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Call 1-800-525-7000. This is faith and finance, biblical wisdom for your financial journey. Well, we're so blessed to have relationship expert, Shanti Feldhahn, back with us today. She's a good friend, she's written several very helpful books about marriage, and in particular, today we'll be discussing thriving in love and money. Shanti, welcome back to the program. It's always great to be with you. Well, I'm delighted, and this is such a key topic that so many of our listeners need to tackle, and so we're going to dive in today and hopefully give them some really practical handles that will help them.
You know they say about marriage, Shanti, when money troubles come in the door, love goes out the window. But of course you and your husband Jeff have done some great research that's identified how to avoid that, and I know you say in the book a lot of it comes down to really three steps that couples need to take to avoid this tension or conflict in their marriage around money. So just give us an overview of those steps and then we'll dive in a bit more.
Sure, yeah, this actually comes out of the research project. We did a three-year research project to try to figure out what are these things that can help us. And so we found that there's three specific things, there's lots of things that anybody can do, right?
But there's three things that are particularly high leverage, and by that I mean like if you do this, it has an outsized impact, okay? So the three things are you have to have built up or build up some cushion, some margin in your budget, in your finances. And the second thing is you really have to be able to talk to your spouse about money. It can't just be a one-person thing, it has to be two people and you have to be able to communicate about it. And then actually one of the biggies is you really have to understand what's going on underneath the surface and how you and how your spouse respond to money.
That's so good. I want to start there with this last one before the break, and I know you spend a majority of the book really unpacking how to understand what's underneath the surface and leading to some of these big aha moments of we'll, in a future interview, maybe go deep into those. But give us an overview, if you will, of this last step, and that is understanding how we and our spouse respond to money.
Yeah, it's really crucial because honestly you kind of have to do that in order to do the other two steps. And so here's really the bottom line, is to recognize that if there is tension around money, it is not about the money. It turns out it's about how money makes us feel and how it makes our spouse feel. And it's about all of these insecurities and worries and beliefs about how money should work that are running out of the surface, and we have two different sets of those.
And it's funny, it was in the middle of the research for this, and I was speaking at a big women's convention a few years ago, right in the middle of it, and I always kind of interview people no matter where I am, trying to tell me how you think. And so I was talking to this one couple that ran one of the exhibits at this big convention, and they were both kind of sheepish about the fact that they hadn't really connected around money, even though they kind of wanted to, sort of. They were essentially like, the husband said, I've got no problem with planning.
Like, that's a good idea, but our income is so cyclical, you know, we can come away from this convention having made a ton or nothing, right? And it's like, how do you plan for that? And the problem is, I don't have a problem with planning, but I do have a problem with planning when it means I'm going to be clashing about money with her. And that is the issue that we found is present in many couples, including, by the way, me and Jeff, when we started this project. I can only imagine you all began to unearth some things you had to deal with, and we all do, which is why this is so key. Well, we're going to continue this conversation just around the corner and get into these other two steps. Why is cushion in your budget so important for alleviating conflict in marriage around money and communication?
It always comes back to communication, right? Shaun T. Feldhahn with us today. Much more to come just around the corner.
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This institution is not federally insured. Delighted to have you back with us today on faith and finance. I'm joined today by my good friend, Shaun T. Feldhahn. She was an analyst on Wall Street. She got her graduate degree from Harvard University. She's a best-selling author and social researcher. And today we're talking about her book, Thriving in Love and Money, that she wrote with her husband Jeff.
And specifically three steps you can take to ease the tension around money in marriage. She started by talking about this critical topic of understanding what's underneath the money conversation. All of those things that are about anything but money that are so key for us to understand. The book dedicates a significant portion to unearthing those things, and that's why you need to pick up a copy of it.
But we're going to move on to the other two keys. And you said beyond understanding, Shaun T., that really we need to have some margin in the budget. And this was interesting because so often we think about, well, we just need a little more income. And it wasn't a matter of the income in your research. It was really around the fact that you were living on less than your income, wasn't it?
Oh, yes. What we found is that no matter where the line was for the couples, we had a couple thousand people in our study group on this. And this, by the way, these were nationally representative surveys. These weren't just like Facebook polls.
So this is nationally representative across all the demographics you can think of. What we found is no matter what level people were at in their income, it wasn't that number. It was living below that number that mattered so that you have a little bit of cushion. Now, some people was just a little, right?
Some people had a higher amount. But what we found is the presence of that cushion was one of the key factors that kind of it helped avoid some of the most dangerous tensions. We found that there were some tensions around money that are a lot more concerning than others, that caused a lot more damage to the relationship, and actually having that cushion helped avoid it.
So, for example, let's just say that you're living close to the line. Maybe you've got a smaller income and your car breaks. Well, if you've got some cushion to be able to fix that car, it's like less likely that a lot of stuff in your relationship is going to, you know, you're not going to be as thrown. You're not going to be as likely to yell at each other.
You're not going to be as likely to do some of these things that cause completely different issues way beyond the fact that you have to fix the car. And so that's really the cool thing about cushion. It's protective, not just of your finances, but of your relationship. Yeah, and there's so many implications around having that margin, including one of these big traps in marriage around money, and that is hiding purchases or doing things that you haven't informed your spouse about, right? Oh, sure. And that's not just related to cushion, obviously, because there's a whole host of reasons that go back to understanding each other that helps you build that cushion in a healthy way, because you can have cushion and still hide stuff. Yes, that's right. You know, it's like, what are those things that really are going to help with the relationship?
But if you know those things, it helps you build the cushion and helps with everything else. Yeah. And that's why the budget is so key. Having that spending plan where both of you are involved in the process to give every dollar a name, that budget, Shanti, can actually become an instrument of peace, can it? Absolutely. The budget is just, it is a tool that is so, so crucial. And yet, here's something that's going to actually maybe push a couple of buttons for you and your audience, if you don't mind me saying so.
No problem. It is really crucial, but you have to, A, you have to be able to understand one another in order to develop that budget. Right? Like you have to be able to, in order for it to not be just a one person thing and for it to be a two person thing, you have to be able to have that conversation and understand what each of you are valuing and all that kind of stuff. And that's sometimes a little bit hard if it's like a money person married to somebody who's just not as interested in talking about it or whatever. But both people matter and the understanding has to happen in order to actually create that budget.
And so the other thing that I wanted to mention that's maybe going to push a couple of buttons is that what we found is that going to, for example, a budgeting class at church, right? Like you're in some sort of a financial management workshop or how to get out of debt or whatever. What we found in the survey is that only 23% of people can talk about money. And guess who goes to the budgeting class at church? The people who can talk about money.
People who can already talk about money. And so one of the things that we have to grapple with that's really, really crucial is to recognize that there are many, many marriages out there. Maybe people listening to this where the money person has been trying to kind of carry it single-handedly and they don't realize that maybe they haven't really opened the door and drawn their spouse into that conversation.
Yeah, that's really good. Well, let's go there next because we've talked about you need to understand what's underneath the money conversation. We've talked about the fact that you need margin in your budget each month. This third one is all about communication, and I'm not surprised. It seems like everything in marriage comes back to being able to communicate well. So what else might you be able to offer for our listeners today in that area?
So the communication thing is, it is really, it's a secret weapon. And here's the issue again for, I think, people to grapple with. We, as you heard, 23% of people could talk about money well, 77% can't. And this is, as I think I said before, it's a nationally representative survey.
So this is very, very common, right? And here's really what we found in the, we did some regression analyses and we looked at some of the different factors. And we actually found that communication even trumps having that cushion and having the perfect budget and having built up the margin. If you, what we found is that statistically, if you can talk about money, even if that sort of technical stuff isn't perfect, you are far likely, more likely to avoid the negative tensions and the problems and the resentment and the defensiveness. Then if you have the perfect budget and you've built up lots of cushion and, you know, whatever, but you can't talk about money. And so that's something for, again, for people who are more money people to recognize that, wow, you know, I've, I've been doing a lot of this solo, right? Like I've, I've been creating the perfect, you know, budget and the great spreadsheets. And I've been working 80 hour weeks to build up, you know, a retirement plan and all that stuff is good. It's not like that's bad.
It's good. But what we found is that you are far more likely to have a better relationship. If you can pull in your spouse on that, even if some of that stuff isn't quite the way you wanted it, you're far more likely to have a great relationship around this area. Yeah. Well, Shanti, we've just scratched the surface today, but this is so key and helpful.
And there's a lot of fruit that comes from leaning into this, Shanti. I mean, I know you and Jeff experienced it in your own marriage. Isn't that right? Yes. I was worried you were going to come back to that one.
We started out not being able to talk about money at all and doing so just changed everything in our relationship. I love it. And that's what I want for our listeners.
I so appreciate you stopping by and taking a few minutes to be with us today. Absolutely. That's Shanti Feldhahn, bestselling author and researcher.
Pick up a copy of this book. Your marriage will be better for it. It's called Thriving in Love and Money. Much more just around the corner. Stay with us. We're grateful for support from Movement Mortgage, who provides residential home loans in all 50 states. Guided by a mission to love and value people and a goal to redefine the mortgage process, Movement seeks to help others achieve their financial goals. You can find out more at movement dot com slash faith movement mortgage LLC supports equal housing opportunity in MLS number 39179.
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We're back. I'm Rob West and this is faith and finance. It's the time of year that we're thinking about gifts. And I just want to say how grateful I am for the many generous supporters in our listening audience. You enable us to share the good news of God's wisdom on finances. Won't you consider sending a year in financial gift to help us continue sharing about what God has to say about money? Simply go to faith fi dot com and give your gift today. And again, thank you for your partnership. None of this would be possible without you. Let's talk to Esther in Rochester.
Go right ahead. I have an investment of a heritage that I got. You know, the family had left me and you had suggested before an online banking. What is the best online banking that you could give me advice on to invest my money that my family had left me?
Yes. So this is money you want safe with FDIC insurance. You're not looking to invest it in stocks and bonds. You really want it just in a bank high yield savings account. Is that correct? That's what you had advised me prior and just yes, correct.
Okay, very good. Yeah, if this is money that has a 10 year plus time horizon, I think you could consider, you know, putting it to work and perhaps investing it to try to outpace inflation. But if it's money that has a shorter time frame or you just you don't want to take any risk at all with it, then I think an online savings account now actually has some decent interest rates.
So I might look at Marcus, that's M-A-R-C-U-S dot com. You could look at Capital One 360. You could also look at Ally Bank, A-L-L-Y. What you're going to get with the online banks is much better yields just because they don't have the brick and mortar operation. So they're able to pass that cost savings on to you in the form of a higher interest rate and there's no fees.
So they don't charge anything to keep the account open. So any of those three would be great, Esther. Does that sound good? It sounds good. Okay, let's head back to the phones today to Indiana. Hi, Greg.
Go right ahead, sir. I'm 68. I'm talked to the company that I work for and I'm able to retire, work full time to the end of the year and then go to part time with them. And just to keep myself busy, but I've got like 350 in an IRA with them. My wife, I have another 400 in annuity and another 200 in fidelity.
And then we've got 50,000 in the bank and savings with 50,000 in bonds and then 75,000 in life insurance. But I was concerned about if I should wait to retire to roll over my IRA because I don't want to see it. I keep hearing things where my things might drop drastically.
And if I keep waiting, you know, waiting till the end of the year, I just didn't know if that was a wise thing to do. Or should I roll that over and service now and then go ahead and drop the part time in a month or so? Yeah, makes sense. So you would typically want to wait until you retire or separate from the company before you roll that out. I think there is some wisdom in combining the 401k with the IRA that you have. So you just kind of minimize the number of accounts you have for simplicity sake. And then secondly, you could hire an advisor potentially that could then take over and actually begin managing this for you on a monthly basis.
Which, you know, I think will make some sense to me. What are your main questions at this point just financially other than the appropriate time to roll that out? Are you wondering whether you're on track to retire or do you feel like you've already kind of run the numbers and know that you have enough to be able to supplement your income based on your monthly needs?
I think that I could supplement. Yeah, I didn't know if I tried to hold out and wait till the end of the year. Would I possibly take a substantial drop in the IRA that I have with them or the 401k I should say that I have with them? Is that a risk worth taking or should I roll it over now and then transfer to part-time? What is the 401k currently invested in at this point, the mix between stocks and bonds?
Do you know roughly? I believe it's like 30% that's a little risky and 60% or 70% that's not. But I'm only at risk for about 30% of it.
Okay. Yeah, so that's probably a pretty good place to be given what you've got here. I mean, remember, once you retire, if you're in good health, you need this money to last decades unless the Lord returns. So, you know, I think keeping an allocation to stocks even in retirement makes sense.
And, you know, at 65 or 70, I'd probably have still at least 30%. In some cases, you might want to have 40% in stocks just to provide that growth component. And then the balance and fixed income investments and maybe an allocation of the precious metals as well. So I wouldn't be necessarily making any major changes right now just based on what I'm hearing, especially if the 401k is down a little bit.
You know, we want to give that time to recover. And then I think the key would be that whenever you roll that out to the IRA, that you get it invested again immediately because you don't want to try to time the market in terms of when to get out, when to get back in. You just want to stay invested with the right allocation that's appropriate for your age and risk tolerance and give that the chance to work and grow over time no matter what's going on in the market, whether we're in a recession like we'll likely be later this year or we're beyond it and, you know, the market's making new highs. You just want to continue to stay with that long term perspective and, you know, apply that rules based approach that says, OK, I've chosen this allocation for these reasons and I'm going to stay the course. So I wouldn't necessarily see you needing to get out of that 401k right now.
I think this is a time just to stay put. And then when you're when you're ready to retire and you've separated from the company, then you'd start consolidating these into one retirement account where possible. And then you've got to choose. Do you want to manage this to yourself or hire somebody to do that for you? I'd have somebody do it, but I would also want to be drawing income from it. But yeah, that is the main reason that I would want to take it out of the 401k now and roll it over so that I would still maintain the same lifestyle or the way that we've been living. But you don't need to start drawing that income until you retire, correct? Correct. Yeah.
So and that's perfectly appropriate. I mean, that's really the approach you would typically take. You accumulate during your working years, the accumulation phase in 401ks and IRAs and whatever else you have. And then once you get into retirement, you convert that to an income stream. Typical rule of thumb there is four percent a year would be a good number for you to be able to draw it out and then still maintain that principal balance. So it would last the rest of your life and you can have something to give away or to pass on as an inheritance. But I would say leave that right where it is.
And when you're once you're retired, then you roll it to the IRA and let your advisor take over. Doing a great job here, Greg. Keep up the good work, my friend.
Well, that does it for us today. I'm Rob West. Thanks to our amazing production team and to you for listening. I hope you'll join us again next time right here on Faith and Finance. Faith and Finance is provided by Faithfi and listeners like you.
