Financial happiness and wealth creation revisited

Chris

Barron: Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ag View Pitch. We're getting into that time of year as we record this podcast in the middle part of March, getting close to spring field work. And I think it's time that a lot of people are going to be in the field, are going to be driving and have opportunities to listen to some things. We do also have this podcast will be on YouTube. If you're not on YouTube and you do get on there once in a while, please subscribe and like our stuff. That's going to start helping us get a little more traction to get some of this really good content out there. And so, but today what I want to do is, I don't know, about a year and a half ago or 2 years ago, we started working with Mike Finley, who's sitting here beside me, and we did the very first podcast was called Financial Happiness.

And we talked a lot about the financial industry and how to build wealth and those kind of things. And so today what I want to do is, uh, talk about Financial Happiness Revisited. And so we're going to cover some of the stuff in review, but we're going to talk about some new things too and just kind of see what's going on in the world since the last time we talked about the importance of financial happiness and what that really means. So, Mike, welcome. Thank you for being here. Appreciate it.

Mike

Finley: Thank you for having me.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, you bet. And so I guess let's, let's start out. I think a lot of times people have a guy or a person that they go to as a financial advisor and a helper. And I'm thinking of a number of different clients we work with over the years that I'll, you know, I'll say, okay, so what else are you doing besides the investments in the farm business? And, you know, well, I'm, I'm working with so-and-so at a bank or, you know, Edward Jones or whoever, and I've got a guy, or they're, they're related to me or whatever, and so I trust them and things. What I want you to do first of all here as we talk about financial happiness and, and creating wealth is explain to me the difference between— and our listeners here— the difference between commission-based and fee-based compensation.

Mike

Finley: Okay, so commission-based, and in the financial industry we call that a load, a load. So you may have a Class A load or a Class C load. So Class A load, with every dollar you give your guy, you very likely would be paying a 5.75% commission with every contribution, and that means you have to make 6.11% to break even, to get back to zero. So I think we can all do that math and see that it doesn't work well for us. It does work well for the guy. Uh, Class C load is a 1% commission that is on your investment every year, and it stays on that investment throughout the entire time you have that investment, which can actually cost you more over time. So those commissions are a way for the financial advisor to make their money. The mutual funds, the ETFs they put you in, well, they have their own set of fees that they charge to basically pay their overhead and to make their profit.

And so there's multiple parties making money off the individual. And so your goal as an investor is to minimize the fees and the loads. And one thing for sure, you want to totally eliminate loads. And the way you do that is if you choose to work with a financial advisor, you choose a fee-only advisor. A fee-only, meaning you pay them a specific fee like you would an accountant. You agree on a financial plan or an hourly rate, for example, and then you pay them that fee. And then you make sure they put you in low-cost index funds or ETFs to diversify you all over the world in stocks and bonds and cash. And then you make sure that you have the right person guiding you down the right path. In other words, they are a fiduciary. They are required to do what's in your best interest at all times. And so that's kind of the difference.

Basically, you never want to be working with somebody who does not have a fiduciary responsibility to you. And I would tell you, You definitely do not want to work with anybody who's not a fee-only advisor. But saying that, you know, I'm the guy who says you can do it yourself. And I know many people look at this and think, oh, it's too much trouble. It's too much time. Well, no and no. So once you properly allocate your investments, in other words, you transfer the money over to a place like Vanguard or Fidelity into the low-cost index funds or ETFs. Then you leave them alone. I personally spend less than 5 minutes a year on my portfolio, and the average investor can do the same and do very well with their investments. So it's not time-consuming and it's not difficult, but it does take a certain level of education to get control of your money.

Chris

Barron: Talk a little bit about, um, you know, There's a lot of confusion out there, and so it seems like, you know, I think people feel like they got to have somebody just doing everything for them because it's so confusing, and it's almost like it's intentional confusion in that industry. Um, you know, there's a lot of things going on, and then there's— I think there's some confusion between, um, you know, different types of funds. And so talk a little bit, or or define the difference between, you know, what you talked about with an ETF versus a mutual fund.

Mike

Finley: Sure. So a mutual fund can be an actively managed mutual fund where somebody within the fund is buying and selling, trying to time the market, trying to be in the right place and avoid the wrong place. Or you could have an advisor who's actively managing the portfolio. They're buying and selling. They're trying to be in the right place and avoid the wrong place. And what we know from decades of research is both those ideas are very bad. You end up with lower returns and higher fees with active management. And that's not an opinion. We know this and we've known this for a great deal of time. And so you want to avoid active management. That's a no-brainer. We have a tendency to think that, uh, the guy, the financial advisor, he knows which ones to be in. He does not. Nobody knows the future.

So if you want to be invested in multiple asset classes, like large companies and small companies in the US, overseas, real estate, that's perfectly fine. You can do that with index mutual funds because the fee is so low, or an ETF, an exchange-traded fund, where that fund can be traded actually very similar to an individual stock. I'm a little hesitant to recommend ETFs to the average person because the average person tends to trade them like individual stocks, meaning more like active management, which would be a big mistake. Why I prefer index funds as a practical measure. Index funds you buy and you hold. That's how you become wealthy over time with investing and specifically with stocks, because as we've seen recently, Inflation. Inflation has reared its ugly head and it's causing all kinds of things to go up. And the best inflation hedge over time has been the stock market.

It's returned 7% on average beyond the inflation rate over time. So when you're owning stocks, you're able to have a hedge against inflation, and that's a very important tool for someone as time goes on.

Chris

Barron: Interesting. So we're going to come back to inflation here in a bit as it relates to some things specific to farming and to producers that, you know, high percentage of them, they're listening to this podcast. You know, continue a little bit more on the confusion and why or how we have a conversation with somebody because a lot of times these are relationships. And so let's say that your, I don't know, your uncle is at Edward Jones and he's helping you, you know, and if they're, you know, or any of these, and I'm not just picking on Edward Jones, I'm picking on essentially the entire industry with just a few that are, you know, fee-only because it's more rare to see a fee-only financial advisor than it is to see a commission you know, based.

Talk a little bit about how we navigate changing that, or what are some of the things that, you know, the average listener here— okay, well, that all is good and well, but how the hell do I handle that? What are my first steps? What are some things that I should do?

Mike

Finley: Well, the reason why there's more fee-based advisors versus fee-only is because there's a lot more money in it. So if you follow the money, you, you see why the majority of the industry is fee-based, where they're making money in all kinds of ways— loads and commissions and fees here and transactional fees there. So that's almost to be expected. Now, some people might think, well, the industry should change, the industry should do better. Well, that's pie in the sky, right? They're not going to change. There's too much money involved. They don't want to change. They want to keep that money streaming in. So then you might think, well, the government should— well, come on now, folks, the government's not going to be the solution here either.

The government may come in and try to help you if you've been illegally screwed over, but the truth is everything I'm talking about is perfectly legal. So the answer to all of this is the individual. It's us. As we become educated, we force change on an industry once we know what to invest in and what not to. So thanks to John Bogle, who started the first index fund at Vanguard, He changed the industry. He created an investment that has very low fees, the 500 Index Fund, where you could invest directly without any loads. And because of that, little by little, the industry changed dramatically, forcing these other companies like Fidelity and Schwab to offer the same low-cost index funds or ETFs. And so gradually the industry has changed not because the industry wanted to change, but because it was forced on them thanks to Mr. Bogle and thanks to a more educated population.

Chris

Barron: Hmm, interesting. So, uh, as we look at the commission-based or those that are generating revenue, I do want to hit on another portion of the industry for a minute, and then we'll kind of circle back and summarize this portion of the discussion. But Um, when we help producers transition, in other words, we're looking at farm operations going from one generation to the next, a lot of times what we, what, what we ask is, okay, while you're in the midst of that transition, and some, for some operations it's a 10-year process, for some it might be 3, for some it could be 20, depending on how early they start the transition process. One of the things that we always suggest is that they look at life insurance covering the younger person.

And a lot of times what's interesting to me is, you know, we'll, we'll talk to them about, you know, you probably need a 20-year term life policy here for this transition. And I— and the key word there is term life policy because they're very inexpensive. And you can, you know, if it's a 30-year-old person that's transitioning into the farm, they can buy a million-dollar term life policy for, you know, maybe $600, $700 a year depending on their health and that kind of stuff. And it's really inexpensive and it is a really excellent backstop so that if something happens to that individual, the transitioning partners are not in business with the spouse and not wanting to be, you know. So it's, it's those types of vehicles.

But one of the things that I run into occasionally is they'll start having the conversation with the insurance agent and the insurance agent leads starts leaning towards whole life and why whole life is a better investment. And then every time I've looked at that, I haven't— I've really struggled with why would you just not do the less expensive thing while you need it and then just do your own investing. So talk a little bit about insurance companies and, and why, why is there a drive toward whole life from what they promote versus the term Well, that correlates to our prior conversation.

Mike

Finley: Basically, the insurance agents and the majority of financial advisors, they have a conflict of interest with the information that they're recommending to you. And when I say recommending, I'm saying that they're going to push products and services that make them a lot more money. So that's why annuities are sold at such a great rate. Whole life is another example. The commissions on a whole life First year is generally 100%. So that means every premium that you pay them in the first year goes to them as a commission. So yeah, they like that. And so when it comes to picking up your education, whether that's on investing or insurance, and it, it sounds counterintuitive, but you do not go to your local financial advisor or life insurance agent to learn about those products.

You have to find an independent teacher, if you will, to help you better understand these products and how to do it wisely. So paying 10 times the cost for a whole life policy— and that's about what it comes to, 10 times the cost— and that's to cover all the big fat commissions that come with that. And so again, the individual has to educate themselves to buy the right products, because otherwise they're going to be sold products that make more money for the industry and their agents than you.

Chris

Barron: So how do you have the conversation with them? What are questions that you should ask your helper? So regardless of who they are, maybe they're, they're great and maybe they are, you know, really doing the best job they can of taking care of you. But you do, you do have load fees and all this stuff. What's the best questions or what should you ask them to determine what it's actually costing you to be working with them as opposed to somebody that is a fee-only?

Mike

Finley: Sure. So first, let's just take a step back. The way the industry was built was to hide the fees. So a lot of people even have this concept like, oh, I'm not paying any fees, I'm paying 1%. Yeah, yeah, I'm— I hate to break it to you, but you're paying a lot more than that. So the average person is losing 2 to 3% a year in just being drained from a portfolio, investments, insurance products.

Chris

Barron: So what's that amount to though? Like, because that starts to become exponential. Do you have some numbers off the top of your head that like if a person had $100,000, you know, or was putting $10,000 a year in or whatever, what's that amount to over a 20-year, 30-year period? You have any—

Mike

Finley: well, I can tell you over a 20 to 30-year period, you're talking hundreds of thousands of dollars. You could be talking maybe half a million dollars in the compounding of fees. So people talk about compound interest, which is an amazing thing, but the compounding of fees is also an amazing thing for the financial industry, which is why it's a multi-billion-dollar industry. So we need to understand that, first of all, the products and the fees are built together. And so the fees are baked into the product. So you, you want to ask your advisor, your insurance agent, How do you make money? And if you can't get a straight answer that you understand, you're talking to the wrong person. That's it. If, if they can't give you clear-cut answers, then you should go away and talk to somebody who can.

And in most cases, you're not gonna get straight answers because they really don't want you starting to learn about all the money they make and how they make it. And so it, it takes time. So that's the first question. How do you make money? And based off my portfolio with you, my, whatever I have with you, how much money are you making on a yearly basis off my account? And you want to get that clear. And if they're not going to give you that answer or they talk around the issue, again, go somewhere else. So I'd start there and then I'd be educating yourself on, okay, what other options do I have? We have a tendency, and this is how I got started, by the way. We have a tendency to just stay local. We talk to our local financial advisor, insurance agent, and, you know, we think, oh, they're going to help me. Well, yeah, they're going to help you.

So you, you want to think bigger, go beyond your local advisor, insurance agent, and look at all the options you have out there. So, for example, Vanguard. Vanguard is the largest mutual fund company in the world, and they offer some of the lowest-cost investment options out there. Well, you don't have a Vanguard representative in your local town, But you can easily invest in Vanguard index funds or ETFs online, connecting your bank account, getting those retirement accounts going, and a brokerage account to keep your cash earning 5.27% today. I'll say that again. You can put money in a federal money market cash account at Vanguard in a brokerage connected to your bank account that you can go get whenever you need it. And it's currently paying 5.27%. Do not let money sit in that bank earning little to nothing. The bank wins, you lose.

Chris

Barron: They like those deposits so they can loan more out, see?

Mike

Finley: Well, that's right. Yeah. And all of this, by the way, this whole discussion is about how can you do this best for you and your family. If you want to feed the, the litany of advisors and insurance agents out there and their families, you go right ahead, but that's less that's going to be in your pocket and your family's pocket.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, it still comes down to— I always ask people, how much time do you spend working on your business versus working in your business? And, and financial planning, management, and development of your financial planning and knowledge and stuff is 100% always completely working on your business. And You know, we— Shay and I have done some measuring the last couple of years and looked at the operations that spend a higher percentage of their time working on the business versus in the business. And you can see a direct correlation to their profitability and their— and it's not just profitability on the cash flow side, it's earned equity, right? It's equity growth of the business. It's very noticeable on the balance sheet. So really, really good stuff.

I want to go down another path here a little bit with you with respect to farmers and two, two things, because you brought something up a minute ago, but I want to start with the why should farmers be putting any money in Vanguard accounts or whatever when they're going to need money for quote unquote working capital? They need that, those, those funds available. You know, if you put them in something long-term and then they go to borrow money, it is more difficult to, to show that as working capital. And we're going to probably see some working capital burn here in the next couple of years, potentially, if these commodity prices stay low like they are as we record here in March of 2024. What's the reason?

What's, what's the value or the benefit for producers to take a portion of what their profits are or what their profits should be even on years of loss into thing, into these, you know, say just a typical index fund, just to kind of make it a simple question?

Mike

Finley: Diversification. You're trying to diversify some of the risk out of your total portfolio. The average farmer, the average businessman, they want to build. They want to build that farm up. They want to buy more land. Businessman wants to build up the business. And that's understandable. But to diversify some of that risk away, you also invest in other businesses. So when you're investing in stocks, you're investing in other businesses throughout the United States and throughout the world. So that's kind of a no-brainer in the big picture. And that's going to help you later down the road when you're ready to exit the farm. And instead of pulling money out of the farm, you've already built up a kitty of money that will take care of you in retirement.

So you'll not have to pull so much money out of the farm, if any, for example, from one generation to the next, because you always have that dilemma when you start exiting and someone else is entering. And so this diversification aspect will not only save you some taxes. So the other thing to think about here, so when you're putting money in, let's say a 401. It's going in pre-tax. You're saving taxes, right? And then you're investing in stocks, which are businesses that are going to appreciate over time, historically 7% beyond the inflation rate. So we're talking over 10% historically. And that is a return that is positive versus someone who says, well, I need to cut my taxes, so I'm going to go buy equipment, for example. Well, that equipment's not going to appreciate in value. It's going to depreciate and then you're going to write it off.

Well, this way you're actually investing in appreciating assets that will grow over time and give you that tax benefit. So I understand the, the mindset of minimizing our taxes. Well, an easy way to do that is your 401.

Chris

Barron: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And that's something personally that you've helped me with is You know, we have two different businesses. So we have, you know, I'm involved in my family's farming operation, and I also have Ag View Solutions, our consulting business. And so you've helped me be able to participate to the maximum amount I can in the 401 on the farm side of the thing. And then in the other business, we said we, we established a SEP. And I guess that's something that I would encourage people to think about, is that because a lot of people that listen to this have multiple profit centers too, they're they aren't just farming, they have maybe a trucking entity, they have other businesses from which they could set up. And I wouldn't call it double dipping, but it kind of is, right?

It's, you know, you can, you can set up a retirement fund in multiple entities and pull out of each of those entities and really capitalize on some pretty big tax savings because it's— I know it personally, it saved me a ton of taxes. By virtually doing exactly what you're saying.

Mike

Finley: And that—

Chris

Barron: and again, it's not a recommendation, but it's the whole reason we always have done the Ag View Pitch for almost 600 episodes now is because we want to bring out perspective. And we're not telling people you have to do this or you should, you know, but we're trying to bring perspective out there. And this is a huge opportunity that you present and that you've helped me with. So thank you very much because it's like, you know, it's a whole new wealth creation avenue. That's like a whole nother business. Instead of letting somebody else have the business, we take control of the business ourselves.

And with that said, one other thing I want to ask you, and then we'll get back to this farm thing, but it seems like too sometimes people think, well, I do have control of that, I buy and sell stocks myself, because they know what's gonna, you know, and they don't— as farmers, we're kind of that way too, because we deal in commodities. And so, you know, we think, you know, we listen to all these know-it-alls that don't know any more than we do. Like you said, you know, they don't know if the market's going up or going down. It's just perspective. But we have to make our own executive decisions. Talk a little bit about why it's not smart to buy and sell stocks when a lot of people are like, well, but I've made a lot of money. I bought this stock and it made me a shit ton of money. And so that's why I'm doing this. Because they think they're smarter than the stock market. Why is that not?

Mike

Finley: So that's ego. It's ego speaking. It's the ego. And it usually comes with the man. Not always, but usually. And it's, it's us thinking that we know more than the market.

Chris

Barron: It's play too, right?

Mike

Finley: It's— oh yeah, just doing something on the side. Yeah, right. So what you're doing is gambling and that's fine. If you want to take a small amount of money and gamble, go right ahead. It's like when you go to the casino, as long as you realize you're going to lose your money, When you go to the casino, that's fine. You want to, you want to get lucky once in a while and win.

Chris

Barron: That's what they're hoping for, right?

Mike

Finley: Of course. Of course. And you can get lucky, but that's what gambling's about, right? Index funds is you becoming the casino. In the end, you will win. The odds are in your favor. So that's why you have a portfolio of index funds. That's why I have them. That's why Warren Buffett recommends you have index funds. Because at the end of the day, you're trying to put the odds in your favor. And it really does come down to math. And if you do the math, you see what's going to benefit you. Low cost, low fee index funds diversified all over the world, feeding those accounts in retirement accounts, like a 401 or a Roth IRA, or even in a brokerage account. And then you just buy and you hold. You don't buy and sell. You don't think you know something that somebody doesn't. And that includes your local financial advisor. He does not know the direction of markets.

And if you have somebody who's trading on your account, well, again, that's gambling, and that's going to work out not in your favor over time.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, appreciate that, those comments. I— that was exactly where I wanted you to go with it. Um, back to the farmer, and that's— that was kind of farmer-focused as well, just with how we, how we think and how we invest. You brought up inflation, and when, you know, there's probably nobody that understands inflation better than farmers, honestly. You know, inflation is really a good thing when it's really high because it brings— it makes commodity prices higher, and then that works good for us. So usually, like, on the farm, we're, we're counter to the general economy. So like, if the general economy is doing really good, farmers tend to be driving and driving to town in an old pickup.

If, if all of a sudden, you know, it goes the other way, inflation goes up and the people in the cities are having a really shitty time for a couple of years, all of a sudden you see farmers driving to town in a new pickup. With that said, we've had a lot of inflation, but now inflation has slowed back down. Commodity prices have kind of gone in the tank. And you talked about cash. So there was a lot of money made from 2020, '21, '22. And sort of in '23. It's hit and miss in '23 from what we're seeing with our clients. There's a lot of wealth that was developed in a 3-year window inside that 4 years. Okay. There's a fair amount of our clients, and I guarantee you there's a bunch of people listening to this that are sitting there on cash like you just— you described a little bit ago. It's like, if you're sitting on cash, why the hell is it in the bank if you're sitting on it?

Or, or, you know, and there's some financial institutions out there that do pay a little bit, but it's closer to 2% or 3%, you know, and that other 2% on some of these guys are sitting on $500,000 or a million or whatever of quote unquote working capital. Talk a little bit about what they could do practically to move it into an account like in Vanguard and how it would be generating that 5.27% you're talking about. And maybe more or maybe less depending on what these rates do, but that's a hell of a lot different than a 2.5% or a 3%.

Mike

Finley: Of course. So what you're doing is you're opening up a brokerage, a non-retirement brokerage. You could open up a single brokerage or joint brokerage with your spouse, for example. And then you would connect your bank account to Vanguard and you would move this money to the federal money market, which is the settlement fund. It's the default. In other words, you don't really have to pick it and just go into there. And currently it's paying 5.27%, which is generally much better than you're earning in the bank. Because what is the bank doing, right? They're taking your money, they're lending it out 8%, 9%, 10%, whatever, and they're paying you squat. Well, that's a great deal for them, not you. So the idea is get your money working for you in that brokerage at 5.27% currently. And it's liquid, meaning you can go get the money whenever you need it.

It's back in your bank account in 1 to 2 business days. But while it's at Vanguard, it's working for you instead of working for the bank or the credit union. So ultimately, you're trying to get your money working as efficiently as possible wherever it's at.

Chris

Barron: Part of the reason it's working as good as it is too, probably, is, is because there's a whole bunch of people uninformed that are borrowing that money on the other side, right?

Mike

Finley: Well, that's correct. And, and at the end of the day, you know, someone might say, well, the bank's got to make money too. Well, yeah, the bank will do what's best for the bank. You, the individual investor, needs to do what's best for you and your family, right?

Chris

Barron: Especially when those opportunities are there. So, so just for clarification, you set up that brokerage account at Vanguard, uh, and maybe there's other places besides Vanguard, but I'll come back on that in a second. But you put that money in there, it is liquid so you can move it out within a 24— in and out within a 24-hour window so that when you do your balance sheet and you look at your working capital position, that's working capital that's actually working for you instead of working for the bank.

Mike

Finley: Exactly.

Chris

Barron: And, and that's the thing, too. There's a lot of us, I think, that sit— that are sitting on grain And when you're sitting on grain, there's a, there's a cost of money even though the grain's not yet sold. And I think sometimes we've had, we've had some clients that are sitting on cash and they think, well, that grain in the bin's not costing me any money, but there's a huge opportunity cost to the tune of 5.5% on that money even if you are sitting on cash. And this whole inflation thing, I think has really changed the algebra that we need to do to truly understand how are we managing this. And when we look at a couple of operations that we have, because there's less of them that are doing kind of exactly what you're talking about, there's a lot of them that are generating an extra $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 a year just by managing their money correctly.

And, and that's kind of why I wanted to have you back on again, is just as an observation, it's interesting to Shay and I how some of these, some of these operations have figured out how to manage their money. You've obviously— and thank you for this— since our conference in, what, 2023, you were a speaker at that conference, and you've helped a bunch of our, our farm operations just via Zoom, getting on with them and kind of help them get started with this.

Um, and we'll come back to that at the end of the conversation of how people can reach out to you and stuff, but What I want to do next is just kind of ask you what other things in the industry, or if you're trying to educate people, what are some of the other key things that people listening to this should be aware of or should be thinking about in the next few years, whether it's retirement or, or anything in terms of financial happiness, just in general, anything that, that I haven't brought up or that you think is super important yet?

Mike

Finley: Well, the one thing to keep in mind is, you know, you're getting a tax break now, let's say, when you're putting money into a 401 with the idea that your taxes will be lower in retirement because you'll be in a lower income bracket. And based on where you live, let's say you, you're a farmer in Iowa. Well, if you pull money out of a 401 after the age of 55, you'll pay no state income tax. None. So that means you've totally eliminated state income tax from every dollar you put into the 401 if you live in Iowa and other states where that money comes out tax-free at the state level. You'll only pay federal income tax and again, pay it at a lower bracket. So you're not only deferring tax on federal money, but you're actually eliminating all state income tax when that money went into a 401 and then pulled out after the age of 55. So that's one thing to keep in mind.

Chris

Barron: You're making the Illinois guys mad.

Mike

Finley: I imagine so. I imagine so.

Chris

Barron: In Minnesota, probably too.

Mike

Finley: Yeah. And so you want to look at your situation, your state rules, and figure out how can you best minimize that tax burden. So I'm sure most farmers are always working at doing that. But if you can build up capital, it's going to appreciate over time versus depreciate. That's a way to really help yourself as you minimize your tax hit going forward. And then part of this too, you know, sometimes people think they're too busy or it's too hard. The big reason to educate yourself on this and to do it right is so not only that you're helping yourself, but you'll be able to teach your kids, you'll be able to teach your grandkids, you'll be able to educate them on the right ways to do this versus sending them out into the world, which is how I got started, and saying, good luck. Because the people out in the world don't care nearly as much about your family members as you do.

So the reason to be educated on the topic is to help you and your generations that follow.

Chris

Barron: So how do you find the helpers?

Mike

Finley: Okay.

Chris

Barron: So, uh, that's the toughest question I have for you, probably.

Mike

Finley: Yeah, that's, that's not the easiest thing in the world. One, again, decide, are you going to manage your own investments or are you going to seek out the help of someone to help you. And so if you're really thinking that you need help, one, you can go to my website, the nonprofits called thegivingsolution.org, thegivingsolution.org. We help people with their finances for free, no cost. So what we do is we take donations and we use those donations to vet fee-only advisors that we have scrutinized. To help you with your finances. So that's where I would kind of start, is our nonprofit. But you could also go to Vanguard. They charge 0.3% as a fee-only advice. Nothing wrong with that. You could go to Ignite Planning. They charge by the hour, by the project. That's another fee-only advisor group, IgnitePlanning.com.

Chris

Barron: Where are they located?

Mike

Finley: They're located in Cedar Falls, Iowa. Okay., and, uh, they're basically students of mine, so they're, they're doing all the right things, but of course they're making a profit, but you'll know exactly what you're paying them, right? It's fee-only fiduciaries, as would be Vanguard, as would be my nonprofit. And so the goal is, again, you want to make sure you got the right people helping you along the way. And if it was me, if I really needed financial help, If I was going to pay somebody, I would only pay them, let's say, for one financial plan, like get me started, get, get everything. Let's talk about Social Security. Let's talk about taxes, talk about insurance. And then after that, maybe you meet once or twice a year at an hourly rate that you've agreed upon, whether that's $150, $200 an hour, whatever the case may be. And that'd be it.

They put you in a low-cost portfolio of index funds or ETFs., and then you go live your life, you go do the stuff that you love as your portfolio works for you behind the scenes.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, I looked at mine when you came here today for the second time this year. So yeah, I mean, I just, just to echo what you're saying here because it's, it's so true and it, and it's, it's life-changing, um, when you don't have to put it in somebody else's hands or trust someone else and be able to kind of look at it and learn how to, how to kind of navigate those things on your own. Um, as far as the anything else goes, I mean, the, the giving solution.org, that's where— so if people go on to that, that's got all this information you just described in there then, is that right? Correct.

Mike

Finley: And you can also go to my website, my for-profit website, thecrazymaninthepinkwig.com. And that's where you get education. We have classes coming up, personal finance classes, investment classes, retirement classes. They can be attended in person, but they can all be attended via Zoom. So you can learn more about these issues from basically from me, a guy who's going to teach you without selling you anything. I'm not here to sell products. I have enough. I have enough money. I don't need more money. What I do need is to find the audience who's ready and willing to change the direction of their life.

Chris

Barron: So one of the questions I have for you that I guarantee you, there's people watching this that are skeptical, and especially if there's somebody that has a spouse or somebody that's in this industry, it's like, well, screw you. I'm— this is our livelihood, you know? And that would be understandable, right? But it's, it's like, okay, Why are you doing that and why is there no conflict of interest with you? And so what are you getting from Vanguard? What kind of kickback are you getting from Vanguard? The interesting thing I want to, I want to lay out there before you answer the question is, is I've had a number of clients you've helped and it's funny, most of them have said, I've tried, I don't want to pay him, I try to pay him and it's like they, he won't even take anything, you know?

And, and I think that's partially why you started the and correct me if I'm wrong, but started the nonprofit is so that you can allow some people to give back. Because I, I don't think people want to take, you know, right? And that's why you're— you want to give. And I always tell people, in life, you get what you give, you know. If you, if you give out, you're going to get back. Um, talk a little bit about that, about why you're doing what you're doing.

Mike

Finley: Sure. So I started this journey 35 years ago, I read my first financial book and I realized I was doing everything wrong. And so as I fixed my life financially and on a broader scale than my actual life, I started helping people with their finances. I started realizing how much they needed to learn and how much they could learn and do better. And by the time I hit age 45, which was 15 years ago, I retired. I had enough. I didn't need more money. I had enough money. And it's a concept that I tried to teach people. Uh, we can stop chasing after more money and more stuff, and we can start directing, redirecting our life toward helping people. And so one of the areas of talent that I have acquired over time is financial management, helping people with their finances. And so nope, Vanguard does not pay me. No one pays me.

Uh, if you want to invest your money in Fidelity or Schwab, I could help you do that. That's perfectly fine. I tend to be loyal to Vanguard because John Bogle is the guy who changed the industry with the first index fund. But at the end of the day, it's trying to find the people that want to be helped. That's what I do. And that's why the nonprofit, you're correct. I started that as an opportunity for people to donate. If they want to provide funds to the nonprofits so we can help people who generally are not getting helped. So the financial industry, unless you have a nice chunk of money, they don't care about you. Well, we do. And my motto is whether you have $5 or $5 million, we will help you because those people who don't have much, in many cases, they're the people who need help the most. They're just trying to get going or they're trying to— they're starting over.

They, they don't have much, but they need help. And that's what the nonprofit is there for, is to provide assistance to people that have kind of been shunned by the industry.

Chris

Barron: Yeah. And you've helped our kids. I think it's also the younger people too that I think you're pretty passionate for as well. Um, you know, you've helped, I think, every single one of our kids with respect to saving at a young age, because that becomes exponential Regardless of whatever business the kids get into, and I think that's what's important for the farmers to listen to here that have families that have kids, grandkids, whatever, to help them get started in wealth development and, and trying to make sure that they have financial happiness, you know, in the future. We have kind of an interesting country anymore, and the way things are going, it's— I think it still has a lot to do with we kind of got to take care of ourselves.

Mike

Finley: Well, that's right. There's so many opportunities and possibilities in America today. I mean, we live in the greatest country in the world. I believe that. I'll believe that till the day I die. But you have to take advantage of those opportunities. They're not just going to show up at your, at your doorstep. So at the end of the day, I teach people how to take advantage of all these opportunities waiting for you to seize them.

Chris

Barron: Mm-hmm. Awesome. So one last thing. This is the last thing and we'll wrap it up. You made a comment, you used a word called enough. One of the things that we see as a struggle a lot of times with the senior generations that are either in transition, thinking about transition, struggling with transition, um, I always tell people, and people have heard this that listen to me a thousand times probably by now, is there's three emotions that a lot of times will impact our decision-making. Which is ego, insecurity, and control. And those three emotions, I think, enter into transition because a lot of these successful people have worked their asses off to get to where they're at, to build what they have. And now, you know, so they've built their ego up because they've been successful. From an insecurity standpoint, well, if I start giving this away, am I secure?

And what's this look like? And I've always been in control. I'm not sure I want to give up, you know, give up control. Part of understanding that is recognizing, I think, your financial security, because most of the operations, or pretty much all of the operations that we've worked with, at least to this point, have been in a position where they're financially secure it's just a matter of understanding you've got enough. Because I think sometimes we put a lot of stress on ourselves to kind of keep going, to keep doing, do more, do more, do more. At what point did you decide, I have enough? And how did that impact you from a mental standpoint? Because I think that's hard for a lot of us, especially in agriculture, because we live it and breathe it and we own it. It's an entrepreneurial thing. It's not like the listeners here are self-employed, the majority of them anyway.

I mean, and so it makes it hard to give that, you know, to back away. How do you— what would you tell someone to be comfortable with saying, okay, I have enough?

Mike

Finley: So I would say it doesn't happen overnight. It didn't happen for me overnight. It started taking place somewhere in my 40s. And it just kept building. And as I started to research it and understand the concept of enough, I realized that I could really improve my life. Because if I didn't, if I just kept chasing after more money and more stuff, I could have done that. I could be richer, whatever that means. But it would have had an opportunity cost to what I could have done. And so when I retired at 45, 15 years ago, That opened up the opportunities for me to educate people on money at no cost, help people with their finances at no cost, and basically provide me a path of giving that enhanced my life. It made my life better and it made other lives better.

Chris

Barron: Mm-hmm.

Mike

Finley: And I could not have done that if I did not reach that point of enough. And so you're redirecting your energy. But what you're really doing is changing the direction of your life. And I can tell you, it was one of the best decisions I've ever made. This idea of unconditional giving, trying to help people with the talents you have so they too will one day be able to give unconditionally. And collectively, I think that's how we improve our society. That's how we move the ball forward as a community. Mm-hmm.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, you get, you get in life what you give for sure. So, um, Mike, you've— this has been a great conversation. Um, I think that, um, if people want to get a hold of you or look you up, um, go through that, but also list the 3 books you have, or the 4 books you've written, because I like to give them away with clients that we work with. You know, the Financial Happiness, if they've never dealt with you or looked at that. The other one is Now What, which is for those kids that are graduating from high school or college, and have you just kind of talk about those, those 4 books real quick as we wrap up. Yep.

Mike

Finley: So one, you can reach out to me at thegivingsolution.org or thecrazymaninthepinkwig.com. Either place you can reach out to me. Uh, the 4 books I have written, uh, Financial Happiness, big book on money and life, How to Make It Better. What Color's the Sky is the book on investing, how to become that wise and efficient investor. Graduation, a book on, well, what people think of as retirement, but I think of it as graduating to a bigger, better place in your life. And then Now What is a book I wrote to that, to your point, high school, college graduate, and out into the world, a book that I wish I would've received. In other words, let's prepare them. Because the world can be pretty harsh. It can be pretty challenging if you don't know much about money. So I wrote those books as a way to help people build a better relationship with money. And I, I write them in simple terms.

Anybody can understand them. That's not brain surgery. There's a glossary in the back of every book to help you better understand the language of money, because there is a language to money. And they can be purchased on Amazon, you know, Barnes Noble, that's fine. At the end of the day, it's a matter of how much do you want to learn and how much do you want to understand so you can teach your family. But I can tell you personally, that first book that I read when I was 25 years old, it basically changed my life once I started to apply the principles. It was worth well over half a million dollars and I paid $20 for it.

Chris

Barron: Yeah, exactly. And that's, you know, I— as we wrap up here, um, first of all, thank you very much. I really appreciate it. Um, appreciate your friendship and really appreciate everything you've done for our family. And that's why I want to make sure we get this out to people, because I think, I think everything you have here can really change people's lives. And that's really a cool thing. The last thing I want to say though too is Did you ever do anything with Damien Mason?

Mike

Finley: With who now?

Chris

Barron: Damien Mason. Do you recognize that name? A bunch of people on this podcast are going to remember or know it. He wrote a book called Do Business Better, and one of his, one of his chapters is No Money or You'll Have No Money. And I think of that a lot of times too, because that chapter correlates to a lot of your stuff. That he talks about in there too. So that's another book I recommend that people look at if they haven't also looked at, but there's just the one chapter on that, on the money part. But I sincerely, um, you know, care about everybody that listens to our podcast and I want to definitely make sure that— and then that's the whole reason why I wanted to do this Financial Happiness podcast again and get this out here for people, because I think it can change lives and Um, we really care about all of you guys.

And I guess with that said, unless you got anything else, I think we'll wrap it up.

Mike

Finley: No, but I, I do remember him now. We did a podcast, so you could check that out. We had an interesting conversation as well. So ultimately, it's, it's up to the individual. Uh, I teach people how to not only manage their money but to improve their life.

Chris

Barron: Yeah.

Mike

Finley: And you can do that. Uh, you can do that. And sometimes we just need to be told that to, to initiate this process.

Chris

Barron: I'll get a hold of Damian and make sure you do another one with him too, because, you know, not everybody catches every single podcast. And so there's— I think it's worth, you know, doing the revisited segments. So with that said, um, hey everybody, really appreciate you, you listening. And hopefully this was something you could catch during busy time or when you're out on the road running around. Pass this stuff on to other people if you would too. This really helps us out. Please subscribe on, on the apps and stuff, those kind of things. I never asked for that and I always forget, and it does help us if you would subscribe and like some of this stuff. We don't try to push this stuff out to a massive audience, but it does help when we can grow that part of it. So with that said, thanks everybody. Thanks, Mike. And we will catch you all again next time on the Ag View Pitch.

Mare mare mare mare.