Smart Money Podcast — Planning for Pet Emergencies: Vet Budgeting Tips to Avoid Financial Stress

Welcome to NerdWallet’s Smart Money podcast, where we answer your real-world money questions. In this episode:

Learn how to financially prepare for the costs of pet emergencies with firsthand experiences from pet owners and experts.

How much does emergency pet care cost? How much should you budget for unexpected pet expenses? Hosts Sean Pyles and Ronita Choudhuri-Wade discuss the unpredictable nature of pet emergencies and the importance of financial readiness to help you understand how to effectively manage unexpected veterinary costs. They begin by sharing their personal experiences and discussing the emotional toll of pet emergencies, with tips and tricks on setting up a savings account for pet expenses, considering pet insurance, and understanding the wide range of potential costs involved in emergency care. Vivien, a pet owner from Jersey City, New Jersey, also shares her story of dealing with an unexpected pet emergency.

Then, Dr. Angela Beal, a veterinarian based in Columbus, Ohio, joins Ronita to discuss strategies for financially preparing for pet emergencies. They discuss tactics for setting up a dedicated pet emergency fund, the benefits of pet insurance, and practical steps for emotionally and financially managing unexpected veterinary expenses.

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This transcript was generated from podcast audio by an AI tool.

Pets are wonderful. Pets are lovely. Pets are simply the best. But pets can also chew on furniture. They don’t know not to wander into traffic. They eat things that they shouldn’t, and all that can land them somewhere nobody wants to be: the emergency room.

Pet owners could expect to pay a minimum of $2,000, probably more, for an emergency situation. I think setting aside maybe $50 to $100 per month in a savings account and letting that account grow would be a good idea.

Welcome to NerdWallet’s Smart Money podcast. I’m Sean Pyles.

And I’m Ronita Choudhuri-Wade.

And this is episode three of our nerdy deep dive into the cost of pets. And today, Ronita, we are not all sunshine and rainbows and puppies and kittens; it’s time to talk about what to do when the worst happens to our furry family members.

This is the thing nobody wants to imagine will happen: the accident, the poisoning, or the sudden turn of health, all the things that land you at the veterinary hospital where you’re at risk of making not only healthcare decisions but financial ones too.

I feel fortunate that in all of my years of pet ownership, I haven’t had to deal with a trip to the emergency vet, at least not yet, and I’m knocking on wood as I’m talking.

Yeah, I can’t say I’m so lucky. We had to take Mo to one of those 24/7 emergency vets after he ate something. We still have no idea what it was, but he got violently ill. He kept puking, and there was blood, and it was like eight o’clock at night. It was all really scary.

But we took him there, and the vet gave him something for dehydration that he was experiencing and then meds to solve the stomach issue. The visit was about 30 minutes, and the total cost was $666.89. We had a deductible, and then pet insurance covered the rest. It’s one of those things that felt so random within a very normal week, but frankly, you should expect or at least prepare for, because pets are, if nothing else, unpredictable.

They are. Sometimes you get happy tail wags. Sometimes you get a large puddle of puke.

I appreciate the visual, Sean.

Hey, it is a favorite activity of many cats, Argus included. He has a weekly puke at this point, so that’s always a fun surprise whenever we find it. So for those who are wondering what it might cost to get emergency care for your beloved pets, well, it varies widely depending on the species, your location, and the type of emergency.

It’s really hard to generalize. But WebMD says for a large dog, it can be anywhere from 80 bucks for a simple blood test to $5,000 for emergency surgery. No doubt it’s possible to go well beyond that if it’s some sort of catastrophic emergency like getting hit by a car.

Yeah, it can be a whole lot of money, which sometimes doesn’t seem fair. You may call it a pet peeve.

I see what you did there, Ronita. Yeah, when pets can cost as much as treating humans, well, I guess that’s why a lot of us consider them irreplaceable family members. And the costs keep going up too. The Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks what we spend on veterinary care, and the price of vet services in urban areas rose 6.4% from June of 2023 to June of this year.

And that’s some inflation right there.

Certainly is. Earlier this year, USA Today released a report that found 91% of 1,000 dog owners they surveyed said they’d experienced some degree of financial stress in the past year related to the cost of pet care. Sixty-six percent of them said that they’ve cut back on personal spending because of that expense.

I know I would. So it really is so important to go through the worst-case scenario exercise for a reality check on how you would deal with that kind of unexpected situation. Could you afford it if your pet had a major emergency? How would you deal with it? Do you have a number in your head for what you’re willing to spend? All really critical questions when it comes to care for your furry and scaly family members.

I appreciate the shout-out to Ozzie, the Gecko, who fortunately has not had any emergencies in has 22 years of straight chilling. All right, listeners, we want you to bark and meow at us with your stories about your pets and what it takes to keep them in kibble. What are you sacrificing in your budget to have an animal?

We want to hear any and all pet stories over the course of this series. So to share them, leave us a voicemail or text the Nerd hotline at 901-730-6373. That’s 901-730-N-E-R-D. Or email a voice memo to [email protected]. And if you have audio of your pets, all the better. So Ronita, where do we start today?

Well, first we’re going to hear from Vivien Schweitzer, a journalist and pianist from Jersey City, New Jersey. She and her partner recently had firsthand experience with a pet emergency, and she’s sharing her story with us. Hey, Vivien, welcome to the Smart Money podcast.

Thank you. Great to be here.

Today we are talking about something that’s a little bit difficult. It’s pet emergencies, and I know that’s something that you’ve gone through.

So my husband and I had been talking about getting either a cat or a dog for a long time, and a friend of ours said to us, okay, so I have a feral cat who’s just had kittens. Are you serious about getting pets because if so, I have to give away some cats? And this was last summer, so 2023. So we adopted two adorable kittens who were then three months old and brought them home, and they’re called Idris and Deshani.

Why don’t you tell us what happened to Idris?

We were trying to get them spayed and neutered ASAP. After we did that, the place that we got them spayed and neutered said that Idris had a little hernia, and we needed to get that taken care of immediately. So it wasn’t an emergency in the sense of they’d swallowed a bottle of pills or poison or something like that, but it was something that we needed to fix.

How old was he again? Three months when this happened?

Yeah, I think about four months when this happened. So he was still pretty small.

Can you walk us through what happened next?

So we’d taken them to this amazing place called People For Animals Affordable Veterinary Care For All. And I’d found them in part because I’d called so many vets just to get a quote for the spay and neuter procedure, and no one could tell me how much it would cost or even give a ballpark figure, which I found really odd and surprising because it’s such a routine procedure.

It was surprisingly opaque, almost like the human healthcare system where you just cannot get a ballpark figure for a really basic procedure. So we found this amazing place, and the reason we didn’t take them back to this place is because although they were fantastic and so reasonably priced, because it’s so reasonably priced, there’s a long wait line. So at that point, we just decided to find a private vet that was closer.

Did he have any symptoms or was there anything going on like that, was he suffering at all, or was it something more preventative?

It was one of those, it’s kind of preventative, but you really need to do it so that the hernia doesn’t explode or something like that. So again, I think it wasn’t an emergency in the type of sense that you’re rushing them to the 24-hour vet because they’ve swallowed something. But it was more the not knowing what would happen if we didn’t. I think it was one of those you need to get this taken care of so nothing worse happens.

So then what happened next?

I called around a lot of places, and I was just trying to get a ballpark figure, which was really difficult. And then I found this new vet, women-run, and I liked that too. And they gave us a quote upfront with a minimum cost and the maximum cost, which I really appreciated, and they fit him right in. So we ended up taking him there.

And so what were those minimum and maximum costs you were given?

So the low estimate was $736, and the high estimate was $874, and they broke down the cost in between that as well.

Talk me through your emotions during this process, what you thought initially as you went through it and then at the end. And we’re guessing that Idris is fine now, right?

Happy to report, he’s totally fine. Well, I actually felt a little bit guilty at first because, as it turned out, if I had taken him to one of the private clinics, when they were doing the pre-op assessment, they probably would’ve seen that he’d had a hernia and then they could have done the hernia at the same time as they’d done the spay procedure.

But as it turned out, he had to go through the spay procedure and go under the anesthetic, and then three weeks later, he had to go under another anesthetic for the hernia operation. So I actually felt a little bit bad that I’d put him through essentially two surgeries within three weeks.

But I think a lot of the communication isn’t great, and these places tell you they need to do an assessment before the spay neuter, but it’s not really communicated why that is. And if someone had said to me we need to do an assessment first and then we’ll be able to tell you how much it is because, for example, it’s very common for kittens to have a hernia. And if that’s the case, we’ll do both.

All it seemed to me, as the person shopping around for a vet, was it was just very confusing and poorly communicated, but I figured that was better than riding it out to see what happened.

And hopefully, he doesn’t remember any of it now.

Since this is the Smart Money podcast, I did want to come back to the financials. So you paid between $700 and $850. How did you manage to cover the costs?

We put it on a credit card.

And did you have pet insurance? Is that anything you’ve ever considered?

We don’t have it at the moment, and our reasoning is that they’re still so young and that they don’t go outside. I think in a couple of years we’ll probably end up getting pet insurance just because it’s obviously more likely that they’re going to have some issues, but I also realize that in the meantime they could swallow something, so we might change our mind on that and get pet insurance.

How did you feel about putting it on a credit card? Was it just more of like, okay, this is convenient, let’s put it on there, or were you just thinking ahead of time pet costs are going to go on the card?

We actually just put a lot of stuff on the card anyway, we get points and what have you, and it’s such a fairly big chunk of change, so that tends to go on the credit card. And I think that was also the thing with the spay neuter. I think with two cats, it was going to be like $2,000 to get both of them if we hadn’t found the discount place.

Yeah. And so was there any other aftercare required? Did they need any medications, anything like that?

Fortunately, they didn’t. I think he just had a few pain meds, but nothing serious.

Have you made any changes to how you think about paying for pet expenses, emergency or not?

I’ll definitely still put stuff on a credit card, and I would definitely advise any friends who are considering getting pets also to just shop around for a vet who’s willing to be as upfront as possible with the costs, because I think some vets are, like this vet gave us a very detailed budget summary of minimum and maximum, and that made the process a lot less stressful because you’re not going to get hit with the equivalent of a human surprise billing thing.

Well, that’s wonderful and we’re so happy to hear Idris is perfectly fine now. I’m going to guess he’s a happy cat and not torturing his sister.

Yes, a very happy and very needy but happy cat.

Well, Vivien, thank you so much for joining us today and sharing a bit about your pets and your experience with paying for an unexpected expense.

Great. Well, thank you so much for having me.

First off, I’m glad to hear that Vivien’s cats are doing okay. Her story really exemplifies how random pet emergency expenses can be. It does seem like they were smart about how they shopped around for their vet care, though. I’m hoping they were able to pay off that credit card balance quickly, ideally before they paid any interest on their debt, because we know how expensive credit card debt can be and how difficult it can be to get out of it once you’re in it.

Totally. What I thought was interesting, and something I think a lot of us can relate to, is this idea of looking for something slightly cheaper, but that in the end can actually end up costing more. And a lot of it is about knowing.

If she had known about the potential of a hernia issue, I’m sure Vivien would’ve known to go to a vet, but since they didn’t, the kitty had to have another surgery to remove the hernia in addition to the neutering when it all could have been done at once.

Well, clearly, as we’ve already noted, it is just so, so important to at least think about what you would do if the worst happened and you needed to take your pet to the emergency vet. Even better, set aside some money or, as we’ve talked about in the last episode, consider pet insurance.

Yeah, I will tell you we were really glad to have it when Mo ended up at emergency care. So next, we’re going to hear from Dr. Angela Beal. She’s a veterinarian based in Columbus, Ohio, and has done a lot of writing about pet care and the veterinary industry. We’re going to hear her recommendations for preparing your finances for if and when you need to get emergency care for your furry family member.

That’s coming up in a moment. Stay with us.

Dr. Beal, thanks so much for joining us today on the Smart Money podcast.

Thanks, Ronita. I’m happy to be here.

So we’re talking today about emergency pet care, those unexpected expenses that can come up regardless of how well you take care of your fur babies. In your opinion, why is it so crucial for pet owners to be prepared for unexpected veterinary expenses?

Studies have shown that unexpected expenses are a major stress for pet owners, and as little as actually a $250 bill that’s unexpected can result in really difficult decisions for pet owners. So if a pet owner is not financially prepared, they may not be able to choose the best care for their pet. They may have to opt for second, third, fourth-tier care and maybe just the basics. And in worst-case scenarios, a pet may need to be euthanized because the pet owner doesn’t have the funds for their care.

So Dr. Beal, why do you think it’s so hard to plan for these expenses, and why do you think many people put off putting savings aside or creating a plan?

I think if people have not experienced a pet emergency before, they may not realize how significant that event can be and how stressful it can be. Statistics show though that the majority of pets will experience some sort of emergency during their lifetime, and I think people probably don’t realize just how common pet emergencies are.

These types of things aren’t happy thoughts, so I think we tend to focus on the good things and the good times with our pets. So we may not necessarily want to think about disaster situations, although that kind of thinking and preparation really is important.

Can you share some common pet emergencies that can result in significant vet bills?

Sure. Toxicity is a big one. Pets like to get into all kinds of things. They may eat something that’s toxic. Certainly, hit-by-car accidents are quite common with both dogs and cats, broken bones and other sorts of trauma. Even a fight, two dogs fight, and you have significant injuries from that.

And then going over to the medical scene, those are traumatic situations, but over on the medical side of things, a lot of diseases, kidney disease, for example, are very silent and don’t cause a lot of clinical signs until it gets really bad, and then all of a sudden, you have a medical emergency on your hands. And at that point, the disease has progressed quite a bit, and treatment is going to be a significant expense.

If a pet parent doesn’t prepare, how much more difficult does that make the decisions around what care to say yes to?

I think it makes it very difficult. A pet owner who is prepared can focus on their pet and making sure they get the care they need. If a pet owner is not prepared, then their focus shifts to having to decide what diagnostics can I afford, what treatments can I afford? And it all becomes about the money. They’re focused on their pet as a secondary thought, unfortunately, although everyone would much rather be focusing on their pet.

In our previous episode, our guest talked about economic euthanasia, the idea that you have to let a pet go because you can’t afford to help it. You touched on this earlier as well. What are some practical tips for pet owners to start saving for potential emergency vet care so they don’t face that kind of decision?

I think ideally, the best-case scenario is that you have a pet savings account that you set up yourself. You budget a certain amount every month and put it into a savings account so that money is there and it’s ready if and when you need it. Other options include pet insurance, very similar to human health insurance. And so that can be a nice safety net for people.

And then another option that can even be combined with the other options is having a healthcare credit card. CareCredit is one that’s very popular in the veterinary world. This is a healthcare-specific credit card, and a lot of people will even pair it with pet health insurance. They can cover the initial bill, the credit card, and then be reimbursed by their pet insurance company and turn around and pay off that credit card bill quickly.

When you talked about the savings account, what would you suggest or what are your tips on how much to save? And we know that age, breed, of course, type of pet can make a difference, but what are your tips for how pet owners should research how much they should put aside?

I think a good place to start would be with actually the pet insurance company websites. A lot of these websites will list costs for certain types of pet emergencies, and that could give you an idea of how much a particular pet emergency would cost.

I would say just off the top of my head that with rising veterinary costs over the last several years, a pet owner could expect to pay a minimum of $2,000, probably more, for an emergency situation. So I think setting aside maybe $50 to $100 per month in a savings account and letting that account grow would be a good idea.

I know that when Mo ate something strange, again, what it is, we still do not know. I think that vet bill, just that one instance, was close to $1,000 straight away. He didn’t need very much as far as getting better or anything like that. They gave him something to pass through his system, and then he was fine, but it was just straight away a thousand bucks.

Right. And if you’re talking about a situation where a pet requires several days of hospitalization or intensive care, you can see how that bill would increase significantly.

Absolutely. What would be your advice on how pet owners can put the money aside? Would you suggest putting it in a separate account, like a separate savings account? Any other ways to structure it?

I would suggest that a pet owner has a separate savings account that is earmarked specifically for their pet’s emergency care. That way, the money doesn’t just get lumped in with everything else and potentially spent, and then it’s not there when you need it.

The other thing I would mention is that when we talk about an emergency savings account, I really would earmark that just for emergency situations. So routine veterinary care like vaccines and parasite prevention, things like that, should not come out of this fund. This fund should be specifically set aside for emergencies only.

Do you know of any financial assistance programs or organizations that can help pet owners with emergency vet bills?

There are a number of organizations that are set up to help pet owners with vet bills, especially emergencies. I will say most of them are fairly small and potentially connected with local shelters and things like that. Most of them require an application process, which can become really challenging and difficult.

If you’re a pet owner and you are in an emergency hospital with your pet right now and your pet needs care fairly quickly, it would be challenging to have to take time to go through that process. I don’t think a lot of them are probably the best option for pet owners. And again, most of them are small organizations and can only help a small number of pet owners.

What advice do you have for pet owners who are struggling to find room in their budget for emergency savings?

For those pet owners, I would say that whatever they can set aside is better than nothing. They could also consider an accident-only pet insurance policy, which are the cheapest pet insurance policies, and most companies provide them for around $20 per month or maybe a little more, but that’s pretty affordable for most people.

And that type of policy does not typically increase in price with age. So policies that cover illnesses, the cost of those policies increases significantly as pets age and their likelihood of becoming ill increases. But the accident-only policies typically don’t increase with age.

The other one I mentioned, the healthcare credit card, is another option. Obviously, then you’re paying interest, which is not ideal, but it can be an option to help you deal with an emergency situation.

And while we have spoken a lot about the financial aspect of emergency situations, do you have any advice for how to deal with the emotional side of something happening suddenly and taking your pet to the vet and then dealing with bills?

Going along with what we’ve talked about, I think again, being financially prepared can take a huge burden off of pet owners. When the pet owner is stuck thinking about how on earth they’re going to pay for this emergency care, that’s incredibly stressful on top of the stress of worrying about your pet and how they’re going to handle the emergency.

So if you can take away that piece, if you can be financially prepared and not have the stress of worrying about how you’re going to pay for that, I think that would help pet owners tremendously.

Any final thoughts for our listeners on how they can prepare both emotionally and financially for the possibility of their pet needing emergency care?

I think proactively providing excellent care throughout your pet’s life. I realize we’re talking about if we have an emergency, but trying to prevent emergencies before they happen, of course, is always better. So just keeping on top of your pet’s care, making sure they see their vet annually, at least, for checkups and wellness care like vaccines and parasite preventives that can help them avoid emergency situations, is certainly the best situation.

And then on top of that, I think having a good support system in place and maybe even a plan, and no one wants to think about what will I do in an emergency, but just having a plan in mind about how you will take care of that emergency if it happens, know where your local emergency hospital is and know their phone number and how to get your pet there if an emergency arises, so you are not scrambling in those moments any more than would be expected.

Dr. Beal, thanks so much for joining us today on Smart Money podcast. This is incredibly helpful.

You know, Sean, I took away a lot of advice from talking to Dr. Beal, and it got me thinking about how important it is to know your options and resources, especially before Mo randomly starts puking on the floor.

I remember we were frantically Googling that evening, and if we had known where the emergency vet was beforehand, we could have saved time and maybe even had more of a choice of where we could take him, on top of knowing how to exactly pay for the upcoming bill.

Yeah. If listeners take away just one thing from this episode, it should be Dr. Beal’s point about just having some plan, any kind of plan, for a pet emergency. Even setting aside $10 a week into a high yield savings account would put you in a better place than burying your head in your cozy companion’s fur and ignoring the possibility of a crisis. And as Vivien’s story makes clear, this is important no matter the age of your pet.

So Sean, we’ve spent this episode talking about something that, as we said earlier, nobody really wants to think or talk about, which is their pet having some sort of emergency, but there’s another aspect of pet ownership that is even more difficult.

Yeah, I think I know where you’re going with this. End-of-life issues for our pets are incredibly emotional and hard to deal with, and they can involve a lot of discussions about money. What are we willing to spend to extend their lives even just one more day?

Honestly, it’s something I don’t even want to think about. Mo is my best friend, and he’s with me here all day. How do you put a price on the life of a pet? That is just pure agony. I know it’s coming one day; I just don’t even want to think about it.

In our next and final episode, we are going to talk about those decisions, how we make them, how we afford them, and how to know what’s best for our animals. And I’ll hope not to cry.

So what I want and what I want a client to see is that they have a pet who experiences the best possible quality of life for as long as possible. But when that quality falls lower, then we make the right decisions to make sure they get to leave this earth in the arms of their owner or eating a cheeseburger.

For now, that’s all we have for this episode. Do you have a money question of your own? Turn to the Nerds and call or text us your questions at 901-730-6373. That’s 901-730-N-E-R-D. You can also email us at [email protected]. And remember, you can follow the show on your favorite podcast app, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and iHeartRadio to automatically download new episodes.

This episode was produced by Tess Vigeland. Sean helped with editing. Kim Lowe helped with fact-checking, and a big thank you to NerdWallet’s editors for all their help.

Here’s our brief disclaimer. We are not financial or investment advisors. This nerdy info is provided for general educational and entertainment purposes and may not apply to your specific circumstances.