The State of the Housing Market and Why Real Estate Is Not AI-Proof with Jason Oppenheim

20:20It's not going to happen necessarily this year, but I think we're going to start seeing enormous job losses, and that's probably the biggest problem. And by the way, that is counter-deflationary, because I think we will then need to pay UBI. We'll need to be offering a universal, I wouldn't even say basic. I mean, it could be high income, it could be a service income, but also that'll be a lot less expensive, too. I mean, we'll give robots. I mean, homeless people, instead of spending$100 ,000 a year like we're doing now, you can get a robot for$30 ,000 that will cook, clean, and do many other things for people to provide services for them.

20:58So I'm generally optimistic. I think the quality of life for a lot of people is going to go way up, almost everyone. I really think that a person who's a poor person today in 10 or 15 years will be living like a wealthy person. or at least a wealthy person today. I actually think the quality of life will come together. I think the bottom is going to benefit the most because look at, I can get most of the things I want anyway, right now. If I want a Michelin star chef and I want to -

21:30Nicole Lapin:Yeah, but you're Jason Ovenack. I'm saying a person with money can get most of the things they want right now. But in 10 or 15 years, a person without that much money is going to have a maid, someone washing their car, someone doing their dishes, someone cooking for them, someone that's going to be able to handle their health care largely, babysit their kids. I mean, that quality of life, it's going to raise people's quality of life. I can afford that stuff right now, but it'll be, that will be, instead of costing me, for all that stuff, it could cost me maybe$400 ,000 or$500 ,000 to get all that stuff all day long.

22:02That could cost, in 10 years, that could cost$30 ,000.

22:06Nicole Lapin:Are you first in line for a robot? Not first, because I don't need to dick around with an early generation robot. But when they're able to clean and do dishes and wash my car and cook for me, I mean, the quality of what they're going to be able to do is going to be a 10. I mean, they're going to be the – my robot in five years will be the best chef on planet Earth. There's no human that will be able to cook as well as my robot. So I will have the best chef in the world. You'll have the best chef in the world. It'll be amazing. It'll be a therapist. It'll be a chef. It'll clean my house better than any maid could ever clean my house.

22:42It'll answer every question I have. It'll do everything.

22:44Nicole Lapin:So how are you putting your money where your mouth is around? Well, I'm heavily invested in Tesla and long-term bonds. Listen, nobody knows, but I mean, I'm definitely betting on deflation, and I'm betting on some of these AI companies doing quite well. Tesla's building robotics, and it has artificial intelligence, and there's a relationship to space and space is going to be the new frontier for energy. I mean, energy is going to be money and we're going to be launching data centers off of the moon in 20 years. I mean, we're not going to be getting, we're going to be getting energy from the sun and it's probably going to be coming from, you know, swarms of satellites collecting that and then microwaving it back to earth.

23:28You know, I sound crazy, but it's going to happen. I'm into it. But it's going to happen.

23:32Nicole Lapin:Is there, are you still big on the leverage treasuries too? Are you still in TMF? Yeah, I'm still, it's not doing well right now because of the war and oil prices. But yeah, in the long term, there's TLT, which is a non-leverage, there's TMF. Actually, I think it's a great time to get in it now because I think the war has caused some inflation with oil. So it's at like$35 a share. I mean, I honestly, I think it'll be double in within a couple of years. I really do. What are you buying now? Well, I'm buying a condo for myself, but not as an investment. I'm kind of tapped out on real estate. I own a lot of real estate.

24:08In LA? LA and Newport Beach.

24:10Nicole Lapin:That's where your condo is going to be? Well, I'll be living between Newport Beach and LA. I have a house in Newport Beach, and I have a condo in LA. I'll be going back and forth. I don't think that I would be investing in real estate right now. You can't make any money in LA because anything I'd be investing in would be eventually over$5 million. and the mansion tax would just wipe out too much profit. Also, I don't see the market going up considerably over the next few years. So I'm not really buying real estate. Well, there's a bunch of headlines and I know you love all these headlines that you're going to ask about.

24:41Nicole Lapin:They're always right. Which is that there's a new crisis housing bubble going on. No, no. Because sales have been down like 8.5%. Wait, so they're saying that there's a bubble and that it's going to burst? I mean, prices suck. Prices have been in the gutter for like five years. LA real estate, luxury real estate market's down over the last - $400K for median price. Well, I can't speak so much for the national average. I don't do real estate across the country. But the LA luxury real estate market, we're selling houses now for the same price they sold for eight, 10 years ago. And that's common right now.

25:16I mean, the luxury real estate market is basically at where it was eight to 10 years ago. No growth. That's terrible. I mean, it's not a bubble. It's the opposite.

25:25Nicole Lapin:It's a new type of bubble where you're not making money. Well, no, I don't understand that definition of bubble. Crisis. I thought a bubble was when something's going to pop. Scary, headlines, big. No, no, no. Then I think you're not using the term bubble in the way that we hear about it in real estate. Bubble is something that's going to pop and then prices are going to go down. And that's not going to happen. No, because prices suck right now. Prices have been going down for years. But what about an affordability crisis? What kind of crisis are we in? Give me a crisis. This is not going to be popular, but we're not in an affordability crisis in the way that you would normally define affordability.

26:01Everyone loves complaining about being in an affordability crisis. And yes, we're in a high interest rate crisis and an inflation crisis, so to speak. Not anymore. I mean, now inflation's in the twos. The idea that prices are still going up is nonsense. CPI, every acronym that measures inflation is in the twos. That's historically pretty average. Yeah, 3 % is average. Yeah, so 2 % to 3%. So we're closer to 2 % than we are. Who cares? We're in the 2 % to 3%. So inflation is no longer a concern. And like I said, I'm a big believer in deflation coming up. But we've had a lot of inflation in the last few years.

26:38When people talk about affordability, they should be talking about rent, not purchase. Because purchase price has everything to do with interest rates. So it's nonsense to say we have an affordability crisis if you're talking about interest rates. You could say we have an interest rate. Interest rates are up, sure. To say that an affordability crisis is directly related to interest rates, then what? When interest rates go down in a few years and we fix the affordability crisis? That's nonsense. That definition is stupid.

27:04Nicole Lapin:I don't think it has to do with interest rates. I think it has to do with income. Incomes have been going up considerably on average over the last few years. No, no. The income gap has increased dramatically. Well, income gap is not an affordability. It used to be 3x your income to get. a house and now it's six x that's because of interest rates that's an interest rate problem not enough it's a it's also a wage problem when you're thinking about rentals no it's not let me get into rental you would have single digit increases in wages but double digit for rent rents are not rents are not higher i will i'll square it right now i will do the unpopular and i will teach people uh why they're wrong and i'll get all the comments come in you can hate me as much as you want.

27:48But let's put aside purchasing, okay? Because obviously when interest rates are high, it's going to take more of your income to purchase a house. That's an interest rate problem. It's not an affordability problem. Affordability should be about rent, okay? Because that's not so much related to interest rates. If you do an analysis of what it costs to rent a 1 ,000, and I've done this deep dive. So just, you can -

28:17Nicole Lapin:I heard you and your brother spent 30 minutes with Chachi between this. So encourage people to do it on their own. If you look at what it costs in the similar location over the last 75 years, pick a, I don't know, a location. I mean, I'll just say Merced or Pasadena. I don't give a shit what location. It doesn't really matter. But it's important that you apply apples to apples. If you pick a location and you track the cost of renting a 1 ,000-square-foot two-bedroom with similar amenities over the last 75 years, it has unbelievably similarly tracked the percentage of median income over the last 75 years, within 1%.

29:01I mean, it's astronomically close over a 75-year term. So there's no affordability crisis in that sense. It costs the same. Now, why does it feel like there's an affordability crisis? For a multitude of different reasons. One, yes, purchasing has become astronomically more expensive because of interest rates. It's not affordability, it's interest rates.

29:24Nicole Lapin:But interest rates used to be 15 or 20%. My only point is it doesn't do the discussion of service if you call a high interest rate environment an affordability crisis. It's not. I mean, you're not moving the ball for it because do you fix an affordability crisis when interest rates go down? No. Affordability should be about rents. It should be about the cost of goods that you need to buy and then rents. If you want to talk about the cost to purchase a house, I agree. It's more expensive because of interest rates. Everyone knows that. There's 26 % of first-time homebuyers in the market versus historically 40%.

29:58I just want to divorce the definition of affordability to purchasing a house because I consider that solely related to interest rates. So let's put that aside. Yes, interest rates are two to three times higher as they were five years ago. So the cost is going to be significantly higher. I agree with that. And when interest rates go down, it's going to cost a lot less of your income. I don't think we should attach the word affordability to that. I really want to focus on rent. So here's why people think that rents have gone up, because they're not applying apples to apples. They go, oh, my parents lived on, we're making this, and they lived in this apartment, and they could afford it, and they could have, yes.

30:34I bet you that your parents lived in an apartment that you wouldn't be willing to live in. I bet you that your parents' apartment was 700 square feet. I bet you that it didn't have a pool. I bet you that it didn't have appliances. I bet you that it didn't have a washer and dryer. I bet you that it wasn't in the middle of town. It wasn't in West Hollywood. It was probably out in like my parents lived in a place in Sebastopol. Nobody knows where that is. Exactly right. It was two hours away. So people don't compare apples to apples. What people say is, oh, well, I want to live in a two-bedroom that's new and has all these appliances and has a gym and has a pool and it's located in the middle of West Hollywood.

31:10By the way, it's 1 ,800 square feet and it's$2 ,800 and that's a lot of money. Yes, if you compare that to what your parents lived in, that's way more – it's going to cost you a lot more of your income. but the size of apartments has gone up astronomically over the last 30 years so we're not comparing apples to apples anymore what you get when you get an apartment has you're getting a lot more services and amenities than you ever did before because they're just offering more saunas and pools and appliances yeah sure i mean sometimes but you're saying we're all security whatever we become fancier our demands have become higher and more importantly people want up until the last few years, have been wanting to live in the city where things are more expensive.

32:01Nicole Lapin:20 years ago, 50 years ago, the percentage of people living in the city was much less. So cost of rentals was less. My only point here is that if you do compare apples to apples and you do a fair analysis of what it would cost, of what your parents were living in, and you take that 1 ,000 square foot apartment with the same amenities in the same location, It costs the same amount of percentage of your income. I'm super surprised that you say this because people come for me so hard when I say that renting is not throwing away money. It's not at all. I never understood that argument that buying and first of all, renting is, I would argue, is throwing away less money than buying.

32:46Nicole Lapin:Well, because you throw away money somewhere. You give the bank interest. Yeah, you're either giving it to interest or you're giving it to your landlord. Why don't you just call the bank president your landlord? And then it's the same thing. It just doesn't make sense. I've never understood that. Throwing away money. I really don't. In fact, when you buy, you're tied down. So you actually have less physical mobility because you now have to... If you want to move when you're renting, you don't have commissions. You don't have transfer taxes. You don't have to move all the furniture and goods. I mean, you could be renting a furnished place.

33:23You're much more mobile. That is inherently valuable.

33:26Nicole Lapin:Valuable, yeah, in a different way. And it costs less to rent right now than it does to buy because interest rates are higher. So yeah, I never understood that. I'm a big believer in renting. There's a psychological pride of ownership. But if you just look at it financially, no, renting makes more sense than buying and always has. unless you think that the market is going to appreciate and then buying makes more sense. That's the only reason that you would buy from a purely financial perspective is if you want to leverage your loan because you think that there's going to be market appreciation.

34:05And historically, there has been market appreciation.

34:09Nicole Lapin:But not as much as the stock market. You would be better off buying a house if you think that real estate is going to appreciate even 5 % a year. Even if you thought the stock market was going to appreciate 7 % a year and the real estate was only going to appreciate 5 % a year, then you're better off buying. There are a lot of people. I'd say just about everyone. I'd say 90 % of my clients would have been better off renting for the last 10 years than buying. Why? Because they're making no money because the market's back to where it was 8, 10 years ago. And they didn't have the mobility. they had all the problems with fixing up the house and the stress of fixing up the house and they didn't and they have to pay commissions to me they have to pay property taxes they have to pay the mansion tax so they would have been better off renting for the last eight years i mean that's just a fact this is a financial fact it's crazy that you're saying that as a real estate guy i mean because it's just honest sitting there not with their feet on the table but arguing with me no about how wrong i was no you're not wrong at all i'm irresponsible i think a lot I think a lot of real estate agents just push the narrative that they think benefits them.

35:15I think just honesty benefits everyone in the long run.

35:18Nicole Lapin:But you don't say this stuff on Selling Sunset. Well, we don't get into this stuff on Selling Sunset. Glorifying, glamorizing buying houses. Well, there's something very glamorous and sexy and rewarding and fun about buying a house. But I'm just talking to you financially. Can we do renting Sunset? By the way, I've made a lot of money buying homes and renting them out long term. I'm not suggesting that you can't make a lot of money in real estate. But if you don't think the market's going to appreciate, then you're better off renting. And I don't think the market's going to appreciate anytime soon.

35:50And it certainly hasn't been appreciating the last few years. So for the last few years, especially in a high interest rate environment, it usually makes sense to rent. I mean, I've been renting for the last three years.

36:00Nicole Lapin:Can we have a spinoff? Of the Selling Sunset spinoff? Renting Sunset? Yes. Fine. It might not get as many viewers, but OK. I mean, why does it get so many viewers? We've had Emma here. We've had Mary here. Like, these women are smoking hot. Obviously, not all the agents that you hire are Emma. But like, oh, my God, is she real? Yeah. There's a lot of beautiful – Emma's stunning, and there are a lot of stunningly beautiful women at the brokerage on and off the show. The brokerage, I think largely because of the show, has attracted tons of women. We're like 85 % women. We started a commercial division that is so far largely men, although I really did tell the guy I really would like to bring in a lot of female commercial agents.

36:50But yeah, we're just a very female-driven brokerage, which is fun. I think it's great.

36:56Nicole Lapin:Oh, Polly was here too? Like next level, like unreal. Oh, yeah. No, I know. Do you think, though, honestly, in sales, being attractive? Of course. Of course. I think being attractive probably helps in 99 % of professions. Do you think it will continue for how many more seasons? You guys are on nine? Ten will be the next one. We've had nine. Nine came out. My hope and expectation is a lot more seasons. Honestly, I enjoy it. And I don't take it for granted either. It's done so much for me. It's done so much for the business. I love it. I really do love it. I've really just come to love it and appreciate it more and more.

37:36Nicole Lapin:It looks like you guys are having fun. Most of the time. Most of the time. I mean, the drama is taxing, truly. Is it real drama, though? Or is it like reality? No, unfortunately, it's all real. And that's what's taxing and stressful. But I have kind of allowed myself to not get as caught up and not feel that I need to solve problems. And I've come to realize that what I think is stressful today will end up being okay in six months. It usually is. So I kind of resigned to just a more like laissez-faire approach to it. And it's really worked. Trying to use financial terms for you. Oh, thank you so much.

38:17Nicole Lapin:Is Christine coming back? Christine Quinn? I can't, you know, I can't like confirm anything. Just between us. Oh, is it just between us? I respect my contractual obligations. I appreciate that. Where are you on your scale of happiness? I've heard you talk about checking in on a scale of 1 to 10. Yeah, it varies. I say I float between a 7 and a 9, which is great. I mean, I'm in a pretty great place. I mean, honestly, everything in my life is amazing. I have like an appreciation list in my phone that I try to go through and remind myself. Because a lot of happiness is just your perception and your appreciation.

38:57I mean, I was really happy. I've been really happy most of my life. But let's say when I was 20. I was a really happy guy when I was 20. I didn't have that much money. I was driving like an old 1969 Camaro that I kind of built myself. I was eating at the Roach Coach, like the little burritos, and splitting Subway sandwiches with my brother, and wearing a wife beater and working on my car, and a waiter with my buddies at Macaroni Grill. And I was really happy, really happy. I don't know if I'm any happier today than I was then. So I think happiness is, no, it doesn't mean that like money and -

39:35Nicole Lapin:So money doesn't buy happiness? Well, it does help a lot. It does help a lot because it removes the financial stress. I didn't have financial stress back then because I didn't have any needs. not needing things, not wanting things, and not needing things is really powerful. And yeah, of course money, you're more likely to be happy if you have money, but you can't just directly buy it. It certainly helps. It can put you in the right environment to be happy, but there are a lot of unhappy wealthy people. And there are a lot of really happy people that aren't wealthy. Yeah, I think it's more a question of appreciating your circumstances.

40:15I mean, honestly, I have got great friends and I've got a great dog and I got, and I go into the office with great people and I've got a healthy family and I'm healthy.

40:26Nicole Lapin:Is that what's on your list? Yeah. I mean, health is the biggest one. I mean, really, if you, you, you are having a good day, if you wake up healthy and the people that you love are healthy and that's just a, you're starting your day off really, really, really well. And you're not in like some labor camp or in some suppressed society. If you wake up in California under the sun and you're healthy, I mean, that's a nine. You're at least a nine right there. And if you don't see that, then that's on you. I mean, you just had your car stolen from your office. I did have my car stolen. Did that bring you down?

40:58No. No, I don't get unhappy over material things. Material things can make me happy. They don't make me unhappy. So if I buy something and my Rolls Royce made me happy, when it got stolen, I wasn't unhappy. Yeah, it's either up or even, I think, on material things. I don't get super attached. I mean, it's a car.

41:20Nicole Lapin:But you spend. Like, you're a spender. Well, I have insurance for it. Otherwise, I would be much more unhappy. Generally, outside of even the car. Oh, yeah. Money, for me, is meant to be spent. Like, how much of what you're bringing in do you spend? or do you just like baffo yolo? I would have a hard time spending everything I made. So I spend a lot and I still, my net worth goes up. Maybe not this year because my stocks are getting shellacked. But yeah, generally I don't stress about money and I certainly don't stress about spending things. Also spending, you don't lose all the money when you spend it.

42:04You buy a nice watch or you buy a nice car. You don't lose all of it. I don't look at buying a Rolls Royce, for example, as spending$400 ,000 or$500 ,000. I look at it as spending$100 ,000 because I'll sell it and I'll lose$100 ,000. If I buy a watch for$100 ,000, I don't look at spending$100 ,000. I look at spending$20 ,000. I'll probably lose$20 ,000 on it.

42:24Nicole Lapin:If you had kids, would you think about it differently? Yeah, to some degree. I don't know if I would change that much. I still want to take care of myself. I have enough money to take care of my kids and do the things I want to make me happy. Do you have a number, like an FU number? Oh, my FU number was passed a long time ago. I mean, it wasn't that long ago that I was living in an apartment with my buddy. Maybe this was actually at this point probably 10 or 15 years ago. 15 years ago. And we were thinking if we could each make$10 ,000 a month, then we made it. I mean, that's just a high quality of life.

43:01That was my FU. It was$10 ,000 a month. $120 ,000 a year,$10 ,000 a month. We decided that that was F you. I'm good. I'm living a very good quality of life at$10 ,000 a month. So I passed my F you money quite a while ago.

43:19Nicole Lapin:And you never changed it? No, no. I'm not a financially goal-oriented person. I want to just live a high quality of life, take care of my friends, take care of my family, and do what I want to do. I don't really have particular financial goals. Never had, really. Except for that one. Honestly, the only financial goal I think that I can remember having is the$10 ,000 a month. And so everything else has been icing ever since. Can we play our game called Secure the Bag? Sure. You have to teach me how to play it. You have to. It's a light bag. Get in there. Pick a paper. Have you ever been ghosted by someone who owes you money?

43:57Nicole Lapin:Have you ever lent somebody money? Oh, yeah. I've lent dozens of people money. There are people when you lend them money that you think you may or may not get it back. I would never lend money to anyone if I wasn't okay not getting it back. And in 90 % of cases, I get it back because there's a reason why I'm lending it. I'm more than happy to do it. And it's fine. There are instances where I lent money to people that I was pretty sure I wasn't going to get it back. And that's happened. And that's never bothered me at all. So I wouldn't say ghosted. I wouldn't say ghosted because I wouldn't – I'm not going to chase someone down.

44:38If they can't pay me back, then I'm just going to take the L. And I should have known that going in.

44:42Nicole Lapin:Yeah. So I wouldn't say they ghost me. I don't even – Maybe this is actually a good opportunity to educate about how bonds work because the riskier the person or the country or the company, the more interest rate you get back because there's more – Yeah, that's a good point. The more risk, the more reward. You wouldn't get it back. But you're not charging interest rates, obviously, to friends. 90 % of the time, no. But if it's like a structured business thing, then yes. But no, my friends and family and shit like that, obviously no. I have in a couple of cases recently, I won't be specific, but lent somebody to help them with a down payment.

45:19And so I'm charging a 5 % interest on that. But yeah, 90 % of the time. Which is less than the bank. Well, yeah. I mean, I'm just, I'm not really doing it for the 5%, but it's just that person, you know, I'm not giving away free money because people should be understanding the cost of capital. But yeah, I'm not trying to like, you know, squeeze an extra one or 2 % out of it.

45:44Nicole Lapin:Makes sense. Yeah. I mean, the adage is like, you lend a friend money. I've lent clients money all the time. But I protect it with a, you know, with a note and it's never not worked out. In fact, I loan money to clients probably dozens of times. We have a concierge service where we just front the money, interest-free. I don't even want to deal with the interest. They have a house, a$4 million house. It needs$20 ,000 worth of work. I just pay for everything, and then I get it back when it sells. I'm not going to bank Jason. I think that's a part of just being a luxury real estate agent. You can front the money and get the work done, and then you get it back.

46:21Nicole Lapin:never been burnt not once i've never met a real estate agent well i think we're the only ones that do that who wants to give me money okay yeah well it's it's just what am i charge you no it doesn't make sense i just offer it to every single client now if a client has a two million dollar house and wants to do 150 000 remodel no i'm not and i'm not interested in that but if it's 20 i mean we just finished a house up up in the hollywood hills here where it was even a wealthy guy but i'm like let me just i'll do it all and then we did you know we do the just probably 20 30 grand staging cleaning it up fixing the pool landscaping painting you know whatever and yeah so we just it's like an investment for yeah yeah i don't know why i'm gonna get it back i'm gonna sell the house if anything you know it's more likely i sell the house so it's kind of an investment in my in my My own success.

47:17All right.

47:17Nicole Lapin:So I'll hit you up. If you want to sell your house, you can gladly hit me up. I will fix your house up for you. Thank you so much. Because then you'll clean the poop. We have a dog. I prefer not to clean the poop. But if I'm about to show it and there's poop, I will clean the poop. Have you ever felt guilty for making more money than someone you love? No. Plus, I'm extremely generous with the people I love. So they love that I do well. and by the way there's nothing more enjoyable with money than spending it on the people that you love i find i get no more happiness i don't think i have well i don't want to sound like i'm bragging but i enjoy it very much what's a cheap habit you'll never give up no matter how wealthy you are oh my well ex-girlfriend now but she still does this for me cooks me slops which is my favorite meal it's just a plate of rice with marinara sauce and then ground up you know meat like ground up beef and it's i go over there like once a week we watch a a show together and she cooks me slops i if i got poor again i'm not that mad at it because i would just eat slops like five nights a week that's like your ramen slops is so much better try it and you put some crushed red pepper on it oh my god it's good she is almost annoyed at how often i ask for it because that's all i want it's all i want when i go over there and she's a good cook but i just want her to cook slops every time i go over there my cheap habit i have so many i'll order postmates or doordash a lot but like i love a bogo what's a bogo a buy one get one i love a bogo deal oh wow if i saw a bogo it would be a red flag for me that it's not good interesting yeah you don't get quality in a bogo i'm a quality guy i'll pay okay mr slops guy oh fair that's fair actually but i do like if i'm gonna get a steak i'll you know i'm not gonna get what i buy one steak get one sure i don't know i had delicious bogo banana bread so can i just digress here and i was just gonna say the great white banana bread it's the best banana bread i've ever had in my life it was the bogo Oh, come on.

49:34Nicole Lapin:It was a bogo. Well, now I'm eating my words. How did you get a free banana bread at Great White? On the app. Oh, wow. There's a special, a bogo from Great White. Can we just tell the audience that there's no better banana bread on planet Earth, probably even in the solar system or galaxy? There's whipped honey butter with it. Yes, I know. Two of them came. I go like probably twice a week to get it. Well, if you go on an app, you'll get a bogo. Ask for it to be extra. Well, I'm going to push back on getting it to go. Because the best part about it is when it comes off warm and crispy. It's warm because we live near Great White.

50:07You need to go to Great White and you need to get it fresh with the butter literally melting onto it and the crispy edges that are still. My brother and I literally fight to rip off the edges and eat the crispy edges. The edges are delicious. All we see is the center of the sitting here.

50:19Nicole Lapin:That's how it comes to my house with an extra one. I don't believe that it's like Din Tai Fung. You've got to go to Din Tai Fung. You can't get that dumpling that's not perfectly hot at your, although I did have Din Tai Fung last night. but from postmates but no don't don't don't ruin the the banana bread experience go to go get it in person when it comes out hot and crispy i'm adamant about this you're not you can't you can't do that you lost this argument but yeah i did lose the argument have you ever googled your net worth yeah yeah of course there's not a i don't think there's a well what does it say 50 million is that accurate ish i guess so i guess it's reasonably accurate although the interesting thing is it's been at 50 million for like 10 years i'm like do these people not think that i've ever made a dollar in the last 10 years it's really right inflation just put it at least bacon inflation into my network honestly it's weird you i've no never should we do it right now can you yeah never i don't think anyone cares oh i've googled myself a lot i google myself to see what articles are out there or if i get caught you know by tmz or something i'll go out and the next day.

51:22Oh, I Google myself quite often just to kind of see what articles are out. Yeah. It's kind of fun.

51:27Nicole Lapin:Does it upset you? I don't get upset by much. Like, do you read comments? No, I don't read comments. That would probably upset me. I just don't read comments. You never have or you've had to? Pretty much. I mean, in the last 10 years, there have been millions of comments probably, I imagine, about me or the show or whatever. No, maybe a couple dozen. I mean, maybe one time I got bored and I just looked real quick. But generally, no. Do you have Google Alerts set up? No. I have them and then I put them in a separate folder. Yes, I do have a Google Alert. I got an email. Yes, I do. I'm sorry. I do.

51:58Nicole Lapin:That's efficient. I'm going to guess. So Morgan's Googling my net worth right now. But I'm going to guess that it's not out there because nobody cares. Well, no. They'll all make it up probably. I guess it'll say it's going to say like 2 million. And yours is 50? Okay. No, I'm just saying. Is that going to be easy, right? That's exactly what I'm saying. Did you Google my net worth before you came? I've Googled people's net worth. It's just like the million. If you're successful, they're going to just throw two million at you. Yeah. It's not that accurate. But I do all the time. I want to know, especially clients.

52:28I'm like, oh, this football player. Let's see. What's his net worth? I mean, listen, it's usually off. It's fun.

52:34Nicole Lapin:Slightly suspicious that you guessed exactly what mine was. Oh, no. It's just because I've Googled a lot of people's net worth. It's always two million. Okay, you're done with the game. No, I like this game. do you negotiate or do you get awkward and just pay that's interesting like with contractors yeah 90 percent of time i'm happy to pay full price because i think that that person's going to appreciate the difference more than me that's kind of like a you know utilitarian approach but if it's something meaningful like if it's if i'm buying the rolls royce you know and i want to try to negotiate fifteen thousand dollars yes i'm going to negotiate the larger items i don't negotiate smaller things.

53:11Nicole Lapin:You can negotiate a Rolls Royce. If you're buying it at a dealer, yeah. You can negotiate everything, really. When you buy a new car, you can negotiate it, yeah. But I thought that the quota cars, like the Ferraris of the world, are not negotiable. Rolls Royce was one year old, and I bought it at the Beverly Hills dealership. And I looked online for a while and compared pricing. And also, my insurance is going to try to pay me out, and I'm going to negotiate that. I'm going to ask for more. I mean, on macro items, yeah, it's worth my time. But if somebody is asking me for, I'm going to, you know, whatever, I'm at some store and they want like 150 bucks, I'm not going to negotiate that.

53:51I want them to have, they're a small business. I never negotiate small stuff. And it's also depending on the business. If it's a small business, I'm never going to negotiate. If it's a valet, you don't negotiate valet. Well, yeah, you do. Sometimes I pull up in front and they're like, oh, 50 bucks to park up here. I'm like, okay you know i'm not going to say oh 40 bucks but you know he'll use that money better than i will but larger things with larger corporations 100 wealthy people yeah and corporations i'm going to negotiate against them for sure they don't need the money any more than i do do you feel like it's sport like to win no i just want to feel like i'm getting a fair prize i'm not not it's not a sport for me i just want to sport for me it's my only cardio i don't get off on it I just want to be treated fairly.

54:33What's the most expensive mistake? I haven't made that many mistakes.

54:36Nicole Lapin:You don't make mistakes. You don't make mistakes. I don't really make mistakes that often. No. What? I don't really make mistakes that often. I can't think of a big mistake that I've made. Socially or professionally or financially. Really. I mean, maybe I've made a couple small. But whatever. Nothing like that pops up. Like an investment, a relationship. No, I've never regretted a relationship. I mean, of course you can say you've regretted some investments and some not. But I mean, overall, I've been a huge winner in investments. So I've been very happy with my investment strategy. But I'm risky because some don't do well.

55:12I think I shorted gold. Oh, you know what it is? Sometimes I wish I'd held investments. So when Netflix and Facebook dropped to like nothing a few years ago, I bought like a million dollars of each. And they would be like$4 million each right now. But I was a little bitch and I sold. I got nervous and I sold.

55:31Nicole Lapin:You didn't lose money, though. No, I didn't lose money, but I could have made millions. I lost potential. You're mourning your paper gains. I'm mourning my paper gains. Those are just as real as a loss. That's illegal at Money Reef. We're not allowed to do that. That's silly. Why is that any sillier than losing money? The lost opportunity is just as valuable as lost money. I mean, it's all the same. So you made money. Intellectually. A lot of money. I left millions of dollars on the table. That's no different than losing millions of dollars. Yeah, but how do you predict when the high is going to be?

56:01Nicole Lapin:I know. So I'm not mad at my – I mean, it just is what it is. Yeah. I mean, I don't stress out over investments. I'm not ever going to invest in anything that's going to stress me out. I'm not going to take those kind of risks. Has money ever ruined one of your relationships? No, it's only helped. I don't think any girl has ever been like, oh, my God, you're doing too many nice things for me. Come on. I'm going to rewrite these. Okay. What would you say a question should be? No. What's the most important financial question? What's the question I should have asked you but didn't? I think that people think that a certain amount of money is going to make them happy.

56:32I think what is more enjoyable is the slow struggle towards success. That is way more enjoyable. Even arguably more enjoyable than being successful. I think the most fun aspect of success is the slow climb. Every year, the grinding and moving towards a goal and seeing yourself become more successful and you're bringing up your friends with you and employees and that kind of joint struggle towards success is so enjoyable. It's so rewarding. I think that is way more fun than just being successful. That's why probably a lot of trust fund kids probably are a lot less happy than the people that are a lot less wealthy but are grinding towards success.

57:18I mean, the process is, you have to enjoy the process. And I think that that's the most fun.

57:25Nicole Lapin:Yeah, because there's a goal fallacy once you hit one goal. Absolutely. That's why I don't do goals. That's why I don't do goals. Now you're just opt out of. Well, because it's the process that's the fun part. It's definitely the process. And the enjoyment of the success. I don't know why people just throw a bunch of money. I guess if you have kids, you want to leave a legacy. But come on. Your kids don't need$50 million. I mean, if you have some money, you should just be spending the shit out of it. And do it on your kids too. I mean, and your friends. I mean, why not? You should be, I don't know.

58:01I really, really think that, especially now with AI creating, where things are going to be so cheap in the future, spend your money now.

58:10Nicole Lapin:Why wouldn't you spend it when it was cheaper? Well, I mean, just start enjoying it because you're not going to be needing it much in the future. I really don't think you're going to be needing it. You're still going to need first class flights and things like that are going to be, you know, still going to have to spend money. Travel will still be expensive. Although it'll all be, I mean, we won't have human, you know, pilots and stewardesses probably in 15 years. So that'll be a lot cheaper. Or stewards. Or whatever you call them. Come on, Jason. Fire up your chopper to Orange County. No. No, after cooking.

58:44Nicole Lapin:Choppers, I don't like choppers. That makes me, I just sweat the whole time. Not a chopper guy. Are you scared of flying? I don't love being in a chopper. Or a private jet? Yeah, I don't love being in a private jet either. I prefer a larger. It has to be a really large private jet or I'll prefer commercial. I don't like the rocky, you know. Although I do fly JSX, which is pretty small. Although I've had some pretty rough experiences in JSX. So, yeah, I don't like small and I don't like choppers. I'll do a chopper if it saves me a ton of time. But I just I swear I just I'm stressed out the whole time.

59:17Nicole Lapin:Well, I'm sure you're into like the tunnels that Elon's building that will get us a boring company. I don't know. I think I'll just wait. I just I'm really looking forward to autonomous vehicles. I want my autonomous sprinter van. What do you mean? I have an autonomous Tesla. Yeah, but you have to be there. I want to be able to relax, watch TV, chill out and have no risk of an accident and just have my little cold soda right here. and my big-ass TV and my massaging chair. And there's one other chair next to me, and it just drives me perfectly smoothly. No slamming on the brakes, no risk of an accident.

59:55That, I'm looking forward to that. We're just a few years away from that.

59:59Nicole Lapin:Utopia, here we come, Jason. By the way, we're also going to all have our own drivers. We're all going to have our own chauffeurs in five years. We're going to need drivers. That's my point. My daughter's one years old. She's never going to learn how to drive. That's my point. I'm just talking about the quality of life for people is going to go up so much. We're not just going to have Michelin star chefs. We're going to all have our own autonomous chauffeurs. It's good life coming up.