Jeff Rose: Good Financial Cents

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Welcome to the New Retirement Podcast. Today we're going to be talking with Jeff Rose. He's the founder of the Good Financial Sense blog, The Wealth Hacker YouTube channel, author of Soldier of Finance and a CFP. We're going to discuss why financial control and independence is important and how to plan, save and invest your way there. We'll also take some listener questions. Jeff is a veteran of the Iraq war who then became a CFP before building his fast growing media empire. Jeff, welcome to our show. It's great to have you join us.

Yeah, I'm excited to be here.

Yeah. So I thought first we could kind of dive in a little bit more about what it means to be Jeff Rose and kind of how you got here because your story is inspirational and I think there's a lot of lessons in there. I guess my first question was, have you gotten comfortable with the whole Media Empire label yet?

I think so. Empire, for some reason, always has this negative connotation to me, but I've just enjoyed producing all types of content. Writing, actually is the one that I. I'm saying I enjoy the least because it, it hurts the most. Hurts my brain, that is because, like, I'm just not a great writer. But like recording a podcast, recording a video, like, I just, it typically brings me life. Like, I enjoy it, but yeah, so I've. I've gotten comfortable with it.

Yeah. And have you? You know, I guess you start with writing, obviously that's. And you find that the hardest. But then that does feel. When I watch some of your YouTube stuff and listen to some of your podcasts, that definitely seems like it comes much more naturally to you. Are you starting to produce a lot more of that kind of content versus the written content?

Yeah, I mean, it's taken me a long time to figure this out, but as far as, like, me actually writing anything for, like, me to record a podcast or a video, there was a time where I could just hit record and go, and it actually wasn't that bad. Like, it didn't suck that bad. I'm at a state now where I just think seeing like the YouTube landscape especially, or even podcasts, I mean, there was just such great production that exists that I've put a lot of more pressure on myself to produce the final product. The final offering is good quality. So I do spend some time. I don't script out anything. Like, that's just not me, actually. Do I Respect for those that don't know this. Like, you do an amazing job putting all these questions together, giving some context. Like, I look at what you do and I get, I give it. I get anxiety because it takes a lot of my brain that I don't have, I guess, to do like this part. So take like what you put together and like, number one, a sentence, number two, a sentence, maybe a few bullet points. And that's what I start with. And then from there I can hit record and record the podcast, record the video. Unless there's like any specific, like, stat or figure, you know, I want to share, like a dividend yield, for example. But if it's all stuff that I already know, like based on my experience, personal story, I just list out the major bullet points and I'm good to go. And then from there, I'll have an editor take that podcast or video after it gets transcribed, and they'll turn that into a very, very well written blog post. Better than I could ever put together.

Yeah, I shared your kind of highlight video that's on your YouTube channel with our team. And I was like, this is pretty amazing because it seems very well produced. It's kind of amazing what can be made with a. I mean, I don't know how big your team is, but from the take of what it was about, which is kind of like how you, how you've built your business, it seems like you are super efficient with resources. But it comes across as well produced, well edited and all that stuff. I mean, how big is your. The team that's behind you?

So on the blog, on the website itself, like, we've got like five team members right now. I just have a podcast editor, I have a executive assistant. And then the video team right now is actually a subscription service that I've been using for a year. It's called vidchops V. I D Chops. And it went through a process. I've had video editors, but I kind of geek out. Like, for me, what? Like, for me, I know we talk about control, right? I mean, that's one of the questions I think we started talking about. Control and financial independence for me was if I wanted to create a piece of content, if I want to record something, whether it be video or podcast, and I want to know how to do it. I want to have the equipment right now, this whole setup. I've got three cameras, I got my podcast mic, my mixers, and all this stuff. So I did geek out on getting all this set up. But why was. Because when I'M ready to do something. I didn't want to have any obstacles in my way preventing me from doing so. Whereas I know there are some entrepreneurs. I know, two advisors, financial advisors, have like a great podcast, a lot of listeners, and one of the guys I talked to, like, he doesn't know how to record a video, like by himself, you know, and there's part of that I can respect. Right. I mean, he's just there for the expertise, you know, his knowledge. So I can respect that. But for me, it's like I want to be able to come here, hit record, and then. And go, you know, and not have anything stopping me. So anyway, that's the approach I have taken. You know, what works for everybody is differently, but that's. That's what I enjoy.

Nice. Well, you. You mentioned you also have an ea. Is that like a local person or is that a virtual.

Yeah, she is virtual. She actually lives north of Nashville, so not too far from me. And I didn't realize that until after, I think after I started, she was referred to me, not knowing that she was like 45 minutes from me. But we have never met in person and we've been working together for at least three or four years.

All right, I'm thinking about getting an ea, so maybe I should. If they have spare time, let me know.

My favorite, My favorite thing with my executive assistant, which I finally figured this out. So we. And there's a few different apps you can use, but I use an app called Voxer with a V, which is almost like a chat, like an online. Like a chat, like a walkie talkie, but with like a chat function. So I'm the type of guy where when I get an idea, I don't want to send an email, I don't want to get on the slack. I will if it needs more detail, but I just go on Voxer and I just start talking and she'll take that and run with it. So, like, that's been such a huge blessing.

Yeah, it definitely feels like this. You have the superpower that some kind of super empowered individuals have where they really figure out what to outsource in their lives, remove a lot of friction, and it lets them scale up in a big way. I mean, are you really intentional about that or is it just kind of happened?

I definitely was not intentional. It all started for me when I joined a business coaching program. And this would have been probably eight or nine years ago. Program's called Strategic Coach, founded by Dan Sullivan. And there was a lot of different exercises that we went through to get us to that point. But I remember one of the first things that he introduced us to was the entrepreneurial time system. And in that there are three different days of the week. You have your focus day, your free day, and your buffer day. And then one of the first exercises we had to do was, over the last year, calculate how many free days that we had taken. And his definition of a free day was nothing work related. So that means not reading no trade magazines, no blog posts, no emails. And at the time, I was still a practicing financial planner, so I didn't work on the weekends. I was good there. But I also was growing this media empire that you spoke of, which at that time was mainly the blog. And I was writing blog posts, I was responding to emails, I was tweeting all this stuff on the weekends. So that exercise, calculating how many free days I took over the last year took me all about 45 seconds because the answer was zero. Like, zero I hadn't taken. I didn't even know what a free day was. And that began this process of, like, one of the first things I did was I scheduled, I think it was a Wednesday during the summer, taking my kids to the St. Louis Zoo. And like, I know that sounds like, so stupid, but like, at that time, like, taking a day out of the middle of the week, that wasn't a vacation to go do a family thing and not respond to email. So, like, I had to set up with my assistant. I'm like, listen, hey, don't call me if there's an a client. There's a dire emergency. But other than that, like, don't contact me. And that's, you know, I said we set that up. And I freaking out, like, oh my gosh, can I really do this? Like, it's because, you know, vacations before was like, I was always checking email. You know, it was either on my BlackBerry, old school, you know, on the beach, you know, checking email or checking the stock market, whatever. You know, it was almost like the status thing of like, oh, look at me, look how important I am that I've got my BlackBerry and I'm. I'm emailing my clients, you know, because that's how important I am. Yeah, it's like, it's so funny looking back, like, hustle culture.

There's like hustle culture right now or kind of grinding culture, you know, in Twitter.

Yeah. So anyway, like, that began this whole process of like, taking time off. So then it started, you know, I had to start answering this question of like, okay, it's not can I do this? Or how do I do this? It's like, what do I need to change about my role, my duties, my team that allow this to happen? And it was not too long after that, I believe is whenever I scheduled a two week RV trip, it was just my wife and my three boys at the time. We didn't have our daughter yet. So I took a two week RV trip and completely, I would say I didn't completely unplug, but for the most part I did. Unless there was. I did have like, I think one or two a client emergencies come up that I had to get on the phone and it was totally fine. But nonetheless, like, I'd never taken two weeks off to go get an RV and go to the Grand Canyon. And that just began this process of continually focusing on what Dan Sullivan defines as your unique ability. You know, what are the things that you enjoy doing, that you love doing, that give you life, that give you purpose, but further, furthermore, also pay you very well. And you know, that was like, I mean, I used to schedule my own appointments. It was like one of those things I just kind of did. And it's like, why, why am I doing this? You know, you go to a doctor's office, you don't call the doctor's office and talk to the doctor and they put you on the, you know, on the calendar. It was just like these little things. I just started to change about what I was doing and not, not not only train myself, but train, train myself, my staff, and also my clients. Like, hey, when you need a distribution from your ira, you don't need to talk to me. Mary will take care of it. She can handle that. When you need to update your beneficiaries, you don't need to talk to me. You can talk to somebody else on my team. So we did have to retrain a lot of people. But man, just starting that process was just so life giving.

Yeah, it's great hearing your story and kind of like how you or this process that you went through. Are you still working with a coach right now?

No, like I, I did strategic coach for five years, then I did Michael Hyatt. He had a coaching program for a year and then began to transition. We ended up moving to Nashville and it's been four years that I've had any sort of coach. And I finally have reached this point in my life where like, I recognize, like, I need it. I'm looking for something. I won't say actively, but I am asking questions because I do have some certain requirements I guess that I'm looking for. But yeah, I mean, coaching has just been. I've had mentors, I've been in mastermind groups, and I kind of just walked away for a little bit. Kind of like took a break just to deal with some family stuff. And now I'm at this point where I'm seeking it. I recognize it is definitely a void in my life right now.

Can you just give us some quick color before I move on? Just like where you're at right now in terms of the media side of things, like the audience that you reach, because this goes to kind of what you're trying to get done. But when I took a quick look at YouTube and some of the podcast stuff that you're doing, I mean, there's some pretty big numbers out there.

Yeah. So I mean, for those that don't know, I was a financial planner for 16 years. I was CEO of my own wealth management firm, my own RIA Alliance Wealth Management, and really thought that was it. I was going to do that for the rest of my life. And along the way I stumbled upon blogging. And as I started to learn just the reach and the impact and also the business side of it, that's where it ended up shifting. So I think it was two years now where I ended up selling the financial planning practice altogether. Focus on the blog, the YouTube channel and the podcast. The blog is the main business. The YouTube channel and the podcast are more or less like marketing components supporting components of the site. So right now with the blog we attract anywhere from 500 to a million visitors a month on the site, depending on how much Google likes us. YouTube, I think we got 375,000 subscribers. And the podcast is something I've had for a while, but re relaunched I guess the fall of last year. So it's still small in comparison. I think we're only getting between 10 to 12,000 down downloads a month right now. But yeah, I mean that's what I do. And it's been, you know, it's funny where I live right now, I live just outside of Nashville and Dave Ramsey, like his headquarters is literally like, I think like six miles from my house and every time I drive it towards Nashville, towards Franklin, you know, there he is like right there. And I mean he's something I, you know, I like a lot of what Dave does. I also disagree with a lot of things that he does. But you can't deny just the impact and the reach that he's had with his show and his Books and all his training stuff. And it's impressive to see his new building that I believe is all paid for in cash. And I think what I've heard is he's had some good real estate investments in the Nashville area and has capitalized on those. But nonetheless, he's been an inspiration of mine because whether it's just every day, when I produce something, it's like, man, I know I'm going to help somebody. Like, I know that this piece of information, whether it be a podcast or video or blog, is going to help somebody. And I don't always get those people responding back, saying, oh, thank you so much. But the ones I do get, those are ones I hang on to, you know, and it's just. It's good. It's just good knowing that. I've had, like, a few people reach out to me this week, actually, just sharing, like, hey, like, when I first started listening to you, I had a negative net worth, you know, and now we have plans of, like, retiring early, and it's just like, oh, that's cool. You know, like, it's. It's so. It's neat knowing that I, you know, I. I was that seed for them. They still had to water it and nurture it and, you know, take action and do everything. But it's cool knowing that something that I did, you know, gave them the catalyst to start it, you know, to realize that there is something different for them and that they took action on it 100%.

I want to give a shout out to all the listeners and users and consumers of people like Jeff or myself or other people that are trying to build things. Because actually, the feedback you get isn't that often, but positive feedback goes a long way. I mean, I share. We get the same stuff. People email us and be like, hey, this stuff's been game changing my life. And we're like, sharing it to our team. It's like, oh, wow. Like, we've had this huge impact. It's almost more valuable than someone's like, hey, we think your company's worth a lot of money. You're like, okay, great. But, you know, we're really here. Like, you can we positively impact lots of people, build kind of a new way to serve these folks.

Yeah. And then you bounce that off with the. I think for every one positive comment that I get, and this is mostly on YouTube, which I've got thick enough skin now, but I probably get like 250, like, mean comments or just like, it's like, wow, dear Lord.

And.

But I'VE just, I've embraced it. I love responding with emojis. That's what I do. Giving people a virtual hug is like, gosh, like, you just, you just hate the world right now. Like, wow. I feel, I feel almost. I feel good in the sense that I have. I've impacted your life that much that you felt the need to leave this two paragraph diatribe me comment. Like, wow, okay. Awesome.

Yeah. That's amazing. Yeah. Every channel's any. Every channel is so different. Well, yeah, congrats on. You're a testament to focus. Right? I mean, that's something that I've heard a lot too, is like, hey, you got to really focus on what you want. And I remember reading about how you were, you know, kind of shutting down the, you know, wealth business and doing this. And I was like, at the time, I was like, wow, that seems like a big move, but clearly it's, it's working out. And so your vision, like, how big do you think this could get? Gosh, you know.

I used to get really, I want to say obsessed with hitting certain numbers and hitting visitors, and maybe I'll go back there and I'll revisit it behind the scenes. There's been some shakeup, like, with the business structure, and I had a falling out with a business partner that has, I won't say derailed the business, but it definitely has forced me to take a step back and reassess what our goals are. Because at one time when I was working with this business partner, we had an exit strategy or exit goal of 100 million of selling the site. And as of right now, we're nowhere close to that. But I recognize for me, it's like, gosh, when I started getting those numbers, I can't even fathom I don't need $100 million. When you see these NBA and major league Baseball contracts, like, all these athletes making this insane amount of money, it's like, gosh, how do you even spend that? And I recognize I started getting really caught up in that and what did we need to do to get to that number? And really, I mean, that's great. And that's not. I mean, that works for certain people, but for me, it removed why I started this in the first place. What was the whole point? And yes, it was a marketing channel for the financial planning practice, but underneath was really just this desperate cry to prevent people from making the same mistakes. Not only that I made, but for those that don't know my background, my dad filed for bankruptcy twice in his Life not once, but twice. And when he passed away, I mean, he had a negative net worth. He was asking me to pay for an insurance policy on him. I think it was a whole life policy. It had to have been a whole life policy, pay the premium so that I would get the death benefit. That was his way of like, hey, I want to give back to you. Like, oh, dad, that just feels wrong. It just feels wrong. And, and maybe I would have made money out of the deal, but I just, I was like, no, I don't want to do that. Like, I just, I'm not comfortable doing that. And, you know, seeing how much he struggled with finances and also seeing like early on in my career, like I was going down that same path and knowing that we're not the only ones. My dad was not the only one. I'm not the only one. And just wanted to share a lot of that stuff with people so that they didn't fall in that same trap. So that continues to be, you know, the mission and the purpose behind it. So I have tried to figure out a way of like, how do I track this? I mean, I can check Google Analytics all day and downloads and views on YouTube. And to me that's just like one of these metrics is like saying, oh, how many followers you have on Instagram? It's like, I want to know how many of these people actually took action and did something and started investing. Started a Roth ira, bought life insurance, retired early. Like, that would be something if I could track. As of right now, I just take a screenshot of every positive comment or email that I. Not every comment, but mostly the emails that I get for people because I'm like, man, somebody's taking time out of their day to thank me for something that I did this week or 10 years ago. I put that into a little folder just so like, man, I need a little pick me up. I can read like, oh man, I remember Carol or Johnny or whomever. Like, it's just good to, good to remember that.

Well, it's interesting where, you know, we just did this OKR exercise which is objectives and key results for our business. So this is a big thing from John Doerr, who is a venture capitalist here. He took it out to Google. And most many companies out here use this methodology of like, how do you set goals and how do you drive alignment in your organization? But one of the discussion points was, you know, what's our big hairy, audacious goal? Right this Bhagavad. And we're reading like Google well, for YouTube, they had a bhag early on of like, we want to have 100 billion hours of video consumed per. I don't know if it was day or week or month, but it was not that big amount of time. But it was, like, seemed like this insanely audacious goal which they ended up hitting. But the. So we were thinking about ours and to your point about how do you measure impact? We provide planning software, but we can see what people are doing, like what they punch in, how they're tracking their plan, how they come back to it. And we're building in more capabilities so we can help them take action and see the impact. So we were like, okay, we want to help 100 million people per month through planning. That's what we want to get to. Or maybe bigger. I mean, we. We feel like this problem is, you know, global. There's 7 billion people on this planet, right. Most of them are pretty crappy with their money and have very little control. And the ones that do, well, they seem like they have much better lives. So do you have that kind of, you know, big goal in your mind of, like, where this is going to be in 5 or 10 years for your business?

Yeah, I think, you know, there is, like, one metric that I'm trying to figure out, a way to track it, but it was. When I say it this way, I don't actually like how it sounds, but it's like helping 1 million people make $1 million. And it's like, oh, that sounds actually like, it sounds somewhat superficial. Right. But the more behind that is, if I can show people to do it the way that I would do it is that means if they make a million dollars, then they're going to take 10% of that and they're going to give it to their church or a charity or, you know, some sort of charitable organization. And also, like, when you learn how to do this, I mean, for the most part, like, you can't help but want to, like, share it with others, you know, so it's like, you know, there's going to have that, that, that. That exponential reach. So it's like, gosh, like, if I could show, you know, 1 million people to make a million, and then they take 10% of that and give it away to a good cause. You know, I think I forgot the number now, but it was like some crazy number. Yeah, it's like that was really more. The reasoning behind it was not so much. So they can go out and buy a Lamborghini and put that on Facebook or Instagram, but really just show people how to do that. And that's something I've not really openly shared a lot, just because I'm looking for the cool thing to name it, put a little trademark behind it, and then I have some sort of way to track it. And I don't know what that is, but that's kind of what I'm doing without really verbally announcing it as a goal.

That's awesome. Well, it feels like you're well on your way. I mean, you know, 375,000 YouTube subscribers. Many people would kill for that, you know, so. And that's just one part of what you're doing. So, like, you know, as you've helped people over the years, you know, do you have, like, a methodology, a kind of, like, steps people should take that you. You find, or I guess that help them address the most common problems to kind of get on track?

Yeah, I mean, I really don't, like, oh, wait, what's my Dave Ramsey? Like, Baby steps. And, you know, I do like, you know, his initial steps. I mean, for most people that don't have, you know, a savings account, don't have an emergency fund, all that good stuff, like, that's important. But really, like, at the end of the day, like, it becomes like, you got to know what you're trying to do. Like, you got to have that goal. Like, you got to know what are you trying to accomplish. Because if you're just saving just to save, I mean, that's good. I mean, it's probably better than most, but if you don't have a specific goal of retiring at a certain age, I think before I even understood financial independence, my goal at the time, when I was still a financial planner, was not retire at the age of 50. I wanted to have the financial resources so that if I could retire at the age of 50, it was a possibility. But at the time, I'm like, man, I don't ever think I really want to retire. I mean, probably naive because I was still in my late 20s, early 30s, but even now. So time is recording. I'm 43 years old, and I still enjoy what I do. Not a financial planner anymore, but I enjoy sharing my experiences and helping people. I really like testing new things, whether it be opening new accounts, testing. I'm really into crypto right now and just testing out different investment platforms so that I can kind of be that guinea pig for people, because a lot of people are scared to take that risk, you know, like, oh, it just seems overwhelming. I don't know how to do it. Like, okay, well, let me do it, you know, and I'll record a video and publish a blog, a blog post, or record a podcast and, you know, share my experience. But so, like, it's going back to answering your question is you got to have that goal, you know, is that you want to retire at the age of 50 and have so much an income. Like, if that's the goal, because without that, then it's like, well, because once you know that, then it just becomes this whole reverse engineer and like, okay, well, what do you need to start today? What's the first step? What do you need to do?

And are you. I mean, it sounds like you're financially independent today. Probably.

I mean, I cannot buy all the Jordan 86, three rookies, as I would like, mostly because my wife won't let me. But though it's so funny because, like, financial independence, like, for those that haven't achieved it, like, you read it, you know, like, you'll read the definitions and maybe you listen to the podcast or read the blogs, but whenever you're here and you've arrived, like, you almost like, oh, is this it? Like, is this what financial independence is? And I don't know if I'm jumping ahead here, but. So my middle son, so I've got four kids, my middle son just turned 12, and his favorite team, favorite player, Steph Curry of the Golden State warriors, was in town playing the Memphis Grizzlies in town. It's like three hours away. And I'm like, dude, your favorite player is in town on your birthday. Like, you have to go. Like, we have to go, right? So we took off on Monday, drove to Memphis, went to the game, you know, spent the night, went to David Buster's the next day, played video games, and drove back. I didn't have to ask permission. I didn't have to ask for time off. Only thing I had to, no, I didn't have to reschedule this podcast. That was because of snow. And to me, it's like, to me, that's financial independence of. I got to do that because I wanted to and I got to do with one of my kids. And we had an awesome one on one trip. Warriors lost, but it was still a great game. You know, it's just. And so it's like those little things, but those are the things that I almost have to. Like, I do a gratitude journal every single day. And sometimes, like, I forget, like, that's. That's my life right now, you know, for others like, they don't get that opportunity, you know, And I have to like, tell that to my kids all the time. Like, hey, this. How do I say this? Like, this isn't the real world. I mean, it can be, you know, but for many people, like, this isn't how it works. It takes time. And I think something you and I have talked about before is my kids get the benefit of seeing hours and years of hard work and sacrifice to get where I'm at now. And that scares the crap out of me because they don't see the 96 Grand Am that I drove or the 98 Chevy Lumen that I was driving as a financial advisor. They don't see the house of my dad had to borrow money from his ex wife, my mom, to purchase, which was $8,000, you know, the house that we grew up in. They don't see that. I constantly remind them and show them pictures and stories and you know, just so they realize, like, hey, this, this doesn't just happen overnight like this. There was a lot of work and luck and drive and grit, you know, that got got me to this point. So that's, that's something that you also want. It's going to take a lot of that as well.

Yeah. It's awesome to hear that story, by the way. I think it's. Is it Ja Morant? He's the guy, right? That guy's incredible. That guy's the next Steph Curry. I don't know. Did you see the video? The highlight where he's like almost banging his head against. Was gonna knock his head against the backboard. Guy can jump like he was up a four foot vertical.

It was, it was amazing. I think he had at least two or three alley oops to him. Like that game. It's like, you might not like we. I'm not a Memphis fan per se, but like, dear Lord. I mean, there is a team. It's exciting to watch, especially with him. I mean, he, he is fun to watch.

Yeah, for sure. We'll have to do a separate session on the, the warriors and basketball. I did see in your YouTube video your collection of sneakers. I was like, oh, that's pretty interesting. He's got like a whole closet full of like clearly collector items here. Yeah, no, by the way, one interesting thing that I've done sometimes with my kids is like, like, if we're watching an older movie, like a movie from like older. I mean, like from like the 80s, I'd be like, yeah, you know, there's a phone booth, right? Look at these cars, there's no cell phones. Right. That's what it gives them a little sense of, like, it wasn't life wasn't like it is now, always connected. And also your life is super blessed. And most people, yeah, don't get to live this way. And you may not either, because you have to make your own money and kind of figure out your way in the world. But they do get the benefit of kind of seeing, they say a lot of entrepreneurs, they have entrepreneurs in the family because they've kind of seen, seen their parents do it and they're like, oh, it's possible I can go start a company. You know, you can do it for nothing. You know, I think a lot of people that think about starting companies, they feel like it's this giant challenge is impossible to do and they never do it. And, you know, you gotta just start somewhere. So we talked a little bit about kind of financial independence and some of the things you need to do. I think as people get closer, one of the big challenges in our audience is, you know, how do I know I have enough? How do I actually turn these assets that I've been saving my whole life into, into income and feel like it's safe enough to make this switch? Any insights from, you know, your life as a planner and working with folks or your own life where you're like, hey, this is how I managed to make it real. Because, like, especially if you're younger, right. You're in your 40s, right. You might be alive, hopefully 50 more years, you got to have enough income and, you know, from passive income or whatever, or things that you love doing where you can, you know, sustain your life.

Yeah. I mean, it doesn't matter what your age, how much you have, it's. It's never going to feel like it's safe. Like, it's never going to feel like it's the right time. And that's just something. And for me, because it's that transition of going from their career, like what they do every single day to all of a sudden now, like, wait, what, I don't have to wake up at 6am and go to work and drive to the office or wherever I got to go. So it's never going to feel safe. And I mean, the only thing you really can do is run the projections and with the help of hopefully a financial professional that can address just how you're invested and also knows your tendencies and just run these projections and that's really all that you can do to see if it actually makes Sense. Or if you're just completely in the dark, just for. Some people may have like, oh, I've got $200,000. That seems like that's enough based on your spending needs. No, your two and a half years are done. You have to go back to work. But I think it's just like, accept the fact that it's never going to feel like the right time. And being scared is a good thing. I mean, that's not a bad thing for the most part, unless you never retire. I've had instances where people had millions of dollars and these were talking about, we'll say grandparents from the Depression era, where they wouldn't even spend their Social Security check because they thought they were going to run out of money. There's that extreme. That's not healthy. But I think accepting the fact, like, hey, okay, I really want to do this right now. And I think also too, it's just quality of life. And what is your job? How hard is it? I had a lot of clients that used to work at a power plant, and it was a hard job. And there was instances where guys they worked with busted their butt working overtime weekends. Finally get a couple million dollars. All right, it's time to retire. And it wasn't my client, it was a friend of theirs. He was retired for a couple years. Heart attack, done. And that's basically working where it's just too much. So, yeah, never going to feel safe when you start working with somebody. Run the numbers to see is this going to work out and then plan for some. Plan for life to get involved. And there's going to be some oh, crap factors are going to come up that's going to drain the, the piggy bank a little bit. But, you know, as long as you, you've had somebody give you that stamp of approval, I mean, I think that's when it's time, time to go, right?

What kind of safe withdrawal rate do you kind of coach people up on or have you seen out there as a best practice?

Oh, it's so funny. Like, I always, I mean, you always start with that, like 4%, 5%, somewhere in that, that, that ballpark. And maybe it was just the clients I had, but that's where we would start. And like, that's what they always were, like, yeah, that sounds good. And then like three months later, like, oh, hey, we're going to go on this vacation or we want to buy this car or we're going to do this home repair. And I'm like, do you remember that plan that we worked on. We were like. And you were like, we're very confident that there was nothing else that you were going to spend money on, at least in the first year. Like, we haven't made it halfway there and you're already asking for more money. That wasn't every single client, but there's definitely some of those that come to mind. But always tried to stay in that 4 to 5% range. And if anybody wanted to take more out, it was just like, hey, your money, you know, you are in control of that. Like, just, you need to understand what are the potential ramifications if we do this and we run the numbers again so they could see. And either that would scare them into like, oh, no, you're right, maybe I don't need this.

Or.

Or it was like, eh, I only live once. Yolo.

Right, right, right. Do you, like, how frequently were you checking in? Or do you think people should check in? Is this like every six months? Kind of like rerun the numbers and see where you're at. Or is it quarterly or is it annually?

Yeah, I think with most, most of the retired retiree clients that we had that were taking their distributions, like, we would meet at least once every six months. Depending on how complex our situation was. There were a few that we'd meet quarterly, and that was really it. I mean, if we needed like a phone call, check in. And there were some that I had to tell them, like, listen, stop, you know, stop, stop checking. And I hate to say that, but I just think of one situation where, I mean, I thought the guy was gonna have a heart attack because the Dow Jones was down 1%. And I could hear it in his voice and I could see it. It's like, dude, this is not healthy for you because it's like, we have a plan. The plan is in, in place. You know, trust the plan. And like, you have to surrender that and like, if it's too much for you, then that's fine. But realize if we go into, you know, if you're going to go back to the bank or wherever you want to go, then a lot of the things that you want to do is not going to be a possibility.

100%. Yeah, I think it's hard for people like, you know, in the past, you know, whatever decade, I guess, right, since the great financial crisis, it's been pretty good times in the. Very good times in the stock market. And so people are getting used to that. But you know, if you have to, if you go to retire in the first few years, there's some serious volatility and the market's down a lot. You have to be ready psychologically and feel confident that like, yeah, the long term plan is going to hold together or you're going to might find yourself doing bad things that like selling it all at the bottom, which is what many retail investors do. Like, I can't handle it. And then they're out and then they're screwing themselves for the next 20 years.

And something that I did and I don't know, I just feel like I need to do this because a lot of these retirement questionnaires that you take, like, oh, how risky are you? And how much loss can you stomach? Oh, I'm good with 20%. That's happened before. Yeah, that's fine. They're like, okay, well you've got 1.5 million. So if you were to lose 20% in a year, here's how much. This is what it looks like and you quantify it and most people will be like, oh, crap, hell no. So they think they're okay with that until it happens. So I always try to quantify so they could see in regards to their specific portfolio. This is what that looks like when you hear this all the time. Okay, you see that on tv? Well, this is what it looks like for you. How does that make you feel?

I think this is the biggest part of one of the biggest values of having a financial advisor in your corner is that when, you know, the bad stuff hits the fan, you have someone to talk to before you, you know, start, you know, making crazy moves. One user from our audience, Jolene, was saying, hey, you know, why don't more people retire offshore? I mean, did you see people, you know, making big moves either in onshore, like cheaper locations or let's go to Mexico for five or ten years?

No, I mean, not really. I mean, maybe that's just because where I, I was in the southern Illinois area, so a lot of people kind of stayed there locally. I will say here recently I've had quite a few people. I know I've moved to Puerto Rico, take advantage of the tax benefits. But no, not really. And that's the thing for most people. Well, I would say the most common reason is that for retirees that have their kids and have their grandkids is that they don't want to move too far away from them. It's just more of the family aspect or it's just the fact that like. Yeah, that just sounds scary. Like, how do you do that? You know, I mean, if you've never done it before.

Yeah, that's what. Yeah, it's a great point in the grandkids. You know, I think a lot of people, they don't. That. That is like the biggest single thing that drives a lot of grandparents to say. It's the greatest part. Last question here. You know, Brian is asking about, you know, any best practices on autopilot piloting, like the decumulation part. Have you seen people do that? String accounts together and automate it?

Yeah. No, Like I read his question. I'm like, he has to be an engineer. Like, there has to be some sort of engineering background. Because I'm like, oh, I'm sure that you could set something up that is definitely over. Over anything that I would have any interest in doing. But no, I'm. I mean, yeah, that's. I would be curious to see like what he's trying to do and if anything else exists out there, especially with different accounts, because I'm sure there's software that exists. But it sounds like, I don't know, a lot of these firms, they don't work together. They don't like working together.

Some of that's actually in our software at some point. Maybe I'll show it to you. We help people think through how to take down taxable tax deferred and then tax exempt. But there is still a lot of, you know, thinking that people doing it. Okay, well, look, we have two minutes left. So before I wrap it up, any. You've listed some great resources which we'll put into the show notes. But any other, you know, resources that you love that you want to call out, including your own for folks that are. Our audience is mostly like kind of 50 plus, getting ready for retirement and looking for help.

Yeah, I mean, not so much maybe like on the investing side. But you know, I mentioned a strategic coach and basically like was a goal setting system that I ended up learning through that process. And I finally basically took that, adapted that, and I've created it. So it is a course. It's called the 10x goals accelerator. And for me, it's almost kind of like the same reason why I do what I do is so with strategic Coach, all these other coaching programs, I mean, you're talking like 10, $15,000 to be a part of it. And I wanted to create something that was for the younger version of me or that person that wants this but doesn't have the 10 or $15,000 to set it up. So basically it's just like a goal setting system which sounds pretty generic in a sense. But I mean just the process that I went through in that coaching program, like how it has impacted my business, my personal life, you know, how I set goals, how I achieve them, how I celebrate the wins and passing that on to my kids. And man, it's just like it has really, truly been like a game changer in my life. And so anyway, that's something else that it's live. I'm not really heavily promoting it yet, but I'm excited to get it out there because I know how much of an impact it's going to have on people just because how much has impacted me.

Sure. Well, it definitely. So the 10x goals accelerator. We'll find it and put a link to it. Thanks Jeff for being on our show. Thanks Dotto Roberson for being our sound engineer for the folks out there. Appreciate your time and listening to this and if you've made it this far, definitely check out Jeff's site, goodfinancialsense.com or YouTube channel or blog, podcast and also a link to the course. And hopefully you check out our software as well. And with that, appreciate your time and attention and have a great day.

Sam.