Start100K

The podcast designed to help people get to their first $100,000 dollars of net worth – and beyond! Follow along as host Brandon Lovingier shares his past financial failures, how he overcame those setbacks, and how you can too! His family was able to become debt free and get on track to financial security and independence before ever earning more than $50,000 per year. His passion for helping others has led him on a journey to share practical tips that anyone can apply. Now go get started!

35 - What is Enough? 02/01/2024

35 - What is Enough? How do you define enough I know for me this is kind of a difficult question and it's something that I wanna get into a little bit deeper this month with some of my other writing and I just think about this in terms of so many things um you know I mean is this money is it time is it lifestyle is it freedom and you know for me I think there's a little components of all of that I think that whenever it comes down to you know enough or we'll call it enoughness then you know we're we're looking at or at least I'm looking at you know there is a money component to that because there's a certain amount of money that I'm going to need to have in order to set myself up in a way that I think I need to be happy but yet there's also so many other examples of people that have so much less than me and they seem to be happy there's an incredible amount of variance in you know what human beings think is enough and what it takes for us to each individually be happy and so I think I just wrestle with this idea quite a bit because I I guess maybe I don't feel like I've achieved enough or I've experienced enough so it's hard to really define exactly what that's gonna be for me I mean I think I have an idea of what that looks like you know for me I think it really boils down to am I able to live in a way that is aligned with what I feel is important in my life so for me and this is you know I'm just speaking for me not for anybody else but for me that really boils down to living a life in a way that I'm able to openly express myself in terms of my faith my creativity my love for others and also be able to just feel safe to express my opinion I think that is one thing that I've really had a hard time with most of the time I've been in the military it's just I've been so throttled you know as far as like opinions and stuff like that like good ideas like actual good ideas not you know the the good idea fairies that we joke about but you know actual creative ideas that actually move the needle toward you know making things better you know those a lot of times get shot down and that's one of those things that yeah I just I don't know I I just get so excited about being outside of that system and and being able to just express myself I mean of course you know I'm able to do stuff like this and things like that but even that with it is within limits you know there's a lot of things that I can't say there's a lot of things that I can't divulge about myself publicly because it could be misconstrued in in a certain way and so I think that's one of the biggest things that I think is going to be good for me and because we have made some good choices I'm gonna be in a pretty good spot to not need you know this not need this JB for a long time but you know I just kind of wonder like what does that look like for you like um you know jail Collins uh I think famously you know created the you know FU money you know which is just you know that concept actually you know it did a episode on it a while back on FSU money and really you know it's just you know the how much do you need to be able to just say no I don't want to do that and able to live in a way that that you want you know so I think you know that's kind of a a first step but then you know beyond that like what is it you know what does it take to to craft the the life that you want to live and so you know that's really just something that you know I've really thought about here lately real quick I guess I'll give you kind of what I currently think is going to give me umm you know all those things you know like what what what do I think enough is going to be for me and honestly I think that enough for me is actually pretty small compared to maybe some other people that I see in the the news and you know other influencers and stuff like that but really I just I wanna have our house paid off I want to have access to woods so I can go and take a walk or run in the woods every day and I want to have the freedom to do creative projects and stuff like this without any limitations and most importantly I want to have the ability and the But umm you know it it does wear on you overtime whenever you know especially whenever we lived much closer you know like hey you know the expectation is we're we're always supposed to go and do stuff with them and you know even my last reenlistment you know I had a lot of family that could have come but did it and so you know that kind of stings a little bit you know and so I don't want you know that's that's one thing that I I wanna make sure that I provide for my son I I think if anything I'll be the annoying dad that you know at least whenever he's younger you know teens and you know maybe early 20s or whatever is gonna go ohh my goodness dad is so annoying he's always here all the time but later on in life I I hope he'll look back and go man dad is there all the time anyway all right well that's kind of what I'm what I'm thinking about and you know I'm trying to think about ways to you know put some parameters around that I'm actually working on our article right now about you know kind of how much you need to save for retirement and stuff like that for my unlisted money project and working on like a little calculator and stuff there so I don't know been playing around with it I I think it's looking pretty promising but but either way I think you know at the end of the day I think it's really important to think about what you really want so then you can chart a path forward so that you can eventually achieve that I think you know what where I end up is probably going to be a little different than what I think it's going to look like right now I think it's hopefully gonna be better but you just never know I mean I guess the saying goes you know plan for the best prepare for the worst so to speak and that's kind of what I've been trying to do so just trying to make sure I've got all my bases covered and and be in a position to where I can seize opportunity whenever it it comes up they say that you know luck is when preparation meets opportunity so trying to create my own luck in the world but either way I hope this is helpful if you have thoughts on this or whatever feel free to shoot me a note and um yeah I guess yeah I guess you can still hit me at you know podcast add star100k.com or if you wanna hit me over on the enlisted money side you can just shoot me a note at [email protected] but either way have a fantastic day /episode/index/show/start100k/id/29749148

34 - Money Day 2024 Was a Success! 01/13/2024

33 - Hunting for a New High-Yield Savings Account HYSA 01/12/2024

33 - Hunting for a New High-Yield Savings Account HYSA It has been years, actually, over a decade since we changed banks for our high-yield savings account (HYSA). But this is the year, I had a bad experience. I’m actually kind of embarrassed about it, but more on that later. Long story short, we were not being valued as loyal customers and I refuse to stay with a bank that treats me unfairly. Housekeeping note: I have no affiliate or partnership relationships with any of the banks mentioned. This is just my own experience and opinion. There are no referral or affiliate links in this article. A Quick Backstory and What Happened Originally, we’d started our first high-yield savings account with a company called ING Direct. I’d spent quite a bit of time researching different banks and settled on ING Direct because they had great rates, I could easily open several accounts, nickname my accounts (this actually wasn’t that common 10+ years ago), and their customer service was great. Fast forward, they were purchased by Capital One and rebranded as CapitalOne 360 Savings. Okay, no problem. Customer service was still great, rates were great (or so I thought), no worries. I was checking my accounts and renaming one for a goal we’ve established in conjunction with Money Day this year. I noticed my interest rate on my accounts was 0.3% - not the 4.35% that Capital One shows on the site. I called and they said I had a “legacy product” and would need to reopen my accounts in order to get the current rates. Needless to say, I was pissed! If I have to open brand new accounts, I’ll be opening them with a different bank. The hunt begins. My Criteria for High-Yield Savings Accounts I am very particular about my high-yield savings accounts – up to a point. I’m very aware of my tendency to analysis paralysis. I’m a natural overthinker, but once I settle on a decision, I generally feel very confident about it. There’s also a couple other reasons why I’m not too particular about some things but more particular about others. Chasing high fees or jumping on the “trendy” HYSAs can get you into trouble or end up not being quite as awesome as the marketing makes it seem. Because I tend to go overboard comparing, I have to set my criteria and not get too wrapped up in the tiny details. In reality, when I set clear criteria, there’s likely only a few banks that will fit the bill. Here’s the main things I look for in a high-yield savings account: 1. Competitive Rates 2. No Fees! 3. Ability to Open Multiple Accounts 4. Checking Account Available at Same Bank 5. Quality Customer Service 6. No Hidden Rules and “Gotchas” /episode/index/show/start100k/id/29458568

32 - I'm Back! Kind of... 01/07/2024

Episode 31 - The Value of Military Pay and Pensions 01/14/2023

Episode 30 - Let’s Talk Crack Money with Zac Spainhour 12/14/2022

Episode 29 - Financial Wisdom of a Six-Year-Old 11/18/2022

Episode 28 - Be a FI Leader - Interview with Doug Nordman - MilMoneyCon 2022 10/04/2022

Episode 27 - Grab Your Slice of Financial Independence with Monica Scudieri - MilMoneyCon Interview 09/07/2022

Episode 26 - Google Forms Budgeting Experiment 08/18/2022

Episode 25 - Flying Too Close to the Sun 06/09/2022

Episode 24 - Removing Labels To Evaluate Opportunities 04/18/2022

Episode 23 - Stop Comparing Yourself to Others 04/04/2022

Episode 23 - Stop Comparing Yourself to Others I believe that it is impossible to feel better about yourself by comparing yourself to other people. What does feel good? Comparing yourself to who you used to be. I talk about my personal mission statement of perpetual improvement in Episode 10. I work hard to improve every person, project, or organization I’m involved with. This includes myself. If I look back in time, I should be able to see that I’ve improved immensely over time. When I look back 5 or 10 years, I hardly recognize the person I was then. My personality is much the same, my personal drive to help others is still the same, but my education level, habits, accomplishments, and experiences have shaped me into someone I could not have dreamed up 10 years ago. Now, I love to dream about what kind of person I’ll be in the next 5 or 10 years. I honestly have no idea, but I have a couple rules to help me direct my curiosities and some questions that I use to help keep myself from stretching myself too far either. I’d love to hear your thoughts on this, shoot me a note at . Action Items: Think about some ways that you are comparing your life, financial or otherwise, to others. How has that comparison made you feel? Has anything positive came from that? Write down, no seriously, write it down, some things that are positive in your life that didn’t exist 1 to 5 years ago. Write down some positive things you want to happen in the next 5 years. Pick one item from your list of positive things you want to happen in your life and take a small action toward it. Then schedule some time on your calendar each week to think about how to make that happen. I suggest setting an alarm on your phone to go off once each week. You don’t have to do anything when the alarm goes off, but you can if you want. The rule is you can’t remove the alarm until to accomplish the goal or make that thing true in your life. This isn’t something you need to share. It’s just for you. Lastly, please share the show with someone else. Better yet, pick your favorite episode and share it on social media. Thanks for all your support! Now go get started! Links: The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel You’re Not That Great by Dr. Daniel Crosby Standard Deviations Podcast /episode/index/show/start100k/id/22656791

Episode 22 - Extended Vehicle Warranty Tip 03/28/2022

Episode 21 - Monetary Benefits of Military Service 03/21/2022

Episode 20 – Is Getting a Tax Refund a Good Thing? 03/14/2022

Episode 19 – Is It Always Best to Do It Yourself? 03/07/2022

Episode 18 - How To Save Money On Groceries 02/28/2022

Episode 18 - How To Save Money On Groceries Food is one place we actually spend more on, but we are still pretty frugal. Here’s what I mean. We prioritize health and performance. We buy high quality meats and vegetables. We also use a lot of spices, so that adds a bit to the budget as well. To take advantage of all these tips, you might need to work on your cooking skills a bit. However, that's a very worthwhile goal! Here’s how we save on groceries: Keep an Eye Out For Free Food What's better than free? Obviously, there are some limitations and sometimes there's a good reason why its free. However, there's lot of free food to be had if you know where to look. Buy Nothing Groups We're a huge fan of our local Buy Nothing groups we've been a part of. This doesn't just apply to food though. We've gotten lots of great items for free and gotten rid of lots of things as well. If you like to save money and meet great people, you can't go wrong. Volunteer at Local Food Banks I've done this most of my life. Often once you've served everyone that comes through to get food, you can take what's left home. I like this one because it helps people in need and reduces waste. If you're military, check out your local USO. Sometimes they give away free food too. Plan out a menu and stick to it. And cook at home. Planning out a menu keeps us from buying a bunch of extra stuff. We know what we need to buy and don't buy a bunch of extra food we didn't plan to. This keeps us from buying too much and wasting from buying unnecessary food. Have “Brinner” Once a Week Egg omelets and bacon are pretty cheap for a whole meal. We started doing this because my son likes breakfast food – gets him to eat dinner. I also like a good omelette for dinner, so it's a win-win! Cook Enough for Leftovers We always make sure to cook enough to have leftovers for the next day. I literally split up the leftovers when we serve up food for dinner. This helps so I don’t overeat and makes sure I’ve got lunch for the next day. Keep Cheap Frozen Meals on Hand We keep pulled pork frozen flat in a baggie for nights when we don’t feel like cooking. This is our equivalent of keeping frozen pizza on hand. Make sure it’s pretty flat and you can just break a chunk off as needed. I cook up about 10 pounds at a time, so I only need to do this every so often. Plus, I like to . Have a Leftovers Night. Pretty self explanatory, but just save up extra leftovers and have that as a meal. Saves on cooking and saves you money! Buy in Bulk Buy in bulk and freeze up meal-sized portions. We buy in bulk at Sam’s or Costco. We currently have both because we’re trying to compare Sam’s and Costco. So far, we like Sam’s better, FYI. Shop at ALDI Seriously. They have surprisingly good food at generally great prices. I have no affiliation with them or get compensated in any way. We just like them. Grow Your Own Food Grow and can your own vegetables. We also got a ton of green beans from the food bank once and canned them all. Kept them from going to the trash and kept us fed. Action Items If you’ve never had Brinner, that’s breakfast for dinner, you’re seriously missing out. It’s time to try it. Plan out your meals. The more intentional you are, the better. Learn to cook. This one skill alone is probably the most valuable skill any person can have. It’s good for your health, happiness, and wallet! To contact me, please email . /episode/index/show/start100k/id/22264724

Episode 17 – How Income Tax Brackets Work 02/21/2022

Episode 16 - Budget Is Not A Bad Word 02/14/2022

Episode 15 - Invest in Yourself 02/07/2022

Episode 14 – The Cost of Earning More versus Saving 01/31/2022

Episode 13 – The Importance of Having an Emergency Fund 01/24/2022

Episode 13 – The Importance of Having an Emergency Fund Full Article: Imagine this, you’re working to get your finances on track, paying down debt, and your car breaks down or you have an emergency room visit and have to pay a deductible. If you have an emergency fund, you pay for it with your cash and then build it back up and move on. If you didn’t have the emergency fund, you would now likely have to borrow that money which would further compound your problems. I know for us, having the cash on hand for these things has greatly reduced our stress. What’s interesting is that we have never used the emergency fund, but we also avoid touching it like the plague. We are generally able to get creative and adjust our expenses if something difficult arises. We might end up running on thin margins or pulling from other savings, but having that buffer really puts us at ease. For us, we keep the emergency fund in a totally separate bank from our normal checking and savings so that way we aren’t tempted to use it for random things. We do have a checking account at that bank, so I can transfer and use the money almost instantly if needed. This might not be necessary, but for me, being able to keep it separate and label or nickname the account as the emergency fund creates physical and mental separation from everything else. In other words, it just keeps it simple. I hope this gives you something to think about and helps clarify some of my previous discussions on emergency funds. As always, I’ll leave you with some Action Items: Decide where to keep your emergency fund and name the account the emergency fund if possible Make a plan on how to build up your emergency fund and how much you need to save. Generally 3-6 months is considered a good baseline. If this has been helpful, please share the podcast with someone you know. I’m trying to reach my first 100,000 people, so every share counts and is greatly appreciated! To contact me, please email . Now go get started! Before you go, please remember this information is for educational and informational purposes only. Please seek tax, legal, or investment advice before making any decisions. /episode/index/show/start100k/id/21815888

Episode 12 – Book Review for The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey 01/17/2022

Episode 11 – FU Money for Military Don't Stay Only for the Money 01/10/2022

Episode 10 - Perpetual Improvement for the New Year and New Intro 01/03/2022

Episode 9 - Money Day Annual Review 12/27/2021

Episode 9 - Money Day Annual Review This week, I’m going to talk about how to start planning out our annual review which I call Money Day. I got this concept from the Get Rich Slowly Blog. In short, it’s a day to set aside and take care of financial stuff. Ours has evolved over the years, but we’ve been doing this for the past 10 years. I’ll link to the article in the show notes. I highly recommend checking it out because it does contain some great ideas which I won’t be covering here. Aside from Christmas and Halloween, Money Day is my favorite day of the year! I love to strategize and geek out about money stuff. My wife on the other hand, well, she doesn’t get too excited. Wine helps, but I try get everything prepped and ready so she can just help make decisions and move on. A lot of great things have come out of money day though. We started both of our IRAs, changed to better banks, started my son’s 529, saved for cars, planned out some great trips, and made some life-changing money moves for ourselves. Without a doubt, this meeting has a large impact on our financial success each year. Here’s the basic agenda for our money day every year: Calculate our Net Worth – It’s good to get a check on where your’re at. My goal is to make sure our net worth rises every year. We’ve been able to do this every year since we started tracking with one exception. That year, we had a lot going on, moved, bought a car, put my wife through school, and the market took a pretty decent hit right before I calculated our net worth. Rebalance investments – This might not be necessary depending on how you have things set up, but I do this every year regardless. Plan Trips for the year: We look at what trips we want to take in the year. For instance, if we have a wedding to go to, we’ll go ahead and plan that out. The most important part to this step is to set money aside for all these trips. Talk about and plan any large purchases coming up in the next year: Then we start setting aside money or a savings plan for these things. Reset the Budget: I keep track of this on a spreadsheet and we update it at least every year. We have additional items that we need to look at and decide every year as well. Some topics of discussion have been things like: Should we buy a Costco membership? Do we rent or buy a camper (we rented, just in case you’re wondering. I did a quick cost analysis and it was actually cheaper to rent for the # of times we would go). Here are some great things that have come from money day: Setting up our IRAs Transferring my IRA to a better company Paying off debt Putting my wife through school Saving for having a baby Taking some really fun family vacations Keep in mind, you can do this any time you want. You can have a money day more than once a year as well. There are definitely times that we have had little “mini money days”. The main thing is that you actually set time aside to make some positive change in your financial life. Don’t hold onto stuff all year waiting to discuss on money day. I keep a running list of topics for each year and add things to it. This is a great time to get organized and also to plan and dream. Make it fun! If you have any things like this that you do, please share! Send me a note. I love to hear from you all! Action Items: Pick a day for Money Day. Make time to spend time on your finances. Get a system to organize your financial life: App on your phone, spreadsheet, something. Share the podcast and subscribe so we can complete this journey together! Check out our Facebook group and connect with others on their journey to financial security and independence! To contact me, please email . Now go get started! Before you go, please remember this information is for educational and informational purposes only. Please seek tax, legal, or investment advice before making any decisions. Links: Money Day Article: /episode/index/show/start100k/id/21603890

Episode 8 - Setting Financial Goals and Checkpoints 12/21/2021

Episode 8 - Setting Financial Goals and Checkpoints Links: Investment Calculator: 4% Rule Resources: This week, I’m going to talk about how to start planning out your financial future and start making some goals toward your first $100K as well as checkpoints well beyond that. First though, I need to announce the winners from last week’s contest. Congratulations to Drew in Missouri and Dom in California! I’ll be getting their books sent out this week. One will get a copy of I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi and one will get The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey. Let’s talk about the check[points we’re going to calculate real quick. In Episode 6, I talked about these, but I’ll recap and expand here. Net Worth Ground Zero - Where you are now: Calculate your Net Worth Head above water - Positive Net Worth: Once your net worth is more than Zero. You may already be here, but if not, this is a really important and exciting milestone. $100,000 Net Worth $100,000 of investable assets: This is different from net worth. This is all your appreciating assets in investment or retirement accounts. IRAs, 401ks, brokerage accounts, etc. For me this is our TSPs, Roth IRAs, and investment account. Technically, the 529 we started for my son falls in this category, but I don’t count it because I consider it his even though it’s technically in my name. Pinnacle Point – There are a few different ways I’ve seen this before. When your money makes more than you contribute When your money makes more than you can contribute to retirement accounts per year (401k contribution limit) When your investments make more than your annual salary each year The pinnacle point isn’t anything anyone is likely to ask you, but I think it’s good to use one or all three as checkpoints along the way. It’s much easier to stay motivated if you have more things to shoot for. Plus, that’s just really cool to see how your invested money starts doing more and more for you! F-U Money: This is when you can say no to just about anything AND MEAN IT! If you can live on your savings for a year or more without affecting your financial journey too much, you’ve pretty much made it here. This can mean different things to different people, but that’s what it means to me – no longer having to do anything I don’t want to. $1 Million net worth When you hit this one, it’s cool because you can say you’re a millionaire. Pretty Cool, but you may or may not be done at this point. Financial Independence: This is what a lot of people call your FI number. Really, this is just how much you need to retire. To get this number, the rule of thumb is to take your annual expenses and multiply by 25. This is based on the 4% rule created by Bill Bengen. If you want to learn more about that, I’ll link to some resources in the show notes. The 4% rule is just a rule of thumb. There has been a lot of research suggesting that market conditions may allow for higher withdrawal rates and you can adjust this over time. Long story short, it’s still a good rule of thumb. If you are planning on retiring early, you might want to use 3.5% which is 28.5 times your annual expenses. Don’t get too wrapped up about this, it’s kind of arbitrary. The only reason why I talk about it is because we need it to chart out some of the other checkpoints along the journey. The 4% rule makes sure you don’t run out of money based on all historical 30-year periods – including the great depression. You are extremely safe to plan of being able to withdraw 4% in retirement. Keep in mind, you might hit these different points in a different order. You may already be past some of these checkpoints. We won’t know until you calculate your net worth and see for yourself. Refer back to episode 6 or my youtube channel for more info on calculating your net worth. So, how do I decide what these goals look like for me? Great question! Start with your current expenses – everything you spend per year. If you don’t know, that’s the first thing we need to address. If you know you spend everything you make, then your annual pay will work for now, but you need to know how much you’re spending. Now that you know how much you spend per year, you can calculate your FI number: 25 times annual expenses (or roughly 28.5 for early retirees or FIRE folks). Keep in mind, this is a rule of thumb. Now, you can punch this into the investment calculator at Calculator.Net. I like using theirs because there aren’t many adds and most importantly, it shows a spreadsheet by year. This is where we can get some of our other checkpoints along the way. I’ve put a link to this calculator in the show notes. You’ll have to play around with the numbers to get your monthly contribution figured out. The default shows a rate of return, you don’t have to use this, but I wouldn’t use super high numbers. I also won’t give you a number to use either. Anything between 6 to 8 is probably pretty safe. You should play around a bit just to see how much a difference it makes. Once you have the calculator dialed in, you should be able to see at the spreadsheet at the bottom. Look at the end balance column. That’s how much will be in your accounts. If you don’t have any debt, this is easy, just look at the years you’ll hit each target. To see the different pinnacle points, you want to compare the interest column for each year to your checkpoints to see when your money will start making more than you can contribute and then more than you make in a year. If your net worth is negative, then you can look at which year the end principal column would bring your net worth to Zero. For instance, if your net worth is a negative $50,000, then the year that your balance will hit $50,000, you’re zeroed out and are moving into a positive net worth. You can use this spreadsheet to see what year you should hit each goal. Write these down! Share your goals with others. You can go to our Facebook group for this too. It’s a private group and is a judgement free zone. We’re all in this together! What if I “Can’t” contribute enough to reach my goals? Well, you have 3 options: Make more Spend less Change your goals I’’ll talk about these in a later episode, but if the math doesn’t work out, you’ll have to make some adjustments. If you need help, reach out. Post in the Facebook group or email me at To Recap : Net Worth Ground Zero - Where you are now Head above water - Positive Net Worth $100,000 Net Worth $100,000 of investable assets Pinnacle Point – one, or all three if you’d like F-U Money $1 Million net worth Financial Independence Action Items: Start outlining your goals on your journey. We’ll take a deeper dive in later episodes, but it is critical to have goals. Share the podcast and subscribe so we can complete this journey together! Check out our Facebook group and connect with others on their journey to financial security and independence! To contact me, please email . Now go get started! Before you go, please remember this information is for educational and informational purposes only. Please seek tax, legal, or investment advice before making any decisions. /episode/index/show/start100k/id/21555569

Episode 7 - Holiday Giveaway 2021 12/13/2021

Episode 6 - Why Start With $100,000? Plus How and What to Track 12/06/2021

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