More Money Podcast - How to Be a Rich Old Lady - Author & Founder of Invested Development, Amanda Holden

Episode Date: December 17, 2025

It is such a treat to have Amanda Holden, also known as Dumpster Doggy, back on the show for the first time since February 2020! Since we last spoke, she has pivoted from live events to teaching over 25,000 students online and writing her debut book, How to Be a Rich Old Lady, which comes out this January.In this episode, we discuss why you don’t need to be good at math to be a good investor and why investing is the key to you building a beautiful life. We get into the weeds of investment basics, explaining why retirement accounts like 401ks and RRSPs are just "buckets" for your investments and why understanding the difference between the account and the product is crucial. Amanda also shares her experience working in investment management during the stock market crash of 2008 to explain how we can prepare our portfolios—and our emotions—for the next inevitable downturn.For full episode show notes, visit jessicamoorhouse.com/448Follow meInstagram @jessicaimoorhouseThreads @jessicaimoorhouseTikTok @jessicaimoorhouseFacebook @jessicaimoorhouseYouTube @jessicamoorhouseLinkedIn - Jessica MoorhouseFinancial resourcesMy websiteMy bestselling book Everything but MoneyFree resource libraryBudget spreadsheetWealth Building Blueprint for Canadians course Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

And welcome back to the more money podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Moorehouse. And it is such a treat to have my next guest back on the show. I've got Amanda Holden on the show. Last time she was on here was back in February 2020 right before COVID shut everything down, which was a time. And as we talk about in this episode, because of COVID, she had to completely restructure her financial education business, which was predominantly public. speaking and running live in-person events to become one that runs now online and includes her invested development online courses and workshops where she's taught over 25,000 students about investing. And coming from a background in investment management, she has always been passionate about teaching women specifically about how to build wealth so they can gain financial freedom, which eventually led her to today, where she is releasing her first book, which comes out in January, and it is aptly called How to Be a Rich Old Lady. Now, I'm so excited to have Amanda back on the show. We were kind of writing her books in tandem. I was just finishing my book

while she was in the middle of hers, so I kind of got to see behind the scenes. And she really did put her blood, sweat, and tears into this book. And it really is an amazing, funny, easy-to-read book about a not so easy topic, which is investing, which can be very scary and intimidating, but it really is a wonderful read. So I know you're going to love it and you're going to love this episode where we kind of go here, there, and everywhere and talk about some of the most important things everyone to know about investing. So with that, let me get to that interview with Amanda. Welcome back to the more money podcast, Amanda. Excited to have you back on the show because I just looked it up and the last time you were here online was February 2020 and now it's

November 2025. Holy crap. A lot has happened. You have a book out now. This is very exciting. I do have a book out now. And yeah, I probably could not have predicted what was about to come. Did you say February 2020? February 2020. You were on a show and we were talking about, I'm not sure. I don't know. I haven't listened to episode in a little bit. So I think we were just talking about kind of what you're doing with dumpster dog, dumpster doggy, your blog, Instagram. I think you started kind of really going in that direction and just kind of what you were, you were just kind of, I think, at the beginningish, maybe. Did you just move to New York, maybe? I had moved to New York about six months prior to COVID. Okay. Yeah. And so to COVID happening. And so yeah, I was like, I had like solidified

what my business was for anybody that doesn't know me. I'm dumpster doggy on social media. That's an old nickname. We can talk about that or not. But I also run a business called invested development. And so my business had started to take hold. And once I felt like I had a bit of financial stability doing my business, I moved to New York. I'm from Portland, Oregon, and I moved to New York City. And so I moved from the West Coast to the East Coast, far away from everybody who's ever loved me. And then COVID happened. And it was, of course, just, I mean, New York City was an incredibly, I mean, it was a very, it was so sad. Yeah, it was crazy. It was, yeah, especially New York. That was, yeah. It was, it was really wild to be at one of the

epicenters. But, you know, even, even more than that, it was, it was very wild to be here so far away from my family and my friends and without really an ability to make new friends and new chosen family. And so, gosh, in a way, it was almost, it was kind of a turning point for my business because when we went into lockdown, and so this was just a couple of months after we talked, when we went into lockdown, I, you know, I took April and May to like use it as a time to like, well, first of all, just like make myself extremely useful to people who were trying to navigate what was happening with the loans that were being lent out to small businesses for the stimulus checks, what was going on with the economy. And so I just tried to rise to the

occasion and be a really helpful resource. And then what I also did is I made a lot of changes in my business that like now looking back, I am able to see allowed me to scale and get to where we are now. Yeah, because I think at the time you were doing mostly in-person events, which are so lovely. And I feel like we missed them. And now they're kind of coming back slowly, but surely. But that obviously was a big part of your business that you can do for a number of years. Yeah. And so the big, we, everybody lost something. And what I lost was so minimal relative to what so many people lost because of COVID. But, you know, what I lost was like, but was this like the primary form that my business had taken, which was in person speaking in

events. And basically like the idea was just like getting women together in these kind of like renegade like underground like whisper networks. Like let's talk about finances. Let's like talk about what we feel like we can't talk about when we're either, you know, inside of the context of our families or relationships, you know, especially if we are married to men. And that was the idea behind my business. That's why I started my business was to instigate these types of conversations and to have fun doing it and to build these support networks. And so what I lost to COVID was a national speaking tour. I had like, I think it was like a nine or a 12 city speaking tour that I was about to do. But it was okay because it's really hard to run a business on live events. And that's,

that was true before COVID too. And so what I did was I just moved everything online. And I had actually already been teaching on Zoom before COVID. And so I did have some foundation of knowing how to make that transition. But, you know, switching everything over to either Zoom or to be on video is ultimately what allowed me to build the type of business that doesn't require so much effort for such a little payoff. Events are so amazing too. I love going to an event, but oh my gosh, I don't think if you've never organized an event yourself, like whether, honestly, even just like a Bachelorette trip or whatever, any kind of event that you have to organize is so much work for very little thing. I mean, you know, there's the experience, but it's exhausting compared to

doing that online, you're like, oh, my God, this is so much easier. And like you said, it's scalable. You can reach people who don't live where you live or you're not going to that location. You can reach them in that way. And I'm seeing over the years how you've been able to create this amazing community. And you have such a unique voice reading your book. I've been reading a lot of books this fall for the podcast. And when I started reading your book, I'm like, like, oh my gosh, this is so Amanda, and I love it. It's very fun. It's funny, but it's also educational, and it's just like a very easy read. Like it was like, it just slipped into it. That's how I kind of felt writing your book. It was, I'm so excited and happy for you. And also,

most people don't know this, but when I was at the tail end of writing my book, I think you were halfway through yours. And we did a little mastermind with Kara Perez with her book as well, which was so special. And it's so cool just to now. It's like, hey, I remember how stress it is because I remember, oh my gosh, I'm like, I remember my middle. It was stressful. And now you're on the other side of it. You've got a book. You've got a title. It's so exciting. I did it. It was, yeah, it was really difficult for me to write that. I think that you, like, it may have come more naturally to you. For me, it was like, you wrote about different things, like going through a book, I'm like, oh, this is why you were stressed. You, it's thorough. There's a lot

in here. There's a lot of good stuff in here, but a lot of stuff. So, yeah. yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it now while you're stressed. Thank you. It was a battle against my attention span, but I won. But I won. I did it. You won. So tell me a little bit about the title that you eventually landed on. I know there was a few, even in the book you talk about. There's a few alternate titles, naked rollerblading when you're 80. I wish that was it. That's a great one. The haters guide to investing. How to buy nipple tassels when you're 80? I love it all. But we landed on how to be a rich old lady. Tell me about the significance of that title, what does it mean? I love the idea. Like, honestly, when I envision myself, I'm like, I do want to be a rich old lady. Yeah. Thank you. Yes. Deciding the title of the book was like a six-month-long process. And it was, I mean, it was so hard. So I, like, I sold the book under the name Invested Development, which is the name of my business. And part of the reason, they advise me to do that is because like there's some brand brand recognition with my with my business and like that just helps but I always knew it was never going to be invested development and I just like

I think that you know if you if you get it if you get that like there's a riff on arrested development it's like it's great but like if you don't then it's just like it's just like words that don't mean anything right and so just for a little bit of background my book is a book about investing I come from the world of investment management. And so my act of service, my gift to this space is to just like try to write down everything I know that a regular person needs to know about investing. And specifically because, and this is very true in the U.S., and I think it is also true, maybe to a slightly lesser extent in Canada, but for us to be able to afford to live when we are no longer able to work, you have to know how to be an investor.

And that's just that that's just the unfortunate reality of being in the United States is that we just are seeing this erosion of our social safety net. Like I think I say in the book that like, I've had fish net tights that work harder than the U.S. is social safety net. And it's true. And I actually don't, like, I don't think that my book should even. need to exist. I don't think it makes any sense at all to require every single person be a master of modern portfolio theory. That's just, even from an efficiency standpoint, it just makes no sense

whatsoever. But here we are. And until the revolution comes, we all really need to know how to protect ourselves when we're operating within the finance industry, which by the way, like, if you're in the U.S. and you have a 401k, if you're in Canada and what are your accounts, a TFSA. We got our TFSA, we got our RRSP, we have an FHSA. That's a new one to help you buy your first home. Right. And like, and if you are picking investment products, which that's what mutual funds are. They are investment products. You have to know how to protect yourself in the same way you, you know, under modern day late stage capitalism, you have to know how to protect yourself from pretty much every single major industry that operates like a shakedown scam

to be navigated by individuals. And so that's very, that's also here in Canada. That's, it's, it's frustrating because it's like, on the one hand, you need to learn all these things that, yeah, I kind of agree. I feel it's unfair to ask everyone to learn how to manage a portfolio, do it on their own and all these kind of complex things. And on the other side of it, yeah, you can hire someone, but also you don't know who's good and who's bad. And there's a lot of predatory, you know, people in the financial industry that are just going to take your money and run. And that could mean literally taking your money and run or just charge you incredible high fees that are going to eat into your future retirement. And so you also have to navigate the murky waters of the financial industry when, you know, these people say, oh, I'm an advisor.

I'm here to help you. But are they really? And so great. I get that it's a, it's not fair. But it's the reality. So what do we? going to do about it, you know? Yes. And something I say in the book is even if you go on to hire somebody, like, that's fine. Like, I am certain that if you want, you can find somebody who can be a really wonderful member of your team, but you still can't do it without a baseline level of financial literacy. You need to know what they are doing. Yes, because without it, you just leave yourself completely open to manipulation and completely vulnerable to what is ultimately, remember, we're dealing with for-profit industries, like even your 401K, the investments that exist inside

of your 401K, like, that Wall Street's getting rich off of those products. And so we just all have to know what we need to do to protect ourselves on a baseline level. So that's kind of like that's one piece of like the why. But the hope is that also like on the other side of this, you can build yourself some financial stability and not just for the future, which a lot of times when we're talking about investing, we're talking about the future just because that's the nature of markets. They don't work overnight. And so this is a tool for long-term wealth building. But it is also about giving yourself this psychological relief of knowing that you're doing what you can right now. Right? Like if you have had like learn what is a TFSA or learn what is a Roth

what actually is it? Like if you've had that fall out the bottom of every to-do list that you had for like the last 100 to-do list that you've made, like that also is just, it's frustrating and painful. And so basically I'm putting everything I think that's just like the average regular person needs to know about investing to stay safe and then hopefully build to something that is really wonderful and beautiful and wild for the future and for right now. And so then, to circle back to your initial question, then the question is, how do you, like, how do you name that book? Yeah. I'm like, I couldn't even remember my original question. I'm glad you brought it back there. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. And so, you know, something we were really stuck on for a long time was just

the SEO of it all. And like, they really wanted the word invest to be in the title. Yeah. Yeah. And so for a long time, I was just, like, so stuck on, like, what title could I use that would include the word investing? So people know that it's not just like a general personal finance book. I come from the world of investment management. And it's not that I don't cover personal financial principles, but it's, it's bigger than that. It's about going not, it's not just surviving. Yeah, we're not at the basics. It's not just about the basics. It's like we're going beyond that. Exactly. And so I just really couldn't get that. there with the word invest and then like I was also coming it from like my angle where I was like

I mean if I was like let's say I was doing an ebook like and it was all up to me I would choose something crazy it would have been called how to buy nipple tassels when you're 80 just because that's kind of like how I roll but like you know Simon and Schuster said no nipple tassels no that makes sense from I mean I have no idea about that particular publisher but it sounds like two old very conservative men. Simon and Schuster say no. And to like to be fair, they were like, hey, just to remind you, you're writing a book about investing. Yeah, yeah. Let's remember where we're. Do we need the words nipple and tassels in the title of your book about investing? And it's like, you know what, fair enough. And where we kind of, and I had kind of

like the, like, I had liked the name, the Heater's Guide to Investing. Like, were something like the disillusioned girls' guide to investing, but I really didn't want the word girl to be in the title. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just think, like, we're kind of, we're past that. And like, I also, I call- Let's picture ourselves as rich old ladies instead of girls, just at the beginning. You know, I kind of, I think that's a, you know, nice way to be like, no, let's, let's focus

on where we want to be instead of where we're at. because you are going to be a rich old lady if you follow these steps. I want to kind of talk a little bit about where we start in the book, which is like, and you kind of mentioned this earlier, we need to have that financial foundation. Even if you want to work with an advisor, you know, hand off your investment somewhere, you still need to know these core things. What are some of those core things that are essential when it comes to investment knowledge that people need to know?

Sure. So in terms of financial foundation setting, I spend about 50, pages going through this. And part of the reason, and it's a section where we are not, we're not talking about stocks. We're not talking about bonds. We're not talking about Faberje eggs. We're not talking about like quote unquote investments, like in the traditional sense. But what I really want people to understand is taking action like building up an emergency fund or paying off credit card debt. These are investments in yourself and in your future. And it is generally where we begin. And so often I think we get really thrown off by personal finance advice

because it's just such a fire hose of information, do this, do that, right? And it's like often the advice is very conflicting. And we're also often told that like you're a special snowflake and you are allowed to have your special snowflake goals, which is true. But like also everybody's got to pay their bills. Everybody's got to clip their toenails. We're actually so much more the same than we are different in trying to, in attempting to do the task that is navigating this crazy capitalist world. And what you need first and foremost is just some cushion. And so in order to build a cushion, what do you need? You need emergency money. You need to actively be working on paying off credit cards and other what I would like describe as either high interest or emotionally distressing

debt. And then also like working on what I call growing your gap, which is just me growing the difference between your income and your expenses because the gap is where the magic happens, right? The gap is what allows you to not only, you know, fuck off for the summer and go surf in Morocco, but it's also going to be what allows you to purchase the investments that allow you to someday retire because you can then live off of the profit of those investments. And so that's that's the first step and that's the first section of the book. But then for the sections thereafter, the next five, there's six sections in the book, the next five sections really delve into the world of investing. And then the last section is about all sorts of

topics, including, for example, I wrote a chapter on investing in community because I believe that the way that we operate within our communities is an investment in the world that we want to live in. And so it's the technical stuff, but then it's also just some, you know, some more kind of theoretical stuff as well. Yeah. And I completely agree. And I kind of think when you, you know, we talk a lot about investing for like retirement or for your goals, but also when you're, investing and building wealth and getting yourself in a better financial position, then it does give you more freedom to invest in things that may not look like it has an R-O-I, like your community. It's like, well, it does. It's not maybe as tangible or there may not be a price take attached

to it. And I feel like a lot of us, when we're at the start or we're just building that emergency fund, just trying to, you know, pay our bills, it just seems like that's an impossible task until, again, you take those steps, you see the compounding magic of it all. you're like, oh, I am now in a position where I can, like, automate a charitable donation and not even notice it or volunteer some of my time, whereas before I just didn't have the capacity. But now I can, like, maybe choose my own hours or whatever the case. But again, that's all, you know, roads lead to more freedom when it comes to learning about investing, I think.

I think so too. Yeah. So let's get into the weeds a little bit. So because I know it's a very meaty book, which is great because I think often you'll pick up one of these books and you're like, okay, I don't think you actually told me, though, how to invest, even when you're on social media especially. So many people are like, invest. It's so important start early. And people like, yeah, but like how, though? So for people who are, you know, wanting to hit the ground running, they've done the foundational, you know, elements of the,

you know, building that and setting themselves up with that good financial foundation, where should they start? Do we start with accounts? Do we start with products? Do we start with how much should I contribute? Where do we go? Sure. So what you just said just made me think of something that is very much a pet peeve on the personal finance internet is like one of the most common types of content you will see is somebody saying something like just automate $300 per month to your Roth IRA and compounding at a 10% rate over 30 years, you will be a millionaire. Yep. But that that completely misses the point. It obfuscates like what you actually need to do or what is causing this money to compound at a rate of 7, 8, 9, 10% per year.

Because it is not a Roth IRA that is compounding at a rate of 10% per year. It's the investments inside. Yes. The Roth IRA is the account. It's not the product we have. in Canada, too. We were like, I'm invested in RRRSPs. I'm like, but what's inside the RRRSP? They're like, I don't, what do you mean? I'm like, that's just a bucket. It's just a bucket you put stuff in. So what's in the bucket? Exactly. Exactly. It's like, well, it's, it's kind of like if you were packing to go on a trip and somebody was like, what are you packing? And you were like a suitcase. And they'd be like, yeah, okay, like I get that that's what, but what's inside? Yeah, I'm like, that's not the question.

That's going to tell me a little bit more about the trip or the journey that you're about to have. It's like, what is actually packed inside that thing? And so I think that the first and most important lesson, everybody needs to learn is to really pop these two ideas apart. You have the bank accounts. And for us in the United States, that's Roth IRA 401K. And then those are special retirement accounts. And we can talk a little bit about that. But even just like a general investing account that we colloquy.

locally call a brokerage account. And in Canada, you would call them a taxable or unregistered account. Exactly. And so either way, it is a bank account. Okay. So set that over here. Now we move over to the actual investment piece. So what's important to understand is a TFSA, a Roth IRA, a 401K, they can all hold cash. And if they hold cash, that cash is your investment decision. You have invested. in cash. Now, you can also purchase investments with that money. And this is where we start to talk about we're using the term investment products, but really what we're talking about is funds that hold either stocks or bonds or some combination of the two. And so the core unit of investing here is

stocks and bonds. And so we get really caught up with kind of just even trying to be like, okay, well, would, like, should I do this fund? Like, should I do an index fund? Should I do a mutual fund? Should I do an ETF? And it's like, we can get there. But can you explain to me what a stock is? Because that is what is powering your returns.

And so that is why we have to start our, even though it feels a little bit obscure, we have to start our investing education with the core units of investing, stocks and bonds, even though you might not personally ever buy an individual stock yourself. But that is what is being held inside of these funds. that are being held inside of, yes, your bank account. And so really making the distinction between these two decisions is really the most important first step, in my opinion. Now, what I wish is that we could spend way more time on the investing piece.

So that's second piece, the stocks, the bonds, the funds. But the retirement account landscape is so complicated. that we often get hung up on this first step. And so something that I spend a lot of time doing, like I consider moving the retirement account piece to later in the book because like I just don't, I'm sick of it being the roadblock to people getting. Like you think people are like, well, which account should I do? Because honestly, I just, it's funny.

I just did a podcast interview before this and we had this conversation. Well, what should I do? A T of S A RSP first. And that is such a roadblock for people because they're like, well, I can't invest unless I know what bucket to put it in. and I get that, but also that shouldn't be the reason that you delay investing for months and months and months. Yeah, I mean, I, like, if, if you were to tell me, like, it will, it'll take me another year before I, like, figure out what retirement account I qualify for, or I can open

a non-retirement, regular, regular brokerage account right now, I'd be like, go open the brokerage account. Yeah. You just, like, got to get started. You can move it. You can change it. Yeah. Yeah. And, like, and, like, there's the, the different types of accounts I would call Roth are traditional, right? And so with Roth and this is not the difference maker. The difference maker is how much you invest, plain and simple. And I think that that's actually kind of, that maybe like sucks to hear because it's like it puts like the onus back on you to just like do the dang thing that kind of sucks. Like we can all admit that like having to invest a bunch of money just to like not live in poverty when you're 80 it's like it's not it doesn't

feel good it's not fun like it's not like the most fun thing to do by any means but it's just the truth that the single most important factor to any of our success is both well i would say number one how much we invest which is of course connected to how early you start and then second the investing strategy inside of the account so the investments that you choose whether you just let the money sit in cash, for example, in a money market fund, which is a fund that holds cash, or if you invest in the stock market, for example, an index fund that invests you across the global stock market, that is going to be the difference maker, not whether it's in a Roth or a traditional account, because the retirement account system in both the U.S. and Canada has everything

to do with taxes and specifically how the investments inside are ultimately going to be taxed. And so I do spend quite a bit of time here because another thing that is really missed, I don't know about if this is the case for you, but in the U.S., what is really missed here is that all retirement accounts exist as a tax shelter for investment growth. And what that means is that, well, we're dealing with two types of taxes here. We're dealing with income taxes because most of us fund our investment accounts with money we earn through work. And so we got to deal with income taxes. But then when we introduce a new way of making money, which is through investing, it introduces a new type of tax, which is taxes on

investment gains. And so people in the states get very hung up on the when do I pay my income taxes question, which is, do I pay them now with a Roth? Or do I kick the can down the road and pay the income taxes later when I withdraw the money in retirement. And so it's like it really becomes this online pissing match between the two, which is like it's fine. Like I have my opinions. But also, we don't know what future income tax rates will be. So even your accountant can't tell you, which is better, because they can't tell the future. We're making this decision with an unknown variable. And so the most important thing to focus on is this other benefit that nobody ever talks about, which is that it is a tax shelter for investment growth. And so if you invest in a brokerage

account or if you just like open up a Robin Hood account and you start buying stocks and those stocks pay dividends inside of your Robin Hood account, inside of your regular, regular brokerage account, you're going to have to pay a tax on that dividend. Now, if that same exact thing happens inside of your Roth IRA, let's say you buy a stock or a fund and it pays a dividend, as they often do, you do not have to tell the IRS about, you do not have to pay, you do not have to pay a tax on that gain. And that is the primary benefit offered by all retirement accounts. And this is also the case in Canada. And so summarize it by saying they're all good. They're all fine. Yeah. They both have their benefits. And yeah, like you said, it's if you're, you know,

worried about, oh, should I do the TFSA, which is like you're paying the tax now, but then it grows tax free. That's why it's called a tax-free savings account. And then the RSP is what you delay paying the tax until the future, but that's why you get that tax deduction. But they both have great benefits. But yeah, it's funny. I had a conversation recently about, well, A lot of discourse online, especially with the young people, is they do not like the RRSP. I think probably because it just doesn't seem as cool anymore as the TFSA, which is a little bit newer. But they both have their place. And again, too, if this is the reason you're like, well, which one?

Just, yeah, just start investing and then you can change your mind. Yeah, you may have to pay some tax if it's in a taxable account. But again, you're never stuck. And I think that's another misconception. People are afraid that they're like, well, put the money in there. I think it's stuck in there now until retirement. I'm like, no, you can change your mind. you can move it around. No, you totally can. And like, it's just, it is also just like the reality

that as we progress throughout our careers, and I think especially as women who tend to do more moving in and out of the traditional workforce, and so at least in the States, that kind of just like means you end up with like a bunch of different retirement account. And so like right now, I have open a Roth IRA, a solo 401k, an HSA, a regular brokerage account, a traditional IRA that my old 401K was rolled into. And there's not really a way for me to consolidate any further, but it just, like, every year depending on like what my work looks like and where, you know, what the source of that income is, it depends where I'm actively putting money into, right? Contribute is just a word that means save to, right? Yeah. And so that's just like kind of the way it is. And we have

have to get used to it. And it's so clumsy. It's so inelegant. But like, just like the, like to summarize a retirement account piece, it's just like pick one and get to moving. Like the work of investing is not the work of hemming and hawing over whether a roth or a traditional is better. Just know when you're going to pay the income taxes. Maybe consider doing a mix of both because both are fine. And then keep, keep it moving. Now, another element that I think also we see. often getting glossed over when you're just looking for like investment advice or information online because again they're like five seconds 30 second clips or whatever is well what is the right investment for me not just products but portfolio so like I feel like risk doesn't get talked

about enough when it really should but you know I think often I see young investors new investors are like yeah so I just bought you know often I hear even it was a Canadian which drives me crazy like just buy an S&P 500 index fund and you're good. I'm like, so you're telling somebody, not knowing their risk profile, their investor profile, to buy a fund that is 100% stocks. You know how risky that is? Even with an index fund, there's risk. So you want to talk a little bit about why understanding what your goal is and who, what your kind of risk tolerances and understanding what a portfolio means. Because again, portfolio is like one of those words. What do you mean, though? What is that? And why is it important?

for me. Yeah, my stonks, my bonds, my peony babies. That's it. That's it. Yeah, that's your. Or Labuboos. Are those out already? I need to get more hip to the times. I'm an elder I don't. I think they're out now. I think I just discovered them and now they're out again. Okay. Like, I can't keep up. There's the, are the Trader Joe's toots a thing where you are? The new Starbucks bear cup. No, it's actually like, no, it's like actually totally sick. And like, We are sick people that like we always just need the like most recent consumer product. But that's, I think that's a separate conversation. It's a separate conversation.

But yeah, anyway. Yeah. Well, I mean, even just to use your example, like think of a person who thinks that like what this person is recommended is a fund that is essentially a portfolio of all U.S. stocks. And what this person didn't understand is that that is really like only appropriate as a long-term investment. What if this person was saving up for a down payment for a house? What if this happened in 2008? Well, your down payment just lost 58% of its value over the course of six months because that's what the stock market does.

And that is very specifically what the U.S. stock market did over the course of six months between 2007 and 2008 or 2008 and 2009, I should say. It peaked in 2007. And so what you must always do is start. with your goals for your money. And I think it's easiest to start with like, what am I just like, what am I trying to do here? Am I trying to buy a house? Am I trying to earmark it for the long term? What is it that I'm trying to do? It's hard because it's not like we always know exactly what we're supposed to be doing with our money. And that's why some of this like kind of financial foundation

setting is actually good and just understanding, okay, like what things do I need to do in what order? it's an important part of this exercise, but just trying to give each dollar a job and also then understanding the timeline for which this goal is going to happen. And then what you do is you puzzle piece it together with the investing options that are available out there. And so another one, we can call this Amanda's pet peeves, another one of my pet peeves, and this applies maybe more to the investment management industry itself, whether you're signing up for your 401k through work or you're signing up to use a robo advisor who's going to help you invest. You know, one of the first questions they will ask you is like, what's your risk

tolerance? And for somebody that doesn't know anything about investing, how are you, like, it's like, what do you mean by that? Like, I don't know, it's like medium, like medium large size, like big old size. Like what are we like, what are we measuring? Like, what is it that we're even trying to measure here? And so that is why in my book, I don't start by saying, You need to make a decision about your risk tolerance. What I would say is you need to understand the options that are out there. Here's the good news. There's not that many.

We're really talking about stocks and bonds. And we can get into the details about how you're actually going to purchase those things later. But what you need to understand is what are the risks of stocks and what are the risks of bonds? Also, risk doesn't exist without a relationship with reward. And so risk and reward have a dynamic. and they are two sides of the same coin. Generally, the more risk you take, the more return you can expect. And so everything exists on this risk-reward continuum. But it's not until you have an understanding about the types of investments that you can accurately assess whether or not

you're willing to take that risk. And so that is why I start with like, hey, okay, we'll get there. We'll talk about you. We'll talk about how to figure out what makes the most sense for you. Why don't we just first start with what we're even talking about? And so that's really stocks, bonds, cash. And so starting with just understanding what you can expect out of these different categories, then I think is the nice segue into talking about, okay, then what makes the most sense for you, right? So knowing that stocks are in general higher risk, but they also have had a much higher rate of return over long periods than bonds or then cash. But you have to pay a price for those higher returns. And that price is, first of all, it's volatility. Any year could be horrible.

I mean, you could lose 50%, 60% of the value of your investments in a year. But over time, we're talking about like on average in the U.S. 10% returns per year for international stocks. it's like a little bit lower, but it's still higher than cash and bonds. It's interesting actually that you and lots of other Americans I talk about, they usually use a 10% like average rate of return. In Canada, we typically use 8%. I don't know whether that's just because we are more conservative or we're just factoring in things like future taxes and inflation.

But yeah, what I always get my pet beef is when I see Americans say like 10%, 12% returns every year. I'm like, that's a bit, that's a bit high. I don't know about that. We'll see. but but even actually on that do you want to kind of explain when someone says like on social media you can expect like a 10% return where do they get that information what are they talking about yeah that's such a good question also one of my pet peeves couldn't agree with you more and i do not use

i do not use a 10% rate of return in in my book um it is true that the u.s stock market has returned 10% a little bit more than 10% actually um on average we say annualized returns since we began reliably tracking it in the 20s in the 1920s. And so it is a pretty robust pool of data. Now, in terms of the international stock market, that's like a little bit harder, of course, to get a read on because how are we slicing and dicing this? What are we including and over what timeline? And so no matter what international stock market returns figure you're looking at, it's never going to be an apples to apples comparison to the U.S. stock market. And you can really cherry pick your way into like any figure that you want. And in fact,

like, for me, one of the hardest parts of this book as a person that does not have a relationship with a data provider was figuring out what I wanted to use for my international returns figure. And what I landed on was a calculation of 7 to 8% for international returns. But you can imagine that that's hugely variable. Like, are we just talking about Europe? Are we talking about Europe and Canada? Are we talking about Asia? Are we including Australia?

Like, what is it? But I would just say it's a good idea to expect stock-like returns, but nothing like 10%. And so that's in general. historically what we're looking at in terms of returns. But that doesn't mean that that's what is going to happen moving forward. Right. Because we're using historic, I think this is where it kind of gets confusing. It's like, we're telling you what you can expect based off of the past, but also don't expect to get historical returns because we can't predict the future. So it's, we're guessing, based off of past data. Absolutely. And, and so you will see folks who just are,

folks who are using 10% are either just like historical patterned purists that believe that like the best evidence we have for what is going to happen in the future is what has already happened in the past. And so they say 10%, why would I use something different, especially if they're looking at US stock returns. And then I think what is actually more likely is folks who are online and creating content that is designed to capture the algorithm or go viral, they want to give you the most inflated number possible so that you click on their link, so that you take their course. And so, of course, I mean, when you run the numbers, like a 10% rate of return is going to look so much better than a six or seven percent

rate of return. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's the, the, the difference is staggering. And so that, that, that does, that has more to do with the algorithm than it does with reality. And so, um, certainly beware of anybody that ever trots out calculations using a 10% return without any explanation, because that would require, first of all, history repeating itself, which is very unlikely, and that you are invested only in either the U.S. stock market or whatever is the top performing stock market moving forward. And it also assumes that you are not going to be in a diversified strategy, including integrating something like bonds or maybe even cash. And the reason why you would integrate something like bonds, which have a lower expected rate of return over

time, is because they are considered to be lower risk. And why might you want to alleviate some of the risk you have in a strategy? Well, there's a lot of personal reasons why you might want to do that. a big one is because stock returns are not necessarily guaranteed. That's the other risk. When we talk about the stock market, there's really two forms of risk. Volatility is one. We know that we experience that. The other is that there's not any guarantee that this is going to work out, whereas bonds are a contract and they have to pay a stated rate rate of interest over time. And so there's just a bit more of a guarantee built into the type of investment it is. And it's a different, like it pays you by a different mechanism. And so the idea is like, why don't I diversify the mechanisms

by which I'm trying to grow my money? Like, do I want to hinge my entire life savings on essentially corporate profit? And so, and, and so like the 10%, like, if you are investing in bonds, you're not going to get a 10% returns. That's just, that's just a. But also then your portfolio may not drop by 30%. So kind of going back to our conversation about investor profiles, your risk tolerance and risk with your investments, and, you know, why you shouldn't just take Joe Blow from Instagram

or TikTok's advice to buy an S&P 500 index fund because you've heard index funds are good, which they are. It's important to understand who are you, what are your goals, what's your timeline, and can you stomach your portfolio dipping by 30%? Because I'll tell you right now, I know a lot of people, speaking of COVID during 2020, when everyone was going bonkers with investments, they were putting it all on black. And then they were shocked when the market dipped again. And then the economy shifted. And they're like, whatever, what happened? It's like, this is why you need to diversify into different markets and

different asset classes, because if you don't, sometimes the only way you know your risk tolerance is after an event like that that really tests it. And then you know, oh, yeah, I took on too much risk. not okay. Yes. And it's you really put yourself in a dangerous position if next time we have a market crash, because it will happen and it might happen soon, to be totally honest, that if you are not prepared for that and you, like, what we see time and time again is that when that happens, it gets primal. Like your brain is designed to protect you. And you are going to be, you are hardwired and you will be chemically driven to do something about it in that moment. And if your instinct is to sell out at the exact lowest point, you've done it wrong.

The point of buying investments is not to sell them at their exact worst point. And so there's a couple of things. And this is something I talk about a lot in the book because I started my job in investment management in 2008. And so I got on the job and things were cute for about like two months. before shit hit the fan. And so I'm very sensitive to it because I was ultimately thrust into a client-facing position. And so my job as a person in her mid-20s was to try to quell the concerns and the fear. I mean, really the terror of people who were living through 2008. I was like really

on the front lines of that stock market crash. And it is like, that experience is like coded into me, onto me, like on a cellular level. And so I am as an educator, like borderline obsessed with preparing people for market crashes because I had so, I mean, grown men, doctors, engineers, business owners who had, like, who had, who are so savvy and who had figured out ways to make tens of millions of dollars, lose half of it in a blink of an eye in an instant, which, by the way, like, let's say you had a portfolio of 10 million that dropped to five million during the 2008 crash. Like, let's say you were all invested in the U.S. stock market. You would have a portfolio of over 30, almost $40 million now if you had just held

on. And so there's really two things we can do to prepare ourselves for a crash is to, first of all, diversify, right? Don't be writing all on the stock market, right? Having bonds as a psychological cushion can just help you be a better stock market investment. which is what we need you to be in order for you to be a successful investor and then the other thing is just really truly like be emotionally prepared for it i think it's so easy to pretend or to act like it won't affect you but like i promise you it will it is going to be so like imagine you saved up a hundred thousand dollars and that was so hard to do and you're invested and you did everything right and then the stock market crashes and now you're looking at 50k that sucks

that that is going you're going to be questioning whether you did it right and so we need to have these conversations before things get primal and like I am very much of the mind that so many people that are invested in their 401ks don't understand it's just an account that invests them in the stock market and so if something like that happens and you don't even know that you're invested in the stock market that is that should be illegal in my opinion And there should be somebody like me who is there on your first day of work who is going to talk you through it, like really talk you through it. It's like actually insane to me that you would like have to have your sweaty first day of work and make like portfolio management

decisions that are going to affect the rest of your life on that day. And it was true here. We have like group RISBs. We also have, you know, defined contribution pension plans where you get to choose your portfolio, but often it's, yeah, it's like you're young and you're just starting a new career and you're like, I don't know. Or you set it up a long time ago. You've been in with this company for 20 years and you never shifted your portfolio because you didn't even know what you're invested in because you got one day on your first day telling you pick a portfolio. You're like, that one, I guess, the medium one, whatever, you know, it's crazy. It is crazy. But kind of going off what you were saying of how to prepare yourself for when there is the next

crash, which will happen at some point. And this isn't as scary. This is just, these happen in there was 2020, remember? That was a very short one, but we saw it and people panicked. And I know a lot of people were in my DMs selling. I'm like, don't touch it. What did I tell you? Don't touch it. Do nothing. And it's going to happen again and again because that's just it can't go up forever. That's just, it's crazy. So you need to prepare yourself by understanding, yeah, your risk and all these elements we've just talked about, but also like a big factor in like understanding the behaviors and to prepare for that is to educate yourself. The more you know, the more what you're supposed to do when these things happen.

Because you're like, oh, I've seen this. I read about that. And I think I'm supposed to not sell. Absolutely. And another piece of this education that I think is so important is understanding why it happens. Yeah. And I have a couple of chapters in the book about, well, first of all, what to expect out of the stock market. What kind of behavior should you be expecting?

Because you have to know, like, that's actually. your best protection is knowing what is normal. And what is normal is market volatility. But then also understanding the underlying mechanism, I think, just allows you to stay calm in the moment. And what is important to understand is it's not as if like a corporation profits and then a ferry comes and waves its wand and that makes the stock go up of that company. there is another there there is something else at play these stocks so a stock is a a piece of

corporate ownership right you are a business owner now and these shares of ownership are sold in a marketplace kind of like anything else that is sold in a quote unquote free market and so what do we know about like what do we remember from econ 101 what do we know about supply and demand supply and demand set prices of all goods for sale in a free market and shares included. And so really what we are experiencing on the day-to-day, because the supply of stock doesn't change very quickly, right? Like you think it's like it takes, it's not every day that a corporation is destroyed and takes its stock down with it.

It's not every day that you have an IPO where a corporation creates new shares. And so the supply of shares is relatively stable, but demand. for shares is changing wildly. And by demand, I just mean, do investors want it? Do we not? Are we buying? Is it a cool stock or not a cool stock? Are people selling? It's because it's not cool anymore. And it is, it is true that profit is the engine that over long periods are going to drive returns, right? Ten years from now, we're not going to be talking about any stocks that aren't more profitable than they are now. Yeah. But in the show, short term, there is so much drama in the markets because we as humans as investors are

extremely dramatic. And this can happen on an individual level. We can start to get into group think tendencies. We can engage in herd behavior. And this is very common during both what we call manias. Right. So for example, buying a bunch of AI stocks, even though they have no path to profitability, at least not yet, very reminiscent of the initial dot-com bubble. Yeah, I know. Where people are, it's like this, it's called Robert Schiller is an economist and he calls it irrational exuberance, right? Where people don't, they don't care that there's no profit and they just buy the stock

anyway. And all that buying is the mechanism that pushes the price higher. Yeah, because you're like, well, all these people want it. And then you want it and then more people want it because more people want it. Right? But it hasn't actually changed the, the intrinsic value of that company or that stock. Exactly. The stock is not going up because it is a successful company. It is going up because people think it will be a successful company. And so there's always this, and that's not specific to AI stocks. There's always this type of speculation happening in the markets because you would

only buy an investment if you thought it was going to make you money in the future. But what don't you know, you don't know the future. And so this type of buying and selling based off of an unknown future is just a part of the markets. And so things kind of can get, you know, oftentimes the market is quite rational, but things can get out of hand. We can get like way too excited culturally. And we can also get way too bummed out culturally. And so 2008 is a good example of this. stocks crashed across the board because people sold their stocks, not because these corporate, I mean, some of the banks were broken. Yeah. That's for sure.

You know, some of the banks certainly had a hard time recovering from the broader economic calamity that was the great recession. But Coca-Cola was fine, right? Yeah, I know. It's like its value didn't actually shift. It was just people's like, I need to get my money out because I'm going to lose my house or all these things. I'm afraid, basically. Right. And so it's important to remember it is the selling of stocks that is the mechanism that

drops the stock market lower. And at that point, you just have to remind yourself, hey, like, we're just going through one of these periods where people are freaked out. We will return to equilibrium eventually because people are going to like, you know, after the dust settles, people are going to pat themselves. They're going to, they're going to, you can't see me if you're listening on podcast, but I'm feeling my shoulders. I'm feeling my head. I'm okay. I survived. Yeah. And what you're going to do is you're going to look around and be like, oh, there's kind of like a lot of good deals in the market right now. I can buy stocks for extraordinarily cheap of these corporations that we know are still making a bunch of money.

And so people then start to slowly put their money back into the market. And by put money into the market, I mean they're buying stocks. And that is the mechanism that pushes it back higher. And so just understanding that these cycles of investors getting very excited and getting very spooked, they do happen and is just a part of being an investor. But over long periods, what you see is if you were to map the stock market over corporate profit and specifically profit growth, what you see is that it's a pretty tight line. And every now and then, it diverges, right? It diverges from reality. And if it really only works to be a stock market investor is if, number one, for better or worse, you think that corporations are going to get more profitable over time.

I happen to think that they probably will. And then number two, that you believe that the stock market will ultimately reflect that profitability, but not without some real housewives of Wall Street, right? I love that. And trying to kind of bring it back to when we were talking about diversification. This is why it's important to, you know, or wise, in my opinion, to not just buy one stock and hope it goes up because we don't know what's going to happen. We don't know what, you know, stocks people will be excited about or like not excited about. So just buy, this is why I am an indexer is just by the entire market, buy all the companies. And we will see which ones do really well. And the ones that don't, well, they don't. But it'll be a nice

big basket of eggs instead of just buying one egg and hoping for the best that it hatches. Exactly. I don't know why there's an egg that's hatching. I was trying to go with an analogy and then I'm like, I actually don't know where I'm going. You know what I mean. You know, I always say, don't put all your eggs in one basket. Then you know what I mean. And it's, especially when it comes to like single stock investing, like what you have to remember is like you could do all of the possible analysis of a company and get it right that this is a company that is going to continue to be more profitable in the future. And it still won't matter if investors don't reflect that back to you. Yeah. And so you're not just trying to predict the future of a business. You are trying to predict whether or not investors writ large are going to be as interested in this business as you. And so it's it's a bit of a fool's errand, right? You're also kind of banking on this fact that you know something that the rest of the market does not know, because all of this

buying and selling is actually a very effective voting machine. So everybody across the world is voting on what they think the right price of a stock should be through their actions. And what we see is that this wisdom of crowds effect, where it is very impossible to, on a consistent and regular basis, to basically beat the rest of the world at investing to say, I know more than the entire investing public. And so it's just, a lot, it's, it's, it's not just easier to invest using something like an index fund, which invests you across an entire market. It's actually also historically, significantly more successful. There's this misconception that buying individual stocks makes you somehow a

better investor when in fact the majority of the time it means you're probably going to do worse. And so this is great news. Rejoice, right? Like the easy path is actually the more successful and reliable path. And so I actually think it's one of these rare instances in money managed. Like to me, budgeting is a slog. Like it is, it is a, it requires week in and week out work, but it makes more intuitive sense. Whereas with investing, there's more of a learning curve, but it's much easier to just get set up and then get your ass outside because life is meant for living and not not watching. Yeah. I know. It's kind of that we're talking about this and you have so much amazing information in your book and what I want

to kind of reiterate because whenever I talk to people about investing, I know this sounds like a lot of information and it is and I used to be you and it seems like an impossible task. But now I'm on the other side of it. And I'm like, oh, it's so simple. Once you get it and really just take the time to learn this stuff and then you can read multiple books and they're all probably going to say the same, you know, relatively the same advice. But, you know, in different words in different ways, you just have to invest and then live your life. You don't have to be like an investor that is always looking at the markets every day. No, I don't. I literally just have my portfolios set up, index funds, put my money in there a few times per year. Don't touch them. That's what I do.

And then I live my life. And that's kind of the beauty of, and that's kind of going back to the, you know, title of your book, How to Be a Rich old lady. Rich old ladies are, you know, rich old fund ladies because they have hobbies. They've got their. money working for them. They're not playing the stock market. They have better things to do. And so it's really about learning this stuff, applying it, and then living your life. But it is about getting started learning the stuff, which you can do with your wonderful book, Amanda. Before I let you go, because I know we could have talked for another hour, but there's a reason you wrote a book and it's so in depth because there's so much to go through. What's one thing

you want to leave listeners with, just to give them a little sense of like, if they're like, I'm a bit overwhelmed or this is a lot, just a little sense of like you got this or some kind of words of inspiration. Sure. Well, I love the way that you put that. And if you read my book, you will understand that like this is not about investing for investing's sake. To me, learning to invest is only useful to the extent that it allows you to live a beautiful life. And so do know that there are educators out there like Jessica, like me, who are committed to helping you get through the learning curve, which is a lot like learning a new language, right? I think people tend to think that like, oh, like, I'm bad at math, so I'm going to be bad at investing

when it's, it really has like nothing to do. You can still be bad at math. Like also, I still tell I'm like, I'm not like good at math, but somehow I've been able to pass all these financial exams because it's not, it's not about math at all. It really isn't. It's really not about math. like I am like doing math so little on on a regular basis and like truly only I'm like only doing math when I'm like calculating the age gap between like me and Harry Styles and so like is there much of an age gap he's not young anymore right is he not who's well I don't know actually I in my mind I'm like is he like in his 30s now we're older but he's also older so I think it's fine okay great good to know I don't know I look at him I'm like what a little

What a whippersnapper he is. That's whenever I see a photo of Timothy Shalamee, I'm like, this is a child. This is someone's child. Like, he's 15. I know he's probably like 29, but I'm like, he is so young looking. Yeah, he's young looking for me. Young looking for me for sure. No, you're just, you're learning a new language and you would never beat yourself up if you did

not like pick up French on the first try. Yeah, no. And so just know that it always is going to take going through it a few times. and even having a few different teachers. And I just, I hope that I can be one of those teachers for you. I mean, there's a reason that I've always like pushed everyone. I know because I've an investing course, but it's for Canadians only. And so whenever I have an American, I'm like Amanda's course, Amanda's course, because I've always just love how you teach. It comes from a place that's really fun, friendly, educational, no BS. And it's, and you've been very consistent

doing your thing since I've known you. So so happy that your book is coming out. Tell me, Where can people find it? Where can people find you online as well? Sure. So how to be a rich old lady, technically only I don't have Canadian publishing rights. No, it doesn't matter. I told you it's online. Girl, what do I tell you, you can buy Amanda's book on Amazon? You can buy it, I believe, on Indigo. You can order it into your local bookstore. Don't worry. We have the same thing where I couldn't get my American rights sold. But it's available online aboard's Noble Amazon. So if you're American, you could buy my book too. So don't you work. I'm going to look it up to be at Indigo. But yes, you can buy Amanda's book in Canada. Don't listen to her. She doesn't know what she's talking about. I don't know anything. Okay. And in the U.S., of course, you can buy it wherever books are sold. And if it's something that you can't afford right now, then request it from your library. That's also right from the end. Yeah, you can do that in Canada too. No, your book, hardcover and e-book is available online to purchase through Indigo. Do you have an e-book? Yeah, there will be an e-book and there will also be an audio book. Sorry, that's what I meant. be an audio book. I am recording the audiobook, and I've got a few more sessions. And so it's out on January 13th. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. Pre-order, because your book doesn't come until January, so you have to pre-order

this book, and I will be giving away a copy to some lucky winner as well. But thank you so much, Amanda, for coming on the show. Do you tell us where we can find you online? I can't remember. At dumpster. Dot doggie on Instagram and TikTok. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. And if you want to find out where that name came from, listen to the original episode that I did with Amanda, back in 2020 because I know we talked about that. Well, thank you so much for joining me.

Pleasure to have you back on. So excited for your book to finally come out. Thank you for having me. And that was my episode with Amanda Holden. Make sure to find her website. Go there to check out all the things about her including her book at Amanda-Holden.com. You can follow her on TikTok and Instagram at Dumpster Doggy. If you want to know where that moniker comes from, there is a backstory, which we didn't get into in this episode.

we did in our original episode together back in 2020. That was episode 227. So if you want to listen to that, you can find it wherever you're listening or watching or if you want to find the show notes to easily find it, go jessicamorehouse.com slash 227 for 227. Like I mentioned, I'm going to be giving away a copy of her book once it's released. So we'll not be drawing the contest until January because her book comes out January 13th. But if you want to enter to win a copy of her book, how to be a rich old lady, then just go to jessicamorehouse.com slash contest. You will also find other books I'm giving away from guests that have been featured on this season of the show.

Feel free to enter them all. You'll only win one if you are a lucky winner. So, you know, but you know, you have more chances to win if you enter it to win all the contests. I also just want to say for all of my American listeners, I always do personally love her invested development workshops and courses. I've known Amanda for a long time. she really, really does know her stuff. So if you're looking for an investment course,

then make sure to check her course out. Again, more information on her website. But if you're Canadian, because I know we did talk a lot American jargon in this episode, I do have my own investing course called Wealth Building Blueprint for Canadians. So make sure to check that out, Jessica Moorhouse.com slash course. And yeah, it's specifically for Canadians because we don't talk about 401ks or Roth RAs. We talk about TFSAs and FHSAs and RR. SPs and RESPs and RDSPs, all the SPs, and so much more. And it is a really great course. I've had it for over four years. I've helped hundreds of students achieve lots of their big lofty goals and hit six figure, you know, portfolios. It's a really good course. If I do say

so myself. So that's it for me, but that's not it for the podcast yet. This is not the season finale. That happens tomorrow. I'm going to drop a final episode before we go on holiday break for You know, so I'm going to Vancouver once again, visiting the fam and taking so much needed time off. And I'm very excited to have my next guest on tomorrow. I've got Gillian Johns Red. She has a great book called Retire Often, which I'm really excited to talk about, all about retiring often, mini-retirements and financial freedom and all that really nice stuff. Kind of a good companion episode to what I talked about with Amanda in this episode.

So you're not going to want to miss that. So with that, thanks for listening and watching on YouTube. And I will see you back here tomorrow for the season finale of season 22 of the More Money Podcast. The More Money Podcast would not be possible without the amazing talents of video editor, Justice Carrar, and podcast producer Matt Rideout, who you can find at MRAVCanada.com. Thank you.