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Welcome to personal finance for
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long-term investors, where we believe
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Benjamin Franklin's advice that an
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investment in knowledge pays the best
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interest both in finances and in your
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life. Every episode teaches you personal
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finance and long-term investing in
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simple terms. Now, here's your host,
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Jesse Kramer. Hello and welcome to
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episode 109 of Personal Finance for
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Long-Term Investors. My name is Jesse
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Kramer. By day, I work for a fiduciary
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wealth management firm helping clients
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all over the country. and by night. I
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write a blog called The Best Interest. I
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podcast here on personal finance for
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long-term investors where I simplify
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complex ideas about personal finance
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from investing to taxes to retirement
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and beyond. Today, we've got a fun
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episode for you. I asked a few other
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terrific financial creators to share a a
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funny story or a cautionary tale from
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their own lives, specifically about the
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idea of spending money. Perhaps it's a
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keeping up with the Joneses type story
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or a a total misunderstanding of how the
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world works or a a painful lesson
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learned or even in one case I know a
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question to ask of all you listeners.
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The point is our choices to spend or to
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save. They're some of the most basic but
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most fundamental choices in our
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financial lives, right? Spending and
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saving is this foundational principle.
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We we can't talk about Roth conversions
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in retirement unless we're first making
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prudent spending choices and abundant
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saving choices along the way. But before
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we get into that content today, we have
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a review of the week and I want to tell
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you three quick stories somewhat related
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to spending. At least two of them are.
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So, first our review of the week. Shane
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Immler left a five-star review on Apple
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Podcasts. He says, "The complete
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package. I found Jesse through another
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finance themed podcast, and I'm glad I
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did. He has a way of breaking down
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complex financial topics into
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digestible, easy to understand
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conversations. His humor and personality
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make him likable and more importantly
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relatable. Whether you're a finance pro
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or a new investor, you should subscribe
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to his podcast and don't forget to check
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out all the articles on his blog. Shane,
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thank you so so much for those kind
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words. And yes, listeners, if you
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haven't heard, I now have a new batch of
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super soft t-shirts specifically branded
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for personal finance for long-term
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investors. They're no longer the best
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interest branded shirts, but instead
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personal finance for long-term investors
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shirts. So Shane, uh, you know you have
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one on the way. Shoot me an email. make
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sure I have your your name and address,
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which I believe I already do. And I'm
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going to get you hooked up with one of
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those new Supersoft t-shirts. So, that's
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exciting. And another not quite normal,
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but also just exciting news. I want to
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share a a quick success story, a a
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win-win story that I think proves the
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concept of what I'm trying to do here on
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the podcast, and I I wanted to share it
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with all you listeners. So, a listener,
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Paul, he reached out to me in January,
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and Paul's brother, we we'll call him
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Peter, although I'm I'm intentionally
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keeping him somewhat confidential. his
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identity confidential for now. Peter
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works for big tech company. You know,
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think Microsoft, Amazon, Google, etc.
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And like many longtime employees of
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those big tech companies, Peter has a
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lot of restricted stock units, stock
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options, some vested stock in that
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company, plus he has a large salary paid
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for by that company. In other words, so
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many of Peter's financial eggs are all
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tied up to this one company's basket.
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And and that's a really big risk. And
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with retirement probably within five
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years or so, ideally for Peter, there's
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a lot of work that he has to do to
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ensure that his retirement plan is set
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up for success. So Peter went to Paul,
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his brother, who's our listener. Paul's
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our listener. And Peter knows that Paul
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loves personal finance. And he went to
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ask him some questions. And Paul gave
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him some answers, including sending
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Peter some of our podcast episodes here.
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And Paul also said, "Hey, Peter, why
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don't you reach out to Jesse directly?
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He helps people like you." So, Peter and
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I started a conversation and over a
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couple months of good conversations that
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led to Peter now working with me
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full-time as a client. And the reason
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I'm sharing this story with you
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listeners is because that's the the
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virtuous cycle that I'm hoping for here
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with this podcast. This is super fun for
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me to produce and talk into this
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microphone. It's awesome to interact
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with you all via email to answer your
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questions on the AMA episodes. But, as
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you know, I I don't run outside
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advertising. I'm not pushing book sales
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on you. I don't have affiliate marketing
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relationships. The one and only way I
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support this podcast financially and the
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way I support my family financially is
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by working with clients all over the
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country here from Cobblestone Capital
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Adviserss in Rochester, New York. Right.
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We're a fully fiduciary independent
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wealth management firm. We solve complex
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financial questions for the individuals
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and families who we work with. So, Paul,
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thank you so much for listening and for
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thinking of me and and helping out this
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business model, if you will. At least,
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you know, it's working the way I'm
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intending it to work. Peter, thank you
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for coming on as a client if you're
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listening. My vision for the podcast is
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that it'll always stay free and very
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high density in terms of the helpful
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content to everybody out there
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listening. So, if you or someone in your
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life is seeking trusted expert financial
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advice, I hope you'll continue to think
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of me. Okay, on with the show. Before we
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get to everyone else's spending stories
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today, I want to share two powerful
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stories that I learned from from clients
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from my work recently. If you read all
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my blog posts, you actually probably saw
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this blog post in last month, but I
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wrote this recent article. It's called
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scar tissue, and the link to the article
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is in the show notes. So, if we think of
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a deep wound, a terrible burn, the
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remnants of of life-changing surgery,
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that's scar tissue, the body's natural
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way of healing after an injury. I had to
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look this up. So, when skin or other
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tissue is damaged, the body produces
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something called collagen fibers to
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close and strengthen the wound. And that
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repair process results in scar tissue
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with an appearance and a texture
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different than the original tissue
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because it's laid down so quickly to
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heal from the wound and without the
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original structure of our of our normal
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skin. Physical scar tissue it it does
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carry some sort of memory component with
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it too. The same event that burned us or
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cut us can create some emotional
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psychological wounds or quite often a
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particular event might not leave any
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physical scar tissue at all but it
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creates this deep memory scar tissue. I
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don't know if you all listening remember
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this, but at the end of 2022, there was
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a terrible blizzard in Buffalo, New York
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that killed, I think, 40 or 50 people.
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And I was actually caught driving in
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that blizzard, actually in the early
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hours of that blizzard. And I have no
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physical damage, thankfully, from the
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blizzard. But there's a mental wound in
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my brain that gets very hyperactive when
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I'm driving in the snow. Kind of like,
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you know, your your uncle's knee that
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aches when a storm is on the horizon.
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Those mental scars, right, forged from
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some sort of intense or traumatic
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experience, they shape the way we think,
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the way we react, and the way we feel
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long after that proximate event itself
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has passed away. The scars can protect
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us in some ways. You know, making us
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more cautious for future events. But
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they also limit us if we never learn or
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heal or reframe the story behind the
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scar. If you've educated yourself enough
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on personal finance and investing, you
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know that money's mental and
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psychological aspects probably matter
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much more than the numbers do. I'd argue
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that most people I speak with struggle
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more with the mental and the
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psychological than they do with rational
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arithmetic. But sometimes you need to
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hear a a firsthand account, a real story
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for that fact to sink in. And back in
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May, I was blessed to hear two stunning
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anecdotes of this type. And I want to
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share those anecdotes with you. So the
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first one is from an elderly lady I met
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with just this delightful woman, very
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kind, very funny. She was born in the
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late 1930s, so just on the tail end of
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the Great Depression. And by the time
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she was 16 or 18 or 21 years old, those
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kind of ages where we really start to
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shape our personal worldviews and the
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Great Depression had been done and
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dusted for a couple decades, but I'm
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sure even though maybe she didn't
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realize it as a child, the echoes of the
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Great Depression surrounded her. She was
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really she was swimming in it. And if we
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think of the adults and the role models
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in her life and their experiences as
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adults in the Great Depression, it
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starts to make sense. Those echoes,
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those lessons, those fundamental changes
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in American life all informed the person
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that she grew up to be. And in some way,
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they informed the person she is today in
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2025. Now, regarding financial planning,
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she and her family saved and invested
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wisely for many, many decades. And here
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she is in her late 80s living off less
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than 1% of her portfolio assets every
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year. And as we've discussed here on the
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podcast and I've written about on the
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blog, living off of 1% per year is very,
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very, very low and doubly so for someone
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her age. And yet, despite that
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mathematical fact, this woman looked
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around the room at her children in a
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meeting with us and looked at my
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colleagues and looked at me and she
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said, "Thank you all for what you're
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doing, but I just want to make sure you
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guys really understand. I do not want to
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run out of money. So, if all we do is
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look at the math, we'd think to
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ourselves like, wow, that's kind of a
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silly thing to say. Someone withdrawing
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1% per year, let alone someone who's 85
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plus years old withdrawing 1% per year,
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they will never ever ever run out of
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money. But if we pause and zoom out
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remembering where she came from and what
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she's been through, the light bulb goes
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off. Aha, this is great depression scar
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tissue. It's still there 85 years later.
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not an opinion. It's there. It's fact.
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It's very real to her. And we might
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think to ourselves, well, the numbers
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just don't justify feeling that way. And
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sure, I agree with that. The numbers
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alone don't justify her concerns. But
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that memory scar tissue, it didn't just
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manifest on its own. Just as with a real
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scar, it got there through some sort of
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burn or cut or traumatic injury, right?
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Traumatic. This woman's concern, her
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memory scar tissue is born out of real
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financial trauma from the Great
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Depression. It doesn't just disappear
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with a few off-the- cuff lines of
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retirement math. And the second story
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along those lines comes from a
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45-year-old man, as nice and humble as
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you can imagine, the very salt of the
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earth kind of guy. 25 years ago, he
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started his career in a bluecollar
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technical manual labor field, and he
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just worked, worked, worked, progressed
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one step at a time. And now for the last
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couple years, he's been managing his
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entire company's manual labor workforce
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of 1,700 employees. So serious, serious
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progress. But to explain where he came
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from, he told me this story. He said,
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"I'll never forget it. Our daughter was
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young at the time. We were in Wegman's
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grocery store. I walked over to the meat
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department. I got one of those packages
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of chicken breast. I put it in the cart,
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but my wife stopped me and she looked at
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me and she said, "I'm sorry, honey, but
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we can't afford chicken." So, just
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imagine that, listeners, what did that
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chicken cost, but the budget was tight,
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right? Kids are expensive. Income was
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hard to come by at the time. And you
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fast forward to today, he's leading a
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team of 1,700 employees. His
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compensation definitely matches his
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responsibility. We're talking easily
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within the top 1% of all earners in the
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country. Hard work is really paying off
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for him. He's the kind of guy who
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deserves it. But he admitted to me, he
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goes, "I'll never forget hearing that we
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couldn't afford chicken, and sometimes I
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still feel like that's my relationship
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with money." Okay, so once again, we
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might think, well, the numbers just
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don't justify feeling that way. And once
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again, I would agree. The numbers alone
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shout out, "You know what, man? Eat
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nothing but chicken for the rest of your
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life. You'll be fine." But his memory
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scar tissue. It didn't manifest on its
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own. It got there through burns or cuts
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or traumatic injury. Traumatic. So, I'm
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not sure if it was disappointment or
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sadness or shame, a combination of those
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things, maybe a different emotion
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altogether, but the feeling that you
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can't afford a quote unquote simple
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grocery item for your family, that
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feeling sticks with you and it leaves a
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mark. And even as life goes on, the
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financial floodgates might open like
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they did for this guy, but the scar
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tissue still sticks around. So then I
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think to myself, what about you
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listening? And what about me? And I
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mean, we don't have any financial scar
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tissue, right? Well, we're going to jump
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from scars to opthalmology. It's not
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that I'm becoming a medical expert, but
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I do know this. We all have two blind
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spots in the middle of our visual field.
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The optic nerve blind spot. I had to
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look this up. It's a small area on each
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of our two retinas where the optic nerve
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exits the eye. It contains no photo
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receptors and therefore is incapable of
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detecting visual information. And the
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great irony is that most of us are
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ignorant or blind, you could say, to
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those blind spots. Most humans have gone
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their entire lives without realizing
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that they have blind spots in their
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visual field. Yes, you listening, you
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have two blind spots in your visual
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field. And I'd argue that most of us,
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you listening at home, me talking to
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this microphone, the two people I talked
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about before, we go our entire lives
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blind to our own financial scar tissue,
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blind to the trauma, blind to the
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long-lasting effects that define our
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very lives, define the way we choose to
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spend money or not spend money. We make
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daily financial decisions as a function
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of those long-held beliefs. Some are
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logical and and maybe well thought
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beliefs, but other are a function of
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pure financial trauma. Yet again, this
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is one of those times where I want to
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call upon David Foster Wallace's speech,
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This is Water. Longtime listeners,
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longtime readers know it's one of my
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favorites, especially the opening story,
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The Parable of the Fish, where David
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Foster Wallace says, "There are these
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two young fish swimming along, and they
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happen to meet an older fish swimming
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the other way," who nods at them and
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says, "Morning, boys. How's the water,
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and the two young fish swim on for a
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bit, and then eventually one of them
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looks over at the other and goes, "What
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the hell is water?" We're so immersed in
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it, we forget it's even there. Or as
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Wallace said, the most obvious and
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important realities are often the ones
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that are the hardest to see and talk
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about, just like our blind spots, just
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like our scar tissue. Here's a quick ad
00:13:23
and then we'll get back to the show. Did
00:13:25
you know my written blog, The Best
00:13:27
Interest, was nominated for 2022
00:13:29
personal finance blog of the year, and
00:13:31
it's been highlighted in the Wall Street
00:13:33
Journal, Yahoo Finance, and on CNBC. I
00:13:36
love writing, especially when that
00:13:37
writing is to share financial education.
00:13:40
And I usually write one or two articles
00:13:42
per week. You can read them all at
00:13:44
bestinterinterest.blog.
00:13:46
Again, the web address is
00:13:48
bestinterest.blog.
00:13:50
Check it out. So, thanks for listening
00:13:53
to those stories. I'm interested to hear
00:13:54
what you have to say. And now, let's get
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to some of our awesome guest
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contributors today and start with their
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stories. So, for the first one, let's
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pass it off to Joe Salaul Seehi from
00:14:02
Stacking Benjamins for his hilarious
00:14:04
mini bar story. Hey there, Jesse and
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personal finance geeks. This is Joe
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Salaul See from Stacking Benjamins and I
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have a story that didn't kill me but was
00:14:16
a fantastic time with money. I was
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dating this wonderful woman at the time.
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I'm from farm country West Michigan. I'd
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never been to an upscale hotel. And this
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woman I was dating was fantastic. By the
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way, now we've been married 32 years.
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And I decided I was going to invite her
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to go to Chicago with me. And I found
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this beautiful hotel just north of all
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the bars, which was called at the time
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the Clarage House. And it's in this kind
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of brownstone neighborhood. Beautiful
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place. And we pull up and of course I
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immediately see that the parking's going
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to be a bunch of money and the money
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that I really don't have. and I could
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barely scrape together the money for the
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hotel room, but I really wanted to
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impress this fine young lady. And so I
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figured it all out. We get up to the
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hotel room and everything looks great,
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but there's a refrigerator. And so I
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walk over to the refrigerator while
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Cheryl is getting ready to go out this
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first night in Chicago. When she comes
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out, I've got some macadamia nuts and a
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Bud Light and I'm watching the football
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game. And Cheryl said, what are you
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doing there? And I said, it's amazing.
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There's this refrigerator in our room
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that's just full of snacks. And she said
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something ridiculous. She said, I think
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you have to pay for those. And I said to
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her, I don't think you know how much I
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paid for this room. Cuz in my mind,
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there was no way that of course that
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they were going to charge for this.
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Well, what was really cool was not only
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do we go out, we have a wonderful time
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at this jazz club and at dinner, we come
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back and not only do they have little
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chocolates on our pillow, but they've
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restocked the Bud Light and the
00:16:03
macadamia nuts from the refrigerator.
00:16:06
So, the next morning we go out to the
00:16:08
museums and before we go, I grab some
00:16:11
potato chips, I grab some M&M's, and a
00:16:14
couple bottles of water. And then we
00:16:16
come back, those have been restocked.
00:16:20
We had the best best best weekend. But
00:16:23
the next day, as we're getting ready to
00:16:25
check out, and of course, we've been
00:16:26
married now for 32 years, so this is
00:16:28
before, you know, maybe you could do
00:16:30
some type of phone checkout, but I
00:16:31
thought you had to stand in line. So, we
00:16:34
get our suitcases. We begin to leave. We
00:16:37
get to the elevator and I all of a
00:16:39
sudden got this idea cuz I'm a pretty
00:16:43
moneysavvy guy and I don't want to waste
00:16:45
money. I said, "You know what? You go
00:16:47
downstairs and I'll be right back." She
00:16:48
goes, "What are you doing?" And I said,
00:16:49
"I forgot something. I'll be right
00:16:51
back." So, I go back to the hotel room
00:16:54
and I take my suitcase. I unzip it right
00:16:57
in front of the refrigerator and I take
00:17:00
my hand and I just pile everything in
00:17:05
the fridge into my suitcase and I zip it
00:17:09
back up and now I'm getting a ton of
00:17:11
value out of all this stuff. So, I go
00:17:13
back down and I wait in this super long
00:17:15
line to check out. We waited forever and
00:17:17
Cheryl's just over sitting in the front
00:17:19
window of the hotel watching the cars go
00:17:21
by and pedestrians. And I finally make
00:17:24
it up to the front and the woman says,
00:17:26
"Well, how was your stay?" And I said,
00:17:28
"Oh, this place is amazing. We had the
00:17:31
best time. Thank you so much." And then
00:17:33
she said, "Did you enjoy the mini bar?"
00:17:36
I thought to myself, "What business of
00:17:39
yours is that?" But I'm a pretty polite
00:17:42
guy, so what I said out loud wasn't
00:17:43
that. I said, "Well, thank you. We
00:17:45
enjoyed it very much." And then she
00:17:48
says, "Well, I've see here the purchases
00:17:52
you made the first two days." And then
00:17:54
she takes out a piece of paper and said,
00:17:56
"Would you kindly list here all the
00:17:58
other things that you had?" And I see
00:18:00
those. This is 30 years ago. And the
00:18:02
M&M's were not 75 cents like they were
00:18:06
at the store at the time. They were like
00:18:08
350. This Tober loan, I'd never had to
00:18:11
loan was like five bucks. Those little
00:18:13
Jack Daniels things, you know, six,
00:18:14
seven, eight bucks. And I've got all of
00:18:16
it in my suitcase right next to me. And
00:18:20
there's this just pit in my stomach
00:18:22
because I was really struggling with
00:18:24
money
00:18:26
and I don't know what I'm going to do.
00:18:29
So I look at this list and then I look
00:18:31
down at my suitcase and I look back at
00:18:34
the list again and I look back at my
00:18:36
suitcase again. The guy behind me coughs
00:18:39
because he's been in line every bit as
00:18:40
long as I've been and I'm clearly
00:18:42
wasting time. I look over at Cheryl and
00:18:44
she's just giving me the like, "What's
00:18:45
up look?" And then I look at the woman
00:18:47
and I thought for a second and I said,
00:18:50
"I had all of it." And she goes, "Excuse
00:18:53
me?" And I said, "I had all of it." And
00:18:57
she was super professional. Her mouth
00:18:59
only went up for like a quarter second
00:19:01
into this unbelieved, unbelievable
00:19:04
smirk, like this laugh. But then she
00:19:07
went, "Okay, very good. Just sign here
00:19:09
on the bottom and we'll just charge it
00:19:10
to your card." And as she is putting in
00:19:14
these expenses and getting me my
00:19:16
receipt, I'm just praying, "Please let
00:19:17
my card go through. Please, please,
00:19:19
please, please, please let my card go
00:19:22
through." And I blocked out exactly how
00:19:23
much money it was. But that day, we had
00:19:25
Toberlone all the way home and potato
00:19:28
chips and more macadamia nuts and a
00:19:31
Snickers bar. And it was a fun drive
00:19:34
back to Michigan, but it wasn't fun
00:19:36
paying that bill later. So, there's my
00:19:40
stupidness with money. Turns out the
00:19:42
mini bar, Jesse, isn't free. How many
00:19:45
times in your life have you spent money
00:19:47
without even realizing it? Have you ever
00:19:48
been so embarrassed about something that
00:19:49
you simply accepted your fate rather
00:19:51
than trying to maybe find a way out of
00:19:53
it? Have you ever eaten a tollerone
00:19:55
candy and washed it down with a mini
00:19:56
bottle of Jack Daniels? Thank you, Joe,
00:19:58
for sharing that story. And I think a
00:19:59
good takeaway here is that very few
00:20:01
things in life are truly free. And if it
00:20:04
seems too good to be true, that might be
00:20:06
the case. Okay, now let's hand it off to
00:20:08
Justin Peters, host of Fiminded. Hey
00:20:11
listeners of Personal Finance for
00:20:13
Long-Term Investors. I'm Justin Peters,
00:20:15
host of Fi Minded, a podcast for people
00:20:17
chasing financial independence and
00:20:19
having fun along the way. Jesse asked me
00:20:22
to share a spending story. I definitely
00:20:24
had my fair share of like keeping up
00:20:26
with the Joneses moments, but today I
00:20:29
want to go a little bit different
00:20:30
direction and tell you about a situation
00:20:32
that taught me an unexpected lesson. It
00:20:35
was fall of 2024 and I heard a bunch of
00:20:38
noise outside my house. I stepped out
00:20:40
and saw a construction crew putting up
00:20:42
no parking signs right in front of my
00:20:44
place. I live in a neighborhood with no
00:20:47
restricted parking, so I asked one of
00:20:49
the workers what was going on. Turns out
00:20:51
the city was installing a crosswalk. I
00:20:54
was a little annoyed because this is
00:20:55
where I usually park and I hadn't
00:20:57
received any notice, but I brushed it
00:20:59
off. That was until the weekend. I had
00:21:02
just picked up a piece of furniture and
00:21:04
when I got home, I realized I couldn't
00:21:06
unload it on my own. I called my sister
00:21:08
and she said that she could come help me
00:21:10
in 20 minutes. So, I parked halfway in
00:21:13
front of my driveway, halfway in the new
00:21:15
no parking zone and I went inside to
00:21:17
wait for her. When I came back outside,
00:21:19
there was a parking ticket on my
00:21:21
windshield. I was so furious. Those
00:21:24
signs had literally just gone up that
00:21:26
week. The curb and the crosswalk weren't
00:21:28
even painted yet. I was mostly blocking
00:21:31
my own driveway and I'd only been inside
00:21:33
for maybe 30 minutes. I thought to
00:21:36
myself, "Well, there goes $50." Later
00:21:38
that night, I went online to pay the
00:21:40
ticket. There wasn't a cost on the
00:21:41
ticket, so I was expecting about a $50
00:21:44
fine. And instead, I found out it was
00:21:47
$512.
00:21:49
Apparently, since I was blocking a
00:21:51
crosswalk, I was cited for impeding the
00:21:54
mobility of the disabled. Yeah. Yeah. I
00:21:58
was fuming and ready to fight. But I ran
00:22:01
into an issue. I'd been driving my
00:22:04
girlfriend's car, so the ticket was in
00:22:06
her name. Whenever I called her and told
00:22:08
her about this, she didn't want anything
00:22:10
to do with going to a courthouse and
00:22:12
contesting the ticket, which is honestly
00:22:14
totally fair. It was my mistake and my
00:22:16
problem to deal with. So, I did some
00:22:18
digging. And to contest it, I could have
00:22:21
completed an affidavit, got it
00:22:23
notorized, and then scheduled a court
00:22:24
date, which of course had limited
00:22:26
daytime hours. I think it was like
00:22:28
something ridiculous like 10:00 a.m. to
00:22:30
3:30 p.m. with like a 12 to 1:00 lunch
00:22:33
hour. So, I was like, "Ugh, man, I'm
00:22:35
going to have to like find some time
00:22:36
during the day to go and take care of
00:22:38
this." But I was ready. I was going to
00:22:40
go full crusader and get this parking
00:22:42
ticket reduced. But that's when my
00:22:44
girlfriend asked me a very simple
00:22:46
question. Is all that time and energy
00:22:49
worth it? At first, I was like, "Oh,
00:22:51
hell yeah." I was so defensive. I felt
00:22:54
so wronged. a $500 parking ticket,
00:22:57
parking in front of my own house for a
00:23:00
crosswalk that didn't even exist yet.
00:23:02
But then later that night, I started
00:23:04
thinking about it. I was already
00:23:06
overloaded and stressed with other
00:23:07
things that I needed to take care of.
00:23:09
And the whole process, I know, would
00:23:11
have drained me. And honestly, there was
00:23:13
no guarantee that I would have won. I
00:23:15
think I had a legitimate case to to
00:23:17
prove, and hopefully I could have got it
00:23:18
reduced to a normal parking ticket, but
00:23:20
that wasn't guaranteed. So, what did I
00:23:22
do? I paid that freaking ticket the next
00:23:24
day. Sure, I still grumble about it now
00:23:27
and then, but as soon as I hit the pay
00:23:29
button, I felt this overwhelming sense
00:23:31
of relief. And honestly, I'm glad I
00:23:34
didn't put myself through all that
00:23:35
hassle. That's where the lesson comes
00:23:37
in. Sure, I recognize that this comes
00:23:40
from a place of privilege. I had the
00:23:42
financial means to make a problem go
00:23:43
away, but that isn't something I
00:23:46
normally do. I usually go out of my way
00:23:48
to save money, even if it means
00:23:50
inconveniencing myself. But this
00:23:52
experience showed me something
00:23:54
important. As I gain more financial
00:23:56
freedom, there are moments when it's
00:23:58
okay to let go. Since then, I've been
00:24:00
experimenting with spending a little bit
00:24:02
more on convenience. Just last week, I
00:24:05
paid extra for a later flight so I
00:24:07
didn't have to wake up at 4:00 a.m. My
00:24:09
younger, super frugal self would have
00:24:11
been absolutely horrified, but my future
00:24:13
self, the one that's trying to find
00:24:15
balance between financial optimization
00:24:17
and enjoying life, would be proud.
00:24:19
Jesse, thanks for giving me a chance to
00:24:21
share my spending story. And if you're
00:24:23
listening and you want to find a
00:24:24
healthier balance between your money and
00:24:26
your happiness, come check out my
00:24:27
podcast, Finded. Now, it's not a perfect
00:24:30
correlation, but it seems that many
00:24:32
younger people feel like they have
00:24:33
enough time that they're comfortable
00:24:35
sacrificing time or sacrificing
00:24:37
convenience in exchange for money. Like
00:24:39
Justin's example, a person might gladly
00:24:41
take the earliest flight possible to
00:24:42
save 50 bucks. But as we age and likely
00:24:45
as life or careers or relationships get
00:24:47
more and more timeconuming, our internal
00:24:49
calculus of time versus money starts to
00:24:51
change. Personally, if I knew it would
00:24:53
cost me one or two hours, would I go to
00:24:55
court to explain Justin's parking ticket
00:24:58
snafu for 500 bucks? I mean, I think I
00:25:01
probably would. You know, would I trade
00:25:02
an hour for 500 bucks or for the
00:25:04
potential of saving 500 bucks? Yeah, I
00:25:05
probably would. But if it was 50 or $100
00:25:08
ticket, no way. I don't think I'd do
00:25:09
that at all. I mean, my go-to example
00:25:11
that's very obvious to me at least when
00:25:13
I hear is someone is willing to drive
00:25:16
across town for cheaper gas. So, they'll
00:25:18
spend 10 minutes in their car, they'll
00:25:20
drive 5 miles to save 15 cents a gallon,
00:25:23
which is what, $2 on on a fillup. Your
00:25:26
10 minutes is worth way more than $2.
00:25:28
And I bet if we each paused and thought
00:25:30
about it, we could find some places in
00:25:32
our lives where we don't value our time
00:25:34
and convenience enough, and we ought to
00:25:35
be spending a little more money to save
00:25:37
ourselves a little more time. even a big
00:25:39
celebration, would you spend a little
00:25:41
extra money to celebrate the big special
00:25:43
moments in life? Now, for that question,
00:25:45
let's pass it off to Jordan Grummit, aka
00:25:47
Doc G, from the Earn and Invest podcast.
00:25:50
Hi, I'm Jordan Grummit, aka Doc G, and
00:25:54
this is my money story about Keeping Up
00:25:57
with the Joneses. I grew up in an upper
00:26:01
middle class neighborhood and because we
00:26:04
were surrounded by wealthy people, we
00:26:07
were used to this idea that you spent a
00:26:09
lot of money on houses and cars and you
00:26:11
spent a lot of money on restaurants. In
00:26:14
fact,
00:26:16
one of the most expensive restaurants in
00:26:18
our area was one of the few that I think
00:26:20
was rated five stars. It was called Le
00:26:23
France. And LRA was the place to go to
00:26:27
get the best meal. And when my
00:26:29
stepsister graduated high school, she
00:26:32
asked for her present to be a family
00:26:35
meal at Lefrance. Now, this was back in
00:26:38
the whatever 1980s and probably would
00:26:41
cost around $400 to $500. A lot of money
00:26:44
certainly at the time, but not
00:26:46
particularly prohibitive for my mom and
00:26:49
my stepfather who both owned their
00:26:51
businesses, who saved 50% of their
00:26:54
income and were well on their way, if
00:26:57
not already at financial independence.
00:27:01
So, keeping up with the Joneses in this
00:27:02
case was no big deal. We could go to an
00:27:04
expensive restaurant just like our next
00:27:06
door neighbors, by the way, who owned
00:27:08
two Bentleys. But there was a catch. You
00:27:11
see, my mom is the child of a woman who
00:27:16
lived through the Great Depression in an
00:27:18
orphanage and never had enough money.
00:27:21
And then my mom was married and the main
00:27:23
bread winner in our family, my father
00:27:27
died. And so my mom had a lot of money
00:27:30
trauma both generational from her mother
00:27:33
as well as lived from the loss of my
00:27:35
father. So even though years and years
00:27:38
after my father died, she had remarried,
00:27:41
we had accumulated a decent amount of
00:27:44
wealth, the idea of spending that much
00:27:46
money to go to a restaurant was painful
00:27:51
and anxietyprovoking. And I remember for
00:27:54
the weeks leading up to this dinner, my
00:27:57
mom had serious reservations. In fact,
00:28:00
it was unclear whether she would even go
00:28:02
up to the last minute. We all eventually
00:28:05
did and the dinner was lovely and then
00:28:08
we moved on with our lives and it didn't
00:28:12
have a huge impact on our wealth. In
00:28:14
fact, it had zero impact on our wealth.
00:28:18
It was one splurge, one day where we
00:28:21
spent more than we normally would to
00:28:24
celebrate my stepsister's graduation.
00:28:28
years later, I think a lot about my own
00:28:31
ability to spend. Often, I have trouble
00:28:34
spending money, too. I have the same
00:28:37
generational trauma. I remember my
00:28:40
grandma hoarding money. I remember my
00:28:42
mom being anxious and worrying about
00:28:44
running out. And so, for me, spending
00:28:48
money is really, really hard. It's not
00:28:51
that I'm so connected to my net worth as
00:28:54
being that important. It's just I was
00:28:57
brought up with this idea that things
00:28:59
aren't that important and you shouldn't
00:29:02
spend money needlessly. Now, I've gotten
00:29:04
better at that and we live a life where
00:29:07
we spend a lot of money by necessity. We
00:29:10
are lucky we have a high enough net
00:29:11
worth where we can do that. But I often
00:29:14
think back to that dinner at Leon
00:29:18
when I get anxious about spending and I
00:29:22
tell myself that occasionally
00:29:26
occasionally it's okay to spend money
00:29:28
even more than you had planned.
00:29:29
Occasionally it's okay to keep up with
00:29:32
the Joneses. Occasionally, it's okay to
00:29:34
do what other people in your area are
00:29:36
doing, especially if it is brief, if
00:29:39
it's one time, if it's not going to hurt
00:29:42
you in the long term. What it made me
00:29:45
realize is it's not the oneoffs that get
00:29:48
us in trouble. It's the habits. And so
00:29:52
you can sometimes spend frivolously as a
00:29:55
one-off to do something that lights you
00:29:57
up or celebrates a family member or
00:30:00
creates a moment that you'll always
00:30:02
remember. And those one-offs are fine.
00:30:05
The people who get in trouble are the
00:30:07
people who have a habit of keeping up
00:30:10
with the Joneses, a habit of spending
00:30:12
too much. And by nature, I will never be
00:30:18
one of those. I love that quote. It's
00:30:20
not the one-offs that get us into
00:30:22
trouble. It's the habits. What an
00:30:23
awesome takeaway. Now, do you have any
00:30:25
habits that you think are quote unquote
00:30:27
keeping up with the Joneses? Or going
00:30:28
back to the scar tissue example that I
00:30:30
was telling you, do you think you might
00:30:31
have some blind spots that are kind of
00:30:33
jonesy in nature? It's a little bit of a
00:30:35
scary question, and it might be worth
00:30:36
consulting with your spouse or a friend
00:30:38
or a colleague to get their input on
00:30:40
that one. But there might be another
00:30:41
side to that story, too. Can we be blind
00:30:43
to our own frugalism or blind to our own
00:30:46
minimalism? blind to our own cheapness,
00:30:48
so to speak, to our own deep down desire
00:30:51
to spend much, much less. For that,
00:30:53
let's pass it off to Diana Miriam, the
00:30:55
founder of the Economy Conference and
00:30:56
the host of Optimal Finance Daily. Hi,
00:30:59
this is Diana Miriam, creator of the
00:31:01
Economy Conference, which is a party
00:31:04
about money designed for the FIRE
00:31:06
movement. So, my philosophy in general
00:31:09
is that the less materialistic I am, the
00:31:12
more idealistic I get to be. And that
00:31:16
has served me very well. I also really
00:31:19
like the idea of stealth wealth. Like no
00:31:21
one would ever look at my house and my
00:31:24
car and my material possessions and
00:31:27
think that I had money. I very much
00:31:29
enjoy being underestimated. However, I
00:31:33
am not completely immune to the perils
00:31:37
of consumerism and I certainly have
00:31:39
moments where I feel like my house is
00:31:42
dumpy or I feel insecure about my
00:31:45
clothes or whatever, right? I'm human
00:31:47
just like everybody else. And right now,
00:31:50
I am dealing with this as it relates to
00:31:53
my car. So, I love my car. It's a 2010
00:31:57
Mazda 3 that I bought for $6,000 cash in
00:32:02
2018. When you think about like keeping
00:32:04
costs low for a car or like optimizing
00:32:08
car costs, I think it really boils down
00:32:11
to like how you've engineered your life
00:32:14
to drive less or that's how it's worked
00:32:16
out for me. And so I don't drive very
00:32:18
much. Like I work from home. I go to the
00:32:20
grocery store. I mean I certainly drive
00:32:22
around but I don't drive much. And I've
00:32:24
only put maybe 40,000 miles on this car
00:32:29
in the last, what is it, 7 years. So, I
00:32:32
love this thing. It served me very well.
00:32:35
I've done routine maintenance. I've
00:32:37
never had any issues with this car. And
00:32:40
it's a rebuilt title, but it's great.
00:32:42
The thing is, there must have been a
00:32:45
time that when I cleaned the dashboard,
00:32:47
I used maybe a cleaner on it that I
00:32:50
shouldn't have used on the dashboard.
00:32:53
And with the sun beating through the
00:32:55
windshield, it created this like sticky
00:32:59
dashboard. And I have pets. I drive
00:33:02
around my dog everywhere. And so this
00:33:06
sticky dashboard is now like covered in
00:33:09
like fur and dust and it just looks
00:33:13
gross. And I am so tempted to buy a new
00:33:17
car just because of my sticky dashboard.
00:33:20
I would say this is an example of me
00:33:23
feeling like peer pressure to buy
00:33:27
something because the car is very
00:33:30
functional. And in general, I really
00:33:34
value function over aesthetics, but in
00:33:37
this case, it just looks so gross. And I
00:33:40
don't want anyone in my car because I
00:33:42
feel like they're going to judge me for
00:33:44
my sticky dashboard. So, the reason why
00:33:45
I tell you this story is mostly as a
00:33:48
desperate plea. I've gone down Reddit
00:33:51
rabbit holes to like figure out how to
00:33:53
fix this sticky dashboard situation and
00:33:56
there's apparently no solution to it. If
00:33:59
you have dealt with this and you figured
00:34:01
out a way to fix it, please, please,
00:34:03
please contact me. Or if you see me
00:34:06
driving around in a new car and you
00:34:09
thought that I was all about stealth
00:34:10
wealth and not buying things that I
00:34:12
don't need, now you know why. Here's a
00:34:15
quick ad and then we'll get back to the
00:34:17
show. I love getting your questions and
00:34:19
some of you ask me questions about the
00:34:20
wealth management firm I work for in
00:34:22
Rochester, New York. Others ask about
00:34:23
the Best Interest blog and this podcast,
00:34:25
Personal Finance for Long-Term
00:34:26
Investors, which operate without
00:34:28
advertising, without pushy sales, and
00:34:29
with no payw walls. How can the blog and
00:34:31
podcast stay afloat without me dumping
00:34:33
my own money into it? Well, to answer
00:34:35
both those questions, I want to point
00:34:36
you to episode 78 of Personal Finance
00:34:39
for Long-Term Investors. I intentionally
00:34:41
recorded episode 78 to shine light on
00:34:43
those topics and inform you how you are
00:34:45
actually helping and can continue
00:34:46
helping these projects carry forward. So
00:34:48
if you've ever been curious about the
00:34:50
business of my blog and podcast or if
00:34:52
you're curious about my day job in
00:34:53
wealth management, please check out
00:34:55
episode 78 and let me know what you
00:34:56
think. What is a sticky dashboard worth?
00:34:59
Perhaps more importantly, what's it
00:35:01
worth to you? A lot of the spending and
00:35:03
saving questions come down to that type
00:35:05
of question. What's this thing worth to
00:35:08
you? It could be a bigger house or a
00:35:09
nicer car. It could be dining out. It
00:35:11
could be going on vacation, being
00:35:13
fashionable, hanging out where the cool
00:35:14
cats hang out. There's nothing wrong
00:35:16
with saying that something in life has a
00:35:18
lot of value to you and that you want to
00:35:20
spend more money on it. But we can't say
00:35:22
that everything has that much value to
00:35:24
us. We can't spend all our money and all
00:35:26
those things such that we end up not
00:35:28
saving a single penny. But Diana is
00:35:30
showing us some of the opposite side of
00:35:31
that coin. There's nothing wrong. In
00:35:33
fact, there are many things right with
00:35:34
stealth wealth. It's that iceberg
00:35:36
principle, right? Wealth is what you
00:35:38
don't see. Morgan Hel says it's the cars
00:35:40
not purchased and the diamonds not
00:35:42
bought. It's the renovations postponed,
00:35:44
the clothes foregone, the first class
00:35:46
upgrade declined. It's the assets in the
00:35:48
bank that haven't yet been converted
00:35:50
into the stuff you see. That's wealth.
00:35:53
But is wealth also the dashboard that
00:35:55
you left uncomfortably sticky for years
00:35:57
and years and years? Going back to
00:35:59
Justin Peter's story, perhaps there's a
00:36:01
season in life when you simply accept
00:36:03
the sticky dashboard for what it is and
00:36:05
you continue to save save. But I'd argue
00:36:07
there are other seasons of life where
00:36:08
the the sticky dashboard or the t-shirt
00:36:10
that's ripped and falling off your
00:36:12
shoulders or the insistence upon only
00:36:14
buying the bargain cuts of meat at the
00:36:16
grocery store. There's a later season of
00:36:18
life where those habits don't really do
00:36:20
you that much good anymore. I listened
00:36:21
to an episode of Bigger Pockets Money
00:36:23
the other day and the two co-hosts Nindi
00:36:25
and Scott, they're both very financially
00:36:27
successful by any metric. They were
00:36:29
chatting about how they're likely to
00:36:31
never sell a single share of any stock
00:36:33
or stock fund that they currently own
00:36:35
and instead they're going to live off
00:36:36
the dividends from those stocks. They're
00:36:38
going to live off the income from their
00:36:40
real estate investments. They'll work
00:36:41
part-time in some capacity forever.
00:36:43
They'll never need to sell any stocks.
00:36:45
And I understand that part of that
00:36:47
statement or that idea, which can be a
00:36:49
point of pride, so to speak. You know,
00:36:50
it takes a lot of time and dedication
00:36:52
and saving in order to accumulate that
00:36:54
kind of wealth. But as I listened to
00:36:56
Mindy and Scott, I did find myself
00:36:58
asking, "Well, then what's it all for?"
00:37:01
If you've reached the season of life to
00:37:03
consider selling stocks to fund your
00:37:05
lifestyle, but you decide not to, then
00:37:08
what was the point of those earlier
00:37:09
decades of scrimping and saving and
00:37:11
building that portfolio up? There's a
00:37:13
famous quote in economics by Stiglets,
00:37:16
and he says, "If you've never missed a
00:37:17
flight, then you're wasting too much
00:37:19
time sitting around in airports."
00:37:21
Similarly, I'd argue that if you never
00:37:23
have to sell a single share of any of
00:37:24
the stocks you own, then you might have
00:37:26
wasted too much of your own life
00:37:28
acrewing those stocks in the first
00:37:29
place. Well, speaking of time, some of
00:37:32
us get started a little too late, but
00:37:34
it's not too late to catch up. And
00:37:35
here's a great person to share that
00:37:37
story, Bill Y, the co-host of Catching
00:37:38
Up to Fi, and also the former captain of
00:37:41
a boat named Yolo. Hello, Jesse. This is
00:37:44
Bill Yan from Catching Up Defi, a
00:37:46
podcast that I co-host with Jackie
00:37:48
Kumcosski for late starters to the
00:37:50
financial independence journey. You've
00:37:53
asked me to come on the show and tell
00:37:54
you a little story about Keeping Up with
00:37:57
the Joneses. So, I have many of those
00:37:59
unfortunately as a late starter, but the
00:38:01
one that comes to mind is a story about
00:38:04
our boat named YOLO. And as we all know,
00:38:08
YOLO means you only live once. So, my
00:38:10
wife and I moved from Chicago to
00:38:12
Tennessee in sort of an incidental
00:38:14
geographic arbitrage. We built a house
00:38:17
in a classic Jones's neighborhood where
00:38:20
the houses all looked the same. They
00:38:22
were all many thousands of square feet
00:38:26
and it was a boating community. Now, if
00:38:29
you're going to build or buy a house in
00:38:31
a boating community, aren't you going to
00:38:34
buy a boat, too? Doesn't it seem only
00:38:36
natural? The good news is there was 200
00:38:39
some odd uh properties in this community
00:38:42
and only 32 boat slips. So it was a hot
00:38:46
commodity. We got in on the ground floor
00:38:49
and thankfully in addition to buying a
00:38:51
boat and naming it YOLO, we bought a
00:38:54
boat slip. So we went on to enjoy this
00:38:58
boat. Our kids were growing up and in
00:39:00
high school. We had their friends over.
00:39:02
We went tubing. We went wakeboarding. We
00:39:06
truly enjoyed the memories that this
00:39:08
boat provided us with. However, one day
00:39:12
we were out lounging around as the sun
00:39:15
set and the waters were calm and we were
00:39:17
heading home at the end of a long day in
00:39:20
the sun and I opened it up wide open and
00:39:25
proceeded to run across a rocky shaw and
00:39:29
crashed Yolo uh on this shaw. Luckily,
00:39:33
we did not sink, but we required a very
00:39:35
embarrassing tow all the way home. Now,
00:39:38
what do you do when you crash a boat?
00:39:40
Well, of course, you have full
00:39:42
replacement insurance and you take that
00:39:44
money and you buy another boat.
00:39:46
Actually, you buy a bigger boat. And
00:39:48
that's exactly what we did. Now,
00:39:50
luckily, we bought used and didn't buy
00:39:52
new uh for these fun but very
00:39:55
depreciating assets. Actually, I
00:39:57
wouldn't call them assets at all.
00:39:58
They're liabilities. What is the
00:40:00
definition of a boat? It is bust out
00:40:03
another thousand. What is the best day
00:40:05
of a boat owner's life? Well, it's the
00:40:07
first day or the last day. Uh these are
00:40:10
things that are holes in the water in
00:40:12
which we fill them and they're going to
00:40:16
sink your finances if you're not
00:40:18
careful. Now, we had them for the
00:40:21
memories and our kids think fondly of
00:40:23
the times that we had the boat, but
00:40:26
after the crash and upsizing our boat to
00:40:29
the next level, Jones's boat, we called
00:40:32
it Rocky Bottom because what happens to
00:40:34
YOLO when Yolo crashes on a rocky shaw?
00:40:38
Well, you end up with a rocky bottom.
00:40:40
And we live in Tennessee where we
00:40:42
proudly sing the song Rocky Top. So,
00:40:45
Rocky Bottom I found to be a very unique
00:40:48
name for our next level Jones's boat.
00:40:51
The boating life ended for us after a
00:40:54
handful of years. It has it it had its
00:40:56
season in our life and our kids went off
00:40:58
to college. We became empty nesters. The
00:41:01
boat sat on its slip gathering dust and
00:41:05
requiring maintenance ongoing of course
00:41:08
and eventually we decided okay we need
00:41:11
to sell. The good news is, in spite of
00:41:14
having to have all the gas, carrying
00:41:17
cost, maintenance, a motor engine
00:41:19
overhaul, my wife had had the foresight
00:41:22
to have us buy the slip as part of our
00:41:25
foray into this, keeping up with the
00:41:27
Joneses community. That slip appreciated
00:41:31
remarkably in the seven years that we
00:41:33
lived in that house and in that
00:41:35
neighborhood. And thankfully all of the
00:41:38
carrying costs, all of the maintenance
00:41:40
costs, all of the motor rebuilding costs
00:41:44
that we had incurred in owning the boat
00:41:46
were covered by the cost of selling the
00:41:49
asset of the slip. So what are the
00:41:52
morals of the story here? Well, first of
00:41:54
all, buy utility and rent luxury. We did
00:41:58
we really need to buy a boat? Probably
00:42:00
not. Did we feel that we needed to buy a
00:42:02
boat for our kids and the having the
00:42:04
pressures of living in a boating
00:42:06
community? Well, of course. Of course we
00:42:08
did. Where you live is where you eat,
00:42:11
where you who you socialize with, and
00:42:14
you know, the cars start to look the
00:42:15
same, the people start to look the same,
00:42:18
and if you upsize the neighborhood in
00:42:20
which you live, your lifestyle is only
00:42:22
naturally going to upsize. So, buy
00:42:25
utility and rent luxury. Could we have
00:42:27
rented a boat that we use 10 to 12 times
00:42:30
a year? Absolutely. Did we need to own
00:42:33
one to do it? No. But it did give us
00:42:35
naming rights. Buy assets to pay for
00:42:39
your luxuries or liabilities. This is
00:42:40
what the wealthy do. You can afford the
00:42:43
the car if you have assets that are
00:42:45
covering the cost of this. The boat slip
00:42:48
was what saved us in our boating
00:42:51
journey. And what we did do with this,
00:42:53
however, is we bought experiences. We
00:42:56
bought memories. So, was I a happy
00:42:59
boating owner? Yes, I was. Would I do it
00:43:02
the same again? Maybe. But I might have
00:43:06
given it some more thought. And without
00:43:08
buying the slip, it truly would have
00:43:10
sunk our finances. uh with the sunk cost
00:43:13
and the opportunity cost lost and paying
00:43:17
16 to $20,000 for a boat and then
00:43:20
$25,000 for a slip that in a matter of
00:43:24
five to seven years appreciated to
00:43:26
$55,000. So it was nice in the end that
00:43:30
all these costs were covered, but guess
00:43:31
what? So we sold the boat, we sold the
00:43:33
slip, we covered our cost, but then the
00:43:35
money went into building a hot tub in
00:43:37
our new home. So, go figure. You know,
00:43:39
different neighborhood, different
00:43:41
Joneses. Remember the morals of the
00:43:43
story. Buy assets to pay for your
00:43:46
luxuries and liabilities. And you don't
00:43:48
have to keep up with the Joneses. You
00:43:50
can stay ahead of them if you're
00:43:52
monitoring your finances and prudent
00:43:55
with your purchases. Thanks for inviting
00:43:58
me to be on the show, Jesse. I hope this
00:44:00
has uh helped your audience realize that
00:44:02
they too can don't have to keep up with
00:44:04
the Joneses. Take care, Jesse. We'll see
00:44:06
you soon on catching up to FI, I hope.
00:44:09
And thanks for the invitation to be on
00:44:11
your show. Rent your luxury and buy
00:44:14
utility. And another way that I've heard
00:44:16
that is rent your fun. So, you know,
00:44:18
owning a boat, owning a snowmobile,
00:44:19
owning a a ski chalet in the mountains 5
00:44:22
hours away from where you live. Those
00:44:23
are luxuries. And it seems like, you
00:44:25
know, 90 95 99% of the time the
00:44:28
sentiment you hear from the people who
00:44:30
own those luxuries is that it's just not
00:44:32
worth the effort or the cost or the time
00:44:35
to actually own those luxuries. I've
00:44:37
shared on my blog and the podcast before
00:44:39
that one of my biggest and dumbest
00:44:40
spending mistakes of my adult life
00:44:42
involved both sides of that sentiment
00:44:44
actually. So, a group of friends and I,
00:44:46
we rented the smart thing. We rented our
00:44:48
luxury by taking a long weekend trip to
00:44:50
Lake Placid in the winter. Stayed at a
00:44:52
little cabin in the mountains. The cabin
00:44:53
had a hot tub. And if you've never spent
00:44:55
a snowy mountain night with good company
00:44:57
in a hot tub, it's a pretty cool thing
00:44:59
to do. So, coming off that weekend, I
00:45:01
decided that I needed to buy a hot tub.
00:45:04
And I did. And I spent too much money on
00:45:06
it. And I never used it as much as the
00:45:08
initial cost would have merited. And
00:45:10
when I sold my house in 2023, I very
00:45:12
intentionally kept that hot tub sitting
00:45:14
right there at the old house. But
00:45:16
whether we have a little money or a lot
00:45:18
of money or something in between, the
00:45:20
habits in our spending life play such a
00:45:22
vital role. And Jeremy Schneider,
00:45:24
founder of Personal Finance Club and
00:45:26
founder of Nectarine, he built decades
00:45:28
of habits being a borderline broke
00:45:30
entrepreneurial startup founder until he
00:45:32
sold his business for 5 million bucks.
00:45:34
And this story that he's about to tell
00:45:36
just goes to show that habits usually
00:45:37
don't shift as quickly as our life
00:45:39
circumstances do. Hello long-term
00:45:42
investors. This is Jeremy from Personal
00:45:44
Finance Club. My frugality journey is a
00:45:47
little bit different than most. I spent
00:45:49
most of my 20s and early 30s living like
00:45:52
I was still in college very very
00:45:54
frugally. I was starting a company that
00:45:56
I started out of college, but we were
00:45:58
bootstrapped. And so I was always paying
00:46:00
myself the least of anyone at my
00:46:02
company. My max take-home salary was
00:46:04
$36,000 a year. And so I was just trying
00:46:08
to live on as little as I could to put
00:46:09
as much into the company as I could. And
00:46:10
so for a decade plus, I was living
00:46:13
basically with extreme frugality until
00:46:17
something really great happened in my
00:46:19
mid-30s when I sold my company for just
00:46:21
over $5 million. And so I went from
00:46:23
being borderline broke to being a
00:46:25
multi-millionaire with a click of a
00:46:27
refresh button on my bank account
00:46:29
website. But, you know, those habits
00:46:31
that had been ingrained in me for 15
00:46:34
plus years didn't stop overnight. you
00:46:38
know, I became more of a more of a
00:46:40
afficionado of investing. I was putting
00:46:42
my money away. I was growing my wealth.
00:46:44
You know, my share after taxes of the
00:46:46
company say I was about 2 million, but
00:46:48
over the years that grew to about 5
00:46:49
million. And one day, as a a
00:46:52
multi-millionaire with a net worth of $5
00:46:53
million, I was flossing with and I hate
00:46:57
flossing. And I had this little piece of
00:46:59
floss that was about eight inches long
00:47:01
and it kept slipping out of my fingers
00:47:03
and just made made it this frustrating
00:47:05
and it it had always been so frustrating
00:47:06
to me. And I stopped and I asked myself
00:47:10
why am I using using such a small piece
00:47:12
of floss and the only answer I could
00:47:15
come up with is to save money because
00:47:17
that's what I'd always been doing
00:47:19
because I didn't want to waste you know
00:47:20
when I was trying to pinch every single
00:47:22
penny I could in my earlier years. I
00:47:25
wouldn't want to like waste these huge
00:47:27
pieces of floss. So now as a
00:47:28
multi-millionaire, I was still trying to
00:47:30
floss with an eight eight inch piece of
00:47:31
floss and it was literally negatively
00:47:34
impacting both my like person or my
00:47:37
behavior and my mood because I was
00:47:39
getting frustrated and my health. My gum
00:47:41
health was frust was was suffering from
00:47:44
not flossing as much as I would
00:47:46
otherwise because this was such a
00:47:47
frustrating experience. And you know on
00:47:49
that day it kind of snapped that I could
00:47:51
just pull out yards and yards of floss
00:47:54
and wrap around my head and around my
00:47:55
body and just bathe in the stuff and it
00:47:58
wouldn't even be a rounding air on, you
00:48:00
know, any of my bank accounts. And so
00:48:02
I've started using much longer pieces of
00:48:04
floss. And uh it's just a funny example
00:48:07
of how money decisions and spending
00:48:11
decisions are often very ingrained in us
00:48:15
from either our childhood or our young
00:48:16
adulthood. and we do things because it
00:48:19
the way it feels or the way we've always
00:48:21
done things. And even when there's like
00:48:23
evidence staring you in the face that
00:48:24
it's not good for your life. And so on
00:48:27
that day, I decided to start using
00:48:28
longer longer floss. I now floss more
00:48:31
often. My gum health has improved. All
00:48:34
good things. That's my story of
00:48:36
frugality. This has been Jeremy
00:48:39
Schneider. And you can follow me for
00:48:40
more dental tips on Instagram, personal
00:48:44
finance club. Listeners, thank you for
00:48:47
tuning in to this episode. I'd love to
00:48:48
know what you think of this specific
00:48:49
episode because if you've been listening
00:48:51
for a long time, you've probably seen
00:48:52
that I enjoy some experimentation with
00:48:55
episode formats, whether it's the AMA
00:48:56
episodes, the simple fact that I start
00:48:58
most episodes with a monologue before
00:49:00
the interview or write fun experiments
00:49:02
like this one. So, let me know if you
00:49:04
enjoyed it. As always, please send your
00:49:05
questions to my email, jessebinest.blog.
00:49:08
These are awesome ways we all get to
00:49:10
learn together. You know, a rising tide,
00:49:12
it lifts all ships. An investment in
00:49:13
knowledge pays the best interest. So,
00:49:15
thank you for listening to Personal
00:49:17
Finance for Long-Term Investors. Thanks
00:49:19
for tuning in to this episode of
00:49:21
Personal Finance for Long-Term
00:49:23
Investors. If you have a question for
00:49:25
Jesse to answer on a future episode,
00:49:27
send him an email over at his blog, The
00:49:29
Bestin Interest. His email address is
00:49:31
jessevestinterest.blog.
00:49:34
Again, that's jessevestinterest.blog.
00:49:37
Did you enjoy the show? Subscribe, rate,
00:49:39
and review the podcast wherever you
00:49:41
listen. This helps others find the show
00:49:44
and invest in knowledge themselves, and
00:49:46
we really appreciate it. We'll catch you
00:49:48
on the next episode of Personal Finance
00:49:50
for Long-Term Investors. Personal
00:49:53
Finance for Long-Term Investors is a
00:49:55
personal podcast meant for education and
00:49:57
entertainment. It should not be taken as
00:49:59
financial advice and it's not
00:50:01
prescriptive of your financial
00:50:02
situation.