How To Get Rich ft. Ramit Sethi 01:04:10

- It's Sophia Franklin. You are listening to Sophia with an F and the F is for phenomenal. This podcast is rated F. I know in my last relationship, my boyfriend would pay for everything. I'm putting everything into savings and that's our fun money that we'll use. - Okay. - We did break up though. So I kind of came out the winner there. - Yeah. - But. - Huh, interesting.

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Hi everybody, welcome to Sophia with an F, welcome back. If you haven't already, hit the subscribe button. You know you wanna do it and I am way more entertaining on camera, 100%. I know it's hard to believe but I really am. Today I am talking to a guest who is going to make us rich, is that correct? - That's right. - I'm talking to Ramit Sethi who is a finance expert, New York Times bestselling author and is probably all

over your TV screens right now. Every single time I open Netflix, it's you. That's what I like to hear. Every single time. And it's a great picture of you. Thank you. Just wanted to let you know. And your Netflix series is called How to Get Rich. Yep. So thank you so much for being here. Welcome. Thank you. We've had a very eventful past 30 minutes. I had to do three wardrobe changes. I smell like an onion.

Yeah, she got too nervous and started smelling like an onion. That is not what happened. We were arguing over who gets to sit in the chair you're sitting in because my left side profile is way cuter. Yeah, but I need every advantage I can get. But then you're saying that your left side looks better. Yeah.

And are you positive about that or was it just like a power struggle thing? No, I'm sure. I've had like hundreds of cameras on me now. And like I said, I'll take any advantage I can get. I feel like you're going to be good from any angle. I'll take this angle. Do you know how nice I am that I let you sit in that chair? You are nice. I feel it. You do? I feel the love. Okay, good. I love it. So Remy, I am so excited to have you here. We are going to get into how to get rich. I have questions that are

Probably things you have not been asked before. Okay. Are we going to look at your money? A hundred percent. Okay. But we're not going to say it out loud. Maybe. I don't know. We'll see. We'll see how fucking rowdy we get. Maybe how many commas are in that number. It depends on the commas. Exactly. And you're wait quickly. Cause I did, I need to ask you this before we even dive in your New York times bestselling book was called. I will teach you to be rich. Did anyone try to sue you?

No one was like, it didn't happen, fuck you, lawsuit? No. Okay, so why did we call the Netflix show something different? Great, now that is a great question. Okay. If it were up to me, you know I'd have I Will Teach You To Be Rich brand consistency. But they have a very small tile.

that little icon on Netflix. So we've got to have a name that shows up instantly. Okay. Yeah. So it was not a legal issue at all. No. They weren't scared about that. I don't think Netflix is scared of my legal team. No, I thought maybe Netflix would be scared. No. Okay. So I can literally be like, I will give you an orgasm.

Yeah. Who's going to sue you for that? That would get them some good press. No, I don't think so. That's a little bit different. I will give you a Lamborghini if you watch this. I could title a movie that. I don't know. I think that's a good idea, though. I think you should definitely do it.

This is, can we talk about this the entire fucking time? You're like, what podcast am I on? I ask the real hard hitting questions. Can I title my next special? I will give you a Lamborghini. Ramit Sethi, not a lawyer. What is your legal expert advice?

yeah can we talk about like how much legal background you have no we're gonna get into money all right because everyone's obsessed with it and you know how to make people rich and i'm gonna leave here rich i feel yeah wealthy yeah like old money wealthy just like being in your aura that's how it should be in your presence okay

When I was watching the show, because I was watching it last night, fascinating, incredible. You have a very different approach to money than my financial advisor does. And I think a lot of people do. Yeah. Well, I think that most of us, when we think about money, we feel overwhelmed. We feel guilty.

We feel like someone's gonna come out and just tell us all the things we're doing wrong. You know, you shouldn't be spending money on lattes. You should set up a really complicated trust.

And it's not fun. It's not fun. And the way I look at money is, I look at money and I see a beautiful cashmere coat. I look at it and I see a trip for a family to go to Disneyland or two people dating to go out to an amazing restaurant in the city. And I see joy and possibility. And so when people talk about money, what I really want them to start with is, what is your rich life?

And if we can start there and you can get excited and you can tell me what that is really specifically, then we can use money to get there. - Okay. So you take the approach of it's not like,

What do we have to not do? Right. Which, I mean, that's how I grew up. Save everything. Don't buy anything. If you are going to buy something, it better be a house. Okay. This one I need to talk to you about. We got to get into this. All right. First episode. You like roll your eyes when I think it was a couple, they wanted to buy a house. And you're like, this shit is so fucking stupid. You did not say this shit is so fucking stupid.

But you said there people are obsessed and think owning a home is like the epitome of wealth or smart wealth, right? We're obsessed with home ownership in this country. And I have some things that are going to surprise some people. So owning a home can be good.

But sometimes renting can be a better financial decision. And as an example, I have rented for about 20 years by choice. I can go out and buy a place today. And I've made more money renting than owning. And people go, what's this guy talking about? He's saying the sky is green.

In a city like New York, where we are right now, if you run the numbers, especially in an expensive neighborhood, it actually makes very little financial sense to buy. So when I lived pretty close by, I kept a close eye on the market. If I were to buy the same size, same view, same square footage, I would have paid 2.2 times more

than I was renting and I'd have to go to Home Depot, maintain all this stuff, pay interest, opportunity cost. I said, "No, I'm just gonna rent. "If anything breaks, I text somebody." And I took the difference and I invested it, which made me way more money. So I'm not saying it's a bad idea to own, but I am saying for the biggest purchase of your life, you've got to run the numbers.

So, okay. I want you to run that back just a little bit in layman's terms because with renting, I understand because I looked into buying an apartment here as well. And I think the closing cost was, it was definitely six figures easy. Like what six, what six figure? I think it was like a hundred K. Okay, great. But that was just the closing cost. Yes. Okay. Let's talk about that. That's awesome that you ran that number. Most people don't even think about that.

So you were already ahead of the game. - They don't think about that. What, they just show up to sign and then figure it out? - Yes, because in America we are told that buying a house means you are successful. Buying a house is the best investment. We hear these phrases so much that they almost become religious to us. We just repeat them without ever thinking about them. You're throwing money away on rent. Funny, we never say you're throwing money away eating out at a restaurant. You're paying your landlord's mortgage.

How come no one's ever concerned that you're paying the owner of that sushi restaurant's mortgage? We have these phrases. We never really think about it. So what we do say is granny bought a house in Austin, Texas in 1970 for $200,000. And granny just sold it for a million dollars. Grandma made $800,000. We basically take the big number and subtract the other number.

But that's not really true. If you run the numbers carefully like you did, you have to factor in closing costs, you have to factor in all the interest you're paying, which is a lot of interest, the opportunity cost of taking the money you put on a down payment which you could have just invested, and then all these repairs and inflation. These are all what I call phantom costs. - Phantom costs, I like that. - It's like swimming with 20 pound weights on your arms.

You think you're going far, but you're actually slowed down. So what I want people to do for the biggest purchase of their lives like a house is what you did. Run the numbers. You can go online. You can search for a buy versus rent calculator. And the big message I have, especially for young people watching, is never feel guilty about renting.

It can actually be a great decision. You do need to make sure you're also investing, but there's an obsession in this country about owning a house and I don't think you have to own a house to be successful. - Well, that comparison you made, renting versus going out to dinner and spending that kind of money,

when you put it that way, like it's stupid, right? - Yeah, I mean-- - Like they're both similar things. - Yeah, when I ask people, what is your rich life? A lot of people will tell me freedom. I go, freedom, what does that mean, freedom? And they go like, I wanna be able to go where I want, when I want. I go, fantastic.

and then many of those very same people just put their entire life savings in a 30-year mortgage i go where's the freedom in that right some of them have very good reasons they want to live in a certain school district they want to redecorate or they just want to that's totally okay i don't want people blindly making decisions about their money just because some uncle somewhere told them to yes although we can agree real estate great investment

- If it makes sense. - Sometimes. - If the numbers make sense. - If the numbers make sense, yes. - What is the best investment? - There's no such thing, but I'll tell you what I tell my family when they ask where should I put my money. I will tell them that my favorite investment

for almost everybody is something called a target date fund. Let me make it really simple. Imagine a pie. All you have to do is pick the fund based on the year that you will retire. So if you're going to retire in 2050, there's a fund called Vanguard 2050 or Schwab 2050, Fidelity, whatever.

All you do is you put your money in there every month automatically. - Okay, is that like a SEP IRA? - Good question, a SEP IRA-- - Because I know what that is. - Yeah, you know it 'cause you run your own business. Okay, awesome. So a SEP IRA, think of your house

in each room a room is like a SEP IRA you have a SEP IRA some people have a Roth IRA a 401k yeah fantastic inside each of those rooms you want to have some furniture and the furniture you choose is your investment so you've got a SEP IRA which is awesome because you can contribute a lot of money gives you some tax advantages within a SEP IRA you've still got to invest your money

- Got it. - And that's where you would do something like a target date fund. - Okay, I'm smiling right now because I worked at Morgan Stanley for, I don't know, four or five years for a team of financial advisors. Everything you just said,

Right over my head. I don't remember one of those things. I'm like, what was I doing those five years? No, it's okay. It's okay. This stuff is, it seems complicated, but also Wall Street makes it complicated for us. They'll tell you that you need to hire experts to help you with it. They'll tell you that you need financial advisors. I got to tell you about this. Your old colleagues are not going to like this, but let me tell you the truth.

Some people pay financial advisors. Did you get to the point in the show where I talked about 1% fees? No. All right. Let me just... But I pay that. You do? Oh my God. I really trust him. It's actually a financial advisor I used to work for. Wow. That's so great. All right. Is he going to watch this? Give it to me straight. All right. Fine. No, but I'm going to send him a clip. All right. You're going to... All right. Send him a clip after you fire him because this is what's about to happen. You make a lot of money. You're young.

Over the course of your life, do you have any sense how much you think you will pay this financial advisor in fees over the course of your life? So if it's just 1%, I have a very safe stock portfolio with this financial advisor. And then on E-Trade, I like do my crazy shit. Okay.

So I'm not really planning on making that much money back. And I know it's going to be like 10 years from now. Okay. So the 1%, I mean, I don't know what it will be. Like in dollar values, when you go out to eat at a restaurant, how much do you pay for dinner? Let's just say like a hundred bucks. Yeah. Okay.

How much do you think from now until you retire, just total ballpark, that you would feel comfortable paying this financial advisor? Probably like a thousand a year. Okay. Maybe, maybe three. I'd go up to three. Three thousand a year? Mm-hmm. Okay, very good.

can we run some numbers i'm really scared you should be scared can we run some numbers yeah you're gonna tell me mine or yours we're talking we're here to talk about you well apparently so you think that you'll probably pay him something like just to make the math easy like 30 to 90 000 in fees

like a thousand dollars a year for the next 30 years. Yeah. Maybe even 3000. No, I probably pay him 3000 a year if I had to guess. 3000 a year. So 90,000, let's even say a hundred thousand. That's a lot. Oh, it is? Because the actual number is actually multiples of that. It's going to be hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees. If we ran that math, knowing a ballpark of what you make, it's probably more like 500,000 to a million dollars in fees.

Okay. Well, that's terrifying. So basically what I should do is look at my Morgan Stanley account, see what stocks he has me in, write them down, fire him, go over to E-Trade, do it myself.

- Yes, all except for the part where you write it down 'cause I really don't give a shit what he has you in. - Exactly. - Why does somebody of your age, young, entrepreneur on the rise, need to have a conservative stock? Why? - Well, I mean, he has it conservative and then I do my other shit. - Do you know why he has it conservative for you? I'm gonna tell you. Because

I have to stay with him forever? Because most people who don't know a lot about money, they love the word safe. People who don't know a lot about money are terrified of losing money. They're terrified. So their advisors will say something like, they'll say it in code. Let me tell you what they say and let me tell you what they really mean. They'll go, we're not here to try to beat the market. What we do is make sure your money's safe because you're an entrepreneur. We know you want to focus on your business. And so we keep your money safe. That way, it's always going to be there for you.

And as you hear that, how does it make you feel? It makes me feel warm and fuzzy. Yeah. It's like, oh my God, he gets me. He gets me. Meanwhile, they're taking... Daddy vibes. And they are taking hundreds of thousands of dollars. Now, I don't mind paying for good advice. I don't mind. I don't mind paying for a great restaurant. But if you went to a restaurant and they tried to charge you 1% of your portfolio, would you pay?

What the hell does that even mean 1% of my proof exactly exactly? Thank you. I

It's engineered, the way they charge is engineered to be confusing because normal people like you and me do not think in terms of percentages. We go, look, just tell me how much it's gonna cost every year. - Okay, but also if he's putting me in like the riskiest investments, then he can also win big really fast. - You don't need that. Okay, how old are you? - 30. - 30, phenomenal. And the income you have today, would you say that over the course of your life, it's probably gonna go up? - Yes. - Yeah, I think so too. So right now the money you've got in there,

you can afford to let that sit and grow for the next 30 plus years, right? So you can afford a little bit of volatility. It can go up, it can go down, no big deal. Over the course of the last 100 years, the S&P 500, it's just this index of the stocks, has gone up roughly about 10% per year on average. Some years it goes up 15, some years it goes down five, whatever. When you take out inflation,

It's 7% per year. Now, 7%, what does that mean? Most people have no idea. What that means is if you just put money in right now, it doubles every 10 years and it keeps doubling. And at 30, that is a lot of money. You don't need risky stuff. You don't need to be super conservative. It's not like you're about to retire tomorrow. Your money can just sit and ride and grow to huge dollar amounts. If we calculate it right now, you won't even believe how much money you're going to have.

i mean trust me after this episode is done you're gonna give me a whole plan done a whole financial you just do it on camera well we actually will we will get to that oh okay wow and then you're gonna tell everybody how much you made this because this became a coaching session today

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Your cash back really adds up. Okay, we're going to do a hard swerve because my podcast, primarily we talk about sex, relationships, which let's get into relationships and money. Yeah. Because that is a huge thing.

A large amount of divorces have at least some strain of financial disagreement in them. Right. It's not over sex. It's not over, I was about to say cheating. That's probably not true. But finance is a thing. It's not about cheating. It's about how they allocated their Roth IRA. Right. Ah, I just can't take it. Right. So I want to ask you, do you think men should pay for everything?

No. Okay. Let me rephrase. No, no, no. Let's stick with that. No, let me rephrase. First date. And I'm not asking you personally. First date. Should a guy pick up the bill? I don't mind if a guy picks up the bill. I remember being single in New York, going out for lots of dates. I think that if we're talking about heterosexual relationship, I think that you can stand out

as a woman by offering and by really meaning it. But I don't mind if the guy says, "Hey, you know, I asked her out. I want to pick up the check." No problem. - Women do not listen to what he just said. - Yeah. - Do not listen to what he just said. - You don't think that you should even offer? - Never. - Okay. - Never. - Okay. - So you're telling me if you go out on a date with a woman when you were single and she pulled out her credit card, you'd be like, "Damn, I want to tap that ass."

That's, uh, I don't think I made that connection. Well, if she was using a really good credit card, I'd be like, okay. Yeah. Or like, you know, she's like chase Sapphire reserve. I like to maximize my rewards. I'd be like, damn. If she was using a bank of America debit card, I'd be like, this date is over immediately. We are done. Done. Okay. So you won't date a broke bitch.

I won't date someone who uses a debit card. Why would you? It's no good. Right. And if, you know, yeah, when people are putting out their credit cards on the table, you know, I'm taking a look. I'm making notes. You take a little look. Yeah. So anyway, if someone offered, I think it's very generous. And I think whether it's on the first date, whether it's on a second date, a third date, I love generosity in a relationship. And I think you can be generous always.

Both partners can be generous in whatever way is meaningful to the other. Okay, so you like it because you can see that she's generous not because it's like she's flexing Yeah, totally. I don't care about the flex. I

But you also want her to be independent, right? That's hot. Yeah, yeah. I think that's amazing to be able to say, hey, I'd love to pick this up, to have the confidence to be able to say that. That's awesome. Okay, let me ask you this. Would you let her pay for it? Or would you say, no, no, no, no, put your card away? I think first date,

Answer correctly, please. Yeah, I wouldn't. I mean, I can't even think of it actually happening. So maybe they took your advice, you know? Okay, so that's never happened to you. I'm trying to think. I'm racking my brain right now. But let's say we go out for a third date. We went somewhere else. We go to get drinks. They go, I'd like to get this round.

On a third date, I think that that's pretty meaningful to me. Okay. Maybe people are different. I don't know. I think generosity is really attractive in a relationship. I agree. Yeah. But I just think, you know, there's different ways to be generous. I agree. So in your mind, to stay on the dating thing for a second. Oh, we're going to stay on it. Okay. Should a woman ever offer to pay? I think she can, but...

but for different reasons, I will do it because I want to feel out his response. - So if he says yes, then you're like, I'm out of here. - I'm out. - Okay, so you're testing him. - Yes. - Okay, and does that work? - It depends. I mean, I'm not like, you know, if I go to Walgreens and I'm picking us up popcorn and a DVD, 'cause those still exist. - You can tell that this is such a fake example. She just said it herself. If I'm picking up a DVD, oh, please carry on with this totally real example.

at Redbox with some Twizzlers. No, but obviously I'm not gonna be like, babe, can you hurry and Venmo me? Or can you like, you know, can I come grab your card? Okay, I have a question for you. When you go on dates, I'm sure there's some times where you earn a lot more than he does. Mm-hmm.

yeah right maybe one time okay what happens in that case i think he i never really knew his finances and he didn't want me to know and he would flex so much but i had an idea okay so i was just letting him flex okay okay okay i think that's interesting because i had a couple i have a lot of couples on my podcast who have differences in income in one case they were both in their 30s

She told me, she said, when we go out to dinner, I want him to pick up the check. And he was there on the podcast. He goes, yeah, I want to pick up the check. I slide my credit card across the table, but then she slides it back and says, no, I want you to put your money in your Roth IRA because you haven't been investing. Now I asked them, how much do you make? Can you guess the differences in income?

No. He just started a business. He's in his 30s. He pays himself $2,000 a month. He's just getting off the ground. She makes $200,000 per month. Okay. She makes a hundred times what he makes. Now, here's an interesting question. Who should pick up the tab? Okay. Well, now you're putting me in a, I mean. Yeah. This became my podcast now. You're trying to put me in the uncomfortable position. Who should pay? Okay.

She can pay for a certain period of time. Also, is she a cougar? No, no. Oh, they're both in their 30s. Fine. Okay, fine. In that situation, I think it's fine. Okay. But I think they're going to run into issues. They definitely have. That's why they came to see me. Not financial issues. She is going to lose respect for him. Okay.

And that brings me to the next thing I wanted to talk about is, so you've talked to, I mean, tens of hundreds of couples, right? About their finances. What dynamic have you seen works the best? The woman making more money, the man, and we're just talking obviously heterosexually. Okay. The dynamic, the most common dynamic that I've seen is he makes more.

The budding dynamic I've seen is she makes more, especially in cities. Women in their 20s are actually earning more than men. And that's causing a lot of dynamic changes like we were just talking about. Who pays? And, you know, if you just look at the numbers, if someone's making 100 times the other, they should probably pay. But gender roles are sticky. They're really hard to change. Yeah. Okay. So there's that. The biggest dynamic I see with couples who...

have problems with money is they never actually created a shared vision of a rich life. So they'll come to me, they'll be like fighting over Target, some $20 purchase. And they're really fighting, like it's a huge deal in their marriage. And I look at their numbers because I see all their income, everything, and I put it on screen.

And you're just like, this couple makes like $300,000 a year or they're in debt, whatever. And the thing that we fight over in relationships, which is, oh, I can't believe you spent that much on video games or groceries or Target is almost never the real problem. The real problem is we have two different views of how money should be spent and we never sat down and actually talked about our vision together. Yeah, I could definitely see that.

It's crazy how many people will get married. Oh yeah. And don't even know. The majority. The majority, really? Yeah, so we sat down. That's insane to me. My wife and I sat down. I still have the Google Calendar invite. And we sat down and we had an agenda. We're like, kids...

Name of kids, where do we wanna live? Like what if you found out-- - Was this on the first date? - No, hell no. - Or were we talking? - No, money people, they love to go out and give this advice. They're like, "You should talk about money on date one." I'm like, "Have you guys ever been on a first date?" You don't talk about your asset allocation on date one. - I'm all about doing that. - No way.

100%. 100%. What do you ask him? I make jokes. I'll be like, you know, he'll like flex in some way. And I will just subtly be like, oh my God, you're kind of rich. And then- They love it. They eat it up because it's such an outlandish thing to say. And- Meanwhile, she's got a notepad out. She's like, he laughed. What's the next data point I'm going to capture? Okay. Then what do you do? And-

And I'll just, you know, in a funny way, just kind of ask him. I won't say how much. I actually know it. Sometimes I will straight up say, how much do you make? And what do they say? They laugh and think I'm crazy. Do they tell you? No. They think I'm joking around. But you planted the seed. I planted the seed. Okay. All right. What if a guy did this? To me? Yeah.

I would say my finances don't matter. Oh, his do. His do. Okay. Because his are ours. Oh, and yours are whose? You know what? No, I sound very outdated. I'm a very progressive woman. I really am. Okay. I think I like what you were saying about how the lady said, save your $2,000 to her man. Put it in a Roth IRA. I know.

I know in my last relationship, my boyfriend would pay for everything. I'm putting everything into savings and that's our fun money that we'll use. We did break up though. So I kind of came out the winner there. Interesting. Okay. Did you actually...

sit down and agree on that or was it just an understanding? - We agreed on it. - You did like explicitly? - We verbally said it. - Wow, okay. Okay, despite the rest of it, that's cool. I love when couples talk about it and sometimes I hear couples and they tell me how they divide up their money. Sometimes it is seriously crazy.

but i ask them both does this work for you they go yeah i go do you understand the implications of this for example if one of you breaks up with the other etc here's what's going to happen they go yeah i go then fantastic you don't have to use my exact system i think it's pretty good it's pretty simple but

you know you your rich life is yours if you have an agreement with your partner and something makes sense one of you loves to go out to fancy restaurants and the other is perfectly fine with something a little simpler cool make it work for the two of you understand the implications and enjoy your rich life okay so let's say you've been dating someone because you think it's not kosher to ask on the first date no hell no

I like how you pretend it's like a joke, but every guy's like, yeah, we know what's going on here. But the thing is, no, because the issue with that usually is you don't want to think of this girl as a gold digger, right? But these men know that I'm successful in my own right. Right. Which is cool. So they know you, they know you're successful. Yeah. So in that case. So it's not like I, I'm asking because I need that.

Agreed. From them. But what if you find out they're also successful, but maybe 75% as financially successful as you? They would have to have a lot of other things going on for them. Okay. At that point. You want somebody who makes more than you? If they don't, I do. But if they don't, it's not a deal breaker, but they have to have a lot of other great things. Okay. Okay. You know what you want. Yeah. All right.

That's cool. Does the girl, I mean, you're marrying, but like, let's just say metaphorically, does she have to make as much as you or you don't give a fuck? No. When I was dating, I was not at, first of all, I wasn't doing what you do on day one. Uh, how much do you make? Ha ha ha.

No, I was not doing that. But I will tell you what, I picked up clues because all of us can pick up clues. What type of places do they go out to? Do they work out? Do they go to a workout class? Do they have a trainer? You pick up clues, right? And then there are some natural moments early on in a relationship where you can actually talk about money and it's not weird. Yeah. First trip.

hey, we're gonna take a trip together. Let's just call out the elephant in the room. Like, what are the expectations? Like, you know what, I'd love to pay for this. And this is my treat. I love this place. I'd love to share it with you. - Right. - Okay. Or it's moving in together. Certainly getting engaged, getting married. And I messed up on this one myself 'cause-- - I'm so excited to hear this. - In my book, in chapter nine, I talk about having the money conversation with your partner. You know, I have all these exactly what to say.

And she was my girlfriend at the time. She had asked me for some advice on her 401k. I was like, read this book. I gave her my book. I was like, come back to me in six weeks. - Google it. - Yeah. And so, I knew all about her finances. When we got engaged, she came to me and she was like, you know what? This doesn't feel good because you know everything about my finances and I don't know about yours. And I was like, oh shit, I violated my own rule, which is talk about money proactively.

So we sat down, we talked about money, we talked about my money, her money, our money. What does it mean that, like where do we want to live? How often do we want to travel? And so that opened up a lot of communication, but honestly that was not the last conversation. What I've realized after getting married is we have had, we have a conversation every month about money. We have it on the calendar, we talk about it.

And just like if you had kids, you're going to talk about kids all the time. It's not you talk about it one and done. Same with money. For us, it's like it allows us to decide. Yeah, where you travel, what you eat, what kind of convenient stuff do you have around you? So I actually love talking about it. You love talking about money. So how soon into dating do you think it's appropriate to bring it up? Because you don't think date one is appropriate. Not date one. I think...

You know, you're gathering clues early on. First few dates, you're going like, hey, how'd you grow up with money? Like, what do you remember? Yeah. That kind of stuff. Let's talk about some of those indicators. Yeah. Because the thing is, is the reason why I asked that particular boyfriend right off the bat to show me his like bank statements. You did not ask him that. I did. Okay. Bible on my life. This is amazing. Okay.

And I had him pull up. Yeah, I had him pull up his bank account. How did we not get you on my Netflix show doing this? We could have rolled camera on this. I mean, hello. Wow. Hi. Season two. Season two, baby. Let's go. The reason is...

Because there were certain indicators that he made money and certain ones that he was broke and cheap as fuck. Let's hear it. Let me guess. He used a debit card at dinner. No. No, too obscure. Although people who have credit card debt use debit cards. Okay. He mentioned something about a loan or debt or something like that. No. All right. What was it? His apartment. Oh, it was a little dingy. Dingy, tiny. Okay. Okay.

I was very confused. Okay. She's got nice clothes and a smaller apartment. Fine. Rode a bike, bicycle. Come on. Riding a bike does not. But now it's cool. But now it's good for the environment. Like this was a little bit like when it wasn't. He was. All right. What else? But it was. Did he wear Crocs? No, but it was the apartment. That was it. I couldn't, I was like, I couldn't get over it. So did you say like, Hey, like, how did you say it? Uh, you seem to make a lot of money, but this apartment looks like a piece of shit. How'd you say that?

So my, I had my mom look up his apartment on the MLS. Oh my God. I didn't believe it was his apartment. And I thought he might be like a serial killer. And like, he like was living in his grandma's apartment or something. And then she did confirm the apartment was in his name. Okay. And then we were just sitting on the couch and we were just laughing, having a good time. And I was being a little bit wild. And I think I made a joke about him being rich. Um,

Because he was talking about his job and celebrities. Men in New York love to name drop. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not as much as L.A., though. Really? Yeah. But here they... Here they name drop it in less of an annoying way. Yes, I agree. Like, they just say it to just, you know, let you know. That's interesting. I would have thought the name dropping is like...

bars they've been to, places they've gone, hot spots, things like that. But okay, I'm with you. - I think there's a lot of name dropping here, but it's not done as a flex as it is in LA. I've been saying the word flex a lot. I haven't used that word in a while. I don't know where that shit came from. But anyways, that's how it happened. - So then what'd you say to him? - I was like, I'm just a little bit confused.

things aren't really adding up. Can I see what-- - And then you pulled out your pie chart, you're like, according to my calculations, you should be living in a larger square footage apartment in Nolita. Is that what you said? - I did not say that. I wasn't that rude, but I was just like, I don't know, it's just not making sense. Can I see?

Can I see what? Can I see your bank statements? Can you show me? And did he? Yeah, he did. Oh my God, man, please. You don't have to show your bank statements. He fell in love. It was love at first sight. So he was like, of course. Oh my God. You know, okay, this is my dream. Next time this happens, please just FaceTime me immediately. And then like, while this conversation is happening,

And I'm just going to observe. I have my popcorn ready and then he can pull out his bank statements and I'll analyze them right there on the spot live. Oh my God. That could be my reasoning as to why. Yeah, I know Ramit, this Netflix guy. Yeah, I think your financial advisor is really fucking you. Let me get Ramit on the phone. Done, done, done. Done, deal. That's so good. Save on Cox Internet when you add Cox Mobile and get fiber-powered internet at home and unbeatable 5G reliability on the go.

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I'm

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I want to wrap up the relationship talk, but it's just so fascinating. Would you feel okay if your lady made more money than you? Or would you find it somewhat emasculating?

That's a great question. I know. I think my opinion has changed over time. Okay. And I told my wife this because when she started making more, I was like, I love you, baby. I love you. Keep it coming in, please. You're like, I actually, I'm cool with this. It's so cool. Who knew? Um,

When we were dating, I remember being out with a bunch of my guy friends and we were talking about how important are different things for us in relationships. And we were talking about money and I remember being like, it's not really that important to me. Like, I make good money. Whoever I'm in a relationship with, I'm good. And I met my wife. I didn't ask her her income like you. And she had a nice job. She was working in the city here. And...

- It was cool. We started talking more about money as we got more serious and she eventually left that job and went to start her own business. She's a personal stylist. And it was fascinating because when you start a business, you know, it's tough. It's tough, you don't have income coming in, you gotta find clients. And there were some tough times in that early stage. And then her business took off. Like she crushes it, she does really well.

And this introduced this new dynamic in our relationship. And what we have talked about together is when we started dating, I wouldn't have gone looking for somebody who made money. But now it actually is amazing that she makes the money she makes because we can talk about money in terms of what do we want for our life. Yeah. So that totally makes sense to me.

If she makes money and you guys were on the journey together. Yes. That makes sense to me. Yeah. And that's an awesome thing. But we also should remember that journeys don't only go up. Like people get laid off. Yep. Things happen at any point in our lives. Someone's going to get sick. Someone's going to have to take time off from work for any reason.

And so the journeys work on the up, but they've also got to be talked about what happens when they're going down. Right. Because we're going to go through all this stuff together. Right. I always tell people, do not let your career or your net worth define you or give you a sense of purpose because it can be gone like this. That's wise. And so many people, like that is literally, you know, where they get their self-esteem and their identity and all these things. Yes.

Yeah, I mean, you're right. I'm trying to learn that myself. You and me being like, yeah. It's true. I know. 100%. I mean, anyone who has a microphone in front of them, as we both do, we're like, wait a second, isn't this our identity? But you're right. Money comes, money goes. Of course, we should save it, invest it, plan for the best. But sometimes things happen. Yeah. There's more to us than just what's in our bank account. Right. A lot more. Okay. So how could...

We find out and we I mean me and the sleuths my listeners find out how much a guy makes without being psychotic like I was and saying What's your bank statement? Why are you asking me this? I'm not gonna be what are some sneaky questions like oh like how much did you have to pay in taxes? Yeah, that's sneaky. That's not sneaky at all. Okay, but give me a sneaky one Ask him this ask him. How did you grow up?

Okay, that's number one. Everyone's gonna say middle class. All the super wealthy people I talk to, they literally say that they're middle class. I'm like- Why? Because in America, it's shameful to admit that you're wealthy. Like, I literally have their bank account statements in front of me. They're people who have $10 million. They go-

We're comfortable. I go, you're more than comfortable. You have a 70 foot boat. Wait, that's so interesting. Yeah. Well, in America, we have a tortured relationship with money. We hate it in the sense that we're puritanical. We always believe in frugality. No to coffee, no to this, no to that. But we also are obsessed with it. We look at our friends, Bora Bora pictures. We go out on first dates and try to find out how much money someone makes. We're obsessed with it.

and so it's a very unhealthy relationship wouldn't you say yes i would rather we we are a little bit more at ease at ease in two ways one we got to know our numbers so if you're going out on dates and you're asking questions but you don't know your own numbers then if somebody tells you some number what are you going to make of it right it would be like me when i first started working out i walk into a gym i go uh

How much you benching? He goes, three plates. I go, what? I don't even know what that is. What's a plate? So we gotta know our numbers. And then the second part is we gotta know our money psychology. A lot of people have lots of money, but they feel anxious and guilty. A lot of people feel like they're never gonna get ahead, but they've never even read a single book about money or calculated anything. So we've gotta do those two things. We gotta know our numbers. We gotta know the basic language of money, which is not hard. And we've gotta work on our money psychology.

- Wow, that was very profound. So how do we work on our money psychology? We read, we read, we research. - Yeah, so watch the show, follow me on social media where I talk about, for example, if you and a partner,

one of you is an overspender. You know what most people do? They go and they berate their partner. They go, "Oh, why are you spending on that? "Such a waste of money." But what they rarely do is actually get curious and go, "You know what? "I notice you really love that organic broccoli, whatever. "Tell me what you love about it. "I never actually tried it, "and I realize I'd like to know why you're into it. "What is it?" And then you'd be surprised. They go, "When I was a kid,

My family, somebody choked on broccoli and from then on I only buy organic broccoli. I go, wow. And it costs us what? An extra $6 a week? Okay, fine. Or what if we try something else? What if we took that money and spent it on traveling? Would that make us happier? We could go to a broccoli farm. Exactly. We could go somewhere where they grow broccoli. Now we're talking. Right? Exactly. That is called, what is it called when you meet in the middle? What the fuck is that word? We got a beautiful broccoli compromise here, people.

Okay. I love that. How do you feel about tax evasion? And can you tell us how to do it? This is, this is date two topic. Amazing. This is date two. That's good. That's good. Okay. Have you asked people this? No. What do you think they would say? What do you think I'm going to say?

I think you're gonna find a very strategic way to like pretend like you're answering it but not really answer it. No, I actually... You're like, no, I actually do it. Yeah, I actually do evade my taxes and let me break it down for you. Here's my strategy. Okay, let me tell you about taxes. So first of all, most people, they go, oh my God, I want to have a secret Swiss account. I go, first of all, that's way out. No one does that anymore. The best way for an average person...

to minimize their taxes is to take advantage of all their tax advantaged accounts. You have a SEP IRA. Most people have a 401k, Roth IRA, et cetera. And you know what you do after that? Get on with your life. I was gonna say that. People are obsessed with taxes. I'm happy to pay my taxes. You know what? It means that I made a lot of money. So that's why you live in New York. I live in California, whatever. I'm happy to pay it. I can afford it. And in fact, taxes on guys like me should go up

And that pays for people to be able to afford food for their kids. - You know what? I agree with you. - Thank you. - I was joking about the tax evasion. - I know. - And I mean, unless like I really-- - Unless there's like a real like offline tax evasion move.

That we'll talk about after this. Here's what I told my accountant. I was like, listen, on a scale of one to Al Capone, I'm like a two. So like, let's just put that in perspective. He was like, good to know. Yeah, me too. It's too scary. Yeah. Why do we want to try to evade all this shit? So what? We can make an extra $3,000? It's pointless. That's what I'm saying. When...

I'm a billionaire, which will happen. Okay. Everyone just heard that. Maybe if you get rid of your 1% financial advisor. He's gone. I mean, after this, he's gone. He's fired. Can we text him right now?

- And say you're fired? - No, no, say this, say this. Oh, this is amazing. - Like Donald Trump style? - This is amazing. No, say this, say, "Hey, out of curiosity--" - I'm concerned. - No, just say, "Hey, out of curiosity, "what are the fees that you charge me "for your advisory services?" - Do you dare me to? - Yes. - No, I already know it's a 1% fee. - Yeah, but I want to see his answer. They don't like it when you ask. By the way, I have nothing against paying $300 an hour, $500 an hour for a great advisor, but never a percentage. It makes no sense.

I just need to get rid of him. Yeah, but let's have some fun too. Do that later.

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We're going to move on from relationships. I want to talk about

Happiness and money. Okay. Are rich people happier? You would be surprised. They're not. They are. Okay, wait, wait. We got to talk about the level though. The level. Don't tell me this 75,000 bullshit. No, no, no, no, no. Okay. Every billionaire I've met.

they are not well in the head I agree I agree and they are miserable I agree okay are we talking about Elon Musk because he is miserable I have not met him okay but I've met a few okay are we gonna name names well no because I just said they're cuckoo in the head and miserable but they're not happy people okay

- There's probably some element of like a backwards bending curve. You're happier, happier, happier, and then you're pathologically unhappy to get to that level. - Yes. - Probably that.

there's this research study out there that everyone quotes everyone on Twitter 75 that stop quoting that article please no one ever actually read it and there's a difference between happiness and self-satisfaction bottom line you can use money to buy convenience to buy back time to buy experiences I love that and honestly if you really love a beautiful jacket fantastic I love clothes so if I want to spend money on that that's part of my rich life awesome so

But when I say are rich people happier, can you put a dollar amount on that? No. Because rich is different. Yeah, it is different. No, I can't. And actually, I want people to stop thinking of rich as a number. Sometimes people go, oh, I'm a millionaire. I go, well, that depends. You know, is that a lot? Maybe if you're in Manhattan, it's different than Kansas City. It's different if you're 65 than if you're 25.

Rich is not a number. Rich can be picking up your kids from school every afternoon. Rich can be traveling for two months a year. Your rich life is yours and you define it. Yeah, if you're making...

you know tens of millions and you're working 80 hours a week to me that's not rich yeah to you to that person it might be well they're wrong okay that's okay i feel i feel you earn the right to tell people a couple of things they're just point blank wrong about like i see somebody wearing crocs i go i don't care how much money you have that is wrong i agree with you done yeah

so okay crocs are no so billionaires are miserable okay i like to say things just point blank great you know millionaires could go either way okay but if you are you know on the poverty line yeah you're not happy if you're fighting for survival every single day i think it's very hard to live a rich life if you're fighting for survival and that's why i'm happy to pay my taxes

Sometimes I think I wish it were just a little bit easier. Just a little bit. And I lucked out. I think you probably lucked out too. I had two parents. My parents immigrated from India. We grew up in a house.

Wow, like I'm lucky no matter how you spin it. And what if I hadn't had that? So I've been very fortunate, lucky, I worked hard. But yeah, if you are working 16 hours a day and making minimum wage, it's really difficult. - Yeah. - Really difficult. - Yeah. I remember when I first moved to Manhattan, I was still on my Utah salary. So I was making 40K. - Whoa. - Living in Manhattan.

That was some shit. - So what did you do to eat? - I would barely eat. For real, I would barely eat. - What about to go out for drinks? - Have guys pay for it. - Okay. - Yeah, but that was like, and that's, but 40,000 is-- - That's not a lot. - But it's a lot of money. - Not here. - But not here. - Yeah. - How much do you think you have to make to-- - I don't know. - Be comfortable here? How much do you make, by the way?

I'm comfortable. What's that phrase that all those people use? I'm comfortable. Oh, wait, no. What is it? I know what you're talking about. Yeah. But I can't think of it right now. But I don't say I'm middle class because that's bullshit. When people are clearly not middle class, it's actually offends me when they go, I'm middle class. But also, what are you asking? I asked them, how did you grow up?

A good question. How did you grow up? What do you remember your parents saying around the dinner table? There's always these phrases too. We can't afford it. Money doesn't grow on trees. That actually tells you a lot. That woman who was making 200K a month, I asked her, what do you remember? She goes, my parents taught us about investing in compound interest at the age of five.

i like those parents yeah yeah money should be talked about it's not meant to be kept in the shadows right and it is it totally is so one of the ways to find out how much someone makes is to say how did you grow up yeah should we stay away from trust fund kids wow

- No. - Be honest. - Why? I thought when I went to, okay, so I went to public school in high school, elementary school, all that, and then I went to college at a private school, and I paid my way through scholarships. I had this idea in my head that people who go to private schools are spoiled. I don't know where I got that from, but I just absorbed it somewhere.

And I get to school and in the first week, you know, you meet people from all over the world and you're just like, holy shit, half the stuff I thought about the world is totally wrong. And that was one of them, which is just because you grew up with money does not necessarily mean you are spoiled. Yes. I think that's important to know. A lot of my friends from college grew up with money. You would never know it. Yep. They have a hunger, the same hunger I had, etc.,

So yeah, trust fund, I don't care. - You don't necessarily need to stay away from them. - Correct. - But I mean. - Ask 'em. - How much is in this trust fund? - Yeah, how much and when does it get distributed? Are we talking about 25 or 65? 'Cause I got-- - Yeah, yeah. So you worked in, I mean you work in finance.

did you wear a Patagonia vest never fuck that never you were in a Chad Brad never ever no never what what else do they do I could tell you everything about them I worked in Silicon Valley yeah tell me they wear the vests you ever see that show on HBO Silicon Valley you haven't it's I think I saw like one episode that's like my friends like all those guys I don't

- They use the word orthogonal, okay? Like all the time, exactly. - No. - Yeah. - I went to Stanford once because my friend was going there to a party and I needed to leave immediately. - Okay, I spent five years there. - Did you go to Stanford?

Sorry, I just do a lot of reasoning. That's okay. I needed my glow up. I needed it. That's fucking dope. After, after. That's really, really cool. Okay. So I think at this point. We just got to get into your financials. You've dealt with a lot of couples. Yeah. Because I don't think you actually answered this one. Then we'll get into my shit. Okay. You deal with a lot of couples. Would you say you see a higher divorce or breakup rate with.

the woman making more money than the guy. Not a higher divorce rate, but I would say it's safe to say there's a higher amount of conflict. Okay. Yeah. And the reason I asked that is because my mom, breadwinner in every single relationship, she's been married a few times. Wait, this is like, so this is so interesting because she was the breadwinner in your marriage.

Potential relationship you might be the breadwinner because you earn a lot. Mm-hmm I will not allow that to happen. That's why I'm asking these guys on a first date I got you. You know, you just send a questionnaire just to be more efficient Just send it ahead of time. I should start you can set up a Google survey and the answers can come to both of us I should start. All right, you should wait till like the second or third date. Oh, wow. Oh

Yeah. The fact that I just said that seriously, you're like, you're insane. Okay. So what, what do you want to look at? I want to know your income first. I've got Bitcoin. I've got E-Trade. I've got my Morgan Stanley account. All right. Let's see it all. I've got my Chase debit account. Give it to me. Give it to, give it all. All? Yeah. Okay. So this is the Morgan Stanley account. Okay. All right. That's a healthy number.

And I see you've got Morgan Stanley and Chase. Okay. By the way, just so everyone knows that this is a considerable amount of money is that your account says total wealth.

They don't say that for a normal like a random account. You know, people take their checking account. It just says, here's how much is in your checking accounts, asshole. Yours says total wealth. Okay. Wealth management. Okay. So we're talking about a lot of money. Good. Okay. Now let me show you my chase. Okay. I want to really show you my fucking postmates. Let's look at postmates. We can do that.

I'm going to go to my Mint app. Just let me look and see where you're ordering from. That's all I need to know. Okay. Wait, wait. Yeah. Postmates. Postmates. You better throw an ad in this one. I've said your name 58 times now. Okay. Here we go. All right. Let's look.

Okay, so there's like a lot of Starbucks. P.O.P.O. is very good. Can I say the names of these places? Of course. Okay, you love... This is basically like... I know all these places. It's like a... This is a single person New York order. Starbucks, Joe and the Juice, P.O.P.O., The Smith. Like, perfect. You know what? Keep scrolling because I do have like... Orchard Grocer for $77. Okay. Vegan. Okay. Okay.

So basically each of these is like 60 to 70 bucks. Okay. Would this be...

One person, two people. One. One and then tip and all that stuff. Yeah. And I over ordered. Are you a cheap tipper? No. All right. You ordered from Papaya Dog. What the fuck? That was a late night. This is like crazy. Hold on. I got to look. What time was this ordered at? 5.07 AM. I fucking love it. This is all the evidence I need. I'm like, nobody who lives in New York ordered from Papaya Dog. And then I click it. 5.07 AM. This is insane. Westville. Okay. Very good.

Am I supposed to be doing anything about money? I'm just looking at where you order from. You're skipping over, you know, sushi, Thai. Who cares about that? Those are normal. Okay, so we are supposed to be talking about numbers. Oh, okay. Are you hungry? I'm like, it really tells you a lot. Like I walked in here and in the studio, there's somebody here who ordered from Chick-fil-A. We're in Manhattan right now. I'm like, who the fuck?

- Who the fuck ordered Chick-fil-A? - Excuse me, I have a very incredible palate. - Oh, you do? - I do. - Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. - I do. - You do have an Indian, you have Indian food on this plate. So let's just read what you ordered from this Indian restaurant. You like Indian food? Wow, this is shocking. One garlic naan, one rata, wow, that's a little unconventional for a non-Indian person. - Thank you, thank you. - One samosa, one chicken tikka, I'm so surprised so far.

One dal makhani. Okay. You know what? And one chicken tikka masala. Not a bad order. You know what, sir? I'm going to go ahead and take you to Buenos Aires, the best Argentine restaurant. I'm going to see what the fuck you order. Okay. Shit. I'm on the spot now. It's supposed to be me putting you in. Okay. Why are we talking about food? I don't know. All right. So I looked at this. How much did you say I spent? I don't know. You spend a lot of money eating out. Whatever. I don't know.

Who cares? This whole entire thing just went off the fucking rails. Here's what I would say. I would say your net worth is really good. Young, your income, I don't know what it is, but your net worth is up and it's going to go way up. You will be a multi, multi, multi-millionaire.

It's just math. Okay. So with that in mind, we might need a couple of tweaks to get into that level. That's the next episode for somebody in your situation. I would say, first of all, congratulations. It's awesome. Like it's amazing what you've accomplished. And with the show, it's awesome. The amount you spend on food, honestly, whatever, whatever.

But what matters more is making sure that you're invested properly because that's where your real wealth is going to come from. Right. Which it's not. We can fix that. Okay. Making sure that you are minimizing your fees because unlike with sushi, if you pay for really expensive sushi in the city, you get better sushi. It's flown in from Tokyo that day. That's not how it is with finance. You pay more, a higher percentage, you do not get better investment results. Right, right, right. Okay? Fix a couple of big things and honestly, if you want to eat out,

A little bit more, fine. That's fine. Yeah. That's fine. You've done an awesome job. Wow. Thank you so much. This has been amazing. I can't wait to hire, well, fire my financial advisor. Me either. Can I hire you? I can't hire you. You can't hire me, but you can text me and I'll... Will you give me free advice?

You're going to charge me? No, I'm not going to charge you. I'll give you free advice. Just let me throw a camera next time you go on a date and get what you do. A thousand percent. Whoa. Catch me season two. Wow. How to get rich on Netflix. Okay. And where else can they find you? You have a podcast. I have a podcast. I bring couples on and they share all.

their numbers it's crazy it's yeah you've never seen it like this so that's called I will teach you to be rich and of course if you want to take control your money you can follow me on social you can get my book and my journal and follow my newsletter all those places get started money's fun I think today is a great example money can be fun you can take control of it and and live your rich life you can't and anybody can yeah

Anywhere that you're starting from, you can live your rich life. Thank you so much for coming on. This was like a blast. It really was. This was way fun. Bye, flutes.