409: How I Lost 40% of My Retirement Savings (A Huge Money Mistake)
The Clever Girls Know Podcast With Bola Sokunbi
Bola Sokunbi
4.8 • 931 Ratings
🗓️ 19 March 2026
⏱️ 11 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
New Book - Clever Girl Millionaire;
I'm sharing the story of how I accidentally triggered taxes and penalties on my 401(k) after leaving a job, the lesson I learned the hard way, and what I would do differently today.
If you're changing jobs or thinking about cashing out a 401(k), this is something you need to understand before making a move.
What I share:
- The 401(k) rollover mistake that cost me thousands
- Why cashing out your retirement account can be extremely expensive
- The difference between a 401(k) rollover and a payout
- How to avoid early withdrawal penalties and taxes
- What to do with your 401(k) when leaving a job
Money mistakes happen to everyone, even financial experts. What matters most is how you learn from them and rebuild.
I share this story in Chapter 6 of my new book Clever Girl Millionaire, where I talk about real-life financial mistakes, lessons learned, and how resilience plays a role in building long-term wealth.
If you've ever made a financial mistake, know this: your story isn't over. You can learn, recover, and keep building.
More Clever Girl Finance Resources:
👋 New to Clever Girl Finance? Start here:
https://clevergirlfinance.com/start-here
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❤ Get the best-selling Clever Girl Finance Books: clevergirlfinance.com/books
❤ Get access to 30+ free courses, worksheets, savings challenges, and our favorite banking resources: clevergirlfinance.com/course-packages
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❤ Follow us on Instagram: @clevergirlfinance
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | So let me tell you something that stings to talk about. I am a finance expert, a CEO, I've written |
| 0:06.0 | all of these books. But before that, I made a huge mistake that cost me 40% of my retirement |
| 0:13.0 | savings pretty much overnight. This isn't a story from a friend. This is a story from me, |
| 0:19.1 | my personal experience. And in my new book, Clever Girl |
| 0:23.1 | Millionaire, I talk about this story I'm going to share now and other stories that I haven't |
| 0:27.6 | gone into detail before to remind you that nobody's financial journey is perfect and people make |
| 0:33.8 | mistakes. I certainly did. So today I'm going to walk you through one of my huge |
| 0:38.4 | money mistakes, what exactly happened, how I got through it and was still able to build wealth. |
| 0:46.5 | Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Clever Girls No Podcast. This is Bola Shokumbi. I'm the founder |
| 0:52.2 | and CEO of Clever Girl Finance. |
| 0:55.1 | The Clever Girls No Podcast is a podcast for women offering a space for conversations around personal finance, business, life, and living. |
| 1:03.3 | I'd love for you to subscribe to this podcast, and you can do that everywhere you listen to your podcast episodes. |
| 1:09.2 | And if you love what you're listening to, be sure to leave a review so that other amazing women just like you can to your podcast episodes. And if you love what you're listening to, |
| 1:15.5 | be sure to leave a review so that other amazing women just like you can find this podcast too. |
| 1:22.5 | Also, don't forget to stop by Clevergirlfinance.com forward slash subscribe and sign up for our weekly newsletter. It's a great way to get motivation and accountability sent straight to |
| 1:27.4 | your inbox as you work on achieving your financial goals. |
| 1:30.6 | We also have over 30 plus completely free courses to help you on your financial journey. |
| 1:36.2 | And if you haven't already, check out our YouTube channel. |
| 1:39.2 | Just search Clever Girl Finance on YouTube. |
| 1:42.4 | You can also find us on Instagram at Clever Girl Finance. |
| 1:46.1 | Okay, let's get into today's episode. So let me take you back. When I got my first corporate |
| 1:53.2 | job, I started contributing to my retirement plan, my 401k at my job. And a little while later, |
... |
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