The Stacking Benjamins Show - podcast cover

The Stacking Benjamins Show

Joe Saul-Sehy and Josh ‘OG’ Bannerman, CFPart19.com

Named Best Personal Finance Podcast by Bankrate.com and Kiplinger — and the only podcast the Plutus Awards retired from competition after winning twice — The Stacking Benjamins Show is personal finance that doesn’t put you to sleep.

Hosts Joe Saul-Sehy (former 16-year financial advisor, ex-WXYZ-TV “Money Man”) and Josh “OG” Bannerman, CFP (Certified Financial Planner, Bannerman Wealth) sit around the card table in Joe’s mom’s half-finished basement in Texarkana and talk money with the smartest guests in personal finance, investing, and behavioral economics. As Fast Company wrote, the show “strikes a great balance of fun and functional.”

Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday: expert guests, real headlines, listener questions, and Doug’s trivia. Topics include investing, retirement planning, budgeting, real estate, behavioral finance, taxes, and financial independence — for anyone who wants to be smarter about money without being talked down to.

Subscribe to The 201 — the free newsletter that goes deeper than the show — at stackingbenjamins.com/201

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Episodes

Life Advice From a Top American Entrepreneur - Panera Founder Ron Shaich (SB1426)

Want to know how to stack AND enjoy more Benjamins? Us too! That's why we like taking life advice from the right people. In our minds, Ron Shaich, founder and former CEO of Panera Bread joins us to talk about living a life of service. Ron's had a full life, making money quickly but still working. How come? It turns out, Ron's best life advice revolves around how to live with meaning, rather than chasing money. We talk about his early days with the company, reinventing Panera before it was broken...

Oct 25, 20231 hr 10 min

Our Top 5 Ways to Save Money Fast (SB 1425)

Has the cost of...everything...got you down? Us, too. That's why today we bring you our Top 5 Ways to Cut Expenses Fast! If you're looking for some easy wins, we're bringin' them, along with a couple ways that may not be the fastest ways to cut expenses, but are completely worth the time and effort it'll take. Has the return to the office had a bigger impact on your Benjamins stack than you remember? In our headlines segment, we see how many American workers are coping with the surprising cost o...

Oct 23, 202358 min

Can You Balance Time and Financial Freedom? ep 1424

Are you letting your dreams of financial freedom slip through your fingers, always putting them off until tomorrow? Join us for today's special roundtable discussion, where we explore the art of not postponing gratification while still pursuing your financial freedom. Our featured guest is none other than the "Ordinary Sherpa" herself, Heidi Dusek, who joins Doc G and Len Penzo in this insightful conversation. Discover the delicate balance between securing your future financial freedom and livin...

Oct 20, 202356 min

Travel Savings Hacks: Reward Programs, Travel Guides, and Best Practices (with Lee Huffman) SB1423

Where have you seen inflation the most? Maybe in travel. Between flights, the rental car, lodging, and admission fees, it feels like it takes FIVE bags of Benjamins to leave your back door for a long weekend! On today's show, we're thrilled to welcome travel savings expert Lee Huffman. He shares tips, tricks, and best practices to get the most out of your travel savings, wherever you may go. Be sure to tune in and get the most travel savings on any upcoming travel plans you have. In today's conv...

Oct 18, 20231 hr 3 min

Stumbling Toward -- and achieving -- Your Goals (Live from Bali!) SB1422

Ever think that you aren't sure where you're headed with your money? Today we talk to TWO guests who began experimenting and found themselves much more prepared for the future than they'd thought. First, Annie decided it was time to experiment with "van life" during the pandemic. Her goal? To see if living and working from anywhere was actually viable. She'll share her stories, including what worked, what didn't and what she thinks about trying again long term. Plus, Tonia shares her story of ho...

Oct 16, 20231 hr 12 min

When Have Your Saving, Spending and Earning Habits Gone Too Far? (SB 1421)

How much is too much of a good thing? How do we achieve the optimal balance between the two extremes of cheapskate and YOLO? Joining us for this extreme discussion we welcome the founder of the EconoME Conference and Doug's ex-girlfriend, Diania Merriman; Doc G from our sister show, the Earn & Invest Podcast, and writer extraordinaire, Paulette Perhach. They'll discuss what makes for extreme saving and extreme spending. In the second half of this extreme roundtable discussion, we talk about ...

Oct 13, 20231 hr

Stop Guessing On Your Investment Choices (featuring Frank Legan) SB 1420

With so much emphasis placed on saving and investing throughout your working career to insure a secure and wealthy retirement, sometimes enjoying your life today can take a backseat. On today's show, we're joined by author Frank Legan to talk about adding humanity and the need to live your life in the moment into your financial planning. It's all about reaching a balance between planning/saving/investing for the future with treasuring and living your life today. In short, we're talking about cho...

Oct 11, 20231 hr 6 min

They Flipped Their Way To Financial Independence (SB1419)

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of stuff you have accumulated? Ever looked at the mountains of stuff and wondered how many Benjamins you could flip that into? Joining us today are a husband-and-wife team, professional flippers Melissa and Rob Stephenson. We'll learn about how they started flipping, how to actually make money flipping, and how you could make flipping your side hustle. If you have ever wanted to learn how to make money on eBay, Amazon, or Facebook Marketplace,...

Oct 09, 20231 hr 4 min

Does a "Wealthy Life" Mean More Money? (SB1418)

How do you define a wealthy life, and what how do you identify "wealthy?" On today's special roundtable, our panelists share their reactions to a piece that tackles how we define wealth—and not all wealth is tied to how many Benjamins you make. We're joined by our friends Miranda Marquit, Paula Pant, and Len Penzo. Is wealth to you taking a fancy, luxurious vacation every year? Or do you define wealth as having the freedom to step into your own backyard sanctuary and fire up the grill? Is wealth...

Oct 06, 20231 hr 8 min

How Fear Can Help You Manage Money Better (with Farnoosh Torabi) SB1417

Fear is such an innate and naturally occurring emotion that we may write off irrational fear, or even living in a constant state of fear as normal. What impact do your acquired or ingrained fears have on your life, success, and finances? How do we acknowledge, come to terms with, and ultimately overcome our fears to reach our full human potential? Joining us to tackle this important topic is our friend and host of the So Money podcast, Farnoosh Torabi. In our headline, we explore a study that sh...

Oct 04, 20231 hr 3 min

How Liz Elting Went From a Horrible Career to Billions With One BIG Career A-Ha (SB1416)

How much should personal passion factor into our choice of job/career/professional pursuit? Is it acceptable to be content with going after a sweet stack of Benjamins, even if the way you earn them doesn't align with your passion? Why do we have to choose between success and passion? Joining us today to tackle the money or passion debate is thought leader, Fortune 500 member, entrepreneur, and passion advocate Liz Elting. She'll help us learn how we can influence our career paths so that it alig...

Oct 02, 20231 hr 12 min

How Polluted Is Your Financial Plan?

How is your thinking plan looking? Is it all clear skies and amber waves of grain? Or is it a pollution-riddled smog alert experienced during rush hour in LA - if it were next to an erupting Mt. Saint Helens? Joining our roundtable is Elaine King, a Peruvian-born CFP® who practices financial planning in Miami. She joins our regular contributors - Paula Pant who is currently located in Manhattan, New York, and Len Penzo who is still somewhere in a bunker below the Los Angeles pollution. They'll d...

Sep 29, 202355 min

Mastering Emotions and Maximizing Energy in Financial Decisions

How much of your own emotions and energy go into your financial decisions? Dr. Julia DiGangi joins Joe to chat about how to master your emotions and maximize your energy. She teaches us how to recognize stress triggers so you can control your emotions and energy before they get out of hand. What proactive steps can we take to master our emotions? She will help each of us self-analyze our relationship with money - the emotional energy and emotional relationship. What would our money say about you...

Sep 27, 20231 hr 12 min

Secrets to Unbreakable Confidence and Financial Success (ep 1413)

Are you ready to maximize your confidence and unleash your inner bad bitch (even if you're a guy)? Today's interview with certified and self-proclaimed bad bitch Lisa Carmen Wang, and it's one you do not want to miss if you're looking to achieve more self-confidence to accomplish your dreams in relationships, career, and life. She dives into her story of self-discovery and how she built unbreakable habits that allowed her to tune out her critics and focus on being her best self. Lisa's book, The...

Sep 25, 20231 hr 12 min

A Big Money Lesson From Taylor Swift (ep 1412)

Taylor Swift made even more headlines when she decided to sidestep traditional Hollywood studios and distribute her new movie, filmed as part of her Eras Tour, directly to movie theaters and millions of her adoring fans. What does Taylor know that the rest of us should about the value added by so-called middlemen? Joining us for this special roundtable discussion, we welcome back author and advisor Eric Brotman who joins Paula Pant and Len Penzo. In the second half of show, sponsored by DepositA...

Sep 22, 20231 hr 12 min

From Burnout to Fully Charged: Building Energy To Create Wealth SB1411

You have one money-making engine that's greater than all of the rest: you. Many of us duct tape our health, popping pills for symptoms and covering up the root causes of our energy depletion. Burnout shows itself in a myriad of ways, and today Dr. Neha Sangwan dives into the clues that you just might be burning the candle at both ends. We talk about stages of burnout, identifying how we got to burnout, and what we can do to quell the problem once and for all. We talk about the stages of burnout,...

Sep 20, 20231 hr

Surprise! I've Achieved Financial Independence (plus young entrepreneurs LIVE from Camp FI) SB1410

Imagine that you JUST figured out what the financial independence movement is all about. You've been saving, but doing nothing exotic. You earlier had thought that putting money in the stock market was "gambling," like many people do. Today, though, you figure out that you've not only done a great job of making your dreams come true, but you've achieved financial independence, and you're still in your 40's. How happy would you be? Today we're live from Camp FI (camp financial independence), wher...

Sep 18, 20231 hr 5 min

Dump These 8 Things To Clear Clutter and Save Money (SB1409)

What could be better than clearing clutter and saving money at the same time? And just in time for the upcoming holiday season! Maybe you'll end up with more cash in your pocket to get through the traditionally rough holiday season with more money in your pocket. On today's special roundtable discussion, we dive into an article about what you can avoid buying and reduce clutter. We're joined by Columbia Magazine recipient and Afford Anything's creator, Paula Pant; Bunker Quarterly recipient and ...

Sep 15, 202356 min

Trading Time For Money: Building a Small But Mighty Real Estate Empire (SB1408)

Trading time for money. Most of us do it. In fact, before financial revolutionary Vicki Robbin (find her on past episodes), the practice was even more prevalent. Chad Carson is a real estate investor who believes that if you're building a pile of assets, often less can be more (especially if it's slightly hands-on like real estate). Using his own journey and real-life examples of other people, Chad talks us through the "trading time for money" connundrum, and hopefully helps us that Go Big or Go...

Sep 13, 20231 hr 4 min

The Naked Money Meeting: Where Money and Communication Collide

Are you ready to get intimate? Really intimate? Bare it all and totally expose yourself with your partner? We're jumping into financial bed with Erin Skye Kelly to learn about the relationship-saving power of scheduling regular "naked money meetings." Rather than sliding the uncomfortable conversations under the rug, Erin shows us how to confront the topic and overcome you and your partner's money blocks and win together. Take Erin's Naked Money Quiz for free to get real with yourself and face y...

Sep 11, 20231 hr 12 min

5 Exercises To Improve Your Money Life with Suzanne Lucas (REWIND) ep 1406

On today's evergreen Friday roundtable rewind episode from August 21, 2020, we dive into doing financial fitness exercises to build better money habits with the Financially Savvy Latina herself, Natalie Torres-Haddad. Also joining us is Richard Simmons, showing us all the Financial Fitness exercises, opps no it is the creator of the award-winning blog lenpenzo.com, Len Penzo; and our co-host-with-the-most and CFP, OG. You'll want to tune in to reinforce the importance of integrating good money h...

Sep 08, 20231 hr 19 min

Building a Strong Real Estate Foundation: Tips for Novice Investors with Paula Pant (Special Episode) SB 1405

Ever wonder how real estate investors reach the summit of success? Our friend and regular Friday roundtable contributor, Paula Pant, joined Joe and Crystal Hammond on the most recent episode of our sister show, Stacking Deeds, Building a Strong Real Estate Foundation: Tips for Novice Investors with Paula Pant . Paula opens up to Joe to share her journey from the early days of starting in real estate investing to where she is today. All Stackers can learn valuable lessons about smart real estate ...

Sep 06, 202357 min

The Magic of Relationships (even in construction!) with Mark Ellison (Special Edition) SB 1404

Join us for a special Rewind Week edition as we check in with Crystal Hammond and our sister show geared toward real estate investing, Stacking Deeds! She sits down with the best carpenter in the remodeling business, Mark Ellison, to dive into not just real estate topics, but key takeaways about the importance of relationship-building that you, our Stackers, can apply to your own lives. FULL SHOW NOTES: https://www.stackingbenjamins.com/stacking-deeds-020-rewind-1404 Deeper dives with curated li...

Sep 04, 20231 hr 9 min

Financial Planning Strategies: Creating a Budget That Works (SB1403)

Are your household finances running like a well-oiled machine? Does each member of the household know his or her role(s) in reaching your own financial planning strategies? Who's your family's CFO? Who's got the COO role? Joining our roundtable to discuss financial planning strategies, we welcome Lacey Langford from the Military Money Show, PLUTUS award-winner Len Penzo from lenpenzo.com, and our own guy who knows how to run efficient systems, OG. In the second half of the show, our panelists sh...

Sep 01, 20231 hr 4 min

What Topics In Personal Finance Worry Us? (Live from Podcast Movement - SB1402)

Ever wonder what personal finance topics worry everyone else? You're not alone. We all wonder if our view of the world (and personal finance, by extension), are the same that other people hold. That's why today we're live from the floor of the 2023 Podcast Movement Conference with two other great podcasters: Shannah Game from Everyone's Talkin' Money and Paula Pant from Afford Anything. Both Shannah and Paula, along with our own OG share their take on how our audience worries have changed this y...

Aug 30, 202359 min

Charting Paths to Financial Independence (SB 1401)

Is the secret to achieving your financial independence in taking a never-ending sabbatical? We're thrilled to have sisters Sammie and Michelle Varghese to discuss what they've learned about financial independence and how taking time off work can lead to greater things in your life. In addition to financial independence, what other life and/or career goals do you have? How did discovering the FIRE ("Financial Independence, Retire Early") change Sammie and Michelle's trajectory, what can you do to...

Aug 28, 20231 hr 12 min

Use Mindset Magic To Transform Struggles Into Triumphs (SB1400)

Does a hard life automatically mean you're destined to struggle with finances? On today's show, we're all about mindset and how adopting the right mindset can set you on the path to financial success—and how having the wrong money mindset can hinder your financial progress. We're honored to invite Tiffany Grant down to the basement to share her real-life experiences and struggles, and how having the right mindset helped her overcome the early disadvantages. Doc G from The Earn & Invest Podca...

Aug 25, 20231 hr 10 min

Getting Zen With Your Money SB1399

How much is enough? Enough money, enough status, enough possessions, enough leisure? We are happy to welcome Manisha Thakor to the basement to discuss some of the revelations she learned after experiencing what she calls the "cult of never enough." How do we disconnect our personal lives from our work lives? Is a cool $5 million enough to retire on in America? In our headline, we take a peek into the retirement lifestyle of the top 0.1% of households. And in Doug's trivia, he might leave you scr...

Aug 23, 20231 hr 12 min

Top 5 Money Lessons From Movie Characters (SB1398)

What lessons have you learned from the silver screen? Today we dive into LOTS of great lessons about finance from our favorite films. Joe and OG both prep their top 5 and do not share them with each other until they hit record. Will your favorites make the cut? You're about to find out! Plus, in our headline segment, if you work from home we may have some good news; most companies plan to continue their current work-from-home policies, according to a recent study. What does this mean for your "w...

Aug 21, 20231 hr 9 min

Bridging the Gap Between Academic Research and Industry Expertise Where Do You Get Your Advice? (SB 1397)

Where do YOU turn for true financial advice? Your family and friends? A CFP professional? Your bridge club crew? TikTok??? On today's special Friday roundtable episode we're thrilled to have an all-CFP lineup to each give their two cents on where to look for true financial advice. We're happy to welcome back our friend CFP Michael Kitces after a long hiatus; we also welcome back the queen of Sensible Money CFP Dana Anspach; and finally, our in-house CFP OG joins the gang. In the second part of t...

Aug 18, 20231 hr 12 min
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