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It\’s the second Saturday in the month of May and we start you off on Roadmap to Retirement, the radio show. We begin by dedicating the entire one hour of our show today to all of the moms from around the Delaware Valley that will celebrate Mother\’s Day tomorrow. We also send prayers and support out for Karen Bezar, David, who will not be with us for the show today.

Hey, Joe. Good morning, and thanks for that. Really appreciate it. We are looking forward to tomorrow for a nice Mother\’s Day for everybody and we hope everybody enjoys that. Well, we\’re excited about the show today. We got a lot of information. We got Jim O\’Brien in from Del-Val We\’re going to talk a little bit about auto and homeowner’s insurance.

I\’m going to ask Jim point blank today, I had somebody ask me, can you really save 40% on your auto insurance? Because in one of the commercial spots that runs for Del-Val as part of being a partner with Roadmap To Retirement. That\’s the bold line in the story. When we bring Jim into the conversation, we\’ll ask him that question. Didn\’t mean to cut you off.

That was a good cut off too.

Yes, it was.

So, we do. We\’re so excited to have Jim on the show. It\’s always great because it\’s an important part of a financial strategy, make sure that you have the proper coverage. Especially, for people who have accumulated assets. Not against anybody, but you have some assets, nicer cars, bigger houses, things like that. It really starts to become much more important what type of coverage you have not always just the price issue. But these guys do a wonderful job, because it\’s about value as well as price for them. So, good situation, we look forward to hearing from Jim.

I know Bret\’s going to be talking a little bit about second opinions. We find that to be such an amazing topic. Because, at our workshop, sometimes we do have people come up and say, and I think I covered this last week, \”Hey, I\’d really like to come in and visit with you guys. I see that you have a lot of value, but I don\’t want to upset or offend my financial advisor.\”

I find that to be so interesting. Because I understand loyalty. I think it\’s a wonderful quality to have loyalty. But at the same time, this is somebody that\’s working for you, you\’re not working for them. You want to really make sure at this particular stage in life that that person first of all, should be a fiduciary. If they are, they want to operate in your best interest, so they shouldn\’t have any concerns. They certainly shouldn\’t be at all offended if you go out to get a second opinion on something.

We really encourage people to continue with that path of becoming their own wealth advocate and doing the research. Maybe they hear a new idea or something like that, that they can bring to their financial advisor and assess whether that advisor knows what they\’re talking about, or maybe doesn\’t. It\’s better to find out earlier, versus it being too late. Does that make sense, Joe?

It makes sense to me. Here\’s what I would say, because I live in that world, or I live in that space. If I\’m delivering the goods, if I\’m doing what I profess to do, I want a potential client to get a second opinion. Because after the second opinion, I\’m back in the game. I respect it, appreciate it, and certainly encourage it.

You\’re absolutely speaking our language because we are so comfortable, so confident in what we present as solutions for people. We want them to hear the other stories. Because once they hear the other stories, we\’ll see most times how they pale in comparison. We love it. As a former hockey player, I really love it.

Especially this time of the year.

That\’s it. I just go look like they\’re standing in the corner of the boards, and they\’re just lined up perfectly for me. I think it\’s a good situation.

Let me bring Bret Elam into the conversation. last week, you talked about a scenario from the competition, and you were able to break down some of the differences or some of what the story was versus what the story is.

Yeah. Again, we talk about education advocacy, again fiduciaries, who\’s doing what in my best interest. It\’s just being that steward for not only yourself but your family and just you don\’t know what you don\’t know. Again, part of that second opinion is just identifying \”risks\” that we face out there in retirement. Do we choose to fix them, do we choose to ignore them? It doesn\’t mean the ostrich approach is all right, that they\’re never going to exist. It\’s just uncovering them at the end of the day.

So, Bret, what exactly is on your agenda for today’s discussion

David said, it\’s really talking about the second opinion. We talk about doing our workshops, we talk about it here when we have people come in as part of that Thrive Retirement Roadmap review, and just really going to drive it in again today here on the radio. Just talking about all the different ways where a second opinion really counts and just the different ways of how people have had really great results by simply, you don\’t know what you don\’t know and just seek out more information.

Del-Val insurance. You\’ve heard the name so many times on this program on Saturday mornings and during the week as being a proud partner and being a part of Roadmap To Retirement, the radio show. Jim Muelbronner is with us for today. Jimmy, nice to have you joining us again. It doesn\’t happen as much as we would like, but we appreciate having you in there. I won\’t ask you before the break, but I will ask you that question as the show rolls on, can you really save 40%? But I think the answer is yes, you can.

You can, Krause. I appreciate you all having me here. It\’s always great to be here. Believe it or not, I\’m looking at my notes. I wrote a couple things down to discuss. I have the numbers 20% to 50% written here. So, 50% is greater than 40. So, that\’s a yes to your question. I\’ll describe how that happens later.

All right, we\’ll find out that from Jim Muelbronner from Del-Val insurance, who will be with us as well. David, I\’ll come back to you in a little bit. When you collect all of your thoughts in prep and I know you have something specific that you\’re going to talk about.

Well, I think people want to get clarity on that ultimate question of, do I have enough money to retire the way that I want to retire? The sub question of that is, and will it last my lifetime? I think that\’s a big confirmation that people are looking for. That gives them a sense of certainty, if they can. Our goal is to just tell them the reality, we don\’t try to be diplomatic, we just want to be brutally honest and tell people what the deal is.

What\’s interesting, with very minor tweaks, most times we can give that confirmation. The other area, and this is where we\’re very, very excited about, because of Thrive has recently brought on some additional resources in the tech strategy space. I think we\’ve become very popular and pretty well known that we\’re not just plain old vanilla financial advisors, that we really understand how all the puzzle pieces do fit together.

The second big thing that we hear is about taxation. How do I save on taxes, right? These are RMD’s, these required minimum distributions. We at Thrive have really brought on some wonderful additional resources that I think we will become the preeminent tax planning financial advisory firm in the Delaware Valley.

One workshop scheduled for next week on the 16th of May. That\’ll be at the Wissahickon in Blue Bell Library, which is on West Skippack Pike in Blue Bell. Go to thrivefinancialservices.tyl16lnm-liquidwebsites.com to get registered to attend. I can give everyone one unconditional guarantee. The guarantee is based on what everybody says, David, who leaves the workshop. Who attends and leaves the workshop. They left the workshop more educated than before they walked in the door, which is an amazing thing when you think about and it. It\’s part of the reason why we do this show, why you do this show, why you\’re here, why you\’re part of our partnership, Jim. We want to educate the listening audience so they can make a better decision.

Amen, Krause. You said the venue we\’re going to next week, the 16th, the Wissahickon Library in Blue Bell. Love that place. I\’ll tell you why. Right now, it\’s the four year anniversary from when we started doing our educational workshops here in the greater Delaware Valley. Very first venue we went to, was in the Wissahickon Blue Bell Library. So, four years later and how many workshops, David? We\’re probably counting-

350.

There is a little place in our heart for that venue there, just being the place that our very first workshop was conducted at. Today\’s show, Krause, I want to talk about the importance of second opinions. Again, when we talk about second opinions, it\’s always all about having our partner, Jim here as well because definitely property and casualty insurance or auto homeowners is a big spot of where second opinions definitely play into it.

But something that David and I really have a passion for, and for those listening in the audience have been to our workshops. Typically, you hear David close them up talking about a personal story for him as he\’s gone through the Battle of cancer and has beaten it. I\’ve talked about the story about my son under the age of two went through a brain tumor, got misdiagnosed, and the importance of a second opinion being able to diagnose that.

I\’m sure many people of our listening audience too, can talk about where a second opinion definitely mattered in their life. Now, while we talk about health and health is very important, we always say wealth is shortly there behind it. Your health and wealth are probably the two most important things that we have going for us and all the other things fall into place, if you will.

But when we talk about those no obligation, second opinions Krausey, it\’s an opportunity for people to say, I\’ve already done this, am I doing a good job or not? Then it\’s us being a fiduciary, with full transparency saying, \”Yeah, you look good there. You may be a little weak there.\” Again, it\’s those things, and I just mentioned a little bit ago, it\’s our job to bring them up and identify them. Again, your plan as you’re playing out our plan is your plan.

We say, these are the risks that we\’re going to face in retirement. Is it living too long, is it I\’m going to get sick? Is it one of Us lives too short? Is it going into a long term care facility? Is it, I\’m going to run out of money too early? I don\’t know. Again, any of those things, sound like, and that could be people that are listening to the show today. All those things are possible. But again, it\’s just getting that a second opinion because I believe I have my plan here. But again, it\’s always been needing to be adaptable, because life can sometimes change as well.

But when we identify those risks Krausey, again it gives people that opportunity to say, \”You know what, I understand it\’s there. I\’m going to ignore it. I can fix it.\” Sometimes people say, \”Hey, Thrive, the Thrive army, can you guys help me fix this issue or I may end up fixing on your own.\” But the worst thing you can do is take that ostrich approach and think everything is great and indeed something is not, and where it sits, it\’s sitting with a professional, sitting with a fiduciary to identify what\’s out there. Especially complimentary, again, no obligation, second opinion

Yeah. I think David was spot on with his statement about people looking for validation or looking for the answer to the question, will I have enough? Will I be able to get through? Will my retirement last? With each passing day, it seems that that question is challenged by a news story or it\’s challenged by a thought that supports us living longer. Whatever the case may be, it\’s out there, it\’s an answer that you need to work to get, for sure.

That\’s it. You said it right there. There are so many times people that were meeting in these workshops, and we\’ll start giving some examples. Again, we had a couple just come in this past week, 72 and 74 years old. Both people already collecting social security. Again, we talk about the importance of second opinions. Typically, if somebody coming in like that already collecting, \”There\’s nothing I should do.\” But no, it\’s the importance of us understanding the numbers that somebody had.

Well, what we had found out when we sat with that couple was that one spouse was actually entitled to a benefit, $300 more than what they were receiving five years ago. Now, unfortunately, you can\’t go back five years in time. But again, conventional wisdom says, I\’ve been on Social Security forever, the Social Security system would have gotten it, and they definitely pay me everything that I should be getting.

I\’m telling you flat out that everybody can hear us, that\’s not right. Again, everybody tries their best to do the best, but I can promise you, they\’re not making sure that you\’re getting the absolute best benefit that you\’re entitled to, unless you ask, and then it\’s validating, making sure that what the answer you got was absolutely correct as well. That\’s a big deal. We start talking about $300 a month, there\’s a lot of things that you can do with an extra $300 a month. That\’s an example of again, going through, am I getting every benefit?

Is that $300 deficiency, an example of the individual respectfully not knowing?

That\’s it. That\’s what it always is, is people coming in here saying, \”Hey, I\’ve done my best. Everything I\’ve done to the best of my ability to date and the guidance and the advice that I\’ve gotten.” Now I\’m coming in, and that\’s the second opinion, no obligation. Did I do it right? We start asking them some questions like, \”Why are you asking all these questions?\” Because we\’re trying to back into whether you getting the right benefit that you have? It\’s the importance that we don\’t just ask questions to ask questions. We have plenty of time that we can do other things.

But if you\’re coming in with your own time, and we\’re spending our own time on no obligation, second opinion, we want to make sure everyone\’s getting the most value of it at the end of the day. That\’s one way of just looking at socials, $300 a month, $3600 a year, that\’s a big deal money coming in. We talked about when Jim gets in the next segment of the importance of people doing second opinions just related to homeowners, and property insurance.

Again, it\’s like squeezing a balloon. Do I want less benefits or it could be cheaper or I want to make sure that I\’m protected. So many times people come in through our Thrive Retirement Roadmap, you\’ve got all these investment properties. Someone slips there, you\’re held out there. Do you have the right coverage? Or it\’s like way, your way over covered over here. Does it make sense, can we save money? That\’s why we partner with great companies like Del-Val because we\’re not the experts. We know a lot; David, Karen, and the rest of the army, here at Thrive.

It\’s important on us, knowing a lot, and then when there\’s areas that are outside our expertise as we bring in people like Jim. We meet a lot of people during the workshop they come in and say, \”Bret, this is called taxes and retirement. I\’m only 59 years old. I got five or six years’ time left in retirement. I\’m not coming in.\” Whoa. We love you. The chance that we get an opportunity to speak five or six years before you hang up the cleats is a lot better than two months before you hang up the cleats. People never plan to fail, they fail to plan.

We love and we invite all those people to come into the office as well as part of that complimentary Thrive Retirement Roadmap. Because you have the time to make changes if we\’re not on the right track Krausey.

I want to just use the example you just used. For the last five years, the individual was missing out on $300 a month.

$18,000, five years, Krausey.

That\’s a lot of money. But they can\’t get back, just because they didn\’t know.

Just doing it right. Again, so many times you meet with people in our world, and all they ever want to talk to you about are investments. It\’s important, but it needs to fit hand in hand with everything else that\’s out there.

We meet a lot of people taxes. A lot of our listening audience just wrapped up your first year of taxes 2018. Statistics were, only 6% of people are now itemizing because of all the changes. We\’ve been talking about that. With those you\’re like, \”Bret, I\’m in the standard deduction now. There\’s nothing I can do.\” Yeah, it\’s important that we still see that full tax return. Because even if you\’re showing last year, if both of you are over the age of 65, your standard deduction was $26,600. That doesn\’t mean if you gave money to a nonprofit or a church or one of those organizations, \”Well, Bret, I\’m now way above it. I can\’t write that off anymore.\” Well, yes, you can. That\’s the second opinion.

We dive deep. We ask you questions during that Thrive Retirement Roadmap Review, because everyone\’s circumstances are different. Before it was very easy to identify what somebody was giving money to a nonprofit. Here, especially when we get people into retirement. \”Well, Bret, are you still giving money?\” \”Yeah, I just I\’m not writing off anywhere.\” There\’s a better way to do it. Can I still get that right off. It\’s one of the biggest things that David and I spoke about and again, the rest of the team here at Thrive, get that second opinion as it relates to taxes.

Again, David shared with you, how it\’s going to go a little bit deeper into the tax conversation that we\’re excited about. Again, our passion is there, again and completely always putting those puzzle pieces together. Things like legacy, estate planning, these are all things that we do as second opinion on why, no obligation. You\’re spending money to get these things all put into place. Is it nice to get another professional set of eyes to be put on it?

To me, one of the most critical things, and David\’s going to talk about it in the last segment, is get a second opinion on that income/distribution strategy, or how the heck am I not getting a paycheck anymore in retirement than I can replicate that same thing? That\’s such a big deal and something that people don\’t have. Sometimes people need that first opinion because they don\’t even get that written plan as it relates to that income plan as well.

We can\’t stress the importance. I\’ve talked about kicking off the segment on the health side of it, but my gosh, that wealth side of it is just as important.

I mentioned when this segment started the workshop on the 16th of May, if you don\’t have the ability to make that workshop, go to thrivefinancialservices.tyl16lnm-liquidwebsites.com, and get on the calendar, Bret, for an upcoming workshop.

It\’s no obligation. Again, you don\’t know what you don\’t know. And again, we\’re all trying to grow as human beings. Just a little bit more education, whether it\’s the workshop, hearing us here on the radio or coming into one of the sessions. Again, it\’s what we love to do, and I hope you hear it in the passion that we have.

It\’s real and it is true

We\’re starting to zero in on what Memorial Day weekend will look like. For those of you who are planning to go down to the Jersey Shore, we certainly hope you\’ll take Roadmap to Retirement with you.

David, before I bring Jim into the conversation, I want you to give me for the audience to hear it, the quote on second opinion.

You can\’t get a second opinion from the same person who gave you the first one.

Good stuff. You didn\’t know I was going to ask you that.

I was completely not prepared.

It rolled right off your tongue. Well done, good stuff. I think that\’s kind of a theme for today. With that, we\’ll transition into a longtime partner of the show. Del-Val Insurance. One of the managing partners, Jim Muelbronner is with us, and joins us. Jim, we welcome you in to the conversation. You\’ve been savvy enough, or you\’ve been around us long enough to know that this is all about trying to be smarter about the decisions that you make. Accumulate dollars in your buckets and then understand where to go with those buckets of money. That\’s why you\’re one of the partners. You have an interesting scenario, in that you can help every single listener on this radio station. I think that\’s pretty powerful.

I believe I can, Krausey, they just have to all call.

That\’s all, we\’ll get the number after. But let\’s talk about it. 40%, that\’s a lot. That\’s a big deal. You\’ll see a national insurance company say, hey, I can save you $300, I can save you $400. I don\’t know what that means in terms of percentage, but I know what you do, and I\’ll start right there.

Real simply, the savings can be we have people come paying $6,000 premiums for their auto homeowners umbrella policies, and they walk out of our office paying $3,500. So I think that\’s close to 40%, right, Krausey? It\’s certainly doable and it happens every week with plenty of examples.

Bret, one of the things you were talking about that I felt the need to touch on is second opinions. In my business, man is it competitive. All you have to do is listen to the radio, Krausey, watch TV, watch your football game. I bet you half the commercials you hear are insurance, get quotes, get quotes, get quotes. I work on the assumption that clients already have a second opinion, or are going to get a second opinion when they call me.

Here\’s one thing, if you don\’t mind me weighing in on that. Here\’s one thing I don\’t like about those offers. I\’m not dealing with anybody. I\’m connecting with the individual. All I\’m doing is inputting information online into a website, and I\’m going to get a quote automatically, it\’s going to generate. I don\’t even know if what I\’m putting in there is the right information.

Well, that\’s one of the values of dealing with an independent agent, especially but any person in general is that you\’re getting human eyes looking at your policies, deciding whether you need to adjust coverages, whether you have adequate coverages and finding you great coverages at a better price than you\’re currently paying. That\’s the benefit that we as humans have over a computer, I guess is the way I would say.

Well, and when you\’re looking at should I have limited tort or full tort, for example?

You need to know the differences between the two. Correct. One of the things that that struck me when Bret and David were talking earlier is that, yes, we are in different businesses, you guys are in the financial business. I\’m in the insurance business, closely related, but different businesses. One of the big things that we both bring to the table, however, is that we\’re not employees. For instance, you\’re not an employee of a bank. You\’re not an employee of a mutual fund. I\’m not an employee of an industry insurance company. We\’re independent agents, you\’re independent financial planners. By nature, you\’re not beholden to any one company.

When somebody goes to you or somebody comes to me, I shop you with all the companies I represent. Can you imagine everybody that came to you for advice, David, you said, \”We\’re going to put you in this mutual fund.\” If you put everybody in the same mutual fund or even the same family of funds, that wouldn\’t be unbiased advice you\’re giving that person. You\’re selling that fund because that\’s the only one you represent. A lot of times when you go to a bank or you go directly to an insurance company, all you\’re going to get is that insurance company\’s choice. You get one choice. We represent 15 to 20 different companies depending on the line of business and we\’re going to give you the best price and the best coverages for your particular situation.

Yeah, that\’s the ideal situation. You don\’t want somebody that has an ulterior motive by offering what they\’re told to offer by the company that they work for. We\’re fiercely independent as well as you are. That way, we don\’t look at the name of the company, we do validate it. We want to make sure it\’s a top quality company, it\’s well capitalized and all of that. But if they got the best performance, if they\’ve got the best pricing, that\’s what we want for our clients.

That\’s right. I\’ve been both sides. I was a captive agent, my partner and I for 20 years. And then 15 years ago, we went independent, because we realized that\’s going to be the most value to our clients. We\’re giving them choices, we have options. No one insurance company is the best for every situation or every person. It\’s just, it can\’t be, and it\’s not.

Jim, what are some of the samples, some of the things that you\’ve seen maybe over the past couple of weeks?

Fortunately, with our relationship with you guys and being on your show, we\’ve got a lot of calls and emails from people. I think by our count, we have an 80% success rate.

Of all the people that call in, 80% become clients

They\’re becoming clients because of the rates and the services we offer. I would venture to say that the other 20% it\’s generally because of a driving record issue or extensive claims or something like that, where they kind of have to stay where they\’re at. But if you\’re a good client with a fairly decent clean record, we\’re going to write 80% of those with the companies we represent.

Transfer that into Major League Baseball terms.

That\’s comes to 40%, Krause.

It\’s a $40 million career.

That\’s a big contract a year.

What I\’m trying to do here today is get in front of people and have them reach out to me so that I can help them. Krausey, here\’s your 40%, the 80% that we do, the savings are generally 20% to 50%. If you\’re paying a decent sized premium, if you have kids driving, you\’re in a nice house, you have some kids driving four cars, something like that. That translates into thousands of dollars you are saving just with a simple phone call or a visit to our website at devigi.com.

Let\’s do the math. If there\’s 10,000 people listening to this segment of the show right now, 8,000 individuals, eight of the 10,000 people you can help with their insurance right now. It doesn\’t mean that they need to change their insurance. But the whole theme of Second Opinion, get out your declaration page, call Del-Val Insurance and check in balance what you\’re paying.

Now, if you\’re saving $2500 and you\’re on the doorstep of retirement or you\’re on the road to retirement, that is significant, Jim.

It certainly is. You remember, we\’re giving as good or better of a product. All the companies we represent, you would have heard of. They\’re all top A rated, and we\’re given the same coverage. We\’re going to review your coverage which is extremely important. Because a lot of people out there driving around haven\’t had their insurances looked at for coverages. There\’s a lot of coverage changes, especially on the homeowner side of things. There\’s a lot of additional coverages now, service line coverage, water backup coverages that weren\’t available on policies years ago.

Those kind of things need to be reviewed. At the same time you get a review, you can get a huge savings.

Let me hop in here real quick because I\’m a client of Del-Val. I have a 22 year old daughter, about to be 23 years old. When can she come off my policy?

She can come off anytime, David. Typically, we like to wait, I think it makes sense financially because when she goes to get her own rates, there\’s going to be credit as an issue. You want to make sure they establish credit.

She has established credit. That was one of the things we obviously gave her some plans on.

I know your daughter went to college. Usually, a time you would look at that as when she graduates college, she\’s established some credit, and especially if she\’s ready to move out into an apartment on her own would be the time to spin her off your policy.

We\’re going to consider that. My youngest is off to college in August. She\’s going to Florida, we live in Pennsylvania. So what would we do with her coverage? How do we modify that?

She\’s in Florida.

She\’s going to live in Florida.

We\’re not licensed to Florida. But I would put her in touch with a call.

No, she can stay on our policy, but she didn\’t have to have full coverage at that point, right?

With our clients or clients, we tell them just wait till they\’re established wherever they\’re at. If they\’re leaving, find a job somewhere, they just graduated college and they want to stay where they\’re at in college and try and find a job there. They\’re fine on your policy for a finite period of time.

Can they be done in some reduced coverage?

If she has a car down there?

She\’s not going to have a car.

Okay. If she\’s not a resident, if she\’s got a legal resident down there, then you can remove her from your policy.

Okay. Jim, those are just examples. That\’s a second opinion right there.

Right there, absolutely.

That\’s what I just wanted to show. That\’s actual questions that we\’re going to have for Jim and Fran is, all these changes are happening for us. I got to imagine doing that is going to put some savings back in Karen\’s pocket and my pocket, or Karen\’s pocket, at least.

And also, how many people that we do business with have children in college.

By just letting your agent know that that child is away. It\’s a whole different rating than if they\’re living in your house.

Special thanks to Jim Muelbronner for joining us for the full hour of today. Del-Val Insurance has up to now 50% dvigi.com. As David mentioned with Jim in terms of their dialogue, right before we went into our last commercial break, those scenarios, those real life examples of getting a second opinion hold true with insurance certainly hold true with the Roadmap To Retirement as well. Go ahead, Jim.

If you do reach out to us through the website or through the telephone, please remember to mention that you heard us on Radio 1210. We have a little giveaway pool that we do.

Good. I like that.

Please mention that.

I hope our audience appreciates the time that we put in. Because we want to put out a great product. We really want to make sure that our listeners are walking away after the hour with a lot of value. That\’s something we always ask in our workshops. I go out for about 15 minutes in our workshop and just tell people, the purpose of our workshop, what\’s going on, the agenda, a little insight to the topics we\’re going to be discussing.

Then Bret goes on for about 45 minutes. It\’s really some of the nuts and bolts of tax planning and Social Security planning and all of that. Then I come up after Bret. The first thing I say is, how many of you thought it was worthwhile to come out tonight? What\’s a really good feeling for the two of us is that 99% of the hands go up and say it was worth getting in my car, coming over to a public library, sitting here for a period of time. I\’m walking out with more than I came in with. I think it\’s a goal of the show as well, and certainly the second opinions. We really want people walking out, either clearing up their uncertainty or confirming their certainty. I think that\’s important.

I really encourage our listening audience to get to our website at thrivefinancialservices.tyl16lnm-liquidwebsites.com, because it\’s not one of those websites that talks all about us. I visit a lot of different websites out there. One of the first things you see on typical websites is everything about the owners of the company. We did this and we did that, and we\’re this good, and we\’re that. We just try to put a lot of good quality content. Because we think, a more educated client, and that doesn\’t mean they\’re completely financially educated when they come to us. But if we can prep them, if we can get them up to speed on the topics, that conversation we\’re going to have, it really makes for a much more productive situation when we\’re sitting face to face. Because people then come in with the right questions, they know what questions to even ask. That\’s a really important aspect as well, because sometimes we don\’t even know what we don\’t know.

We want to instigate people to go to our website and see that content that\’s on there, Joe. I think that\’ll be really helpful for people.

Yeah. I think the individuals will feel better about asking the questions. They\’ll feel more comfortable, even if they don\’t have the answer, that\’s okay. But they\’ll feel more comfortable about engaging in a conversation.

It\’s the biggest frustration that I\’ve had for 30 years because this is what I do every single day. Literally, when I say every single day, that\’s seven days a week, 365 days a year for the past 30 years. I am my business. I love it. I always have, I have tons of passion for it. My personal reward is knowing that I had some impact on somebody financially that when they leave me, they leave me in a better situation. That\’s a big goal. That\’s maybe validation, maybe I got to see a therapist over that, I\’m not really sure. But you get what I\’m saying.

By visiting the website, I think that\’s going to have a lot of value for people. The other thing that I really want to encourage people to do, in addition to visiting the website is to email us, or text message us. Next week, we\’ll put out a text number that right during our live shows, if people want to give us a text, we\’ll be able to respond to some questions. No question is stupid. Sometimes by asking that question that you may think is stupid, you may now just have solved a couple thousand people\’s questions that were in their mind that were too afraid to ask.

We want to start getting some dialogue going back and forth. Whether it\’s during the show or pre-show that we can cover some of these topics on the radio. We think it\’ll be good. We try to always come up with content that we think is relevant, that\’s current, that we think will have good impact. But if there\’s other stuff that people in our audience, that Thrive army want to hear, let us know about it.

Absolutely.

You email us at [email protected]. That\’s our general mailbox for the show. Just jot down some questions. You don\’t even have to tell us who you are. Just send us an email, we will respond on the show, answer that question live for you. Like I said, we\’ll get a text message. We\’re working with a company right now to figure out how we can do that from a logistical standpoint. But we\’ll get that accomplished.

What I wanted to cover just quickly, Joe is the idea, for those people who may not end up coming out and seeing us. Whether it\’s through the workshop or through one of the consultations, just because you don\’t come out to see us, doesn\’t mean we don\’t want you to get the value of what we know. I want to talk a little bit about how to create a retirement income plan.

Now, what\’s unique about that previous statement I just made is that most people think, I want to put together a retirement plan. The Harvard Business Review actually did an article, it was like a 10 or 12 page article about the concept of retirement income planning, big difference than just retirement planning. When people think about retirement planning, what they typically default to is, what\’s my net worth? People judge their retirement plan on how much money they have saved, what\’s my net worth? That\’s a huge mistake. Because what you should really be focusing on is what is my guaranteed monthly income for the rest of my life and my wife\’s life or my husband\’s life, whatever the situation may be. It\’s a big difference, Joe.

You think you can repeat that? That\’s an amazing statement.

Probably not because it\’s too early in the morning, but I will certainly try. A lot of people base whether its success or whatever, on a retirement plan being what their net worth is. Just this number, just this number. The more millions, the better. But what\’s interesting, and this is what the Harvard Business said is, that\’s all wrong way of thinking. Your way of thinking should be how much guaranteed monthly income do I have for the rest of my life and my partner\’s life? Because that number is a great number. But like we\’ve seen recently, the volatility in the market, like on Monday of this past week, the market took a huge dip real quickly off in the morning, because President Trump came out and said that he\’s going to continue the trade war and maybe put more sanctions on China and so on and so forth.

Now, things always play out, but again, if we\’re starting to see some fundamental cracks in the financial system, and we go back to a 2008-2009 situation, probably most of our audience were still working during that period of time. But if that happened while you were retired, you may have $3 million or $4 million sitting soft away, that now becomes $2 million. All of a sudden, if you based your withdraws off of 4 million, and now it\’s 2 million, there\’s got to be some consequence to that, right? Either we\’re going to have to revision our spending habits, or we\’re just going to flat out run out of money.

A retirement income plan is very different than a retirement plan. Just like anything, in my opinion, that you\’re going to try to tackle is you should have it written out. I ask that question quite frequently at our workshops, how many of you sitting in our audience tonight have a written retirement income plan? Just the opposite of what most people do raise their hands on a lot of the questions, nobody raises their hand. Some people are going to ask, what is that?

As part of the Thrive Retirement Roadmap Review, which is complimentary, we provide a written retirement income plan. It\’s that map. It\’s literally what do I do year one, where do I take my money from? What bucket? I have four buckets of money? I have a cash bucket, I have an equity bucket, I have a bond bucket, and I have a non-correlated asset bucket. Where do I take that money from? Because I want to base that decision on longevity of the money and tax efficiency of the money. Because if I just randomly do it like 99.9% of the people do, there\’s going to be some consequence to that. I may run out of money too early, I may pay too much in taxes. Those are two things we don\’t want to certainly have happened.

Let me put this in context for the listening audience off of Bret\’s example, or reference to four-year anniversary of doing workshops. I did a quick calculation. Approximately 26,000 people have come through those workshops all answering, they don\’t have a retirement plan. Pretty amazing, staggering number.

A staggering number.

At one side of that, we\’re so excited and proud that we\’ve been able to at least instigate. People can\’t walk out now and say, \”I don\’t know.\” We\’ve divulged it all. Whether they take action or not is their responsibility, but 26,000 and we\’re just getting warmed up, Joe. Next week, I\’ll hopefully be able to get to this and talk about a list of things that you actually have to do to get that retirement income plan.

Very well said David, excellent topic this week. That will do it for us today. Special thanks to David, Bret, and Jim. Unfortunately, Karen could not be with us this week, but we hope to have her back on the discussion next week!