Or listen on any of our other podcast websites such as Spotify, Soundcloud, or Apple Music.

---

Announcer  00:00

This program is paid for by JAKIB Media Partners. All opinions or statements expressed on this program are solely those of JAKIB Media or its guests and do not reflect the views of WPHT or Audacy. Today’s program is pre-recorded Welcome to Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show with David Bezar, Karen Bezar, and Bret Elam from Thrive Financial Services who have been featured on Fox, ABC, NBC, the Wall Street Journal, and more. Saving for retirement is a great start. But it’s what you do with this money that really matters. What’s your strategy to reduce taxes, generate income in retirement, reduce your risk, and get even more from Social Security? This is where you can count on straightforward and objective advice about how you can make your money go a lot further in retirement. Roadmap to Retirement, The Radio Show. Now here are your hosts David, Karen, and Bret along with Joe Krause.

 

Joe Krause  00:52

Welcome everyone to another edition of Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show with David Bezar, Karen Bezar, and Bret Elam. We’re all back together again, got a great show lined up for you as we come to you, at the halfway point of 2023. Listen up as we go into the commercial breaks, you’ll hear about opportunities over the next two weeks to get registered for one of the upcoming workshops. There’ll be four different choices over the next two weeks. And you must get registered in order to become educated about the Roadmap to Retirement, which we will continue to do David and continue to talk about as long as people will listen. How’s that?

 

David Bezar  01:34

That’s actually yeah, I think that makes sense. That’s a good one. Yeah. And reminding us that we’re already halfway through the year is just mind boggling. I mean, where does time go? Right? Just flying by? Well, we certainly had a hot week. Right? Temperature wise, a lot of news out there a lot of things, no doubt, right, a lot of things going on. So definitely want to welcome our listening audience in welcome everybody this morning, here at the table, we’re having a good time, we got a lot of good stuff to go over. Right? It’s like you said halfway through the year, there’s still plenty of time to get the proper type of planning in place to set yourself up for success in retirement. And, you know, Joe will always say this, that you know, our workshops, and when we when we meet with people, that there’s a lot of complexity to retirement, getting to retirement, I don’t want to belittle it at all, but it’s not that hard of a formula, right? Yeah, find a good job or a business or whatever it is that you get earnings from, hopefully you keep your expenses, although that’s getting a lot harder to keep your expenses at a reasonable rate with all the inflation that’s going on out there. But if you can keep your expenses below your income, you’ll have some money leftover and surplus, hopefully that’s going into a good type of retirement plan. It’s properly invested and earning a decent amount of interest. So that compounds each year, and you know, you let it sit there for 25-30-35-40 years, and you should have this nest egg built up, that prepares you for retirement, then the fun starts. And I say that somewhat facetiously. The fact that you’ve got to now start making decisions to protect that nest egg. Because outside of that nest egg, for the vast majority of people listening today, the only other source of income is Social Security. And people have lots and lots of questions about Social Security and the viability of Social Security. So now we really have to rely on that nest egg to produce enough income after inflation and taxes to rest, you know, to last the rest of our lives. 

 

Joe Krause  03:44

I was just going to say I was even if you do nothing, even if you’ve done nothing and you followed your scenario, and you’ve got to that point, you got this bucket of money and you’ve done nothing, cut it at least in half and give it to the government because if you don’t do anything, you’re gonna lose most of it in taxes.

 

David Bezar  04:00

Yeah, right. I mean, it’s just it’s absolutely amazing. And I think a lot of folks that have attended our workshops, engaged Thrive in some fashion, have definitely gotten themselves educated enough to come to the conclusion that taxes are going to go up during those retirement years. So that, you know, that’s what it takes to get there. But now that they’re there, missteps and mistakes can cost you 10s of 1000s of dollars, if not hundreds of 1000s of dollars. And that’s why we do this show, right? Our show is geared for folks that are either pre retirees kind of in that three, four or five years out from retirement, or have already entered retirement. We want to help people get educated, we want to create awareness. We want to provide the education and then if needed the leadership to navigate through those complexities. So at the end of the day, you had a nice successful retirement. You have peace of mind that you were there. Everything turned out to be okay. That’s why we do the show. So we got a lot of good stuff to cover. I’m gonna jump right over to Karen and have her share a little bit of what she’s going to cover on today’s show.

 

Karen Bezar  05:11

I have a list Joe, I have a list again. So it’s kind of a list, I have two..seven things on my list. Two things to think about for retirement. And oddly enough, I was thinking the same thing the other day, like we are halfway through the year. If you planned on making or planning for your retirement and the beginning of the year, you’re like, oh, yeah, I’m gonna do this, this and this for her already halfway through the year. So it’s time to get going. So I have a little list to help you get started and move the year.

 

Joe Krause  05:42

You know, I do. And I always put parentheses on my show notes list. And I always check it.

 

Karen Bezar  05:51

I always leave lists for David because he loves my lists.

 

David Bezar  05:54

And Bret, what are you going to be covered in today’s show?

 

Bret Elam  05:57

You actually just spoke about Social Security. So actually the consultant that the government uses a Mr. Larry Kotlikoff has a podcast. So he actually spoke about on his podcast and a little bit to what Karen had said, as well. I also have a list where they talked about seven flaws with modern financial planning and talked about the importance about why you need to revisit your plans, and why your plan needs to be customized for your particular situation. So excited to share that in the next segment.

 

David Bezar  06:25

Good stuff, we got a good show lined up, Joe, in my segment, we’re going to talk about should your retirement date be tied to a savings goal? Or are there other factors that you may want to consider? And then how do you track? If you’re on the right game plan, right? What’s the accountability? That the way you’re planning the timeline for that retirement is meeting those different milestones. Right, again, sometimes, you know, just the way things work. We kind of, we kind of have more of a wish list. Right? Then actually, you know, Karen says list Bret says, you know, a dedicated list that gives us those milestones. Did I hit this mark? Am I ahead? Am I behind? Are we doing those, whether it’s daily, weekly, monthly, or annual, and I would tell you, the closer you’re getting to retirement, the shorter the time interval should be to make sure that you’re checking in and everything’s working out on that list. Here’s just a couple quick statistics that I’ll talk more about in my segment. But when it comes to retirees by age and how much money, how much investable assets they have set aside, according to the census, this is what comes up. Of people aged 55 to 64, who have 500 to $1 million in investable assets. 35% of those people are retired. Of people 55 to 64 Who have under $50,000, investable assets 35% are retired, of people 65 to 74 with $500 to $1 Million in investable assets,  82% of that population are already retired, and of people 65 to 74, with under $50,000, investable assets 77% are still retired. And of people over the age of 75, more than 90% are retired regardless of asset level. So it’s a little vague and how you maybe interpret that, but you know what it’s basically identifying as some people are prepared. Some people may be some people you know, who are prepared or supplementing Social Security and pensions with additional money living maybe a more lively retirement, and people who not are more reliant on a fixed income where so you know, with Social Security, yep, we’re getting cost of living adjustments, but inflation is still hammering it and like you said earlier, taxes are definitely hammering that. So you really have to kind of put those plans together. So I think we got a great thing lined up tonight. 

 

Joe Krause  09:10

I was just gonna say a really, really good show lined up. We’ll get everything kicked off with Bret Elam on the other side of the break. This is Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show if you’ve got some time this upcoming week, get registered for one of the upcoming workshops perhaps we’ll see you at the Kimberton Inn. You’ll find out information in one of our commercial breaks on how you can get registered to thrivefinancialservices.com. Back in a moment. Back here on Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show. David Bezar, Karen Bezar and Bret Elam them all back together again as we deliver another week of good information. Don’t forget if you miss any of the information on today’s show and you’d like to read and listen to the show. Just download the podcast you’ll find it on thrivefinancialservices.com or wherever you get your podcast and bread as you know the podcast continues to be a great source for people to consume some of the content perhaps or read and listen to some of the stuff we talked about.

 

Bret Elam  10:07

It’s amazing how many people continue to listen and get feedback from them, which is awesome. Again, you wonder sometimes who’s listening now.

 

Joe Krause  10:15

I was driving down in Atlantic City the other day, but the podcast on it was a 65 minute ride of the podcast. Do you hear things that you missed when you were listening to it live? I do a lot.

 

Bret Elam  10:26

And in our category financial services, we’re getting ready to to reach the top 20 here worldwide, which is very exciting as well, just just the army continues to grow. But I wanted to chat about again, Professor Larry Kotlikoff, who is the consultant that the government uses related to social security. And on his most recent podcast, Mr. David Blanchard, who’s a financial planning expert, and heads up research for PGIM DC Solutions. And while they talk about how financial advisors do a better job of planning today, at least compared to your traditional stock jockeys are stockbrokers and insurance agents, which are more just transaction focus people, there’s still a number of important ways that this industry is falling short of inevitably, the potential. So what this article really dives into these these to talk about, I guess, the nuts and bolts of modern financial planning process contrasting to what they refer to as economics based planning, we’re going to keep it light, which allows for more nuanced perspectives about defining goals and achieving successful outcomes, which is a relative term versus traditional planning, which is what I think a lot of our listening audience has been used to, which offers a more buyer nary perspective of success or failure, meaning black or white, there’s no gray and life is all about being gray. So these two talks about an over reliance on these things called Monte Carlo simulations, which is, hey, what’s my chance of likelihood of success, and the one key problem for the industry to address and another is figuring out how to more clearly and effectively communicate the importance of different sources of risk. And the two things that they talk about, which is interesting, just going to touch on this, and then we’re going to dive into the flaws is understanding longevity. And then sequence risk is a sequence of returns, which, which we’ve talked about over the years. So I want to jump into this, these two gentlemen and talk about their main criticisms for the standard process. Where I believe that our listening audience and something that we pride ourselves here at Thrive, is that we believe that we owe it to our clients to continue to improve, improve, improve the means of communication, giving people that peace of mind and security, because of this thing called under consumption that a lot of us are fearful of like I don’t want to run out and so forth. So let’s jump into things talking about the seven flaws of modern financial planning. The very first one is they focus too narrowly on the Bionaire by an airy possibility of success. So what the heck does that mean is that when you look at these things called Monte Carlo simulations, it tells you what’s your likelihood, they run into different scenarios as the most common outcome metric and financial planning tools used by advisors today is this thing called Monte Carlo simulations. In basic terms, you’re looking at a stated income goal, and a portfolio Performance projection, which is full of Atlantis assumptions. And if you accomplish the goal in its entirety, you assess whether you assign a successful outcome for that particular trial. So you do 1000 And they do 1000 different simulations, and all the results are added up. And then that’s your probability of success. Here’s the issue is that when you use those type of analysis, if you fall $1 short, and let’s just say in year 30, it’s a failure. So it’s either you made it or you didn’t. And life is more again, Greg, because do you need that extra dollar in your 30? Or do we need to talk about what’s reality to your situation, which is the importance of looking at it again, it’s true or false. And again, life is more than just true or false of success versus failure. Number two, failing to communicate the continuum of outcomes. I like this one as well. So adding to another point, they talk about how the industry commonly fails to fully communicate the importance of talking about outcomes that are possible in all given scenarios. Again, we look at things very my optically but for example, let’s talk about this planning effort should acknowledge that individuals can and do cut back on their spending needs and in retirement if they need to And the subjective cost or utility penalty of doing so varies a lot ready on the type of consumption being curtailed. Meaning if I said, you’re not going to be able to go on as nice a vacation or you’re going on a vacation, that’s one set of cutbacks versus the second one is you can’t eat. And again, understanding discretionary or non discretionary expenses, and what is on the table to adjust and what isn’t? Those are things that need to be delved into all the time we get a lot of people come in here and say, This is what our expenses are. And we said, does that include getting their hair and nails done? Does that include going on vacations that include gifts as that include health care? Again, it’s all about what is necessary. And what is a one, two versus a half, two and looking at those items. Third one here is failing to define what failure means to a specific client, again, the importance of things being directly associated to your situation. This is it right now. And especially the gentleman who’s the expert for social security talks about this as under a standard approach of running retirement projections, you could run an analysis that would technically tell a person of modest means they have a 0% probability of success with their stated goal, but the same time they’re going to achieve 90% of that goal with guaranteed sources of income. So it’s understanding again, because everything looks at failure or success that David talked about, they may have a pension, you may have an annuity that’s given you a guaranteed stream of income, plus Social Security, you may be missing that extra that last 10%, but your 90% is there. So understanding failure doesn’t mean you’re going into bankruptcy. It just means we need to understand where’s that failure is coming? Am I am I going to be 90% of my goal 80% of my goal is do I need to look at discretionary income do I need to look at non discretionary income. And looking at a specific scenario, again, the importance of not taking, I guess, the Gospel, the messages that are going out there to 300 million people and the importance of why nothing, none of that stuff matters. What matters is your particular situation. And your particular situation is unique to everybody else that is out there. The fourth one here is failing to communicate clearly about mortality. And longevity risk. This was just reaffirmed that if we have a couple age 65 is a 50% chance that one makes it to the age of 92. And a 25% chance that one makes it to the age of 96, which can be a long time. So in talking about these guys, they talk about that many people often think about mortality and longevity, the same type of way that like big insurance companies do when they’re talking about just simply spending rates, risk taking, etc. But they talk about, that’s actually not a very constructive approach, because any given client only has what one mortality date, we don’t live in a world of averages, we say how the market is going to return 8% a year you but we don’t live in a world of averages. That’s where we talked about the importance of sequence returns, just like we understand what life expectancy is. But what really matters is what your life expectancy is we got to look into genetics and all that kind of good stuff.

 

Joe Krause  18:13

And just because one individual may make it to 90 to their partner may not. That’s exactly right. I mean, that’s the obvious, inevitable fact that my wife and I really actually talk about that all the time. Jeans are strong, but my jeans are not so good. 

 

Bret Elam  18:30

So we need to go into the analysis, where are we going to fall? That’s exactly right. And they say, for example, in real life a client dies at age 80. It didn’t matter if the portfolio lasted for another 15 years, because they’re not around to spend it at the end of the day. So misconceptions about longevity can easily lead to over or under consumption. And it’s the importance that you need to find the balance between the two, because you have people that may be living under a rock, which isn’t necessarily a good thing, where we want people to flourish and live life because you never know when it’s your time. Number five is failure to appreciate the effects of guaranteed income on risk tolerance, a shared list probably to a number three, if you have those guaranteed sources of income. That’s a big deal and understanding what risk level and what risk tolerance can I take with my other assets because again, if you have Social Security, you have a pension, you have those guaranteed sources of income that are taken care of those income needs that allows you to take possibly a little bit more risk with the rest of your portfolio. So again, making optimal decisions requires multiple inputs. And in reality, people are complex creatures, they say with multiple goals that they must manage together. Again, the importance of not just looking at things in a binary fashion is trying to put all those different pieces together. Number six is putting too much emphasis on theoretical optimal outcomes. Again, if a Social Security Report, if you have two people that say wait till age 70, to collect Social Security, and they died at age 73, or 75, from a financial perspective, they didn’t make it to their break even analysis. And a lot of people have in their head, got to do the break even analysis got to do the breakeven analysis of what makes sense. They may have collected more wealth if they had drawn earlier, but they could have, but they couldn’t have known when they were going to die. And again, that’s where you try to talk about what are the what ifs, and how do you take some of those risks off the table. And on the brighter side, that younger generation will be inheriting a larger pile of money because they inevitably ended up passing away early. And the last one here is number seven, failing to revisit point in time assumptions or adjusting the course, we talk about all the time adjusting the course and revisiting the plan Karen talked about, we’re now halfway through the year of always re looking at things and changing those assumptions. Because so that you’re not spending too much or spending too levels so that you can live. I always say when people are in their 60s, early 70s, these are go go years, then we get to our slow years as we get into our 70s and 80s. And then inevitably, and I stole this from a client, then they become your no go years where you’re inevitably not working. So does inflation matter when you’re 95 years old, no matter a little bit, but people want to flourish and live today in their 60s and 70s. So the importance of revisiting that plan. And if you’ve been listening to this saying, hey, I’ve been doing this on my own running my different scenarios where I work with an advisor, and we just talk about that success, what’s that percentage chance of making it. And you’re ready to take the step to go a little bit deeper of what makes sense for your particular situation, my assets to give us a call at 215-798-9088 and the importance, we’re more than happy to talk to you about the importance of going through all those different questions, and talking about what ifs so that you can be in control your situation so that you can live and flourish today.

 

Joe Krause  22:01

See, I think it’s important to do it because even if I’m self managing myself, and I’ve got a great plan lined up and everything else appears to be in place on a moment’s notice tomorrow, something could occur that completely destroys, self managed plan. That’s correct. Life is not black and white. Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show, back in a moment.

 

Announcer  22:21

This program is paid for by JAKIB Media Partners.

 

Joe Krause  22:25

Don’t forget, as we returned back here to Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show if you want to attend one of the upcoming workshops, go to thrivefinancialservices.com or call 215-798-9088. Karen, over to you.

 

Karen Bezar  22:40

Thanks, Joe. Well, I hope everybody had a fantastic Fourth of July long weekend. For some people it was long and was kind of a confusing weekend holiday for some people. But hopefully everybody had a great week. And again, yeah, we are in July, we are halfway through the year, which you know, they say as you get older time goes faster. And I truly believe that but times definitely go faster. And in January, you’re like, Okay, here’s my list of things that I’m going to accomplish during the year. Some people do it, some people don’t. But if planning for retirement, or retirement was something that you’re going to have to do by the end of the year, here’s some things that you need to start thinking about if you haven’t already done this as well. So I have a list of seven things. Hopefully we’ll get through my list, Joe, you know how I am listening. So number one, you want to review your retirement plan. But better yet, if you don’t have a retirement plan, maybe start time to start thinking about devising that plan. And you want to devise your plan. So it’s tailored to your goals and factors and things like you want to start thinking about what your cost of living is going to be, medical expenses, Social Security, these are things you need to start thinking about. Or better yet, I would say you can come out to one of our workshops that we have going off going on during the summer, or give us a call here and you can actually schedule a complimentary consultation 215-798-9088. I promise you, it’s complimentary. When I meet with people at the seminar, and I get them on the schedule, sometimes they feel like they do ask me again. They’re like now what’s it going to cost? And they’re waiting for that gotcha. Because we invited you to come for the first time. You share information with us. We really want to get to know what you want to do in retirement and then you come back a second time, and we really give you a detailed study of what your retirement is going to look like. And the woman that I spoke with set her appointment. She goes okay, the first one’s free. How much is the second one? I’m like I swear to you you are not going to pay for a thing when you come in and meet with us. So really amazing, right? And once you become a client, you’re our client. We have a speak, I was speaking with a client we have over in the UK, she’s a dual citizen. Unfortunately, her husband passed away, and we’re dealing with things. And you know, I’m answering all these questions, questions about Social Security, things that are just kind of not even in regards to what she’s dealing with. And she’s like, Okay, now, how much do I owe you? And I said, You don’t owe me anything. She’s like, but how do you make your money and I was like, you’re our client, you’re part of the family. So we are here to help you, you became our client 3, 4, 7 years ago, and this is what we’re doing for you. She’s like, I’m surprised because everybody I’m talking to is telling me this going across this causes, again, complementary 215-798-9088. So one you want to review or you want to put together your retirement plan. Number two, you want to prepare for the impact of inflation, right? Inflation is rampant right now. So it’s going to be part of your retirement, whether you like it or not, what we do here, when we meet with you, is we will factor inflation into your entire plan. Among other things, we will factor in inflation, we sit down, we ask you how much you think you need to live off in retirement. And we we put all those numbers in what do you have saved currently, maybe how much more do you need to have saved to have a successful retirement, or we’re going to show you by one of our software means is that you’re on the right track. So it’s great information to have. So again, number two, you want to prepare for the impact of inflation. Number three, you want to protect your assets from the market. It’s, you know, it would be nice if you had that bucket of money. And then it was earning such great interest every year that you can live off of your interests. But in reality, that’s not going to happen, especially if you’re going to be retired for 30 years or longer. So you want to protect your assets from the market. But you also don’t want to protect him so much that you’re not making any money in retirement. So what we can do for you here is we can do a review of your current asset allocation and give you an idea. Are you being too conservative? Are you being too risky? Along with protecting your assets from the market? I’m just going to another thing you have to have is you need an income plan. Where are you going to start taking your money from? Are you going to start Social Security right away? Are you going to let it grow? Those are things you need to think about. Number four, you want to plan health care very carefully. We had a show a few weeks ago, where we discussed, you know, people don’t always understand long term care. And when you’re working, most of us, luckily have a company that we’re working with that actually covers your health care expenses. But when you’re retired, you’re not working for that company anymore. So you need to plan for the cost of Medicare. And you need to plan for a supplement and also, along with planning for the cost of it. Do you really understand Medicare and how it works? And what you actually need to get? Do you need this extra insurance, you need this extra insurance? Long-term health care isn’t covered? Most of it is not covered under Medicare. So what are you going to do to protect your hard earned income and your hard earned money that you worked for for so many years? Another thing that people don’t often think about? Sometimes they don’t even know about it, and they’re shocked when they find out is you’re going to have those Medicare surcharges. Right? You want to understand, Okay, I’m just paying this for Medicare, yes, but you could end up paying more for Medicare, if you’re not careful on retirement. Again, it’s based on your income. So number five, you want to shift. This is this is important, but you want to shift your perspective from saving to now spending that money, right. You’re in retirement. So now you made it to that point. And now you’re gonna have to shift from spending to from saving to spending mentally it’s a big mental shift. So up until retirement, like you’re spending, when you spend your money that you save before your retirement, you’re like nope, nope, that’s bad. I can’t touch my retirement accounts. But in retirement, it’s the opposite, right? It’s okay to start spending your money. And it’s okay to not have to save your money all the time during retirement, but you want to have an income plan that you’re comfortable with. And you want to understand that yes, I’m okay. Each year I’m okay. I can spend this much money. And you do have to, like Bret said you need to revisit that plan, right. Number six, you want to reestablish your purpose. So other than having enough money in retirement, you want to enjoy your retirement. Don’t want to sit around, maybe you do, maybe that’s your retirement plan but you kind of think about okay, what are we gonna do in retirement? And again, number seven like I just said earlier and like Bret alluded to in the previous segment is you need to stay on top of your finances and retirement and you got to stay on your plan right you might think once you’re retired you have a solid financial plan in place especially if you met with us here at Thrive Financial Services 215-798-9088. But once you’re on a fixed income, you know you need to revisit that plan every year and we sit down with our clients as often as they need and we revisit that revisit that plan. So please give us a call 215-798-9088. Take a look at our website. We have a lot of great information there thrivefinancialservices.com and hopefully everybody will have a healthy and happy retirement.

 

Joe Krause  30:55

You know sometimes in life as we get ready to go to the break you get these little simple reminders I was in Florida, I was behind a gentleman who was getting a doughnut at the counter and it was $2.89 like that and he turns to me shocked he said I just retired? How am I gonna make it?

 

Karen Bezar  31:13

It’s not a joke, it’s not a joke. It’s serious. You want to enjoy it, you want to be able to enjoy that doughnut.

 

 

Joe Krause  31:24

Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show back in a moment.

 

Announcer  31:27

Make sure you head to thrivefinancialservices.com and register for the upcoming free workshops. It’s Tuesday, July 11 at the William Penn Inn starting at 6 PM. Come out meet the team, get educated at the free workshop register now at thrivefinancialservices.com. Again, it’s Tuesday, July 11 at the William Penn Inn starting at 6 PM. Register now at thrivefinancialservices.com. And again at thrivefinancialservices.com.

 

Joe Krause  31:54

Thanks again everyone for listening to the Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show, one segment to go with David Bezar. A lot of good conversation today. Don’t forget to listen to or read listen to the podcast go to thrivefinancialservices.com. David, over to you sir. 

 

David Bezar  32:09

Hey, Joe, just a quick calming, kind of continuing with your story out of Florida. I think it was was I don’t know two weeks ago that I was feeling a little bit under the weather. And I for whatever reason, you know, I’ve gone completely vegetarian. It’s a year now that I’ve been a vegetarian, all that kind of stuff. But I was really craving good chicken soup. Yeah. Right. Like I just thought you know, that kind of, it always kind of feels the heart or whatever you want to call it. So Karen, I happened to be, you know, one of the big chain grocery stores because I wanted that prepared. I didn’t want Campbell’s soup. I didn’t want processed, I wanted something like the home style prepared by a real chef or cook or whatever. So we went to one of the local grocery stores. I won’t mention the name Wegmans. I mean, anyway, sorry about that. But we went there and I walked up to the prepared where the soup was enjoyed. I actually took a picture and at our last seminar I went over to my phone and I shot like a walk around the room and I showed people the picture for a quart of homemade chicken soup. It was $14.98

 

Joe Krause  33:20

Wow, is that broth or was that vegetables?

Karen Bezar  33:26

But even canned soup, I bought it for him and he was like wait, it’s to something for –

 

David Bezar  33:35

You know, God bless. I mean, we’ve done very well you know, I’ve been a financial planner now for 34 years. I’m gonna be 60 years old. Like there’s not a lot of circumstance where I think about what something costs or whatever else. But there comes a breaking point and I’m telling you straight up I did not buy that chicken soup. Like no way no how. And when I you know what, like, I clench my fists, right my the hair on the back of my neck stands up. When I hear people on CNBC or MSNBC or CNN or Fox News, whatever you want to tell us that inflation is under is being tamed. Right? It just isn’t the facts people are getting hammered out there. So okay, I’m gonna go off my soapbox now but people gotta get prepared. So what I was going to talk about.

 

Joe Krause  34:28

Not everybody has enough, not everybody has the determined will to walk away and not buy the chicken soup. They will still buy it despite and that’s where the that’s where the effect even comes from even

 

David Bezar  34:40

holy smokes Joe I mean you You hit the nail right on that it and again it because it’s our day to day and it’s what we’re so immersed in. Like I always wonder like and you know, the three of us sitting here from Thrive Financial Services can attest because we meet with people And we hear and we learn about people’s habits and their thought process. And you’re so right. And one of the things that kind of illustrates what you just said that some people don’t walk away and they’re spending is we’re seeing, for the first time, the absolute highest credit card balances in the history of credit, like people are now completely living off of credit, to supplement the shortfall of what they have between their income and their expenses. And that’s why retirement planning is so critically important. And I think, you know, I listened to a podcast the other day, and I wanted to throw this out to our audience. And actually, you know, the four of us sitting here at the table as well, the podcast said, and this was, you know, I’m big on, you know, regaining health and longevity and doing all the right things that I have control over. Right, the one thing I don’t have control over is what the good Lord was going to ultimately do. And kind of what my DNA says, But you know, all the longevity experts, all of the doctors that I’ve dealt with, they say your DNA is a loaded gun, but you as an individual have the finger on the trigger, and can decide whether you’re going to pull it or not with your habits. So I was listening to this podcast and the speaker on the podcast said, what would it be like? How impactful for people? Would it be if you could give them the ability to see the last 10 years of their life?

 

Joe Krause  36:50

Wow, great question.

 

David Bezar  36:51

Holy smokes, right. Yeah. Holy smokes, can you do it? Well, I don’t think so. I mean, figuratively, if there were now looked, I mean, there’s predictive index and things of that sort. But if you could see what your health looked like, would you do something different today? If you could see what your lifestyle would look like? Could you do something different today to impact the outcome of that? Right? Could you see what your kids end up looking at? Like? Could you see what your grandkids end up looking at? Like? Would you do something different today? To make those changes? Right, man, just a very thought provoking idea that if I could peer into what life will look like in those last 10 years, would it change my habits? Would it change my actions? So that’s something that I’ve committed to myself to always ask what I’m doing today? Is it going to have a positive impact on those last 10 years of my life? Or is it going to be detrimental to those last 10 years of my life? So I think, as I think about that, you know, this other quote that I learned long, long, long ago, that comes to mind is success equals when preparation meets opportunity. And relative to our show today, what I think the opportunity is, is that Thrive Financial Services, has made such a strong commitment to an education first approach to people who are pre retirees or retirees. And how we do that is we provide these educational workshops and dinner seminars, we provide webinars, we provide a newsletter, we provide all kinds of material and resources that give people education about what it’s going to take to be successful in retirement. It all culminates down to probably the biggest opportunity that thrive gives the community is the ability to have a comprehensive analysis done of your current retirement situation. Complimentary, right. We do not care. Like it’s hard for people to understand this. But we don’t care. I don’t mean to say the word we don’t care, we’re indifferent. Whether you do business with us or not. And the reason behind that is the fabric of our company. The ideal of our company is if you do good by people, people will ultimately do good by you. So we never feel the pressure. We never give pressure to have to do business with somebody. Now, what happens again, because I think when people are Looking at the opportunity of getting a comprehensive, deep dive analysis, it typically takes us on average, Joe? 10 hours to put that work together. Because you end up getting a Social Security Analysis, you get a Medicare analysis, you get three different tax reports, right, we do a tax report on what your projected effective tax rate will be in your retirement years. That’s important to know, we give you an analysis on whether a Roth conversion strategy makes sense to minimize the taxation in the future. We also do a tax efficiency cash flow analysis that tells you how to distribute your money. Where do you take, you know how much social security to take, if you will have a pension, when to take that, when to start distributing money out of your non qualified accounts out of your Roth accounts out of your traditional deferred accounts. That report in itself is utterly amazing for people. We do a retirement stress analysis. And that’s what Bret talked a little bit about, where we look at every possible scenario that you provide the information for you, as a consumer, you’ll give us your information. And we will create the probability of whether or not your assets will last throughout your lifetime. Now, like Bret said, that’s not necessarily critically important for some people. Because you may have you already on Social Security, you may have a strong pension. And just from those two things, you’re meeting your monthly expenses, and you’re living life. Okay. But if you need your assets to supplement all of that, it’s important to find that out. And that’s what that report does. And then the last report we do is a report that takes a look well, Karen talked about looking at your portfolio, and the risk associated to the portfolio, whether you’re taking too much risk or not enough risk, to get that proper rate of return to make sure that that nest egg grows over time, and can distribute money without being depleted. So that’s the opportunity. The preparation for that to begin again, success is really on the consumer, the preparation is getting yourself in a state of mind that you know what this guy who’s talking on the radio this morning is making some sense. Like, I do want to have a glimpse into what the last 10 years of my life is going to be like, I want to know financially that I’ve got peace of mind. You do what you want with your health situation. But again, right second to hell there’s going to be Do I have enough money to do the things I want to do in retirement. So the preparation is number one, getting yourself in the state of mind. And then the second is picking up the telephone, making a phone call to Thrive and saying, hey, I want to come in for one of those complimentary consultations. It’s a two appointment process. Our team here will schedule Both appointments for you at the same time. So one, you know, we get to meet each other and we get to get you know, gather and get all the information. The second is where we’ll present that analysis. And then it’s up to you from that particular point in time. So if you’re interested in that, the best way to proceed, give us a call 215-798-9088. Get yourself on one of our advisors calendars. We’ll be happy to help out.

 

Joe Krause  43:26

I think you answered the question. Maybe you answered the question to your question. Can you see what the last 10 years of your life will look like?

 

David Bezar  43:38

From a financial perspective? 100% Yeah, absolutely.

 

Announcer  43:50

Thanks for listening to Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show from Thrive Financial Services. If you’re like most Americans, you have more questions than you do answer about what to do with your retirement savings. If you have a question about your IRA or your 401k pension or other tax-deferred accounts, if you have a question about reducing taxes, generating income or filing for Social Security, whatever it is, David, Karen, and Bret are here to help and often your questions can be answered in a simple phone call, call 215-798-9088. And so you know no statements made during Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show shall constitute tax legal or accounting advice you should consult your own legal or tax professional on any such matters. information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investment or investment strategies investments involve risk and unless otherwise stated or not. Guaranteed Be sure to first consult with a qualified financial adviser and or tax professional before implementing any strategy discussed here David Bezar, Bret Elam, and Karen Bezar from Thrive Financial Services and Thrive Capital Management are licensed to offer investment advisory services through Thrive Capital Management LLC and SEC-registered investment advisory firm office headquarters located in Fort Washington and offices of convenience used exclusively for client meetings in Exton, Yardley, and Cherry Hill. Roadmap to Retirement, the Radio Show was a paid commercial announcement from JAKIB Media Partners. If you’d like to learn more about the power of the Radio Hour contact Joe Krause at 267-261-3428. Today’s program has been pre-recorded.