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Chris Miles from MoneyRipples.com tells us how to get our financial situation in order. We cover everything from an easy tool (and app) you can use to track your in and out (plus business AND personal) expenses called Mint.com. He also tells us what to do whether you're a spender, saver, or steward of your money. And a whole lot more!\n\nDisplay TranscriptRobert Plank: Today we're going to talk with Chris Miles, the cash flow expert. He's a leading authority on how to quickly free up and create cash flow for thousands of his clients. How are things today, Chris?\n\nChris Miles: Just fantastic, man. How are you doing?\n\nRobert Plank: I am super. I'm fantastic times a thousand. So you say you're a cash expert. I don't really know what that is, and when I think of cash flow expert, I think of Suze Orman, Dave Ramsey, Robert Kiyosaki. Is that kind of along the same lines or is that different?\n\nChris Miles: Take Dave Ramsey or Suze Orman and then totally do the opposite of the advice that they give, and that's basically what a cash flow expert is.\n\nRobert Plank: All right.\n\nChris Miles: Closer to Kiyosaki, yeah. What I really help people do is one, increase income, and then two, make sure we get expenses down any way we can but not to the point where you're living on rice and beans.\n\nRobert Plank: Okay, so not as crazy as Dave Ramsey gets?\n\nChris Miles: Definitely not that crazy. It's really about how to have lifestyle freedom, be able to really enjoy the life that you have and get your money working for you so you're not always working for your money.\n\nRobert Plank: I mean, that sounds good to me because you never know. Any day you might get hit by a bus or something crazy might happen.\n\nChris Miles: Exactly. Yeah. That's exactly it, man.\n\nRobert Plank: I'm seeing that your average client finds $33,000 per year laying around, and I'm seeing that you have all these skills and all these things you can do for people. The thing that really jumps out for me is you can tell people how to find $4,000 in 45 minutes. That's pretty crazy.\n\nChris Miles: Yeah, it's actually not too hard. That's the funny thing. Especially if you're a business owner. Business owners, they leak more money than anybody that I've seen. It's not just what you can lose at home, it's what you can lose in your business. I'll tell you, sometimes the biggest money leaks we have is the money that we never make in the first place, the money that we don't earn, the lost opportunity cost, right?\n\nRobert Plank: Right.\n\nChris Miles: Things like that. When I'm working with somebody one-on-one, typically I find about $33,000 a year or so. That's pretty average.\n\nRobert Plank: Where the heck does $33,000 come from?\n\nChris Miles: It comes from two places. Well, two general places I mention. One, increasing income, or two, maximizing the expenses you're doing. For example, one place that's easy that almost everybody will find something is starting to track your money. It's interesting because a lot of business owners that I work with, they'll say, "Hey, you know what? Chris, I always thought that the way to financial freedom is just make more money. If I just make more money then I'll solve any money problem I have," but what they're finding out is that as time goes on, the more money they make, the more they end up spending, too.\n\nRobert Plank: Oh, yeah. I've noticed that, too.\n\nChris Miles: Yeah, it's Parkinson's law. It's human nature. We tend to have our expenses rise to meet wherever our income is, right? Even if we free up money, you'll end up finding a way to spend that later on and say, "Man, wasn't I just like this a little while ago? I feel just as broke as I was before." I get a lot of people that say that, so what I have them do first and foremost is to start tracking their money.\n\nA great way to do that in your business, first and foremost, is use things like QuickBooks to kind of track your expenses and income and everything coming in.