NerdWallet's Smart Money Podcast - Here’s What Tariffs Could Cost You (Plus: Downgrade or Ditch Your Premium Card?)

Episode Date: August 7, 2025

Understand how new tariffs may hit your wallet and whether premium credit card fees are still worth it. What do new U.S. tariffs mean for prices on everyday goods and cars? What should you consider when choosing a premium travel credit card? Hosts Sean Pyles and Elizabeth Ayoola discuss the latest economic indicators and the changing landscape of credit card perks to help you understand how today’s macroeconomics and personal finance decisions intersect. Joined by news Nerds Anna Helhoski and Rick VanderKnyff, the team unpacks key insights from recent federal data drops. They begin with a discussion of the latest tariffs and economic reports, with tips and tricks on understanding how import duties impact consumer prices, why inflation could be on the rise again, and how job growth revisions may affect consumer sentiment.  Then, credit card Nerd Melissa Lambarena joins Sean and Elizabeth to discuss whether high-fee premium cards still deliver value. They cover how reward structures are changing, when it makes sense to downgrade instead of cancel, and how opening or closing a card affects your credit score. Take the Smart Money Podcast Listener Survey 2025 and enter to win a prize! https://nerdwallet.com/podsurvey  Card benefits, terms and fees can change. For the most up-to-date information about cards mentioned in this episode, read our reviews: Chase Sapphire Reserve Makes Big Changes: Higher Fee, New Rates, More Perks https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/credit-cards/chase-sapphire-reserve-overhaul-june-2025  Chase Sapphire Preferred Review: Strong Option for Travel Rewards https://www.nerdwallet.com/reviews/credit-cards/chase-sapphire-preferred  Chase Freedom Unlimited Review: A Potential One-Card Solution https://www.nerdwallet.com/reviews/credit-cards/chase-freedom-unlimited  American Express Platinum Review: Top-Notch Lounge Access, Big Credits https://www.nerdwallet.com/reviews/credit-cards/american-express-platinum  5 Things to Know About the Bank of America Premium Rewards Elite Credit Card https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/credit-cards/5-things-to-know-about-the-bank-of-america-premium-rewards-elite-credit-card  Want us to review your budget? Fill out this form — completely anonymously if you want — and we might feature your budget in a future segment! https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScK53yAufsc4v5UpghhVfxtk2MoyooHzlSIRBnRxUPl3hKBig/viewform?usp=header In their conversation, the Nerds discuss: tariffs 2025, credit card downgrade effects, new credit card impact on credit score, consumer inflation trends 2025, unemployment report July 2025, core PCE inflation rate, job growth revisions BLS, credit card rewards explained, travel credit card comparison, high annual fee credit cards, credit card utilization ratio, closing credit card and credit score, 2025 economic outlook, de minimis exemption 2025, trade war impact on consumers, credit card strategy during inflation, interest rates and consumer debt, credit card perks vs cost, credit card churn risks, emergency fund importance 2025, how tariffs raise consumer prices, July 2025 consumer sentiment, credit card reward program changes, and economic uncertainty and spending. To send the Nerds your money questions, call or text the Nerd hotline at 901-730-6373 or email [e-mail]. Like what you hear? Please leave us a review and tell a friend. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If you love free stuff, this message is for you. We're always looking for ways to improve the podcast, which is why, right now, we're giving out prizes for seven lucky winners who fill out our listener survey. It only takes a few minutes, and you'll be entered to win some really cool prizes. One winner will get a pair of Sony ULT Wireless Noise Canceling Headphones. And six winners will get the Bagu Cloud Carry-on bag. And full disclosure, I have one of these bags, and it's one of my favorite travel bags. Just go to nerdwollet.com slash pod survey and complete the form by September.

15th for a chance to win. You can read the official rules for more details, which again can be found at nerdwollet.com slash pod survey. Thank you and good luck. The federal government does a lot of economic data dumps. Seems like every day there's a new important statistic that comes out about how our economy is doing. But last week was a humdinger of data dumps, and a lot of it has an impact on your personal economy. So today, we'll walk you through some of it. Welcome to Nerd Wallet's Smart Money Podcast, where you send us your money questions and we answer them with the help of our genius nerds. I'm Sean Piles. And I'm Elizabeth Ayola.

Later this episode, we'll be looking at credit card fees and which ones are worth spending money for perks. But first, our weekly money news roundup, where we break down the latest in the world of finance to help you be smarter with your money. Our news colleague, Anna Hilhouski, is here with fellow news nerd Rick Vanderknife to walk us through some of the big economic statistics that came out recently. And we're going to hear a bit more about tariffs, too, right, Anna? Yeah, that's right. And Rick and I've been digging deep into all the huge stats that came out last week. Rick, what would you call last week? A monster week for economic data or we were pretty stressed.

It was a monster week in the middle of a monster year generally for economic news. And, yeah, it kind of hit a crescendo last week. I worried that it's not going to slow down any time soon. What we're going to try and do here today is make it all a little bit more digestible for people. starting with kind of the big headline last week. And right now, it's just tariffs. And in case you missed it or you're not a regular listener, we're in the midst of a trade war. And last week, it escalated. Now, just a disclaimer, we are recording on Wednesday. So if there's been any changes that we haven't mentioned, that's why we haven't. This morning, for instance, President Trump announced an additional 25% tariff on India as a punishment for purchasing Russian oil. And that's bringing India's tariff rate to a whopping 50%. Now, Rick, there's all a bunch of tariffs that were in place way prior to today. A ton, yeah, yeah, 50% tariff on steel and aluminum and steel-related products, 25% tariff on automobiles and car parts, 17% tariff on tomatoes from Mexico.

So it kind of runs the gamut. And some of the latest ones, 50% on copper and 40% on countries that are trying to dodge US tariffs by routing through other countries first. So as of today, there are a slew. of country by country tariffs. And these are delayed versions of what Trump called his Liberation Day reciprocal tariffs. There is now a 15% baseline tariff on most imports and up to 50% on specific nations. The only country other than India with a 50% tariff rate is Brazil. And that was imposed in response to what Trump calls a threat to the U.S. national security. Now, several

countries were able to secure deals, right, Rick? Yeah, 15% with the EU. South Korea and Japan. And originally 25% for India was announced as a deal, but obviously that's been scotched with today's news. Some of these deals include agreements for nations to invest in the U.S. And it's a little bit fuzzy about how these will work. And there's a lot of talk about future penalties over Russian oil purchases, India being the first example. But consumers are going to, if not now, eventually feel the effects from it. So tariffs are paid by importers and they usually pass the added costs on to customers or they have to absorb it. Now, price increases will impact all consumers, but they

tend to hit low-income households the hardest. Yale Budget Lab also projects that tariffs are likely to affect things like clothing and textiles, driving up commodity prices for leather products like shoes and handbags, apparel, and other textiles. And retailers have been stocking up goods ahead of the tariff deadlines. And that could delay some of those pricing impacts, but it's unclear exactly when consumers will start really seeing those higher prices. And some companies and industries are sort of absorbing the cost for now. Autos are a big example. The 25% tariffs have been in effect for months.

Prices have not gone up dramatically. Kelly Blue Book recently said they went up 1.2% in June. That's partly because cars, there were a lot of inventory that was pre-tariff, but also because manufacturers are eating the costs for now. General Motors and Volkswagen both reported big losses in the last three months. And, you know, for competitive reasons, nobody wants to be the first to raise their prices. But the Yale Budget Lab says that car prices could raise more than 12% over the next couple of years. Right.

Eventually, they'll stop just absorbing those costs and likely pass them on to the consumer. So there's quite a few tariffs that are going to be happening next. So after this big slew is over, Trump has moved to shut down. the de minimis exemption worldwide. And that's a longstanding loophole that excludes businesses from paying tariffs on really low value packages that are shipped to the U.S. So I think lots of things from like Sheehan or Amazon. Cheap stuff, but then they have to be paying the tariffs on them now. So that's been around since 1938. And it was originally intended to like ease trade inefficiencies. And then it was later expanded. And Trump had ended the exemption for Chinese

businesses in May. So this new expanded order won't go into effect until the end of the month. But there are also some other tariff center consideration, lumber, pharmaceuticals, rare earth minerals, aircraft and related components and trucks. And I think in a couple of weeks, the U.S. is going to be releasing the results of its probe into semiconductor and chip imports. And that's going to be a big one. There's a lot of other sources of tension and uncertainty in the economy other than tariffs. Rick, the July jobs report just came out, and it caused quite a stir. Can you talk us through a little bit what happened there? Absolutely, yeah. Unemployment ticked up just a hair to 4.2%, but job growth was

far below expectations, 73,000 jobs in July, and then the bigger news was the revisions to the earlier months, so if you want to talk us through that. So there was a significant revision for May and June job growth, and it led to a combined drop of 258,000 jobs. Revisions aren't that weird, even though it kind of sounds like pretty dramatic, but I do want to get ahead and explain why. The BLS, that's the Bureau of Labor Statistics, releases preliminary jobs data. They're based on surveys that are collected middle of the month. So you're not really getting a complete picture. And jobs data, like a lot of other data, is revised multiple times as accuracy improves. Why am I explaining all this? Well, following the release of the report,

Trump fired Erica McIntarfer, the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, who was appointed by former President Biden. Rick, can you explain a little bit about what Trump's reasoning was for that? Well, he was taken by surprise by the job numbers. It kind of punctures his narrative around how the economy is booming now. He reached all the way back to the election last year to accuse the head of BLS of manipulating numbers, he thinks the numbers were manipulated to make him look bad and make the economy look worse than it actually is for political reasons. VLS chief was a Biden appointee, and that was a reason enough, apparently. Right after, there was a lot of backlash. And Trump's own former

BLS commissioner, Bill Beach, said that, quote, there's no way the BLS head to alter numbers. And he was talking about that as commissioner, he never saw the data until it was finalized. And then And the only thing that he was touching was some wording in the report. There are some serious problems with the president firing someone over an economic report that they don't like. It's going to erode public trust in not only jobs data, but trust in other government stats that we're going to be talking about, like GDP, like inflation. It's threatening the independence of agencies that are compiling economic stats. Let's turn now to talk about some other economic data that we've seen. Rick, can you talk a little bit about GDP right now?

What do we see in the most recent report? The most recent report showed the second quarter GDP kind of rebounded from the first quarter. We actually had negative growth. It shrank by 0.5 percent in the first quarter. That's never a good sign, but it was kind of a technical dip. There was a surge of imports ahead of the Trump tariffs as businesses kind of stocked up on inventory. In the second quarter, we saw some of that rebound. Imports went back down as that stockpiling ended, and some of the tariffs kicked in.

And the consumer spending rose, possibly because consumers were trying to buy things before tariffs really kicked in and inflation. So there's some potentially anomalous behavior. There's some weird technicalities that just all around doesn't make the economic picture too clear. Now, the next quarter we're kind of hoping will be a better indication of where the economy is at as the tariffs are taking full effect and we'll see a response from consumers and businesses. Now, something else that consumers are pretty concerned about right now are prices. So Rick, take us through the inflation report that came out last week.

Yeah, last week we had a report from the personal consumption expenditures price index, which we will just call the PCE from here on out. It shows that inflation is beginning to edge up. The core PCE had dropped down to about 2.5% by April, and now it's at 2.8% in the most recent month. That's well above the Fed's 2.% target. That's what the Fed is watching as it makes rate decisions. On a monthly basis, it rose 0.3%, which is, again, it's ahead of most of the terrorist landing,

so it's kind of a worry sign for the economy. The Fed's under a ton of pressure from Trump to cut rates, but it's still not seeing what it wants to see in terms of the inflation numbers. Right. And there is a lot of pressure right now on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell to cut rates and certainly primarily coming from President Trump. But the president can't fire a Fed chair. that still hasn't stopped him from intensifying, again, kind of leaning on the Fed, which is an

independent entity. And the Fed is looking to all the economic data that we've been talking about, GDP, inflation, jobs to guide its decisions. The Fed met last week and made its decision for the month of July, and they chose to not cut rates. The dominant speculation right now is that the Fed could cut rates at its September meeting. But even though it doesn't feel like we're a long way from there. We kind of are a long way from there because of all the reports that are going to be coming out. It's also really unclear if we're going to see tariffs having a bigger impact on the economy and that being reflected in the data. So something else the Fed tracks and we're thinking about is how people are feeling about the economy. It looks like it's a pretty

mixed bag out there. Pretty mixed bag. Yeah, two of the most widely reported consumer sentiment reports came out last week, one from the University of Michigan and the other from the conference board. Both measure basically how Americans feel about the economy. Are they optimistic? Are they concerned? How are they feeling in the longer term about their job prospects, about prices? It's not hard data, right? It's measuring how people feel. It kind of feeds back into how people feel because when they hear other people are not feeling great about the economy, that might affect their own feelings. Right. And consumer sentiment really dove back in spring when a lot of the tariffs were first being announced and people were hearing a lot of news about coming inflation. That inflation hasn't really material. realized yet. And so some of those numbers have been bouncing back a bit. Do you want to walk us through that, Anna? Last week's two major surveys came out, one's from the University of Michigan and the

other from the conference board. And they were, again, a little bit mixed bag. They reported that consumers are feeling slightly better about current conditions, but there's still a lot of worry about what's ahead, especially when it comes to jobs, income, and as we mentioned, many, many times now, the impact of tariffs. The overall picture there is people aren't panicking, but they're not terribly confident either. We've covered a lot of ground today. What does this picture mean for people? As our resident economist Elizabeth Renter said last week, consumers may be feeling uneasy about the economy and all of that uncertainty, particularly around tariffs for igniting inflation, could lead people to front load purchases. We've already seen that come up in the data,

but that could continue even more so. Combine with high interest rates, it's possible that debt could become unmanageable for households. On Wednesday, the New York Fed reported that credit card debt, for example, had hit $1.21 trillion. And that's in line with last year's all-time high. Now, if the economy can stay resilient, consumers might be able to stay afloat, but if true hardship starts kicking in, it's going to be more of a challenge to manage debt. So that's certainly something to be mindful of. Yeah, with fewer jobs, trade wars, and inflation ticking up, I can't stop thinking about the importance of having an emergency fund because you never know what's going to happen next. Well, Rick and Anna, thank you for breaking this all down for us.

Yeah, thanks for having us. Up next, we answer our listeners question about whether it's worth paying high fees for credit cards that have reward programs and other perks. But before we get into that, we're running our annual listener survey. And yes, there are prizes. We're giving away the first ever smart money branded merch. It's super exclusive. Only seven people will get it.

Not even Elizabeth and I have this merch. One winner will get a pair of Sony, ULT, wireless, noise-canceling headphones. Six others will get the Bagu Cloud Carry-on Bag, which is actually super nice to have one myself. The survey takes just a few minutes to complete, and we read every single response. This is your chance to help shape what SmartMoney covers, how we cover it, and how the show evolves. Head to SmartMoney.com slash Pod Survey and fill it out by September 15th to be entered for a chance to win. And a reminder to send us your money questions. If you are worried about how to navigate your finances with what's going on in the economy,

you need help with your budget, or you're thinking about buying a new car. Leave us a voicemail or text us on the nerd hotline at 901-7306373. That's 901-730 N-E-R-D. You can also pop us an email at podcast at nerdwollet.com. And a special shout-out to anyone who lives in Scottsdale, Arizona. The smart money team is going to be there in early September, and we're looking for a listener or two to talk with in person. So if that's your jam, send an email to podcast at nerdbolic.com

with the subject, Scottsdale, and a money question that you would like to talk with us about. All right. In a moment, this episode's money question. Stay with us. Are you looking for ways to make your everyday life happier, healthier, more productive and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one bestselling author of the Happiness Project, bringing you fresh insights and practical solutions in the happier with Greta. Gretchen Rubin podcast. My co-host and happiness guinea pig is my sister, Elizabeth Kraft.

That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore ideas and hacks about cultivating happiness and good habits. Check out Happier with Gretchen Rubin from Lemonada Media. We're back and we're answering your money questions to help you make smart of financial decisions. This episode's question comes from a listener via email. Hello, nerds. I am writing to see what you folks think about my Chase Sapphire Reserve card I have had since December 2016. I am really annoyed with the changes Chase is making with the fee increase and all other travel being cut from three to one points. That impacts a lot of my travel spending because a lot of things can't be booked through Chase's portal.

In parentheses, trains in Europe, etc. I don't want to close the card because it's tied as my seat. second oldest line of credit, 8.5 years versus 13 years for my oldest card. So my question is, what would you folks advise on downgrading the CSR to the Sapphire Preferred or the Freedom Unlimited? To add context, I get 3.5% on travel from Bank of America's premium travel rewards card, so that would beat the Sapphire Preferred's three points. My second question on this is, what would my credit score get lower to if I swapped my premium card from the CSR and open an Amex platinum line of credit? My score has been in the 805 to 820 range lately. Thanks, J. Rod.

All right, J. Rod, those are some fabulously nerdy credit card questions. And to help us answer them, we have credit card nerd Melissa Lamberina. Hey, Melissa, welcome back to Smart Money. Hi, everyone. Thank you for having me. On this episode, we're going to talk about some credit card companies that are nerd wallet partners, but that doesn't influence how we discuss them. The benefits, terms, and fees mentioned were accurate at the time of posting, but things can change. Some offers may have expired by the time you're listening, but for the latest details, you can follow the links in the episode description. Let's start broadly for anyone who's new to credit card rewards. What are they and why do some consumers go bananas for them?

Credit card rewards are different incentives that issuers can offer in the form of points, miles, or cashback. And they can be very valuable, especially if you're a big spender. This could add up to hundreds of dollars, maybe more annually that can allow you to stretch your budget or even fund your next vacation. So a big caveat that I'll add is that as sweet as some of these perks are, they really aren't worth it if you are unable to pay off your credit card balance. Credit card interest rates can be super high, and so the amount that you'll pay in interest is pretty much guaranteed to quickly wipe out any value you would get from these rewards. So please tread very carefully, and don't go into debt just to get a sign-it bonus or to get extra points for your trip to Japan.

How did you know I was trying to go to Japan, Sean? I'm speaking for myself here. I'm planning my honeymoon in Japan right now. Okay, well, let's dig into the listener's question about the Chase Sapphire Reserve more specifically. Chase recently announced an increase of this card to annual fee. The new annual fee is $795, up from $550. That is very steep. This change went into effect for new applicants on June 23, 2025, and for existing

cardholders, they would be getting the new benefits and feature starting October 26, 2025, and would be on the hook for the higher fee the next time they renew their card. So, Melissa, what are some of the other changes that will impact credit card holders, and how do they change the calculus about whether these cards are still worth the annual fee. It's that annual fee that is a big change for card holders, and it may no longer align with some budgets out there. The card packs a lengthy list of perks that you can use potentially to make it up, but you'll have to put in more effort to track these benefits and use them. Well, Melissa, the listener is annoyed, and so am I, about a specific change. Many travel purchases are being

cut from three to one points. I'm a Chase Sapphire Reserve card holder, and that's a major deal breaker for me, especially considering many of the new perks that would justify the price hike aren't appealing to me. Can you talk us through how this change from three to one points impacts cardholders? Yes, this change gives Sapphire cardholders fewer rewards to book travel outside of Chase's portal. So if someone wants to explore the best deals out there, look for last minute promotions or discounts, and earn a solid rewards rate on travel, then this card might not longer be as appealing to them. And Chase is also changing how points are valued when redeemed for travel booked through Chase's portal. So, Melissa, talk us through how the change to how Chase's

valuing points redeemed in their portal is really going to work in practice. This is a drastic change for cardholders. Previously, they could earn 1.5 cents per point on Chase travel. Their new program called Points Boost will allow them to redeem points now for two cents a piece towards select flights or hotel stays. Now, this sounds more valuable if those flights or hotels will fit your travel preferences and they qualify for points boost. But if they don't, they will be worth one cent each. So your points will be worth one cent a piece. And that's significantly lower than what the card previously offered. All of this is just underscoring for me why Chase's credit card point system is just too fussy to mess with. I know some people love redeeming their points and

gaming the system and booking through the portal. But to me, that is just a few too many hoops to jump through when it comes to getting the value of a credit card point. I don't know. That's just me personally. No, I agree. And I'm just under a year of having the card. And this sounds very stressful. I don't need any more stress. So on that note, some customers like the listener and myself are conflicted about how closing the account could impact their credit score. I know closing a card can affect your credit utilization ratio and also the age of your credit, which are both important factors for your score. So can you expand on both? Definitely. Your credit utilization ratio is the amount of credit that you're using compared to the credit you have available.

Experts typically recommend not using more than 30% of your available credit. This is just to sum up what that means for people who might not know. And when you close your credit card, that amount of available credit shrinks. And this is what in turn can negatively impact your credit scores. Your age of credit is also a factor that impacts your credit score. It tells lenders how long you've been an active user of credits and also gives them an idea of your track record over time. So when you close a credit card, it can reduce the average age of your remaining accounts when it's eventually removed from your credit report. Listener J. Rod here asked about how much their score might be lowered. And it's really hard to

pinpoint or predict exactly how much a score might be lowered because there are so many factors that go into one person's credit score. But I think folks can play with credit score simulators to see how a potential closing of a card might affect their credit report. But it seems like their score is in a pretty healthy range anyway. So they might not have to worry about it too much, really. Exactly. Now, Melissa, I flirted with the idea of downgrading my car. like the listener. So what are the implications of downgrading the Chase Sapphire Reserve? And also, what happens if they get an Amex platinum right after? The only thing that should impact their credit score for the latter is opening a new line of credit, right? That's correct. Downgrading a credit

card doesn't impact your credit score because you're not opening a new line of credit. You're keeping the same account and the number. And that's typically the appeal of being able to downgrade. you're just changing the card's terms. Now, opening the Amex Platinum can temporarily cause your credit score to drop, and this is common with most credit card applications. So whenever you're applying for new credit card, you can expect that. And let's talk about the process of downgrading a credit card or getting a product transfer, as it's sometimes called. Is this as simple as just calling your credit card issuer? Can this be done online?

What's their best bet here? Typically, you have to call the credit card issuer. and I've done this myself before. It's fairly easy, but you do need to set aside some time to chat with customer service or possibly other representatives. And you can call them and just ask them if you can downgrade your credit card to a different option. Every issuer is different, so they might only allow you to downgrade to a select amount of cards in their portfolio or all of their cards in their portfolio if they allow you to downgrade

at all. But it's worth asking if it brings you closer to your goals. So what are the top things that folks should consider when they are trying to choose between keeping, downgrading, or canceling a card? Well, like our listener did, it's important to consider whether they want to preserve their good credit. If they have any applications that are coming up, they're going to be applying for credit anytime in the near future. They also want to consider the cost of maintaining the credit card they have. and whether it still aligns with their spending and lifestyle and they can make use of the card's incentives and perks to make up the annual cost if there is one.

Another thing to consider how much you would save by downgrading if that is an option for you. Next, the value of rewards with one option compared to the other. And also what happens to those rewards if you were to close the account or downgrade because you might need to end up using them or risk. losing them before you make any sort of change of that sort. And then lastly, consider any details unique to you, like our listener did. For instance, they are considering their options between the freedom unlimited and the Sapphire preferred. And the decision will ultimately hinge on whether they can make up that annual cost of the Sapphire preferred, but also the tiebreakers will be where

they do most of their spending. For instance, are they spending more on grocery, and streaming, or are they spending more in the category of drugstores? And these are things that I want to consider because their Bank of America card already rewards some of the similar categories. So that's ultimately going to help narrow down the tiebreakers. And Melissa, I want to hear your thoughts as well around how someone can make that $795 annual fee on the Chase Sapphire Reserve worth it, as in how can they use all of the points or options that they can get from this card to really justify that cost. So what is your approach to getting the

most out of a card with an annual fee and ensuring that you can maybe hopefully come out ahead of that big price tag? You want to be aware of everything that the card offers. And if there are any dates to keep in mind or any sort of restrictions, for instance, the Sapphire Reserve issues half of a credit during part of the year and then the other half the next part of the year. So these are things you want to keep in mind, an organization is key when you're dealing with the card that has a lot of nuts and bolts because you want to make sure that you're able to make the most out of every single perk that the card offers to justify that fee. But it's important to note that if you don't already spend in these categories or on these services and the card is leading you to

overspend just to make up the cost of that annual fee, in other words, you're spending on things that wouldn't align with your budget or that aren't in your budget, then it's really not worth it. Yeah. I think that's where I land. It's really not worth it because of all the time and effort and organization that would go into justifying the fee for a credit card. I mean, I like my credit card points. Don't get me wrong, but simply not worth it for me. I'd rather spend my time and mental energy elsewhere. I wish I could justify the fee because I do like the card, but I am not interested in a Peloton membership, an Apple TV and Apple Music subscription, and all the rest of the things on that list. So I'm going to have to agree with you, Sean. What else can you do with nearly

$800, Elizabeth? I'm guessing your son would love some toys for that amount of money. No, not another toy for me to step on. But we are trying to go to London in September. And one of the tickets is about $700. So there you go. That's great. And that is definitely how you should be thinking about credit card annual fees. And London, that sounds very exciting. Yes, it's home for us. So it'll be visiting friends and family, but it's been a while. Melissa, can you share if you have any cards with annual fees and how you justify them yourself? Yes. So like you, I am also someone that needs a card that is very simple. I'm not into keeping track of all the different card perks and different incentives, especially if they come with limitations. So I like to choose a simple card that aligns with my spending habits. And it's simple enough that I can keep a mental note to know when I have to. use up a credit, like an annual credit, or where I might have to do any spending that's already

within my budget to make sure that I'm able to make the most of it. Well, thank you for all of your tips and advice around managing this newly, very expensive annual fee. You are very welcome. And that's all we have for this episode. Remember, listener, that we are here to answer your money questions. So turn to the nerds and call or text us your questions at 901-7306373. That's 901-730 nerd. You can also email us at podcast at nerdballot.com. Join us next time to hear about financial advisor fee structures. Follow smart money on your favorite podcast app, including Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and IHeartRadio to automatically download new episodes.

And a reminder that we want to help you with your budget. If you want us nerds to poke around your finances and give you some tips and strategies, head over to the episode description and click the link to fill out the Google form. And here's our brief disclaimer. We are not your financial or investment advisors. This nerdy information is provided for general, educational, and entertainment purposes, and it might not apply to your specific circumstances. This episode is produced by Tess Vigland and Anna Halhawski. Hillary Georgie helped with editing, Nick Krasny mixed our audio, and a big, big thank you to NerdWallis editors for all their help.

And with that said, until next time, turn to the nerds.