BiggerPockets Money Podcast - 98: Change Your Money Mindset, Change Your Life with Vicki Robin

Episode Date: November 11, 2019

You know Vicki Robin as the author of Your Money or Your Life, but on today’s show, we dive MUCH deeper into her story and her background. Growing up without a lot of money, she learned how to use her resources to appear as though she had more. With limited funds, her mother taught her that she could use them all at once on one thing, or she could stretch them further by shopping at a discount store. Vicki carried these lessons through her adult life, moving into homesteading and while, technically living under the poverty line, she never felt the pinch of not having all the trappings of the modern world. In fact, it wasn’t until she met Joe Dominguez, learned the foundation of what would later become Your Money or Your Life, and started teaching others about how to handle their finances that she realized that the gap between what she had and what others had was quite vast. She knew she had to appear prosperous, so people wouldn’t reject her message simply by her appearance. Her message has reached more than one million people, and has changed the lives and financial futures of countless more.  Vicki herself has been able to focus on her passion - environmental issues - and has the freedom to pursue her passions due to her fully funded retirement at such an early age. In This Episode We Cover: Vicki's journey with money On having a poverty mentality On how to appear prosperous to other people Survival thing for social animals How the behaviours of her peers differed from hers On working with Joe Dominguez What her journey looks when she wrote the book, "Your Money or Your Life" Her concern re climate change Resource sharing How the financial independence movement evolved Capitalist game The levels of financial independence Freedom to have new interests and following them Her advice on life circumstances Vicki's living situation right now and how she used real estate And SO much more! Links: Financial Independence - Reddit Mr. Money Mustache Mad Fientist BiggerPockets Money Podcast 58: Optimizing Every Channel to Achieve Financial Freedom with Grant Sabatier Millennial Money Dollar Revolution BiggerPockets Money Podcast 55: How to Quit Your Job and Travel the World with Millennial Revolution Profiles: Your Money or Your Life Vicki Robin's Website Your Money or Your Life Facebook Community Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money podcast show number 98 with Vicki Robin, author of your money or your life. Clearing your mind, getting rid of your debt, having savings. And for a lot of people, you know, just like getting $100,000. I mean, that's like impossible in most people's minds. And $100,000 of 4% interest is not going to be financial independence. But it frees you to reset your life. It's time for a new American dream, one that doesn't involve, working in a cubicle for 40 years, barely scraping by. Whether you're looking to get your financial house in order, invest the money you already have, or discover new paths for wealth creation, you're in the right place. This show is for anyone who has money or wants more. This is the Bigger Pockets Money Podcast. How's it going? Everybody, I'm Scott Trench, and I'm here

with my co-host, Mindy Jensen. How are you doing today, Mindy? I'm doing so well, Scott. I'm so excited for today's episode. It is with... With Vicki Robin, I don't know if you've heard of her. She wrote this little book called Your Money or Your Life. Did she say it published in 1992? And it went on to sell, I don't think this is correct. I think her publisher is maybe not sharing accurate numbers. It went on to sell 600,000 copies.

But I swear, I know 600,000 people who have read this book. Yeah, I think it's clearly a dominant force in the relationship with money and using money in passive income and just fueling financial independence and living your lifestyle of your dreams. It's just a foundational work in this world that we live in in the financial independence community. If you haven't checked it out,

it's absolutely a must read. It's one of the several books on the subject to go and figure this out. Yes, yes. And I'm going to stop you right there. And I'm going to stop everybody who's listening and say, if you have not read your money or your life, you need to pick it up at your local library,

pick it up at the bookstore, order it on Amazon right now. You need to read this book. You need the information that's in there. It's just so, well, at the time, it was groundbreaking when it came out. She got on Oprah. And it's groundbreaking in that it will absolutely change your life about money. If you've already read the book, get a copy and give it to somebody who needs to read the book

because it will change your life. It will change their life to read this book and understand, oh, that's what I could be doing with myself. Instead of just plotting along at work, pushing papers back to the next guy over and over again, eight hours a day, what is it? Like stamping out widgets, it will change the way that you look at everything.

Absolutely. And she's just a pioneer, incredibly smart and thoughtful and intentional about how she does things. And I think you're going to pick that up in our interview with her today when you hear about the life choices that she made versus those that were available to her and those that her peers made and kind of where that directed her over the course of life

intentionally to where she is today, having changed millions of lives and really making an impact on the community. Yeah. And you know what I thought was really interesting is she said that your money or your life isn't a finance book. You know what? It's like seven different books all wrapped up in one. It's a book about finances.

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Mickey Robin from Your Money or Your Life. Welcome to the Bigger Pockets Money podcast. I'm so excited you're here today. Yeah, I'm excited to be here too. We start every show off with where does your journey with money begin? And I'm really, really curious how you grew up, you know, childhood, early adulthood, your whole money story. So, right? My whole money story.

Yeah, right. Okay. It's interesting because every time I reflect on it, being 74 years old, I have a lot of stories, you know, so they're mutable. But when you said it just now, I thought of when I was like four years old and I had a little friend over and my grandma gave me two, you know, covered cherry chocolates, one for me and one for my friend. And I figured out that I could have both as long as I lied. So, I mean, I had an enterprising mind from the get-go, I guess. So I grew up in upper-middle-class family. Parents were both professionals. My mother, especially, had grown up in the Depression

where her father lost everything except his pretenses and his wife's pretenses. So they had a real skill at appearing wealthier than they were, you know, holding their heads up high in the middle of not having a lot. And then she married a doctor. But I think she always taught us that sort of poverty mentality or the depression mentality of use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without. Even though, you know, and just when I was a kid, it was clear she would take me to the bargain basement store. I would have a choice of one dress for school from the nice store or five dresses from the bargain basement store. So I learned early on how to, you know, not how to stretch a dollar, but how to appear prosperous in the eyes of the world. That's an interesting memory.

But, you know, my father was a doctor that was like a high class, you know, upper class profession. And my family is Jewish, but my grandfather changed the name from Rabinowitz, Parabinovich, to Robin. And so we appeared to be Christian, which was lucky in North Shore, Long Island. So I guess the story I'm telling right now is sort of like the sort of mutability of class. And I'm aware of class right now because a friend of mine, I talked about my appearance now of having more than others, you know, and I don't, I don't see that. I see myself as still in that frame of figuring out how to put together a life that works for me on the resources that I have. So I guess I'm skillful. But, so that's my upbringing.

I went to Brown University, and it was paid. for through an inheritance I got from my father, so that was all taken care of. So I came through and I was top of my high school class and da-da-da-da. So I have a lot of privilege. You know, I have educational privilege. I have intellectual privilege. I have racial privilege. And I have that sort of background.

I have a training in how to present yourself. It's just, it's interesting for me. morning to be reflecting on that because I just had that conversation yesterday. And I was just in the middle of a text with somebody on this issue of class in America, which is theoretically supposed to be a classless society. And yeah, it's not. And it's increasingly not. And so the people who are at the bottom who basically in the 70s, you know, the parents of the people I grew up with, they were all in the everything gets better and better in the United States. United States, you know, people get more and more prosperous. People were able to have a middle-class

income, working on a blue-collar job. So it was a really different time. And I think a lot of times when people in this movement, the fire movement, talk about themselves, they really don't talk about social class. They don't talk about the milieu they grew up in. They talk in an individualistic way, you know, like this is how I made it through, but they don't talk about the influences of psychological and social influences of class, at least in my perspective, or at least it's always a story of like, I broke through. So all that privilege has really undergirded my ability to make my life work no matter what my means. I was part of the back to the land. I was part of the And all I had to say is like in 1969, I put all my furniture out on the sidewalks,

sold my car, bought a van, and, you know, started the great adventure that we all took back in. And so I spent a long time homesteading, philosophizing the meaning of life, analyzing what was wrong with the culture I grew up in. You know, it was really great for that period of time. and at that time, what I learned was to use, you know, we had such limited means that we never threw money at any problem. We just like, if the car broke down, we learned how to break, but fix the car. You know? And so I learned a lot. I learned to hunt. I was never the one that pulled the trigger, but to butcher and can meat and be raised pig. We raised.

We raised animals. We had a half-acre garden. We did those things. And it all seemed like the richest life I could imagine. And this morning I was thinking about why did that feel not like poverty when I was living below the poverty level? And it was because I was in a community that was dedicated to the same thing I was. So my reference group was in the same situation I was and had the same spirit of adventure I had. And it wasn't until many years later, really when your money, your life was published in 1992, and I went on the road where I was interacting with people who had way more than I did. And it was like leaving a bubble of contentment and being in a world of where people thought nothing is saying, well, let's go out for drinks. Like, yeah. I'll have water. You know, let's go for lunch.

I'll have those soup. Why don't we just split the bill four ways, you know? Like existential crisis for a week. So, you know, it's, I'm just reflecting on this, and I guess it's appropriate for the podcast because this is what I'm talking about. The struggle to map. your life with the lives of people around you.

And it's because we're social animals and rejection and banishment, rejection, losing status. These are all like survival things for a social animal. So I bet you there's people who listen to your podcast for whom these psychological issues are intense, whether it's that you were born with a silver spoon and so you feel ashamed or whether you're born, you know, with no spoon and you scrapped your way up in life. So, yeah, so that was my circumstance. And then, yeah, I also, the other thing that I did when I was younger is I went to, I lived in Europe for a year and a half.

And I went to school in Madrid college. And I had a certain amount of money for a certain period of time. I doubled a period of time and spent the same amount of money. So I really learned how to be super frugal and do everything I wanted. I had a car and I really loved traveling to the hinterlands in Spain and every weekend I would just get a bag of oranges, a bunch of baguettes of bread and fill my car so that, you know, with people. And then we would sleep in nunneries. You know, we would like knock on the door and for, you know, like a dime, you get to like sleep in the hayloft.

So, you know, it's those sorts of things. It's those sorts of things that inform my life, this having a range, having class fluidity and also stuff fluidity. So my financial independence journey really started when I teamed up with Joe and I'd met him fairly early in my life. And he explained to me how I could take the savings that I had invested in at that time, Canadian bonds, dollar denominated Canadian province of Ontario bonds that had 9% interest. And then I could turn. I know. Yeah, right. And yeah, you're going to die at this one. You know, and then I had

another bunch of money when my mother died. And that was, I got to invest that in 1981 at like 12 to 15 percent interest. So basically, I would say there's a lot of luck involved, dumb luck involved in my story as well. I often think of myself as like the forest gump of everything. I like wandering into scenes that I don't belong in, but somehow or another, this seems to work. Vicki, one question I had about all this is, you know, this circumstance you described and how it was all relative to your circumstances. Many people, I think, were raised in a middle, upper middle class lifestyle, but probably didn't go down the same route that you did in your 20s. What do you think your peers, who you grew up with, how did they, did their behavior differ

from yours or? Oh, my gosh. No, no. Yeah. I mean, for years, I avoided my high school reunion because I was voted most likely to succeed in my high school class. And then if I'd gone to a reunion. I'm sorry.

Did you or did you not write a book that sold more than a hundred? copies. Yeah. What are we at now? Two million, five million? No, no, no, no, a million copies. Yeah, but only a million. There was about 30 years between graduating from college and that, and that feels accidental to me as well. I mean, it feels like the product of a focus on what matters most. I mean, for me, your money or life is a spiritual book. It's a spiritual book by, you know, presents as a money book, but it's really a spiritual book. It's about your attitude toward life and focusing on what matters most. And so we really had dedicated ourselves to growing spiritually. And so that didn't produce a very prosperous lifestyle, but it did produce

your money or your life, which is not just about the math. I just did a class on this where I really wanted people who are fans of your money, your life, to understand that it wasn't about the money, it was about the meaning, it was about the purpose, it was about building soul force and bank accounts. So I think that that book shines with all that inner work that we've done for a long time. Yeah, so, but I, you know, I was like, people,

I graduated from high school with our doctors and lawyers, you know, accountants and hedge fund managers and some of them bumped into something in life and were bumped off of that, you know, not all of them. But I think it wasn't a chosen lifestyle. Well, but I'm listening to you describe this amazing lifestyle where you are doing what you want to do. You chose to live on a homestead and maybe you're living, you know, below the poverty line, but you don't feel the poverty line because you're well fed, you have clothes, you're surrounded by people who are also doing all of this.

same things. You sound happy to me. I wonder how many of those doctors and lawyers and hedge fund managers are so excited. Or do they wake up in the morning and they're like, oh, I got to go to work again. I mean, maybe the lawyers are really excited to go be mean in the courtroom and maybe the doctors are super pumped about like saving a life, but they aren't allowed to go find their spiritual self because they're too busy trying to keep up with the Joneses and try to make the payments on the cars and, you know, all of that. So I read that that you were voted most likely to succeed. I'm like, okay, check that box off. So I don't know, maybe it's a preaching to the choir thing, but it sounds like you get to spend your days doing whatever you want. And if medicine was your thing, now you have

the opportunity to go and study that because money isn't an object. You don't have to worry about putting food on the table and, you know, paying your mortgage and all of that. So yeah, no, I disagree with you. Sorry, respectfully disagree with you. you, you did become the most likely to succeed. You succeeded. You won life. Congratulations. Thank you.

I'm still here. Let's hope my luck holds out for another 10 to 20 years. Yeah. So, I mean, but just back to working with Joe, you know, it's like I felt that he had something that other, you know, like I've never heard anybody talk about money like that he talked about money. And so when people started to approach him about. What do you know that I don't know?

I mean, I was there when he was sitting, thinking about how he's going to explain what he did to a couple who wanted to find out. And he was thinking through, let's see, first I did this, then I did that. There was no nine-step program. He didn't follow a program. And he did all of this very reluctantly. He had no desire to be famous. That was also, that was all sort of an interruption to his main intent. in mind. So he

did that explanation to the couple, then people would show up three couples in our living room or four people. And we started doing the seminars because we were working with an organization that needed money. And so we thought, well, we could teach this and raise money. So really,

until Joe died, and really for several years after that, all of the money that we brought in was dedicated to funding, mostly little groups, that were working toward a sustainable future. So that also is part of my history that until that whole, you know, the whole group of people, Joe died, the group of people unraveled, and I set out on my own, that whole period of time, none of that money was mine. So people look at, you know, best-selling author million copies think, oh,

She has a butle of money. And now because I've saved and because your money or life continues to be successful and we don't have the foundation anymore, I don't have the foundation. So the money comes into my pocket and I've turned it into paying cash for two houses. One, I live in with two rentals and then I bought another rental. So I don't know if I'm a topic anymore. So no, I think the thing is that when I'm on the road for your money, money in your life. That's when it became my means and the gap between my means and what other

people had created stress for me because I had to figure out how from the circumstance I was coming from. I could look prosperous enough so that people wouldn't reject the message because the messenger looked like a hippie. Oh, that's an interesting point. There's some foreshadowing to this too earlier. Yeah. And some of the themes growing up. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So that's what I mean about, you know, I was aware of where I was going to get to in the story from the beginning that I'm just thinking today about class issues. And a lot of ways you determine somebody's classes by the things they have. And I also was, you know, for me, writing the book and publicizing it and traveling and speaking, et cetera, that was all about lowering consumption in North America as an environmental issue because of, you know, overconsumption. It became clear to me in the late 80s that consumerism was the biggest driver of basically, you know, then we were interested in the hole in the ozone, but we were pretty clear that we were heading toward breakdown someplace around the 2020s. I mean, the early people

in the sustainability field were already mapping resource flows and consumption. And they said, If we keep going the way we're going, our civilization is going to start breaking down around about now. And so I was trying to put, you know, as a little Dutch girl, you know, putting my finger in the day. I was trying to influence Americans to consume less, save more, for the sake of the planet, for the sake of the critters, you know, and for the sake of the plants and for sake of the healthy soils and for the sake of all that. So that's why I did all it. And it was fun. I mean, I learned a ton. So that was the challenge. And we knew that we were so radical that if we looked, if there was a hair out of place, you know, people could go like, oh, she looks ratty. I don't have to do what she's talking about. So it was in service to a mission at that time. So yeah, I know, no. I wandered all over the place. So there you go. Well, so what were your general relative means at that time? And how did you stretch it to pull off that appearance and relate to your target audience?

Well, here's the deal. I mean, at that point, I was spending about $800 a month. And I know that because I have accurate to the penny accounts. So, you know, it was about $800 a month was what I was spending at that time. Joe is about $500. And so how did I pull that off? Is that what you're asking? Yeah, what were some of the things you did to appear prosperous or relatable to your target audience with this work on that budget?

Well, one of the things just to say is that when you live in a group of people, that's one of the biggest strategies for lowering your expenses. Is, you know, a resource shared is an expense halved. So I had plenty. I had more than enough. I shopped in thrift stores. You know, everything I had just about, except for, you know, underwear was used. But I had good taste from being brought up by a mother who had really good taste. Yeah, I cleaned up. I have to say I was fortunate, you know, and I think the good fortune was something that was installed inside of me

that was not cowed by others, that I could read a situation and figure out how to be in it in such a way that I could fit enough to be able to do the work I wanted to do. So I bought this really, what I thought was a really nice dress, this purple dress, for the first book tour.

And so boom, there Joe and I are like within a few weeks on Oprah, you know, in my purple dress with these big shoulder pads and these little cinched in waist. And I saved that dress and I was on Oprah for a second time. And I wore the dress as a symbol of, you know, you don't have to buy something new for every time, every wedding you go to. And then I saved the dress for maybe I was going to be on Oprah again. I never got on Oprah.

But yeah, stuff like that. You know, it's like number one, being able to costume. I think it's all costuming. You know, we used to call it clipboarding because you go into a circumstance, you know, and you have your, you know, this little daytimeer thing or whatever, you know, at that time we had paper day timers. So you have your little leather day timer that you got at the thrift store,

you know, and you hold it in your arm in a very official way, and somebody says something to you, when you open up your daytimeer, and you take a note. And it's just like, wow, you know, who's that? What's she writing in her daytime? I don't know. A lot of it, you know, a lot of it, you know, a lot of, I guess what I'm saying is that a lot of our money life is about appearances.

Oh, sure. You want to appear as wealthy or wealthier as everybody else so you fit in. And a lot of consumption is about overcoming the shame of not having what other people have or being influenced by, you know, your new best friend is somebody in an ad. and you want to have the body that person has, you want to have the couch they have, you want to have the motorcycle they have. A lot of our consumption is really about self-comparison and trying to get on the pony that other people seem to be riding.

And so that's why, you know, since 1974, pretty much there were a set of policies in the early 70s that started to drive apart. You know, the middle class started like saying, at the same level and the wealthy started accumulating more wealth. And so a lot of consumption has been people trying to bridge that gap because it appears that other people have what they don't. I learned this when I used to work in an agency that provided Christmas presents

for people in poor communities who would hit some hard times, You know, not that they were stuck there, but, you know, they were used to giving Christmas presents to their kids. Anyway, so we would go and we dressed up like little Santas and go in and deliver bags of presents. And I was stunned by how nice everybody's houses were. They were like nicer than my house, you know, their furniture, there's end tables, their everything was like, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, what is this about? And I found out that people were renting furniture at an incredible interest rate so that they could feel respectable. That what I was doing encouraging people to spend less was difficult for people in the bottom because they needed to spend more they felt in order to hold their heads up to get. I honestly, folks, I don't know why this is the topic.

I've never talked about this on any of my financial independence podcast. But I think it's an important part of it because a lot of people end up in debt. You know, we joke about buying things they don't need to impress people they don't like. We joke about that, but it's actually really true. And so you have to start waking up and peeling off those layers, this false layers of status. And just start asking, and that's what your money or life does. start asking, well, who am I? Who am I in the middle of all this stuff and all this debt and all this

lifestyle? Who am I? What do I really want? You know, when I was five, what did I think about life? So, yeah, I think that's an important part of the process. Please ask me another question. No, I think it's great. I think it's fantastic. I think that the, it seems like there's two key things here, right? One, you mentioned resource sharing, right? And that enables you to, if there's a trapping of the middle class that you want, but you're sharing your how. housing expense. You can so easily afford it and it's not going to break your budget if that becomes necessary. It's just contextually in terms of the framework that other people can apply to their lives. And then secondarily, you know, it's the fact that you, that this is, I think, the major

thing inhibiting a large portion of the middle class where you want to appear prosperous to other people. And a lot of the questions, even in the FI community, is around how do I have this appearance of how do I get this great value or get the same result as what other people are doing, but at no cost or a fraction of the cost. It's why travel hacking I think is so popular within the five community. It's completely different experience to go and take that cruise that you've earned with travel reward points than it is to pay $1,000 in cash for it. So maybe there's some of that going on there as well. There's a sense of pride and cleverness in that sort of self-cleverness that you get to have what other people have on half the cost or a quarter or no cost.

Yep. Yeah, that is a lot of the fire community, is that cleverness, which I just explained it has been real for me. Yeah, well, maybe another question about this would be, how have you seen this movement evolve over the last couple of years? Like, are we seeing a growth in the fire community in the past five, ten years, or has it always been there and always been growing slowly? And we've just maybe noticed it because I'm 12.

Oh, so number one, I don't know, you know, because I came into it. I stumbled into it a couple years ago. I determined I wanted to update your money or life because I met some millennials who were in debt and disoriented and they've never heard of your money or life. So I thought, okay, fine, I'll update it for this next generation, you know, leave it in better shape. Then I found it because a lot of the advice from earlier was like pre-smartphones. It was, you know, it's like it was a different world back then. And it wasn't until a month after I signed the contract that I discovered the Reddit, the Financial Independence Reddit. So at that point, I think there was a couple hundred thousand people on it. And I think now there's double that. So it's kind of burst onto the scene in the last couple of years. I take no credit for that.

I think a lot of it is Mr. Money Mustache and, you know, mad scientists. A lot of it is that some of the main proponents have first on the scene. They've been public. They've been interesting podcasting. Podcasting is, I don't know, it's like five years old maybe. And, you know, before that we did it differently. And so suddenly the information is flowing out. And then anybody and his brother can start a website, you know, and start blogging,

put up some, you know, add someplace, you know, and do some affiliate codes and start to make money. So it's been not only a movement that has caught hold because of the value of it, but it's also a style of education that's caught hold because people realize they can make money from it. So I think that's been part of the burgeoning thing is that it's been a sort of new ecological niche out in the internet. And so a lot of people have come to fill it, including, you know, my dear friend, Grant Sabatier, who's helped me a lot, who has millennial money, and he's a book about financial freedom.

So he taught me a lot to talk millennial a lot. So I think the technology has promoted this explosion. And, you know, there's a new simplicity to it, whether it's, you know, Mr. Money Mustaches, you know, beautiful chart about if you save more, Or, you know, you're just sort of like block and tackle. You're just pulling your FI date closer to you. So, I mean, he has had a lot of influence, I think. There's always been somebody who comes along in every generation

who just hits that sweet spot and suddenly they gain prominence. And I think one book I read called The Simple Life by David Chai really made a difference from me because he traced this impulse throughout American history. And really every generation has a version of this. It's frugality, simplicity, conscious living, you know, rural arts, back to the land. There's always about 20% of the American population that's interested in this. They're interested in a countercultural approach.

And so I think what I see in the fire community, though, by and large, not critical of anybody, is that it is about the math and the money. I mean, it really is about the math and the money. I do not see an intense spiritual dimension, a desire for life to be more meaningful, a desire to leave your job not just to leave, but to be part of something that you long to be part of, that you can't because you have to work.

So it's been very appealing. I mean, I know Joe was an engineer. I see a lot of techies engineers in this movement. I find people relatively apolitical, just figuring out what the system is and how to work it and how to get through it and how to have a life that they prefer, but don't see the social political dimension of things that one of the things is happening is that the middle class is stagnant.

And so, you know, I tell people, you know, I mean, basically I call us smart rats, you know, we're the smart ones that get off the ship. And, you know, you start to see really one of the basic tenants is be an owner of capital. It's the capitalists who actually are getting wealthier and the W2 people are stagnant. So you start to figure out, okay, how can I be one of the capitalists? How can I own capital and live on passive income? Because that's the winning game.

And so fire is sort of like an every man's capital. You know, how to win at the capitalist game. So that's what I notice in this generation. In my generation, it was more spiritual growth, you know, like meaning, purpose, back to the land, simplicity. You know, there was one of important books when your money, your life came out, was Dwayne Elgin's book, Voluntary Simplicity. And so a lot of what we did was a critique of affluence. and a choice to live a life that was not, you know, retiring early, but to step outside the more better, more is better world and live in enough is enough world

and learn the skills that basically our affluent lifestyle has eliminated. You know, it's like, people don't even how to cook anymore. No, absolutely. I love what you just said there about how it's like, it's a capitalist scheme, right? It's about the numbers. And perhaps that's why there's a lot of growth in this is because some people appreciate that spirituality component and should. I think I'm with you on that.

And some people don't. But a lot of the content out there is not talking about what you do with it once you accumulate the capital and the passive income. It's just talking about how to do it. And I think that there's some really interesting implications down the line from that where you wonder is the financial independence movement is all the stuff we're talking about accelerating income inequality or wealth inequality, or is it combating it when it allows the every man to apply a very sophisticated

level of intelligence on accumulating and then investing and harvesting the returns of capital? So I think there's a lot of interesting stuff going on there. I think, you know, one of the things I've said to people that I've met in the fire community, you know, when I've been asked to do talks or podcasts, is that, you know, there's sort of like an identity crisis. I call it like, you know, an induced mid-life crisis, you know, what's it all for? What's it all about, Alfie? And so people scale a wall of fear and they pull the trigger and they get out.

And they are in a, you know, the uncomfortable part of freedom. They've lost their social circle. They've lost their time structuring. They've lost their ability to talk to the guy in the bar on Friday nights. You know, they've lost a lot of what makes us belong. And for a while there is a period of time where you sleep, you know, you pick out on Netflix, you know, you do the things, you know, you learn to play guitar. Everybody talks about learning to play guitar, you know, or you go and you travel or you do. You just like, you know, you optimize money and now let's optimize other things, you know.

So let's optimize our bodies. Let's, you know, so. And then that, I think, wears out for a lot of people. And what I notice is that a lot of people who have been on the FI path, they have the experience we had where people notice that you know something that they don't and you start to be an educator. You start to share what you know in a lot of different ways. And some people, you know, they start their blog or some people, you know, they volunteer in the senior center and they help people with taxes. You know, people start to realize I have something I can give because I've mastered something in this world. But eventually, I think that then you start to realize there's more to life than any of this, and I don't know what it is.

And so people start to, whether it's going back to school or volunteering, people start to explore what else is there in life. So it's a process, but since the fire community is so focused on the getting there, there's not, I'm starting to serve the people who've gotten out and are looking for something else. I don't know if that addressed your question. No, I think that's helpful. On that same topic, how do you, you know, a lot of people we're starting to see are getting out of the game earlier before they meet any of the technical definitions of FI, like this 4% rule or these arbitrary numbers.

And maybe they're doing something more similar to what you were doing where, you know, hey, there's some math to us, but it's about what I want to do with my life and I'm going to get out of there. I wonder if there's a correlation between the amount of your nest egg and passive income and other types of assets. that you have and your ability to go after that. Maybe it's not totally phi, but maybe there's a point earlier in the process

where people can start making that shift. What do you think about that? Yeah, I think there's a lot of people. Number one, I've talked about the levels of financial independence and the first level for me is freeing your mind, getting out of the competitive status game and realizing that there's a me inside all of this, you know, all of this pretense. There's a me inside. The me inside wants something different from all this

stuff. So freeing your mind and being able to see how you're being manipulated to buy things is really important. And there's plenty of people from whom that's the whole deal. That's the whole deal. And so they get their expenses under control because they want what they have. They don't want what they don't have and they know the difference. And then they go on to, they get a master's in something else and they re-tool for a profession that's more aligned with who they are. And then there's getting out of debt. And I think the getting out of debt is, you know, if it only leads to getting out of debt and not building it up again, that's such a liberation. You know, you can do so many things if you just do that. And then there is the,

people who have financial planners, say, six months of savings, six months of expenses in liquid assets and liquid form. And that, you know, people go on the road with their family. People do the things. They already do the delayed pleasures at that point, knowing that they could, you know, either apply their old profession to make some money or do it part time or there's one person who I know, and probably tons more, you know, figure out, like, they want to be in, in nature and they volunteer. They live in national parks, you know, and they get a stipend and they do a few programs for, you know, the visitors.

So basically it's like getting on top of just that, clearing your mind, getting rid of your debt, having savings. And for a lot of people, you know, just like getting $100,000. I mean, that's like impossible in most people's minds. And $100,000 of 4% interest is not going to be financial independence. but it frees you to reset your life. So I think there's many, many, many reset points along the way. I actually think retiring early,

I have been challenging that idea more and more because I think what makes life worth living, one of the things is meaningful work. You know, applying yourself to something that stretches your mind, that uses your body, that you yourself believe is important, that you have deemed important enough for you to spend your life on. And that serves the human journey, you know, that serves a larger community. Because as I said, we're social animals.

So I think working, I think the point should be financial independence. Freeing your mind, freeing from debt and freeing yourself from one paycheck away from penury. and then rededicate yourself to something that's meaningful. You know, I've called it recently, financial independence retire eventually. Love it. I love that. No, no, I love that a lot because I think so many people hear about this, oh, wait, I can quit my job. That's desirable for a lot of people because they don't love their job.

I mean, who loves pushing the papers to the next person eight hours a day? That's not a lot of fun. I mean, for most people, some people might really love that. I had a boss that I really couldn't stand. Everything about her was like she was a miserable person and she shared that with everybody. And I didn't want to work for her anymore. So I quit. And it wasn't about never working again.

It was about never working for her again, never having to work for her again. So I work at bigger pockets now because I love my job. I'm teaching people how to invest in real estate and, you know, teaching them about their finances. But so many people that I meet on this about fire are focusing on the RE part, the, you know, oh, I can't wait until I quit my job. Well, what are you going to do when you quit? Right. Oh, I don't know.

Then don't quit. If you don't know what you're going to do, you're going to be really bad at it. You're going to, you know, watch TV and sleep all the time and, you know, gain a lot of weight. And you need to have a purpose. and I love that you retire eventually. Yeah. But now you don't have to work and make money. You just have to do something you love.

The park ranger. That was Carl's initial desire was to quit his job and then be a park ranger. And now he's doing other things. Right. But you can be a park ranger eventually. That's the thing is that I guess if I'm talking to you because I've been financially independent a long time, I have retooled my life again and again and again and again. I have been interested in many things.

I've had a chance to just bust myself back to a buck private. I'm doing it now with climate change. I want to make a contribution to what I consider a climate emergency. And so I'm hauling forward the skills and the projects that I've done before. And in theory, if all goes well, I'm going to go to the climate conference in Santiago, but I don't. but I don't fundamentally, professionally have any right to do this. But I have the freedom to learn. And I have the freedom, I have the humility to not have to go with my entire brownie badge of badges, you know, my brownie sash.

I have the freedom to go as somebody who is not professionally authorized, who is a learner who cares deeply. And that always takes me into stuff that's interesting. I'm not an economist. I wrote a book about money. I'm not a financial plan or financial anything. But I cared. You know, I wrote a book about local food. And, you know, and I'm not a farmer.

I've had a messy garden for years. I always have a messy garden. But I cared about provisioning for my community and for communities in general. It's the largest supply chains of our food system ever breakdown. So I just dove in and I learned everything. So basically all I'm saying is one of the freedoms is the freedom to have new interests and follow them.

And new interests and follow them and new interests and follow them. You know, it's like there is no one thing. I mean, maybe you travel for a year and then that bug is gone. And if your identity is I travel, then boom, you're screwed. So at the end of that you might find that you're in Nepal and you want to work in an orphanage. So you do orphanage for a while and then you work in an organization

that looks at the problem of poverty in the two-thirds world. And then that's not it for you anymore. You can continually respond to the calling that comes from within and the calling that comes because you've encountered things. One of my favorite stories is Christy and Bryce, you know, and they, what's her book, Millionaire. They were on one of the episodes of the podcast,

and they're traveling around Europe, is that right? Yeah, because they're traveling full-time, but... Quit like a million. Sorry, sorry, Christy, if you're listening to this. But they bumped into some, a librarian who told them that the books for kids were all about white kids. And, or there were books for people of color, kids of color, but they couldn't find them in the library.

So Christian and Brides applied. their tech skills to a database for librarians so that they could say, okay, Asian, transgendered, you know, and then they would find books for kids who are like that. So you encounter needs and you realize I have a lot of skills and I can help. So that's what I hope people will do. I think it's a wonderful mission. It's like the point of this is like when you help people become financially free early in life or at least, you know, mentally, free early in life from this. They're going to go on and change the world in a positive way in countless ways that you can't predict, which I think is an incredible mission. Same thing that

we're trying to do here. Everybody in the fire movement, I hope, is trying to do with that. Yeah. Liberate life energy to serve in these very complex times, you know, where we need people liberated from sort of the thrall of capitalism so that they can help as people sort of fall off the bottom or fall off the side or that there's parts of life that are not being attended to because we're all so busy. Yeah, I agree. Tax season is one of the only times all year when most people actually look at their full financial picture, including income, spending, savings, investments, the whole thing. And if you're like most folks, it can be a little eye-opening. That's why I like Monarch. It helps you see exactly where your money is going and more importantly, where your taxed

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with Desjardin business, It's all under one roof. So join the more than 400,000 Canadian entrepreneurs who already count on us. And contact Desjardin today. We'd love to talk. Business. Yeah, I have a question about your levels that you were talking about where if you're your mind get out of debt, have some savings and maybe target $100,000 or some mental breakpoint

on that journey. That was no issue for me, right? Because I started this right out of college and lived like I was in college, continued doing that. I've never been in a position, basically, except for the first couple of weeks at my job, where I felt that I was going to be completely constrained by that. But I think someone who's purchased a middle-class lifestyle, who has a nice home with a big mortgage, who has a car with a car debt on it, who has a lot of money in their 401k maybe, but very little cash liquidity in their bank account, maybe that is going to be a more difficult challenge for them.

Do you have a different set of advice, or is it the same thing? It's going to be a more difficult, be a little harder to free your mind and figure your way out of that situation? I don't think it's hard. I think you can wake up in any circumstance. You know, the Buddha woke up being a prince in a castle. You can wake up in any circumstance. That can be quick. You can just like one morning you wake up and you look around at your whole fiefdom and you go like, this means nothing to me. It's not who I am. I stumbled into a path and it's wrong. I got into the wrong machine.

I got the wrong horace on the merry-go-round. That's easy. And there's grief upon awakening no matter what your means, whatever your life's circumstances. Because when you wake up, you realize, okay, I have to start backpedaling out of this. And I have to do it intelligently. I mean, I can throw caution to the wind

and I could sell my house in a sinking market. And I could just put frying pent to fire. But you start to see, what you can do. Maybe you get rid of your car and you realize I could actually buy a beater, you know, it was a really good engine, but no class. I mean, you start to look at where you've invested yourself in sort of looking good. So I think you can backpedal out of that. Now, I mean, a lot of people with that kind of house and that kind of lifestyle are not going to look at taking in borders, you know, or subdividing their house to have a mother-in-law.

but that's something you could do. You could, as I say, a resource shared as a cost have. I mean, there are people I know who have a life like that who have moved out of their house into a motorhome and rented the house. So, I mean, that's another way. You say, okay, I have these assets, I have these debts. How can I deploy the assets in such a way

that they actually pay off my debt? And so I think the other part of this which doesn't have anything to do with your means is your cleverness and your motivation to clear things up. If you look at your circumstance and you think, but you really don't have the guts to do anything different because your partner doesn't want it, your parents will be disappointed because you've got the golden handcuffs on you, whatever. If you don't have the depth of motivation, you're never going to do anything. But if you do, you will get creative and you will see how I can turn what I have into assets. And it's like my house, you know, having put two mother-in-law

apartments on the ground floor of my house, that's the sort of thing that's totally possible once you wake up. So I did want to ask about that because, you know, bigger pockets, we do have a heavy lean towards real estate investing in our community. Could you tell us a little bit about your current housing situation and how you're using real estate? Yeah. So I live in a community where just the basic dynamics of the economy are sort of ruining. Not ruining. That would be an extreme thing. But challenging our community because working class people increasingly can't afford to live here.

People have houses and they've turned them into Airbnbs. So a lot of working class people are being kicked out of their houses, kicked out of the mother-in-law apartment so that people can make more money. and I'm not critiquing that. I'm just saying that that's happened. And it's a free market economy, and so people have the right to do that. You can do whatever you want with your possessions pretty much.

So that's not okay with me. It's not okay with me. I mean, the town I live in because of economics is becoming almost like a gated elder community, you know, because people with resources have been able to come in and buy up the real estate. So I've been very dedicated to affordable housing, basically, because the people I love don't have the means to stay here. I mean, people are leaving.

People are essential to my community, you're leaving because they can't afford it. So that's part of my motivation of putting in this mother-in-law apartment. It was to provide affordable housing to people. And very often the people who've rented it, and then I turn my garage into it. an apartment because I liked having that mother-in-law so much that, you know, I just say, okay, I've got a resource and how do I share it? How do I share it in a way that still works for my needs, which is for a lot of privacy and autonomy? So I rent them, you know, below probably market value rent. I get income and people in the community get a place to live. And very often,

And my little places are people who either are new to the community or young people with, you know, service jobs or, you know, people, you know, somebody is in a divorce and they're transitioning. So I usually have, sometimes I have people for a couple of years, but usually it's just, you know, the six months to a year, getting their footing in life again. So I love doing that for the dual reason that it provides some income and also it provides a service. And so also looking at this, I had money in like socially responsible investments, you know, in market products. And I wanted to be a one one woman reversing the lack of rentals. I mean, rentals are scarce as hens teeth. So anyway, I kept my eye out to buy a property that was in decent enough shape and that I could rent for a decent rental. And I found one last April. Boom, it went on the market on Sunday, Monday morning. I had a, an offer on it because I've been looking at the market and I knew that this house was a good one. So, picks things up. Now I have a renter in there. So it's a dual thing. It's like, I like real estate because it's real, you know? It's like, there's not some market conditions and not some stock market condition. And even, you know, I mean, I realize even if things tank, I've got a

tradable resource. And even if money tanks, I've got a community resource that's tradable. So I, you know, as I told you, I'm early in life. I lived very, you know, very close to the ground. And that feels good to me. I don't like to ride a high horse. I like to ride the pony where your feet are almost dragging, you know. No, I love it. I mean, I love the fact that you were, it's first an intrinsic motivation, a desire to help the community. And then it makes sense financially. And then third, you operate and are achieving that. And it's helping your lifestyle, your community goals, your value, it's supporting your values. I think that's wonderful. Right. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that feels really, really good to me. And I also involved in a network, this model has been

used in other communities, a network of people with wealth who want to bring a percentage of their wealth into the prosperity of our community. And so we call it Whidbey Island local lending. And so people with business ideas will present them to the network and people in the network who want to invest can invest. Usually it's loans. And so there's about $2 million that have been loaned into our community through this network. And I'm actually basically carrying two mortgages for right now, you know, for people, one a farmer and one a single mom. So that feels good because that's, you know, everything for me is about community. And yeah, I've supported farmers. I supported local food restaurants. I supported the pet store where I buy my cat litter. And so

my money and it's, my return is basically my net return is as good as anybody on the, you know, index fund. So I'm investing. in my community, in the businesses and the real estate. And all my investments strengthen the weave of my community, which actually for me is a currency. Because the more I support the people around me, the more is a sense of belonging that the fabric is strong. And if I need something, the fabric is there for me too.

So the money economy doesn't do that for you. It doesn't care about you. It doesn't love you. Your investments don't love you. They won't come and bring you flowers when you're in the hospital. That, you know, if you invest yourself in the money economy, all you're doing is participating in a fairly spiritually desiccated environment. No, I think it's wonderful.

I think it's something that people are going to have to work in order to gain access to is the type of investing that you're doing. But it's probably far more rewarding. It may be, you may have lower risk investing in things that you know, people you know, businesses you understand, real property that's local to you, that kind of stuff, and you may get better returns, and you may do so in a social responsible manner. So I think it's fantastic and wonderful there. Yeah, one more thing I'll say is that there was a 16-unit apartment complex, four four-plexes, that was for sale right in the middle of my town. And there's a bunch

us who got together who basically we did low interest loans, bridge loans, two-year bridge loans to a group of people who are willing to do the conversion of this into a condo community and they had they put solar panels on the roof and they built a common house. Yeah, so through that bridge loan where everybody who did the loan charged 2% interest for two years and we were able to create a 16-unit condo complex that has high community values. So, I mean, it's not just small projects, small individual projects, but there's sometimes people get together. And you can transform something in your community. You could take something that's run down and you could form a group that wants to make it into, you know, hostile for travelers. And you can do

that. You know, it's just you change your mind about things. Love it. Well, Mindy, should we transition to the famous four? Yeah, Vicki, is there anything else you want to say before we get to the famous four? That's a good question. And I really think in this circumstance, it's been pretty freewheeling and you've been pretty receptive. So I've probably said more than I should. Oh, no, it's been wonderful. It's been awesome. I don't agree at all. Whoa, Mindy disagrees with Vicki on every turn. Yeah. But no, I could happily talk to you for another four hours.

Thank you. This has been wonderful. And, you know, everything you're saying, I'm hearing, I'm understanding, I'm thinking exactly the same thing as you. You know, it's not about the retirement. It's not about focusing on that one thing. And the community, when you find a community that you fit into, when you haven't fit in, I mean, we have the same mom, you and I do. And, you know, I have a lot of the same experiences that you do, although I would have given my friend the two chocolate covered cherries because I don't like cherries. But I'm hearing you saying all these things.

And, you know, when you find a community that you fit into, it's just like, ah, it's so wonderful. You don't have to, like, feel like the big weirdo all the time. And, you know, I love that you're building a community where you are with what you want to do. And that's just, that's fantastic. I will say one thing, just how you say. said it is like I have joined a community. I didn't form it. I'm contributing to a community of place that was here before me, will be here after me. And that feels very comforting to be part

of something that's larger than yourself, that you're not always having to lift up through your own life energy. So that's just the one correction. Okay. Well, I will stand corrected. Okay. Okay. It is now time for the famous four questions. These are the same five questions that we ask of all of our guests, or four question and one command. Vicki, are you ready?

I am ready. What is your favorite finance book? Yeah. So there's a lot of people that I adore whose books I'm not going to talk about. What came to mind when I heard that question was a book called The Resilient Investor by Michael Kramer. and Hal Brill and one other. I'm sorry, I can't think of the other.

But anyway, it's a framework for investing. It's a framework for understanding that not all currency is money and that you can invest yourself in, they have like a nine square format where you see where you, you know, all the different things you can invest yourself in to increase your sense of well-being and wealth. So the resilient investor by Michael Kramer. Awesome. I have not heard of that,

but I'll have to check that out. That sounds very unique. interesting. Yeah, I've never heard of that book either. That's why I said it. There we go. What do you consider to be your biggest money mistake? Okay, my first loan in this lending network, I had no idea how to do loans. Once again, I was a buck private and trying to just do good in the world. And a woman came in with this idea of doing a bakery. And she had a court, she reported having a resume that was able to do this. I didn't know how to read a business plan. Anyway, I loaned her $5,000 to get her bakery started,

and I was so excited to be part of it. And it turned out several years later that she'd borrowed the same $5,000 from a lot of people in the community and given the same equipment as collateral that she gave to me and that she kept boring and boring, and that's how she paid her staff. She never had any profit, and eventually when up against the wall, she left. just bugged out of town. So adios that. But so I'm better at doing it now. And, you know,

I use my heart and head. Fair enough. I think there's, there's a lot of lessons there to learn if you're interested in getting into this kind of private sector investing and lending. Right. Yeah, I want to point out, Vicki said she didn't know how to read a business plan. I'm assuming you know how to read a business plan now. I do better. I know how to write one as well as reading one. So, yeah, I've learned enough to be able to do a good job at local investing. And I have a lot of money in my community now, a lot of my personal money in the community. It's wonderful. What is your best piece of advice for people who are just starting out?

Well, step one of your money or life. Usually I say, oh, just start keeping track of your money. But step one is to do a balance sheet. And I think if you're trying to get oriented and you're disoriented and you're disoriented in your personal finances, being able to look in a no shame, no blame way at your current position, being able to stomach that, being able to look at, oh, I've brought in like $2 million in my life, and now I'm $10,000 in debt and I have no idea where the $2 million went. You know, that confrontation with the results of your financial behavior in the past,

if you can stomach it. And we say in your money, your life, no shame, no blame. If you can just look at that and accept, yeah, right, that's what I did. I made $2 million. Boom. Next time I do that, I'm keeping it. So it's very motivating. And I also, sort of the other side of that is gratitude, acceptance and gratitude.

You know, if you look around at what you have and you're just very grateful for it, rather than rejecting it because you made a mistake or rejecting it because it's not as good as other people's. You just like walk in gratitude, like everything you have. You only have three forks. Wow, I have three forks. You just turn that everything. So the more gratitude you can legitimately feel for the blessings in your life, the better

foundation you have to get your finances together. Awesome. What is your favorite joke to tell it? It's the most difficult challenge question of the famous for it. Yeah, so my humor, I'm an improv actress. You know, I do improvisational theater. So my humor is all situational. It's all playing off of other people's offers.

So I have no jokes. That's okay. Dollar Revolution tagged Scott and I on Twitter with Eddie Elfbein, who posted a joke about Star Wars. Did you know wookie meat is edible? No. Yes, but it's a little chewy. Ah.

Oh my gosh. That was a wookie grown. All right, where can people find out more about you, Vicky? Well, yeah, your money your life.com is your money your life website. And vickyrobin.com is my own personal website where I'm blogging on social issues pretty much. and your money or your life.com is like the one stop shopping for everything associated. And also there's the Your Money or Life community on Facebook that is really active. And I appreciate it.

And I go in and I like people and I learn things. So I recommend joining that community. I didn't know you had a community on Facebook. I have to go check that out. And all of these links will be available in our show notes, which can be found at biggerpockets.com slash Money Show 98. Vicki Robin, this was fabulous. I think I did a pretty good job of not fan-girling all over you today, but it was internal, I swear.

This has been an honor speaking to you. I'm so excited, and you just made my whole day. Thank you. This has been wonderful. Thank you so much for coming on and sharing everything. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Thank you for having me.

I've said things I never said before in this context. Yeah, I think I was keying off your, your, your, your, sort of subtle fan girl thing. But I think these issues are not spoken about, you know, the class, the envy, the status, the getting roped in. What gets you roped in to a way of life that makes no sense to you? And then how do you step back out of it? I think that's super important. Yeah, you're right. Nobody's talking about this. And I think that it's one thing to hear about it and think, oh, this is really great. But then, yeah, you need to figure out your why and figure out how to fix all the things that you've done. I don't want to say done wrong, but done, you know,

not true to yourself. Unconsciously. Absolutely. Yeah, this was wonderful. Vicky, thank you so much. We will talk to you soon. Bye, Kitty. Okay. Bye-bye. Thank you. Thank you. All right. That was Vicky Robin from your money or your life. Mindy, what you think? Eh, you know. Oh, my God. I can't like, contain my joy. My whole body is just bubbling up with excitement. That was fantastic. I love her mindset. Like she's just, she gets it. She's got it. She understands what life is all about. And I love that she's building her community. I love that she's working on things that don't

necessarily bring her a ton of money because she doesn't have to have that anymore. She still makes money, but she's not, like, that's not her focus. And, you know, taking that away from your forefront of your mind is just really freeing. The comment, I absolutely agreed with everything that she was saying, but, you know, I disagreed with her a lot in the episode. She's like, oh, I was voted your most successful or most likely to succeed. Yeah, you hit that. You hit that nail right on the head. You're Uber successful. You're Mickey Robin, you know, but I felt like I disagreed with her all the time, but I didn't. I was like, oh, I just, I can't. I got to stop rambling. Scott, what did you think? You get the sense, you get the sense with like, I don't know this is too far, but like the founding

fathers, right? Like these guys, these guys who started America, like, like got our country going, you know, and set up our government. And these guys, a lot of them, you know, if you look back, we're financially independent early in life. They kind of figured out this, that, hey, this, like, here's a way to set up my business, you know, like Ben Franklin's printing shop, get a partner to run it and split the income, whatever. I got passive income. Ben Franklin was a house hacker, I believe, as well. And then they go and pursue a wide variety of interests that go across a large degree of disciplines. And that, I think, is really something that excites, it excites me about what Vicky has done with her life. She's really been able to be like, yeah, money. Yeah, it's like pretty

basic math. Like, here's how to get by on very little. I don't really need that much. And here's how to create passive income and all that kind of stuff. And I'm going to go and pursue impactful matters with my life, one after the other, the whole way through. And I just think that's such an appealing and interesting way to appeal to things. I think that's one of the things she also said, there's a warning in there, if you picked it up, where if you make your identity about what you're doing on the path to fire, like, I'm going to travel the world. I'm going to be a renowned world traveler. And then you're like, okay, you're after, you're into that. You're like, I don't want to travel anymore. Well, you're in trouble. So understand that fire is really,

about the ability to reinvent yourself multiple times and multiple interests. There's just a lot of really great stuff that came out of that show. Yes, now that you're at the end of it, go back and listen to it again. I've already rambled. I enjoyed that discussion thoroughly.

I would like to give a shout out to the mad scientist for introducing me to Vicky because that is how we got her on the show. And this is going to be a very good episode that will resonate for a long time. Scott, I was so excited with Vicky's comments. I didn't even look up a goodbye. Clever.

Let's use Vicki's way. Clever. Let's just do Chewbacca goodbye. Say goodbye. From episode 98 of the Bigger Pockets Money Podcasts. We've got Mindy Jensen and Scott Trench. And we're going to say, Burr.