December 11, 2024 • 60 mins
Today’s episode offers a peek into what your favorite personal finance podcast might be like, if only it was hosted by two ladies! Jen Smith and Jill Sirianni are hosts of the Frugal Friends podcast which is all about embracing a more intentional and frugal lifestyle… but not THAT kind of frugal. They challenge the idea that frugality is about deprivation and instead highlight how it can empower you to achieve financial independence while living a life filled with joy and purpose. Jen and Jill drive this point home in their new book, Buy What You Love Without Going Broke, which is exactly what we’re talking about today- spending money! We cover the ways that we’re doing it wrong, how to spend money in a healthy values-driven way, and strategies to support those new habits!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to How to Money.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Joel and I am Matt, and today we're talking
about buying what you love without going broke with Jen
and Jill from Frugal Friends.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Yeah, so, Joel, I don't want to offend our guests today,
but Jen and Jill are basically like the girl version
of us. They just got longer hair. Just kidding. They
really are friends, though they talk about money on their podcast,
Frugal Friends, which they started right around the same time
that we started Hours I think back in twenty eighteen.
One big difference though they've written books, and specifically they
(00:49):
have a new book hitting the shelves in January. That
kind of attention span, do we, Matt, No, No, The
name of the book buy what you Love Without Going Broke,
And that is exactly what we're talking about today, spending money.
We're gonna talk about all the ways that we're doing
it wrong, how to go about spending money in a
in like a healthy values driven manner, ways to support
(01:11):
those new habits, all that and more. Today we've got
a lot to discuss. There are four of us here,
after all, all of us podcasters, so I think we're
gonna have a lot to get through, so we'll cut
to the chase. Jen and Jill, thank you so much
for joining us today on how to Money.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Thanks for having us such a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 4 (01:26):
Yeah, it's a full house.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
We love it most definitely. We're excited for you, excited
for this new book. And but first question out of
the gate that we got to ask everybody who comes
on is what's your craft your equivalent? What do you
like to suploi? John, we're gonna talk about spending here today,
what do you like to splour John? While you're still
being smart with your money and thinking about your future.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
So for me, I think it's a little weird, But
for me it's not weird. I buy pre cut vegetables,
which in the frugal living space is like a gas Like,
why would you spend extra to have your vegetables pre cut?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Sounds like heresy, right.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
But if it's that barrier to entry between me cooking
and me getting takeout, that's usually what it is, is
the effort that it takes to chop a vegetable. I'm lazy.
I embrace it. So pre chopped vegetafici, I love it.
I love either way to say it.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
That's my thing I love. Okay, So my wife she
she chops real veggies. Not to brag that thing said.
She does get the pre peeled garlic from Aldie in
the in the ziplock resealable bag because that is such
a time consuming task and she gets all in your
fingernails and she hates it. So she's like, I'm buying
(02:37):
that pre peeled garlic living high on the hog.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I know.
Speaker 4 (02:40):
I take it a step further and I get minced garlic.
So yeah, I'm just I'm there.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Jen has your wife beat of the efficient, Jill, how
about you? For me, it's paying for car washes still
the like drive through kind. But then we've got this
place near us called Woodies Washhack. I'm not paid by them,
I should be. And afterwards you can wipe down your
(03:09):
car and vacuum it out included in the price of
the wash itself, and it is a party to me.
Could I clean and vacuum my car at home? Absolutely?
Do I have the supplies to do it? Sure do?
Would I rather go to Woody's Washack.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Because they're playing the cool like beach music and they
got very strong vacuum.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Sometimes for employees, even power it's essential. Their employees will
help you to kind of detail your car, and then
you try and tip them and they can accept tip.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Wow, it's like wood.
Speaker 4 (03:47):
Yeah, washhack is a vibe.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
I think the other thing that is included in that
is entertainment for your children if you.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Uh, because they got the led all the colors.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yes, my kids are like, dad, please can we go
to the cars? But then you also get some work
out of them. They help you clean the car on
the back back end, So it's it's worth it if
you can find a cheap enough place because it hits
a bunch of those facets.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
I don't have kids, but it's entertaining for me.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
You can borrow mine. Joke, same years will be old enough.
And that's when you know you've like turned the corner
when you start putting them to work and all of
a sudden, it's like, wait a minute. Life looks a
lot different now than when I used to just do
everything for you. You're starting to pull your own ways.
I know.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
I do make my twenty month old bring his own
diaper to the trash can and that's nice.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Yeah, see that's progress.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Yeah the drift, Yeah, life back, I'm.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Curious Okay, so our listeners know that where Joel and
I stand when it comes to organization or how nerdy
each one of us is when we approach our finances.
What do you what's y'all's take on budgeting specifically, because
Joel's like more of a shoot from the hip kind
of westerner, like a Western movie kind of guy. I'm like,
I'm more like a sniper, kind of rifle kind of guy.
(04:56):
I'm very exact zerous on budgeting. What about y'all. Do
y'all have a you've got to similar breakdown?
Speaker 4 (05:01):
You've got two of us two Yeah, So I'm very
much like Joel, which is so funny because we both
Joel and I have the specific personal finance backgrounds like
pre podcasting. Yeah, but I am very much like go
with the flow. And I think the reason I love
values based spending so much is because it allows me
to feel confident in my outgo and income without having
(05:26):
a really strict plan. So that's definitely more my vibe.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
And I like being in the nitty gritty. It's just
fun for me. I have a spreadsheet that I created.
I like looking at all of my transactions. However, both
of our approaches to budgets are that it's like step
four or five in the grand scheme of personal finance.
There's so much more that needs to come before putting
(05:54):
numbers to paper. The way that we manage money, the
decisions that we make about spending are far more nuanced
than just math. Okay, so it's really not the first
step for us.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Yeah, So, like, what, in your opinion what comes first?
Because I think for a lot of folks, budgeting, like,
let's say you're trying to get fit, it's like, okay, exercise.
I feel like budgeting is sort of like the exercise
equivalent when it comes to to physical fitness. But what
do you think should should come first?
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Well, I think budgeting is actually the like physique plan. Right,
If you have a plan to get a six pack,
you then need to develop the skills of exercising in
order to execute that plan. Right, So we talk about
essentially a plan to develop developing those skills so that
(06:42):
you can actually stick with your budget. That's what so
many people are missing.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
So both kind of tangible and intangible. Intangibly, it is
a lot to do with understanding ourselves and kind of
what makes us tick, What are our values? What do
we enjoy spending money on? What could we care less
to spend money on? And tangibly, we talk about a
couple of things that you can do before you're even budgeting,
(07:07):
including a ninety day transaction inventory. So even knowing first
where is your money going typically what are you finding
yourself spending on, can help to inform the plan that
we make going forward. So we say doing a ninety
day transaction inventory because it kind of captures the typical
(07:29):
transactions purchases that we make and can maybe even get
some of those outliers, the things that don't happen every
month but they happen occasionally kind of a thing and
compile that all into a spreadsheet to be able to
see where am I spending money on most often, what's
taking up the majority of my expenses and might even
(07:51):
be informative on some of the habits or impulse purchases
that we tend to make. What time of day am
I typically spending in pulsively? At what location am I
typically spending impulsively? How do I feel about where my
money is going? So even creating a whole other column
of essentially being able to journal about our transactions not
(08:13):
lengthy paragraphs, but being able to identify, Oh, do I
remember where what came just before I made this purchase?
Do I remember was I with anybody? How was I feeling?
How did I feel after I made the purchase? These
things can kind of help us to understand how do
I feel about the way that I'm spending money? Do
I even remember it? Did it fulfill my needs? Did
(08:36):
it satisfy whatever it was that I was hoping that
it satisfied? Did it solve for the problem that I
thought it was going to solve for? Can then help
us to understand is this where I still want to
be putting my money or are there different ways that
I can be allocating the way that I spend, which
can then help to inform the budget.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, now I like that.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
And Joe, one of the things you said kind of
at the beginning there was you talked about knowing ourselves
and how that's kind of important and important first step.
And you guys argue in the book that it's you know,
the way you're spending money. It's not necessarily a personality trade.
I think we tend to think of it like I
am this or my spouse is this, and it is
this ingrained thing? Like are we spenders or savers because
(09:19):
of nature or nurture?
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Like? Yeah, is this a habit that we've accrued over time?
Speaker 4 (09:24):
I think we a lot of people in marketing want
us to define ourselves as spender or saver because it's
a lot easier to define yourself as a spender because
everybody spends money. So if I have internalized that I
am a spender, it is a lot easier for a
marketer to get me to spend money, especially impulsively. So
(09:48):
I think that kind of perpetuates it. But we also
we tend to live for better or for worse in
extremes because it's a lot easier to look at things
in black and white one end of the spec to
remove the other, and that we don't have to process
a lot of nuance or a lot of like follow
up questions when we look at things in black and white.
(10:10):
And so the spender saver idea is that black and
white idea. The problem is is that everyone is a spender,
and everyone should be and can be a saver. It
just depends on where you are at financially, what season
you're in, at what capacity you do Each of those.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Like what you're pointing to. There are like essentially labels
right in the ability to sort of latch onto certain labels,
and in our sort of modern consumerist culture, I think
oftentimes we can tend to let our purchases reflect our
chosen identity or the labels that we have adopted. Do
you think that that's the part of the problem when
it comes to how it is that we're maybe unintentionally
(10:54):
or maybe even intentionally spending our money. It's almost like
I'm outdoorsy, I gotta get any super room exactly.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yep. Yeah, I think that these labels that we take
on could even go just beyond how we spend, but
how we manage money as a whole, how we think
about money, how we approach it, and then how we
interact with it and spend it. We talk a little
bit in the book about kind of these cognitive distortions
to say it in a clinical way or just unhelpful
(11:21):
thinking styles that can become a part of our daily
living that absolutely impacts finances, but aren't just a financial thing.
But labeling all or nothing thinking over generalizing. We can
do these things in all aspects of our lives, but
especially too when it comes to our finances, thinking I
(11:41):
am a spender or a saver, or you know, everything
is all wrong and I'm broke and I'll never be
able to make more money, or labeling our situation, however
it is that we might label it. I think really
being able to look at what have I believed to
be true about my situation? What of that thinking style
(12:03):
is helpful, what's not actually serving me? And how can
I bring in some reality to the situation. I know
for me, I can catastrophize a ton when it comes
to my finances. This happened when we paid taxes last year,
and it was the first time that the business had
(12:24):
shown a profit, and we were an escorp at the time,
and I had only had W two's that year, which
was also very unusual for me. I'm used to being
a ten ninety nine and needing to set my own
money aside, but I didn't that year, thinking oh, it's
all getting withdrawn from my paychecks. We're good to go,
(12:45):
until I got hit with a tax bill and I
was so overwhelmed by this and catastrophized. I'm like, this
is an insane amount of money. Thank goodness, we did
have money set aside like it didn't. It didn't call
us to go broke. But I then was thinking, if
I have another crisis event, this is going to be
(13:07):
really awful for us. So I even told so my
husband and I we have scooters as like our second vehicle,
and I put a rule on my husband and I
that we couldn't ride our scooters until we like put
more money back into savings because I was afraid if
we got into an accident, then we'd have to pay
our medical deductible and that could cause us to go
(13:29):
an absolute financial ruin. So I just really went to
such an.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Extreme with it, shellfish just in case. We haven't a
lot of a gratchat.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
I know we developed it.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
This was it was legit, and I almost had a
breakdown in our accountant's office where I'm just like, what,
how did I not see this coming? I'm the worst? Ever?
How do I have a personal finance podcast? I can't
let anyone find out about this Here I am talking
openly about it.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Now if there's tens of millions of people, nonetheless, you.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
Know now everybody knows. But it took me pausing to
realize and kind of talk myself through this situation of Okay,
what made me think that I wasn't going to owe
any taxes this year? And come to find out, it's
a problem a lot of people face where they don't
(14:19):
withhold enough even as W two employees. It was the
first time ever that I had been fully a W
two employee. So it's just I just didn't know. I'm
not stupid, but I encountered a situation that I had
a lack of knowledge about. But I now know and
I can move forward. I did have the money, Awesome,
(14:42):
I'm not going to have to go into debt for this.
I can make changes. I can actually help other people
to be able to understand and protect themselves against some
crisis event and their tax accountant office and stay on
a tax prison. But I think for me knowing this
about myself, that okay, I can and to overgeneralize and
what are the steps that I need to take in
(15:03):
order to help myself calm down, bring in some of
the reality, and start to put action to it rather
than just staying in my head and taking on all
of these cognitive distortions, these unhelpful thinking styles that are
actually not going to serve me well when it comes
to managing my money.
Speaker 4 (15:19):
And then ignoring it and not paying your taxes.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
And just like yeah, some get me, uncle Sam, I
moved to some island where they can't the long arm
of the law can't get you, right, just go out
on the lamb jen.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
I guess when we're talking.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
About spending, a lot of people think about spending as
something that they have to do right to put a
roof over their head, pay the car note. Although Matt
and I say, don't ever have a car note or
something they get to do right now. This is the
spending that's like kind of fun, buy an ice cream
with my family or whatever. But you guys talk about
spending as a skill, So.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
I'm curious to hear, like why you think it's a skill,
and then how we can become like more skilled at spending.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Yeah, it really is a mindset shift, because we're not
taught how to spend money. We are simply taught. We're
barely taught how to earn it. We're taught that you
can get a job or you can start a business,
and that's pretty much it. And then we're taught you
have to spend as little as possible in order to
be responsible with money and if you can make enough,
(16:19):
then invest it. But we're not really going to teach
you that either. So that's kind of the extent of
our financial education growing up and even as adults. Nobody
online really talks about how to spend money all. A
lot of the talk in the frugality space is about
(16:40):
how to get as much as possible for as little
as possible, how to get good deals, use coupons, Bogo,
or just deprive yourself so you can live with nothing.
And that's great for some people, I guess, but for me,
I love spending money. I just do. I love getting trees,
(17:00):
I love treating myself. I love treating my kids. I
think they deserve it. I deserve it, but I feel
guilty when I treat myself, So what's up with that? Like,
I definitely deserve it. So there is this radical middle
between spending all your money because you have it and
(17:20):
being really quote unquote good at spending and then saving
all your money, which is the other extreme, and usually
that's done out of fear of not having money because
if I spend it, I'll need it as soon as
I spend it. So where is this radical middle where
we can yes, spend money but also save it and
(17:41):
not go broke. And that is where we found that
spending is a skill. So if you're going to learn
how to spend money and build the skills and the
practices you need to stick with a budget, then you've
got to look at a lot of sub skills. So,
like any skill or activity, to master it, there are
(18:02):
a lot of sub skills. So like to be good
at communication, you also have to be good at not
just talking, but listening, and it's the same with spending.
So we talk a lot in the book about these
different sub skills to stick with being good at spending totally.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Yes, I think one of those is curiosity. You talk
about that in chapter two. How can that be helpful
when it comes to folks learning how to spend their
money in a more value driven way.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Curiosity is one of those pieces that we say should
also come before making a budget, and it can be
part of that ninety day transaction inventory process where we
understand ourselves more as we take a curio a curious
kind of not knowing approach to ourselves, just wondering about
(18:53):
what we enjoy, what makes us tick, what we don't like,
what we can say easy nos to and better yes
is too. And so when we can approach ourselves with curiosity,
it includes asking questions but avoiding why questions. We've found
that the why question can really put us on the
defense or that automatic kind of fight mode. It's the
(19:16):
difference between why do you want to spend so much
with car wash? To what is it about wood? He's
washhack that is so enjoyed, so much better than the washing.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Wash.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But yeah, the ones, the one is I need to
justify myself and the other is let me dig deeper,
let me think more about what it is that I
enjoy so much about this activity, this thing, these items,
and can help us learn how can we even go
further deeper into those things? And possibly are there ways
(19:54):
that we can meet that value without spending money if necessary?
Speaker 4 (19:59):
Yeah, And and a lot of that can result in
some false rationalization where we'll say, okay, well my car
needs to be clean, so I need to go to
the car wash, and that's how we justify things, and
then we don't give space to get creative with how
we spend and save money. And so yeah, maybe going
to the car wash. You love it, It's a vibe and
(20:20):
you can afford it, then we say it's okay to
want to go to the car wash. You don't need
to justify and rationalize your purchases to be needs. They
don't all need to be needs. It can be very
empowering to want something and then be able to afford it.
And then when we're looking at our expenses more as
wants than trying to falsely justify them as needs, it
(20:43):
opens up a lot more space to get creative with
how we meet needs.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Yeah, so I can see that curiosity.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Maybe if I'm thinking, all right, should I spend money
on a video game system or on some hiking shoes,
I could see say, well, how do I like to
spend my time saying, oh wait, I like to get
on the trails more than I like to stay indoors,
And so that's that's going to help me make the
decision between those two things. But what if somebody's saying,
my curiosity reveals and I like fancy cars, but I
also don't really have the budget to buy the brand
(21:13):
new Ribbean? Like, yeah, how do you help people decipher
thinking through value spending when maybe they can't afford things
they're into.
Speaker 4 (21:20):
So it's great, like I said, to want things. It's
really great to want things, but what we value really
comes down to our needs. So often when we talk
about values based spending, the first thing that comes to
somebody's mind is but like, yeah, I like lattes, and like,
that's that's what I value. And in reality, values are
(21:44):
much deeper than that. They are technically human needs, and
so it's very it's very broad, but we have found
that we can distill what at least most Americans value
most highly into four things. They all start with F
and then we'll talk about like how we found those.
(22:07):
It's family, friends, faith, and fulfilling work. So some relationships
with your family, romantic relationships, kids, friendships, just feeling of
connection belonging on deep levels. And then also just on
like recreational or hobby levels, some kind of faith or spirituality.
(22:27):
And then fulfilling work, so not necessarily like your passion project,
but work where you're feeling like you're contributing, that you're
using your creativity, you're being able to live in your
full potential. Just work that you enjoy and then also
pays you. So those are kind of the four baselines.
(22:48):
Pretty much everything we spend money on is really truly
to get one of those things, and if it's not
one of those, it can come down to something on
them hierarchy of needs. I don't know if you've heard
of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, but it's like five levels.
The first two are basic needs, so we've got food, shelter, water,
(23:10):
and then we've got safety and consistency. Above that, we've
got psychological so that's where we get into the family, friends,
and then we have self esteem above that, which a
lot of that can be found in your work, so
it's respect, self confidence, stuff like that. And then at
the very top you've got self actualization, passion, creativity, innovation,
(23:34):
like feeling like you're living in your full potential. We
found a lot of that in fulfilling work and in
spiritual practices. So that's how we got to these four
f's is looking at this hierarchy of human needs. And
so if one of your values isn't meeting one of
those four, it's probably still going to fall somewhere on
(23:57):
that hierarchy of needs. When I say I value a
nice car like a rivion, like they're beautiful cars, they're great,
I would love one, But what I I truly like
I want that, that's not it's not in need, and
it's empowering for me to say, like, yes, I want it,
(24:19):
and if I can afford it, I'll buy it. But
actually what I want more is relationships with the people
I love, flexibility in work, and you know, a community
of people around me. So those are really the things
I want first. And then if I'm fulfilling all those things,
then I can double check. I can double back and
see if I still want the Rivion and see if
(24:42):
it's still an important thing to budget for.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, see if there's there's slack in the budget. Two
things I will say, when you say Rivian, it sounds
twice as expensive. I got.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
I got dinged so many times when we were recording
our audio book for say, really normal things in life wrong.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
Like Jen just say it normally, like it's really.
Speaker 4 (25:05):
Mass Low's hierarchy of need, and I still say Maslow.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
I still says Tomato.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
So we've got more to get to with Jen and Jill,
including like what do we do in a society that
is constantly trying to, especially this time of year, part
us from our money.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
We'll get to some questions about that with them right
after this all right, We are back from the break
talking about how you can basically buy whatever you want
without going broke with Jen and Jill, including Viands. I'm curious,
(25:42):
like I've had a question, I guess about self control.
I'm curious if you think it's harder than ever today
to just rein in our spending because it seems like
at every turn there's a company out there that are
trying to part us from our dollars. Do you think
that this is a new challenge or has it always
been the case?
Speaker 4 (25:59):
It has all always been a challenge, but never more
challenging than it is now in the nineteen twenties, and
when like pr and marketing really, you know, after the
Industrial Revolution, when marketing really came into its own, it
was you had to be at the right place at
the right time, listening to the radio or reading the
(26:19):
newspaper to get an AD. And now you wake up
and you open a device and they are right there,
not just random, but tailored to you and so and
there are so many options for types of It's never
been easier to start a business or to offer a
product or service. So there's so many different types now too,
(26:41):
so it can be very confusing to decide do oh
do I have this problem? Do I need this product
or service to solve the problem? And you just have
to ask yourself so many more questions than you used to. So, yes,
it is harder than ever to keep your money to yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
Yeah, it feels like a marketing in the nineteen sixties
was like, yeah, I want a new TV. But now,
like the way that they can drill down via algorithms
and marketing because of all the data that they have
about you can be so specific and you're like, how
did you know? Like, like the algorithms know us better
than our friends and family, it seems at times. And
(27:24):
then that can I think trigger impulsive spending, and that
is a massive enemy of being able to spend responsibly.
So like, how do we counteract this marketing machine and
the influx of kind of like proposals to get us
to part with our money on a regular basis. Is
it part of just kind of like where we hang
out and not hanging out there anymore?
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Well, first of all, I think it's important to say
that we are not bad or there's something wrong with
us because we impulse spend. I think that that will
forever and always be something that we face. We see
something it seems to solve a problem that we have,
and we buy it. That's going to happen, And so
in some ways, part of the solution can be to
(28:08):
factor that into our spending plan that I want to
create some flexibility month to month, week to week on
allowing myself to be able to see something and buy
it if I want to and not feel like I
have to constantly deprive myself. But from there, I think
it can be helpful to identify what type of impulse
(28:29):
spender are we because we don't We're not all the
same in the ways in which we make impulsive spending decisions.
It could be some of the top five that we
identify in the book is spending out of habit, spending
as an activity, spending as the result of social influence.
The thrill of the hunt can cause us to impulse
(28:51):
spend and stress or emotional spending, and so that ninety
day transaction inventory can be helpful and identify what type
of impulse spender am I is it? Am I typically
buying things that I wasn't planning on when I was
feeling sad or celebratory, or it's the same day, at
(29:14):
the same time, at the same location, and so it's
a habit spending or is it every weekend when I'm
out with friends? So maybe it's social influencer shopping as
an activity. And so when we can first identify what
is it that draws me to spend in this way,
then can help to inform how will I then intersect
this pattern that's happening. And each one is going to
(29:36):
have a different type of solution to it. So, for instance,
if let's say for me, it's when I'm scrolling on
my phone late at night and all these instagrammers are
getting me and my walls are down, and I've made
too many decisions today and I'm just going to one
click buy that thing because it looks cool. If that's
kind of where I tend to be finding myself spending
(29:58):
the most money, then there's a a couple of things
that I could do from there. It could mean that
I need to curate who I'm following better that Instagram.
Social media the Internet can be a wonderful place and
have tremendous resources, but sometimes they don't serve us well.
But could I be taking inventory of who I'm following?
(30:20):
Could I be following accounts that are talking about more
conscious consumption or lower waste or helping me towards some
of the goals that I have, like meal planning and
prepping more. And I can follow these accounts that have
interesting recipes, easy meal prep recipes. Or it could be
that I need to find another activity that's going to
(30:41):
provide me with the dopamine hit that shopping does give us.
That finding something and being about to purchase it really
does release for us. And so for some that could
be instead of scrolling, I'm going to watch funny videos,
or if you're an animal person, you're going to watch
some cute cats and dogs doing whatever it is that
(31:01):
they do online.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
Or go play some pickleball.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
Well, if it's late at night, I don't know if
I'm going to go out and put on my.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
Yeah, I mean maybe you can, but you shouldn't.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
But something to replace that action that is of similar
value or similar time commitment or similar like doesn't require
you to get out of bed and put your sneakers on.
Finding something else that you can do instead of rather
than just completely eliminating it, finding an alternative solution with
(31:34):
your creativity.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Yeah, we say similar sizes, Like there are small size,
you know, like low barrier to entry things and you
want to replace those with lower barrier to entry things,
and then there's medium size, and we've got a list
in the book to kind of help you figure out,
you know, if this is the size of my trigger,
then this is the size of my solution sort of thing.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Nice, it's a similar, Yeah, it's getting a similar fix
for that receptor or whatever it is that you're trying
to trying to fill there. But you mentioned social media,
and I wonder like if even more than the algorithms
and sort of the different products were fed because, like
I one end, you've got like TikTok shop and literally
you've got folks who are hawking goods and they want
you to buy that thing. But I'm curious of your
thoughts on social media because I almost feel that the
(32:16):
exposure to the different types of lifestyles that are out there,
that that could even be more detrimental to our personal
finances than the one off buying some tennis shoes, which
literally happened to me because Vans was like, oh, you
love these these shoes, and so I bought those shoes.
But that isn't necessarily going to wreck me as much
as following somebody that has this beautiful home. Oh they
(32:39):
live out in Lake Tahoe or there's like these you know,
like the different mom influencers that live out in like
Utah and stuff like that. But like seeing their homes
for instance, And I wonder if just that exposure to
all that's out there, if that has almost warped our
perspective as to what is normal and even that right
there causes us to make that like I've altered decisions
(33:01):
that inevitably leads to like our financial ruin. Does that
make sense?
Speaker 4 (33:04):
Yeah, I think it's more of so I think it
causes less of these big life changes like home purchases.
But I but I think that the grandioseness is intentional
because I'm looking at this beautiful home and I'm like, oh,
I know I can't have that. I know I can't
afford that, but I can afford this coffee maker that's
(33:27):
in her video, Like I can afford a small piece
of it.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
You can get one step.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
Or these videos that have like feature like forty different products,
and everybody rage hates like on it. They don't want
you to buy forty products from their video they want
you to buy one there, and you look at that,
you're like, oh, I can't afford all of these things,
but I can afford one thing, and that's the goal.
If their video was reasonable, like in a normal looking
(33:57):
house or with one or two products, you're less likely
to feel inadequate enough to make the impulse purchase to
try to increase or get closer to that aspiration.
Speaker 3 (34:14):
Yeah, which is why I think it's so important to
then understand some of the deeper need that that purchase
is tethered to. And that can be a question we
ask ourselves, is what which of the four FS might
I be trying to get closer to in making this purchase.
We talked with a woman recently who said, you know what,
I think my recent purchase from an Instagram influencer for
(34:39):
these cute dresses actually had to do with my need
for belonging and connection. And that's a really vulnerable thing
to realize and to name. But how powerful to be
able to say, Okay, the next time I encounter this,
I'm more equipped to know this isn't actually about me
needing another dress. I think I probably have plenty. This
(35:01):
might be about me wanting deeper connection with people. How
do I get that instead?
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (35:09):
And then there's trade offs when you buy the dress, Yeah,
but of not being able to do other things with
that money. But you're right, like I think we are
often spending money in a moment of fatigue or in
a desire to fill some sort of other for lack
of a better.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
Phrase, whole in our heart.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
And you, guys, you also make the case in the
book for getting the biggest financial decisions right right. You
basically talk about, oh, if you're able to reduce your
housing costs or transportation costs, it can kind of act
as a pressure release valve, which makes some of the
smaller purchases less harrowing. Like you know, the book The
Latte Factor was super popular, and then there was this
whole thing about, man, if you buy coffee out, you're
(35:45):
a newdiot and you're ruining your personal finances. And I
feel so much more of an ability to not stress
about small decisions because I drive a ridiculously old car
that costs me almost nothing. How big and important is
that for people? And that's the fact that the expensive
recur and car payment is preventing them from being able
to feel any sort of bliss in those minor purchases.
Speaker 4 (36:05):
Yeah, pressure release valve is such a perfect term for it,
because when you are focusing on these bigger things, then
you don't have to stress about the smaller things so much.
And I feel like so as a you know, as
a woman who grew up in early two thousands diet culture.
(36:28):
And I saw this video recently and I just got
a tech. We talked about this in an episode recently.
I got a text from a friend who listened to
it and she was cracking up. But I saw this
video of this woman talking about how to save money,
and she references weight watchers who apparently were saying that
the way you lose weight or the way you gain
(36:49):
weight is through blt's bites, licks and tastes, and they're like,
pay attention to all these small tastes, right, I know,
it's it's so bizarre, but she's but they're like, you
can't you basically can't eat anything good or you'll gain weight.
And so this woman was saying, you can't spend on
(37:10):
anything fun or you'll be broke. And I'm like, what
in the actual head, Like those small pennies and dollars
are not what is causing the problem. The two the
biggest problems are the income and your biggest expenses, which
according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics for Americans is
(37:34):
your housing, transportation, and food. So if we can get
if we can really number four, actually investing is number
that's a what do you do? It is one of
those BLTs. Yeah, you'll let you decide which one. But
(37:54):
if you if we can really hone in on the
cost of our housing, the cost of our insportation, and
the cost of our food, then we don't have to
worry as much about all the other things, and it
definitely takes the pressure off of getting values based spending
one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Right, Let's talk about some of the different external factors
that we all deal with. How does our environment impact
our different buying decisions, like, for instance, can a missy home?
Can that really lead to more purchasing mistakes as we
are feeling overwhelmed at the end of the day and
scrolling doom, scrolling and get fed something I don't know,
something that we think is gonna like Joel said, feel
(38:33):
that that empty hole. Somebody read the book.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Wow, this is for those alleys. So absolutely we are
living within a context. There's this idea that's talked about
in social work. It's kind of a foundational concept of
person in environment pie for short, because food, And it's
(38:58):
this understanding that, yeah, we our individuals with our own
stories and experiences, likes and dislikes that exist also in
an environment within a context that also informs kind of
how they are influencing and being influenced. So our environment
certainly includes our immediate physical spaces, but also our larger
(39:19):
community and where we are. So everything from who we
choose to follow on social media, to our friends that
we have and how we engage with them, the ways
that we enjoy connection to the homes that we have,
and the types of neighborhoods that we live into our
immediate environment and maybe even how cluttered or how simplified
(39:43):
it may or may not be, can absolutely bear weight
on what we think is normal as well as how
cluttered our decision making might be, how fatigued we might
be depending on how much stimulation is happening around us.
So there's obviously now so many different things that could
be looked at in that, But if we were to
(40:04):
just talk about our immediate physical spaces, absolutely having a
simplified environment, And that doesn't mean minimalist, that doesn't mean
you only have a couple of things in all of
your walls are white. It could just mean that you
know what you have, what you have does serve you,
and you know where it's located, rather than I have
(40:28):
no idea and I don't know where my things are,
so I'm buying duplicates instead. And now I feel stressed,
and so I'm going to purchase things that I probably
don't need because I feel overwhelmed, and this is the
dopamine hit that I need. So we do certainly talk
about how important it can be to simplify our environment
(40:48):
and how that act can help us in identifying what
is our clutter kryptonite, what are we maybe drawn to
spending on a lot, Maybe reduce the amounts of duplicates
that we purchase, the amount of just decor the things
that we think that we need. Can help us really
open our eyes to okay, but what do I have
(41:09):
already and start to build some of that contentment and
also the repulsion of decluttering that I never want to
have to do that again. Oh, I'm not going to
purchase things to refill this house again.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
I mean we've all been there where we bought something
and we're like, already have that. I found it like
two months later, right after putting the light bulbin or
whatever it is that we ordered a second time. And Yeah,
I think the more we are organized like it, clean space,
clean brain. But I'm curious too, Jen, what do you
think like about kind of our overall culture from a
(41:42):
self reliance standpoint? Instead of asking your neighbor for a
cup of sugar, now we can instacart it, yet it's
gonna cost us a whole lot more. It feels like
this is part of it and that and that maybe
we've kind of become so bought into this self reliance
thing to such an extreme that we're unwill willing to
ask our neighbor for something, even though it probably actually
(42:03):
aids in our relationship, in our friendship over time, and
it also helps us save money. Is there something I'm
getting in that?
Speaker 3 (42:08):
Well?
Speaker 4 (42:09):
Yeah, our country was founded on the desire for self reliance,
so it is literally ingrained in the foundation of where
we live. Is this desire to not be beholden to
essentially a monarchy?
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Thanks piritance?
Speaker 4 (42:26):
You know, So we have just like taken that and everything.
So much of technology has gone towards that because it
is such an American value that it's very marketable, and
I believe that it has been taken to an extreme
that is really detrimental not just to our finances, but
(42:48):
just to our mental health and how disconnected we can
be from each other, and so we are seen like
if we're relying on someone that we are not successful,
or that we're mooching or just you know, any we
don't want to be seen as a burden. Yet if
(43:08):
somebody asked us for help, we'd be more than happy
to help them, like whether they're in you know, dire
need or just we're willing to ask, right, But we're
not willing to ask, And that's just a cultural thing
that has been like ingrained in us and fueled by capitalism.
And so I think we really need to fight those
(43:29):
feelings of like asking for not help, but like connectedness
and sharing resources is not a sign of weakness, but
it is a sign of wanting to be connected.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
I like that. Yeah, I think I think we could
all use a little more connection in our lives. And oftentimes,
instead of reaching out to other people, we tend to
consume our way out of any sort of little predicament
we might.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
Find come so much easier too, right, just to click
the button one click to buy. It shows up on
my doorstep, even in hours instead of days, And so
I don't even need to ask my neighbor next door
for the butter.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
It's just gonna come to me. But ladies, we've got
more that we want to get to. Actually, we're getting
close to Christmas, and so we got some I guess
some practical questions to get to. We'll get to all
that right after this. All right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
We're still talking to with Jen and Jill from the
Frugal Friends podcast. We're talking about buying stuff and and
hopefully just some good advice about to help us be
able to buy the things that we actually want without
screwing up our finances in the process. And ladies, we
are getting close to Christmas, and I don't know, I
would be curious to know actually how they had the
money audience is doing as far as like what percentage
(44:47):
of the gifts they've planned to buy have they actually
bought already they're wrapped under the tree line now, I
would hope, so those planners, right, but like you know,
almost everyone feels compelled to spend to express their love
at one time or the other. And that's not always bad,
like buying an engagement ring for my wife that was
like one of the best purchases I've ever made. But
how do you think about spending to show affection, especially
(45:11):
during the holidays.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
I think you do not have to spend money to
make the season magical or to tell people that you
care about them. That doesn't mean you don't have to
spend all together, but I do. For Jen and I,
we've both made lists of the things that we will
spend money on this holiday season, and the things that
(45:33):
are easy knows for us, we are not going to
spend on these things, and that has really helped to
free up feeling really confident about spending on the things
that are these intentional. We've already made a plan for it.
This is actually going to be fulfilling versus the things
that maybe everybody else is doing or it's kind of obligatory.
(45:54):
But I've learned I don't need to spend on that
to really enjoy this time or to tell people that
I care about them. I think that a well written
letter to somebody encouraging them, telling them what they mean
to you can be far better than some lackluster, cheap
(46:16):
five ten dollars whatever that you bought because you just
thought you had to so. And I probably even no
gift is better than a TACKI gift, but absolutely being
able to identify in what ways could I really encourage
this person or build them up. The things that I've
kept from friends are the pictures that they sent to
(46:37):
me or a letter of encouragement. I can't really tell
you any other small gift that I've been given that
I've kept or even remember who gave to me. But
absolutely I keep the meaningful cards and notes and again
pictures sent that illicit memories together. So I think being
(46:57):
thoughtful this season and considering how can I enjoy the
things that make me feel festive without spending where it's
not necessary.
Speaker 4 (47:09):
And I feel similarly to Jill, but I have a
mother who wants to give gifts more than she wants
to like, listen when I say that I don't need.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
One, and there's a mom Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (47:24):
There's a lot of people who gift giving is their
love language and they just want to do it, and
so for them, if that's you. Then I think investing
in local businesses or organizations is a fantastic way to
live out that desire and that value for you. And
(47:47):
even if you like, the person is going to appreciate
that you invested in something local. So for me, I know,
I'm gonna end up giving a few gifts like white
elephant or just random peace people. And so what I
did was I went to a local succulent shop and
I bought a couple of their three dollars succulents. And
(48:08):
then I went to the thrift store and I got
a couple you know bowls or you know, cute planters,
and I will plant succulents in thrifted bowls. And so
I have. I have invested in two different local like
a business and a local organization, and I feel good
about that. So even if the person may not like
(48:30):
love that gift, I feel really good about where my
money has gone in the community.
Speaker 1 (48:35):
Very cool. Have y'all either of y'all set like hard
budget amounts for how much you're looking to spend this Christmas,
this holiday season? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (48:43):
I every month put aside money for the holidays because
I do enjoy it so much, and I yes, I
beg right, you I'm guessing just.
Speaker 1 (48:54):
Follows her heart.
Speaker 4 (48:56):
I absolutely just follow my heart to the original budget
budgeting question.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
But that's I mean, that's exactly what.
Speaker 4 (49:03):
I feel so seen, And I don't know if that's
a good thing.
Speaker 1 (49:07):
But it is good.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
It helps me to even look back on years prior.
Then thankfully we can do that with the internet, to
identify what have I spent on years prior, how much
should I maybe anticipate spending this year, What did I
enjoy spending on, what did I not this year? My
husband and I have decided, even though I put money
(49:29):
aside for the holidays, that we are not giving gifts
to each other. Last year we did it and we
returned both of us every single thing that we got
for each other. That now I'm just like, it's not
we're not doing it. That's not going to happen. But
what we do really love is hosting people in our
home and eating good food and maybe going to a
(49:51):
concert or an event of some sort. And so that's
what our money that I have set aside is going
to go to. We're just going to eat really well.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
All right, last question for you guys, how has value
based spending changed your life, and combined with that, what
are your biggest spending struggles currently?
Speaker 4 (50:11):
So it has given me a lot of freedom to spend.
I have gone back and forth when when we were
paying off debt, my husband and I, I felt guilty
every purchase I made. Even if I'd made a budget
and I had but put money in the budget for
something I still spent. I felt guilty spending on it
(50:32):
because it wasn't the quote unquote best use of the money.
And then once we were done, I couldn't get myself
to spend money because I was like, we now we
got to reach financial independence and invest it all. But
then I ended up just reverting to my old ways
of like mindless spending for a little while, and I
(50:52):
was like, I'll just make as much money as possible.
And so it was really in that season where I
had to just I like, what is enough? What is
enough to earn? What is enough to spend? And once
I started asking myself nuanced questions and started rewriting the
rules that I had, you know, been reading through all
(51:16):
these personal finance books and started innovating and making my
own rules. And that was values based spending, values based
spending isn't a set of rules. It is a guideline essentially,
a framework to help you make your own rules. And
that created a lot of freedom for me to say
yes to more things that I value, and also to
(51:38):
say no to things that, yeah, I may like and
I may value, but I know I value something else
more and I don't feel deprived. I just I want
to live the fullest life possible, and I've defined what that.
Speaker 3 (51:53):
Is for me. I'm going to steal the word that
Jen just used, but I would agree that it is.
It is freedom and flexibility for me, not just for myself,
but I think for those around me. Recognizing that spending
and managing money is not a one size fits all.
I think values based spending recognizes that and creates room
(52:16):
for everybody to find their own kind of radical middle
the things that they want to spend on and feel
really confident in their money management, and that it's okay
if it looks different for me than it does for
gen or anybody else. And I think has really increased
my confidence in the money decisions that I make, my intentionality,
(52:38):
the way that I consume to not feel guilty about
spending wildly on travel, but being okay with being a
one vehicle household and hardly ever buying new clothes because
I've really identified it's okay if you think it's not
frugal for me to have the most expensive travel plans,
(53:04):
but here's where I make it work for our situation.
So I have really loved kind of leaning into that
and just the confidence that it brings. And I would
say the area of spending that is still a sore
subject for me. It's always going to be food. I've
definitely given myself a lot more freedom in Okay, this
(53:27):
is just the amount of money that I like to
spend on food. I think other people would balk at
the amount of money that I spend for two people,
but it it is what works for us. But I'm
I'm constantly in this ebb and flow of all right,
we got to rein it in.
Speaker 2 (53:42):
I think it's a sore subject for like everyone too
right now, Like partly it's the past four years especially, Yeah,
so like partly everyone looks at that and they're like, man,
they're beating themselves up, even though it's just market conditions
to a certain example.
Speaker 4 (53:54):
Yeah, I think my biggest struggle is never thinking that
I earn enough, even if the income and expenses are aligned.
But I've just always been a like income is never enough,
sort of like mindset always growing up the we never
(54:15):
make enough money, and so I still struggle with with
that part, which is why I'm not like a earn
money online influencer or anything.
Speaker 1 (54:27):
Well. I think somebody wrote in a book that maybe
creativity is a solution, Jen, but I don't know if
you can find that and buy what you love without.
Speaker 4 (54:35):
Going I mean, my full time job is a podcaster.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
So I appreciate y'all sharing, and I love what y'all
are saying here, and Jill specifically you talking about y'all
being a one car family, have an old old ready clothes.
Speaker 3 (54:49):
My clothes are ready, but I think.
Speaker 1 (54:54):
I may have overstepped. I apologize just making.
Speaker 3 (54:57):
My own shower.
Speaker 1 (55:00):
It's hard to look at you, but we really appreciate
y'all coming on. We're going to make sure to link
to the book, which comes out January seventh, by What
you Love Without Going Broke. And Jen and Jill thank
you so much for joining us today on the podcast.
Speaker 3 (55:15):
Thanks for having us. It's been a blast, so fun.
Speaker 1 (55:18):
All right, Matt, that was a good convo. It was
great man and the Jol and Matt equivalents over there
at the Frugal Friends podcast a Our Spirits Sisters. That's
for sure. Totally all right. So what what was your
big takeaway from this combo mine? I guess this is
a takeaway. It's funny because I'm going to push back
like the tiniest little bit, which is so contrarian because
(55:39):
literally everything they say. It's funny because like last week,
we talked with somebody who everything she said we kind
of disagreed with at least, you know, when it comes
to traditional personal where we came to some of the
conclusions from yeah yeah, but like literally everything Jen and
Jill are saying it's like, I mean, totally within the
wielhouse of what we talk about here on the show.
But at one point when we're talking about I forget
(56:01):
the context, but they were hating on the why question,
like why do you spend money on this? And I
don't And I want to push back just respectfully, and
they're not even here to defend themselves, but I think
it's okay for us to ask the question why. But
it all comes down to, like the tone and the
attitude in the heart behind the self examination, or like
don't call yourself an idiot while you're doing it, yeah,
(56:23):
or like there's a big difference between thinking through, man,
why do I want to spend money on that? Right?
Versus why would you spend money on that?
Speaker 2 (56:31):
Like there's there's a massive difference there, and you can
be a curious aren't angry?
Speaker 1 (56:34):
Why exactly? And so maybe that's what we were talking about.
Maybe we were talking about the curiosity aspects one of
the subskills when it comes to spending money in a
healthy way. But I think it's really important for us
to ask the question like why, like what is it
about this thing? Because what you're doing is you're you know,
you're peeling back the layers of the onion, trying to
get at the root of the thing, as opposed to
(56:55):
just being satisfied on the surface with a purchase that
may or may not cost you a ton of money,
but in real maybe there's something a little bit deeper down.
Maybe you can get closer to the root of the issue,
and maybe that doesn't even cost money. It's totally okay
to spend money, but it's I think, like they were
talking about, really important to identify why it is, what
it is that we're seeking to modify to fulfill, to
(57:15):
find fulfillment, and you know with some of these different
purchases that we make.
Speaker 2 (57:19):
Yeah, I think my big takeaway that was when Jill
talked about pie.
Speaker 1 (57:23):
She said person in environment, Uh huh. I love that.
Speaker 2 (57:26):
I thought it was so good and she she specifically
called out clutter kryptonite, and I was like, oh man,
this is so interesting how the environment we find ourselves
in more humans, right. But you can put yourself in
one situation and it's incredibly stressful and you're going to
react in one way, and you can put yourself in
another situation that's incredibly soothing, and you're going to react
in another. If I'm hanging out in a hammock or
if I'm in an escape room, I'm going to act
(57:46):
differently in both contexts. And so I think where we
place ourselves matters. The things that we're putting in front
of our eyeballs constantly are attracting our attention, and they're
suddenly changing the way that we think about life. What matters?
What how are our spending is going to impact our happiness?
My mom Matt always used to say when I was
a kid, garbage in, garbage out, And I think as
(58:07):
a culture we're in wise, we're putting so much garbage
into our lives, into our brains when it comes to
what we're consuming, and the people were following on social
media and stuff like that, And then if we were
just to reduce the amount of garbage going into our brains,
there's a good chance we'd keep more of our money
in our wallets too.
Speaker 1 (58:23):
Totally agree, man. The beer that you and I enjoyed
during this episode was a ten fitty, which is an
Imperial Stout by Oscar Blues Brewery. Another one we recently
had on we didn't have on We enjoyed a Dale's
Pale Ale. Yeah. But this is, yeah, like I said,
an imperial stout.
Speaker 2 (58:39):
What'd you think, man, this is what a classic stout
is supposed to taste like. Yeah, it is big, burly,
it's roasty, it's not fancy, like he doesn't have all
these adjuncts and stuff added into it.
Speaker 1 (58:50):
But it's legit. I like that, you said, Burley, this
is like a lumberjack of a stout. Yes, yes, this
is what you imagine like a two hundred and eighty
pound Lumberjack, like it only does a couple things, but
it does it really well.
Speaker 2 (59:01):
Right wielding a big ax after a long day of
chopping down trees is the beer he drinks.
Speaker 1 (59:04):
And looking awesome while you're at it? No, yeah, I
wrote down it's dark and oily like it is almost
kind of slick, which then made me think of, like,
not like slick as in Weasley, but like, I don't know, oily,
And it also made me think of soy sauce, Like
this beer had almost like a soy sauce kind of undertone,
which I think there's a lot more soy sauce in
(59:25):
my life than there is a life tole but you'll
just have to take my word for it. But soy
sauce in the best kind of way when it comes
to a stout. But I like soy sauce, but I
don't imbibe it merely a much. You don't get through
as much of it. You guzzle that stuff. Yeah, just
before we recorded this episode, took my six ounces. Yeah,
but always do that right after lunch here you go, No,
I don't, but we do go through a good amount
(59:46):
soy shots and our household of six. But that is
going to be it for this episode. You can find
our show notes up on the website at howtomoney dot com,
and we will be sure to link to Jen and
Jill's not not only their book, but also their podcast
if you want to check it out as well. For sure, Buddy,
that's going to be it for this one. Until next time,
best Friends Out and best Friends Out.
Welcome to How to Money.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Joel and I am Matt, and today we're talking
about buying what you love without going broke with Jen
and Jill from Frugal Friends.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Yeah, so, Joel, I don't want to offend our guests today,
but Jen and Jill are basically like the girl version
of us. They just got longer hair. Just kidding. They
really are friends, though they talk about money on their podcast,
Frugal Friends, which they started right around the same time
that we started Hours I think back in twenty eighteen.
One big difference though they've written books, and specifically they
(00:49):
have a new book hitting the shelves in January. That
kind of attention span, do we, Matt, No, No, The
name of the book buy what you Love Without Going Broke,
And that is exactly what we're talking about today, spending money.
We're gonna talk about all the ways that we're doing
it wrong, how to go about spending money in a
in like a healthy values driven manner, ways to support
(01:11):
those new habits, all that and more. Today we've got
a lot to discuss. There are four of us here,
after all, all of us podcasters, so I think we're
gonna have a lot to get through, so we'll cut
to the chase. Jen and Jill, thank you so much
for joining us today on how to Money.
Speaker 3 (01:24):
Thanks for having us such a pleasure to be here.
Speaker 4 (01:26):
Yeah, it's a full house.
Speaker 2 (01:27):
We love it most definitely. We're excited for you, excited
for this new book. And but first question out of
the gate that we got to ask everybody who comes
on is what's your craft your equivalent? What do you
like to suploi? John, we're gonna talk about spending here today,
what do you like to splour John? While you're still
being smart with your money and thinking about your future.
Speaker 4 (01:42):
So for me, I think it's a little weird, But
for me it's not weird. I buy pre cut vegetables,
which in the frugal living space is like a gas Like,
why would you spend extra to have your vegetables pre cut?
Speaker 1 (01:58):
Sounds like heresy, right.
Speaker 4 (02:00):
But if it's that barrier to entry between me cooking
and me getting takeout, that's usually what it is, is
the effort that it takes to chop a vegetable. I'm lazy.
I embrace it. So pre chopped vegetafici, I love it.
I love either way to say it.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
That's my thing I love. Okay, So my wife she
she chops real veggies. Not to brag that thing said.
She does get the pre peeled garlic from Aldie in
the in the ziplock resealable bag because that is such
a time consuming task and she gets all in your
fingernails and she hates it. So she's like, I'm buying
(02:37):
that pre peeled garlic living high on the hog.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I know.
Speaker 4 (02:40):
I take it a step further and I get minced garlic.
So yeah, I'm just I'm there.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Jen has your wife beat of the efficient, Jill, how
about you? For me, it's paying for car washes still
the like drive through kind. But then we've got this
place near us called Woodies Washhack. I'm not paid by them,
I should be. And afterwards you can wipe down your
(03:09):
car and vacuum it out included in the price of
the wash itself, and it is a party to me.
Could I clean and vacuum my car at home? Absolutely?
Do I have the supplies to do it? Sure do?
Would I rather go to Woody's Washack.
Speaker 4 (03:27):
Because they're playing the cool like beach music and they
got very strong vacuum.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Sometimes for employees, even power it's essential. Their employees will
help you to kind of detail your car, and then
you try and tip them and they can accept tip.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Wow, it's like wood.
Speaker 4 (03:47):
Yeah, washhack is a vibe.
Speaker 2 (03:50):
I think the other thing that is included in that
is entertainment for your children if you.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Uh, because they got the led all the colors.
Speaker 2 (03:57):
Yes, my kids are like, dad, please can we go
to the cars? But then you also get some work
out of them. They help you clean the car on
the back back end, So it's it's worth it if
you can find a cheap enough place because it hits
a bunch of those facets.
Speaker 3 (04:08):
I don't have kids, but it's entertaining for me.
Speaker 1 (04:11):
You can borrow mine. Joke, same years will be old enough.
And that's when you know you've like turned the corner
when you start putting them to work and all of
a sudden, it's like, wait a minute. Life looks a
lot different now than when I used to just do
everything for you. You're starting to pull your own ways.
I know.
Speaker 4 (04:25):
I do make my twenty month old bring his own
diaper to the trash can and that's nice.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
Yeah, see that's progress.
Speaker 3 (04:31):
Yeah the drift, Yeah, life back, I'm.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Curious Okay, so our listeners know that where Joel and
I stand when it comes to organization or how nerdy
each one of us is when we approach our finances.
What do you what's y'all's take on budgeting specifically, because
Joel's like more of a shoot from the hip kind
of westerner, like a Western movie kind of guy. I'm like,
I'm more like a sniper, kind of rifle kind of guy.
(04:56):
I'm very exact zerous on budgeting. What about y'all. Do
y'all have a you've got to similar breakdown?
Speaker 4 (05:01):
You've got two of us two Yeah, So I'm very
much like Joel, which is so funny because we both
Joel and I have the specific personal finance backgrounds like
pre podcasting. Yeah, but I am very much like go
with the flow. And I think the reason I love
values based spending so much is because it allows me
to feel confident in my outgo and income without having
(05:26):
a really strict plan. So that's definitely more my vibe.
Speaker 3 (05:33):
And I like being in the nitty gritty. It's just
fun for me. I have a spreadsheet that I created.
I like looking at all of my transactions. However, both
of our approaches to budgets are that it's like step
four or five in the grand scheme of personal finance.
There's so much more that needs to come before putting
(05:54):
numbers to paper. The way that we manage money, the
decisions that we make about spending are far more nuanced
than just math. Okay, so it's really not the first
step for us.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
Yeah, So, like, what, in your opinion what comes first?
Because I think for a lot of folks, budgeting, like,
let's say you're trying to get fit, it's like, okay, exercise.
I feel like budgeting is sort of like the exercise
equivalent when it comes to to physical fitness. But what
do you think should should come first?
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Well, I think budgeting is actually the like physique plan. Right,
If you have a plan to get a six pack,
you then need to develop the skills of exercising in
order to execute that plan. Right, So we talk about
essentially a plan to develop developing those skills so that
(06:42):
you can actually stick with your budget. That's what so
many people are missing.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
So both kind of tangible and intangible. Intangibly, it is
a lot to do with understanding ourselves and kind of
what makes us tick, What are our values? What do
we enjoy spending money on? What could we care less
to spend money on? And tangibly, we talk about a
couple of things that you can do before you're even budgeting,
(07:07):
including a ninety day transaction inventory. So even knowing first
where is your money going typically what are you finding
yourself spending on, can help to inform the plan that
we make going forward. So we say doing a ninety
day transaction inventory because it kind of captures the typical
(07:29):
transactions purchases that we make and can maybe even get
some of those outliers, the things that don't happen every
month but they happen occasionally kind of a thing and
compile that all into a spreadsheet to be able to
see where am I spending money on most often, what's
taking up the majority of my expenses and might even
(07:51):
be informative on some of the habits or impulse purchases
that we tend to make. What time of day am
I typically spending in pulsively? At what location am I
typically spending impulsively? How do I feel about where my
money is going? So even creating a whole other column
of essentially being able to journal about our transactions not
(08:13):
lengthy paragraphs, but being able to identify, Oh, do I
remember where what came just before I made this purchase?
Do I remember was I with anybody? How was I feeling?
How did I feel after I made the purchase? These
things can kind of help us to understand how do
I feel about the way that I'm spending money? Do
I even remember it? Did it fulfill my needs? Did
(08:36):
it satisfy whatever it was that I was hoping that
it satisfied? Did it solve for the problem that I
thought it was going to solve for? Can then help
us to understand is this where I still want to
be putting my money or are there different ways that
I can be allocating the way that I spend, which
can then help to inform the budget.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, now I like that.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
And Joe, one of the things you said kind of
at the beginning there was you talked about knowing ourselves
and how that's kind of important and important first step.
And you guys argue in the book that it's you know,
the way you're spending money. It's not necessarily a personality trade.
I think we tend to think of it like I
am this or my spouse is this, and it is
this ingrained thing? Like are we spenders or savers because
(09:19):
of nature or nurture?
Speaker 1 (09:21):
Like? Yeah, is this a habit that we've accrued over time?
Speaker 4 (09:24):
I think we a lot of people in marketing want
us to define ourselves as spender or saver because it's
a lot easier to define yourself as a spender because
everybody spends money. So if I have internalized that I
am a spender, it is a lot easier for a
marketer to get me to spend money, especially impulsively. So
(09:48):
I think that kind of perpetuates it. But we also
we tend to live for better or for worse in
extremes because it's a lot easier to look at things
in black and white one end of the spec to
remove the other, and that we don't have to process
a lot of nuance or a lot of like follow
up questions when we look at things in black and white.
(10:10):
And so the spender saver idea is that black and
white idea. The problem is is that everyone is a spender,
and everyone should be and can be a saver. It
just depends on where you are at financially, what season
you're in, at what capacity you do Each of those.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Like what you're pointing to. There are like essentially labels
right in the ability to sort of latch onto certain labels,
and in our sort of modern consumerist culture, I think
oftentimes we can tend to let our purchases reflect our
chosen identity or the labels that we have adopted. Do
you think that that's the part of the problem when
it comes to how it is that we're maybe unintentionally
(10:54):
or maybe even intentionally spending our money. It's almost like
I'm outdoorsy, I gotta get any super room exactly.
Speaker 3 (10:58):
Yep. Yeah, I think that these labels that we take
on could even go just beyond how we spend, but
how we manage money as a whole, how we think
about money, how we approach it, and then how we
interact with it and spend it. We talk a little
bit in the book about kind of these cognitive distortions
to say it in a clinical way or just unhelpful
(11:21):
thinking styles that can become a part of our daily
living that absolutely impacts finances, but aren't just a financial thing.
But labeling all or nothing thinking over generalizing. We can
do these things in all aspects of our lives, but
especially too when it comes to our finances, thinking I
(11:41):
am a spender or a saver, or you know, everything
is all wrong and I'm broke and I'll never be
able to make more money, or labeling our situation, however
it is that we might label it. I think really
being able to look at what have I believed to
be true about my situation? What of that thinking style
(12:03):
is helpful, what's not actually serving me? And how can
I bring in some reality to the situation. I know
for me, I can catastrophize a ton when it comes
to my finances. This happened when we paid taxes last year,
and it was the first time that the business had
(12:24):
shown a profit, and we were an escorp at the time,
and I had only had W two's that year, which
was also very unusual for me. I'm used to being
a ten ninety nine and needing to set my own
money aside, but I didn't that year, thinking oh, it's
all getting withdrawn from my paychecks. We're good to go,
(12:45):
until I got hit with a tax bill and I
was so overwhelmed by this and catastrophized. I'm like, this
is an insane amount of money. Thank goodness, we did
have money set aside like it didn't. It didn't call
us to go broke. But I then was thinking, if
I have another crisis event, this is going to be
(13:07):
really awful for us. So I even told so my
husband and I we have scooters as like our second vehicle,
and I put a rule on my husband and I
that we couldn't ride our scooters until we like put
more money back into savings because I was afraid if
we got into an accident, then we'd have to pay
our medical deductible and that could cause us to go
(13:29):
an absolute financial ruin. So I just really went to
such an.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Extreme with it, shellfish just in case. We haven't a
lot of a gratchat.
Speaker 4 (13:38):
I know we developed it.
Speaker 3 (13:39):
This was it was legit, and I almost had a
breakdown in our accountant's office where I'm just like, what,
how did I not see this coming? I'm the worst? Ever?
How do I have a personal finance podcast? I can't
let anyone find out about this Here I am talking
openly about it.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Now if there's tens of millions of people, nonetheless, you.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
Know now everybody knows. But it took me pausing to
realize and kind of talk myself through this situation of Okay,
what made me think that I wasn't going to owe
any taxes this year? And come to find out, it's
a problem a lot of people face where they don't
(14:19):
withhold enough even as W two employees. It was the
first time ever that I had been fully a W
two employee. So it's just I just didn't know. I'm
not stupid, but I encountered a situation that I had
a lack of knowledge about. But I now know and
I can move forward. I did have the money, Awesome,
(14:42):
I'm not going to have to go into debt for this.
I can make changes. I can actually help other people
to be able to understand and protect themselves against some
crisis event and their tax accountant office and stay on
a tax prison. But I think for me knowing this
about myself, that okay, I can and to overgeneralize and
what are the steps that I need to take in
(15:03):
order to help myself calm down, bring in some of
the reality, and start to put action to it rather
than just staying in my head and taking on all
of these cognitive distortions, these unhelpful thinking styles that are
actually not going to serve me well when it comes
to managing my money.
Speaker 4 (15:19):
And then ignoring it and not paying your taxes.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
And just like yeah, some get me, uncle Sam, I
moved to some island where they can't the long arm
of the law can't get you, right, just go out
on the lamb jen.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
I guess when we're talking.
Speaker 2 (15:32):
About spending, a lot of people think about spending as
something that they have to do right to put a
roof over their head, pay the car note. Although Matt
and I say, don't ever have a car note or
something they get to do right now. This is the
spending that's like kind of fun, buy an ice cream
with my family or whatever. But you guys talk about
spending as a skill, So.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
I don't know.
Speaker 2 (15:51):
I'm curious to hear, like why you think it's a skill,
and then how we can become like more skilled at spending.
Speaker 4 (15:57):
Yeah, it really is a mindset shift, because we're not
taught how to spend money. We are simply taught. We're
barely taught how to earn it. We're taught that you
can get a job or you can start a business,
and that's pretty much it. And then we're taught you
have to spend as little as possible in order to
be responsible with money and if you can make enough,
(16:19):
then invest it. But we're not really going to teach
you that either. So that's kind of the extent of
our financial education growing up and even as adults. Nobody
online really talks about how to spend money all. A
lot of the talk in the frugality space is about
(16:40):
how to get as much as possible for as little
as possible, how to get good deals, use coupons, Bogo,
or just deprive yourself so you can live with nothing.
And that's great for some people, I guess, but for me,
I love spending money. I just do. I love getting trees,
(17:00):
I love treating myself. I love treating my kids. I
think they deserve it. I deserve it, but I feel
guilty when I treat myself, So what's up with that? Like,
I definitely deserve it. So there is this radical middle
between spending all your money because you have it and
(17:20):
being really quote unquote good at spending and then saving
all your money, which is the other extreme, and usually
that's done out of fear of not having money because
if I spend it, I'll need it as soon as
I spend it. So where is this radical middle where
we can yes, spend money but also save it and
(17:41):
not go broke. And that is where we found that
spending is a skill. So if you're going to learn
how to spend money and build the skills and the
practices you need to stick with a budget, then you've
got to look at a lot of sub skills. So,
like any skill or activity, to master it, there are
(18:02):
a lot of sub skills. So like to be good
at communication, you also have to be good at not
just talking, but listening, and it's the same with spending.
So we talk a lot in the book about these
different sub skills to stick with being good at spending totally.
Speaker 1 (18:22):
Yes, I think one of those is curiosity. You talk
about that in chapter two. How can that be helpful
when it comes to folks learning how to spend their
money in a more value driven way.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Curiosity is one of those pieces that we say should
also come before making a budget, and it can be
part of that ninety day transaction inventory process where we
understand ourselves more as we take a curio a curious
kind of not knowing approach to ourselves, just wondering about
(18:53):
what we enjoy, what makes us tick, what we don't like,
what we can say easy nos to and better yes
is too. And so when we can approach ourselves with curiosity,
it includes asking questions but avoiding why questions. We've found
that the why question can really put us on the
defense or that automatic kind of fight mode. It's the
(19:16):
difference between why do you want to spend so much
with car wash? To what is it about wood? He's
washhack that is so enjoyed, so much better than the washing.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Wash.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
But yeah, the ones, the one is I need to
justify myself and the other is let me dig deeper,
let me think more about what it is that I
enjoy so much about this activity, this thing, these items,
and can help us learn how can we even go
further deeper into those things? And possibly are there ways
(19:54):
that we can meet that value without spending money if necessary?
Speaker 4 (19:59):
Yeah, And and a lot of that can result in
some false rationalization where we'll say, okay, well my car
needs to be clean, so I need to go to
the car wash, and that's how we justify things, and
then we don't give space to get creative with how
we spend and save money. And so yeah, maybe going
to the car wash. You love it, It's a vibe and
(20:20):
you can afford it, then we say it's okay to
want to go to the car wash. You don't need
to justify and rationalize your purchases to be needs. They
don't all need to be needs. It can be very
empowering to want something and then be able to afford it.
And then when we're looking at our expenses more as
wants than trying to falsely justify them as needs, it
(20:43):
opens up a lot more space to get creative with
how we meet needs.
Speaker 1 (20:50):
Yeah, so I can see that curiosity.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Maybe if I'm thinking, all right, should I spend money
on a video game system or on some hiking shoes,
I could see say, well, how do I like to
spend my time saying, oh wait, I like to get
on the trails more than I like to stay indoors,
And so that's that's going to help me make the
decision between those two things. But what if somebody's saying,
my curiosity reveals and I like fancy cars, but I
also don't really have the budget to buy the brand
(21:13):
new Ribbean? Like, yeah, how do you help people decipher
thinking through value spending when maybe they can't afford things
they're into.
Speaker 4 (21:20):
So it's great, like I said, to want things. It's
really great to want things, but what we value really
comes down to our needs. So often when we talk
about values based spending, the first thing that comes to
somebody's mind is but like, yeah, I like lattes, and like,
that's that's what I value. And in reality, values are
(21:44):
much deeper than that. They are technically human needs, and
so it's very it's very broad, but we have found
that we can distill what at least most Americans value
most highly into four things. They all start with F
and then we'll talk about like how we found those.
(22:07):
It's family, friends, faith, and fulfilling work. So some relationships
with your family, romantic relationships, kids, friendships, just feeling of
connection belonging on deep levels. And then also just on
like recreational or hobby levels, some kind of faith or spirituality.
(22:27):
And then fulfilling work, so not necessarily like your passion project,
but work where you're feeling like you're contributing, that you're
using your creativity, you're being able to live in your
full potential. Just work that you enjoy and then also
pays you. So those are kind of the four baselines.
(22:48):
Pretty much everything we spend money on is really truly
to get one of those things, and if it's not
one of those, it can come down to something on
them hierarchy of needs. I don't know if you've heard
of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, but it's like five levels.
The first two are basic needs, so we've got food, shelter, water,
(23:10):
and then we've got safety and consistency. Above that, we've
got psychological so that's where we get into the family, friends,
and then we have self esteem above that, which a
lot of that can be found in your work, so
it's respect, self confidence, stuff like that. And then at
the very top you've got self actualization, passion, creativity, innovation,
(23:34):
like feeling like you're living in your full potential. We
found a lot of that in fulfilling work and in
spiritual practices. So that's how we got to these four
f's is looking at this hierarchy of human needs. And
so if one of your values isn't meeting one of
those four, it's probably still going to fall somewhere on
(23:57):
that hierarchy of needs. When I say I value a
nice car like a rivion, like they're beautiful cars, they're great,
I would love one, But what I I truly like
I want that, that's not it's not in need, and
it's empowering for me to say, like, yes, I want it,
(24:19):
and if I can afford it, I'll buy it. But
actually what I want more is relationships with the people
I love, flexibility in work, and you know, a community
of people around me. So those are really the things
I want first. And then if I'm fulfilling all those things,
then I can double check. I can double back and
see if I still want the Rivion and see if
(24:42):
it's still an important thing to budget for.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yeah, see if there's there's slack in the budget. Two
things I will say, when you say Rivian, it sounds
twice as expensive. I got.
Speaker 4 (24:54):
I got dinged so many times when we were recording
our audio book for say, really normal things in life wrong.
Speaker 1 (25:03):
Like Jen just say it normally, like it's really.
Speaker 4 (25:05):
Mass Low's hierarchy of need, and I still say Maslow.
Speaker 1 (25:08):
I still says Tomato.
Speaker 2 (25:11):
So we've got more to get to with Jen and Jill,
including like what do we do in a society that
is constantly trying to, especially this time of year, part
us from our money.
Speaker 3 (25:20):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (25:20):
We'll get to some questions about that with them right
after this all right, We are back from the break
talking about how you can basically buy whatever you want
without going broke with Jen and Jill, including Viands. I'm curious,
(25:42):
like I've had a question, I guess about self control.
I'm curious if you think it's harder than ever today
to just rein in our spending because it seems like
at every turn there's a company out there that are
trying to part us from our dollars. Do you think
that this is a new challenge or has it always
been the case?
Speaker 4 (25:59):
It has all always been a challenge, but never more
challenging than it is now in the nineteen twenties, and
when like pr and marketing really, you know, after the
Industrial Revolution, when marketing really came into its own, it
was you had to be at the right place at
the right time, listening to the radio or reading the
(26:19):
newspaper to get an AD. And now you wake up
and you open a device and they are right there,
not just random, but tailored to you and so and
there are so many options for types of It's never
been easier to start a business or to offer a
product or service. So there's so many different types now too,
(26:41):
so it can be very confusing to decide do oh
do I have this problem? Do I need this product
or service to solve the problem? And you just have
to ask yourself so many more questions than you used to. So, yes,
it is harder than ever to keep your money to yourself.
Speaker 2 (27:03):
Yeah, it feels like a marketing in the nineteen sixties
was like, yeah, I want a new TV. But now,
like the way that they can drill down via algorithms
and marketing because of all the data that they have
about you can be so specific and you're like, how
did you know? Like, like the algorithms know us better
than our friends and family, it seems at times. And
(27:24):
then that can I think trigger impulsive spending, and that
is a massive enemy of being able to spend responsibly.
So like, how do we counteract this marketing machine and
the influx of kind of like proposals to get us
to part with our money on a regular basis. Is
it part of just kind of like where we hang
out and not hanging out there anymore?
Speaker 3 (27:45):
Well, first of all, I think it's important to say
that we are not bad or there's something wrong with
us because we impulse spend. I think that that will
forever and always be something that we face. We see
something it seems to solve a problem that we have,
and we buy it. That's going to happen, And so
in some ways, part of the solution can be to
(28:08):
factor that into our spending plan that I want to
create some flexibility month to month, week to week on
allowing myself to be able to see something and buy
it if I want to and not feel like I
have to constantly deprive myself. But from there, I think
it can be helpful to identify what type of impulse
(28:29):
spender are we because we don't We're not all the
same in the ways in which we make impulsive spending decisions.
It could be some of the top five that we
identify in the book is spending out of habit, spending
as an activity, spending as the result of social influence.
The thrill of the hunt can cause us to impulse
(28:51):
spend and stress or emotional spending, and so that ninety
day transaction inventory can be helpful and identify what type
of impulse spender am I is it? Am I typically
buying things that I wasn't planning on when I was
feeling sad or celebratory, or it's the same day, at
(29:14):
the same time, at the same location, and so it's
a habit spending or is it every weekend when I'm
out with friends? So maybe it's social influencer shopping as
an activity. And so when we can first identify what
is it that draws me to spend in this way,
then can help to inform how will I then intersect
this pattern that's happening. And each one is going to
(29:36):
have a different type of solution to it. So, for instance,
if let's say for me, it's when I'm scrolling on
my phone late at night and all these instagrammers are
getting me and my walls are down, and I've made
too many decisions today and I'm just going to one
click buy that thing because it looks cool. If that's
kind of where I tend to be finding myself spending
(29:58):
the most money, then there's a a couple of things
that I could do from there. It could mean that
I need to curate who I'm following better that Instagram.
Social media the Internet can be a wonderful place and
have tremendous resources, but sometimes they don't serve us well.
But could I be taking inventory of who I'm following?
(30:20):
Could I be following accounts that are talking about more
conscious consumption or lower waste or helping me towards some
of the goals that I have, like meal planning and
prepping more. And I can follow these accounts that have
interesting recipes, easy meal prep recipes. Or it could be
that I need to find another activity that's going to
(30:41):
provide me with the dopamine hit that shopping does give us.
That finding something and being about to purchase it really
does release for us. And so for some that could
be instead of scrolling, I'm going to watch funny videos,
or if you're an animal person, you're going to watch
some cute cats and dogs doing whatever it is that
(31:01):
they do online.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
Or go play some pickleball.
Speaker 3 (31:06):
Well, if it's late at night, I don't know if
I'm going to go out and put on my.
Speaker 4 (31:11):
Yeah, I mean maybe you can, but you shouldn't.
Speaker 3 (31:13):
But something to replace that action that is of similar
value or similar time commitment or similar like doesn't require
you to get out of bed and put your sneakers on.
Finding something else that you can do instead of rather
than just completely eliminating it, finding an alternative solution with
(31:34):
your creativity.
Speaker 4 (31:35):
Yeah, we say similar sizes, Like there are small size,
you know, like low barrier to entry things and you
want to replace those with lower barrier to entry things,
and then there's medium size, and we've got a list
in the book to kind of help you figure out,
you know, if this is the size of my trigger,
then this is the size of my solution sort of thing.
Speaker 1 (31:53):
Nice, it's a similar, Yeah, it's getting a similar fix
for that receptor or whatever it is that you're trying
to trying to fill there. But you mentioned social media,
and I wonder like if even more than the algorithms
and sort of the different products were fed because, like
I one end, you've got like TikTok shop and literally
you've got folks who are hawking goods and they want
you to buy that thing. But I'm curious of your
thoughts on social media because I almost feel that the
(32:16):
exposure to the different types of lifestyles that are out there,
that that could even be more detrimental to our personal
finances than the one off buying some tennis shoes, which
literally happened to me because Vans was like, oh, you
love these these shoes, and so I bought those shoes.
But that isn't necessarily going to wreck me as much
as following somebody that has this beautiful home. Oh they
(32:39):
live out in Lake Tahoe or there's like these you know,
like the different mom influencers that live out in like
Utah and stuff like that. But like seeing their homes
for instance, And I wonder if just that exposure to
all that's out there, if that has almost warped our
perspective as to what is normal and even that right
there causes us to make that like I've altered decisions
(33:01):
that inevitably leads to like our financial ruin. Does that
make sense?
Speaker 4 (33:04):
Yeah, I think it's more of so I think it
causes less of these big life changes like home purchases.
But I but I think that the grandioseness is intentional
because I'm looking at this beautiful home and I'm like, oh,
I know I can't have that. I know I can't
afford that, but I can afford this coffee maker that's
(33:27):
in her video, Like I can afford a small piece
of it.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
You can get one step.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
Or these videos that have like feature like forty different products,
and everybody rage hates like on it. They don't want
you to buy forty products from their video they want
you to buy one there, and you look at that,
you're like, oh, I can't afford all of these things,
but I can afford one thing, and that's the goal.
If their video was reasonable, like in a normal looking
(33:57):
house or with one or two products, you're less likely
to feel inadequate enough to make the impulse purchase to
try to increase or get closer to that aspiration.
Speaker 3 (34:14):
Yeah, which is why I think it's so important to
then understand some of the deeper need that that purchase
is tethered to. And that can be a question we
ask ourselves, is what which of the four FS might
I be trying to get closer to in making this purchase.
We talked with a woman recently who said, you know what,
I think my recent purchase from an Instagram influencer for
(34:39):
these cute dresses actually had to do with my need
for belonging and connection. And that's a really vulnerable thing
to realize and to name. But how powerful to be
able to say, Okay, the next time I encounter this,
I'm more equipped to know this isn't actually about me
needing another dress. I think I probably have plenty. This
(35:01):
might be about me wanting deeper connection with people. How
do I get that instead?
Speaker 1 (35:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (35:09):
And then there's trade offs when you buy the dress, Yeah,
but of not being able to do other things with
that money. But you're right, like I think we are
often spending money in a moment of fatigue or in
a desire to fill some sort of other for lack
of a better.
Speaker 1 (35:22):
Phrase, whole in our heart.
Speaker 2 (35:24):
And you, guys, you also make the case in the
book for getting the biggest financial decisions right right. You
basically talk about, oh, if you're able to reduce your
housing costs or transportation costs, it can kind of act
as a pressure release valve, which makes some of the
smaller purchases less harrowing. Like you know, the book The
Latte Factor was super popular, and then there was this
whole thing about, man, if you buy coffee out, you're
(35:45):
a newdiot and you're ruining your personal finances. And I
feel so much more of an ability to not stress
about small decisions because I drive a ridiculously old car
that costs me almost nothing. How big and important is
that for people? And that's the fact that the expensive
recur and car payment is preventing them from being able
to feel any sort of bliss in those minor purchases.
Speaker 4 (36:05):
Yeah, pressure release valve is such a perfect term for it,
because when you are focusing on these bigger things, then
you don't have to stress about the smaller things so much.
And I feel like so as a you know, as
a woman who grew up in early two thousands diet culture.
(36:28):
And I saw this video recently and I just got
a tech. We talked about this in an episode recently.
I got a text from a friend who listened to
it and she was cracking up. But I saw this
video of this woman talking about how to save money,
and she references weight watchers who apparently were saying that
the way you lose weight or the way you gain
(36:49):
weight is through blt's bites, licks and tastes, and they're like,
pay attention to all these small tastes, right, I know,
it's it's so bizarre, but she's but they're like, you
can't you basically can't eat anything good or you'll gain weight.
And so this woman was saying, you can't spend on
(37:10):
anything fun or you'll be broke. And I'm like, what
in the actual head, Like those small pennies and dollars
are not what is causing the problem. The two the
biggest problems are the income and your biggest expenses, which
according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics for Americans is
(37:34):
your housing, transportation, and food. So if we can get
if we can really number four, actually investing is number
that's a what do you do? It is one of
those BLTs. Yeah, you'll let you decide which one. But
(37:54):
if you if we can really hone in on the
cost of our housing, the cost of our insportation, and
the cost of our food, then we don't have to
worry as much about all the other things, and it
definitely takes the pressure off of getting values based spending
one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (38:12):
Right, Let's talk about some of the different external factors
that we all deal with. How does our environment impact
our different buying decisions, like, for instance, can a missy home?
Can that really lead to more purchasing mistakes as we
are feeling overwhelmed at the end of the day and
scrolling doom, scrolling and get fed something I don't know,
something that we think is gonna like Joel said, feel
(38:33):
that that empty hole. Somebody read the book.
Speaker 3 (38:36):
Wow, this is for those alleys. So absolutely we are
living within a context. There's this idea that's talked about
in social work. It's kind of a foundational concept of
person in environment pie for short, because food, And it's
(38:58):
this understanding that, yeah, we our individuals with our own
stories and experiences, likes and dislikes that exist also in
an environment within a context that also informs kind of
how they are influencing and being influenced. So our environment
certainly includes our immediate physical spaces, but also our larger
(39:19):
community and where we are. So everything from who we
choose to follow on social media, to our friends that
we have and how we engage with them, the ways
that we enjoy connection to the homes that we have,
and the types of neighborhoods that we live into our
immediate environment and maybe even how cluttered or how simplified
(39:43):
it may or may not be, can absolutely bear weight
on what we think is normal as well as how
cluttered our decision making might be, how fatigued we might
be depending on how much stimulation is happening around us.
So there's obviously now so many different things that could
be looked at in that, But if we were to
(40:04):
just talk about our immediate physical spaces, absolutely having a
simplified environment, And that doesn't mean minimalist, that doesn't mean
you only have a couple of things in all of
your walls are white. It could just mean that you
know what you have, what you have does serve you,
and you know where it's located, rather than I have
(40:28):
no idea and I don't know where my things are,
so I'm buying duplicates instead. And now I feel stressed,
and so I'm going to purchase things that I probably
don't need because I feel overwhelmed, and this is the
dopamine hit that I need. So we do certainly talk
about how important it can be to simplify our environment
(40:48):
and how that act can help us in identifying what
is our clutter kryptonite, what are we maybe drawn to
spending on a lot, Maybe reduce the amounts of duplicates
that we purchase, the amount of just decor the things
that we think that we need. Can help us really
open our eyes to okay, but what do I have
(41:09):
already and start to build some of that contentment and
also the repulsion of decluttering that I never want to
have to do that again. Oh, I'm not going to
purchase things to refill this house again.
Speaker 1 (41:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:21):
I mean we've all been there where we bought something
and we're like, already have that. I found it like
two months later, right after putting the light bulbin or
whatever it is that we ordered a second time. And Yeah,
I think the more we are organized like it, clean space,
clean brain. But I'm curious too, Jen, what do you
think like about kind of our overall culture from a
(41:42):
self reliance standpoint? Instead of asking your neighbor for a
cup of sugar, now we can instacart it, yet it's
gonna cost us a whole lot more. It feels like
this is part of it and that and that maybe
we've kind of become so bought into this self reliance
thing to such an extreme that we're unwill willing to
ask our neighbor for something, even though it probably actually
(42:03):
aids in our relationship, in our friendship over time, and
it also helps us save money. Is there something I'm
getting in that?
Speaker 3 (42:08):
Well?
Speaker 4 (42:09):
Yeah, our country was founded on the desire for self reliance,
so it is literally ingrained in the foundation of where
we live. Is this desire to not be beholden to
essentially a monarchy?
Speaker 1 (42:25):
Thanks piritance?
Speaker 4 (42:26):
You know, So we have just like taken that and everything.
So much of technology has gone towards that because it
is such an American value that it's very marketable, and
I believe that it has been taken to an extreme
that is really detrimental not just to our finances, but
(42:48):
just to our mental health and how disconnected we can
be from each other, and so we are seen like
if we're relying on someone that we are not successful,
or that we're mooching or just you know, any we
don't want to be seen as a burden. Yet if
(43:08):
somebody asked us for help, we'd be more than happy
to help them, like whether they're in you know, dire
need or just we're willing to ask, right, But we're
not willing to ask, And that's just a cultural thing
that has been like ingrained in us and fueled by capitalism.
And so I think we really need to fight those
(43:29):
feelings of like asking for not help, but like connectedness
and sharing resources is not a sign of weakness, but
it is a sign of wanting to be connected.
Speaker 1 (43:45):
I like that. Yeah, I think I think we could
all use a little more connection in our lives. And oftentimes,
instead of reaching out to other people, we tend to
consume our way out of any sort of little predicament
we might.
Speaker 2 (43:57):
Find come so much easier too, right, just to click
the button one click to buy. It shows up on
my doorstep, even in hours instead of days, And so
I don't even need to ask my neighbor next door
for the butter.
Speaker 1 (44:06):
It's just gonna come to me. But ladies, we've got
more that we want to get to. Actually, we're getting
close to Christmas, and so we got some I guess
some practical questions to get to. We'll get to all
that right after this. All right, we're back.
Speaker 2 (44:25):
We're still talking to with Jen and Jill from the
Frugal Friends podcast. We're talking about buying stuff and and
hopefully just some good advice about to help us be
able to buy the things that we actually want without
screwing up our finances in the process. And ladies, we
are getting close to Christmas, and I don't know, I
would be curious to know actually how they had the
money audience is doing as far as like what percentage
(44:47):
of the gifts they've planned to buy have they actually
bought already they're wrapped under the tree line now, I
would hope, so those planners, right, but like you know,
almost everyone feels compelled to spend to express their love
at one time or the other. And that's not always bad,
like buying an engagement ring for my wife that was
like one of the best purchases I've ever made. But
how do you think about spending to show affection, especially
(45:11):
during the holidays.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
I think you do not have to spend money to
make the season magical or to tell people that you
care about them. That doesn't mean you don't have to
spend all together, but I do. For Jen and I,
we've both made lists of the things that we will
spend money on this holiday season, and the things that
(45:33):
are easy knows for us, we are not going to
spend on these things, and that has really helped to
free up feeling really confident about spending on the things
that are these intentional. We've already made a plan for it.
This is actually going to be fulfilling versus the things
that maybe everybody else is doing or it's kind of obligatory.
(45:54):
But I've learned I don't need to spend on that
to really enjoy this time or to tell people that
I care about them. I think that a well written
letter to somebody encouraging them, telling them what they mean
to you can be far better than some lackluster, cheap
(46:16):
five ten dollars whatever that you bought because you just
thought you had to so. And I probably even no
gift is better than a TACKI gift, but absolutely being
able to identify in what ways could I really encourage
this person or build them up. The things that I've
kept from friends are the pictures that they sent to
(46:37):
me or a letter of encouragement. I can't really tell
you any other small gift that I've been given that
I've kept or even remember who gave to me. But
absolutely I keep the meaningful cards and notes and again
pictures sent that illicit memories together. So I think being
(46:57):
thoughtful this season and considering how can I enjoy the
things that make me feel festive without spending where it's
not necessary.
Speaker 4 (47:09):
And I feel similarly to Jill, but I have a
mother who wants to give gifts more than she wants
to like, listen when I say that I don't need.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
One, and there's a mom Yeah right.
Speaker 4 (47:24):
There's a lot of people who gift giving is their
love language and they just want to do it, and
so for them, if that's you. Then I think investing
in local businesses or organizations is a fantastic way to
live out that desire and that value for you. And
(47:47):
even if you like, the person is going to appreciate
that you invested in something local. So for me, I know,
I'm gonna end up giving a few gifts like white
elephant or just random peace people. And so what I
did was I went to a local succulent shop and
I bought a couple of their three dollars succulents. And
(48:08):
then I went to the thrift store and I got
a couple you know bowls or you know, cute planters,
and I will plant succulents in thrifted bowls. And so
I have. I have invested in two different local like
a business and a local organization, and I feel good
about that. So even if the person may not like
(48:30):
love that gift, I feel really good about where my
money has gone in the community.
Speaker 1 (48:35):
Very cool. Have y'all either of y'all set like hard
budget amounts for how much you're looking to spend this Christmas,
this holiday season? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (48:43):
I every month put aside money for the holidays because
I do enjoy it so much, and I yes, I
beg right, you I'm guessing just.
Speaker 1 (48:54):
Follows her heart.
Speaker 4 (48:56):
I absolutely just follow my heart to the original budget
budgeting question.
Speaker 1 (49:02):
But that's I mean, that's exactly what.
Speaker 4 (49:03):
I feel so seen, And I don't know if that's
a good thing.
Speaker 1 (49:07):
But it is good.
Speaker 3 (49:09):
It helps me to even look back on years prior.
Then thankfully we can do that with the internet, to
identify what have I spent on years prior, how much
should I maybe anticipate spending this year, What did I
enjoy spending on, what did I not this year? My
husband and I have decided, even though I put money
(49:29):
aside for the holidays, that we are not giving gifts
to each other. Last year we did it and we
returned both of us every single thing that we got
for each other. That now I'm just like, it's not
we're not doing it. That's not going to happen. But
what we do really love is hosting people in our
home and eating good food and maybe going to a
(49:51):
concert or an event of some sort. And so that's
what our money that I have set aside is going
to go to. We're just going to eat really well.
Speaker 2 (50:00):
All right, last question for you guys, how has value
based spending changed your life, and combined with that, what
are your biggest spending struggles currently?
Speaker 4 (50:11):
So it has given me a lot of freedom to spend.
I have gone back and forth when when we were
paying off debt, my husband and I, I felt guilty
every purchase I made. Even if I'd made a budget
and I had but put money in the budget for
something I still spent. I felt guilty spending on it
(50:32):
because it wasn't the quote unquote best use of the money.
And then once we were done, I couldn't get myself
to spend money because I was like, we now we
got to reach financial independence and invest it all. But
then I ended up just reverting to my old ways
of like mindless spending for a little while, and I
(50:52):
was like, I'll just make as much money as possible.
And so it was really in that season where I
had to just I like, what is enough? What is
enough to earn? What is enough to spend? And once
I started asking myself nuanced questions and started rewriting the
rules that I had, you know, been reading through all
(51:16):
these personal finance books and started innovating and making my
own rules. And that was values based spending, values based
spending isn't a set of rules. It is a guideline essentially,
a framework to help you make your own rules. And
that created a lot of freedom for me to say
yes to more things that I value, and also to
(51:38):
say no to things that, yeah, I may like and
I may value, but I know I value something else
more and I don't feel deprived. I just I want
to live the fullest life possible, and I've defined what that.
Speaker 3 (51:53):
Is for me. I'm going to steal the word that
Jen just used, but I would agree that it is.
It is freedom and flexibility for me, not just for myself,
but I think for those around me. Recognizing that spending
and managing money is not a one size fits all.
I think values based spending recognizes that and creates room
(52:16):
for everybody to find their own kind of radical middle
the things that they want to spend on and feel
really confident in their money management, and that it's okay
if it looks different for me than it does for
gen or anybody else. And I think has really increased
my confidence in the money decisions that I make, my intentionality,
(52:38):
the way that I consume to not feel guilty about
spending wildly on travel, but being okay with being a
one vehicle household and hardly ever buying new clothes because
I've really identified it's okay if you think it's not
frugal for me to have the most expensive travel plans,
(53:04):
but here's where I make it work for our situation.
So I have really loved kind of leaning into that
and just the confidence that it brings. And I would
say the area of spending that is still a sore
subject for me. It's always going to be food. I've
definitely given myself a lot more freedom in Okay, this
(53:27):
is just the amount of money that I like to
spend on food. I think other people would balk at
the amount of money that I spend for two people,
but it it is what works for us. But I'm
I'm constantly in this ebb and flow of all right,
we got to rein it in.
Speaker 2 (53:42):
I think it's a sore subject for like everyone too
right now, Like partly it's the past four years especially, Yeah,
so like partly everyone looks at that and they're like, man,
they're beating themselves up, even though it's just market conditions
to a certain example.
Speaker 4 (53:54):
Yeah, I think my biggest struggle is never thinking that
I earn enough, even if the income and expenses are aligned.
But I've just always been a like income is never enough,
sort of like mindset always growing up the we never
(54:15):
make enough money, and so I still struggle with with
that part, which is why I'm not like a earn
money online influencer or anything.
Speaker 1 (54:27):
Well. I think somebody wrote in a book that maybe
creativity is a solution, Jen, but I don't know if
you can find that and buy what you love without.
Speaker 4 (54:35):
Going I mean, my full time job is a podcaster.
Speaker 1 (54:38):
So I appreciate y'all sharing, and I love what y'all
are saying here, and Jill specifically you talking about y'all
being a one car family, have an old old ready clothes.
Speaker 3 (54:49):
My clothes are ready, but I think.
Speaker 1 (54:54):
I may have overstepped. I apologize just making.
Speaker 3 (54:57):
My own shower.
Speaker 1 (55:00):
It's hard to look at you, but we really appreciate
y'all coming on. We're going to make sure to link
to the book, which comes out January seventh, by What
you Love Without Going Broke. And Jen and Jill thank
you so much for joining us today on the podcast.
Speaker 3 (55:15):
Thanks for having us. It's been a blast, so fun.
Speaker 1 (55:18):
All right, Matt, that was a good convo. It was
great man and the Jol and Matt equivalents over there
at the Frugal Friends podcast a Our Spirits Sisters. That's
for sure. Totally all right. So what what was your
big takeaway from this combo mine? I guess this is
a takeaway. It's funny because I'm going to push back
like the tiniest little bit, which is so contrarian because
(55:39):
literally everything they say. It's funny because like last week,
we talked with somebody who everything she said we kind
of disagreed with at least, you know, when it comes
to traditional personal where we came to some of the
conclusions from yeah yeah, but like literally everything Jen and
Jill are saying it's like, I mean, totally within the
wielhouse of what we talk about here on the show.
But at one point when we're talking about I forget
(56:01):
the context, but they were hating on the why question,
like why do you spend money on this? And I
don't And I want to push back just respectfully, and
they're not even here to defend themselves, but I think
it's okay for us to ask the question why. But
it all comes down to, like the tone and the
attitude in the heart behind the self examination, or like
don't call yourself an idiot while you're doing it, yeah,
(56:23):
or like there's a big difference between thinking through, man,
why do I want to spend money on that? Right?
Versus why would you spend money on that?
Speaker 2 (56:31):
Like there's there's a massive difference there, and you can
be a curious aren't angry?
Speaker 1 (56:34):
Why exactly? And so maybe that's what we were talking about.
Maybe we were talking about the curiosity aspects one of
the subskills when it comes to spending money in a
healthy way. But I think it's really important for us
to ask the question like why, like what is it
about this thing? Because what you're doing is you're you know,
you're peeling back the layers of the onion, trying to
get at the root of the thing, as opposed to
(56:55):
just being satisfied on the surface with a purchase that
may or may not cost you a ton of money,
but in real maybe there's something a little bit deeper down.
Maybe you can get closer to the root of the issue,
and maybe that doesn't even cost money. It's totally okay
to spend money, but it's I think, like they were
talking about, really important to identify why it is, what
it is that we're seeking to modify to fulfill, to
(57:15):
find fulfillment, and you know with some of these different
purchases that we make.
Speaker 2 (57:19):
Yeah, I think my big takeaway that was when Jill
talked about pie.
Speaker 1 (57:23):
She said person in environment, Uh huh. I love that.
Speaker 2 (57:26):
I thought it was so good and she she specifically
called out clutter kryptonite, and I was like, oh man,
this is so interesting how the environment we find ourselves
in more humans, right. But you can put yourself in
one situation and it's incredibly stressful and you're going to
react in one way, and you can put yourself in
another situation that's incredibly soothing, and you're going to react
in another. If I'm hanging out in a hammock or
if I'm in an escape room, I'm going to act
(57:46):
differently in both contexts. And so I think where we
place ourselves matters. The things that we're putting in front
of our eyeballs constantly are attracting our attention, and they're
suddenly changing the way that we think about life. What matters?
What how are our spending is going to impact our happiness?
My mom Matt always used to say when I was
a kid, garbage in, garbage out, And I think as
(58:07):
a culture we're in wise, we're putting so much garbage
into our lives, into our brains when it comes to
what we're consuming, and the people were following on social
media and stuff like that, And then if we were
just to reduce the amount of garbage going into our brains,
there's a good chance we'd keep more of our money
in our wallets too.
Speaker 1 (58:23):
Totally agree, man. The beer that you and I enjoyed
during this episode was a ten fitty, which is an
Imperial Stout by Oscar Blues Brewery. Another one we recently
had on we didn't have on We enjoyed a Dale's
Pale Ale. Yeah. But this is, yeah, like I said,
an imperial stout.
Speaker 2 (58:39):
What'd you think, man, this is what a classic stout
is supposed to taste like. Yeah, it is big, burly,
it's roasty, it's not fancy, like he doesn't have all
these adjuncts and stuff added into it.
Speaker 1 (58:50):
But it's legit. I like that, you said, Burley, this
is like a lumberjack of a stout. Yes, yes, this
is what you imagine like a two hundred and eighty
pound Lumberjack, like it only does a couple things, but
it does it really well.
Speaker 2 (59:01):
Right wielding a big ax after a long day of
chopping down trees is the beer he drinks.
Speaker 1 (59:04):
And looking awesome while you're at it? No, yeah, I
wrote down it's dark and oily like it is almost
kind of slick, which then made me think of, like,
not like slick as in Weasley, but like, I don't know, oily,
And it also made me think of soy sauce, Like
this beer had almost like a soy sauce kind of undertone,
which I think there's a lot more soy sauce in
(59:25):
my life than there is a life tole but you'll
just have to take my word for it. But soy
sauce in the best kind of way when it comes
to a stout. But I like soy sauce, but I
don't imbibe it merely a much. You don't get through
as much of it. You guzzle that stuff. Yeah, just
before we recorded this episode, took my six ounces. Yeah,
but always do that right after lunch here you go, No,
I don't, but we do go through a good amount
(59:46):
soy shots and our household of six. But that is
going to be it for this episode. You can find
our show notes up on the website at howtomoney dot com,
and we will be sure to link to Jen and
Jill's not not only their book, but also their podcast
if you want to check it out as well. For sure, Buddy,
that's going to be it for this one. Until next time,
best Friends Out and best Friends Out.
Hosts And Creators
Joel Larsgaard
Matthew Altmix
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