I Will Teach You To Be Rich - 100. 100th Episode Special: Top 5 Can’t-Miss Moments

Episode Date: May 23, 2023

Celebrating 100 episodes of the I Will Teach You To Be Rich Podcast, we look and listen back to five of Ramit’s favorite can’t miss episodes covering: Disparate incomes, Credit card debt, Living beyond one’s means, Reverse gender roles, and High income problems.  This episode is brought to you by: Trade | Right now, Trade is offering our audience a free bag of coffee with any subscription at http://drinktrade.com/ramit. Nomorobo | To protect yourself and your family from phone scams, go to https://nomorobo.com/ramit for a 14-day free trial. Masterclass | For unlimited access to every class and 15% off an annual membership, go to http://masterclass.com/ramit. Long Angle | If you've made a lot of money and you're looking for a community of peers to turn to for advice, go to https://www.longangle.com/ to learn more. Links mentioned in this episode Other episodes Connect with Ramit Get the Podcast Newsletter and exclusive Q&A about the show Get Money Coaching with Ramit  Download the Conscious Spending Plan Get my New York Times best-selling book Get my no-numbers journal Instagram Twitter YouTube Submit a question for the newsletter iwt.com/askramit If you and your partner have a money issue and you want my help, I occasionally select a couple to work with, free of charge. Apply for my help here. Produced by Crate Media.

A lot of you ask a lot of questions about these episodes in the comments on Instagram, on YouTube, all over my social media. So I decided I'm going to answer the very best questions every single week. If you've ever wanted to ask what happened behind the scenes or what would I do or why did they do this? Well, every Saturday I'm going to be answering your questions on the new, I will teach you to be rich podcast newsletter. So I'm adding a link right now. You can go ahead and ask your question about today's episode, and I will answer the very best this Saturday to get on the newsletter, go to IWT.com slash podcast newsletter.

That's IWT.com slash podcast newsletter. That's I W T dot com slash podcast newsletter. You can get the link right below. Ask any question about today's episode and I'll answer them every Saturday on this new podcast newsletter. Connie, if you paid for dinner with the two of you, how would you feel about it? I feel like I'm not getting what I want out of the relationship and then I also feel like it's irresponsible of me to let him take me out to dinner So you make 2.4 million a year income? Yes. Yeah, that sounds horrible, but yes You make too much money to be behaving this way. So the question simply quit. Simply ask is I always setting ourselves in failure Well, what's the worst case for YouTube?

Financially speaking. Continuing down path. Is slope, yeah, for sure. The path to whereon is the worst case. There are sacrifices that are going to have to be made. That is a struggle. That will definitely be a struggle. We want to live the way we're still living. I don't care about cars like we

can buy it dry less expensive cars than that's fine with me. This is our forever home. I mean I we don't. Yeah we feel like it's we don't ever want to move again. Our jobs are our jobs and our income is what our income is, but I think you two are living above your means Have you ever acknowledged that to each other? Sometimes now we talk about money. I feel like I'm stepping into like a landmine I'm making more than date is now, but he's going to be making a lot more than me. And it's like, I love Nate.

He's my person. We're engaged and we're old, you know. So why is it so hard for me to do this? She would love, if I said, honey, you have a blank checkbook? Do what you want. I didn't even know how much we made. You're netting 80,000 a month, and you're questioning my audible $12 subscription every day. I had to sign $175,000 per month. When we fly, we fly as basic economy as we can.

When we say in hotels, it's the cheapest. My yard is in shambles. There's no reason for this. There's a problem here. Big news that I want to celebrate with you today. We are at our 100th episode of this podcast. Almost two years ago, I started talking to couples about their money challenges on Instagram. It was COVID. A couple reached out to me on Instagram. They said, Hey, Rameet, can you help me? I said, ah, all right. If you do it live on Instagram, they were like, okay, I said, and you have to share all of your numbers. They're like,

fine, I said, what? And within five minutes of speaking to them on Instagram live, I knew this is what I should create a podcast about. And here we are, a hundred episodes later, getting to celebrate. Now think about all the things that have happened in the time since the podcast started. Number one, we now have a Netflix show called How to Get Rich, which made the top 10 shows in Netflix. This podcast hit the top five podcasts in all of Apple podcasts. And we launched a video version of the podcast so you can actually see the couples and you can feel what they are feeling by observing their body language and their eye contact.

Recently, we've added a second weekly episode so you can listen on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Make sure you subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and our YouTube channel. Now one thing my wife taught me is that we've got to celebrate these things, because we don't know when it's going to happen again. And so whether you are celebrating a small win, like paying off $200 of debt, or whether you're celebrating huge wins, I want to celebrate. And that's exactly what we're going to do today. Let's celebrate the first 100 episodes of I Will Teach You To Be Rich, the podcast, with

five of the most memorable episodes so far. The first episode that I want to highlight is when couples have highly disparate incomes. Think about this. If one partner comes into a relationship and they make twice as much as the other partner, what does it mean? What if it's three times, 10 times? What if it's even more than that? What's interesting to me is that a lot of us believe that we'll just celebrate. Oh, that's fantastic. My partner makes more than me. That's awesome. We're all in this together. But what you often see is that things are not that simple when there's a huge disparity. And one of my most memorable examples of

this is Connie and Wes from episodes 64 and 65. Now he recently started a business. He makes $2,000 a month. She makes $200,000 per month. Not per year. She makes $200,000 per month. In other words, she makes 100 times what he makes. How do you think that affects their dynamic? How would it affect yours? I want to reintroduce you to this fascinating couple. And as a quick reminder, this episode took place a while ago before we were sharing video of our podcast. So let's listen in on an audio clip of them talking about this dynamic. When it came to eating out, about this dynamic. When it came to eating out, is that important to the two of you to do it once a month? So I asked her if I could just even once a year take her out somewhere? What are you too busy for that? It's not a time thing.

I think if I knew that he had XML that was going to retirement savings every month, then with what's left over, I would be comfortable with him taking me out. Well, who's picking up these checks? What checks are we talking about? That's where the problem is. Tell me. So we're talking about that's where the problem is tell me And not to say we don't go out, but I mean We had our first real dinner date in the last month

What how long have you two been together? over a year Okay, so you you went to that salad place the first time okay, and then It was a nice place. We just only got salad because I didn't think it was fair for me to buy an actual meal. So I just got an entree because I didn't. I feel like it's irresponsible for West to be spending money cultivating this relationship when I think it's more responsible for money to be going into savings for him. You feel that way about his finances. Yeah, because I have control issues and I wanna...

Yes. Okay, and Wes, what do you feel about, for example, going out to dinner? With what I grew up saying is my dad would take the family out, you know, occasionally wants every other Friday, like I said, and you know, he would pick up the check and then so when I have told Connie repeatedly that I would love to take her out to dinner, let's go do that. But when we do go to dinner, it's, you know, I would like to pick up the tab, but I get the, not going to call it a scolding, but I get that little bit of a lecture that's like,

hey, you shouldn't be paying for this. So one, we shouldn't go out of dinner. And two, when we do go out of dinner, she's going to pay for it, not me. And it's like, well, I really just want to take you out, you order whatever you want on the menu and let me pick up a tap. And she thinks that's a bad financial decision.

You want him to do exactly what you do with money. Is that fair to say? Yeah, that sounds horrible, but yes. But he's not you. Yep. Connie wants Wes to take her to dinner. Wes agrees. He wants to take Connie out.

He wants to pay. But when he reaches out for his credit card and tries to pay, she would rather that he save the money. Okay. I love coffee and I want to tell you about the system I set up so that I can get all kinds of new coffee regularly. I know there's a few brands of coffee that I love. So I set up a document and in that document I track the types of coffee I love, Verve,

Joe Coffee in New York and there's a few other brands that I love with the specific roast. But then every single month, I'm hunting, looking for new types of coffee. And so what I'll do is I'll ship myself a couple of new bags of different roast, different types of coffee from different regions, and then I take a little notation card I write down, what works and what doesn't. Now, if you think I'm a psycho, what am I going to say? This is my rich life.

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schedule. So, upgrade your morning routine with better coffee. Right now, trade is offering our audience a free bag of coffee with any subscription at drinktrade.com slash remete. That's drink trade, T-R-A-D-E dot com slash remete, R-A-M-I-T, for a free bag of coffee with any subscription purchase. Again, drinktrade.com slash remit. At IWT I'm all about teaching my listeners and students how to live their rich life whatever that means to you. For me a rich life is being able to invite my closest friends and family to a stunning

resort in Mexico for my 40th birthday. It's having a personal trainer plan, my workouts and my macros every week, and it's never having to get a spam call. Think about it, how many times a day are you getting a call from an unknown number, or better yet a text from XF345Z claiming there's a problem with your electric bill? I'm busy, I want my day to be efficient, I don't have time to deal with these spam calls. That's why I want to let you know about this episode's sponsor, Nomo Robo Max.

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That's n-o-m-o-r-o-b-o-dot-com-slash-remetit r-a-m-i-t. Let's listen into one more clip. Before you listen, keep in mind again that Connie is worth $6 million. She makes $200,000 per month. Wes, who's just started his own business, makes $2,000 per month. Wes, who's just started his own business, makes $2,000 per month. What would it look like if the two of you said, we are going to go out to eat once a month? Would it be possible? A lot of silence on this call. It would be possible.

What's your caveat? Go ahead. So it kind of goes back to the trust of finances. And so for example, West and I went out to Vegas. I had a business meeting out there and then West and I were going on vacation for two or three days. And what was it? It was a $300 credit that we had at the dinner place.

Yes. So we had a $300 credit for, it was a nice dinner place. So we went, I had drinks with my business partner ahead of time and I knew that we were getting close to that $300 mark. And I love the thought of Wes just kind of being the man and just making decisions. I love the theoretical thought of that. And I had a glass of wine and the waiter asked if we wanted the whole bottle. And again, I love the notion of West just taking charge, but I was more on the, I'm just going to have a glass of wine and west it. Let's get the whole bottle. So next thing you know, dinner cost $400

instead of $300. And we didn't drink the bottle of wine. And $100 is such a minuscule rounding error. It doesn't count anywhere in regards to my net worth, but it was the trust issue of, I have to pick up that extra $100. As you hear that, there's so many different layers going on, there's gender roles and expectations, there's different incomes, highly disparate incomes. There's a new relationship that's about a year old. There's a lot. Can Connie and Wes ever get

aligned on money? Well, you have to listen to the full episode to find out. Check out part one of their story in episode 64 and part two in episode 65. The next theme that I noticed in our first hundred episodes is couples getting themselves into debt. And what's most concerning is when they get into credit card debt. One of the most mind-blowing examples of this was Sarah and Kevin in episode 80. Let's listen. Did you take the money from the house and pay off all the student loans as well? No, because we were, the goal was to take the additional. We sat down and we decided we were going to pay off the credit card debt. And then the additional amount that we had left over, we were going to invest some of it, save some of it, to have cash available for whatever reason.

And then utilize that for down payment on land. Okay. So we didn't pay everything off of it now. Okay. That student loan that you had, which you did not pay off, how much was it at the time? Um, about 30,000. Okay. What was the interest rate? Do you remember? It's nothing. Right. I mean, it's low. It's zero. Zero right now. I mean, okay. But back then, this was six months ago. Oh, what? Yeah. Hold on. Let me get this straight. What the hell? I didn't know about these timelines.

Yeah. hold on let me get this straight. What the hell I didn't know about these timelines. Yeah, hold on I'm speechless. Yeah, you paid off a hundred and thirty thousand dollars of credit card debt six months ago and now you have fifty thousand dollars of credit card debt just six months later. Yeah Whoa $50,000 of credit card debt just six months later. Yeah. Whoa. So what happened? Life. I don't know. Wait, okay, this isn't, this is like,

if this was five years, I would be like, all right, yeah, life happens, but six months, we can figure this out in like 25 seconds. Let's just do it right now. Okay, life happens, all right, yeah, life happens. But six months, we can figure this out in like 25 seconds. Let's just do it right now. Okay, life happens. All right, life, not that much life happens in six months. So let's break it down. What vacations did you take in the last six months? I was speechless. That almost never happens on this show. To go back into tens of thousands of dollars in debt in just six months and have no clue what happened to it.

I actually didn't believe it. I didn't accept it. So I said, let's figure it out right now. And we did a quick back of the napkin calculation on where the money all went. Well, we paid for a cruise that we have coming out. How much is that? Ballpark. 7000 I think. What number do you think I would pick to write down here? How much is your crew's going to cost?

You said 7000. What do I think the real number is? 8? 8500? Higher. Kevin? $8,000? $8,500? No. $8,500? Higher. Kevin? $11,000, $11,000, $50,000. Okay.

Love out of home on it. Okay. So let's say $11,000. What else do you spend money on the last six months? You see what just happened right there? This false desire to always minimize how much things cost. People who get into debt often do this consciously and unconsciously, they'll say, oh, yeah, we went on to dinner last night. It was probably like 30 bucks. When you

factor in tax, tip, transportation, everything, it was 70 bucks. And they do this in part because they're embarrassed of how much they spend, in part because they want to ignore it, in part because they don't know. There's lots of different reasons that it happens. We spent the next few minutes uncovering what they've spent on in the last six months. Trips, clothes, a surgery and post-care, business coaching for Sarah, and Christmas gifts. Let's see what it all added up to. Let me finish calculating these. $72,500 in the last six months. What do you think about that number? Wow, that's unexpected.

That's how it happens. They spent $72,000 in six months without even realizing it, putting them right back into debt. Now if you think that this is all the episode is about just spending money on debt, you're only scratching the surface. The surprises keep on coming in this episode. So please, you have to check out this two-parter with Sarah and Kevin, where we talk about how they're upbringing affects the way that they behave with money. We talk about how they're going to pay off this debt, and we talk about the moment they tell me their plans for school for their three

daughters. Are there any other things that are really important for the two of you to start doing? other things that are really important for the two of you to start doing. They've been for the girls school next year. What? Where'd that come from? We haven't talked about that at all. No, so they're in private school. How much? They're in their school.

It's for all three. It's without financial aid. It's about 55,000 a year. What the fuck? How are these secret expenses coming up right now? They're already there at the school. What? I mean, this was that they're in the middle of their first year.

Oh, well, okay, that option's out the door. All right. So what the fuck you, you you sign them up for this school? That even knowing where the money was coming from. Find out the whole story at episodes 80 and 81. One of my favorite things to do with money is to spend it on experiences that I otherwise would not have on my own. For example, when we went to Japan, my wife and I both loved design and architecture. We hired a local expert who showed us around highlighted different design elements

and even took us to visit the home of two architects. These are the kind of experiences you can get when you put on the money lens of experience rather than cost alone. And I bring this up because learning during these experiences like the match at tasting that I've been to, and the coffee tasting I went to in New York,

and the cooking class in Italy with my entire family, these are memories you'll never forget. And I want that same experience for you. That's why I'm thrilled to introduce you to today's sponsor, Masterclass. With Masterclass, you can learn from the best, and it's all online so you can learn anytime anywhere and at your own pace. There are over 180 classes to pick. In 11 categories,

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whatever skill it is you choose to work on. With Masterclass, you can learn a new skill in as little as 10 minutes on your phone, on your TV, or anywhere else. I highly recommend you check it out. You can get unlimited access to every class. And as an I will teach you to be rich listener, you get 15% off an annual membership. Go to masterclass.com slash remit. Now that's masterclass.com slash R-A-M-I-T for 15% off Masterclass. I get a lot of questions from people who have used my book.

They've automated their finances. They've set their investments up. They go, all right, I did the basics. What's next? And when you've made a lot of money, you'll notice that there's not a lot of advice specifically for you. The blog posts that are typically focused around people who are just starting off or even people in debt do not really apply to you anymore.

And it can also be embarrassing to ask. You can't really post about certain topics when you have money because your friends don't know how much you make and nobody really wants to hear about how do I take cooler vacations or What do you all do for tax optimization? Because the first response is oh rich people problems. I don't like that phrase because rich people problems are problems nonetheless How are you supposed to find someone you trust, whether it's an accountant or a travel advisor. The usual advice that you find on Google doesn't really apply at a certain level. So if you've made a big jump in income or net worth and you wish you had a community of people who just get it, I want to introduce you to today's sponsor Long Angle. The Long Angle community is composed of high net worth individuals with

diverse backgrounds in technology, finance, medicine, real estate, law, manufacturing, sports, media, and more. I'm a member of this community. There are so many interesting members of the community and the majority of them are first generation wealth. They're young, highly successful individuals, and they join the community to share knowledge and learn from each other, to get confidential, unbiased support, knowledge, sharing and networking. And, you can do it online through their digital platform, as well as face-to-face connections at their long-angle in-person events. Now, members also have access to unique private market opportunities.

And as I mentioned, I'm a member of Long Angle. I like it because it's vetted. Everyone on there has a certain amount of net worth. And therefore, they are asking relevant questions of the community. You're not going to get people on there giving the same old advice like, hey, here's how you save money on celery. That's not the purpose of this community. Some of the topics that I've loved are multi-generational family trips,

or questions like, we want to travel for six months with our children. What do you all do for school? How do you make travel more seamless for children? I've seen topics I loved about concierge doctors. Topics that no one is really talking about publicly. And on their online community, there are groups for all different topics like education for kids, events, even philanthropy, and how to become more thoughtful about giving. There are literally thousands of conversations going on right now at long angle, and I love it because it's a super high quality group, and people are even starting to meet in person. Now in order to join, members must show proof of at least $2.2 million in investible assets,

liquid or illiquliquid, and a community organizer will hold a brief Zoom call with every potential member to make sure it's a fit. Go to longangle.com to learn more. That's longangleange.com. Next up, one of my most memorable episodes is about living beyond your means. And I want to direct you to the episode with Christine and Thomas in episode 84. I often hear from couples who are making great money, but they are stressed out by little things like groceries or their cable bill or eating out.

And I can tell you that in these situations, it is almost never the small things that are going to move the needle. The truth is often they're quite simply living beyond their means. And often it's the house and the car in that order. That is how it works. People will fight for 15 years about the price of pickles, never realizing that pickles are irrelevant. It's that they're overspending on their house, they are house poor, or their car is invisibly dragging them down with all these phantom costs, and they just have no idea. A great example of this is Christine and Thomas. They have three young children. They bought a nice house, and they make very good money, but they are stressed about money every single day Let's listen and on a clip when we discover they are spending 98% of what they make every single month

Let's take a look at the fixed cost shall we? What's that number next to the fixed costs? The combined how much are you both spending on your fixed costs as a percentage of your gross, excuse me, your net income? 98%. Is that high or lower? What does that number mean to you? Outrageously high to me.

Yeah, Thomas? Yep, same. Yeah, really, I prefer to see 50 to 60%. Okay. There are rare exceptions, but they are extremely rare, and you two are not in that rare of a situation. So with 98, what is the implication if you have 98% of your take-home income is being spent on fixed costs? How do you think that affects your life? We can't save an emergency fund, then we also can't save to do things that we want to do.

Yeah. What else? Can't go on vacation. Can't lose our jobs. Right. That's a good one. What else? Can't get sick or have any other major expenses.

Yeah. It suddenly makes a lot of sense. Why Christine, you're waking up, looking at your phone, you're asking about like sending urgent messages about a $200 check, which I don't do that. Right, I don't. And I don't want you to have to be fixated on $200 when the two of you make $133,000. It's just the way you have set your expenses up.

It forces you to play small. I worked with Christine and Thomas to try to get that number down. But what I learned in this episode, what you see is that they still weren't really internalizing what it means to spend 98% of your income on your fixed costs alone. And we also have direct TV, which is over $100 a month. See, I didn't feel that bad about you. I know it's an expense, but like,

I'm pretty proud of the way that I've every year called them and said, I'm going to cancel, and I don't think a hundred dollars is that bad, when like you think about if we're going to supplement that with all these different subscriptions that are going to equal a hundred dollars. I think if you were making five hundred thousand dollars a year, I wouldn't even be having this conversation.

Yeah. But you two are living above your means. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Have you ever acknowledged that to each other? No. I think so.

Not in terms of at least of these assets. Yeah. Well, every month you're losing money. Yeah. Sometimes, especially if you are trapped in a cycle of overspending and you don't know how to get out of it, it can feel really hopeless. And every time you try to make a change, it just feels like you're rearranging deck chairs on the deck of the Titanic. It's totally normal and common that bulls will end up focusing on the smallest things they'll spend all kinds of energy and actually doesn't move the needle at all. To find out what we were able to get their costs down to, check out episode 84. I think you'll be really surprised by the progress

that they have made. Next example, gender roles. Gender roles and money are real, but they are rarely talked about, especially shown. And one of my goals is to shine a light on our expectations of gender roles. For example, true or false? A man should pay on a date. What would you say? What if I asked you why? These are really interesting examples of how we think about gender culture, money, systems. And so we've featured lots of different and diverse examples of gender roles on our episodes. One of my favorite examples of this is Serena and Nate, episode 73 and 74. They're both in their late 20s and they are engaged. Serena makes almost two times what Nate makes. She makes $80,000 a year. Nate makes about $45K a year.

He's a medical resident, but in a couple of years, he's going to be a doctor. And at that point, his salary is going to increase dramatically, likely to about $300,000 plus. Now, I really like this couple. They're clearly in love. They clearly care for each other. But Serena has some very strong opinions on how money should be spent in their relationship. Let's listen to a clip. So the check comes, the server puts it down in the middle of the table. What goes through your mind? Well, I know just based on where we're at, based on what we usually do. We usually split the track which I'm fine with.

We'll treat you sometimes. And it's really generous about, oh, let me get you a coffee. Like, do you want anything? He's great about that and it's really sweet, especially if someone who that is not by first way to show love and relationship, but he's very generous in that sense.

I guess what goes through my mind is I wish, you know, need to treat me, but one day we'll get to that point, but tonight might not be that point, and that's okay. But you just said that I do treat you more often than you treat me, so that's- No, yeah, I know. Okay. Do you wish he treated you every time? Um, no, but I think, you know, when the check arrives, like, of course, I want to feel taking care of. So Nate, what would you say if you were more generous

when that check came? But it would probably be, do you want me to cover this? Would you probably do it? The problem is sort of being, if the story in order to go for a reply, that would be great. I can't really afford it. So that's kind of a problem. Absolutely. That's like someone saying to their partner,

would you like to fly in that private jet? And they're like, yeah, sure, yeah. Well, I can't actually afford that. So that's cool, I'm glad you want to, but we're not going. So how can you be generous, Nate, if you can't afford the dinner? Now this went on for a while. It was extremely fascinating to hear both of their perspectives on who should pay until I flipped it.

Why don't we just invert the whole thing and see what happens? Nate says to Serena, you know, Serena, it would be really nice if you would offer to pick up the check, like a lot more of the time, because actually I can't recall you ever offering. And by the way, you make a lot more money than I do. So don't you think it would be fair? Look at that big smile on Nate's face right now. Nate's got the biggest smile.

I love this technique of inversion, especially when there is a cultural norm or a gender norm or some other kind of expectation that is not spoken. Okay, it's never written down, it's never articulated clearly, but everyone just kind of gets it. That's where this technique of inversion can become extremely helpful. I love this episode. I think they were so honest in what they said to each other in bringing their hidden expectations to the surface. And I want you to hear this whole story, especially what they decide to do about the rent.

Let me make sure I understand. So you're, you're each paying a thousand dollars, your rent went up, that made it very difficult for you, Nate, to afford it. Serena, you wanted to stay in this particular area, so you had a back and forth, and you concluded with Serena, you're paying a little bit more like $160 more per month for this apartment. Yeah. How much more do you make than Nate?

I'm making that significant. I would say significantly more. Great. All right. Can I just say Nate, you're making way less than Serena and you're paying essentially 50-50. That's the problem. That's the reason that when you go out to dinner, like the two seem totally unconnected, don't they? The amount you pay for your apartment and then going out to dinner and all this drama happening around the check coming, but it's actually directly connected. Nate, you are spending too much for your portion of housing and therefore you have nothing left over. No wiggle room. You can't

even give Serena a straight answer on when you can pay her back $50 a month and that's causing stress. Do you see how it all rolls back to one thing that is seemingly invisible in your finances? Yeah, it's this. So, Serena, let's say that my wife and I were dating and I was like, hey, move in with me and I make like twice as much as you but we should split at 50-50. What would you say to that? I don't think I would love it if it were me. Okay, would you love it if it were Nate? No. Okay. Good. Okay, great. So we can meet there.

I think that the most successful couples I see, especially in situations like this, where you have separate incomes, etc. is proportional. So, proportional means if you're making 65% of the income, you pay 65% of the joint expenses. And that would probably suggest that you pay more for this rent and that net pay less. How would you feel about that? It's kind of like with the talking about the check, like I think it would be really hard for me at first, just because it's not something I've done ever before and not something I even, and I think would have considered.

Yeah. Yeah. Let me ask you this. Before you answer, before you go on. Let's just fast forward like three years and Nate's making 325K. How much should he pay for the rent? Yeah, this is the thing we've talked about. I would be super weirded out. And he expected me to pay 5050 for rent.

Wait, what are you talking about? You make more right now and you're paying 5050 basically. I know. That's kind of a double standard. I know, but I'm not making That much like I'm making more than Nate is now, but he's going to be making a lot more than me Oh, so it's a it's a gradation. So what's the number where in your mind? I've never even thought about that because it's not a number It's not a number. It's not a number.

Yeah. So in this case, when you flip it, what if he is the higher earner, he picks up the check. He pays more rent. He takes the family on vacation. Suddenly, the whole thing sounds preposterous. These clips only really scratch the surface of my fascinating conversation with Nate and Serena. And you can find it in episodes 73 and 74. Number five, high earners. Let's talk about the high earners that come on the show.

One of the things I love is highlighting the diversity of money and cups. Now, if you pick up a newspaper or magazine, you will often see articles about people in severe debt. And I think that's helpful. We want to talk about that. In fact, I've had people on this show with $800,000 of debt, credit card debt, student loan debt, all kinds of debt. But what you almost never hear are wealthy couples talking about money. That only happens behind closed doors until this show. One of the things that you will discover is that people who make more money stop talking about it. Media does not

really focus on them. Although, even if you have a lot of money, all of your financial problems don't vanish. Sure, some of them do like being able to pay for dinner or keep the roof over your head, but there are still legitimate problems. And I love sharing these because I want to show you that just because you get more money, it doesn't mean all your problems are going to vanish. You've got to develop other skills. So please know, as you listen to all these episodes, if you feel nervous about money today or anxious or fearful,

you're still going to feel that way if you have a million dollars, five million dollars, ten million dollars. Okay? I literally cannot tell you how many millionaires I've spoken to who drive around town to save money on blueberries or gas. And my favorite example of this is Charles and Michelle from episode 20. Charles wrote me because he said in all caps, help my wife of 21 years is about to divorce me because I am too cheap. Their net worth is over $10 million. They make $3.1 million per year, But Charles still insists on sharing a Netflix password, and he questions Michelle's $12 a month audible subscription. Charles is afraid that if his wife starts spending, she's going to trip and fall and make

them go bankrupt. But Michelle is so sick of his cheapness that she's on the verge of divorce. Let's listen in. So clearly, you probably talked about this before. I'm sure it's been a hot topic of discussion. Charles, it sounds like Michelle wants to get some furniture. What has your approach been with this furniture that she wants to get? So my first approach was, okay, when I hear her ideas, I start to hear she's saying, she's saying, she's saying, she's okay. For the next 12 months, this is this is kind of outline what do you want to do to the house

for the next 12 months. And that's planned for that. So there's no like big surprise. And that's when Michelle cringes and doesn't want to do it. And that's what causes this drive. She would love if I said, honey, you have a blank checkbook, do what you want. Is that true, Michelle? I would love him to take them enough money that he needs. He said he needs 150,000. Take it. Give me the rest. I mean literally like you only need 150. You're netting 80,000 a month

and you're questioning my audible $12 subscription every day? There's a problem here. We fire our taxes jointly and I had to sign for taxes recently. Couldn't believe my eyes. I didn't even know how much we made. I had to sign $175,000 per month. My yard is in shambles. There's no reason for this. When we fly, we fly as basic economy as we can. When we say in hotels, like he said, it's the cheapest. Now, we're not in Motel 6 and we're not, you know, it's undyour straights, but it's probably the quality, if we made $100,000 a year, and there's nothing wrong with that. The problem is we make more. The reason why I'm not giving a list is because it comes down to the words that he said before,

convincing, being thoughtful, being planful. I'm all those things. I'm analytical as well. I plan, I research, I weigh the, and measure, I don't just willy-nilly just say, hey, I wonder why I kept today. I'm doing research, et cetera. So, but those words are unacceptable and they shut me down. And when I hear those, I'm like, I'm not giving you a list

because the minute I say, let's do this, that's not being thoughtful, that's not being plantful. Well, I'm just saying, it give me a chance to think it out. But so these are issues that everything that he's saying is fantastic. They make sense. They're logical, but in reality, it doesn't play out like that. What I hear beneath the surface is this fear that if you take Michelle's approach, which

you've described as being more intuitive, more spontaneous, that somehow you will lose the core of what made you successful. And that suddenly you're going to just lose it all and oh my god, I dropped $75,000 on dinner tonight. Can you see a reality where you ever spend $75,000 on one dinner, Charles? No. No, I don't think so. It would be very hard to do that. Can you ever see a reality where Michelle spends that much on a single dinner? For the two of us, no. It is really, really hard for people to turn the page in their rich life. Let me explain what I mean. For highly successful people like Charles, all of their

skills of saving and investing and planning and optimizing got them to the top of the mountain. So from the outside, you look at them and you say, you made it. Why are you agonizing over $200 But to them, they see the very skills that got them here as identical with themselves. They can't separate the desire for success from themselves. So I can sit here and repeat, turn the page, what's your rich life? It doesn't mean anything to Charles yet. Michelle can even say, I'm about to divorce you and it still doesn't really hit home. This identity is deeper than money. It's deeper than relationships. Goes to the very core of who Charles is. By the way, I sometimes ask

people on my newsletter, what would you do if you had a hundred million dollars? The answers are so fucking depressing. Half of them say, I'm already living a great life, I wouldn't change a thing. I know they're trying to signal that they're happy, but I consider this almost a criminal lack of imagination. To not know what you would do with essentially unlimited money, not even a single amazing trip,

not even taking your family to create an unforgettable memory. I'm not impressed. Half of the people respond, pay off my house, they don't invest the rest. For what? You fucking won the game, you have a hundred million dollars. And now you want to invest more? These are the kinds of answers people give when they haven't really thought through their

rich life, when they haven't given themselves room to dream. Now, there's just one more catch with Charles here. He actually has that kind of money, and yet he can't stop making more of it. If someone has a net worth of $11 million and earns millions of dollars a year, that person can easily afford first class. If that person is deciding not to fly out of fear that he'll trip and fall and spend $11 million, that's a red flag. And if that person's wife is threatening to divorce him for his money beliefs.

That's one of the biggest red flags of all. Will Charles be able to finally stop being so cheap and turn the page on his spending for the sake of his marriage? You'll have to listen to episodes 20 and 21 to find out. All right, that's a wrap to our five most memorable episodes of the last 100 episodes of this podcast. We really only scratched the surface. So if you are new here from watching my Netflix show, please check out these fascinating

episodes to help you hear the whole story. We release new episodes every Tuesday and Thursday. Make sure you subscribe so you can be notified as soon as a new episode comes out. You can follow us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and of course YouTube where you can see the actual couples, their eye contact, and their fascinating body language. Thank you for listening to I Will Teach You to Be Rich, and I can't wait to see you next week. Thanks for listening to I Will Teach You to Be Rich. I'm Remi Tseati. Please follow the show on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

If you haven't read, I will teach you to be rich. My book, pick up a copy. You can get it at any bookstore or any library, and it will show you the specific tactics for how to build the I Will Teach You To Be Rich system into your personal finances. how to build the I will teach you to be rich system into your personal finances.