Gaining Financial Freedom From Infinite Banking - Client Series | WWBS Podcast

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Creating wealth, eliminating debt, and controlling the banking function as it relates to your needs takes practice. It is. It takes education. It takes a little bit of time, but it's an incredibly liberating way of financial life. We would encourage you to learn more about it. A great way to do that is to head on over to wealth without Bay Street.com forward/masterclass. Go ahead and check out the masterclass that's there. Sign up and register, and we're even going to ship a copy of this incredible book, becoming your own banker, where it all started, right to your front door. We look forward to you joining us on the other side of masterclass. All right, well, welcome everybody to another episode of wealth without Bay Street. I am your host, Jason Lowe. My amazing colleague and co host, Mr. Richard Canfield is actually sea doing. He's on a lake right now celebrating a birthday with a very good friend of ours. And while he would love to have joined us from a sea doo on a body of water, he felt that that would not be very safe and it might be a bit of a distraction. So Richard's not able to be with us here this afternoon, but I am. As part of our client series conversations that we are having, we are joined today by two amazing people. David, Trish, we just. We are so excited to have you here with us. Welcome to the show.

Thanks, Jason.

Thanks for having us.

How was that for, like, an introductory monologue? Like, was that pretty good? I know I'm not like David Letterman.

Or anything, but we got some practice.

Yes.

Well, I'll tell you, we're so grateful to have you both with us. And what I would invite you to do is maybe just share with our listeners who, you know, they visit our podcast and they use the words, hey, we binged on your podcasts. We listened to every episode that's in your catalog, and we're starting to hear from existing clients. And these are really interesting stories, and so maybe take some time just to step through what life was like before becoming your own banker before and how you discovered the process.

Did you want to go? Well, I would describe Trish and I as probably average citizens, I guess. I mean, in terms of income level. We live in a typical neighborhood, you know, lots of good people around us. But we're in a working neighborhood. Everyone's coming and going all the time. Pretty typical. Yeah, we fit the mold of your average Canadian, I would say. I mean, yeah, living paycheck to paycheck for sure. Like. And I know before we discovered this, we were the pretty atypical rsp, you know, term life insurance, you know, listening to our financial advisors and at the time, and we're still actually with them with one financial thing, but we. I'm an ex military member, so we were going through CISA Financial, which is the military financial advisor company. And yeah, we got the same message. You know, just, you know, invest in your RSPs. They'll grow 7% or 9% every, you know, every year. And Bob's your uncle, right? Well, just in 20 years, you guys are gonna have so much money and this and that. Well, I think it's been about 20 or 25 years now since we started doing that. Since then, I've put myself through school using my RSP money and savings. We've borrowed against it before. We've used it for this and that and the other and for using the mortgage program and everything else. So we always thought it was a great thing. But in the end, there's almost nothing there. So we've always had to start over again. Re. You know, put more money into it and then, you know, hope that, you know, maybe. Maybe we can keep this nest egg going a little longer this time before we have to tap into it again. And so.

And all the while getting loans for everyday life things, right? You know, our vehicles or, you know, anything, you know, we'll say maybe over $5,000. That's unexpected or, you know, those kinds of things.

So. Always chasing our tails. Always. We're always chasing our tails. And I think that's the same for a lot of people.

Absolutely. Listeners can relate, you know, because we speak to folks in that same circumstance all the time. And how did you discover the process of becoming your own banker? What was that moment for you when you said, okay, I think I'm onto something here?

Well, you're gonna laugh because it is really just me. Like, I'm. I've. Over the last couple of years, I've sort of stepped out of the box of thinking like everyone else. And I really. I resonate with anyone that thinks a little bit differently. And I'm. And that goes for a lot of things which we won't go into right now. But. But it was interesting. I was just. Trish went into Safeway in the. In Fort Saskatchewan, and I was just listening to 6:30 Chad, and. And I had heard it before. I had heard the becoming your own banker thing even a couple years prior to that, but I wasn't really listening. I just. It was in the back of my mind, and I thought, oh, it's a little interesting. But that one day, for whatever reason, was listening. And I was listening for a good 10, 15 minutes, and. And I just said, you know what. What do I have to lose, man? I'm gonna call this number, and I'm gonna do the boot camp. I'm gonna. I'm gonna book us for the bootcamp. And I did. And Trish thought I was a little crazy. She wasn't sure about it. You know, that's taken a leap. And you never know because, you know, how often are you sold on something that you're not sure about or that turns out to be a. But, yeah, good point. We. We took. I took the leap. I booked it. I booked it. We went in for that one Saturday. We met you as well as several of your other colleagues. And shortly after that, that got me excited. And then I read Nelson's book, becoming your own banker. So I read that. I read it in a day, I think, and then I reread it. I think I've read it about five times since then.

Oh, that's fantastic.

But, yeah, I mean. And so we booked an appointment with you, and. And there you go. And that's where we're at. That's where.

Well, I think. I think you've really become a voracious reader on this subject because you, you know. Yeah. The one thing that I really, really enjoy is that anytime we talk, you. You're always asking the question, hey, is there anything else that I should be reading on this subject? And I recall from our first meetings and what we talked about when you said, you know, here are the things that we really want this process to accomplish for us. And so could you maybe expand on some of the, you know, some of the highlights of your experience with this process and to the extent that you're comfortable, you know, just sharing some of the things that you've been able to do as a practitioner of this process?

Well, I'll say, first of all, I think we're on our. Eighth time taking out a policy loan now, I think eight or nine times now. I've got a spreadsheet set up. Trish again, thinks I'm obsessive about this.

But he does a very good job.

But I have a really nice spreadsheet laid out, so I'm always keeping track of our policy loans. I remember we went into your office the one time and it was about the six month mark when we got our first policy and you showed us how to do it and it was a very small amount at that time, but that kind of got us started. So we just took some money out of our policy loan just to test it out. And I don't know that we use that for anything significant at that time, but it sure opened the door to possibilities right at that moment. So very shortly after that, we were going on vacation later on in the summertime and I took out another policy loan, all the while, of course, just keeping the payments going because what this did for us was it freed up cash flow for us almost instantly. So it's not a problem to pay off a credit card, even if it's a small amount, and just kind of keep payments going towards policy loans. So this is kind of what I've been doing for a couple of years now. And it's, it's been very freeing, I think, in a lot of ways because we're not having money arguments anymore and.

We don't have to go to the.

Bank and we don't, yeah, we don't have to worry about where money's coming from anymore. Like, well, I mean, when you're talking about big sums of money, we're not quite there yet, but it's, you can see the growth. Finally, after 20 years of doing the same thing, we're just now starting to see positive growth.

Wow, you made, you made a very powerful statement when you said, you know, we don't have money arguments anymore. That is, if you think about, you know, there are couples out there right now who are arguing about money. And one of the biggest contributors to, you know, relationships basically crumbling apart are financial problems that are directly the root cause is money. And so to hear you say that is just, it's very humbling. And Trish, I'd love to hear from you, like, what, what has been from your vantage point, what has been the biggest positive impact on taking this process and implementing it in your life?

I think for me, the, it took me longer than Dave to kind of get on board with the thought process, but once we started changing the way we were thinking and we started the policy loans and then using them for things we needed in our life, then, you know, the wheels start turning and then it just kind of takes a whole life of its own. And so, I mean, some of the, just little everyday things that aren't necessarily planned like, you know, in this summer, our washer, dryer and dishwasher all bit the dust at the same time. Hey, no problem. Here's what we need to replace. Here's what we have in the policy and really like it. I think it's hard for people to get their minds around in the beginning because we have large sums of money going out, but it's really not going out. It's going back into our own lives to be used for other things. So we paid for our sailing vacation with it. We, the kids are going back to school. We took out money for the kids school.

We just recently helped Keenan with our son with a car loan. Yeah, he was stressed out about having to go to the bank again and all that. And I said, why are you going to the bank? Just borrow it from us, which is essentially your inheritance. So we know you're gonna be good for your inheritance repayment.

Keep the money in the family.

And he has, he's been good. It's a very low payment. He pays on his terms. He's a student now, so you know, he's not made of money. But he pays it back or he doesn't pay it back. I'm not worried about it. No stress zero.

That is amazing. Thank you so much for sharing those examples of how you utilized it. Because we get questions right from people who are at that stage that you were at in the very beginning of your journey of discovery. And I think one of the key takeaways that I'm hearing you both say is that everything begins with the way that we think. And so when you're exposed to a different way of thinking and you understand that yes, banking is a part of everyday life, but when you can begin to change the flow of money so that presently for people right now they earn an income, but the bank sees that income before they even see it, it gets directly deposited into the commercial bank. The money sits there waiting for you to pay bills and take care of your personal financial overhead. And you're thinking, gosh, we're living paycheck to paycheck and we're doing all the work and everyone else is getting all of our money. And so how do we change that so that we keep money in the family? We change that flow and you're already describing that peaceful, stress free financial life that it begins to create. Because once you start thinking differently and you have the desire to change and then you start acting differently, it just opens up a whole new your imagination gets to work on what else can I utilize this process For.

And, gosh, that really does. You know, one of the things we talked about before was my RSP program at work, and I think this is available at a lot of companies, but people don't know because they just go with the norm. But my RSP program and my employer's contributor portion of that does not have to be registered. And I can take out a policy loan once a year, or I shouldn't say a policy loan withdrawal from that RSP program without penalty once a year. So right there, that increased what we're putting into our policy by an additional. I think it worked out to be about 6,000 a year. And if at some point I leave this employer, that money is free and clear for me, whatever their portion they put in is free and clear for us to, again, roll into our policy. Some of the highlights that I like to share with people because they maybe don't realize the benefits that are going to come, but we, we don't have a truck payment anymore. We paid off my truck. We paid off Dave's truck. We don't have a credit card balance. And, yeah, that, that makes you feel pretty free. And our next focus is getting the mortgage down. So, you know, a little bit by.

Little bit, for the first time in a long time, almost all. We're very, very close to having all revolving debt paid and recaptured.

Yeah.

Congratulations.

It's an awesome feeling that.

Yeah, I have goosebumps just listening to you describe it, because it really is. It's such an honor to be able to serve, and I think I can speak on behalf of all of our listeners as well. So thank you, David, for your service, and we appreciate it very much. And it's one of the things that we, we want to make sure that folks who are. Who are researching this process is we always love to ask existing clients, what would you share with people? What advice would you give them as they're going through their journey of discovery of becoming your own banker, the infinite banking concept? What advice would you share with them?

Oh, man. First of all, question your current financial advisor. Like, ask the right questions, like, what are the. What. What's. What am I looking at for taxation when I retire? What am I like, what are my actual rates of return? And can you explain that to me? Because rates of return on RSPs, they sound good on paper, but it doesn't always translate to be that great in real life is what we found. And that's only speaking from my experience. I'm not a financial guy, I'm not a math guy, but our Experience has been the returns have always been pretty abysmal. Like they're never as good as what they seem. And I would start there and then I would either a pick up a book and read about this stuff or attend the boot camp and do it as soon as possible.

I think my advice would be, you need to start as soon as humanly possible. Because we wish we would have started this 10, 15, 20 years ago. Really, time makes a huge difference. And even in the short time we've been doing this, we've seen what a big difference that makes. And even if you can't afford to do a lot in the beginning, you have to start somewhere. And even our son also has a policy with you, and it's a small one. He is young. He is 21 years old and he's just starting college, so he can't afford much, but he's got it started. And we have told him, you know, no matter what's happening throughout college, do not, do not miss contributing to your policy. And if there's a risk that you're going to, you tell us and we'll pay it. And that's how much we believe in this program and getting started on it as early in life as possible.

That is such incredible advice. Thank you for sharing that. And you know, of course, we're describing the process of becoming your own banker, the infinite banking concept. And one of the, of course, the, the holy grail of books on the process is R. Nelson Nash's book, Becoming youg Own Banker and looking a little worn. Oh, this is my, this is my original one. And you can see that I had to have it coiled because it was literally falling apart. And this is actually going to be in the Smithsonian Museum one day because I've got so many notes from all of the mentoring that Nelson was. He was so generous with his wisdom and his coaching, being blessed beyond the definition of good fortune to be mentored by him for so many years. And it's a good time to share with listeners that there's a great documentary film that you can view. It's available at no cost. And if you just visit our website and just go into the resources tab, you'll see the Nelson Nash film. It's a documentary that'll give you a very good glimpse into the essence of just how incredible Nelson was, because we would not be speaking with each other today had it not been for Nelson. And so, again, I can't express how grateful I am to have been introduced to this process and what an honor it is to serve so many wonderful people like you and Trish. And I'll tell you that over the years and right now, as we all know, we're right in the midst of. You know, I like to kid around and I say it's like day 697,228 of this COVID 19, you know, pandemic that we're dealing with. And I haven't had a single client contact us to say we're super frustrated that our policy values keep going up every day. You know, people are sharing with us.

This is what they do. They do go up every day.

I check every single day. Isn't that good?

It's crazy that more people aren't doing it. I just find it amazing.

I'll tell you, our business. Our business has more than tripled since this onset of COVID It's been a very interesting phenomenon. And you know, what I'll share with you, too, is that we get asked the question, you know, hey, what makes you unique? And why should we work with, you know, Ascendant Financial and your team? And so rather than me answer that question, I'll turn it over to the both of you.

Easy, easy question to answer. You. You're not just a life insurance broker. You are. You're. You teach us how to work the system. And, no, I don't think anyone else is going to do that. Maybe there are other people that are doing it now. I don't know. But if I went straight to, say, Sun Life or straight to a guy at Equitable, I don't think I'd be getting the same advice. So I would get a policy. Sure. But I wouldn't ever know how to properly use it.

To work for us.

To work for us. Yeah.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Very humbling.

And I would say, you know, we've dealt with several financial advisors over the year, and it's. It's always been status quo. And I feel like with you and your team, Jason, it's been such a positive experience for us. You. You've taken the time to walk us through. You've answered any question that we've had, whether it's, hey, can you give me a call? Or if we shoot you an email, you know, and not only that, but you develop a very personal relationship with your clients, which is very important to us.

Thank you. That brings joy to my heart. Such a wonderful, wonderful community.

We could keep going.

Great clients. Well, hey, let me turn the mic over to you. We're super grateful because we really. One of the things that we talk about on our team all the time is how do we show up in a way that no one else is showing up. And Trish, you hit the nail on the head where, you know, if you're dealing with. And there are many wonderful financial advisors out there, you know, in our country, there are many great people who do great work and great things for their clients. It's just the toolkit that they're working with is, and the approach to it is very status quo. It's all very product focused. Let's figure out the best product, you know, to sell to you and to achieve whatever it is that you know, you're hoping will happen. Whereas the process of becoming your own banker is not a product. The tools that you're using to implement the process, the dividend paying, participating, whole life insurance contracts, that's just a tool. And Nelson used to share with us all the time that if you put the best tool for the job in the hands of someone who doesn't know how to use it, not only are they not going to turn out any good work with the tools, they're likely going to break the tool. And so that's why it's so important to work with a good coach, with somebody who is thoroughly familiar with this process and who can coach and mentor clients to be able to utilize it. And that's why every single advisor in our organization is an authorized infinite banking practitioner with the Nelson Nash Institute, has been through our internal mentoring program. Because we have a very unique way that we serve our clients and how we develop those personal relationships. Because that's what's most important is the relationship. Otherwise what are we doing for.

Exactly. We're very thankful that we met you and that we have you helping us in this journey.

Thank you. I'm honored. And one of the questions that I always like to ask existing clients is so imagine for a moment there's someone out there right now listening, watching. Maybe they're on YouTube, maybe they're on the Facebooks or whatever it may be and they're, they're kind of sitting on the fence. What would you say to that person?

Man, take the leap. Get educated. Just look into it and contact Jason Lowe right now and just ask some questions. Just start the conversation. I mean, we've been dealing, like Trish said, we've been dealing with status quo financial advisors for a long time. And we hear the same messages that you'll hear in the mainstream media and from every other financial advisor out there and the banks, like, get your RSPs, keep taking the risks so that, you know, your money will grow and then we'll end up taxing you to death. You know, when, after the growth and after you really need it in your retirement. I mean, we've been hearing all of these messages, like, put as much money as you can in RRSPs, get term life insurance. And none of this, if you really think about what they're. What the mainstream wants you to do, it's not for your benefit, it's for their benefit. Just get educated. Do, do the boot camp, like, and do it as soon as possible. That's my message. I'll post it there.

Yeah, no, I mean, Dave summed it up pretty good. I would just add to that that, you know, we're getting to the age where we have some friends who are retiring, just about to retire, and some of them have already retired and they're learning. They're learning a lot, but they're learning it the hard way. And it's a bit late. So, like, we're seeing that writing on the wall and we're so happy that we're not going down that road.

Wow, that's amazing. Thank you both so much. And, you know, as it relates to getting educated on this process, you know, because we're still in the midst of this, you know. COVID 19 is that so if you found yourself thinking while you were listening to Dave and to Trish, you found yourself thinking, wow, this is something that I really want to explore more. I want to get more education. In lieu of a boot camp, we do have a master class. And so that master class is something that you can enroll in and consume 24.7from any device that connects you to the Internet. And so if you, if you visit wealthwithoutbaystreet.commasterclass again, that's wealthwithoutbaystreet.com masterclass. You're going to see everything that's included in that for you. And we would wholeheartedly encourage you to do that and certainly to capture any thoughts or any questions that come up for you so that, as Dave mentioned, you create that time. And you can speak to myself, you can speak to someone on our team who is going to take the time necessary to make sure that you get to clarity. And if you like what you see and you like what you hear and you decide that this is an advantage to you and to your family, that's great. And if you don't, as long as you leave happy, that's okay too. And I can't thank you both enough for joining us and for committing some time from your schedule, we know that you could have been doing other things on this Friday afternoon, and you chose to spend it with me, and I'm very grateful. One of the parting questions that I always like to ask every guest on our podcast, if you think for a moment that not all heroes wear capes and, you know, you may not think of yourself as a hero, but every single time that you're adding value to other people, that you're creating benefit in other people's lives, you are. And so my question to the both of you is, who do you want to be a hero to?

Oh, man, he has to think about it.

Yeah, go ahead.

For me, it's the kids, hands down.

Yeah, I was gonna say the kids for sure. But there's also a lot of people out there that are struggling, and if they just thought about things a little differently, it would open up a whole new world, you know? And I just, I hope this reaches somebody out there, like you said, that's just on the fence, has maybe heard about this and all their friends have told them, oh, it's so expensive and blah, blah, blah. And we've even. You're gonna laugh. We even had friends of ours who were trying to sell this to a little bit because we were so excited about it in the beginning. Still are. We've even had people say, oh, that sounds like a cult. So anyway, so we have a chuckle about that all the time, but, man, all you need to do is just think about things a little differently and get educated. And I hope it reaches somebody like us that were on the fence.

Well, there you have it, folks. Gabe and Trish, another client series conversation episode right here on Wealth Without Bay Street. We thank all of our listeners across the globe for tuning in. And if you're on YouTube, Facebook, please take a moment. Just smash the like button. Let us know if you've got some value from this episode. We'd love to hear your comments and your feedback, and we would also encourage you again to visit wealthoutbaystreet.commasterclass. make sure that you get your hands on a copy of R. Nelson Nash's book, Becoming youg Own Banker. That's a great addition to your library. You'll be very glad that you got this book, I promise you. And so, Dave, Trish, just so grateful. Thank you both so much. We appreciate you. Our listeners are undoubtedly going to be inspired by hearing your story, and I wanted to wish you both an amazing rest of your day. And thank you again for joining us.

Thanks for having us. Jason.

Thanks Jason. Have a good one.

Thanks for listening to the Wealth Without Bay Street Podcast where your wealth matters. Be sure to check out our social media channels for more great content. Hit subscribe on your favorite podcast player and be sure to rate the show. We definitely appreciate. And don't forget to share this episode with someone you care about. Join us on the next episode where we continue to uncover the financial tools, strategies and the mindsets that maximize your wealth.