00:00:00 Speaker 1: Welcome to How to Money. I'm Joel. I'm Matt. 00:00:03 Speaker 2: Today, we're talking about America's debt debacle, perpetual shopping, and mystery vacations. 00:00:16 Speaker 1: You know, buddy, this is our Friday flight, our little roundup of the different personal finance headlines, the ones that we think you need to be paying attention to, the ones that we think matter the most to you. And so that's what we're getting into today. Joel? 00:00:30 Speaker 2: Yeah, the $ 40 trillion debt level. We'll talk about that too and how we should wrap our heads around that as personal finance enthusiasts. 00:00:38 Speaker 1: Are you going to give a bunch of examples? Like $ 40 trillion, that's like 12,000 Mount Everest stacked on top of each other. 00:00:45 Speaker 2: I wasn't planning on it, but is that actually accurate? 00:00:49 Speaker 1: I think I heard somebody say that recently. With $ 1 bills? 00:00:51 Speaker 2: No, no, no. 00:00:52 Speaker 1: Like for meters or whatever, or feet. I don't even know. They're like, you know, Mount Everest is however many feet. Speaking of which. I don't know. I literally don't know. 00:01:02 Speaker 2: My heart goes out to the people of Nepal and all the flooding and devastation there. 00:01:06 Speaker 1: Did you? 00:01:07 Speaker 2: Yeah. You shared that with me yesterday. I hadn't seen it. 00:01:09 Speaker 1: And I was like, oh, man. Wow. Can't believe it. When I saw it, I literally thought to myself, Lord, help this to be AI. Because I was just like, there's no way this is real. Like that wall of water was just totally insane. Hard to, yet something else that's hard to wrap your mind around. But going back to money, I don't often find that those illustrations help me to wrap my mind around that much money. You know? Agreed. 00:01:31 Speaker 2: Agreed. Real quick, and this is on a completely unserious topic. I was just thinking the other day, so one of my favorite websites is Slick Deals. You make fun of me for this because sometimes I just go there and I'm just like looking to see what kind of random deals they have on offer. And sometimes I find great stuff and sometimes I've, Wasted my money because I bought stuff that looked like it was a good deal and maybe it was worthless. 00:01:52 Speaker 1: Speaking of perpetual shopping. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 00:01:55 Speaker 2: I feel like you jumped the gun on the story a little bit here, Joel. I need to go to slick deals less often and it needs to be less of a knee-jerk thing. But sometimes it makes me laugh. 00:02:04 Speaker 1: And so it is. 00:02:05 Speaker 2: Maybe my version of social media scrolling is going to Slick Deals to kind of see what's up. And lately I've seen some like $ 5 lingerie pieces for sale there. I would never buy my wife one of these things because I think it's just... Is it a good deal or is it a good deal? 00:02:22 Speaker 1: Right. 00:02:23 Speaker 2: No, I think usually it's the super cheap stuff and it's not. 00:02:25 Speaker 1: What's wrong with five bucks for a lingerie? 00:02:27 Speaker 2: I know. But the comment section on this super cheap lingerie. Because it's a bunch of middle school boys. 00:02:35 Speaker 1: Exactly. Or men who still act like middle school boys, I'm assuming. 00:02:38 Speaker 2: I think that's exactly what it is. And then I'm laughing like a middle school boy. The first comment on this $ 5 piece of lingerie that is 64% off was, perfect, my mother-in-law's birthday is coming up. 00:02:50 Speaker 1: Thanks. 00:02:53 Speaker 2: And there's just all these great follow-up comments. Maybe it's just the budget. 00:02:57 Speaker 1: And the mother-in-law. Right. 00:03:00 Speaker 2: Someone else said something like, dude, they don't have 3XL sizes these aren't made for women with real curves and just so it was just goofy going down the rabbit hole I was laughing while talking to my wife about it in bed and. 00:03:14 Speaker 1: Good times good times I see how I think you revealed a little too much here Joel as to why it was that y'all were talking about this you're like babe I can get you something right now like we don't need no need to wait the problem is I can't wait to tell Emily that this is what you talked about on the Friday flight the next time I see her The problem is if you click those, then the Slick Deals algorithm feeds you more of that stuff. And I'm like, I don't need more $ 5 lingerie. That's not actually what I'm buying. I'm only clicking on it to look at the funny comments. Yeah. I was just thinking I might have that conversation with Emily as we are on our way to see The Odyssey. Finally. Finally, this Friday afternoon, Friday evening. And you know what I realized that we won't be doing? is I don't think we'll be driving to see the Odyssey in my Honda Odyssey because I got a new car. Whoa! Yeah. This wasn't in the notes, so I just kind of sprung this on you. It happened. I knew it was going to happen soon. Yeah. 00:04:19 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:04:20 Speaker 1: Maybe we'll break it down next Friday flight, perhaps. But, yeah. All electric, dude. It's a Tesla. Uh-oh. Yes. Yeah, yeah. And maybe, yeah, we can go over the numbers and why it makes sense and how I justify it. Is it the fridge on wheels? What's that? Is it the fridge on wheels? No, I didn't get a Cybertruck, but I got the bigger one to be able to accommodate hauling the kids to school. Goldwing doors? Kate would not at all allow me to even consider getting those doors. And honestly, I don't want to either because, I mean, as I've ramped up the research over the weeks and months— There's just more issues. Like the more luxuries you have in something like an automatic door like that, you run into problems. So you run into problems with the strut as it goes up like that. But anyway. Okay. All right, next week. Stay tuned, folks. Wanted to drop that bomb because we have officially needed to hand over my one-car family library card. I don't know what card I have that means I have some sort of elevated status because I'm a one-car family. But I did see that I lost the one– we had a one-car family discount recently. When it came to our insurance. And so I was getting the insurance lined up before we are going to go pick this thing up. That was a discount that we had. So that's not something I quoted out everything else, but I didn't ask them to account for the fact that we're going to be losing our one car family discount. 00:05:39 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:05:39 Speaker 1: Which I'm like, did she make that up? Did she just slide that in there to make me feel good about myself? I'm not sure how substantial it was, but... All right. 00:05:46 Speaker 2: Well, I want details next week, all of the reasons why you went fully electric. Because you were looking more towards hybrid for a long time. That's what I was expecting you to pull the trigger on. 00:05:53 Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, maybe... I don't know. Maybe we'll get into it for a second. Dude, the hybrids are so expensive. There is such a demand. And for good reason, right? Toyota in particular. The Toyota hybrids are just bomber. Like, they are so bulletproof. They're so solid. And they have the reputation. And because of that, people are willing to pay such a premium... in particular for these like early 2020s up to like 2023 is sort of the range I was looking at, RAV4 hybrids, some of them, like they're barely more affordable than brand new. Like it's like they have not taken the depreciation hit and folks are clamoring to get their hands on these things. And I thought that some of this would die off because I kind of, you know, considered this a couple of years ago and in particular the high demand. They are still in high, I think maybe as they are just as in high demand as they used to be. And this is just the hybrid, not the plug-in hybrid. And so ultimately it came down to price and realizing that, well, shoot, if we're looking at getting something that's this old and that has this many miles on it, we could probably, like, what are some of the other options out there? And, you know, you kind of got me thinking in that direction because you were like, hey, check out like the Kia, the Sorento at some point. You're like, that's a solid hybrid. But then I started thinking, okay, well, I. 00:07:11 Speaker 2: Was trying to push you towards plug-in hybrids. Because of the way you guys drive, having some electric capability would mean completely eliminating, not just like having better miles to the gallon, but reducing your need for gas at all in that vehicle most of the time. 00:07:26 Speaker 1: For the vast majority of our driving. The downside is a lot of those electric miles wouldn't get us all the way. And so then you are relying on the actual internal combustion engine, which, yeah. And we've talked about this, right? Like having a highly fuel efficient vehicle, there's a big gap between that and something that's fully electric because you're paying, I mean, fractions of a cent for a kilowatt hour when you're charging super off peak. I know, is it Graham? Listener Graham, friend of the show, local Graham. He's talked before and I think he pays in like the hundreds of dollars annually, like just for the year to run it. And I've according to my, I've run the numbers as well. And it seems like, gosh, this really does make the most sense. And we are only looking for something around town specifically to get the kids to and from school, running the errands. And like, we're still going to hang on to the old 2012 Honda Odyssey, baby, for sure. But as far as the daily driver goes, it didn't make sense. It made a lot of sense just looking at fuel costs for the break even as early as, if not sooner than seven years, not to mention just some of the, the fun and joy that you get out of driving a newer vehicle too. 00:08:39 Speaker 2: Driving an EV, if you haven't done it, it's so fun, like to everyone else out there. 00:08:43 Speaker 1: It's a blast. 00:08:44 Speaker 2: Just the instant acceleration is a joy, like puts a smile on your face. So they're fun to drive. I'm curious to see it. I'm sure it's got full self-driving. I'm sure it's the plaid version because, you know, Matt never does anything cheaply. 00:08:58 Speaker 1: Yeah. Plaid software. But then also it's got like a custom paint job. I bet, yeah. It's kind of got the, is it, I don't even know what I'm saying. Burberry? I don't know. It's got some sort of fancy plaid paint job. No, it does not. But I wanted to surprise you with that today. Nice, dude. Well, congrats. 00:09:13 Speaker 2: I look forward to seeing it. Take me for a ride in it. 00:09:16 Speaker 1: I'm happy, but I'm also a little sad because I'm just like, well, those single family, single car family days are behind us now. I feel very normal, honestly. I feel very prototypical, average American, but at the same time, I don't know. Yeah. Is that so bad? Who knows? No, it's not. All right. 00:09:35 Speaker 2: Let's talk about national debt, though. Let's get into it. We've got a lot of stories to cover. 00:09:38 Speaker 1: Yeah. Let's do it. 00:09:39 Speaker 2: So we've crossed officially as of, what, seven days ago, the $ 40 trillion debt threshold. And it is just a big round number, which draws attention, Matt. It doesn't necessarily mean we have gone over some cliff or that we have gone past a point of no return in the amount of federal borrowing that has been done. But it doesn't mean even that there are any sort of like immediate consequences on the horizon. But it is still, I think, this point of concern for people, and understandably so. Like, when does, when do we cross the The level of national debt impacting, and I think it is impacting all of us now to a certain degree, but when does it have major ramifications? And I heard it likened to a meteor headed toward Earth. And if you've got the telescope out and you're like, oh, this is 50 years away, you kind of go on about your business, assuming you'll be able to figure it out at some point in the future. But the meteor is getting closer. 00:10:40 Speaker 1: Yeah. Not unlike the premise to Project Hail Mary, where we're like, the sun is cooling, and this is eventually going to lead to widespread famine, basically. 00:10:50 Speaker 2: Or whatever that Bruce Willis movie was, right? Didn't they have to go up? I don't think I ever saw it, but they had to go up and blow up the asteroid or something like that. 00:10:57 Speaker 1: Oh, yeah. Dude, that's classic 90s cinema right there. Yeah, yeah. 00:11:00 Speaker 2: So I'm curious to hear your takes. Obviously, we as a country continue to make poor decisions, especially over the past 20 years, and they've accelerated recently, that have created an unsustainable path. Yeah. 00:11:14 Speaker 1: No, I think so. I mean, similarly, it's not great, but it's also not some sort of, oh, the world's on fire now, right? Like we were on this path for a while. Although, like if you look at charts, you see our debt grow significantly. Like it was the pandemic spending. Essentially, like as of now, had we continued at the pace we were, we would only be at 30 trillion right now. But starting around 2020, increased government spending. But I think the more concerning thing is just like, well, what does that actually mean? And it's the fact that the interest payments alone are set to overtake Medicare spending this year. And it's second only to Social Security, which is, that's when it starts feeling like, to borrow Joel's favorite term, the albatross around the neck, right? Like about 14% of federal spending is going towards interest payments. which is pretty dang significant, right? And I don't think that this means we should be panicking. This isn't a call to abandon U.S. stocks and go full international or anything like that. But I do think if we were wise, we would look ahead and look at the next 20 years and say, man, I don't think things are going to be quite as forgiving or great as they've been for the past 20 years, right? I think that there is a chance we might see tax.... 00:12:36 Speaker 2: Reduced growth, higher taxes, more drag on the economy. 00:12:39 Speaker 1: Exactly. We're going to see those brackets tick up. I think that would be wise. It's also all relative, too, because you think about the rest of the world, other countries. 00:12:49 Speaker 2: Even more attention was drawn to this with the Treasury Secretary's attempt to kind of quell interest rates by buying back 30-year bonds, using short-term debt to do that. And some people said, oh, this is like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. That only shines a spotlight on it. And there was a financial news story. 00:13:10 Speaker 1: As opposed to actual policy change that's going to lead to a healthier economy. Right. 00:13:14 Speaker 2: So this financial advisor, Charlie Bilello, he has a great newsletter. And he basically said, and I'll quote, he said, instead of cutting spending and reducing deficits, which would be a long term solution to the problem, they're resorting to financial engineering. And that is exactly is what this is, is like we're unwilling to make the hard choices in our country to say, actually, we have to raise taxes or we have to cut We have to make changes to the program, the Social Security program. Like we have to we have to actually probably implement a bunch of these things to to put ourselves on a path to fiscal solvency. But what we want is to have our cake and eat it, too. And nobody's willing to be especially our politicians and us as voters as well to be the adults in the room to say this is going to have real big long term impacts over time on the next generation. But we just want the good old days to continue. And so, yeah, it's also interesting to see the impact that it's had on the gold and Bitcoin in just the past like 10 days. And more people, those are seen as when the U.S. dollar, when the way the U.S. system is structured, when there's more doubt cast on that, people tend to flock towards Bitcoin and gold more. 00:14:24 Speaker 1: Yeah, that's true. Yeah, as a slightly more independent market. asset classes. Um, and I think on a personal level, what this means, like what the, what this should point to and the lessons that we should be learning is like, don't be like the U S government, right? Like you want less and less of your monthly budget being focused on paying down debt. Yes. Um, as opposed to the governments where it seems like, unfortunately it's more and. 00:14:49 Speaker 2: More, I think it's even by the way, particular with you have floating interest rates, think about, we're not going back to, and maybe I'll eat my words, but we're not going back to the era of 3% interest rates. And if you get more and more comfortable with debt, especially floating rate debt, you might find that the rates on that debt increases, making it more difficult to be able to afford those monthly payments. So those forms of debt should be a no-no. The more we can afford debt and rein in our own lifestyle and spending, the better off we're going to be. 00:15:21 Speaker 1: Which is so funny that you bring that up, too, because that's exactly the state that the U.S. finds itself in, right? Like, it's this new debt that's at higher and higher rates, as opposed to, like, if you, like, dig into some of the data, Japan, I'm pretty sure is Japan has a larger share of debt per their, the size of their economy, per their GDP. But, and so you might think, well, how come, how come Japan is not freaking out? Well, it's because that debt is locked in at lower rates. And so it's relatively, it's a small share. payment that they're making when it comes to interest, as opposed to U.S. We basically got like a title loan, like the interest that the U.S. is paying relative to Japan. So it's all these factors. It's a confluence of events. And hopefully this is something that at least we as individuals can learn from our government. I was going to talk about the job hopping article. There's a journal article that basically challenged the idea that in order to be a good employee, you need to be loyal, stable, and you need to be with an employer for a certain number of years. They're essentially challenging that and saying, oh, actually, your ability to hop from one job to the next shows that you are adaptable. You've got this superpower. You've got the skill set that means whoever you're working for, including this new company that you're applying for, it means that you're going to be able to quickly adopt company culture, hit the ground running, be incredibly productive. What do you think about that? article, that take. 00:16:48 Speaker 2: I thought that was interesting. It's probably also accurate in many work climates. I think there's like a balance, right, that needs to be struck. And we talked a lot about the switching premium that existed during COVID, like hopping to a new job was going to get you paid more in many cases than sticking around. That has largely declined. It doesn't mean it doesn't exist, especially in a one-off basis, although the trend has kind of receded. But Yeah, I think this makes sense, especially given that young people are more willing to job hop. And as they're kind of figuring out what they want to do in their career, where they want to work, what direction they're going in, they probably are the most quick to adapt to a new work environment and to kind of figuring things out and kind of getting weaved into the fabric and knowing what their role is in that company more quickly than someone who's like, stayed at a job for 10 years, they're really set in their ways, then they get the new job. And it takes a lot longer to onboard them and to get them kind of integrated. So I think that makes a lot of sense. I think if you do it, if you're finding a new job every year, year and a half, it doesn't matter that you are quicker at acclimating though, because at some point, me as the employer, I'm going to say, are you going to be around long enough to actually bring the value that I hired you to bring? Or are you learning, you're good at it, and you bail real quick. So you got to find that happy medium, I think. That's when, Joel, you're like, no, no, no, baby. It's different this time. I'm here for the long haul. 00:18:19 Speaker 1: That's what it feels like. I feel like this also raises like a mental health sort of question, where it's like younger generations are, are they more easily able to not, I was going to say code switch, not code switch, but like context shift. And it's almost like there are these sort of like siloed portions of their mind, like from an identity standpoint, as opposed to somebody who they work in a certain job, they see themselves in that role themselves. they are the title of that job, which obviously there are certain examples of that, that are also unhealthy, right? Where your entire sort of self worth and identity is tied up in your specific job. But I also wonder if like the sort of fracturing the, uh, horcruxification of, uh, of sort of like your work career, if that tends to might end up taking a toll on you. Um, but I also want to push back a little bit too on the article because, um, I found it really interesting because I'm also saying to myself, well, what came first, like the chicken or the egg? What came first? 00:19:15 Speaker 2: Was it the adaptability that you learned? Oh, I thought you were going to drop in on us and tell us which one came first. And I was like, finally, an answer to this question. 00:19:23 Speaker 1: Thank you. I don't know. I don't know. Yeah. What came first though? Like that adaptability and the fact that you learned that from job hopping or the fact that if you are somebody who naturally has that skill set that, you are obviously going to flex that muscle a little bit more. You're going to go the route of going from one job to the next because you have the ability to context switch, to change roles quickly, to adapt from one company culture to another. So I don't think this is a slam dunk that like, oh, by doing this, you are going to give yourself a superpower. You're going to be able to set yourself apart in the market. I think it's a tightrope, sort of like you were saying. It might be a little bit of both. But something certainly for folks to consider. Something else to consider on the job front is, well, how do you get jobs in this environment? And there was a recent analysis and it found that if you respond more quickly when an employer reaches out to you, you're more likely to get the job. And this just makes a lot of sense to me. I don't think you have to respond within like 30 seconds because actually, Matt, this study was more, it was digging into online gig requests. And I think this is a very different thing in so many ways that if you're looking for somebody on Fiverr and you send an email to five people and the first person to respond is going to be the one who gets your business oftentimes, especially if the others are more delayed. But so I don't know that I would take this as like gospel truth for every job seeker, but I do think there's a lot of truth to, are you reasonably responsive? Like, do you respond to emails, phone calls, whatever, within the hour or two. And this isn't to say that you need to be glued to your email all day, every day, because there's certainly a need to take time away for deep work. But especially if you are in the job hunt, I think if you snooze, you lose. And if you are late to respond to requests or emails from a potential employer, they might see you as someone who's not responsive, who doesn't fit on the team. Totally. 00:21:26 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:21:26 Speaker 1: I think that there is something, like you said, this is intuitive. It makes sense. Um, I think you can take a non-Fiverr or a non-gig work sort of takeaway from this as well, which is like, when I hear that, I think, well, it doesn't mean that you should be responding to every single thing that comes your way, right? Even like a more traditional job hunter, someone who's applying for jobs right now is looking for a new, a new full-time sort of gig. Um, I think what it points to is an ability to be incredibly focused on an opportunity that you see, that you know is checking all the boxes, that you know is a great company that treats its employees well. The ability to be laser-like focused and respond immediately because you've been preparing for this. Oh, and in fact, I'm going to go ahead and rework my resume in order to speak directly to this company and to use their language. Oh, I'm going to make sure I research this company so that when I interview with these guys that I am it's very clear that I'm a good fit. Like that's like- Shows intentionality. Yeah, the intentionality and to really, when you see something and you know it's going to be good, and sometimes it's tough to know. And so you're casting your net kind of wide. But over time, you should be focusing on something very specific. It makes me, I don't know, it makes me think of real estate, right? And I think about- successful real estate investors narrow their focus, right? What is your search box or your buy box? The buy box, yeah. You are, like, I'm thinking about the last couple of houses that we purchased. We not only knew the specific neighborhood, not only the specific street, but even like specific sections of the street, like a certain intersection and a specific house. And I'm thinking about back when we lived in the city, like we, I've looked up the information for who owned that house because it was currently being rented. That's called stalking. And they were living in France. And I sent them an email and we sent them a letter. And they're like, actually, we've been very happy with the renter. But then guess who they reached out to a few months later when that renter was no longer there. Who did they think of? The couple that sent them the nice letter because, oh, actually, it turns out that they also got a full-time offer over in France. Yeah. I don't know. Something like that makes me also think about jobs where if you know, something's going to work and you're pretty sure that like, I can move without fear and with some clarity towards something, you give it your all as opposed to, as opposed to like the spray and pray kind of approach where you're wasting everyone's time, you know, printing out. 00:23:59 Speaker 2: A bunch of stuff and sticking it to mailboxes all over town. Like, yeah, that's, You're casting your net too wide. And same thing with applying for jobs. You can utilize whatever automated tools to automatically apply for all the jobs that fit your... But there's a difference between doing that because hiring managers can see that. And they know that, oh, this looks exactly like the other 20, 30, 40, 50 applicants I've received just this morning. There's something different about that versus somebody who picks up the phone and calls them, perhaps. 00:24:29 Speaker 1: I don't know. There's other ways to... to approach it, I think. I think that's true. I think that's true. 00:24:34 Speaker 2: I think especially in today's environment, sticking out as a job seeker is really important. And part of that is jumping through some of the AI language loopholes. And then part of that is being responsive and being intentional for the role, the company where you want to get hired. So you can't just kind of submit the online application and pray. I think in that case, you're probably not going to get reached out to. 00:25:00 Speaker 1: Yeah. Totally agree. Let's talk about prenups. We didn't talk about it last week. Let's talk about it now. That's right. There's a rise. 00:25:05 Speaker 2: I'm not sure where you stand on this now. It's something I've changed my mind on because at first I was like, prenups, why do it? You're going to get married. The goal inside of marriage is to stay married. So prenups, who needs them? But I've changed my mind because every state has a different essentially prenup pre-written for you. And so why not create your own instead? And so basically the judge will decide for you if you don't decide for yourselves in advance. And one of the things that this article I read, which was in the Wall Street Journal, was they were saying that judges are not typically generous to the stay-at-home spouse. So that would be particularly harmful towards women most of the time historically, more and more men obviously staying at home though now too. So more couples are adding in clauses, Matt, that trigger the prenup if one partner leaves the workforce that trigger essentially more generosity. 00:26:05 Speaker 1: So the leave the workforce clause. 00:26:08 Speaker 2: The penalty, right, that you get that we've talked about for a long time that takes into account like lost earnings because you stayed at home. The fact that you've kind of fallen off a career track and it's harder to get back on it. So the prenup can take full advantage of and can take that into consideration. But- A judge often does not. So this is a case in where if that's something, if you're planning on getting married, if you know someone who is, that should be a consideration, I think, in the prenup. Well, what if one of us decides to stay at home? 00:26:36 Speaker 1: How are we treating that? Yeah. No, I think that's the thing that I remember when I read that. That's the part of it that stood out to me as well. The fact that this leave the workforce clause wouldn't kick in until someone actually leaves the workforce because they're going to take care of the kids and is gender neutral. And we know plenty of... dads, fathers, husbands who are staying home because the ladies are bringing home the bacon. And yeah, I think that's totally fine. Personally, you know, like I don't like that it's necessary And personally, we do not have a prenup, but I understand that it needs to exist. We don't either because I didn't think of it that way before we got married, which was so long ago now, Matt. We've been in the world for two decades. There's other agreements you can make even now, like even the fact that, I don't know, I guess is that technically called a post-nup? Post-nup, yeah. But that's not something I'm interested in because we take a different view as to marriage in particular and what that means for how I view Kate and our relationship. But I totally understand... that's needed more and more today. As folks are living just more sort of individual siloed lives, which on that account, did you see that Fidelity reported that only like 40% of couples have joint accounts now? And that's sort of, that's evidence of the fact that people aren't overlapping their lives, even though all the data points to the fact that couples who do combine their money, who do have a joint account, have much higher levels of satisfaction and happiness within that relationship. 00:28:13 Speaker 2: It's almost like couples, what they're doing is they're saying, I'm a little bit nervous or I've seen the divorce rate. And so what I'm going to do is I'm going to hedge my bets. And you just can't do that in marriage. Like if you're committing to the things we say at the altar, I think combining bank accounts kind of comes with the territory and it suggests something about your commitment level. And so to see that you know, four and 10 people combine their finances. When all the data shows that the couples who do kind of combine everything and they kind of go all in, it doesn't mean that they're always successful, but they are more successful in terms of marriage and they have higher happiness levels overall. So have the prenup, but maybe also combine your bank accounts. Maybe the prenup is the way you hedge a little bit and then you jump all in. I like what you said that it doesn't automatically mean that there's going to be relational success, right? Because it's not like the joint account, it's sort of like we're talking about the 40 trillion earlier, right? It's not like, oh, all of a sudden we hit the magic number and that means things are about to fall off the cliff. No, in a similar way, just because you get a joint bank account doesn't mean, oh, you're going to have the best marriage, let. 00:29:22 Speaker 1: Me tell you. No, but what that means is by having combined your money- is that you have shared common goals with each other, right? Like you have a shared sense of identity. It's a lot more we and our money and our goals in our life, as opposed to, well, this is my money. 00:29:39 Speaker 2: That Marriage is not always easy. You're combining different family histories, different individual personalities. 00:29:56 Speaker 1: Yes, it's super messy. But through that hardship is where you forge the depth of relationship and you forge understanding, you forge trust. And so by doing that, it's almost like training or something. It's like boot camp. By going through that, it doesn't mean automatically by doing that, it's like some kind of license. No, it's formational training. And going through that with somebody, it changes the way you think about things and how you view each other. So I think that's when I hear those stats, I always think about that. It's not the fact that this is some magic pill that you can take. Rather, it's sort of putting you on a trajectory of working towards understanding your partner better. Yeah. All right. 00:30:37 Speaker 2: We got more to get to, including would Matt go on a mystery vacation? Would he pay money not knowing where he's actually going to go on that trip? We'll talk about that and more right after this. 00:30:47 Speaker 1: And here is the ad. I got distracted, Joel. You said my name, and then I started thinking of Mystery Vacation. I saw the mystery van from Scooby-Doo, and my mind was just like swimming in all random directions. Do you think I'm ADD? No, I think I am, but I don't think you are. I feel like I tend to focus on whatever is in front of me. It's just you put something new in front of me and it made me think about it. Anyway, it's time for our ludicrous headline of the week. And this week it is from KTLA. Headline reads, buy now, pay later. No, let me read that again. It says, buy now, pay later. Loans now being used for utility bills, rent, etc. Basically, the article is getting into how Once upon a time, we used these sorts of types of payments for like the bigger things that, oh, it's going to be tough to stomach clicking purchase and seeing that much money leave, but now it's being used. Or at least just non-necessities, right? On a daily basis, basically, for typical things that you would not use that for. And I'm not sure if we're going to actually come down on the same side of the argument on this one, Joel, so I'll let you go first. All right. Well, the New York Times, there was another article specifically about this, and they noted that there are lending apps called Flex and Zip, which allow customers to take out loans to pay for broadband, to pay for internet, to pay for electricity, to pay for health insurance, cell phone service, water bills. Man, basically like it's getting, BNPL is getting into every possible way that you spend money, even the necessities. 00:32:30 Speaker 2: And I just, I think the more we dive into this as individuals by saying, yeah, let me pay that off in four easy installments. It's a psychological nightmare. It prevents us from seeing our money the way we should and feeling some of the friction and the pain. It's actually, it's just like a more advanced version of something we've talked about, Matt, that I've said I hated, which is the budget billing. Oh yeah, you get the simple $ 260, $ 240 utility bill It's the same like clockwork every month. But then when you have higher usage months, you don't feel the pain that makes you actually change your habits. And so I don't like this at all. 00:33:11 Speaker 1: I don't know. 00:33:11 Speaker 2: It sounds like maybe you're into it. Tell me, tell me what you think. 00:33:15 Speaker 1: I don't like it. I'm not into it, but I guess I'm just thinking, like as I was thinking through it, I just found myself asking, well, is it all that bad? Because they don't typically charge interest. And so because of that, it kind of seems like they're less, less risky from an interest rate standpoint than credit cards, right? Like some of them still have, they've got similar protections. Been true of regular buy now, pay later when you buy a pair of blue jeans. Like, yeah, well, if I'm going to pay $ 80, why not just pay $ 20 four times and not pay interest? That sounds nice. 00:33:44 Speaker 2: Yeah. 00:33:44 Speaker 1: And so, so why not? I mean, it's so, and again, the fact that there are higher stakes when it comes to credit cards and we talk about credit card usage all the time, right? Like if you are smart about it, if you follow the golden rules of plastic, um, then there's a way that you can incorporate that into how it is that, that you spend and that you buy. I think the risk. So from an interest and again, from a, from a, from a, how much you're paying for at standpoint, It's much less risky. But I do think the risk profile changes a little bit in that you're kind of regularly punting these expenses down the road. And that part I obviously don't like. I don't like the fact that you, it's like you're never really, I like what you said. You said something about not having a clear understanding of your money. And that's kind of what happens. It kind of softens it over a few months, right? As opposed to like here and now. And then before you know it, you've got every dollar coming in from your paycheck going to these purchases that you've already made, purchases like in the past. But I can also envision a younger, somebody who's younger, who's also perhaps job hopping and they've got the skills to be able to context switch, right? Perhaps the same kind of person is saying, well, you know, by the time that four months ago, that payment rolls off, well, then I can roll another one on. And it's sort of like this rolling cycle of paying fours. They're paying them. They're not, racking up any fees. They're ignoring the offers for other loan products that they're trying to be, that they're getting sold. And they're using it to their advantage. I think that there is a use case where someone is savvy, they can use the system. Me personally, I'm not interested. Most people using these products are not using them that way. And for most people who are told, hey, you can pay your utility bill in four installments instead of paying it all at once, they're going to think, great. Uh, like this, this, this provides more freedom in my budget this month. It's similar to kind of what we talked about. Was it just last week about the student loan payment pause? What did people do with that? They were their own worst enemies. And to say, you don't have to pay this and then bring it back into their lives. They can't handle it anymore because they've racked up other bills. And I think that's what most people who use buy now pay later end up doing is it's self-immolation. It's, it's self-harm. 00:36:05 Speaker 2: They end up hurting their finances and You can say for the random savvy person who use, but most people don't. I don't use buy now, pay later. Most of our listeners don't use buy now, pay later because they realize it has slippery slope tendencies. Is it possible to game the system and use it to your advantage? 00:36:23 Speaker 1: Yes. 00:36:24 Speaker 2: But I think most people who are savvy with money don't. Credit cards are different because we've talked about the rewards that credit cards offer. 00:36:30 Speaker 1: Which is why I use them. 00:36:31 Speaker 2: The protections that credit cards offer. And so that makes it- Not only the protections, but the benefits, right? 00:36:37 Speaker 1: Like think about how many, in the past year, have you used more of the protections from the credit card without one small error? I've used them for both. You definitely have. But I can't think of the last time I had a fraudulent charge. I just looked up, at least with Klarna, it said their typical user, it does tend to skew younger, but the significant user base has excellent credit. So you're looking at 750 or higher as opposed to someone who's got poor sub 600 credits. So I'm interested to hear from listeners. If folks are like, wait a minute, guys, that's me. Like I'm exactly who you're talking about, Matt. Like I'm trying to use this in a smart, savvy way. We want to hear from you. But if you are also like us and you're just like, I'm old, I'm setting my ways. I don't want to mess with this stuff. That's how we are. But I guess I'm just opening up the possibility that there might be folks who are using some of this new tech to their advantage. 00:37:31 Speaker 2: Yeah. And if you're the financially savvy person, why are you using buy now, pay later and not your credit card that offers superior benefits? It seems like the more optimal move for sure. Right. So I just think if you're looking for the most optimized ways, this is the most lazy way to buy that offers you the longest payoff timeline, but it can come back to bite you. And I think the more and more things we get used to putting on buy now, pay later, similar to you could talk about some of those apps where you can get your paycheck early. And it sounds great. And guess what? There's a suggested tip amount, but I guess you really can, if you want, you can get your paycheck early and you can not pay a dime. So why wouldn't you do that? Well, just because of the behavioral reality of it. Like, why are we trying to get our paycheck two days early? It's coming Friday anyway. Why do I need it on a Wednesday? And most people who partake in that, it's because they need the money, right? And they want it earlier and they don't have They haven't developed the financial discipline to be able to actually afford to wait for their paycheck to come. So you could talk about how you could game the system, but I think ultimately the system is gaming you. 00:38:42 Speaker 1: And when it comes to buy, not pay later, there's not much of a system to game, right? Again, there's not much benefit, which is why personally I've got zero interest in using it because I'm just like, it doesn't make sense why it is that you would go with that. I will say something I 100% agree with was, so you want to talk, the Atlantic article about shopping. Oh yeah. Yeah. Basically it's talking about how awful it is to buy stuff today. Cause essentially we used to like, it was an activity. You would go shopping versus today. Uh, I love what they said, which was a little bit shopping. So basically you get a little bit shopping all the time. Oh yeah. And so like you get sucked into this like endless vortex of you click this and then you get pulled over here and then you see a 40% off that you click through, but then it's not the color you want. And actually there's only like one singular pair of shoes. That's, one size, one color. But then you're on that site, and then you're clicking there. I 100% agree with essentially what I would call the infinite scroll shopping equivalent, right? Like there is always a new potential deal that's out there, as opposed to a finite number of goods. that you are limited to. That's the difference between in-person shopping versus online shopping. Yes, you have the ability to get the best deal possible, but there's always the, oh, there's like the addictive slot machine behavior. Oh, maybe if I click one more and dive a little bit deeper, a little bit deeper, I might be able to find an even better deal. That's the part of shopping today that totally sucks. Yeah, and we're even being fed ads more and more on shopping sites. So you go to a site to buy something, and then they're showing you ads for other stuff that you can buy. And not even just more of the thing you're curious about that they sell, but they're trying to push you towards products that are paying for placement. So Seth Godin had a blog about how much money Amazon makes now by having advertisements at the top of the search results. And it's so much money, Matt. Like if you. 00:40:35 Speaker 2: I don't know if this is, yeah, if you're like searching for laundry detergent on Amazon, my guess is Tide or Gain or somebody like that is paying big money to have some sweet ad at the very top of the search results or promoted results. There are all these ways that shopping has actually become much more difficult and frustrating in the era of online, everything online and social media fed that it seemed like things would become more clear, more simple. easier to price compare, and the opposite has become true. And I think we're all at this point frustrated with how shopping takes place in 2026. And it makes me think about, you know, at the beginning of the episode, talking about how I use slick deals. I just need to kick back to the curb. I think I just need to shop less and I need to put myself in fewer online places where shopping is being pushed at me. It's getting harder than ever, but it's, and you can't avoid it completely, but I think there are things we can do as individuals to kind of reduce at least the amount of shopping, perpetual shopping that's pushed on us. Agreed. Yeah. 00:41:32 Speaker 1: And I think we'll find ourselves, even though we might perhaps be paying a little bit more, we would find ourselves being substantially happier because it's not this endless loop of, oh, maybe there's another deal. This is shout out to my boys over at Aldi, right? This is, it's that decision fatigue that we're eliminating from our lives to be able to simplify in a way where generally speaking, you know, you're saving money, but you don't need all the options out there. You just stick with something that's basically good enough. Yeah. 00:42:01 Speaker 2: All right, would you, sir, would you take a mystery vacation to save money? You know what the price tag is, but you don't know where you're going or what it's going to look like. 00:42:12 Speaker 1: I think I would in my, if I was younger, I would. And I think if I was older, like if I was an empty nester, I would also do this. But right now, dude, it's the sandwich generation thing, right? Like we've got our kids pulling on us. We've got our parents pulling on us. Like we're just getting stretched in the middle. And like, there's just, Our time off and vacation days and being able to travel, those days are a premium, I feel like, right now. And so because of that, I'm also willing to pay more of a premium to know exactly where I'm going to go for the trip that I know we need to take, as opposed to rolling the dice or opening the mystery. Was it Laffy Taffy, the white? It was the mystery flavor, the question. Like, I'm not willing to do that right now, right? Like, I've got enough candy. Like, I just need a specific type of vacation. I think I would be up for it, though, when I've got more time off. I don't think I would. Oh, really? 00:43:10 Speaker 2: When you dig into the details of how some of these companies work, they make it sound like you might get an exotic destination. Hey, you might end up in Hawaii. You never know. But the vast majority of the people who book the vacation end up getting what is essentially the rock-gut cheapest place you could possibly go. So they're ending up in Vegas or Orlando or DC, which are some of just the cheapest cities to fly to. 00:43:36 Speaker 1: You can fly there for 97 bucks. Right. 00:43:39 Speaker 2: And you could have bought that super cheap ticket on your own and decided which of those three cities you wanted to go to versus allowing them to pick that for you. There was something like 18 out of 2000 of these mystery vacations were good ones and the rest were just these super run of the mill generic places. So you're kind of playing the lottery. And it reminds me of my stupid foray in New York city, trying to get a discount ticket on Broadway. And we played, we did this thing called Broadway roulette. I talked about it on the show and how you are, you get to pick some of the shows you don't want to go to. And, and then you're just trying to get a discount ticket essentially to go to a bunch of other shows, which they're going to pick for you. 00:44:17 Speaker 1: And we ended up going to the show and we really didn't like it at all. 00:44:21 Speaker 2: And if I had realized, I think I just would have been, I would have rather paid more money. and gone to a show while we're in New York City that we're dying to see. So maybe that sounds like anti-frugal. I think it's actually more frugal to budget a little bit more, to have more money set aside, to go see the thing while you're in the place that you really want to go do. And some of these mystery vacation sites, they might sound cool, but I think a lot of people are going to end up being let down because they're like, another trip to Vegas because it's cheap. And then I ended up gambling more money than I was planning on. It just I think it sounds cool in theory, but in reality, most people end up not liking it. 00:44:59 Speaker 1: Yeah. No, you said that you're being more frugal by planning for this ahead of time. It comes down to what you're planning for, right? And you are being more frugal, not with your money in this case, but with your time, right? Because yes, as a traveler, you travel to New York City, you're a tourist, right? So as a tourist, you've only got so many hours and so many days there and you want... every minute that you're spending there to not be like jam-packed full, but to be spent in a way that aligns with your values. It would be different, for instance, if you lived in New York City, then you're, yeah, let's do the thing. Let's go check out some new show that we've never checked out because we've never actually thought to, but I would do it for a discount. So maybe that's why I was saying I would consider it once I'm an empty nester, because at that point in time, I'm envisioning oh, I could see Matt and Kate, Matt and Joel, Matt and whoever, traveling a good bit more. And if that were the case, it's more common for me to travel. And I might be willing to say, oh, let me try this. Let's roll the dice, see where we end up. But when it comes to the precious vacation days we have right now, yeah, not willing to. 00:46:05 Speaker 2: Our typical advice, Matt, is to find the deal and And book something that is a great price to a destination you're interested in. And I think you can do just as well kind of going with that philosophy instead of saying, oh, I really want to go to this place. Let me hope a deal pops up or just book it even if it doesn't. Say, what are like the top 10, 15 places I want to go? If a deal pops up for any one of those places on travel dates that I can go, that's when I book. And that's just what's going to help reduce the cost, especially if you're traveling to in non-peak times, but I think this mystery vacation thing is probably too much for me. 00:46:44 Speaker 1: That's true. All right, we're pushing 50 minutes. Should we do AI or pump that to next week? What do you think? Let's punt. 00:46:49 Speaker 2: Let's punt. Really quick, though, there was an article about the eSIM for travel and how these, since we're talking about travel, how these services have just become so popular. Oh, yeah. And a lot of the major cell phone companies are finding that their revenue is going down because that was one of their big ways to make money was by charging you roaming, right? 00:47:10 Speaker 1: You remember the term? 00:47:10 Speaker 2: We don't use the term roaming much anymore, but some people still pay it, right? If they're with one of the major cell phone providers and they're traveling somewhere and they're using their phone abroad. And there become just a slew of ways to tackle this problem and to save big money when you travel and be able to use your cell phone and data at the same time. 00:47:27 Speaker 1: Google Fi. Yeah. 00:47:28 Speaker 2: Was the first company that did a great job at making it pretty seamless to travel abroad. And it's pretty dang inexpensive to get a Google Fi plan and to have extreme international access. US Mobile has, I would say, a superior offering as well. And then there are the eSIM companies like AeroLo, which has just taken off. Everybody's using AeroLo because it's so easy and it's so cheap to get what you need. 00:47:54 Speaker 1: It's so easy. A week abroad. Dude, it's so stinking easy to switch on the eSIM. Like just, I just think about the days of having to get an actual card, pop it in there and doing like the ability, like you can have on your phone right now, multiple SIMs set up with different networks. If you're just like some, some kind of like high powered broker or something like that, and you always need to have coverage and you happen to always be traveling in the backwoods of Alabama or something like that. And there's, oh, that's where I lose my Verizon, and that's when I need to hop over to U.S. Mobile, which is, when it comes to U.S. Mobile, wait, what are the terms? It's Dark Star, it doesn't matter. It's like Warp Speed. Warp, Dark Star, yeah, yeah. But gosh, man, the ease in which you can switch from one card to the next is incredible. And AeroLo specifically is fantastic for folks traveling abroad. To be able to get cards not only for all of Europe, but even specific countries and get even more of a deal depending on where it is you're going to travel. It's pretty unmatched. 100%. 100%. All right, pal. That's going to do it for this episode. For this episode. Indeed. But not forever. We're not signing off forever. Just for this episode. Yeah. That'll be it. Folks, head over to HowToMoney.com. Check us out there. Head over to the HowToMoneyPod channel at YouTube.com. 00:49:16 Speaker 2: We look particularly handsome today, so you definitely want to check this one out. 00:49:19 Speaker 1: Me? We do, both of us. Oh, we, we. No, you look nice. You look nice. What's that hat you got on? I actually got this. Is that your Billy hat? When I was in Hawaii. No, this is a Hawaiian owl, I guess. It's got the Hawaiian word for owl on it. So, yeah, it's one of my favorite hats. And it's always fun. to have an article of clothing from a destination. And I don't like the, I don't like the t-shirts that have like the destination written on it. That says it on there. Yeah. But I like this kitschy owl hat. That's because you're not a middle school girl, Joel. That's why you don't like it to say like Myrtle Beach or whatever. You don't know that. Don't speak for me. I thought it was the Billy Strings hat because I feel like anytime you have something that's very colorful and or has an animal on it and or is a little trippy. That is true. I think of Billy Strings. That is true. 00:50:10 Speaker 2: Which, by the way, his new album dropped today. Everybody go listen to it after you listen to this. Oh, did it really drop today? 00:50:15 Speaker 1: Yeah. So much for the pies. I didn't even know that. Another winner. All right. Let's get out of here, buddy. Until next time. Best friends out. Best friends out.