Why a Joint Account Can Be a Sign of Healthy Marriage

Barry speaks with Douglas and Heather Boneparth. Doug is the president of Bone Fide Wealth and Heather is the firm’s Director of Business and Legal Affairs and Chief Compliance Officer. They also discuss their new book Money Together. They discuss the challenges couples can face discussing their finances, why marriages with joint checking accounts tend to last well, and how to navigate money as a couple. See omnystudio.com/listener https://omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

  At Brookfield, we believe you can own wealth that's measured in generations. Because true ownership looks beyond today and beyond cycles. For 125 years, we've built long-term wealth through expertise, discipline, and a clear vision for the future. Providing investors access to alternative strategies built for what's next. Brookfield. Own what's next. Learn more at Brookfield.com/own. This is not an offer to sell or investment advice. Investing involves risks, including loss of capital. Past performance is not indicative nor a guarantee of future results. Please review performance and offering materials before investing.

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  This is the Bloomberg Tech Minute brought to you by ChatGPT. I'm Carol Muster. Getting hired at SpaceX requires exceptional ability and may include having Elon Musk review a candidate's resume. So writes Bloomberg Business Week's Lauren Grush. She reports that the company culture is defined by Musk and job candidates must understand that a commitment to SpaceX means adhering to this culture and exhibiting loyalty to Elon Musk. To get hired, candidates must demonstrate their achievements from past jobs and hands-on experience matters more to recruiters than advanced degrees, with the company looking for people with raw innate intelligence. A spokesperson for SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment on its recruiting and hiring practices.

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  But according to recruiters, advisors, and those who've interviewed for jobs there, it's the space exploration dream that draws people to the company and Musk invokes that dream regularly to remind workers why they're there. Prospective hires are told that the job will require stamina, including in job ads that candidates, quote, "must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed." One major perk for all that hard work? Employees' access to equity, either the right to buy shares or payment in the form of restricted stock units that vest over time. That's the Bloomberg Tech Minute brought to you by ChatGPT. Get started at ChatGPT.com.

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  Bloomberg Audio Studios, podcasts, radio, news. This is Masters in Business with Barry Ritholtz on Bloomberg Radio.

• 2:47Barry Ritholtz?

  This week on the podcast, I have an extra special guest, guests plural, Heather and Doug Bonaparte. I've known Doug for, I don't know, 10 years, maybe something like that, and Heather for a couple of years. When I went to their book party and dragged my brother along because he was in the neighborhood, we sat and had a conversation. And I'm like, eh, a book about couples' money, this is gonna be, you know, it is what it is. And as we were chatting, I'm like, son of a gun, this is a really interesting topic for the podcast. I have to have them on. And I thought this conversation was absolutely fascinating, not just about power dynamics

• 3:28Barry Ritholtz?

  within a relationship, but everything from budgeting, prenup agreements, inheritance, communication. Really, this was really fascinating. I found it super interesting, and I think you will also. With no further ado, my conversation with Heather and Doug Bonaparte. Thanks for having us. Thanks for having us, Barry. So I've been excited to have you come talk about this since your book party, because it is not the usual financial book. It is a lot of stories. You guys have interviewed hundreds of couples. But before we get to the book, I want to just dive a little bit into your backgrounds.

• 4:10Barry Ritholtz?

  Heather, you went to law school at my alma mater, Benjamin and Cardoza School of Law in New York City. I didn't know that. Yes, we both went there. Oh, I love that. Not at the same time. And Doug, you got your MBA from NYU Stern. Very different career paths. Tell us, what were the original plans?

• 4:28Speaker 05

  Well, the original plan for a, for an elder millennial like myself, I think, got thrown out the window during the great recession in 2008. So I was in law school when that happened. Yeah, and so I graduated in a very different labor environment than the one I entered school in. So my expectations were not met. I mean, that's an understatement. So, you know, I ended up in the world of commercial insurance, which shouldn't surprise you that that was not exactly what I went to school for.

• 4:56Speaker 06

  I thought you loved commercial insurance.

• 4:57Speaker 05

  You know what? I ended up having, you know, having a fine career in that for over 13 years. And I really liked learning a lot about risk, which we write a lot about in the book. But that was certainly not the path and the reason that I went there. And so much of my earliest money stories as a young adult were really wrapped up in the shame that came from graduating law school with six figures of student loan debt to a labor environment that was not welcoming to, to young lawyers.

• 5:25Barry Ritholtz?

  And the studies show you graduated into a recession, your lifetime earnings are actually lower than people who graduate into a boom, which is really interesting sort of thing. Doug, MBA from NYU Stern, what was the plan?

• 5:39Speaker 06

  Yeah. So by the time I made it to grad school, I was still focused on building my own wealth management firm and building a book of business. I grew up the son of a certified financial planner. So I've done nothing else in my professional.

• 5:50Barry Ritholtz?

  That was always the plan from start?

• 5:52Speaker 06

  Was always the plan. That's what I was doing during college undergraduate. Went to New York City as a love story. Wanted to be with Heather. And that was October, literally October 2008, I'm getting off a plane.

• 6:04Barry Ritholtz?

  Nothing was really going on.

• 6:05Speaker 06

  Nothing was happening. So watching it all.

• 6:08Speaker 05

  He moved to New York City with a duffel bag and a dream.

• 6:10Speaker 06

  Absolutely.

• 6:11Speaker 05

  Like, straight out of a movie.

• 6:12Speaker 06

  I shipped up three boxes and went to Sleepy's on Fifth to get a bed that day. Random roommate on Craigslist.

• 6:17Barry Ritholtz?

  My wife and I watched a whole bunch of rom coms over the holidays. And this is like.

• 6:24Speaker 06

  This is the setup for one of them.

• 6:25Barry Ritholtz?

  We're leaving out, you two meet as freshmen at the University of Florida. So you guys been together since freshman year, is that right?

• 6:33Speaker 06

  Yeah, since 19, 18, 19.

• 6:35Barry Ritholtz?

  Since eighteen nineteen?

• 6:36Speaker 06

  Since eighteen nineteen.

• 6:38Barry Ritholtz?

  So it's a hundred, a hundred and thirty years going on.

• 6:40Speaker 05

  You know, and, and, and I think we make this point too, then, and, and we're, we're transparent about this. We're not perfect. I mean, Doug and I, I would say, lived the life cycle of some marriages before even getting married. I mean, we had to figure out what it would look like to, to be adults and grow up together or apart. I mean, they were a couple of years there where we didn't know whether we had a future together. When I went to New York City, he moved home to work for his father.

• 7:06Barry Ritholtz?

  And where's home?

• 7:08Speaker 06

  Uh, South Florida, Boca Raton.

• 7:09Barry Ritholtz?

  Okay. Boca Raton, wow. So, so wait, so you meet when you're eighteen or nineteen years old, just about, when did you first start talking about money with each other? Was that way off in the future? Or was that an early conversation?

• 7:25Speaker 05

  It was not a conversation for a long time. I don't think we really started talking about money together until we came back together and said, like, it was really after law school that we took a hard look at, at each other and where we had been and where we were. And we said, we want to give this a real shot. We want to start our adult lives

• 7:42Speaker 06

  Our adult shot together.

• 7:43Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 7:43Speaker 06

  But we were observing money behaviors for our entire time dating throughout undergraduate. Probably me observing Heather more than Heather observing me. You're an only child, product of divorce. Her story is shared in detail in the book. So I was, as the son of a financial advisor and working in an advisory practice, probably getting a lot more observation points on Heather than her on me. But to Heather's point, when we ultimately had decisions, joint financial decisions to make, such as sharing rent, the typical stuff that couples come together for, um, I would say, because we had those observation points around each other, and obviously being together for so long before we needed

• 8:25Speaker 06

  to make decisions, it played in our favor and helped us navigate it. Although, I don't think you or I anticipated multiple six figures of graduate student loan debt as this big boulder we had to figure out how to move in our financial puzzle.

• 8:40Speaker 05

  And I don't think that he could have anticipated the weight that the debt would have on me. And, you know, it's so interesting. And, and we interviewed a couple for the book, and I would say the same for Doug, too. Like, there's people who view debt, especially, like, debt from higher education, as, you know, this is an investment in myself, it's an opportunity, it was a necessary evil to get where I need to go. That was not the message that I was telling myself. My debt was not some outside, you know, financial hurdle. My debt was me. It stood for everything that I wasn't.

• 9:12Barry Ritholtz?

  Really? I'm so shocked to hear. I mean, having read the book, and I know you, not as much as I know Doug, but I know you. I'm really kind of surprised at that. I can compartmentalize things like that. And just like, I remember when we were young and broke, and my wife used to sit there Sunday nights writing checks out. And she's like, "We don't have enough money to send all seven checks." I'm like, "That's easy. Send the check, don't sign it," to whichever one. And they'll bounce it back. And, you know, just remember which one you could do. You could rotate through seven, and by then, hopefully, we'll have a little more money. She was aghast at that. I could not possibly care less.

• 9:54Speaker 05

  It's so interesting. And there were elements of it that we were totally okay with. Like, I remember we first moved in together on the Upper West Side. We would go to Fairway, to the grocery store. And we had like our set of like, of very affordable meats that we could get every week. Every week, we ate the same things, and I packed us lunch every single day to go to work. And I was completely okay with that. But anytime there was a major financial decision we had to make, or anytime there was even like the smallest hiccup with my student loan debt repayment. I mean, I would, it would send me into these like deep emotional spirals. And they were not just about the money. It was like, "I am worthless. I'm never going to get anywhere in my career. I can't believe I did this to myself." Like, it really ran so deep.

• 10:39Speaker 05

  I was punishing myself.

• 10:40Barry Ritholtz?

  So there's a line in the book that I want to bring up here because it very much relates to what you're saying. Quote, "Most money conflicts aren't really about money." Explain. What are they actually about?

• 10:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, it's, so we have a whole first section of this book that touches on our beginnings, right? Who we are and our relationship with money starts long before you meet your partner. It is the meals you shared with your family, where you went on vacation. Maybe it's some trauma you experienced with the socioeconomic status, both from the side of being privileged, all the way to food insecurity or housing insecurity. Our cultures, our religion. It is almost endless, the amount of touchpoints in our past that shaped the way we feel about money, that we bring into our relationships, that we bring into our adulthood. So when we are having an emotional response to money, it's usually not the number on

• 11:36Speaker 06

  the screen, or the check you're writing, and the bill you can or cannot pay. It is something you're fixing it to, that you've experienced. And if you can get to the bottom of that, if you can create that relationship, you're going to be that much better off in evolving and having a better financial relationship. Because now you've got to bring all that to your partner, who also has all of that in their own unique way. And I think that right there, shows you how difficult this particular topic is around love and money.

• 12:09Barry Ritholtz?

  So when you guys sit down with a couple to talk about money and financial planning, what's the biggest mistake you see? What are most couples, what's the biggest error that comes up time and again?

• 12:22Speaker 05

  They're not communicating. They're not communicating either substantively about these issues, about they're not going deep enough to understand why they feel the way they feel.

• 12:31Speaker 06

  Very surface level.

• 12:32Speaker 05

  Very surface level, and they're getting caught in these surface level disagreements, right? It's these behaviors that happen over and over again, because we're not taking the time to dig deeper, to understand what's actually going on, like what Doug just said. Because that's how you build empathy for one another. You may not agree with the way your partner approaches it, but if you don't even understand why they feel the way they feel, you're never going to get past those squabbles over spending, or about what you're saving for and being misaligned on your goals, unless you're taking that extra step to really understand. Empathy builds that bridge in people.

• 13:06Barry Ritholtz?

  Communication, Doug, you you want to say something?

• 13:08Speaker 06

  Yeah, I like putting examples and stories behind that. You have someone who does the shopping in a household. They come home with an extra bag of rice, or we already have that item. The other partner gets very upset. We already have four chicken broths and you bought two more. Maybe, you know, is it that they spent the money on two more boxes of chicken broth? Or is it because there were some issues with food security growing up? And that is plaguing their identity around money. So they fight about the chicken broth.

• 13:36Speaker 05

  We did interview, yeah, we interviewed someone who came from, and it's, I think it's a great example. Came from extreme adverse childhood experiences. They experienced homelessness, abuse.

• 13:48Barry Ritholtz?

  Living in the car, I remember.

• 13:49Speaker 05

  Yeah, living in the car. And one of the ways that played out in his young adult life was always overstocking his fridge. And always overstocking his pantry, because you never wanted to feel the safe. You feel safety in being overconsumptive as an adult. So just one example of how that shows up.

• 14:08Barry Ritholtz?

  I'm not a prepper, but we had plenty of paper towels and toilet paper heading into the pandemic, which you write about. One of the things that shocked me in the book was the whole debate about joint accounts, separate accounts, hybrid. I mean, to me, this is partnership blasphemy. I had to ask my wife this morning. Hey, when did we set up our joint account? And she's like, don't you remember we were leaving for our honeymoon? We got married on a, um, on a Sunday afternoon. We got home, a Sunday, and knew we got home at like six, seven o'clock. We signed all the checks, gave it to our neighbor to deposit. That was our opening deposit on our joint account.

• 14:51Barry Ritholtz?

  Anybody I know that doesn't have a, everybody I know who's married disproportionately, um, has joint accounts if they're still married. And we went over the other day talking about this, uh, over all the couples we know that are divorced. How many of them did not have joint accounts? And a disproportionate number that we knew about, because she's usually friends with the wife. I'm friends with the husband.

• 15:17Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 15:17Barry Ritholtz?

  And, uh, sometimes we, uh, after divorce, you inherit one side or the other.

• 15:24Barry Ritholtz?

  I don't, I don't understand how you can get married and not pool your assets, pool the financial responsibility, or at least the discussions about what are we spending? How much is a vacation? What are we spending on shoes or watches or whatever? And I'm genuinely shocked that's a debate. What did you guys find?

• 15:46Speaker 05

  I would start with the caveat that I think that there are legitimate reasons why people are apprehensive to join and pool all of their finances together. If it's a second marriage, or if somebody came from maybe an abusive family, like, there could be legitimate reasons why.

• 16:00Speaker 06

  Or come from a lot of money.

• 16:01Speaker 05

  Or come from a lot of money, which, you know.

• 16:03Barry Ritholtz?

  Well, they may have a separate trust or a separate account, but at the very least, isn't there a household account? You're paying the mortgage and rent, you're paying for vacations, clothes, food.

• 16:13Speaker 06

  Oh, we've seen it, we've seen it all.

• 16:15Speaker 05

  We completely agree, completely agree with you on this, that having a joint account puts you in the best position to work as a team.

• 16:21Barry Ritholtz?

  You're partners, right?

• 16:22Speaker 05

  Communication, and it's also just the transparency, right? Of being able to see what comes in and out and save for joint goals together. I mean, we talk about this, there's, of course, there might be reasons why you don't. But there's no question that you're gonna, it's gonna work better.

• 16:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, all the data points to that your relationship will work out better in general and financially if you are taking a team approach to your finances. Imagine, you know, playing the same game on two separate fields. That's insane, right? What are you doing here? Um, but there is one thing, regardless of how you set it up, and I think in practice, we always encourage clients to do what works for them, but the thing you need to have is transparency. You wanna have your own individual account? You wanna have your own individual account? You wanna chop up the expenses? By the way, that scales horribly when you start bringing family into it.

• 17:14Speaker 05

  Having children.

• 17:15Speaker 06

  Yeah, what are you gonna do? Pay 25% of the formula because they make 25% of the household income for the baby? This is, this is crazy stuff. But if you have transparency and everyone has access to each other's bank accounts and you're doing these reviews and everyone knows where everything is, sure, I could see pathways for that working, but again.

• 17:34Barry Ritholtz?

  I don't, and we would all agree, this is not the most effective way to manage a household financial situation.

• 17:39Speaker 05

  And what we found in speaking to so many relationship coaches and couples therapists and psychologists is that this this money, this money topic actually translates to couples therapy as well. The idea of yours, mine and ours. No one is saying that you need to come together as some like homogenous blob and now you're just one person and all your assets are

• 18:00Barry Ritholtz?

  All your goals are the same, yeah.

• 18:02Speaker 05

  You are supposed to maintain your individuality and have individual goals, whatever that may mean, if that could mean individual financial goals. We take no issue with that. Yours, mine and ours. It's the same in couples work.

• 18:14Barry Ritholtz?

  Coming up, we continue our conversation with Heather and Doug Bonaparte, authors of the book Money Together, talking about writing a book as a team. I'm Barry Ritholtz, you're listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio.

• 18:44Speaker 00

  At Brookfield, we believe you can own wealth that's measured in generations because true ownership looks beyond today and beyond cycles. For 125 years, we've built long-term wealth through expertise, discipline and a clear vision for the future, providing investors access to alternative strategies built for what's next. Brookfield, own what's next. Learn more at Brookfield.com/own. This is not an offer to sell or investment advice. Investing involves risks, including loss of capital. Past performance is not indicative nor a guarantee of future results. Please review performance and offering materials before investing.

• 19:22Speaker 01

  This is the Bloomberg Tech Minute brought to you by ChatGPT. I'm Carol Muster. Getting hired at SpaceX requires exceptional ability and may include having Elon Musk review a candidate's resume. So writes Bloomberg Business Week's Lauren Grush. She reports that the company culture is defined by Musk and job candidates must understand that a commitment to SpaceX means adhering To this culture and exhibiting loyalty to Elon Musk. To get hired, candidates must demonstrate their achievements from past jobs. And hands on experience matters more to recruiters than advanced degrees. With the company looking for people with raw innate intelligence. A spokesperson for SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment on its recruiting and hiring practices.

• 20:06Speaker 01

  But according to recruiters, advisors, and those who've interviewed for jobs there. It's the space exploration dream that draws people to the company. And Musk invokes that dream regularly to remind workers why they're there. Prospective hires are told that the job will require stamina. Including in job ads that candidates quote, must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed. One major perk for all that hard work? Employees access to equity, either the right to buy shares or payment in the form of restricted stock units that vest over time. That's the Bloomberg Tech Minute brought to you by ChatGPT. Get started at ChatGPT.com.

• 20:48Barry Ritholtz?

  I'm Barry Ritholtz. You're listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio. My guests today are Heather and Doug Ponaparth. They are the authors of the book Money Together. How to Find Fairness in Your Relationship and Become an Unstoppable Financial Team. So communication and transparency, pretty straightforward and with a little hindsight, obvious. What was the biggest surprise? What did couples say to you where you kind of looked across each other and said, what the hell is that about? Like, what shocked you?

• 21:19Speaker 06

  Heather would always say, and I would agree with her. Often the things that shocked us were the things that were not being said. For example, you would ask a very forward question, or rather you would pick up. I would do a lot of this over Zoom. You'd pick up body language. You would see one partner zoning out or spacing out or not engaging. So those were all tells that there was something greater going on on that particular topic.

• 21:46Barry Ritholtz?

  What sort, what sort of topics engender that sort of response? Is it the full spectrum or were there things that were? Like, I could imagine credit card debt and reckless spending being an issue. That's obvious. What, what surprised you?

• 22:05Speaker 05

  You know where I saw this come up and I, and I, it always caused me to kind of tilt my head and want to know more. Was when you would see one spouse, it was typically a man, who was running his own business or an entrepreneur, and it really felt like it was his show. And, and the risks that he were to be taking, and this happened more than once, felt like they really did not consider the family as a whole. It felt very, very much like, well, this is my plan, and if it doesn't work, burn it all to the ground. And you could see his wife sitting next to him.

• 22:39Speaker 06

  Agghast.

• 22:40Speaker 05

  Like, agghast, but silently agghast. Like, you could see that it was like, she's like, you're right, like, this is, this is his ride, and, and we are all, I would say, along with it, but being held hostage by it.

• 22:52Speaker 06

  Wow.

• 22:53Speaker 05

  And that, that was where we saw the, the silence and the body language play in. And I've said to Doug, like, we interviewed a couple folks who, like, had been in bankruptcy for business ideas of theirs, and, and that's fine, but, like, just the, just the,

• 23:07Speaker 05

  the lack of accountability to the rest, to his partner and to his children, and just saying, well, and I'll try again, and I'll, and I'll keep trying again. Like, what kind of roller coaster are you bringing your family on if she doesn't feel like she has a voice to even be part of this discussion that we're having?

• 23:21Speaker 06

  Seeing someone without agency is not a good thing to look at. It doesn't look good. And you can see it. If you're asking the right questions, or you're a financial professional, and you're looking at that situation, yeah, it's, it's pretty ugly.

• 23:36Barry Ritholtz?

  And I have to ask about this, since we were talking earlier about dividing some household work and, and responsibility. How did you do this work together? How did each of you contribute? You work together, is writing together a different experience?

• 23:53Speaker 05

  It's a journey. It was a journey, Barry.

• 23:56Speaker 06

  This was something.

• 23:57Speaker 05

  So, I, writing is a huge part of my life. I was a journalism major in undergrad. I, there was a very long time of my life where I had only hoped to get back to a moment like this, where I could use my words and my storytelling ability and my, and my question asking ability, which was honed three years as a lawyer, to write something like this, to find a way to help people through my writing. We always kind of knew that I would be taking the lead when it came to writing

• 24:22Barry Ritholtz?

  Yeah.

• 24:22Speaker 05

  the words on the page of this book, but Douglas and I sat together on 90% of these interviews, of the couples, many of the experts, and the way that we would do this is we'd have like a big picture meeting, we would talk through different chapters, eventually they all fell into the five sections of the book.

• 24:39Barry Ritholtz?

  Uh huh.

• 24:39Speaker 05

  And then I would draft it and I would put it to him and I would say, does this one make sense from a practitioner's standpoint? Like, are we covering enough of the bases from a practitioner's standpoint? And two, from a male lens? We wanted to write a book, I think one of the greatest challenges in writing this book was not us working together, we've worked together in many different ways over the course of our careers, but how do we write something that resonates with all genders?

• 25:07Barry Ritholtz?

  So I know Doug's voice, which is kind of snarky and funny, and I got the sense that you did most of the writing in this, at least in terms of, I don't want to say feminine, but it's a gentle, sensitive the right word?

• 25:24Speaker 05

  Empathetic.

• 25:25Barry Ritholtz?

  Empathetic tone. Yeah. Which I don't get from Doug's tweets.

• 25:29Speaker 05

  No.

• 25:29Barry Ritholtz?

  Um, but here's the more interesting question. When you guys went through the whole process of drafting and editing and writing the book, did it change at all how you guys talked about money with each other, how you thought about it? Yes. Like, reading the book might affect some people, how did writing the book affect you two as a married couple?

• 25:50Speaker 05

  Oh my goodness.

• 25:51Barry Ritholtz?

  In profound ways.

• 25:52Speaker 05

  In profound ways, in so many ways. I mean, I will tell you that some of the couples we interviewed completely changed my perspective on what it means to have enough.

• 26:03Barry Ritholtz?

  Yeah, really?

• 26:04Speaker 05

  And that, it was, these were perspective shifting relationships that we've made with some of these folks.

• 26:12Barry Ritholtz?

  Give us an example.

• 26:13Speaker 05

  Um, well, on one hand, we interviewed many couples who objectively, on paper, live a very different socioeconomic life than we do. They live in a lower cost of living area, they make it work on a lot less, and they have love, they have family.

• 26:29Barry Ritholtz?

  A roof over their head.

• 26:29Speaker 05

  They have faith, they have a roof over their head, and they have enough. We asked every couple that we interviewed, do you have enough? And the answers said so much, and they gave us such perspective. So like, there are couples that on paper... Are living a very different life than we are, you know, objectively of less privilege. And they just were so happy and content and proud of where they were. And I think sometimes when you're an ambitious guy, Doug and I are both-

• 26:56Speaker 06

  We'll flip it around, right? We interviewed a lot of people who are highly successful, entrepreneurial, building their second, maybe third business. And we asked that same question, don't have enough. It was never enough-

• 27:09Speaker 05

  Brought them to tears.

• 27:10Barry Ritholtz?

  Really?

• 27:11Speaker 06

  To tears. When they realized, like, hey, we just reflected on all this amazing stuff you did. You know, you're telling us you don't have enough. And then kind of that moment, that pause where they realize like, oh my God, what is my enough? Where they look at, I mean, it ran deep sometimes, the family they didn't start, the second child they maybe didn't have, the time they didn't get with their spouse to enjoy something in their life.

• 27:33Speaker 05

  I think that maybe one of the greatest things we learned in it, and it made its way into the book, not only through those conversations, but we had conversations with folks who were dealing with life-threatening sickness or terminal illness. And we realized that time is the greatest currency that we have.

• 27:50Barry Ritholtz?

  Of course.

• 27:51Speaker 05

  And I know we can say it, but to really believe it and feel it. And I think that we embody that now in our life.

• 27:57Barry Ritholtz?

  Let me float a theory at you about enough. I think if you're in middle class, or upper middle class, or lower middle class, the range is pretty tight. Like, upper middle class is a lawyer and accountant making a couple hundred grand. Bottom of that group is somebody in civil service making 40, 50, 60 grand. That's the range. Once you're in the top 10, 1, .1%, it's from a million a year to billions. And no matter how much money you have, there's always a tier above it that seems to be, gee, you know, if I just made another million dollars a year, I could fly private.

• 28:38Speaker 05

  From succession. Didn't Tom say that in Succession?

• 28:42Speaker 06

  Yeah, Tom says it to Greg, oh, 5 million. You know, yes, you know, the worst kind of rich there is. Not enough to retire, you know, too much to do nothing. You know, whatever.

• 28:53Barry Ritholtz?

  Too much to do nothing, not enough to retire.

• 28:56Speaker 06

  Yeah, you know, I love that show. But going back to what this process did for us in our relationship, you have thought, and I will chime in and say, for me personally and selfishly, the amount of work that needed to be put into myself in order to, because this, this book is a product of major life decisions Heather and I made three and a half years ago to leave 13 years of being a corporate attorney, which was the very reason, that stability, the benefits, the salary, that was the stability I needed to grow and be the entrepreneur.

• 29:38Barry Ritholtz?

  And I have, I have to interrupt you. I have the exact same experience. My wife was a teacher for 35 years. The firm launched in 2013. I didn't feel like it was a risk. But at the very least, hey, healthcare is covered.

• 29:52Speaker 06

  Yep.

• 29:52Barry Ritholtz?

  All these things you don't have to worry about. And I had the conversation with my wife, are you okay? First of all, changing careers from a lawyer to finance, but then, hey, I know I'm making a decent salary, but I want to go do this on my own.

• 30:06Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 30:06Barry Ritholtz?

  I think there's an opportunity here. And she was like, go for it.

• 30:09Speaker 06

  Not to spoil the book, but I got very comfortable after having reached certain goals in building the firm that I probably would have kept feeling comfortable and having Heather continue being an attorney at her job forever.

• 30:27Speaker 05

  Burying the lead here.

• 30:29Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 30:29Speaker 05

  That in that moment in time was also the time that we had two very small children. Covid hit, Covid hit when we had an 11 month old and a four year old.

• 30:38Barry Ritholtz?

  Wow. So you stuck at home. That's tough.

• 30:40Speaker 05

  Yep. I'm working a corporate job, corporate legal job in a GC's office of a Fortune 100 company from home, taking care of our two children and also moonlighting as Doug's business associate for the firm, which I've basically helped to build from the ground up.

• 30:54Speaker 06

  Yeah, there's never been a day that I haven't done that. She wasn't my co-pilot, helping me make critical decisions.

• 30:58Barry Ritholtz?

  But she's working three jobs here.

• 30:59Speaker 05

  I was working three jobs and I was being stretched so thin that I felt like I had completely lost myself in trying to stay above water. And there was a moment where we said, you know, We formed this whole cruise ship of our life around servicing the risk that you were taking in starting this firm, but when is it about me again?

• 31:20Barry Ritholtz?

  So let's, let's talk a little bit about

• 31:22Speaker 06

  Sure.

• 31:23Barry Ritholtz?

  the stories from your marriage. And I have to ask, it's all narrative, no spreadsheets. Why did you decide to tell this story in a narrative format?

• 31:35Speaker 05

  There's been too, there's enough books on budgeting and spreadsheets.

• 31:38Barry Ritholtz?

  Tons.

• 31:39Speaker 05

  Enough people have tried to do it. And I, and also

• 31:41Barry Ritholtz?

  Also, also a perfect budget's not going to solve much for the dynamics of your relationship with someone.

• 31:48Speaker 05

  That's right. There's a reason that folks have not read this book before. And it's because doing this stuff is emotional work. It's personal work. It requires understanding stories and hearing things you may not want to hear. That goes way, way, way deeper than the numbers. So we wanted to do something that we felt like would really uncover the things that weren't being said. Like, there were so many invisible moments that I, I hope we made visible in this book.

• 32:16Barry Ritholtz?

  So you bring a lot of therapists and psychologists and, and couples counselors into the book. The question that was running through my head as I was going through that is, hey, at what point should any couple get professional help? Be it working with a financial planner, or going to couples therapy or, or a shrink to help them work out their emotional issues?

• 32:41Speaker 06

  Yeah. So, you know, probably self-serving statement here. I'm all along on people using professionals to help them find the time and the space and the agency to talk about things that need to be discussed. But, you know, there's never a bad time. I think if you can first recognize that you're going to need help finding the space, finding the time, right? Self-starting is, for me personally, one of the hardest things that I struggle with. So I'm always open to finding people who can help me do that. But I think practically speaking, if you are both wanting to improve and not being able to get past step one, like every conversation you're having, hey, let's, let's sit down and have our, you know,

• 33:24Speaker 06

  money date, our conversation. And every time you've attempted to do that has resulted in, you know, a fight.

• 33:31Speaker 05

  Or are you avoiding it for two months afterwards because you didn't get anywhere?

• 33:34Speaker 06

  Or you're not developing, so what we want you to do is develop a practice around talking about money with your partner. To Heather's point, it's been eight months, you were supposed to talk three months after that first one. You're not creating practice and discipline and consistency. If this is happening, you do over and over again, and the frustration is there, time to start finding other solutions. Maybe outsourcing that to a professional is the way to go. That could be a financial professional, that could be a therapist, that could be a marriage counselor.

• 33:58Speaker 05

  Or a financial therapist. I mean, there are some folks that are carrying such deeply rooted shame around money into their relationship. That's not something your partner can unwind by themselves.

• 34:10Speaker 06

  It's not their job to fix it either.

• 34:11Barry Ritholtz?

  You talk about money stories that people bring into a marriage or a relationship. What are some of the ones that, you know, really resonated with you?

• 34:21Speaker 05

  The stories that we heard?

• 34:22Barry Ritholtz?

  Yeah.

• 34:23Speaker 05

  You know, I think stories that were steeped in people's culture, the cultural messages that they brought into their relationship. There was a woman from Taiwan who, who received a higher education here in the US. And she brought into her marriage these scripts about what she, what she could,

• 34:49Speaker 05

  what she felt like she deserved and what she was allowed to strive for in her life.

• 34:53Barry Ritholtz?

  Is this the woman who had to go home to settle her father's estate?

• 34:55Speaker 05

  No, no, different woman. We heard a little bit about her story in the, in the culture chapter of the book. But I just remembered her talking to us about how she was always taught not to live a small life, but to live like a demure life, to not showcase her wealth, to not strive for too much wealth. Perfect example, she graduated with a grad degree from Columbia and she was waiting tables at the restaurant down the street from her, her dorm, and she was eating the leftovers off people's plates. She felt like that was what she deserved. Like, these are stories that she carried into her relationship and trying to find a way to like marry those messages with, one, somebody else's, but two, to like build a life that reflects both of your values when.

• 35:40Speaker 05

  You're kind of questioning what place those values even have in your life, right? So somebody, one of the financial therapists that we spoke to, my friend Asia Evans, I remember she said, "People who carry that into their adult relationship have to be asked, "Are the circumstances in which you were taught those things actually even present in your life today? And if you're answering that question, no, well, there's stuff that needs to change."

• 36:05Barry Ritholtz?

  So, so how do you have couples that have never really had this money conversation? How do you have them take the first step? Where should they be beginning?

• 36:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, so we are very long on, we call them money dates, you can call them whatever you like, but you have to have a forum in which you first are sitting down to discuss things relating to your financial life. And we talk about the best practices of having to do this, right? You don't start with the numbers typically, that's a great way to get someone to flee the scene right then and there.

• 36:34Speaker 05

  And that's why at the end of each section in the book, we offer a list of like eight to 10 conversation starters. You don't need to do them all at once, you don't even need to do them all ever. But the point being, conversation starters and how we start to learn a little bit more about what's bothering the other person, what they're carrying into the relationship.

• 36:50Speaker 06

  Sure, and what you do here, instead of focusing on numbers and talking about, here's another one you don't want to do, talk about what went wrong this quarter, or what's not working, flip both those things around. What did work? What are the wins you should be celebrating? We want to build momentum here. Talk about the goals that you both share. I know if I say, "Hey, can we talk about that vacation we want to go on?" That chair's pulling right up, we're sitting down, and I got a nice way to then talk about the budget and get into the numbers, right? We almost do this categorically backwards. And what we need to do is understand the rulebook for creating those consistent conversations that we need to be having regularly. Little things, time and place matter, right?

• 37:31Speaker 06

  We call it family rush hour, from the time the kids come home from school to just shy of going to bed. This is probably the absolute worst time to conduct anything having to do with our lives, let alone our financial lives.

• 37:43Speaker 05

  You loved that. That was your favorite time to talk about money.

• 37:45Barry Ritholtz?

  I would run out of my three o'clock appointment when we were marooned in our house. Heather, guess what?

• 37:50Speaker 06

  And it's just like kids throwing food all over the place. One kid, she's like, what do you got for me, Doug? This is a great time to talk about this. It was the worst.

• 37:58Barry Ritholtz?

  Spaghetti hanging out.

• 37:59Speaker 06

  She would return the favor. We're exhausted. It's 10:30 at night. She wants to get into all the serious stuff. We're gassed. I'm like, I can't, I can't even keep my eyes open, let alone follow along. So time and place matter. What do you like to do together? Can you carve that out? Put it on the calendar, set the reminder, pre-schedule those meetings, do stuff you like to do. So I say, can't wait to go do that. And you're not canceling that. These are little things that when you build a practice around them, go a very long way. Because if you're doing this quarterly, and we suggest you do speak comprehensive, or not the data, you're going to talk day to day about money, week to week about money. We're talking comprehensive view of your financial life on a quarterly basis. That's not a lot of cracks at that during the year, right? You're getting four.

• 38:43Speaker 06

  Great, we now can divide by four. So over multiple years, right? Two years, eight, 12, account by four here. That's not a lot, but it's going to take a very long time. These are long games. Do you go to the gym one time after not working out and find yourself in the best shape of your life? No, you will be sore. Go to the gym four times a week for six months. I can almost guarantee you will be in the best shape of your life. Do these quarterly meetings over three years. You should have this figured out and you should be getting there with your partner.

• 39:12Barry Ritholtz?

  I love this quote from one of the chapter titles. Being prepared is better than trying to predict what will happen. Is that preparation? Is that planning? Is this all part of the same concept of getting people to talk, having them focus on this?

• 39:26Speaker 05

  Absolutely. I, I, I think that one of the hardest things for people to do is accept that we don't know what's going to happen, right? And I spent years dealing in risk for, for work. And I think it's just really hard to accept that you could do everything right. And it thinks still may not pan out the way that you wanted them to. But when we embrace that, we embrace that there's 10 different ways to get to the goal you want, not just the one that you guys locked in on five years ago and you hoped this was the one way we would get there. Because disappointment looks for space closest to home, right? So if you're not making it there, you're not, those expectations aren't being met. We can't take those five steps to get to that one financial goal. And then you're taking it out on one another. You're beginning to resent one another.

• 40:09Speaker 05

  But when you embrace this idea that life is fickle, things are unexpected. We don't know what's going to be required of us next year. We don't know whose job is going to be stable two years from now, even though it feels great today. Everything's gravy today. We don't know two years from now. When you embrace that idea of flexibility, fluidity and being nimble in your relationship, you're able to work better together as a team and pick up slack for one another when you need each other.

• 40:35Speaker 06

  Do you want to know, you know, people say, oh, enjoy the journey, you know? You'll get to the end goal, but enjoy the journey. The people that are capable of actually enjoying whatever journey they're on are the ones that have put themselves in flexible enough of a situation that when life inevitably hits you across the face, and I guarantee you it will, it does it every single time. Those who are more proactive in their response versus those who are reacting and running around as if this is the worst thing that ever happened, those are the people that are enjoying their journey. Hey, we knew something, you know, something wild was going to take place. We have a plan for that. Let's go change it up.

• 41:11Speaker 05

  Well, great, great example from our own lives. We always knew that someday I had hoped to work at the firm and that we were going to do our business together. But the time in which that came about was because my corporate job very, pretty suddenly wanted us back in the office four days a week. It kind of came out of the blue. We weren't prepared for it from a childcare standpoint. And instead of, you know, we could have solved for it. We could have solved for it. I could have gotten a babysitter. I could have gone back. We looked at each other and we said, is this the moment to accelerate this goal that we've always had? Do we take this as a sign from the universe? It was a little, it was a little backwards from what we were planning. We thought we had a couple more years of runway before we would take this leap together. But we took it and, and you know what?

• 41:53Speaker 05

  Like it was unexpected, but it worked out for now. You know, everything's for now because we don't know what two years from now will bring.

• 42:01Barry Ritholtz?

  Really, really interesting. I mentioned there's a lot of narrative, a lot of storytelling in the book, but there was a data point jumped right out of the book and grabbed me. 15% or more of marriages today involve a prenuptial agreement. 20, 25 years ago, that was less than 5%.

• 42:20Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah.

• 42:20Barry Ritholtz?

  That's a shocking change. What's behind it? Why has this changed so much?

• 42:25Speaker 05

  I think that there's lots of ways to obtain a prenup now. I mean, there's even companies now that are offering more of a prefab.

• 42:33Barry Ritholtz?

  There are platforms for this.

• 42:34Speaker 05

  Right, there are platforms.

• 42:35Barry Ritholtz?

  There was always Bloomberg forms for a prenup, but.

• 42:38Speaker 06

  Yeah, but now we've made it, you know, we've made it frictionless now.

• 42:42Speaker 05

  You took the word out of my mouth. This has become a frictionless process for a lot of folks.

• 42:46Barry Ritholtz?

  A prenup app, you just work your way through it and that's it.

• 42:49Speaker 05

  Yes, there's several, but I think also the way that millennials feel about prenups is that they're starting, I think also, this is anecdotal, I don't have any data to back this up, but I think a lot of us are products of divorce. I think you have, you have a generation, right, you have a generation aging into adulthood and to marriages where we've seen our parents.

• 43:07Speaker 06

  Half of millennials have watched their parents, you know, go through divorce and they're saying, well, I don't want to witness or be a part of what I just saw them go through.

• 43:16Speaker 05

  And I, and I think so much now, people understand that a prenup is not setting your marriage up to fail. It is outlining expectations for certain situations happening. It's just a contract, right? It can also outline certain expectations for during the course of your marriage. It doesn't have to just be limited to the dissolution of your marriage. And I think that our generation in particular is very, is very keen on opportunities to have our expectations managed, even with the people that we love the most.

• 43:47Barry Ritholtz?

  So there's a quote in the book that I was kinda never really thought about, but you made me think about it, quote, "When you marry into money, the privilege might come with strings attached."

• 43:59Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah.

• 44:00Barry Ritholtz?

  Explain that.

• 44:01Speaker 06

  Absolutely. So, speaking of expectations here, so when you're the married in, the person who is marrying in a family of, you know, substance or wealth, right, you're probably going to get to experience a number of things that are a product of the family that you've married into. It could be vacations, it could be, here's your house or a down payment on your house. And you would think, well, that's really wonderful. Go give your in-laws, you know, a hug and a kiss for that.

• 44:28Speaker 05

  And it is really wonderful.

• 44:29Speaker 06

  It is, yes.

• 44:30Speaker 05

  It is.

• 44:30Speaker 06

  It is, but.

• 44:31Barry Ritholtz?

  I hear a but coming.

• 44:32Speaker 06

  But in many cases, this sets up expectation. Now that this family has for this person, it could be how they raise their kids. It can be how you act and behave on vacations, how you spend. The idea that maybe your financial household isn't even your financial household. It's there. So where's your agency? Where's your independence? It sets up a lot of what ifs, right? What if this doesn't work out? Where does that leave me? What if I might lose my husband due to really sad state of affairs? Then what? Am I going to be supported? So setting expectations around this is critical to the marriage.

• 45:15Speaker 06

  And otherwise, they're going to, through the entirety of their marriage, find themselves asking, what if, and will I be okay? It's not a great way to go into a long-term committed relationship.

• 45:29Speaker 05

  And I think some of this is really difficult to talk about because you're not just. Yes, you can set certain expectations in terms of the mechanics of some of these things. But like, some of this is, you have to observe. How is your spouse with his parents? How much have they financially supported him or her over the years? How, what, what level of control have you observed them trying to exert over that adult child of theirs in exchange for the wealth and generosity that they're giving your family? We've seen it. We've all seen it, I, I, I think, you know.

• 46:03Barry Ritholtz?

  You wrote, write in the book about, and I have it all caps, the family, sort of a succession-like wealthy family that wants to control everything, control the relationship. They're holding all the, all the cash and they're manipulating everybody to get what they want, not just outside in the world of whatever acquisitions are going on, but within the family dynamics itself. How do you deal with that?

• 46:29Speaker 06

  It's not easy. It is not easy. And we keep coming back to the obvious answer of communication transparency. It does require the person you are marrying into, the family member that you're marrying, you have to find a way to become transparent and open and honest about your relationship with them. This is not the time to just sit there quiet and let this happen to you. You have to be able to advocate for yourself in some way because it is your life and it's going to be a life that you share together with someone. These are probably uncomfortable questions and conversations. But what's more uncomfortable is when you don't address them and something happens five, 10 years down the road, or you have two, three kids.

• 47:12Speaker 06

  You cannot put the toothpaste back in the tube at this point.

• 47:15Speaker 05

  And it's not to say that you should not accept the generosity, right? This is a wonderful thing and there's many benevolent parents that just want to see their child and their child's spouse and their family succeed. And they want to offer that generosity during the course of their life. It can be a beautiful thing, but having the conversations upfront about what this means. Do they want to have, if they want to offer to help you buy a house, do they believe that they're entitled to help you look for that house? Are there stipulations around where that house needs to be? Does it need to be in the town in which your, the, which the adult child grew up in? Are there certain expectations that they want to help pay for the, the grandchild's college? Are there stipulations there as well? But I think that one way to also, you know, kind of pose and gauge

• 48:00Speaker 05

  how, how enmeshed the adult child is with his parents is saying, "I would like for us to have our own financial advisor. I would like for us to grow our independent wealth as a family." How do you feel about that? Say that to your spouse.

• 48:14Barry Ritholtz?

  How do these big wealth gaps, and it doesn't have to be succession, it could just be reasonable wealth gaps.

• 48:22Barry Ritholtz?

  How do they distort the power dynamics inside the relationship? Forget the relationship of the couple to the in-laws or the parents. Within couples, how does that dynamic play out? And what should be done about these sort of gaps?

• 48:40Speaker 05

  Well, I think that privilege cuts both ways. And that's what we like to, we write about privilege and the many angles of it so that you can understand. Also, like, your socioeconomic conditions could have been great, but your perception of them is what matters. We can't say, oh, you grew up with more money than me, so you had it easier. You had a silver spoon in your mouth and your life was gravy and I had a terrible life. And so, none of your feelings around it with your family matter. That's something we dispel as well, right? Your story is your story. You don't know if your partner, who, yes, may have objectively grown up with greater privilege than you, you don't know if they're carrying deep-rooted expectations, like the long shadow of the family name. It's, that is, that is a heavy load to bear for some people.

• 49:24Speaker 05

  So, I think there are ways, like, different ways this shows up in a relationship. For another example would be like, how that privilege plays out in terms of your values? You know, what are you trying to accomplish together as a couple? That may not be something that if you didn't grow, if you didn't grow up with privilege, maybe your goals and expectations are, I don't want to say more limited, but maybe they're more proximate. Like, I want to build a life that just involves not being strapped for cash, us being able to afford a roof over our heads. Then you have a partner who grew up with such privilege, they didn't even have to consider their salary when they chose their career, because they knew that there would always be kind of this existential safety net available to them.

• 50:07Speaker 05

  How do you marry those two, those two belief systems together to kind of find a life that, that, that... Can I identify the meaning for both of you?

• 50:16Speaker 06

  I would also add, in these situations, it's easier to assume that these conversations will go down a road of upsetting the family, or something bad or negative. And I just want for a minute to throw in the possibility of it working out well, that a family would appreciate the fact that their child and the person they're marrying are forward-thinking enough to make sure they're okay, that everyone is comfortable. You know, the family isn't always, oh, the evil rich family.

• 50:47Speaker 05

  Right.

• 50:47Speaker 06

  A lot of times, in fact, I would argue most of the times, this is all out of love. This is all out of love. And if you don't approach and you don't ask, you'll never know. We just assumed you were very happy with all this wonderful stuff we've been doing for you and Ryan. We didn't know it made you feel uncomfortable every time you came on the cruise ship. Why didn't you say anything?

• 51:09Barry Ritholtz?

  Coming up, we continue our conversation with Heather and Doug Bonaparte, authors of the book Money Together, talking about writing a book as a team. I'm Barry Ritholtz. You're listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio.

• 51:36Speaker 01

  This is the Bloomberg Tech Minute, brought to you by ChatGPT. I'm Carol Muster. Getting hired at SpaceX requires exceptional ability and may include having Elon Musk review a candidate's resume. So writes Bloomberg Businessweek's Lauren Grush. She reports that the company culture is defined by Musk, and job candidates must understand that a commitment to SpaceX means adhering to this culture and exhibiting loyalty to Elon Musk. To get hired, candidates must demonstrate their achievements from past jobs, and hands-on experience matters more to recruiters than advanced degrees, with the company looking for people with raw, innate intelligence. A spokesperson for SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment on its recruiting and hiring practices, but according to recruiters,

• 52:21Speaker 01

  advisors, and those who've interviewed for jobs there, it's the space exploration dream that draws people to the company. And Musk invokes that dream regularly to remind workers why they're there. Prospective hires are told that the job will require stamina, including in job ads that candidates, quote, "must be willing to work extended hours and weekends as needed." One major perk for all that hard work? Employees' access to equity, either the right to buy shares or payment in the form of restricted stock units that vest over time. That's the Bloomberg Tech Minute, brought to you by ChatGPT. Get started at ChatGPT.com.

• 53:01Barry Ritholtz?

  I'm Barry Ritholtz. You're listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio. My guests today are Heather and Doug Poeneporth. They are the authors of the book Money Together: How to Find Fairness in Your Relationship and Become an Unstoppable Financial Team. Last, last prenup question. I mean, it's a given that the person who's marrying into the wealthy family should have their own legal counsel. Is it fair for them to ask the wealthy family to pay the bill for the lawyer?

• 53:36Speaker 05

  Oh, my goodness. I mean, I, if you, off the cuff, I think it's fair.

• 53:41Barry Ritholtz?

  Okay.

• 53:42Speaker 05

  I think it's fair.

• 53:43Speaker 06

  What's the worst that could happen?

• 53:45Speaker 05

  What's the worst that can happen in asking? I think, I think you prove a very good point because, again, like, when we're talking about negotiating power and power dynamics.

• 53:53Barry Ritholtz?

  Disparity can be giant.

• 53:54Speaker 05

  You know, there's, there's the lawyers who handle, you know, Beyonce and Jay-Z's prenup, and then there's Joe Schmo down the street and whatever. I, I, I don't think that it would be unreasonable to ask that if we're entering into this and that this is something that impacts not just me and my spouse, but also your family as well, that maybe you'd be willing to subsidize a piece of this.

• 54:12Speaker 06

  Come on, heck of a way to broach the conversation by saying, hey, we've been doing all this work here. Pay the legal bill versus, I want you to know, we're going to do some work here so everyone's comfortable. We're taking care of ourselves, that you're comfortable. By the way, would you pay the bill?

• 54:27Barry Ritholtz?

  Very, very different way you're phrasing it. So let's talk a little bit about estate planning. Quote, "People go on a journey when they inherit money." I never really thought of that, but explain, what's the inheriting money journey?

• 54:42Speaker 06

  Well, first and foremost, we love stats, right? Like, most inheritances are five-figure numbers.

• 54:49Barry Ritholtz?

  Ten grand?

• 54:49Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 54:50Barry Ritholtz?

  The numbers you have, the median was like $45,000, but it's totally skewed

• 54:56Speaker 06

  Oh, yeah.

• 54:56Barry Ritholtz?

  by the very wealthy inheritances.

• 54:59Speaker 06

  The mega, yeah, the big, big ones.

• 54:59Barry Ritholtz?

  And the average person's inheritance is little or nothing.

• 55:02Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. So then you have to ask yourself, so what's really being inherited here? What's really being transferred from, you know, the decedent to the children or the heirs? And typically, it's obviously memories and the experiences, both good and bad, that end up in the possession of the child of the heir.

• 55:27Speaker 05

  There's a quote, and it's slipping my mind, but it's something like, "Inheritances are the numeric symbolic delivery of all you have left from someone." And you wish you had more time, you wish you had more memories, you wish you had more moments, and one more chance for one more conversation. And so for people, that $12,000 as a bonus from your job is very different from $12,000 from your mother.

• 55:55Barry Ritholtz?

  So let's talk about what I think is the most interesting trend I've seen in estate planning over the past few decades, which is

• 56:04Speaker 06

  Giving gifts, yeah, during lifetime.

• 56:06Barry Ritholtz?

  Doing this while you're alive, so you can enjoy it with each other.

• 56:09Speaker 06

  Yeah, I love it, I love it. That was a big Wall Street Journal article a handful of years ago. I absolutely love it. I see it show up in practice quite a bit. Probably one of the nicer, you know, boomer mechanics in estate planning that I've seen happen over the last few years. Yes, you should. You should get to create these experiences while you're alive, you know, and everybody can enjoy that. You see your hard-working millennial children dealing with the high cost of home prices, and they can't get ahead or settle down with their family, and you want to step in and do some gifting so they can afford it? I think it's probably one of the most beautiful things out there. Wish that happened to us here. It didn't happen. All right, if you know, guys, if you know anyone, let us know.

• 56:49Speaker 06

  But you're seeing this trend emerge and I'm seeing it show up in practices. It's really a beautiful thing. And also perhaps a sad, I don't know the particulars of these situations, but good planning is good planning. You know, as a financial advisor, where the rubber meets the road and all of the topics that we cover in comprehensive planning is estate planning is the one. It's the biggest piece of all of it at the end of the day. And what you're doing here, it's about legacy, right? So now you have children and you have their parents creating these experiences, knowing they helped. Let me back up for a second, just to give you an idea of how I truly feel around the other way that this typically happens. It is, we're not going to talk to our children about money.

• 57:32Speaker 06

  It's taboo, you know, you'll figure it out. Or the worst one, we don't want to burden them today with this. And it's so ironic.

• 57:41Speaker 05

  That gets really on.

• 57:42Speaker 06

  I really do. It's so ironic because what you're going to do is the exact opposite of what it is you just said. You don't clue them into the estate planning. Now you're dead and not only did you leave a burden to them.

• 57:55Barry Ritholtz?

  The whole estate process, whether you're a beneficiary or the executor.

• 57:59Speaker 06

  By the way.

• 58:00Barry Ritholtz?

  It's a lot of work.

• 58:00Speaker 06

  Even the best plans are a ton of work. You see this all the time, like, oh man, my dad did a really good job playing this out. Five weeks of, you know, it's insane.

• 58:11Barry Ritholtz?

  While you're grieving.

• 58:12Speaker 06

  Yeah, while you're grieving. All of this is happening here and it's just such a joke to take the line that I don't want to burden my kids and then literally burden them, you know, to no end and you're dead. You don't even get to see, you know, thanks, mom, thanks dad, that was great. And it's a disaster. It's a disaster. So that's how I truly feel about it. That's why these gifts during the lifetime, I think, are just absolutely wonderful.

• 58:40Speaker 05

  But it just goes to show that it works both ways, right? Like we just spoke about the family where wealth, two things can be true. Wealth can be used to control people and it can be used to show that you love someone and to create legacy and deepen the love that you have for your family. Two things can be true.

• 58:57Barry Ritholtz?

  So before I get to my favorite questions I ask all my guests, I just have to ask, what are the red, other red flags we haven't gotten to? What do you think is the biggest issue that we just haven't spoken about over the past hour?

• 59:13Speaker 05

  Holding mistakes over your partner's head. A lot of people do a lot of foolish stuff early in their adult life in your twenties. You make some mistakes, you carry a little bit of consumer debt.

• 59:24Barry Ritholtz?

  In your forties and your fifties.

• 59:26Speaker 05

  But you know, whatever, like you.

• 59:27Barry Ritholtz?

  It happens.

• 59:28Speaker 05

  You YOLO'd it in your twenties and you had ten grand in credit card debt. Then you met your spouse, they helped you pay it off. And now, all they ever talk about is how you're not good with money.

• 59:38Barry Ritholtz?

  They remind them of it.

• 59:39Speaker 05

  Because I helped you pay off your debt. So I guess my point is not getting over things that are just missteps. They're not mistakes in your life. Holding them over your spouse's head because what that does is it erodes their confidence and it pulls them away from being a meaningful participant in their financial lives.

• 59:55Barry Ritholtz?

  Really, really interesting. All right, let's jump into our favorite questions we ask all our guests, starting with, and this is like our speed round, we only have about five, six minutes.

• 1:00:04Speaker 05

  Love it.

• 1:00:04Barry Ritholtz?

  Who were your mentors who helped shape your career?

• 1:00:07Speaker 06

  Give you a hot take, you know, Heather and I maybe still agree with me on this one. We really had a lack of mentors in the beginning of our career. We found ourselves really having to figure a lot out for ourselves. And this isn't a flex or look how, yeah, look, look what a big boy I am.

• 1:00:21Speaker 05

  We're in the market for mentors. So if anybody listening would like to be our individual mentors, we would love that.

• 1:00:26Speaker 06

  For me, they became, they came mid-career into where we are today. Friends of ours, for sure. But early on, it was, it was lacking. I do view it as something where, you know, it built me up, it built some character here. But if I'm being honest, I really wish I had someone there to sit younger professional Doug down regularly and say, how are we doing?

• 1:00:45Barry Ritholtz?

  Could save some time and effort.

• 1:00:47Speaker 05

  I had one woman, one female attorney, who was always one grade level above me and has been a driving force in my legal career and even brought me back to a job in a soft landing after a tough situation. So I had one mentor in my career.

• 1:01:04Barry Ritholtz?

  So you can give her a name if you want to give a shout out.

• 1:01:06Speaker 05

  Oh, her name's Julia.

• 1:01:07Barry Ritholtz?

  Hey, Julia. Let's talk about books. What are some of your favorites? What are you reading currently?

• 1:01:13Speaker 05

  You know, it's really hard. I have to say, I love to read, but this past year, when you're writing a book and promoing a book, it kills you.

• 1:01:19Barry Ritholtz?

  Other than the research you're doing, there's no pleasure reading.

• 1:01:22Speaker 05

  Every book I read was a personal finance book, although I love cultural commentary because, again, like journalist brain. I read What Happened to Millennials by Charlie Wells, which I really enjoyed as somebody who.

• 1:01:33Speaker 06

  He's a bloomer guy.

• 1:01:35Speaker 05

  Oh, it's, it's, he, he basically tells the story of, of where we were post nine 11 through the eyes to present day, through four different folks, like, and followed them on their journey. It was just, I thought it was a brilliant commentary on, on where we were and where we find ourselves. And it was, it found a way to like, frame it all very positively on, on our future. And I just, I, I loved it. But I'm actually looking forward to reading more nonfiction or more fiction this year. And should I say it? I'm about to read the heated rivalry books. Rachel reads, Rachel reads books. If you know, you know.

• 1:02:09Barry Ritholtz?

  I hear heated rivalry, I think of Doris Kearns Goodman. I don't.

• 1:02:13Speaker 05

  Well, if you know, if you know, you know.

• 1:02:17Speaker 06

  Um, last book I read, I have to go fiction. I have to go sci fi. I have to escape the world of business and finance. I, you know, we, we write these books and, and I know all our friends who write them as well, but I like to escape. Like, if I'm gonna read, I'm gonna enjoy.

• 1:02:31Barry Ritholtz?

  You're talking to a sci fi guy, hit me.

• 1:02:32Speaker 06

  Um, it was long overdue. I read Snow Crash was the last one I read, which if, you know, was the first.

• 1:02:37Barry Ritholtz?

  Did you read Neuromancer?

• 1:02:38Speaker 06

  No, no, not yet, but.

• 1:02:40Barry Ritholtz?

  It's a little geekier.

• 1:02:41Speaker 06

  It's okay. I'm, I'm here for it. But, uh, you know, your first, uh, you know, wow, calling the metaverse before the metaverse, that, that was really cool. Um, finally got it.

• 1:02:49Barry Ritholtz?

  I'm trying to remember which book, the future is here, it's just not evenly distributed. Is that Snow Crash?

• 1:02:55Speaker 06

  Um, I don't think so.

• 1:02:56Barry Ritholtz?

  Okay.

• 1:02:57Speaker 06

  No, but that was great, uh, for a video game guy who always dreamed of a world that was, you know, alt reality. That was super cool.

• 1:03:04Barry Ritholtz?

  Have you read, I'm assuming you read Ready Player One, right?

• 1:03:07Speaker 06

  No, I actually haven't even watched the movie.

• 1:03:10Barry Ritholtz?

  So before you watch the movie.

• 1:03:11Speaker 06

  Because I wanted to read Snow Crash before it.

• 1:03:14Barry Ritholtz?

  So I was flying on a plane and sat down with that book and we landed and I was done.

• 1:03:19Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'm told it's amazing. That's what's next.

• 1:03:23Barry Ritholtz?

  That's your assignment for today.

• 1:03:24Speaker 06

  Well, that'll be my next flight call.

• 1:03:26Barry Ritholtz?

  Yeah, absolutely. Thirty seconds. What are you streaming or listening to these days?

• 1:03:30Speaker 05

  Landman, awesome show.

• 1:03:32Barry Ritholtz?

  Next on our queue.

• 1:03:33Speaker 05

  You have to watch it. The Pit, of course.

• 1:03:35Speaker 06

  Pit's massive.

• 1:03:36Barry Ritholtz?

  A little too grisly.

• 1:03:36Speaker 05

  Oh, fair enough.

• 1:03:37Barry Ritholtz?

  My wife was like, watching like this.

• 1:03:39Speaker 06

  Fallout.

• 1:03:40Speaker 05

  We watch a lot of sci-fi.

• 1:03:41Barry Ritholtz?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:41Speaker 05

  Fallout is our, is our.

• 1:03:43Barry Ritholtz?

  Have you guys seen Three Body Problems? The book was.

• 1:03:45Speaker 06

  No, I caught it. We didn't go there. We love a lot of post-apocalyptic type stuff.

• 1:03:51Speaker 05

  We watch a lot of apocalyptic.

• 1:03:52Speaker 06

  Silo, Fallout, those types of shows really, really take us there.

• 1:03:56Barry Ritholtz?

  Try, try Three Body Problems. I think it's Apple TV. I don't remember, but it was really, it was really worth seeing. Final two questions. What sort of advice would you give to a recent college grad interested in a career in, fill in the blank? Journalism, legal practice, financial planning?

• 1:04:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, if we're talking personal finance and financial planning, you're playing a long game here. Give yourself like, if you're going to figure out how to get this career going, figure out how to survive for like five, seven plus years. It's just going to take that kind of time to actually mature as a person in your life. So find out how to do that. Play long game. This isn't a one, two, three year learning curve. It's like a five to seven year learning curve.

• 1:04:37Speaker 05

  Keep a list of your wins. Keep a, keep a running list of everything good you do and all the value that you bring to your organization. Carry that with you because being your own self-advocate is more important now than ever.

• 1:04:50Barry Ritholtz?

  And I, I have heard women say that's especially important for them.

• 1:04:54Speaker 05

  Critical.

• 1:04:54Barry Ritholtz?

  Versus men blunder into things full of self, undeserved self-confidence and women often don't apply. Let me mansplain sexism to you. Women also often, I've had a lot of women tell me they haven't applied for things because they think, "I don't check every box. Out of 10, I have 8." And a dude is like, "I have 3, but how hard can it be?"

• 1:05:17Speaker 05

  I can't tell you how many men I know have fallen up in their careers. Well, women have told themselves that they aren't qualified for a position. So yes, keeping a running list and finding a way to really articulate, package that, and show your value.

• 1:05:30Barry Ritholtz?

  And our final question, what do you know about the world of financial planning, investing, couples, money therapy today? Might have been useful, you know, back in 20 years ago when you guys were really first ramping up.

• 1:05:45Speaker 05

  Understanding that time and money are inextricably linked concepts and how we spend our time is a currency. When we talk, so much of this work that we did is about how we allow for a couple equity at home to create greater, sorry, greater equity for women out in the world in particular. And the link between time and money is critical.

• 1:06:06Barry Ritholtz?

  I love that.

• 1:06:07Speaker 06

  Fair doesn't mean equal.

• 1:06:09Barry Ritholtz?

  Okay.

• 1:06:10Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 1:06:11Barry Ritholtz?

  Okay. Solid.

• 1:06:13Speaker 06

  50/50, probably not a practical approach to everything you do in life. Find out what your split is. There are many couples out there who are happy with 80/20, 70/30. It works for them. What doesn't work is when you're not talking about it to find out what fairness is in your relationship. That has helped us out a great deal in the last few years.

• 1:06:29Barry Ritholtz?

  Guys, this has been absolutely fascinating. We have been speaking with Heather and Douglas Bonaparte, authors of the book Money Together. If you enjoy this conversation, well, check out any of the 600 we've done over the past 12 years. You can find those at iTunes, Spotify, Bloomberg, YouTube, wherever you get your favorite podcasts. I would be remiss if I didn't thank the crack staff that helps put these conversations together each week. Alexis Noriega is my video producer. Sean Russo is my researcher. Anna Luke is my podcast producer. I'm Barry Ritholtz. You've been listening to Masters in Business on Bloomberg Radio.

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