Podcasts I Recommend To Improve Your Financial Life

The great thing about technology is the ability to have an entire world full of knowledge and information at your fingertips. And in my opinion, one of the best ways to get information is through the medium of podcasts. There’s almost no other way to turn what might be considered idle or wasted time, into something really productive. Being able to gather information while commuting to work or walking around town is a major game-changer. After all, we only have so many hours in the day, so podcasts are a great way to get some of those hours back.

In fact, my own foray into the personal finance world didn’t start with blogs. It started with podcasts. If it weren’t for podcasts, I probably never would have found my way into the personal finance world. Heck, I’d probably still have no idea what I was doing with my money.

In this post, I’d like to share some of the podcasts that I listen to on a regular basis. I find these podcasts extremely informative and I’m sure you’ll find them informative too.

The Right Way To Listen To Podcasts

But first, I want to talk about the right way to listen to podcasts. I know, this sounds pretty dumb, but hear me out! There is a right way to listen to podcasts, at least if you want to maximize your time.

First, I highly recommend listening to podcasts when you’re doing something that might otherwise be unproductive time. Going to work, walking to the store, or cleaning your house? Use that time to listen to podcasts. You’ll learn so much and basically turn that time into productive time. Or at least you’ll get more use out of that time. You don’t really think about it, but it’s easy to spend several hours a day commuting, walking around, or doing other stuff that isn’t all that useful. If you use that time to listen to podcasts, you’ll be surprised at how much knowledge you can acquire.

Second, you’ll want to listen to certain types of podcasts at about 1.5x speed. If you’re listening to an NPR podcast or something similar, by all means, you’ll want to listen to it at regular speed. Those shows are about the way the story is presented, so listening to it on extra fast speed will ruin the experience. But, for basically all personal finance podcasts, it really doesn’t matter what speed you listen to it. What we really care about is the information, not the production value. Save time and listen to your personal finance podcasts at 1.5x speed or so.

Third, you’ll want to download an app to listen to your podcasts. Since we’re listening to these podcasts while we’re out and about, we need an app that downloads the podcast right to your phone. We also need an app that has speed controls, since all we care about is getting the knowledge. The absolute best podcast app out there for iPhone is Overcast. It lets you download the podcast directly to your phone and has speed controls that let you listen to the episode at 1.5x speed or more. Once you’re subscribed to a podcast, Overcast will download new episodes as they come out. The app also has a feature called “Smart Speed” which removes all the dead air from the podcast. If someone pauses during a podcast, Overcast recognizes that dead air and skips right through it. That’s a huge time saver.

*Unfortunately, I’m not too familiar with Android phones, so if anyone has any suggestions for an Android podcast app, please feel free to share.

Podcasts I Always Listen To

I have a number of podcasts that I always listen to as soon as they come out. Here’s what I recommend:

The Dough Roller Money Podcast

This was one of the first shows I found when I started getting interested in personal finance.  The show is hosted by Rob Berger, who is an attorney like I am (so I might have a soft spot for him).  While his shows aren’t produced as frequently as some of the other shows on this list, almost every show he puts out there is chock full of information.  He gets really deep into investing topics, and especially emphasizes low fee, index investing.  His shows vary in length from 30 minutes to an hour.

Financial Rockstar

Another show I listen to on a regular basis.  This show is hosted by Scott Alan Turner.  As he explains on his podcast, he was a “money moron” who eventually became a self-made millionaire 13 years later.  The show is more of your standard Q&A type radio show.  Folks send in their questions and Scott answers them.  Typically  he’ll answer about 5 questions or so per show. He also usually starts his show with a featured topic that he discusses for the first 5 or 10 minutes.  This show is a bit more basic, but still useful for people like me who just want to get all the personal finance information they can.  His shows are about 30 minutes long.

His and Her Money Show

If you’re looking to get out of debt, then the His and Her Money Show is for you.  Talaat and Tai McNeely host the show and bill themselves as “America’s Number 1 Money Couple.”  They also recently won two Plutus Awards at Fin Con 2016!  In each show, Talaat and Tai interview a new person who shares their own debt free story.  It’s really a great way to learn about all the ways you can pay off debt and a great source of inspiration if you are in the process of paying off debt yourself. I was actually fortunate enough to be able to share my debt free story with them back in August.  Their shows are about 20-30 minutes long.

Million Dollar Plan

Once a week, Pete the Planner learns about a listener’s financial life and gives them actionable steps.  I find this show particularly useful because we’re getting real numbers from real people.  It’s always interesting to see how others are doing and what they are doing right or what they could be doing better.  When you get those real numbers, you can really see what you can do as well.  Shows are about 30 minutes long.

Sound Investing w/Paul Merriman

This is probably one of my favorite podcasts.  Paul Merriman is a former financial advisor and hosts one of the more technical podcasts out there.  If you are an investing nerd, you’ll love this show.  I like to think of Paul Merriman as sort of like JLCollins.  He tells you exactly what index funds you should invest in – giving you the ticker symbol and everything.  Paul does emphasize weighting towards small cap value funds and he convincingly explains why using empirical data.  If you are ever worried about the long term performance of the market, Paul will be able to comfort you.  Shows range from 30 minutes to an hour long.

Radical Personal Finance

Oh man are these podcasts long!  Joshua Sheats hosts Radical Personal Finance and goes extremely in depth into all sorts of financial topics.  His shows are usually between 1 and 2 hours long, so you’ll really want to make use of your speeded-up playback settings in your podcast app.  But seriously, listen to his show.  You’ll come out much, much smarter for it!

Afford Anything

Paula Pant’s show is just terrific.  It’s more of an interview based show, but the guests on her show are some of the biggest names in the personal finance community. Paula and her guests share a lot of information about real estate, investing, and topics that aren’t directly related to personal finance as well, such as how to be more productive in your work.  Shows are typically about an hour long.

Stacking Benjamins

Joe Saul-Sehy and O.G. host a sort of variety show on money topics, three days per week.  This is another one of the first podcasts I discovered.  They claim they don’t teach anything, but that’s just a plain lie.  You’ll learn a lot from this show.  Shows are about 45 minutes long.

Other Personal Finance Podcasts I Recommend

The below are shows that I also recommend.  If you still have time, try to throw these into your listening schedule as well.

Millennial Money. Shannah (Compton) Game distills fairly basic money topics for Millennials.  If you’re young and trying to learn about money, this is a pretty good show to listen to.

The Money Guy Show.  Brian Preston and Bo Hanson also discuss various money topics.  This show has apparently been around forever (2006 or so), so the fact that they are still producing shows speaks volumes about their commitment to helping people with their money.

Money Tree Investing Podcast.  Hosted by the Stacking Benjamin’s crew of folks, this show is more about the technical side of investing.  Really good stuff here for those that are looking for more advanced money topics.  I typically listen to this show as soon as it comes out as well.

The Retirement Answer Man.  Another great show.  Roger Whitney talks about various money topics related to retirement.  Like Stacking Benjamins, it’s also more of a variety type show, with Roger jumping around to various money topics.

Financial Independence Podcast.  This show is hosted by the Mad Fientist.  He typically interviews people and learns about their financial independence story, or shares information about achieving financial independence.  The only downside is that new episodes aren’t released very often.

So Money.  Farnoosh interviews people four times per week, and then does a Q&A session on Fridays.  I often skip a lot of the interviews simply because they aren’t particularly relevant to me, but every once in a while, she does interview people I’m interested in, and when she does, I stop in and listen.  Otherwise, I tend to mainly just listen to her Friday Q&A sessions.

Quick Hitter Podcasts

There are a number of podcasts that are super short shows – 10 minutes or less.  I call these shows my quick hitter shows.  Since I listen on 1.5x speed, I can usually listen to these shows in 5 minutes or less.  These are great for when I need something really quick to listen to.

Money Peach.  This is a pretty basic and straightforward show, but I like hearing Chris Peach talk and it’s always good to brush up on the fundamentals.

You Need A Budget.  The folks over at YNAB do a quick podcast every week or so that has pretty useful information on budgeting and planning.

Side Hustling Podcasts

Readers know that I love side hustling, so I have a variety of shows that I listen to that are geared towards the side hustling crowd.  These aren’t directly personal finance related, but if you enjoy side hustling, you’ll want to take a look at these shows.

The Side Hustle Show.  Nick Loper has a great show in which he interviews people about their various side hustles.  Great for anyone looking for inspiration or interested in other people’s side hustle stories.

Get Paid For Your Pad.  Jasper Ribbers wrote a book about Airbnb and hosts a podcast where he interviews people about their Airbnb experience.  If you’ve thought about doing Airbnb or are a current Airbnb host, this is a show you’ll want to listen to.

Rideshare Guy Podcast.  Harry Campbell hosts this podcast where he talks about Uber, Lyft, and food delivery services.  I’m a big fan of these type of apps and the potential they have for making money on the side.  Harry is particularly unique because he actually left his job as an engineer for Boeing in order to do Uber and work on his blog full time.  I recommend this show if you’re interested in sharing economy/on-demand platforms.

Scavenger Life Podcast.  This show appeals to my dumpster diving side.  The hosts make a full time living by flipping items on eBay that they find in thrift stores, garage sales, or on the side of the road.  They also own a home that they Airbnb and talk about on their other podcast, Shampoo and Booze. These two basically live a dream life to me and really demonstrate unique ways you can make a living in today’s world.  The shows are really long and can often be all over the place, but are interesting to listen to.

Have you listened to these shows?  Any of your own recommendations?  I’m sure I left out tons of other great shows, so please let me know!