It’s hard to believe, but we celebrate 200 episodes of the Maple Money Show this week. Joining in the fun are my most frequent guests from the past four years, and good friends, J.D. Roth and Miranda Marquardt. Rather than focus on a single topic for episode 200, I decided to reflect on my previous conversations with J.D. and Miranda here on the show. For example, Miranda updates us on how she continues outsourcing tasks like grocery shopping and housekeeping. And J.D. talks about his recent move and reminisces on one of his big money mistakes. 

 

Welcome to the Maple Money Show, the podcast that helps Canadians improve their personal finances to create lasting financial freedom. This episode of the Maple Money Show is brought to you by Willful. Did you know that 57 percent of Canadian adults don’t have a will? Willful has made it more affordable, convenient and easy for Canadians to create a legal will and power of attorney documents online from the comfort of home. In less than 20 minutes, and for a fraction of the price of visiting a lawyer, you can gain peace of mind knowing you put a plan in place to protect your children, pets and loved ones in the event of an emergency. Get started for free at maplemoney.com/willful and use promo code Maple Money to save 15 percent. Now, let’s chat with J.D. and Miranda. 

 

Tom: Hi, J.D., and Miranda. Welcome back to the Maple Money Show. 

 

J.D.: Hey, Tom.

 

Miranda: Hey. 

 

Tom: This is episode 200. I was looking through some of the past episodes and realized the two of you are tied for four episodes each. I believe it’s three individual episodes, plus you both have been on panels, live at FINCON. Not only have you been on the most episodes, but you’re two of the people I’m closest with. I thought we’d just have some fun and celebrate 200 episodes and what is almost four years of the podcast. The podcast editor here, Steve Stewart, pointed that out—that we’re closing in on four years in about a month. 

 

Miranda: Steve is really good at knowing how old your podcast is. 

 

Tom: He’s on top of everything for me. I’ve had him since the beginning. 

 

Miranda: It’s what he does. He just lets you know how old your podcast is and how many episodes you have. 

 

Tom: Yeah, he gave me all sorts of interesting stats, compared it to his podcast that he used to run. He’s been very encouraging with the show throughout the years. You guys have been on quite a few times. We’re giving you each that number “five” now. I should hand out badges. What I wanted to do is just look back at some of the past episodes and see where you guys are and if anything’s changed. One of the first ones I wanted to jump into right away was Miranda, back in episode 13. You talked about the benefits of outsourcing other things. We’ve talked from a business standpoint that you can outsource writers or my podcast editor, but you are outsourcing other things like something as simple as someone coming in and cleaning your house because you found value in what you pay them, to what you could be doing with that time. Are you still doing that? And how are you finding that? 

 

Miranda:  I still have somebody. I still outsource somebody in my house. I outsource somebody to take care of my yard. I use personal shoppers to get buy shopping done for me. I just send a list. She kind of cribbed off of Instacart a little. On Instacart, you can make a list and share the list with somebody rather than going through Instacart, trying to find somebody and having Instacart take their cut or whatever. I just make a list on Instacart, share it with her, and then she goes and gets it. It works out well for both of us because it’s cheaper for me than using Instacart. But she gets to keep more of the money because I pay extra. She buys the stuff at the store and then I pay her on top of that. She gets more money than she would get with Instacart. And even paying her extra, it’s still cheaper for me than Instacart. That’s actually a really fun thing if you can find somebody who does that. She was somebody who ended up fulfilling a lot of my Instacart orders. And after about the fifth or sixth time, she said, “Hey, I do this other thing on the side that would be beneficial for both of us,” and I said, okay.  

 

J.D.: My question is, how do you decide what to outsource? To me, I would never consider outsourcing my grocery shopping. How does it make sense for you? Why does it make sense for you? 

 

Miranda: Because I hate grocery shopping. When I’m trying to decide what to outsource in my life, whether it’s yard work, cleaning the house or grocery shopping, I don’t like any of those mundane chores. They are time-consuming. Making your list,  going to the store, then bringing everything back, putting it all away—it’s all very time-consuming. 

 

J.D.: That’s not fun for you? 

 

Miranda: No, I don’t like it. I like baking and cooking but I prefer cooking with friends. If I’m by my lonesome on an evening, I don’t like cooking for myself. So most of what I get are things like a cauliflower rice bowl or something that I can heat up and eat. 

 

J.D.: See, that’s why you don’t like shopping, you’re buying cauliflower rice bowls! 

 

Miranda: I have to buy the cauliflower rice bowls to eat at home because when I eat out, I get a charcuterie board, and drink an entire bottle of wine, J.D.! So when I’m at home, it has to be the cauliflower rice bowls. I’ve worked really hard to get rid of this hormonal weight gain I ended up with a few years ago and I don’t want it again so it’s cauliflower rice bowls, at home. 

 

J.D.: Don’t take nutrition advice for me. I’m at my biggest girth in history so you should not be taking advice from me. 

 

Miranda: I think figuring out what to do is basically taking a step back. I talk about this all the time. What are your values? What do you want from your life? What do you want your life to look like? And then how do you use your money as a tool to get that in exchange for getting more time? So far, I haven’t outsourced the laundry. I don’t particularly like doing laundry, but it doesn’t take up a lot of my time and energy. I could throw a load in and then go to work, right? I haven’t outsourced my laundry yet because I could throw a load in, and I can get some work done. I can get a bunch of stuff done. I switch the load. Or, if one of my subletters from downstairs—my son has two friends down there subletting from me. If they want to come up and use the laundry, I don’t even have to switch my own load. They’ll just switch it for me so they can put their stuff it. I think it really just goes down to what is taking up your time and energy and what do you really not like? That’s how I decide what I’m going to outsource. Why do I want to spend my time—even if I don’t work with that time, like with the cleaning… Even if I don’t work during that entire time, I’ve gotten some time back to do something I enjoy, like get a massage, go have my nails done, or just sit and read a book. That’s getting my time back as well. 

 

J.D.: For me, I hear buying the time back and trading time for money and all that. I’ve done that in the past too when I’ve had a housekeeper. But I’m finding that more and more, as I get older and as my ADD becomes more problematic, I’m not going to use the word outsource, but I hire people to do things that are overwhelming me. I just paid somebody to clean my roof. Now, I could have clean my roof, but I’m out of shape and it’s a huge roof and it was messy. Yes, I could do it but it’s probably going to be eight hours of work for me, or I could pay somebody to come in and do it. They brought in five or six people and spent over an hour. So it was eight hours of work for them too—eight person-hours, but they got it done quickly. They charged me a lot of money because, hey, that’s what contractors do right now in this economy. But for me, I was feeling overwhelmed. I find that more and more that’s what I’m paying to do—paying people to take away the overwhelm. 

 

Tom: I find that too. Even though Miranda said it on this podcast three and a half years ago, I just recently hired a cleaner and it was so much better. She came in for four hours and like you, J.D., what she did in four hours would have taken me the weekend, probably. It’s not just about the money and the time, it’s also about the quality. If someone can do something faster and better than you, it’s added value. I’ve said in other episodes around home renovations and such, I just don’t have that in me for most of them. I’m not going to retile my bathroom or anything like that. And if I did, I wouldn’t be happy with the results so what’s the point? Some things you just need to hire out, but it’s also nice to hire out and save time. These aren’t always expensive things. This doesn’t have to be a case where you have to make a certain amount of money to have a cleaner or something like that. It just depends on if they cost more than what you value your time at? Even if that time is you doing something with the kids. In my case, on the weekend, there’s value there. It doesn’t always have to be connected to earning income. 

 

J.D.: I don’t know. I feel like it is to some degree, though, a luxury of wealth, because my family—

 

Tom: That’s a good point. 

 

J.D.: I grew up poor, in a trailer house and we struggled to get by. There was no way we would ever hire a cleaner because we had more time than money, essentially. What I’m hearing Miranda say is, that she’s reached the point where she’s comfortable enough and has enough income that it’s more productive for her to use her time to generate more income than it is to do these other tasks. It’s a fortunate position to be in, of course, but it’s interesting because you’re trying to balance out time and money. 

 

Miranda: And that’s the thing. When I talk to people, the most common thing they say is, “How do I free up the money for a house cleaner?” That is the most common thing that people want to know, how do I get a house cleaner? I always say, the house cleaner is going to come and do a deep clean and that’s going to be the most expensive part of it. The first time the house cleaner came to my place, it took about three and a half hours. And now she’s here for an hour and a half to two hours and just does once a week. It’s just having that once a week—to go through dust, vacuum, clean the bathrooms, clean the tubs, change the sheets in the guest rooms, all of that stuff. I always talk to people about how much they can afford. Some people can only afford to have somebody come in every other week or once a month. So you have to figure that out. But I do warn them, you’re going to have to save up for that initial cleaning because most cleaning services will come in and do a deep clean and that’s going to be the most expensive thing. But then if you want to maintain the clean, you have to have some sort of regular schedule. So sit down and figure that price point out, then sit down and look at your budget and figure out, “Okay, if this is what really matters to me, let’s look through my spending and see what I’m spending money on that doesn’t matter to me as much, and see if there’s a place to either cut or find a way to earn more money.” That’s the hard thing, right? But a lot of the time we’re looking around—and this happened to me as well. I still have to (every now and again) go back through and say, “Okay, let’s review our spending and make sure am I spending on the things that matter to me.” So often we just spend money without thinking about it. And by saying, okay, the house cleaning is a huge thing for me. It’s the most important thing for me. Now I need to go back through and say, where am I spending money that’s not important to me. And how did we get here? I have a whole bunch of little knickknack things that I used to buy all the time. These just go on a shelf somewhere, and gather dust. And then they’re a pain in the butt when I have to move. And also, the amount of money I’ve spent on knickknack things in the last three years amounts to a European vacation, for goodness sake! That’s where I stopped and said, “Oh, what am I doing here? I want to travel more, but how is what is happening?” And it’s the same thing with the cleaning of the house. When I decided I wanted a house cleaner, I was already making good money and had just moved back to Idaho. Basically, the house cleaner was because I moved back to Idaho. The cost of living there is 60 percent of what it was in Philadelphia so that extra money went right into a house cleaner. 

 

Tom: Yeah. J.D., you mentioned the idea that when you were younger you had more time than money. I think that is an important thing, but even if you are lower-income, people are making decisions where if they don’t have the time they need… Daycare is an obvious example. But there are still cases where we’re even at a low income you  still have to make those decisions, “I’ve got this much money, how am I going to break this out?” So it’s kind of like Miranda said, by moving she cut her cost of living so much that it kind of paid for itself, which is it’s great if you have the opportunity to move based on the cost of living. 

 

J.D.: Right. My girlfriend and I moved about a year ago. Here in Oregon, we moved from Portland to Corvallis. It’s more of a lateral move than anything. But at the time, I really lobbied hard to make it cost of living because I consider myself semi-retired, relatively comfortable, with plenty saved. And I thought if I can move someplace like Idaho or Savannah, Georgia or some other place where, maybe I don’t like it as much as I do Northwest Oregon, but I like it fine— 

 

Miranda: Honey, I know what you do in your spare time. That’s not legal here in Idaho. 

 

J.D.: Oh, okay. Fair enough! Oregon has legalized marijuana. That’s what Miranda is saying. But there are places you can move to and you spend a lot less money but I really wanted to do that. I thought, “Oh, my gosh, this would be great. We could leverage the fact that I have plenty of retirement savings and move someplace with a lower cost of living.” It didn’t happen though. We both like the Pacific Northwest quite a bit, and there’s a reason it’s expensive right now. It’s got good quality. 

 

Tom: The fact you did that, though, is it still making those decisions based on what’s important to you, I would think. Your most recent episode—

 

J.D.: It’s mindful, being conscious. 

 

Tom: Your most recent episode on the show was Adventures in Homeownership, where you kind of went through everything you were dealing with at that time. It sounds like you’re still dealing with it—with the roof and everything. And your very first episode was Avoiding Money Mistakes. Do these two intersect at all? Have you had any money mistakes in your new house adventures? 

 

J.D.: No, no, no, no. The new house here in Corvallis is great. But yes, the previous home (which is why we were talking about adventures in homeownership) up in Portland, had a great yard. It had literally a park-like setting. They use that a lot in real estate literature (which is kind of BS) but this was literally like a park. The house itself was so frustrating. It required constant repair and maintenance and it just felt like there was no end to it. I eventually reached a breaking point. So I very much consider that a financial mistake because beyond the money that we put in to purchase the home, I put in something like $150,000 of my own money to remodel the place. That’s a lot of money—a lot of money! And we didn’t get that out when we sold it. You hear that all the time, that you’re not going to get out what you put into remodeling. It was a mistake to have moved there. The inspector had told us not to purchase the home but we decided to throw money at the problem. In the end, the inspector was right. The hilarious thing to me is, that the people who bought the place from us, their inspector told them not to purchase the home too, and they did it anyway. 

 

Miranda: It’s fun. 

 

J.D.: Fun? Miranda, historically, I had terrible depression and anxiety. It has never been worse than when I lived in that house. Since moving to Corvallis, things haven’t eliminated the depression and anxiety. It’s still here but it’s at a very low level. It has subsided. Living in a home where I felt there was always something wrong—not just something wrong but several major things wrong at the same time was destroying my mental health. It was crazy. 

 

Miranda: And those are the reasons why we always talk about how much I love being on Team Rent because somebody else takes care of that business. 

 

J.D.: Exactly. 

 

Miranda: I did tell my landlord—because he’s got to sell this year because of the capital gains tax exclusion and how that works here in the U.S. he’s got to sell sometime this year. I did let him know I am interested in buying this from him because I like this house I’m living in right now. I don’t like moving, and I like this house so I did tell him I’d be interested in purchasing it from him. We’ll see what he comes back with. I think he’s got a nephew that might be interested in buying it. But that’s the other thing. I’m fortunate that I have the ability and the means. If I get kicked out of this house, I’ll look for a condo somewhere, something that’s like more of an apartment kind of situation. My son and his friends are already thinking, “Okay, well, we may have to just move out and find our own place if we lose the house or whatever” but being prepared for that is important, too. I think one of the hard things we run into, especially here in the U.S… It’s really easy for the three of us to sit here and talk about, “Well, what do you value? Make decisions based on that. Move to a lower cost of living area…” Well, moving is expensive. Not everybody can just pack up and move to another area. There’s a lot that goes on, especially in the United States, which doesn’t really support people trying to figure out their values. I’m looking at my sister who’s a teacher with four kids. She has to live with my parents because teachers don’t make enough in Idaho to be able to afford the skyrocketing rent and housing. She’s working on a summertime gig right now, trying to just get enough money to pay the bills. She has childcare help from my parents and even from me. But how do you get ahead in a society where, even if you work really hard, you’re still not making ends meet? There are several different conversations about money and how to get ahead based on where you happen to be and the kind of systems you’re in. That was a lot of word salad—hello! Anyway. 

 

Tom: The thing about teachers, I’ve talked to some teachers and I don’t think they make enough money anywhere. You can look at their salary and compare it to something else, great. But I’ve never known a teacher that’s not working 60 hours a week. When you talk about not having the ability to do things like clean your house or something like that, in any kind of job like that where you’re working more than 40 hours a week, you’re definitely making that decision to give up something else with your time. Miranda, another thing you talked about with me, a long time ago. 

 

Miranda: Oh, no. 

 

Tom: We did a panel with Kyle Prevost on the power of networking. Since we’re talking about how the careers affect all this, how are you feeling about that, currently? Using a network to actually benefit yourself as a career—you’re also doing politics now as well so I’m sure you’re probably doing a lot of networking? 

 

Miranda: Yeah. Networking is really important and that’s especially true if you’re a freelancer or doing any sort of creative type of work. Almost all of my job leads, I almost never apply for. Almost all of my jobs and my current clients have come as a result of some sort of networking. Even just being on LinkedIn. I just started a gig doing some content for Encyclopedia Britannica. That came as a result of somebody who found me on LinkedIn five years ago. He brought me to an agency. Now, he’s left the agency, but now he’s bringing me along to this next gig. Just being out there. I had somebody messaged me just a couple of days on Twitter ask, “How do I hire you?” I said, “Well, what is your budget?” And he said, “I’m going to send you an email.” I told him I’ve been in the hot springs, so I’m probably not going to get to it until tomorrow. But those kinds of things—being visible, networking… And networking is more than just establishing relationships with other people. It’s also how visible you are.  

 

J.D.: Right. 

 

Miranda: Networking online and everything is hard right now because you have to— 

 

J.D.: And it’s also reputation, too. 

 

Miranda: Yes, yes. Yeah, J.D. has a good reputation. Probably the best reputation of all of us maybe?  

 

J.D.: I don’t know. I don’t know what my reputation is. I read a lot on Reddit. It’s one of my guilty pleasures. And I subscribe to some subreddits that would make you think the world is coming to the end… 

 

Miranda: Oh, it is. 

 

J.D.: No, it’s not. It’s just (bleep) put out by the media. I read the anti-work, subreddit and the work reform subreddits. The people who are writing in there, I’m guessing, are primarily young men. I don’t know. They have some valid complaints. There’s no question. There’s no question. But they also take this very regimented approach or view of work that is just meant to be a place to go earn a salary and that’s it. And that all jobs must pay whatever they want it to pay. I think it’s much more complicated than that. And I think what they’re missing out on is, that every job is an opportunity to build your reputation and form connections. When I look back at my life, I’ve worked some pretty crappy jobs. And I’ve had some pretty crappy bosses but I’ve always tried to maintain a positive attitude, even when I was miserable. But your work, your career, is an opportunity to build these connections and to build your reputation. And you never know when things are going to come back. They can come back five years from now, 10 years from now. You talk about something on LinkedIn five years ago, but there’s networking. I think it’s very valuable to create this social network of contacts because it allows us to draw on other people as resources, and to help other people when they need help that matches our expertise. Anyway, I get very frustrated when I see this anti-work and work reform subreddits as just further examples of the decay of social capital in our society. They make me sad. There are some very real problems that need to be addressed, but these people take it to an extreme that I think goes too far. 

 

Miranda: I think part of the issue that we’re running into right now is, that everybody wants to feel treated like a human and with dignity in their work, whatever they’re doing. We have gotten into the habit of a society denigrating certain jobs or denigrating certain groups of people and saying, “Well, you’re not worth any sort of living wage,” right? There is no place in the United States where you can get a modest, two-bedroom apartment, working 40 hours on minimum wage. 

 

J.D.: Has that ever been true that you could do that? 

 

Miranda: Yes, actually, yes. The whole point of the minimum wage was when it was enacted as it was supposed to help you afford basic living things. What a lot of people don’t realize is, that a large percentage of people on minimum wage are actually adults who have families to support. Let’s not forget, that productivity has gone up a ton in the last 60 years, but minimum wage hasn’t been changed for almost 20. You look at things like CEO pay, which has exploded, but it used to be CEOs made about 50 times what our workers made. Now, CEOs make 344 times what a worker makes. I think it’s important to take a step back and say, “Wait a minute, do we live in a society that really does support people?” We’re right now in a situation where we’re sitting here saying we need more mental health resources. Well, yes, we do. Meanwhile, state budgets are cutting mental health support everywhere. I was just talking to my friend last night who said, “I’m not sure how long I can stay at this job.” She works at a hospital. She’s not the worst paid but she’s not supposed to have to work two holiday weekends in a row, but they’re still making her work two holiday weekends in a row. She doesn’t get extra overtime because it falls under whatever this loophole is that they’re using. It’s like a whole situation. There needs to be some sort of balance where, if I work 40 hours a week, I should be able to afford the basic necessities of life, you know? 

 

J.D.: I feel like it’s so complicated because there’s so much that goes into choices, education, choices to have children. You mentioned your sister has four children. And I’m not trying to put down your sister. I’m just using this as an example. But choosing to have that many children before you know that you have enough money to support them. I mean, I know it probably is a religious thing, but I look at my friends and some of them who are struggling… And I have some friends who vocally do not value education, formal education, especially higher education. And yet, if you look at the numbers, the number one factor in what a person earns is their level of education. That is the highest correlation above race, gender, anything else. How educated are you? That’s going to be the strongest correlation to how much money you are. 

 

Tom: Before we go, I want to ask both of you just for a bit of a summary of your philosophy—a bit of how you see personal finance in your own life and how it might help others. J.D., I’ll start with you. 

 

J.D.: Well, I was thinking about this this morning because I was just reading a report from the United States Federal Reserve on the economic well-being of Americans. I also think it’s pretty funny that this is the Maple Money Show and we’re talking largely about American issues. 

 

Miranda: We are definitely Americans. Center us! 

 

Tom: It’s all about you guys. 

 

J.D.: To me, this Federal Reserve report on the economic well-being of Americans is pretty interesting because it shows clearly that self-reported, economic well-being has increased over the past decade. And yet, Americans perceived national economic well-being—the American’s view of the economy has declined sharply. So there’s this weird disparity where almost 80 percent of Americans believe they are okay or doing well financially, and yet only 40 percent believe the national economy as a whole is doing well. And that that’s a weird dichotomy. I’ve been thinking about this this morning. One of the core parts of my philosophy is, yes, we are absolutely at the mercy of larger economic forces. Think about Ukraine. You have a country invade you. Your economic situation is absolutely impacted by the war. So you, as an individual, are subject to larger economic forces, there’s no question. Yet, despite that, it’s you as an individual who are responsible for making the most of whatever your circumstances are, no matter how good or how poor they are. It’s up to you to do the best with them. In the metaphor that I use is, it’s as if we are each in our own individual boats on a river or the ocean. And the river or ocean is like the economy around us. Let’s use a river as an example. It’s got a current that’s pushing you in a direction and you are responsible for maintaining your craft, your boat, and for steering it in the direction you want to go. If you don’t do anything, you’re just going to get the defaults. You’re just going to get wherever the current pushes you. My philosophy is, we should do whatever we can to make the river calmer, safer for all boats. That’s absolutely something that we can work toward. But we should also, individually, be making our own craft more seaworthy and more able to handle a variety of different situations. That’s my convoluted metaphor. 

 

Tom: That’s great. Miranda, what have you got? 

 

Miranda: For the most part, my financial philosophy boils down to figuring out what matters to you and then viewing your money as a resource and directing those resources in a way that lets you achieve your goals, helps you live according to your values. That’s tempered with recognizing that sometimes you need help, right? Sometimes we need to invest in our people. It’s kind of complicated in that, I get to come at this from a position where I can say “Just spend your money according to your values,” because I have plenty of money to do that. But I think what it boils down to is, you’ve got to figure out what’s important to you. Try and spend your money according to your values. In my position, I say, “I can do that.” I like to go out and use my time and resources to fight for a more just and equitable world. 

 

J.D.: What I think is interesting, Miranda—I don’t know whether you’re consciously aware of this or not, but your philosophy that you described and everything you’ve talked about here very much mirrors Ramit Sethi’s, I Will Teach You To Be Rich philosophy. 

 

Miranda: Oh, nice. 

 

Tom: Well, thanks, both of you for coming back on. This is your fifth time, and I’m sure we’ll have both on multiple times in the future. I like to have the people I’m closest with on. I think we have much better conversations than some of the times where if I don’t know someone that well, there’s a warm-up period to it during the episode. So it’s always good to have both you on. I’m sure we’ll have you both on soon again. Thanks, guys. 

 

J.D.: Thanks, Thomas. 

 

Miranda: Thanks, Tom. 

 

Thank you, J.D. and Miranda, for coming back to the show and for sharing your thoughts and what influences different peoples’ spending choices. You can find the show notes for this episode at maplemoney.com/200. As usual, if you haven’t yet, head over to our YouTube channel and subscribe there. We’ll be getting back to releasing never-before-seen content, soon. You can search for Maple Money or go to maplemoney.com/youtube and subscribe today. I look forward to seeing back to next week when Chad Robinson joins us to discuss private mortgage lending. See you next week.