Ep.151- "Don't Fight Over Money" with Gregory Gann

This is the You Winning Life Podcast, your number one source for mastering a positive existence. Each episode, we'll be interviewing exceptional people, giving you empowering insights, and guiding you to extraordinary outcomes. Learn from specialists in the worlds of integrative and natural wellness, spirituality, psychology, and entrepreneurship so you too can be winning life. Now here's your host, licensed LMFT 🎗️, marriage and family therapist, certified neuro-emotional technique practitioner, and certified entrepreneur coach Jason Wasser.

Hey everybody, it's been a little bit since we've recorded a brand new episode. It is a week before Thanksgiving 2022, and hopefully you've been enjoying the last number of episodes that have been recorded over the last 6 months. We had so many incredible conversations in a very short period of time that I've had such a backlog, back catalog of episodes that haven't been released. And I even found one that hasn't— that snuck through the cracks and never got published. And hopefully you've been enjoying those. And as always, I really would love to hear from you. I know that there's so many people who are listening to this, and I get randomly— I'll get a message from people that I know that are listening to the episode. But if you have not yet connected with me, I'd love to do that. Please send me a message. You know, you can do it directly to my email address, jason@thefamilyroomsfl.com. You can find me on Instagram, Jason Wasser LMFT 🎗️ or the You Winning Life Instagram channel. We also created a TikTok account, which is You Winning Life. And you can go to any of those platforms. And sorry, the You Winning Life one is Jason Wasser LMFT 🎗️ for the podcast on TikTok as well. So today's guest is Gregory Gann. He is a CDFA Esquire. If you all remember Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, for those of you who— I'm just aging myself right there— Bill S. Preston Esquire. But Greg Gann started the Gann Partnership in 1989, bringing an unparalleled combination of skills and experience as a licensed attorney mediator, and certified divorce financial analyst. Even though he's an attorney and a member of the bar, he doesn't specifically practice law, but prefers to collaborate and complement his specialty in coordinating with practicing attorneys. So today we're going to talk about how important it is for marriages, for families, for those unfortunately going through divorce, to navigate financial plans, how the concept of collaborative divorce, collaborative mediation is such an important part of going through that process, especially when it comes to working with people like myself who are mental health professionals, uh, when it comes to having children and navigating, uh, parenting plans and, uh, summer camp and, and our, you know, what needs to be, uh, taken care of for the children. And even if you don't have children, how to set up both a financial planning, uh, situation and financial analysis justice for that. So we're going to get into some very heavy topics, perhaps some even emotional topics. Um, one, as a child of divorce, and two, uh, having gotten divorced in 2010, even I didn't have kids, how much I learned about this topic, um, especially when I became a family court mediator, uh, which I decided not to go into even after I took the training, which we'll probably talk about a little bit as well. But really, this is an incredible thing, and you know, the things that do need to be talked about when it comes to finances and relationship in a family. So stay tuned. All right. So welcome. As you guys heard in the pregame introduction, we're going to be talking about some heavy topics here. And Greg, I really want to thank you for coming and sharing your expertise and wisdom with our community. Sure.

Thank you.

So first off the bat, I know, you know, one would think that if you are helping people with divorce, The Financials of Divorce, that you were actually a practicing family law attorney, and I thought that, but actually you're coming from a very different background in law.

So I am a member of the bar. Um, I, I have an entire family of lawyers. I mean, uncles, brothers, sister-in-laws. I mean, law, you, you know, to be in my family, it was almost a prerequisite to go to law school. But I, a friend of mine was built, was in the real estate business, frankly. And I watched him build equity. And I watched my father go to the beach with files and bill for billable hours on the sand. And the building equity seemed a lot more appealing to me. So I actually went into the commercial real estate business. Which of course is a lot of negotiation and finance. And in the late '80s, the banks just stopped lending like overnight, and it was a pretty extreme recession. And I thought, you know, I don't know that I have the stomach to do this on my own. And, and it occurred early enough in my career that I did a lot of soul searching and felt that the, the, the skills that I had developed segued perfectly into being in the financial planning field. So I got to the divorce financial, yes, with a legal background, but, um, directly from as a registered investment advisor for now almost 40 years.

And have you found similarities between those two fields before you started going into this financial analyst for relationships and divorces, did you see a lot of similarities from that type of contract negotiation and, and talking about money that maybe made it easier for you to transition, but also you found like, wow, like people upfront know they should be talking about these things when it comes to real estate and couples and relationships and families aren't talking about this, but they absolutely should be. Talking about these things with the ease and with the flow or with the simplicity that we can be doing it in the professional world?

So it's funny. I, when I drive by the law school that I graduated, I literally look up and I say, thank you, dear Lord, for the opportunity. I was a philosophy major in college. And so the practicality of law and just the way of thinking, I'm very grateful. I would, you know, whether one practices or not, I think it was the best education I received. And so it does change your way of thinking, I think, because as a lawyer, I think, well, it's part nature, part nurture. You know, it's part of, I think, my way, but also I think it was honed by legal training is to question. And of course, a philosophy major is akin to that as well. But to question and say, okay, what could go wrong? Because if everything goes well, that's wonderful. So I always loved the investment management business. I love learning about industries and where trends are and psychology and invest. I love all those aspects. But what I really missed from the commercial real estate business was the negotiation. And I remember one of my first bosses in the commercial real estate industry, he was really a mentor to me. He went out on his own and he wanted me to go, but I didn't. And In any event, he, when he was leaving the original company, he said, well, what do I do? Put it on my resume, you know, dealmaker, right? You know, but that's what he did. He made deals, right? And that part of the divorce business I love. I love seeing people who are disparate positions and watching them come together and, and come up with something that they can both live with. I say divorce is a matter of compromise and sacrifice. No one is going to get through it without some kind of compromise or sacrifice, and you've got to find out what's really important. What are the hot buttons for each? And give enough of the hot buttons. Give in. That, that was her hot button. Give that to her. And then this is your hot button. You'll get that, you know. So it's massaging those deals, and, and that's I find it challenging, but I find it— I hate to say this because people are going through a horrible time, but I find it fun and rewarding.

Well, that makes sense, right? But the idea that you as a professional— one of the things I always want people to hear is that they could be allowed to have fun and enjoy what they do, even if there is, God forbid, a difficult situation, whether it's a divorce or if they're in the medical field. And patients die, people get sick, right? Whatever it is, there is always going to be a negative emotional downside to things, but it doesn't mean you can't be passionate about what you do. And I think you just gave us a great example of that. And, and one of the things I was thinking while you were talking about that, right, here I am as a marriage and family therapist, and I'm working with couples, hopefully to move them even further away from having to go into this situation of working with an expert like you. And, and I'm wondering, like, are there times when you're seeing them argue or disagree about something? And you're like, if you guys only talked about this 10 years ago, the way we're talking about this now, with a therapist, or 5 years ago, or 2 years ago, is there— do you think that there's some similarities between how you probably get them to an agreement, even though they're not dealing with the emotions about how they feel about each other, or the actual core problems of their relationship, but that same technique if they actually applied that to their emotional side, to their romantic side, to their commitment side, would probably have not allowed them to get into this situation in the first place?

It's a great question, but, um, I mean, I believe very much in finance, financial therapy, and a lot of things that the Financial Therapy Association does and stands for. And I think marriage scripts and what script that someone comes into a relationship and all that is important. But by the time I'm working with them, they have decided to go— you maybe mutually, or one party has decided to go a separate direction. And, um, and so my role is that I don't try to think about how could I have kept them together as much as how do we preserve, you know, they're going to be a family, right? They're going to remain a family. If the way they go through the process of separating will have a major impact on what kind of family unit they will have. And I gotta tell you something, Jason Wasser, every, every single divorce I've been involved with, Even those who, who desperately did not want to get divorced, every single divorce, the parties are happier after. And many of them didn't realize that they really weren't happy. They really weren't content. They were, they were, you know, camouflaging it or getting involved in other things not to look at their relationship. Um, and, and, and, and, and I don't say it As I think I say it to people who don't want to get divorced, as sort of a coach, if you will. And but it's true. And I say, you've got to trust this. You are, you know, we're going to come back 6 months a year, and you're going to tell me you're a happier person.

You know, so, yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And I hear this all the time of, well, we're a family, right? I don't want to break up the family. And I see this a lot of times, especially more so when it's the wife working with me, or, you know, or from that perspective, versus the husband saying, well, I don't want to be the person breaking up the family. And which is, I hear differently on the male side is like, I don't want this. I don't want to be considered a failure. I'll hear sometimes that from the opposite side as well. But more commonly, and obviously, maybe that's just the people who are showing up in front of me. That type of theme where the, where the, where the wife might say, I don't want to break up the family, and the husband might say, I don't want to be considered a failure, so therefore we're going to keep working on it. But I really do want everybody, you know, people to see that, like, it's not, you know, there were cracks in the system a long time before where you're at now, and you either work on it and you agree to work on and you agree to get better and you agree, like you said, to see the other person's perspective. Here's the pushing points and here's what I'm willing to accommodate. Or you're going to end up having these conversations where it just is about doing those things. And I see the one as a child, as I mentioned, a child that went through this, as you know, from 6th grade till, you know, I moved out of the house. It was such a long process and how devastating. And I have two younger siblings that were in elementary school, middle school at that time. So seeing it as a, you know, 15, 16, 17, 18-year-old, year-old adults and hearing just the fights about the semantics, not about the emotions. And now as a therapist trying to work on the emotions, they're two very different but very heavy and also equally important topics. So it makes sense what you're saying, right, that you focus on X when this is already too far gone and they have to acknowledge it.

And they— and I certainly believe in, you know, therapy, coaching, all of those other paraprofessionals to help them. That's not I mean, I have an interest in it, but it's not my expertise.

Right.

And so, you know, nor is it the expertise, of course, of most lawyers. So it's a multi-pronged approach.

Yeah. So going into the, you know, the approach of you doing this versus the run-of-the-mill attorney, I know we were talking a little bit before about your philosophy and approach to handling these things versus someone just going right away and hiring an attorney and retaining an attorney. Um, can you break that down for everybody who's listening? So one, if God forbid they need it for themselves, or they do know someone going through, so they can help, you know, be more informed and advocate for their best interests.

Yeah. So it's a, a question of, you know, to whom should the first call be placed, right? You're having marital issues, you're gonna separate. Um, and in our society, In fact, there are a number of articles about this. People associate a lawyer as the party to play, you know, in whom to place the first call. The problem with bringing in a lawyer is, and again, I say this as a member of the bar and very proud member, lawyers wear a banner across our chest, and it's called a lawyer, attorney at law. And it means bring on the war, right? It means we're entrenched in a, in a battle. You have crossed— your spouse is now not your just your spouse. Your spouse is now the plaintiff or a defendant. You have changed that dynamic in a very powerful, profound way permanently. So, you know, if, if I were, you know, if I were going to buy— I'm looking behind you, Jason Wasser, at your bookshelf— and if I were going to buy your bookshelf or wanted to buy your bookshelf or you wanted to sell your bookshelf, we would determine what the fair market value, what condition is it in, and we would, you know, we, we'd negotiate and we would come up with the terms, and then maybe we would say, you know, we would like this, um, uh, ratified through, through a, a legal agreement, and we would want it memorialized, and we would take it to a lawyer to draft the agreement. That's how people buy businesses. That's, you know, look, the greatest purchase most people make in their lives is their home. They don't have a lawyer negotiate, they have a realtor negotiate. So this whole notion of you need a lawyer to negotiate and the first place you should go is the lawyer, it becomes a very hostile— so who is the gatekeeper? We talk about gatekeepers in, in healthcare, right? And your primary doctor leads you to a specialist, whatever. Well, I think that you want a gatekeeper, candidly, other than the lawyer so that the gatekeeper can bring in the ancillary professionals that are appropriate. And different lawyers handle cases very differently.

Sure. Yeah.

So, um, yeah, I think that, I think that's really important. And the other thing is, is that when the lawyers bring me in, I'm beholden to them. Okay, I'm almost like their little puppet where, you know, I— you can't say this, Greg, you can't say that, I don't want you to get— don't give me your input, or don't— I don't, I don't want— I just run these numbers, tell me what the tax implications— I'm, I'm like their gopher. Okay, and I feel like I'm not trying to brag, but I feel like I have so much more to offer, and it should be a give and a take. I want to— I learn from them, I want to You know, but I know things that might help in the case as well. And if so, if the client comes to me and then I bring in the attorney, now who's, who's in control of the case? And I bring in attorneys many, many times, people who do not have lawyers. When I bring in a lawyer, I said, look, here's the scope that I want you to do. If there's, if there's motions or depositions or court-related you know, work. I want you to do the court-related, but I'm going to do the financial and the financial negotiation. I want to keep you in your lawyer lane. And then that dramatically, dramatically limits the cost. Well, let me just say this without taking over. Think about it a second, Jason. A lot of the lawyers don't like me because I'm interfering, like, you know, Uber and Airbnb disrupted the taxi and hospitality industries, and, and taxi companies and, and hotels didn't really like— well, if I'm minimizing or holding a mirror to a client saying, look, is the law— do you really need a lawyer to do this? They're threatened by it.

And I, you know, but yeah, it is a disruption to that, a disruption of family law. And I think that's where, you know, people aren't familiar with some of the terms that I kind of want you to kind of break through with them, um, right? Collaborative law, collaborative family law, collaborative divorce is one of a probably three synonymous terms that are used pretty similar, if I'm not mistaken.

Well, when I hear collaborative, I think of like one term. I mean, I'm hearing you, you're repeating collaborative. Is, are you asking what collaborative law is?

Well, is that like, will they, will people find those three terms synonymously used to when it, when it comes to, uh, divorce or marriage, you know, these type of situations, whether it's the mediation, whether it's the divorce process where it's collaborative family law, collaborative divorce? Well, are those interchangeable? Not really.

Okay, collaborative law, collaborative family law is different than mediation. Okay, it's also different than litigation. Um, it's a great concept, but it really hasn't caught on much. It's, it's not thriving. Um, the, the notion is, is that each party will have an attorney But the, uh, and there will be a mental health professional. This is the model. In order to be on the team, you have to be collaboratively trained by the national group, which of course I am. Um, and in the training, there is a— the team is comprised of 2 lawyers, one for each side, at least one mental health coach, maybe two, and at least one divorce financial neutral. Okay, um, that's the model. In order to be on a team, you have to be collaboratively trained and you follow that model. The problem is— so, so let me back up. So the attorneys, everybody signs an agreement that if the parties do not reach a settlement, the attorneys have to recuse themselves from litigation. They cannot file court on behalf of those parties. So the whole orientation is, how do we settle this out of court? Which is wonderful. However, in reality, that's the model that everybody gets trained on. And I think this is one of the reasons it's not thriving is the lawyers will say, you know, we don't really need a mental health on these cases that, you know, we don't really need a coach. They're fine. We don't really need financial. So now what you have is two lawyers going back and forth, and the only difference is, is that, um, if they don't reach a settlement, the parties have to get another lawyer. That's it in reality. And they've deviated from the model. And this goes to— it's actually a good segue because it really goes to who should be the gatekeeper. Do you want someone? And the problem is this whole collaborative talk is all about, you know, meeting of the minds and putting everything on the table and brainstorming and creativity. But when you come to that with a perspective of the court and what a judge would do, you don't realize how constrained, how limited You really are. The attorneys really are because 99.9% of their practice is court-related, litigation-related. Okay. And so to get new clients, they put out a banner and say, I'm collaborative so that they can at least be on the case if the client asks. Okay. But they're not, they're not, they weren't indoctrinated in that world. I was indoctrinated in that world. I came from my father as a divorce lawyer. I grew up with divorce. You know, I think some kids grow up hearing words like playground, basketball. I heard child support and alimony. And our system is broken. And when I decided to disrupt this industry, I didn't decide to disrupt it. I went in on the collaborative route and I realized there were not collaborative participants, frankly, on the legal community. And so while I went to them with my hands open to help them and help their clients, they really were roadblocks and viewed me as competition.

Wow.

I know, it's sad. It's a real pity.

So when you moved into this new stage, this new awareness, what was out there as far as trainings and workshops and reading and community for you as a professional? I know for me, right, it's my training, which I loved also. I'm so grateful for my training as a marriage and family therapist from Nova Southeastern in Fort Lauderdale. And, and it's funny, I'm also massively thankful. So today, I just put a post on this this morning. It's been 9 years since I started doing the integrative mind-body work, that because of my divorce, I was having panic attacks because of what I was going through, and nothing solved it. And I stumbled upon this, this alternative medicine, integrative medicine, mind-body modality, um, and then eventually became a practitioner of that. So I know that there are things that never would have been taught in graduate school that were not practiced within the mainstream normative therapy community, that I needed to go out of the box and I had to even go through my own suffering in order to find there. So what were you finding around the time that this was becoming an aha to you, and what led you, you know, to becoming part of the community and then eventually a totally different certification?

Well, let me say this, like, you know, it wasn't out of the blue, and it wasn't like I went from being a dentist to a, you know, Certified Divorce Financial Analyst. Right. So as a, as a registered investment advisor, you know, I've been involved in estate planning, tax issues, investment management for years and years. I had a cadre of estate planning attorneys. So, and there's always continuing ed, right? The irony is you want to hear something very ironic. I'm in the state of Maryland and I'm a member of the Maryland Bar. Maryland has zero continuing education requirements. I've been a lawyer since, what year, 1986, '87. Okay. And I have had zero requirements for continuing ed in all of those years as a lawyer. Hmm. In the investment management business, in the certified divorce financial business, there's a lot of continuing ed hours required every single year. So it's very ironic, right? We would think a lawyer. I always say, like, you know, to become a— I think even if you are, you know, are a hairstylist or do nails, I think you have to, you know, take— get certifications, whatever, right? Um, not necessarily in this. So I'm a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst. Um, that was a required, you know, uh, designation. You had to do different modules, pass them, move to the next module, whatnot. I also have a designation of as a Master Analyst in Financial Forensics. With an emphasis in matrimony. Um, and, you know, I— between that, the law background, the registered investment advisory background, there's a lot of continuing ed, but also there's a lot— I mean, you know, I'm 62, I've been doing this for a long time. You sort of just— it's become second nature.

Yeah. Is to talk a little bit more about this, this, this training, right? The Certified Divorce Financial Analyst. That's coming under— so there's an organization that this is now through, and they obviously have this newer philosophy different than the collaborative divorce approach.

Well, no, no.

Or is it similar to that?

It's, it's not. To be a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst is giving— is a designation by the Institute of Divorce Financial Analysts to be certified to help folks in all aspects of financial issues relating to divorce. Whether it's taxes, whether it's equalization of assets, whether it is valuing pension plans and doing the net present value today of a pension plan, a variety of different things. So where you take that designation, you know, you, because you have the designation, you can, I mean, I'm an expert. I do expert testimony on trial. So that's, that is not collaborative trial. Um, you can use it in mediation, which I do. You can use it in collaborative, you can use it in litigation. It is just a framework and education and a designation for all dealing with any kind of divorce case. That makes sense.

Got it. So I want to kind of jump to the beginning of a relationship from your perspective of some of the things that you think couples should absolutely completely do, that hopefully the relationship works out. But if not, here are some of the things that you should be mindful of as what comes up in front of you. And I know we briefly, in our pregame, we talked a little bit about the importance of a prenup. And maybe, you know, maybe some, some mis— you know, biases or misbeliefs about what people can have, should have, should talk about, especially when it comes to financial literacy, especially when it comes to those type of conversations, but also other topics that you see that show up in front of you that should be maybe more impressed upon them earlier on in their relationship, and even dating and maybe having conversations even before they get engaged. What would, what would come to your mind on some of those things?

Well, you know, the number one topic that's the most taboo in our, you know, Anglo-Saxon culture is money. Right? People can ask the most personal, intimate types of questions of people, but God forbid should you ask what you make a year or how much you have in the bank, right? I mean, it's really kind of ironic when you think about it. And the number one, there's not a close second, the number one conflict in marriage and in relationships is money. So it's the million-pound gorilla, and it's not discussed. And the problem is you have, you know, your accountant, number-crunching people who people think of about money, okay? And then you have your mental health professionals who people think of for emotions. And who do they— there's this gap between emotional well-being and financial well-being. It's like sort of that Venn diagram. And I think there's tremendous need in this area. I think that everyone should have premarital financial counseling. I think it's really important to know what your values are about money and what your partner's values are and what, how, what, what was money, what were, what were what were the issues they felt about money growing up, or what was money like in their childhood or their household, and the other to understand that. Um, so I am finding more, surprisingly more younger people, first marriages, who are wanting a prenup today. And I feel like I'm throwing the lawyers under the bus, and maybe I, I guess I am, because I, I, I I believe in legal counsel. I don't think anyone should get divorced without legal counsel. I just think you, you have to understand what legal counsel is and where they're— where their expertise is and where it isn't. When you bring in a lawyer to negotiate a prenup, you're starting the relationship with, with— it's acrimonious, it's, it's territorial because each of the others is a lawyer. To me, that's a perfect opportunity to bring in a— and I don't mean this self-serving, whoever— a, a, a, a marriage financial expert who can help them craft the terms that they can both live with, and then they can take it to an attorney to memorialize.

Right.

Okay, but, but you're talking about it as as a, in a healthy conversation. And we approach prenuptial agreements as, what did he get, or what did she get? It's not about what they get, it's what do I get? What did I preserve? What am I— what are my protections in that prenup? It's for each party. So I think it's a matter of changing the paradigm. It's not— you don't look— you shouldn't look at a prenup and saying, what did I give up? It should be, what did I preserve and what did I get? Mm-hmm. One last thing, because when you talked about prenup, it occurred to me, I actually wrote something up years ago about this. Uh, years ago, I had a couple, they were only married 6 years, very short marriage. She worked in the wife and, uh, and husband worked together in husband's family business in those 6 years of marriage. So she'd worked there pre-marriage and then post-marriage. But during the marriage, in those 6 years, the value of that business absolutely took off and just— it went gangbusters. Okay. Right. Okay. And now it's 6 years later and she wants out of the marriage. Okay. And she's entitled to the marital share of what that business grew in those 6 years. They did not have a prenuptial agreement. Now, Jason Wasser, how much did that business grow? First of all, you have to— it's very expensive to have a business, a formal business valuation. Okay, that's very expensive today with today's value. But now tell me what the value was 6 years ago. You tell me that. You tell me what it was. So I, I say to these folks, if nothing more, even if you don't have a prenuptial If you have major assets like that, why don't you have an agreement that states at the date of marriage, this business was— we agree that the business was worth this. This is our agreed-to value. You don't even have to talk about how it would be divided, but at least then, you know, right? So, you know, it's like, it's like if I have collectibles or jewelry, and I'm, and I, I, I, I'm, I'm, I want to call my insurance company to make sure they're, that these things are itemized and protected. Itemize, protect your assets. I mean, I believe in a prenup, don't get me wrong, but even if you don't have a prenup, at least have an agreement with what things are worth at the date of marriage, right?

And most people agree to it and sign off on it.

Right.

And that doesn't necessarily need to be notarized by anybody. It's just to be an agreement.

But, you know, it can't hurt to be notarized. Okay. So there's, you know, like no cost to have it notarized. So why not? And, you know, I didn't put her signature there and she didn't put mine. And, you know, and all you're doing is specifying these are the values as of the date of divorce that we agreed to. I mean, a date of marriage that we agreed to, right?

And I know there's a lot of—

it's a lot of issue.

Yeah, and I know there's a lot of mess because I've seen it over the years of, of what is entitled or expected if the relationship doesn't work out versus what actually each state's law says of where they're getting divorced in. Um, and that's always leading to a lot of fights that I've seen and heard about. Um, another—

but the agreement will supersede—

correct, correct— whatever state they may move which is why it's so powerful, especially when, you know, the myth of, well, I'm not making anything now, and they're not making anything now. So we'll deal with it when we get to a much better place in our life. But then that really doesn't happen, or you're going back to the philosophy of not talking about money, that it just keeps getting avoided. And you said something interestingly, you know, I see it as so important that when you're talking and you're dating, and you're getting into relationships, and you're you're looking for, like, lifestyle similarities or core value similarities, but having these conversations about money beliefs, or like even credit cards, right? Like, okay, so do you carry credit card debt? Do you pay it off every month? Do you— what's the longest you've held credit card debt for? How much are you willing to be in relationship with someone who has credit card debt? And up to what limit? And those timeframes, like, rarely are those conversations had. One of the questions I love asking my clients in that dating situation is, are you okay with letting a family member, a parent, or another family member of your partner have access to free use that credit card on a regular basis, or even in an emergency basis? And what— right, and navigate, right? So these are all things that no one on upfront will think about. But I'm sure you've seen this dozens of times. Oh, my parents needed something, and I just gave them— they have a copy of the credit card and they put $4,000 on it and they'll pay it off, but then it doesn't get paid off. And now they're wanting to buy a property and their credit limit is dinged, right? Or whatever it is. So how often do you see stuff like that, that like really are these non-run-of-the-mill, just like, okay, you make this much, I make this much, here's how much you've saved, here's how much I've saved. Okay, let's talk about our rainy day fund and our money. We're going to put a shared account. And even though there really isn't, you You know, independent accounts and shared accounts are a myth a little bit as well, which maybe I'd want you to talk about. Um, but those other things, these external factors, family factors, how like of someone else having access or using their money, or do those things come up often as well?

Sometimes. I would say that every case has its own dynamic and nothing is cookie cutter. Okay. And you know, how do you explain to people that a lot of what I do is about finesse. How do you define finesse? You know, I mean, other than testimonials, how do you define that, you know, cases that were with lawyers for, for a year, year and a half didn't settle and somebody else can come in, and after 8 weeks they're settled. Okay, I have a case right now where the lawyer dropped the client. And, and by the way, when the money dries out, the lawyers drop their client. This whole notion that they're my advocate— they're only your, your advocate while the, the, you know, the fee is being paid on their credit card. Okay. When the— when you don't— when you run out, when the money dries out, they're not your advocate. I see it all the time. Yeah. But so I reached out to the attorney. Now she doesn't have an attorney, just me. I reached out to the attorney, said, you know, let's, let's talk about that. There was lawyers for a year. I don't have a tax return. I don't have any financial record on the spouse. I have no idea what they were doing. And I reached out to the attorney and the attorney says, this is not a complicated case. I said, I don't think it is either. It's pretty— we should be able to settle this. Right. So they have a 3-day trial scheduled next month. I just got the case and I'm hoping that within the next 2 weeks we're going to settle it and we don't have to go to trial. I mean, and this is a family that can't afford to go to trial. Yeah. It's, you know, so you want, you know, I say finesse, but I see this all the time and you just question. And, and the other thing, Jason, is, is I'm on involved in cases where, um, I, they run the gamut in terms of networks, some that really don't have much of anything, some that have a whole lot. And the ones that have a whole lot, I will tell you that They're the, the, the, the legal community is pushing papers through courts for about a year, year and a half before they ever even talk about negotiating. And, and you, and you know, it's going to happen because you know the zeros after in the net worth, the name. And until you start, until you start negotiating. You're just spending money that's wasted. I mean, I think only 97, 98— I think 97, 98% of cases settle outside of court. Very few are adjudicated in front of a judge. So you're spending a year, year and a half doing all this court crap that's, that's, that, that's superfluous because it never even— it settled. It might even settle the day of trial on the steps of the court, right? All of that, all of that discovery all was, was, you know, wasted. Yeah, or just— discovery can be important. I'm not saying it, it's, it, it's not important, but if you have it, you gotta get it, and then let's start analyzing it and let's start negotiating and come up with a settlement.

It reminds me of a case years ago, um, someone I was seeing here, and very contentious, and I was seeing the child for, for therapy, and they moved from another state, and I— and they wanted me to come out to the court case on the other side of the country to testify for, I don't know, 15, 20, 30 minutes, whatever it would have been, about what was going on and some of the things that was being shared with me for the, for the child. And not even going in as an expert, but just as the therapist to this case. And, uh, flew out there, rented a literally. And it was a whole thing. And at the end of the day, they didn't even call me in. The judge didn't even call me in because something wasn't filed the right way. And, and the amount of money that that cost in order to do that for this client that I know didn't have the money versus the spouse that did.

Can I piggyback on that?

Yeah.

I'll say to somebody, what— let me— I'll say, let me ask you a question, and don't embellish, be blunt. What have you spent so far They may be in the, you know, it's 6 months with a lawyer. What have you spent so far in legal fees? And they'll say, I don't know, $20,000, $30,000. Or, or I'll ask them at the end of their divorce, what did they spend in legal fees? And they may say $50 grand. Okay. And I'll say, well, then what did it cost you to divorce? And they'll say, it cost me $50 grand. And I'll say, I hate to break the news to you, it costs you way more than that. Because if your money could make 10% a year, just to keep it easy math, every 7 years. So in 7 years, the $50 that you gave to the lawyer would have been worth $100. In 7 more years, it would have been $200. In 7 more years, it would have been $400. I mean, your retirement went, you know, you get, you, you sacrifice your retirement years. Or the quality of your retirement years, or the age at which, because of these fees. And yet these are the same lawyers who will scrutinize, you know, did that person sell you a load or a no-load mutual fund? It was 0.2, 0.5% higher in this or that. I'm not saying what's right or not right, but these are the, this is the group of people who scrutinize everyone else's fee. And the value. And, and one of the things that I say, Jason, is, is that in sports, in business, and just about everything in life, success is generally measured in terms of speed, right? Effectiveness and cost. And I'm just saying, you know what, the divorce business, it's a business. Should be evaluated under the same metrics. And if they're not delivering success, then it's time to say, if I continue to do what I've already done, I'll continue to get what I've already got. And maybe it's a time to change, have a paradigm change, bring in another perspective, have another gatekeeper, you know, because it's not— if it's not working, it's not working.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And, and I see it, and I grew up with it.

And but look, I have a family of lawyers, as I said to you. They don't like hearing this from me, right? You know, I'm— it's a pretty good fiefdom to be a lawyer. A family— it's, you know, it's a pretty good— you've got a pretty good game. Yeah, pretty good gig.

Yeah, it's, it's frustrating because I know the emotional turmoil, one, of going through it as a young adult, but two, going through it as child of my parents and knowing things can, you know, I've been playing with this, this, this phraseology over the last couple of weeks of like, we don't have to choose to make life more difficult than life is already, as difficult as life already is. And I think a lot of this process specifically when it comes to divorce, whether it's the system, whether it's just like, you know, old news, old politics, old ways of doing things, right? Like you said, is not caught up to how it actually could be solved in the most efficient and effective manner. And it makes me really thankful that there are practitioners out there like you who are doing it differently. The same way that I see therapy and integrative mind-body healing and then talking and having conversations the way you're having conversations, how drastically important it is to do that. And, and why this isn't a typical episode for my, for my podcast, but why I think it's a radically important episode, because how can I talk about relationships and how can I talk about entrepreneurship without talking about what happens when that relationship or that business doesn't work out? And one of my business coach, Rick Sapio, he always, you know, he always goes into a business deal with an exit plan already established and the timeframes of, hey, we're going to meet every 6 months just on this topic. About, are we both still 100% into this? Is this working for both of us? And we already have our pre-established business prenup if one of us decides that isn't working. And when he told that to me a couple of years ago, I'm like, that's brilliant. I've never heard anybody say that before about businesses. And, you know, and I work a lot with family businesses and coming from a third-generation family business and deciding not to work in the family business on a day-to-day basis, right? It's, it's it's even family businesses, forget, you know, on top of a marriage. Yeah, right. And I don't know if that's actually some things that you've seen, whether it's not divorce, but have you worked also with any family businesses from that perspective?

Okay, sure. You know, something that you, you hit on, I wanted to bring up, you, you triggered a thought earlier and you talked about prenup and we've talked about money and relationships and the taboo topic and whatnot. And there's an area within counseling called discernment, right? Are we, you know, do we want to work on this relationship or do we want to bail? And I think there are like, you know, 6 pillars of discernment counseling, and one of those pillars is money. And when I have spoken with discernment counselors, I said, what do you do when you get to the money part? And candidly, what they have uniformly told me once I've asked is we kind of brush over because I'm just not comfortable talking about money and, and whatever. And yet that's the number one cause of, of, of problem. And so my goal is to help families. Okay. Ideally would be to stay together if it happily stay together. But if they've made the decision to, to part, how do they do it in the most healthy way? And, and it is not an oxymoron to have a healthy divorce. I see it every week. Okay, it's not. And, and for many people, that is the best alternative. But before you decide to divorce, there, there should be some kind of discernment counseling and If, and what, and why that's important with money is if I can say to a spouse, look, I'll be blunt with you. If you divorce, you're not going to be able to, I don't see you being able to afford to live in that 5-bedroom house anymore. But I see you down the road in the 3-bedroom townhouse. And if you can get your arms around that, then you're working on the relationship because you want to work on the relationship and not fear. You know, as the driver, right?

It's the external stuff versus the internal stuff. And I agree with you when you say like a lot of these therapists in general don't— you know, I see it when they, when they, with, when it comes to charging fees for therapists. And I now joke that I now charge attorney rates for my therapy, right? Or, and I'm moving into, or I'm moving into what attorney's fees are for what I charge. And right, because attorneys don't have a problem saying this is what I charge, and if you want to email me, and if you want to call me, and yeah, I bill in these increments, and here's a retainer. And, and I, in a way, I do think therapists, one, need to become way more financially savvy in that regards. One, for what they're charging for themselves and they're realizing their value and not giving up their time, effort, and energy as experts. And two, about like how they have these conversations. Exactly, it's so spot-on that if they, if we in our field as mental health professionals do not have our money stuff worked out, which could show up very much in our practice and the type of clients we take and accept and work with, then we're not going to be able to help the clients navigate through this, you know, that pillar, specifically whether we are a discernment or non-discernment-based philosophy. I see it day in and day out, and how much of their— your own internal value as a professional, and then how can you help a client with their value of their own life and their own identity and their own worth.

And when you're billing on an hourly basis, it's distorted. And I say that for a couple reasons. Number one is, you know, what, what takes me an hour would have taken me 4 hours years ago when I got— right?

Sure.

So You know, the fact that I have more experience, expertise, therefore things take less time, is it less valuable to a client? Number one. But when you— the, the other issue in with hourly billing, and I don't do hourly for this reason, I do a flat fee, um, is that in law, I mean, one of the most basic tenets in the law, if not the most, is that there should not be a conflict of interest between the attorney and the client. But when in family law in particular, when the more the parties are in conflict, the more the legal fees are. So there is a, a built-in conflict of interest. If the attorneys got paid a flat fee I think the— I know these cases would settle, your head would spin.

Oh, I'm sure. I believe you 100%.

And why shouldn't it be a flat fee? If they can deliver a successful— we talked about speed, effectiveness, cost. If they can deliver a healthy outcome in the most, you know, with the greatest speed, the most effectiveness, and the least cost, you know, why shouldn't they be rewarded for that? Right, you know, so our, our whole system, the, the conflicts, the internal conflicts of interest, the brokenness of, you know, courts were, were created for criminals, okay, for murderers, not for family. As I said, you know, your spouse becomes a plaintiff or defendant, you know, that when I hear words like plaintiff and defendant, I mean I, I really, I, I think of criminals, criminal law. That's what the courthouse was created for. It was not created for families, okay, and fam— and, and resolving family issues. And, and you're going to tell me that a neutral judge— neutral— who, with his or her own biases, and it that is brought into a case with very limited time is going to determine what is the best outcome for your family unit? That's who you want to decide what, what's best for you? You're going to put your future in the hands of one person with that one person's bias, with, with that one person's lack of knowledge of your whole family dynamic, history, money? You know, really? Yeah, that's our system. Okay. Um, and you think you're going to do better than that? And I hear people say to me, well, I want my day in court, or, you know, I want it aired. Nobody, nobody is going to the courthouse. No one is going to the courthouse and seeing that your husband was an adulterer, right? No one's irrelevant. Pull up the record to the right and it doesn't give any more money. It doesn't mean, you know, exactly.

So, and I think that's what people assume.

Deal, deal with Jason to figure out how to move forward in your life to deal with these emotions. That's not my area of expertise. But, you know, if you spend all your money now, now you're gonna have less to give to Jason to get you healthy, and your whole retirement future is going to be infringed.

Yeah, I couldn't have said it better, because it's, it's, it's what's perpetuated by industries. It's perpetuated by the situation that we're set up in. And, and I'm so glad that, like, right, I think this is such an important episode that, you know, there are certain things. I had a conversation with one of my other, um, one of my clients about, um, property adjustment and property management. And, and, uh, at a— someone I know who was on an invest in one of the investing podcasts, um, and said, like, you know, from the beginning of you buying properties, whether you're doing it as an investor or as a, or as a homeowner, you should make an upfront relationship with a property adjuster because usually it just goes through your insurance and they just set it up and they have the property adjuster come out from the insurance. Well, that's benefiting the company. It's not benefiting you. They're doing what they can do to get the least amount of, right? So it's exactly that. Every industry has exactly what you described, unfortunately happening to it. And I'm really thankful that we get to have this conversation. About looking at it from the other perspective of what we can do, how we can become more empowered, how we can have healthier dynamics within, within these challenges that are coming up. And, um, and that's why really I'm so glad, you know, that we're here. And I want to point—

can I say one thing?

Absolutely.

By the way, yeah, so I have a, a, a sore toe. It's a hammer toe. Okay, not a big deal, not a health thing. Okay. And The orthopedic surgeon immediately wanted to schedule surgery. 2 podiatrists wanted me to schedule them. And the, the other podiatrist said, I don't know that surgery is going to correct this. And in fact, with tendons, it actually may even make it worse. And so, you know, we know that, but you have to follow the money, right? And everyone has bias. And but the, the track of the money will disclose for so many people where the bias is.

Yeah, agreed.

In anything in life.

On one of my, uh, one of those websites where you advertise, right, they're, they're like one of those, um, you know, like a Psychology Today, or where you go and you search for a practitioner that will have these specialties. Um, and one of those websites I have, my job is to have you fire me as soon as possible.

I like that.

Because I think it can be done simpler. Exactly. I think we don't have to get stuck in all the chaos. I think I can help figure out the, the beliefs, assumptions, and expectations that you are throwing out at the world, or your partner, or your child, or your business, or whatever. And if we don't attend to that, it doesn't matter what the problem is. The challenge usually is, is what your belief is about the problem, not actually the problem in and of itself. And that's the approach I really do like taking. And I do find like once we— well, it's not that you have to leave your job, it's your belief about what you thought the job was going to be in the first place. Or it's not you have to leave this marriage or relationship. It's, well, what has been your longstanding beliefs, assumptions, and expectations about relationships and marriage and financials are in the first place? Everything you and I are talking about today. And that's the issue. It's not your partner. It's not the— I mean, it might be, I mean, if they're doing some illegal, sketchy, shady crap, but that's a different conversation. Then that becomes an ethical, moral issue, not a beliefs, assumptions, and expectations issue. And I'm really, really thankful we can, we can talk about that. And I want to point people to some resources on your website, right? DivorceWithUs.com. And if you go right to the homepage, there's a free ebook. It's called Not Just the Legal Battle: The Better Way to Financially Handle a Divorce. Blogs and all those other things. And is there anything else that you would love for anybody listening that wants to hear more, get more from you?

Well, this isn't about me. I'll tell you my— here's, here's really my passion. My passion is to create awareness. You know, I, I think divorce— and I'm saying this as someone who is a widower, okay— I don't think there's anything more difficult, more challenging, more strenuous than divorce. I am very, very empathetic to anyone going through this. Okay. And but, you know, there's an industry around marriage. Right. And what, what a wedding has to look like that is being promulgated by an industry. And there's an industry around divorce. And You don't, you don't have to have a $100,000 wedding to have a good party. Okay? And you don't have— 70 to 80% of folks, at least one party is not represented by a lawyer. So again, I just— the awareness that I want to bring to the public is that this is really at its heart a financial transaction, and they should approach it accordingly, and they will have the most healthy outcome. And that doesn't mean there's not a role for an attorney, but to think that they can't make a move without an attorney, or they're afraid, you know, well, what if my attorney thinks I'm speaking with you? I'm like, well, you're paying your attorney. Your attorney's working for you, not the reverse. You're paying your attorney's retainer. And there's so much fear and trepidation, uh, in, in this area. And it's, it's got to change. It is changing, and it's got to continue to change because this is, this is a, you know, we have a, we have a close to 50% divorce rate in our country. It's high. And most people cannot— this— the financial implications of divorce are profound and, and, you know, they have to come in, they have to reach an equitable outcome that sacrifice compromises, words I used earlier, but in a cost of the most cost-effective and healthy way to get there.

Yeah.

So whoever can, you know, it's just creating that awareness.

And I want to add to that statistic. The first marriage is over. I think it's 52%. The numbers go up. Of risk of divorce for second marriages.

And even more so, higher even than third.

Yeah. Yeah. So the most important thing is, right, obviously, if we have to be in this situation, working with this area of, of looking at things to solve the problem is radically important. But the first thing is, is that it doesn't matter what relationship you go into. If you don't heal your stuff, it's going to keep showing up over and over again, no matter who you choose to be your partner the first time or the second time or the third time.

So one bag of crap for another bag of crap.

Exactly, exactly, exactly. So again, thank you so much for sharing with— again, everybody who's been listening, check out— to go to the website, it's divorcewithus.com. And again, like I said, there's that really cool free ebook that you can download and blog and how, uh, you know, Gregory's company and, uh, can help you and— or someone you love and someone you know who may be going through these situations, or maybe even to help you move further away from it before it even happens, and setting up some financial insight to attend to this. And Greg, thank you again for, for your time today.

Okay, Jason. Thanks for listening to the You Winning Life podcast. If you are ready to minimize your personal and professional struggles and maximize your potential, we would love it if you subscribe so you don't miss an episode. You can follow us on Instagram and Facebook at You Winning Life.