Season 4, Episode 5 The Joy of Saving: Strategies to Get You Excited About Saving Money

[00:00:00] Eric Brotman: Welcome to Don’t Retire… Graduate!: The podcast that teaches you how to advance into retirement rather than retreating. I’m your host and valedictorian Eric Brotman. And we have a true celebrity on our show today. Jeanette Pavini is an Emmy award-winning consumer and investigative reporter. She’s completed over 10,000 money-saving segments for CBS News, Hallmark’s home and family and MarketWatch. She’s the author of The Joy of Saving: Money Lessons I Learned from my Italian American Father and 20 Years as a Consumer Reporter. And she offers people unique money-saving strategies. She’s been a guest contributor on the today’s show. Her advice has been featured absolutely everywhere.

Hundreds of places. Good morning America, oprah.com. And now thankfully don’t retire. Graduate Jeanette. I cannot read your bio. It is simply too too long and amazing for, for us to fit it into a half hour show. But welcome. Thank you for being on this morning.

[00:00:56] Jeanette Panivi: Thank you for having me on I’m really happy and excited.

[00:01:00] Eric Brotman: You have you have an incredible career of of helping consumers make decisions around personal finance and starting mostly with money mindset. And so can you share a little bit with us sort of how, how this became your passion and you know, was this deliberate? Did you know about it? Wasn’t an accident that you fall into this, this magnificent career.

And, and how did you discover that money mindset was the key to getting started?

[00:01:26] Jeanette Panivi: Well, you know I, I guess I really developed this career out of my own need in a way. I was living in the bay area, which is a very expensive place to live. And this is going back about 25 years. And I was a single mom at the time, and I was having a hard time.

I was, you know, struggling along and I went into this thinking, okay, How do, how do I make it easier? How can I afford to live you know, buy my kids, clothes, you know, pay the bills and all these things. And so I pitched a show idea through our public access and the show ended up being kind of like a uplifting show, but it wasn’t really about, you know, saving money.

So I, I took my idea and I went to a local station and that had a show called All Consuming. And I did a story, my first one on how to put a kid’s wardrobe together for under a hundred bucks, a complete wardrobe. And it was a hit, it just resonated people were writing in and they wanted more. And really Eric, that was my very first segment.

I wasn’t even reporting at the time, but I just started doing these money savings segments. And it just got so much attention that it just evolved into this, you know, 20 plus year career. And I realized along the way through my father this wonderful Italian American who saved every penny that, you know, your mindset had more to do with it than just about anything when it came to saving money.

[00:03:02] Eric Brotman: I love that. And I think at the end of the day, consumers love to save money, everyone loves to feel like they’ve gotten a deal. Like they’ve gotten a sale. I think some consumers like to rationalize some of their purchasing by saying, Hey, I got such a good price on this. I had to buy it, even though it wasn’t something they needed.

So I, I, maybe you can talk to consumer mindset a little bit in addition to money mindset, because you certainly have the background for that. But w w what are, what is. What are the endorphins? I’m no scientist, but what are the endorphin rushes that come in from feeling like you got a good deal? It was kind of like the, the car buying experience is feeling like you won, you won a deal or something.

[00:03:41] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah. You know, I like to say many, many consumers closets are filled with great deals, still with their price tags on it, you know? In other words, they buy it just because it’s a great deal. Not because you need it. And I think that part of it comes with, you know, kind of like the, okay, I got the deal and, and it’s this thrill of success.

But my, my theory is people need to get more excited about seeing a hundred dollars. In their savings account than they do seeing the $400 pair of shoes that was marked down to a hundred dollars in their cloth. You have to shift what excites you about money. And, and it’s interesting, you know, when people start saving money and make the choice that instead of spending it, they’re going to save it.

And they actually go online and they look and see what’s in their bank account and that it’s growing. It starts to shift over to that’s where your obsession and excitement comes from. But I think that there’s this, you know, it feels good when we buy something new. And it’s, it’s exciting, but it’s very short-lived until we move on to the next and yet when you save money, it stays with you because that money’s still there.

So I often say put something on hold. Decide whether you really need it and then make the decision of buying the purchase. And the bottom line is there will always be another sale. So if you miss it this time and you wait that’s okay, because something will go on sale again.

[00:05:11] Eric Brotman: So you’re a single mom. You’re, you’re living in San Francisco area, bay area, 25 years ago. One of the most expensive places to live in the United States still. So the only question I can come up with is how, how do you do that? How do you bootstrap in a situation that sounds almost dire.

[00:05:32] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah. I mean, I was, you know, definitely living paycheck to paycheck. This is back when I was, you know, in my twenties. So actually probably about 30 years ago, I was in my twenties and late twenties. So I. I think that I was lucky in that I saw my father who was, you know, part of the greatest generation. Right. They lived through the depression, they lived through world war two.

They, they came out of that era, not only, you know, surviving, but really thriving. And I don’t know how my dad did it, but he raised, there were five of us kids, so seven mouths to feed and we lived in San Francisco. I don’t think my dad made ever more than probably at his height maybe. And of course this is going way back, but you know, 45, $50,000 a year.

And yeah. He, he, we never really went without, I mean, we didn’t live extravagantly, but we went to private Catholic schools in San Francisco. We, you know, we always had food on our table and there was seven miles to feed, but, you know, so I learned from him that you, he, he just, you know, he always said in my generation, you’d earn a quarter, and then you’d save 10 cents. You’d spend 15. Your generation earns a quarter, spends the quarter, and then borrows another quarter at 25% interest. So he, he really started to talk to me and spend time with me. And I learned a lot from that generation of of, of that money mindset. It was never, they never felt, you know, deprived of anything at all. They just felt more of a sense of gratitude for everything. It was amazing. And when my dad passed away about six years ago, I mean he and my mom owned their home in San Francisco. He had a significant amount of money saved in the bank account and you know, to take care of my mom.

And, and so it was really his mindset that evolved my mindset.

[00:07:42] Eric Brotman: So I’m going to ask you a loaded question and you don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, because I don’t want to mess up your family Thanksgivings forever, but did your four siblings also glean this knowledge or did he just happen to spend that time with you or you were receptive to it? Is this something that the whole family adopted or was this something you were just, you had your antenna up and said, I want to adopt that?

[00:08:05] Jeanette Panivi: I think all of us grew up that way. I was the youngest of the five, so I think they’ve, we’ve all adopted it. We’re all very conscious of, of spending money and try not to, and always living within our means.

I think that’s key. I think I’m the only one though that built a career on it and wanted to share it with people because you know, Eric, what I really try to do is, is make people see that it’s it’s, there is always a better way to save money. There is a way to, to move forward because when you have credit card debt and when you can’t pay bills, I’ve been there.

I know it’s, it’s like a monkey on your back, but just doesn’t seem to ever want to get. But, but you can. And and so I did build a career on that and, and it really, it took off because I think that this is something that people get excited about once they hear, okay, wait a minute, this is something I actually do have control over.

It’s important to realize you want to have control over your finances, as opposed to your finances having control over you. And this is at any age. I mean, I’m in my mid fifties and you know, a lot of my friends are my age or a little older is thinking about retirement and a lot of them are still worried about, you know, saving money.

And so I think that if you could start this at a young age, that’s great, but I do believe it’s never too late.

[00:09:34] Eric Brotman: There’s a, there’s a whole lot of, of evidence to support that, that time is the greatest resource when it comes to wealth building. Time and behavior. Starting early and doing the right things really are far more important than having the right investment or the right even luck.

You know, it really is about behavior. There are there are so many young people today who are, who are stuck with student loans, for example. I think it’s even worse than the consumer debt that, that I think in the eighties and nineties, there was a lot of consumer debt, but now I think it’s almost all student loans for young people.

They can’t launch. They may want to, and especially in the bay area, I mean, forget it. People are if I’m not mistaken, people are renting RVs in their driveway for thousands of dollars a month. Like that’s crazy. So how do you do that? How do you, how do you get the education that you, that you desire and that you’re capable of handling so that you can build a career and build a vitae like so many of us did in, you know, you and I are contemporaries.

So what we did in the, in the eighties and nineties to build our, our vitae, if you will. How do young people do that when the price tag is exorbitant, and they’re going to wind up with starting in a hole instead of starting with.

[00:10:51] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah, it’s, it is a different era. And and our era that we grew up in was different than our parents.

And so I think each generation presents this, this set of challenges. And and I, you know, I believe in education, but I do agree. It’s really difficult. When you come out of school and you get a job and you know, and then you spend years paying back your, your debt. I think it comes back down to really living within your means. And, and I feel like the first step for anyone in that position is to really, to sit down and I mean, it goes back to basics, just writing out what, what all of your monthly expenses are and what set in stone, like your student loan payment or your rent or things like that and what you have flexibility in. Your cell phone bills, your entertainment, you know, your grocery bill, your grocery bill is the one thing that you have the most flexibility on.

And I’ll explain that in a minute. And then you look at the. But, you know, aren’t set in stone that are flexible and you say, okay, how do I either live without this for now? Or make it the least expensive that I possibly can. And for example, I’ll, I’ll give you your grocery bill I mentioned. People just go to the grocery store and they spend hundreds of dollars.

If you plan your grocery bill, if you plan your grocery shopping list around what’s on sale at one point. Local grocery stores. You’re one of their reward card members. You take advantage of any deals you use coupons. Coupons have come a long way. Apps make it so easy. You, you then take control of that bill and I’ve done this experiment, Eric.

So many times you save about 40 to 50% off your grocery bill. Right there you could save a hundred, 150 bucks a month depending. You know, what type of groceries you buy. So now you have a little bit more money that you’re saving that could go towards those things that are set in stone. I have a great story of a, of a college student, someone coming out of college that wrote to me yesterday with a photo and she read the book and she didn’t really know about coupon codes or promotion codes.

And she was ordering something that was $40 online. She decided to, you know, Google and look and find, and she found a promotional code that saved her 50% off her first time purchase. And so she was so excited. She took a picture of it and she saved 20 bucks. So those little things add up and I don’t and you mentioned time.

It takes what, five minutes to, to look for a promotion code. And yet you could save the equivalent of, you know, an hour and a half of, of your wages. You know, if you’re making, you know, 14, 15 bucks an hour. So, so I think that really knowledge is power. And then the other thing in regards to student loans is to talk to your lenders.

I’m a firm believer. If you have credit card debt or any type of debt, if you talk to your lender, you explain the situation. A lot of times they will, I think more now than ever they’ll try to work with you. And I think that that’s also a step people need to take.

[00:14:06] Eric Brotman: There’s first of all, I’d like you to talk to my wife about the grocery shopping.

Cause she, she does most of that for us and I’m quite certain, she just indiscriminately knocked stuff into the basket. So mayor, if you hear this episode, I just threw you under the bus and I’m sorry, I’m actually just kidding. Just kidding. I want to stay married to Jeanette if you don’t mind. So I’m going to, I’m going to resend that remark.

[00:14:30] Jeanette Panivi: Well, it’s easy to do though, Eric, you know, I do it myself. I’m guilty. Constantly, but, but honestly, when I was really living on that paycheck to paycheck time in my life, that was one area, boy that you, you saved same with personal care items. I mean, you see these things where people, you know, are, are used, like at a pharmacy, all these, like you know, bucks back or the rewards, and then they use it, combine it with sales and they end up spending $10 and they get a hundred dollars worth of things. It, my mother’s caregiver was a big person that did that and she would show me these what she did. And it was amazing. So it’s worth the time. And just one other thing in regards to the budget is I think, you know, my dad’s day, I have a whole chapter on this in my book.

It, the envelope system, I mean, we, he had envelopes that were marked groceries, gas, clothes, what have you. And when he would get paid, he would put that cash for that month in that envelope. And when we ran out of that cash, you know, it was a lot of pasta for dinner until the next pay day. It, that is that consciousness of, of your money.

He had a relationship with his money. That’s the problem today. We don’t, we don’t have a relationship with our money. We don’t have cash. We don’t turn over, you know, our hard-earned cash. We give a credit card and we’re unconscious as we sign it, myself included many times, you know, I, I think for example, I was in New York once and I was shopping. And I bought some clothes and I was talking to someone and I didn’t even look at it when I got back to the hotel, I said, oh my God, I just spent this much. And I think it was like $700 and I wasn’t even, it wasn’t anything even amazing that I, I just was a couple pairs of pants and I thought to myself, would I have stood there and turned over seven $100 bills for this? And there was no way. And so I brought it back and I kept like $150 of the stuff that I really wanted. My dad had a relationship with money because he touched it. He turned it over. We have to get back to having that relationship. And I know we don’t use cash, but we use currency.

We need to be aware, use your debit card, keep track of it, know what cash you’re turning over. That to me is, is the key to the money mindset.

[00:16:49] Eric Brotman: I think it goes even deeper than just the lack of physical cash. So many apps and so many so many financial institutions have created what feels like games. Even investing has, has become gamified.

And I think that’s actually quite dangerous because these aren’t games. I mean, this is your livelihood. This is not a Atlantic city or Las Vegas. This is your livelihood and your, and your financial future. And it is so easy to hit an ATM or to just swipe a card and think nothing of it until the 28th of the month, when you get, when you get your statement. For people who pay their credit cards in full every month, which I encourage absolutely everyone to at all times, if you’re, if you’re able and hopefully you’re able, if that’s the case.

Yeah. There’s perks. There’s airline miles. If you, if you’re traveling again, there’s, there’s cash back. There’s all kinds of different things. I mean, at the end of the day, I think I get 2% back on everything I buy. Well, that’s pretty significant. As long as you don’t pay interest. So you can, you can make it a tool.

Now you mentioned starting with the, they have-to’s and, and writing down the things in your budget that are critical. For example, the student loan payments, not flexible. You have to pay it, but that works when you’re 22. What happens when you’re 17 and you’re contemplating borrowing $50,000 a year for an undergraduate education in, in the fine arts and you really don’t know. And I’m picking on that. It could have been anything. I was an English major, so I’m allowed, but if you were going to be to borrow that kind of money for an undergraduate education, when you’re too young to have any idea what that’s really going to be. Yeah. I think that’s a very dangerous thing.

[00:18:34] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah. I, I, I would agree with you on that. I think. I mean, I, I always recommend, you know, what’s exciting to you at 17 or 18 might not be as exciting to you when you’re in your twenties. And when you’re looking at the career opportunities, I think, you know, I think there’s a lot of great community colleges out there where you can go and get, you know, get your undergraduate, get different to you know, classes in the areas that you want to possibly pursue and spend two years deciding is this really what I want to do? Are these classes what interests me? Because nine times out of 10, unless you’re, you know, really completely sure of something, you change your mind. And so I think that that’s one way to save a lot of money. And, and then also it gives you time to maybe save a little money, apply for some, you know, different grants, different scholarships.

I have a whole chapter in there about scholarship money that goes unused because there’s, there’s a lot of random scholarships out there that people just don’t know about. So it gives you time to prepare. I think that that is so important to have a plan, not only a plan of action, but a plan of payback, you know, and, and how to lower how much you’ll actually be spending on your college.

[00:19:57] Eric Brotman: How much time do you, do you spend, or do you encourage people to spend balancing between the living for now and the planning for the future? There’s a, and let me, let me just, just add a little bit of color to that real fast before you, before you answer.

Because I, we seen people who literally are incredible savers and they, they save a huge amount of what they make and then they never enjoy it. And they’re not healthy enough or they. They, they die too soon and it, it just, they never took the trip. They never lived their lives. We certainly see other people who spend a dollar 10 for every dollar they make and wind up in trouble in a whole different way.

How do you strike a balance there? What do you, what do you suggest or recommend to, to maintain that without going too far either direction?

[00:20:43] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah, I think, no matter what fin–let’s oh, that’s kind of a, to have two parts to that answer here is the first thing is I think no matter how much you’re making, even like I look back at my parents when they were, I mean, talk about living paycheck to paycheck.

They always had fun. They always got together with, they had the gang, which was the group that they grew up with. It’s a great story. But they, they would get together and have potluck dinners. They’d have picnics. They take advantage of free museum days. I mean, we grew up and we had a lot of fun, so there’s free ways to enjoy your life.

Then when you get to a place in your life, when you’re living more comfortably, I don’t think you should be afraid to, you know, spend the money in a way that if on things you enjoy taking the trip, it’s just, when you do that, let’s say you say, all right, we’re going to go spend three weeks in Europe.

We’ve we’ve saved for this. We’ve earmarked this money. This is, we can enjoy this stiff. Look for the best flights, look for the best deals on hotels and go, but just, you know, take the, take the time it takes to, to make sure you’re getting the best deal. You don’t want to be the guy in the seat where the, you know, the person next to you paid half of what you’re paying, you know?

So, so just do your research, but I think, you know, and I think you get to a place in your life where you have money and you’re thinking about retirement, and this is where I think, you know, financial planners, working with someone who, who knows how to, to make your life enjoyable as you grow older and making sure that you’ll have the money 10 and 20 years from now.

And you know, one of the things that I always say is you want someone who, who knows now, whether you’re going to be missing out on something later on, unless you do something right now, you know, I mean, they can tell you, Hey, look, I would, I would invest here. I would do this. I would save this. You could do this so that now, so that later on, you know, you’re not struggling. And I think that that’s I th I see a lot of value in that, a lot of value. And so I think there’s different stages. One you’re kind of in control and the other, you could work with someone to be to help you along that path. But I think you have to enjoy life.

I mean, you know, w one of the best stories is when my, my dad, he saved and we took a lot of little local staycations. But my mom had no idea how much money he had saved. And when he was passing away, my mom was worried about, you know, am I going to have to go live somewhere? You know, eventually, and this and that, I said, no, mom, dad saved enough that, you know, you and dad saved enough that you could be, we’ll have someone come into the home.

You don’t have to leave the home. And I told her how much he had saved in the bank. And she, her mouth dropped and she looked at him and she said, and we never went anywhere. And you know, here, it was just so funny, you know, he’s on his last days, it was one of the most priceless moments. You know, they were married 65 years, but think, but, but in a way it was good because my mom has, she’s still alive and we still are able to, to give her the care.

But I think. I think we have to enjoy our lives, but also I think living within your means is, is very enjoyable and finding, I don’t know, just, I think, I think 2020 was very humbling for a lot of us because we realized the value of a hug. We realized just the value of simplicity of just being with family.

I mean, if COVID didn’t, if COVID taught us anything about, about, you know, humility, I think it came through. You know, being in position where we couldn’t see or hug people. So I think we go back to basics now and we’ve learned to enjoy within our means. And if your means allows you to go to Europe for six months, great. But if your means allows you to do a staycation and have fun at a local motel, then, then enjoy that as well.

[00:24:36] Eric Brotman: Jeanette, you’ve done tens of thousands of stories on consumers and, and you’ve done some investigative work. I know you, I think you, you blew the lid off some some, some wireless carriers who were fleecing the public and you’ve done some, some investigative stuff.

Has there been other than the, the $100 kids’ wardrobe that I know launched your passion for this and launched a launch your career, but. Was there one sort of aha moment or one story that jumps out at you that you said, I can’t believe I got involved in this, but boy, am I glad I did?

[00:25:10] Jeanette Panivi: What a great question. You know, I, I did do a lot of stories that, that stayed with my heart and and you know, jumped out at me and grabbed my grabbed on to me. I think that the, the one story. I think this was, it was really a powerful story for me. I used to do when I was at CBS, try to help consumers. And I would say the overall pattern was the people that would write to me and, and, or call in on our hotline that they were having consumer troubles were a lot of times people that just didn’t know exactly how to talk the talk. In other words, how to call and they would find, customer service and, you know, really know their customer rights. And that I think is like the overall theme. But there was one story about a woman who had really a rough life.

She had a child that had cerebral palsy. She was a struggling single mom in the bay area. And she had been in a really not great relationship when her child was born and she realized she needed to be. The mother before anything else and with the partner she was with, that was not the situation. And so she had been renting an apartment.

It was, her name was on the lease and this guy would not get out of the apartment. He wouldn’t. And so she went, you know, and told the sheriff and the police and said, look, I I’m, I’m moving. He’s on the lease to make a long story short because her name was on it. The lease, it affected her credit. It affected her credit so severely that she couldn’t even get the proper housing because it, it ended up turning into eviction.

And so the eviction showed on hers, even though she tried to do all the right things. So it went on her credit. She couldn’t get the right, it was it was really sad situation. And she was trying so hard with a child with very severe, special needs. So she called me. And I was able to help her. I contacted the three credit reporting bureaus.

I explained the situation. I contacted the lawyer that had done the eviction. He contacted the landlord. They, it took months, but we got everything resolved so that her credit was cleared up and her name was cleared and she was able to buy, I mean, not buy to rent a house that was a much better neighborhood.

I mean, much better for her child that had wheelchair access. So that stood out to me because it really made me realize how, how we could do something as simple as signing a lease and not realize all the things that could happen down the way. So I just, I realized at that moment how powerful your signature is.

And I always have told consumers, just know what you’re signing, know the potential downside. Now this is an extreme case, but also know your credit impact. Like people forget about their, you know, things going on, their credit or their credit scores. It’s it’s important. You know, you can get three free credit reports a year through annual credit report.com.

And I think that’s the truly free one and no, your credit. So that stood out to me because for so many reasons, but mainly because how something could snowball and affect you for years.

[00:28:23] Eric Brotman: That’s an amazing story. And I’ll bet you somewhere she is remembering that in a way that that was life-changing that you can’t even imagine, you know, and, and has shared that story with other people and no doubt and given them hope so that’s that’s that’s awesome.

[00:28:38] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah. Yeah. I actually stayed in touch with her when I was leaving CBS. I remember I. I, I, it was the last phone message I got was she was crying on the phone and she said, Jeanette, you’re my angel. I’m so excited. You won’t believe this. We have a house. It has a little white picket fence and it has wheelchair access.

And it was like just such a great way to end that phase of, of my work there. But, you know, there were so many, so many stories and I’ll tell you, Eric, the best stories were the stories that of people. It wasn’t something that was a report that came out from, you know, some government agency, all those, those were good stories, but it was always what real people were experiencing.

I’ll tell you the strength of the human spirit. It’s willingness to change. Its ability to change its mindset. It’s in there. And I also, one of the things I’ll say is to take, people just, there’s an awareness. Know what’s available out there for you you know, through help because there’s, it’s fine to accept the help cause it’s there to get you to the next place.

[00:29:44] Eric Brotman: I am so disappointed that we’re at the end of the show because this has been so fantastic. I knew you’d be a wonderful guest and I had no idea just how moving our conversation would be. And so I thank you for that. I need an extra credit assignment though, because you know, you’re not getting off the hook here.

All our listeners need to know what they can do as a, as one action item coming out of our time together today. What would that extra credit assignment be?

[00:30:10] Jeanette Panivi: So the extra credit assignment for the listeners is quite simple, but probably the most important thing that they will do as, as you, whether you’re ready on your journey to financial freedom or, or just starting. I want you to just do a list, two lists. One: things that are set in stone that you have no control over. And one list of things that have flexibility and think of everything. I mean, it could be your coffee and scone that you buy in the morning and look at the list of flexibility and pick three of those things. Just three to start with and decide how you could either eliminate that cost or lower it.

And then I did that at the beginning of the year as an experiment for myself, when my book came out and I was able to save a hundred. I think it was about $160 a month. I called my my cell phone carrier. I got a lower rate. I called my home alarm system. I got a lower rate and I there was one other thing and I can’t remember off the top of my head, but I did and I saved about 160 a month. Do that.

And then that money is now money that you can put into your savings account. And then just decide that you want to find joy in saving.

[00:31:24] Eric Brotman: Great advice. Great extra credit assignment. I encourage everyone to follow that. I think it’s a it’s an easy, but incredibly important exercise. So where can folks find out more about you?

Where can they get a copy of your book?

[00:31:36] Jeanette Panivi: Yeah. So the joy of saving is available on Amazon. And I have a whole joy of saving community. Jeanette Pavini the joy of saving community through Facebook and Instagram. And you know, I’m more than happy to always share tips. People send in their tips and it’s just a real community that where we try to find, you know, joy and happiness and what we have and in saving money.

[00:32:01] Eric Brotman: Well, I love it. I hope folks will check out your website and a copy of your book. Thank you so much for spending so much time with us this morning. I think we ran long, but I just wanted to hear everything you had to say. So thank you, Jeanette. This was a pleasure.

[00:32:16] Jeanette Panivi: Pleasure was mine. Thank you for all you do for you and for your listeners. Really.

[00:32:21] Eric Brotman: Thank you for listening to Don’t Retire… Graduate!. If you like what you hear, please subscribe to our podcast and leave a review on apple podcasts or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Don’t Retire… Graduate! is a book available in print, Kindle and audio formats, and a workbook with all the exercises you need to build your own financial freedom plan. For more information, go to Brotmanmedia.com or buy your copy and leave us a review on Amazon.

Please also check out our online financial literacy courses at BFGuniversity.com. We’ll be back next week with another installment of office hours and in two weeks with another engaging guest. For now, this is your host, Eric Brotman reminding you don’t retire, graduate.

[00:32:59] Narrator: From this day forward. Let us begin changing the way we view retirement. Today, I implore you. Don’t retire. Graduate. Visit our website at brotmanmedia.com to subscribe and please like us and post comments on social media. Securities offered through Kestra investment services, LLC. Kestra I S member FINRA SIPC investment advisory services offered through Kestra advisory services, LLC.

Kestra AAS and affiliate of Kestra I Kestra IIS or Kestra ASR, not affiliated with Brotman financial or any other entity discussed.