Friday Flight - Points for Paying your Mortgage, Credit Card Consultants, & AI UBI (to each according to his need!) #1092

Summary

How to Money: Friday Flight - Points for Paying your Mortgage, Credit Card Consultants, & AI UBI (#1092) Date: January 23, 2026
Hosts: Joel & Matt (iHeartPodcasts)

---

Episode Overview

This Friday Flight episode is a fast-moving, candid round-up of the week's most interesting and impactful personal finance headlines. Joel and Matt break down new ways to earn credit card points by paying mortgages, explore the emerging industry of credit card consultants, dig into AI-powered personal finance tools, and wrestle with Elon Musk’s provocative prediction that AI will make retirement savings obsolete. Through it all, they offer their signature blend of skepticism, humor, actionable advice, and personal anecdotes.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Cocktails vs. Mocktails – Not the Savings You Expect

• Dry January and Mocktail Costs ([02:05]–[04:17])
  • Study finds mocktails are priced nearly as high as cocktails, upending the common expectation that going alcohol-free will save money.
  • Quote:
    “This study basically found not really. Like, mocktails are almost as much as cocktails. And that's what I've seen when I go out and about.” – Joel ([02:55])
  • High price justified by the craft and complexity of ingredients in many mocktails.
  • Money-saving tip: Order straightforward non-alcoholic options (such as soda) if cost-cutting is the goal.

2. Credit Reports and Hiring: Fading Away in Most States

• Background Checks and Credit Report Restrictions ([05:09]–[06:41])
  • Eleven states now ban employers from using credit reports in hiring, with New York the latest to join.
  • Companies are moving away from credit-based hiring nationwide due to legal and compliance reasons.
  • Important: Credit checks may still apply to certain sensitive jobs.
  • Quote:
    "There are just fewer companies checking your credit report because it's illegal in enough states where maybe we'll just bag that process altogether." – Joel ([05:51])
  • Your credit still affects many other aspects of your financial life.

3. Student Loan Wage Garnishment Temporarily Paused

• Update on Student Loan Defaults ([06:41]–[08:00])
  • The Department of Education has paused wage garnishments for 5 million borrowers in default, recognizing persistent issues in the student loan system.
  • Borrowers are urged to resume payments as soon as possible regardless of pause, especially with new plans on the horizon.
  • Next week’s episode will feature Stanley Tate, “the student loan lawyer.”

4. New Bilt Credit Cards: Earn Mortgage Points, For a Price

• Paying Your Mortgage with a Credit Card ([08:00]–[10:23])
  • Bilt launches new credit cards letting homeowners pay mortgages and earn points, but with a 3% processing fee.
  • The fee can be offset if you generate enough points from other spending.
  • These hoops mean the card is only worthwhile for big spenders who can maximize point strategies.
  • Quote:
    “For most folks, the juice is probably not going to be worth the squeeze.” – Joel ([09:52])

5. Is the Credit Card Points Game Too Complicated?

• Time vs. Reward When Optimizing Points ([10:23]–[14:04])
  • Complexity is intentional: maximizing reward systems is like having a part-time job.
  • Hosts endorse straightforward 2% cash-back cards such as Citi Double Cash or the Fidelity card for most people.
  • Quote:
    "It's just gotten too complicated to optimize the different credit card reward systems, the points. So you're better off not trying." – Matt ([10:41])
  • Personal finance is personal—know yourself and pick systems (or cards) you can realistically manage.

6. Credit Card Consultants: Worth It?

• Who Should Hire a Pro? ([14:04]–[17:23])
  • There’s a growing niche of “credit card consultants” to help optimize rewards, but most people don’t need one.
  • Exceptions: A consultant could be worth it for single, high-cost events (like a wedding) where smart card strategy can fund a honeymoon.
  • AI tools like ChatGPT can now provide nearly the same service for free.
  • Quote:
    "If ChatGPT has all that knowledge stored, then you might not need to hire someone." – Joel ([17:23])

7. Weddings: Smaller Parties, Cash Registries, and High Costs

• Trends in Wedding Spending and Gift Preferences ([17:36]–[19:55])
  • Average wedding parties are shrinking (now about four on each side).
  • Wedding party participation costs have risen—now over $2,000, similar to a month’s rent.
  • Hosts both endorse the idea of honeymoon or house-fund registries instead of traditional gifts.
  • Quote:
    "I would rather give money to those funds than I would like, buy them some dishes or something like that." – Joel ([19:12])

8. Ludicrous Headline: $99/Month for a Tony Robbins Chatbot

• AI Self-Help Coaches and Personalization ([21:06]–[27:34])
  • Wall Street Journal reports on people paying $99/month for a Tony Robbins AI chatbot; hosts are skeptical.
  • Joel shares how uploading personal data to ChatGPT for fitness advice is shockingly effective and highly personalized.
  • Main concerns: High subscription cost and lack of genuine human spontaneity and creativity.
  • Quote:
    "But it's just a program. Trained to act like that person. ... I'm going to pass on these for now. I'm going to keep it old school." – Joel ([23:53])

9. AI Used to Slash Hospital Bills

• Real-world AI Money Hacks ([28:39]–[29:41])
  • A Medium article details a family using Claude (an AI tool) to analyze and successfully negotiate down a $195,000 hospital bill to $33,000.
  • AI can increase consumer power by exposing billing errors or overcharges, making advocacy easier for non-experts.
  • Quote:
    “AI is not great for everything. But this is one of the ways that I think folks can certainly use this technology ... to their financial advantage.” – Matt ([29:33])

10. Elon Musk and the Future of Retirement Savings in the Age of AI

• Retirement Obsolete? ([29:41]–[31:17])
  • Musk claims AI will create such abundance that traditional retirement saving will become unnecessary within 15–20 years.
  • Hosts are highly skeptical, noting Musk’s spotty record with predictions and the unpredictable nature of human work and technological progress.
  • Quote:
    “Should we all say screw it to our IRAs and our 401ks because Elon says we're not going to need them 20 years from now?” – Joel ([31:03])
  • Historical context: grand predictions about technology freeing us from work haven't panned out as imagined.

11. Should You Tap Retirement for a House Down Payment?

• White House Proposal: Broader Access to 401k for Homebuyers ([31:17]–[33:29])
  • Proposal under consideration to allow penalty-free 401k withdrawals for home down payments, similar to an existing $10,000 exception for IRAs.
  • Matt is wary; making retirement savings more accessible tends to undermine people’s future financial security.
  • Short-term goals (like home purchase) should use non-retirement savings.

12. U.S. Geopolitics and Investing Implications (“Greenland Whiplash”)

• Presidential Rhetoric and Financial Fallout ([33:29]–[40:41])
  • Ongoing U.S. political posturing about buying Greenland is driving global financial ripples: mortgage rates tick up, gold surges, markets fluctuate.
  • The broader concern: If U.S. foreign relations and global standing shift, should long-term investment strategies change to include more international exposure?
  • Emphasis on not reacting to short-term news, but remaining mindful if trends persist.
  • Quote:
    “At some point you do have to rethink your investing strategy. ... If the position of the United States in the world and in the global order is changing ... should we then approach our own future investments differently?” – Joel ([37:21])
  • Caution: U.S. economic resilience is strong, but the permanence of global relationships is uncertain.

---

Memorable Quotes

• “The juice is probably not going to be worth the squeeze.” – Joel, on paying your mortgage with a rewards card ([09:52])
• “It's just gotten too complicated to optimize the different credit card reward systems ... you’re better off not trying.” – Matt ([10:41])
• “If ChatGPT has all that knowledge stored, then you might not need to hire someone.” – Joel ([17:23])
• “AI is not great for everything. But this is one way that I think folks can use this technology to their financial advantage.” – Matt ([29:40])
• “Should we all say screw it to our IRAs and our 401ks because Elon says we're not going to need them 20 years from now?” – Joel ([31:03])
• “If it's super near term, hang on to that money in cash. ... Invest it within a brokerage account where you're not going to get hit with [a] 10% penalty.” – Matt ([33:24])

---

Notable Timestamps

| Topic/Segment | Timestamp | |------------------------------------------------------|--------------| | Cocktail vs. mocktail pricing | [02:05]–[04:17] | | Credit checks in hiring and new legislation | [05:09]–[06:41] | | Student loan garnishment pause | [06:41]–[08:00] | | Bilt mortgage payment card launch details | [08:00]–[10:23] | | Credit card reward system complexity | [10:23]–[14:04] | | Credit card consultants – do you need one? | [14:04]–[17:23] | | AI personal finance assistants | [21:06]–[27:34] | | AI for negotiating medical bills | [28:39]–[29:41] | | Elon Musk’s AI/UBI retirement claim | [29:41]–[31:17] | | Tapping 401k for house down payment | [31:17]–[33:29] | | US/Greenland geopolitical impact on investments | [33:29]–[40:41] |

---

Conclusion

Joel and Matt’s Friday Flight delivers insightful, practical takes on the latest personal finance news, deftly weaving in trends in credit cards, employment, AI, weddings, and even speculative geopolitics. Their advice remains grounded, urging listeners not to chase overly complicated rewards schemes or to bet their future on unpredictable ideas—whether they come from fintech startups or tech billionaires. As always, they emphasize personal financial systems that fit the individual, a balanced skepticism toward industry hype, and the importance of staying plugged in to changing economic realities.

Next week's highlight: Student loan legal expert Stanley Tate will join the show.

Transcript

[Matt]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed Human.

[Joel]

Welcome to how to Money. I'm Joel.

[Matt]

I'm Matt.

[Joel]

Today we're talking mortgage payment perks, credit card consultants, and AI ubi.

[Matt]

Yeah, a ubi. You're talking about Musk. Did you see the latest news about him getting in a fight with the Ryanair CEO?

[Joel]

Yes.

[Matt]

And I didn't follow this spat online. Spat because I don't spend any time on X. But I love that. Evidently, Elon said that he was going to buy the company and then replace the CEO with somebody actually named Ryan, which is like the most juvenile, stupid, but also hilarious that, that I saw.

[Joel]

Well, Ryanair has been, it was like kind of the original when it comes to like discount airlines. Oh, yeah, it all started in Europe.

[Matt]

And Ryanair and EasyJet. Man, I remember flying those jokers.

[Joel]

If you hate Spirit, you have Ryanair to blame for that.

[Matt]

Back in 2000, I guess 2006, and I think we flew from Milan to London for 20 bucks or I guess it was €20.

[Joel]

And of course, the Ryanair CEO, he's like this shameless self promoter and he's using this spat as he's like, hey, now we get this idiot sale or whatever.

[Matt]

Idiot seat sale?

[Joel]

Yeah, for $23.

[Matt]

Cause like, so funny, some of those.

[Joel]

Flights are so dang and they can. They've just figured out a way to do it for incredibly cheap. And that's where the spat started, by the way, is because Elon was like, hey, you need to put Starlink on your airplanes. And the CEO was like, no, it's going to cost me money.

[Matt]

And nobody's going to actually pay for the stupid thing.

[Joel]

Our customers are so price sensitive. It's going to add and it's going to not just cost him money, but apparently it's going to, you know, the planes are going to have to use more fuel because of the antenna you have to put on top of the plane and all that stuff. And so he thought through it. And so while Elon, of course has a vested interest, the CEO of Ryanair also has a vested interest in keeping costs low.

[Matt]

So.

[Joel]

Really funny.

[Matt]

Yeah. This is our Friday flight that we're going to cover. Maybe more pertinent personal finance related headlines that are going to impact your dollars. Joel, you have a note here about cocktails. What's the. What you want to talk about?

[Joel]

Well, so there was a study that just came out about the price of cocktails versus mocktails. And I think a lot of people like doing dry January. Right now. They're thinking of it as a way to, I don't know, get over too much drinking over the holidays. I think that's where people find themselves.

[Matt]

Great to do a reset.

[Joel]

Yeah, I feel like a little like a fast from alcohol can be good for your body and. But a lot of people I think assume this is going to be good for my wallet too. I'm going to save some money. If I switch from cocktails to mocktails. I can still go out and hang with my friends, just not drinking booze for a while. And this study basically found not really. Like mocktails are almost as much as cocktails. And that's what I've seen when I go out and about. I don't really drink mocktails and.

[Matt]

But like you want the real thing.

[Joel]

Yeah, I usually want the real thing and I usually just want to pay for it.

[Matt]

May as well get the real thing.

[Joel]

One, maybe two. But it's, it's just interesting to see. I think people assume they're going to save money in dry January, but that if you're still getting the expensive mocktails, then you're not going to.

[Matt]

It makes sense though. So I get why restaurants or bars are maybe keeping the price higher because you are expecting to pay cocktail prices and why should you pay a ton less for something that might be just as crafted? Like there is. I've seen some of these like na alcohol free gins. They sell at the like total Wine or whatever.

[Joel]

They're cheap.

[Matt]

They're not. And you look at all the ingredients that go into making them. Like I've never had one, but I'm thinking, oh, this is actually something that might be like pretty decent tasting.

[Joel]

Right.

[Matt]

Like there's a difference in getting a mocktail that's still crafted and has lots of these complex ingredients that cost something as opposed to like you can't just get it like a gin and tonic, hold the gin and still charge me the same amount for basically a tonic one.

[Joel]

Right.

[Matt]

But like if it's a. If it's like a crafted mocktail, I'm fine paying close to what a typical cocktail cost might be.

[Joel]

But you have to have that, I think your heads up if you're trying to save money this January or really February. February is a nice month to do it too because shorter, fewer days, you have to commit.

[Matt]

Are you drinking less this month or.

[Joel]

I just drink less in general. But like, yeah, no, I'm not really making any commitment to drink less. No.

[Matt]

Yeah, I haven't really been. Although I. This feels so premature to even say, but for the past Three days, I realized, oh, I haven't had a drink. And I will be reporting back as to the impact it has had on my body. All right, my friend.

[Joel]

Yeah, keep. I feel like it's sleep score.

[Matt]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's not just the sleep score, but I'm like, oh, is. Has my tendonitis gone away? Like, there's less inflammation in my body. I don't know. This is starting to sound like a Huberman podcast or something like that. We want to continue to go down this.

[Joel]

We digress. But just like I'll tell you off.

[Matt]

The mic, because people aren't here for the. The physical fitness talk. No, necessarily. I think. I think the right amount of it they're down for, but not. We can't overdo it a little bit.

[Joel]

Here and there and then get to the money talk, boys. Yeah, let's.

[Matt]

Let's do that.

[Joel]

Let's. Let's. First, let's talk about jobs for just a second. CNN ran an article about background checks in the hiring process, and apparently I didn't realize this. Eleven states have now made it illegal to use credit reports in the hiring process. So New York being the most recent of those states, which means more employers are ditching that now when they're trying to find qualified candidates. They just. It's kind of like when California makes a law mat and the rest of the nation just kind of follows. Not even because there's laws in other states are enacted that are similar, but just because if I'm a company who has to abide by California's law, might as well just do it across the board. Right. And so this is kind of what's happening in this space. There are just fewer companies checking your credit report because it's illegal in enough states where maybe we'll just bag that process altogether. There are exceptions. Right. In even the states that ban it, though, for certain types of jobs. So you have to be aware of that if you're applying for a more sensitive position, you might still have your credit pulled. And even though, like a rough credit history, it might not pose as much of a threat to your career in 2026 as it would have many years ago, I think it's important to note that it can still cause harm. Right.

[Matt]

And it still cause harm to your wallet, how much you're paying for stuff.

[Joel]

That's right. Yeah. Yeah. It's not just the fact that you might not get a job if they're checking your credit score and it's not so great. But it's also, of course, that your credit score matters for a bunch of other reasons, too. That's right.

[Matt]

Okay, a little student loan update. We've talked about the impending wage garnishment that's coming down the pike for the 5 million folks who are in default. It's obviously something that you need to be paying attention to. But that being said, wage garnishments have been. Drumroll, please.

[Joel]

Paused.

[Matt]

At least for now. The Department of Education announced that on Friday of last week as they basically acknowledged the broken student loan system that currently exists that we've all been or borrowers have been subject to over the past. I feel like it's gotten especially bad over the past 25 years, but we should know more in early summer as new repayment plans are implemented. So for everyone who has student loans, you can breathe a sigh of relief right now, in particular if you're deep in student loan debt. But it is also a good idea to get back on track with payments as soon as possible, if you can, even if garnishment isn't this imminent threat. And actually, you're going to be speaking with a friend of the show, Stanley Tate, about student loans.

[Joel]

And I'm really, really excited to talk to him. And we'll air that next week on the show because he's known as the student loan lawyer. The dude, he's buttoned up. He knows everything there is to know about student loans.

[Matt]

Basically, we have a nice general knowledge. He has a very specialized knowledge of student loans, the legal ramifications.

[Joel]

So if you're kind of in a position where you're like, what? I don't know what's happening in the student loan space, but I got student loans. And I'm trying to figure out how to proceed. That episod going to be enlightening next week. Let's talk about credit cards. Matt the Bilt Bilt credit card. It's been an interesting experiment, right. Mostly to help renters get points for paying rent with a credit card. Because until Bilt, a lot of people are like, oh, man, this is like, the biggest expense of my life is my rent. Wouldn't it be nice to earn some credit card rewards points for it? Well, Bilt made that a reality. A lot of homeowners have been wondering, well, when they might be able to get in on that action. Right. To get rewarded for their monthly mortgage payments.

[Matt]

Missing out on that party.

[Joel]

Yeah. And so Bill was like, well, we're helping renters. One of these days, maybe we'll get around to helping homeowners. Well, that day has arrived. The Wait is Over and Built is launching three new credit cards next month that essentially allow you to do just that. But the rewards earning process is a little convoluted and the big rubber is that you're going to be on the hook for a 3% processing fee when you attempt to pay your mortgage with a Bilt card, which essentially undermines the goodness of being able to use that card to pay for your mortgage. You can though use rewards from using your Bilt card elsewhere to cover that fee.

[Matt]

It's like an offset, right? An offset benefit.

[Joel]

So built like, oh, if you've amassed enough rewards from spending at in a bunch of other ways on this card, then yeah, you can waive that fee and you can still get points for paying your mortgage, which is kind of cool. You just have to jump through all the hoops and. But really this is Bilt's attempt to get you not just to use it to pay your mortgage, but to use it everywhere to make this your front of wallet card, as they say. And so if you have a big monthly mortgage and you're a big credit card user and you're keen on using Bilt's points efficiently, this might be a good card for you might want to look into it. But I do think for most folks, Matt, like the juice is probably not going to be worth the squeeze. I was excited to hear the announcement, but a little deflated on some of the details.

[Matt]

Yeah, well, it's almost, it's almost self defeating because especially like there's multiple options as to how it is that you can earn those points. And when you have a large like on one hand you think, oh no, no, I want a large. Well, oh, I happen to have a large mortgage payment, so this is going to be especially more attractive. Attractive to me. But there is that 3% fee and.

[Joel]

So, so the larger the mortgage fee.

[Matt]

Yeah. And so then what that means is that you then have to charge more to the card in other areas of your life. And depending on what your mortgage is, that might be a tall hurdle to be able to clear. But it actually makes me think of a recent column about whether basically life is too short to optimize your credit card rewards. And the thrust of the article is that it's just gotten too complicated to optimize the different credit card reward systems, the points. So you're better off not trying. And that is honestly, that's not too far from the truth because credit card companies, they seem to have purposely made reward optimization difficult. It's almost like a part time job so they can still tout these incredible benefits. They talk about the lounges, but it's tougher than ever to actually realize these benefits unless you are incredibly organized. If you got the spreadsheets going on, you gotta be dedicated to the task at hand.

[Joel]

They've even chucked it up into part of their goal. Yeah, they even chucked it up into, well, the first six months of the year. You can get a reward if you spend in this way or. But they made it so confident, confusing, and they've made it so difficult to get some of the rewards that are promised on the headlines that. Yeah, it's like, it's frustrating as a.

[Matt]

Credit card user, whether or not you get that full benefit. Oh, you have to actually book the travel through our travel portal and then you're. So then you have to jump through those hoops and then you're trying to compare, oh, well, how much is travel there versus if I were to purchase that on the open market. It begins to get much more difficult and so convoluted. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So which specific credit card makes the most sense for you now? Depends on just some of those behavioral factors. It depends on how much you typically spend. And I do think, man, that this makes a great argument for the really straightforward cards like the Citi Double Cash 2%. You're a fan of the Fidelity card, which is a 2% cash back that goes into your investments, which is great if you're trying to up that savings rate as well. Or my latest favorite card, which is the Robinhood Gold card. The only downside there is because it's such a new. Well, there's an annual fee, but if you think about earning an extra additional percent with no cap on your annual spending, that's pretty stinking huge. Honestly, the biggest thing that bothers me about it is I've recently tried, so I've only been using it for a month and I will say, so far so good, but I need to up my credit limit because I continue to. I'm putting all my spending on this one card now or not literally every dollar. But a lot of my spending, certainly all the dollars that I used to spend on my Double Cash card is going on there. And I don't like how close I am getting to the limit because it's just a brand new card. And so they're just. I think they're hitting everyone with a standard limit and you go in there and try to up it and they're like, oh, we're actually not able to do that now. So it's still in the early stages of this card.

[Joel]

And if you're using too much of the available credit that you have, it's.

[Matt]

Not great for the aforementioned credit score that we just recently talked about. But I think finding a system that's going to work for you is certainly the. This prescription from the how to Money Boys.

[Joel]

I think we even got an email from a listener this week who created a website to help people, like, keep track of all their credit cards when the annual fee is coming up.

[Matt]

No way.

[Joel]

And it just goes to show that it's a complicated thing, and I think a lot of people get lost in some of that complication. If you're the kind of person like me who. Attention to detail, not your strong suit, Matt. Attention to details, totally. You're great at that. Like, that's your jam. Me, not so much. And so me playing the game, I'm liable to fall flat on my face and screw something up and just not get the value that I thought I was going to. So know yourself, I guess, too, when you're playing the credit card game. And if you're like, I'm probably going to mess things up and not get the value, kind of like Joel would, then go with the 2% card.

[Matt]

You're totally underselling yourself. That being said, though, I saw an article about how you can hire a consultant, like, literally somebody to kind of advise you as to what cards you should be using.

[Joel]

I thought that was interesting because one, I didn't really realize that that was. That people did that as a job. They were like, hey, let me help you. I knew they were like, you could gig blogs and websites.

[Matt]

You could gig doing anything.

[Joel]

Yes, you can. And so part of me is like, encouraged that, wow, isn't it incredible what people can do for work these days? And you can become. You can become a credit card consultant and make it in this world. That's pretty nuts. So I guess that begs the question, like, does it make sense to hire a pro, a credit card consultant, to help you become efficient and to optimize those credit cards perfectly for how you spend? And even this, the article that talked about it, Matt, I think they. The basic assumption was that the answer is for most. For most part. The most part, no. Right? That a credit card consultant for you or for me or for most of our listeners, most of the time, it's not a great idea. There's no need. But if you have a particular expensive thing event coming up in your life, then maybe that's when a credit card consultant could Be worth like if there's more money basically.

[Matt]

If there's more money on the line, 100%.

[Joel]

And the biggest example they gave in that article was like a wedding, right. And how before you start spending, but it's going to cost a lot, right. You're going to have to hire the photographer, pay for the venue, the food, all that stuff. You're going to spend a lot of money. And the goal obviously is to not keep the credit card debt around. If you can pay it off on time and in full, use credit cards and get some dope rewards in the process. And people were able to get their honeymoon paid for. Right. Like first class seats and flights to Bora Bora and sweet hotels they never would have been able to enjoy otherwise. That's kind of cool. And a credit card consultant I think can help you make smart decisions and optimize that. Well.

[Matt]

Or you could use chat. So that's a good point too. That's the other thing too. Where have you tried it? I did okay. Because I wanted to see how well are the large language models able to kind of parse the details. And I put in a hype. Yeah. So I did that this morning. I was like hypothetically, you know, do you ever wonder if it's logging all of your requests and kind of building this dossier on you?

[Joel]

I don't wonder that. I basically know it is. It knows me at this point.

[Matt]

I also wanted to have accurate information to be able to deliver results to me, like in a more efficient way. So anytime I do research for the show or I'm trying to figure something out and it's not a situation I'm personally in. I always like type in hypothetically. Yeah, maybe I'm overthinking it, which is certainly the case. But I was surprised to see at how it broke down. The certain cards and they're talking about, hey yeah, certain big expenses like a venue that's like a. That's the kind of thing that you want to put on a new card, like a Chase card where you're. Where it requires a big spend so you can get the 125,000 points. Oh, the Amex Gold. I think it was talking about catering because a lot of times they're positioned as restaurants and so you get 4x on that. And it was pretty amazing. And then they talked about how for all the rest you can look at something like a 2% card, which is totally how we would approach it, I think how we would recommend it to folks. So I don't know. I Guess I'm a little less keen on something. A niche hustle like this, when you can find the information, it's one thing.

[Joel]

Well, it used to be that you had to do a lot of digging on your own to find the information, and you would hire a pro because they had all that knowledge stored in their head. But if ChatGPT has all that knowledge stored, then you might not need to hire someone.

[Matt]

Yeah. And you can turn to literal people for other things. Actually, later in the show, we will talk about chat and individuals and the sort of conflict that inherently exists, I think, between those two dynamics. By the way, I wanted to mention the extreme expense of weddings. It actually seems to be part of the reason why we're seeing a trend towards smaller wedding parties than not. They actually found that the average wedding entourage is down to eight instead of 10, so four on each side, as.

[Joel]

Opposed to people just have fewer friends now. What do you think?

[Matt]

That's also probably the case.

[Joel]

I want to save money. And also I don't have another friend.

[Matt]

To ask chicken or the egg sort of scenario here. But it's just. I think it could be good news for would have been groomsmen and bridesmaids. Uh, the average price of the wedding and bachelor slash bachelorette party, it's equivalent to a month's rent, more than $2,000. So that can be tough to stomach. If you've got a good friend, you want to be involved, but you're also tight on cash. You've got other goals. But it's just an interesting trend to see this. And this is something we've seen for. For years. Just smaller wedding parties, smaller guest counts at weddings as well as they've got generally smaller but higher quality, as opposed to kind of like a massive more budget wedding, which is certainly what Kate and I, I think, tried to throw because we didn't have a. A ton of money. I wanted to get your thoughts. What do you think about the people foregoing the registry and instead asking for money for something like a honeymoon fund?

[Joel]

Dig it. Or I'm all for it.

[Matt]

A home down payment. Do you see a distinction between honeymoon and a down payment for a house?

[Joel]

Really? Yeah, I think those are the same.

[Matt]

Exactly the same, pretty much.

[Joel]

I think those are two things that are deep goals and desires for people who are getting married. Oftentimes, like, we'd like to take an awesome trip together to celebrate, which makes sense to me. And we really want to save to buy a home. And I would rather give money to those funds than I would like, buy Them some dishes or something like that. Because especially with people getting married later and later in life, lots of times they've amassed. They've got the things already. Yeah. And they're like, this is our other really big goal. They're like, buy me more stuff.

[Matt]

You're like, actually, my old ratty towels work just fine. Yeah. You still make that work. I can't make whatever you said Bora Bora trip. Have you been to Bora Bora?

[Joel]

Never.

[Matt]

I haven't either.

[Joel]

No. I don't even know if it's a real place. I'm assuming it is.

[Matt]

Does kind of sound made up.

[Joel]

Yeah. You feel good giving cash to people who have those?

[Matt]

Oh, totally. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's just I can see a more traditionalists saying, oh, no, you gotta like do the thing where you got the gun. Because I remember doing that when Kate and I got engaged. You remember going into the store with a gun, like the scanner, scanning everything beyond. I want that, I want that, I want that. But I think there's, there's something to be in It's a Wonderful Life. George Bailey. What? He had cash that he received as like. I mean, I think a lot of it was because of their wedding as a wedding gift. And so that like, that was their honeymoon fund that they.

[Joel]

Spoiler alert.

[Matt]

Save the banquet. If you haven't seen the movie, you should. We're out of the holiday season.

[Joel]

It's been out long enough now. I think people can handle that. Spoiler. Alright, we got more to get to on this episode, including, do we even need to invest for retirement anymore? One of the richest men in the world says, nope, we'll get to that and more right after this. All right, we're back from the break. Time to get to, as always, the ludicrous headline of the week. This one comes from the Wall Street Journal and it read, people are paying $99 a month to talk to a Tony Robbins chatbot. Matt, is this you? Did I.

[Matt]

You added me.

[Joel]

I know you love that guy. So there's.

[Matt]

I know very little about the dude.

[Joel]

He seems all right. Like, I think some of his investing advice is a little bit off, but.

[Matt]

Oh, I didn't know he gives investing.

[Joel]

Oh, his last book was like a diatribe about, oh, really? Investing in private hedge funds and.

[Matt]

Well then how dare you say that? I'm down with him when he's got financial.

[Joel]

But he's an encourager. Like there's other things that he talks about.

[Matt]

Yeah, I thought he was like all about motivation and that kind of stuff.

[Joel]

I think he's probably really, really good on that front. I don't know, I've never been to one of his conferences, but.

[Matt]

Oh, I know somebody who did and it was. I think it was like a multi day event.

[Joel]

Did it change their life?

[Matt]

I don't know. But I remember him telling me how much it cost to go and it was like, I want to say like six grand.

[Joel]

Okay.

[Matt]

For one person. What? That's nuts.

[Joel]

That is nuts.

[Matt]

Yeah, I can't get behind that.

[Joel]

Just wait till we throw our $10,000 conference. We'll see how many people show up. Yeah, not gonna happen. Okay.

[Matt]

Our wise wouldn't even show up.

[Joel]

Well, we were just talking about AI, Matt, and this. So let's keep talking about AI. Like, I recently uploaded like all the data from my Garmin into ChatGPT.

[Matt]

You said you're gonna do that. Did you actually upload the CSV file?

[Joel]

Yes, the CSV file. Nice. It's super impressive how the kind of personalized input that it can give you based on all of your statistics that it can now analyze and then the goals that you have, I can tell it, hey, here's. Here's what I. Here's the race I'm running in two months. Here's what I want to achieve. What's the best training plan to get there? And it knows, not just like in generalities, but it's highly specific.

[Matt]

That's crazy.

[Joel]

You know.

[Matt]

Okay, side note, did you just log in online? Because I've only ever done it from my phone.

[Joel]

Yeah, on the app. App on my phone.

[Matt]

And then emailed you the file.

[Joel]

Yep.

[Matt]

Good enough.

[Joel]

Yep.

[Matt]

So it worked because I've done it as well, but obviously not nearly as customized. But like I've said, hey, I'm this old, this is my goal, this is what I'm currently doing. But to actually have real data from. I mean, you've had your watch for like three years now. Yeah, I mean, that's pretty.

[Joel]

It was like 350 runs or something that it logged and then it was able to.

[Matt]

That's amazing.

[Joel]

Analyze the long term trends, which is insane. And so these programs are just getting better and better, more and more useful. But now, like, we're getting to the point where there are just so many AI programs being pitched to consumers, some of which are kind of quirky and some of which are just not cheap. Like this, your favorite self help guru, right. Who probably has an AI now that is trained to answer questions in their voice and speak to you in their tone with their Insights. I don't know how I feel about this, Matt. I think I have mixed feelings. I don't like the monthly fee. 100 bucks a month to talk to your favorite guru, who's not actually your favorite guru, but it's just a program. Trained.

[Matt]

Yeah. To act like that person.

[Joel]

Yeah.

[Matt]

Is there. That's the part that rubs me.

[Joel]

But I could see too, like why people are attracted to it. I think I'm going to pass on these for now. I'm going to keep it old school. But it did make me wonder, like, and even if we would never charge this much money, but what if there was like a how to money AI and it existed on our website and people could ask questions and it would from all of the podcast episodes and all of the newsletters and articles we've written. It could help people based on their specific situation with all the general information we've put out over time.

[Matt]

Well, what you're hinting at is a conversation we had with a company that we were working with from an SEO standpoint that we were, we were asking these questions two years ago about does it even make sense to focus on SEO anymore with everyone going to chat as opposed to going to Google. Right. Like, essentially chat has become the new Google. Like I search for things on Gemini or chat that I used to Google and it just provides it in a more succinct sort of narrative way. And I think that's a part of the power of it. So, yeah, what you're saying is what if we have the ability to. Someone has the ability to get personal finance information via us, which I think that's totally fine and it absolutely could be a useful tool. But for our listeners, the personal finance side of it, the money, especially with it being a subscription, like a recurring source of, you know, I'm not looking at this from a business standpoint. I'm looking at it from the consumer end. Continual source, continual expense every single month. And that's the part that rubs me the wrong way. And the fact that it's based on whatever it is that it can find, whatever it can scrape from the Internet. It's always backwards looking. Which is why, like, we've never talked about coaching, like doing coaching with folks. But that makes so much more sense to me because, yeah, you are dealing with an individual. And maybe this is because you're hearing this from two dudes who don't have anybody who wants to coach with them. Maybe if we had like thousands and thousands of people and we couldn't get to all of Them we would be more prone to launch something where it was a paid for service where folks were able to get answers. But there's something about talking to an individual and hearing in real life, in real time, like as you and I talk, we synthesize new ideas like in the moment. And that is not something that you get with chat until we reach that point of like the, the generative AI. At which point is that even. Can you even say that that's Tony Robbins or whatever? Because it's not him who's saying that. It is the technology deciding what it's going to say. Because right now if you. So in preparation for this, I pulled up, I was like, okay, give me reasons why I should go for a run this morning. It's cold, it's rainy, but I know I need to do it anyway. Give it to me in the voice of Tony Robbins. And it did a great job. Granted, I didn't get hear his big whatever, mainly voice, whatever. It was pretty entertaining. And I saw things that he has said in the past that I know that he says. Right, same thing. And so then I changed it. I said, okay, now give it to me in David Goggin's voice, which was awesome.

[Joel]

A lot more curse words than that one.

[Matt]

There are many more expletives for sure, but it was so funny. It's like I don't care if you can't even feel your fingers when you're lacing up your shoes. Because I could hear his voice because I've listened to more of his audiobooks over the years. But even still, it's based on stuff that they have said in the past. It's backwards looking as opposed to where something is being created in the moment. So on one hand I see the usefulness of it as a tool. On the other hand, if you're looking for like a personal connection or something that's more impactful, paying for software like this doesn't make a ton of sense to me. Paying for coaching where you have more of a one on one with somebody. That is something that I think can be inspiring to folks.

[Joel]

One of the things they highlighted in that article was that some of these people are so in demand, unlike you and I as coaches, right. That their hourly rate is 500 bucks an hour, 1,000 bucks an hour, $10,000 an hour.

[Matt]

And they're only dealing with executives and people at the top of the business food chain.

[Joel]

So this is the kind of person you, as a normal human with normal dollars in your bank account would never be able to Talk to. You could never hire them. You couldn't even get one hour of their time and now you have them in AI Chatbot forum. And so better than nothing, I guess.

[Matt]

Yeah.

[Joel]

I don't know.

[Matt]

How do you feel about. Would you be interested in coaching folks, like one on one from a personal finance standpoint?

[Joel]

Oh, I think that'd be fun. Like, it does, it does sound like a good time. I think I prefer this method, disseminating it from media.

[Matt]

I mean, it's much more efficient. But also you certainly lose something. Like you get to hear a voice and. But if you're talking to someone directly, there's certainly power in that. I would be curious to know if there are folks who would email us and say, yeah, dudes, you should consider this and somehow we're actually going to achieve inbox zero tomorrow because nobody's going to actually reach out to us.

[Joel]

If they do, I don't know, maybe.

[Matt]

We launch it, maybe, who knows? So similarly, using AI but for free, that's the way to go. And there was an article in Medium that highlighted how a family used Claude, which is another one of the models, to take a $195,000 hospital bill down to 33,000, which is still a lot, but obviously much, much better. And AI was able to analyze the charges and it just alerted this family to let them know what was bogus so that they could push back on what they didn't have to pay for. This is something that individuals can do on their own. And it just takes, you know, some time, it takes some research if you are doing this manually. Right, like trying to comb through the.

[Joel]

Weeds and look through the financial assistance policies of your local hospital.

[Matt]

Exactly. But I still allows you to do this on your own, but it just makes it so much more efficient. It's easier, it's faster. AI is not great for everything. But this is one of the ways that I think folks can certainly use this technology that everyone's talking about to their. Their financial advantage.

[Joel]

Yeah, we're actually going to have more suggestions in Tuesday's upcoming newsletter about how you can use AI in your life, in your personal finance life, in ways that it's helpful and not harmful. All right, Matt, the question that Elon Musk raised this week was, does saving for retirement even matter anymore in the age of AI? And Elon Musk said basically, like, no, you don't need to do that. Like in 15 or 20 years retirement savings, it's like an obsolete concept. Who needs it? Basically, I think his thesis is that AI is going to create so much abundance that there's no need to save for the future in this rosy sunglasses, rosy glasses, kind of tinted, world's paradise of the future. It's paradise. And you don't, you know, you don't have to save for your own retirement. And he said people will be able to have whatever stuff they want. And that is, I guess, essentially based on AI's ability to reduce costs, making education free, and then the reality of a universally high basic income coming down the pike. And, man, I love to hear people's predictions, but, man, if you look back at a history of Elon's predictions, some of them have just not come to pass. Some of them have taken much longer than he thought. So should we all say screw it to our IRAs and our 401ks because Elon says we're not going to need them 20 years from now?

[Matt]

Yeah, probably not.

[Joel]

Probably not. He's smart. But I, yeah, I think I saw someone say something along the lines of like, I would pay very little attention to Elon outside of his main area of expertise. And I think I feel the same way.

[Matt]

Well, he just underestimates the human spirit and our desire to work and to create and to create beautiful things. Like, it makes me.

[Joel]

So he would say, you don't have to do that in the form of work, you can do it in the form of hobbies or an art.

[Matt]

Exactly. And guess who else said that? John Mater Keynes, when he said that we would only be working like seven hours a week because, like, technology would have advanced so much. But guess what? We just use that efficiency to make us more productive, which more prosperous and more prosperous, which I think is the more likely outcome. So it seems a bit short sighted to me. Speaking of retirement, there might be more ways to tap your retirement account early. So the White House, they just proposed that we should all be able to tap our 401k before age 59 and a half for a home down payment. And I'm sure all the folks listening who are like, oh my gosh, I've got a lot of money in there. I would love to be able to do that. So you can already do that.

[Joel]

Normally, it's off limits for many, many decades, you know, without the penalty.

[Matt]

Yeah, you can do that. However, with your IRA, you can do that with $10,000 of IRA money. But President Trump's proposal is that you should have access to some of your 401k savings for that goal as well. Which I don't love this basically because the more Accessible, you make your retirement dollars, I think the more likely that folks are essentially going to become their own worst enemy. And it's like, well, no, no, this is something I'm choosing to do. I want to do this. Yeah. But like, now you is saying, yes, I want to do this. Future you is saying, no, don't do it.

[Joel]

Don't interrupt compounding unnecessarily.

[Matt]

Yeah. You are satisfying this near term goal of yours rather than allowing those assets to grow for their future. And so it's, it's certainly far less terrible than tapping retirement for vacation or trip, you know, like a depreciating asset. But yeah, we'll see where this goes. But if you do want to buy a home relatively soon, like, you shouldn't be putting those dollars into a 401k to begin with.

[Joel]

Right.

[Matt]

Like, if it's super near term, hang on to that money in cash. If you're looking at, you know, a couple, couple of years off into the future, like, yeah, invest it, but invest it within a brokerage account where you're not going to get hit with 10% penalty.

[Joel]

All right, Matt, let's talk about Greenland. I've never thought this much about Greenland in my whole life, as I have in the last two weeks.

[Matt]

Used to be the Roman Empire. Now it's Greenland. It's green or Iceland, as Trump also.

[Joel]

Said, it's an icy place.

[Matt]

It's an icy place, but we're talking about Greenland. That's right. What's the latest? It's hard to keep up because it's been Greenland whiplash back and forth.

[Joel]

Davos this week. And yeah, there were things said before and at Davos. And so tensions are rising because apparently the US Desire, or maybe not, I wouldn't say the US Desire, our President's desire for us to have Greenland. These are just the facts, folks.

[Matt]

Yeah, I think it's something like 91% of Americans are not interested in Greenland.

[Joel]

Yeah. So it's him.

[Matt]

It is. It's the man himself who is interested in green.

[Joel]

It is. And so you and I, we try to avoid the political here. But, but this battle, this like all of the verbiage being thrust around about Greenland, it's creating real financial fallout. And so mortgage rates, which had finally ticked below 6% thanks to a bond buying push from President Trump, are now rising again as political and geopolitical tensions increase. Gold, right. Was going up there for a hot minute because as geopolitical tensions get crazy, people turn to safe assets like gold. So it just is interesting to see how these words, that our president's words have such a wide ranging impact and how long. Right. Do those impacts remain?

[Matt]

Well, that's the biggest question, I think.

[Joel]

And so much depends on the rhetoric because you can see the stock market bouncing back significantly after Trump says, oh, we wouldn't take it by force. Like as, as his rhetoric calms down, everyone takes a sigh of relief and markets start to act a little more normal. Yeah, this thing, it seemed like it started like a joke and it's having wider implications. I just, and I think how the money listeners are wondering too, Matt, and I'm curious how you would address this. Like, clearly impacts are, are being felt like there are shifts, like, oh yeah, the tremors. Right. In the, in the finance world, do we make any changes based on the rhetoric? Because there are actually changes coming down the pike in the economy.

[Matt]

I think that's so that's what's so tough to know.

[Joel]

Right.

[Matt]

And like, that's the crystal ball aspect of like looking ahead. But like, that's what I think I'm most concerned with.

[Joel]

Right.

[Matt]

Because like you think about the implication, like how it's impacted our relations with like Mexico and China. I'm sorry, Mexico and Canada specifically. Right. Like our near our neighbors who are close by.

[Joel]

Yeah.

[Matt]

But like this feels like the, they're.

[Joel]

A little more sketched out by us now.

[Matt]

Like the rhetorical path that he's taking now is now reached across the Atlantic and these are European allies. And dude, like when we talk about invest. So this is an investing conversation. Right. Because when you talk about what the market has done over the past 100 years, that's there's a reason we say that, because it's predictable. Right. Like we can look back to 100 years worth of data and say, oh yeah, it's not guaranteed, but all things for the most part remaining the same. This is, this is what you should expect.

[Joel]

And it's been an era of free markets and free trade. Yeah.

[Matt]

But that might be changing. And that's the sort of larger thing to point to here is the fact that over the past 100 years, the US has been the leader when it comes to global trade. Like the global economy. We have been sitting right there at.

[Joel]

The crossroads of it.

[Matt]

And that to me is a little concerning as we look off into the future. Right. Like that is the, oh, do I now start to consider investing more internationally as opposed to fully within U.S. securities? Like, that's the concern when you see.

[Joel]

The status quo is interrupted. Like, do at some point you do have to Rethink your investing strategy. And you don't want to do it based on like short term outbursts, I don't think. But you also, maybe it is a good idea to kind of take a step back and say, well, if the, if the position of the United States in the world and in the global world order, global standing is changing and we're viewed differently and maybe our trade partners don't, you know, enjoy the same relationship they used to with us, should we then approach our own future investments differently?

[Matt]

That's the biggest question. We're not having this conversation because international stocks did better last year. Like you. No, I don't care about that.

[Joel]

Like you look, that's one year.

[Matt]

That's one year and literally it was last year. You look to the past three years, even us comes out on top. You look at the last 13 years, us comes out on top. Last 30 years, guess what? Us still comes out on top. But, and so what we're talking about here are like multi year changes. Not any sort of knee jerk. Like, I don't want anybody right now to be freaking out and thinking, oh, they're pulling out their apps, they're logging into their brokerages right now and making changes. That's not at all what I'm doing. It's not what you're doing, and it's not something that I think we would even talk about doing, but for another couple years, you know, like, if this continues down that path, then I think you got to say, all right, maybe things, things are changing. Yeah, I think if, I think there are plenty of folks who are going to say, dudes, y' all are just fear mongering. Like you are overestimating the power of one man to completely wreck this global system that the US has been able to erect over the past 100 years. But then I know that there are also other folks who are saying, no, man, we've been saying this for years like he's the worst and he's gonna wreck this entire thing. So all that comes down to your political leanings.

[Joel]

And you and I have consistently talked about how we shouldn't be as responsive to and how capitalism, the US capitalist system has been incredibly resilient. Oh, so resilient in the face of tariffs and in the face of just some of these like one off deals with tech companies. And so we have a really robust free market system that one person cannot single handedly throw a wrecking ball through. But it can impact the future trajectory of our system, even if it's in small ways.

[Matt]

The domino effects could be outsized. And sort of what you're saying is that not only, yes, the US Economy is resilient, but how permanent are the relational damages that are being done with foreign leaders and the decision that they then choose to make for their countries because they're like, well, the US Is not a dependable trading partner.

[Joel]

That's what's hard to know. And again, this feels so political and we try to avoid that, but truly.

[Matt]

Got to pay attention to it.

[Joel]

When you watch the markets move the way they have this week, when you see the dramatic response from world leaders and Mark Carney and the way that they're turning away from the United States towards other countries, then it should at least give us pause. And again, you're right. Neither you or I are making dramatic changes right now. But it is one of those things to have on your radar. And how do I want to invest in the future? And do I, do I still feel okay, we should go back, look at our investment plan and say, is this something I feel comfortable? Is this the direction I want to be investing in for the next 20 or 30 years? I don't know where I'm going to come down on that yet, Matt. We'll see.

[Matt]

And this is not a political conversation because we're not saying that this is good or bad. Right. Like, that's what makes it a political conversation, the fact that you're agreeing with this policy or you're disagreeing with this policy. We're just pointing to the economic facts and the financials and the numbers and how that could be impacted by what's happening on the global stage. For sure, you got to pay attention.

[Joel]

Busy week. All right, that's gonna do it for this episode. If you want show notes, you'll find those up on our [e-mail] you can always sign up for the [e-mail] newsletter all right. Till next time.

[Matt]

Best friends out.

[Joel]

Best friends out. You love what you do. You also love the idea of not doing it one day. But it's getting harder to know the best way to move into the future towards retirement. Right. We hear about inflation, rate hikes, the changing market, got to get kids through college, build an emergency fund, and then there's retirement.

[Matt]

Yeah. Here is where Fidelity comes in, though. Fidelity can help you to find clarity. And saving for the future is even as your path and your priorities evolve. How? Well, they'll help you to create a free, personalized plan that adapts as your priorities change. They'll also show you what's called timely insights, small tips on ways to save and invest to help meet your goals. And you can monitor your plan so you stay on target.

[Joel]

The future is coming, and so is retirement. Fidelity can help you take it on your way. Learn [e-mail] future expenses charged by your investments and other costs and fees associated with trading or transacting in your account. Apply Fidelity brokerage Services member NYSE SIPC.

[Matt]

This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human.