Who Is Kim Butler? – Episode 125

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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 today we’re going to be talking to Kim Butler and we’re going to be talking about a conversation that’s probably the most uncomfortable conversation that we could ask Kim. And that’s asking her to talk about herself. And she’s done a lot of impressive things. And I think our listeners would really like getting to know who is Kim Butler? Where did she come from?

[00:44] Why did she decide to be where she is today? And where is she going tomorrow? So hi, Kim. Hello, Todd. Couldn’t we talk about the dog, Emma dog? Wouldn’t that be more fun? Maybe not for you, but I think our listeners and, you know, I myself am, you know, fascinated by where you started and where you are. And most importantly, I guess where you’re going. So I’d like to share that with everybody. Well, I am definitely happy to talk about the where we’re going. But yes, I’m sure a little background is helpful. So shoot me some questions. All right, Kim. Well, I mean, obviously you weren’t born a financial advisor or maybe you were. But I mean, where are you? What’s your background? You know, where where did this all start?

[01:26] You know, it is funny. In the fourth grade, my dad got me a milk cow and I started milking the cow and selling the milk and keeping track of the money. And so, yeah, we can all, you know, kid about stuff we did in our childhood. But I truly was interested in money from day one. I loved keeping track of the money and I had to keep records. This was for 4-H in Corvallis, Oregon. And we would put the milk, you know, this is raw milk with a quarter cream on the top. My sister, after a few years, she got a milk cow also. We milked by hand for years and years. And why that matters to our listeners is because work develops good character. And any time we can get our children involved in work, and believe me, having

[02:19] a milk cow and a farm was serious work. But any kind of work really helps develop character. And I think a lot of people really appreciate, especially the work ethic that gets formed on a farm. But again, to bring things to their relevancy, money mattered to me. And I saw money coming in and I saw money going out. We had to pay for the grain, for the hay, for the milking machine when we finally got that, etc., etc. And I had huge responsibilities at a very young age around the carrying of the milk and the cows and the keeping of the grain and just the whole financial aspect, the in and the out of the money. So it was something that I did from fourth grade to twelfth grade. And I saved up enough money to put myself through college.

[03:08] And from that early age, I’ve always been interested in money and both the inflow of money and the outgo of money. I think that’s fantastic. And is it interesting that, you know, you learn to associate effort to dollars and then realize that, well, although effort can result in dollars, there has to be a better way. Absolutely. And I think I’ve always been interested in the business side of things, too, the leverage, you know, the better way. How could we do this better, make this better, improve upon it, help more people, whatever way you want to put it. And I don’t really recall any specific thing. In fact, I have an English degree from college, but I will admit that focus was on communication and whether it was writing or speaking or what have you.

[04:00] Clearly, we all know that the ability to communicate is a very, very important skill. And interestingly enough, I’ve always enjoyed speaking in front of large groups as well. That’s never really been an issue for me in terms of fear or confidence or being unwilling or what have you. And I’m so grateful to the Colby profile, which, of course, I didn’t take that till long after college, but it really just helped me solidify myself and my own skin. So if people haven’t picked up on our love of that profile, that’s at Colby K-O-L-B as in boy E dot com. And gosh, I wish I’d known it earlier. I mean, I think if you’ve got kids that are in high school, taking the Colby profile is one of the best things they can do to figure out what their

[04:49] talents are. And that’s something that I’ve always been supported by. My parents really encouraged us to focus on our strengths rather than our weakness. So I think that’s an important thing. And even right out of college, when I worked at a bank, which was, of course, a very structured environment, you know, this was before banks had investments. But still, I enjoyed the communication that I was doing with clients. I absolutely enjoyed the business development work that I did. And I worked with the trust departments and the car loan companies that had, you know, their work inside the banks and mortgages. And I learned so much good there. But I also I believe from early, early on, have had a serious

[05:33] entrepreneurial bug. Isn’t it interesting, I mean, coming from a bank environment myself, that you know, not only did the banks teach you how to handle the customer’s money, you noticed that the way that the bank handled its money was directly opposite to the way that it told the customers they were supposed to handle theirs. Isn’t that true? And I know you’ve shared stories before with your own background and conversation with a manager that basically said, just shut up and do your job. Don’t overthink. Don’t try to get the big picture and don’t try to have your clients do what the bank does. And isn’t that sad? But yet it is still possible for all of us to do exactly what the banks does. And I think, you know, maybe in the last half of your life,

[06:24] at least, I mean, that’s what you’ve dedicated yourself to. Without a doubt. And it’s interesting, while we can’t fractionalize or use fractional reserve lending like the banks do, in other words, we can’t split our dollar up and use it many, many times as the federal reserve does. We can, through strategy, get our dollars to do lots of different things for us. It can be liquidity. It can be invested. It can be an emergency opportunity fund, et cetera. And I absolutely really credit my entrepreneurial clients at the bank for helping me see things like the capability of a bridge loan as an investment or hard money loan. It was called then also helping me see the capability of a business. And very quickly, once I transitioned out of the bank,

[07:15] I sought out an opportunity where I could have my own practice at a very young age and being female, which is unfortunate that that matters, but it did. And everybody that I interviewed with wanted me to be an assistant. I didn’t want to be an assistant. I wanted to be an advisor. And so going through that process, too, was very instructive. And again, that entrepreneurial bug just led me through all the muck so that I could find a place to have my own practice. It’s interesting how one day you can go to work and you’re living under being ignorant and it’s OK. But then when you find out that you’re no longer ignorant the next day, when you come back to work, it’s being irresponsible. And it’s hard to live with being irresponsible, isn’t it?

[08:01] Yes, that is so true. As a matter of fact, in Canada last week, we were with a group of advisors. And at the end of the day, I said, hey, can everybody just do quick, positive focus? You know, what was the best part? And this one guy who’d had a blast for three days said, you know, I would like to thank you, but I now know truth that I didn’t know before. And so I’m not going to thank you. He was kidding, of course, because of exactly that. He said, I now have a responsibility. I know truth that I did not know before. And I cannot keep doing business as usual. And I mean, that’s what makes me show up at work every day is the fact that, you know, I’m participating in your mission, which you vocalized much more than I have of personal responsibility.

[08:53] I mean, you know, once the scales have fell from your eyes, you have to recognize what you see. Absolutely. And all of us as Americans, as citizens of the world, even want to have more responsibility and stewardship around our money. But unfortunately, do largely to the media, but also to the banks and the brokerage houses that have such a large voice within the media. We’ve gotten very, very misled. And so I think it was about 1995 that I figured out, oh, gosh, this typical financial planning that I’m doing. Well, I mean, that was the end of it. I knew for three or four years that the typical financial planning that I was doing was misleading. I could see it in the forums I was giving clients.

[09:41] But it was 95 when I finally just put my foot down and said enough. I am not going to continue to go this path. And then, like you said, you know, once that truth becomes clear to you. And I thought it I completely thought it was wrong. And then, like all things, I thought, oh, my gosh, maybe it’s right. And then once you get confidence in the rightness of it, you want to just shout it from the rooftops. And as I’ve gotten older and as our practice has matured and we’ve helped more and more people, I’ve gotten even bolder about being very specific about what works and what doesn’t work. And my patience for what doesn’t work is gotten thinner and thinner and thinner so much that I would rather have a client say,

[10:27] no, I disagree with you. Goodbye. Then I would have a client say, well, kind of maybe sort of let’s, you know, do a little bit of both, because I know that the securities environment of stocks, bonds and mutual funds is not what it used to be. And I know that the whole life insurance environment is what it has always been. And so people today are seeking security and confidence in their money, and we know how to provide that. And I would compliment you on that. And just like to mention that to our listeners. I mean, you literally lose a percentage of your clients because they’re not on board with what you believe in, don’t you? Absolutely. And we’ve seen it in the podcast work and in our blog and our newsletter list that we email everybody to.

[11:16] There are people that opt out because they do not agree with it. And a lot of my story is mentioned in the Financial Planning Has Failed book. So if you’re curious about a little bit more detail around it, just from what you can learn from the path that I’ve walked, the Financial Planning Has Failed book spells it out. And it also spells out a lot of the historical reasons why typical financial planning was put forth in the press and in our lives. Also, why the securities industry, the stock bond mutual fund industry is what it is and some of the history and the dates behind all that. So it’s a pretty interesting read for people that want that kind of detail. It’s at Partners number four, Prosperity dot com slash ebook.

[12:02] And there’s an audio version there as well. Awesome. Well, of course, we’ve talked about where you came from. We kind of talked about where you are. But I mean, where does it go from here? What’s your what’s your goal? What makes you wake up every day? Oh, I’m so excited about that, because my overarching goal is to help more people, help more and more and more people. And first it’s hundreds, then it’s thousands, which is where we are now. And I absolutely want it to be millions and even billions if we can get it there. And the way to help more people is to continue putting things out there that educate them on the matters of money. So we are working on another book already. We just had Busting the Interest Rate Lies come out

[12:46] and we’ve got Busting the Life Insurance Lies, which is a couple months away. I’ve already got in mind my next book, which will be something about the 529 plans or, you know, from Gifts to Miners Act, you know, that whole education arena. We’re going to bust up those lies. Obviously, this podcast is a great way to continue to share our message. And we just so encourage our listeners to share it with other people that are interested in this. We’ve formed the Prosperity Economics Movement, which is a nonprofit organization designed to last well past mine and my husband’s lifetime and serve not only the advisors that are sharing this message, but also the clients, because it’s hard as a client to feel like

[13:36] you’re the only one using whole life insurance as an emergency opportunity fund or you’re the only one using the bridge loans or the life settlements as investments. And so we want to share the prosperity economics message for clients as well so that they can connect with other clients and get to know some of the other people that are using these products and practicing these strategies with their own money. So there are two websites that I want to put out there for people’s knowledge. If you are being shared this podcast from somebody else and you want to learn more or listen again or find some other resources that we have, ProsperityPeaks.com, and that’s P-E-A-K-S like mountaintoppeaks is for clients.

[14:25] So that’s ProsperityPeaks.com for clients. And then our advisor website that supports the prosperity economics movement is long, but it’s Prosperity Economics Advisors.com. So economics and advisors are both plural and it’s O-R-S because that’s the traditional way to spell it and looks better and is more proper in my mind. So ProsperityEconomicsAdvisors.com. Super. And I also would like to mention that if you go on Amazon, if you look up Kim, I believe it’s D.H. Butler, correct? Yes, it is. KimDHButler.com. You can see the book she currently has published would invite all of you to buy whatever book she has published. There’s a free one that she offered you that no one else but our listers has access to.

[15:15] So I encourage you to take advantage of that offer. Again, this is No BS Money Guy Todd Strobel. Once again, special thanks to Kim Butler for sharing what I think is a significant message and a significant responsibility for all of us to share. So take care, everybody. 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.