Learning to Stop Hating Ramit Sethi

The FAANG FIRE Bookclub just finished our discussion of Ramit Sethi’s “Money for Couples”. During the discussion I brought up my own complicated feelings with Ramit. It started with me admitting that I hated Ramit Sethi.

His first book “I Will Teach You To Be Rich” came out in 2009, the same year I graduated college.

My first job out of college was working in online marketing. I was deep into all things SEO/SEM/marketing and would regularly come across Ramit. You see, Ramit hung out with a crowd of early internet “hustlers”. Not hustlers in the purely derogatory sense, but more grinders and ‘The 4-Hour Workweek’ wantrepreneurs. He made money by selling courses before selling courses was a thing. He was “growth hacking” before growth hacking was a thing. He was emailing out blog posts (ie newsletters) a decade before it was a normal thing.

I thought to myself: “Who is this silver spoon Stanford graduate who makes money off online courses to teach me how to be rich?”

I thought he was just some cringe internet marketer with a punchable face.

… and why isn’t he wearing shoes?

He was just a young guy who turned his blog into a book. That first book, “I Will Teach You To Be Rich”, was what made him more broadly well known. I was certain he only wrote it to act as the top of the marketing funnel for his online courses. He was a pure marketer at heart, always trying his hand at multiple businesses at once.

Foundationally he was getting people to think about their “Rich Life” and then identifying for them that they couldn’t get there with their current spending and earning levels.

Here is what you were greeted when you unsubscribed from his newsletter. Pure early internet growth hack.

Luckily, Ramit also had an answer. You could sign up for his course “1k on the side” to teach you how to start your own side hustle. For a mere $1,000 Ramit could teach you how to create your own side hustle.

Young Ramit on his brother’s podcast:

“So, my site started off as a personal finance site and really my interest is not in money, it is actually in behavioral change. That is my background, persuasion and social influence. So, I started off just writing about money and I wrote a book, came out in 2009, developed some courses online, earn 1K is one of them, my flagship one. Coming up soon I have got a new major course coming out on how to find your dream job.” - Ramit

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From Hater to Fanboy?

Now in 2025 I own the reprint of “I Will Teach You To Be Rich”, the IWTYTBR Journal, and just hosted a book club featuring his newest book “Money For Couples”.

How did this guy get to me?

How did this FIRE critic get to me?

He did it by masterfully saying the same thing over and over and over, over a long period of time. He did it by adding his own personal branding to budgeting, or in his words “Conscience Spending Plan”. He did so by being consistently opinionated and having strong opinions on topics like: Renting vs Buying, Advisors charging AUM fees, and the US not building enough housing.

He also did so by inviting the world into real conversations with real couples through his podcast.

So while I hated 20 year old Ramit, I grew to really appreciate what 40 year old Ramit was doing. He was genuinely finding creative ways to help people save money. He was simplifying things in a way that someone earning $30k and someone earning $300k could equally get value from.

Side Note: His wife Cassandra is awesome. I was following her when I was going through a capsule wardrobe phase (after my “tracking everything I wore” phase). I was wanting higher quality versions of simple clothes that I would wear more often.

I didn’t even realize they were married until a now well dressed and slightly less punchable face started popping up in my IG feed.

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Then I started listening to his podcast, where he brought on couples to dive into their financial situations. It was raw. It covered people earning over $500k as well as those earning much less, ranging from retirees to individuals sinking in student loan debt.

I was so impressed with how this “hustler” was masterfully navigating these complex financial issues these couples were facing. He broke things down in a way that helped me fully understand how little the actual numbers have to do with our relationship with money.

Did what started out as a hustle evolve into some type of genuine expertise?

I can appreciate that he tricks people into thinking they are not budgeting while actually modeling out an entire year of future cash flow.

I can appreciate how he engages with trolls on twitter when he pushes against the dogma of home ownership vs renting.

I can appreciate how he has said the same thing over and over over a long period of time.

I can appreciate how how masterful of a marketer he is to this day, always thinking about the next step in the funnel.

Someone in the book club referred to his new book as “a self help book masquerading as a personal finance book”. I think that sums up a lot of Ramit Sethi. He has tricked us into not only being better off financially, but he also forced us to think beyond just the numbers. And you know what? I can appreciate that.

TL;DR “Money for Couples” Review:

If you are wanting a book to read with your partner that will help you talk about money AND think about your future I would definitely recommend reading Ramit Sethi’s Money for Couples. I would skip “I Will Teach You To Be Rich”, but instead pick up the Journal that expands on Ramit’s “Rich Life” framework. It is the perfect companion to Money for Couples.

The actionable scripts he provides directly resulted in meaningful changes to how I structure my finances, leading directly to my path of “Simplification”.

That is why I no longer hate Ramit Sethi. I consider him among the easiest to recommend personal finance authors of this generation. He is a good counterbalance for my more numeric natural optimizer mindset.

I am normally very anti “vision board woo”, but Ramit tricks me into it by asking very pointed questions around what “My Rich Life” looks like.

But he can’t make me stop tracking my spending on avocados.