The #1 Money Habit That Separates Winners from Losers | Caleb Hammer

25:20Caleb Hammer:I'd rather you stick to the more try and chewed. So I'm okay with Snowball and Avalanche. He says only Snowball. So I disagree with that a little bit. The big one, the one that scares me and they don't seem to move under him. First of all, he goes mutual funds instead of index funds, which is weird. So you're getting like high management fees and stuff like that. It doesn't make sense. And they rarely beat the market if ever. But even still, take that aside. They suggest you can withdraw six to 7 % a year. and just live off of it forever because it averages 10 % a year. But it makes no sense. Like no financial model agrees to that.

25:56Caleb Hammer:4 % has a 95 % chance of completion. Even 4 % is not 100%. 3 % is the only 100%, like 3.5%. So that's a dangerous thing. And the fact, the one thing that does kind of annoy me about them, again, I think more positive than negative by far, but it's that they won't change their opinion on anything, even when proven wrong. I mean, every financial motto has proven that one wrong. And maybe it's because the business is built around it. Maybe it's in that more conservative, like they just can't budge on things and admit they're wrong. So, I mean, that one actually does kind of blow my mind that they stick to that.

26:32Caleb Hammer:It really does. I do also think the richer you get, the less connection to reality you have, no matter how hard you work. Or just the data. I mean, I've been pretty successful these past two years, but now I just try to get into the data of the average American. I mean, I guess it helps that I view the finances of them on a consistent weekly basis. You're not like Bill Gates who doesn't know the price of a money. Exactly. I love that clip, though. We should really play that because that thing still makes me giggle. Have you ever seen it? How much do you think Rice-a-roni would be within a dollar?

27:06Five dollars. Okay, let's... The audience didn't like that. Let's see. Ready? Oh, it's a dollar. Look, what a bargain. I'll take five. I know. I don't want to make fun of him. He's a G. He's done so much, to your point, done so much good stuff for the world, but it's incredible. What does a banana cost? He's like, yeah, like$20,$22. That's crazy.

27:30Caleb Hammer:That's crazy. I couldn't say the exact price, but I would have never said anywhere. That's crazy. No, it's got to be like 75 cents a banana, 50 cents a banana, depending on organic or not. But let's talk about actually, so imagine somebody right now has 100K that they want to invest. How are you telling people to break that down? Like retirement, savings, fund money, et cetera? Yeah, well, I mean, there are some basics that have to be met first. They need a six-month emergency fund before they can invest. High interest debt, pretty much any debt above 8 % that's on a mortgage, any debt above even 6 % that's on a mortgage needs to be killed.

28:07But if those things are met, then we love target date funds.

28:11Caleb Hammer:You're 2060, you're 2030, and you pick near where you're going to retire. starts more aggressive and it just automatically gets more conservative when you get closer to that target date it gets a little too conservative too quick for most people a little too bond heavy but either way it's good for the average person because it'll balance and they're not going to balance themselves um i mean low-cost index funds are great you know especially i mean the trump accounts for the kids they're typically only a few options in there and most of them are like the s &p 500 is actually yeah it's for a reason it's basically the American economy overall.

28:45When I looked at them, they're not better than a traditional 529 plan.

28:51Caleb Hammer:529, you're going to be using that for school stuff, right? But this person can just let it grow and not even think about, okay, what do I have to use this for? So 529, I think, is what makes sense for the average parent if they're thinking about investing in their kid's future. Yeah, that's interesting. Pokemon cards. What do you think about people buying and selling them? If you can do it, if it's in your budget, that's fine. But that's where people fuck up is they're ripping that's what they call it they're ripping and they can't afford it and it's a gamble and it's an addiction and they're chasing them and it's crazy i feel the same way i actually got into it with logan paul about this on the internet and and i didn't know that he was the one you know that was sort of like the the you know big advocate for pokemon cards but i mean we've seen this so many times all the way back to the tulip craze to remember when people were hawking those bored apes on the internet with nfts right and and now we've got these cars and somehow it's different because over the past 10 years if you look at trading cards or pokemon cards or nostalgia it's outperformed i'm like guys this is what happens every time but people lost their mind i mean people i think i got like maybe a few death threats it's probably nothing new to you too but i was like i literally just said maybe don't speculate on highly tradable assets that have no intrinsic value and don't make you actually any cash flow.

30:05Caleb Hammer:I think it's fine to do if it's for fun and it's in the budget. I wouldn't be putting your entire life savings into that. That's where people go wrong. If you're putting your entire life savings into a single asset, regardless, you're usually doing it poorly. You have to guess if those are going to make more money or lose money over the next 10 years. What are you guessing? I mean, people are insane about it. If I had to coin, oh no, no, no. If I had to do maybe gain. Again, that's not something I'm putting all my faith into. Yeah. It's like a CS ghost skin. You think Pokemon cards are up in 10 years?

30:34Caleb Hammer:Yeah, maybe. I mean, it's just very internet. The internet loves it. And I mean, if you continue having people like Logan Paul, who are pretty big and they're really pushing it, it's going to work. And a lot of people are into it. I mean, some finance creators that are friends with big Pokemon people. It's everywhere. Dude, I'm taking that bet. We're going to check in in 10 years. We're going to see who's right. What do you think is the dumbest investment that you see people make in general? the dumbest investment i've ever seen is someone invested into a gold mine in uganda but that's that was a singular investment not a ongoing thing was he from uganda oh no no it's american oh he's looking in like tensia now we got an update the other day oh no yeah so his investors pulled out yeah he's waiting for this next one to get funding before he comes back on so i mean but that was a singular one average investment i actually was just experiencing this with like a cousin the other day actually and it's very common it's just like when people you know maybe they have a little bit in their emergency saving like their emergency savings fine their debt situation is fine and instead of investing in like low-cost indexes or something they're getting like cds i don't know like like what are we doing here like why are we looking at three four five percent even on good treasuries we're looking at like what five and a half it's what are we doing if you don't have big investments going if you're not taking swings well young in like the S &P 500.

31:56Caleb Hammer:I don't really understand it. They're just low yield, but people are so risk adverse when it comes to their money because it's their money. Also, isn't it interesting that so many people are like risk adverse, but spending prone. Yeah. So it's like, don't let my money take any risk, but I'm going to 1000 % have a loss with my execution of what I spend. Oh yeah. But they're, you know, they're getting fun with that spending. They're getting fun at that high spending thing. So they're feeling that instant return, which is much more powerful. My husband does say there's a hundred percent return on fun.

32:24And I say, that's absolutely not true.

32:26Caleb Hammer:I mean, it is true though. You get the dopamine hit immediately. Doesn't mean it's a good return, but it's there. So the opposite of the dumbest thing that you've ever seen, what do you like? I put so much money in this. Nobody else does or more people should. This is a type of investment that I actually really like. I mean, I usually just talk to retards, so it's kind of hard. You don't really see much people doing good things um you know i don't think people need to buy houses it's kind of that's been passed you know right now you could just your money from a down payment or anything or going to a mortgage instead in the s &p 500 will just be housing any day every day so you don't need to buy a house it's okay to buy a house but i think for the average american even though it might not be the best return on investment compared to investing i think it's nice to get their money locked up where they can't touch it.

33:16Caleb Hammer:Of course, you can with the key locks and stuff, but when people can't touch it, that's actually nice because you're not going to withdraw it like that, like a 401k. People would draw from 401ks all the time. So maybe for the average American, they do need to be babied and having it in an asset that they can't just touch like that is actually a good thing. So funny. We used to have this graph back when I worked at Vanguard a million years ago and the graph was like a S &P 500 return, which was, you know, let's call it 10 % on average over 10 years. And then it was average investor return, which was like three and a half, 4%.

33:47And then it was average investment return with a financial advisor, which was like 8.5, basically the 10 % minus fees. And their entire job is basically not to beat the market, but just to keep your ass invested. And that was the first time I realized, oh, our financial willpower is so low that anything that does protect us from ourselves can actually be a game changer.

34:10Caleb Hammer:Yeah, especially when people are drawing when the market's down because they're scared. It's like the literal, there's no other worst time. Makes no sense. So, you know, maybe it is better to just baby people. Are we investing in the SpaceX IPO? Oh, it's interesting. I tracked it a little today. It's been a very busy day. I mean, it's already in the NASDAQ. So if you're in the queues, you're good. You're in it. I never would bet against Elon, but man, the economics of that deal are wild. First trillion today, officially. And I think the first time we've seen as, I mean, he's like wrapped a bunch of stuff in there.

34:43So there's like, you know, Grok inside it and all of this other stuff and Twitter. But they've definitely got to grow a lot. I think the average, I hope the average person in the US now realizes how much later stocks actually trade on the public market than when they used to. Because, you know, back in the day, if you got the Amazon IPO, that was amazing because it IPO really early.

35:05Caleb Hammer:Yeah, they had to use that to raise money. Exactly. Now these companies are 9, 10, 11 years in, and a lot of those gains are gone. Yeah. So you've got to be careful with that big pop. But the thing that's going to help SpaceX, right, in my opinion, the ticker itself is usually before being allowed in the NASDAQ, you had to trade for months. But they got allowed in on opening day, which is unheard of. I believe it's a rule change, if I'm not mistaken. I think so, too. I mean, that helps it stabilize a little. But I mean, that within itself is crazy that it traded immediately in the NASDAQ. Yeah.

35:37And also, I suppose, I mean, there's a lot of people that are going to be getting out of that stock, though, now that it's public. So just here in Austin, we have like three groups that have made 10 to 50 billion dollars on that. Isn't that wild? That'd be like valor on us. Then you would pay off that student debt.

35:55Caleb Hammer:Nope. What is... I don't get that. Just, well, first of all, like, it just does it. It's not there. It's not in my head. There's an automatic payment. So I've never, I've thought about it three times and it's bringing it up on a podcast. No way. So it's like, oh, what am I doing? It's just like, why even take the effort? I know the math wins in the end, even though it's like, it's nothing anymore. It's like, what's the point? Okay. Here's the thing I keep coming back to with Caleb. The reason his show exists is because people aren't always able to see themselves or to audit themselves. Sometimes you need someone on the outside to open your books and tell you what's actually going on.

36:29And guess what? If you own a business, the stakes of not having expert knowledge guiding you are existential. That's actually why I founded something called the Growth Boardroom. The Boardroom is an on-demand board of advisors for business owners doing seven, eight, or nine figures a year. Our advisors have a great experience in finance, ops, marketing, hiring, and strategy. And they're going to be really honest with you because they're your outside eyes to look at the reality of your business and help you unlock the next level of growth for your business. All business owners, from mom and pop shops to Silicon Valley unicorns, have blind spots.

37:04And dear God, have I seen this lately after working with thousands of owners. The best businesses, they have an outside advisor that tells you the things you don't want to hear, because I can almost guarantee you're making every big million dollar decision by yourself, and you think and pray you're right, and often you are not. After seeing as many deals as we've seen, I can safely tell you most small business owners fail in their business, not because of competitors, not because of the market, because of dumb things they do inside of their business. The smartest operators often have the biggest blind spots.

37:40So if this is you and you run a business that is scaling to a million dollars plus in revenue, you should apply to join the boardroom. It is the only place where people will tell you the truth about your business. And I will start by being the one to do so. You know, what's interesting is like, I don't, I didn't know your story before you came on the podcast. I'd obviously watched a bunch of your stuff. We'd interacted, but I didn't realize that you started with a ton of debt. Like, so you, you, yeah, you bully these people a little

38:07Caleb Hammer:bit sometimes to get them to change their mind, but you actually kind of have sat in their shoes. Oh yeah. Like what was that story? Which is the best way to do it. And I think that's why I'm able to kind of talk to them the way I do. Cause I was there. Um, when I graduated high school, one of the first things I did. And my parents corrected me on this story. When I said it on Rogan, I said, first advice they told me to do is go max out a credit card for a piano. So I immediately did that. Also a store card maxed out for an iMac because I needed a sick iMac for college. A card maxed out on McDonald's.

38:41Caleb Hammer:That was before I got fat, but I mean, it was still delicious. And federal student loans for a bullshit degree that I dropped out for anyway. Sally May student loans. 13 ,000 hour car loan, which, you know, it's the inflation and bullshit. And, you know, luckily 10 years ago when I got that 10, 10 or eight years ago, that was still a lot of money, you know, and a family loan for a down payment on the car too. So I just owed money to everybody. And I had goals of where I wanted to get to in life. And even though I was making through my own business of writing music, like the minimum to live in like a little apartment and my loans and minimum fee payments.

39:24Caleb Hammer:With the goals I wanted to go, I couldn't get there. I just looked around and I was like, this isn't it. And my friend got a job down here in Austin, Texas. I was up in Kalamazoo, Michigan, where I'm from and with the college. And he got a sales job, just a random sales job. It's very low pay, but great upside if you do well. And they were applying for the same job. And he was like, yeah, you want to put your resume in? I was like, okay. But he was calling me. He was like, hey, you want the job? I was like, okay. So I just packed up my sedan, sold all my stuff, drove down in a week and a half to Austin.

39:51Caleb Hammer:And it was a$32 ,000 a year job, which Austin, Texas,$32 ,000 a year, not great. But the upside was basically unlimited. There was no capital sales. And sales is just in my skill set. And I was just pretty good at that. I immediately got into it, got to the top of the sales team in terms of sales volume and in commission. And I immediately started making six figures. And I was just plowing towards the debt. And I did the avalanche. It wasn't the snowball. I did highest interest, lowest interest. So I was going to those credit cards, then Saturday May, and then family because that was personal.

40:25Caleb Hammer:And then the other things, except for my federal low subsidized student loans, saved up that emergency fund and then kept going just as hard as crazy, cutting everything I could, living in cheaper places, doing roommates, all that good stuff so that I could save up for a 10 % down payment on a house in Austin. And then I rode the COVID market soon after I bought that, sold it for a thousand dollar, a hundred thousand dollar profit, like pretty, pretty quick. That was a timing thing, but that's why you always want to be in the market is for timing, whether that be stocks or company, whatever it is.

40:55Caleb Hammer:You just want to be in the market is usually the important claim. Rolled that into the next property, the rental property. And I kept rolling, rolling, rolling. And a couple of years later, when I went to start the YouTube channel, I accumulated a quarter million dollar net worth for a 26 year old, which is obviously way above the median, but that's before any YouTube penny, anything like that. So I went from negative$90 ,000 at 18 to positive$250 ,000 and then started the YouTube channel, giving people the exact kind of conversation and craziness and chaos that I love that I wish someone did to me when I was in my early 20s, late teens.

41:34So you went from negative$90 ,000 in debt to$250 ,000 net worth.

41:39Caleb Hammer:Oh, by the time I hit number, yeah, let's call it like six. Six to seven years, yeah. Six to seven years. If you were going to go give somebody the process to copy your homework, to go from high five figures in debt to multiple hundreds of K in net worth, what is your first five or seven steps? One, start the budget. Without the budget, there's nothing. There's nothing. And you're going to find where your skill set is going to meet the market. And that's hard for people to find, and reasonably so. There's passions and whatnot, and that's what I was following at the time was my passion. But I was going to sell, so I went into sales.

42:14Caleb Hammer:So where can you be in the market that is going to reward you the best for your skills? From there, paying down the debt, probably snowball method, best for most people, smallest to largest, and get that fully funded emergency fund and either eye towards that real estate or put your eye towards this maxing out into the market. Max out your 401k, Roth IRA, whatever you can do. At least try to hit that 20%. We like 50, 30, 20 after that point of the maxing out the emergency fund, 50 % on needs, 30 % on fun, which is a big percent, by the way, and 20 % on investing. So people think I'm stingy, like people can't fund.

42:50Caleb Hammer:I'm like, no, just get rid of all the bad shit in your life. A couple of years, you know, if it's bad, maybe even a little longer, but preferably shorter. And then 30 % of your money goes towards fun. That's a crazy amount of money. I'm telling people to spend their money like crazy. That's wild. at that point if you're living 50 30 20 it's just you know from there it's there's so many paths you can go down it just depends where your life goals are so people almost seem to over complicate it like if it's really just those let's call those four steps or five steps if you want to break one down into two um maybe we think we have to do 47 things to be financially free and we don't no of course not and there are some more many things you i mean you have to take care of things along the way they're like maybe at some point set up a trust at some point make sure you're all your insurances are in place you're giving the best rates they're like those little steps along the way but the major things that actually get you to that financial freedom is that's all pretty basic it really is i know but i think it's good that you still talk about it because the phenomenon i see is once you make money you don't want to talk about it anymore like it's like gauche like you know you'll see like somebody now maybe it's a little bit they should i think they should let's test it what's your net worth what more than nine figures okay yeah okay you passed the test yeah i don't think i would say like exactly how many but it's because i do feel i feel something about it yeah i feel like it feels showy or does it really i think aspirational i'd say yeah i guess aspirational like you earned it you didn't do anything you didn't already want to do it right no that's very true and i didn't have it i mean i started like you i was in credit card debt and know what it sounds like when your debit card dings at the grocery store and you can't pay it.

44:36Caleb Hammer:I think we should celebrate people who are successful. I think we should celebrate when people have come from those hard points. If I had foreclosure notices on my house growing up, those are things you should celebrate. So I'm happy to talk about my success and that the podcast is successful and that I make money and that I brag about how many people I employ and how my payroll is like a half a million dollars a month. That's things to brag about. I think that is what people should be doing you don't brag about it in terms of ha ha you poor fucker i'm rich it's not like that but it's good to look to success i you know i love reading uh biographies and all this stuff on all these very successful founders and or even my favorite movie of all time is the social network this is of all time i love it the music is so good the direction the writing that's just art yeah and it's complicated because everyone's life is complicated man if wasn't perfect.

45:29Caleb Hammer:I've made so many mistakes. I'm going to make mistakes next month. We all do, but that's what's so good. And I think we should celebrate success. So I want more wealthy people to break down their, you know, how they did it, how much they have. Yeah. I agree with you. Yeah. I was talking to Vivian too, about it too. I think, you know, I way rather know how you spend your money and how much money you've made when it comes to business and your life, et cetera, than like you're showing me your fancy cars or fancy houses. Like that to me is so uninteresting, but i do think and then you get a lot of shit so that's probably the other reason why rich people don't like to talk about it that much yeah because at a certain point you know it becomes like what did i see it was like lewis hamilton the other day and he's like there shouldn't be billionaires and he's worth 750 million dollars he's like oh what's the cutoff bro like at what level are we doing it you know that's really weird no it's totally totally irrational it makes no sense not to mention that it costs you have to create a massive amount of value to get that kind of wealth Like if nobody watched Lewis Hamilton and bought his merch, he wouldn't be worth that.

46:29And so like, that's a decision we've all made to commoditize that. Even the OnlyFans chicks, which like not my ethical compass. Other people find value in it. So I guess that's what they do. Although I would never start that company.

46:43Caleb Hammer:OnlyFans. Yeah. Well, dude who started it is dead anyway. So. Is he really? Didn't work out. Wow. I think it was cancer or something. I just think it's, I'm really, I was really upset when I saw the first like female young, or the, the youngest female self-billionaire was from prediction markets. That was like a false sheet. Oh, there fuck. Couldn't be. Couch is fun though. If you don't, if you don't mess it up, it's fun. That's what I was using for Superbowl. It was fun. And I broke even. It worked. If you're not addicted to it, if you're not losing, like just going, if you're not harming you or your family or your financial position, I think it's, I think that's fun.

47:19I guess it just seems bad for society. Like, no net positive.

47:23Caleb Hammer:I guess so. I mean, do casinos have a net positive? I mean, people... No, I wouldn't want to be known for making a casino either, though. But you don't really care. But, like, Vegas in general, like, that does... There's... What? What's the metro area? Like, 2 million people there? I mean, a lot of it's funded off the tourism, a lot of... Not employment and all that, but man. And on the moral side, for what it's worth, I mean, a lot of our lottery and stuff, it pays for schools. And it's like, I don't think it's necessarily, I mean, it's probably if, if we had the dictatorial stamp, it's probably better for society if it didn't exist.

47:55Caleb Hammer:That's not how it works. So we just have to decide, educate people on how to do it properly. If you're going to have fun there and help people that can't control themselves. Yeah, it's so true. I want to talk about some of the war stories from financial audit because they're so unhinged and amazing. like who do you think is the guest you still think about because their finances were so bad they even shocked you honestly um we had a streamer on the show pretty recently streamer she was not making a living out but she had like two cents in her checking account or no she made like two cents in an entire month yeah she was it just speaks to what people are doing today some people they see so many successful influencers that they just really want to be an influencer themselves and she was willing to just throw everything away so she could make like two cents a month but she still thinks it's gonna it's gonna work she's gonna be the next famous streamer and we don't plug people's information on our show because we don't let people come for clout so that was startling because she just wanted to keep going you know it wasn't the craziest debt or the craziest drama but the fact that she's just willing to put her entire life on hold and go further in the hole just to pursue this dream that clearly wasn't working out.

49:06Caleb Hammer:It just speaks for an entire generation of people that are willing to do that. It was scary. You know, it is interesting that you say that is like, I have noticed that might be an Austin phenomenon too. And this younger generation, like I don't want to have to sleep on the floor and I want to be able to eat what I eat. And so I'll take some of the pain, especially when I'm young. And I think you should take some of the pain when you're young because there's nothing worse than being old, not as skilled and broke. You'd rather be young, not skilled and broke. You can fix that. When you're older, it's hard to get a job.

49:41The job market isn't as easy anymore. It's hard to pick up new skills. Everything's stacked against you the older you get. So all the people are like, well, you can wait and you've got lots of time. I'm like, do you? I don't know because your formative years and your 20s is where you set up basically the rest of your financial future.

49:57Caleb Hammer:Oh, yeah. Like, you know, if you don't get that right and you're streaming all day and you aren't good at it and you keep going, fuck. It's not even like I 100 % agree on that and I'll just add to it. It's like, let's just pretend like you're doing meh in your 20s and you're only able to invest 5%. That 5 % growing over the course of four or five decades is incredible and is going to be more than you throwing 20 % aside when you only have like a decade and a half left till retirement. it. That compound growth in the time that people are just willing to give up is startling. They don't really understand it.

50:30Caleb Hammer:And it's fair there. I mean, I don't want to say kick because I don't want to be in the business and infantilizing people like somebody could part a day, but you're a young adult. You want to go get a car, get your own place. You want to travel. You got some money. When you look at just the growth, if they just set five to 10 % aside, a little bit of sacrifice, the amount of money they have by retirement is crazy. Was there a single dumb purchase that somebody defended aggressively that usually cars always cars people's is like when i can get them to actually relatively break even on the car then go borrow for a 10 000 car and they make like a net gain of 40 000 they'll fight me to the bone they'll fight me to the bone this is so societally grand it's crazy are these like bmws and mercedes and anything it's been mazdas it's been toyota's it's been everything it's been everything people are so attached to their cars I don't understand why.

51:21Caleb Hammer:I've never been that guy. I've never been... I love my Model X, but I'm not like... I want to give up my financial future for it. I don't understand. So let's say that you have a partner and you need to snap them out of their money making bad decisions. Do you have one line or one go-to argument to break somebody's frame? Man. I don't know. Because most of them, they just view it as a personal attacker, as an insult. And that's not necessarily the most productive place to be. How long have you been with your husband? We've known each other since we're 11. So if you go at him, he'll probably take it as a little bit of an attack.

51:57Caleb Hammer:Not a, we're trying to start a conversation to get better, right? Yeah. Like, so I actually don't know. I mean, I don't know. I am not the relationship expert guy. I love basking in the tea of some relationship drama, but I'm not the relationship expert guy. So what do you say when you're talking to somebody and they don't listen to you? Well, see, that's their thing. Because I'll have the couple on that side of the table. Yeah. And I'm willing to tell that person's a retard on their behalf. Like, but if it was... Is that the go-to line? Well, that's one of them. But if it was my girl, I can't call her a retard.

52:30No.

52:31Caleb Hammer:Sweetie. You've got to be gentle. You've got to come along. Okay, I just want to talk about something. This isn't an attack. This isn't personal. This is just... I just want to talk. So, I don't know. I'll be brutal for the other person. Yeah. What do you have? Something that you typically go to? one line or an argument to break their frame it is usually if i can loop it back to their kids it always wins because that's where they really feel that emotion you know if i can make clear that like their kids are gonna have to put their lives on hold to take care of their parents that just sacrifice nothing and live their life up so they could have whatever they wanted now like they usually think about oh shit i didn't do that for my parents that sucks i don't want to be like that for my kids so if i can lift their kids into it in like a non-weird manipulative way like that kind of works yeah then a little manipulative it's tiny tiny n was there a guest that infuriated you at the time for their views on money on money yeah if i can't get them to make any sacrifice especially for their kid that'll infuriate me i guess the uh other day i think it it was before you stole him over there before you stole colton my viewers know colton he's over there now it works for her um i think he produced it a dude called uh my friend and co-worker who's black the n-word to his face not really a financial perspective but that didn't really make me happy wow you shouldn't do that with a hard r to not even a soft day wow that's aggressive aggressive yeah i called his boss in the post show and gotten fired so usually i don't try to impact people's lives outside of the show other than positive.

54:09Caleb Hammer:But no, he can go fuck himself. Yeah, that's tough. Did you do that one? Yeah, he did that one. Do you have any indication? Let's say that I'm with somebody in a relationship or a partnership or a friendship. How can you tell if somebody's going to actually change their financial decisions or not? So we see it a lot on the show where people use future words, lots of words coming up. I'm going to change this. I want to change this. Is it going to change? I have a plan. if it's always i'm gonna i will not i am or have at least shown some kind of uh desire to then at that point i just don't believe it i really don't there's because people people know i'm going to give them shit on the show so they prepare these self-defense mechanisms where they say they're going to they plan to they want to but i don't give a shit if the documents in front of me that represent your most recent month show that you clearly aren't doing that now i don't care what you say you're going to do that's that's the easiest thing for me to see it's the actual action in the moment and people are just using forward words like i'm out yeah you need to see so basically you have to see some sort of action like i just did just a little but if all they fall back on is i'm going to or i have a plan or i want to that's that's a no-go what percentage of people actually change their financial behaviors on our show we see really good results we see we're further away from the annual review so i'm forgetting the exact number but it's something like it was like twenty thousand dollars twenty eight thousand hours in 12 months is the average high interest debt payoff on our show which is really good what's that compared to like the norm is there a way to really compare that no i guess not because i mean the average american sucks defiance so i mean compared to the norm they're definitely doing better they're at least going in the right direction when the average american isn't yeah um so i mean people have gotten houses people have gotten on emergency funds.

55:59Caleb Hammer:People have gotten, he does a lot of good things that have made from the show. Yeah. I think one of the hard parts is like, I had a friend call me the other day and she wants to have a prenup and figuring out what to do getting married. And thankfully her partner has made pretty good financial decisions, but her ex did. And that's sort of, she's had to carry that load historically. And so I think a lot of what your show at least does, and like hopefully this conversation today is try to figure out who are the people that you want to be around, because that's going to be your biggest indicator of holding down.

56:29Like, I mean, you probably don't see too many really, really rich one side of the couple with really, really broke other side. Like everything sort of gets pulled down by one. Is that true?

56:40Caleb Hammer:Absolutely. I call people out all the time when they're, you know, I use it in a different way because sometimes anchor means good, but like the anchor for relationship where they're just, you know, they want to go forward, but they've dropped them in the middle of the ocean and they can't go anywhere. and this is it is very common honestly unfortunately and in couples episodes where one person is the villain and that is very common instead of both of them being a villain um and it's really sad to see because i feel empathy for the other person because the other person loves the person who is making mistakes to death they're kind of trapped there because it's like what are you going to do just give up the love of your life well maybe that person's not going to change their behavior so now you're stuck with that as well it's that's a brutal choice to make sometimes.

57:24What would you tell somebody who's with someone who doesn't want to change their financial behavior?

57:29Caleb Hammer:Well, you would try to get them into couples therapy. I've paid for some couples therapy myself. So at least start there. I don't want to give up immediately. But I mean, just like any marriage, if you, if you, if someone's drinking too much and they're just not willing to change, you know, whatever it is, lifestyle wise, they're not willing to, and you've done everything. There is the part of, but you just leave. Yeah. Yeah. It seems like, that almost doesn't happen enough. I want to do a few kind of rapid fire-ish questions and see what you think. So let's go with most underrated purchase you've ever made.

58:07Caleb Hammer:I bought the staging furniture in my house. It was 50 % off. There we go. It was underrated. No one knows, but I saved a lot of money. Oh, that doesn't make me happy. I bought the staging furniture in my last house too. I like that. Okay. That's a new underrated way to buy things. what's the most expensive thing you ever bought um individual thing that wasn't real estate probably my model x yeah and you're happy with that yeah i love it i'm sorry i'm not making it anymore so i'm with it forever you know i'm with that car well until like i there would have to be something crazy that's really good but i can't think of any other tesla that's better than that so do you believe in keeping cars basically until they bust well i mean if you can't afford it then of course But, you know, I mean, I could afford to go get something else if I wanted to.

58:52But do you think you should just keep the other car anyway or not?

58:55Caleb Hammer:I'm just keeping it because it's like the best Tesla. And I do like Tesla. The self-driving is just insane. What about, is there something that you like kind of secretly judge people for as a financial decision? As a financial decision? Because I judge people for a lot. As a financial decision? Yeah. Yeah, I mean, if someone's getting like the nasty-ass flavor in an ice cream stand and they're spending their money on that, I don't know what's wrong with this. What's nasty? I think mint chocolate chip is a disaster. I don't know what people are doing. Why do you sell like you men and hating mint chocolate chip?

59:25My argument is I think it's men versus women.

59:27Caleb Hammer:Why are you eating mouthwash? Doesn't taste like that to us. This is why. Maybe there's a gene, like cilantro. Well, mint actually makes me gag. So I actually can't do that. So I think it's nasty for different reasons. like it actually makes me like almost throw up so you don't brush your teeth no i do but mint isn't what makes toothpaste toothpaste they can get rid of the scent so what do you use like it's a flavorless toothpaste it's everything else is in it just doesn't have the flavor and then i do do a minty mouthwash but that's for the sake of everyone else and i just like suffer through it and i'm used to it now that's such a fun quirk actually i figure you have weird quirks because probably yeah i don't know you come i mean people say i'm autistic i bet i am i don't know i don't think i'm like super autistic but i definitely you know felt it less oh you're pretty empathetic would your girlfriend say that you have a lot of empathy uh she knows that i can feel pretty intensely oh i like that um it's not always on my you know i don't show perfectly yeah me neither i'm just in my show just in my life now yeah i'm actually a little embarrassed lately i like kind of understand the double wear prada character do you know that one like miranda this is something maybe only a chick does i'm not really gay that was for colton but again you stole him away you liked it actually actually i think colton you made a gay joke when i first met you which made me uncomfortable in this era you know he was my gay now he's yours enjoy can i claim a gay yes that's how that works what about uh like the money rule you personally struggle to follow none really i'm pretty disciplined uh if anything i mean this is what togi told me he's an influencer that just goes crazy i just need to actually expend more live more i don't i haven't gone on a vacation since i started youtube i just i don't do that shit why i like to work i don't like to fly but i love to work i also feel like it's almost like winning the lottery i have a limited time to do this so i'm just i'm gonna go crazy yeah i could spend more how old are you 20 uh 31 yeah do you how long have you done youtube for four years we just hit a month ago that's a long time like everybody thinks that that's really fun and easy but then you do it for long enough you're like it's actually a total work yeah well and of course Just like, I mean, this whole place with you, I turned mine into an actual business.

1:01:56Caleb Hammer:So it's a job. And it's like, yes, I could show up and just film financial audit and it would be really chill. But we would do a lot more than that with the Doubtwise Budgeting app. A membership, a premium membership of shows called Hammer Elite that 110 ,000 people subscribe to a month. Yeah. It's crazy. It's like one of the biggest things out there on the internet. We just do so much. What are you doing there? in hammer elite uh we have three really good high quality premium shows that we make it's like its own network uh on a daily basis oh is that where your premium channel on youtube that you can subscribe to and so it's all done on youtube yep it's all done on youtube and then we have the off-platform version at hammer elite.com so wherever people want to be we don't have a preference that's actually huge to have 110 000 people subscribing to yeah 10 bucks a month yeah that's great it's a good business it means i can't employ people student loan actually really quickly.

1:02:47That's controversial. Okay. What about you had an actual governor on?

1:02:54Caleb Hammer:Oh yeah. Whitmer, my home state. Yeah. Michigan. Yeah. And Newsom said no. That was annoying. I wish he would come on here. I want Greg Abbott because our property taxes are insane. And most of it's a recapture for other school districts. And then they build fucking palaces of football stadiums in the middle of nowhere. It's insane. I'd love to have DeSantis and then Hochul. Yeah. Did Abbott say no? no one else responded except for uh newsom who said no but i'm sure when people get in their like election cycles yeah they'll do it we can bring them in you know i'd love to have someone running for president next time yeah i'd love to have both parties on i'm hoping in democrat so uh i don't know given your twitter history i don't know if you're getting a democrat yet she was whitmore that's true but she's kind of uh like old school democrat yeah no she's not like she's not like leftist but even so i think i think we and mandami would get along um interesting as people you know am i a democratic socialist no but i think we'd vibe and i think we'd have a good time and i think i'd be really i was really fair with her as well i crazed her on things they've made real progress on and i called out bullshit that the state was spending money on and i would do that for him as well i'm sure there's things that are you know i mean new york's one of the greatest cities in the world for a reason so yeah you know who else is amazing is um the former governor of North Dakota.

1:04:13He's a stud and basically built one of the only billion dollar companies in North Dakota, a tech company.

1:04:19Caleb Hammer:We've had senators that have tried to come on the show and the administration tried to get us with the Secretary of Treasury. Yeah. Besser, right? Yeah. I would be sick. No. It's just like, ah. You're not going to get something. Kind of want the guy at the top. Give me the guy at the top. You and Trump would be aggressive. Yeah. Yeah. We'd have fun. Yeah. Can you handle some of the debt for us on there? Well, my fear is the growing interest payment, largest growing category of the federal budget, the Pentagon now passing audits, Social Security about to get a 25 % cut in literally five years. Our social programs are out of control.

1:04:54Caleb Hammer:It's a fucking mess. I mean, I know this isn't applicable for the average person maybe to apply to their finances, but you do have a lot of political opinions financially. Kind of. I think, I mean, I, every time I take a political assessment, it says I lean right economically and then I'm like decently left socially. So it's like, it's, uh, I get, I get pretty centrist on every assessment I take, especially the more extensive assessments. I get pretty centrist, but you know, when, when you start thinking like personal responsibility, you immediately do start getting some opinions that are more right-wing coded.

1:05:29Caleb Hammer:So, I mean, we rarely talk about like different social things or different, uh, just a few things we talk about do tend to be the more right-wing positions which immediately you hear someone take one right-wing position you take one left-wing position you assume all the rest of their positions yeah so it's you know for us uh over at our studio we love jokes this you know austin's like one it's like the roast capital now you know we love humor we love bad words insulting words and that shit is great and it's like it before that was appropriate on the internet we're leaping it more but yeah um now you're back uh so it's just like we like that and you know people see that as more conservative it's not this is not being offended by everything um i mean yes i believe personal responsibility i'm not i've always said i'm okay with paying more in taxes but i want to make sure we at least have control over the programs actually investigations into uh any kind of abuse or anything like that i'm happy there's getting some more arrests around the country of those who are being bad actors but with social programs are out of control in some points.

1:06:29Caleb Hammer:I've had so many people on my show that are on food stamps and whatnot, which is a program I strongly believe in and advocate for, for those that need it. But it's literally because they're choosing to pursue their passion instead of getting their job, which they could go get, and I could go get them tomorrow, but they're choosing to do something. So they're like, I'm going to pursue my entrepreneurial spirit of, you know, pottery and not, oh, I don't make enough. Who would have thought, okay, here's my food stamps. It's like, okay, but you could just go get a job tomorrow at FedEx. Like, you can go do that.

1:06:59Caleb Hammer:So why do we subsidize you for that? And that becomes right wing, even though I very much support food stamps and social programs and many things that people fall back on. Because we want them to fall back on for the sake of our society. That is good. Very pro-college. I'm not pro-being stupid at college. I'm not pro-infinite student loan debt forever. Because every time we raise the gap on student loans, the cost of college goes up. It is an infinite cycle there. i mean immigration people on the right have called me like uh they've disagreed with me because i'm pro-immigration but i'm pro-selective skilled immigration you know similar to how many other countries do it and i think hey you know if you're trying to come here illegally that's also not good let's not just let anyone in no matter what let's let in a good amount of immigrants let's select two and vet people so immigration's good uncontrolled which no one else does is bad Yeah.

1:07:49Caleb Hammer:So, and that's, I think, a pretty centrist position. That, I mean, that's what Obama believed in. That's what Clinton believed in. That's what both Clintons believed in. It's more left-wing than Trump, maybe. It's more left-wing than some of the populace on the right, but it's pretty normal. Yeah. No, well, I like how you call it the debt. I mean, I was sitting at a breakfast yesterday with, of all people, Mike Pence, and both parties now just raise the debt. I have a lot of respect for Trump-Pence. I have a lot of respect for Obama and the Clintons, but everybody except you know except bill was a debt raiser oh yeah they don't give a fuck and even even though the republicans say you know they're willing to criticize the budget but they're willing to criticize the pentagon which can't pass an audit so they're hoping to take me for that one yeah it's like that is a real thing there's uh the law going on with the military disability right now there's this unvetted and there are people abusing it again it's a program i want to even fund more for people that need it i don't think there should be the cases of abuse that we have on our show that people would just turn a blind eye because it's a sacred cow.

1:08:50Caleb Hammer:That doesn't work. We don't get to do another 250 years of this thing if we're not even willing to call out certain things. So no, no, no. They both suck when it comes to spending and debt. Yeah. I guess this is the American way these days. It is now. Well, hopefully if they're listening to Caleb Hammer, if they're signing up for your premium, if they're listening to this podcast, then there's maybe a little bit of change that can happen. And And so thanks for sharing all of this and being so honest. It's not that normal or easy these days. No, thanks for having me. Anything you would leave somebody listening to right now who maybe hasn't had a chance to listen to your show, maybe you'll never get another chance to talk to them, but you know that you could give them some financial wisdom.

1:09:33What would it be?

1:09:33Caleb Hammer:There's a choice. Every day you wake up, you can choose to be a retard or not a retard. Choose to not be. Thank you, Caleb. Yep.

1:09:44you