More Money Podcast - 206 How to Talk to Your Parents About Money - Cameron Huddleston, Author of Mom & Dad, We Need to Talk

Episode Date: October 2, 2019

This episode is a must a listen because it’s about something we all need to think about. I’m talking about having that important yet awkward conversation with our parents about their financial situation. As we get older, it’s only natural for us to think about the future, and the future of our parents. Although they worry about us as their children, we also worry about them and want to make sure they’ve got everything organized and prepared too. But, we’re still their children, so it’s a weird path to navigate. We want to respect them, but we also want to protect them. Which is why I’ve got Cameron Huddleston on the show to share her insight into this topic. She is an award-winning journalist with more than 17 years of experience writing about personal finance and she also recently wrote the book Mom & Dad, We Need to Talk about this very subject. As she explains in our interview together, she had a personal experience with her mother that inspired her to write this book. Now, I hope her story inspires you…plus I’m also giving away a copy of her book! Visit https://jessicamoorhouse.com/contests to enter to win a copy of her book! For full episode show notes visit https://jessicamoorhouse.com/206 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to episode 206 of the Mo Money Podcast. Thanks for joining me for another episode. Oh my gosh, what a week it has been. I launched season nine last week and I was very excited to put it out. I'm very excited about this season and all the guests that I have in store, but I did not expect to have pretty much just like the best day ever in terms of launching season nine. Like I had the most downloads I've ever had, which leads me to believe that although there are a ton of you out there that are loyal listeners, thank you so much for sticking around all these years. There's a ton of newbies. Thank you for joining me, choosing to listen to the show about personal finance and

money, which I know isn't as sexy as, I don't know, talking about The Bachelor or something like that. But I feel like you'll probably get more about, you know, you'll get more long term from this show probably than a show that talks about reality TV. And I'm not knocking reality TV because I am a reality TV junkie on my own time. I'm just saying, if you know, we only have so many hours in the day. So you're going to learn some great, great stuff from the show and this episode in particular. So for this episode, I have Cameron Huddleston on the show. She is an award-winning journalist with more than 17 years of experience writing about personal finance, but she's on the show because she just came out with her first book called Mom and Dad.

We need to talk how to have essential Essential Conversations with Your Parents About Their Finances. I know, very specific topic, but so important. I don't know if you know. I don't know. Okay, number one, let me just like back up a whole minute, not even a whole minute, a whole second. I read a bunch of personal finance books, and I bet if you're listening to the show, you probably also do. A lot of the books out there are super general and may never answer some very important questions like, hey, what do I do when I get older and my parents get older, and I need to start thinking about their future? And can they afford their retirement? Do they have an estate plan? Like, do I have to be worried about them? How do I approach the subject of,

hey, are you doing okay for money? I know I'm your child, and I want to be worried about them? How do I approach the subject of, hey, are you doing okay for money? I know I'm your child and I want to respect you and all these kinds of things. For me, as someone who is getting older and my parents are getting older and my, you know, parents on my mom's side are no longer with us. These types of conversations and things are very front of mind for me. So this, for me, I was so excited to have Cameron on the show. And I'm so glad that she wrote this specific book because I think it can help a lot of people. And she also shares her personal story of why

she was inspired to write this book. And well, it has to do with her own mother. So I think you will get a lot out of this episode. I think it's a very important thing we all need to talk about and think about. Now, if you are new to the show, welcome. As I said, make sure to subscribe if you haven't. Uh, if you like what you're hearing, make sure to also, uh, leave a iTunes review or review on whatever platform that will allow you to give me a review. Um, because I love to do shout outs. I will be doing shout, shout outs to, uh, new reviewers, new reviewers in some future episodes. And I would love to give you a personal shout out on a future episode. Also, make sure to get onto

my email list because I do a lot of these episodes, like I pre-record them, but I have a lot of things going on. Like, you know, I do webinars. I do live events. I have my own online course. If you want to learn more about investing, investing foundations for Canadians now available on jessicamorehouse.com. I've got a lot of things going on and I don't necessarily get the chance to share with you on this podcast, but I share everything and anything about what's going on and exciting things in the loop on my email list. So just go to jessicamorales.com slash subscribe to get on there. Also, I have a free Facebook group that anyone can join. It's called facebook.com slash groups slash money life balance. There's also a link on my website.

But if you want to find out who else listens to the show or just have conversations with people, ask them questions. There's no such thing as a dumb question. There's also no judgment. It's a no judgment zone. No meanies in my group. It is all about just helping each other, learning from each other so we can live better lives and be awesome in our money. So make sure to join the free Facebook group. Okay. That's all I'm going to share. I'm going to close this mouth of mine and going to share. Okay, I'm not. Obviously, I have a podcast to share with you, but I am going to now share a few words about this episode's sponsor. You're going to want to listen to the end of this little bit because there's a freebie that you're not going to want to miss at all. That's all I'm going to say. Okay.

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slash Mo Money to get access. limited access to their entire library. Just visit thegreatcoursesplus.com slash MoMoney to get access. Once again, that's thegreatcoursesplus.com slash MoMoney to get one free month. Thank you so much, Cameron, for joining me on the MoMoney podcast. Thank you so much for having me. I am very excited to have you on the show. This is a topic I have definitely not covered on the show, but it's something that as I've kind of witnessed my parents deal with, with their parents, as I get older, it's a topic that I think people need to just learn more about and think about, which is talking to your older parents when you're an adult about their financial situation.

But before we kind of dive in, I want to kind of learn more about you and your background because I know you have a very long history of writing about personal finance. I do. I've actually been writing about personal finance for more than 17 years and I've been a journalist for even longer than that. I know it makes me feel old to say that. No, you started when you were 10. Right, right. I was a child prodigy.

Graduated college when I was 12. No, I'm a Gen Xer. And so I have been writing about personal finance for a long time. And I stumbled into this line of journalism. I didn't start out covering finance or business or anything like that. I was just a general assignment reporter with a newspaper and found my way into personal finance reporting in 2001. I had gotten my master's in economic journalism and we were heading into a recession and no one was hiring.

In fact, I had been working for Dow Jones Newswires before I went to graduate school. They had a hiring freeze. Other places I wanted to work had hiring freezes. But Kiblinger's Personal Finance Magazine was looking for an editor for its website. And they took a chance on me. And that's how I got started. And I've been writing about personal finance ever since. And you're not sick of it. Because it's surprising for me. And that's how I got started. And I've been writing about personal finance ever since. And you're not sick of it because it's surprising for me. I'm surprised I still love talking about it. The interesting thing is that because I get to interview so many different people,

I'm always learning something new. Certainly, I have written a lot of the same article in a variety of different ways, approaching it from a different angle, but I'm learning a lot of new things, I feel like, all the time. And so that's what makes it enjoyable. No, absolutely. And so you've been writing about pretty much every topic under the sun about personal finance for a very long time. What inspired you to write this book called Mom and Dad, We Need to Talk? How to have essential conversations with your parents about their finances? Because again, it's a book that I think is necessary for everyone to check out, but I don't think there's many books on this topic. Right. Exactly. Who in the world wants to

tell people they need to talk to their parents about their finances? I must be crazy. I was inspired to write this because of my own experience with my parents, largely because of the mistakes I made. And I don't want people to make the same mistakes that I made. And I made these mistakes as a personal finance journalist, someone who should have known better, which just goes to show that if I didn't realize that I needed to be having these conversations with my parents, most people probably don't. Because most people don't have a handle on their own finances. So the last thing they're thinking of doing is talking to their parents about their finances. My mother has Alzheimer's disease. She was diagnosed when she was 65. That was about 10 years ago at this point,

and I was only 35. And I had not had detailed conversations with her about her finances before she started having memory problems. Now, before she actually was officially diagnosed and I was seeing the signs that she was having trouble remembering things I did scramble to get her in to meet with an attorney to make sure all of her legal documents were updated which is so so important but I was stepping in and getting involved without really knowing what sort of accounts she had. You know, I had a general idea of where she stood financially, but I was having to figure things out as my mother was forgetting. And there was one account that slipped under my radar and was almost turned over to the state here in the U.S. We live in Kentucky, actually. And it was almost turned over as an unclaimed asset just because I didn't have a good accounting

of her financial assets and her accounts because I had not had a conversation with her. Also, my father, he died at the age of 61 without a will. And he was in a second marriage. So just kind of a nightmare on both sides. And I know that my situation is somewhat unusual, but of course everyone dies. You know, it's a hard truth and, you know, you might never have to get involved with your parents' finances while they're living, but if they don't have legal documents such as a will, you're going to have a much harder time when your parents die dealing with what they've left behind. This can lead to all sorts of fighting among family members, a lot of stress for you. homers aging and living longer, more and more people are going to be needing long-term care,

which means more and more kids, adult children like me, are going to have to get involved in their parents' finances. And if you wait until there's a health issue, if you wait till your parents need your help, at that point, it can be too late. Yeah, exactly. I know just from having the experience, seeing my parents having to deal, like, you know, specifically with my mom, both of her parents have passed away in the past several years. And, and that was a unique situation. I think as no one, you know, she has three brothers, no one really expected it. They just kind of figured, well, they're very healthy. And then it was kind of one. And then, you know, uh, first my grandma and then my grandpa three years later. And it

was kind of a wake up call that while we need to, we need, they've never, I guarantee you, they never had conversations about money with my grandparents. And now that I'm getting older, I'm in my thirties. So it was my husband, our parents are aging. This is something like for me, I I'm like, I definitely want to have these conversations with my parents well before it's too late, like you mentioned, because you don't want, like, there is, you know, I found out there is a history of Alzheimer's in my family, and you never know what could happen. And, you know, what if, like, my mom really is the money manager out of my parents. So what happens if she starts forgetting my accounts? I'm not sure if my dad would have that information. There's a lot of things to consider.

So Jessica, I think your parent's situation is not unusual. There's one spouse who handles the finances more than the other. And a big benefit of having these conversations with your parents is it can get them on the same page too. So that if one parent were to die before the other, the other parent is in the know. And oftentimes it's sad to think this, but your parents aren't having these conversations with each other about their finances. And so if you're prompting them to talk, it's going to ensure that everyone is more prepared. Yeah. I've never really thought about it but I'm not I'm not sure how much my dad knows or doesn't know or or what kind of money

conversations that they have like I talk to my mom once in a while because obviously I talk about money all the time for my job but I yeah so that's another thing I'm gonna have to bring up I think at Christmas time just so you know get a feel for how do you do things? How should I be prepared? And how much is dad involved? And all that kind of stuff. And since you mentioned it, I will mention that if you're going to talk to your parents during the holidays, you want to be careful how you time it. Maybe not the best time of year to talk about it, is it? You know, it's not so much that it's... You want to be careful not to have the conversation during a holiday gathering. Right. Oh, of course. Yeah.

So, but you know, plenty of... But it is a private conversation and there might be people there who don't need to be part of it. And those holiday meals can actually be stressful. And if it's the only time a year when you're with your parents during the holidays or when your siblings are there too, what you could at least do is wait till the next day and say, Mom and Dad, you know, my brothers and sisters and I have been wanting to talk to you. We don't have to have this conversation right now because it's the holidays and we're celebrating. But let's pick a time when we can all sit down together and talk. It's really important that we have these conversations. I know they might seem kind of awkward to start talking about your finances, but mom and dad, we want to be able to help you if you ever need help. And to do that, we're going to need some information from you. And we're going to need to start planning for

emergencies that could arise as you get older. And we want to make sure that if we have a plan, it's going to make things easier. We're not going to have to react because we've already been proactive. Yes, that is so key. I think so many people think, oh, I'll just deal with it when it happens. But if anyone's dealt with an actual emergency in their lives, it is terrible to react because you may not make the smartest choice. You're just making a decision based off the little information you have and raw emotions. So it's always better to have a plan, always. And the other issue is that if you're reacting to an emergency, such as a health emergency, say mom has had a stroke and she's in the hospital and

mom is now single because she's divorced or your dad has passed away, you might not have legal access to her accounts to pay the bills for her because your mom has not taken the steps in advance to allow you to have access to those accounts. In the US, the document is called power of attorney. And is it the same in Canada? Yeah, it's the same in Canada. Yep. And so this legal document is so, so important. I would say it's more important than a will. This is the one document and the living will. It's also called an advanced healthcare directive here in the States.

These documents, the power of attorney lets you name someone to make financial decisions for you if you no longer can. The living will, advanced healthcare directive lets you name someone to make healthcare decisions for you and spills out what sort of end of life medical care you do or do not want. You had to be mentally competent to sign these documents. So if you wait till mother already has dementia, the attorney might not let you sign the documents. And at that point, it's too late. You're going to have to go through a lengthy court process to get access to your parents' financial accounts or to be named guardian, to make healthcare decisions for your parents. And that's a horrible situation that no one wants to have to go through. So waiting till that emergency arises, at that point, it can be too late. Is that kind of where you would suggest people start in terms of what they should talk to their parents about? Like, hey, we just want to talk to you about, do you have a will or a power

of attorney? Is that kind of a starting point or is that kind of something that you build up to? That's a great place to start because if you find out anything, you want to find out that. Those documents are so, so important and you want to make sure your parents have them. And if they don't, you want to encourage them to meet with an attorney to get those documents. And if your parents can't afford to meet with an attorney to get those documents. And if your parents can't afford to meet with an attorney and maybe you're in a position where you can help out, you might want to suggest, hey, mom and dad, think of this as a gift from me. I would love to pay for these documents because it's so important that your wishes are spelled out in writing, that you've named someone to make

financial decisions for you if something were to happen to you. And I know some parents might see it as giving up control, especially with that power of attorney. But you let your parents know, you know, mom and dad, by doing this, you are actually maintaining control. If you don't pick someone, a court could end up picking someone for you. And it might not be the person you want. If you don't spell out who gets what when you die with your will, again, a court's going to decide and family members are going to start fighting over who gets what. And I know you don't want that to happen. So talking about these legal documents can be a good way to start the conversation. So I know in your book, you talk about a lot of different topics that you definitely need to approach. We've kind of talked about maybe some long-term care, end of life planning. It kind of

goes into, hey, do you have a will? But I feel like sometimes they'll have a will, but it may not necessarily spell out, but like, what do you specifically want? What are your wishes? How do you kind of talk about that? Because I know a lot of people feel so uncomfortable about talking about end of life with their parents because it's like, I don't want to talk about that because I know a lot of people feel so uncomfortable about talking about end of life with their parents because it's like, I don't want to talk about your, it's not like I'm talking about, you know, do I get an inheritance? I just want to make sure that I know what kind of ceremony you want or what you, you know, just these important things that we all have to deal with. You could actually say it just like that. Yeah. Because as uncomfortable as talking about death is, actually some people would rather talk

about that than the financial side of things. Is that right? It is. It is. People are, they're so funny about money. And these conversations don't need to be about the specific details of your parents' finances, the dollar amounts. Certainly details like where do you bank? What sort of accounts do you have? Those are important, but you can let your parents know, I don't need to know how much is in that bank account, that retirement account. I don't need to know whether I am getting anything in your will. I just need to know you have one. But sometimes talking about those bigger picture issues like what are your final wishes,

that can sometimes break the ice. But yes, if you know that your parents really avoid the topic of death, that's certainly going to be more difficult. But one way to bring it up, especially if you have parents who have recently had to deal with the death of their own parents, get them talking about that. You know, mom and dad, let's talk about that experience. I know it was hard for you. What were some of the hardest things you had to deal with? Oh, you didn't know whether your mom wanted to be cremated or buried? Hmm, what do you want? You know, Getting them to talk about their own experience with their parents might open the door more easily to having this conversation and getting them to think about it. My mother, when she was married to my dad, complained because she had asked him again

and again what he wanted when he died. And he would always dodge the topic. He would say, and I'm not kidding, because my mother complained to me after they were divorced. She's like, you got to find this out from your dad. But she would say, yeah, your dad always said, just sharpen my toes and hammer me into the ground. And I am so grateful that my mother, before she developed dementia, told me exactly what she wanted, that she wanted to be cremated, that she wanted her friends to speak and share stories. I'm so grateful. And you can use a story to get your parents. You can say, hey, I had a friend who had a conversation with her parents, and she's so glad because now she knows her mom wants to be cremated or her dad wants a party, not a depressing funeral service.

Yes, a somber service. He wants a party and he wants it in the backyard of the family home. Letting your parents know that a friend has had the conversation and how helpful it was for them. Or you listen to this podcast and, hey, I've been thinking about this. I know it sounds kind of somber to talk about and, hey, I've been thinking about this. I know it sounds kind of somber to talk about this, kind of morbid, but if we talk about it now, then it's going to make it easier for those of us who are left behind to deal with a very difficult situation.

Yeah. And I guess, is this something that you would want in writing, especially if, say, you have siblings or a big family that may have their own thoughts and feelings about things? I guess you don't want to just like, oh, this is what they told me verbally. It's like you'd probably want this in writing. So you could be like, no, no, no, this is specifically what they outlined. And here's the paper. Yes. Tell your parents to put it in writing.

Same goes for the will. Don't just tell us who you think should get what. Put it in writing. Same goes for that, you know, the will. Don't just tell us who you think should get what. Put it in writing. You know, that end-of-life care that you might want, put it in writing. Don't just, you know, assume that we can make the decision for you because we don't want to make that important decision for you. Put it all in writing. And another thing that you can do to make it easier is to ask them to put all of their financial information in writing, list all of their accounts, their assets, their liabilities, everything in writing, passwords.

Tell them to put that list someplace safe and tell you how to access it when the time comes, when there's an emergency. And you can agree on those situations when you would be allowed to access that information. Yeah. No, absolutely. This is something I need to get my parents and then my husband's parents to do. So I feel like this is going to definitely inspire some people listening. You're like, okay, this is on the to-do list now. One thing I want to talk about, which is probably even more of an awkward conversation to have is your parents' retirement savings. Because I feel like a lot of people, especially

parents, they want to look like, no, no, no, you don't have to worry about me. You worry about you. But I mean, if you have no idea whether your parents are sufficiently okay to survive in retirement and who knows how long their retirement can be. How do you broach that subject to be like, do you have enough? Do you have things organized? So when you try to broach this topic, you don't want to look like you're judging them in any way. So asking your parents if they have enough might not be the right way to do it. Not the right term. And that's okay. You know, you want to get the information, but you don't necessarily know how to go about it. So what you could do instead is ask them in more general terms. If they haven't retired already, say something like, you know, hey, mom and dad, what is

retirement looking like for you? What do you expect your retirement to be like? And their answer is probably going to give you a good clue as to where they stand financially. They might say, well, we haven't even thought about retirement. We probably are going to have to just keep working and working until we can work no more. And then you say, well, what if something, and then you get them thinking about issues that could arise. Well, you know, that might work, but what if there's a health issue and you can't keep working like you plan, what would you do then? And then get them thinking, not saying this in a judging way, but just a little bit, just kind of matter of factly like, oh, what would happen if this, or if they're already in retirement, just say, how's it going? Are you doing the things that

you thought you were going to get to do? And they might say, yes, it's been awesome. We're so glad that we saved enough to have the retirement of our dreams. Or they might say, well, I don't know. We thought we'd be traveling more, but it's so expensive to travel, we haven't been able to do it. And then you could suggest perhaps, well, I have some great tips on how to travel cheaply. Or you can point them to websites or articles about using travel rewards credit cards or offering to help them as opposed to critiquing their decisions. Right, telling them they're doing it wrong or something. Yes, you don't want to do that at all because you have to remember that even if your parents have made mistakes, they are still your parents. You are the child and they think of you as a child And they certainly don't want to get advice from their child.

Which can be difficult, depending on like, you know, for me, I'm like, I love to talk about this stuff. But for me, I know I have to respect my parents and whatever they're doing. So I don't really talk to them about finance too much or, oh, have you learned about this new thing? Because in general, I feel like I get the sentiment. They are on their own journey and they're good. If they have a question, they'll ask me.

But otherwise, that's kind of me interfering and I never want to look like I'm interfering. You're right in some regards. You know, your parents are on their own journey. But don't assume that if they have a question, they're going to ask you. Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. You don't have to, like I said, ask for specifics initially. Just talk about those bigger picture issues. And another way to do it is, and this is what I did with my mom. This is the one conversation I did have with her. Before my mother developed dementia. I asked her to look into getting long-term care insurance. And she took my advice. She met with an insurance agent and she didn't qualify because she had

another health issue, another preexisting condition. And so. But bringing this topic up, it's not so related to your finances in particular, but it's about planning. And so saying, hey, do you have a way to pay for long-term care if you need it? And that again can lead into the whole retirement conversation. Do they have enough funds to pay for healthcare, long-term care, retirement, that sort of thing? It's kind of a backdoor into the conversation, talking about one particular aspect of aging. Yeah. And that's, again, something I think me and my husband have talked about. And I know I've talked to my sister who's married and they just had a baby and they themselves have talked about, but I'm not sure if we have actually talked to our parents or, uh,

you know, parents-in-law, um, about, Hey, when there's a time where maybe you're at that age where you need to sell your house and move, what are we doing? Are you moving? Do you expect to move with, in with us, which may or may not be feasible, or are we doing? Are you moving? Do you expect to move with in with us, which may or may not be feasible? Or are we going to put you in a retirement, you know, community? And that's also, I think a very different, difficult thing to bring up because I think sometimes parents have certain, um, they've already made a plan that they may not have shared it with you. And so you're like, Oh, Oh, you're gonna, you're moving in with us. Are you? Oh, okay. We don't know if we're up for that or, you know, it's a tricky situation,

but man, do you need to find that out before it's too late. You know, that's another way though, to have these conversations is to talk about their plans for whether they're going to stay in their house. Because some people I feel like have very firm, they're like, no, I'm staying in this house. I'm going to die in this house. Or they're like, I don't care. You can put me wherever. I'll be happy. But if your parents say, I'm staying in this house, I'm going to die in this house, you say, well, is this house set up to accommodate you as you age? You're living in a two-story home, mom and dad. Are you going to be able to get up and down the stairs? Can you get into the bathtub to take a bath or a shower? I understand that you love your home. Most people do, and you've been there for years, but maybe it's not

going to suit you as you get older. And maybe you would love having a smaller place that requires less maintenance, costs less, and then you're going to have more money to do things that you can enjoy. Putting a positive spin on it is a good way to do it. You don't want to harp on all the negatives like, oh, this house is too big for you. I know it's too expensive for you to maintain. Talk about the benefits of moving someplace smaller and how it's going to free up money for them to do fun things. Exactly. No, that's always nice. Yeah, that's always, I think, a key thing. No matter what, make sure it's like a positive kind of spin or tone. That's probably the easiest way to go about it. But one thing I've been kind of thinking this

whole time, what if your parents are just not even receptive to having a conversation about anything to do with money? Because I know, depending on the generation, they're like, no, we don't talk about money. That's rude. It's taboo. It's inappropriate. What do you do if you're in that situation? There are going to be some parents who are going to balk. No matter the approach you take, the number of times you try, one thing you can do is get a third party involved. That might be some sort of financial professional, either someone your parent is working with, or suggesting to your parents that they meet with someone you've worked with. Hey, mom and dad, I just did my estate planning documents. Would you like to meet with my attorney so that you can draft your own or update

the ones you have? I met with a financial planner, a financial coach. It's been so helpful. Would you like the name of this person? Or reaching out to a family friend, a clergy member, encouraging that person to get your parents talking with you. That's one way to do it. Again, telling them, you don't have to tell me this information, but if you could write it down, at least for me, and tell me where to find it, and we'll agree on those situations when I can access it. That's another option.

I think the bigger problem, though, is if you have parents who you know are not on top of their finances and you know will likely need your help or support and they're refusing to talk to you and you don't know the extent of support they're going to require because you don't know if they have any retirement savings or any sort of plan to pay for long-term care, whether they can cover health care costs. That's when you run into more trouble. And that's when you have to either say, okay, I'm in a position financially where I can start maybe saving some money to help my parents out or my siblings and I, we can all work together to create this fund for our parents or preparing yourself emotionally for telling your parents, I'm sorry, but I can't help. I would love to be able to help, but I am not in a position financially. I've got kids I have to support or I need to prepare for my own retirement. I wish I could help you,

but I can't. Because you have to remember that your finances do take priority, especially if you have kids, because you don't want to put your kids in a situation where they have to support you. Yeah. I guess that's kind of typical, like that term, the sandwich generation where you have aging parents and young kids and you kind of feel like you're kind of in between and you want to help both. But obviously, it makes the most logical sense. And that's kind of typical. Everyone always says, you need to make sure that you are okay financially, because if you're not, then you can't help anyone else with their situation. So you have to help yourself first before you can help others. Exactly.

Yeah. And it's not like a selfish thing. It's just, it's the same, you know, ideas being on that airplane and putting your mask on first before you put a mask on somebody else. But that's, that's a difficult situation. If you do have to tell your parents that you're like, I just can't afford it. What, what do you do if you are in that situation? Is it just a matter of, I can't financially help you, I can't give you money, but I can possibly help you in terms of some other type of support? Yes, just the same way that a parent might help a child, an adult child, because if you continue to support that adult child financially, that child is never going to learn how to manage finances on his or her own. So you point them in the direction to information about how to create a budget, how to pay off debt. Do the same for your parents. Point them to resources that they

can use. Hey, mom and dad, here's a place where you can go get credit counseling, or here's a place where you can get more information about, you know, paying off your mortgage or, you know, what you, you know, various resources out there, because there are a lot of them to help lower income people, you know, take control of their finances. There are resources that can help people do that and pointing them to those resources and saying, here, this is where you might be able to get some help. Yeah. And of course, one resource that our listeners can take advantage of is your book. So where can people find more information about your book, Mom and Dad, We Need to Talk?

If you go to CameronHuddleston.com, there are links to the places where you can buy my book, including Amazon.com, one of the obvious places. I have a couple of free resources on my site. One is a downloadable in case of emergency organizer that you could print out and give to your parents and they can fill it out with all of their financial information, including final wishes and tell them to put it someplace safe or give it to you if they feel comfortable doing that. I also have a, it's a scam red flags sheet that you can print out and give to your parents. And this is a good way to start the conversation too, saying, you know, hey, I found this online, hang it up by your phone, hang it up on the refrigerator, because there are a lot of scams out there, mom and dad. And I want

to make sure that no one's trying to take advantage of you because there are lots of people out there who do want to take advantage of older adults because they think they are sitting on a lot of cash with their retirement accounts. You don't want to point out they're trying to take advantage of you because you're old. Because again, that's no good. That's no good. So I have both of those resources on my website, links to places where you can buy the book. And I do in the book have a long list of the information you need to gather, 10 different conversation starters, a lot of sample conversations, dialogues when it comes to talking about estate planning documents, long-term care, a chapter on talking to your parents about when

it's time to move and what to do if they don't want to talk. Yeah. No, I think it's such an important thing that people need to start thinking about. And it's great that there's a whole book on pretty much all the things that they probably have in their head, like questions and answers to everything. So I appreciate you taking the time to write this book and then join me on the show to kind this episode at jessicamorehouse.com slash 206. And you can check out the show notes for every single episode. And if you have no idea what the hell is a show note, that's okay. All it is, is kind of a recap of the episode. So important, just, you know, key points of what we talked about in case, you know, you didn't have time to take notes or you just don't want to take notes and and also some important links and resources that we share in every episode so all you have to do for any episode is go jessicamorehouse.com slash whatever the number of that episode is or just go to

jessicamorehouse.com slash podcast it has every single episode and show note on there as well so that's just something you can do. I have a few exciting things that I want to share with you. So do not go away. I just have a few words to share about this episode's sponsor, and then I will get right back to some exciting things. This episode of the Momany podcast is supported by The Great Courses Plus. You've heard me say this before, the best time to start investing is today. And the same goes for investing in yourself. If you've always wanted to learn something, gain a new skill, or just get better at something, it's never too late. And today

is the day to start doing it. Just take it from me. I started blogging eight years ago to learn digital marketing. And now I run my own online business. And I'm still continuing my education all the time because it's never been easier to learn. That's why I'm really excited to share with you the Great Courses Plus. It's an online library with courses on thousands of topics. You want to learn about the stock market? There's a course for that. You want to learn how to paint with watercolors? There's a course for that. You want to learn how to paint with watercolors? There's a course for that. You want to get better at photography, which is something I'm actually trying to work on on my downtime? Well, there's a course called Fundamentals of Photography that will teach you all about camera settings and how to take better photos taught by an award-winning

National Geographic photographer. If you want to get started and see what kinds of courses there are, The Great Courses Plus is offering all Mo Money podcast listeners one free month of unlimited access to their entire library. Just visit thegreatcoursesplus.com slash Mo Money to get access. Once again, that's thegreatcoursesplus.com slash Mo Money to get one free month. Okay, exciting thing number one, I'm of of course, giving away copies of Cameron's book. I can't just have her on the show and not give away her book. Come on, who am I? So if you want to enter to win a copy of her book, Mom and Dad, We Need to Talk, make sure to go to jessicamorehouse.com slash contests. And actually, I'm going to be giving

away a ton of books this season. I always do this because I also just love the opportunity to send books to readers so I can, you know, just spread the love and spread the knowledge. So, um, there's going to be a ton of other contests on that page. So go to JessicaMorris.com slash contests, and you can enter to win a number of different books for, you know, I don't, I guess really this is me being lazy. I didn't want to just like wait every week and then like update and put a new content, you know, book giveaway up there. I'm just putting them all up there. Um, right now though, I will, I'm not putting everyone up there cause I'm still getting new guests guys. Um, but this will kind of give you a sense of who is going to be on the show in the future. So, uh, make sure to go there

to squarehouse.com slash contest. Why not? It's free books, guys. I think I also mentioned this last week, maybe. I can't remember. But I will be doing one of my Millennial Money Meetups in Toronto, November 19th. Tickets will be on sale very soon. I will let everyone know, subscribe to my email list first. So go to jessicamorris.com slash subscribe to get on the email list. Um, but if you've never been super fun, there's some appies, delicious appies, FYI. There's drinks y'all. Okay. And there's going to be a wonderful panel discussion, me moderating, a special guest, and another special guest. I'm going to reveal that when I put tickets on live and whatever like that. But it's also a

great chance to meet other people that listen to the show or are in the Facebook group or read my blog or whatever. Get to nerdy money talk with them. And also, hi, you get to see me and hang out with me why not come on super fun um so look out for that that will be happening very soon uh last thing i want to share is if you uh are into the youtube i've recently gotten to the youtube learned you know some important i can't believe it's youtube's been around for this long and i just like just got on the bandwagon. I just like kind of discovered what YouTube is all about. Sad. Like what's wrong with me? Anyways.

So because of that, I have a YouTube channel. I've had it for a while and I've really just put like these podcast episodes on there because people were saying, Hey, can you put them on there so I can listen? Cause I listen on YouTube. I'm like, yeah, sure. But now I actually create amazing content and videos. And I always want to know what you want to learn more about. But I love doing video. I have a film degree. Better use it because otherwise that was expensive and useless. And you can check it out at youtube.com slash C slash Jessica Morehouse one or that's way too long. Go to Jessica Morehouse dot com slash YouTube and that'll take you right there. Okay. Or search my name on YouTube or whatever, but go there,

subscribe, check out all the new videos I've got going on and yeah, we'll have a good time on the YouTubes together. That is it for me. I'm going to, I'm going to wrap this up right now. Thank you so much for joining me for this episode. I'm going to see you back here next Wednesday with a fresh new episode that you're going to love. Thanks again for listening. Make sure if you're subscribed, you know, thank you. But also, if you liked what you hear, give me an iTunes review. I'll give you a shout out on a future episode.

All right. That is it for me. Have a good rest of your week and take it easy. This podcast is distributed by the Women in Media Podcast Network. Find out more at womeninmedia.network.