E30: The Wisest Investment with Robin Taub

This podcast is brought to you by Gensler Wealth. The information discussed today is meant to be general in nature and not tailored to your specific investing circumstances. This means that you should talk to your regular Gensler wealth advisor or your own advisor before acting on any information we discuss today. Nothing in this podcast is intended to be a solicitation and past performance does not guarantee future returns. November is Financial Literacy Month, so today we are going back to school. Sorry, I mean yay. Today on the Unlimited podcast we speak with Robin Tobe, keynote speaker and best selling author about her award winning book, the Wisest teaching your kids to be responsible, independent and money smart for life. Let's go. Well, welcome everyone to the latest episode of the Unlimited podcast. You may or may not know we're recording this in November, and you may or may not know that November is Financial Literacy Month. So I thought it would be a wonderful idea to have a podcast focused on financial literacy and even better focused on how you can educate your children to be smart financially and fiscally responsible people. So I'm really excited today to have as our guest, Robin to. Robin is a Chartered Professional accountant. They call that a cpa. She's a keynote speaker, a bestselling author, and her latest award winning book, the Wisest Investment teaching your kids to be responsible, independent and money Smart for life gives parents the information, strategies and inspiration they need to teach their kids about money. Robin's full bio, as usual, will be in the show notes. I'll tell you just a little bit more about Robin. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce with high distinction from the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. She is also passionate about improving opportunities for women CPAs to advance into positions of leadership. From 2008 until 2017, she was a member and then chair of the Chartered Professional Accountants of Canada's Women's Leadership Council. And Robin puts her money where her mouth is and has two mostly smart money smart young adults, a son and a daughter. Or that those are her words. Mostly smart. I love this. Robin describes herself as the Google Translate for personal finance. So we have the benefit of having the full force of Google here with Robin. So Robin, thank you very, very much for joining. Looking forward to speaking with you.

Thanks for having me. Brian.

Amazing. So I gave a little bit of an intro, but I always find that our guests tend to tell us a lot more and in a lot more fun way. Maybe that didn't sound like English, but that's okay. So do you want to just before we dive into the core topic here, which is teaching children how to be, you know, financially smart. I guess in a nutshell. Can you tell us a little bit about how you got to this point that you and I are talking here and you have a fantastic book out which I've read and I enjoyed a lot. So maybe give us your journey and then we'll dive into the important stuff for our listeners for sure.

So as you said in the intro, I am an accountant by training, but I like to think that I'm not your typical accountant. You know, accountants have a bit of a bad rep for being boring or dry. And I don't think I'm like that. But I did start out in a very traditional career path. I worked at KPMG and then I worked at a mid sized firm that merged with Ernst and Young and I was in tax. And then I actually left public accounting and went to work for one of the clients of the firm doing real estate syndication. So limited partnerships. That was interesting. I, I, I like real estate as an investment and just it was an interesting field to be in and I learned a lot and, and then it was a very small under resourced firm and I like to joke around that I had like horrible bosses like in that movie and it wasn't sustainable. So I bumped into a friend that I had gone to high school with who was working at Citibank Canada in derivatives marketing. And he encouraged me to come in for an interview. And I did. And to my great surprise, I got the job. Cause it was a really difficult interview process and I worked on the trading floor. I wasn't a trader, but I was a marketer. So we interfaced with the traders and our clients essentially. And the team I worked in was focused on financial institutions. And I met amazing people. I'm still really good friends with some people that, you know, I worked there with. And it was just such a different environment. Like people that have seen movies like Margin Call or you know, those Wall street kind of movies. Too big to fail. It really does look like that. So that was really cool. And then while I was working there, I had my kids who are now 26 and 28, but it was just very difficult to balance with some other things that were going on in my life at the time. So I took a leave of absence. But I didn't end up going back. And when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do after, I guess it was around the 2008 financial crisis. And there was this focus everywhere but in Canada as well on financial literacy and financial capability and Thinking that it was critical to Canadian economic growth and prosperity. There was a task force in Canada, so I started doing some work in that area. Started off with the Ontario Securities Commission. I started doing some writing for their website and it just kind of went. Went from there. So that's how I. I felt like it was a good use of my background and my financial experience, but also my education and I had credibility as a cpa, so.

Right.

Yeah, that's kind of how it happened.

And then event. But now and then we got to the point where you've got this book out that, you know, has gotten accolades. And I think, I think you mentioned the. What's the gentleman's name wrote the wealthy barber? Chilton.

Yeah, David Chilton.

David Chilton has made comments about the book. So how. So. So how did you go from starting to do a little bit of work on financial literacy to, you know, quote unquote, wrote the book on financial literacy?

Yeah, exactly. So as you mentioned in the intro, I was volunteering on this council for CPA Canada on Women's Leadership. And at the same time, they had done some research that came out of the financial crisis that found that 78% of parents had tried to teach their kids about money, but two thirds said that they hadn't been particularly successful at it, and more than half didn't know what information they needed. So CPA Canada wanted to create a resource for parents, and it was their first consumer publication. Like, they created a lot of guides for accountants, but never anything for Canadians. And they knew me through my work on that committee, and they knew I had kids and they just were like, would you be interested in writing this book? And I was like, well, it wasn't on my bucket list. I actually never was like, oh, I have to write a book. But I was like, I actually, yeah, I think I. I could do this because it's unusually. I'm good with numbers, obviously, I'm an accountant, but I'm also a good writer. I'm good with word. So not a lot. Not a lot of people. Apparently. I've had like, I've done those types of personality tests and stuff, and it's a very unusual combination. So, yeah, so that's how it happened. They commissioned me to write the first version of this book, which was called a Parents Guide to Raising Money. Smart Kids. And then fast forward many years, I went my separate ways from them and I decided to update the book after Covid. When, When Covid hit, I was like, okay, this is a financial wake up call for a Lot of families and the world has changed a lot, and it's time to do an update. So I changed the title to the Wisest Investment. That is actually David Chilton's idea. He. He gave me the. The idea for the title.

Yeah, yeah.

And I came to him because he created a really good course for people that want to write nonfiction books and market them. And I took the course and used a lot of. I used as a blueprint for writing the book, to be honest. And then he was kind enough to give me an endorsement. And he does call it a treasure chest of great ideas presented in short, punchy chapters.

Don't give him too much credit here because pretty soon he's going to come and ask for some royalties on this. Uh, so you gotta. You gotta be really.

He's been very supportive, as has his son Scott. So, yeah, no, he's great, Great guy.

And we want to understand and talk about some of the key concepts in your book. But at. At the highest level, maybe because people might say, okay, well, I'm just gonna. It's interesting topic, but I'm, I'm. I got other things to do. I'm gonna turn off the podcast now. So. No, what I want to understand at the highest level, then we'll go deep in is like, what is the risk to parents of not teaching their children about good financial management? This is, this is the reason why everyone wants to stick around and listen to the rest of this podcast, which is going to be amazing. So, so what, What's. What's the risk of not doing this?

The risk to parents, and I'm talking about regular Canadians out there, is that most of them can't afford to support their adult children financially. And if you don't give your kids this basic life skill to be able to manage their money and make sound financial decisions throughout life, which is really the definition of financial literacy, having the knowledge, skills, and confidence to make responsible financial decisions throughout your life, then it could come back to haunt you, because as I said, most can't afford to support their adult kids, or if they do, research shows that they do it at their own expense, like it could jeopardize their own financial futures.

Right?

And with wealthier Canadians, and I know those are some of the people that you work with, you know, there's other concerns. The consequences are if their kids aren't ready and prepared to. To be good inheritors, they're not financially mature, uh, if they're not going to be good stewards of wealth. I think that concerns the wealth creators or the wealth preservers, you know, that they want to make sure that their kids are going to be good stewards. So that's from the parents perspective and from the kids perspective. Um, as I said it, if you don't teach them, they're going to be lacking a basic life skill. You just need to know this stuff. You could start to form bad habits early that become hard to break as you get older. And thirdly, if you don't have a good handle on your finances, it can cause a lot of stress and it can even lead to more serious physical and mental health issues.

Okay, so this is serious stuff and it's important stuff. And I, and, and I agree with you because we, you know, part of this podcast is trying to educate folks. We've done 101 sessions on bonds and we've talked about other type real estate and other types of investing. Like, these are things that I think everyone needs to know. And of course, we're here for our clients, for those who, who, who need it. So let's dive into maybe some of the key concepts in the book. And what I always love is, is lists, you know, like what are the, you know, five things of this or 11 things of that. And I'm using specific numbers because I know you have a 5 and I know you have an 11. Maybe you could break us down. You know, how you walk through teaching folks about.

Yes.

Or, or what are the, what are the core concepts you. You impart in your various key lists there?

Yeah. So I created this framework and I ref. So basically any topic that you would teach your kids or talk to your kids about, money would fall under what I call the five pillars of money. One of these five pillars?

Yeah.

So those five pillars are earn, save, spend, share and invest. And the five pillars never change. But as your kids grow up and get older, the specific topics and examples under each of the five do. So the framework is the five pillars. And then I've broken it up into four different age groups. So young kids, 5 to 8, preteens 9 to 12, teenagers 13 to 17, and emerging adults 18 and over. So you can think of it as like a five by four matrix. And anything that you'd want to discuss with your kids has to be age appropriate. So it would be, you know, what is a topic under one of those five pillars of earn, save, spend, share and invest for that specific age group that my child is at right now. And that's how the book is written. So the first chapter is really for parents and it explains what we Talked about just now why teaching your kids about money is the wisest investment. It gets into financial literacy in school. School. But then it also helps parents get their own financial house in order so they could lead by example. And then each of the subsequent four chapters, there's only five in total, is for a specific age group and again is structured each these chapters structured the same under the five pillars. And it's really practical. You've read it, you know, Brian, like family discussions, things to do. Just really like very actionable stuff for any parent to be able to pick it up. Just figure out, you know, what the issue is that they want to discuss or what's come up in the family and be able to know what to say.

So yeah, no, great. And it's laid out quite well. So maybe just to give folks a sense of what you mean and you don't have to go through every single age group. But can we pick one of these five pillars, whatever you think would be the best and say, well, if it was for, you know, a smaller child, I guess you would teach it by doing X and it as they progress it, this is how it progresses, correct?

Sure. So like, let's just start with earn, because if you don't earn anything, then you really don't have the other choices of saving, spending, sharing or investing.

Right.

So, so even young kids earn because they get money from the tooth fairy or for birthdays and holidays. And then as I said, they have to make choices about what to do with it. So I think with in the young kids chapter, I talk about having a, a piggy bank because again, even in this digital world with young kids, it really starts with cash. And I explained bills and coins and how to play counting games and stuff like that. When we move on to pre teens, we're talking about allowance and we're talking about odd jobs that they be old enough to do or qualified for. Like babysitting is best example, being a camp counselor, referee for sports, so earning that way. And then again they're old enough to open a youth account, so that's really under saving. But you know, you can see how things change as your kids get older. They don't have a payment. Yep, for teenagers, that's the age where many teenagers get their first real job. And some parents still give an allowance, but others don't. So again we get into like how, you know, how should an allowance be used in your family? Is it a money management tool? Is it payment for chores? Is it an above a hybrid and their first real job? And Their first real paycheck. Because a lot of teens do work. You know, they work retail. You see them around, especially in the last years with COVID A lot of teenagers were doing jobs that previously would have been hard for them to get, but there was so much desperation. And then the last age group would be emerging adults. So mostly they're pursuing post secondary, but they're probably working summers or even during the school year to help pay for university. And some of them may be doing co op terms at university as well. So just we talk a little bit, a little bit more about filing a tax return and taking advantage of tax breaks for, for students.

Right. So I want to go. I have a whole host of things to go through. But you mentioned the A word which is allowance. We pause there for a second and. And I think a lot of, a lot of folks are trying to figure out, do we do an allowance for the kids? If we do, how much do they have to work for it? Do they get it? Regardless, would be curious to get your thoughts as the expert here.

It is the most commonly asked question I get, I would say, is, is allowance. And I think the reason is that some people want to tie the allowance to chores, to chores around the house because they want their kids to understand that money doesn't come for free and you have to earn money. Whereas in other families, they, they just believe that an allowance should be given so that kids have the opportunity to manage money and make mistakes when the stakes are low and make choices and live with the consequences. And we can talk about that a bit more. And they feel that the chore should be done out of a sense of family responsibility and everyone should be pulling their weight. You know, again, it doesn't have to be one extreme or the other. It can be a combination. It can be a hybrid, a basic allowance. So they have the experience managing money. And then if they want to earn more, they can do extra chores around the house that you would maybe have to pay someone else to do, you know, but still contributing to the household. Because I just think that in a family everyone has to pull their weight and pitch in. And even as your kids get older and they no longer live with you, you want them to come back and help you sometimes. So, you know, you don't want them to think that like everything comes with a price either. So you have to do what's in line with your values and also your means when it comes to an allowance.

Okay, so thanks for that. So that's the. The do you or do you not you know, do an allowance. Then how do you figure out what the amount of the allowance is?

When your kids are little young kids, you can probably use a rule of thumb like a dollar per year of age per week or 50 cents. So your 7 year old would get, let's say $7 a week. But once they get to be preteens and they're a little more independent and they're out in the world, it has to be based on a simple budget that you put together. Like who's paying for what? Mostly you're paying at that stage. And what's it going to cover? You know, are they going out with their friends, how often? You know, just those kinds of things. Needs versus wants. And then once they become teenagers, you might want to shift more responsibility to them with their budget and we'll talk about that to make them feel more accountable over their spending. Like it's, they're spending their own money. So again, a more, a little more comprehensive budget that covers more things. And maybe you only give them their allowance monthly. So they have to learn how to manage re, you know, resources over time.

Right. You know, this, this. Not to digress, but this conversation reminds me, I don't know if you're allowed to mention this TV show anymore at all, but the Cosby Show, I don't know.

Oh, I know, it's.

Do you remember this one where Theo says he wants to sort of handle his own money and whatever, and the father, which we won't mention his name because he's done some terrible things, basically walks through with Theo. Okay, so you start with this amount of money, you know, are you gonna, you know, how you gonna eat? Are you gonna go out? Says, are you gonna get, get clothes? He says, oh yeah, I gotta look fine. So he takes some extra money and.

At the end of the day, or real money, I forget.

Yeah, at the end of the day, I think Theo has like two bucks left. He's like, see, everything's good, dad. He goes, you gotta have a girlfriend. Oh yeah, gone. Has no money left.

Anyway, I used to that clip in like speeches that I did a long time ago. And then like you said, I was like, I don't think I can show this anymore because he's canceled. But it was so perfect and it was so funny.

So anyways, hopefully people don't mind us talking about that. Okay, so got the five pillars of money. We talked about allowance a little bit, maybe talk about. You have this concept of 11 healthy habits of financial management. And 11 sounds like a lot. And you Know, you might be talking for 20 minutes straight here, so. But in maybe a late fashion. What are your 11 healthy habits of financial. Everyone should listen up here closely.

Yeah. So again, these are really for parents so they can get their own financial house in order and lead by example and model, be good financial role models for their kids.

I guess you sort of can't teach your children how to be great with money, finances, etc. If you're not, you know, walking the. Walk the talk, as they say.

Yeah, walking the talk.

Walking the talk. Walking the talk.

Yeah, exactly. And because kids, especially teenagers, they're going to call you out on it if they think you're being a hypocrite. And. But that's again, one of the reasons parents don't talk about it or shy away from it because they're afraid they're going to be called out on their mistakes. But no one's perfect. You know, it's okay to make mistakes and to, to learn from them and share those with your kids. So don't let that stop you. Okay. So the 11 healthy habits are knowing where you stand financially. You know, as an accountant, that's a good one for me. Like a net worth worksheet and a cash flow statement. Living within your means is number two. Number three is related. It's saving or paying yourself first. Number four is understanding the difference between good debt and bad debt. Should we keep going or should we encourage people to buy the book so they can find out what the next seminar.

Well, no, no, keep, keep going and I'll ask you a few questions on some of these.

Sure. Okay. Number five, set up a financial safety net. Number six, know the difference between needs and wants. Number seven, teach delayed gratification and set financial goals. Number eight, track your spending. Number nine, save now for your children's education. Number ten, present a united money front. And number eleven, prepare a will and powers of attorney.

Okay, that is a, that is a lot.

Those are them.

Maybe talk about quickly. What. Just, let's just hit on a couple of those topics. Talk about good and bad debt, maybe. What does it, what does that mean for folks?

Right? So good debt is debt that is attached to an asset. So you've had to finance something, but that thing, that asset has the potential to go up in value. So classic example is a mortgage on a house in normal circumstances where the house appreciates in value over time. Or if you borrow money to invest, you know, in stocks and bonds in your RSP or something. That would be another good example in Canada, student loan debt could be considered good debt because, you know, as long as it's reasonable, manageable, it's an investment in your future earnings potential. And as long as you can pay it off in a reasonable period of time, it's good debt. Bad debt is essentially consumer debt. So we're talking about credit cards, you know, just personal lines of credit that are used to finance like stuff.

Right.

Stuff that doesn't necessarily go up in value. In fact, it's usually doesn't have much resale value. Um, you know, or like a department store credit card debt would also be considered bad debt.

Right, okay. And then so that's good, that's important for people to understand, which also falls into the living within your means item too. Because if you're taking on debt to buy clothes or material stuff that doesn't go up in value, maybe you should stop doing that. Um, and knowing where you stand.

Right. Because if you're preparing a net worth worksheet periodically, let's say even annually, you'll see if you've got, if your debt's growing, your assets are shrinking, you know when it should be going in the other direction.

Yeah, for sure. And then what about the children's education? Because there's some really nice freebies the government provides for folks in Canada that want to save for education. And, and you know, even with some of the families we work with or high net worth families, sometimes we don't really see resp accounts either set up or maximized. And you know, so maybe give a few points on that.

Yeah, I mean they just don't bother with it because they, they don't need it. But so yeah, so for most Canadians, if you don't take advantage of an resp to save for your child's post secondary education, you're leaving money on the table.

Yeah.

And the reason is that the government will match up to it's 20% up to 500 a year. And, and so if you make a contribution to this plan that you set up, a registered education savings plan plan, you'll automatically get this deposit of 20% from the government. So you put in 500, you're getting a hundred and a 20% return risk free is fantastic. So you know, obviously you have to use, you know, the money and the plan needs to go towards your children's post secondary education. But that's, I would say it's fairly broad. And how, you know, it's not just university, it's colleges, it's trade schools, et cetera. And if you do a family plan, if one child doesn't go, it can all be used for the other. There is a lifetime maximum on the grant. Now the amounts you contribute are not tax deductible as you know, so you don't get a tax deduction on the way in, but on the way out. Any, any income that's earned in the plan is taxed in the student's hand. And that's nice because the student's usually in a lower tax bracket than the parents.

Right.

So. And they also are entitled to tuition tax credits and stuff like that. So it's such a great tool to use and I think even if you're ultra high net worth, like why not still, still free money.

Yeah, we, we, it's not income testing.

It'S not means tested. They don't say you're not eligible if you're, you know, if you have income of this or anything, anyone can use it.

Yeah, no, for us it's a no brainer when you can get a 20% free return on your money with no risk whatsoever. We highly encourage everyone to do it for sure. Okay, so sort of digressed a tiny bit there, but just trying to flesh out a little bit of your, of your healthy habits. Let's, let's turn to. Okay, so we understand the risk of not teaching children about wealth. We understand the five pillars and the healthy habits. But how that, you know, how, how do parents actually get down to the, to the teaching part? You know, this, as you say, it's not necessarily really easy for folks to do. Everyone out there may not feel that they're the smartest person financially. They may be geniuses at what they do in their own lives and professions, but maybe not finance if that's not their thing. So how do parents overcome this challenge of, you know, of having these conversations?

Yeah, that's, and that's totally reasonable. So again, like as I said, the research shows that the biggest challenges are lack of time, lack of knowledge or lack of opportunity. So lack of time. I try to encourage parents to look for teachable moments, opportunities to build a money lesson into your daily lives as they crop up naturally. Because we're always transacting and interacting with money, things are going to come up and your kids are going to ask questions about them. Like, you know, when you pay for something tapping with your credit card or your phone, they're going to ask you what you're doing or maybe you take the initiative and explain the difference between a debit card and a credit card. There are so many, I mean, when you're doing your tax return or gathering the information to do your tax return, you can explain what you're doing and why. When you're grocery shopping, it's an opportunity to talk about budgeting and comparison dropping. Like it just, it comes up if, if you look for them, you'll find them everywhere. So that's the, that's like a great solution to the I don't have time. Like, you don't have to set aside special time. You know, you can do it while you're driving them to school or to soccer or whatever. Um, the I don't have the knowledge is another thing. And that's really where I hope the book can help. Because as I said, it does break, break it down by age and by the five pillars. Any topic you could think of, it is addressed in an age appropriate way. It is hard as, as we talked about before, like if you feel like you're not good at it yourself, it's embarrassing. So you might avoid it. But just think about your kids. You definitely don't want them to suffer from the consequences we discussed. And it is really, really important. So maybe it's something you can learn together. If you're not great with this yourself, you know, it's, it is something that you and your kids can learn together. And then besides being a good financial role model, which we talked about, which is another way that you're teaching your kids and it doesn't take any extra time because they are just watching and listening and learning from you, another thing that people don't think about is using your values. So your personal values are the things in life that are most important to you, that you're willing to take a stand for. And they can be used to help guide and prioritize financial decision and set meaningful goals. So I think that that's a tactic that parents can be a little more clear about with their kids and can have an open, open conversation about. And I even created a self assessment tool called the Values Validator that people can find for free on robintobe.com to help people get clear on what their values are. Because your top values are the things that you know, you can use to, as I said, set goals, prioritize. Just keeping those things top of mind and letting your kids do the exercise too and finding out what's important to them.

Okay, no, good advice. Really good. I just want to touch on one thing you mentioned. And actually I think this, this aligns with maybe some of the updates you just made to your book. But you were talking about, you know, you're out and you're tapping your phone to pay for things. And that may be a time to teach children, you know, what, what's going on here. You know, the world has changed a lot. And I think you mentioned it earlier, you know, cash, there's not a lot of cash that I think most people are using on a day to day basis. You tap your phone and all of a sudden magically you can pay for things. If you're my kids, you magically pay for things with your phone. How do you, how do you explain in this new world money and how it works and where it comes from and you know, when you tap what you know, where is that originating? How do you do that today versus, you know, another day in the past?

Well, the age appropriate thing is important to keep in mind here because with young kids, it's going to be too hard for them to grasp digital or electronic payment. So with them, stick to the cash. Even though you're not using a lot, you probably have some around the house or you use it here and there. I mean, I really hardly use it anymore. And I was, I was just in Spain and in Europe they are so cashless. It's like even more than here in the US I think they're still a little bit behind. People still use cash more there. So. But with your kids that are like, that are pre teens that might have their own smartphones that are a little more digitally savvy and I think you can, you know, they, they probably get it like it's money, but it's just not physical or, or tangible. And there's, you know, you can explain that. Like your digital wallet on your phone is pretty much the same as your credit card, but you still have to have the ability to pay for that at some point with actual money. That again, might be all digital but still spending real. Yeah, you're still spending real money. And again with cash, there's that visceral pain of loss when you hand, if you're still doing it, handing a 20 over, it's like, oh no, I'm getting only like a five.

I, I feel the pain with the tapping too.

Trust me, you, yeah, a lot of people. So I was going to say if you tap, if you tap, what you can do is you can set up notifications on your phone or alerts or if you have a smartwatch, you will get a reminder every single time you use it and that will, believe me, remind you that you're going to see that on your statement or that's coming out of your bank account right away if it's a check, debit card.

Right.

So those bringing that friction back into to your personal finances will help you remember because otherwise it's so frictionless. Spending is still so frictionless. It is so frictionless. But saving is still really hard and it's so tempting to just tap, tap, tap. And like you said, if it's your kids and they're, they don't have their own credit card because they're too young, you're paying. So they don't even. They're spending your money.

And that is easy to do, I am well aware. Thank you for reminding me. I'm going to take a moment to cry. No. So one other topic in the spirit of, you know, money today or in this new world, which is, I don't know if this is financial management, but it's something that children have to be aware of as it relates to money is, you know, all the fraud and phishing and bam and cyber stuff. I don't know, I can't recall. Do you address that? I think you address that a little bit in your book. How do you, how do you teach kids to be ridiculously careful these days? Because, you know, I think with, with the cell phones and the tick tock and all this, they're signing up for everything. Just sign, you know, and, and how do you make sure that they're not, you know, doing something to cause a financial problem?

Again, I think it can be a teachable moment because I feel like every day now I'm getting these texts that are fraudulent, like ups, your package doesn't deliver cibc, your, your PIN is wrong. So show your kid that you're constantly getting these things and you can even point out often with phishing, there's a lot of little tells like grammatical mistakes, punctuation always err on the side of caution, as do not click. Do you not interact with it? And with emails too, you can see the sender is. Sometimes it looks like it's coming from Apple or your bank, but if you click on the sender you can do that safely and you see it's just some weird account.

Yeah.

Do not touch those things because I mean, I feel like everyone has made that mistake once. My son, he's who's in his late 20s, just got fish. He scanned a QR code in a coffee shop and it went to some weird thing and I don't know, I don't know what happened, but his car got compromised. So you just have to, it is really be on alert and there's so many like horrible scams out there like for parents and grandparents to be aware of too. I've, you know, if you heard about this grandparents scam where they say your grandchild's been in a horrible accident and right away with 10,000, like there's, and with AI and deep fakes now they're getting so clever at how I'm just always so suspicious of everything now like healthy skepticism, you gotta talk to your kids about it and show them examples.

Yeah, for sure. Okay, so we're, you know, we're coming to the end here. I, I, I, I thought I would ask you, you know, before we, I have a few more questions for you. Maybe more on the fun side, but not that fun. By the way, I, this is, this is my favorite thing on earth. But if I said okay, there's only, you know, you, you have to leave our listeners with one key tip for families to get their financial house in order to teach their children good financial habits. One thing to take away from this 30 some odd minutes here or to take away, they don't have your book but of course we'll put a, a link in the show notes so people can get it if they want. But what's the one key tip that people should remember coming out of this?

It's hard to pick one because as I said, I have like my three key strategies, but I think being a good financial role model and leading by example. So try to get your own financial house in order. First you can learn along with your kids because they are watching and listening and learning and they are aware of both the good and the bad habits. So you are such an important role model for your kids. And also research shows that parents, sorry kids really want to learn from their parents. They want their parents to be the ones to teach them. So if I have to pick one, that's the one.

Okay, amazing. So thank you so much for the financial literacy chat. But now onto very important topic here. So listeners will know that I'm a big music fan and a little birdie told me that you might have met Bruce Springsteen one time. Yes, and I did. I want to hear this story.

Okay, so it was around 2000.

Wait, were you the one dancing on the stage and dancing in the dark?

No, that was Courtney Kalo.

Okay, just making sure.

That would be fun. That would be a real claim to say. Yeah, no, so I've always been a huge Springsteen fan. Like I love music and I go to tons of shows and I've always gone to see him in concert. And one of my good friends is also a huge Springsteen fan and her cousin is married to now, but maybe dating at the time, the actor Edward Norton. And he was his friends with Springsteen. So my friend Sheri got us backstage in Toronto when he was here, and it was so cool because it was at the. I guess, I think it was the old Maple Leaf Gardens maybe even. No, I can't even remember now where it was, or the Scotiabank Center. But we, we went backstage and there was like people back there, like Canadian music royalty. Like, I saw Blue Rodeo back there. But they like take us into. I think we went into Patty's dressing room first. So Bruce's wife who's in the band, and she was like getting her hair and makeup done and she was so friendly and she gave us her cd. She had like a solo record. And then it was like 20 minutes before the show started it. And they like take us into Springsteen's dressing room and I'm like, isn't he like doing his warmup exercises or does he have better things to do than like, just talk to us Like, I cannot believe he's doing this. And he did. And he like gave us all a hug. And I think I had my son's guitar strap, cuz my son plays and a sharp beat. But I was just like too embarrassed or like I just felt bad badging him 20 minutes before the show to sign it. So I didn't. But we, you know, he gave us a hug. He was so friendly. He's just like, he's such a cool guy. And then we were like in the pit, like really, really close for the show. And like, it was so. It was like a dream come true.

He was singing to you. Amazing. Amazing. Okay, last. That's good. Great story. Last question that we ask all our guests. I don't know if you. I know you listened to a number.

I heard it in the last.

So we usually spring this on people, but you might know. So you know our theme here. We are an independent wealth management firm. We really have the sort of ability to look around for anything our clients need and help clients in any way on the financial side. That's sort of our mantra. And so we say, you know, our tagline is your wealth unlimited when you're with gains of wealth. So I'd like to ask our guests, you know, if you weren't doing what you're doing and the world is unlimited to you, you could do anything in life, anything in the world, you know, what might you be doing today?

I'd either be a backup singer for spring in a great band like the Stones or Springsteen or a roadie, like something where I'd be like around that. But I wouldn't, I, I don't ever think like I would be the, you know, the Springsteen or the Taylor Swift.

Right.

I'd be just happy to be part of it in some other background kind of way. So that's my answer.

Okay. Amazing. I love it. All right. Well, listen, Robin, thank you so much for shedding some light on the wisest investment. We're always looking for risk free investments here at Gensler Wealth. We generally can't find anything that's risk free. But I will say teaching your kids about financial literacy is definitely a risk free investment. I think so. Thanks for sharing that with us. We we'll have your full details in our show notes. We'll have a link to the book for those who want to read it and get it and just wish you the best and happy learning to those for Financial Literacy Month in November. And we'll talk to you soon.

Okay. Thank you, Brian. Thanks.

Thanks.

The Unlimited podcast is hosted, hosted and produced by Brian Ginsler and is edited and mixed by myself, David McMillan. This podcast is not to be taken as investment advice. If you like what you heard, don't forget to rate the podcast and follow us on Social medianslerwealth. Thanks for listening and see you next time.

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