Marcus High-Yield Savings Accounts (HYSA) Giving the Highest Return Since Pandemic

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Wow! It’s finally happening! High-yield savings account rates are up. Today, we are seeing the highest return since the pandemic in 2020. Marcus HYSA (high-yield savings account) are at 2.5% but my readers get an additional 1% APY bonus if they sign up through my link here. That means that by signing up today, you can secure 3.5% rate of return on your savings for the first 3 months. I wrote about what HYSAs are here, but I thought I would provide an explanation as to why I this is the perfect avenue for short-term savings in today’s post.

HYSAs are low risk investment options for short-term savings:

HYSAs are low-risk investment options for short-term savings. How is this different from the stock market?

I like to use the stock market for my buy-and-hold strategy. Because of fluctuations in the market, the value of my investments could go up or down any day. The only way to beat the market is to buy and hold long-term. Historical data has proven that staying in the stock market for a long period of time is the best strategy.

The stock market’s volatility also means that I would not want to keep my short-term savings in it. Short-term savings refer to money that I am saving up for a particular event. In my case, my short-term savings was for the resumption of student loans. With the student debt interest rate at 0% since the pandemic started, we had decided to put our savings in a HYSA to earn interest on it over time. Unlike the volatile stock market, this rate of return is guaranteed, and can not go negative.

Examples of short-term savings:

Saving for a house
Saving for the birth of a baby
Preparing for student loan repayment to resume
Saving for next round of school tuition
Saving for an emergency fund
Saving for a wedding
Planning a trip/travel
Buying a new car

Why are HYSAs better than a savings account?

Savings account at other banks have a much lower interest rate. For example, I do my banking with Chase bank and at the time of writing this post is 0.01%. Compare that to 3.5% that you get by using my referral sign-up bonus! That means that if you have $10,000 in your savings account, you will earn $1 from Chase, and $350 from HYSA every year. That’s a no-brainer for me.

Why choose Marcus for your HYSA?

Marcus provides a return rate that is 4x the national average. It also is FDIC-insured for up to $250,000. That means you can put your savings here to rest without worrying about the value going down. Marcus in particular is backed by Goldman Sachs, a long trusted company. They also have same-day transfers up to $100,000 to and from most banks. This means that your money is readily available should you need it.

Would it be better to pay off credit card debt or save in a HYSA account?

While HYSAs are perfect for short-term savings, I think it is always better to pay off credit card debt first. The reason is because credit cards charge an interest rate much higher than what you would earn by stowing away dollars in a Marcus HYSA. That being said, if you struggle with credit card debt, may I recommend The Credit Pros and their expert services? (*aff) Paying off credit card debt was the first thing we did on our student loan repayment journey, and it was the thing that catapulted us forward towards financial independence. I highly recommend!

Photo by Konstantin Evdokimov on Unsplash

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more. A friendly reminder that this is an opinion piece written by yours truly and should not be considered professional financial advice.

Thoughts: On Work

Earlier this week, I came home from working a day of dentistry. It was Monday, which is a day I am usually off. I was covering for a friend who went on vacation to Korea for a month. I pulled into my driveway as my neighbor was putting away the groceries. She saw me wearing my Figs scrubs (the only brand I wear for work) and cocked her head to the side. “What else do you do besides taking care of dogs?” A funny question, as the dog business is my side-hustle. But here in my neighborhood, I’m known as a dog caretaker, not a dentist. So I told her I work as a dentist and she appeared even more confused. “But if you’re a dentist, why do you bother taking care of pets?” she asked.

Now it was my turn to get a quizzical look on my face. This happens a lot in my life. A sort of disconnect between myself and others who follow the formulaic status quo. I could tell right away that she didn’t understand the point of working if it wasn’t for pay. It was also obvious that she viewed work as a job that one must do, whereas I viewed work as fun things I like to do. She is a stay-at-home mom and might be proud of the fact that she didn’t have to work. It’s also possible she was insinuating the question, “Do you not make enough as a dentist that you have to do more side-hustles?”

So I answered her as truthfully as I can.

“I take care of pets because I like to. It’s fun for me, and I fall in love with them and treat them like my kids. I started out watching just one or two here and there, but now I get requests all the time. Since I have a lot of time on my hands, I accommodate as many as I can. This way, our neighbors can go on their vacations with peaceful minds, knowing who is taking care of their pet family members.

I actually do a lot of things! They are all fun for me and give me joy. On top of taking care of pets, I am helping a bakery grow and I write a blog to help new grads, moms, and people in debt live minimalist lives in order to get closer to financial freedom. I also volunteer at the farm down the street. You should join me sometime!”

Her son came out of the house at that point. A saving grace for both of us. ‘Ah, okay’ as she backed away. I hope I didn’t freak her out. But it’s true. I can’t say at what point during the pandemic I actually became financially free – in the sense that I am not tied to my money, and I stopped working for pay alone.

Perhaps it was when I had enough FU money to quit the job that I hated. More likely it was the healing time period when I learned that I could create any position for myself. Or maybe it was after people reached out to me to help them. Did you know that I never asked to work at either of the two dental offices I currently work at? Actually, I was expecting to never work in dentistry again! I also did not apply to be a wholesale director of the bakery. In all three cases, they came to me and asked if I could help at times when they had no one.

I do my work because it entails helping others. That’s what I like to do. Not because of the money anymore. If my jobs were taken away from me today, I wouldn’t be sad, mad, upset, or worried. I would probably just shrug my shoulders and keep contributing myself to this life, keep showing up for people I’ve gotten to know. Not much would change, except maybe a pivotal shift on where I spend my energy most.

When I think about work, I don’t think of it in the traditional sense of a job. I just think of it as another day where I go and help a few people out. That’s all. I am not dependent on a specific company or career. I am only dependent on myself. I’ve focused on building myself up rather than building a career. (That’s advice I would give any college student!)

My neighbor was probably thinking to herself, “Poor gal. She has to work so hard to be able to live.” I’m over here thinking, “How do I get this neighbor out of her box to join me in this thing called life?” Hopefully we become fast friends. Bringing over banana bread might do it.

Do what you love, and call it work. Some say it can’t be done, but I’m trying my darndest to prove them wrong.

Why You Should Always Cash Out Your Venmo Account

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

I recently became aware of the fact that people keep funds in their Venmo accounts. I was shocked. From a finance perspective, this is a terrible move, keeping your money locked away for someone else’s use. By keeping money in a Venmo account, you are funding Venmo’s ability to fund others. I’m sure Venmo is happy. But your future self won’t be when you realize why this is bad for your financial life. So I decided to write a post about why we should always cash out our Venmo accounts. But first, a bit about my philosophy around money.

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I like to think of money as our life energy. We spend time and physical energy doing our work, in exchange for money. Money then becomes a tool to buy what we need and want. Therefore, money is the middle man between our life energy and our possessions. Because money is a symbol of life energy, I treat it preciously.

You see, I don’t like to work for money. I would prefer my money working for me. That is the basic premise of being rich. The more we get our money to make money for us, the less we have to do the physical work, which then saves life energy and time, both of which increases our potential to make even MORE money.

What do I mean by making money work for you?

Well, let’s say you take your money and invest it in a brokerage account. You buy an investment at $100 and the company grows and does well. Your $100 is now $150. You just had your money work for you, earning you $50 without you having to work. Of course you will be taxed on your gains, reducing your earned income to let’s say $30. That isn’t much different than being taxed for the income you earn. In the end, that’s still $30 you didn’t have before, and you didn’t lift a finger to earn it.

Another example is real estate. Take our story. We scrapped together a down-payment to buy our primary home. We purchased a property whose monthly mortgage would cost the same as our monthly rent. Then we rented a portion of our home. The money we put into the home adds value to our assets in the form of equity earned, and the rental unit downstairs earns us an extra $623 a month. Prior to purchasing this home, we were paying someone else to keep a roof over our heads. By buying this property, we are making our money work for us, not us working for someone else’s benefit.

Even if you feel like investing in stocks or buying real estate is out of reach, you can still have your money work for you in more conservative ways. I wrote about investing in High Yield Savings Accounts for people who want access to their money in the near future or who are too uncomfortable with stocks and real estate.

Also, in my free course on Mastering a Budget, I wrote about the importance of assigning every dollar a job. Dollars are like responsibilities within a household or a workplace. If someone isn’t assigned a responsibility, the work doesn’t get done. Likewise, you need to make your money accountable for doing the work for you. If not, it’ll most likely float past your fingertips into another person’s hands as quickly as you earned it. Nothing gets done because money isn’t held accountable, and neither are you.

What does this have to do with Venmo?

Well, I personally never keep my money in my Venmo account. There is no benefit to it. It doesn’t make my transactions go through faster. It doesn’t make it more convenient for me to track the dollars I have. It doesn’t allow me to give every dollar a job. And it doesn’t grow my wealth.

I pull out every dollar from Venmo (at $0 charge using the Standard Trasfer to my bank account) the minute the notification goes through that I got paid. There are two pros to this.

This pulls every transaction amount separately and automatically logs each bank deposit from Venmo as its own transaction. This is important because we use YNAB (a platform for budgeting called You Need A Budget) to give all our dollars a job. Withdrawing every dollar when I receive a Venmo deposit simplifies the categorization step in YNAB (my affiliate link to get you started). The categorization step allows us to track how every dollar is made and every dollar is spent.
It also allows us to then take that money and increase our wealth, by putting it somewhere it can grow (like a HYSA or investment account) or paying for something to avoid debt.

Keeping money in Venmo is like keeping money locked away. It prevents financial wealth from growing as fast as it can. It also makes it more difficult to master a budget. I don’t know about you, but I cannot keep track of how much money is in my Venmo handle once two or three transactions go through. I simply forget! If you think of your dollars as little employees working for you, then you are essentially keeping your employees in a cage preventing them from accomplishing work!

One final note:

There is a circulating argument that it is more convenient to pay a friend when there is already money in a Venmo account. I just want to attest to the fact that it’s not any more difficult to make a payment through Venmo by pulling the money directly from a bank account. And if, by “convenient”, one means that they can justify spending money more easily when it’s already in an account meant for fun activities (dining out, birthday gifts, pizza, etc.), then that’s just them fooling themselves. But they would be right.

It’s easy to tell yourself, “I can dine out tonight and I’ll venmo my friend Bob for the meal. There’s still money in my Venmo account.”

That IS convenient! But you aren’t getting any richer.

Imagine the alternative. Your friend Sue pays you for last week’s dinner. You had offered to pay for the meal for your group of friends so that you can earn the credit card reward points in order to travel hack and fly internationally for free. You immediately transfer the money Sue gives you and place it in your HYSA (this is my affiliate link to set a HYSA up with Marcus. It gives my readers an additional 0.2% APY boost). When Bob asks if you want to grab dinner, you think about how you don’t have enough in your “Dining Out” envelope for dinner tonight. You ask if Bob would prefer to order pizza and save $10 a person or if he would be open to rescheduling to a future date when more people can join so that you can catch up with multiple friends at once and save on your “dining out” spending.

Sure, it isn’t glamorous. But it isn’t inconvenient either. It is simply … financially SMART.

After you’ve emptied your Venmo accounts, consider – Where else are you holding your money for the “just because”? And then go out there and pay yourself first. Make your money make money for you.

Your life energy will thank you.

The True Cause of a Spending Problem

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Do you have a spending problem? Are you someone who just can’t make ends meet? Have you found that no matter how much you increase your income, you can’t break the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle? Do you find yourself shopping when you are stressed or tired or sad? Perhaps this post is for you.

It may not be what you want to hear, but the truth is this:

A spending problem is the result of not knowing who you want to be, or where you want your life to go.

Emotional spending occurs because a void needs filling. Unfortunately, more often than not, the spending itself fails at solving the problem. Rather, it extenuates it by creating a loop cycle that enlarges the void and brings us further from our true goals.

For example, have you ever tried to treat your stress by shopping online? At first, it felt good, but after a while, regret starts to sink in and your newfound purchase falls short of delivering lasting happiness, not to mention instantly decreases in value. Does it sound familiar to you? Because it sure does to me.

Not knowing who we want to be or what we want our life to look like makes it difficult to know what is worthy of our time and money. If we do not have a clear purpose, goal, or ambition, then it becomes easy to fall into the cycle of spending our resources on what people around us promote, rather than what we need. Because what we gain was never truly for us, it doesn’t fill the void at all, resulting in spending again, and again, and again.

If you want to treat a spending problem, my financial advice is to start with you. Define who you want to be and where you want your life to go. At least, that’s what we did and it worked for us. Because I used to be like you, too. I had $30,000 in credit card debt. I had more than half a million dollars in student loans. I went shopping every weekend in my early twenties and bought avocado toast while I was in dental school. I had a serious spending problem, until I realized who I was and what I wanted.

I am a simple person. I enjoy reading books and baking bread. I find joy in quiet time and yoga. My mind is healthiest when I am outdoors collecting rocks on a beach. I wanted a life of financial freedom. I wanted to be able to choose a job to my liking. I wanted the autonomy to work in a way that is aligned to my values. I want the freedom to call my own hours, to choose days of rest, to pursue other passions, and I understood that I couldn’t do that if I chose material stuff, trends, and status symbols. That’s how this all started.

I was lucky enough to find a financial advisor in my early years who delved deeply into what I wanted for my future. It was only then, when I saw the big picture, did I have the motivation to get rid of my spending problem. And if I am being honest, without a clear picture of where I wanted my life to be, I would just as likely have reverted back to my previous ways. It was the clarity that kept me going.

The true cause of a spending problem is not being intentionally clear enough about your life.

Here are good places to start:

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If you have trouble paying off your credit card debts, you can always try The Credit Pros. They will help identify the most damaging and most helpful credit items, as well as provide advice and educational tools.

How to Gain Enough Financial Independence To Quit Your Job

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

Yesterday, a dentist came to the dental practice to do a working interview. He would be the doctor to take my place at our busy practice. Upon meeting me, he asked why I was leaving. I told him the truth – that I wanted to take a break from dentistry and spend time living life.

He looked at me quizzically, as if confused by the language I spoke.

“But what are you going to do with your student loans?,” he asked incredulously.

So I explained to him our financial journey. I tried to tell him that we live a life of financial independence. We don’t make our life decisions based on money alone. Rather, we decide what to do based on a happiness meter.

“But how can you do that? Aren’t you worried about your debt?”

When I told him no, that we had planned ahead for a lifestyle such as this, he scoffed lightly and said, “Most people decide to do that after loans are done.”

I simply shrugged and said, “I guess.”

I didn’t really have the energy at the time to convince someone that it is possible to live life financially independent. I recognized someone not ready to open up to the possibility of an alternative life, free of societal expectations and a pre-formulated timeline.

Even though we still have student debt, we have created all the micro-steps to be paid ahead of our original plan, build wealth, and have the reserves needed to create flexibility in our lives. What I did not explain to him was that most people are on a 20-25 year forgiveness plan. Only a few tackle a ten year repayment plan. We were on track for six years, despite having one of the largest debts possible caused by higher education. We have not ignored retirement accounts and have secured a real estate property that is both commercially zoned AND a residential address. We built a savings account that can support a 14-month hiatus from work without curbing our spending or selling our house. (If we sell our house, neither of us need work for over three years and still support our current living expenses, although I hardly see us not working for a few months in reality because that’s just my personality…) We made certain life decisions, such as buying a home in a lower-income area, choosing not to have kids (sorry mom and dad!), living a frugal lifestyle, prioritizing our passions over money, and living a life of less waste in order to get to this place. Some of these decisions were harder than others. We were both born into families that could not financially help us and we have worked hard and diligently to be here.

If he hadn’t been so judgmental about my decision to quit, I probably would have told him how he could do it, too.

On here, I wanted to share with those who were interested exactly how to gain financial independence and quit your job, if you wanted. It isn’t for everyone, and the path might not look exactly the same. I suppose in the end, I can only speak for myself, my life, and what I have done.

I am not sharing this because I think this is the best way to live life. I am sharing this because in resigning from work, I had more people come out of their shell and tell me that they’ve always wanted the freedom to do the same, but feel trapped in the workplace. I am sharing this because I want people to have hope and empowerment. I genuinely want to help.

Here is my not-so-secret, not-rocket-science, not-traditional, not-socially-approved-nor-socially-accepted way of gaining enough financial independence amidst student-debt enslavement to quit a job that was not right for me.

1. Figure out what you want in life.

Decide on your main priorities. Identify your values and try to marry your lifestyle with those values. Only then can you curate your life in a way that brings you complete joy.

2. Eliminate all the unnecessaries.

For me, that meant unnecessary material things, as well as unnecesssary people. Even quitting my job was a practice of getting rid of the unnecessaries. It started with de-cluttering my life, then severing toxic relationships, then separating myself from obligation and societal expectations and norms. Now, I have the ability to assess whether things improve my life or not. If not, then I let go.

3. Begin to grow your wealth.

After steps one and two, all that is left are the bits of life that add value. It started with Mastering a Budget. I wrote an entire course on how to do it, and I shared it with the world for free. I have been told by my students that it has been helpful to their journey. Here are a few testimonials:

Prior to this course, I considered myself pretty familiar with my expenses and a mindful shopper. However, at the end of each month I constantly found myself wondering where all my income had gone. I realized that I was in denial about my budgeting skills & decided to purchase this course. “Mastering a Budget” challenged me to think hard about my goals and how my finances play a role in achieving such goals. Developing a clear understanding of my “why” for budgeting has kept me on track when I feel like I am going off course with my finances. While on this budgeting journey, I realized that I was spending more than expected on certain categories and not saving nearly enough towards my goals. Additionally, the frugal challenges detailed in the course put me outside of my comfort zone but had long last financial benefits that I will continue to carry on. “Mastering A Budget” provided me with the motivation and tools to create a budget that is well suited for my lifestyle and goals. I highly recommend this course to everyone!

“Having graduated with a significant amount of student debt, I realized I needed to be more aware of my budget and how I spend my money. However, I did not have much insight on how to properly manage my finances let alone having a game plan on how to do so. This course not only helped provide me a fundamental understanding on budgeting, but was also very concise and easy to follow. To anyone that wants to better understand budgeting but doesn’t know where to start, I would definitely recommend this course.”

If you want to learn how to start a budget, sign up to receive this free guide on creating a budgeting tool that works for you.

4. Get rid of debt.

We use the snowball method to tackle debt. Trust someone who has a lot of it – this part is no fun, but necessary. I decided that I would not feel financially free until I remove the debt completely. I did not want to wait for a government to remove it 20-25 years later. I know myself well enough to understand that I would psychologically feel the burden of my debt until it was completely gone. If I had chosen a loan forgiveness plan, I would not only depend on the government’s promise to pay off the debt, but I would also be completely dependent on my job. Dependency on a job was the last thing I wanted. Here is why:

My father was very dependent on his job – he had a family to support. He had to do things that were not aligned with his values in order to keep his work. His job as a sales engineer was stressful for him, as his higher-ups dumped uncomfortable confrontations between the factory and the company on their middle man. He then had to give up his pride as he went on to his second job as a janitor for Staples on weeknights. When that ended, he worked at Hollywood Video pushing tapes at a check-out stand alongside high-school teenagers. When we were older, he worked weekends at Robinson’s May, where his boss who paid him minimum wage forced him to miss the important things in life – like his children’s performances and sports matches. He finally quit his retail job when his boss threatened to fire him because he did not want to work on Christmas Eve. I remember the night he came home. He seemed very proud of standing up for what is right, but also, a bit beaten by a system holding him down. After watching my father go through that, I vowed to fight for my financial freedom so that all his sacrifices and hard work were not in vain.

5. Save as much money as possible.

This may seem like basic advice, but seriously, be as frugal as possible. We experimented with many ways to pinch pennies, such as eating rice and beans for a whole week, as well as taking on a room-mate as a married couple. All of my frugal challenges can be found here. I would highly recommend implementing as many frugal life-hacks as you can!

6. Build an emergency fund.

An emergency fund can reflect your risk tolerance. We are both risk averse people. I wanted to have a healthy buffer via an emergency fund in preparation for unexpected expenses. Some budgeting strategies allow for flexibilities within the budget so that emergency funds are unnecessary. Despite keeping additional savings in each category of our budget for unexpected events, we still keep a separate emergency reserve. I know it’s traditionalist, but diversifying financial strategies is one way we prepare for the future. In order to speed up the process, keep your money reserved in a high-yield savings account. We have opened an account with Marcus, and you can use this referral link to earn an additional 0.2% APY for up to 3 months.

7. Invest in the future.

We could have easily been close-minded and focused on attacking my student debt wholly. But I wanted to be very well-rounded in our financial approach, so we made sure to contribute to our 401-K retirement accounts (we each have one) along the way. Even though it means slowing down our loan repayment progress, it also meant diversifying our assets in order to compensate for the ups and downs life might throw our way. If you do not have a business or work for a company that provides a 401-K account, look into opening up a Roth IRA.

8. Look to real estate.

Rent in California is not cheap. Once we set up our 401-K’s, removed credit card debt, and funneled our hard-earned dollars towards my student debt with auto-payments, we started to look at buying a home because we viewed renting as a sure-fire way to throw away money. We had saved an emergency fund in step 5, and essentially used that emergency fund as a down-payment. Being the avid finance people that we were, we had been eyeing the market for the past two years. This allowed us to know the price point within our budget, as well as knowing the best bang for buck in our particular area. We ended up purchasing a commercially zoned live/work loft which is considered both a business and a residence for less than my student debt! Since we spent some of the emergency fund money, the minute we bought the house, we started all over again and grew our emergency fund back to what it was over the course of the next year.

9. Create passive income streams.

On top of our jobs, which provides active income streams, we wanted to set up sources of passive income. I have alluded to a few of those passive income streams above. One passive way to build wealth is our Marcus Savings Account, which gains interest over time and builds our emergency fund. Another is our 401-K, which gains interest over time and builds our retirement fund. A third is our room-mate which helps pay down our mortgage and build equity. Even this blog brings in passive income from past posts via affiliate links. I like things that continue to grow even when left alone. There are many ways you can create passive income, and I would definitely set yourself up for success in those venues because you never know what will happen to your active income stream.

10. Earn more money.

There are many ways to earn more money. I personally love the side-hustle. In the past few years, I have been a dog-sitter on Rover, worked at a bakery, opened my own bakery, baby-sat, made wedding favors, signage and decorations, sold my stuff on Poshmark, and wrote on this blog. I am not trying to sound insensitive to the effects of COVID on many people’s work lives. The opposite is actually true. I want to instill hope that there are ways to earn money all the time. People just have to think outside the box. A few examples relevant to this time in particular:

baby-sitting so that WFH parents can focus for at least an hour a day
tutoring to help kids who have fallen behind in their schooling
meal-prepping for over-extended parents and family members
financial planning or guidance for those who want to get out of debt accrued this year
mental health services for those who suffer from stress or depression
online yoga classes via ZOOM (so what if you’re not a certified yoga instructor?)
create websites for small businesses that need a digital place to grow
a longer list in my previous post: The Ever-Growing List Of Ways To Earn Extra Income.
for early morning people, check out these 15 early morning jobs to jump start your day!

I know these are only a few examples, but before you can find ways to earn extra income, you need to first give yourself permission to do so. It’s possible you may find that you are the only one stopping yourself from making more money!

Despite Mike not working since February, despite COVID, despite dental offices closing down temporarily, I feel a strong sense of certainty that taking time off during this most stressful and precarious time is the right move for living a balanced life. I only speak for myself, but have found that in doing so, other people have reached out to ask just how.

I hope this has been somewhat helpful, but I know that none of this happened over night. Small steps every day is what it takes to create the space for change. If it feels too over-whelming to think about, try to start with Step 1. Write down your wildest dreams, your values, the things that excite you… Then go from there.

I want to sincerely offer advice so as always, do not hesitate to reach out if you need a helping hand with getting started or finding your way. If you want to read more, here are a few posts you may be interested in.

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Monthly Goals: November 2020

This month’s goals come at a very interesting time for me personally.

The reason being, I have decided to quit my dentistry job.

I have decided to quit dentistry for many reasons.

I have lost meaning in my daily work.
I felt under-appreciated by a changing health-care system that prioritizes customer service over health itself.
I felt that I could not balance the expectations of my patients, the expectations of my workplace, and my own personal expectations.
My values are not aligned with where I am currently working.
I wanted to spend the holiday season with family and focus on the people that matter to me.
I was feeling burnt out and knew that if I did not give myself a break, I would grow to resent what I do for a living.
I want to live an intentional life, which means curating out the things that do not bring me joy.
We have made the lifestyle choices (invest money, spend less, own less, avoid having kids, avoid a large mortgage) necessary to avoid job dependency.
We have created the boundaries necessary to ignore social expectations and pressures, thus giving us freedom to live how we want.

Despite this freedom, I still have goals. But without the job identity, the goals have shifted slightly.

I think that quitting was very cathartic for me. I admit feeling stressed the last few months, mostly because I was holding on desperately to something I should have let go many months ago. I was fighting an internal battle, one between the past self and future possibility. Finally turning in an official resignation letter did just the trick.

It wasn’t very easy. I felt depressed for a few days, afraid of what I had done, anxious about the future. It’s like any ole break-up. It feels easier to run back to what is familiar and feels safe, even after you’ve outgrown the past. It takes a lot of reserve to not turn back. Luckily, the sadness and fear did not last long. After I sat through my emotions, I started to really notice a shift in my personality.

I sang songs randomly, after years of refusing to listen to music in case it over-whelmed my mind.
I smiled more frequently, and was more open to socializing. I connected with a high school friend, decided to make time for my grandma’s birthday party, and even drove to East LA on a Friday evening after work to grab tacos with my mother-in-law at a stand that she used to eat tacos at when she was my age.
I picked up old habits, like learning about photography, doing art, and playing guitar.
I connected with my husband more, rekindling our dumb banter from the college days.

For November’s monthly goals, I am sharing with you a TIME OFF BUCKET LIST. Even though my time off doesn’t start until November 19, I have decided not to wait until my last day of work to start living life to the fullest. This bucket list contains a number of goals I have always wanted to accomplish but have put on pause in order to partake in an American Dream.

As some people already know from my Instagram, we are taking a few long trips over the course of three weeks from November to December. I have lived in California since 1998 and I have yet to actually see it. I find that a shame.

It’s got me thinking, how much of our life are we actually wasting away doing things that don’t really matter in exchange for stuff that don’t really make us happy?

Not that I have the answers.

Just that I am trying to figure it out.

TheDebtist’s TIME OFF BUCKET LIST

Create Spotify playlists for different occasions and moods
Improve Photography Skills
Learn French
Improve Guitar Skills
Explore California National Parks
Visit old friends
Write a book – and self-publish it
Create more courses
Get into artwork again
Visit a Japanese spa (because we can’t go to Japan)
Go to a butterfly sanctuary
Go birdwatching in the San Joaquin Wildlife Sanctuary
Explore tide pools for hours
“Live” on a farm – milk a cow or extract honey from a beehive
Learn recipes of my homeland from my mom
Hug a Redwood tree
Tour a lighthouse
Learn to make alfajores
Bake someone’s wedding cake
Do a cold bath dunk
Bake the following from the Tartine Book: Gingerbread Cookies, Spiked Cocktail Nuts, Brownies, Chocolate Pots de Crème, Devil’s Food Layer Cake, Lemon Meringue Cake, Pastel de Tres Leches
Eat Pho for the first time (yes!)
Learn how to make ramen from Mike
Master a few advanced level yoga poses
Learn how to sit on my hands

I add the last one, because just like anything, I always dive headfirst into something new, including this “mini-retirement”. Supposedly it’s a chance for me to figure myself out. Somehow I have to balance that with living life to the fullest. Like I said before, I’m still figuring it out. But honestly, thank you for joining me on this wild ride.

If you have any other bucket list ideas, do share! Who knows when my next mini-retirement will be.

The Ever-Growing List of Ways to Earn Extra Income

This post may contain affiliate links. Please see my disclosure to learn more.

There are two paths to growing wealth: spend less money, and earn more money. I have already addressed the former in my Ever-Growing List of Things I’ve Given Up in the Name of Frugality. It’s about time I address the latter.

I am ALL about the side-hustle. I have spent the last fifteen years of my life working multiple part-time jobs and creating side hustles. I had three jobs in Undergrad at the same time, and worked after school in dental school. Job titles that I’ve held include Jamba Juice worker, Jamba Juice Training Mentor, Banana Republic Visuals Specialist and Retail Associate, Dental Assistant, Private tutor, Tutor at a tutoring company, University Librarian, Rover Dog-Sitter, Baker at Rye Goods, Owner of Aero Bakery, Dentist, and Blogger. On top of that, I have earned extra money guest-writing for people, being a “lab-rat” for all sorts of University research studies, baby-sitting, baking treats for parties, and other random title-less positions.

Your Job Doesn’t Have to Match Your Profession

I know COVID-19 has caused many people to lose their jobs. I hope this post finds you, somehow. There are endless ways to earn money. There is no reason to stick to what your degree or license is on. Many jobs require very little experience, and honestly most of what I did I learned along the way.

For example, I had no culinary degree and yet I reached out to a bakery via Instagram and asked for work. I took the only shift available (the early shift from 2am to 6am) and balanced it with my 5-day-workweek as a dentist. From there, I learned how to open my own bakery and manage that from the comforts of my home.

Likewise, I had only lived with my family dog for four years, but I deemed myself good enough for dog-sitting. I simply applied on the Rover App which only required a few lines of information and a few essays as to why I would be a good fit. After four years of dog-sitting, I now manage my own dog-walking and dog-sitting business. I have grown my clientele to the point where I don’t need to advertise myself. I have repeat clients on the regular.

I have never changed diapers in my life but I sure as heck volunteered to babysit. I used to dabble in writing and somehow, I was paid to write all of the content of an entire website at the age of 20. No one gave me permission to create a blog, or be on podcasts, or half of the other things I ended up doing. But I did them, and you can too. All you need to do is throw yourself out on a limb, ask people around you how you can be of service, and give yourself the permission to try, and fail, and grow. You need to be vocal, confident, and trusting of your skills and talents. I believe every person has a long-list of things to contribute, and by offering to do so, we not only make ourselves richer but those around us richer too.

With that said, here is my ever-growing list of ways to earn extra money.

Start a blog. I use WordPress as my hosting site and I started this blog for free. I first learned I could earn money for this blog through this course: Making Sense of Affiliate Marketing. I then turned the blog into a business site which costs a yearly fee, but the money you earn from your blog can easily offset that fee. I would highly recommend growing your e-mail list via ConvertKit so that you can reach even more people.
Create an E-Course. I created my first E-Course called Mastering A Budget. I highly recommend Teachable (this is my affiliate link). It is such an easy program to use, and I know many people who have earned hundreds of thousands of dollars via Teachable. Write E-courses on things you care about or know a lot about. Trust that what you have to teach people is valuable!
Save electricity. We participate in OhmEvents and shut down our electricity during high-usage times. The first month, we earned $80. The second month, we earned $70. You can earn over a thousand dollars a year saving electricity. It can even pay for your utility bills for the year! Sign up using my affiliate link to OhmConnect and start earning now. If you use my affiliate link to sign up, you will automatically earn $20!
Pet-sit. There are many apps from which to pet-sit, but the one I used to get started is Rover. I highly recommend it if you’ve never dog sat before. You can choose to dog-sit either at the pet’s home or your home, walk dogs, or just swing by and check up on dogs. Getting paid to play with pets is the best! Once I built my clientele on Rover, I was able to create my own website and run my own dog-sitting brand.
Baby-sit. There are many parents who need baby-sitters. Especially now that WFH is more common. Over-whelmed, over-worked, and over-extended parents need a break! Guess who can offer their services… Baby sitters have always made decent money (more than minimum wage jobs like retail), although they do hold more responsibility. But it is gratifying work and gives you a second family to be a part of.
House-sit. House-sitting is a great gig. My sister-in-law blends house-sitting with dog-sitting. She offers to watch dogs at their homes, thereby increasing the value and the fee. House-sitting is also great if you like to travel. You can choose to housesit in a different city, and get paid while traveling!
De-clutter your stuff and sell them on Poshmark. I recently discovered Poshmark and have had high success selling my things on this platform. I make about $50 a month selling things on Poshmark. It’s also a good place to shop responsibly and frugally (see my previous post here).
Clean Homes. If you know how to clean, then you have gold on your hands. I know many people who hire others to clean their homes for them on a weekly basis. Cleaners get paid anywhere from $100-$200 per visit. If you don’t mind getting on your hands and knees and you like to work in solidarity, then perhaps cleaning homes is the right gig for you. Plus, nowadays, professional cleaners are much needed! Turn on a Spotify playlist and get to work.
Drive for Uber or Lyft. After your day shift, drive in the evening for one of these companies. I heard that certain nights and weekends are popping. My brother did this for a while during his year between undergrad and dental school. He mostly drove around the city that he already lives in. It’s a great gig for night owls.
Deliver food via PostMates, GrubHub, or Amazon (Whole Foods). Food delivery has become increasingly popular and there is prestige to becoming a Whole Foods delivery person (I hear there’s a daily waitlist!).
Create Websites. Know a little bit of code? Understand the basics of websites? It’s okay. I didn’t either but look at me now! I am not tech-savvy. I have problems when my phone updates. And here I have built this space from scratch. Offer your services to someone who is just starting their business. I am sure they have a lot of other things to worry about. Create their website, learn along the way, take their feedback, and keep tweaking.
Be a photographer or videographer. Nowadays, almost anyone can turn these hobbies into a real job – that earns decent income! You can sell your pictures online so that others can print them and frame them around the house. Or you can shoot for events or companies. A photographer or videographer can easily make $1,000 from a single event. If you’re really good, you can make a few grand! Just ask around. There are many people who need professional pictures. It is the digital age, after all.
Tutor. I used to tutor high-school level math, Spanish, biology, and chemistry. Tutoring makes $60-80 an hour, depending on your area. In order to increase efficiency, tutor multiple kids at the same time. Offer the parents a discount to seal the deal. You will get paid more for the hour.
Teach a class. I do think that everyone has something to offer. If you are the more creative type, why not teach music, dance, finance, or basic life-skills. Hold virtual classes via Zoom. Do something fun, like teaching a class on how to make a latte. Or how to tend to plants. Do a workshop of calligraphy – and make it a series! I have used my baking knowledge to teach a Lunch-and-Learn over Zoom for a company before. They paid me to show people how to make Blueberry Rye Scones for 30 minutes. The world is at your fingertips.
Lead Yoga and Gym Classes. My best friend is a yoga teacher for CorePower Yoga. And although gyms are closed now, you can always make yoga videos on YouTube and get paid after a certain number of views. Or you can host a Zoom meeting and have people tune in. Charge them a registration fee and give them access to your Zoom room after they’ve paid. It doesn’t have to be a work-out class in person.
Be a professional de-clutterer or home organizer. People are stuck in their homes. They have turned their attention to long-ignored spaces. (I know I have). The de-cluttering craze has gone viral (was it not already?). But many people give up half-way through because of the rigorous process and the overwhelm. I have a friend who started a business that helps people de-clutter their homes. Consultations via Zoom or Facetime are easy to set-up. Help people create the ideal WFH spaces.
Become a Virtual Assistant. A virtual assistant job could entail social media management, editing blog posts, checking emails, scheduling appointments, booking travel, and more. Essentially, this job pretty much involves doing things that people need done but don’t have the time to do. Sound familiar? This is a great job for people who wish to work from home, are good at organization, and don’t mind tedious tasks.
Rent out your car. There’s a site called Turo, which works kind of like AirBNB. You can list your car (it only takes 10 minutes!) and have others rent it from you. This is especially great if you work from home and don’t need a car every day. It is also a great option for those who have a fancy car that people will want to borrow for a joy-ride.
Become a landlord. We actually rented out a room in our home for the first five years of our marriage. This helped us to save money which we funneled into my student debt. It also helped us save money to buy our first home, and then again to buy our second home. This is one of the ways we made our home cash flow positive.
Help People Move. I moved 10 times before high-school, and then 7 times after college. Let me tell you, moving isn’t very fun. Many people need help with the labor-intensive part of moving, so offer to help people move their stuff! It’s a workout, and it makes decent money, too. If you’re efficient, you can make $100 an hour!
Place Advertisements on your Car. I know this one is pro-consumerism and I don’t love it, but it is an option. I drive a Scion XB that’s fairly old and has a lot of flat angles. It is the perfect moving billboard. I haven’t done this because I don’t love promoting buying things in general, but if you need to make passive income and don’t mind pasting something on your car, this is an easy one.
Work Part-Time at a Grocery Store, Bakery, Restaurant, Hotel, Coffee Shop, Retail Store, etc. This one ends up being the hardest gig to land in 2020. Who knew? But as the economy reopens, be prepared. Keep an eye out. You’ll likely have to play the numbers game and apply to as many opportunities as you can, but don’t give up!

Over time, I will add to this ever-growing list. Feel free to chime in!

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The Real Reason Doctors Can’t Pay Down Their Student Debt

I was sitting at work once (and many times after), talking to colleagues of mine who were all in their early thirties – fairly young by doctor standards. We were talking about student loans (what else?) and how steep the price has become to get an education (in this case dental, but it applies to education in general). We were going through our numbers and they were going through their excuses as to why it was impossible in their situation to pay down debt. Of course, me being me, I gently stated the obvious which was that the real reason doctors “can’t” pay down their student debt was because they thought they deserve more than everyone else.

This statement may hurt many doctors’ feelings, but actually, it’s true.

For example. I had one person complaining about drowning in student debt. He blamed it on the kids and the fact that he is a single income household. Fine. But he also just bought a brand new Tesla SUV. He gets a nanny to watch his kids so that it’s easier on his stay-at-home wife. He gets help (did he say $100k a year??) from his in-laws that is budgeted for the kids. His dining out bill is $800 a month. But he can’t afford his student debt.

Another person also bought a brand new car after graduation, enrolled his 6-month old in Montessori private school, took wild vacations (without travel hacking!), and bought a grand house for their family of three.

Yet another person owns two medical-grade massage chairs in his home, bought his girlfriend a Tesla, and drops $10k on trips around the world.

What if I told you that this story is repeated many times over? I have spoken with my fair share of indebted graduates, especially after releasing my own personal story with ChooseFI.

They all wish to banish their student debt. They also don’t wish to do the work.

Here’s the thing I see most often with doctors. They work very diligently to get through school. They do anything to get to their dream career, including taking out a huge sum of moolah (hell, I did too). They sacrifice the best of their young years. They put off buying a home, earning money, and settling down. Then graduation hits and they think, “I’ve made it.” For a brief second, they breathe a sigh of relief thinking it’s all going to be worth it.

So they buy a new car to celebrate. Then they buy a home or a practice. They go out every weekend for food. Sometimes they dine out a few times a week! They want to live in affluent communities. They want to go on vacation. They throw themselves a dream wedding. They buy nice clothes and expensive Figs scrubs. But more than all this are the little purchases. They want the daily coffee, the trinkets from the $5 section in Target, the happy hour events, the spin class – you know, the harmless stuff.

They become obsessed with the high-life and quite quickly, they refuse to give it up.

And if you think I’m being extreme, I’m not.

Because when I graduated, I wanted all these things, too!

The most excruciating part about facing my student debt, the part that nearly killed me, was realizing that after every sacrifice and sleepless night, after giving up the best of my youth, after working three jobs during school, after wracking my brain on ways to extend $40 for another week, after being a model student, the good daughter, the most loyal employee, the most valuable I could be to the community – the work was still not done.

And when I tell new grads coming to me for advice on making loans disappear that they have to use their beat-up high-school ride, possibly move-in with their parents or take on a roommate, cook dinner every night, manage a budget every week, wear their same scrubs from dental school for five more years, and try their darndest to travel for FREE – well, their faces fall and I can see the disappointment plain as day scrawled on their furrowed brows.

Only thing is, I can’t tell if the disappointment lies in the fact that they have to continue living like a college kid for ten more years or if the disappointment lies in me – because I wasn’t the magic genie they wanted that would grant them their wish.

I can tell you how to repay your loans. You just might not like it.

99% of graduates with more than $350k of debt choose to stay with loan forgiveness. Probably because it hurts the human psyche too much to know that everything you’ve done thus far is not enough.

Becoming a doctor does not end the day you graduate. Not for me. It ends the day everything you need to become a doctor is behind you. Loans included.

Not everyone thinks this way, though. Many people truly believe that the hardship stops the day you get the degree. Ahhh, time to sit back and enjoy the benefits of all our hard work. But how can that be when you don’t even know what a hard-earned dollar looks like?! What makes you better than the rest of ’em?

I know I’m making enemies here but I must pose the question. If not I, who will?

I don’t blame the docs. They were merely children when they signed their lives away for a chance at the American Dream. I blame our upbringing for creating the expectation that a doctor’s life is a rich and easy one. I blame the institutions that are set in place that allow universities to charge this much money to get educated. I also blame lending companies who are handing out loans this large. Child robbery, that’s what I call it.

I implore to all the existing doctors that make it seem like being a doctor is easy. How will we ever change the trajectory if we keep implying to young ‘uns that pursuing this career path will mean they won’t have to work hard for the rest of their life. How will they realize and make an informed decision when the time comes?

I know the real truth.

That behind the facade of wealth is an increasingly long list of medical professionals patiently waiting 25 years for loan forgiveness to hit. Behind every confident thrust of the credit card is an avoidance technique that makes life a bit easier to live. Behind all our heroics and saving lives lies a coward afraid to face our social responsibility to pay back debt that we chose to take out. And behind every accomplishment lies a lifestyle creep that is avalanching too fast out of our reach, propelling doctors further forward towards an unsustainable way of living.

The real reason doctors “can’t” pay back student debt is because they won’t.

They choose not to work hard anymore. It isn’t burn-out, although that stuff is real too. It’s the social expectation that a doctor’s life is breezy. The mindset to pay back debt just isn’t there. Many cannot accept that graduation is not the end-game. They think they already won.

There will be excuses. I don’t buy any of it.

There will come a day when I will finish my loan repayment journey, and people will think it’s a miracle. They’ll think I was one of the lucky ones, rather than a penny-pinching maniac. Perhaps the stars aligned and the pandemic gave me this “unique” ability to pay back loans faster because I was not being charged interest for six months. My parents must have helped me out. An investment strategy probably worked out for me but not them. I can’t wait to see the excuses they make. But none of that will be true.

My current car is a high-school ride that I’ve had for 13 years. The passenger’s rear-view mirror doesn’t match, because when someone broke it (probably to re-sell it), I didn’t want to pay an extra $60 to get one that was white when the stock color was black. Mike even helped me put it on the car myself because I didn’t want to pay a service fee at the auto shop. My neighbor came out of his garage this past week and looked at me funny when he saw me physically hand-washing my car. He said, “That’s … nice…” and walked away slowly.

I sometimes have to wipe graffiti off my windows, because I chose to live in a lower income neighborhood so that I could buy a business storefront AND a dwelling at a very low price. Last Friday night, it was getting ratchet at the club next door since they moved the party outdoors due to COVID restrictions. I’ve had to run away from my own home before when the riots first started and they fired fireworks at the cops.

I spent a third of last year working midnight shifts. I still wear my USC scrubs that I was forced to buy upon entering dental school in 2012. I run with the Nike’s that my husband bought me as a gift when I was attending dental school so that I could “be cool”. They used to be orange but now they’re mostly black. I sell my de-cluttered stuff on Poshmark. I research heavily in order to travel the world for FREE. I come home from work to work. I still actively budget every week. I aim to spend only $200 a month in groceries for the two of us and $150 a month in dining out. I created a lifestyle where my job is three blocks away, to reduce the gas I have to buy. TO REDUCE THE GAS I HAVE TO BUY. I spent my last birthday repainting our bathroom. We spent Mike’s birthday picking up birthday freebies. Heck, even our cat was free.

Do you know the real reason THIS doctor can pay off student debt?

Hard work and a willingness to.

It’s not rocket science.

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