← So Money with Farnoosh Torabi
So Money with Farnoosh Torabi
1847: Rethinking FIRE, Quick Ways to Save with Brad Barrett, Founder of ChooseFI
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- [00:00]
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Brad Barrett
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Farnoosh Torabi
You're listening to so Money with award winning money guru Farnoosh Torabi.
- [02:16]
Brad Barrett
Each day get a 30 minute dose.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Of financial inspiration from the world's top business minds, authors, influencers and from Farnoosh yourself.
- [02:26]
Brad Barrett
Looking for ways to save on gas.
- [02:27]
Farnoosh Torabi
Or double your double coupons. Sorry, you're in the wrong place. Seeking profound ways to live a richer, happier life. Welcome to so Money. The financial independence movement and fire. You know when it was maligned is it seemed like this deprivation. It just seemed like it was all about just cutting to the bone and just racing towards some number on a spreadsheet or on a screen. And that's no way to live a life.
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Brad Barrett
Welcome to so Money everybody. I've got Brad Barrett on the show today. You might remember Brad. He was on the podcast before the pandemic. He's also an incredible financial expert. He's the co founder of Choose a Phi, which is one of the top financial podcasts, a massive online platform for learning about fire financial independence, retire early. Brad and his wife breached fire in their 30s. And when he was last on the show, he talked a little bit about that path and how the couple was able to save a million dollars in 11. So now we're catching up with Brad. He's got some new ideas and views on the fire movement. His approach to earning and financial independence personally has evolved, and I wanted to learn about that. Brad also shares some of his best tips, small steps for saving big money, and I'm actually looking into one of the cost reductions he recommends. Yes, me. All right, here we go. Here is Brad Barrett. Brad Barrett, welcome back to Sew Money, co founder and host of Choose Fi podcast and platform, where you're really encouraging everybody to get on this fire bandwagon. Financial independence, retire early. You, when you were last on this show, talked about your own journey to millionaire status. Fire status. I want to revisit that, but also catch up because it's been a pandemic. And I think, as we were saying before we came on the show, you've had a little bit of a philosophical change as far as how you approach work and money and just life. And I kind of agree. But first, welcome back, my friend. It's great to reconnect.
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Farnoosh Torabi
It is so good to be back here. Thank you so much for inviting me and listeners.
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Brad Barrett
I was on Choose Fi talking about a healthy state of panic, which I have to say, Brad, you not only liked it, you loved it, you love the book, you read it. Paige Turner, for you. How has fear been a force in your life? I guess I didn't get to ask you this question on your podcast.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, I think why. Why I love the book so much is it just. It spoke to me. It spoke to my soul, truly. And. And I think, I think it's easy to bemoan things that you think are wrong with you in life and not then look at, hey, what is the superpower of this? And I think that was what was so beautiful about. About your book. And, and, yeah, I mean, I've. I've always been limited, I think, in my own mind, with fears, just fears of fitting in, fears of not being good enough, fears of, you know, just everything. Fears of literal safety, like, and. And I don't think I've ever done enough Inner work on it, to be honest, to. To really grasp where did they come from? Why. Why are they there? And. And reading your book really helped me kind of start that. That. I mean, start down that road, I guess. And so, yeah, that was hopefully the first of many steps, but. But, yeah, it really. It deeply spoke to me.
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Brad Barrett
Hmm. Well, thank you. I really appreciate that. I mean, especially coming from you, somebody who has achieved so much in his financial life and in his career and in his personal life. Last year on the show, we talked about your comeuppance into the Fire Move, a real sort of spokesperson for FIRE financial independence, retire early. I talk about that in the book, too, and how while it is this potentially great achievement for some people, it's not the right move. It's not the right move. There's FOMO around. Okay, well, if I want to be financially independent, I have to do it this way. I have to be extremely frugal. There's sort of like, there was a script for this. Yeah, we have many scripts now for fire. But when you pursued it, what was the desire, the initial desire? And, And. And be honest, like, were there. Were there times where you're like, this is really hard. I don't know why I'm doing this. You and your wife managed to save a million dollars in 11 years. A hundred thousand more dollars. X plus dollars a year. That's amazing. That's a lot. That's a lot. It's a lot of not eating certain things and not doing certain things, I would imagine.
- [07:10]
Farnoosh Torabi
It's. No, it certainly is. And yeah, I mean, there's so much there furnished. I suspect we could talk the rest of the podcast just on what you asked me in the last couple of minutes. But, yeah, I mean, I think my mindset has changed entirely. Just, you know, coming to the broad. The broad point of this, I think the entire community's mindset has changed, which I think is wonderful. I will get to your specific question in a second. But I think the. As you're saying, financial independence, retire early. I think one of the things that I'm proudest of, that. That Choose Fi has done is really take the focus away from the re. Because I think the retire early is such a distraction for people, and it kind of just sucks up all the oxygen in the room. Right? It becomes like this distraction of, oh, this is just lazy people who want to run away from things. Right. They just want to sit around and retire early, and that's that. And, like, I just find that I. I just totally disagree with that. Frankly, I, I, I can't imagine there are many people, if any, that have the wherewithal to reach financial independence at any point in their life, early, late, whenever, who are just going to sit around and do nothing. So I mean we focus on that re so little. It's just the universal good of financial independence and pursuing financial independence, however you define that and I think that's, that's something we've been very diligent about, is you get to define what your path to FI looks like. And yeah, I mean, since you asked about, about my path specifically, you know, it's hard because I think with the benefit of hindsight and with the benefit of the psychological place that I'm in now after reading a book like Die with Zero by Bill Perkins or reading the article the Tail End at the the website. Wait, but why? And realizing furnish we were talking about this before we jumped on about our kids getting older and realizing that literally every year you spend with your child from 0 to 18, according to this article on the tail end, the tail end by way by, it's 5% of the time you will ever spend with them, literally a full 5% each year. So by the time they get to 18, they graduate, graduate high school, you're at 90% furnished. 90%. So I mean, and if you think about it, that actually makes sense. You don't want to think about it because it's really, really sad. Right? But think about your kids. And when I think it's easy to get lost in the sadness of that, but I choose to look at it of oh wow, I still have all these years. I need to maximize this. So when my daughter, who's a roller coaster crazy enthusiast, wants to talk, talk to me about roller coasters at 9:30 at night and I'm really tired. I say in my head, I have a thousand more nights with her before she goes to college. A thousand more nights. So again, it's easy to say with the benefit of hindsight that I was a little too extreme on my path to fi, but in the moment furnished, it didn't feel that way. It didn't feel like we were depriving ourselves. It felt like we were living a wonderful life. We were just being a little bit smarter with money. We were the skill of spending, as we like to call it, I think we were getting, we were honing that skill. And it didn't feel, it didn't feel bad. It didn't feel like deprivation to me at all.
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Brad Barrett
One of your very recent episodes, Unchuz Fi is about frugality and how to balance. You call smart sort of smarter spending. Frugality gets a real bad rap. And I think for a good reason. I mean, I think maybe it's like the word budget or the word. You know, it's like, it's very triggering and it. We think of a certain person doing certain things with their money. That's very extreme. And yet it's still something that runs rampant in the personal finance community. There's a lot of frugality idolizers and frugality philosophers. And, you know, how do you, how do you balance the smart spending or slash, you know, frugality on the one end of the spectrum, smart spending on the other, with all of your other financial pursuits like buying a home and sending your kids to college and planning for retirement and also enjoying your life, which might include a few vacations. What, what was the sort of outcome of that episode that for you was really compelling when you talked about frugality with your guests? Which, by the way, if you're looking for some frugality experts, Jen and Jill of the Frugal Friends is who you had on that show.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah. And they're great. They absolutely go to them for all your budgeting tips, all your frugality tips. Yeah. I mean, again, like I said a couple minutes ago, I. I'm torn because. Because I've had an evolution as my FI journey has gone on. So the place where I am right now is probably the spendiest I've ever been because I think I'm. I'm realizing I want to allocate my spending during these finite years I have with my daughters. And I think that's okay. I think that's what's wonderful about personal finance and fi is you get to decide. And I know that just sounds almost self evident, but it's really not. There's no path. There's no specific path. Like you said, I think the financial independence movement and fire, when it was maligned, it seemed like this deprivation. It just seemed like it was all about just cutting to the bone and just racing towards some number on a spreadsheet or on a screen. And that's no way to live a life. Right. I mean, who wants to live like that? That. That makes no sense to me. And I think, I think every person has to find that. That line for themselves and hopefully they can figure out where the spending actually adds value to their life. And I think that that's kind of my mantra is find what you value and don't just do things unconsciously. Because society has told you this means you're successful, right? Living in X house or driving Y car, right? Like that means you're successful. I think you have to realize there's a finite pot of money that you're bringing in every month. Now, obviously, you can always earn more. You can negotiate, you can go to a different job. Like, there are clearly strategies for that. But realistically, if we're honest with ourselves, if you're living paycheck to paycheck, if you're going into a negative every single month, you have to make changes, right? Like, I'm not going to lie to you, I'm not going to sugarcoat this to furnish to you or your audience. Like, because that would be disingenuous. You have to make changes if you're in a hair is on fire type scenario, right? And I think, I think there are easy ways to, to make those initial changes. And like, you know, I don't know how, how micro we want to get right here. But like something simple like, like a cell phone. If you're spending a hundred dollars a month on your cell phone, that's crazy. I mean, it's just like, I, I, I don't love to stand on your cell phone.
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Brad Barrett
It's like My bill is 1, 20, 120amonth. I have an iPhone for one person.
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Farnoosh Torabi
For one person?
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Brad Barrett
Yeah. Why, why is that crazy? I'm an iPhone.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Go to Republic Wireless. My, my family just moved. They all have iPhones. It's unlimited data. I think it's like, it's 25, $30 a month. It's fantastic. They run on really? Yeah, it's amazing.
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Brad Barrett
Do you have an iPhone? I don't want to give up the iPhone three.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Three of the four. I don't have an iPhone. The three other three girls.
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Brad Barrett
By the way, this is not an ad for Republic Wireless, but I'm just genuinely curious.
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Farnoosh Torabi
So actually, hold on, I'm going to update that. We were at Republic Wireless, we just moved to Mint Mobile, so Mint Mobile. And it's fantastic. The service is amazing. So. And furnish, the reason why, like I'm harping on even like something that seems small is when you're pursuing financial independence, every hundred dollars. So, like, you might literally cut $100 from your cell phone just by moving to Mint Mobile. Okay, that's actually $30,000 less you need in your financial, in your net worth to reach financial independence. Thirty thousand dollars. Every hundred dollars a month you cut out of your budget. So sure, it sounds little, but it's actually Big. And that's kind of cool. And you know, we could do the math if you wanted, but keep going.
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Brad Barrett
I like this because. Yeah, I know I don't like to sort of get into the weeds of, you know, to cut this out or cut that out or, or not. And rather even saying cut, we're just saying like make a smarter choice.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, smarter.
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Brad Barrett
Because you know, there are also big things you could do. Like my neighbor at one point, post recession, her taxes had remained, her real estate taxes had remained where they were pre 2, 2008. But we know during 2008, 9, 10, 11, home prices came down. And so the comps in her neighborhood sale prices were down. She was like, why am I paying the same property taxes? So she, she went to court, which sounds like a big deal, but it wasn't, it was like a morning and she came with her required documents to like you needed like three home, home sales in your neighborhood to sort of justify why your taxes should come down. And she did. She saved 5,000 a year by asking for an adjustment to her real estate taxes based on where the market had been going. That stuff too. I mean it's not a phone call, it's not a switch to Mint Mobile, but I mean there's a lot of sort of these bigger, as Ramit Sati says, like these $30,000 questions and not the $3 questions. Like when people want to know when they spend all this time thinking about like high yield savings accounts. Yes, important, but also are you investing too? You know, are you as, as concerned about where, what the fees are on your mutual funds? Because that is where I'd be more focused on than like my interest on my savings account.
- [17:09]
Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, I mean that to me is the most massive thing of all. Right. Is actually the funny thing is people who think they're doing right by and I don't want to malign an entire industry of financial advisors, but just the actual, the assets under management concept. Right. So yeah, it's crazy. Again, people think they're doing well. They've reached, they've gotten to a point where they're saving, they're investing. And what do you do? You go to that professional down the road and you think they're going to help you. But realistically, essentially nobody can outperform the market over 40 year period. It's just, it's almost impossible. Like the likelihood is probably 1 or 2% and the chance of you finding that person is again, almost zero. So it's just the worst bet in the entire world basically. And how we look at it is you control what you can control, which are fees when you invest. So for me it's just I buy low cost, broad based index funds like S&P 500 or total stock market and the expenses on those are tiny. Right? So it's like 0.04% or something like that. It's essentially zero. But just contrast that farnish with, okay, hey, I went to a financial advisor. They're going to charge me 1% of my assets in a fee every year. And then because they're going to try to prove their brilliance, they're going to put me in some expensive mutual fund, probably at another 1% expense ratio or thereabouts. And it all sounds tiny, right? Like the, oh, it's just 1%. It's nothing. But when you look at a 2%. So let's say you're going to get 8% market rate over 40 year period annual, just hypothetically, of course, we don't know what the market's going to bring, but in A S&P 500 versus maybe if they can match the market, but then it's less 2%, right? So you're only getting a 6% return with that financial advisor. You're going to lose. I've run the numbers on this so many times and of course it's, it's, it's case specific, but you're going to lose about 40 to 50% of your net worth. Literally 40 or 50%. I pulled up an article the other day, was like, okay, I would have had a $7 million net worth. And because I went to that financial advisor and who put me in this expensive, expensive mutual fund, I lost three and a half million dollars. I mean, furnished. That's crazy, right? Like, so one of the absolute best decisions you can do, clearly is to invest. But for me it's just go to Fidelity or Schwab or Vanguard or wherever and just find AN S&P 500 or total stock market, ETF or mutual fund and just keep pumping money in there. Like you talk about the $30,000 questions, this is the three to five million dollars.
- [20:00]
Brad Barrett
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- [21:49]
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- [22:16]
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Farnoosh Torabi
The question.
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Brad Barrett
So you just have one fund? You don't diversify beyond that although that's very diversified within there but like you don't have like also international or real estate or anything like that.
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Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, I mean I personally don't. And of course you know we, we can, we can talk about this. And, and I think people of good faith can argue over should we have some bonds, should we have whatever. Like I think clearly there's room at the margin. But I personally don't. I mean like when I invest in the total US stock market fund at Vanguard or Fidelity, I'm getting three to 4,000 companies that have 100 million plus American workers that have international operations all around the globe. Like I mean to me that's about as diversified as I can ask for. Sure. Again there's always the argument of oh it's cap weighted so it's, you're really getting 20 tech firms in terms of 25% of your fund. I, I get those arguments but I mean man, if I can, if I can match that market at rock bottom fees and get the ingenuity of 100 million American workers and people around the globe, like I'm pretty darn happy with that.
- [24:02]
Brad Barrett
Yeah. Awesome. Well, fast forward. We've been talking a lot about. Well I didn't. This actually this part of the conversation I didn't expect which I love, which is like Brad's best tips that Brad's best money tips. But let's get to current day and talk a little bit about your post pandemic philosophies around work and earning. As you were saying before we were live, you and your co founder of Choose Fi, you were like the goal because I think you launched in what, 2018.
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Farnoosh Torabi
It was like 2017.
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Brad Barrett
Yeah, 2017. And you've had astronomical growth. Your podcast is one of the top podcasts. Your like the go to website for financial independence and you're like we're going to take on the kahunas of personal finance. We're going to, we're going to dominate the world. Which I think is like an, it's a respectable goal. I at one point also wanted to become the Tsarina of personal finance. I then had two children. Was like I kind of want something else. You know, I don't know if this is like really what I, what's the new philosophy that you have around your leadership at work and, and why has it changed?
- [25:14]
Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, yeah, it's a great question and it is so interesting that you and I have both gone through the same evolution.
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Brad Barrett
It's like it's inevitable. Like you get a little bit of success and you're like, oh, my God, I want more of this and more of this and more of this until you realize, like, actually, more is not more.
- [25:28]
Farnoosh Torabi
No, no, more is not more at all. And, yeah, I mean, I think, obviously, so many negative things from the pandemic, et cetera, et cetera, but I think one of the very positive things for a lot of people is it's been. It's been clarifying, it's provided some level of clarity in your life that. That maybe you never would have gotten. And I think. I think that came to us at Choose a vi, and certainly to me personally. But, yeah, I mean, it's kind of hard to even put myself back in the shoes of 2019, but realistically, October 2019, we win podcast of the year at the big Fincon financial conference. That whole conference was essentially Choose a Fight. It was like this crazy. We were on top of the world, and we thought that we could take on essentially anyone in terms of providing value to the country and the world for financial, personal finance and financial independence, certainly. And. And we had the appetite for it then. And I mean, honestly, furnish, like, it's hard to put myself in those shoes these days because I just. I don't have the appetite for it anymore. I mean, I love helping people. That's why I'm still doing this probably 40 plus hours a week at this point, when I've reached a point of financial independence. And it's costing me, you know, it's. Obviously, it's costing me a good portion of my life on a weekly basis to do this, but I think. I think I'm doing good in the world. Like, I genuinely believe that. That I'll look back some. Some many, many decades from now and say, like, man, that was. That was a pretty good life. You know, you. You did something good. And. And it didn't have to be. You were bigger than Dave Ramsey. Like, it. It didn't have you. It didn't have to be right. Like, and. And I think we started down the path of, oh, we're gonna publish books, we're gonna be a book publisher, we're gonna have a. A foundation, we're gonna have this big team. We're gonna have all fill in the blank. It's so easy. And this to the audience, I think this to me transcends certainly just this myopic podcasting thing. But it's so easy to say yes in life, but, man, saying no is a real skill, and you have to zealously guard your time. And. And I think it's easy to say yes to things, especially when they're good. Right. Or even better than good. But if it's not that great or that, hell yeah. I think you have to be really, really mindful of your time and your energy and what you'd actually rather be doing, frankly. So, yeah, I mean, furnish. I have. I have come full circle on this. I. I mean, basically, at this point, the choose a five side of, you know, really our. Our business. It is. It's just me. It's me. And I have one of a friend named William who's been our tech guy for years, who was on our podcast years ago.
- [28:28]
Brad Barrett
I love it.
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Farnoosh Torabi
That's it. I mean, it's literally. There's no big team there. There were. There was a big team, but it's just the two of us now.
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Brad Barrett
Yeah, I. That resonates so much with me. And I was just having a conversation yesterday with somebody who said, what I really appreciate about you most, Barnoosh, is that you're really honest about how you just, like, do it yourself. And it's not because I'm looking for high fives, and it's not because I'm looking for. I don't. It's not because I want to make my life harder. It's just because for me, what is harder is managing a team. For me, what is harder is feeling responsible for other people's finances, livelihoods, happiness. I like to solopreneur it. And even if that means leaving a lot of money on the table, because I know that the cost to achieve that for me is not. Is not worth it.
- [29:18]
Farnoosh Torabi
I'm still with you. And that's okay. That's a beautiful thing. It is okay.
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Brad Barrett
And it doesn't mean you're not ambitious. I used to conflate those two things.
- [29:26]
Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah.
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Brad Barrett
If you don't aspire for more, you're not ambitious.
- [29:31]
Farnoosh Torabi
No, it's crazy. It's. Yeah, it's so messed up. And I mean, for me, it's like, okay, again, it cuts to the essence, again, for. For people looking at Choose Fi. What is the essence of what we produce? So, like, I don't think, honestly, virtually anybody who has followed us for years would know that, really, anything is different on the inside of our organization, to be perfectly honest, because the podcast comes out, sure, Jonathan's not on anymore, but Jonathan and I are still great friends, business partners, et cetera. But the podcast comes out, my newsletter comes out every Tuesday. We have our. Our choose a five local groups around the world, and I'm Actually trying, like, one of the things I'm trying to do is make them better. Now. I, I'm spending dozens of hours now trying to. We've, we've made it very hands off. And these are in real life meetups. So, like, we have a Choose ay New York City group with a couple thousand people in this Facebook group and their meetups and all these things. But like, I want to provide support. I've, I've let it be this like, autonomous, decentralized organization. But those, those local groups, those in real life connections, I think they matter more than anything. And that's where I want to spend my time. So that's, that is what I'm spending my time on. Those three things, the podcast, the newsletter, and those local groups. And, and again, I don't think anybody notices from the outside that, oh, choose a vi is different or smaller. Like, it still looks like the same thing. And because we're still providing the value. And I think that, again, okay, to you who's listening to this, like, my story might not resonate to you because you're not, you're not creating a podcast or whatever, but. But I think it can and I think it does. Right? Because what in your life, what's. What, what is clarifying in your life that, that you could cut out, that you can get rid of, that doesn't bring you energy, I think, right furnished. Like, that's how I look at it. It's like what brings me energy and.
- [31:27]
Brad Barrett
What doesn't and being selective, being really deliberate about where you show up and when I show up in certain ways in certain places, like, I don't do everything. I don't do all the TikTok and the threads, whatever. I don't have a YouTube that I'm actively populating, you know, so there's a lot of other stuff that I'm not doing. But the. What I do is very intentional. And why I do it is a factor of a few important variables that are personal to me. But I have to feel like I see, I have to see these variables present before I step into something. One is there's a market viability for this, like you're doing in person gatherings, not just because it's fun. There's evidence that people want this. People are showing up, people are buying tickets. My book launch, I. This is my fourth book launch. The other three, I never charged for book events. But realizing that now more than ever, people want to gather. And psychologically you need to charge people ahead of time because they're not Going to show up, left to their own volition, especially since the pandemic, we much prefer being in our pajamas at home. We will find all the excuses to not show up. So I charge ahead of time and boom, 80 people show up, whereas maybe 10 would show up. But so it's. And I like doing it. Like I. When you said that this is like for you, not just impactful work, but for your audience, but for you too. And that's also the variable is like, will this spark joy? So is there a market viability? Will this spark joy? And can I keep at it? Because I don't like one and dones. I mean, sure, I do things on experiment basis. I will throw a dart, but I like stuff that endures. That to me is a measure of success. Because what is that really saying to me? Like, you're good at it, you're consistent, there are results, there's an roi. It's worth doing again. The podcast, my books, my speaking. This stuff is what I hope to do forever. And I've identified this stuff as like, where I really want to show up because again, all those other variables are there. But yeah, no, I'm not doing TikTok. I'm not. I can't. I can't. I don't. Can't. But then there are those people. You know them, Brad, they're like always in all the ways that's actually one person's goodness. Oh, my God. But he also runs like a 100 person firm.
- [33:45]
Farnoosh Torabi
Yeah, I can't imagine. And, but I mean, in fairness, there is. And certainly I experienced this. You talk about fear with, with, with your book. Like, I definitely experience FOMO on some level of, oh, maybe I should be doing Twitter. Maybe I should be doing this. But like, but to your point, you eventually come around to, I'm just one person. There's only so much I can do. There's only so much I want to do. And that is okay, right? Like that, that's the big takeaway is that is okay. You add value to your world and your life in the way that you see fit. And I think I've, I finally really become deeply settled with that. Which is, which is wonderful.
- [34:21]
Brad Barrett
I'm thrilled for you. I'm glad we've reconnected and I want everyone to go. If you aren't already familiar with Brad and his work at ChooseFi, please, I have all the links in our show notes. Brad Barrett, thank you so much for all this great, all this great information. Your insights, your honesty, your candor. I'm cheering you on.
- [34:43]
Farnoosh Torabi
Thank you. Always love to be here. Always love to chat with you. Thanks again for having me.
- [34:51]
Brad Barrett
Thanks to Brad for joining us. Learn more about him@choosefi.com and I hope your day is so money.
- [35:11]
Farnoosh Torabi
When you're a forward thinker, the only thing you're afraid of is business as usual. Workday is the AI platform that transforms the way you manage your people people and money today so you can transform tomorrow. Workday moving business forever forward.
- [35:26]
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