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Military Money Manual Podcast Episode 1 Transcript
[00:00:00] Spencer: All right. Welcome to the inaugural episode of the Military Money Manual Podcast. I'm Spencer.
[00:00:06] Jamie: I'm Jamie.
[00:00:07] Spencer: And I am the owner operator writer of the Military Money Manual website. That's “militarymoneymanual.com”. I'm investing for financial independence by age 40. And I'm an Air Force Officer with no kids. That's a little bit about my background.
[00:00:24] Jamie: I'm also an Air Force Officer. I have three kids and mostly just here because I'm Spencer's friend and fellow travel enthusiast, fellow financial personal finance enthusiast. And we're just here to talk a little bit today about what we've learned over the years.
[00:00:39] Spencer: So, this podcast is mostly designed for people who are in the military, whether you're enlisted. A military spouse. and if you don't know how to invest, you've never learned how to invest. if you're looking for a financial coach or a goal to work towards, that's kind of why we started this podcast is we've had a lot of conversations about personal finance in the military about travel . And we just want to share some of the things that we've learned over the years with you. So, three topics we want to talk about today, emergency funds. And Jamie had a recent experience where you had to use an emergency fund and that kind of sucked. And we're gonna talk a little bit about travel and if you want to learn more about that, I've got a whole course set up on my website and then I've also got a book coming out later this year. So yeah.
[00:01:34] Jamie: I've gotten to see a preview of. It's pretty good. I'm excited for it to come out.
[00:01:37] Spencer: Thank you for that. So speaking of emergency, Jamie, you recently had your, was it two-year-old Honda?
[00:01:47] Jamie: it was a 2016, so almost five years, five years old. And it was giving me some issues, very kind of electrical car. And so, it was beyond my capability to repair myself. took it to the dealership. They basically couldn't find anything wrong and said it was more of nuisance faults. Basically, finally got fed up with it after four, maybe even six months of, of driving it with these issues. Found another local dealership that had good reviews online a repair center, not a dealership, sorry.
And they found a whole slew of stuff that was wrong with it, including a Honda serviceable of how to fix it. Long story short, it was about $2,100 worth of stuff, which when I first entered the military, as a second Lieutenant, that would've been a significant emotional event. And we talked about it even of how it seemed like a significant emotional event to me, but in the grand scheme of things really wasn't because we've saved up for about five months of our expenses in our emergency fund.
So, we were able to just pay for that bill. And after a couple weeks, the emotional sting of paying $2,100 to get your car. Was pretty much gone.
[00:02:52] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:02:53] Jamie: so that's, that was kind of a neat example of one thing. I wish we had the capability to do when we were a little bit younger newly weeds with no kids or when we only had one kid and it just takes a little bit of time and a little bit of deliberate planning and being intentional with your budget and you’re spending to make something like that happen.
[00:03:09] Spencer: Did you have an emergency fund, like right when you got into the military or did you like, like what kind of.
[00:03:19] Jamie: Yeah. So, I, I think, yeah.
[00:03:20] Spencer: When did you start saving for one
[00:03:21] Jamie: Probably, my first year or maybe second year in the military, I started following more of like the Dave Ramsey plan of building up a small emergency fund, paying off all your debt aggressively and then building up a bigger emergency fund and then going into long term savings like college and house and, and stuff.
When we first got married, my wife and I were more than a hundred thousand dollars in debt.
[00:03:45] Spencer: Ouch!
[00:03:45] Jamie: it was about $107K or so I looked at, I went back and looked it up a couple months ago. Yeah, of course I have lots of spreadsheets archived on it. but it was both of us had a USAA career starter loan.
[00:03:56] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:03:57] Jamie: Which you talk about in your book and on your website. we had car loan. We had lots of student loans for my wife, and she also had some credit card debt that was from before we got married, but we were obviously tackling it as a team at that point. So about $107K or so and we were able to pay that off in about 24 months.
[00:04:17] Spencer: That's awesome.
[00:04:17] Jamie: In total, which was super aggressive, but that basically is how we started down the path towards financial independence or financial freedom or financial peace, depending on which program you're talking about.
[00:04:26] Spencer: Yeah. Yeah. It's that's pretty good. A hundred thousand dollars in 24 months. That's probably a whole other episode right there.
[00:04:34] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:04:35] Spencer: My wife and I, when we got married, had about $110,000 between the two of us and we paid it off and it took us four years. She actually paid hers off in a year by like living at home with her parents and just. You know, not going out.
[00:04:50] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:04:50] Spencer: Just smashing it.
[00:04:51] Jamie: It sometimes takes an aggressive, mindset and just focus of this is my goal and we're going all in to get rid of this.
[00:04:59] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:04:59] Jamie: And once we had the ability to control where our money went, it was very freeing.
[00:05:03] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:05:03] Jamie: And then looking back on it now and saying that we, you know, have emergency funds saved up, we saved up for vacation. We'll talk about a little bit more in a second, but you, you we've determined where our money goes instead of the Toyota financing department.
[00:05:17] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:05:18] Jamie: And whatever else.
[00:05:19] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:05:19] Jamie: student loans, determining where our budget goes.
[00:05:22] Spencer: Yeah. It's so liberating when you finally are debt free. and you get to decide where every dollar goes.
[00:05:30] Jamie: Exactly.
[00:05:30] Spencer: And that's something that is just like, it's amazing because instead of like, oh, I have got to make these payments, you know, like, yeah, you have got to pay rent, you have got to pay your mortgage. You still have got to pay wherever you live. but you're not paying like for a choice that you made years ago.
[00:05:45] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:05:45] Spencer: Right. Like you get to make new choices now.
[00:05:46] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:05:47] Spencer: So that's pretty cool.
[00:05:48] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:05:49] Spencer: one article that we read recently was about how 39%. Of Americans. I, I think it's probably either higher in the military just anecdotally, but 39% of Americans can't come up with $400 in an emergency. And to me that's just insane. Like 400 bucks is not that much money, even if you're just got in the military, and, you know, fresh outta bootcamp or whatever, like your expenses are nothing.
[00:06:21] Jamie: Yeah. Even for junior enlisted.
[00:06:23] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:06:23] Jamie: They should, you know, and typically I think it's just, someone's never showed them.
[00:06:27] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:06:27] Jamie: I don't want to give away too much of your book, but one of the section talks about like none of my commanders, none of my supervisors, nowhere in tech school or in basic training or an ROTC or whatever training you go through to get in the military. No one talks about this and they're, their course is available at the airman family readiness center or military family support center and things like that. But you have to go seeking out. So, you have to have someone to nudge you, whether it's a friend or supervisor to kind of show you that this is something you should care about.
And it's, even if it's a selfish, motivation, if I want my life to be better in 10 years, then that's okay. But, but do something. But $400 isn't much. And so, I, I think if most people haven't been able, uh- to cover those kinds of expenses and they just- no one's ever showed them. Their parents probably didn't set a great example for them. And then no one in the military teaches that.
[00:07:13] Spencer: Yeah. I mean, well, like everything in the military, right? Like if someone can't do a task it's because they didn't have good training.
[00:07:18] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:07:19] Spencer: So, like that's, it's the same thing in finances, right? Like if no one shows you how to do it or no one shows you like, hey, you can't spend your entire paycheck or even worse. Like you can't be a paycheck behind
[00:07:30] Spencer: Where you're just covering next month's credit card statement, which was kind of like where I was when I was a second lieutenant. and then I got married and my wife showed me how that was really stupid.
[00:07:39] Jamie: Haha, yea! But you're not alone. I mean, and, and the, the situation that we both came into marriage with as, you know, getting real money for the first time.
[00:07:46] Jamie: Both of us being married, relatively young compared to some of our friends and then both of us coming with debt into the marriage. And then next thing you. as a couple, you have more than a hundred thousand dollars student loan. And the average for the new couple in America is I would have to look at the article, but 60 or 70 grand, I think is the average for a newlywed couple.
[00:08:06] Jamie: and so every, the large majority of couples starting off in the hole, like that is, is just not good. So yeah. Getting out of debt early and quickly and aggressively, or intentionally allows you to have an emergency fund and cover some of the expenses that pop up, because life happens. It, it will happen.
[00:08:23] Spencer: Yeah, one thing I will say though, is that like, once you kind of have the financial foundation built is something that I've seen over the last couple years is like, as my incomes increased, as I spend, you know, more time in the military and the time in grade increases go up and the promotions happen, my wife makes more money, is that it's still good to have like cash immediately available, but like the amount of cash, eh, like I've gotten to the point now where like, we basically just leave $10,000 in our checking account and it just kind of floats, you know, like we don't have a specific like emergency fund set aside, but we just keep enough cash on hand that we could cover something if we need to.
But between all the credit cards we have, like, we would be able to, you know, if there was. $2,000 auto bill, we'd be able to cover it with a credit card and then find the money within the next month or so.
[00:09:17] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:09:17] Spencer: So, it's a little more precarious of a situation and I definitely don't recommend that if you're just starting out.
Like when I first was starting out like the thousand dollars emergency fund and then building it up to where it covered, two, three months of expenses was essential to like getting out of debt. Building the financial foundation and then like rapidly accelerating the road to financial freedom.
[00:09:36] Jamie: Yeah. I think one of the hard parts is there's so many things, whether it's investing in the TSP or whatever the options are, how do I get out of debt? How do I save for retirement? How do I open a Roth IRA? Whatever it is. just do something.
[00:09:49] Spencer: Yeah!
[00:09:49] Jamie: Just move in some direction.
[00:09:50] Spencer: Yeah!
[00:09:51] Jamie: That's gonna point you in the right direction as you're making progress little by little.
[00:09:55] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:09:56] Jamie: instead of getting just frozen with the amount of potential options.
[00:10:02] Spencer: Right.
[00:10:02] Jamie: Just pick one and start doing something. So, yeah, like you said, analysis para-analysis paralysis. Yeah. But like you said, probably relying on a credit card better as your net worth, you know, you go up a little bit and you have a little bit more cash flow sitting around. but it, it, it gives a real peace of mind too, for some people, to just have, have some cash sitting it ready to go.
[00:10:25] Spencer: Definitely.
[00:10:25] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:10:27] Spencer: Cool. Well, thanks for sharing that story. so the other topic, one of the other topics I want to talk about today was travel and the trip that we just got to do together with our spouses.
[00:10:43] Jamie: Just amazing.
[00:10:44] Spencer: So if you want to talk about that for a minute and just like where we went and how we were able to do it.
[00:10:52] Jamie: Yeah, yeah!
[00:10:52] Spencer: And then I'll-
[00:10:53] Jamie: It was great.
[00:10:53] Spencer: Maybe, maybe you can say how you guys booked in and we'll say how we booked it.
[00:10:56] Jamie: Okay, yea, absolutely. So, my wife and I have a fair [00:11:00] share of credit cards. We're not quite at spencer's level, but we've acculated a little bit of, AmEx points. We have some Chase points, some Citi points. but basically what we found is we, we live in Hawaii right now. We're both stationed here, and we found a deal where the four seasons resort in Lanai, which was recently voted again the nber one hotel in America.
[00:11:20] Spencer: Yep.
[00:11:21] Jamie: And they had like three different nber ones. It was like nber one, beach resort, nber one hotel. I forget the whole list of awards that just got again. but the four seasons resort in Lanai was an incredible trip. We found it, we booked it through the American Express travel and the fine hotel and resorts program, which came with some extra fringe benefits, like a hundred dollars credit free breakfast for both of us. early check in late checkout, upgrade of room type if available, things like that.
So, we basically booked it. And right now, they're running a promotion as well, where the private or semi-private airfare was included. So, we got in a small six-person plane, and it was just you, you and your wife and me and my wife.
[00:12:05] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:12:05] Jamie: And we showed up 30 minutes prior to take off. And 10 minutes later, we were airborne. I think it was very quick, very smooth. They flew us right over to the airport in Lana. Got on a shuttle bus, drove us to the airport and they let us check in at 9:30. We ended up doing a two night, stay there, but we checked in so early and checked out at 4:00 PM where we really had a solid three full days.
there like I mentioned, we, we had booked through the AmEx travel portal, and we have, a significant amount of AmEx points, not quite Spencer’s level, but we ended up choosing to do half credit. half cash, I'm sorry, and half AmEx points. So, we basically got a 50% discount if you will.
[00:12:47] Spencer: Yeah. Yeah. the AmEx fine hotels and resort card. This my, that was my first time using it.
[00:12:54] Jamie: Yeah, same for me.
[00:12:54] Spencer: And that's a benefit that comes with the AmEx platin card, which normally is a $550 fee. But for military service members and their spouses, under the military lending act or MLA law. The fees are AmEx completely waves, the annual fees.
[00:13:09] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:13:09] Spencer: Which is just insane.
[00:13:10] Jamie: And my wife and I each have one, I think you guys have a handful of them.
[00:13:13] Spencer: Yeah. So, I have, I think about six because I've kind of gone down the road of upgrading the lower tier, like the AmEx gold and the AmEx green cards. And then my wife has a, a couple platin’s as well. but I mean the benefit was, I mean it was, they let us check in at 9:30 in the morning.
Yeah. And from the time we got to, the hang- I mean, you guys got to the hangar at 8:30.
[00:13:34] Jamie: Mm-hmm
[00:13:35] Spencer: And we were checked in at 9:30. So that's-
[00:13:37] Jamie: That's checked into the hotel.
[00:13:38] Spencer: Yeah. Checked into the hotel. So that's, that's you know, walking out to the aircraft, taking off, flying over to Lanai shuttle, like 20 minutes shuttle bus, the COVID 19 screening at, –
[00:13:50] Jamie: At the airport.
[00:13:50] Spencer: At the airport in Lanai. And then we were checked, like we were in our rooms by like 9:30.
[00:13:54] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:13:54] Spencer: It insane.
[00:13:54] Jamie: It was an incredible experience.
[00:13:55] Spencer: So yeah. And again, I mean, that was made possible. So, we, my wife and I booked it all on AmEx membership, reward points, she had about a quarter million points. So, it's not a great redemption. It's a one to one where one, or like how I think about it is a one to one. So, one AmEx point is equal to like 1 cent worth of travel and you can get much better redemptions than that. So, like for instance, I booked ANA on, upon airways from Honolulu to Tokyo roundtrip in first. And we got 10 cents per AmEx point for that.
[00:14:26] Jamie: That was like a $27,000 ticket or something, right?
[00:14:29] Spencer: It was, it was two. Yeah. It was two tickets. There were $27,000 round trip in first class, and we'd paid nothing for it. maybe it was a little bit of taxes and fees with taxes or something.
[00:14:37] Jamie: I mean, it's a joke how, yeah, especially what I found is where I'm starting to develop. my game, if you will, is into the international transfer partners in the redemption levels there.
[00:14:48] Spencer: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:14:48] Jamie: There's a lot of value there for sure.
[00:14:50] Spencer: Tons of value.
[00:14:51] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:14:51] Spencer: So that's just a little taste of the travel stuff. I've got a full course on my website. You can find at “militarymoneymanual.com” and then a little popup should, should pop up there and you can throw your email address in there.
Or you can go to “militarymoneymanual.com/umc3”. That's Uniform Mike Charlie three. It stands for ultimate military credit cards course, and it's a free, a hundred percent free. five-day course, just throw your email address in there and we'll get you hooked up and explain how to do all of it. But AmEx chase, city us bank, they're all waving annual fees.
[00:15:25] Jamie: Yeah, there's a lot of options. I, I did the course, pretty early on and there's not a lot of spam or anything. no spam actually but Spencer will, he will send sometimes updates. you know, also on the, on the website, there's April 2021: here are the top cards you should get this month, as well as if you're just starting out, you know, start with these cards and work your way down.
But, pretty much as you'll find the Amex Platinum chase Sapphire reserve are kind of two of the more popular ones. that one in particular, we love we're getting ready to PCS this smer and it just has a $300 travel credit. So, whatever we spend for $300 travel related is just straight reimbursed.
[00:16:01] Spencer: It's gone. Yeah.
[00:16:01] Jamie: It's just gone off our bill.
[00:16:02] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:16:02] Jamie: So, between that and our Hilton credit, we're gonna use, we have a lot, and that could be a whole other episode too talking about, the travel of, of our move this summer.
[00:16:10] Spencer: And the, yeah, that's true. Yeah, because you guys are PCSing this smer. have you opened any cards recently?
[00:16:16] Jamie: not too recently. My latest one was the AmEx green a couple months ago.
[00:16:20] Spencer: Oh yeah.
[00:16:20] Jamie: so I got that one and then planning it after a year to upgrade to another platin.
[00:16:25] Spencer: Yep.
[00:16:25] Jamie: and then before that I had the AmEx gold, which is kind of similar, but the AmEx gold is great at the commissary. It has great redemption four times, four percent. points for grocery stores and restaurants. It's also really good. So yeah, I, I like the AmEx gold features that it almost makes me not want to upgrade to the platin but I also like the platin value as well.
[00:16:45] Spencer: Yeah. I, I was kind of torn too, because I, I used the gold daily. So, when it came time for the one-year mark, it was painful to actually upgrade the goal to the platin. But once that's gone, you're allowed to open up another MX gold.
[00:16:57] Jamie: Mm-hmm, yeah.
[00:16:58] Spencer: So that's- that's what I ended up doing.
[00:17:00] Jamie: Yeah. Lots of options. And, and again, it's maybe more advanced thing to get 19 platin cards or wherever. No, if you're just starting out and you start with one and he on the, on the website, Spencer walks through, you know, start with one from USA or Navy fed or something like that.
[00:17:17] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:17:17] Jamie: and they'll, they'll typically give younger or younger service members a lower credit card, but they'll let them open it and you might need that to kind of start out and then eventually you'll be ready for AmEx platin level.
[00:17:30] Spencer: Yeah. The biggest thing is like don't ever take on debt to build a credit score.
[00:17:36] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:17:36] Spencer: You don't need to do, it's not worth it, all you need to- yeah. It's not worth it. Just, all you need to do is maybe federal USA, any of the military friendly banks open up one of their lowest tiers, no annual fee cards-
[00:17:44] Jamie: Don't pay.
[00:17:45] Spencer: Yeah. Don't. And just, and, you know, use it a couple times a month. pay it off immediately. Just put gas and groceries on it paid off immediately. And then six months later you'll have a 700 or 720 credit score. And you'll be able to, you'll be eligible to open up Amex Platinum and Chase Sapphire Reserve and all the top tier cards. Yeah. So, yeah. that's the, I mean, and I, I explain all that in my course, but it's, that's the easiest way to-
[00:18:07] Jamie: We could talk about the card options all day.
[00:18:09] Spencer: Oh yeah. We're gonna, I think we'll have a whole episode. Maybe we'll just walk through our wallets or something.
[00:18:14] Jamie: Yeah. Yeah. So right now, my wife is we're about ready to open up a couple spots on her chase 5 24 limit. Which Spencer can explain in a second. So, we're kind of holding another month for two spots to open up for her.
[00:18:26] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:18:26] Jamie: So, we have some options. I think we might go with another another Hilton or maybe a Hyatt card from chase for her. I have that one and like it a lot.
[00:18:33] Spencer: Yeah. The the hotel credit cards I think are really undervalued, by people because you get the free annual night, and you don't pay the annual fee.
[00:18:41] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:18:41] Spencer: So, I mean, right now, my wife and I are, especially with COVID where they just kept extending the free annual nights. We're sitting on maybe seven or eight free annual nights between Hilton, Marriott, Hyatt, and IHG. And it's hard to spend them, haha.
[00:18:57] Jamie: So, what are you gonna do?
[00:18:58] Spencer: Yeah. It's like we can't travel that much. I can't take leave that much.
[00:19:00] Jamie: One of the things I love about the free nights’ certificates too, is if you go to a hotel that has a resort fee, they don't charge you the resort fee or, or the taxes that come with staying there. So, for example, the embassy suites in downtown. Waikiki is $40 a night for resort fee.
And so, you go there with your thing and it's, you're good. Like nothing, there's no extra cost there other than what you spend on food and whatnot, but yeah, yeah, yeah. We can talk all day about that one.
[00:19:26] Spencer: Yeah. We'll definitely have a whole episode about that. Okay. So last thing I wanted to touch on today was I got this new book coming out. it's called “The Military Money Manual Practical Guide to Financial Freedom”. And it's basically the book that I wish someone had handed to me, my first day in the military, or even before that, when I was in ROTC.
[00:19:44] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:19:45] Spencer: which I probably wouldn't have gotten it completely because you just, you're not used to getting that paycheck. but I it's like for myself, I didn't start investing in the TSP until I was in for about four years. [00:20:00] And it was different back then. Cause we didn't have BRS.
[00:20:02] Jamie: Right.
[00:20:02] Spencer: the blended retirement system where you get the 5% match, which anybody who comes in after 2018 is automatically in that system. And if you got into the military before then there was an opportunity to opt in and some guys did, but most people didn't. But the TSP, I mean, that is a, it's a fantastic retirement program. And I just, nobody explained it to me. I thought it was a bad deal. And I didn't realize that all it is, is its index fund investing.
[00:20:27] Jamie: Yeah. Well, we're triggered to think that usually if the government offers something's, if the air force or military runs something, it's probably not great.
[00:20:33] Spencer: That's right. Yeah.
[00:20:34] Jamie: But it's, it's really good. Low cost.
[00:20:36] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:20:36] Jamie: Performs. Well, And has a different limit of how much you can contribute each year.
[00:20:41] Spencer: Mm-hmm.
[00:20:41] Jamie: Compared to Roth IRA. And so, you can really stock a lot of money away.
[00:20:46] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:20:46] Jamie: Uh and set yourself up with very low-cost investing. If you only did the TSP, nothing else.
[00:20:51] Spencer: Yep.
[00:20:51] Jamie: You'd be ahead of probably 90% of Americans or more.
[00:20:54] Spencer: Solidly. Yeah. Yeah. 90% definitely. So, yeah. So [00:21:00] I, I talk about, you know, the TSP. I talk about the BRS. I, I just talk about how to like to set yourself up for financial freedom in the book. we're targeting late smer 2021 for the book coming out. And I'll have more details on that as we get closer, but Jamie was a a beta reader. So, thank you for-
[00:21:19] Jamie: Yeah, no it's good!
[00:21:20] Spencer: Going through all my my edits and I know it was a little painful with some of my pros, but, uh…
[00:21:28] Jamie: It's it's a really good book. And like you said, I think people will benefit from it and even not just people in their first year in the military. It's just someone who maybe hasn't gotten started yet. No one showed them.
[00:21:39] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:21:39] Jamie: So, they don't necessarily need to be the 19-year-old or the 21-year-old or a brand-new second Lieutenant or a brand new, private or airman. it's just, if you, if you don't have a plan for your money and what your future's gonna look like, then the book will have some steps.
very easy to read. not that many pages. Do you know the final count?
[00:21:59] Spencer: I think it's gonna be under a hundred.
[00:22:00] Jamie: Yeah. It's, it's a pretty quick read even with going through and, you know, making suggestions and stuff as a beta reader right now.
[00:22:07] Spencer: Yeah. So, I, I intentionally try to keep it short and sweet, and to the point, like, you know, I, I asse I don't asse you know anything so you can pick it up and read it. If you, if you just got in the military, you need, you don't know anything. And then if you want to know more, I'll have end notes in the back and you can, you know, dive into all the studies and all the, all the background information that went into actually writing the book.
But I, I didn't want to get it bogged down with a lot of, you know, notes, and, and everything. And, so I, I just try to keep it as, you know, as simple as possible. And then, like I said, it's, it's the book. I wish someone had handed me. And if you look out there, there's, there's really only maybe two or three. And I know there's Doug Norman's military guide, the financial independence and military retirement. he wrote that a couple about a decade ago. And then there's a few other ones out there on Amazon, but yeah.
[00:22:56] Jamie: There's not many for sure.
[00:22:58] Spencer: Yeah.
[00:22:58] Jamie: And do you know what format the book, is it only gonna be like an eBook or is it like a ghetto PDF you're downloading from some.net, you know?
[00:23:07] Spencer: Yeah, exactly. so no, I've actually I've hired an editor and we're gonna be self-publishing through her publishing, her publishing a agent it's gonna be available as an eBook, so you can get on your Kindle. You can get on Amazon, you can download on my website or you can get a hard cover and eventually we're gonna have soft cover as well.
And we've just got some cover mockups in, and they look really good. I'll post some of those in the show notes. and you can take a look at those. we just actually had a poll from my audience readers.
[00:23:39] Jamie: Yeah. Did you get a good response?
[00:23:40] Spencer: I did. Yeah. Yeah. So, they, nobody liked, well, not nobody, but there's about 70% for the dark and 30% for the orange color. Oh yeah. So, looks like the dark color wins.
[00:23:48] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:23:48] Spencer: and yeah, we're going to get that published here. Oh, and it's gonna be an audio book too.
[00:23:54] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:23:55] Spencer: So I think I sent you the sample for that. You thought it was Obama reading. Is that the final voice? I think so. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. It was good. Yeah. It was good. It's easier to listen to than I am. So, yeah.
[00:24:03] Jamie: And the date again for that? You're targeting publishing?
[00:24:06] Spencer: August 2021.
[00:24:08] Jamie: Okay.
[00:24:08] Spencer: Yep. So, we're only a couple months away now.
[00:24:10] Jamie: Yeah.
[00:24:10] Spencer: So probably by the time you hear this podcast, it's probably gonna be out. So-
[00:24:14] Jamie: And the title one more time,
[00:24:15] Spencer: “Military Money Manual, a Practical Guide to Financial Freedom”. And you can find all the details about it on “militarymoneymanual.com” and it's also gonna be on Amazon, Barnes and noble, basically anywhere that sells books.
[00:24:27] Jamie: Nice.
[00:24:27] Spencer: So that's awesome. well, Jamie, I think this went pretty well.
[00:24:31] Jamie: Yeah!
[00:24:31] Spencer: So!
[00:24:31] Jamie: Think we did okay for some amateurs haha!
[00:24:33] Spencer: Haha, yea! Thank you for hosting us in your living room, which has been torn apart due to PCS. But all the show notes and stuff will be on “militarymoneymanual.com/podcast”. And other than that, I think I think we can wrap it up unless you have anything else to add?
[00:24:52] Jamie: No, just, just remember start something just-
[00:24:54] Spencer: Yeah!
[00:24:54] Jamie: Move in the positive direction.
[00:24:56] Spencer: That's right!
[00:24:56] Jamie: Little by little.
[00:24:57] Spencer: That's right.