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ChooseFI | Financial Independence Podcast

608 | Die With Zero, Revisited

ChooseFI | Financial Independence Podcast

Jonathan Mendonsa & Brad Barrett | Choose FI Media, Inc

Investing, Careers, Business

4.8 • 5.2K Ratings

🗓️ 20 July 2026

⏱️ 73 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Brad Barrett's daughter just graduated high school. She's heading to college in a few months. The number of times he'll see her for the rest of his life? Already countable. This realization—visceral and unavoidable—brought him back to a conversation that changed both his and Chris Hutchins' lives nearly four years ago: their interview with Bill Perkins about Die with Zero. Key Topics Introduction and Episode Impact 00:00:00 Brad and Chris reflect on the massive impact Bill Perkins' Die with Zero episode had on their lives and why they wanted to revisit it. Seasons of Life and Time Bucketing 00:05:30 Brad discusses how the concepts of seasons of life and time bucketing fundamentally changed his perspective, especially as his daughter prepares for college, highlighting the fleeting nature of time with loved ones. The Optimization Trap 00:12:00 Chris shares his struggle with over-optimization, particularly around travel planning and points maximization, and how he's been re-evaluating what he's actually optimizing for in life. Frugality as Superpower and Liability 00:18:45 The hosts debate whether frugality is still a superpower, discussing how the skill of spending shifts throughout different stages of financial independence. Running the Numbers on Withdrawal Rates 00:28:00 Chris shares research on annuity rates and the 4% rule, revealing that 96% of the time people never touch their principal and discussing more rational ways to hedge against financial risk. What Are You Optimizing For? 00:38:15 Both hosts dig into the fundamental question of what they're optimizing for—discussing the Tuesday Project, baseline fulfillment, and creating great average days versus one-off experiences. Time, Work, and Life Balance 00:47:00 Chris processes his struggle with filling all available time with work-adjacent activities and discusses the challenge of setting boundaries when you love what you do. Action Items and Future Plans 00:58:30 The hosts commit to specific actions inspired by the episode, including Chris's summer camp idea for families and Brad's commitment to create time bucket lists. Notable Quotes "You should fear wasting your life more than you fear running out of money." — Brad Barrett (quoting Bill Perkins) "Time is everything. My daughter just graduated high school. She's going to William & Mary in a couple months and again, you talk about seasons of life. Combining this with Tim Urban's The Tail End article, you realize time is running out." — Brad Barrett "I think frugality is a superpower at times and then it becomes a liability at times." — Brad Barrett "What I know for certain is every day I'm running out of time. So that's like a metaphysical certainty. You are running out of time." — Brad Barrett "I've gotten good at spending more when things aren't crazy expensive. Where I still struggle tremendously is when I feel like I'm paying for something that there's a reasonable way to get it for a better deal." — Chris Hutchins Key Takeaways Create a time bucket list: Identify experiences you want to have and assign them to specific age ranges when they would be most meaningful and feasible Calculate your real financial safety margin: Determine if you're using a 2%, 3%, or 4% withdrawal rate and whether that level of conservatism is preventing you from enjoying life now Identify your seasons of life priorities: What matters most in your current season? Kids, health, travel, career? Allocate time and resources accordingly Audit your optimization habits: Are you optimizing for the right things? Is maximizing credit card points costing you more in time and stress than it's worth? Plan one 'season-appropriate' experience: Book something that leverages your current life stage, whether that's a trip with young kids or an adventure that requires physical fitness Consider giving to your children now: If you plan to leave an inheritance, evaluate whether giving some portion during their 20s-30s would have more impact than waiting until…

Transcript

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0:00.0

Hello and welcome to Chutify. Today in the show, we have a fun one. We have my good friend Chris Hutchins from the All the Hacks podcast. And we are discussing one of our favorite topics. So it's the book, Die Was Zero. Chris came out with an episode in December of 2022 on his podcast with Bill Perkins, the author of this book. And I listened to that episode, no fewer than three times in literally

0:22.5

that week. I texted Chris. I said, this is incredible. It's a paradigm shifting book for me.

0:29.2

It's a paradigm shifting concept. Not the actual die was zero. Nobody wants to die with zero dollars,

0:34.3

but the rethink on so many aspects of life. I think this book is revolutionary, and Chris and I

0:40.4

got together and wanted to go back over the book, go back over that episode, and see what our

0:47.7

takeaways are nearly four years later. It's a little bit different in that Chris and I are each

0:52.2

putting the episode on our feed, so you'll hear that he kind of introduces it, even though it's an episode to Choose a Vi.

0:57.2

You are really going to enjoy this episode.

0:59.7

And with that, welcome to Choose That Bye.

1:04.9

Before we get started, I keep this podcast entirely ad-free for two reasons.

1:09.3

First, this is a Phi podcast and I don't want to

1:11.7

promote products that I don't want you to buy in the first place. And second, I really like the

1:16.4

clean listening experience of a show where you don't have to fast forward ads. To keep it ad-free,

1:21.5

all I ask of you as a listener is the next time you open a travel rewards credit card,

1:25.6

go to choosefi.com slash cards.

1:28.5

And with that, onto the show.

1:33.6

Today I wanted to sit down and talk about Bill Perkins' book, Die Was Zero, and the interview I had with him and all that impact.

1:40.7

I had a conversation with my friend Brad, who is joining me today because he similarly had a really, really strong feeling about this episode and had a big impact on his life. Since we both had that opinion and we've both been in this space for a while and we've been thinking about it for years, what would it look like to come back and reflect on it? So, Brad, thanks for joining me. Yeah, Chris, this should be fun. You know this episode had a huge impact on me. I just couldn't shut up about your episode and about his book. And yeah, I must have talked about it on my show a dozen times. I feel like not to be egotistical, but I think I kind of spread that far and wide in the fight community. And it really took hold. I mean, I think people started thinking differently a little bit at the margins. That's ultimately what a great idea is. It challenges you to think a little bit differently. So it's funny. This episode, I feel like we have so much to talk about. It's going to be hard to

2:34.6

organize our thoughts. I think that's the biggest challenge. Yeah, so I put a lot of stuff in here.

2:38.5

For anyone listening who randomly hasn't listened to an interview with Bill Perkins or read his book,

2:43.4

Diwa Zero. I released the episode on my feed. It's episode 285. You can go have a listen.

2:49.4

And it was a re-release of the episode from many years ago.

...

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