Friday Flight - Perpetual Quitting, A Second Hand Surge, & Debt Management Plans #522

But I will persevere and get through this episode. The podcast cannot go on without you. I cannot go solo. The show must go on. But I see a note here about a sixteen year old driver. What's out all? Okay, So my neighbor, right, my neighbor, they she just turned sixteen and she got she got a new car, not not a brand new car, but a very nice out East station Wagon, And oh yeah, dude, that's what I want.

I love this Audi stations running the family and her parents both of her parents drive out East too, and so it's I just thought it was kind of funny that as I like saw her basically getting into her brain new car I was super excited for you know, obviously that's a really cool thing for a sixteen really get a car. I didn't. I bought my own first car, and I remember it costs so it was to feel in this Audi Wagon, even used. I'm guessing it costs

a little more than a few thousands. Her car is nicer than the one car that we own as a family, and I just think it's funny and exactly. I just want to say, though, I think some people might see that and they might get bummed out. For me, I wear that as a badge of honor. I'm like, that's great, because, yeah, it just reinforces the fact that we are spending very little money on vehicles. We embraced the ugly we exactly, and if you embrace it, then it puts a whole

different spin on things. I think sometimes it's easy to see people getting things and you're like, oh, but I kind of want that, And if you're like, if you know what you want, it makes seeing other people get things, it makes it less less jealousy inducing. And so um, yeah, congrats to my sixteen year old neighbor in her new car. And uh, she listened to the show I don't think so, not that I know of. But yeah, it's one of those things I don't need to listen to that show

mom and dad taking care of me. Maybe someday, though, when those mom and Dad dollars run out, you'll need to test. But all right, well we'll move on and I get to the sampling of stories we found this week. It is our Friday flight. Let's hope Matt can make it the whole way through without heeling over. Oh I

got this, okay, all right. The first thing, the first story we want to talk about, it has to do with employment, and it's about people quitting their jobs obviously, with the Great Resignation is what it's been titled over the past eighteen months, people leaving their jobs, finding new ones, getting paid more, which in a lot of respects is great. But here's the thing. Folks who moved on to a

new job last year are actively looking for something else again. Again. Yes, they're like, got that new job, not want the new new job. Like, hey, I think you're making this a habit exactly. And I think this shouldn't come as a surprise necessarily, because there are still two jobs out there

for every job seeker. So it's a very strong job market for those who are looking for employment, and depending on what position you're in, there might be headhunters reaching out to you saying, hey, we got another job and you get paid more. And I get how it can

be hard to resist. But for those folks who made the switch last year, either the grass wasn't as green as it looked on the other side, maybe they don't like their job as much as they thought, or they're looking to boost their income in a big way again. And I get that impulse, but I think it's important Matt to mention that increasing your income it's obviously it's easier than normal given the current state of the job market, but if you do this too much, it'll start to

have a detrimental impact on your future. Like once, maybe twice is fine, but I think if you have too many jobs with less than a year on your resume, future potential employers are gonna start to see that. They're gonna start to look elsewhere. They're gonna be like, oh, wait, is this person going to bounce again? Um if they get this new job, so they're not worth the higher That's right. It is expensive to bring on and onboard new employees. Yeah, and so that's something you need to

think about. You know, job hopping in order to grow your income can be really smart. But if you try to do it three or four times, if you try to kind of make a big move on the reg then this is something that ultimately, I think will come

back and bite you. That's right. I wonder how many folks made that that switched last year and are now considering it because they saw how easy it was for them to do, right with with so many interviews happening online, with the ability to work from home, it's not like you have to change your commute. I think for a lot of folks the ability to switch jobs there are fewer barriers. But I agree, I think you could overdo

it. It It makes me think about I never really played pinball machines, but you know, if you like, would it like tilts, if you like shaking machine or something like that. Like, I think you can do it a couple of times, but if you overdo it, then it like locks down the paddles and it's like, hey, you're trying to cheat. Yeah,

that is how I view job hopping. Let's talk about thrift stores, because it looks like more Americans, they actually feel comfortable buying things second hand these days, as they should should. Yeah, a survey from thread up reveals that nine percent of Americans are willing to go all Maclamore with it and score their threads from the local thrifts. Real popular song for a while. Do people still listen to that? I don't think so, but it made its mark within our cultural sphere. But but that is up

from seventy back in twenty nineteen. And I think part of the appeal for folks is that they're able to buy nicer things when they opt for a second hand items over a new one. And this is a trend that I like to see. Uh. I mean, how often do we talk about kurb alerts here on the show. Um? Frequently, we do it a lot. But we want all how the money listeners to get into that mindset of being thrilled about finding something usable on the side of the road.

If you think about it, it's sort of like a game. It's actually way more fun to buy you stuff, I think as well as sort of like you said, it's that mindset shift. And if you can view your sixteen year old neighbor getting a sweet audio wagon, Uh, not necessarily as something that induces jealousy, and instead you see your powder blue Homer Honda Odyssey Van as a badge

of honor. Then it completely shifts things. Uh. And obviously that the top reason that folks were willing to buy secondhand or buying used or going to thrift shops is to save money. With the higher prices that we're all experiencing,

folks are are switching up their purchasing habits. And I'm really interested to see if this is a habit that sticks around, because you think back to the Great Depression era and like you had an entire generation of folks who were impacted very dramatically by this thing and throughout their entire lives, where some would say like quite miserly, right, like like an unwillingness to spend money, saving and scrimping

at every turn possible. I am definitely curious to see if this is something that continues, or if, when inflation resumes it's normal levels, if we basically go back to all of our previous spending habits. It's a good question. The Great Depression certainly seared something in the minds and memories of a lot of individuals, and understandably so. It's so much so that their grandkids even talked about their grandparents handled money and how they reused it block for

the rest of their lives. It changed the way they lived for in perpetuity. And I hope for some of us at least, that that, um what's going on with higher prices, with inflation, that when things do combat down, that we don't necessarily forget all of the lessons that we've learned during this time. R. Yeah, I hope that is something that we can take away from these higher prices. Right, let's talk about vacations and disconnecting for just a second.

Match Like, and when I talk about vacations, I'm actually thinking about a vacation from social media. And uh, it made me. I thought about this because you're gonna quit Twitter. I'm not really on Twitter. I I will go on there a couple times a week and just see what some of my friends are up to, But for the most part, I'm not really on social media very much. But um, I guess I read this article by Cal Newport and he has wrote the book Digital Minimalism. It's

a book we would recommend to everyone out there. Cal has written a lot of great books actually, but he actually just wrote a blog post about how taking a break from TikTok or Instagram or any of the social media apps, well, we'll actually make you happier and less anxious. And he cited a study that was done by the University of Bath about how taking just a one week break its significantly improves people's well being. And here's how cal summed it up. Matt he said that social media

usage hurts your mental health. That's his opinion, and I'm inclined to agree with him. I think for most of our listeners, taking a week long break this summer and seeing how it makes you feel and seeing maybe whether it reduces your anxiety and helps you feel more connected to the people around you is a good idea. I think this summer is a perfect time to take seven days and just kind of experiment and see whether staying off social media for longer periods of time actually makes

you feel more human. Like I said, I'm not a heavy user, but it's it does make me want to just like give it up all together for a week and just kind of see the results. So maybe I'll report back and let people know how it goes. Yeah, I would agree as well. I think a lot of us are sort of shaking our heads that like, yes, we know that this is a bad thing, but we kind of shrug it off and we may not necessarily

be willing to actually implement it into our lives. Theoretically, we know it's a good thing, but we're not willing to actually put it into practice. Like I got to think part of it, too, Matt, is that some of us out there are addicted. Yea, truly addicted. When you look at what addiction is, many people are addicted to their smartphones. They are addicted to some of these social media apps, and so it's gonna be even harder to kind of break not just uh, what's a habit, but

potentially even an addiction. Totally, yeah, I completely agree. I wouldn't say I'm addicted, but I always get caught up on my Instagram, like at the end of the day or you know, at different points in the day, I will continue to refresh until it says end of stories or whatever says I guess I'm thinking about posts. But the same is true when it comes to stories, and there is even like there's a shorter time line when

it comes to stories. As well, because they're up there at the top the oald of the last for twenty four hours. I do feel a need to watch all of them before they expire because I might miss out. I have literally, by the way, never posted an Instagram story fun fact about me. But I think what you said is true, Like, we're not actually going to know the effects of stepping away from that unless we actually try.

And so, with Instagram being my social media platform of choice, at some point this summer, I will also commit to doing a seven day I don't know if you want to call it a cleanse, but just like a fast removing that from my life, because for me, it's just the amount of time that it can suck out of my life, right Like you're sitting there, hit and refresh and then and now they started implementing some of the Explore features within the actual timeline, So before you know it,

I'm watching some guys totally eat it on a skateboard, or I'm watching some homebuilders. The algorithm it's like fail videos or like architectural like engineering like stuff that totally fascinates me and and sucts me in. Yeah, well that's

the thing. The algorithm knows us better than we know ourselves, and it sucks us in and so it's probably a good idea to create some sort of hard and fast rule and to create some sort of a detox from time to time so that you can maybe take a better measurement of how it's impacting you and whether or

not you can survive without it totally. Yeah. So you know, this reminds me too that most Americans don't take all of their vacation time, and so we're recommending for you to take some time off social media, but take some actual time off from work as well, because you don't have to go somewhere expensive, you don't have to go somewhere fancy, you don't even necessarily even need to leave town.

But just make sure that you're taking some steps to remove yourself from your work where you're stepping away from the screen at least for a little bit. We do believe that breaks will make us all better. Yeah, I agree to take a break from social media, but also take a break from work. And all right, let's talk about lawns for a second. Lawn care, because you know, we don't have to remind anyone that there's a severe

drought occurring in large parts of the country. California is in the middle of its third year of severe drought, which has led to a bunch of water restrictions. The same is true in Texas, you know, where some reservoirs are apparently down to less than of capacity, which has led you know, a lot of utilities to implement mandatory water use restrictions. Now, we went through this in Georgia. I don't know, it felt like a decade ago, and

you know, I forgot about that. That's right. We we well, the governor was urging us to take shorter showers, and and so I still it's still one of the best lines ever said to a shorter shower. Um. But while this is a bummer, if you like having a lush, green garden or lawn, you know, we're attempting to put a positive spin on this because at least you're saving money.

You're not. It's a little water your lawn. It's all about the mindset, that's right, And so the cost of utilities, it's a large expense when it comes to owning a home. So we're Matt and I were really open to any tactic that gives you the option to cut your water Bill. But here's the thing. If you don't want your lawn to go brown, as everything is just dying off, maybe

consider going with fake grass or synthetic turf. You know, more cities and counties are allowing it across the country, and we're seeing a lot more of it around our neighborhood as well. Matt, my friends Steve. Our friend Steve, he just redid his house and he put turf fin instead of grass and it looks great. And the great thing on top of that is no more watering, no more mowing, no more other expensive upkeep. You don't have think it out there and weed the lawn like that

might have used to do. So I don't know, I think maybe maybe Steve's onto something. Maybe he's a starting a new trend. Yeah, so there aren't all positives, of course, you know, when it comes to artificial turf, because the biggest downside is that the fakes off. It's a lot more expensive than sod. Specifically, it's around ten times more pricey. But of course that one time expense is going to save you money over the years on maintenance. Uh, those

costs seriously add up. And we actually came across a really in depth breakdown of the two types of lawns that will link to and it turns out that you will be able to recoup your upfront costs after about six years. And so this is something to consider if you like having that picture perfect lawn. Uh. It kind

of makes me think of like solar panels. There's an upfront cost, but the benefit that you're going to be able to read from that it pays off in the long run, often times what like ten to fifteen years, and so it's even less when it comes to artificial turf. But if you don't care as much about how your yard looks, then you can consider letting your yard go to seed. Quite literally, more Americans are considering prairie style

yards and are completely rethinking their laws altogether. Not only you did that right, we did, yeah, and we did it somewhat to save money, but it also allows for native plant and weeds to actually flower and bloom, which is helpful for pollinators who are looking for food after that you know, long and cold winter, and so from a pollinator standpoint, evidently this is the most important thing

to consider in the month of May. There's there are some communities around the country who started this thing called no mo May, and we are actually just out of May. But the fact is that is something you can still continue to implement in allowing native natural grasses and other things to actually blossom. But of course don't forget that letting your your lawn, letting your yard go a little more natural, is going to save you money when it comes to the water that it requires as well. And

plus I think it actually looks pretty good. Uh you know there there are there are ways to make it look cool as opposed to just a bunch of dandelions like sprowning up. Well, I think to water costs have gone up around the country, especially in some of the biggest cities because of droughts and water shortages, and so

take it like your water bill. And if part of the reason your water bill is kind of expensive is because you're watering your lawn, cut it out and maybe you won't only save money, but you'll your lan will be more habitable for the helpful creatures out there that need it exactly. Well, We've got several other stories that we're gonna get to, including when higher education, when those advanced degrees don't actually pay off. We'll get to that

story plus a few others right after this break. We are back from the break, and let's get to that ludicrous headline of the week, which is, Matt, what you just tease to talking about higher education and whether or not it is beneficial? And so this this article comes from Business Insider, and it's titled Millennials and gen's ears are getting swindled by the biggest scam in higher education? Wow, what are we gonna uncover here? This is a good story. Yeah, well,

this one is specifically about master's degrees. That's what they're writing about, which begs the question, our master's degrees a complete waste of time and money? Well, so much of that depends on what kind of master's degree you're getting, where you're going, and what's your marketability is after the fact. And so stats do show that folks who get a master's degree are burdened by a whole lot more debt than the average person who just comes out of school

with a bachelor's degree. It's something like thirty two dollars on average versus sixty dollars on average, more than double that's right for someone who has both a bachelor and a master's degree. But here's the thing. Folks with a master's degree, they also earned about eighteen percent more than someone who only has a bachelor's degree, and that isn't necessarily true across the board though some of master's degree holders they don't see any meaningful increase in salary with

that new advanced degree in hand. That would be a tough pill to swallow, Matt if you're debt just doubled and it's like your paychecks stays the same. You put in all that effort years of schooling in order to hopefully advance in your career um and be able to generate, you know, a greater income, and if that doesn't actually

come to fruition, that's got to be a bummer, that's right. Yeah, Master's degrees they can help you to meaningfully advantage, you know, within your career or allow you to pivot towards something completely completely different that you might enjoy more. But it's crucial to pursue higher education with your eyes wide open, because that advanced degree doesn't guarantee a higher salary, although

it almost always is going to mean more debt. Advanced degrees in the arts, humanities, and theology evidently almost always have a negative return on your investment, and so keep that in mind. Don't. Like it's one thing if you're talking about lawyers and doctors and like even dennists like you're going to see a massive increase within your earning potential over the over the course of a number of years. But when it comes to some of these other degrees,

you might want to think twice. And that's this doesn't necessarily mean that it's not worth it. People pursue education for more than just the ability to make more money. Although here at how the money we are often going to focus on the side of it. But if you assume that more education is always going to equal more money, that's just not true. That it is not an assumption

that you want to make. Uh. And so as always we want to recommend for folks to tread lightly with student loan debt, especially if it's for a degree that puts you in a bigger financial hole without any real promise of those future returns. Yeah. Man, that's something that that Emily and I had to discuss because she is getting a master's degree right now, becoming in order to

become a licensed therapist. Unfortunately, there's going to be like a pretty decent payoff between between what she was making before, although you know there were a few years where she wasn't working at all and what she's going to be able to make as a therapist. But it also provides that important level of fulfillment to to get to actually

do what you want to do with your life. In her case, it's a very practical degree, right, It's not like she's getting a higher degree in like, like we said, the arts, and so now she's going to be able to appreciate the arts at a higher level. It's like, now this is literally a job in a certification that is going to allow her to practice. She's going to become an official counselor after she gets that degree. Yeah, for sure. So there's definitely both things that you want

to consider. But it's it's it's not I think a lot of people just think it's a slam dunk that getting another degree is going to inevitably, um, increase their income. But there's such a thing as being over educated, right, and sometimes the more degrees you have, it's not necessarily going to correlate to making more money. Um. But yeah,

let's talk about a scam, Matt. The first second that could have actually been our ludicrous headline of the week if we had so chosen, which actually came from our local TV station here in Atlanta. And it turns out that a local guy here in town he bought about a few homes and he's paying sellers at least partially

in a worthless cryptocurrency. And apparently this guy he calls himself the godfather of real estate, which I gotta say is a red flag right there, like, I don't probably want to do business with anybody who has that moniker. Let's step away from the table if that guy is sitting exactly and so yeah, what he does is he convinces unsuspecting homeowners to sell to him and to take up tot of the proceeds in what are known as traptions, uh, which if you want to know what those are, Apparently

there's some basically a crap coin. They're a cryptocurrency that isn't traded on any of the major exchanges. And so once the seller saw minds on the dotted line, they are now the proud owner of some U S dollars, but also an abundance of digital coins that have little to no value that they can do actually nothing with and so is it then move on their part, Yes it is, But is it also nefarious and potentially illegal on the part of this godfather real estate, this huckster. Yes,

it also is. That it's despicable and a man, I feel like it's stories like this that just kind of sour me on the crypto space in general. It's all the scams out there, It's all the people that are using a a newish technology in order to hoodwink people into giving up something of value in exchange for something that's worthless. Well, I mean, it's not that blockchain technology doesn't have some serious potential, because we feel that it does.

But you know, as we've documented here that the crypto space is rife with hucksters and different scam artists out there, and so our advice would be to never take crypto assets that have questionable or dubious worth for an actual tangible asset. U S dollars are going to be a vastly better medium of exchange when you're selling anything, especially something that can command as much money as an actual

home as actual real estate. We think it's a really good thing that crypto prices stuff fallen because we're seeing less watercolor conversation around the topic, which likely means dwindling interest because we're not crypto experts by by any stretch of the imagination. But we've always said and will continue to say that buying cryptocurrencies is a speculative move. You should enter into those conversations and transactions knowing that you could potentially lose it all. So don't put money at

risk that you aren't willing to completely lose. Yeah, the crypto space shows promise, or at least the technology does, and and maybe we should actually have an expert on here in the near future, Matt, to talk about crypto in a little more depth. So we we've actually got someone that we're hopefully going to bring on in a couple of weeks. So yes, stay tuned for that. But

let's talk about shrink flation for a second. Mat. That is not a scam, but it certainly feels like a gut punch when you're your your your favorite food items are are they shrink by let's say ten, that's happening, and it's happening in the grocery store. Clearly we've talked about that, but it's also happening at your favorite neighborhood restaurant and also a lot of the bigger chains out there, so they're they're just like signs of shrink flation and

happening basically everywhere. And Bloomberg they reported that Subway is putting less meat in its wraps and sich that certain Mexican food chains are changing the kind of steak that they're using from the nicer cuts to the not so nice cuts. Okay, quick interruption. If you had the steak from Aldi ever or recently which kind, well, specifically Ribby, because Kate was there the other day, I don't think so, some well marbled Ribby and we we bought one just

to try it out. Holy crap, dude, it was so good. I was blown away at the quality. So I highly recommend laying some eyes on the meat over there at least and looking at whether or not the cuts look good. And of rant, very small quick rant over. No, I mean I like a good steak. I don't eat it very often, but if all the is selling it and

it's really impressed reuter. Okay, Well, other signs of trinflation that are happening to mentioned Subway, but Dominoes apparently their ten piece wings not got cut to eight and and the price stayed the same. So I don't know. A part of me thinks that's smaller portion sizes are probably a good thing for Americans in general, you know, literally speaking of that is true. Yeah, whether we're eating out or we're shopping at the grocery store. But it's a

good idea. We would say to check and see if your favorite items are getting smaller, because you want to know whether or not the thing that you're paying for

the cost the same is actually is actually smaller. And so one of the best ways Matt for people to be able to decipher that is to check the price per ounce And that's something I look at frequently, especially when most of the time I'm not brand loyal and so I'm just literally looking for the best deal, and price perounce really is the measurement that's going to help

you out the most in that regard. Yes, right, Yeah, most folks surveyed said that they would actually rather have their old portion sizes with a higher price tag attached. That's what they say. But there's a reason that that is not the tactic the businesses are taking, because what they're hoping is that you won't notice. But we want smart how the money listeners out there to pay attention because string inflation is a reality of the times that

we're living in. We're not going to be able to avoid it altogether, but we want you to at least be able to recognize it use unit pricing to your advantage. And what I think this means for us as we go out to restaurants is that that we have to make some mental calculations because there are very few of us who are nerdy enough to carry around like a notepad or to have an ongoing note on our iPhone where we're jotting down the price per ounce of a particular beer or the price of a burger at our

favorite restaurant. But just this being on your mind, just it being on your radar is enough, I think, to start paying attention to the prices at your local restaurants. Bottom line, we want you to be a more conscientious consumer as opposed to someone who just continues along the same behaviors without giving as much thought to the cost. Yeah, if I was, if I was going into a subway right now. Remember the whole Wendy's commercials with the old

lady saying where's the beef. That's what I would be saying if I was in there, and I might even is the roast beef? Pull up that YouTube clip or something. But it's a subway. It's it's been a long time. I used to subway all the time, like in high school and college. I cannot remember the last time I stepped inside of subway. No, it's been a minute. The

whole Jared thing, I think kind of ruined it for me. Well, let's not go there, let's not talk about that, but let's let's let's do talk about debt here for just a second. Map Because for how money listeners who who are in a lot of debt, who maybe feel like they're in over their head in debt, you know, we've talked about different ways that they can go about getting helped, some ways that they can go about it themselves to help fix their debt problem. It takes time, right, it

doesn't happen overnight. But for other folks, there are nonprofit organizations out there who specialize in helping people for free. And the thing is, companies like Money Management International can create something that's known as a debt management plan, and you know, other folks Matt A. Lot of folks who advertise on radio and television, they might tell you to stop paying your bills, to pay them directly, and that they're going to be able to solve your debt problems

for you. That's a big red flag. That is kind of like that crypto scam. It's gonna leave you, uh, screwed over a barrel. But the top nonprofit debt repayment companies they can help you by getting you into what's

known as a debt management plan. And so if you want to know how much better it is than maybe even just paying off your debt as agreed over time, the Money Management International rand the numbers and they just posted those recently, and and they took an average amount of debt which was just about eighteen thousand dollars and an average a PR of And do you know how much time that would take you to pay off, Matt, I haven't run the number in my mind. I do

not know one months to pay it off. And that eighteen thousand dollars in debt would cost you a total

of fifty dollars over that period of time. Right, But with a debt management plan, your a p R would be closer to six percent because these nonprofit organizations are actually able to help you lower the interest rate with some of your creditors, and you'd pay that debt off not in three one months, but forty eight months, and you pay not a total of fifty nine dollars amazing, but a total of two dollars months to forty months

is like the biggest thing. Like, just think about the amount of life that you have back where you don't have to worry about these payments. That's right. So I thought that was cool seeing you know, Money Management International's annual report on debt management plans and how they help people. So I don't it just this is kind of like a public service announcement if you are out there and

you feel overwhelmed by debt. What Money Management International has local organizations in almost every state, but you can also just talk to someone on the phone, and so we'll put a link to their site. Um it's a dot org right in our show notes. But with so many people out there who are predatory in the debt space, this is one of those places where you can turn and get actual help and get out of debt like

much quicker than you thought was possible. Yeah, and Money Management International is a specific credit counselor, but there are a number of different companies, and we'll make sure to link to NFCC, which is the National Foundation for Credit Counseling. Will have a link to their site within our show notes as well. But Joel is going to be it for this episode. I made it through without completely losing my voice. Congratulations the Lord, thank you, thank you very much.

But that's gonna be it. We hope everyone has a great weekend and we will see you back here on Monday. We've got a great interview lined up with some good friends of ours who are local here to Atlanta. That's all we're gonna share for now, but you'll have to check back in here on Monday to find out who it is. We hope to see you then, So Joel, that's gonna be it for this episode until next time. Best Friends Out, Best Friends Out.