MtoM #156: Family Doc Pays For a Dream Wedding With Cash and Finance 101: How to Wire Money

This is the White Coat Investor Podcast Milestones to Millionaire Celebrating stories of success along the journey to financial freedom.

This is Milestones to millionaire number 156. Family doc pays for a dream Wedding with cash. Do you ever find yourself wishing there was somewhere to go to ask your finance, insurance or investing questions? White Coat Investor communities are a great place to turn. We have a thriving community across all of our social Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit and our WCI forum. We've been discussing solutions to your money problems since 2011. Join the Conversation with thousands of other White Coat investors. Follow WCI on your favorite social media platform for financial resources, tips and strategies. Just head to your platform of choice and search for the White Coat Investor. You can do this. The White Coat Investor can help all right, students, the webinar is coming right up. It's February 21st. This is my annual webinar I do for students. This is the talk I would give if I came to your medical or dental school and had an hour with you. I call it what Medical and Dental Students need to Know about Money. I'm going to be doing it together with student loan guru Andrew Paulson. We're going to talk about not only student loans, but we're going to talk about why your patients need you to be financially literate. The secret to being a financially successful doctor how to invest during medical school. Should you be lucky enough to have funds to do that? How to save money during residency interviews, and maybe why you shouldn't buy a house during residency. You can sign up for this@whitecoatinvestor.com studentwebinar it's going to be at 6 o' clock on February 21st. 6 o' clock mountain time. Sign up even if you're not sure you can be there. I'm sure we'll be recording it and get you a copy of that, but we'd love to see you live. It's going to be live. I'm going to take live questions. We're going to stick around long enough to answer all your questions, just like I would if I'd come out to your school and talk to your class. So looking forward to doing that with all the students out there. We've got a pretty exciting interview today. You know, this is a unique milestone. I love celebrating unique ones. I mean, I'm perfectly fine celebrating people paying off their student loans and becoming millionaires, but every now and then it's good to throw in something unique. And this one certainly is. Stick around. Afterward, I'm gonna talk for a Minute about how to wire money. My guest today on the Milestones Millionaire podcast is Adam. Adam, welcome to the podcast.

Hi. Happy to be here.

You've been listening to this for a long time now. It's your chance to be on it. Tell us what milestone we're celebrating with you.

We are celebrating. My wife and I had our dream wedding.

All right. Congratulations on getting married, first of all.

Thank you.

I think the financial aspect of this, however, is the fact that it was dream wedding. So tell us what you mean by your dream wedding.

Well, when I had initially proposed and engaged, I actually called in to your podcast. What was it, back in 2021 or 22? Asking about recommendations for a wedding ring. And you gave some really good advice. And I broke down, and I bought basically her dream ring. And then after I proposed, we were planning the wedding, and when it came to finances and timing, she said, well, I'm going to need at least two years to plan all this. I said, no, no, no, we can do this in one year. And she said, oh, we're going to need so much money. We're going to need at least 100,000. I said, what? Dave Ramsey said, you know, you can have a nice wedding for 10,000. And that was my perception. Just, you know, you can have a nice wedding for $10,000. I had no idea how much it would cost. And I told her, you know, well, I'm. I'm working, and I have enough saved up, so I can basically give you this much of my paycheck. And, you know, that was basically $60,000 at the time because I was working extra, and I had signed on early for a job, and I said $60,000 should be okay. Well, it ended up costing about twice as much. It was about $120,000. Wedding.

Wow. And this is not a classic Indian wedding with elephants or anything like that, right?

No elephants. But we did have some big surprises for guests.

Okay, very cool. Because I've talked to people that have been to weddings. I don't know that they had weddings. I mean, the flowers were $250,000. A wedding is one of those things that's a little bit like an education in that it costs what you're willing to pay. Right. I mean, some people get married for $200, and other people spend 5,000 or 10,000 or 25,000. And obviously, you can spend half a million dollars on a wedding if you like. So it's all about what you want and what you can afford. It sounds like you guys decided it was $120,000 wedding. All right, so that's impressive, I think, to pay for that with cash. You didn't borrow any of this money for this wedding?

Nothing borrowed.

Okay, so how'd you do it? How'd you come up with. I mean, you started with $60,000 in the bank, but somehow you came out with another 60. How'd you get all this money together for this dream wedding?

Yeah, well, I think we cash flowed most of it. So my resident salary is about $60,000 and about half of that $30,000 goes into my retirement. 403 HSA, Roth IRA. In 2021, I spent about $15,000 for the engagement ring. And then in 2022, our hospital has some moonlighting and so I made about 90,000 in Moonlighting. And then in early 2023. So we got married in May of 2023. I had some money from Moonlighting in early 2023. And so that plus her salary, she's an anesthetist, was able to help pay for this. So she's an AA and she makes about 200. 200,000.

Okay, so over what time period did you save up the money?

About a year.

And it sounds like that was not the only thing you saved for. You were continuing to save for retirement at the time.

Yeah, yeah, that's sort of a non negotiable for me. I just every year I max out my retirement accounts, those three. And when we started dating, I told her she has to do the same and planning for our future.

What's your specialty?

Family medicine.

Family medicine. Okay. And you're what year? You're a PGY3 now or what?

I just graduated, so I am about five months into my job as a nocturnist.

Okay. But it was right at the end of residency, basically. When you got married?

Yeah.

Okay, very cool. All right, well, tell us about the wedding.

Yeah, well, it was very exciting, I'd say. The first thing that we did was we looked at venues because with COVID we knew a lot of people that had planned weddings and they got canceled and they planned them again and they got canceled again. So that's partly why I want to do this quickly if a year is quick. But we looked at venues for sometime in the spring. I felt like that would give us enough time, the weather would be nice. It's an indoor wedding. The venue ended up costing about 20 to 30,000. About 20,000. And then 8 or 10,000 in like add ons, extra food, extra lighting, things like that. And then we looked at churches. Churches were about $2,000. And then the rehearsal dinner was like 10,000. So we booked all those several, several months in advance. Next, she knew she wanted a lot of flowers, and I had no idea flowers are going to be so expensive. So, yeah, she got a florist, and the flowers cost about 20,000. She got two dresses, alterations of veil. I'm counting in makeup, the wedding rings, the tux, the groomsman gifts. This was all about 26,000, but each dress was around. The first dress was 8000. The second dress was 6000. $2000 in alterations, $3000 for the veil. The entertainment, well, that was. Depends on what you count. But we had circus performers, because I'm a former circus performer and acrobat. We had a dj. We had a surprise dancing robot at the end. We took professional dance lessons to perform our first dance. There was sushi, there was cake, creme Brulee. We spent $5,000 on these really nice invitations we helped pay for out of towners. We booked their spot at the hotel as well as gave them sort of welcome gifts. There was a party bus to transport people from the church to the venue. So there was just a lot of extras that came in. And I'm very thankful for our wedding planner to help kind of guide us through all this, because with both of us working full time and me picking up extra shifts and residency, it was very stressful. And so she helped organize all this. And it was difficult to find a good wedding planner, but I think once we found one, she was very helpful.

How many guests total did you have?

We invited 200, and about 175 attended.

Okay. And this was not a destination wedding. Doesn't sound like this was in your hometown. Yep. Okay. And what do your family and friends think of this wedding? Were they just totally wowed by this, or is this par for the course in your culture and community?

No, I think everyone was very surprised. I think we sent out really nice, very fancy, expensive invitations. And I think people kind of knew that this was going to be a really exciting wedding. My parents didn't. I mean, they. They helped a little bit. They helped kind of with the tips, and they hosted some parties here and there. But this was all paid for by us. You know, I. I worked my way through college, I paid my way through school, and so, I mean, I never really expected my parents to help out with anything. And I think them seeing me do that and then, you know, do this is. Is really impressive for them.

Yeah. So it's been six to eight months now. Looking back. Any regrets whatsoever? Things you wish you hadn't spent as much on or that you wish you'd spent more on.

Yeah, I would say it was tough. When we first started to find a wedding planner, we. I don't want to say we kind of got scammed a couple times where we would set up with someone and we'd send them a unrefundable deposit, and then they would stop emailing us and stop texting us, and we wouldn't hear anything for two or three weeks. And then, you know, it's like, okay, well, we don't want to continue working with you. And so you lose that deposit. And it was really odd because, you know, the first, I don't know, week when you're kind of deciding whether you're going to work with them or not and they're helping you out a little bit, they were great. And then as soon as they get the money, they just drop off the face of the earth. So I wish we would have taken some early recommendations before we found our really good wedding planner.

You know, a lot of people would look at this and just think, you're nuts. You know, for example, we've been married for almost 25 years. We probably spent $5,000 on our wedding. You know, that's what you spent on invitations. Some people might criticize you and say, you know, that $120,000 would have gone a long way toward getting you started off in your financial life, paying off debt or going toward retirement, financial independence. What's your response to those sorts of criticisms?

I say I'd be one of those people making the criticisms. Before I met my wife, I think I always dreamed of a really nice wedding, and she did, too. And I think just kind of based on my upbringing and struggles throughout life, I became more of a super saver. Just work hard, save up a lot of money. I don't really need a lot to live. I'm pretty happy just with not a lot. And so a lot of my friends kind of did that. I started seeing more of a trend of people kind of getting married in a courthouse or, you know, not spending a lot of money. And I thought, oh, you could spend that money on a down payment for a house or, you know, a nice honeymoon. And my wife, you know, she always wanted a big wedding. And the more I thought about it, I thought, well, there's not a lot that I'm going to spend money on. And so, you know, I think the few things that I do spend money on should be really, really nice.

Yeah, very cool. Well, you know, my guideline is if you can pay cash for it, you can afford it. You know, it's the same with cars as it is with vacations and weddings. Clearly you can afford this. You saved up the money, you saved it in a year or less and paid for it. So you should give yourself a pat on the back, financially speaking, for doing this. There's a lot of people out there that they go borrow 30 or 40 or $50,000 for a wedding, and 10 years later, they're still in debt for their wedding. And I think that's a terrible way to start off a marriage. But this sounds like dancing robots and all to be a pretty great way to kick off a marriage, show that you guys can work together and save up and, and cash flow, expensive things. And I think that's a great thing to a great foundation, a great financial foundation to start a marriage with. So congratulations to that. What advice do you have for somebody else that wants to save up for something? Maybe it's a wedding, maybe it's a honeymoon, maybe it's a dream trip around the world, maybe it's a fancy truck. Who knows? What advice do you have for them?

I'd say if you're like me and you work hard, you love your job, you save up enough money, you can afford the nice things that you really like. I do think it's important to have that money saved up and have that money available, as well as fully fund your future and protect against catastrophe, things like death and disability. But I think the whole point of having money is to spend it and it doesn't do any good just sitting there in the bank. And it was really tough for me to kind of part ways with this money and spend it. I think it's hard for me to spend on anything, even going out to eat and spending $50. I prefer to cook at home. But if it's worth it, I think you should buy it.

Awesome. What's next for the two of you and your financial goals?

Well, my plans are to finish paying off my student loans. That's number one. I borrowed about 200,000. I'm putting about 20,000amonth, and so I should be done in the next five months. And then after that, I want to save 250,000 a year for about 20 years, and then I should be able to retire around age 50. I don't plan to retire. I actually really love my job and I want to continue working as. As long as possible. But that's probably next to my goals. Max out my 457 start at 529. We're working on having kids, so build a family, support our parents, and then probably plan to spend more money on travel and a nice house.

Pretty awesome. Pretty awesome. Well, congratulations to you on your success. Thanks so much for being willing to come on the Milestones podcast and using it to inspire others to do the same.

Thank you for having me. Best of luck for everyone out there and everyone single or planning on getting married.

Okay, great interview. I don't know how many of you spent $120,000 on your wedding. I'll bet it's not that many of you. I have talked to white coat investors that have spent far more than that, though. So there is a huge variation, right? Anywhere from $50 for a marriage license in the courthouse to half a million dollars, probably. Much like education, it costs what you're willing to pay. So figure out what you're willing to pay, pay for in cash, have a great time, and learn to save for things that you really want. I think that's great advice. Now, I promised you at the beginning of this podcast, we're going to talk about wiring money, and some of you have never actually wired money. Here's the deal, right? There's lots of ways to send money from one place to another. For example, you can write a check. You hand somebody a check and they go take it to their bank and they cash it. And then the money sits there for a little while, it clears, and then eventually it's in their account instead of your account. Well, you can do it a little bit faster doing an ACH transfer. This is essentially an electronic check. But once it gets to their bank account, again, the bank's not 100% sure it's there. It takes a few days for it to clear. Well, if you don't want that to happen, the way you move the money instantly to their bank account and everyone believes the money is actually there is by wiring it. And so for lots of big purchases, like when you buy a house, for instance, you need to wire the down payment, or the lender needs to wire the funds to the seller of the house. Or if you're making a big investment, like if you're putting $100,000 into a private real estate fund, you'll almost surely want to wire that money. And so you need to get used to wiring funds. It's one of those financial chores you need to learn how to do. And you can do it by going into the bank. For many years, that was what you had to do. You had to go into the bank and you talk to the teller and you show them some id and they ask you some questions. And you're in there for 20 minutes or 30 minutes, and eventually that wire is sent out. Sometimes the bank charges you a fee, might be 20 bucks or 30 bucks to send it. Sometimes it's included in your benefits for having a bank account there. It's probably more likely at a credit union than it is at a bank account, but I've had both of them charge fees for me. Before you can wire money out of your brokerage account, you know, you can wire money from Vanguard, for instance. Nice thing about Vanguard is, at least at a certain level of assets, they stop charging you for wires. And so you can do free wires out of there. You know, I noticed I mistakenly sent one out of a bank account instead of out of my Vanguard account and had to pay 29 bucks for it. And so I should have just, you know, wired it straight out of the Vanguard account. Instead, I transferred it from Vanguard to the bank and then wired out of there, which not only took longer, but cost more money. However, when you call somebody up like Vanguard or when you walk into the bank, they will ask you how you verified the wiring instructions, and the wrong answer is by email. Email can be hacked. Okay, assume that nothing you ever send by email is private because it can all be hacked. You know, one of the worst scams out there are people that start intercepting emails and pretending they're the person on the other side of your emails, and they eventually get you to give them your bank account information. This happened to a white coat investor a few years ago. They were investing into a real estate investment, and they ended up emailing mistakenly with a scammer, and they wired their investment money into the scammer's bank account. And the problem with a wire, right? This isn't like a check. You can't go back and cancel the check. This isn't a credit card transaction where you've got some recourse with the credit card company. The money's now in their bank account. They pull it out, they close the account, they disappear, the money's gone. So you got to be real sure that you're wiring it to the right place. So email doesn't cut it. It's okay if they email you the instructions, but you need to call them up and verify on the phone using a number that you looked up elsewhere, not that was emailed to you. Verify on the phone the wiring instructions. And Vanguard and most other reputable places will ask and actually demand that you confirm those wiring instructions in person or by phone. Or they won't send the wire. It's one of the requirements. I've gotten halfway through the wiring process before and they asked, how do you verify this? And you say by email and they won't send it. So you got to get off the phone, go verify the instructions, come back, call them up, go through the whole process again. So don't do that. The information you'll need to know, of course, is the routing number. Basically every bank in the country has one of those and the account number you're wiring into. Everything else is kind of superfluous. The name on the account's nice to know, for the benefit of which is usually you. It's nice to know that sometimes it's good to have the address of the bank, those sorts of things, but the main things are the routing number and the account number. Sometimes they want to know what kind of an account it is. Checking or Savings it's almost always going to be a checking account you're wiring into or out of, but it could be a savings account, so you need to know that as well. But for the most part, it's pretty straightforward process. You prove who you are, you have the information you need to wire, you make sure you didn't get it from email only, and then you send the money. And usually that same day it's transferred from your account to their account or vice versa. So get used to wiring money. It's one of those financial chores you'll need to know how to do. For me, it's been an increasing number of times in my life. There are many times where I only send one wire in two or three or four years. Now I feel like I'm doing it a half dozen times a year or more, so you better get used to it. All right? If you ever find yourself wishing there was somewhere to go to ask your finance, insurance or investing questions, you should check out the White Coat Investor Community. It's a great place to turn. We have a thriving community across all of our social Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit and our WCI forum. We've been discussing solutions to your money problems since 2011. Join the Conversation with thousands of other White Coat investors. Follow WCI on your favorite social media platform for financial resources, tips and strategies. Just head to your platform of choice and search for the White Coat Investor. We have a new community out as well. We call it the Few Few Financially Empowered Women. You can sign up for that if you'd like to be a financially empowered woman@whitecoatinvestor.com Few all right, this has been the Milestone to Millionaire podcast and you can sign up. Come on this podcast. You can apply@whitecoatinvestor.com milestone and we'd love to have you on and celebrate what you've accomplished and use it to inspire others to do the same. Keep your head up and shoulders back. You've got this. We'll see you next time on the Milestones to Millionaire podcast.

The hosts of the White Coat Investor are not licensed accountants, attorneys, or financial advisors. This podcast is for your entertainment and information only. It should not be considered professional or personalized financial advice. You should consult the appropriate professional for specific advice relating to your situation.