We finish out our series and bonus episode with something we were lucky to have, a Q&A round from Phylecia. Specifically addressing some of the issues that have happened during the pandemic on what types of things today are considered to be emergencies, and not emergency funds. We talk about her and her background and some general philosophy and are extremely lucky to have her.
Thank you for continuing to listen! We are back on track and Season 4 will be here before you even know it.
We finish out our series and bonus episode with something we were lucky to have, a Q&A round from Phylecia. Specifically addressing some of the issues that have happened during the pandemic on what types of things today are considered to be emergencies, and not emergency funds. We talk about her and her background and some general philosophy and are extremely lucky to have her.
Thank you for continuing to listen! We are back on track and Season 4 will be here before you even know it.
Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen, thank you again for joining us here on the truth about investing back to basics. Let's continue our episode here with our guest, Phylecia Jones. Words.
Phylecia Jones:Should I ask you all questions?
Chris Holling:You should. Sure.
Sean Cooper:Sure.
Phylecia Jones:Oh, okay. Well, here's here's a real question for you all investing your emergency fund.
Chris Holling:Did, we talk about that.
Sean Cooper:A little bit.
Chris Holling:I don't Remember? A little bit?
Sean Cooper:I don't remember what show but
Chris Holling:you know what it was
Sean Cooper:emergency fund. Go ahead.
Chris Holling:It was the savings aren't real or are they episode. And
Sean Cooper:that sounds right.
Chris Holling:That's where we talked about, ultimately, what what savings are which I mean, we can, we can kind of do the sparknotes version. So to me, savings doesn't really exist. savings is a pile of money that either goes to an emergency or something shiny. And so if you have things that are likely to go to one of those things, because you're able to look forward and the same kind of stuff that we're talking about, then you're able to at least evaluate what those things are. So you've got a deductible for a home or for car insurance, or if you're self insuring, and you want money set aside for a new car, whatever those expenses that are either going to be a risk, if it's expensive, and you need to replace it, or if it's something that you know, you're spending money on, you just don't know how much or or when, whether that's auto maintenance, or maybe fancy clothes or something along those lines. And then the money that you have set aside where it goes, I want to buy these things, which would be the shiny stuff category. Once you've established those, to me, there isn't much of an emergency fund to be had. That's left, there's, there's kind of some stretches in there where you might have maybe this is money that I haven't figured out where to allocate it yet. Like I have a spot that I've held a couple of those before. But that's, that's more of a, you know, once I figure out what this inevitable possible risk is, or once I've figured out that, what this the shiny thing is, and that's important to me, then that's when a new category gets created, and it gets allocated as such. So I don't I don't have an emergency fund. And I, I kind of feel like it, it doesn't truly truly exist in that sense. Is that
Phylecia Jones:interesting
Chris Holling:that too, too fine a point to? Is that a little too deep that we wanted to go today?
Phylecia Jones:No, it's not deep enough. Now. I will say when it comes to personal finances, and I'll swing this back over to business, to business finances as well,
Chris Holling:yeah.
Phylecia Jones:So I actually do have an emergency fund. But I also have a short term savings fund, and a vacation fund. So I kind of I've learned to budget with the different bank accounts. And so that's how I move my money around. So I hit all these goals with the emergency, I call it long term, long term savings. So long term savings. And then there's a goal for the short term. And then there's a vacation and then hubby and I we do adult allowance. So all money goes into one pot. And then we give each of ourselves an allowance that we agree upon each month. And if somebody wants more money, they have to do a PowerPoint presentation.
Sean Cooper:I feel like that's torture to both of you though. I feel like that's torture to both of you. Because then you somebody else has to sit through a PowerPoint presentation.
Phylecia Jones:No, it's good. So this is how we every month at the end of the month we go through like here's the financial update, so that nobody so so that no one can say they don't know what's happening with the money. Um, you know, usually I'm the one who has to have more maintenance, you know, cuz I gotta get my nails done.
Chris Holling:Just picture and like, what are your marital goals is like, Oh, well, we we set up these these graph charts. And this is this is how we figure Oh, well, if you see the increase in this allowance that we could utilize for the future that's such and such.
Phylecia Jones:No allowance is your play money. So that's, you know, if you want to go buy purses and things, you can go and do that with
Sean Cooper:Jarmar called it the baller, right?
Chris Holling:Yeah, I do the same thing. It's the baller bucket. Yeah,
Phylecia Jones:yeah, it's called Do whatever you want. And nobody will give you side eye based on what you're purchasing.
Chris Holling:That's a long name.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah.
Chris Holling:I like baller bucket.
Phylecia Jones:When I was single it was just fun money when I was single, it was just fun money now it's just allowance money.
Chris Holling:Yeah.
Phylecia Jones:Now inside of business, I actually do budget through different bank accounts in business. So I created this little method that was based on my maiden name, which is Ross, so, ROSS. So there is a bank account just for revenue. So you know, from getting paid through PayPal stripe or anything, all revenue goes into that account. And then on the first and 15th, or, you know, I will go in and start divvying up that money based on percentages into O, you know, which is overhead, then there's the salary account, and then there's the savings account. So that's how I've been able to manage money in the business. So I know what is overhead and what works. And then of course, I always allocate at least 15% into the savings, just in case, you know, well, at this point is not a just in case. It's like when crap happens in business. And then there's other buckets of accounts that I have for training. So I'll know if I'm going to allocate money for training this year, you know, for all those courses, and conferences and things like that. And I think there's another one I can't remember. But those are the basics It was so it's like ROSS, revenue, overhead salary and savings. And that's how I managed the money with the business.
Chris Holling:Ross. Yeah, I can see that. Yeah. And that's, yeah, it's, it's the same same kind of stretch that I was talking about, it's all psychological at that, at that point, head, because I mean, for, for me, you know, it's the same, same type of stuff, where we'd have it broken down. When we were running my wife's business, that we we had a section that was the, this is the general expenses, these are the fixed expenses that are going to happen every month, here are some of the long term goals that are going to be more like, decor for for the space or training to be able to expand and maybe charge more and the software that's going to be utilized. And and then once all those expenses are are handled, then that's when we had the surplus, just like we were talking about earlier on. And then that surplus, we we figured out, Okay, are we trying to work to get a couple months ahead are we are we wanting to put it towards something specific, but that same time, that's, you could call that savings if you wanted to, but every single thing is is allocated for me at that point, because then if you're looking at a surplus, once we've decided, Okay, we have this surplus, this is going to go towards next month's expenses, this is going to go towards this liability, deductible that we need to maintain for business, this is this is going to go for increasing the deductible so that we we don't have to pay as much of a monthly fee and start working towards that it's technically savings, if you want to call it that. But because it's allocated for something already, then you know, then no savings. So point one for Chris, for for No, not really having savings. Just saying. No, that's cool. I think it's I think it's interesting that we've never, never, we don't allocate separation of those funds, the checking account savings account it because it's all electronically generated of how everything is divided out, then it all remains in one account because we we use a separate budgeting finance account to do so. And so it all just sits in the same pile.
Phylecia Jones:I like having pots of money all over the place. It's just easier because um, well, it's just easier for me and also in sometimes, depending on how you're running your business, you know, if you're doing payroll so that it doesn't go into like one big account because it'll just keep running payroll, even when you're don't want them to sometimes. So I just I just keep it very simple for me, because that's how I did my personal finances is to keep these different buckets so that it's very clear to everyone and this was something even with my husband was being very clear on what savings and whats vacation money. Yeah. Because his brain is savings, is savings and I was just like, well, savings is supposed to be for something. And we agreed that
Chris Holling:what was that? It was savings is supposed to
Phylecia Jones:be for something
Chris Holling:Oh, just checking
Phylecia Jones:but his his thing is that's not what savings is for so he couldn't articulate what savings was for. We created a vacation account to solve all these problems. So if there's a new problem, we have a new account for it.
Chris Holling:That's good.
Sean Cooper:That works. You mind if I jump back in on what to do with the emergency fund?
Chris Holling:I mind but
Sean Cooper:nobody cares what you think, Chris?
Chris Holling:I know.
Phylecia Jones:All of your listeners care.
Chris Holling:That's it.
Sean Cooper:It's true. It's true. They wouldn't be here if it wasn't for him.
Phylecia Jones:Are you over 100? Or you said three digit downloads.
Chris Holling:So what I was saying is that there are
Sean Cooper:For certain episodes Yeah,
Chris Holling:for an episode, where
Sean Cooper:we're over four digits
Chris Holling:We are actually at I was just looking at this. Where is it? stats? stats, we are at 1212. We got 1212 downloads as of this recording 1212 downloads for the podcast.
Phylecia Jones:Oh,
Chris Holling:yeah,
Phylecia Jones:yeah.
Chris Holling:Look at us Sean, making progress.
Phylecia Jones:This is going to be your most popular show. I'm just predicting that,
Chris Holling:you know, I hope it is because as soon as it's the most popular, then that means that Jarmar is gonna have to come back and try to claim the title. And
Phylecia Jones:yeah,
Chris Holling:fight fight fight fight would be great.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, Sean, now back to the emergency fund.
Sean Cooper:Yeah, so I mean, as you guys kind of pointed out, it really depends on how you define the emergency fund. So if you are looking at it from a more traditional standpoint of if an emergency comes up and you need cash, then the bulk of the emergency fund, at least a certain portion of it needs to be very, very liquid, which really limits your options in terms of what you can do with it. Essentially, you're looking at, you know, cash, a checking account, a money market account, money market, ultimately has, you know, very close to the same liquidity as the other two, you just might have some limitations on how often you can move money in or out of it on a monthly basis. But it's still pretty much instantaneous,
Chris Holling:because that's a non qualified account.
Sean Cooper:Yes, that would be correct
Chris Holling:look at me learning continue.
Sean Cooper:But it is earning some money as some interest in that money market account. Now, in today's terms, under current interest rate environment, you're earning very, very little in most money market accounts. So you'd have to be fairly active in terms of researching which money market accounts are actually paying something worthwhile. But for the most part, that's what you're looking at for a very liquid options, and secure options. And then again, it depends on you know, how much you need to put into that portion really depends on your your personal finances. But if you were, you know, just ballpark figure, you know, you might be looking at like $5,000 to ensure you have sufficient liquidity for the say the average person, but it is going to depend on your individual financial needs. Above and beyond that. So for many people, they're going to want to have some security blanket larger than that. Or, for example, if you're trying to achieve that six months of expenses, savings is not necessarily what I would consider an emergency fund. But it's, you know, additional funds that you have available, if you were laid off or something happened and you didn't have a job, you want six months of expenses basically covered, those funds don't have to be as liquid, especially if you already have that initial account of you know, a few$1,000, whatever it is, if that fits the bill for you. Those funds don't have to be as liquid. And so since Chris mentioned the non qualified account a non qualified account, you can move as much money in or out of it at any time that you would like basically, the limiting factor in terms of liquidity is going to be if you open up a say brokerage account or just an individual account with a whether it's a broker a registered investment advisor on your own. What have you. The limiting factor on liquidity and security is going to be what you invest in. So at this point, they've really kind of shortened down the the trading cycle and liquidity cycle of those non qualified accounts. It used to be t plus three, which is trading day plus three days for funds to settle. Now it's actually t plus two. So realistically, you're looking at if you invest the funds into stocks or bonds or something along those lines, you're looking at the trading day, plus two additional days for the funds to settle. If you set up some kind of link between your your brokerage account and your checking account. You can typically have those funds electronically transferred between the two essentially instantaneously, sometimes they take a cycle of overnight to actually show up in the other account. But for all intents and purposes, we're talking about fairly liquid accounts of, you know, maybe four days on the high end. And that'd be four business days. So four actual days of the market being open. For liquidity purposes. As far as security goes, again, that depends on what you invest in. And for funds that you're you're setting aside that you don't know when you're going to need them, you hope that you don't ever actually need an emergency fund. But since you don't know when you might need it, you, you tend to want to keep those funds a bit more conservative in terms of your overall portfolio. So more that moderate conservative or conservative profile so that you're not risking large downside. For example, if you are saving that six months of expenses, and say that's, you know, 30 grand, if you have 30 grand in an account, and all sudden you do need it, but the markets tanked and you lost 30% of your, you know, 1/3 of your investment. Now, it's only worth 20, that emergency fund isn't going to help you nearly as much as the original intent. So so you're not going to want to have as high a risk profile on those types of funds. Whereas like Felicia talked about where you're, you're saving for something in particular, that might be a few years out, or, you know, all the way out to retirement, that's where you have a much longer investment time horizon, you can recover from the market fluctuations, you actually have time to recoup any losses that you might experience, the emergency fund doesn't have that same flexibility per se. So does that more fully answer the question?
Phylecia Jones:You got deep there?
Chris Holling:You know, he does that.
Phylecia Jones:I know. But here's the thing, let me we should do a lightning round, because you started off saying that you need to define what is an emergency. So I want to throw out a couple of questions to you, Sean, and you Chris, as well. And we're going to figure out what is an emergency? Are you guys ready? I know you love your show.
Chris Holling:I don't I don't know if you want to find out what I classify as emergencies.
Phylecia Jones:To find out, okay,
Chris Holling:Let's do it,
Phylecia Jones:so we have this emergency fund, and my friend just called me and said Beyonce is going to be in Vegas next weekend.
Sean Cooper:Not an emergency.
Phylecia Jones:Okay. Oh, instant not an emergency.
Chris Holling:I totally agree.
Phylecia Jones:It's not an emergency, Chris.
Chris Holling:No. I mean, like Beyonce and Timberlake, like
Phylecia Jones:if it's Timberlake and Beyonce, maybe, okay.
Chris Holling:I mean, like, really, like, it's, it's not an emergency for me, I might need to go spin, a sign off Colfax for, you know, like, a couple extra hours to try and make sure that to make it happen, but it's not coming out of my emergency fund. That's what
Phylecia Jones:Okay,
Chris Holling:That's what's not happening?
Phylecia Jones:Okay, so, okay, the roof has a leak in it, is.
Sean Cooper:Emergency
Chris Holling:Emergency
Phylecia Jones:Because sometimes I've learned you have to be very clear, because some people don't think that's an emergency.
Chris Holling:No, absolutely. And that's that fits back into for the full circle of what what you're talking about. If you take this, you know, you take your deductible. I'd say I'd say a new roof deductibles. What like 10? grand about right? Yeah, no, maybe
Phylecia Jones:I've never had the issue. Thank God.
Chris Holling:I don't know. But
Sean Cooper:It depends on where you are, it's much higher in Colorado because of your guys's frequent hail damage,
Chris Holling:correct?
Phylecia Jones:Yeah,
Chris Holling:well, we'll just we'll just say 10 grand just for the number sake. But if you if you have the 10 grand that's set aside rather than having it sit in your checking account, because you have it set aside because you have a purpose for it, right? And so it's not really savings. But you call up your buddy, Sean and go, Hey, can I set up a nonqualified account and then it's gaining interest on a conservative rate because he's smart and said do it on a conservative rate? Then you have that money available for the emergency and if you don't have that emergency for five years, then you've gained the interest from now till then, but you still have the money available? Still emergency?
Phylecia Jones:Okay.
Sean Cooper:And you want typically need those funds instantly, because the deductible typically you have a few, a little bit of flexibility and
Chris Holling:unless it's your cousin Joe that sees the leak in the roof and swears it's there and needs it done by tomorrow and he just needs the cash like
Phylecia Jones:Yeah.
Chris Holling:Don't Trust Joe.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, so the next one. AMC is trending on Twitter, and everybody's jumping in Robin Hood. Should I use that as take my money from the emergency fund to jump into Robin Hood so I can make a million dollars like what I saw on YouTube.
Chris Holling:The No,
Sean Cooper:not an emergency
Chris Holling:No.
Phylecia Jones:Are you sure?
Sean Cooper:Yeah,
Phylecia Jones:sure.
Chris Holling:That's no an emergency, no
Phylecia Jones:okay.
Sean Cooper:That's,
Chris Holling:A million dollars, that's an emergency.
Sean Cooper:That's money that you don't care about you never saying again.
Chris Holling:Yeah, that's true.
Phylecia Jones:I don't know, you guys need to get on Twitter and straighten some people out.
Chris Holling:We've tried but remember the whole like, social media is not our strong suit thing. Like,
Sean Cooper:yeah, I avoid it actively.
Phylecia Jones:Well, it's happening today. So just FYI. It is actually happening right now.
Chris Holling:I'm in
Sean Cooper:I believe it.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, so I have a car.
Chris Holling:Uh huh.
Phylecia Jones:It's still running, but it's kind of old. And it doesn't have good gas mileage. If I get a new car, I get better gas mileage, and I look better in it. Is that an emergency?
Chris Holling:No,
Sean Cooper:no.
Phylecia Jones:Really?
Chris Holling:Yeah.
Phylecia Jones:Really? better gas mileage?
Chris Holling:No. Sorry. When I said no, I really, I really meant. No.
Phylecia Jones:Plus it was an electric car and I'm saving the environment?
Chris Holling:Oh, no,
Sean Cooper:no.
Chris Holling:That's fun game. Go buy a bicycle
Phylecia Jones:Buy a bicycle. What if my leg hurts
Chris Holling:buy buy an electric bicycle? You've seen those. There's people that are getting all hurt about those like the purists of the bicycle world. Nevermind. What's the next one?
Sean Cooper:Everybody wants to be offended at something
Chris Holling:got hurt feelings? Sorry. Yeah
Phylecia Jones:Okay. Um, my spouse wants to start a brand new business. And we think it'll really work out. Should we dig into the emergency fund for it?
Chris Holling:I like the idea.
Sean Cooper:No
Chris Holling:No,
Phylecia Jones:no,
Chris Holling:that's your investing money. Not your emergency money.
Phylecia Jones:But what if we don't have any investing money is all we got?
Chris Holling:Then we might have to do an entire episode about possibilities on how to build capital.
Phylecia Jones:Oh, you guys are so boring.
Chris Holling:Oh, wait, okay. I see what she wants. Sean. Okay, give me another one. I dare you.
Phylecia Jones:Um, my dog needs surgery.
Chris Holling:Oh, well, that's not fair
Sean Cooper:emergency.
Chris Holling:Yeah. I can't give an emergency fund to that. That's fine. Yeah.
Phylecia Jones:Okay. Okay. You know, some people wont just Just checking.
Chris Holling:See how, she's trying to trip us up and make us look like a couple of savages.
Phylecia Jones:No, not savages. Just what good with money. There you go. Okay, we're just coming out of the pandemic, and I haven't seen my mom in a year.
Chris Holling:Yeah, ergency. Buy four tickets so that you can sit in all of them. That's what she wanted
Sean Cooper:not emergency
Phylecia Jones:not emergency.
Chris Holling:It's not an emergency. No,
Sean Cooper:I'll let you and Chris. Go ahead and play this game, though. That's clearly more to be had out of Chris's response.
Chris Holling:Well, that's what I was saying is I was like, Oh, I figured out what she wants. And that's why I said buy four seats. You know, bring your friends.
Phylecia Jones:So see going to see mom after the pandemic is not an emergency.
Chris Holling:No. Nanny. Oh. Oh, no. Oh, The Mamas in the world right now? is is mama sick?
Phylecia Jones:She could be, we don't know, we haven't seen her
Sean Cooper:That would have been the travel budget.
Chris Holling:That's the travel budget. He's right. Mine's a vacation budgets. Not a big deal.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, the pandemic is coming. And I have to work from home now. And the kids need new laptops. for school?
Chris Holling:No, I mean, the silence is more just because I'm thinking like, why do they need a computer but whatever.
Phylecia Jones:Cuz they have to turn the cameras on now.
Chris Holling:And they?
Phylecia Jones:Well, and and just for everyone listening, this is actually a real issue that a lot of parents had with the because the requirements because all because usually, a lot of people have like maybe one or two laptops, and the kids have to all you know, parents watching them use the computers. Now, since everybody had to be online. At the same time. A lot of people were in the situation of having to buy multiple laptops, multiple computers at the same time for all the kids or everybody in the house. So now that's the that's the question. Is this? Is this an emergency?
Chris Holling:No. But it's a high priority. So if you
Sean Cooper:agreed
Chris Holling:can't make it happen elsewhere in your in your financing, then then the emergency fund is something you'll just have to build back up. So it's it's a backup plan. How's that?
Phylecia Jones:Oh, interesting, Sean.
Sean Cooper:I would tend to agree with that. It's find alternatives for a period to get you through, you know, unless you have no computers then you're kind of SOL
Chris Holling:yeah, I'm more inclined to say let's buy him a typewriter and tell him to deal with But
Phylecia Jones:how old are you? a typewriter?
Chris Holling:I'm just you know, I'm just wise.
Phylecia Jones:Is that next to your VHS player too?
Chris Holling:Yeah. And my 8trax
Phylecia Jones:and that Betamax
Chris Holling:laser discs.
Phylecia Jones:You probably still know what a dial tone sounds like, don't you?
Chris Holling:I Do
Phylecia Jones:Oh, I don't have any more.
Chris Holling:Yeah. That's because we're good with money. Not like,
Phylecia Jones:Oh, I just got an inner a request for an interview to go work at one of the biggest fortune 500 companies in the world. But I don't have a new suit. Is that any emergency?
Chris Holling:No.
Sean Cooper:You specified new suit. I don't think you I need,
Phylecia Jones:I want to leave. I want to leave a good impression. I got to look good. You know,
Sean Cooper:do you have a suit?
Phylecia Jones:I got something. But it may not be the suit. That'll get me the job.
Chris Holling:No birthday suits on.
Sean Cooper:Depends on the job.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah, it does depend on the job. So
Chris Holling:Is this the 500 company where you're the janitor. N
Phylecia Jones:So new suite, not an emergency.
Chris Holling:No.
Sean Cooper:No.
Chris Holling:I like this game. This is a fun game.
Phylecia Jones:Trying to figure out going to see mama is not an emergency.
Chris Holling:It's close.
Phylecia Jones:It's close
Chris Holling:If Mama's sick, you can do it
Phylecia Jones:the kids getting their education is not okay. paying for college the first year college for my kid?
Chris Holling:No.
Phylecia Jones:And I didn't have the the 403 B. I didn't have a 401k to pull from or anything. Oh,
Chris Holling:No 529 is no
Phylecia Jones:no. 529 not 403b sorry. wrong thing
Chris Holling:No.
Phylecia Jones:No. Wow.
Chris Holling:I mean, now you're you're veering into a totally different territory. I don't even know how Sean feels about this. But
Sean Cooper:this just sounds like a lack of planning.
Chris Holling:Well, now we know exactly where Sean sits. No,
Phylecia Jones:Not that he's trying to shame anyone listening to this show that's trying to get better with money. We're just giving some examples
Sean Cooper:You've got to start somewhere. That's true.
Phylecia Jones:Yes, start somewhere.
Chris Holling:My my response to that is is much more of a soapbox than anything maybe for a different episode. But I I'm much more inclined, even if the money is available to send said kiddo to trade school or military first. Anyway. But you know, like, that's, that's because it's it's not like, it's not like it's a bad thing. I think. I think it's an important set of valuable skills. And you know, if you go through it, and you have a couple of years to learn about yourself, and you still want to go to college, and yeah, that sounds great. But if you have the skill set for something that you can always do to even you know, if things fall through, and then you have ways to pay for yourself through college and you're not taking on, you know, what, what's that? What's that john Melaney bit? They, I paid $250,000. Whereas I signed a contract when I was 17. That's illegal. You can't do that. That's theft. And I think people are making triple digit decisions when they're 17. And they shouldn't. So
Phylecia Jones:You only live once. Why not?
Chris Holling:You know what? Yeah, you only live once. It's fine.
Phylecia Jones:Rack up that $3 trillion dollar student loan debt.
Chris Holling:It's fine.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, I'm coming out of the pandemic. I haven't, I followed all the rules. I stayed home. I masked up didn't talk to anyone. Now I'm really stressed out. And I want to go to a spa.
Chris Holling:You know,
Phylecia Jones:five days.
Chris Holling:You know, Felicia,
Sean Cooper:definitely not an emergency.
Chris Holling:When you were coming out of that sentence. I really thought you were gonna say psychologist and I was gonna give you the green light and then you just spa just
Phylecia Jones:so psychologists? Yes. Emergency?
Chris Holling:Yeah, I think that's just
Phylecia Jones:Spa. No, not an emergency.
Chris Holling:Yeah.
Phylecia Jones:Okay. Okay. Just Just getting clear because some people have very different views on what's an emergency.
Chris Holling:Right. I totally agree.
Sean Cooper:emergency is the unexpected instant thing that has to be covered. Your the emergency fund is the you planning for the unexpected, if it's something that you could have antissipated, it doesn't fall under emergency.
Phylecia Jones:The pandemic was unexpected.
Sean Cooper:Yes, but most of the things that you talked about coming out of the pandemic were not necessary things. They're things you might want, but they weren't necessary.
Phylecia Jones:Oh, wow, you need to have a whole show on what's necessary, wants and needs.
Sean Cooper:Oh, yeah, needs and wants my wife and I have a whole list of needs and wants.
Phylecia Jones:Well, that's all I have for you in the is this an emergency lightning round?
Sean Cooper:That was that was a good round.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, I'll come up with more for you guys.
Sean Cooper:I'm curious. And would you have answered those essentially the same way we did?
Phylecia Jones:Um, well, a spa, for me, it's probably an emergency. But remember, I have an emergency fund and I have short term fund, so I can just dig into something else.
Sean Cooper:Exactly. Not the emergency fund.
Chris Holling:Did you hear that Did you hear that? That that I can dig into that pile that goes towards emergencies or shiny stuff thing that you just talked about?
Phylecia Jones:No, it's not shiny stuff. It's things that I didn't anticipate to come up that I might need,
Chris Holling:like a spa?
Phylecia Jones:Yeah. You know, I've earned it
Chris Holling:I've been alone. And,
Phylecia Jones:you know, I've been alone, you know? Come on, the dog threw up on the carpet. That's an emergency. I need a new one.
Chris Holling:A new dog?
Phylecia Jones:No, we'll keep the same dog. Well, thank you for answering that. That's really good. I think. Um, I actually do think a lot of people need to hear more of this. Because over the years of talking to people helping them with money, emergencies are definitely interpreted very differently. throughout the world, or in the United States, rather.
Chris Holling:Yeah, well, and I, I really do think that a lot of that stuff gets justified when you haven't taken the time to, to create those separations, like we were talking about. So when when I'm saying, I'm setting aside a certain amount for my car deductible, and then I, you know, I'm just aware of where everything needs to go. And then the trip to go see mom after the pandemic comes up. Well, oh, yeah, well, you know, my car's fine right now. So I can I can make this trip happen, because I'm looking at my checking account, and my checking account looks fine. But when you have everything allocated, and you start going, Okay, where's this money gonna come from? Oh, well, this is set aside for this. This is allocated for that. And, and that's why personal finance and budgeting is important to me. Because when you see it all laid out, then that's, that's when you have a much better idea as to what what you have to operate with. And you don't make those choices, not because they're a bad choice. Just because you you're seeing the writing on the wall and what what could come up later. Which also means that, hey, you know, things are starting to ease back into it, we're starting to back away from mask mandates, we're starting to see a little bit more travel. And maybe that's the time to be like, Ah, you know what, mom's gonna want to see me. And so let's wait, it's a couple months out before, before everything kind of really starts to lift or it just seems like it's starting to and I don't know when let's let's start putting a little bit of money into the seeing mom category. Still not
Sean Cooper:planning, planning,
Phylecia Jones:planning. Not to shame anybody who did not plan?
Chris Holling:No. That's that's
Sean Cooper:This is the truth about investing, not the
Chris Holling:right
Sean Cooper:sugarcoated.
Chris Holling:Right
Sean Cooper:investing.
Chris Holling:Yeah, that's, that's why that's why
Phylecia Jones:Sugarcoated investing. I want to do that. Sounds tasty
Chris Holling:They do have sugar coated investing. It's called, like, pyramid scheme, I believe. Yeah, that's a that's a sugar coated investing.
Phylecia Jones:Wow. I will say this one thing I have learned out coming out of the pandemic, I do think business owners need to start allocating or planning, planning to take some time off, you know, you know, so that you won't hit that burnout phase. At the end of the year, make sure you start putting money away so that you can go to a spa, if you have the funds to take your team so everybody can kind of relax and get rejuvenated, so that you can plan and make goals for the next year. I think what we're about to see with a lot of business owners is that when we did pivot last year into you know, kind of staying at home doing our own thing. A lot of us have had our heads down, focusing so much on the business and I think we're still kind of heads down and not really taking a break. And I think a lot of people are starting to get to that burnout point. So I've been telling people make sure you're taking breaks, taking a vacation. Wrap that into your plan and your goals. Because you know, burnt, burnt out. It doesn't really help the business, it doesn't really help you either. So I always just say, make sure you plan for it. And you'll just be a better business owner for it.
Chris Holling:I totally agree
Phylecia Jones:In my opinion.
Chris Holling:I totally agree. Well, and it's you know, it's just creating your own Bala bucket for the business. The the old, the old triple B.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah, you need one business baller bucket.
Chris Holling:That's what I like.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah, let's do it.
Chris Holling:I want to hear a little bit more about you and your business itself, rather than just the name. Because I'm, I'm curious and kind of, kind of tell us a little bit about you. And you're really, you know, it's this is kind of like the, the easy shout out. I guess thing that's you want to call it that that was the most eloquent way that I clearly could have said that.
Phylecia Jones:So basically just talk the beautiful things about myself
Chris Holling:Talk beautiful things about yourself, because because you talked beautiful things about me and okay things about Sean, because he's fine.
Phylecia Jones:That means you guys have to just do a calendar, that's all, we need some merch. So right now run a company called I find you close. And I actually just go out and research events that are looking for speakers. And it was something I kind of fell into when it came to marketing my business. And that was getting on stage. So I put this together so that other people who run businesses run podcast, can have an easy way to find opportunities to get on stage. Because researching takes a lot of time. And for me, it was actually coming really easy. And it was kind of fun for me to go see what's out there in the world when it comes to getting on stage in front of in front of an audience to talk about what you do, you know, inside of your business. So I run a membership, you can go check it out, ifindyouclose.com And every Monday we send out a new list of speaking opportunities. And we're starting to see international gigs are opening back up. A lot of live events are starting to happen. And and that's just basically what we do. So we just, we go and find the things and put them in a list and give them to the people who want it.
Chris Holling:That's really cool.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah,
Chris Holling:that's really, really cool.
Phylecia Jones:It's a fun business model. I like it.
Chris Holling:I was trying to think like, well, maybe maybe you just need an incredibly talented speaker from a podcast that you did.
Phylecia Jones:You know, there are opportunities for you. There are opportunities, there's going to be more I don't know, you know, as you guys go forward with your podcasts, there's definitely gonna be some for you to get on stage, maybe talk about the podcast and talk about money. Because there are quite a few money conferences and of course, podcast conferences, and people are always wanting to know how you do things.
Chris Holling:Where does that? Where does that fall in the regulation world, Sean? Seriously.
Sean Cooper:terms of talking about what aspect?
Chris Holling:I don't know if she said, Hey, you guys are we got it all set up. High five. This is cool. Come out and talk about your podcast. Does that get complicated? Because we're more I don't know. it's complicated
Sean Cooper:No we could go talk. No we could go talk.
Chris Holling:Do we have to talk together? Can you talk by yourself? Can I talk by myself? Or does that become weird? Because I remember us having conversation about it where it was like, we can't really, or at least maybe it was just me. Maybe I can't go out and be like, Oh, do you? Do you know me from the truth about investing? Because that was one of the things you talked about wasn't it wasn't?
Sean Cooper:Nah you could still say that. You just can't really be compensated for most things. But you can go market. See, that's good. Right? Right.
Phylecia Jones:So you can get on stage.
Chris Holling:Okay. Okay.
Phylecia Jones:Yes. So depends on when when you two are ready to do your road tour with your podcast.
Chris Holling:We can road tour Sean. We could have Anastasia, announce us.
Phylecia Jones:See you come with your own MC. Even better,
Chris Holling:That's right?
Phylecia Jones:Which actually is a good move to do to be honest. Just saying
Chris Holling:that was a jab at our voices is what that was.
Phylecia Jones:Your voices are great.
Chris Holling:See, see. That's all I do is I just fish for compliments.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah,
Chris Holling:catch up. You just cast and you catch and cast and you catch.
Phylecia Jones:You know, compliments are an emergency. Can, Can you go buy compliments. Can that come out of the emergency fund?
Chris Holling:Yep, sure can.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, cool.
Chris Holling:Sean. Sean, is that emergency the emergency fund
Sean Cooper:Oh, man.
Phylecia Jones:Want to go get it for free. Okay.
Sean Cooper:Yeah. Just keep casting like Chris and
Phylecia Jones:you should just start up a business where people can just call you all you know, pay you just to say if it's an emergency or not.
Chris Holling:I thought you were gonna say I should start a business where people can call me and pay me to tell me I'm great, which I was like, yeah, let's
Phylecia Jones:No no, no,
Chris Holling:let's do that.
Phylecia Jones:Something a little bit
Sean Cooper:that would be a hotline to you know, you call up and you just give people compliments. People need a little boost they give you a call and you're like, hey,
Phylecia Jones:he compliments for just for him though.
Sean Cooper:I know I I didn't see the money in Chris's endeavor.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah calling and giving compliments maybe a little bit better. But you know, but if you set up your your, your your call line so people can pay to determine whether or not they have an emergency could be could be useful.
Sean Cooper:It sounds like fun.
Chris Holling:You know what, I've got this. I've got this figured out. Okay, here. We're gonna do a trial run real quick. Think about think of an emergency question Phylecia and then think of one just think of one. You got one. You got one.
Phylecia Jones:Okay,
Chris Holling:got it.
Phylecia Jones:Can I repeat one?
Chris Holling:Just sure you can repeat one.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, cool. I got it.
Chris Holling:Okay. I don't even have a name for it. What's the name? It's whatever. Hello.
Phylecia Jones:Hi.
Chris Holling:Oh, hi. Hi. Oh, sorry. Are you are you calling about about figuring out the the emergency funds?
Phylecia Jones:Yeah, I'm trying to find the emergency hotline. Is this it?
Chris Holling:This is the emergency hotline. Go ahead.
Phylecia Jones:Oh, my gosh. So, cool. Okay, so here's the story. I just talked to my friend and she's getting married in Vegas. And she wants us to wear these ugly ugly dresses.
Chris Holling:Not an emergency, But you know what,
Phylecia Jones:but I didn't get there yet.
Chris Holling:I know. Not an emergency. I'll tell you what, I'm sure you would look great in that dress.
Phylecia Jones:You know, I want a refund.
Chris Holling:I was trying to offer the compliment. Immediately after the yes or no question.
Phylecia Jones:I didn't need the compliment. I needed to talk to someone to get it all of my chest.
Chris Holling:Sean, your business model sucks. This is your fault.
Sean Cooper:Chris, You didn't use the sandwich approach compliment then the critique then the compliment.
Chris Holling:Okay. Okay. Okay. Emergency fund hotline.
Phylecia Jones:Hi, Is this, Chris? Yes, it is and you have a lovely voice. Oh, thank you. I'm just calling to you know, see if I can get some advice on an emergency.
Chris Holling:Tell me about it.
Phylecia Jones:Okay. So the other day, I kind of noticed that there was a family of squirrels in the ceiling. But my friend called and said, I can go to the spa with her. So I'm trying to decide, oh, should I use my emergency money? You know, I can get the squirrels out what you know, like a little smoke and duct tape it but that spa thing you know, you know, it's been a pandemic, can I use my money for that?
Chris Holling:You know, I, I like how you're taking the time to really process all of this and you're making
Phylecia Jones:I know, thank you
Chris Holling:you're making you're making some important decisions and really good on you for giving me a call first. That was
Phylecia Jones:Thank you!
Chris Holling:I think you're better off not worrying about the the spa and taking care of those squirrels first, but I bet once you get that all straightened out that you'll be able to handle that spa. And that smile treats you so good afterward, later on. later on. Just not today.
Phylecia Jones:Okay, okay. I guess I can work with that
Chris Holling:their sandwich, Sean, Is that better? Well played. Oh, I didn't hang up the phone, click. Okay, this this has gotten out of hand, talking about sandwiches and stuff. I should probably wrap this up because clearly nobody else is gonna do it.
Phylecia Jones:I'm just a guest.
Chris Holling:And you you've been a great guest. And I applaud you for being a guest and you do so such a good job as a guest we need another guest and Next. Next time you just keep being that. Good guess.
Phylecia Jones:So is your show an emergency? should I listen to it?
Chris Holling:You know, I think you can budget your time appropriately to listen to this show.
Phylecia Jones:All right.
Chris Holling:Whoo hoo. See, sleep deprived and quick witted. Sean, let's close this out. Are you gonna Are you gonna close this out? Because clearly you run this thing now?
Sean Cooper:Nope. Nope. Leaving that to you.
Chris Holling:Suddenly when there's work to be done, thank you. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for joining us today. Today, probably the last couple days because this this was a podcast that we probably are breaking up into two if it's not already broken up into two. But thank you for joining us on listening with us today. And really thank you Miss Phylecia for for joining us, because this this has been great
Phylecia Jones:Thank you for having me. This was fun. This is fun. I had a lot of fun. Thank you.
Chris Holling:Do you want to send that shout out to your business one more time?
Phylecia Jones:Oh, you can go check me out at ifindyouclose.com.
Chris Holling:That's great. Okay, well make sure to check her out. Thank you for joining us on this episode slash episodes. And really thank you like, we tried to say thank you for taking the time to want to learn how to better yourself, because I think that's an important skill that not everybody goes out of the way to try and go find. So we appreciate you coming back out to the bonus episode, wrapping up officially season three from the truth about investing back to basics. We'll be back here, hopefully after our little season break hiatus to go ahead and hit season four where we're gonna get, you know, more in depth into some more complicated topics because that's what we do. And thank you for joining us again, my name is Chris Holling.
Sean Cooper:I'm Sean Cooper.
Chris Holling:And this is our guest,
Phylecia Jones:Phylecia Jones.
Chris Holling:And we will catch you on the next episode. podcast disclaimer disclaimer. The disclaimer following this disclaimer is the disclaimer that is required for this podcast to be up and running and fully functioning and moving forward. This is going to be the same disclaimer that you will hear in each one of our episodes. We hope you enjoy it just as much as we enjoyed making it.
Sean Cooper:All content on this podcast and accompanying transcript is for informational purposes only opinions expressed herein by Sean Cooper are solely those of Fit financial consulting LLC, unless otherwise specifically cited, Chris Holling and Phylecia Jones are not affiliated with fit financial consulting LLC. Nor do the views expressed by Chris Holling or Phylecia Jones represent the views of fit financial consulting, LLC. This podcast is intended to be used in its entirety. Any other use beyond the author's intent, distribution or copying of its content is strictly prohibited. Nothing in this podcast is intended as legal accounting or tax advice and is for informational purposes only. All information or ideas provided should be discussed in detail with an advisor, accountant or legal counsel prior to implementation. This podcast may reference links to websites for the convenience of our users. Our firm has no control over the accuracy or content of these other websites. advisory services are offered through fit financial consulting, LLC, an investment advisor firm registered in the states of Washington and Colorado. The presence of this podcast on the internet shall not be directly or indirectly interpreted as a solicitation of investment advisory services to persons of another jurisdiction unless otherwise permitted by statute, follow up or individualized responses to consumers in a particular state by our firm in the rendering of personalized investment advice for compensation shall not be made without our first complying with jurisdiction requirements, or pursuant to an applicable state exemption for information concerning the status or disciplinary history of a broker dealer, investment advisor or other representative. A consumer should contact their state securities administrator.
Chris Holling:No, I was gonna tell you I believe it or not, we finally just hit triple digits on a couple of our episodes. Seansky
Sean Cooper:Oh, for downloads
Chris Holling:for downloads
Sean Cooper:nice.
Chris Holling:Like just just broke it like I like I'm sure I'd looked like that kid. It's like hitting the refresh button and waiting. Kids were we got one that's at 100. And one at one oh one I'm like triple digits.
Phylecia Jones:So what's your number one show?
Chris Holling:Our number one is the pilot episode for season two with Jarmar, who we were just talking about the first rule of investing part one. And then Part two is is also pretty high up there. And then the other triple digit is the introduction. Yeah, but that that kind of happens.
Phylecia Jones:Our number one is the end of cuffing season.
Chris Holling:Oh,
Phylecia Jones:That let's you know what we talked about on the show.
Chris Holling:I don't but it sounds inappropriate.
Phylecia Jones:I no it's it's it's a cuffing season is when you go and you know you get all boo'd up get it get somebody to start dating like in November so you can hit the holidays. You can get all the Presents Then you leave them after Valentine's Day,
Chris Holling:I
Phylecia Jones:That's, cuffing season and then you go and get ready for summer fling season so then you go exercise and you get out there for summer. Yeah.
Chris Holling:That's such a great term for such a dirty dirty trick. I also like to use the term all boo'd up. I like that boo.
Phylecia Jones:Yeah, you got to get you a boo for the holidays.
Chris Holling:Holiday boo, which is different than boo and Halloween holidays. That's
Phylecia Jones:see. See, this is financial. See, this is how some people manage money.
Chris Holling:That's a boo boo. There are boo boos in investing.