All The Things You Didn’t Learn in School with Rob Finlay - 178

Welcome Money Buddies to this week's episode of Money Talk. This week we're talking about what we didn't learn in school, financial freedom and credit cards. I'm your host, Skylar Fleming, and let's get talking. Today we're going to be talking about adulting and how to handle your finances. When you're just getting started, it can feel so daunting because you aren't sure what to do, and we've all told ourselves the age old saying, I wish I would've learned this in school. And that's why it's so important to talk about money so that we can all learn about these things that we were not taught about, like taxes, budgeting, investing, credit cards, and all the other things that we're gonna talk about on today's show. Today's Money Buddy wrote a book exactly to help address that. So we're gonna spend some time today talking about some of those main things that are left out of our education when it comes to money, and dive into how you can learn about them, as well as the importance of having a trusted resource when it comes to money for Skyler's Story Time. Today I want to talk a little bit about the changes that happened last week on the podcast. I hope you like'em. I hope you like the new website, the new show. And one of the main things that I like so much about the new changes and the recent updates we did to the show is your ability to text me directly. Thank you so much to everybody who texted me last week and entered that$10 giveaway that I mentioned on the rollout of all the new changes. On Money Talk. Thank you so much to Scott from Ogden, Utah. You are the winner of the$10 gift card. And make sure if you have any questions throughout the show, head to the show notes and click send me a text message. If you want a direct reply, make sure to include some way for me to text you back. Otherwise, I'd love to read'em on the show and talk about your specific question. So please make sure to text me. I would love to interact with more people in this way and who knows, maybe we'll do another giveaway in the future. But regardless, I'm happy to give away knowledge and help answer your questions that you might have. So make sure to head over to the show notes and send me a text. But that does it for this little short snippet about texting from last week's giveaway. Let's get back into this episode. And it's leading me to put a little bit more investment into this podcast. I'm starting to spend a little bit more money on it because I really want to see it grow. And for the story time today, I wanna share some of the thoughts that I've had around some previous guests that have been on, that have been encouraging me to. To think outside of a budget when it comes to things like this, and think outside of the box and think about investing in myself because that's what I'm doing by putting some more money and time and effort into the show while preparing for the CFP exam. So that's my story time today. Real quick and short, honestly, just make sure you're investing in yourself. If there's something you know that you can do that may take a little bit of money, whether it's starting a podcast, a YouTube channel, starting a business, starting a lawn care business, those are just some of the things that come to my mind. If it's gonna take a little bit of money, be okay with that. But it's worth having the conversation of how much is this gonna cost? How can I prepare for this financially? So that's something to consider with today's story time. But let's get back into it with today's money Buddy, who is Rob Finley? I. Rob Finley is a Wall Street Journal, bestselling author, seasoned entrepreneur, renowned speaker, and father of four. He is a successful entrepreneur and commercial real estate investor. When Rob is not in his day job, he's passionate about agriculture, exploring new practices and sustainable methods to enhance environmental stewardship and farming. But he recently released a book titled, Hey Dad, and that's what brings him on today's podcast. So we will get into his book and talk about it a little bit more, but. Think of it as the premise of, Hey dad, how do I do this? And we're gonna be talking about that. Hey dad, how do I manage my finances? Portion of it today? But the money talking points for this week are, how can tracking your expenses help you get started? Two, what's something you wish you would've been taught in school? And three, how can you avoid the early dangers of finance? With those many talking points in mind, let's get talking with Rob Finley and welcome him to the show. Welcome to the show. Rob, thank you so much for joining. I'm excited to have you here for this conversation.

Oh, thanks for having me, Skyler. It's great to be here.

This is gonna be a fun one. I'm excited to talk about some of the ideas that maybe we feel like we weren't taught in school. Some of those things that everyone struggles with, they're like, oh, I wish I'd have been taught taxes, or everyone knows those sort of things. So I'm excited for this conversation, Let's start off by laying the groundwork with what are some of the common things that people feel like they don't know when it comes to adulting with money?

I think there's quite a few things. one of the biggest things is. Money and how it's used. Is I think a lot of times young adults come out and they think more about how much money they're gonna make, but in reality it's about planning and setting budgets. And so I think one of the first things that I always recommend to young adults is budget. And a budget is so important because it's a map of where you're gonna go and without a budget, you have no idea and you're just gonna spend money. And I think if I look back at my life, When I had a budget, things were okay. When I didn't have a budget, things went sideways very quickly. and I think a lot of people assume that budgets are restricted, like a budget is a bad thing. A budget will help you feel liberated and really deliver financial freedom.

Yeah. That's fantastic. I like the idea that it delivers freedom because. it certainly can restrict people. maybe if you're coming at it from too aggressive of an angle or you feel like the only thing you can do is cut back your spending, and that's all the purpose of a budget is. How do you think people get to that point where a budget can be more freeing and lead to that freedom?

I think it comes down to a couple things. One, living within your means, right? And a budget will help you do that. I think where people get in trouble is all of a sudden you're an adult and you go and get your first apartment only to realize like, oh wait a second, I have to pay for. Rubb removal, or I have to pay this fee and this pet, or hey, I just a, and adds an incredible expense to somebody's budget.

Yeah, we just got one, so I'm feeling that expense, head on right now.

There you go. Right? It's like, yeah. I mean, nothing puts more in, you know, it's, it's a, it's like a, you know, another consumer in your, in your household, one that has unlimited budget. but in reality we start to think about the things where I I think they can be liberating and there's a lot of freedom in understanding that if you're looking at the expense and you know it's gonna happen. And you plan and you know your budget and where you can go into it gives you the freedom so that you can make decisions quickly. Can I afford this car? Okay, I've done this budget and I've realized I can afford$500 a month in a car payment. Okay, well now let's go figure out, let's back into what kind of car you can get. So it's not like, you're doing it logically as opposed to being very almost reactionary like, oh, I just bought a new I thought it was gonna be$500. Oh no, it's actually,$800 now. I'm in trouble

How have you seen that ability to make quick decisions because of a budget help you in your life?

Budget's about everything, right? once again, I wanna focus on, people think, when I first went with my own kids about budgeting, they all thought, oh no, this is bad. I don't wanna do that. But then all of a sudden they start saying, well, this is actually eye-opening. And actually when you look at budgets and you have things like, Hey. You you should put money for fun stuff on your budget. You should put stuff for savings on your budget. that that you can enjoy on your budget. it's not about delaying gratification. It is all about knowing how much gratification you can take at this moment. what helped me early on was really understanding compounding. The benefit of compounding because when you start to say, geez, if I just put a little bit of money away now, that's gonna be a huge benefit going forward. maybe I don't need that really nice car now and but soon I will be able to afford something great and, have some financial freedom going forward.

Yeah. I like that idea of just putting a little bit away now, and that's something that. My wife and I are currently dealing with we have these student loans that we wanna pay off from her PA school, but we also know that we're young and this money has so much more time to grow. So that's a real battle. How can people who are getting into their finances find that battle within their budget between saving or paying down debt and investing?

Yeah, I have this concept of good interest and bad interest, right. And I, And I, think, you know, obviously as, as you can start to go into more financial stuff, you can look at it both ways. I try to equate very simply for people who don't understand, I wrote my book, Hey Dad, about helping young adults transition from being, dependent. On their parents to independent people. And one of the things you realize is Hey, you went to PA school or you're a biology major we will talk about this later. school isn't teaching us about interest rates. Right. And, and things like that. So the first experience young adults could have to interest rates. Is when they start to look at it for real and they're responsible for it. And so I take this approach of good interest versus bad interest. good interest is money that people are paying you, right? So I put money into a money market, it pays me. So that's good interest. I take money and I pay my credit card debt or my school loans, that's bad. And the way that I try to advise. Young adults is to, there's, there's a interest rate associated with everything that you receive or pay. So if I look at it and I say, okay, well my interest rate that I'm receiving on my money market is 3%, 4%, whatever it is, but I pay 22% on my credit cards. it makes more sense for me to pay off my credit card debt than it is for me to keep putting more money into my savings. And so that's the, those are the key concepts I want people to look at. Same thing with you, student debt. Well, you have to look how much are you earning on your savings

Yeah, it's about three and a half percent right now versus 7% on the student loans.

So, I mean, there you definitely want to have some cushion, right? I think one of the biggest fears for any young adult, and this is the number one thing, have some rainy day savings have something that you do not touch. matter because ultimately you get your dog, and the dog gets into, something and you have to go to the emergency room vet and you're gonna have to pay for that. So always have some emergency funds. But after that. You should definitely be looking at what is my cost of capital versus, what am I borrowing at versus what am I receiving.

Yeah. And you're gonna be hard pressed to find some sort of way that credit card debt interest and credit card debt makes sense to keep, there is this tricky balance for my wife and I right now, that these. Student loans are there at about six to 7%. There are a couple different loans, but could we earn more than that over the long run in the stock market? Probably. And so that's where it gets really tricky, trying to debate these returns that you don't have an exact percentage for. if I have that money market account, if it for some reason is earning 7% and our student loans are at six, the math, there's pretty simple that you can earn more in one. And if you. Want to get into it and you wanna play the math game, there is potential there to take advantage of those differences. But that's what's tricky. And I think what's hard, especially for young adults with that incredibly long time horizon, is that percentage that you don't necessarily know or see. Do you have any advice for people on how they can still consider investing money when they maybe don't see that exact written out percentage?

So I, it might be contrary to what many people feel, but I would say don't.

Hmm.

retail investors don't maximize and do not achieve market results in the stock market. they buy when it's high and sell when it's low, Unless you're really astute and patient, you said that, and it's an operative ward, a patient investor. Sure if you put money in the stock market and you close your eyes and you don't look at it again, and you're well diversified, you're in, funds and index funds, whatever it is, close your eyes and, over that horizon, you're good. if you're gonna watch that stock market every day and you're gonna watch that stock and think that you're gonna buy it at a certain point, I don't know if I would do it. So I think personally, here's the thing, no matter what. You most likely will not get your credit card debt interest rate returned on

that one's not gonna happen. You

Right. So, so for, so for anybody who's listening, get rid of your credit card debt. Now, that's not to say don't have credit cards. Have credit cards. Because one of the other things that I talk about in my book that's so important is credit scores. Because as you mature your horizon, and I don't mean mature physically or mentally, it's just like as your time horizon as an adult continues your purchases. We'll get bigger. Right? now you're looking to buy a house or a business or something large. if you were smart in the beginning and understood how credit scores work and the importance of maintaining a credit score, then you will have credit cards and you'll use them and and do it. But you ultimately want a really good credit score when you go to borrow large sums of money.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, this is fantastic. we've covered a broad range of things already and we'll talk about it. We'll make sure to touch it at the end. your book, Hey, dad, is kind of that, Hey dad, what's this solution? What's this supposed to be? I'm excited. To hear more about the book, but we're also covering a lot of things, which I think is gonna be great for everybody listening, because there's gonna be something that everyone listening right now can say, oh, credit scores, I need to talk about that more. please reach out to us. Or it's budgeting. Maybe they say, oh, it feels restricting to me. How can I get help? Making it not feel restricting. I love where we're going. We're really covering. A wide gamut today, and I think that's great. Let's talk a little bit about credit cards, because this is something I'm starting to get more into. I went a little too hard into credit card hacking, at the beginning and kind of burnt myself out on it. But let's touch on how credit cards can be a useful tool. are you a fan of credit card rewards and such?

I do, and some, I think if you do for travel and things like that, there are some really good opportunities for people there. quite frankly, I don't focus a lot on that, because I think there's better times. Yes, You can always swap out credit cards. the most important thing with credit cards is don't carry balances. I mean that to me is you you can sit there and yes, maybe it's a habit, just like couponing is a habit and a fun, uh, hobby for people. credit card hacking is another great hobby. ultimately, if somebody takes away one thing from me talking carrying credit card balances is bad. Having a credit card is good. Having it as a standby line of credit in case a real emergency happens is good. But using a credit card to create credit scores is what's important.

And you don't have to pay interest to create a credit score. I think that's, that's a myth I have tried to bust is if you get that statement to renew and then you pay off that statement balance, there's no interest charge and your credit score is better off for it. So it's kind of a myth that these banks and credit unions sell that you call and you say, how can I. Increase my credit. They're like, well, get a credit card, put your gas on it and just pay the minimum payment. It's like, you don't have to do that. They're just making free money off of you.

Right, right, right, If I was earning 22 or 28% on you, I would tell you, to keep it. I keep it in there. too. Let's just pay a little bit. and I think that's for people who aren't math majors or finance majors, this is really important stuff, and that comes back to. an adult is a lot, right? You're, I equate this to, if you've traveled in an airport and they have these, walkways that move, right? sort of like an escalator, but they're, walkways. And I think our life as a young adult is very much like you. You get on at one part of the terminal and you go through all the gates on this road. You're going from first grade, second grade, third grade, so on and so forth. Ultimately. You get off at your gate and now you have to figure out what you're going to do. a lot of things that happen that are well beyond just, you know, getting a job and where you're gonna live. But ultimately it comes down to having the financial freedom and the financial independence, which is why if you don't have that background in it. You really need to study. You really need to allocate time to understand the things that make up your financial life. All the stuff that your parents were doing to support you. You have to, and learn.

Yeah. And it's important to learn it or at least try to learn it.'cause if you just bury your head in the sand, you're gonna end up in a worse off position with credit card debt and things like that.

Oh, yeah. For taxes. I mean, you can get in trouble with taxes not knowing you had a side hustle don't pay your taxes, right? Those are, Those are, real things that happen.

Yeah. And taxes was the next area I wanted to touch on. So thank you for this perfect transition. This is something that I think every person ever has said. Why was I never taught how to do this? why is it so important to make sure we know about this area? Why isn't it taught, and things like that.

Yeah, I think there's, a, tendency with a lot of financial literacy. Is to make it very confusing so that you will go to experts. And I think that is something where, financial stuff, I'm in my, my day job is in capital markets. And, and, and so yes, it is very, very. Sophisticated and difficult to understand, but that's one little part of it, right? Understanding basic concepts like taxes and uh, investing are important and you should have the basics. But I do think that, that there is a point where it is so cheap and easy to get tax advice and your taxes done, it makes sense to use an expert because is a lot to it, these tax codes. So I, I go back to this financial literacy. I think we should, as young adults and, and, and everybody should understand the basics of taxes, right? What you need to do, exemptions, deductions, why you pay taxes, why some things are more beneficial than others. But then really rely on the experts to give you the real specific guidance. I do think, look, people go to graduate school just to understand taxes. Right. So, So, these these are complex things, so understand the basics, you're in physical therapy, right? Is that what you were saying

my wife is a physician assistant,

Okay. Oh, pa Okay, so, so a pa, right? I know that if I have a fever, go take Tylenol. But if it's anything more than that, I go to an expert. And I think if we try to create financial literacy to understand the basics, but knowing when to go to a professional is, is, important.

Yeah, and same thing goes with money is there's these different steps of professionals, like maybe there's a coach because you only need to get past that basics of budgeting and you need that next step on budgeting. But then there's a CPA for maybe like you're starting that side hustle and a business and things like that. And you need the tax help or there's financial planners that are gonna help you with the whole entire thing of retirement planning and estate stuff So there's definitely the people you can go to. Why is it useful to have these trusted resources in our lives?

Because I think there is some complexity into it, right? Having these, these experts though, can really help you get to a much better foundation. And they're not hard. And I think that's the barrier we should try to break down is if you can go talk to somebody at Fidelity Investments and they have so many resources out there for you to get. Advice that you should take advantage. Don't be afraid to ask people for advice. Don't be afraid to go to these trusted advisors because they will help you incrementally grow yourself and grow your investments. Help you grow your budgets or maintain your budgets and really get you into this financial freedom. I think I keep on using this word financial freedom I think if you look at the stress that most young people have, at least me personally, when I was growing up, it was all about financial freedom. Did I have enough money? And it was so much stress, like, you know, most marriage and relationship battles happen, with finances and stuff like that. So having a good understanding of your finances and a good budget will help make your life smoother and easier.

Yeah, and I think so many young adults, or really anybody now YouTube University is gonna be the first place they go to learn about money, but. You really gotta take that next step and ask someone directly as well, because your questions, you're always gonna hear some sort of financial advisor or a disclaimer at the end saying, your situation is unique. We didn't consider your specific things. And that's a cue to tell you, Hey, I need to ask somebody this specific question. I encourage this a lot because a lot of people listen to the big YouTube shows or big podcasts but there's so many other people out there too that you can ask these questions to.

I interviewed 30 experts in all fields from financial advice to budgeting to, investment parameters, banking, you name it. And I think that was their thing. That was, they're approachable, right? And, and in fact, a lot of people who take a lot of pride in their, in their job and their profession. Want people to ask them and, and want their advice.'cause the, the alternative, and you talked about social media. One of the biggest fears, and this was, this was a, a, a theme that was every single person I spoke to in my interview, on my book, especially around finances, taxes, credit, all said the same thing. They all had this one theme, which is. Make sure if you get advice, you know the advice you're getting is from a credible source. Because I think in this day and age, yes, YouTube is great, but making sure that you understand who is that person giving you advice on YouTube and what is their purpose for giving you advice. what are their credentials, right? I can go on, right, or they can, right? I, I go on, I go on Instagram and there's a guy there that tells me I can make a million dollars overnight. Okay, well if you're making a million dollars overnight, why are you on Instagram telling me how to make a a million dollars overnight? It's, it's that kind of stuff. And if you look and peel the layer of the onion back, you realize this person's not really has anything. So making sure you get your advice from credible people who have experience, who understand the technical requirements of doing this, and once again, like you talk about taxes, like you wanna get into trouble, right? really ruin your life early, don't pay your bills, don't pay your taxes, right? You really wanna ruin yourself for life, do those two things. And making sure that you do these things right and you're paying your bills and you paying your taxes is critical to survival.

Yeah. And paying your taxes is definitely up there. the IRS is like any other creditor except they have guns and can take all your stuff. they can just come and do what they need to do because they're the IRS. So if you're not gonna pay somebody, make sure it's not the IRS.

Right. and quite frankly, you should be paying everybody, right? I mean, being in debt is a tough thing, right? and debt is good and, valuable to you going forward. But at that same token, You can't get over levered too much debt, but you do need to pay your bills and your creditors because if you don't pay it now, it grabs on and it stays with you. And, and learning about credit and understanding that these, you know, Hey, I missed that payment, or, oops, I missed it without trying to solve it. Will not help you. These things stay with you and will be detrimental to your ongoing borrowing and financial freedom.

Yeah. What does financial freedom mean to you? So maybe you are, taking these topics and ideas that you're learning about and applying'em to your life, I'm sure. What does that freedom point mean to you?

Freedom means that you don't worry about it, right? It's not that you're not worried about money and stuff like that, but it just means I have enough financial freedom to know that I know what my money's coming in. Where it's going and I have enough in savings that if I have an oh crap moment, I can cover it. I have enough money that I'm investing that will grow. So I'm living within my means. that doesn't mean I don't go on vacations. That doesn't mean I don't go out to dinner and have fun. Doesn't mean I don't have Netflix and apple tv. I live within, I know my top line revenue and I know my expenses. that's what financial freedom means to me. It's not about having unlimited money. in. I'm not, I'm not Jeff Bezos who doesn't have to worry. I'm not that person. So I have to think about. Am I living within my means? And within that means am I enjoying and I'm not worried about it. The old me, when I first started out, became a young adult and I had a, a child at a very early age. I had no financial freedom because I had no budget. I had no idea what kind of money I had, where I was spending my, I had no idea. I had no idea and I relied on my credit cards to support my lifestyle and, and I was a very, very bad situation. So financial freedom is just being able to enjoy being financially free.

And there you go. I love that. one of the things I love to tell people is you can worry about your money just a little bit and make sure to put some dedicated focus into it. Or if you don't do that, you're gonna worry about it all the time, not be able to sleep. It's always gonna have that big burden on you, so you have to commit at least some time to focus on your money. Think about it, because whether we like it or not, money touches every aspect, every avenue of our lives, and we're gonna have to consider it at some point. Let's say that young adult is just getting started. Maybe they had a bit of a rocky road, but they're not buried in debt. Maybe they have a thousand,$2,000 in credit card debt Nothing crazy. How can they begin to get back on track with it?

I think it comes down to looking at, once again, you have to look at a budget, right? I don't wanna belabor the. Point, but you have to see where else It's Right? you need to see where it's going.'cause if you don't see where it's going, you have no idea how to fix it, right? it's like, you know, you're in a sinking ship and you don't look for the hole in the boat, right? you've gotta figure out where it's coming so you can at least try to plug it up. Then you look through it, and then you prioritize where, where are these, where's this money coming in and, and where is it going out and what is necessary and what's. What's critical, what's sort of a nice to have? I think by separating that, you start to look and say, geez, you know what, yeah, I've been really good. I've got that$2,000 worth of debt. But you know what, I love sports betting and maybe, maybe it's. Maybe we, we change that a little bit or, oh geez, you know what? I go out Thursday, Friday, Saturday night with my friends and we go crazy. Right? It's like, yeah, okay, well maybe you just go and do one or two back to that. Financial freedom doesn't mean you don't go out, right? Because it's important that you go out. You're not being a shut in and just, you know, Scrooge with your money. You've gotta be able to go out and enjoy, right? Otherwise. Why work? So you still do it, but just focus on what's really important. Make a little bit of a sacrifice in your spending. And it's not just sacrifice, it's a reallocation, it's a short term reallocation of your money. I'm not gonna go out this week. I'm gonna take that$150 or$200 I was gonna spend, and I'm going to put that into my credit card debt. there's, you know, after 10 weeks, you'd be pretty good.

Yeah. Take that little bit of sacrifice. And even if, budgeting can kind of beat this dead horse that finances just beat on. if you're scared of that budget word and you don't want to jump right into it, I recommend people to just start tracking your expenses. At the very least because you're gonna then be able to visualize, If you start to track your spending, you're gonna see, oh, I'm spending$300 every week or two on going out to eat. And then you tell your friends that you're doing that and they're gonna say, holy cow, I'm spending that much too. And then you're collectively together gonna be able to say, let's not do that, and you're not gonna have to worry about making enemies

Right, or let's focus on it, right? instead of doing it a couple times, let's do it once, or Hey, let's do once going out and let's do a barbecue at the house, house. It's like doing that kind of stuff. So it's not like being a shut-in, but you, you're absolutely right. I mean, when you start to track your expenses, and that's a great point. Tracking your expenses, you can start to see where things go and look, it's, look at all the apps you have, right? That maybe I didn't need that app. And, you know, and, and subscriptions. I mean, you start seeing a lot of these things come out where they're tracking subscriptions writing this book and talking to experts, I started to do it myself. I've got Hulu, Netflix, you know, Amazon, this, that, I'm like, I only, I have one set of eyes. But anyways, it, it is important though, to prioritize where you're spending your money, but you've gotta see it first.

Yeah, you have no idea how to budget or where to budget if you don't know where your money's actually going. And one of the things as well to note here is that all the people you're listening to on financial podcasts or media or books aren't perfect. I've let subscriptions renew on accident that I meant to cancel. I'm sure you've had little mistakes that you've adjusted and corrected along the path. So if you are in that situation where things are maybe a little bit of a struggle, it's okay. You can adapt and adjust and overcome it.

Oh, absolutely. you're never too deep in right? It's, there's always a plan and that's very liberating to be able to say, I've got a plan right there. it's horrible to be in a place where you think you have no out, but you do. you do. And there there's a way you can slowly, you can talk to, you know, there, there are credit companies. If you're way behind and in bad shape, call'em, talk to'em, Yeah. Maybe they can help you, maybe they can't, but at least you're gonna make a plan to go and be out. And then once you master your budget, you know what you can spend. Now it comes to the fun time, which is. Now I can look to how do I make money, right? First thing is controlling the bleed. Now I know how to control my bleed. Now let me increase the top line. And by investing and knowing how to invest money is'cause I think that was one of the critical things I've learned. It's like you come outta school and you don't know the difference between a stock and a bond and ET, F and A, you know, and this and that. You don't know what, why, what is Robinhood versus Charles Schwab, right? And, there's a lot of information out there but once you get that part, now, the sky's the limit. Now you can really make real wealth for yourself.

that's fantastic. Even if you're in trouble right now, you can make adjustments, adapt, get back on path and get things moving in the right direction. So Rob, this has been a fantastic interview. I got two final questions here. First, I wanna give you a moment to talk about your book. Hey Dad. But then the second question. Will be. What's one thing you wish you would've known sooner about money when it comes to becoming an adult? But first, how can people find you and learn more about your book?

Sure, sure. So they can find me online. It's rob finlay.com. you can go to my website and then, you know, the book is called, Hey Dad, everything you should have Learned but Didn't about being an adult. it's a fun book. I have four young adults, and so a lot of the questions come from that, Hey dad, how do I. Fill in the blank. And so I went out and I interviewed 30 experts in all things from budgeting, finding apartments, buying a car. I even interviewed a NASCAR race car driver and his crew chief about how to take care of your car once you have it to a Navy seal, about emergencies and everything in between. But it's really meant to be a foundation for you as a young adult to be able to have the, the sort of the main food groups. Of going through this situation where you are going from being a dependent child to a independent young adult

That's fantastic. What's one thing you wish you would've known sooner when you were a young adult about money?

laying out my expenses. Not getting into credit card debt. Really understanding how, how impactful that is and how that stress of money in my early life, I still remember it to this day, how painful it was to have a new child not be able to pay for things, be broke, and not knowing how to solve it. And it was finally putting a budget in place and I wouldn't wish that on anybody that, that sort of, that. Of, of debt and, and finances when it's easy to fix.

Yeah, I love that. You just gotta get right on that path and then it'll keep pushing along for you. Doors will open up, opportunities will open, things will become easier, so that's fantastic. What a place to leave it on. Rob, thank you so much for joining. This has been a great conversation.

Great. Thanks. Thanks.

Thank you so much to Rob for coming on and imparting some of that great wisdom on us and helping us learn. About some of the things that we weren't taught about in school, but let's get into the money talking points here today to round out this episode. The first one is, how can tracking your expenses help you get started? Well, it can help you get started by finding natural options to cut back on your spending. It's also gonna be a whole lot easier to convince your friends that you don't need to be spending money with some data. The data can help you overcome the behavior that you've been fighting so hard to figure out or get under control because it's gonna help you understand more naturally that you're maybe overspending in that area because you're gonna be able to give yourself an actual number to what you're spending. This data can also help bring you back to reality and help you realize how much money you're spending, and then truly ask yourself, is it worth it? Which in that same vein of convincing your friends and family that maybe you need to stop spending money in a certain area. You're gonna be able to have a more enjoyable time with your friends and family because you're going to be able to get your spending under control, and your friends and family will thank you because they're probably also trying to not spend so much money in certain areas. So using your data. Is going to help everybody when it comes to getting their spending under control. And it's gonna become really easy to make these decisions just with some simple tracking. And here's a story that I've shared before, but let's talk about eating out. This is one of the major expenses for every single American, and for me in high school, it was a big deal. I started tracking my expenses and realized this was a huge. Line item for me and I told my friends and we all realized that we wanted to scale back because we were spending a lot, but we also valued the time. So really this allowed us to pause and reconsider and say, do we want to be spending the money in this area? Yeah, let's go for it. Let's enjoy spending money eating out. We're not eating out that expensive. Anything like that. We weren't eating at fancy restaurants, we were just getting fast food. Which side note may or may not have been. Good for us, but just in the financial realm, we were able to pause and reconsider and understand that we did enjoy that expense. So what's something that tracking your expenses has helped you realize you were spending too much on or right after this episode, or even right now, pause this episode. Go plug in your expenses or your credit cards or whatever, into some sort of tracking app like my Budget Coach, which you can sign up for in the show notes. But then track your expenses and then send me a text of which expense category you realized naturally that you were spending too much money on. You can find the link to text me in the top of the show notes, but now that you've paused it or looked at your expenses and you're tracking, and now that you're starting to get some categories under control, let's move on to the second money talking point, which is what's something you wish you would've been taught in school? For me, it's taxes and investing. I think that people are missing out on so much, and I remember in my financial literacy class, we had this dumb assignment to pick three or five stocks and track them each week in class. It was a waste of time. It did not teach us anything. I don't remember a single thing from that exercise except the fact that I chose. Apple because I was a big Apple fan boy in high school, but it didn't teach us anything at all when it comes to investing. We were just taught, well, if you look at the stock market, it does numbers fancy, right? But we weren't taught anything about how to actually invest, let alone how to invest well with single stock picking like we were doing, forget the single stock picking. We shouldn't have been doing that anyways. This class should have been a great place to teach us about indexed ETFs or other index based funds. So that we could be a part of the whole market because the single stock picking, if anyone did follow what they learned in that class, they would just be gambling.'cause we were not taught how to evaluate a stock or determine if it was a good purchase or not. We just chose stocks at random, which would set us up for failure in the long run because it's just a gamble on the stock market. Now, of course, looking back, if I would've just kept with those stocks from the time I was in high school till now, they would've made me good money. But I had no way of knowing that or guessing on it is all it really would've been. So I really wish I would've learned more about investing in school because there's so much opportunity for you young listeners and those who are still in school to get started earlier and earlier. The value of money when you're young is incredible. More particularly the value of your time as it relates to money is even more incredible. So learning earlier would be great, and I wish it was taught in school in more detail, in depth. Of course, learning how to pay our taxes and how those are paid is something that everybody talks about every single year. But taxes are super complicated, and that's a completely different side topic, which I won't dive into right now, about why taxes have to be so complicated. But they are complicated. And that's a good example of one topic that comes up every single year in terms of what's something you wish you would've learned in school, but what do you wish you would've learned in school? Send me a text about it and I'll teach you about it in an upcoming episode, and then you'll know about it. So what do you wish you would've learned in school? You've been listening to this episode and some things came to your mind. Click that link in the top of the show notes. Send me a text about that, and I will teach about it in a future episode. But thank you to everyone who's texted me so far. It's been really fun to engage with listeners in this way. And how it works is I receive your fan mail, it tells me the last four of your phone number, and then I can relay those on the podcast or put'em on the website or things like that. So make sure to be texting me. It's really fun and exciting to see those come in. And if you want me to reply, leave your email or phone number and I'd be happy. To get back in touch with you and respond to your question that way. But just so you know, those don't provide me a way to respond directly to each of you. So if you are wanting a response, either keep listening to the podcast and I'll talk about'em on the show or gimme some sort of email or contact information to reply to you with. But let's move on to the third money talking point. How can you avoid the early dangers of finance? Well, the first thing here is to avoid credit card debt. Try your absolute hardest to stay outta credit card debt. And you may have heard me talk about the myth. Or just the lie of needing to carry a credit card balance. It is a flat out lie. If you've ever been told that you need to carry a credit card balance to improve your credit score, you are misled, which is unfortunate, but it's just not a fact. You don't need to carry it every single month. I have never once paid any amount of interest on a credit card or carry it a balance over multiple statements, and that is the key thing. No there, you don't have to carry it over multiple statements. You can let it go for one statement. And then you pay off the statement balance. My credit score is doing great, and all of those credit cards are still reporting their usage because that credit card balance is reported to your credit score when the credit card statement is generated. Now your goal is to pay off that statement balance before the due date. That is how you avoid interest while still having your credit card balance help your credit score. So look at the statement balance and pay that off by the due date, and you'll be golden with credit cards, no credit card interest, and all the credit card rewards. Some of you may have been listening and just heard me talk about avoiding credit card debt altogether, but what have, you've already found yourself in the midst of this danger of personal finance. What do you do now? Well, this is where you apply the first money talking point of this episode. You start tracking your expenses and income. If your expenses are higher than your income, then you're never gonna be able to get outta credit card debt. Simple as that. It's just not possible. You have to be realistic with yourself here. You have to get your spending back within your means and even further below that.'cause once you're back within your means and spending less than you make now you're gonna have some extra money to funnel towards your credit card debt and work to get out of it. Even if you come into some sort of large bonus at work or overtime payments or things like that. If you're still regularly spending beyond your income every single month, you're never gonna actually get outta credit card debt. No matter how much of a bonus or extra payment you throw towards your credit card, eventually it's gonna creep back up because you're always overspending your income. So make sure to be careful there. Make sure your spending is below your income period. There's no exceptions there, or else you will end up in credit card debt. Another thing to think about here, do not bother with 0% balance transfer cards until you have a true plan to get outta credit card debt. They're just another trap in order to get you to move around your debt to a new card and pay interest to them, unless you are going to pay off the balance before the 0% expires. Do not bother with it. I have a 0% card that I'm using right now and it's because there's a plan in place for it. We already have the money set aside ready to pay it off a month before the interest starts on the card so that money stays put away and we never have to worry about any interest on the card. The auto pay to pay off, the whole balance is already scheduled in everything. It's just waiting for that time to happen. The money's in a separate account earmarked for that credit card, and that's it. And it's because there's a plan. That's why we can mess around with 0% credit cards. There are a lot of different dangers to finance that you have to be on the lookout for. A few other ones are feeling like you have to buy a house or feeling like you have to buy a new car. Those sort of things can be a very early and big trap with your personal finances because you may not need to buy a car, so just be on the lookout. Any sort of those, buy the newest thing may be a trap. I have a refurbished M1 Pro MacBook that is doing phenomenal for editing my podcast and any other work that I needed to do, but it's refurbished. It wasn't brand new. It was a great deal. So be on the lookout for those sort of things. Anytime you're buying new, there's potential there to get into some sort of financial trap. That's just something to consider. But if there is an early trap that you would like to warn people about or maybe you found yourself in that you don't want other people to find themselves in, send me a text and I'll mention it on the show in a future episode and we can talk about early financial traps. That'd be a pretty fun episode. But let's wrap this all up with a big thank you to Rob for coming on this episode. I know we talked about a lot in this episode, but that's because there's so much out there. That we weren't taught about in school. I really hope that this can serve as an all-in-one kind of episode so that you can share it with your friends and have a great money. Talk about one of the topics because we have all said, I wish I was taught about this in school, so now you have it, an episode that covers a whole lot of those things. One of the main things that stood out to me is how much goes into our personal financial situations. We may not need an expert or a high paid professional, but having somebody in your corner that can be on your team is incredibly helpful. So shoot me a text and send me your questions from this episode and be sure if you wanna reply directly, include an email or a phone number in your text message. I would love to talk about it. Also, don't forget about the idea that I'm considering of starting a Discord group for the Money Buddies. If you're interested in that, let me know and we can start talking about money over there. It'll be great to have a central community where we can all chat about different questions and ideas that we have and money challenges we're going through. But that does it for this episode. I hope you learned a ton. Remember to send me a text with the brand new feature right at the top of the show notes because it's a great way to get in touch and ask me any questions that you might have about this episode or your own financial situation. I. Thank you all for listening to today's episode. The best way to stay up to date and connected with All Things Money Talk is to subscribe to the podcast and sign up for my email list. Head over to Money talk.show and submit your name and email right there on the homepage. You can also use my contact page on the website to send me any questions. If you're looking to get started with budgeting, I've partnered with my budget coach, a platform that connects your budget directly to your financial coach, and I'd love to work with you over there. And help you with your budgeting. The link is in the show notes. Remember, the best way to learn from today's episode is to go and have a money talk about today's topic with a fellow money buddy. Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Money Talk. I'm your host, Skyler Fleming. Have a great week.