← All the Hacks: Money, Points & Life
All the Hacks: Money, Points & Life
Building Better Habits, Strengthening Relationships, and More Listener Q&A with Chris and Amy
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- [00:02]
Chris Hutchins
From defining your routines and setting boundaries to optimizing your time and maintaining relationships. Today I'm teaming up with my amazing wife Amy to tackle a bunch of your questions. Whether you're looking for tips on creating better habits, valuing your time, improving your relationship and family dynamics, or just discovering some great date night ideas, this episode is packed with so much. I really hope you enjoy it. Thank you to everyone who sent questions in. If you're new here, I'm Chris Hutchins and if you enjoy this episode, please share with a friend, leave a comment or review. And if you want to keep upgrading your life, money and travel, click Follow or subscribe. Oh, and if you'd like to submit a question for the next Ask Me Anything episode, head on over to allthehacks.com ama now let's get into it right after this. What if you could go through your inbox twice as fast? How many hours a year would that save you? Hundreds, Right? Well, welcome to Superhuman, the fastest email experience ever made and one of the most valuable tools I use every single day, which is why I love that they're our sponsor. Honestly, it is hard to explain in just a minute how much better Superhuman is, but I'm going to try to give you five quick reasons you have to give it a try. 1. You can split your inbox into different streams for VIPs, your team, your most used tools, and more so you can focus on what matters most. 2. Superhuman AI lets you write entire emails with just one line in your own voice and tone.
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- [02:18]
Amy, welcome back to the show.
- [02:20]
Amy Hutchins
Good to be back.
- [02:21]
Chris Hutchins
So we got so many questions. So first off, shout out to everyone who submitted a question. This is probably going to be a bit of a regular thing. So if you go to allthehacks.com ama you can submit questions for the next one, and I think we just kick it off. I'm going to start with a question from Laura. I'm going to kick it to you first. What is the newest habit or practice that you've adopted that has had the most significant difference in your life?
- [02:46]
Amy Hutchins
Something I've started doing since I turned 40 is saying yes and meaning yes, or saying no and not feeling any guilt about saying no to something that I never really wanted to do in the first place. So I would say just really owning my decision and not making decision based on the guilt that other people might put on me for either attending an event or doing something that really just didn't fit for what I need at that point.
- [03:12]
Chris Hutchins
And this is gonna be interesting because I have some context on almost every one of your answers. But how do you handle situations where you feel this pressure to say yes, but you really just don't want to do the thing?
- [03:24]
Amy Hutchins
I definitely don't have this figured out. I would say this is newer territory for me. But I think there is something very liberating upon turning 40, where I don't feel the same amount of social pressure anymore. And there are still a lot of things, particularly around family events, that is really hard because there is this pressure around activities and events that come up often. And honestly, I might just not want to do them. And so the thing that I've found makes the most sense for me is deflecting and saying no, but no. And so, no, I will not be attending this thing. And I'd also then love to find separate time for the two of us to connect down the road. So it kind of softens the blow, and it allows me to kind of redirect on my terms.
- [04:10]
Chris Hutchins
So one of the areas this comes around, especially as we approach the holidays, is like, where do you go for the holidays? Whose families do you spend time with? And it clicked in my head.
- [04:19]
Amy Hutchins
Oh.
- [04:19]
Chris Hutchins
When I was a kid, it's not like I spent every single holiday with my grandparents. And so my parents made a conscious decision at some point that, yes, some years we'll go see Grandma and Grandpa on one side, Grandma and Grandpa on the other side. And then some years we'll just stay as a family and we'll do it ourselves. And I think until you have children, you don't have your own family to necessarily do holidays by yourself with. And so you're so used to going to see your parents or your siblings or your aunts, your uncles, or whoever it is. And so it just reminded me, thinking back to my childhood, that it's okay. Some of these traditions are going to break once you have a family and you'll create new ones and you can kind of do whatever you want. And just because it's the way you've done it before doesn't mean you have to keep doing it that way.
- [05:05]
Amy Hutchins
It's a really good point. I also feel like one thing we realized is a lot of other people actually feel very similarly, and so no one's really owning it until one person does. And then suddenly everyone else is like, oh, yeah, I agree. I don't want to do that either. And so I think there's a lot of value in just owning that decision.
- [05:23]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah, I'm very blunt with people. Sometimes it turns people off, but I am not afraid to let people know how I feel, even if it ruffles feathers. And so I think I probably need to go the other direction sometimes and be a little kinder.
- [05:36]
Amy Hutchins
I remember the first time we were out and about and one of our friends asked us if we wanted to meet up the next weekend or something for brunch. And you were like, eh, no thanks, and turned around and walked. And I was like, what? It was very eye opening, but I have a huge appreciation and respect for the way you did it because you, you completely owned it. And I think there's a lot of respect in saying, no, it doesn't work for me and that's fine.
- [05:59]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah, I mean, I didn't say no, walk away and never speak to this person. I think I was like, no, next weekend. I'm really looking forward to just doing nothing. And even though I didn't have a good excuse, I just owned the fact that the thing I wanted to do was not the brunch and I just wanted to do nothing.
- [06:14]
Amy Hutchins
What is your more recent habit or practice that you've adopted?
- [06:18]
Chris Hutchins
So I think I've talked about this. So I feel like this might be a cop out, but I used to be, even with children, would wake up a few minutes before the kids woke up. And now I feel like I wake up a little bit earlier, sometimes at 4:00, sometimes at 5:00, sometimes at 6:00. Kind of depends whether I was getting work done or binging some show the night before or I just went to bed at 8:00. But I think what's changed in the reason behind it, and not every day is perfect. I think we'll talk later about kids and parenting, but. But when I get up, some days it might be to exercise, some days it might be to just crank through an inbox and get a few things done. I feel like I can accomplish so much. Mostly distraction free from like 5 to 6:30 and then that one hour where the kids are awake before they're going off to school. I'm not trying to catch up on that email. I'm not trying to do that thing. And so I love the one to two hours that you get if you wake up before your children to really allow you to be more present with them before they go off to school and you go to your desk and you go to work and you're just back in that zone. I think I'd been waking up early, but I haven't been as intentional about it until recent. And I really like being intentional. And that doesn't mean every morning I have to work out, right? You literally work out every single morning. I think you had, you know, a multi month long streak. I'm not that reliable with working out, but that is something that's important. But the next question from Justin was actually about routines. So I'm curious. I know you start every day with a workout. What other routine things do you try to get done every day?
- [07:55]
Amy Hutchins
I wouldn't say I have a super rigid routine, but there are definitely some things that I feel like I have to do every day in order to feel accomplished. So a few things. One, it's really important for me to make my bed the morning just to feel like things are in a good place. Obviously that's hard when you're in it, but once you're up and out making the bed, I work out first thing in the morning. And so it's one of those things that it's much easier to do when there's no distraction of kids and people calling me and texting me and all of that. So doing it first thing in the morning when I haven't even processed that I'm working out, I get up, I get after it, and I feel so much better. You can attest to this. If I don't work out for several days in a row, I don't love myself. I just don't feel like a really nice human.
- [08:39]
Chris Hutchins
This is a question for both myself, but it feels like a safer environment to ask it when someone's partner needs that thing, Whether it's a walk, a nap, a workout, a snack. What is a good way for their partner to suggest that? Because sometimes I've said, amy, I think you should go work out right now. And it's now gotten to the point that you're like that kind of feels like you're telling me I'm in a bad mood.
- [09:00]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. And it's usually accurate. I am in a bad mood and you tell me and I work out, and I actually feel much happier, nicer. So I don't know. I guess every personality is different, but I trust you enough to tell me directly, like, hey, maybe you should go work out. You'll feel better. And I now know that's real. When I do it, I see the immediate impact of feeling better and being nicer towards you and being more present and or patient with the girls. And so for me, that's a really huge one. Just for my own mental sanity. What about you?
- [09:36]
Chris Hutchins
From a routine standpoint, for a long time I'd eliminated breakfast by just doing this Brian Johnson blueprint nutty pudding. And it was funny. I'm not convinced in the science nutrition that it is the best thing ever, but gosh, it was so easy. I didn't think about anything. It was like, I wake up, I get through my inbox two four days a week, exercise, have some nutty pudding, makes it really easy. I never have to think about breakfast. I'm very much a creature of habit in that way. Outside of that, my habits are probably less daily. Like, it's really important for me to have things organized to be able to get into a focus. So my habit is anytime I need to do focused work, it's I need the desk clean. I need all of the outstanding little things for me, which are like, are there any upcoming payments that I need to make that I haven't organized all those things. Once those are clear, then I can focus. So I like my habit in the morning to be things like clean out the inbox, clean off my desk, get done any of those quick wins to make you feel like you have momentum of just things that have been chipping away at you and then get into it. Similarly, I think one of my goals, which we haven't really talked about for 2025, is to be a little bit more intentional with routine and getting workouts in health, nutrition, all these things. So really dialing that in. So I hope we get to have this conversation a little bit later, or I hope I can find someone that might be a good person to really talk about routine and dialing it in that this is another topic we bring up for sure. Okay. Another question about this relationship. Hi, Chris. Love the podcast. You two have such a beautiful marriage and family. What, in your opinion, are the keys to a successful relationship? So for a little bit of context, for anyone listening, Amy and I have just celebrated 20 years being together. I can't remember if we've hit the point at which we've been together for more than half of our life, but it's plus or minus six months now. It's like somewhere right around now.
- [11:35]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah. Borderline.
- [11:36]
Chris Hutchins
And so later, someone asked a question about dating where I was like, I don't have a lot of feedback there, but when it comes to relationships, I have some thoughts, but I'll let you jump off. What do you think makes this work and has made it work for so long?
- [11:47]
Amy Hutchins
There are a few things that I think have worked really well for us, one of which is we laugh a lot. Thank God you're really funny. But I think we both laugh at ourselves and we laugh at each other, and you keep it really light. And so even when I'm in a mood, you can find a way to turn it around. And I really appreciate that. On the more serious side, the full transparency aspect has been critical for us. I think there is nothing I feel like I can't tell you in a way that you would judge me for. You're always willing to hear me out. You're always willing to try to understand my perspective, even if I do something that might be nonsensical. And so the fact that we can be our true, authentic selves and feel like there's a safe space where we can be fully transparent about anything, like we don't have to hide things has served us really well. And then I think the last piece of it is just full acceptance. And I learned this through the years because I remember when we first started dating and the first few years we were married, the first few years, this still happens, but little things, like, you would go to the kitchen, open a cabinet door, get a dish out, and leave the cabinet door wide open. And in my mind, it just drove me absolutely insane because I'm also very organized and, like, everything tidy and neat, and it just made zero sense to me that I would see these doors open all the time. But having come to realization that this is just the quirk you have, and I actually now really love that about you, it's like, oh, Chris has been here, so it kind of makes me smile now. But I think that the acceptance of recognizing you are who you are, and I'm not going to try to change that. It's just that's part of why I married you. And that's a reminder of, like, when you're not with me, I still see you everywhere. So it's kind of nice.
- [13:42]
Chris Hutchins
It's funny, one of the things you said made me think of something that I think works really well for us, and it's understanding what the other person needs and prioritizes. For example, I love to put things off to the last minute. And you don't love when anyone, including me, puts things off to the last minute. And what I've learned is you are most of the time much more accepting of me putting something off to the last minute as long as I communicate that I'm putting it off. And so if I say, hey, I'm going to make dinner tonight and we're going to have dinner at 5:30, and I haven't started making dinner and communicated anything and it's five, you're in the kitchen making dinner because you want to make sure it happens by 5:30.
- [14:30]
Amy Hutchins
I'm resentfully cooking at that point.
- [14:32]
Chris Hutchins
Yes.
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Amy Hutchins
Yeah.
- [14:33]
Chris Hutchins
But if I message you and say, hey, I am preparing something, it is quick. I will start it at 5. Then at 4:50, you're not running to the kitchen to go cook dinner. Right now, my acceptance of 5:30 might be like 5:30, 5:30, 5 if it's five minutes late. If you don't see me by 5, oh, 1, you're like, why aren't you here? You said 5:00. So I think I still probably need like some automated thing where if I ever text you a time and at that time I haven't started doing it, my, like Apple Intelligence on my phone follows up and says, I know I'm running two minutes behind, but I'm on it. That would be a great feature. If there's an AI app that does that, I would love it. So I think that's a big one, is just knowing that if you're in a frustrated mood whenever we would have an argument about something, you don't want to solve the argument in the moment. In fact, trying to solve the argument in the moment will ultimately or often not be a positive outcome for me. And so I've learned to be like, let's solve this later. But we've learned that by understanding what each other need. And so I think that's been really helpful. So I'm not going to try to convince you to do something. I'm gonna learn what I need and explain it to you so you understand it. And I think that's been super, super helpful. I think we've both accepted doing things that while we would love the other person to do, we understand that those things are more of a priority to us than other people. So I have this new habit of wanting to take the kids to go sell cans and trade them in at the recycling place and get some coins back. And you have a habit of wanting the house to be clean. And so if I want the cans to make it to the garage in some place where they're going to be sold, versus the recycle bin where no matter what they're getting recycled, it's just whether we're getting 5 cents a can. I need to clean the counters because your priority is clean up, not make 5 cents. And my priority is make 5 cents. Which, by the way, we will probably get to whether making 5 cents is a good use of time later in this conversation about when to optimize and when not to. But I think a big key for us was just understanding those quirks of what we need and what our personalities want. It's kind of like the love languages concept, but way beyond just love. I think one other key, which goes back to this question about dating advice where someone said, hey, dating's hard. Do you have any advice on trying to find your person? When did you know you wanted to marry each other? I have no advice about how to date in 2024.
- [16:53]
Amy Hutchins
If something happens to you, I 100% will be dying alone. I would have no clue how to start.
- [16:59]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah, I have no doubt that you will figure it out, but I hope it doesn't come to that. One thing that I think is unique and I said, we've been together 20 years and we've only been married for 12. We dated for eight years. And so I think one thing, we didn't rush into it. And not saying that rushing into it is bad, but we just kind of didn't feel this immense pressure. And we tested a lot of things out and I think we traveled for seven and a half months, 24, seven with each other before we got engaged. And so I'd say we got to see what it was like to be in circumstances together that I don't think most married people ever see in their entire lives.
- [17:39]
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- [20:06]
That made it really easy for us to be confident getting married was that by the time we felt like we needed to be married, we'd already done so many things and lived together and traveled together that we knew we were compatible on so many levels.
- [20:22]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I agree. The ability to go through so many different experiences in life and really pressure test the low points to me was a huge sign. I specifically remember when we went to my parents and we told them we were going to be traveling the world for a year to together. And my dad turned around and said, either you guys will be together forever or you will come home and you will never talk to each other again. And here we are. So obviously, you know, he's right. So far, so far, so good. But I think there's a very real truth to it because when you're with someone through really difficult or tense low points in the shared experience, you really see the best and the worst of the other person come out. And we had a lot of those because we were traveling on $30 a day, so we were not staying in nice places. We didn't have great transportation. Food and gastrointestinal stuff was like a whole different beast. And it allows you to get to know the person really well. I will add one thing, though. For those people who are dating one, you're superhuman. So keep going and good luck. The one thing I will say, though, is if you don't have time to really pressure test all of these different experiences, the most important thing I think you can do is just be really authentic to who you are, because you don't want to be attracting the wrong kind of people by putting on a front like, you're great the way you are, so just let that shine and you're going to attract the people who appreciate and enjoy that.
- [21:57]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah, I would say try to pressure test it. And this is like my dating advice. That might be horrible advice, but I could imagine a world where I'm like, oh, hi, let's go on a trip tomorrow to Africa and see what happens. And that may be crazy, but we learned so much from traveling together, from being in situations where we weren't surrounded by our friends and family, from being in uncomfortable places, that I would try to put yourself in those situations earlier because they're going to happen, and they're going to happen not only later in life, but they're going to happen when you have kids that are, you know, keeping you up at night. They're going to happen when you're more stressed out and more tired. And so if they don't go well early, maybe you can work on it. But it's probably also going to be really hard in the future.
- [22:47]
Amy Hutchins
Dating is also very interesting because I think before I met you, I thought I knew my type, and it was not you. And when we first met, I remember I actually didn't really like you that much, and you didn't even remember who I was. And so it's almost like we had totally crossed paths in a way that I think for most People, if they would have just stopped there, we would have never ended up together. And I think that's actually really interesting. Unfortunately, based on our circumstance. For those of you who don't know, Chris and I both were in a co ed business fraternity and Chris was my big brother. He was assigned my big brother because I had rushed a semester after him. And so based on our competitive natures, we were like, we are going to win the best big little of the semester. And even if that means we have to hang out together and we don't.
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Chris Hutchins
Want to, I don't remember not wanting to. But now, you know, they say you learn something new about your partner every day.
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Amy Hutchins
Okay, to be fair, in the beginning, you were not my cup of tea. However, in spending more time with you, I went from being like, oh boy, here we go, to wait a minute, do I actually like this guy a lot? And I realized through that time, because we continue to spend more time together, I loved hanging out with you. You were really cool and you made me laugh all the time. And that's not what my initial perspective of you was. So I thought that was actually also really, really interesting. It turns out I didn't really know myself or my type at the time.
- [24:24]
Chris Hutchins
I have another story to add, which is that when I was working at Google Ventures, there were two friends of mine and colleagues that both separately had a conversation with me and said, hey, dating's tough. I'm trying to find a person. This is a person that I'm looking for. This is what I want in life. And I knew them pretty well. I'd been working together with both of them for over a year. And I remember one moment being like, well, what about this other person? And they both worked together for over a year and they both thought I was crazy, despite working together and both wanting what I thought was the same thing. And having been on trips together and hung out together and off sites, never crossed their mind. And I was like, why don't you guys go out on date? And they did. And now they are married, they have two kids, and it was just totally wild that two people that worked together and knew each other and hung out socially together that wanted the same things, never even realized it. And so I don't know what the answer to that is, other than be more transparent with people about what you want so that even if you don't realize that person might be right across the desk from you, that maybe they will and they can connect you. So we said we had no dating advice, and here we are.
- [25:29]
Amy Hutchins
Okay, we'll move on to the next one. This question comes from Liron. Chris, what is it like having such.
- [25:35]
Chris Hutchins
An awesome wife, Amy and lerona and cahoots over here? I think there's probably no surprise from the way that I've talked about you for the last three years on this show that having you in my life makes everything better. It makes the house run better, the family run better, my life run better, me happier, me laugh. I would say in lines with our previous dating advice, find someone that's just awesome to be around. And I think we balance each other out really well, which now that we work professionally together is probably even more important. You don't need to find someone that you can professionally work with, but a lot of life and a lot of raising kids is work. And I remember Emily Oster wrote this book, the Family Firm. It's all about how raising a family is kind of like a business in certain ways. And so whether you're going to work together professionally in a corporation or not, you're going to work together. And so find someone that is compatible or complimentary I think would be really valuable. I can't read the name of the person that wrote this question, but, Amy, what is it like having such an awesome husband?
- [26:40]
Amy Hutchins
Is a person's name Chris Hudgens?
- [26:42]
Chris Hutchins
Yes. Yes. That's. Who wrote the question.
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Amy Hutchins
I feel really fortunate to have found my best friend and married him. It's amazing. You are definitely the most interesting, the most charismatic, and yet the most quirky person. You're everything all in one, and it just depends on what environment you're in at that given point in time. I love watching you exist. You say the funniest things and you make me laugh all the time. Even if it's rolling into bed at like 1am you'll say one thing, I will laugh for 20 minutes. So I really just. I enjoy your company.
- [27:24]
Chris Hutchins
I do, too. These were great questions. Thanks, Lerone. And thank you, Chris. One more question on this. Justin asks date night ideas. Any suggestions?
- [27:34]
Amy Hutchins
So we haven't tried this yet, but there was one thing that you showed me on Tick Tock, I think, and it was a couple that goes out and they commit to spend $20 at the thrift shop and they go and buy these ridiculous outfits.
- [27:49]
Chris Hutchins
Just to be clear, you have $20 to buy your partner's outfit, correct? Yeah. You don't get to pick your outfit. Your partner has $20 to buy whatever you're going to wear that night.
- [27:58]
Amy Hutchins
Exactly. So the couple, they spend $20 at the thrift shop, they come back, gift it to their partner, and then both people put on the attire from the thrift shop and they go out on a date. I feel like that would be a really epic date night, and I think that's something that we should do the next time we go out. We haven't tried it, but I'm game. Minus any wigs. I am not down to put that on my head. Sorry.
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Chris Hutchins
Okay, so a wigless, hatless thrift store event is in our future. It'll probably be no surprise that I think any date night that involves an escape room is an excellent date night.
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Amy Hutchins
One book you bought me maybe a year or two ago was the Adventure Challenge. And that's actually a really cool book because it comes with a variety of different ideas where you can select indoor, outdoors, 30 minutes, 2 hours at home, out of the house. So it can be very tailored to the time and the location that you have available to you. But we've done some really fun things that were outside of our wheelhouse that we wouldn't necessarily have thought of. And it just takes the burden of having to come up with those date ideas and does it for you. So those are fun.
- [29:13]
Chris Hutchins
Those are great. But also, it doesn't have to be crazy. One night, we had childcare set up, and instead of going out to a nice restaurant, going to have drinks, I think we actually, like, snuck back into the house and just hung out watching TV and eating pizza and going to bed early. Like, we just didn't even go out. And I don't even remember whether we told anyone that we were still in the house. I think they thought we left and we were, like, in the basement, in the office. I can't remember what we did exactly. But a date night does not have to be fancy. It's whatever you want it to be. I think it's just important to make sure, especially as you have kids, to just get out and have some time for you, because that's something that I've talked to a handful of friends, and they just lost that. And when I've encouraged people to bring it back, it was really awesome. And even tell their kids, hey, it's important for mommy and daddy to have some time together also. And, like, they understand that. And, you know, I imagine someday we're gonna be like, hey, do you guys wanna plan something? You plan whatever we're doing for date night, and we'll report back. We'll take pictures.
- [30:14]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I loved that pizza date night. That was epic.
- [30:18]
Chris Hutchins
Another one is around. Household responsibilities. How do we Decide who does what around the house. And I'll just add that not every household responsibility is around the house. Could be on the Internet, could be related to taxes, could be related to organizing financial stuff. Amy, what do you say?
- [30:35]
Amy Hutchins
This is Chris's segue to try to get credit for all of the work that he does? Because I would say Chris leads a lot of our digital life, and I lead a lot of our physical life, and so it kind of breaks down that way. But in all reality, I don't know that we necessarily have conquered this whole. How do we divide household responsibilities? I think there are natural divisions of responsibility. I actually very much enjoy doing laundry. It's therapeutic for me. And so I do the laundry in the house because I don't mind it. You manage a lot of the financial stuff or having to call banks and deal with payment stuff, because, honestly, it's my nightmare, and I really don't want to have to touch that. And so I think understanding those things and funneling those responsibilities where maybe one person enjoys it or doesn't find it to be such a burden, makes a lot more sense than trying to equally split 50 50.
- [31:38]
Chris Hutchins
What about the sewage pump? Was that a physical activity that I clean every month? Because it doesn't feel very digital.
- [31:44]
Amy Hutchins
Okay, to be fair, it's not every month. It's every quarter. But, oh, man, Chris gets stuck with all the crappy responsibilities, literally.
- [31:53]
Chris Hutchins
Usually if it involves, like, climbing really high ladders, cleaning the solar panels, that kind of stuff, I volunteer for those physical activities. And then a lot of the stuff we don't really keep score on, who's cooking dinner the most, who's, you know, walking the dog, those kinds of things. It just happens. And if you are listening to this and you're saying, that doesn't sound like us, go back and listen to the episode Amy and I did with Nate and Kaylee Klemp on a book they wrote called the 8080 marriage. And it just kind of removed the keeping score and made life so much easier and got rid of a lot of the mental burden. Okay, let's move on from relationship stuff and talk about a bunch of different perspectives. There wasn't really a bucket for a lot of these questions. So I'm going to ask you a question that I think was written for me, which is what interviewer episode has most impacted your life or changed the way you think? And I ask you first, because I know every Wednesday morning, first thing you do is go and listen to the episode for the week. And that evolved from doing it because you were excited because you hadn't heard it to. Well, now I've heard it because I work here. But I want to make sure it's all done correctly and everything went out correctly. But which episode has had the most impact on your life?
- [33:01]
Amy Hutchins
I always refer back to Die with zero, and that's been really impactful because I think prior to that, I grew up in a mindset, and we were operating in a mindset where you always save. And I think that came at a cost of foregoing experiences and or other opportunities for a means of continuing to save. And so the interview that you did with Bill Perkins was really eye opening because it made me look at every decision I was making very differently as a way to optimize my life and the experiences I'm having today versus trying to punt all of these great times and purchases and experiences into the future when I won't be able to enjoy it so much. So that's one I lean on heavily. I think about almost every day, and it's definitely changed my actions on a regular basis. What about you?
- [33:59]
Chris Hutchins
So this is a tough one. I feel like it's like asking you to pick your favorite child. Right. I've done 200 episodes now, which, by the way, we never really celebrated because we just put out an episode as number 200. So I don't think I could pick one because I just scrolled through the list right in front of me and I was like, oh, man, I love that takeaway from talking about negotiation. That was super meaningful. If you asked which one I recommend the most, which, by the way, Pro Hack someone taught me that when you're trying to ask someone a question like this, what is your best, your favorite? Ask them not what your favorite book is, but what book have you gifted the most or what would you recommend the most? Because it takes a little bit of the pressure away of hey, what's your favorite? Which is a really hard question as you're experiencing with my non answer. So I often recommend people check out the Arthur Brooks episode I did about happiness because I think it just kind of opened my eyes to a topic I hadn't thought about a lot. And this is a bit of a weird answer, but the research I did for the Points versus Cash Back episode was really meaningful to me because it really twisted my mindset on the value of points, and it's just kind of changed the way I think about a lot of things. And so sometimes when I do a solo episode, it's not the end result that is so powerful. It's the fact that I did 30, 40, 50 hours of research going into it. And so every one of those, like the amount of research I did on insurance and the impact of that seeing people write reviews about saving tens of thousands of dollars a year on insurance is amazing. Someone sent an email in today that thanks to something in a newsletter, they were able to finally go get a calcium score for their heart health. Like seeing that kind of feedback every time is exciting, but it happens with every episode. So it's impossible for me to pick just one episode. So I am going to punt on giving a real answer to that question.
- [35:55]
The latest report from the FTC showed that in 2023, $10 billion was lost to consumer fraud and 2.7 billion of that was lost to imposter scams, which had over 850,000 reports last year. So what do you do about it? Well, first off, just learning more about the tactics these scammers use can help you know what to look out for. But a big way I try to keep our family protected is to make sure all our personal info is removed from as many data broker websites as possible, so we're less of an enticing target. You'd be shocked at how many sites out there are sharing your address, phone number, birthday, email, and more. Fortunately, you can get these data brokers to remove your info, but unfortunately the process takes hours and hours to do yourself. I know because I tried to contact them and only after spending 10 hours did I give up and start using Delete Me, our sponsor today. And not only do I use Delete Me for our immediate family, but I also paid for a subscription for my parents and in laws as well. DeleteMe is an amazing service that will not just find and remove your personal info from hundreds of data broker websites, but they'll continuously scan for new data that shows up and get that removed as well. On average, they find and remove over 2,000 pieces of data for a customer in their first two years. So if you want to get your personal information removed from the web, go to allthehacks.com deleteme and get 20% off a plan for you or your entire family. Again, that's allthehacks.com delete me this episode is brought to you by Vuori, which is a new perspective on performance apparel that I wear almost every single day. It is so versatile that it can be used for just about any activity, whether it's running, training, swimming, yoga, or even lounging, running errands or going out to dinner. Seriously I wear my Vuori Meta pants out to dinner all the time, but today I want to talk about their Dream Knit collection. It's super soft, lightweight, moisture wicking, but it also has this amazing four way performance stretch that makes everything so comfortable. It's pretty much impossible to narrow down my Vuori recommendations to just one thing, but today I want you to check out the Ponto Performance Jogger for men or just the Performance Jogger for women. They're both part of the Dream Neck collection and my wife Amy and I absolutely love them and wear them all the time. Seriously, Vuori is an investment in your happiness and for our listeners they're offering 20% off your first purchase plus free shipping on US orders over 75 and free returns. So get yourself some of the most comfortable and versatile clothing on the planet@AllTheHacks.com Vuori that's V U O R I again, that's AllTheHacks.com Vuori V U O R I To discover the versatility of Vuori clothing exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. I just want to thank you Kwik for listening to and supporting the show. Your support is what keeps this show going. To get all of the URLs, codes, deals and discounts from our partners, you can go to allthehacks.com deals. So please consider supporting those who support us.
- [39:10]
I will answer the next question which is would you still use an EA from Oceans and that's an assistant Hassani who's on our team, if we weren't using it for business purposes and it was only personal or we had to pay full price? Well the second part of it's really easy. We do pay full price. I would love, if the CEO of Oceans is listening, wants to just give us half off, but that's not the case. We are paying full price. In fact, I don't even think we got the thousand dollar off offer that everyone now gets if they sign up. But the question is whether we'd use it if we weren't using it for business. And when we first signed up for it, the idea was that it would be like 5050 personal and business. And we ended up having so many business things that were so high leverage that Posse Knee was able to figure out that she's basically fully focused on the business. So you could make an argument that because we no longer have an assistant on the personal side that no, we wouldn't do that. However, now we are in a circumstance where we're wondering should we hire a Second Ocean Za that focuses a bit more on personal things and that's part of our 2025 planning. And I think it really depends person to person whether you can fill 40ish hours a week with personal tasks. I don't think we could. I think it would be hard. So would I be up for hiring someone to help with personal things on some basis that isn't full time? Absolutely. And there are agencies. I think Squared away is one. There's a company that someone I tried to hire started called Faye. I think it's find Faye.com and it's more personal assistant help on a less than full time basis. And so I think those things can be really valuable if you have tasks and not time. But would I be able to fill 40 hours a week if I didn't have any business needs? Probably not at this point in life. But part of that is that a lot of the things that someone might often outsource to an assistant, like booking travel or organizing things, is stuff I love doing and stuff that I do and then create content around. So it might not be a perfect answer. Do you have any thoughts?
- [41:16]
Amy Hutchins
I think we could actually use 40 hours for an EA if they were local. So I think that's the one thing you just have to ask yourself is for personal matters, are most of them able to happen online or remote? And if so, I think it makes a ton of sense and like Chris had said, we are looking at adding an additional personal part time focused ea. So I think it makes a lot of sense.
- [41:45]
Chris Hutchins
And I'll just plug because as we're thinking about 2025, one of the things we're thinking about is that role. The second thing is thinking about hiring someone to help on the producer side. So if anyone's listening and kind of falls in the bucket of podcast producer or skills adjacent to that, please send us a Note. Podcast@AllTheHacks.com that is a role that I'd love to find someone in the audience that loves the content and already loves the show that can help with planning and blocking and tackling all the content calendar, organizing that with partners, figuring out what's next, helping with some of the research that goes into it. That's someone that we're looking for in the coming year. So please send us a note. Speaking of meeting new people, the next question from Jackie is what tips and tricks we have to meet and network with like minded individuals or friends such as business partners, investors or even just friends. She finds meeting people in your 30s difficult, which I totally agree with and wanted to have some ideas. So I have experimented in ways that made you very uncomfortable because there was some dating app that launched a version called, like, BFF or something, and it was literally like Tinder for friends. And I never pulled the trigger on swiping on someone, but I was like, I agree with this problem. I would like to meet someone that I'm not friends with just because they live on my block or because I worked with them five years ago. And so I believe there are people that live in the town we live in that would be better close friends of mine than people that are friends of mine. And I'm not sure how to find them. I remember when we moved into the neighborhood, I asked you if you would be cool with me writing up, like, a postcard about us and who we are and going around the neighborhood and putting it in people's mailboxes. It would be like, hey, we're Chris, We're Amy. We have this daughter. We just moved to the neighborhood. We like playing board games, but we don't want to stay up till two in the morning. We'll have some cocktails, but we don't need to get hammered. Do you want to be our friends? How did you respond? Did we do that?
- [43:46]
Amy Hutchins
I just wanted to crawl into a hole and die. When you told me that, I don't think we actually ever executed, at least not that I'm aware of. I think it's actually a really creative idea, looking back, but I don't know, there's just something that feels very.
- [44:02]
Chris Hutchins
I think you probably said desperate was one of the words that came to mind. And I agree. I think it's the bluntness of my personality, which is like, I'm not trying to be desperate. I'm just, like, trying to find the best friends. And it's like, I want to cast a wide net to find the most interesting people. And it probably would have been a little too far to be like, here's the screening criteria. We're going to run everyone that we meet through. We could probably just keep that to ourselves, but I don't have a perfect answer other than just going to events where things that you're excited about are happening. And so I recently went to a conference called the Chicago Seminars, and it was all about points and miles. And there are probably six episodes that you will hear about, everything from buying gold at Costco to the gift card reselling market to buyers groups, and a lot more that will be future episodes in the coming months. And I am so excited to share Them. I've been going down so many rabbit holes that have really taken over a lot of my time. And I've met some really great friends. And so if you're passionate about a sport, if you're passionate about a charity, if you're passionate about an organization, I wouldn't be afraid to go to those things. There are local meetups on basically every topic under the sun. However, I will say that there's this period of time, probably in your 30s, before your kids are old enough to go to school, where friends is tough and meeting new ones is difficult. I'm not sure what to do. And I went through that. I think you went through that. Then we had kids go to school and then all of a sudden your kids in a class with 20 kids, probably 40 parents, and now all of a sudden you have all of these people that you're seeing all the time. And it doesn't mean they're all going to be your best friends, but chances are they're going to find a few there. And it seems like every parent I know in their 40s, 50% plus of their friend group is their kids, schoolmates, parents. That's not a bad thing necessarily.
- [45:54]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, I would agree with all of that. Definitely follow your passion and find groups that align around those things, whether it's a local run club, a church group. But my point is, if you follow things that you are passionate around, you will find other people who have similar interests and it's much easier to engage and kick off a discussion that way. I think the other thing that I have found and heard from some of my friends who've done this is put yourself out there and go sign up for something that seems completely outside of your wheelhouse. For example, one of my friends just signed up randomly for a tap dance class. She's not a tap dancer. This is not in her wheelhouse. But she met a lot of really cool new people who actually were also doing some of this for the first time. And so it creates this kind of bonding experience. That could be an interesting way to kick off a friendship and put yourself out there and to establish some kind of rapport.
- [46:51]
Chris Hutchins
Back to the point about introducing two friends that got together. I would say there are a lot of people out there that you might know them very casually and they could be great friends, but you just haven't found a way to make it happen. I am not shy at doing this. So if we're at the park and our kids are playing and we meet another parent, I'm always the first person is like, hey, let's exchange numbers. You know, we hang out one time, not interesting.
- [47:15]
Amy Hutchins
Great.
- [47:15]
Chris Hutchins
We don't hang out again. And no one's ever, like, upset about that. So I just think we've done that a lot. And I know every time we see someone at the park and I'm like, oh, that couple looks really cool. I'm like, let's go give him our number. And Amy's like, what are you doing? But it ends up working out.
- [47:29]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah.
- [47:30]
Chris Hutchins
And we end up having some friends that are just people we met at a park and we exchanged contact information with. And then we had the fortunate benefit that they also had kids that were playing at the park. So that worked out, but it expanded even beyond the school network and that worked really well when kids were really young. I wouldn't expect it to be easy to go meet friends if you don't have kids at a playground.
- [47:51]
Amy Hutchins
I highly don't recommend that.
- [47:54]
Chris Hutchins
But for people with really young kids before school, that's one idea.
- [47:57]
Amy Hutchins
Okay, the next question is a very good question specifically for you. Justin asks for credit card rewards. Is it better to have a player 2 have cards from different issuers so that you can rack up points for more travel partners, or is it better to have them as authorized users on your card to rack up points faster?
- [48:16]
Chris Hutchins
Great question. I actually think I want to do an episode entirely on how to think about all of the things I talk about when you're playing whatever game it is with another person. So whether you have a player two or even some people as they get older and they have kids over the age of 18, starting to think about this even more with player three, player four. And just to be clear, this is not what we call each other in our house. This is standard terminology when it comes to credit cards, when it comes to deals, when it comes to all this stuff, at least within the kind of group of people that talk about this stuff for a living. And so I don't think authorized user cards have that much of a place in the world for partners who are older adults because you can load your card onto their Apple Pay. You can share your card on one password so they have access to it online. In the case that they need it in person, you can just hand them the card. And I've rarely seen a circumstance where they can't use the card in person. One place where I think it is interesting and I can't remember the exact banks and issuers where it helps the most. So you're going to need to do some Searching yourself is that there are some banks and card issuers where if you make someone an authorized user, they will inherit the longevity of that card and the account associated with it. So it can be really helpful with younger kids, it can be helpful if your partner doesn't have a lot of credit to be able to make them an authorized user on an issuer where it matters. So do your homework and that could help boost their credit score, make it easier for them to get approved for things. So I don't care about adding as an authorized user, but the question seemed to be more, do you just have one card and I'll focus on that or do you spread things out? I love spreading things out because then you have the chance to be eligible for more bonuses. Every card that you've been able to have in the past, someone else can have. So now you get two opportunities. There's a really great offer. Now you can both have that. So I like that. I like spreading across different programs. I do like keeping them somewhat consistent. So you're the Hilton person. You have Hilton status, you have Hilton cards. I have Hyatt cards and Hyatt status. On airlines, it's a little bit different because it's not like when you both fly, you earn on one person's account like you do with a hotel, so doesn't matter as much. But we also don't have a lot of airline cards, so that doesn't really matter. So I think spreading things out is great. Using the fact that you have two people can just unlock twice as many opportunities. And that's precisely what I think a whole episode will be around. Do you have anything to add about how to manage this so it doesn't drive maybe your player to a little bit crazy when they find out that they're randomly getting credit cards in their name?
- [50:52]
Amy Hutchins
You are the king of spreadsheets. And so I would recommend putting together a simple spreadsheet and I would say.
- [50:58]
Chris Hutchins
Give them a heads up in advance. Yes and usually no because I have to unlock and unfreeze our credit. So I say, hey, Amy, I'm going to unfreeze your credit. You're going to get some text messages. Can you give me those codes so I can unfreeze them? Because we're going to do this thing and this is why. And then you say, is this going to change everything I have to do? Do I have to relearn the whole system? And I say, no, it's going to be so easy. I'll just update this little doc.
- [51:20]
Amy Hutchins
You are experiencing my Day to day life firsthand.
- [51:23]
Chris Hutchins
Right now, I actually think I might bring Kai back, who came on talking about all kinds of deals and repeating them because he's just thought a lot about this with multiple players. So stay tuned for that.
- [51:33]
Amy Hutchins
Okay, next question is about valuing time and opportunity cost. This is going to be really interesting. Can you discuss how you personally view diminishing returns and opportunity cost? You spend so much time optimizing small amounts of money relative to your overall net worth. Curious to hear more on your decision making and also things that you view not worth your time to save money.
- [51:56]
Chris Hutchins
I believe that there is not only an episode. Amy and I actually talked about doing a series once a month where we just get in the habit of every month, or maybe it's every quarter writing down all the ridiculous discussions we have about spending way too much time to save way too little money. And we have like a public therapy session where we talk about these ridiculous things, which 90% are me, but 10% are you.
- [52:19]
Amy Hutchins
That's true, but 90% are you.
- [52:22]
Chris Hutchins
Yes. And so I will say that I love this stuff. And so a really important thing is when I'm trying to save money, part of it is because I enjoy it. So that is an important factor because if it wasn't, I absolutely wouldn't do most of this stuff. Another piece of it, and I'm actually dealing with this right now. When I stayed at a hotel recently, they took a $50 deposit and they never refunded it. And I called them and it would seem like it's going to be a mess to get the $50 back because not only have they not given it and I've tried once, but also it seems like I'm going to have to find some way to give them a new card because I don't actually have the card that I put it on anymore. At least the numbers change. It's changed from MasterCard to a Visa. So I don't even know if they can refund the card they took. Now, how long should I spend trying to get $50 back? Probably not two, three hours. Probably definitely two minutes. And how do I factor in the fact that maybe I've already spent 20 minutes trying to do this? At the end of the day, there are some things that if you just can't let them go, I think fighting to value your time might not be worth it. So in this case, I can't let go the fact that someone owes me $50 and is not going to give him back. If I were running a marathon trying to beat my time and a hundred dollar bill dropped out of my pocket. That would be a tough circumstance. I don't want to stop, but, like, I can't just throw a hundred dollars away on the sidewalk and ignore it. And so refunds are like this in a lot of cases. It's like, oh, do I really want to drive all the way here to process this refund? You had a circumstance the other day where Target shipped everything in a box with no protection, and half of the things were broken. There were shards of glass, and they were like, please send it back to us. And on one hand you could have said, this isn't that expensive. I could just eat it because I don't want to pack up a bunch of broken glass. But you chose to go on live chat and argue with someone to get a refund without sending it back. Was that worth your time?
- [54:21]
Amy Hutchins
When I think about the opportunity cost of my time and the fact that I was missing riding bikes with you and the girls to deal with this live chat fiasco, it was definitely not worth my time. But it's hard in the moment to pick our heads up and say, whoa, what are we doing here? And oftentimes it takes either one of us calling each other out to kind of take a step back and say, we're being completely crazy. This makes no sense.
- [54:46]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah. I do think that us voicing these things is great because even though we both have these tendencies, we push each other out of them. I'm just learning to play every game in life at a more advanced level. There was a time where opening up a new bank account for $100 and transferring over my direct deposit might have been worth it. And now for me, that time is not now. That doesn't mean that for someone listening to this, it might be the perfect thing if you could open up four bank accounts a month and split your direct deposit and make $400 every month over the course of the year, make an extra $5,000. Great. Now that I think about it, it sounds like a better idea than I thought of a few minutes ago. So maybe we'll be having a few more bank accounts, but I again, I think you have to think about it in the moment and ask yourself, like, play the scenario out. Does it make sense? What other things could I do with my time? Could I increase the value of my business? How much would I pay to spend more time with my kids? And I'm getting better at it. But as you can see, for me, just walking through that example that I thought was a Bad idea. I still have this tendency to look at everything through these rose colored glasses of finding a deal and what it could be. So it's hard. I think I will prepare better for an episode we do on this topic and maybe find someone that can help me through this. It's like I need a spending and thrifty coach here just to bounce ideas off of. But I think as long as you're doing something you enjoy and feeling good about it, I don't necessarily think it's as big of a waste of time as it is if you're just doing it to save the money. And so there have been times where I don't necessarily enjoy driving somewhere in traffic. And so if we bought something from a grocery store and like the box was actually cut open, sometimes just throw it away. Although I will say the one huge advantage of buying your groceries online is that when you have issues like a box of blueberries is moldy, you can return them online instead of having to drive back to the store. And so, you know, groceries online might be more expensive, but depending on how often you get something you need to return. Like this morning we learned that we have some E. Coli carrots. Possibly they are recalled. And buying those carrots online, easy refund. Would I drive all the way back to the grocery store to return carrots that were recalled? Absolutely not. It wouldn't even cross my mind. I wouldn't feel bad about it. I probably would have earlier in my life. I definitely don't now and it doesn't bother me. So we also got a ton of really great questions about children and everything from thinking about time to tips for traveling with kids. General advice whether we will fly business class with our kids. This came from my last day May with Kevin. What's the plan here? How to prepare for a baby. Thinking about private school. There are some really great questions. How to think about childcare and different options, stimulating kids content. Tldr Stillwater is an awesome show on Apple tv. Amy and I both absolutely love watching it and to our kids it is low stimulation. Yes. So instead of getting to all those today, I'm gonna just propose we dedicate an episode to tackling some of the big parenting questions. And if there are too many that fit into that one, then we'll punt it to the next time. But thank you so much for sending them. We will get to them at some point and I'm excited for it.
- [58:01]
Amy Hutchins
Yeah, likewise. You should see a kid focused episode coming out in a few months.
- [58:06]
Chris Hutchins
Yeah, I think. Let's do it in January. Great.
- [58:09]
Amy Hutchins
All right.
- [58:09]
Chris Hutchins
This has been a lot of fun. I love having you on the show. I love doing things more casual. You're an awesome wife, as we already established. So thank you for being here. If anyone has questions, all the hacks.comama for the next one. This has been great. See you next week.