The Personal Finance Podcast - The BEST Brokerage Accounts (Plus The Best Cash Back Cards This Year) - Money Q&A

Episode Date: April 12, 2023

In this episode of Money Q and A, we're gonna talk about the best cashback cards for 2023 and a bunch more. How Andrew Can Help You:  Join The Master Money Newsletter where you will become smarter with your money in 5 minutes or less per week Here! Learn to invest by joining  Index Fund Pro! This is Andrew’s course teaching you how to invest!  Watch The Master Money Youtube Channel!  Ask Andrew a question on Instagram or TikTok.  Learn how to get out of Debt by joining our Free Course  Leave Feedback or Episode Requests here.  Thanks to Our Amazing Sponsors for supporting The Personal Finance Podcast. Chime: Start your credit journey with Chime. Sign-up takes only two minutes and doesn’t affect your credit score. Get started at chime.com/ Thanks to Ka’Chava For Sponsoring the show! Go to kachava.com/pfp and get 10% off on your first order.  Shopify: Shopify makes it so easy to sell. Sign up for a one-dollar-per-month trial period at  shopify.com/pfp Policygenius: This is where I got my term life insurance. Policygenius is made so easy. To get your term policy go to policygenius.com and make sure your loved ones are safe. Hello Fresh: Check out Hello Fresh www.hellofresh.com/pfp50 and use promo code PFP50 for 50% off your first order and free shipping!  Links Mentioned in This Episode:  JL Collins Blog Stacked Book M1 Finance The Best Cashback Cards Chase Freedom Flex Capital One Quicksilver Cash Rewards Credit Card Capital One SavorOne Cash Rewards Credit Card Citi Custom Cash℠ Card Citi® Double Cash Card Blue Cash Preferred® Card from American Express Blue Cash Everyday® Card from American Express New to Credit: Capital One Quicksilver Secured Cash Rewards Credit Card Business: Chase Business Ink Cashback Credit Card Youtube  The Complete Guide to VTI (Vanguard Total Stock Market Index ETF) The Warren Buffett Portfolio: Simplify with Only 2 Index Funds The 6 Best Charles Schwab Index Funds to Buy and Hold for Life!  Connect With Andrew on Social Media:  Instagram  TikTok Twitter  Master Money Website  Master Money Youtube Channel   Free Guides:   The Stairway to Wealth: The Order of Operations for your Money  How to Negotiate Your Salary  The 75 Day Money Challenge  Get out Of Debt Fast  Take the Money Personality Quiz Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Find your advisor at IG Private Wealth.com. On this episode of Money Q&A, we're going to talk about the best cashback cards for 2023 and a bunch more. What's up, everybody, and welcome to the Personal Finance Podcast. I'm your host, Andrew, founder of Mastermoney.com. And today on Money Q&A, we are going to be talking about a bunch of different things, including what the best cashback cards are for 2023. If you guys have any questions, make sure you hit us up on Instagram.

or Twitter at Master Money Co and follow us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or whatever podcast player you're listening to this podcast on right now. And if you want to hop out the show, leave a five-star rating and review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify or your favorite podcast player. I cannot thank you guys enough for leaving those five-star ratings and review. So today, we're going to be going through a number of your different questions. So the first thing we're going to be talking about is my favorite brokerage accounts and which type of brokerage accounts you should potentially open

based on what you're investing in. And in addition, what type of accounts you're looking for if you're looking for a Roth IRA, an IRA, or just a taxable brokerage account. The second thing we're going to be talking about is my favorite books for people who are in their early 20s or 30s and learning how to build wealth. But these books aren't just for people

in their early 20s or 30s. It's also for anybody looking to learn how to build generational wealth. Got a bunch of book recommendations for you. That question came in on, Instagram. Then we're going to talk about what the best cashback credit cards are for 2023 and we'll talk through which credit cards are best based on where you spend your dollars. And then lastly, we're going to talk about how do I recommend someone do their tax return if they are just a normal 9 to 5 W2 employee with a brokerage account. So we're going to go through

these four questions today in Money Q&A. If that's something you're into, let's get into it. All right, so question number one is, what are my favorite brokerage accounts? So I get this question all of the time on social media. I've answered it a few times on social media, but I'm going to go through my top brokerage accounts and why I like these companies over maybe some of the others. Now, some of this depends on what you're investing in and your financial situation. So you have to take into consideration what you are investing in, what financial situation you are in, what accounts you want to open, how you want to expand your portfolio over time, all of these different things. Now, obviously, you can move money over very easily when it comes to investing from taxable brokerage

to taxable brokerage. So making sure that you just make this decision early on and just go with it. I don't want you to take a bunch of time trying to decide which one you want to go with. If there's one that you think might be a little bit better for you, then just run with it and go with that one. It doesn't really matter when it all bakes down. If you choose from any of these four, it doesn't truly, truly matter that much. The differences are for. pretty minor. So the first one, and this is one that I absolutely love for ETF investors or if you're an individual stock investor is M1 Finance. And M1 Finance is a brokerage account that really has a very modern dashboard and they're adding a lot of new features. This is why I really, really like

M1 Finance for all the new features they continue to add. So I've been talking about M1 Finance for a very long time since the beginning of this podcast because of the modern dashboard, because of the features they offer. So if you like looking into investments and having things set up in a modern way, M1 finance is the best option on this list. Now, they only have ETFs. They do not have index funds. Does that matter? To me, it does not matter.

In fact, for beginner investors or most investors, I like ETFs for the flexibility. Usually they have even lower cost than a lot of index funds. And so investing in M1 finance gives you that option. And when you invest in ETFs, you can create portfolios. And in one finance, they call them pies. So when you create these portfolios, you can put together a three fund portfolio,

a Warren Buffet portfolio. you can put together as many funds as you want and have these pies in place where it's a very visually appealing way to invest your dollar. So that's one thing I like about pies is they're visually appealing. But once you have that set up and you have your pie in place and you know exactly how much your asset allocation you want inside of that pie, meaning what percentage of stocks, what percentage of bonds, what percentage of international funds all inside of that fund, then you can rebalance automatically every single year where typically you have to rebalance by going in there, figuring out, doing some math, and rebalancing your portfolio.

With M1 Finance, they have a new button that you can just push, and it rebalances your portfolio automatically for you. This is amazing for, if you're looking to tax loss harvest, this is amazing for a number other reasons as well, including saving you time from rebalancing. We don't really want to spend a lot of our time rebalancing if that's something you're interested in. So M1 Finance has an automatic rebalance feature. Now, you can open a IRA at M1, you can open a Roth IRA at M1, a lot of other accounts as well. They have checking now and savings builder.

So M1 Finance is a great all-in-one finance app that's available for you. Now, another thing that they do is you can actually borrow on margin at M1 Finance at a very competitive rate. In fact, they have some of the most competitive rates out there, meaning you can borrow against your investment account if you need that for maybe a backup emergency fund, for example. Or you can borrow against your investment account if you wanted to invest in a rental property and you had your investment account available in there. So these margin accounts are something I don't recommend unless you are really financially

literate. But if you want that available to you, M1 Finance does have these margin accounts that have a competitive rate, much more competitive than these other options, where some of these other options will allow you to invest on margin, but the interest rate is way too high. It's above that 6 to 7% range that I want you to stay below, especially when it comes to taking your money and making sure that you are smart with debt. So that is one where you definitely can look at that in M1 finance as well. Now, the cons of M1 finance, one thing I don't like about M1 finance is that you only have specific trading windows every single day unless you pay them a monthly fee. So these specific trading windows are twice per day, but unless you're a day trader, it doesn't

really matter for most people. So that's one con that I have with M1 finance. And the second con is there's no index funds, but it doesn't really matter if you're investing in ETFs. You're going to get the same returns or very similar returns. Number two is the OG of the index fund, which is Vanguard. Now, Vanguard is one that I've been investing in for a very long time. I've had a Roth IRA for years at Vanguard. and Vanguard has by far my favorite ETFs and index funds. Now, if you invest in M1 Finance, you can buy Vanguard ETFs at M1 Finance, which is what I do. But if you invest at Vanguard, they have some of the best OG index funds. In fact, Jack Bogle is the father of index funds and the creator of index funds,

and he founded Vanguard as well. So Vanguard has investors' interests at heart. And Vanguard is one of the best brokerage accounts. If you're like, I don't know which one of these to choose, I just cannot make up my mind. just go with Vanguard because they have their investors best interest at heart if you don't need all the fancy features if you don't want all this additional stuff in place just look at Vanguard. Vanguard is always a great place to invest. Now it does not have a modern dashboard. In fact, they are kind of behind when it comes to that, but it's still one of my favorite places to invest. And if you really can't decide,

that's the one I would look at for sure. Now, the next one is Fidelity. And Fidelity is an interesting one because Fidelity has a ton of different investment options available to you. In fact, when I look at Fidelity, I think they have probably the most investment account options that are out there. For example, if you want a charitable account, they have that available to you. If you want your 529, they have that. If you want a specific type of 529, they have that available for you. If you want to have a taxable brokerage account, Roth IRA, if you want to have an IRA, if you're self-employed and you want a 401K, they have all of these things available to you at Fidelity.

So I have my kids 529 accounts at Fidelity. I have a taxable brokerage at Fidelity as well that I've had for years and years and years. In fact, that taxable brokerage account that I have at Fidelity was the first account I ever opened as a teenager and I still have that account. So I like Fidelity. I've had Fidelity for the longest out of any of these. And I don't think you can go wrong with Fidelity. In addition, Fidelity also is the first company to do zero cost index funds. Now, these index funds, we talk about a lot in Index Fund Pro. These zero cost index funds do not have a long history yet, but they did introduce those in 2017, 2018, somewhere in that range where they had index funds.

they have zero percent expense ratios. So looking at those Fidelity index funds, if you want a zero percent expense ratio, that's another option for you at Fidelity. Now, if you want a Vanguard index fund, I would not buy a Vanguard index fund at Fidelity because they charge you like a $25 fee every time you buy that Vanguard index fund.

So if you're looking for a specific index fund, you like VTSAX, for example, the Vanguard total stock market index fund the most, then looking at Vanguard be your option. But if you like those zero fee funds at Fidelity, then going with Fidelity would be a great option. In Charles Schwab, I have limited experience, with. I haven't used them a ton, but I've done videos on them on YouTube and really dove deep into

Charles Schwab and they are a great brokerage as well. And you can see, even as of recent, a lot of companies have been putting more dollars into Charles Schwab. They have great index funds there as well. Now, if you're confused on which index funds you may be interested in, we have done videos for Vanguard. We have done them for Fidelity and we've done them for Charles Schwab on the Master Money YouTube channel on my favorite index funds. And I do deep dives into each one of these. We put a lot of of work into these and we use Y charts to deep dive into my favorite index funds. We go through the returns. We go through the top holdings, all of those different things. So make sure you check out the Master Money YouTube channel if you're interested in my favorite index funds for each of these

brokerages because we do a ton on there. We are really improving those videos as well if you were interested in that. So those are my top four brokerage accounts. But the key here is just choose one, start investing and build that investing habit. The most important thing that you can do is get started and build the habit. The habit in place, even if you don't have a lot of money, building that habit, putting it into place, even if it's $50, $100, $150 per month, and making sure you do it every single month because the habit is more important than how much you're investing, especially if you're young. Now, as you age and if you're older, it is never too late to start investing, you need to open one of these brokerage accounts as soon

as possible and start investing your dollars to start to grow your wealth and build your wealth. So just choose one, run with it, and let's get started investing. All right, question number two is, what are my favorite books for people in their early 20s looking to build wealth? So these books that I'm going to mention here, I got five of them that I'm going to mention today. In these books, these are not just for people in their early 20s, although everybody in their early 20s should be reading these books. But these are also for any age whatsoever. If you're looking to build wealth, these will change your perspective on wealth. Number one is the simple path to wealth.

Why do I recommend that first for everyone? Because the simple path to wealth is literally what the title states. it will put together a wealth building plan for you to achieve financial independence in the most simple way possible. In fact, the investment portfolio that J.L. Collins uses in that book is a simple one fun portfolio. We did a YouTube video on that one fun portfolio if you want to check that out on the Master Money YouTube channel. But that one fun portfolio is a very powerful portfolio where all he invests in is VTSAX. And we break it down in that video so that you can deep dive into that. But also, the simple path to wealth, J.L. Collins wrote that to his daughter, so she had everything that he knew about achieving financial independence and freedom. And there's a lot of philosophy in there as well. Also written by J.L. Collins, on his blog is something called a stock series. I would recommend everybody go read the J.L. Collins stock series. We can link it up down below as well. In that stock series, he truly goes through some of the best writing out there that you can read when it comes to learning how to invest your dollars. And I read it in my early, early 20s, and it really changed my perspective when it.

it came to investing your dollars as well. Number two is a newer one. This came out last year, and the author came on this podcast, and it is called Just Keep Buying by Nick Majulia. Nick Majulie is one of my favorite finance writers. If you don't follow his blog, dollars in data, he has great articles once per week, every single week that come out, and they are definitely worth the read. But Just Keep Buying is a great baseline to learn about how to think about money and how to think about personal finance. And he gives you actionable tactical tips. In addition, to some amazing philosophies when it comes to learning how to build wealth. So reading Just Keep Buying is a fantastic book. It is definitely a classic for most people. I think most people need to read that

book. Number three, and this had the greatest impact on me early on in my life is the millionaire next door. If you've never read this book, the millionaire next door teaches you that true wealth, building true wealth is not the flashy cars, it's not the massive houses, it's not having all of these different flashy things. Most people who build generational wealth live in standard living You can look at something like Warren Buffett who still lives in the same exact house that he originally bought at the beginning of his career. He lives in his first house. And so you can look at this for a lot of different instances.

And then all of a sudden you're going to realize that really wealthy people, not all of them live in these giant mansions. They fly in private jets. They have all these mega yachts. Instead, what they do is they live a very normal lifestyle and save a large portion of their income so that they can have freedom instead. And so the millionaire next door goes through that and it goes through a ton of different statistics on people that they interviewed and they interview tons of different millionaires.

They go through it, talking to all of them and how they invest their money and what they do and the habits they've built. It is an absolute must read if you have never read that book. The next one is Get Good with Money. And Tiffany Aliche just came on this podcast. One of the best books I've read in the last couple of years as well. And she talks about financial wholeness in that book. And she gives you all 10 different things to become financially whole from tracking your money to investing.

She goes through insurance. She goes through things like estate planning. So get good with money is a fantastic book. If you have not read it yet, I would definitely read through it. Even if you feel like your financial situation is all put together, Tiffany is absolutely amazing. And this book is absolutely amazing as well. And then number five, the fifth one I'm going to give you, and I'm not giving you a lot of common ones for a very specific reason because I think there's a lot of really good personal finance books that have come out within the last couple of years.

The fifth one is a friend of mine, Joel Saul, See High, and it is called Stacked. Now, Stacked is one of the best books that have come out in the last couple of years as well. Why? Because Stacked gives you a bunch of really actionable personal finance advice, but it also does it in a very, very entertaining way. So if you know Joe, and Joe has been in this podcast recently also, which we will link up down below. We'll link up all the interviews for the three authors that I'm talking about here that have been on this podcast. Joe is always lighthearted. Joe is always having fun. And the thing about this book is that it is a really fun read. And if you find personal finance, to be really boring and you're looking for exciting ways to kind of get into this so that you can get your money right and put it all together so you don't have to think about it anymore. Then Stacked is a great one because he has entertaining things that he goes through in there. There's a bunch of jokes. There's a bunch of dad jokes in there as well if you like those. So Stacked is a fantastic one because he goes through his entire process, but he does it in an entertaining way. And it's also co-authored by Emily Guy Berkin as well. And so she and him put together just it's a great combo for that book.

Absolutely love that book. So those are the five books I would recommend if you're looking to wealth in your 20s, 30s, 30s, 40s, it doesn't matter what age. Those are five of my favorites right now. I remember when I needed to hire someone fast, but finding the right person quickly felt impossible. And if you've ever been there, you know how stressful this can be. That's where Indeed comes in. When it comes to hiring, Indeed is all you need. Instead of struggling to get your job post noticed, Indeed's sponsor jobs help you stand out and hire faster. Your post jumps up to the top of the page, making sure it reaches the right candidates. And it makes a huge difference. Sponsored jobs on Indeed get 45% more applications than non-sponsored ones. And there's no need to

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All right. So question number three are what are the top? cashback cards for 2023 or for this year. So I get questions about credit cards all the time. In fact, I need to probably talk about them a little bit more in this podcast because I get questions so often. And we've talked about travel hacking. If you haven't heard that episode, we kind of go through my favorite cards. In addition, we have an episode with my friend Chris Hutchins, who is the host of the All the Hacks podcast. He goes through some really cool ways to use your credit cards and how to use them in a smart way. In addition, though, I'm going to go through today some

of my favorite cashback cards right now. And it depends on your situation. So we're going to go through, you know, based on where you shop and how you spend your dollars, which cards are best for you. Because that's how you got to think about credit cards is where do you spend most of your dollars and based on that, then you can decide which card is best for you. Or if you have different goals like travel hacking goals, for example, then making sure that you pair this together with your travel hacking goals is going to be a very important thing. Or if you run a business, what's the best cashback business card?

So I'll show you my favorite cashback business card today so you have that information. So the first one I'm going to talk about is the Blue Cash Preferred card by American Express. Now, this is best for people who spend a lot of money on groceries. If you spend a large portion of your income on groceries, this is a fantastic choice. Now, what is the bonus on this one? So you can earn a $250 statement credit after you spend $3,000 in purchases on your new card within the first six months. Not a great bonus incentive there compared to like travel hacking cards. If you look at the Chase Sapphire or the Chase preferred, not the best bonus in the world.

But if you spend money on groceries, and this is where the key comes into here, you get 6% cash back on supermarkets and 3% cash back at gas stations. So this is a great card to use for all your grocery shopping trips because you get 6% cash back up to $6,000 per year in purchases. So another place you get 6% cash back on this card is with streaming subscriptions. So if you a lot of streaming subscriptions, maybe you spend $100, $150 per month on streaming because you cut the cable cord. this is another great option for that.

3% back on taxis, ride sharing, parking, trolls, trains, buses, and more. Then you get 3% back on gas station. So transportation costs. If you have high transportation costs or food costs, which is a big part of the big three, it's going to be a big portion of your budget, and this is a great one. And then 1% cashback on all other purchases. So this is very, very high for supermarkets. It's very, very high for food.

You're not going to find anything any higher than this. So it's a great option for that. Now, there's an annual fee of $95. but for the first year it's wave. So if you go through the first year and you figure out, hey, this one's not worth it for me, then potentially you could close this card if you figured that is the best option for you.

Now, with all of these credit cards that I'm talking about here, we're going to link them up down below in the show notes so that you have instant access to that. In addition, I'm going to send you the page where we talk about each of these cards as well. These are affiliate links, and it will help support the show

that if you open up one of these cards, please do it through our affiliate links. It helps support the show. We truly appreciate that as we go through these. So the Blue Cash, preferred card from American Express is by far my favorite one when it comes to opening a card if you spend a lot of money on groceries and if you spend a lot of money on gas. Now, if you spend a lot on everyday items, that's the second one we're going to be looking at. We're going to look at three of

them here on everyday items. So the first one is the city double cash card. And with the city double cash card, this is one of the bread and butter when it comes to spending money on everyday items. And it is widely regarded as the best cashback credit card on the market for everyday spend. And the reason for this is because city double cash earns you 1% when you buy and 1% when you pay the minimum amount due. So when you buy something, you're going to get 1% cash back on everything you buy. Then when you pay the bill, you get an additional 1% cash back on every time you pay the bill. But the key here is the reason why people love this card is there is a $0 annual fee. So this $0 annual fee is going to be one that allows you to get that cash back

without having a fee at all. Now, they don't have a bonus at the time recording this. Now, make sure you're looking at the current bonuses, if you're listening to this later on. If you're listening to this a year from now, for example, make sure you're looking at the current bonuses because these bonuses change all the time. But this is by far a great set it and forget it. If you don't want to deal with all this crazy stuff and you just want to set it and forget it, get a couple percent cash back and you don't spend money specifically anywhere, this is a great one on everyday purchases, the city double cash. The next one is the Capital One QuickSilver Cash Rewards card. So this one does have a bonus. So it's a $200 one-time bonus after you spend

$500 on purchases within the first three months of account opening. This also has a $0 annual fee, but you earn 1.5% cash back on everyday purchases. City double cash is 2%. This is 1.5% cash back on everyday purchases. Now, this is a decent, no fee cashback card and is one that you can definitely look at. And it also has 0% balance transfers and 0% APR on purchases for the first 15 months as well. So you can balance transfer over to this card. And for the first 15 months, you'll have 0% intro APR. That is a definite consideration for folks who have the credit score to be able to open this, but in addition, one, a transfer over a balance that maybe has a high interest rate.

Now, comparable to this would be the Chase Freedom Flex also, which we'll talk about in a little bit here. And the Chase Freedom Flex is going to be one that you can compare to this, but this is great for everyday purchases. Now, another one, if you go to restaurants a lot by Capital One, is the Capital One Savor One Cash Rewards Credit Card. Now, with the Savor One Cash Rewards Credit Card, you also earn a one-time $200 cash bonus after you spend $500 in the first three months.

But this is where it really becomes valuable is if you do a lot of entertainment spending, maybe you go to a lot of concerts or you go to a lot of different things. This one allows you to get 8% cash back on Capital One entertainment purchases. So inside of Capital One, they have a dashboard there that allows you to go through and buy tickets for concerts, things like that. You get 8% cash back if you do that. So for example, I have friends in Florida here who go to every single country concert that comes through the state of Florida.

And so when they do that, this would be a perfect card for the. them because they're spending hundreds of dollars every single month, if not more, on concerts. And so spending 8% cash back will be a great option. I also have friends who go to every single jazz concert that comes through the area. This would be another great option for that as well. You also earn unlimited 3% cashback on dining, entertainment on anything outside of the Capital One portal or popular streaming services. So this one has 3% cash back on a lot of other options and 1% on other purchases. So I actually like this one a little bit more than the Quicksilver. you are spending money on dining a lot or if you're going out a lot. This is a great card for you

and then 1% on other purchases, whereas the traditional Quicksilver gets you 1.5% on other purchases. Now, there's no annual fee for the saver one also, so you can check that one out. And it's just a decent no-fee cashback card. Now, if this is your first card or your student, there's two options here. The Chase Freedom Flex, which is very similar to the Capital One Quicksilver, but the Chase Freedom Flex, Flex, $200 bonus cashback. If you spend $500 within your first three months, but here's what I like. And this card I hold in my wallet. I have the Chase Freedom Flex in my wallet currently, and I use it because I like the Chase ecosystem when it comes to combining points, but I also love the Capital One ecosystem as well. But this one has definitely

always been in my wallet for a very long time. And you earn 5% cashback on up to $1,500 in combined purchases in bonus categories, which rotate every quarter. So they have bonus categories that are available to you rotating every quarter. And you can earn up to $1,500 on that, which is why they call it the Freedom Flex. You can also earn 5% back on travel purchase through Chase, which is a great perk if you'd travel hacking. But I would probably look at the Sapphire before this if you're looking to travel hack, if you're looking at Chase ecosystem, or the Sapphire preferred, or the other Sapphire cards as well. And then 3% back on dining and restaurants, which is awesome and drugstore purchases. So if you spend a lot of money at drugstores,

3% back cash back on that and then 1% on all others, $0 annual fee. So this is a newer card, but because of the incredible bonuses, especially 5% back on bonus categories, this is one that I like more than the Quicksilver because of this reason and because they have those rotating categories. So I think this is one that is a much better one. That's why I keep it in my wallet because of those rotating categories. So this is great zero fee annual card. One of my favorites for beginners as well as the Freedom Flex because the Chase ecosystem, you can transfer points around so that you can get those dollars in the right places, especially if you're looking at travel hack. They also have a Chase Freedom card for students. So, For college students, I always get that question all the time. If you want to have a credit card but you have enough money to pay off that card or you just want to start building credit, this is a great student card to look into. You get $50 bonus cash back. If after one purchase is made within the first three months, great perk there, you get $50 cash back just for making one purchase.

And if you're a student looking to build credit, this is a great option or a secured card, something like the Chime Credit Builder is also a great option because what you can do there is you can put one bill on the card. Maybe you just fill up your gas tank or you buy your groceries on one card and that's all you use that card for and then you pay it off in full every single month that's the key here you have to pay it off and full every single month I pay my off weekly so that I don't get behind or anything like that but making sure you pay it off in full every single month you're going to have a longer credit history which is really going to build up

your credit over time so this is a great one for students who are just starting off now if you have a business my favorite business card overall this is an amazing card is the chase ink business cash credit card now with the chase ink business cash credit card you're going to get a massive bonus on this. $750 bonus cash back after spending $6,000 on purchases within the first three months. So if your business spends $2,000 or more per month on a credit card, this is a great option for you there because you earn 5% cash back on the first $25,000 spent in combined purchases at office supply stores on internet, cable, phone services, and each account anniversary year. So 5% back on all of those items. Then you earn 2% cash back on the first 25% cash back on the first

$25,000 spend in combined purchases at gas stations and restaurants at each account anniversary year and then 1% cashback on all other purchases with no limit whatsoever. The key there is no limit. Because if you run a business and you spend a lot of money in that business, having no limit available 1% cashback is awesome. And it comes with that $75,000 point bonus. So they market it as $750. But $75,000 points is the key here because if you utilize those points for travel, you can

get a lot more out of it than $750. In fact, you can transfer it over to your Chase Sapphire or vice versa. You can transfer your Sapphire points over to the Inc card and you can use those for travel hacking. So if you have a business, even if you have an LLC, you can open a card like this, have it open and spend for your business purposes and get this bonus and it's going to allow you to really get a lot of extra points when it comes to travel hacking. So this is a great card. I hold this card in my wallet, but I hold the Chase Inc. Business Preferred card in my wallet. So Chase Inc. is my go-to when it comes to business cards right now. I think it's a great card to have in your business also. So if you guys have any questions about these cashback cards, make sure you'll let me know. And check those links down

below if you want to read up on some of these. These are the master money links that we have available down there. And if you're going to get one of these cards, please do it through our links. It really does help out the show. So we truly appreciate that now. Let's get to the next question. All right, the next question is, how do you recommend someone do taxes as a single person with a nine to five and a brokerage account? So this is the part where you have to make a choice on how you want your taxes to be done and what you think is going to happen in the future because for me, I wanted to build generational wealth. My tax situation was going to get more complicated. So what I did when I was in this exact situation is I went ahead and I hired an accountant. I did my own taxes for

the first couple of years via turbo tax and just didn't love the process or doing it whatsoever. And sometimes I'd be doing my taxes and I wasn't positive if everything was 100% correct. I'd have to go ask a bunch of people and go do a bunch of research. This was early, early on in my early early 20s. And so when I went to this process, I just was never comfortable. So I ended up hiring an accountant and made everything so much easier. And I actually learned so much more and mastered a lot of different accounting principles because I hired that accountant. They would teach me all of these pieces that I needed to understand. So here's how to figure out if hiring a CPA is worth it is the first thing to understand. So if your taxes are complex and if you don't have the

patience or skill to do your own taxes or if you are unsure how specific tax laws worked, then that may be a good reason to hire a CPA. If you're okay with those things, if you're okay with doing it on your own and you're okay with doing it with a free tax software or a $40 tax software, then that's fine as well. Now, how much does a CPA cost for someone who just has a W-2? It's not going to be a lot. And it depends on the state you live in and the actual CPA that you hire, but it's anywhere from $100 all the way up to $5, $6, $700. I wouldn't pay much more than that if you just have a W-2. But for example, I just talked to a friend who did this with just a W-2 and they spent $1,000,000, $75 on their CPA. Or you could have turbo tax to it. Now, I think I originally spent three or

$400 on my CPA, but it was with two tax returns, my wife's and I. When we just had W2, now I spend obviously a lot more on that. I spend a lot on accounting every single year because our situation has gotten much more complex with different businesses and things that we run now. But originally, it just wasn't that expensive. And it was something that gave me peace of mind. But in addition, they found tax breaks that are going to allow you to save money. Now, when I say this, as your tax situation gets more complicated, spending money on an accountant is the best dollars that you can ever, ever, ever spend because they're going to save you so much more money when it comes to your tax situation. In fact, a certified financial planner, some of the best things

that they can provide for you is tax strategy. Well, an accountant that can also be a tax strategist is one of the most valuable things that you can have under your belt. I'm going to go through the ways that someone with the W-2 should be filing their taxes and obviously talk to a tax professional or seek professional advice if you're unsure about some of this stuff. But when I go through some of this, I'll show you how an accountant can actually help you as well. So the first one is gathering your tax documents. So every year my accountant, give me the tax documents that they need. I gather those documents.

I upload them to a portal. And once it's uploaded in that portable, they take care of everything else. So the most work that I have to do is gathering my documents, which is not fun. Let's get real. It's never fun to gather all these documents, especially when you have a million different brokerage accounts like me, because part of my job when it comes to hosting this podcast is trying out different brokerage accounts. So I have a bunch of different forms that come back from brokerage accounts and businesses

and all these other things. Number two is determine your tax filing status. So an accountant's going to walk you through and figure out what the best status is for your personal situation, especially if you're single. It's going to be pretty obvious on what your situation is going to be, like in this question. But if you're married, then maybe your status is going to be something very different. Then they're going to determine your taxable income. So your taxable income is your total income minus any deductions or exemptions.

So are you going to take the standard deduction? Is that your best option? Or do you have enough deductions within your tax return that's going to allow you to reduce the amount of money that you actually have to spend on taxes. Your accountant's going to help you with that. That is a very valuable information if they can find more than the standard deduction when it comes to filing your taxes. And then they're going to help you understand tax deductions and credits. So you've got to understand this stuff if you're doing it on your own. If you don't understand tax deductions and credits, turbotax sometimes will spit out random things for you to have for tax credits and deductions. And it is very helpful. But if you don't understand this stuff, then an accountant's going to help you with that as well.

They're also going to complete your tax return and send it off for you and file your tax return. And then they're going to pay any tax owed. So all of this process is what they're going to help you do if you're a W-2 employee is go through all seven of these steps that we just talked about here. And if you would rather just hand that off to somebody, it is a very easy thing. So all you would do is collect the documents, hand it off. You'd have a meeting. They'd go through the process and they'd file your return. You probably have one meeting before you file the return.

And that's it. It's a very simple process for you as long as you can get those documents together and you keep track of those documents. throughout the year. So I am very pro-accountant because of that reason. I'm very pro-good accountant. Now, how do you find a good accountant? I would ask family or friends in your area. I've asked my accountant before if he is taking on any more clients. And he has said he's only taking on businesses now because every time I talk about him and people have asked about their firm and I send them their way, they just get flooded every time. So what I would do is I would ask your friends and family if they have an accountant that they like or they enjoy if you're looking for one in that area so that you can

interview that accountant and see if it's the best option for you. Listen, I hope you guys, enjoyed this episode of the Personal Finance Podcast. If you guys have any questions, make sure to hit us up on Instagram or Twitter at Master Money Co. And if you got value out of this episode, don't forget to share this episode with the family or friend as well. Thank you guys so much. I truly appreciate each and every single one of you for listening to this episode. We will see you on the next episode. Rosen lasagna, medium power, 15 minutes. Sounds like Ojo time. Let's play. Feel the fun with Playojo. The online casino with all the latest slacks.

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