[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Reservation has changed significantly because you may not hear through the third party site. The other advantage of doing what I'm saying is one of the complaints we've had repeatedly is where you paid money, you have a reservation booked, you go to the airline site and they don't know who you are. And that confirmation number you were given for the airline doesn't work.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's a danger sign all the way around. With hotels, there are a lot of real sketch.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Hotel booking sites. Uhm, Priceline's not one, Hotwire's not one, Hotels.com isn't one. There are a lot of UFO hotel booking sites that are either out and out con artists crooks or shady.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You gotta be very aware. Check, uhm, what the Better Business Bureau has.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] On a third party travel site, for any form of travel, tours, hotels, air flights, see what kind of rep they have with the Better Business Bureau or with TrustPilot, uh, Better Business Bureau, I prefer for this.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And if you see just complain after complain after complaint, you've seen everything you need to know.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I'm sorry about how long-winded that explanation is.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] This is an area you've gotta be careful with. As for Travel Zoo...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Travel Zoo is almost like a catch-all, uh, promotional site and often what you book is not


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] A travel zoo operated thing. It's just travel zoo is almost like a bulletin board for travel deals so much of the time.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It is a legitimate business purpose.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For an apartment complex to want your daughter's social security number.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Because they are basically extending credit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] When they're renting a place to you and based on what they find with your daughter's credit,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They may require a higher security deposit than they would otherwise. They may even say they won't rent to her.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh yeaah, and so often thank you in college, parent has to guarantee and then they'll want your social security number. So this is standard business practice and is actually a legitimate purpose and reason


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For requesting the social security number, you're right to always have that automatic visceral reaction. Wait, wait, wait.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Why do these people want my social security number? And they got to show you why they actually should have it. If they can't, they don't get it. In this case, it is a legitimate request for it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So we got a lot of things to unpack here. How cool that you're getting the opportunity to live in communist China. You're going to go to Portugal and Portugal has been so


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Exceedingly popular with Americans, so much so that the golden passport is pretty much done there. That's where you can get permanent residence.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] In Portugal in return for buying a property in certain parts of the country. Uhm, there's been a big backlash there because Americans and some other foreigners


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is considered to be by many economists to be overvalued. And it is very possible that over the next year, the dollar will decline in value versus other currencies. But my experience historically has been that predicting currency directions is a tough one. It is really hard. And even though very learned people who are involved with monetary


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, finance may find that all their business, all their.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, models show that the dollar is going to decline in value versus the euro and other foreign currencies. It may not play that way. So you could do this as a dollar cost averaging thing, moving money from dollars into euros gradually in equal amounts each month till you move from communist China to Portugal. And if that is something you want to do,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You already have the right ideas. Wise and Revolut are the two most efficient ways


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is use a bank's foreign currency conversion process and transfer process because the banks rip you off like you cannot believe


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Which is why Wise and Revolut and some of their competitors exist. Uh, you can have accounts with them.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Where you have the money on hand, the question then becomes, what risk is there to your money while it's sitting there if either of them went and solve it? How is your money protected or is it not? And that's where you need to concentrate your efforts. And coming up ahead, there's a plague in medicine, a curse against your wallet,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That I gotta make sure you are totally on the lookout for what a rip off. One thing that I've discovered is I get older.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I visit a lot of medical offices for different things and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Probably two thirds to three quarters of the medical facilities or offices I go to are all pushing


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Instant credit plans at those offices.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's like taking out store credit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You know how I say never when they say at the register would you like to save 10% on your purchase today by getting a blah blah blah card? Uh-uh. The answer is no when you're offered that at the retailer because that's junk credit and will carry interest rates up to 36%. Well now,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That has infest, infested, infected, all those words, the medical industry, and they're all pushing you


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] At dental offices, cosmetic dentistry or, or, uh, medical, um, optional medical, what do you call those? Elective medical places.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Regular medical places, regular dental practices, they're all pushing the instant credit plans. And they'll have, uh, big things there right in the office, signage or, uh,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or tabletop things all pushing the credit plans that they offer and their instant approval kind of plans. Instantly committing yourself


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To being in debt, typically 24 to 36% interest.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Now I don't know who, when you got up in the morning, thought it would be a good idea to take out a 36% loan. No, you didn't, did you?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And, and nothing's there telling you, hey, we're gonna rip you off at this doctor's office. We're gonna rip you off at this dentist's office with a 36% interest plan. So,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They want you to do it. You know why all the doctors and dentists want you to do it? Cause they get their money right then.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so these companies that offer these instant credit plans, they're making money both sides of the transaction. They rip off the dentist or the doctor with what are known as discount points.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Where they're not getting dollar for dollar that they send you credit.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They're taking a cut on what their services charge just so they know they have the money. That's why they do it. So they don't have to worry about coming after you for money. They get it right then at the discount from whoever these, uh, they're known as white label providers offer the credit. They take a hit and then you get eviscerated.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I mean, just eatin' alive with massive interest.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I mean, even if you have to pull a credit card out of your wallet and pay


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Your co-payer, your deductible or whatever it is, do that. Do not fall for this rip-off of the in-office instant credit. And yes, many of them will say, oh,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Ninety days interest free. Six months interest free. What are they not saying?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Well first of all you need a magnifying glass to read the mice type and see the outrageous rate of interest you're paying taking that credit out.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Because most people who take that credit out aren't going to be able to get it paid off in that 90 days same as cash or 6 months same as cash.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Avoid like you'd avoid the bubonic plague. How do you avoid the bubonic plague?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, I like that. That was, that was good rhyming. I could never do rhyming things when we'd have that in high school poetry. Couldn't do it. Okay, so.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The free monitoring that they're offering you from Experian.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's okay for you to take it as long as after the 24 months.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It does not auto renew at a huge fee coming out of your wallet. As long as it would just discontinue after the two years, no harm, no foul, I think it would be worth doing just because it's another set of eyes on your credit. Paying for credit monitoring.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's not worth it, never do it, particularly since free credit monitoring is something that's a thing now in the marketplace.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And it does seem like there may be a compromise of your daughter's identity.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So, even if the credit bureaus don't get back with you.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] What I would do for your seven year old daughter is I would implement a credit freeze. Minor credit freeze is much more complicated than it is for adults. You're going to have to send in documentation to each credit bureau. They require that you, who you are, that you provide proof that you are the legal guardian or parent of this child and that you want to establish this credit freeze.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And they will do so and it protects your child against, uh, child identity theft, which is very, very common by, uh, people who are trying to assume another identity for any of a number of reasons. They could have a criminal record they're trying to hide from, from potential employers, could be, uh, illegally in the United States.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so, setting up, because the, getting this thing from the cemetery.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I think it's worth it for you to go through the extra hassles and the paperwork of establishing child identity theft. As you see, the credit bureaus are so


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Customer oriented that you're a month and waiting. Obviously they don't care about us at all. You have to make them care and this is how you do it by setting up the child credit freeze.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So Ian, you're 19, you've got the drill already.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I was talking to a 26 year old just yesterday who got, just got a car.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's an old Hyundai. Think he said 2006.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Has just under 200,000 miles on it and cost him a couple of thousand dollars. And so he has transportation. And he would not want to have that monthly payment. By the way, Ian, your friends who are all into the idea of getting some kind of new car, they're facing a typical monthly payment of nearly $800 a month on a long term loan.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Plus, with a new vehicle, they've got enormous insurance costs.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Your instincts with your 2009 Honda, you're right on the money. 330,000 miles on it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And, you know, for a Honda, that's just barely getting started. The only thing you gotta watch with a Honda is their engines historically have a problem with the, uh, timing chain, and you have to change that every 100,000 miles. And that's a, a, uh, preventative maintenance thing worth doing, and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I don't know why Honda's never fixed that problem with that chain. But anyway, the engines are so


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Reliable. That Honda has lots of life potentially in front of it. And now here you are.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] With a vehicle that's costing you nearly nothing. So to your question, when do you dump a car?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Consumer report says you dump a car when the cost of a repair exceeds the remaining value of the vehicle. Period.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And my answer always was when the cost of a repair is 50% or more of the remaining value. Consumer report says I'm wrong.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That it's when the cost of repair exceeds the value of the vehicle. And so I defer to them and their 90 years of wisdom in this area. So, uh, you keep that car, you are driving basically for free.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You don't have a monthly payment. You have cheaper insurance.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And with a 2009, all you should have is liability coverage on it anyway. And good job for you. What's the 101? The 101 is actually 700.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] When somebody has to think about having to make that $700 a month payment every month, plus having really high auto insurance.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That is all you need to know about why driving an older vehicle that you can own payment free


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And that concludes today's episode of our podcast. I want to thank you so much for joining us. I want to tell you if there's something you've heard me say today or any day that doesn't ring true or right with you, you feel like I'm just plain dumb, I'm wrong, whatever, please take a moment


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And go to Clark.com slash Clark Stinks and post away. And have a great one.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It's my pleasure to welcome you to the Clark Howard Show, where our mission is to serve you and empower you so you make better financial decisions in your life.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I'm going to begin this episode by talking about one of my favorite things, travel deals. Then after I take your questions, I'm going to talk about one of my least favorite things, customer no service.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That actually seems to be, so often in life we say, oh things are worse than they used to be. This is the customer no service we're getting. Okay, so I got an oddball one for you. Spirit Airlines.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is running a promotion right now, uh, called Status Match.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And what it does is it's designed to get people who travel frequently


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Because there's a segment of the travel marketplace that travels quite often and doesn't ever consider flying on Spirit, Frontier, Allegiant, Breeze, or Avelo. The five, uh, deep discounter airlines. Although Breeze is kind of its own thing. But Spirit, with a straight face,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is offering you the ability if you are in a bunch of different hotel programs or airline programs, you have different levels of status.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You get an array of privileges, including if you've got really nice status on a hotel chain with a hotel chain or with an airline for 99 bucks for a year.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You pay no baggage fees for a check bag or a carry on. You got seat assignments. You got a free snack, a free drink. I mean, it's a deal. Uhm, but then again, you're a flying spirit and it's something


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That to me is worth spending the $99 because I travel about 30 weeks a year. I'm on an airplane.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And there are times that there will be a deal in spirit and I have my micro carry on, but


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It was funny cause recently I was flying coast to coast and I was staying five days.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And I kept trying because Spirit had the best fare in the market, but then once I added in the baggage charge,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It, and because it was coast to coast, I was going to pay for a seat assignment. It wasn't cost effective anymore. And so I went on a regular, regular airline, whatever you call it.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So the status match to me, there are enough times in my life where I go last minute where spirit will be, in my opinion, worth it if I'm not having to pay all the fees.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So if you want to know how to get there, just whatever search engine you use.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Status match and get all that stuff free. You get a smaller number of benefits if you're


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, anyway, uh, what is your status now? Cause you're, you're Ms. Delta 2023.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Do you know that they take them to the, right to the, uh, they walk up those stairs right by the plane?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So they're taken from a parking lot that has security, they go through it, they're driven to the plane door, literally, and they don't have to deal with the rest of us normal earthlings. But, uh, one other thing is I'm mentioning spirit, so there's a new study


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That finds who's the cheapest to fly on if you do have to go the last minute and they, uh,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And Spirit was significantly cheaper.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, the next closest and cheap fare, last minute travel was Southwest. Then, uh, higher United and American that were right.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Right there, pretty much even. And delta.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Was by far the most expensive for a last minute ticket. I mean, hugely more expensive than even their full fare competitors.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] United and American and Delta has said that their bookings are so strong. They're so positive about revenue and they feel like they're running a better airline than American and United right now, which is probably true.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That they're in a position to charge significantly more for those last minute travelers than their direct competitors or anybody else. So, it's your money, you can decide.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So if you're not familiar with Dollar Flight Club, they're a smaller operator, but a competitor with, uhm, what used to be called Scotch Cheap Flights is now called Going. I still don't get that name. And there's- So bitter.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I mean, Scott's such a neat guy and you can identify with his name and I just don't get the marketing reason to take Scott's name off of him. But anyway, not for me to decide.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So the Dollar Flight Club offer is a massive savings because for what these services do is they give you alerts.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] On special, fair deals, both in coach and then, uh, front of the plane or also premium economy. So not just both. Any fair category when a deal pops up, you get an alert and for a regular traveler, it can save you a lot of money.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, I don't understand what Dollar Flight Club's doing because they're giving people lifetime access and so I guess that's the lifetime of Dollar Flight Club. You gotta understand anytime somebody offers you a lifetime deal,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That it means for as long as they're around and they may be doing great.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So, if they are doing great, don't understand why they're offering something 90 plus percent off.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, October in the world of civil, uh, civil discourse or


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Civil society. Civil society or, uh, France has such a history of street protests. I mean, it goes back to, uh, 17, what was the year of the French Revolution? 1780.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Anyway, whatever it was, uhm, it's been part of their thing where they


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So finally I spit it out right after spitting out all those wrong years. Uh, I guess I could have named every year in the 1700s eventually I would have been right. Uh, so.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, sporadic violence, but for the most part these have been energetic, but very peaceful protests.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Americans can't understand these protests at all because what the French are so up in arms about is there's a new law.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That retirement age is now 64 instead of 62 or 62 instead of 60, something like that. So I would not hesitate at all. October is a world away from what's been going on.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Can I, I had so many angles on it, can I do em? You can, but I, I just, let me read Rob's and then you can see if you want to address each of them. You're the boss, so whatever you say.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Okay, so, uh, you've already booked the cruise so that I can't give any recommendations on.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Don't, where you can, don't do the shore excursions offered by the cruise line. Do your own. Uhm, if you like to drink alcohol, uh, this is the week you don't drink. Because I'm gonna get to the drink package thing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, on the other question as well, the cruise lines charge so much money for alcohol. I mean, I am so lucky that drinking doesn't matter to me. It's not something I really do at all. Uhm, and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Know that on cruise ships many times there will be


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Drink specials at certain times, almost like happy hours you'd have on land. And if you do like alcohol, that's when to do it. A lot of the things that people spend money on, you don't have to. So you really can


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Are not worth it unless you really like to sling back a lot of alcohol. I mean you calculate how many drinks you'd have to drink per day to make the alcohol package work.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I don't recommend them. On the other hand, if you are somebody who loves to drink a lot, then you can probably make the math work. I mean, you see it on any cruise ship. Whatever the first bar is to open on a cruise ship each morning, it's full.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Whether it's 9 o'clock in the morning, 9.30, I mean, they're, they're knocking back those drinks. Is that the expression, knocking back a drink?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And by the way, there'll be things they'll have. They'll have events where you go to a loyalty program event or whatever and they're serving free alcohol at those, uh, and so you can get free drinks that way. Anyway, you can get the free drinks, um, which again means nothing to me. Internet package.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] A lot of people specifically don't buy internet on a ship because they want this to be time away. If you're having to keep working some while you're on a ship, you need to stay in contact with family or friends.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, that would be a good reason to buy the internet packages.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeaah, I do buy it. Alright, now Dan, on your question about interior cabins, I can't do that. I have to have a window.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, there's a blogger who only sales interior cabins and if you search for her on YouTube, she'll point out all the pluses and minuses of booking interior cabins and really think through


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Would a week for you in an interior cabin be no big deal? Or would it feel like you were, uh, being sentenced to, uh, to jail for a week?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And so that's one I can't really tell you other than yes, the interior cabins are day in day out going to be by far the cheapest way to be on a cruise.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The cruise lines mark them up so much that I don't buy the excursions from the cruise lines.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] I buy them outside so you can, if you go, uh, there are all these cruise sites like, uh, cruise critic and, and various flavors like that where you can learn about


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Sure excursions, you can read reviews of independent shore excursions, lots of sites for that. People go on Caribbean cruises. There are a bunch of sites that just talk about alternative excursions and sell them to people looking


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To beat the cost from the cruise line, usually it's half price.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Going third party, but a lot of ports I've been to enough. I don't even need an excursion. I do my own thing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Right. So you don't want to put it too close. That once happened to me with uh, two of my three children were on a cruise with me and the port was Belize and we did this thing called cave tubing.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] With the bats, which apparently is not the safest public health thing to do. And, uh, we were late getting back to the ship and the only reason the ship didn't leave without the 24 of us on that excursion is that


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] A cruise line excursion was an hour later than us getting back. Otherwise, I would have been able to talk about that in full detail about my extra time and beliefs that thank goodness didn't happen.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] For many reasons, it's actually getting worse right now. How do you deal?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] With customer no service from an organization. I'm going to give you suggestions. Customer no service is a plague and according to the American customer satisfaction index, it's actually getting worse. They found the largest decline in customer service that consumers are experiencing


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] In one year, the worst decline in their entire history, I've loved the, uh, the consumer, the American customer satisfaction index, which first was


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uh, Department of University of Michigan, now an independent organization, spent around nearly 30 years, and


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They've seen this really ugly downward trend. Wall Street Journal reports that three quarters of Americans


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Have experienced a problem in the last year. A customer no service problem. Give you a comparison. A generation ago.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] A third of people in a year would say they had a customer no service problem. And it's clear that companies don't care. There's this attitude that, uh, they call next.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That rather than trying to fix a problem for somebody else, they're like, okay.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Yeaah, so let them go away. NEXT! There's always...


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Another sucker to come along that will do business with a company that offers customer no service. So what do you do about it? Now it's become so the thing to post on social media.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That that that works so effectively, even as recently as three or four years ago, companies are becoming numb to that because, and consumers are too, that just complaining about somebody on social media,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] There was a time that companies had these social media task forces that were trying to monitor their corporate damage.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And people would get help they didn't get before. And there was a lot of DMing going on that you would post something and then they direct message you and say, Hey, let us see if we could help you. Sorry, we haven't so far.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And now companies in many cases are just ignoring those. So,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Strategies that I recommend when you're dealing with customer no service.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is to use any and every tactic other than writing a complaint that's the length of a short story. Being humorless.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Or expressing anger in your post and never, never not ever say, I'm never going to do business with you again. So you say that, what incentive do they have?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To do anything for you if you said, I'm done with you. I'm never buying from you. I'm never flying you again. I'm never, whatever it is again. So you want to be brief. You want to be,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Clear and concise with what the problem is. Clear and concise what you're seeking. Be reasonable with what you're seeking.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And you do this every possible way when you've been blown off by a company. I mention the Better Business Bureau as a tool.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And whenever I mention it, we'll hear from people who say, I filed a Better Business Bureau complaint. It didn't do anything. That's not the point.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You're playing baseball here. Those of you who are baseball fans, who is a great hitter?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Somebody who hits 300, meaning they get a hit, uh, 30% of the time that they're at the plate.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] That's what you're trying to do with various tools, like posting on social media, filing a Better Business Bureau complaint. Anytime it's a bank or credit card company, always file a complaint at consumerfinance.gov.


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[Assistant] Their help rate is probably much higher because you got the teeth of the federal government.


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[Assistant] The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau so much because they're making banks behave that otherwise don't care and don't do the right thing. Uhm, don't complain to a CEO of a company. I recently had a problem with an airline.


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[Assistant] I went on their website and looked about us and saw all the smiling pictures of their corporate executive team. I went down three levels. Then I figured out the email address, which took some work, figured out the email address of a third level down person, sent an email.


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[Assistant] Thought it didn't work at all. Three weeks later.


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[Assistant] I got a response my problem was solved that had been going on for four months. You, you, if you do use social media, you must employ humor. Humor


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[Assistant] Life's tough. We don't care about you. But then a very humorous video that caught on that became, what do you call that? When it spreads viral, um, ended up finally getting United to behave.


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[Assistant] Uhm, and so any and all tactics are what you have to employ. Should you have to do all this stuff? No.


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[Assistant] But the nature, why has it gotten so much worse over a generation? Because the nature of American business has changed so much. Size has made companies not care.


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[Assistant] As they get larger, they don't care. And something that's demonstrated again and again and again.


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[Assistant] Is people in the executive areas of companies have no clue.


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[Assistant] What's actually going on in their organizations because they live in a cocoon.


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[Assistant] They do not have contact with customers. They are clueless. You gotta give them a clue. Krista?


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[Assistant] Uh, even if she does, and that, the requirements all surrounding, uh, payments that people receive on Cash App, Venmo, or Zelle, and I'm going to ignore that Big Bad Zelle is in this. She don't want to use Zelle. Anyway, uhm, the requirement that they send these


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[Assistant] Has been suspended. The feds are trying to figure out some other way to figure out who's not reporting income. We'll see how that.


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[Assistant] Eventually, if ever comes back. But even if it does,


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[Assistant] All you have to do if you get a 1099 like that is you report it and then you back out that as income with an explanation that this was a roommate paying their share of the rent and you're good. That's so easy to prove.


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[Assistant] That there's no concern for your, uhm, for your daughter at all.


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[Assistant] So pharmacy benefits managers are a curse on the American people.


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[Assistant] And uh, there's so much dirty dealing and kickbacks and all kinds of things that are costing the American people a fortune, costing the federal government a fortune with


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[Assistant] Uh, the portion in government of all levels with the portion of healthcare they pay for in the United States, by the way, it's more than half of all healthcare now in the United States.


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[Assistant] And CVS is trying to build this fortress and enforce behavior. No, this should not be legal.


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[Assistant] It is illegal restraint of trade in my opinion.


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[Assistant] And CVS, what they cannot provide in customer service, speaking of a customer no service organization, they're trying to force through their relationship with employers,


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[Assistant] And require people who use their PBM care mark to have to fill their prescriptions.


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[Assistant] At CVS. Look, the employees don't even want to work at CVS. Why should you have to use them to get your drugs?


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[Assistant] They own CareMart, yeaah, CVS, CareMart, Aetna, they're all one very unhappy family. They may be happy together, they're just an unhappy family for us.


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[Assistant] So what can you do? A lot of your scripts, Karen, if they are generics, are cheaper filling market price than they are through the plan you have through, uh, work.


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[Assistant] And so you should always comparison shop, use GoodRx or one of their competitors. If you are a warehouse club member, you'll find that regularly, not 100% of the time, but most of the time, unless they zero out the cost of generics for you under your, uh, Caremark CVS plan,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You'll find that what you would pay as a cash payer will be cheaper at the warehouse clubs than using


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[Assistant] The supposed benefits for pharmacy available through the employer.


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[Assistant] Oh yeaah, which is Mark Cubans. They now call it Mark Cubans Cost Plus Drugs. And there is a whole bunch of companies now selling prescriptions not involving insurance or anything like that, that routinely are much cheaper


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[Assistant] For 80% of the drugs out there, than using these kickback friendly, uhm,


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[Assistant] pharmacy benefits managers that are a real problem in medical care and for us in the United States. A curse. They are a curse.


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[Assistant] Uh, to meet both of my deceased grandfathers, I never knew them. It'd be neat to meet people I heard about I never knew.


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[Assistant] And, uh, my dad died when I was pretty young. It would be neat if he could come back.


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[Assistant] Oh man, did we have conversations about housing. Uh, that's a story for another day. Uhm, in short, my father started a, uh, uh, homeless shelter for couples back


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[Assistant] Sorry. Anyway, sorry, go ahead. Uh, so famous people. Uh, I know it would be Margaret Thatcher. It would be Winston Churchill.


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[Assistant] And, uh, cause I'm fascinated with what the two of them did.


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[Assistant] For Britain, where's today's Maggie Thatcher, by the way? They need it really badly. Uh, third person? Oh, it'd be Dr. King.


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[Assistant] $1.50 hot dog and drink is like a Costco signature.


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[Assistant] It's a Kirkland Signature hot dog now by the way. Who knows how many tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars Costco loses every year as a loss leader on that hot dog and drink.


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[Assistant] So I got my tires at discount and my lunch was with tax of $1.59.


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[Assistant] But it'd be fun if people got to answer that question and see their answers.


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[Assistant] So, I hope, other than who I would want to have my $1.50 hot dog and drink with, uh, you heard something today that you can use in your life or share with a friend today and know that


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[Assistant] We're here and we do this to serve you each and every day. That's what this is about, is we all learn together, we all grow together, and


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[Assistant] Whatever way you can at a time that people say they're not happy with America's direction, you're the one that can make a difference. One person at a time, one volunteer activity at a time.


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[Assistant] In your neighborhood, your community, your city, your state, your country.


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[Assistant] Do something to make a difference. Be somebody who makes life better.


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[Assistant] For our country and the individuals who live in it. Have a great day.


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[Assistant] Being a retired federal bank examiner for 18 years, it is obvious that Clark is not intimately aware of how banks are rated and supervised. All banks receive individual camel component ratings and composite ratings. Clearly SVB had poor management and weak liquidity based on the level of long-term treasuries on their balance sheet.


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[Assistant] However, the FDIC, Fed, and Treasury covered for the terrible supervision oversight because many of the investors and loan customers were of a particular political party that donated to their party. The California State Examiners and the SF San Francisco Fed should lose their jobs over this malfeasance. And that's from Keith.


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[Assistant] This is less of a Clark Stinks and more of a Clark error of omission. You answered a question about 529 plans. If you don't know if your kid will be attending college, you mentioned you can roll the funds over to an IRA.


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[Assistant] Good info, just not complete. Please be sure and mention there's a $35,000 limit.


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[Assistant] This is important to know as many save more than that amount and you wouldn't want people using this as a Roth funding vehicle without understanding the limitations. You also said if they get a scholarship, you could roll over the funds to the IRA. I think you should have discussed the scholarship rules.


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[Assistant] In the case of a scholarship, a non-qualified withdrawals up to the amount of the tax-free scholarship can be taken out penalty free, but you'll have to pay income tax on those earnings. Thanks for keeping us in the Mostly Correct Loop on so many things, Linda.


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[Assistant] Clark, you talk a lot about the 5% on gas you get back with the Sam's Club card, but I think it would behoove your listeners to understand that Sam's Club and Walmart gas is not the top tier rated, is not top tier rated like Costco.


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[Assistant] Most modern car manufacturers recommend top tier for better engine performance and longevity. I'm sure the 5% is good anywhere on gas, but not worth the 1% in savings if you fill up at Sam's regularly. Also, you talk all about, you talk about toilet paper too much.


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[Assistant] And don't mention that Walmart, White Cloud is their brand, and Sam's are both better rated than Charmin and Costco via Consumer Reports, and they are comparably priced, Brad.


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[Assistant] Clark, you're always hawking Consumer Reports subscriptions. I'm just waiting for you to show up at my front door with a subscription postcard and a rainbow vacuum.


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[Assistant] I get every issue of Consumer Reports for free on the Flipster app by logging in with my public library card. I love old school magazines, but haven't had to buy one in years. Sean.


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[Assistant] You told people to use the online system for passport renewal from the US State Department


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[Assistant] I did and after 10 weeks my renewal application is still in received status. The next status in process is supposed to take the longest amount of time and now they've paused the online renewals due to a backlog.


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[Assistant] Peter, and I did have a couple people write in about this issue.


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[Assistant] I listen to the podcast daily on my phone. Then I look at the links I'm interested in. That's in our show notes under the podcast.


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[Assistant] My gripe is that after every show I click on a link that has at least one pop up saying I have to subscribe to read past the first few sentences. Most notably the Wall Street Journal. Being forced to subscribe doesn't seem in keeping with the Clark way.


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[Assistant] Could you please post links that are free to read and don't require me to provide personal info just to be read? Tracy.


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[Assistant] But you don't fully understand Disney timeshares called Disney Vacation Club or DVC. You said the math does not work in your favor, but the math definitely does work for some people. If you want to stay at deluxe level resorts on Disney property and go to Disney at least once every three years, it will definitely be cheaper long term.


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[Assistant] The one I purchased them for. Doesn't that tell you something is different about the Disney product? I can go over it personally with you over a dull whip in the Magic Kingdom. Love your show and all the great advice, Douglas.


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[Assistant] You stinky, stinky, dirty, nasty boy in today's- Woah!


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[Assistant] In today's episode where you were answering listener questions, you had a slight slip of the tongue. You reveal to your audience that you review the questions ahead of time and prepare for them.


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[Assistant] It's totally fine that you prepare for your listener's questions, but we the audience are under the impression that you are hearing them for the first time and are answering them off the cuff. It's time to clear the rotten smelly air. Do you or don't you prepare for your listener questions, David?


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[Assistant] Stinky advice about searching for a credit union. You said search at ncua.org on the show, but it's actually ncua.gov. And it's actually cuna.org to really search for a credit union.


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[Assistant] And I blame your stinky producer for not catching that, and that would be me. Okay, I got several.


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[Assistant] Based on how the employees enter their W-4 information. I noticed that after they changed the W-4 in 2020, when employees can't claim $4,000 or two dependents or more, they tend not to have enough taxes taken out or have nothing taken out at all.


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[Assistant] Josh in Michigan says, my teenage son will be traveling to Cuba for a week long missions trip this summer. Cuba's not included under T-Mobile's international coverage, so talk is $2 a minute and 50 cents for texting. Is there a cheaper way to keep in contact that we could set up before the trip?


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[Assistant] Can you, I wonder if they have WhatsApp, if they allow you to use WhatsApp in Cuba? That would be a good way to text, to get the internet card.


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[Assistant] I recently updated my firmware and now it will not recognize my generic ink cartridges. Keep in mind, it did recognize them before the firmware update. First, I wanted to make sure everyone's aware of this and second, is this something happening in the printer industry?


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[Assistant] Super disappointed by Epson as their ink is double the price of the generic.


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[Assistant] Or third, if you have one of these already, don't update your firmware.


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[Assistant] Contact the Florida Attorney General. Thanks for all you do and I never think you stink, lol.


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[Assistant] I'm so glad to be able to welcome you here to the Clark Howard Show. Our mission is to serve you and empower you so you make better financial decisions in your life. Up first today, I want to help you avoid some of the tactics that get you to spend more money shopping.


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[Assistant] And the impulse to shop is strong anyway for us, but retailers have become so adept at getting us to spend with them. I want to tell you how to rein that in. And we're, uh, this is a family show, but I'm going to cuss right now. I'm going to say the word annuity.


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[Assistant] Annuities are selling like crazy right now.


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[Assistant] And I'm going to tell you later why that's happening and what you need to be careful and aware of before you get sucked in by that annuity salesperson. So speaking of getting sucked in, spending money.


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[Assistant] Retailers, retailing is having such a rough ride. I mean, it's, let's make no bones about it. It's tough being a retailer today. And so,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] They are using more and more psychological tactics to get you to buy.


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[Assistant] If you're worried you spend too much money on impulse stuff, I want you to know that your phone, this thing here,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Is the enemy of your wallet when it comes to retail. Okay. How often do you see something that says for special prices, give us your cell phone number. What's that about? Okay. They will give you discounts.


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[Assistant] That will come to you by text. And that's why they want your phone number.


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[Assistant] But it's not for the discount. It's because they get you to buy things you wouldn't buy otherwise. Social media. You follow a company on social media.


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[Assistant] They got their claws in you, really into your wallet big time. Because all this is about creating sales purchase momentum.


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[Assistant] That, and it could be a brand you really like, I don't know.


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[Assistant] Anything about clothing brands, but so often it is in the clothing category where we have a wardrobe and they're just trying to get us to fill it in more.


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[Assistant] In the past it bought houses that were built long time ago. I bought two houses that were built.


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[Assistant] In the 1930s at different times, I lived in homes from that era.


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[Assistant] And people did just fine with 16 items of clothing. That was what they had. Today, people have storage units for all their excess clothing.


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[Assistant] I mean we are closed horses in the United States and know that, that the spending you do, if you look at what you got already, think how many things you're not wearing, not using. So,


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[Assistant] Avoid the temptation if you know that's who you are of downloading the app from a retailer, especially a clothing one or a manufacturer, clothing manufacturer. Don't have it. Don't give them your cell phone number. Don't follow them anywhere.


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[Assistant] Because if you do, you have a natural affinity for clothing. You have a natural affinity for that brand. You're gonna spend more money.


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[Assistant] Right. So alright, so we're talking about this trade off. So you got a 20% discount, but then you spent the other 80% that maybe would be better in your pocket. True. So this is the hard part.


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[Assistant] With the bargains, the, the constant parade of, sale, sale, sale, sale, and you get this deal because you're on our mailing list, you get this deal because you follow us on social or whatever, is that


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[Assistant] You're still taking real money out of your wallet and you're buying things. So if you really think about it and you've got all these things that are far more clothing than you need, that you can't wear all of them, then maybe you want to give up that hook and not buy those items.


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[Assistant] Thank you for mentioning that because that came from the airline industry.


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[Assistant] And retailers have very heavily adopted that over the last two years, uh, that


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[Assistant] The airline industry has been able to get people to impulse buy a ticket because they'll say, only one seat left at this fair!


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[Assistant] Okay, so I tried to, I don't know if you remember this, I did this experiment where I would take that seat


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[Assistant] Go to a private browsing session and then I wouldn't finish the booking, but I'd take that seat and then I'd see what the fare would do. It would go up $10 or something like that. It was really just a


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[Assistant] Sales technique to get people to make that purchase. So when you see one item left, two items left, maybe it is true. Maybe you have a hard to find size and they really only have that. But know that the principal purpose of that is to create that urgency to buy.


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[Assistant] Yeaah, okay, so let's start, uh, let's skip the re-load, go first to the last thing you said, different city.


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[Assistant] Affairs to Asia almost always are going to be so much cheaper out of certain cities departing from the United States that it's worth it to buy a separate ticket to get to that gateway point. Uhm, with Asian markets, uh, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New York, that those four


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Tend to have fares that, uh, gosh, there are cases where you'll pay a third the price out of one of those four, what you'd pay out of your hometown and domestic fares are cheap enough. Just got to make sure that on you're going, you cannot afford to miss your over the water flight. You got to go the day before from urine.


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[Assistant] Georgia, so you'd have to go to, uh, New York, Seattle, San Francisco, LA.


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[Assistant] So you don't miss the over the water. Not as significant or important coming back. Uhm, there aren't necessarily days of the week that will be better. If you look at a fair calendar you'll see that.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, you know, where you see the fares different days of the week, you'll see what day going, what day returning will get you the cheapest combo. Trip insurance is only necessary if you are buying


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] A non-refundable ticket that is not changeable and you'd not be able to use the money later.


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[Assistant] Or you're buying a tour. You mentioned a tour operator, I think. Yea, tour operator.


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[Assistant] Uhm, tour operator money often is non-refundable. So.


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[Assistant] Thailand is such a user-friendly destination for foreigners.


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[Assistant] That you really don't need a tour operator. You might, when you land somewhere, when you're in a place, you may want to buy a day tour from somebody. Those are readily and easily available, but you don't need an overall overriding tour operator.


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[Assistant] Hotels can be extremely inexpensive in Thailand. Less than ten dollars a night to


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[Assistant] Many thousands a night. They have the widest gap just about of any, uh, tourist destination in the world in hotel prices.


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[Assistant] And in between you'll do just fine in most of Thailand, somewhere around a hundred dollars a night or so, you should be able to get a really nice place to stay as for living there. Oh, no visa requirements for Americans there, at least not right now. No COVID testing requirements.


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[Assistant] And if you are going to live there, maybe permanently,


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[Assistant] Go there as a renter for six months or a year first.


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[Assistant] And see what it's like to actually live there versus just visit.


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[Assistant] Yes, and I will tell you we have verified that Chase does this. I know because I did it in a TV segment where I showed the Chase policy saying that you were mandatory required


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[Assistant] To be in Big Bad Zelle and Chase is one of the owners of Zelle, the parent company of Zelle and this is disgusting self-dealing and putting customers in harms way with this very, very, very dangerous app


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[Assistant] That you better have a really good reason in your life before you bring zeal into it because the heartache that you can suffer with all the money disappearing from your account


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[Assistant] Just because you have no kids doesn't mean you don't have a need for life insurance. You actually do have a need for life insurance to protect each other in the, in the, uh, untimely,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And unfortunate loss of one or the other of you in addition to your sadness.


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[Assistant] You could buy a 30 year level term, it's not going to carry your full working lifetime, but it would carry you


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[Assistant] And the initial policy you should buy should be roughly 10 times each of your earnings.


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[Assistant] Uh, the policy is tax free going among spouses. There's no tax issue involved. So I've got a guide at Clark.com that walks you through how to buy level term insurance.


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[Assistant] You want to know how to buy it the right way and the wrong way is to go to a salesperson because they're going to tell you every reason why you don't want level term insurance that you want some kind of permanent insurance policy. As for the fact that your policy would run out at 58, your income is going to rise over the years.


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[Assistant] In a number of years, let's say, uhm, 10 years from now, you would buy a second level term policy that then would carry you instead of 58, carry you to 68, the two of them would ride together


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[Assistant] And the premium on the later one would be higher because your mortality risk becomes higher at 38 than it would be at 28. But please.


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[Assistant] Protect each other by buying the Level Term Insurance.


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[Assistant] And speaking of insurance straight ahead, I'm going to cuss again. We're going to talk about annuities. Annuities are hot right now. They are selling like crazy.


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[Assistant] And this always happens following a tumultuous time in the stock markets. People saw a decline that was stomach churning.


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[Assistant] In both stocks and very rare, over the last time.


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[Assistant] It happened, uh, gosh, was it 130 years ago that stocks and bonds both fell in concert at nearly equal rates? It's very, very rare. And people saw right before their eyes this money they'd worked hard to save. They had put in investments that suddenly


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Uhm, in one year's time, they may have lost, average person, 17% of what they had invested.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And that set the table perfectly for annuity salespeople to come in and say,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Oh, we can take care of this for you. We've got this perfect product that will protect you on the downside.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] But you're also getting the upside at the stock market. But are you really? No, no.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Okay, the way these things work, and again, the salespeople


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] We were sad, we were depressed, we were distressed, depending on your emotional level with investing, when the market cratered.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The insurance industry was ecstatic because they knew it was going to be their next wave of using fear to drive the sale of garbage indexed annuities. They don't use the word garbage in them.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Since the word annuity is looked at as a cuss word.


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[Assistant] There's so many people have been burned by them. They will call them something else, anything else other than telling you it's an annuity. So what happens with these annuities?


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[Assistant] That supposedly promise you stock market returns with zero risk. Zero risk.


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[Assistant] You get upside, but you could never lose money. Okay.


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[Assistant] So what they do is they cap the gain you get from the market and in up years,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] The market gains can be really high in a year, but you only get part of that. You also don't get the dividends from stocks, which are a big part of what you earn over time.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And then on the downside, they say, okay, so you're not going to lose anything or the most you can lose is 5% or 10% or whatever is you have to meet


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[Assistant] The contract language that could be 165 pages long.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] And you do anything that the contract required. You miss something. You don't do everything exactly as required. You lose that downside protection.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] You don't have access to the money. If there's some reason you need the money, you get hit with massive, unbelievable surrender charges. Surrender charges are where you pay a massive penalty to get access to your money. Why do they charge such massive penalty?


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Because these annuities have massive commissions for the salesperson and that's why the salesperson is pushing these because they make the money.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] So the insurer, having paid these massive commissions,


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Doesn't want to then lose money having paid the commissions cause you say, this was dumb, I'm getting out. So they charge you those.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Sorry, I use massive so much. You know, people have a tendency to do that when they're, when they're being expressive, they will throw out so much. And so I'm guilty as charged.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] It depends on the insurance company, but the commissions on insurance products many times exceed in the early years the premiums you've paid in. They can be quite large. That's why insurance agents have so much incentive.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] To sell you, uhm, whole life, variable universal life, things like that. There are cases.


[User] Please transcribe this text

[Assistant] Rare cases where whole life insurance makes sense. Variable universal life.


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[Assistant] Never, never, not ever. All it does is blow up on people as we've heard all through the decades.


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[Assistant] The industry's been making a case that now that interest rates have risen, that you will earn more from them.


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[Assistant] In a guaranteed multi-year annuity, this is different than the indexing I was talking about, that they, the insurance company says we promise we'll pay you


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[Assistant] Five percent on an annuity for five years. Good luck finding that somewhere else.


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[Assistant] And then you are their prisoner for that period of time. You can't sell it. You, you have that money with them. So right now.


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[Assistant] That promise does not seem great because you can earn, as we talked about on the podcast a week or two ago, there are now CDs paying over 5% for long terms and then you have much more flexibility


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[Assistant] Is not a disaster for someone to go into one of these, but you give up a lot of flexibility.


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[Assistant] If you go into one, so you'd have to be able to say, you know what? I'm getting a good two points higher in interest from it than what I can find in the marketplace for a CD of equal length. I would say that would be to me the tipping point where giving up that freedom with the money could potentially be worth it.


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[Assistant] So this is interesting because you're, uh, essentially creating your own pension.


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[Assistant] And these are referred to usually as immediate payout annuities where you take a sum of money and you didn't have an employer that gave you a pension.


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[Assistant] You're taking the money, you're throwing it into this, and it gives you a monthly allowance for as long as you live.


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[Assistant] And if you live a long, long time, you win, you live a really short time, the insurance company wins. And so it's all an actuarial game.


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[Assistant] Not, no, the commissions are not big on immediate payout annuities. So it's not something you'll hear from salespeople a lot, but it, but it is something that, um,


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[Assistant] Did not work for the last 10 years because interest rates were so low the insurers couldn't pay.


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[Assistant] A decent return. Uhm, there are fee only financial advisors


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[Assistant] Who believe they can build you a better way of doing this using various forms of bonds that you'll be able to have that assurance with a certain sum of your money.


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[Assistant] Uh, more complicated, but I think it's worth sitting down with a fee only financial planner.


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[Assistant] I've been a long time fan and advocate of longevity in annuities where you take your money, uh, some amount of that money and you buy


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[Assistant] Longevity annuity that kicks in at typically age 80 or 85. So you can spend all the money you have till your 80th birthday or 85th.


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[Assistant] Knowing that the insurance policy will pay you till you die.


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[Assistant] Because again, the insurance companies counting on maybe you don't even live to collect the first penny from that at 80 or 85 or you don't live long after that. So if longevity is very common in your family, either of these


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[Assistant] Become more and more favorable as tools. And if there's nobody you wish to inherit any money, they become a potential tool.


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[Assistant] Your employer may ha- obviously has their heart in the right place that they're offering a company match.


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[Assistant] Including administrative costs and investment expenses would be below .5 of a percent. One half of one percent. This is 1.68% just for administrative costs?


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[Assistant] This is a problem. I don't know where you are in the hierarchy and the organization would be appreciated if you were to offer, to offer the information that the expenses are way too high and the plan, uh, that's up to you if you think that's something you could say.


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[Assistant] Otherwise do exactly what you're doing. Pick up the, uh, the amount of money you got to put in to pick up the employer match. Do the rest of investing outside of that.


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[Assistant] At one of the low cost, one of my low cost favorite children, Vanguard Schwab or Fidelity.


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[Assistant] And you won't be paying expenses like that.


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[Assistant] In fact, the administrative costs are zero with the three of them, not 1.68% for your Roth IRA. You only have the embedded costs of the investments you're in, which is, can be zero at Fidelity or three one hundredths of one percent at Vanguard,


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[Assistant] Or I think five one hundredths of one percent at Schwab.


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[Assistant] If you're a really small company, all in administrative costs plus investment expenses on the investment choices people go into would be three quarters of 1%.


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[Assistant] So this is more than double the, that just for the administrative costs before you even consider the cost of the investment expenses for each investment. That plan is a disaster, plain and simple. Uh, I appreciate each and every one of you and I want you to know


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[Assistant] We try to over time get the topics that we're hearing from people and we appreciate so much you taking the time to reach out to us. Remember,


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[Assistant] The resources we have available to you at Clark.com, at ClarkDeals.com, and then with our Team Clark Consumer Action Center where for more than 30 years we've provided one-on-one free advice, info, and guidance available to you 30 hours each week.


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[Assistant] You can see how to get that free one-on-one advice at Clark.com slash CAC. Have a great one.


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[Assistant] So you can make better financial decisions in your life.


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[Assistant] One of the ways we do try to help you achieve your money saving goals


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[Assistant] Is through our newsletters, they're free!


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[Assistant] And our content at Clark.com. So, newsletters, Clark.com slash newsletters, and you can see what's available.


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[Assistant] Something else we do at Clark.com, submit your Clark Stinks at Clark.com slash Clark Stinks. And it's time for me to hear what I got wrong. And after that, if you're someone who is willing to be fleet afoot and move frequently


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[Assistant] I'm going to tell you how that works and I actually have a brother who did something like this before the modern technology era saved him a fortune. But right now it's time for you to hear from the vast array of


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[Assistant] Complaints that we've had about things I've said or done on Clark Stinks.


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[Assistant] Joseph, thank you. Uh, first of all, I was one of the people who was flat out wrong when the inflation genie started.


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[Assistant] And I thought it was really because of the supply chain disruptions. And I was wrong as were others, but let's just talk about me. I was wrong.


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[Assistant] Because I was focusing too much on the inflationary pressures we were feeling with goods. And I really miss the picture of the much more stubborn, more difficult inflation that involves services. Inflation has come down.


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[Assistant] There's been too much money sloshing around the economy.


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[Assistant] And the Federal Reserve is doing a lot with it. If you want to really get pointy headed, uhm, what's going on with M2 right now is a good indicator.


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[Assistant] What the Federal Reserve is doing, trying to soak up money out of the economy so we don't have too much money chasing


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[Assistant] Too few available services or goods. And so yes, one of the things that ultimately is a sad byproduct


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[Assistant] of attempts to rein in inflation once the genie is out of the bottle is you try to create hardship in the employment sector so that employees are afraid of bugging the boss for more pay.


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[Assistant] Or the boss having to offer more pay to attract workers. So that will be part of the picture. The good news...


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[Assistant] And there is good news here, is we're starting from such a, such an extremely historically low level of unemployment.


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[Assistant] They were not going to be in an ugly cycle of unemployment in order to get inflation out of the economy.


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[Assistant] Uh, but we will get inflation out of the economy if the Federal Reserve does not lose its nerve.


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[Assistant] Rick, 100% correct. And the fact that I neglected to mention that, even though I've mentioned that before and I remember the question, and I just...


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[Assistant] That, that chip in my brain was malfunctioning. You know, we had this chip shortage and that one must need replacing. You're right.


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[Assistant] Jim, hope springs eternal, the lions eventually.


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[Assistant] Will be victorious. It just always seems to push off a little more the seasons that it just seems so promising. So you mentioned the NFL. I immediately go into that. Uh, so yes, very well put. I've always used the expressions, uh, soft hit, hard hit, and I should use a soft inquiry.


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[Assistant] Hard inquiry or as you said, hard pole or soft pole, because I do mistakenly make it sound like if I say soft hit, just as you said.


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[Assistant] Hard inquiry or hard poll is when you initiate an application for credit.


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[Assistant] A soft pull or soft inquiry is when someone you already have a relationship with is checking up on you and that credit card companies do this every single month on us that has zero impact and is not an inquiry that affects your score at all.


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[Assistant] Dennis, thank you. Alright, so there's a thing about the cruise industry. When you read reviews online, uh, that are posted by a cruise blogger or you watch YouTube videos about a ship or a line, they all suffer from what I call sense of omission.


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[Assistant] They are dependent on having good relationships with the cruise lines in order to get cabins for free or upgrades for free or whatever when they are bloggers or whatever that follow the cruise industry.


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[Assistant] So you only hear positives or omissions of negatives. It's not like there's no consumer reports of cruise lines that's unbought and unbossed and is just telling you, hey, this cruise line's a dump or whatever. So you're not going to have that. Everything's going to be glowing.


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[Assistant] At the least, it's kind of like the Airbnb problem where if an Airbnb is four and a half stars, the Airbnb is actually a dumb because everybody's graded in the fours all the way to five. Nobody is ever below a four it seems. So you cannot decipher, discern looking online


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[Assistant] When a cruise is really going to be not okay for you, your lifestyle or whatever. In addition, think about this versus an airline ticket.


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[Assistant] Pretty much for the most part it's a so what, because it may be a bad phase of your trip, but it's just taking you to your destination where the fun is going to start.


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[Assistant] The cruise ship is your fun. It is your destination. And if you pick a line that's really not suitable for your lifestyle, what you enjoy or whatever, then you spent a lot of your hard earned money on a really crummy week.


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[Assistant] Or three days, four days, five days, whatever it is, what a cruise expert can do. They're going to ask you questions about what you like to do, what you normally enjoy doing in your leisure time, what kind of other trips you take to try to gauge what


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[Assistant] What kind of, uh, level of travel you enjoy. What kind of activities you want. So let's say you're somebody who really likes a chance to really party.


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[Assistant] Okay, there are a lot of cruise lines that could name. You're not going on if that's what you're into. You're going to be bored to tears.


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[Assistant] Really need, ehm, you don't go on carnival because they are the, the,


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[Assistant] They call themselves, are they the fun ships? Whatever they call themselves. In fact, carnivals had so much problem with raucous parties that they've recently issued a warning to passengers on the limits to how much partying is okay. And if you party too much,


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[Assistant] And you don't follow their rules. They're throwing you off the ship mid cruise. So this is why that cruise lines have personality profiles, if you will.


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[Assistant] And they have levels of luxury or lack of luxury. So that's why when you're new to this,


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[Assistant] Having a cruise expert is really important and more important than the money in this case because you don't want to spend even a bargain amount on a week that you're gonna hate.


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[Assistant] Oh, the really experienced agents say, oh no, you never want to be on deck six on that ship because blah, blah, blah. You want to be on deck nine or whatever it is.


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[Assistant] Okay, so Perry, do you know what divorce court costs? If I cut my own hair, what would Lane do to me?


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[Assistant] Yeah, this is not happening. Oh boy. My wife had me completely locked down in 20 during the pandemic and my hair was getting really ridiculous and I do TV five days a week and


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[Assistant] Uh, TV was really getting upset with me because I was looking really disheveled. And this became a problem. I mean, I, this is a case where


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[Assistant] I actually pay, uh, $16.95 for my haircut. That's pretty embarrassing that I spend that much isn't it?


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[Assistant] That it's a bad job market. I mean, there were a number of years


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[Assistant] The pharmacist salaries were going up and up and up and we even have now, uh, in markets where people are getting these large bonuses to sign up as a pharmacist and that's


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[Assistant] Really significant information and I appreciate you sharing it that we're in your market in Missouri.


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[Assistant] That it's the opposite. There's a surplus, not a shortage of pharmacists.


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[Assistant] John, okay, so with the Costco card, also with the Sam's Club Mastercard,


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[Assistant] There are certain places if you buy gas, they're not going to give you the 4% at Costco, the 5% at Sam's. And yes, if you are a member of both warehouse clubs, you buy a lot of gasoline,


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[Assistant] You want to pull out that Sam's Club MasterCard and get your 5% cash back on every gallon of gas you buy up to this crazy limit they have that they cap your gas rebate each year.


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[Assistant] Thank you, Jason, for doing so. And I don't know why I didn't mention that a lot of Vanguard customers are eligible for Monte Carlo modeling. And if you're not familiar with what this term means, where it does extreme calculations based on various, uhm, stock market returns


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[Assistant] In years, in all the years you're leading up to retirement and in retirement to let you know


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[Assistant] The outside risk or benefit either extreme.


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[Assistant] of how you have your investments done, the mix of your portfolio and for a lot of people there's a great fear


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[Assistant] In the five or less years leading into retirement.


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[Assistant] And those first five years in retirement. So Monte Carlo modeling is an extremely valuable tool where you can play what ifs so you can sleep well at night or see you need to make changes so you can sleep well at night.


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[Assistant] Chris, thank you. Alright, so how do we know if listeners prefer and viewers who watch the show, who prefer the occasional double up


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[Assistant] of Clark sinks, we know from the number of downloads.


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[Assistant] And do you have recent data on whether the Double Clark Stinks now performs? So we'll check that because we let the wisdom of the crowd decide. And if in fact we find that it's a tune out for people to do our occasional special edition Double Clark Stinks,


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[Assistant] We're not going to do it. On the other hand, if it's a big booster shot.


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[Assistant] Is not for those numbers. We do it because there are times we get so many cart stinks backed up. We want to get to more of them because there are times that my discount deodorant and discount soap just aren't doing the job.


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[Assistant] And we need extra time to hear all the ways I should spend more on deodorant and soap.


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[Assistant] So, that's the story and I want to tell you, coming up next...


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[Assistant] Good news on rents. Rents are dropping overall all over America. This is a great thing. But what if you want to get even cheaper rent?


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[Assistant] I got a weird way for you to do it, and that's straight ahead.


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[Assistant] That apartment rents are dropping. The Wall Street Journal recently reported that apartment rents


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[Assistant] Have dropped in every major market in the United States month after month for the last six months.


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[Assistant] And this is such a reversal when we saw rents going up and up and the number of apartments, new apartments that are going to be available in 23.


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[Assistant] Apartment developers saw these rising rents in the last many years and they all decided pretty much at once they were going to build new apartments. So those apartments are all built towards the high end.


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[Assistant] So if you are of more modest income, living in a more, uh, moderately priced apartment, you may say, well, that's nice for, for high end renters. What about us? What happens is that the overall supply


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[Assistant] ends up influencing the rent levels that people pay. And what will happen is that people who are in more modest departments see the deals


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[Assistant] In nicer places, they move, creating vacancies and lower cost apartments that then have to struggle to fill their apartments. So this is good news all the way around, but still rents are high.


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[Assistant] So what's the alternative if you're looking for cheaper rent? Well, USA Today did such a fun story that reminded me of my brother Neil forever ago. My brother Neil, uhm, was trying to stretch money at, in his younger days.


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[Assistant] And what Neil was doing, Neil had really good taste in furniture and furnishings.


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[Assistant] Decorating and all that. And it was during a housing slump in the United States.


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[Assistant] And he would go to a real estate agency that was having trouble selling a home and he'd say, well, you can rent my furniture. And what he meant was he would show home the house and he'd pay to move in, he'd pay to move out and he'd get free rent in return for


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[Assistant] Furnishing and decorating the place. Somebody's staging is very common now. It was not 35 years ago. And so we'd move into a place and a place that had not sold


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[Assistant] This first one we moved into sold, went under contract really quickly. And word got around, and the town he lived in,


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[Assistant] And he moved again and again and again. And his only expense was the moving truck.


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[Assistant] And this is before the internet and having to set up phone service. And he did not pay rent.


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[Assistant] Till the economy recovered in the housing market, he didn't pay rent, I think for three years, something like that. Just moving from place to place to place. Well, now there's something going on.


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[Assistant] That is really crazy. It's called a bump notice.


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[Assistant] And in this situation, these are available around the country.


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[Assistant] Is you become a standby renter and this is going to become even more of an opportunity as landlords with all this new inventory of apartments coming on


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[Assistant] They're gonna want some money coming in. So unlike my brother getting the free rent.


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[Assistant] A standby membership allows you to pick a fully furnished one, two or three bedroom apartment. 350 cities in this.


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[Assistant] And you pay a flat rate of rent.


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[Assistant] That is heavily discounted from normal rent. But the idea is the landlord is bringing in some money in an apartment that would sit empty otherwise. And the discount you get is about a third off rent. What's the catch? The catch is if they end up renting your unit


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[Assistant] 72 hours, you gotta go. It's almost like staying in an extended stay hotel.


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[Assistant] Except you don't get to decide how long you stay.


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[Assistant] The landlord decides how long you stay. But in return, you get this heavily reduced rent in a furnished place. So what you're having to move are your clothes and whatever possessions you have other than that. But you get the advantage of the discount rent.


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[Assistant] So this is something that, uh, gosh, this is so me.


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[Assistant] Our daughter when she lived in Pasadena in Southern California.


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[Assistant] And I was staying at a new residence in by Marriott that I got on Priceline. And I'm staying in this thing and I walk it off. Yes, I really did this. It was 450 square feet approximately. And I was like, I could live in this. This would be great. And.


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[Assistant] I was, I was talking to my wife and I said, you know, honey, this, I mean, this is so much better a way to live. We just live in this. She said, go ahead if you want to, I'm not coming.


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[Assistant] And I'd get in these hotels and some of them would be really nice, some would be really crummy and some would be in between and I'd get to some and I'd think, wow.


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[Assistant] All right. Thank you. All right, Steve, I appreciate your post here. All right. First thing is that


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[Assistant] Mortgage is the interest rate on almost all mortgages in the United States, different than other countries. The interest is not calculated daily, like a car loan or credit card or something like that. Interest is calculated monthly. So paying your payment.


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[Assistant] Uh, let's say half a payment twice a month will not actually save you any money at all.


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[Assistant] But paying bi-weekly will save you money by doing exactly what you said in your post. You will over 52 weeks have made 26 half payments to the equivalent of 13 monthly payments.


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[Assistant] And so you will have the advantage of having made the equivalent of one additional payment per year, reducing the length of your loan. Now you said regardless of interest rate. So I don't talk about this now because if somebody has


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[Assistant] Oh, legacy, interest rate on a loan, they've never refied. Maybe their balance is too low for it to make sense to refi. Uhm, doing


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[Assistant] Extra payments on principal. And it doesn't have to be paying every other week. It can just be paying.


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[Assistant] An extra amount every month on the payment coupon, there will be a box for additional principal payment.


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[Assistant] So you send them an extra amount on that and do it consistently every month.


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[Assistant] You will reduce the principal and reduce the length of term of your loan meaningfully, but because it is ultra rare in the United States.


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[Assistant] To have an interest calculation other than monthly on a mortgage, paying a monthly payment


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[Assistant] Uh, and, you know, twice in a month, half of it twice in a month, will actually not save any money at all on the interest or the balance of the loan.


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[Assistant] So first of all, I'm confused because I don't know if this is by state. I guess we need to get an answer to this because my prescription is a two year prescription that I get every time I get an eye exam.


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[Assistant] I don't know, but mine is uhm, cause I just had my eyes examined and uhm,


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[Assistant] The prescription I got was good till 25 that I just received.


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[Assistant] So maybe there is a difference, so maybe we should check the legal thing.


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[Assistant] On that, as to why that's required, might be, might be required with contacts and not on glasses, is contacts are considered to be a medical device in a way where you could have a problem with your eye


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[Assistant] That could undiagnosed could lead to significant deterioration of vision or even blindness.


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[Assistant] And that could be the reason why, but we're only speculating here, Sue. So we are going to get an answer to this for you if it's different than what I just said. But yes, no doubt.


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[Assistant] Contact lenses create a financial burden.


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[Assistant] And buying them online or from one of the warehouse clubs, uh, forgetting the cost of the eye exam.


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[Assistant] Getting your contact lenses from a discount or which you have a full legal right.


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[Assistant] To have the full contact lens prescription so you can fill it anywhere can make a huge difference in what you have to pay for the lenses over time. The issue with the exam, we'll find out if the one year thing is what you suspect.


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[Assistant] That is because of contact lenses being a riskier venture.


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[Assistant] That is the craziest, well, this time I roll the dice and this time I don't. That's a funny answer. So, uh, that's why I'm always for the twofer.


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[Assistant] Which is where you want to see if your automobile insurance covers you and use a credit card that provides at least what's known as secondary coverage, whatever your car rental company, your auto insurance doesn't cover, that the credit card steps in. So what's the loss of use limit of $1,000?


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[Assistant] The car rental agencies, let me tell you, the insurers argue


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[Assistant] With the car rental agencies, like you can't believe about this.


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[Assistant] Car rental agency will calculate a daily loss of revenue to them of X number of dollars for a vehicle that's now not available for rent.


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[Assistant] And so this has been a huge fuss with the insurance industry saying the car rental companies are using


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[Assistant] Crazy insane calculations of loss of daily net revenue for that vehicle. And so that's what they're fighting about. And that's why they cap it at the thousand.


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[Assistant] So you have the additional benefit if you use a credit card that covers temporary use of a rental car and you have the coverage from your auto insurance, I would say you still decline


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[Assistant] All the pseudo insurance kinda stuff from the car rental agency. And you have an update on the contacts question of just moments ago.


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[Assistant] So the state can say, you can't have a two year script. You can only have a one. That's wonderful you found that out. So.


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[Assistant] Uh, it may be that the problem, Sue, in your state is that your state is the one that requires the one-year limit. And, uh, if you search online for your state, you may find that's the reason or it may be


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[Assistant] That this is a full employment practice on the part of the eye examiner that he or she wants return visits once a year instead of every two years.


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[Assistant] Okay. Thank you, Krista. And thank you for listening today. We hope you'll consider joining our Clark.com community. It's full of fellow money savers, community.Clark.com. Have a great day and a good weekend.


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[Assistant] Timothy in Alabama has a question about this. He says the trucking company I work for won't allow me to borrow against my 401k. Is this legal?


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[Assistant] You said you love credit karma as I do, but they don't help me if I'm ever scammed.


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[Assistant] What is your opinion of not having that help and also do you think


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[Assistant] Having, let's say, Credit Karma as well as two or three banks monitoring my info at the same time. I'm interested in your opinion and advice.


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[Assistant] And Eugene in Georgia says, with the recent shuttering of robo-advisor Bloom, does Clark have a recommendation for an alternate that can manage my retirement accounts over several providers?


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[Assistant] I have 401k rollover IRA and Roth IRA accounts all with different providers. Each one offers some type of their own robo management, but I liked having a third party independent service managing them all.


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[Assistant] But you gotta tell what happened with that guy. You gotta have to finish that story.


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[Assistant] To be in this situation, but it has been stressing me out lately. I am 25, single, and sitting on $60,000 in savings. This does not include my retirement accounts. I have $6,000 in student loans to pay off.


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[Assistant] I would like to invest in real estate, but being young and single, I would like to relocate to a different state at least once, one more time just before truly settling down in my home state in a few years.


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[Assistant] What would you suggest is the best real estate investment for my situation? I've considered syndications, house hacking, a small multifamily home for one year, and other options. I don't want all this to sit in a savings account any longer.