Why I Chose To Retire At 70 (Surprising Truth Revealed) | Retirement Reality

Jim doesn’t describe retirement as lazy or slow. He calls it unrushed.

After decades of meaningful work with much of it spent serving as a missionary and living overseas, Jim retired just shy of 70. Not because he had to, but because the work had reached a natural pause. The urgency lifted, the schedule loosened, and for the first time in a long time, life stopped pushing him forward. 

Financially, Jim’s story is refreshingly calm. He explains how saving consistently, living frugally, and building most of his wealth in a brokerage account gave him confidence long before retirement. With Social Security covering their basic needs, money has shifted from something to optimize to something to steward, with generosity at the center.

Jim also reflects on knowing when he had “enough,” delaying Social Security intentionally, and why retirement doesn’t require spending more just because you can. For him, fulfillment comes from faith, family, friendships, fitness, and finances, the five pillars he believes make life work well.

Jim’s story is a reminder that retirement doesn’t have to be rushed, flashy, or dramatic. Sometimes the greatest reward is simply time, and the freedom to move through it at your own pace.

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Jim is not a client of Root Financial Partners, LLC and received no compensation for participating in this video. His statements reflect his own opinions and experience and are not indicative of any specific client’s experience and are not a guarantee of results. No cash or non-cash compensation was provided, and no material conflicts are known.

Advisory services are offered through Root Financial Partners, LLC, an SEC-registered investment adviser. This content is intended for informational and educational purposes only and should not be considered personalized investment, tax, or legal advice. Viewing this content does not create an advisory relationship. We do not provide tax preparation or legal services. Always consult an investment, tax or legal professional regarding your specific situation.

The strategies, case studies, and examples discussed may not be suitable for everyone. They are hypothetical and for illustrative and educational purposes only. They do not reflect actual client results and are not guarantees of future performance. All investments involve risk, including the potential loss of principal.

Comments reflect the views of individual users and do not necessarily represent the views of Root Financial. They are not verified, may not be accurate, and should not be considered testimonials or endorsements

Participation in the Retirement Planning Academy or Early Retirement Academy does not create an advisory relationship with Root Financial. These programs are educational in nature and are not a substitute for personalized financial advice. Advisory services are offered only under a written agreement with Root Financial.

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Ari Taublieb, CFP ®, MBA  is the Chief Growth Officer of Root Financial Partners and a Fiduciary Financial Planner specializing in helping clients retire early with confidence.

Transcript

Freedom Without Quitting Work

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome back to the Early Retirement Podcast. I want all of you to know the earliest time you can retire doesn't mean you actually need to retire. In fact, most people think when I say, hey, you're in a position to retire, that people just do. That doesn't happen that often. Most of the time, people go, wow, that's great to know. I'm going to keep working another year for my team so I don't just leave them high and dry. Or I've got this project. Or I don't know what I'm going to do yet in retirement, but it's really nice going to work knowing I don't actually have to be here. If I have a bad day, if politics change, I have the ability to do what I want to do, which is spend my time on whatever it is I want to do. And that's once again where I want all of you to live. I don't want you in that I don't know phase. Many of you have heard this before, but I'm a soccer player and my wife says I'm worse than hangry when I'm injured. If you don't know hangry, that's hungry and angry. A very dangerous combination. And she used to think right when I get my MRI, I'm going to be even worse than that. Why? Because I'm going to see the severity of my injury. But the truth is I relax and I relax even if the injury is bad, because now I know the truth. I have a plan. Got it. I might have to do six months of physical therapy or a year to get back on the field. But I know what I need to do in order to once again play soccer, which is the goal in this case. I want all of you to know, wow, what if markets went down right when I retired? Or what if tax brackets change? Or what if my health changes? Or what if I live longer? Or what if, what if, what if, wow, I still see that I would be in a position if I were to make the following changes. Great, I still want to retire. So if you're wondering, okay, what do I need to know before I retire? Once again, guys, you can email me the word retire in the subject line, and I will respond back with a free guide. It's a checklist to make sure you don't forget anything. If you want to build your own plan, just make sure to put in the subject line the word optimize, and then I'll send you the software that I use to build financial plans. And then finally, we love to help people retire early. So you can go to our website, rootfinancial.com, and that's when people are like, wow, I get I need to be financially educated on all retirement topics, but I don't want to actually be the one in charge of implementing it because I want to be enjoying my retirement. And it's our job to make sure we're helping you get the most true value out of what you've worked so hard for. So many people just keep working until 60, 65, thinking, you know what, that's what I got to do, that's what my parents did. But that's not the reality. The reality is there's so many of you who listen to this podcast who go, wow, maybe I could retire earlier, but don't take action on it. And we want to show you, hey, here's when it could be possible. And we're not just gonna sugarcoat it, we're not gonna blow smoke, we're gonna show, hey, here's the reality based on your situation, how much you could spend, here's what's reasonable. So it might surprise you, but it also might be a little bit of tough love. And we believe in being transparent. So hopefully the podcast resonates. I do all of this for you guys for free, and I love getting to do it. So thank you in advance for letting me record these episodes, or else it just feels like I'm talking to outer space. So appreciate you guys emailing me for these free guides. That's a long intro. Let's get to the episode.

The Five F’s For A Full Life

SPEAKER_01 2:50

At this point in life, I can say what we need to do for all of us is to cultivate four no five F's. Okay. Five F's. Cultivate your faith, cultivate family, cultivate your friends, cultivate fitness, and finally cultivate your finances. And when you cover all of those, life can can go along pretty well.

SPEAKER_00 3:19

And if you can do it in an unrushed way, it's even better.

SPEAKER_01 3:23

It's even nicer.

SPEAKER_00 3:25

What I'm doing in this new show, Retirement Reality, is having heartfelt, candid conversations with people who have already retired so you can hear from them what worked well, what didn't, and everything in between. I hope you enjoy. And if you're retired and you want to personally come share your story on a future episode, there's a link right below this in the description of this episode where you can apply to be a guest. Now go enjoy the episode.

Meet Jim And The Unrushed Mindset

SPEAKER_00 3:50

My guest today retired at 70. Actually, it was 69 in 11 months to be exact. And he has a fun word, which you'll see in just a moment, because it's the first question I always ask my guest, which is what's worried, what's one word, excuse me, you would use to describe your retirement? And he has a fun one. So I hope you enjoy that. But the major kind of message that I took away from this episode is you don't have to have it perfectly figured out. You don't have to spend $20,000 a month to enjoy your retirement because he's spending way less. Little hint is it's less than $4,000 a month, and he's enjoying retirement. And even when I press him and I say, hey, okay, what would you spend on if I made you spend X amount? He goes on to say, I don't really know. I think I'd actually start giving more. And so it's a refreshing outlook. Someone who enjoyed their life for, you know, uh a very noble cause. And many of you, I hope, will resonate with this episode and go, well, that's something that I didn't know maybe I could consider doing a little bit more of, or maybe it's just a healthy outlook. So I hope you enjoyed this episode with Jim. By the way, this is the email that I referenced during today's episode. This is the exact email he actually sent to me, so I just want to share it because it was very kind of him. He says here, hey, Ari, love the show today. That was regarding a live show a long time ago. He goes, I was busy, but uh enjoyed it to the end. Let me encourage you to never apologize anymore for going too long. You're a character and we love listening. What you have to tell us and teach us is good. On another note, I know your focus is early retirement, but could you once in a while talk to people like me who are

Purpose After Work And Mission Life

SPEAKER_00 5:20

finally retiring at 70 and goes on to tell more? So, yes, I make content based off whatever it is you guys are looking for. So tell me what have I not done that you want to see more of? Is it long-term care? Go in the comments. Is it more Roth conversion, superhero accounts? When should I retire? Purpose, visit a different community. Just tell me what the heck you want because I want to make it for you. Enjoy today's episode. Jim, thank you for joining me on this episode of Retirement Reality. We've been trying to schedule this for a long time and we finally got to it. And so I ask all my guests the same question first, which is what is one word you would use to describe your retirement so far?

SPEAKER_01 5:56

And I have been thinking about this for months now. And I was going to say lazy, but I decided the other day that it's um unrushed.

SPEAKER_00 6:10

That's I mean, look, that's in my top five words. Unrushed. I've gotten freedom and I've gotten fun, but unrushed, I like. Okay, now pretend, Jim, you have unlimited words. Why unrushed?

SPEAKER_01 6:23

Because I can do whatever I need to or want to. And if my wife wants me to do something, I am not rushed to do what I gotta do. I can go do that. So you know it this the the schedule is l very few things that I have to really do at a particular time. How long have you been retired? Since the beginning of August. So it's about five months.

SPEAKER_00 6:52

Okay. Now, when you were working, was it I have no time to do anything else? Did you kind of practice retirement before you got here? What was that transition like?

SPEAKER_01 7:03

Um I was uh in a sense self-employed, so I kind of took care of my own scheduling. But there was always a lot of stuff to do and uh always on call. And um so now I don't have to deal with all that.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Did you like being self-employed?

SPEAKER_01 7:25

Uh yes. And that's why I work so long.

SPEAKER_00 7:29

How old were you when you retired, so in August? I was 70 years old.

SPEAKER_01 7:35

Actually, I was 69 in 11 months.

SPEAKER_00 7:38

So I I love that. And look, many of you have watched the show uh a few times. I hate the word retirement. I hope everyone works as long as they like it. And if you like it, don't stop. And then normally a day comes where you want to start to do other things, but the ultimate goal in my head isn't how can you retire by 50 and never have to think about work ever again? It's how can you live a fulfilling life? So you worked until 70. Jim, do you mind telling us why you work so much longer than a traditional retiree?

SPEAKER_01 8:06

Well, my wife and I were missionaries, and so we had a cause and a calling, and uh we just continued doing that.

SPEAKER_00 8:16

Amazing. What does your day look like now that you're not working?

SPEAKER_01 8:22

Uh, up by six, usually, uh, do some exercise, have breakfast, clean up, um, read the Bible, pray, uh, come into the office and look at uh a verse of Greek from the New Testament, uh trying to dust off my Greek that I learned several times, and then check emails and other communications, and then just kind of mess around in the office or around the house, do what needs to be done in the yard, help in the kitchen,

Finding Opportunities To Serve Nearby

SPEAKER_01 9:00

name it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:03

You probably know this question's coming if you've seen the other episodes, but travel is a hot topic. Some people retire, they immediately start traveling the whole world because they couldn't during their working years. Were you able to get your travel bug fixed? How do you look at travel?

SPEAKER_01 9:18

We have fixed our travel bug by not wanting to go anywhere. Okay, tell me about that. Uh throughout our ministry, we would travel to the village, an uh a remote village location to do field work for about three months at a time and do that twice a year. So we were always going back and forth, back and forth. Uh the last few years we've been doing that from the US to our work in in Peru. And so we have done a lot of traveling. Not to different places, but to the same place um overseas for a long time. So we've just we just don't want to do that anymore.

SPEAKER_00 10:05

Makes sense. Um in terms of those who want to start to get more involved, I hear about this often of, hey, I'm working a job that's so stressful. I would love to do more mission work. I just don't know where to start. Where would you tell people to begin?

SPEAKER_01 10:20

Well, you look around, um check. I mean, if you're looking at uh faith-based kind of ministry, then check with your church or other organizations in town. Uh you could probably hear about them on the news. Um check into to what's happening uh around you, and uh you'll find you'll find plenty of opportunities available. So it's easier than you think. Oh yeah, there there are hundreds of ministries all over the place. And a lot of them are you know just a few handful of people doing it in a locality, up to organizations like American's Purse or something like that, that they're doing stuff worldwide and have thousands of people involved. So there are lots of opportunities.

SPEAKER_00 11:17

Yeah. You retired at 69 in 11 months, and you could have retired, I'm guessing, earlier if you wanted to. Why did you choose to keep working? Was it purpose? Was it financial, accommodation?

SPEAKER_01 11:31

Um basically purpose. Um we actually never we have not finished some of the projects that we were involved with. And our intention is to continue doing some of that on a volunteer basis. Um I just haven't gotten back to it. I thought I would start, you know, in August or September. And I just I gotta I gotta get back to it.

SPEAKER_00 12:02

Yeah, but I love that unrushed word, and we're gonna keep coming back to that. So, like there truly is no rush. But my I I'm wondering, I mean, look, I don't know how many years you've been working, but if you stopped working at 69 and 11 months, you were probably working the last, let's call it 50 years, and now you don't have to. That's quite a shift, even if you enjoyed what you do. How are you scratching the purpose bug? Or is that really something that you're like, Ari, I don't think about it?

SPEAKER_01 12:33

Well, I'm involved with some things at church here, and we help with uh some people and some organizations here in town. Uh so we're you know, we're c we're covered that way. Um I've been busy trying to rearrange our retirement fund investments, and that has taken a whole lot more time and effort and just trying to get my head around all sorts of stuff. Um and I like tracking finance and stuff. Um I got into it uh about a about a decade ago. And uh so I kind of keep track on stuff and and I'm really surprised that in the last like three or four years it suddenly started to appear like, hey, we've got

Knowing When You Have Enough

SPEAKER_01 13:30

something we don't need to worry about retirement, we're gonna have enough. Um so you know, it gets to a point and all of a sudden it just starts to shoot up.

SPEAKER_00 13:40

So yeah, it's amazing. Let's let's it is amazing. Let's talk about that enough because that's something a lot of people struggle with. How do I know when I have enough? Do you remember if there was a light bulb moment, maybe you were 63 or 64, where you went, wow, I feel like uh we we're kind of at that enough? Or and please be as honest as you're open to sharing, do you feel that you would constantly do a little bit of, well, if we had a little bit more, we'd be more comfortable?

SPEAKER_01 14:04

I started realizing a couple years ago that we had plenty. Uh some of the what we had been investing and s and um saving for, we had enough. Um I had kept wanting to work, my wife had wanted to retire earlier, and I thought, you know, let's let's go until I'm 70. Um just partly because we still had the work to do, but I thought, you know, just a few more years and we'll have a little bit more income. And even even though we had enough. There was still work that we were wanting to do, and we thought we'd just keep doing it.

SPEAKER_00 14:45

Love it. And that's the best way to do it, by the way. It's not financially have to be here. I am actually of the belief, and I could be completely wrong, but I'm of the belief most people actually like what they do. It's that they feel forced to be there, and that's what makes it not as fun. And it makes you go, well, I feel like I got to do this project, even if maybe this is one day I want to take off to prioritize my health or whatever that may be. Jim, I don't need the exact numbers. In fact, I don't even want the exact numbers, but do you mind sharing a general breakdown of how much is in, let's call it, superhero account money, brokerage, 401k versus Roth. Is it all 401k? Is it 99% with 1% in a Roth and you've never heard of a superhero account? What's the general breakdown?

SPEAKER_01 15:28

For us, percentage-wise, I don't know. The majority of it is in what you call superhero account and a brokerage account.

SPEAKER_00 15:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 15:39

The uh four we had a 401, actually it was a 403B for a nonprofit. So we had some in that and then individual IRAs. Which are minimal because most of it went to the 403B, or just I was just putting it into our own accounts, our brokerage accounts.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Now, I see this a lot, so I'm glad that you don't I'm glad that I don't think you've made this mistake, and I hope you don't. I hope anyone else watching doesn't make this mistake because you'll see a lot of videos online that will induce fear. You gotta worry about these RMDs, they're gonna kill you, and you're gonna stay up at night unless you do the conversions. And the truth is, if you have a superhero account, and that's the majority, it's just quite frankly something you don't really gotta worry about. You have a different problem, which is a good problem of okay, how do we understand what amount should be in dividends versus um potential growth positions in that superhero account? Because if you want all dividends, you'd be looking at a big tax bill every year. So this superhero account, I'll see this a lot with people who are self-employed. And uh, most people

Superhero Accounts And Dividend Taxes

SPEAKER_00 16:50

will comment on the videos I wish I knew about this earlier. Why didn't other people tell me this? I just thought I should put money into a 403B or 401k. Why didn't someone else tell me? So, how did you first learn about the brokerage or superhero account? And did you know that it was going to be this helpful?

SPEAKER_01 17:06

I think I remembered it this morning. The first time I got started in this, I was in a youth group. I was in my mid-20s. Okay. And I was out of college, and a friend in the youth group had gotten married, and her husband did financial planning stuff. I thought, I'm getting started, I'm gonna go talk to him. We sat down. Now get this, this is weird. Okay. Of course, you gotta get all the name, birthday, all that kind of stuff. I said is my birthday, and he stopped. And he looked up and he looked back down and he says, That's my birthday. We were born on the same day. Same day.

SPEAKER_00 17:55

You guys started compound interest at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 17:59

Anyway, uh, so I started saving with him and we put into some account and they managed it. It wasn't until like 30 years later that I started doing my own management and moving it into a brokerage account. And I I learned about it just because of some I had I don't know how I got it, but some email came by an interest or something that had these investment newsletters. And so I started reading. And then there was others, and there were others, and of course that opens the floodgates, and then you know. But that got me interested, and I realized I could do this myself and not be putting it in mutual funds and not be putting it over here and there, but yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:53

I assume I know I okay, thank you for sharing. And that is funny. Same day. Oh, you couldn't write that. Um, I assume you're the one managing it, and perhaps your wife is a little less interested in the finances, but am I wrong? And and the truth is, Jim, if God forbid you were to ever pass away, your wife would find a new calling and want to become a financial advisor?

SPEAKER_01 19:14

No way.

unknown 19:16

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

Do how do you guys talk about money? Is it, hey, let's let Jim worry about it? Are things discussed as hey, what's a big purchase, let's talk about this?

SPEAKER_01 19:27

For the most part, I'm done it all. No, we talk about stuff a little bit. And if we need to get something, you know, we talk about it and decide what to do and do it together. But um She's concerned. We're having at this point in life, we're having more and more friends who are dying. Um had one just this week and just got word of another one who's uh terminally. So, you know, that's hitting her pretty hard. Yeah. Uh and so she can she's concerned. You know, what happened what what happened with me? So we've got to sit start doing some more conversation about that.

SPEAKER_00 20:13

Yeah. And it's difficult because I I've seen couples in similar situations go, okay, so wife, would you please sit down? I'm gonna tell you about how amazing these 401ks are and how you see how we got a tax-deferred benefit for so many years and how the RMD is gonna and then they yeah, over their head. And so the best way to do it, I've found at least, and if you guys have a better idea in the comments, tell me what you've done. But the best thing is you just start fun. Okay, pretend we had 20,000 a month to spend, which we don't, but what would we even spend it on? Like imagine we had to try, like, and then they go, well, actually, I would buy this one thing. And then you go, okay, well, do you think that's feasible? Well, how much do we actually have? And when you start to get them to ask the questions, that's when you know you're on to something. So I keep it as fun as possible until they start to show interest. And I found that's the switch.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

Okay, okay, I'll have to keep that in mind. I've yeah, I've heard you asking people or mentioning that to other people, yeah, and uh, so I thought, okay, what would I do? And honestly, you know, talking about $20,000, $30,000. I'm going, I can't think of that. And so I tried to dumb it down. I said, This is this is even before baby steps. This is not even baby crawling, this is baby tournament. I went into the store and bought everything I needed and then was told here's ten dollars. You cannot leave the store with this ten dollars. I love you. I love you. What would I do? I'm going I don't know what I would do. And when I go to stores now, I think of that. I love that and I'm going, how am I gonna how am I gonna use all that we've got? What are we gonna do with all we've got?

SPEAKER_00 22:00

I've asked a similar question. And what most people tell me is if I had everything I needed, I'd pay for the person's groceries behind me. Because I'm not just going to buy something for the sake of buying something. I don't need it as you're telling me not at all, right? That's going back to the mission of life. So I like that example there. Uh Jim, let me ask this because I I'm excited to talk to you at the age that

Social Security Timing And COVID Curveballs

SPEAKER_00 22:20

you're at today. What's been your social security strategy? Because I hear a lot of different strategies out there. I'm going to make sure I delay as long as I can. So if something happens to me, my spouse gets the larger benefit for the rest of their life. Other people go, no, I think I can invest and do better. What's been your process?

SPEAKER_01 22:36

I was just waiting till 70. Yeah. You know, to have the most. There was a point in time where I was thinking, well, take it early, and I don't need it, so I'd save it. Yeah. But then about the time we could have started doing that COVID hit. And it would have been beneficial for us before that because we were living overseas. And so we'd have foreign earned income exclusion. But with the pandemic, we ended up coming back to the States for a while, and we never got back to full-time residency overseas, and so from 2020, we can't exclude any income. So that screws that up. And so if I'd have started taking it, it would have been I'd have only gotten a portion of it. You know, you you get a man you get less. But then if you got all this other income, then they take out another half of it and don't pay it for you for later. And so you know it it would have been nice, but it wouldn't I don't think it would have worked the way I thought it would work.

SPEAKER_00 23:55

It's a great example of why I say I don't do financial plans. And some people say, Yes, you do. I've seen them on YouTube, those case studies. I go, nope, I do planning because you can plan all you want until COVID hits, until it turns out you're gonna work longer than you think, or a health event occurs. So being able to be light on your feet and be dynamic. Jim, you're a great example of certain people will say, I'm gonna turn on Social Security early because I can save it or I can invest and do better, or whatever that may be. But if they have big RMDs coming, that's gonna impact the effectiveness of a Roth conversion. In your case, if RMDs are not the primary concern, delaying yields a higher benefit. And now, do we know how long any of us are gonna live? No. But what you're doing is you're playing the probability game. And so I appreciate your insight in the way you're even looking at it, because I think you're thinking about it in a very similar way to how I'd think about it. Let me ask this um generally, is there an amount on a monthly basis that you try to spend from a budget perspective, or do you feel it's hey, I just spend on what I want and whatever's left over is left over?

SPEAKER_01 25:02

Or we don't we have not worked with a budget. Okay. Do you find it? We are very frugal. Okay, tell me. So we don't, you know, we don't overspend. And we've always had sufficient that we don't need to worry about a budget, which we're pretty pretty we're I don't know what to say. That's that's nice. And not many people can afford that, I I assume, from the way I hear others talking about it, but I'm I'm smiling, Jim, because I had someone say I'm very frugal.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

I go, great. So what, three, four thousand a month? They go, no, no, no, ten thousand a month. I go, okay, your definition of very frugal is different than mine. So before you say yours, I want everyone in the comments here who's gonna watch this. What's your definition of very frugal? Because when I hear very frugal, that to me, like my gut is very frugal. Okay, assume there's no mortgage. Do you have a mortgage, Jim? Uh no. Okay, so no mortgage.

SPEAKER_01 25:59

That's

Spending Less And Giving More

SPEAKER_01 26:00

part of why we can be where we're at, because we're gonna get a share in the family house.

SPEAKER_00 26:05

So okay, great point as well. So like my thought, very frugal, like what's coming to me is I would say $2,500 a month. If I heard very frugal. $2,500 a month, and that's including like over the course of a year of, hey, if you have to buy a new car, that's every 10 years or travel, stuff like that. But $2,500 a month, so let's call it like let's just say $30,000 a year. Are you like, whoa, whoa, whoa, that's like I don't even know how we'd live off of that. I'm talking more $5,000 a month. Are you like, I'm below that? What's like the average, if you had to guess?

SPEAKER_01 26:40

I'm figuring three thousand is enough for us a month.

SPEAKER_00 26:44

Yeah, so $36,000 a year. And so once Social Security comes on for you, do you know what your benefit is projected to be?

SPEAKER_01 26:51

I've already been getting it, and we have more than that. So yeah, so you're just social security is enough for our basic needs.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Right. Unbelievable. Enjoyable. Okay, let's talk, just because I can't help myself, the superhero account mistakes that I see all the time. The the biggest ones are people will say, I love dividends. I need the dividends, and I'll say, Stop right there. What's a dividend? And they go, Well, it's a company thanking me for owning them. I go, that's correct. But what's the ultimate goal? And they're like to maximize return. I go, that that is true. I'm all about maximizing return, assuming you can sleep at night. But if there was a company that paid you a, let's call it, 2% dividend and grew at 3% a year, that's a 5% return on that one position. But if that company did not pay you the dividend and instead grew at 10%, would that be more attractive? And most people go, yeah, but that's not like as guaranteed. It doesn't feel as safe as a dividend. I go, that's true. That's something we have to consider here. But dividends are great if you need more income to live off of or if you like the position. There's certain people that have said, all right, I can tell you actually secretly hate dividends. I go, no, I don't. If there's a company that's going to grow well and pay me a dividend, I'm not like gonna be upset. But I want to make sure that I'm prioritizing me. And I want to make sure I own things in the right accounts, and that's something that gets missed. What's been your approach so far with dividends in your superhero account?

SPEAKER_01 28:11

I have aimed at getting dividend funds, like the income aspect of it, because the you know the growth, you don't you don't see that except for on paper until you finally leave the position. When you close the position, then you don't have any more growth, any more income later. Yeah, you might have enough, you know, a lot from closing it. But have you considered it? I like the income aspect of it.

SPEAKER_00 28:40

Okay. Have you considered, because this is something that not saying it'll blow your mind by any means, but many people hear this and go, I just didn't know about that. Have you considered keeping the same exact investments because you like the income, but shifting the location? So putting those dividend investments into your 403B or IRA because that way you're not taxed on it. So you still receive the dividend, but you're actually deferring the taxes. And then the rest of your portfolio that's growing is in your superhero account, or is that something that you intentionally stay away from?

SPEAKER_01 29:12

I didn't think I could put more than the limit in my Roth.

SPEAKER_00 29:16

Good question. Sorry, let me rephrase. Whatever is currently in your IRA or Roth IRA or 403B, whatever's in there right now, you could go make a shift today. And there'd be no tax consequence because any changes in there are tax deferred. So what you could do, not saying you should, but what you could do is go and look at all your dividend investments in your superhero account and go, okay, what if I kept those? But I just instead owned them inside of my IRA or Roth, because then I don't have to pay taxes. And then in the growth account, that's more your superhero. That's not generating dividends because the only risk here, which is, by the way, a beautiful problem. Like if you're paying taxes, it's because you're making money. But if you wanted to do it most efficiently, generally what we'll see is someone will say their superhero account should own things that are either extremely conservative because they're living off of that money, or it's growing heavily because they don't need the money. So in your case, you don't need the money. You're living off Social Security and you're good. So although the income is nice, it's just creating more tax liability. Theoretically, you could own that in these other accounts you have and just grow more. But to your point, like, grow more for what? Like you have all your needs. So let me ask this what, like, let's pretend you passed away tomorrow. Never fun to talk about, which I recognize, but I'm the weird guy that brings it up. Yes. Where's the money going? Is it going to kids? Is it charities? Do you feel good about how much you leave behind? Would you feel regret going, why didn't we spend more? It's gonna go to charities. Yeah. Do you feel good about that? Yeah. Okay. Certain people will tell me it's I feel great about that, but you know, I did work for this. I want to make sure I can spend more. I'm not getting that sense. I'm getting the sense that you're comfortable and you don't need to spend beyond your means for no reason. Is that right though?

SPEAKER_01 31:10

Right.

SPEAKER_00 31:11

Yeah. What if I truly, and I know you already kind of alluded to it with your $10 example, but what if we went further and I said you've got to spend $10,000 before the end of the month. It's December 12th, as of this recording. You have to spend it. What would you spend it on? Or else it goes poof.

SPEAKER_01 31:28

Probably give it to there's there's some people that I know in Peru that uh could do an awful lot with that.

SPEAKER_00 31:36

Amazing. And in the world, if the world had more gyms, it would be a better world. So I love that answer. Um, Jim, you very kindly said this, so I want to reiterate um because this is interesting. Um, I never thought this would be the case. I never thought this would be my life, but I'm reading an email you sent to me in September 17th, 2025. You said, Hey, are you enjoyed the show today? Let me encourage you to never apologize anymore for going too long because sometimes I do go too long. You go, you're a character. We appreciate listening to you. Um I know your focus is early retirement, but could you once in a while talk to people like me who are finally retired at

Advice To Younger Self And Wrap

SPEAKER_00 32:10

70? We loved our work and kept at it extra years. So, what do we do with all our retirement issues and finances? And um, so even here, the my question is, you know, Jim, we've got a 40-year age difference between us, which I think is cool. Um my question is, what's it like? And be as honest as you'd like, and I'm open to all feedback. What's it like hearing about retirement planning from someone 40 years younger than you? Are you like, hey, I saw this video of this kid? What the heck could he possibly know? Was it weird? Was it weirdly comforting? I mean, what was the the vibe like watching a videos from retirement related of someone like me?

SPEAKER_01 32:51

Um, honestly, there are several of you guys out there that are young. But if you guys have done the the studying and you know all these different things, you've got the knowledge that we don't have. And there's you know, that's that's why we turn to people like you, or we find you and listen to you and find out what we can learn and what maybe we can apply to our situation.

SPEAKER_00 33:24

Well, that humility has taken you far because I hear people like you going, wow, okay, if I had extra money, like my first thought, if you said, all right, you have to spend another 10,000, my initial thought was not, okay, could I help someone in Peru? Even though that's to me, do I have everything I need? I really do. My first thought was, okay, well, I really love playing soccer. What if they discontinue the cleats I like wearing and then my my feet are uncomfortable or whatever? They're they're probably not gonna discontinue it. And I'm just naturally thinking, okay, I have to spend it, how am I gonna spend it? But you don't really have to spend it. If I really have all my needs met, I want to give more, I do want to help more. I won't, I'm curious, how did you have this mindset of I have enough, I'm good? Because there's this concept of I gotta keep up with the Joneses, and you never know how much is too much, so I gotta just make sure I can buy the water bottles while I can, or whatever it may be. I'm impressed by your mindset. How did this occur?

SPEAKER_01 34:23

I was like this by temperament from when I was a kid.

SPEAKER_00 34:27

So did your parents talk about money openly? Was it taboo?

SPEAKER_01 34:32

No, I I don't remember them talking about it at all when I was growing up. I knew I knew it was a little tight for them.

SPEAKER_00 34:40

Interesting. Wow, because that there's I talk to a lot of people who feel guilty with how much they have, and they will honestly say, I my life's goal is to give away as much as I can. And I go, awesome, beautiful. If that's your goal. Um, and then I'll say, Did you enjoy your career? And they go, No, it was so stressful. And I'll go, okay, so you didn't enjoy your career for it sounds like a long time. Now you're guilty that you have all this money, even though you saved to get to this point, and now you want to give it all away. Like that, that to me is doesn't sound like that enjoyable of a life. It sounds like you found your calling and you did what you enjoyed until you were 70. Do you remember there being a crossroads, if you will, of like, okay, I could go this route in life, or I could go this route in life, and choosing to go this way instead of maybe a traditional nine to five at you know some sales office?

SPEAKER_01 35:30

Uh I don't remember any particular crossroads. Was it early on? It was basically when I was in high school that I was confronted with or presented with the possibility of being involved in ministry as a missionary and felt that that's what God was sending me to do. So with that in mind, I proceeded to go to college and get involved in church ministries, and it led from one thing to another until finally I went to Peru.

SPEAKER_00 36:06

Wow. Well, I believe many people in the comments will share their gratitude for people like you because it is really powerful the work that you do. So, Jim, I want to thank you for coming on the show, and I want to end my episode the way I like to end all of them, which is by shutting the heck up myself and letting you talk to your younger self or anyone who's thinking of retiring in the next few years. Do you mind sharing? Because this is advice that truly I wish I could show every email. And many of you, before I let you share, Jim, I promise I will shut up. Um, before Jim shares here, many of you will tell me, I don't want to reply on YouTube because it's public. I don't want that to come back to me, but you'll send me a comment and you'll say, the final things people say at the end of your episodes will dictate largely whether or not I choose to retire at this time or that time. And the advice from these people that you have on your show are really changing the way I look at things, and I appreciate it. So I want to just say, Jim, you're helping more people than you know by even being willing to share. And so I will go ahead and shut up now.

SPEAKER_01 37:06

One th one th way of thinking about it that I thought I would close with is that at this point in life I can say what we need to do for all of us is to cultivate four, no, five F. Five F. Cultivate your faith, cultivate family, cultivate your friends, cultivate fitness, and finally cultivate your finances. And when you cover all of those, um life can can go along pretty well.

SPEAKER_00 37:49

And if you can do it in an unrushed way, it's even better. Appreciate you coming on the show and sharing all of this. Guys, give Jim some love in the comments for being open. And it's fun and refreshing to hear people who enjoyed what they did. And it wasn't a, okay, I I had to finally work until 56, then the second they let me out, I was out of there. Which look, I know that's some of you. I know some of you are like, why didn't I pursue something like Jim pursued? Because the the truth is maybe your circumstances didn't allow for it. Maybe so it's one of those things, don't beat yourself up. Now, what can you do to put yourself in a great position? Jim, thank you again for coming on the show.

SPEAKER_01 38:26

Thank you. Thank you for all of the interviews you do and for all the videos you and James do. They're very, very helpful.

SPEAKER_00 38:35

Thank you. We do them for people just like you. Thanks, Jim.

unknown 38:38

Bye.

SPEAKER_00 38:38

If you enjoyed this episode of Retirement Reality, check out how we help people retire with confidence. You can see we have an FAQ section on our website. If you just hover over the resources tab, you can go ahead and see this FAQ section here and learn everything about what it's like to work with us, including our personalized planning process, a quick overview of how everything works, do you have enough money to become a client? Where will your money be? Everything from tax planning to fees. We are extremely transparent and want to make sure that you're working with someone that resonates with you. Hopefully you enjoyed this episode. And if you once again want to be a guest on a future show so that you can share your story, you can see that in the link of this episode. Thanks. Thank you all, as always, for listening to the early retirement podcast. I love getting to host these shows and make different content for you guys every single week. I've not missed a single week in years, and that is because I love getting to do this. Now, please be smart about this before you actually execute any strategy that you see me talk about or hear me talk about, should I say, please talk to your financial advisor, your tax preparer, your estate attorney. Please be smart about this. None of this should be construed as financial advice. This is for fun, educational, informational purposes only. Once again, just quick disclaimer here, guys, please be smart about this. Appreciate you listening as always. And you can, of course, submit a question on my website, early retirementpodcast.com. If you, of course, want me to address a specific case study or topic. I will not promise I can get to it, but I respond to every single person. And if I find it will be helpful for a lot of people, I will absolutely make an episode on it. At the very least, give you some insight. That's it. Thanks, guys.