1858: Why Six-Figure Earners Still Feel Broke (and What to Do About It)

Summary

Podcast Summary: So Money with Farnoosh Torabi
Episode 1858: "Why Six-Figure Earners Still Feel Broke (and What to Do About It)"
Release Date: July 28, 2025

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Introduction

In Episode 1858 of So Money with Farnoosh Torabi, award-winning financial strategist Farnoosh Torabi delves into a pervasive financial paradox: why individuals earning six-figure incomes often still feel financially strained. Joined by Priya Malani, founder of Stash Wealth and host of the podcast The F Word, they explore the underlying factors contributing to this phenomenon and offer actionable strategies to achieve genuine financial well-being.

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Key Discussion Points

1. The Magic Number Framework

   Priya Malani introduces the concept of the "Magic Number," a revolutionary approach to personal finance that simplifies budgeting. Unlike traditional budgeting, which allocates specific amounts to various categories (e.g., groceries, gas, shopping), the Magic Number framework focuses on a single, pivotal number that dictates savings and investments.

   • Quote: "With the magic number framework, there's one number you pay attention to, and then you can literally spend the rest of your money guilt free." [02:33]

   How It Works:

   • Define Goals: Determine what you want to achieve financially, such as renovating a kitchen, traveling to Europe, or early retirement.
   • Automate Savings: Calculate the amount needed monthly to reach these goals and automate these transfers.
   • Magic Number: The remaining balance after automating savings is your "magic number," which you can spend without guilt.

   This method shifts the focus from restrictive budgeting to goal-oriented financial planning, fostering a more positive relationship with money.

2. The Myth of Homeownership as the Best Investment

   Priya challenges the traditional belief that purchasing a home is the optimal financial investment. Citing a 126-year study from The New York Times, she reveals that, on average, home prices across America have appreciated a mere 0.37% annually, barely keeping pace with inflation.

   • Quote: "On average annual, year over year, your home barely kept pace with inflation." [16:27]

   Key Insights:

   • Investment Returns: Renting and investing the difference often yields higher returns compared to tying up capital in real estate.
   • Flexibility: Renting provides greater financial and geographical flexibility, allowing individuals to allocate resources more efficiently towards diversified investments like ETFs and index funds.

3. Lifestyle Inflation and Student Loan Debt

   Despite earning substantial incomes, many high earners fall into the trap of lifestyle inflation—where increased earnings lead to proportionate increases in spending, resulting in no net financial gain.

   • Quote: "Your income goes up, and then you're still living paycheck to paycheck." [29:17]

   Contributing Factors:

   • Student Loans: The average Stash Wealth client carries approximately $80,000 in student loans, significantly higher than the national average, which hampers financial progress.
   • Social Media Influence: Constant exposure to others' lifestyles fuels unnecessary spending and reinforces the need to keep up with peers.
   • Over-Saving: Particularly among children of immigrants, excessive saving without strategic investment leads to overly constrained lifestyles without proportional financial benefits.

4. Differing Mindsets: Cultural and Generational Influences

   Priya highlights how cultural backgrounds and generational mindsets influence financial behaviors. For instance, immigrant families often emphasize extreme savings and job security due to past experiences, which can lead to over-conservative financial strategies in the present.

   • Quote: "Living in that fear and taking that risk. I don't want to do that every day." [32:14]

   Implications:

   • Risk Perception: Older generations or those from risk-averse backgrounds may view investing as gambling, deterring them from engaging in diversified, growth-oriented investments.
   • Time Valuation: Younger generations, including Priya herself, value time more and prefer efficiency, opting for automated financial solutions to manage their wealth without exhaustive manual interventions.

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Insights and Advice

1. Embrace Automation in Financial Planning

   Automation liberates individuals from the complexities of manual budgeting and investing, ensuring consistent progress toward financial goals without requiring constant attention.

   • Quote: "Building a financial foundation without having to lift a finger takes one thing and that's automation." [10:44]

   Benefits:

   • Consistency: Regular automated contributions prevent impulsive spending and promote disciplined saving.
   • Simplicity: Automation reduces the cognitive load associated with financial management, making it accessible even to those overwhelmed by traditional budgeting methods.

2. Calculated Risk-Taking in Investments

   Farnoosh emphasizes the importance of viewing money as a game requiring strategic risk-taking rather than reckless gambling.

   • Quote: "Calculated risk is where the sweet spot is." [19:13]

   Advice:

   • Diversification: Focus on diversified investments like ETFs and index funds that offer steady growth with lower risk.
   • Avoid High-Risk Speculation: Resist the allure of "get rich quick" schemes, such as individual stocks or volatile cryptocurrencies, unless they are a small, calculated portion of a well-rounded portfolio.

3. Reversing the Budgeting Process

   Reversing traditional budgeting by prioritizing goals over spending constraints fosters a more positive and intentional financial lifestyle.

   • Quote: "You're not coming at it from a 'it's never enough' mindset. You're coming at it with... what you want to be doing a year from now." [27:21]

   Steps:

   • Identify Desired Outcomes: Clearly define short-term and long-term financial goals.
   • Allocate Funds Accordingly: Automate savings towards these goals first, allowing for guilt-free spending with the remaining funds.
   • Regularly Review and Adjust: Continuously assess financial plans to ensure alignment with evolving goals and life circumstances.

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Conclusions

Despite earning six-figure incomes, many individuals feel financially insecure due to factors like student loan debt, lifestyle inflation, and ineffective budgeting strategies. By adopting innovative frameworks like the Magic Number, embracing automation, and shifting cultural and generational mindsets towards strategic investment and intentional spending, high earners can overcome financial stress and build sustainable wealth.

Final Thoughts:

• Ownership and Responsibility: Recognizing and taking responsibility for one's financial habits is crucial for meaningful change.
• Strategic Planning: Thoughtful financial planning that aligns with personal goals and values leads to greater satisfaction and security.
• Accessibility of Tools: Modern financial tools and technologies make sophisticated financial management accessible and straightforward, eliminating the need for overly complex or expensive solutions.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• "With the magic number framework, there's one number you pay attention to, and then you can literally spend the rest of your money guilt free." [02:33]

• "On average annual, year over year, your home barely kept pace with inflation." [16:27]

• "Your income goes up, and then you're still living paycheck to paycheck." [29:17]

• "Calculated risk is where the sweet spot is." [19:13]

• "Building a financial foundation without having to lift a finger takes one thing and that's automation." [10:44]

• "You're not coming at it from a 'it's never enough' mindset. You're coming at it with... what you want to be doing a year from now." [27:21]

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Resources Mentioned

• Stash Wealth Website: stashwealth.com/so_money – Access free financial guides, tools, and detailed calculators for home buying and parenthood planning.

• The F Word Podcast: Available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other major platforms, offering concise and actionable personal finance tips tailored for individuals in their 30s.

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Closing Remarks

Farnoosh Torabi and Priya Malani provide invaluable insights for high earners who, despite their substantial incomes, struggle with financial security. By reimagining budgeting, addressing emotional and cultural barriers, and leveraging modern financial tools, listeners are empowered to transform their financial lives from feeling perpetually broke to achieving true wealth and satisfaction.

Transcript

[Farnoosh Torabi]

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[Farnoosh Torabi]

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[Farnoosh Torabi]

And I'm not the only one in.

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[Farnoosh Torabi]

So Money Episode.

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1858 why six figure earners still Feel Broke and what to Do About it.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

You'Re listening to so MONEY with award winning money guru Farnoosh Torabi. Each day get a 30 minute dose of financial inspiration from the world's top business minds, authors, influencers and from Farnoosh herself. Looking for ways to save on gas or double your double coupons. Sorry, you're in the wrong place. Seeking profound ways to live a richer, happier life. Welcome to SEW money.

[Priya Malani]

I'm going to take you through the framework and I'm going to teach your listeners how to get something that we give our clients, which is called their magic number this is the most important number and the only one you need to pay attention to. So whereas with budgeting, you have like all these very I can only spend this much on groceries, I can only spend this much on gas, I can only spend this much on shopping. With the magic number framework, there's one number you pay attention to, and then you can literally spend the rest of your money guilt free.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Welcome back to Sew Money, everybody. I'm Farnoosh Tarabi. Where do you stand on budgeting? Do you love it? Do you hate it? Do you feel defeated by it? Well, we're going to get into a lot of the complexities around budgeting today.

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And offer a very simple solution. We're joined by Priya Malani, who is the dynamic founder of Stash wealth and host of the new podcast the F Word, who's making personal finance a lot simpler, smarter, and honestly more livable, especially for high earners in their 30s who.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Feel like they're still behind. In our conversation, we dive into why.

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Budgeting is broken and how to reverse it with one powerful number. The myth of home ownership as the best investment, how to avoid the trap of lifestyle inflation even on a six figure salary, and why investing isn't hard, but the emotional baggage around money absolutely can be.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

We'll also explore the personal side of.

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Financial planning, where therapy meets strategy and the mindset shifts Priya helps her clients make to stop living paycheck to paycheck and start building real wealth.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Let's get into it. K. Milani. Oh my gosh. Blast from the past. Welcome back to so Money. We have so much to catch up on. You have so many great new offers for our audience. As a personal finance expert, wealth manager, founder of Stash wealth, we're so grateful to have you. Welcome.

[Priya Malani]

Thanks so much for having me. Farhanoush. I'm so happy to be back with you.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Let's start with the cool news of that you've arrived into the podcast scene. What has taken so long? I don't know, but you've been such a source of wisdom for so many years, particularly the dinks, the dual income, no kids, millennials, a lot of people on our show who are, who listen. But you now have a podcast and I'm so happy that you're doing this. It's called the F period word. I think I know what that stands for and you just go for it. You cackle. These affected topics like budgeting and living below your means, but of course through your lens. Well, you gotta live your life. Let's Acknowledge that like we all, we want a lifestyle, we wanna be happy, can we make our money work for us? So maybe just tell us a little bit about the genesis of this podcast and what you hope it's going to offer. In a world where we have so many podcasts and books and TikToks and all that stuff that we love, it gets noisy.

[Priya Malani]

Yeah. You are an inspiration, have been an inspiration. And one of the reasons that I didn't it took me so long is because there are, like you said, so many great podcasts out there. So many great finance podcasts out there tackling all different aspects of money. We had been asked for a podcast for several years and it was partially bandwidth and partially, I was like go listen to Farnesia show, but quite you quite frankly. And there's, there's a ton out there. And so for me it was really about figuring out what I could say that would be additive to the conversation so that I wasn't just repeating things that everyone else was talking about. I wanted to be very, very specific. So we made some decisions about the F word. One is that it's not so much long form. I don't know what really is considered long form, but where our episodes are like maybe 15 minutes, they're really short micro episodes. Because personal finance is not difficult, I don't need to belabor the point about budgeting. For 45 minutes to an hour, I can get across exactly what you need to do and what will make you maximize your money. And so it's hyper targeted to 30 somethings, the moves you need to make in your 30s really to maximize your money today and then your wealth potential for the future.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Awesome. I want to ask you about budgeting in a minute because I think for as long as I've been hosting the show, it keeps coming up over and over again. We were talking prior to recording, we were both on the same page about it, which we're like, we hate it. We don't think that it's, we think it's a very defeatist approach to personal finance. This idea that you have to limit your consumption and your financial allocation. Like no one likes repetition like that. It gets boring and also life evolves. So maybe we have to just call it something else. But I love your quick takes on that. But for those who are new to our show, who may not have heard you on so Money in the past, tell us a little bit about Stash wealth.

[Priya Malani]

Sure. So started stash wealth about 12, 13 years ago with the mission of empowering individuals who are Ambitious high earners in their 30s who Wall street ignores. Right. These are people who are making great money. They're in the accumulation years. And unfortunately Wall street won't give them the financial advice, the financial support that they need. And as far as we're concerned, the sooner you get access to good financial advice and GU, the more successful you'll be. Your 30s are by far one of the most critical times to a time moments in your life to start making these not only start implementing good money habits, but it's also a time in your life where so many critical decisions are coming up. Yeah, your 20s are like anything you do in your 20s, you can course correct in your 30s. That's like the, that's the decade of mistakes and learning. And then when you get to your 30s, you're a little bit more serious. You're maybe starting to get into a relationship. You might be thinking about how do I optimize my full 401k or stock options? Do I, Should I buy a home? Should I keep renting? There's just so many decisions that come up in your 30s and it could be a critical time to, to set yourself on the right course, right path.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

What were some things you did in your 30s besides maybe starting a company that you felt was a leap, a launching pad for the rest of your financial life? I guess for us, maybe I'll go first. It was like focusing on earnings a lot. You know, they say your peak earning years are you're like your late 30s or maybe early 40s, depending on your industry. I really worked a ton in my 30s. I also coincidentally had kids at the same time. That was interesting. Sure, let's start a family at the same time when I'm trying to make all the money and work all the time. But I learned investing in child care was a great investment because it allowed for us to continue earning and setting a foundation, a financial foundation for later in life when our kids were older and we didn't want to work as much or we didn't want to work as many hours and we didn't have childcare. To have that Runway that we established in our 30s that we then invested was like has it's now really coming to fruition. So those were the two things I think for us. But what about you?

[Priya Malani]

Yeah, and those are great. Just taking a second to think about your earning potential and starting to negotiate for yourself and advocate within your company. Or maybe having to leave your company because you realize you might be capped or the environment isn't right. That doesn't allow you to grow and achieve your potential, just simply evolutionary road. I think of that movie sometimes where you just wake up, you go in, you don't think about it, you go home. It's like, no. But actually taking a second, taking a beat to think about that. I think that's so smart and a great one. I love to be. It sounds so silly as a founder, but I'm lazy because all my time goes to my company. So for me, the smartest thing I did was employ automation. Building a financial foundation without having to lift a finger takes one thing and that's automation. So I like to start with that one because I think it's the least intimidating and the easiest to wrap your head around when you're feeling overwhelmed by personal finance. Like, okay, what do you want to accomplish? Whether it's this year, in three years, early retirement, down the road type stuff, and then put a plan in place to automate it so that you don't. So it's happening. You don't have to think about it, you don't have to lift a finger. You're busy, you're doing other things, and your foundation is just being built without you paying attention.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yeah. Oh, my gosh. You know, there are these, like, investing courses out there that charge thousands and thousands of dollars. And they prey on, a lot of times, women who might be single or newly divorced or coming to money stuff for the first time and feeling very vulnerable. And they know they need to invest, but they don't know where to start. And then they sign up for these classes that are like, make it sound so complicated. And then they graduate after two weeks and they're like, talking about individual stocks that they're buying. And I'm like, whoa, okay. Did at any point someone tell you how simple this can be and how you don't have to get into the weeds of, like, the actual company you're buying? I mean, I love that you're passionate about this and you have an interest in Nvidia, but did they at any point, point tell you that all you have to do is go to an automated platform, There are many of them, and take a quiz. And then they create a diversified portfolio for you that is largely ETFs and index funds that charge very little carrying costs. And you make a decision once to your point, you make an automatic decision of how much automatically am I going to contribute to this portfolio every month out of my paycheck. And then you go back to living your life that took a lunch hour to explain. And that now they're charging you thousands of dollars for this three week like this. I want to tell everyone, public service announcement. You don't need that. You don't need that. I teach it for 29 bucks in an hour. You know what I mean? I talk about all the time on this podcast. Like this is where I think. And now let's talk about women and money and how we get preyed upon sometimes with a lot of this. And everybody does because we're taught as a culture that money's complicated and you need all these sophisticated people and instruments to get you through it. But at the end of the day, it's so simple. It's actually quite simple thanks to automation and thanks to where we are with technology today. Maybe 20 years ago you did need some more, more tools, more investing in that area, but not anymore.

[Priya Malani]

Not first of all, music to my ears. You're 100% right. I think the part that has we've benefited from when it comes to technology is the automation and then the ongoing management of it. Right. So something simple as tax loss harvesting or automatic rebalancing, the new tools that are out there that you can get into for as little as five bucks, they do all that for you. You do not need to pay someone. We joke at stash. We say it all the time. Like, investing is the easiest part, the absolute easiest part of the job that we do. Some clients have us doing their investing, but we do not pretend that's the hard part. That is absolutely the most commoditized part of the industry. It is so simple. And with the tools and technology like you're talking about, specifically Robo advisors, anybody out there can set up a portfolio, invest into it automatically, and never have to think about it again. And everything's happening for you.

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Yeah.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

So what's the hardest part of your job?

[Priya Malani]

80% of what we do is therapy, without a doubt. The financial advisors that I employ are CFPs, and they are so smart and so good at tetrising financial pieces to build a beautiful plan for success so that you can achieve the lifestyle you want today and the future. The part I have to teach and when we bring on new financial advisors that we really spend time training on is the emotional intelligence, the account holding clients accountable. We have couples that are fighting and one thinks they're right and they should do this, and the other person, partner might say disagree. Helping them get on the same page, speak the same language. When it comes to money, that is a harder part of the job. The numbers are the easy part.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

What are the biggest emotional complexities that people come to you with. Is it? And I think I know some of them. But I want to hear from you and be curious to know if there's overlap.

[Priya Malani]

Okay, so there's a couple uphill battles that I think we usually have to fight. One is a lot of clients have been getting financial advice from their parents. So before they come to us they've heard old nar, older narratives that may have worked for prior generations that don't necessarily fit our approach and our ideas around how money should money should serve up.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

What's an example of that?

[Priya Malani]

The one I quote that's probably the easiest I talk about it the most often is renting versus buying. The common narrative out there is that you will make more money by buying a home than renting if you continue to rent. That is a financially schools game. Yeah, exactly. It put you in a worse off position. Mathematically. That is not true. We prove it time and time again. Not to say that you can't. Your home won't grow in value, but the difference between what people think a home does for them and what it actually does for them is night and day. And I'll usually quote this stat from the New York Times article a long time ago, it was like eight, nine years ago. They quoted a 126 year study that found if you look at home prices across America and you remove bubble markets. Okay, so if you live in Chicago or LA or New York, this doesn't necessarily holds. But across the majority of the country, home prices over 126 years have appreciated 0.37%.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Oh my God.

[Priya Malani]

On average annual, year over year, your home barely kept pace with inflation. Now if you compare that to having just rented and taken that big down payment, put it into the market. We all know, you know the stock market annualized over a hundred years. It's not over three years, it's not over five years. You have to be patient. But it does way better than that. So that renting versus buying is a big one. The other one I'll bring up because I think it'll fuel an interesting conversation is the difference between investing and gambling. Emotional uphill battles we have to get through with couples is usually the guy not trying to stereotype but he comes in wanting to buy crypto wanting to buy all this sexy single stock stock. My buddy told me about this thing. I need to get into it and completely helping them shift the narrative of what that's gambling. You can do that, but you shouldn't do it with the majority of the money that you've worked really hard for. To your point earlier, diversify index. Slow and steady wins the race.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

It's so common that one in particular, where I don't know where it was explained at some point that money is a game and it should be treated like a game. Maybe it's the movies that we watched, maybe it's. There are people that. There are people who got rich quick, right? There are those examples and they make the news for a reason, by the way. The news does not report on the mundane. The news reports on news breaking things. The stuff that breaks the mold, right? Where it's like this guy or gal did buy crypto at $0.02 and now, like, who but who did that? We'd all like to go back in time in a time machine and buy Amazon in 1990. Most of us, we ride the market, if we're lucky to do even that, because they're actually. I was reading that so few people even invest. Let's just talk about that. I think what it's like 20% of people are actually in the market. And so I, yeah, I hear that a lot where that you're not really doing money if you're not being this bold actor with your money. And yeah, people have built great wealth by taking risks. But as I learned too from entrepreneurs, that the mistake that people often make with entrepreneurs and their relationship with risk, it's not that they are blind to risk, it's that they have a plan to mitigate risk. They understand risk as part of the journey and they don't go into it without a plan. So we don't. We often we skip that part when we do. When we talk about risk taking. Oh, we just gotta go for it without a parachute. You'd be stupid.

[Priya Malani]

Calculated risk is where the sweet spot is. Yeah, I couldn't agree more.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

So let's talk about budgeting, because that comes up a lot too. And I don't have a whole lot. I don't have like a dissertation on this. And within the absence of mint, people are scrambling still. This mint went away more than a year ago. And while there are alternatives, they charge and people want free stuff. So what do we do? What do you help people with when it comes to budgeting? What's your philosophy?

[Priya Malani]

Yeah, okay. So the philosophy is called reverse budgeting, and we've systematized it within our financial planning framework. So I'm going to take you through the framework and I'm going to teach your listeners how to get something that we give our Clients, which is called their magic number. This is the most important number and the only one you need to pay attention to. So whereas with budgeting, you have like all these very. I can only spend this much on groceries, I can only spend this much on gas. I can only spend this much on shopping. With the magic number framework, there's one number you pay attention to, and then you can literally spend the rest of your money guilt free. And so part one, decide what you want to accomplish. Right. Like we talked earlier, before we started recording about the point of budgeting, why do you budget in the first place? You budget so that hopefully at the end of the month, you haven't spent all your money and you have something left over to either put towards a trip or put into your general savings account, or put towards retirement or put towards redoing your kitchen. But you want money left over so that you can put it somewhere. What if you inversed that and you said, what do I want to accomplish? I want to renovate my kitchen. I want to travel to Europe next year. I want to retire when I'm 55 years old. And you figured out what strategy, what saving strategy you needed to accomplish that, and you automated it. Okay, if I want to go to Europe next year, I want to spend, I don't know, $10,000. So $833 needs to be automated every single month. And when your paycheck hits, you just. Just set it up, automate it. Make sure that money is going into a separate account that's nicknamed Europe Trip, preferably at an online bank. So it's earning a higher yield. I know your listeners. You've taught them this. You want your money working harder for you. Now if you take the time to think about what you want to accomplish, you figure out how much you need and you automate it, then what's left? You can actually blow all of it month to month. You can spend all your checking account down to zero, guilt free.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yeah. And if your goal is to get out of debt, then that's the fixed payment you're making every month. $10,000. Yeah. Automated. Yeah, Makes sense to me.

[Priya Malani]

So the number you have left over to spend, let's say you're earning $100,000, and you decide you have to automate across all of your goals, $1,000 a month. You might say, okay, well, I have 3,000 left to blow every single month, guilt free. That's your magic number.

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[Maya and Sim]

Hey, it's Maya and Sim from the Girls that Invest podcast. If you are an IT or security pro, you know managing devices, identities and applications can fil overwhelming and honestly risky. That's where Trelica by1Password comes in. It helps conquer SaaS, sprawl and shadow it by discovering every app your team uses, managed or not. With pre built app profiles, you can assess risk, manage access, and even optimize your software spend. Plus, it simplifies onboarding, offboarding and compliance, all while cutting costs by eliminating unused licenses. Take the first step to better security for your team. Learn [e-mail] special offer.

[Priya Malani]

And so what you can do, and this is my favorite part, is you can put it all on a credit card.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yeah.

[Priya Malani]

Earn those rewards points and you know with confidence that as long as you don't spend more than your magic number, you can pay off your credit card in full and on time.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

At that point it may require though, you're like, okay, I only have $3,000 left and I need to make some cuts. But at that point, because maybe you have been overspending, you've been spending that $833 as part of your maybe your needs for the month or what you think are needs. So what? Any tips for like how to reassess your spending so that you can more comfortably afford that automatic 8? In this case, $800 a month towards that Europe trip?

[Priya Malani]

Yep. I have found doing this for over a decade that people always start the exercise thinking there will not be enough. And inevitably, once we plan for all the things they really care about, they realize that what's left over is more than enough for them to do the rest of the things. You're not coming at it from a it's never enough mindset. You're coming at it now. It totally shifts that you see, oh, I have money going to this thing I'm excited about. You have of just little bits of money going to all these different things and what's left is almost always enough. And if it's not, it is the first indicator for whether or not you're living a lifestyle you can actually afford. That's a big problem. A lot of people don't know whether or not they're, they have no clue whether they're living a lifestyle they can afford. Now if you find out you're living a lifestyle you cannot afford because the things you want are too much, too expensive, or you're going into credit card debt because you're using credit cards to supplement Your lifestyle, in addition, supplement your income. The fir. That's a great position to be in. To realize, okay, I need to. Maybe to your point of earlier, I might need to negotiate for more salary because. Or find a new job or I need to find a way to earn more.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yeah.

[Priya Malani]

But at least you now know you're not blindly living a lifestyle you can't afford. You have to take. To take ownership. You have to take radical responsibility.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

You had a recent episode on this just this week, the real reason you feel behind even with a $200,000 salary. I remember the first time I crossed into the six figure territory, income wise. I was like in my late 20s, I think, and I. First thing I did, and I will be very honest about this, given that I think you'll find. You think you'll laugh because I. I was a financial reporter. I had actually written a book about money. And so I was like, I knew what to do. But my instinct when I started to make more money was, I want to buy those Marc Jacobs shoes at Barney's. I want. I thought about wardrobe first thing. I didn't think about how do I invest more. I didn't think about how much more to put towards experiences or meaningful things. I was like, I want to dress better because I actually had a college professor. It was. I think it was a chapter four of you're so Money is called Rich people dress good. He was from Texas, and I always laughed at that. But I was like, when I get to be a rich person. And I thought, a hundred thousand dollars. I'm rich. Yeah, I'm rich. I'm gonna dress good. No more TJ Maxx. Anyway, it happens to the best of us. Tell me about why today, though, someone making six figures feels behind. I mean, I can guess, right? They might have one student loan that they still are paying off, and that'll crush it. That's it.

[Priya Malani]

Our average client has about 80,000 in student loans.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

What? Come on.

[Priya Malani]

50,000 more than the national average.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yes.

[Priya Malani]

Student loans are for real. And that's. That's definitely a big pain point. I'll point to a couple other things. You're talking about lifestyle creep, where you're lifestyle inflation. Right. Your income, and you're living paycheck to paycheck. Your income goes up, and then you're still living paycheck to paycheck.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Yeah. What happened?

[Priya Malani]

Oh, it's so difficult in this era of social media where we're looking at what everyone else is doing all the time. It is so difficult to get out of our own way. But that's why it becomes even more important for Anoosh to think about what you want to be doing a year from now, two years from now. Instead of acting out of impulse, acting more in a more thoughtful and planned and intentional manner saying okay, I want to upgrade my travel. We have one client I like to talk about that they decided in their financial, financial plan they were like, you know what? Every trip over three hours we want to be able to upgrade to first class. If the flight's over three hours, we're upgrading. But they intentionally made that decision. We were able to plan for it and now anytime they take a trip, they can do that with intention and not fall victim to over. Yeah, it's a really cool. It's a nice way to explain how tangible financial planning can be because we are all about lifestyle. You shouldn't have to compromise your lifestyle today to plan for the future. And that's another reason why you're 30s are the most critical, most fun part is because you still have time on your side and you can course correct and it's a great, it's a great time to do that. Another thing that I often cite is going back to our parents and I see this in particular with children of immigrants. I often find that they are saving for the sake of saving. They are over saving. And so their lifestyle today feels actually excessively crunched, more crunched than it needs to feel feel because they are stashing so much away into a general savings account. They're overfunding their 401ks when you get started. I think that I the immigrant mindset is very much a safer mindset. We've come from another country, we don't know.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Fear, huh?

[Priya Malani]

Yeah, it's fear.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

I always joke. It's not a joke, but it's. The irony is that the families that moved here from another country, my family was like a war torn country. They came here not knowing, took a huge risk like, like talk about defying fear. But then once they got here and planted their feet on US soil, they were like wow, that was crazy what we just did. Let's try to live as simple and as stable a life as possible because we that's not sustainable like that. Living in that fear and taking that risk. I don't want to do that every day. So then they start to overcompensate in the savings department and in the rationale department and the anti. Like my parents did not invest because first of all they don't. They didn't have a stock market In Iran, they never grew up with this concept of investing your money, maybe buying real estate, but not like in other companies. And so my parents didn't start investing until they were in their 40s, 50s, and now my dad's still working.

[Priya Malani]

That's what they wanted to do that.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Was safe for them. They're like, a job is safer. I know I can always work. I can't always get my money back in the stock market, which was not a. That doesn't really makes sense.

[Priya Malani]

But okay, yeah, that's going back to that mindset. That Wall street narrative of investing is more like gambling, which feels very risky. And that's not the way true investing is. But they impressed on upon you to be a saver, to be, to be smart with your money. And we often find that these high earners are actually stashing away way more than they need to. And what happens when you put so much into your 401k more than you actually need to is you lose. Let leverage you completely complete leverage for your lifestyle today. And also goals that you want to accomplish before you hit 59 and a half.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

I will also say that I don't know if it's an immigrant thing or just a generational thing, that I value my time a lot more than my parents insofar as my dad will spend hours trying to save a hundred dollars on something or my mom will take a whole afternoon to go return something. Whereas if I buy something and I don't want anymore, I might give it to someone, I might donate it. If I'm gonna go to the mall, I'll return. Like, I hate returning things. I will if it was expensive. But if it was like a twenty dollar something, oh, I'll, I'll just sit with it. I'll be like, my bad, I bought something that I shouldn't have because then I gotta take time out of my day and go to the thing and it's like my parents don't even understand, like someone else doing your laundry or, or like dry cleaning for dry cleaning. Like just don't buy it if it needs dry cleaning. That's their men. So anyway, just another anecdote to support your brilliance.

[Priya Malani]

Absolutely.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

All right, tell us where we can find this podcast and also how we can work with your team at Stash wealth. Because I think you're speaking our love language here, Priya, of like how to manage our money without sacrifice, without compromise.

[Priya Malani]

So the F word is on Spotify and Apple and everywhere you can get your podcasts. And we, we publish on Thursdays So new episode launches every Thursday. And like I said, they're super short and sweet. Just a little bit size tip that is actionable and easy to implement. That's the name of the game as far as we're concerned. And then far nouge for your listeners, we've put together a special, special spot for them to go get a bunch of free resources that we've created. So if you go to stashwealth.com so money you'll find a whole bunch of resources, free tools, videos. We created recently a bunch of guides. Okay. These are really awesome. So for people who are interested in buying a home, that is a very tricky thing to navigate as a first time home buy. So we've put together a really comprehensive home buying guide and the other one that I love is the Planning for Parenthood. It's an awesome guide, but it also includes a really great detailed calculator to know if you can actually afford a kid, how it's going to change.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Oh my God. Yeah.

[Priya Malani]

So before you jump right into it, maybe you take some time on the baby calculator and take a look at how it's going to adjust, how it's going to, what kind of adjustment.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

There's no, no maximum for how much you can spend as a parent. There's just always things to buy and spend and the market is very good at convincing you you need all of it. And your kids are very good at convincing you you need all of it.

[Priya Malani]

I'm an aunt. I got two little nieces and somehow their existence has totally changed how much I'm spending. If mom won't say yes, you know Priya, Wow.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Good, lucky nieces. They've got option. Priya Milani, thank you so much. I'm so glad we got to have you back on. We roped you back on. You're the best. Thank you.

[Priya Malani]

Thanks, Parish.

[Farnoosh Torabi]

Thanks so much to Priya Milani for joining us. Go to stashwealth.com Sew money for all those incredible guides. I'll see you back here on Wednesday. And I hope your day is so money.

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[Maya and Sim]

Hey, it's Maya and Sim from the Girls that Invest podcast. If you are an IT or security pro, you know managing devices, identities and applications can feel overwhelming and honestly, risky. That's where Trelica by1Password comes in. It helps conquer SaaS, brawl and shadow it by discovering every app your team uses, managed or not. With pre built app profiles, you can assess risk, manage access, and even optimize your software spend. Plus, IT simplifies onboarding, offboarding and compliance, all while cutting costs by eliminating unused licenses. Take the first step to better security for your team. Learn [e-mail] special offer.