Personal Finance Club

There’s been some really good journalism digging into these index rule changes on the eve of the SpaceX IPO. The most nefarious explanation looks bad. SpaceX gobbled up xAI and X, and the Frankenstein mega company is hemorrhaging money. The investors who poured billions into xAI and the Twitter acquisition want out, and see index funds as sitting ducks who will be forced to buy in at market prices. There’s just one problem. Those pesky index rules generally prevent this kind of thing, with seasoning (period of time before inclusion), minimum float (companies have to sell a significant portion of their shares), and profitability rules.

Nasdaq specifically has a strange role here, as they operate as both a stock market AND an index provider. As an analogy, think of Nasdaq as a grocery store where buyers can come in and pick whatever items they want. But right out the grocery store are middlemen who sell ready to go baskets of groceries without having to walk through the aisles. (These are the fund providers). Nasdaq ALSO wanted a piece as a middle man, so they have their own basket outside of the store (QQQ). But SpaceX came along and said, “Hey, I’m willing to have my stock sold exclusively in your store but I really want it to be in your basket outside the store too” That creates a conflict of interest between Nasdaq who wants to carry SpaceX and those passive investors who are trusting Nasdaq to provide an ethically crafted basket of stocks.

Draw your own conclusions, but for me, this isn’t something I’m worried about. I’m focused on buying more shares of broad market index funds. An attempt to speculate that the newly listed SpaceX stock will go down and adeptly step around it is much more likely cost me time and money than somehow result in outperformance. The big money is in the holding for long periods of time, not the fancy trading strategies.

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy

This is one of those little things that no one ever TELLS you to do, but could save you THOUSANDS when it comes time to sell a home. My process is really easy. Whenever I have make a “capital improvement” to my home, I just add it to the spreadsheet and scan the receipt into Google Drive. It takes about a 1 minute.

Not EVERY piece of maintenance you do on your home counts as a “capital improvement” though. A capital improvement has to add value, prolong the useful life, or adapt the home to new uses. Things like remodels, adding a deck, new roof, new HVAC, new fencing, etc would count. Routine maintenance doesn’t count. This would exclude things like painting, fixing leaks, patching drywall, pest control, etc. If you’re not sure, I say add it to the list, put a note in your spreadsheet and let your tax preparer figure it out!

Another BIG thing that can reduce taxes on your sale is any transaction costs. Things like title fees, transfer taxes, realtor fees, escrow fees, etc. Those can easily add up to the tens of thousands of dollars that shouldn’t count toward your gain on the house!

When I filed my taxes, I sent this spreadsheet over to my tax preparer and it quietly lowered my tax bill by over $59,000! Had I not sent that, he probably wouldn’t have asked and I’d be $59K poorer. The more you know!

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy

The work of a financial advisor can really be broken down under two main umbrellas:

1.) Financial planning
2.) Investment management

The planning is all of the hard work listed on the left hand side of the “What a great advisor can do” page. Investment management is actually pretty simple and takes very little time. A transparent advisor will admit it only takes a few minutes per YEAR. Click buy on a few funds, then leave it alone and let the market do the work.

Yet most advisors charge commissions for selling stuff (like insurance or investments) or a percent of assets under management (AUM). HOW DOES THAT MAKE SENSE?! Why are they charging for the easy part and ignoring the hard part?

That’s why it’s so important to seek out a FLAT-FEE financial advisor. This is someone who doesn’t charge an AUM fee or earn any commissions based on what they sell you. (In fact, they don’t sell anything). They charge a clearly advertised price JUST for the advice.

For what it’s worth, I only stuck with that advisor for a couple years. I was managing some of my investments on my own (in index funds of course) and was watching what he was doing and came to the conclusion back then he wasn’t going to magically beat the market by stock picking.

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy

Credit to whose recent post highlighted this jaw dropping contrast and inspired this post.

It easy to get complacent with the status quo when it’s all you’ve known until you see a comparison like this. I’m in favor of laws requiring puppies to stay with their moms until at LEAST eight weeks. Having seen some eight-week old puppies I think they would probably be better served to have that number be even higher. But for HUMAN babies, so many mom’s are faced with this horrendous choice. Leave your newborn human baby at some kind of (expensive) childcare, or give up your income that’s critical to housing and feeding that baby (and you). As a new dad, I feel horribly for all new parents faced with these terrible financial decisions amidst all of the other challenges of being new parent.

What can you DO about this? Well, for YOUR life, do the best to make these situations better for yourself by following the two rules. If you’re living below your means and investing early and often, you’ve got a built in financial cushion to help get through financially challenging times. Societally, I think we need to do better. Challenge the status quo and vote. The US is in SHOCKING contrast to the rest of the world on this issue. Most of the world offers between 14-24+ weeks of paid maternity leave. Of 188 countries that have known maternity leave policies, the US is one of EIGHT (joining Suriname, Liberia, Palau, Nauru, Western Samoa, Tonga, and Papua New Guinea) that offer no paid leave to new moms. We can do better.

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy

Getting DMs like these still blows my mind. And I get a surprising amount of them. I picked up a lot of followers in 2019-2020 covid era. Those who implemented my advice are now starting to become millionaires, just 6-7 years later. CRAZY.

And that advice is stupid simple: Earn more, spend less. Invest the difference in index funds. Leave your investments alone.

Many think this advice is TOO simple. It seems like there should be some complex hack. You might think things like:

• Shouldn’t I be doing deep market research on the best stocks?
• Shouldn’t I be using some advanced life insurance tax strategy?
• Shouldn’t I be leveraging debt to grow my wealth using other people’s money?
• Shouldn’t I graduate to some more advanced investing strategy than index funds?

The answer to all of those questions is NO! All that gimmicky stuff is a distraction. Real wealth is built by focusing on the basics. Consistency over time has amazing compounding impacts.

If this (anonymous) investor never invests ANOTHER PENNY, and leaves their investments alone in an index fund averaging a 10% return, at the age of 65 they’ll have over 28 MILLION DOLLARS. Wild stuff.

Don’t get distracted by they shiny object. Keep pushing towards your goal. Once you see traction it will go faster and you’ll be there even before your own projections!

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy

Please let me preface everything with this: Any financial analysis feels callous against the backdrop of war. This isn’t meant to mitigate or ignore the atrocities of war. That said, many are rightfully worried about their finances during this type of volatility.

About two weeks ago, the stock market looked bleak. The market was down about 8% year to date and felt as though we were in a free fall. Tensions with the Iran war were rising. Gas prices rising. Economists projected further slowdowns to to increase costs of oil. Some were even using the R word (recession). Many investors understandably wanted to “get out until the rebound”

And today? The S&P 500 just closed at an ALL TIME RECORD HIGH. Why? Well, investors are apparently betting that the economy is in good shape and that all those fears mentioned above won’t come to fruition. If you sold two weeks ago “until the rebound”, well you missed it. The market is up almost 11% in JUST THE LAST TWO WEEKS.

This is the risk of “timing the market”. When everything is in free fall, the bears sound like geniuses. “Get out now. The worst is yet to come.” Those (like me) who say “Stay the course. Don’t just do something, sit there!” sound naive by comparison. But this is like a broken record on repeat. When things seem the bleakest, it takes the most resolve to continue to sit there and do nothing, but it’s the right thing to do.

I recently did my taxes for last year and got a 1099-B which details all the times I sold shares during 2025. Mine was BLANK. I buy low, buy high, plan to hold for decades. (Of course I will sell at some point when I need the money, but I didn’t happen to last year).

If you want to build wealth, don’t get caught up in the ups and downs of the market. Focus on YOUR race. Make more. Spend less. Keep investing early and often.

As always, reminding you to build wealth by following the two PFC rules: 1.) Live below your means and 2.) Invest early and often.

-Jeremy