‍

Featuring

Priscilla Brehm, Wealth Advisor, Morton Wealth

Kristin Dillon, Modearn® Advisor, Morton Wealth

‍

Lifestyle creep is not a dramatic financial event. It is a food delivery subscription you barely use, a rent upgrade that felt reasonable at the time, a closet full of things you barely remember buying. It happens when income rises, and spending rises automatically to meet it, and sometimes exceed it, without anyone consciously choosing that outcome.

In this episode of Financial Commute, Priscilla Brehm and Kristin Dillon, a baby boomer and an elder millennial who have each spent decades watching this pattern play out from both sides, talk about what lifestyle creep looks like today, why the antidote is not deprivation but design, and the practical habits that help you live the life you want while building wealth.

‍

‍

Key Takeaways

• Lifestyle creep looks different across generations but the financial impact is the same. For baby boomers it often showed up in material goods, private schools, and keeping up with neighbors. For younger generations it shows up in subscriptions, food delivery, travel, and experiences. The form changes. The mechanism is identical: spending rises automatically whenever income rises, and the gap between what you earn and what you keep quietly disappears.

• Thoughtless spending versus thoughtful planning are the two paths. Priscilla draws a sharp distinction between the two. The decisions we make today have an impact on the rest of our lives. Lifestyle design is not about spending less. It is about spending with intention: knowing why you are buying something, what role it plays in your life, and whether it aligns with what you actually value.

• Social media is a constant, personalized commercial. Kristin describes what has changed: it is not the occasional TV ad anymore. It is a continuous curated highlight reel of everything other people are buying, doing, and experiencing. The pressure to spend is ambient and it is permanent, which makes mindfulness around spending a skill rather than a default.

• The cart strategy is a simple and effective spending filter. Kristin's habit: add things to your cart and close the app. Nine times out of ten she forgets about it. If she cannot stop thinking about it after that, she buys it. For Amazon specifically she picks one day a week, usually a Thursday, to review the cart and make deliberate decisions rather than impulse ones. The dopamine hit of adding to cart without buying is surprisingly effective.

• Want or need is the right question, but it is not always enough on its own. Priscilla adds a layer to the question: if it is something you want, why? What role will it play in your life? If it is something you need, do you need it now, and do you need the most expensive version? Pausing to answer those questions before buying changes the trajectory of the decision without requiring willpower or deprivation.

• A planning partner changes outcomes. The client story Kristin shares illustrates this directly. A woman in her mid-40s who had earned a strong income for years and had nothing to show for it was referred to Morton Wealth. Within a year and a half she had paid off her debt, cleared back taxes, started maxing her 401k, built over $100,000 in savings, and started running again. The financial clarity freed up mental and emotional space in her marriage and with her kids. She went from spending by accident to spending by design.

Key Moments from this Episode

0:00 – Intro: lifestyle creep, social media, and spending by accident
1:13 – Welcome: Priscilla and Kristin on lifestyle creep vs. lifestyle design
2:36 – Baby boomers vs. elder millennials: how lifestyle looks different by generation
4:52 – Is homeownership still the American dream?
6:54 – Thoughtless spending vs. thoughtful planning: how to shift the mindset
7:24 – Social media as one constant commercial: the pressure to keep up
9:06 – From Dallas to TikTok: how media has always driven lifestyle creep
9:57 – Client story: mid-40s, great income, nothing to show for it
13:46 – From spending by accident to spending by design
14:38 – Credit cards, impulse buying, and the cart trick
17:05 – Want vs. need: the question that changes your financial trajectory
22:16 – Closing framework: how to make spending decisions that reflect your values

‍

Questions This Episode Answers

1. What is lifestyle creep?

Lifestyle creep is the gradual, often invisible process by which spending rises to match or exceed income increases. It does not usually happen through one big decision. It accumulates through smaller ones: a nicer apartment, a few subscriptions, more frequent food delivery, a vacation that stretches the budget a little more than planned. None of it feels dramatic at the time. Over years, the gap between what you earn and what you keep narrows, and sometimes disappears, without anyone consciously choosing that outcome.

2. Why do I feel like I have less money even though I make more?

You are not imagining it. Income growth is often invisible in your day-to-day life because spending subtly rises alongside it. A raise gets absorbed into a slightly nicer apartment, a few more subscriptions, food delivery instead of cooking, and small upgrades that feel reasonable in the moment. Individually, none of these are dramatic. Cumulatively, they can absorb an entire income increase and sometimes more. Kristin shares the story of a client in her mid-40s who had earned a strong income for years and woke up one day realizing she had nothing to show for it. That feeling of "I make more but I have less” is one of the most common signs that spending is happening by default rather than by design.

3. How do I know if my spending is out of control?

A few signals worth paying attention to: you cannot easily answer where your money went last month, subscriptions you barely use are still charging you, your credit card balance surprises you at the end of the month, or you have earned more over the past few years but do not feel meaningfully more financially ahead. Kristin recommends a mid-month check-in on your credit card balance and asking yourself two questions: am I able to pay this off? and what am I giving up to have this balance? That opportunity-cost framing turns a passive habit into an active decision. The goal is not judgment. It is visibility.

4. What is the "want or need" framework for making better spending decisions?

Priscilla describes a simple pause that changes the trajectory of most purchases. Before buying anything, ask: is this a want or a need? If it is something you want, ask why. What role is this purchase going to play in your life? If it is something you need, ask whether you need it now, and whether you need the most expensive version. Taking a breath and stepping back for just a moment does not require willpower or deprivation. It just creates space between the desire and the decision. That small pause, applied consistently, produces an outsized cumulative difference in both financial outcomes and how you feel about your choices.

5. How do I stop spending money impulsively?

The most practical tool Kristin shares is the cart strategy: add the item to your cart, close the app, and walk away. Nine times out of ten, she forgets about it. If she cannot stop thinking about it after a day or two, she buys it. For Amazon specifically, she recommends picking one day a week (she uses Thursdays) to review the cart and decide what actually belongs there. She also suggests removing your credit card from stored payment on shopping apps so that buying requires manually entering it, which creates just enough friction to pause the impulse. The gap between desire and transaction is where intentional spending happens.

6. How does social media affect the way we spend money?

Kristin describes what has changed clearly: it is no longer discrete commercials in discrete doses. It is one constant commercial and one big highlight marketing reel. Previous generations were exposed to aspirational content in limited moments like a TV show, or a magazine. Today the feed is infinite, personalized, and relentless. The pressure to spend is ambient and permanent, and it is algorithmically optimized to show you exactly what you are most likely to want. Combined with one-click purchasing and services like DoorDash, spending has never required less thought. Mindfulness around spending used to be optional. Now it is a skill.

7. When should I talk to a financial advisor about my spending?

The most common signal is a sense that you have been working hard, earning well, and still not feeling ahead. Other signals: credit card balances that carry from month to month with no clear plan, savings that have not grown alongside income, or a persistent feeling that you should have more visibility into where your money is going. Kristin shares a client story that illustrates the difference a thinking partner can make. A woman in her mid-40s came in with a good income and nothing to show for it. Within a year and a half, she had paid off her debt, cleared back taxes owed to the IRS, started maxing out her 401(k) for the first time, and built a buffer of over $100,000. Notably, she also started running again. The financial clarity freed up mental and emotional space for her marriage, her kids, and her own well-being. The value of an advisor was not a spreadsheet. It was direction, and someone to think alongside.

8. Do I need to spend less to build wealth?

Not necessarily. The point of lifestyle design is not to spend less, it is to spend on things that matter to you and let go of things that do not. Priscilla puts it directly: the goal is not to spend money badly, and it is not to deprive yourself. It is to make sure your money is moving through your life in ways that reflect who you are and what you actually value. For many people, that shift alone — from spending by default to spending by choice — creates the room to build wealth without feeling restricted. Sometimes lifestyle design also means giving money away in ways that reflect your values. It is a philosophy of intention, not restriction.

‍

‍

Why This Matters for Anyone Whose Spending Has Grown Alongside Their Income

Lifestyle creep does not usually announce itself. It accumulates quietly, and by the time most people notice it, the gap between what they earn and what they keep has been narrowing for years. This episode is not about restriction. It is about reclaiming the choice of how your money moves through your life and making sure it is actually pointed at the things that matter to you.

• Anyone who has had their income increase in the last few years and has not felt meaningfully more financially ahead as a result
• People who find themselves buying things they barely remember wanting or using subscriptions they forget they have

At Morton Wealth, the lifestyle conversation is one of the most important ones we have. If you want a thinking partner on spending by design rather than by default, that is exactly the conversation we are here to have.

‍

Relevant Content

Money Guilt: How to Move Past It

Smart Spending Strategies: Life, Family, Career, Investments

‍

Disclosures: Information presented herein is for discussion and illustrative purposes only and is not intended to constitute financial advice. The views and opinions expressed by the speakers are as of the date of the recording and are subject to change. These views are not intended as a recommendation to buy or sell any securities, and should not be relied on as financial, tax, or legal advice. You should consult with your financial professional, accountant, or tax professional before implementing any transactions or strategies concerning your finances.