#130 - Gen Z Money Trends: How TikTok and Instagram Are Shaping Personal Finance
episodePreviously titled “Gen Z Money Trends: How TikTok and Instagram Are Shaping Personal Finance” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 31, 2026
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Who are the guests and what Gen Z social finance trends will they showcase?
I'm Ben. And I'm Ernie.
And you're listening to Budget Nerds.
No, you are not. All right, friends. Today, we have something really special and really weird. It's going to be a little bit of a different episode of Budget Nerds today. We have brought on from the famous, world-class, awesome YNAB social team, Sarah and Amber. So Sarah, is like the TikTok maven, and Amber is in charge of Instagram. And they are killing it, to say the least. They are so funny, so informative. Just the best. And they are gonna come on to the show and talk about some, I guess, Gen Z money trends. Some, like, what the kids are saying these days. And... I realize that I'm old now and I haven't been on Instagram in like five years, which is like a million years in social media land. So I don't know what's going on.
So yeah, they're going to come on and they're going to show us. And we have promised to be grumpy about these trends. That's the idea. Me and Ernie are going to be grumpy about them. But mostly we're just going to talk about them.
And Ben, I feel like I don't even have to try to be grumpy. Like this is just going to be natural for me. So...
All right, so let's welcome on Sarah and Amber. Hey, guys. Hey, Ben. Welcome, welcome.
Huge fan. Thank you for having us. We're very excited to see what you guys have to say about some of these trends.
I feel so weird. I feel like you guys are taking over the show because normally I have all these windows open with notes and stuff, but you guys are running the show today. You have all the plans. So the idea is you're going to show us a video that kind of encapsulates a trend in the personal finance world either on tiktok or instagram or i feel like they're all the same now it's just like the scrolly vertical video world right all the same at this point it's all the same and uh we're gonna react to them and talk about them so i think it'll be really fun um yeah anything you guys want to say before we jump in
Honestly, I think the less that we say, the better to get the raw reaction.
Y'all, they have been really secret. Like, they won't tell us anything. They were like, should we share our notes? And we're like, no, no, we can't share our notes with them. So, yeah, we are completely in the dark on what we're going to see today. I'm sure a lot of you guys know their faces if you're on the vertical video scrolly apps. You guys know them well. So, yeah, I'm excited to see what we come up with.
Why don't we get right into it? Amber, you want to show us video one?
Video number one. Here we go.
This month, my husband and I are doing No Spin November, which means for the whole month of November, we are spending money only on essentials. So groceries, gas, replacing household items like toilet paper, paper towels if we really need it. The rules are no eating out, no shopping, no online purchases. Yeah, that's pretty much it. Just spending money only on things we need day to day. But for me, I have a bad relationship with just shopping all the time and we don't need to do that. I don't need to do that. Especially with Black Friday coming up, I feel like there's so much pressure to buy things because they're on sale and like we don't need it just because it's on sale. And that's me telling myself I don't need it just because it's on sale.
Like that is such a great marketing tactic. I'm very excited about this little challenge. I'm excited to see how much money we save Or I save personally just by not randomly going to target TJ Maxx because I'm bored. Oh, there's a little November challenge if you want to join in. It's only the fifth day. We have been successful for all five days so far, which is good. But yeah, there's our little monthly challenge. Follow along if you want to see how it goes.
Okay. Okay. I love it. Just the no spend vibes like for a period of time, right?
Mm-hmm.
I will say that in general, I love any kind of trend. Like I'm just an emotional type person and I get sucked into those trends really easily. So you're not being grumpy at all. I know you're enthusiastic about this.
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