Spring Cleaning Your Finances in 5 Simple Steps

As the weather warms up and everything starts to bloom, it’s the perfect time to clear out the clutter. Not just in your closet, but in your finances too. In this episode, Austin, Josh, and Jordan walk you through a five-step financial spring-cleaning checklist.

You’ll learn:

• What to ditch from your monthly budget
• How to refocus your short, mid, and long-term financial goals
• Smart ways to rebalance your investments
• How to use this year’s tax return to plan better for next year
• Tips to organize your documents and protect your financial life

For the full video, links, and show notes, visit thewealthmindsetshow.com/s2e10

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Chapters

• 1:08 Review Monthly Expenses & Cut Out The Clutter
• 8:26 Check in on Your Financial Goals & Set New Ones
• 10:35 Rebalance Your Investments & Portfolio
• 16:42 Tidy Up Your Tax Strategy
• 23:40 Organize & Simplify Your Financial Life
• 25:57 Key Takeaways for Financial Spring Cleaning

Transcript

You're listening to The Wealth Mindset Show where Hixon Zuercher Capital Management's team of finance professionals, portfolio managers, and a life coach come together to tackle complex topics in finance and retirement planning so you don't have to. From investment strategies and wealth management to tax planning, retirement income, and aligning your money with your values and purpose, The Wealth Mindset Show offers the tools to thrive.

Austin Wilson:

All right. Hey, hey, welcome to The Wealth Mindset Show, where our Hixon Zuercher team will have conversations on managing wealth, navigating retirement, and making smart decisions for a secure, meaningful future. I'm Austin Wilson, Director of Investments at Hixon Zuercher Capital Management.

Josh Robb:

And I'm Josh Robb, Director of Wealth Management at Hixon Zuercher Capital Management. And today we're joined by Jordan Shaw.

Austin Wilson:

The Jordan Shaw.

Josh Robb:

Another financial advisor here at our firm. And we are talking about financial spring cleaning. We're in that mode, right? You're getting out of the winter season-

Austin Wilson:

That's right.

Josh Robb:

You're getting outside. You're maybe doing some work in and out of the house so we want to talk how you can do that with your investments-

Austin Wilson:

With your money.

Josh Robb:

And your finances.

[1:08] - Review Monthly Expenses & Cut Out the Clutter

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely. So yeah, we're going to take time now to reset our minds and get ready to hopefully save thousands and put the year ahead into a good state of mind. So item number one, let's talk about it, regular expenses. Let's just take a review, take a step back, look at what we're spending on a regular basis. This is a really good opportunity at the beginning of a year, and as we're looking into the spring here, to look at maybe cutting down or eliminating expenses you could do without. So, the question that I have is, how many subscriptions do you guys have?

Josh Robb:

Oh, geez. I don't even know if I have the number answer.

Austin Wilson:

It's a lot.

Josh Robb:

It is a lot. You got your streaming services, and we have a couple of those, but then there's subscriptions of stuff where it's just ... We do some Amazon where you automatically get delivered-

Austin Wilson:

Subscribe & Save.

Josh Robb:

Toilet paper and the essential stuff you're going to need. They're subscriptions because they reoccur without me doing anything.

Austin Wilson:

So how do you keep track of them?

Josh Robb:

I have a budgeting app.

Austin Wilson:

Do you?

Josh Robb:

I do have a budgeting app so I do track expenses, and especially reoccurring ones. I do periodically look at those. And there are some where I question them but others think they're essential-

Austin Wilson:

Of course.

Josh Robb:

So, we're in a debate on those.

Austin Wilson:

Jordan, subscriptions?

Jordan Shaw:

Oh, yeah. Every month I look at every charge that comes out so I do keep tabs on it. One of the biggest reasons I do that is to see what am I paying for that I do not actually need. So sometimes my wife and I can disagree. The Ring app has a subscription that you can pay for the videos and things. And I was like "I don't think we need that." And she said, "I like it." Sometimes you don't really agree.

Josh Robb:

The first time someone steals something off your porch, and you can't-

Jordan Shaw:

Then I'll wish I had it, yeah.

Austin Wilson:

His neighborhood is a little sketchy-

Jordan Shaw:

Rough...

Austin Wilson:

Especially that ... Those people that are-

Jordan Shaw:

Right across the street, yeah.

Austin Wilson:

Diagonal from you. They're a little rowdy. That's me by the way.

Jordan Shaw:

Got to keep an eye on them.

Austin Wilson:

Yeah, got to keep an eye. We're the same way as Josh, I take a look at everything and same as you. Making sure I know what's being spent. Yeah, my iCloud is 10 bucks a month or whatever, and my ... Josh does free cloud services only.

Josh Robb:

Well, my Android phone has yet to use up all its free stuff, whereas Steph also has a iCloud. A friend of mine was telling me they got a server and cloud at their home. When they plug in at night to charge it automatically downloads all their pictures to a shared drive-

Jordan Shaw:

That's what you need.

Josh Robb:

For all their phones. That's pretty cool.

Austin Wilson:

That is pretty cool.

Josh Robb:

And so, I thought you, if you're going to pay for a subscription service for space, have it where you can all share. Because half the time I want Steph's pictures, not mine because she takes better pictures. So, if we have a shared drive that's on the cloud, that's pretty cool. So I'm thinking about going that route and we would all share one space.

Austin Wilson:

And we've got the typical streaming services and stuff as well. And this is not promoted or an advertisement in any way, but I found this app ... Of course, I fell for an ad for an app because they're all over the place, right?

Josh Robb:

We subscribe to it.

Austin Wilson:

And I'm on a free trial by the way.

Jordan Shaw:

For an app.

Austin Wilson:

But the app is called Monarch, and it is a-

Josh Robb:

Butterfly identifier, yeah. I use that one too.

Jordan Shaw:

Nice. We all use that.

Austin Wilson:

It's a financial bring everything in.

Josh Robb:

Okay.

Austin Wilson:

It looks at all of your accounts. You can link them so that it sees your transactions, of course, and categorizes them, and shows where your money's going. It has a whole section on recurring expenses.

Josh Robb:

Okay.

Austin Wilson:

So, if it sees things pop up more than a time or two it's like "Hey, is this recurring? How much should it be...?"

Josh Robb:

Now does it think Chick-fil-A's reoccurring?

Austin Wilson:

If you go there enough it would. And if you get the same order every week.

Josh Robb:

Spend the same amount.

Austin Wilson:

So that's really cool. You can link your investments as well and show that. So I just tried a free trial.

Josh Robb:

Do you like it?

Austin Wilson:

It's $100 a year at full price but they're currently running a special for 50. So if I like it after seven days I can keep it for 50 and then it'll renew at 100 -

Josh Robb:

The key would be, does it alert you that itself is a subscription recurring?

Austin Wilson:

Right, right. I know.

Josh Robb:

That's when you know they're being honest if they tell you that.

Jordan Shaw:

And that brings up a point. The annual subscriptions, I probably have more of those than the monthly. Those ones will sneak up. I once paid for an annual subscription to a trail app so I could go anywhere in the world and find a trail near me. And do you know how many times I used it?

Austin Wilson:

Once.

Jordan Shaw:

One time. When I was still on the free trial too, so I paid for nothing.

Josh Robb:

There's not a lot of trails around.

Jordan Shaw:

No.

Josh Robb:

And then half the time it renews and you're like oh, I got to remind myself next year. You continue because you forget. A year later, oh, I was going to cancel that.

Austin Wilson:

And with free trials because free trials are what seven days or 30 days or whatever. I always create a reminder on my phone.

Jordan Shaw:

I do that too.

Austin Wilson:

Sorry Josh, you don't know what I'm talking about, but Apple's new updates will put your reminders in your calendar app. Oh, it's the greatest thing since sliced bread.

Josh Robb:

You didn't have that?

Austin Wilson:

Yours already did?

Josh Robb:

Geez, yeah. Where else does it go?

Austin Wilson:

I know. So anyway, those are some ways to look at maybe some subscriptions you've got. Eating out is another thing to revisit. It's a huge budget buster for people. I mean, obviously, inflation has been high the last handful of years, and food costs have risen, and restaurant costs have risen across the board. So this is just a great time of year to say, "Hey, let's look back and" ... You can probably look back at all of 2024, at this time, and the beginning of 2025 and say, "Hey, on a monthly basis, how much am I spending on eating out? Is it reasonable?" Because maybe you're doing fine. Is it unreasonable? Because your body would probably thank you-

Josh Robb:

It's a trade-off. It's a trade-off.

Austin Wilson:

And your wallet would thank you but it's a trade-off there.

Jordan Shaw:

But I get cash back on dining.

Austin Wilson:

Oh, that's nice. So, can you afford not to?

Josh Robb:

I know.

Austin Wilson:

You're getting paid to eat.

Jordan Shaw:

Honestly, seriously.

Austin Wilson:

It's free food. You're getting paid to eat.

Jordan Shaw:

Yeah, come on.

Austin Wilson:

Here's another one, gym memberships. Anyone have a gym membership? Jordan does.

Josh Robb:

Jordan does, yeah.

Austin Wilson:

Do you use it?

Jordan Shaw:

I do. We do. But this is only month two of having it so check back a year from now.

Austin Wilson:

Jordan's going to be swoll and broke. No.

Jordan Shaw:

That's right. That's right, a trade-off.

Austin Wilson:

Everyone has a family ... Or a Planet Fitness, I feel like, membership for 9.99 a month.

Josh Robb:

And they forget about it.

Austin Wilson:

And no one uses it. I mean, not no one. The statistics are 25% of people who haven't used it or something like that. So that's a super interesting thing there. But yeah, another thing to look at as you're entering a new year is negotiations on things. Internet and cell phone are the two that come to mind. You actually have a lot more power as a consumer than you think. These companies will just routinely jack up your price and hope that you never say anything. Often if you do call and say something they'll give you a bit of a break.

Josh Robb:

Yes.

Austin Wilson:

I just recently did this. We have Spectrum, not a plug for them, but it's one of the bigger ones in the area here for our phone and our internet. And I was able to call and renegotiate. You have to threaten to leave and say you're looking at other things and then they're like "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, let's see what we can do here.

Josh Robb:

Looky here.

Austin Wilson:

But they usually will work with you because you're worth more at a 25% discount than a new customer at all. So call your cell phone provider, call your internet provider, maybe there's a deal that you can take advantage of there. As we enter the new year. The next thing we'll talk about is financial goals.

Josh Robb:

Yes.

[8:26] - Check in on Your Financial Goals & Set New Ones

Austin Wilson:

This is a great time to be starting ... Revisiting those goals you set in the past and are they still applicable. Or setting new goals you want to hit by the end of the year or by summer. So, Josh, talk a little bit about that.

Josh Robb:

I mean, there's a couple of reasons. One, you mentioned cashback so credit cards. A lot of times they're going to send you an annual summary at the end of the year, and so that's a good time to start this process of looking back and checking your financials to say, "How did I do on my spending? How did I do on my savings?" I can look at this year-end review type of thing and set or reset those goals. So if my goal was to increase my emergency fund, what did I start? How did I end? Did I actually accomplish that? And then where do I want to go from here? Is that at a good spot or do I want to keep going and saving?

So short-term goals, those are the ones that you're going to try to hit maybe in this 12-month period and say, "Okay, what do I need to do to get there?" And then your midterm goals, that is probably more paying down some debt. Things you're not going to get this year but in the next maybe three to five years you're going to hit. Those are the ones where you're evaluating what's changed. Maybe some of that debt you could refinance, if interest rates move, those types of things to make it easier. And then your long-term goals, which are your retirement, that's the one you mess with the least.

Austin Wilson:

Oh, probably.

Josh Robb:

But it's good to check on them.

Austin Wilson:

Especially when you're younger.

Josh Robb:

Yes. For instance, let's say you're saving in your company's 401K or whatever their retirement plan is, getting the match, did they change anything in the plan? If the answer is no, you probably also don't need to do anything unless you want to increase your savings, obviously. But if you set your goals and you're on track it's just a review. Just a quick look to say, "Am I on track?" Those short and midterm you're going to be adjusting more often. Long-term, just am I heading in the right direction?

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely. Jordan, any thoughts on goal setting?

Jordan Shaw:

Yeah. I like the whole concept of it being spring cleaning here. If you look at this every month it can almost be discouraging. You have that month where-

Austin Wilson:

Profits, yeah.

Jordan Shaw:

If you have a month where all those annual subscriptions come due it's like wow, I didn't hit any of my goals because I'm paying $500 more than I used to. But looking at it over the course of a year or six months or something like that is helpful because you can see okay, I did make progress. It was slow and steady but I'm working. Or, I didn't, and here's why I need to make some changes.

[10:35] - Rebalance Your Investments & Portfolio

Austin Wilson:

Next up, rebalancing. So we are advocates of rebalancing your portfolios on a periodic basis which I'm sure we're going to talk about the different philosophies you can do there. But one thing to keep in mind is that markets move, right? Certain areas of the markets do really well, certain area markets don't do so well. Certain asset classes do better than others. It's time to be on some sort of a plan for periodic rebalancing. And, Josh, talk a little bit about the benefits of rebalancing.

Josh Robb:

When you look back historically, rebalancing on a set schedule ... And again, this is not reacting to the market-

Austin Wilson:

Correct.

Josh Robb:

It's on a schedule to say, "It's time to do it again." Reacting on the market is more emotionally based decision-making. This is saying, "Okay, it's"-

Austin Wilson:

Quarterly, annually.

Josh Robb:

"Twice a year, once a year, whatever you choose, it's time to get back to where I need to be." If things are up and you're selling them to get the things that are down you're buying when they're up. I mean, it's what you want to do. And you're doing it on a schedule instead of emotional reaction. There's really two reasons why you rebalance. One is adjustments based on what's going on around you. Again, not emotionally reacting but just finding opportunities. And then the second one is cash needs. So the other reason why you want to rebalance periodically is to make sure you have the right amount of cash in your accounts. Sometimes you may have too much and you need to rebalance and put it to work. Especially in retirement, I need cash. I have withdrawals coming out so I'm going to rebalance to generate what I need. So those are really the two reasons you want to rebalance.

And talking about this spring cleaning, the main one we're focusing on is that getting back in alignment, right? If you need cash you're going to generate it but you might as well get back in line while you do it. But what we're talking about here is okay, what's changed? How can I utilize my investments to take advantage of that? Again, I'm not running from something that I'm scared of. It's saying, "What's different than what it was last time?" For instance, tariffs have happened in the last six months. So if I'm reviewing my portfolio, if I'm doing this spring cleaning, anything that I want to switch because of this new news that we have going around ... Just being strategic and planning through, not because I'm scared that something's going on, I'm just ... Let's take an opportunity and see where we're at.

Austin Wilson:

Another thought on that is, if you are systematically pulling money out or putting money in, you're rebalancing yourself, right?

Josh Robb:

If you're generating cash proportionately-

Austin Wilson:

Exactly.

Josh Robb:

Or you are adding cash proportionately-

Austin Wilson:

Correct, correct.

Josh Robb:

You are going to stay more in line.

Austin Wilson:

You mentioned maybe having too much cash. Maybe you're not in the distribution phase you're in the accumulation phase. So maybe you had a bunch of your investments that pay dividends, most do especially in mutual funds and stuff like that, this is an opportunity to go in and make sure, if you can, to turn on dividend reinvestment and stuff. That makes things like cash buildup not really an issue. But, Jordan, I was going to ask you, what are your thoughts on frequency of rebalancing? And what you like to see or how you see that working?

Jordan Shaw:

Really the best thing is you don't want to be doing it too much. I would say doing it too much is going to be arguably more detrimental than maybe doing it every couple of years. I would say, key at least once a year. I like quarterly. I like having someone in your corner that you can talk to like an investment advisor and say, "Okay, make a goal, make an idea of how many times are we going to be looking at these targets that we're trying to rebalance too." But I've come from working with passive investment managers. Obviously, we're, here at Hixon Zuercher, active investment managers. There's ways to do both well. But if you're overactive in the sense that you're getting in and you're making tweaks constantly, that is going to hurt your returns. It's not really the point of investing for most people so I think that's what you want to avoid.

Josh Robb:

And I'll say, when it comes to retirement planning, or just investing in general, this is also a good time to review how much you're saving because you may have gotten a raise, there may be other cash flow changes to your budget where it's good to decide, do I take a portion of that new money and add it to my retirement savings? While you're looking at this rebalance also look at your cash flow in and out of that account and say, "Do I need to adjust this?" And if you're spending, is that spending number still the same, right?" So during this rebalancing review stage, how's my cash flow in and out, whichever direction it's going? Let's say I was doing 100 bucks a month and I got a raise at work, can I do $125 a month? What can I do to increase my savings? And then on the other end, if I'm retirement, is my cost of living going up where I need a little more money? Do I need to rebalance or readjust that?

Austin Wilson:

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We understand that complex financial situations call for deep expertise in investing, tax strategies, and retirement planning but our approach goes beyond that. We integrate your financial goals with your core values helping you visualize the possibilities your wealth can create for a secure future. Our mission is to build, protect, and grow your wealth while keeping your vision at the forefront of our strategies. If you're ready to take the next step in your wealth management journey visit hzcapital.com/start to see if we'd fit your needs and to schedule your intro, call. Again that's hzcapital.com/start. Now let's get back to today's episode.

[16:42] - Tidy Up Your Tax Strategy

Austin Wilson:

All right. Next topic to discuss is taxes because guess what? It's springtime. You probably just filed or are about to file. Hopefully, by the time this comes down you've already filed.

Josh Robb:

Or extended.

Austin Wilson:

Or extended. You filed your taxes, you know whether you got a refund, or you owed, and how much that was in relation to your income. You know a lot of information. I just love our American tax system where the government's like ... You're like "How much do I owe in taxes?" They're like, "Oh, you tell me. You have to let me know and then we'll audit you if we feel like it's maybe not so good." But that's the American tax system. So, Jordan, talk about things you may have learned during tax season, withholdings, deductions, things like that. Life changes as we've both had over the last year that impact your taxes. So talk a little bit about your thoughts on that.

Jordan Shaw:

First I just want to say, I wish every tax interaction and process that I've gone through was like filing with the city because all I had to do ... I just did this yesterday. Gave them my 1040, and they went into the back room for about five minutes came back out and everything was withheld perfectly. It's just one little calculation they have to make. And, obviously, that's not the federal or state situation.

Austin Wilson:

Their tax law's a little bit bigger.

Jordan Shaw:

Exactly. So with that, obviously, you have a lot more uniqueness, a lot more changes and things you have to pay attention to, especially when you're having kids or changing jobs or changing states. Last year was a crazy year for us. It's okay if not everything is perfect, you can't really predict everything. We had a kid at the very end of the year and there was no-

Austin Wilson:

Good move from a tax perspective.

Jordan Shaw:

Good move from a tax perspective, bad move from a tax planning perspective because it was really hard to make sure that the withholdings were perfect. It's really being able to identify as much as you can of what will happen throughout your year, and working with a tax professional or a tax planner to help you figure out what that looks like for you to make sure you're optimizing that. You don't want a huge refund, you don't want a huge payment that you owe. In most cases that's what we see which is unfortunate.

Josh Robb:

I think that withholding. If you're employed, you get a W-2 at the end of the year and you get to elect how much you want withheld from your payroll every pay period. And that's something you can adjust at any time throughout the year. What you need to know is, I want to withhold enough to cover my tax obligation but I don't really want to over withhold. Although I get money at the end-

Austin Wilson:

It was a tax-free loan.

Josh Robb:

That was my money anyways. They didn't give me extra money that was my money. We usually try to say, "Make it as small as possible. Just don't pay any penalties. But you want to pay what you owe and do it along the way to avoid any of that. So that's the key when you talk about ... When re-evaluating. The main thing you're going to tweak is your withholding.

Austin Wilson:

Josh, talk a little bit about the tax-advantaged account situation, planning for limits, and stuff like that in the new year.

Josh Robb:

There's different timeframes on what you can and can't do. We'll start with your employer plan so 401(k)s, 403(b)s. You have through the calendar year to contribute into that plan and it comes from your payroll deduction. So, you have to make changes to your payroll deduction in order to increase or decrease that. On 12/31 you're done. Now if you have retirement accounts outside of your employer so a Roth IRA or traditional IRA, those type of accounts, you actually have until you file your taxes in the next year to make contributions. If you get to February and you haven't filed yet and you're like "You know what? I wish I would have added some more money to my retirement." You still can which is nice. You have that ability up until you file your taxes. So there's two different timeframes there. But any money you put into something that's called tax-deferred, it means you're paying taxes later, you're deferring taxes, you usually get a deduction, usually. There's some income limitations. But usually get a deduction in that year. So you want to make sure your tax form shows that to get credit for that deduction.

Jordan Shaw:

I'll also mentioned too, with some of those tax advantage accounts, the limits of what you can put in to fund that pre-tax growth in those accounts it does change-

Austin Wilson:

Every year almost, yeah.

Jordan Shaw:

And a lot of times people aren't notified of that so paying attention to that. If you're able to save as much as possible in those accounts, and you haven't looked at it in a couple of years, you might be putting in below what you actually could and missing out on a couple of thousand dollars of more contributions.

Josh Robb:

And then if you own a business ... This gets a little more complicated because there's a lot of deductions and expenses you can write off and all that. But make sure that you're just thinking through those costs and what you can do. Maybe at the end of the year it'd be better for you to buy some new equipment than owe tax, right? So, you'd rather just spend it on the business to reduce your income and have something to help your business than in January 1st owe that to the government. End of the year is a lot of times when you do tax planning as a business owner, not in March, April when you're filing your taxes because you want to know how much am I probably going to owe. Can I reduce that by doing something that would be beneficial for the business?

Jordan Shaw:

Right.

Austin Wilson:

I actually heard this funny story of an old farmer who was like, "How do you prevent paying these huge tax bills at the end of every year? You know you have a bunch of tax due?" He's like, "Well clearly you've never gone shopping for a pickup truck at the end of the year for your farm."

Josh Robb:

Right.

Austin Wilson:

That's a good way to deduct a lot. So yeah, that's taxes. Or not if you, you should have some way of organizing your tax documents. Now these come in usually at the beginning of the year for the prior calendar year so you've probably already got them for 2024. But there are two ways that I would recommend doing this. Number one, if you're old-fashioned, keep that paper document in a folder, in a firebox or something, labeled properly. Number two, if you're not so old school ... This is the way I do it is Jenna and I have a shared iCloud folder, Apple.

Josh Robb:

No, that's nice. It seems nice.

Austin Wilson:

As we get those documents in, scan it, and shred it. Scan it and shred it. It's there, if you need it and you never have to worry about it. And then after so many years you can go delete those old folders because you're not going to need them again.

Josh Robb:

Seven I think is the-

Austin Wilson:

Yeah.

Josh Robb:

Seven years is the-

Jordan Shaw:

Seven years.

Josh Robb:

The amount of time you have to keep them. Tax forms from accounts so investment accounts where you make contributions or have capital gains. But the other ones that you have to keep in mind, depending on if you itemize, is property tax. You're going to pay your property tax at some point this year, maybe twice a year depending on how you pay your schedule. That's a tax deduction if you itemize. There's certain things that they're not just tax forms but those. Contributions to charitable organizations. They're going to send you a receipt probably when you make the contribution. They don't always do it at the end of the year-

Austin Wilson:

Unless it's recurring.

Josh Robb:

So, you got to hold onto those, scan it in, or put it somewhere. Because at the end of the year instead of trying to call them all and say, "Hey, can I have another" .... Collect it. Collect it as it goes.

[23:40] - Organize & Simplify Your Financial Life

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely. All right. Last topic we're going to talk about is organizing your financial life in the new year. So, Jordan, what are some thoughts and just general topics that people just need to keep in the front of their mind as they're just getting set up for a new year of planning?

Jordan Shaw:

Well, I would say you don't have to do it all at once. That's key there. I think of actual spring cleaning like yard work. I was out a couple of weekends ago and I did a little bit of progress, but I wasn't able to get a whole couple hours’ worth of stuff done to make my yard look the way I wanted to.

Austin Wilson:

A noticeable difference.

Jordan Shaw:

Thank you. See, you noticed that there was about a 5% increase in the-

Austin Wilson:

It was marginally better.

Jordan Shaw:

Marginally. But that really is the key. If you can just start making one or two of these changes. Start going through just the last few weeks of what are you spending money on. Are there some things that you can organize better with your tax documents? Little things. Looking at your withholdings. Making a plan doesn't mean you have to do the whole plan in one sitting. Just keeping that front of mind.

Josh Robb:

And prioritize what are the most important things. What are the things that either are most valuable to you or will have the biggest impact? One of the ones, like we talked at the very beginning, is if I can save some money that's probably valuable to me so maybe you start there and see what you can do and then work down your list. But estate plan, periodically review maybe once a year, just a quick scan through, anything change. Anything changes that I need to update? The other one is credit cards. Check your credit report, make sure there's nothing wrong with those. If you're signed up for any alerts or software, there's LifeLock or those types of things, where they may alert you ahead of time. But it's good to just do a quick review. You can get a free report on your credit from the three different bureaus. Once a year just do a scrub through of that, that's a nice spring cleaning thing. Passwords, that's your most likely vulnerable spot, review that. Am I reusing them? Do I have one favorite word I use everywhere?

Jordan Shaw:

Password one, two, three on everything.

Austin Wilson:

Enable two-factor authentication-

Josh Robb:

Oh, that's the best.

Austin Wilson:

On everything you can.

Josh Robb:

Yes.

Austin Wilson:

Because even if your password's the same, you ... Someone couldn't probably get in that easily.

Josh Robb:

No. It adds one more layer that they'd have to also have access to the phone or wherever you're receiving that.

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely.

Josh Robb:

Probably don't put in your email if you use the same password on your email as whatever it is-

Austin Wilson:

That's right.

Josh Robb:

But that's a whole other thing.

[25:57] - Key Takeaways for Financial Spring Cleaning

Austin Wilson:

But I think, Jordan, you hit the nail on the head here. I think that it's little incremental things that can really add up over time. What's the philosophy? If you can get 1% better every single day instead of getting big chunks at a time, you're actually going to end up being much better over time. So just take the long path here and make little chip away at those little things because they're going to add up over time. Yeah, that's what we have for spring cleaning your finances. Any closing thoughts?

Jordan Shaw:

By the end of the summer my yard is going to look so good you just wait.

Austin Wilson:

Before the fall. Before leaves fall.

Jordan Shaw:

Right before the leaves fall-

Austin Wilson:

That's good. I appreciate that.

Jordan Shaw:

It's going to be clean.

Austin Wilson:

Josh, anything?

Josh Robb:

The key is just don't overwhelm yourself, and don't beat yourself up if you don't get everything done. But set some goals and just work towards them like you said.

Austin Wilson:

Absolutely. Well, if you found value in our conversation don't forget to subscribe to The Wealth Mindset Show on whatever platform you're listening to so you don't miss an episode. Also, feel free to visit us at thewealthmindsetshow.com for more resources, transcripts, links, all kinds of stuff we talk about on the show. If you're ready to invest with us head over to hzcapital.com we'd love to hear from you, and maybe we can be a good fit. And, of course, invite you to follow us on social media so that you can keep up with what's going on in our lives and with the podcast. We're on pretty much all the platforms so stay connected. Thank you for listening and we'll see you next time.

Josh Robb:

All right, thank you.

Austin Wilson:

Bye.

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