Blog

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    #208: How to Talk to Your Parents About Retirement and Beyond — with Cameron Huddleston

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA208.mp3" title="How to Talk to Your Parents About Retirement and Beyond -- with Cameron Huddleston" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Well, this could get awkward.

    Your parents and grandparents are aging. (Duh.) You want to have a few important financial conversations with them. It’s time to get the answers to questions like:

    “So … are you ready for retirement?”

    “You’ve been retired for 10 years … how’s that going? How are your finances looking?”

    “Do you have a will or legal trust? What’s your estate plan situation?”

    “Do you have an advance health care directive?”

    “To whom have you given your power of attorney?”

    “What types of accounts do you have, and how can I — or someone whom you designate — access the passwords if and when the appropriate time comes?”

    These financial conversations are important, but awkward. Most people would rather discuss the news, the weather, or the Kardashians.

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    #207: Ask Paula – Should I Take a $30k Paycut for Better Work-Life Balance, or Stick it Out?

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA207.mp3" title="Ask Paula - Ask Paula - Should I Take a $30k Paycut for Better Work-Life Balance, or Stick it Out? " artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Matt and his fiance earn $7,500 per month combined. They save more than half of their income. He’d like to take a different job that will decrease his income by $2,000 per month, but improve his quality of life. Should he?

    Suja wants to take out a loan for business growth. What red flags should she watch for?

    Anonymous and her husband are thinking about buying half-million-dollar home, purchasing a second car, and having a baby. They’ve saved an emergency fund and a 20 percent downpayment. Are they ready?

    Trayci wants to quit her 9-to-5 and start working as a 1099 self-employed lifestyle. How should she manage this transition?

    Daria is curious about the economics of a podcast. What do the income and expenses look like?

    Jared wants to retire early and then sell off his rental properties, but he’s worried about the depreciation recapture tax rate. How should he plan?

    Ali wants to set up a long-term giving plan, but most of the advice out there is geared towards wealthy donors. How should middle-class workers set up their charitable giving?

    Financial planner Sophia Bera (hailed by Investment News as one of the Top 40 Under 40) joins me on today’s episode to answer these seven questions.

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    #206: When Career Zigzagging is Smarter – with David Epstein

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA206.mp3" title="When Career Zigzagging is Smarter - with David Epstein" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    We live in a society that values career specialization.

    You’re not a “doctor” — you’re a pediatrician, an anesthesiologist, an oncologist.

    You’re not a “lawyer” — you practice family law, or bankruptcy, or criminal law.You’re not an “engineer” — you’re an electrical engineer who specializes in solar technologies, or a civil engineer who specializes in the application of artificial intelligence in highway traffic design.

    Specialization is beneficial and necessary, but specializing too early in life or too narrowly can also have drawbacks. According to today’s podcast guest, New York Times bestselling author David Epstein, overspecialization can stifle innovation if we’re all digging in parallel trenches. Sampling a broad range of subjects prior to specializing (e.g. at the undergraduate level, or as a hobby) allows people to make connections between far-flung domains and ideas.

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    #205: Ask Paula – Am I On-Track for Retirement?

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA205.mp3" title="Ask Paula - Am I On-Track for Retirement?" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Is it ever a good idea to use your 401(k) as an emergency fund?

    What’s the best way to break up with your financial advisor so that you can move all of your funds to Vanguard?

    Should you put all of your Roth IRA money into index funds, or is there a better option for your money?

    A listener has a job offer working less hours for more money, but without a retirement plan. Is this a good move?

    When running a small business as a sole proprietor, are there tax advantages to incorporating or forming an LLC? If so, what should you consider?

    What’s the best way to maximize the earnings on a large amount of savings while keeping the savings liquid? Can a robo-advisor help with this?

    Myself and former financial planner Joe Saul-Sehy tackle these six questions in today’s episode. Enjoy!

  • Unusual Ideas about Self-Care … FIRE Edition

    ByPaula Pant

    There are people who claim that ‘self-care’ requires wasting money.

    They’ll encourage you to “treat yourself!,” because “you deserve it!”

    Buy those shoes! Enjoy that upscale sushi restaurant! Upgrade to the nicer, newer car! You work hard. You deserve it!

    Uh-huh.You know what else you deserve?

    You deserve the relief that comes from wiping out a debt.

    You deserve the joy that comes from buying an investment or a rental property.

    You deserve the pride that comes from maxing out your contributions to a retirement account.

    You deserve the stress relief that comes from taking a long walk in the park while listening to an audiobook, or taking a yoga class, or enjoying a hard workout at the gym.

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    #204: Upgrade Your Thinking, with Super Thinking authors Gabriel Weinberg and Lauren McCann

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA204.mp3" title="Upgrade Your Thinking, with Super Thinking authors Gabriel Weinberg and Lauren McCann" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    You make decisions on a daily basis about your career, family, friendships, health and investments; these choices shape your life.But how much have you thought about how to think?

    There are common threads and collective wisdom across disciplines. These common threads create mental models, which are frameworks for understanding the world. Mental models allow us to apply insights from a variety of unrelated fields, using reasoning by analogy to make better choices about our lives.

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    #203: Ask Paula – Early Retirement and The Four Percent Rule

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA203.mp3" title="Ask Paula - Which House Should I Pay Off First?" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Many people in their 50’s or 60’s warn us about catastrophic or ‘black swan’ events. But what’s the likelihood that this will actually happen?

    How can you use the 4 percent withdrawal rule for early retirement planning, given that your portfolio will be split among accounts with different tax treatments? How do you adjust your retirement plan for future taxes?

    Should a couple in their 30’s switch from term life to whole life insurance?

    Should a couple in their 50’s with adult children bother buying life insurance in the first place?

    Is it okay to keep all your assets at one investment brokerage, like Vanguard or Fidelity?

    And can you deduct rental losses if your income is over $150,000?

    Former financial planner Joe Saul-Sehy and I answer these questions in today’s episode.

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    #202: Slow Travel is Cheap Travel – with Nomadic Matt

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA202.mp3" title="Slow Travel is Cheap Travel - with Nomadic Matt" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    In 2006, Matt Kepnes worked at a hospital in Boston, and he felt miserable. He dreaded fighting traffic, spending his days under his offices’ fluorescent lighting, drinking stale coffee.

    He decided to take one year off — a “gap year” — thinking that after his sabbatical, he’d resume another 40 years of punching the clock.

    He worked 60-hour weeks in order to save money for his sabbatical year. He saved $30,000, then handed his boss a resignation letter.

    Matt traveled for 18 months, returned to Boston, and realized he had lost his willingness to punch the clock. He couldn’t sit still in an office any longer.He re-packed his bags, bought a one-way flight to who-knows-where, and reinvented himself as a travel writer known as Nomadic Matt. He lives on a budget of $18,250 per year, or $50 per day.

    In the last decade, his travel information website, NomadicMatt.com, has become one of the most popular travel blogs in the world, drawing millions of visitors. His writing has been featured in The New York Times, CNN, National Geographic Travel, and the BBC. He’s a New York Times bestselling author, and he’s traveled to more than 100 countries.

    In today’s episode, Matt and I discuss the art of slow travel.

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    #201: Ask Paula – Which House Should I Pay Off First?

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA201.mp3" title="Ask Paula - Which House Should I Pay Off First?" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Ross and his wife are both in the Navy. They bought a home while they were stationed in Hawaii. Then the Navy sent them to Virginia, where they currently live; they’ve purchased a home there, too. They kept the Hawaii home as a rental property, and they’d like to move back into it when they retire. Which home should they repay first?

    Mike is 33, debt-free except for his mortgage, and earns more than $200,000 per year. He saves half of his income. What should he do with his savings? Pay off his mortgage? Invest?

    Josh has a nervous habit of checking his investment account balances daily. How can he break this habit?

    Amanda and her husband live in a duplex. They have $115,000 in equity in their home, and another $115,000 remaining on the mortgage. They’d like to move. Should they hold the duplex as a rental? Or should they sell and use the proceeds to buy a cheaper home, with a goal of being mortgage-free?

    Christy wants to know how to compete with other aggressive real estate investors who are bidding on homes.

    I answer these five questions in today’s episode. Enjoy!

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    #200: What I’ve Learned from Interviewing 500 Millionaires — with Jaime Masters of Eventual Millionaire

    ByPaula Pant
    [smart_track_player url="https://traffic.libsyn.com/paulaandjaymoney/AA200.mp3" title="What I’ve Learned from Interviewing 500 Millionaires -- with Jaime Masters of Eventual Millionaire" artist="Paula Pant" social="true" social_twitter="true" social_facebook="true" social_gplus="true" social_linkedin="true" social_stumble="true" social_pinterest="true" social_email="true" ]

    Nine years ago, I was flipping through an issue of Kiplinger Personal Finance magazine (as any normal 26-year-old does), when I came across an article about a woman who paid off $70,000 in debt in 16 months.

    Her name was Jaime. She lived in Maine, with her then-husband and their young son. Her husband was a professional juggler who earned $30,000 per year; she brought home 3x his income.

    They bought the trappings of the American Dream: the suburban house with a white picket fence, a brand-new Honda Civic, a Jeep CJ7 with 36” tires, several kayaks, and a premium cable subscription.

    The result? They found themselves in massive debt, with a combination of vehicle loans, student loans, and a home equity line of credit.