It's Not About The Money

The first episode in four-part series on the YNAB Four Rules. 

Today: Giving every dollar a job, and why embracing the reality of your financial picture empowers you with clarity about your priorities. 

  • (00:00) - Cute, little dogs
  • (02:17) - Rule 1: Give Every Dollar a Job
  • (05:47) - A plan, not a forecast
  • (10:21) - Scarcity and priorities
  • (14:08) - Building the muscle of decision-making
  • (15:53) - The three approaches to personal finance: Accounting, forecasting, and allocating
  • (20:23) - YNAB excels the best when you reflect reality inside of it

--- 
Steve Nay: 

Tyler Smith: 

Creators & Guests

Host
Steve Nay
Strategic tax advisor for solopreneurs. Enrolled Agent; Owner of Daybreak Tax LLC
Host
Tyler Smith
Financial coach for working professionals

What is It's Not About The Money?

Solopreneurs and small business owners: learn about leadership, operations, entrepreneurship, productivity, taxes, client creation, marketing, bookkeeping, and more.

YNAB Rule 1: Give Every Dollar a Job
===

[00:00:00]

Cute, little dogs
---

[00:00:01] Steve: Tyler, I think I might be more of a small dog person than a big dog person.

[00:00:06] Tyler: Okay. What size is the dog that you own?

[00:00:09] Steve: uh, she is like 50, 60 pounds, something like that. It's a pretty big.

[00:00:15] Tyler: on the larger side of medium.

[00:00:17] Steve: Yeah.

[00:00:18] Tyler: Large ish.

[00:00:19] Steve: Uh, yeah. Last year we fostered another dog that was slightly larger than her. And we're currently fostering another dog that is much smaller.

He's like less than 20 pounds.

[00:00:32] Tyler: Oh, you got another foster dog. That's awesome.

[00:00:35] Steve: a, some other kind of doodle. But a slightly different breed and he's smaller and he does some of the same things that the other foster dog did, but they don't irritate me in this dog. They're just cute because he's in this little package.

[00:00:50] Tyler: Yeah. Oh, that makes total sense. Like what's an example?

[00:00:54] Steve: uh, like coming up into your personal space like that, that used to bother [00:01:00] me.

[00:01:00] Tyler: in my area.

[00:01:01] Steve: Right, like don't, don't come stick your nose in my lap, uh, but if the, if the little dog does it, it's just cute. Like he'll come lick your toes, and that's, it's just funny, where if the big dog had done that, I would have been like, get out of my space.

[00:01:16] Tyler: Yep. I relate to that. Another one. I, I don't have, 35 pounds. So My sister has like a 20 dog pound, uh, sorry, 20 pound dog. And for me, it's the jumping up, like putting their paws up on you. If my dog does that, I'm like, nope, nope, not allowed. This little dog does that. I'm like, Oh, that's so cute. Yes, I will hold you.

[00:01:37] Steve: right,

[00:01:38] Tyler: Interesting.

Well, congratulations on the new, on the new foster dog. That's exciting.

[00:01:44] Steve: yeah, he's, he's cute.

Hello there, dear listener. I am Steve.

[00:01:54] Tyler: And I'm Tyler. Welcome to another episode of It's Not About The Money, the podcast where [00:02:00] we help you gain the clarity you need to run a successful small business,

[00:02:04] Steve: Tyler has a financial coaching practice and I run a tax business. We are both small business owners like you, and this podcast is our exploration of entrepreneurship, one episode at a time.

Rule 1: Give Every Dollar a Job
---

[00:02:17] Steve: So Tyler, we've been talking for a long time about how we need to do a series on the YNAB four rules. I think the time has come.

Mm

[00:02:27] Tyler: And it wasn't too long ago that we did a. book club episode on the book called YNAB or You Need a Budget by Jesse Mecham. And we almost didn't talk about these rules at all because we got really caught up in how the book changed. Well, at least my life, maybe yours as well. I feel like I kind of dominated that one.

Sorry, but yeah. So yeah, we've been talking about this idea for a while. And so today we're going to discuss the first of YNAB's four rules. But I thought before we dive into that It might be worth just framing this up a little bit for people who may not have [00:03:00] heard of you need a budget, A-K-A-Y-A, or their method or their company or whatever.

So

[00:03:07] Steve: Yes.

[00:03:09] Tyler: YAB is a company that makes, in my estimation, like this is, this is me. I, I'm not a representative of the company. I'm not affiliated with them, although I'm certified to coach, uh, their method. But from my point of view, they basically make two things. They make a software. The YNAB app, which is a budgeting app that helps people manage their money.

But more importantly than that, they make kind of a philosophy or a budgeting methodology. They call it the YNAB method or the YNAB for rules or in more recent, uh, videos that they've been coming out with, they re they started referring them to, to them as the YNAB for habits, which I think is kind of interesting.

[00:03:49] Steve: Mm.

[00:03:50] Tyler: And the idea here is that these, if you follow these habits, if you follow these rules. And they're more like rules of thumb or principles, that you will gain total control of your money, have [00:04:00] peace of mind, not stress about money, et cetera, and basically be successful financially, at least when it comes to managing your cashflow and aligning that with your values.

So, uh, we're going to do an episode each on each of the four rules, and we'll start with rule number one. That makes a lot of sense. Uh, today.

[00:04:17] Steve: does.

[00:04:18] Tyler: Yeah,

[00:04:19] Steve: Rule number one is give every dollar a job.

[00:04:24] Tyler: that's right. Which is. Another way of saying, I guess, you may have heard the term zero based budgeting, this is a variation on that,

[00:04:34] Steve: What does the zero refer to?

[00:04:36] Tyler: like a zero sum game would be another, like, I guess that's a good question, uh, it's, you have a chunk of money And you're going to assign that money into different budget categories until it's all gone. There are zero dollars left unassigned or unaccounted for.

[00:04:55] Steve: Okay. Yeah.

[00:04:56] Tyler: so you're not holding any in reserve, you're not doing any forecasting, you're just, [00:05:00] you are taking all the money that you have and assigning every single dollar to a specific job until there's zero left.

So I guess that's the tie in with zero based budgeting.

[00:05:10] Steve: Okay. Is this different from, uh, envelope budgeting? Where you take all the, all of the income and you're putting it into envelopes until it is all gone and assigned to an envelope?

[00:05:21] Tyler: I would say that's such a great question. the envelope system. Is,

[00:05:27] Steve: Like, whether they're

physical envelopes or, or just conceptual envelopes, lines in a spreadsheet.

[00:05:32] Tyler: It's part of it, but there's actually more to it. And we'll get to that in a little bit. Cause that's actually a direct, uh, comparison I want to make between several approaches to budgeting and how YNAB is different than the envelope system, even though it has a lot in common with it.

[00:05:46] Steve: okay, great.

A plan, not a forecast
---

[00:05:47] Tyler: So, Rule one, it's very simple. It's give every dollar a job. I think this makes intuitive sense to most people when they hear it. It's like, Oh yeah, I have all this money. I should have a plan for the money, but it actually [00:06:00] looks, I wanted to describe what it looks like by telling you my favorite, favorite, favorite question that I like to ask people.

When I'm coaching them through, uh, their personal finances, which is, I guess the first thing we do typically is we, we come up with a list of all their expenses that they think that they need and want, but that's separate from, that's before we even talk about money. That's just like, what do you want to do with your life?

What do you need to do with. What, you know, what are your obligations and things, and after that list is done, then we go through all their bank accounts and we just add up all the money that they have and all their checking accounts, all their savings accounts. We don't do like retirement accounts or brokerage accounts or anything like that.

This is just the money that they have liquid available to spend in their, you know, operating expenses of their life, basically. And then they have a number, it's like a, it's, it's a concrete number. It's an amount of dollars that they have. To their name in that moment, and then I just asked them, what do you want this money to do for you between now and when you [00:07:00] get paid again?

So that's kind of how it gets applied.

[00:07:04] Steve: Uh huh.

[00:07:04] Tyler: Um, and then they divvied up into their, like you said, like their digital envelopes into their budget categories, all the way until there's none left. It's all been assigned a job,

[00:07:16] Steve: Okay. And this is just the money that you have right now. This is not any future money that in two weeks I will get paid and it will be X amount. You might know that already, but we're not touching that yet because it has not materialized in the bank account. Right?

[00:07:32] Tyler: right? Right. And actually, I'm glad you brought that up. There are a few common points of confusion that people encounter when they're trying to apply this rule. And, uh, one of them is assigning only the money that you have, like you just said. Right. So YNAB or your budget is actually a plan for the money that you have right now.

It's not a forecast for money that you're going to get in the future.

And in my opinion, that's like [00:08:00] one of the big breakthroughs of YNAB and why they've been so successful in helping people overcome like money related stress and problems is it's very simple. It's like, if you have 1, 000 right now.

Don't stress about anything except for what you want to do with that 1, 000 between today and your next paycheck, because you don't have control over anything else anyway. And if you try to predict the future, you'll probably be wrong and then you'll be frustrated and then you'll stop budgeting because you've had a bad experience,

[00:08:31] Steve: Right. Uh huh.

[00:08:33] Tyler: what happened to me when I used to try to do my budget in a spreadsheet.

It only ever lasted like a couple of weeks because I would inevitably be wrong about the future and get frustrated and quit basically.

[00:08:48] Steve: And one of the hardest things to predict is probably what your spending is going to look like exactly. And that I'm sure we'll talk about this more in, in the later rules, such as roll with the punches. But, anyway, I, [00:09:00] I like your framing of this as a plan, not a forecast and your plan can change as time goes on.

And it should, because you don't know the future yet and you don't have control of anything that will happen in the future yet.

[00:09:13] Tyler: Right. Yeah. Having a plan is more like setting an intention, right? I mean, you can't control the future, uh, to an extent. It's just going to be full of surprises. That is a future rule. YNAB rule number three, actually, which is called the roll with the punches, gets into like what to do when your plan inevitably changes and how to deal with that in a way that's not frustrating and makes you want to quit. Um, So that's kind of one common confusion point, is yeah, this is a plan, it's not a forecast. Specifically with income though. So it's one thing if you get, if you're a W2 employee that gets paid consistently every two weeks, like the exact same amount of money. That makes it a little more possible, and maybe even a little more tempting to try to forecast your future income.

But a lot of people have variable income. Like they work an hourly job, [00:10:00] or they're a freelancer, or they're a business owner, or they have, uh, they're a family with multiple income streams and it just, you know, what if your spouse teaches piano lessons and it's just different every month, right? And so rule one just totally eliminates any of the guesswork in any of the stress. Like I said, I'm trying to predict the future income as well as the expenses.

Scarcity and priorities
---

[00:10:21] Tyler: So, where people trip up on this though is when they're very first getting started with a budget, uh, and they, the amount of money that they have right now is actually not enough to fully pay for all the things they want to pay for in the current month. And they kind of can freak out sometimes because they're being faced with that reality for the first time.

Yeah.

[00:10:44] Steve: is this like, um, you, you might get paid before the end of the month, and so there's not enough money right now to cover through the end of the month? Or even if, like, this is all the money we're getting until the end of the month and it's not enough to cover all of those expenses?

[00:10:57] Tyler: I see both all the time, but the first one [00:11:00] is probably. The more common where it's like, maybe we're doing this toward the beginning of the month and you've received either no paychecks in that month yet, or only one of two that you're expecting or something like that. And so they're like, Oh my goodness, I budgeted for my mortgage, my groceries, some eating out money, and a few other things.

Uh, and now I did it. I gave every dollar a job. But I've got a lot more budget categories left and no money to put in them.

[00:11:27] Steve: Uh huh. Yeah.

[00:11:29] Tyler: And so part of, part of it is kind of like coaching through that and being like, okay, what bothers you about that? Right. And it's, it's pretty easy to understand what might bother somebody about that, but are you going to get paid again this month?

Oh yeah, I'm going to get two more paychecks this month. Okay. So. Can't you just wait until that paycheck comes, and then at that point give all those dollars a job. And the beauty of rule one, and what really is the underlying principle, is it's a matter of prioritization. Because it [00:12:00] introduces scarcity, right?

Like, this is all the money that you have right now. And when you answer that question of what do you want this money to do for you, between now and the next time you get paid, you have to make choices. Mm

[00:12:13] Steve: Yeah, I think that's really powerful because the scarcity is there already, but it's, this forces you to acknowledge it. Like this is the, we have a finite amount of money right now, but there are things that we need the money to do. And so we've got to decide which one is which one of the, you know, prioritize, put these in order of what are we going to fund first?

[00:12:34] Tyler: And there are budgeting apps out there that operate on a forecasting system. And I'll talk about that a little bit later, but what's interesting about that is when you put in your future paychecks into your budget, it's a totally different mindset. Then only putting in the money that you have, because what it allows you to do subconsciously is actually spend the money before you earn it. And that gets a lot of people into, well, into credit card debt, [00:13:00] basically. Right.

[00:13:01] Steve: Oh yeah, for

[00:13:02] Tyler: like I don't have the money in the bank right now, but I know I'm getting paid in five days. And so I'll put it on the credit card now and then I'll rely on that future paycheck to pay it off. Right. Again, I've done that.

That's what, that's the way I was living before I was a YNAB er years ago. And so it hides, it hides the scarcity. It like insulates you from it. And so you make worse choices.

[00:13:27] Steve: right. And when you, uh, you can only fund the categories with money that's actually there when it comes time to spend it, you know, like the money is there. I can feel comfortable spending this thing. I don't have to worry about is there, can, can I do this from the bank account or does this need to go on the credit card?

Like, you don't have to worry about that at all just because the, the money is there, you've already made the plan for it, and you can, you are okay to spend it on this, but you can't spend it on this other thing that is not yet funded because that money hasn't come in.

[00:13:56] Tyler: Right. Yeah. So you can see how that would be a [00:14:00] different, uh, how that kind of mindset would cause you to make different decisions, potentially spending decisions. Yeah.

Building the muscle of decision-making
---

[00:14:08] Tyler: And, you know, I've, I've thought a lot about this. I think financial, I I've become a fan of the term financial fitness. As opposed to like financial knowledge or financial health, because I think it's a practice, just like exercising your body.

And it's like a muscle, just like building muscles in your body. Um, and I've, I've, I've asked myself, I've kind of pondered like, what are, what is the exercise? What are the exercises that lead to being financially fit? Like I know bench press would make my chest muscles bigger if I did it consistently, right?

What, what would make my finance? Muscles bigger. And I think, I don't know, this is a work in progress, but I think the exercise is making decisions

and you can only, you know, make decisions that are as good as the information that you have in front of you. And [00:15:00] so by practicing making decisions about prioritizing the money that you have, you actually build the muscle of being able to make good financial decisions. That's, yeah, it's kind of a working theory, I guess, but, because there's never going to be a system that you can build that won't need to be changed or modified when life throws a curve ball.

Right. And what's going to save you in those. Moments is not your system necessarily, but your ability to make a good decision that's not based on fear or panic or like a gut reaction. So, yeah, I think it's all about practicing the decision making, which is why rule one of YNAB is so, so cool. And so important is it causes you to make a lot of smaller decisions up front so that your muscles are strong.

Your financial muscles are strong when those big decisions come along.

[00:15:49] Steve: That's really cool. I like that. I've never thought of it that way before.

The three approaches to personal finance: Accounting, forecasting, and allocating
---

[00:15:53] Tyler: You asked about the envelope system and I said, YNAB is kind of like that, but a little bit different, a little bit [00:16:00] more. And so I kind of wanted to run through, uh, three different types of approaches to personal finance or finance in general, talk about like their, what they're good for, what they're not good for, and then ultimately how YNAB.

It takes the best of all three and puts it all in one place. So, and these are generalizations. So if you're a CPA, I'm sorry for what you're about to hear, uh, or a tax professional, sorry, Steve, but, um, but so in general, there's an approach that's I call, or I've heard called the accounting approach and accounting in the sense of, um, what is accounting approach?

It's tracking your expenses and looking at reports of how you spent your money. And like. Analyzing that and hopefully informing future behavior. And so there are systems out there, budget apps that, that cater to that way of doing things. Uh, Mint would be an example of that, right? [00:17:00] Uh, may, may it rest in peace, yes, Mint being discontinued.

But, but you know, it was really good at taking all your transactions across all your accounts, putting them in one place, making reports about it. So you could look at what happened in the past. And kind of account for

[00:17:12] Steve: Yeah

[00:17:15] Tyler: Another approach would be forecasting, which we already talked a little bit about, which is when you make a plan based on what you think will happen in the future, both in terms of income and expenses.

Um, and an app, uh, there are many out there, but one that comes to mind immediately that kind of takes this approach is the EveryDollar app, where it actually has a slot in each month in the app where you put in all your paychecks for that month, and then all the paychecks for the next month. So it kind of presupposes that you know how much money You're going to make in the future, which again, for certain people, that is possible because they have a regular income.

Right. But for a lot of people, not possible either have to estimate [00:18:00] and be wrong or, you know, I dunno, it's a way to do it. It's a way to do it. And then the third approach would be. Allocating, and I would call the envelope system an allocation method where you've got a concrete amount of money and you're allocating it into different envelopes or assigning it to different jobs until it's all been assigned, which sounds a lot like what we were talking about, right? YNAB rule one, giving every dollar a job. But the problem with the allocation system is that it fails to think about planning for the future in a way.

[00:18:34] Steve: Tell me about that.

[00:18:36] Tyler: Yeah. So, I mean, there are ways to account for the future using an allocation system. You know, basically what it looks like though, is any money that's left in your envelope at the end of the month. would stay in the envelope and roll over into the next month, and I will, I will say like YNAB facilitates this.

So I, I'm not saying it's wildly different YNAB from what the envelope system is, but [00:19:00] it kind of takes, uh, YNAB, the method and the app combines elements from all three of these, from the accounting approach, the forecasting approach, and the allocating approach, because it lets you make a budget template.

For the long term, using something that they have called targets. And then you allocate into your plan only what you have. And of course, it provides reports looking backwards as well for your spending habits and things like that.

[00:19:29] Steve: Okay. Ah, that is interesting. Cause I do, I really like that, um, the, the template idea with the targets, but I hadn't thought of it in the context of allocating being, being really useful for that.

[00:19:43] Tyler: I mean, you could do that with the envelope method. I mean, I don't know a lot of people anymore who do like straight up cash envelopes. Uh, budgeting, although there is a movement on YouTube and TikTok, uh, that we've discovered, which is very satisfying, like ASMR levels of satisfying to watch [00:20:00] people, you know, stuff their cash in envelopes, love that, but, but more practically, a lot of people are, are, have moved on to the digital realm, I guess, in, in this realm, but so, but you could do it, you know, you could write on your envelope, like eventually I'm going to need 1, 200 for this expense.

So every month allocate this much into this envelope, which is what YNAB targets do for you, essentially. They automate that process.

YNAB excels the best when you reflect reality inside of it
---

[00:20:23] Steve: This is a useful way to think about it. That there's, there's three kinds of things that you might. If you want to get out of budgeting and YNAB, okay, combines all three of those and you can use them or not, I guess, depending on what you need, like the allocating part, you don't have to do that.

Well, no scratch that.

[00:20:45] Tyler: Well,

I would argue that, that you do. I mean, that's, that's, that's the, the,

[00:20:49] Steve: Okay. Oh yeah. Cause it's

existing funds.

[00:20:52] Tyler: is basically giving every dollar a

[00:20:53] Steve: Yeah. Okay.

[00:20:54] Tyler: Yeah. The twist, the YNAB twist is that they allow you to plan for the future in a way that's [00:21:00] difficult to do with cash envelopes through the software features. Right.

[00:21:04] Steve: So did I say that wrong earlier then that the targets are more for forecasting

[00:21:09] Tyler: Um, Oh,

[00:21:13] Steve: need 1, 500 for the mortgage. So that's the target on there. I only have 750 right now. So let's drop that in there. But the, the bill's not going to be due until after the second paycheck comes in. So that's okay for now, but it will show up as yellow to be like, this one is not fully funded yet. Keep track of that. But you've, you've given every dollar job that you have right now.

[00:21:36] Tyler: right. Yeah. I kind of worded that in a very specific way on purpose. Let me say it again. Cause it is kind of like, I actually don't think YNAB allows you to forecast in the traditional sense because it doesn't allow you to budget future money. So it does allow you to plan. It allows you to plan for future expenses.

And start saving for future expenses. But I think that's actually [00:22:00] different than allocating money that you don't have yet towards those expenses. So here, here's how the wording I said, uh, it lets you create a budget template for the long term plan. So that's the planning part and then allocate only what you have to that plan.

That's different than an app like, uh, we just looked, you and I recently at one called Monarch Money, which has got the forecasting element in there. So you put in like what you're expecting to earn each month, and then you take those future dollars that you don't actually have in your bank account yet.

And then you allocate it into the budget ahead of time.

[00:22:40] Steve: Mm-Hmm.

[00:22:40] Tyler: you know, that might work really well for some people. I'm not. I'm not bashing it or anything, but that's not the YNAB, that's not part of the YNAB methodology because they have found that, um, again, to them, it's very important that people make decisions, better decisions based on the scarcity of their money.[00:23:00]

And if you forecast your income out into the future, I mean, you could spend it all tomorrow because you're going to earn it eventually, you'll be able to pay back the debt eventually, right? And they just want to stay as far away. I'm going to try and get as much information from that as possible, I think.

[00:23:11] Steve: because it's very easy for that to get away from you

if you're, if you're not very disciplined about it, where the, the forced, uh, scarcity of like, this is, you only have these dollars right now, so only work with those. That's the constraint that's built in right there. You can't get around that. Mm-Hmm,

[00:23:31] Tyler: Yeah. I think it's just an embracing of reality. And I tell that to my clients all the time when they ask me, Oh, what's the best way to do this, that, or the other in YNAB. And kind of my rule of thumb or my advice typically, and it depends on the situation and what they're trying to accomplish, but it's like, YNAB excels the best.

When you reflect reality inside of it, right? And so like, if you, like, I commonly get questions [00:24:00] about how to handle reimbursements, I'm like, well, you bought lunch for your friend. So put that at your budget, the whole amount, because that's what, that's reality. That's what happened. You paid the 35 for lunch, not just the 15.

[00:24:14] Steve: Yeah.

[00:24:15] Tyler: And you don't know if they're going to. Reimburse you, right? Like they're supposed to, and they are probably intending to, but until that Venmo hits your checking account, like it's not there, it's not real. So just do what really happens. And I think that applies. That's, that's what I love about YNAB so much is it embraces reality.

And I guess you could argue maybe the truth of your financial picture and that embracing of reality and the truth is what gets you to the clarity that you need to understand what your priorities really are.

[00:24:46] Steve: Yeah. And it's just so much easier to hold in your head when you have that clarity of like the, the numbers here are, reflect reality. And that's all I need to know. I don't have to think about, well, is this, is this bill going to hit before the credit card bill [00:25:00] is due?

[00:25:00] Tyler: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:25:01] Steve: of that just,

[00:25:03] Tyler: Clarity is so powerful. I think I learned this, uh, again, working with one of my clients where we, we built his budget and then we gave every dollar a job and we were like, Oh, you're spending more than you make. Like you have negative cashflow. Not good. Right.

[00:25:21] Steve: yeah.

[00:25:23] Tyler: But his emotional reaction was so positive because he was like, but now I know.

Like I see exactly where my money's going and where I want it to go. And it took him a few months to, to go from negative cash flow to positive cash flow. But it's like he was now able to answer the question, where's the money gonna come from to make this positive cash flow situation? Whereas before, so, so I guess what I'm trying to say there is it almost doesn't matter how dire your financial, financial circumstances are.

That clarity, although it might be a little painful at first when you see the reality for the first [00:26:00] time, it's really freeing and really empowering and actually, yeah, it really provides a lot of relief.

[00:26:07] Steve: Yeah. And

[00:26:09] Tyler: And. And some long, awkward silences when people realize it for the first time. Right. I mean, it's not, I'm not gonna say it's fun all the time,

[00:26:16] Steve: Right, for sure.

[00:26:20] Tyler: but yeah, I think that was a, that was a life changing experience for me because I was like, Oh man, he's got negative cashflow. Like, I don't even know where we go.

Like, this is, how is he going to react? You know, and I was very shocked when he was like, I feel so much better. Just knowing

and having clarity. I'm like, yeah. So, and then he fixed it. You know, you can't fix a problem. You don't know you have.

[00:26:41] Steve: Right. And then you're not stuck with the question after the fact of where did all the money go, because, like, you

[00:26:49] Tyler: Right.

[00:26:50] Steve: Now you understand, like, I was spending more than I was earning, that's where all the money went. And now I can fix that, and I won't have that problem anymore.

[00:26:58] Tyler: Yeah. And you know, it's [00:27:00] interesting. I know for a long time, I guess YNAB did a survey of their users a while back and they use this in their marketing material now that like the average new. YNAB users save something like 6, 000 in their first year of using a budget. And like, that's a big number and it's impressive.

And they also say the number is like 600 in their first month. Alone, right? So there are, you know, they're trying to argue like, yeah, pay us our subscription for the year. It'll pay for itself so fast. You wouldn't even, you know,

and you know what? I, it's just, it's so true. Anecdotally. I mean, you know, I don't, I haven't done the survey.

I don't know. I don't know the data, but when you realize you've got eight subscriptions that you didn't remember that you had, and. You actually spent twice as much on groceries as you think you do in your mind. It's like not that hard to cut the costs where they need to be, uh, in many circumstances, depending on whether or not you have an income problem to go along with the spending problem, of course, right?

[00:27:59] Steve: Yeah, [00:28:00] sure.

[00:28:03] Tyler: Anyway, so that's rule one. Give every dollar a job so that you can get clarity. about your priorities, because you're going to have to make decisions about what you want to fund first, second, third, and what you have to wait to fund. And the cool thing is, as we go along through this series and talk about future YNAB rules, eventually you start getting ahead.

And you have to start making decisions, or you stop having to make decisions about what do I have to prioritize and give up this month? And the questions start becoming like, okay, now I have money left over. What do I want to do with that before I get paid again? Do I put it towards a future month and get further ahead?

Do I become extra generous this month and give somebody a nice gift or a donation or something? Do I make an extra aggressive debt payment? I mean, you start getting more and more options as you go.

[00:28:55] Steve: Yeah. And that's really exciting when you get to that

[00:28:58] Tyler: Yeah. [00:29:00] And I think that's a, that, that about sums it up.

[00:29:03] Steve: All right. Rule one, give every dollar a job. And we'll come back next episode. We'll talk about rule two,

[00:29:10] Tyler: Right. Which is called embrace your true expenses.

[00:29:14] Steve: true expenses. All right, so we'll see you then. Thanks, Tyler.