Emotional Balance Sheet with Paul Fenner

Paul Fenner
  • 5.0 (26)
  • Self-Improvement
  • Updated Weekly

Welcome to the Emotional Balance Sheet, the financial planning podcast for working parents who are building careers and raising kids at the same time. If you and your spouse are both senior-level professionals, raising kids in school or college, and are tired of stitching together four different specialists to run your financial life, this show is built for you. Each conversation tackles the planning conversations real families are having: education costs, retirement timing, equity compensation, career transitions, estate coordination, and the emotional weight that lies beneath it all. Hosted by Paul Fenner, Certified Financial Planner®, Enrolled Agent, and founder of TAMMA Capital. Paul is also a parent to four kids, including a set of triplets, so he knows the pace firsthand. TAMMA Capital is a private family office that brings financial planning, tax, and investments under one umbrella. To schedule a conversation, visit www.tammacapital.com or email pfenner@tammacapital.com.

  1. 5d ago

    Patience Has a Blind Spot

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What if the most disciplined thing you do with your money is quietly working against you in one specific account? Today I walk through a family that had not touched their investments in several years. While that is highly unusual, what was not was our review of one of the spouse's equity compensation. The flat rate a company withholds at vest can sit well below what a high-earning household actually owes. And every vest quietly adds to the same position, which means holding is not standing still. Patience answers how long you hold something. It says nothing about how much of it you own. Pull up your most recent vest confirmation, find the shares that vested and the shares withheld for taxes, divide one by the other, and write that number down next to your marginal bracket to determine if you have a gap. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: Your Holding Period Matters Most   Understanding the "Big Beautiful Bill": Tax Changes That Impact Families Balancing Careers and Kids   Staying the Course: How Long-Term Investing Builds Wealth Through Market Cycles

    Patience Has a Blind Spot

  2. Sep 3

    When Selling Means Admitting You Were Wrong

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What are you actually holding onto when you refuse to let something go? What could it be costing you to keep hoping you'll be proven right? In this episode, I get honest about the three years I knew I'd leave my corporate career before I actually did, and why that's the same trap I watch families fall into when they won't loosen a single stock that's grown too big. I get into why this hits hardest for people who've done well, and why the real price of holding on is rarely the money. I leave you with one question to run on a single piece of your life, financial or not. If you were starting from scratch today, would you build this again? Not whether to sell. Just whether you'd choose it on purpose. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: The Financial Story You Keep Telling Yourself The Greatest Story Ever Told Your Brain Is Writing Your Financial Story. Is It Telling the Truth?

    When Selling Means Admitting You Were Wrong

  3. Aug 27

    The Hardest No in Your Personal & Financial Life

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What's the hardest thing you've ever had to say no to, and was it really the nicer car, or was it something you actually loved? Today, I get honest about the "no" I'm worst at, turning down more of the work I genuinely love, and why that one is so much harder than turning down a bigger house or a nicer car. I talk about why this hits working parents hardest. When the income lever is always in reach, "enough" stops being a math problem and becomes a permission problem. And the cost of saying yes to more never shows up on the same page as the benefit. I share the number Theresa and I save at home that keeps me honest, the count of summers left with the kids, and the small practice I use to keep the no available. We close with one question worth asking before your next yes. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: Aligning Your Spending and Time with Your True Values Time Is the Ultimate Planning Killer Inflated Expectations: The Hidden Force Undermining Financial Peace

  4. Aug 20

    Patient or Just Stuck?

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation How do you tell the difference between being patient with your money and just being stuck? Today I want to work through an idea about long-term thinking: know the very few things that will never change, and put everything else in a bucket that needs constant updating. I use the example I see most often, a job change, where a stack of retirement and account decisions gets made in week one and then quietly runs for years on settings nobody chose on purpose. I lay out the two-bucket sort I use to tell a permanent decision from one that simply has a shelf life. I also get into where this shows up in my own life, the finite window with my kids at home, and why putting that in the permanent bucket made a lot of other decisions easier to say no to. I close with one question you can ask about anything you've held without touching for years. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: What To Do When The Plan Stops Working The Financial Case for Doing Nothing Are You Rich Yet? Why Families Still Struggle to Feel Wealthy

    Patient or Just Stuck?

  5. Aug 13

    When the Right Call Looks Wrong

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What do you do when the smartest money decision you made is the one you can't stop second-guessing? In this episode, I dig into a line from Morgan Housel about how it's possible to make good decisions that don't work and bad decisions that work beautifully. I talk about why that lands so hard for families who built their careers in fields where good process reliably produces good results, and why money refuses to play by those rules. I use the example I see most often: families with a large portion of their net worth tied up in company stock, and a decision to trim it or hold it that ends up looking wrong for a while, either way. I also share a decision from my own life that looked questionable for a couple of years before it didn't, and what that taught me about separating the quality of a decision from an outcome I couldn't control. We close with one small question you can ask about the money decision you keep replaying, the one that finally lets you put it down. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: Funded Contentment: Am I Going to Be Okay? The Financial Story You Keep Telling Yourself Pessimism Sounds Smart, Optimism Builds Wealth

    When the Right Call Looks Wrong

  6. Aug 6

    Two 401(k)s and Nobody Watching

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What if your money problem was never a behavior problem? I keep coming back to the idea that doing well with money is mostly about patience and long-term thinking. I believe that. But what if you're already cleared that bar, and not where you want to be? You saved through every downturn since 2008. You never panic sold. But your financial lives are still not where you want them to be, and it costs real money. I walk through what actually goes wrong: two 401(k)s that were never looked at in the same window, a household stock allocation that nobody chose on purpose, equity comp that quietly builds concentration and leaves a tax gap that shows up in April, and beneficiary forms that have not been touched in over a decade. None of these is a behavior failure. They are decisions with no deadline attached, which is a different problem entirely. I also talk about the deadline I had to invent for myself, and why it's still uncomfortable to say it out loud. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: Can we Really Do That? When Savers and Spenders Share a Life Aligning Assets and Liabilities: Temporal Diversification

    Two 401(k)s and Nobody Watching

  7. Jul 30

    The One-Page Form Most Busy Parents Miss

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation When was the last time you actually read the beneficiary designation on your 401(k) at your previous employer? In May, I sent every family I work with a current readout of their beneficiary designations across every account I track for them. It was the highest-response email I sent all year. For some families, everything was clean. For others, there were gaps we addressed that week. In this episode, I walk through what's actually on those forms, why a beneficiary designation overrides your will, and the technical points that catch busy working families off guard: ERISA spousal consent on 401(k)s, the HSA tax bomb for non-spouse beneficiaries, the SECURE Act 2.0 ten-year rule now in full enforcement, and the difference between per stirpes and per capita. The action this week is simple. Pull up the beneficiary designation on one account, any account, and just read it. If you can't find it, that's the result. Then set a recurring calendar reminder once a year to do the same for every account in the household. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and you're tired of coordinating four different advisors to manage your finances, I offer complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: Why Stories Move Us More Than Numbers Why Quiet Time Is Your Most Valuable Financial Skill Your Biggest Financial Risk Isn't the Market

    The One-Page Form Most Busy Parents Miss

  8. Jul 23

    The Principles Are Simple. Your Life Isn't

    Work with Paul: Schedule a 30-minute conversation What if you already know the financial principles you need? What if the problem isn't strategy, but execution across a life that's grown too complicated to coordinate yourself? This week, I work through a Morgan Housel idea pulled from a John Reed book. Most fields or industries have three to twelve core principles, with the rest focused on implementation. In finance, the principles are stable. Your life is not. I share a story about a dual-income family with three kids and six accounts spread across three custodians, where nobody was actually steering the ship. And a personal story about how long it takes to act on principles you already know. The action this week is small. Write down the five to eight financial principles you actually live by. Audit your decisions over the last six months against them. The gaps aren't a strategy problem. They're an application problem. Connect with Paul If you're a working parent juggling a senior-level career and a growing family, and are tired of coordinating four different advisors to run your financial life, I do complimentary 30-minute conversations. Schedule one here. For resources discussed in this episode, visit tammacapital.com/podcast. Follow Paul on LinkedIn. Resources Featured in This Episode: How a Financial Planner Can Help You Aligning Personal Interests with Financial Objectives: A Five-Step Guide to Effective Wealth Planning Spring Clean Your Finances; 5 Ways to Get Financially Organized

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About

Welcome to the Emotional Balance Sheet, the financial planning podcast for working parents who are building careers and raising kids at the same time. If you and your spouse are both senior-level professionals, raising kids in school or college, and are tired of stitching together four different specialists to run your financial life, this show is built for you. Each conversation tackles the planning conversations real families are having: education costs, retirement timing, equity compensation, career transitions, estate coordination, and the emotional weight that lies beneath it all. Hosted by Paul Fenner, Certified Financial Planner®, Enrolled Agent, and founder of TAMMA Capital. Paul is also a parent to four kids, including a set of triplets, so he knows the pace firsthand. TAMMA Capital is a private family office that brings financial planning, tax, and investments under one umbrella. To schedule a conversation, visit www.tammacapital.com or email pfenner@tammacapital.com.

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