Online Scams to Avoid

This is Doug Hastings, Vice President of Moody Radio, and we're thankful for support from our listeners and businesses like United Faith Mortgage.

Let's call it the couch cushion dash. This is the moment when you need a tip for the pizza man, a few bucks for your kid's lunch, or you can't say no to the sweet eight-year-old and her Thin Mints. But you've got no cash and no other options but to tear apart the house, searching for hidden money. It's Ryan from United Faith Mortgage, and it's funny how we can usually find a way to scrounge together a few bucks hidden around our house. Shame on you if it's from your kid's piggy banks.

For many listeners though, there's enough money sitting inside your home to buy a swimming pool full of Thin Mints. Home values have gone up across the country the last few years, leaving many of us with a good chunk of equity tucked inside our homes that we could cash out to use for life. If you'd like us to help, we are United Faith Mortgage. Ask financial advisors which emotions cause people the most trouble with their money, and most will tell you fear and greed.

There's even a fear and greed index that investors use to gauge market sentiment. Hi, I'm Rob West. Unfortunately, scam artists use those emotions too as they try to separate you from your money.

I'll talk about the latest ways they're doing that online today. Then it's on to your calls and questions. 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is MoneyWise Live, where God's financial principles always overcome fear and greed. With people spending so much time and money online these days, it's no wonder that scammers are also focusing their latest efforts there.

And the first one we'll look at is probably the most common. We've talked about phishing many times before. That's phishing with a ph, not an f. But it bears repeating because it continues to be highly successful for thieves. It's when cyber crooks try to make you think they're someone you can trust.

A company, perhaps a colleague or a friend. Most often they use email, but they've expanded their efforts to cover many other ways you might communicate with someone online. It's all to get you to give up your personal financial information or click a malicious link. In most cases, a phishing email will indicate that you owe money or that you're due money, again, capitalizing on fear or greed. You can often spot a phishing attempt by carefully reading the message.

They usually have poor grammar and misspelled words. When you see that, immediately hit the delete button. Next in the scammers bag of bad tricks is fake antivirus software. This happens when you're looking at a website and you get a message saying that your computer is infected. Usually they'll offer free software to clean your computer, but by downloading it, you'll actually infect your system with a virus or what's called malware.

Leave that page immediately and use only software from reputable anti-malware companies like Norton, McAfee or Intigo. There's another version of this that we might call the tech support scam. You'll get a phone call during which scammers try to pass themselves off as tech support from your actual anti-malware provider saying your computer is infected. They'll ask you to download an app that allows them to take control of your computer remotely so they can, quote, fix the problem for you. And after they have control, well, they'll actually download real viruses onto your system without you knowing it.

Guess what happens then? Well, they'll do a scan that, surprise, turns up those viruses. Then they'll require you to pay them to have the malware removed. And even if you hand over the money, there's no guarantee they'll actually fix the problem.

If you get a call like that, hang up. Reputable anti-malware companies won't cold call to tell you your device is infected. Norton, for example, says they'll only call you if you first contact them about a problem and their tech support is free to subscribers. And that's another clue that you're being scammed when tech support wants to charge a large sum of money to fix a problem, sometimes more than the device is even worth. Beware of ads on Google offering service for exorbitant sums because even scammers can advertise there.

If you have a problem, contact the manufacturer or a reputable anti-malware provider. The next online threat focuses on greed. Let's call it the fast and easy money scam. You'll often see these in search results. They'll take you to fake websites that offer quick money by doing almost nothing.

What are they really after? Often they'll try to get you to turn over personal information similar to what you might do if you were applying for a real job, like giving your social security number and other financial information. Never give out financial details in response to an email, ad, or search result. Another way the fast and easy money scam can get you is by requiring you to pay for something upfront, like purchasing training materials before you start the job. Once the scammers have your money, you'll never hear from them again. You know the old saying, if it seems too good to be true, it probably is?

That really is the case here. Jobs that require no skills or training and few work hours are rare as unicorns. If such a job really existed, they wouldn't have to advertise it. People would be lining up by word of mouth alone. Okay, we have time for just one more online scam and that would be fake shopping sites.

The internet is loaded with them and they usually have one thing in common. They offer you great deals on your favorite brands at ridiculously low prices, sometimes 75% off or more. Don't fall for these fake deals because then the scammers will have your credit or debit card information. There you have it, the latest online scams. Your calls are next, 800-525-7000. I'm Rob West and this is MoneyWise Live, where God's truth guides our every financial move. Welcome back to MoneyWise Live.

I'm Rob West. Thanks for being with us today. Phone lines are open, 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. We'd love to hear from you. Are you looking to know how to save for college? You want to think about your giving and how to approach the tithe of your life?

How to approach the tithe versus sacrificial giving? Perhaps it's longer term retirement or paying off that credit card debt. Whatever's on your mind today, we'd love to hear from you. Again, the number lines open 800-525-7000. Before the break, we were talking about online scams and boy, there are so many of them these days.

I think what we need to recognize is that we can simplify it a bit. Number one, ftc.gov, the Federal Trade Commission, has some great information on how to protect yourself. If you find you've been the victim of identity theft or you're suspecting, perhaps, fraud through a digital means, the FTC is a great source of information. I think you can boil it down to, number one, be really smart as to how you transact business online. Change those passwords regularly.

Make sure they're strong. Don't do business over public Wi-Fi. I think another big one is just this idea of phishing that we mentioned. Don't click on links in emails, especially if you don't know where it's coming from. Remember, they're impersonating, in many cases, legitimate financial institutions, so you'd be better off going directly to their website.

Don't do a Google search. Type it in yourself and make sure you get to the correct page and then never give information over the phone. Whether they claim to be the IRS, somebody in the legal area, or even the police department, no matter who it is it's calling, they won't ask for you to give personal information over the phone.

So just don't do it. Hang up and you can contact them directly. And we want you to stay safe online so you can be a good steward of God's money and hopefully this information today will help you. All right, let's head to the phones.

We're going to start today in my hometown, Fort Lauderdale, Florida, WKES, and welcome Winston to the broadcast. How can we help you, sir? Yes, good afternoon. My question is this. My first grandchild has gone off to college very soon, and I understand that when a child goes to college sometimes they get credit cards and, you know, when they come out of college they're in debt already because their parents are taking care of their college expense in regards to tuition and all of that. Now as a grandparent, is there a program that I could put some money in that if he has some personal needs he can go right to it and have access to it?

Is there something like that? Yeah, you know, I think the first question, Winston, and let me just back up and say I really appreciate your desire here to come alongside your grandchild and make sure that he or she can not only get through college but do so in a way that allows them to graduate debt-free so that they can start out on a strong financial footing. And, you know, when it comes to the money that you want to provide some assistance to, is it directly related to college expenses including tuition, fees, books, supplies, equipment, things like that, or is it really more spending money that may not be college-related directly?

Correct. More spending money. Okay, so then we don't want to use a 529 plan which is particularly attractive for financial aid reasons because it's considered an asset of the parent and it can grow tax-free.

So if this is really just to provide some extra spending money, I think the next question is make sure you have communicated with the parents so you all are on the same page about how you're going to go about this. And then you'll want to understand kind of where he has his account set up. Does he have a checking account with a debit card?

If so, great. You know, there's some really easy ways and systematic ways for you to transfer money into that account. Zelle is one that's fast and free.

It's very popular now. Z-E-L-L-E. You can learn more at zellepay.com. You could go to your bank and set up an automatic transfer, an ACH transfer of a certain amount every month right into his account. That would be one way.

You could use Venmo. If he doesn't have a checking account, I really like the one from Capital One called Capital One Money. It's specifically for teens, no fees. He'll have a debit card. They have a great smartphone app and you can use that to transfer money in and out of the account and really get him set up to begin managing money well. So I think the key for you is number one, communication with mom and dad so everybody's on the same page. And then number two, make sure that you set it up in an automated fashion so your grandchild knows when that money is coming in and you don't have to think about it.

You just kind of set it up and forget it and then you perhaps can come back every six months or so and see how it's going, perhaps even quicker than that. I think the other thing, Winston, is just to really lean into this opportunity to make sure your grandchild is learning God's way of handling money. And so perhaps as a prerequisite to you providing this assistance, you require that he or she read a book like Your Money Counts from Howard Dayton, which I'd be happy to send to you if you hold the line after we're done here today. And maybe you guys read it, you read it and he reads it and then you guys compare notes after every chapter. But keep in mind it's really important that he not only learn the financial literacy side of managing God's money well, but really the biblical underpinnings for all of it.

Starting with God owning it all and that he or she is a steward and that money is a tool and we need to live simply and hold it loosely and begin to practice generosity systematically at the very beginning before anything else. And just kind of all of these big ideas that so often kids leave home without understanding and they're really game changers positioning your grandchild for the rest of his or her life. Does all that make sense though? Make a lot of sense.

Alright, so let's just recap here. You stay on the line, we'll get you a copy of this book to pass along as one of your graduation gifts. Two, talk to mom and dad about whether or not your grandchild already has an account. If not, look at Capital One Money for teens.

And then thirdly, set up an automated transfer of whatever that amount is in and you can look at Zelle, Venmo or using the Capital One Money app for those transfers. We appreciate your call today. Let's stay in the state of Florida, head north just a bit and welcome Meg to the broadcast. Hi there. Hi. Go right ahead. Thank you for having me on the program.

Thank you. So my husband and I have been looking at least here in Florida, the housing market is booming. It's the seller's market, but the housing is quite expensive. And we also got some goals such as being debt free.

Right now, our only debt is our home and college for the kids and obviously giving more to God's kingdom. And we thought we could put that along with providing affordable housing for people and as an investment opportunity. And we thought about buying lots of land and putting manufactured homes on them.

And we've done some research. You could do that for about 100 grand selling for about 150 grand. And basically use the profit for the goals that I just mentioned and at the same time provide affordable housing. Yes.

I like that Meg. I think a couple of thoughts. Number one is tell me how you plan to pay for this. Do you have the money saved up to buy the land, the lot for this first property or will you have to borrow?

We would have to borrow. My husband has done some research. He talks about doing about 70 percent of it through.

He called it a development or a company that does give loans for development or construction. And then the other 30 percent via his father in law. But the idea would be that the profit that we make, the very first home that we actually were probably going to use a lot of that for a down payment for the next lot so that we wouldn't hopefully have to get into another loan when we repeat it again.

Okay. And have you talked about the terms with your father in law? Would that be where you all would share some of the profits or is he doing this just to be of assistance to you all?

It's assistance and eventually, yeah, obviously we would like him to. It will be like a partnership business thing. And do both of you feel like both you and you and your husband and your father in law, you feel like you have a solid financial footing underneath you? You don't have credit card debt. You have margin on a monthly basis. You've got an emergency fund.

You're on track saving for retirement. All of those things? Yes. Okay, great. And he's in a financial position to be able to do this as well? Yes.

Okay. I think the key there is, you know, so often we can go into these things with the best of intentions and then something doesn't happen the way we expect it to. Perhaps of no one's doing it just, you know, the housing market turns down, it takes longer to sell. You know, we get into a, we start to tip into a recession and the, you know, you haven't sold one of the properties and all of a sudden, you know, something goes awry and then there's relational damage in the midst of it. So I think you just want to go into it with everybody's eyes wide open, knowing the risk, making sure you have clear communication and I would even write it down as to what are the expectations and the terms. Is this a gift? Is it a loan? Is there interest that's going to be charged?

Is there going to be profit sharing? Put that on paper. That may seem too formal, but at least it's going to avoid any unmet expectations that could lead to a relational collateral damage, which certainly is, you know, no amount of money is worth that. So that would be the first thing. The second is, you know, I like that you're going in with some down payment.

I'd prefer that it be yours, but I can understand, you know, why you might want to do this. I think just understand there are some potential lender restrictions when it comes to not only investment properties, but also manufactured homes. You want to check local zoning ordinances.

You want to just make sure you've done your homework because, you know, manufactured homes are similar to a traditional single family home, but somewhat different in some respects. And so just make sure you have, have you done your homework on that side of it? Other than that, I would just say go slow. And before you, I like the fact that you're going to deal with one property first and you're going to realize some profit before you roll it into the next. Don't get over leveraged and try to do too much at once. I would say let's get to the place where hopefully, you know, you're buying these all with cash at some point down the road. And keep in mind, the market's been on a tear on the upside. We're going to see some softening here in the days ahead. Even if there's not any kind of bubble here that's going to burst, it's definitely not going to keep up with the growth rates we've seen.

It's just not sustainable. So I hope that helps, Meg. All the best to you and your husband and your father-in-law. This is MoneyWise Live. We'll be right back.

Welcome back to MoneyWise Live. I'm Rob West. Phone lines are open. 800-525-7000. Just ahead, we'll be talking to Peter in Michigan about investments. We'll be talking to Elaine in Alliance, Ohio about HSAs. And Mary in Austin about her mother-in-law's $20,000 in checking and where she can put that to a gruesome interest. But before we do that, let me mention here at MoneyWise Media, we're all about coming alongside you to be an encouragement, to provide hope and wisdom as you manage God's money well. And we do that every day by providing biblical financial content here on the radio, on the web and in our app. Providing innovative tools like we do with our digital envelope system in the MoneyWise app, which you can download in your app store. But we also provide expert guides, men and women who can come alongside you in your journey to be found faithful as a steward to provide helpful assistance.

And that really takes two forms. It takes on the form of our certified kingdom advisors. If you need professional financial advice, whether that's financial planning, estate planning, investment management, tax and accounting or even insurance. And our MoneyWise coaches. Our coaches are really there to help you with spending plans and debt repayment plans and giving plans.

They do it completely voluntary. These are men and women who just as a part of their ministry want to come alongside God's people to help them manage their money well. And here's the good news. We have a brand new team of MoneyWise coaches that have just come out of training. They're ready to go.

And so we've got some additional capacity. So if you want somebody to journey with you as you set up your spending plan and just think about how to manage God's money well. Maybe you've just been struggling to get out of debt and you need some encouragement. Our coaches can help. Here's where you go.

Head over to MoneyWiseLive.org. And if you need a CKA, click find a CKA and you can do a local search. If you want to connect with a coach, just click connect with a coach and we'll get you connected. And I know they'll be excited to serve you. And we look forward to hearing from you. All right. Let's head to the phones.

Austin, Texas. Mary, how can we help you today? Yes, I'm calling actually on behalf of my husband. He's always working and his mother recently asked him where she could place her money. She's accruing some money in her checking account. She lives so frequently, but we want her to be able to have access to it in case you were to have an emergency with her house or, you know, a car or something like that. But she has twenty thousand dollars and we just wanted to put it in a really safe place. Yes. Well, that makes sense.

And I'm glad you're walking alongside her to help her make these decisions. You know, right now, about the best you're going to do is one half of one percent. And, you know, you might find a few banks that go a little bit higher than that, but they're all going to be less than point six percent. A couple of my favorites are favorites are Ally Bank and Marcus.

You could find them online again, Ally and Marcus. You know, both of them have great websites, great smartphone apps. Here's the key, though. You can link it up to her checking account or she can with your assistance and you'd move the money over. It's going to be FDIC insured. There's not going to be any fees or expenses. She'll get that one half of one percent in interest over 12 months, but it's going to move up as interest rates move up.

So it should be a little higher down the road. The key is that it's safe and it's protected with the full backing of the full faith and credit of the United States government through the FDIC insurance. I like the fact, though, Mary, that you'd get it out of her checking account. You know, she's probably not somebody who's going to be out there spending uncontrollably. But, you know, it's an out of sight, out of mind thing. So you can transfer it over with the click of a button and it'll be there usually within a day or two through the ACH system.

But it's not mixed up with her daily spending money that would probably remain in her checking account. So I'd check those out. Pick one of the two. Again, Ally or Marcus.

You could also go to bankrate.com and look for others if you'd like to do that as well. And I hope that helps. We appreciate your call today. Folks, we're going to pause here when we come back.

A lot more to come. Victor wants to talk about trading stocks from home and Peter wants to know where to invest $100,000. So we'll tackle both of those, plus your question.

Here's the number, 800-525-7000. This is MoneyWise Live, where biblical wisdom meets today's financial decisions. We'll unpack God's truth around your life just ahead. Stay with us. Welcome back to MoneyWise Live.

So glad to have you along with us today. We've been taking your calls and questions covering a range of financial topics, applying God's truth and wisdom. We're going to do that with Elaine in Alliance, Ohio. Elaine, I understand you have a question about a health savings account. Is that right? Yes.

Hi. Thanks for taking my call. I have an HSA through Optum Bank. We own a farm, so we pay our own insurance. So it's a high deductible account. And I now have just over $27,000 in our health savings account.

And Optum on my online, when I look at it, they're encouraging me to invest quite a bit of it. Actually, they say I'm eligible to invest up to $25,000 of that money. I would love to look at it all as an investment, but it actually is money that we have set aside for our insurance, which has a family deductible of $12,000.

We're very blessed that we have had good health so far and haven't had to use much of that. But we're getting older and not sure how much of that I really, truly ought to keep in there as just savings and what I could actually invest. They're telling me $25,000. I'm thinking more like $20,000 to keep $24,000, like two years of my insurance worth.

What is your thoughts on that? Yeah. Elaine, is additional money being put in every month or over a fixed period of time? I put it in once a year. Okay. And how much are you adding to it? $7,000. Okay, great. And if you were to look back over the last couple of years, on average, how much are you taking out a year for medical expenses? $2,000 to $3,000 at the most.

Okay. Yeah, so I mean, generally, I would say, you know, at a minimum, you would want to make sure that you have what would be considered a reasonable amount for the year ahead, and then add some buffer to that, and then you could invest the rest. Because keep in mind, with you adding an additional $7,000 to it, and you're not even using anywhere close to that on average, and I realized that could change. You know, as long as you have a year or even two, as you said, in reserves for what could be expected, based on, you know, just what you've been spending historically, then I would say beyond that, you absolutely could be free to invest it. And that's really the beauty of the HSA is get that money working for you. It's a very powerful tool for retirement, because past age 65, you can pull that money out, and it doesn't have to be for medically related expenses. And so, you know, I think that alongside your other retirement savings vehicles will be a phenomenal resource.

But you also don't want to get in a position where you've invested money, money that's invested typically should be for the long term, meaning, you know, 10 years plus, and if you're having to sell investments, especially if it's a down market, you know, that's not the ideal situation. So that's why we want this one to two year buffer. And I think you could go on the one year end, just based on the additional money that's going in there every year, being so much more than what you need. Does that make sense?

Yes, it does. Now, when I look and I push to invest, they suggest betterment, and you just punch in your amount. Is that where you would go with that?

Yeah, I think that could work quite well for the amount of money you're talking about. You know, that's going to give you basically an index ETF approach. And basically what that means is they'll use exchange traded funds to build a portfolio that's very broadly diversified, it's going to have a mix of stocks and bonds, the allocation between stocks and bonds will be determined by your age and risk tolerance, which they'll put you through a questionnaire to determine that. And then among the stock portion, they're going to have a mix of international and domestic stocks, large cap, small cap, mid cap. So you'll have a good range of the indexes, which just means you're going to capture the broad moves of the market, not any one particular sector, but the market as a whole.

And that's probably a good thing. And the same will be true on the bond allocation, it'll be a mix of, you know, government and corporate short term, long term durations. And, you know, it's going to be very low cost. And again, you'll just get that long term growth as the market moves up. And obviously, there's going to be some bumps along the way, especially that, you know, given that we're 12 years into a bull market, but I think as long as you set aside what's appropriate for a year to at the most, then you could feel free to invest the rest.

And I think that betterment approach with the amount of money you're talking would work just fine. So thank you for checking in with us. If you have other questions, don't hesitate to call back Elaine. Let's head to Illinois.

Victor, you're next on MoneyWise Live. Go ahead. All right. All right. How you doing? It's wonderful to get through you all. I listen to you every day.

I've been trying to, yes, it's a blessing I give to Moody, one of my charities, and I'm just a blessing to hear you every day, especially when I get off work. I'm trying to do investment like trading from home. I took a course, but I'm trying to see, okay, what type of computer to get and what, who to get on to start doing that type of training at home. Like small training, starting off with a thousand dollars and work myself up, but learning how to do it first before I put in a whole lot of money. Sure. And Victor, are you thinking about short-term trading where you're trying to pick winners and losers and move in and out to capture up, you know, trends in the market quickly, or are you thinking about just being systematic with a long-term diversified investment strategy? Yeah, I'm trying to be systematic. I'm going to stay in for the long, learn it, and then work it, and not try to just get a little game and then you happy.

I'm looking for a bigger picture than that, a long picture than that. I'm glad to hear that because I wouldn't, I would encourage you not to invest if you were going to take the first approach. You know, when we invest, it should be for the long haul, meaning 10 years plus, we should have money that's going into the market after we've set up our emergency fund, after we've been giving systematically, after we've taken care of any, you know, short-term needs.

This is money that really truly is for the future and well into it. With that, we want to do it in a prudent way, meaning following Ecclesiastes, being properly diversified. We want to make sure that we're not too emotionally invested in it. It's such that, you know, if we were to see a downturn that lasted for even one to two years, you wouldn't automatically just pull the money out, you know, and try to time your re-entry point. You'd really, you know, leave it there as long as you have the right strategy and allocation.

So I think that's a good thing. If you're just getting started, I like the robo-advisors. You know, Vanguard has a robo-advisor. Charles Schwab has one called their Intelligent Portfolios. You could use Betterment, which we just talked about with the previous caller. Any one of those three would take you through a question and answer process, and then with an algorithm, they'd set up a very low-cost, diversified, indexed ETF portfolio.

It would rebalance periodically, and it would automatically reinvest every time you made a deposit, but there would be very little cost to it. So I'd go that route. Again, Betterment, Charles Schwab Intelligent Portfolios, or the Vanguard Advisor, which is their robo-advisor solution.

I think that'll give you what you're looking for. You can learn some things along the way. And by the way, if you want to do some more study on this topic, our friends at soundmindinvesting.org would be a wonderful resource for you to learn God's way of handling money and investments.

So check them out as well, soundmindinvesting.org. Thank you for listening, Victor, and for calling today. God bless you, sir. We're going to pause much more around the corner. Stay with us. Welcome back to MoneyWise Live.

We're having so much fun today. We're actually going to stay after for a few minutes and take some additional calls. So if you have a question you want to ask, I'd love to hear from you. Here's the number 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000. Let's go back to the phones.

Cleveland, Ohio. Hello, Andrew. How can we help you, sir? Good evening. How are you guys doing today? Thank you for taking my call. I love you guys.

Thank you, sir. I'm about to be married for the second time. I'm a widow, and I'm going to be 65 when I get married in November.

And I marry a young lady who's 54 now. And just, you know, we have kids from previous years and just want to know how to do the estate planning or how I, you know, like the house that I have right now was, you know, with my late wife. You know, my kids grew up in and everything and just trying to decipher how, you know, as far as, you know, moving forward, you know, we come together, is it, you know, things that, you know, like the house that was, you know, accumulated with the previous marriage and all of that. And it's just kind of want to make sure that, you know, I do things right from as far as my kids go, you know, and but also do right by her as well, you know, because, you know, something happened to me. And she's in the house that, you know, there was, you know, that I've been in for the last 25 years, and just don't know how to set that all up as far as, you know, with a wheel and estate planning and all that.

Yes. Well, that's great, Andrew, and I really commend you for thinking through this because, you know, we really need to think about as we merge our lives and two become one, that includes your finances. But it's so much more than that, obviously. And so making sure you all have done a good bit of premarital counseling, I think is critical from a pastor, somebody who, a Bible-based church, you know, that can really help you all prepare for this really big decision. And make sure that it's God honoring and that together you all are going to pursue Christ as the head of the marriage. But then also to take stock and think about the finances, you know, do a really understand, you know, where you're both at financially coming into this, how money was handled, not only in the previous marriage, but, you know, even growing up because that's so formative about how you all view money today.

What are your tendencies in these areas and how can you all come together as husband and wife? I think, you know, updating clearly your wills and estate documents will be critical just because of all the changes involved. And this is in one situation where I would say that a prenuptial agreement could apply. And the only reason for that is because when you're bringing two families together that obviously have kids that, you know, from previous marriages where there's, you know, wealth or debt from a previous marriage, it's not that we don't want to join husband and wife together.

We absolutely do. But what we want to make sure of is that, you know, if there's assets that need to stay with one family for the benefit of certain children on that side that that's talked about in advance and that, you know, there's relational trust built and that there's decision making that happens beforehand so that that can be then documented in a way that promotes unity. But also recognizes just the complexities of the financial lives that you're bringing to the table. You know, if you're coming in with assets, you may want to pass along assets to your children and she may want to pass them on to hers.

And that would be a decision you all would need to make. Doesn't mean in any way you're planning to get a divorce or you don't trust your spouse. It's communicating your concern for the future financial security of the other relatives and documenting that in either a prenuptial agreement. Or I love what our friend Ron Deal talks about when he talks about a togetherness agreement, which is essentially a different approach to the same idea where you really work through all these issues and then you could even have a togetherness agreement drafted by an attorney. So it's binding a legal contract and I would recommend you pick up a copy of his book, Andrew. It's called The Smart Step Family Guide to Financial Planning from Ron Deal and Greg Pettis. And it's when it's going to walk you through all of these issues and even get very specific about what that togetherness agreement can look like.

So pick up a copy of that book, The Smart Step Family Guide to Financial Planning, and then I would encourage you to connect with one of our certified kingdom advisors in the estate planning area there in Cleveland so that person can walk you through the questions and answers you need to be responding to. And then for any legal documents that need to be updated or drafted, they can handle that as well. Does that all make sense to you? Oh, absolutely. I appreciate it. It's Ron Deal and one gentleman who was helping write the book, Ron Deal and someone else. Greg Pettis.

P-E-T-T-Y-S. Greg Pettis. Yep, you'll find it on Amazon or at Focus on the Family and The Smart Step Family Guide to Financial Planning. Listen, all the best to you. We appreciate you listening and calling. We'll certainly pray the Lord's blessing over you. On to Zealand, Michigan. Peter, how can we help you, sir? Hi, thank you for taking my call.

So I have a question. After selling some property, we have about 100K that's sitting in the bank right now in a savings account. And I'm trying to see what would be the best way to invest the money. I know that I can live in a savings account and just kind of give me a half a percent or something in a yearly basis. We basically don't have any debt except for what remains of the house is we actually own about 100K in the house. So the rate that I have in the house is pretty low.

It's about 2.5. So I really don't want to put the money and pay off the home because the rate is so low. So that being said, I'm just trying to find ways that I can put 100K, set it aside as a savings, besides the regular savings account.

Yes. And talk to me about how you think this money will ultimately be spent and in what timeframe. Right now, we have two little kids.

They're about 11 years old. So it will partly will be for college, but not all of it. And I always want to have the variable in case of an emergency. We need it. We can tap into the money and get some of it out. We are putting enough in our 401K, so that shouldn't be a problem.

So yeah, that's pretty much it in regards to the money. And what savings do you have apart from this $100,000? I have another one which is basically just for regular expenses. So that one fluctuates between two to three grand.

Plus checking accounts that we use are expensive on a monthly basis. So this will be the one that pretty much is just sitting there right now, not making any money. Okay. Well, a couple of thoughts. Number one is, I'd like for you to think about this in terms of three buckets. Bucket number one is your emergency savings. It's that money that you would, if you had something unexpected, not planned replacement expenses, like we know the washer and dryer is on its last legs and tires on the car, things that we should be planning for. That's not a part of our emergency expenses. We're talking about your unexpected loss of income.

We're talking about a transmission that just goes out unexpectedly or something comes out of left field medically. That's where our emergency fund kicks in. And I'd like for you to have three to six months expenses in that first bucket.

Total up what you're spending on a monthly basis and multiply it by three or as much as six based on your comfort level. And I'd put that in an online savings account at Marcus or Ally Bank. You're only going to earn a half a percent, but you're not going to have to pull money out of an investment that's down when you need it for emergencies.

It's supposed to be liquid and secure. So that would be bucket number one. And you could link that right up to your checking account if you ever need it.

It's just an ACH transfer away. Bucket number two is that portion of the hundred thousand that you genuinely want to go directly toward college. And I'd set up a 529 plan for that portion. I'd go to saving for college dot com, run through their question and answer process to determine which is going to be the best 529 for you.

It may not be the one in Michigan based on the performance of the Michigan plan versus any tax benefits of you staying in Michigan with a 529. But that's going to get that money growing tax free as long as it's used for qualified educational expenses. Then if there's any money left over and you genuinely believe you're not going to need that money for 10 years, then I'd say go ahead and put that to work. And I'd probably use, you know, with whatever's left, let's say that's 50K.

You know, one of the robo advisors would be a great option. So Vanguard advisor, Schwab Intelligent Portfolios or Betterment. When you get up over one hundred thousand, I'd encourage you to contact a certified kingdom advisor to invest it. But I think as you're just getting started, that would be a great solution just to get you going.

But does that all make sense to you? Yeah, the last portion that you talked about at the Vanguard per se investment is that is that a 401K investment that you're talking about or is it different type of investment? It would be a taxable account because you're already doing your retirement savings. I mean, if you've got if you don't have a Roth, you could open a Roth IRA and put it away on. It wouldn't be a tax deduction, but you get tax free growth. But then beyond what you can put into the Roth, which if you're married would be 12000 for this year, unless you're over the age of 50, and then it'd be 14000 between the two of you. That money is just going to, I'm assuming, going to be in a taxable account.

But so it's you'd pay capital gains as you have profits, but at least it would be growing for you for the long term. Does that make sense? Yep, it does. Yeah, I appreciate your time and thank you for taking my call. All right. We appreciate it, Peter, and thank you for calling today. Well, I think that's going to do it for us today. We are going to stay after.

So if you're holding on the line, I want to encourage you to stay on the line because I have some extra time and our team is going to stay around and we're going to answer additional questions. But let me say thank you for being on the broadcast today, being a part of our MoneyWise family. I do want to remind you, MoneyWise Media is entirely listener supported. And so if you count yourself among the MoneyWise family, we would encourage you to prayerfully consider supporting the ministry.

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