So Money with Farnoosh Torabi

Today's episode is for anyone who has ever stood in the vitamin aisle reading about the exact right creatine dosage for a woman "in this stage of life" and thought... okay but where's the aisle for my retirement savings?

I'm right in the thick of this myself. Midlife money is basically all I want to talk about lately, because I think we are the forgotten demo. There's an entire industry telling us how to optimize our sleep, our supplements, our skin. But when it comes to actually managing our money at this stage, when the stakes are higher and the runway to retirement is shorter, the advice mostly dries up.

So I'm thrilled to have Lindsay Goldwert here. She's the co-author, with Gabrielle Moss, of The Midlife Plot Twist, and she's spent a lot of time talking to women about the money moment we're in right now: the shame, the catching-up, the marriages where one partner has quietly been steering the ship, the total reinvention some of us are doing in our forties and fifties. Lindsay, welcome to So Money.
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.

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What would you do if caring for a parent meant putting your own financial future—and your kids’—on hold?

That’s not a hypothetical. It’s the reality facing millions of Americans right now, including Senator Andy Kim—a father of two, a son navigating his own father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and now, one of the leading voices in Washington pushing for change.

Today’s episode is a deeply personal and urgent conversation about the true cost of caregiving in America—financially, emotionally, and systemically.

This interview is also a special crossover with The Montclair Pod, my local news podcast, where I co-host alongside Michael Schreiber—who you’ll hear in this conversation as well. Together, we sat down with Senator Kim to talk not just about policy, but about what happens when aging, illness, and money collide inside your own family.

Before serving in the Senate, Andy Kim worked in national security and diplomacy, and today he represents nearly 10 million New Jersey residents. But in this conversation, what stands out most isn’t his title—it’s his story.

He opens up about his father’s battle with Alzheimer’s, the impossible trade-offs of being in the sandwich generation, and how quickly a family’s financial plan can unravel in the face of long-term care costs.

We talk about why so many families are blindsided, what Medicare does—and doesn’t—cover, why long-term care insurance is falling short, and what changes may be coming.

Also check out: Caring for Aging Parents with Beth Pinsker
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Can you pause your 401(k) contributions when life gets expensive? This week on Ask Farnoosh: balancing retirement savings with immediate needs, navigating student loans after SAVE, and helping parents who have little saved for retirement. Plus, why some retirees are returning to work, a lawsuit challenging McDonald’s use of AI in pricing, and updates on Book to Brand, MidiCon and So Money’s midlife-focused next chapter.
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today I’m joined by Carrie Joy Grimes. founder of WorkMoney(opens in new tab) and the author of the new book The Joy of Money(opens in new tab). She’s a former union organizer who spent years helping workers fight for better wages and benefits while also trying to untangle her own complicated relationship with money — debt, shame, financial anxiety, all of it.

In this episode, we talk about why so many women still avoid taking ownership of their finances, how to rebuild confidence after money mistakes, whether homeownership still makes sense, and how to separate what society tells us should make us happy from what actually does.

We also talk about the inspiration behind her new book, The Joy of Money, and why she believes financial security is not just about numbers — it’s about feeling safer, freer, and more in control of your life.

This episode originally aired on May 13.
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

If you've ever felt like the math just doesn't work anymore, you're doing everything right, still coming up short on your housing payment, groceries, student loans, this episode's for you.

My guest, Freddy Smith, spent nearly 20 years acting, including nine of those years on Days of Our Lives, before a business manager, who was supposed to be handling his money, stole it and stopped filing his taxes. Then came the pandemic. He lost the show. He moved to Florida and had to rebuild his finances from zero in a brand-new career. That personal collapse turned into a mission.

Freddy started sharing what he was learning about taxes, investing, inflation, and the Fed on TikTok and Instagram, not as an expert, but as someone figuring it out in real time alongside his audience, and that honesty struck a nerve. He's now built a community of two million people in three years, and it's now the subject of his new book, Generation F'd: How Millennials and Gen Z Were Robbed of the American Dream and How We Can Fix Our Futures.

In this conversation, Freddy and I get into why he thinks the real crisis for millennials and Gen Z is not financial illiteracy, it's wages that haven't kept pace with the actual cost of living.

We talk about his big four: housing, student loans, childcare, and healthcare, why he thinks college needs a hard math test before anyone signs on the dotted line, his wild but genuinely compelling case for how a young person could retire with millions just by investing early, and why he's cautiously optimistic that his generation is about to be the one that finally changes the system.

This episode first aired on July 27.
How's midlife going? Fill out Farnoosh's survey and help shape the podcast in 2027.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.