A Matter of Choices : They Got Lucky

The Money Make-Over feature was inaugurated with The Times’ Wall Street, California pages last year with the idea that real-life experience would be a powerful teacher, and that the professional advice offered in each case could benefit the public as much as the individual or couple directly involved.

Make-Over subjects have been a diverse group facing varied challenges. For some, it was overspending or unrealistic goals or career setbacks or family situations. For others, it was an investing style that was too risky or too cautious or not diversified.

With today’s end-of-year report, The Times revisits five Money Make-Over subjects to see how they responded to financial planners’ advice and whether they profited from it.

The Coopers and Rhoni Smith faced significant debts but were fortunate enough to have fate come to their aid. Jackie Motobo and couple Dan Robertson and Steve Schullo were diligent savers whose portfolios needed a few adjustments, and who feel they are better off today for having taken some of their planners’ suggestions. For Sydney Kamlager, the problem was a lack of discipline, but she now has a better idea of where her money is going.

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Just a year ago, Michael and Stephanie Cooper were on the verge of filing for bankruptcy protection and couldn’t really afford Christmas presents for their two daughters, now 4 and 2.

Although the two-career couple made about $75,000 a year, they were over their heads in more than $20,000 of personal debt and debating whether to walk away from their three-bedroom Carson home.

However, the Coopers were determined to do anything they could to avoid bankruptcy or losing their home. Financial planner Darlene Jacobsen of Corona del Mar laid out a strict plan designed to extricate them from their debt crisis in two years. The couple took some significant steps this year to get their financial house in order. Some very lucky breaks also helped.

In April, Stephanie, 32, went on the “Wheel of Fortune” game show and won a new car and $42,500 in cash. That allowed the Coopers to pay off all their personal debts and get rid of their 1988 Chrysler LeBaron, which they donated to charity.

The couple also increased their incomes. Stephanie left her $33,000-a-year job as a talent agent for a better-paying position with DreamWorks SKG. Michael, 31, a radio engineer, got a raise, and he took on some more freelance work, as he had planned and as Jacobsen had encouraged.

“I truly believe in prayer,” Stephanie says. “We’ve paid off all of our creditors. We have no debt now. Zero. Nada. Zilch. Just the mortgage.”

In fact, the couple have begun saving regularly--they were saving only erratically before-- toward long-term goals such as retirement and the children’s educations, as well as for shorter- and intermediate-term goals such as a new house.

“One of the things we learned through the financial advisor was to pay ourselves first, then our children,” Stephanie says of the couple’s changed approach to money.

The couple have also made a point of learning to manage their money together.

Stephanie had been handling most of the finances, but Jacobsen pointed out that although many couples do have one person take care of the money, it’s a bad idea in the long run.

“Now we have a money date. We have a glass of wine,” Stephanie says, and go over the bills, make financial decisions--”we do that together.”

Most important, though, is that the Coopers have stopped overspending.

They returned, before the lease expired, their 1993 Jeep Cherokee with its $416-a-month payments and got a cheaper second car.

Whereas they at one time had several credit cards, they now have only one, and they pay it off each month. The couple who two years ago charged $1,500 in Christmas gifts are singing a different tune. Gifts for family and friends this year were conservative, the Coopers say, about $500 total.

“Everything we bought for Christmas we paid for in cash,” Stephanie says. “The temptation is not there anymore. We had a very hard lesson.”

But perhaps the most important lesson their experience taught them, the Coopers say, is that material goods aren’t very important in the great scheme of things.

“Remember that God, your spouse and your family are the most important things in life,” Stephanie says.

“We call ‘em our three Ps that we go by now--prayer, perseverance and patience, in that order.”