A surprise mailbag! July 14, 2023

0:28A listener production. Ask and answer them. I'm going to make him answer them, actually, because it's easy when I ask the questions. I get to ask him the hard ones. He, of course, is Andrew Page Esquire. Mr. Page, how are you, sir? Yeah, really good. Really good. It's Sunday? What's going on? Yeah, it threw me there. But it's great that we got so many questions and some really good ones, too. Such good questions. Give the people what they want. Exactly. Well, let's do that. All right. Well, let's choose the Australian. Yeah. All right. Let's dive in. here's one from peter who actually oh well you say good questions i think you said good questions because you know the first one's gonna be about property i'm not sure um i didn't go on oh i know i'm i'm now regretting our choice of a special friday mail magazine is it too late to change no come on don't tease me hit me with it you don't get too much of a chance to rant but i'm sure you'll enjoy it anyway peter says stop me morning guys i'm just wondering why everyone seems to quote real estate auction results why don't they mention private treaty sales which i believe are at least triple the level of sales of auctions and it's kind of a question that is on one hand a very well it's a one-line answer but it's also what i liked about this one mate is it kind of talks to some of the psychology behind what we do so before i go into my answer and cover that stuff i'm going to ask you why do we care about auction sales mate i don't have a good answer actually i wasn't i was not aware yeah i was not aware of there was such a stark contrast between private treaty and and auctions so that's that's surprising i just uh anecdotally had assumed that that auctions most people sold um through auctions was my way working hypothesis i don't now that i'm saying that out loud i don't know if i've got any really good data to sort of base that on and that's why i love this question because it is it gives you it just it creates that impression right they're talking about it so it must matter that's almost almost the starting point yeah well is well what's the answer is the answer that they one one amount of data is more just readily collated and distributed or something like that or yeah i don't know for sure either i have to say uh but i i have a very strong suspicion that's exactly what it so there's he there's i'll go i'll go there's i'll put it out two stars in my mouth at the same time here there is none of this data is absolute anyway right the sheer number of stars you've seen this before the number of trades on the australian property market in a given weekend are tiny tiny tiny same with shares by the way when we say how did bhp shares go today we really say what did the few people who bought the few people who sold agree to pay rather than what does everybody who owns bhp shares think this company is worth it's just literally the trades on the day that matter and so auction results it is the trades on the day that matter on one hand what else do you use and i think there's some value in that question we need to remember it's not particularly necessarily accurate or even descriptive.

3:27Like most things, you and I have talked about monetary policy before, we disagree on it. But what we do agree on is it's the direction of the change that's more useful than the absolute number. And I think when it comes to auctions, it's all on a single day. It's reasonably transparent in terms of properties are sold on the market and in auction in front of other people and recorded on the day um it's a single point in time which data people love because it gets you can collect it all on a saturday and say right on saturday we have the auctions here's what happened this weekend all in one point rather than well there were some houses on the south some sold on monday some sold on tuesday somebody on the market for a week some for a month some for six months uh some sold so-called off market never actually you know we're advertised they just found a buyer for them how do you collate all that and kind of come up with something indicative and descriptive i think it's really hard to do so i I don't think it's a problem or it's even a bad thing that they do it that way.

4:20But I do think, and this is what I liked about Peter's question, is people look at it and say, oh, obviously that's a thing because that's a thing because that's a thing. As you just said, good question. I don't know why. We all just assume we all talk about it every week. Does it matter? Is it representative? I'm not sure. We assume it must be. As I said, I think far more importantly than is it representative is just if the trend is representative. And it probably is because if you're in the market, you can buy your house you know you buy a house that's for sale you buy a house that's at auction generally speaking they're going to be reasonably similarly not priced but similarly impacted by the the demand and supply story of the markets it's probably reasonably indicative so i like that i also wanted to take the chance to i think i've told the story before mate i can't remember if i have then feel free to stop me or just let me ramble on one of the two have a snooze go get a coffee i was on i was at sky news business when back before osbears when sky news business was a thing and we're talking about management estimates and i said i think it was on air but it might have been you know the break uh i said i said look i never use management estimates anyway because they're always unreliable and not very useful and you know it's you got to be a little bit careful and this guy who was on the panel with me looked at me straight in the eye and said well what else do i put in my spreadsheet and it was kind of the idea of like because it exists it's better than something it doesn't exist because i get to pretend there's some certainty and he wasn't him pretending he was i'm i'm 99 and a half century was genuinely serious like if i didn't get management's numbers then how could i possibly do my spreadsheet now my answer would have been either don't do the spreadsheet or if that's literally what you're relying on to do everything you're doing and management's regularly wrong or they fudge the numbers or they you know do silly things to try and get the numbers if they're going to miss which wrecks the long-term future all those things that are problematic with with management earnings estimates and and market own estimates this guy was like well i know what's wrong but what else would i use which just blew my mind and still i still i still think of that every frankly more often than i should it's like but but you know what's wrong with use it because it's there that that was literally and i don't there was no irony in his his reply i'm absolutely sure he did it because it was better than nothing right in theory i would argue it's worse than nothing because you you know you're willing you're you're thinking independently that could be one way to do it exactly you're willfully allowing yourself to be misled in one direction or other anyway but i like that that's what i like about peter's question mate because it's the thing that's there it's availability bias and the absence of that what else do we think about the property market how shower house what a house probably i don't know well there's a number over there good let's grab that number because then i can answer the question confidently or even for myself not even talking heads just people in general you know i've got a house my house is worth x dollars or i think it is has it gone up or down recently i don't know the auction numbers say up okay that's good then yeah we just like to have something in the absence of you know nature abhors a vacuum uh but probably no more and probably a whole lot less than the humans or a vacuum when it comes to the things we want to know go on it's friday morning friday afternoon uh some would say maybe that's uh the basis of some religions but i'm not gonna give you more people well yeah there is but there is some concept of you know i don't know what what how some of those happen why did why did this thing happen why did the crop fail what did the house catch on fire i can't explain it i needed an explanation i think it's kind of the same thing yeah no i think i think there's a lot to be said for that i am always struck by the opacity of the property market.

7:35It is, I mean, we are so lucky in the share market. There is so many rules of what must be disclosed. I can see exactly where all the buyers are lined up right now, where all the sellers are. I don't, you know, all this price withheld nonsense and, you know, all the vendor bid rubbish. And just like the whole auction process through the disclosure of information is just, it's just muddy and it's very, Well, I'll be a conspiracy theorist. It's very much done that way because the middlemen, the real estate agents love it that way, right? Because that gives you the informational edge that you need.

8:11So, yeah, I am struck by that. I also think, too, that just like with the share market, there is danger in speaking at too aggregated a level. Yeah, totally. I mean, you know, a one bedroom falling down place out in the back of nowhere is very different to a beautiful harborside mansion. You know, they all get sort of lumped in together. There are different markets. There are different assets that are all there. And so sometimes a lot of, I think a lot of nuance is lost within all of that. And I find it depressing, frankly, that we have so over-financialized these piles of bricks and mortar that we almost need the market to tell us what it's worth.

8:53And what I mean by that is that, and Buffett talks about this a lot. Who cares? Pretend the market's going to close for 10 years. Would you still buy the share, right? What's he getting at there? It's like, well, he's getting at the fact that there is value, inherent value in holding this asset. I don't need someone to come and give me, like to take it off my hands for me to realize value. Just holding the damn thing is incredibly valuable because of the cash flow it delivers to me. Now, in any kind of sane world, that's what, in fact, for all of history, That was what the great thing about property investing was.

9:24Overall capital was more or less preserved in real terms. It really didn't grow that much. But who cares if I can't sell it? Because I get this wonderful stream of income that comes off the rest of it. And so because the income side of things is negligible at this point in time, again, in real terms, in net terms, that's probably negative for about, I think, 40 % of investors, something like that. it's just a shame I suppose that these very basic human right assets you know shelter has come to a point where it's just you know it is a bit of a speculative dimension to it. So I want to ask you then just a bit of an aside but as a bit of a tangent as well on one hand you kind of said why are they hiding obfuscating these numbers you know why aren't they being transparent with these numbers on the other hand we say well let the market close for 10 years I'm not saying you're wrong.

10:15As you were talking, I was thinking that through. On one hand, I really believe in transparency when it comes to public markets. I think it's important. On the other hand, the fact we have that transparency of regular reporting means, again, as I was saying about auction results, we listen because we're being told. And because there's a number to put in a box, I hope our listeners really get this. So we desperately want a number in a box. And once someone puts a number in a box, we go, oh, okay, good, we can anchor to that then. And we don't really ever ask ourselves whether it matters, how accurate it is to your point about potential obfuscation and other things.

10:45I mean, on one hand, I'm like, I'm glad there are people, organizations who can give us share prices and property prices. And that makes a more informed in air quotes market. But I wonder how much of the Kool-Aid I've been drinking. I mean, to Buffett's point, shouldn't I just say, there's a four bedroom house over there on a block of land that's 800 square meters. And I would pay, it depends where it is, 1.1 million dollars for it. I'm gonna make stuff up now. I don't watch the property market that closely. Regardless of whether someone is worth half a million or two million dollars. I mean, there's something, yes, there's something about understanding the cash flows of something and being able to value it as an investment.

11:20Same with shares. If you told me, here's a business, it's a supermarket, it's got a thousand stores, it does this much in profit, this much in sales, how much do you pay for that? You've said many times, do your valuation independently and then compare it to the price. I wonder at some level if we wouldn't actually be better as investors. I mean, people hate the idea, what do you mean I can't have prices? I need those so I can make my judgment. That might almost be the tell, right? It's like, no, no, no, you don't. You actually need to say, Willis is worth$24. How much is it selling for? $30. Oh, I'm not buying that.

11:47Coles is worth$84. How much is it selling for? $30. Oh, buy that then. I mean, that's what we should be doing as investors. And so many of us are so tied to the price the market's offering. We kind of, you know, I wonder if we're being led in the wrong direction. Yeah, but that doesn't mean that you don't collate and present this information. I think the information, I mean, I'm trying to think of the flow here, but you start with information and from that you withdraw intelligence and from that you gain wisdom like there's a flow there it all stems from there now the mistake that you're highlighting which is the right one is to rely too much on any one kind of metric or what you know what is kind of telling you but i'm really glad that it's out there right i i i can try and piece that together appropriately put it in context etc etc so i tend to think i tend while i agree with your point what's the remedy?

12:40We don't have prices publicly disclosed. I think that leads to more unintended consequences that are more pernicious. So I would be much more open, transparent in terms of the property price data that comes out of the market. To make for a more informed market all around tends to make things more efficient. Now, will some people take some of that data and apply it in silly ways? Yeah. Can you stop that? Sadly, no, because people are people are people. but it's just better than the alternative i think and i wish i wish there was i wish there was better data on property this is frustratingly weak and there's like two providers right yeah that's right that give you give us the data so there's a huge concentration of counter party counter party risk if that's the right term that's there but yeah yeah i'm i still i'm still sure i the reality is the reality which is we all think we want more data because we're supposed to want more data especially more efficient whenever someone says things it's like the tax system let's make taxes more efficient by you know having a flat tax no no you don't want efficiency you want a flat tax you know i'm not saying you're saying that but i just some things we again the things we think we believe because everyone says it all the time more data means more efficiency sure does lead to better outcomes for the average investor i don't know maybe it does maybe it doesn't if you close the doors for 10 years would the average investor be better off or worse off i would i would suggest to you the average investor be better off with no price data no ability to sell over 10 years just just almost by definition but maybe that's maybe that's wrong that's pretty extreme i don't know i have to have to chew on that one for a bit while you do that let me go to another question mate um this one is i have to apologize i uh i mentioned kelly who um sent me a message to say that she was excited you're following her on on twitter and then i realized it was a a spoof account someone was trying to scam her uh and and and she uh you know we had a bit of fun with that which i appreciate kelly and thank you for taking the right in the right time in the right vein uh she sent me a message saying uh i've only just caught up on the last few episodes realize you call me out on air i was hoping my first star appearance would be a question but hey i'll take it now kelly you're welcome but it also made me i don't think she meant it intentionally but made me feel guilty that i hadn't asked her question yet so i'm sorry to make you a punchline kelly and then not ask the question so i will rectify that hopefully with that with your uh your uh forgiveness as i ask you the question ram she says hey scott and ram i've got a question for the pod on something i've never really heard anyone talk much about before Now, Kelly, you've listened to this podcast for a while.

15:04I'm going to talk about the same things over and over again, so we're probably going to have an answer for this one either. But let's pretend. She said, I have asked a few friends who work in finance who all seem curious, but agree they hadn't given it much thought either. Kelly says, I'm a single female in my early 30s, and at some point in the next, say, three to five years, will likely either start a family on my own or with a partner if I have one. Even if it's a few years away, I think it's worth starting to financially plan for now. though i'll say this is really not something we teach young women in our society to think enough about you're absolutely right kelly i have a decent portfolio of etfs she says and some individual stocks and i pay a high tax rate on my income by the time maternity leave rolls around i'd hope that portfolio is back in some green territory exclamation mark and i've been thinking about whether it's a good idea to use that year out of the workforce to sell some profit making holdings, pay tax at a lower rate on the capital gain because my marginal tax rate would be lower that year and use the opportunity to maybe rebalance the portfolio and buy it back in.

16:06Is that a savvy use of a low income period of my life or is it a terrible idea? Is there any other financial advice you can think of that is important for your female audience in particular to hear? I've been listening for several years now and noticed that most of your questions come from men, but I'm sure there are a ton of women listening who would love to hear your thoughts and advice for them especially since our financial lives are for many reasons including taking time out to have and raise children different to many men your advice helps keep me grounded and super focused on building a good future for myself especially through these rocky market periods a great weekly reminder to hang in there and write it out thanks and fool on Kelly Kelly that's an exceptionally great couple of questions and I feel even more guilty now for not asking them before and instead had taken the opportunity to give Ram a bit of grief and also obviously warn our listeners.

16:56Hopefully the good news will be warned our listeners to be careful of scam and spoof accounts. Mate, what do you reckon? Sell down some stocks during a year off work, and in Kelly's case, potentially maternity leave to take advantage of the lower tax rate and then buy back in? Or is that a silly idea? No, it's not a silly idea at all. It's a great idea, in fact, but there's a but. I wouldn't be doing it for the sake of it, But if I'm in a situation where I feel as though I would like to be doing this anyway, that is the time to do it. If it's not a super urgent thing, but you're generally thinking, geez, I'm a bit overweight on this or I'm no longer as enamored with this company when I first bought it.

17:35Again, my usual refrain is don't base that on the profit or loss. It's irrelevant. It's important to sort of work out your tax. But, you know, whether you continue to hold or not is based on the future, not on the past. So don't base it on that. I did the exact same thing. I mean, I didn't have an income for a while there as I was trying to sort of do this crazy startup thing. And it was a great opportunity. Really. I mean, I saved thousands. If I had been doing that. Millions. In your portfolio. Let's wish that that was the case. But, you know, I mean, I saved a lot, a lot of money by doing that.

18:08And I mentioned in a recent episode, a bit out of order because of these prerecords, how that was the advantage of a family trust structure as well, sort of directing where the payments go. So I think the thinking is bang on. There's other parts of the question I want to get to, but I'll let you have a crack at that component. Yeah, thank you, mate. I think it's a great idea. I will just throw one thought. Sorry, I think it's a great idea. To Ram's point, don't just do it for the tax benefit. Do it because it's the right thing to do. Although you do get to potentially effectively pre-pay some tax at a lower rate, which is always nice, right?

18:44But if you've got to pay a million dollar capital gain at 45 % tax, or you can pay$300 ,000 gain so far at 15%. That's true. That's a really good point. There's some really meaningful tax savings there. So have a think about that. The flip side though, Kelly, and probably not you because you're young and you know I hate young people, even our young female listeners, my apologies, is that you just want to be a little bit careful. It depends on what the stock is and how long you're going to hold it for. Because if you were to, let me just use round numbers because it's easy. if you were to sell a hundred thousand dollar uh stock and let's say it's capital going a hundred thousand dollars you pay tax at 30 percent again pick numbers you got 70 grand left over now you reinvest that 70 grand you're kind of you've paid the tax so that's out of the way but when you had the hundred grand you were kind of you were you were letting the tax money ride you were making gains on the tax that you otherwise would have paid right so the 30 grand tax you're paying now because you're selling early, you would have still had invested.

19:42And so again, on that full hundred grand, even though there was tax at some point in the future, you get to compound the tax officer's money effectively by holding it out of the market. And so leaving it in the market, I should say. So that's kind of, there's some benefit there. And more so, again, probably not for you at your age, but more so if you were going to hold those for the long term and then potentially at some point harvest an income from those shares. So think about an ETF, for example, you say you have a portfolio of ETFs. If, for example, you're going to hold the same ETF till you were 70 and use that to generate retirement income.

20:11Now, you may not because it's 40 odd years away, but let's say you were. You could never sell that at all and get fully franked, or mostly franked would be because it's an ECF, mostly franked income for the remainder of your retirement without ever recognising a capital gain. And again, then you're using the tax officer's money to generate dividend income, which is even better. So there's a couple of thoughts just to think about. You do get the tax benefit, so that's great. If you're going to sell it anyway, sometime in the next five or 10 years, you're almost certainly better off to do it while you're having a year off work, if maternity leave or travel or whatever else you wanted to do.

20:46But otherwise, just think about what the likely future, and you can't know for sure, so you know, it's cool. But have a think about it. It's the stuff you tend to keep for the very long term. Never selling means you never pay capital gains tax, or maybe your heirs do, and that's their problem, not yours. But at that point, it just lets you do that in a very different way. You want to get on to the rest of the question? I just reflect on the observation that this is a total sausage factory of an industry. It's 90 % male. That's lovely. Would you like that? But it is. It is. It's full of testosterone and male ego.

21:21And we're weaker for it as an industry. I'm not just trying to be PC here. I think there's umpteen numbers of studies that show ladies just tend to be more emotionally resilient, which is we keep preaching is just such a key key important thing less less influenced by greed more aware of the downside um and just you know so it's it's a shame i think the the funds management industry the advice industry just weaker for just having a bunch of ego-driven hothead males you know and just just watch the wolf of wall street you know how many women were in in in those various scenes and it's kind of like yeah actually pretty pretty reflect uh accurate reflection and it's it's it's just disappointing i suppose um i don't know why more girls don't get into it i probably because it is can be a pretty yeah um what's the word for it the culture's not great and i you know you you you'd you'd be in a very clear minority as a female in this industry and you have to deal with some really annoying personality types as a general rule.

22:31Remedy aside, of course. Oh, obviously, we're different. But I mean, you know the type, mate. When you look at the typical broker, right, they just fit a mold. It's like a real estate agent. You can spot them three blocks down the road. All of the usual sort of tells and not the best sort of human characteristics, I'll happily say. So I don't know what the remedy is, but I do just underscore that point that, and I'm not saying it just to be nice, But this is something that - Because his ram's not nice, by the way. He's not - No, there is a genetic advantage as a female when it comes to investing.

23:10And use that to encourage you to go into it. And also use the fact that the system is just - I mean, it is - For better or worse, it does tend to be that child rearing is mainly done by one of the sexes. And that means a couple of things. It means that you miss out on the experience and the career progression. It means there's usually, if you're having a few kids, I mean, that's a long time out of the workforce which the CV sort of stagnates. And not only that, you're not adding anything to super along the way. So if anything happens to the marriage or the partnership or whatever it happens to be, and statistically, you're a real disadvantage, unless you sort of start fighting things through the court.

23:56So I think it's really important for women to think about finances more. And it's not fair. And hopefully we can move things more in the right direction. But because of that unevenness, you kind of got to work a bit harder to sort of really save and invest because of the disadvantage that's inherent in the system. Yeah, it's lovely. Beautifully put, mate. Kelly, I guess a few thoughts. Ramit, you talked about the industry itself, the professional investors, and you're absolutely right. What I despair about is, not that I need people to do economics, but the percentage of high school students, women or girls who are doing economics, is at like a 40-odd year low.

24:42There's so many more blokes than girls doing economics. So when you're trying to change the future, I don't think economics and money is in any way, shape or form the key thing that society should be focused on. And I don't, you know, I've said before, an economy is there to serve a society not the other way around. So economics is not the most important thing in the world. But it's pretty bloody important if you do want to take control of your financial future because understanding the way the world works properly means understanding the way the economy works for better or ill and to be able to make good decisions and thoughts.

25:13So you kind of, I'm a bit, if it was up to me, I make economics more compulsory during high school, not because I'm a finance nerd. I'm sure science people are saying, no, it's biology. And some of us, no, it's geography. And no, it's maths. It's the way the world works. You know, we talk about maths and English, the way we communicate and count. And yes, economics is to some degree applied maths and applied psychology, but I think it's useful. So it really disturbs me that not enough girls are doing economics because the path to finance is generally, you know, investing is generally, indirectly or directly through economics.

25:45You didn't do it at uni, mate, So you're an exception. But most people do economics, then do commerce at uni, or economics at uni, then join some broking firm. That's how it tends to work. That's why they're all so terrible. Well, they're totally right. Nonsense filled with their heads. But even at school, I wish more girls did economics as a proportion, and absolutely. Well, can I just, just to underscore that again, I mean, this is, I really want to highlight the point you make there. It's not some abstract kind of academic error. I mean, you can't talk about or think about society at large, without understanding economics.

26:17It's really the study of interaction between humans. That's right. So it's kind of, you know, and it makes you a more informed voter. It's got more to do with psychology than maths, man. People think economics is a math subject. I mean, there are some mathematical ways to explain what happens. I'm convinced it's applied psychology. Keynesians, yeah, or the econometricians, whatever they call, you know, we found such great virtue and value in applying mathematical laws to physical laws. And it's like, wow, that's really powerful and really predictive. And so we put it to economics. We've talked about that, right?

26:52Numbers in boxes. Yeah, right, right. You know, and it's just... You know the great... Sorry, I'm talking about the great thing... I'll let you talk. The great thing economists did was utilize the Latin term ceteris paribus. Yes, I love that. Which, and it's absolutely correct in the way it's used, which is these two relationships hold if nothing else changes, which is 100 % right. The reality is there is no circumstance in the entire world in which nothing else changes. You can't hold everything else constant because the world is a messy lot of interactions for different reasons, for emotional and logical reasons and theoretical and practical implications.

27:25And saying, well, this would happen if nothing else changes is perfectly fine. But it's like saying, if my grandmother had, will she be a bicycle? I mean, yeah, sure, but she doesn't. She's not. So what's the point? Yeah, I mean, this is the thing that there are, So as we talk about valuation, DCF and these kinds of things, are you ever going to get anything that's very accurate out of that? No. Is it a complete waste of time? No, it's not. It can be very informative to your thinking and trying to sort of understand how things work. I think there's value in applying math to certain economic concepts as well.

27:56Not to make the mistake of hyper-specificity and false precision, but because of just helping you sort of think through all of those kinds of things. But, you know, it's worth remembering, too, there's a lot of pretty big debates that are unsettled there. So I'm with you that that should be more widely taught. But let's stick to the big eternal truths, you know, the basics. Like the supplies and demand. High school commerce, not university economics. Exactly. Exactly. Yes. yeah for sure for sure sorry you go on no i was gonna say so in terms of in terms of women so my point was so what i was getting to with the high school stuff is there is still too much of a sense in society and among women unfortunately and it's not women's fault but it is what it is that economics is a boy's thing and that money is a guy's thing and that investing is something that guys do and girls don't do and i'm really glad that in a whole lot of areas around our society those gender stereotypes being broken down it's really really really important um you know what i've said before when i think of a nurse i think of a woman now partly as my mom was a nurse partly because i'm conditioned to i think doctor honestly the number of times i've assumed doctor met bloke is embarrassing and not because i consciously want to because i've been conditioned to do it and it's not okay but it is what it is and so when we think economics finance money investing it's like you know girls don't tend to be interested in it i'm glad you are kelly by the way and again that's why i'm saying i'm generalizing absolutely but i know from our own membership stats at Motley Fool, for example.

29:23We index dramatically, overindex dramatically for blokes rather than girls, right? And it drives me nuts. Oh, same here. 90 % of our members would be male. Right. And that's the society we're in. It doesn't mean it's okay. We're not going to accept it, but that's what we're doing. So, Kelly, you ask a beautiful question about, you know, what women need to know. I guess the first thing I'd say for women listening is, and I should do my job for me, which is please encourage your female friends to get more involved in investing. Not the ones who are in finance, they get it already. The ones who aren't, the ones who are doing the caring professions because they care and are so focused on the family and their jobs and other things that they don't remember to think about finance or consider it, or it's just so far outside their experience, they don't know what they don't know.

30:04They're the people you can absolutely help. Kelly and all the women listening, if there are blokes, all the rest of the blokes are listening, talk to your partners, talk to your kids, talk to your mother, talk to your auntie, talk to your friends. Make sure that the women in your lives have at least had, these don't have bad to them don't you know don't do a bloke mansplaining thing by the way just just you know but but try would try to try to expose them to some of this stuff particularly if they're not into it you can't create desire you can't do all that sort of stuff but a man's not a plan as they say and a man's certainly not a financial plan and so that's it's just a really really important thing to do so i think that's i think that's important kelly i'm going to add a couple thoughts first is investing doesn't care money doesn't care whether you're male or female so you're absolutely right there are some specific things rams talked about that about you're taking time out of the workforce to raise kids and that kind of stuff that's absolutely true women get paid less than blokes i mean add those two things together and wonder why women have you know lower superannuation balances than guys it's not a surprise but i would say uh don't overthink the investing thing from a recognize when it matters when gender matters when it doesn't matter you know woolly shares will go up or down whether or not whether a bloke owns them or a both cases saving works the same way in both cases the money itself doesn't doesn't care what i'm most passionate about is is getting women to know what they don't know and i don't know the answer i wish i did i've talked my wife so many times about this trying to find a way to get more women i mean look selfishly at a business level my boss would be more than happy if i had more women members because we'd have more members overall but it's not really even about that it's just i don't know how to get more girls to do economics i don't know how to get more women to invest probably because i'm not a woman funnily enough um so if you've got ideas kelly or anyone else please let me know i'd love to i'd love to help um there are too many blokey voices like andrews and mine doing this podcast right there's some great female driven podcasts out there i would say and i don't mean this about anyone in particular please don't fall for the um where when we have to do things differently or there's a there's a you know a pink color to a podcast or pink color with financial product therefore it's for women it just it doesn't work that way um it shouldn't work that way and please be mindful of that um don't let people sell you stuff you know it's like ethical investing they charge you more fees because they're trying to get you in on that that angle it was like oh here's a woman's thing you got there's some superannuation funds out there by the way targeted at women that charge fees that are extortionate and frankly unethical and unconscionable but they do it and they try and attract women because they are this is for women we're like you it's like no no they want you to believe that so they can charge you more fees so just just be careful with that uh but but whatever you can do whatever you can tell us to do however you can help us do it.

32:36Listen to female voices if they're more acceptable, if they just sound better, if you feel like they share your experience and they know what you're going through and vice versa. If you can find some affinity with some genuinely great female financial advisors, podcast hosts, writers, whatever, knock yourself out. And if your friends, if it helps them, then that's awesome. I love it. But just be careful of that. But again, I'll just reiterate before Ram jumps in again. Just that idea of, you know, it's not fair that women earn less, take more time out of the workforce so we don't fix that as a study.

33:07We absolutely should, let me say that. We haven't yet. It may take years for us to do so. In the meantime, I'm glad you're taking control of your own financial life, Kelly, because that's important. You know what? You're a great example for your friends and family. If you can do a bit of a, hey, here's what I'm doing. Here's what I've seen work for me. Here's how it's worked. You should try this too. You're going to do them a massive, massive, massive favor that honestly, they won't really understand for decades. And when they do, you'll be their favorite, mate, because you'll have done an absolute special.

33:33Yep. I just think it's all in the framing. I think a lot of guys are attracted to – well, the reason more guys are probably attracted to it because it's a very hubristic approach of, yeah, I can make a squillion dollars, you know, and I can drive the Ferrari and get all the girls and all that stupid sort of macho kind of nonsense. Whereas, I've got to be careful. You know, the generalization might be for girls. It's not like, well, I'm not – I think that sounds really dumb and risky and good luck with that, boys. but I am very interested in preserving and growing my wealth in a prudent, low risk kind of way over many, many years.

34:09So I think usually when I speak to people about the market, it's just straight away you're seen as like a crazy gambler. It's like, oh my gosh, you've got all your money in the sham. Like the people like look at you with like, you are, you're an idiot. It sounds really, really reckless to do. And I think there's a lot of good alarm bells that go off for reasons, for good reasons when, when, when you sort of say that. But just, and that's why I say framing is important. So when you're having conversations, it's like, hey, this is not about trying to buy a big private yacht and have a sports car and impress people with these stupid shiny things.

34:39This is like, what do you want? You want long-term security? That's what you want. And that's what it's about. And frame it that way. And by the way, sisters, you're sailing into the wind against all kinds of prejudices that are out there. So it's kind of even more important. And maybe that's the best way to do it. I don't know. 100%. and by the way Kelly if you or anyone else got any ideas hit us up on all the usual socials and email and stuff I'd love to do it I've interviewed some female investors before Miss Moneybox I don't know if she's still blogging Roman yeah she's great yeah she's doing some stuff she actually was doing a doctorate last I spoke to her she's been on the podcast years and years and years ago I probably should get it back on actually probably a good idea there's other female entrepreneurs and people we've talked to yeah look but if anyone listening has some ideas of ways that have worked for them or their friends or something else and they want us to pass them on I would love to So feel free to hit us up.

35:32And we're not going to do a women investing special because we don't know, but happy to talk to female investors and see what works. We'll just pass on some stuff. So feel free to do that as well. I'll give a shout out to Kate from the Rask podcast as well. It does it with Owen. That's another good female voice in this space. That's great. Motley Fool Money. For more, subscribe to the free newsletter at fool.com.au forward slash listener.