Speaker 1: Welcome to How to Money. I'm Joel and I am Matt.
Speaker 1: Today we're talking frustrating funflation, money morons and home haters.
Speaker 2: Joel. In the video, I was holding up my shirt.
Speaker 2: I've got my fun Time vacation shirt on for our
Speaker 2: Friday flight today. It looks like, well, I like it.
Speaker 1: It makes me think you're going to Fiji after this
Speaker 1: or something?
Speaker 2: Is that happening? This is like, it's my summertime. I'm
Speaker 2: a vacation shirt. So it feels a little weird psychologically
Speaker 2: wearing it right now while we are working. But I
Speaker 2: realized I only wore once this past summer. This unfortunately,
Speaker 2: the summer is coming to an end. Man. Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: like the kids are back in school, so where we
Speaker 2: are yet? You know school started up this week, we
Speaker 2: start and lee where we are. Most people are like, uh,
Speaker 2: we don't start for like three more weeks, guys. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Is it the labor day? A lot of times folks
Speaker 2: to get start after labor Day. That's not how they
Speaker 2: do it down here in this out anyway, Like ten
Speaker 2: percent of our of our school year in by men.
Speaker 2: I know. Yeah, I wanted to wear my vacation shirt
Speaker 2: because it felt like it was appropriate, I guess for
Speaker 2: today's episode because I wanted to get one more wear in.
Speaker 2: It's just so soft and it's got palm trees and
Speaker 2: stuff on it too. This looks good. I like how
Speaker 2: you'd like that.
Speaker 1: All right, let's we got a bunch of good stuff
Speaker 1: to get today on today's Friday flight. But I just
Speaker 1: briefly wanted to respond to a listener email, and I
Speaker 1: think listener Ali made some great points. You and I
Speaker 1: had talked about long term disability on an episode that
Speaker 1: came out a couple of weeks ago, and long term
Speaker 1: term disability insurance.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah.
Speaker 1: One of the things that you and I had talked about,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe a little too flippantly, was if you are
Speaker 1: a brain worker, like if we were, like we're podcasters, Like,
Speaker 1: what could happen to us that we wouldn't be able
Speaker 1: to make an income? And the truth is, like if
Speaker 1: we got taken out of the legs, Matt, like, we
Speaker 1: could still do this job. But then there are we
Speaker 1: didn't give enough credence.
Speaker 2: They missed my mouth.
Speaker 1: Right right exactly, But there are things that could happen
Speaker 1: that would really cause us not to be able to
Speaker 1: do work in the way that we've been become accustomed
Speaker 1: to and potentially even like disallow us from podcasting, right,
Speaker 1: some sort of degenerative disease or some sort of cancer, right,
Speaker 1: And so Ali pointed that out. I appreciated her pointing
Speaker 1: out that out. In her email, she talked about her
Speaker 1: aunt who was like a high powered lawyer and because
Speaker 1: of a disability like it and not having disability insurance,
Speaker 1: long term disability insurance in particular, like a completely just
Speaker 1: a sad ending as her aunt ended up passing away,
Speaker 1: and just what the impact it had on the family.
Speaker 1: It made me rethink, like, after our conversation, maybe I
Speaker 1: think she's right. I think we were just a little
Speaker 1: too flippant with that. I think more people, even knowledge workers,
Speaker 1: even brain workers, should should consider having long term disability.
Speaker 1: It's not just for people like working in the coal mines.
Speaker 2: If people should that, do people still work in the
Speaker 2: coal mines? I can only picture Derek Zoolander. You know,
Speaker 2: it made me think of the is it the I'm
Speaker 2: sure people do one of the Social Security offices where
Speaker 2: the files are stored literally in an old salt mine.
Speaker 2: And by the way, this is our Friday flight where
Speaker 2: we talk about stories, So we actually will get to
Speaker 2: a social security story later on during the episode. But yes,
Speaker 2: especially with her, well, I like what she said. She said,
Speaker 2: it's not a bron versus brain sort of mentality that
Speaker 2: you should take when it comes to long term disability.
Speaker 2: And that was an older episode that was the best eat.
Speaker 2: But I think there's no way that we didn't talk
Speaker 2: about how folks are like three to four times more
Speaker 2: likely to become disabled than they are to die during
Speaker 2: their working career, because those are the stats. And I've
Speaker 2: got to think we said that. I didn't listen back
Speaker 2: to that episode all the way to hear whether or
Speaker 2: not we did, But I do think in her case,
Speaker 2: she experience got to see a first hand how this
Speaker 2: wrecked some family members, and you just experience it just
Speaker 2: feels a bit more real when you experienced it that way.
Speaker 2: But at the end, I completely empathize with her in
Speaker 2: that you still have to look at the numbers though,
Speaker 2: and with the likelihood of you needing to use something
Speaker 2: like that right because on one of the end of
Speaker 2: the spectrum, you ensure for nothing and you're taking, you're
Speaker 2: shouldering all the risk yourself. At the other end of
Speaker 2: the spectrum, you could ensure against everything, pay all the premiums,
Speaker 2: and you're gonna end up broke, especially long term disability.
Speaker 2: Like the premiums are really expensive. You we're between one
Speaker 2: and three percent of your anal salary, and so risk
Speaker 2: tolerance comes into play. Here's what you're saying, Yeah, you
Speaker 2: definitely have to take that into account. And so so
Speaker 2: this is more about I guess whether or whether or
Speaker 2: not you want to take on those long term disability payments,
Speaker 2: and just I mean, yeah, you start to add up
Speaker 2: those monthly premiums and then you start thinking, okay, so
Speaker 2: that's specific to whatever the exclusions might be included as
Speaker 2: part of that long term disability plan as opposed to
Speaker 2: and this is something that I've done, is just like, hey,
Speaker 2: can I instead take those dollars, invest those dollars aggressively
Speaker 2: over the years, and then you've got yourself a decent
Speaker 2: little nest egg that you can do anything with. Right,
Speaker 2: If you hit hard times, then you can use that
Speaker 2: to help you through that. If you don't it this
Speaker 2: hard times, then you can use that those funds. You
Speaker 2: can give that money away, you can go on a
Speaker 2: nice vacation, you can fund your kids college and so
Speaker 2: there's just additional avenues for that money to go, as
Speaker 2: opposed to one way premiums towards an insurance company when
Speaker 2: you're hoping that you don't ever have to take advantage
Speaker 2: of that insurance, but obviously it's there just in case
Speaker 2: you do.
Speaker 1: And the closer you get to full financial independence and
Speaker 1: just we know it's a spectrum, right, it's not a
Speaker 1: once or all or nothing thing. But the further you
Speaker 1: get along that spectrum, the less likely.
Speaker 2: You need it.
Speaker 1: Right, Because you're more self insured, you're more self insured,
Speaker 1: and that is something that we push people towards in
Speaker 1: more areas that their life. As insurance becomes more expensive,
Speaker 1: it feels like there are more kinds of insurance that
Speaker 1: are being pushed on us, and we have to be
Speaker 1: really careful about how much we're spending on insurance. Some point,
Speaker 1: some insurance products are like crucial homeowner's insurance, right, But
Speaker 1: can we even in that self insure more. Maybe long
Speaker 1: term disability for is more important, and you've got to
Speaker 1: spend the money for a few years until you've built
Speaker 1: up a significant enough ness eg To feel like you
Speaker 1: are self insured to the point where you don't need it.
Speaker 1: But it's just it's at least worth considering. And I
Speaker 1: do think she made some great points. It was worth
Speaker 1: bringing it.
Speaker 2: Up totally, So we give the story to make Yeah,
Speaker 2: she made some good points. I was gonna say, you
Speaker 2: saying that, maybe also think of context. It's not just
Speaker 2: about how much risk you're willing to take on yourself
Speaker 2: a context and whether or not. Let's say you are married.
Speaker 2: Let's see you've got a partner. What is their ability
Speaker 2: to go out there and become the main breadwinner? Right,
Speaker 2: maybe it's you, But if they have the ability to
Speaker 2: do that, Okay, well then maybe Okay, let's say maybe
Speaker 2: you have kids. Does that mean then maybe your you
Speaker 2: switch rolls a little bit? Right? If they don't have
Speaker 2: the ability to go out there work, Okay, that's a
Speaker 2: scenario that is a very context specific sort of question
Speaker 2: to ask as to whether or not it becomes more
Speaker 2: or less necessary or.
Speaker 1: Is there income discrepancy between the partners where the standard
Speaker 1: of living would fall significantly?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 1: So, yeah, there's all of these contextualized realities. It's not
Speaker 1: an easy peasy decision like sure, let me get this
Speaker 1: really expensive insurance or no, I don't need it because
Speaker 1: I work with my brain.
Speaker 2: It's it's a lot more involved than that. That's true.
Speaker 2: All right, you're talking about groceries. Oh one of my
Speaker 2: favorite time to kick it off one because I love
Speaker 2: to eat. I like good food. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I had some actually reheated smoked pork but that I
Speaker 1: made this week.
Speaker 2: Oh it was delicious. How do you reheat it? Do
Speaker 2: you you do like fried rice style? Or you just
Speaker 2: kill it? Baby? Yeah? Yeah, that's what you get it
Speaker 2: all crispy. Okay, So this was a I don't even
Speaker 2: know where this story was. Was this some business insider?
Speaker 2: But basically they're talking about NBC, CNBCNBC, Sorry about that, CNBC. Essentially,
Speaker 2: so the key takeaway on this one. They were talking
Speaker 2: about how the number of essentially consumer goods that you
Speaker 2: buy in the grocery store are down compared to last year.
Speaker 2: Some of that has to do probably a lot of
Speaker 2: it has to do with inflation, but people are buying
Speaker 2: something like two percent fewer groceries and you're.
Speaker 1: Good like like items, yeah, like like ues. Essentially, is
Speaker 1: this is this money saving related? Is this o zempic related,
Speaker 1: Matt like or is this kind of.
Speaker 2: I So to me, this feels more like a business
Speaker 2: story as opposed to personal finance, right, because I hear
Speaker 2: two percent one point eight to be exact, and I'm like, okay,
Speaker 2: to me, that doesn't seem like a big deal. Especially
Speaker 2: and this is immediately immediately where my mind went, especially
Speaker 2: when you consider the amount of food way there are
Speaker 2: in American households thirty to forty percent. The EPA estimates
Speaker 2: up to fifty percent of groceries are lost to waste,
Speaker 2: just like household food waste, and so on one hand,
Speaker 2: I'm like one point eight. I'm sure from a business perspective,
Speaker 2: they're saying, oh, how do we get you know, how
Speaker 2: do we get our sales back up? People are buying
Speaker 2: fewer items. But for me, I see this and I think, well,
Speaker 2: on an individual level at least, I think there are
Speaker 2: just other levers that we can pull when it comes
Speaker 2: to ensuring that you're not throwing away jel, you reheated
Speaker 2: that pork butt or whatever, But what about the slimy
Speaker 2: the slimy greens and the curtain in the bottom of
Speaker 2: the produce bind that you've got in your fridge? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's have you eaten those? That's what we're
Speaker 1: talking about here far like you have many of those
Speaker 1: right now, but if I did, I would probably eat them.
Speaker 1: That's when I go to buy veggies or fruit. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I'm weird. Ask my daughters like about the
Speaker 1: expiration date for what I'm buying.
Speaker 2: I will like lift up.
Speaker 1: At Costco, you know, in the in the cooler section,
Speaker 1: I will like lift up twelve boxes to get to
Speaker 1: the strawberries that are just a couple of days fresher,
Speaker 1: because and I mean they they like turn away and disgust.
Speaker 2: They're like, this is my dad, it's the same batch.
Speaker 2: I don't know if it's like at Costco, like if
Speaker 2: if they're in the same giant horb cardboard box. These
Speaker 2: are processed of some giant conveyor belt and the berries
Speaker 2: that are in the container at the bottom of the box.
Speaker 2: I don't think like five minutes newer.
Speaker 1: But the spinach, the spinach man, sometimes there's like six, seven,
Speaker 1: eight days where the expiration date is is different in
Speaker 1: different boxes. Really spinish, oh yeah, pay attention man and
Speaker 1: Spanish thinking about spinich. That's one of those things that
Speaker 1: like if you're like, if it hits the expiration date,
Speaker 1: it could be pretty nasty at.
Speaker 2: That point, yeah, you don't know for sure, you don't
Speaker 2: want anyway. That's that's just where my head went, which
Speaker 2: is uh, I guess a recommendation, not a recommendation, just
Speaker 2: my advice that would be to find ways to like
Speaker 2: one point a, that's one thing. But on the other hand,
Speaker 2: I'm thinking of different ways that at home we can
Speaker 2: waste less food by following recipes. If you're not so
Speaker 2: inclined to under you know, to be able to cook
Speaker 2: just like shooting from the hip at home, maybe that
Speaker 2: means bash cooking once. Gosh, you and Emily have done
Speaker 2: a lot of this with like don't you you'd like
Speaker 2: smoke chickens every Sunday, but just cooking multiple meals all
Speaker 2: at once, freezing them. If that's a way for you
Speaker 2: to not waste food or eating leftovers, actually eating the
Speaker 2: food that you've made so that just doesn't end up
Speaker 2: in the trash. Can.
Speaker 1: I think one of the other culprits too, is that
Speaker 1: people are just eating out more. And we've seen this
Speaker 1: right and left right that it's easier. The crossover happened
Speaker 1: a few years ago that people spend more eating out
Speaker 1: than they do on groceries, and it's not coming back like,
Speaker 1: and this is a way that we spend more money,
Speaker 1: and this is a reason why we're seeing people buying
Speaker 1: less food at the grocery store. You can blame it
Speaker 1: on inflation. I'm blaming it on lifestyle choice for most people,
Speaker 1: and they're saying, I'd rather spend money eating out, even
Speaker 1: if it costs a lot more. So I'm buying less
Speaker 1: stuff at the grocery store because I'm making less stuff
Speaker 1: at home. And ultimately, this is a decision that's going
Speaker 1: to impact your budget. So be careful how much money
Speaker 1: you spend eating out. Yeah, you might buy fewer groceries,
Speaker 1: but ultimately it's raising your food budget overall.
Speaker 2: Totally. Yeah. So there's on that note of groceries, there's
Speaker 2: a survey that showed that more folks are using their
Speaker 2: cash back and some of the different like credit card
Speaker 2: benefits that they receive to pay for necessities like groceries.
Speaker 2: And I think the article is trying to position this
Speaker 2: as like, isn't this terrible, But Joel, I'm gonna take
Speaker 2: the story and spend it a little bit because I
Speaker 2: think this is just an argument for the fact that
Speaker 2: money is just perfectly fungible and it makes me think
Speaker 2: that maybe there's a certain subset of folks out there
Speaker 2: who are realizing that, like, oh, I'm getting a little
Speaker 2: more responsible with how I'm spending. I used to always
Speaker 2: use my points and kind of ear market for a
Speaker 2: trip for vacation, which there's nothing wrong with that, But
Speaker 2: if you realize that, I think I actually do want
Speaker 2: to get a little more intentional with my spending. You
Speaker 2: take this points, you take the statement credit, you used
Speaker 2: it to offset you're monthly spending from the last statement,
Speaker 2: and then you can, I don't know, attack let's say
Speaker 2: a vacasion a little more thoughtfully, as opposed to like,
Speaker 2: I don't know, kind of like blow it on the dice,
Speaker 2: rolling it. See what happens opening your points within the
Speaker 2: credit card portal and seeing what you got and what
Speaker 2: your money You're like, I'm going to Vegas.
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh man, now I'm gonna spend even more because
Speaker 1: I'm going to waste my money gambling. I think you're right,
Speaker 1: Like I have no problem with people using I think
Speaker 1: for many people we're down. Like if you want to
Speaker 1: play the system and you pay off your balance in
Speaker 1: full and on time every single month, like go for it.
Speaker 1: The travel credit cards, there's some really good ones out
Speaker 1: there that was to chase Afire Prefer just how to
Speaker 1: really awesome sign up books. And if you're going to
Speaker 1: meet the terms and you're not going to spend more
Speaker 1: than you should, like, that's a worthwhile card to have
Speaker 1: in your wallet, especially if you're a heavy traveler. But
Speaker 1: I think for most people, keeping it simpler and more
Speaker 1: basic is probably the best way to go. And so
Speaker 1: whether that's a statement credit, whether that's like using the
Speaker 1: cash back to kind of pay make it cheaper for
Speaker 1: your your grocery built to kind of subsidize your grocery build,
Speaker 1: if you want to think about it like that, that's great.
Speaker 1: Part of it's yeah, like you said, it's fungible. Part
Speaker 1: of it is in your approach, like how are you
Speaker 1: thinking about where this money goes? And I think if
Speaker 1: we're really sensitive about our grocery bill, putting some of
Speaker 1: the money there, it might help it feel like groceries
Speaker 1: cost a little bit less just because we're using a
Speaker 1: credit card.
Speaker 2: Intelligently.
Speaker 1: The MX Blue Cash Prefer is one of the best
Speaker 1: cards if you if you feel like your grocery bill
Speaker 1: is too high too right, because you get that six
Speaker 1: percent cash back on your groceries. So that's a credit
Speaker 1: card can help. I guess if you use it appropriately
Speaker 1: as well to kind of reduce how much you spend.
Speaker 2: Yeah, six percent? Is it up on up to five
Speaker 2: thousand and spending? I would say it's nine? Is it nine?
Speaker 2: I think it's something like that. I could be up
Speaker 2: it all I know. And this is revealing a little
Speaker 2: bit about us and how much we spend on groceries.
Speaker 2: But we tend to hit that mark around halfway through
Speaker 2: the year. And it is now August and we have
Speaker 2: officially spent that much money. Wow. No, it's six thousand,
Speaker 2: by the way, six okay, six, not five? Yeah, no, nine,
Speaker 2: And the price is right game. I would have won
Speaker 2: that one, jeel. But in that case, yeah, I'm hopping over.
Speaker 2: I do love the Amex Bluecash Preferred. But I literally,
Speaker 2: as I was closing out last month, I told Kate,
Speaker 2: I was just like, hey, I just noticed we're not
Speaker 2: earning the six percent anymore on the groceries. Go ahead
Speaker 2: and pull that card from your wallets through everything on
Speaker 2: the on the robin Hood card.
Speaker 1: But there was another article about just like premium credit cards,
Speaker 1: and I think this is one of those things. We're
Speaker 1: seeing more and more of them. We've talked about how
Speaker 1: the the annual fees are going up and up and
Speaker 1: up on these cards, and they're especially to like upper
Speaker 1: middle class people. It feels like, Oh, I'm going to
Speaker 1: get so much value out of this. Look at the
Speaker 1: look at the sweet airport lounges. I'm going to be
Speaker 1: able to go. I'm going to go into uh because
Speaker 1: I have now this premium access and I get to
Speaker 1: get a nice little beverage before my flight or something
Speaker 1: like that. I think it's really important before people sign
Speaker 1: up for those, though, Matt, to realize, well, to look
Speaker 1: towards the past year, well, how many how many flights
Speaker 1: did I take that I actually show up to the
Speaker 1: airport pretty early? Am I hanging out at the airport?
Speaker 1: Like my sister loves to hang out at the airport.
Speaker 1: Those get the lounges, Oh yeah, dude, Yeah, But they
Speaker 1: travel eight or nine times a year and they're getting
Speaker 1: their way early. They're taking full advantage. It's worth every penny.
Speaker 1: But for me, like who travels once a year, and
Speaker 1: if I am, I've got kids in tow and stuff
Speaker 1: like that, we're not getting their hours in advance with
Speaker 1: the lounges.
Speaker 2: It's just hours early getting a bloody Mary. Can I
Speaker 2: get like a little Shirley temple for the kids too?
Speaker 2: Exactly exactly? Oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: No, it's like is it worth it for you and
Speaker 1: how you live? And you got to kind of like,
Speaker 1: don't just assume because it meets one or two requirements
Speaker 1: or it's it's got one or two benefits that you like,
Speaker 1: that it's still worth getting that card. Totally agree not
Speaker 1: to mention the fact that folks get tempted into higher
Speaker 1: levels of spending with brands that they don't even yeah,
Speaker 1: necessarily frequent. Right, It's like, oh, you get a Peloton
Speaker 1: the Peloton credit, and all of a sudden you're doing
Speaker 1: business with Peloton when otherwise you're like, well, I kind
Speaker 1: of just do that at home.
Speaker 2: Stretch.
Speaker 1: YouTube stretches that like that jol does. That's for that
Speaker 1: are free on YouTube. I can look to them people
Speaker 1: if you want them.
Speaker 2: They're great. So that's the whole thing, actually being honest
Speaker 2: with yourself and addressing or recognizing whether or not you
Speaker 2: are being tempted into spending with like these luxury brands
Speaker 2: when otherwise you might be perfectly happy with the way
Speaker 2: that you had been spending.
Speaker 1: Well, I just wanted this is another one of those
Speaker 1: words that just got made up, you know, like, oh yeah,
Speaker 1: I think this is it to make up new words.
Speaker 1: It's funnish, Yeah, it's funnish, But dude, all the fun
Speaker 1: stuff is more expensive, right, Like this was ad nauseam
Speaker 1: what people talked about with the World Cup. It's so
Speaker 1: expeditive and likes only the richest of the ritch can
Speaker 1: go to some of these games. I saw even that
Speaker 1: a few of the big name music acts are trying
Speaker 1: to Like Coldplay was one of them. Charlie XCX. I
Speaker 1: don't really know who that is except for the Brat
Speaker 1: summer thing. I think that was her thing was that
Speaker 1: last summer. But she they're trying to release like twenty
Speaker 1: dollars seats, a very very small amount to curb kind
Speaker 1: of how expensive it feels. But they're so like, think
Speaker 1: about how many people go to a cold Plate show.
Speaker 1: That's it's probably thirty thousand people at a Coldplay show.
Speaker 1: I'm guessing they haven't announced, but I'm guessing it's like
Speaker 1: two hundred tickets that are toenty bucks.
Speaker 2: And everything else is still just to be able to
Speaker 2: say that, like, hey guys, we release some of those affordable,
Speaker 2: all the level tickets for the price conscious folks out
Speaker 2: there exactly.
Speaker 1: So I don't know that it's actually going to make
Speaker 1: a difference in most people's lives, but man, it does
Speaker 1: feel tough out there for people who want to have fun,
Speaker 1: and it feels like experiences sporting events. Think about those
Speaker 1: Nicks playoff tickets. How expensive those were? Concerts these days?
Speaker 1: All of the flooding events, it's crazy expensive.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So okay, My thoughts on this are that this
Speaker 2: is a holdover and I hate to be the one
Speaker 2: that's still banging this drum or whatever, but I feel
Speaker 2: like this is still a holdover from the pandemic, right, Like,
Speaker 2: first of all, you tell people that you can't hang
Speaker 2: around other people because they're going to kill you, so
Speaker 2: that does something to you. But then secondly, as the
Speaker 2: economy shut down, the government's just like fire hosing cash
Speaker 2: into people's checking accounts, and all of a sudden you
Speaker 2: get to this because when did all the start, When
Speaker 2: did these insane ticket prices? When did all this happen?
Speaker 2: This was post pandemic, This was sort of the knee jerk,
Speaker 2: the reflex of sort of corrective action, right, folks were
Speaker 2: at home for a long time, and then then a
Speaker 2: year later it's like, oh, wait a minute, now we've
Speaker 2: got we've got more money than ever. We can go
Speaker 2: to concerts. You see ticket prices skyrocketing like that. But
Speaker 2: I think the big question is why has it continued?
Speaker 2: And I think it's I think it's social connection at
Speaker 2: the end of the day. But I feel like it's
Speaker 2: two sides of the same coin, right, which is I
Speaker 2: think more time, Like we're spending more more time atomized,
Speaker 2: not hanging out with other people, not being in community,
Speaker 2: not being a part of sort of like civic clubs
Speaker 2: and the Putnam bowling alone. Right, this is that all
Speaker 2: over again. And so there's a healthy part of Oh,
Speaker 2: I want to go hang out with my friends, Let's
Speaker 2: go to a concert. That's amazing, Like that's such a
Speaker 2: great healthy thing to do. As we create these memories,
Speaker 2: we have a ton of fun. I feel like this
Speaker 2: is an argument that you can get behind, Joel. You
Speaker 2: love going to concerts. It's a ton of fun for you.
Speaker 2: But then the flip side of that is the fomo
Speaker 2: side of things, where there's just like that anxiety that
Speaker 2: goes into someone feeling like, oh, well, everyone's going to
Speaker 2: the what coldplace you know concert or whatever the guy
Speaker 2: from HR or the lady firmation of a reference to
Speaker 2: that in the in the past spring, they're going, maybe
Speaker 2: I should go too.
Speaker 1: Nobody's starting that Matt that didn't get any viral attention.
Speaker 1: I don't know what you're talking about, and like.
Speaker 2: That to me feels like the sort of unhealthy side
Speaker 2: of it as well. For both of those reasons, I
Speaker 2: think that's part of why we've continued to see higher
Speaker 2: ticket prices, whether it's concerts, whether it's sporting events. But
Speaker 2: I'm assuming that you're probably down, you know, to maybe
Speaker 2: spend a little bit more of your entertainment dollars towards
Speaker 2: sporting events or to concerts.
Speaker 1: Right, not really sporting events, but concerts, Yes, ish, because
Speaker 1: I will say the price still matters as to whether
Speaker 1: or not I'm gonna I'm gonna pay it. Like there's
Speaker 1: a band that I liked that's coming in October, and
Speaker 1: I was like, hmm, yeah, if it was like in
Speaker 1: the fifty to sixty dollars range for ticket, I'm interested
Speaker 1: to see them at that price point. But they're not
Speaker 1: one of my all time faves. And so I think
Speaker 1: tickets were like one hundred bucks. I'm like, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna do it. So I think we just
Speaker 1: need to be willing to say no more often, Like
Speaker 1: it makes me think about There was this article about
Speaker 1: how now that Spirit Airlines has gone, people are taking
Speaker 1: the bus more to get where they want to go.
Speaker 1: I've ridden the megabus across the Southeast before. It saves
Speaker 1: a lot of money. Like you love the buses.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's great, it's.
Speaker 1: A great way to travel. I'm glad more people are
Speaker 1: picking up on it. But it doesn't mean because just
Speaker 1: because it's more expensive that you always have to say no.
Speaker 1: You can just pick and choose and say listen, instead
Speaker 1: of going to like eight concerts a year, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: go to four. I'm gonna go to the ones that
Speaker 1: I really really care about. Or instead of taking Spirit
Speaker 1: air which is very relatively inexpensive, I'm gonna I'm gonna
Speaker 1: take the bus. I'm still going to get there. I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna find a way to do it for less.
Speaker 1: And yeah, do I wish that concert tickets would go
Speaker 1: down in price? Yeah, but is Ticketmaster in charge of
Speaker 1: that world, and will concert tickets go down in price? No,
Speaker 1: I'm a realist, So it's just yeah, it's just one
Speaker 1: of those things. This is gonna, I think, probably annoy
Speaker 1: us for years to come.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, Well, speaking of buses, I know, I don't
Speaker 2: know if you would are gonna like spend some time
Speaker 2: talking about how great Mega bus is, but for meanwhile,
Speaker 2: since I've ridden it, but remember it with fondness, I'm
Speaker 2: just a snob. Man. I've never ridden on a bus,
Speaker 2: and I think that my I think my bus riding
Speaker 2: days are behind me. I mean I take that back
Speaker 2: in college, like I would alway take the bus, right.
Speaker 2: We had an awesome bus transit system at UGA, which
Speaker 2: evidently stinks now evidently they've reduced the some of the
Speaker 2: routes and stuff. And somebody told me recently they're like, oh, man,
Speaker 2: nobody rides a bus anymore. I'm like, oh, it's too bad,
Speaker 2: Like everybody used to ride the bus. That's just like
Speaker 2: how we did it. Talk about relational connection, mass a
Speaker 2: good place to hedy, dude, I'm telling you, like, can
Speaker 2: you just strike up a conversation with someone random? Like
Speaker 2: I literally would do that all the time. But as
Speaker 2: far as traveling to other cities, they're talking folks who
Speaker 2: were like, oh, yeah, I took a took a trip
Speaker 2: from upstate Maine down to New York City or something
Speaker 2: like that, and I'm just I think, I don't know.
Speaker 2: I just have a hard time the visioning getting to
Speaker 2: the bus stop, waiting getting on board with a bunch
Speaker 2: of other folks. I feel like we're going more and
Speaker 2: more in the doria. I just feel like we're going
Speaker 2: more in the direction of uber and lyft. Right Like
Speaker 2: that thing comes to me. Somebody needs to create like
Speaker 2: an uber and lyft long haul or something like. I'm
Speaker 2: sure you can do uber or lyft to another state,
Speaker 2: but I don't know, that's probably gonna be a crazy expensive.
Speaker 1: The prece point on some of those bus trips is
Speaker 1: pretty pretty great, and some of the accommodations on the
Speaker 1: buses look like they've gotten much much better. Like they've
Speaker 1: got Wi Fi and they've got tables that face tables
Speaker 1: in the middle of like two seats on either side,
Speaker 1: so you can like create like a little cabinets or something.
Speaker 2: Selah.
Speaker 1: So, I mean, I know you're fancy, but there's a
Speaker 1: lot of other folks out there who uh, you know,
Speaker 1: men of the people like me, women of the people,
Speaker 1: they'd be willing to.
Speaker 2: Dude, I don't want to hear it. Tell me that
Speaker 2: the next time you it's like a hostel. It's like
Speaker 2: you being like hostels are the best, the best, and
Speaker 2: like they are good for a certain period of time.
Speaker 2: Like I'm so glad that when I was younger that
Speaker 2: I stayed in plenty of hostels, sleeping in a room
Speaker 2: with like twenty other people for the really cheap spot,
Speaker 2: you know, And it's just it's rough. I've got some
Speaker 2: great stories, great memories. But guess what are you staying
Speaker 2: in a hostel anymore? When you travel with Emily or
Speaker 2: your kids?
Speaker 1: You're not same here right Like I'm place, but I
Speaker 1: don't know if I'm beyond a bus trip yet.
Speaker 2: Really, Okay, well, how about this maybe all time staying this,
Speaker 2: and the next time you take a bus trip, you
Speaker 2: let us know and we'll spend we'll spend plenty of
Speaker 2: time talking about how wonderful it was, just what your
Speaker 2: thoughts were for now, how much what you were able
Speaker 2: to say?
Speaker 1: We got more stories to get to. Okay, Americans, it
Speaker 1: turns out, are only getting worse at personal finance mat
Speaker 1: I don't know about you didn't surprise me. There's there's
Speaker 1: this new TIAA survey and basically they found that financial
Speaker 1: literacy has dropped to a ten year low. The average
Speaker 1: score on their simple quiz and by the way I
Speaker 1: went through it to take a look, was forty seven percent.
Speaker 2: So did you take the quiz? Yeah?
Speaker 1: Dude, it was so easy like it was. It was
Speaker 1: not like because sometimes the Wall Street Journal will publish
Speaker 1: articles and they're like, can you test can you try
Speaker 1: this quiz out? And sometimes the answers can be misleading
Speaker 1: and it feels like there's two right answers and they're
Speaker 1: like you were wrong on that one. Yeah, But this
Speaker 1: one was like it was something I would hope anybody
Speaker 1: who graduates high school would know the vast majority of
Speaker 1: these things, and they didn't.
Speaker 2: They dropped from like fifty two out of forty seven yeah,
Speaker 2: last year to this year. Right, it's just like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's not great. I never heard of this thing. It
Speaker 2: was called the Personal Finance Finance Index and I did
Speaker 2: not take the quiz. I'll see how I do after
Speaker 2: I sawn off with you.
Speaker 1: Like part of me holds out this hope that personal
Speaker 1: finance classes in high schools becoming mandatory is going to
Speaker 1: help fix this problem. I also wonder you and I've
Speaker 1: talked about, like, it's great that it's mandatory, but so
Speaker 1: much of whether how effective these classes are going to
Speaker 1: be depends on the teacher, depends on the curriculum. So
Speaker 1: I would hope that these classes would make it a
Speaker 1: goal that everyone going through those classes would be able
Speaker 1: to get a minimum of like a ninety percent on
Speaker 1: a test like this. And I do think these are
Speaker 1: just some of the basic questions. We'll link to the
Speaker 1: quiz in the show notes, but I feel like that
Speaker 1: these are some basic questions that everyone should be able
Speaker 1: to answer, and to see that people can't even get
Speaker 1: fifty percent of them right is like, is harrowing. No
Speaker 1: wonder people are bad with money.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So on the note of quizzes and surveys, there's
Speaker 2: another survey that said a third of folks have more
Speaker 2: credit card debt than they do retirement savings, which was
Speaker 2: pretty shocking. So the story led with that, and I thought,
Speaker 2: there's I don't know, man, that seems maybe it's just
Speaker 2: overblown or something like that, And I went digging through
Speaker 2: the details a little bit, and I was thinking, okay,
Speaker 2: I could pick I could totally picture a twenty two
Speaker 2: year old. Are they going to have more credit card
Speaker 2: debt than retirement savings? Absolutely? Yeah. I was disheartened to
Speaker 2: see that they weren't serveying people as young as eighteen
Speaker 2: or twenty two or even twenty five. It started at
Speaker 2: thirty year olds, which that's when and allthough it's to
Speaker 2: seventy nine year olds, and so a third of those
Speaker 2: folks between age thirty and seventy nine have more credit
Speaker 2: card debt than retirement savings. That's that's tough to stomach.
Speaker 1: You gotta flip the script, Matt. People can't be having
Speaker 1: ten thousand dollars in credit card debt in five thousand
Speaker 1: dollars in their investments. And if you you know, to
Speaker 1: get that kind of credit card debt racked up, it
Speaker 1: takes time. It takes months, and to kind of write
Speaker 1: the ship, it's going to take a while too. But
Speaker 1: it's your're sure to get started to have a plan
Speaker 1: to pay off the credit card debt and then to
Speaker 1: get the full match in your formal Okay, you've got
Speaker 1: to have like start making small decisions like you know what,
Speaker 1: no takeout for the next three months while I'm paying
Speaker 1: this credit card debt off intensively. They're just all sorts
Speaker 1: of changes that you have to make both mentally and
Speaker 1: then with where your money's going in order to be
Speaker 1: able to fix that. Because I think for a lot
Speaker 1: of people, they hear that, they're like, that's the situation
Speaker 1: I'm in, they get despondent, and man, that's not gonna
Speaker 1: help either. I think that we don't want to like
Speaker 1: shame you and say you know you're you're an idiot,
Speaker 1: can't believe you did that. This is like you are
Speaker 1: in company with a third I guess of investing Americans,
Speaker 1: so you're not alone. But there's changes that have to
Speaker 1: be made so that you can get kind of back
Speaker 1: on proper footing when it comes to your finances. That's right,
Speaker 1: all right, let's take a quick break, man. We got
Speaker 1: more to get to. Oh before I like do the
Speaker 1: whole pitch, though, what I need to do is hop
Speaker 1: over here to the sounder board and make sure I've
Speaker 1: got that cued up. But we've got more to talk to.
Speaker 2: For instance, we're gonna talk about Social Security running out
Speaker 2: of money. We're gonna talk about people hating on homeownership.
Speaker 2: We'll get all that more right after this. Grooming my mustache. Sorry, okay,
Speaker 2: that's vanity right there. Keep it groomed. Oh do you
Speaker 2: have any like bird nests growing up in Internet? Do
Speaker 2: you have a mustache comb? Yeah? No, it's tiny scruble. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Oh okay. I don't keep it in my pocket, but
Speaker 2: I have it in my bathroom at home. Are you
Speaker 2: gonna turn into one of these guys that has like
Speaker 2: no mustache wax and you're like going to grow it out?
Speaker 2: And do you remember when I used to have a
Speaker 2: mustache parents, but not that much? Yes, I do. I
Speaker 2: thought you had a great mustache. Your family disagreed, though,
Speaker 2: thank you. I'm glad you appreciated it anytime I bring
Speaker 2: it up. Well, first of all, Kate's like, well, you
Speaker 2: both can't have mustaches. I think that's true, though that
Speaker 2: kind of gives a different vibe to the show. I agree.
Speaker 2: I think if we both did, people would be like two,
Speaker 2: those guys are just too much. They overlapped too much. Yeah,
Speaker 2: like our friend Dan, he's also got a great mustache.
Speaker 2: But if he was your co host and you're both
Speaker 2: sitting there with your then it looks silly. But if
Speaker 2: one of us looks like me, one of us looks
Speaker 2: like you, feels a little more appropriate. I was gonna say,
Speaker 2: if you didn't have a mustache com I'd like get
Speaker 2: you one for Christmas, or something like a nice tortoise shell.
Speaker 2: I bet there's some nice ones out there that you
Speaker 2: can get. I guarantee there are nice waxes, nice poems.
Speaker 2: You got to talk about social security.
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's get to the Ludacro's headline of the week.
Speaker 1: This one comes from Yahoo Finance, and the headline says,
Speaker 1: will social Security go broke in twenty thirty two?
Speaker 2: Here's what's happening.
Speaker 1: And the headline is frustrating, But it's more than anything.
Speaker 1: What's happening with social security is frustrating. And this is
Speaker 1: an update that kind of happened Matt while we were
Speaker 1: out of town a few weeks ago. At this point
Speaker 1: in time, we've talked about it. We had Mike Piper
Speaker 1: on the show to talk about social security and the
Speaker 1: state of social security.
Speaker 2: The system in.
Speaker 1: General is troubling, and our politicians are elected officials unwillingness
Speaker 1: to address the issue is even more troubling, Like there
Speaker 1: are changes we could make, and the sooner we make them,
Speaker 1: the better. That could kind of iterate to solve this problem,
Speaker 1: or at least to mitigate the problem, make it less,
Speaker 1: make it less bad in terms of how things are
Speaker 1: going to shake out, make it more better, make it
Speaker 1: more better.
Speaker 2: Let's make sucure security more better.
Speaker 1: But the trust on is going to drive in twenty
Speaker 1: thirty two, which is what I think, one quarter sooner
Speaker 1: than it was previously expected for Q one thirty two
Speaker 1: versus q Q four thirty two versus Q one twenty
Speaker 1: thirty three. Right, And this is just going to keep
Speaker 1: getting more headlines. It's going to ramp up confusion, and
Speaker 1: people are just going to especially young people, young listeners,
Speaker 1: to how the money. I think they've already gotten the memo.
Speaker 1: They've got the message social security is not going to
Speaker 1: be there for me in the way that it was
Speaker 1: for my parents. And I don't think they're wrong.
Speaker 2: No, I agree. I think more folks our age have
Speaker 2: been wising up to it. It's it's a large part.
Speaker 2: And yeah, it's interesting because I don't think that there's
Speaker 2: as much concern from younger generations like our age and
Speaker 2: younger are essentially counting on it less and less. Right,
Speaker 2: It's like a spectrum, like if you are in retirement
Speaker 2: and that's your only source of income, Yeah, you're like,
Speaker 2: what's going to happen to My payout is going to
Speaker 2: get cut by almost twenty five percent. I think it's
Speaker 2: like twenty two or twenty three something. I think twenty
Speaker 2: five or twenty six percent. Yeah, oh really, Oh I
Speaker 2: thought it was a little bit less in that. But
Speaker 2: that's assuming that the government does nothing. And demographics show
Speaker 2: that we have a larger and larger percentage of voters
Speaker 2: who are older, which means it is going to get
Speaker 2: addressed somehow. Like there's for a while I was thinking, oh,
Speaker 2: they might just let this thing kind of sunset, like
Speaker 2: right off into the sunset. Nobody has to touch it,
Speaker 2: nobody has to get right drug over the coals, wracked
Speaker 2: over the coals or whatever for being the one that
Speaker 2: increases taxes. But at the same time, you've got a
Speaker 2: larger and larger block of folks who are counting on
Speaker 2: Social Security. But yeah, fact is, it is a real thing.
Speaker 2: I think what's important to note is that this is
Speaker 2: this isn't clickbait like the trust fund will run out,
Speaker 2: there will still be people paying into it, so it's
Speaker 2: not like it's drying up completely. So it's a little
Speaker 2: misleading there. But there is a structural issue that comes
Speaker 2: when it comes to social security, the future of it,
Speaker 2: how much it is we should be counting on it.
Speaker 2: And in the past we've talked about how or maybe
Speaker 2: you and I have talked about it, like when we've
Speaker 2: talked about sources of income, and you're like, I've got
Speaker 2: the stool, and you've got one leg that's this, You've
Speaker 2: got one leg that's that, and think about social Security.
Speaker 2: Perhaps it's just one leg of your retirement stool, but
Speaker 2: a weaker a weaker leg, right, it's not as sturdy
Speaker 2: as it once was, and so your other legs have
Speaker 2: to be even sturdier. Yeah, to make up. Like when
Speaker 2: you lock.
Speaker 1: We've talked about this before, when you log into social
Speaker 1: Security dot gov and it predicts what you're you know,
Speaker 1: what you're going to have in terms of a Social
Speaker 1: Security check when you hit different retirement ages. You can
Speaker 1: don't plan for that full amount, you know, plan for
Speaker 1: twenty five thirty percent less than what social Security dot
Speaker 1: Gov is telling you. Because especially like it's we're it's
Speaker 1: it's not only the Social Security Trust Fund is running out.
Speaker 1: It's so we're heading in the wrong direction. With more
Speaker 1: and more government spending, people living longer, people having fewer kids,
Speaker 1: and fewer.
Speaker 2: People paying into the system, paying fewer payroll taxes.
Speaker 1: It's only going to become a more and more unhealthy system.
Speaker 1: And the longer we wait to address it, yes, we
Speaker 1: can still find ways to put money into the system,
Speaker 1: but as a country with as much debt as we
Speaker 1: have they're trying to address the issue, it becomes more
Speaker 1: and more tenuous. Right, And so, yeah, this is just
Speaker 1: something to be aware of. And it's just again a
Speaker 1: call to as a DIY investor, be very intentional and
Speaker 1: not rely, not overly project, and rely on what Social
Speaker 1: Security is going to do for you.
Speaker 2: That's one reason that I'm encouraged by more and more
Speaker 2: folks who are saying, well, why why would I buy
Speaker 2: a house? Right? That's another story. We came across somebody
Speaker 2: who's writing I can't remember where, but essentially he was
Speaker 2: just like, I got the money I saved up, but
Speaker 2: I'm choosing not to purchase a home for one reason.
Speaker 2: I don't like the house I can afford. It's in
Speaker 2: a neighborhood I don't really like. But secondly, my net
Speaker 2: worth is growing more by investing those dollars. And you
Speaker 2: are seeing people who are investing more than dollars more
Speaker 2: their income. But that's the trick you need to offset,
Speaker 2: You need offset. I'm thinking about home ownership. Why has
Speaker 2: it been the number one way that Americans have built
Speaker 2: their net worth over the lifetime. Is because it's a
Speaker 2: forced method of savings. You are required to if you
Speaker 2: want to continue to live in that house, right, And
Speaker 2: it's one thing for someone to say that like, okay, well, hypothetically,
Speaker 2: if I were to invest, you know, I'm going to
Speaker 2: see my mind to increase out a faster at a
Speaker 2: faster rate, at a faster clip. But there's a difference
Speaker 2: between being forced to because you're living in the house,
Speaker 2: and if you don't, you get kicked out of that house.
Speaker 2: As a disclosure, it's a face. It's a savings treadmill, right,
Speaker 2: Like you are on this thing, and no matter what
Speaker 2: you are, at a certain pace, you're clipping along and
Speaker 2: you're socking money away. You're building equity there in your home.
Speaker 2: Can you do that on your own you need to.
Speaker 2: We just talked about why you need to because of
Speaker 2: social Security not necessarily being there in the same way
Speaker 2: that it is currently, but you need to. And what
Speaker 2: I think the four to one k millionaires is one
Speaker 2: of the more encouraging notes where people are signing up
Speaker 2: for that it is automatically being taken out of their
Speaker 2: pay out of their their paychecks, and they're not thinking
Speaker 2: about it, right, Like that's another mechanism and is a
Speaker 2: great reason why it is that we are actually seeing
Speaker 2: so many four one k millionaires. But you have to
Speaker 2: be so intentional about that, Like that's what's so clutched.
Speaker 2: That's the key because if you're not being intentional about that, yeah,
Speaker 2: you're going you're not gonna have nearly as much money
Speaker 2: on hand.
Speaker 1: I think there's some tried and true, like realities of
Speaker 1: wealth building that remain steady generation after your generation, and
Speaker 1: then there are other ways in which you have to say,
Speaker 1: what's the reality I'm facing and does it still make
Speaker 1: sense to do it the way my parents did it?
Speaker 1: And I think for more and more and more young
Speaker 1: people are saying, especially if they live in higher cost cities,
Speaker 1: especially with the discrepancy between mortgage what they pay in
Speaker 1: a mortgage is what they can pay in rent for
Speaker 1: something very similar. They're saying, hmm, doesn't really make sense
Speaker 1: the way different my parents doesn't really make sense the
Speaker 1: way it did eight, ten, fifteen years ago. And they're
Speaker 1: not wrong. And I'm not saying that the housing market
Speaker 1: won't change. And because right now, like home prices compared
Speaker 1: to the average salary, like there's a bigger discrepancy than
Speaker 1: there's been in a really long time then and that
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that can't change and level out.
Speaker 2: I think it can.
Speaker 1: I think the housing market could plateau for a while
Speaker 1: and it's going to look more appealing and appetizing to
Speaker 1: buy a home potentially five, six, eight years from now.
Speaker 1: But it doesn't like buying a home, you know, conditions
Speaker 1: be damned to Like that's not intelligent, that's just that's
Speaker 1: just trying to relive the playbook of your parents when
Speaker 1: the playbook doesn't make sense in the same way. It's
Speaker 1: like in the NFL, as they changed the defense, you
Speaker 1: got to change what you're willing to do on offense.
Speaker 1: And maybe you need some more head fakes and hail
Speaker 1: mary's and post routes.
Speaker 2: I don't know, Matt.
Speaker 1: I don't know enough about sports to really say, but
Speaker 1: this is like somebody's been brushing up on is Madden.
Speaker 1: This is a point where you call an audible you
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, and you make a change to
Speaker 1: kind of the scripted way that it's been done. And
Speaker 1: for a lot of people, I don't think it means
Speaker 1: home ownership can never be a reality. But you're just saying, Hey,
Speaker 1: given the facts on the ground, I'm going to prioritize
Speaker 1: investing right now. Maybe in maybe years down the road,
Speaker 1: I will revisit this decision. I'll be in a better
Speaker 1: off financial position. I'll be able to actually afford the
Speaker 1: house I want if at the same time, the housing
Speaker 1: market experience is a little bit of a correction totally.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the game has changed, which is why that's what
Speaker 2: you're talking about, right You're talking about being flexible because
Speaker 2: the game has changed because interest rates are so sick
Speaker 2: and high, and that's one of the ways that we
Speaker 2: see rates come down. Well, all of a sudden, housing
Speaker 2: homes in particular get you know, start getting a lot
Speaker 2: more affordable. And there's another article we saw that said
Speaker 2: that Americans were forking over an extra sixty five billion
Speaker 2: dollars because they were going essentially with their buddy, Like
Speaker 2: the first it's like, oh yeah, I know a guy,
Speaker 2: I know a guy that does mortgages, and they're like,
Speaker 2: oh yeah, okay, and they go with him or her
Speaker 2: and they don't get another quote. And sixty five billion
Speaker 2: dollars is so much money.
Speaker 1: So much race of money spread over you know, many
Speaker 1: hundreds of thousands of borrowers, but are millions of borrowers,
Speaker 1: so a little bit for everybody. But we've talked about
Speaker 1: how that adds up too.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: Yes, not shopping around like we shop around for everything.
Speaker 1: It's you know, except for the most expensive thing that
Speaker 1: could Like if it believes you an extra one hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty one hundred and fifty one hundred and eighty
Speaker 1: dollars a month because you didn't shop around and get
Speaker 1: that better mortgage rate through your local bank or credit union.
Speaker 2: Or talk to most like the credit union.
Speaker 1: Yes, yeah, yeah, Like we've talked about this when we're
Speaker 1: looking at some of these adjustable rate mortgages, Like, man,
Speaker 1: some of our local credit unions have far better rates
Speaker 1: than we've seen anywhere else. And if you're just like
Speaker 1: taking your realtor's recommendation for a mortgage lender, and you're
Speaker 1: just going straight there and you're not asking any questions
Speaker 1: and you're not comparing apples to apples. The money you
Speaker 1: could leave on the table, could it could be way
Speaker 1: more than your Netflix subscription every month? Think it costs you, like,
Speaker 1: you know, ten times your Netflix subscription.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you want to talk about other ways that folks
Speaker 2: can get discounts, let's see on their home insurance. Yeah,
Speaker 2: additional ways to make your housing cost a little bit less.
Speaker 2: So I loved this.
Speaker 1: There was an article I think it was in Baron's
Speaker 1: I don't remember kipling her about DIY upgrades that you
Speaker 1: can make. And one of the things they mentioned was
Speaker 1: even just like you know, your home insurance company is
Speaker 1: going to ask you what what certain questions about your
Speaker 1: house and certain changes that you make can impact you
Speaker 1: in a beneficial way when it comes to how much
Speaker 1: you pay for homeowners insurance. So one of those things
Speaker 1: is having a home security system, right and back in
Speaker 1: the day, that meant calling this one giant company who
Speaker 1: would install it for you, and they would put you
Speaker 1: in this nasty little contract and they would charge you
Speaker 1: like fifty five dollars a month, and if you tried
Speaker 1: to get out of that contract, they would break your
Speaker 1: legs or something like that. Right, that was kind of
Speaker 1: their tactic. It was the scare tactics and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: Then alone came simply safe.
Speaker 1: Were they the first? The first empty safe? Was the
Speaker 1: they started it all? And they just the revolution? Yes, And
Speaker 1: so even if maybe they're not the absolute best choice
Speaker 1: for everyone anymore, they're still a great choice worth considering.
Speaker 1: I think the having that competition thrust into the market,
Speaker 1: it opened up a whole nother space of like DIY
Speaker 1: homes security that didn't really exist before. You had to
Speaker 1: have a professional come to your house and install the
Speaker 1: cameras and blah blah. We don't do that anymore. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: it's like plug and play with tons of different companies
Speaker 1: out there selling you equipment for a pretty low cost
Speaker 1: and then selling you the monitoring on a monthly basis
Speaker 1: for a heck of a lot less for like ten percent.
Speaker 1: You know of what the big company used to charge.
Speaker 1: But this is an inexpensive thing that you can do
Speaker 1: to your home that actually could save you money over
Speaker 1: the long haul. So it's worth asking your homeowners insurance company, Hey,
Speaker 1: what can I do to save money on the costs
Speaker 1: as these costs of risen And if okay, if I
Speaker 1: got a let's say a cheap home security system, how
Speaker 1: much would that reduce my homeowners insurance bill? And you
Speaker 1: might find that you'd more than cover the costs of
Speaker 1: that security system you're installing in a year. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: it's I think it's one of those things more people
Speaker 1: should should consider.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, it makes me think about just other ways
Speaker 2: that you that a lot of folks when they're hit
Speaker 2: with a surprising new PREMI increase or maybe the like
Speaker 2: if they got a teenage driver, it's just like, oh
Speaker 2: my gosh, how much are we gonna and this these
Speaker 2: are waters that we're starting to We're still a few
Speaker 2: years out, but I'm still I talk to friends all
Speaker 2: the time and they've got teenage drivers and they're just
Speaker 2: talking about how much it costs, and they're looking for
Speaker 2: every good student discount possible. Right, But when you have
Speaker 2: home insurance rates that slowly creep up, Yeah, it's the
Speaker 2: boiling it's the frog and boiling water. Man. You just
Speaker 2: you get used to it and you're like, oh, I
Speaker 2: guess that's just what it is now as opposed to
Speaker 2: finding other ways to make your homeowners insurance costs less,
Speaker 2: like like installing a trampoline. I'm pretty sure that makes
Speaker 2: that brings down the cost of your homeowners insurance, does Nigel? Sure? Right?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know we have a trampoline. I know
Speaker 1: you do too, And I'm yeah, I don't even remember
Speaker 1: if they asked me the question.
Speaker 2: About do you have it. I don't know if they
Speaker 2: did either. I don't know why I thought of that.
Speaker 2: I was just thinking through, like what things on our
Speaker 2: property are make us more of a liability risk perhaps,
Speaker 2: And I'm like, oh, we do have a trampoline. You
Speaker 2: know you got some of these different Yeah, anyway, did
Speaker 2: you see.
Speaker 1: The article about the security deposits the fintech companies that
Speaker 1: are like allowing you to essentially pay an annual fee
Speaker 1: or smaller sums so that you don't have to pay
Speaker 1: as big of a security deposit if you're renting.
Speaker 2: If you're I did not, so fill me in. All right.
Speaker 1: So this is fascinating and it's terrible because just like
Speaker 1: everything else in modern America, there are fintech companies coming
Speaker 1: down the pike to try to help you out in
Speaker 1: a way that like where you have to pay less
Speaker 1: money in upfront, but ultimately it's going to cost you
Speaker 1: more in the end.
Speaker 2: And so these these.
Speaker 1: Products function kind of like insurance, like we're talking about
Speaker 1: where they are. You know, the security deposit this is
Speaker 1: this is gone now once you've paid this company and
Speaker 1: I forget what I forget what this company was called.
Speaker 1: I can try to look it up. But like these
Speaker 1: third party services charging you less money so that you
Speaker 1: can and they'll pay essentially the security deposit on your behalf.
Speaker 1: But if something happens, like to the property while you're
Speaker 1: in it, you now there's another party you're dealing with,
Speaker 1: and at the at the same time, like what you
Speaker 1: paid them, you never get that back. Let's say you
Speaker 1: kept the home and pristine condition and you moved out,
Speaker 1: like you don't, you don't get this back. So it's
Speaker 1: it's instead of a security deposit, this is like an
Speaker 1: insurance product that you're buying. And the National Consumer Law
Speaker 1: Center dug in and they basically said, hey, these put
Speaker 1: tenants in a worse financial position when you use when
Speaker 1: they use products.
Speaker 2: Like this, so as opposed to saving up on the
Speaker 2: front and having the cash on hand to be able
Speaker 2: to actually put the deposit down what you would most
Speaker 2: likely get back if you did keep the place, yes,
Speaker 2: in good shape. Oh I don't like that man. This
Speaker 2: is it's just like another way of breaking up these large,
Speaker 2: larger sums of money into monthly payments. It's like pm I,
Speaker 2: but like for rent deposit as opposed to a private
Speaker 2: mortgage insurance.
Speaker 1: But yeah, and it's just remike me too as a renter.
Speaker 1: To protect yourself, will one save up and have the
Speaker 1: have the security deposit, have all the money you need
Speaker 1: to make that happen, along with moving expenses, along with
Speaker 1: an emergency fund, but also take pictures when you move
Speaker 1: in and when you move out so that you document it,
Speaker 1: because there are some shady landlords out there too who
Speaker 1: will be like, yeah, you did a fifteen hundred dollars
Speaker 1: worth of damages. Here's the three hundred dollars from your
Speaker 1: security deposit that you know that we didn't need. And
Speaker 1: you're like, what, I didn't do anything, And then you're
Speaker 1: in some sort of legal dispute and nice, at least prove.
Speaker 2: That you didn't do anything. Yeah, yeah, it's a much
Speaker 2: stronger case. You want to talk about water. Should we
Speaker 2: talk about how waters get more expensive? We got tired
Speaker 2: for that.
Speaker 1: Have you noticed that water bills are going up? I
Speaker 1: feel like this has been happening for years now, that
Speaker 1: a little bit. It's not just electricity prices, it's water
Speaker 1: bills too. Yeah we so okay, So yeah.
Speaker 2: This is the story basically talks about how, generally speaking,
Speaker 2: I mean water, it's increasing at a faster clip, at
Speaker 2: a faster rate than consumer spending inflation just across the board,
Speaker 2: which I mean, I don't know, everything's getting more expensive.
Speaker 2: I did find it interesting that they were sort of
Speaker 2: cherry picking some extreme cases though, some instances where oh
Speaker 2: this the reservoir is empty, and it's like, okay, yes,
Speaker 2: we've got some serious problems when it comes it comes
Speaker 2: to the kind of water and the rates that we're
Speaker 2: able to pass along as the municipality to our residents
Speaker 2: and to our customers. It makes me so thankful for
Speaker 2: and I don't even know if we where we live,
Speaker 2: if we get our actual water from Atlanta, but it
Speaker 2: makes me think about the giant works project that they
Speaker 2: did where they drill or Mike, remember the name of
Speaker 2: the of the drill. They bored a tunnel from the
Speaker 2: river all the way to this reservoir, and it changed
Speaker 2: our days city days on hand water from like two
Speaker 2: or three days to like thirty, which I'm like, that
Speaker 2: seems responsible. Good job city there, right, Yeah, And so
Speaker 2: on one hand, there is not a ton that you
Speaker 2: can do when it comes to a when it comes
Speaker 2: to the kind of infrastructure spending that has to take place.
Speaker 2: That's why a lot of it is taking place, right,
Speaker 2: It's just these systems that have been in place for
Speaker 2: a long time. They need to be replaced. You can
Speaker 2: keep that in mind, But I doubt many people are
Speaker 2: going to change where it is that they're moving to
Speaker 2: based on what kind of condition it's. It's sort of
Speaker 2: like looking at the an Hoa and looking at the
Speaker 2: reserves and being like, hmm, how are we doing There's
Speaker 2: not there's not a whole lot of folks doing that
Speaker 2: when it comes to the city that they're living.
Speaker 1: No, but they should be. In the case of an Hoa,
Speaker 1: probably should be exactly the city means the water, you know,
Speaker 1: and how how what you know? What what does that
Speaker 1: look like? But when it comes to individuals other there's
Speaker 1: there's bigger reasons that you're moving to a certain city
Speaker 1: or to a certain district, whether it's schools, jobs, to
Speaker 1: be closer to a family. But on a personal level,
Speaker 1: there are absolutely things that you can do. And that's
Speaker 1: what we talk about here on the show.
Speaker 2: The things. We're not talking about policy, we're talking about
Speaker 2: what you can do as an individual. Do you say,
Speaker 2: like to take your showers? Well, literally, when Georgia was
Speaker 2: going through a drought many years ago, the then governor,
Speaker 2: they were he like, he had like an address to
Speaker 2: the state and he and I'm still remember I can
Speaker 2: say it the way he said it, take a shorter shower,
Speaker 2: Like that's the way, Like that's what he said to people,
Speaker 2: and he's not he's not wrong. Like the shorter shower. Okay,
Speaker 2: shorter showers, they take no shower at all than the
Speaker 2: shorter shower.
Speaker 1: Now he didn't say don't bathe, which I appreciate because
Speaker 1: people would have probably revolted. But replacing your toilet lofo
Speaker 1: toilet sped in. The water company will pay you, we'll
Speaker 1: buy the toilet for you basically to do that, and
Speaker 1: then you're able to save some money or not having
Speaker 1: a fancy lawn right that requires watering. There are all
Speaker 1: these ways that you can around the edges at least
Speaker 1: save on your water bill. I don't I don't know
Speaker 1: that you're going to like cut it in half, right,
Speaker 1: but you might be able to get to lop fifteen
Speaker 1: twenty bucks a month off of your water usage if
Speaker 1: you take just a couple of measures and you did
Speaker 1: that don't involve smelling when you show up to work.
Speaker 2: It's true. It makes me think about my parents' house,
Speaker 2: and they're like, they do the exact opposite. They're just like, oh,
Speaker 2: I love it when the water flows. So like my dad,
Speaker 2: he takes much pride in the water pressure at our house.
Speaker 2: And I will say, like, you get in the shower
Speaker 2: there and like it feels like a tingly massage. It's
Speaker 2: insane just how much it just cuts through the hair.
Speaker 2: But one of the downsides of that, and I told
Speaker 2: him the last time we were talking about this, I
Speaker 2: was just like, you know, remember that time that the
Speaker 2: water filter that was on the outside of the fridge
Speaker 2: cracked and water went everywhere and kind of ruined the floor.
Speaker 2: I was just like, I wonder if that has anything
Speaker 2: to do with the fact that the pressure going to
Speaker 2: the all of our appliances all to all of your
Speaker 2: appliances in the house are like, it's basically twice what
Speaker 2: it should be. He's like one of the regulators or
Speaker 2: whatever that's called, right, Yeah, so, so modern plumbing codes,
Speaker 2: it's the PrV. It's the pressure reduction valve or something
Speaker 2: like that, and it's supposed to be set at a
Speaker 2: certain level. But either older homes that were built before
Speaker 2: that was required either don't have that, or sometimes people
Speaker 2: get down there and they increase the pressure. And I'm
Speaker 2: just saying that that also leads to other problems down
Speaker 2: the road, Like your valves on your faucet, it's not
Speaker 2: made to handle that kind of pressure as well. So
Speaker 2: not only are we talking about you on a daily
Speaker 2: basis using more water, but also just the premature failure
Speaker 2: of a faucet, of a valve on the toilet or
Speaker 2: something like that, you know, like the failure. That's what
Speaker 2: my parents called me, Matt. Oh no, you didn't. You
Speaker 2: didn't fail to launch my friend. But yeah, so that's
Speaker 2: that's the story about water. We won't get into how
Speaker 2: I'm spending I'm buying big jugs of bottled water now
Speaker 2: for my for my expresso machine. Oh okay, did I
Speaker 2: tell you that is it's that's the most expensive way
Speaker 2: to pay for water apparently, and a giant thing something
Speaker 2: about the water chemistry. But we will connect that it's
Speaker 2: worth it because you got to do that. I think, dude,
Speaker 2: this is my new craft beer equivalent. I think I'm
Speaker 2: willing to say that here on the show. Now that's
Speaker 2: I'm spending more of my premium top dollar on. I mean,
Speaker 2: I already spent it. But we were just talking this
Speaker 2: morning about dabbling and getting into the higher end coffees
Speaker 2: because I can tell the difference, and I'm like, hey,
Speaker 2: I'd rather do that than by another four pack of
Speaker 2: some really nice beer. I think the espresso you made
Speaker 2: me before our trail run was delicious. That was this morning.
Speaker 2: Literally did you enjoy that? That's so good.
Speaker 1: Nothing puts a pep in my step makes you want
Speaker 1: to run up a mountain like that. So yeah, that's
Speaker 1: gonna do it for this episode. Yeah, and again, we
Speaker 1: are on If you're listening to this on the audio feed, awesome,
Speaker 1: thank you. But we're also on YouTube. You can check
Speaker 1: that out. We'll put the link to our new YouTube
Speaker 1: channel in the show notes. You can see our beautiful
Speaker 1: smiling shining faces over there. If you do, go over there,
Speaker 1: hit the subscribe button and like hit the thumb leaees,
Speaker 1: because then that tells like the YouTube overlords that like
Speaker 1: our content is worth watching and they matter like way
Speaker 1: too much in our society these days. So tell them,
Speaker 1: tell them we're okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're okay, We're okay. All right, that's gonna be
Speaker 2: it for this particular episode. Buddy. We hope everyone has
Speaker 2: a fantastic weekend. We'll see you back here on Monday,
Speaker 2: so Buddy, until next time, best friends out, best friends out.
Speaker 2: See you later, Buddy later