"He Lost His $150K Job, But I Make Every Decision": Ramit Sethi on a Couple Stuck in a Parent-Child Money Dynamic
I Will Teach You To Be Rich
Isabelle, 37, and Ryan, 40, have been married for 12 years and have a four-year-old daughter. Six or seven months before the episode, Ryan was laid off from a software engineering job that paid about $150,000. Isabelle, a university professor, became the sole earner. On paper they are doing well: about $1.2 million in assets and an $800,000 net worth. Isabelle came to Ramit Sethi because she is exhausted from being, in her words, "the only one actively thinking about and managing our financial future." Ryan says that whenever he tries to get involved, he feels judged or shut down.
Ramit opens with a pattern he sees often on the show. One partner, often the woman in a heterosexual couple, takes over the bills and the planning. The other steps back and says she's "so much better at this." Eventually the first partner wonders why she's the only one doing it. Ramit wants to know how Isabelle and Ryan got into these roles, why money became a source of stress rather than something they do together, and what it would take for them to work as a team. He also warns early on that the dynamic may be co-created, and that control is part of it.
Two Versions of the Same Problem
Isabelle describes making the day-to-day, big, and long-term decisions herself. The layoff has left the household "in limbo," full of stress about what they can spend and about Ryan's job search. While thinking about a will and life insurance, she realized how much of the financial structure rests on her. She raises a real fear: if she died, she isn't confident Ryan could carry things forward.
Ryan admits he is "mostly here for her." He calls himself "the classic money anxiety person." They do talk about money from time to time, and things improve briefly, but then he gradually "falls off" again because spending makes him nervous. Isabelle thinks they are fine even on one income. She sees Ryan carrying a lot of stress about small daily purchases she considers trivial, and she calls that "a very tiring way to live."
The Ice Cream Scoops
Her example is from a HomeGoods trip the previous weekend. While she was busy with their daughter, Ryan texted her photos of two ice cream scoops, one for $6 and one for $14. She told him to get whichever, probably the one with the handle they liked. He picked the $6 scoop. At the register she asked, "Did you really get that one?" Only afterward did she see his text comparing the two, which said, "I feel poor."
Ryan explains that with his large income gone, he felt it was better to spend less, since $6 here and there adds up over weeks and months. When Ramit asks what roles they were playing, Ryan says Isabelle was in "almost a maternal role" because he was asking permission, which put him in the role of a child. Isabelle first says she simply didn't care which scoop he bought. Ramit pushes back by pointing to her comment at checkout, and she concedes it was said in "a very much a judgy tone." She adds that this happens often: Ryan buys the cheaper item and she asks why he didn't get the nicer one that would last. Ryan says there clearly was a "right" decision, since she got upset when he picked the cheaper one. When Ramit asks why he asked her at all, Ryan says he may have "a bit of a phobia that I'll make the wrong decision" because his decisions are judged frequently.
Ramit notes that in premarital counseling they had agreed on a spending check-in threshold of about $50. Twelve years later, with much higher income, they are texting about a $6 scoop. Ryan acknowledges it isn't really about the scoop. It's guilt about larger purchases, which colors everything else.
The Espresso Machine and the Guilt
Ryan says any purchase makes him feel guilty in the short term, and bigger ones stay with him longer. He used to run a coffee roaster, and when he was working he bought a $3,000 espresso machine. Both agree they could afford it at the time. He still feels it was a silly purchase and describes the guilt as a heavy feeling in his chest. It gets worse when he reads a joke as an attack. Isabelle recently told friends they probably had "about $5,000 worth of coffee equipment." Ryan heard that as a sign she'd been dwelling on it for months, and he responded by walking away or giving one-word answers.
The layoff deepened this. Ryan says he wasn't upset at first. Severance covered the first months, and he hadn't been happy in the job, where he felt his work wasn't valued despite performing well on every metric. Afterward, though, he "kind of fell off": "Okay, I don't deserve anything." He stopped buying things. He admits he often stays in situations he dislikes, especially at work. He has struggled to accept a big cut in earning power after 11 years as a software engineer, in a field where layoffs are becoming more common and remote flexibility is shrinking. He had wanted to consider moving further west, closer to the coast where more tech companies are. Isabelle said no and the conversation ended. He points out that they moved to California for her career, yet she wouldn't move "20 minutes west" for his.
How Decisions Actually Get Made
Isabelle says she makes most decisions. She set up their whole system herself: a joint checking account with linked credit cards, plus separate individual checking accounts and cards that she doesn't look at. She is the only one thinking about life insurance and a will.
Ramit then asks them to recreate a recent conversation Ryan had started about investing. Ryan had suggested setting some money aside that he could research and manage, possibly in stocks. In the first retelling, both of them softened it. Ryan quickly clarified that he didn't mean picking individual stocks, and Isabelle talked about diversified retirement funds. Ramit stopped them: "I feel like you're both performing for me." Ryan eventually said what Isabelle had actually told him, that it was "one of the worst things we could do." She said she didn't remember but would trust his memory, and that she didn't like hearing those words now. Ryan said this is the pattern: "Every time I try to get more involved, I just feel like I'm shut down and I'm just belittled for it. So, I just don't."
Isabelle said she had put a lot of effort into becoming informed, and it frustrates her that Ryan isn't at the same level when she asks for his help. Ramit summed it up: she wants him involved, but when he gets involved she doesn't approve. She agreed. When asked why she needs to control and direct his involvement, she said: "I mean, I do like being in control." She worries that if she steps back, things won't get done, or won't be done right, and they won't have a secure future or a cushion for their daughter.
The pattern goes beyond money. Ryan says that when he makes the bed, she remakes it, and when he sweeps, she sweeps again. Isabelle says it's sometimes easier to do things herself, and also that she's exhausted and doesn't want every wrong decision to be entirely her fault. Ramit asked what she gets out of being a martyr. She said it gives her a sense of contribution, so that no one can say she isn't doing everything: working, caring for their daughter, handling the finances, being the breadwinner. She acknowledged it feels "kind of good in a way." She traced this to being functionally an only child of immigrant parents who didn't speak English. She was the family translator from a young age, and by age 11 she knew their mortgage better than they did.
She named the downsides herself. She burns out. Nobody checks or challenges her decisions. She worries her daughter will copy the pattern. Ryan now feels his input isn't valued, so he shuts down. She said her main reason for wanting change is their daughter. She also noted that their retirement plan currently relies mainly on her pension, so if something happened to her, "this whole structure falls apart." Ryan replied that he would be upset but they would carry on. Most passwords are in a vault, and he could move somewhere cheaper with their daughter. Isabelle said she didn't really believe him. Ryan said she doesn't have much faith in his decision-making. When Ramit asked whether he actually demonstrates engagement with money, he said no, adding that he gets shut down when he tries and that he doesn't like debating, which is her strength.
Masks, a Walk Outside, and a Return
Isabelle said she hadn't worried much about money when they had two incomes. Ramit didn't believe her, and Ryan confirmed she had worried then too. She suggested it might be "the story that I wish I was telling." She described proposing couples therapy once, during an argument after she asked about his job search and he snapped at her. Ryan said he had just been ghosted after a second- or third-round interview. He shut down and the topic never came up again. Isabelle also clarified what had changed: before, her worries came with positive trade-offs like travel. Now she has cut all the "fun," and what remains feels much heavier. Asked whether she would feel good about money once Ryan got a job, she hedged. Ramit said the honest answer seemed to be no, and she agreed. Ryan added that even when they had twice today's income and were contributing above recommended levels to retirement, he still felt he had no decision-making ability and felt terrible about the espresso machine.
Ramit said he felt like he was "battling with a ghost," getting defensive answers to every question. He sent them outside to decide honestly whether they wanted to continue, telling them that if they were going to keep up the show, "it's not for me." Speaking to the camera, he explained that he was being tough because both seemed to be wearing masks, and he couldn't help people without knowing who they really are.
They came back. Isabelle explained that her job involves teaching, professional development, and workshops, which require projecting credibility, and that she is used to masking things. Ramit added that as a young woman of color and daughter of immigrants in academia, she has had to professionalize how she presents herself. She said she wanted to continue because "you're telling me things I don't want to hear," and sometimes people need that. Ryan said he had been deflecting. Because he felt his opinion wasn't valued, he stopped trying or caring, and he carries a lot of guilt about that. Both said they wanted to be there. Ramit called their return a strong positive sign. He said he could browbeat anyone into agreeing to save more in a Roth IRA, but change only lasts when people take the initiative themselves.
The Numbers
Their Conscious Spending Plan showed $1.2 million in assets, $175,000 in investments, $68,000 in savings, $688,000 in debt, and an $800,000 net worth. Fixed costs were 83%, investments 3%, savings 0%, and guilt-free spending 15%. When Ramit asked what it was like to do the plan together, both admitted they hadn't. Isabelle has kept the CSP for one or two years, tracks their spending, and asked several times to go through it together. When that didn't happen, she did it herself, and Ryan verified her figures. Ramit called this a good illustration of how money works in their relationship.
Isabelle is proud that their only debt is mortgage debt, and she thinks investments could be higher because they didn't understand investing until their mid-30s. Ryan's first takeaway was, "I can probably buy the $14 ice cream scoop." He also said he knows his anxiety is irrational and that he would probably benefit from therapy. Ramit replied: "not maybe, for sure." He described a "cloud of anxiety" that keeps Ryan from seeing what the numbers mean.
Gross monthly income is $12,594 and net is $9,189, all from Isabelle, which works out to about $151,000 a year. Isabelle says 83% fixed costs doesn't feel high day to day because they have already cut eating out and children's activities, and daycare costs are dropping. Ramit said they may be the only couple he's seen who actually cut spending after losing half their income, and he told them to take the compliment. Ryan was proud that they hadn't touched their savings, which Ramit estimated covers about nine to ten months of expenses.
The 3% investment line is a 529 college account for their daughter. Isabelle has 8% going pre-tax to her pension and about $150 a month to a 403(b). They had been maxing out Ryan's 401(k), which Isabelle set up by logging in and raising the contributions herself. Since the layoff, his contributions have stopped completely. The account is still with his old employer, and Isabelle has been asking him for a while to roll it over. Ryan admitted he had dragged his feet out of "false hope": he kept expecting a new job with a 401(k) to roll it into.
Isabelle's savings method has always been to pay everything, sweep the checking balance down to around $8,000, move the rest to high-yield savings, and spend on things like trips when there's enough. Ramit called this "a little sloppy." It works when there is plenty of money, but now savings aren't growing. Guilt-free spending is listed at $1,356 a month, though Ryan says it's lumpier in practice. They have an upcoming trip to Iceland that was paid for "before the layoff." There is no line for vacations, which Ramit said "kills me" because travel matters to Isabelle.
The Second Mortgage
Individual categories looked reasonable to Ramit, such as $650 for groceries, $350 for after-school care, and $135 for pet costs. Then he noticed two mortgages. The second is on a condo for Isabelle's mother. After Isabelle's father died a few years ago, her mother, who is older and has mobility issues, couldn't keep living three hours away. Her house in central California wasn't worth enough to buy in their more expensive area, so they put all of its value, about 50%, toward a down payment on a condo, leaving about 28 years on the loan. Her mother's only income is Social Security, which roughly covers her daily needs.
Her mother also owns a house in Mexico worth about $200,000, which Ryan says is roughly enough to pay off the condo. She has been trying to sell it for a couple of years but moving slowly. Ryan thinks she is struggling to let it go, and he noted this has been a point of disagreement between him and Isabelle. Isabelle thinks her mother would use the proceeds on the condo and is even more stressed than she is, partly because she remembers Isabelle's father once losing a job and the family nearly losing their house. They had also discussed, without acting on it, having her mother move in with them and renting out the condo.
To the camera, Ramit said the numbers were actually "okay" to him. The individual fixed costs are reasonable except for the two mortgages. They have about ten months of savings, and 15% guilt-free spending isn't bad for one income. What bothered him was that they could keep going like this indefinitely. He wanted to sharpen their spending so it reflected who they are. Removing the condo payment brought fixed costs to about 66%.
"Paying Bills Is Not Managing Money"
Ramit described a pattern he sees often, especially among women on the show. The "money person" is deep in the details. Isabelle checks her tracking app every time she buys something and asks, "What's this $12 charge?" Their partner defers to them. But the money person often doesn't have a real system. They move money around and treat bill-paying as financial management. Ramit said that isn't managing money. It's pushing paper, which computers do better. The important questions go unasked: what percentage goes to savings automatically, what the investment rate is, whether retirement is on track, how to plan for the trip you want. Instead, he said, people fixate on "the price of pickles."
Asked what a healthier relationship would look like, Ryan described being interested, informed, and communicating so they're on the same page. Isabelle said she would need to be less judgmental and more open to ideas she doesn't initially agree with, and to suggest learning about things together. She realized she brings her professional role as the most knowledgeable, most powerful person in the room into other settings. She laughed as she remembered Ryan telling her she uses her "teacher voice," and she acknowledged it's a whole mentality of authority, not just a voice.
Ramit tried to pick a simple chore to discuss and uncovered another example. Isabelle had gone on "laundry strike." One week she washed only her own clothes and left his out, without saying anything. Ryan called it passive-aggressive and said it was frustrating that she never explained. Isabelle agreed. Ramit said he didn't care whether they did separate laundry. What struck him was that the frustration was never communicated. He told them he saw a brighter future where they could disagree and still feel like a team. In a later aside, he described the "mixed messages" Isabelle sends: participate in money and the house, but you're not doing it right. That, he said, leads people to opt out entirely.
Whose Career Plan Is It?
Isabelle thinks the main fix is more income, and she and Ryan disagree on how. Ryan has focused on high-paying jobs. He says he has always been recruited rather than doing the recruiting, so job hunting is new to him. He has started looking at related, more local roles paying roughly $70,000 to $80,000, which he'd be fine with because he'd be closer to his daughter and have better work-life balance. Ramit said that sounded like a great plan.
Isabelle proposed a different idea: Ryan could be a stay-at-home dad for a few years while she earns more by teaching summer classes for an extra $20,000, doing grant or committee work, and similar. She mentioned a $2,000 summer committee opportunity that had just come up. Ryan objected that she's always telling him she's drowning. Ramit liked that Ryan pushed back and agreed it didn't add up: she is already overwhelmed and on laundry strike, yet wants to take on more. He pointed out that when she feels bad, her solution is to tell Ryan what to do next, and he turned a camera toward her as a "mirror." Isabelle admitted that if she were unhappy about something, like toys left out, she would clean up herself, passive-aggressively. She called herself "a terrible rage cleaner." They agreed they don't yet have the skills to handle this on their own and that they should go to therapy. Ramit suggested a coach or therapist, and said the core issues are disconnection, the parent-child dynamic, and the lack of a shared vision.
Isabelle's Childhood: Mechanics Without Dreams
Isabelle's parents were seasonal laborers. Her father did farm and field work, and her mother worked in factories. They typically worked six or seven months a year and got through the rest on savings and unemployment benefits. What she heard most was "We can't afford that" and "We need to save for when we won't have money." She stopped asking for things because she knew the answer. Her father would sign over his paycheck, and her mother managed everything. The family only built property and made progress once her mother took over, which taught Isabelle that "your dad doesn't know what he's doing with money." She went to college and graduate school on full rides, which is why she has no student debt. Her parents are very proud, though she says her mother still doesn't really know what she does.
She connected this upbringing to her reflex to cut spending right away when their income dropped. When Ramit asked whether her mother ever dreamed, Isabelle said the house was their dream, which is why passing it on means so much. Asked whether she herself dreams long-term, she said she didn't know. Ramit's observation was that both generations are stuck in the mechanics: the partner hands over income, she makes sure bills are paid and sets money aside for lean times, and there is no dreaming even though her income is many times what her parents earned. Ryan disagreed a bit. She does dream in smaller ways, watches travel videos, and has said she lives for her next trip. Ramit agreed that counts, then pointed out that travel appears nowhere in their CSP.
Ramit asked whether she was confident Ryan would earn an income again. She said yes, but questioned whether he should stay in the same field, since she never felt he was passionate about it. Ramit asked why she was telling him what to do with his career. He compared it to his own view as the child of Indian immigrants: if his kid wanted to act, he wouldn't forbid it but would have them interview 20 actors about how they actually live. "But he's not a kid," Ramit said. Telling Ryan what to do is "one more screw in the disempowering toolbox." Ryan admitted his sense of worth is partly tied to his income and that he sees himself as a provider. His parents mostly talk to him about his career accomplishments.
Ryan's Childhood: Take Up Less Space
Ryan grew up in rural Canada. His father was a small farmer, and his mother started washing dishes at a nursing home and worked her way up to management. Where Isabelle's family was open about money, his parents seemed ashamed of it and taught him nothing, so money topics came with anxiety. He described a culture of apologizing for everything. His mother is proud of raising kids who put others first. When Ramit asked what that implies, Ryan said: "That you're worth less than someone else." He said it has "been plaguing me most of my life." He has worked with a therapist on being more assertive at work and in his personal life. He was taught to take up less space, not interrupt, and always consider others' feelings first. His older sister struggles with this even more. Whatever the problems now, he credits Isabelle with seeing more in him early on and pushing him forward in his career.
He described his parents as "very poor" with money. His father got involved in pyramid schemes, and his mother lived paycheck to paycheck until retirement and still spends each check as it arrives. Ramit called them "dreamers" always waiting for the next big break. Isabelle said Ryan daydreams but then beats himself up and doesn't act. She linked that to his family's belief that things "just aren't going to work out for us," almost like "the curse of the family." Ramit called this an external locus of control, a rational response for people who have been poor for generations but not a helpful one. Ryan said he didn't adjust his spending up as his income rose, and that he mostly rejected his parents' money habits. The part he kept was putting others ahead of himself.
Speaking to the camera, Ramit said he felt compassion for both. Each grew up with scarcity and a month-to-month mindset, and even with far higher incomes, they struggle to change their psychology.
The Magic Wand
Asked what they would change with a magic wand, Isabelle said she would "destroy" the entrenched parent-child dynamic. She would replace it with regular communication about big decisions and equal contributions. Ryan's version was smaller: he'd like "some say," maybe owning one key area. Ramit, and then Isabelle, pointed out that he minimized even his magic-wand answer. Ramit compared it to someone whose "rich life" is a beach house that doesn't need to be near a beach or have a roof. Ryan then said he wants to understand what he's doing and make correct decisions. Isabelle said she wants to stop worrying and stop watching him worry, and to turn stressors into plans instead of a cloud that follows them everywhere. Ramit summarized it as "no clouds," whether about laundry, the dishwasher, career, or the house in Mexico. He named the underlying problem as indecisiveness. Their vision should be to become a decisive couple who enjoy talking about money, where each supports the other but individual problems belong to the individual adult, which is also what they want their daughter to learn.
Ryan added that he wants to live without guilt, even about purchases he researches for months. He worries about spending too much and about what Isabelle will think. Ramit reframed that as a rule: agree on the rules before any major purchase, and once the purchase is made, feel only joy about it. No jabbing. Isabelle said she doesn't enjoy the jabs and that hearing her words repeated by Ryan was painful.
When Ramit asked for her travel goal, Isabelle started explaining the past before settling on one international trip a year, "for myself and for my daughter." Asked whether Ryan would come, she said he was "welcome to come if he wants, I suppose," then called it a joke. Ramit asked Ryan directly whether he likes that joke. Ryan said, "I don't like when you joke about going on vacation without me." Isabelle said that was fair, that she shouldn't have said it, and apologized. Ramit noted that since she knows Ryan struggles to assert himself, comments like that are a real problem and also a chance for both of them to practice.
In another aside, Ramit said he hadn't smiled in 15 minutes because money, for them, is an endless checklist. When he asked Isabelle about taking two hours to watch a movie, she said she could never. He connected this to children of immigrants who were taught that any unproductive time is wasted, and who therefore never learn simple enjoyment.
Deciding on the Job
Ramit asked for the single most important decision. It wasn't retirement savings, given Ryan's $175,000 and Isabelle's pension. It was Ryan's job, and Isabelle tried not to make that decision for him. Ryan listed his options: be a stay-at-home dad, take a job far below his skill set, invest in education such as grad school, revive his previous business, or start a new venture. Isabelle added retail-type work, and Ramit added getting help through a job-search coach or networking groups. Ryan wanted to weigh pros and cons. Ramit narrowed it to one question: stay-at-home dad, or a job paying over $50,000? Ryan chose the job because he doesn't want Isabelle to keep struggling or take on more. He agreed to widen his search to jobs paying $60,000 to $70,000 for a month, then look at related careers where he could bridge his existing skills. Isabelle said she would fully support any clear decision, since the "cloudy holding pattern" was the real problem.
Ramit shared how he would set this up. In his own relationship, neither partner asks about purchases under $50. For Ryan, he suggested: expand the search to jobs over $60,000 right away, hire a career coach if there are no interviews after a week, go down to $50,000 if needed, and after that become a stay-at-home dad for at least two years and then reassess, with Isabelle stating her expectations for that role. Ryan compared it to an OKR. Ramit's reply was to bring OKRs into the relationship and make it systemic.
Confronting the Condo
Back in the CSP, Isabelle wanted to start with retirement savings. She proposed at least $150 a month in post-tax retirement contributions for Ryan, taken from guilt-free spending. Ryan said he'd be comfortable using up to about $10,000 of savings to start investing. When Isabelle then tried to find money for vacations, she hit the same limit, and Ryan said what nobody had said yet: the problem is the condo. It needs to become a rental while her mother moves in with them and maybe spends time in Mexico, or they need to be more assertive with her about selling the Mexico house. Ramit encouraged him to say it directly, and he did: Isabelle needs to be more assertive with her mother.
Isabelle said this is very hard for her but fair. She proposed that if nothing happened in six months, her mother would move in. Ryan added that if he became a stay-at-home dad they couldn't carry the condo, though with a job they might manage until her mother sorted out her feelings. Ramit said he wasn't satisfied with that. With 83% fixed costs, no savings, no vacation money, and shrinking guilt-free spending, another job loss would mean real trouble. Isabelle said she avoids stressing her mother and would rather carry the burden herself. Ramit said her daughter might one day do the same with her, and added: "Your mom is not a fragile flower." This is a woman who worked seven months a year and ran the family's finances.
Isabelle cried. She described being in the "sandwich generation," caring for a young child and a parent at once, where what she wants to do for one isn't what's best for the other or for herself. Ryan said her mother had planned to retire in the Mexico house with Isabelle's father. Ramit acknowledged that the house isn't just a financial transaction, that there are ways to honor it and people who can help with that conversation, but that it remains one of the biggest numbers in their plan.
He asked what their daughter would say about money in 25 years if nothing changed. Isabelle said her daughter would give almost the same answer Isabelle had: mom took on the responsibilities, dad handed over the paycheck. She wants her daughter instead to see both partners contributing to decisions and to see money as a way to live a rich life, not just pay bills. Ramit described an alternative future: parents who talked openly about money with her at an age-appropriate level, a mother who had hard conversations with her own mother, and a father who openly said coffee was part of his rich life. Isabelle said that would make her very happy. Ryan wants his daughter to see him as involved. The couple noted that their daughter already asks "mommy," not "daddy," when she wants something, even from the time when Ryan earned more.
The Revised Plan and Retirement Picture
They agreed to plan as if the condo payment will be gone in six months. That brought fixed costs to 66% and freed up $2,765 a month for guilt-free spending. They lowered that to around 20% to 21%, added about $800 a month to investing, set aside $350 a month for vacations (a bit under $5,000 a year), and, at Isabelle's suggestion, added $250 a month for home repairs. Ramit questioned the $250 a month going to the 529 before their own retirement was fully in place and zeroed it out to show the effect. He reminded them that all of this was on one income. Adding a conservative $3,500 a month net for Ryan brought fixed costs to 47% and left about $5,000 a month. Ryan saw the implication right away: without the condo, he could work part-time and spend the rest of his time as a father. "The clouds just cleared," Ramit said.
Isabelle's pension will be about 68% to 70% of her final salary, which she conservatively estimates at $150,000 to $160,000. Ramit's rough calculation used 70% of $160,000, Ryan's $3,500 a month, and the new investment contributions, and projected about $187,000 a year in retirement income, inflation-adjusted, before Social Security or her 403(b). Isabelle had guessed $100,000 to $120,000, and Ryan $150,000. Both found the projection comforting. Ryan thought it might even be conservative given his past contributions. Ramit asked whether Isabelle needs to keep taking extra summer work. She said probably not, and admitted she takes on small extra jobs whenever she can make an extra thousand dollars. Ramit said she is following a "rule book from 45 years ago that doesn't apply to you today." She said she still can't imagine sitting down to watch a movie without feeling she's wasting time. She and her friends call it "toxic productivity."
Homework
Ryan first described his homework as a process. Ramit pushed for outcomes. They agreed the condo is Isabelle's responsibility: within six months, the condo payments stop. Ramit said not to keep an option that isn't really feasible. When pressed, Ryan admitted that having her mother move in would "drive us all a little bit crazy," so selling the Mexico house is the only option. Ryan's homework is a job paying over $60,000, or about $3,500 a month net. Isabelle asked him whether he would really be comfortable earning $50,000 to $60,000. He said yes, if it's local and gives better work-life balance. What they want from that balance is more time together as a family, less rushing, and space for what they want to do rather than what they have to do. Isabelle's version was "a movie Wednesday." Ramit told them they already have the money. With a couple of big changes, they're fine.
In his closing remarks, Ramit said Isabelle probably expected him to focus on Ryan's mistakes and instead found she plays a large part in the dynamic. He called her decision to come back and continue one of the bravest things he has seen on the show. He said Ryan found his voice by the end, and he wants more of that from both of them.
Follow-Ups
In her first follow-up, Isabelle said the most surprising thing was how uncomfortable the process was, given that she had applied, listened to many episodes, and thought of herself as comfortable talking about money. Her biggest realization was that she had been holding on to the Mexico house emotionally just as much as her mother, which is why she avoided dealing with the condo while trying to cut everything else. She had since had a long, emotional conversation with her mother, and they planned to list the house within six weeks. Both would need to travel to Mexico, which explained the timeline. Ryan said he was surprised by how "checked out" he had been. Out of fear of conflict or mistakes, he had pushed decisions onto Isabelle and added to her stress. He was also surprised by how long the condo had been in limbo. They were scheduling regular money discussions, and he was widening his job search while still interviewing for roles at his previous level.
About seven weeks after the recording, they sent another update. Ryan had accepted a job offer at $150,000 a year. Isabelle's mother had accepted that the Mexico house needs to be sold and was planning to travel there in September to move it forward. Isabelle said that even though Ryan's new income means the condo is no longer strictly a financial necessity, they still plan to resolve it within roughly six months for practical and personal reasons. Ryan said their money conversations are now "actual conversations," with regular meetings about savings and goals and more openness to each other's feedback. They had already made a plan together for how to handle the new income once he starts.
There's this real concern. If I die, he's so.
I got laid off. Then I kind of fell off and I'm just like, "Okay, I don't deserve anything."
I'm the one that's making a lot of the decisions and that gets really tiring.
Every time I try to get more involved, I just feel like I'm shut down and I'm just belittled for it. So, I just don't.
It seems like you want him to be involved, but when he tries to get involved, you don't approve of it.
I think that sounds accurate.
You feel the need to control and direct his involvement with money.
I do like being in control.
Maybe I have a bit of a phobia that I'll make the wrong decision because I feel like my decisions are judged quite frequently.
You have 83% fixed costs. You have no savings, no money for vacation, your guilt-free spending is getting chipped away.
Yeah.
And if one of you loses your job again, we got problems.
Wait a minute.
In lots of relationships, one person ends up handling the money. And we see it all the time on this podcast. One person, often the woman in a heterosexual relationship, pays the bills, makes the plans, and thinks about the financial future. At first, feels normal. It's even helpful. But here's the problem. The more one person takes over, the easier it is for the other person to step back and even stop trying. So eventually, what you will find is one partner thinking, "Why am I the only one dealing with this?" And the other's thinking, "She's got it under control. She's so much better at this than I am."
That is exactly what's happening with Isabelle and Ryan. They're 37 and 40 years old. They've been married for 12 years with a four-year-old daughter. And Ryan lost his job six months ago, but it turns out their money problem started way before that. Isabelle feels like she is carrying their whole financial future all by herself. Interestingly, Ryan says every time he tries to get involved, he feels judged or shut down.
I want to know how they ended up stuck in these roles. Why did money become something stressful instead of something they do together? And ultimately, what is it going to take for them to start working as a team? Let's meet Isabelle and Ryan.
Isabelle, you wrote something on your application that caught my eye. You said, quote, "I'm exhausted being the only one actively thinking about and managing our financial future." Tell me more about that.
I'm the one that's making a lot of the decisions, the day-to-day decisions, the big decisions, the long-term decisions, and that gets really tiring. But then the other thing is that I feel like we've been in and are in a little bit of a limbo because Ryan lost his job a while ago now. And I think that that's led to a lot of stress and anxiety about money, about finances, about we can or cannot spend on this, about trying to find work.
And I've been doing a lot of future planning and a lot of thinking and there's this very real concern I have that if I die he's so. Right? There's this notion that I've started thinking about getting a will set up, getting life insurance. I've been thinking about all of those things and that's made me realize that I think I'm holding up a lot of the financial structure in the household. I would like trying to move towards a place where I could know that if I were gone, I could trust him to continue that moving forward.
I'm mostly here for her. I'm not going to lie about that.
Okay.
I'm the classic money anxiety person. I would definitely like to find more of a comfort point, like she was saying. We do have conversations about money from time to time. I feel like sometimes it improves in the short term and then it kind of falls apart again.
What's it?
The whole aura or teamwork or anything like that. One of the things that we kind of run into is the concept of spending makes me nervous, I guess, and I unconsciously, over the course of the next few weeks or so, kind of gradually fall off.
I feel like we're doing okay. I still feel like even on a single income where we are, I think we're okay. And I think he's a lot of the times carrying a lot of stress and anxiety about small day-to-day spending that I think is trivial.
What's an example of something small that he focuses on?
He just said, "I knew that was going to come up," because I told you it was going to come up. We were at a HomeGoods store just last weekend. He went off to look at some things while I was with our daughter and he sent me a picture of two ice cream scoops.
Okay.
One was $6, one was $14. I was with our daughter. I couldn't really think about it, focus on it. I was just like, "Just get whichever. Just get whichever. Probably the one with the little swoopy handle that we like." And then I didn't really pay attention to it. He put one in the cart. When we get to the register, it was a $6 one.
Mhm.
And I think I said as we were paying, "Did you really get that one?" And I didn't see this until after: he texted me when he was comparing the two, "I feel poor." And I still sit and think to myself, "We are not poor." I don't think about those things. I don't stress about that level of purchase and I feel like he does. I don't know. It just feels like a very tiring way to live.
Ryan, what was going on when you were at the store looking at the scoops?
Well, I just feel like a lot of those little decisions add up. So, when it's looking at those smaller day-to-day things, I do feel like with my income gone, it was fairly large and sizable. Kind of just felt like maybe it's a better idea to spend a little less. $6 here, $6 there over the course of a week or months does add up.
When you both hear the description of what happened at the store with the ice cream scoops and you zoom out, what role is each of you playing in that dynamic?
I'd say that she's kind of taking on almost a maternal role if I'm asking for permission, which she shouldn't be.
And what role are you taking on then?
Like a child.
Yeah, parent-child dynamic. He was asking for permission and I didn't care, to be honest. That's just—
And you didn't care. So I went to tell you one.
I'm not so sure I agree that you didn't care.
You don't think so?
No, because what happened at the checkout?
You're right. You're right.
What did you say?
"Did you really get that one?" And it was very much a judgy tone. I don't feel like I need to give permission for those kinds of purchases. I kind of wish you just—and we've talked about this before—there's a lot of instances where he'll get the cheaper item and I'll say, "Why didn't you just get the nicer one that'll last longer or that you actually wanted instead of the cheaper thing that will then either not be useful?" I don't know what—
Think about it.
I feel like oftentimes I'm the decision maker in things and I feel like I'm the one who can make the informed decisions because I have a better understanding of where finances are. I just don't want to be making the informed decisions all the time.
I'm not interested in what you want and don't want. I'm only interested right now in what role were you playing?
If we're following along with the same dynamic, I am the parent in that dynamic.
Mhm. And you're—
It's the same way that my daughter might come up and say, "Can I get this or that?" And I'm making that decision.
Well, I feel like there was a right decision obviously because she got upset when I got the cheaper ice cream scoop.
Oh, so she the right decision.
I was leaning towards the cheaper scoop and I just asked her which one she wanted and she said she didn't care, so I bought the cheaper one because I felt more comfortable with it and then she kind of lashed out about it.
Why'd you even ask?
I don't know. It's just—
Think about it.
Maybe I have a bit of a phobia that I'll make the wrong decision because I feel like my decisions are judged quite frequently.
Okay. Money obviously makes both of you uncomfortable. Is that fair to say?
Right.
Ryan says yes. Isabelle?
I—
If not, feel free to disagree with me.
I don't feel like it does.
Okay. It does come up enough. I know that one of the things that you talk about is guilt-free spending. We've jokingly said that, or she's jokingly brought up that there's no such thing as guilt-free spending.
For him.
If I buy myself something nice, I dwell on it and feel guilty about it for the rest of my life.
Okay. Is it when you buy something nice, it's wracked with guilt? Or is it when you buy anything?
I'd say anything in the short term, but in the longer term, the larger purchases more so. This is an example of a larger purchase. I'm a huge coffee person. I used to run a roaster and I bought a $3,000 espresso machine back when I was working and we could afford it. Wasn't a big deal, but I still feel like it was a silly thing for me to buy in terms of the cost and I feel guilty that I bought that.
How does guilt show up for you? Where do you feel it?
It's like a heavy feeling in the chest, I suppose. Or sometimes I feel like maybe I'll misconstrue a comment or a little joke that she made. And this is where it gets really bad in terms of money, and I'll feel like I'm being attacked. She'll make a little comment about the cost of my espresso machine and she's just half joking and didn't really even give it any thought, and I'll feel like she's been dwelling on it for months or something. And I'll just either walk away or give one-word answers and just kind of—
Got it.
Shut down.
Do you remember what kind of joking comment you make?
I don't know. I'm trying to think about when that might have been. And I know we had a couple of friends over lately and I made some comment about the $3,000 espresso machine and a very fancy grinder and very—there's a lot.
What did you say?
I said something like, "Oh, I think we have about $5,000 worth of coffee equipment here."
And do you agree that when he purchased it, you both could afford it?
Yes, I do think so.
But then I got laid off, which is becoming more common in my field. And then I kind of fell off and I'm just like, "Okay, I don't deserve anything." And I didn't really buy anything. I didn't feel like it was the time for that sort of purchasing.
When did that happen?
Probably about seven months ago.
Okay. Sucks.
Yeah.
Yeah. I vividly remember.
What was your first thought when that happened?
I wasn't actually upset at first, which is funny because she's mentioned before that we might be fine if I did a career pivot or went for slightly less money and became more comfortable.
Okay.
But I have a hard time coming to terms with reducing my earning power that much. Well, this is a career that I've had for 11 years, right? I've been a software engineer for 11 years. It pays pretty well in the past. It had a lot of flexibility in terms of remote hours and things like that, which is changing.
Did you feel anything at all or were you like, "Okay"?
I was like, "Okay." To be honest, it didn't hit me quite as hard the first time because I was getting the severance, which covered the first few months, and I wasn't happy there if I'm totally being honest with myself. I was doing fine as far as every metric went, but I didn't feel like that was valued.
Do you feel it's common that you stay in situations that you don't like?
Yeah, probably.
Career, any other parts of life?
Career primarily. One thing we talked about when I was looking for employment is I wanted to move, and this is a huge life decision, so I don't blame her for disagreeing, but I wanted to move a little bit further west so I could look at more jobs out closer to the coast, which is where a lot of the tech companies are. And she pretty much just said no. And then we were done with the conversation.
And that's where you are today.
Yes, that's where we are.
You say no, you still want to do that for better job opportunities. Is that right?
I was tempted. Yes. It's something I wanted to at least talk about or put on paper, but it felt instantly dismissive of my career when, being honest, we moved to California for her career and she won't move 20 minutes west for me.
I see. Okay. Isabelle, what do you do for a living?
I am a professor at a university nearby.
Okay. And how long have you two been married for?
12 years and a couple weeks.
Oh, cool. Congrats. Kids?
One child, yes. A four-year-old daughter.
Okay, great. All right. How do decisions get made in your household?
It's probably going to be me for most decisions. I would say we have our financial system set up and in particular that was probably entirely me, which was setting up a joint checking account, setting up credit cards connected to that for each. We each have individual checking and credit cards separately where I don't look at his, I don't track it, I don't do anything with it. That was all set up by me. I'm the only one looking at things like life insurance. I'm the only one looking at things like a will.
When was the first time you had a serious conversation about—
Probably when we were getting married. We had the standard discussion about what we're comfortable spending at each time, what we're looking for in terms of where we want to live in the future, all of that.
How much you're comfortable spending. What do you remember saying?
At the time we were making considerably less. So it was like $50.
Right? I remember that. I remember that. It was, yeah. Yeah.
It was premarital counseling.
Isn't it kind of interesting that now 12 years later you are texting about a $6 ice cream scooper?
Yeah, it's fair. I don't think it's about the ice cream scoop. It's probably just because I feel guilty about some of the other larger purchases and maybe I just make assumptions based on that.
I kind of love the idea that they were both in this store and he's agonizing over whether to buy ice cream scoop number one or ice cream scoop number two. It tells me so much about their relationship. What layers are you noticing here? Here's what I'm noticing. I'm noticing that instead of being curious of her partner when it comes to how he chooses to spend money, she kind of puts him down. And that makes me understand why he might not want to participate in money in this relationship.
She feels like she does everything, but also little jabs after checkout. "Oh, you bought that one." It's quite interesting. So, I'm starting to suspect that whatever dynamic they have with money is co-created, and definitely a lot of it is due to control. Let's find out if I'm right.
I'm going to take a wild guess. Maybe you've been putting off seeing a doctor for a while for some unexplained condition. Hey, why is my left eye blurry? Do I have toe fungus or is it just gross toenails? Whatever it is, stop wondering if you should get it checked out. Go see someone right now. You can use our sponsor Zocdoc. They make it really easy. You don't even have to get on the phone to schedule an appointment.
Zocdoc lets you search and compare local in-network doctors. Whether you're looking for primary care, dentistry, eye care, or anything else, you can easily search by specialty or symptoms. And you can book in-network appointments with more than 150,000 providers across all 50 states. Getting an actual appointment is easy. You just look through the real appointment openings, click what works for your schedule, and book it instantly.
And what's great is their appointments happen fast, usually within 24 to 72 hours. No more waiting months and months to get the care that you need. Your health matters and taking care of yourself should not be complicated. Find and book the right doctor with Zocdoc. Head to zocdoc.com/RAMIT.
To get started and check that appointment off your to-do list. That's zocdoc.com/RAMIT.
When I first started IWT, I was the person who answered every single customer service email, but I didn't really love it. And as the company grew, I couldn't really keep up. So, I hired a great customer success team that has taken over ever since.
If you are looking for help with your customer service in your business, one great option is this episode's sponsor, ElevenAgents by ElevenLabs. ElevenAgents is a platform for AI voice and chat agents that can actually listen, understand, and resolve customer issues. They handle the simple stuff like looking up customer accounts, processing requests, and they know when to hand off complex tasks to a person.
Their agents use the same AI tech as ElevenLabs, the company known for realistic voice and audio models in over 70 languages. So, if you've ever heard an AI voice that sounds real and natural, there's a good chance it's from ElevenLabs. My team and I actually use ElevenLabs. And if I needed AI voice and chat agents, I would use ElevenAgents.
If you're looking to improve your customer service experience, check out ElevenAgents. If you run a business or handle customer operations across support, sales or marketing, you can start with a demo at elevenlabs.io/ramit. See how ElevenAgents can fit into your workflows and help build experiences that your customers will actually love. Elevenlabs.io/ramit. That's elevenlabs.io/ramit.
You know how they say when you get married your life gets better because of your wife? I have found that to be true because my wife was like, "Why do you keep on staying awake all night? What's the point? You're just on Reddit. Get off. Go to sleep." And I hate to say that I did it and it actually worked. That's why I try to go to sleep on time and we bought a high-quality mattress. I just take sleep a lot more seriously.
And this is why I'm excited that sleep scientist Dr. Aric Prather is hosting our next presentation in our Rich Life: Road to $100K program. Join us on Wednesday, September 30th for this free live event where Dr. Prather will walk you through the exact changes he makes with patients in his sleep clinic, including what to do when you are lying awake in the middle of the night or why going to bed earlier doesn't always mean more sleep. If you've tried everything and you still wake up exhausted, don't miss this very important addition to your rich life. Register today at iwt.com/expertsession.
What else did you talk about in the survey? Investing. I don't think it was any kids.
Some of it was that detail stuff and then some of it was larger picture, like—
Wait, this doesn't sound very substantive.
Super substantive. We have had discussions about saving as well.
What do you talk about?
Well, usually it falls back on her. I end up feeling kind of dumb. I'll bring up something like, "Maybe we should start investing in stock." "That's the absolute worst thing you can do." I'll be like, "Okay."
I phrased it like that?
You pretty much said that. What did you say then?
Actually, yeah. Let's recreate this conversation. So, when did this happen? I like this.
It was probably a couple weeks ago.
Perfect. Okay. Who brought it up?
I did because I was trying to look at getting more involved in money because she wanted to talk about it.
Can you recreate it and I will just listen? Do it as realistically as possible.
I was wondering if maybe we should set some money aside and I can start handling investments for us and research it and figure that out, like an individual stock portfolio.
Are you thinking about individual stocks, like selecting places?
Not individual ones. Not like I've got a good feeling about Disney.
Well, that's what wasn't clear to me because when I think about investing, it's like investing in probably a retirement account and thinking about funds that are diversified.
Right. Well, we're not really recreating the conversation. Maybe we should.
I'm realizing that there was a misunderstanding from the beginning.
What's with the performance? I feel like you're both performing for me and I'm not interested in the performance, because if you all are here to put on a performance, then you're going to walk out with me reacting to your performance. I don't really think you want that. Do you think that we could recreate that conversation as it actually happened?
I was thinking about putting some money aside just to start investing in stocks on my own. So, I'm kind of handling a bit more.
I don't know if that's a great idea, honestly, because I honestly can't remember what I said, Ramit.
Yes, you can.
No, I can't. I'm trying to think about what I said.
You said it's one of the worst things we could do.
That's remembering of it.
Well, let me tell you what's going on here. I suspect that you think it's going to look bad if you actually say what you said, and so you're trying to mask it by saying—
Possible. Yes. I don't remember saying that, but maybe I did, and I should trust your memory of it. That's fair. I probably did say that's probably one of the worst ways that you could invest, and I don't like hearing that coming out of my mouth now.
That's fine.
I just feel like that's an example. Every time I try to get more involved, I just feel like I'm shut down and I'm just belittled for it. So, I just don't—
Yeah. And I'm hearing that and just feeling like about it because that's not what I want to do either.
Mhm.
But—
Finish a sentence.
I feel like I've put in a lot of time and effort to try and be more informed about things, and so I'm asking for his help on decisions, but he's not at that same level of informed. And then that's frustrating, too. I don't know where to go from there.
It seems like you want him to be involved, but when he tries to get involved, you don't approve of it.
I think that sounds accurate.
Ice cream scoop all the way up to investments.
I think that's accurate.
So, what do you want to do about that? Because I can give you a bunch of whiz-bang stuff. Let's look at the numbers. Look at the percentages. Doesn't change anything. What is going on that you feel the need to control and direct his involvement with money?
I do like being in control. I feel like currently I'm more knowledgeable about it. And I think that that's something that I try to leverage, but I am realizing that I probably need to just step back.
Really?
I worry that if I step back, then things won't get done or things won't—I don't want to say be done right, but be done right.
And if that happens?
Then we're not going to be in a good financial situation moving forward. We won't have a secure future or we won't have savings or we won't have something to fall back on for our daughter. So—
Keep going.
That's what gives me anxiety at night, is thinking that if I step back things are going to fall apart.
Mhm.
And I don't like that feeling either. But it's very hard to stop.
You've heard stories of a wife telling her husband, "Clean the kitchen counter," and then he cleans it. She goes, "You didn't do it the right way. Now I need to do it." This is kind of a—
Don't look at me.
Wait, did this happen?
Yes. Well, sort of. She says that I make the bed wrong. So, anytime I make the bed, she'll go up and remake it. Anytime I sweep, she'll re-sweep.
It's a pattern, and it's not just in finances.
Talk me through it.
If I want it to be done and if I want it to be done correctly, sometimes it's easier to do it myself.
Okay. So, just do it then.
But I'm tired all the time and I'm exhausted and I don't have the time to be doing all of these things and I don't want to feel like if I make the wrong decision it's all entirely my fault.
What do you get out of being a martyr?
I don't know. I don't know.
Think about it.
A sense of—it's not satisfaction, but a sense of contribution, a sense of I'm putting everything out there and no one can say that I'm not doing X, Y, or Z, right? Trying.
Because I'm working. I'm taking care of our daughter. I'm doing the finances right now. I'm the breadwinner because he doesn't have a job. I'm even cleaning the kitchen counter the right way.
Mhm.
Does it feel good?
I don't think it's—no.
I think it feels kind of good in a way.
There's probably some truth to that. Yeah, because I'm very accustomed to always being on top of things and always being productive and always, always, always, always moving. Part of that is probably coming from the fact that I was functionally an only child of immigrant parents who did not speak English.
Okay, got it.
And so from a very, very, very young age, I was the main translator. From the age of 11, I knew our mortgage better than my parents did. I was very accustomed to that and I've always had that type of control in that.
What's the downside of trying to take on control in every part of your life?
I get burnt out and I get exhausted.
What else?
Well, like I said, I always kind of have this fear of I'm the only one making the decisions and what if I'm doing something wrong and there's no one—I don't have a cross-check or someone to have input and validate or challenge decisions that may not be correct.
Okay. What else?
One of the things that I worry about too is my daughter seeing that and then replicating it herself because I'm replicating my own patterns and I know that to some extent.
She's four, right?
Mhm.
She sees it already.
Yep.
What about your partner?
Well, I think that he's starting to—well, not starting to, but I think getting to a point where he feels like his input isn't valued and his decisions aren't valued.
So, therefore, he—
Shuts down.
Yeah. Disempowered. Says, "I can't even get an ice cream scoop the right way, so you deal with it." Why not just keep doing this the rest of your life?
The big thing for me and the reason that I want to try and make progress towards breaking these patterns is because I think a lot about our daughter. That's really the main thing for me. I feel like if it was just me and him, I probably would be okay to continue this on, but I don't want her to grow up and feel like she has to do the same thing because it's tiring.
But then the other thing that I worry about is if I walk out of the studio today and get hit by a bus, and that's something we need to think about. But right now our retirement plan is primarily my pension.
Mhm.
My income would fall through. So that's the other thing that I worry about too. If something were to happen to me, then this whole structure falls apart.
I warn you, I'd be upset, but I think we would carry on to some degree. Most of our passwords are in a vault, etc. And my current financial situation is pretty largely determined by where we're located as well. So, if I was able to take Sophia and move, we could probably find something else. But we'd figure something out is what I'm saying. I have thought about it. It's not like I go through and I brainstorm for it, but I don't think we'd be completely screwed.
How do you receive that, Isabelle?
I don't know if I believe it necessarily.
Why do you think she doesn't necessarily believe you?
She doesn't have a lot of faith in my decision-making or a lot of what I do.
Do you demonstrate engagement and excellence with money?
No, but I feel like anytime I try to, I just kind of get shut down. And I don't like debating, and she's much stronger when it comes to that.
Well, morbid or not, one way to win the debate is if your partner's dead. There's no one to debate with anymore. I'll do it my way.
Right.
Who else? I would prefer not to get to that.
I would also prefer not to get to that.
I prefer not for my wife to die in order for me to have a way to engage with money.
That's true. I'd still be uncomfortable, but I was in my 20s when we were married. It's not like I was completely—
They seem like real concerns, Isabelle.
Yeah.
I'm worried about this. I'm worried about that. You worry a lot, right?
I feel like when we were dual income and when I was maxing out his 401(k), when we had all of this set up, when I had my—I feel like I wasn't worrying about it as much then.
You're telling me that you were not stressed or worried about things in your household when he had a job?
That's true, I think.
I don't believe that.
You don't think so?
No way. Not in a million years.
I will agree with that to some extent.
Did she worry before when you had a job or no?
I think she did. We were dual income and we were making considerably more than we needed to. And honestly, in her case it paid off because I—
I just want to know, was she worried or not?
Yes.
Okay. What is this? What's with the masks? The stories you're telling yourself. "I don't worry."
I don't—
What's going on here?
I don't know. Maybe it's the story that I wish I was telling instead of the one that I am.
I was calm. I was cool, collected. But then this thing happened to him and now I'm forced to be worried. Have you all been to therapy?
I've been to individual therapy, but we haven't done couples therapy.
Why?
I suggested it once.
You suggested it and then stormed off after a bit of an argument about—
I was very frustrated and upset that conversation. I think I'd asked him something about how his job search was going or something to that effect and it felt like he responded in a very elevated manner. It felt like he kind of snapped a little bit, and then I snapped back and said, "I think we need to go to therapy."
Okay.
And I don't know if you responded. I feel like I just blacked out and left.
You just turned off and didn't want to talk. So I just kind of let you be eventually.
And then we didn't bring it up again.
Yeah. And I feel like for me, I'd just been ghosted after a second or third round interview and I was kind of not feeling great. So maybe there was a little bit more emotion in my voice at that point that wasn't intended or directed towards her.
I think maybe there was stress and worry, but there was also more positive components to it than there are now. I feel like I was worrying about, are we setting aside enough for retirement? Am I structuring these savings in a way that makes sense? But there was also this trade-off of, oh hey, but if we do this we can also travel, or hey, if we do this we can also do these other positive things. And I feel like what's been lost more so is I'm not thinking about that anymore.
The positive parts.
Yeah. I feel like some of the extra income and some of the extra that we had was going towards—
Fun.
Fun, quote-unquote fun. And now we're in a position where I feel like I've cut all of that and what's left is this and it feels much heavier.
If and when Ryan gets a job, that you will both feel good about money?
I think I would feel better, but I think I'm also in a position now where I still—this is a new threat or new anxiety that's been introduced where I'm still thinking about, are our systems set up well enough? Is he set up well enough so that we could move forward?
What's your answer to my question? Would you feel good about money?
See, I want to say yes, but the answer is probably not immediately or not easily.
I think the answer is no.
Yeah.
I don't know why it's so difficult to acknowledge there are parts of yourself that may be at odds with the way that you want to present yourself. I feel like I'm battling with a ghost right now. Every question I ask, I'm getting defensive reactions. And, "Well, I should feel like that. I'd like to think I would feel like that, but—"
Yeah.
It's all a bit of a show. And I wonder—
If you do that here, how much of that is happening when the two of you talk to each other?
Yeah, that's quite possible. You brought up the example of would she be worried about money. I think we both would be anyway because we were super comfortable. We had twice the income we have now and our expenses were pretty minimal. We were contributing above advised levels to our retirement, and I still felt like I had no decision-making ability.
When I bought the $3,000 espresso machine, I felt like crap. And I still do two, three years later.
So the fixation on the income without actually focusing on what's really going on here, to me...
Yeah.
It's not adding up. Here's what I'd like to do. I want you to go outside and have a really honest conversation about what you want to get out of this. Because if you'd like to continue, I would love to continue with you. I think there's a lot of layers to dig into here. But if we're going to keep up the show, it's not for me.
Okay.
Let's take a few minutes. They'll escort you out and then we'll come back and let me know what you decide. Okay.
I'm being a little tough on them. You know why? Because they are both wearing masks, almost like it's a performance. Now, I'm not sure if they know they are or not, but either way, I am not connecting with who they really are. So I'm effectively shaking them because I want to see that mask fall off. I don't mind who they are beneath it. Everyone does stuff that's embarrassing. Everyone says stuff that's maybe not perfectly politically correct. That's okay.
This is a common thing, and the first step is actually acknowledging that we are different people in different situations. But I need to know who they actually are if we want to make changes. That is why I am being a little tough on them.
What did you decide?
Well, we're back here.
Uh-huh.
So that was one thing. I always say part of my profession is I'm a third part performer. I teach and I do professional development and I do workshops, and a lot of that involves presenting yourself in a particular way, speaking in a particular way, and also maintaining a sense of credibility and professionalism in how you present yourself. And I think because of that, I'm used to sometimes masking certain things that I don't particularly want to share or be very honest about.
Yep.
But the other reason that I was telling him I wanted to continue is because you're telling me things I don't want to hear.
Wow.
And sometimes I think we need people to do that.
I'm honored.
So congratulations. You're making me very uncomfortable.
That's never my goal, but that sometimes is the byproduct.
Yeah.
Yeah. Well, I appreciate you sharing that. And I can only imagine some of the ways that you've had to professionalize your appearance, the way that you show up as a woman, daughter of immigrants.
As a person of color and as a person who's young in a space of professional development.
Exactly. Yes. Especially in an academic environment. So let's acknowledge that. And the fact that you came back and you said this is making me uncomfortable and I want to walk towards that, that's a huge sign for me, a positive sign. So I appreciate you coming back. Thank you. Ryan?
I think I've been deflecting too much. I think that at some point, I don't know the main reasoning, maybe I just felt like my opinion wasn't valued, so I just kind of quit trying or caring. And I should have been putting more effort into it, and I have a lot of guilt, which is the reason for that.
Do you want to be here?
Yeah, I want to be here.
Okay. I'm glad you're both back. I've been pushing hard, and I want to acknowledge that. I know what it takes to be in those seats. It takes a lot of work. It takes a lot of effort. I would be remiss if I let you walk out of here and I had spent hours reacting to the words you had said, but we hadn't really gotten to the truth. That's why I've been pushing. So what do you say we keep moving forward?
Yeah, of course.
Okay, let's do it.
Honestly, it's pretty impressive to see them come back in the room and share this new energy that they are bringing in here. That's one of the reasons that I try not to be too aggressive when I speak to couples, because I can browbeat anyone into saying, "I need to save more in my Roth IRA." But the minute they walk out of the room, they're not going to do it. When people see this almost judo that you're playing with each other, they start to realize, "Oh, if I want to get something out of this, I need to take the initiative." And I'm seeing that here.
Both of them are saying, "Hey, we're ready." That responsibility is important, especially because when you come on this podcast, sometimes you might discover parts of yourself that you didn't even know exist. And what's worse, sometimes you might not like what you see. But the fact that they are back and they are pushing on, I'm all for it. We're going to take a look at the numbers right after this.
You ever leave an hour-long call on Zoom and you end up looking at your notes and they say something like, "Remember the balances. Follow up on the workshop." You're like, "Huh?" Don't leave your important calls with notes that you can't even understand an hour later. Instead, use Granola and leave every call with insights and clear action steps that you can actually use.
Granola is an AI-powered notepad that makes your meeting notes useful. It captures what happens in your meetings and turns it into clean, structured notes with decisions and action items pulled out and made easy to find. What's great is that it seamlessly integrates into how you already work. No setup, no awkward bots or unneeded friction. Just jump on a call like usual and Granola will transform your fragmented call notes into actionable insights you can reference and still understand weeks later.
One of my colleagues uses it and told me, "What I love about Granola is that I can stay focused on the conversation instead of scrambling to take notes and capture every detail. After the meeting, I have clear notes and action items ready to go. Once you try it on a first meeting, it's hard to go without." You can try it totally free. Head to granola.ai/RAMIT. That's granola.ai/RAMIT to get your time back, especially if you do lots of calls. Go to granola.ai/RAMIT and try it on your next call.
One of my money rules is that I like to buy the best and keep it as long as possible. Now, when I say the best, sometimes it's expensive, sometimes it's not actually that expensive, but it is the best that I have found. I did it with my car when I bought a Honda Accord, which I kept for 19 years in meticulous condition. Same with my clothes, my phone, even my mattress. And that is why I chose a Leesa mattress.
Leesa makes premium, beautifully crafted mattresses designed specifically for how you sleep, whether it's on your stomach, side, or back. They make it easy to figure out which mattress is best for you. You just take their two-minute sleep quiz. And Leesa mattresses were named the best hybrid and best memory foam mattresses by the New York Times Wirecutter. And they come with free shipping, easy returns, and a 120-night sleep trial.
Go to leesa.com for 25% off mattresses. Plus, get an extra $50 off with promo code RAMIT, exclusive for my listeners. That's leesa.com, promo code RAMIT, for 25% off mattresses plus an extra $50 off. And support our show and let them know we sent you after checkout. Leesa.com, promo code RAMIT.
I'm going to take a look at their numbers by pulling up their Conscious Spending Plan. Let's take a look. Assets, $1.2 million. Investments, $175,000. Savings, $68,000. Debt, $688,000. Total net worth, $800,000. Fixed costs, 83%. That's quite high. Investments at 3%, savings at zero, and guilt-free spending at 15%. Very interesting here.
So as I throw those numbers up, what was it like to do the Conscious Spending Plan together?
Yeah, the plan, I don't know if I'd really say it was together. She filled in a guess of what she had, and I went over it and verified it. But maybe we didn't do it together, if I'm being honest. We had two different versions that kind of joined together after working on it separately. And when you say how did it feel to do it together, that kind of shines more light into the dynamic we should have.
Yeah.
Yeah. So I've had our Conscious Spending Plan for over a year, maybe two years now. So I had the plan. I have all of the accounts. I know what our spending is. I track that regularly. And then I think I kept trying to ask, can we sit down and walk through this together? It kind of kept not happening, and as I probably usually do, I just ended up doing it. So yeah, I don't think it was together necessarily.
Yeah. Turned into a transaction, huh?
Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. Probably a great illustration of how money works right now in your relationship.
Right. Right.
Okay. Let's go through the numbers. My hope is that by the time you walk out of here, were you to do another CSP, you would do it together. Okay. What do you think of those numbers?
I think they're pretty good. Honestly, one of the things I'm proud of in that box is that our only debt is mortgage debt. So I worked very, very hard. We worked—no, just me. We worked very, very hard to knock down existing debt that we had. I think our investments could be higher, and I think that's a consequence of not figuring out what any of that meant or was until our mid-30s. But other than that, I'm pretty happy with where we are there.
Good. I love hearing words like happy and proud. Proud is my favorite word that people use to describe how they feel about their numbers. That's awesome. Well done. Ryan, how about you?
I feel pretty good about it. Definitely in terms of having assets. I feel like we have done a lot as far as that goes.
Do the numbers mean anything to you?
Yeah, they do. They mean that we're fairly comfortable, I guess, from the look of it.
Mhm.
I can probably buy the $14 ice cream scoop.
Is that for real? Is that what you take away from this?
Part of it, yeah.
What else?
That maybe I'm a little anxious about my purchases still.
You know that, right?
Yeah, I know. I already knew that. I'm not taking a lot away from it. I feel like with me, part of the problem is I know it's irrational, and maybe I would benefit from therapy more so than discussing it.
Not maybe, for sure.
Yeah. What I take away from your response is there's a cloud in front of you, this cloud of anxiety that doesn't let you actually see these numbers and see what they mean. And I would love it for both of you to be able to see all of your numbers and actually make meaning out of it. Right? So one way to do that might be therapy, continued discussions, and what we're going to do today. Okay. Let's see. Ryan, can you read off your combined gross monthly income, please?
Sure. Gross monthly income, $12,594.
Okay.
Net monthly income is $9,189.
All right. So $12,500 per month. That's her income. I know that right now you don't have an income. That's a household income of $151,000. All right. Fixed costs. What number is that, Isabelle?
83%.
That's pretty high.
Yes. It doesn't feel high on a day-to-day for me.
Really?
I feel like we have made a lot of adjustments in our day-to-day already that have helped mitigate some of that change. Like where we eat out or don't eat out, the kinds of activities we sign our daughter up or not for. We're having a big drop-off in daycare spending.
You two may be the only couple who actually adjusted your spending down after cutting half your income out. This never happens.
So yeah, that's why I think it...
Are you guys hearing me? Have you ever taken the compliment?
No, I haven't. I'm terrible at taking compliments.
You all are pivoting off to some other thing I don't care about.
Thank you.
Take the compliment. It's amazing. Nobody ever does this. You guys are unique. That's amazing. I also have never heard anyone with 83% fixed costs say that it doesn't actually feel that stressful.
I'm not worried about am I going to make the mortgage payment or are we going to have enough to cover the gas bill? That's what I think of when I think about money stress, is we're going to meet all of our fixed costs and we'll have some left over.
I will say that I'm pretty proud that we lost effectively half our income and we still managed to kind of avoid dipping into savings, which is something that people generally have to do.
Big time. It's incredible. Your emergency fund is 68, let's just say $70,000.
And we haven't...
That's roughly 10 months of expenses, maybe nine months.
Yeah.
That's impressive. All right, let's look at the rest of the numbers. Investments are at 3%. That 3% post-tax is a 529.
Yes.
So y'all are putting money aside for your four-year-old instead of for yourself.
Part of it is that I have a solid pension, and so I have 8% taken pre-tax. So that's already accounted for. That's why my net monthly income is that chunk lower. And I also have that small additional 403(b) for mine.
150 a month for that. Mhm.
When Ryan was working, we were maxing out his 401(k), but that had been a recent development. I logged in and increased the contributions myself. But I don't know where that account lives right now. I can't access it. I can't put money into it. I can't access it. I don't have the dual auth for it.
I logged you in.
But his retirement contributions have stopped entirely.
Yeah, my retirement contributions have stopped. I need to move it over. I'm actually in the process of doing that. I'm trying to get a check.
Is this an issue? The fact that right now he's not contributing to his 401(k).
I think it's an issue, yes. Because what if I go outside tomorrow and get hit by a bus?
Yeah. What if?
I think he won't have anything to fall back on. Part of what's been annoying me about that is I've been asking, can you move this to a non-employer account? Can you move it to just a standard IRA or something else? And I think you've been saying, "Yeah, I'll look into it," for a while now.
You drag your feet, Ryan.
Sometimes, yes.
Yeah. Why?
If I'm being totally honest, maybe there's a degree of false hope. I was interviewing multiple times, and I'm just like, "Yeah, this job's really close. I'm going to get it. I'll just move it over to another employer 401(k)." And then it fell apart at the last minute.
Investments are 3%, again, going to your 529. Savings are at zero.
That reflects how I've essentially always functioned around savings, which is what we have left over goes into this spare savings, high-yield savings account. And then if we have the money for a thing, we do it. And if we don't, we don't.
So this is interesting. Now I'm seeing...
Now it's stressing me out.
Right. This approach, which is a little sloppy.
Mhm.
Of, "Hey, let's just cover everything and then whatever's left over, we'll put it in savings." That works when you have oodles and oodles of money because bread is bread. There's no amount you're going to spend on bread that's going to materially affect you. So at 300K, you're doing great. And now you're realizing, oh my gosh, savings is not growing at all. Okay.
Yeah.
And then finally, we go down to guilt-free spending, 15% or 1,356. Is that accurate?
That's probably high. Typically, we go months without spending anything, but then we have a large lump purchase.
What would it be that's a lump one?
We have an upcoming trip to Iceland that she paid for in advance.
It's interesting looking at your numbers. All the spending is quite reasonable in the category. Groceries, 650. After-school care, 350. Pet costs, 135.
But then I notice two mortgages.
Yes.
So, we've got a mortgage on a house and a mortgage on a condo. Can you walk me through it?
Well, I can tell you that's what feels like it's killing us sometimes. The long story or the short story?
Give me the short first in one sentence.
The short story is we are paying the mortgage on my mom's condo.
What's the longer story?
The longer story is my dad passed away a few years ago. My mom was living three hours away and could not sustain it. She's older. She has mobility issues, and so we decided to move her down here.
Okay.
Much more expensive in this area. And so the house that she sold in central California was in no way going to pay for a home here. So we put the entirety of the house value into the down payment for a condo.
What percent?
About 50%.
Okay. So that's why the amount you're paying is so low.
Yes.
Okay. And how many more years on that condo?
28.
28. Okay. Let's just say 30. And it's a high percentage. Interesting.
It's worth saying that her mom also owns additional property that she's looking into selling that would cover a large chunk of that.
Really?
Well, she is. Yes.
How soon?
That's been a point of disagreement between us. She has a home in Mexico that she is trying to sell, but it's been a couple years now and she's moving slow.
Couple years?
Give me your phone. I'll knock this out in 15 minutes. What do you mean? What? Couple of years.
I think she's struggling with letting it go.
How much will she make?
About enough to pay off the condo. About 200 or so.
That's quite interesting. And would she take the money and pay off the condo?
I think so. But I think the reason she would do that right now is because she knows that Ryan doesn't have a job and that we're paying it ourselves.
She knows this?
Yes, she does.
And what does she feel about that? Does she feel stressed?
I think so. Yes. I think she feels enormously more stressed than I do.
Possible.
Well, she comes from my childhood and from our upbringing. She comes from a place where she remembers a time when my dad lost his job and they were within inches of losing the house. So her stress is coming from a place of, if I don't do this, you're going to lose everything.
But not enough for her to sell the house.
Yeah.
No.
Does she have Social Security?
Yes. That's her only source of income.
That covers what she needs on a day-to-day basis, or do you have to put in extra?
No, that about covers what she needs.
Okay.
Right. If worse came to worse, theoretically, we have talked to her and she's okay with moving in with us and renting said condo, but we haven't really quite approached that yet.
Do you think you need to do that?
Not quite yet, but I think we're encroaching on that territory if I can't find something else.
You might be surprised, but these numbers are okay to me. Let me tell you why. First, while 83% is way higher than I like to see, I can see that all of their fixed costs are quite reasonable except for having two mortgages. Next, I can see that their savings, while they are saving $0, they actually have 10 months of savings. So if they want to stop saving, okay. Their guilt-free spending, 15%, not bad for a one-income household.
Yeah, there are a couple things that I noticed. They don't have any money for vacations, and they've talked about liking to travel, etc., etc. If they wanted to continue like this, they could. But that's actually what troubles me. So, if anything, I want to help them sharpen their spending so that it becomes very clear who they are, what they love, right in their CSP.
I also know that if we took it up, we'd be back down to 60% for fixed costs approximately. Should we look?
You can.
Let's take a look. Let's zero out the condo. Down to 66%. Yeah. You have cut back on other things in fixed costs. I could see that. It's impressive.
Yeah. A lot of those numbers are reflecting serious cutbacks.
That you've cut back.
Yes. No savings.
Except for this 70K that you put aside when times were flush.
Right. Right.
I noticed things like no vacation money.
Which kills me.
Because I know that vacations are important to you.
Yes, it is.
Yeah. Up until now, it hasn't really been an issue. I think it will be more of an issue long term because that factors in the fact that we paid for some of the vacations and a large chunk of it already.
Oh, like Iceland.
Yeah.
Where did that money come from?
It came from the before times, I'd say.
BL, before layoff. Okay.
Yeah. Well, I acknowledge it was sloppy, but a lot of the time we had enough income for many years that my strategy was I will just take whatever's left over in the checking account at the end of the month, bring it down to like eight grand, say, send over the rest to high-yield savings, and oh, look, there's enough money there to book this trip.
Ryan, what are you hearing when she describes this?
I don't know.
Are you hearing a well-developed financial plan?
Not really necessarily.
Yeah. But isn't it interesting that in your relationship, she is the one in charge?
Yeah, that's true. I feel like if I try to develop something, it's dismissed, but I don't really pay attention to what she's doing. And maybe I should be as well.
Not maybe.
Yeah.
Yes. I find this pattern is very, very common where we have the person who's the money person and they have multiple spreadsheets. How many spreadsheets do you have?
Oh, no. I don't have any spreadsheets other than this one.
This is the only one?
I keep everything on an app.
Okay. How many times a day do you log into your app?
Anytime I buy something, I get a, "What? What's this $12 charge?"
Thank you very much. So they are in the guts of the finances, and then the partner doesn't pay attention, goes, "Ah, you're so good at it. You're better at math than I am. You handle it. You're so good."
And then what it turns out to be is that the person who's the money person actually does not really have a developed system. They just move numbers around here, there. They think that managing money is paying bills. I find this is very common, especially with women who come on here. Paying bills is managing money. That's not managing money. That's like pushing paper. Computers can do it better than us.
But nobody in the relationship, even the money person, is talking about the important things. What percentage is automatically going to savings? What's our investment rate? Are we going to have enough at retirement? How do we plan for this vacation that we want to take? These are big questions, but most of us end up being concerned about the price of pickles.
Yeah.
Sound familiar?
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. I would agree.
So healthy is: I am interested because I know that money affects us. It affects our daughter. It affects everybody around us. My mother-in-law, all of it. I am knowledgeable. And if I don't have the knowledge, I read the book, one of those, both of those. And I communicate because I got to get my partner and me—we got to be on the same page. That's how it would look like. What about for you, Isabelle?
A healthier relationship and a healthier couple's relationship with money would involve me being less judgmental and being more open to suggestions or ideas. And even if I don't agree with them initially, being open to saying either we can discuss this further, or can we both learn about this together and come back to it?
Because I was realizing that, and again this comes back to a professional setting. In a lot of professional settings, I'm very accustomed to being the person that's most knowledgeable in the room and the person that's in power in the room. I think I'm realizing that I bring that into a lot of spaces. I'm laughing internally because I remember he's mentioned before, "You're using your teacher voice."
Wow. Insightful.
And I don't mean to do that, but—
And it's more than the voice too, right? It's not just the voice. It's the—
Yeah. That's the mentality. It's the mentality of, I have authority and I have power in this space. And I don't know that I realized that I was doing that.
That's good. What a great realization. Life-changing.
Yeah.
Oh my God.
Yeah. Yeah.
So I actually think it's incredibly courageous of both of you to be here. Isabelle, for you to apply. Amazing for you to stay here even though you're discovering these things that are quite uncomfortable.
Yeah.
Right. I appreciate you. And then Ryan, you're here. You initially said, "I'm here because she wants me to be here." What are you seeing for the reason that you are actually here now?
I want to be more comfortable with money. I want to have more of a say in the decisions.
Yeah, I want you to as well. Who does the laundry in your relationship? Oh, did I open up a can of worms? I just wanted a simple one. Who empties the dishwasher? I don't care. Pick a simple one.
We each do our own laundry.
Huh?
I went on laundry strike, I'm going to call that, because I was tired of doing the whole family's laundry all the time.
Okay.
And so we didn't even discuss it. I think one week I just did my laundry and I picked out all of his, and then the next week we had two laundry baskets.
I still do hers from time to time. I should reflect on, but she doesn't touch mine ever.
What did you think of the fact that one day she just stopped doing your laundry?
I thought it was passive-aggressive.
Okay.
It probably was.
Yes, I agree. And what else?
Frustrating that it wasn't communicated.
What a microcosm. Here I am just trying to find a simple example, and it turns out every little thing I look under, there's a story that is a microcosm of what's going on here.
Yeah.
I don't mind if y'all do separate laundry, whatever. But the fact that it was never communicated, that you went on strike, which meant there must have been a lot of frustration, like, whoa.
I don't know if you see a brighter future, but I do. There is a brighter future where the two of you actually feel good about laundry. There is a brighter future where you feel good about money, where you can talk about it, where you might disagree, you might do it differently than you're doing it now, but you actually both are like, "Okay, we're a team."
Right.
Do you believe that?
I think so. Yes. Yes.
Okay.
Yeah.
Right. Yeah, I think so. Okay.
In this family, Isabelle manages the money. She's also recently the sole earner. And if something's going to get done, she's got to do it herself. Does any of this sound familiar? Maybe for your parents, maybe for you. This is something I frequently hear, especially from the female guests on this show.
And as Isabelle takes on more and more responsibility on her shoulders, do you notice the dynamic happening with Ryan? She sends totally mixed messages. "Hey, I need you to participate in the money. Oh, you're not doing it right though. Hey, I need you to participate more around the house. Ah, you're not doing it my way though." And that is very confusing for the recipient. When you get mixed messages, a lot of times people simply give up because they go, "No matter what I do, I can't do it right. So I'm opting out of this game altogether."
We do not want that in a relationship. We want to find a way to come together, to have a vision, something that connects us, not keeps us separate. How am I going to get them to come together? Especially if it means having to change who they are from the inside out.
Do you think the CSP is in a good position or not?
I think so. Yes. I think that the change that we need to make is probably to increase income. And I think we maybe disagree a little bit on how to do that.
Right.
Okay, let's talk about that. So what has the discussion been around, Ryan, you getting a job?
I've been focusing on high-earning jobs. I've always been the one who's been pursued rather than the one who's in pursuit. So this is new for me, and I think that's part of the reason why I'm struggling with it.
What is your plan going forward?
I'm currently looking at pivoting some other positions. I'm looking at moving into some tangentially related fields that are a little bit more localized but pay less.
How much would you make, ballpark?
Probably like 70, 80,000.
Okay. So you used to make 150.
Yeah.
You would make, let's say, 70, 80 with one of these jobs. It'd be nearby your place.
Yeah.
And you could do it. Are you okay with that job?
I'd probably be okay because I'd still be closer to my child and have a better work-life balance.
Got it. Honestly, sounds like a great plan to me.
Right.
Isabelle, what's your perspective on this?
We need to increase income, but I don't necessarily think that has to be him working. So one possibility that I floated by him is that he could be a stay-at-home dad for a few years. I have the potential to make more money. I always do. I think I have a fair amount of expertise in my field. I could teach summer classes and make an extra 20K. I could take on additional grant work or additional training or additional university. I had an opportunity pop up in my email last week to make an extra 2K over the summer just for some committee work. I've floated that as an idea by him. I don't think it would be a substantial increase in income, but would be enough to offset some of those losses.
If I can interject, I feel like that's not necessarily the best move because she's always telling me she's drowning and she's doing too much already.
Hold on. I kind of love—this is cool. "No, I think you say that, but actually I don't believe it." I kind of love this.
This is something we already talked about. Now she's bringing up something that counteracts that. It worries me a little bit.
Right. It doesn't add up. You're already stressed. You're already feeling overwhelmed. You're on laundry strike. Although this stay-at-home dad would solve the laundry problem. But you want to take on more. What do you make of that?
The other thing that I've floated by is a complete career pivot and trying to find other ways.
It's really funny that in the example where you do not feel good, your solution is to tell him what to do next. Isn't that the problem?
My solution—
Take a look in the mirror. Hold on. Do I have—I have a mirror right here. Look, let me put this camera on. I'm going to put it at you. Look at this mirror. Look in the mirror.
It's funny because the first thing that I probably would have said is if I wasn't happy with something, I would have done it myself.
Which would be—
No, if I came home and, I don't know, the toys weren't put away, I would probably passive-aggressively have put everything away myself. That's the actual truth. That's the actual true thing that I would have done.
Not clean. Yeah. Rage cleaning.
I know it's rage cleaning. I'm a terrible rage cleaner.
Okay. So perhaps we can do this in a more healthy way.
Yeah. That's not—
If everything that you construct in this plan works and you still don't feel better, what would you do? Hint.
Work on this.
How do you do that? How do you work on your own feelings?
Right now, I don't. No, I don't.
But what would you do?
Talk to him, right? We should talk together. We should talk about meeting expectations or changing expectations possibly.
I'm going to suggest that the two of you maybe don't yet have these skills, right? So how do you do it?
Right. And I still think we probably need to go to therapy.
Agreed.
For a while.
Maybe get a coach. Maybe get your own coach or therapist. There's so many ways to get help besides rage cleaning and then telling him what to do. And
That's actually the crux of what's going on here, which is total disconnection, parent-child thing, and not actually having a vision of what do I want, what do you want, and then what do both of you want.
Yeah. I think that's what we are, especially what we both want. I think there's a disconnect there right now in terms of what we see moving forward.
I got to figure out how this all started, and we're going to get into that right after this.
How come everybody teaches you how to save but nobody teaches you the skill of spending money meaningfully? It's a tragedy to end up older and older having atrophied at the skill of using your money to live a rich life. I need you to take this seriously. And if you need help planning your retirement and you want to go into scenarios and more specificity, check out Facet.
Facet can help you make a plan that lets you use your money for the moments that matter to you. Facet charges a flat membership fee for financial planning, never a percentage of your assets. And you get access to a team of CFP professionals, always a CFP, always a fiduciary, who help you create a personalized financial plan that meets you where you are. They can help with big things like investments, moving across the country, saving for kids' college, traveling in retirement, estate planning, all of it. Your financial plan should match up with your rich life vision. And Facet can help make that possible without the exorbitant fees.
As of the date of this recording, Facet is waiving the enrollment fee for new annual members. And for my audience, Facet is offering $300 into your brokerage account if you invest and maintain $5,000 within your first 90 days. Head to facet.com/ramit to learn more about which membership option is best for you.
Facet is an SEC-registered investment adviser. I'm not a member of Facet and have an incentive to endorse Facet as I have an ongoing fee-based contract for cash compensation based on this endorsement. All opinions are my own and not a guarantee of a similar outcome.
Isabelle, what do you remember your parents saying about money when you were young?
We can't afford that or we don't have the money. My parents were seasonal laborers. So my dad did a lot of farm and field labor. My mom was at factories. A lot of the time they would work six to seven months out of the year, and then you made it work for the others based off of savings and unemployment and just figuring things out.
Yep.
I was very accustomed to knowing where we were financially, what we could and could not afford, but it was always, we need to save for when we won't have money.
Did you tell them that?
They were telling me that.
I see.
And I think I internalized that message very early on. I still remember I wouldn't ask for things because I knew we couldn't afford them.
Yeah.
You just wouldn't ask for it.
Yeah. What else did you observe them doing with money?
I didn't observe my dad doing a whole lot of anything. I think he was always just, I'm going to go out and I will work as hard as I possibly can, as many hours as I can, and come home. And their routine by the time I came along was, I will just sign over my check and pass it along to you. And my mom was the one who always managed everything.
It's common, right? Common in a lot of matriarchal cultures.
Yeah.
Yeah. It was always just the mechanics, right? We're managing how we pay all of the bills this way. Maybe we'll have enough for X or Y but not Z. It was a lot of that type of messaging.
Did you go to college?
I did.
How'd you pay for it?
Full ride.
Wow.
Also grad school. Full ride.
Wow. Very impressive.
Which is why I don't have debt. That's why I don't.
Yeah. That's pretty cool. Were they impressed that you were able to do that?
Yes. Yes. They were both very, very proud of me. I think they valued education quite a bit, and so that was something that they fostered from a very early age.
I still tell folks my mom doesn't know what I do, really. She doesn't understand what I did in grad school. She doesn't understand quite what I do now other than I teach.
Yeah.
But I think they were both very proud of that and also very thankful because if they hadn't done that, I would have been in student loan debt. There was no other way around it. There was absolutely no way they could have contributed at all.
Right.
When you think about your relationship with your parents, your relationship with money, their relationship with money, what messages about money do you think you internalized as a kid that you are bringing into this relationship?
There was definitely the messaging of, your dad doesn't know what he's doing with money, so I will do all of it, because when he did manage the money, they didn't get anywhere or do anything. So all of the property they built, the house, everything was after my mom started managing it. There was definitely that. There was a lot of scarcity mindset around money. Like I said, I didn't ask for things because I didn't have it.
Do you have scarcity mindset today?
I think right now we have been, and I think that's been part of actual, when we realized that our income was dropping, it was a very natural reflex to just say, okay, we are cutting now.
Okay.
And I said, we've lived on a much lower income before, so I think it was like, yep, all right, we're not eating out at this place anymore. That's just what it is because that's what I grew up with.
What else?
I also know that there was a lot of things I didn't learn from them, right? My mom right now, her only income is Social Security. There's no concept really of saving for anything other than that.
Mhm. Does your mom, or did she ever, dream?
I don't think so. I think having a house was their dream.
Yeah.
Which is why right now, for her to have that house and pass it on.
Yeah. That's meaningful to her in a way that others may not recognize.
Yeah.
Do you dream?
Long term, I don't know that I do. There's things that I know that I enjoy doing, but I don't know what it looks like down the line.
Yeah.
Your mom spent a lot of time in the mechanics of money. Dad hands over the check. She makes sure the bills are paid.
Mhm.
Put some money aside for when times are lean.
Right.
You do the same. Money comes in, your husband makes money, made money at his job, gives it to you. You sign him up for his 401(k). You make sure the bills are getting paid on time. It's okay. It's fine. You're getting things done. Stuck in the mechanics forever, though, from one generation to the next.
Right. Even though income has gone up tenfold.
Yeah.
From what my parents made.
Yeah. No dreaming still. Just mechanics. Just pure mechanics.
What are you hearing, Ryan?
I feel like she does dream to some extent, but it's usually smaller scale dreams like my own. She's always the first one to be watching travel videos on Instagram and all over the place. She's told me before that she lives for her next trip. I consider that a form of dreaming.
Wait, I love that. But where is it in the CSP?
It's nowhere right now.
It's nowhere right now. Right now.
Okay, got it. Fair enough. Fair enough. I actually think your reaction to the cutting of 50% income is very, maybe more healthy than any other couple I've seen on this podcast. Most people, they lose some income and they just go, "That sucks. Anyway, let's go to TGI Fridays." I'm like, "What the?"
Yeah.
How are you spending 75 bucks there? Anyway, the travel thing is interesting. You like to travel. You said, "I dream of the next trip." But you didn't answer that in the dream. Why?
Because that's a zero right now. I don't know.
Ah.
Yeah. I don't know what that would look like.
Do you think deep down you are not confident that your husband will ever make an income again?
Oh, no. I don't think that I don't. I'm having a hard—I know I should answer a yes or no question because this was a yes or no question. I think he can make an income again. Yes.
Okay, fair enough.
I don't know that I'm 100% convinced it can or maybe should be in the same field. And I don't think that's necessarily because he is or is not incapable of it. I think that's because in your previous job and a couple of others, I don't ever feel like you were passionate about it. And I feel like now might be a time to pivot or to find something that maybe has better balance or that you care more about.
And so that's where I am. I think, yes, he can make an income again. That's not the question. I just question whether there could be things that are better fits. That was a very long answer to a very short question.
No, it's quite illuminating because while you may or may not be right, my perspective is, why are you telling him what to do about his career?
I don't know.
It's just perpetuating this parent.
Yeah.
Why don't you tell your daughter that she's not allowed to go into this field and—
We're not going to go there.
What is she not allowed to do? Okay. Kids of immigrants can say what the kids like. You think if my kid wanted to be an actor, I'd be like, what the—
Well, that's what I say. She's not allowed to go into the arts.
But I will say this, this is what I said. Here's my real answer. Because, yeah, Indian people are not really into their kids becoming actress or actor in general. However, if a kid wanted to be an actor, actress, I would say, okay, you got to go interview 20 actors and actresses, successful ones, failures, everything. You got to ask them about their lifestyle. How much can you spend on a haircut? How often do you travel? Where do you live? Can I see what your apartment looks like? And then you get honest, is this the kind of lifestyle I want or not? Because if they really want to do it, they're going to do it. But most kids make dumb decisions because they don't know anything.
Right. Right.
All right. But he's not a kid.
He's not a kid.
Yeah.
And this whole, you should do this or try that or whatever, is just one more screw in the disempowering toolbox.
Yeah.
Ryan, any reactions?
Yeah. I partially heard that I don't think she thinks I'm going to make the same salary again, which might be me being defensive because I feel the same way, because it has a high earning potential with a lot of time dedicated to it.
Yeah.
And I think that's partially where the—
Do you feel that your value is determined by your income?
A little bit sometimes. If I'm being honest, I want to say no, but yeah, I think there's some truth to that.
That's fine. Most men feel the exact same way. Most men see themselves purely as a provider.
Right.
And then, so do you see yourself as that? A provider?
Yeah, I'd say so. I also feel like in my family dynamic, larger scale, my parents don't really talk to me much about my accomplishments other than my career.
Well, well, well. What a surprise. Isabelle is behaving very similarly to what she saw modeled from her mom. It's no surprise she feels like she needs to be in control of everything because she's been doing basically that since she was 12 years old, almost taking on the role of a parent in her own relationship with her parents. And there's a double whammy that her mom took over responsibility of the family finances because her dad was not good at money. I wonder what kind of effect that has for the next generation as Isabelle doesn't really seem to trust Ryan. I'm curious to see what Ryan's experience with money growing up was.
Tell me about growing up. What did they say about money?
Worker parents, but my dad was a small farmer in a rural community. My mom worked at a nursing home. She worked her way up into management eventually, but she started washing dishes. And yeah, they took a different approach, though. I feel like Isabelle began taking over, right? Taking over their finances. My parents, on the other hand, were maybe ashamed, and they didn't pass any of that on. So anytime I brought up money, there'd be anxiety around it.
Did you grow up in the Midwest?
Sorry. I grew up in Canada in a rural area.
Oh, wait. I don't have a metaphor for this. Because in the Midwest there's a lot of guilt. There's a lot of shame. Is this common where you grew up?
Yes, it is.
Yeah.
Okay. Religious or no?
Canadian.
Pretty much.
Rural Canadians love to feel guilty.
I think there's cultural overlap. What is Midwest? Explain that to me. I haven't heard this before.
Yeah. You know the trope that it's sorry, apologize for everything? It's like that times a thousand.
Yeah. My parents, my mom in particular, she's always said that she's really proud that she was able to raise self-aware kids. You put others first.
What's the implication?
That you're worth less than someone else.
Right. They come first.
Yeah.
And she sees that as a virtue.
Right.
And how do you see that?
I feel like it's been plaguing me most of my life, if I'm honest.
Yeah, tell me.
I've had problems working on it, and I did say that I've seen a therapist, right? That's one thing I've worked on, is being more assertive in my career and my personal life because I'm not very, which shows up with the money, I suppose. But yeah, because of the way I was brought up, I was always taught that I need to take up less space. I need to not interrupt. I need to always think about someone else's feelings before I do something.
Do you have any sisters? I'm guessing no.
I have an older sister.
Really?
Yeah.
In your household as a kid, who was the more dominant parent? Mom or dad?
That's a tough one. Probably my mom most of the time in terms of who made financial decisions and things like that.
Okay. Is your sister similarly, does she struggle with being assertive?
Oh yeah. I would debate my sister who's in a much worse place than I am with it.
Yeah. Really? It's been an affliction for her. It's caused trouble.
Yeah.
Wow. Okay.
Say what you will that she doesn't let me make my own decisions, Isabelle, sometimes. But she has helped me, I would say, in some sense, and which is what fostered a good relationship early on with some of that. I like the fact that she saw me as more than what I was, and she pushed me towards becoming better in my field and things like that in ways I don't think would be possible without her. I don't think my sister had the same dynamic.
That's tough.
Yeah.
That's really tough. It's tough to see the way that you grew up with your parents. When you're a kid, you don't know any better, and that's the family that you're born into, and that's what's normal to you. And then as you grow up and you start to meet other folks and get in different circumstances like working, and you realize, wow, the lessons I learned were not very helpful. In fact, they're actually quite harmful. That's tough.
Yeah.
Yeah. I find it quite amazing how candid you are, especially about your childhood, and how accessible it is. You've clearly done work to be able to catalog the ways that you grew up. It's very impressive.
Right.
Are your parents both alive?
They are.
Okay. And are they together?
They are.
Okay. How are they with money today?
Very poor. Are you?
Uh-huh.
Yeah.
Yeah. Do they make questionable financial decisions?
Oh, like what? My dad, growing up, has been involved in pyramid schemes. My mom has been very much paycheck to paycheck most of her life up until retirement.
Okay.
Even in retirement, as they get money, they spend it, kind of thing. All of it. And they're just waiting for the next paycheck to come in to buy more.
They're dreamers.
Yeah, I guess you could say that.
Waiting for the next success is right around the corner, the next gig, the next deal. Yeah. It's all going to take care of itself once we hit this next thing.
Yeah.
How come you're not like that? Are you?
Whoa. Wow. Interesting response. Is he?
I think I daydream, but then I beat myself up about it and don't actually do it.
Yeah. I don't think he has the optimistic.
That's crazy.
You're like a mini dreamer, but then you're like, "Ah, this will never work." And then he's done.
I've never met somebody like this.
Yeah.
Okay. Okay.
Which I actually think reflects a little bit some of your parents' dynamics because they tend to have this belief that things aren't just going to work out for us, or it's the curse of the family.
That's classic poor people mentality. The world happens to us. We can't change anything about it. So we just are here to exist and deal with whatever comes our way.
Yeah.
That's external locus of control. And actually, a lot of times people who have grown up poor for generations, there's a lot of reasons they believe that. Things have not gone their way, and they have gotten screwed XYZ way. And so in a way it's kind of a rational response. Also not helpful.
Right. Right.
So here now, their son, as recently as six months ago, making $150,000 a year, living in Southern California. That's quite a difference.
Yeah.
How did you grapple with the changes in your socioeconomic status?
Not well, I don't think. I don't feel like I—and it's good that I didn't in hindsight because we'd be in more trouble—but I don't feel like my spending necessarily reflected it. I always felt like my peers were spending more and things like that.
What messages about money did you grow up with that you are bringing to this relationship?
I don't feel like the messages I got about money growing up have really worked as me believing them so much as me rejecting what they do because I've seen how it negatively impacted things.
What about the part about assertiveness and putting other people ahead of you?
Okay, that part definitely.
Yeah.
Okay.
I didn't know the Canadian rural thing. Okay. Thank you very much. I love learning more from my guests on this show. Ramit Sethi learns the most about stereotypes from around the world. Thank you to my guests.
In all seriousness, I want you to notice that the way you grow up, especially some of these cultural mores, these beliefs that we have, can actually profoundly affect and harm kids as they become adults. If the idea is you've got to put someone else ahead of you, as Ryan aptly observed, that means you have to put yourself back. Just think about all the ways that comes out. School, careers, romantic relationships, money. So for parents watching the show, think about the messages that you are consciously and unconsciously sending to your kids because 30 years from now, they might be exhibiting some of the same challenges that Ryan is here.
I actually have a lot of compassion for both of them. They both grew up with money scarcity. They both grew up with a lot of money ideas that I typically see with poor families, which is we don't plan further than a month ahead. How could we? We're just trying to get by this month. And so, even though Ryan and Isabelle are making way more than their parents ever did, they struggle to change their psychology. So, actually, it's been really helpful to hear how they grew up. It gives me a new sense of why they're doing what they're doing. Now that I understand how both of them grew up with money, let me see if I can figure out what to do about it.
If you two had a magic wand and you could rechart, recast the way that you show up with money in this relationship, what would it be?
If I had a magic wand, I would completely try to destroy what has become, it feels like, a very cemented parent-child dynamic. I don't want—
What would you do instead? Tell me what you would do, not what you wouldn't do.
What I would like to do instead is have regular communication about major decisions and try to have equal contributions.
Great. Even if one of you earns more.
Yes.
Wow.
We've kind of gone back and forth on who has earned more over the lifetime of the relationship.
Now, let's go back and forth right now in terms of what would be in your magic wand vision. Go ahead, Ryan.
Yeah, I think on both of us contributing equally to discussions, or it doesn't even have to be equal. I'd just like to have some say, maybe take one key area and move forward with that.
I would say that, yeah, we are used to one of us making more or less than the other. Like she said she had a free ride. I thought that was interesting because she didn't through grad school. I paid for a little bit of your grad school too because I was working during that time period.
That's interesting. That's true. My tuition was covered, for what it's worth. I had a job. It just wasn't making as much as I did previous.
Yeah. You better remember that big old check I wrote for you. That apartment wasn't free.
No, I don't.
Is that what you want to say?
No, that's not what I want to say.
So, I don't mean to put words in your mouth. Absolutely.
It was $650, though, which—
It was cheap. It was a Midwestern university.
What else would you want in this magic wand situation? It's got to be bigger than this, y'all. I'm glad. I want you to have conversations where you contribute. But what else? It's a magic wand.
I just want to point out that even in his magic wand scenario, he didn't say equal conversations.
Yes, he minimized. You do the thing that many people do when they talk about their rich life. Be like, "What's your rich life?" Like, "Well, one day maybe I'd like to have a beach house. It doesn't even have to be near the beach. It doesn't even have to have a roof. It doesn't even have to have a door. I just want to be able to see sand somewhere on my floor." What the kind of fantasy is this? Rich life, not minimal life. Okay, Ryan.
Yeah, I'd like to be better educated, and I know that takes more action than anything, and I haven't necessarily put in the effort.
You want to be educated or you want to be good?
I want to be good at it. I want to sell a lot of—
Great. What else? Because I like education. I am educated, but I want to be good at what I do.
Yeah. Maybe educated is the wrong word. I want to understand what I'm doing. I want to understand my actions, and I want to be able to make correct decisions.
Good. I agree. Go ahead.
And I think again, in a magic wand scenario, I just want to not be as stressed or worried about things, but also not see him being stressed or worried about things that I don't feel are worrying.
What if he's stressed or worried? You want to be the one who's responsible for fixing it?
No. I think that's part of it, is being able to say, "Hey, I'm worried about this," and try to understand or contextualize it in a bigger picture. Try to generate plans for maybe tackling that stressor instead of it just being this floating cloud that's following you everywhere. I like to kind of—
No clouds. That's what I'm hearing, right? No clouds. No clouds around laundry, no clouds around dishwasher, no clouds around money, no clouds around career, no clouds around the house in Mexico, right? It's just clouds everywhere.
Yeah.
Yeah. Fix that.
Yeah. There's a lot of things that I feel like we circle and circle and don't get anywhere on.
You're indecisive.
Yeah.
Yeah.
You all want to be decisive.
Yeah.
That's what I would put if I were you. Magic wand, we become a decisive couple. Magic wand, we actually like to talk about money. Magic wand, when one of us has a problem individually, the other will support them, but it's up to them to solve their problem. They are an adult. They stand on their own two feet, right? Because guess what? You all want to be solving your daughter's problems for the rest of her life?
No.
No.
No. I would like to have her set up to be financially literate and be able to move on in the world herself.
And emotionally literate.
Yes.
And all of the above, right?
Right.
Well, she only does that if she sees mom and dad doing it.
Yeah.
Isabelle and Ryan are not decisive. And I can tell it drives them crazy because it's driving me crazy. Pick a simple decision. Now we don't have to think about it anymore. Let's execute. I know I'm supposed to be talking about feelings on this show once in a while, but sometimes I'm like, can we just not? Can we just get this done and move on? Do what I say or don't. I don't care. But I can't do this indecisive stuff anymore. My challenge is to get them to make a decision today because if they don't, they will walk out of here and be indecisive for the rest of their lives.
Okay. I love the vision. Anything else in the rich life vision that you would want to add?
Travel.
I'd like to live without guilt for every decision I make.
Good.
As far as purchases go, even when I make my biggest purchases that I put months upon months into researching and going over because I'm that type of person, I worry that I'm spending too much or I worry about how she'll think, which isn't healthy. And she picks up on it, and then she feels like it's too much on her too.
Well, she also says stuff that makes you worry too, right?
Yeah.
We got $5,000 worth of coffee here.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Can I rephrase it? So, I want for us to both be able to know what are the rules before we make a major purchase, both of us. And once we make that purchase—
It's done.
It's done. We only feel joy about it.
Yeah.
I want us to be a team. I never want us to be jabbing at each other. I want us to be supporting each other. Sure, we may have to have difficult conversations. That's normal. But I don't want to be jabbing, right? Do you see the jabbing that we've even talked about today?
Yeah.
Okay. Do you like it?
No.
No. It sucks.
No.
I don't actually think—I've heard you do it a couple of times in the examples. I don't even think you enjoy it.
No, I don't. But then it comes out, and then I guess I don't think about it. And that's one of the things I was saying earlier. To hear my words coming back out of his mouth is like a—
Yes. It's physically painful for you. I saw you. And actually, I don't mind that. Yeah, this is hard. It's hard to hear. That's why you were doing all these games and digressions and diversions. Our mind is amazing. It will do anything to avoid pain. But sometimes that pain is telling us, "Oh my God, this is not right. This is where getting help comes from. This is where becoming a team comes from." All right. So, what's the rich life vision?
I mentioned earlier, our saving strategy right now is non-existent, but I would like to keep continuing to travel. I just don't know how to do that yet.
How many times a year?
Previously, in the before times—
No, I just want an answer to my question.
Once a year. One international trip a year.
Can part of your rich life be you all answer questions directly?
No.
Like, what the—because guess what? Remember how you said you spin?
Yes. Yes.
You are spinning out right now. What we do here is what we do everywhere.
So in my rich life vision, I would like to travel internationally once a year.
Great.
Yeah. For myself and for my daughter. I love taking her places.
And Ryan, are you going or no?
He's welcome to come if he wants, I suppose.
Usually I go. Yeah.
What? What the—
No, we're joking. That was a joke. He always comes.
I don't like that joke.
Yeah, that's fair. I sometimes don't know that you want to go where I'm suggesting going.
I get that. I think we have different goals. I like day-to-day conveniences more than you do. You won't spend anything on yourself, and then you'll just plan a big trip.
I'm sorry, Ryan. Do you like when your wife jokes about going on vacation without you?
She just did recently, but it wasn't a vacation. It was a family—
Not my question. Do you enjoy when your wife jokes about going on vacation without you?
No.
Tell her that.
I don't like when you joke about going on vacation without me.
That's fair. And I should not have done that.
Okay. Thank you.
I'm sorry.
I don't mind these things come up here. I don't mind it.
No.
But I am glad because I think you may be realizing the amount of layers to unpack here, and I think you may be realizing you cannot do it on your own. That's not a normal type of joke or comment to make.
Mhm.
And the fact that you know that Ryan struggles with being assertive—
Yeah.
—is a real problem. Actually, an opportunity for the two of you to work on it. For Ryan to say, "Hey, wait a minute. That felt weird," because if my wife made a joke about me not—I'm welcome to go? No. What is this? Where's this coming from? And then for you to not say those kind of things, actually say more positive things. "I would love for both of us to do it." Any thoughts going through your head right now, Ryan?
No.
Okay. Let me know if there's anything you want to say. I want to make sure that your voice is heard today for sure.
Thanks.
How come I haven't cracked a smile in the last 15 minutes? I'm supposed to be talking about their rich lives. Give me something. A pet, something with their daughter, anything. No. Money to them is just an endless checklist of things they need to do. One of the questions I asked Isabelle was, "What if you ever just took a couple hours to watch a movie?" And before I could even finish asking the question, she said, "Oh, I could never. I could never spend two hours watching a movie."
Many people, especially kids of immigrants, know what this is like because what you saw your parents model was, "You need to be productive. Why aren't you waking up? It's Saturday. Okay, you slept in until 8:30 a.m. Time to get up. Did you study for your SATs? Did you do—come on." And on and on and on. And so you don't actually build the skill of simple enjoyment. In fact, if anything, you are told because you are not being productive, you are wasting your time. So you accomplish things and you grow up and you go to a good school and you make a lot of money and etc., etc., etc. And just like so many guests on this podcast, you do everything except learn how to live a rich life. That is what I'm trying to change for Isabelle and Ryan.
I want to pull back up the numbers in a second, but before we get to those, we need to make a decision because you have a lot of clouds floating. What's the most important cloud that you need to push through right now?
We need to put in savings for retirement, or—
You do? How do you know?
Because there aren't none right now.
Your retirement has $175,000, and your wife has a pension.
Yeah.
Do you even need to do that? Is that the first decision we need to make?
I suppose it's not the very first one.
Let's do the first one. What is it?
I think it's the job.
Yeah.
Yeah.
What do you want to do about it?
Yeah. And that's the first answer that came into my mind, but I'm also trying not to make that decision for him.
Good.
Yeah, I agree with that. I feel like I've already tried over the past few weeks to pivot to more—I don't know, I don't want to say more realistic because I don't know if they are more realistic to pivot—but more accessible options.
Okay. So, what do you want to do?
I'm looking for what I can find that would reflect my skill set and pay reasonably in my area that would give me better work-life balance.
Okay. Well, I hope it works out, but if what you've been doing for the last month or two is not working, what do you want to do? What are your options? Lay them out on the table.
My options would be to be a stay-at-home dad for a little while.
Okay.
I could take something dramatically below my skill set. I don't know if that necessarily makes sense if we're earning.
Don't tell me what's wrong. Just tell me the options. You could cut your pay. What else?
What else could I do? I could invest in education to further my career.
Maybe grad school or something like that. Okay, good. What else?
I could invest in my previous business, which was going a little bit but fell apart a little bit at the end.
No. Oh, well, it's an option four.
Yeah.
Okay. What else?
It's just an option. I'm not saying it's the best option.
I like that. You're right. I stand corrected. That's option four. What else?
Okay. I could look at a new personal development venture or a new business venture.
Yeah.
It's related, more business.
We'll call all those business, whether old business or new business.
Yeah.
Ask your wife if she's got any options that you haven't considered.
Do you have any options?
The only one on that list that I don't think either of us has considered is taking some other kind of job, right? Like a retail job or—
I think you mentioned taking a dramatic pay cut.
Yeah, that's what I said.
Well, I thought that meant—
Could be working at Target, could be working whatever. That's a huge pay cut. I think it all falls under that. Okay.
Maybe one other option I might mention is you could get help with your job search.
Right.
You could hire a coach.
Yeah, there's lots of ways. You could get into networking groups, etc.
So, we've got quite a few options here. I love how diverse they are. In fact, your options were so unusual that all of us were like, whoa, at some point, and I think that was really cool. How are you going to make this decision?
I think I need to look at the pros and the cons of each decision. I need to discuss them with her, and I need to weigh that against one another.
Can I suggest, would it be possible for the two of you to make this decision in 60 seconds?
No. No, I don't think so.
Okay. Do you think it's possible, Isabelle?
I think it would be possible to say yes and to stick with an alternative option for six weeks or eight weeks and reevaluate.
I think the fundamental question here is, are you going to be a stay-at-home dad or are you going to find a job that makes over $50,000?
Okay.
Which one?
Probably find a job. I don't want to see her continue to struggle or take on more responsibility than she can.
Okay. How long are you going to continue your job search the way it is before you change something?
I think it needs to change.
Great. You're going to change it immediately. What are you going to do first?
I'll look into options. I'll look into options for coaching. I will look into options that are maybe a little bit more outside of the box.
Let's pick one at a time.
Okay.
Do you want to expand your job search to jobs that pay $50,000 to $70,000 a year?
Yes, probably.
It's yes or no.
I'd say probably 60 to 70.
60 to 70. You want to expand by $10,000. Okay, great. You're currently looking at $70,000 jobs. You want to expand it to $60,000 jobs.
Right.
Great. Works for me. How long you want to give that?
With the way things are moving right now, probably a month. But—
A month. All right. And after that?
After that, I'd want to look into ways that I could move into a related career that requires different skill sets that I could pick up easily and bridge my existing experience into.
Okay, Isabelle, any feedback?
I think that sounds like a good plan. Honestly, one of the things that I've been feeling lately is that we've been stuck in this cloudy holding pattern. If you would just make that as a decision and go for it, then we could just go for it. Or if you're thinking about doing additional certifications and it's going to require whatever number of hours a week, just knowing that and committing, I'm fully behind that. Okay, we can do what we need to.
One thing I noticed is that when there is a lack of clarity around money, around relational agreements, then sometimes the worst of us comes out. For example, we have a rule in our relationship. Let's just say anything below 50 bucks, we're not going to ask each other about. So therefore, if you text me about ice cream scoops, I'm not answering. And I'm also not saying, why'd you get that?
Right.
Whatever. I'm not concerned. We already have an agreement. If it's not clear about how long is this job search going to go on before changing and what's going to happen next, then we start to become very looking over the person's shoulder. I don't know. We don't want that. We want clear sets of rules.
If it were me, this is what I would do. I would say, number one, starting immediately, I'm expanding my job search to jobs over $60,000. Number two, if after one week I am not immediately seeing interviews, I'm getting a career coach. Now, we need to talk about how much we can afford, etc. But this obviously is not working. I've sent hundreds of applications. Maybe I'm doing something wrong. Need to get a coach.
Number three, I'll go all the way down to $50,000, but after that I'm going to be a stay-at-home dad for at least two years, and then I will reevaluate. That's how we make decisions. Boom. And then I go, Isabelle, are you cool with that? She goes, yeah, but here's what we would do as a stay-at-home dad. This is my expectation. What do you think? Boom.
What are you noticing, Ryan? I can see you taking this in.
It's more thought out. It's goal-oriented with timelines. It's more like an OKR than anything.
Exactly. Bring the OKRs into the relationship. I know people say that's weird. Why you use Notion or what? I don't care. Make it systemic.
Yeah.
Okay. Should we look at the CSP?
Yeah, sure.
All right. What do we need to change on this? Because on one hand, we're at 83%. On the other hand, you say it's okay. There's a couple things that jump out to me right away. What do you want to do? Isabelle?
I think that we need to solidify what we're doing with savings and investments first, just because right now it's this floating nebula of something.
Well, what are you going to do?
I would like to add some post-tax retirement savings to his accounts specifically, and I don't know how much that is, but I am of the mindset that I would like to set up at least something now so that when he gets a job or if he gets more income, then we can redirect there.
Where's the money coming from?
Right now, it's going to have to come from guilt-free spending. I don't think there's any other way of getting that out. And we don't spend that much every month. I know that for—
We're talking numbers now.
Yes.
I want less stories. I want you to tell me the numbers to move around.
Can I add at least 150?
Sure.
To his post—
Yes, we'll do that. That's going to come from guilt-free spending.
Yes.
And we will put it up here. Okay. Ryan, you wanted to add something?
I was just saying that in terms of investments, I don't mind dipping a little bit into savings. Nothing dramatic, but if it's under 10,000, I wouldn't be super concerned.
You would dip into savings for what purpose?
For starting investments, if they have the potential to earn.
Okay. What else?
I think when I look at the savings, I want to be mindful of setting aside for vacation. So, I'm trying to think if I keep something to under 3,000 divided by 12, what, like 250 a month? See, then we're—
So, let me point out what's happening right now.
Yeah, my brain is—
You're moving. You're down to 13% on guilt-free spending, which is okay.
Yeah.
But if Ryan is a stay-at-home dad, there's not really money for vacation.
Yeah.
Right.
I know. That's what I'm looking at as I look at—
I think unfortunately there's no way around. I think it's the condo.
Yeah.
Okay. Talk about the condo. What do you want to do?
I think it needs to be looked at as either a rental property or we need to get more assertive with your mom as far as moving it.
Yeah. I'm in denial about that.
What's the Spanish word for Ryan, but Ryan who's got a lot of swag? Because Rico Suave is on the prowl right now. What just happened? He's like, "Yeah, we need to do this or do that, and it needs to happen now." I was like, "What? Who is this guy?"
He has feelings about the condo.
Yeah. And I like it. Listen to what he's saying. Ryan, speak up.
Yeah. I just think that it either needs to be a rental opportunity and we temporarily move her in. Maybe she splits some time in Mexico a little bit.
Look at her.
Or she splits some time in Mexico a little bit and she stays with us. Or we just need to get more assertive about having her look into options for moving.
Who's we? We need to get assertive. Is it your mom?
It's Isabelle.
Tell her.
I need you to be more assertive with your mom about moving the property in Mexico to pay off the condo.
Yeah.
Isabelle?
So I have a very hard time with that, but I also think it's fair, and I know that at the end of the day that would alleviate finances. So, can we set a timeline? Say something like if there hasn't been any movement in six months, she moves in and that's what it is.
Right.
Because we need, you know it.
Right.
Give her time to move it, and if not, this is what's—
Right. If there's no movement as far as me finding employment or her—
Yeah. Then, yeah.
I think if I'm going to be a stay-at-home dad, we can't have the condo, effectively.
What if you get a job?
We could probably make it work then financially until she could sort out her feelings with the property.
I like this conversation. I would like to be a little bit more directive because you all are letting your mom's feelings, which, while I respect the dynamic, you have 83% fixed costs. You have no savings, no money for vacation. Your guilt-free spending is getting chipped away.
Yeah.
And if one of you loses your job again, we got problems. So, I don't know. I'm not satisfied with this six months, see how she feels. If I get a job, it's fine. Uh-uh. We have talked a lot about Ryan being assertive. Isabelle, what about you?
In terms of with my mom?
Yes.
I have feelings there. I know I need to be more assertive with her, but I struggle with stressing her out, so I'll just carry it.
Maybe your daughter will do the same thing one day when she needs to talk to you. Mom is always stressed out, so I better not bring this up. What do you think, Isabelle? Is it time to change this?
Yeah, probably.
Your mom is not a fragile flower. Your mom worked seven months a year, took care of the family finances, handled a lot of things. Your mom is not a fragile flower. Don't treat her like that.
Yeah. It's very hard to not see her in that way.
Mhm.
How are you feeling?
Hariness is challenging.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think I keep feeling like I can reason myself out of it, but I also know that numerically speaking, that's just not what the story is.
Yeah. That's right. And it's not even just about the numbers. We can work with the numbers one way or another. It's actually the two of you as a unit saying, "What kind of life do we want to live?"
Right.
And notice, this is the moment. Ryan, who has struggled with being assertive, who's in the dynamic of the parent-child, you, Isabelle, struggling with perfectionism, pointing back at him frequently. Why don't you do this? How many days until that? But now we have a moment where Ryan is actually quite assertive.
Yeah.
This is what you need to do. And what is your mind telling you in the back of your head?
I don't know if that's the choice I want to make.
Yeah. So actually, both of you have a lot of compassion for each other. This is not easy. Nobody wants to be told by somebody, you got to do this, you got to do that. But actually, what do the two of you want?
Yeah.
On this one, I happen to agree with Ryan. I think there's probably a way to say it. Hey, of course we love your mom. Of course we want to help her out. Of course we are fortunate we can do that. We also need to start putting ourselves first. That means the way we talk to each other. That means the way we make decisions together. And that even means something as simple as taking vacations together.
Yeah.
I want to go with you, and I want you to want to go with me. I want to put money aside so that we can do that. I also have a hobby. I want to continue doing that hobby. Right now, we can't do these things when we are paying this much. And it's not that your mom is unable to, it's that she won't sell the house.
Yeah.
So, I need you.
She's dragging her feet. She's been dragging her feet for two years.
So, Ryan, you got to say something like, Isabelle, I need you to make this happen. And I know it's difficult for you. You've never done this in your role. If you can't do it on your own, get help. But I need you to make this happen.
I need you to have a conversation with your mom. And I know that it's tricky. And I know how much the property means to her and how much it meant to your dad, but I also feel like she said herself that she's happier when she's here. And I think it would mean more to her long term to have the condo.
Yeah.
Damn. Honestly, the two of you are really doing the hard work right now. How are you feeling, Isabelle?
I'm sad.
Mhm. How come?
It's this whole, right? It's this whole being a person in—wait a minute.
It's okay. Take your time. We're in no rush.
Sorry. It's this whole feeling like, and I just heard it described the other day and I hadn't thought about it that way, but being in a sandwich generation where I'm the caretaker for a young child, but also the caretaker for a parent. And it's just a hard balance because I know what I would like to do for one is not what is best for the other or what is best for ourselves. So it's just a hard decision to feel like I'm making.
Yeah.
And she was also so happy when she got that condo.
I think I don't have as strong feelings about it, obviously, but I do think a lot of what's going on with her is just that she had planned on retiring in that house with her dad, so she's dragging her feet on it more.
Before he passed. Yeah, it was their dream to—
I understand that. There's a lot in that house. I'm sure it's not just a house. It's not just a financial transaction.
Yeah.
So, there's a way to honor that. There's a way to acknowledge that. There's a way to talk to your mom about that. You may not know how yourself, but there are plenty of people who can help you do that.
Yeah.
But the fact of the matter is that the two of you right now are disconnected about money. And this is one of the big levers. This is one of the biggest numbers on here.
Yeah. Yeah.
Let's fast-forward for a second and pretend it's 25 years from now, and I meet your daughter, and she comes on this podcast, and I ask her, "What do you remember your family saying about money when you were growing up?" If nothing changed after today, what would she say?
She would probably say something similar to what I said earlier.
Almost identical.
Yeah. Yeah. Mom took on the responsibilities. Dad was kind of
Whatever. If he made money, he brought it and gave the paycheck.
All of that.
Right. Right.
Now, let's say you walk out of here and you make some big, bold decisions. 25 years from now, what would she say?
I would like her to say that both of her—hey, when you're in a partnership, both people contribute to the financial decisions in a partnership. And I would also like her to see money as a mechanism for a rich life, something that's positive that allows you to do what you enjoy doing and what you find value and passion in doing, as opposed to what I feel like I grew up with, which was let's pay the bills and get everything done and try to save up for the next thing.
That's what your CSP is right now.
Yeah.
So, it's okay, but it's just treading water forever.
Yeah. Right now, we're in a treading water.
What if she came here and she said to me, "I remember my parents making a big change right around when I was five. And I remember this because they sat me down and we talked about it. We played a game together. We had a little pie chart and we put money in this and that. I remember as I got older, I started to understand that my mom, Isabelle, had to talk to her mom and she had to have a really uncomfortable set of conversations. They were difficult, but actually it ended up being good for both of them."
"And I remember my dad actually participated in money just like my mom. They would talk about it. They would plan on where they were going to go. He had this hobby of coffee stuff. He used to spend money on it. But he always said, 'This coffee is what's important to me. This is part of my rich life. Yours is going to be different than mine.'"
What about that?
That would make me very happy.
This is how you do it. This is how you do it. You have these conversations now. And then you teach your daughter. You don't shield her from money. It's not meant to be shielded from. It's not a monster. You talk about it with her. Age appropriate, but you get her involved. You let her know, "This is how I grew up with my mom. This is what my mom did." Right?
Right.
Ryan, same for you.
Yeah.
"I struggled being assertive. It wasn't working for me. It actually caused a lot of fights when you were young." Tell your daughter. "And so I had to change that. I went to this guy, saw his podcast, got a therapist, got a coach, etc., etc., etc., and it really changed things." What do you think?
Yeah, I think that's probably the best move. Definitely the best move to have her see me as more involved so she doesn't have a similar dynamic in the future.
Yeah.
I also already know that I want her to see us both the same way.
As a team.
Yeah. As a team.
As is, I'm the one she approaches for secondary things a lot of the time.
She's noticed the dynamic already. If she wants to buy something, she will ask mommy and not daddy.
Wow.
Yeah. Even when I was the one making more studs and even resent.
Wow, kids are smart.
She already knows who to ask for certain things.
Yeah, kids are smart.
Yeah.
Without making big, bold changes, just glide right into recreating your childhood.
Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. What do we want to do on the CSP? We can project this six months out. What's going to happen with the condo?
So if we project six months out, I think in either case we zero it out.
Great. Love that decisiveness. Zero. Holy. Fixed costs just dropped. I don't—
66%.
Admit that.
Now, next. Yeah.
Yeah.
We now have $2,765 a month in guilt-free spending. What do you all want to do?
I'll defer to you.
I think we could probably reduce that to 20%, put the 10% in savings.
Love it. Fantastic. Let's do it. I'm going to add another, let's just say 700 bucks. Let's add even more. Let's add 800 bucks to investing. Okay. Yeah, you're down to 21%. Y'all, that's it. That's life for the rest of life.
We could put the rest in.
No, I need to go on vacation.
Vacation? Okay. You want to put it there?
How much? Well, same. Now, I always get stuck in reverse mathing how much I would need to go. Let's just say 350.
350 a month. So, roughly 5,000 a year. A little lower than that.
Yeah. Yeah.
All right.
Gifts we honestly do out of guilt-free spending, I would argue.
Yeah, that's true.
But then I don't know what's—
You need to put $250 a month away. But it's neither here or there. Usually, I like to see couples knowing their own retirement is dialed in before they start putting 250. 250 a month at a young age can actually be quite consequential.
Right. So, just to zero it out, just to show you what would happen. All right.
I would question not having anything going into the long-term emergency fund for home repairs.
Oh, yeah. Good idea.
Yeah.
Fine. Let's put it there. Home repairs, 250. That's smart. Boom. So, now you're saving. Yeah, I agree. Well, let's keep in mind your savings account is $68,000, which is 10 months or so, 11 months of savings. That's solid.
That's nice.
Yeah, that's nice. And by the way, this is all on one income. You want to do another income? Watch this.
Let's say 3,500 post-tax. I'm being conservative here. Your fixed costs dropped to 47%. And now you have $5,000 left per month.
Yeah. Right. Which was that? Three, yeah. Yeah. That's like a $50,000, $60,000 job.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
So, what does that tell you? We could take the CSP numbers off screen. What does that tell you?
It tells me there's flexibility in what I want to do. I don't even have to necessarily pick. I could probably be comfortable, if we got rid of the condo, just taking a part-time job and then being the father figure the rest of the time.
Exactly. Yes, you have options. Seeing the numbers helps you see it. But what I'm seeing, what I just saw right now is like the clouds just cleared. Holy, I could work part-time. I could do a 50K job, 60K job. I could be a stay-at-home dad, whatever.
Right. There's a lot of—
There's a lot of—the two of you now get to decide clearly. Right. And have we thought about how much you're actually going to have in the future?
I don't know a number, honestly. I know what percentage of my salary it'll be for pension.
Okay.
I have no idea for him.
What percentage is that for you?
It's about 68 to 70% of what my salary will be at retirement age.
Okay. Do you know what that salary will be? Ballpark.
It's probably going to be around 150, 160 at least.
160.
But it's hard to—yeah.
Conservatively.
It's conservative. Yeah. That's very conservative.
So 70% of $160,000 will be your pension.
Mhm.
Okay, without including Social Security or anything else like the 403(b) I'm making small contributions to.
I ran some quick calculations for you, back of the napkin. So they include your pension, 70% at 160K, which I think is conservative. They include a $3,500 a month net pay for you, Ryan, which I think is conservative as well, and to be able to make those investment contributions that we talked about. How much do you think you would make in income when you retire? Right now you make $151,000 a year.
My own back-of-the-napkin math wants to say somewhere between 100 to 120.
Okay, Ryan?
I want to say 150.
Okay. According to our calculations, $187,000 a year. What do you make of that?
That means that I can only calculate what I know for mine. I don't have any idea what his looks like.
I do think that might be conservative for me too, based on my previous income.
Yeah, because you were previously putting in a lot more.
Yeah.
So, what does it mean? The fact that it's 187,000, probably more.
I see it as we're going to continue to be comfortable in retirement. I don't have to worry about it. We'll be at or above our current living. Well, inflation, but—
No, this factors inflation.
Yeah. Yeah. I think we'll be at our current lifestyle.
Okay.
Which is comforting, I think.
Ryan?
Yeah, it's comforting. I think that I agree with that. That's a comfortable number.
Okay. Does it mean that you need to take on extra work in summers?
Probably not.
Yeah. So, let go of that.
Yeah. What else does it mean you do not have to do?
It probably means that I don't have to be doing as—it's not just the teaching in the summers thing. I pick up a lot of extra work just here and there and everywhere because there's opportunities for it, and I tend to be the person of, "Well, if I could make this extra thousand, I'll do it."
That's because of how your parents grew up.
Yeah. Yeah.
And you are still following in their footsteps, which can be good, but it's also destructive. It's not healthy to be following a rule book from 45 years ago that doesn't apply to you today.
Right. Right.
So, you actually get the freedom.
Yeah. Of time.
Yeah. Time and making those decisions.
Can you imagine just sitting and watching a—
No. Absolutely not. No. I have a very hard time doing that. If I'm not actively doing something, I feel like I'm wasting my time.
Gosh, I wonder where that came from.
My friends and I call it toxic productivity.
Yeah.
It's—and I, yeah.
The only thing that absolutely has to happen is what? What needs to change with your CSP?
That condo.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's the one thing.
Yeah.
So, wow. What I'm seeing here is each of you walking out of here with one big piece of homework. Ryan, what's yours?
To change my job search and be supportive towards moving her towards moving the condo with her mom.
No, one. And I don't want process. I want outcome. What are you going to have? What is your piece of homework that you are going to get?
I'm going to support her in approaching her mom about moving the condo.
That's more important than you getting a job?
Looking at that right now, it kind of is.
You don't need—
I think the condo is my responsibility.
I agree.
I think that's my homework.
Exactly.
Is to either get moving on selling that house or moving her into our—that's it. I think that's it.
Yeah. And Ryan's like, "And not the second one." That's what Ryan wants to say.
Yes.
Why? Say it, Ryan. It's okay. It's your house too. Be like, "I love your mom, but no. Option one."
Right. Right. I think it will drive us all a little bit crazy.
So actually, I think that's really important. Don't give yourself two options when option two is not feasible. There's only one option.
That's true.
That's the one that has to happen.
Yeah.
Okay. That's your homework.
Okay.
And you know the timeline, too. What did you agree on?
Well, I had suggested six months.
Great. For moving a property, your payments stop in six months.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
End of the year, roughly.
So, there you go. Now, what is your one piece of homework?
I don't know.
Yes. And how much does that job need to pay?
Over 60,000.
Fine. 3,500 net per month and you all are good.
Yeah.
Whatever it is. That's it. Clouds are cleared. Any questions?
No.
My mild question to you is, I feel like you feel hesitant about that lower cutoff. That value tied to income.
Ask him. Don't tell him. Ask him.
Well, that's my question. Are you going to really be comfortable in a job that pays 50 or 60,000?
I think I'll be comfortable with it if it's local and it means a better work-life balance.
Okay. So, we can prioritize that.
I respect that.
Yeah.
What do you all get out of better work-life balance? If you're not taking on all these extra gigs and you have a more comfortable work-life balance, what do you get?
I think we get more time together, honestly, and as a family.
I think maybe not be stressed all the time. Right now, there's a lot of things that we do where we're always running around. We're always trying to go from the one thing—
I want the vision. What do you get?
I want to watch a movie Wednesday.
I want to get more time and relaxation and maybe space to do the things that I want to do as opposed to the things I have to do.
Beautiful. That's a beautiful vision.
Yeah.
It's pretty hard for you to say, huh? I would love that. I would love it for the two of you and your daughter to just be like, "We're just going for a walk," right? "We're just going to go play. We're not in a rush."
That would actually be the coolest thing of all. It's not about the money. You have the money, right? Make a couple big changes and y'all are good. That's the stuff your daughter sees. But even without your daughter, that's the stuff that makes life joyful.
Gosh, there was a lot of courage from Isabelle and Ryan today. And I just want to acknowledge how much they had to go through just to come here and to stay here. I think Isabelle kind of expected me to go to town on Ryan and tell him all the things he was doing wrong. And I think she quickly discovered she actually plays a part, a very large part, in this dynamic. It's uncomfortable to have a mirror reflected at you and realize, "Oh my gosh, I might be a part of this problem." That is not easy. And to her credit, she came back in here and she said, "Let's keep going." Incredibly courageous. One of the bravest things I have seen on this show.
Ryan has taken a backseat to money. And I am very happy to say that by the end, you notice that he seemed to find his voice. And if anything, I want more of that. I want them both to sit up straight and speak openly about the things they want, about the things they need. Now, it's going to take a lot of work. This is going to be hard, but it's also one of the most valuable things they can do for themselves and for their daughter. And now, let's hear their follow-ups.
Hey Ramit, just doing a quick follow-up. The most surprising thing about our conversation, I think, was how uncomfortable the whole process made me feel. I'm the one who submitted the application. I've listened to many, many episodes of the podcast. I've always thought of myself as someone who's comfortable talking about money. And honestly, it was just deeply uncomfortable in a lot of ways.
I think that's because Ryan and I were really forced to grapple with the sometimes unhealthy patterns of communication and dynamics that we've fallen into over 12 years of marriage. All the things that we should say that are being left unsaid or implied or hidden in jabs or just these little ways that we talk to each other and about each other. I think for me it was really eye-opening to hear someone else's perspective on those and to really think about how we can improve and better our communication as we move forward.
My biggest takeaway for me personally is that I think I've been hanging on to that house in Mexico emotionally just as much as my mom has, which is why I think I've been really reluctant to push on finding a solution for the condo, which is just one of the biggest hits to our fixed costs.
I've been trying to think about, how do we increase our income? How do we lower other expenses? How do I set travel and retirement and everything on the back burner? And I'm realizing that I really can't be doing that. So I have already sat down and had a very, very long and very emotional conversation with my mom about this. We have a plan. We have a plan in the next six weeks to list the house. And it's only six weeks because we'll both, I think, need to be in Mexico. So there's some delay there in traveling. But we have a plan and I think she's on board. She understands and I was very grateful for that. And I'm very grateful to you and the team for this experience. It was great. Thanks.
Hey guys, Ryan here with a quick update. Yeah, so I think my biggest
Surprise from the whole conversation was in two different levels. The first one was just how checked out I was on our finances. I was just afraid of confrontation or making mistakes. And I kind of just ended up sending a lot of those decisions Isabelle's way, and it was causing her a lot of stress.
The other surprise was just how long the condo had kind of been in limbo, and so that was kind of a huge surprise for me. I realized it had been a while, but I wasn't sure that it had been quite that long. I think the whole process was pretty uncomfortable, but we're definitely making steps on moving forward with that.
I'm going to be a lot more present in our finances going forward. We're scheduling discussions about money regularly, which is really good for us, and expanding my job search for another one, just kind of to look at variable incomes there. I do have a few things in the works that are in my similar level, though, which is good. I've been interviewing and excited for that. But I think at the end of the day, I just need to kind of move forward and see what I can find and just be there for Isabelle and make sure we make the right decisions together as a team.
It's been, I think, about seven weeks since we spoke to you, and so we were just recording a quick update. We have a couple of really exciting new updates, so I'll turn it to you.
Yeah. So I guess the most exciting or most dramatic change is I've received a job offer, which I've accepted, for $150,000 per year, which kind of resets our finances a little bit more and makes things a little bit less tight.
Yeah. So we're really excited about that. We're kind of figuring out what that looks like for us now and kind of how we're going to be moving forward. On my end with my homework, we are or have been talking to my mom a lot about selling the house in Mexico, and I think she has kind of accepted and come to realize that's something that we need to do, and so we are moving forward with that. Planning to travel there. Well, she's planning to travel there in September to really start moving on that a little bit more.
I think the other thing that I've realized and that we've realized through this process is that even if it's no longer strictly a financial decision, even if we can afford the cost with the new job, it's still something we need to do just from a practical perspective and a personal perspective. So that is still something that we plan to do in the next six months or so, hopefully.
I think moving forward, the biggest thing and the biggest mindset shift has really been thinking through and discussing together how we want to plan things and spend money consciously. We're going to be kind of adjusting to a whole new income and a whole new approach to how we tackle those decisions. And I think we've been having a lot of good conversations already about how we're going to do that.
Yeah, and I just wanted to add to that that we've been having a lot of these conversations, and on that note, they have been actual conversations. We've been a lot more reciprocal to each other's feedback, and we've been having meetings regularly discussing our finances and what we want to do, what we want to save for, where our financial goals are and things like that.
Yeah. So I think we've already kind of sat down and made a preemptive plan for what we're going to do once he starts the job. And I think we're in a good place. I'm really hopeful for what the next while is going to look like for us. So thank you so much.
Thanks.
If you want to know the exact month and year that you will have $100,000 in your investment portfolio, sign up for my new program, Road to 100K. I'll help you hit that number fast. Go to iwt.com/100k to sign
Article published · Updated