Hey friends, if you've been sitting on a book idea and wondering, could this actually become something? This is your moment. Join me in New York City on October 9th for Book to Brand. This is my intimate full day immersive designed to help you turn your idea into a clear, compelling, pitch-ready book concept. You will meet the insiders, agents, publishers, and recent authors who can help bring your book to life. Spots are limited and early bird tickets are on sale now. Head to booktobrand.co to reserve your spot. So Money episode 1974, Ask Farnoosh. You're listening to So Money with award-winning money guru, Farnoosh Karabi. Each day, get a 30-minute dose of financial inspiration from the world's top business minds, authors, influencers, and from Farnoosh herself. Looking for ways to save on gas or double your double coupons? Sorry, you're in the wrong place. Seeking profound ways to live a richer, happier life. Welcome to So Money. Welcome to So Money, everybody. I'm Farnoosh Tarabi, April 24th, 2026. It's Ask Farnoosh Friday. And today we have questions about what the heck is a Trump account? You know what? To be honest, I had avoided the topic and everyone was asking. So I looked under the hood and I'm actually, you know, I got to say that I feel like it's being oversold a bit, but I think I might open one up for both of my kids. And I know what you're going to say, but I have a strategy and I'm really excited about it. And I'm going to tell you what it is. So hang tight, but lots more until then. We're also going to talk about a quick and dirty estate plan. So this came up this week where I was doing a podcast with my friend, Lindsay Stanberry. She's the creator of The Purse. It's this incredible sub stack. You've got to subscribe. It's this phenomenal, wonderfully layered, in-depth, well-reported sub stack on family and finances. Okay. So Lindsay Stanberry, she's this seasoned financial journalist who started this sub second. She and I did a podcast together this week, not on So Money, but on her podcast, which is coming out soon on money and families and kids. And also then we talked about estate planning and she was like, give me sort of the quick and dirty on how to estate plan. And really like, what do I need in case of an emergency? Like, what if there is a worst case scenario? What should I have set aside for my family in terms of a will and life insurance and all the things. So I thought I would bring that to us today because I have it. I know what the go bag is now. The go bag, you know, but it's not really a go bag, but it's really like the things that you want to have, the checklist, and you could probably assemble this about 50% of it this weekend, but I'm going to give that to you later on in the show. I also want to share a quick story and I'm going to share that right now because I'm going to boomerang back to it later when I talk about some of the news this week, but my son, okay, in the car this week, we were driving around and, you know, all of our grandparents, their grandparents are still alive and well, knock on wood. And he's 11, my son. And he said to me kind of out of the blue, he said, mom, quick question. So, you know, Mimi and Gigi and grandparents, they don't work, but like, how do they pay for things? That's a cute question. And you know, I live for these questions. I sat up in shotgun seat and I said, okay, here we go. So I said, Evan, they are in retirement. And when you work from age 20 or 25 or whatever it is until you retire, which is usually like these days in your sixties, you are supposed to save a portion of your income every single year. Okay. And I, you know me, I always tell people save, save, save. And this is why. So you save a fraction of your money, every single paycheck, and you put it in an investment account. You want to invest it so it'll grow faster. And then hopefully when you retire, all this money is waiting for you when you retire. And then you don't have to worry about working anymore. And you got to budget that money and like every month, give yourself a piece of it and live off that. And I said, additionally, there's this thing called social security. It's a tax out of every paycheck. The government saves that money for you, hopefully, and gives it sort of, you know, back to you or some of that back to you when you retire. I think I'm going to give him all the details about it, but you know, high level. And that's also something that you get. So combine that with your money and that's your retirement money. And he goes, oh, okay, got you. And then I went on and on and on. I was like, but you know, some people, a lot of people don't have enough money. He goes, okay, whatever. And then that was like it. He had reached the end of wanting to know anything more about that. So I'm going to finish the conversation with him at some point later. Actually, I'm going to finish the conversation with you later because there is some news, some new news about retirement readiness that I want to share with us and other news as well. There are some really interesting headlines this week about money that I think we should keep an eye on. And we're going to get to that as well as the mailbag. In case you missed any of the episodes this week, oh my gosh, oh my gosh, what, what, what, what? Go back to Wednesday's episode. Start with that, okay? Because I haven't read a book in a long time, a really good memoir in a long time, I should say. and I did recently, and it's called Strangers, the number one New York Times bestseller, a memoir of marriage by Bell Burden. Yes, I did the thing everyone's doing. I don't usually like to do what everyone's doing, but I did the thing. This is a book that chronicles the fallout of Bell Burden's marriage. Bell Burden is for all intents and purposes, a modern aristocrat, literally a descendant of the Vanderbilt lineage. And she marries a man. They stay married for, I think, 20 some years. They have three children. She enters the marriage with a number of trusts with millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars in these trusts. She's a lawyer. She went to Harvard. She gets married to this man who works in finance. and during the course of their marriage, she stops working and relinquishes all of her financial autonomy and decision-making and oversight and question asking to the husband. Sound familiar? Can you guess what happens? Okay. So this is why I didn't even want to read the book because I was like, what am I going to learn? What is there for me to learn in this book? And I think it wasn't really so much for me to learn anything. It wasn't so much that I had to learn something financial in this book. It was more about learning the how to deliver a message about financial lessons to the masses in this book. The how of how she did it is really important and critical. There is one thing about, there is obviously what I do, right? Which is all these books, right? All these books about the importance of financial empowerment for women. A lot of people take that advice and I'm glad for it. But there is something else about Abel Burden doing it in her way in a memoir that is I think going to reach more women than I ever will And I okay with that I all in support of that We need more of these printings It ninth printing this book I think she's going to save a lot of women from the despair that she went through. She's on the up and up now, obviously. She's gotten this book deal and this book is being turned into a Netflix special. Anyway, on Wednesday, I was joined by Heather Bonaparte, who is a lawyer herself and the author of a book called Money Together. We got into it, the two of us, about all the things that this book teaches women and couples and why we really appreciated her story. Do you know that many people are upset with Bell Burden for talking about the inner details of her marriage, calling it inappropriate and not motherly. And what kind of example is she setting for her children? You know, what kind of example is she setting for her children? An excellent one, an important one. Hopefully her kids will realize that they, you know, should really respect the work that their mother did for them because it is work when you are a full-time caregiver, her, right? Her husband did not respect her, but more so that you should marry someone who sees you as an equal partner. Her husband did not see her as an equal partner. This book was not meant to paint a bad picture of their father in her children's eyes. I don't think she meant this to be retribution on her husband. She told the facts. There are not many adjectives in this book, you'll notice, to describe her husband. I think that was obviously a legal choice, but it is the truth. If you don't like the truth, I mean, people were more upset with Bell Burden than they were with her husband for leaving her during a pandemic with three children to raise while he would go pursue an affair. They saw nothing so wrong with that, but more so found fault in her recounting the story publicly. If anyone should have a problem with it, maybe it should be him, but he was fine with it. He said, sure, fine, go publish it. He didn't sue her. So I think for the public to be upset with it, that confuses me. Anyway, then on Monday, I talked about The Price of Ambition with Caroline Palmer, who's actually a neighbor of mine in town. And she wrote kind of a thriller during the pandemic, Taking Care of Three Kids. I can see how that would come together. And it's all about, it's fiction though. What happens when success starts to blur your sense of self? The book is called Workhorse and it draws from her years inside the high gloss world of fashion publishing. And she takes us beyond the cliches of the Devil Wears Prada book, which by the way, I cannot wait for May 1st because that's when the sequel comes out. The book reveals a more complicated and at times darker story about ambition, identity, and the quiet trade-offs that women make to get ahead. We also talk about working in publishing in the early 2000s, like I did and making very little in New York City, but sort of feeling like you really had a community in that time and in that way and how we kind of sort of miss it, you know, we wouldn't have changed it. I don't think I would have changed the way that I started out my career in any, in any way of it, in any sense of it. And not even how much I was making. Sure. I would have like to have made a little bit more money, but I think it gave me the gumption and the hustle that I really needed for this career. All right, we're going to get into the news next and then the mailbag, and then I'm going to wish you a happy weekend. First, AI job cuts are accelerating on the street, Wall Street. The New York Times reports that Wall Street's longstanding assertion, They were very firm that AI would not steal jobs. In fact, it would just enhance human jobs. Well, that's not really working out, is it? In fact, there have been a lot of layoffs in the last quarter at a lot of the major banks, investment banks. And it has benefited these same companies who said that AI would not replace human work. They've collected billions of dollars in profits, all while shedding 15,000 employees. and many of them saying it's thanks to AI. AI has been helping them automate work in a lot of areas like back office, areas where employees used to like fill out paperwork to comply with various laws and regulations. In the front office where seven-figured salaried professionals would put together complicated financial transactions for corporate clients. Again, this is in the New York Times. And by the way, y'all, this is not just happening on Wall Street. If you haven't yet, I really recommend you go back and listen to my conversation with Che Wong. He's the co-founder of a startup called Pelgo. We talked to him in March. They're helping workers reskill for the jobs of tomorrow. There's also a feature story in the New York Times Magazine, and they also interview the author of this article in the Daily Podcast discussing how AI is impacting software developers, specifically coders. And while yes, that industry has been really impacted by AI, a lot of job loss there, but it's not total annihilation because we still need humans to program the AI, manage the AI, and sort of act like architects and be less in the weeds and the data dig, but be more like the visionaries. There have been these analogies to Steve Jobs where coders and software developers really see themselves more as the big picture people where they'll tell the AI, okay, give me 10 iterations of this idea. And now they have more choices and more ways to tinker in shorter periods of time. It's actually great in some ways, but you have to be willing to want to do that kind of work. And if that's not something you're interested in, then maybe you got to look at shifting gears entirely. But that's the reskill that some of these software developers are being tasked with. Now, in the health section of the New York Times, I found a story that intersects with money and tech. And it's about age tech and how this is an industry that is kind of on the up and up. And what it's doing, it is helping seniors as they age, help them to reduce their costs during the aging years. So we've been talking a lot on the show about the cost of aging, especially for those who need at-home care. They need to go live in a nursing facility. These are the sorts of costs that typically need to come out of pocket. Medicare does not usually cover this. And when I read this article entitled How Age Tech Might Help You Grow Old at Home, I got excited. Because here's the problem, right? Our homes are not really set up for aging in our homes. We have to leave our homes. A lot of people would prefer to stay home. That's the dream. And so age tech is solving this problem. What are we talking about? These are like smart walkers, glasses with lenses that provide real-time captions of conversations for those with hearing issues. A concierge service that connects older people to drivers, like think Uber, but for seniors. And then also giving them access to deliveries, even if they don't have a smartphone. AARP reports that 25 of caregivers are remotely monitoring their loved ones with apps videos or wearables which is nearly double the percentage from five years ago So if you interested in entering a booming industry this might be it If you're interested in health or tech or the aging population, caregiving, this has all of it. You know, even if you just like one of these areas, this has maybe your name on it. And this is where there might be some job opportunities, some innovation opportunity. This story presents a lot of angles for us, whether we are taking care of an aging parent, whether we are that aging parent, whether we're a job seeker or an entrepreneur, lots to glean from this story. All right. Now remember my son with his retirement question, how do they afford stuff? Well, he didn't like my part two of that discussion where I wanted to get into how Americans are really struggling with that. And now a survey that I could have tossed into my PowerPoint presentation in the car, Wall Street Journal reports that Americans are getting more worried about having enough money for a comfortable retirement. And this is due to the rising costs and fears about the health of entitlement programs. Some 61% of workers are very or somewhat confident in having enough resources for retirement. That's down from 67% last year and a recent high of 72% in 2021. And that's according to a long running survey by the nonprofit Employee Benefit Research Institute. It's the lowest point in this survey in nearly a decade. So, you know, someone asked me this week, what's more important, friend? Are you saving for college or retirement? And I said, very simply, college is four years, retirement can be 30. And within those 30 years, you've got your costs, you've got healthcare costs. There are many ways to afford college, including your contributions, your child's contributions, the college's contributions, right? They could provide scholarships, they could reduce tuition. There are student loans, of course, we want to be careful with those. there's no Stafford loan or federal loan for retirement. So this is primarily on us. Social security is still a resource for now. And by the way, you can go to ssa.gov and figure out your estimated payout in retirement after this podcast, if you wish. I highly recommend it. It's fun. But no, you don't set aside your retirement savings plan to help fund your college savings plan. That's a no-no. And I think that some people do that anyway. And it's no shock to me that some people are losing confidence in their ability to have enough for retirement. It's because when we are not retired yet, the cost of just being a non-retired person is too high. You know, college, housing, groceries, car payments, insurance payments. Lastly in the news, remember in college and even in your 20s and maybe even just yesterday, when you were trying to save money on going out, what would you do? You would pregame. Well, turns out the millennials and even the Gen Xers are doing this all over again with prices for everything from groceries to gas climbing. Americans are pinching pennies and they're making hard choices, says the Wall Street Journal. Many have cut out alcohol altogether. And for those who still have a cocktail, they're entering a flashback era of pre-gaming where they drink a few drinks at home before going out to keep from spending much more to get the same buzz. There was a survey by Zappy. They surveyed a thousand people and they found nearly a third had drinks within the last three months, pre-drinks to avoid paying higher prices at venues. Guess the price of an average cocktail in America right now. It's 13. It's $13 and 61 cents. Oh my gosh. Remember that episode I did a couple of weeks ago on hashtag loveflation and how people have stopped dating as a result of the price of going out. That survey is sponsored by French wine company, Louis Jadot. I've partnered with them. Louis Jadot, by the way. I can't believe this is where we're at, but I'm in New Jersey where the World Cup is coming and we're dealing with New Jersey transit from New York Penn Station to the stadium costing 150 bucks. Can you believe that? And I guess if you think about the cost that people are paying for these tickets, it's just a fraction of it. And then when you get to the stadium, I can't even imagine what a beer is going to cost. That's why I'm staying home and watching the game on the small screen. All right, let's hit the mailbag. Are Trump accounts worth it? Well, let's first discuss what these even are. They're known as 530A accounts, not too far from the 529 accounts, right? But I'm going to tell you right now, they're not very similar. They may be close to each other numerically, but that's about it. A Trump account is a proposed, in some cases, government-seeded investment account for children. The idea is to help build wealth from birth, zero to 18. Still a little foggy on the structure and the rules. I'm not foggy on it. Feels like it's just kind of new. And I have a lot of questions. It doesn't seem like there's a lot of answers, but we'll go with what we got. So here's how it works. You can open up a Trump account starting as soon as your child is born. Every year until the child turns 18, you can put up to $5,000 a year into this account with after-tax dollars. All right. If your child was born in 2025 through 2028, the government will give you an extra thousand bucks as a booster. And that's where that seeded investment comes in, that government seeded investment account comes in. But if you've got a 10-year-old, you can only do that 5,000. You're not going to get that extra thousand. The money would be invested in stock index funds and it will grow tax deferred, not tax free, tax deferred. When your child turns 18, the Trump account converts automatically into a traditional IRA. So now your child is 18 and all that money that has grown in their Trump account following the market, the U.S. stock market indexed, is now in a traditional IRA and it follows traditional IRA rules, which means that generally speaking, you cannot withdraw the money from this account without paying penalties or taxes until the age of 59 and a half. If you do, it's considered an early withdrawal that comes with a 10% penalty and you have to pay income tax on the earnings. Now, there are a number of exemptions to the 10% tax penalty for first-time homebuyers. You can withdraw up to $10,000 over the course of your lifetime from the IRA, penalty-free. You're also exempt from that 10% penalty for qualified higher education expenses, health insurance premiums paid while you're unemployed. But generally speaking, an IRA is really designed for your future, right? Retirement. It not considered a tool for college savings or a tool for buying a home right If it is it not the first choice It like the backup backup backup And I find that this Trump account is sometimes being marketed as an account that can be used for anything, super flexible, build wealth, and then use it to your heart's desire. Okay, sure, but there are catches to it. And are there other accounts that could possibly get you to reach your goals that would be more advantageous? And my answer is yes. So if your goal is to save up for college for your kid, then a 529 would be more advantageous actually because there are better tax benefits to a 529. The money that goes in, if depending on your state plan could provide you a state tax deduction, the money grows tax-free and the withdrawals are tax-free when they go towards qualifying education costs. Even a custodial brokerage account might be better for your kid because with a custodial brokerage account, there's way more flexibility when they turn 18. They don't pay a penalty for withdrawing the money. They can use it for whatever they want. They don't have to wait until retirement. But here's what I think could be an interesting hack to the Trump account. So as I said, once your child turns 18, the Trump account converts into a traditional IRA. Now, we've talked about how with a traditional IRA, you could convert it into a Roth IRA, correct? So at 18, your child has this traditional IRA that was formerly a Trump account. And let's say you've been contributing the max $5,000 a year into this Trump account, starting when your kid's born. By the time they turn 18, this money has been tracking the US stock market, which returns about 7%, 8% every year historically. So conservatively, you're looking at, what, over $200,000 by the time they turn 18 in this Trump account, which now is a traditional IRA. They're 18 years old. You pay the tax on that to convert it into a Roth IRA. You pay income tax on that, right? But their income tax when they're 18 is, what, maybe very little, right? They're not working. Presumably, if they are, they're not making a whole lot. this may be their lowest income year, which means this is also their lowest tax owing year. The best year to convert the traditional IRA into a Roth IRA. So then they do that. And of course, less money will go into the Roth IRA from that 200 plus thousand dollars. But now they've got a Roth IRA with six figures in it, starting out at 18 years old. And once they get a jobby job, they'll start contributing the max perhaps that they can to this Roth IRA, which who knows what it'll be in 18 years. Right now it's $7,500 a year. Maybe it'll be $10,000, $20,000 in the next 18 years. And that, my friends, is when the money really starts to compound. So let's do that math. You've got 200, let's say, let's forget the taxes for a second. Let's say you've got $200,000 in that Roth IRA continuing to compound at 8%. Let's say 45 years later, let's say you've been contributing, let's just say 500 bucks a month. My friends, your kid's got almost $10 million, $10 million by the time they're 63. This is just math. This is just math. This also assumes that your kid is going to continue the good work that you started. So that's what the Trump account could start, but will your kid finish it? Finally, from the mailbag, the estate plan, quick and dirty plan. You need to know what's going to happen to your money in your absence, correct? You want to know that. Call it whatever you want. But bottom line, everybody needs a will, which is essentially a legal document that says what will happen to your assets when you pass away. If you don't have and who will also take care of your children, your minor dependents, when you pass away. If you don't have this document, then the state determines this, which takes time, which may not be to your wishes, which could cost more, and it can be a complete headache and a disaster. So take the time to book an appointment over the next few days with an attorney to review your assets or online, there are services that can help you to figure this out. But what you can do on your own in the meantime, this is going to all go in your go bag in case of an emergency. You want to identify the guardians for your kids. Who's going to be your power of attorney? This person's going to have the ability to act on your behalf with regard to your financial affairs. You want to make sure that all of the beneficiaries for all of your various accounts, your insurances, your bank accounts, your retirement accounts are up to date. And then also very important, do you have a break open glass document or like a safe password online document with all of your bank passwords, your key contacts? If something happens to your partner, do you know how to access their life insurance? Do you know where their will is? Do you know where the username password to their bank accounts are. Very important that this is somewhere secure. Maybe it's in a lock box, in a fireproof lock box in your home. And then of course, life insurance. Life insurance is important for those who want to take care of their dependents in the event that they pass away. Dependents includes children, but it can also include aging parents as where many of us are increasingly taking care of our parents. A term life insurance policy that covers 20 years, 30 years, basically how long do you want to support your beneficiaries, right? If your kids are little, one, two, three years old, and maybe you're thinking, I'm going to get this life insurance policy to cover them through college and maybe then some. So then you're looking at maybe a 20 year policy. It can be very affordable relative to whole life insurance, which covers you for your entire life. Most people just need term. Life insurance you can buy online. How much do you need? Eight to 12 times your income. And I would say too, for the non-earning spouse in the household, if you have a person who's not working outside of the home in a traditional job, but is maybe a caregiver or is just unemployed at the moment, maybe is just full-time caregiver, that person has an economic value. And if they unexpectedly pass away, that is going to be economically devastating as well for the household. So I believe that even those who don't work outside of the home should have life insurance policies, right? Stay-at-home mom, usually we say, is doing a job that carries a value of six figures with all of the work on her plate every single day. Let's say she's valued at $250,000 a year. So her life insurance policy better be about $2 million. All right, everybody, that's our show. Thanks so much for tuning in. And I will see you back here on Monday when we're gonna talk to Amy Marin, a psychotherapist, mental strength trainer, and an internationally best-selling author. Her latest book is called The Mental Strength Playbook. I hope your weekend is so money.
