On a recent episode of NerdWallet’s Smart Money Podcast, the hosts laid out a number that should stop any middle-income household cold: middle-income earners are spending 95 cents of every dollar they earn and…
On a recent episode of the Animal Spirits podcast, Ritholtz Wealth Management’s Ben Carlson laid out a number that should reset how millennials think about their parents’ money. “A 65-year-old couple, there’s a 64%…
On a recent live audience taping of The Ramsey Show in Denver, a 29-year-old named Trayvon asked Dave Ramsey, Rachel Cruze, and Jade Warshaw whether he should bend the famous Baby Steps to invest…
On a recent episode of Financial Audit, host Caleb Hammer looked across the table at a young couple with an infant and delivered one of the more memorable lines in his catalog: “You might…
The scenario plays out on retirement forums almost weekly: a 50-year-old with $1.8 million in a traditional 401(k) and $400,000 in a taxable brokerage wants to walk away from work, spend roughly $90,000 a…
On a recent episode of the Catching Up to FI podcast, financial planner Aubrey Williams made a point that should stop anyone shopping for an advisor in their tracks: the label most consumers think…
Priya, a 45-year-old caller to Jill Schlesinger’s Jill on Money show, opened with a common knot: she loves her career but her current job has turned ugly. “I have been working a long time,…
A listener wrote in to Vivian Tu’s podcast Networth and Chill with a story that should be required reading before anyone combines finances with a partner. She had paid off her partner’s truck and…
The retiree was 66, single, living in Pennsylvania, and relying on a $1.1 million brokerage account to supplement her Social Security income. Her goal was straightforward: generate about $55,000 a year from the portfolio…
A 58-year-old man with a $620,000 401(k) balance dies suddenly of a cardiac event. He had divorced four years earlier, drafted a new will leaving everything to his two adult children, and assumed the…
The check most retirees actually receive in mid-2026 is $2,083 a month, or roughly $25,000 a year. That sounds modest, and it is. What surprises recipients is how quickly that benefit becomes partly taxable…
The retiree we are modeling is single, 71, and sitting on $4 million split across a $2.5 million traditional IRA, an $800,000 Roth IRA, and a $700,000 taxable brokerage account. Required minimum distributions hit…
A listener named Carrie Anne wrote into the Rich Habits Podcast with a problem most adult children would recognize. She wants to pay her late 60s parents $1,000 a month for watching her kids.…
Herb, a retired federal employee featured on the Early Retirement – Financial Freedom podcast, says something most working people would find absurd: he is better with money now that he has stopped earning a…
Two more years of work can permanently reshape retirement income for someone without a pension, but the math hiding inside that decision reveals yield-tier traps and inflation pressures that change the answer depending on…
