Q&A: Austin & Robert's Worst-Ever Investments, War Time Investing, and Solo 401(k)s

Primary Topic

This episode covers diverse financial topics including wartime investment strategies, the worst investments made by the hosts, and insights into Solo 401(k) plans.

Episode Summary

Austin Hankwitz and Robert Croak host a comprehensive Q&A session on the "Rich Habits" podcast, addressing listener queries about financial decisions in times of war, cryptocurrency investments, and retirement strategies like Solo 401(k)s. The hosts share personal anecdotes about their worst investments and provide advice on asset diversification during uncertain times. They also discuss the potential of Solo 401(k)s for maximizing retirement contributions and detail strategies for investing in cryptocurrencies. Key insights are offered on maintaining investment portfolios in fluctuating markets and leveraging personal finance tools to enhance financial stability.

Main Takeaways

  1. Diversify investments to mitigate risks, especially during geopolitical tensions or economic instability.
  2. Avoid panic selling during market downturns; historical resilience of markets suggests long-term holding is beneficial.
  3. Solo 401(k) plans can significantly enhance retirement savings for self-employed individuals.
  4. In cryptocurrency investments, balancing the portfolio across various sectors and coins is crucial for managing risk.
  5. Reflecting on personal financial missteps provides valuable lessons and underscores the importance of thorough due diligence in investments.

Episode Chapters

1: Introduction to Episode

The hosts introduce the episode's theme and upcoming topics. They remind listeners of a webinar and discuss the episode's sponsor.

2: War Time Investment Strategies

Discussion on whether to liquidate stocks during a potential war. Robert emphasizes the importance of strategic asset diversification.

3: Cryptocurrency Investments

Insight into building a cryptocurrency portfolio from scratch, with suggestions for balancing major coins and emerging cryptocurrencies.

4: Worst Investments

Austin and Robert share personal stories about their worst investments, emphasizing lessons learned and the importance of investing in people, not just ideas.

5: Solo 401(k) Plans

Exploration of the benefits of Solo 401(k) plans and the concept of the mega backdoor Roth, with guidance on how to maximize these retirement tools.

Actionable Advice

  1. Review your investment portfolio: Regularly assess and adjust your investments to align with current economic conditions and personal financial goals.
  2. Consider historical market trends: During market downturns, remember that markets have historically recovered and often present long-term growth opportunities.
  3. Educate yourself on retirement options: If self-employed, explore Solo 401(k) plans and the potential tax advantages they offer.
  4. Balance your crypto investments: If investing in cryptocurrency, distribute your investments across different coins and sectors to mitigate risks.
  5. Learn from investment failures: Reflect on past investment mistakes to improve future decision-making processes.

About This Episode

In this episode of the Rich Habits Podcast, Robert Croak and Austin Hankwitz answer your questions!

How do the rich invest during wars?
What cryptocurrencies should I own in 2024?
What is the worst investment you've ever made?
Should I do a Mega Backdoor Roth Solo 401(k)?
How should I approach buying a new car?
Should I liquidate my Roth IRA to pay off credit card debt?

People

Austin Hankwitz, Robert Croak

Companies

Public.com

Books

None

Guest Name(s):

None

Content Warnings:

None

Transcript

Austin Hankwitz
Hey everyone, and welcome back to the Rich Habits podcast, a top ten business podcast on Spotify. This is our question and answer edition, which means we take your questions via Instagram, DM'sichhabitspodcast, or email richhabitspodcastmail.com, and we answer them. We give you our unfiltered perspectives and guidance and everything that we think you should probably consider doing. But of course, this is not financial advice. We're just a couple of financial educators on the Internet sharing our own perspectives and experiences.

But before we jump into the episode, Robert, I do want to remind everyone that we are hosting a webinar on May 8 at 04:00 p.m. Eastern time. We're going to be talking about the tax loss harvesting that comes with direct indexing. Very, very important a way for anyone to save literally thousands, if not tens of thousands of dollars on their investment gains. When they're ready, be sure to save your spot.

It's completely free. There's a link in the show notes below, and I also want all my options traders to listen up because I want to tell you just a little bit about public.com dot. But first, I want you to ask yourself, have you actually ever thought about all the fees that you're paying to trade options? Probably not, right? Aside from the regulatory fees, there are commissions, and most platforms charge per contract fees as well.

That's what makes today's sponsor, Public.com, so interesting. Public doesn't charge commissions or per contract fees. And in an industry, first they offer a rebate of up to option contract traded, which is so, so cool. So check it out. If you trade a thousand option contracts on public, you'll get up to 100 $180 in rebates.

Robert Croak
And if you trade 10,000 contracts, you could almost make $2,000. So it's really, really cool. So more importantly is the rebate means you can maximize your profits and minimize your losses. So to recap, there's no commissions, there's no per contract fees, and you get up to $0.18 on every contract traded. See why Nerdwallet recently awarded public five stars for options trading?

Austin Hankwitz
And to start earning up to contract traded, go to public.com dot. This was paid for by public investing options are not suitable for all investors and do carry significant risk. There is the full disclosures in the podcast description below. Be sure to check those out. And this is for us members only.

Now, Robert, are you ready for our first question? I am so, so ready. I love these episodes and the questions just keep getting better and better. So let's go. All right, so our FirSt question comes from Rob D.

Rob says, I love the podcast. I just followed you guys on Instagram. I hope you all answered my question. I feel like there might be a war coming, a big one. My question is this.

Is it ideal to withdraw the money you've invested into stocks if a war is declared? How does the rich man approach wartime? Robert, this question is a sad one, right? No one wants war, but it's hard to ignore what's going on around the world, and I think our followers should be prepared. So, do you want to kick this one off?

Robert Croak
Yeah, I'll kick it off. And I think it really just comes down. Rob, great question. And, yes, sad topic, but we have to be honest with our situation and what we're staring at when these types of things arise in the markets and in the world. And so, for me, it's really all about hunkering down.

Maybe it's not time to take that new job. Maybe it's not time to go start that new company and really just look at weathering the storm. But secondarily, it's all about understanding what could happen in the markets if they become shaky. And then really just looking at it, of, how can I diversify while still earning gains in a bumpy market? So, the ways to look at that are high yield savings, treasury bills, tangible assets like real estate, and also gold.

Right now, gold is really soaring. It's still a store of value. You know, I prefer crypto, but gold is great. So I think it's just really hunkering down, understanding how to diversify and play it a little safer when we get into these down markets. But I don't think we're there yet.

We're seeing some bumps in the road right now, but I still think we have some strong things to happen in 2024. But those are my takes. Austin, I'd love to have your thoughts. Yeah, certainly not there yet. But, you know, Rob, to answer your question specifically, should you sell your stocks?

Austin Hankwitz
No. Right. There's no reason to panic or have a knee jerk reaction. Of course, COVID was a great example of, like, the worst case scenario of what could happen to the stock market. I mean, everything was down by 2030, 40% in only a couple weeks time.

It was a terrible time to be an investor, but the smart investors use that as an opportunity to build wealth in the future. And so, you know, when you sell your stocks, one, you might be selling them for a loss. Don't want to do that. And if it's a quality company, let's say like Costco or Procter and gamble, there's no reason to think that Costco or Procter and gamble will go out of business, because if you sell a stock, that means you think the company is going to go under. Right.

There's no reason to think those things are going to happen to those names in those companies during a war. So just want to encourage you, just like we kind of talked about on Monday's episode Black Swan, events do happen, and we are certainly in a weird time right now with the stock market. It's up and down. It's left and right. Some folks think it's might go down to 4700, talking about the s and P.

Others think we're going to keep going higher. Who knows? But the last thing you want to do is have a knee jerk reaction and sell and do bad things because of your emotional response. Yeah, Austin, that's a great point. When you think about what just happened to COVID and you're not old enough to remember, like when 911 happened and other things in the past, the Gulf war, things like that, you just really get to a point where everyone is uneasy and there's all of this unrest because of wars and what's happening with COVID and those types of things.

Robert Croak
And it's really just difficult to know what to do. I've lived through so many of these, and I understand the turmoil that can happen seemingly overnight in a market. And that's why we're always telling you to make sure that you keep your eye on the prize. You're actively watching your money, and you're diversifying, because if you have all your eggs in one basket, it could be bad for you if the market's sour. So it's just really important to just keep your head up, keep an eye on things, and understand where the markets could go, given these situations.

So over the decades, for me, investing, I'm just a buy and hold kind of guy. And I know that over time, the s and P 500 and the QQqs, the Nasdaqs of the world are going to go up and to the right. We might have a bad year or two here and there, but over time, the math just is in our favor. And so that's why you really want to consider just holding tight, hunkering down, and just really just stick to it. Because those knee jerk reactions could really hurt you.

Because if you sell and you panic sell and have that knee jerk reaction, and then the markets correct in a week, two or month or a couple months, then all of a sudden you might miss a big run and then sit on the sidelines because you fear you're too late. So I think it's just really important to always understand the macro information that's presented to you and know what to do, because you just can't always try to time the market and have a knee jerk reaction. What a great question. Rob D. Our next question comes from Nick M.

Austin Hankwitz
Nick says, I love the podcast, and I look forward to listening every Monday morning on Spotify. Thanks, Nick. We appreciate it. Nick's question is this, what are the best cryptocurrencies to invest into right now? I'm building a small portfolio from scratch, and I want to know exactly what to buy and how much waiting.

So Robert loves crypto, and he's been in crypto longer than myself, so he's kind of a nerd when it comes to crypto. I'm a little bit more of like the layman. What's like, you know, I want to have it, but I don't want to, like, really, really, like, do so much analytical research on crypto like I do with stocks. I love analyzing stocks, but crypto, for me is like, kind of a weird concept to wrap my brain around sometimes. So to answer your question, Nick, I keep it really simple myself.

Again, as a layman, I've got three cryptocurrencies, bitcoin, Ethereum, and Chainlink, Btc ETH and Lin K. If I was building a crypto portfolio from scratch, I'd put 50% into bitcoin, maybe even 60 or 70%, and then whatever is left, I would divide it in half between Ethereum and Chainlink. That's what I would do. Again, as a guy who's just trying to have a little bit of crypto in his portfolio and is not so passionate about it as I am with single stock investing. But Robert is the other side of the aisle there.

He loves his crypto. So, Robert, what's your perspective here? Yes, Nick, I love this question. And I actually took some notes for you because I want to make sure to really spell out my thoughts and, and the weighting, as you asked, for each sector, and for me, crypto, I try to look at it as having three to five of the best in class in each sector that I believe are the ones that are going to perform the best in this bull market. So how I would look at it is, if I were building a portfolio right now, I would be right alongside with Austin on bitcoin.

Robert Croak
Ethereum Chainlink, and XRP, and I would do 40% to 50% in those four of that portfolio. Then after that, I would have AI. I would have 15% probably in AI, 15% in gaming, and then another 5% in decentralized science, and then I would hold 20%. That would be for new coins that I would be adding on a regular basis. And there are dozens of those that are really good and just have the overall portfolio be maybe no more than 20 total coins.

And that's how I would break it down. There's the weighting. And, you know, some of my favorites if you go to gaming, would be Nakamoto games, Beam, immutable x. But then AI is such an important sector right now. And I love veracity, Agix, fetch, ocean protocol, and bit tensor.

Those are great. And then look for new coins. A couple of my favorites are pal pal aegis, which is aegis and sincus sync. So that's the breakdown. That's what I would do if I were building a portfolio right now, is to have some of that leverage across all of these top sectors and three to five coins in each.

But make sure you're always holding, you know, the stables, and that's bitcoin, Ethereum, chainlink, and XRP, in my opinion. I appreciate it. Okay, good question, Nick. Our next question comes from Justin V. Justin says, hey, Robert Austin.

Austin Hankwitz
I love the show, and I can't wait to attend the new webinar you're hosting. I love the open Q and A. You all do. At the end of each one. Justin, we look forward to having you there.

Justin says, they say billionaires lose millions to make billions. What was the worst investment you two have ever made, and how did you overcome the loss? Oh, what a question. It was a good question, because I feel like Robert myself have both made pretty terrible investments in our lives. Robert, you want to kick this one off?

Yeah. And I want to put a little wrinkle to this, because a terrible investment can be one that you didn't make. I was ready to write a check for Uber pre IPO as they were doing one of their last rounds before the initial public offering, and my check was going to be $25,000. There were three of us that were investing, and me and one of the other guys backed out. And then post IPo, my $25,000 would have been worth $7 million, roughly.

Robert Croak
So sometimes it's the ones you didn't make, and I've got countless ones that I did invest. And the biggest lesson I learned from that is invest in founders, not an ideas, because a really good founder that's strong and intelligent will pivot and figure it out. And a shitty founder will spend the money, go through the money, worry about themselves, and not find a way to win. So if you're doing venture investing or startup investing, find the founders, bet on the quarterback, not the concept. But I will say, too, back to the founder idea here, right?

Austin Hankwitz
I invested into a founder who was on the younger side. I think I wrote him a check for $15,000. It was a wonderful idea. It was essentially a debit card that would build your credit as well, right? So it's like a credit building debit card.

It was like first of its kind back in like 2020, 2021, really, really cool stuff. And the founder just, he had it all, but he couldn't connect the dots. And what I can appreciate about what you said about, you know, investing into the founder and not the idea or the product is this guy straight up said, listen, investors, I'm not going to waste any more of your money. I've realized I cannot get product market fit. I cannot hire the right person.

I can heal. Whatever the excuse was, he's like, listen, I can't do it. So instead of pretending that I'm going to, you know, pivot and do this and do that and try and win, try and get this and try that and waste your money, I'm stopping now. I'm going to swallow my pride and I'm going to return to you 60% of your original investment. So that did happen.

I got 60% of my money back, which was better than nothing, which has also happened in the past. But it's like, I respect that guy. I respect the fact that he can swallow his pride and say, like, I just can't do it, and here's your money back. I'm sorry I wasted your time. Now, the worst investment I ever made was I invested $75,000 into a startup back in 2020 or 2021, early 21, late 2020, and it went completely to zero.

I got none of that money back, and it was, it just all went kaput. And I think the biggest lesson I learned from that. Robert, additionally, on top of your investing into the founders, not the idea, is that you too, as an investor, need to do so much diligence on what you're investing into. Right? I think when we see people make investments, like into Uber or into the ABC XYZ company, that get them really excited, they're like, yeah, I'm a venture investor.

I invest into startups. That's what I do. I'm cool. I'm, you know, David Sachs. Look at me.

When actuality, it's like, you're not, you know, like, take a deep breath, dude. It's not that deep. Like, this is really, really risky of an idea. And you should make sure, like, you know, the numbers, the data, everything, like the back of your hand before you actually do it. And I think that was a big mistake I made in the beginning, was like, I trusted the people, and I trusted their word and what they said they had and what they said they were doing without opening up what was called the data room and looking into the specifics, I just took their word for it.

And that was a big mistake and something I've certainly learned from now. Robert and I, we recently invested into a company. I think we both throw checks for 20 or 25,000. I don't know how much you wrote for. I wrote.

I wrote a check for 20,000. About a month ago, Robert and I did, into this incredible, incredible company out of Austin, Texas, and, you know, really excited about it. But we made sure we did our diligence beforehand. We made sure we met the CEO. Of course, it was part of something called a special purpose vehicle and SPV, a sort of a way to pool investor money together.

But it was an awesome experience, and we did everything right. So not only did we invest into the founder, but we also invested into the idea and all the proven data they had on that idea as well. And one thing, just to cap this off, and this is a really great question, is to understand that if you are at a point where it's time to start venture investing and you're diversifying, look at it this way, when you're making this investment. The biggest mistake I made early on, let's say, post silly bands days, is I wrote checks that were too big. Austin should have never written a $75,000 check to that company that he lost at all.

Robert Croak
He should have written a ten or $25,000 check. Because it's better to take more shots over more deals than it is two or three deals with bigger shots. Because you really want to look at it that if you do five venture investments, you're hoping one is a home run, one maybe breaks even, and you make a little money back or get your money back, and you assume two or three are going to go to zero. So it is a game of trying to figure out how can you capitalize on the big ones. But you have to look at it this way.

If something goes meteoric and it becomes a unicorn. There's not really going to be much difference as far as because the return is going to be so incredible for you and probably life changing. So if you wrote the $25,000 check versus the 75, it's still going to be incredible for you. But the downside risk is obviously a third of the damage that it can do by writing the smaller check. So learn from me.

Write the smaller checks. Diversify over more deals, because you can always put more money into the winners when they raise the next route and beyond. Let's just take venture investing out of the equation. Let's talk about single stock investing. A lot of people listening right now probably have made a bad single stock investment.

Austin Hankwitz
I sure have. The first single stock I ever invested into was a penny stock. I was 15 or 16 years old, and me and my buddies thought we figured out the Chinese manufacturer that was creating the iPhone five, and we thought we knew it. We thought we got it figured out. You thought Foxconn was the penny stock?

No, no, no. Was it Foxconn? They were making, like, the lcd digitizers for the iPhone. That's like, one component part, but they're like, yeah, we're gonna get this contract. Like, we're gonna get it, whatever.

They never got the contract. I lost all my money. Obviously, it was like a couple hundred bucks. But what I'm trying to say is, like, I have lost thousands of dollars investing in a single stocks. Robert, I'm sure you've lost thousands, if not more, investing a single stocks as well.

Just considering the size, your portfolio, and I think the biggest piece of advice I can give to Justin and anyone else listening that's trying to get over the losS, the hump of, LIKE, oh, my God, I lost this moneY. What was I thinking? Every day that you don't sell your loser costs you what you would have made if you had that money elsewhere. Right? Opportunity cost is something we talk ABout all the time here on the podcast, and it is the most IMPORTant thing to consider when it's a losing investment.

For example, let's say you invested $10,000 into Tesla on January 2 of this year. You're now down 40% on that. So your 10,000 is now ONLy worth 6000, whereas the s and P 500 is up about 4%. So closer to about 10,000, 510,400 there. But by holding on to Tesla stock, because for whatever reason, maybe you are really bullish or whatever, maybe you like me and you own Tesla no matter what the company is.

But by holding on to it. That's money. Not only that you're losing on the way down, but money you could have made with another investment on the way up. So just think about now as you look at these losers in your portfolio, because it's this theory, right, Robert? We're like, oh, it's down 80%, whatever.

Like, it could always go back. It can always go back up. It can always just go back up to where it was. Stocks can go to zero. Dude, I've seen it happen a hundred times.

Stocks can go to zero. I don't care if it's a recent ipo. I don't care if Jim Cramer's talking about it. I don't care if you read it on the Internet. Stocks can go to zero.

They can always go down more. I don't care. Care if you're down 90%. It can always go down more. And that is the big like, hump that I had to get over when I started single stock investing was like, okay, I made this mistake, but I'm not going to hold on to this for the rest of my life hoping that it's going to do something else.

I'm going to learn from that mistake and take that money and invest it into the next best thing. Yeah, it's such a mindset shift to be able to get away from the losers and understand the opportunity cost rather than riding it for years and years and saying it's going to come back. And I hate to lose. Don't invest with emotion if it's a loser and you feel like the time has come to get rid of it. Get rid of it.

Robert Croak
Get that money somewhere else where it's making money and you'll be fine. Earlier in the show, you heard us talk about the investing platform public.com dot. That's where you can trade options with no commissions or per contract fees and you get a rebate of up to contract traded. NerdWallet recently gave public five out of five stars for options trading. If you want to see why, go to Public.com and start getting a rebate of up to contract traded paid for by public investing options not suitable for all investors and carry significant risk.

Full disclosure and podcast description and us members only. Major shout out to Public.com dot. We love you. We use you. I've been a user since 2020.

Austin Hankwitz
I got Robert on the public train in 2023 and we never look back. And they are one of our favorite sponsors of the show. They're a partner. Shout out to Katherine. I hope you're listening.

Thank you so much for being awesome and go check out public.com, guys. All right, our next question comes from Margaret P. Margaret says, hey all small business owner here. Love listening to the show because I feel like you too not only help me with my personal finances, but also growing my business. So here's my question.

I've been using a sep IRA for my retirement investing for the last ten years. However, I just discovered the solo four hundred one k. I learned that you can also do a mega backdoor Roth with your solo four hundred one k. One, do you know what the heck this is? And two, should I do it instead of my Sep IRA?

Robert I'm going to kick this one off because I actually do this weirdly enough. So let's start at the beginning, right? What is a sep Ira? A Sep IRA is a simplified employee pension IRa. It's a tax deferred retirement account that a self employed person can make and contribute toward.

It's very similar to your traditional IRA in the sense that you can deduct from your taxes what you've contributed to this account. A way for anyone that's, you know, a solopreneur, a small business owner, to invest toward their, call it retirement accounts that are not just the iras like the Roth IRA that we talk about now. The Solo 401K is very similar. It's a retirement account that self employed individuals like Robert and I can also use. What's cool about the solo four hundred one k to Margaret's call out here is that mega backdoor Roth component.

It's really complicated, and I'm not going to pretend like I'm a tax expert or any type of retirement CPA, right? I'm just a guy on the Internet who listens to his own CPA. But the website I use that taught me a lot about the mega backdoor Roth solo four hundred one k and the platform that allows me to max out and contribute toward this mega backdoor Roth Solo 401K is called carrymoney.com carrymoney.com dot. I'll have a link for them in the description below. But I invested $66,000 toward my mega backdoor Roth Solo 401K in 2023, and you can invest up to $69,000 in 2024.

And why that's important, Robert, is because on top of my backdoor Roth Ira in 2023 of, what was it, $6,500? I think I was also able to contribute $66,000 after taxes to my retirement through this solo 401K. It's unbelievable stuff here. So if you are a small business owner or solopreneur, and you are not yet contributing to a solo 401K, Roth. Rather, solo 401K.

You certainly should learn more about it. And again, carry money is a great resource to do that. So find a good CPA, find a good advisor, and really make sure you implement these strategies, because Austin and I both use it. It's very beneficial, especially with the $66,000 amount per year. So, yeah, it's a great one.

Robert Croak
And I love this question. Very complex. So, Austin, you crushed the breakdown. I love it. All right, our next question comes from Thomas D.

Austin Hankwitz
Thomas says, hey, guys, love the podcast. I recently totaled my car, and now I'm on the prowl to buy a new one. I'm trying to figure out, though, which is better. Should I use an auto loan to buy a car or a personal loan? It seems like auto loans have better interest rates.

Additionally, do you have any recommendations on where I should go to borrow the money? Robert, I'm going to let you answer this. Yes, Thomas, great question. First and foremost, don't you dare go buy a new car. If you've got your sights set on a new car, you have to wait at least another 30 to 60 days.

Robert Croak
And here's why. Volkswagen was the first of its kind to offer cash back to dealers to get them to take inventory. That's where the car market's at right now. So that's going to keep happening elsewhere as well. And so what you're going to see is the ripple effect in the coming weeks and months of more and more rebates and deeper discounts because the car market is in a really tough spot right now.

So to answer your question directly, if you have to buy a new car, please wait a little bit longer. You'll save a few thousand dollars. I'd prefer you stop looking at new cars. The way to look at it is this. If you're going to get new, you want a lease, and if you're going to buy, you want to buy used.

So that's it. That's the end all, be all. It's the truth. The car is the biggest depreciating asset you're ever going to buy, besides a boat. So why would you buy a new one?

Within three years, you're going to lose 40% of its value, and you're going to be upside down on the loan. So to tackle the loan part, it's definitely better to use an auto loan over a personal loan, because you're right, the interest rates are lower, but also the credit criteria is lower as well. So keep that in mind. You have the advantages. So use the auto loan for the auto.

It's just going to be better for you, better terms, and it's going to be an easier situation. But please look at buying used. Find a two year old car that's got a good carfax, three year old car, save yourself the 30% that's already depreciated and drive it till the wheels fall off. And the reason, Thomas, why Robert is suggesting the auto loan over the personal loan and why the bank gives you a lower interest rate on an auto loan versus a personal loan is because of the collateral, right? If you want to go get a personal loan, and it was uncollateralized, and there was just, you know, hey, let me go borrow 2030, $40,000.

Austin Hankwitz
The bank's going to be like, uh, how do I know you're going to pay this money back to me, where if you're like, hey, I'm going to go buy this car that's worth something, and I'm going to use your money to buy it. They're going to be like, hmm, okay, so here's your interest rate. And if you don't pay us, we're just going to repossess the car, and then we'll sell the car to make money back on our loan. Where, again, personal loans. There's no collateral.

It's just, you know, borrowing money. Thomas, I'm doing you a favor here, man. I've looked up the interest rates on auto loans, depending on the credit scores. According to Nerdwallet, if your credit score is between 600 and 660, you're going to look at about 14%, which is. Oh, my gosh, dude, really, really high.

If it's between 660 and 780, which is prime, which is where most people are going to be, you're looking at about nine and a half percent, which is still pretty high. I mean, it's high. It's high interest debt. And then super prime, even, let's call it 780 to 850, you're looking at about 7%, which is still pretty high. So, Robert, what did we learn about this?

We learned that used cars and auto loans at the moment are considered high interest debt. So, Thomas, you should borrow as least amount of money as possible, so you're not going into high interest debt. And you should want to pay this off as fast as possible, because if you're stuck with a 1112, 13, 14% interest rate, building wealth is going to get really, really hard. And Robert, and I say this all the time, you cannot out invest your high interest debt. The stock market is up.

Let's call it three or 4% this year. This would be a 14%. I mean, you all see in the difference there, right? So it's just please, please heed our advice here. Yeah.

Robert Croak
And a little pro tip for those of you that might know a car dealer. If you know someone that has a car lot or a used car dealership, go ask them if they're a friend or a family member or a cousin or whatever and say, hey, can I go to the next auction with you and give you $250 to let me buy a car there? Because you could get pre approved. And I recommend go to a credit union because you might get better rates and terms there. You get pre approved, go to an auction and save a couple more thousand dollars if you're buying it along someone that buys at auction.

That's what I've done over the years and it's worked really well for me. So that's a little pro tip for those of you that have that option. I also want to encourage you to do your homework and don't settle just because you don't have a car right now. Right? You mentioned you told your car, super happy that you're safe.

Austin Hankwitz
Don't be afraid to rent a car just a little bit longer as you are looking on Cargurus, Facebook, marketplace, auto trader, Craigslist, even for people who are selling their cars. For example, and it's so funny, my friend did this. He was looking for a car between eight and 10,011 ish thousand dollars. And he found like a 2014, 2015 Hyundai Elantra with like 80, 9000 thousand miles on it. And it was only like nine or ten grand because some rich people in a neighborhood in South Carolina, you know, didn't want the car anymore, is their family car.

All the kids went to college and they all got new cars and like, oh, I just don't want this car. It's a payment, blah, blah, blah, like insurance, like, we just want out of the garage. Like someone can get it. And he found it on Facebook and he bought it for like nine grand. It was worth like 15 or 16,000.

So like, those things happen. And don't be afraid to hold out a little bit longer and look for those opportunities. Love that. Love it. Now, our last question comes from Juan R.

One says, good morning, gentlemen. I need help paying off my credit card debt. I just recently started learning about personal finance and I'm ready to become debt free and begin building wealth. I've got $30,000 in credit card debt and $30,000 in my Roth IRA. Do I liquidate and sell everything in my Roth IRA to pay off the credit card debt, or should I do something else?

Robert, I see you're snickering, so I'm just gonna let you take away. No way. This is you. As much as any question on earth is you. I want you to go first.

All right. One, I'm gonna be very candid. Whenever someone says, oh, I'm just gonna, you know, borrow against my 401k, or I'm gonna sell my 401k or my Roth IRA. I'm gonna sell these things so I can get out of debt. Listen, listen, listen.

You are literally taking whatever chunk of money that you would have had when you were, let's call it, 65 or 70 years old, and you're just throwing it away. You're just getting rid of it, because what you don't realize is this $30,000, let's say you're 35 years old. This $30,000 over the next 30 years, if you don't touch it, is worth over $1.3 million, Juan. That's what you're saying. You're saying, I would rather pay off $30,000, then let my retirement grow into over a million.

Right? We don't want to do that. Never borrow from your future for today's pleasures. Right? We always want to make sure our money is always working for us in retirement.

First and foremost, we can maybe pause investing for retirement like you probably should, considering you have $30,000 of high interest credit card debt. Like, let's get laser focused on paying that off before maybe we start investing more money because you can't out invest high interest credit card debt. But if the money's already in there, there is no reason to take pre withdraw penalties and taxes and left and right, all this other stuff. Like, there's no reason to do that. All you have to do is go to the description below, download our honest budget, create one, and stick to it.

Find the margin in your monthly budget. Get aggressive, get the side hustle. Start driving Uber, deliver the door dash, you know, start working at that third job or second job, whatever you can do for a small season of your life. Like, I'm talking six, nine months here to get an extra kind of lift against this 30,000. Attack it like it is a virus in your household.

Get rid of it and never go back into high interest credit card debt. That's just a mic drop. I was going to close it out by saying, juan, get the side hustle. Make a month, pretend it doesn't exist. Put it towards the credit card debt.

Robert Croak
Knock out the credit card debt as fast as possible. Do not touch the roth. Absolutely not. Austin, great breakdown. Love it.

And what an incredible episode. And one, actually two. Robert and I have an affiliate link for Lendingtree below. So if you want to get a debt consolidation loan on Lendingtree, go check that out. We will obviously get some sort of commission here, but it's really important.

Austin Hankwitz
You can use it or not. Definitely go check out a debt consolidation loan because what that's going to do is it's going to consolidate all your credit card debt into one monthly payment. And the interest rate, nine times out of ten is about half of what it would be for your credit card debt there. So let's say credit card is 30%. The debt consolidation loan might be between twelve and 15%.

So it's just going to allow you to attack that credit card debt much faster. I love it. What a great episode. And for those of you following along today, don't forget you have one day left to get tickets to the money mindset wealth building summit that we're holding in St. Petersburg this weekend.

Robert Croak
Austin and I will be there on stage and just a ton of other great guests and speakers, and we look forward to having you there. And if you do buy the virtual ticket, please remember that it is recorded. So if you don't have time to watch it during the event, you can watch it whenever you'd like. There's a link in the show notes for the event. And just a quick reminder, if you've not yet left us a five star review on Spotify, please go do that.

Austin Hankwitz
We also have clips that we share on Instagram at Rich Habits podcast TikTok as well. I think we just hit 1000 followers over there. That's pretty cool. That's Rich Habits podcast as well. We have our YouTube channel where we post not just clips, but also kind of breakdowns of specific episodes and answering questions.

So go check out our YouTube channel as well. But we're all over the Internet and we are doubling down on the Rich Habits podcast this summer. We cannot wait. We're launching a newsletter, we're doing the webinars, we're doing a community. It's going to be a big, big deal.

So we are really, really excited for you all to come along on this journey with us. And we just can't wait to deliver immense value to each and every one of you. And with that being said, everyone have a great rest of your week.