The Mel Robbins Podcast
Take Control of Your Money: How to Save More, Get Out of Debt, & Build Real Wealth
19 Jan 2026
Chapter 1: What financial advice can help me take control of my money?
Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. I hear it from you all the time. You're stressed about money. Everything costs so much more right now. And you're right, it does. Buying a house feels out of reach. Saving seems impossible. So if you're falling behind, or there are people in your life who are struggling financially right now,
And if you're wondering, is it too late to get a handle on my finances or you're trying to pay off your debt or you're convinced you're never going to retire or you're so tired of money always being a source of anxiety or the source of fights with your spouse, if the idea of building wealth feels out of reach, This episode is dedicated to you. You're going to love this.
Our guest today is David Bach. He's one of the most trusted money experts in the world. He's written 10 New York Times bestselling books on the topic. And more importantly, David Bach has taught millions of regular people just like you how to build wealth starting exactly where you are right now. And I'm having this conversation because you keep telling me you want to know exactly what to do.
And that's exactly what you're going to get in this episode. David Bach is going to tell you the specific funds to invest in. He's going to share the shocking mistake that you're probably making in your 401k or your Roth IRA. Have you done a rollover? Well, you better listen to this because this is a mistake that's costing people right now. His advice is so tactical, so specific, so simple.
Once you hear it, you're going to realize, oh my gosh, this is right under my nose. I can do it. And I want you to know, I'm somebody who has felt the terror and the nonstop stress of not being able to pay my bills. I know what it's like to not know how to dig yourself out of debt and wonder if you ever will.
And I'm going to tell you, if you follow David Bach's advice, you not only can do it, you will do it. Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. I'm thrilled that you're here today. I'm thrilled to be here today because it's an honor to be together, to spend time with you.
And if you're a new listener or you're here because somebody shared this with you, well, I just wanted to personally welcome you to the Mel Robbins Podcast family. Today, you and I are going to talk about the top habits that will build financial freedom for you and the people that you care about. And there is no better person on the planet to teach those habits to you than David Bach.
David has been one of the most respected voices in personal finance for over 30 years. He is the author of 10 New York Times bestselling books, including the mega smash hit, The Automatic Millionaire. which is a specific step-by-step plan that millions of people have followed to get out of debt, to save for a better future, all by starting exactly where you are right now.
His books have sold over 7 million copies. They've been translated into 20 languages. And he has made a career of helping millions of people just like you build real wealth and stop making the mistakes that are currently keeping you in debt and holding you back. He's here today to give you a specific step-by-step plan to take control of your finances.
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Chapter 2: How can I build wealth starting from where I am now?
If I take everything to heart that you're about to teach us, how will my life be different if I apply what I learned from you today? Well, first and foremost, I'm going to give you hope.
A lot of people right now are missing hope when it comes to their money, which is impacting their life. So I believe that nobody should be left behind when it comes to money. That's why I've spent 30 years of my life teaching people about money. And so the challenge right now in this country, honestly, Mel, we're leaving people behind.
In this country right now, 7 out of 10 people are being left behind because they're living paycheck to paycheck. Wait, so... seven out of 10 people in the United States live paycheck to paycheck? Stop for a moment and take that in. Because that means if you're driving down a street and there's 10 houses, seven of those 10 are living paycheck to paycheck.
So if you're living paycheck to paycheck, if you've got credit card debt, you maybe have student loans and you don't have hope, I promise you at the end of these 90 minutes together, or however long we are together, you will see the light at the end of the tunnel. So that's number one, okay? Number two, not everybody's living paycheck to paycheck, right?
Because there's three other people out there for the 10. So if you're starting on investing, maybe you've opened up your Roth IRA, you heard about that somewhere, or you're using your 401k plan at work. Or you've even bought your first home. You're doing a lot of things right, but you're not sure, am I doing everything right? Like, you kind of have this doubt. Like, I'm not sure.
I don't know if I'm really on track. I don't know if I really have the right investments. So maybe you think you're doing things right, but you still know you need help. I got you too. Now, some people are starting over. Okay. Right? I mean, the reality of life is between divorce... between widowhood, you know, average age of widowhood in this country is 59.
When you look at what happens to women as a result of widowhood financially, they're often wiped out. And we're getting real, real serious quickly here. But like, so as a woman, you can't afford to not know what's going on with your finances.
There's so much I want to just pull apart from that. Because a lot of people ask me, how did you get out of debt, Mel? My husband and I were $800,000 in debt at the age of 41. So I like that you're starting with, you have to make a decision that you're tired of living paycheck to paycheck. You're tired of being in the situation that you're in.
And you're here to tell us because you have helped millions of people get out of debt. That it's not too late? It's never too late unless you give up. I always say you're one decision away from a different life. And for me, I'm very negatively motivated. Like things have to get really bad. I'm kind of stubborn. Yeah. And I just got to a point where I was so tired.
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Chapter 3: What are the two escalators to wealth that I should know about?
No one's coming to save you. Nope. No one's coming to pay these bills. But I'll be damned. There's so many people that are way less smart than I am that have figured this out. If these other people can do it, then I can figure this out too.
Two things get people typically to make a decision around money. What are they? Or life in general. It's pain or it's clarity around what's most important to you. Now, some people have to go through a lot of pain to get clarity.
Yeah.
That's the hard way. The hard way is someone smacks you with a two-by-four and you're just like, I can't do this anymore. That was my grandmother even at 30. Maybe her pain wasn't like yours with so much debt, but her pain was, she got clarity around, I'm 30, we have no money, we don't have a college degree. She sold wigs at Gimple's department store. My grandfather worked in a plant.
They were middle-class people living in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. And at 30, she got clarity. that she didn't want to retire in Wisconsin. She decided at 30, she's like, it's so freaking cold here. Well, I grew up across the lake in Muskegon. Okay. So I know. So she grew up there and she's like, I want to retire one day to Florida or California. She decided that at 30.
Then, like you, she worked on her plan for three decades. My grandmother used to say, David, you don't get rich in days. You get rich in decades. You don't get out of debt in days. The problem with debt is you can get in debt in a day, but you can't get out of debt in a day.
I think it's just this moment where you get so sick of your own situation that you organize the resolve to change and do better.
I want to broaden the tent a little bit because I do think that statistic that seven out of every 10 people in the United States and plenty of people around the world right now are struggling, they're paycheck to paycheck, they're feeling the pressure and the stress of it all.
And I want to talk a little bit about some other people, like people that might be entering one of the worst job markets out there. You're in your 20s and you're not quite sure what to do because you're saying to yourself, I can barely even pay for my rent with three roommates and I'm having trouble finding a job right now and I have crushing student loans.
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Chapter 4: What common money mistakes should I avoid to secure my future?
Because the system's rigged. You need to hear this, especially young people. There's two escalators to wealth. They are real estate and stocks. You have to own real estate and you have to own stocks. And this market's now more rigged than it's ever been. And when I say rigged, what I mean is everything in our country is designed for those two asset classes to go higher.
All the tax laws, all the incentives, everything. All the opportunities that exist are for investors. If you're not an investor, you are being left behind faster than you've ever been left behind. Anyone who's in their 20s today can start investing their change. That's true. You can start investing literally today. You can open an app like Acorns and be investing your change.
Every time you spend money, you can be investing a dollar at a time in diversified portfolios. You can click a button at almost no cost. And that was not true 20 years ago. 20 years ago, it was hard to sometimes become an investor with a small amount of money. Today, with technology, the whole playing field has been democratized.
What are some of the biggest mistakes that people make when it comes to money that keep them stuck? Okay.
Number one, when it comes to money, you either have a plan for your money or someone else has a plan for your money. Okay. So, like, let that sit for a second. Either you have a plan for your money or someone else has a plan for your money. Lots of people have a plan for your money. The automatic economy is driven by your phone. Okay, that phone that we hold all day long is a money magnet.
Think about that as a money magnet. What do I mean by that? That means this tool is either helping you build wealth or it's taking wealth away from you. Oh, hold on. So the phone is either helping you build wealth or it's taking money away from you. And by the way, in both cases, it's automatic.
So what's happening today, there's never been greater technology ever in the history of our lifetime to separate you from your wealth. But nobody wants to separate you, Mel, from your wealth once. They want to separate you from your wealth for your lifetime. They call it the lifetime value of a customer. Okay.
So when I bring you into whatever I'm selling you, I don't want you to buy from me once. I want you to buy from me on a subscription level. I want you to be paying me, whether everybody, think about Netflix, the gym, every single service, your vitamins, your creams, your lotions, and your potions. Everyone's got you signed up to pay them automatically.
Okay.
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Chapter 5: How can couples manage their finances effectively?
But you got to have a plan for what am I putting away for the future? What am I putting away for emergencies? And what am I putting away for my dreams? That's called a plan. Okay. What most people have is what I call the no plan plan. Okay. Did you catch that? It's the no plan plan. So like if you're listening and you're like, I don't really have a plan for my money.
I'm sitting here right now.
Actually, you have a no plan plan. Most people are literally walking around with a no plan plan. And so what happens is the only thing that's a part of their life financially is their paycheck comes in. And then it goes right out the frickin' door. That's because you got a no plan plan. You need an automatic millionaire plan. Okay.
You need an automatic millionaire plan where your money is automated to go into everything that is important for you financially. And what needs to happen is you almost, you take out a yellow pad of paper and you go, these are the things I have to have. Okay. I have to have rent. Yeah. I got to live somewhere. Yep. I have to have a car payment.
Now, a lot of car payments are way higher than they need to be, but there are certain things you have to have. You have to have healthcare. Then you make an hour list. These are nice to have. So like when you go back to you having $800,000 in debt, you had to cut things out.
Oh my God, we didn't go on a vacation for like a decade. See people- We didn't go out to dinner. We cut subscriptions. Like we had to pull the kids out of town soccer for a year. Like we just couldn't afford it.
People have to like really hear that because they want it to be fixed often in 12 months. And you just said you spent a decade, but your whole life's different. The other thing is when you start the process of digging out, you start to feel better. It's so true. It actually doesn't take you being debt-free to feel better. It just takes you starting the process of working on getting debt-free.
Okay, I want you to hear that. Whether you're on a walk or you're in a car or you're listening to us at work or you're watching us on your big screen on YouTube— I mean it, like you literally will feel better when you start taking control. You don't have to get out of debt. Why do you start feeling better when you start chipping away at your debt?
You feel better instantly because when you don't deal with your finances, you know you're not dealing with it. It never goes away. It is in the back of your mind.
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Chapter 6: What strategies can help me invest wisely for long-term growth?
It is in the front of your mind. And the problem with money is we use it all the time. We constantly have to spend money. So when you know you're not saving anything, you're not an idiot. You know what you're not doing, right? So I just think it's all about priorities. And to me, what the priorities should be, ideally, I'm not trying to tell people what they should do, but to me...
I want you to use money as a tool to free yourself. From what? From everything. I want you to have options. So I think the more you prioritize what matters in your life, like get super clear on your values, like what's really important to me? What do I value most?
When you deeply look at whatever it could be, my family, my community, making a difference, my spiritual growth, being with friends and family, being in nature, choose the things that matter most to you. Because what I taught when I wrote my first book, Smart Women Finish Rich, I taught people, because this is what I do with my clients, take your expenses, line them up,
Write out your values and then go right through your expenses and compare them to your values. And ask yourself, do they match? And most people spend money in a way that is in conflict with their values. And when you are clear on your values, the decision-making process around your money becomes easier.
Okay, so we know you got to have a plan or you have no plan, but you got to have a plan and you're going to give us the plan. And it doesn't matter if I'm living paycheck to paycheck. It doesn't matter if I've just gone through divorce and I'm financially ruined. It doesn't matter if you're 20 years old and you don't have a job yet. Like this is the plan we're going to follow. But so keep going.
The biggest myth we have about money is if I make more money, I'll be rich. You won't be rich if you make more money if you don't keep some money. You got to make money and then keep some money. So for 20 years, I've been teaching people to pay themselves first automatically one hour a day of their income.
That means if you have a job with a 401k plan, the first hour a day of your income goes right into your 401k. I don't even understand what that means. What's the first hour of the day of your income? Okay, great question. So most people come to work at nine. I came here at nine. Okay. Right? Yep. And they work until five. Okay. And they're getting a paycheck from you. Okay. Right?
They're being paid from nine to five. Yes. That first hour a day, whatever you make, some people make $20 an hour. Some people make $30 an hour. Some people make $50 an hour. Some people make $100 an hour. Some people make minimum wage.
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Chapter 7: How can I feel better about my finances before becoming debt-free?
Yes. Some people make minimum wage. Whatever it is, that first hour a day of your income... Has to go into a pre-tax deductible retirement account. Okay. So that could be an IRA account or if the company has a 401k plan, that's where it goes. Okay. Now, one hour a day of your income equals 12.5% of your gross revenue. Okay.
So 12.5% of your salary. Yep. Is what you want to be automatically putting into like out of sight, out of mind and at work.
So now here's the thing. People are going to like, did he just say I'm supposed to save 12.5% of my gross income? Are you freaking kidding me?
Yes, that's what I'm thinking. Because I'm like, I'm living paycheck to paycheck.
I'm living paycheck to paycheck.
And I feel trapped and I can't do the things I want to do. So why would I take 12% that I don't have? So let's go through the math on this. Let's go through the math.
The whole reason you want to pay yourself first is so you don't pay taxes. So what the government did decades ago, over 40 years ago, was create tax laws that made these 401k plans deductible. Okay. So that means, and this is why it's called pay yourself first, that means when you put money in a retirement account, It avoids paying taxes. You skip the IRS. Okay.
Legally. Okay. So hold on a second. So if I, let's just say I make a hundred bucks in a day, I'm going to take 12 bucks and put it in the 401k. What you're basically saying is under the law, the $12 comes out of the hundred. Not taxed. Not taxed. versus what happens where if you don't take it out, the whole 100 is taxed.
So the other thing is what happens is you put it in your retirement account. Now it grows tax-free and it grows tax-free until you take it out at retirement. Now, you can always access it beforehand. You shouldn't because then there's taxes and penalties. So it is a vehicle to grow your future money. This is when you're putting money aside for your future. Okay. This is not for your house.
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Chapter 8: What specific steps should I take if I'm starting over financially?
He's going to be graduating from college. He's going to have his first job. If my kids save an hour a day of their income from the moment they get their first job, they'll never have to worry about money again. That's how simple it is. Because one hour a day of your income buys your financial freedom.
Now, there's actually a lot of research on this now too because we've been doing this for so long. So Fidelity has one of the largest 401k plans in the world. As of this month, 565,000 people who are millionaires inside their 401k plans. Those millionaires have, on average, $1.4 million in their retirement account. How long did it take them and how much did they save? They have all the data.
I'm going to give it to you right now. It took an average of 26 years, and the average person who has $1.4 million inside these Fidelity 401k plans is age 59. And they saved 14% of their gross income, a little over one hour. It's like one hour and 10 minutes.
So if you put 14% away and then the employer, which most employers match on top of that, that's what these people did that became 401k millionaires. They became automatic millionaires in 26 years. These men are ordinary people, okay? They're ordinary people who simply spent less than they made. They spent 90 cents out of every dollar. Actually, they spent 86 cents out of every dollar.
So they just saved 14 cents out of every dollar.
Got it. So one takeaway for sure, if you work for a company where there's a 401k, pull it out, make sure you're taking out at least 12%. and make sure you know it's actually invested in something. What should you invest it in? Okay, I'm going to tell you exactly what you should invest it in. Okay, I'm writing this down. I'm going to make this super simple.
I know we're taping this, but I like it. I'm just going to pretend like this is for everybody that's behind this wall, for all your young people here. Yes. Okay, so I am willing to bet my life on it that your Fidelity plan has what's called a target dated mutual fund in it.
Target dated mutual fund.
Okay. Because this is what's in the bulk of all 401k plans now. Okay. So in the bulk of 401k plans, you have a target dated mutual fund. And what that does is that is an asset allocation fund that is professionally managed between stocks and bonds. And it is created to be rebalanced towards your age of retirement. So higher risk when you're younger and more conservative when you're older.
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