Matt Schulz is currently with LendingTree as one of the company's public faces. Schulz speaks with schools, companies and media outlets about personal finance and money. His experience includes public engagements such as: TV appearances, speaking, workshops and education.
Matt Schulz, a personal finance expert and author of ‘Ask questions, Save Money, Make More’, joins Forbes Talks, to give tips on negotiating bills, salaries, and promotions.
0:00 Introduction
0:20 How To Optimize Your Financial Standing
1:37 What Are The Right Questions When Negotiating A Promotion?
5:00 Credit Cards: What To Know
6:21 Strategy To Negotiate Your Goal Salary
9:59 Common Mistakes With Negotiating Salary
12:57 Tips On Negotiating Lease/Rent Contracts
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Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.
Matt Schulz, a personal finance expert and author of ‘Ask questions, Save Money, Make More’, joins Forbes Talks, to give tips on negotiating bills, salaries, and promotions.
0:00 Introduction
0:20 How To Optimize Your Financial Standing
1:37 What Are The Right Questions When Negotiating A Promotion?
5:00 Credit Cards: What To Know
6:21 Strategy To Negotiate Your Goal Salary
9:59 Common Mistakes With Negotiating Salary
12:57 Tips On Negotiating Lease/Rent Contracts
Subscribe to FORBES: https://www.youtube.com/user/Forbes?sub_confirmation=1
Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:
https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript
Stay Connected
Forbes newsletters: https://newsletters.editorial.forbes.com
Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes
Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes
More From Forbes: http://forbes.com
Forbes covers the intersection of entrepreneurship, wealth, technology, business and lifestyle with a focus on people and success.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 Hi everyone, I'm Rosemary Miller here with Matt Schultz, a personal finance expert and
00:08 the author of Ask Questions, Save Money, Make More, here to tell us about negotiating financial
00:14 success.
00:15 Thank you so much for joining me today, Matt.
00:18 Thanks for having me.
00:19 I appreciate it.
00:20 Absolutely.
00:21 So Matt, how can individuals effectively negotiate bills and expenses to optimize their financial
00:27 situation?
00:28 Well, the good news is that there are so many ways that you can do it and so many opportunities
00:36 because one of the things that I try and put out there as much as I can when I'm doing
00:44 interviews in my day job at LendingTree is that you have more power over your money than
00:52 you realize if you are willing to wield it.
00:57 And that comes whether you're talking about a gym membership, a mortgage, a credit card,
01:06 a job interview, or if you're talking about trying to split the cost of a group dinner.
01:15 You have so many opportunities to negotiate and to find ways to pay less, earn a little
01:25 bit more, keep more of your hard-earned money by asking the right questions and kind of
01:33 taking the right approach when it comes to negotiating.
01:38 So what are those right questions?
01:41 Well, it really depends on what you are looking at and what you're trying to accomplish.
01:49 One of the inspirations for this book was the fact that I've done a bunch of interviews
01:59 over my time as a personal finance expert talking about how 76% of people who ask for
02:06 a lower interest rate on one of their credit cards get one.
02:11 And the average reduction can be anywhere from six to seven percentage points.
02:16 It's a really big deal.
02:18 And whenever I tell that to people, I get a lot of response of, "Oh, wow, that was something
02:24 that you could do."
02:26 But the truth is that it is.
02:29 But it's something that you generally have to ask for, and they're not going to necessarily
02:36 throw at you.
02:38 And just to kind of give an example of what some of the right questions might be, in this
02:44 particular case, it's a situation where maybe you look at sites like LendingTree or in your
02:54 snail mail or at your local bank or credit union to see what other credit card offers
03:01 might be out there for you.
03:04 And then you pick up the phone, call the 800 number on the back of your card and ask your
03:09 card issuer, "Hey, I've had your credit card for three or four years.
03:15 I've never missed a payment, but I just got offered this card with a 21% interest rate
03:23 instead of the 25 or 26 that I'm paying.
03:27 Do you think, would you be willing to match that?"
03:31 And oftentimes, you're going to at least get a, "Well, let me consider it."
03:38 They're very rarely going to give you a solid no right off the bat.
03:43 And that's really the case whether you're talking about credit cards, mortgages, gym
03:48 memberships, contractors, whatever the case might be.
03:53 We feel kind of funny about asking for these things because we don't necessarily feel that
03:58 we have all this power that we think we do.
04:01 But the truth is that these businesses want to keep you around.
04:05 And a lot of times they will do a little bit of negotiating and work with you if you are
04:13 willing to pursue it.
04:14 Oh my goodness.
04:16 You're letting me in on stuff right now.
04:17 I know the phone calls I'm making when I finish this interview.
04:21 Ask and you shall receive.
04:24 It really is amazing.
04:26 I can't tell you how many interviews I've done where people have reacted like you just
04:32 did where they're like, "No, there's no way that that's the case."
04:37 But the truth is that I've been following these numbers for many, many years, even going
04:44 back before COVID and all that sort of thing.
04:47 And these success rates have stuck around for many years, good times, bad times, COVID
04:54 times, high inflation times.
04:57 It's generally always a good idea to ask.
05:00 Wow.
05:01 So is this only for credit cards you've had for a while or let's say you have a new credit
05:06 card, can you call as well?
05:10 You may not want to call if you've only had that card for like six weeks or something
05:15 like that.
05:16 But certainly once you've gotten to a year or more, you absolutely can make a call.
05:24 And just sticking with the credit card idea, there are plenty of other things that you
05:31 can negotiate too.
05:33 Like for example, if you're late with making a payment, which we all do every once in a
05:42 while, even with auto pay, that stuff is kind of imperfect.
05:46 But you can call and ask them to waive that late fee.
05:51 And if you're somebody who only has this happen once every few years, you are almost certainly
05:56 going to have the person on the other end say, "Oh yeah, no problem, we'll waive it."
06:01 A lot of credit card issuers have policies, whether they're unwritten or otherwise, that
06:07 kind of give you a mulligan on that first missed payment.
06:15 So again, it's just another example of why it's so important to pick up the phone and
06:20 ask.
06:21 Oh my goodness.
06:22 You're like letting me in on secrets right now.
06:24 Why do people know this stuff?
06:27 Well Matt, could you give us some strategies for negotiating salary?
06:34 Yeah, really, it depends on kind of what your situation is, whether you are negotiating
06:43 salary for a promotion for a job that you already have, or if you're pursuing a new
06:52 job.
06:53 And in either case, it really is kind of about making sure that you have all the information
07:00 you need and not being afraid of asking other people for their advice and not being afraid
07:09 to kind of tell people what you've done.
07:13 One of my favorite things in the book is where a career coach talks about the idea of taking
07:22 a little bit of time each week to make notes of what you have accomplished in that week,
07:31 even if it's just stuff that is basic kind of blocking and tackling in your job, all
07:37 the way up to when you kind of went above and beyond.
07:41 And having that sort of thing is helpful when you are pursuing something like a promotion
07:48 or a raise because we all do things that go above and beyond.
07:53 We all work really hard.
07:55 We all try and do a good job in our roles, but we don't always remember all the good
08:01 stuff that we've done.
08:03 And if you can take a couple of minutes once a week, once a month, whatever you feel comfortable
08:08 with to kind of keep a log of what you did that's amazing or even what you did that was
08:15 just kind of, like I said, kind of blocking and tackling basics of your job sort of stuff
08:20 and how you are doing your job well, that can be a really powerful tool for you to use
08:28 to kind of craft your story that you're going to give to your boss when you're asking for
08:35 that promotion or that raise.
08:37 So I noticed you didn't say, tell your boss that, you know, somebody else is trying to
08:43 poach you from the company.
08:45 Is that not something someone should do when looking for a raise, promotion, anything like
08:49 that?
08:50 Well, it's it really, it really depends on your situation.
08:57 And like in so many aspects of negotiation, there's an aspect of are you willing to walk
09:04 away?
09:06 And we think about that with like a car dealership, if they're just not coming down and we'll
09:11 walk away and then they'll chase us to the car, not letting us leave without making another
09:17 another offer.
09:20 But when you are doing something like that, when you're saying that somebody is offering
09:24 me a little bit more money, if I am, if I go ahead and change jobs, then that is something
09:33 that you need to be careful about.
09:36 Because if if you mentioned that it could kind of change how you're viewed in your in
09:41 your boss's mind, depending on how valuable you are, it can be a useful tool and also
09:49 how willing you are to potentially walk away.
09:53 But long story short with that is that it's probably good to tread lightly with that.
09:59 Well, in your experience, Matt, what are the most common mistakes people make during financial
10:04 negotiations and how can they be avoided?
10:07 Well, honestly, the biggest mistake that people make is just not participating.
10:16 And I understand I'm somebody who is on camera and talks to people all the time.
10:22 And I am also somebody who gets nervous about raising my hand in a room full of people I
10:29 don't know or making a phone call to to ask for something.
10:33 And these things are hard, especially when you're talking about a giant international
10:40 mega bank or mega company.
10:43 You just feel like you don't really have a chance.
10:46 But the whole theme of my book is really that you have more power than you realize because
10:54 you are valuable to these companies.
10:58 And ultimately, if they can waive a 30 dollar late fee or give you a 10 dollar logo T-shirt
11:08 or something like that to keep you around, the companies are often willing to part with
11:15 that money because they know that that'll engender a lot of goodwill with you, keep
11:21 you happy and keep you spending money with them.
11:25 And then your lifetime value as a customer just goes up.
11:29 So it's it's not a philanthropic thing.
11:32 Businesses, businesses aren't charities, but they also understand that giving a little
11:38 bit to the customer when it's likely to be followed by good feelings and extra spending
11:45 is ultimately worth it in the long run.
11:48 Well, Matt, when negotiating contracts or agreements, what financial aspects should
11:53 individuals pay close attention to for their benefit?
11:57 Well, it really does depend.
12:03 Some of the when you're talking about, for example, like a like a credit card or some
12:08 other sort of loan, it's important to understand some of the headline details, things like
12:15 any fees that might be involved, any interest rates that might be involved, any deadlines
12:21 that might be involved, because all of that stuff matters.
12:25 And as the old saying goes, what you don't know can cost you.
12:31 And that is certainly true.
12:33 So we've all we've all got to do lists that are 100 miles long and we all don't want to
12:38 spend a whole lot of time looking at financial fine print and kind of going through all of
12:44 this sort of stuff.
12:46 But it is important to take time, regardless of what that document is, to make sure that
12:52 you at least understand the broad strokes of it before you sign.
12:57 And I do want to go back because one thing just crossed my mind that I'm sure a lot of
13:01 people have questions about.
13:03 Do you have any tips for negotiating your rent on a commercial lease or even your rent
13:09 on your apartment?
13:11 Yeah, it's that's that's a tough one because it is so dependent on your circumstances,
13:21 on where you live, on the time of year.
13:25 But when you are looking at rent against so much of these negotiations, whether you're
13:32 talking about rent or any other negotiation is about kind of having data to back your
13:40 view and to help you create your story.
13:44 So if you are somebody who is negotiating a lower rent, you can do a little bit of homework
13:53 to see what the availability is of apartments like yours in the area that you are looking.
14:03 That can give you a little bit of clue as to how much wiggle room there might be when
14:09 it comes to negotiating, if if there's any.
14:14 And so that that is certainly one of those key points.
14:17 It really is about data.
14:20 And that's really one of the things that I share a lot in the book is that the more homework
14:24 you can do, the more data you can derive, the more input you can get from people who
14:31 have been through these things before.
14:34 Oftentimes, the better off you'll be.
14:36 Wow.
14:37 This has been so helpful, Matt.
14:39 Thank you so much for joining me today.
14:42 Thank you.
14:43 I appreciate you having me.
14:44 Thank you.
14:44 [END]