem to love this MMM, but even discounting his inconsistencies, his choices are neither prescriptive for everyone else, or even right, they are simply his.
You have to account for that 40 minute drives drag on your time, safety, and wear on the vehicles as well. I dont think I could ever handle more than a 15 minute commute, unless it was on the bike (then I’d have to make it longer) or running to work. I dislike commuting intensely, you never get that time back.
Fair points from both of you. I definitely have loosened my purse strings — I buy nice tickets to baseball games with my wife’s blessing (but I get carried away with the playoffs). For our upcoming anniversary trip we’re going to be spending a nice sum of money to see Hamilton on Broadway (my idea) and spend a few days in the Hamptons (her idea).
I often can justify a single large purchase or trip by absorbing it into the cushion of an otherwise cheap spending month or if needed working an extra ED shift (which I don’t want to rely on). I think what makes me nervous are large recurring charges.
Of course it’s all relative to other things. When we bought our current house 6 years ago I was in training and my wife was working part time and in school part time and her take home pay was something like $200-300 per paycheck every 2 weeks (after taxes, insurance, daycare automatically deducted from her check, etc that’s about what was deposited into her account). We had no cash savings and used a doctor’s loan with 0% down for the home purchase. Moonlighting then wasn’t a necessity but helped significantly.
Now we both are fully employed, our incomes are significantly higher, and the house that 6 years ago was actually above the price range we wanted now feels relatively cheap (I also did a refi x 2 to get the rate lower on the current home).
I had a flight cancelled going through Manhattan last summer and caught Hamilton. Didn’t know much about it but it was the only thing I could walk in and get a ticket for. Now it’s really popular and tough to get a ticket I hear. Great show though, especially if you like rap and history!
You caught it at the right time. It’s sold out 7-8 months in advance now. I had to completely overpay to get tickets.
7th row, $150, 10 minutes before curtain time. Eat your heart out. 🙂
The credit card bill is paid for already so at this point I am past the sticker shock and can just look forward to the show.
But way to rub it in…