Jesse cracks open his inbox for another round of Ask Jesse. In today's episode he fields questions about YNAB'ing through job loss, financing a car and investing the float, and what personal finance books he recommends for kids.

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People have been doing it for years by following the YNAB method -- self-actualizing by aligning their spending with themselves. Now the YNAB team has come up with a word to describe it. It's not a budget, it's not a set of rules.

It's spendfulness.

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The Four Rules are out... the Five Questions are in! Well... not really, the Four Rules have just been transformed and clarified. As Jesse has pointed out in prior podcasts, the Four Rules were really just one rule, the first rule -- Give Every Dollar a Job.

And that is still the master rule. To clarify what giving every dollar a job means, YNAB has come up with five questions:

1. What does this money need to do before I'm paid again? (Reality)
2. What larger, less frequent spending do I need to prepare for? (Stability)
3. What can I set aside for next month's spending? (Resilience)
4. What goals, large or small, do I want to prioritize? (Creation)
5. What changes do I need to make, if any? (Flexibility)

These five questions are designed to give you more clarity about what you want your money to do for you, and ultimately how you want to spend your live. In a word, how to live spendfully.

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If you have been procrastinating about starting to manage your money, Jesse has a message for you. It's ok to start now, and start small -- and you don't have to be perfect either! Jesse has been using the YNAB method to manage his money for twenty years now, and he still hasn't reached perfection. But, he has become more in tune with his spending and learned how to create more joy in his life as a result, and he's helped millions of other people to do the same through YNAB. Jump in!

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Every year Jesse experiments with his money. In 2023 he decided to ditch his credit cards, and he continued that experiment through 2024. The result? His average bank account balance is up 18%, his time spent maintaining YNAB is down, and most importantly, money is simpler. He doesn't even miss the points and cashback rewards!

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It's almost the New Year, and that means it's time to make resolutions! Jesse loves resolutions, goals, and goal planning, and he has some advice for you this year. Before you start setting your goals for next year, do this simple vision exercise first.

Imagine that money is no object, and you have unlimited funds to work with. What would you like to do next year? What kind of things would you need to arrange in your life to make that happen? Remember money is not an issue here -- if you need to hire someone to take care of certain tasks for you, or buy something to improve your efficiency, or anything else you can think of, you can do it! Write these things down on a sheet of paper.

You have already started the process of thinking about where to spend your energy in the New Year, and wherever your energy is going, your money should be too. Now, when you bring reality back in, which means limited funds and resources, you have a clearer idea of where to focus those resources in order to help you reach your goals.

Happy New Year!

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Ebenezer Scrooge is a classic Christmas tale, a tragic character who lets his insatiable desire for money blind him to the circumstances of the people around him -- particularly his employees -- and the spirit of the Christmas holiday. He didn't even seem to enjoy spending his wealth, only the accumulation of it. While Scrooge is not a good role model for generosity or charity, he did always pay his bills on time.

Next Christmas you can give yourself a bill, or rather give yourself a bill now, and every month between now and next Christmas! Think of the things you want to buy and do next Christmas (not just gifts, but travel and cooking) and add up how much you think you'll spend. Divide it by twelve, and that's your bill to be paid each month between now and December 25, 2025. Then you can spend your money in a way Scrooge never could -- on gifts and family and generosity.

Merry Christmas!

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The FIRE movement, which stands for "Financial Independence, Retire Early," has a long-lived and strong fan base on the internet. The idea behind FIRE is simple: figure out how much money you need to live on each year, then calculate how much money you would need to save up in order to live on the returns from your portfolio indefinitely. Once you hit your number, BAM! You're retired, and live happily after ever. Right?

Jesse sees this idea as, ultimately, just another form of procrastination about money. When you put all your focus on the number you need to retire, you forget about the most important thing about money -- how you will spend it! After all, money has to be spent to be useful, whether you spend it now or save it to spend later. Saving until you hit a magic number doesn't help you get closer to figuring out what you want your money to do for you, and therefore how you should spend it.

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It's not too late! The first rule of YNAB's Four Rules is "give every dollar a job," and you can implement it right now. Take a look at your bank account balance, and think to yourself: what does this money need to do for me right now? What does it need to do for me in the future? Now you have started thinking about your future self, and being proactive. This simple step can change your life!

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Jesse grew up in a frugal family -- frugality for frugality's sake, as he describes it. As he has grown, discovered the YNAB method, and worked the four rules, he has come to a conclusion -- he is not even a little frugal! Frugality implies thrift, spending little money so as to conserve the resource. The idea is that spending money frugally is an effort to not waste money.

YNAB's four rules help you identify the things that matter in your life, however, the things you do want to spend money on. And once you have identified those things, Jesse challenges you to double down and spend more on the things that matter to you. As he has mentioned in other episodes, money is just an extension of you, and if money is you, then why would you want less of you in the world?

So Jesse is not frugal. Not even a little bit!

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