Hey, everybody, welcome.

I do not sound like that.

Hey!

All right, this is Motley Fool Answers.

I'm Allison Southwick and I'm joined by Deanna Yocom and Robert Brokamp, personal finance experts here at the Motley Fool.

How you guys doing today?

Just grand. Fantastic. All right. Feeling above average, I would say.

Interesting, you should mention that because today we're going to talk about the finances of the average American.

We'll peek into wallets, brokerage accounts, and credit card statements to see how Joe and Jane public are doing, so you can see how you stack up.

You might find today's show extremely affirming.

But if you find it depressing, never fear before we're done.

We'll show you how to get on track.

The inspiration for today's show came to us from Ryan. He writes,

I feel I'm doing well with my 401k retirement, but I see my balance and I wonder how well I'm doing.

I'm married, 31 years old. I have 26,000 in my account. Is this good or bad?

So his question reminded me of the time when here at the Motley Fool, one of the benefits

is that if you need some financial advice, you can for the low, low price of taking Robert

Brokamp out to lunch, he will sit down with you and you'll talk to him about your money

and where you are and how you're doing and what you should do next. And we sat down

with him over at Thai food, I believe. And the only thing I remember from the conversation is that

Robert said, you guys are doing okay. You're going to be fine. I remember that too. All I wanted

was for someone to tell me, you're going to be okay. I know that because that's why I say

...