Roundup: Buy vs. Rent, Mortgage Amortization, Minimalism and More | Ep 551

26:33and I don't know how much a sliding door, you know, be a thousand, two thousand, something like that dollars, right? But I could actually do that. I could pay for it out of my own pocket, but I'd be giving it as a gift in essence to the landlord. But I could make that decision, right? Which is interesting. But yeah, like that's something that I'm probably not prepared to do because I don't know exactly how long I'll live in this unit. So yeah, I mean, there's some stuff like that. Like, do I really feel like painting the walls when I'd have to probably repaint them or pay a fee for. So like, yeah, you do give up some of the personalization, but again, it's just at the margins.

27:09And at the end of the day, it's just money, right? Like, what are they going to charge me? Like, even if I painted the bland walls into a nice color, like maybe they actually like it better and they just leave it that way. Like it might actually be a positive for the homeowner or the property manager. I don't know. It's a question I could ask. But yeah, I mean, I think the scary part of renting for me is again, that lack of continuity, which is why I don't think I ever would have done this, even though I talked about on the podcast, certainly for years about, Oh, I'd love to rent. I think it would be great.

27:40Like I just could never do that to my girls, like make it. So like our fate was in someone else's hands, right. In terms of like, Hey, if the owner of the home decided to sell, like we have to look for a new place. And that wasn't, that wasn't what I wanted for my daughters. Whereas this is just me in this place. And like, if the homeowner decides to sell it because it's just not working for him, I can find another place really, really easily. So I'm not worried about that. So that issue has been mitigated, but that's always hanging over my head that like, yeah, they might just decide not to renew.

28:10They might sell the place. And while I probably plan to be here for five more years, at least until my younger daughter graduates from high school, like, yeah, I might have to move. And that's a cost, obviously. And it is what it is. But yeah, that's kind of the only negative I've found. Yeah. Thanks for listening to Chooseify and for all your support of our mission here. The absolute best way to support Chooseify is when you sign up for your next rewards credit card to use our cards page at chooseify.com slash cards. I keep this page constantly updated, so it should always be the top resource for you.

28:42Thanks for being part of our community and for your support. I know we talked last time about sort of minimalism and maybe even I asked you, How long would it take you to pack up your place? But one thing that happens when people go to a new place and they are purging their stuff is that they get into this new empty place and they end up buying stuff. They end up filling the space. Have you noticed that happening at all? No. Well, yes and no. I mean, I guess, yeah, it would be ridiculous to say no because there obviously was an expense, right? So this is a three-bedroom place. my daughters each have their own bedrooms here for when they they stay with me and yeah i had to go out and buy beds for each of them i had to buy desks for when they do their homework i had to buy nightstands and lamps and all that like there certainly is an expense and then yeah i had to buy a chair or two for the living room we have a second area downstairs in the basement like you know, I had to buy a little bit of furniture and frankly, like the other cool part is like, I don't care about this stuff at all.

29:50So yeah, like you, you jokingly asking, like, or we talked about like how quickly I could get out of here. Like I own virtually nothing at this point that I actually care about. And again, with this, the minimalism and simplification, like I love that. Like I could probably recreate my entire wardrobe in 15 minutes on Amazon. Like I know the exact shirts, like the exact Under Armour shirts, the soccer t-shirts I have, the exact shorts, like it's all in my Amazon account. So like Ginger, it's pretty wild. Like in this day and age with a password manager on your computer and Dropbox and your phone and a passport and some credit cards, like you don't really need anything.

30:30Like I could get on any computer I need to. I don't need like my setup. I had sure I have some lights for the podcast. I have a microphone, but I could just buy all that stuff really easily. Like it's actually really liberating to just not own anything that I really care about. So like, yeah, I'm not going to like trek that furniture around the world with me. Like I don't care about it. I'll sell it. I'll donate it. I'll leave it in the place if they want it to be furnished. Who knows? Right. But like, yeah, I really have been pretty good with not, not filling it up with like unnecessary things.

31:00I think there's always the level of necessary. Like I needed to buy stuff it is, an air fryer, microwave oven, whatever, fill in the blank, a Keurig machine. But yeah, other than that, I've done a pretty good job. I think it's a really interesting framework that you've laid down. And I want you to write a book about it. And here's the conceit, right? The idea, like we've all heard this idea, get rid of everything except for the things that you care about, that you're really deeply attached to, the things that bring you joy. But your book is going to be get rid of everything you care about so that the only things that you have are things that you can easily walk away from.

31:41Yeah. I love that. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. I like thinking about it. Yeah. It's like, uh, I don't know if it's Buddhism or meditation or whatever, but like, it's like a total detachment from stuff. And it's not to say I don't own stuff again. I own some books. I own all the things that are necessary for, for a house. I have a nice piece of luggage that I just got like, but I don't care about any of this stuff. It's all just, it's just money, right? Like if whatever forbid, like, you know, I had a fire or something or something happened, or I got robbed or, you know, not that anybody would rob my place because there's literally nothing of any value in it, but I could literally recreate my whole life in a couple of clicks on Amazon.

32:26And that might sound weird to some people. I suspect there are people listening to us who are saying like, Brad, that doesn't sound great to me. Yeah. Right. Like Ginger, you might be one of those people. Like that's wonderful. If that doesn't sound great to you, that's, I'm not trying to proselytize and like say that this is wonderful. This is how you should live. Like I'm saying, this is how I'm living. And I find it really liberating. But Ginger, what are your thoughts? I don't know. I have to think about it more. That's why I want to read your book about it because I do. I mean, we've kind of talked about how I kind of lean that way in terms of I really want to be less attached to my things.

33:00I'm constantly getting rid of stuff. But at the same time, as I hear you talking, I'm like, yeah, there is something about it that doesn't sit super well with me in terms of I think of like, oh, well, there's some, I don't know. Yeah. There's something about those things that I have chosen. I mean, I guess it's just the idea of attachment, right? But there's some messiness there that feels alive to me. And so that's why I feel like, oh gosh, I kind of have to think about it more because those things, those things are also attachments to the people that I love and to experiences that I've had. So I'm not sure I lean that way, but I'm not ready for the fire yet.

33:47Yeah. And that's perfectly fine. And yeah, let's, let's hope there's no, uh, no fire. Obviously I'm not wishing for that. Let's be clear. But yeah, like I think it's okay. And I think that's, that's a fun part of this conversation is to figure out like, Hey, where am I in life now? Like, what do I think about my stuff? Like, do I want more stuff? Wanting more stuff is not a bad thing. It's really not. And I'm not saying you're necessarily wanting more stuff, but like, if you're listening to this and you're saying like, Hey, this stuff brings me joy. It brings me happiness. Like I'm really carefully cultivating what comes into my life.

34:20And I want a net increase in wonderful things that I value. Like that's really great, but do it with eyes wide open. I think like if you're doing it that way, that's great. But if you're just buying haphazardly, I think that's, that's the intentionality, Ginger, that we're constantly talking about here at Choose a Pi is if you're living a life of intention and you're being specific and you're really thinking through purchases, then you can't go wrong with those purchases. I think my issue is with people unconsciously just purchasing and doing it to fill some hole that it's not really filling. And it's not to say there aren't things that I wouldn't rebuy.

35:01I'm not advocating that. I'm not advocating that I want to keep culling things down or that I wouldn't rebuy things if I lost them. I've said repeatedly, for some bizarre reason, I love noise-canceling headphones. I have these Bose ones. I'm not saying they're better than any other brand, but I just really liked them. I forget they're probably two to$300. If I lost them, if they broke, I would buy them in a heartbeat. I wouldn't even think about it. And they just bring a lot of satisfaction to my life. It's like, I always joke when I turn that button on and I get the noise canceling, it's like, it's like lying in a meadow.

35:33Like I just feel like this sense of like peace and serenity. And maybe it's like quiets the noise in my head or the ambient noise around that just like really gets to me, but that was a great purchase. I'll make it again and again and again. And I think that's a cool aspect of life is like, Hey, what are those things that are important? What are those things that like going back to Marie Kondo or Marie Kondo, which would be the Japanese version? Like what brings me joy? And I don't know, especially even for clothes. And I don't, I'm not like a fashionista by any stretch of imagination, but like I've pretty much called almost all of my clothes at this point.

36:11And I just wear things that I really love that fit me well, that are comfortable, that are nice material, even if it's a little expensive. Like when I went traveling, when I went to Indonesia, when I went to Bali and Singapore, a friend of mine, Samantha talked about Merino wool and these t-shirts that are just really great for hotter climates. And And even though wool doesn't normally connotate like, oh, I'm going to wear this to a 95 degree Singapore. But she convinced me and I bought, I think I bought four of them. I subsequently bought two more long sleeves and these things aren't cheap. I mean, I think most of them cost like a hundred dollars per, but I wound up getting a different brand that were maybe 40 or$50 per shirt, which is not inexpensive, but Ginger, these are fantastic.

36:58I wore them and they are wonderful travel shirts. They're great shirts to even wear around town. like they look nice and they fit great. So I can wear them to maybe even not formal occasions, certainly, but like out to dinner or something like that, even though it's a t-shirt, it's a really nice thing. And like, again, there are five people in the old days, certainly who would bristle at, Oh, you spent$50 or$40 on a shirt. Like, come on when you can get free t-shirts at FinCon or wherever it is. Like, but I mean, like that's not the life I'm playing at this point. These are really wonderful things.

37:29And I'd rebuy them in a heartbeat also. Okay. So you also mentioned in that previous interview that you're just sort of spending less. You said, my life doesn't really cost that much. And it makes me think about, okay, that's the case for a lot of us. We really try to get our expenses down. I am currently trying to make my$5 ,000 chase spend to get my 100 ,000 points. I bet a lot of listeners are in this process right now. And it's a little bit higher than it used to be. I mean, I haven't obviously done the bonus for three or four years, whatever that thing was. And so I'm like, oh, spending $5 ,000 on a card is a little bit harder than I anticipated.

38:13And I kind of have a solution that I'm happy to share. But it brings up this point of like, oh, is this a mistake? Do we end up actually spending more when we're using credit cards and especially when we're trying to meet a minimum spend? What do you think of that? Yeah, Ginger, that is a really good question. Actually, Sean wrote in about this actually looks like late last year talking about like behavioral economics and do we wind up spending more on the credit card than we would if paying cash. And yeah, it's an interesting one. So first, right, like you're talking about a travel rewards credit card that you opened up recently that you have to hit this minimum spend.

38:56And it's fairly considerable. So you said$5 ,000 in three months. So it's like what, 1667 per month on average. Now for anybody who's getting into travel rewards cards, the way those bonuses work, you usually hear something like that, like spend$5 ,000 in the first three months and earn this bonus, whatever it may be. and how that works again like it's not that you have to hit exactly that amount of money or the 1 ,667 a month like if you had a five thousand dollar purchase that you put on the card two days into it that would trigger that bonus at that point you'd get it at for most cards you'd earn that bonus then at the end of that first statement close so also the other thing is let's say you put $2 ,000 on the first month.

39:42And then you paid it off, of course, on time and in full that month. And you want to do that every single month in your credit cards or travel rewards makes no sense to pursue. It's just that$5 ,000 cumulative. So it's not like you have to carry a$5 ,000 balance, like you're going to get hit with interest or something. It doesn't work that way. You put $2 ,000 on the first month,$2 ,000 on the second month, you're up to 4 ,000 cumulative. Then when you hit that next thousand in that third month, then you've reached that bonus requirement and you get it from there. So Ginger, always just important to kind of hit the highlights of the old school stuff.

40:15But yeah, I mean, listen, I think just the practical reality of life is retailers and certainly with how easy Amazon is, man, cutting the friction, yeah, it makes your life easier, but it does make it a whole lot easier to just buy things. And I don't know if I can intellectually, 100 % honestly say like, if I had to actually shell out cash, that I would have made 100 % of the purchases that I made. Right? Like I don't, I don't think there's any way that I could very honestly say 100%. I'd like to believe that I would make 90 plus percent of the same purchases, but unless you ran that side by side, it's just hard to know.

40:56I don't think I make a ton of just like wasteful purchases, but I do spend a lot. And frankly, you might even be able to make the counter argument that because a lot of us in the fight community are maybe have a tendency to be a little too frugal and this might be a strategy. So I'd be curious of your opinion on this random stretch that I might have here is that like, because a lot of us are too naturally frugal that we might not spend enough, especially on things that might add value to our lives. So like I'm really into health and fitness and optimizing my sleep specifically. So I just got one of those, the whoop band.

41:32And as I often do, I was listening to Tim Ferriss and he had an episode with Kevin Rose recently. He was talking about like Kevin was talking about some kind of nose spray that like helps cut down on like catching viruses and such. And like, okay, like, does it sound a little kooky? Yeah, maybe, but like it was$20. And I'm like, you know, I really care about my health and I don't love going to conferences or five events and worrying that I'm going to get sick, like maybe even just as a placebo, it would be worth the 20 bucks that it cost me. Like, would I have paid that if I had to shell out$20 in cash?

42:05Yeah, I probably would have thought about it a little more. Or I would have instituted something like that 72 hour rule that Liz from Frugal Woods talked about way back when in 2017. So yeah, I mean, where do you come down on this? Okay, I come down, I think I'm the opposite. Because cash is like, not as real to me. It's this piece of paper in my hand and then I give it away and then it's gone. Whereas a credit card is the story of how I spent my money. So literally the trail, the trail of it is the story. Okay. Yes. And so I'm less likely to spend money if I know I'm going to have to like contend with this later in terms of not paying the bill, but in terms of like, oh, well, when I look back at how much I spent at the coffee shop this month, it's embarrassing.

42:53Versus if I just grab cash from over the fridge and buy a coffee, that's like nothing. There's no evidence of anything happening to myself. And so for me, I don't think the cash versus card like works in that way, because to me, it's about the trail. But I do worry a little bit about meeting the minimum spends because I noticed my thoughts around it where, oh gosh, I have this big bill, but then I almost feel relief. I'm like, oh, I'm, I'm, I'm in this period where I have to hit my 5 ,000. So great. Take my money. And I'm not so naive to think that there isn't something like not great about like, maybe I am spending more than I would.

43:38Yeah. And you might be. And yeah, Yeah, I think we need to be careful of that, right? Because clearly this whole travel rewards thing, we talk about free travel or close to free travel. If you are spending extra money to hit the bonuses, then this is very clearly not free travel. So something I've done, and there are some stipulations around what you can and can purchase in terms of gift cards. So I'm not advocating going out and buying gift cards, but I've even preloaded my balance at Amazon by buying$500 or something like that. Like if I was fairly close, like you can actually just buy your own gift card, like basically top up your Amazon account.

44:17So I've done that before. Sometimes you can prepay some things. Like that's another nice part about being in the FI community is a lot of us have some assets. I think most of us have some assets where even if it's that you're just getting started, like you're in a position where you're not worried about cashflow so much. like you can make decisions from more of a place of power. And I've always found this to be like a really unsung aspect of like the benefit of FI is just by virtue of, again, we're not living paycheck to paycheck. Even if you're just a year or so in to your FI journey or even months, depending on your income and your savings rate, like even if you're starting from zero, you might now have a couple thousand dollars in the bank or 5 ,000, 10 ,000, whatever it may be.

45:01like you're not so worried anymore about, hey, am I going to have enough money to pay when the electric bill comes out or the mortgage comes out? You can actually make decisions from a place of strength. And yeah, just not having to worry about timing has always been a nice thing for me. So like if I see an amazing deal on something, like the joking example I always used to use was like aluminum foil, which again is silly. But like if you find some non-perishable and like just some amazing deal somewhere and you know you're going to use X amount in a year or two, why not buy a year or two supply?

45:36And now naturally you can't do that with everything, Ginger, right? You don't want to have your house look like a hoarder's palace. So I'm just talking at the margins, you can make decisions from a place of strength where what actually matters is the value and the deal as opposed to, do I literally have enough money to pay for this based on the check that's coming in on the 15th and 30th of the month and the money that's coming out otherwise. And it sounds like a little thing, but I think the psychological satisfaction of that is huge. And yeah, like something like that, where I just kind of top up my Amazon balance a little bit at the margin.

46:13Like that's a nice thing because I spend a decent percentage of my expenses on Amazon. And I know I'm going to go through that, whether it's a month, two months, six months, a year, I'm going to go through it. So it's not like all that I'm foregoing is just like the interest that I would have earned on that little bit of money, which is essentially negligible, right? So that's kind of a, at least a cool rethink from my perspective. Yeah. I would add two little tips to that. So another way I think to think about it is instead of waiting for the optimal card bonus, instead to time by your big expenses.

46:49So I've definitely had some times when it's like, oh, we're about to throw down so much money for summer camp, you know, or, oh gosh, we're getting a water heater. Or when we got our roof, I was like, okay, it's time to open a card because I know that I will instantly meet that spend. And so maybe it wasn't the time of the, again, it wasn't optimizing. It wasn't the time of like the absolute best card, but that can be a way to kind of hedge for that. And then here's another idea I have. I don't know. People might not like it. I'm going to share it anyway, which is, okay, my husband and I put aside money every month to give to charity, but we don't give it out every month.

47:31And so it builds up, right? Until we decide like, oh, okay, we're going to make this donation. And I've always had in the back of my mind, like if I'm$500 short, I'm probably going to give this to Give directly anyway, which is a great charity you should all go check out, right? So I'll just do that now, right? Like, as a backup, I can always just make a charitable donation. Now, I get that maybe that's, like, to me, that's great, because I'm going to give that money to that charity anyway. So it doesn't really matter if that happens this month or next month. But I could also see, hey, maybe this isn't great, because you could probably put a debit card in, and then they're not having to pay the extra$15 or whatever.

48:16So I get that you're not optimizing for the charity in that way if you're paying for a credit card instead of a debit card. Although, do they still have to pay the fees for a debit card? That's a good question. I do not know. Yeah, that might be true. And if that is the case, then whatever, use your credit card. But I think it's always been a nice safety net for me knowing like, oh, I'm not going to feel pressure to make some purchase that I'm not ready to do because I always know if I don't meet that spend, I'll just give some money away that I was going to give away anyway. Cool. I like that.

48:50I like that a lot. Yeah. Really good tips. I don't think anybody's going to get mad at you. Don't worry. And yeah, I think what's kind of fun and we're, you know, we've been talking about minimalism and looking for these little improvements. Like I would kind of challenge everybody out there listening is just look for little ways that you can improve your life. Like look for little pain points. And again, the journey to FI is not only about the money. Like to me, it's about just living a better life. And, and I, I just look for like little ways, little things that annoy me in my own life. And I'm not looking for the negative.

49:27I think that's a bad way to go through life, but just like, what are little things that I can improve on? Like just even tiny things, This is going to sound so silly, but I used to carry around a wallet with a whole bunch of cards in there, and it was just annoying. And really, in this day and age, I'm not carrying around cash. I haven't had a dollar in cash in a very long time. And all these cards were just taking up space. I think now I added a little magnetic, tiny little wallet to my phone, and I just have in there one credit card, my driver's license, and my insurance card. Though, frankly, I could put my insurance card, I could put a bunch of that stuff in Google Wallet or Google Pay at this point.

50:07Or I guess people with Apple can do Apple Pay and such. But that Google Wallet is also neat. I was able to put my AAA card in there. You can put a ton of different things and not actually have to hold these. But I even think about something like my library card. Okay, I've been schlepping this thing around for forever in my wallet. And how often do I go to the library? I go to the library a decent bit for most normal people, but I don't go that often. If I go once a month, it's a lot. So what did I do? I put it in my glove compartment. I put it in my glove box in my car because literally every single time I go to the library, I have to drive myself there.

50:44So I just grab it. And at my new place, like when I check my mail, it's outside and it's a little ways down the road. So I have my key for the mailbox in my car also because invariably when I'm going to check the mail. It's when I'm just getting out of my car. So I leave that in there. But yeah, and Ginger, like again, these tiny little things like I now just walk around with all I have is my phone and this tiny little magnetic thing that's attached. And even frankly, sometimes that's a little too big. And I just like hold the magnetic thing in my one pocket, my phone in my back pocket, and it fits perfectly in these shorts that I have again with my recreating my wardrobe.

51:21I got five pairs of these athletic shorts off Amazon and they're fantastic. And even like I optimize for like, Oh, how does my phone fit in the pocket? And it fits fantastic. So again, these are all silly things. And I suspect like somebody is rolling their eyes. They're like, Oh, this is what he's thinking about. Like, this is how, you know, Oh, poor me. Like my life is so difficult. Like, and I'm not arguing that I'm just saying, like, I'm just looking for these little improvements and like, what are just little tiny pain points in your life? And how can you look for like just a little workaround that you might not have thought of because you've done it this way forever.

51:54I've always carried my library card. I've always carried a key chain with seven different keys on it. And like, I don't need to do that anymore. Like the pool for my community here, like the pool's only open for a couple of months in the summer. I don't need to carry that key all year round. So I leave that on the same key chain with the library card. So it's just these little things. I love this. I think it ties back to what you said earlier in the episode, when I was talking about paying off my house and you said, well, yeah, this should be fun. And that's totally the reason that we're doing that.

52:27Like it is really fun because we haven't been at a place in our life where we've been able to do something like this before, where we've had enough extra that we could just throw it on the mortgage and that we could make that choice and that it could be for a goal that is really close, that we can really see. It is fun. And I think That's kind of what this community is all about, right? So even the small stuff, right? We're trying to have fun. Yes, we are trying to have fun. And yeah, Ginger, I guess kind of in closing, a fun thing that's going on kind of behind the scenes here at Chooseify is Jonathan, my old co-host here at Chooseify for the first five years, co-founder of Chooseify.

53:07He has been creating something really amazing at our website and hopefully will be an app pretty soon. And it's basically what we've always had these Facebook groups for, like the main Facebook group on Choose of I has, I forget, it's something like 120 ,000 people. And we have all of our local groups on Facebook. And that's been a source of frustration for a lot of people who frankly don't want to have anything to do with Facebook, never get notifications because Facebook throttles so many posts and such. And Jonathan's built what he's calling our Choose of I local platform. And it's really more than that, frankly, and it will become much more than that.

53:45but that's the easiest way to think about it right now. And we just passed 10 ,000 people who signed up for this. So it's still a tiny fraction of the 120 ,000 who have been on Facebook, but now that's naturally over eight plus years. But if you're listening to this and you have not signed up for it yet, we're not trying to sell anything. Of course it's free, just like everything at Chooseify. Just go to chooseify.com and right smack in the middle of the homepage, create your free account. Then there's login for the next time you wanna come back. And the cool thing Jonathan just created and literally just sent out as we're recording this, the first weekly digest.

54:20And what's neat is you'll get an email every single week and it will show all your local events and all the activity in all these threads of, hey, I posted in there. And these are the replies I got that I might not have seen. Like Jonathan is a wizard with technology and he's now able to personalize all these emails. So you're going to see what's going on in my Chooseify local group. And really my ask to you, if you're listening to this is if you haven't signed up and you're a part of the Chooseify community, now is the time to stand up and be involved and just literally sign up for this free account.

54:55And hopefully if you're not seeing any local events in your area, then you can stand up and create some. You can get in touch with the local admin of your local group who frankly, like, well, well, yeah, we've gotten in touch with the local admins. Like when they see that people are on this, they're going to be incentivized to get off of the Facebook group and come to the Choose a Vibe platform. And the cool thing is even in 2025, Ginger, and this sounds crazy, like email is the best way to get in touch with people, certainly people in our community. And when a Choose a Vibe local event is created in your area, you will get emailed.

55:32So you're not, again, beholden to the stupid Facebook algorithm where maybe you see 1 % of the events that are created, you get to see every single one and you can respond right there in your email. Jonathan created this so you can RSVP right there. You'll get reminder emails. Again, you'll get this weekly digest that'll tell you what's going on. Like you will never miss a local event ever again. And really now this is behavioral of like, we all need to make this a success. Jonathan built it and we need to create these events in the local group. So please admins, if you're listening to this and you don't know how to do this or need some help, just reach out to me.

56:12Feedback at choose a buy.com. If you are in a local group and you haven't had an event recently, like create one again, you could reach out to us. You could stand up and say, I want to be an admin. My local group has kind of gone dormant after COVID and whatnot. Like I want to stand up and be an admin, please. This is the time. So we have built it. We've built something that I'm, well, I haven't built anything. Jonathan's built it, but I'm really proud of this. And I think it's something really, really special. But at this point, we need you. We need you to get in there and comment on threads, create threads, ask questions.

56:46We're going to have a lot of ability to have our amazing friends and experts answer all the questions. It's going to be this flywheel where we're getting more really wonderful, involved questions about FI, about the journey, about different aspects, real estate and who knows health and wellness or sequence of returns. Like when you ask a question and you can get a world-class expert to answer it again, this flywheel of, we're going to get more questions come in. We're going to be able to send more of these out in this local digest. So you're going to see, Oh wow. Chad Carson answered this question on real estate or Carson answered this unsafe withdrawal rates.

57:22I'm promising this that, you know, I've spoken with them in passing, but Cody Garrett is going to answer tons of questions as a CFP. Like you're going to be able to get this. And like, there's something really special going on, Ginger. And we're at that inflection point where now's the time it's been built and we need people to come in and just get involved. And I think that's what the choose a by community has always been great at. And it's just been astonishing over the last eight years. And I've never seen a community like this. And, uh, I'm just really excited that we've finally been able to build something that, that is good enough for the five community.

57:56And not only is it good enough, I think this thing has huge potential. Yes. Brad, actually joining the new site has inspired me to go to my first meetup. Ooh. Yeah. We haven't even talked about that. So I do think because there is just, I just never went to the Facebook site for a lot of different reasons. And so I think for a lot of us, this can be a really clear, like now's the time, like Brad said. So hop on there and see what's going on in your local group. Oh, I love that. I absolutely love that. And yeah, it's just neat. I've seen so many of the local groups have just a ton of activity recently.

58:33And yeah, it's just great seeing a lot of these case studies. I know someone reached out to me the other day. He went to his first choose a by local group and it was actually the one that my brother runs in Wisconsin. And he's like, here's a picture of our group. You might recognize one of the people. And I'm like, oh, there's Scott. This is wild. So yeah, just really, really cool stuff. Yeah, I think the local groups have always been the heartbeat of Choose a Buy. And I think this is really gonna make a difference. So, all right, Ginger, as always, we never know where these roundups are gonna take us.

59:06I think this is a really fun conversation. I think we covered a lot of interesting things, food for thought for a lot of people to really just kind of look at their own lives and think about how does this impact me? All right, until next time, thanks for being part of the Choose a Buy community and thanks for listening. Thank you for listening to today's show and for being part of the Chooseify community. If you haven't already, the best ways to get involved are first, subscribe to the podcast. So you're listening to this on a podcast player, just hit subscribe and then subscribe to my weekly newsletter.

59:35I actually sit down every Monday and write this by hand and I send it out Tuesday morning. So just head over to chooseify.com slash subscribe and it's really, really easy to get on the newsletter list right there. And I would greatly appreciate it. It's the best way to get in touch with me. You can actually just hit reply to any of those emails and it comes directly to my inbox. So that's the way that I keep a pulse of the community and how we keep this the ultimate crowdsource personal finance show. And finally, if you're looking to join an in real life community, we have Chooseify local groups in 300 plus cities all around the world.

1:00:12So head to chooseify.com slash local and you'll find a list of all of those cities in 20 plus countries all across the world. And if you're just getting started with FI or you have a family member or a friend who you think would be interested, two easy ways. Choose a FI episode 100 is kind of our welcome to the FI community. And even though it's a couple years old at this point, it still stands up and it's a really great just starting point to get an understanding of what is financial independence? What are we doing here? Why are we looking to live a more intentional life where we save money and use it as a springboard to live a better life.

1:00:49And then Choose a Vi created a Financial Independence 101 course that's entirely free. Just head to choosefi.com slash fi101. And again, thanks for listening.