Overcome Emotional Spending and Spot Job Scams That Could Cost You Thousands

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Jun 30, 2025

Amanda Barroso shares her low-buy journey, revealing how grief influenced her emotional spending. She emphasizes mindful budgeting, including planning for travel, and offers tips like creating a 'grief budget.' Eva Velasquez, CEO of the Identity Theft Resource Center, discusses the alarming rise of job scams, highlighting red flags and recovery steps for victims. The conversation stresses the need for awareness in avoiding scams and encourages a proactive approach to protecting one’s finances.

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ANECDOTE

Grief Triggered Emotional Spending

Amanda Barroso shares how grief led her to emotional spending after her dog's cancer diagnosis and passing.
She entered a cycle of overbuying and returning items despite initially strong mindful spending habits.

ADVICE

Budget for Grief and Healing

Create a list of healthy coping activities for emotional moments instead of turning to spending.
Include a "grief budget" for meaningful, healing purchases to allow intentional flexibility.

ADVICE

Quarterly Reset Prevents Goal Failure

Break year-long financial goals into quarters to allow reset and reprioritization.
View setbacks as chances to adjust goals, not failures, to maintain motivation.

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Learn how to reset spending habits after emotional setbacks and protect yourself from job scams that cost real money.

How do you reset your money goals after emotional setbacks? How do you avoid job scams that steal your savings? Hosts Sean Pyles and Elizabeth Ayoola discuss mindful spending and scam recovery to help you stay in control of your financial life. They begin by welcoming NerdWallet writer Amanda Barroso to share a candid check-in on her year-long “low-buy” journey. Amanda shares how grief led her to relapse into emotional spending, but also how she’s refocusing her goals like budgeting for travel to Spain and saving for a future Disney trip. She offers reflections on intentional spending, how emotions influence shopping habits, and tips like using a visual calendar, reevaluating goals quarterly, and creating a "grief budget."

Then, Sean and Elizabeth are joined by Eva Velasquez, CEO of the Identity Theft Resource Center, to discuss job scams. They talk through the red flags in one listener’s experience and explain what to do if you’ve been scammed, including how to report scams, the emotional toll of being victimized, and ways to avoid phishing and imposter schemes.

The free NerdWallet app makes it easy to be smarter with your finances because you can track, save and invest your money in one place: https://click.nerdwallet.com/3687710914/smpc

In their conversation, the Nerds discuss: how to stop emotional spending, job scams, fake job postings, crypto job scams, emotional spending triggers, retail therapy, low-buy year, mindful spending, budgeting after grief, how to protect against job scams, reporting scams, crypto payroll red flags, scam recovery tips, coping with financial guilt, intentional spending strategies, budgeting for international travel, Monarch Money app, how to track spending visually, how to reset financial goals, how to bounce back after overspending, scam urgency tactics, phishing red flags, upfront payments, crypto-based wages, high-pressure tactics, imposter scam examples, avoiding crypto scams, scam victim shame, scam financial recovery, scam reporting tools, Identity Theft Resource Center, scam personal data risks, emotional triggers and money, how to budget with a partner, grief and spending behavior, long-term savings motivation, budgeting apps for couples, how to recognize fake recruiters, and scams on social media.

To send the Nerds your money questions, call or text the Nerd hotline at 901-730-6373 or email podcast@nerdwallet.com.

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