← The Stacking Benjamins Show
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- [00:00]
Joe Saul-Sehy
This episode is brought to you by Navy Federal Credit Union. Navy Federal can help you find and finance the right vehicle with ease. With Navy Federal's car buying service powered by Truecar, you can find the vehicle that's right for you as you search through inventory, compare models and you could get an amazing rate when you finance with Navy federal. Visit navy federal.org truecar to learn more. Navy Federal Credit Union Our members are the mission. Navy Federal is insured by NCUA Credit and collateral subject to approval. If you went on a road trip and you didn't stop for a Big Mac or drop a crispy fry between the car seats or use your McDonald's bag as a placemat, then that wasn't a road trip. It was just a really long drive.
- [00:44]
OG
At participating McDonald's.
- [00:46]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Hey stackers. One of my favorite reasons, and there's so many reasons why I love Greatest Hits week, is that I, ahead of time, get to share with you what to look for in these episodes and why we actually are calling it a greatest it. So the primary interview today is with a gentleman named Ken Honda. And Ken has this philosophy called Happy Money. And here's how happy money affected me when I first read about it. And then I got to interview Ken. I not only had this amazing interview with him, but later that day I was chatting with my friend Paula Pant from Afford Anything and I went on for over an hour about why, in my opinion, this is all the best parts of the fire movement without what I see as the nasty downside. And it was a great conversation. And I've had so many conversations around this idea of happy money and why this philosophy works for me. So you're probably wondering a maybe, what is the fire movement? Well, that's financial independence. Retire early, people trying to be financially independent as quickly as possible and maybe retire as soon as they can. And what I when when I don't like the fire movement. And generally, of course, I believe financial independence is great when we get it earlier, but I don't like it when it's takey. How do I make more for me? How do I get more for me? How do I, you know, not tip people as much? How do I cheapen stuff? It just, it has this ick quality, ugly underbelly. And when it's not like that, it's fantastic. Because truly it is about us, isn't it? I mean, I feel fantastic when I could help somebody else get ahead and it helps me at the same time. And there truly is no us or them. It's totally us. So when today you hear Ken talk so much about gratitude, this is what I believe is the key to being human and financially independent all wrapped in to one, which is why this resonates with me so much. I found that when I became financially independent, nothing really changed. I didn't feel particularly different when I realized that I was surrounded by people who wouldn't let me fail regardless of my financial situation. That's when I truly felt like I, quote, made it to happy ever after. Isn't it funny? Interdependence felt better than independence. I still want financial independence. I want to pull my own way. I want to be able to do what I want to do. But the interdependence, when I knew that I was surrounded by wonderful people that I was going to help and those people that were going to help me truly, truly changed my life. And I'm not naturally a joiner or the world's most popular guy at parties. So this, this really was a surprise that it felt so great. I still feel, I feel a ton of gratitude for those people who are willing to help me. Also on this episode we talk about HSA changes. That's a health Savings account for our newbie stackers out there. We're going to mention some specific numbers that were right at the time. Those are no longer relevant. Here's the new number stackers you can contribute if you are doing self only coverage. Your contribution limit is $4,300 in 2025. That's up from $4,150 last year. Family coverage went up from 8,320 24 to 8,550. And by the way, if you're age 55 or older, good news, you can contribute an additional thousand as a catch up contribution. So the numbers have changed. I just gave you the nuance, but that's not really why I wanted to keep this as part of the episode. It was part of the original episode but I wanted to keep it anyway. It's how an HSA can help you win with money. And if you're new to financial topics, Health Savings account can really be helpful if you're eligible. And how do you know if you're eligible? Well, you'll either have one available through work and your HR people can tell you or your HR documents can tell you. Or if you have a high deductible plan on your own, check and see if it's HSA eligible. It will tell you. Your provider will know if you don't have one. No worries. You can easily get there without it. But if you do, I'd recommend taking advantage of it. And I love that part of the episode that we're going to dive into. We detail, by the way, HSAs in our guides. Prices go up on our guides, both the Tax Time guide and the Employee Benefits guide on August 1st. So because you're a member of this community, we want to give everybody a month to buy it at current prices. So if you're listening now, you've got one month to get the guides. A little bit less than a month. You buy them once, we update them every month so you never have to buy another one as long as we keep making ours. Stacking benjamins.com guides and man, if you know somebody who's bought one, you know how valuable those can be. Finally, there's this great discussion about the new at the time settlement changes that were coming to real estate commissions. If you remember, there was this huge settlement and so the way real estate professionals were paid was supposedly going to change immensely and it was going to change everything. Have we truly seen much change in the way people buy houses, the way people pay commissions? I'd love to get your take now, especially if you're into real estate. We give our feelings at the time on this episode and it's neat to hear what we thought at the time. It's also interesting to see how little that seems to have changed things or or has it and I just don't know. We also talk about commissions that real estate pros receive. We got some pushback. I remember at the time from real estate pros that we didn't understand why they got paid so much. Well, if you actually listen, we were talking about this weird investor tre where the same people who complain about mutual fund fees seem completely numb to much higher fees on a real estate transaction. Doesn't mean real estate pros that you're not worth it. I just think there's this weird blind spot that people have that can be so picky about fees on one side and then quickly sign a real estate document which agrees to lots of fees on the other side. But that said, has the settlement changed those fees very much? Love your take. So those are some of the highlights I'd love for you to point to. How does happy money work for you as a philosophy? Are using an HSA if one's available and have real estate transaction rule changes change the game at all in your estimation. So either go to stackingbenjamins.com voicemail, leave a note for us for the show or share it in our community, it's the Stacking Benjamin's Facebook group where we help each other work through money's tough spot. Stacking benjamin.com basement we'll get you the link to our wonderful community of stackers helping stackers. All right. Those are the reasons why I chose today's show. And with that, enjoy today's greatest hit.
- [08:14]
OG
Hey, this is Jen Pilcher, Navy Spouse of 23 years. And when I'm not helping military spouses.
- [08:20]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Connect in our digital community, I'm stacking Benjamins.
- [08:30]
Doug
Live from Joe mom's basement, it's the Stacking Benjamin show. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug. And on today's show, let's meet the Marie Kondo of personal finance, best selling author Ken Honda. Plus, it's Cats up day. I don't know what a sup is, but I got a cat that might come into play. Huh? Anyway, in our headline segment, while everyone obsesses over fund and advisor fees, the justice department is obsessed about another fee, hidden realtor commissions. We'll also throw out the Haven lifeline to a lucky listener and save time for my Cats up flavored trivia. And now two guys who are celebrating that apparently it's also moonshine day. It's Joe and. Oh, J, J, J.
- [09:32]
Joe Saul-Sehy
No moonshine for me because it is Wednesday. Hey there, everybody. Welcome to the party in the basement. I'm Joe Saul Sehi. Average Joe Money on Twitter. Just so you know who's who. And here's the guy who's not the fake OG on Twitter. He is the real OG who is the original character that Tracy Morgan portrays on his.
- [09:54]
OG
That's right.
- [09:54]
Joe Saul-Sehy
I never knew you were from Brooklyn and now we're in the penal system.
- [09:58]
OG
Yeah, well, I thought it was a pretty fair representation that the writers took some liberties with the backstory, but that's okay.
- [10:05]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah, but you and Tracy Morgan have the same basic life attitude.
- [10:08]
OG
We sure do.
- [10:09]
Joe Saul-Sehy
That guy's so funny. Isn't he? Hilarious. Yeah, he is. He is such a great comedian. No comedy on today's show, though.
- [10:16]
OG
Oh, straight lace. Got it.
- [10:18]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Very straight lace. Because Ken Honda's here. Man, I have to tell you, this philosophy of Ken's, the happy money philosophy is I am down with this. I am totally. Our good friend, our mutual friend, Paula Pant and I had like a two hour conversation about Ken and about this philosophy that we're going to talk about with him today. Happy money.
- [10:38]
OG
Happy money.
- [10:39]
Joe Saul-Sehy
On today's show, we got Ken Honda waiting for us. But first we've got a little headline about the Justice Department OG so let's get rolling.
- [10:48]
OG
Hello, darlings. And now it's time for your favorite part of the show, our Stacking Benjamin's Headlines.
- [10:54]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Our first deadline comes to us from Market Watch. This is written by Andrea Rickwier. Hidden Realtor Commissions could be Next Housing Market Domino to Topple as Government Probes mls. You familiar with the mls?
- [11:11]
OG
Yep.
- [11:11]
Joe Saul-Sehy
The mls.
- [11:13]
OG
Multiple Listing Service.
- [11:15]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Multiple Listing Service. And that's when you put your house on the market. You put it on the mls. You can put your house on the MLS and lots of people see it. Well, let's take a quick look at what Andrea writes. Another potential blow has been struck against the long standing way in which real estate agents get paid. In April, the Department of justice wrote to CoreLogic, a real estate software provider demanding the company turnover information on how it works with multiple listing services, the locally owned and operated compilations of real estate data. The civil investigative demand concern potential antitrust law violations, justice said, specifically practices that may unreasonably restrain competition in the provision of residential real estate brokerage services in local markets in the United States. Not the first time the Justice Department has taken an interest in how competition gets stifled in the residential real estate market. And the April demand joins another high profile legal case, a lawsuit filed in March which charges that real estate brokerages and their industry group conspire to keep agent commissions artificially high.
- [12:22]
OG
Yeah, I would too, when I'm getting 6% of a $700,000 house sale.
- [12:29]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Is there any new news here? In the American way of transacting, real estate, buyers never have any reason to demand a higher level of service or a lower fee from their own broker since the seller is essentially paying the tab for both sides. And often when sellers try to offer fees lower than the 3% that's standard across most of the country, brokers tend to steer buyer clients away from those listings, even if the house was a good fit.
- [12:55]
OG
Hmm. I wonder if you could use the word broker for any other financial transaction that one does throughout one's life other than real estate, like. Oh, like stock broker or financial broker insurance. So basically there's people out there that will not do what's in your best interest because their incentives don't match up with yours.
- [13:17]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Well, and you see people that try to get lower fees in this particular market. And it's so frustrating because I've had friends have this happen. They put their house up for sale by owner and the house doesn't move. And it's a gorgeous House. All they're trying to do is save a few thousand bucks on, on realtor fees.
- [13:34]
OG
A few thousand? No, it's. It's tens of thousands. I mean, a few thousand would be. No, seriously, a few thousand would be. If you're selling $100,000 house, right? That's a few thousand. You sell a $200,000 house down $10,000. That's more than a few 12. Yeah. And so if you're at like, I don't know what the average house price is these days, but if you're selling a 450,000, $500,000 McMansion, dude, that's 30 grand, man.
- [14:02]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Somebody talking about their half million dollar house in San Francisco online the other day. Half.
- [14:09]
OG
It's like a cardboard box set up.
- [14:12]
Joe Saul-Sehy
In an office parking lot.
- [14:13]
OG
That's an alley.
- [14:14]
Joe Saul-Sehy
That's a $30,000 commission.
- [14:17]
OG
But to be fair, it's really funny because I've had these discussions with realtors and no offense to realtors, everybody's got to make money. I get it. But it seems like there's some diminishing return there. I mean, even in the financial planning space, you might charge 1%, but you don't charge 1% on 10 million. It starts to edge down pretty quickly once you get past this initial number, whatever your personal firm's number is, so to speak. And it doesn't seem like that happens as much in the realtor space. It's like, so if I sold a $3 million house, commission still 6%. It's like, isn't there some sort of cap break point? Yeah, like some kind of discount.
- [14:58]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Right. Now, even in the mutual fund industry, if you pay an upfront commission on your funds, if you buy X amount of American funds all at once, a good fund company, but one that traditionally has a commission attached, you will pay less money if you invest more money. And it doesn't even have to all go in the same fund.
- [15:16]
OG
You can put it, or at the same time, you can promise to do it in advance over a certain period of time. You can say, I'm going to give you this. I'm going to invest this amount of money over this period of time. And they'll aggregate that total amount, even hypothetically, and say, well, because of that, we're going to lower $1 of your costs.
- [15:35]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And we still hate on that. And yet there's crickets when we talk about this real estate game. But I love the way this is set up. I mean, imagine if there were commissions on funds, but the person trying to get out paid the entire commission for the buyer. Pay the commission for the buyer and the seller. It would be the same thing. Like the seller has to get out. They pay nothing to get in. So they're like, I mean, this is basic human motivation. Oh, I can get him for free. Cool. Oh, I got to pay a big fee later. Well, but that's not until I sell later. That's later. I'm not worried about it cost me nothing now. So I go ahead and I get in and then I pay that. I paid this monster commission to cover the person buying my shares and paying to get out my, my own commission on both sides. There would be, there would seriously be a lot less grumbling about fees.
- [16:27]
OG
Yeah. And could you imagine if there was also the back ended nature of like, well, Jack selling his house at 4% commission instead of 6? So right now, as a now I'm not going to show you that mutual fund.
- [16:39]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Right.
- [16:39]
OG
I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna tell you about that mutual fund because that one, Merrill is good.
- [16:43]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Merrill lynch is steering every, all their clients away from that trade. Or they set up like an exchange that doesn't include any of those trades. Like, hey, you can sell it to your buddy Bob for that if you want. But if you want to sell it on the exchange. Yeah.
- [16:58]
OG
You want to be one of the cool kids.
- [17:00]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah.
- [17:01]
OG
Painful boat.
- [17:02]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah, it's, it's phenomenal how that, that just setting it up the correct way, kids, is how you make a ton of money and not have people complain about it. That is the key to the whole thing. I'll link to this on our show notes page. It's Stacking Benjamin Stockham. And by the way, we obviously can't solve the real estate commission issue today, but this brings up a bunch of conundrums. OG Number one, work with a realtor or not work with a realtor. I'm all for working with a realtor. I mean, hey, I want my house to get sold. If I'm somebody who's, who's selling a property and I, I've got to move, I'm going to bite the bullet and get in that system. Because outside that system is ugly. They do have some expertise that I don't know about. I know I'm going to pay through the nose for it, but if I find a good realtor, I mean, when I was in Texas and we were moving to Michigan, our house sold in two days. And it sold for reasons I would not have done on my own. We overpaid like Hell, to get our house sold. But I didn't have to worry about it.
- [17:58]
Ken Honda
It was.
- [17:59]
Joe Saul-Sehy
It was done. It was done right. Done the first time, all the I's dotted, t's crossed, I'm out of there.
- [18:04]
OG
And you paid out the nose for it.
- [18:06]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And I paid out the nose for it. And I'm still happy. I'm still alive. The other issue here is negotiating fees with your Realtor. I mean, historically, I always thought that was the way to do it. Right. My. My Realtor and I did some negotiation. Once again, I had a time frame, and so I didn't negotiate as heavily as I probably could have. Plus, as we'll hear with Ken Honda, I have kind of a personal philosophy on that. Maybe we can talk about it later. But I negotiated the amount of time more than the fee. I know that if my hot investment house doesn't sell in the first few days, the Realtor is going to ignore it until a few days before it's time to re up. Right. So I negotiated the amount of time, like, no, no, no. You're not getting it for six months. You are not getting it for six months.
- [18:54]
OG
Mm.
- [18:54]
Joe Saul-Sehy
You're gonna get it for three. And she said, that's not enough time. And I said, either you got it for three or you don't have it. And she told me all the reasons it wasn't enough time. And I said, well, do you want it? And she goes. She goes, yeah, I'll take it.
- [19:11]
OG
Yep. And then it was sold in two days.
- [19:12]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And it was sold in two days. Yes.
- [19:14]
OG
So apparently, you were you overshot by two months and 28 days.
- [19:20]
Joe Saul-Sehy
I will pay you all the money that you ask for, but I want the ability to fire you very soon if it doesn't sell, because I know about how atrophy works in that market.
- [19:30]
OG
Yeah, you get to pick. I mean, this is no different than any other sort of negotiation, right? You can pick the money or you can pick the terms. Which one of those two do you want? I want the money, Then I get the terms. Yeah, if you want the terms, then I get to pick the money.
- [19:43]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah. Yeah. And I had three people use our realtor very successfully because I recommended them afterwards. So she ended up winning big. You know, she got what she wanted, I got what I wanted. Our second headline comes to us from Financial Planning. This is good news if you have an HSA available. Oh, gee. Do you see this? From the IRS? Clients can save more into HSAs next year. This is written by Catherine Mayer, but it's obviously available Everywhere clients are going to be able to sock away some extra money into their health savings accounts. The annual limit on deductible contributions to an HSA will jump by 50 bucks for individuals and a hundred dollars for families next year. I still think when I look at HSAs, Roth IRAs, traditional IRAs, I think HSAs are our number one more than ever. I'm thinking you save their first OG because it's in tax free. Like fill this up before you fill up your Roth ira. I don't know. I get your opinion on this because it goes in tax free, it comes out tax free. So where the Roth gives you one end of the stick, the traditional gives you the other, this potentially gives you both.
- [20:51]
OG
Yeah, I think so. Except for the fact that just the mental image of what that account is for has people use it a little bit more frequently. You know, when you look at your Roth ira, you don't think, I could use this for a broken arm? Although technically you certainly could, right?
- [21:08]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah.
- [21:08]
OG
But you look at your HSA and you go, boy, I had a lot out of pockets this year. HSA works really, really, really fantastically. If you can also then cover the out of pocket costs. If you can do both, then you know, the HSA works great. If all you're doing is filling it up and emptying it out on an annual basis, whatever your out of pocket is, that's what you should put in there. But for a long term savings vehicle, it works really great. If you can, if you can do both of those things.
- [21:36]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah, I know it's hard, but if you can, and this is the part of the strategy most people don't realize, is that you can keep those receipts forever and declare them 25 years from now using interest on the money that you made, which I think Kochi is your point that. So where a lot of people use an HSA the wrong way, they'll just cover these deductibles. I know it's very difficult, but if you can come up with somehow enough money to cover that out of pocket expense somewhere else and hold onto that money is tax free for a longer period of time, your interest could potentially pay these bills down the road. That'll save you a bunch of money. If you can just make that work.
- [22:20]
OG
If you can do both. Yeah, yeah.
- [22:21]
Joe Saul-Sehy
I think our takeaways here OG is hsas. If you can swing it, max that thing out. Especially if you can leave the money there long term. When it comes to hidden realtor fees, I don't know G that there's much that we can do about it. I think just being aware of what you're paying, and maybe the big takeaway is what you said about negotiating those. The term or the fee, you get to decide. One of them. Coming down to the basement is a guy that I've been super excited to talk to, this gentleman, Ken Honda, is Japan's number one best selling personal development guru. And he is a guy who, if you've ever studied eastern philosophy, is a master at the eastern philosophy of money. His new book out is called Happy Money and it goes over that. Getting rich quick is no way to achieve happiness. And of course, money, for a lot of us out there in the audience, it causes fear, it causes stress, it causes anger, it breaks apart relationships, marriages, ruins people's lives. Obviously, money's just a piece of paper, but oh, gee, we bring a lot of emotion to the table. And that's what Ken talks about is emotionally, how do you handle money? This, this philosophy? Well, let's let you hear about it from the man himself, Ken Honda. Coming down to the basement and coming down the stairs to the basement. I'm so happy he's here with us. Ken Honda is here. How are you, man?
- [24:12]
Ken Honda
Great, thank you. I'm so excited to be on your show. I listened to your show and it's so fun and entertaining and I'm sure you're uplifting a lot of people with the topic of money.
- [24:22]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Well, just remember, if anybody learns anything can, they have to keep it to themselves. So just remember that. I want to start with your early days with money. Tell me if I'm wrong, but I think that you studied everything you could get your hands on about finance in the early days. What types of people did you meet as you were studying? As many people as possible.
- [24:44]
Ken Honda
I had a very unique childhood. My father is a very successful accountant and he wanted me to be very successful at very young age. So he started teaching me everything about money, about the mindset and also the money IQ part, which is taxes and how to make sales and how to keep customers. So he used to take me to the shopping mall nearby and he just asked me to point out which shop makes the biggest sale and profit. And at the time, you know, the fish market, you know, it's very busy, so I thought fish market. And then he said wrong. You know, a lot of people buy fish, but it's cheap, so they have to work so hard. And right next to it is a mattress store, and right next to it is a real estate agent. And then if you sell one House you can live on for like a month or two. But if you. Even if you sell one fish, you could probably get a soda or something. So he taught me about the essence of business. So I was a very financially savvy, acute child.
- [25:49]
Joe Saul-Sehy
But you met all kinds of different people. And it seems like. And in fact, I want to actually quote you from your book, because I love this quote. You say, I'm going to share a little something with you. It doesn't matter how much you have or make. It's your feelings about money that determine your wealth. Explain that to me.
- [26:09]
Ken Honda
Yes. So my father used to take his clients home. So I had a chance to meet them. And I realized that there are two kinds of people around money, happy people and not happy people. And it's not how much you have or how much you make. It's about how they deal with money. If they're doing what they love, and happy customers, happy employees, and they are in heaven. Whereas, even though if you make a lot of money, if you're struggling, trying to take advantage of customers or all these other people, you're very miserable. And I could tell that as a child, because child sees things through. And I realized, oh, I don't want to be wealthy, but very unhappy.
- [26:55]
Joe Saul-Sehy
It's funny that you say that, because I know so many frustrated people that have a lot of money, and you wonder what they have to be frustrated about. But you point out that we all have the same fears. Like, people with lots of money have fears. People middle income have fears. It doesn't matter how much money you have. The mindset then is everything.
- [27:15]
Ken Honda
And later I found that there are two kinds of happy people. Happy people with money and happy people without money. If I could choose, I'd rather be happy people with money. That's how I sort of started my journey, with money.
- [27:31]
Joe Saul-Sehy
You tell a story at the beginning of your book about a woman going through your wallet, and she's. She's looking at the different bills and talking about them. Can you tell that story?
- [27:42]
Ken Honda
I was approached by this mysterious woman. She asked me if she could take a look at my wallet. And at the time, Japanese people, very curious about wealthy people and celebrities and what kind of wallet they use. You know, you want to kind of see what kind of wallet Justin Bieber has. And that's the Japanese people think. So I said, pretty people, trustworthy at the party. So, okay, you can just take a look, but make sure that you give it back to me. And she was just checking my bills. She took all the bills Out. And she was doing something, and she said, this is good. This is great, or this is nice. And then she put back all the bills and give my wallet back to me. And she said, ken, all your money is good. And I asked her what's good about it, and she said, your money is smiling. That shows you make people happy and receive money. On the other hand, if people are trying to take advantage of other people, or if people do what they don't like and receive money, your money is crying in your wallet, sometimes angry. And I was like, wow, that is interesting. And that's the first time I started to see money as energy.
- [28:54]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And that's funny because you say that in the book, that there's, you know, money, when it comes down to it. And I love this analogy, is just a. I mean, it's. It's either a piece of paper or maybe it's an electronic thing that we have, you know, attached to our phone or whatever it might be. And yet everything around money is emotions. There's this whole emotional component. In fact, I think. Can you call it emotional garbage?
- [29:16]
Ken Honda
Right? Yes. And later I found out, as I studied about money, the people who are so genius but who lose everything sometimes, you know, hear all those stories. And I found out they're financially savvy and intelligent, but they're so messed up emotionally. So unless you heal these wounds that everybody has from childhood, we are weird with money. You know, we tend to be fearful of money. We want to take control of money, and it's because we see money as security, money as freedom. We see all kinds of things around money, but money is neutral. So unless we deal with what I have about money, we cannot be free and peaceful. That's what I found out, and that's what I've been teaching hundreds of thousands of Japanese people. And I have them become financially free, both emotionally and financially.
- [30:11]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Well, and obviously, in the seven minutes that I have left with you, we're not going to be able to make people completely free. But. But where do people start then, Ken, if you want your money to be happy money, where do we begin?
- [30:24]
Ken Honda
Joe, that's a beautiful question. I asked the same question to my mentor, who is Wahei Takeda, who's called Warren Buffett of Japan. He's one of the wealthiest Japanese person, investor, and also great businessman, very generous man. He said, when the money comes in, say, arigato your money, and the money goes out. Also arigato your money. In other words, arigato in, arigato out. So when you receive money Just say thank you. And when you spend money, also say thank you. Because we are doing the opposite thing. When we receive money, we're so frustrated. Why this amount? I'm so upset. Some people must be taking advantage of me. And when we spend it, we do that with guilt and also resentment. Oh, I don't want to pay taxes, I don't want to pay electric bills and all these things. So instead of frustration, deal with money in gratitude. And once you deal with gratitude, a lot of interesting things happens. One, you will probably stop worrying about money because wahe said you cannot focus on money. Gratitude and money worry at the same time. It's how human mind functions. So if you keep appreciating money coming in, money going out, you have fun with money. And if you forget, after a few days you realize that, oh, I forgot to worry about money.
- [31:56]
Joe Saul-Sehy
So it really is then. I mean, what I'm hearing from you, Ken, is it's about self talk. It sounds like I'm doing very positive self talk with myself about my money.
- [32:05]
Ken Honda
Yes, it's so true. Because when think about it, you know, there could be so many accountants, dry cleaners, and out of all those people, they hired you. And that's amazing that they chose you to give their precious money to. So you can say thank you. Thank you for the money. You're giving it to me. So you appreciate your clients and bosses more. And I had a student of mine who was a secretary who realized this and then she started appreciating to her boss about the job she's given. And a few weeks later she got her big raise. So if you appreciate people appreciate back to you. And that's a human nature. So if you keep start appreciating, a lot of great things happen. And it's not a spiritual thing, it's. It's a very psychological thing and it happens so easily.
- [32:55]
Joe Saul-Sehy
You mentioned this quite a bit. It's the law of attraction.
- [32:58]
Ken Honda
Yes. And also you have to take a look at other things in a totally different way. For example, debt. A lot of people worry about debt, they feel burdened about debt. But debt is something that people trusted you. So debt is a symbol of love and trust. When you think about it that way, you know, a stranger, banks, whoever, your friends, they trusted you that you're going to pay back the loan. So instead of feeling burdened, you can feel trust. Ah, I didn't know I have that much trust. So if you just transform your relationship with money, you feel much, much lighter. So instead of feeling the burden of that Just feel the joy of trust. You're being trusted by banks, and interest is a way of appreciating them. So if you just transform your ideas about money, you'll be happier and you end up making more money, receiving money, and you find yourself in the cycle of happy money.
- [33:55]
Joe Saul-Sehy
There's a lot of us who would like to be trusted by banks a heck of a lot less, though. Ken.
- [33:59]
Ken Honda
Yeah. You're talking about credit card score, right?
- [34:02]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yes.
- [34:02]
Ken Honda
And it's the same thing. It's a trust. And instead of feeling like miserable and frustration, you just keep your trust higher. That's what what Had Told taught us. You have to be trustworthy to be successful in business. And it's exactly the same thing. If you do what, what you're right. You know what you're supposed to do, your credit card goes sky high.
- [34:24]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah, absolutely. I want to ask you, by the way, about your mentor. I want to. I want to take just a second for this. You tell some stories about him. He owned a candy company.
- [34:34]
Ken Honda
Yes. And he's like in Nagoya, where Toyota is. He's like a Charlie and chocolate factory guy. He built a huge castle for sweets because he made fortune by selling cookies for kids. So in return, he wanted to do some great favors. So he built this sweet castle and invited all the children to enjoy cooking and learning about how to make sweets. And he always carried gold coins in his pockets. So whenever he finds a beautiful smile, he gives this real genuine gold coin to the best smile of the day. And that's what. That was his fun. And he said, I'm buying his or her lifetime of smile. It's a great shopping. That's who he was. He passed away three years ago.
- [35:22]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Did he really? He just sounds like. Well, you say in the book he's the happiest man you ever met.
- [35:28]
Ken Honda
Yes. He's the most generous. And I learned so much about generosity and also how he gets so lucky in investment in his life. And I've learned so much. But his answers are very Zen. So he doesn't answer me back right when I say which company should I invest? And he says, you have to see the companies through your heart. If the company is making people happy, you should invest in the company. And I asked him, how do I do that? You have to have a beautiful heart to be able to figure out the other ones. So his teaching is very dense, but I really enjoyed it. So I'm going to probably write another book on that.
- [36:12]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And what book number would that be? Because you've written many, many Books already?
- [36:16]
Ken Honda
Yeah. I've written more than 50 books and sold about almost 8 million copies in Japan. And I'm leaving Japan and expanding to 40 different countries. My book is going to be out in about a year.
- [36:30]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Wow.
- [36:30]
Ken Honda
And the first one is coming out very soon in US and UK and Australia at the same time.
- [36:36]
Joe Saul-Sehy
And that's got to be exciting. Also, I want to leave with one big concept that you have in the book and it's financial. You have financial IQ and eq and I think these are really important for our listeners to understand to. To understand your concepts. Can you explain the difference between those two?
- [36:53]
Ken Honda
Financial IQ is something that a lot of teachers and consultants deal. It's about taxes, marketing, how to run business. It's a knowledge side and moneyeq is more of a wisdom side. It's an emotional side. You know, you have to be able to receive well. We are so good at giving, but we are stuck at receiving. And also appreciating is another key we forget to appreciate in our life in general about our money, about the job, about the family members, about the people who work with. And number three is a trust. Trust in money or trust in money flow is the hardest thing in life. And the last one is share. Sharing is the most beautiful thing you can do on this planet. And you don't have to be super wealthy. You can share a dollar with somebody and then that gives you joy and also sends a message to you that you have more than enough. And this feeling of having more than enough gives you so peace, so much peace and security. And so instead of accumulating wealth, you have to find or seek happiness and security and peace in yourself. That's what I teach.
- [38:04]
Joe Saul-Sehy
I absolutely love that concept completely because I don't know, especially in the financial field, as you know, Ken, so many people are chasing something and they're never going to find it. They will never.
- [38:15]
Ken Honda
So true.
- [38:15]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Yeah.
- [38:16]
Ken Honda
Yes.
- [38:17]
Joe Saul-Sehy
I want to ask you one more thing. There is a craze which is going across the United States right now. This force of nature called Marie Kondo. I read your book and I'm reading Marie. I feel like I'm reading Marie Kondo for money. Do you. And I've heard, I've heard other people say that. Do you appreciate that, that comparison or not?
- [38:37]
Ken Honda
I really respect her work. Actually. She publishes from the same publisher with me. Yeah, I have a lot of mutual friends and she does incredibly beautiful work. And I actually do you know, Marie Kondo in my main office and my home. And I do have a very similar view on money. So it's like a sparkling joy. If you feel like you should feel you should spend the money out of joy, that's good. That's happy money. And if you like, ooh, I don't want to do that, or you know, grab money, I call it yucky money. So it's more like a heart based way of living. So I think our teachings are very similar.
- [39:18]
Joe Saul-Sehy
It read very similar and I ate it up, every page. The book is called Happy the Japanese Art of Making Peace with your Money and it's everywhere. Ken.
- [39:28]
Ken Honda
Yeah, it'll be at a major airport in June and July and then probably after that and all over. US, Canada, UK, Australia and other 40 countries coming along.
- [39:40]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Well, thank you for spending a few minutes with us on Stacky Benjamins and talking about making your money happy or making you happy.
- [39:47]
Ken Honda
Thank you so much, Joe. It's been a privilege and this is a lot of fun. So thank you so much.
- [39:57]
Doug
Hey there trivia fans. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug, and Cats update doesn't quite make too much sense to me. I mean, longtime listeners know just how much I love cats and I've been sitting here telling Joe's mom's cat Cooper all day, sup dude? And he just sits there looking at me, flipping me off. So I am here to tell you this is a horrible ill conceived holiday. Instead, looking at my calendar, I think it's better to focus on us on National Moonshine Day. Now look, I've mooned many people in my time and come to think of it, those festivities might be a little meta because moonshine provoked some moonshine, if you know what I mean. So how about this trivia? While USA listeners are familiar with moonshine in relation to fast cars, illegal speakeasies and the 1930s, the term moonshine was originally conceived in a different country. Which one? I'll be back with the answer just after I see what Joe's mom's cooking. Hey there money podcast lovers. I'm Joe's mom's neighbor Doug, and here on Moonshine and Cats Up Day. I actually remember that after a fairly significant at Moonshine evening, the cat and I, we did have a chat. He wasn't really into cats Up. He could tell a mean joke about these guys in the outhouse. It was just blue and a little off color, but oh my God, it was funny. But oh, my head still hurts thinking about that night. Hey, here's something serious though. Today's trivia answer the question was this while you while USA Based listeners might think of a still out behind the house creating moonshine in the countryside. The term moonshine was actually created in another country where. Well, here you go. The term moonshine dates back to the 18th century of England, where it was used to refer to spirits illegally distilled or smuggled into England. Also known as moonlight in the 19th century, moonshine shine has a long history of creating awkward moments in places other than your family picnic. Good news, huh?
- [42:15]
Joe Saul-Sehy
See ya. Big thanks to Ken Honda. I love this idea that money won't make you happy. Don't get me wrong. More money gives you lots of opportunity, but if you're an unhappy person, more money will make you an unhappy person with more money.
- [42:37]
OG
That's right. Yeah.
- [42:38]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Just great stuff. I also really love. And we didn't have much. We didn't have enough time to really get into that. I like the idea of losing a little bit of money in your negotiations, like leaving some on the table, because your life is about relationships, and if people like working with you and they want to work with you and they feel like it's profitable working with you, you will always have opportunities presented to you by those people.
- [43:06]
OG
Right? Well, I take this approach when it comes to people working for me. And I don't mean, like staff, like assistants or something. I mean, like, when I go to hire somebody to do a project, we had somebody come and paint a bedroom, or we had somebody install an appliance in our house. They had to kind of build out a shelf for it or whatever, a construction person. And I could tell the moment. So this guy comes in, we tell him what we want to do, and he's like, okay, yeah. And he's kind of thinking. And I know what's going through his head. He's thinking, okay, what number could I tell him that's respectful enough for my time? Because this is a pretty easy project, but it's respectful enough for my time that I make a few bucks, but gives me enough wiggle room. So when he barters with me, I can come down a little bit. And I'm still. Don't. You know what I mean? Like, I could tell he was, you know, he's like, all right, So I think, you know, I could do. So let's.
- [44:02]
Joe Saul-Sehy
Do.
- [44:02]
OG
Let's.
- [44:02]
Ken Honda
Let's.
- [44:03]
OG
Let's do 500 for one because I had to do two. He goes, let's do 500 for one. And I guess I could probably do. And I go, cool. So about a thousand for both of them. And he just stopped. He goes, yeah, that would be a thousand for both of them. I said, great, Here's a check for half of it. And he's like, oh, no, that's not necessary. I go, yeah, it is. You're going to set aside some time to get this done. And he's like, well, I'm pretty booked until after Christmas. And I said, no problem. Here you go. Now, some people would think about that and say, oh, dude, do that.
- [44:35]
Joe Saul-Sehy
What were you doing?