267. "She makes 2x more than me. I feel ashamed."

Ramit Sethi of I Will Teach You To Be Rich talks to Maria and Andre, a married couple in their 50s navigating a difficult retirement gap. Maria has built nearly $500K in net worth, a strong pension, and a clear path toward retirement. Andre, who moved from Brazil and only recently received his green card, is rebuilding his career in the United States with just $16K saved for retirement. They earn around $187K a year combined, but their financial tension is not really about the numbers. Andre feels ashamed that Maria earns twice what he does, while Maria worries that she will have to carry their future alone. Ramit helps them unpack the pressure Andre feels to be the provider, the cultural beliefs shaping their relationship, and how they can build a retirement plan that gives them more time together not less. In this episode we uncover: • Why Andre feels ashamed that Maria earns twice as much as him • How Andre’s recent green card changed his ability to build a career • Why $16K in retirement savings feels so frightening at age 50 • Why Maria’s pension could transform their retirement future • Why Andre believes a man should earn more than his wife • How their finances are combined, but still feel separate • Why Andre’s business expenses are creating confusion and resentment • The hidden cost of working six days a week • Why Maria wants more time with Andre, not just more money • Why Andre keeps defaulting to “work harder” instead of building a plan • How Ramit reframes retirement from fear into options • Why their future may be much stronger than they realize • The importance of acting like a team rather than competing with each other • How Andre could double his income after getting his HVAC licence • Why their Rich Life includes time in Brazil, leisure, and being present together Chapters: (00:00:00) “What would you do if your partner had no retirement plan?” (00:00:48) Meet Maria and Andre (00:02:12) Andre’s career, green card, and starting over (00:03:32) Andre has just $16K saved for retirement (00:04:48) Building their Conscious Spending Plan (00:05:54) Their $496K net worth revealed (00:07:35) “She makes double what I make” (00:10:11) How Maria increased her income as a teacher (00:12:05) Learning to spend consciously (00:14:16) Maria wants Andre to have a retirement plan (00:20:03) Their fixed costs and uneven financial burden (00:25:43) How long their savings would last (00:29:20) The reality of rebuilding your life in a new country (00:39:43) Andre’s childhood beliefs about work and money (00:45:17) What if Andre never earns as much as Maria? (00:52:07) Ramit’s message to Andre (00:58:33) Rebuilding their Conscious Spending Plan (01:07:15) What their retirement could actually look like (01:11:11) “None of this means Andre has to work until 80” (01:12:09) “It’s not a competition. It’s a team.” This episode is brought to you by: Superpower | Head over to https://superpower.com and use code RAMIT for $20 off your membership. #sponsored Facet | As of the date of this recording, Facet is waiving the enrollment fee for new annual members, and for my audience, Facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to facet.com/ramit to learn more about which membership option is best for you. Offer has been extended to 12/31/2026. #FacetAd LMNT | Get a free LMNT Sample Pack with any order at https://drinklmnt.com/RAMIT Gusto | Try Gusto at http://gusto.com/ramit and get 3 months free when you run your first payroll Connect with Ramit • Get my new book, Money For Couples • Get Money Coaching with Ramit • Download the Conscious Spending Plan • Listen to my book—now on Audible • Get my New York Times best-selling book • Get my no-numbers journal • Other episodes • Instagram • Twitter • YouTube Apply to be coached for free on this podcast at https://iwt.com/apply

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ramit Sethi?

  Are you feeling stuck with your money? Have you told yourself, "I need to figure it out." But you haven't really done it? I understand that not everyone is going to sit down and read multiple books about money. I get that. That is why I created Rich Life: The Road to 100K. This is a step-by-step program that shows you how to build a money system that works. Like figuring out the date that you're going to have $100,000 invested, how to automate your money, and how to cut through the noise. Plus, you will get access to weekly live events and a community of like-minded people, plus a library of my best materials. This is the program that will finally help you get on track with your money,

• 0:43Ramit Sethi?

  and you can join today at iwt.com/100k.

• 0:48Speaker 01

  At this point, he has to work forever. I'm planning on retiring. Am I going to spend all of that time alone?

• 0:54Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think the solution is?

• 0:55Speaker 01

  That he makes more money?

• 0:56Speaker 02

  Oh my God, so she makes like double that I make. For me, it's not comfortable. That's how I feel.

• 1:01Ramit Sethi?

  Is it because she makes more and she's a woman?

• 1:04Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05Speaker 01

  We've been having this conversation for years.

• 1:07Speaker 02

  Ah, I feel shame.

• 1:08Speaker 01

  He's just been in survival mode. And it definitely would feel more comfortable for me too if he was able to contribute more.

• 1:14Speaker 02

  I work so hard. I deserve to have like a better life. I deserve to go to a restaurant and look at the menu to the left side, not the right side.

• 1:24Ramit Sethi?

  What if you never make as much as Maria?

• 1:27Speaker 02

  Okay, she makes more money, but I was supposed to be the one taking the lead.

• 1:32Ramit Sethi?

  You would like him to make more, but you also mentioned that you want him to be able to not work all the time and take time off.

• 1:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:39Ramit Sethi?

  Can you be a leader if she makes more money than you? What would you do if you had a solid retirement plan, but your partner did not? How would you handle it? Today, I'm speaking with Maria and Andre. Maria is 53 years old, Andre is 50, and Maria is happy with her retirement. But Andre only recently opened up his retirement account for reasons that might surprise you. Let me take a look at their application. Maria writes, "Andre is a recent immigrant and has no savings or assets. I'm concerned about his ability to contribute to our retirement." As a teacher who's been saving, I have a good job and a solid retirement plan, but it's not really enough for two. The question I have is what would you do in this situation

• 2:24Ramit Sethi?

  if you were only eight years away from your retirement? That's what I'm here to find out today. Let's get started and meet Maria and Andre.

• 2:33Speaker 01

  We've been together for over five years now. And I was hoping things that would would be more cohesive by now.

• 2:41Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, Andre, did you know that she was applying?

• 2:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 2:45Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, and what was your take on it? Were you supportive or not?

• 2:47Speaker 02

  The first time I wasn't supportive about that. So I was thinking like, so why don't want to open my financial life to a podcast? For example?

• 2:56Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 2:57Speaker 02

  I was a little bit resistant about that. I'm working with a therapist. We talk about that all the time and she helps me a lot. She sees the things differently. And then I said, so why not? Now I can build a career here in the United States. And I want to be more active in our lives, you know? It's like making a good amount of money and managing this money the way that gonna be a benefit for both of us.

• 3:26Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Where did you move here from?

• 3:28Speaker 02

  From Brazil.

• 3:29Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, and how long ago was that?

• 3:31Speaker 02

  It was 12 years ago.

• 3:32Ramit Sethi?

  12 years, all right. Do you have your green card? Or what's the ability to work right now?

• 3:37Speaker 02

  Yeah, now I have my green card.

• 3:39Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, how long ago did you get that?

• 3:40Speaker 02

  September 2025.

• 3:42Ramit Sethi?

  Recent?

• 3:43Speaker 02

  Recent.

• 3:43Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, all right. Any children?

• 3:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, we both have children, adult children.

• 3:47Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 3:48Speaker 01

  Mine are 23 and 26.

• 3:50Speaker 02

  I have an 18 years old daughter. She lives in Brazil with her mom.

• 3:55Ramit Sethi?

  Got it. What do each of you do for a living?

• 3:57Speaker 02

  I work as a HVAC guy. But when it requires a license, I have my boss with me to help me out. So I'm working on my license now.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  I've been a teacher for over 20 years. I work with adults. I have students from 18 years old to 60 years old. And it's very fulfilling work for me.

• 4:16Ramit Sethi?

  Great.

• 4:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 4:17Ramit Sethi?

  Cool. My mom was a teacher as well and my mother in law as well. So teaching runs in our family. That's awesome. Okay. Andre, I'm curious about your work experience and the income. Were you able to work before you received your green card?

• 4:31Speaker 02

  Yes, I was working as a subcontractor and I had a company. They used to pay me by.

• 4:39Speaker 02

  I don't know the words, like commission.

• 4:41Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. How does the income you made then compared to the income that you make now?

• 4:45Speaker 02

  So basically, I think that is about the same because before I was like as a subcontractor, but it was like all the expenses that I had, it was on me. Car, uh, gas, helper, uh, insurances and everything. So it's about the same thing. I feel shaped sometimes because I'm putting all my effort on it to make more money, to manage the money, to get a nice result. But I know that I'm far away from that.

• 5:14Ramit Sethi?

  I see.

• 5:15Speaker 02

  And I don't feel comfortable about that.

• 5:17Ramit Sethi?

  And have you saved for retirement?

• 5:19Speaker 02

  Not that much.

• 5:20Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. How much are we talking about?

• 5:22Speaker 02

  Now we have like sixteen thousand dollars.

• 5:25Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, that's your retirement.

• 5:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, this is my retirement.

• 5:29Ramit Sethi?

  Got it. So what is the crux of the question here today? Maria, you applied. What are you hoping to get out of today's conversation?

• 5:37Speaker 01

  I feel concerned for Andre's situation. He hasn't really been in a place where he felt like he could, could make a plan for retirement, like he's just been in survival mode.

• 5:51Ramit Sethi?

  And now, are you in survival mode still?

• 5:53Speaker 02

  I think so.

• 5:54Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 5:55Speaker 01

  We're together and we recently combined finances, but I only recently started thinking about retirement in the last few years. And I feel like I have a good plan that covers like one person's life. With him in the picture, it would, it just makes it a lot tighter to try and to do, to have like a future together on basically one income.

• 6:17Speaker 02

  I still working on it, so uh, it's a very beginning of my career. I don't get paid as much as I would like to have to get paid, but it's enough to pay for my bills and send some money for retirement, but that's it.

• 6:33Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Can we take a look at the numbers?

• 6:35Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 6:36Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. What was it like uh, coming up with this conscious spending plan together?

• 6:40Speaker 01

  It was fun. Yeah, I like it. And I will let you speak more about it.

• 6:45Speaker 02

  Yeah, for me, it was a totally challenging thing. My main concern was like make money. But not manage the money. I was like, okay, I need to, my bills are about $4,000. I need to make more than $1,000.

• 6:59Ramit Sethi?

  This is very common. It's like coming across almost every culture that I speak to. Every country, every culture. The guy is single minded. I need to just make more money. It's classic. Okay, so that was your mindset.

• 7:13Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:14Ramit Sethi?

  And then looking at these numbers, what did you notice?

• 7:18Speaker 02

  I noticed that in certain way of making more money makes sense. But if I manage the money, I can get a better life.

• 7:27Ramit Sethi?

  Nice.

• 7:29Ramit Sethi?

  Honestly, that's a huge insight. Okay, let's take a look at the numbers. Maria, can you read off the word in bold and the number next to each of these items, please?

• 7:39Speaker 01

  Assets, $44,000. Investments, $454,000. Savings, $32,500. Debt, $33,600.

• 7:52Ramit Sethi?

  Total net worth?

• 7:53Speaker 01

  $496,900.

• 7:55Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think about those numbers?

• 7:57Speaker 01

  Need a few thousand more to hit that half million.

• 7:59Ramit Sethi?

  You might get it by the time we leave this room.

• 8:01Speaker 01

  It's true, it's true. When I was looking at this just as, as my plan, I felt really good about it because I also have a pension that will cover at least half of my salary.

• 8:13Ramit Sethi?

  Let's talk about you and what you feel about these numbers.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, how do I feel about them? I feel really proud and grateful and, um, happy.

• 8:23Ramit Sethi?

  Cool. Andre, how do you feel about these numbers?

• 8:25Speaker 02

  I don't feel comfortable about that because I know that most of the money that is there, it comes from her. I don't feel that I'm contributing enough for that. I could be, I could do it better.

• 8:36Ramit Sethi?

  Let's look at the income. Andre, can you read off your combined gross monthly income?

• 8:42Speaker 02

  $15,600.

• 8:44Ramit Sethi?

  $15,600 a month.

• 8:46Speaker 02

  A month.

• 8:47Ramit Sethi?

  So around $187,000 now per year. And then it looks like it's gonna go up $201,000 soon.

• 8:58Speaker 01

  Mine's going up. Maybe we haven't put, we don't know how much his would go up yet, so we haven't added that yet.

• 9:02Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, okay. So in other words, you're gonna jump up by $14,000 a year in a few months. And probably more considering Andre's gonna get his license.

• 9:14Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 9:14Ramit Sethi?

  All right, great. What do you think about that number?

• 9:19Speaker 02

  Well, I think that is amazing. But at the same time, I feel that I should be like, the percentage that I was contributing with that should be much better.

• 9:28Ramit Sethi?

  She makes 10,500 and you make about half of that, 5,000.

• 9:33Speaker 02

  This is uncomfortable for me.

• 9:35Ramit Sethi?

  Uh huh, because you're making less.

• 9:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:38Ramit Sethi?

  Why?

• 9:39Speaker 02

  I feel like that I'm starting my career again. And as a man, I don't feel comfortable with that, so.

• 9:48Ramit Sethi?

  Because?

• 9:48Speaker 02

  I know that she doesn't put me in charge of this. She's very, very gentle and understanding with me. But my feeling is like, oh my God. So she makes like double that I make, you know? It's like for me, it's not comfortable. That's how I feel.

• 10:06Ramit Sethi?

  Is it because she makes more and she's a woman?

• 10:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 10:10Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, got it. In Brazil, do men typically make more than women?

• 10:14Speaker 02

  Make more money.

• 10:15Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. And are they in charge of the finances?

• 10:17Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 10:18Ramit Sethi?

  All right, let's take a look at the rest of the numbers. Your fixed costs are at 68%.

• 10:22Speaker 01

  It was lower before we combined. Mine was lower before we combined.

• 10:26Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  But we do live in a high cost of living area.

• 10:30Ramit Sethi?

  All right, let's look at the rest. Investments at 12%. Is that accurate?

• 10:35Speaker 01

  A lot of my savings comes out pre-tax.

• 10:38Ramit Sethi?

  Uh huh.

• 10:39Speaker 01

  So the savings rate is actually much higher for me.

• 10:42Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, because of the...

• 10:44Speaker 01

  It's more like 25%. Yeah.

• 10:46Ramit Sethi?

  What?

• 10:47Speaker 01

  I've been saving aggressively the last few years because I just started.

• 10:51Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, I see. And is that reflected here when it says 23%?

• 10:56Speaker 01

  Oh, not the savings, the investing. The investing's much higher.

• 10:59Ramit Sethi?

  It's not showing up here because it's pre-tax.

• 11:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:01Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, fine. And then savings, it says that of your income, you are saving 23%. Is that accurate?

• 11:08Speaker 01

  It was until a few months ago, but it's probably more like it took that down to 1,200 a month. Yeah.

• 11:15Ramit Sethi?

  But it says 17 right now.

• 11:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 11:17Ramit Sethi?

  You took it down?

• 11:18Speaker 01

  So yeah, because I haven't been saving for the wedding, for the kids, and I haven't been saving for the car maintenance, so that's 500 less.

• 11:26Ramit Sethi?

  What do you do with the money now?

• 11:28Speaker 01

  We've been having some extra expenses lately.

• 11:30Ramit Sethi?

  Like?

• 11:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, like taxes. I never had big taxes before, but I got one of those this year.

• 11:35Ramit Sethi?

  Why? Why did you not have the high tax bill and now you do?

• 11:39Speaker 01

  I'm making a lot more than I was until recently. And last year I sold a house, so that... Offset my income a lot.

• 11:48Ramit Sethi?

  Maria, you mentioned that you were able to recently invest a lot more money. How'd you do that?

• 11:54Speaker 01

  Oh, well, I made a lot of big changes in my career. I went back to school. I was able to, my, my kids fledged. So that was the big life change is that I could focus on my career. It was never a priority before that. So I put myself through grad school twice. And then I asked for a promotion and they were like, tell us what you want. It was really cool because that was my first experience of like, wow, I get to decide what I want to make here. This is awesome. And then I did that again when I switched school districts. And then this new raise that's coming up is also a promotion. I've been kind of like doing various proposals through the, out the year. And then I, and I said, there's all these things that I want to do.

• 12:39Speaker 01

  Can I, can I do them and get paid for it? And she was like, definitely.

• 12:43Ramit Sethi?

  Whoa.

• 12:44Speaker 01

  And it was a 10% promotion, so it was awesome.

• 12:47Ramit Sethi?

  You know what? Well done. I love that you've been doing it consistently over and over. And I love that you have done this most recently as a teacher. Because one of the common critiques I get when I talk about increasing your income is, hey, I'm a teacher or I work for the government. This won't work for me. And while there are pay bands and there's certain things that private industry doesn't have, there are ways to get creative, whether it's doing what you have done or starting a side business. And I think it's amazing what you've accomplished.

• 13:19Speaker 01

  Thank you.

• 13:20Ramit Sethi?

  Well done. Yeah. Andre, what do you think of these numbers? Are you familiar with the conscious spending plan?

• 13:27Speaker 02

  Yeah, we go over it like once a month at least.

• 13:30Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 13:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:31Ramit Sethi?

  Great.

• 13:32Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 13:32Ramit Sethi?

  You sit down and you?

• 13:33Speaker 02

  We sit down on a computer and they go over and she tried to, she, she goes like, she's the manager. She's go, she goes explaining to me what's going on.

• 13:42Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 13:42Speaker 02

  And I tried my best to understand what's going on.

• 13:45Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 13:45Speaker 02

  And tried to do my best to follow it.

• 13:48Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. And what would be an example where you try to follow the conscious spending plan on a day to day basis?

• 13:56Speaker 02

  Money on things that I wasn't supposed to expand because for example, before I'm a big fan of going to bakeries.

• 14:02Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 14:03Speaker 02

  For example, and go.

• 14:04Ramit Sethi?

  What do you get?

• 14:05Speaker 02

  I like chocolate things and things like that. So nice treats.

• 14:09Ramit Sethi?

  All right.

• 14:10Speaker 02

  And I was doing that every week, every weekend, for example, and when I, when I go there, I don't care about money. I don't ask for how much you're gonna cost. Just give it to me.

• 14:19Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 14:20Speaker 02

  And I'm not doing it anymore. We do sometimes when we think that makes sense, but not like before, like another thing like spending money outside of home. For example, I used to go every day to have like a lunch somewhere else or going to a gas station and get like snacks, things like that and pizza and things.

• 14:45Ramit Sethi?

  That's actually a great use of the conscious spending plan. It, I love what you said. It's like, I used to just go to these places and not think about money at all. And now we have the conscious spending plan. Sure, I can still go once in a while. But in general, I'm not going every day mindlessly, unconsciously. That is exactly the point of the conscious spending plan. So that's a great job. You've heard me talk about how one of my money dials is convenience, but one of my more recent money dials is health, which means I love spending money on things that make me healthier. This is why I pay, for example, for a personal trainer. It's why that I've worked with experts to learn how macros work for the foods that I eat.

• 15:27Ramit Sethi?

  And what's great about the concept of money dials is you decide. And if health is one of your money dials, then I recommend checking out Superpower. Superpower is a membership program that gives you real data and insights about your health. The process starts when they send a licensed professional to your home, or you can visit a nearby lab. And with one lab test, you get access to over a hundred biomarkers, things like cholesterol, iron, creatinine, sodium, cortisol, testosterone, to unlock a better understanding of your body, basically to get a baseline. Their app shares detailed information on your heart, liver, thyroid, hormones, metabolism, vitamin and mineral levels. All tracked and assessed over your lifetime, not just a single snapshot.

• 16:11Ramit Sethi?

  Make this the year you stop guessing about your health with Superpower. For a limited time, our listeners get $20 off to unlock their new health intelligence. Head over to superpower.com. Make sure you use code REMIT for $20 off your membership. That's code REMIT after you sign up. They'll ask you how you heard about Superpower. Do me a favor, and if you could, tell them Money for Couples sent you to support this show. Two misconceptions about Ramit Sethi. Number one, he doesn't like Italian food. That's not true. I like pizza. Number two, that I'm categorically against all financial advisors, also untrue. I'm simply against paying a percentage of your portfolio to an advisor.

• 16:54Ramit Sethi?

  I would rather you pay a simple, flat fee or an hourly rate. That is where our friends at Facet come in. Facet charges a flat membership fee for financial planning, never a percentage of your assets. And you get access to a team of CFP professionals, always a CFP, always a fiduciary, who help you create a personalized financial plan that meets you where you are. They can help with big things like investments, moving across the country, saving for kids' college, traveling in retirement, estate planning, all of it. Your financial plan should match up with your rich life vision, and Facet can help make that possible without the exorbitant fees. As of the date of this recording, Facet is waiving the enrollment fee for new annual members.

• 17:38Ramit Sethi?

  And for my audience, Facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to facet.com/ramit to learn more about which membership option is best for you. Facet is an SEC-registered investment advisor. I'm not a member of Facet and have an incentive to endorse Facet as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement. All opinions are my own and not a guarantee of a similar outcome.

• 18:07Ramit Sethi?

  You said it, I listened. A lot of you have been asking for me to do more around single people and money. It's time to do it. I am casting a new reality series about love and money. So if you are single and you live in LA, I want to talk to you. Go to iwt.com/datingshow. And if you've got friends who are single in LA, send them the link. Iwt.com/datingshow.

• 18:32Ramit Sethi?

  Let's talk about the disparity in income. So, right now, Maria, you earn $126,000 a year. And Andrea, you make 61K per year. How do you feel about that, Maria?

• 18:44Speaker 01

  I know that it makes him feel uncomfortable. And it definitely would feel more comfortable for me, too, if he was able to contribute more. But I'm happy to do it if he's, you know, building his career and investing in himself. That hasn't happened as quickly as I would have liked. Like, we've been having this conversation for years.

• 19:04Ramit Sethi?

  What was the conversation that you had?

• 19:06Speaker 01

  Basically, like, you need a plan so that you're not just spinning in survival mode. And like he said, he's still there. So I need some kind of reassurance, like, this is actually gonna happen. It's not gonna be like this forever.

• 19:20Ramit Sethi?

  When you say, "He needs a plan", what does that plan look like to you?

• 19:25Speaker 01

  The purpose of it, I'll start with that, is that he'd be in a position where he wasn't working all the time and stressed out and that he'd have more time to relax and enjoy life with me. Like, as it is now, I do a lot of things for leisure that he doesn't, that he can't do. Like, he's working on Saturdays. He can't take time off. He doesn't have paid time off, things like that. So, like, we just took our first vacation together last, or in February

• 19:55Ramit Sethi?

  All right.

• 19:56Speaker 01

  in five years. And it was the first time he had had a week off.

• 19:59Ramit Sethi?

  What did that feel like?

• 20:00Speaker 01

  In 12 years. Like, he doesn't do vacations.

• 20:03Ramit Sethi?

  Wait, are Brazilians connoisseurs of leisure? When I talk to Italians, they don't, they love leisure. They're the world's foremost experts at leisure. What is it like for people in Brazil?

• 20:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, we love leisure.

• 20:16Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, that's what I thought.

• 20:17Speaker 02

  The situation before was my status. I'm working in my career. I can't take, like, days off, like, because I don't have, like, a plane. I work for a company that they gave, basically, they gave me a schedule. So they are okay when I ask for days off. But at the same time, when I, when I know that, so I need to stop for a week, three days, four days, I know that that thing gonna impacting my income.

• 20:43Ramit Sethi?

  That sounds pretty reasonable. You're now in the building phase of your career. So if you take time off, that's gonna affect your income. Makes sense. And Maria, I hear that you have built a career. You're making more now than you have ever made and you want to take some time together.

• 21:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, so this is the day to day, but then the other side of that is at this point, he has to work forever, you know, and I'm planning on retiring in like eight years. And so am I going to spend all of that time alone or with friends? Or can I, I want to enjoy some of it with him too.

• 21:19Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think the solution is?

• 21:21Speaker 01

  That he makes more money and he has a plan and that he can save more, invest more.

• 21:28Ramit Sethi?

  And then?

• 21:29Speaker 01

  And then he would know like, oh, I, if I work this long and save this much, then I can retire at this date. And we've kind of run some numbers where if he, he could work till like 70, if he's making more and being strategic about it, it's still like nine years longer than, or actually more because he's a little bit younger than I am. So that would be like almost 12 years later.

• 21:51Ramit Sethi?

  So if he retired at 70, how old would you be then?

• 21:55Speaker 01

  Seventy-three.

• 21:56Ramit Sethi?

  How do you feel about that?

• 21:57Speaker 01

  Kind of sad. Yeah. Yeah. I'd like to spend more of that time together.

• 22:02Ramit Sethi?

  What would the ideal be for you? What age would he retire at in your ideal world?

• 22:07Speaker 01

  Maybe like 65.

• 22:09Ramit Sethi?

  65? Okay. Do people in Brazil save for retirement?

• 22:12Speaker 02

  Nah, really. Okay. So not that much. So that is like a retirement in Brazil is like a buy, you can choose by this, the, the amount that you're making, or you just can wait for the maximum age, they're going to pay you the minimum.

• 22:28Ramit Sethi?

  What's the age that most people retire there?

• 22:30Speaker 02

  It's about 65 years old in Brazil.

• 22:32Ramit Sethi?

  And what does it mean to you that you might have to work past 65?

• 22:37Speaker 02

  Some way for me is like scary because I don't know how I'm going to feel after that age. But at the same time, I can enjoy working.

• 22:45Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 22:45Speaker 02

  So I feel, I, I feel that I'm going to be the kind of guy that not going to stop working. Even if I don't, I have money enough to not do anything.

• 22:53Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 22:53Speaker 02

  You know, I would like to keep active and doing things.

• 22:56Ramit Sethi?

  And you are planning to retire at 61?

• 22:59Speaker 01

  61, full time. Yeah, I could, I'll probably teach part time after that.

• 23:03Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. So I'm hearing a couple of things I'm curious about. You mentioned that you would like him to make more, have a plan, but you also mentioned that you want him to be able to not work all the time and take time off.

• 23:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 23:16Ramit Sethi?

  Those two seem. Connected.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 23:19Ramit Sethi?

  If he has to make more, he probably has to work more. What do you think about that?

• 23:23Speaker 01

  He can't work anymore than he is. He already works a lot. Yeah, he needs to be more focused and strategic about it.

• 23:28Ramit Sethi?

  What does that mean?

• 23:29Speaker 01

  In my mind. Well, like having a license where he get paid more.

• 23:33Ramit Sethi?

  He's doing that, right?

• 23:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, he just started. Yeah. He's been much more proactive recently, but it's very recent.

• 23:41Ramit Sethi?

  So beneath the surface, if I'm reading it right.

• 23:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:43Ramit Sethi?

  Are you a little frustrated that it's taken so long for him to start being more aggressive?

• 23:47Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 23:48Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 23:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's what I'm doing now is like to increase my.

• 23:51Ramit Sethi?

  Your skills.

• 23:52Speaker 02

  My skills, because for example, when I start working with this company, for example, I was just doing appliances.

• 23:58Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 23:59Speaker 02

  Uh, and the amount of money that you get on it is not that much.

• 24:02Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 24:02Speaker 02

  But when you're talking about HVAC, it's much more.

• 24:06Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 24:06Speaker 02

  And I was pushing the, my boss all the time. I was like talking to him, hey, I, I come to this company. Uh, this since the day one, I talk to you that I came here. I don't mind working with appliances. But my goal is HVAC.

• 24:21Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 24:21Speaker 02

  And then finally, uh, he gave me opportunity. So I'm studying every day and when I go over it, I go like three hours over the paperwork to learn. And because it's like a test that takes like a hundred questions. And requires a lot of understanding of that thing. So as soon as I get that license, I can apply for different jobs that pays me, pays me more. So for now, I need to build it.

• 24:48Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, let's go back to the numbers. I have a few more questions on your numbers. Fixed costs are at 68%. And if we take out the miscellaneous, they are at 59%. Would you say that it's fair to include 15%?

• 25:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, for sure. Like car registration.

• 25:07Ramit Sethi?

  Yes.

• 25:07Speaker 01

  Household things.

• 25:09Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, good. So let's say it's accurate. I've found 15% is remarkably accurate in what most people forget to include. So at 68%, what do you think about that number, Maria?

• 25:20Speaker 01

  Uh, it's too high.

• 25:21Ramit Sethi?

  Too high.

• 25:22Speaker 01

  It's been, it's been tight since we combined, um, resources.

• 25:27Speaker 01

  It's felt tight for me and and it's but it's also been good because he's been able to start saving for retirement. So that was the trade off there and it didn't feel good to have our separate finances separate and I had like all this extra income and he was like just barely getting by month to month.

• 25:44Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah, as an example, if we split out your fixed costs, they're 59%, which is right in that zone of 50 to 60% and Andre, your fixed costs are 85%.

• 25:57Speaker 01

  And actually, before we combined mine, we're like 48%.

• 26:01Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 26:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, because I'm covering a lot more of the expenses than he is.

• 26:06Ramit Sethi?

  What, you're covering like gas?

• 26:08Speaker 01

  Well, like the rent.

• 26:10Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, you're covering more. Is that proportional?

• 26:12Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:12Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, well, that's how it should be.

• 26:14Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:15Ramit Sethi?

  You make more, you should probably cover more.

• 26:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, but I'm covering like insurance, car insurance, health insurance, all the savings, trips to Brazil, pretty much everything that's not his essential stuff.

• 26:27Ramit Sethi?

  You combine your money, right?

• 26:29Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 26:30Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, so then like, I'm curious about the covering this 50 50, etc.

• 26:35Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 26:35Ramit Sethi?

  Why?

• 26:36Speaker 01

  Well, we just recently started doing that and we haven't like worked out all the account logistics yet.

• 26:43Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 26:44Speaker 01

  But also, I think that because of the way that he manages his money is seeing how much he has left in his account.

• 26:51Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 26:52Speaker 01

  That it would be taking away a sense of autonomy and and does that seem fair?

• 26:59Ramit Sethi?

  Like? Yeah.

• 27:00Speaker 01

  Yeah, it would be hard for him to know how much to spend if he didn't have like his situation in his account.

• 27:07Ramit Sethi?

  You'll ever read a book called Money for Couples? We shoot.

• 27:13Speaker 01

  I'm always like placing it before him. He hasn't picked it up on his own.

• 27:17Ramit Sethi?

  Because it's interesting to me that you you're married, you have combined your finances, which I think is great, but you're still doing this 50 50, but also kind of proportional, like it just seems like a lot of work and you've already gone 70% of the way by combining your finances. But right now, you're in this very confusing liminal space. Why not just go all the way? When you have been managing your own money in your way for a long time, when you get married, that changes. You can't just do it your own way. You have to talk to each other. You have to compromise. She's been managing money her own way for a while. And now to bring in a partner and to have to talk about it, that's one thing.

• 28:02Ramit Sethi?

  But it's yet another when you are the higher earner. Because after all, you make more money. So shouldn't you be the one who makes the call? And actually, the answer is no. Because when you are married, it doesn't only matter that you make more money. You're now partners. You have to talk. You have to compromise. And that is a challenge here. It can be difficult to combine incomes, especially the longer you have done it on your own. But it's also really important. Because if you continue operating as single people when you are a married unit, you're not really going to be a team. If you and your partner are struggling to truly get on the same page so that you're cooperating over your money, this is a perfect time to join my money coaching program. We do live events every month.

• 28:47Ramit Sethi?

  And even if you don't see money the same way, come to our program. I will help you build a plan that works for both of you. Join at iwt.com/moneycoaching.

• 28:57Speaker 01

  Part of the issue is that he hasn't separated his business expenses from his personal expenses in a clean way.

• 29:05Ramit Sethi?

  Oh.

• 29:06Speaker 01

  And that's been really, really messy.

• 29:08Ramit Sethi?

  That's messy.

• 29:09Speaker 01

  Really messy.

• 29:10Ramit Sethi?

  You could fix that in like one day. You got a business credit card?

• 29:13Speaker 02

  Yeah, I just use for my business expenses, I just use my credit card.

• 29:18Ramit Sethi?

  That's awesome. That's ideal. And then what's, where is it getting co-mingled with your personal?

• 29:24Speaker 02

  Well, because I need to pay for that credit card, you know? Sometimes I feel that it's not being fair from the company that I'm working for. For example, when I buy a part.

• 29:37Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 29:37Speaker 02

  Or something like that, they should refund me.

• 29:41Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 29:41Speaker 02

  A hundred percent. And they're not doing that.

• 29:43Ramit Sethi?

  They're not refunding you a hundred percent?

• 29:45Speaker 02

  No. So they're not refunding a hundred percent. And when I got my paycheck, for example, I say I expend a hundred dollars. They put like in my paycheck as like a commission.

• 29:57Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 29:57Speaker 02

  And I pay taxes over it.

• 29:59Ramit Sethi?

  I see.

• 29:59Speaker 02

  I know that is wrong. That is wrong. They should me pay a hundred percent and no taxing on it. So for example, the gas is from my pocket too.

• 30:09Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 30:09Speaker 02

  They give me like a little bit money to cover for my gas, but it's not enough.

• 30:15Ramit Sethi?

  This is like one, one of the many ways that companies screw over people who don't have a lot of power in the labor force.

• 30:23Speaker 02

  And I try to approach a company, they ghost me.

• 30:26Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 30:26Speaker 02

  And at this point, I.

• 30:28Ramit Sethi?

  Should we put this company on blast right now? No, no, no, I don't want you to lose your job. Fuck this company.

• 30:33Speaker 02

  I want, I talked to her and I said, I'm not gonna go more aggressive with that because probably they're gonna fire me.

• 30:39Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 30:39Speaker 02

  And I'm gonna use this company as a step for my next job.

• 30:42Ramit Sethi?

  Good.

• 30:43Speaker 02

  So I'm working in my license and I'm sure that I'm gonna get it as soon as I can.

• 30:48Ramit Sethi?

  Let's go back to the numbers. Current savings that you have would last about four months. Okay. Not great, but not horrible. Investment at 12%, but it's actually higher because it's pre-tax. Let's talk about retirement. So Maria, have you calculated how much you will have at retirement?

• 31:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, between 10 and 12,000 a month gross.

• 31:09Ramit Sethi?

  That's a lot.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  Yeah, for one person. And it would cover two of us too. And that's part of the reason why the emergency savings, like the same thought is not that high because like I have tenure. And we have a very well-funded program, like the possibility of me losing my job is really, really slim.

• 31:27Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, you currently make 10,500 a month gross. So you could make more in retirement than you make now.

• 31:34Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:34Ramit Sethi?

  So grand total, we're talking about retirement, roughly 100 to 115,000, maybe a little bit more, it sounds like. Is that accurate from what you know?

• 31:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, so maybe similar to what I'm making now, yeah.

• 31:48Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, is that enough?

• 31:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:52Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think about that? Like you have. Kind of guaranteed to make six figures in your retirement.

• 31:59Speaker 01

  Like I said, I feel really grateful and yeah, that's the biggest word because I really didn't plan until a few years ago. Honestly, I was even on food stamps a few years ago because I was reeling from a cancer diagnosis and things like that. And so I had to make a big shift of like, oh, I get to have a future, for one thing. The time when I don't want to be working anymore is closer than it used to be. That's why I said I started investing really aggressively and focusing on that.

• 32:31Ramit Sethi?

  What age were you when you started aggressively investing?

• 32:35Speaker 01

  Forty-nine.

• 32:36Ramit Sethi?

  Forty-nine?

• 32:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:37Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think about the fact that Andre has just recently started his career path and is, in my opinion, aggressively moving up the value chain?

• 32:47Speaker 01

  Well, we've had this conversation before because we can make fun of the age difference, like two and a half, three years. Well, when I was your age, I didn't have a plan either.

• 32:58Ramit Sethi?

  But you mentioned your frustration with Andre that he has not changed, developed his plan fast enough. Kind of similar, right?

• 33:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 33:07Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think of that?

• 33:09Speaker 01

  I feel like I have been really patient. Like, we've been having these conversations since I was forty-nine and he really has only started taking it seriously more recently.

• 33:20Ramit Sethi?

  More recently means what?

• 33:22Speaker 01

  Like the last couple of months.

• 33:24Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 33:24Speaker 01

  It's not that he didn't think it was important and probably I would have felt the same way at forty-five. It's just that there's more pressing issues and because he's in that survival mode, he hasn't been able to make a plan.

• 33:35Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 33:36Speaker 01

  It just has felt like it was a focus issue because there's no reason he couldn't have gotten his license before. Like, he didn't need a green card for that. He could have been ready and those were conversations that we had.

• 33:46Speaker 02

  I was in a fragile situation before. I didn't have the many choices to have a different job. The company that I was working before, that was the only thing that I found. That set me working with them as a subcontractor. At the same time, they knew that situation, they knew that I didn't have choice and they took a lot of the advantage of it. So I couldn't make a plan. I didn't have the chance to make a plan. So now I have, I was like not feeling like up to making a plan. Because I didn't have the basic to make a plan. So how gonna make a plan? I don't know what gonna happen tomorrow.

• 34:25Ramit Sethi?

  You know how hard it is to move to the US and to become a citizen? I have known many people from when I was a kid who waited for 10 to 15 plus years just to get a visa to come to the US. And once they're here, it's not easy either. There are all kinds of barriers put up. As you can see, there are companies who take advantage of people who don't have a lot of negotiating power. And it's expensive. We have to factor all of these things in when we hear Andre's story. Exciting news, one of our longest running sponsors, Element, has just launched their new Lemonade Iced Tea. And it's built on the same formula as Element's core drink mix, but now with a full spectrum black tea extract for a natural source of caffeine.

• 35:08Ramit Sethi?

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• 35:48Ramit Sethi?

  Get a free eight-count Element sample pack with any purchase at drinklmnt.com/ramit. That's drinklmnt.com/ramit. Try it totally risk-free. If you don't like it, they'll give you your money back, no questions asked. My philosophy with your money is you've got to fight for simplicity. And we use the same principle in my company. At IWT, we fight for simplicity because we have a small, but incredibly capable and talented team. We all work remotely, so we don't have commute time. We only partner with brands that we love and respect, and that are easy to work with. So if you are looking to simplify parts of your business,

• 36:30Ramit Sethi?

  like payroll, HR, and more, check out Gusto. Gusto is online payroll and benefit software built for small businesses. It's all-in-one, it's remote-friendly, and it is incredibly easy to use, so you can pay, hire, onboard, and support your team from anywhere. Whether you need help with automatic payroll tax filing, simple direct deposits, health benefits, commuter benefits, workers' comp, or 401K matches, Gusto makes it simple and has solutions for nearly every budget. It also helps you save time with automated tools built right in, like offer letters, onboarding materials, all of these things, so you don't have to create everything yourself from scratch. Plus, it's simple to switch. Just transfer your existing data to their system, and you're good to go.

• 37:15Ramit Sethi?

  Try Gusto today at gusto.com/ramit and get three months free when you run your first payroll. That's three months of free payroll at gusto.com/ramit. One more time, gusto.com/ramit. Can I flip this situation for a second? Let's say that a man lived in the US, meets a woman who moved here from Brazil. She doesn't have her citizenship or residency. He's making more, he's been working for a long time. And then they move in, get married. He's paying more proportionally, her income is lower. Would this be an issue at all?

• 37:58Ramit Sethi?

  No. No. What do you say, Maria?

• 38:01Speaker 01

  Probably not.

• 38:02Ramit Sethi?

  Why is this an issue here?

• 38:03Speaker 02

  I think that's because I'm a man.

• 38:06Ramit Sethi?

  Uh huh.

• 38:07Speaker 02

  You know, that's like, that, that belief that she brings from her, uh, culture. And I bring from my culture too, that the man is to lead.

• 38:18Ramit Sethi?

  Mm hmm.

• 38:18Speaker 02

  Is the one that takes like the, the initiative to the things.

• 38:22Ramit Sethi?

  Good.

• 38:23Speaker 02

  And takes care of, of things. I think that I'm be, I'm being negligent on that, on that. And at this point, because, uh, it's okay, she's, she makes more money. But I was supposed to be the one that taking the lead.

• 38:37Ramit Sethi?

  Ah.

• 38:37Speaker 02

  To do the, to, to manage the thing and make the thing happen.

• 38:42Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Can you be a leader if she makes more money than you?

• 38:45Speaker 02

  I think so.

• 38:46Ramit Sethi?

  I think so too.

• 38:47Speaker 02

  It's kinda challenging for me first because I'm just got my immigration situation done. Second is the language. So I think that I speak English enough, but sometimes it's not that great for to take care of things. I don't know, uh, how the laws and the opportunities work here because it's 12 years. Seems like a lot is not enough to get everything that I should know about how the system work, working here. I try to learn a lot, but anyways.

• 39:19Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 39:19Speaker 02

  She is much better than it, she's a native.

• 39:22Ramit Sethi?

  And Maria, what about you?

• 39:24Speaker 01

  That's a really interesting, um, thought. I didn't make that much money until recently. And I had the, I was child rearing, I was a stay at home mom for six years. I really like being a homemaker and I didn't really want to work full time. On the other hand, being with Andre, it's been, um, it's been a good like push for me to like, okay, nobody's taking care of you here, like you gotta figure this out. And that was part of the like shifting gears. Because none of the women in my family, like my blood relatives, um, they were all homemakers primarily. They didn't put their careers first. And at some point I realized like I was waiting for money to come from somewhere else.

• 40:09Speaker 01

  At the same time, like the, I've always been very, very active with the community, with, um, starting projects and.

• 40:17Speaker 01

  Like planning the meals and all the social engagements and all of that. So it's, a lot of that has to fall by the wayside when I'm working full time because that's not the kind of thing that he does at all, like I do, almost 100% of all of that. So that's why it's an interesting juxtaposition because it's not as simple as like just trading off the finances. There's other trade-offs too.

• 40:41Ramit Sethi?

  Of course, yes, that makes sense. So much of what we're talking about here is about gender and identity. Yeah, expectations. And those are real. Like you have said repeatedly, Andre, a man needs to be a man, a man needs to lead. That's real. That's in many cultures. I also hear what you're saying, Maria. You were waiting for a long time for somebody else to help with the money. That's real. And at the same time, I'm wondering, do we have to simply abide by those roles that we grew up with?

• 41:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 41:16Ramit Sethi?

  Honestly, this would not be a conversation if the roles were reversed. If we had a man earning more than his wife, and she was working to make more money, but she probably never would make as much as him, and he had to cover some of her expenses because they're married and in their 50s, this would not be an episode. You would not be listening to this right now. But because the gender roles have reversed, this is challenging and even controversial. And I want to be candid about this. We have gender roles. They are real, but we should still be questioning them. I actually think that people are more capable than they themselves know. Just because they grew up seeing gender represented in a certain way, doesn't mean it has to be that way.

• 42:00Ramit Sethi?

  I know plenty of young women, in fact, women in cities earn more than young men in their 20s. So what does that mean? It's having quite different effects across the socioeconomic spectrum. And the fact is, we have to start dealing with a new way of relating to money. Let me understand a little bit more about how you each grew up with money. Maria, what do you remember your family saying about money when you were young?

• 42:23Speaker 01

  They didn't talk about it a lot. There was always enough for everything. And I always knew that I'd have like my college paid for. But aside from that, it was like if I wanted anything, I needed to earn at least half the money myself. We didn't do any kind of like luxury things, really. Um, that's not the way that my parents wanted to spend their money.

• 42:46Ramit Sethi?

  What part of the country generally did you grow up in?

• 42:48Speaker 01

  Central Coast, California.

• 42:49Ramit Sethi?

  Got it. Okay. And are your parents still alive, still together?

• 42:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, still alive, still together.

• 42:55Ramit Sethi?

  How are they doing financially?

• 42:56Speaker 01

  They're doing okay, but they don't like to spend money.

• 43:01Ramit Sethi?

  Ah.

• 43:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:02Ramit Sethi?

  Do they have it?

• 43:03Speaker 01

  They have enough.

• 43:04Ramit Sethi?

  They have enough and they don't like to spend it?

• 43:05Speaker 01

  No.

• 43:05Ramit Sethi?

  Tell me more.

• 43:06Speaker 01

  I think they're afraid of not having money. They both grew up um, in situations um, where there were at least periods of poverty. And so they have that, that scarcity of feeling of like, somebody could lose their job and we would lose all their money, even though they're retired.

• 43:25Ramit Sethi?

  Hmm. You think that they are reasonable to believe that? Or has it become unreasonable?

• 43:31Speaker 01

  I think it's become unreasonable. I, I wish they would enjoy their life more.

• 43:36Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, okay.

• 43:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:36Ramit Sethi?

  You tell them that?

• 43:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:38Ramit Sethi?

  And what do they say?

• 43:39Speaker 01

  They just kind of blow it off.

• 43:42Ramit Sethi?

  It's hard to change decades, sometimes generations of belief. Do you think any of that also lives in you?

• 43:50Speaker 01

  One of my um, money dials is being able to give generously to my family. I really have loved being able to spend money since I started making more money in ways that feel really good and satisfying and fulfilling. So for some reason I didn't take that on.

• 44:06Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 44:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:07Ramit Sethi?

  Did you think that was um, accidental or was it purposeful?

• 44:11Speaker 01

  When I left for college, I just really shed a lot of my family beliefs and

• 44:16Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 44:16Speaker 01

  Didn't take those with me. Yeah.

• 44:18Ramit Sethi?

  How'd you do that?

• 44:18Speaker 01

  I don't know. I was just really open to new thoughts and ideas and did things really differently than my parents. Even if I would come visit for a little while, I'd be like, so how long you're staying for?

• 44:28Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, really?

• 44:29Speaker 01

  Yeah. Yeah, they, my dad basically had the, the thought that like, once you're 18, you're on your own financially, except for paying for college and

• 44:37Ramit Sethi?

  Wow.

• 44:37Speaker 01

  He instilled a lot of independence in that way.

• 44:40Ramit Sethi?

  And did both of them work or just one?

• 44:42Speaker 01

  Just my dad. My mom, um, she had a career, so to speak. She was also a teacher. She got her masters in linguistics, but she only worked really part-time. She put everything else first and she never made good money doing that.

• 44:58Ramit Sethi?

  I see.

• 44:59Speaker 01

  Or significant money, I should say.

• 45:01Ramit Sethi?

  Does she ever talk to you about money? No.

• 45:05Speaker 01

  Not really.

• 45:06Ramit Sethi?

  And your dad? No?

• 45:08Speaker 01

  No, not really.

• 45:09Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Where have you learned about money from?

• 45:11Speaker 01

  From you? From other people on the internet?

• 45:14Ramit Sethi?

  How'd you do that? Did you go online searching for like?

• 45:17Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:17Ramit Sethi?

  Investing and things like that?

• 45:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:19Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, that's cool. And when you encountered this, what was your reaction to all this material, books and things out there?

• 45:27Speaker 01

  Well, I think that he and I both had this sense of like being responsible with money, but not planning it or managing it like beyond the month to month.

• 45:38Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 45:38Speaker 01

  And so I definitely had a feeling of like, I could have been doing this differently for all this time. Yeah, but I do remember my thought process when I was younger was like, the future is uncertain. And who knows, like if the world was going to implode by then and then what could, what could with all that money do me at that point?

• 46:00Ramit Sethi?

  Right.

• 46:01Speaker 01

  So now I'm like, well, it's probably going to be around in some form in eight years. So it feels more real.

• 46:07Ramit Sethi?

  This is very common, you know, especially when people are young, kind of like a little nihilistic and they go like, ah, who knows, I'll be dead by then. And so you can't take it with you, all these phrases that we've absorbed.

• 46:19Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:20Ramit Sethi?

  And then as we get into typically 40s, we go, oh, wait a second, like, I actually know people who are older and they're not in a good situation, or the word retirement starts to loom as more real. So it's classic, classic path you were on.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  For sure.

• 46:34Ramit Sethi?

  That's pretty interesting. What messages about money do you think you bring from your family to this relationship?

• 46:42Speaker 01

  I definitely carry a sense of responsibility for the household in terms of like the grocery shopping and food and household finance management in that kind of way. I think a lot of women that work full time joke like, I wish I had a wife, you know, that kind of thing. And so I'm, I'm doing both of those roles. I definitely feel like men should work. Like, it would feel awkward to me if, if he, if I was, you know, supporting him a hundred percent. So I guess that's a message that I'm bringing on. And I don't necessarily feel that way about women, like, because I, I see that women do so much caretaking. And so I feel like it can be more acceptable.

• 47:23Ramit Sethi?

  Andrea, what about you? What do you remember about your family saying around money when you were growing up?

• 47:29Speaker 02

  No talking about money at all.

• 47:31Ramit Sethi?

  None?

• 47:32Speaker 02

  None.

• 47:33Ramit Sethi?

  Is that common?

• 47:33Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think that it's common in Brazil. So my dad was like a hard worker the whole life. He was like always providing. We never had like a hard time at home.

• 47:43Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 47:43Speaker 02

  It's like a tight life, you know, not the rich people. But always we were living in a nice place, um, having everything that we need. We went to the school. My father was providing for everything. But I remember that was like when I was asking him, oh, would you like to have the bicycle? Would you like to have this and that or a trip or something? Or the answer I was always no.

• 48:09Ramit Sethi?

  Really? No, and then what?

• 48:12Speaker 02

  No, and period.

• 48:13Ramit Sethi?

  That's it?

• 48:14Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 48:14Ramit Sethi?

  And what did you say when he said no?

• 48:17Speaker 02

  Well, I didn't have a chance to say anything.

• 48:20Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, just end of story.

• 48:21Speaker 02

  End of story. And then when I became fourteen years old, I started working to make my own money to get the things that I couldn't have from my, from my, from my family. But I didn't have an idea how to manage that money because we never talk about that.

• 48:35Ramit Sethi?

  Did your mom work?

• 48:36Speaker 02

  No.

• 48:37Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Just at home? She was at home? Yes. And how many siblings do you have?

• 48:41Speaker 02

  Just one brother.

• 48:42Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, got it. All right. When you were fourteen, what job did you get?

• 48:46Speaker 02

  I was like, uh, I was working in an administration, like a

• 48:50Speaker 01

  Like a messenger kind of.

• 48:51Speaker 02

  A messenger, okay.

• 48:52Ramit Sethi?

  And what did you do with the money that you made?

• 48:54Speaker 02

  Basically, I was using to have fun and buy clothes.

• 48:58Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 48:59Speaker 02

  That I would like to have my, my parents never gave to me.

• 49:02Ramit Sethi?

  Got it.

• 49:02Speaker 02

  So in Brazil, we have a nice culture, a different culture. So teenagers in Brazil, they like to wear brands.

• 49:08Ramit Sethi?

  Mm hmm.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  And I never had a brand sneaker, for example, or something like that. That was okay, now I can buy it.

• 49:15Ramit Sethi?

  Cool, all right.

• 49:16Speaker 01

  And he was hustling to like the, in Brazil, they, they let students, teenagers go to school at night? So he was working full time during the day and then going to high school at night?

• 49:27Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 49:28Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:28Speaker 01

  Like, we both started working around the same time.

• 49:30Ramit Sethi?

  Uh huh.

• 49:31Speaker 01

  And I felt like I was doing a lot, but compared to Brazilian standards, no.

• 49:34Ramit Sethi?

  Wow.

• 49:36Ramit Sethi?

  That's quite interesting. Andre, what messages about money from your childhood do you bring to this relationship?

• 49:44Speaker 02

  Money is tight. Money is like. Scarcity? Yeah.

• 49:49Ramit Sethi?

  It's not enough.

• 49:50Speaker 02

  You have to make money and hold it.

• 49:53Ramit Sethi?

  Ah.

• 49:53Speaker 02

  Don't spend money. At the same time, I think so, I work so hard. I deserve. I deserve to have like a better life. I deserve to go to a restaurant and look at the menu to the left side, not the right side. I don't wanna, I don't care about how much they're gonna charge me.

• 50:12Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 50:13Speaker 02

  So I want this dish, you know? I feel so, if I don't have money, I don't go, period.

• 50:19Ramit Sethi?

  And if I do go, I'm gonna get what I want?

• 50:22Speaker 02

  Yeah, exactly.

• 50:23Speaker 01

  I think he definitely brings that, that like work hustle ethic of like, just keep on working, keep on working, keep on paying the bills and rather than like the vision.

• 50:35Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 50:36Speaker 02

  Yeah, definitely.

• 50:37Ramit Sethi?

  He's right.

• 50:37Speaker 01

  And to a higher degree than like anybody I grew up with or know.

• 50:42Ramit Sethi?

  Meaning work harder.

• 50:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:44Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah, like.

• 50:45Speaker 01

  It's more of an immigrant work ethic that I see.

• 50:47Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 50:48Speaker 01

  You're gonna work two jobs in one day, you know?

• 50:50Ramit Sethi?

  Many people who come here are just, I just need to work hard and I, that vision thing is, I don't understand what that is. I'm just gonna double down and work harder than anybody else. How much of this is resonating with you?

• 51:01Speaker 02

  I think that is 100% accurate.

• 51:03Ramit Sethi?

  How do you think all that contributes to where you are today?

• 51:07Speaker 02

  The main thing is like, we never knew about money before. We could start earlier.

• 51:15Ramit Sethi?

  Yep.

• 51:15Speaker 02

  For saving money and planning the future and everything.

• 51:19Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah. One thing I heard about you, there wasn't a lot of planning going forward. It's just like, work hard today.

• 51:25Speaker 02

  Work and pay the bills. That's it.

• 51:27Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah, that's it. And that's for life. Okay, what's the laughter?

• 51:32Speaker 01

  That's not a play.

• 51:34Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 51:35Speaker 01

  But I definitely like respect that he is a hard worker. And that's something I've always appreciated about him from day one. But yeah, that balance, we really need that balance.

• 51:47Ramit Sethi?

  Do not wait to learn about money. And definitely do not wait to talk about money. She didn't start taking action on her money until her late 40s. He didn't take his money seriously either. And this is exactly what happens when it comes to personal finance. This is why I want you to learn about your money. And then you to talk to your kids about money. I am sick of so many people growing up with their parents never talking about money. And then they are left defenseless to figure it out on their own. That's why I wrote my books. That's why I started this podcast. Take control and stop waiting for someone to come save you. What else do you make of what I said about the clues from your childhood, Maria? How do they combine to bring you to where you are today?

• 52:28Speaker 01

  I know it adds to his sense of shame that he mentioned.

• 52:31Ramit Sethi?

  Because?

• 52:32Speaker 01

  Because like he said, though, he feels the man should work. And I think by that he means should contribute more financially than the woman does.

• 52:40Ramit Sethi?

  Should make more, should contribute more.

• 52:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:42Speaker 02

  Yeah, I don't think that should be more. I think that should be balanced.

• 52:48Ramit Sethi?

  Does that mean equal?

• 52:49Speaker 02

  Not equal. I don't mind if it was a little bit less. For example, I would like to share at least 50% with everything, you know?

• 52:58Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, what if you never make as much as Maria?

• 53:02Speaker 02

  I wouldn't care about her at all. It's like about how much she was making or not.

• 53:08Ramit Sethi?

  Oh.

• 53:08Speaker 02

  If it was me in her, in her, in her place.

• 53:12Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 53:12Speaker 02

  I would say like, okay, make money enough to have your, to do your things. To contribute with this and this and that, I would take care of the rest. I really don't care.

• 53:25Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 53:25Speaker 02

  That was my position if it was in her shoes.

• 53:28Speaker 01

  I'm okay with that if he has leisure time. And he's, like you said, kind of covering your own bills. Because honestly, in the last, well, almost since we met, I've been actually covering some of his business expenses, mainly the vehicle. He's never really been able to cover a work vehicle that's needed for his job. And it's a huge money drain.

• 53:51Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 53:52Speaker 01

  I think if he had those bases covered. And didn't have to work until he was 80 or whatever, then yeah, I'm okay with it being imbalanced for sure.

• 54:02Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, that's cool. That's actually, that's actually pretty different than how you were both raised. So I appreciate you coming up with perhaps a different vision than you grew up with, but that might be right for the two of you. Let's dial in a little bit more on that. Rich life, have you talked about it?

• 54:23Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:23Ramit Sethi?

  What is it? What's your rich life, Andrea?

• 54:25Speaker 01

  Well, then I'd have more time with my husband. In many ways, I feel like we're already living it. I'm really happy with our life. Get to live in a beautiful place and be in nature, go to the beach almost every day, and get to spend good time with my family and most of the family's pretty close. If I could wave a magic wand and have everything I wanted, then we've both mentioned that we would like to have our own house. I don't see how that could happen where we live now very easily and in our current situation, but, and then I like to travel. You could see on our CSP that that's like a, a high area where we save for and stuff.

• 55:06Ramit Sethi?

  Where do you like to go?

• 55:07Speaker 01

  I just got back from the desert with my kids. I like to go there every spring. Where our vision is to go to Brazil every winter and not have to do winter over here.

• 55:15Ramit Sethi?

  Nice. Cool. Okay. What about you, Andrea?

• 55:19Speaker 02

  Rich life for me is balance, you know? So being responsible with the money, but if I wanna do something or buy something that I, I think that is reasonable or just for a desire, let's say that I wanna buy like a boat or something like that, that was like, oh, really wouldn't buy this. And I can count on the money and go then purchase whatever I want, being reasonable for sure, and have a balance of life, talking about how many hours and how hard it worked.

• 55:52Ramit Sethi?

  How many hours you wanna work in your rich life?

• 55:54Speaker 02

  Forty hours a week.

• 55:54Ramit Sethi?

  All right.

• 55:55Speaker 02

  And that's it.

• 55:55Ramit Sethi?

  And what about traveling to Brazil? Is that part of your rich life?

• 55:59Speaker 02

  Yeah, it is. Actually, it is. So that's like, like she said before, we would Would you like to expand the winter time, American winter time in Brazil? Because it's summertime over there, it's gonna be great.

• 56:11Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 56:11Speaker 01

  And the sense of relaxation that comes from that because we're both kind of exhausted at the end of the day.

• 56:17Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's one thing that I would like to say too is like she is mentioning that she would like to have more

• 56:25Speaker 02

  my presence more like doing things after work in the weekend. I'm exhausted, man. I can't, I even if I go, I gonna sleep. You know, I'm not gonna be present in there, it's just gonna be my body in there. My soul is gonna be in another place totally different because I feel totally tired, exhausted. I work really hard. For example, Friday I was working underneath a house all day long, replacing ducts in a space like maybe 11 inches.

• 56:58Ramit Sethi?

  Wow.

• 56:58Speaker 02

  I barely fit in there.

• 57:00Ramit Sethi?

  So to come back home after that, it's like you're checked out.

• 57:04Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah, I wanna take a shower and eat and don't bother me, let me alone.

• 57:09Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 57:09Speaker 01

  And he often works Saturdays.

• 57:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, sometimes.

• 57:12Speaker 01

  So then he's just spending Sunday recuperating.

• 57:14Ramit Sethi?

  I think I have a much better understanding of both of you and where you came from and the financial situation now. I'm curious, you have told me what your rich life is, it seems quite aligned. What do you think you could do with your numbers to make your rich life possible? Just conceptually, what major big things might you shift in the conscious spending plan to be able to live the rich life that you described?

• 57:45Speaker 01

  I think he needs a job that values him and pays him better.

• 57:48Speaker 02

  I'm working on it, I'm working hard on it. First of all, I need my license and then there is a good opportunities over there.

• 57:54Ramit Sethi?

  I agree, so what you said, I totally agree with. I think everybody here agrees, a better job that's more stable and that values you.

• 58:02Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 58:03Ramit Sethi?

  Number one, that solves a lot of problems, right? And you're on the path to doing that.

• 58:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:08Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, so that's number one. What else?

• 58:10Speaker 01

  Having the joint accounts so that it's more smooth and doesn't feel like a who's doing what kind of thing.

• 58:16Ramit Sethi?

  Agreed, that's a great insight. Number two is the two of you truly acting like a team. Your money is already combined for the most part, so just go the extra step and the two of you look at it together. That would be awesome. That will make you much more of a team instead of this his and hers mentality. I agree. Anything else?

• 58:39Speaker 01

  Keeping the business expenses separate.

• 58:41Ramit Sethi?

  Yes.

• 58:42Speaker 01

  So it's not a drain.

• 58:43Ramit Sethi?

  Hundred percent, yes. There's got to be separation because that makes everything too confusing. It's just unclear what's going on then. There's resentment. We don't want that. Yes, clear separation. What else?

• 58:54Speaker 02

  Understanding.

• 58:56Ramit Sethi?

  Tell me more.

• 58:57Speaker 02

  Being understanding about the situation that we are.

• 59:00Ramit Sethi?

  Yes.

• 59:00Speaker 02

  So for my, for my side, I need to understand that she makes more than money than me. She is, she knows my situation and I, I, I don't need to be like that, that defensive about that. And she from her side, understand that what's my situation now and understand that it takes time. I'm working on it, you know?

• 59:27Ramit Sethi?

  I think that's actually beautiful. Understanding, acceptance. I love that you led with yourself first. You said, I need to accept, I need to understand that she makes more. And not be defensive about it. That's, uh, yeah, very powerful. And I love that you then said, this is what I need from her. Very powerful. Kind of want to acknowledge Andre. There's so many things that I notice and that I admire about him. Before we started recording, he mentioned that his English was not particularly good. And he asked if, sometimes if he didn't understand what I was saying, if I could repeat it in a different way.

• 1:00:09Ramit Sethi?

  And I was kind of surprised because I thought his English is excellent. What really surprised me about Andre is his self-awareness. Growing up in one culture and coming to another is not easy. He talks about the culture he grew up in. He talks about the culture here. He acknowledges that he has not done a great job being a leader. And he also talks about how tired he is when he comes home from six days a week of work. There's a lot to be said for being able to acknowledge where you are, your weaknesses. And one of the things that I hope to be able to help them with is where to go from here. What I'm seeing here is

• 1:00:51Ramit Sethi?

  You were raised in the US even though you were not taught about money and you were relatively recently on food stamps. But actually, your career has done very, very well. You married Andre, who came from another country, grew up hustling. That's what he saw from his dad. Now, yeah, I don't think that according to maybe US standards, you have not strategically operated your career in the way that somebody who's taken my dream job program would. But you've worked hard. You have been agile with these companies that may not have treated you particularly well. You're getting a license and you're on the path to get another job. I think that's really powerful to accept.

• 1:01:36Ramit Sethi?

  Maria, you're always going to make more money. That's just the nature of you having chosen this career path, et cetera. And that means you're probably going to shoulder proportionally more of the expenses. I think that's, you've got to accept that. But then I just zoom out and I go, wait a minute, why are we even talking about this? The two of you are married. So it's less about who's shouldering what and more like, what's the rich life vision? And how can both of us get there? Now, if you're, Maria, if you're like, look, I make more money, so I don't want to have to go grocery shopping anymore. Fair enough. We can talk about that. We can find a solution. That's totally reasonable.

• 1:02:17Ramit Sethi?

  But I think that the moment we get out of the me versus you and instead go to us, you actually are in an amazing position. How does that strike both of you?

• 1:02:29Speaker 02

  It sounds reasonable.

• 1:02:30Speaker 01

  Yeah, it sounds true. We had that conversation like two or three weeks ago and it ran some numbers and it was like, you know what, even if nothing changed, we're going to be okay.

• 1:02:40Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 1:02:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. In terms of financially.

• 1:02:43Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:02:44Speaker 01

  We still want him to work less and not be so exhausted all the time. So that that piece needs to change, but and it wouldn't be as much as we would like and that I think that he. Deserves, but it's not like a dire scary situation, which that was kind of a shift. I was like, I think we might be in a scary situation here together. But when we looked at the numbers more closely, it was like, okay, we're gonna be okay.

• 1:03:10Ramit Sethi?

  Wow, that's powerful. How did you feel when you came to that realization?

• 1:03:15Speaker 01

  I felt relief.

• 1:03:17Ramit Sethi?

  Nice. What about you, Andre? I don't think you realized it.

• 1:03:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, no, we talk about that.

• 1:03:23Ramit Sethi?

  But did you feel it? Or did you say, ah, okay, I need to work more?

• 1:03:30Speaker 02

  I feel that because the culture that she has and the beliefs that she has, she understand that what's the best idea to get there. But like, as you said before, so you're not like that from since the beginning.

• 1:03:48Ramit Sethi?

  Yes.

• 1:03:48Speaker 02

  So it's not your setup.

• 1:03:50Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah, that's not your default.

• 1:03:51Speaker 02

  It's not your default, yeah. And then, once in a while, that's the default pops up.

• 1:03:59Ramit Sethi?

  Mm hmm. Of I need to work more.

• 1:04:01Speaker 02

  And then I feel threatened.

• 1:04:03Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, yes. So this is not just one person who needs to change, it's both. Because Maria, as I've spoken to her, I told her, look, you make more, and that is something you're going to have to accept. If you want to live this rich life together with more time together, you're gonna have to accept it and get comfortable on the expenses. But she's not the only one who has to change.

• 1:04:29Speaker 02

  No.

• 1:04:30Ramit Sethi?

  You have to take the leadership on other areas, like making the plan, communicating it effectively, working with your boss, jobs, et cetera. How do you feel about that?

• 1:04:41Speaker 01

  Oh, I'd love for him to take more initiative.

• 1:04:43Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:04:43Speaker 01

  I'm definitely the leader manager in the relationship right now.

• 1:04:47Speaker 02

  Actually, we were talking about yesterday, and we were having like a pizza last night. And when she was like, I was trying to say what I wanted to, and she was taking the decision. And I let her do it. And then at the end of the so, I need you, I would you like to choose? I would you like to take the lead on it? I would you like to say what I want, and you don't let me? I'm not fighting with you, just suggesting that let me do it.

• 1:05:17Ramit Sethi?

  Wow.

• 1:05:18Speaker 01

  That's true.

• 1:05:18Ramit Sethi?

  This is a very powerful lesson over pizza. Actually, very amazing. I know you see a therapist. Do the two of you see one together?

• 1:05:27Speaker 01

  We should. We do not.

• 1:05:28Ramit Sethi?

  I think that would be amazing. This pizza is the first thing that I think you should bring up. This dynamic is co-created. It is not just one of them. And the good news is that even though they are in their 50s, they still can make a change. And the powerful thing they have here is a vision of a rich life that is inextricably together. We're gonna go to the numbers, and what we're gonna do is we're gonna look at them and see what changes, if any, you want to make specifically in your conscious spending plan to be able to live the rich life that you want. We have a gross monthly income. I'm actually gonna just increase this. Are you okay with that?

• 1:06:06Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 1:06:07Ramit Sethi?

  Let's fast forward.

• 1:06:08Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:06:08Ramit Sethi?

  So, how much should I put?

• 1:06:10Speaker 01

  11,670?

• 1:06:12Ramit Sethi?

  11,670.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  Would be my contribution.

• 1:06:15Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, 11,670.

• 1:06:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:16Ramit Sethi?

  Right there. 63% now, fixed costs.

• 1:06:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's much better.

• 1:06:21Ramit Sethi?

  Much better. So we went down from 68 to 63. Rent isn't gonna change. Utility's not gonna change. Insurance fine. Car payment at 770. Not changing, correct?

• 1:06:31Speaker 01

  Not for four years.

• 1:06:32Ramit Sethi?

  What car is it?

• 1:06:33Speaker 02

  Tacoma.

• 1:06:33Ramit Sethi?

  Toyota Tacoma?

• 1:06:34Speaker 02

  Toyota Tacoma.

• 1:06:35Ramit Sethi?

  It's a very reasonable car. How'd you get it at 2.99%?

• 1:06:38Speaker 01

  I have amazing credit.

• 1:06:41Speaker 02

  Yeah, because her credit was really nice.

• 1:06:44Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:44Speaker 02

  And we got like, at the end of the year, that's what I think they gave us.

• 1:06:51Ramit Sethi?

  Best time to buy a car?

• 1:06:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:06:52Ramit Sethi?

  They're desperate.

• 1:06:54Speaker 02

  Yeah, because they need to put in a market. They want, they want that they have in a stock. Gotta go.

• 1:07:00Ramit Sethi?

  I love it. This is what I did exactly. Walking in and watching the absolute desperation on the sales floor. And people are like, "Oh, Ramit, you're so mean to car salespeople." I'm not mean, but I'm gonna extract every last dollar when I am buying a car. So, amazing. December, mid-December to the end of the year. Beautiful time to buy. Great job. Okay, and then after that, that goes away as well.

• 1:07:27Speaker 01

  Well, he burns through vehicles. That's the thing, so...

• 1:07:31Ramit Sethi?

  You can't burn through a Toyota in five years.

• 1:07:33Speaker 01

  He does at least 3,000 miles a month.

• 1:07:35Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:07:37Speaker 01

  We'll see.

• 1:07:38Ramit Sethi?

  You're not gonna find me arguing against a Toyota on this show.

• 1:07:40Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:07:41Ramit Sethi?

  Debt payments at zero, well done. Groceries at 800, alright. Child support at 325, not changing?

• 1:07:48Speaker 02

  Not changing.

• 1:07:49Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:07:50Speaker 02

  Actually, it's about to change because she turns 18 years old.

• 1:07:55Ramit Sethi?

  Oh, so should we take it off?

• 1:07:57Speaker 02

  Not for now because that is like, the laws are changing in Brazil. I don't know what gonna happen.

• 1:08:03Ramit Sethi?

  Alright, let's leave it. Okay, look, cut to the chase. The miscellaneous here, if you wanted to, you could reduce that. It's a thousand dollars a month. People who do not track carefully at all, they incur 15% extra. But if you make it a point to track, you can usually cut this number down by 50 to 80%. So it just depends on if you want to do this or not.

• 1:08:29Speaker 01

  My sense is that it's covering things that we're aware of, but it's just for the simplification of the spreadsheet. Just put them all in that one category.

• 1:08:39Ramit Sethi?

  So keep it.

• 1:08:39Speaker 01

  I think so.

• 1:08:40Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, great, let's keep it then. Alright, investments, you're at 11%. Savings, including $1,000 a month for Brazil travel. Is that accurate?

• 1:08:53Speaker 01

  Well, and other vacations, yeah.

• 1:08:56Ramit Sethi?

  Alright, keeping it. And then, wow, look at this, down. You now have $1,832 a month in guilt-free spending. That's 15%. Right now, you're spending less than that, correct?

• 1:09:10Speaker 01

  Uh huh, yeah.

• 1:09:11Ramit Sethi?

  So, I mean, again, you have money to play with. You could take 500 bucks, 800 bucks a month, whatever the number is, and put it into investments, if you like. What do you think? Why is it getting so quiet in here?

• 1:09:24Speaker 01

  I think because we haven't experienced those numbers yet because they're happening in the future. So I'm like, where'd all that extra money come from? Yeah, so this is thinking ahead of like, okay, when we start making more money, where do we want that extra money to go?

• 1:09:37Ramit Sethi?

  This is, it's kind of hard, right?

• 1:09:39Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:09:40Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:09:40Speaker 01

  I just now actually clicked that in.

• 1:09:42Ramit Sethi?

  Yes, this is what, so, I love this. The difficulty you are having in...

• 1:09:49Ramit Sethi?

  Like, first of all, just believing that this is gonna happen. And then second, like, what do I do with this? That is so common because most of us never plan. Never. We're literally just reacting day by day. Oh, this expense, that expense, where's the money? And what we are doing here with the CSP is zooming out, even zooming forward in time, a few months when the new raise comes in. And now we're like, whoa, we have way more money than we thought. What are we supposed to do with? But notice that it's difficult for you to make a plan. It's also difficult for him to make a plan. So the two of you are actually in this more together than you realized. Making a plan is not natural to most people.

• 1:10:30Speaker 02

  No, definitely not.

• 1:10:31Ramit Sethi?

  So let's work the plan. Right now, according to this, you have $1,800 a month in guilt-free spending. I think you should spend some money guilt-free. Go out to nice dinners. And?

• 1:10:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think doing 500 a month in investments to help with retirement would be good.

• 1:10:47Ramit Sethi?

  All right, let's do it.

• 1:10:48Speaker 01

  For two people.

• 1:10:49Ramit Sethi?

  Let's put it in there. Wow, 15% of take-home. It's actually more than that because you got some pre-tax stuff. That's pretty good. That's $2,000 a month being invested post-tax. And another roughly $2,000 a month being invested pre-tax. That's $4,000 a month. What do you think?

• 1:11:09Speaker 01

  That's great. That's awesome.

• 1:11:12Ramit Sethi?

  It's pretty good.

• 1:11:13Speaker 01

  Close to $50,000 a year.

• 1:11:14Ramit Sethi?

  And now we have not factored in one other major driver here. Your income. What do you think it's gonna be? You have a sense?

• 1:11:23Speaker 02

  Yeah, so I can, after I got a new job and after the license, I can make like, my net is gonna be around eight.

• 1:11:32Ramit Sethi?

  Eight? You currently make 4,200 net.

• 1:11:36Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:36Ramit Sethi?

  You're gonna double that.

• 1:11:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:11:38Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Do you wanna see what happens? Did you do this in the CSP?

• 1:11:43Speaker 01

  No.

• 1:11:44Ramit Sethi?

  No?

• 1:11:46Ramit Sethi?

  Why not? The CSP, the whole point is to play around and project. People go, no, I didn't do the one thing that would be amazing.

• 1:11:53Speaker 01

  That would be fun.

• 1:11:55Ramit Sethi?

  Why not? Because do you believe that it's gonna happen?

• 1:11:57Speaker 02

  I think so. I think to be more realistic is like in the very beginning, it was gonna be about six.

• 1:12:04Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:12:04Speaker 02

  And then when I got stable, it's gonna be about eight.

• 1:12:09Ramit Sethi?

  All right, well, let's see what happens at both. I do love that. It is so funny. People love to worry about money. They love to agonize about money. But the one thing they rarely do is actually plan for when things go well. So sometimes I get to have fun like this and show you. Let's take a look. Six thousand instead of four thousand two hundred net. Watch the numbers. It dropped to fifty five percent. Net per month is now fourteen thousand three hundred eighty dollars. This isn't a fantasy. This is very likely to happen, right?

• 1:12:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:12:41Ramit Sethi?

  Very likely.

• 1:12:42Speaker 01

  Very likely.

• 1:12:43Ramit Sethi?

  Let's take a look at how much you now have left. You now have three thousand dollars a month to spend on guilt free spending. Just to bring this really down to earth. This is going to happen. It's a matter of time. If you had three thousand dollars a month guilt free spending, how would your lives change?

• 1:13:00Speaker 01

  I'd love to hear what you have to say about that.

• 1:13:04Speaker 02

  I think that it's kind of, I consider like a financial freedom.

• 1:13:08Ramit Sethi?

  Keep going.

• 1:13:08Speaker 02

  To be reasonable and responsible, but spending money, the things that I would like to do.

• 1:13:16Ramit Sethi?

  Like?

• 1:13:16Speaker 02

  Going out for a dinner, like a trip here and there. Something that I would like to buy and I can't now.

• 1:13:23Ramit Sethi?

  Chocolates.

• 1:13:24Speaker 02

  Chocolates and things like that, or some electronic that I would like to buy.

• 1:13:30Ramit Sethi?

  That's what you do. Love that. What I'm hearing is be reasonable, keep saving, keep investing, increase those numbers probably. But also spend a little bit on things I love. That's how, that's how money works. That's exactly what I would do. What do you think, Maria?

• 1:13:47Speaker 01

  I agree completely. Yeah.

• 1:13:49Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. What's interesting is having this conversation where we are plugging the numbers in. We are fast forwarding, even going as far as me showing you what happens when you make eight thousand net. Watch this. Wow. Fixed costs drop down to forty eight percent. You now have five thousand dollars a month. Okay, we ran some numbers and I would like to show you some of the possibilities of what might happen with your finances.

• 1:14:20Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 1:14:21Ramit Sethi?

  Andre, with your additional income, if you increase your retirement contributions by an additional $2,000 a month, by the time Maria, you are 61, the two of you will have $1.53 million. What does that mean to you?

• 1:14:43Speaker 02

  Wow.

• 1:14:46Speaker 02

  It means like, we did it.

• 1:14:47Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah?

• 1:14:48Speaker 02

  We bit it.

• 1:14:49Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Let me give you a little bit more color on what that number is. If you were to take 4% out every year, which is kind of a conservative estimate, that would mean $61,000 a year in safe withdrawal income from your investments, which is basically double our earlier projections. So if we include the pension at 50% and the new investment income that you could take out, starting at age 61 for Maria, that would mean that combined with social security, a small amount, you would have $135,000 per year.

• 1:15:36Ramit Sethi?

  What do you think?

• 1:15:37Speaker 02

  Can you go? And then I follow you?

• 1:15:40Speaker 01

  We would be comfortable. We would be, we could live a good life.

• 1:15:43Speaker 02

  It's gonna be a reasonable life. Reasonable.

• 1:15:48Ramit Sethi?

  Okay.

• 1:15:48Speaker 02

  Not like a rich, rich, rich life that we can like do fancy things, but it's safe.

• 1:15:55Ramit Sethi?

  Okay. Would you want more?

• 1:15:57Speaker 02

  For sure.

• 1:15:58Ramit Sethi?

  Both say yes, okay? This is how we think strategically. This is how we go from just working every day to building a plan. What are your options? Each of you give me one.

• 1:16:08Speaker 01

  He'll only be 59, so I imagine he's gonna wanna work longer.

• 1:16:12Ramit Sethi?

  Okay, so you could work longer. Work a few more years. That will allow you to invest even more. That will allow your income in retirement to go up.

• 1:16:20Speaker 02

  Save you more?

• 1:16:22Ramit Sethi?

  Yes. You could cut your expenses now and contribute more to retirement, absolutely.

• 1:16:28Speaker 02

  Downsizing?

• 1:16:29Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:29Speaker 02

  For example?

• 1:16:30Ramit Sethi?

  Great. You could move to a smaller place. You could cut down on XYZ expenses. For sure, you could do that. Okay, back to you Maria.

• 1:16:39Speaker 01

  Did we mention making more money, like increasing his income even more?

• 1:16:44Ramit Sethi?

  Could do that.

• 1:16:46Ramit Sethi?

  Cause right now I have $2,000 a month going towards retirement. Cause if, for example, if you're making an extra $4,000 a month, if you want to get really aggressive, you could take 3,500 of that and put it towards retirement and take the 500 and have a nice time. It's up to you. That's a variable. I agree.

• 1:17:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:17:09Ramit Sethi?

  Maria suggested to you that you could work longer.

• 1:17:16Ramit Sethi?

  What if you suggested the same thing to her? How about you?

• 1:17:19Speaker 01

  I was, I was, the next thing I was gonna say is I could work towards another promotion where I'm making more. I still wanna plan on

• 1:17:29Speaker 01

  stopping working full-time as soon as I can.

• 1:17:34Speaker 01

  But that, but I can work part-time for longer.

• 1:17:37Ramit Sethi?

  Nice.

• 1:17:38Speaker 01

  While you're still working. Yeah.

• 1:17:40Ramit Sethi?

  Lots of options. So there are so many things that I see. Again, this is what I'm trying to show you is how to think about a plan. Because your plan has lots of different opportunities for you. If, first of all, just to find out that you're gonna make over $130,000 in retirement. Retiring age 61 is amazing. Incredible. Second, the fact that you have lots of different levers to push in order to make more. You can work longer. You can work longer. You can get a promotion and go, cause I only conservatively used 50% of your salary. You can take it up to 60%. You can make more. You cut expenses. There are a lot of different things that you can do.

• 1:18:24Ramit Sethi?

  But all of it is up to you. You all just get to decide.

• 1:18:30Ramit Sethi?

  But the difference is it's not just up to chance. Which I think has been kind of an underlying belief for a long time. We just need to work harder and hope that it all works out.

• 1:18:43Ramit Sethi?

  I don't think so. There's a plan. Y'all get to choose.

• 1:18:46Speaker 01

  I like that there's, that there's lots of options and none of these have to involve Andre working till he's 80. So that means we would get more time together.

• 1:18:55Ramit Sethi?

  Definitely. That's the core lesson from this plan. This is a conversation where we're talking about what do we get to do? What do we get to do? And it's fun. It's like, let's stay longer in Brazil, or let's treat our family to something beautiful. All these things, right? In order to do that, two things have to happen. One, you gotta keep moving forward on the career that both of you have agreed to. But second, you actually have to probably leave some of those beliefs behind. Both of you. The beliefs that it needs to be yours versus mine, that we need to split everything 50/50. Why? You're married. Y'all have a future together.

• 1:19:41Ramit Sethi?

  As I say in Money for Couples, our future is together.

• 1:19:43Speaker 02

  It's not a competition.

• 1:19:46Speaker 02

  It's a team going to the same direction.

• 1:19:49Speaker 01

  We're more powerful together. Yeah. It's nice to think it's not that far in the future. It feels like I've been waiting for so long that I, like, I don't have my head out of the weeds. And it's like, oh, this could happen really soon.

• 1:20:02Speaker 02

  Actually, this advice that you're giving to us, it gives me hope.

• 1:20:10Ramit Sethi?

  Really?

• 1:20:10Speaker 02

  Yeah. I was like, I was like, okay, focus, work, work, work, work, make it happen. But I couldn't see the future. And I was like, when finally it will happen?

• 1:20:26Speaker 02

  And how far is that? I couldn't see that.

• 1:20:29Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:29Speaker 02

  And then it brings me, it brought me hope.

• 1:20:32Ramit Sethi?

  Yeah.

• 1:20:32Speaker 01

  I'm so glad.

• 1:20:34Ramit Sethi?

  I think this couple is adorable. I mean, between us starting to shoot, they were holding hands with each other. There's a lot of asking each other what they think. And I have a lot of confidence in this couple. Not only because financially, they're actually in a pretty impressive position, but because they are talking, they are communicating, they are listening. And I can see the wheels turning as they both realize they're going to have to change the way that they interact with money. You know, one of the most powerful things in life is to know that you have levers you can pull. That's because so much of life feels out of our control. So when I was asking them questions about what might happen, they were just stuck in this one-dimensional view

• 1:21:19Ramit Sethi?

  of their finances. But when we zoomed out and we showed them they have different options, they can work longer, they can save more, they can contribute more. There's so many ways they can do it. That was very empowering. And I want you to know that you have levers you can pull with your own finances as well. Let's check out their follow-ups.

• 1:21:37Speaker 03

  Hi there. Following up on our session with Remi, I would say our biggest surprise was seeing that our financial future as a couple wasn't as dire as I was concerned it might be. And the key takeaway was feeling how important it is to be a cohesive team, to move forward together. And now that Andre's more solid, I don't have to figure this out alone. And that feels really good. The change that we will be making is me stepping back and trusting that Andre wants to take more initiative with the money dates and also planning our first trip to Brazil.

• 1:22:19Speaker 02

  Hi, my biggest surprise is I had the opportunity to understand that even with 15 years old, if I manage the money and combine the finances with my wife, we can have a good result and reach our goals. My takeaway was the discipline and knowledge.

• 1:22:43Speaker 02

  is the key for the success. And the change that we decided to do together was combine our expenses, assets, bills in one account.

• 1:22:53Speaker 03

  Since we met, Andre and I have worked out most of the logistics of directing funds from our personal accounts to our shared accounts, which has allowed Andre to contribute 10% of his paychecks to his retirement account. And we've been more clear about how we're in this together. And together, we're doing fine financially. I see Andre really dedicating himself to reaching his career goals. So I know we'll have a stable future where he's not just in survival mode and we'll have more free time together. Speaking of, he did the work of purchasing our tickets to Brazil. It'll be his first time back in 12 years. So yeah, thank you for the intention that you brought to help us create our rich lives together.

• 1:23:38Speaker 02

  I would like to say that I'm feel more confident now. It helped me to feel more financially safe. So I check my credit every day to make sure that I need to take some actions. Check my budget weekly to make sure that it's in good shape. I talk to my wife about expenses. And I watch my business expenses to make sure that I'm not going to spend money and having a problem with my credit card. So this has been amazing. It's much better relationship with her. So thank you, Remi. You helped me a lot.

• 1:24:13Ramit Sethi?

  Listen up. If you want my help with your specific money questions, there are only two ways to get it. First, you can apply to be on this podcast at iwt.com/apply. Or second, you can join my money coaching program instantly at iwt.com/moneycoaching. In that program, you get access to live virtual events, monthly group coaching calls, live Q and A's, and an amazing, huge community of other people like you. Check it out at iwt.com/moneycoaching.