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The Psychology of Money - Interview with Bestselling Author Morgan Housel

Morgan Housel and his wife needed a house. It was June 2016, and they had agreed they wouldn’t make an emotional decision on one of life’s most significant commitments. This would be their first home, where they’d celebrate Christmas morning and welcome friends to backyard barbeques. Their son was about six months old. Being patient, they decided, would be critical to their search. No emotional home buying. No impulse moves.

After they saw a house on Zillow that looked nice, they drove up to the driveway to tour the property. “Wow, I love it,” his wife said. “We’re like, oh my God, it’s perfect,” Housel recalls. “We told each other, ‘We have to buy this house right now.’”

“I love this as an example of even when you think you’re an unemotional person and you go out of your way to say you’re not going to be emotional, some things are emotional,” Housel says. “You shouldn’t pretend housing or children, or money isn’t emotional. So much of investing isn’t a spreadsheet, it’s emotion.”

Housel, a partner at The Collaborative Fund and former columnist at The Motley Fool and The Wall Street Journal, published his international bestseller, The Psychology of Money, in 2020. The book is 19 short stories exploring how people think about...

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