The Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast

E124: Money, Mindset, and Wellness—Building Wealth & Resilience with Dr. Bonnie Koo

• Kerry Reller

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Welcome to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay Podcast with Dr. Kerry Reller! In Episode #124, I’m joined by Dr. Bonnie Koo—dermatologist, financial coach, and author of Defining Wealth for Women. We dive into why financial health is a key pillar of wellness and how mindset, education, and creativity can empower you to build lasting wealth. Dr. Koo shares personal stories and strategies for overcoming money shame, escaping the trap of linear income, and creating a life you don’t need to retire from. Whether you're a physician, parent, or professional feeling the squeeze of rising costs, this episode will leave you inspired to think differently about money.

Bonnie Koo, MD is master certified life coach, physician and founder of Wealthy Mom MD. She is the money coach for women physicians. She is a proud graduate of Barnard College and Columbia University's College of Physicians & Surgeons. She is the host of the Wealthy Mom MD Podcast and author of Defining Wealth for Women: (n.) Peace, Purpose, and Plenty of Cash!  She currently resides in Tampa, Florida.

00:00 – Intro & Dr. Koo’s background: doctor to money coach
01:14 – How she transitioned into finance coaching
02:16 – Why high earners still struggle with money
04:15 – The link between money and wellness
06:54 – Tools Dr. Koo uses for health: CGM, Oura Ring
09:52 – Common myths about money and wealth
13:25 – Moving from scarcity to abundance
17:28 – Changing money narratives and internalized shame
20:33 – Why money is a tool for health, freedom, and choice
23:04 – Examples of creating money (and income-producing assets)

Connect with Dr. Koo
Instagram: https://instagram.com/wealthymommd or @wealthymommd
Facebook: https://facebook.com/wealthymommd
Website: https://wealthymommd.com

Connect with Dr. Kerry Reller
Podcast website: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprou... 
My linktree: linktr.ee/kerryrellermd
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kerryrellermd/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ClearwaterFamilyMedicine
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/clearwaterfamilymedicine/
Tiktok: https://www.tiktok.com/@kerryrellermd
Clearwater Family Medicine and Allergy website: https://sites.google.com/view/clearwa...
Podcast: https://gethealthytbpodcast.buzzsprou...

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Kerry:

Hi everybody. Welcome back to the Get Healthy Tampa Bay podcast. I'm your host, Dr. Kerry Reller, and today we have a special guest, Dr. Bonnie Koo. Welcome to the podcast.

Bonnie:

Hi. Thanks so much for having me here.

Kerry:

I'm excited'cause I know you're a seasoned podcaster as well, and I think maybe you can share tips, but tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.

Bonnie:

Sure. So my name is Bonnie Koo. I am a physician like you and I'm a dermatologist by training, which was technically my second career. And then I guess you could say my current slash third career'cause there might be a fourth. Who knows? I do personal finance and life coaching for female positions.

Kerry:

So how did you get into that from Medical Doctor to Life and Money Coach? How did that transpire?

Bonnie:

Yeah, so definitely was not something I was thinking about. I think for a lot of us, entrepreneurship kind of finds us or we just had this desire to do something more. I was just educating myself about money because like pretty much everyone, I didn't really know that much and then I was just sharing what I was learning with my fellow colleagues and that's like the short story and then I just got started. I was getting asked to speak and then I started a blog and then things just kind of happened organically. And then at some point I did decide to start a business and do this. Like legit it.

Kerry:

Yeah. After you're like consulting and answering so many questions, you realize, hey, something can actually come of this. Right? Yeah. Using those, yeah. Unique skills. And you also wrote a book, right? Is it called Defining Wealth for Women?

Bonnie:

Yes. That was a few years ago.

Kerry:

A few years ago. Okay, cool. So why do you think so many women specifically maybe high achieving ones kind of struggle with like a mindset, money mindset?

Bonnie:

Well, I think everyone does regardless of income. I think what's different when you're a high income earning woman is that you think you should know better because you are making a lot of money. But if you like step back for a second, it's like, why would making more money mean that you know anything about money? It just means you have more to, you could say, play with more to spend more to waste. You know, it feels higher stakes. So I think that's what's different. And I think because of that, we had this thinking like, well, I'm making good money. I should know what to do with it. But again, it's like, why would you know? And then I think there's a lot of shame and discomfort around it because we don't know what to do with it. Unless you were very lucky and had parents who were educated about money and educated you, but that's not common.

Kerry:

I mean, you see that with a lot of people, like football players in the NFL and things like that. They come into all this money, they don't know what to do with it, and then in some not great circumstances, it's gone.

Bonnie:

Yeah. Lottery winners too, right?

Kerry:

Oh yeah. Absolutely. Lottery winners. Why do you, why do you think that is?

Bonnie:

That's a good question. Well, I think a lot of it is they just don't know what to do with it, and I think if you don't have a plan all of a sudden you're like, well, I have tons of money and I could just spend it without realizing that it will run out if you don't grow it. So I think people tend to go on spending sprees. Like if someone gave me a million dollars right now, I would definitely spend some of it on stuff that maybe I wouldn't have spent money on, and I would put it to work, so I would make more money. But most people aren't thinking that when they have money. A lot of people think of money as money comes in and then I spend the money, and when they think of money, they think of money they wanna spend.

Kerry:

So, I mean, my podcast circles a lot about like health and wellness and I think discussing money can cause a lot of anxiety and stress in people's lives. How would you say that you can put people at ease, maybe it's knowledge or whatever other way. What do you think?

Bonnie:

I think with money, there's like two pieces. One is the actual like learning the information, the strategies, like the knowledge, kinda like you said. But the reason why, as you brought up, have anxiety and just like not so positive feelings that doesn't have to do with money itself. That has to do with socialization, culture, religion, and just the general. And it's not even the us It's like the whole world, just people's general discomfort talking about money. But if you really think about it, it doesn't make sense and it's super important. And you said health and wellness, like I can't think of I think it's probably one of the top wellness topics, because having money allows you to actually be healthier and be more, well, just to give you example, I actually was talking about this in my coaching program because people kind of put money to the side here, but then there's health and there's wellness. It's like I'm very grateful that I have the money to be able to, for example, have a concierge physician. I have one in Tampa. I feel grateful that I, I don't have a personal trainer now. I did. I need to find a new one, but you know, be able to hire a personal trainer for my wellness. Of course, I don't need to hire a personal trainer, but it makes things easier or be able to spend money to go to a gym. So having money is a huge facilitator for health and wellness and obviously all the other areas of your life that are important. So everything comes back to money, and that's because money is the exchange of value to be able to live.

Kerry:

I mean, I feel like those are really key, key points. Like I feel like the rising cost of groceries make people limited to be able to afford healthy foods. Maybe they want to be eating organic foods, but they cannot afford them, or, maybe they want to go shop at Whole Foods or it's a, you know, not able to, there's a lot of different, I guess, concept around the, the food buying thing that could be limiting. I mean, it's so much cheaper to go to a fast food place than it is like, you know, I don't know I like fresh kitchen a lot, so I'll say fresh kitchen, right? Because it has whole foods and healthy ingredients and I try to encourage people to eat that way. So, you know, if they don't have those resources, it's much more difficult to, you know, do that. And then even, like you said the gym aspect and exercise, right? Not only do you have to build your time around that, right? And it might be more limited if you're a person who's having to work more hours to make money. But, you know, having the financial means to join a gym, maybe bring equipment into your home, or even like in affording a personal trainer and things like that too. So those are super important things that can help our overall health and wellness

Bonnie:

Oh yeah. I mean, I don't know if you used the video, but I just got this. This is a CGM. It's, can't really, it says oura I have the oura ring and again, these are these wearable devices and they're not inexpensive. But I am pre-diabetic and I've had a CGM before and it definitely gave me insight and then I stopped wearing it and I was like kind of like, well, I don't see it. I don't know what's going on. So I was like, okay, I need to get it. I need to start using it again to keep my glucose in check for me. So again, that required me to spend a hundred dollars to get to these sensors. They each last. Two weeks. I've already, I already had the Oura ring, but that's like a 500 or$400 investment. So of course

Kerry:

did not know that it was that expensive actually,

Bonnie:

Yeah, I mean, you can use, you can use your health HSA funds to pay for it. But again, these are obviously not necessary for health, but it def I think for me, it definitely helps modify my behavior when I see the glucose. I think right before this recording it said glucose spike detected. I'm like, damn it.

Kerry:

no, I've actually used the CGM for fun really. And I learned a lot, you know, everybody's a little bit different in their response to certain foods and activities, and I think it was very enlightening and I have encouraged patients to, you know, pursue that even when they're, like you said, pre-diabetes, some of them are able to afford that investment. And typically the like the freestyle ones that come in. They say you can get it for like 75 a month, get two for two weeks, and it's helpful. I didn't know Oura Ring had a CGM now too, but they're definitely becoming more mainstream. Oh, it's a Dexcom

Bonnie:

Yeah, it's Stelo, S-T-E-L-O. But the, they've partnered, so the Oura app imports your data and the oura I mean, I think the ring is fascinating. Everyone's like, oh, you're gonna stop wearing it after a few weeks after you get data. But now I love it'cause it tracks your sleep, it tracks your stress levels, like it gets to know your body. And now with the glucose thing, I just got this two days ago, so I don't have a lot of data. But it like matches it with what they see in your vitals and it basically like, oh, you didn't sleep well last night and your glucose was elevated. So,

Kerry:

Mm-hmm.

Bonnie:

and you know, you probably know it's family medicine. If you don't sleep enough, it definitely affects your blood sugars. Right? Things like that. So anyway, I'm really excited to see what it says. It's probably gonna tell me to stop eating so many carbs, but.

Kerry:

our health app that we work with, our weight management clients does integrate with the oura ring. I don't have anybody that has one, and I don't actually have one myself. But it does, like you were mentioning like sleep and cortisol levels and you know, like you said, stress and everything. It can definitely obviously be intertwined and I mean, if you're a data nerd like me, I think it's a great thing to have, but some people don't wanna know so much. But the more you have like the ability to fund these things and you know, you can really, I guess, escalate your overall health in that way as well. So what are some myths, like money myths or thought patterns that kind of hold people back, whether you know medicine or not in medicine?

Bonnie:

Yeah, well, I think probably the two that come to mind immediately is, you know, a lot of us feel like money is made linearly. And what I mean by that is it's a direct time, times effort equation to make money. On one hand we think it's true. On the other hand, we also know it's not true because that doesn't explain how are some people making millions of dollars and we all have the same hours in a day? And so that's a lot of, that's conditioning from how we were brought up. And honestly, the, the school system also if you think about it, like, and also people who think they're not educated, so whatever that means to them, whether they didn't finish high school or didn't finish college or maybe went to college, but not an elite college, the amount of money you make and your ability to make money has nothing to do with your intelligence. And I think for professionals like us, that could land weird, but it really doesn't. It has nothing to do with your intelligence because that is not required. You just have to know how to make it. And then you also have to understand that money can be created out of thin air. And what I mean by that is, you know, most people are paid are other salaried or they're paid hourly. You know, most positions we are paid, you know fee for service, right? Like per unit of whatever RVs, et cetera. And, but that's not the only way to make money. And so I think a lot of people, you know, at some point they're like, oh, I'm behind. Like, I'm never gonna be able to retire. But that's all based on the thought air. That money is made linearly I'm, and so it's like, well, I'm 50 and I don't have. You know, whatever they think they should be having their retirement account and now I'm behind and I gotta work another 10 years or whatever they're thinking. But that's not true because money isn't made linearly. Now, if you do wanna, like if you have money goals that require you to have more money in five years versus 20, then you're gonna have to do something a little different. And what I mean by a little different is your traditional model of retirement is you max out your retirement accounts and then hopefully by 60 or 70 there's enough for you to live on. I know we're kind of going off topic. I could talk about this stuff forever, but that's also an outdated paradigm because go to school, get good grades, get a high paying job, and then retire like. I think, well not just me, but people are just kind of questioning that paradigm. It's like, who said we should have the same career for 30 or 40 or 50 years? And that then I would wanna retire. It's like, how do we build a life that you don't have to retire from? So when people tell me they wanna make sure they're ready for retirement, it's like, well, what does that mean to you? And I'm guessing most of your audience, they're not gonna retire and just sit around and do nothing.

Kerry:

Right.

Bonnie:

maybe travel, right? But it's like, how do you create a life where. That's not the end goal. Like to me, the goal is to have money coming in from multiple sources so that I'm not dependent on one income stream, and for most people, that's their job.

Kerry:

Mm-hmm. Yeah, exactly. The salary. So I, I mean, you, you even said it right there, like, in school, we're not learning these things right. In school, they're like, oh, what do you wanna be when you grow up? Right? Like to, like you said, be in that job like 30 years work, retire, and then you're done. Right. And I think that's a shame, but like you said, a lot of people are questioning the system. And I think we're also taught to, you know, save and not build wealth. So in a way it's not, I don't know, how do we go from like that scarcity to abundance with that thought pattern? Like when we're supposed to be, oh, we gotta save, save, save instead of building something.

Bonnie:

Yeah, so it's not that you shouldn't save, it's just don't just put the money away and do nothing with it. Like it should be working for you. Like there's that saying, every dollar has a job and each dollar is like a soldier and each soldier should be making money for you. You know? So in terms of the scarcity, that just means you know, the not enough syndrome. And so I think. I'm not even sure if I have access to abundance per se, but I think we wanna go from feeling like there's not enough to feeling like there is enough.'cause the truth is all of your listeners have enough money if they're able to listen to this podcast, they have enough money. And so if people can just focus on that, like, yeah, I have enough today. Like I'm just guessing you, you're not worried about not being able to pay your utilities bill tomorrow, for example. Right? Like.

Kerry:

Mm-hmm.

Bonnie:

If you really like sit down and like logically think, yeah, I have enough money right now today, I'm pretty sure tomorrow as well. And so that's accessible to almost, like I said, everyone listening to this podcast right now, you know, because they have the ability to means they're, they're sufficient in that sense.

Kerry:

So let's say someone is, you know, concerned and stressed and in debt, how would, how can they start thinking about, you know, saving, investing, and getting out of this stressful situation?

Bonnie:

so there's a few things there. One is that so debt is kind of like a loaded topic and even word because again, I think it's not just in the US but debt is like villainized. It's bad if you have debt. There's obviously different types of debt. There's good debt, there's bad debt, whatever. I guess good debt, student loans, bad debts, credit card debt. Although I would call some student loans are bad debt, like I would for example I know I don't, I don't wanna give too many details, but let's just say I know someone who's going to college and is going to a no name college and it's not a judgment about the school he's going to, but it's a judgment that he is going to a crappy college that costs$70,000 a year. Now that. I think is bad debt. Anyway, I went off topic there, but schools, as you know, are just so ridiculously expensive. It's just not worth it, in my opinion. Thankfully in Florida, the schools are very cheap. The state schools.

Kerry:

The state school. Well, the colleges

Bonnie:

state colleges, yeah.

Kerry:

yeah, yeah. I'm like, I, well, you're living in the Tampa Bay area, and if your kids are growing to private school, they're not cheap, in my opinion, but if they're in public school, they have also now the scholarship and stuff, which is nice for some people to be able to do that.

Bonnie:

I meant the colleges in the, in the state. So that's, so part of it is to just like uncouple their negative feelings around debt because that's just all beliefs that they've inherited from all the people around them. Like especially Dave Ramsey, who basically is like the anti debt person. So I'm not saying debt is good, but debt in itself It's neither good or bad. And so I think they have to, and also a lot of people place their sense of worth or value to how much money they make, how much debt they have, and how much money they have or not have. And so we need to uncouple that. Like, just because someone has debt doesn't mean they're bad with money, but a lot of people kind of conflate the two. And then, you know, people who have an inflated sense of self when they do have a lot of money, you know, who just think they're better than people because they have, it's, it's very like, if you like. Like even just saying the, when I say these things to my clients or other people, everyone's like, oh yeah, that's dumb. They don't

Kerry:

That what?

Bonnie:

it out loud, just bringing into that awareness, like, yeah, why would someone feel better than someone just because they had more money? But you see it all the time,

Kerry:

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Bonnie:

So, and then the flip side too.

Kerry:

mm-hmm. yeah. I was gonna say with the flip side, like I think, like you said, how do you uncouple the thoughts of. Are you, whatever, have a lot, have a little or whatever from your worth, right? Your value that you give back to society or how you feel about a person. Do you, is this something that you typically kind of coach on in your programs or

Bonnie:

I think the first thing is just the having, yeah. So having the awareness. Like I feel like every, anytime you wanna change something is you first have the awareness, so like. For example, let's say it was me that had, I don't know,$200,000 of credit card debt. And just miserable because of it and thinking I'm a bad person or whatever because of it. So I think the first step is just being aware of the fact that I think having debt means I'm a bad person.

Kerry:

Okay.

Bonnie:

Just having an awareness that, oh. I think having debt means I'm a bad person or I'm not good with money. So just that initial awareness is like the first step because some people never have that awareness and they will spend the rest of their lives thinking that.

Kerry:

Yeah.

Bonnie:

So that's step one is just the acknowledging of, and that in itself can be really powerful.'cause then people are like, again, they might, they're not like verbalizing out loud. And just to say it out loud, some people including myself, sometimes. You'll s You'll see how ridiculous it sounds when you say it out loud, right? But they're not like logically thinking they're just like, you know when you're stuck inside your brain and body, like all crazy, all sorts of crazy things can happen. But sometimes just saying it out loud, you're like, well, that does not make sense at all. What can I do about it now? So step one is acknowledging, and then step two is, I always tell my clients is. Add the phrase I'm telling myself. So in this case, I'll say, I'm telling myself that I'm bad with money because I have$200,000 of credit card debt. So that inserts like a space I'm telling myself because it's like when you hear yourself saying, they're like, yeah, I'm, it's not true. I'm telling myself that this is true. So that also. Not just creates awareness, but it starts to create some separation between you and that belief that you think is true.'cause most of the thoughts that we have aren't, aren't true.

Kerry:

Yeah. Yeah. So it's like changing your thought pattern and, and therefore, hopefully behavior right. For the next future

Bonnie:

Yeah. And then mu money, you know, it is a topic that can be loaded. So depending on your upbringing, there can be, you know, you could say traumatic experiences depending on how your family was with money, depending, you know, some, we all know people who grew up with little means and are doing very well now, but they're still gonna carry some of that heaviness with them. And so, some people literally need money, trauma therapy. They might not call it that, but it's basically, you know, therapy needed to work on experiences from childhood, which. I probably include other things besides money. Money's like kind of a byproduct of lots of other things, so.

Kerry:

Yeah, I mean, I, I guess in every aspect of life there could be many traumas and things like that as well. Yeah. But interesting. So why do you think that financial health is like a key part of overall wellbeing? I mean, we kind of touched on it, but what would you

Bonnie:

Yeah. Well, I. Everyone listening, what I would love for them to take away is that ultimately, money is a tool and it's a tool to help you live the way that you want, right? That's why we need money, because I need money like we're renting now. I need money to be able to pay rent so I can have a nice place to live in, right? I need money or needed money to have this microphone so I could podcast, and the sound isn't terrible, and so money is critical to every aspect of life. That doesn't mean everything costs money, but almost everything does. And there's a lot of problems that money can solve if you have the money to throw at it. Not every problem can be solved with money. And so we talked about earlier how it can really help with your health and wellness. And again, it's not about like, oh, you need to go buy all these devices to be in better health, but certain things will be much easier if you have money. Being able to go to the gym. Like if you can't afford to go to the gym, it's not that, of course you can still exercise. It's just gonna take a little bit more, you know, effort to do so. So, and then, you know, my son, he gets speech ot, reading, tutoring, all that's out of pocket. Of course we could have gone through the public school, but he goes to private. And so all those things cost money. And so do we need to do these things for him to pay for them? No, but. You know, I wanted to give him the best support that we could, and I'm very grateful that I have the resources to do that. So these are just like little examples or like, you know, we like to travel a lot, so having the ability to pay for travel and, you know, all that kind of stuff. So it, it infiltrates every area of life. And when you don't have money, it's. It's not that, you know, oh, I'm just gonna have, I don't know, a more modest home or that, you know, not everyone wants the things that I want or has the desires that you would like, but most of us, not most, every one of us needs money to live a certain way. And you, you can't like separate the money from life. So. If you wanna like work less, pretty much all my clients wanna work less, but then they all say, but I can't because of money. it's just so intertwined with life that it's so important and it for a hundred percent sure affects all areas of our life

Kerry:

You mentioned that you can create money. What would you uh, give us an example of that?

Bonnie:

well. I mean, I'm in, you know, I'm an entrepreneur like I was, I talked to a lot of female physicians who wanna start businesses or have business ideas and in all various stages. And a lot of'em are like, well, I don't know if people would pay me. And I'm like, listen, people make money on the internet selling farts in a jar. That's like a true thing. I don't know if that person does it anymore, but Did you hear about this a few years ago?

Kerry:

I don't know. No,

Bonnie:

Yeah, but this is legit true. And they were selling it for hundreds of dollars for per jar. So what I mean by just creating money is like you just have to have money is an exchange of value. So you just have to have something that people want. Like think of all of us, we all spend money on things. Why? Because it's something that we want or something that we have to pay, like taxes. But generally speaking, most of the money we spend on are things that we want. I didn't have to buy an iPhone. The iPhone is hugely valuable. That's why people are willing to pay a thousand dollars, even people who quote unquote can't afford it because it is so helpful and valuable. So I'm not saying you need to invent the next iPhone, although you certainly could, but anything that's of value, like think of like it's just looking around like, I don't know. I paid someone for curtains that I bought from Costco because I need shade from the window. So just. So you can get a job, but if you wanna, I think the creation of money really comes from being a business owner and creating something of value. So I'm not saying you have to go into business, but I do recommend it'cause I think that's where you have the most control over your time and effort and, and money. And it's also inherently very risky. I think if you're listening and you have a business idea that's percolating, like I would just say don't ignore it and you can work on it while you're doing whatever job you're doing now.

Kerry:

Yeah. What is, I guess, one financial decision that you're kind of most proud of for you?

Bonnie:

Oh, not getting legally married

Kerry:

Oh, okay.

Bonnie:

because you're, it's a contract. Sorry.

Kerry:

I'm just curious. Go ahead.

Bonnie:

Oh yeah. And I don't know if it's like the proud of, but like, I think you could say it's an important one that I've made because you and I probably just see a lot of people getting divorced.'cause it's just, you know, divorce rate's, what, 30 to 40, 50 people say 50%. But for our demographic it's 40% ish or maybe even less. But it's still pretty high. And all of us know people who've been divorced who are just fighting over money. And like if you just, even the whole institution of marriage, and I am not anti-marriage per se, but if you think about the legal implications, it's kind of strange. It's also based on patriarchy. When women, we were property of men, like that's the, that's, those are the origins. And so here in the US getting married is like a legal contract and it people ignore it. And then when they get divorced, they regret not having a prenup or just thinking through it a bit more. I think you should marry for love, but I think we all have to realize that it is a contract, so it just makes things easier not to be married, to like, not have to worry about things. And so yeah, whenever I see these, you and I are probably in similar Facebook groups and just hearing about the stories, like it's, I'm just very grateful that I don't have to, I won't have to deal with most aspects of it.'cause when you have a child with someone, you know, you still have to go through family court or whatever.

Kerry:

Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. So you have recently moved to Tampa. What, I guess I, one I wanted to know like what you like most about being here, but another question would be, I think the rising cross of everything in Tampa how would you coach someone on that who was maybe comfortable and now everything is just going crazy in the last few years?

Bonnie:

you know, I'm from New Jersey and New York City, so the prices here are still cheaper to me, But I have looked at housing prices. I was just trying to get a sense of what they used to be and what they are now, and I could see the dramatic increase. So I think this is actually a good question because you know, with technologies changing so fast and with ai, I think people have to really pay attention to what's going on. I don't mean like being glued to the news, but I think the job market and how people make money is it's already happening and it's gonna be changing just more and more rapidly. And this is also, you know, I think. Physicians or anyone that has a quote unquote stable job needs to really be on top of this. So what I mean by that is you have to be agile and flexible. And so I think this is where you have to really be. When I say creative, what I mean by is you don't have to be an entrepreneur, but you have to think like one. And so what that means is having a creative mindset, a growth mindset. Being flexible and adjusting your skillset. So like, yeah, maybe you're, and again, I'm only using the doctor example because I am one. It's like, okay, I may, you know, I'm gonna pretend to be you. I'm family medicine'cause a lot of people, whatever skillset they have, they, well, I can't do anything else because I'm a doctor and it's like, but the skills required to be, and I don't even mean the specific skills, like what you do with patients, but be able to learn quickly, be able to think through things, being able to communicate. I'm talking about those skills that are not specific to what you do. You have to know what your skill sets are. You have to be willing to learn new skill sets, and then being able to adjust and get ahead of it because AI is gonna take over some jobs or it's gonna modify jobs. And so if you're just gonna live under a tree. I just think it's a not good for your financial health, but also just a missed opportunity to do something new or creative with that. So, okay. So I know you asked about the growing cost of in Tampa, but again, it's, I don't know, I personally rent, and now that I moved here with two hurricanes, I have no desire to buy. I've never been a huge like having to own a home, but I don't know, I just feel like in Tampa, if your house got ruined, and even if you have insurance, it's not like it fully paid for everything. So I think your housing costs should not be a huge expense, and I'm sure people listen, there are people listening here who are spending way too much money in terms of their monthly income on where they live, and it's just. It's a choice, I should say.

Kerry:

There's like an equation that I remember the real estate people telling us. What is it? Like a third of your income or something?

Bonnie:

25% or

Kerry:

25%. Okay.

Bonnie:

Yeah, but even less than that, if you could like, I dunno, everyone's different. Like it's not one of my dreams or desires to have like this super nice home. Like I think I do think about it, right? Because I live in a town home right now, and we did that because I'm like, well, I don't really know where I'm gonna settle in, so let's just rent. And then figure it out. And I've been here for just under a year and I still don't know where I'd wanna live, so I'm just probably gonna resign the lease here. But then I do, sometimes I'm like, well, you know, it'd be nice to have like a nice backyard and a pool. I'm like, but then I'd have to take care of the backyard and the pool and deal with everything that breaks. Like I really love not having to worry about that stuff. But on the flip side, I love you know, traveling and paying for it. And so I, everyone's priority is different and so part of me is like, if you really wanna have that house and you're willing to do that, despite the risk of living in the Tampa Bay area with the hurricanes, you know,'cause certain areas are obviously more flood prone, then I think you just have to like be mindful of what you're spending on that compared to your total income and how else you wanna live. And then also just. Reevaluate your finances. And it's like, am I making enough money? If not, how to figure out how to make more? And everyone's like, well, how do you make more? You figure it out by thinking about it and being creative. You don't do that by just sitting around hoping that you'll get a raise. You have to be proactive.

Kerry:

Mm-hmm.

Bonnie:

But I also think a lot of us have that, well, I'm an employee and I just want a paycheck for my time. And there's nothing wrong with that, but you will never create substantial wealth as an employee unless you don't spend any of the money that you make. So there's just, there's just pros and cons, right? There's just different things.

Kerry:

Mm-hmm. I recently read rich Dad, poor Dad. Have you read that or any comments?

Bonnie:

Yeah. I think that's a great book to read. And I think anyone who's a teenager. And above can read it. There's also it, they made a board game for kids. It's

Kerry:

I know we've played it.

Bonnie:

oh yeah,

Kerry:

it was so interesting. So we did buy it and I've played it with my eight and 10-year-old and my, and my husband, but we, the 5-year-old cannot play it yet, but it's fun and it gets them their juices flowing too, you know, like whether, you know, they wanna start a circus, which is one example of like. One of the things you can do or a petting zoo and things like, like it just, you know, like you said kind of have to be an entrepreneur to want to create wealth. It seems like, at least with this board game, but it is a fun game.

Bonnie:

Well I think it's so funny. I was like, oh, we didn't even talk about like the, you know, the base, the basic, if I, if I people walked away with just one thing from this episode is I. The whole, the key, the key is like, how do you build wealth? You have to have slash buy income producing assets. That's what that book's about. That's what that game is about. And most people, when I said at the very beginning, they think of money as money that they can, what can I spend and buy with it? So they're thinking, I wanna buy a home, not an asset. People say it is, but it's not while you're living in it. And if you live in Florida, you definitely know it's not an asset while you're living in it and or they wanna buy a nice car. And none of those things are income producing assets. They say the middle class buy liabilities first assets later, and they say rich people. And again, this is just, you know, generalization. Rich people buy assets and then they buy the liabilities because their assets are paying for the liabilities.

Kerry:

Book. Mhmm.

Bonnie:

But most of us do it in reverse. Like when I see new physicians and like, they're just like starving to buy a new home. I'm just like, don't do it. Also because most new physicians don't stay at their jobs very long anymore, so, but it's the American dream to buy a home. I never had that dream, thankfully. But I do spend money on other things that are probably just as expensive, so,

Kerry:

What, what, give us an example of the assets that are income producing that someone should start with rather than thinking of buying a.

Bonnie:

So I don't, so retirement accounts, what I mean by that are like, you know, your 4 0 1 ks, your IRAs that are invested in the stock market, those are technically assets, but they, you don't, you can't use them until later because you have to wait for it to grow with compound interest. But they are technically asset, but they're not assets that pay you now, you know, someone's explained to me, investing like. Investing is taking today's cash flow. So today's paycheck for tomorrow's cash flow. So the question is, how soon do you want tomorrow's cash flow? So the retirement accounts that tomorrow is decades away, right? So if you want the cash flow sooner, I mean it's active. Real estate is probably the quickest turnaround and there is work involved. But you have to remember with all these assets I'm talking about, the money is not made linearly. So a lot of people are like, oh, I don't have time for real estate. And I'm like, but do you have, but you have time to work 50 hours a week. So it's, what I mean by that question is you put in work for real estate, but then it becomes more hands off. And then also the, the tax code is written for real estate investors. And I don't think people realize that.

Kerry:

Mm,

Bonnie:

Like it literally is written for real estate investors and business owners. But real estate investors get the most write-offs. I. Because who wrote the tax code? Rich People and depending who's president, they usually modify the tax code to reward real estate investors. So I don't know if you know this, but when in Trump's first, term he created a hundred percent bonus depreciation. So I don't wanna go into the nitty gritty, but every, you know when you buy a home, a rental property, you can write off depreciation, which is paper losses that aren't real losses, but the government lets you take a certain percentage every year with a hundred percent bonus depreciation you can take all of it in the first year. So. Basically that means you can write off a lot and have substantial tax savings. So it's not just what you make, it's what you keep. So I have real estate friends, not me, who have not paid federal income taxes in over a decade because they're real estate investors. So there's a reason why so many wealthy people invest in real estate because it is a true wealth creation vehicle and it's a physical asset as well. So that's usually what I recommend to high income earners because they, they usually do have the capital for a down payment. And also banks like you when you make a lot of money, meaning like you'll get a loan, a mortgage for that. So that is a relatively quick turnaround if you're willing to put in the work for that. There is passive real estate. Less work, but then the returns are also less and slower. So as you can see, there's no easy button. If there was something super easy that would make a lot of money, I'm sure you would've heard about it by now. You can hit it big With business, there's no but businesses, they say 90% of businesses fail in the first three years or something like that, which sounds like horrible odds. And the potential rewards are also sky high. There's no limit technically.

Kerry:

Mm-hmm. Yeah, honestly, given the hurricanes and things like that in our area, a lot of businesses had to close or move and stuff like that too. So you know, it's pretty sad as well in our area, but hopefully they find, you know, of other avenue or things like that. Like I can think of several just in our like main street, safety harbor area. They lost power for so long and they had to use their insurance, and it's just a, it's a really, you know, terrible, terrible thing. But you know, I think you kinda give hope with what other ideas may come and what they could do with that to, you know, continue building wealth and surviving really about,

Bonnie:

Yeah, brick and mortar businesses are definitely harder because of the actual physical pro property that can be damaged. And you know, with COID, a lot of business, the businesses, again, I talked about earlier, like being adaptable. The businesses that adapted and were flexible, they survived the pandemic. So let me just give you some examples, right? Like, so a lot of restaurants went out business, but the ones who adapted quickly. To you know, really amping their takeout or delivery game like I was in New New Jersey at the time, or even, you know, a lot of physician practices, you know, had trouble private practices, but not all did you know, so for example, one of my friends, a pediatrician owner, she you know, it's not visits decreased but what she ended up doing was like, well, how can we bring money into the practice? Because patients don't wanna come in because they don't wanna be around sick people. And so she realized that, you know, COVID insur insurance was reimbursing covid testing pretty well. And so they, I got, I dunno, got the machine or whatever and were making it available. So that's kind of what I mean by being flexible and creative, like thinking a bit out of the box, like what else can we do? And even within my business. You wanna have redundancies, streams of income. So my business makes money not with just one service. It's money comes in multiple ways. And so I think that's kind of what I want people to take away was like, you have to have multiple streams of income. If you're only, if you only get paid, if you work and you show up to work, that's a problem.

Kerry:

Yeah, I think that's a great message for sure.

Bonnie:

yeah, then the question is, okay, how can I create another stream of income? And it doesn't mean it has to be like something on the side that just makes money in your sleep, but for example, do you own your own practice?

Kerry:

I do, yes.

Bonnie:

Yeah. So for you it's like, and you know whether or not you wanna talk about it, but, but if the only way your practice makes money is direct patient care, then I would encourage you to think of how else the practice could bring in money that's not fully dependent on you seeing patients.

Kerry:

Yeah, yeah. I'm always thinking of things in new

Bonnie:

Yeah. I mean, you could hire

Kerry:

easy'cause we're also like an insurance based world, which is also hard. But yeah, another story, another day for that I think. But yeah, no, I mean, I think this is very educational and I hope you know, I think people can get. Much out of this, but whether it's just the mindset and acknowledging things or getting creative in what they need to do and kind of helping relieve the stress and anxiety of, of money. And, you know, it's not a dirty thing to talk about, but it is a difficult thing to talk about. And for some reason society has made it that way. But are there any last words or anything you'd like to share other than obviously I'm gonna ask you where can people find you but.

Bonnie:

I think one of the most powerful things that we don't know we could do is ask ourselves questions. And so if you are, in a very stressful money situation for whatever reason. So it's really easy to kind of go into a bit of a victim mode, like, why is this happening to me? But if you just flip the question a little bit and ask yourself like, how can I make more money? How can I get out of debt? How can I create other sources of income? Like that question is just powerful in itself because it's shifting your brain to look for solutions versus just focusing on the problem.

Kerry:

Yeah, that's good advice as well. So where can people find you if they wanna work with you or follow you or any, or read your book or your podcast?

Bonnie:

yeah. So my the brand name is Wealthy Mom md, and so that's my Instagram handle. So I would probably say just find me there, and that's also the name of my website, and it's also the name of my podcast, so pretty easy.

Kerry:

Nice. Yeah, well it's nice to have you in Tampa, so thank you for moving here. But yeah, thank you so much for being on the podcast today. This was a lot of fun and educational definitely for me as well. And I hope everybody will tune in next week to listen in. Bye.

Bonnie:

Thanks for having me.

Kerry:

Thank you.

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Dr. Kerry Reller

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