If You’re Between 32 and 48, Don’t Screw This Up

⁠⁠⁠⁠Start a free trial, and get 50% off your first year of Monarch Core Tier with code MONEYGUY at https://bit.ly/monarch-moneyguy If you’re in your 30s or 40s, this could be one of the most important wealth-building periods of your life. Brian and Bo explain why ages 32–48 create a powerful “wealth window” where rising income, compound growth, retirement investing, and smart financial planning can work together. You’ll learn why reaching your first $100,000 invested matters, how much to save for retirement, why a 20–25% savings rate can be so powerful, and how lifestyle inflation, credit card debt, housing costs, and missed 401(k) opportunities can derail your progress. Whether you’re investing at 30, building wealth at 40, or wondering if you’re on track for retirement, this episode gives you a framework for making the most of these critical years. Jump start your journey with our FREE financial resources⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Reach your goals faster with our products⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Take the relationship to the next level: become a client⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Subscribe on YouTube for early access and go beyond the podcast⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Connect with us on social media for more content⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Bring confidence to your wealth building with simplified strategies from The Money Guy. Learn how to apply financial tactics that go beyond common sense and help you reach your money goals faster. Make your assets do the heavy lifting so you can quit worrying and start living a more fulfilled life. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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

• 0:00Brian Preston?

  You might think your twenties are the most important decade for building wealth, but in your early thirties, a wealth window opens up that's uniquely powerful. And we've never really talked about it before.

• 0:11Speaker 01

  Brian, I am so excited because today we're going to show you for the first time ever, why between the ages of 32 and 48, it may be the highest ROI window of your entire financial life. And we're going to show you how to take full advantage of it.

• 0:27Brian Preston?

  I'm Brian, he's Bo, and this is the Money Guy Show where two financial advisors help you maximize your money in the messy middle. And with that, let's jump right in.

• 0:43Speaker 01

  All right, Brian, to set the stage, let's start by reviewing the Wealth Multiplier. And you know, if you've listened to this for any amount of time, the Wealth Multiplier is this idea that our money can multiply through time. And we talk all the time about how a 20-year-old that's willing to sacrifice and defer $1 today can watch that $1 turn into $88 by the time that they retire.

• 1:06Brian Preston?

  Yeah, this is one of those things. Look, if you're in your twenties watching this, God bless you, you have the world by its tail. But I just know, if we're all being honest, and I look at the stats, most 20-somethings are broke as a joke, and they're just not saving and investing. So I wanted to create a show that allowed us to really focus in on the people that are between ages 32 to 48, because this is a magical period. We're going to show you the analytics on why if you miss this window, your future self is just going to be so disappointed because there's so much just true opportunity. And Bo, we actually have some numbers on this. Now, look, for a 20-year-old, it's 88 times over. That's

• 1:49Brian Preston?

  seven times what a 35-year-old has. But I don't think we can sleep on the fact that even for somebody in their mid-30s, that their multiplier is still close to 13. If you take it out to somebody who's in their 50s, we have to round it up and be generous to get it to three. So there's already a three times better for somebody in their 30s versus somebody in their 50s. You can quickly see, time is your enemy and your friend. It's time to harness that for your future good.

• 2:19Speaker 01

  And so while we see that the Wealth Multiplier, it does deteriorate through time, there's still a window right there that even if you're not in your twenties, your dollars can be so, so, so powerful. We call this the Wealth Window. Brian, you've already alluded to this. This is that stage of life, that area under the curve when you are between the ages of 32 years old and 48 years old. And what we're going to show you today is why, when it comes to wealth building, when it comes to building for the future, in our opinion, this is the highest ROI window in your entire financial life. And you do not want to miss out on it.

• 2:56Brian Preston?

  The whole purpose of this show is to get you motivated. If I don't get people to take action on this show, I have failed as a creator. Because that's the educator, the heart that I want people to know, is that you've got to do something. And I want to give you some context so we can go ahead and frame this conversation, Bo. I want to show the average contribution rate by generation. And if you look at this, look at Gen Z, this is the youngsters, 7.5%. Now, look, we've already said, when you're in your twenties, you're broke as a joke. Millennials, 9%. Gen Xers, that's my generation, 10.5%. Baby Boomers, 12.2%. Why do you think, all of a sudden, as people get older, their savings rate all of a sudden starts going up? They catch retirement religion because I think

• 3:41Brian Preston?

  that they realize, holy cow, I am actually going to need money in the future to save. But here, let me go ahead and tell you some sad facts. We all play around with the artificial intelligence. I was playing around with mine, and I said, hey, for the median US American, what do they have at 65 in retirement assets? And it said it's just under $200,000. I said, okay, let's go a little further. For the, when do you cross $100,000 as an American? And what I found was, is according to my artificial agent that was giving me, pulling data out there, it said in the late 40s is when most Americans cross into $100,000.

• 4:24Speaker 01

  So the median American doesn't actually hit $100,000 in liquid assets until they're in their late 40s.

• 4:30Brian Preston?

  And I just told you that the Wealth Window that we're going to be talking about today is 32 to 48. Because let me go ahead and tell you the cold, harsh reality is also, when do most millionaires cross into seven-figure status? It's 48 years of age. Do you see the compare and contrast difference? You have one path where the average American, the typical American, doesn't even cross into six figures, $100,000 until they're like 48 years of age. Meanwhile, the financial mutant that actually started doing something while they were in their 30s, because we know that's when the typical person figures this out, is in their early 30s, they will have a million dollars. And it's all because of this Wealth Window that we're going to be covering today.

• 5:11Speaker 01

  So let's talk about why this window is so unique. What makes it so powerful when it comes to wealth building? Well, the very obvious one is that in this window, your earnings are likely rising. For most of us, when we're fresh out of college, fresh out of high school, anywhere between the ages of 18 and 23 years old, we're likely not earning a huge salary. We're likely broke as a joke for most people. But as we move through our twenties and as we move through our thirties, we actually begin to see our income increase. From age 22 to age 32, this is according to the US Census Bureau, median earnings rise about 71%. And we talk about all the time on this show, the bigger your

• 5:53Speaker 01

  shovel is, the more margin you can create, and the more margin you create, the more money you can deploy. So if you just think about this in common sense, mathematical terms, if you're a 22-year-old and you're earning the median average annual salary of $35,000, and you are saving 25%, you're saving about $8,750 a year, which is great. It's nothing to scoff at. But by the time you get to 32, if we see that 71% increase in earnings, now the median earnings for a 32-year-old is $60,000. 25% of that number is $15,000 a year. That's almost double what you were able to save at 22. And then by

• 6:34Speaker 01

  the time you get to the end of this decade, that your income starts to rise, at 42, the median 42-year-old makes $70,000. 25% of that is about $17,500. As you progress through the Wealth Window, you're saving more and more and more if you're doing it the right way. Because now you have the earnings that will allow you to behave that way.

• 6:57Brian Preston?

  Well, the earnings rising gave you the margin to actually put the money to work. Look, without a doubt, I want you saving, investing in your twenties. But I get it. I mean, you're coming out of school, making, you know, $30,000 to $40,000 a year. Life is going to consume the majority of that. So that's why it's not until you've got a little traction under you, and the reality, and welcome to Realville, this is when you actually have an opportunity to make the choice, that I'm going to start saving something for the future. As in this window, from 32 to 48, we're going to change your life. And the second part of this is, is because this window is unique, is because you have still decades, literally like three decades of compounding growth. This is a magical thing.

• 7:42Brian Preston?

  And this is what I think is the Money Guy difference. We're actually going to share with you how valuable this window is. And I'm hoping this will change your life because every one of you who's watching this, I want you to do something. Because this is so important, you just have to do it. And with that, Bo, show them how powerful those early dollars are when they're putting things to work.

• 8:05Speaker 01

  Yeah, if you think about it, if you're a 32-year-old in the workforce, you have 33 years for your dollars to compound, if you want to plan on retirement, a normal retirement age of 65. So those dollars in your 30s, while they may not be the same 88 times over dollars as a 20-year-old, they are still, they still have huge potential or a huge portion of your final portfolio. Look at this. Let's assume that you invest $340 per month, every month, from the age 30 all the way out to the age 65. And let's assume that you can earn a 9% annual life rate of return. So you never increase or change your savings rate. Well, in each one of those decades, in your 30s, in your 40s,

• 8:47Speaker 01

  in your 50s, you save just a hair under $41,000. Exact same amount of money saved. But when you look at the age 65 values, those dollars that you saved in your 30s, that $41,000 you put away, is now worth $619,000. That $41,000 you saved in your 40s is now worth over a quarter of a million dollars. That $41,000 you saved in your 50s is worth over $100,000. If you think about the percentage of your entire retirement portfolio,

• 9:23Speaker 01

  The money that you saved in your 30s, in that decade, accounted for 62% of your entire portfolio, of your entire retirement portfolio in one decade. Now, if we squeeze it down and we think about where the wealth window actually exists, age 32 to age 48, the work that you do and the money that you put away and the savings that you're able to accumulate there can represent almost two thirds, 66% of your entire financial independence investment portfolio. This is an unbelievably important time for to be putting those dollars to work.

• 10:02Brian Preston?

  I want to put, because earlier I had the percentage of asset or of income going into 401ks. And I want you to kind of lay those numbers next to what we have here. Because we have the Gen Xers and then the Baby Boomers. They both were doing much higher rates than what the Gen Z was doing. But look at that, even if you're, even if you're loading it up in your 50s and 60s, if it's only for the, somebody who's in their 50s, that's only 10% of your total retirement is impacted. Because you just don't have enough time for compound and growth. Same thing for the people in the 60s. In your 40s, that is your future self. That's 25% of your retirement is your 40s. It's the 30s that is 62%.

• 10:45Brian Preston?

  Or as Bo has already shared, 32 to 48, this wealth window that we're talking about today, the do something action window is 66% of your retirement. Guys, I don't know of anybody else out there that's just out there literally shaking you to wake up and realize this is the time. Make something happen. Small decisions can have huge, huge results if you can respect the wealth window.

• 11:11Speaker 01

  Well, I think it's so, I think there's so much press out there and so much curriculum around start early, start early, start early. Do it in your 20s, do it in your 20s, do it in your 20s. And we want to give you that voice of reason saying, yes, if you can start in your 20s, if you can do it early, absolutely. But if you live in this window, if you are in the wealth window, you still have time and opportunity on your side. We already said it's because likely your earnings are rising. You still have decades of compound growth. But this is also most likely the age and stage where your career flexibility is at its highest point. And there are a few ways you can think about this. Likely by the age of 32, you're not just in a job anymore. You're likely in your career.

• 11:53Speaker 01

  And now, as you begin thinking about how you're going to progress from age 32 to 48, how are you moving forward in your career? Are you climbing the corporate ladder? Are you taking on more responsibility? You're moving into managerial roles? If you are, that's likely going to allow you to pursue promotions, pay raises, bonuses, or maybe you've decided that the field or vocation you're in right now is not the direction that you want to be going. You actually have a resume now that's likely highly attractive. So now you can go find a higher paying job or potentially even switch careers altogether.

• 12:26Brian Preston?

  Well, I love, and look, Bo, Bo's good. Because we've found some stats that said for people who start a business that actually has employees.

• 12:34Speaker 01

  Entrepreneurship, another great example.

• 12:35Brian Preston?

  That's good. The typical age, a lot of people think that's a young man's game. No, the reality, it's around somebody who's in 42 years of age, clearly in that 32 to 48 window. But I'm here to tell you, I want to give you the glass half full, which is unusual for me because I'm an optimist. I usually try to rose color everything I share with you.

• 12:52Speaker 01

  You're in the glass half empty. You normally do the glass half full.

• 12:55Brian Preston?

  I'm very optimistic on everything. But I want to tell you, I'm in my 50s myself. And I've almost on a weekly basis now, I have conversations with clients that are unfortunately finding out that the reason I'm focusing on this wealth window between 32 to 48 is that you are in control in this phase. 32 to 48, you're, you kind of have all the things that Bo said, the flexibility and so forth. But once you cross into that, that 50s and beyond, it kind of changes. And I hate to be that, that gloomy about it. This is why I'm trying to, like I said, motivate the younger people to think about what it looks like when you get to be my age. It's because 1.7 million Americans that are 55 plus are displaced from their jobs.

• 13:38Speaker 01

  From 2023 to 2025.

• 13:39Brian Preston?

  And it's even worse, and this is part of these conversations. 22% of workers who are 50 plus say they feel like they were pushed out of their job because of their age. So if you're somebody who's watching this and you're in your 30s or 40s and you just assume you have, next decade I can catch up. You know, it's okay that I'm focusing on the messy middle and the kids and the family, but I'm not saving for the future because I'll have time in the future. It is not guaranteed. I'm here to tell you, this window of 32 to 48 will change your life if you take it serious. But you need the context to know that pushing it off until next year or next decade is not ensured that it's going to be successful.

• 14:23Speaker 01

  So Brian, as we were talking about in pre-show, like, okay, this window, we've looked at the math. We know that it's so valuable. So if someone's in this window, what are the priorities we could give them? What are the things that we could say, hey, these are the goals? These are the milestones? These are the things that you need to do in this window? And the first one, we went back and forth on this, but we really do think in this window, this is probably the very most important thing you can do from a financial and wealth building standpoint. And it's get to your first $100,000 of invested assets as fast as you can. Try to get to that tipping point. Try to get to that critical mass as quickly as humanly possible.

• 15:02Brian Preston?

  I'm going to try to channel my biggest inner Shia LaBeouf moment is you just, you just do it. Do it. Because I just, I want something, because look, I'm telling you guys, hopefully, I mean, the educator, the, the heart that I have is that when I showed this to the writing team, I was like, something, it just troubles me when I find out how many people are delaying. And when I see what the median household has at retirement, I was like, somebody needs to really wake up America and say, just go do something. And you ought to try to get to your first $100,000 like your life depend upon it. Because I'm here to tell you, it will depend upon this.

• 15:40Speaker 01

  Brian, if I told you that you had the next week off, we have it covered here, where are you going?

• 15:45Brian Preston?

  You know the answer, that's easy. I'm headed to Florida.

• 15:47Speaker 01

  I knew it. The man cannot stay away from theme parks and $50 churros.

• 15:52Brian Preston?

  Look, this is just part of my money story. Everybody's got something they're willing to spend on. Mine just happens to be roller coasters and ice cream bars shaped like a mouse.

• 16:01Speaker 01

  And you know what? I actually love that. It's okay to spend money on things that you enjoy when you know that you can afford it.

• 16:08Brian Preston?

  And that's where Monarch comes in. I love how Monarch puts my accounts, my investments and spending and savings all in one place. So I can plan for things that matter to me.

• 16:17Speaker 01

  Yeah, things like waiting in line for an hour to sit in a teacup.

• 16:24Brian Preston?

  I can also ask Monarch's AI assistant anything about my finances. Like, hey, how much did I spend on food at theme parks last month?

• 16:31Speaker 01

  Or did this vacation cost me more than four years of college?

• 16:35Brian Preston?

  I kind of feel like you're being mean at this point. With Monarch, you can easily track your savings goals. So you can enjoy your money without derailing your whole financial plan.

• 16:44Speaker 01

  Or in Brian's case, enjoy your money while literally riding something that goes off the rails.

• 16:50Brian Preston?

  Why are you being so mean? They've got all the lap bars, I'll be safe.

• 16:54Speaker 01

  Write your own money story with Monarch. Use code MONEYGUY at monarch.com to get your first year of Monarch Core half off at just $50.

• 17:01Brian Preston?

  That's 50% off your first year at monarch.com with code MONEYGUY.

• 17:05Speaker 01

  If you're someone who's investing $833 a month, that's $10,000 of year with an 8% annual rate of interest, it'll take you about seven and a half years to build up $100,000. And we already know that most Americans are not doing that. We just said that most Americans don't actually hit $100,000 in liquid investment assets, still well into their 40s. But if you can start saving just that $10,000 a year, it'll take you about seven and a half years to get to that first $100,000. What's amazing is that the bigger the numbers get, the bigger the numbers get, the more exciting the picture gets, the more exciting. Do you recognize in that same amount of time,

• 17:48Speaker 01

  again, if you're just saving $10,000 a year, what took you seven and a half years at the beginning of your journey to go from zero to $100,000? If you can continue that on, by the time that you get to $500,000 in the same period of time, seven and a half years, you can go from $500,000 to $1 million without saving more, without increasing your savings rate, without going out there and picking individual stocks and figuring out how to beat the market just by staying consistent. If you can let your dollars do the heavy lifting for you and you get to that critical mass of $100,000, that snowball gets bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger to now where?

• 18:32Speaker 01

  What used to take you seven and a half years now, you can do five times over in that same amount of time.

• 18:39Brian Preston?

  Well, it goes slow, slow, fast, faster, faster. And then, you know, that's why when people tell me that $1 million is not anything anymore, I'm like, guys, you realize as soon as you cross 100,000, you're on the path to get to that first million. And then if you don't think a million's enough, you want to get to 3 million? Wait until you see how fast, because look at what the spread is between 900,000 to $1 million. It's like a year.

• 19:04Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 19:04Brian Preston?

  Because the, remember, the thing that took you close to eight years, now this thing is happening on a yearly basis. The law of numbers, the bigger the number, the bigger this all goes. That's the whole power of compounding growth. And that's why a lot of you are just like me. You might have big intentions, big desires, but you just don't know what to do with your next dollar. We've solved it for you guys. And I know we talk about it a lot, so much so that you're like, all y'all talk about is, guys, it's the better way to do money. If you need to know what to do with your next dollar, I would ask you, please follow the food. We've got not only the free download at moneyguy.com/resources, but you can also go buy my book, Millionaire Mission. This thing will tell you what to do, how to cut the corner off

• 19:47Brian Preston?

  so you don't get distracted and you actually let your army of dollar bills do all the heavy lifting.

• 19:52Speaker 01

  Oh, what I love about the Financial Order of Operations is it's, it's very prescriptive on what to do with your dollars. What things should I be doing? Where should I be deploying them? What are the affirmative things I ought to be doing?

• 20:06Speaker 01

  But sometimes that's not enough. Sometimes we need to know, okay, well, I hear that and I see that. What are the things that I should avoid? If I'm in this window, if I'm in the wealth window from age 32 to 48, what are the things I ought to be aware of? Cause maybe if I can remove the things that I should avoid, it will allow me to better focus on the things I should do, like following the financial order of operations. And the first one will come as no surprise, because again, this gets tons of press, tons of publicity. So often in this window, this is the age and stage of life where lifestyle inflation and keeping up with the Joneses and trying to live a bigger, better life today, happens. And look, that's not inherently a bad thing. Lifestyle inflation gets such a bad rap that, oh, it's, no, you

• 20:50Speaker 01

  don't want your lifestyle to inflate. You don't want it to inflate. That's not true. All of us, we want our 40s to be better than our 30s and our 30s to be better than our 20s and our 20s to be better than our teens. And that's okay. What you can't do is let the pace of your lifestyle outpace the pace of your portfolio. If you're doing it that way, you're doing it the wrong way.

• 21:10Brian Preston?

  Well, also, I think about like the people who graduate college and then immediately go buy a brand new car. Cause like, I earned this. I mean, how many doctors do we see fall into these type of spending traps when they got student loan debt and other things? And a lot of times it's because they've just been in school so long and they're like, I've earned this and they want to reward themselves. No, guys, there's a time and a place. Make sure you do something for your future self before you start rewarding the current self. And that's, that leads right into the next thing. The things that I see people fall into is when they get bonuses, restricted stock units or raises, they don't actually put any of that to work for the future. They, once again, it's like, you know, pigs at

• 21:52Brian Preston?

  the troughs. And they're like, let's just give you more for lifestyle than ever putting money for the future. And you see this over and over again.

• 22:00Speaker 01

  Yeah. What you don't want to do is allow those types of incomes to be nothing but lifestyle increasers. If you can figure out, if you're someone who has a variable comp plan and you have big bonuses at the end of the year, you have RSUs or other type of equity compensation, if you can learn how to live on the base and build your life around the base, and then allow that extra additional variable comp to be the supercharger on your wealth building journey, you're going to give yourself so much freedom and so much flexibility in the future. But far too often, what actually happens is someone starts with the same savings. They're like, oh man, okay, I gotta get a 10%, gotta get 10%, gotta get 10%. And they get to a 10% savings rate and they never change it. And their income

• 22:43Speaker 01

  goes up and their bonuses go up and their rewards go up, and yet their savings never follow suit. Don't let yourself be that 45 year old that wakes up and says, holy cow, I'm saving the same amount of money I was saving when I was 35. I started maxing my 401k out and that's all I ever did. I never saved more. I never added. I never increased. If you're doing that, you are not taking advantage of what you can be doing in this wealth window.

• 23:09Brian Preston?

  Yeah. I mean, and if you want, we share it all the time, the 60 40 rule. If you get pay raises or you get these bonuses, let's 60% go towards your savings and investments and 40% towards that better lifestyle. And then also as you're making, cause you notice there's a common thread here as we keep talking about lifestyle choices and the creep that comes from that. You know, if you look at the housing costs for the typical American, now look, we, look, a lot of grace towards housing right now, because we had not only high interest rates, but we have a big run up post pandemic with what's happened. But it is interesting that Americans, 33% of their budgets going towards housing. I'm just saying, if you get choices in that, I mean, you could afford to do this and minimize

• 23:52Brian Preston?

  this. We'd love for you to keep housing as close to below 30%, even ideally below 25%. So you can have more money going to savings and investment towards your lifestyle and not being house rich, life poor.

• 24:06Speaker 01

  Well, even often at this stage, this is for a lot of people, the beginning of the messy middle where your family starts growing and you start adding children in. According to Smart Asset, in 2025, the average annual cost of raising a child under age five in the United States reached about $28,000. That's combined across daycare and costs and diapers and all that kind of stuff. It gets expensive. And so what happens is it's naturally, there is this tendency for the increased cost of life to crowd out the desire to save. If you can fight that urge, if you can figure out how to automate your savings, how to get as close to 25%, or even if you can't get to 25%, just get 1% better than

• 24:51Speaker 01

  you were last year, you're going to allow yourself to still capitalize, still take advantage of the wealth window, even while the messy middle, messy middle is happening, even while it feels like you have a thousand different things pulling you in a thousand different directions.

• 25:05Brian Preston?

  So let's bring this thing home. Here's the thing, a lot of you are probably now, you've, I've got you motivated, you're interested. You're like, okay, where am I? Am I ahead of the curve? Am I behind the curve? Or I'm right where I'm supposed to be? You don't have to have a question mark on this. We've actually created a great free resource for you. I'd encourage you to go to moneyguy.com/resources. You can actually fill out our calculator completely free and figure out where you are. And then now, after you have that number, let's actually give you some milestones to figure out by decade, how well you're doing with this wealth window.

• 25:39Speaker 01

  Yeah. When we think about it, you know, the age is really, it's age 32 to 48. And as we thought about this, there's kind of some different milestones in there that are worth recognizing at these stages. And the first is in your early 30s. This is the very first part of the wealth window. We want you thinking about, what's really happening in this stage is you're beginning to finish the base. In your twenties or even before that, you were likely starting to build the base. Well, now you are finishing that. And so there are some milestones. And if you're doing these things, it's an indication you're doing it right. The very first one, you're getting your full employer match. You're not one of those 30 year olds, one of those one in four working Americans that's not out there fully taking advantage of all of their free employer money.

• 26:23Brian Preston?

  And you're not doing credit card debt. Look, this is the one, I'm amazed at Americans and how bad we are with this false bridge of debt. Because if you look at the stats, 53% of people who are that 30 to 45, that's, that's right there in that, that wealth window we're talking about are carrying a balance month to month. Guys, that is an absolute disaster.

• 26:47Speaker 01

  It's a disaster because the average interest rate on those credit cards, on those balances they're carrying is 22.15%. You will never be able to build wealth if you are losing 22% of your dollars to interest payments. So if you have high interest debt, figure out how to get rid of it. Don't keep throwing your money away. We don't care if you debt avalanche. We don't care if you debt snowball. What we want you doing is figuring out which system works for you so that you can get that high interest debt off of your balance sheet.

• 27:20Brian Preston?

  You've noticed, we've just skipped the twenties altogether. That's the ideal time if you can discover this, but I've often give a lot of grace for people in their twenties because we have the goal of you want to be saving and investing 20 to 25% of your gross income. Well, in twenties, you have an excuse. In the thirties, as we've shown earlier, you got to pay raises. You're on, you're no longer in a job. You're more likely in a career. You're watching a personal finance show as we speak. You need to be approaching 25% savings and investment rate. So your money can start working for you.

• 27:52Speaker 01

  And if you're not there today, can you be 1% better than you were last year? 2% better than you were to? If you can improve through time, you will change your financial life. So then you move from this early 30s phase into this late 30s. And frankly, for financial mutants, this is when you've begun to separate from the masses. This is likely where you're going to begin looking around at your peers, not with a sense of comparison, but with a sense of noting, man, I noticed they're still stressed, they're still frustrated, they're still trying to figure things out. And I'm beginning, even though life is crazy, even though I'm in the messy middle, I'm starting to recognize that I've got some things going on for me that are likely moving me in the right direction. And I'm beginning to look very, very different than the median American or my peers around me.

• 28:37Brian Preston?

  You know, I've already spent some time talking about why we like 25% of your gross income. But I'll do it one better because some of you, maybe you didn't catch this right at 32. Maybe you've started finding our content and you're 40 years of age or 38 years of age. If you actually go to our website, moneyguy.com/resources, we have a great resource to actually tell you the number you need to be saving and investing based upon your age and then the anticipated date that you want to retire. Don't sleep on this. This is the part that allows your army of dollar bills to actually do the heavy lift.

• 29:09Speaker 01

  Another thing that happens in this stage is that you're beginning to recognize your financial life has likely gotten a little more nuanced. And so now you're not just trying to think about, okay, how much am I saving? How am I putting my dollars to work? Where am I putting them according to the financial order of operations? But how am I doing it in a way that's optimized for my particular situation? I've begun to think through tax strategy. I recognize that if I'm a lower income individual and I save $10,000 into my pre-tax 401k and I'm in a 12% tax bracket, that's going to save me $1,200 in taxes. But if I'm someone who's in a higher tax bracket and I'm in the 32%

• 29:49Speaker 01

  marginal rate and I save $10,000, well now that's going to save me $3,200 in taxes. I can kind of think about that as like a 32% imputed rate of return on my dollars. I'm beginning to look at and analyze my financial situation, not so that it's just Simpleized solution, but so now it is specific to my situation and what's optimal for me.

• 30:11Brian Preston?

  It's crazy. I have to keep repeating this, but you're, you're going to notice a trend because I think we all graduate high school and we assume that we're not going to just try to keep up with the kids who's driving the cool cars. But here you are in your late 30s and you're going to find out you're still struggling with keeping up with the Joneses. If you want to know why I know that this is a true struggle with most Americans, look at this stat right here. 40% of those making over $500,000 a year. No excuse if you make over $500,000 a year, but 40% of them living paycheck to paycheck.

• 30:42Speaker 01

  That's terrifying.

• 30:42Brian Preston?

  That, that is the part that I'm telling you guys, watch how you're making decisions. Remember how we said in this stage of life, you should start seeing separation. This is when we've done, you know, the, the whole case studies where we have Manny the mutant versus average Alan. These people can make the exact same incomes, but all of a sudden they are in completely different places because of their choices. Make the Manny the mutant type decisions.

• 31:09Speaker 01

  And if you want to know how to do that well across like the big things in your life, we have tools for you. Go out to moneyguy.com/resources. Check out our car buying tools. Check out our home buying tools. Familiarize yourself with our rules around how you should make those big purchases. Cause if you can do them differently than the world around you, differently than the average American, your financial life will look very different than the average American. Because as you make those decisions, then you become into your early 40s. And this is where, and I think this is exciting, Brian. This is where we said, you can really begin to overwhelm your wealth journey at this crossroads.

• 31:47Brian Preston?

  Yeah. Remember, because this is that, that sweet period, right? Cause in your 50s, there's no promise of, that your career is going to be what you think it's going to be. But in your 40s, statistically, these are peak earning years. So make the most out of it. If you look out there, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, between 45 and 54 are your peak earning years. So if you're behind on anything, and like I said, you've used our know your number course or your calculator that's free on the website, you can go figure out if you're ahead of the curve, behind the curve, or right where you're supposed to be. This is the time to catch up if you are behind the curve.

• 32:22Speaker 01

  And I think a lot of people, they go into this age thinking, okay, I'm going to take my foot off the gas. Now I can take my foot off the gas. And while that may be true, you may want to measure, okay, what's the cost of taking my foot off the gas? Or if I can continue saving aggressively and having automated investments and doing some meaningful work in my early 40s, is that going to allow my early 50s, mid 50s, late 50s, early 60s to look very, very different? Cause what you're likely noticing at this stage is this is probably the first time for many where you've begun to have some breathing room. You finally feel like you're not being pinched. You're not being pulled in a thousand different directions. And not only can you still begin funding the things for your future

• 33:06Speaker 01

  financial independence self, you also get to start funding some of those like abundant step eight goals at this stage as well.

• 33:13Brian Preston?

  Yeah. I want to, I want to close this thing out. This was a special episode for me because um, I really hope that the, the message made its way through where I'd please don't let the vein in my head that popped out like Shia LaBeouf when I'm trying to just really motivate you. Don't let this moment pass you by. I want you doing something because the key takeaways are, is that every raise should have a purpose. You've got to get to a hundred thousand dollars like your life dependent upon its stat. There's a reason that Charlie Munger said that hundred thousand was so important. We're echoing that. We've done the math. We've shown you the illustrations. Don't let procrastination and lack of discipline steal your future. This is an important window. Don't waste

• 33:58Speaker 01

  it. The wealth window is so, so, so valuable. Yes. If you started at 20, you're in a great spot, but if you're anywhere between ages 32 and 48, you still can have a meaningful impact on your financial future. It's not about being perfect. It's not about getting every single decision right, but the earlier you can start getting more decisions right than you get wrong, the better your financial future will look, the more flexibility you'll give yourself, the more opportunities for freedom you'll have. Don't miss this opportunity.

• 34:32Brian Preston?

  I, I feel like there probably is a fork in the road moment here. Is that there are a group of you who are going to use this as motivation and hopefully today changed your life. And please go to moneyguy.com/resources. Use every bit of our free resources to accelerate your journey, create tremendous success. But there's going to be others of you who watches, but they're like, bravo. This is exactly what I remember going through my life. I made the hard decisions. I remember the sacrifice. I remember why they call this the messy middle where you're short on time, you're short on money. I made the sacrifice. Now I'm with these guys are talking about where my decisions are complicated. I don't know where all this complication came from, but it's a lot of

• 35:13Brian Preston?

  it's because of the success of creating good decisions. If that's you and you watch this because it cheered you on and all the sacrifice you made earlier, we've got a place for you too. It's called become a client. We'll leave the porch light on for you. This is the type of content that's hopefully going to change people's life, but also let us connect with the people who made those sacrifices. So we can continue to help you change your life. I'm your host, Brian, joined by Mr. Bo. Money Guy team out.

• 35:39Speaker 02

  The Money Guy Show is hosted by Brian Preston and Bo Hanson. Brian and Bo are partners with Abound Wealth Management. Abound Wealth Management is a registered investment advisory firm regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission in accordance and compliance with the securities, laws, and regulations. Abound Wealth Management does not render or offer to render personalized investment or tax advice through the Money Guy Show. The information provided is for informational purposes only, may not be suitable for all investors, and does not constitute financial, tax, investment, or legal advice. All investments involve a degree of risk, including the risk of