0:01

you have to presume that all your information is out there on the dark web.

0:04

I mean, all these scammers are talking to each other.

0:07

They're selling your information. a long list of this information is getting sold so they can blast out

0:12

phone calls or emails with all the bots.

0:15

You have to protect yourself because The attacks are incessant.

0:20

They're coming at you from all directions and all ways, shapes or forms.

0:26

you mentioned the limbic system. And that is so true.

0:29

Think about a big market drop or crash. It's the same thing that gets activated.

0:33

It's almost like a scam. You've got to weather the storm.

0:36

You've got to Trust, but verify that things are going to be okay.

0:41

You just got to avoid taking quick action.

0:44

Call somebody, other things you can do, I guess, for credit card

0:48

scams is don't use a debit card.

0:50

Use your credit card because it. Protects you federally and the companies want to protect you.

0:57

how is it that these are so believable?

1:00

I think there's a confluence of factors. Number one, again, urgency, right?

1:05

All of us, all of us, when we are pressed with a sense of urgency.

1:12

There's a fire. There's a, metaphorically speaking, there's a fire,

1:15

there's a grizzly bear, right? So we are activated, we are afraid, and we are willing to do whatever

1:22

it takes to fix the problem, right?

1:25

And so that sense of urgency is Often associated with a lot of these scams.

2:00

Hello and welcome back to Catching Up to FI.

2:03

I'm Bill Yount and my co host Becky Heptig and it's snowing outside.

2:07

Oh my god. We're in Knoxville, Tennessee and I have to get to work tomorrow in

2:11

about four to six inches of snow. That shuts us down.

2:15

And you're sub zero out there, Becky,

2:17

right. That's right. this episode won't air for several weeks, but we're recording it during

2:22

the big freeze that went across the U.

2:25

S. And so today we were at negative 10 and it tried to snow, but it's very,

2:31

very light because it's just so cold. So I'm staying inside with my warm, catching up to FI sweatshirt on.

2:40

All right. Well, who do we have on the show today, we've got a very special guest today.

2:44

We're talking to Paula Pant. I'm very excited about that.

2:48

And I am going to jump in with her intro, but then we're going to let Paula give

2:53

us a little bit of her background also.

2:57

Alright, so Paula Pant is a podcast host, writer, speaker, and media

3:02

commentator on financial independence, real estate investing, money

3:06

management, and financial literacy.

3:09

She's the creator and host of the Afford Anything podcast, which has more than

3:13

30 million downloads 3, 000 reviews and is ranked by Apple Podcasts as

3:18

one of the top 50 business podcasts.

3:21

You can also hear Paula on the Stacking Benjamins podcast.

3:26

She's the founder of affordanything. com, a personal finance and financial independence website that draws two and a

3:31

half million annual page views and holds more than 78, 000 email subscribers.

3:38

I first met Paula. At Campfire Rocky Mountain 2019.

3:43

And then again at the Choose FI Foundation gathering at FinCon in 2019.

3:49

And we most recently hung out with Paula at Podcast Movement in Denver last August.

3:55

It turns out Bill and I were both at FinCon 2019 in the same room

3:59

at the same time with Paula, but we didn't know each other then.

4:05

We're, we're chatting with Paula today about a very important

4:08

topic, scams against the elderly.

4:11

Now I'm going to guess that you know someone who has been

4:15

scammed or even helped an older loved one deal with this issue.

4:20

It is a huge problem. It's growing every day.

4:23

So we hope that you listen to this episode and I'm going to encourage

4:27

you listen to this episode all the way through to the very end because it is

4:32

that important and you're probably going to want to book mark this one also.

4:36

So Paula Pant, welcome to Catching Up to Fi.

4:40

Oh, thank you so much for having me on.

4:43

it's awesome you to join us all the way from New York.

4:46

It's been an honor to hang out with you and get to know you personally

4:49

and to come on our little show. I'll tell ya, we're really blessed.

4:54

So, some of our audience, they're new to PHY, and they

4:58

may not know your background. They may not know where all this came from when it started,

5:02

and this Afford Anything brand. Can you take us briefly through your story, your Genesis story?

5:08

Sure, absolutely. So when I graduated from college, which was in 2005, I did what everyone

5:15

does, which is I, I got a job. And I became a newspaper reporter at a small newspaper in Colorado.

5:23

And, my starting salary was 21, 000 per year.

5:27

And over the span of the next three years, I got a couple of raises and promotions.

5:32

So at the time that I quit that job, which was in 2008, I had a full

5:36

time salary of 31, 000 per year.

5:39

And that's the most money I've ever made as a W 2 employee

5:42

working for somebody else. So with it.

5:46

Salary ranging from 21, 000 through 31, 000.

5:50

Again, that's in 2005 through 2008 dollars.

5:53

So adjusted for, adjust that for inflation.

5:56

But with a salary ranging around there, I knew a couple of things.

6:01

I knew that I was not going to be able to make good money in

6:06

my chosen field in journalism. By working.

6:09

At a newspaper, I knew that for me, the future was going to be independent and it

6:14

was going to be online as a journalist. And I also knew that if it was going to be independent, that would

6:21

give me the leeway to be able to be location independent as well.

6:25

I would be able to travel. And so in 2008, I did what nobody ever does.

6:29

I quit voluntarily, quit a job at a print newspaper, which is unheard of.

6:35

And, at that time I had about 25, 000 saved.

6:38

I'd saved about one year salary over the span of the previous three years of work.

6:43

Now that did not come from my W 2 income.

6:46

That came from the 1099 income that I was making during the evenings

6:49

and weekends because I was freelance writing every evening, every weekend.

6:54

And I saved on average about 800 per month.

6:59

Every month over the span of three years.

7:01

So after three years, that adds up to 25, 000.

7:04

That's about one year salary. So with that in the bank, I quit my job, bought a one way plane ticket

7:11

to Cairo, Egypt, and for the next two years lived out of a backpack.

7:16

And traveled predominantly in countries where the dollar exchange

7:20

rate really worked in my favor. I was in Egypt, I was in Laos, I was in Cambodia, I was in

7:26

mostly places where the U. S. dollar went a lot further.

7:29

And I would just go to one spot, I'd go to Vientiane in Laos.

7:35

And just park myself there for two weeks or three weeks and write

7:39

freelance articles and kind of really explore Vientiane in depth.

7:44

And then I would pack my bags and go to Phnom Penh in Cambodia

7:48

and do it all over again, right? So I lived that lifestyle for a total of 27 months.

7:54

That was 2008 through 2010.

7:57

And when I was doing that, the most consistent piece of feedback that I

8:01

heard from my friends was they said, Oh, I would love to do something

8:04

like that, but I can't afford it.

8:08

every single person. I would love to do that. I would love to travel, but I can't afford it.

8:13

And that drove me nuts for so many reasons.

8:16

not the least of which was I knew that all of my friends were

8:19

making way more money than I was.

8:21

And, They made different choices, right?

8:25

And, they had stainless steel appliances.

8:27

They would go to bars and get these $14 cocktails.

8:31

They would go to concerts with $100 concert tickets, right?

8:35

and there's nothing fundamentally wrong with that.

8:37

If you sit down and you weigh the options and you say, would I rather

8:41

travel or would I rather Have a luxury apartment with fancy cocktails

8:47

and expensive concert tickets. And if you sit down and you weigh those choices and you come to the

8:53

thoughtful, deliberate, conscious decision that you would rather have

8:58

the luxury apartment and the cocktails.

9:01

Great. I applaud that you, that is a deliberate decision, but if that's

9:05

a deliberate choice, then you would not say, I can't afford it.

9:09

You would say. It's not a priority.

9:12

I would love to travel, but it's not a priority.

9:14

I would love to travel, but I choose not to because there are other

9:18

things that are more important to me. That would be the statement.

9:21

To say I can't afford it is disempowering and also untrue.

9:26

And so after hearing that time and time and time again, in February of

9:30

2011, I started to Afford Anything because I wanted to spread the

9:34

message that you can afford anything.

9:38

You just can't afford everything.

9:40

Every choice that you make carries a trade off.

9:43

Saying yes to something implicitly means you are saying no to something else.

9:47

And that doesn't just apply to your money. That applies to any limited resource that you have to manage.

9:52

It applies to your time. It applies to your energy.

9:54

It applies to your attention, right? It applies to.

9:57

Every limited resource and that central core message.

10:01

That was what I wanted to impart on anyone who would listen.

10:05

So that began in February of 2011 and here we are today.

10:10

That's just a genius catchy phrase.

10:13

I mean, it really works for everything, as you said.

10:17

I mean, it's value based and you make decisions that have

10:21

impact elsewhere in your life. And that just exploded into your brand.

10:29

And where are you today with this?

10:33

so the afford anything podcast is the the main vehicle.

10:37

it's what we are primarily known for. The Afford Anything podcast has, as you've said, we've had over 30 million downloads.

10:44

We on average get around maybe 400, 000 downloads per month.

10:48

So we have a very thriving community and yeah, we have a newsletter,

10:53

like, I mean, you know the stats. We have a newsletter with 78, 000 newsletter subscribers.

10:58

I've been shepherding this community for the last 13 years.

11:03

And, I often think of Afford Anything, not necessarily even

11:07

as a personal finance show.

11:12

But truly what we are is we are a show about how to make better decisions,

11:16

how to think critically and evaluate your options and make better choices.

11:22

We're a show about how to think, becoming a more clear, cogent thinker.

11:28

We're a show about that told through the lens of money.

11:33

You you recently interviewed an astronaut, which I thought was absolutely

11:38

fascinating, where it talks about making, making goals and reaching your goal,

11:43

and he failed two or three times, and lo and behold, he became an astronaut.

11:47

And so you do have a far reaching breadth of topics that you cover.

11:53

You're right. It's not just a financial podcast.

11:56

Right. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

11:59

So about a year so ago, I went to Columbia.

12:02

I did a fellowship at Columbia University in business and economics journalism

12:07

because I wanted some really in depth training about how to talk about

12:12

economics to a broad audience, right?

12:16

my training was as a journalist, right? But my training was as a print newspaper journalist, and so I wanted

12:22

to go back to school, A, to get more broadcast focused training, and B,

12:27

to get training that's specific to the world of economic journalism.

12:32

And what I found, largely, was, in terms of how to talk to an audience about

12:39

economics is sometimes you talk about astronomy you talk about Coca Cola, you

12:46

talk about shoes and sneaker heads, you talk about all of these different facets

12:52

of life because everything is economics.

12:56

So has your recent stint at Columbia, has that changed?

13:00

What Paula pants slash afford anything is going to be, or the direction

13:06

is going to go in the future. one of the things we do, so on the, typically we are a weekly podcast, right

13:14

now at least we're a weekly podcast. We are going to, after episode 500, we're going to escalate to twice a week.

13:20

So effective episode 500 is going to air on 4 24 24, April 24th, 2024.

13:28

And after episode 500, we're going to be a twice a week show.

13:31

But anyway, all of that is to say that right now we are

13:33

normally a once a week show.

13:36

But on, once a month, on the first Friday of the month, we

13:38

air a first Friday bonus episode.

13:42

And that typically has been our test kitchen.

13:44

It's our experimental playground. And we have played around with a bunch of different formats.

13:49

we, for example, briefly had a stint called Invest Anywhere.

13:53

that was the first Friday theme. What I've started doing since going to Columbia and getting trained as

13:59

an economics journalist is the first Friday episodes I've done sort of a.

14:04

This month in the economy analysis, right?

14:08

So, hey, here's what happened. the Federal Reserve for example, in December, the Federal Reserve

14:14

published its beige book, right? Which is a snapshot of economic conditions.

14:20

It's basically the Federal Reserve's 2023 year in review, right?

14:24

So one of the things that I did for the January 1st Friday episode

14:27

is really look through that beige book to try to pull out data and.

14:31

Share it with the audience in a way that makes it interesting, that makes

14:35

it sound like, more entertaining than simply reading a Fed report.

14:40

And so so I think that's the, what I've gotten from, from.

14:44

Doing that on the first Friday episodes, I've gotten very good

14:47

feedback from our community.

14:49

And so I think we'll not only continue to do that every first Friday, but

14:54

we may even intensify it, make that a more than just once a month feature.

15:00

Our audience also needs to know that you're a real estate maven and that

15:03

started somewhere in all of this. And so you have your hands in many hats.

15:07

Can you speak briefly to. Why that journey?

15:10

I know you don't take like talking about real estate that much, but you have a

15:13

class because you get these questions so often, but where did this real

15:18

estate journey come from and how does it dovetail with the rest of your empire?

15:24

Well, as I began making money, I started investing my money into

15:28

lots of different assets, right? So I started buying index funds.

15:32

I. Have a very, very small, very small crypto allocation.

15:37

And I also started buying rental properties and it's funny because

15:41

nobody ever asks me about my index funds, even though that is as a

15:46

percentage of my net worth, that is ballpark, I would say about equal to

15:51

the value of all of my properties. I have just as much money in index funds as I do in rental properties,

15:57

but rental properties are. They're tangible, they're visceral And maybe they're a little bit more unique,

16:03

lots of people have index funds, relative to the percentage of people who own index

16:08

funds, fewer people own rental properties. And so I think for all of those reasons, I started getting a lot of questions

16:13

about rental properties, and I just started getting from the audience, and I

16:17

just started getting the same questions again and again and again, to such an

16:21

extent that it was clear that there was appetite for a structured, guided, course

16:28

that would teach people, all right, if this is something that you also want to

16:31

do, here's exactly how you get started.

16:33

Here's a step by step guide to knowing whether or not you're ready, and then,

16:39

here's how to analyze properties. Here's how to find properties, whether locally or out of state,

16:46

here's how to obtain the financing. Here's how to actually close the deal.

16:50

Here's what all the terms in the contract mean. Here's how to build your team, particularly if you're building a remote

16:55

team from out of state, how to build out a team of property managers and general

16:59

contractors and and so forth, and then here's how to protect all of your assets.

17:03

So, here's the map. Here's the flow. Here's how you do it.

17:06

Boom. So,

17:11

Nobody asks you. Do you stick to three fund portfolio?

17:16

Do you follow JL Collins? And what is Paula Pant's index fund portfolio?

17:20

Tell us now, we're getting a scoop. well, I have a barbell allocation, so I do not have a bond allocation.

17:29

I am all equities, 100 percent equities.

17:33

Wow. But Bill, don't forget she is a little younger than us.

17:39

Yeah, well, I'm about 80%, 20%.

17:42

So I'm not far behind, but I'm 58. So I got to be a little bit more cautious.

17:46

Well, and. I am 70, 30 the 30 is bonds and cash and in three weeks, I'm going to be 68.

17:57

So there you go. Oh, happy, happy, birthday.

18:00

happy almost birthday. thank you. you. know Paula, my oldest son also does real estate.

18:06

I know he has gleaned a lot of useful information from what you have out there.

18:12

And back in the day, I don't know.

18:14

If you do this anymore, but I know back in the day you actually shared

18:18

real numbers with your listeners from your real estate portfolio and show

18:24

them how these numbers were working, the income that outflows and all that.

18:27

And, and he found that very, very useful.

18:30

So thank you. Oh, excellent.

18:33

Excellent. I'm glad to hear it. Yeah. I think those videos are still up on my YouTube channel, youtube.

18:38

com slash afford anything. I was looking at it the other day and there's a handful of videos with like

18:44

March 2017 income report, you know?

18:48

Right. Transparency works wonders, and you're a very transparent

18:53

person, and we appreciate that.

18:55

Becky, we better jump into our I think we

18:58

Otherwise, we're never going to I know, I know this has been great though.

19:01

So all right, Paula, we are going to talk about scams against the elderly.

19:08

And what I wanted to do here at the beginning is just give people a yardstick

19:13

to give folks an idea of how big.

19:17

this problem is. So I have a list of stats here that we got from an article that you sent us.

19:25

It's actually an FBI article. So, this is speaking to how big this problem is.

19:30

So according to the FBI, the over 60 crowd is the second

19:36

highest in number of victims.

19:39

And the first highest in the number of dollars lost and we are double over 60

19:48

in the number of dollars lost is double the second place age group in 2022.

19:56

88, 000 total victims by count and 3 billion in losses.

20:03

and these are all 2022 stats.

20:06

So the top crime type in number of victims, number one is call center fraud.

20:12

So that's tech, customer support, government impersonation,

20:15

and that kind of thing. That's 18, 000.

20:19

Non payment, non delivery.

20:21

Was 8, 000 personal data breaches 8, 000 confidence romance was 7, 000 and

20:29

credit card and check fraud was 5, 000.

20:33

And those add up to 88, 000.

20:35

All right. So top crime types and the amount of dollars lost investment.

20:42

Crime 990 million, tech support 588 million, BEC or business email

20:51

compromise and wire transfers.

20:53

I know if anybody's bought a house recently, how many, they would

20:57

spend an hour telling you how to do your wire transfer so that

21:01

you don't get scammed with that. So that's obviously

21:04

And I know a few people who have been scammed from that.

21:06

That's, yeah, yes. Yes.

21:09

Crypto scams and means of payment are rapidly increasing.

21:14

And the confidence romance is four hundred and nineteen million.

21:19

And the last stat I wanted to share was victims and dollars.

21:25

by state. So, the four top states where these occur are California,

21:29

Florida, Texas, and New York.

21:32

So, what do those states have in common? They have an older population in some cases.

21:38

is also a wealthier population, more moneyed population.

21:42

So, why is the over 60 crowd targeted?

21:46

For really a few reasons.

21:48

Number one, the over 60 crowd tends to have more money, more accumulated

21:53

assets than younger age groups, right?

21:56

That's just naturally over the span of a person's lifetime.

22:00

They're going to have assets that grow and compound in, whether those

22:03

be 401k assets whether that be a home that is now paid off free and clear,

22:08

typically over the span of a person's life, their wealth accumulates.

22:12

And so people who are over 60 as a broad category have more money than people

22:18

in their twenties or in their thirties. In addition to that, people who are over 60 often don't have the safeguards

22:25

in place of being able to bounce this off of somebody that somebody

22:31

who is younger would be, right? So, if you're 45 and you receive a phone call saying, Hey this is the police.

22:38

We've just arrested your son for a DUI.

22:42

You need to send us 2, 500 right now, or your son is going to remain in jail.

22:49

Right? If you're 45 and you receive that call, likely you're at work and you can then

22:56

put down the phone and say to your colleague, Oh my goodness, my son just

23:01

got a DUI I need to go deal with this.

23:03

And that conversation, the fact that somebody else is involved, you're, you

23:08

now are more, there's more people who are more likely to be able to spot the

23:13

suspicious threads of, wait a second. Why is it that you're not driving down to the.

23:18

Courthouse or to the local jail to hand off this 2, 500.

23:23

And why is it that you can't just write a personal check?

23:26

why is it that you're going to some random address?

23:28

And why is it that you have to give them a cashier's check?

23:31

That sounds a little bit fishy. Right?

23:33

So when you've got those other people who you can bounce that off of People, there

23:37

are more people who are likely to flag it. Whereas if you're over 60, you're retired, you're more likely to

23:42

be at home by yourself, right?

23:45

your kids have grown up, they're out of the house. you're more likely to be at home by yourself.

23:49

There's nobody else who's around to flag this for you.

23:54

Well, I have a personal story here, and like Becky said earlier,

23:58

Either we've been scammed, we know somebody has been scammed.

24:01

And if you haven't been scammed, you just haven't met enough scammers

24:05

because all your information's out there and it's going to happen.

24:09

This is why Becky said this episode is so important.

24:12

I had a family member, elderly.

24:14

Lived alone, much like you said loves the computer, is always online, and got

24:21

either through the computer or by phone call or both the threat that all of our

24:26

information, financial and otherwise, was out there, and unless she did

24:31

this, which turned into a target gift card scam in order to get the money.

24:36

Unless she did this all of it was going to be out there and

24:39

she could lose all her money. And so somebody was preying on her.

24:43

It was extortion. She was afraid, didn't understand tech and thought, even though she's a smart

24:51

person, she got emotional about it.

24:54

And guess what she didn't do? She did not call anybody.

24:58

She was told this, you've got to keep this secret, and if you

25:01

tell anybody, it's all out there.

25:04

And so this went on for a week.

25:08

Hmm. person went to every Target store in the area buying gift cards.

25:14

Wow. didn't call anybody for a week.

25:19

I hate to say it, but this tallied up to probably a year's worth of spending.

25:24

37, $37,000 000.

25:27

Not an insignificant amount.

25:30

No, for this person, not at all.

25:33

And I couldn't believe that it happened.

25:36

How did we get down this path, this little rabbit hole through all the

25:40

Swiss cheese holes to have this happen?

25:43

I mean, my idea has been stolen. I have to put in extra protections because somebody tried to

25:49

access my financial accounts.

25:52

It's scary out there. it's not just, little credit card fraud.

25:55

It really happens, and then it's with you for the rest of your life.

25:59

And you've got to take precautions. If you haven't taken them before, and the whole point of this episode

26:04

is to take these precautions now.

26:06

Right. Right. Now, scammers prey on secrecy and on urgency, right?

26:12

Secrecy and urgency. So, Bill what you said about how they told her not to tell anyone, right?

26:18

That's a huge red flag. And you see this again, in those scams of, Hey, your son has a DUI, he's in jail.

26:26

You can't tell anybody, they'll tell you not to discuss it with anyone.

26:31

The romance scams, right? Hey they pretend to be they'll position themselves as, as

26:38

a lover or, as a quarter. But then they'll say, hey, don't tell anybody about this.

26:43

and then they gain your trust in that way. But that secrecy, first of all, anytime that you receive a phone call, that's

26:48

already a red flag at this point, right?

26:51

And is particularly if the caller tells you that you should not be discussing

26:56

this, that this needs to be secret for any reason, or if they say that this is

27:01

urgent, and it's something that you have to do now those are huge, huge red flags.

27:07

Right? The IRS is never going to call you and say, you urgently need to send us a check

27:11

right now or you're going to go to jail. It doesn't happen.

27:15

Right? So anytime that there's that urgency pressure, that's a huge, huge red flag.

27:20

so Becky, do you know anybody that's been scammed? Have you been scammed?

27:23

No, I have not. But last fall when we were in Bali, one of the girls that was there at the retreat

27:31

with us told us a story about her dad.

27:35

It was a romance scam. And I just want to say when I was going through those stats, I was

27:39

naming off different kinds of scams and we're going to go through those.

27:42

So don't be concerned that you don't know what we were talking about a

27:45

few minutes ago, but her father got involved in a romance scam and she

27:52

finally figured out what was going on.

27:55

And in her case, she even went to the bank to try to shut it down.

27:59

And she could not because it's his account is his money.

28:03

He could come in and buy a cashier's check if he wants to, they can

28:07

talk to him about it, but nobody could literally shut it down.

28:12

And, the only thing that stopped it was when he emptied his 401k,

28:17

which was to the tune of 160, 000.

28:22

So yes, she eventually figured it out and couldn't stop it because

28:27

she couldn't talk him out of it. She couldn't talk him into stopping.

28:32

And these are victims of a crime. We can't blame the victim.

28:35

There's a lot of shame involved in this. There's a lot of isolation and loneliness.

28:40

And the criminal is to blame, not the person that succumbs to this crime.

28:46

it's absolutely amazing. One more that I have to tell you about, because this, for whatever reason,

28:51

in my family, there's been issues. And there's a scam where a family member who's a medical professional Got

29:00

a call from the sheriff's department.

29:02

Okay. And the sheriff's department said, you missed this deposition.

29:07

and there's a fine for having missed your deposition in this case.

29:11

And they had personal information about the case because it was public

29:15

and it seemed incredibly legitimate.

29:20

And this family member got scared, didn't know what to do.

29:24

I mean, when you get this legal threat, it's like, that's a system

29:29

you don't want to get involved in. And it seemed legitimate.

29:32

Luckily. she started talking about it, as you said, she was at work, she started

29:37

talking about it with other folks. It got to the point where we actually called a lawyer friend and said,

29:41

and we asked them, is this real? Can this possibly be real?

29:45

And the lawyer said, absolutely not, this is a scam.

29:48

But it sounded so real, on a fear.

29:53

Yep. Yep. I love those two points that you brought us, Paula, if it's urgent or if they want

29:59

you to keep it secret, because that's something we can keep in the front of

30:02

our minds and use that as a yardstick when something doesn't feel right.

30:08

Urgency. Secrecy. The other thing is, if you receive a phone call, generally, be

30:14

suspicious of any inbound phone calls.

30:16

If that person who's calling is claiming to be a representative

30:19

of whatever organization, then, politely say, oh, thanks.

30:25

Why don't I give you a call? At your organization's phone number, right?

30:30

Give me your name and I'm going to call your organization and I'll ask to speak to

30:34

you and then hang up and whatever, or if they are from the the local county jail or

30:40

the local county courthouse, go online, go to the website, look up the phone number

30:46

of the jail or the courthouse that's on the website, and then call that number and

30:50

say, hi, I was just on the phone with Mr.

30:54

So and so and we got disconnected. May I please speak with him, right?

30:59

If they claim to be from a particular company, they're, oh, I'm, I'm

31:02

representing, I don't know what target or night, whatever, oh, okay, great.

31:07

I'll give you a call. You tell me your name and I'm going to hang up and then I will call you.

31:12

and then you just call Target's customer service line and say, Hey I was just

31:16

on the phone with you know, so and so customer service rep from your company.

31:20

This is the case number that we have but, you should be placing that as an outbound

31:25

call because if you're placing it as an outbound call and you're calling the

31:29

phone number that's listed on the website, then You're likely to be speaking, I

31:34

mean, certainly scammers can build spoof websites as well, but you've added the

31:38

friction there, you've created a, another filter within that funnel so that you've

31:44

got this added layer of protection. If you're getting an inbound call, you have no idea where

31:49

the call is coming from. if you're placing an outbound call, you at least know who you're calling,

31:54

assuming that the website isn't spoofed, Well, I let all unknown calls just go to voicemail.

32:00

And the part of the reason for this is artificial intelligence.

32:03

People are voice printing you.

32:06

If you talk to them, they're getting your voice print and

32:09

some financial institutions will use your voice to accounts.

32:13

I mean, this is scary stuff.

32:15

well, I hate to tell you this, but if you host a podcast, they've got your voice.

32:20

True, Oh, well, another way to get at me.

32:27

All right. Becky, we wanted to go through sort of a list of scams.

32:31

So the people are aware of the breadth of this. We've touched on a few, but in general, there's two types of scams.

32:37

Phishing. That's P H. I S H I N G, which are the online scams, the digital scams.

32:44

And then there's the social engineering scams, where you're basically in contact

32:49

with a person, whether it be in person, or by phone, or these days, video chat.

32:55

You're dealing with a person.

32:59

So Becky, let's go through that list and help us get started.

33:01

All right. All right. So we talked earlier about tech support and, when I first read this, I don't

33:07

think I really understood what that meant.

33:09

But , is this someone calling you saying, whatever it is, or

33:13

is this like when you try to call somebody asking for tech support

33:17

This is oftentimes you receive an inbound call in which they

33:20

say, Hey, I'm from Best Buy. So we'll go back to that example.

33:23

I'd use Target as the example earlier, but, I'm from Best Buy,

33:26

I'm from Microsoft, I'm from Apple.

33:29

There is an issue with your device and you're going to need to.

33:34

Send us money. or personal information possibly?

33:38

Okay. Okay. Great. Or let me onto your device and I'll help you fix it.

33:42

Ooh, yeah, yeah, absolutely.

33:46

And, older folks aren't as tech savvy.

33:48

I don't understand things the way my kids do.

33:51

So that's easy to talk somebody into that.

33:55

Yeah. Well, the other component to this is that there are these scams where there

34:00

are these like done for you scams where layer upon layer upon layer builds, right?

34:07

So another form of a tech support scam is let's say that you one day you decide

34:14

that you want to start your own business, but you have no idea how to do it.

34:18

So you go online and you enroll in what you believe in what is

34:23

marketed as an online course for how to start your own business.

34:27

Very normal activity. There are a lot of I'm a course creator myself.

34:30

There are a lot of legitimate online courses out there, but let's

34:33

say that this one that you enroll in is actually not a real course,

34:37

it's just the beginning of a multi layered scam.

34:41

So you enroll in this quote unquote course and they start sending

34:47

you all of these quote unquote business opportunities, right?

34:51

But then they tell you, you know what? You're going to have to upgrade your computer and you're going to have

34:56

to upgrade all of your equipment in order to be able to run this business.

34:59

But here, we'll send you a computer.

35:02

Right. And we'll send you something and also you're going to need to make a business

35:09

filing and you're going to need to set up bookkeeping and you're going

35:13

to need to set up accounting and, oh, doesn't that sound really complicated?

35:16

LLC registration and bookkeeping and on all of that, but guess what.

35:20

Pay us a bunch of money and we'll take care of that as well.

35:23

And then it becomes, fee after fee after fee after fee of all of

35:27

these downstream upsells, right?

35:30

So that this, what you think was a $1,000 course that you quote unquote,

35:35

enrolled, purchased or enrolled in, turns into $30,000 by the end of it.

35:39

And you still haven't really gotten adequate delivery

35:43

of what they said they do. the computer that they said that they would send you still hasn't shown up.

35:48

The LLC registration that you were supposed to have gotten

35:51

was never actually filed. That's another, tech support is sort of an element of that, but that's

35:56

another type of scam that can happen.

35:59

There is just one quick story and we'll get back to your list.

36:03

A reality TV star named Jen Shaw, who was on the Real Housewives of Salt Lake

36:09

City, who was actually convicted and sent to jail for running a scam just

36:14

like the one that I just described. She was one of the ringleaders of a scam in which she used her celebrity

36:22

and the trust that many people had in her as a celebrity to draw people

36:26

into one of those scams in which she sold a fraudulent course and she sold

36:32

these fraudulent products online. Yeah, I mean, celebrity gives you a lot of, that's one of the scams

36:39

is the virtual celebrity scams where, you could be Taylor Swift and

36:42

say, you know I got this for you.

36:44

And, you'd get a lot of traffic, right.

36:47

And there. No, there's so many names for these things.

36:51

It's almost funny. You talk about phishing, but then there's other kinds of phishing.

36:55

There's spear phishing, where they have your personal info already

36:59

and make it sound more legitimate. So they're really spearing you.

37:02

There's whale phishing, where they're coming from the top down

37:05

as the CEO to the employees saying you've got to do this or that.

37:10

Then there's something called smishing, where you're getting, it's

37:14

cell phone and text messages, right? Where the bank says, Oh, no, you've got fraudulent activity.

37:20

You've got to do this now and enter all your personal information.

37:24

All this ishing. Okay.

37:27

And then there's the next thing on the list I've never

37:29

heard of, which is spooching. Tell me what spooching is.

37:35

I actually don't know what spooching is. I haven't heard of that one.

37:38

Well, you mentioned it before, I think, cause it's a fake website.

37:41

It could be a charitable organization. It's a false charity.

37:45

They may even. Be a full fledged false charity.

37:49

It's not just a one time and done deal.

37:51

And that's spooching where you end up on a website from Google that isn't real.

37:57

And this scared the heck out of me because you can go to these shopping

38:01

websites and you think you bought something, but no, you just spent 300

38:05

bucks and it's never going to show up. How do you know that something's real?

38:11

I did that at Christmas now. It was only a 25 item, but I bought something off of a Facebook ad.

38:19

And because it was like the perfect gift for somebody.

38:22

And after a week or so, I was like, is that actually going to show up?

38:27

They got my money. I don't know if I'm going to, and I did receive the article

38:32

and I was very happy about that. But after that, I was like, you know what?

38:35

I don't think I'm going to buy stuff off of Facebook ads anymore.

38:38

Cause I didn't think about it at first.

38:41

And, but then later when it took a while for the item to show up, I thought,

38:44

maybe this was not such a good idea. Mm

38:49

I mean, social media is a big source of scams these days and all across

38:55

the age spectrum, you've got to be very, very careful with social media

39:01

as far as your romance scams, your shopping scams, your buying scams.

39:06

it's exploded in the last few years, according to the article you sent us.

39:11

we talked a little bit about the celebrity scams, and then another thing on the list

39:16

is government impersonation, and I think all of us have heard of that, of somebody

39:20

calling, saying they're from the IRS,

39:25

or, you know, some government agency, but especially the IRS, that

39:28

sort of strikes fear in everyone.

39:30

so is that a, a situation where you would say, I'm going to hang

39:34

up and I'm going to call you back? Or does the IRS just not ever call people?

39:41

I have never heard. I don't want to make a definitive statement that the IRS never calls people.

39:46

I have never heard of the IRS calling a person.

39:50

Typically, the IRS, if they need to contact you, will send a letter, right?

39:55

They will send a letter in the mail. I have never in my life heard of any legitimate case.

40:01

I don't want to say that it never happens.

40:03

I would need to talk to an IRS spokesperson to be able

40:06

to validate or verify that.

40:09

But I have absolutely never heard of that happening.

40:11

I've only ever heard of the IRS sending letters in the mail.

40:14

And, and I've heard the same thing. We talked about the charity scams and then next on the list is romance.

40:21

So how does this get started? I mean, I've obviously heard of this because that's what my friend's father

40:26

succumbed to, but how does this happen?

40:29

So typically, I mean, most people these days of all ages, including

40:34

people in their twenties and thirties and forties, you know most people

40:38

meet online, most people meet their romantic partners online.

40:41

So you might meet somebody online through a dating app or through

40:45

a dating website and that person.

40:48

you and that person develop some type of a, a relationship through

40:54

text messaging, through phone calls, through emails, through digital

40:59

communication, but perhaps you don't meet.

41:01

maybe it's long distance, right? During the pandemic, there were whole, full fledged relationships

41:07

where someone was like, geez, I have a boyfriend of all ages.

41:10

including people in their twenties and thirties, Oh, I've had this

41:13

boyfriend for eight months, but we've never met in person yet, or I've had

41:16

this girlfriend for eight months. We've never met in person yet.

41:19

So it's increasingly common that you might start to develop a romance with

41:25

someone who you meet online, but who you haven't met in person and where it

41:30

becomes a scam is then that person starts to say, Hey, I'd love to come see you,

41:35

but I need you to send me some money. or, Hey, I have this family issue that I'm dealing with and, I need some money.

41:43

All right. And you think, well, this is, this is my love, right?

41:47

This is, my new boyfriend or girlfriend, like, of course I want to help them out.

41:52

Yeah, I can send them something, I'm in a comfortable position.

41:56

They're struggling. I'm happy to help.

41:58

This is a person I love. Yeah, I mean, that also leads into a very common one, grandparent scams.

42:05

Can you give us an idea what a grandparent scam is?

42:07

Oh, a grandparent scam is where basically they prey on the love that a grandparent

42:12

has for their grandchild and they will call and say that something bad will

42:19

happen to the grandchild unless the grandparent pays some amount of money.

42:25

It could be, and again, there's a whole variety of, I mentioned the DUIs earlier.

42:30

Hey, your grandchild is in jail.

42:32

Your grandchild was arrested for a DUI. They're in jail.

42:35

You need to send us bail. Right? That's a common one.

42:38

And you can't talk about it with anybody. There's also the version of it, of your grandchild is in the hospital.

42:43

Your grandchild was in an accident. They're in the hospital right now.

42:48

And, we need money immediately for your grandchild's treatment, right?

42:53

And that also creates that sense of urgency as well.

42:56

There is the, your grandchild is going to, so typically it's either your grandchild

43:01

is going to be in legal trouble or your grandchild is in medical trouble, right?

43:05

And what grandparent wouldn't pay everything to keep their kid

43:10

healthy and out of jail, you know?

43:13

Right? but they call and. Invent this story and create this false sense of urgency.

43:21

To combat that, I mean, you put the phone down and you call your grandchild

43:25

or you call your child who's the parent of the grandchild, right?

43:29

that would be a very good I mean, this, this should be easy to avert if, as long, with just a few minutes

43:34

of checking on, is this real or not?

43:39

But I understand that they're pulling at your heartstrings, but we all have to be

43:42

careful and and check on, is this real?

43:45

Right. One of these scams I found interesting that is, remember

43:51

the movie Catch Me If You Can? The check forging scam back in the day, I think it was the 50s or the

43:57

60s, and this guy now fights scams.

44:00

I can't remember his name, we'll have to put it in the show notes.

44:03

But the check cooking and washing scams have become very popular again

44:08

because checks aren't that popular and what they do, or I learned what

44:12

they do is they'll go to a post office box where they get that key for it.

44:16

They'll take out all the mail, they'll open it up, get all the checks, and

44:19

then you use like nail polish to take the payee and the amount off

44:24

and then they'll submit the check. For whatever amount they want to put on there and then the latest

44:30

version of it is more of an A. I. Version where they just take a photo of it and reproduce it with any amount they want

44:36

on it and take it out of your account.

44:39

It's unbelievable. These things still happen. And there's one that I've been hearing about recently that I'd

44:48

like for you to just tell us a bit about, and that's SIM swapping.

44:54

Can you Sim swapping. Can you tell us what that is?

44:57

Now I'm familiar with sim swapping in the overseas context.

45:01

Because overseas, oftentimes when you travel, you need to

45:05

switch out your SIM card, right. In, in order to be able to maintain connectivity.

45:10

So. When you switch out your SIM card, what that means is that when you contact your

45:17

regular contacts back at home, they're not going to see you as the caller, right?

45:22

They're going to see some foreign phone number.

45:26

Now, this happened to me when I went to Greece. I took my SIM card out of my phone.

45:30

I put in. A Greek SIM card, and then every single friend that I contacted,

45:35

they didn't see me as the way that I normally appear as a saved contact.

45:40

That's not what appeared in their phone. They saw a Greek phone number that appeared in their phone,

45:44

and it was me just contacting them. And so oftentimes if there is a person who is traveling then their

45:52

friends and family are at risk of misidentifying a scammer as that person

45:58

because that person can no longer be identified by their usual contact card.

46:03

If I understand this correctly, and I may not I believe that one of the

46:09

latest things is that someone calls you and they talk you into letting

46:14

them load an eSIM on your card.

46:16

And then that means they have access to everything you have connected

46:21

to, which can be your financial institutions and passwords.

46:27

Oh, have access to your phone.

46:30

Mm hmm. Mm Right, right.

46:32

That is a new one, actually. Well, I guess with that, with the popularity of e SIMS, because

46:39

e SIMS didn't become popular. And I mean, I first heard about an e SIM less than a year ago, I would say.

46:46

And I feel like I'm relatively tech savvy, but yeah, with a popularity of

46:50

e SIMS, this is certainly a new one.

46:53

You heard about, andy Cohen, the television host co hosts the New Year's

46:58

Eve ball drop with Anderson Cooper. He just, right after New Year's, he was scammed out of tens of thousands of

47:05

dollars and part, one of the ways in which that happened is the scammer sent some

47:14

type of a request to his bank and the.

47:17

The bank tried to call him, the bank found it suspicious, so

47:22

they called him to authorize it. But he had call forwarding set up, and so the call forwarding went to the scammers.

47:33

So yeah, being able to intercept somebody else's call forwarding

47:37

also leaves you vulnerable. hmm. So, Paula, can you give us an idea, and, we actually may have covered

47:45

this, so but just in case there's something left to talk about, is how

47:50

is it that these are so believable?

47:53

I think there's a confluence of factors. Number one, again, urgency, right?

47:58

All of us, all of us, when we are pressed with a sense of urgency.

48:05

There's a fire. There's a, metaphorically speaking, there's a fire,

48:08

there's a grizzly bear, right? So we are activated, we are afraid, and we are willing to do whatever

48:15

it takes to fix the problem, right?

48:18

And so that sense of urgency is Often associated with a lot of these scams.

48:23

A lot of people, particularly older people we talked about secrecy, but

48:27

there's sort of another element. There's also just loneliness and isolation.

48:32

And typically, if a person is lonely or is isolated then think like a

48:36

romance scam, for example, becomes more believable because it's so appealing.

48:42

AARP has a great, great breakdown of some of the scams that the scams

48:49

perpetrated against people who are, are 60 plus or, or 55 plus.

48:53

And, some of the anecdotes that they describe, you read, the

48:59

victims, the victims aren't simply dealing with the fallout of a scam.

49:06

They're also mourning a breakup, right?

49:09

Because they're experiencing the grief and the loss that comes from a breakup

49:15

because they really believed that they were in a romance with this person.

49:20

Know, so, and that often comes, loneliness and isolation can

49:26

fuel a lot of that longing.

49:28

There is also, and I'm sorry we have to say this, there is some element

49:32

of cognitive decline that does happen to many people in later ages of life.

49:37

And that cognitive decline can also impact decision making and

49:41

it can impact Your ability to, to be able to spot those red flags.

49:49

Yeah, it's you mentioned the AARP and I want to take a moment to they're a great

49:53

resource for this and they have something that Frank Vasquez made me aware of called

49:57

the Perfect Scam Podcast, where they go through these things and tell real stories

50:04

with real people of the kinds of people.

50:07

Stuff they go through and they also have a fraud watch network.

50:11

You can go on to this and Learn about all the different kinds of scams They even

50:17

have a heat map of where the scams are happening right now and what they are

50:21

They do a great job of trying to help us avoid these things and so in Saying

50:29

avoid these things, what are some tips, I guess, then, that how do we avoid them?

50:36

What would you recommend to people that are potential victims of these scams?

50:41

What are these red flags and how do we avoid them?

50:44

So as we've talked about, anytime that you feel a sense of urgency, know that

50:49

that's a red flag, and again, that sense of urgency will likely come from the

50:53

idea that somebody is in legal trouble or somebody is in medical trouble.

51:00

That's often what fuels that. But anytime that you feel this sense of urgency and that sense of urgency

51:05

must be met with immediate money. Take a pause, because no, no hospital emergency room is going to demand payment

51:13

in order, to perform a life saving operation that just doesn't happen,

51:16

don't know about that. I work in the ER.

51:20

But no, no, I mean, in all seriousness, you've worked in the

51:23

ER, they do not demand payment. Doctors are required to treat a person regardless of their ability to pay,

51:29

I'm just teasing. No, but, but, but it is exactly that idea, the, the what if the

51:37

ER really does need payment. That's what gets people, that's what fuels that sense of urgency.

51:43

It's precisely that worry that leads people to think, Oh no, the

51:48

ER needs this payment right now. I'm going to go send it.

51:50

Because I don't want to take the risk if, even if there is a 99 percent

51:56

chance that this is a scam and a 1 percent chance that this might be real.

52:00

I don't wanna take the risk that 1% risk that my grandkid is in

52:06

the ER and the doctors are not gonna save my grandkid's life.

52:10

Right? So I think it's, it's really important to, to be absolutely fundamentally

52:15

clear that like, that will never ha it is not a 99% 1% thing.

52:21

It is a 100% 0%.

52:24

It is an absolute no er will ever do that.

52:27

Right. You're, you are correct. I was just teasing.

52:30

And then you mentioned the limbic system. And that is so true.

52:33

Think about a big market drop or crash. It's the same thing that gets activated.

52:37

It's almost like a scam. You've got to weather the storm.

52:41

You've got to Trust, but verify that things are going to be okay.

52:45

You just got to avoid taking quick action.

52:49

Call somebody, other things you can do, I guess, for credit card

52:52

scams is don't use a debit card.

52:55

Use your credit card because it. Protects you federally and the companies want to protect you.

53:00

You only click on links that you trust, all those emails and phishing and

53:06

online links that we get all the time, we are bombarded with potential scams.

53:11

Just look in your junk email inbox.

53:14

They're all there. There may be a letter changed or a.

53:17

com versus a. org, but these emails as if they're from companies or from

53:22

people can look very real.

53:25

And I've succumbed to a post office scam where they said, Oh, where they

53:29

get some personal or credit card number, because if you pay a dollar, you can

53:33

come to the post office and pick it up. They never do that.

53:36

They leave something in your mailbox or on your door, but you get this text

53:39

and it's like, Oh my God, you do it.

53:41

And then you're like, I just got scammed. Just like Becky with her Facebook stuff.

53:46

There are just so many ways, and they come up with new and creative ways,

53:50

and we bump into them all the time, and we need to prepare ourselves for this.

53:54

It's scary that, humans want to trust.

53:58

We're innately driven to trust, and it's hard to untrust.

54:05

Mm hmm. So I've got a couple of more questions.

54:09

Number one is how do we recognize this?

54:15

We've talked about how we can recognize it.

54:17

What if you are, and there may be lots of people in our audience who

54:22

are in the position of caring for a parent or an older loved one?

54:28

How can we recognize it in someone else?

54:32

Is there a way we can look for signs to recognize that this is happening to

54:36

someone else that we're responsible for?

54:40

Well, first we talked about romance scams.

54:42

I would try to get as much, if you find out that somebody in your life

54:48

has a new romance, try to get as much information as possible about that person.

54:54

Hey, can I meet this person? If they're long distance, can I talk to this person over zoom?

54:59

Hey, this, if this person is dating my mom or dad, right.

55:04

I'd love to meet them. I'd love to, they're local, I want to meet them in person.

55:08

If they're long distance. I want to have a coffee with them over Zoom and I want to

55:11

do it right now or tomorrow, Huh. So I would, for romance scams, I would try to, immediately get to know who

55:17

that person on the other end of the line is so that you can get Sniff

55:22

out, is this a real person or not? Get their a, what's their Facebook profile?

55:27

Are they on Instagram? Are they on Twitter? Let's see your LinkedIn from back when you were working.

55:32

You must have had a LinkedIn at some point. like what is, what is this person's online presence?

55:37

So, that's one of the things I would do, I would also, especially with AI now,

55:42

and the way that voices can be imitated.

55:45

I would have some type of, this is what I do with my own parents.

55:49

We have kind of. Secret words, basically, like I've told my parents, if you ever get a

55:56

phone call from a voice that sounds like mine, and that voice is asking

56:02

for money, then we have a couple of basically safe words or secret words

56:09

and I'm like, I want you to ask me for these specific words, right?

56:14

and if I know those particular words, the passwords or the safe words or

56:19

whatever you want to call, however you want to call them, all right, that's a

56:22

way of knowing that it's actually me. Alternately, you can ask to FaceTime me, cause I'm like, mom and dad,

56:28

real, look, realistically, I am never going to call you asking for money.

56:31

I've got plenty of money. That's just, there is no situation in which I would ever call asking for money.

56:37

But if you ever get that call. And the voice is mine and you want to know whether or not it's me.

56:42

Number one, ask if you can FaceTime with me or Zoom or Skype or, whatever

56:46

your favorite video medium is, right?

56:49

Number one, do that. Number two, ask for those passwords or those safe words.

56:54

And number three, if you really want to add another layer onto that, just start

56:59

quizzing me about various little tidbits from my childhood that only I would know.

57:05

What was the name of my first goldfish? You know?

57:09

That's a good security question. Yep,

57:12

our family has done the same thing. We have a secret passcode because not only can AI duplicate your voice,

57:22

but now they can create a video.

57:25

That looks like it's you in some compromising or dangerous situation.

57:33

So we have the passphrase so that we know whether or not what

57:37

we're seeing is real or not. Wow.

57:40

It just keeps getting worse. I wrote, when I was at Columbia, I wrote, I wrote a huge, almost

57:47

thesis level paper on this topic.

57:50

And at that time, AI was not really in the picture,

57:54

you know? It's amazing how much things have changed.

57:57

the political ads that have been duped.

58:01

They can do the same thing with any of us. Yeah, I know it's scary, but

58:05

being prepared is our best defense. well, you have to presume that all your information is out there on the dark web.

58:11

I mean, all these scammers are talking to each other.

58:14

They're selling your information. a long list of this information is getting sold so they can blast out

58:20

phone calls or emails with all the bots.

58:23

You have to protect yourself because The attacks are incessant.

58:27

They're coming at you from all directions and all ways, shapes or forms.

58:31

And we're going to have a podcast dedicated with an FBI agent to how do

58:37

you protect yourself on the internet?

58:40

What do you need to do to protect your digital and personal identity?

58:46

That's coming up. So there'll be a follow up.

58:49

Yeah, there will be a follow up episode to this that we're very excited

58:52

about. hmm. That's Great.

58:55

So, if you find yourself or your loved one in the middle of a

59:00

scam, how do you shut it down? First make sure, first staunch the bleeding, right?

59:04

Make sure that there's no additional future outflow of money.

59:08

And that's going to depend on how the money has.

59:10

been delivered? Do they have access to your bank account?

59:13

Do they have access to your credit cards? Or have you simply been sending them?

59:17

Have you been sending them wire transfers or cashier's check?

59:20

Like, the delivery mechanism of the money will determine whether or not they have

59:24

the ability to get more money from you.

59:27

But make sure that you shut down any ability.

59:30

That they have to, to access your money.

59:33

I would immediately report it to your bank, report it to

59:36

the local authorities, right? Report it to, to, because those are two institutions, your bank

59:41

and your local authorities that should immediately know about this.

59:46

You, really file a complaint with the FBI.

59:49

I, we, and I know you're reading from the FBI list right now, but

59:53

the two best sources of information out there are AARP and the FBI.

59:58

Both of them are at the forefront.

1:00:01

Of this issue The Internet Crime Complaint Center.

1:00:06

That's why it's IC3Cubed. And I actually had to contact them when my identity was stolen.

1:00:13

They're very helpful. And your bank will walk You through the steps you need to make.

1:00:17

We had to change all the account numbers and transfer them into different accounts.

1:00:21

There are authenticator apps that are very good now where in order to access

1:00:26

your account, it brings up a different number every time that you have to put

1:00:31

in as a security code because those texts, two factor authentications

1:00:34

can be, if they have your cell phone. number or the SIM card issue, they can get those authentications

1:00:40

and access your accounts. So, the institutions are trying the best they can to avoid this, but the

1:00:47

scammers are probably ahead of the game.

1:00:50

and we haven't talked about password managers.

1:00:54

So Paula, would you recommend that all of us have our

1:00:57

passwords in a password managers? Absolutely, absolutely.

1:01:01

Keep all of your passwords in a password manager because that is the only way

1:01:05

that you can have unique passwords on every single one of your accounts.

1:01:09

So if someone gets at is they can't use that to break into

1:01:14

any of your other accounts, otherwise it would be really easy.

1:01:17

If someone got one of your passwords, they could just try that same.

1:01:21

Access to one of your passwords. And we need to teach our kids about these things because it's hard to go backwards.

1:01:29

And change everything. It's a lot of work.

1:01:32

And if you do it from the front end and use, say for example,

1:01:35

the one I use is LastPass. Are there other password managers that you guys use?

1:01:40

I've heard of those. We use one pass and, and I would suggest even with the password manager to set up.

1:01:47

Two factor authentication every place that you can.

1:01:52

yeah, exactly, exactly. And I agree the authenticator app is, even more secure than, than text messaging.

1:01:58

We've covered a lot of ground. Becky, paula has helped us out with all these scams.

1:02:03

We've gotten to know her a bit too on the front end.

1:02:05

And one of the things. We'd like to in order to round things out, because, we put our best foot

1:02:11

forward and we don't always tell folks about our mistakes and late

1:02:16

starters make a lot of mistakes.

1:02:18

Everybody makes a lot of mistakes. Paula, can you give us what your biggest financial mistake was?

1:02:23

My biggest ever, Well, yeah.

1:02:27

whoo, the biggest ever was not getting a prenup.

1:02:31

So to anyone who's listening, if you do not have a prenup if you're

1:02:35

about to get married, get one. If you're already married, you can get what's referred to as a postnup.

1:02:41

A postnup is similar to a prenup. It's simply a document that you draw up after the marriage after your wedding

1:02:48

day, right, after you're married. But either way, whether it's a prenup or a postnup, you need that agreement in place.

1:02:56

I think it's especially important for women these days that acquire

1:02:59

assets and have significant assets before they enter a marriage where

1:03:03

women are the primary bedwinners. And I think it was in your case that you had these real estate assets or other

1:03:08

things going on that became at risk because they were prior to the marriage,

1:03:13

but they became accessible at the time of dissolution of the marriage, right?

1:03:20

All right. So Paula, what, what's been your biggest win or one of your biggest wins

1:03:27

Starting my own company, the as I said, the, the highest income that I ever made

1:03:33

as a W 2 employee was 31, 000 per year.

1:03:37

And that was, that's in 2008 dollars.

1:03:39

So adjusted for inflation, that'd be probably what 37, 38, 000.

1:03:45

Maybe, maybe 40, 000 at the most today.

1:03:48

So, that's the highest salary that I ever made working for someone else.

1:03:52

And if, if I had stayed on that trajectory and just gotten, 3 percent

1:03:56

raises over time, I mean, I would be, I would still be in the five

1:04:00

figures today in terms of salary.

1:04:02

So starting my own business, there is.

1:04:09

infinite upward potential there.

1:04:13

And it, sometimes it's slow to get going, but as an entrepreneur, as

1:04:18

a business owner, you can grow your income, to orders of magnitude beyond

1:04:25

anything that you might have been able to achieve at your previous W 2 job.

1:04:30

And so I would say to anyone, who's considering the route of

1:04:33

entrepreneurship, it is for many of us, the single best opportunity that we

1:04:37

have to really reach that next level.

1:04:40

And we know all of the stats that the majority of

1:04:42

millionaires are business owners. And, in the five community, we talk a lot about, about the gap, the gap

1:04:50

between what you earn and what you spend and that we need to save the

1:04:54

gap and then try to grow the gap.

1:04:57

And while most of us could stay in to do a little frugaling

1:05:03

or a little whittling down. Of our spending, there's only so much of that you could

1:05:07

do, but there is no ceiling.

1:05:10

There's, there is infinite possibilities of what you can do on the upper end.

1:05:16

Yeah, exactly. All right, Paul, your resources at AffordAnything are fantastic, but

1:05:22

do you have any favorites outside of your own resources that you would

1:05:26

point especially late starters to? Ooh, I have so many.

1:05:31

All right. To learn about the psychology of money, the way that, the thought

1:05:34

processes that we have around it. Morgan Housel, he's absolutely fantastic.

1:05:39

He has two books. The first is called the psychology of money.

1:05:41

The second is called same as ever. I would recommend them both.

1:05:45

Let's see, there is, a writer by the name of Nick Majuli, he writes

1:05:50

a blog called Of Dollars and Data. He has a book called Just Keep Buying that's good for getting a

1:05:55

grounding in, in the investing side.

1:05:59

Of, of personal finance. I'm a big fan of, of anyone who talks about behavioral economics.

1:06:07

so much of personal finance is, I think, not prescriptive.

1:06:11

It's not what to do. It's, it's why do we do what we do, and how do we better understand the

1:06:17

way that the human mind works and the human condition so that we can Then

1:06:20

learn how to make more clear decisions and we can then learn how to work with

1:06:24

our nature rather than against it.

1:06:26

And so, Dan Ariely and everyone who has worked with him, they're some

1:06:31

of the leading, that their research that comes out of the behavior lab,

1:06:35

some of the reading the leading. Behavioral economic research that's out there.

1:06:40

So I would certainly look at them, and follow their work.

1:06:43

Jim's clear, just he writes not about money, he writes about

1:06:46

habits, but developing really strong habits is the cornerstone

1:06:51

of good financial planning, right?

1:06:54

It's first automate. And then anything that you can't automate form habits.

1:07:00

And so James Clear for habit formation is, crucial to, to personal finance.

1:07:08

I would agree. I've read his book and, Atomic Habits, and there's another author that writes about

1:07:13

habits that these are important things.

1:07:17

It took me to create good habits to turn my financial life around.

1:07:21

That was where the problems were.

1:07:24

We're in the reflex habits of lifestyle inflation.

1:07:28

And so I agree with you.

1:07:31

And if you have any other resources for us that you'd like to share

1:07:33

with our audience, please don't hesitate to send us links.

1:07:36

We'll put them in the show notes. Lastly, lastly, I want to know who you haven't interviewed that

1:07:43

would be your next dream guest.

1:07:47

Oprah. Absolutely. Are you still trying?

1:07:50

Are you still trying? yeah, I tried.

1:07:52

So I interviewed her coauthor. Oprah recently coauthored a book along with Arthur Brooks.

1:07:58

They coauthored a book called something about happiness.

1:08:01

The title is Build the Life You Want. And it's all about how, I mean, as the title says, it's all about how to

1:08:08

deliberately construct a life that, that is true to you and that is likely

1:08:13

to lead to your optimum happiness.

1:08:16

Anyway, so Professor Arthur Brooks and Oprah coauthored this book

1:08:20

together and I was really trying to get them both on the show.

1:08:25

But I got Arthur Brooks, whom I love, he's been on the show twice, on the Afford

1:08:28

Anything podcast twice and he's brilliant and an absolutely wonderful speaker and

1:08:34

researcher but but I was, I was a little bummed that his co author did not join us.

1:08:41

I'm sure you'll keep trying and I'm sure she will find out that

1:08:44

there's extreme value in being your guest on the show because I

1:08:48

have to, give you a little props. I love listening to your interview style.

1:08:54

Your preparation is fantastic and the way you conversationally get through all the

1:09:01

topics that you want to get through and go in tangents that are truly interesting.

1:09:07

Your interview, I can only aspire to be the interviewer that you are.

1:09:13

Thank you. Thank you. All right, Paula, we've come to the end of our time together.

1:09:18

It's been awesome. We've provided a lot of value to our audience.

1:09:21

I know they're excited about hearing from you.

1:09:24

I want to thank you, as does Becky, I think, for being on the show today.

1:09:28

I hope we get to chat with you again in the future about other topics.

1:09:32

Absolutely. I would love that. Thank you for having me on the show.

1:09:37

All right, see you soon, Paula. See you soon.