Top 5 Financial Moves That Actually Changed Our Lives. #472 Part2

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In this episode, we pull back the curtain on the five financial moves that created real change in our lives....no fluff, no hype, just the systems and decisions that actually stuck. We discussed the importance of going all in on a few moves instead of ten half‑started projects.

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Transcript

Setting The Stakes And Focus

Automate Money And Pay Yourself First

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Alright, y'all. So in our last segment, we just talked about giving a little shout out to D'Angelo, how he was, in essence, the soundtrack to my teenage years. In this segment, we're gonna be talking about the top five financial moves that actually changed my life. Alright, guys, so listen, let's let's talk about this. So we we're gonna talk about the top five financial moves that actually changed my life. Listen, guys, um, I know a lot of people will give you BS. I'm gonna give you real, real, real things. And I'm gonna say this through everything that I teach you guys or everything that I'm letting y'all know about, this is through the School of Hard Knocks. I think a lot of people would just be lying. And if they're successful about something, they'll just say, oh, well, I'm successful on that, and not really giving you the real real. I'm telling y'all the truth, right? And I'll say this right now like if you do things half-assed, right, it is expensive. Whatever you do, if you're gonna do it half-assed, as me and Dr. Renee have learned, it's gonna be expensive, it's gonna waste time. Um, and I'll be honest with you, for me, it's like messes with my confidence. So I'm learning now, 10 years in, that although you can throw a lot of different things um at the kitchen sink in terms of like real estate and investing here and you know, doing side hustles there and all that stuff, like it there's something to be said about committing, there's something to be said about having focus to like one or two things and really spending real resources, real attention um uh to that. Otherwise, when you have like 10 different things that you're trying to handle, and then you're trying to teach people 10 different things, people can see it. They know that you're not committed to it. And in essence, maybe nine out of 10 things will be a hobby, right? And for us, what we're trying to let y'all know is that we changed our lives with very specific action. And I think, Dr. Renee, what we need to be clear about is like what are the things that we did that actually changed our lives, not what are the experiments that we did that are kind of augmenting our lives. And I think that's what happened to us, where we did like specific moves that changed the trajectory of our lives big time. Those are things that we need to let people know about. And then I think we started experimenting, and as a result, you know, maybe we could have done. Um, they augmented our lives, maybe, and some to some extent, some of them even subtracted from us. But I think we should just be real with them about that. So let's hit it. All right. So I'm gonna say the first thing definitely is automating money like a system, right? Not an emotion. So we talk about budgeting all the time. So I'll be very real with you all. Like we are at a point now where um, you know, we pay ourselves first. So if we get a paycheck, the money goes into our savings, and that's savings for kids' college that goes into savings for our emergency fund, that goes into savings for our car fund, just in case the car breaks down, that goes into savings for insurance, right? So we have disability insurance and we pay ours one year at a time, the premiums, because it's cheaper that way. So we put our money in and it just comes into our bank account and then it gets diverted into an online savings account where we can't touch that money, and it just gets automated for us. Yeah. Um, because I think a lot of times, if you get really emotional with your money, right, and you're not systematic with it, that's where you get half-assed with it, or that's where you start to hold on to money longer than it needs to be held on to.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

Or you start spending it when you don't start spending it.

SPEAKER_01 3:28

Right, right. I I I wholeheartedly agree with that. And I think the key thing for us right now is we started thinking about our future first, right? Like where are we gonna be in 15 years, where are we gonna be in 20 years? And um, obviously, the first thing that we discussed 10 years ago was we gotta get out of debt. We put, I'd say what, 90% of our our resources towards paying off our debt.

SPEAKER_02 3:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

The last 10%, we always main sure that we put money into our 401ks so that we can get the match. You wanna let them know why the match is important or you want me to do that?

SPEAKER_00 4:09

You mean the match from your employer?

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Yeah.

Debt Paydown And Employer Match

SPEAKER_00 4:12

Yes, free money, right? So basically, you know, you if you if your employer does match, right, in your 401k, that's if they do. Not all employer employers do, but if they do match, um, what you want to do is definitely put up to and including what they are going to match. So for example, if your employer says that they're going to match up to whatever 15% of your paycheck is, then you want to get as close to that 15% as possible because you're gonna put in 15% and then they're gonna match that amount of money that you did not necessarily have to work for very specifically, right? You didn't have to put in time for dollars for that money um directly. So that is what we call free money, and you want to be able to do that because that will then help your 401k accrue interest much faster.

Low‑Hanging Fruit Over Shiny Plays

SPEAKER_01 5:10

Yeah. And I would say this, y'all. After 10 years, I think the best way to, if you want to create wealth for yourself, is I'll be honest with y'all. Like, I think we talk about real estate way too much. I think we talk about other types of like alternative typing investing way too much. What is at your job, or if you are locum's doc, like the low-hanging fruit of just getting out of debt, saving money, putting money into a brokerage account, putting money into your individual retirement account, putting money into your HSA if you can afford to, and you know, make sure you choose the right spouse. Like, don't get a divorce, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:58

Is that right there?

SPEAKER_01 6:00

That right there. Those are the most important. It's like it's like uh Hitch, that movie Hitch, right? Where you got funny ass, what's that name? Kevin, what's that name? What's the white guy's name?

SPEAKER_00 6:10

Kevin Kevin shoot Kevin.

SPEAKER_01 6:15

Kevin Bacon, the white guy, and he's doing the things with his q-tips and throwing it away and doing all this stuff. It's like, and what does Hitch say? He's like, listen, just a two-step. Simple. It's right here. I don't need to go out to pizza. I got pizza right here. Kevin James. Kevin James. Kevin James, you know what I'm saying? We got pizza right here. And that's what it is with your with your finances, y'all. Right here. See the two-step right here. Starting there. I got my IRA, yeah. You know what I'm saying? I got my 401k right here. I got my 403B. Ooh. Ooh, you can do that sometimes. Ooh. Uh-huh. What what move is that? That's the HSA. That's the HSA. If you have enough, right? Do the HSA. Right? And then, like this, you know what I'm saying? You got a good spouse, you know what I'm saying? Who you can trust. You know what they do at night, you know what I'm saying? Uh-huh. You know where they be at. You know what I'm saying? Ooh. Hey, ah, right? People try to make it too complicated, yo. I'm telling you, with these syndications, these real estate thing, y'all, you know, you're gonna be a surgeon and you still need to be doing like syndicate. Like, listen, y'all. I'm telling you, don't fall for it. Um, we've been there, and we're gonna talk about it on a future episode. I'm telling you, am I lying, Renee? Because we got to talk about this house that we got in Pennsylvania that I just want to sell, you want to keep, and I don't think that it's it's worth it. But the most important thing is pay off your loans, guys. Save your money, do all the tax advantage things, focus on that and stay consistent with that. Once you get consistent after that, then you might want to consider some of these other things. That's my number one thing.

SPEAKER_00 7:53

I I I'm gonna do the two-step while you're talking. Don't do no two-step while you talking. Go ahead. So I agree with you to some extent. Um, but I think that we have to distinguish building wealth versus saving for retirement because I don't think that those two things are the same. Right? So while the IRA, the 401k, those may be building, you know, or saving for retirement. I don't think that is the same thing as building wealth. And I think you don't think that there's a distinction.

Wealth vs Retirement: The Debate

SPEAKER_01 8:32

I think you're playing with some. I'll leave it with you like this. I think the big mistake that people make is you talk to people who got right out of medical school or out of residency or people who are young attendings and be like, yo, listen, like rather than worry about, we're not saying rather than worry about boards, but the person is basically saying you got to get multiple streams of income from your house, you got to get mad doors, you got to do this, all these different things. It's like, listen, pass your boards, put money into your 401k, save your loans, and then listen, if you decide to get into real estate, I'm gonna be real with you, you have to spend a lot of time working on it. Because if you do it half-assed, if you do it half-assed, it's gonna come back and bite you in the in the butt. And you have to make a decision in your mind. Am I ready to walk away from medicine now? The reason I say that is because if you're operating a lot, if you're doing procedural-based type of uh um, you know, you you really need to work on your craft. And it's hard to work on your craft while you're trying to, you know, make sure that the tenants plumbing is taken care of.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 9:39

It's tough.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

It is.

SPEAKER_01 9:40

So I'm not saying I'm not saying that you can't, I'm not saying that um, you know, you can't build wealth outside of the 401ks and all that stuff. I'm not saying those things don't, or excuse me, the the real estate things, but what I'm saying is is yo, just like if you're gonna do real estate, then you better do real estate. That's all I'm saying. Right. Right?

SPEAKER_00 10:01

I know, I know, but I think I think the the distinction that I'm making is so that people understand, like, your 401k, your IRA is not really for building wealth, right? That is building a retirement, right? Because you you can certainly build a 401k in an IRA and never be wealthy. Right? Like that that is possible.

SPEAKER_01 10:26

Why where are you getting that from? Tell me, explain, because you're just saying things without really explaining it.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

Meaning, like, so when so the what is the definition of wealth, right? Is what we have to really think about. If you're doing your 401k and your IRA, and we're talking about building wealth, it's like, well, building wealth when, right? Because at some point, your 401k and your IRA is for you to retire. A lot of these definition of wealth.

SPEAKER_01 10:57

Here, real quick. Wealth is the total value of all assets owned by an individual, which can include both physical possession, possessions, right, and intangible assets minus all debts. It is a stock of your network. It is a stock of valuable resources and possessions, such as money, property, investments, rather than a flow of income earned over time.

SPEAKER_00 11:18

Go ahead. Right. So it's your essentially, that was a rhetorical question, by the way, when I was like, what is your what's the definition of wealth? Essentially, your net worth is going to determine whether or not you're wealthy. But wealthy when is really what I'm asking, right? Because the question is, do you want to wait until 65 or 59 and a half, you know, to determine whether or not you are wealthy? Some people want to build wealth still in their youth so that potentially they might be able to walk away from medicine, right? So I think we need to kind of distinguish that. It's like, yeah, build your, you know, build your retirement. But if you are trying to build wealth, what are some of the things that you need to do in order to do that, you know, in the next 10, 12 years when you're not hitting 59 or you're not hitting 65 years old?

Protect Your Earning Power First

SPEAKER_01 12:16

Okay, I get what you're saying. What I'm telling you guys, guys, what I'm telling you all right now is this your biggest ability to build wealth before you retire is your income as a doctor. I'm telling you guys right now, not how many real estate properties you have, right? The the way in which you're gonna buy real estate properties is through your income as a doctor. Is that is that the truth? Yes, yeah. Right? So that means that you need to pre that means you need to protect that ability to make money as quickly as possible. That means you need to get disability insurance. That is, you know, okay, right, just in case something happens to you. That means you got to pay off your debt so that the money that you're bringing in as an income is going like into your savings account or is going into a brokerage account, right? Like you got to be able to do that. Um, you got to make sure you pass boards, you got to make sure that you're okay, you know, clinic-wise, clinical-wise, right? Whatever it's procedural in the clinic or whatever, right? But that's that stuff is hard in and of itself. And then to throw it on top of that, oh yeah, you need to try to get like, you need to try to get this, like um, you know, this multifamily place. And then listen, like they call in because you got toilets that are not flushing and all that stuff, especially when you finish this residency, that's a lot. So all I'm just saying is I understand what you're saying. I'm just letting people know how it looks like real time. That's all I'm saying. Right. That's all I'm saying. I think so. Yeah, if you have a hundred doors, if you have a hundred doors, that's great. But if you have a hundred doors and then you still, like you are heart surgeon and you still got heart surgery in the morning and all these different things when you're studying, right? Right.

SPEAKER_00 13:52

That's all I'm saying. I agree. I agree. I think that what's important. Be careful. I think what's important here is that people need to understand that there's a certain, there's a certain priority, right? And people don't understand that you can't prioritize there's no way that you could prioritize everything on the same line. Everything can't be number one, right? And so I think what I hear you saying, because correct me if I'm wrong, isn't it? They hear what I'm saying. Well, I'm asking you, okay, correct me if I'm wrong, but what I hear you saying is that the first thing you need to do is actually make sure that you can work as a doctor. And what does that mean? There are check boxes that make sure that you can work as a doctor. You gotta pass your boards, gotta be able to be licensed, right? You gotta get a job as a doctor, right? When you get a job as a doctor, make sure you keep that job, you know, to the point where you can continue to make some income. Whether you jump from job to job to job is is not the issue, but make sure you keep a job, some job, uh a locums gig, anything, right? Just work as a doctor. Make sure you protect your ability to work as a doctor, i.e., disability insurance. Because if your hands are broken and you can't operate, you got a problem. Yeah. So get your disability insurance, right? That's job number one is make sure that the thing that you invested all this time and money into that you actually are able to do. That's number one. Then number two, save your money. Save your money. Why you why you spending everything? Why you gotta go out and get the new car? Why you gotta go why? Why are you doing that? Right? Save your money. Stop spending your money all over the place. Spend the money for things that you need, absolutely. But you gotta take it.

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Don't be buying lucids. Don't be buying lucids. You ain't gotta buy no cigars. You gotta bring back the love into this. You ain't gotta buy no cigars. You ain't gotta buy sneakers. Yo, get some sketches, so you'll be all right.

SPEAKER_00 15:57

It's the S, right? Not telling people what they should have, shouldn't buy. But you know, save your money for the things that actually matter, right?

When To Add Side Hustles

SPEAKER_01 16:05

And the real quick, real quick, even the sneaker, the sneaker, uh, that whole like how like Jordans are like a thousand dollars, that whole like pyramid scheme is gone now. I love it. I love it. Yo, try to buy some sneakers, and as soon as like a minute into them being on the website, they completely sold that. This is stupid, yo. Come on. Anyway, move on, move on, move on.

SPEAKER_00 16:27

But yeah, so save your money. The way you do that, the way you know what money that you're gonna save and what money you're gonna spend. So if you want to buy the lucid, if you want to buy the sketchers, that you basically budget, right? Make sure you know where that hard-earned money is going.

SPEAKER_01 16:45

The funny part is you come to work, you come to work, you're gonna be wearing those nice Nikes, and then you're gonna take them off and put on those nasty shoes anyway. So just wear the shoe that you know, like I don't see the point. You cannot tell people what to buy. Like, like do people be buying expensive figs scrubs. Why? Especially if you're a surgeon. It's like, all right, if you really operate in, you know you ain't trying to get blood all over these nice scrubs.

SPEAKER_00 17:06

That's how I'm gonna be able to do it. But we can't actually wear figs into the OR unless you're going to really understand.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Yeah, I don't know why they do that. The hospitals, but most of the time I see people change right before.

SPEAKER_00 17:17

Yeah, I was gonna say, usually hospitals are like, nah, you can't wear that in here because they're wearing it outside. But in any case, all right. Let me finish my point. Like, can I finish my point, please? Like I'm just asking you, is that what I'm hearing you say? Yes, that's because you're you're kind of like going like, well, do this, do that, do this. But people still need a priority, like a list.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

Guys, focus on the hanging fruit, focus on a low-hanging fruit. Focus on making sure you can be a doctor and that what everything that requires you to be a doctor, focus on that first. Then focus on the things that'll um keep money flowing to you. And what I mean by that is paying yourself first, putting your money in different tax advantage accounts that are for you, right? And focus on investing that stuff. Once you get to a point where you feel like, you know what, my career is um, my career as a clinician is really good. I feel like what I've brought in, I have a good enough nest egg. Maybe I can start considering something else. But just know that when you start doing all of these different side projects, or if you consider a side project, it needs a lot of attention, right? And there's a possibility that that attention can take, or the attention that's required to be very successful in that field will take away your attention from what you're doing as a clinician. It's just in my opinion, like I can tell you 30,000-foot view that it's great to go into real estate, but I can also tell you from the ground that it's tough.

SPEAKER_00 18:45

So, at what point would you say that someone should take on a side hustle?

SPEAKER_01 18:52

I don't know. It's not up to me, it's up to down.

SPEAKER_00 18:56

No, I don't know. I mean, you just went on this whole tirade about how people buy looses in in Jordans. Like at what point?

SPEAKER_01 19:07

I I I think that I think there's a point where somebody who's in medicine has to realize or they come to a realization that they don't want to do this forever. That may occur when they just start as an attending, it may start when they are finishing residency, um, it may start later on, but whenever they realize that, right, that's when they are going to start examining and looking at other ways in which they can basically get off the ramp, right? Whether that's through investing in real estate or what have you, right? In my line, like that's the majority of people that hold my question. Let me finish. Let me finish. Most people who come and they want to talk about um, you know, I got into syndications or I got into the side hustle, it's gonna build me a certain type of thing, is they got, in essence, what's the word I want to use? Either they got jaded or they just feel like yo, medicine is not for them, and they want to do something different. That's usually the number one story that they tell before they start telling people about the specifics, right? So that's that's the reason why I'm saying that.

SPEAKER_00 20:27

Right, but that's not what I'm asking you. Thank you for your answer, but it is completely not what I was asking you. My question was more because we were talking more about finances, I'm asking you at what what is the general state of of their finances that you feel they would have to be at in order to then embark on that, right? Because they they will have that thought, right? And then they'll start working towards that thing. What is the point at which you think in general, right? In general, because we we can't be in everybody's pocket, but what is the point in general at which you think that they should start down that road of okay, now I'm gonna dip my toe into this other venture. And not even necessarily leave medicine altogether, but at least really just I'm gonna go into my first project. I'm gonna divert my attention to this just I got you, I got you. So I'm gonna hold my thoughts.

SPEAKER_01 21:37

I'm gonna hold my thought until you say your point. I'm gonna use that as a point of privilege. Go ahead, say what you gotta say first. That was it.

SPEAKER_00 21:45

My I said my question. No. Um, you go first. Go first with what? I'm asking you a question. You don't have thoughts about this at all? No, I'm asking you a question.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

I'm asking you a question. So mine is going to be, like, I can't give specific numbers. Mine is going to be when you realize that you are willing to take some losses for the greater good. And what I mean by that is when you realize that you may need to make a significant investment in something else, whether that's time, energy, or even money to get you off that off-ramp of medicine. Right. Now, that hopefully is occurring once like you are like feeling very stable. And for me, stability would be you're out of student loan debt. You've passed your boards, clinically, you feel like you're like on cruise control. That could I can't tell exactly when that's going to be for some people. For us, that was six years in. Right? That was like six years into our to us leaving residency. You know, so for somebody else, that might be a little bit later on. But when you get to that point where you're like, yo, this is not sustainable, I need to do something else, you may need to consider that.

SPEAKER_02 23:07

So you know, okay.

Taxes As Strategy, Not Fear

SPEAKER_01 23:08

But let me let's let's for the sake of moving and not being circular, let's let's keep it moving. So um, number two, I have is taking taxes seriously, right? You have to learn the game of taxes, and you have to realize that there's no reward in running away from it. Right. I think I've said this in earlier episodes that the IRS code is like a book of it's basically a cheat code on how you can lower your taxes. And if you are nervous about it, if you run away from it, then what ends up happening is you get treated like everybody else and you end up paying a lot of taxes when you don't really need to, right? So it's not just saying I have a CPA, but you really need to understand the strategy. And there are books, I'll put them in the show notes. There's some books out there that can help you and easily understand the strategy of how to keep your taxes low, the decisions that you need to make, whether it's doing some charitable contributions or putting money into your taxable accounts, um, there's a lot of different things that you can do to help bring your taxes down. And that's, I know in the past we've always said, oh, if you're locums, you can do all these different things. Even as a W-2, uh as somebody who's employed, there are things you can do to lower your tax burden, right? So super important. Um, I think that when we like early in our career, right? I think when like we had a CPA, and what we realized is that like when I wasn't engaged or when you weren't engaged, like really locked in, focused with what we needed to take care of from a tax standpoint, by the end of the year or when it was time to do our taxes, there was always regret.

unknown 24:47

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 24:48

It was always regret where you're like, damn it, why didn't we do A, B, C, D? Why don't we track this stuff? And I'm just saying, like, this is another low-hanging fruit where if you put your full attention towards making sure you're making the right decisions with your money and the right decisions that's going to help you in terms of taxes, if you could make those decisions, you're gonna keep more of that money in your bank account instead of giving it to the IRS.

SPEAKER_00 25:13

Yeah, I think that that's I think that that's true, but I also think that that's very tough, right? Because the planning or, you know, the questions that you have to ask in order to be able to really get the full benefit. So yeah, if you don't, if you don't know how to ask the appropriate questions because you just don't know what questions to ask and you don't have a great CPA, then it becomes a little bit difficult. And I think that's what happened with us, right? If we're talking about mistakes that we made, there were just some questions that we didn't know, and it was like trial and error. So we had to lose money before we could start really understanding that, oh, wait, you know, all of these things that we should have known during the year last year, we're gonna ask up front this year, and so on and so forth. So just you know, keep track.

Autonomy Through Locums And Control

SPEAKER_01 26:06

I think you bring up a good point, but I'll be honest and tell you that the next time I met with the CPA, they told me things and I just forgot about it. You know what I'm saying? So there's there's knowledge and then there's even implementation, right? So those are two separate things. So I I agree with what you're saying. Sometimes it's hard. Well, it is hard to get that information if you're not an expert at that. But then once you get the knowledge also, there's another step to implementing it, right? Right. Same thing with student loans. It's like, yeah, I don't want to be in student loan debt, but then once you get the knowledge to know that this student loan debt sucks, implementing the plan is two separate things, also. Right. So I I agree with you. I think you make a good point. I'll link below some of the books that we've used. Um, but I do think it's important to understand that you don't need to love your taxes. Um, you just can't afford to ignore them. I'll leave you to like that. Is that fair enough? Does that work for you, Dr. Renee? Don't nobody love their taxes. You know what I'm saying? So your CPA loves taxes. So all right, let's move to the third one that I've learned. Listen, y'all. Um this one's gonna be a little bit controversial for half of our audience, but I'm just gonna say this right now. All right, so I have it on my notes as choosing locums or independent contracting for life or contracting so that you can have a life of autonomy as well as control. I say that with the caveat of there are plenty of people who are employed right now who have control of their lives and they're not independent contractors. What I'm saying is after 10 years, what we're realizing is money's important. Income, getting the most amount of money that you can get paid is very important. But for me and Renee, we don't, or at least me, I don't value Rolexes more so than I value time with my family. I don't value lucids more so than I value time with like why do you do this, me? Dr. Love, you know we love me. We love you. Actually, I have lucid, I have lucid jealousy, actually. I think lucids are a way better card than Tesla and stuff. And listen, y'all, let me tell you something right now. Dr. Love, he is killing it. He does things the smart way. He And he loves his family. He has 109, he does things as a 1099 ER doc, and he is killing it. So if you guys are looking for advice on what to do it from an ER standpoint, you guys need to be looking at him. So I say that in jest. I'm joking around. But he does it the smart way. His lucid is as a business expense, right? So as much as I joke around, my man is doing it the right way, right? But what I'm just saying is it's important how you work and why you work, as opposed to what you're getting from it, which could just be an income, right? Because you could get paid a million dollars to do whatever you want to do in medicine. That sounds great. But if you every weekend have to be on call, if you can't get away and go to a funeral, you can't have your birthday off, you can't have your spouse's birthday off or your kid's birthday off, or you know, you go to a wedding and it's time to give your daughter away and you can't be there because you got to deliver a baby. We heard that one. What what are we talking about here, right? So I just think that it's super important that, yes, me and Renee are locum tenons, we're independent contractors, we have decided to focus on autonomy and control. But I think also for you guys who are independent, or excuse me, for you guys who are employed, you know, it's super important to really focus, I think, on the control aspect more so than the income aspect, um, to some extent. So you know.

SPEAKER_00 29:44

Yeah, I think you know, we I had a quick conversation with someone um about you know quality of life. And quality of life, when we talk about quality of life, a lot of times we're talking about, you know, the quality of life outside of the hospital. But remember. Remember, there's a quality of life also inside of the hospital. So, you know, make sure that, yeah, if you're getting a good income or you're getting some something from this job, that it's a job that you actually want to wake up and go to. Because, you know, if it's a job that you don't actually like, there are things about the job that you fundamentally just say, I don't want to do this, but it is giving me this benefit or giving me this income. Then the question is, you know, for that time that you are at work, which could be a lot of time that you're at work, is your quality of life being affected? Um, so I think that that's something to think about as well. Choose wisely.

Real Estate Requires Intentional Work

SPEAKER_01 30:41

Oh, yeah. I a hundred percent agree with that. Um, for me, control over my time, it's the highest form of wealth. I just leave it to you like that. Could we be making more? I'm gonna let y'all know, guys. We could be making way more, y'all. Like, yo, I could get like three lucids. You know what I'm saying? But um, I've decided wrong with Lucids, four Jordans, you know what I'm saying? All right, you know, but you know, I wanna make sure my kids like me, and that's important to me, you know. So that's all you gotta pay them$20 each. I gotta make sure my wife loves likes me, you know what I'm saying? So you gotta pay me$20. And and I and I got a security system now, Dr. Renee. I know when the milkman comes in the mailman, all that shit. She got AI, all that, all right. Anyway, let's move on to real estate. Boom. I was gonna bring it back to this. So you gotta understand, why are you laughing? You gotta understand where I'm going with this. Real estate, right? You can do real estate, guys. It's important if you make it important. But it has to be done with intentionality, all right? Not just like I should buy something because somebody says I should buy something, right? Real estate really works when you work it, right? So that notion of I'm gonna do real estate and it's gonna give me passive income. Nah, I don't work like that.

unknown 32:05

Dr.

SPEAKER_01 32:05

Renee, am I lying?

SPEAKER_00 32:07

You're not.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

Right. If you're gonna do it, you gotta understand the numbers, you gotta understand the market that you're in, you gotta understand who's gonna manage the property. Are you gonna hire a property manager? When you get a property manager, are they gonna take money from you? Right?

SPEAKER_00 32:23

Well, yes, they're always gonna take money from you.

SPEAKER_01 32:26

All this stuff, like you can't half-ass this, yo. If you really decide to get into it, it's work, right? Like Big Daddy can't is work, baby. You know what I'm saying? Like, you gotta be ready, right? And the other thing too is I'm telling you right now, like, I ain't I know people always talk about like, yo, like I'm gonna get this property and in 10 years it's gonna be a pre man. I don't believe in all that appreciation hype. For me, it's about cash flow. How much prop how much money I'm gonna get from this property right now in terms of rents and so forth. That's one thing that I would say. So um wait, what you laughing at?

SPEAKER_00 33:02

Well, I do think that appreciation uh is a real thing, so I do believe in it. Um but you know, it depends on what you're going into the real estate for, right? If you're going for a buy and hold, then yeah, like then you gotta worry about the cash flow. But if you're going in for, you know, some sort of a flip or you're doing a syndication, you know, you're going into real estate for a you know, for a specific um reason in a specific way, then yeah, you're gonna go into real estate or your your going your motives for going into real estate might be different than someone else's. You have to ask yourself, what is my motive for going into real estate? Am I truly trying to buy and hold, right? Am I trying to buy and hold and be, you know, be the landlord of this place and potentially get a property manager if I need to? Um, and if not, then if you're buying and holding, if you're not getting a property manager, then yes, you're gonna have to be extremely involved in maintaining this property. If you're going in for a flip, then you're gonna dump a whole bunch of money into it with the hopes of getting a bunch of money out of it pretty quickly, right? So you're not buying and holding. You're whole you're hoping that within a few weeks you're gonna be able to make your money back, right? If you're going into a syndication, then you're putting in your money, but you're thinking, okay, well, I'm gonna wait for the appreciation because that is literally the only way that I'm going to get my money back, is for this thing to appreciate, and then I'm going to sell it at the point at which I feel that the appreciation is going to give me a significant prop uh profit. So I think you know, it you can't lump everything together, right? And there are still other ways of doing real estate, right? I'm not lumping all these kinds of things.

SPEAKER_01 35:01

Man, I ain't lumping everything. Well, I'm saying is if you're trying to get that with that that multifamily, listen, I'm telling you how I look at it. And that's what I've learned, not what do you call it? You trying to give people the text. I'm telling you what I've learned. Listen, I'm inside what you're learning, but you can't. Get that cash flow, everybody. Get the cash flow. That's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_00 35:20

But but you're telling them this in the context of you know, one way of doing real estate. You you're not getting a lot of money. The way in which I've done it. The way in which I've done it. Well, you've done it two ways now, but you're you're done. That's the way I wouldn't do, guys. Okay, I understand that. But you but you have to understand that someone who's listening may not really understand what you're saying. And you have to distinguish between every month from your rent from your renters.

SPEAKER_01 35:48

I want that check. Give me that check. Where that check at? You know what I'm saying? And who's gonna get that check? And where that check is gonna go. That's what I'm saying. Don't worry about what the house is gonna do in 10 years. Where are the rents? Where they at?

SPEAKER_00 36:02

That's buy and hold, babe. That's what I'm talking about. So, and that's buy and hold. That's buy and hold. So some people may not want to do buy and hold. They want to go take away.

SPEAKER_01 36:12

I can't front though, Dr. Renee. Hey guys, I can't front. Listen, don't I make Dr. Renee look good? I know I'm bad. I know that I am like my points are so like like they could be like I over summarize things and so forth. So I make Renee look like the real smart person and stuff. Trust me, I think like she does. I'm just giving you all the real. She's not giving you real. You know what I'm saying? I am giving you the real. That's a real thing. That's why I say I make her look good. Talking about. I make her look good because I know I I take the I take the fall. I'm the fall guy. I got it.

SPEAKER_00 36:41

Nah, maybe I'm making you look bad. Maybe that's what's happening. Maybe that's actually what's happening. Maybe I'm just making you look bad.

SPEAKER_01 36:48

Let's move on to the next one. But before we move on to the next one, listen, real estate isn't passive unless you've built the system to make it passive. That takes time, that takes energy, um, that takes dedication. That's all I gotta say about that.

SPEAKER_00 37:02

So oh my god, go to the next tip. Please, please, let's close this out because I can't put this man no more. No, you don't close nothing out.

SPEAKER_01 37:12

You the co-host, I'm the host. I tell you what.

SPEAKER_00 37:15

Anyway, hurry up me.

SPEAKER_01 37:17

I gotta go pick up our kids. Let's go. Protecting the asset, and the asset is me. I'm telling y'all, this is super important, guys. Number five, protect you, right? The asset is you. For me, it's my health, it's my mind. Um, I'm focusing on rest, I'm focusing on strength and my health, and um also insurance. Telling y'all right now, insurance is a big thing, y'all. Telling y'all.

SPEAKER_00 37:42

What kind of insurance name?

Protect The Asset: Health And Insurance

SPEAKER_01 37:44

Uh, I'll get there when I when I get there. Don't tell me what it is. All right, thank you. Oh my gosh. Um, trauma surgery has definitely taught me that when the body goes, the mission goes. Because I see people's lives get snuffed out really quick, right? So it's super important um to make sure that you're um the relationships are right, that you're taking care of your body. Um, you're telling people that you love them when you do. And um, you know, work isn't everything, right? So for me, uh, as you all know, I've been focusing on working out. I've been focused on a mix of strength training as well as getting ready for a 5K. I want to build my heart and I also want to build my my physical so that my wife don't leave me looking sexy. I love that, right? Um, okay. I'm focusing on sleep. Check them cameras again. Yo, that's fine. You know, I learned how to block out negative energy, right? Um, I'll be honest with y'all, guys. Insurance is a real thing. Insurance is a real thing. Um, disability insurance, I know it's one of those things that if you never need it, then you spent all this money. Um, but you can't predict if something will happen to you. You could be doing something very simple, something very run-of-the-mill. And if you injure your hands or you get injured and you can't do your job, then the best ability for you to make wealth is sideline, right? So, you know, you listen to our our um sponsors, you know that who we rock with and what we have to say about disability insurance, but it's very important to have that. The other type of insurance that I would say is very, very important, y'all. Um, once you have kids, once you have dependents, is life insurance. But even more so than that, yo, I'm gonna tell you something right now. As from a ground-level grassroots is umbrella insurance, y'all. Super important. Super important because you'll be shocked um at people who are not in the field and they look at you as a target. Some people may look at you just as dollar signs, and the ability for you to have coverage that um you think you'll never need, or for you to kind of think about like people coming after you just for you know your insurance or just for you from a financial standpoint is something that I think is is hard to grasp, particularly when you come from a certain demographic. But once you reach reach a certain level, it's like, yeah, I gotta protect, I gotta protect myself. And I gotta protect my ability for my family to um feed and eat and all that stuff. So I would say insurance is very important also. Um, so that's that's that's one thing I have to say. And I I I left it as last because I think that you know, I don't want to spend too much time here. Uh but I also don't want to say goes without saying. Like this is really important.

SPEAKER_00 40:44

Yeah. I agree. That's all I got to say about that.

SPEAKER_01 40:48

Yeah, if if like the you know, like guys, like the system that we have is like Dr. Renee works weekends and I work the rest of the week. Um but we both have disability insurance, we both have umbrella insurance. Um Renee is now starting to pick up walking more and exercising more. Um, but this is this is a system and it's a plan. And the key thing is like if I break down or if Renee breaks down, like good portions of this plan break down, right? So for us, staying healthy, um, that is a financial strategy, actually.

SPEAKER_00 41:25

Yeah, yeah. Oh, absolutely, absolutely. So if you insure your car, you should insure your body.

SPEAKER_01 41:33

Yeah. And it's funny, like a lot of people will insure their car, and then when it comes to insuring themselves, definitely with in firms of disability or you know, anything else, they're like, Well, I don't need it.

SPEAKER_00 41:45

It's like, well, but you know Well, they insure their cars because you you legally have to. Um But I think a lot of people would not insure their cars if they didn't. If if it weren't illegal. Um But you know, you can always get another car. You can't always get another body, right? And that's I mean, I think just the the logic behind that, it just makes sense um to insure yourself. So hopefully those of you listening out there, everybody has disability insurance.

All In Beats Half Measures

SPEAKER_01 42:20

Yeah, I and I would say this, guys, like to end this whole subject, like yes, I think that there's a lot of things that I'm saying that I've said um that are real, um, that to some extent I say some things with ingest and so forth. But I hope you guys understand the core components of what I'm saying, which is Dr. Renee's will give you the 30,000-foot view of like what to expect. I prefer to give you like the real grassroots view of certain things, right? So the reason why I kept pushing the whole thing with cash flow is I believe that it's important to get cash flow. But yes, appreciation is important. Like you want to make sure that when you get a house that you know that in the next 10 years, if you're in an okay neighborhood, that eventually that property will be worth more. That's important. But also at the same time, you don't want to be using your own money to be paying the mortgage for that property because you're not getting enough money. That's true, right? That's all I'm just saying, right? And I think a lot of times people will say certain things, but then they're not really really being honest about what it means on a day-to-day basis. Yeah. If you're not getting the cash flow, who's gonna pay the mortgage? Right. You can't wait 10 years for the appreciation to kick in when the mortgage company is like, we want to our more, we want our money. That's all I'm saying, guys. So listen, you know, every major financial decision that we've made, it's mainly because we went all in. And the things that I'm telling you that I have an issue with or that I'm telling you this is how it really is, is mainly because I did it half-assed, or we did it half-assed, right? So whether that's starting a side business, whether that's putting too many irons on the stove, um, but things that we talk about really positively, paying off debt, you know, uh paying off debt, you know, um, making sure that we're doing locum tenons and making sure that, you know, we have a really tight family unit. We were all in on that and stuff. So um, Dr. Brandon, you want to add anything else before we finish this?

SPEAKER_00 44:21

No, I think you make a good point that that's the recurring theme, right? You know, there's there's no there's no amount of financial advice that you're going to give to someone that is going to explain to them what you just explained. It's like you just have to go all in, you know. So I could tell you, well, do this, do that, whatever. But if you're not all in it, then it doesn't matter. Like your money is not gonna solve your problems. You're going to solve your problems by your commitment.

SPEAKER_01 44:49

Right. And just like you said before, and I'll I'll just leave this will be the last point. Even if you don't like your career, or even if you're having a problem with your job and you think that maybe real estate may be the key to get out of it. Well, I'm gonna tell you this right now. If you do it half-assed, it'll just be another distraction. So that's what I'm talking about. If you feel like real estate and um whatever side hustle that you're doing may be the key to do it, go all in and do it. And that will help you get off the that will help you get on the off-ramp to whatever your problems may be clinically. That's all I'm just saying. All right, y'all. We just finished the five financial tips that I've learned over the last 10 years. Um, next we're gonna get into a listener question um about doing locum tenons and then going to another continent. Check out the next one.