Eric Brotman is on the show to share with us the four strategies everyone needs to implement to keep Uncle Sam away from your money.
There are so many different ways to build wealth, but the ones Eric focuses on during our interview all has to do with taxes.
Believe it or not, very simple decisions you make today will have tremendous benefits or consequences later in life. Whether we are talking about a 401k, ROTH IRA, 529, or even some outside-of-the-box strategies, all of them have tax implications.
Here’s what we discuss:
NOTE: At the end of the show, Eric drops a bomb on me and I wasn’t ready for it. You are going to “feel” the awkwardness when Eric mentions something which I am NOT a fan of. But...he does a pretty good job of “bending” me just a little bit :)
All the show notes, links and anything Eric and I mentioned can be found at https://www.moneypeach.com/session117
Peter Hug has been in the gold industry for nearly 40 years which makes him an expert in my opinion when it comes to gold.
Now to be honest, I am not a fan of gold (yet). In fact, I have never once invested in gold because I have personally never liked gold as an investment.
So, why am I willing to learn more about gold now, right?
First off - I don’t know much about gold. One of my rules is I do not invest in things I don’t understand. Therefore, investing in gold was never something I was comfortable doing.
Secondly, (I thought) gold didn’t have a great track record when compared to the equity markets. From what I do know, the the price of gold has increased by 355% over the past 30 years, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average has increased by 1,255% during that same time frame.
But, now I am also learning that over the past 15 years, gold has outperformed the market. In fact, gold has returned 355% over the last 15 years (same as the 30-year return) while the Dow has returned only 58%.
After seeing the facts, I decided to ask Peter to come on the show to see if he could convince me gold was a viable option. Here are some of the takeaways from my interview with Peter.
Today we discuss:
All the show notes, links and anything Peter and I mentioned can be found at https://www.moneypeach.com/session116
She’s been the leading lady on local tv for nearly 15 years and now, she is stepping into the next chapter. She’s also my leading lady in life and the Mama to our crazy kiddos. We sit down and she answers the ONE question EVERYBODY has asked us since she resigned from her position.
“How can you just leave a job? An income? Are you scared?”
Many of you know our debt free story and how we were buried under $52,000 in debt in 2010. For those that don’t, well, we tried to keep up with the Jones’ for too long and well, it got us in BIG trouble. Expensive cars, stacks of credit cards with racked up bills, way too much crap and trips we had no business going on. We HAD to make some serious changes.
We had to adopt many new habits and behaviors to get rid of the excess and the debt. We still live under those principles to this day. These habits are what made giving up an income and moving into our next chapter of life, completely possible.
During our interview, Andrea and I break down our Top 5 Money Hacks that we still live by today. We credit each one for helping to get us diminish our debt nearly 8 years ago, move into this next current phase of life and still manage to love each other BIG.
Today we discuss:
• The dreaded “B” Word...yep, BUDGET, I know, but it works...however, we have a fancy-schmancy way of spinning it so it feels awesome.
• The beauty of Sinking Funds aka little online piggy banks that make for saving for special treats easy and seamless.
• The importance of an Emergency Fund. Trust us, that AC unit will go out in June, in Phoenix, while it is 110 degrees outside.
• Old Cars. Yes, we drive 10 year old cars with 160k miles on them and we do not care what the peeps next door think.
• The “$100” rule. We adopted this years ago and it still happens, with every purchase. It’s a must.
All the show notes, links and anything Andrea and I mentioned can be found at https://www.moneypeach.com/session115
Wow - did someone just say that your 401k is a bad plan?
Yes.
Rebecca Walser comes on the show to share with us why your 401k isn’t just hurting you...it’s actually KILLING your financial plan.
It all started back in 1978 when the famous 401k plan was in a way created by accident. Back in the late 1970s, most employers contributed to a defined benefit plan (AKA a pension) and that cost employers a lot of money.
During this same time, tax rates were much higher than they were today and some very highly compensated executives were looking for loopholes to avoid these high taxes. What they proposed was they could be bonused out in the form of a 401k plan, which allowed them to take their bonus, dump it into a 401k plan to avoid paying the high taxes now, and then grab that bonus money at retirement when taxes were much lower.
However, a few years later businesses started catching on and realized they would save millions upon millions of dollars by getting rid of the pension plan and moving to a 401k plan. Instead of having to fund a pension for years after retirement, they could offer a company match and have the employees contribute the majority to their retirement.
And that’s how the 401k became the retirement standard in today’s world...on accident.
But, it’s not 1978 anymore. Taxes are much different than they were then, the government debt is much higher than it was then, and there is a huge problem facing social security.
How are we going to pay for social security AND how are we going to pay off this massive $21 Trillion of debt?
Is it possible that taxes could go up from their all-time lows of 2017?
Wait a minute….if taxes are at an all-time low and we forecast we may need to raise taxes in the future to pay for the government's financial mess….then does it make sense to save in a 401k today?
Are we avoiding having to pay very low taxes today so we can pay much higher taxes in retirement?
In the interview, Rebecca and I talk about:
All the show notes, links and anything Rebecca and I mentioned can be found at https://www.moneypeach.com/session114