Learn English Money Phrases 💵💰💷

So I was just at the bank and I thought I should do an English lesson where I talk a little bit about money. And specifically, I wanted to talk about describing people who don't have enough money and describing people who do have enough money. The first two words that come to mind are the words broke and loaded.

I have a friend and he's always broke. He never has money. As soon as he gets a paycheck, he spends it.

And I have another friend who's loaded. He has lots of money. He always does.

Whenever he gets paid, he puts the money in the bank and he doesn't spend it. So welcome to this English lesson about money. And there's your first two words.

When someone is broke, they don't have any money. When someone is loaded, they have a lot of it. The next word is the word afford.

When you can afford something, it means that you have enough money to buy it. When you can't afford something, it means you don't have enough money to buy it. Right now, I can't afford to take a trip to Europe.

I don't have enough money to do that. But I can afford to go to a Blue Jays game with Jen because that doesn't cost quite as much as a trip. So when you say you can afford something, it means you have enough money and you are able to do it.

You can go and buy whatever you need to buy and use it as you need to use it. And when you say you can't afford something, it means you just don't have enough money for it. So let's imagine that a friend of yours has asked if you want to do something fun with them.

Maybe they want to go to a concert or go on a trip, and you might not have enough money to do that. You could say to them, I'm short on cash right now. When you say you're short on cash, it doesn't mean you're completely broke.

You probably still have money to pay your bills and to buy groceries and all those things. You just don't have money to do something fun. You're short on cash.

Sometimes I'm a little bit short on cash after I buy groceries and I buy gas and I get my vans fixed. Sometimes when someone suggests doing something fun, I might say, hey, maybe we'll do that in a month because I'm a little bit short on cash right now. So this next phrase does not describe me.

It's the phrase to be rolling in it or to be rolling in money. Maybe you know someone who's really, really rich. Maybe you know someone who is rolling in it.

They are rolling in money. This simply means that they have more money than they know what to do with. I really wonder what that's like.

Again, I am not rolling in it. I am doing okay. I can pay my bills.

I live a very nice life, but I'm certainly not rolling in it. So if you know someone who's extremely rich, you could say they're loaded. Or you could say, they're rolling in it.

So another phrase you might use to talk about a time when you don't have enough money is to say, money is tight right now or things are tight right now. If someone says this in English, if they say, money is tight right now, it means, again, they have money. They have enough money to buy groceries and to eat and to pay their rent and to pay their bills, but they don't have money to do anything extra.

So you might say to a friend, hey, let's go to that weekend festival. And they might say, hey, why don't we do that another time, maybe next year? Because money's tight right now.

Things are tight right now. This next phrase is used again to talk about someone with lots of money. And you might use the phrase, they have money coming out of their ears.

When you say, someone has money coming out of their ears, it's kind of a funny image, isn't it? It means they have lots of money. I don't know where this phrase came from or why we say it, but maybe you have a friend and they're just rich.

They're loaded, they have money coming out of their ears. Whenever you go out, they pay for everything. That would be a nice friend to have, wouldn't it?

Anyways, if you know someone who's really rich, you could say, wow, they have money coming out of their ears. So sometimes people have trouble making ends meet. In English, when we say that someone is having trouble making ends meet, it means that they don't have enough money to pay for everything.

In this situation, it would mean they don't have enough money for rent, they don't have enough money for groceries. When they get paid, they use the money very quickly, probably for things they need, and they obviously, and for sure don't have money to do anything fun. So when you say someone has trouble making ends meet, it means that they're struggling.

They probably need a little bit of help. So some people are good with money, and some people are bad with money. When you're good with money, it means that you make money at your job, you pay your bills, you live a nice life, you save for retirement.

You are good with money. You know how to budget. You know how to manage your money.

When you're bad with money, though, it's the complete opposite. It means that you spend more than you make. You're constantly going into debt.

You probably owe a lot of money. You probably have loans and credit card debt. When you're bad with money, it's not a good thing.

So I hope all of you are good with money. I hope you manage your money well, and I hope this English lesson helped you learn just a little more about how to talk about it. Remember, if this is your first time here, don't forget to click that red subscribe button.

Give me a thumbs up, leave a comment below. And if you have some time, there's always another English lesson to watch. Bye.