retirement Archives • Bitches Get Riches

Procrastinating on Opening a Retirement Account? Here’s 3 Ways That’ll Fuck You Over.

June 8, 2022June 8, 2022 Piggy 1 Comment

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.

Wait… what’s a retirement account again?

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.

How to Painlessly Run the Gauntlet of a 401k Rollover

March 29, 2022August 2, 2022 Piggy 26 Comments

If we’ve taught you nothing else here at Bitches Get Riches, it’s that you should:

sign up for your employer’s retirement plan and
job hop your way to a nice fat salary.

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!!!!!

Ask the Bitches: “Do Women Need Different Financial Advice Than Men?”

March 22, 2022March 29, 2022 Kitty 12 Comments

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.

Your Girl Is Officially Retiring at 35 Years Old

November 30, 2021November 30, 2021 Kitty 56 Comments

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.

Season 3, Episode 7: "I'm Finished With the Basic Shit. What're the Advanced Financial Steps That Only Rich People Know?"

Season 3, Episode 7: “I’m Finished With the Basic Shit. What Are the Advanced Financial Steps That Only Rich People Know?”

November 19, 2021December 4, 2021 Piggy 3 Comments

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?

Getting to the advanced financial steps is harrrrrrd...

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!

Investing Deathmatch: Stocks vs. Bonds

December 10, 2018June 2, 2022 Piggy 3 Comments

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!

Investing Deathmatch: Investing in the Stock Market vs. Just… Not

October 16, 2018June 1, 2022 Piggy 10 Comments

It’s time for another thrilling episode of… INVESTING DEATHMATCH! In which we pit two forms of investing against each other and see which one escapes the struggle unscathed.

Today’s fight is an ancient grudge match between two opposing philosophies: extreme caution and risk-taking. In one corner we have investing in the stock market—an inherently risky proposition but one that comes with untold rewards. In the other, we have the option of the risk-averse everywhere: just… not with the stock market, and instead, playing it safe by sticking your money in a savings account.

It occurred to us that we needed to cover this battle to dispel some incorrect assumptions about money management.

After the Great Recession and stock market crash of 2008, a lot of young people coming of age in a new and fragile economy were scared away from the stock market. They saw the grownups around them ruined by plummeting stocks and improperly leveraged debt.

As a result, millennials are statistically less likely to have anything invested in the stock market—whether it be through a retirement fund or a managed portfolio. These younglings are choosing to play it as safe as possible.

But is that truly the way to win this Investing Deathmatch?

Fighters… TAKE YOUR CORNERS!

Investing Deathmatch: Paying off Debt vs. Investing in the Stock Market

February 5, 2018May 30, 2022 Piggy 13 Comments

LET’S GET READY TO RUMBLLLLLLLLE!

It’s time for another thrilling episode of Investing Deathmatch, in which two forms of investing enter the ring, and only one leaves victorious. Or, more accurately, we decide that investing is a far more complicated affair than wrestling and the outcome of the fight depends on a number of nuanced factors.

But I digress.

TO THE BLOOD SPORT!

This fight has a long and sordid history. We’ll be uncovering old wounds, dredging up arguments long held in stalemate. We’ll be discussing a topic about which every damn personal finance blogger on the Internet has a very firm opinion. And we’ll be demystifying an age-old enigma of financial independence.

Brawlers, take your corners.

You Won’t Regret Your Frugal 20s

November 30, 2017April 7, 2022 Piggy 14 Comments

The topic of regret is a controversial one, especially in personal finance. Whole treatises have been written on the premise that if you live frugally during your twenties and make sound financial decisions for the future, you’ll regret wasting your youth as a joyless loner.

We reject this characterization of a frugal youth for a couple of reasons:

It doesn’t take a lot of (or any) money to have fun with your friends. In fact, some of the best times I’ve had with friends involved spending zero dollars!
You can (and should) pursue fun long past your twenties. A great woman once said that if you’re not getting happier as you grow older, you’re fucking up. And I whole-heartedly agree! Life has only gotten better after thirty for me.
You’re at more risk of regretting not saving than you are at risk of regretting not going out to da clerb that one time. Saving for retirement in your twenties isn’t a ticket to Regretsville or Unfuntown. It’s a way of ensuring you’ll be able to have fun later in life instead of working forever.

And yet fear of this kind of regret persists.

FOMO

I get it! No one wants to constantly feel left out. FOMO is real! But I also firmly believe that no one wants to get to retirement age only to realize that all the money they could’ve lived on for another twenty to thirty years got puked out after a night of binge drinking. (It has been said that you’d have to drink a lot of alcohol to puke out your retirement savings. These naysayers underestimate both the power of compound interest and the alcohol tolerance of the average 23-year-old.)

Yet I don’t fear regretting my frugal twenties when I get to my twilight years. Now, depending on a single, barely funded income stream after retirement, one that could easily go up in a puff of smoke… that’s something worth regretting.

Investing Deathmatch: Traditional IRA vs. Roth IRA

September 18, 2017March 25, 2022 Kitty 12 Comments

Two methods of investing in the stock market enter the ring.

Only one will leave victorious.

Welcome back to another installment of… INVESTING DEATHMATCH!!!!!!!!!

If you’re one of our Patreon supporters, there are four things I know for sure about you. One: you’re beautiful on the inside and out. Two: you’re powerful, also on the inside and out (like, you are spiritually intimidating and also extremely muscular). Three: You have excellent taste in blogs run by women who are emotionally in their mid-seventies but physically in their early thirties.

The fourth and most important thing I know about our Patreon supporters: Once a month, they get to choose a topic for an upcoming blog post. And this month they selected a battle royale between traditional IRAs and Roth IRAs.

So if you enjoy this week’s post, you have our gorgeous, strong, good-taste-having, democratically empowered Patreon supporters to thank for it. Please consider becoming one, or continue to aspire to grow up to be one.

Now let’s get down to the EXTREMELY ANALYTICAL CARNAGE.