Caitlin's Corner Financial Conversations for Even the Healthiest of Relationships I recently read the book Strangers: A Memoir of Marriage by Belle Burden. In case you haven't heard the buzz, the book chronicles the abrupt collapse of the author’s 20-year marriage. I have so many thoughts on this book, few of which I'll dive into here. What I do want to focus on is why this book matters as a financial memoir for women. Early in the book, Burden details how she and her family are bonding in...
23 days ago • 11 min read
Susan's Scoop All Aboard at Inflation Station! Should I be excited that my car now holds $80 worth of gas when it used to hold just $40? All jokes aside, the inflation rate lately has been no laughing matter, with overall prices up 3.8% in the past year, and gasoline up over 50%. If you’ve come to one of my tax strategy presentations, you may have seen my slide where I identify inflation and taxes as the two biggest wealth killers – and then I go on to say there’s not much we can do about...
30 days ago • 4 min read
Caitlin's Corner 10 Skills I Wish for Every Graduate A couple decades ago on a hot June morning, I sat sweating in a maroon cap and gown, having just finished a mediocre speech to my graduating class. I slid my heart-shaped sunglasses back up my sweat-beaded nose for the 100th time. Gearing up to throw my cap, I had no idea what a Roth IRA was. A conversation I hear often among parents is how we can best set our kids up for financial success. I believe strongly in building a healthy money...
about 1 month ago • 6 min read
Susan's Scoop The New FIRE: Financial Independence, Recreational Employment As most of you know, my husband and I “retired early” from our W2 jobs almost 3.5 years ago now. As you would imagine, it’s been 3 years of waking up late and lounging by a pool all day – except that’s not how it’s been at all. Today (and yesterday, and the day before that), my husband has been at our properties dealing with maintenance issues – a cracked floor, limbs down from recent storms, and a broken-off toilet...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Caitlin's Corner Motherhood Math I was not planning to write an article about Mother's Day. I had an entirely different subject mapped out, but then I felt called by Lindsey Stanberry to share my career vs. motherhood story. The media seems to have waged a war against working moms, so rather than reminding you of how worthy you are of the flowers, brunch, and gratitude (and you ARE!), I want to highlight why the weight of motherhood in the US in 2026 cannot be so easily relieved by those...
about 2 months ago • 7 min read
Susan's Scoop What if Later Never Comes? As much as I love writing about tax strategy and financial topics, I thought I would write about something a little more personal today. This past weekend I attended a family wedding and saw relatives that I haven’t seen in a long time; most of them had heard through the grapevine that my husband and I “early retired” from our W-2 jobs a few years ago, and a lot of them had opinions about it. One of them accused us of being “reckless”, a few said we...
about 2 months ago • 3 min read
Caitlin's Corner Save the Most Taxes Today, or Save More Later? Around this time of year, one of the internet's favorite debates is about the tax refund: should you celebrate a big refund, or does it mean you did something wrong? The answer could be a little bit of both. First, you should understand that when the tax policy changes in a pretty dramatic way halfway through the tax year (looking at you, OBBBA), you're more likely to be in a position of having over or under-estimated your tax...
2 months ago • 4 min read
Susan's Scoop Would you still work if 95% went to taxes? If the government took 95% of your wages for income taxes, would you still go to work? What about 70%? Or 50%? (Surprisingly, rates north of 50% actually can happen to self-employed U.S. residents in places with high state/local taxes!) Since tax day was yesterday, I thought it would be interesting (fun?!) to take a deeper dive into the psychology behind paying taxes. I recently was invited to speak at an event for the Black Women in...
2 months ago • 3 min read
Caitlin's Corner Your Life, on Oil Whether you've been tuning into the news or not, by now you've inevitably heard about the US-Iran conflict, and what it means to the global oil supply. Perhaps you hadn't heard of the Strait of Hormuz until last week. Maybe this whole time, you've optimistically thought: So many countries, including the US, have invested in alternative energy sources throughout the decades- so we should be more insulated to hits in the oil supply. Or: I'll budget for more...
3 months ago • 4 min read