Speaker 1: Welcome to How the Money. I'm Joel and I and Matt's.
Speaker 1: Today we're discussing life without Amazon, new data that says
Speaker 1: that Roth's stink and taking as sabbatical. Joel, is life
Speaker 1: without Amazon actually possible? We'll find out in this episode. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: we'll get to that a little bit later on, man,
Speaker 1: but you know, before we launch into the personal finance
Speaker 1: stories that could affect our money during today's episode. Man,
Speaker 1: what a week we have had right earlier this Wednesday, Dude,
Speaker 1: I thought one was going to be nothing but rainbows
Speaker 1: and unicorns. But you know, regardless of where you fall
Speaker 1: on the political spectrum, I think we can all agree
Speaker 1: that the rioting that took place on Wednesday in our
Speaker 1: nation's capital, Dude, it was shameful, and I really hope
Speaker 1: that nothing like that ever happen in our our country again.
Speaker 1: It was a sad day for America's democracy and how
Speaker 1: it is that we governed. But man, I just really
Speaker 1: hope that we truly have brighter days ahead of us. Yeah, Man,
Speaker 1: me too. I agree, And I think what makes our country,
Speaker 1: what makes the United States of America such an excellent place,
Speaker 1: it's not individual people, it's not singular leaders that that
Speaker 1: make America a wonderful place to live. It's truly is
Speaker 1: like the rule of law and the respect for our institutions.
Speaker 1: And you know, we are a money podcast, Matt, We're
Speaker 1: not a political podcast, so let's not be labor the point.
Speaker 1: But it is just such an important part of of
Speaker 1: the system, including our economic system. And I hope too
Speaker 1: that what happened on Wednesday is a turning point in
Speaker 1: the discourse that's happening in this country, which really has
Speaker 1: just kind of like led to the fanning of the
Speaker 1: flames and the dangerous actions that happened this week. So
Speaker 1: we just wanted to mention that to our listeners and
Speaker 1: just kind of come together in solidarity. I know, you know,
Speaker 1: most of our listeners feel the same way as us
Speaker 1: and and and they think that those actions were out
Speaker 1: of control, out of line um where it was terrible
Speaker 1: to watch and just a sad day in the history
Speaker 1: of our country. For sure. YEA, hopefully we will have
Speaker 1: nothing but rainbows and butterflies. Uh had actually two thousand
Speaker 1: dollars that actually might be happening here coming up. We
Speaker 1: don't know for sure, but obviously we'll keep folks posted
Speaker 1: on that. But speaking of that steamulus checks, Man, did
Speaker 1: you get your stimulus money from from last week? I did.
Speaker 1: I finally saw deposited in my account. Almost seventy of
Speaker 1: Americans have received their their money, but dude, many others
Speaker 1: haven't because of a glitch in the matrix or maybe
Speaker 1: it was an I r S screw up one of
Speaker 1: the two. If you are eligible for a stimulus payment
Speaker 1: but you haven't received it yet, check out the I
Speaker 1: r S Get my Payment tool again. It's actually up now.
Speaker 1: Last Friday, it wasn't up yet. Uh. And if it
Speaker 1: shows you a message saying status number two not available,
Speaker 1: then you won't be receiving your payments until you claim
Speaker 1: that credit when you file your tax return. So just
Speaker 1: a point there. Apparently this affected a lot of people
Speaker 1: who filed with one of the major tax prep services. Yeah,
Speaker 1: a few of them. Yeah, something to do with the
Speaker 1: way they process your return and how they open up
Speaker 1: a separate account in order to take their cut. And
Speaker 1: because that account is now defunct, Um, you're gonna have
Speaker 1: to wait until filing your taxes to claim your refund,
Speaker 1: which stinks, But it's just important to be aware of.
Speaker 1: At the same time, all right, Matt, let's talk about
Speaker 1: investing for a minute. A question on many of our
Speaker 1: listeners minds. I feel like some of the ask HTM
Speaker 1: questions on the show revolver on this is like, do
Speaker 1: I do I want to pay taxes now or later um?
Speaker 1: And obviously many of us would prefer the hs A
Speaker 1: route and avoiding taxes altogether when we're saving investing for
Speaker 1: the future. But when it comes down to choosing a
Speaker 1: traditional ira or or a roth ira, that's essentially the
Speaker 1: question you're asking, Do I want to pay taxes um
Speaker 1: now in and invest in in a roth ira or
Speaker 1: do I want to pay taxes when I'm withdrawing my
Speaker 1: funds in retirement and invest in a traditional ira instead. Well,
Speaker 1: there's new data from Boston College and it essentially says
Speaker 1: that saving in a traditional ira is better than investing
Speaker 1: in a wrath uh. They're finding show that the vast
Speaker 1: majority of folks and retire are paying an effective tax
Speaker 1: rate of zero percent. So according to that data, that
Speaker 1: means that the vast majority of folks should take the
Speaker 1: tax break now and invest in a traditional hire a
Speaker 1: while you're effective tax rate is much higher, and then
Speaker 1: pay taxes on your retire mode draws weight on the
Speaker 1: road when your tax burden is virtually non existent. But Matt,
Speaker 1: you and I would say, not so fast, Boston College.
Speaker 1: It's not that easy, right. Uh. You know, if you've
Speaker 1: listened to the show for a while, you'll notice that
Speaker 1: we are big fans of the rath i Ra. So
Speaker 1: what gives right, Well, first of all, one of the
Speaker 1: aspects of roth Ira is that we think is fantastic
Speaker 1: is the ability that you have to withdraw contributions from
Speaker 1: that account without paying any fees or penalties. For a
Speaker 1: lot of folks, that gives a tremendous amount of flexibility
Speaker 1: and peace of mind. Right Knowing that they essentially have
Speaker 1: an extra pad of funds to access on top of
Speaker 1: the emergency fund is sort of like a second emergency
Speaker 1: phone almost. This is something that I've even done before.
Speaker 1: I've I've withdrawn some contributions before to a roth Ira
Speaker 1: to invest in a real estate deal. So it's just
Speaker 1: nice knowing that you have that extra stash, you have
Speaker 1: that cash there as an option. Yeah, and again, you know,
Speaker 1: we hope people would throw out the arras and they're
Speaker 1: not tapping them willy nilly. But but again, it's a
Speaker 1: great backup to the backup. And uh yeah, another question
Speaker 1: you want to ask yourself is are you planning to
Speaker 1: be like the majority of Americans in that study. You know,
Speaker 1: we all know that pensions, you know, they're they're not
Speaker 1: really hanging around very much for people in corporate America.
Speaker 1: If you work at a job that still has offers
Speaker 1: you a pension, thank you, lucky stars, because it's getting
Speaker 1: rarer and rare. And the median household surveyed in that study, well,
Speaker 1: they had a total of about a hundred and eighties
Speaker 1: six thousand dollars in retirement funds that they are going
Speaker 1: to be drawing down. Well, when you do the math,
Speaker 1: that's most likely not going to be enough money for
Speaker 1: most people. Some of our nerdier listeners may have already
Speaker 1: done the math for themselves already, Matt, and they're probably
Speaker 1: shooting for somewhere in the million dollar plus range UH
Speaker 1: to have in their investment accounts when they eventually retire.
Speaker 1: You know, we're definitely planning you and I UH in
Speaker 1: our families on having more than a hundred eighties six
Speaker 1: thousand dollars when we retire, that's for sure. And so
Speaker 1: I think to um. When we're talking about listeners that
Speaker 1: are attentive to their money and invest really well of
Speaker 1: our long period of time, who are going to have
Speaker 1: bigger stockpiles to draw from, it means that you're going
Speaker 1: to be in a higher tax bracket than most of
Speaker 1: your peers. And and that's another check mark in favor
Speaker 1: of the Rath I ray as opposed to the traditional Yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean that kind of leads us to another reason
Speaker 1: why we like the RATH right when you know, when
Speaker 1: you're withdrawing more money out of your retirement account because
Speaker 1: you saved more, like your nest egg has grown over
Speaker 1: the years, and you're gonna want to avoid paying taxes
Speaker 1: on those withdrawals or you know, or distributions. And the
Speaker 1: thing is, this study is based on our current income
Speaker 1: tax rates, which are really low right now, and you know,
Speaker 1: they were significantly lowered in large part due to the
Speaker 1: Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which is set to expire
Speaker 1: after and so there's a really good chance of taxes
Speaker 1: going up after that point. So that's just another reason
Speaker 1: why it makes sense to pay the taxes now while
Speaker 1: they are historically low. It's definitely worth kind of taking
Speaker 1: the burden hand than possible lead to in the bush. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we'll post a link to some of that that
Speaker 1: data from Boston College. You can make your own decision,
Speaker 1: But we kind of wanted to to play a little
Speaker 1: point counterpoint to that because there are a lot of
Speaker 1: good reasons why Matt and I are believers in the
Speaker 1: roth Ira as opposed to the traditional Ira in a
Speaker 1: lot of circumstances, and that doesn't necessarily hold true for everyone, Matt.
Speaker 1: You know, we we've talked about other circumstances where people
Speaker 1: might want to consider a traditional ira. It can get
Speaker 1: really nuanced, but as a whole, we do like the
Speaker 1: rath and it has a lot of perks like the
Speaker 1: ones we just mentioned. All right, let's talk about life
Speaker 1: without Amazon. Is it even possible, Matt? That's a question
Speaker 1: I think a lot of people have, and especially don't
Speaker 1: think it's possible for us. We are one of those
Speaker 1: households that is. I wouldn't say reliance on Amazon because
Speaker 1: I think we could change our ways, but dang, we
Speaker 1: sure to use them a lot. And you're you're not alone.
Speaker 1: I mean, there's a lot of people in that boat
Speaker 1: that are have gotten just habitually used to using Amazon.
Speaker 1: On the reg for little things here and there, um
Speaker 1: or more big things too. And the New York Times
Speaker 1: that recently had an article that offered some insight and
Speaker 1: just made me think about how big Amazon has gotten
Speaker 1: and how many industries and they have gotten into. And
Speaker 1: you know, you'd have to stop listening a certain podcast
Speaker 1: even now to avoid doing business with Amazon, because they
Speaker 1: just bought podcast company Wondering. They also own Ring the
Speaker 1: Doorbell and camera company Twitch, not to mention all the
Speaker 1: countless sites and apps that use Amazon web services. I
Speaker 1: guess you'd have to see who does the hosting on
Speaker 1: this website source exactly. But but at least some people
Speaker 1: are trying. What they want to do is to avoid
Speaker 1: doing business with with Amazon altogether. And I understand their concerns,
Speaker 1: I'll say, um, But in Canada, a site called not
Speaker 1: Amazon has sprung to life in order to bring more
Speaker 1: business and also awareness to small local businesses. It's not
Speaker 1: Amazon dot c A because it's a Canadian site, right exactly.
Speaker 1: You know, man, I wish that there was a better
Speaker 1: resource just for all cities, right you know, like there
Speaker 1: aren't and there isn't an easy way to locate your
Speaker 1: local businesses if you're shopping online, you know, I've I've
Speaker 1: looked at locally dot com before, which is a pretty
Speaker 1: good that kind of sources individual cities and goods that
Speaker 1: you can potentially get there within your city, but it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily focusing on independent businesses. And honestly, it's just
Speaker 1: not the best solution that we have yet. It's not
Speaker 1: the real true answer, but hopefully there will be one,
Speaker 1: you know, fairly soon. But man, you know, when it
Speaker 1: comes to your money to what's really important is that
Speaker 1: you're not mindlessly making purchases on platforms like Amazon, but
Speaker 1: that you're also considering alternatives. You know, so hop over
Speaker 1: to different sites like hop over to eBay to consider
Speaker 1: buying used and men. Here's the thing is that, like
Speaker 1: everything that's on eBay isn't necessarily used. Like sometimes they
Speaker 1: are items that were maybe at floor models or items
Speaker 1: that were returned. It's not just old stuff that somebody
Speaker 1: found out good will and are flipping within their ebase.
Speaker 1: But there are a lot of individuals and small businesses
Speaker 1: that do most of their business or a lot of
Speaker 1: their business through sites like e Bay. So when you
Speaker 1: shop at eBay, obviously eBay is a bigger tech company,
Speaker 1: but there's a lot of people that are making their
Speaker 1: living through that site. And in the end, like, I
Speaker 1: just want people to be better at searching for goods,
Speaker 1: you know, and instead of just going to Amazon, or
Speaker 1: instead of just going to Walmart UH and searching for
Speaker 1: your item and ordering it. Like, I want folks to
Speaker 1: become professionals at hopping over to like two or three
Speaker 1: different sites quickly searching and then finding the best deal.
Speaker 1: That way, they know that they're not over paying for
Speaker 1: goods to where the wheels have been greased and it's
Speaker 1: completely frictionless and they can buy things without even hardly
Speaker 1: thinking about them. We don't want the ability for us
Speaker 1: to spend money to become automatic. Yeah, and Amazon has
Speaker 1: made it almost that easy to to be automatic. And
Speaker 1: that's what we want to avoid ourselves and for our
Speaker 1: listeners to avoid. And at the same time, too, we
Speaker 1: we want to recognize that at times it makes sense
Speaker 1: to pay more to shop locally, to support UH the
Speaker 1: businesses that matter to your community, the friends of yours
Speaker 1: that have started a business, or just your neighbors that
Speaker 1: own a business. And just because you can get it
Speaker 1: cheaper in some other place doesn't always mean that that's
Speaker 1: the best course of action, right, that's right, all right,
Speaker 1: But we got more to get to on this episode, Matt,
Speaker 1: including some of the interesting stuff that we didn't get
Speaker 1: to last week that's in the relief bill, And there
Speaker 1: was a story about dirty deck collection tactics on the rise.
Speaker 1: We'll get to and more right after this break. Alright,
Speaker 1: we're back from the break, and we'll get to that
Speaker 1: dirty debt collector's story here in a minute. But let's
Speaker 1: go ahead and talk about a few other things that
Speaker 1: made it into the five thousand page relief bill that
Speaker 1: was passed at the end of last year. Which have
Speaker 1: you been saying that a lot lately last year? I
Speaker 1: haven't showered since last year. That's nothing. Our girls keep
Speaker 1: on the l man, Alright, Our girls were saying that
Speaker 1: earlier this week. They thought it was so funny. Um.
Speaker 1: But Man, One of the things that was included in
Speaker 1: the bill were was one that had to do with
Speaker 1: flexible spending accounts. In recent episodes, we advised you towards
Speaker 1: uh spending all of your unused fs A money on
Speaker 1: eligible items, because at that point in time, we were
Speaker 1: entering a sort of use it or Lose it scenario.
Speaker 1: You know, we were recommending folks to maybe you restock
Speaker 1: their first aid kit, load up on sunscreen for the
Speaker 1: summer because everybody is probably going to be going to
Speaker 1: the beach, right, I mean, like vaccines will be out
Speaker 1: by then. Dude, it's gonna be crazy. There's gonna be
Speaker 1: a sunscreen shortage embarkment party in the USA. Seriously. But
Speaker 1: that use it or lose it scenario is no longer
Speaker 1: the case. Congress is now allowing f s A money
Speaker 1: to be carried over from last year to this year
Speaker 1: without penalty, and has instituted a twelve month grace period
Speaker 1: for unused money in healthcare independent f s A s
Speaker 1: And so that's great news for people that were unable
Speaker 1: to use those funds because of changes COVID made to
Speaker 1: your health and you know your childcare needs. The bad news, though,
Speaker 1: is that this is an employer option to offer this. Uh,
Speaker 1: it's not mandatory, and so hopefully yours is keen to
Speaker 1: to help their employees. But if you don't hear any
Speaker 1: communication from HR soon, uh, and you've got F s
Speaker 1: A money that you don't want to lose, make sure
Speaker 1: that you are being proactive and reach out to them yourself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think you can light a fire in the
Speaker 1: HR department, not a literal one, but like the one
Speaker 1: that gets the ball rolling to uh to so that
Speaker 1: they fill out the paperwork so that you are eligible
Speaker 1: to all that money over, uh Matt. Another random thing
Speaker 1: that made it into the relief bill was a crackdown
Speaker 1: on illegal streaming, and um, I think you know. The
Speaker 1: first time I read that, I was like, oh man,
Speaker 1: they're gonna arrest so many people in this country and
Speaker 1: butt them behind bars for up to ten years. Apparently
Speaker 1: because that was. One of the elements that made it
Speaker 1: into the bill was harsher prison sentences for illegal streaming.
Speaker 1: But I read a little deeper to find out what
Speaker 1: the deal was. Fortunately, it's not harsher jail sentences for
Speaker 1: individuals who accidentally or even on purpose stream pirate content.
Speaker 1: But but it's really about the spammy companies you see
Speaker 1: on the internet offering you access to thousands of channels
Speaker 1: for eight dollars a month. You know, I'm sure we've
Speaker 1: all seen a website like that or had a friend
Speaker 1: who asked us like, should I sign up for this
Speaker 1: streaming services? So cheap and it gives me everything Well,
Speaker 1: the reason it's so cheap and it gives you everything
Speaker 1: is because it's a pirate service. It's illegal, and we
Speaker 1: we should not know. We should not be signing up
Speaker 1: for those services. And now the folks running those companies
Speaker 1: could get cracked down on UM. I think that's a
Speaker 1: great thing personally. That totally reminds me of all of
Speaker 1: MP three dot com. Did you ever use that site
Speaker 1: back in college? Now? I remember using like lime wire
Speaker 1: and stuff like that, though, So the thing with all
Speaker 1: of MP three dot com is it was a Russian
Speaker 1: site and you were literally paying for for music and
Speaker 1: you could make you know, you could download albums, and
Speaker 1: it was something. It was crazy cheap. I forget how
Speaker 1: much it was, but I think it was just kind
Speaker 1: of more there. Like the fact that you're paying for
Speaker 1: it just kind of got you off the hook from
Speaker 1: from a guilt standpoint, right, like something pays for the
Speaker 1: entire album, Like I'm not like completely just pulling it
Speaker 1: off a torrent, you know, but but really you were
Speaker 1: only enriching people who were stealing that stuff. Unfortunately, it
Speaker 1: probably went straight to putin. So uh, dude, speaking of streaming, Uh,
Speaker 1: we're getting inundated with streaming services. I bet you know
Speaker 1: some of our listeners out there are subscribed to maybe
Speaker 1: a few too many, potentially even seeing your monthly viewing
Speaker 1: bills arrivaling what your old school cababilities to be. You know,
Speaker 1: we are all about peering down to curb your monthly costs.
Speaker 1: But there's another phenomena when it comes to streaming and
Speaker 1: I it is finding something you actually want to watch.
Speaker 1: All the platforms you use, I mean, you can find anything,
Speaker 1: but like it's really difficult to to kind of go
Speaker 1: into each one of the different services kind of find
Speaker 1: not a specific show or movie, but just you know,
Speaker 1: it's hard to browse. And that's something that that real good. Uh,
Speaker 1: this new startup, that's something that they're doing. I gotta saying.
Speaker 1: We've all been there on a Friday night with a partner, spouse,
Speaker 1: or a friend trying to watch something and we're like,
Speaker 1: what do you want to watch? What do you want
Speaker 1: to watch? I don't know. Let's scroll through here and
Speaker 1: see and you can scroll for twenty minutes and be
Speaker 1: like yeah, I mean there's like three things that we
Speaker 1: kind of want to watch, but um, yeah, and so
Speaker 1: hopefully real good what we're talking about here is gonna
Speaker 1: help that out because basically, what they're trying to do
Speaker 1: is allow you to log into all of your streaming
Speaker 1: accounts at the same time on its own platform to
Speaker 1: find what you want to watch with more ease. And
Speaker 1: that should make it easier to find stuff you actually
Speaker 1: want to watch, um and and that you have access
Speaker 1: to allowing you to to get that content. And it
Speaker 1: also makes it so much easier to see the content
Speaker 1: that's out there that free streaming providers are offering to
Speaker 1: Matt because you know, we've talked about this on the show.
Speaker 1: There are like over a hundred free stream yeah Roku
Speaker 1: channel exactly, and I think IMDb has a channel too,
Speaker 1: and some of them are at supported. But there's all
Speaker 1: sorts of potentially great content that you can watch for free,
Speaker 1: but you gotta like individually logged into those channels and
Speaker 1: see what they've got access to it, and a lot
Speaker 1: of us are going to do that. But if you
Speaker 1: sign up for real good log in, you can easily
Speaker 1: see all those free offerings in one place, which is
Speaker 1: just gonna make it a little bit simpler and easier.
Speaker 1: On movie night, Yeah, I was reading up on it
Speaker 1: man and and one of the things that I feel
Speaker 1: like one of the problems they solve is the clunky interfaces,
Speaker 1: like the user interface. Anytime you sit down to your TV,
Speaker 1: like you're just pushing an arrow. And even when you
Speaker 1: go to search something like maybe you can do the
Speaker 1: voice thing if you have like a fancier platform that
Speaker 1: you use, but you're kind of punching it in, you're
Speaker 1: kind of going on the keyboard. It is so outdated.
Speaker 1: And one of the great things about Real Good is
Speaker 1: you can download the app, search it on your phone,
Speaker 1: which is super easy because you're either doing voice to
Speaker 1: texts or swipe text anyway, right, and then it pulls
Speaker 1: it up there and in particularly if you have a
Speaker 1: Roku device, you can just hit play from your phone
Speaker 1: and once you found that thing, and it'll play it
Speaker 1: automatically on the service that you already have loaded on
Speaker 1: your TV. There you go. That is really cool because honestly,
Speaker 1: navigating the different platforms that you know, the different smart
Speaker 1: TV options, like with a little remote with a clicker, dude,
Speaker 1: that is the worst. It's good to me, that's the
Speaker 1: worst part of streaming. And in my mind, if you're
Speaker 1: able to solve that problem, I'm totally gonna check them out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'll start using my phone to find what I want
Speaker 1: to just gonna go a lot quicker and then just
Speaker 1: like shooting on up to my TV exactly. I like it. Alright,
Speaker 1: So all right, let's talk about dirty debt collectors. Matt.
Speaker 1: There's something interesting happening right now that could be trashing
Speaker 1: your credit score. Uh, and it's called debt parking. It's
Speaker 1: taken on this interesting terminology some debt collectors out there
Speaker 1: who lack proper morals there Um, dirty human beings are
Speaker 1: are putting debts that you don't know onto your credit report,
Speaker 1: which sounds like a terrible thing to do, and it
Speaker 1: is a terrible thing to do. Towards the end of
Speaker 1: the last year, the FTC took action against a specific
Speaker 1: debt collection firm in Missouri that ended up stealing over
Speaker 1: twenty four million dollars from consumers through this practice. And
Speaker 1: I think part of what makes it so devious. It's
Speaker 1: not just the posting of the fake debts to your account,
Speaker 1: which in and of itself is terrible, but the fact
Speaker 1: that they aren't sending any notification your way when they
Speaker 1: do this, and so that means that most people are
Speaker 1: finding out about this fake debt when they're applying for credit.
Speaker 1: Like let's say they're applying for a mortgage because they're
Speaker 1: buying a home, and then it turns out that their
Speaker 1: credit score stinks because of this terrible scam that these
Speaker 1: debt collectors are running. And basically they're hoping that because
Speaker 1: you're in such a bind, you're gonna pay off the
Speaker 1: fake debt that you don't actually owe in order to
Speaker 1: rectify things quickly. So it's they're counting on the fact
Speaker 1: that we're not organized. You know, that people aren't don't
Speaker 1: feel empowered, and they're just like, oh, I probably owe
Speaker 1: that money. That sounds that sounds like me. Yeah, And
Speaker 1: so yeah, you need to be on the lookout to
Speaker 1: see if debt parking has happened to you, if your
Speaker 1: credit score has gone down in the hole. You could
Speaker 1: be the victim of a debt collector doing something like
Speaker 1: despicable like this. Yeah. So, so, like we mentioned, the
Speaker 1: FTC is taking action, so that's good, but you need
Speaker 1: to take action too, you know, Like we just said,
Speaker 1: this is definitely a call to be organized with your
Speaker 1: finances and make sure that you know what's going on.
Speaker 1: And one of the ways that you can do that
Speaker 1: is to make sure that you continue to to pull
Speaker 1: your credit reports. Right, they are still free every week
Speaker 1: through April. Uh. You know, normally you can only access
Speaker 1: your report from each of the bureau is just once
Speaker 1: a year. And dude, in particular, to make sure that
Speaker 1: you pull your reports before you apply for an important
Speaker 1: line of credit like a mortgage or a car loan.
Speaker 1: Uh specifically, maybe even doing that a couple of months
Speaker 1: before you know what, you want to take out one
Speaker 1: of those loans. That way, you have some time to
Speaker 1: possibly clean your report up. Yeah, fix the situation. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but make sure that you do that so that you
Speaker 1: can see what it is that your lender is seeing,
Speaker 1: because they're going to be looking through your report, um,
Speaker 1: you know, and if there's any incorrect information, any fraudulent
Speaker 1: information on your reports, you can file that dispute with
Speaker 1: that specific bureau. No doubt. Stories like that make me
Speaker 1: so mad because it's people taking advantage of other people.
Speaker 1: So yeah, it's just it's not right. All right, Let's
Speaker 1: talk to Matt about paid time off and sabbaticals. That's
Speaker 1: something you don't hear much about, but a lot of
Speaker 1: Americans left a a bit of their PTO on the
Speaker 1: table last year because many vacations were just scratched completely
Speaker 1: for a lot of families and lots of companies to
Speaker 1: typically don't extend vacation days or maybe they'll give you
Speaker 1: a couple of months in in the first quarter of
Speaker 1: the next year to use those dates. But but some
Speaker 1: companies are responding really well and they're offering extensions on
Speaker 1: the use of that PTO because of the obvious extenuating circumstances. Hopefully, Matt,
Speaker 1: like you said, this summer, you know, we're gonna see
Speaker 1: more beach vacations happening. We're gonna see maybe by summer
Speaker 1: and fall, more safety when it comes to flying, a
Speaker 1: lot more people getting in the air. But but either way, uh,
Speaker 1: taking all of your PTO is a great goal to
Speaker 1: have this year, even if it doesn't mean that you're
Speaker 1: you're hopping on airplane to go somewhere else. And City
Speaker 1: Group Matt I saw recently started offering subbaticals to employees
Speaker 1: who have been there five years or longer. You can
Speaker 1: take three months off and still get paid of your
Speaker 1: normal salary. That's really sweet. Yeah, I'd love to see
Speaker 1: like the mini sabbatical of the three months off, the
Speaker 1: thing become a little bit more of a trend um.
Speaker 1: I don't know, man, every time I've traveled somewhere, I
Speaker 1: swear you run into an Australian. They travel like crazy,
Speaker 1: and the Australians are like, I'm on holiday, and they're
Speaker 1: like and they're off for like three months always, And
Speaker 1: I'm like, we need a little more of that in
Speaker 1: this in this country. We unfortunately, the of the twenty
Speaker 1: one richest countries in the world, the US is the
Speaker 1: only country that doesn't mandate paid time off. All the
Speaker 1: other big time countries out there do it, the US
Speaker 1: does not, And so it's no wonder man, that is
Speaker 1: not a part of our our culture. You know, it's
Speaker 1: not a part of the norms that surround our work
Speaker 1: and vacation because oftentimes it starts at the top. But
Speaker 1: it is cool to see it not starting from the
Speaker 1: top in this case. You know, City Group is doing this,
Speaker 1: and hopefully we'll see other companies do it as well.
Speaker 1: But you know, like we just live in a country
Speaker 1: where people work too much and where stingy vacation policies
Speaker 1: just they're they're kind of the standard and a lot
Speaker 1: of folks might be worried you know that if you
Speaker 1: take your full allotment of time off, that it might
Speaker 1: be a career killer, you know, Um, but it's not.
Speaker 1: In fact, it's important for you to be able to
Speaker 1: maintain a solid output at work by taking time off.
Speaker 1: You know, when you take time to rest, it can
Speaker 1: bring new clarity to the things that you do every day. Uh,
Speaker 1: And it gives you a renewed vigor and enjoy as
Speaker 1: well den it to your daily work. Yeah, man, not
Speaker 1: like I was close to burnout with what we're doing
Speaker 1: here at how the money, I I love it, But
Speaker 1: just getting a couple of weeks off at the end
Speaker 1: of the year was just so nice. Man. We've prerecorded
Speaker 1: a couple episodes throughout, a couple of best the episodes.
Speaker 1: I know some people hate that, but but for us,
Speaker 1: those were good ones, and those are ones. But for
Speaker 1: us to be able to continue to enjoy what we
Speaker 1: do and and to be enthusiastic about creating this show,
Speaker 1: we do need to take that sort of time off.
Speaker 1: I mean, and it really does make me appreciate, Like
Speaker 1: I was like jumping in the bit to come back
Speaker 1: in here to record an episode in early junior, I
Speaker 1: was so excited. Um, and I think, you know, I
Speaker 1: don't always feel that way, but it is nice to
Speaker 1: take that time off to feel excited again. I feel
Speaker 1: like that time off actually just accentuates the work that
Speaker 1: we do. Yeah, and I think it only reinforces at
Speaker 1: the same time. Yeah, totally man. And you know we're
Speaker 1: not going to dive into this as well, but there's
Speaker 1: other studies as well that show that people who take
Speaker 1: more time off, uh, they're the ones who actually get
Speaker 1: the raises at work, they get the promotions. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so keep that in mind next time you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I think I'm not going to take that Friday off,
Speaker 1: you know, but dude, that's gonna be it for this episode.
Speaker 1: Up on the website, we'll make sure to link to
Speaker 1: some of the different stories that we talked about during
Speaker 1: this episode. You can find that at how the Money
Speaker 1: dot com. Yeah, and we'll be back on Monday with
Speaker 1: listener Questions episode. We love taking your listener questions. Have
Speaker 1: you have a question for Matt and I go to
Speaker 1: how to Money dot com slash ask You can toss
Speaker 1: your question our way and we hope to take it
Speaker 1: on a future episode and We hope to see you
Speaker 1: back here on Monday. Have a great weekend and Matt.
Speaker 1: Until next time. Best friends Out, Best friends Out,