Freehold, NJ · Member since 2021 · 77 posts · 43 votes
Greetings fellow BPers,
Here are the pros and cons as I see it, of having a risk averse spouse:
PROS:
Every move, thought, plan, expense, phone call, email is questioned. This is good because it forces you to be sure that every step you take is moving you in the right direction, and you're not wasting time on distractions.
CONS:
Every move, thought, plan, expense, phone call, email is questioned. This is bad because it undermines your confidence, makes you feel stupid, makes you scared, and slows down your forward momentum.
Communication is obviously the key to any great relationship, but what do you do when your communication only triggers fear in your partner? They don't mean to be negative, but the "helpful" comments hurt anyway.
@David Rosenhaus Being questioned has never undermined my confidence or made me feel stupid or scared. If you feel those feelings, it indicates lack of self confidence. You will gain confidence as you educate yourself and gain experience. It could also indicate an unhealthy situation where your spouse dominates decisions and belittles you as a way to retain control. If they make you feel scared or stupid, they are not being helpful.
I think it is good when my spouse questions me, but only if the feedback is logical and constructive. If it is emotional driven negativity, it is not helpful and there is no way to overcome the objection. Without knowing what the criticisms are, it is hard to say how helpful it is.
Negative people work very hard to find problems, so hard that they manufacture and manifest their own problems.
@David Rosenhaus Being questioned has never undermined my confidence or made me feel stupid or scared. If you feel those feelings, it indicates lack of self confidence. You will gain confidence as you educate yourself and gain experience. It could also indicate an unhealthy situation where your spouse dominates decisions and belittles you as a way to retain control. If they make you feel scared or stupid, they are not being helpful.
I think it is good when my spouse questions me, but only if the feedback is logical and constructive. If it is emotional driven negativity, it is not helpful and there is no way to overcome the objection. Without knowing what the criticisms are, it is hard to say how helpful it is.
Negative people work very hard to find problems, so hard that they manufacture and manifest their own problems.
Investing your own capitol always requires some risk. Period full stop.
Have you tried writing a risk assessment? One way is to use a risk matrix. Do a google search and you will see what I mean.
This will not make sense in text so do the google search if you are not familiar. You will need to start by clearly defining what exactly you want to accomplish.
On one axis you have a severity scale - minor impact to our life, to catastrophic destruction. ( how bad can this thing really get?)
On the other axis you have a probability/frequency scale ( how likely is this thing to occur? )
The key is to stay out of the red danger zone - you never want to be in the intersection of the matrix where something is "almost certain to happen" and the consequences are " Catastrophic"
The great thing about using a matrix to solve risk problems is that you can add incremental mitigating factors to lower frequency and or severity and move your target into the area of the matrix where risk is tolerable.
Risk tolerance varies. If one is super risk averse REI is not a great space to be in. For some a government job with a pension plan and benefits is an option.
However one path will offer the opportunity to earn bags and bags of green freedom to do as you will and the other might get you a retirement party with sally from the office a lovely supermarket bought cake in 30years and vacations to other side of the sate.
Fact: The one thing that all financially successful people have in common is their willingness to take well understood risks.
Thanks Joe. It's a combination of both. I'm knew and learning so of course I don't have the answers to put her mind at ease, and am therefore a little sensitive. I know as a fact she's not trying to undermine me, but my own trepidation responds to her fear. And her reactions are definitely emotionally based. I need to honor her feelings without limiting my own progress.
Understanding the technical aspects is the easy part. Execution is the hard part. Kinda like getting started in RE investing, right?
I haven't specifically done the matrix, but I'm already doing basically the same thing and sharing those mitigating factors to put us both at ease. But maybe having it written and graphed is a more concrete way to approach it. Thanks.
Thanks Joe. It's a combination of both. I'm knew and learning so of course I don't have the answers to put her mind at ease, and am therefore a little sensitive. I know as a fact she's not trying to undermine me, but my own trepidation responds to her fear. And her reactions are definitely emotionally based. I need to honor her feelings without limiting my own progress.
Understanding the technical aspects is the easy part. Execution is the hard part. Kinda like getting started in RE investing, right?
In that case, my best advice is be persistent. Explain to her that you are committed to making this work, but only when she is comfortable. Also explain to her that this is very important to you and give her reasons why. Not to put words in your mouth, but most likely you want to do this for your families financial security. In other words, you are doing this because you love her. Maybe you see this as a way to fund retirement, take more family vacations to create memories, provide a legacy after you are gone, give more to charity or simply as a way to raise your standard of living. Whatever you hope to accomplish, paint that vivid picture for her. Focus her attention on the end game.
If your wife is anything like mine, charts and graphs won’t help. My wife is very supportive, but her eyes glaze over when the numbers come out.
So I decided to focus on the emotional side and show how my investments provide security for our family. I understand that she is concerned about the leaky toilet or whatever, but I let her know that I have accounted for those things and have ‘X’ number of dollars in reserve to handle it.
Just keep reinforcing the financial security and freedom. When she asks a question that you don’t know the answer to, just tell her that it’s a good question and that you don’t know the answer, and that you will find it. Then do the research and answer the question!
Hey David, meet my way more risk-averse than me Fiance in my profile picture. She questions a lot of the decisions. Especially when my first deal will come before our first house. She's given me the hard no on house hacking so it's led me to take the risk on myself. I have enough confidence to take on all of the risk myself and instead use that energy to prove to her that it works.
P.s. she owns her own business so she's not completely new to risk, but this type of risk is new to her.