Goal setting; we all know we should do it, but what makes it so difficult to take this first step? Maybe we don't believe it works, or maybe it's the fear of failure - no matter the reason it remains true that if we don't know where we are going, any road will get us there. Join us in our discussion with Brian from SAVVI financial about the importance of goal setting and how to do it in a way that makes sense to YOU!
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Episode eighty three, Goal Setting for Financial Success. Welcome to the Frugal Friends podcast, where you'll learn to save money, embrace simplicity, rights, and liver with your life. Here your host Jen and Jill who Gonna Set them Goals. Welcome to another episode of the Frugal Friends podcast. My name is Jen, this is Jill, and today we're talking about goals. Set them, goals them, reaching them, make new ones, ye set them up, knock them down, build them back up again bowling and we have Brian Harrison from Savvy Financial with us to talk a little bit more about goal set thing. But first let's talk about our sponsors. Let's do it. Today's episode is also brought to you by vision Boards. Ever want to do something then forget you want to do it. That can throw your decisions all off kilter. Don't let that happen to you. Put your dreams on a vision board. From the magazines that brought you Decapage and collages comes vision boards. Cut out pictures of your dreams and glue them to paper so you don't forget what you're doing. All of this for vision boards, that picture of a beach will only make you feel depressed for a little while. Yes, there's something about this process that makes me think of Oprah. I don't know if she was the first one to talk about doing this. I just remember some dude who like made a million dollars talking about how he did this one time, and I'm like, I don't know about them vision boards. I think it's just what I look at in the cold darkness of winter, wishing I was on a beach. That's the wrong kind of vision board. When you're like looking at that beach and it's you're so depressed and you can't go anywhere because you're not spending any money, and like, well, that's that's a vision. It's not the kind of vision I need right now. But it's a vision. It's a vision, and it's on the look. It's on a board, and then it starts to fray because magazines weren't meant to last for an eternity, and it's taking you an eternity to get to the beach. So sad, now we've thoroughly depressed you. Let's talk about goal setting, some real goal setting that is based on fraying magazine pictures. Yes, so we could just sit here and talk about like why it's important to set goals and like to find smart goals. But we are not that basic, So we are going to get into the nitty gritty of goal setting, why you should do it, smart goals and all the things I said. We're basic, but like we're going to get into them deeper. So buckle up if you're in your car and get ready for a ride. Uh, you should just be buckled already. Yeah, But anyway, we're going to go through an article, and then on the second article you'll hear a third voice, which is Brian from Savvy, so we actually have a representative and because of his work there, he also has a really unique perspective on goal setting. So um, I'm excited to bring in his voice. But you'll just hear John and I on this first article. Brian went to M I T and we did it, so you'll have to bear with us for the first half. I guess well, Jen was on m I T. S campus, so she brings that I did walk through their once. Yeah, you'll hear her talk about that. So as far as goal setting goes, this first article comes from Personal Excellence and they talk about seven reasons why you should set a goal. So if you're still one of those people who's any road will get me there. I'm fine, I'm just gonna kind of do my life and hope that by the time I'm sixty five my life is dope and a do dope things, but probably not going to be the gates if you're not actually setting goals. Here here's what here's what we're going to tell you. So Number one, it helps you to take control of your life. And absolutely I would agree we can often sleep walk through this thing. Just do the routine, do the things in your life that are most pressing and right in front of you, and lose sight of what do I want to do long term? What do I want to see life look like in five fifteen years from now, And so setting a goal can help you to gain some of that control and actually be taking steps towards achieving those things. And you're, as we talk about so often, you're wise of what you want to see in life. So if you're listening to this podcast, you probably have some kind of like quote unquote finding ential goal, right, So I'm sure you don't need any preaching about the importance of goal setting, but I think it's important to know that even if you have these vague financial goals like I want to be more frugal, I want to pay off debt, I want to do this, or that, there are specific ways to write goals and specific reasons and mindsets behind writing goals that will help you write better goals that will help you achieve bigger outcomes. So I wanted to just like preface all of this with that and saying that, like, yes, you you are already poised to take control of your life, but if you give us the next half hour of your time, I hope that we can help you optimize the place where you're already at with goal setting. So the second one is is that goals help you get maximum results. Like I just said, top performers and world class athletes, those are the people that set goals. They write them down and they set big goals, goals that I don't know if you've ever heard Jill the big hairy audacious goals, Like I don't know who said that, but somebody. I always hear that, like, make your big hairy audacious goals like the right crowds. Yeah, be like b h A goals. I don't know where that's from, but I hear it all the time, and so like making these goals seem just out of reach, so that even if you follow a little bit short, you're still away further than if you had just tried something that was in your comfort zone. Number three on this list, it creates a laser focus, and I would even would probably say to this it at least creates focus. Um. Then we talk about a little bit later of kind of the pros and cons of being so laser focused on a goal and how that can just typically be for a season if we want best results. But certainly it does create focus. While you might be heading in a general direction, a specific goal can help you know exactly what you want to spend your time and energy on and how to accomplish that thing. If you've written the goal well and it's not super vague, it can really help you actually take strides and potentially big strides towards that thing if you've given your time to set that very specific type of goal. Number four is it creates accountability. And this is often a scary one. This is the reason why people don't speak their goal into existence, they don't share it with people, and they inevitably let it just waver off and get forgotten about. It's because they don't want accountability, because if you fail, then you have said accountability. And yeah, so this is the accountability is to yourself, not to anyone else. But I wholeheartedly believe in accountability partners and sharing it on your Facebook and like making it known to other people, like having that accountability like out in the universe that nobody is going to like chastise you if you don't meet your goal. But it just creates an environment in your mind that Okay, now I this really exists, Now I really have to do this, which is connected to number five, which it motivates you. That having a goal and if it's paired with some accountability, can be quite a motivating factor to actually do it. Once it's spoken out loud or written down or somewhere outside of your mind and set into motion, it can be a very motivating factor. I know this past year, on New Year's Day or New Year's Eve, Eric and I got together with some friends and we all sat around the table and talked about goals for the upcoming year, which was a new experience for me. I'm not typically one who would write down goals in the new year. M. I don't know. I think I've thought it's cheesy, but now I'm like, oh, but it actually is quite motivating. And I realized, once I speak this thing out, if I'm still friends with these people next year, they're gonna expect it from me. I'm going to expect it from myself. And it's a motivating thing, which then you have to be in some way realistic. But yeah, also set the bar a little bit higher for that ability to then achieve it, that it's something you have to work towards. So yeah, I I it has been so helpful to actually have something on the forefront of my mind to motivate me to take certain steps. And having those goals set helps me to say, you know what, I'm not just going to sit on social media tonight. I'm going to do this other thing instead, because that's actually going to get me towards this spoken an identified goal. Yes, definitely, And that leads into the next one, is be the best you can be. So goals help you achieve your highest potential. Without goals, you default to a routine of activities that keeps you feeling safe and comfy each day, and that's so true. I just think of Obviously, the biggest goal that we've ever achieved is our debt payoff, but there have since then that has primed me to make other goals, like obviously that's how I started writing, and that led me to a new career path, and and all these things all because of little goals that I've set, and other people take notice and invite me into new things or I'm pursuing new things because of these goals, and they have shown me like a potential in myself that I had absolute lutely no idea was possible. I just released my third book, What What? And if you had told me that that was something I was going to do three years ago, I would have laughed. And and if you told me the genre was going to be in, I would have also laughed. So it's really giving yourself permission to be this person that you don't know yet but is so yeah, but is it's scary, but is so much better than anything that you could have planned for yourself. M I love what you just said right there. I love the way your mind works. Lastly, similar to what you just said, Jen number seven, live your best life. So I joke about this sometimes, like you know, living your best life now, as if that's like a real thing. But goal setting can help us step into the best of who we are or the best that we can achieve. And I'm gonna go out on a limb here a little bit. I'm really going to hope I'm not stepping on toes. This is my experience. I took some time a couple of months ago to have a time of reflection and think through I answered some of these very specific questions. It was like, you know, what do you want to be or have accomplished in five years from now, and then what are the steps that are going to help you to get there? Along with other questions of you know, what is the last six months of your life looked like and are they aligned with the things that you say you value? And it was a really i think beneficial time for me to kind of work through those things. But one of the questions was who are some people that are older than you that you admire that you would want to be like? And again I'm saying this in all humility, I could not think of many people. I could think of a lot of friends that I admired, but I could not think of many people who are twenty thirty years older than me that I would want to aim at, being like, that's just in my circle. I did identify a few, don't get me wrong, but it was far less than I would have that I would like. And I got me thinking, why is that, Like, these people are twenty to thirty years older than me, Why am I not seeing this progression of of life and wisdom and experience that I would want to glean from. And it occurred to me, it's because this self reflection and goal setting process has not happened in their life, and that we are capable of being stagnant, of not growing, of achieving a certain level and staying there. That terrifies me. Like to imagine me at fifty five and I have not matured beyond where I'm at right now, that that does not sound like any any place I want to find myself. But I realized that I could find myself there if it is not my intention to grow and gain experiences, knowledge, skill set, And that takes intentionality. It takes goal setting, regardless of kind of what ideas we might have around this process or or how trite it might seem. If we're not aimed at anything, what's the saying any anything will get you there? Um, so yeah, I don't mean to like bring it down too heavy, but I I started to realize how important this kind of pausing, reflection, identifying values, setting goals, taking steps to achieve those goals, to actually grow as we get older, so that we don't find ourselves eighty years old and never having gained more knowledge and wisdom. My goodness, how sad? Word? Yes, good word, And I like I want to point out also is that you said like years older. I'm sure that there are people that look like they're their places we want to be, that are maybe just a few years older than us. But I think where we lose sight of goal setting is that we are our goals are too short term. There six months a year, two years out, and we don't spend enough time goal setting for five and ten years out. One of my favorite books is The Top Ten Distinctions between Millionaires in the middle Class by Keith Cameron Smith, and he talks about how millionaires are always doing long term goal setting. They're always thinking five ten years in the future, where the middle class is very focused on right now, and even our goals are focused on right now, like how fast can I get out of debt? How can I make my monthly bills? Like, how can I increase my spending for next month? But what we should really be spending investing more of our energy in is doing long term goal setting and then working backwards, so like reverse engineering our goals from the ten year point. And so I actually made a financial freedom planner. If you follow me on Instagram, you've definitely seen me talk about it once a year around this time, um, we're due to go through it. We talk about our one year, five year, ten year goals in different categories so family, financial education. So we'll start with ten, we'll go to five, will go to one, and then we'll break down our next year and do month by month goals and so we work on this together and then it has like others like monthly budget and savings planners and all that, but at this point in our life, we're mainly using it for goal setting worksheets. If you want to get that, you can go to Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash Freedom Planner and use the code Frugal Friends nineteen and you can get fifty percent off for that financial Freedom Planner. But yes, so thinking longer term with your goals. It's fantastic. It's challenging to me even and I will say there was a time in life where I thought it was silly to plan that far out. I had a friend who was planning vacations five to eight years out, and I'm just like, you don't even know what's gonna happen in life. That's so far in the future. Plan a vacation for this summer. I just, I genuinely had something where I was just opposed to it. I'm like, you don't know what's going to happen in life, so why try to go that long term? But I start I've started to realize now as I've gotten older, that there is so much more time in life that if I don't have these more longer term goals, then I might be sorely disappointed when I get to already fifties sixty and I haven't actually really planned for what life is going to look like them. In those same set of questions that I had talked about, which I can link in the notes as well, I think it's a really phenomenal practice to do. Just my therapist mind loves it. But one of the questions was you know, what do you want to do in ten years? And I realized, holy moly, ten years. I've never thought about that, which is interesting to hear you say, like, oh, that's traditional middle class for you. Uh, But I realized that is all of my thirties in ten years from now, I will still only be forty Yes, hear me, loud and clear, forty as young people like, that's overwhelming to me, But that's ten years. I I usually think like, what can I do in two years? And everything I listed out was accomplishable if that's a word. In like five years, you know, it was learn a language, pick up you know, my instrument again, do some drawing. I'm like, I could do all this in five years. What in the world is ten years? How do I wrap my mind around that? But it's been such a good exercise for me to start to aim bigger. Yeah, I mean, and that's really what we're trying to get out, is to think bigger, just to think and plan bigger. And yeah, Travis and I go through the same planner every year, and we'll look at our planner that we did the year before, and our five and ten year goals are not always the same. And they don't have to be You don't have to be married to your goals, but you have to set them because reverse engineering your short term girls gold Girls goals out of your long term goals is more effective. Good stuff. Well, let's move into our next article and we're going to bring in Brian from Savvy for this next portion. We are so excited to have Brian, the head of consumer product at Savvy on the podcast today to share a little bit more about what they do over there at Savvy, but also to get your input, Brian on some of these articles that we're looking at about goals setting and here your input, particularly from the perspective that you bring and the product that you're talking about today. So we want to take a look at this article from It's called about Leaders and it's talking about the Harvard study on smart goals. And we started talking a little bit about it before we even hit record. But Brian, you were saying that you even had planned to talk about this and some of the myth around it. But yeah, what's your take on this. Well, I heard of the study about twenty years ago, and I think at the time someone said it was a Yale study. So then it morphed into a Harvard study, but then in the pawn it off to some other ivy league, just passing it back and forth between really smart people. But then to find out it was urban legend was heartbreaking. But then I think, like you, I realized, well, wait a minute, we know I'm me and there are other studies that back up the fact that if you have goals, you're better off than not having goals. And if you're if you write down those goals and take the steps that I know you're going to talk about in a little bit, then you're more likely to get where you need to get to too. So urban myth or not, Um, it's it certainly brings some actionable advice with it. So um. But yeah, no, I've known about the study for a long time. I've cited it, and then to see actually just before our interviewed that it was maybe a little bit of a legend. Um, heartbreaking, but but still some really important stuff. Before we define what smart goals is for anybody who is not aware, we will get there. I did like in this article how they outlined some of the major reasons that people don't set goals, and they list for the first one, being that they may not realize or recognize the value or impact of having a goal. Yeah, what did you think about this? Jen? To me, it's still, like I guess from where I sit, I'm still shocked when people don't have goals, but it's not as common as I assume so, and I guess that comes from a place where, like things, things don't come easily to me. So I've always had to like set goals to make sure I get anywhere, or I will just get nowhere. But yeah, I liked I liked being reminded of these reasons why people don't set goals. So, yeah, like you said, the first one is most people don't recognize the value. The second one is the vast majority of people had never had any training in goal setting. And then the third people fear failure and will avoid it at all costs. And then the fourth one is people fear that others will be critical of them if they don't achieve the goals. And I think, I think the peer pressure thing is definitely something that has made me nervous to share my goals. Like I've always made goals, but sometimes I won't share them because I'm like, what if I don't reach them, then I have to like have people ask about it and all this stuff, and so it definitely reminded me of this is definitely something that's still like rears its head even in my life. Brian and your work, what have you seen some of the barriers are in goal setting? Well, I think it's interesting. Last week I was talking to one of our users. We work through employers, and I was at a benefits fair and she came up and she's like, Oh, I want to use this, but I'm so bad with money. And I said, well, you know that. It's a you know the first episode, admit you have a problem. I was like, okay, so you know that. And you talk about the impact of goals, well, setting a goal can sometimes be a reality check to say, Okay, you know, I do have a lot of student debt and I haven't saved anything for retirement. But it's that class half of half empty positioning of well, a goal should be about what you want to get out of life, and it doesn't just have to extend to finances. If you want to get healthier, more in shape. Um, when you look at what a goal is, it's about okay, well, what do I really want, and then when I understand that why behind it, it's like, Okay, here's why I'm not doing take out for every meal at work, and here's why I'm taking some of my money and putting it into retirement plan or your alley, you know, going to the thrift the thrift store, or upping the coupon, finding the online deal. And so when it becomes about not I haven't I haven't done what I need to do. But it's like, okay, but if I change, I can get what I want out of life. And we tried to build our tool. It'savvy around getting what people want out of life, not the I have to eat my vegetables. This is so hard. It's like, no, this is about good, good stuff, but it's hard. It's a reality check sometimes for sure. Yeah, I think the thing for me has been if it just has seemed way too unattainable. If I know that in my mind, the steps I'll be able to take towards it are so minuscule that I don't even want a look at the goal because I don't want to be disappointed at what small steps I'd be taking, thinking that ignoring it is better and doing nothing is better. I don't understand, like feeling when you start to explain it, Yeah, it doesn't doesn't make sense. It's like, yes, something is better than nothing, even baby steps towards this goal, but but making it an achievable goal, not aiming at setting up for failure, certainly not being afraid of it, but not making this lofty thing that is completely unattainable. Yeah. And I think that's the difference between goals and dreams, Like dreams may not be attainable right now, but goals should be. Yeah. Which that is kind of how they define smart goal, so smart being the acronym for a good goal to set, and so basically smart stands for specific, measurable, achievable, real, a stick and timetable, so that when you're setting a goal, it's not just oh, I want to eat better, well, okay, but how are you going to do that? And what's going to measure whether or not you're eating better? How will you know that you've even achieved that goal? Or I want to save money, I want to get better at saving okay. But how so, this has been a really helpful tool for me to remember, Okay, if I want to set a goal, these are the foundational components that it should have to it. Even as a therapist, I use this whether or not not. Harvard says it actually is like a good thing to do. Um, I do think that these measurables for goals are super helpful. Yeah, Brian, what is your view on smart goals? I love smart goals and I'm from Boston, so I have to make sure to make sure they are is hard smart's so I agree with you in being in the advice profession, this is a great way to look at as a litmus test of what your goals are. It's interesting, though, One thing that some of the other research has shown is that one thing that maybe left out of smart is to make it actually a little bit challenging. So you talked about the baby steps, but it's this balance between something that is achievable, but it's gotta be a little bit of a challenge because I could say, you know what, I'm not going to eat chocolate for the next two hours, and it's like me to go. But it's like, oh, you know what, I'm going to yourselves. I've got this headset that's tethering me to my my laptops. I can't get to that Halloween. But it's like, Okay, you know, congratulations, you know that maybe that was the baby step, but then there has to be that next baby step. So absolutely, and because like you said, people can set goals that have they have nothing to measure, and all of a sudden, it's like, well, I wanted to get in shape, but what was the roadmap there? I wanted to be better about my money and pay off that debt? Well what does that look like? And it's not just wishable thinking that I'll get you there. Yeah. I like the idea of pairing this with what if questions of like you're saying, you could set very easy and attainable goals, but then is it is it really a goal at all? Or is it just you're living your life, but pairing it with some creativity and pushing yourself to say, what if I didn't eat chocolate for two months? Now we're talking. So that actually reminds me because I wrote about smart goals in my new book that just came out this month, and part of the thing that I thought was missing also from smart was emphasis on the challenge. And so I found another acronym to go with it, called ABC, And so the A is achievable slash aim high, and then the B is believable, so that it's actually believable, but you also believe in your elf and you're like self affirming, and then the C is committed. So I like to pair those two acronyms together, and I think that that offers like the challenge that's smart sometimes can be missing. Did you come up with this, Jen, No? No, no. I found it on the just take anyone else still by the book, by the book, whether it's your idea, right right. I put it in in paper or on kindle, and it's all packaged very nicely and you can buy it. That's what I like A frugal friends like ABC mug tow for you know, your A BCS. That would be very smarts. Okay, So another thing I liked about this article is that so okay, maybe we should. So we've gone over the smart, the acronym, what they all are, but I like right underneath it um it has an action plan, so says, do some goal setting in the following areas or categories that are important to you, and it lists all of these different categories that you can have smart goals in. So it's not just financial. It's really to become a well rounded person, you have to have well rounded goals. So it's family, career, education, attitude, physical service, advocation, Oh, hobbies, hobbies, that's a fancy word for hobbies, like really cultured. Yeah, but but I liked having. And then they have like a little wheel that like at the center of all of these words is a little circle that says core values. And so like all of your smart goals for each of these categories should go through the lens of what your core values are. Everything leads back to the thing or the things that you value most. And that's a Sometimes we can get through life and we get to a place and we're like how did I get here? Like how did I get so far away from who I wanted to become? But if you're making goals through the lens of your core values, even if you're reaching goal, whether you're you know, reaching them or not reaching them, you're still going to be getting closer to the person that you want to be. I think that's a great point because especially with financial goals, no one thinks about I really want to get to a million dollars in my four oh one K just because it's about you know, I want to spend more time with my family, and I want to get to a point where I don't have to get in my car and sit in a commute for uh, you know, an hour to get to my job. And and yeah, when it's through the lens of the why behind the goal. And then the other piece which I think you were alluding to, is also to visualize, like what would it be like would it be like if I were to get there? And when we think about this is getting you on getting what you want out of life piece of goal setting. And then it's when you can picture and think like, right, that travel, that time with my family, the um, the vacation home that I wanted, all all the aspirational things were just the feeling of wow, you know what, that student loan is gone. It just it's all really positive and it becomes motivating. Yeah. And I think this is where you can look at whether or not it's congruent with your core values, because you could be setting a goal that's not even your goal. Right. We can sometimes even borrow this from other people of uh, I wanna financial independence, retire early? Well, is that actually your personal goal and doesn't align with your core values? Do you actually not want to work after age thirty? Does that align with your core values who you know yourself to be? And if not, then it's incongruent and you're gonna feel this kind of lopsided. I don't even know if I want to be working towards this or I'm not quite reaching this, but I don't even know if I want to. So making sure that it actually aligns with who you are as a person and your value system and all other aspects of life. Does this feed into Does it help me with my other goals of wanting to spend more time with family or become more physically fit, or learn a new language, or whatever kind of goals that you're setting for yourself. Do they all support each other? Because there? If not to, you're gonna be in like, there's gonna be incongruence. It's gonna be lopsided. It's not gonna work. Yeah, I know, we have a lot of we have a diverse listenership, and part of our audience are high like high achievers. And I'm not gonna say overachievers because that's rude. Um, they're high achieve verse. So come at me. Yeah, but there, Um, I would you know, love to lump myself into this group. I would be honored to. But like when they get a singular goal, they will work diligently until that goal is met and and I can highly identify with that. Through our debt payoff, we sacrificed and we neglected a lot of other things. But after having some time to reflect and and look at goals and kind of look at this well rounded person that I want to be, I almost wish that I had taken more time to set goals in these other areas of my life during that time and not been so laser focused on this one goal. And I still would have reached it, because that's the person that I am, and I'm committed. But I neglected and I sacrificed things and times and events that I won't be able to get back, and so part of me regrets doing that. And so especially for like early retiree listeners and and people that are diligently paying off debt, like those are great financial goals and obviously I'm super onboard with them, um, but also you know, take time and like look at the other areas of your life, like who do you want to be what are your core values and what are the goals that you have to get there too. It's a great point because the every goal is going to affect other goals. And it's interesting because this was the problem that that we tried to solve it Savvy because we built it to try to optimize someone's financial life. And that's hard because, as you talk about, when you pick a goal and if you're just laser focused on relentless, it's almost like you put the blinders on and like, if I'm all about paying off my debt, but I work somewhere that has a match on my four oh one K and I just am so focused on paying off that debt, it's like, well, do you realize your employer had free money on the table for is safe for retirement? And the flip side is true, well, well what if I just put all my money in retirement? Then I was like, oh my goodness, my car just broke down and I nothing in my checking account. So it's challenging, but you know, in certainly time to write, you pick the career where it's like I'm going to retire by forty and then it's like, oh my goodness, I'm miserable with what I'm doing. Maybe it wasn't the goals. The good thing about goals too is um, you can change them so they're not written written in pencil. Um. But yeah, sometimes that relentless focus can take away from the broader context of I need to look around to make sure that this, you know, overachievement. I'm sorry, Um, how achieving achievement in a bunch of your nerves just achievement? Will just call it achievement. That that isn't at the expense of of what really matters. Yeah, yeah, And that if you get knocked off the horse on this goal that you're aiming at, it's possible that if you have a few goals simultaneously, you're still maintaining in one of the other areas versus, oh, man, I'm knocked off the horse on my one and only goal, and that can be really demotivating. That's a word. And I will balance this with I love the book The One Thing by Gary Keller, and so I wholeheartedly. I love the idea of of focusing on one thing at a time, but not like four years at a time, so you can still practice one goal at a time sort of thinking. But having a few different goals going simultaneously. I don't know if that makes sense, but like you can have them there and say, like this month or week or day, I'm focusing on this schal and kind of go back and forth. That way. I like to have, you know, you know, two or three goals going at one time. That way, it's it's manageable, but not to all over the place. So if you haven't read the One Thing by Carrie Keller and j Pop soon, definitely read it, and then I think you will understand my gibberish a little more. Um, speaking of one thing, Jen, there's there's one thing I'm always about, and you don't need to diversify on this one. It's the the we that's right. It's time for the best minute of your entire week. Maybe a baby was born and his name is William. Maybe you paid off your mortgage, Maybe your car died and you're happy to not have to pay that bill anymore. That's built Buffalo Bill, Bill Clinton, this is the bill of the week, Brian. Every week we invite one of our listeners or our guests to give us their favorite bill for this week, and we would love to hear yours. So I narrowed it down to two. And I'll tell you the one that I didn't pick, because I'm gonna get in trouble for not picking. And I thought of my wedding and I was like, oh, the wedding was expensive and it was wonderful. And I was like, oh, that is so much just pandering because my wife's amazing. But you ever listened, Um, I was gonna pick it, but I thought more more appropriately, UM. A few years ago, actually about five and a half years ago, I went back to grad school and I don't know how I fooled him, but I got into a program at M I T, which actually is how I met one of the co founders of Savvy. And I remember at the time thinking, am I gonna take this time to work and go to this crazy heart program? And then the bill for it was a hundred and forty one thousand dollars and I was like, oh, that is not frugal, but its school was a lot cheaper. But I met one of the founders of Savvy, and I had been in the financially ice business, and it was just amazing to see what they were doing. And I made wonderful friends lifelong connections. And despite the size of that bill, probably the largest bill other than buying a home, that I've ever encountered. UM, I wouldn't be on this podcast with you today. I wouldn't be part of Savvy helping to democratize financial advice. I wouldn't like appear to be smart because I get to hang out with all these people that I went to school with. Um. But it is just such a blessing to be around those folks on a daily basis. So yeah, I'm going to pander to my my folks at M I T and UM and say my favorite bill was that forty one thousand dollars. Yeah, well that is the first M I T bill we've ever gotten on the show, but one of my favorite. UM, it hurt. When did you graduate? Graduated? And I did? I did, well, you know I did. Actually refinance rates were so low, so I actually took my student low own debt from that and I put it into my house. And I'd like to pretend that it doesn't exist anymore, but it's just, you know, it's it's in this this roof over my head right now. Yeah, but it was an amazing experience. It was executive programs. So I kept working at the time, and all of us are trying to hold on families and jobs, and you talk about goal setting. I mean, you know, you'd be amazed what you can do when it's just okay, well I just have to make this work. Yeah. Yeah, I am learning that as a parent right now, a first time parent. I actually thought that same phrase today. I'm like, you just make it work. I'm not I'm not a mom. I don't know why they let me go home with this kid because it came out of your body. Jen, Yeah, that's how that happened. You make it, you take it. I don't know if you buy it what, but yeah, you just you just do it. You make it through you don't. You know. I had a friend of mine who was like, up, we didn't break the kid today, Like, good job. You know, every day's victory as a parent. Yes, it's so good. Well, if you want to submit your bill of the week, if it's an M I T bill or any other kind of bill, visit us at Frugal Friends podcast dot com slash bill and tell us what you got. We're only accepting Ivy League bills. We're talking about a Harvard Study. M I t are today everybody. I walked. I walked into m I t once um and then I walked through the court era and I walked right out. Jobs. See that's why you're so smart and successful, Jen, because I wanted to Yeah, well now it's time for you know it? My next favorite part good lightning wound. Well, So, Ran, we want to know more about Savvy. Why is the philosophy behind savvy financial? Like what makes it different from just googling your financial questions? You know, it might get you to a good place like your podcast, it might be to oh man, I've had some doozies with Google searches, deep dark, famous last words. Well, thanks for asking. So Savvy was built really to democratize financial advice. And I started my career as a financial advisor and it's a wonderful role. You get to help people with their money and help them make smart decisions. But what's happened over the years is that you need more and more in assets to work with an advisor. And so Savvy was built to just say, can we bring this to the masses. And what Savvy does that's that's different. You mentioned the importance of being really specific and actionable. So the advice that Savvy gives we get down literally to the dollar to say you should open this account with this much and move this from here to here. And the cool part is we don't ask you for your money. We're not. You know, there are a lot of robo advisors out there, and and there are some great tools in the marketplace, but robo advisors are designed to hey, like, we're gonna give you all these cool tools and then please invest with us. And so we savery we say we're actually a fiduciary, so we're gonna give you advice and it's going to be unbiased. And you know, similar to what we talked about earlier. It maybe you know, what should I pay off my credit card or should I fund my four ohn K? So we look at it and try to find the optimal outcome. So it might be all in on one or or a combination of the other. But what we do with the tool does we help you to organize your financial life, because that's the really important first step. So we're kind of like tools such as MINT. I don't know if I can say that, you know, but but we help you organize where all your stuff is and you can link your accounts and then we help you understand where your money goes, sort of like a budgeting exercise, but we're not latte counters. Just a general idea of where your money goes and insights about it. And then it's where the goals come in. So you can pick goals like retirement or buying a home, buying a car, how much life insurance do I need? UM? How do I send my kids to college? How do I pay off my student loan debt? We just rolled out an optimization around how to attack specifically student loan debt, and then we come back with advice to say, here's what you need to do. And hey, you're really on track or you know what you're you're getting there, but here's what you can you to get back on track. So we have a free tool that anybody can can use that gives you an idea. You know, it's it's most of what saving doing if you really love us. We have a paid version too for ten dollars a month that's not not too too bad to I less than a financial advisors. True there and some people too. We realize that UM in our tool can certainly help you. We had We talked to one of our users who was really really sophisticated and had a lot of money, but he was early to do it yourself planner, and he we gave him advice. He's like, I didn't know that I could do this thing, called it back to a roth Ira contribution. You know, I never knew I could do that. I don't. I thought I didn't. I made too much money to do a roth Ira And now I found out how to do it. And it's like, yeah, like we built that in there, and we build in the tax code and all this other sophistications that Yeah. As I mentioned, I worked with all these crazy smart people who can really do math, and so it's it's a very powerful tool and like anybody can you said, yeah, so there are some really cool features on it, Like I spent the past few weeks playing around with it. Tell us a little bit about that. They have such cool names to the decision optimizer and the stress test Simulator, like those I think, don't you guys have like a frugalizer or something. I'm not mistaken, Like I want to get emails from you I use the frugalizer. Isn't that I just you just like isers, right, I mean, is that came up with That's true, That's that's all Jen. Yeah, I like good lighting around and she likes frugalizers and you're an awesome team. So way to go. So savvy is based. The math is really an optimization model. And so what we do is we create optimal outcomes or we recommend optimal optimal outcomes for your financial life. So the team that built this, that's been been together for a while, um, they actually started on in problems like airline yield management and how to make school buses run on time. And what they did is took the complexity of how do I balance all this out of someone's financial life and put it into a robust optimization model and came out with one of a few ideal outcomes, which could be here's how much you save into here, here's how much you work toward college and balancing all of that because I may have a goal that's you know, I would really like to send my kids to college, and I'd like to retire the stage, but the word to get there because all these things balance out, but I also need to buy a car and hope, by the way, like ress and I just give up, right, So that optimization model helps to take all that complexity and come back with something that makes sense. Yeah, because even if you could figure it on on your own, it can Yeah, it can be exactly overwhelming like that. But if you can have something that says, hey, this is how it is, it's okay that it's this way. It's not you know, ideal, but this is the way it has to be, and you're like, okay, I'm not failing. I can still get it done. Yeah. Are there any circumstances where Savvy and its resources might not be right for somebody? It's a great question. You know. One of the things that we don't have yet is a human element to it, and we're you know, hopefully going to roll that out next year where we could have some human coaching in there. Um, there are people who there's a self service element to what we do. You have to go in and link your accounts up and then you have to answer certain questions on an online portal. And some people who aren't necessarily tech savvy. You know, I'm sort of intended that if you're not really good, I just want to talk to someone and have them tell me what to do and just like throw all my statements in front of them, like, well, maybe you are better served by a human financial advisor, so um right at a higher price point a higher price like word one. It's like okay, well so so sometimes we will, you know, certainly, anytime one of our users needs help getting through the tool, but a lot of times like I really just want to talk to someone, like well all the advices here on the screen, just you know. So yeah, I would say that the person who's probably not a great fit for us, at least today is someone who just really needs someone to do it for them and really needs to meet with someone or have that human element. We try to build that into the tool, but it's still an online advice tool. It's still digital. It's not funnest the person. Maybe I don't know. We try, but maybe someone needs a person. It's they might be better served with a human advisor if they have money and if they qualify. But most of us like saving money more than people, so I think we're fine. Yes see, you know, you can get your advice from a tool like Savvy, and then I have more money to hang out with fun people, right, yeah, and not talk about money exactly, just spend it on cool stuff. Yeah, so we mentioned it earlier, Um, but can you remind people where they can go to learn more and use savvy? Sure, I'd love to. So it's savvy with an I f I dot com s a v v I f I dot com and check out the website. It talks about our story, talks about how it all works. In the upper right hand corner, you can click on sign up and like I said, we have a free plan. So if it sounds like, yeah, this thing sound good, try it out, start putting your stuff in, and you know, hop on chat if you need help. I might be the person who chats with you because you know, we're we're a fast growing but we're still a company, right. We talked to someone last week and they thought, like, you guys have ordered employees, and like, yeah, that sounds cool on our way. But we just rolled and we're a fairly new tool. We we roll out with our first employer partner last year and we've just rolled out our direct to consumer platform this past May. So and we'd love the feedback too. I'd say, if you sign up and then I like, you know, you guys can totally do this better. Just drop us a line. It's some of our best feedback, positive or negative, comes from our user base, so we can make this thing better and help people to make more smart money decisions. That's awesome. Well, thanks so much for coming on Brian, and uh, thanks for being part of the show. We have found Savvy to be like a really cool tool and something we think that our listeners really benefit from. Truly, like we've said for the past few weeks, like the free version has all the cool features that you would pay for. Two it's not just one of those like gimmicky free trials. Now, we we wanted to make the free version of Savvy good and then you know that you like, wow, I really like this, Okay, but I'm you know, it's not like I signed up for this and gave all my info and now it just this thing stinks. Now, we've had a really positive response with the tool, and and I know you've we've been able to sponsor and you've been able to mention the tool on some previous podcasts, so we really appreciate that partnership as well to get people on the platform. Yeah, definitely thanks for coming on the show. Brian. Thank you great. I'm so glad that we have had Savvy as a sponsor for the show. I think they are doing a really great thing for frugal people. And uh, we have really benefited from that partnership and in his wisdom, especially as we start to think more big term, long term once we're out of debt, what comes next and how can we get the resources of the wealthy at a frugal cost or Yeah, for those that are wanting to approach it in a more frugal way. So I'm glad that it exists with today's technology. Yes, and if you want even more engagement on these things of goal setting and long term thinking and just frugality, we're doing this book club thing in this month. We're while we're wrapping up, but we're still reading. I will teach you to be rich by remat Sati for book club this month. Yes, if you want your middle class mindset challenge, re Meat will do it. I highly recommend you read this book. If you want a free copy because all your other frugal friends got it from the library, don't you worry. You can get one by leaving us a review at iTunes or Stitcher. Screenshot the review and send it to Frugal Friends Podcasts at gmail dot com and we will select one random winner from every five reviews we get at the end of each month. And that is that's coming up, so you still got time to get re meets book and if you want an example of a review, because we all need examples in life to know exactly what we're talking about. This view comes from Rachel, and she says great show, five stars. She happened to give us five stars. Just started listening to your podcast and have been binge listening for the past couple of days. I love how relatable you both are. I feel like I'm chatting with my girlfriends at a bar about the most important things in life while not taking ourselves too seriously. Keep up the great work bringing wisdom to women in a fun and relatable way. Love money Hacking Mama, Thanks so much, Rachel, love connecting. I actually did just connect with money Hacking Mama on um Insta, so she has a blog, so even feel free to check that out. Thanks for the support. We love to support each other. Yes, and uh, we will keep coming at you, not from a bar, but from wishing we were at the bar, but definitely talking to you like your girlfriends. Every week, every Friday, we will be here and until next Friday. I have a good frugal week. Bye, reach those goals, get them. Herugal Friends is produced, edited and mixed by Eric Syria. Um, what goals do you have now that you've accomplished this whole? This is perfect, This is the right thing to do right now. Okay, this is right, This is okay. So um book is launched, holidays are coming. So in January, I want to lead a a private challenge group UM with people from my email list, our listeners, whoever. UM. But I want this group to be for people that are having a hard time doing you know, spend challenge, having a hard time cutting their expenses all this stuff. A challenge group where we can really invest in each other. And uh so nice. How many people would be a part of that as many people as will pay me money. But yeah, I don't want it to just be like a thing where I like just send out rant like you know, pre assigned emails, Like I want to be in people's lives, in it with them, And that obviously takes time away from my family and my work to do that, and so it's been then Yeah, well, I mean, I guess it depends on how you look at that, coming from a maybe the potential consumer side of things. You know, people pay for therapists to help them reach goals all the time. This is gonna be much cheaper than that's so expensive. If you pay out a pocket for therapy, you are paying eight five to a hundred per fifty minute session. I know, I'm a therapist, So yeah, I mean to kind of get that kind of very tangible help from yourself and others in the group, which when it comes to reach ingles, group environments are very helpful for that hearing and seeing how other people are accomplishing it. So yeah, that that does hold value to me. Yeah, you're well good. Um so. But so I've never done anything like this before. It's always been very intimidating. I've seen other people do it, um, but I've never I've never felt worth paying for um. So, you are valuable, you are beautiful. This is something that I am, Um, I'm putting out there. It's going to be in January and yeah, we're gonna we're gonna figure this thing out together. But it's gonna be like wallet therapy. Yeah, Yeah, that's gonna. Yeah, it's we're gonna we're gonna get more frugal together in it's going to be real good. How about you, Jill, oh, Jen, You're so much better at this than me. I do. I am learning this process. I would say right now, I have not the smart goals. I have kind of the the lofty ideas of things I want to accomplish and need to get down to what are the steps I need to take to do that. So as I think about my ten year kind of what what do I want to have accomplished, it is a lot of I do want to learn a language, but not not a language. I want to become proficient in Spanish. Uh. So I do have an app that I am working through. I have a friend who will help me at times, but I need to be more diligent with it. So I'm I'm hoping to be able to identify how I can do that in the new year, like kind of what things I need to be putting in place for that. Um, come down to Florida. Are there a lot of Spanish speaking people? Oh? Yeah, Allah, you can go to daycare and talk to miss Isabel. Yeah, yeah, that's a real thing. I think that's kind of my my one priority long but like a bigger, more lofty, but need to really take strides in it this year. And of course paying down debt, I mean paying off debt. I hope to have that done by March. So that's probably taking up a bit of my focus right now. So that's great. Yeah, well, we'll revisit our goals. Boy, we actually haven't recorded. I know, I know. It's yeah, we'll revisit these and see how we did. We'll know. Yeah, we'll know by March how both of us did with both of our media goals. Perfect. Oh boy, I see you then,