Ready to Take the Next Step ?- Episode 259

This transcript was auto-generated and may contain errors.

[00:04] Welcome to the Prosperity Podcast, fresh alternative personal finance talk for independent thinkers who prosper outside of Wall Street. Here’s your host, best-selling author, Kim D.H. Butler. Welcome to another episode of the Prosperity Podcast. We’re going to have a special treat today because we’re going to find out a little bit more about Kim and how Kim works and then what we need to do if we decide to take that next step. The next step is typically sending an email at hello at partnersforprosperity.com or going on her website. But then it’s, what do I do after that? So Kim, are you there with us? Yes, Spencer. Hello. Hello. Hello. So our listeners, and this is feedback that we get often, people say, hey, I really

[00:55] love the podcast. I feel like I’m learning so much and they get to know you more and they may dive in and read a book and they realize, okay, I’m ready to take the next step. And because you’ve been doing this for quite a while, you’ve got a process and we would love to hear what that process is. So what’s that next step? So the beginning of that next step is having a little bit of organization around your finances. And this is not financial planning. Financial planning says that you have to have everything all neatly tied up in a bow with your assets and your liabilities and your income and your expenses. And you have to know all the detail and make a bunch of projections and et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

[01:38] This is prosperity economics. And what that means is that we take the dollars that you have today and we help you get the most out of them. And yes, we too may make some projections just in order to help you learn about how things act in the future. But we’re really, really focused just on the dollars that you have today. So it helps if you’re just a little bit organized when you come to us, just a little bit of a big picture sense of where your dollars are and a little bit of a big picture sense of what’s going on in the income and expense world. And I am a very big picture person and I’m well aware that not everybody is. So for those of you that are, that’s totally logical to you. For those of you that are a little more detailed, you’re going to think,

[02:21] gosh, you know, aren’t you missing a whole bunch by not getting all the details? And the frank answer is in the first meeting, no, we’re not missing anything on purpose. Because sometimes second principle of our seven, seeing the big picture of your finances is the most valuable thing that you can do. And that’s really what I strive to do on that first meeting. So as Spencer mentioned, you reach out. Hello at partners for prosperity dot com. We go through just a little bit of fact gathering prior to the meeting that usually either Jill or Teresa or Lou does. Sometimes we even do it on a form. It kind of depends. We’re pretty ready here to help anybody. And I think that’s an important thing. We don’t have minimums here.

[03:01] We can help anybody and sometimes we help you really fast because there’s not much that we can do. And other times, of course, it’s a more thorough process. But the way that we work with clients is completely over the phone. So we have clients in all 50 states and I say over the web also. And yet it’s interesting. I’ve found as technology gets greater and greater and more and more people are used to having video meetings, Skype chats, that kind of thing. I tend to go less and less to the technology and just have the phone conversation because it enables me to really listen to you and you to me. And I think that’s super critical because it is something that I find enables me to help you more.

[03:43] And in addition, of course, Lou Panetta is also doing some of these meetings because he’s our advisor that helps some of our clients as well. And he too likes to listen. We just find us those first second meetings are primarily typically just over the phone so that everybody can listen. Nobody’s fussing with the technology and screen sharing and videos and et cetera, et cetera. Does that make sense so far? That does make sense. I agree with that philosophy. Then the second step is to go in one of two directions. Many people contact us because they just want a product. They want the cash value life insurance that they’ve heard about. They want the bridge loans that they’ve heard about. They want the life settlements or a very myriad other list of alternative

[04:26] investments that they work with. And they really don’t want a deep dive into all their finances. They really don’t want an expose on the seven principles of prosperity. Maybe they’ve already read them or heard them or feel like they know them or what have you. They just want a product. And so in that environment, that’s what we do. We get on the phone again fairly quickly. We’re able to delve into which product is the right fit and based on whether the person is accredited or not. So just quick sidetrack. If you’re not familiar with this term, accreditation means you’re over a million dollar net worth or your income is 200,000 single 300,000 married. And if you’re over that accreditation line, then you have certain

[05:05] investments that are available to you. If you’re under it, you don’t have those investments available to you, but we have others that are available. So we figure out the best product. We talk IRA versus cash similar to an earlier podcast. If you haven’t grabbed that one already. It will be helpful to you. And then we’re able to get down to product fairly quickly because it’s fairly clear what is going to be the right product for that fit. So that’s one way that we can help you is very specifically product oriented. Now, the other way that we can help you is more strategy oriented. And so we have a five step process that we charge a fee for, and the fee depends on the person situation. It’s usually, I’ll just say a thousand to 10,000 to give a big range,

[05:53] but it enables us to go in a little deeper, ask a lot more questions, get more detailed, cover the seven principles of prosperity, use our specialized proprietary prosperity profile, which is a one page document that maybe we’ll chat about on another podcast, if you convince me to let the cat out of the bag. And it enables us, this process enables us to have a much deeper dive. It’s very strategy oriented. And at the same time, it ends up often picking up the same products as well, because strategies are what you do and products are what you buy. And you can’t really implement a lot of strategy with the typical financial planning products that are out there. There are some, and without a doubt, we have some people that

[06:42] don’t ever buy product from us. They just pay us for the strategy. But it’s very clear in my mind that most people are very benefited by the product. So that’s an in addition environment. And we do it typically towards the end, middle to the end of the strategy sessions. Again, there’s five steps to our specialized process. And you can read more about our specialized process on the website, partners, number four, prosperity.com. And so if you are curious about that, the prosperity pathway, we call it. Again, it’s five steps. That doesn’t mean it’s five meetings for one family. It could be 10 meetings. And for another, it could be two. It just depends on the situation. But those are the ways that we work with our clientele.

[07:27] Now, before I go on and talk a little bit about organizing your finances, questions so far, Spencer? I do. I actually have a question. So why is it that you put stress, such an emphasis on the strategy versus the product? Thanks for asking that. So as I’ve indicated, products are things that you buy. It literally could be a life insurance policy, a money market account at a brokerage firm, a bridge loan, a life settlement fund, self-directed IRA, whatever it is, those are products. They’re very straightforward. You buy them. Strategy is what you do with them. So as an example, borrowing against your cash value of life insurance, that’s a strategy, not reinvesting your dividends or your interest at

[08:07] your money market account or your mutual fund. That’s a strategy. The product is the money market or the mutual fund. The strategy is what you do with it. And most strategy is as simple as checking a different box. Like if you have a savings account at a bank, you check one box to reinvest your interest and you check another box to pay your interest in cash. I know savings accounts aren’t really paying any interest, but you get the point. So that’s a important distinction to me because I think people sometimes get confused, like, well, you know, how are you different? Like, what are you doing that’s different than a typical financial planner? And the fact is both our products and our strategies are different.

[08:43] So a typical financial planner is going to be typically stock, bond and mutual fund oriented. We’re not, we’re bridge loans, life settlements and cash value of life insurance oriented. A typical financial planner is going to be reinvesting your dividends and trying to grow those accounts as big as possible. We don’t like dividends reinvested unless it’s IRA money. We want those dividends paid in cash if you have them. And there’s a whole host of other strategies. I literally have a page. That is a 10 or 20 strategies. Maybe sometime I’ll get you to let the cat out of the bag on those as well. And we’ll actually share them because to a certain degree, they’re just basic economic transactions.

[09:25] Like I said, they’re available on the forms, typically the paperwork that you do for the product that you own, but people just don’t understand how to use them. So again, products are things that you buy or invest in or put money in and strategies are things that you do. That makes a whole lot of sense. And it also makes sense why you’ve taken the time to write books and why you’re doing the podcast. See if you were just focused on products, then you’d be running commercials all day and you’d be selling the hottest product. And your message would always be changing, but because you actually believe in the strategy and focus on that, those are principles that stay long-term. So it’s pretty, for me, at least when I’m wanting to invest in my education,

[10:11] I want to invest in something that it’s going to be sound and last through a long time versus something that’s going to change overnight. Absolutely. And before we get into organizing your finances, a quick personal story. My eldest is graduating from college this Saturday from my alma mater. So very special. And that, interestingly enough, marks the 30th year that I have been helping people with their finances, the beginning of the 30th year. And it’s something that whole product strategy differentiation is something that I’ve been working with that entire time. And with the first three years as an exception, because I was at a bank then, I’ve been working with the same products over that entire time.

[11:02] Now, the actual providers of those products have changed, but the same underlying principles I’ve been working with most of my career, minus the first few years when I was still learning and figuring things out and trying to do typical financial planning. And if you haven’t read my story and you find that it might be helpful to you on our website is a book called Financial Planning Has Failed that we wrote telling the story of me figuring out after those first few years that the typical financial planning route that I had been trained on was not working and what to do instead. Wonderful. So now, you know, let’s talk about your career. So you’ve been doing this for the last 30 years. You focus on strategy, and then we’re going to segue into being

[11:53] organized and what kind of information you need to have. And I would imagine that that process has become more efficient over time. So we’d love to hear how do you approach that now? And what’s the best way to get organized? Yeah, it’s a great question. So it’s very important that people get a handle on their cash flow. And it’s boring and horribly detailed, but you absolutely positively must know how much money you can save every month. And so whatever it takes, you can use ment.com, you can use you need a budget, you can use the envelope method, you can use napkins, you can use a yellow pad, you can use whatever calculator system you want. You’ve got to get a handle on how much you can save every month.

[12:31] That’s a critical part of being organized. And then the other part, and again, it can be done at all kinds of different levels. You can go all the way up to QuickBooks in terms of organization on your assets and your liabilities. Our bookkeeper uses QuickBooks, and I certainly highly recommend that. And I’m going to be specific about QuickBooks, not Quicken. Quicken is a checkbook environment. QuickBooks is an accounting environment. And there’s lots of programs online and whatnot that other people have recommended and you can use. But there’s an important distinction there in that it’s proper accounting because we in our family actually literally have a set of books, i.e. an asset list, a liability list.

[13:16] So things that you own and things that you owe, as well as an income list and an expense list, which is often called a P&L on the accounting side of things or an income and expense statement. And then the real key is combining those four things. So assets, liabilities, incomes and expenses with a all important fifth area, which is that of protection. And so the protection arena is your wills and trusts, your life insurance, your car insurance, your home insurance, your liability, your disability, your medical, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And the five things, so assets, liabilities, income expenses and protection are unwieldy without a doubt. And having them organized is not an easy thing.

[14:03] We have recently overhauled the creation of our prosperity profile. And I think it’s a fabulous tool to help people get organized. It’s not available for everybody. And so maybe at another time, we can talk about it and how you might get it if it’s of interest to you. But the first step is, like I said, getting clear on how much you can save, getting a automated program, automate, automate. You know, it’s just like in business, you need to treat your finances like a business. And everybody should have two jobs, their own main income earning job and the job of keeping their family’s finances, because it is a job and obviously some people easier than others. But having the handle on again, even if it’s just a yellow pad

[14:47] and a list of what you own, what you owe, and then the income and the expense and the importance of committing to an automated savings program. And then, of course, figuring out how to invest as you progress. Those are the aspects of organizing finances. That’s obviously at a very high level, but that’s truly where it starts. Do you ever get people that say, but Kim, this is hard. Or I just want someone to do all this for me. Yes. And I have a response for both in the this is hard part. Yes. As is anything good in life. Like you want good health, you got to work out. Is that hard? Yes. You know, you want good relationships, you got to work at them. Is that hard? Yes. So it’s up to you to just gather your wits

[15:34] and get it done. Or if you truly want somebody else to do it, then pay to have somebody else do it. And I will put a plug in here for our family’s bookkeeper of over 25 years. Carrie Putman, she has done a podcast before. I’m more than happy to share her information. Of course, she only takes on a few new clients every month. But she has a neat system. She has two ways that she works. One, she can get you all set up on QuickBooks and then just let you do your own thing. Or she can actually literally handle all of your bill paying and organization of your finances, which is what our family has done. And people might think that’s kind of funny since I handle personal finances. But since I’m not detailed, I too want somebody to do all this for me.

[16:21] I totally understand the big picture. I have no interest in the details. So working with Carrie enables me to have the details handled. And I’m super, super grateful for that. Now, of course, we have an accountant as well, but it’s an important distinction, bookkeeper to accountant, because the accountant’s doing the tax work on an annual basis, you know, a couple of times a year we’re talking. Carrie is in our books every week. And as anybody that pays bills know, even if you do the online thing, which, of course, she does for us, you have to be paying more consistent attention, really, to the cash flowing aspects, especially when you have a business. Carrie does our personal books and both of our business books.

[17:02] And that enables us to have a proper set of books, which then, of course, makes the accountant’s job when it comes to tax time way easier because everything’s organized and the work has really been done every month. Well, you know, that’s a very clear and concise answer because that’s exactly what it should be. If it’s something difficult or something worth it, then you have to put in the work. You have to do it. I want to echo as well for Carrie. I referred her to my friend Mike, gosh, last year, two years ago. And Mike said that it was a game changer for his business, simplified his life, increased his income. So now he’s able to focus on the things that he really enjoys. So a wonderful point there for the listeners.

[17:43] You dropped a couple of hints of things that I think we’ll have to circle back to. People may be saying, hey, how can I learn about this or where can I get these reports or where can I hear about all of these different documents? Well, the best way to do that is to contact him directly at Any parting last words of advice? Just that we welcome input. So if you have questions, I’m happy to handle them. I love doing email. And it’s something that sometimes just a quick email answer can send somebody on their way. Of course, we love to work with new clients. We are taking new clients on and not everybody’s a right match for some of these programs. But we can very quickly figure that out, get you headed in the right direction.

[18:32] So I encourage the email and you said it well. Hello at partners number four, Prosperity.com. Thanks, Kim, for being with us today. And thank you, listeners, for being with us on another episode. If you like what you hear, please share this with your friends. Tell them, leave us a review, let us know what you think. And then the best to do is to reach out to Kim. Even if it’s just an email to say hi, it really does make our day. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to the Prosperity podcast. To take control of your money and have it work for you. Visit us at partners for Prosperity.com. If you liked this episode, make sure you subscribe and leave a review.