WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:00:02]
ANNOUNCER: You found it. It’s your safer place for retirement planning. Prepare to be coddled in pure fiduciary goodness with your host and president of Decker Retirement Planning, Mike Decker. This is Safer Retirement Radio. If you’re in or near retirement, listen up and learn about a math-based, principle-based approach to retirement that is designed to help you enjoy a safer retirement. These strategies are to help protect and grow what you’ve saved and live the life you want today. So grab a pen, because your safer path to retirement planning starts now.
MIKE: Welcome to Safer Retirement Radio where you get the transparency that you deserve. I’m Mike Decker, your host, president of Decker Retirement Planning. And Clayton, thank you for joining me here today. Clayton, the retirement builder, part of our team as well. Clayton, thanks for being here.
CLAYTON: Mike, thanks for having me on.
MIKE: It’s the holiday season. And this is the last show of the year, Clayton. We’ve pulled out all the stops for this show today. We’re gonna be informing everyone listening today. [LAUGH]
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:01:02]
MIKE: I’m excited about this. Chili cookoff and when that has to do with bull market wins. I don’t want people to think that bull markets wins are anything special other than it’s just a nice-to-have. Got a funny story about that too. But we’re gonna be talking about eggs today and what the price of eggs has to do with the fees that you’re paying in retirement. There’s a direct correlation that seems to be happening there. We’re gonna dive into those details as well as obstacle races and the retirement race. And all the different nooks and crannies, the obstacles, the crawling, the jumping.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:01:39]
MIKE: Everything that gets in peoples’ way. And how to just get rid of that, level the field out, and have a much better retirement. A safer retirement, dare I say. But before all that, before we dive into all that, Clayton, let’s talk about our first topic today which is conclusions. Conclusions, it’s hard not to think about conclusions when it comes to the end of a year. It’s hard not to. And there’s a lot that’s happened this year in 2019. I mean, for goodness sakes, the market keeps at new highs. Our president’s still in office, for better or for worse. Some people, that’s a good thing. Some people hate that. I’m not taking either side. [LAUGH]
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MIKE: There’s a lot happening today. There’s a lot that’s happened this year. And did you ever watch House of Cards?
CLAYTON: I did not.
MIKE: Okay. It was a funny interview I saw of House of Cards where they thought, you know, we recognize the current environment, but we’re just gonna take it to the next level. Just something a little bit farther along. And then they’d film it, and then as they’re airing it, it was very close to reality. Now, for all the Safer Retirement Radio listeners, here, I’m not suggesting that I’m for or against any sort of political agenda here. This is a politically neutral environment on the show here.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:02:56]
MIKE: It’s about finance and retirement. But what I’m suggesting is, we tend to think, “Oh, that will never happen.” “Oh, well, this won’t happen here.” But it kinda does. So when you conclude a successful year, you ought to pat yourself on the back. Financially speaking, do you end this year how you wanted to? I think that’s a fair question. I think it’s a fair question to reminisce about, and hopefully the answer was yes. Did you set yourself up for success? Did you have goals?
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MIKE: I’m sure there’s some sort of acronym that articulates what a goal is. You’re laughing, Clayton. Do you know what is it?
CLAYTON: I don’t, but I know that people come up with this kinda stuff all the time, so I’m sure that somebody has a great acronym for it.
MIKE: The smart goals, like it’s specific, measurable, something like that, but.
CLAYTON: Yeah.
MIKE: Did you set yourself up for success this year, whether you are retired or whether you are near your retirement date. I think it’s a fair question too. Are you in line with that?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:04:00]
MIKE: The bull market keeps going. And by all means, I don’t want it to ever stop. I don’t think anyone wants it to stop because the general masses, and I’m rooting for the little guy, has the best odds of just markets going up. But at some point, things change. And so, when we talk about conclusions, I want to talk about a few, Clayton, with you of conclusions of order. When I say conclusions of order, what I want to talk about is are you set up with a plan that you feel good about? Are your retirement plans, the travels that you want to do, are those in line?
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MIKE: Are we moving in the right direction that allows us to fulfill our dreams? For goodness sakes, for most Americans that retire correctly, that do the preparation, retirement is one-third of their life. That’s a pretty big deal.
CLAYTON: That is a long time. You think about that. That it’s almost a third of your life that seems is spent getting to the point where you’re stable in your career and you’ve kinda got things humming. And then that next third is working and saving, and your end goal, to me at least, is so that you can retire, and then that you’ve got that final third. That final leg of the journey.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:05:13]
MIKE: It’s the conclusion. Are we prepared for our conclusion? Are we set up and on a path that allows us to be able to retire and live the lifestyle you want for the next five years, 10 years, 15 years, 20 years, 30 years? For some folks listening, it could be for the next 40 years. Now, maybe these are some questions that you’ve had before. Maybe it’s, well, you know, I’m on the right track because I’m saving money each year, and my savings keeps growing, my investments keep growing, and I’m doing things correctly. And if that’s your case, then wonderful.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:05:50]
MIKE: But what’s the conclusion? What do you want to articulate as your retirement plan? Are we setting ourselves up to continue? Not only have a wonderful conclusion this year, and a wonderful conclusion in 2020. I hope you all have a wonderful new year and that we kick off this 2020. It’s kind of a fun, you know, numbers are fun for me. 2020 is see clearly. We can make that a thing. Are we setting ourselves up for success or not? And let me offer you just a few principles to guide yourself through on your retirement and how you’re setting things up. These principles ring true to anyone that believes in structure.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:06:29]
MIKE: For anyone that would like guidelines for their retirement. Anyone listening right now, or will catch this as a rebroadcast through podcast or one of the clips on Facebook and Instagram, anyone that would like to project their future and protect their lifestyle. The first principle is to, simply put, draw income from principal guaranteed sources. However you want to structure that. When you draw income from principal guaranteed sources, the talk of the next big crash is irrelevant. It doesn’t matter anymore. Because your income is principal guaranteed.
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MIKE: Whether you do a small bond ladder or some CDs, which I recognize interest rates are low, and Clayton, I want to ask what your thoughts are on the current interest rate environment with this. But some people have income annuities. I don’t necessarily love income annuities because that sets you up to be in a fixed situation for life, and the dynamics of the financial markets are always changing. And so to commit yourself for 30 years on one product in one way, I think that’s a bit much, personally speaking. But there’s a number of different assets out there.
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MIKE: But Clayton, you heard about this every day when you’re in your seat as a planner and when you visit with clients. Principal guaranteed accounts have a very tight correlation with their rate of returns with the interest rates. And we’re in a difficult interest rate environment. What do you say to that?
CLAYTON: Yeah, you know, with where we are, interest rates are near historic lows. If you look back over a hundred years, you can see that interest rates, they are about as low as they ever have been. I think it was 2016, beginning of 2016. May, we hit close to 1.4 percent on the 10-year treasury yield. And so that’s a good kind of baseline to watch.
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CLAYTON: If you look at that right now, we’re sitting not too far above that. And so for anybody that is looking at getting into a principal guaranteed account, understand that we are near this point where, for some people, it might not make sense. For other people, it does make sense. It matters what your goals are.
MIKE: Now there’s a few new investments out there, and some are new, some are not. But, like, equity-linked CDs, that’s a thing. It’s worth looking into. There’s these new ETFs that have the least you can do.
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MIKE: They’re not principal guaranteed, but they’re like a guaranteed loss of maximum, do you remember the rates? It was like five percent, 10 percent. I mean, they’re all different. Look at the prospectus. There’s new products out there that give you a floor. A baseline so you don’t take the 30 or 40 percent hit that a lot of Americans tend to take every seven to eight years. I think it’s an 80 plus percent chance every seven years, seven to eight years, that there’s a massive market correction. Those odds are against most retirees’ favor, but when we set yourself up for success, you get the right conclusion that you want.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:09:31]
MIKE: You get the right retirement that you want. You can protect your lifestyle. You follow the first principle, and that’s just simply put, draw income from principal guaranteed sources. So that you can sail through these market corrections that happen. That you can sail through whipsaw and certainty and, I mean, human emotions get in the way of proper investment channels. Let’s embrace the fact that we’re human, and let’s set ourself up for success. The second principle that can help the ultimate conclusion, retirement, beautiful thing, is diversify by purpose, not just by risk.
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MIKE: So many people, and it’s a fun conversation, they’ll come into the office and they’ll say, “Hey, Mike, I’ve got a great plan. I am invested beautifully. Look at that diversification. I mean, look at the small cap, mid cap.” And then they, I love this, they’ll recite to me all the industry jargon to show how smart they are. And they are smart. I don’t want to patronize them by any means. They are very intelligent people.
CLAYTON: Sure.
MIKE: And they even use the fun lingo that financiers use to make us sound smart, which I think is a bit pretentious. But when all is said and done, they show a beautifully diversified portfolio that’s built for accumulation. Not for distribution.
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MIKE: All of it has one purpose, and that’s to grow. But when you need to draw income from your assets, it can’t help you. When you need to have that quick emergency cash, if markets are down, it’s a very expensive emergency at that point. So when all is said and done, the second principle is to diversify by purpose, not just by risk. That’s to say that, have some assets that are set up to pay you your income for the first five years. Some other assets that are principal guaranteed that are gonna pay you from year six to 10, or however you want to structure it. But the principle says diversify by purpose, not just by risk. If you diversify just by risk, that’s an accumulation play, and it’s shortsighted to the overall picture of retirement planning.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:11:24]
CLAYTON: Sure. Well, and one thing to consider, I guess one more point I would add on that, is mathematically, when you are drawing income from a fluctuating account, which for the folks out there listening, that is a pie chart, it’s a fluctuating account, it can go up and down, mathematically, you are compromising gains when the market is up, and you’re accentuating losses when the market’s down.
MIKE: It’s that second part that you said that’s so critical. Accentuating your losses when the markets go down in the down years. That right there is the killer of most retirement plans. Accentuating your losses in the down years.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:11:59]
MIKE: Food for thought. You can always go to deckerretirementplanning.com and get more content on that and do some more research or get your education. I’m sure that’s all everyone wants to do right now is, holiday season, let’s break out the textbooks. No, it’s easy to read. Nice and simple. Just a few pages, but it provides a lot of value for people that just want to get the overall scope of it. But the third principle I want to talk about, and all of this, and setting yourself up for the right conclusion, and I’m getting to conclusion of 2020, not just retirement as the conclusion, but use a distribution plan, not a pie chart. And that’s not just a term.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:12:37]
MIKE: A distribution plan is a spreadsheet that maps out your income from now or whenever you retire until age 100 or whatever age you put. That allows you to, down to the month, net of tax, say, okay, this is what it looks like. Am I okay with that? And if the answer’s yes, then you’ve set yourself up for success. But if you’re not using a spreadsheet, a distribution plan, what we call internally with our technology as I say for distribution, it’s a guessing game. It’s an absolute guessing game. And I don’t care how smart you are. At the end of the day, if you win, it’s because you got lucky.
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CLAYTON: Yeah, and that distribution plan is something. It’s not a budget. It’s not telling you what you need to spend your money on. It’s telling you, do you have enough to cover those needs? And it answers those questions. Can I retire, and will I have enough money to last me the rest of my life?
MIKE: I’ll never forget this client. Single lady, lives up in Washington. And she says, “You know, I really don’t need much, but I just, I’m done working at the Macy counter.” She’s worked there most of her career. She was in the jewelry section. And just loved it. But she felt kind of trapped. She knew that her health wouldn’t last forever.
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CLAYTON: Sure.
MIKE: And she just wanted to do something more with her life. So we set her up with a plan. We used all three principles, and she was able to conclude her work life. And I’m saying work life, as in working because she had to. And then she took other jobs that were fun jobs. Her first one, I’ll never forget, she calls me up, she says, “Mike, you’ll never guess what I’m doing.” I say, “What do you mean?” She says, “I just got my dream job.” I said, you know, let’s make up a new name. Let’s call her Dorothy. I’m thinking that ’cause I’m going to Kansas for Christmas. Kansas.
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MIKE: So, “Hey, Dorothy, what do you mean? You’re going back to work?” She says, “Yeah. Because this is my dream job. I’m not making much money, but that’s okay. The plan’s set up. We’re all good to go. This is all just extra money, but really, I want to get paid for something I love to do, and I’m at Yellowstone now. I’m at Yellowstone all summer long guiding tours in my favorite place in the world.”
CLAYTON: That sounds like one of the most fun things you could do.
MIKE: She had her own little cabin that was there, and she didn’t spend much time at Old Faithful. She was kind of the backwoods, like, the other aspects of Yellowstone that’s just enchanting.
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MIKE: And it’s so much fun, ’cause when we have to do a client review, I’ll say, “Hey, Dorothy.” Actually, I have to email her. “Hey, Dorothy, it’s time to touch base. When are you coming up for cell service?” [LAUGH] And she’s having a ball. But that’s the point, is how you want to conclude your work life and enter retirement should be done by, or it needs to be done by the three principles because it doesn’t matter if markets go up or down. It doesn’t matter if they go sideways. The turbulence is irrelevant because she, Dorothy, has set the plan up by the principles of retirement planning.
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MIKE: And sure, we use a safer distribution plan which is a math-based approach to calculate all that. But when it comes down to it, oh, she’s living the dream. Every summer, it’s like she takes a different job to be in a different favorite place that she loves.
CLAYTON: Yeah, I’ll tell you a story about a couple that I met with, that they had retired, and it was a similar situation, that they had enough, they were fine, and he was able to go and get a job doing something that he loved to do. And when he initially took the job, he thought, “Oh, this will be all right.”
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:16:19]
CLAYTON: But it ended up being something that he was working at a sporting goods store, and for him, it was hunting and fishing, and for others out there, maybe you would want to work at a jewelry…
MIKE: Home Depot’s a popular one for retirees just to go because they love building. It’s so fun.
CLAYTON: Yeah. And so he was able to not only be around what his hobby was, hunting and fishing, but he was able to talk to people all day at work about his favorite thing. And then on top of that, they had him walking all over the place, so he was getting some laps in around the store.
MIKE: Getting those steps in.
CLAYTON: He was walking six to eight miles a day at work. And he loved it. He was as happy as he’d ever been.
MIKE: We’ve got another client that photography was his big deal.
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MIKE: And so going to Africa, doing African safari, huge dream. Then moved over to an Alaskan cruise and catching those photographs. I mean, it’s so enabling when you can conclude the part of your life where you have to be earning income, and you enter into a part of your life to where it’s new beginnings. You’re spending your time how you want to do. And for all of you listening right now that would like to see where you stand and to see where your conclusion lies to where you can conclude the time when you need a paycheck and you can enter into the life where it’s paycheck optional, love to invite you into chat with us.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:17:40]
MIKE: We’re here in Washington. We’ve got Seattle, Kirkland, and Renton. Or San Francisco, Utah, or Salt Lake and Lehi, Utah. San Francisco, California, sorry. [LAUGH] But we’re here helping people retire every day. We’re here helping people conclude their financial burdens and enter into their financial freedom.
CLAYTON: And I think the question that I would pose to our listeners is, what does retirement look like to you? Because when I would talk to these folks, these couples, these individuals that would come in, I had to define retirement differently for some of them, ’cause some folks out there, it is going from working to not working anymore.
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CLAYTON: And you go and you pursue whatever fun thing it is, or you just take time off and you just focus on yourself at that point. For others, it is finding a way to serve locally in the community. However. Or for others, it’s that, like you mentioned, Mike, it’s going from having to work to wanting to work. And that the only thing that changes is you know that if you had one bad day at work, you could hang up your hat and walk away, and that would be it.
MIKE: That’s it. No hard feelings.
CLAYTON: Yeah. So consider that to our listeners, is what does retirement look like to you? Because for what it looks like for your neighbor, your friend, your family member, it might not be the same for you. So think about personally what you want that to look like.
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CLAYTON: And you can fit that into, or a distribution can fit into what it is you’re looking for in retirement.
MIKE: Oh yeah, feel free, call right now, 833-707-3030. If you want to know where you stand in your pursuit to retirement, we can mathematically calculate that for you. We do all the work. You just got to let us know, okay, where are you right now. Okay, great, if you were to retire today, here’s what that looks like. Does that work for you? If not, okay, what’s your number? We back that in, we find you the right situation.
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MIKE: But the fun part is, conventional wisdom, I’m saying that sarcastically, what the bankers and brokers are suggesting is that you’ll take four percent of your total assets, and that’s just it. That’s oversimplification, but that’s what they’re saying. And that you’ll live off of 60 percent of your income. No. No. Retirement is much more complicated than that. We want to just put in your numbers into a situation and then show you transparently what it looks like. So you can just know where you are. And for all of you that want to start 2020 off in that year, in that phrase, in that mindset of let’s see where we stand, let’s see how we can get to our goals, we’d love to invite you in.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:20:09]
MIKE: 833-707-3030. Must have at least 300 thousand of assets saved up for retirement. And we recommend 55 or older. However, if you’ve saved up millions of dollars and you’re 40 years old, can come in. We have clients that retire at 40 years old. And that’s a hoot. That’s a good time. Even if you have a lot of qualified assets, we can still help you with that. We have ways, some fun, strategic ways to help people retire earlier if they would like to. But 833-707-3030. Call right now. Or you can go to deckerretirementplanning.com and you can click on the middle of our pages on the right side there. You can request a review with us.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:20:47]
MIKE: But here’s what it looks like. For all those listening right here, here’s what happens. When you give us that information, first off, we want to treat it with respect. And so, we’re just gonna call you and say, “Hey, we got the information. Just want to confirm you’d still like to visit with us. We’d like to talk about your retirement plan,” and we’d say what specifically concerns you. And we want to know what that is. And then we’ll schedule a time that’s convenient for you, Monday through Friday in one of our offices in Washington, Utah, or California. And then what we do is, we conduct ourselves the research.
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MIKE: So you can come in just for a simple review. And this is where you are. And when you come in there, you’ll say hi to Jess or Darryl or Katie, one of our operations managers who will greet you at the door and bring you some nice treats and a nice warm beverage to, you know, handle the cold weather we’ve having in our beautiful offices. And then you’ll spend time with one of our purebred fiduciary planners. These folks are legally bounded to what’s in your best interest. And they’re gonna take the information you gave us and then help walk you through objectively where you stand and where you need to go. And for a lot of folks, the retirement year’s early because they just didn’t know.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:21:58]
MIKE: We’re here to give you that transparency at 833-707-3030. Or you can go to deckerretirementplanning.com. But Clayton, can I tell you a story?
CLAYTON: Absolutely. Let’s hear it.
MIKE: Now, I want to tell you the story here, and before I dive into it, when it comes to bull markets, bull markets are nice only when you can understand the power that’s really behind a bull market. Or the danger that a bull market provides. And yes, I know bull markets, for all those who don’t know the term, bull market means going up. Okay? And you can remember that bull has a U in there. U is up. Bear markets go down. Now bulls strike up, which is why they call it a up market for a bull and blah-blah-blah.
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MIKE: Simply put, up markets are dangerous for a lot of people.
CLAYTON: Sure.
MIKE: And I’m gonna explain that just a moment. To help iterate that, I want to talk to you about my first experience with a chili cookoff.
CLAYTON: It sounds delicious.
MIKE: Yeah. That’s typically an October activity, but it’s still chili season. Any time that it’s cold out there. But, so, okay. First time ever conducting a chili cookoff, and I said I’m in, I signed up for there, and then I forgot about it. Okay? No idea. This is years ago. No idea that the chili cookoff is there. And then I get a email same day. Hey, by the way, your chili here, it’s a chili cookoff, but it’s also feed a community situation, so there’s a lot of charitable outreach here.
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MIKE: And I say, “Shoot, I’m not only feeding people, but I’m supposed to feed people an award-winning chili. I don’t have time for this.” And so what I did is I got three cans. It was three cans of one chili and a couple cans of another chili. I put them into a crockpot. And then I bought a block of cheese and an onion. This is the back of my office. I got one of those, like, little butter knives. And I’m chopping away. I’m just tearing up, right? But I’m committed. There’s no way I’m gonna cancel a charitable cause. And I chop up this onion and I buy a crockpot, ’cause I couldn’t go home.
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MIKE: I bought a crockpot from a thrift store and cooked it in that. I washed it all out. It was nice and sanitary. And I threw it in there. No expectations, but I won. I won the chili cookoff that year. Competition wasn’t that stiff, apparently, but I didn’t have any context. That was my first year doing this. But I won because it was a lot of cheese. Still some onions. And I took a store-bought chili that was already proven to be good. What store-bought chili is gonna put out something that’s bad? They would go out of business.
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MIKE: But I won that year. Now here’s my point. The second year that I entered into the same chili cookoff, okay? Different community, but still the same situation. I thought, “This is easy.” So I made it from scratch. Chest, you know, chest is out. Head held high. I put it in there. Talking smack. Just no one can touch me ’cause I’m an award-willing chili cookoff contestant. And no one else has my title. I lost horribly that year. [LAUGH] It was so bad.
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MIKE: People were hungry, and there was still some of my chili left over. [LAUGH] Here’s my point. The bull market makes it really easy for you to be successful. The first year that I entered a chili cookoff, the competition was very, very low. The quality was very, very low, and someone had to win and it happened to be me. The second year it was a different environment with a different community, and there were other people who had much more experience that were competing.
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MIKE: Warren Buffet has a quote. When the tide goes out, you can see who’s swimming naked. Bull markets are dangerous only when they turn to bear markets. That’s it. If any of us want to think that for the last five to 10 years that we got this, I am pleading with you to reconsider your stance. All I’m suggesting is, let someone come in and at least double-check it. Now a fiduciary would be the proper person.
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MIKE: Only 1.6 percent of all financial professionals are fiduciaries to the actual high standard that they’re meant to be. All financial representatives have a fiduciary responsibility to CYA, if we’re being totally honest. But 1.6 percent have a fiduciary responsibility. They’re legally bound to what’s in your best interest.
CLAYTON: So it sounds like you’re talking about a stress test on just a current existing plan for the listeners out there, is that right?
MIKE: Do your stress test. And if we’re the ones that you’d choose to come in, we want to do a math test, mathematical test. We do it for you. You don’t need to know math to do this.
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MIKE: We just run our safer distribution plan to show you were you stand and if you’re on track. And then we also look at the principles of retirement planning to see are you set up correctly. ‘Cause if you’re not, if you’re still stuck in accumulation mode and pounding your chest, “Each year I can get the gains,” we’re good. When markets turn over and go down or even go flat, you’re not good anymore. And you’re trying to take a crappy chili and win a chili cookoff every single year. And it’s disappointment after disappointment after disappointment. Now I will tell you, I learned my lesson. The third year, I took out all the stops.
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MIKE: I smoked the beef that I bought. And I brought prime. I brought a prime brisket. I mean, really nice cut. And I smoked it, and I cooked it nice, and I put it in there, and I cooked Sun Beans, and I had canned beans, so we had the flavor and the texture. Now, I mean, I pulled out all the stops. And I won the third year. But I put in the work to be able to win. And I did the research to do so. The best part for everyone listening right now is you don’t have to do necessarily the research yourself. You just need to make sure that you’re working with a purebred fiduciary, someone like Decker Retirement Planning, to help you get there.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:28:15]
MIKE: To help you get the clarity that you need to have the plan that will not only just get you through, but it will also enable you to protect the lifestyle that you want and have dreamt about your entire life throughout retirement.
CLAYTON: And for the listeners out there, a lot of advisors that I know of that use that pie chart approach, you’ll go in and say, “Let’s stress test this.” And they pull out their Monte Carlo, they run the Monte Carlo simulation and they say, “Look, this is how it’s gonna do in these different situations.”
MIKE: First off, who understands the Monte Carlo that doesn’t work in finance? It’s a fancy tool that infers you just to play nice and agree with them.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:28:58]
MIKE: The Monte Carlo was invented not for finance. It’s just used for finance because it helps the banker, broker, prove its point. There’s a chance that it will work. Cool.
CLAYTON: The Monte Carlo is based on if the market does this or this. But what about your specific situation?
MIKE: Or income.
CLAYTON: Or income.
MIKE: Monte Carlo doesn’t account for income. It doesn’t. It’s how well your investment will perform over a certain period of time.
CLAYTON: And it doesn’t take into account the black swan events either.
MIKE: Doesn’t take into account the black swan events. Clayton, how would you like a stress test where we test your investment but don’t account for income in your retirement? [LAUGH]
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:29:40]
CLAYTON: I know. It just, it leaves me speechless. So one of the things to consider is when you’re going in through a stress test, ask yourself these questions. If my spouse passes away before I do, how is my spouse going to be? How’s the plan gonna hold up? How are they gonna be okay with income if one of them is gone? ‘Cause things like that happen unfortunately. It’s unexpected. It doesn’t happen. People don’t live to their life expectancy all the time. And some people live longer than expected. And so those are things to consider as well. Other things is how does it affect your estate? How are taxes affected by this? So these are all things to consider with that stress test.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:30:15]
MIKE: I’m gonna say it how it is here, and this is a bit frank and straight to the point. But I want to say it for all of you listening right now, whether it’s via radio and you’re driving to an event, or you’re on the podcast, listen to it after the fact, there’s still time for New Year’s resolutions. So I want to be very straight with you and not only get you the transparency that you deserve, but to set the right expectations. Don’t be upset for the results you didn’t get because you didn’t do the work. Let me say it differently. Don’t be upset for the results you didn’t get because of the work you didn’t do.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:30:52]
MIKE: If you want to have a retirement that can last you for 30 plus years, it’s gonna take more than just understanding that you’ve diversified yourself in a fancy way. There are a lot of questions out there, and to be able to do so, takes time and effort. And for all of those that are willing to put in that time, and that want to sync up with a fiduciary that specializes in retirement planning, now is the time to take action because we’re still in a bull market, which is a happy situation. But when reality hits, and for all those who didn’t experience 2008 as a retiree, and you’ve retired in the last 10 years, it’s a lifechanging moment.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:31:30]
MIKE: I want to invite people in right now. 833-707-3030 if you want to be talking to us. We’re here in Washington, Utah, and California helping people retire with a math-based, principle-based approach to maximize their retirement, and to make sure that the work is done so they can protect their lifestyle. They can enjoy the retirement that they want.
CLAYTON: Yeah, and I don’t want the listeners to think that coming in and meeting with us is gonna be a lot of work. All you have to do is just take an hour, hour and a half out of your day, come sit down. We’ve done all the work on our end.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:32:02]
MIKE: There’s no magic pill. We just have the tools to help you. [LAUGH] There’s no magic pill for retirement. It takes some work. But for those who are willing to put in the work and to take their retirement serious, as serious as we take every client’s retirement, we want to invite you in. 833-707-3030. Or you can go to deckerretirementplanning.com to learn more and sign up there. Or, when I say learn more, we’ve got guides and eBooks and a whole plethora of content for you to continue that venture.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:32:33]
MIKE: But when it comes down to it, retirement’s a beautiful thing. But it takes work to prepare for it. Clayton, when we talked about the show today, I thought this was the funniest one of them all. And truth be told, for all Safer Retirement Radio listeners, Clayton doesn’t actually know this next segment. This is gonna be a fun surprise to him. Eggs and retirement.
CLAYTON: I’m…
MIKE: Did you know they’re correlated?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:33:03]
CLAYTON: I’m excited. Oh, I’m sorry. I am…
MIKE: That was bad.
CLAYTON: Oh, I know.
MIKE: You’re excited. The quality of a retirement directly correlates with eggs. I never thought I would say that on the air, but it’s true. It’s absolutely true. And what I want to do is I want to present to you my case and tell me if you think I’m right or wrong, okay? Eggs right now, there’s two parts to eggs, okay? The cost of eggs and the quality of eggs. Right now across the nation, the eggs are averaging about, oh, I think it’s a buck 20 or so for the container or something around there. The average is 120.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:33:39]
CLAYTON: You’re talking like for a dozen, right?
MIKE: For a dozen or something like that, yeah. Around there. I mean, there’s different cartons. If you go to Costco, the cartons are massive. If you go to a local grocery store, there’s different sizes and such. But eggs, there’s a price point for eggs. And what’s interesting is eggs are a loss leader for a lot of grocery stores. They put them in the back so you go get your eggs, and then you buy a bunch of stuff on the way here. On the way to check out. That’s the design of the eggs and milk being a loss leader.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:34:05]
MIKE: But eggs, the price keeps going down over the years, and it’s a rock-bottom moment right here. They just can’t keep getting less. What’s interesting is interest rates can’t keep getting less. I mean, they’re can if you’re Japan or Venezuela. How’s Venezuela doing right now?
CLAYTON: Oh, man.
MIKE: But there’s two big concerns that a lot of big retirees have, and you may share these Safer Retirement Radio listeners, so let me just illustrate them, and then we’ll get back to the egg correlation.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:34:38]
MIKE: Inflation. It’s a big deal. Eggs used to cost a couple of pennies back in the day. And if you live where my wife grew up, in Kansas, you just got your eggs from your neighbor. That was it. There were plenty eggs to go around. Inflation goes up, eggs cost more money. But eggs, for some reason or another, are still relatively cheap. Why? Inflation is being held artificially low. We’re not used to a cost-of-living adjustment that maybe happening in 10 years, 20 years, or 30 years. When egg prices are gonna skyrocket, guess what else is gonna skyrocket?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:35:18]
MIKE: Everything else that’s happening. Now here’s the rubber-band effect. Farmers right now that are having to produce eggs at a next-to-nothing cost are squeezed. They have to figure out how to feed them for less and less each year. That’s really hard to do. Because then you’ve got the other crops that are also being squeezed and can’t keep up. And then farmers are going bankrupt because it’s just too low of a price. And then you have the quality of the egg where you want to maximize your production, and you’re doing it, and I’m not an animal activist by any means, but if you YouTube this, they’re stuck in little cages.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:35:58]
MIKE: They’re stuck with hormones. And all these different chemicals that are there. And they’re saying that they’re free-range, but free-range is only like a hula-hoop side of the outside that they could walk too, but they’re all stuck together. And there’s different ways that they’re manipulating what the egg could be. Because they’re trying to hit that price point. Now I’m not gonna dive into some deep analysis of the markets, but this kinda seems a little familiar. Quantitative easing. It’s a fancy way to try and manipulate our markets. The interest rates. There’s a separation of the fed, and what’s been going on in our markets.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:36:37]
MIKE: And we’ve thrown out tradition of how things used to be monitored. And the fed is keeping the rates artificially low. And I really feel for our fed chairman, Jerome Powell, ’cause he’s getting bullied around a little bit by Trump, for whatever it’s worth. But he’s doing the best that he can given a really tough situation.
CLAYTON: Wasn’t it just a couple years ago that Bill Gross, the Bond King if you remember his name from the ’80s, he came out and he even said that the fed is keeping interest rates artificially low. And he went on to say in that interview that it’s unsustainable. It’s not gonna last.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:37:20]
MIKE: It’s unsustainable. And then here’s the last squeeze that’s just like eggs. Fees. Financial fees are being squeezed across the industry. Fidelity, Schwab, TD Ameritrade which is now Schwab, or soon to be. E-Trade. I mean, rates keep getting lower and lower. How in the world do you think any investor is going to get quality investment advice when the fees keep getting lower and lower and lower? How in the world do you think this is going to be a sustainable source of information for you?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:38:00]
MIKE: How in the world can the price of eggs stay low? Can the markets sustain what they’re currently doing? Can financial custodians keep getting squeezed less with less and less? I’m not advocating for more. I like how Schwab does robo investing. They basically say, “Yeah, this is what it takes to keep the lights on for this service, have at it.” I think behind the scenes they’re saying, “Yeah, they’re gonna screw it up and then they’ll come to us for our advice, and then we’ll make money.” It’s a long-term play. But when all is said and done, what in the world are we trying to accomplish? Now, my wife’s a nutritionist, and we have eggs every now and then. I don’t believe in extremes.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:38:38]
MIKE: But we buy certain eggs that do cost a lot more. But you know what, we’re not putting a lot of crap into our bodies. For those of you, those investors that are trying to invest with low fees, there are some companies, I won’t say who they are, they’re recommending C share mutual funds which have hidden fees in them that hurt your portfolio, and you may not even know about them. The squeeze that’s happening on the American investor is just like the egg industry. And it’s only going to get worse, in my opinion. So when it comes to your retirement, are we chasing the lowest fees that could cost you 10X later down the road?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:39:21]
MIKE: Are we letting the fee tail wag the dog? Or do we want to have, pure and simple, good advice for a reasonable price? That’s all I’m suggesting. What’s most important to us? To have less fees but poor performance and a lot of risk? Or a plan that will protect you and accomplish the things that you want to do throughout your retirement? Now, there are some people out there that have high fees, and I recognize that. I mean, for goodness sakes, the fees on variable annuities and REITs are outrageous right now.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:40:00]
CLAYTON: Yeah, especially when you compare the fees to the returns for a lot of them. If you’re interested…
MIKE: [LAUGH] You couldn’t even say that with a straight face, it’s so bad.
CLAYTON: I know, Gosh. If anybody’s curious, if you think you might own an income rider or a variable annuity or anything like this, it’s always good to understand what actually goes into that. One of the things that I love doing with folks, they come in, say, “Hey, I’ve got this annuity I’ve had for a couple years. How is it actually working?” And…
MIKE: What’s really going into it?
CLAYTON: Yeah.
MIKE: Yeah.
CLAYTON: And then we call, we just get the insurance company on the phone, just ask them some straightforward questions.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:40:39]
CLAYTON: Because I want to make sure that everybody that’s coming in with one of these understands what they actually have. And almost every time I made that phone call, the couple or the individual that was there, the investor on the other end of the table, they were always left with more information that they didn’t have. And unfortunately, it was usually upsetting information that they were given.
MIKE: A bit of a surprise.
CLAYTON: Yeah. So if you think you’ve got one of those and you want to understand a little bit more about it, give us a call.
MIKE: Or understand the health of your retirement. If you want to understand the health of your retirement… I’ll liken it this way.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:41:18]
MIKE: Celery has a lot of chemicals that are typically used to produce celery. Just, it’s a finicky plant, apparently. So you wash celery when you eat it. Should be fine after that. Other fruits and vegetables, you don’t necessarily need to be as concerned about that. What you put into your body affects your state of being. What you put into your portfolio affects your state of being too because it affects your lifestyle. If you want to just see what is in your portfolio, if you want to have a simple review of the health of the investments and how they’re actually working, the sustainability perhaps, because it needs to sustain throughout the rest of your life.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:41:59]
MIKE: We would love to do that for you at no cost to you. You don’t even have to commit to working with us. Just come in, ask for the Decker review, and we can go through your portfolio and just show you where the toxic investments are, where the fees are that are dragging your portfolio down, and just help free yourself. It’s an incredible thing. My wife, before we finished this offer, my wife has something called MTHFR. It’s a genetic mutation, and what it means is, she has a thyroid issue and cannot breakdown fully, or folic acid. It’s in milk. And she can’t digest gluten very well.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:42:41]
MIKE: She doesn’t have celiac. She could eat gluten. She just can’t digest it, so it sits in her gut for a long time. She can have milk and dairy products. She just can’t break down that folic acid or, you know, what’s in milk. And, well, it slows her down. When she found out about this, when she finally had a doctor that said, “Hey, you have MTHFR, get rid of these two things and you’ll be fine,” she immediately could run faster, sleep better, think more clearly, and had a better lifestyle.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:43:11]
MIKE: I’m willing to bet that your portfolio right now, you right now listening in your car, listening on your AirPods as you’re going for a jog, listening to us on podcast, you at home listening to your radio station, I’m willing to bet that there’s some part of your investment portfolio that’s holding you back and your financial professional is not telling you about it. Not because they’re a bad person. They just need to make sure there’s bread on the table. But you deserve to know that. I hope you call us, if you’re 55 or older, have at least 300 thousand of assets saved up for retirement.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:43:50]
MIKE: We’re here helping people cleans their retirements and get the right investments for them. 833-707-3030, or go to deckerretirementplanning.com to sign up for our service at no cost to you. Just one visit. Cleans everything that you’re looking at. 833-707-3030. A big one, Clayton I know you guys talk about this a lot is, interest rate risk. A lot of people have no idea the interest rate risk that they actually have in their portfolio. Especially with bond funds. It’s devastating. And it’s a shock for a lot of people. So I hope people call in. 833-707-3030 and so we can visit with you in the new year.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:44:30]
MIKE: And to cleanse it all out so your retirement can function how it’s meant to be. It’s a beautiful thing. I’ve got an embarrassing story here, but Clayton, anything before we continue on?
CLAYTON: Just for those listeners that, you heard interest rate risk, maybe you’re wondering what that means for you, I mentioned earlier that we are in a historic low interest rate environment. Now interest rate risk, as interest rates rise on a fixed income account, that can cause you to lose value. For example, on a bond, if you have a three percent bond and interest rates jump up to four or five percent, you can’t sell that bond for what you bought it for.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:45:12]
CLAYTON: And that’s where you’re taking that hit. So that’s what you need to consider with interest rate risk, is they have that inverse relationship. When interest rates go up, the value of that bond goes down.
MIKE: Don’t confuse bond funds as principal guaranteed sources, ’cause they’re not. All right. Clayton, to wrap things up, I want to talk about retirement as it is, an obstacle race. Now I don’t mean physically here. What I mean is, retirement is an obstacle race of political risk, of taxes, of health. Of just about everything here. Now for all of you listening right here, this is my personal story.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:45:51]
MIKE: For you it may be something similar. But my brother who is a bodybuilder, very fit, just kind of disgusting how fit he is. He’s not massive, he’s just healthy. I mean, he looks like Superman. I mean, underneath his arms, he’s got that triangle inverted situation going on here. And when he flexes, it’s just disgusting how fit he is. And he would do these things called Spartan races. And I thought, “I can do that. I used to run half-marathons. I used to do cross country. It’s just running for a while.”
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:46:30]
MIKE: And so, I signed up. [LAUGH] And then I forgot to train. Now there’s three levels. There’s a sprint, a super, and a beast. And let me tell you about this. The sprint was as easy as can be in Boise, Idaho or just outside of Boise, Idaho, we just ran up and down a few hills and had a few obstacles. And the obstacles were fun. Jump over this beam, army-crawl through this mud over here. It was fun and it was over and it was basically a simple vacation. So here I am just going, “Oh, this is easy, I can do the other ones.” And so I sign up for a super. Do it up in Seattle. And it’s pouring rain.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:47:08]
MIKE: Raining so much that the cars couldn’t get out of the grass lawn. That every car had to be towed out of the parking lot by the end of the race because it had rained so much. This is back a couple years ago when there was a lot of flooding up in the Snohomish area. [LAUGH] Now we got through it. It was freezing cold. 36 degrees. Light rain the entire time. Eight to nine miles. I think this was eight miles, so I was lucky to not have that last mile. And 35 obstacles that really started testing. I’m thinking, “Gosh, I am not prepared for this.” But we got through.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:47:48]
MIKE: It was tough, but we got through. But here’s the kicker. Spartan Beasts Bear Lake Mountain just outside of L.A. up in the mountains here, we’re driving up there. My wife and I having a vacation to, what was it, Sayulita, Mexico after I finish this trip. I said, “Babe, I got to get this in, complete the trifecta. I got to do this, okay? I need to complete this for me.” Talk about conclusions. “I need to complete this for me, and then I’ll treat you to it.” So she says, “Okay, well, I’ll come with you and then we’ll fly from there to Sayulita together. It’ll be just fine.”
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:48:24]
MIKE: She is busting up laughing on the way there because as we’re pulling up, this is not a mountain or a lake, it is a ski resort with black diamond, double black diamond-grayed hills. Now for all of you who don’t ski, let me explain what a black diamond and double-black diamond means. Steep. Like, so steep that you have to crawl up it because if you stand you might fall over. The race wasn’t just 13 miles, which is half marathon, practically. It went up and down the mountain over three times to where you had to crawl or slide down on your butt.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:49:08]
MIKE: There wasn’t much cross country of just flat terrain, easy cruising along, which is what I thought. There wasn’t a lot of easy obstacles of just hop over this little six-foot wall. They were eight-foot walls. Who in their right mind puts an eight-foot wall after you just climbed up a three-mile hill? It was torture, is what it was. And we paid for this. [LAUGH] So we were halfway through the race. And I’ll never forget this. We had just gone over at peaks. We’re coming down so there’s a little bit of a relief there. But it’s very woodsy and a lot of twigs and end of trail.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:49:48]
MIKE: It was a really rocky and twig-routed trail here, so you really had to watch each of your step. And my brother and I, he had trained, I did not. We’re passing people keeping up a pretty good pace, and the look on people’s face of just pure defeat. Now, they’re on the mountain. There’s no Disneyland ride of, “Please, pick me up, I’m good to go.” I mean, eventually people might find them if enough runners say, “Hey, there’s a person back there that can’t move.” You know, there’s danger to this. People were absolutely defeated, and it wasn’t even halfway done. Not even halfway.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:50:27]
MIKE: For some people, we caught up to them an hour after they had started, and they had trained for the race. They were so ill-prepared, though, because the training wasn’t done correctly. Retirement could not be closer to this story. Now for you, you may have had an experience of working a grueling series of hours you didn’t think you could go through. For you it could be that you had kids and one of the kids was an absolute terror. For others, it may be having to deal with a very difficult experience. For my mom, it was recently, until my grandmother passed, she took care of her for years. And it was a very trying experience.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:51:05]
MIKE: We all have marathon-like trying experiences that we’re not prepared for. Retirement doesn’t have to be one, though. What’s interesting is, if sprint were retirement, anyone could just do it. And back in the day, that’s what it was like. You would only be retired for about three to five years. Not much planning needs to go into account for a three-to-five-year retirement. But when you have a 30-plus year retirement, when your retirement is a third of your life, there is much more risk at hand here. Because, just for example, the Secure Act that just passed, how does that affect your retirement and your estate documents?
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:51:46]
MIKE: What if they changed it to your RMDs, and the table went up significantly? What if Uncle Sam says, “Gosh, there’s a lot of IRA assets that are out there. A lot of 401(k) assets out there. I’ve got a lot of debt. They’re gonna die anyway. I’m just gonna jack up the RMD, required minimum distributions here, get more money to pay off this debt, and they’ll figure it out.” That’s a very real situation. What if the income brackets jump up to back where they were a couple years ago? And when I say couple years, 10, 20, 30 years ago, to where they used to be.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:52:21]
MIKE: That’s a very real situation that’s devastating for retirees. See, there are so many hurdles that could be in front of you. If you’re wanting to retire and be retired for 20 to 30 years. Yet we’re planning as if it’s a three-to-five-year investment and things just keep going. The bull market just keeps happening. I am pleading with you that’s not the case. And that we need to properly understand what the correct training is, what the principles are, we need to use a math-based approach.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:52:51]
MIKE: So when you’re like I was, very realistically going down a mountain, very, very thirsty, out of the nutrition packs to keep the energy up, and I turn the corner and there’s another hill that you’re not devastated. That in retirement you’re prepared to do so. There are some very critical aspects of retirement plan, like what we use internally called a tax buffer. It’s a tax-saving strategy, so if taxes jump up, it buffers it out for you. And if you never use, it’s income for you.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:53:27]
MIKE: That if one of your spouses passes away, we can shift the accounts in such a way to where you don’t have that much spousal risk. See, these are the hurdles that you can’t anticipate up. But when you turn the corner and you see it, it’s either devastating or you’re prepared for it. We are those who prepare for you to tackle the big retirements. The long ones. Not the three-to-five-year ones. Anyone, in my opinion, could plan a three-year retirement. Most people cannot, including financial professionals, properly plan a 30-plus year retirement.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:54:00]
CLAYTON: And for those listening, if you have a 401(k) or an IRA or a Roth or invested money, which is most of us, this applies to you. So keep that in mind.
MIKE: For all of you listening right here, and the reality is set in that retirement planning does take a big more effort than just diversifying your assets in a fancy way, don’t be scared. Don’t lose sleep over this. I don’t believe in fear. Anything can happen in life, but we as humans are resilient.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:54:40]
MIKE: We are set up for success. And for all those that want to take the retirement as serious as we do here at Decker Retirement Planning, at no cost to you, we would love to visit with you and to map out what your training looks like. When I say your training looks like, you don’t actually have to do any training. We’re here to help do that for you. We’re like Sherpas that will walk up and down Mount Everest with you every step of the way. We have a full-on servicing department that can walk you through each of those steps. So when it comes down to it, folks, we’re here for you. Call us at 833-707-3030 for a no-cost visit to where we can visit.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:55:16]
MIKE: We can sit down and visit with you, have an open conversation with no pressure. And I want to be clear. Here’s what the visit is. And then I want to talk about what the visit is not. The visit is for you to understand the financial headwinds that may be there, and how to set yourself up for success. The visit is not a place to make financial decisions. There is too much to be done before the financial decisions need to be made.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:55:50]
MIKE: There’s too much to be discovered before we can plan a proper plan. There’s too much to do from a retirement planning standpoint that it’s not appropriate to make decisions in the meeting. The meeting is to gather information to review where you are and where you need to go. So when it comes down to it, if you want to come in and get clarity and comfort to your retirement to verify that, yes, your retirement can be done in the way that you planned it to be, that you can protect your lifestyle and continue to enjoy it.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:56:26]
MIKE: If you want to be going on trips every single year, let’s show how we can make that happen. It’s math-based. It’s principle-based. It’s not to make the decisions in the first visit. It’s just to gain clarity of where you stand and where you need to go, which is a very empowering visit here. For all of you listening, I hope you’d call us. 833-707-3030. Take us up on that offer at no cost to you. Must be 55 or older and have at least 300 thousand of assets saved up for retirement. We would love to help you get there. All we do is retirement planning. It is our specialty and it’s our specialty for a reason. We’re here in Washington, Utah, and California helping people every day retire.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:57:05]
MIKE: People just like you accomplish the dreams that they set out to do. 833-707-3030. Clayton, thanks for joining me on the show today. We got to wrap up here in the last minute.
CLAYTON: Thanks for having me on, Mike. I love being here.
MIKE: So for all those listening here, if you celebrate Christmas, I hope you’ve had a Merry Christmas. If you don’t, I hope you’ve enjoyed just the slowing down of the season. For all of you folks that are celebrating New Year’s, I hope it’s just a wonderful time. Drive safe. Watch out for drunk drivers. Please don’t drink and drive. Have your designated driver that’s available there.
WHAT EGGS HAVE TO DO WITH YOUR RETIREMENT [00:57:39]
MIKE: But enjoy yourself. Let’s have a great time. And then have a wonderful 2020 to where we can set everything up for success and see clearly what the retirement is meant to do. From all of us at Decker Retirement Planning, I’m Mike Decker. Thank you for listening to the show. We’re gonna be here same time, same place next week. And we look forward to it then. Thank you.
