Your Mid-Year Tax Checkup: Fix Problems Before They Become April's Problem (SB1878)

Most people only think about taxes twice a year: while filing, and while dreading filing next time. That gap is exactly where expensive surprises are born. Today's episode is a genuine mid-year tax tune-up, the kind of checkup that takes maybe twenty minutes and can quietly save you from an ugly bill, an unexpected penalty, or a refund that wasn't actually a win. No jargon-heavy lecture, just a clear walkthrough of what to check right now while there's still time to fix it. What You'll Walk Away With Why a big tax refund last year tells you almost nothing about whether you're on track this yearThe four numbers you actually need to know to build your own mini tax forecast in one sittingHow the IRS "safe harbor" rule works, and the two different percentage thresholds that keep you penalty-freeA common myth about side hustle income that trips up more people than you'd expectWhy switching to a Roth 401k without a plan can quietly blow a hole in your monthly cash flowThe real math behind donor-advised funds, and why writing a check to charity may be leaving money on the tableA simple gut-check for figuring out whether you need a professional or can handle a financial fix yourselfWhy This Matters Now In your 40s, your financial life usually gets more complicated before it gets simpler: a raise here, a side hustle there, maybe two incomes in the household, maybe a bonus that shows up at an inconvenient time. Each of those changes quietly shifts what you owe, and waiting until April to notice means you've lost your best chance to do anything about it. A twenty-minute check now isn't about becoming a tax expert. It's about making sure next spring is boring instead of stressful, which, when it comes to taxes, is exactly the goal. From the Basement A home AC disaster turns into an unexpectedly useful lesson about getting a second opinion before writing a big check, whether it's for a repair, a service, or apparently, a $3,000 HVAC estimate that turned out to be a $300 fix. Consider it a bonus lesson in trusting your gut when something doesn't add up. Resources Mentioned Stacking Benjamins Tax Guide https://stackingbenjamins.com/guides — free guide for organizing your mid-year tax reviewStacko Financial Action Month board https://stackingbenjamins.com/stacko — the interactive game with a money move for each dayField Kit Finance https://fieldkitfinance.com — track net worth, spending, and subscriptions in one placeDaffy https://www.daffy.org — donor-advised fund platform referenced for charitable giving strategyIRS Estimated Tax Payments https://www.irs.gov/payments — where to make an estimated payment directly See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Maybe it's time we talked. Kiplinger calls it the trillion dollar talk, a conversation about inheritance, estate planning, wills, and the questions families should be asking before those decisions become urgent. Because knowing what your family wants and having a plan for it can be one of the most important financial conversations you will ever have. Ready to start yours? Visit kiplinger.com to learn more about the trillion dollar talk and what this historic wealth transfer could mean for your family.

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• 1:03Speaker 00

  It is Monday in Mom's Basement, and that means OG just took a sip of coffee. I'm about to take another sip of coffee. Doug, you got the coffee out?

• 1:10Speaker 02

  I've already had three, and I am so amped up.

• 1:13Speaker 00

  This is, it's gonna be a bad day, OG.

• 1:15Speaker 02

  It's, yeah. These people need to listen fast because my mouth's gonna be moving.

• 1:20Speaker 00

  The words we don't want to hear Doug say is, "I've already had three." Like, that is, that is bad news. What's good news, though, is that at the beginning of every week, we toast the people that kept us safe all weekend. The people have been working a lot of, lot of overtime to keep us safe. Men and women are armed forces, so raise your mugs, stackers. On behalf of the men and women making podcasts in Mom's Basement and the men and women stacking Benjamins across the world, here's to you. Thank you so much for all you do. Let's go stack some Benjamins together now, shall we?

• 1:51Speaker 02

  Thanks, everybody.

• 1:52Speaker 03

  Uh-oh. Sounds like somebody's got a case of the mundus.

• 2:02Speaker 02

  Live from Joe's Mom's Basement, it's The Stacking Benjamin Show.

• 2:16Speaker 02

  I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug and how's your tax situation looking? I know what you're thinking, Doug, it's only August. And I say to you, hey, person I made up for this open, you should think about taxes now so that it's all great next April. So on today's show, it's your just past mid-year tax checkup. What should you toggle to get the best tax treatment on your money? We'll share. And that's not all. It's financial action month. So we'll take one square from the Stack-O game board and help you make an easy and profitable money move. And even with all that, I'll still save time for some of my trivia you can brag about to your friends. Because everybody loves when you bring up random facts out of nowhere, right? At least that's what I think.

• 3:01Speaker 02

  And now two guys who are probably sitting around bragging that they get to work with this guy. It's Joe and O G G G G G.

• 3:14Speaker 00

  That's right, stackers. Welcome to the place where I sit here and pinch myself because I get to sit next to Doug. It is the Stacking Benjamin Show. We're super happy that you're here. It is Monday. We're getting nerdy today, O G, because it is mid-year, just past mid-year, tax evaluation, tax planning in mom's basement.

• 3:35Speaker 04

  You can see my desk right now. I've got.

• 3:39Speaker 00

  Got all the tax stuff ready to go.

• 3:41Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 3:41Speaker 00

  Sucks. It does suck. But you know what's cool is it sucks a lot less if you handle it now. If you handle it today, we're going to get into this.

• 3:51Speaker 04

  Wait, you're talking about 25 taxes that are on extension, right? Because that's what I'm dealing with. Is there something I'm supposed to be doing besides that? Because I got till, you know, this is what, early August-ish? I got till October to get this done. Are you telling me there's something else I'm supposed to be doing on my taxes besides this?

• 4:09Speaker 00

  Believe it or not, we're going to talk 2026 on today's show. So stackers, get ready to make some moves. Get your documents out. We're going to talk about exactly what you should get out and. How to maybe, maybe tweak a little bit so that you don't have to do some big tweaking next April. Hey, it is financial action month. We're kicking it off with today's show. You can get your name submitted to win a copy of Stacked, my book, pretty comprehensive book about how to do your financial plan. You'll find that at stackyourbenjamins.com/stacko. Because the big thing at Stacko, that's the game we play. It's like bingo, where you can take different financial actions. We're going to walk through one of those, Doug, as you

• 4:53Speaker 00

  mentioned earlier, walk through one of those today. So, a lot on tap. We're going to get right into it. But first, we got a couple sponsors who help us keep on keeping on. We're going to hear from them. And then, we are going to do some mid-year tax planning. Let's get it rolling. Well, you may know the chaos is the name of the game here in mom's basement, what with guests coming in and out, Cooper the cat getting in the way, Doug being, well, being Doug. The holidays make it even worse, because it's all about food and big meals. And the problem is, prepping for those takes forever. But what about those between meals, right? The meals between those huge, huge, huge bookends. Well, that's where Factor comes in. Factor

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• 6:22Speaker 00

  and your taste buds will thank you. For Cheryl and I, Factor has been a great way for us to stay busy and focus on family life and beating mom at card games. I use Factor and you should too. So let's eat real stackers. Head to factormeals.com/sb50off, use code SB50OFF. And you know what? You're going to get 50% off and one free breakfast item per box for one year while supplies last until December 31st, 2026. That is code SB50OFF at factormeals.com, SB50OFF at factormeals.com. See website for more details.

• 7:07Speaker 05

  Hello, darlings. And now it's time for your favorite part of the show, our stacking Benjamin's headlines.

• 7:13Speaker 00

  Guys, I came across a Kiplinger piece from senior tax editor Kelly R. Taylor about mid-year tax planning. And my first reaction was probably the same as yours. We just finished taxes. Here from OG, I'm still working on taxes. Why are we bringing them back into the basement? Didn't Doug put the tax records in a grocery bag marked, "Do not open until panic season"?

• 7:34Speaker 02

  Panic season.

• 7:36Speaker 00

  Doug, where do you keep your tax documents?

• 7:40Speaker 02

  All right. So in all seriousness, I do have a, there aren't many documents that you keep anymore, like actual paper documents. And not many you get. So I, you know, I have a, for the few that I might get, I've got an old school manila folder that sits in a spot on my desk or, you know, in my desk. And that goes there. And then I just create a digital file folder and throw stuff in there as they come.

• 8:04Speaker 00

  It's perfect. It's all password protected with the password being password?

• 8:08Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. 123.

• 8:09Speaker 00

  Yeah. It's like the Louvre making Louvre their password.

• 8:14Speaker 02

  And putting the really valuable stuff right near the window.

• 8:18Speaker 00

  You just can't make it up. But this piece makes a great point. The best time to make tax decisions isn't when you're filing the return because by then the year's closed. So today, we're going to create your mid-year tax checkup. We aren't preparing anybody's return. We're going to figure out whether tax surprise might be coming and what we can still do about it. So the first half, we're going to try to make sure there are no surprises. In the second half, we'll talk about some cool tax planning techniques. And by the way, before we start this, I should do the disclaimer. I should have Doug sent you the disclaimer for you to read that federal taxes are complicated. State rules are different. Major transactions deserve help from a qualified tax professional. This is for entertainment purposes only. How's that? Is that good?

• 9:00Speaker 02

  It was okay. I mean, but now we know why I'm here.

• 9:05Speaker 00

  All right. What are the questions we ask? Because at this point in the year, OG, what we want to do is we want to build a forecast, right? What do we need to gather before we start making tax moves?

• 9:17Speaker 04

  Oh, well, this is something that we actually tackle every second half of the year for clients. This is one of the kind of standing review segments in our planning year. What are the things that we look forward? Well, we look for obviously your completed 2025 return, you know, because that's the basis for all of the changes from 25 to 26, right? Because you've got really accurate data from 25, clearly, because you just filed it. And that's the starting point. The 2025 return is, you know, the basis for here's all the changes we're going to make, you know, or the changes that that can happen from 25 to 26. And it's a good barometer for where you're at relative to where you

• 9:59Speaker 04

  were pacing this time last year. So we know where 25 is. The next thing we want to look at is all of your pay stubs and income earnings for this year. Obviously, forecast that out for the rest of the year. If you get paid a bonus in the second half of the year, maybe that's a little harder to guesstimate what it's going to be. But by this time, maybe you have some idea of what that is. And then the other piece is, what are the other tax things that you've done so far this year that we need to be aware of? Did you make any charitable contributions? Have you paid property taxes or real estate taxes? Have you done any capital transactions? Did you buy or sell any property, any stock? Have you done any conversions? Are you thinking about doing any conversions? Most people honestly, wait until the end of the year for that, or should wait until the end of the year. But that just gives us a basis of like where all the bodies are buried right now.

• 10:44Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 10:45Speaker 04

  And now you get to start trying to Manipulate that data for the next six months to figure out, you know, what, what kind of changes we need to be.

• 10:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, I like everything that you said, and in my head, I'm breaking those up kind of into four things. First is based on last year and where I am this year, how much money do I expect to make? If you think the business is going well this year and you get bonuses, my bonus is going to be about the same. Those are the hard parts, as you know, OG, these lumpy one offs can change things, but we got to look at what the expected full year income. So I love the fact that you go back, look at last year compared to where you were at this point last year. How does it look? Second, your expected deductions and credits that you're going to get. Third, how much tax do I think I'm going to pay? And then fourth, how much have I already paid? So have I, have I already paid enough in to make sure that I'm going to be okay?

• 11:37Speaker 00

  Because a big thing that happens, OG, one thing that happens is people assume if I got a big tax refund last year, well, then I'm good. You know, without going through the stuff that you talked about, they're like, oh, I'm good. I got a big refund last year.

• 11:51Speaker 04

  Yeah, well, maybe you got a big refund because you got a, a one off bonus and they withheld it appropriate. Actually, more likely than not, while tax surprises on the upside are annoying, obviously the more detrimental tax surprise is the one where you owe money that you didn't expect. And a lot of times people will say things like, they taxed my bonus at a higher rate. No, all of your income is taxed at the same rate. It's just, you know, well, not all the same rate, but it's the same schedule, right? It's just they withhold it at a different rate. Either, either they're obligated to because of how it's coded in the IRS, or they do it as a, as a favor to you because, you know, they know, like, if you don't, you know how much money you make because we pay you every day.

• 12:35Speaker 00

  This could end badly if you don't.

• 12:37Speaker 04

  Yeah, if we don't take out 40% of this, you're going to owe a big chunk of it on the backend and it never feels great. But you got to account for that every year. And once you've built the baseline for that, you know, that data, then if you do have a one off surprise, you know, it's October 20th and your boss goes, hey, here's a bonus for 20 grand. You're like, oh, great, thanks, I guess. You know, you can just add that line item into your model and, and figure out where you're going to be.

• 13:02Speaker 00

  Well, and that is, and I love that you went there because this is really where I want to go next, which is having that big refund. Okay, to your point, that's fine, but. There are two questions that people should be asking, and they're not the same question. Number one is, how much will I still owe? Am I going to owe? Do I project that I'm seeing that I'm going to owe? And how much will that be? And then second, and this is a different question. Will I face an underpayment penalty? Because I think a lot of people don't realize, OG, that if you don't stay close enough, you're going to run afoul of what's called the federal safe harbor. You're going to have a penalty because throughout the year you didn't withhold enough. Can we talk about that a second? What, how does this penalty work?

• 13:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, penalties suck in everything, sporting events, tax events. Generally speaking, the yellow card or red card is a really bad thing to get, you know?

• 13:54Speaker 00

  Can you see having an IRS agent come to your house? And he stands there in front of you and doesn't say anything. And then like the soccer ref, he just puts up the red card.

• 14:03Speaker 04

  I mean, that would be bad. You'd be like, oh, no.

• 14:05Speaker 00

  No, no, no, no.

• 14:05Speaker 02

  Throws this yellow handkerchief at your front door.

• 14:08Speaker 04

  You're just here like tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet, tweet. Like this big, big flag comes your way.

• 14:13Speaker 00

  Like, please don't, please don't, please don't. Red card. Oh, crap. Prior to the tax withholding, personal foul, not withholding enough.

• 14:22Speaker 04

  On that guy.

• 14:25Speaker 04

  Yeah, penalties suck, man. And if you can avoid them, the better, better you are. The IRS assumes that you earn a consistent income throughout the year. So if you say that you make a hundred grand, if your W2 says a hundred grand, they assume that you earn that in $8,000 increments every month. And so you're, you're withholding account. Your tax payments should match that level of income. Now, the reality is, is that sometimes we don't earn money that way. And then it's incumbent on you to tell your CPA or to tell the IRS that, hey, I didn't, I didn't earn 200 grand evenly throughout the year. I earned 100 evenly throughout the year. And then literally on December 28th, I got a check for 100 grand. Now that buys you out of that tax penalty problem to some degree,

• 15:10Speaker 04

  but you still have to have the withholding in by, you know, those quarterly estimated payments, which is also kind of stupid because it's not really quarterly. And I just, I as a taxpayer slash business owner just cannot understand how someone set this up and then called it quarterly.

• 15:30Speaker 00

  So horrible.

• 15:31Speaker 04

  And no one has ever challenged us, like no one has, or maybe they have and they just don't win. But your taxes are due January 15th. That is for Q4 of the prior year. Your tax withholding payments, I should say, if you're self-employed, something like that. April 15th for Q1.

• 15:50Speaker 04

  Okay. Stands to reason that's in the ballpark. Also, April 15th for any mistakes from the prior year.

• 15:59Speaker 04

  Okay. You know, kind of self inflicted, I guess, maybe, but it's a big day. June 15th. Because that.

• 16:08Speaker 00

  Right. Cause we feel like it. Cause somebody doesn't know math.

• 16:13Speaker 04

  And September 15th. Because that also. Yeah. But then your taxes are due October 15th, if you filed an extension or September 15th event. You know, anyways, it's.

• 16:26Speaker 00

  So my takeaway from this is it's just always tax day. There's just always a tax deadline.

• 16:31Speaker 04

  It certainly feels like that. If you're a business owner, I can tell you. So the way that you avoid the tax penalty on your personal income tax side is one of two things. You can either withhold 110% of last year's tax bill. So there's a line item on your tax form on the second page that says, this is your total tax. And that number is whatever it is. And now you've withheld more than that or less than that. And that's how they calculate your refund or your tax bill due. But that number, this is your total tax number. If you multiply that by 110%, that gives you what's called your safe harbor number for next year. So as long as you hit that, you're good. And, you know, look, if you go win the lottery and you make $77 million in Powerball

• 17:14Speaker 04

  and you under withhold, as long as you're at 110% of last year's, you're not going to have a penalty. You're going to still hold the taxes, but you're not going to have a penalty due.

• 17:20Speaker 00

  Yeah. When you say you're good, it doesn't mean you've paid the right amount of tax. It means you're not going to get the penalty.

• 17:25Speaker 04

  You're not going to get a penalty.

• 17:25Speaker 00

  Just to be clear.

• 17:26Speaker 04

  The second way to avoid the penalty is to withhold 90% of your total liability.

• 17:32Speaker 04

  In that example of having a large income or maybe your income was high last year and now it's smaller this year. So you're like, well, I'm going to totally hit the 110. If I did that, but I'm not going to make as much money, you still have to have 90% of your liability. So this requires a little bit of planning. So those are the two numbers. Usually what your CPA does, or what TurboTax does when you fill out your taxes, is it prints off coupons for your tax withholding for those due dates. That is basically 110% divided by those four, four payments, you know, and, you know, the first one due April and then June, September, and then October. But a good rule of thumb is to definitely check it in July, August time period, see where you're at, run that model, like we were talking about. And

• 18:17Speaker 04

  then you give yourself September, October. There's no rule that says you have to pay it in September, or I should say could only pay it in September or January. You can jump online and be like, hey, my, my bonus paid in August and I've, you know, I need to get this money, this extra money that I know I'm going to owe sent to the IRS, get it out of my hands. Basically, you can just go online and IRS.gov and make estimated payment.

• 18:41Speaker 00

  Yeah, I know people that like that. The second that they get it, just get rid of it. So there's no-

• 18:46Speaker 04

  Ship it to the IRS. You're going to owe the money anyway. You know, and I get the whole argument that people have about like, well, I could put this money in my account and earn the 3%. You can. You're right.

• 18:57Speaker 00

  There's a lot of know yourself in this.

• 18:58Speaker 04

  Or you will spend it. And then April will come around and you'll be like, ah crap, now I have a payment plan. I'm under withheld. I owe interest. I owe penalties. It can get pricey in a hurry.

• 19:10Speaker 00

  Doug, let's turn this into a game.

• 19:12Speaker 02

  I, I'm terrified of this every episode, Joe.

• 19:15Speaker 00

  You're going to have the ruling. But Doug, I'm going to give you a statement. You tell me whether it's a useful tax move or a myth we need to bury behind the water heater. Ready?

• 19:24Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 19:25Speaker 00

  I received a raise or I changed jobs, so I should review my withholding. Tax move or tax myth?

• 19:34Speaker 02

  Useful. Move.

• 19:36Speaker 00

  Yeah. What other changes OG should make us think, you know what, I should probably look at my withholding besides a raise or change in jobs?

• 19:45Speaker 04

  Well, I think where people make some mistakes here is if they have more than one job and together those jobs make good income, but each one individually maybe is a little bit lower. The math will say, you know, oh, the first $10,000 tax at this rate and so on and so forth.

• 20:02Speaker 00

  They don't think about the fact you've got two jobs.

• 20:04Speaker 04

  Yeah. So the W4 does ask you that opportunity. It does give you that opportunity to fill in that information so that the, the correct column basically is used in your withholding. That's a mistake, I think on the downside. I think on the upside, you know, obviously if you have kids, if you get married, if you get divorced, family life events are going to have an impact on which boxes you check. If you turn 65, you know, you get to check a box, you guys, you know, it's coming. So you get a few extra bucks. Those are probably the biggest ones.

• 20:35Speaker 00

  Yeah. The only other one I can think of that we talked about earlier was the bonus, right? You get a big unexpected bonus and you're like, oh, maybe I need to look at what was withheld there. But yeah. Question two, Doug. I received a big refund last year. So my withholding must be correct this year.

• 20:54Speaker 02

  No, I'm going to say myth.

• 20:56Speaker 00

  It is a myth. Last year's refund tells us what happened last year. It doesn't matter toward this year. A lot of things could have changed. Question three, I can make one giant estimated payment in December and automatically erase any earlier underpayment penalty.

• 21:12Speaker 02

  No, the years are, that's a myth, right? The years are totally separate.

• 21:16Speaker 00

  OG.

• 21:17Speaker 02

  If I heard your question correct.

• 21:19Speaker 04

  Yeah, no, that would be bad. I mean, you could do it if your income is lumpy like that, but if it's relatively uniform, you will be, uh, surprise, surprise, surprise.

• 21:31Speaker 00

  Yeah. Round four, question four, increasing your withholding late in the year may work differently from making a late estimated payment.

• 21:42Speaker 02

  Duh. Increasing your withholding late in the year works differently.

• 21:48Speaker 02

  I'm going to say useful, but I don't know.

• 21:52Speaker 00

  That's a tax move. That's some good tax planning going on there, OG, I think.

• 21:55Speaker 04

  I mean, you should evaluate it. And if you are under withholding and it's the middle of the year and you can crank that up a little bit, that'll, that'll definitely help.

• 22:03Speaker 00

  That's why we're doing this show right now. Question five, my side hustle earned a profit, but I left the money in the business checking account, so I don't have to pay a tax on it.

• 22:15Speaker 02

  No, that's, that's not how that works.

• 22:19Speaker 00

  You've seen that before though, OG. Tell me, there's no way you haven't seen somebody think that. Well, I'm just gonna leave it in the business. So I'm not personally taxed on it.

• 22:26Speaker 04

  Well, I mean, to be fair, it does matter what kind of business it is.

• 22:30Speaker 00

  It does. Yes.

• 22:31Speaker 04

  But generally speaking, small, but you said side hustles. So that to me, that implies, you know, a small business after your expenses in a small business, you know, your run of the mill mom and pop shop type of thing. We're not talking about, you know, General Motors here. I mean, although it works similarly. You have your income, you minus out your expenses, that's your profit. That profit number then is basically passed through to the owners of the company. If you're the only owner, it just shows up whether you spend the money or you don't, or you consume the money or you don't, or transfer it from your account, or you don't. The profit is going to show up on your personal tax return as, as earnings and then you have to pay taxes on it.

• 23:12Speaker 00

  This is where it's really important when you set up the business to know what type of business I'm setting up, what the positives and negatives are of different ways of setting up the business. That's for a different episode because it doesn't help all of our stackers. But when you're setting up the business, you gotta know. Last one, Doug, you purchase a margarita machine and write business development on the receipt to write it off.

• 23:37Speaker 02

  Please let that be true. Please let that be true.

• 23:39Speaker 00

  OG.

• 23:40Speaker 02

  But it's not.

• 23:42Speaker 04

  I mean, do you own a bar?

• 23:45Speaker 04

  Or golf course?

• 23:46Speaker 00

  Well.

• 23:48Speaker 04

  Wedding venue? I think those are fine. Yeah.

• 23:51Speaker 00

  Yeah. To your point, oh gee, that could be audit bait, Doug. But it depends on what type of business you're running. All right. Now we know whether a problem is coming. So we have done our, am I ahead of the game? Am I behind the game? How do we fix it while there's still time? I mean, the first thing we could do, oh geez, we can adjust withholding. The second thing we can do is we can adjust our estimated payments. The third thing we could do, increase withholding from our remaining income the rest of the year. Oh gee, you like any of those better than the others?

• 24:27Speaker 04

  I'm a big fan of out of sight, out of mind. So if you're going to be owing money, I think it's better to take a little bit out of every paycheck to catch up or to be even money than it is to say, oh, I'll just, I'll be good for it in April. Slippery slope.

• 24:44Speaker 00

  In the second half of today's discussion, we're going to get beyond the essential checkup where we projected the year, we compared the expected tax with the tax already paid. We figured out how to start fixing the problem after Doug's trivia. We're going to move from defense to offense. We're going to talk about what we still can do with retirement accounts, HSAs, investments. What can we do to put ourselves in a stronger position before December 31st here at our just past mid-year checkup? Doug, let's do our trivia checkup. What do we got in the tank today?

• 25:21Speaker 00

  Hey there, stackers. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug and looky here. It's our old pal Martha's birthday. Yes, that's right. The queen of homemaking skills, Martha Stewart, is having a big day. So let's ask you a Martha-related question. What was Martha Stewart's money-related profession before she became a television icon? I'll be back right after I go help Joe's mom with the frosting on her latest creation. She always has too much, so I guess I'll have to find a home for the rest of it.

• 25:53Speaker 00

  Well, you may know that chaos is the name of the game here in mom's basement. What with guests coming in and out, Cooper the cat getting in the way, Doug being, well, being Doug, the holidays make it even worse because it's all about food and big meals. And the problem is prepping for those takes forever. But what about those between meals, right? The meals between those huge, huge, huge bookends. Well, that's where Factor comes in. Factor is made with high quality ingredients that you recognize and trust with over 175 banned ingredients. You always know you're eating something that's good for you, even when you don't have time. It's ready in two minutes, whether it's lunch between meetings or dinner after holiday shopping.

• 26:37Speaker 00

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• 27:21Speaker 00

  So let's eat real stackers. Head to factormeals.com/sb50off. Use code sb50off. And you know what? You're going to get 50% off and one free breakfast item per box for one year while supplies last until December 31st, 2026. That is code sb50off at factormeals.com, sb50off at factormeals.com. See website for more details. There is a financial conversation that's coming to millions of American families, and there's a pretty good chance nobody wants to be the person who starts it. Inheritance. And here's why that matters. An estimated $124 trillion to heirs in charity

• 28:05Speaker 00

  is expected to be transferred by Americans over the next 20 years. It's an extraordinary amount of money, but Kiplinger's research found that 51% of adults and their parents, get this, never talk about money. And there's a pretty big disconnect. 47% of parents expect to leave a meaningful inheritance, while only 24% of adult children expect to actually receive one. Nearly 30% of parents don't even have a will in place. Maybe it's time we talked. Kiplinger calls it "the trillion dollar talk," a conversation about inheritance, estate planning, wills, and the questions families should be asking before those decisions

• 28:47Speaker 00

  become urgent. Because knowing what your family wants and having a plan for it can be one of the most important financial conversations you will ever have. Ready to start yours? Visit kiplinger.com to learn more about the trillion dollar talk and what this historic wealth transfer could mean for your family.

• 29:06Speaker 00

  It's incredible, at a small company like Stack and Benjamins, how one, one hire makes all the difference in the world. If you're a small business, the right hire can be make or break. Hoping the right people see your job posting isn't the best growth strategy. When the pressure's on, you need the right hire. This is a job for sponsored jobs. Indeed Sponsored Jobs is a boost whenever you need to find quality talent. When workplace chaos hits and you need the right hire, this is a job for sponsored jobs. Hiring, indeed, is all you need. Stop struggling to get your job post even seen at other sites. Get matched with and hire quality candidates who can drive the results you need. Reach candidates

• 29:48Speaker 00

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• 30:32Speaker 00

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• 31:09Speaker 02

  Hey there, stackers. I'm Frosting Gobbler. That doesn't sound right. And guy who knows a great carrot cake from the smell, Joe Spomps neighbor Doug. You and I are celebrating the queen of decorating's birthday today. And before the break, I asked you a question about our good friend Martha. What was her money related profession before she ruled the boob tube? The answer? Back in 1967, Martha launched her career as a stockbroker and continued down that path for seven years. It was later, I'm told, that she was promoted to inside trader.

• 31:43Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 31:44Speaker 02

  What, too soon? And now back to two guys trading their insider knowledge on how money works. It's Joe and OG.

• 31:55Speaker 00

  OG, you're, you are a big fan of frosting, aren't you?

• 31:57Speaker 02

  No, no.

• 31:59Speaker 00

  Huge frosting lover.

• 32:00Speaker 02

  He's not. This is how the audience will know that you wrote that trivia and not me, because neither OG or I like frosting.

• 32:08Speaker 00

  So gross.

• 32:08Speaker 02

  And I can't eat carrot cake.

• 32:10Speaker 00

  I didn't know you couldn't eat carrot cake. There's nuts in carrot cake.

• 32:13Speaker 04

  Weak constitution, that's why.

• 32:15Speaker 02

  Oh, nuts, nuts kill me.

• 32:19Speaker 00

  Well, now we know. Now we know the secret sauce. So gee, we've, we've had enough.

• 32:24Speaker 04

  Between an occasional almond and a whiff of cat dander, we could take Doug down in a heartbeat.

• 32:30Speaker 00

  I am a fragile hothouse flower. Well, let's talk about something else that's fragile, which is your tax situation.

• 32:37Speaker 04

  My nose is all stuffy. I'm gonna go to the hospital.

• 32:40Speaker 00

  I'm gonna take another day off.

• 32:43Speaker 00

  We handled the immediate tax payment problem in the first half of today's episode. Let's take a look at moves that could improve your larger financial plan. One move OG people make right away is to go, okay, I'm going to hide more money in my 401k. I think before you do that, you probably got to look at how your employer match works. Cause you could make your tax situation better, but you might end up making your overall situation worse, depending on how your employer matches.

• 33:12Speaker 04

  Well, I think where I see this happening more frequently is when, you know, somebody online says Roth 401ks are better than traditional pre-tax. You know, I'm just going to do that unknowingly adding $8,000 to their tax bill, which could be fine in the long run, if you believe that you're at a, you know, lower income tax bracket today. And in the future, it's going to be higher and this money's tax free. But if you haven't accounted that for that from a cash flow standpoint, and God forbid you do this with two people, you know, you're talking about could easily be $15,000 swing in cash flow where, you know, now that money is going to be reduced from your paycheck because it's going to auto, you know, you're going to have a higher, higher gross income or taxable income, I should say.

• 33:55Speaker 04

  You know, you might owe some money on the backend, but if you don't have that flexibility in your cash flow to absorb 15 frigging grand a year, where's that going to go? It's going to go on credit card or it's going to go and reduce cash reserve. You're, you're going to eat into your emergency fund. And if you're not accounting for that right out the gate, you have some problems now.

• 34:14Speaker 00

  Could be a big tax surprise. Yeah.

• 34:16Speaker 04

  Yeah. You're 22 and this is your first job or you just got a huge pay raise. You know, because you changed companies and you're like, what should I do? Like, that's a perfect time to do that. Like make that switch, you know, all in because, you know, it's going to have a, it's not going to have as big of an impact. But I see people do these things without seeing the second or third domino down the line and like, what's going to happen? And then, I don't care who you are, 15 grands, you know, it's yeah, it's a notice of a thousand bucks a month or 1,200 bucks a month is somewhat noticeable in, I would say, the vast majority of people's cash flow.

• 34:49Speaker 00

  But if you've got good cash flow and you just did the projection during the first half of today's show, and it looks like you're going to get a big refund back, well, then this might be a great time to change over to the Roth.

• 35:01Speaker 04

  Could be.

• 35:01Speaker 00

  Assuming you can, you can absorb it. Yeah.

• 35:03Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 35:04Speaker 00

  Let's talk about HSAs, putting money in the HSAs. How could that potentially change the second half of the year tax wise?

• 35:11Speaker 04

  Well, it's another pre-tax account, right? We've talked about HSAs before. I'm not entirely convinced that it works out exactly perfect. What I mean by that is, does the increased healthcare cost that you're out of pocket now, offset the fact that you now get to save more money? Like, there's no rule against you saving money anyway. You know what I mean? So if you had $8,000 to save, yeah, it's nice to put it in an HSA because it's, you know, you have some tax benefits. But I think you have to evaluate that very carefully, I guess is what I'm saying. When it comes down to, you know, your health insurance benefits at work, I think everybody is just so drawn to, oh, I'm going to pick the HSA because that's supposed to be awesome. And it's like,

• 35:54Speaker 04

  well, maybe if you pick the health insurance that is a little different, you know, you would still be out of pocket the same? I don't know. Like, it's hard to project that. And little foreshadowing, what Doc G is going to talk about in a couple of days, there's not a lot of transparency in the healthcare space, unfortunately.

• 36:12Speaker 00

  Yeah, I remember when Beth Pinsky was on, she was talking about the fact that HSAs haven't grown the way that people expected them to grow, because 100% what you're talking about, OG, people are like, do I really want that much out of pocket?

• 36:26Speaker 04

  I mean, dude, we spend, I think our premium for our family on a small business plan, right? I think it's three grand a month, 3,500 a month. And when we just had this thing with my middle kid about his hand, went to this hand specialist and they're like, okay, let me check your insurance. I'm like, whoa, pump the brakes. I'm not fixing to spend 2,500 bucks today. So how about you let me know what the cash price is? And they're like, well, we collect $200. How, like, what does that get me? I got three x-rays, time with the PA, time with the surgeon and a new brace for my kid, like a brace for his thumb. And it was $211.

• 37:06Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 37:07Speaker 04

  I guarantee that if I ran that through insurance, it would have been 2,500 bucks.

• 37:12Speaker 00

  Oh, yeah.

• 37:13Speaker 04

  And, and I'm on the hook for the copay. We don't need to turn this into an insurance.

• 37:19Speaker 00

  No, and again, we will be talking about, we are going to talk about that machine on Thursday with, with Doc G. So the HSA can help, but don't go get an HSA just because of the fact that you think you want to have some tax help, like really think through your overall plan. If HSA is going to be.

• 37:36Speaker 04

  Glad I have one. Glad I've got money in there that's growing. I use it. I don't, I'm not one of these guys that like holds on to it and waits for, till I'm 107 to start spending.

• 37:48Speaker 00

  Well, and the downside there too, I mean, the estate planning issues around HSA.

• 37:53Speaker 04

  Estate planning, you got record keeping, you know, I just, I don't know.

• 37:57Speaker 00

  Yeah. Let's finish up this discussion with your investments. OG, here in August, what should I be looking at with my investments tax wise if I'm auditing?

• 38:07Speaker 04

  Tax wise on investments? Well, I guess you probably just look and see what's the best performer for the year and then make sure all your money's in it.

• 38:15Speaker 00

  That's it.

• 38:15Speaker 04

  You know?

• 38:16Speaker 00

  Tax wise, though.

• 38:18Speaker 04

  Yeah, taxes be damned. That's my answer. It's like, if you don't have the number one performer as of August 1, statistically, you are going to lose money next year. So.

• 38:29Speaker 00

  Yeah, your goal is to pay more in taxes. What are you doing staying diversified? Like, let's get with it.

• 38:33Speaker 04

  Yeah, I, on the tax front with investments, I think there's a couple of major levers that you can pull. I think you can be strategic around IRA conversions if that's something that's going on in your world and you've got pre-tax money and you have an idea of where those brackets are, but I wouldn't do that until December or, you know, like Thanksgiving time, because you need to have some pretty good certainty on where your, where your income's going to be. The second thing is certainly on capital gains treatment and tax loss harvesting. The jury's out on whether or not the juice is worth the squeeze there if you're not very, very, very tactical. Don't have an exact system built in, but I will tell you one thing that I think is is uniformly true now.

• 39:14Speaker 04

  Across the board, there is no reason if you have non-qualified assets, if you have a regular brokerage account. There is no reason to be donating money to charity via cash instead of a donor advised fund. It's inexpensive. It takes a little bit of time, but it's not the end of the world. And if you're going to say, well, I only do a hundred dollars a month in my church envelope. Awesome. Take that out of the frigging highest tax thing that you have in your investment account. And put the hundred dollars a month back in your investment account and buy the rebuy the thing at a higher basis. You know, so you're you're giving the charity the tax problem, which they don't, they don't deal with, right?

• 39:55Speaker 04

  They skip taxes and you don't pay taxes and you get to replenish your investment account or re, you know, rebasis your tax account. I don't know how to say it any differently. Like you're, you're basically right sizing it. You know, from a tax standpoint. It's $50 a month. Like where's the cutoff? I just don't see why you wouldn't do this. You know, record keeping wise is one line item. Like charitable fund donation 1,500 bucks this year. Done. You don't have to keep track of all the receipts. You know, people will say to me, well, you know, we just like to give a little bit to a lot of different places. No problem. You just go online and do it. You just have to sit down and do it. The only reason you don't want to do this is because of your own personal vanity of you want to like hand the check.

• 40:38Speaker 04

  You know what I mean? Like you want to be seen filling out the check and putting it in the envelope and putting it in the church plate.

• 40:45Speaker 00

  Or skipping the envelope and handing it to somebody to show that you're a good, good person.

• 40:49Speaker 04

  Yeah. Jesus don't care. He's good, man. He got enough. He's okay. However, you send it to him. You know, or whoever, doesn't have to be Jesus. You can send your money to anybody. But especially as it compounds over time, you know, you think, okay, if I'm 30, what's the value of stripping off my highest tax stuff every year for my charitable contribution? Even if you're only giving away a little bit of money. You just strip that off, or you're trying to build that muscle. You don't know where you want to give the money away yet, but you know, you want to be charitable. And so you're like, I don't, I don't believe in anything strong enough to give them any of my money, but I want to build that muscle. Boom. You put it in the donor advice fund. You don't have to give it out of the donor advice fund. The donation, the charity that you're doing, the charitable event is when

• 41:31Speaker 04

  you take it from your brokerage account goes in the donor advice fund. So I think everybody should have one of those. So if you have charity on top of mind.

• 41:40Speaker 00

  We will link to, by the way, donor advice funds is a whole different episode on its own. We spoke with Adam Nash, who was the creator of Daffy, a donor advice fund company. We'll link to that in the show notes. If you want to go deeper on donor advice funds. What about evaluating OG, your tax location, like asset location, you know, I've got something that throws off a lot of dividends in my non-qualified account. I got pretty tax efficient stuff in my IRA. Do we want to tweak that too?

• 42:09Speaker 04

  I mean, it's definitely 401 stuff. I'm not, there's bigger, bigger problems to have than.

• 42:17Speaker 00

  Yeah. Again, juice squeeze.

• 42:19Speaker 04

  I mean, what are you talking about? You have a million dollars in your brokerage account. A diversified ETF portfolio is going to kick off 20 grand of dividends, which by the way, are taxed at a pretty preferential rate relative to income.

• 42:31Speaker 00

  It's not zero, but it's not the first thing you're looking at.

• 42:34Speaker 04

  I mean, it could be zero. Dividends are tax free up to a certain amount. So.

• 42:37Speaker 00

  Yeah. I want to end on this. Who should be doing these things themselves and who really needs that professional tax person?

• 42:47Speaker 04

  I think that this is a great linkage to my HVAC story from earlier last week, I guess, maybe toward the end of a show, you may be caught it. But Doug said it succinctly. So I'm gonna give Doug all the props in the world. Mad props.

• 43:01Speaker 00

  What's going on Doug?

• 43:02Speaker 04

  Whoa. You were like, you got three choices. Your choices are get a second opinion, become an expert on your own, and whatever the third one was. So.

• 43:16Speaker 04

  I really took it to heart.

• 43:17Speaker 02

  Find somebody you trust and stick with them.

• 43:19Speaker 04

  There you go. Find somebody you trust. So yeah, I think you're one of those three people, right? You either have the competence and the time and energy to devote to it. In which case friggin get after it. If you don't and the impacts are big enough, then yeah, I think you need to look for outside help.

• 43:36Speaker 00

  Big thing today, stackers. It's a good time to be a planner. So your mid-year tax checkup, project your full year income, estimate what your total tax is, add up what you've already paid, find out whether you're on track, and then begin tweaking based on all that. We have all these moves and more in our tax guide. If you go to stackybenjamins.com/guides, you'll see our tax guide and that's a nice place to start to begin getting your handle on how this whole tax planning thing works. That's a wrap on our big focus, tax planning.

• 44:14Speaker 00

  It is financial action month here, mom's basement. And if you're playing stacko with us, let's take a look, guys, because the stacko board looks a lot like the bingo board. We've got scout is the free space in the middle. OG, pick one of these off that our stackers can do today. Maybe takes them 10, 15 minutes and we put some money in people's pockets. Let's do it.

• 44:34Speaker 04

  I can do anyone I want. I can tell you what I just did.

• 44:37Speaker 00

  Oh, good.

• 44:37Speaker 04

  I just got an email from Apple saying that their Apple one subscription is increasing the price. And so I went online and I checked. So number six, check your subscriptions. I went through and I figured out that it's not better for us to bundle it as a family because the people don't use all of the things like we use two of them. So we're going to unsubscribe from, from the ones that we don't use and basically unbundle the service and save myself 150 bucks a year.

• 45:06Speaker 00

  That's fantastic. Yeah, we canceled Apple for the summer. I think we're going to get it back in a couple of months. There's now a couple of series on there that we want to watch, but that's a great one.

• 45:15Speaker 04

  Well, you're talking about Apple TV. I'm talking about like the whole Apple.

• 45:18Speaker 00

  Ecosystem thing.

• 45:19Speaker 04

  Thing. Yeah.

• 45:20Speaker 00

  Yeah. Yeah. Check your subscription, stackers. That is number six on the list. Pause the podcast, do that right now and you will put some money in your pocket. But here's the thing, OG, don't just cancel the subscription. Take that money now and spend it to one of your accounts.

• 45:41Speaker 02

  Go to Culvers.

• 45:42Speaker 00

  Exactly. Oh, man.

• 45:43Speaker 04

  And if you don't know, I will just add to this. If you don't know where your subscriptions are, you can use the field kit. You can cancel everything right from there.

• 45:50Speaker 00

  Take the field kit. The field kit's the old vault. Stack your Benjamins.com/fieldkit and they'll cancel it for you. And hopefully by this point, OG, as you and I talked offline, hopefully field kit's open. If it's not, it says join the waitlist. So it might be a day or two before you are able to do it. But oh, man, I am hoping by the time people hear this, the field kit is open. All right. Thank you so much for spending time with us. If you know somebody who needs that mid-year checkup, maybe they mentioned they got a big bonus this year. Maybe they mentioned that they're still working on their taxes for this year and they need to be a little better organized, whatever it might be. Great time.

• 46:28Speaker 04

  Hey, I'm organized. I have piles right here.

• 46:32Speaker 00

  Somebody feels seen, Doug. Somebody feels like I'm talking directly.

• 46:34Speaker 04

  I will tell you, I am. I am happy. Sometimes you find little tax surprises. So in my infinite wisdom last year, I might add, my infinite wisdom, I paid my property taxes twice in 2025.

• 46:47Speaker 00

  Bam.

• 46:48Speaker 04

  Bang, oh, bang, oh, double tax benefit. Now, of course, this causes a little bit of a tax problem in 26, but that is 26 a problem to deal with.

• 46:57Speaker 00

  That's a story for another day.

• 46:59Speaker 04

  Swim in the Scrooge McDuck money of 2025 for a while. Yeah, buddy. Good job, OG.

• 47:05Speaker 00

  Strategery. Which one is that? There's, there's 25 spaces on Stacko. That must have been space 26. Pay your property taxes twice.

• 47:12Speaker 04

  Double pay. Pull forward, pull forward expenses. Yeah.

• 47:16Speaker 00

  Ah, that's gonna do it for today. Doug, what should we have learned on today's show?

• 47:20Speaker 02

  Well, Joe, first, take some advice from our tax discussion. Taxes are a lot less taxing if you do some tax planning proactively instead of just reaching to your tax mess next year. Tried to squeeze two or three more taxes in there, but it was two. Okay, one more time, I gotta say it. It was too taxing. Second, that Stacko tip, go do it now. You get to use that cool red Stamper thing you bought just for Stacko. But the big lesson, don't tell Joe's mom. She's Martha Stewart of Texarkana. Apparently that doesn't make her happy because she'll just correct you and say that Martha is the Joe's mom of Connecticut. Not sure why that's triggering, but I'd stay away from it anyway.

• 48:04Speaker 02

  What are you waiting for? Grab your Stacko board and play along at stackingbenjamins.com/stacko. Everybody's doing it. This show is the property of SP Podcasts LLC, copyright 2026, and is created by Joe Saul Sehi. You'll find out about our awesome team at stackingbenjamins.com, along with the show notes, and how you can find us on YouTube and all the usual social media spots. Come say hello. And oh yeah, before I go, not only should you not take advice from these nerds, don't take advice from people you don't know. This show is for entertainment purposes only. Before making any financial decisions, speak with a real financial advisor.

• 48:46Speaker 02

  I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug, and we'll see you next time, back here at the Stacking Benjamin Show.

• 48:59Speaker 06

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• 50:10Speaker 00

  Welcome to the after show. This is the part of the show that doesn't exist. What's going on with your air conditioning that we're going to talk about?

• 50:18Speaker 04

  This is just a question that I have, and I would appreciate. Any HVAC professional to walk me through this because I'm not an HVAC pro.

• 50:29Speaker 02

  Who knows?

• 50:30Speaker 04

  That's not, that's not my jam. I can change oil in a car. If you buy the oil for me, jack the car up, show me the screwdriver I need to get the oil out. And exactly what oil looks like, then I can get the oil out.

• 50:46Speaker 04

  Why is my oil pink? It's like, oh my God.

• 50:48Speaker 02

  Yeah. Tell me you don't know how to change oil without telling me.

• 50:53Speaker 04

  I did actually change a complete, like now we're going to be totally off the rails. I did change a tire in front of my kids once and they're like, what are you doing? And I'm like, I'm showing you how to do this. And I actually did it like first go, no, didn't miss anything. Didn't, didn't like, you know, you had to like take the lug nuts off before you jack the tire up. So you get the little torque, you know? And I'm like, I didn't miss any of that. And I was pretty proud of myself.

• 51:14Speaker 02

  Were you brave enough to drive the car away after you changed the tire?

• 51:19Speaker 04

  No, but I did have a time where I was trying to jump one of my kids' cars with a, and it wouldn't, it wouldn't take. And so I called my brother and he's like, what do, what do you got it connected to? And I told him, he goes, oh yeah, that's insulated. Like it's a big metal bolt in the engine. He goes, yeah, but it's insulated. You gotta try something different. And as soon as I did, you know, it was a big spark and the car starts up right away. You know, you're like, oh, anyways, I digress. Here's the problem. So our AC goes out. It's 150 million degrees in Dallas. Thankfully we have more than one. So like a little part of the house is like potter than the face of the sun and another part is tolerable. And, um, you know, we called the emergency number, people come out the next morning and this kid's like, and I say

• 52:01Speaker 04

  kid, cause this 22 year old service tech person explained what's going on. He goes out, tests a bunch of things and comes back and says, here's what's wrong. The power line from the unit outside to the unit inside is not connected. You know, it's broken. It must've frayed. It's not getting power. So you need a new one of those. And I was like, okay. What's the ticket? You know, what's the jam? What are we doing? He goes, well, first of all, I can't get to it till next Thursday, a week from now. Secondly, it's going to be pretty pricey because we got to run this conduit up to your roof line and drill a hole in your roof. And then, you know, this is a big project, can take us all day. It's going to be three grand. And I'm like, holy schnikes. Okay.

• 52:40Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 52:40Speaker 04

  And I argued with him a little bit. I'm like, why can't you fish it through the existing wire, all this other sort of stuff? And he says on the way out, he goes, look, we're not the cheapest guy in town, so you'll probably find somebody cheaper. You know, but we guarantee our work, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But if I were you, I would shop it because, you know, you might be able to find somebody that can do this sooner than next Thursday. Which obviously it's a thousand degrees in Texas. So, you know, I'm trying to get done. So we call another guy that we had done, done some work with before. He comes over later that day. Same story. Here's what's going on. Here's what he says. What's the, what did the other guy say? And I told him and he just kind of looks like, hmm, that's not a normal. I could tell he was like, that's not a normal problem. Like it could be a problem, but it's not a normal problem. Comes over, gets out his tools and he goes, well, if it doesn't have power,

• 53:26Speaker 04

  you know, then this little tool I have here wouldn't be lighting up like a Christmas tree. So you got power. That's not the issue. The issue's got to be this sensor here and let me try it. And he, you know, he's talking through what he's doing. I don't know the first damn thing what he's doing, but he's, you know, this reset button's not resetting. He goes, is the breaker off? And I go, well, it's in the garage. I don't know. And he goes, no, the breaker's right here. Did it trip yesterday when this one off? And I was like,

• 53:51Speaker 04

  I don't, I wouldn't know. And so he rewires some stuff, you know, goes, okay, I think this, you know, and then he goes to the breaker, flips it on and it runs. He goes, there you go. Okay. Yeah, you're good. You know, of course I'm like flabbergasted that this guy fixed it. It's amazing. It's like miracle work. He wants 300 bucks, which is totally fine, totally respectable, but he said, I don't want any of your money yet because I want to make sure this is actually the fix. He's like, I fixed it, but I want to make sure that this, there's nothing else that was broken because of the fact that this thing effectively overheated and it tripped this system that is designed to make it so that you don't cause further damage, but let's run it for the day and call me later.

• 54:30Speaker 00

  Cool.

• 54:30Speaker 04

  I was like, well, let me pay you. You know, he goes, nah, you're good. Okay. So here's my question to all the HVAC people.

• 54:38Speaker 04

  Is there some sort of like, like, like, how do I know that I'm not getting totally screwed along the way? Because if I would have called that second guy, the first guy was very convinced that this was the problem. And it clearly wasn't the problem. And there's a pretty big disparity between three grand and 300 bucks. And the fact that this other guy like literally was like, well, did he try this? And like, holds the electrical thing up to the wire, you know, goes, well, there's power. Like, didn't he check that? Like, it was just like, you know, maybe it's a little how I feel. Like when I meet with a client and they're like, well, I have a guy that does it. And you're like, wait, how did you do this? Like, why did you do it this way? Like, this is completely wrong. You know, this isn't the law.

• 55:22Speaker 04

  Maybe it's the same sort of experience. I was telling Doug this story earlier. I wrote an email to the company. I said, I'm going to choose to believe that you guys aren't screwing people out of their money on purpose, that this is maybe just a training issue. Like, maybe just this guy needs a little bit more education or experience, but you might want to invest in that. But how do we handle this? You know, as non-educated consumers of this particular, or any particular industry? Like, because, you know, you got the, one of the biggest companies in Dallas that comes out and goes, hey, very confidently, like, I checked everything, boom, boom, boom. Here's the, here's the problem, not great news, we're going to fix it for you. Can't do it till Thursday. You know, you're like, okay. You know, what if I didn't have another guy? I'm sitting, it's frigging 100 degrees in my house for the next week.

• 56:07Speaker 04

  Going to spend $3,000, only to find out, by the way, that that wasn't the fix. Because they would have done all that and then gone, oh, that ain't it.

• 56:14Speaker 02

  This is just like every other service that you have to use in your life. All the way from, you know, the top most educatedly required service, whether it's doctors or nuclear fission scientists, all the way down to HVAC.

• 56:30Speaker 04

  Use those guys all the time.

• 56:31Speaker 00

  All the time.

• 56:32Speaker 02

  I know, right? I mean, you just have to either find somebody you trust, or have a second opinion, or get yourself educated. I can't think of a third.

• 56:43Speaker 00

  Fourth option.

• 56:44Speaker 04

  I mean, is there a chance that this was just a big scammy scammy McScamerson? I don't know. I tend not to believe that's not the case. Just maybe it's an education thing.

• 56:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, I would believe it's not the case only for one reason. I don't think he would have told you to shop him because he couldn't get to it so quickly. If, if he was scamming you, if he was scamming you, he would have tried to get your money today.

• 57:05Speaker 04

  But I will tell you that the invoice that they sent just said, service required 2,900 bucks.

• 57:11Speaker 00

  Wow.

• 57:11Speaker 04

  Like it didn't say like, wow, like I would want to see labor for guys at $200 an hour times three hours, you know, like that I can wrap my head around, you know, 67 feet of high density, 24 volt cable, 67 feet of conduit, you know, like whatever you're like, okay, this guy, you know, we priced this out and that's how much it costs, you know, they've got a markup, I get that, but a line item that says fix it three grand.

• 57:43Speaker 02

  I'm with Joe. I think this is like technician error. By that, I mean, he just was moving too fast, didn't assume the simplest issue may be the issue.

• 57:55Speaker 04

  What's that, the Akam's razor thing? The most likely thing is the, is the most likely thing.

• 57:59Speaker 02

  Exactly right. Yeah. And so, and he just kind of, he had a fork in the road and he took the more complicated path, but I don't think it was a scam because I think Joe nailed it.

• 58:09Speaker 04

  Scammy, it's just, it's like, I guess, I guess my question isn't the scam part. It's more about like, how do you protect yourself against?

• 58:16Speaker 00

  The wrong diagnosis.

• 58:17Speaker 02

  Well, you did it, right? You did it because if I remember the story you were telling me, you got this big number and you're like, your spidey senses went off and you're like, hold on. And then you asked.

• 58:27Speaker 04

  Well, mostly I was like, I'm going to be on vacation for a week. I can't have my house be a hundred degrees and I can't not go on vacation, obviously.

• 58:34Speaker 02

  But something didn't smell right to you and you're like, I better get a second opinion. And you asked Lissa and she had somebody else you guys had used in the past. So you called him and then he showed up and he was awesome. So I mean, it's just, you just got to trust your, your gut on some of those cases.

• 58:49Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 58:51Speaker 04

  Anyways, AC was fixed yesterday. So got that going for me, which is nice.

• 58:56Speaker 00

  300 instead of three grand. Well, I just think my rule of thumb is if maybe if it has a comma in it, I get a second opinion.

• 59:05Speaker 00

  If the bill has a comma, just ask more than one person. I don't know. I'd love to hear stackers. Let us know either chat about it in mom's basement, our Facebook group, or write to us, [email protected]. Imagine how grumpy OG would have been this whole episode if he didn't have his AC fixed. If we were recording this and he was, if it was 142 in his house.

• 59:31Speaker 04

  Yeah. Well, like I mentioned there, we do have a few, a couple of other ones. So it was just another wing in the house.

• 59:40Speaker 00

  He'd go over to the east wing for the day.

• 59:45Speaker 00

  He'll have Jeeves shut off that part of the house.

• 59:47Speaker 04

  Shut off the west wing, the library.

• 59:53Speaker 00

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