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This year. Give a gift that goes far beyond the moment. An Invest 529 account. Whether it's a child, grandchild or someone just starting out, you're helping them save for education that can open doors for a lifetime. Invest529 is a tax advantaged way to save for college, trade school, or even apprenticeship programs. It's flexible in easy to start and you can contribute any amount, big or small. And because the money can grow tax free, it's a gift that really builds value over time. So instead of giving something that gets used up or set aside, give the gift that can change a Life. Start an Invest529 account today. Go to invest529.com to get started. Your business identity is everything that shows what your business is about. From what customers see to what they don't like, like legal paperwork, website security and state licenses. Get more for your business. More privacy, more tools, more guidance with Northwest Registered Agent. They're the largest registered agent and LLC service in the US with over 1500 corporate guides. Real people who know your local laws and can help you and your business every step of the way. Northwest is your one stop business solution. Don't wait. Protect your privacy, build your brand and get your complete business identity identity in just 10 clicks and 10 minutes. Visit www.northwestregisteredagent.com paidjill and start building something amazing. Get more with Northwest registered agent@www.northwestregisteredagent.com paidjill. Welcome to the Jill on Money Show. It's Tuesday, December 2nd and we are here listening to what's on your mind, hearing whatever is going on and trying to help you find different ways to get where you want to go in your financial life. If you've got a question, just go to jillonmoney.com, click the contact Us button, write us a note and of course if you'd like to join us live, check the box. Mark will do everything else While you're on the website, check out our subscription service. It's called Jill on Money Live. That's where you have access to quarterly live webinars. The back catalog of those webinars. We just had a great one about year end tax and financial planning. There's also bonus audio and video content. It's all for 45 bucks for the next 12 months. Right now let's talk to James from North Carolina.
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So I'm in my 50s, I'm 53. My wife is 47. We have a unique situation where we have a four year old child that we want to start spending a little more time with and kind of cut back on work a little bit and maybe even make some job changes. And I just needed you maybe to evaluate that and see if it's possible that we could do that.
A
I mean, you're really young, so I'm hopeful that you saved a pile of.
B
Money to do this.
A
Tell us a little bit about your situation and, like, what are the numbers behind it? Now I know what the goal is. Like, bail out. Let's go on. How can we make this happen for you?
B
We're not looking to totally cut out of the workforce. We're just looking to maybe cut back one or two days a week. Maybe my wife cut back three days a week. Maybe just work three days a week, and I might work four days a week. We have been very diligent savers. My wife better than I. We have almost 2 million in savings. It's not the savings account. It is all our investments. That's the hard thing. It's all investments that we have that money in.
A
That's okay. That's not hard. Of the 2 million, how much is retirement money and how much is non retirement money?
B
Of the 2 million, all of it's retirement money.
A
Oh, yeah.
B
We have put a lot of money into retirement and just recently started saving a little bit of cash. So we have maybe $30,000 in cash.
A
What about your house? Do you own your home?
B
Not yet, but we have a very low interest rate. I always hear you talk about how important it is. Just if you have a low interest rate, don't worry about paying off the house. Our interest rate is only 2.65. I think we have 13 years left on it.
A
What's the outstanding mortgage amount?
B
It's 269.
A
And what do you think the house is worth?
B
It's about 1.3 million.
A
Oh, my gosh, Mark, they're swimming in moolah. Okay. Do you want to stay in the home as part of this downshift?
B
Yes. We love our house. We like where we live. It's a great location. It's probably our dream house. We looked at it for a few years before we bought in this situation. Then when my wife became pregnant, we were like, we needed a nice residential area for him to grow up in and play with children. So we really like being here right now.
A
How much do you earn and how much does she earn? Just current situation.
B
Current situation, I'm at 275 gross, and she's about 225 gross.
A
So if we dropped you guys down. What would that mean for you? How much would you earn together?
B
Together, Crunching the numbers. About anywhere from $300,000 to $350,000.
A
Let's say $300,000 between the two of you. Can you pay your bills on $300,000?
B
Yes.
A
No problem.
B
No problem. We just have really just the mortgage bill. We've been putting away money for 529 plan. He has a.
A
What do you have in the. Wait a second. How much in the 529 plan?
B
$54,000.
A
Mark. This is unbelievable. Presumably this is it for kids. Just one.
B
Yeah. I have an older son and that's why the total is so large because he chose not to use his 529 plan. It's still there. So we're going to shift it to my youngest son.
A
Interesting, interesting. So if you guys actually ended up being able to do this and we can just pay your bills out of it, would it require you also then to put away less money in your retirement account or do you feel like you'd still have some extra cash flow?
B
Less money in the retirement account.
A
So if you're making $300,000, what do you think your spend is like real Be, be conservative. So I'm going to say that, you know, whatever we're going to use for this, I'm going to say that it's something like around 15 years. Right. Till we get the kid to college. So is that essentially like you're going to work for 15 years at this $300,000 level and then retire?
B
I could see myself every few years just cutting back a day or so like starting out at four, maybe five years down the road, cut back to three and maybe just not really, really retire until either kick me out or I'm just tired and I would like I could really foresee myself, I'm healthy so I could foresee myself working till 66 to 70 years old possibly.
A
Are you self employed or are you employed? Do we have retirement matches by the employer?
B
Yeah, so I'm self employed and I'm putting away like seven or $8,000 a month in retirement. And my wife, she has a government job so she will collect a pension after I think 16 more years and she's putting away about 5 or 6,000 in retirement.
A
Dude, you're having a self, Are you having like a self funded pension plan as a self employed person?
B
Yes.
A
You can absolutely do this? Absolutely. I think what you're going to need to do though is cut back on that retirement pretty significantly. I kind of want you to. What do you think your real expenses are? A year forgetting about what you save for retirement?
B
It might be 7,000 to $8,000 a month, maybe.
A
All right, so I want you to have at least $100,000 in cash. I think that's where we want you to be. So that would mean that you just cut back on the amount you're putting into retirement. The goal would be to take that extra cash flow, put it in cash, and you keep building your retirement. Your wife has a pension. I mean, you're going to be fine. I think you really can do this. I really do. So let's do some other fun things like do you have life insurance on each of your lives?
B
We do not have life insurance. And Joe, I'm sorry to interrupt, but the caveat to that is my wife is thinking about leaving her pension job.
A
What? No, no, no. She can't. She's not allowed to. Okay, wait, I'm listening. I'm listening.
B
Because she just wants to do. Be a contract employee as well and just maybe work three days a week to spend more time with son. And because we foresee him being in activities, because now she works 12 hour shifts. So she works three days a week, and there's going to be a lot of activities. She will miss and miss part of his growing up. So that's. That's something that she's been wrestling with as well.
A
Okay, so how much would she receive as a pension benefit if she finished this this year? What's the pension benefit that she'd be entitled to?
B
It's not much. I mean, if she continued to work for those 16 years, it'd be around 12 years.
A
And I know exactly how that. Good. That's going to be. I'm wondering if she left now. She's vested. What. What would the benefit be at her age, 65, or whatever they say is the.
B
Yeah, it might be a thousand dollars or so.
A
All right. It's not nothing.
B
Right. And their medical. The medical will be paid. 80% of the medical would be paid.
A
That's big. You can't go below $300,000. And we have to keep testing it. We really do. I would go down to your four day. So you're going to go four and she's going to go three. Right. That's the game plan.
B
Correct.
A
You can always crank it up again if it doesn't work.
B
Yes, that's true. And that's a. That's a conservative estimate. I think there's more that we can do to bump up those numbers a little bit too.
A
So I think it works. Can she buy life insurance through the government and make sure it's portable, meaning she can bring it with her if she leaves. You should check that out.
B
Okay, I'll look into that. I don't know the answer to that question.
A
I feel like they need a 10 year level term policy is not going to be cheap because you're 53 but you are in good shape. Or do you have an association you might be able to get it through like you know, nurse association.
B
Yes, yes, that's a good point. Point. We do. We're constantly getting advertisements in the mail for that.
A
So yes, I think that that's, that's what I think I would do. I would check both of those things. We gotta buckle down before you, you pull the trigger on this. We really do. So I want to do that. And do you have estate documents in place because you do have a four year old.
B
Yes.
A
Oh, thank God. I thought he was pausing for a second. I was gonna be able to take his butt.
B
I know, I know how you want us to answer that question.
A
I know people are just going to start being like, yeah, of course I do. It's like, course I did my homework. No problem. I think that, I think you can do this. I think you should be diligent about creating the non retirement savings. And even like, honestly, if you find yourself like you're still working, you've got your emergency reserve built up, right? You're like, oh, I'm not doing anything. I'm not prepaying the mortgage, I'm not doing this, I'm not doing that. Okay. And you still have good cash flow. Then what I would do is open a non retirement joint brokerage account because I think you guys just need liquidity. You just want to be able to have money that's already been taxed. It would be so cool if you know you have $100,000 that's safe and secure and then you have another couple hundred thousand that's in an invested in investment account with not high, high risk, but just moderate risk. You know, like a balanced account. If you have a question, if something's going on, you may think it's a little thing, someone else might think it's a big thing. It doesn't matter if it touches a dollar. We want to help you out. Go to jillonmoney.com and click the Contact us button. You can subscribe to us on the Odysee app or wherever you get your podcasts. Don't forget to do something nice for someone else today. Change your work, Change your wealth, change your life. Thanks for listening. We'll talk to you tomorrow.
B
Foreign.
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Has their own reason for giving. For some it's something personal, like honoring a loved one's memory. For others, it's about paying it forward after someone helped them through a tough time. And sometimes it's just a quiet belief that things should be better than they are. There are a million reasons to give, but now there's one way to do it better. It's called Daft Giving 360 and it's a public charity that offers the giving solution of a donor advised fund that makes charitable giving simple, tax smart and more impactful. So how does a donor advise fund from Daft Giving360 work? First, you open an account and contribute. Contributions can be anything from cash, stocks and securities or even non cash assets like real estate, life insurance and corporations crypto. And you may qualify for a current year tax deduction even if you don't make your grant decisions right away. Next, you can choose to invest that contribution. You can select from a variety of investment pools, or if your account is over $100,000, you can recommend your own investment advisor to manage the funds. And then, when you're ready, you recommend grants to the causes and charities you care about. And you do it on your timeline. Could be this week, could be next year. There's no rush. You just log into the daft giving 360 client center. Then you can grant in just a few clicks. Daft giving360 takes care of the rest. They verify the charity, send the check, and include a personalized grant letter with your name and custom letterhead. And when tax season rolls around, you've got a simple, personalized annual report ready to go. What's also great? There's no minimum contribution to open an account, but once you do contribute, you can grant to charity right away or invest and potentially let those charitable dollars grow tax free until you're ready to grant. So whether your reason for giving is deeply personal, practical, or somewhere in between, daft giving360 helps you make a greater impact with less hassle, more flexibility and more strategy. There are a million reasons to give. There's one way to do it better. Daft giving 360. Want to learn more? Visit daftgiving360.org what's up world?
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It's Vaughn Miller, Super Bowl MVP, chicken farmer, and now host of Free Range. This is a show where I go off the field and off the script. We're talking what's hot in music, film, trending news and everything blowing up your feed. If you love football, you're feeling home. But if you're here for the vibes, the Internet deep dives the conversation. This is your podcast. Join me every Wednesday. Follow and listen to Free Range with me, Von Miller everywhere. You get your podcast.
Podcast: Jill on Money with Jill Schlesinger
Date: December 2, 2025
Host: Jill Schlesinger
Main Theme:
This episode centers on a listener question from James in North Carolina, who, along with his wife, is considering cutting back on work to spend more time with their young child. Jill provides an in-depth analysis of their financial situation, weighing the viability of reducing work hours while maintaining long-term financial security and life priorities.
Jill concludes James and his wife are well-positioned to reduce work, so long as they shift from max retirement savings to building liquid, non-retirement reserves, and don’t compromise on life insurance and estate plans. The step-back is doable with careful cash-flow monitoring, a healthy cash buffer, and continued attention to benefits (like pension and healthcare) especially if his wife pursues contract work.
"Change your work, change your wealth, change your life." — Jill Schlesinger