Tom Laune and Stress Free Planning – Episode 097

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[00:01] Welcome to the Prosperity Podcast, fresh alternative personal finance talk for independent thinkers who prosper outside of Wall Street. Here’s your host, bestselling author, Kim D.H. Butler and No BS Money Guy, Todd Strobel. Hey everybody, welcome to another edition of the Prosperity Podcast. This is No BS Money Guy, Todd Strobel, and we’ve got a real treat for you guys today. We have one of our Prosperity Economics advisors, Tom Lonnie, who actually owns a company called Stress Free Planning. Now what’s interesting about Tom, and I could talk to him for hours because I’m so fascinated by this subject, is that Tom comes to us from the music industry. And he really has some unique insights on some pretty cool people and how this

[00:51] industry works, and it just completely fascinates me. Welcome, Tom. How are you? I’m doing great, Todd. Thanks for having me on your show today. Super. Well, Stress Free Planning, how long and how did that get started? Well, that’s a great question, Todd. I started it about three years ago, about 2013, and I had been in the music industry for 28 years prior to that and really, really had a great run in the music industry as an independent music engineer and producer. So I was the guy behind the scenes working on those big boards that look kind of like a flight engine cockpit or whatever. Air traffic controller. Yeah, like an air traffic controller, exactly. So it was, you know, it was something that I started three years ago because I

[01:41] saw a huge need in the music industry specifically from what I came from for financial knowledge. There’s just so many people that are struggling and getting bad advice. And I really wanted to be able to help people. And the primary role that I had, Todd, for 28 years was serving artists. So I would work with them to try to get their vision out of their head and try to get it to where it would be realized so that other people could hear what it is that they were wanting to present to the world. And I really loved that role. And I just wanted to continue that in a way that would allow me to help artists and serve them, but in a little bit different way now. So that’s kind of how I transitioned from one thing to the other.

[02:36] I kind of, there’s a big backstory on that if you’re interested in that, but that’s kind of the general, the general point of it. I think the thing that impressed me most about your story was I never really thought, but your ability to be in the music industry is sort of similar to like a professional athlete in that it requires a lot of not only skill, but ability and injury or illness could threaten that at any time. And it’s really something that has to be planned for and protected. Isn’t it? It absolutely is Todd. So one of the things that happened to me was I went through a string. Like I said, during 28 years, I went through a string of bad or incompetent financial advisors and I just thought, Oh my goodness, what is going on?

[03:30] I can’t get anybody who’s really honest and telling me the truth. But one financial advisor that I had over the series of my 28 years in the music business told me to go out and buy the best possible disability insurance that I could buy. That was when I was 35, sort of on top of the world, making a really good living in music and I went out and I said, okay, I’m going to go out and research this and try to find the best type of disability I can get. And I found what’s called an own occupation policy, which means it ensures what you specifically are doing. And in my case, because I was creating music and using my ears all day long to do that, what my insurance was on was my hearing. So that is the, what happened three years ago that caused me to change

[04:19] careers was I got some hearing loss and I could no longer do what I was doing prior I could no longer make music. So I really used that disability insurance and, and that’s why I’m so passionate Todd about helping people understand that their ability to make a living is really the most important or the most valuable asset that they have. And unfortunately, all of us can say this, it’s something you really probably don’t appreciate in most cases until it is gone. So if you’re listening to this today, we invite you to go to bulletproofwealth.coach, am I saying that correctly? That’s exactly right, Todd. Um, also Tom can be reached at 800-591-3928. And is there a geographical area that you serve or which one of our

[05:10] listeners might be able to call you? Well, listen, I’m right now, I work primarily in Tennessee, of course, it’s national music business and music industry capital, and I’m in Franklin, Tennessee specifically, and I love to meet people face to face, but I’m also licensed to work right now in California, and I’m working with some folks there from the music and the film industry and in, um, Oklahoma as well, just from just random circumstances, but, um, it’s not, I’m not specifically have to just work in those three states, but those are where I’m licensed right now. If you’re happened to be in a different state, um, I bet you would be a good contact person for, to help them find the right person.

[05:54] Absolutely. I would absolutely help you. And, and, um, it’s, it’s not a problem at all. Super. Well, the next question that I kind of want to get to is that my understanding after talking to you, that pretty much everyone, not just the musician themselves in the music industry is self-employed, which means that you don’t have a consistent paycheck coming in every Friday. So that kind of creates a unique situation you need to prepare for as well, doesn’t it? Yes, exactly. Todd, it’s sort of the white elephant in the room is that people just assume, Hey, he’s in the music industry that he must be, you know, have tons of stable, regular income. Um, but in the, in reality, one of the biggest things I struggled

[06:40] with over my 28 year career was trying to figure out how to keep a constant income stream coming in to pay for all of the needs that I had for my family and, you know, I have two kids and, and it is just something that has been a real passion of mine is to help people specifically in the entertainment industry, uh, try to take those ups and downs in cashflow and try to stabilize that or even it out. And I’ve done just tons of research over the last three years. Um, and I found that the best, absolute best place that I can find to be able to store cash, to be able to collateralize it if you need to is inside of a dividend paying whole life insurance policy. And that is, um, what I do really is help people design these, they’re

[07:31] very, very, very unique, specially designed contracts that allow people to save money and if they need to stabilize their income, they can access that, take a loan against it and be able to cover their needs until their next big royalty check comes in. Does that make sense? Oh, that makes such complete and total sense. So number one, we’re talking about protection. We’re going to protect the, your ability to earn an income, which I would think that the life insurance, as well as being a great place to store your cash also helps to do that, um, because in and of itself is guaranteed to pay that money upon your death to those people you care about. Exactly, Todd. So there’s so many different benefits.

[08:17] It’s unbelievable. You’ve got tax advantaged growth that minimizes the amount of taxes paid. That’s another huge advantage. You’ve got one of the key components of it being bulletproof for me. Now this very state to state, but in Tennessee, where I’m primarily working out of there’s creditor and predator protection. Now that amount varies on a state by state basis, but in Tennessee, it’s 100%, anything that is built up as a cash value inside of a whole life insurance policy is creditor and predator protected. So that’s a very, very key point. And you’ve got an uninterrupted compounded growth at a competitive return, and you just can’t get that anywhere. It’s unbelievable how hard just that one thing is.

[09:01] And that’s a key foundation of what I try to talk to people about as well. And when you say competitive return, we’re recording this in 2016. What kind of return are we talking about? We’re talking about, I would say in the mid 4%, which you put money into a standard bank and you’re going to be getting 0.0000017 or something like that, so it beats the heck out of that and it’s total liquidity. And honestly, that’s why I called my firm Stress Free Planning is because there’s zero stress. You don’t have to prove that you’re in a hundred percent working, you know, making a living at that exact moment. You don’t have to prove that you’re a hundred percent healthy to get to access this money, to get a collateralized loan against it.

[09:50] So it’s very stress free. You just call the company and say, send me a check. And that’s what happens. Super. And again, if we could just mention that the rates of return do vary with the interest rates going up. So not only are these interest rates superior to what the banks are now, but they also continue to stay above those bank rates. Don’t they? Absolutely. Todd, there’s no question. They, the, uh, insurance companies just seem to be really, really good with managing their money. And I think one of the main key reasons is because they know that they have a one-to-one capital reserve ratio versus a standard bank, which has of course, fractional reserve lending. And that just causes everything to get out of whack and they’re

[10:38] creating money out of thin air. And it’s just, it’s not a good situation. So I really believe that helping these musicians stabilize their income, finding a place to be able to store money that you can get to if you need it and, uh, have tons of other fantastic benefits, um, along with it is just a critical, critical thing to help these people. So we’ve protected the income. We’ve stabilized the income. And again, you know, you had a real nice way of putting it, but the bottom line is, is that money stored inside a whole life insurance policy is not subject to IRS liens or being sued. That’s what we’re saying. Isn’t it? Exactly. That’s exactly it. And as any self-employed person, music industry or not, I mean, the

[11:26] fact of you being sued is really not, if it’s a win, probably. Yeah, it’s definitely, it’s definitely out there as a possibility. And I think one of the things I love about it is, uh, also is the, the unstructured loan payments. I mean, that’s kind of, I don’t want to get too technical, but the fact is, is that you can take as much time as you need to repay these loans. Um, and it’s just gives you the freedom of not saying, okay, I have to do this much per month if I take a collateralized loan against my cash value of my internal buildup and my life insurance policy, you can, um, just pay it back when you get that next check, when you get that next big thing happen, when you get your, um, next royalty income, you

[12:12] can pay back, uh, that loan. And it’s very, very low stress on, on, uh, for you as the, as the, uh, owner of the policy. Does that make sense? Todd? Absolutely not subject to any 59 and a half age restrictions. So wait to be retirement age. Um, and that’s three to 4%. I might point out, this might be new to the people. I imagine we’re attracting maybe some different listeners in today. That’s after the cost of the insurance, isn’t it? So in a sense, you’re getting your insurance paid for, and you’re still getting a net three to 4% and that is just one heck of a deal. That really is Todd. It really is super. Why don’t we identify your company one more time? It’s so the name of my firm is stress-free planning.

[12:59] So I have two websites, I have stressfreeplanning.com and then my system that I’ve created to, um, to really outline all these different things that we’ve talked about is called the Bulletproof Wealth System. And that is BulletproofWealth.coach. And at either place, you can book a complimentary 60 minute coaching session. I’ll take a look at what you’ve got going and do whatever I can to help you, um, try to get your finances stabilized and get you on a path towards compounding growth and not just, you know, money slipping through your fingers and you don’t even know where it went. Super. Again, that was BulletproofWealth.coach or there is also an 800 number, which is 800-591-3928. And specifically, we’re reaching out to our listeners in Tennessee and

[13:49] California. Um, although if, you know, if you’re in the music industry and in a different state, I would reach out to Tom anyway, because he understands how to get you in touch with people who speak your language, understand your problems and what keeps you up at night. Um, and I can’t tell you after being in the industry for as long as I have, I certainly have taken a couple of pages of notes just from talking to Tom today myself. Well, thank you, Todd. I appreciate it. Tom, anything else you’d like to add to our listeners before we wrap up? I think that’s about it. I just, um, I just want to say, you know, give me a, uh, give me a call if you, if you have any questions. And I know we sent a lot, you know, put a lot of detailed information

[14:34] out today, and I really hope that you were able to take something away from this. Super. Well, again, this is the Prosperity Podcast with No BS Money Guys. Special thanks to Tom Lonnie, and we will talk to y’all again soon. Thank you for listening to the Prosperity Podcast. To take control of your money and have it work for you, visit us at partnersforprosperity.com. If you liked this episode, make sure you subscribe and leave a review.