Afford Anything

Tag: extra savings

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#457: Ask Paula: I Sold All My Stocks Last Year. Now I’m Kicking Myself.

Angie sold all the stocks in her retirement account last year. And now the market’s climbing. What should she do with her $500,000 cash position?

Christina will be graduating with six figures of student debt. Should she refinance out of a federally protected loan to lower her interest rate?

An anonymous caller wonders how Paula and Joe handled their primary residences when they moved out of state.

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

Enjoy!

P.S. Got a question? Leave it here.

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#449: Ask Paula: Should You Buy Real Estate in Today’s Economy?

Jackie is a 42-year-old paralegal with two rental properties. She wants to buy three more. She asks for Paula’s thoughts about today’s economy. Should she buy under these economic conditions?

Jen’s husband will retire with a pension that pays twice their living expenses. Does she still need her own retirement account?

Rachael just bought a duplex, which she wants to househack. But she’s having second thoughts. Did she bite off more than she can chew?

“Minouche” is a return caller with new information: she believes that borrowing from Dad is her only path to home ownership. Does this change Paula and Joe’s advice to her? (And is it even true?) And Molly, a concerned mom, shares some thoughts about this situation.

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

Enjoy!

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#440: Ask Paula: Am I Saving Enough For Retirement?

“Barbara,” an anonymous caller from Episode 422, is struggling with a scarcity mindset. How does she stop worrying about the future and build the confidence to enjoy life now?

Samantha and her partner have lived out of their truck for 20 years. They sorta-kinda feel ready to buy a house and settle down. But they’re hesitating. What if they hate it?

An anonymous caller wants to retire and travel in 20 to 30 years. How does she know if she’s saving enough?

Trace plans to take a mini-retirement next year. Where should she keep her savings until then?

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

Enjoy!

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#420: What We Learned in 2022, with Paula Pant

Dr. Ellen Vora, M.D., shared insight into the roots of procrastination, offering evidence-based tips for how to overcome our own inner demons of anxiety, fear and laziness.

Psychology professor Bill von Hippel described why too much happiness is just as detrimental to our long-term health and wellbeing as too little happiness.

Wall St. Journal columnist Spencer Jakab observed the perfect storm of conditions that gave rise to meme stonks and other oddities of our era.

Former financial planner Joe Saul-Sehy argued for “strategic under-diversification” and explained the Sharpe Ratio.

Data scientist Nick Maggiulli explains the save-invest continuum.

And financial planner Bill Bengen, the creator of the 4 percent retirement withdrawal rule, talks about what most people misunderstand about the safe withdrawal rate.

These are just some of the highlights from the Afford Anything podcast in this 2022 year-in-review episode.

Enjoy!

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#414: Ask Paula: I Think I Can Retire Early. Am I Delusional?!

Natasha thinks she and her husband have saved enough to retire early, but they’re scared. Are they ready or are they delusional?

Should Krista tap into the equity from one of her rentals to rebalance a portfolio that is weighted heavily in real estate?

Anonymous is a savvy investor who wants to retire early. She wonders if she should hire a financial advisor, or if she can manage her investments herself.

Amanda is worried that her recently diagnosed health condition might force her to stop working.  How should she financially prepare her family?

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

Enjoy!

P.S. Got a question? Leave it here.

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#408: Build YOUR 15 Year Career, with Kiersten and Julien Saunders

When Kiersten and Julian Saunders began dating in 2012, they fell in love quickly, and their relationship felt strong – until they started talking about money.

They broke up as a result of their first money conversation.

Luckily, they got back together, figured out how to have tough conversations, and paid off $200,000 in debt over the next five years.

Then they started thinking about how to hack their careers. They came up with a plan for a 15-year career.

Today, they join us on the podcast to talk about the 15-year career framework and how to approach your career – and your finances – in 5 year stints.

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#402: The Psychology of Money, with Morgan Housel

Do you wrestle with the idea of leaving your savings in an account earning next to nothing versus investing it in the stock market?

Do you use investment strategies that allow you to work with your nature, rather than against it?

Are you careful to seek investment advice from those who share your investment goals, or do you get caught up in the trends of day traders?

Morgan Housel, author of The Psychology of Money, joins us to discuss why investing is not the study of finance, but the study of how people behave with money. Morgan is an award-winning financial journalist, former columnist for the Wall Street Journal and The Motley Fool, and one of the foremost thinkers in the world of investing.

As a long-term investor who shares our buy-and-hold philosophy, Morgan has behavioral finance insights that can help us invest for financial independence with more clarity and a better understanding of ourselves.

We discuss how to develop self-awareness around biases, the importance of flexibility for long-term strategies, saving like a pessimist and investing like an optimist, becoming durable in the face of market adversity, the key difference between patience and stubbornness (and how it affects your mindset), expectation management, the importance of bonds and emergency funds, and a difficult lesson about tail risks that Morgan learned at age 17.

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#399: Ask Paula: The Stock Market Is Down – Can I Still Retire?

Bella is SO CLOSE to reaching F.I.R.E and is worried about her withdrawal rate if the stock market drops. If the stock market does drop, can she withdraw as much as she had originally planned?

Sam has been investing for several decades and thinks that he should stay invested in his portfolio, despite the recent drop in value…but he is still wondering if there’s a chance that he should sell.

Meisha is making more money at her new job but can’t contribute to her 401(k) for the first six months – what should she do with her extra money in this interim??

Kyria is a young investor with multiple goals: she’s wondering how to best save for a down payment without it being eroded by inflation and also whether her investment choices should take on more risk, since time is on her side.

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

Enjoy!

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#390: Ask Paula: Help! My Bills Are Too High

We start this episode with two anonymous callers who have opposite problems: one says her bills are too high, while the other is worried that she’s saving too much.

Anonymous (“Izzy”) saves A LOT. She wants to relax about her spending more, and start including more joy into her life. How should she approach the next 10 or 20 years, so that she can enjoy her financial security?

A different anonymous caller (“Starlight”) has the opposite problem: her expenses are mounting. Her bills make her uncomfortable. She wants to shake up her investments so that she can tap her assets in order to make her payments. Ideally, she’d also like to buy a house in Europe within the next 10 years. How should she do this?

John liked the episode with Bill Bengen, where we discussed the 4% rule.  However, he questions whether that rule should really be applied to the FIRE community.

Steve is a landlord who needs his property to cash flow, but doesn’t like to raise rents. What should he do?

Do you have a question on business, money, trade-offs, financial independence strategies, travel, or investing? Leave it here and we’ll answer them in a future episode.

Enjoy!

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#362: Ask Paula: Okay Seriously, Why Hasn’t Anyone Solved the Budgeting Issue?

David is questioning how to better manage his spending. He’d like a stronger framework to think through budgeting challenges.

Elisa and her husband bought a home, and now they’re saving extra income every month. She has a pension and her husband is an entrepreneur. How much should they be saving for retirement and how should they invest their extra money?

Geoff invested primarily in taxable brokerage accounts for the last twenty years. He’s built a $6 million portfolio and reached financial independence. He wonders about the smartest strategy for withdrawing from those taxable brokerage accounts to efficiently manage capital gains?

Jenna and her husband are planning on buying their next home in a few years. She wants to know if I-bonds are a good way to save for the down payment and closing costs.

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

Enjoy!

P.S. Got a question? Leave it here.

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