I live in Korea, and I was hemorrhaging cash until I changed how I think about earning both American and Korean money

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• After several years of teaching in Korea, I started earning money with U.S. companies on the side.
• For several years, I didn’t really know how to effectively manage having income in two countries.
• My money coach helped me change my mindset about how I manage multiple income streams.

When I first came to Korea in 2013, I arrived expecting to have one primary (and very modest) source of income: my teaching job at an after-school English academy for elementary-aged students. The problem, however, was that I was also saddled with $60,000 in student loans. Out of necessity, I sent most of my salary back to my U.S. bank account every month to fulfill my monthly loan payments.

After living in Korea for a couple of years, I found a way to supplement my income: freelance writing and working as an editor for a small boutique content marketing agency. Suddenly, I was earning money in the U.S. again. It wasn’t much in the early days, but it was helpful for adding to my loan payments or buying and shipping things I couldn’t get locally, like deodorant, my preferred brand of American toothpaste, or candles and oil diffusers in my favorite scents.

I struggled with financial responsibility

As multiple streams of income came into different bank accounts in two countries, I was rarely a good steward of my earnings. Though I eventually managed to pay off $60,000 in student loans 11 years ahead of schedule living in Korea, I find myself falling into the habit of buying on credit and rolling over a balance, making my credit score fluctuate and my blood pressure incrementally spike.

Other times, I would simply overspend in Korea and have digital dust bunnies left in my bank account before my next payday. To offset my sudden penniless circumstances, I would pull cash via ATM withdrawals — either money I’d sent home from my Korean salary or money I’d earned from writing — and immediately deposit it more times than I care to count.

Until earlier this year, I didn’t consider myself financially responsible. I decided that enough was enough, and I had to get my financial affairs in order; I had no excuse to continue living like a poor college graduate anymore.

Mixing money was complicating everything

I hired and met with Joe Maddux, a money coach, in early February, and his biggest recommendation — keeping my “Korean” money and my “American” money separate — has changed the way I view my finances, how I save and spend, and how I’m paying down my debt (again).

Aside from asking me to be brutally honest about where every cent I spent was going, Joe helped me see where I was making some painful financial mistakes.

For example, I hadn’t considered how much of a disservice I was doing myself every time I would pull money from one country to the other. For one thing, the currency exchange rate between the South Korean won and the U.S. dollar has gotten worse over the years. When I first arrived in 2013, the math was almost perfect — $1 was equal to about 1,040 Korean won. In my head, I would convert local price tags to dollars and know about what I was spending.

In 2024, the exchange rate from $1 has fluctuated between 1,300 and 1,400 won, usually around 1,350. Like everyone who feels pain pumping fuel into their car when it’s 30 cents higher than it was a few months ago, every time I sent money back to the States, I felt like I was hemorrhaging cash, losing 30 cents on every dollar I sent back. And regardless of how I decided to move money back and forth, I was always losing some small percentage purely on varying exchange rates and the banks keeping what they considered their share.

Additionally, Joe helped me see how I was allowing my mindset of having two streams of income halfway across the world to justify making and sticking to a budget and sometimes living above my means. Every time I moved that cash back and forth instead of keeping it separated with specific “jobs” or purposes, I was giving myself permission to make bad money decisions.

‘American’ money stays in America; ‘Korean’ money stays (mostly) in Korea

Joe and I worked out a budget for what I could spend in Korea each week and month. I now have a “Financial Friday” where I look at what I’ve spent over the week on my Korean credit card and pay off the balance for the week. If I’ve gone “over” my allowance, I have to cut that out of the following week’s budget. Weirdly, I love my Financial Fridays because it helps me keep myself accountable.

Joe also introduced me to the concept of the sinking fund — the practice of averaging your annual costs for things and saving ahead of schedule for them. This blew my mind and, for the first time in my life, has made saving fun because I know I get to use it on things I enjoy, like travel.

If I have “Korean” money left over, I can send it back to my U.S. accounts to pay down my accumulated credit card debt or keep it in Korea for a rainy day. So far, it’s fallen into the latter category. (I can always find a way to spend money!) But thanks to Joe’s help, intentionally keeping my money separate has helped me take control of my financial life and get me closer to true financial freedom.