The Personal Finance Podcast - Pay Off Debt or Keep Investing? (Money Q&A)

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Starting point is 00:00:50 Hey fruit flies your baby boom ends here Save the Everyday with Amazon On this episode of the first episode of the first personal finance podcast, should you pay off debt or keep investing. We're going to cover it in this money Q&A. Everybody and welcome to the personal finance podcast. I'm your host, Andrew, founder of Mastermoney.com. And today on the personal finance podcast, we're going to be diving into your questions on this money Q&A. If you guys have any questions, make sure you join the Mastermoney newsletter by going to Mastermoney.com slash newsletter. And follow us.

Starting point is 00:01:48 us on Spotify, Apple Podcast, YouTube, or whatever podcast player, you love listening to this podcast on it. If you want to help out the show, consider leaving a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcast, Spotify, or your favorite podcast player. Now, today we're going to be diving into five of your questions here on this episode of Money Q&A.

Starting point is 00:02:09 The first one is going to be, how do I handle high expense ratios in my child's Roth IRA? Should I switch vendors, change funds, or stay the course? Question two is how do I get smarter about small business finances, talking through writeoffs and taxes and making better financial decisions? Question three is, is disability insurance worth it? And who really needs it? And one should I look out for in a policy? And question four is with $150,000 in student loans and a strong investment strategy, should I focus on paying off that debt or should I keep on investing? The last one is, as someone starts a web design side business in California, should they create an

Starting point is 00:02:48 LLC, corporation, or what should they consider long term? And so we have all that more on today's episode of the personal finance podcast. So without further ado, let's get into it. I have a question for this show. I started a Roth for our child and I'm disappointed that the expense ratios for the funds are 52 basis points or 0.52%, 0.98%, 0.96%, 0.95%, and 1.02%. Should I, number one, change vendors. Number two, keep the funds and select new ones for 2026. Number three, change funds within the same vendor. And number four is just take the money out and go to a lower expense ratio fund manager.

Starting point is 00:03:31 Thank you so much for the thoughts. Now, the first thing you need to note when it comes to this is congratulations on even thinking through this. Because it's an amazing thing that you opened up a custodial Roth IRA for your kids. That is going to be a very powerful vehicle for them for a very long period of time. because when you open a custodial Roth IRA for their kids, I want everybody listening just to note this, is when you open one, they have to have earned income. So they can earn income from mowing lawns. They could earn income from working at the local grocery store down the street.

Starting point is 00:04:01 They could earn income if they have a little side business going on online. But they have to have earned income. And however much they earn, that is how much you can contribute to the Roth IRA all the way up to the yearly limit, which is $7,000 per year. So if they only earn $5,000 per year, you can put $5,000 per year into that custodial Roth IRA. If they earn $4,000 per year, you can put up to $4,000 per year. Now, they don't have to put their money into it. You can fund it for them, but those are some of the custodial Roth IRA rules. So if anybody is considering this, make sure you're reading through those

Starting point is 00:04:35 rules before you just open one for your kids. It's very hard to open one if they do not have any earned income. And so when it comes to this question, it is very important to look at expense ratios up front because they have a very long time horizon. And these accounts, if they are financially disciplined later on in life, can grow very, very large. And this is tax-free growth over time. And the last thing you want is some of these fund fees eating into what they are investing in. And so these are four great options here that I am looking at. But high expense ratios can really, really destroy your rate of return.

Starting point is 00:05:09 Because let's say, for example, you invest $10,000 in a fund. And it has that 1% expense ratio versus one with, you know, know, zero point zero five expense ratio. And over the course of 20 years, if you got an 8% rate of return, that fee could cost you over $25,000. And high fee funds are just eating into your compounding power. So it's really important to make sure that you're trying to keep the fees low, specifically in your funds. Now, if you're going to pay a fee, the time to pay a fee is if somebody is helping you in some way, shape, or form, that would be more of interest to me to pay a fee if they're helping me and guiding me. And it's really actually helping me. It is worth the amount

Starting point is 00:05:45 of value that they are giving me. Outside of that, that is where, you know, when it comes to some of these funds, there are so many low-cost options that I would be looking into these low-cost options. So option one is to change vendors. Sure, if these are the options available within your provider, that would be the first thing I'd be looking at doing is changing providers and going somewhere else. Vanguard and Fidelity are what we preach on this podcast all the time. And the reason why we talk about those two providers all the time is because their costs are so low. That is one of the number one things that we look up for up front is do you have really low expense ratio funds? Fidelity is a great example. They have funds that literally have zero percent expense ratios. So you would not

Starting point is 00:06:28 be paying anything in comparison to some of these, which are half a percent all the way up to one percent. It is a massive, massive difference. So every $10,000 invested over the course of that 20 years, you'd be saving that additional $25,000 and allowing that more. money to compound into the future. So very important to look into this is Vanguard and Fidelity. Vanguard funds are also very low expense ratios. And so it's something I would definitely look into as well. That's the only options you have within your provider. And I don't know who your provider is. But if those are the only options that I would consider that first, secondly, though, is I would look for some other options out there. Maybe there are some ETFs. Maybe there are some index funds

Starting point is 00:07:07 within the provider that you currently have that you could invest in with much lower expense ratios. Now, we have something called the investing cheat sheet. And on that cheat sheet, it is one that I will try to make sure that we link that up in the show notes. But with that cheat sheet, we have something like, my favorite index funds in ETFs. It's a big list of them. We also give you that cheat sheet in index fund pro, which is our course on investing and teaching you how to invest for beginners. And so both those places will have that as well. But we'll look at that cheat sheet because those all have very low expense ratios and we're very picky on who we choose there. So, If you keep the funds currently, those would be funds, like for example, for me specifically,

Starting point is 00:07:46 if those were the funds that were available, I would not be interested in them and I probably would not stay the course within those funds. But if you do stay the course, I would definitely look for new ones in the future that are not eating away at your total. You could talk to your financial advisor or whoever else. If you have one, it sounds like you might currently be working with one. Now, option four, you have take the money out and move it to a low fee manager. So if you think that manager can truly, truly help you in the long run, and it will reduce your stress, it will reduce your anxiety. There's nothing wrong with doing that. Just know that when you go to the low fee manager, just run the numbers on what those fees that the manager is charging will cost

Starting point is 00:08:22 you in comparison to just going to a low cost index fund or ETF. So as long as you can kind of think through that, you can do a Roth IRA trustee to trustee transfer and there are no penalties or taxes. And you can transfer it over that way. I actually literally just did this. So I had an old Roth IRA at Merrill Edge, which is like Merrill Lynch, which is a part of Bank of America, that I had neglected to move over. And I just moved it over to Vanguard. I actually did this last week. And it's a very easy process. So if you open your Roth IRA somewhere like Vanguard, for example, Vanguard has a process already in place that allows you to do this with like three clicks of a button where you don't even have to go to Merrill to do this. You actually go to Vanguard's platform.

Starting point is 00:09:02 You log in to Merrill through Vanguard and then say, hey, I want to transfer these funds to my new Roth IRA here at Vanguard. And Vanguard just does it for you. It is so incredibly easy. I couldn't believe how easy it was because I hadn't done it in so long. But it was so incredibly easy. And so you could do that and move it over to Vanguard or if you wanted to move it to a fund manager to help you through the process, you can do that too. Just making sure again that you run the numbers on their expense ratios to ensure and their fees to make sure that it works for you. And high expense ratios absolutely matter, especially in funds. All the funds are competing as a race to the bottom. There are so many low fee, amazing options out there that there is no

Starting point is 00:09:40 reason to be paying high expense ratios and funds. And so for you specifically, I would definitely move these over somewhere else. It seems like every other day there's another financial scam. And we see them day after day, especially with the advancement of AI. And so in order to make sure that you avoid some of those financial scams, you need to have a financial protection plan. And that is why I use Delete Me. Now, Delete Me is by far my favorite service when it comes to getting your personal information removed online. Because if there are some sort of scammer out there who gets a hold of some of your personal

Starting point is 00:10:15 information, they can go out and buy the rest of your information from data brokers. So if there's a data breach and they get your name and your address and maybe your phone number, they can take that information and piece it together with other data brokers out there in order to go out and scam you. I had this happen to me a long time ago, and they were open up student loans in my name, and they were opening up bank accounts in my name, and I don't want that to ever happen to anyone else. And so I found a service called Delete Me. And what Delete Me does is they remove your personal information from these data brokers

Starting point is 00:10:47 so that you don't have to worry about these data brokers having your information. Now, at first, I tried to do this on my own. I tried to get my information removed from data brokers, and it was taking hours and hours and hours. And so then I went and had Delete Me do it for me. And they removed my personal information from thousands of data brokers immediately. And the cool thing that I love about Delete Me is they will continuously keep removing your information from these data brokers. And so they have some amazing plans out there. If you go to join DeleteMe.com slash PFP, you'll be able to get 20% off your delete me plan there. So make sure you go to JoinDeletme.com slash PFP. Again, it is one of my favorite

Starting point is 00:11:25 services that are out there. So definitely go and check that out. You want to make sure that you are protecting your finances online. All right. The next question, I operate a small local business and wonder if you have content on how to become financially intelligent about write-offs, taxes, etc. I wonder if I'm making the right financial decisions and how people smarter than me handle growing, operating a business. So this is a awesome question. And honestly, this is a topic that I love to talk about. I can go on this all day long. And it is one where, Maybe we'll have another show coming out at some point in time where we're kind of talking through business and some of the struggles that we go through and how we handle some of those

Starting point is 00:12:03 struggles and problems, but also how we think about business and scaling and growing into the future. But we're going to talk through, I'll give you a couple of just different pointers, specifically when it comes to taxes and write-offs and some of the things that I do on a weekly basis to make sure that we are looking at the business as an owner and as someone who is operating the business. So the first thing I want you to do is think of the business as something. that you want to make sure that you are developing systems and processes and putting those in place as if you did not have to be there all the time. A lot of times, people who are in local businesses also work in their business. And so for them, a lot of times they have to be the technician.

Starting point is 00:12:42 So maybe if you own a bakery, for example, you're also baking the cakes and you're baking the pies and you're making sure customers are taking care of and you're making sure that you're ringing up the cash register and you're closing down and you're cleaning up. That is something you definitely don't want to be doing. And especially if you want to scale in the future or make a lot more money, you want to make sure that you are working on the business and not in the business. Now, this is a process that takes a lot of time. And coming up with these processes is something that has gotten easier over time, A, because the information that we have, but B, also because that you can utilize systems like AI to help you write standard operating procedures. And so this is something where

Starting point is 00:13:21 if you don't have systems in place already, I'm going to recommend you two books. Traction and the E-Meth. Both are absolutely amazing books. The E-Myth is probably better for small businesses, and then traction as you scale is another great system that you can put into place. And so I'm going to kind of talk through some of this with you, but I would definitely recommend those two first. And then I want you to know your numbers weekly. What is your revenue? What is your expenses? What are your margins between your revenue and expenses? And what is your cash flow? I want you to think about that. And the reason why I want you to know this is because we want to think about our tax situation here in the future as we go through this. Now, I would recommend setting your tax

Starting point is 00:13:57 money aside. You want to budget your money in your business, similarly to how you would budget your personal finances, but it's very important that you have to have a budget when it comes to your business. So I would set your tax numbers aside, you know, 25, 30 percent of profit need to be set aside in order to pay your taxes. You can use a tool like QuickBooks. There's tools like Wave out there. I use QuickBooks because it's just the easiest thing for me and all my businesses are connected there for the most part. So there's a lot of also like more advanced ones that have come out lately that I haven't tried yet. But QuickBooks has sort gotten a little clunky in some areas. But now that they've gone fully online, I think it's been

Starting point is 00:14:32 much, much better. Now to master the write-off game, how do you even think through write-offs? One, you hire people in your corner who are smarter than you when it comes to this. So I have, and I talk about this all the time, I have a CPA who is laser focused on making sure I maximize my tax situation. And he is someone who is also a tax strategist and helps me through all of my business when it comes to ensuring that I am paying the least amount of taxes for what I am doing. Now, this is something where I am very black and white when it comes to this. I only do tax things by the book. I know there's a lot of business owners out there who will kind of try to find lines and stuff like that. I don't play that game whatsoever. If I need to pay my taxes,

Starting point is 00:15:14 I will pay my taxes. Get to Caesar. What is Caesar's? And beyond that, then what I'm going to do is try to figure out legal ways that I can reduce my tax liability. And so here's just some quick and easy ones that you can think about. But first, you need to hire a CPA if you don't already have one. If you're doing your business taxes, that is not something I'd be interested in doing. In the future, it is worth the money, I promise you, especially if they can give you tax strategy. That's the key, though. They have to have some tax strategy background to help you with your write-offs.

Starting point is 00:15:43 So some simple ones, things like business use of your car. You can track your mileage. I use an app called Mile IQ. I think even like QuickBooks has one now that comes free when you use them. There's a bunch of different things out there that you can utilize. Home office expenses. If you work and do the books at your house or if you work and look at these numbers at your house, you have some home office expenses. You can use a portion of your rent or a portion of your mortgage. You can also write off a portion of your utilities. Those are all different things that you can definitely do. Equipment and software use in the business. Make sure you're writing that off. Any equipment that you buy, any software that

Starting point is 00:16:18 buy if you have to go out and buy a new laptop, even if it's only a portion of it being used for your business, you write off that portion. And so those are going to be really important stuff. You got to make sure that you're writing off meals. So meals are 50% deductible if it is with a client or work related. And so if you're going out, let's say, for example, you're married and you go out with your spouse and you guys are talking business at dinner. Well, that meal is a business meal. And you can write that off in the future. Now remember, again, everybody listening right now, I am not a CPA. So you need to talk through with this with your CPA, but I'm telling you some of the stuff that we do that are helpful when it comes to some of your write-offs.

Starting point is 00:16:51 Continuing education. So if you're in, let's keep using the bakery example. If you are a baker and you go and you start taking classes on how to bake the best Italian wedding cakes, well, then guess what? You get to write that off, even if it's something that you're really just interested in or maybe you are really interested in baking cupcakes and you go to cupcake classes and it's fun for you. It doesn't matter if it's fun for you. It's also a write-off because it's part of your business. Marketing and advertising is always, you know, a big one, website costs, social media tools. You can write off the portion of your phone, the percentage of your phone usage that is for business. All of that stuff can come down and be

Starting point is 00:17:27 something that you definitely want to make sure that you were writing off. And then contract labor, freelancers, VAs, those types of things. So here's a good rule. If it's ordinary and necessary for business, it's probably deductible. So again, I am not a believer in toting the fine line with the IRS. I am very black and white when it comes to this. I do everything, the book, and that's just because I really, really value not getting audited. And that's a really important thing I think most people need to value. But three is to make sure that you get that bookkeeper or that tax pro. And so there's a couple of things that you can do. My accountant also does my bookkeeping. So he does my taxes and my bookkeeping for the most part. In my other bigger business,

Starting point is 00:18:08 we had to hire a bookkeeper in-house because there was just so many different transactions going on. I mean, usually any given month, we can have anywhere from three, to 7,000 transactions in a month. And so that we had to have somebody kind of come in and be the dedicated bookkeeper. And then my other accountant just does the tax returns on that. But you're going to make sure that you have a bookkeeper or some sort of tax pro. And A, they'll help you avoid overpaying in taxes. B, they'll legally maximize your deductions that you didn't even know existed. That's the cool thing about them. And C, you can focus on growth and not the spreadsheets. And that's the big thing for you is to make sure that you're focusing on working in the business and on

Starting point is 00:18:45 the business and not on some of these other things. Now, I want you to think like a CFO when you're in your business, even if it's just a small business. What ROI am I getting on each expense? That's number one. Can I increase revenue without increasing overhead? Number two, what am I doing now that doesn't move the needle? That's three. And then why, or do I need to raise prices to tighten margins? And that's four. So thinking like that all the time, asking yourself those tough questions is going to be really, really important to think like a CEO. And then learn from the best. So traction and the e-myth is the first place I would start. But there are a ton of great books out there that I think a lot of people can get a lot of value out of. I'm going to give you a couple here so that you can kind of go through

Starting point is 00:19:26 and utilize some of these books. These are life-changing books for me that I think will help you. So for building and scaling businesses, traction, the e-myth were great. Scaling up is also really good if you're trying to scale your business. And who is how to hire people. That's another great one. And then there's a book that was recommended by Alex Hermose that was called predictable revenue that I absolutely loved. So those are some of the ones on building and scaling a business. If you want some leadership books, like if you have any people in your business that you need some leadership on, unreasonable hospitality is a great one to help your employees understand how to be hospitable. The culture code is another good one.

Starting point is 00:20:04 And the five dysfunctions of a team, if you're trying to build out that team, is also a big one. And then Extreme Ownership by Jocko Willink is another great one. And then some of the other things that I would kind of think through is if you want to go through personal growth, like the compounding effect is great. A complaint-free world is also a good one that helps, you know, with mindset, those types of things. And so I think all of these are really, really great stuff that can help you when it comes to kind of building your business and kind of thinking through that process. I'll try to put together a business book list.

Starting point is 00:20:33 We have all of our business books and we put them out kind of on a weekly basis. It's finance and business books on the master money newsletter. So if you're not on that, we have something called the High Performance Book Club. And every single week, I kind of send you what I'm reading. I have an amazing list that I've been going through lately. And so I want to share that with you guys on what I've been reading lately because I haven't been on fire when it comes to some of these books. And so making sure you go to that high performance book club is going to be a really,

Starting point is 00:20:55 really good spot also. So anyways, good luck with your business. If you have any other business questions, you know, feel free to send them in, everyone. I love talking about that. And we will jump to the next question. All right. So lately, I've been noticing how fast things are changing at home.

Starting point is 00:21:10 The kids are growing like crazy. Clothes don't fit anymore and routines are changing. And it just hits you. Life is expanding. And when your life grows, your responsibility grows with it. That's something I've been thinking about more this spring, making sure the safety net we have in place actually matches the life that we're building. And that's where PolicyGenius comes in.

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Starting point is 00:23:51 Ooh, then it's the vacation of a lifetime. I wonder if my out of office has a forever setting. An IG private wealth advisor creates the clarity you need with plans that harmonize your business, your family, and your dreams. Get financial advice that puts you at the center. Find your advisor at IGPrivatewealth.com. The next question is, would you recommend getting disability insurance? Is there anything that you would look out for when selecting a plan?

Starting point is 00:24:19 I would love to get your thoughts on disability insurance because I've never really heard anyone talk about it, but I was encouraged to get it. So let's start with what it is. So disability insurance is basically income protection. So what you're trying to do is if you get hurt or sick and can't work, disability insurance is going to replace part of your income so you can still cover your bills so that you can feed your family and stay afloat financially. So think of disability insurance is the same or a similar thing as life insurance. It's not that similar, but just think of it as

Starting point is 00:24:48 life insurance, but instead of losing your life, you just get hurt. So if you are someone who goes to work every day and you have to work on your feet and you break your leg and you can't go into work, disability insurance would be something that would help you through that process. If your ability to earn a living is your greatest asset, which it is for most people, disability insurance protects that asset. And that's how I want you to think about it, is you want to make sure that you have it in place if you want to protect that asset. Now, if you have a nest egg that's built up over time and you think you could cover some of your expenses for a longer period of time, and maybe you don't need it, but for some people, you may need it. So you probably will need it if you rely on your paycheck

Starting point is 00:25:27 to pay bills. Okay, that's number one. If you're self-employed or a small business owner without access to sick leave or benefits. That's two. If you're in your peak earning years between your 20s and your 50s is typically when that is, if you have dependents who to rely on your income, that's a big, big one, then you're probably going to need disability insurance. And you don't have massive savings or investments to cover long-term loss of income. So let's say, for example, you have a three-year emergency fund. Well, then maybe you won't need it. But if you're someone who is living paycheck to paycheck, you may want to look into this a little bit more because disability insurance can help you if something happens. Now, you're more likely to become disabled

Starting point is 00:26:03 than die young, obviously, for most people. And so that's why many people need disability insurance even more than life insurance yet few actually haven't. If you're thinking through like the obvious answers, that's something for sure that could happen. Now, you might not need it if you're financially independent. If you're close to retirement with plenty saved, if your partner earns enough to fully support the household, that's a big one for a lot of you married couples out there. If your partner earns enough to help you just get by and support the household, then you will not need it. Or if you already have a strong long-term disability policy through work, then it should be completely fine. Sometimes work will cover your disability policy for you. And so check into that for sure and

Starting point is 00:26:41 check with your HR department to see if they actually have something there. Now, if you're, what's a look for in a policy? There's a couple of things I'm going to give you on tips and guidance on this. So first thing you want to look for is OWN own occupation coverage. So you're protected even if you can't do your specific job. That is one big piece that you want to make sure that you have. But I want you to pay attention to one thing. It's called the elimination period. Now, how long you have to wait before the benefits start? Because is it 60 days? Is it 90 days? You need to know what that number is so that at least at a very minimum you can have an emergency fund saved up. That would be your first goal is to have that emergency fund saved up for that time frame.

Starting point is 00:27:20 So if it takes 60 days before you get your first check or 90 days, you know, that's two to three months. And so if you are living paycheck to paycheck, that elimination period is going to be very important to you to make sure that you know how long you have to wait before those benefits can start. Also, check the benefit period. How long you would receive payments? Is it two years? Is it five years? Or is it until retirement?

Starting point is 00:27:43 Obviously, each one of those is going to change how much the policy costs. But if it's two years, you know, at least that gives you a two-year window to figure things out. If it's five years, that gives you a really nice timeline to figure things out. or if you're just completely disabled for the rest of your life, that is the until retirement benefit that would help you. And you also want to make sure it covers two things. Illness and injury. Okay.

Starting point is 00:28:04 So if you're someone out there who just gets injury coverage, maybe you're a blue collar worker and you're thinking to yourself, well, what if I just, you know, break my leg and I can't go in for a couple of months? That's why I want to get it. But you also need to make sure that you have illness coverage because, God forbid, you have some sort of illness that pops up or cancer or something along those lines. You need to make sure you have coverage for both. that's a very important piece to have when it comes to disability.

Starting point is 00:28:25 So here's the question I want you to ask yourself to kind of end this and I'll wrap this up. If you couldn't work for six to 12 months, how would you pay the bills? If the answer is, I'd be in trouble, then disability insurance is worth seriously considering. And it's not about fear. It's just about protecting your income and your family. It's also about protecting your future self. So we'll do it a second podcast, kind of breaking this down even further. But that's some of the big things that I would be looking for, the big, big points that would really matter to me if I'm shopping around for disability insurance. because I think it's a very important thing for a lot of people to look into.

Starting point is 00:28:55 And with all insurance, the last thing I would say is, you know, a lot of people say they wish they got the insurance. Insurance just protects your income. It protects your money and it protects your financial situation against the things that could happen in life. All right. The next one is, hey, Andrew, I hope this message finds you well. I listen to the podcast religiously and thank you for everything that you do. I recently graduated from graduate school and I love saving. However, I wasn't sure where to start. Thanks to your podcast, I've opened a Roth IRA HSA and ETF, and I am reaching out to seek some guidance on the best approach to managing my finances, specifically in regard to paying off my student debt versus continuing to invest and save for my

Starting point is 00:29:33 future financial goals. First of all, amazing work thus far as even opening those up. It is congratulations on doing that. Here is my breakdown of my current financial situation. Student loan debt. I owe a total of $150,000 in student loans with interest rates ranging from 2% to 8.5%. This is my only debt. Saving in investments, I am saving $1,600 per month towards purchasing my first rental property, which I plan to do in the next couple of months. And I'm contributing $1,180 monthly to my Roth IRA, and I have a 403B where I save 4% of my paycheck. Additionally, I contribute $100 per month to my HSA until I max out my Roth IRA. And once I have maxed out my Roth IRA, my plan is to focus maxing out my HSA. I also invest $60 per month into an ETF, VOO,

Starting point is 00:30:22 Given this situation, I am uncertain whether I should focus on aggressively paying down my student loans or continue with my current investment in savings strategy. My primary concern is balancing the potential long-term growth from investing, especially with the Roth IRA and rental properties, against the interest I'm paying in student loans. I would greatly appreciate your thoughts on what I should do. Should I keep prioritizing my investment strategy? Reallocate some of my savings to aggressively pay down my student debt, particularly the higher interest loans. Thank you so much for your time in reviewing my situation.

Starting point is 00:30:50 So this is something that is a situation. A lot of people have to deal with. And first of all, congratulations on graduating. Congratulations on opening up these accounts. And you are crushing it when it comes to your investment accounts. And that is absolutely amazing what you are doing there. You are going to be building a ton of wealth over time just by what you are doing there. So here's where we're going to think about our student loan debt. Okay. If you're a long time listening, you probably know what I'm going to say here. But anything above that 6% interest rate, we consider high interest debt.

Starting point is 00:31:21 Okay? And because of that, we want to look at these loans and say to ourselves, we have two options here. We can either start aggressively paying these down and trying to get these low. And I don't know what percentage of your loans that is. If you recently graduated, it could be, you know, a big percentage could have gone towards that or it could be a smaller percentage. And we're going to look at those, you know, seven and eight percent rate loans.

Starting point is 00:31:41 And we're going to say to ourselves, how do we get these paid down fast? Now, we could, A, refinance them and move them. into a lower interest debt vehicle, which if they're very, very large, let's say, for example, it's 100 grand. If it's 100 of the 150, that would be something I'd probably be more interested in because aggressively paying down 100 grand really, really quickly is tough. If you're young and you are really this discipline when it comes to your finances thus far, you may be okay in managing this situation where you can kind of move it over to a lower interest vehicle and just begin paying it off, you know, over time. And if you're disciplined in investing your money, your investments

Starting point is 00:32:17 are going to grow really, really rapidly based on what you're doing here. And also, I love that you're saving for that rental property because that just gives you additional options that you may not have had in the future. Also, if you want us to do more real estate content, shoot me an email and I'll absolutely do that. But I want you to rank out those loans. So anything above a 6% we're going to put on one side of the coin, and then anything below 6%, we will just continue making those payments every single month. And then I want you to keep doing what's working. You're saving up for that rental property. It sounds like you want to really get into the real estate game. You're also maxing out your Roth IRA and you are maxing out and moving

Starting point is 00:32:52 money towards your ASSA contributions. Now, the first place I would probably look or consider is maybe the rental property savings into paying down the 8% interest debt. And then once you get that 8% interest debt down and if you don't refinance, then I would kind of move slowly back into the rental property investing game there and saving that cash. Because it's cash that is sitting there, the rate of return on that is not going to be a ton. And it will take you a few years to get enough money to kind of put down on a rental property unless you're going to do some sort of house hack or something else along those lines. So that's probably the money I would utilize towards this short term until you get that paid down. Now, if it's not a lot in the high interest

Starting point is 00:33:28 debt, you could also consider pausing some of the $60 per month, the ETF contributions and putting that towards your high interest debt and then revisiting your budget. So one thing I would also do is look at my budget and say to myself, can I find an extra $200 to $400 per month that I could put towards this debt and make sure that I can carve that out and pay this down. But you, on honestly, are in an unbelievable situation right now, all I would say is I would make these minor tweaks. I would look at one, seeing if I could refinance any of the high interest, if there's a ton of it, and seeing if I can get a low interest rate on that, too, if you can't do that, I would start to reallocate some of the rental property funds towards that high interest debt.

Starting point is 00:34:06 That'd be the first place I would look if it's a large amount. If it's a smaller amount, then I would just look at some of that ETF funds too, that's $60 per month and starting to move that over. And then four is I would look through some of my situation and say to myself, can I find two to $400 extra every single month to put towards this debt? But that 8% interest debt, it cannot linger at that 8%. You want to make sure that you're getting that paid down. And then eventually we can move up and get back to our rent to property saving or whatever our other goals are. So that's how I would approach it. But if you have any other questions on that, let me know. And again, absolutely

Starting point is 00:34:38 amazing job. You are crushing it. And I love, I love, love, love to see. people doing this kind of stuff because it is absolutely amazing. Hey, Andrew, I'm looking to start a side business creating websites marketed to small businesses as I attempt to not only build multiple streams of income, but also detach my time from my money generation, as has been discussed on your podcast. I'm looking at starting my business through a platform called Sight Swan that gives me software to create websites and find leads while being completely white label. My question for you is that as I am just starting out, should I establish an LLC or a corporation for this.

Starting point is 00:35:15 Taking ahead and wanting to eventually buy a business and real estate, what should I consider when comparing these options? For context regarding state laws, I live in California and would be establishing myself there. Thank you, as always, for your awesome content. I'm really enjoying the business show in addition to the Personal Finance Podcast latest episode. Thank you so much for the love there too. And I really appreciate this question because this is a great question. I think a lot of people need to think through.

Starting point is 00:35:38 So when starting out, I always go with an LLC because you can shift this LLC around and it's flexible and you can move it around as time goes on. Now, LLCs are very simple to set up. They're very simple to manage. And especially when you are just getting started, this is the easiest route to take. It's just going with that LLC. They offer that limited liability protection. And so that's one thing that I really love about LLCs, meaning your personal assets are shielded if the business ever gets sued, but they're also flexible for taxes. And by default, it's a pass-through taxation. So you're going to report your profits and losses on your personal return, which is often more favorable when you're small. So those are the three reasons why I would start with the LLC.

Starting point is 00:36:17 Now, as time goes on, and here's the two other considerations, this is an S-Corp. So I have two companies that are in an S-Corp, and when your business earns at least 50,000 or more net and profit annually, you might consider electing to an S-corp because there are some tax considerations that you want to think through. It's going to help you save on self-employment taxes. The thing about an S-corp is you have to pay yourself a reasonable salary, and excess profits can be distributed it as dividends, which may reduce your overall tax burden. And so typically what I will do is you're forced to pay yourself a reasonable salary. But in addition, it helps you with your tax burden overall. And a lot of times I'll pay myself in distributions as well. So I'll make my salary as low as I

Starting point is 00:36:57 possibly can do it legally. And then I'll pay myself in distributions because there are some tax benefits there. Now, C-Corp's are the other option. And those are way more complex. And they're generally not needed unless you plan to raise venture capital or keep profits in the business long-term. but C-Corps are not always, always needed. Now, thinking ahead, again, I would just start off with the LLC. That's the easiest way to do this. But if you're buying businesses, you could also do something like a holding company for anyone out there who's looking to buy businesses.

Starting point is 00:37:24 And for real estate, separate LLC. So you mentioned that you want to invest in real estate. You do not want your website building business to be under the same LLC as your real estate. They need to be two separate things. And a lot of people I know do separate LLCs for each property also. And it just helps with the liability there and really, really important. Now, California has some specific considerations also. They charge a minimum, and I didn't know this until recently,

Starting point is 00:37:46 but they charge a minimum of $800 annual franchise tax for LLC's and corporations, even if you make no money. That is, you know, it doesn't really promote business. I'll just put it that way. Now, some people will start a sole proprietorship and wait until they have traction to form an LLC, but keep in mind, there's no liability protection there. And if you're working with clients, you want to make sure you have some of that liability protection.

Starting point is 00:38:07 But given your long-term goals, I think an LLC makes the most sense in this scenario. Again, I'm not an attorney, but you can talk to an attorney if you need to. But I think a simple LLC makes the most sense. It's what I always, always, always start with with any company that I start is an LLC. Then I'll start to shift it if I need to once revenue comes in and I'm starting to see how much money I'm making. So that's where I would start and then go from there. Now places to open them, you can do it anywhere from legal Zoom to there's a million places to open them online cheap. Or you can go to an attorney and have them open it up for you. You're just going to pay a little bit more. But you will get your questions answered if you have some questions.

Starting point is 00:38:40 feel free to let me know if you have any other questions on that, and I'll be able to help you any way, shape, or form that I can. Listen, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode of the Personal Finance Podcast. If you guys have any questions, please join that Master Money newsletter by going to mastermoney.co slash newsletter, and we may answer your question here on the show. Listen, again, thank you so much for being here and we will see you on the next episode.

The Personal Finance Podcast - Pay Off Debt or Keep Investing? (Money Q&A)

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