Am I the Financial Asshole?!
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When we were first married, we fully believed if we tithed to church, all our money issues would be over. By the third year married, we found ourselves sitting in credit counseling services.

I am in a wave of friends turning 30 this year, so a lot of big parties are happening. I am terrified where this is headed. Had a kid several years ago and the relationship with dad did not work out. He does not help with the now teenager and barely sees her unless she happens to be at his mother's house. I racked up $30,000 worth of credit card debt. The grief of it ruined my relationship and I collapsed. My husband, brother-in-law,

and I bought a house together. Immediately, I am terrified. Am I the asshole for thinking this way? ♪♪

What's up, rich friends? Welcome back to another episode of Net Worth and Chill with me, your host, Vivian Tu, aka Your Rich BFF and your favorite Wall Street girly. I'm all about money transparency and that's exactly what I preach about. So you got to walk the walk to talk the talk, right? I think every single person should be talking about money more. And a lot of the feedback I've gotten from the besties on the show

on what they want to hear about is that they feel awkward or like an asshole for wanting to talk about a taboo topic like money. So today we are flipping the script and I am going to be answering if you are in fact the financial asshole. I asked for submissions for stories, conundrums, and sticky situations all about money. Today we're going to be going through those submissions and I'm going to let you

going to let you know if you are actually the bad guy when it comes to your money and your finances and your relationships. I'm so excited to test out this format. All of you guys have told us that you would love to hear more solo episodes. So let us know what you think, and I hope you enjoy.

Support for this show comes from Pure Leaf Iced Tea. When you find yourself in the afternoon slump, you need the right thing to make you bounce back. You need Pure Leaf Iced Tea. It's real brewed tea made in a variety of bold flavors with just the right amount of naturally occurring caffeine. You're left feeling refreshed and revitalized, so you can be ready to take on what's next. The next time you need to hit the reset button, grab a Pure Leaf Iced Tea. Time for a tea break? Time for a Pure Leaf.

Okay, so I'm so excited. Here are some of the amazing guest submissions, but let's start us off with a story so many of us have experienced in our own lives, okay? Story number one. I bought a house with my husband in the midst of my BFF's pre-wedding events.

With rising interest rates, I told her I wouldn't be able to participate in everything and opted to back out of a $300 two-hour hot tub boat ride. She responded by uninviting me to her bachelorette dinner and instead said I could go to the pregame and go home. When I confronted her, she brought up past trips I had taken to Puerto Rico, to Hawaii, and couldn't understand why I didn't budget more for her.

I told her that the house was at the top of our budget and those trips were planned and paid for in full before we put the offer in on our house.

I told her we were still planning on going to their expensive destination wedding in Europe, but I needed an apology first. It never came, so we never went. Signed, best friend for never. Woo, that is a juicy one. And I'm going to be so real with you. When we were putting this podcast format together, I was sitting with my team and some members of Vox Media and thinking,

I shared this exact example and funny enough, so many people on the call said, ha ha, this was my submission or it would have been my submission. And

It's truly so interesting how these amazing financial life moments have turned into a headache and a heartache. I will say it, you are not the financial a-hole. I think it's really healthy that not only did you have a budget in place for this activity, but also the fact that you were spending well within your means for the other parts of your life.

What bothers me is that when you share this with your friend, instead of being understanding and saying something like, that's a real bummer. I really wish you could come with us. Or even offering to say, hey, it really is important to me that you're there. I'll cover you.

She instead turned it around and made it your problem for not having the money. I think that's not a really good friend thing to do. Do I think it was maybe just a touch petty the whole way how it ended? Sure. But if your friend does not have your best financial interest at heart, it worries me that that would be a trend for the future as well. So I think you're probably better off without this friend.

I'm really sorry that it might've come at the expense of a lot of evenings, you know, crying on the couch, being sad because when I feel like I lose a friend, I hurt just as much as if I were in a breakup. But ultimately I think you did the right thing. We have to be smarter about setting our own financial boundaries because you do not want to go into debt and go broke for other people's life milestones. And for what it's worth, I'm really proud that you prioritized your own.

On to story number two. Had a kid several years ago and the relationship with dad did not work out. We agreed he would help with paying a nanny alternating weeks, which was a problem when it was his time to pay. His mother would loan him money to pay the nanny and that was the beginning of the bad financial pattern. I ended up putting him on child support to which he now owes around $8,000. One year he tried to claim the kid for tax purposes and got a refund, but later was audited and had to pay it all back.

He does not help with the now teenager and barely sees her unless she happens to be at his mother's house. I am in a much better position financially than he is, and I don't rely on child support, which he hasn't paid in two years. He is asking that I dismiss the case and clear out what he owes to me, which feels not fair. Am I the asshole for not even considering this request? Signed, the responsible mother. Here's my thing. I don't think you are the bad guy. I think...

If your daughter's dad doesn't pay child support, it shows either one, a lack of wanting to be a financial partner to you, but two, wanting to support your kid. And I just want to make it really clear, like there are legal steps that you can take to enforce that child support order, which has been given to you

by a court. He could have his wages garnished, his assets seized, his driver's license suspended, and in extreme cases, he could even be thrown in jail for not paying his child support. He should be paying that to you. But I need you to take a second and think about how much you hate your baby daddy

versus how much you want your daughter to have a good relationship with her dad. Like you mentioned, you are in a much better financial position. He sounds like he's struggling. He can't afford the $8,000. I know you probably hate this person. You probably don't like him. You think he's a deadbeat. You probably think that he is no good for your kid. However, you sticking to this child support order, is that going to cause you more strife than it's even gonna cause him?

Because at the end of the day, I want you to prioritize you. And it's so important to me, if you frankly don't think that you're ever going to get that money, if you don't want to bother going through the court system to try and get that money to really stick it to him, which I don't oftentimes think is worth it, continuing to force that issue isn't going to do anything except put him in an even more financially precarious situation and have less money for him to be using to then eventually build a relationship with you.

with your child, I am of the camp that you should do what is going to give you the most peace of mind without any consideration given to him. If you're gonna get more peace of mind by

taking him to court and getting as much money as you can out of him. That is one thing. If the other conversation is, Hey, it actually would be easier for me to just kind of let it all go because then I'll never have to speak to this man again. Aside from when he comes and visits our kid, that's another, but you have to think about, is this person going to really want to play an active role in your child's life? And two, is it going to let you sleep better at night? Sometimes these money conversations are also soul searching. I

expeditions. Question number three. I racked up $30,000 worth of credit card debt, taking care of my family and only told them eight years later when the grief of it ruined my relationship and I collapsed. My family's grateful that I took care of them, but they also have told me that I was stupid for not telling them.

I didn't tell them because my mother's only solution is to refinance her house. She's done it once already and is not currently working. Am I the a-hole for keeping this to myself? What do I do now? Signed, newly single oldest daughter. My verdict on this is that I don't think you're an a-hole, but I do think you're being a martyr that nobody asked you to be.

Yes, it's important to be able to support your family, but it's kind of one of those airplane situations where you got to put your own mask on before you help others. If you are not in a financially sound position, a financially stable, secure place, you then taking on high interest credit card debt to then support your family, it's not going to really help them. It's just going to put you in a worse spot. So I think at this point with all said and done,

I would really consider what are the things that you can do in your power now to get out of this credit card debt and start over. So things like prioritizing debt pay down using the avalanche method. If you've got a couple of credit cards, maybe paying the minimum across everything, and then any additional debt pay down funds, putting towards the credit card with the highest interest rate, that's going to help you pay down your debt most effectively and efficiently.

Two, you could consider a balance transfer card. So this is where if you know you have money coming in, if you have a good job, if you're feeling good about your ability to pay it off, you can open up something called a balance transfer card where it's essentially a new credit card, but you get an introductory offer of money.

0% for say 12 to 18 months, you would truly squeeze every dollar out of your pocket in that time to try and pay this debt down. And then hopefully by the end of the 12 or 18 months, you'd be done. If you don't think you can get it done in that timeframe,

Another option is a personal loan. You can go to any sort of financial institution that you bank with or maybe your credit union, and you can apply for a personal loan. And essentially a personal loan is just a fixed interest rate loan from this bank that's usually going to come at a lower interest rate, so 7% to 15%. You're going to take all that money. You're going to pay down your credit card debt, so you won't have any credit card debt, but now you're going to owe $30,000 to the bank.

And you're going to just, again, pay that down, continue to make as much as you can in terms of payments and get that paid down. The reason this is smart to do, because if your interest rate is

10% instead of 25%, as you would have on a credit card, you'll just spend less in interest fees. And if you are truly feeling so overwhelmed, you're not going to be able to pay this debt down, you don't qualify for a balance transfer or a personal loan, you can consider credit counseling. So there's a lot of nonprofits out there that provide credit counseling, free of charge,

You work with a credit counselor. They negotiate your debt down on your behalf and essentially provide you waivers and fee reducements so that you can get that debt paid down as soon as possible. That said...

You will not be allowed to have a credit card while you're doing that for the most part. And if you do mess up while you are in credit counseling, it's really pretty bad. You have to be committed to being on the straight and narrow. All right, number four. Oh, here's a spicy one. In 2022, my husband, brother-in-law, and I bought a house together. Immediately, I am terrified.

It was supposed to be temporary. Brother-in-law needed a mortgage to boost his credit so he could buy a $90,000 truck. Seems like a lot for a truck. And we'd refinance in a year. That never happened. Now he refuses to discuss an exit plan, saying, things change too much. We split the mortgage, but for two years he didn't pay utilities. He doesn't help with upkeep, and I handle nearly everything. My husband and I also pay for my therapy and prescriptions just to cope.

Since getting the mortgage, brother-in-law openly believes women shouldn't have rights. Selling or refinancing isn't an option. Renting costs the same as our mortgage and our two large dogs limit options. I also have student loans, credit card debt for my small business, and a car loan. I feel trapped in a toxic situation with no way out. My mental health providers say I need to leave, but financially I can't.

Am I the financial a-hole for feeling manipulated into this? Or is my brother-in-law the real problem? Signed, Mortgage Misery. First and foremost, I need to know whose names are on this deed. Is it all three of you? Because if you do not have a legal document that has your brother-in-law on this property, there are actually things you can do in a court of law to get him out of your house. Also, it sounds like your brother-in-law sucks, but aside from him sucking, it

It kind of sounds like your husband hasn't done a very good job setting clear boundaries with his brother. It's not really your job to navigate this hostile living situation when you're not the one who's directly related to him. Your husband should be playing middleman. And frankly, I feel like he should be protecting you a little bit more

from some of the issues that are happening under your same roof. I'd also look into specific legal protections and options available to you based on your state. I pulled this earlier in my research. So I live in Miami, for example, according to Florida law, co-owners of a property, regardless of their ownership percentage, regardless of how the split worked out,

you have a right to initiate a partition action. It essentially enables you to compel a sale of the property. This legal recourse is available even if

All of the other owners object and prefer not to sell. So if you own a part of home and you want to sell, but the other parties don't, you can legally force a sale through a court process called a partition action, where the court will essentially order the property to be sold. And then the proceeds will be divided based on how much each of you owns in terms of ownership shares of the home. This is usually a best option when negotiation fails, when you have money because it is quite pricey,

And frankly, it will probably irreparably damage your relationship both with your brother-in-law, but it might be a tough conversation you need to have with your husband as well. It's a real bummer for me that you're telling me that you are on prescription medication, you need to go to therapy because of how much stress this is causing you. I am a firm believer that your home should be a sanctuary and it should be a place where you get to really be yourself and be happy together.

I can't imagine living in a hostile living situation where every day I go home and that's my biggest problem. So I would consider your options. Another thing just to mention is you say you want to leave, but you're in a toxic situation and don't have the financial means to. I would really consider thinking about what infrastructure you want to set in place so something like this can't happen to you again.

Um, this includes having your own bank account, making sure you have your own money that isn't just jointly owned by you and your husband. Um, you want to have your own stuff. Listen, like I don't mind a yours, mine and ours approach where you share some expenses, you have your own individual stuff, but we as women in particular need to make sure that we have our own money so that you have the freedom to leave a bad situation like this at any time. No questions asked. All

All right, on to submission number five. I'm a corporate executive in my mid thirties and I'm proud to be a self-made multimillionaire. No schemes, no startup that I IPO'd, just years of hard work, climbing the ladder, living well below my means and investing in the market, low cost index funds.

I feel very fortunate to also be engaged to a terrific partner who is himself very intelligent, ambitious, and financially prudent. However, we met well after I had already accumulated my assets, and while his earning power is also very high, mine is higher. We love that. And I have 10x the accumulated assets.

It feels important to me to establish a prenup before we get married, but raising this has been upsetting to him. He thinks it takes away from the romance of marriage and feels unfairly accused of wanting to have claim to my assets. He wants to view everything as joint. I feel like marriage is a legal contract with a lot of potential downsides, even if we don't anticipate want them to occur. Am I the asshole for insisting on a prenup?

Girl, absolutely not. You are a winner. You are smart. You are responsible. You are anything but the a-hole in this situation. I am so bummed that your partner can't see that because regardless of whether or not you draft and sign your own prenup, you get one. The other alternative is that the government gets to write it for you. I don't care if you are left, right, or center.

I think you would know your financial situation and your relationship better than the government. Yes. If that is the case, which it is for literally everyone, you should write your own prenup. In every single marriage contract, you are already agreeing to certain terms upon a divorce. Why wouldn't you want to set them yourself? The fact that he feels it takes the romance out of it is in part due to public marketing around the prenup

We've seen so many celebrities get divorces and it's like one person gets a trillion dollars and the other person's like broke. Or you see the situation where someone marries someone meaningfully their senior and then divorces them and steals half of their money, right? Like,

That is oftentimes more of a case for like reality TV or something that is just like incendiary for the New York Post. But in reality, having a prenup is one of the most loving things you can do because it means that instead of waiting until you are at your very lowest, until you absolutely hate your partner, you

You are doing it on a sunny day. You and your partner are sitting down on a sunny day when you still very much love each other, still very much agree on most things and are agreeing what is fair. Would this man expect to have 50% of the things you brought into the relationship anyway, even without the prenup? Like, I think you should continue to insist that you get one. And if he truly can't come to terms with that, that is a huge red flag for me. So yeah.

Prudent Patty, I apologize I didn't do the sign off, but Prudent Patty, I think you're super responsible. I think you've got a great head on your shoulders. And I don't think you are in the wrong. I think you are, in fact, in the right. And I would encourage you to continue to push this. Ultimately, the more you talk about money in a relationship, the easier it gets. And I'm hoping that with time, your partner can come to understand why this is so important, both to you and for the both of you.

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The next time you need to hit the reset button, grab a Pure Leaf iced tea. Time for a tea break, time for a Pure Leaf. All righty, question number six. I am in a wave of friends turning 30 this year, so a lot of big parties are happening. I am terrified where this is headed.

One friend had her birthday weekend that required travel. People had to figure out and pay for their own travel and hotels. It also involved a cringe murder mystery dinner, which was also covered by the individuals. By the end of the weekend, all of the bills were split evenly. Overall, the weekend was kind of underwhelming, and I didn't really see why it had to take place out of the state.

Is it wrong of me to be upset that this friend didn't cover anything, not even a dinner? I understand everyone has different budgets and I definitely don't expect friends to cover everything. I can't even do that. But I thought she would cover something, especially since we all went out of our way to celebrate her birthday, signed a miffed 30-year-old. I don't think you are an a-hole, but I do think you and your friends need to set more clear-cut financial expectations. So...

Obviously, doing an out-of-state birthday bash is an expensive undertaking. I think...

One thing that I would have asked if I was in your position is to my friend of like, Hey, just so I can understand, like what are the financial expectations of like, am I covering this? Am I covering this? Am I covering this? I think it's a little weird that she didn't offer to cover at least something like the dinner, especially if it's something that she was really into that it sounds like you and maybe some other guests weren't that into. Um, but I think everybody is allowed to have their own financial limitations and

I would say when you assume anything, you know, the saying you make an ass out of you and me. So don't assume going forward, ask your friends, like what is the expectation of what I would be paying for versus is there any part that you would be covering? And let's just lay it all out before you agree and start paying for stuff because that's

This has happened to me before where you agree to a trip and you think it's just going to be lodging and travel and maybe a couple meals. And then suddenly you're also doing a 10 person yacht charter. And then you're also going to this like live action, like

dining while you're watching theater thing. And then like somebody wants to go to like medieval times on top of that. I'm like, okay, cool. That's like kind of a crazy weekend. And maybe I don't want to spend that money. So just like make sure you really understand what something costs holistically before you say yes. Number seven, when we were first married, we fully believed if we tithe to church, all our money issues would be over. By the third year married, we found ourselves sitting in credit counseling services.

Don't give what you don't have even to charity. Am I the asshole for thinking this way? Signed, broke for Jesus. I don't think you are the asshole. I don't think you're a bad person. I think we set ourselves up for failure.

a lot of failure when we don't understand where certain other forces incentives lie. So this is no knock to people who are religious, are spiritual, have beliefs. You are absolutely allowed to have that. But you have to ask yourself,

Why does the church collect that money? Where is it going? Ask those questions of yourself. They obviously want you to donate more and more and more, to tithe more and more and more. Do you have that? Or are you in a less financially stable position and can't actually afford to be doing that as generously as maybe you would be in five, 10 years?

This is all based on your own budget. What I recommend is something called a 50-30-20 method. This is just like a rough jump off point. If you wanna hear about other budgeting strategies, you can check out my book. It's called "Rich AF: Borrow it from your library or buy a copy wherever books are sold." It's also on audiobook. 50% of your after tax income should go towards needs. So I'm talking housing, I'm talking basic transportation, basic groceries.

30% should go towards wants. So that would include getting your nails done, going to a movie, grabbing a coffee in the morning, and in this case, tithing.

I would not include tithing under needs because you can survive without it. However, you can't survive without the shelter. You can't survive without the basic groceries and you'll probably lose your job if you don't have the transportation, right? And so I really recommend putting that under your wants category. For the 20%, you are going to be allocating that money to future you. So that's saving, debt pay down and investing for the future.

The reason why this split is so helpful is because it tells you what things you need to cut back on if you want to be able to continue to spend money on other things, right? So if you want to tithe, and that's a really important part of your financial picture and your goals, you might know that, hey, I can't actually spend money on the latte every morning, or I can't spend money to get my nails done this month. If you're cool with that,

That works. If you're not, if you feel like, oh, the amount that I've been tithing actually eats up into way too much of this pool and in fact will lead to me having financial problems down the line because I'm actually dipping now into needs and into the 20% where I take care of future me, then you understand that you might need to ratchet that back just a little bit. I think

It is really, really important, again, to make sure that your house is built on a solid foundation before you start inviting other people in for dinner. So this is all to say, make sure that you have a really solid budget before you start spending money on anything, but especially money that you may regret having given away later. All righty, number eight. I'm relatively frugal with money. Just learned behavior from immigrant parents who started with nothing.

I invest, pay off my debt ASAP, make good money, and didn't have a kid till my career was established. Am I the a-hole if I can retire much earlier than my husband, or do I take on his catching up? He makes less than me, made poor financial decisions before we met, had a kid early, and went through an ugly divorce. I don't want to necessarily retire much before him because then who do I spend my retirement with? But I also don't want to give up all that I planned for.

signed, woeful wife. I feel like almost all of the submissions that we've gotten today, you guys aren't bad people. I think it's really about setting financial boundaries. You can still love your husband and recognize that he has his own financial picture that he needs to clean up on his own,

You've worked really hard. If you want to retire early, that's not a bad thing. We should also kind of reframe what retirement looks like. Like you mentioned, if you full stop retire and you're sitting at home all day alone by yourself, that is not really fun either. So maybe retirement for you isn't full stop. It's, hey, instead of working my nine to five day job that I don't really like, it's

Two days a week, I'm able to substitute teach. I can still make a little bit of money and maybe that money is money you use to help your partner. But for the rest of the week, you get to really relax, kick back,

you know, pick up crocheting, go to the Y and learn how to swim, whatever you want to be doing with that time. You've worked really hard. You've made really prudent financial decisions. I don't think it's fair for you to subsidize someone else's historical financial mistakes. I also think you are allowed to be human and want to help your partner because you love them. So it's truly a middle of the fairway thing. I think

If you, you know, listen, I don't know exactly how old you are, but additionally, if you are working part-time still, this may be something where you're able to cover some additional expenses and then your partner can actually contribute a little bit more to their retirement accounts, especially if they're over 50. They can use catch-up contributions on their 401k, Roth 401k, Roth IRA, IRA, whatever, and

They're able to put more aside than the average person because they're getting closer to retirement. And so using some of those strategies, they may be able to get to retirement a little bit sooner than originally planned. But again, I don't think you need to derail all of the things you've been looking forward to and you're happily ever after just because you have someone else in the picture. But I also think it's a pretty loving thing to do to help them kind of meet you where you're at and get on your level.

Submission number nine. I always get a nice-ish present for my sister-in-law around $50 for holidays and birthdays. That's very nice of you. But she always gives me something worth $10 back. Am I the asshole if I start only giving her equivalently cheap presents? Signed, Family Feuder. Okay, so hear me out.

I think we have to remember that giving gifts is about giving and not the expectation of receiving. I don't think you're a bad person for feeling a little jilted, but...

I want you to consider, is it possible that you have a more stable financial situation and can afford a $50 gift and they can't? That's one thing to consider. But also if this person is just stingy and a bad gift giver, maybe gift giving isn't their language. Maybe they're terrible at getting you physical like item gifts, but are they the person who always swings by to help you clean your kitchen and just listen to you yap for

for an hour, that has value. Are they the person who's there on a day when you've had a bad one and they're willing to come over and spend time with you or maybe do something nice for you in terms of service, like an act of service, when you're not feeling well? I don't think gift giving is the end-all be-all, but if this person otherwise also sucks and is then just also a bad gift giver,

Yeah, it's okay to not necessarily spend nearly as much time thinking about what gift to give them, but also spending less on the gift overall. Because if you don't want to maintain the relationship in that vein, that's okay. So I would say think about the other ways that that person might provide value in your life. Sometimes it's not monetary. Sometimes it's not gifts. And if you feel like maybe they're making up for their bad gift giving through other ways,

You can continue to give them the gift they deserve that you feel, you know, you would like to give them. And then if they're crappy in all the other ways too, it's like, you know, why are you getting this person a gift anyway? I would just say, hey, let's not do gifts this year. No need for us to waste our money on knickknacks that neither of us are going to use. Item number 10. Okie dokie. One of my closest friends stopped talking to me two summers ago when my husband and I purchased a second home to eventually rent on Airbnb.

She was struggling to purchase a place in our city and it felt like she took it out on me. She recently asked me point blank what I made and I cautiously told her. She assumed I made a little more than her, $80,000, but I make closer to six figures. Now all her joking comments have been around why she shouldn't have to pay for anything because she's the poor one.

Am I the asshole for making more when I have two degrees and more than a decade in my field? Signed, rich slash broke friend. I'm not rich, just comfortable. Some of these sign-offs are really, really funny. I am very, very put off by your friend.

I don't think that just because you make more money, there should be any expectation that you pay for more group expenses. I say that coming from a position of making significantly, and I mean significantly more than all of my girlfriends. They're out there saving the world. One was teaching for America and is now a lawyer. One is a surgeon. A couple of them are like

activist, uh, like a venture advisors for, um, like almost like not, she's like almost like a nonprofit investor. Like they do the best work, but some of that work doesn't pay. And they have never once expected me to pick up dinner. I do because they don't expect me to do it. I do it. But I

The fact that your friend expects you to essentially level the playing field by paying for everything kind of sucks. It sounds like she's a bad friend. And just because you are able to accomplish something with your husband, buying that home, buying that potential Airbnb, it feels like a lot of this is stemming from a place of jealousy. And you don't really want to keep friends like that in your circle because it can just make things really, really hard for

to like share in the future. You don't want to share your wins with them. And that sucks because when I have a big win, I don't even have to tell my girlfriends. They'll probably see it in the news and text me about it. And you want to have those kinds of friends, the friends that are happy for you, the friends that are going to be like, can't wait to come to the housewarming at your new place. And like, you don't want to feel like you have to hide things from your friends to make them feel big. She, she should not have to make you small to feel adequate. And I

I just think this is not a good friendship for you to have. There was one more story that I really wanted to share because I thought it was so important. A friend of a friend couldn't take their spring break trip, so they rented their non-refundable condo to my family for half the price. They transferred everything to our name, and we were on the lease and agreement. It was an amazing condo, but the condo below us had construction, so after two days of jackhammering, we called and complained.

The rental company offered us an extra night or compensation. Since we couldn't stay longer, we took the latter. When returning home and our mutual friend shared the situation, the original renters wanted more money from us. They called and asked and even sent an itemized bill. They even called the company. The rental company said it was transferred to our name and our trouble, so it was our money to keep.

Even when we considered giving some of the money to the original renters, we were told not to, or they could come back to us since it could seem like we agreed. So we never paid any of the money. The compensation was actually more than we thought. And I would have liked to pay some of the money to them, but the threats and harassment became unbearable even before we knew the amount. So we kept it. Are we the financial a-holes? I still get upset about this five years later. Condo construction conundrum. My girl, my guy, I don't know.

You have nothing to be upset about. When that family transferred you the lease and the agreement, you took that risk and took that condo rental off of their hands. Had something really, really bad happened, they wouldn't have reimbursed you for that money. They wouldn't have had like trip insurance to make sure your family vacation went well. They were just being opportunists. I think they're being vultures, frankly.

That moment has come and gone. Their moment to have asked you for more money would have been when you were negotiating the lease transfer, when you were buying the condo rental out from under them because they couldn't go. To have you come back from your trip and only ask you for more money when they found out that you had gotten compensation from the rental company is crazy to me.

Also, it wasn't like you just got free money. Like you were also living through a vacation where jackhammering noises were probably happening during most of your waking hours. That is insane. You are not the a-hole. You should never, ever speak to that family again. And it's weird to me that the mutual friends even snitched on you or like told them like they shouldn't, they didn't need to share that. So this is all to say, please,

Remove this thought from your mind. You are in the clear. You are good to go. You do not need to have this weighing over you. I just, I think you could not have done anything more correct. You should not have paid them. They had no legal claim to it. All righty. I mean, some of these stories were spicy.

As we wrap up today's episode, I want to remind you that you are not an a-hole for wanting to learn more about money, for talking about money, or for wanting to be paid what you are worth.

The stories submitted ranged from marriage money troubles to work conundrums to major friend breakups. But bringing financial transparency to these relationships is so important. You should know how much your partner's making before you marry them. You should talk to your friends about how much you are willing to spend on a trip before you buy the plane tickets and the Airbnb tickets.

And honestly, as slightly awkward as it can feel, having these money conversations early and often can save you a lot of trouble in the future. I really hope that you were able to take some wisdom away from this episode. I hope you enjoyed it. And I hope to catch you guys next week.

Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of Net Worth and Chill, part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. If you liked the episode, make sure to leave a rating and review and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Got a burning financial question that you want covered in a future episode? Write to us via podcast at yourrichbff.com. Follow Net Worth and Chill Pod on Instagram to stay up to date on all podcast related news. And you can follow me at yourrichbff for even more financial know-how. See you next week.

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