Speaker 1: Welcome to How the Money. I'm Joel and I am Matt,
Speaker 1: and today we're discussing unstable coins, ludicrous layoffs, and sweating
Speaker 1: to save. That's right, man, this is our Friday flight
Speaker 1: where every week we tackle some of the best headlines
Speaker 1: out there that have to do with your money. We're
Speaker 1: gonna talk about how these different stories are going to
Speaker 1: impact your personal finances. Real quick, Joel, have you been
Speaker 1: continuing Have you kept up the sell your Stuff challenge? Still?
Speaker 1: I'm still a little bit behind. I need to catch up.
Speaker 1: I've sold a couple of things recently, but I'm still
Speaker 1: I think I've sold maybe like eight things. I'm supposed
Speaker 1: to be at what at this point, like twenty right
Speaker 1: in the late teens. I've been keeping it up, but
Speaker 1: I have not updated my worksheets. But if you have
Speaker 1: kept up with your sell your Stuff challenge, we would
Speaker 1: love to hear from you. In particularly, I want to
Speaker 1: know the kinds of things folks are selling in the
Speaker 1: amounts as well. Because the reason I ask Joel, because
Speaker 1: we just I just listed a mid century bedroom set
Speaker 1: that we have had for a number of years now.
Speaker 1: We just paid a few hundred bucks for it back
Speaker 1: in the day. So you're asking top dollar, Well, I
Speaker 1: looked it up because it still has the name of
Speaker 1: the company on there, and so I just did a
Speaker 1: quick search and I saw that similar sets we're going
Speaker 1: for over two thousand dollars. It's it's amazing how some
Speaker 1: antique sets, things that are fifty sixty years old, they
Speaker 1: just hold their value because they've gone from the junk
Speaker 1: after being owned for fifteen or twenty years, and now
Speaker 1: it's chic again to own some of that stuff that's,
Speaker 1: you know, fifty sixty years old. And some of that
Speaker 1: stuff isn't getting any younger, that's right, Like they're not
Speaker 1: making anymore exactly, and some of the stuff is just
Speaker 1: made hearty, heartier than what's made today exactly. So I'm
Speaker 1: not asking over two thousand dollars for it, but I
Speaker 1: asked for close to that, and I'm just gonna knock
Speaker 1: downer us off it every single day until it sells.
Speaker 1: Let's see what you can get. I will let you know,
Speaker 1: I hope you do get top dollar, because yeah, some
Speaker 1: of those mid century sets in particular, I've just noticed
Speaker 1: how much more expensive some of that stuff has gotten.
Speaker 1: And one of my friends, Josh down in Florida. He
Speaker 1: he actually buys themselves mid century furniture. That's that's his job, right,
Speaker 1: is literally to rehab refinished some of these pieces and
Speaker 1: he marks them up and he sends them all over
Speaker 1: the country and so it's it's but it's cool. He's
Speaker 1: not just ripping people off the he also finding these
Speaker 1: pieces that are prized and treasure. I mean, if he
Speaker 1: lives in Florida, where there are more of them than
Speaker 1: pretty much anywhere else, so he's got kind of access.
Speaker 1: He's at the he's at the source for that stuff.
Speaker 1: And so I asked him recently to help me find
Speaker 1: actually a mid century piano because they're really cool looking.
Speaker 1: They're really hard to find, and I've noticed real out
Speaker 1: of the ground and roll wide like mid century furniture
Speaker 1: is well kind of they've got those like the stick
Speaker 1: legs coming out the front there. It's it's really I'll
Speaker 1: have to post a picture of the one that I
Speaker 1: actually ended up purchasing with this help. Yeah, fancy, So
Speaker 1: you don't even want to know what he sells midcentery
Speaker 1: pianos for. When he gets one, they're they're definitely five
Speaker 1: figures um and yeah, and so he helped me find
Speaker 1: one actually locally that was a lot less than that. Um.
Speaker 1: But I just want to say, sometimes buying a piece
Speaker 1: that costs more money if it's an antique, or if
Speaker 1: it has just inherent value based on its age and
Speaker 1: the way it was made and the fact that they're
Speaker 1: not making more, sometimes it's more of a long term play.
Speaker 1: Even even though it might cost you maybe more than
Speaker 1: a brand new piano one, it might last longer to
Speaker 1: it might have a higher resale value throughout the years.
Speaker 1: So those are the kind of things that are worth
Speaker 1: factoring in. I mean, like your bedroom set. I guarantee
Speaker 1: you you spent less on that bedroom set than what
Speaker 1: you're selling it for now. Yeah, what it's listened for.
Speaker 1: We'll see what you're hoping. Yeah, we'll see how it
Speaker 1: pans out. But with the most bedroom sets, that's not
Speaker 1: the case. If Walmart ikea target wherever you get your
Speaker 1: bedroom set, guarantee you it's words less tomorrow than it is. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, the day you buy, you are immediately losing money.
Speaker 1: Whereas this is something hopefully that not only will we
Speaker 1: be able to break even, but I think we yeah,
Speaker 1: we will be able to maybe double what we paid
Speaker 1: for it. At least. Just one more reason to buy
Speaker 1: vintage or used furniture as opposed to new furniture is
Speaker 1: the fact that it's worth different amounts of different people.
Speaker 1: So you might find a great vintage set of furniture
Speaker 1: for pennies on the dollar, whereas somebody like my friend,
Speaker 1: my friend Josh is charging top dollar right for the
Speaker 1: pieces he's selling. But there's this whole those rare pieces
Speaker 1: he does, he does, but he's also taking care of
Speaker 1: them and the and they're nice. But you can find
Speaker 1: I found some great pieces for that were really inexpensive
Speaker 1: throughout the years. I've held onto him for a lot
Speaker 1: of years now, and I guarantee you they're worth more
Speaker 1: now than when I bought them. Makes me think of
Speaker 1: a listener recently reached out to us on Instagram, and
Speaker 1: she was highlighting the fact that just how affordable it
Speaker 1: is to furnish your home by hitting up the yard sales.
Speaker 1: She she loves the thrill of the chase, the thrill
Speaker 1: of the hunt, but the ability to furnish her new
Speaker 1: place with virtually opinions on the dollar compared to what
Speaker 1: all that stuff would I think. I think yard sales
Speaker 1: are even better than Facebook Marketplace because you might have
Speaker 1: to pound the pavement a little bit more. But the
Speaker 1: prices you're gonna get or even lower because the amount
Speaker 1: of eyeballs is detracting are are usually fewer. Nobody wants
Speaker 1: to get out there on a night Saturday morning when
Speaker 1: the sun starts beating down on you. Everybody wants to
Speaker 1: sit there from the comfort of their home. But that's
Speaker 1: not how you find the deals. Yeah, so alright, alright,
Speaker 1: just enough furniture talking, let's move on to the Friday flight.
Speaker 1: Let's derailed its like, give you that sampling of stories
Speaker 1: we found interesting this week. Let's talk about energy costs first,
Speaker 1: Matt and and do what. We got a bunch of
Speaker 1: stories to get to today that are they're highly interesting,
Speaker 1: I think. But when it comes to energy costs, that's
Speaker 1: another we You know, we got new inflation numbers this week,
Speaker 1: but we're we're seeing higher energy prices alongside higher everything prices,
Speaker 1: it feels like, and so h yeah, prices are still
Speaker 1: inflated across the board. We're obviously paying more for what
Speaker 1: seems like everything. Gas prices are still through the roof.
Speaker 1: But but I'm talking about energy prices in terms of
Speaker 1: heating and cooling our homes, and electricity prices are actually
Speaker 1: up eleven percent year over year. That's thanks in large
Speaker 1: part to a rapid increase in the price of natural gas,
Speaker 1: which is the largest source of electricity generation in the country.
Speaker 1: In a councilor about of the our electricity prices is
Speaker 1: a lot. Yeah, and so the New York Times I
Speaker 1: actually interviewed a few different electricity grid experts. They stated
Speaker 1: that these price increases they're likely to continue for years
Speaker 1: to come, largely because of necessary costly upgrades to the grid.
Speaker 1: And so, yeah, these are gonna be taking place all
Speaker 1: across the country to make our grids safer and smarter.
Speaker 1: In addition to maybe the higher costs are gonna be
Speaker 1: paying for some of these natural resources. And so it
Speaker 1: sucks to know that it's going to cost more to
Speaker 1: heat and cool your home. But I mean, at least
Speaker 1: there are some actions that we can take to combat
Speaker 1: these price increases ourselves, right, Yeah, totally. We talked about
Speaker 1: installation a couple of weeks ago. That's always a good idea,
Speaker 1: but setting your temperature higher during this summer is a
Speaker 1: big help as well. And I feel like this is
Speaker 1: a good reminder to get out there in front of
Speaker 1: you before you start taking down the thermostat. Uh. This
Speaker 1: this might sound crazy, but the Department of Energy, they
Speaker 1: actually recommend setting your thermostat to seventy eight degrees when
Speaker 1: you're home during the day, eighty two degrees when you're sleeping,
Speaker 1: and then eighty five degrees when you're out of the house.
Speaker 1: I don't really care about I'm fine with two eighty
Speaker 1: two when you're sleeping. I think is pretty warm for
Speaker 1: for a lot of folks. And so if you actually
Speaker 1: do this, mad props to you. I hope your family
Speaker 1: still loves you after making the all summer, after you
Speaker 1: have gone through sweating in order to save We're actually
Speaker 1: kind of on board with this idea for us at night,
Speaker 1: it's okay for it to take up a little bit
Speaker 1: warmer you get to you let it give that point. No,
Speaker 1: we we need we got significantly higher than what we're
Speaker 1: willing to deal with during the day because during the day,
Speaker 1: I want the temperature to be cooler because we're moving around,
Speaker 1: the kids are moving und you're you're doing stuff, and
Speaker 1: it's easy for us to start feeling miserable. If if
Speaker 1: you start sweating and just trying to live your life.
Speaker 1: But at night you can just throw back the covers,
Speaker 1: turn that fan on. In particular, is how I think
Speaker 1: we're able to stay cool. Like fans make a big difference.
Speaker 1: And I will say, my my thermostat Matt vacillates somewhere
Speaker 1: between seventy six and eighty, depending on whether or home
Speaker 1: what I'm doing, But that's usually the range of its
Speaker 1: depending on how you feel. You go over there and
Speaker 1: tweak it. But no, you said, it doesn't go below that.
Speaker 1: It does not go into like seventy five, seventy four,
Speaker 1: seventy three territory. Not nice. Unless my mom comes over
Speaker 1: and then she touches it. She she cranks it down.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I'll crank it down in order to control humidity,
Speaker 1: because that's something that I feel like significantly impacts how
Speaker 1: it feels inside the house. If it's getting to just
Speaker 1: just wet too muggy, the i'l tn it down a
Speaker 1: little bit just to dry out the air. But fans,
Speaker 1: ceiling fans make a huge difference, like you said, and
Speaker 1: it can make it feel like ten degrees cooler in
Speaker 1: your house if you keep the fans on. So don't
Speaker 1: forget about those. But making these adjustments to your thermostatic,
Speaker 1: cranking that temperature up a little bit, even if you
Speaker 1: don't go with the Department of Energies recommendations, will be
Speaker 1: able to save you some tremendous amount of money. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's worth noting, especially as we get into these warmer
Speaker 1: summer months where those electricity bills they're about the start
Speaker 1: getting real, right, and if it there's nobody out there
Speaker 1: who does like to crank it up to eighty two,
Speaker 1: I would like to hear from you, And I mean literally,
Speaker 1: I I would like to know some of the steps
Speaker 1: that you take, Like literally, are you wearing nothing in
Speaker 1: your house and all the fans are on full blast?
Speaker 1: If so, and if that works for you, then more
Speaker 1: power to you. Yeah. Please, we you can write a
Speaker 1: blog post for how the Money dot com. We'd love
Speaker 1: to hear all about it. Well, Matt, that that just
Speaker 1: makes me think. I was actually emailing with a listener
Speaker 1: this week named Glenn and he he's actually written about
Speaker 1: putting solar on his house and we kind of went
Speaker 1: back and forth about that for for a minute. He
Speaker 1: wrote about it on his blog. I'll put a link
Speaker 1: in the show notes to that article. But you know,
Speaker 1: it's obviously it's not cheap to install solar, right that
Speaker 1: changing your thermostat and putting in some instulation, those are
Speaker 1: pretty cheap to two free moves that you can make
Speaker 1: in order to save a little bit of energy. Well,
Speaker 1: installing solar is like a bigger project that you're gonna
Speaker 1: have to take on that requires some more dollars. But
Speaker 1: I did want to mention it can still make sense
Speaker 1: if it's done properly and in the right location. And
Speaker 1: it's important to not forget that there's still a substantial
Speaker 1: federal subsidy for rooftop solar installs. You can say, if
Speaker 1: what this year, yeah, if in two, if you install
Speaker 1: solar next year, it's gonna be I think it's going
Speaker 1: down just a little bit. But that's pretty amazing, man,
Speaker 1: that that that the federal government is going to foot
Speaker 1: the bill for more than a quarter of your solar installation.
Speaker 1: And so they obviously missed out on a marketing opportunity
Speaker 1: three three, they didn't hire us. It could have been
Speaker 1: like the flannel push, so everybody would have remembered that's right, well,
Speaker 1: especially as solar the costs of solar installs have gone down,
Speaker 1: the cost of solar panels has gone down. Now is
Speaker 1: like kind of the sweet spot for installing solar if
Speaker 1: you're so inclined. And it's yeah, it is a big step.
Speaker 1: Not everyone's necessarily into, but it bears mentioning, and so yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it matters not only how much electricity you should
Speaker 1: you're gonna be able to replace, though, but also how
Speaker 1: your state or municipality treats the excess electricity that you generate.
Speaker 1: And in some states they pay pay you a or rate.
Speaker 1: Others don't. Others kind of say we'll pay you a
Speaker 1: pittance for the extra solar you generate that you don't use. Literally,
Speaker 1: like in Mississippi, it's a discounted rate, and so they
Speaker 1: pay you very little when you actually send electricity back
Speaker 1: to the grid. It's worth looking into before you opt
Speaker 1: to kind of go all in and drop fifteen or
Speaker 1: twenty grand on a solar install at your house. But again,
Speaker 1: with that federal tax credit, it could make sense for
Speaker 1: a decent chunk of folks, that's right. Yeah, So while
Speaker 1: we're talking about utilities, actually let's talk about a related subject,
Speaker 1: which is scammers who are out there and you might
Speaker 1: be wondering how that's related. Well, we've talked about this before,
Speaker 1: but a Detroit Free Press article brought utility scams back
Speaker 1: to the forefront of our minds. Crafty scam artists out
Speaker 1: there are using color I D to impersonate your utility
Speaker 1: company telling you to send the money immediately or they'll
Speaker 1: be forced to turn off the power to your house
Speaker 1: or to your business. And almost all of the folks
Speaker 1: who are scammed sent money via ZEL, which means that
Speaker 1: that is money that they likely won't be able to
Speaker 1: claw back after they've realized that they've been scammed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and ZEL is usually it's within your banking app right,
Speaker 1: whatever major bank you do business with. Sale has partnered
Speaker 1: with most of those big banks. It's it's kind of
Speaker 1: like a Venmo alternative. And so people are always trying
Speaker 1: to get you to pay money that way because you
Speaker 1: can't call it back, that's right, And so we want
Speaker 1: you to avoid becoming a victim of some of these scams.
Speaker 1: So a few tips. A utility company, Uh, they're going
Speaker 1: to reach out to you multiple times before threatening to
Speaker 1: cut your power or to shut off your water. And
Speaker 1: so if this is the first that you've heard of
Speaker 1: this reach out and contact your utility company directly yourself,
Speaker 1: like they're they're not going to just show up out
Speaker 1: of the blue demanding to be paid right away only
Speaker 1: via zell or Venmo. We want you to challenge whoever
Speaker 1: it is that's that's calling you or even showing up.
Speaker 1: There have been some instances of folks showing up, uh
Speaker 1: knocking on folks doors up there in Michigan. But we
Speaker 1: want you to ask for more information and if it
Speaker 1: seems fishy, then we would recommend for you to report
Speaker 1: it to the Better Business Bureau scam Tracker and we'll
Speaker 1: have a link to that up on our website. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that that is one of the worst scams because especially
Speaker 1: if you're a business and you've got customers coming in
Speaker 1: and out and someone calls you and they're like, we're
Speaker 1: going to turn your power off. Now, Yeah, that's a
Speaker 1: threat because you are gonna you're gonna lose business, customers
Speaker 1: are gonna walk out, and you have that that that
Speaker 1: response that's based on fear. That's right, that's what they're
Speaker 1: that's what they're praying exactly, and they want you to
Speaker 1: send the money immediately and then guess what you have
Speaker 1: been taking advantage of you can't get that money back.
Speaker 1: So it's definitely something to be on the lookout for.
Speaker 1: But Matt, we've got more stories to get to, including
Speaker 1: we're gonna talk about a company who just raised one
Speaker 1: of their fees by a big margin and it actually
Speaker 1: makes it more difficult to get your money back, and
Speaker 1: we'll talk about that and more right after this break.
Speaker 1: All right, we are back from the break, and before
Speaker 1: we get to the ludicrous layoffs storage, well, we've got
Speaker 1: the ludicrous headline of the week, which are we even
Speaker 1: allowed to attribute that description to other stories? I will
Speaker 1: check with our trademark lawyers, our copyright attorneys, and I'll
Speaker 1: get back to you. It goes against our how we
Speaker 1: do things concern on how the money. But this one
Speaker 1: comes from CNBC and the headline reads Terra stable coin,
Speaker 1: which is meant to be pegged to the dollar, plummets
Speaker 1: below thirty cents. And well, obviously a lot of folks
Speaker 1: have maybe realized this if you own any cryptocurrencies, but
Speaker 1: they have not had a great start to the year,
Speaker 1: similar to the stock market. But what happened in the
Speaker 1: stable coin worse uh this week points to an issue
Speaker 1: that we've had with some of the crypto offerings for
Speaker 1: a while. Stable coins are supposed to be no surprise
Speaker 1: here stable uh. They aren't supposed to fluctuate in value
Speaker 1: the way that many of the other coins do uh
Speaker 1: and without being the case, some folks out there have
Speaker 1: decided to stash their savings in stable coin accounts because
Speaker 1: they were paying really hefty rates of interest, like in
Speaker 1: the seven to eight percent range, which sounds pretty incredible
Speaker 1: until that promise ends, and disaster get did for many
Speaker 1: earlier this week, and so we would recommend for you
Speaker 1: to not put money that you need, you know, your
Speaker 1: savings in stable coin accounts. That money needs to be
Speaker 1: in an actual f d i C insured savings account
Speaker 1: with a real bank. So we share the story because
Speaker 1: we want you to know that volatility isn't limited to
Speaker 1: just individual coins like doage coin uh stable coins they
Speaker 1: pose real risks as well. We've shared how it is
Speaker 1: okay to put up the five percent of your overall
Speaker 1: portfolio within cryptocurrencies, but that five percent should include not
Speaker 1: only actual individual coins, but these stable coins as well.
Speaker 1: We want you to only gamble, only speculate with money
Speaker 1: that you can afford losing. That's right, man. A lot
Speaker 1: of these stable coin accounts, the way they're talked about,
Speaker 1: the way they're marketed is like it's not gambling. Is
Speaker 1: that it is like it is the same mus account,
Speaker 1: It is kind of a sure thing, but the reality
Speaker 1: is it's not and it's not ensured in the same way.
Speaker 1: It's not it's not the same thing as the same
Speaker 1: use account, no matter what the websites say or purport
Speaker 1: these accounts to be. And we found that out of
Speaker 1: people found it out the hard way this week. But
Speaker 1: while we're talking about crypto, it turns out that most
Speaker 1: folks who have invested in bitcoin, the most popular cryptocurrency,
Speaker 1: they have a stash that's actually worth less now than
Speaker 1: what they initially invested. And so I can confirm that myself.
Speaker 1: Same here, you and I We both have relatively small
Speaker 1: steaks in mostly bitcoin and ethereum. But yeah, both of
Speaker 1: us are what we initially put in. Well, our position
Speaker 1: is now worth less than the amount we bought in
Speaker 1: for and and and that is because we were, like
Speaker 1: a lot of the other folks who jumped on the
Speaker 1: bitcoin back bandwagon when it was close to all time
Speaker 1: highs late the average price of bitcoin, I believe last
Speaker 1: year was right in the forty seven dollar range. And
Speaker 1: that's when bitcoin was like water cooler talk, right, like
Speaker 1: you you hopped in your uber and that was kind
Speaker 1: of instead of the weather, people talked about bitcoin or
Speaker 1: your coworker, instead of talking about what they were up
Speaker 1: to this weekend, they talked about investing in crypto, and
Speaker 1: so everybody seemed to be getting in on the crypto craze. Well, well,
Speaker 1: now cryptos having its icorous moments, and folks who you
Speaker 1: know bought in last year are kind of kicking themselves
Speaker 1: because bitcoin, Matt, it felt in value in just the
Speaker 1: last week alone, and it's been cut more than in
Speaker 1: half from its all time highs. And so I know
Speaker 1: we say this regularly, and Matt, you just said it
Speaker 1: to but keep your crypto exposure in check. There are
Speaker 1: probably a lot of how to money listeners who would
Speaker 1: be best best served by having zero exposure to the
Speaker 1: crypto asset class. But but for folks who do want some,
Speaker 1: keep it small. And if the past year in general,
Speaker 1: in the past couple of weeks specifically haven't proven that
Speaker 1: out that, I don't know what will, but I think
Speaker 1: it's I think it's crucial that folks really trim and
Speaker 1: make sure that they're not overexposed. Uh, so they're not
Speaker 1: freaking out when weeks like this happened, because crypto is
Speaker 1: still volatile, as I'll get out. That's right. Yeah, let's
Speaker 1: talk about where most folks bought their bitcoin. Coin Base
Speaker 1: was a big one, robin Hood was another. In robin Hood,
Speaker 1: they actually just announced that they are increasing fees for
Speaker 1: taking money out of your account outbound transfers of your
Speaker 1: money from robin Hood to another broke, which will cost
Speaker 1: you one hundred dollars starting in July. That's a decent
Speaker 1: chunk of money. Of course, we hate fees, and so
Speaker 1: this is a pretty crappy move. It's not that robin
Speaker 1: hood doesn't have a pretty slick app. It's an incredible interface,
Speaker 1: and honestly, if and whenever they get some roth ira
Speaker 1: accounts or ira A options within their platform, we will
Speaker 1: probably be pretty excited about that. But the fact that
Speaker 1: they're trying to strong arm their customers by keep keeping
Speaker 1: them locked into their ecosystem, by penalizing them, uh to
Speaker 1: even think about transferring that money to to somebody like
Speaker 1: Fidelity or Vanguard, that is something that we don't like
Speaker 1: feel like it feels like coercion exactly. Yeah, yeah, they're
Speaker 1: they're they're forcing you to stay, whereas like Fidelity and Vanguard,
Speaker 1: they both charge you zero dollars for outbound transfers and
Speaker 1: that's probably because their customers they're not going anywhere. They're
Speaker 1: very happy with the offerings that Fidelity in Vanguard offer
Speaker 1: And honestly, we've talked about this before, but maybe it
Speaker 1: shouldn't be so easy for you to hop into an
Speaker 1: app and mess around with your retirement savings gown. And
Speaker 1: it's not like you and I are against great user interfaces,
Speaker 1: and we can readily admit the Robin Hood has the
Speaker 1: best user interface in the business. The love hate relationship. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's it's pretty cool. But the problem is what that
Speaker 1: what that incentivizes people to do. And a lot of
Speaker 1: people have realized over the last year or two, and
Speaker 1: especially in the last few months that maybe some of
Speaker 1: the trades they made because the user interface was so
Speaker 1: easy and it was so simple to toss some money
Speaker 1: in there start making some trades, that maybe they did
Speaker 1: some stuff that they wouldn't have in a more complex
Speaker 1: system in with let's say Vanguards, Uh, two thousand three
Speaker 1: sort of user interface where it's like old Internet and
Speaker 1: it's really hard to get things done. There is actually
Speaker 1: just a certain benefit to that, even though it looks
Speaker 1: clunky and ugly. At the very least, just delete the
Speaker 1: app from your phone. Right If you have a robin
Speaker 1: Hood account and you're kind of weighing whether or not
Speaker 1: you should you pay the hundred or pay the seventy
Speaker 1: five bucks now or risk paying the hundred dollars down
Speaker 1: the road to make that outbound transfer. At least, at
Speaker 1: the very least, just delete the app. That way, you
Speaker 1: are not tempted to make any day trades. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: we hope robin Hood reconsiders because that's just that's just
Speaker 1: too hefty of a penalty, and they're basically penalizing their
Speaker 1: own customers for wanting to transfer money out even partial transfers,
Speaker 1: which is which is not cool. Yeah, I'm pretty sure
Speaker 1: the average user, the average robin Hood user has two
Speaker 1: thousand dollars of US in their account. That's five of
Speaker 1: their Money's ridiculous, it's ridiculous, it's absurd, it's not Okay,
Speaker 1: all right, let let's keep talking Matt about companies behaving
Speaker 1: badly because there's one company that you and I have
Speaker 1: had mostly good things to say about that we have
Speaker 1: to throw onto the bus today that is Carbona and
Speaker 1: Carbona that's where I bought how that's where I sold
Speaker 1: my niece on Leaf which I was unnamed. So it
Speaker 1: was a decent experience selling my car there. You had
Speaker 1: a good experience buying with Carbona when they kind of
Speaker 1: kind of started a revolution in the way that people
Speaker 1: buy and sell used cars, which is cool. We've always
Speaker 1: thought that that kind of the way they may buying
Speaker 1: cars on the internet used cars on the internet just
Speaker 1: easy and providing that seven day no worries or turn policy,
Speaker 1: I've I've thought that was great. But what's not cool
Speaker 1: is the way that they treat their employees. Apparently it
Speaker 1: turns out they fired folks via a prerecorded zoom message
Speaker 1: this week, and and Matt, this is eerily similar to
Speaker 1: the way Mortgage Refinance Company Better handled layoffs a few
Speaker 1: months back. The CEO kind of took some time off
Speaker 1: after that because yeah, he kind of got uh put
Speaker 1: through the wringer in the headlines after the way he handled, yeah,
Speaker 1: laying some folks off, and so so honestly, here's my take.
Speaker 1: If if you don't have the decency to treat your
Speaker 1: employees with respect, then the likelihood that you're gonna treat
Speaker 1: your customers, well, well, it's not that great either. I
Speaker 1: am of the firm belief that happy employees equal happy customers,
Speaker 1: and so I would say, think twice before buying a
Speaker 1: car from Carbonna, until they write the ship here, until
Speaker 1: they apologize, until they figure things out, because yeah, if
Speaker 1: you're just gonna like willy nilly file hired you know,
Speaker 1: ten percent of your workforce through some sort of prerecorded
Speaker 1: message showing them little to no respect, I feel like, well,
Speaker 1: are they actually going to show their customers respect? Are
Speaker 1: they actually gonna uphold their end of the bargain with
Speaker 1: you buying something as big as big of a purchase
Speaker 1: as as a car. That's true, I think it would
Speaker 1: be a stretch to think that they would treat customers
Speaker 1: any differently. On that note, we're actually seeing more signs
Speaker 1: of a changing labor market. It's not just Carbonna who's
Speaker 1: laying folks off Peloton, Netflix, Wells, Fargo, UM and the
Speaker 1: aforementioned Rebbin and they're they're also laying off a lot
Speaker 1: of their staff the labor market. It remains hot. Overall,
Speaker 1: there's still an average of two jobs for every individual
Speaker 1: who is out there looking for a job, and so
Speaker 1: this does continue to bode well for you if you're
Speaker 1: looking for a job. But we also don't expect these
Speaker 1: conditions to endure forever. So what we're saying is, if
Speaker 1: you're planning an exit, it's even more important to make
Speaker 1: sure that you have a solid place to land. I
Speaker 1: also see this as a warning that the grass isn't
Speaker 1: always greener. On the other side, we reach only dedicated
Speaker 1: an episode to quitting your job the right way, and
Speaker 1: a part of advancing in your career is moving along
Speaker 1: to other companies. But as we've seen, there have been
Speaker 1: a lot of companies over the course of the pandemic
Speaker 1: the pandemic. Darling Company is like Peloton and some of
Speaker 1: these other folks who saw explosive growth, higher tremendous numbers
Speaker 1: of people. But there are a number of things to
Speaker 1: keep in mind, not just the pay, not just the
Speaker 1: salary that you are expecting from this new company. We
Speaker 1: want you to make sure that you're making these decisions
Speaker 1: for all of the right reasons, and that you're not
Speaker 1: just looking at the bottom line dollar amount that you're
Speaker 1: looking to get paid. Yeah, Obviously, our work, what we
Speaker 1: do every day, who we work for, who we work with,
Speaker 1: has a major influence on our quality of life. And
Speaker 1: so you don't want to take a lot of things
Speaker 1: into consideration before you jump ship. And and it's also
Speaker 1: just important to note that who who knows how long
Speaker 1: this hot labor market is going to persist. I wonder
Speaker 1: if maybe these these these firings, are these layoffs, are
Speaker 1: actually signs of more of this kind of behavior to
Speaker 1: come cooling off the job market in a real way.
Speaker 1: We'll see. But let's talk about debt for a second,
Speaker 1: mat And let's we haven't talked about buying now pay
Speaker 1: laters a whole lot lately, but it's something that we
Speaker 1: touch on occasion. And and it turns out, buy now,
Speaker 1: pay later companies are leading more millennials into debt. And
Speaker 1: we've had kind of an issue, although we've kind of
Speaker 1: come around a little bit recently when it comes to
Speaker 1: companies like a firm and Clarna and and the San
Speaker 1: Francisco Gate just published a great article about how some
Speaker 1: of those companies are making it just obviously easier to
Speaker 1: buy things over installments and how that leads to over consumption.
Speaker 1: That's our big problem with it is that it makes
Speaker 1: it easier to buy things over months instead of immediately,
Speaker 1: and so you're like, you become a payment buyer and
Speaker 1: you buy more stuff than you need, more stuff than
Speaker 1: you can afford. It's not that the word against consumption.
Speaker 1: We're just against that thoughtless consumption. And when different companies
Speaker 1: like this make it easier for you to partake and
Speaker 1: thoughtless consumption, that's what we have an issue with. That's right.
Speaker 1: And Americans actually bought more than twenty billion dollars worth
Speaker 1: of goods via these buy now, pay later services last year,
Speaker 1: so much money and and so yeah, especially for folks
Speaker 1: who are looking for an inexpensive way to boost their
Speaker 1: credit score, these companies can actually be helpful. That's something
Speaker 1: we've talked about recently as they're starting to report to
Speaker 1: the credit bureaus activity for For some people who are
Speaker 1: looking for that boost their scores in the five hundreds
Speaker 1: or six hundreds or low seven hundreds, this can be
Speaker 1: a way to include a new installment loan that actually
Speaker 1: can boost your score if used well. But still, even
Speaker 1: though that's the case, extreme caution is necessary when opting
Speaker 1: to use by now pay later at checkout, and we
Speaker 1: think that most folks should stay away altogether because of
Speaker 1: the way people are using it. It's really hard to
Speaker 1: use these things well, to use them sparingly, and so
Speaker 1: they still present a huge risk for for lots of people. Totally. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we're seeing some scary increases actually in the amount and
Speaker 1: types of debt that folks are taking on recent months.
Speaker 1: One of our least favorite debth methods, personal loans, are
Speaker 1: actually pretty hot right now. They're hotter than mom jeans.
Speaker 1: Folks are taking out your mom's not not I, but
Speaker 1: my wife does. A lot of folks are taking out
Speaker 1: personal loans at increase over last year, which is not good.
Speaker 1: These numbers are a sign of debts overload, and we're
Speaker 1: actually going to talk more about that. We're gonna talk
Speaker 1: more about debt next week and how we think that
Speaker 1: you should think about the role that debt plays in
Speaker 1: your life in this shifting economy where rising interest rates
Speaker 1: are having a pretty massive impact. And so you can
Speaker 1: expect to find that episode in your podcatcher on Wednesday.
Speaker 1: On Monday, we'll have a new Ask How the Money
Speaker 1: episode lined up for you and until then, we hope
Speaker 1: that you have a great weekend. And so Joel, that's
Speaker 1: going to be a buddy until next time. Best friends out,
Speaker 1: Best friends Out.