Speaker 1: Welcome to How to Money. I'm Joel, and today I'm
Speaker 1: asking the question can love survive a budget? With Doug
Speaker 1: and Heather Bonaparte. So figuring out your money is tough
Speaker 1: enough if you're flying solo. Doing it with your partner
Speaker 1: ramps up the difficulty level because you're throwing in varied
Speaker 1: money history, habits, and goals into the equation. It can
Speaker 1: create a lot of friction. So my guests today they
Speaker 1: have a lot of great advice for couples looking to
Speaker 1: do better with their finances and to create a team
Speaker 1: vibe with their partner. So if you looked up the
Speaker 1: definition I think of power couple in the dictionary, you
Speaker 1: might just see a picture of Doug and Heather Bonaparth
Speaker 1: next to it. Doug has built his own successful financial
Speaker 1: advisor firm while simultaneously tweeting hilarious memes. And Heather is
Speaker 1: a former corporate attorney. She's the director of business affairs
Speaker 1: for that firm, bona Fide Wealth, and they've written a
Speaker 1: fabulous new book called Money Together. Doug and Heather, thank
Speaker 1: you so much for joining me today on the podcast.
Speaker 2: Well, thanks for having us.
Speaker 3: We're so excited to be here.
Speaker 1: It's going to be a lovely conversation. The first question
Speaker 1: I have for anybody who comes on the show is
Speaker 1: what do you like to splurge on? What's your craft
Speaker 1: beer equivalent. I know you guys are being smart, you're
Speaker 1: saving and investing for the future, but what are you
Speaker 1: blowing money on in the meantime.
Speaker 3: I like to splurge on, probably clothes and fashion. But
Speaker 3: then on the family front, we've really like our kids
Speaker 3: are now nine and six, and we've just aged into
Speaker 3: like our vacation era. Like, we really didn't want to
Speaker 3: spend a lot of money on vacations when the kids
Speaker 3: were younger, because they one, they have no idea what's
Speaker 3: going on. Two, it's a lot more work. It's more
Speaker 3: like like just you know, just doing the family stuff
Speaker 3: somewhere else. But now, like we all really enjoy it.
Speaker 3: So I would say vacations are even more important than
Speaker 3: probably anything else we're spending money on right now.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I'm aligned on the vacation side. This, This
Speaker 2: is really where I'd like to spend the most money
Speaker 2: creating those experiences. So good job there, I'm being aligned.
Speaker 2: He don't lie, No, No, I'm gonna get selfish with it.
Speaker 2: I'll go with my Look, I'm a collector, a habitual
Speaker 2: one at that. I'm that nineties kid that was collecting things,
Speaker 2: you know, throughout my entire life, and right now what
Speaker 2: I am collecting is tequila. Oh oh yeah, oh yeah?
Speaker 2: So that that truly would be your craft beer equivalent there, right,
Speaker 2: So tequila, I've been stuck in that space for at
Speaker 2: least two or three years now, and I do not
Speaker 2: see myself getting out of it. I am a little
Speaker 2: intimidated by how many bottles need to be consumed at
Speaker 2: this point to actually like get through it. So good,
Speaker 2: good job, Doug.
Speaker 1: So okay, so what attracts you to tequila?
Speaker 3: Are you?
Speaker 1: And are you like going for high end fancy labels
Speaker 1: and and are you I guess this is a question.
Speaker 1: Do you ever adulterate it and make a margarita with
Speaker 1: that tequila? Or is this no, this is like you
Speaker 1: sip it by itself?
Speaker 3: Now, now, Joel, are you sure we're going to get
Speaker 3: to talk about We'll get there? Look here today, because
Speaker 3: you just opened up a huge can of work.
Speaker 2: The next fifteen minutes is brought to you by a
Speaker 2: gove it. These are awesome questions. Yes, I will make
Speaker 2: a margarita, and you obviously will use you know, a
Speaker 2: certain type of tequila to do that. But the great
Speaker 2: part about tequila is you don't need to spend a
Speaker 2: whole ton of money to drink really good tequila. There
Speaker 2: are thirty forty fifty dollars bottles that you can buy.
Speaker 2: They're absolutely wonderful, but I am usually sipping it like
Speaker 2: my blancos, probably more than anything else. Although aged you know,
Speaker 2: Renisado's and the Niehos are wonderful too. We can talk
Speaker 2: about this for hours and hours, but yeah, look, there
Speaker 2: are some there are some bottles in there.
Speaker 3: What's the most important thing.
Speaker 2: The most important thing, guys, for anyone trying to drink
Speaker 2: tequila is that it is additive free, right, three ingredients. Right,
Speaker 2: It's water, yeast and cooked to god.
Speaker 1: That is it? Okay? What about what about mescal?
Speaker 2: I haven't gone down that road yet. Like I feel
Speaker 2: like the bourbon drinker is to rye, you know, and
Speaker 2: your Scotch drinkers go super pety like that is the
Speaker 2: tequila drinker trying to elevate, you know, their experience into mescal.
Speaker 2: I'm not a big smoky guy. Lots of appreciation for it.
Speaker 2: Great in a cocktail if you want that smoky you know,
Speaker 2: agave flavor, but not not what I'm sipping on. I'm
Speaker 2: usual to be looking for a high proof or a
Speaker 2: nice blanco.
Speaker 1: Okay, good news, good, it's good to know. Yeah, let's
Speaker 1: let's talk about couples of money, because I could ask
Speaker 1: you more questions about tequila, but we'll stop here. Tell me.
Speaker 1: Tell me a little bit about your own relationship to money,
Speaker 1: maybe individually, and then what it was like to bring
Speaker 1: that history together when you got married. I think that's
Speaker 1: often one of those things where you talk about a
Speaker 1: lot of things as a couple pre marriage, and money
Speaker 1: might be one of those things that doesn't get talked
Speaker 1: about as much as it should.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I admittedly had a very unhealthy relationship with
Speaker 3: money growing up. I'm an only child and grandchild on
Speaker 3: both sides of my family. My parents divorced right as
Speaker 3: I entered my teenage years, and it really impacted just
Speaker 3: my perception of not only wealth, but just of money
Speaker 3: in general. A real picture of scarcity was painted for
Speaker 3: me for a while there in those teenage years, and
Speaker 3: also from my father's side of the family, who came
Speaker 3: from wealth, and money was kind of viewed as a tool.
Speaker 3: Money was used to buy loyalty, and to give money
Speaker 3: was to show love, and to withhold money was to
Speaker 3: withhold love. And those are some those are some deep
Speaker 3: messages to carry into adulthood. You know. Pair that with
Speaker 3: graduating law school in the midst of the Great Recession.
Speaker 3: You know, I had chosen, you know, to go to
Speaker 3: law school because it felt like a responsible thing to do.
Speaker 3: It felt like my path to financial independence was to
Speaker 3: earn as much money as I can in a high
Speaker 3: paying career and kind of like search for that search
Speaker 3: for that exit from those family structures, at least emotionally, right,
Speaker 3: But that's not what happened. The decision kind of flew
Speaker 3: back in my face, and I graduated in law school
Speaker 3: with six figures of student loan debt and a ton
Speaker 3: ton of shame, and so carrying all of those feelings
Speaker 3: and money scripts and emotions and yeah, shame into our
Speaker 3: adult relationship. You know, when I say adult relationship, I
Speaker 3: talk about the time that Doug and I really began
Speaker 3: to discuss marriage and settling down and having kids and
Speaker 3: starting our adult lives together. I mean, we knew each
Speaker 3: other long before that. But when you really start to
Speaker 3: talk about coming together, merging your lives together, talking about
Speaker 3: joint and shared goals, like you really have to start
Speaker 3: to do the work to unpack some of this stuff.
Speaker 1: Right, And when shame is there, it can be so difficult,
Speaker 1: it can it can be an inhibitor to those conversations.
Speaker 1: So I'm curious where that shame come from and maybe
Speaker 1: came from, and then how that impacted your ability to
Speaker 1: kind of merge finances and come up with a cohesive
Speaker 1: strategy together.
Speaker 3: Sure, you know, the shame came from feeling like choosing
Speaker 3: an expensive law school. It was a huge mistake. It
Speaker 3: was a huge financial regret for me, and I started
Speaker 3: to feel like not only was I not worthy of success,
Speaker 3: but I wasn't worthy of happiness, and that I was
Speaker 3: in fact worthless. And you know, those feelings were reinforced
Speaker 3: by the labor environment that I entered into. I spent
Speaker 3: some time in private practice at a law firm. You know,
Speaker 3: being a young woman in corporate law is difficult enough
Speaker 3: as it is now. Tried doing it, you know, following
Speaker 3: in the years of the Great Recession and being underpaid, overworked,
Speaker 3: you know, all these messages together kind of sets you
Speaker 3: up to not really being the most empowered around the
Speaker 3: financial decisions that you've made. And I think that that's
Speaker 3: one of the toughest things is looking back at that
Speaker 3: time and being like, wow, I truly felt so stuck.
Speaker 3: Had I really did not believe one, I didn't have
Speaker 3: any control, any financial control at that time, like staring
Speaker 3: at that giant student loan balance. But I also didn't
Speaker 3: think I was worthy of making financial decisions. I really didn't.
Speaker 3: I was like, well, you messed up. This is the
Speaker 3: lot you made for yourself and you're going to pay
Speaker 3: for it for the rest of your life. And that
Speaker 3: sounds really heavy, but it really felt that heavy at
Speaker 3: the time.
Speaker 1: Doug, where were you coming from? And what's it like
Speaker 1: to enter into a relationship with someone who's kind of
Speaker 1: feeling all those things?
Speaker 2: Yeah, Heather pointed out, we've been together for a very
Speaker 2: long time. I mean, I'm here for everything. She said.
Speaker 2: We met as freshmen in college when we were were
Speaker 2: eighteen and nineteen, so I was along for the ride here.
Speaker 2: And just give you a little bit of background as
Speaker 2: far as where I was coming from. I was the
Speaker 2: son and grandson of serial entrepreneurs. You know, there was
Speaker 2: this lesson of always investing in yourself and you could
Speaker 2: go out there and build something. I watched my dad
Speaker 2: do it, I saw my grandfather do it, and that
Speaker 2: was a really awesome thing to experience. My brother and
Speaker 2: I started businesses of you know, fixing computers, you know,
Speaker 2: selling things on eBay when it came around. We were
Speaker 2: kind of born with the hustle and taught that that's
Speaker 2: a good thing. And as much as there was a
Speaker 2: lot of good parts of that, there was also some
Speaker 2: bad parts. We learned valuable lessons, you know through you know,
Speaker 2: what's like to overextend yourself, what happens when there's too
Speaker 2: much risk on the table. Particularly through that, you know,
Speaker 2: two thousand and eight, two thousand and nine period, as
Speaker 2: I was working with my father, and I think a
Speaker 2: lot of it also backfired on me and that, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, you're going to just work in family business.
Speaker 2: My father worked with his father, and therefore it was
Speaker 2: kind of assumed I would work with my father, and
Speaker 2: you know that that blinded a person from well what
Speaker 2: do I really want? You know, all paths led me
Speaker 2: to leave my family business and go to New York City,
Speaker 2: to be with Heather and have us kind of figure
Speaker 2: it out. And here we are in two thousand and
Speaker 2: eight and nine, you know, her with multiple six figures
Speaker 2: in student loan debt, me coming up to New York
Speaker 2: figuring like, hey, well we'll figure out how to make
Speaker 2: our lives work together. I go to business school and
Speaker 2: take on another six figures in student loan debt because
Speaker 2: at this point, like why not, you know, I was
Speaker 2: very much committed to us, you know, taking these next
Speaker 2: steps in our lives.
Speaker 1: What's another one hundred k?
Speaker 2: What's another one hundred k when she's got three hundred thousand?
Speaker 3: You know? It's also a problem solver. I think that's
Speaker 3: that's what he really gets at here, is that Doug
Speaker 3: was someone who viewed problems as challenges to overcome, and
Speaker 3: I viewed it as like crippling. I didn't know how
Speaker 3: to be nimble, but the background that he came from,
Speaker 3: he only knew how to be nimble.
Speaker 1: Right, So was that what was that like then? Was
Speaker 1: that like a breath of fresh air for you, Heather?
Speaker 1: Or was that like more debility?
Speaker 3: It was difficult. Honestly, it was difficult because I felt like,
Speaker 3: on one hand, he couldn't possibly understand. He also never
Speaker 3: really worked in a corporate setting before, so this was
Speaker 3: something that that was a point of friction for us
Speaker 3: for many years. You know, when when he's never had
Speaker 3: that experience, it's like, sure, you can approach you know,
Speaker 3: you can approach my my situation with with a bit
Speaker 3: of naivete about like, oh, just go in and tell
Speaker 3: the partner that you know, he's a jerk.
Speaker 2: And that I think was less of think less of that,
Speaker 2: and more back to the like I knew Heather had
Speaker 2: done well in law school and had equipped herself with
Speaker 2: a you know, vast amount of knowledge that would serve
Speaker 2: her well. And I think it's you know, short term
Speaker 2: thinking versus long term thinking. That's not you know, the
Speaker 2: entrepreneur thinks, you know, it plays long games, right, Everything
Speaker 2: I was doing was going to be a slow and
Speaker 2: long grind to get there. And that's not to say
Speaker 2: Heather lacks, you know, the ability to think that way.
Speaker 2: Is that when you're thrusted into the environment in which
Speaker 2: she did, and you're standing down, staring down the barrel
Speaker 2: of student loan debt of that size, it is extremely
Speaker 2: difficult for me to say, hey, you've made a great
Speaker 2: investment in yourself. It's going to take time to pan
Speaker 2: to pay off when you're carrying that shame and you're
Speaker 2: carrying the regret of the decisions you made in that
Speaker 2: three year period of time of going to law school
Speaker 2: and graduating in the recession.
Speaker 3: Well, a very a very intelligen CFP we interviewed for
Speaker 3: the book had said that shame is not a funk.
Speaker 3: Shame is a fog. It's fear, obligation, and guilt, and
Speaker 3: it's so sometimes blinding that you just cannot see more
Speaker 3: than a foot in front of your face. And that
Speaker 3: truly was me, And that was the difference between Doug
Speaker 3: and I during that time. Yeah, sure he had that
Speaker 3: long term thinking, but I was My judgment was so
Speaker 3: clouded by the fog of the shame that I was
Speaker 3: in that there was just no way for me to
Speaker 3: see passed it for a while, but we did.
Speaker 1: Yeah, tell me if I'm wrong. My guess is that
Speaker 1: sometimes sometimes, maybe Heather, it was hard to even put
Speaker 1: your finger on the fact that you were feeling shame
Speaker 1: like it was guiding a lot of your decision making
Speaker 1: processes and was guiding some of those relational dynamics but
Speaker 1: you're like, I can't. I can't call it shame. I
Speaker 1: don't realize that's what it is. And I think that's
Speaker 1: the unobserved reality that's directing a lot of people's lives,
Speaker 1: especially how they handle money.
Speaker 3: I will tell you this, I had never used the
Speaker 3: word shame to describe my mid to late twenties until
Speaker 3: I started interviewing experts for this book. And when somebody
Speaker 3: said shame to me, I started I started to cry.
Speaker 1: Experts, Yeah, and she shines a spotlight on it, and
Speaker 1: you're like, that's what it was.
Speaker 3: I still say it, and I wrote it in the book.
Speaker 3: I said, when when they said this to me, the
Speaker 3: shame washed over my body again.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Doug, I'm curious. You are a financial planner. How
Speaker 1: much have you learned about the relational dynamics of money
Speaker 1: as you've worked with clients, Because a lot of people
Speaker 1: assume financial advisor. He's helped me pick the right funds
Speaker 1: to me in. But you're so much more of a
Speaker 1: coach in so many ways. What does that look like
Speaker 1: and what have you learned from that?
Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, it goes well beyond on just the investment piece, right,
Speaker 2: you have so many areas that we focus on, from
Speaker 2: cash management all the way through a state planning. But
Speaker 2: at the end of the day, as much as you're
Speaker 2: writing great financial plans and walking clients through it, you're
Speaker 2: trying to connect to them on a human level and
Speaker 2: figure out how you can help them make the best
Speaker 2: decisions for themselves as humanly possible one and I got
Speaker 2: to give credit to any couple that's coming to the
Speaker 2: table of a financial professional to engage in planning. A
Speaker 2: lot of the things we hope to accomplish in this
Speaker 2: book get carried out through meeting with your advisor regularly,
Speaker 2: putting down a plan, and implementing the recommendations that are
Speaker 2: designed to help them get to the goals that they have.
Speaker 2: But financial planning is not a cure all. When you
Speaker 2: have people coming in with a predisposition in their relationship
Speaker 2: or in more importantly, in themselves, they have yet to
Speaker 2: discover their own identity with money, so they're incapable of
Speaker 2: working together with their partner to play the team game.
Speaker 2: They haven't even done the individual rual sport yet. So
Speaker 2: I see that a lot in practice, and over twenty
Speaker 2: years I've seen it all right from couples who you
Speaker 2: know you have the silent partner at the table who
Speaker 2: says nothing is distracted. Maybe they're on their phone and
Speaker 2: just they're not participating, and you, as a professional, are
Speaker 2: really wondering why there's a lot of professionals who won't
Speaker 2: even touch that with a ten foot poll. As long
Speaker 2: as one person, as long as the decision maker is listening,
Speaker 2: they're going to continue, you know, going down that path,
Speaker 2: and that will backfire later on in the client relationship,
Speaker 2: and more importantly, it will not create a team that
Speaker 2: is required to get to the joint goals that hopefully
Speaker 2: people have together all the way over to the positive sides,
Speaker 2: where people are building up their ability to understand each
Speaker 2: other and sort out their pre existing feelings, therefore being
Speaker 2: able to talk about their joint goals and the things
Speaker 2: that they want for themselves and start playing the team
Speaker 2: game that will never end. That's the easy thing about
Speaker 2: money together. Pun intended is that you don't get to
Speaker 2: win the game. You just get to play different versions
Speaker 2: of the game, maybe a different level, and they don't
Speaker 2: stop from literally birth to death. So figuring out how
Speaker 2: to play it is going to be extremely important if
Speaker 2: you want happiness, if you want fulfillment if you want
Speaker 2: to feel like you have enough, which we definitely touch
Speaker 2: on in the book.
Speaker 3: Let me say this one thing. I think one of
Speaker 3: the most humbling experiences that actually led to our decision
Speaker 3: to write this book and to study this and to
Speaker 3: really spend the time we have on it was that
Speaker 3: when we overcame and I put that in quotes my
Speaker 3: student loan debt, right, we overcame a lot of my issues.
Speaker 3: We were able to do, like really jumpstart our adult
Speaker 3: lives and do the things we wanted to do, buy
Speaker 3: that house in the suburbs, have children, get married, all
Speaker 3: that stuff. For a minute there, we thought we had
Speaker 3: it all figured out. We thought we won that game,
Speaker 3: and we thought that we were set, you know, and
Speaker 3: then guess what happened. Life happened, and the next challenge came.
Speaker 1: Right, It's like what David Brooks calls the second mountain, Right,
Speaker 1: It's yeah, it's that next it's that next hill to climb.
Speaker 3: And I think that so many it's so easy to
Speaker 3: focus on, especially like in a world of like self optimization,
Speaker 3: and there's so many articles and books and experts that
Speaker 3: come out here and say these, you know, do this
Speaker 3: one thing and you've won do this one thing and
Speaker 3: I can guarantee you this.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's the survivorship bias type stuff we wanted.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we wanted to show you that life is so
Speaker 3: uncertain that we don't really know what's going to happen next.
Speaker 3: None of us do. We want to help you prepare
Speaker 3: for whatever happens next.
Speaker 1: I want to dig in on the individual thing that
Speaker 1: Doug was just hitting on. And actually, Heather, you said
Speaker 1: at one point, not in this conversation, but it's something
Speaker 1: you wrote. You said, too often financial advice treats couples
Speaker 1: as a unit, but you're still an individual. And Doug
Speaker 1: you just mentioned something really similar along those lines. And
Speaker 1: how both people bringing something the table matters and financial
Speaker 1: advisors who gloss over that and just deal with the
Speaker 1: decision maker. You're actually gonna it's a mistake. You're stepping
Speaker 1: on a rake. So why is that so important to
Speaker 1: remember when we're discussing financial advice for couples, Like the
Speaker 1: individual nature? Uh, two people coming together to you know,
Speaker 1: as a as a unit.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's why the cover the books of end diagram right,
Speaker 2: there are portions that are individually and you know, distinctly yours.
Speaker 2: And then there's the area in which you're sharing together.
Speaker 2: But let me drill down on that for just a
Speaker 2: moment here. Again, your ability to play a team game
Speaker 2: requires that you have perspective of your partner. It requires
Speaker 2: that you're able to understand how they think and feel
Speaker 2: about money, so that when you start to put your
Speaker 2: ideas and the way that you feel and think about
Speaker 2: money on the table, that you're just not, you know,
Speaker 2: smashing your head against the wall and you're not getting
Speaker 2: any progress here. It shapes the things you say, the
Speaker 2: way you do things when you have that perspective. So
Speaker 2: taking it a step back from there, you can't even
Speaker 2: get to that point, as I mentioned previously, without first
Speaker 2: understanding yourself and you know how you feel and think
Speaker 2: about money. So it's that two step process to get
Speaker 2: ultimately to a point where all right, we can share
Speaker 2: in ideas because we have perspective of one another and
Speaker 2: more importantly, an idea of where we come from.
Speaker 3: And also looking forward. I think this is incredibly important
Speaker 3: because one of the main goals of this book is
Speaker 3: to find greater fairness and equity in the household, because
Speaker 3: that's how we're going to find greater equity out in
Speaker 3: the world is particularly for women. I think it's really
Speaker 3: important to not be subsumed by your partner in your
Speaker 3: career and your life and your goals and your dreams,
Speaker 3: and so it is important to remind people that what
Speaker 3: you want matters. What you want as an individual matters too,
Speaker 3: and regardless of who is earning more income, right, that's
Speaker 3: an incredibly important concept. So it's just as important one, yeah,
Speaker 3: that we understand each other's past, but that we hold
Speaker 3: onto those pieces of our dreams for our future that
Speaker 3: truly matter to us. Because when we talk about not
Speaker 3: only building fair or sustainable relationships, we're also talking about
Speaker 3: holding onto those things that we each want. So, you know,
Speaker 3: one of the questions that we asked we asked all
Speaker 3: the couples that we interviewed for the book, was do
Speaker 3: you have enough? And we wanted them to answer individually,
Speaker 3: not together, and it was very interesting to hear those answers.
Speaker 1: I'm sure you did you have some like one person
Speaker 1: in the relationship say yes and the other ones like no,
Speaker 1: and so like they just they have no mind meld
Speaker 1: on that, okay.
Speaker 2: And I had differing answers when someone flipped it back
Speaker 2: around on us.
Speaker 3: And why that's so important is because it helps you
Speaker 3: then gain some insight into where your partner's at with
Speaker 3: something with with such an important concept as your own
Speaker 3: personal contentment with your lot in life. Like for Doug
Speaker 3: spent almost twenty years to reach this point in his
Speaker 3: career that he is so content with and proud of
Speaker 3: where he's at, And I spent the first ten years
Speaker 3: of my career kind of like just digging myself out
Speaker 3: of this hole of shame. I'm not there yet. This
Speaker 3: book and this project and this work is bringing me
Speaker 3: closer to my enough than I've ever have but us
Speaker 3: answering that question, and Doug knows how important this is
Speaker 3: to me, but only because we've had those conversations.
Speaker 2: Like I mentioned, perspective of your partner, me having that
Speaker 2: perspective of Heather shows me that while I may be
Speaker 2: content with what I have done in my career, and
Speaker 2: I know I'll continue to grow and I've done things
Speaker 2: that I've dreamt of doing, this is all great stuff?
Speaker 2: Is it really great? If she, my partner, is not
Speaker 2: getting close to feeling the same way I do? And
Speaker 2: that perspective right, and that understanding has reshaped how I
Speaker 2: view my business, how I view time outside of my business,
Speaker 2: as a father, as her partner. There is now a
Speaker 2: different picture than there was in the first seventeen years
Speaker 2: of doing this, and now we are together here envisioning
Speaker 2: something that brings us again together around a shared vision.
Speaker 2: Look how much individual play and identity got us to
Speaker 2: needed to be dealt with, uncovered, workshopped, thought out, therapy,
Speaker 2: you know, whether it's therapy or just conversations, whatever you
Speaker 2: need to do ultimately to get to a point where
Speaker 2: now we're playing a different team game. So we didn't
Speaker 2: you know, we thought we had to figure it out
Speaker 2: for a little while. Life happened, you know, man plans,
Speaker 2: God laughs, that's the expression. And here we are, you know,
Speaker 2: in that next phase. Sure it's in the form of
Speaker 2: maybe writing a book, but joining each other in business
Speaker 2: and thinking about you know, the vacations that we want
Speaker 2: to take our children on to celebrate the fruits of
Speaker 2: our labor, all of these things.
Speaker 1: Are there any introspective questions that you think individuals should
Speaker 1: be asking and that couples then should come back together
Speaker 1: and ask each other to kind of dig into some
Speaker 1: of these issues that maybe have been or remained unexplored.
Speaker 3: Well, yes, we do pose it's a ten questions at
Speaker 3: the end of each section of our book that will
Speaker 3: really and some of the questions again, like back to
Speaker 3: this idea, there as much self work as they are
Speaker 3: couple's work. And so we even suggest to readers of
Speaker 3: the book that it's really up to you whether you
Speaker 3: want to be answering these questions for yourself and then
Speaker 3: you bring them to your partner or whether you want
Speaker 3: to sit there oh Prah Winfrey style and interview one
Speaker 3: another and try and elicit those answers from one another.
Speaker 3: It really depends on personal preference. But yes, there's an
Speaker 3: endless number of questions because communication, above all else is
Speaker 3: what you really need to reach this higher understanding of
Speaker 3: one another.
Speaker 2: I think our goal is that as you read the book,
Speaker 2: you will find yourself in it. You will find yourself
Speaker 2: or you will find your partner, and you will be
Speaker 2: compelled to bring that sentence, that paragraph, that chapter, that
Speaker 2: section to another person and say this is me, this
Speaker 2: is you, and before you know it, you're automatically talking
Speaker 2: about that and then you'll probably read the question and say, hey,
Speaker 2: I asked for these based on the stories that we
Speaker 2: are at based on the conversations that we're elicited from
Speaker 2: a particular section, chapter, or sentence that you came across.
Speaker 2: And I think that's one of the most beautiful parts
Speaker 2: of this book is finding yourself and finding your partner
Speaker 2: in it, so you can have those conversations that you
Speaker 2: may be struggling to have or didn't know you even
Speaker 2: needed to have. They definitely need to take place in
Speaker 2: order for you to find that fairness that everyone deserves
Speaker 2: to have because it leads to happiness, and probably one
Speaker 2: of the number one things we should be looking for
Speaker 2: in our lives is to be happy.
Speaker 1: I love you said that, because I think ignorance can
Speaker 1: feel like bliss, but it's actually better and you will
Speaker 1: gain more happiness going through maybe some of these hurdles.
Speaker 1: I've got more questions I want to get to with you.
Speaker 1: I want to talk about conflicts, and I want to
Speaker 1: get to some practical questions too about how this actually
Speaker 1: plays out in reality, with like, Okay, how do you
Speaker 1: combine lives when one of the partners coming into the
Speaker 1: relationship with significant amounts of debt? So we'll talk about
Speaker 1: stuff like that. Right after this break, we're back still
Speaker 1: talking with Doug and Heather Bond depart. We're talking about
Speaker 1: love and budgeting and whether the two can co exist
Speaker 1: and really what it looks like to have a healthy
Speaker 1: relationship on the money front and how that involves so
Speaker 1: much more than just money. And Heather, we talked about
Speaker 1: your student loan debt. You share a personal student loan
Speaker 1: refinance story in the book, And I remember talking to
Speaker 1: a friend who said he had just gotten married and
Speaker 1: he was like, yeah, my wife's student loan debt. Like really,
Speaker 1: soon after they gotten married, she's got to pay off
Speaker 1: her student loan debt. And I was surprised by that,
Speaker 1: and I really realized every couple has their own relational dynamics.
Speaker 1: But when I got married, it was like, what's yours
Speaker 1: is mind, what's mine is yours debt and assets included.
Speaker 1: So do you think married folks should be combining assets
Speaker 1: and debts? Is that outdated? Look what's the approach?
Speaker 3: I think it's you know, I'm going to preface this
Speaker 3: by saying personal preference, because there's lots of reasons why
Speaker 3: people may choose to keep these things separate that include
Speaker 3: family dynamics, family wealth, Like, there can be a ton
Speaker 3: of reasons why it could be a second marriage. So
Speaker 3: I don't really believe in blanket in a blanket statements
Speaker 3: to say everyone should do this or ever one should
Speaker 3: do that for us. And I will also say I
Speaker 3: think it gets incredibly sticky to say your debt versus
Speaker 3: my debt. Right to your point, when you choose to
Speaker 3: combine your life together, how are you practically how is
Speaker 3: that practically going to work? Right? Let's say I have
Speaker 3: a student loan repay, I have a student loan debt
Speaker 3: schedule where I'm paying thousands of dollars a month towards
Speaker 3: my student loan debt. How then are we going to
Speaker 3: figure out a way where my income also helps to
Speaker 3: support our family and our and our dreams and our
Speaker 3: hopes and our lifestyle. So like, I don't truly understand
Speaker 3: how that works long term, And don't even get me
Speaker 3: started about what happens when you add kids into the mix,
Speaker 3: like how are you going to continue to itemize? Like
Speaker 3: are you going to say.
Speaker 2: Two thirds of that of my child soccer practice? I'm
Speaker 2: going to be right right, So you.
Speaker 3: Know, I generally, if when you were first getting together,
Speaker 3: when you're first cohabitating, when you're first getting married, you
Speaker 3: feel like you're not ready to do it all at once. Okay,
Speaker 3: that's fine. But I do truly believe that somewhere, at
Speaker 3: some point, you are going to have to assume some
Speaker 3: responsibility for what your partner is responsible for when it
Speaker 3: comes to debt. I do believe that. I mean, look
Speaker 3: for us, maybe because of maybe because of the size
Speaker 3: of the debt, but I think also because of the
Speaker 3: shame that I was carrying with the debt. Doug knew.
Speaker 3: And when Doug made that gesture of saying, yeah, I
Speaker 3: will be the co signer of the refinancing of your
Speaker 3: student loan debt, it meant so much more than the
Speaker 3: logistics of who you know, it.
Speaker 2: Was of it right.
Speaker 3: It meant so much more than who's going to be
Speaker 3: paying for what. It meant I trust you, I believe
Speaker 3: in you. Your problems are my problems. And that was
Speaker 3: literally a bigger gesture. And I say this in the book.
Speaker 3: It was a It was a more sweeping, romantic gesture
Speaker 3: in our relationship than the way he proposed me. Truly,
Speaker 3: it was that of a deal.
Speaker 2: I believe it.
Speaker 1: It's it's like the love, the action of love, instead
Speaker 1: of just like the lips are right.
Speaker 2: Right, Everything about that's correct. I'm very matter of fact
Speaker 2: about this, right. I've for a number of times already
Speaker 2: talked about this being a team game, and I'll spare
Speaker 2: us the sports analogies and just talk about how you know,
Speaker 2: if you're looking for the most effective and efficient way
Speaker 2: to go about your financial life, you're going to want
Speaker 2: to play that team game. It's you know, it's a collection, right,
Speaker 2: It's the collective household unit here. Notwithstanding the things Heather
Speaker 2: said that may exist for very personal or particular reasons,
Speaker 2: but the mechanics of it, the practicality of it, you know,
Speaker 2: it's better to start sharing, whether it's setting up your
Speaker 2: joint accounts and getting into the actual mechanics of how
Speaker 2: you do this. I do believe, you know, having independence
Speaker 2: and autonomy is a part of that too. Still have
Speaker 2: an individual checking account, you know, your retirement accounts can't
Speaker 2: be jointly held, So there is individuality when it comes
Speaker 2: to managing your money, when it comes to your investments.
Speaker 2: But I'm a real stickler over this thing. You're married
Speaker 2: or you're a partnership, it's typically and should be for life.
Speaker 2: I'm not going to get you know, any particular religion
Speaker 2: involved in this. As much as I'm saying that is
Speaker 2: the commitment you're making to one another, and you're.
Speaker 3: That is the aspirational goal. I don't know anyone that
Speaker 3: goes into marriage hoping that or you know, just accepting
Speaker 3: that someday all and how will they end?
Speaker 2: I have a question, right, I have a question of well,
Speaker 2: what are you doing here if you're not willing to
Speaker 2: go down this road? And it doesn't mean, you know,
Speaker 2: from the day you get married or get engaged, you're
Speaker 2: all in start sharing, you know, right down the middle.
Speaker 2: It means you are going to go on that pathway
Speaker 2: and you are going to work your way to a
Speaker 2: shared financial household where hopefully you're capable of managing it
Speaker 2: as a team and not as two individuals who live
Speaker 2: in their own financial silos but happen to do stuff together.
Speaker 1: The ultimate reality of life, I think is trade offs. Right.
Speaker 1: Everyone can't get what they want all the time, and
Speaker 1: money is this finite resource. So there is there Like
Speaker 1: the best place we were talking earlier about people like
Speaker 1: how each couple needs to bring what they want individually
Speaker 1: into the relationship, but sacrifices need to be made to
Speaker 1: achieve mutual goals that you have together. So there's a conflict,
Speaker 1: there's a little bit of tension there in this is
Speaker 1: the goal I want to achieve, this is the goal
Speaker 1: you want to achieve. This is kind of what we
Speaker 1: want to do together. How do you? How does that like?
Speaker 1: What's the fallout from those conversations?
Speaker 3: I'll say my favorite line, but be first, I think
Speaker 3: it's really important to think about this. Often times, almost
Speaker 3: all the time, an investment in one thing is a
Speaker 3: sacrifice in another. And when we talk about goals, individual goals,
Speaker 3: in order for me to reach one of my individual goals,
Speaker 3: Doug may have to sacrifice something, even if that's something
Speaker 3: is just time.
Speaker 1: And that goes for non monetary goals too. Yeah. Right,
Speaker 1: so like trying to run a marathon and that is
Speaker 1: a pain in the butt for my whole family. So
Speaker 1: there's all there are all these things that go into
Speaker 1: this is my goal. Nobody else in my family really
Speaker 1: cares that much about it, but like they have to
Speaker 1: make sacrifices and then vice versa.
Speaker 3: That is a perfect example, right, It's they're not just
Speaker 3: career driven ambitions. Look look at if a partner says,
Speaker 3: after becoming a new parent, I would really like to
Speaker 3: downshift from the workforce for a little while, and I
Speaker 3: would like to spend more time at home with our kids.
Speaker 3: An investment in that time, on one hand, is a sacrifice,
Speaker 3: is a financial sacrifice on the other I think so
Speaker 3: it's really important to kind of see your lives as
Speaker 3: that fluid and that there will be a time for you,
Speaker 3: and there will be a time for me, and there
Speaker 3: will be a time for us all. And when it
Speaker 3: comes to kind of like knowing how you've struck the
Speaker 3: right balance. I mean, look, I negotiated for a living.
Speaker 3: I still do, but I used to, you know, find
Speaker 3: myself sitting at tables negotiating eight figure settlements and the
Speaker 3: best compromises leave everyone a little bit uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: That's just the truth the okay, talk about the power
Speaker 1: dynamics that enter into that though, because oftentimes the higher
Speaker 1: earning spouse feels like whether they say it or not,
Speaker 1: and it often feels like that to the lower earning spouse,
Speaker 1: to that person gets to call the shots or they
Speaker 1: are in some way the ultimate decider because they have
Speaker 1: more economic skin in the game. So what does that
Speaker 1: look like in practicality when one person feels like they
Speaker 1: holds more cards.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think you first need to recognize just how
Speaker 2: much that's actually conditioned behavior, whether that's through societal systems
Speaker 2: or the way that you were raised, generational differences. There
Speaker 2: are so many ways that you can contribute to your
Speaker 2: family that are far greater than who's making the paycheck
Speaker 2: and what those financial contributions are. And I'll say this
Speaker 2: till the cows come home. The person that is earning
Speaker 2: four or five, six times more or all the income.
Speaker 2: If someone's choosing to support the family outside of earning money,
Speaker 2: that person would likely be unable to do what they're
Speaker 2: doing without the contributions of that other person. So it's
Speaker 2: a very silly construct, right to really, you know, bite
Speaker 2: down hard on when you think about it in that way.
Speaker 2: And Heather, you know, one of the biggest parts of
Speaker 2: this book is how people contribute far greater than what
Speaker 2: they bring in. And I really want to give this
Speaker 2: space to Heather to talk more about just how important
Speaker 2: contribution is from a non monetary standpoint.
Speaker 3: To Joe's point, we found ourselves in that position. You know,
Speaker 3: I was at one point in time the breadwinner in
Speaker 3: our relationship, and I held down a corporate job and
Speaker 3: some pretty great benefits for a long time so that
Speaker 3: Doug could take risks in his career and try and
Speaker 3: build his firm and his and his business and and
Speaker 3: you know, build his thought leadership in the financial planning space.
Speaker 3: But at a certain point, like his career took off
Speaker 3: and suddenly he was making three times the amount of
Speaker 3: money as I was. And that happened to coincide with
Speaker 3: us having our children and COVID a pandemic, you know,
Speaker 3: and a pandemic started when our kids were eleven months
Speaker 3: and four years old.
Speaker 1: And that can change something as simple as like who's
Speaker 1: expected to put dinner on the table?
Speaker 3: That is right?
Speaker 2: Right, that is right.
Speaker 3: And it was very it felt at the time like
Speaker 3: it was very easy for us all to decide whose
Speaker 3: time mattered more. Yes, it was an extreme example because
Speaker 3: that was a quote unquote unprecedented time, like so many
Speaker 3: others that millennials have been through. But it was what
Speaker 3: we did. And as one of the experts said about
Speaker 3: me in the book, that I was complicit in my
Speaker 3: own oppression. But it's true. It was just as much
Speaker 3: me saying, well, you need more time to work than
Speaker 3: I do, even though I was still a corporate lawyer,
Speaker 3: even though I was still helping Doug out with the business,
Speaker 3: even though I was still doing ninety percent of of
Speaker 3: what the kids needed during that time. So, like, I
Speaker 3: don't want to paint such a simple picture that it's
Speaker 3: just so easy to undo these scripts because sometimes they
Speaker 3: just kind of happen to you and you know.
Speaker 2: You've been you're correct, But the conditioning happens over not
Speaker 2: just years, but often decades to where it's involuntary. That
Speaker 2: and of.
Speaker 3: Course we don't want to fail to state the obvious
Speaker 3: that it is important that the person that's bringing in
Speaker 3: income into the household has the time they need to
Speaker 3: do their job. Yes, that is.
Speaker 1: True, otherwise the whole house of cards collapses. Right the
Speaker 1: pay teke's got to keep.
Speaker 3: Coming, sure, but I think that it's just incredibly important
Speaker 3: to view time as a currency as well. And until
Speaker 3: you view it that way, and until that person, even
Speaker 3: if you are the breadwinner, you need to understand that
Speaker 3: that an investment meant in your time and ability to
Speaker 3: pursue your career to the best of your abilities likely
Speaker 3: involves and inherit sacrifice from your spouse and maybe from
Speaker 3: the rest of your family, and being mindful of that
Speaker 3: fact makes you show up more in the moments that
Speaker 3: you're not working and create that fairness and kind of
Speaker 3: maintain that sense of equity.
Speaker 2: And I think it's very important to point out that
Speaker 2: fairness does not mean equal right. This is a balance
Speaker 2: that two people will figure out how to strike in
Speaker 2: terms of what works for their lives and what makes
Speaker 2: both people say I can deal with this, we can
Speaker 2: play ball with this, because if you don't, the consequence
Speaker 2: is resentment. And there is no better way to erode
Speaker 2: a relationship, whether it's built on love or anything else
Speaker 2: than by resenting the other person in that relationship. So
Speaker 2: typically you know only a few things happen when you
Speaker 2: get to that breaking point. You either watch your relationship
Speaker 2: fall apart, and many do because they've completely and utterly
Speaker 2: failed to figure it out by communicating and figuring out
Speaker 2: what kind of balance needs to exist, or that is
Speaker 2: the call to action in which both people will come together,
Speaker 2: sit down and realize something has to give. And if
Speaker 2: you love each other and you care about each other,
Speaker 2: you're gonna work like hell to work it out and
Speaker 2: to make that happen. And Heather and I obviously love
Speaker 2: each other very much, and got to a point where
Speaker 2: she said, Doug, I'm starting to resent you know what's
Speaker 2: going on here, and we really need to think about
Speaker 2: how we fix this. And I heard her loud and clear,
Speaker 2: and we sat down.
Speaker 1: You have to speak up, right, You have to have
Speaker 1: the conversation makes me think of I was just to
Speaker 1: throw myself under the bus. I was waking up five
Speaker 1: minutes before the kids woke up, and I was coming
Speaker 1: upstairs and with my bathrobe, get in my coffee, and like,
Speaker 1: my wife is already making the lunches and preparing the breakfast,
Speaker 1: and I'm sitting there like the dude in the Big Lebowski,
Speaker 1: like an idiot, just groggy and yawning. And She's like,
Speaker 1: I think, like, I'm really starting to get upset that
Speaker 1: you're not like in the game in the morning, and
Speaker 1: so can you figure out a way to wake up
Speaker 1: earlier whatever you need to do to be in the
Speaker 1: game when the kids are up, And that I had
Speaker 1: listened to her, and I had to change my whole
Speaker 1: whole morning routine for that, and in the best way possible, right,
Speaker 1: I was happy to do it, but like she had
Speaker 1: to bring it up I probably should have realized before
Speaker 1: she had to bring it up. But it's one of
Speaker 1: those things where you can't just resent in the background.
Speaker 1: You have to have a conversation about it.
Speaker 3: Here's and here's an important point too. You might think
Speaker 3: that you're not communicating, but every you are communicating right.
Speaker 3: Your spouse may Yes, you should speak up and communicate
Speaker 3: in a constructive way right at a time and place
Speaker 3: that is like low right, that is conducive to having
Speaker 3: these conference stations. But an important point to note is
Speaker 3: that a lot of times, like we communicate in all
Speaker 3: sorts of ways, we communicate in passive, aggressive ways. You know,
Speaker 3: I thought that I wasn't saying anything about the way
Speaker 3: that I felt, But the truth was my action spoke loudly,
Speaker 3: I was snapping at everyone all the time. I was
Speaker 3: huffing and puffing around the house for like over a
Speaker 3: year during this whole time. And what I could have
Speaker 3: just said what I was feeling, which was, Hey, I'm drowning,
Speaker 3: this isn't working, and i feel like I'm not getting
Speaker 3: the time I need for myself in my career.
Speaker 1: And lots of times you think you are communicating it right,
Speaker 1: and you are in some ways, but the partner is
Speaker 1: like doesn't register with me, Like I just get that
Speaker 1: you're not in a good mood, but I don't really
Speaker 1: understand what's happening. And so you actually have to use
Speaker 1: You have to figure out and find the words to
Speaker 1: communicate what it is that you're feeling so that they
Speaker 1: can understand.
Speaker 3: And that's why time and place are so important. Like
Speaker 3: it's not the right time when you're reacting, when you're angry,
Speaker 3: that it's not the time to have that conversation. That's
Speaker 3: why like carving out the time, not just for money dates,
Speaker 3: which are you know, we're huge proponents of the money dates,
Speaker 3: but find a time that you're not reacting and you're
Speaker 3: not upset, to sit down and say, hey, I've been
Speaker 3: feeling this way a lot lately, and I really can
Speaker 3: we have a couple of minutes to talk about what
Speaker 3: we need to do here to make this better.
Speaker 1: So what are the best practices? Because you even in
Speaker 1: my intro I said something about the vibes, like you
Speaker 1: do want people to have good vibes with their money,
Speaker 1: and vibes is like such a hot word these days,
Speaker 1: but what does it look like to have good vibes?
Speaker 1: In your relationship when it comes to money and what
Speaker 1: sort of ingredients are necessary to get there?
Speaker 3: Oh well again, like we love that money date. We
Speaker 3: love the idea of setting a time and a place
Speaker 3: and an activity that you both enjoy and working the
Speaker 3: money conversation into that thing you both enjoy, because then
Speaker 3: you can also start by talking about the things that
Speaker 3: are positive in your lives. Like it's not just well
Speaker 3: we overspends. Let's scrutinize the budget and.
Speaker 2: See, don't start with the negative stuff.
Speaker 3: You want to start with the good stuff.
Speaker 2: Say like, what are your wins?
Speaker 3: What are your wins? What are our wins from the
Speaker 3: last quarter?
Speaker 2: Would you do great this week? I think there's a
Speaker 2: lot here and it's little tiny adjustments are turning things
Speaker 2: just you know, upside down on their head. Everyone wants
Speaker 2: to sit down and think about, Hey, where where's the
Speaker 2: room for improvement? Talk about what you did right? You know,
Speaker 2: that's a great way to get to the things you
Speaker 2: want to improve on. So things that will make you
Speaker 2: feel good upfront. Same when it comes to figuring out
Speaker 2: how to meet your partner where they're at and learning
Speaker 2: how they want to communicate and how they want to
Speaker 2: do that I can assure you. For most guys that
Speaker 2: want to get their wives involved, and what's in front
Speaker 2: of them is a budget or a cash flow statement
Speaker 2: or a net worth you know that is probably not
Speaker 2: going to work. And I'm speaking from experience.
Speaker 3: There might just not be the place to start. You
Speaker 3: want to meet people where they are the find the
Speaker 3: pathway to the interest that works for you. If you
Speaker 3: have a newsletter that you're really enjoying, if you'r's a
Speaker 3: podcast or a financial creator that you like to follow,
Speaker 3: like that is that is an on ramp to better conversations.
Speaker 3: It doesn't have to be zero to one hundred. And also,
Speaker 3: like I know Doug always, Doug always tells clients and
Speaker 3: couples like find a positive shared goal. You guys can
Speaker 3: st say hey, Like a great example would be, hey,
Speaker 3: do you want to maybe go on spring break with
Speaker 3: the kids next year? Yeah? I do? All right, Well,
Speaker 3: why don't we take a look at what we need
Speaker 3: to do every month between now and then to make
Speaker 3: that happen? And yeah, that might require changing some behavior.
Speaker 3: It's casting forward decisions that you can make instead of
Speaker 3: looking backward at what was wrong. We haven't been saving
Speaker 3: any money, so we're never going to get to go
Speaker 3: on vacation.
Speaker 1: You know, that stupid purchase you made last week.
Speaker 2: It really sets back think about what you need to
Speaker 2: get buy into the conversation. I know I tease Heather
Speaker 2: with let's do this family thing because we both know
Speaker 2: we like that. I'm going to get her to the
Speaker 2: table when I say, hey, can we look over some
Speaker 2: numbers here? Maybe that's the things she doesn't like to
Speaker 2: do as much. You'll say, yeah, let's figure this out. Look,
Speaker 2: there's a couple of nights we're going out with friends.
Speaker 2: We just saw them. We don't need to do this dinner. Hey,
Speaker 2: we were thinking about going to this concert, but if
Speaker 2: it meant no to that, so we could go to
Speaker 2: a great you know, all inclusive with the family, it
Speaker 2: becomes fairly effortless to start making those sacrifices or shifting
Speaker 2: those things around. Now you're playing a team game. Everyone's
Speaker 2: on the same page, everyone's going for the same goal.
Speaker 3: And to your point, the vibes are set. When you
Speaker 3: start to reap the benefits of that work, that would
Speaker 3: you start to feel, okay, we are so much more
Speaker 3: aligned on the things we want. Then you find yourself
Speaker 3: reacting less in the day to day to the little things,
Speaker 3: because you really are having the conversations about the bigger things.
Speaker 1: So the good vibes are like setting the tone, yea,
Speaker 1: and they're actually created a better environment to make good
Speaker 1: money decisions together.
Speaker 2: Here here's the biggest piece of it all. And I
Speaker 2: don't want anyone listening to you know, if you're pumped
Speaker 2: listeners like we're gonna go do that awesome, Yes, get
Speaker 2: going on that for sure, but I want you to
Speaker 2: remember that this requires consistency and discipline. You are likely,
Speaker 2: you are more than likely if you haven't been in
Speaker 2: the practice of this, going to have your first experience
Speaker 2: not meet the expectation you have in your head of
Speaker 2: like we're gonna have this awesome conversation. I'm gonna do
Speaker 2: it differently. And you know what you're like, all right,
Speaker 2: that that really didn't go you know according to the plan.
Speaker 2: That's because you did it one time, right, Nobody goes
Speaker 2: to the gym one time after not working out for
Speaker 2: six months or however long.
Speaker 1: And is actually I would, but then I don't be
Speaker 1: very sore, but you.
Speaker 2: Won't be in the best shape of your life. Just
Speaker 2: like anything that requires whether it be investing or anything
Speaker 2: really filed under self care health and otherwise. It requires consistency.
Speaker 2: So if you're doing this on a quarterly basis, give
Speaker 2: yourself some grace. That's four cracks in a year, right,
Speaker 2: that's only four two years is eight three twelve. We're
Speaker 2: discounting by force here. So until such time, it took us,
Speaker 2: you know, a lot of cracks at this to get
Speaker 2: into the rhythm and finding things at work for us.
Speaker 3: And we still have to do the work. We are
Speaker 3: Our finances are are a unique situation. We both work
Speaker 3: in the family business now right, It's it's not your
Speaker 3: typical setup. So we continue to work and I have
Speaker 3: even more questions now than I did at the start.
Speaker 3: But that's good. It's not bad. It's curiosity and a
Speaker 3: desire to keep keep my hands in it more and
Speaker 3: more every month.
Speaker 2: Right, go from macro to micro as you do this, right,
Speaker 2: the macro being, Hey, let's go over what a P
Speaker 2: and L is. Let's take a look at how the
Speaker 2: you know, the mechanics of a business work and relate
Speaker 2: to you know, our family expenses. And then question be like,
Speaker 2: all right, so now that we got this under our belt,
Speaker 2: why are we doing this, or how can we improve this?
Speaker 2: Or should we hire someone to do this? They become
Speaker 2: business decisions that dovetail into personal decisions. So yeah, you know,
Speaker 2: that's kind of the life of entrepreneurs and business builders.
Speaker 2: But you know, even if it's a little easier because
Speaker 2: you've got two W two employees or one W two employee,
Speaker 2: you still have to put in the reps to get to,
Speaker 2: you know, running a smooth operation around these money dates
Speaker 2: and conversations. And then you start to fill in between
Speaker 2: those money dates with actual better communication, better habits, and
Speaker 2: better behaviors that when you do get to you're meeting,
Speaker 2: things run more fluid, smoothly, and expectations are met more
Speaker 2: than they're not.
Speaker 1: I love it all right, I got a few more
Speaker 1: rapid question couples of money topics I want to hit
Speaker 1: up with you guys, so we'll keep talking about this
Speaker 1: in just second with Doug and Heather. Right after this.
Speaker 2: Are back still.
Speaker 1: Talking with Doug and Heather about love and budgeting. And
Speaker 1: I want to ask you guys real quick, A lot
Speaker 1: of folks are hunting on bigger decisions like marriage, having
Speaker 1: kids until they achieve more economic security.
Speaker 2: Is that a good or bad thing, what a great question?
Speaker 2: Like I can hear my grandfather in the back of
Speaker 2: my mind saying like love finds a way, Doug, you know.
Speaker 2: And also Grandpa didn't understand that love doesn't solve for
Speaker 2: you know, six figures and student loan debt. So I
Speaker 2: can really appreciate folks wanting to set up their lives.
Speaker 2: I know Heather and I spent a lot of time
Speaker 2: setting up our careers and lives before we decided to
Speaker 2: get married. So while I have an appreciation for that,
Speaker 2: I think striking a balance between you know, you can
Speaker 2: get caught in this trap of oh, we'll do it
Speaker 2: next year, We'll do it next year. Before you know it,
Speaker 2: you've waited too long.
Speaker 3: I'll never forget I had a friend who I used
Speaker 3: to work with a colleague who said that she wasn't
Speaker 3: going to get pregnant until she used up all of
Speaker 3: her star Ward points. I'll never forget that. But people
Speaker 3: come up with these things. It's too far, no, But
Speaker 3: people come up with these things, right like I'll do
Speaker 3: We'll do what they will do. And I think, like,
Speaker 3: on one hand, yes, right, like, I don't want to
Speaker 3: not acknowledge how incredibly difficult look, we're in like a
Speaker 3: childcare crisis in this country. I could go on all
Speaker 3: twenty minute ran about that. Yeah, but I think there
Speaker 3: is a piece of this, especially when we talk about
Speaker 3: having kids, that I don't know if you're ever really
Speaker 3: going to feel ready.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So I think that that is a that is a
Speaker 3: difficult like a slippery slope. When you're waiting for that
Speaker 3: permission to proceed in any really big thing in your life,
Speaker 3: you might be waiting too long.
Speaker 2: Right Like anyone who's quote unquote figured it out, whether
Speaker 2: it be in their marriage, their love life, or you know, companionship,
Speaker 2: whatever it may be, will tell you one of the
Speaker 2: best things that has happened to them financially has been
Speaker 2: getting married. We're starting a family. I remember a colleague,
Speaker 2: biggest motivator. Yeah, I remember a colleague of mine, you know,
Speaker 2: older gentleman, successful practice. Put his hand on my shoulders
Speaker 2: that congratulations, Doug. This will be the best thing that
Speaker 2: ever happened to your business is having a child, is
Speaker 2: having your first daughter. And again, and I will con
Speaker 2: firm that it was that motivator. It was something that
Speaker 2: just makes for.
Speaker 3: That is a that is a whole I think that
Speaker 3: there there's some, there's some gendered there's some uh without
Speaker 3: a gendered scripts in that. But again, like I said, Joel,
Speaker 3: you opened up work.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well this whole topic is a cannabis Yeah, which
Speaker 1: which is what makes it so fascinating? A couple of
Speaker 1: rapid fire questions? Who should pay on the first date?
Speaker 1: Is it the person who's got the higher paying job?
Speaker 2: I like to split on the first date? Make no split,
Speaker 2: no presumption here between today's world of split and being
Speaker 2: a gentleman and just offering it up. And you know,
Speaker 2: that's really kind of too completely.
Speaker 3: We eve been together too long to answer that question.
Speaker 2: The kids do.
Speaker 3: If it was me, I probably, yeah, I wouldn't mind
Speaker 3: a chivalrous, chivalrous man offering to pay for the first date.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what's more important the budget of the vibes. We
Speaker 1: talked about the vibes just a second ago, But is yeah,
Speaker 1: which one? Which one holds more weight?
Speaker 3: I think the vibes because when we talk talk about vibes,
Speaker 3: we're talking about mutual respect, we're talking about love. We're
Speaker 3: talking about feeling seen in each other's behaviors.
Speaker 2: And yeah, and number numbers don't have feelings. Vibes are
Speaker 2: all feelings, and the feelings really kind of dictate behaviors here,
Speaker 2: so we've got to get the emotional side down.
Speaker 1: That's the hard What's one word you would use to
Speaker 1: describe your money style as a couple.
Speaker 2: Fluid? Yeah, fluid. I like it. We're I think, pretty
Speaker 2: synced up and pretty much on the same page to
Speaker 2: the point where we can we can spend freely. We
Speaker 2: have our eye on the prize and what our big
Speaker 2: goals are. We know when to check in on a
Speaker 2: purchase and when not to. I think we just are
Speaker 2: able to navigate our financial lives with a lot of fluidness. Fluidit.
Speaker 1: Last question, last question. You've been successful in work, in marriage,
Speaker 1: you've got kids. What do you What do you tell
Speaker 1: people about how you've been able to make it work?
Speaker 3: I tell everyone that it's about making room for one another,
Speaker 3: making room for everything, making not just not just our
Speaker 3: ambitions and our careers, making room for each other's personalities
Speaker 3: and not trying to dim the light of the other
Speaker 3: person or of our kids.
Speaker 1: Dang, that's a good way to end. This has been
Speaker 1: such a lovely conversation. Thank you so much for joining me.
Speaker 1: Where can my audience, where can have money listeners find
Speaker 1: out more about your awesome new book.
Speaker 3: Well, you can visit our book website, which is Do
Speaker 3: Moneytogether dot com. We also write a weekly couples and
Speaker 3: money newsletter called The Joint Account, which you can find
Speaker 3: by googling the Joint Account or just looking up Joint
Speaker 3: Account dot com.
Speaker 2: I wonder interested in the firm. It's bonafide wealth dot com.
Speaker 2: But google social media it will take you to all
Speaker 2: of these places and more.
Speaker 1: And so all the show notes up on the website
Speaker 1: at how to money dot com. Which so thank you
Speaker 1: guys for joining me. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 3: Thanks so much, Jill, thanks Jaul.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well, that was a really fun conversation and it
Speaker 1: took some unexpected turns and I didn't realize that at
Speaker 1: the end of it. I might also agree that vibes
Speaker 1: are more important than a budget, but my goodness, Heather
Speaker 1: and Doug make a compelling case for that, and I
Speaker 1: think I'm sold. Like, I think it's true that the
Speaker 1: money part is really important, but if you working on
Speaker 1: the relational aspect and creating good vibes even around those
Speaker 1: money discussions is going to be crucial to be able
Speaker 1: to making the progress that you want to see in
Speaker 1: your family's money life. And man, so many big takeaways
Speaker 1: I think I could go with after this conversation. I
Speaker 1: loved what Heather said there towards the end, an investment
Speaker 1: in one thing is a sacrifice in another. So the
Speaker 1: trade offs thing is real. It is the ultimate reality
Speaker 1: in life. And you as a couple, there are some seasons.
Speaker 1: I remember talking to someone else about couples of money
Speaker 1: not too long ago, and he talked about seasonality, how
Speaker 1: maybe this five years is the season to pour into
Speaker 1: my career, and then five years down the road, the
Speaker 1: tables are going to be turned, and maybe we moved
Speaker 1: to another city from my job the thing that I
Speaker 1: want to accomplish and you've got to figure out what
Speaker 1: that looks like specifically in your own life and in
Speaker 1: your own relationship. But I think that's going to be
Speaker 1: true on a money and on a non money aspect
Speaker 1: when it comes to relational stuff that sometimes, like when
Speaker 1: my wife was in grad school and starting her budding career,
Speaker 1: I am more than willing to take a step back
Speaker 1: to help her flourish because man, for so many years
Speaker 1: the opposite was true, and she really took it on
Speaker 1: the chin to make sure that I could launch this
Speaker 1: podcast with Matt and that we had a really good
Speaker 1: chance to succeed and to build this thing. And so
Speaker 1: now I have a little more freedom and flexibility, and
Speaker 1: so I can do the same for her and be
Speaker 1: there for her so that she can really has a
Speaker 1: chance to succeed in this career that she's starting out on.
Speaker 1: So what is that going to look like for you,
Speaker 1: for your spouse or your partner. Those are really important
Speaker 1: discussions to have. I think it's also important, like right
Speaker 1: at the end, another thing the Heather was saying that
Speaker 1: making room for one another such an important part of
Speaker 1: a successful partnership and for your personality, for your different
Speaker 1: goals and dreams. I think sometimes it's really easy to
Speaker 1: shoot down. Well, Okay, I get that's your goal, not mine,
Speaker 1: so I'm not really interested. But the dreams that your
Speaker 1: partner has matter too, And actually it can be so
Speaker 1: satisfying and fulfilling to play a part in helping them
Speaker 1: achieve those bigger goals, those things they really want to
Speaker 1: accomplish too, even if it's not initially the thing that
Speaker 1: you're jazzed about or wanting to work towards. Together each
Speaker 1: of you is going to have individual and separate goals too,
Speaker 1: so not all of those goals need to or will
Speaker 1: overlap or be goals that each one of you holds.
Speaker 1: So good luck in having those conversations, and my goodness,
Speaker 1: this book from Dug and Heather Money Together, will I
Speaker 1: think be a big help in ushering in some of
Speaker 1: those conversations, prodding you to think a little bit differently
Speaker 1: about how you handle money as a couple, and so
Speaker 1: if you're looking for a place to start, and some
Speaker 1: non dogmatic advice that gets the ball rolling and does
Speaker 1: give you some thoughts about kind of specific ways to
Speaker 1: come together as a couple and handle money, but also
Speaker 1: just some relational prompts to do some of the work.
Speaker 1: I think this is a great book to start. I
Speaker 1: was pleasantly surprise I was reading this book about how
Speaker 1: much how helpful it was given maybe some of the
Speaker 1: content that is out there, and we talked about this
Speaker 1: before we started recording, how some of the couples in
Speaker 1: Money content can be a little crusty, a little old.
Speaker 1: This one feels like it's a book for the moment,
Speaker 1: So I hope you go out there and pick it up.
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoy it. You can find links to
Speaker 1: it up on the website at howtomoney dot com. Thank you,
Speaker 1: as always for listening. Hope to see you back here
Speaker 1: on Friday for a fresh Friday Flight episode. Until next time,
Speaker 1: best friend Out.