Pearl - Modern Women 'Boss Babe’d' Too Hard and Ended Up Homeless

00:00:00.000 So modern women fought for the right to live life on their own terms. You know, most modern women

00:00:07.660 make it a mission to prove they don't need a man. They want to do everything alone. They go to some

00:00:14.460 expensive school to get a degree that no one cares about and get a job that's not going to make them

00:00:19.340 a lot of money. The stats show that women still make less than men across the board. That doesn't

00:00:24.260 stop them from buying cars they can't afford, living in apartments they can't afford, and

00:00:28.420 defaulting on their student loan debt. So what happens when all of these bills come due and they

00:00:34.100 can't afford it? They end up homeless. Some women can live in shelters, but there's only limited space.

00:00:40.220 More and more homeless women have found themselves having to live in a car. There's over 100,000 people

00:00:46.640 in the United States living in their cars in LA alone. There's over 60,000 homeless people. 16,000

00:00:53.400 of those homeless people live in their cars and 46 percent of those people are women. The number

00:00:59.580 rises every single year as housing becomes more and more expensive. That is what we're going to talk

00:01:05.660 about on today's show. Modern women living in their cars. Poverty is the number one reason why so many

00:01:12.800 women live in their cars. Not having enough money to pay for the expenses of life has become the norm

00:01:18.020 for too many Americans, especially women. Living in a car is considered the worst, the best worst option

00:01:25.120 for many women. Many homeless shelters are dirty, loud, and lack resources. There has been a rise in

00:01:30.980 women's living in a car lifestyle, and these women actually choose to stay homeless, often documenting

00:01:37.720 their journey on social media. Hashtags like car life and van life have grown in popularity since the

00:01:43.840 pandemic. So I'm going to first read an article about why so many Americans are living in their

00:01:51.260 cars. I do have a personal story about when I lived in my car. I think I'm going to go through all these

00:01:56.980 women's stories and do mine. You know, sometimes guys, I go through the modern women life cycles,

00:02:02.200 right? And I think, oh shit, I did that. You know, I'm not, they'll always say, you know, you're modern.

00:02:08.720 I'm like, well, I live in 2025. I don't know what, of course I'm modern. Do you know what I

00:02:13.820 mean? It's like, I, I'm, you know, I'm, it's 2025, baby. So, you know, this thing is making me sign

00:02:21.980 up. I can't put a card on live. Oh, I hate it when they make me pay. Freaking it. Okay. I guess I

00:02:26.860 can't read this article. Well, I guess we'll skip it. Okay. So we're going to watch a video first.

00:02:32.240 Wait, hold on. Okay. So we have a woman talking about how to live in your car and why you should want

00:02:38.200 to now, ladies, I have actually not for a long period, but I have lived in my car and I will

00:02:44.740 show you video evidence. It's not, they're lying to you. Okay. They're a lot. This is not what it's

00:02:50.500 cracked up to be. Okay. So this is the eighth month I've been living out of my car and what a crazy

00:02:55.700 experience it's been. I'm currently considering getting an apartment because my car is nearing

00:03:00.240 the end of its life and I don't want to buy another. Before I do that though, I thought I would share

00:03:05.040 the pearls of wisdom I've acquired during my months in my home on wheels. If you're thinking

00:03:10.780 about living in a car by choice, then read on. This is all of the wisdom I've gained from my time

00:03:15.800 living in my car. Why live in a car by choice? This is a valid question and everyone will likely have

00:03:23.720 a different set of reasons. I'll share my personal rationale with the hopes that you can discover

00:03:28.920 your own. The number one reason for me is money. I really don't make that much of it. And I have

00:03:34.480 other financial priorities in life beyond just paying the landlord and electric company.

00:03:40.340 When I've previously rented apartments, most of my paycheck would go to bills and those would

00:03:45.280 there would hardly be any leftover for the things I actually cared about. I'm trying to get my student

00:03:50.420 loans paid off and travel the world. I have to get creative to make that happen because getting a

00:03:56.080 $1 an hour raise once a year isn't helping. Being able to travel and hike is my main priority in life.

00:04:02.300 You know how they say like women rank men seventh in their priorities and you're like, what could

00:04:06.700 they put above men? Hiking. Yep. Since moving into my car in January, I've gotten to explore about 10

00:04:13.700 different states and make two international trips. It would have been financially difficult to make all

00:04:19.340 of these trips happen if I had to pay rent and utilities. This is a big way to readjust my

00:04:24.880 present priorities in order to achieve my long-term goals. I feel more motivated to get things done in the

00:04:31.560 morning and I wake up and make some coffee on the hood of my car. I feel ready to start my day and

00:04:36.820 get out into the world. When I used to have an apartment, it would often take me hours to feel

00:04:41.820 motivated to leave and seize the day. It's much easier to make things happen when I'm already sitting

00:04:47.220 in the driver's seat, literally and metaphorically. Now that we've established the why of living in my

00:04:52.660 car by choice, let's move on to the how. Oh God. Guys, I promise you ladies, this is not

00:04:59.140 all it's cracked up to be. Okay, but we'll follow this train of thought. All right. Use what you

00:05:06.580 have and get it organized. Get a setup that you like. One of the main purposes of living in your

00:05:11.080 car is to save money. So don't go buy a new sprinter van. Find a way to make it work with

00:05:16.340 what you've got. So you have a small car. Can you take out the back seats or open up the trunk into the

00:05:21.780 front? Problem solved. If you have a truck, then get a camper cover so you can live out of the back.

00:05:26.620 If you have an SUV like me, just fold the back seats forward. Consider building a platform in

00:05:33.880 your car. You can sleep on top of it and have extra storage space below. I never built one because I

00:05:40.420 don't have the tools for it or the know-how. Also, I like being able to sit all the way up when I'm

00:05:45.100 hanging out in my car. Platforms usually stop you from being able to do that. Sleeping arrangements.

00:05:50.640 Get yourself something to sleep on. I just use the same inflatable sleeping bed that I

00:05:56.400 use for backpacking and camping. Another good option is to buy a memory foam pad. Don't forget

00:06:01.880 your pillow. You will probably want some aspect of privacy while sleeping in your car and hanging

00:06:06.680 out in the car. One suggestion is to sew your own curtains. I bought fabric and Velcro at Joanne

00:06:12.740 Fabrics and used my mom's sewing machine. The whole project took an hour or so. These are by far

00:06:20.800 the best and most useful, most personal touch I've ever made to my car. Make it feel like home. What

00:06:27.120 else can you add to make your car feel like home? While you probably don't want to keep every piece

00:06:32.500 of memorabilia in your car with you, one or two things won't hurt. I have a t-shirt quilt that I

00:06:38.160 made myself in my childhood teddy bear that I keep by my sleeping spot. I have a dashboard collection of

00:06:45.140 all the cards, notes, and photos people have given me. Just a few personal touches will really help it

00:06:50.480 feel like your own space. One of my favorite small things I have is a solar lantern. My car battery

00:06:56.160 gets drained quickly, so I don't like using the overhead lights. My lantern is just a small,

00:07:01.240 inexpensive touch that makes me happy. I have a backpacking camp stove that I use for coffee,

00:07:07.480 hot water, and simple meals. I'm honestly not too creative about cooking for myself while I live in my car.

00:07:12.600 I usually just go to the grocery store and buy salads and sandwiches. I also stock up on snacks

00:07:18.380 so that I don't need to cook such as bagels, fruits, and bars. However, I have car dweller

00:07:26.980 friends who love to cook, so they don't let living in a vehicle hold them back. I've seen cooking

00:07:34.600 setups that are complete with two burner Coleman stoves, cast iron pans, and Yeti coolers. They're

00:07:40.480 hanging out at a camp spot, frying up the breakfast burritos in the morning. If you want to cook for

00:07:45.720 yourself, you can definitely make it happen. He said, why didn't mom let me stay? Well, the story,

00:07:51.300 I'll tell you guys the story about how I ended up in this car, and I'll tell you it's not that,

00:07:57.320 I'm going to tell you this at the end. It's not that simple. It's pretty funny, so I'll get to it.

00:08:02.300 I would never live in a car. Well, I thought it was a good idea at the time, Marcus. Okay,

00:08:06.640 I'm okay. Showering and hygiene. I live in my car in one place, so I have a gym membership. My

00:08:12.100 membership is $35 a month, and I also work out while I'm there, but that would be a lot if I

00:08:17.820 was only going to shower. If you have no interest in working out, try a $10 a month place like Planet

00:08:23.480 Fitness. I have a friend who lives out of her car in Durango, Colorado, and she keeps a punch pass for

00:08:28.900 the YMCA. It's $4 a punch, which is an entrance fee to use essentially anything. It's a lot for just a

00:08:38.100 shower, but she tries to pair it with a yoga class when she goes. Then it's worth the $4. If you're on

00:08:45.080 the road a lot, you won't have the luxury of a gym membership. Many truck stops, state parks, and local

00:08:51.360 centers will have coin-operated showers. Keep change in your car and find a shower a few times a week

00:08:58.800 or less if that's your style. Yeah, so we got, you know, it's kind of a white woman thing, and I think

00:09:07.520 it's because us white women, a lot of us grew up going to national parks, you know. I certainly did.

00:09:13.540 White guys are just very outdoorsy. They like to adventure. They like to hike, so that's what I would

00:09:19.600 put it where we get these crazy ideas. We're like, we can't afford to do what we did growing up, you know.

00:09:26.320 Live in the car, okay. One day I pulled out of my apartment and left, Sarah said. It was the biggest

00:09:31.580 road trip I ever did, and I was terrified to do things by myself, but it ended up being one of the

00:09:36.640 most liberating things ever. Since then, I wonder if there'll be a serial killer someday that realizes

00:09:43.800 the opportunity of all these homeless women in their car. I don't know if anyone, I just thought of

00:09:48.100 Ted Bundy. That's what I thought of it, okay. Since then, I've driven across the country four more times.

00:09:53.820 Okay, all three travelers interviewed by TikTok are, oh my gosh, all three travelers interviewed

00:10:00.800 by Insider have grown substantial followings on TikTok by showcasing their destinations

00:10:06.240 and how they equip their cars. They constantly field questions about how they sleep, mattress

00:10:12.400 embedded in their cars, cook, handle held stoves, and go to the bathroom outside or in public restrooms,

00:10:17.940 and shower, memberships to Planet Fitness or other gym chains. TikTok is a good way to show

00:10:23.860 the everyday grind of road life, Grace said. On TikTok live videos, I'll go just, I'll just go about

00:10:30.900 my everyday tasks like meal prepping my food. People are genuinely so curious that I don't even have to

00:10:36.680 say a word. So yeah, she's in a van. Well, how many men have lived in a van and no one cares? It's like

00:10:42.880 white women do it. And business insiders, like we must document, we must document this. While TikTok

00:10:50.520 itself doesn't provide much profit for their car lifers, it has helped direct followers of their

00:10:56.360 YouTube pages where they post more in-depth content that they can monetize. Social media has been so

00:11:02.800 profitable for me and most of my income comes from there. Brooke said, I wouldn't have monetized

00:11:07.660 my YouTube channel if I didn't have people ask to support it. TikTok and YouTube have also helped

00:11:14.420 car lifers form a community. Some of my best friends I met on the internet, says Sarah, who's

00:11:19.480 met up with fellow car lifers to catch a sunrise or sunset when they cross paths. Harassment is a risk.

00:11:26.380 It's like, this is what women do, okay? They go on the internet, right? And they document, and I accept,

00:11:33.420 I accept this as a risk. And we buy guns, okay? F around and find out. Do you know what I mean?

00:11:44.900 And then they're like, harassment. I'm like, what? You're on the internet. Anyways, although TikTok has

00:11:51.400 allowed car lifers to normalize their choices, they have encountered their fair share of hate online.

00:11:56.940 Women and online hate, it's like men get hate their whole life and they don't complain.

00:12:02.040 Women go on the internet, which is a public forum, and then they get mad that they get complaints.

00:12:09.420 Old men and women have come into my chat saying, why are you homeless? Are you homeless? Brooke said,

00:12:14.420 they don't listen to what I'm saying. I mean, you are homeless. It's kind of like, what? Okay.

00:12:19.500 Despite her being fully self-supported, Sarah says her trolls have accused her of using daddy's money.

00:12:25.740 I mean, you're a white woman. Come on, can we just? Okay. She's also endured sexist comments.

00:12:30.240 People will say, what's wrong with this girl? You're crazy. If you think you can do this all

00:12:34.300 by yourself, why don't you travel with a man with you? She looks exactly how I thought she would look

00:12:40.040 like. She looks like all the women in Colorado. The digital harassment has made TikTokers wary when

00:12:45.140 it comes to their physical safety. Many post content only after, I should do a life cycle by race.

00:12:52.040 This might get me in trouble, but like, cause I do think white women, black women, Hispanics,

00:12:56.140 and Asians take different life cycles. You know what I mean? Anyways, many post content only after

00:13:01.800 they've already left a destination. They carry weapons for self-defense and satellite phones

00:13:06.280 in case they have an emergency in a location without a cell phone signal. Sarah put an NRA sticker on her

00:13:12.520 Ford so no one would suspect she was a woman traveling alone. Brooke, who's non-binary, said that

00:13:19.260 they try to avoid looking feminine presented by wearing baggier clothes, sometimes avoiding towns

00:13:26.260 they think would not be friendly to LGBTQ plus people. Some of the car lifers acknowledge that

00:13:32.120 white privilege helps make their safety on the road possible. If anything, I would think you would

00:13:37.180 be less safe. Like if I was a robber, I would definitely go for the woman that looks like this.

00:13:42.440 Like that would be my target or me, you know, when I was van life. Okay. And they also might not have

00:13:51.480 the same ease if they were not white. Ultimately, I feel that being a white traveler does come with

00:13:57.140 an extreme amount of privilege. Brooke said, I can guarantee I've had less conflicts with locals or

00:14:02.560 even police as the result of existing as a white person. Well, I could say I was thinking of it from

00:14:08.580 a safety. Yeah. I would, I would say if you're black, that's probably going to be more of an

00:14:12.460 issue with the police. I will acknowledge, I will acknowledge that, you know, some white people will

00:14:17.680 pretend there's no discrepancies. There probably is, you know, but I do think the white people are

00:14:24.260 more likely to get robbed because I would, if I saw a white blonde girl and I was, yeah, safer from

00:14:30.420 police harassment. Yeah. I mean, but, but again, if I was, I mean, I think if like, you're going to get

00:14:37.060 who is most likely to be harassed by police or like profiled, obviously black guys are going to

00:14:43.040 be at the top. I do think white men are going to be harassed more. I think black women and white

00:14:47.980 women, like white women will be at the bottom black. Like, I don't know. I do think that they're

00:14:53.120 going to go for the men first. I do. Anyways, I can guarantee I've had less conflicts with locals or

00:14:59.220 even police as a result of existing as a white person. I know that with all my safety measures,

00:15:04.440 I have to consider my skin color ultimately draws less attention. Despite the potential

00:15:09.800 for harassment, car lifers say this experience has made them stronger and more assertive and

00:15:14.600 more likely to trust their gut. The ability to simply drive away from bad situations helps

00:15:19.260 too. You need to be able to set boundaries with strangers and it's going to be uncomfortable.

00:15:23.640 Sarah said, as a woman, we're taught you need to, you need to people please and be so kind

00:15:30.160 and so gentle. But when you're out there traveling in an unknown city, an unknown place by yourself

00:15:35.620 with nothing but a centimeter of glass and metal as your protection, you have to be assertive

00:15:41.500 and set boundaries. Their time on the road has been life changing. For car lifers, one of the biggest

00:15:46.900 benefits of the lifestyle is the ability to be close to nature. For someone with depression and ADHD,

00:15:53.240 throwing yourself into nature and forcing yourself to get out of bed in the morning because the sun is up

00:15:58.440 is the perfect combination for me, Brooke says. All three travelers said they recognize their

00:16:03.720 lifestyle isn't for everybody. They encourage people to try to live, to try, to try car living

00:16:10.500 out fully before committing to it and stressed the fact that it comes with sacrifices. But if you're

00:16:16.620 willing to give up creature comforts, traveling the country doesn't require a fancy van or a TikTok

00:16:22.160 account. It's easy to craft your own journey. Women love journeys. And you don't have to share that

00:16:28.440 media, Grace said. If people want to live their life and save money, it's totally doable. Okay.

00:16:34.340 Now we're going to watch this video. Hi. Yeah, this is going to be white women. We're, I mean, look at,

00:16:41.760 so I got to be honest, black women and white women, we have different flaws. You know, I see a lot of,

00:16:48.720 I know Doug, Doug will say that like, and I am not saying this, but I don't even want to repeat it

00:16:56.360 because I don't want to get clipped, but he'll, he'll have some choice words, Doug MPA, you know,

00:17:02.580 about, about the black women, but white women and black women just have different tactics. Okay. And

00:17:08.080 different dumb things that we do, you know, different. So I'll give you an example. Okay. So

00:17:12.940 white women, we're really the ones, like if you go into a gender transition clinic, that's white women.

00:17:21.380 White women are the ones transitioning these children. I mean, I don't really see black women

00:17:26.600 messing with that. The white women are really like black women. They really put their aggression up

00:17:31.820 front. So up front, they'll say, you know, they're going to be more like have a slicker tongue than a

00:17:39.220 white woman. Let's say like that, you know, they might cuss you out or something, but they're showing

00:17:43.560 you that aggression up front. The white women show you that aggression in divorce court. Yeah. See,

00:17:48.320 Doug MPA is saying American black women are the worst women on the planet. Not all, but maybe 80%.

00:17:54.860 Doug MPA. I don't know. White women, you know, it's just, we're a little thinner and we have that

00:18:00.040 like white woman innocence, but we do just do different dumb shit. Okay. We do different dumb

00:18:06.500 shit. Now, one of the dumb shit is van living. Now I've done that dumb shit and I will tell you the

00:18:11.920 story, but I'm going to, we're going to get through these and I will, and I will tell you guys the van

00:18:16.520 life story. I'm Christine, and this is my old and blind best friend, Chase the dog. We traveled

00:18:21.420 white women love dogs.

Pearl - March 10, 2025

Modern Women 'Boss Babe’d' Too Hard and Ended Up Homeless ｜ Pearl Daily

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