0:00:00 - Speaker 1
Discussions in this show should not be construed as specific recommendations or investment advice. Always consult with your investment professional before making important investment decisions. Securities offered through registered representatives of Cambridge Investment Research Inc. A broker-dealer member, finra, sipc Advisory Services through Cambridge Investment Research Advisors Inc. A registered investment advisor Cambridge and Greenway Wealth Advisory are not affiliated.

0:00:20 - Speaker 2
It's time to dive into some insider secrets of investing and retirement planning. To make your retirement as smart and as elegant as possible. This is Money Chic with Sherry Rash.

0:00:31 - Speaker 3
Hey everybody, Welcome into the podcast. This is Money Chic with Sherry Rash. Thanks for hanging out with us this week as we talk investing finance and retirement with Sherry, who's a financial advisor and a money coach at Greenway Wealth Advisory. And Sherry, how are you doing?

0:00:46 - Speaker 4
I'm doing great. How are you?

0:00:48 - Speaker 3
Doing very well. We are talking just after Memorial Day, we are into June, so, woohoo, summer is upon us. How was your holiday?

0:00:56 - Speaker 4
It was good. It was a little cold and rainy, but it was still nice. Yeah, it was a weird one, guys.

0:01:02 - Speaker 3
It was really where I'm at. It was in the 90s leading up to it, and then Sunday, right before Memorial Day, it dropped all the way down to like 60 for the high and was rainy to your point, and then the next day it was like 80 again, so it wasn't so bad.

0:01:15 - Speaker 4
It was 50 where I was Okay, all right, a little cooler A little chillier, so I'm glad I'll take the 60.

0:01:20 - Speaker 3
No problem. Well, we got a fun topic this week, so we're going to talk about spending personality types, and so this could be pretty fun. So I want to basically ask you I've got four bullet points here, Sherry and just kind of see your take on these types of people that you might encounter, whether it's existing clients, potential clients, whatever the case is. And you know, I think for any of us, before we can effectively put together a good strategy for really anything and when it comes to our income or investing or retirement, it's important to understand really who we are right and what we do with our money and how we behave. And I know that sounds a little, it might sound a little like, oh, I don't want to think about that stuff, but it's really kind of important to help dissect because it allows you to also do, you know, be better at your job.

So I've got these four. I want to go through them a little bit and just have some fun with this and you tell me what you see or what you think when it comes to these types of spending personalities, and we're going to kick it off with the emotional spender and I'll play along as well. So, folks, if you're listening to the podcast, feel free to chime in with it. Do it to yourself. It's like, hey, am I this one, Am I that one? Or maybe you're a combination of multiples? I definitely think I fall into the emotional spender category, Me personally. What is it, Sherry, and what do you think about it?

0:02:35 - Speaker 4
An emotional spender is someone that not necessarily loves to shop or spend money, but allows emotions to affect their spending habits. So they had a great day. Let's go celebrate by eating out or buying a treat for themselves. That's me. Had a terrible day. Let's go out and eat and try to forget about it, or buy a treat for ourselves. That's me. Or really tired and stressed. Let's go out to eat so we don't have to worry about cooking. So emotions are really driving the spending. It's happy, sad in between. Let's go spend some money and make ourselves feel a little bit better, or commiserate?

0:03:14 - Speaker 3
Yeah, and I think it's pretty funny. I like the way you did that as well which definitely is me is. It makes me think well, I go out to eat a lot, but it's really important, especially if you're talking about being a retiree or pre-retiree, right, because if you don't have a handle on this, this is when it can kind of get out of control. Nobody likes the B word, right Budget, but at the same time, you kind of have to know who you are. If this is what you're going to do, so that, as an advisor, you can plan for this.

0:03:41 - Speaker 4
It's exactly right. I mean, you need to understand your personality in order to have those guardrails in place to save you from yourself sometimes and I am mixed between an emotional spender and a YOLO spender, which we'll talk about next but I can catch myself if I'm feeling a little down in the dumps I don't like to spend money on going out to eat. I enjoy going out to eat, but I do think it's a waste of money.

So I like to buy myself treats and I can catch myself and usually just takes a distraction, like all right, instead of going out to the store, go do this first and that'll distract me enough. So then I'm not going out to spend. But if you identify what you are, you can put the guardrails in place, like I said, to protect you from yourself and from your spending habits.

0:04:31 - Speaker 3
Yeah, that's a good point and we you know my wife is an amazing cook and we go out to eat, I think as a reprieve for her, because she loves to cook and she does an amazing job at it and I am not so good. I'll try from time to time, but typically if I burn it.

That's when we're going out to eat, but it's one of those things where you know everybody's got that kind of that catch and I think that's a great way of thinking about that emotional spender. Maybe it's not food, but just in general that gives us an idea of what that emotional spender might look like. To your point doesn't necessarily mean like a shopaholic, just means something to kind of pick up your mood, whether it's good or bad. So you mentioned the YOLO spender. That's next. So what in the world is YOLO?

0:05:12 - Speaker 4
Yeah, yolo, you only live once, so this this person spends money based on the you only live once philosophy, so they can go overboard on purchases and experiences, because they only live once. You can't take it with you, so you might as well spend it.

0:05:32 - Speaker 3
Yeah, there's not a brinkstruck following the hearse right when we pass away. So you know what? I guess I could probably put myself in this category as well, and that's what I was saying earlier. We might find that we're multiples of these, because I'm one of those that I have no problem spending a big ticket item, like I don't blink at a big ticket item. But I'll get all irritated if I go to Target and spend like $125. I'm like, what did I buy for $125? You know, just like nothing major. You're getting like household supplies and it's things that we need.

But I could see that being that type of spender where this is all you know. I'm only living once. I'm going to enjoy myself, I'm going to get that boat right or I'm going to get the RV so we can retire. But I would imagine, sherry, as an advisor and a money coach, you've got to say, okay, hanging on, you know what are we doing and why are we doing it. What is the real? You know, how much are we going to use this, that kind of thing? Do you try to talk through that with clients so they're not just getting this big ticket item that may not get the use they think it's going to get?

0:06:32 - Speaker 4
Yes, when talking with my clients, I want to figure out what kind of what's their money personality? What kind of spender are they? For example, I had a wealth coaching client and she was having some credit card debt. She was having some issues and with with saving money and she made a very good living and it turned out that she was spending emotionally. She is a nurse and during COVID and she was seeing a lot of really awful things.

0:07:00 - Speaker 3
Sure.

0:07:00 - Speaker 4
And then it just so happened that after her shifts, she would go out and get herself a little something to either make herself feel better or just kind of fill the void, because she wasn't going out and seeing people. That was before how she was getting fulfilled. Now she was trying to fulfill herself with stop. So by asking these questions and figuring out what was going on, we could get to the root of the issue. Okay, and one exercise I had her do was you know, you hear about food journals or keeping track of what you eat for those that might have. You know, eat emotionally, you can spend emotionally.

So I had her go through her last few credit card statements and look at what she was buying and I had her write how she was feeling and when that purchase was made, when she was making those purchases, and was it alone when she was at, was it at night? And she was feeling alone and she was making some purchases online. Okay, well, that is a trigger then for her. Maybe, being alone, idle hands, going online to Amazon, it's real easy. Or was it right after her shift, what happened that day? So figuring out why you're spending money or what you're thinking when you're spending that money helps to put those safeguards into place to help protect you from making those maybe unnecessary purchases Well, protect us from ourselves a lot of times.

0:08:22 - Speaker 3
So, yeah, absolutely, that's interesting. I really like that. So we've covered two of these. Let's go to the next one. I would imagine this next category is probably something that is very appealing to a wealth coach, to a money coach like yourself. That's the savvy spender. This is the person I would imagine, who is just does a pretty good job. They don't necessarily go to hog while in any one direction maybe.

0:08:43 - Speaker 4
Yeah, exactly so. It's someone that's very balanced when they're spending. They spend when needed, but they're usually frugal when they're doing it. They believe in quality over quantity and will pay more for something that they feel is worth it which I am very much trying to work on right now and trying to reduce my yolo-ness and become a little bit more savvy and they believe in spending on experiences more than spending on stuff which I love. I love that, yeah.

0:09:14 - Speaker 3
I think that we're seeing that. I've been watching like Tiny House Nation I don't know if you ever watched that show or not, but people are going tiny with these little houses. I just there's no way I could do it, but I find it interesting and a lot of times that does seem to be the conversation pieces it's a smaller mortgage, it's a smaller footprint, so on and so forth to spend more on experiences versus stuff, right and so therefore, you don't have a bigger house, so you don't have a lot of stuff to put in it and things of that nature. So I could see that being. It seems like that's something that's happening more and more with the younger generation.

0:09:46 - Speaker 4
Yeah, definitely One of the arguments. The frequent argument in my household is over aluminum foil. I purchase the generic aluminum foil because you made the comment before about looking at your target receipt and with some things you nickel and dime and other things you make a big purchase. Well, I'm the same way. I buy generic aluminum foil and it's just not as good as Reynolds wrap and my husband loves Reynolds wrap, so every time the aluminum foil comes out it's just spend a little bit more on the Reynolds wrap. He is a mix of a savvy spender. He believes in quality over quantity. He also spends his money on experiences, but he is a little bit a mix of the miser which is next. But savvy spender is definitely where it's a good direction to try to implement just a little bit into your money personality.

0:10:40 - Speaker 3
Yeah, I like that Well and again, as we can clearly see just through the conversation, we all have a tendency to probably be in a couple of these categories at least two, for sounds like for you and I, and also your husband. So I imagine most people fall into that grouping as well. So let's talk about the miser. Since you brought it up, and again as a coach, this one's got to be a little interesting and challenging because on the one hand, this person has probably done very well for retirement They've probably saved quite well for that but I imagine the opposite side becomes getting them to actually use it or do something with it in their golden years. Enjoy themselves a little bit, and I get it. Maybe it's something they want to. You know they're playing everybody's different. They want to leave it all to the kids or grandkids. Everybody's got a different kind of forte there, but I would think that the miser could be a little tricky as well.

0:11:31 - Speaker 4
The miser is tricky. A miser is someone that has believes any sort of spending, even when it's necessary. Spending is stressful and guilt inducing. They try to cut corners on all costs and usually this is based in some sort of fear about not having enough. And it is hard when you, when I, have clients that are misers, and it's really tough when they both are. Usually it's one may be a miser, the other one may be a YOLO, which presents a whole host of issues.

0:12:04 - Speaker 3
I imagine that makes for interesting conversations.

0:12:07 - Speaker 4
Yes, yes, it does, but it is hard to tell someone spend your money. You save it all of these years. You made sacrifices your whole life. You have enough money, you can spend it, and I have a few clients that I have to remind them that they're okay. You're okay, you can do it. If you can spend that little extra.

0:12:27 - Speaker 3
Enjoy it Right.

And you know I think, sherry, we probably see a lot of this from retirees, for example, who or pre retirees who were raised by folks that went through the depression, the great depression, right, because there was.

I know my, my wife's parents are that way because my father-in-law, for example, he's definitely that way because his mom, he's a matter of fact, they still live in the same house that he was born and raised in, out in Wyoming, and so the house and there's just stuff, there's just a lot of accumulation, because she would never, the grandmother would never throw anything away, right, because they couldn't afford to, especially going through the great depression.

So I know we've seen a lot of that, that kind of that miser, with folks who've gone through that, especially when we're talking about retirees and pre retirees. So then your job is to kind of help them figure out who they are, or get them to be I may be honest with who they are, right, and then work a strategy that's going to encompass that, because it doesn't necessarily mean you have to change, as long as you're planning for it, or at least if you're going to do some, you know, minor changing, because, hey, we are who we are. It might be tough to change at this point in life, but that's really where the information comes in, critical to you, so that you can plan accordingly.

0:13:36 - Speaker 4
Exactly. You cannot apply the same rules that you would have with a miser, with someone that has a YOLO type of mentality. Just bringing up the word budget to them would not go over too well.

And it'd probably be a wasted effort because they're not going to follow it. So by having some rules in place, you can still have the YOLO type mentality as long as everything else is in place your emergency funds, your bills are being paid, you're paying off your credit card statement when you're getting it, you're contributing to your retirement. If you're doing all of those things, then, yes, it is okay to go have that splurge, but you're also not going to splurge every week. So, putting those safeguards in place, having some rules and agree on what you're going to do and have a spending strategy, I think that's important. So in understanding, like you said, where, where, how they grew up, a lot of our money, personality comes from our parents and how we were raised in our environment.

So one fun question to ask is what's your first money memory? What's the first thing? When's the first time you realized money was a thing? I like that, what happened, what was it? And that usually tells me a lot about my client's money personality, because it could be a very positive experience, or it could be, why just remember, you know, my dad having to get a third job to pay the bills, or so that determines what our money personality is.

0:15:03 - Speaker 3
That's a great point. Yeah, I really like that and really that kind of is all part of what you do as a money coach and of course we call the show here Money Chic and it's, you know, secrets about women and money and are you Money Chic? And so you've got this little quiz that you do. Take the Money Chic quiz online. We have that and the show notes the link to that and it's really, you know, are you confident? You know, healthy, informed, capable all of that kind of ties right into our topic this week. And what is your spending personality type? So ask yourself, are you an emotional spender, are you a YOLO spender, a savvy spender or a miser or a combination of a couple of those? And then, of course, you know, make a plan and work that accordingly.

And if you need some help, as always you want to check with a qualified professional before you take any action with anything you hear on our show or any other. So make sure you reach out to Sherry if you have some questions at 703-255-2808. That's 703-255-2808. You can also visit her online at GreenwayWealthAdvisorycom. That's GreenwayWealthAdvisorycom. And don't forget to subscribe to the podcast on Apple, google, spotify, iheartstitcher any of those platforms you like to use. For example, if you're an Apple phone user, you probably already have Apple Podcast pre-installed on your phone. Just open that up and type in Money Chic and you will see that pop up and you can just subscribe to it that way, or Google or whatever platform you're using. Sherry, thanks for hanging out with me this week. I appreciate it. It was a fun conversation. I hope you enjoyed yourself.

0:16:29 - Speaker 4
It was fun, thank you.

0:16:31 - Speaker 3
Absolutely, and we'll talk again here soon on the podcast. So, folks, again, don't forget to subscribe to us here on Money Chic with Sherry Rash, financial advisor and money coach at GreenwayWealthAdvisory. We'll see you next time.