You guys… I have a new favorite book.
Whether you know her from her Invested Development course, her original Dumpster Dog Blog, the many times we’ve quoted her investing know-how here on Bitches Get Riches Dot Com, or her activism against the genocide in Gaza, our dear friend and Amanda Holden is a force to be reckoned with. Which is why when we heard she was publishing her very first book, I was all…
I don’t give a flying nun about inheriting money when my parents eventually buy the farm. As far as I’m concerned, it’s their hard-earned dough. They should use every blessed penny to enjoy their retirement and live comfortably until the day they die.
In fact, I truly hope they do!
They can give me a much greater gift instead of an inheritance: the knowledge that their retirement and passing won’t be a financial burden on me.
Knowing that my parents have a solid retirement plan will grant me enormous peace of mind. I can’t imagine a more generous gift than the ability to enjoy our last years together without worrying about how to pay for their care. I want to compete with my mom at nightly Jeopardy! when she’s shrunken and toothless, not take a second job to keep her TV on! (Note: There would be no competition. My mother is a ruthless, cutthroat home Jeopardy! contender. Fools and kings have fallen before her. She’s banned from pub trivia in three states.)
A solid retirement plan for my parents will also allow me to focus on growing my own wealth. That way, when I get to the age where I’m allowed to be embarrassingly blunt in public, I won’t be dragging down the finances of my younger relatives.
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You and your motley team of thieves have infiltrated the highly secured and top-secret Retirement Archives. You’ve made it past the trained guard dogs, the snipers, the laser grid, the biometric scanners. And now, you’re in position to steal the most valuable knowledge of all: how to save and invest to retire some day in dignity and comfort.
Retiring: it’s not just for The Olds anymore!
Over the years we’ve written about how to set yourself up to retire while you’re young, how to stick with a retirement plan during your working years, and even how to achieve FIRE (that’s “financial independence, retire early,” a forced acronym if ever there was one). Here is the sum of our retirement advice, gathered together for intellectual cramming purposes.
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As promised, I’m back with an update about my early retirement. It’s been six months since I stopped working. As I alluded to in a recent article, shit kinda went off the rails for me since retiring early.
You know, I didn’t have a solid vision for what my first six months of being permanently funemployed would be like… but whatever I had in mind, it sure wasn’t this! Life is full of twists and turns, ain’t she?
Do I have extra juicy, highly personal anecdotes to share? WHY YES, I DO! Navel gazing of the highest degree—dead ahead!
Today’s article is published in collaboration with the Plutus Foundation’s Impact Series. Their theme for October is the financial independence movement. Seems like a fine opportunity to give everyone an update on how my own financial independence is going! If you don’t already follow them, please consider doing so. The Plutus Foundation has amplified a lot of amazing voices over the years—our own fried and scratchy drawls included! They share amazing content. We’re lucky to have them as a leader in the personal finance space.
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If I had to rank all the things I love to do in my precious free time, where would opening a retirement account fall? Let me see, hmm… above a root canal, but below politely accepting a religious tract from a door-knocking missionary. (What can I say? Some of them have pretty nice artwork!)
Have you been procrastinating on opening your retirement account? Feeling lazy? Avoidant? Afraid of the paperwork? Feel like you’d rather use that money on stuff you need or want right now? Obviously, I feel you.
But buck up, son! I’m about to tell you why you can’t afford not to open a retirement account.
To recap with a vast simplification: Americans have access to two main kinds of retirement accounts.
First, a 401(k)—or 403(b), if you work for a nonprofit—is a retirement fund facilitated by your employer. You set it up so they can take money directly out of your paycheck and squirrel it safely away for you to use when you’re terrorizing orderlies in the nursing home. That way you can focus on maintaining your record as Wheelchair Drag Race Champion of Shady Hills Retirement Community and not get distracted by petty financial concerns.
Second, there’s IRAs (individual retirement accounts), both traditional and Roth. IRAs are very similar to 401(k)s, but they’re attached to you directly instead of your employer. There are other differences, but meh, they’re pretty minor. You can get acquainted with the finer points later.
Retirement accounts are powerful tools for growing wealth and stability for your future self. The trick is you have to opt into your retirement account. If you’re self-employed, or you work for a company that doesn’t offer 401(k)s, you need to go out and open your own IRA. And if you work for a company that offers 401(k)s, you need to sign up and voluntarily tell someone to NOT give you part of your paycheck every month.
As broke as you are right now, ignoring a perfectly good retirement fund is a terrible idea. Because if you do that, you’ll lose money in three different ways.
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If we’ve taught you nothing else here at Bitches Get Riches, it’s that you should:
Yet these two bits of career advice might seem to conflict with one another. After all, if you’re job-hopping your way up the salary food-chain, you might be leaving a trail of old retirement plans behind you to languish. What do you do with your old 401k when you move on to a new employer, or even embrace self-employment?
Enter the 401k rollover: the most hateful, obnoxious, and needlessly complicated bureaucratic process known to man.
Today we’re not only going to demystify the process of how to roll over an employer-sponsored retirement plan like a 401k—we’re going to make it beautifully, sinfully painless. It’s going to be so much fun you guys!!!!!
Today on Ask the Bitches, we’ve got a GREAT question about whether women need different financial advice than men. And it was asked by… A MAN?!
(Cue: crashing thunder, rain SFX, opening cords of “It’s Raining Men.”)
That’s right, doubters and haters. Despite our joyless misandrist ways, we’ve got male readers. We’ve even got male readers who are so into what we talk about they’re willing to pay us for our work by becoming Patreon donors!
One such donor asked us a thought-provoking question about gender and money that initially kinda stumped me. In short: do women need different financial advice than men?
I had a knee-jerk reaction to say “no” and leave it at that. (Helpful!) But as I thought about it, I realized there are some significant biological and cultural differences worth discussing. Let’s start by reading the particulars of Patron Mat’s excellent question.
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Earlier this month at the EconoMe Conference, I gave a speech where I revealed I was planning on retiring at 35 years old.
I practiced the speech many times, mostly in the sacred privacy of my shower. To be honest, I wasn’t happy with it! When I tried to talk about how and why I was going for such an early retirement age, I faltered, rambled, and went on weird tangents that had too many 1990s anime references (or not enough, depending on your perspective).
My youthful days as a theatre kid had imbued me with an unshakable certainty that there was no point in worrying about it. The show would go on. I would get up on the stage and say something, and people would clap politely when I was done. Because they always do that, even when you suck! Ah, the beauty of social contracts!
Surprisingly, the words flowed easiest when I was standing on a stage in front of a few hundred people. I could kinda see the faces of my audience through the haze of the UFO tractor beam lighting. I had the world’s best business partner on stage next to me; the front row was packed with wise and supportive personal finance industry mentors; and past them, a sea of faces belonging to people who intimately understood what I was there to say about financial freedom. Before the most welcoming and encouraging audience imaginable, my words came out effortlessly.
“Work sucks, and I hate it, so I’m not gonna do it anymore.”
I should’ve just said that and trusted this audience to fill my remaining 28 minutes with a standing ovation. Maybe wrap with some local jokes? “Thanks for attending my TedTalk. Go Cincinnati, um, Owlbears? No, no, that’s definitely a D&D monster, hold on… [checks notes] Bearcats! Go Bearcats!”
It’s true. If all goes as planned, I’m retiring at 35 years old this coming spring.
Here’s my story.
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When people ask us about the target demographic of Bitches Get Riches, we tell them “It’s for the children.” You can tell because of the G-rated content!
True, our readers-slash-listeners trend young and untested in the ways of the financial world. We wouldn’t have it any other way, of course, which is why so much of what we write concerns the problems of early-career personal finance.
But what about those who have “made it”—gotten through the lean years and succeeded financially? What do we have to say to the children once they grow up and leave the nest?
In today’s podcast episode, we’re talking about Advanced Financial Steps: the shit you want to get to, but can’t until you get through the boring slog of paying off debt and establishing a financial safety net for yourself.
To this end, we focus a lot on investing: investing in yourself, in your goals, in your community. We don’t simply mean stock market investing, or even financial investing. Treat those investments like the horcruxes they are and spread ’em around—diversify! (Just fulfilling our contractual obligation to include one Harry Potter reference per episode. Read the fine print.)
But how does one determine those post-making-it goals? How do you choose where to stash your horcruxes investments once you’ve joined the ranks of the rich? What’s the most effective way to spread the wealth and lift up those around you?
I wish I could say “all will be revealed in this week’s episode” but really, that’s a lofty fucking goal for a twenty-minute podcast by two day-drunk dumbasses with a microphone. So, uh… adjust your expectations accordingly!
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Since the dawn of mankind, certain rivalries have shaped human civilization.
Their power struggles have violently ripped through the fabric of eons, causing the sun to rise in the west and set in the east, the oceans to run dry, and mountains to blow in the wind like leaves. Thus spake Mirri Maz Duur, noted economist.
Today we explore one of these ancient grudges in a segment we call:
INVESTING DEATHMATCH.
Yes that’s right, my precious seekers of financial literacy. Once again, we’re going to break down two forms of investment and pit them against each other in a metaphorical battle for the soul of economic solvency!
Let’s meet our contenders!
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