Latest / QUESTION EVERYTHING / Are You Financially Compatible? Questions to Ask + How to Talk to Your Partner About Finances with Farnoosh Torabi (Financial Expert)

Transcript

Are You Financially Compatible? Questions to Ask + How to Talk to Your Partner About Finances with Farnoosh Torabi (Financial Expert) · QUESTION EVERYTHING

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Big things happen when you're pretty, pretty bold, pretty clever,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: pretty strong. I'm Danielle Robe and each week my guests
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and I have conversations that put a new spin on
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: pretty This is pretty smart. Hello, Hello, Hello, Happy January eleventh.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: It is a few weeks into January, the new year,
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  Speaker 1: and it's my birthday week. I'm not really a huge
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  Speaker 1: birthday girl, but one thing that I've been doing over
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  Speaker 1: the past few years is this, About a month before
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: my birthday, I think about one word that I would
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  Speaker 1: like to feel on my actual birthday. Is it adventure?
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  Speaker 1: Is it peace? Is it relaxation, is it celebration? And
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  Speaker 1: whatever that word is, I try to craft my day
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  Speaker 1: or the weekend leading up to it in a way
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  Speaker 1: that allows me to feel that on the actual day. So,
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  Speaker 1: for instance, for my thirtieth birthday, I took myself to
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  Speaker 1: Aspin because I really wanted to feel adventure and I
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  Speaker 1: love skiing and I hadn't been in a really long
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  Speaker 1: time and always wanted to go there. For thirty two,
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  Speaker 1: I really wanted to have some fun. That was my word,
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  Speaker 1: and so I planned a birthday party with like fifty people,
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  Speaker 1: and I invited everybody to a comedy club called The
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: Comedy Store in West Hollywood and then out to a
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  Speaker 1: bar afterwards. The joke was on me because I'm just like,
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: not that big of a bar girl. And around midnight,
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  Speaker 1: I was like, can I leave my own birthday? I'm
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  Speaker 1: really tired, and this year I just want to feel
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  Speaker 1: relaxation and chill. I want to feel chill. I don't
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  Speaker 1: know which city I'm going to be in yet, but
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  Speaker 1: I'm just going to get a massage and maybe a
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  Speaker 1: hotel room and just be in a robe. I don't
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  Speaker 1: want to go out for dinner. I just want dinner
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  Speaker 1: to come to me in a bed, you know. So
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  Speaker 1: before we get into today's episode, I have one request
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  Speaker 1: and it was actually inspired by today's guest. She shared
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  Speaker 1: with me that she does this, and I love this
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  Speaker 1: idea so much because I love meeting you in real
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  Speaker 1: life and I want to do more of it. So
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  Speaker 1: I'm kicking this off on my birthday. But I'm going
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  Speaker 1: to be doing this once a week. If you write
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: a review and you screenshot it and send it to me,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: or if you send the episode to two friends and
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: you screenshot it to me, you'll be entered that week
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: and I'll pick somebody to do a one on one
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  Speaker 1: zoom with for fifteen or twenty minutes. Knowing me, it'll
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  Speaker 1: probably be more time than that, but we'll just say
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  Speaker 1: that for now, and we can brainstorm whatever it is
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  Speaker 1: you're working on, whether it's career like, maybe you're looking
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  Speaker 1: for a new job, maybe you need to connect with
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  Speaker 1: a certain person, and maybe you're building something and you
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  Speaker 1: want information on how to get press and pr behind it.
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  Speaker 1: Whatever it is that you are doing that I can
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  Speaker 1: add value to, even if it's social media help. Whatever
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  Speaker 1: it is, we will do a one on one call
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  Speaker 1: and brainstorm whatever it is that you want direct one
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  Speaker 1: on one help with. And I have two options because
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  Speaker 1: for those of you who have already written a review,
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  Speaker 1: I still want you to be eligible for this, so
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: you can send the episode to friends. And for those
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: of you who haven't written a review, please do that.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: That is it's so helpful to the podcast. And you
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  Speaker 1: can either DM me the screenshot on Instagram or you
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  Speaker 1: can email me at Danielle atbprettysmart dot com, whichever you prefer.
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  Speaker 1: I'm so grateful to our guests this week for this idea.
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  Speaker 1: I love it, and so I'm going to remind you
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  Speaker 1: about it every so often, but I'm going to be
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  Speaker 1: doing it every single week, so please shoot me those
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  Speaker 1: green shots. Okay, without further adio today's episode. Have you
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  Speaker 1: ever been in a relationship with someone they buy something
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  Speaker 1: that you feel was extravagant or wasteful and it turns
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  Speaker 1: into an existential disagreement. I have a few times. Money
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  Speaker 1: in relationships is so weird to me because relationships are
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  Speaker 1: not about money at all, and yet when we aren't
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  Speaker 1: on the same page with our partner, all of a sudden,
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  Speaker 1: it feels like money is at the top of the
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  Speaker 1: list in terms of compatibility. And we all know the stats.
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  Speaker 1: Financial challenges are one of the top issues couple's address
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  Speaker 1: in couple's therapy and why they get divorced. About forty
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  Speaker 1: three percent of Americans have committed financial deception in a
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  Speaker 1: current or past relationship. Most of us were raised to
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  Speaker 1: be vague about specifics in regards to money, but at
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  Speaker 1: the same time very firm in our habits around money.
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  Speaker 1: And when you're merging lives with someone, you have two
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  Speaker 1: distinct people well with distinct habits and priorities, and how
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  Speaker 1: are you supposed to bring those together? So how do
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  Speaker 1: you do it? How do you determine financial compatibility? What
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  Speaker 1: are red flags that you aren't financially compatible with your partner?
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  Speaker 1: How can you make your relationship work even if you
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  Speaker 1: aren't compatible. I have so many questions, Like, here's a
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  Speaker 1: few more, what is the most productive way to have
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  Speaker 1: money conversations when you're dating? And then how about once
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  Speaker 1: you're married? What questions should you be asking? How do
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  Speaker 1: you do it respectfully and not be weird? And then
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  Speaker 1: here's my biggest question, because I ask all my friends
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  Speaker 1: and they all do it differently. Are you supposed to
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  Speaker 1: merge money? What are the benefits of that versus keeping
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  Speaker 1: your money separate? The question of merging finances upon marriage
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  Speaker 1: is as old as the institution itself. Financial guru Dave
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  Speaker 1: Ramsey says, it's a categorical yes. When you tie the knot,
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  Speaker 1: it's all about ours, not yours or mine. When people
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  Speaker 1: get married, what do they do with their finances?
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  Speaker 2: How do they just.
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  Speaker 3: Send a combine everything?
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  Speaker 1: Yes, you shouldn't like split everything right down in the middle.
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  Speaker 2: No, you combine everything. There's no middle. The preacher didn't say,
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  Speaker 2: and now you're a joint venturer, he said, And now
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  Speaker 2: you're one. So what if one person makes more than
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  Speaker 2: the other. Like, you're not a partnership, you're a marriage.
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  Speaker 2: There is no Let me give you an example. Okay, okay,
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  Speaker 2: my wife has not had an earned income for thirty years.
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  Speaker 2: She stayed home with our children. I do not have
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  Speaker 2: an income. We have an.
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  Speaker 1: Income, and yet our guest today, Farnus to Rabbi, she
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  Speaker 1: has a completely different.
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  Speaker 3: Outlook when there is one pot and two people recipe
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  Speaker 3: for disaster. I firmly believe that your friend and her
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  Speaker 3: partner should have their own separate bank account.
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  Speaker 1: Farnus is one of America's leading personal finance authorities. She's
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  Speaker 1: hooked on helping you live your richest, happiest life. At
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  Speaker 1: twenty two, new was over thirty thousand dollars in debt,
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  Speaker 1: making eighteen dollars an hour. That was before taxes. With
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: a master's degree in New York City. Well, she solely
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  Speaker 1: climbed out of debt in the most expensive city in
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  Speaker 1: the country, and she realized there was a void. She says, though,
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  Speaker 1: that money isn't just dollars and cents. It's a deeply
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  Speaker 1: layered issue, and it's not enough to walk into someone's
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  Speaker 1: home and share five straightforward tips on how to get
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  Speaker 1: out of debt. There are psychological, mental, and emotional barriers
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  Speaker 1: that prevent us from taking action around money. She's been
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  Speaker 1: helping young people and couples ever since. Her award winning
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  Speaker 1: podcast So Money has over thirty million downloads, where she
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: has deep conversations about money with accomplished people like Arianna Huffington,
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  Speaker 1: Margaret Cho, Queen Latifa, Tony Robbins. Damn, I'm in good company.
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  Speaker 1: I was on her podcast this week. There's a new
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  Speaker 1: episode that launched where I talked transparently about where I'm
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  Speaker 1: at financially and the good, the bad, and the oopside.
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  Speaker 1: But honestly, whether you check out my episode or another
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: one on her podcast, it's just really good. I love
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: her interviews. She has a background in journalism and she
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: asks really insightful questions. She's also written multiple books. Her
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: latest just dropped. It's titled A Healthy State of Panic.
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  Speaker 1: Follow your fears to build wealth, crush your career, and
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  Speaker 1: win it life. If I were to put it plain
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  Speaker 1: and simply, what I like so much about farnoushe can
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: be summed up by one New York Times quote about
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  Speaker 1: her advice perfectly practical and that's the truth. There's no
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  Speaker 1: catchy slogans, no millennial meme references. She says it like
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  Speaker 1: it is, and she's super transparent about her own finances.
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  Speaker 1: In fact, she's the breadwinner in her family. So farnoushe
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  Speaker 1: you have the so Money Pod, which I love, and
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  Speaker 1: you have candid conversations for a richer, happier life. What
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  Speaker 1: does a richer life mean to you?
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  Speaker 3: A richer life is one where you have options. You do.
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  Speaker 3: You just have good options, not just any options. You
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  Speaker 3: feel like you can get yourself out of a rut.
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  Speaker 3: And so choices cost money a lot of times in life,
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  Speaker 3: whether that's a choice to leave a relationship, or leave
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  Speaker 3: a job or start a new business. I think to
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  Speaker 3: be able to afford the things that are important to you,
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  Speaker 3: not everything, but the things that you've designated as your
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  Speaker 3: most important, the things that really bring you fulfillment, I
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  Speaker 3: think that's the north star.
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  Speaker 1: You're a journalist and a financial expert. How did you
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  Speaker 1: become a financial expert because that wasn't your first career title.
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  Speaker 3: No, it's like I didn't sit up at night dreaming
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  Speaker 3: about this as a young girl. But I think it's
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  Speaker 3: a short andalog story, so I'll give you like the
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  Speaker 3: medium version of it. But basically, I mean I have
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  Speaker 3: the academic background. I went to school for finance and
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  Speaker 3: then I went to journalism school, so I couple those
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  Speaker 3: two degrees. But my preparation for this role I think
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  Speaker 3: started much much earlier. I would say, as far back
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  Speaker 3: as being a young four or five year old living
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  Speaker 3: with my parents in Worcestern, Massachusetts. My parents are immigrants
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  Speaker 3: from me Ran, and like a lot of Middle Easterners, culturally,
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  Speaker 3: we don't shy away from financial conversations. We love to
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  Speaker 3: learn about money, specifically things like real estate and what
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  Speaker 3: things cost, and we're very much an ambitious bunch.
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  Speaker 1: It's different because there it's like common at the dinner table.
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  Speaker 3: It is like we weren't talking about sports or pop
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  Speaker 3: culture necessarily, and hard stuff too, like the fact that
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  Speaker 3: my dad was having layoffs at his job and that
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  Speaker 3: was anxious for him, and the fact that we were
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: moving to at one point another state and we would
• 10:50
  Speaker 3: have to downsize and what that would mean for our
• 10:53
  Speaker 3: allowances and budgets and all of that, and so you know,
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  Speaker 3: I think that was not a little thing, and that
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  Speaker 3: prepared me to have the career that I have today,
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  Speaker 3: mainly because it made me not afraid of financial topics
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  Speaker 3: and being curious about money, and so gave me this
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  Speaker 3: fluency around financial topics that definitely helped me start out
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  Speaker 3: quickly in my career. I also just wanted to help people.
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  Speaker 3: As young as I can remember, you know, and someone say,
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  Speaker 3: what do you want to do when you grow up?
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  Speaker 3: I always wanted to do something in service and something
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  Speaker 3: that involves storytelling, so that explains the journalism piece of it.
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  Speaker 3: The money stuff too. I think I realized as I
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  Speaker 3: got into journalism that the financial world and distilling financial
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  Speaker 3: topics for a young audience was a complete white space.
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  Speaker 1: I've seen that firsthand on Pretty Smart, because I've done
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: two episodes about finance so far, and they're both some
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  Speaker 1: of my highest rated episodes and the ones that really
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  Speaker 1: touch people. I realized that vulnerability in finance is kind
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  Speaker 1: of rare, and so the more I share think, the
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  Speaker 1: more connected people feel. I did an episode a few
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  Speaker 1: months ago where I was like, I sometimes don't know
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  Speaker 1: where my next paycheck is coming from, and my apartment
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: it looks like a warehouse, and people like I think
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  Speaker 1: felt connected to the honesty so I love that you're
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  Speaker 1: distilling it for younger audiences.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think what you're doing essentially is telling
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  Speaker 3: people that you're a real person. And so much of
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  Speaker 3: the narrative around financial success in our culture has been
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  Speaker 3: a very abbreviated story where it's like the entrepreneur gets
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  Speaker 3: an idea, bootstraps, lives in his car, her car, and
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  Speaker 3: then creates the next New York Stock Exchange listed company,
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  Speaker 3: Or it's someone trying to sell you a course on
• 12:44
  Speaker 3: how to, I don't know, build a business, and so
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  Speaker 3: they tell you how they did it, but they don't
• 12:48
  Speaker 3: tell you the failures and the setbacks and that maybe
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: there was a period of really scraping by I mean
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  Speaker 3: that is the truth. That is most people have that
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: at some period or all the periods. So to be
• 13:02
  Speaker 3: honest about that is so refreshing and so welcome, because
• 13:06
  Speaker 3: we're not getting enough of the honesty.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: I wish I would have had more stories of those parts,
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: because when I started experiencing them for the first time,
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: I thought I was failing because I didn't realize that's
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: what people experience. And then as I interviewed entrepreneurs and
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: sort of offline, they would ask me questions. They would
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: share their honest stories and I was like, oh, this
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  Speaker 1: is just part of the game.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, we think it takes from the success or, it
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  Speaker 3: takes from our ingenuity and our smartness, but no, it
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  Speaker 3: just shows that you are somebody who perseveres. It makes
• 13:46
  Speaker 3: you seem stronger actually, to be someone who can rise
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  Speaker 3: from those ashes and make lemons out of lemonade. I
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: think that's the stuff, and I think we're getting more
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  Speaker 3: warmer to it, and thankfully people like you are sussing
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: it out of us.
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  Speaker 1: So that's so today, I really want to cover couples
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: and finance. So relationships and finance. You have a book
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  Speaker 1: out called A Healthy State of Panic. Follow your fears
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  Speaker 1: to build wealth, crush your career, and win it life.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: I love a Healthy State of Panic. I love that
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: title so much. So when does a couple start discussing finances?
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  Speaker 1: Because you know, I always hear friends online sort of
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: joke like yeah, on the first date, you need to
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: ask their credit score, but like, no one actually does that.
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  Speaker 3: Oh that's just silly. First date, You're just getting to
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: know each other. If you really want to pay some
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  Speaker 3: attention to the money stuff, like you know, when the
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: bill comes and let's say your date is paying, Like,
• 14:43
  Speaker 3: are they a good tipper? I think that's a good
• 14:45
  Speaker 3: telltale side and if they're cheap at tipping, that's not
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: the best clue. But I think that once you as
• 14:52
  Speaker 3: a couple are starting to make collaborative decisions, whether that's
• 14:56
  Speaker 3: we're going to move in together, or we're going to
• 14:59
  Speaker 3: go on a big vacation together for a week and
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: we're gonna split the cost, I think that's a really
• 15:05
  Speaker 3: opportune time to learn a little bit more look under
• 15:07
  Speaker 3: the hood each of you. You know, where you both financially,
• 15:11
  Speaker 3: and if things even move faster and you're suddenly finding
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: yourself talking about long term you know, staying together, I
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: think one hundred percent you should and I have you know,
• 15:20
  Speaker 3: maybe it's like the top five things I would say
• 15:22
  Speaker 3: yes at that point, the credit score, but before that
• 15:25
  Speaker 3: I would also want to learn about incomes. You would
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: be surprised how many married people don't know what their
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: spouse is earn. They have a rough idea, but they
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: wouldn't be able to in a multiple choice probably guess correctly.
• 15:39
  Speaker 3: I've met these people. It shocks me. But because again
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: we feel like when we start to have financial conversations
• 15:45
  Speaker 3: with someone that it's in affront And depending on how
• 15:48
  Speaker 3: you were raised around money, if money was not something
• 15:50
  Speaker 3: that you talked about with your family or you were
• 15:53
  Speaker 3: told it's rude, that's a big one. People think it's
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: rude to talk about money. You may not feel comfortable
• 16:00
  Speaker 3: breaking that ice, and so we just don't talk. And
• 16:03
  Speaker 3: then we end up in a place where we're married
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: and we don't know what our partner makes. So know
• 16:07
  Speaker 3: what your partner makes, Know what they have in savings,
• 16:10
  Speaker 3: even if it's nothing, know what their debt obligations are.
• 16:14
  Speaker 3: And I have ice breakers for people, like, if you
• 16:16
  Speaker 3: don't want to go right into the money talk, talk
• 16:19
  Speaker 3: about life. You know, what was your first job, how
• 16:22
  Speaker 3: is college for you? Did you pay for college? Did
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: you get out debt loans? I mean also inserting yourself
• 16:28
  Speaker 3: in those questions. And because you don't know what's on
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: the other side of the dinner table, maybe its somebody
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: who grew up with a lot of false narratives, and
• 16:35
  Speaker 3: you want to show them that this is a safe
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: space to talk about money.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: See to learn about people's financials through stories is an
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: interesting tactic.
• 16:43
  Speaker 3: I like that, yes, because We love talking about our memories,
• 16:47
  Speaker 3: our happy memories, and that's how we get close to
• 16:49
  Speaker 3: one another is through story, and there's so much that
• 16:52
  Speaker 3: we can extract and that we can then parlay into
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: having a financial conversation. It just feels more natural and
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: not so overwhelming, and in some cases, like you're being accosted,
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: you're being shaken down to learn about your financial one
• 17:08
  Speaker 3: oh one.
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  Speaker 1: So say you do kind of want to talk about
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: money in a more direct way. How do you think
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: you can make those initial conversations? I would say less
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  Speaker 1: awkward and more meaningful.
• 17:21
  Speaker 3: My husband and I have a famous story. I've written
• 17:23
  Speaker 3: about it. It's I love telling you because I think
• 17:26
  Speaker 3: it's it worked for us, and I think you can
• 17:28
  Speaker 3: work for a lot of couples. We were about to
• 17:30
  Speaker 3: move in together. This is prior engagement, previous to getting married,
• 17:34
  Speaker 3: so again a big step in our relationship. And by
• 17:37
  Speaker 3: this point we've been dating for a couple of years.
• 17:40
  Speaker 3: So through observation and kind of passive conversations, casual conversations,
• 17:44
  Speaker 3: I'd learned about and he learned about me in terms
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: of our financial situations. But I wanted to know the
• 17:51
  Speaker 3: concrete stuff, you know, and I think he did too.
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: So we went to a tequila bar.
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: Wait when you say concrete stuff, do you like credit scores?
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: I want to know credit scores. I want to know that. Yeah,
• 18:01
  Speaker 3: oh on no liabilities. I want know your balance sheet.
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: Like if you were a business and I'm about to
• 18:04
  Speaker 3: invest in you, I'm about to work with you.
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: I know you want the P and L.
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  Speaker 3: Right, And so we went to a safe place that
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: we both liked, you know. We went to a bar,
• 18:18
  Speaker 3: a Mexican restaurant that had a great bar that we
• 18:20
  Speaker 3: sat there and ahead of time, I was like, here
• 18:22
  Speaker 3: are the five things I want us to unveil, and
• 18:26
  Speaker 3: we can unveil it at the same time. And here
• 18:28
  Speaker 3: it is. It's your salary, it's your savings, it's your liabilities,
• 18:33
  Speaker 3: it's your credit score. And then I don't rememberbout the
• 18:35
  Speaker 3: fifth one. Maybe it was just like, you know, anything
• 18:39
  Speaker 3: else you want to share, you know, maybe it's like
• 18:40
  Speaker 3: your retirement portfolio, your four to one k whatever. And
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: so we put this down on each of our each
• 18:46
  Speaker 3: of us had our own post it notes. We come
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: to the drinks and we share and I wasn't shocked,
• 18:52
  Speaker 3: you know, it was very helpful to know ahead of time,
• 18:55
  Speaker 3: because as we're about to now go into this apartment
• 18:57
  Speaker 3: and we're going to share in some expenses, it just
• 19:00
  Speaker 3: really level sets expectations. I was making more than him
• 19:05
  Speaker 3: at the time, and that was now clear, and so
• 19:09
  Speaker 3: as I'm spending to keep his capacity in mind, financial
• 19:13
  Speaker 3: capacity mind, and vice versa. I think it just gives
• 19:16
  Speaker 3: everybody the important context that you need to be able
• 19:20
  Speaker 3: to have a healthy plan going forward with now your
• 19:24
  Speaker 3: combined incomes and also not just your combined incomes buy
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: what are you going to separate too? I believe in that.
• 19:29
  Speaker 3: I believe in having a joint account and some separate
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: accounts so that there is a continuous sense of autonomy
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: in the relationship. Because money is a huge source of
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: our sense of independence. Our money, so you want to
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: maintain that to a degree in a relationship, for sure.
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: I actually have so many questions about that, but I
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: want to drill in on what you said first. So
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: my mom was a CPA and then sold mortgages, and
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: so when I was preparing for this, I asked her
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: a few questions and she brought thing up that I
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: had never thought of, and she was like, you know,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: when you start talking about x's and o's people forget
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: to talk about. They're not trying to hide stuff, but
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: they sometimes forget things like do they have hidden real
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: estate properties that maybe they have an apartment they rent
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: out that they forget to tell you because they've had
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: it for so long. Did he co sign on his mother?
• 20:22
  Speaker 3: What are we? The Real Housewives? Remember that episode when
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: her husband had a house she didn't even know. It's like, yeah,
• 20:27
  Speaker 3: oh yeah.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: No, that quite that, But like this one was interesting.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: Did he or she co sign on his mother or
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: her mother's house?
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Yeah, those are great questions.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: That becomes a liability, right, that's like.
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: The next when the next drink comes, that's when you're
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: asking those questions. But honestly, those are fantastic questions because
• 20:46
  Speaker 3: you're right, and it's not because someone's trying to add things.
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: But we do forget. It's like, oh I forgot that,
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: you know, maybe I have this four oh one k,
• 20:54
  Speaker 3: Like my husband just found out he had like an
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: old four oh one K. Someone I interviewed on so
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: Money even said that she went to I think there's
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: a website called find my money dot com or something.
• 21:03
  Speaker 3: Essentially it was like a tax refund that she never
• 21:08
  Speaker 3: collected from the State of Georgia. That was just sitting
• 21:11
  Speaker 3: there with her name on it. It's kind of fun
• 21:13
  Speaker 3: to go and see what you might be missing. It's
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: called missing money dot com. I think that's not a
• 21:18
  Speaker 3: good end. But on the yad, there's also the unfortunate,
• 21:20
  Speaker 3: which is that maybe you've co signed, maybe you did
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: a business deal in college with a roommate, and you
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: still own a joint checking account like my brother did
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: you know, and when he was at University of Arizona.
• 21:32
  Speaker 3: So there's also so yeah, I don't think that's come
• 21:35
  Speaker 3: up in his marriage, but he has since closed that account.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, like you have to start asking real questions.
• 21:41
  Speaker 3: You got to trace it, you gotta get yeah, for sure.
• 21:44
  Speaker 3: I think though, what's important is that you just have
• 21:47
  Speaker 3: somebody that's game, that's okay, and they're not going to
• 21:50
  Speaker 3: feel again that sense of threat, that they know that
• 21:54
  Speaker 3: your questions really coming from a safe and good place.
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: This transparency is good for ever everybody, And I think
• 22:01
  Speaker 3: today versus maybe your mother's generation or even ten years ago,
• 22:06
  Speaker 3: the conversations were harder, and keeping up with the conversations
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: was harder because of the lack of technology to facilitate
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: and keep that transparency. So my husband I use and
• 22:16
  Speaker 3: here's a you know, like I don't. They don't pay me.
• 22:19
  Speaker 3: I just like them. It's called Empower and they used
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: to be called Personal Capital. It's a free app. They
• 22:25
  Speaker 3: have higher paying plans, but basically I just like to
• 22:29
  Speaker 3: use the free version and we pull all of our
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: accounts onto it so I can just click on my
• 22:33
  Speaker 3: phone and see our net worth and all of the
• 22:36
  Speaker 3: breakdown without having to go and ask him, hey, did
• 22:40
  Speaker 3: you pay off your credit card? Or I know he does,
• 22:43
  Speaker 3: but you know there's that.
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: That's good.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: It goes a long way. Yeah, And if he ever
• 22:47
  Speaker 3: wants to know, he can access it too.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: That's really cool. Do you feel like once you're in
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: a relationship you should be talking about money weekly, monthly?
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: How often should you be discussing it.
• 23:00
  Speaker 3: At least quarterly? And this is what I mean by quarterly,
• 23:04
  Speaker 3: it's the big stuff. Maybe it's that you know this
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: year you want to buy a house. Well, in fact,
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: if that's the case, you probably want to be talking
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: about money regularly. And because there are certain things that
• 23:15
  Speaker 3: you want to get in a row before you start bidding,
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: you want to make sure your credit scores are clean,
• 23:18
  Speaker 3: you want to make sure you've got pre approval. Depending
• 23:21
  Speaker 3: on your goals for the year that are more immediate
• 23:23
  Speaker 3: or long term, you like reverse engineer it. It's like
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: we need to accomplish this by March. So starting now,
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: we need to like get these PaperWorks in place. We
• 23:31
  Speaker 3: need to contact these people who are going to help us.
• 23:34
  Speaker 3: There's usually going to be one person who's more at
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: the forefront of that stuff, and that's okay, But if
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: you're somebody who tends to take more of a back
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: seat along the financial ride, it's so important to just
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: stay informed and don't be shy to ask questions. If
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: your partner starts to get wishy washy around getting you
• 23:55
  Speaker 3: the things that you need, like passwords to accounts or
• 23:58
  Speaker 3: getting you on phone call with certain people like the
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: financial advisor, the accountant in your household, that's not good.
• 24:05
  Speaker 3: That's not healthy, and that needs to end. And be
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: aggressive about that if you have to be, because that's
• 24:12
  Speaker 3: not a good partnership. And that is where we do
• 24:15
  Speaker 3: tend to see when couples the communication breaks down or
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: one person is just really controlling, that's where we see
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: a lot more probability for financial cheating or financial infidelity.
• 24:29
  Speaker 3: It's when one person starts to do things behind the scenes,
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: like opening up an extra credit card that you don't
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: know about, making another revenue stream that you don't know about.
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: You need to know at least a few things, which
• 24:40
  Speaker 3: is what is our tax return that year, so you
• 24:43
  Speaker 3: can see everybody's incomes and every like. Really because you're
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: signing that tax return if you're filing jointly with your partner,
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: so really important that you understand if something feels off,
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: like at least we'll look at that income line, and
• 24:58
  Speaker 3: if your husband's like a firefighter and suddenly there's an
• 25:01
  Speaker 3: eight hundred thousand dollars income on there, well that's a
• 25:05
  Speaker 3: red flag and that's an extreme and that's like meant
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: for you know, I'm on a podcast. I'm using like
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: a crazy example, but that has happened. I've talked to
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: CPAs where usually the women and the relationships who are
• 25:17
  Speaker 3: just signing the tax returns. Remember, you're on the line
• 25:21
  Speaker 3: if there's any sort of misdeed or even like a mistake,
• 25:26
  Speaker 3: you're responsible for that as well.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Is there a suggestion you can make so that you
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: can check in with someone without them feeling like you're
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: checking in all the time.
• 25:38
  Speaker 3: Well, you can, in the beginning make it really more formal,
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: not so much like your you know, your rolodex and
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: your calculators, but that you just say, hey, let's have
• 25:46
  Speaker 3: a monthly check in. And along the way you're taking
• 25:51
  Speaker 3: notes in your phone about the questions that you have
• 25:54
  Speaker 3: and you bring them to the table, or maybe you
• 25:56
  Speaker 3: email them to your partner or text them ahead of
• 25:58
  Speaker 3: time and say here's what I'm thinking, Like you're the
• 26:00
  Speaker 3: three bullet points that I want to cover. Like maybe
• 26:03
  Speaker 3: it's you know, we're changing apartments next year, so I
• 26:05
  Speaker 3: want to know what, like our budget's going to be
• 26:07
  Speaker 3: so I can start looking what we think that should be.
• 26:10
  Speaker 3: Maybe it's like, you know, there's inflation and groceries are
• 26:13
  Speaker 3: going up, so we need to we need to carve
• 26:15
  Speaker 3: out more for that. So are we going to maybe
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: give up some things? This has to be a constant
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: dialogue and there's no bad question, there's no wrong question,
• 26:24
  Speaker 3: And at some point you might especially for couples who
• 26:28
  Speaker 3: are newly married, I would say bringing in a third party,
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: like a financial advisor, even if it's just for a
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: few meetings, to help you level the playing field, and
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: to also take a step back and look at everybody's
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: financial variables and say, here's what I think there there's
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: a missing variable like we had one when we first
• 26:48
  Speaker 3: got married. She was like, you need more life insurance.
• 26:52
  Speaker 3: Forget more, you need life insurance because now you're married,
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: you want to make sure your partners are taken care of.
• 26:58
  Speaker 3: And then also a five two nine plan for college.
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: How much money do you need to hire a financial planner?
• 27:03
  Speaker 3: This really varies. There is a traditional financial planner where
• 27:09
  Speaker 3: is like our parents' financial planner, and this person typically
• 27:12
  Speaker 3: charges a percentage of your underlying investable assets. So if
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: you're coming to a financial planner and you've got one
• 27:20
  Speaker 3: hundred thousand dollars in your investment portfolio, they would usually
• 27:25
  Speaker 3: take one to one and a half percent of that annually,
• 27:28
  Speaker 3: whether they make money for you that year or not,
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: whether your portfolio grows or not. Personally, I think that's
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: a really antiquated and unreal way to work with someone
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: because those financial advisors still exist and they still make
• 27:41
  Speaker 3: a lot of money, but they tend to work with
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: higher net worth people because for them, they want to
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: work with someone making a million plus to be able
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: for that.
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: That was my question because when you start saying, like
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: when you're newly married, most people newly married don't have
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: a ton of money.
• 27:54
  Speaker 3: They don't a you find someone who's willing to work
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: with you where you're at, and they're not going to
• 27:58
  Speaker 3: be like using any sort of threshold they exist. Then
• 28:03
  Speaker 3: there is a new crop of financial advisors out there
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: that simply work on retainer, so you know, you pay
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: a monthly fee and they help you with your planning.
• 28:13
  Speaker 3: I would also say that these days financial planning that
• 28:17
  Speaker 3: you were really paying for ten fifteen years ago was
• 28:20
  Speaker 3: to help you manage your investments. But now there are
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: so many free online platforms, well free ish they charge
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: a fraction of the cost of what a human would
• 28:32
  Speaker 3: charge you to manage your portfolio. You can just go
• 28:34
  Speaker 3: on to any online platform like from Charles Schwab or Fidelity,
• 28:40
  Speaker 3: or there's well Front, there's Betterment LS. The list goes
• 28:44
  Speaker 3: on and they're all great and they will do that
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: for you automatically for like zero point three percent versus
• 28:50
  Speaker 3: one to one and a half percent, where a financial
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: planner can really help you. And again this isn't a
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: in this case, they shouldn't be charging you a percentage
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: of your inves They should be charging you like a
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: retainer or like an hourly fee. Is to help you
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: come up with a plan for your money outside of
• 29:08
  Speaker 3: your investments. So they'll say, Danielle, I think you should
• 29:11
  Speaker 3: have a hild savings account. Here, you should. You're having
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: a kid, you might want to start investing for college. Now,
• 29:19
  Speaker 3: here's how you do a five two nine. We can
• 29:20
  Speaker 3: help you set that up. You need insurance, talk to
• 29:23
  Speaker 3: the our insurance guy or insurance gal, et cetera. So
• 29:27
  Speaker 3: that you can feel like you're really checking off the
• 29:29
  Speaker 3: right list.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: I haven't heard of that. I'm so interested to hear
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: that there are different types of financial planners because it's
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: so useful. But most I mean, I feel like, Okay,
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: I can't afford a financial planner right now.
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: That's how the industry has been running for so long,
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: and I honestly, I don't think the marketing has been good.
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: And for those who are the newer companies or the
• 29:50
  Speaker 3: newer financial advisors that are more flexible, they're willing to
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: work with you wherever you're at and come up with
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: a plan and say okay to do this. It's going
• 29:59
  Speaker 3: to be like five hundred a month or seventy bucks
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: an hour or whatever it is. And I would say,
• 30:05
  Speaker 3: even if you find someone that you really like and
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: they do have a more rigid structure fee structure, just
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: ask hey, how else can we work together? Because this
• 30:14
  Speaker 3: is where the future is going. I don't think that
• 30:18
  Speaker 3: those who are very strict and sure they're going to
• 30:20
  Speaker 3: always find their rich clients, but I think that it
• 30:23
  Speaker 3: makes more sense to help the majority of people that
• 30:27
  Speaker 3: aren't in that place.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: So you mentioned just married, and I'm going to tell
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: you about a fight one of my friends who's just
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: married is having and I want to know. Oh, so
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: we're going to talk about accounts after this. But for
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: the purpose of the story, they combined their accounts so
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: they don't have separate accounts. They have one joint account.
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: And her monthly upkeep is much higher than his. She
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: has manicure, pedicure, she has a haircut every six months,
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: or you know however much she has hair color, etc.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: She's not a super extravagant person, but these are her
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: baseline needs. So he said to her one day, he
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: was like, you got to reel it in. This is
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: a big monthly expense. And she was like, you know,
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: we have your friend's wedding next month, and I need
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: to get a manicure paddic heure and get a dress
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: and whatever. Or I can show up looking like Schmiegel
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: and it's.
• 31:25
  Speaker 3: Up to you.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: And he was like, oh, okay, never mind. It turned
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: into a big fight.
• 31:31
  Speaker 3: Yes, you don't have to tell me when there is
• 31:33
  Speaker 3: one pot and two people. Recipe for disaster. Modern couples
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: now getting married after having experienced your own financial independence
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: to some extent or your own fight. You've been making
• 31:47
  Speaker 3: your own money choices, and now you're yes, I get it.
• 31:49
  Speaker 3: You're in a relationship and there has to be mutual
• 31:52
  Speaker 3: understandings and sharing and compromising to some extent. But I
• 31:58
  Speaker 3: firmly believe that your friend and her partner should have
• 32:01
  Speaker 3: their own separate bank accounts and they can decide how
• 32:04
  Speaker 3: they're going to fulfill these accounts. Maybe it's that every
• 32:08
  Speaker 3: month we take ten or fifteen percent of our paychecks
• 32:12
  Speaker 3: and we put them in each of our personal accounts.
• 32:15
  Speaker 3: The rest we put in our shared account. From that
• 32:18
  Speaker 3: shared pot, we're paying for our shared expenses. Her manicure
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: is not his expense. It's not a shared expense and
• 32:25
  Speaker 3: to feel like you have to justify your self care
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: and whatever your routine is with your partner on the rag.
• 32:32
  Speaker 3: That is not only exhausting, it's dehumanizing. And it's not
• 32:37
  Speaker 3: just women that have their routines too. He's got stuff
• 32:40
  Speaker 3: going on.
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: I have two questions about this because I agree with you,
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: like I can't imagine having to feel like I'm justifying
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: my manicure. But there are two issues I see if
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: you don't combine your money. The one is if you
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: guys as a couple want kids, the woman has kids,
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: and then what if she's not working for a little bit,
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: then what happens?
• 33:02
  Speaker 3: Well, I do think that combining your income to some
• 33:04
  Speaker 3: extent is important. You know, so maybe the you know,
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: fifty percent of your income is being combined, the other
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: is being used independently. That's not to say that you
• 33:15
  Speaker 3: never know what your husband or your wife is spending
• 33:17
  Speaker 3: money on. Again, with tools today, with apps, there's a
• 33:21
  Speaker 3: lot of ways to stay transparent and just keeping tabs
• 33:24
  Speaker 3: on each other's income. When there's a situation an event
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: in your life that's not like the norm, where someone
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: is taking time out of the workforce for whatever reason,
• 33:33
  Speaker 3: then it's important to sit down together and reset and go, Okay, well,
• 33:38
  Speaker 3: you know, I'm going to be out of the workforce
• 33:39
  Speaker 3: for minimum one year, so obviously we have to rethink
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: how we're budgeting and what we're budgeting for and with
• 33:47
  Speaker 3: this one single income, you know how we're going to
• 33:50
  Speaker 3: spread it out and make ends meet. And maybe it's
• 33:52
  Speaker 3: that I know a lot of couples where they anticipate
• 33:55
  Speaker 3: let's say, one person out of the workforce, or they're
• 33:58
  Speaker 3: just worried about a layoff, to be honest, or they're
• 34:01
  Speaker 3: getting married, let's say, and they want to save up
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: for the wedding or a house that knowledge ahead of time,
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: six months a year in advance. They say, Okay, let's
• 34:11
  Speaker 3: pretend we're just living on one person's income for the year,
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: and then the other person their income is just going
• 34:19
  Speaker 3: to be saved. And so can you imagine like saving
• 34:23
  Speaker 3: I mean, it's hard, it's going to be hard, and
• 34:25
  Speaker 3: there's going to be some things that maybe you can't
• 34:27
  Speaker 3: do all of the time that you've been doing because
• 34:29
  Speaker 3: now you're living off of one income instead of two.
• 34:32
  Speaker 3: But as a couple, you need to decide what those
• 34:34
  Speaker 3: boundaries are going to be. But The plus side is
• 34:37
  Speaker 3: that you have aggressively saved for this huge goal that's
• 34:40
  Speaker 3: important to the both of you, that you can now
• 34:42
  Speaker 3: achieve faster because you've accelerated savings by pocketing one person's
• 34:46
  Speaker 3: entire income for a year.
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: For purposes of understanding my scenarios, save me and you
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: are married, Okay, So I have my money, you have
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: your money in separate accounts, and then we have a
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: joint account that pays for food, entertainment. We have two kids,
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: and that's from our joint account. Where is the savings
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: and retirement plan?
• 35:08
  Speaker 3: So I think that you have a savings for yourself,
• 35:13
  Speaker 3: for your as a couple. Maybe you're saving somewhere and
• 35:16
  Speaker 3: from there you're paying for like repairs for your home
• 35:20
  Speaker 3: or an unexpected bill. It's your emergency account. We have
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: one my husband and I where we pay for wedding
• 35:26
  Speaker 3: gifts out of there, things that we're saving for jointly
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: or that we feel like is a shared expense. He
• 35:32
  Speaker 3: has a retirement account through work. I have a retirement
• 35:34
  Speaker 3: account through my business. We don't have a shared retirement account.
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: But as married people, if God forbid, I we just
• 35:42
  Speaker 3: said our wills. If he passes away, before I do.
• 35:45
  Speaker 3: Then you know, his retirement passes on to me. And
• 35:48
  Speaker 3: even if we get divorced in New Jersey, it's such
• 35:52
  Speaker 3: that we would probably have to. If we just go
• 35:55
  Speaker 3: by the law, then we would probably split our retirement
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: accounts fifty to fifty. So it doesn't matter whether your
• 36:02
  Speaker 3: retirement accounts or joint or separate. What's important is that
• 36:04
  Speaker 3: you're saving for retirement and whatever is the most accessible
• 36:08
  Speaker 3: and best for you.
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: But and correct me if I'm wrong, because I'm really
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: not an expert. But what I've learned or think i've learned,
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: is that money compounds over time, and it also compounds
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: over amount. So if you have two separate accounts, each
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: with one hundred dollars in it, wouldn't it be more
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: beneficial to have one account with two hundred dollars in it.
• 36:31
  Speaker 3: With everything else being held the same. They're in the
• 36:34
  Speaker 3: same investments, you have the same contribution cadence, you're you
• 36:38
  Speaker 3: know it's going to grow. I see what you're saying,
• 36:41
  Speaker 3: but I have never heard that being like something that
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: couples are like. That's why we have to pull all
• 36:47
  Speaker 3: of our money together. I've worked with my financial advisor.
• 36:50
  Speaker 3: That was never something that she considered important and honestly like,
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: you can open a joint retirement account with your partner
• 36:58
  Speaker 3: if you want it. Like a joint there's a spousal
• 37:01
  Speaker 3: IRA which you can have if you're not working. If
• 37:04
  Speaker 3: your partner's working, you can open up one. Nevertheless, but
• 37:08
  Speaker 3: I don't think that that is a mathematical problem.
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: A quick cut in because after the episode, Farnouche emailed
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: me and wrote this, I'm thinking more about your question.
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: Are compounding with two small accounts versus one big account?
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: I use this calculator and you basically come out with
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: the same amount of money. If each person invests a
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: thousand a month for ten years at five percent interests,
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: that's three hundred and five thousand dollars. If two people
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: invest in one account two thousand dollars a month for
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: ten years at five percent interest, it's three hundred and
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: five thousand dollars. I was genuinely curious, unquote, so I
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: just wanted to share that because I think that gives
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: a lot of insight into the actual numbers in terms
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: of combined versus separate accounts. That's set. Deciding on how
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: you want to do your accounts is more than just numerical. Okay,
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: back to our interview. So statistically, still in America, women
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: earn less for the same jobs oftentimes, Also, most of
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: the caretaking falls on women in the household. Still, and
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around. Like
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: Eve Rotsky talks about time and money in fair Play.
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: I love the way she talks about it. She says,
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: men's we value men's time like diamonds and women's time
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: like sand. So when you do have those separate accounts,
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: say one partner is doing more of the household load,
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: that counts for a lot in my opinions, you know,
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: And it's like, how do you determine what the value
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: of that is? So where does that fall in terms
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: of separate accounts?
• 38:57
  Speaker 3: Wow? Okay, so this is like Podcasts Part two. I
• 39:01
  Speaker 3: think this is such a meaty topic. And one thing
• 39:07
  Speaker 3: that I really want to encourage couples to get behind
• 39:10
  Speaker 3: is outsourcing. So there's gonna be within a household and
• 39:15
  Speaker 3: this is maybe even before kids are in the picture.
• 39:17
  Speaker 3: That completely like makes the situation more complex. But if
• 39:23
  Speaker 3: you're just if it's just the two of you and
• 39:24
  Speaker 3: you've got laundry and you've got to clean the house,
• 39:27
  Speaker 3: and you have a lot of sort of even phantom
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: stuff that you're doing, like scheduling, and someone might be
• 39:35
  Speaker 3: the social calendar keeper, and somebody's like you know, once
• 39:38
  Speaker 3: kids come into the picture, it's like this person's always
• 39:40
  Speaker 3: doing the doctor appointments. I mean, it's really important to
• 39:42
  Speaker 3: first take inventory of all of the things that you
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: and your couple are every day, every week, every month,
• 39:50
  Speaker 3: every year sometimes responsible for, so you know, and we forget.
• 39:54
  Speaker 3: I think it's really easy for and it's not trying
• 39:57
  Speaker 3: to be malicious, it's just like you forget that, like,
• 39:59
  Speaker 3: oh my god, I just realized today I came home
• 40:01
  Speaker 3: and the trash was out, and I was like, my
• 40:03
  Speaker 3: husband's been doing this quietly for like the entirety of
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: living in this house, which is now three years, and
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: I know he does it, but I often forget. And
• 40:10
  Speaker 3: also it's like three days a week, it's the recycling,
• 40:12
  Speaker 3: it's a whole like it's hours a week. And so
• 40:15
  Speaker 3: if I'm ever feeling like resentful because maybe I spent
• 40:18
  Speaker 3: three hours doing something else, like it's a good check
• 40:21
  Speaker 3: in balance, you know. But it's important for couples to know,
• 40:25
  Speaker 3: first of all, what is the inventory of all of
• 40:26
  Speaker 3: the things that we as a household need to get
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: done every week, who's going to do it? What are
• 40:32
  Speaker 3: the hours? And what are some things that neither of
• 40:36
  Speaker 3: us really want to do or have the time for
• 40:38
  Speaker 3: that we could better, We should invest in someone else
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: to do. And that never really happens. Sometimes when you
• 40:46
  Speaker 3: get in a relationship, you just start doing and then
• 40:49
  Speaker 3: suddenly one person's doing eighty percent, another person's doing twenty percent.
• 40:53
  Speaker 3: So very important to just get clear on the responsibilities
• 40:58
  Speaker 3: and who's going to do it and why and and
• 41:00
  Speaker 3: maybe no one's going to do it, and we should
• 41:02
  Speaker 3: outsource it, you know. I think that stay at home
• 41:05
  Speaker 3: parenting is a full time job, of course, and it's
• 41:10
  Speaker 3: you know, to make no money is a crime. And
• 41:12
  Speaker 3: I would encourage couples where if one person is the
• 41:16
  Speaker 3: sole income earner and the other person is doing the
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: other very difficult job of everything else, that maybe together
• 41:23
  Speaker 3: you decide that from that person's income, they're going to
• 41:28
  Speaker 3: every month take ten percent or fifteen percent and put
• 41:32
  Speaker 3: it in the couple that's not working outside of the
• 41:34
  Speaker 3: home in their savings account because they have more than
• 41:37
  Speaker 3: earned it. Yeah.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: I love that because I see it in certain friends
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: relationships to where the person who is working checks in
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: on the other person spending in a way that makes
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: me want to cringe.
• 41:50
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and have a contract. You can make you contract
• 41:53
  Speaker 3: around this, like you know, maybe it's not like notarized,
• 41:57
  Speaker 3: but you know what I'm saying, Like there's a understanding
• 41:59
  Speaker 3: that this is going to happen automatically. You know, every month,
• 42:03
  Speaker 3: it's going to come out of your paycheck or your
• 42:05
  Speaker 3: checking account into my savings account. And I'm gonna be
• 42:07
  Speaker 3: able to use this for all the things that I
• 42:10
  Speaker 3: need to invest in myself so that I can show
• 42:13
  Speaker 3: up for this incredibly hard, important job, the most important
• 42:17
  Speaker 3: job of supporting our family when you're at work. I
• 42:20
  Speaker 3: follow this mom on Instagram and she's the mom of
• 42:23
  Speaker 3: four boys, and she talks about how her job is
• 42:25
  Speaker 3: actually one hundred and eighty thousand dollars a year. She
• 42:28
  Speaker 3: doesn't get paid for that, obviously, but you know, in
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: the morning, she she says, she works out. She's like
• 42:34
  Speaker 3: I work eight to you know, and before eight is
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: my time and after eight is my time. And that
• 42:40
  Speaker 3: doesn't mean that when my husband's home at five that
• 42:43
  Speaker 3: he's not working at home, Like we're working as a
• 42:45
  Speaker 3: team from five to eight. But like I, mom clocks
• 42:47
  Speaker 3: out and in the morning, I need to go to
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: the gym, and I need to shower, and I need
• 42:51
  Speaker 3: to dress up. I put on she like gets dressed.
• 42:54
  Speaker 3: She's like, I think it's important that I'm not doing
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: my job just wearing yesterday's outfit or my pa je
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: because it makes me feel better. I'm going to work.
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: Would you go to work in your pajamas? I mean,
• 43:05
  Speaker 3: maybe we do because we're working from home. But I
• 43:07
  Speaker 3: just thought that was so refreshing And it's less about money,
• 43:10
  Speaker 3: but it's more about showing up for the job and
• 43:12
  Speaker 3: your partner being well aware of it and creating boundaries.
• 43:15
  Speaker 3: That was a huge takeaway. It was like eight to
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: eight moms. I mean, look, if a child wakes up
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: in the middle of the night is throwing up, she's
• 43:22
  Speaker 3: not going to turn her around. Maybe she will, I
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: don't know, but the point being that we have to
• 43:28
  Speaker 3: create boundaries so that we can appreciate more the people
• 43:32
  Speaker 3: that we have supporting us on the home front. Which
• 43:35
  Speaker 3: if she wasn't there, he would one hundred percent know
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: not be able to go out and work the job
• 43:40
  Speaker 3: that he has.
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: What is the strategy you would best recommend for a
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: couple that has different financial habits, different priorities.
• 43:49
  Speaker 3: The first step if a couple comes together and they
• 43:51
  Speaker 3: have way different financial expectations and goals, the first conversation
• 43:56
  Speaker 3: should not be about money. It should be about how
• 43:58
  Speaker 3: are you raised and you you are a big believer
• 44:01
  Speaker 3: in story and the power of story. What are the
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: stories that we're telling ourselves about money? Maybe it should
• 44:08
  Speaker 3: be that you work with a therapist as someone who
• 44:10
  Speaker 3: can coach you through these stories and unpacking them and
• 44:15
  Speaker 3: really figuring out whether you're going to continue these narratives
• 44:18
  Speaker 3: or not. Money is, if not the biggest it is
• 44:21
  Speaker 3: up there as far as why couples often fight and
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: then get divorced. So it's really important to address this
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: and not avoid it. And again I think sometimes bringing
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: in the help of a therapist. There's even now certified
• 44:36
  Speaker 3: financial therapists, people who work with couples and individuals on
• 44:44
  Speaker 3: their money trauma, their money fears, all of that. When
• 44:48
  Speaker 3: you're in a relationship and your partner is not on
• 44:50
  Speaker 3: the same page, the mistake we often make is to
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: judge them, is to assume they're wrong, and to get
• 44:59
  Speaker 3: angry and hurt and take it very personally when it
• 45:02
  Speaker 3: has nothing to do with you. It has everything to
• 45:04
  Speaker 3: do with how they were raised and the stories are
• 45:07
  Speaker 3: telling themselves and the influences that they that they've had, which,
• 45:10
  Speaker 3: by the way, you've had a set of them too,
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: So really important to just get honest with yourselves about that.
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: When you get married, do you take on your partner's debt?
• 45:20
  Speaker 3: So unless your name is on the debt, it is
• 45:24
  Speaker 3: not your debt. This is an important distinction. So in
• 45:28
  Speaker 3: the course of a marriage, there may be where you
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: co sign on a debt, or your partner brings in
• 45:34
  Speaker 3: maybe a student loan, and then you refinance it as
• 45:37
  Speaker 3: a couple, and now your name is on the student loan.
• 45:40
  Speaker 3: So in those cases, very important just to know is
• 45:43
  Speaker 3: my name attached to this piece of debt. If it is, that,
• 45:46
  Speaker 3: I'm equally liable. If it's not, and we get divorced,
• 45:49
  Speaker 3: that debt goes that direction and does not stay with me.
• 45:53
  Speaker 1: So that includes like a deed, a title, a credit card.
• 45:57
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it includes credit cards, it includes student loans, the home.
• 46:01
  Speaker 3: This is really important. I learned this while I was
• 46:03
  Speaker 3: researching a story about partners, usually women who bury their
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: head in the sand financially and allow their partner other
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: partner to take on all the financial decision making and
• 46:14
  Speaker 3: money management. And what one attorney told me was that unfortunately,
• 46:18
  Speaker 3: when women get divorced, they think they own their home
• 46:22
  Speaker 3: because their name is on the mortgage, but their name
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: may not be on the deed. And more than being
• 46:28
  Speaker 3: on the mortgage, you want to be on that deed
• 46:31
  Speaker 3: because when that home gets sold, you will get half
• 46:34
  Speaker 3: of what is sold. Because you're on the deed, you
• 46:36
  Speaker 3: are a co owner. The mortgage is not who owns
• 46:39
  Speaker 3: the house, it's who owns the debt on the home.
• 46:43
  Speaker 3: And so again very important because you may have gotten
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: married and you moved in to a partner's house and
• 46:53
  Speaker 3: you're like, I want to pay the mortgage. I want
• 46:55
  Speaker 3: to be a part of this journey on own home
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: ownership with you, and we love this so we don't
• 47:00
  Speaker 3: want to move. So you think all you have to
• 47:02
  Speaker 3: do is refinance the mortgage and get your name on
• 47:03
  Speaker 3: the mortgage, and now you are a co owner of
• 47:06
  Speaker 3: this home. You're not. You just own the debt together.
• 47:09
  Speaker 3: So what you want to also do is get your
• 47:12
  Speaker 3: name on the deed. And that's unfortunately people are learning
• 47:15
  Speaker 3: that the hard way.
• 47:19
  Speaker 1: It's a new year, and that means new opportunities to
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: make connections. But when it comes to dating, it can
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: be tough to put yourself out there and even know
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: where to start. That's why I'm honestly excited to talk
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: about Hinge, the dating app designed to be deleted. I'm starting.
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: I decided this year I'm going to start to date now.
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: I'm usually more of a meet in the wild, not
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: on Wi Fi kind of girl, but it's twenty twenty
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: four and I need to make some changes. My friends
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: told me I did, so I'm signing up for Hinge.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: It really allows you to go beyond the surface of
• 47:51
  Speaker 1: scrolling left or right on photos, express your personality, and
• 47:56
  Speaker 1: meet people who are on the same page. In the past,
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: I slacked on my profile and I never even wrote prompts.
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: But it's twenty twenty four and I'm promising to be
• 48:05
  Speaker 1: more intentional. I'm going on Hinge and taking the time
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: to invest in my profile. So if you're already on Hinge,
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: you can reinvest in your profile, update those prompts, those
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: photos and dating intentions, and make sure they reflect who
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: you are and what you're looking for this year. It
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: can be as easy as updating your profile to add
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: the Hinge prompt. This year, I really want to blink
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: This year, I really want to get married. Just kidding,
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: don't say that on your dating app. Buy a skincare fridge.
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: Maybe don't say that either, Okay, for real? This year,
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: I really want to do a half marathon, or master
• 48:39
  Speaker 1: the art of cooking, win a pickleball tournament, read twenty
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: five books, create the ultimate playlist for every celebration, explore
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: two new countries, get my yoga certification, or sleep more.
• 48:50
  Speaker 1: Whatever the answer is for you. Manifest the dating experience
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: you want this year, Download Hinge and find someone worth
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: deleting the app for okay. What are some financial red
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: flags in a relationship, Things like being secretive, lying about money.
• 49:11
  Speaker 1: I think refusing to share financial information as a red flag.
• 49:15
  Speaker 1: What things come up for you?
• 49:16
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean everything you just said. I think one
• 49:19
  Speaker 3: of the red flags that doesn't present sometimes as a
• 49:21
  Speaker 3: red flag is when your partner says, I want to
• 49:24
  Speaker 3: take care of you entirely. You shouldn't have to work,
• 49:27
  Speaker 3: you shouldn't have to pay for anything. I want to
• 49:30
  Speaker 3: do it all myself now. Most times that's coming from
• 49:33
  Speaker 3: that person a very good place, like they were raised
• 49:36
  Speaker 3: to maybe think that that is their role, that is
• 49:38
  Speaker 3: how they should be as usually the man in a
• 49:40
  Speaker 3: relationship and a hetero relationship. But that would terrify me, okay,
• 49:45
  Speaker 3: as somebody who really values her financial autonomy and her
• 49:48
  Speaker 3: financial capabilities. And I like to work and I like
• 49:51
  Speaker 3: to earn, so that person would never be become my partner.
• 49:55
  Speaker 3: And honestly, like dating in New York in my twenties
• 49:59
  Speaker 3: where I was in but a lot of the guys
• 50:01
  Speaker 3: were earning. They were lawyers, or they were fine in
• 50:04
  Speaker 3: finance because those are huge industries in New York, or
• 50:06
  Speaker 3: maybe they were even in media, but because of the
• 50:08
  Speaker 3: pay gap, they were making more than I was. And
• 50:10
  Speaker 3: if they were coming to the table with an expectation
• 50:13
  Speaker 3: that for us to work out, he needs to be
• 50:18
  Speaker 3: the alpha, the financial alpha, and take care of everything.
• 50:22
  Speaker 3: That would concern me because why it's a red flag
• 50:25
  Speaker 3: is because and this is just maybe me and my perspective,
• 50:29
  Speaker 3: but tell me if I might be going on a
• 50:31
  Speaker 3: limb here, but I have a feeling that once kids
• 50:34
  Speaker 3: enter the picture, it's not about what's he gonna do,
• 50:38
  Speaker 3: it's what are you gonna do? Are you gonna stay
• 50:40
  Speaker 3: at your job? Probably not, you wouldn't want. There are
• 50:44
  Speaker 3: men I see them on at TikTok. You know, they
• 50:47
  Speaker 3: measure their manlihood and their husbandhood on their ability to
• 50:51
  Speaker 3: keep their wife not working. And I'm like, you're basically,
• 50:54
  Speaker 3: if that's what she wants, that's one thing. If that's
• 50:56
  Speaker 3: not how she saw her future going, then that's not
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: cohabitating in a happy place.
• 51:02
  Speaker 1: Well, it puts so much pressure on the person who's
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: not working too, because they feel like they have to
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: do everything else.
• 51:07
  Speaker 3: And then they'll use it against you. You know, like
• 51:10
  Speaker 3: I work and I make the money, and the power
• 51:14
  Speaker 3: dynamic is so effed up and I don't wish for
• 51:18
  Speaker 3: anybody to be in a relationship like that. So there's
• 51:21
  Speaker 3: paying on the first date, which is very nice and
• 51:23
  Speaker 3: we should be great like that can happen, and I'm
• 51:26
  Speaker 3: not saying like that's as a red flag, But if
• 51:28
  Speaker 3: it becomes a pattern where they don't want you to
• 51:30
  Speaker 3: pay it all ever, because their story is that as
• 51:34
  Speaker 3: soon as I let my girlfriend my wife pay for anything,
• 51:39
  Speaker 3: that's a failure on me or this isn't a dream relationship,
• 51:44
  Speaker 3: then okay, that's a problem. There are a lot of
• 51:46
  Speaker 3: ways your partner can take care of you. The money
• 51:48
  Speaker 3: is only one way, well.
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: You know, until it doesn't and then it becomes a disaster.
• 51:53
  Speaker 1: And we've all seen that happen so many times.
• 51:56
  Speaker 3: Too many times. I get so many dms, I see
• 51:59
  Speaker 3: it online. It's like there was a New York Times
• 52:01
  Speaker 3: piece the other day a woman was talking about how
• 52:04
  Speaker 3: when she got divorced, and she was that partner, that
• 52:07
  Speaker 3: spouse that didn't ask questions and she didn't, you know,
• 52:12
  Speaker 3: assume her power in that relationship, her financial power, that
• 52:16
  Speaker 3: he ran or dry and when they got divorced, she
• 52:20
  Speaker 3: was penniless and didn't have even money to pay for
• 52:24
  Speaker 3: a lawyer. And unfortunately this it makes the news, which
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: makes it maybe seem like an outlier, but it's not.
• 52:31
  Speaker 3: It's just it makes the news because we're not talking
• 52:33
  Speaker 3: about it enough. Yeah, and we don't know actually what's
• 52:38
  Speaker 3: going on behind the scenes, but it's happening a lot.
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, you mentioned questions. My mom and I were laughing
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: trying to come up with some of these. Can you
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: give me five crucial money questions to ask your significant other?
• 52:51
  Speaker 3: Five crucial money questions to ask your significant other number one,
• 52:56
  Speaker 3: what are your financial ambitions? Is there a world where
• 53:01
  Speaker 3: you see yourself really wanting to make more, make less,
• 53:04
  Speaker 3: switch jobs? Like really important to know where their head's
• 53:08
  Speaker 3: at from a career and financial perspective. And it's not
• 53:11
  Speaker 3: because you're measuring their ambition. It's really just because you
• 53:14
  Speaker 3: want to understand what their priorities are and their goals are,
• 53:18
  Speaker 3: because not everybody wants to make a million dollars a year,
• 53:21
  Speaker 3: and that's not a bad thing. It's just that maybe
• 53:23
  Speaker 3: they value their time more, they want to work in service,
• 53:26
  Speaker 3: they want to be more of an impact, which doesn't
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: pay a lot necessarily, So just really good to know,
• 53:32
  Speaker 3: because again, if you have projected a certain lifestyle that
• 53:34
  Speaker 3: you want and now you're getting together with somebody who
• 53:37
  Speaker 3: may not fit that bill, it's not a deal breaker,
• 53:40
  Speaker 3: but it's just good context and really helpful to know too.
• 53:46
  Speaker 3: If and when you get married, what do you think
• 53:49
  Speaker 3: about a household where there's only one income coming in?
• 53:54
  Speaker 3: How do you feel about your partner working while you
• 53:57
  Speaker 3: have children? And I'm speaking to the women in the
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: audience because this is an important question to ask your
• 54:02
  Speaker 3: future male partner or female partner because maybe you learn
• 54:06
  Speaker 3: about how they were raised and what they value and
• 54:09
  Speaker 3: what they think is sort of the success model there.
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: So that's the second question.
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: That's a big one.
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and this isn't the first date. Third, I would say,
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: you know, how did you learn about money growing up?
• 54:23
  Speaker 3: What were the conversations or lack thereof that you experienced
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: witnessed growing up? Like how are your caregivers in your life?
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: Your mom, your dad, your parents? Like what did you
• 54:36
  Speaker 3: learn from them about money? So important because they will
• 54:40
  Speaker 3: explain a lot about who they become and give you
• 54:42
  Speaker 3: the context. So that's three, okay. Fourth, what are your
• 54:49
  Speaker 3: like financial goals? You know, I mean we talked about earning,
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: but now it's like what do you want to accumulate
• 54:54
  Speaker 3: in terms of assets? Do you want to buy a house?
• 54:57
  Speaker 3: Do you need to have a fancy car? Do you
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: want to many vacations a year? Do you want to
• 55:01
  Speaker 3: go on? Like what is your rich life? Very important
• 55:04
  Speaker 3: so that if it is or isn't aligned with your
• 55:07
  Speaker 3: rich life, then there's some working there In.
• 55:11
  Speaker 1: Line with that, I was thinking about what does your
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: ideal retirement look like? People don't talk about that.
• 55:18
  Speaker 3: No, that's a good one. Number five I would say
• 55:21
  Speaker 3: a lot of these questions up until this point have
• 55:23
  Speaker 3: been about the short to medium term, but very important
• 55:26
  Speaker 3: to be able to be with somebody that you can
• 55:28
  Speaker 3: have a shared vision for the future and doesn't again
• 55:32
  Speaker 3: have to be precisely the same, but generally speaking, you know,
• 55:37
  Speaker 3: where do you want to live when you retire? What
• 55:39
  Speaker 3: do you want to be doing when you retire? Do
• 55:41
  Speaker 3: you want to retire early? That's a big goal that
• 55:43
  Speaker 3: a lot of young people have, like do you want
• 55:44
  Speaker 3: to retire and do the whole ride, the fire train,
• 55:47
  Speaker 3: the financial independence retire early journey, which means that if
• 55:51
  Speaker 3: they say yes, then buckle up because you're going to
• 55:53
  Speaker 3: be with somebody who will not be happy with those
• 55:56
  Speaker 3: manicures chances are or organic blueberries, like they're on an
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: aggressive saving schedule. But you know, on the other side
• 56:03
  Speaker 3: of it, maybe it's that you don't have to go
• 56:05
  Speaker 3: to work every day. Also important, like along those lines,
• 56:09
  Speaker 3: do you want to run your own company one day?
• 56:12
  Speaker 3: Because that will also paint a picture for you potentially
• 56:15
  Speaker 3: of like what's ahead. It's going to be there's going
• 56:18
  Speaker 3: to be some risk involved in the money, and there's
• 56:20
  Speaker 3: going to be some maybe some income gap and is
• 56:23
  Speaker 3: going to be some potential failures because that's inevitable along
• 56:27
  Speaker 3: the way career and financial setback. So being with somebody
• 56:31
  Speaker 3: who's an entrepreneur, it's exciting, but it's also important to
• 56:35
  Speaker 3: make sure that this person has financial runway and can
• 56:39
  Speaker 3: afford to take those risks, and you, the partner, is
• 56:42
  Speaker 3: it's gonna affect you?
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: Okay, your book a healthy state of panic. This is
• 56:47
  Speaker 1: not your first book. You've written plenty of books. What
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: did you have to say in this one? In particular?
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: What did you have to get off your chest.
• 56:56
  Speaker 3: I've been working in personal finance for twenty years. A
• 56:59
  Speaker 3: lot of those years I've been asking people questions, and
• 57:02
  Speaker 3: the big question is always how did you become you?
• 57:05
  Speaker 3: How did you learn about money? And now turning the
• 57:07
  Speaker 3: table on me because this is also something that people
• 57:10
  Speaker 3: ask me a lot, Like my guests will ask me,
• 57:12
  Speaker 3: or my clients or people I meet at book events,
• 57:16
  Speaker 3: and they'll say, how did you become you? Like you
• 57:17
  Speaker 3: asked me that question? And I think that this book,
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: for me, it's my fourth book, I wanted it to
• 57:24
  Speaker 3: be not just about money. I've written plenty on the
• 57:27
  Speaker 3: topic of money. I've kind of said everything I want
• 57:29
  Speaker 3: to say about money except this that money is extremely emotional,
• 57:33
  Speaker 3: and the underpinning emotion of so many of our financial
• 57:36
  Speaker 3: questions is fear. And so finally I was at a
• 57:40
  Speaker 3: topic for a book that was not only something worth
• 57:44
  Speaker 3: telling the reader and giving the reader permission to feel
• 57:47
  Speaker 3: like you can be afraid and that's okay, but for me,
• 57:51
  Speaker 3: so many stories as well to weave into this fear narrative.
• 57:54
  Speaker 3: Because I grew up the daughter of immigrants terrified by design,
• 57:59
  Speaker 3: my parents purposely wanted me to be afraid of all
• 58:03
  Speaker 3: the things so that I would stay in line, so
• 58:06
  Speaker 3: that I would stay out of trouble. As immigrants, I
• 58:08
  Speaker 3: think that there is an irony of like, this is
• 58:11
  Speaker 3: somebody who came here took a lot of risk, so
• 58:13
  Speaker 3: that seems really fearless. But then they get here and
• 58:17
  Speaker 3: they're like, we're not taking any more risks because we
• 58:20
  Speaker 3: just did the hardest thing and the fact that we
• 58:22
  Speaker 3: are here, we are grateful and we realize how much
• 58:26
  Speaker 3: luck was involved in this, and so we're not You're
• 58:30
  Speaker 3: not allowed to go on any sleepovers, you cannot befriend
• 58:33
  Speaker 3: random people, you cannot go on trips with your class,
• 58:37
  Speaker 3: You can't go to prom You can't do this, Like
• 58:40
  Speaker 3: my mom would always say, you can date when you're married.
• 58:43
  Speaker 3: You know, there was no boys calling the house, like
• 58:45
  Speaker 3: because she was afraid of I think me losing my
• 58:49
  Speaker 3: way a way that they work so hard to make possible.
• 58:55
  Speaker 3: And it's funny now looking back in hindsight, like would
• 58:58
  Speaker 3: it have killed me to like go on a sleepover. No,
• 59:01
  Speaker 3: but it makes for a great story. But also it
• 59:03
  Speaker 3: really shows me as someone who isn't this just this
• 59:07
  Speaker 3: financial expert who's going to talk to you about becoming
• 59:10
  Speaker 3: more comfortable with your finances in this book, but really
• 59:13
  Speaker 3: this terrified young girl who then grew up to be
• 59:15
  Speaker 3: a still scared forty something.
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 59:18
  Speaker 3: I mean I'm like, have you been outside? It's scary.
• 59:21
  Speaker 3: And yet I continue to make a lot of decisions
• 59:24
  Speaker 3: in my life that require a lot of thought and
• 59:27
  Speaker 3: strategy and a comfort with risk, whether it's you know,
• 59:32
  Speaker 3: building a business, buying a house in a pandemic, marrying,
• 59:35
  Speaker 3: becoming the breadwinner in my marriage, having kids, having a kid,
• 59:38
  Speaker 3: having a second kid, Like, who does that?
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: You know something I felt? Tell me, if you feel this,
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: the more risks I take, the more comfortable I get.
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: Taking them.
• 59:46
  Speaker 3: Yeah, it's basically like flexing a muscle. It's hard at first,
• 59:49
  Speaker 3: and then you can keep adding weight because you're conditioning
• 59:53
  Speaker 3: yourself and your body and the same with risk. It's
• 59:56
  Speaker 3: a metaphor, but it works and fear too. The more
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: that you push your boundaries and flirt with your fear
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 3: and face your fear, the next time it shows up,
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 3: you're not scared of it again. You're like, oh, hey, there,
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 3: what do you want me to learn? That's the whole
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 3: point of the book, is like how to use fear
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 3: as a tool in your life, which arrives when we're
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 3: at a risk taking opportunity and we don't know what
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 3: to do. We want to have all the answers we
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 3: can't and we're scared and rightfully.
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: So, Yeah, I want to share with everybody listening one
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: of the reasons I think what your book hits on
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: is so important. And in my own personal experience, I
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: think that I was holding myself back financially because of
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: the fear, which to me was really the story that
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 1: I was telling myself, or a few stories that I
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: had heard in my family. And I'm still working through those,
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: but I've gotten over the hill of a lot of them,
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: and better things have happened in my life. And so
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 1: I'm excited for everybody to dig into your book, but
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: I also want them to check out your podcast so much.
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: There's an episode with a psychotherapist named Mark Schulz. It's
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: titled are You Attracted to Your Financial Opposite? It is
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: one of my favorite episodes, and I listen to your
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 1: pod all the time, but it's one of my favorite episodes.
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: So if you haven't listened to So Money yet, my
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: opinion it would be just start there and then keep going.
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: But do you have an episode that you wanted to.
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 3: As soon as you get off this, I'm telling Mark
• 1:01:24
  Speaker 3: that you love that episode, because after it was done,
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 3: he was like, was that good? I don't know, I'm
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 3: wor you know, And I was like, Mark, we were fantastic.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 3: So he's such a charming, smart guy and he's worked
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 3: in New York worked, he's been a psychotherapist in New
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 3: York City for like ever, and I'm like, I have
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 3: to talk to you about everything you've experienced because can
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 3: you imagine the people that have walked into his room?
• 1:01:43
  Speaker 3: I mean, all the dynamic and interesting stories. I have
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 3: to say. I love interviewing Queen Latifa. She came on
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 3: the show and talked very openly about losing her money
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 3: early on in her career because she trusted the wrong people,
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 3: which unfortunately is a past in Hollywood and in the
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 3: entertainment industry. You have to be very careful about who
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 3: you bring into your financial life and who you entrust.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 3: I love the Friday episodes. Those are the episodes that
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 3: I dedicate to the audience. I answer their questions. So
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 3: I feel like, for me, you know, the audience for
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 3: now nine years doing this show, it's what's kept me alive,
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 3: and it's been the heartbeat of the show. I do
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 3: things because of the audience. I bring on certain guests
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 3: and cover certain topics because they want it and they
• 1:02:29
  Speaker 3: tell me, and so Friday is like sort of my
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 3: gift to them. It's answering their questions, and I pick
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 3: three or four a week. They've come through, you know,
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 3: all the different portals, but nothing beats that because then
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 3: they'll get back in touch and they'll say, you answered
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 3: my question. I did what you said, and I got
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 3: the raise, or I got the house, or I got
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 3: the divorce, or I got closer to my partner because
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: we did this one small thing with our finances. So
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 3: it's the gift that keeps on giving. And I'm sure
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 3: you feel that way about pretty smart.
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 1: But I love the question answer. There's nothing like it. Okay,
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: I do some rapid fire.
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 3: Oh okay, cool.
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 1: What was one vacation that was worth your money? Oh?
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 3: I went to Paris last fall with my whole family,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 3: my kids. So I'm a Francophile and I studied abroad
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 3: in Paris. I spoke French fluently up until like I
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 3: didn't because you use it or lose it. But I
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 3: understand it pretty well. And I felt very accomplished when
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 3: I was able to take all of us there and
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 3: spent a good seven days touring. And you know, the
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 3: trip had highs and lows, but by and large, it
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 3: was an unforgettable trip. And that's how I like to
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 3: use our money is on experiences and less on things.
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, one product that you bought that was worth your.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 3: Money, Well, it's like something that I didn't like that I.
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: Thought I would important.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I thought I wanted this. Okay, So I think
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 3: it was we were still in the pandemic and so
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 3: there was this You know, how you have like your
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 3: espresso machines, but this is like an espresso for cocktails. Okay,
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 3: it makes you a cocktail using a pod and different
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 3: alcohols that you have, water, vodka, and so like. I
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 3: think I was just excited by the idea of it.
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 3: And then my husband got it for me for my
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 3: birthday a couple of years ago, and I think I've
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 3: used it once and I actually stopped using it because
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 3: the sugar from the alcohol that was in the filter
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 3: it was attracting ants. I know, isn't that so gross?
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 3: So I just like shut that whole thing down. I
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 3: was like, this was a disaster.
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, what is a book that changed your life? Something
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 1: you think everybody should read?
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 3: Oh, this is a sweet book. And I read it
• 1:04:44
  Speaker 3: years and years ago, and I think it's many editions.
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 3: The author has since passed, but he was well into
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 3: his like I think he was in his nineties. And
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 3: it was called What Color is Your Parachute?
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: Hmm, Okay, I read that one.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 3: No, I haven't heard of it, and really a timeless
• 1:04:57
  Speaker 3: book on especially for a younger person or anyone in
• 1:05:01
  Speaker 3: a transition in their careers who's feeling a little lost
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 3: and wants to learn how to take more control and
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 3: feel more invested in their success in their careers and
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 3: not beholden to an employer. And I read that book
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 3: when I got laid off in two thousand and nine,
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 3: I actually interviewed the author and we both came on
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: The Today Show, which was incredible to be able to
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 3: like it was such a three sixty. I had just
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 3: gotten laid off. I was a commentator for the Today Show,
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 3: and I was not sure whether I should go on
• 1:05:33
  Speaker 3: and tell the world that I had just gotten laid off,
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 3: but I thought, yeah, I should, because this is like
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 3: again the honesty and the transparency, not what other financial
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 3: author is going on TV. Being like, my employer just
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 3: laid me off. My agent was worried that it was
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 3: gonna devalue me or make me feel like, you know,
• 1:05:50
  Speaker 3: you've left a job. You know, You's like, who will
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 3: ever hire me again? They'll think there's something wrong with me?
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 3: But no, it was like a mass layoff. It wasn't
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 3: about personal right, it was just like no. And I
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 3: remember writing an article interviewing the author of What Color
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 3: Is Your Parachute and pitching that to the Today Show
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 3: and they're like, great, let's get you both on so
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 3: we did and it was really special. But that book,
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 3: I think it's still like it's selling like crazy, and
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 3: it's like the what to expect when you're expecting book
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 3: for post layoff or in a career transition.
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: I always ask people at the end, what's the smartest
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: decision you've ever made? But I want to change this
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: for you if you don't mind, what's the smartest money
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: decision that you've made this year?
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 3: Well, very specifically this is this might borerier audience, but basically,
• 1:06:38
  Speaker 3: in my world as a creator and as a thought leader,
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 3: you know, I have multiple revenue streams. I books, I
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 3: do brand partnerships, I have a podcast. One thing I've
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 3: not really explored is digital programming and online teaching. And
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 3: I think it's because I'm just not really into the
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 3: technology of it all and the salesmanship of it all.
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 3: And you know, like all these people with their courses
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 3: and the ads, it's like, oh my god, that feels
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 3: like a nightmare. I don't want to hire a team.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 3: I just want to I got into this to be
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 3: a journalist, not a marketing salesperson. So that being said,
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 3: this year was really interesting. If you were like me,
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 3: you're kind of in this like creator world and definitely
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 3: like the ad spends were down, and so that meant
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 3: podcast wasn't maybe making as much, or the brand partnerships
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 3: that were a little bit more frequent and bigger deals
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 3: were also waning, and I got a little afraid. Using
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 3: a page out of my own book, A healthy state
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 3: of Panic, I was like, oh, Okay, this model has
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 3: worked for me for many years, but I think it's
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 3: time to create something new. And this means taking a risk.
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 3: This means diving into some you know, new adventure, a
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 3: learning curve, and that for me was to create some
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 3: digital product of some sort. But that doesn't mean that
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 3: I'm like my first attempt to this was just to
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 3: create an online mentorship program. So in August I just
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 3: put out a sign on Instagram. I was like, I'm
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 3: up for hire if you want to join a group
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 3: mentorship program with me. So many people want my advice,
• 1:08:12
  Speaker 3: they want to pay for my advice. I always say
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 3: no because I'm busy and I just didn't have the capacity.
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 3: But now I'm like, is there a world where I
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 3: can create a model that feels good to me is
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 3: also high value for the client, And so it was
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 3: this group mentorship program, and I'm doing my second run
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 3: of it in January. I did the first in the fall.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 3: That'll continue, and then along the way, I'm like, well
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 3: that inspired me, Like what else can I do? So
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 3: starting also in the new year creating some master classes
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 3: and pop up workshops around money. Again, this is like
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 3: a whole new world for me. I know some people
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 3: have been doing this forever, but it's new to me,
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 3: and I'm excited because it's allowing me to have more
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 3: control and to control the dial on the revenue, whereas
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 3: so much of my career so far has been partly
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 3: doing that but then also relying on partnerships and brands,
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 3: and it's like they can come, but I'm not going
• 1:09:09
  Speaker 3: to hold my breath and I'm going to start doing
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 3: more of this other stuff, which has been really more
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 3: almost it's been more fun, to be honest.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: That's awesome. It's nice to feel like you have a
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 1: semblance of control over your income. Yeah, okay, you know
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: what time it is. Today's a good day. To have
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 1: a good day. I'll see you next week.