4 Seasons Podcast

The Journey to Financial Freedom: Insights from Jeff Bingham of B&H Wealth Strategies

• Jeff Bingham • Episode 2

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Can B&H Wealth Strategies Assist With Creating A Comprehensive Financial Plan?

Learn the secrets to financial freedom with Jeff Bingham, President of B&H Wealth Strategies, as he shares the fundamental steps in crafting a comprehensive financial plan. How do you build a financial roadmap that aligns with your dreams and aspirations? Jeff brings his expertise to the table, discussing the pivotal questions you need to ask: where are you now, where do you want to go, and how do you want to get there? Find out why simplicity is key in financial planning and how saving just 10% of your income can be your ticket to financial success. In this episode, Jeff also shares personal wisdom passed down from his father, reinforcing the importance of paying yourself first.

Navigating the world of financial planning is a journey that requires trust and transparency. Together with co-host Skip Mauney, Jeff delves into the critical role that trust plays in building solid client relationships. Learn how bringing your financial 'shoebox' to the table can lead to tailored advice that truly fits your needs, much like a doctor's prescription. With expert guidance, discover how to make informed choices about your 401k and simplify your financial assets. Whether your current financial setup is already on the right track or needs a little fine-tuning, Jeff's insights will help affirm or improve your financial path. Tune in to hear valuable lessons on creating personalized financial plans that address both short-term and long-term goals for a secure future.

To learn more about B&H Wealth Strategies visit:
https://www.BHRetire.com
B&H Wealth Strategies
423- 247-1152

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Four Seasons Podcast brought to you by B&H Wealth Strategies, serving Northeast Tennessee and Southwest Virginia since 1966. Here we guide you through the ever-changing seasons of your financial journey, offering insights to help you grow, protect and enjoy your wealth. Ready to turn your financial dreams into reality, dare to dream. And now here's your host. President of B&H Wealth Strategies, jeff Bingham.

Speaker 2:

Wondering how to turn your financial goals into reality. Jeff Bingham, president of B&H Wealth Strategies, shares how his team crafts tailored, all-compassing financial plans that simplify your journey to success. Welcome back everyone. Skip Monty here, co-host slash producer, back in the studio with Jeff Bingham. Jeff, how's it going? It's going great, skip, how are you on this Friday morning? I am doing just fine and excited that the weekend is in front of us. Absolutely, absolutely so, jeff. We'll get right to the meat of the episode.

Speaker 3:

Can B&H Wealth Strategies assist with creating a comprehensive financial plan? Well, if we can't, we've been saying that we can't for a long time. So if we can't, we're in trouble, I suppose. But yeah, absolutely. I mean, like I said, I've been part of this organization for 35 years and been, I guess, in the lead seat for over 20 now and we've been around for almost 59 years and that's what we do is sit down with individuals and families and craft the comprehensive financial plan.

Speaker 3:

And we start that with just asking three basic questions, which you'll hear me talk about all the time, and they are as simple as this, that my dad and I kind of came up with gosh some 30, probably 35 years ago or so when I started. And that is, yes, people, you know where are you, where do you want to go and how do you want to get there? And with those three simple questions, you basically have handed them a canvas and their uh and their brush and you let them just start painting and we listen and you know we'll ask them follow-up questions to help them aim a little bit perhaps, because it can be a little difficult and people kind of getting started. But once you get them started on those three questions right there. That's how you make financial dreams come true, is what that amounts to and that's how a comprehensive, if you will, financial plan is developed from very simple questions.

Speaker 3:

As you enter into kind of complex financial issues and things that need to be dealt with. Our job is to take the complex and to distill it down into simple solutions that the clients can understand and be comfortable with. We don't want to hand them a big binder, which you'll see a lot of financial plans that are done that just has all the you know they end up just being doorstops as we used to say. I guess those don't come in binders anymore. We put them in PDF files or however we do it in today's world. But clients want a simple but elegant solution to their financial issues and concerns that they have to make those dreams come true.

Speaker 2:

Very good, very good. Well, what steps does your team take to ensure a financial plan both addresses short-term and long-term goals, or is that even possible?

Speaker 3:

It is. Those can often be in conflict with one another. Again, depending on when I'm first sitting down as an organization with that person. Where are they in their season of life? What stage are they in? So for young people that are starting out, that are just entering into a career and starting off or thinking about having a family, you know that becomes very difficult, right? Because they want to get a house, they've got all kinds of things that are out there. It's hard for young people in that, as I just described right there, to think about the future. Then, right, it's hard to see. You know they need it. They're dealing with here I am today. How am I going to get through this day and the weeks and months and a few years ahead, much less retirement, let's say it's a 30 year old, 30 or 35 years later, because they're strapped. And how do you do that? The thing. Again, going back to the simplicity of it, what I would also tell these people is you got to look at a lot of things life insurance. They need all of these things that are there in the present to make sure they protect their family to be a financial success.

Speaker 3:

And again, I'll go back and talk about when my dad. My dad was one of the wisest planners and best planners. I've ever seen the way you become a financial success. Whether you're rich, whether you're middle class or whether you're poor, you put yourself on the payroll first. If you put yourself on the payroll first, then you will be a financial success. If you don't, it doesn't matter whether you're rich, middle class or of modest means. You won't have that financial freedom out in front of you because there's always, always, things that are going to pull and tug on your pocketbook, things that you're going to want, things that your children are going to want, houses that you're going to want, cars that you're going to want. So those are going to all are going to strap and take that discretionary income away from you that you could be setting aside for the future.

Speaker 3:

You, in the Dave Ramsey thinking and along those lines, or my dad's thinking was in mind as well, now that he's passed along to me is that 10 percent you know it's like Tavi at least 10 percent. Save it before you spend it on anything else. Put it into the bank, into an investment account, build your emergency reserves, do all the things that are necessary, but you've got to pay yourself first or you'll always be playing catch up. But the mathematics of starting early and saving versus waiting until you have money to do it I mean I can't quote the numbers exactly like I used to be able to, but waiting until you're 45 or 50 years old, when you're making the kind of money that you move through your career, you can put it away. But the amount of money that you're going to have to put away to get to 60 or 65, to have enough to retire, versus starting at 25 or 30 years old and putting a modest amount of money away that 10% of your income or even less in some instances the accumulation of wealth, let's say is dramatically different.

Speaker 3:

Like I said, it's hard to play catch up, even when you're making a lot of money, because what happens there is that your lifestyle just increases. Right, so you still have the same tugs on it. It's like we say in cycling it doesn't get easier, you get faster. Well, when you grow your income and you're making more money, you have more stuff. Most of the time, your house gets gets bigger, your car gets more expensive. You know your kids are now getting ready to go to college. Where are they going to go and how much is that going to cost? You're just always going to have those, those pulls on your money. The discipline is start early and do it often and put yourself on the payroll first. You'll be a financial success regardless of the amount of money that you make. Very good.

Speaker 2:

Very good. Well, Jeff, if my financial plan feels like a bad jigsaw puzzle, can you make all the pieces fit or do I need to get a new puzzle?

Speaker 3:

Well, that's a great question and there's no way to answer that. Everybody's situation is unique. But, as you said, jigsaw puzzle we kind of call it quilting things together, but jigsaw puzzles actually I like that a lot. I mean, that's the thing that we do and that we can help people with is that we just say look, you can ask questions about what they have and where their money is and what their financial picture looks like. We ask that when they come in for that first interview and we'll also tell them look, bring all your financial data that you've got in with you so we can see the pieces of the puzzle as you described right there In that first meeting we even talk about, because they haven't, you know, maybe they don't trust us yet.

Speaker 3:

You know, it's private, very confidential stuff and we've been doing it for a long, long time and we can talk about everything. You know, confidentiality is the number one thing in building that trust. But they whoever's new and coming into my office, that new prospective client, needs to push those documents over to my side of the table, right to our side of the table. They've got to be comfortable with that so they can basically interview us for a little bit and decide whether or not they want to push that over there or just have a conversation about it to begin with. Decide whether or not they want to push that over there or just have a conversation about it to begin with. Now, if it's just a conversation, they don't push it over there. To us this can be awfully. It'll be impossible for us to do our job, but we have to build that trust with them. Like it has to be and trust is a two way street in planning is that they have to trust us, obviously, that we are able to do what we say that we can do, and that's them interviewing us. But we're also interviewing them because I have to trust them, or we have to trust them that they're going to listen to us.

Speaker 3:

Right, if we're going to give counsel to them and advice to them and they do part of it, but not all of it, it won't work. It's like you know the thing about going to your doctor and your doctor you don't tell him everything, or he prescribes certain things, you know directions to go in and you think, well, I don't need to do that or I won't tell him about those things. If you don't tell him you're allergic to penicillin, it might kill you. Well, if you don't tell us all about what your financial situation is and we start prescribing remedies, let's say but we don't know everything that could kill you financially right, or could certainly damage you financially right there. So that is what we do.

Speaker 3:

We take all of that week and we can organize it right. One of the things we always say is you bring all that stuff in kind of bring it in a shoebox, right? We call it the shoebox. You just get statements from everywhere. You get some money in the bank. You got some 401k plans. You changed jobs several times and there's money scattered from here to Memphis. We can pull that out and look at it and identify what that is. Talk about.

Speaker 3:

What's it doing for you to consolidate these assets, to simplify your financial plan or your financial life doesn't mean that you're that you spread your risk around. Necessarily you get all that stuff and it could be invested in exactly the same things and have, you know, way more risk than most people actually think. I mean most people don't really understand that. I don't mean that in a negative way either. It's just it's not what they do, right. I mean people are just. You check boxes in your 401k plans as an example and it's two ways that people make finance or 401k plan selections. That I've seen over the years and there's data to support this is that they either the first thing that's on the list or the thing that's been the best performer over a long period of time. If they look at it a little closer and they just kind of check that box and that by default and they just leave it alone, right, and they really have very little idea of what it is. And so it's just a matter of kind of going through that and helping them sort all of that out and seeing if it is.

Speaker 3:

It goes back to where do you want to go? You know how do you know where are you? And we're identifying. Where are you with those things? Right, bring your stuff in, we take a look at it, spread it out, look at it, we organize it. Here's where you are right. You told me where you wanted to go and you also. We talked about how you want to get there. Are these things that you've shown me and we've organized right here for it? Are they doing that? You know? Can that be improved upon? Can that be consolidated? Can? Can that be consolidated, can it be simplified and improved upon? And if we can do that, then we can begin to put together a unique plan for that individual kind of a one size fits one type of concept.

Speaker 3:

And in many cases, if you come in and you're in good financial conditions, what we tell people all the time look, we take a look at your situation and we look at it and we said, look, man, this thing is working the way that it should be working. It looks great. You know, it wouldn't really change anything If we changed it. We'd just be changing it for change's sake. Perhaps. You know, if you like your advisor, we'll stay with you.

Speaker 3:

We can identify and say check the box, second opinion, whoever you're working with is doing their job. Stay with them. But if not, we're also going to tell you. If we think we can help you and improve your situation, then we're going to tell you that we think we can and we're going to show you how we can do that. You know, it's just. It's just that it's a back and forth conversation, it's a and it is. It is a conversation when folks come in here for the first time to do again, just to see where they are, what's going on and you just sit back and let them kind of tell you what's going on and people will open up and be honest with you if you let them talk, right as I've always heard. You know, god gave us two ears and one mouth for a reason.

Speaker 2:

That's exactly right. So no, no, two plans are the same. It depends on that person's situation.

Speaker 3:

One size fits one.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely Awesome. Well, jeff, good to know, and that's something I'd like to delve a little deeper into, maybe in a future episode about 401ks. That's something I have a big interest in. But appreciate your time today and we'll look forward to seeing you in the next episode.

Speaker 3:

All right, sounds good. Thanks, god bless man, thank you. Thanks, god bless man, thank you.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for tuning into the Four Seasons Podcast brought to you by B&H Wealth Strategies, where your financial success is our priority. Schedule your free 20-minute consultation today by calling 423-247-1152 or by visiting bhretirecom. Take the first step toward making your financial dreams come true. Until next time, remember every season is the right season to plan for your future. Securities and registered investment advisory services offered through Silver Oak Securities Inc. Member FINRA, sipc. B&h Wealth Strategies and Silver Oak Securities Inc are not affiliated.