Caught these tips off Twitter and thought it would be fun to see how many of these we can check off ;)
I’ll go first…
From The Man himself, Mark Cuban:
#1. Live like a student
Nope! I used to live like a student, but that was more out of necessity than desire lol… I will say though that this mentality IS a good one to try and mimic though, at least in spirit, as lifestyle inflation is real and if you keep spending all the new money you earn you might as well still be a broke college student!
So a hearty yes to channeling this, but no to giving myself a point here as I def. live more lavishly than my 19 y/o self could ever stomach ;) That guy would never spend $6.00 on a latte!
#2. Don’t use credit cards
FAIL. We use one main “house” card for all bills to rack up cashback and keep things streamlined, but we also pay it off at the end of every month because we don’t like lighting our cash on fire… If you struggle with that 2nd part though, then a hell yes to whipping out those scissors and chopping them up!! The c/c perks will never outperform the loss of fees and stress from debt! Better to just avoid it altogether than play the devil’s game if you don’t trust yourself enough. 👍
(And as much as I don’t want to admit it, I’m 99% sure we overspend using plastic vs cash too… It’s a “convenience” fee I’m willing to pay though after decades of hustling ;))
#3. Save 6 months income
Next Level Activated! 3-6 months banked does wonders to your peace, and honestly even if you can just pull off ONE MONTH of savings it’s game changing.. And the beauty is that once you hit whatever level you’re going for, you don’t have to add any more to it and can divert all future $$$ elsewhere to more exciting things!! Like Pokémon and NFTs! ;)
And remember too, not every dollar needs to be maximized. Even though it looks like the money is just sitting there “doing nothing” and not earning anything, it’s still serving the magnificent purpose of giving you INNER PEACE. And I know a lot of people who would pay good money for that, so soak in as much of it as you can!
#4. Put savings into SPX mutual fund
YUP!!! Well, technically we’re invested in Vanguard’s VTSAX which tracks the TOTAL MARKET and not just the S&P 500 stocks which is what SPX does (or VFIAX – another popular fund from Vanguard), but it’s all a similar concept. You’re betting on a giant portfolio of hundreds/thousands of stocks instead of trying your hand at picking out individual ones which is very (very) hard to do well, especially long-term. And a bonus perk – you can just set it and forget it! A lazy man’s dream!
#5. Invest a % of money into high risk
Score here too! Always smart to have a “long shot” going on the side, though I can’t say it helps too well with that whole “inner peace” stuff as it’s amazing how much MENTAL bandwidth it can take up for being such a small sliver of your net worth, lol… You give me .0001 bitcoins and it’s all I can think about for the next year even though it’s so insignificant! So hopefully your brains work much better at keeping the overall perspective than mine, or at least betting on things that aren’t in the news 24/7 :)
I would also put starting your own business, or buying up other small businesses, in this department too btw… Stuff that has a higher rate of failure, but also a higher rate of rewards when they succeed! And notice Mark didn’t put a specific % amount there either, which I like since our risk tolerances are all different… Though typically you’ll see recommendations anywhere from 5%-10% of your overall net worth to play with which I tend to agree as a good starting point.
#6. Buy consumables in bulk
FAIL. This is kind of embarrassing as it’s such a core tenant of frugality – especially for a money blogger (!) – but for whatever reason we just don’t do much of it… Or I should say, my wife doesn’t do much of it, and ain’t no way I’m going to pipe up and ask her why to then have the task transferred over to me, haha… I let her run the show there, and I run the show here with our finances!
But yes. More bulk = more sex…y. So good on all you Costco and Sam’s Club shoppers banking those savings around the world… At least I think Costco is around the world?! (I googled: “Costco has 833 warehouses worldwide: 574 in the United States, 107 in Canada, 40 in Mexico, 31 in Japan, 29 in the United Kingdom, 16 in Korea, 14 in Taiwan, 13 in Australia, four in Spain, two each in France and China, and one in Iceland.”)
#7. Negotiate with cash
Do yard sales count? ‘Cuz if so I’m an undefeated champ there – BOOM! But can’t say I do much negotiating outside of that… Except for house buying times, but even then we always end up choosing the mortgage route than cash money for ultimate flexibility… Not that we usually *have* the cash to pony up most times anyways, haha… do you know how expensive homes are these days??! It’s insane!
But overall, yeah – anything that tips your hands in negotiations is great, and if you have the cash to back up that fast-talking mouth of yours then you go with your bad self. Not many things feel better than pulling off a good deal!
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And those are his 7 tips!
So let’s see here… Out of the 7 recommended it looks like I can confidently check off at least 3 of them, and then maybe partially 1 or 2 others.
So I’m going to give myself a solid 4 out of 7 here which means I’m definitely no Mark Cuban, but something tells me Mark Cuban isn’t Mark Cuban either ;)
No way he doesn’t use a credit card these days or leverage his millions of billions of dollars to strike deals… I’m sure he buys in bulk and lives like a college student at least in his mind, but obviously these tips are geared more for the general public than an entrepreneurial rock star like himself.
Still, a fun checklist to go down and always good to at least *consciously* be choosing to take one path or the other than living financially oblivious! So see how many you can check off too, and then share below so we can compare!
Your financially conscious friend,
PS: For more insight from Mr. Cuban, here are his thoughts on How To Get Rich
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Photo by TechCrunch / Doodles by J$
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J Money – so great to have you back! I agree with you on # 5. The mental stress is not worth it for me. I like simple and steady like VTSAX.
I bought into Bitcoin with 1 % of my total portfolio. It went up and down – wild violent swings. I finally sold it and broke even…. the lesson learned for me was slow and steady wins the race. Mentally, it was not healthy for me.
To each their own!
Smart to get out once you realized it’s doing more harm than good! I did that with the first round of bitcoin “investing” a few years back (came ahead by a couple hundred) but this time around I have been the opposite of smart, lol… Good thing I’m always too conservative to bet the farm!
1. Does still dressing like a student count?
2. Put everything I can on a cashback card and pay off weekly. Yes weekly. A $4000 credit card freaks me out, even though logically I know it’s the same as paying $750 X that month. Brains are weird.
3. Got it.
4. I’m 60% total market and 40% total bond fund with Vanguard.
5. My track record on this is bad, as you would expect. So not currently doing it.
6. We downsized and don’t have the storage space for 20 rolls of paper towels. Savings from downsizing > savings from Costco. We canceled our membership years ago.
7. LOL. Cuban thinks you can still pay with cash.
Weekly pay offs – impressive! I wonder if that helps with your debt-to-credit ratio any? It should since you’re only “in debt” for a week at a time…. That’s way too many logins for me though haha… My mind isn’t as bothered seeing a high number there, though I agree it would feel better with a lower one 😂
I believe the credit agencies only check your accounts once per month, but I have noticed my score will bounce up 1 or 2 points if they happen to check on a day when the balances are a little higher than normal – like if I’m traveling and skip payoffs that week.
Yes – my credit score goes up a meaningless amount when I use 2% instead of 0% of my available credit. Credit scores are stupid.
I agree with a lot of these things. Although I do use credit cards a lot (and pay off every month). I think that’s true if you carry a balance then yes you should avoid using them. But otherwise the protections, etc are worth it.
I try to live as a student and budget and negotiate when I can. Glad to see J.Money writing? i thought I had read it was sold awhile back? Maybe I messed that up but its been awhile since I’ve read indeed.
hah – you read that right! i sold it a few years back, then had the opportunity to re-acquire it last month so figured what the hell :) Been a fun mind trip starting back again!
Awesome. I’m glad you are back at it then! I’ll be sure to re-bookmark and check back regularly!
I think the last time I read regularly was when I had a job in a physical office. Not saying I was reading instead of working….
#6. Even though I have a Costco membership, I do not agree. Especially for a typical family of 4. TBH, When I rebelled and said no to warehouse memberships we saved a significant amount. Even if we were paying more per unit on average, we were buying significantly less overall. I estimate that not having a warehouse membership saved my family around $250 a month for that one glorious year.
But than again… How would I get my MEGA pack of Mochi…
Just one glorious year? Are you back signed up again?! 😂
sigh… Costco owns me…
Negotiate in cash… but then once you’ve established the price inform them you will be financing after all ; )