Navigating the New Era of Cheap Travel with Scott Keyes #505

Our guest today is Scott Keyes- founder of Scott’s Cheap Flights, a travel platform with over two million members around the world. It’s been called “the travel world’s best-kept secret” by Thrillist and received praise in The New York Times among others. But before he became our favorite expert on ways to keep vacation costs down, Scott worked for years as a journalist, with bylines in The Washington Post, The Atlantic, and plenty of other publications. And now, he’s published a book titled, “Take More Vacations”, which we’ll discuss today as well. With virtually everyone out there clamoring to take a vacation, we’re really excited to be talking about this timely topic. We discuss why we’re living in the golden age of cheap flights, how to get across the ocean for as little money as possible, change fees, and then we also discuss long travel and the changing culture of travel here in the US.

 

During this episode we enjoyed an Evolutions of BORIS the Crusher Caramel Macchiato by Hoppin Frog! And please help us to spread the word by letting friends and family know about How to Money! Hit the share button, subscribe if you’re not already a regular listener, and give us a quick review in Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Help us to change the conversation around personal finance and get more people doing smart things with their money!

 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to How the Money. I'm Joel and I am Matt,
and today we're talking navigating the new era of cheap
travel with Scott Kais. That's right, friend of the show,

(00:29):
Scott Kais is joining us. We've talked with him about
affordable travel before, but we're excited to sit down with
him for an in depth conversation today. If you don't know,
Scott is the founder of Scott's Cheap Flights, which is
a travel platform with over two million members around the world.
It's been called the travel world's best kept secret by thrillists.
It's received praise in the New York Times, among others.

(00:50):
But before he became our favorite expert on ways to
keep vacation costs down, Scott worked for years as a journalist.
He had byelines in The Washington Post, The Atlantic, plenty
of other publications, and now he's published a book titled
Take More Vacations, which will discuss today as well. So yeah,
with you know virtually everyone out there clamoring to take
a vacation, we are really excited to be talking about

(01:12):
this topic today. So Scott, thank you for joining us today.
Thanks so much for having me excited to be here.
We're glad to have you, Scott. And the question we
ask everyone first off when they come on the show,
every guest is what they like to supore John, Matt
and I. One of our favorite things is craft beer.
But yeah, do you have something like that in your
life that you like to every time you get some

(01:33):
extra dollars that aren't going towards investments or saving that
you're maybe like, yeah, sporting on a specific activity or
item you know I do, And it's, uh, it's so
on brand that it's almost disgusting, but it's credit card
annual fees. The binder of credit cards that I have
would astound folks. And probably are you talking about like

(01:56):
like like baseball card collection kind of stop by baseball cards.
We're talking fast sleeves. We're talking you know, uh collated
uh spreadsheets, keeping track of everything. It's uh, it's really
over the top. And you know, look for a lot
of people, mightn't be indicative of some pretty poor financial habits.
But if you can handle it responsibly, treat your credit

(02:17):
cards like debit cards, don't spend money you don't have,
then it can be good. It can be a real
boon for your frequent flyer mile balances for uh and
and other things. And so that's where I splurge is
being willing to eat those credit card annual fees. There
nine five bucks here and there. There's some that I'm

(02:38):
lowth to even admit how expensive some of them are,
but you know, it's unbelievable, unbelievable, Yeah they I mean
the AMEX Platinum up to close to seven y yeah,
I think it's six if I recall. And so splurging
on those as long as there's a really lucrative sign

(02:59):
up bonus or something thing that makes it worth it
is where I like to uh feel good about splurging.
Maybe you can you can send a picture our away
of your mind. I really would love to see that
many credit cards. It was one of the things that
most astounded you know, uh, Scott See Flights is an
all remote company. We got to meet up altogether a
couple of weeks ago in South Carolina for a little retreat.

(03:20):
And it's the one fact that so many folks remember
about me. You know, we did a little like uh,
just kind of fun facts about each teammate and and
you know, this person has a hundred and five credit
cards over the past ten years, neber the best Scott.
That's remember, I would love to see a picture of that.
I'm a nerd of organization. Uh just and so any

(03:41):
kind of nerd nerding out, but specifically with organization and
the fact that you're doing it with travel cards, with
travel fee, with adal fees tied with those, I'm totally
nerding out over here. You gotta share that. But one
of my things. So on that note, let's just talk
about Scott sep Flights for a second, Like, what is
the origin story? How did this come about? Because I
doubt that you finished high school or like I'm going

(04:01):
to start a travel site. Yeah, exactly. I didn't even
know that being a chief flight expert was a career
path that was that that was a thing you could do,
or much less start a company that with sixty people
working for your guidance counselor didn't show you in that direction.
I certainly didn't major in this in college. But you know, look,
it was one of those things where again, you know,

(04:22):
as you mentioned, I was working as a journalist, and
one of the great things about being a journalist is
you're very inquisitive, You're very curious, you want to get
the answer to things. And so, as both a journalist
and uh, you know, I say, a journalist right out
of college, who unfortunately all of them are very underpaid,
I was faced with a problem. I wanted to travel,
but I didn't have much money. And so every time

(04:44):
I would search for flights to Europe, much less to
Los Angeles or else or you know, I would, I
would find just really expensive flights. And so I knew
in my head somehow somewhere people were finding cheap flights,
but I had no idea how to find them. And
so I really kind of wound up over the course
of a really a number of years digging into why

(05:05):
is air fare so volatile? How are people finding cheap flights,
what are the strategies they're using, and uh, this sort
of quest, this investigation wound up leading me in to
the best deal that I've ever gotten in my life
still to this day, which was NonStop from New York
City to Milan for a hundred and thirty bucks round trip.

(05:29):
It was an unbelievable find. I couldn't like, I couldn't
fathom what I was seeing. You know, I've never pulled
out a credit card from my binder so quickly as
I had in that moment. And you know, I took
this incredible trip, went to a soccer gat and you know,
I went to see a C. Milan play a Champions
League game, went skiing in the Alps, when hiking in
Chinquitario was great. When I got back from this trip,

(05:52):
all my friends and co workers, I guess word had
spread and they kept coming up to me. Hey, Scott,
you know I heard about that great deal you got. Listen,
next time you find a deal like that, can you
let me know so I can get in on it too.
And so rather than trying to remember every single person
I need to let know, it's like, why don't I
start a simple little email list and any time I

(06:13):
find a great deal from here on out, I can
just send it out to everybody who wants it. And
so that was how Scott's Flights began, much much more
as an accident than an intentional startup. And it was
just a hobby for for eighteen twenty months or so,
until it grew large enough that it was time to
start thinking is there an actual business opportunity here? And

(06:34):
by turned it into an actual company. And now today,
you know, six years later, it's got sixty people on
the team, millions of people across the country signed up
getting these alerts and making sure that they're not overpaying
for flights and able to take those types of trips
like a hundred thirty dollars to Milan. That's amazing, man,
It's amazing how just kind of you figuring something out

(06:56):
and then telling other people about how that can turn
into it can spread and become you know, giant business
like the one you've created. Totally totally serendipitous. I mean
it feels, you know, I like it's one of those
things that I lie awake at nights sometimes thinking like
what would have happened if I just hadn't been searching
for flights to Milan that one random Saturday afternoon. What
if I just went to the beer garden instead of

(07:16):
like staying home and being a dork and searching for
flights on my computer? Like that would my life? It
would look like my life, Scott, which is not Maybe
I'd be a podcast professional. You don't want to go
down that path, Well, I want to know. I want
to know specifically, what's what's the anatomy of a cheap flight?
Because you know, you call air fare unpredictable and irrational.

(07:38):
So how does a killer sale actually come about? How
is it that something that is, you know, multiple hundred
dollars to to Europe? How does that come across our paths? Yeah,
so there are a few things to think about here.
Is that One is that we are living in what
I call the golden age of cheap flights. And this
comes in the backdrop of airfare, especially over the past

(08:00):
few months, rising really quickly and most folks kind of
having their heads that, oh, my gosh, there are no
cheap flights left. But on the contrary, if you look
at airfare today compared to where it was ten years ago,
airfare today adjusted for inflation, is thirty five cheaper than
it used to be on average, and even more than that,
it's especially cheaper on these sort of long haul routes

(08:23):
that you used to never see affordably, flights to Europe,
flights to Asia, um, those sorts of long haul routes
that um typically you you might have had to normally
spend eight nine dollars maybe more for a round trip flight,
whereas today we see flights from all over the US,
not just from big airports like Atlanta jfk uh you

(08:45):
know O'Hare, but from small airports like Dayton, Ohio, or Cody, Wyoming, Boise,
Idaho to Europe for under four hundred dollars round trips,
sometimes even cheaper than that. And so the reason why
those kind of have become much more prevalent today than
they used to be is, in short, because the airlines

(09:05):
business model has changed significantly, certainly over the past forty
or fifty years, but even really over the past decade.
Whereas airlines historically relied primarily on economy airfare to fund
their operations, but today airlines actually make the majority of
their revenue on things other than your economy air fare.

(09:26):
They make it on things like selling business and premium seats.
They make it on selling frequent flyer miles. Those credit
card annual fees really do add up, but especially the
the other parts of credit card contracts, like selling it
to banks, uh you know, the interchange fees that stuff
like that, that banks really kind of make a ton
of money off of. This is why it's so lucrative
to them and why airlines benefit so much from the

(09:49):
frequent flyer mile programs They make it on corporate contracts.
They make it on selling cargo space, they make it
on certainly add on fees. They make it on commissions.
You know, when you book your flight, they always ask you, Hey,
you're taking that trip to Portland? Do you want a
car to go with it? Do you need a hotel?
That's all free money for the airline's um. So the

(10:09):
airline business model is changed from one where they relied
primarily on economy air fare to fund their their operations
to one today that relies on things other than economy
air fare. And that's how they can afford to offer
those three four dollar flights to Europe in a way
that they used to not be able to. Yeah, so
I mean it sounds like this is an intentional shift

(10:32):
or pivot that the airlines are doing, which sounds like
therefore they can offer those deals. But you you talk
sometimes too about some sometimes there's like these mistake fairs. Well,
what's the difference between what I see as being sort
of this intentional pivot of the industry, you know, to
being able to offer some of these great deals and
in a mistake fair. That's right, So that the hundred
thirty dollar round trip flight to Milan, Uh, the airline

(10:53):
did not mean to sell that for a hundred dollars.
They meant to probably sell that for more like hundred
dollars and somebody in the back office for good as
zero at the end. And you know, look the mistake.
When those mistake fars pop up, they're not common, but
they pop up maybe six, eight, ten times a year
or so, you know, different routes, and they're totally unpredictable

(11:15):
be by their nature because their a mistake. And so
when they pop up, they only tend to last until
the airline can fix it, which is oftentimes a matter
of hours, certainly not a matter of days. That's why
it's so important to find out about them as early
as possible so that you could book them before they disappear.
Those mistakes, you know, while they're while they're rare, they're

(11:36):
they're they're really the holy grail of the cheap flight world.
But the vast majority of cheap flights are not mistakes.
It's airlines actually intending to sell that flight from you know,
Dayton to uh to Frankfurt forty five dollars round trip
or something like that, and they intend to sell it
that way because again, they make so much money on

(11:58):
things other than economy airfare that they make it, you know,
on the front of the plane selling the business card seat,
they make it on underneath the plane with the cargo,
they make it on all the add ons bags and
and and seat selection, but also on hotels and cars
that they just are trying to essentially recoup some gas money.
They've got all, they've got a hundred hundred fifty seats
in the back of the plane, they might as well

(12:18):
try to recoup a little bit of money on But
that it's not it's not the uh kind of driving
force for the airlines the way it used to be.
And so the other thing to remember here briefly is
that the airlines are locked in this really fierce competition
with budget airlines. So you know, United, American, Delta, these

(12:38):
are all legacy airlines or otherwise known as full service airlines.
They're having to compete really directly with your spirit airlines,
your frontier airlines and and and others. And what they
have found is that the spirit airlines of the world,
the frontier ones of the world, they have been winning
this battle for years. Uh to you know, twenty years ago,

(13:02):
the budget airlines were just a fraction of the overall volume.
They flew maybe three or four percent of of passengers.
Whereas the full service airlines accounted for about seventy of travelers.
Today it's down to the legacy airlines account for about
fifty and the budget airlines are up are of quadruple
or quintuple there up to sixteen seventeen percent and growing

(13:24):
every single year. And the reason why is that leisure
travelers treat airfare like a commodity. They just want to
buy whatever the cheapest ticket is. They don't they're not
loyal to one airline or another. They're loyal to cheap flights,
whether it doesn't matter what the airline is on. And
so the budget the budget airlines have been winning. The
legacy airlines have tried to respond by offering basic economy

(13:47):
or by what really, at the end of the day,
lowering their fares to compete with the budget airlines of
the world. And the winners are all the cheap flight
lovers out there, even if you never fly budget airlines,
because you end up seeing cheaper fares on Delta, on American,
on United as a result of that competition. Yeah, and
that's that's kind of what you do, right, you say, like,

(14:08):
I love the budget airlines, but I don't really fly.
I'm I kind of like use that competition to book
on some of the main airlines anyway, Right, So exactly,
we don't send out deals on Spirit, we don't send
out deals on Frontier, but we benefit from their existence
because they force h Delta and American United Jet Blue
to offer cheaper fares than they would have otherwise. Can

(14:30):
can you talk about searching for airfare and then booking,
because obviously it's great to get those Scots Chief Flights
emails into your inbox and it notifies you of deals
you might not have known about otherwise. But what are
your favorite websites for browsing deals? Or if someone's like
has a specific destination in mind, maybe they can't be
quite as serendipitous and just go to the destination that

(14:51):
is most on sale. How do they start browsing in
order to and and and maybe what tactics can they
used to get the best deal. Yeah, So, the the
open secret in the air fair world is that all
of the online travel agencies, you know, these are Expedia
or bits, you know, hot Wire, all those kayak Um,
they're all essentially the same, like you're there's not one

(15:14):
that is consistently cheaper than the others. Sometimes there will
be a little tiny bit of difference in fair but
typically they have basically the exact same fares, or if
one is cheaper, that one might not necessarily be cheaper
on the next search. So starting off with the fact
that there's no one place that's cheaper to search, to me,
it just comes down to user interface users, which one

(15:37):
do you like exactly? And so for me that's Google Flights.
I find it to be quick, easy, responsive. You can
search like seven airports at the same time, so maybe
I want to go to Europe, but I don't care where,
you know, I can put in seven different airports. I
can just put in the continent of Europe. You can
do flexible dates. It ends up just being a far

(15:58):
better experience to search quickly and to get results quickly
than I've found elsewhere where, you know, one search might
take twenty or thirty seconds to return all the information.
With Google, it happens in a micro second. So that's
why I tend to like it. But for other for
you know, if somebody says I just really, you know,
been searching on orbits my whole life. I like it.

(16:19):
You're not gonna you're not gonna miss out on anything
by continuing to search there rather than another site. Well,
there are reasons to to book directly with a certain airline, right, like, like,
can you can you talk about some of the reasons
to book directly, you know, like all the online website
once you've actually found that deal that you want. Yeah,
that this. I'm really glad you brought that up, because
there's a different While while it doesn't really matter where

(16:41):
you search for flight, searching on kayak is virtually the
same as Google flights and elsewhere, the best practice is
generally to book directly with the airline. And there's a
few reasons for that. One is that under federal law,
and there's something called the twenty four hour rule, which
says that when you book a flight directly with an airline,
you're entitled to a twenty four hour grace period from

(17:03):
the moment you hit purchase, during which you can cancel
and get a full get of all your money back,
full refund, no you know, no questions asked. It's kind
of like that five second rule when you drop food
on the floor, exactly exactly who knew that this action
could could could exist in real life. But it's the
second rule, but the the the federal protection. Their federal

(17:25):
guarantee of a twenty four hour rule only applies when
you book directly with an airline. Now that said, a
number of you know places Expedia, Priceline, and others have
their own policies where they say we'll give you twenty
four hours, but it doesn't have the same protection of
federal law the way it does when you book directly
with an airline. So you know, there could be an

(17:46):
instance in an edge case, maybe you call at twenty
three hours, but there's a long hold you don't get
through in time, it ends up just being a little
bit of a uh, you might have a little bit
more difficulty taking advantage in some cases. Generally, booking directly
is going to still make sure that the law is
on your side, but more importantly, if something goes wrong

(18:07):
with your schedule, if the flight changes, if you need
to cancel it, if there's bad weather and you need
to rebook, or something or other, it's far simpler to
do so when you can just chat directly with the
airline rather than having to talk with the airline and
the middleman that you booked through, because each of them
might have different policies. You know, who knows like they're

(18:30):
gonna It's just can be a hot potato about who
you get passed between. So if the flight happens to
be significantly cheaper booking through a price line or online
travel agency, then yeah, you know, if it's if I'm
saving a hundred fifty bucks un bucks, sure I'm going
to book through the online travel agency. But if it's
basically the same price or you know, within ten dollars

(18:51):
or something, I'll generally book directly within airline because it
tends to just be uh you, it tends to work
out better if there if there's any mishaps or any
changes needed with the reservation. That makes sense. You know.
One of one of my favorite tips in your book,
Scott uh you talk about building your own layover and
how you say basically that's the key to crossing the
ocean as cheaply as possible. So yeah, for for people

(19:13):
who don't know what that means, or they're like, wait,
what is this, you talk about how it can save
sometimes being your own layover. Yeah. Look, so I used
to live in Washington, d C. And I wanted to
travel once to to Norway. Flights from Washington, d C
at that time to Norway were like seven eight hundred dollars.
But one day I stumbled across a flight that was

(19:36):
from Washington, d C. To Brussels in Belgium for about
two hundred dollars somewhere in that range. Uh, And so
I knew off top of my head, once I get
to Europe, once I'm in Brussels, I can get a
flight up to Oslow or wherever for fifty bucks seventy
five bucks. And so instead of paying seven hundred dollars

(19:56):
to fly from d C to Oslow and almost certainly
still have a connection, I could just book this flight
from d C to Bronsels for two, hang out in
Belgium for as long as I wanted to, and then
continue on to Norway for seventy five dollars. And so
get two destinations. To You get two destinations, You get
to spend as much or as little time as you

(20:17):
want in your layover city, and you can save a
lot of money in the process. Because I paid three
hundred dollars for that trip to Norway rather than seven
hundred dollars and so, uh, you know, it's not going
to work every single time, but trying to think oftentimes
if cheap flights are priority, trying to look at crossing
an ocean, which you know can be uh pretty expensive,

(20:37):
trying to look at a little bit more creatively, knowing
that once you get to Europe, once you get to
Southeast Asia, uh, it can be a really cheap and
easy to get onto your final destination. Now this is
especially true and especially the case if you're traveling to
a small final destination. Let's say you want to go
to a Greek island. You know, it's actually something called

(20:59):
the Greek Island where if you're if you want to
fly to Santorini, flights are oftentimes you know, fifteen hundred
dollars is something if you search it as a single
itinerary from your home airport in the US, but there
are many It's pretty common to see flights from all
over the US to Athens, Greece for like five hundred
dollars or four hundred and fifty. Once you get to Athens,

(21:21):
you can get a cheap flight onward to Santorini. You
can get a ferry, you know, for fifty bucks or something.
And so by pairing it that way, not only do
you end up with a far cheaper overall trip, but
you also are then able to take the time if
you want to, you know, build in a couple of
days in Athens, be able to go explore the Acropolis
or elsewhere, and and before you continue on to the

(21:43):
Greek island. So I think it's a wonderful strategy can
not only save money, but to make your vacation even
more kind of interesting and robust than it would have
been otherwise. Yeah, a more robust vacation. Now, like, don't
just like the short layover, well, Scott, actually, like we
want to talk a little bit more too about some
of the maybe like some specific routes where you've seen
some some of the best deals recently. We're gonna talk

(22:05):
about that and much more right after this break. All right,
we're back from the break. We are still talking with
Scott Kayes. Who is the Cheap flight Master And uh, Scott,
first question back, like master, since I don't know there's

(22:27):
a CF that's his title. That is my job title,
chief flight expert. That right, you go. He's basically the
superhero of Cheap flights everyone and only, Yeah, do you
have are you like Clark Kent? Do you have some
sort of get up underneath where you're always ready to travel?
You just rip off the button up and then you're
just like heading to Yeah. First question back from the break, Scott,

(22:50):
I am curious to know what are maybe some of
the perennial cheap routes are. There's certain things that pop
up all the time. It's like, I mean, there's always
a deal from here to here, or at least every
couple of months, so that people can at least all right, Well,
if there's just a few places that are always inexpensive
to get to, where should I be looking? Yeah, So
when you're talking about domestically, the places where you consistently

(23:12):
see the cheapest flights are to Florida, just because airlines
have had so much capacity, they're flying so many planes
to Florida. Oftentimes Miami is actually the most expensive one.
But if you're willing to fly, for instance, to Fort
Lauderdale or somewhere else, they're uh, you know, easy to find,
uh flights like under a hundred bucks round trip from

(23:33):
the northeast or under a hundred fifty from elsewhere. In
the country. Hawaii is another one that was historically quite expensive,
but nowadays we see as airlines have really added a
lot of capacity and as Southwest started flying to Hawaii.
You regularly now see flights from you know, the West
Coast to Hawaii under two fifty sometimes under two hundred

(23:54):
bucks round trip from uh the Midwest or the East
Coast for more, like, you know, under under four hundred
bucks round trips sometimes if we're lucky, and so those
pop up much more commonly than it used to. When
we're talking about international, the places where we've seen I
think the highest volume of what I would consider to
be pretty cheap flights for Central America, Costa Rica really

(24:19):
really common to see flights from the US under three
hundred bucks a round trip, sometimes under two fifty. Columbia
similar fairs that have become very popular among travelers and
easy to get too cheap. But then Western Europe, I think,
is the one that a lot of folks really might
have missed how affordable it is to fly there in
a way that it didn't used to be. You know,

(24:40):
a decade ago, you would almost never see flights to
Western Europe under eight hundred bucks round trip. Whereas today
almost every single week we see flights from the US UH.
And again not just from New York and Chicago and
and and Los Angeles, but from small airports as well
to Western Europe under five hundred bucks round trip anytimes

(25:00):
under four hundreds, sometimes even under three hundred if you're
especially if you're traveling during a non peak period. And
so the places that tend to be most you see
those most commonly are Paris, Rome, Madrid, and Barcelona, but
really all over all over Europe if you're if you
have just even a little bit of patients, you tend

(25:21):
to see pretty regularly. And so for folks you know,
your most popular travel destination or travel continent in the world,
and so for folks who are excited for that trip
maybe haven't been able to take it for a couple
of years, UH, the outlook is very very good, even
when we're thinking about this summer. One of the last
thing I'll note here is that, look, a lot of

(25:42):
folks have are thinking right now about how expensive flights
have become, but that is more true among domestic flights
than it is among international flights. Demand for domestic flights
has rebounded, but basically fully if not higher than it
was in nineteen whereas demand for international travel is still

(26:04):
down about compared to where it was pre pandemic, whereas
capacity for domestics is down about it is in some
ways between the US and Europe fully recovered. And so
what that means is that where's domestically there are more
people competing for fewer seats, and that resulting in higher

(26:26):
fairs for flights to Europe. There are fewer people committing
competing for more seats, and and especially in a on
a route or or you know, on a type of
trip that was historically very very popular, very sought after.
And so I think the relative value of flying to
Europe this summer, this fall, even this spring has gone

(26:46):
way up because you can still find those under five
round trip flight. I was looking just yesterday, you know,
it was cheaper to fly to Iceland or to Paris
than it was to fly to Los Angeles from the
East coast. And so, thinking thinking a little bit more overseas,
I think is where the value is. Right now, That's
that's so interesting because that's not what you would expect,

(27:07):
right and like it makes me think you think shorter distance, Yes,
we don't have to fly over the ocean. I think
that's a hold over from COVID, right, because like, in
my mind, what I picture is like folks are like, Okay,
let's get back to traveling a little bit, and it's like, okay,
should we go ahead and do the big European vacation.
It's just like, you know, maybe not, maybe we're still
not totally sure about what that looks like. And they
stick with the domestic travel, whereas it's like, man like

(27:30):
Europe is it's wide open, but it is open for business.
And like you said, if they're still down as far
as the demand, I mean, in my mind, that would
explain the reason that there there are deals there. But
I mean I think a lot of it too is
the fact that is still today. You know, even as
we're recording them. The mask mandate is gone. You no
longer need a mask on airplanes in the US, But
the mandate to show a recent negative test to fly

(27:53):
back to the US even if you've been fully vaccinated
is I think that is the mandate that actually has
a pretty big impact on travel demand. I think that's
probably the primary reason why international travel intrist is still
uh significantly depressed because folks are worried. What happens if
I fly to Paris and I catch a breakthrough infection,
Even if I'm setic or totally fine, I have to

(28:15):
hold up here for a week, ten days, fourteen days?
What about my job, what about my pets? You know,
so it's not just like an emotional or mental barrier there. Yeah,
you've got those actual rules that are practical one and
for many people as well. Yeah, that's true. Talking about
other changes from COVID, though it scott change fees or
something that kind of have always been a thorn in
the side of the consumers. Those kind of vanished, you know,

(28:36):
as a silver lining to the pandemic for for everyone
who likes to fly, or are there any any sign
of those returning into your future? Do you feel like
those are are done for I don't think so. I
think you know, the airlines really made a big holabaloo
about how they were permanently getting rid of change fees,
you know, rather than getting in a whole philosophical discussion
of how permanent is permanent. I would be very surprised

(28:59):
to see if they then come back in any significant
way in the next five or ten years. I don't
use the word transitory. Okay, yeah, yeah, exactly exactly. This
has becomeing a real uh question, just like J. Powell faces.
But um, look, the I think this is one of
the things that a lot of folks needs to really
kind of factor in their mind when they're thinking about

(29:19):
booking flights, is how much easier it is now to
change your travel plans after you book in a way
that it didn't used to be historically. You know, back
back before the pandemic, you when you booked your flight
after that twenty four hour grace period when you could
cancel for free, you were pretty well locked into your dates,
and if you wanted to change your travel dates, you
had to pay an arm and a leg to do so.

(29:41):
I mean we're talking to three penalty in addition to
any fair difference. And so what changed during the pandemic
was the airlines basically across the board got rid of
those change fees. So that now today when you book
a flight, if you later after you book want to
change the dates, you don't have to pay any penalty
at all. Uh that you know, you still do have

(30:03):
to cover the fair difference if your new flight is
more expensive, but if your new flight is cheaper, you
actually get the difference back in the form of a
travel credit. So you know, it's just it makes it
a lot more sort of possible to make prospective bookings,
to make flight bookings on trip that you're maybe not
sure about, maybe you're still a little iffy about COVID

(30:25):
or this or that, and you can say, I'll book
that flight for this summer, a lock in the fair
now while it's cheaper, and then if later on I
decide it doesn't look like a good time to travel,
if there's some new scary variant or something, I can
always push my trip back, you know, three or six
months however long and not rather than being locked into
my dates. Nice. Yeah, the environment has changed when it

(30:46):
comes to booking travels. What it sounds like while we're
talking about fees here, Scott. In your book you talk
about and you actually reveal like why add on fees,
why why separate fees to to check a bag? Why
they have become so common? Can you explain that to
our listen? Yeah, So there are a couple of things
going on here. One um is that the this is
a large part thanks to the rise of the budget airlines,

(31:09):
you know, not just Spirit, not just Frontier, but globally
you know, Ryanair in Europe and easy Jet Air Asia
and in Asian and whatnot. Becoming basically the most profitable
way to start a new airline in the way that
they've been able to. The business model that they've really
honed in on and found success with is to have
a very cheap headline, fair by far the cheapest and

(31:33):
when you search on Google Flights or when you search
on Kayak, but then to have a lot of add
on fees that are varying degrees of optional. You know,
there's some that really are options. You don't have to
choose your seat, you don't have to have a check
in bag, you know, check bag. I usually don't travel
with one anyway. But there are some that are maybe
a little bit less optional. Many budget airins, in fact,

(31:56):
most of them require you to pay for a carry
on bad Egg, which I think I find a little
bit loathsome but you know, it's there. Even with those fees,
it can still be a very good deal in many
cases on a budget airline, but it's something to be
aware of. But specifically in the US, there's actually a
tax code reason why fees. Add on fees have become

(32:20):
so popular, and the reason why is that when you
buy a domestic flight, there is a seven point five
percent federal excise tax that is applied to your fare,
and the fair you know that you pay only includes
things that are not optional. Any optional fees like bag
seat selection, I don't know, meals or stuff like that

(32:43):
are not subject to that seven point five percent excise tax.
And so what that means is that it's more tax
advantageous for the airlines to separate out what they consider
to be optional items because they're not having to pay
tax on that revenue the way they are having to
pay tax on the air fair. So that's part of
the reason why you you you see uh, these sort

(33:06):
of add on fees becoming such a big business as uh,
the airline accountants have really kind of earned their keep
and and advised the airlife that this was going to
be a money maker for them. Yeah, that was that
was kind of like one of the most fascinating parts
of reading your book was kind of seeing that I
didn't like, of course, that's gonna change their incentives and
their desire to lower fares and then find other ways

(33:28):
where that they're not taxed on to make money, so
it just makes sense, right way for them to shelter
that income. Yeah, yeah, and well, you know, and and
and and and in a very similar way. I think
this is part of the reason, part of what helps
explain why we see so many cheap flights, because the
value of you as a customer for the airline, it's
not just the money you pay for your economy air fare,
and that's a dwindling source of value in many ways.

(33:50):
You know, you talk about how big data is such
an important and valuable part of so many companies. Now,
when an airline knows, you know, they have your travel data,
they're much more able to market to you effectively. Oh,
Scott loves to take vacations to you know, Hawaii and February.
So let's keep advertising, you know, to him around I

(34:11):
don't know, October or something when maybe he books those
flights before. Hey, they're good deals to Hawaii. Oh, you know,
so and so it's a frequent flyer. You know, if
we can get them to sign up for a frequent
flyer program, they're much more likely to be a repeat customer.
They earned miles with this airline, they don't want to
let those miles go to waste. They they end up
being able to you know, almost thinking of the airfare

(34:31):
that you pay for your economy seat as as something
of a lost leader. But your your data business, yeah,
your future business, your data being an increasingly valuable source
for the airlines. Well, you send out an email recently
about saving money when it comes to booking a rental car,
and that obviously in the pandemic has become just a

(34:53):
harrier thing, and especially last summer, some of those rental
car prices, like it didn't matter how much you played
your flight because your rental car was actually the most
expensive thing about your trip. So the car apocalypse exactly exactly.
I mean people running you haul in order to save
money around Hawaiian Yeah, and so yeah, you're taking the
road to Hannah in you but can you talk to

(35:14):
us about how folks can say on that aspect of travel,
like how can people get a rental car without paying
a Norman a leg? Yeah? Look, um, one of these
strategies that you can really use effectively with rental cars.
And one of the things I do is to check
back and check back often because let me give you
an example, So I recently had a trip to Boston
for a relative's wedding, and so as soon as I

(35:37):
found out about this wedding, I went and I booked
a rental car UH, knowing that when you book a
rental car with mostly with most UH rental car sites,
you know, whether it's an online traveling see or I
use Costco Travel personally, because I find the cheapest rates there,
your reservation is free to cancel. And so what that

(35:57):
means is, as soon as I know I have this
need for a rental car, I'll go ahead and book it.
And that is setting a price ceiling. So when I
first booked it, i'd have to go back and find
the exact number. I think it was like a hundred
and sixty six dollars was my first booking for a
two day rental. But then you know, I just set
myself a calendar reminder every Monday to go and just

(36:18):
do the same search. And so the next Monday, when
the rate went down to a hundred and fifty dollars,
what I did was I booked that new hundred and
fifty dollar rate and I canceled my old hundred and
sixty six dollar one. And so I say you know,
pocketarly that sixteen dollars, and then did oh the following
Monday when I went down a hundred forty or something,
it did the exact same process. And then the next

(36:39):
week when it went up to a hundred seventy five,
didn't matter because I had already locked it in at
a hundred forty. Again, think of it as a one
way ratchet win, where it's real heads I win, tails
you lose when the when the rent rental rate goes
down for the dates you need, then you can rebook
for free and pocket the difference. If the rental rates
go up, no big deal, You've allready locked in the

(37:00):
lower rate. And that this is something that you can
do really effectively with car rentals because you don't have
to pre pay for them because there's free cancelation, and
so trying to make sure you book as far in
advanced as possible. And then just again we talked about
how I'm a real kind of type a person when
it comes to organization. I just set myself a counter
reminder every Monday morning to just go and do thirty

(37:22):
second search, see if the fares any, if the rental
rates any cheaper now, and if it is, I'll rebook it.
I love it. Colendar reminders saved me so much money.
Basic keep the I R s from hounding me, make
sure I pay my quarterly estimates. That Scott, obviously you
like you're a huge fan of travel. You probably want
all of us to do something that you are doing.

(37:44):
But you are gonna make an arguments or in your
book you make an argument for why it is that
we should probably travel a little more often. And we
will actually get to that, plus a couple other questions
here right after the break. All right, we are back

(38:04):
from the break, still talking with Scott Kais about the
new era of cheap travel, and Scott, I just want
to talk about airline seats shrinking for just a second,
because in your book you you say they are actually shrinking.
I was. I feel like they confirmed my suspicions because
I'm six foot six and I feel like I thought
that they were perennially on the data to support that. Right.

(38:25):
That's my and my apologies. Yes, it's called densification. One
of the reasons why we're living in the golden age
of cheap flights is these seats are not as big
as they used to be because airlines are trying to
fit more onto the plane every single year. You might
have by not upgrading, then like should I pay extra
for more leg room or is that or should I
just got the means and interest by all means? Look,

(38:46):
I mean, that's one of the great things about the
the the kind of current age of of flying is
that you can pay, uh to upgrade to premium economy
where you're gonna have basically, you know, rather than the
thirty or three already one inch of leg room, you'll
have thirty four thirty six inches and so you know, look,
it can make a big difference special if you're a

(39:07):
tall guy. But um, for most folks, you know, buying
the economy seat and putting up with it for a
short flight is tends to be the way that they go.
If it's a longer flight or if you're really tall,
opting for those upgrades can be worth it. Can I
just Reminiscen Scott? Did you ever fly air tran back
in the day? I did? Yeah, do you remember the

(39:27):
air tran? Uh? I forget what it wasn't business class
is what they called it, but it was it was
something where they had those nice, bigger seats and in
for some of the legs from the shorter legs, it
was only a forty dollar upgrade. Or there's there's a
similar aspect that happens with Spirit today where they sell
the couple front rows that you know, it's not exactly
first class, but they call it the big front seat

(39:49):
where it's you know, significantly larger at a relatively reasonable upsell,
you know, often forty fifty sixty bucks. And so, like
I said, you know, if you're a larger guy, if
you are larger woman, or you uh just need to
you know, be traveling a further distance, that can ma
anyways be the most affordable way to have a roomier ride.
Uh looking at that at that big front seat on Spirit,

(40:13):
you're you're paying by the inch. Maybe, yeah, I mean,
as long as people have options, right, Like, I think
that's the biggest thing is that you are you truly
are able to fly in a way that fits with
your budget, in a way that you value your money
and the way in ways that you want to spend
your money. And I think that's one of the things
that all this competition has brought is that no longer

(40:35):
are you just subjected to the standard ticket. You can.
You can go cheap. You can go really cheap. You can.
Sounds like you don't like traveling in a fannie pack,
you know where you've got like two days worth the
clothes just in a little fanny pack so you don't
get charged. But for those who do want to do that,
I love that those options are out there, including Joel
to pay, you know, I think that's one of the

(40:56):
biggest stories of the way that air travel has changed
over the forty or fifty years. Going from a one
size fits all UH offering where you could, you know,
people could fly and you would get it was a
very you know, much more comfortable experience. The seats were larger,
you know, the meals and everything, but you had to
be very much for that ticket. This was not a

(41:18):
mass market thing. You know. You if you were you know,
it weren't in the top five percent of income earners,
you probably weren't going to be able to afford to fly.
Whereas today, you know, it is incredibly affordable. You know,
the vast majority of Americans have have flown in their lifetime.
Around half of people get on an airplane every single year,
and airfare is getting cheaper every successive year. And so

(41:41):
I think that's a wonderful thing that air travels not
something that is just reserved for the rich and the
elite like it used to be, but that it's accessible
for most people, for most people, in that travel is
much more possible for people in a way it didn't
used to be. Yeah, I agree. I think sometimes people
complain about and I'm I'm not gonna be the one
who complain. I am going to be the one who
was like, you know what, I'm okay with those smaller

(42:02):
seats if it means that there are because I can
afford upgrade if I want to write, if but I
personally choose not to most of the time, I'm like,
you know what, I can I can take two hours
and just kind of like a test of will, like
can I exactly exactly exactly. It's like it's like a workout.
What cane can I push myself? Yeah? Well, obviously that's
I mean, this is a trend that we love seeing

(42:24):
where where air travel is becoming more affordable. Let's talk
about a trend that we don't like seeing, which is
that like many folks don't take all of their vacation time.
You know, a lot of folks are choosing to work
over rest and play, even though we say that we
want to travel more. So, yeah, Scott, like, what's up
with that? What's up with the culture here in the
US when it comes to travel, especially when it comes

(42:45):
to air fair. Yeah, look, um, the US is one
of the worst countries in the world and actually taking
vacation days and and look, that's partly a story of
uh there. You know, unlike many pure countries, there's no
requirement for paid time off. There are certainly many jobs
that don't have paid vacation as part of it. But
even among people who do have paid vacation days in

(43:07):
their in their job, you look at at usage statistics
and it's not only is it low by international standards,
it's many ways getting worse. I mean, American vacation days
went from on average twenty days or so in the
mid nineties that people would take off per year to
closer to you know, fifteen sixteen to today. Millennials tend

(43:29):
to be even worse on it. People all say, you know,
we want to take more vacations, we want to travel more,
and yet we're taking fewer and fewer days off. And
in my mind, that's mostly a question, uh question of
what is the biggest hurdle that's stopping people from taking
more vacations and traveling more than they would want to.

(43:50):
Is it a question of of not having enough vacation days.
Certainly that's the case for for some people, but by
and large, that doesn't seem to be the constraining factor.
I think the constraining factor is the headache, volatility, and
uncertainty of booking flights. It's so it's the most volatile
purchase that we regularly make. You have no idea, you know,

(44:11):
is the airfare that I'm seeing from Atlanta to Amsterdam?
Is this a good fare? Is this a bad fair?
Should I book today? Should I wait? It's such a
daunting task for most people that, you know, if you
end wind up overpaying for your flights, you get one
shot at it, and if you wind up over paying,
it kind of cast a little bit of a cloud

(44:32):
over the trip. You feel like you have to pinch
pennies to make, you know, to to make up for
the expensive flights. You kind of have this existential pressure
on your shoulders to enjoy the vacations sufficient with what
you paid for that flight. Whereas on the converse, you know,
you think of back to that hundred thirty dollar flight
I got to Milan. That was a real revelation for
me because unlike past trips where I felt that pressure

(44:54):
to make the expense of the trip worth it, this
time I felt like I was playing with how money.
I felt like, oh my gosh, you know, I saved
so much on flights. Not only can I just splurge
on the actual vacation itself, you know, bet by better meals,
do more fun activities, uh stuff where I might have
pinched pennies beforehand. So not only did I have a

(45:15):
better actual trip, but a better mental trip because I
didn't feel that same sort of pressure to make it
all worth it. You know, I could just sort of
relax and enjoy myself and not feel like, oh, I
gotta make this worth it because I paid so much
for the flight, Like we're like, we're like, I gotta
get up at seven every morning and must maximize the

(45:36):
day exactly exactly. And then, you know, it became a
revelation because not only for this specific trip, but I realized, well,
what if you extend this further? What if what if
most of the trips you take are ones where you're
not overpaying but instead getting a good deal. All of
a sudden you can start to not only you know,
if you pay three hundred or four hundred dollars for
your flight to Europe rather than a thousand, that means

(45:57):
you can take three vacations for the price that you
used to pay for one. So not only do you
get to have more time doing it, but you get
to explore more places. You get to not just go
to the big you know, not just go to Paris
or London, but to go to I don't know, Vilnias,
or go to Copenhagen, or go to Valencia, places that
might be not as high on the average tourist list,

(46:19):
but place that might appeal to you personally. You get
to wind up exploring more places, finding plantings appeal to
you as an individual. And I find you you end
up having a better travel experience as a result of
being able to do that sampling, because you've got cheaper
flights in the first place. So writing this book and
and sort of exploring that, well, what are the knock

(46:41):
on effects of getting cheap flights there? I came away
from it realizing that they're even more life changing than
I had realized to begin with. And and that's why
I'm out here preaching the cheap flight gospel, because they're not.
It's not just about saving money, it's about actually having
better vacations and more of them. I love it well,
And I love your desire to give people not just

(47:02):
to take an extra vacation a year, but to take
a lot more vacations, like and you say, actually those
shorter trips because of the anticipation factor, it actually makes
it a richer experience. I love that too. How even
just looking forward to and then remembering your trip, having
more trips gives you more to look forward to and
then more to remember. But but on top of that,
the longer travel is actually starting to become more popular
right now. So I'm curious to get your take on that,

(47:23):
because more people working remotely, maybe from a random destination
like I'm gonna spend a month in Portugal or I'm
gonna spend a month over here. Um, that's happening more
than ever before, Like Airbnb is reporting less week long
stays more month long stays. Right, So do you do
you have any tips for folks who want to travel
and and also simultaneously work abroad. Yeah, I'm so glad

(47:45):
you touched on that sort of psychology aspect, because I
think one of the biggest mistakes we make when we
think about travel is only thinking about travel happiness as
something that happens during the trip, when in reality, when
you go look at at research of how people tend
to enjoy travel, we actually get as much joy, if
not more joy, from anticipating a trip, from looking forward

(48:06):
to a trip, from day dreaming about that wonderful, you
know cafe we're gonna hang out in Paris, that great
beach we're gonna sip a cocktail in in in Rio,
and and you know, on our our daydreams are not
only free, they are flawless. Nothing bad ever happens when
we think about that cafe, when in reality, during a trip,
you know, I don't know, a bunch of cars honking nearby,

(48:27):
the waiter forgets your drink order, like the rains and
stuff the rains like stuff happens. But this is why,
in large part, the looking forward to a trip and
reminiscing about a trip, it tend we tend to do
it with rose colored glasses, and so I think we
actually end up enjoying it more and why I think
like trying to separate out and take more vacations. You know,

(48:51):
if you've got three weeks of vacation a year, taking
three one week vacations will lead to more happiness than
taking one three week vacation. But you know, when I
wrote this was at a time just before this sort
of work from anywhere became much more than norm and
so you know, it's something that I think has become

(49:14):
like that long slow travel is actually much more plausible
now because you're not having to come home, uh in
a sense, you know, you're not having to go there
and then come back your your your time is less
constrained for this three weeks of vacation might have a
year and then more of like travel now is a
lifestyle where you're where you actually live is changing, and

(49:37):
so you can really take advantage of it to be
able to see far more places, especially if you're like
traveling over to Europe, where by far the largest travel
expense is just the flight across the ocean. But once
you get to Europe, you know, between the trains, the
budget airlines there and everything else, it's really easy to
pop over from Madrid, to Barcelona, Barcelona to Rome, Rome

(49:59):
to Milan, Alan to pairs, you know, like like it's
you know, under a hundred bucks, if not cheaper for
any one of those legs, whereas the expense of getting
across the ocean is oftentimes the biggest one that folks
are facing. And so if you are inclined to do
that slow uh kind of travel and work from anywhere,
doing it in a place where you can bop around,

(50:19):
whether that's uh, Europe, whether that's Southeast Asia where there's
a lot of infrastructure to support that is I think
a really kind of shrewd way to go, And I
love it just as a sampling thing to be able
to test out see how you like different places, and
then for the ones that you like, you can always
come back to later, knowing you know, Paris isn't going anywhere,
you know, uh, Bangkok's not going anywhere. You can always

(50:43):
come back and visit more. Even if you don't get
everything you want out of this one trip. Yeah, it
just takes the pressure off of it being like the
perfect experience, the perfect trips, Like you know what, maybe
next time it'll be it'll be even better. We can
spend even more time here. It's we're huge fans of
your newsletter. Jill and I we both we both get it. Actually,
recently you had you highlighted a like seven deal to

(51:05):
Korea that unfortunately afforded it to man. I was like,
don't you want to go? I had already afforded it
to my wife because I saw it that morning as well. Unfortunately,
we're not going to be able to take advantage of
that one. But can you tell our listeners how they
can sign up for that newsletter? How does it all work? Yeah,
you can go to Scott's cheap flights dot com. No
posturehe these, no underscores, just Scott's cheap Flights dot Com.

(51:27):
We'd be honored to send you cheap flights out of
your home airport. You just put in your email tell
us what your home airport is, and then we're going
to be searching and making sure that you never miss
a great deal popping up from your home airport. And lastly,
you know, as as sad as I am to hear
that this specific career deal wasn't the one. One of
the things I've learned on my seven years now working

(51:48):
as a cheap flight expert is that um, I have
been shocked at just how voluminous cheap fares are that
I was at the outset. I worried, are there going
to be enough deals out there that I could that
like that this is going to be possible as a company,
as a business and everything else. And that has not

(52:08):
once been a problem. Every single day for the past
seven years, we have found cheap flights, especially you know,
flights overseas, not ones that are saving fifty bucks or
on average, our international deals are saving five d and
fifty dollars round trip. So even though this specific career
deal didn't work out, there's going to be another one.

(52:29):
I guarantee it. I love it. We'll be on the
lookout for that. Scott, thank you so much for joining us. Man.
We really appreciate it. My pleasure is always always great
to be here. Thank you so much for having me back. Scott.
It's always a pleasure to talk to you, joel Man.
What a fun conversation. I swear every time we talked
to Scott. It just makes me want to spend a
lot of money, or it makes me not want to
spend a lot of money. It makes me want to

(52:49):
spend some time looking up the cheap flights and making
sure that I am taking advantage of all the vacation
days that we have carved out in our how to
Money schedule. But but for you real quick, what was
your big takeaway from this conversation with Scott. I just
gotta say, some folks have like a mount rushmore of
superheroes that they love or of entertainment stars. Scott, I
think Scott kys would be on our mount rushmore of

(53:10):
frugal money saving dudes. And that's a pretty sure. Yeah. Well,
it's just fun too to talk to somebody when it
comes like he's an expert in a way that we
spend our money. That's very fun. Yes, right, Because you
take that same passion, that same expertise and apply its
taxes or something a little bit drier, it's still gonna
be a less interesting, less engaging conversation because we're not

(53:32):
super excited more the medicine you've got to take right exactly,
but you still need the information, but it's not quite
as joyful to receive it totally. All right. Well, yeah,
my big takeaway was when Scott said the average airfare
going up, Well, that doesn't mean that there are any
cheap flights, and we briefly alluded to this on on
Friday's episode, and Scott talked about it in this interview
where just because you see those headline numbers that inflation

(53:55):
is making everything more expensive, including flights. Yes, the average
air fair is more expensive, but doesn't mean you can't
score a ridiculously cheap deal. And in fact, Scott talked
about all of the reasons you can still score a
cheap deal, So don't pay attention to that stuff. Pay
attention instead to the lolo numbers of the airfare that
you can get because of this new era of chief
flights that we're in. But yeah, what was your big

(54:16):
take right? My? My big takeaway was gonna be really broad,
which is so his splurge was he was talking about
the annual fees that he pays towards his credit cards,
and dude, you and I we hate fees, but this
is one of those situations where if you are taking
advantage of a product, then it can be worth the fees. Uh.
It's it kind of reminds me of debt, right, Like,
I don't think I'm ever gonna say that debt is good. However,

(54:40):
debts might be this thing that you pay a little
little bit on, especially if it's a very low interest rate,
if it allows you to achieve even bigger things. And
so in the same way with Scott with his credit cards,
he's willing to pay, as you know, a small fee,
whether it's ninety five dollars or six He's willing to
pay that annual fee on that card because he is
I know, he is taking full advantage of all of

(55:01):
the benefits of each one of those money's worth and
that baseball cards collecting binding. I want to send us
a picture, please go. I can only imagine how awesome
that thing. That thing looks, But I just wanted to
mention that it's sort of like a general meta takeaway
because there are things that we can do and it
depends on your specific situation, but it is important to
keep the big picture in mind. Let's go ahead. Shift
Gears introduced the beer that you and I enjoyed during

(55:23):
this episode. This was evolutions of Boris the Crusher. This
is hop and Frog beer. What was your What was
your take on this one? Yeah, so this one was
a caramel machiatto stout. So it was interesting. It's it
was definitely sweet, had like dessert like vibes, and it
definitely had those like that makiato thing going on, which
is not totally my jam necessarily, right, It's it's definitely

(55:46):
leans in the sweeter direction. I prefer more dark chocolate
vibes than like milk chocolate sweet. But I still appreciated
this beer because it really did reflect exactly what it
said it was gonna taste like. And even though that's
not the thing I typically go for on the beer shelf,
this one did a really good job of pulling it off. Yeah.
And by the way, the boris stands for bodacious oatmeal

(56:06):
Russian Imperial stout, so it's an entire line that Hopping
Frog has. But I'm kind of with you, man, uh,
And so I guess they call it the macchiata because
it tastes a little burnt. So even though you said sweet,
there is definitely this bitterness going on and the caramel flavors.
It reminds me of going to a coffee shop and
they've got those bottles of the different syrups, the drizzle,
Uh no, not the drizzle, but it's like it's the

(56:26):
clear syrups, you know, the bottles, and the glass is clear,
and they kind of do like a little you know,
they do a SHOT's worth of of whatever that is.
I've never been a fan of that because it tastes
like kind of artificial in my mind, as opposed to,
you know, if there's an actual drizzle of real caramel
on top. I like that. I don't like the caramel
flavoring or you know, like the caramel sugar syrup as much.

(56:49):
And I feel like this this one kind of reminds
me of that. It was still a very enjoyable beer,
but that being said, it just wasn't my my absolute favorite.
But I'm still glad that you and I got to
enjoy this one today. But that's gonna be it. Will
make sure to link to where you can sign up
for Scott's emails. We'll have that up in our show
notes at how to money dot com. We'll also linked
to Scott's book, Take More Vacations, which is definitely worth

(57:09):
reading and it's a great book. Don't forget to sign
up for our new email newsletter, and that's really easy
to do on our website at how to money dot
com slash newsletter. Thanks in advance. All right, that's gonna
do it. Matt for this episode until next time. Best
Friends Out, best Friends Out,