Podcast
206: How to Start Thinking like an Entrepreneur
This week, you’re getting a preview of my talk on entrepreneurship at the 2024 Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians!
Whether you want to start your own business or you’re happy staying an employee, everyone needs to learn the skills of thinking like and being an entrepreneur. The good news is that our training as physicians makes us natural entrepreneurs, and in this episode, I’m walking you through the basics of an entrepreneurial mindset.
Join me on this episode to learn why everyone needs to know how to think like an entrepreneur, even if you have no desire to start your own company. I'm showing you the differences between the mindset of an entrepreneur versus an employee, what gets in the way of physicians thinking like entrepreneurs, and the importance of finding community in entrepreneurship.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- Why everyone needs to learn the skills of thinking like and being an entrepreneur.
- The differences between an entrepreneur and an employee mindset.
- How our training as physicians makes us natural entrepreneurs.
- The challenges physicians face in thinking like and being entrepreneurs.
- How money drama affected my business.
- Why finding a community in entrepreneurship matters.
- The importance of investing in your mindset.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- FinCon
- Peter Kim
- Sunny Smith
- Physician on Fire
- The Ultimate Blueprint for an Insanely Successful Business by Keith Cunningham
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey, everyone, welcome back. So what I want to do today is actually give you a little preview into one of the talks I did, that I personally did at the 2024 Live Wealthy Conference, the Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians. So you’re going to get to hear the talk I did on entrepreneurship.
Now, before you think, oh, that is not for me, so you’ll just hit pause, I recommend, in fact, I did this talk for anyone. Because one of the things that’s so important and important to know right now is that no matter what you’re doing, whether you’re an employee or not, you need to learn and need to really take on thinking and being an entrepreneur. And it’ll be clear what I mean exactly.
So the sound quality might be a little off mainly because it wasn’t meant to be recorded for a podcast and we actually weren’t sure if we could even record the talk to give to conference attendees. But my video guy, Matt Care was resourceful and we were able to capture the whole conference.
And so if you are an attendee, we will be emailing out your access to the conference course that we have created. We’re just putting the final touches on it. It took a little longer than we wanted, but better late than never.
And for those of you who didn’t have a chance to attend and would love to watch the talks, we are going to give you an opportunity to do so for only $297. You get all the talks from the conference and it comes with CME. I think it comes with 12 or 13 credits and it’s category one credits. And so a great way to use that CME money and to get some CME learning on. So we will let you know when that’s available to purchase.
Okay, here’s my talk on entrepreneurship.
I want you to raise your hand if you have no desire to ever have a company or a side gig, like no desire. Only one or two. Okay, I thought there would be a lot more. Okay. Because I was worried, I was like, oh, people who aren’t interested in entrepreneurship might think this talk is not for them. But it is for everyone and I’m going to explain why.
So entrepreneurship, if you look up the definition, it’s something like starting a company for one idea. And that is true, but I also think of entrepreneurship as a way of thinking. And so if you love being an employee because you don’t want to start your own business, fantastic. But you still have to think like an entrepreneur and we call that intrapreneurship.
And so I mentioned in my opening talk about how times are different now. We’re living so much longer, this whole three stage paradigm of study, work, retire, it just doesn’t apply to you. Like what if we’re meant for multiple careers? Like that three stage life made sense when you died at 40 or 50, right? But it’s like when you’re a hundred, it’s like it may not apply and a lot of us do feel stagnant, right? Because medicine can become a little boring after a while, right?
Not only that, but because of, like I said, technology and everything’s changing so rapidly, you really have to think like an entrepreneur, no matter what. You have to develop certain skill sets because you cannot rely – Because the whole three stage career is predicated on like one skill set, one career, you do this for 30, 40 years and then you retire. But we know that’s not true anymore. And if you stay stuck in that model, this is why we’re being replaced by physicians.
And I’m not blaming the doctors, but I think a lot of us are trying to hold onto the good old, well, this used to work, so it still should work. And if you think about the pandemic, the businesses who did not pivot, they died because they were trying to hold onto, this is the only way we know how to make money and it didn’t work. And so they closed their doors.
But the ones who innovated and pivoted, they’re the ones who not only survived, but thrived. So that’s what I mean by, you have to think like an entrepreneur, you have to be creative. You have to be willing to pivot. You need to be able to, you know, you see your problem and you solve it, right?
That’s what entrepreneurs do. We see a problem and we provide a solution for it. And so let me give you an example, I’m one of the examples and then an example where someone pivoted.
So I’ve always been an employee when it comes to being a dermatologist. And so after academics, I went to private practice, it was actually in Philadelphia. And I was an employee and it was a new practice location, but they said don’t worry. Also dermatologists, there’s a long waiting list, a long wait to see us. They were like, don’t worry, you’re going to get busy really fast. And everyone else who I talked to in the other branches said, oh, don’t worry.
But it was very slow. And this is all before I had coaching and I was like, what the heck? I wanted to say WTF, but I won’t say that. I was like, they told me I was going to get patients. And it was so slow because they were paying me a salary draw that they actually started holding that salary draw because they were losing money. And I was just bringing in what I was making, what I was seeing, which wasn’t enough, right?
And so I got really upset. I got really mad. I blamed them. And I was like, you guys need to market me more. And again, there’s nothing wrong with this. As an employee, I think there’s an expectation. But looking back at that experience now, I was not thinking like an entrepreneur, because looking back, I mean, I’m not upset that I’m no longer at that job anymore, obviously, because I get to hang out at Miraval with you ladies instead.
I could have taken the initiative to market myself because if you’re just like, I need to have more patients, like having that like whatever it takes to make it happen, I could have gone door to door and visited all – And I did some of those, right? But I was annoyed. I’m like, why aren’t they setting it up? Why do I have to make the calls?
So that’s an example of just like what I call the employee mindset where you’re just like, everything kind of should be handed to you. Now versus an example where, like I said, during Covid a lot of physician offices were affected too. If you were a practice owner it was a scary time, right? Because patients weren’t coming in. And so there are offices that closed, like they literally went bankrupt because most offices don’t have an emergency fund.
Actually, I was speaking at this pediatrician conference for practice owners and I heard that most of the practices don’t even have a month in reserve, like a month emergency fund for the business, right? First of all, if you didn’t have that, then you really were effed, right? But even if you had that, the pandemic was more than a month, obviously. And so if you didn’t innovate, if you didn’t figure out how we’re going to make this practice survive, then you were done.
And so I always give the example of Alana’s office. So Alana has always been entrepreneurial at heart. And so I remember you telling me that when that happened and you were just like, we’re – What did you do? You bought Covid tests? Covid machines, yeah, and started offering that because I think the government was reimbursing anyone when offering that because initially it was really hard to find a place to do Covid testing, right?
So it’s kind of like, okay, how do we figure out how to keep our practice afloat? What can we provide that would be valuable for our patients? And so that’s just an example of she’s a practice owner, but let’s just say she was an employee. She could have been like, hey, we should buy Covid machines. The reimbursement is really high, let’s figure out how to get the word out that we’re doing this. Like that’s sort of feeding your intrapreneur.
And I would say, again, if you just like being an employee because you don’t want to actually start a business that’s totally fine, but you need to think like an entrepreneur. You need to think about how you can give value to your practice because let’s say Alana was an employee, but she was the one who came up with the idea. Owners don’t fire physicians like that.
Do you see what I’m saying? See the difference? And so you make yourself as valuable as possible. Here’s the thing. They could fire you, because that’s happening a lot, but you have skills that are portable. Like they can’t take that skill set away from you. And that’s the type of skill set you need to cultivate over your life because medicine is changing. It’s like what’s happening now, unfortunately it’s getting worse. And so I think it’s more important now than – Well, it’s true for now.
It’s important. It’s just like you have to develop these skill sets. And so that requires exercising that creativity, innovation muscle. So many of you tell me that you’re not creative. That is not true, you just have not exercised it in a very long time. Kids are naturally creative. That’s just who they are.
They’re always asking why, why. Like Jack’s always like, and then what happens? And then what happens? I’m like, nothing. And then I’m like, and then I think one time the answer was, and then you die. He’s like, and then what happens?
But kids, like they don’t have to – Most of us have not exercised that muscle of thinking. And it’s really hard when you’re working 60 hours a week, if you have a family and dealing with all that. You are all naturally creative, you just have to use that muscle.
Okay, so the good news is our training makes us natural entrepreneurs. Again, this applies to whether you want to have a side gig or not. So we have the desire to help people and make a difference. And that’s what entrepreneurs do. We are really good at solving problems, really complex problems. So we know how to learn new things, like look at it, like look at it like chess pieces. Like we had to finish organic chemistry, those 3D models, you had to figure out how to use all those.
We know how to make decisions, important decisions. We have to every day, especially if you’re in outpatient, like I was seeing like 30 patients. Like I had to make like 30 times three decisions for every patient. We are experts at learning new things. We are so good at learning. And a lot of times when I talk to someone who wants to start a coaching business they’re like, but I don’t know anything about business. I’m like, of course you don’t because you haven’t studied it, but it’s a learnable skill. And guess what? You’re really good at learning.
And everyone has said this, real estate, business, these are nowhere near as hard to learn as what you had to learn in medical school. We keep saying that, but it’s true. And if you want to start a business, you have to learn business skills. You need to learn how to market, you need to learn how to sell, you need to know how to run the business. You need to learn about business finances, which are different than personal finances.
And so there’s all these skills you have to learn, but you can learn them and it won’t take four years and a residency to learn them. You can learn them easily in less than a year. And we’re really good at sticking it out even when things get hard. It’s true, right? And because entrepreneurship, anyone who says it’s easy is just lying. It’s immensely fulfilling because every day is not the same.
All right, so let’s talk about a case study. Oh, that’s me. So some of you may have known me since I first started. So I did not wake up thinking, “I need a side gig. I need to start a company.” I mean, let’s just face it, I’m a dermatologist. I was working four days a week. I was making good money. Like I was home by 4 or 4.30, like life was pretty good. Who said yes? Nice.
You know something’s wrong with medicine when dermatologists are burned out, right? Yeah, they are burned out. So that’s a bad sign when the derms are burned out.
Okay, so I was in, you know, there’s so many Facebook groups for female physicians. I’m sure many of you are in at least two of them, maybe 20, maybe 50. It was my first year out of residency and I started learning about money for myself because basically I was like, oh, I don’t know anything about money.
I had accumulated like $20,000 worth of credit card debt. I had really nice clothes though to show for it. Not that I needed a good excuse, but I had colleagues who had started families in residency, so it kind of made sense for them to have credit card debt. But me, it was just buying stuff.
I was learning about money and then I was sharing that knowledge. So my friend was like, oh, you’re learning about money? There’s this Facebook group for women physicians to learn about money. And so she added me to that group. And then I just started answering everyone’s questions.
And one of the reasons why is because I was starting at this new job. It was academics and I was on faculty and it was a brand new practice. The good news is my salary was guaranteed. And I did get busy pretty quickly, but the first month or two I wasn’t doing much. So you know what that meant? I had a lot of time to be on Facebook. And then that was around the time Facebook groups were becoming popular. I’m just, this is totally true.
And so I would just be on my phone and answer people’s questions. And for me, it was fun. And then people started tagging me like, “Bonnie, what’s your opinion?” Blah, blah, blah. And then a friend of mine, a derm friend, was like, “You should start a blog.” And I was like, why? I was like, well, the White Coat Investor already exists. She’s like, yeah, but he’s a man.
And so then I was like, okay, I’ll start a blog. And I wrote the blog. And then I started getting asked to teach. But I saw that there was this gap in knowledge, you know? Because just because your income quadruples doesn’t immediately implant the money knowledge chip. Did you guys notice that? It didn’t happen.
But I really enjoyed learning about money and talking about money. Again, we have this extraordinary capacity to learn new skills. There’s a lot of fear around learning money, but it’s not because it’s actually hard. It’s just that we have a lot of money drama, right? And perseverance in the face of challenges.
So this was kind of like a hobby that became a job. And it was kind of fun. It was making what I call cute money, like a thousand dollars a year. And I was like, hey, it’s paying for my web hosting, this is good. And then I started going to something called FinCon, which is a conference for anyone in financial media, so bloggers and podcasters.
And I had mentioned I had met Peter at the White Coat Investor and a group of us financial bloggers, we would all meet there. I’m like, this is really fun. This was back in what, 2017. Like I just had a baby, I’m a dermatologist, I don’t need a side gig. And I was working with my first coach, Sunny Smith, who I’ll introduce more on Wednesday morning.
But between Sunny and Peter – Actually, I went to this FinCon, I remember talking to Peter and do you guys know Physician on Fire? So I remember talking to Leif and I was like, I don’t know. I was so confused. And he kind of was like, oh. And then Peter, this is what he said to me, I say this all the time, but he goes like, well, it doesn’t matter, but go big or go home. That’s what he said.
And I was like, I don’t know what to do. I’m so confused. And then I was working with Sunny and then one day I just made a decision. So this is the ability to make – And people always ask me why. I’m like, I don’t remember, but I just decided that I’m going to go all in on making this a business. Because you have to make that decision to do something versus being like, well, I don’t really know. Maybe I’ll try it, maybe I won’t.
And so that was that first decision. And the rest is kind of history, I guess.
Okay, so we make great entrepreneurs naturally, but there are a few things that can stand in the way. We are perfectionists. If you haven’t noticed, we are control freaks. If you give us a script, like go to medical school, take this test, study for it. Okay, apply for residency. Okay, I know how to do that. You’re kind of being told what to do.
Entrepreneurship is the exact opposite. There is no script. There is no this is what’s going to make you successful. If there was, everyone here would be a very successful entrepreneur. So not having that certainty and control is very jarring. And again, we’re perfectionists. So we’ll be like, well, I need to make sure this is all. Or I need to make sure I know everything about business before I start a business, which is also not true.
Actually, I’m looking at you, Heidi, because I remember talking to her because she started a business, and she’ll be on the panel. And what were you saying? She’s like, well – I was like, okay, when are you going to get your first? And she was like maybe when I finish my website, and you said like three months or something.
I was like, first of all, it does not take three months to finish a website. And I was like, you don’t need a website to sign your first client. And I forget what time of the month it was, I was like, you need to sign one by the end of the month. So that’s just an example of perfectionism.
Also, I still have it. Do you know what I still do on these presentations? I will move that bullet point over by two pixels. So I’m like, the spacing’s off, I need to – I did this last night a little bit. So that perfectionism still doesn’t go away, but I’m very particular with aesthetics and stuff.
So I was playing. Here, let me just show you. This line here, I was like, it doesn’t go all the way here. Maybe the line needs to go all the way there. So that’s just an example of my perfectionism. So I was told that maybe I should have my assistant make my slides so I don’t do this in the future.
We’re so used to being experts, so being a beginner in something, we don’t like it. Again, it’s very jarring. And so you really have to allow yourself to be a beginner. Again, you don’t know business skills. You don’t know how to market. So you need to have that beginner’s mindset, and it can be hard when you’re so used to you being the expert.
Also, all of us have money drama. And the money drama carries to your business because a business, there’s a lot of money involved, right? A business, by definition, makes money. Otherwise, it’s a hobby or a nonprofit. And so you have to continuously clean up your money drama, again, because it’s going to, like, whatever money drama you have with your personal finances, it’s going to follow you to business, and it’s actually going to get amplified as your business grows. So if you don’t clean it up, it’s going to become a much bigger problem when you’re making a lot more money.
The good news is because we do make such a great income as a physician, I don’t ever recommend that someone quits their physician job to become an entrepreneur. The great thing is you can still bring in your clinical income while you are building your business if you want a business. And so that mitigates some risks. But at some point, if you decide to go all in, entrepreneurship is just, there’s risk involved because what worked today won’t work tomorrow.
Again, this is all about thinking like an entrepreneur. I’m trying to think, just even selling my course over the years. Like, I don’t have the same thing every time. And a lot of it’s like you have to experiment, and some things work and some things don’t.
One of my coach mentors told me she was at a conference for multi-million entrepreneurs, but she was way ahead of them. And she was in a group like this. And then she’s like, okay, I’m going to tell you the secret to my success. And everyone’s like, my God, the secret. And she goes, I try something, and if it works I do more of it. If it doesn’t work, I don’t do it again. And that was literally the secret.
But that’s just how it is. That’s true, right? And if you’re going to start – Real estate is a business. It does require entrepreneurial thinking, right? And so the same thing is like something didn’t work. It’s like, why didn’t it work? You want to learn from it. But if something is working, keep doing it, right? Like, why would you change the plan?
I actually did that a lot in my business where I kept changing the plan over and over again, and it made my life a lot harder. And so it was only last year where I was like, oh, maybe I should just keep doing what’s working.
And then allowing myself to be a beginner, I actually really enjoyed learning about business, and I still do. And so, yeah, the first year of business, I took like a gazillion courses. How to run an online business, how to market, how to sell, how to run a business.
And just like we have CME for being a physician, there’s the CME equivalent in business. You have to keep learning, especially online businesses. Things are always changing and so right now, actually, I’m learning a lot about business finances, which I really like learning this stuff. So a business finance book has been blowing my mind.
Actually, a lady told me about it. She told me to read it, and I told someone else to read it, and now, like, everyone’s reading it. But so if you run a business, any type of business –
Audience: What book?
Bonnie: How To Run An Insanely Successful Business by Keith Cunningham. And you know what I like about this book? It’s direct. It’s only this thick, because a lot of books are like this thick, but it really could be this thick. Yeah, he does, there’s no fluff. It just tells you everything. It’s just right to the point, which is my type of person.
I definitely had money drama. It’s funny, as a money coach I still have money drama. I just have a lot more tools because our brains are always, as my friend Kelly says, brains are going to brain. So there’s just always going to be money drama that comes up, I’m just a lot more aware of it now.
But I had a lot of money drama that I took a long time to clean up in my business. And by not cleaning it up in a timely manner, it definitely – My business income did go down significantly during a period of time because of that.
Okay, so for those of you who might be interested, whether it’s starting a business or, again, like, how do I start thinking like an entrepreneur? Well, first of all, you’re here, so that’s a large part of it because your mind is going to be exposed to different things. Being here means you’re curious about something, right? There was something that you were interested in, even if it was just staying at Miraval, right?
And so investing in your mind, all the speakers have talked about how important it is to invest in your mindset. And so this could be podcasts. It could be reading a book. It could be working with a coach. It could be group coaching. There’s so many, there’s different price points.
And unfortunately, it’s like going to the gym. You know how you go to the gym if you want to get fit, did you know that once you get there you still have to work out? Right? You can’t just stop. You’re like, I’m done. You’ve got to keep going to the gym. The same thing with your mind. It’s like mental fitness. You don’t just arrive and all of a sudden it’s going to be great. It’s the same sort of thing.
You could ask any of us, like, what’s a business book you’re reading? I just told you a book about business finances that I’m really enjoying right now. Learn how to run a business. A lot of people talk about how they hate having employees, but it’s only because you probably don’t really know how to hire and manage and fire, which is a skill that you can learn. So I’ve gotten a lot better at that.
And then, again, learn from someone way ahead of you. Again, if you talk to all of us, the speakers here or anyone who started a business, we’ve all done it differently. But learn from us because I think Sunny is the one who told me success leaves clues. So there’s many different ways to get there, they clearly all work. You do the one that resonates with you.
And then find your community. Again, we keep saying this, but I would not have been able to stick it through without my community of friends who are entrepreneurs or just have a growth mindset because entrepreneurship – Actually, that graph that Peter showed was like, woo-hoo, you know, kill me right now. That’s how entrepreneurship is.
There’s exhilarating highs and there can be brutal lows. And if you don’t have a compelling and strong enough, like, why am I doing this, and if you don’t have a support team to help you during those times, you will just quit. It’s so easy to quit, right? So I think that’s it.
Does anyone have a question while we’re setting up the panel?
Audience: Can you talk about a couple specifics on money drama and how it affected your business?
Bonnie: Because I guess usually I’m not talking about that in the course, right? So money scarcity is common. And I was having a lot of money scarcity. You know what it was? I felt a lot of pressure to make money because I wasn’t bringing in money as a dermatologist. I didn’t quit intentionally, it was kind of pandemic related. I switched to locums and that last locum's job ended, like, February 22, 2020.
Anyway, so that’s that story. But, yeah, there was one year where I just got really grippy and attached to making money. And you cannot make money from that space. So that was the year that my income went down maybe by 150K or something and I actually went into some business debt. And then I had drama about the business debt, like, that businesses should not go into debt.
What I’ve learned since then is that every business needs capital. That’s why you can take out a loan. We’ve taken out loans, most of us took out loans for medical school. Like, how amazing is it that we can get capital from other places? So I had to actually put in my own money. And so the story I say about that is I am my own angel investor, which means I get to keep 100% of the profits.
So I changed that story from, oh my God, I can’t believe it. Oh my God, I’m so embarrassed I have to put in my own, you know, to fund the business. But now that I’ve changed that story and also just learning more about it. I’m like, oh, this is normal.
Also, did you know this is the first year that Uber made profit? Did you guys know that? Yeah, this year. Otherwise, they were losing something like a billion dollars a year or something like that.
Audience: I’m, what, two years now out of residency. And I think what I’m finding myself sitting here thinking about and grappling with is this idea of, like, a lot of my identity now is I’m a doctor. And I worked really hard for that. And if you could talk a little bit about how your mindset changed to kind of envision to open yourself up to these new possibilities, I think that would be helpful.
Bonnie: Yeah, so that’s such a great question because when I talk to a lot of physicians who are either, some of them are leaving medicine and don’t really have a plan. But they’re just like, I have to leave because otherwise I’m going to totally burn out. And then other people who are just making that transition, being a physician to an entrepreneur. And, yeah, a lot of us do have that physician identity.
Because people will say to me sometimes like, oh, that was such a waste. And I do not think of it as a waste. Like that skill set of everything I just talked about before has definitely helped shape my success and I could not be doing this without being a physician first, right?
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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205: How Physicians Can Start Their Real Estate Journey with Peter Kim M.D.
My guest this week is Dr. Peter Kim, a practicing anesthesiologist with a wealth of knowledge when it comes to real estate investing. He started sharing about his journey to financial freedom on his blog, Passive Income MD, with the hopes of helping other physicians do the same through his online course and physician-only community.
Like many of you physicians, Dr. Peter Kim decided he wanted other ways to generate income outside of his job as a doctor. He landed on real estate investing as the best way to supplement his clinical income, and he’s dedicated himself to helping others make the same move he did. I’ve learned tons about real estate investing from Peter, and he’s here to share his wisdom with all of you.
Tune in this week to discover the different options for physicians who want to invest in real estate. Peter shares why he chooses to focus mostly on passive real estate investing, why real estate is the key to financial freedom for physicians like us, and most importantly, how you can get started on your real estate investment journey.
Join us for a live workshop hosted by Peter Kim on Thursday, April 11th, 2024 at 12 pm ET. Learn about passive real estate and why it might be a valuable addition to your portfolio. Click here to sign up to secure your spot and receive the Zoom link.
This weekend, April 6th and 7th, is your chance to get $200 off Peter's signature program, Passive Real Estate Academy. Don't miss out on this opportunity to gain confidence in evaluating deals and mastering passive real estate in just four weeks. Register now and take control of your financial future!
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- How real estate investments help you take control of your money as a physician.
- Why Peter chooses to prioritize investing in real estate rather than other options like stocks.
- The powerful sense of community in the physician real estate investing space.
- How there is a massive need for education on real estate in the physician space.
- Why Peter prefers to focus more on passive real estate investing rather than active.
- How to make real estate investment your key to financial and time freedom.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- Peter Kim: Website | YouTube | Instagram | Facebook | Podcast
- Passive Real Estate Academy
- Leverage and Growth Summit
- Financial Freedom Through Real Estate
- White Coat Investor
- Die with Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life by Bill Perkins
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey, everyone, welcome to another episode. Now, today I have my good friend Peter Kim, otherwise known as Passive Income MD. And we were just together at the Miraval conference, the first Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians.
Now, when you think of Peter you either think of real estate, most likely, but you also might think of entrepreneurship because now he helps physicians do both. But today’s conversation is going to focus on real estate. Now, pretty much all of the clients I work with, they end up investing in real estate and there is a reason. So that’s what my conversation with Peter is about.
And I also want to invite you to a live workshop that Peter Kim and I are doing, or rather Peter is doing and I’m hosting it. And it’s taking place on Thursday April 11th at 12pm Eastern. Again, that’s Thursday April 11th at 12 pm Eastern.
When this episode comes out, it’s basically the following Thursday. And so you definitely want to sign up and learn all about passive real estate and why you might want to consider it as part of your portfolio. And so the way to sign up and get the Zoom link to join us is wealthymommd.com/passive, P-A-S-S-I-V-E.
Now, that’s next Thursday but what I want to make sure you know is that this weekend, April 6th and 7th, is the only way to get $200 off his signature program, Passive Real Estate Academy. And one of the reasons why I love this program is that you will basically go from zero knowledge about passive real estate to being confident in evaluating deals in only four weeks.
And so if you’ve been thinking about investing in passive real estate but also scared, mainly because you probably don’t have the knowledge, this is one of the fastest ways to do that and be guided and to learn from experts who have been doing this for a long time. And so again, you’ll just need to go to wealthymommd.com/passive and you’ll be able to join the wait list and get the information for our live workshop with Peter all at the same time.
All right, here’s my conversation with Peter Kim.
Peter: My name is Peter Kim, an OB anesthesiologist. I’m now here in Orange County, California, married with two kids. I’m married to another physician. I guess my story started, again, I don’t want to tell the whole story right now unless you want me to later. But again, I found myself in a situation at work where I felt like I didn’t have much control of my schedule, my time.
And so I started looking for other ways to create income. That led me to real estate investing, and led me to some other business opportunities. Next thing you know, I started sharing about it online wherever I could. And that became this, I guess, online brand called Passive Income MD where I blog, I podcast, I have courses, I have conferences. And essentially we just create communities around physicians who want to learn how to create other streams of income, talk about finances, talk about life, talk about entrepreneurship, real estate, all of those things.
Again, it’s been a fun ride and I’ve been able to meet cool people like you.
Bonnie: I remember you told me that how you kind of figured out real estate was you started talking to other doctors who seemed happy. Something like that, right?
Peter: Yeah, I think the story is that when you’re in a bad situation, again, without going into too much detail, it was my chief at that time changed the schedule on me, changed my allocation of shifts, changed it from some daytime that I was supposed to do to some nighttime and more weekends, and less shifts. And so all of a sudden I saw my income potentially cut. I also saw the way I was working, I was going to be working way more nights and weekends than I thought as a partner, it wasn’t a great feeling.
And when you’re in a feeling like that or in a situation where you’re unhappy, sometimes you feel like you’re the only person out there and you feel kind of stuck. I don’t know if anybody else listening to this feels or has felt that way. But what kind of worked out for me, luckily, is that I happened to find somebody like in the doctors lounge and they were telling me about maybe some of the investing they were doing and about vacations they were going on.
And then I realized, wait a minute, there are other people who must have figured this out. They must have figured out some other way to be happy as a doctor and continue to practice how they want to practice. So then I went on this tear where I started asking everyone. I started hanging out in the doctor’s office drinking my coffee and saying, “Hey, yeah, I noticed on Facebook, I saw you guys go on vacation. How often do you take vacations?” And just sort of asking people.
Essentially I became like a reporter where I started interviewing people, in a good way, just to find out more about their lives, find out what they were doing. And it turned out that I found all these doctors who actually were living really good lives as physicians. I never knew about it because you never really talk to them about these things at work, you just kind of live your lives.
And then I asked them like, specifically, what are you doing to really create that life that you want? And it turned out that the vast majority of them were investing in real estate. And so I was like, okay, I’ve got to find out more about this.
And so really, I just started really diving into it as deep as I could. And essentially I figured out that it’s possible for doctors to have their day job, but funnel and shift a lot of their income over to real estate and create this really, really nice other stream of income that really creates a lot of financial freedom for them. And that’s what I started doing.
Bonnie: Yeah, I remember when you first started your blog you were anonymous.
Peter: Yeah. Well, the story behind that is that I had a friend, and his name is CJ Longavin, and I actually interviewed him recently for the Leverage of Growth Summit. He himself has started this business where he started the spirit and alcohol business, which is really cool. But at the time, he was really into this whole finance, you know, doctor and finances thing.
And he and I were talking about it, we started talking about real estate. And then he was like, “I wish more doctors were talking about this online.” He told me about the White Coat Investor. And he said, “There really aren’t a lot of resources around real estate and physicians online, and you should do it because you are learning about it right now. I’m sure people would want to know about it.”
The problem was that I was worried that if I talked about creating more time for myself, creating more freedom, that maybe people in my group would look at me poorly. And I was a young partner at that time and I wanted to talk about things like doctors living paycheck to paycheck, and I couldn’t do that freely, so I decided to do it anonymously.
And it’s so funny how it just took off from there. Even me not even putting my real name, just putting some vague details about myself.
Bonnie: Yeah, how long did it take you to come out?
Peter: I’d say about a year. So I wrote, it was actually really fun writing anonymously because you feel like you can really be open and honest and not worry about it. But then there started to be a point where people started just emailing me trying to find out more about me, asking me where I was, asking to meet with me, asking my opinion on certain matters. And I was like, “Oh my gosh, this is kind of getting bigger than actually I thought it would be.”
And I mean, again, there was a moment where somebody was like, “I’m going to be in your area,” because the only thing I mentioned was that I was in Southern California. They’re like, “I’m in your area, can I please meet with you? I really have a question that I need to ask you and meet up with you in person.” I was like, oh my gosh, this person doesn’t even know who I am. It’s anonymous. This is kind of crazy. Somebody else was like, “I’m about to make this investment. I really need to have you validate whether this is a good decision or not.”
And I was like, okay. At some point I realized if I’m going to really make the impact that I want to make, which I love meeting with people, I love connecting with people face to face. And that’s really why I love the communities that I build. The only way to do that is to be out there.
And I remember talking to people in my practice, some people that kind of knew what I was doing. And I was asking them, what do you think would happen if I came out public? Do you think people would care? What do you think people would think? And most people said, I don’t think people will care very much or not a lot will happen to you. But I was worried about the consequences, worried about the worst case scenario.
And so after a lot of thought behind it, I decided to go public on it. And I went public and nothing happened. Nobody even said anything to me. I remember when I published it, I was all nervous. I’m like people are going to just start calling me into their office and this kind of stuff. But nothing happened. Nobody cared. In fact, if anything, it really allowed me to open myself up and meet more people and connect with more people.
And honestly, they felt that now that I was actually putting myself out there, that I was actually a real person. And people felt more comfortable talking to me.
Bonnie: I love what you said, no one cared. Because every time I’m worried about public opinion, one of my coach friends, I can always count on her to say, “Bonnie, no one cares.”
Peter: Yeah, no one cared. I mean, it did come up later. I will tell you, it did come up later. Later on, finally when – I think it was only just a few years ago, when I was considering my job and my position. And I talked to our new heads of the department because there had been some transition.
And they knew that I was working less and less and less. And one of them actually said, “I know you’ve got this other stuff online. I’ve looked it up. I’ve seen it.” And I was like, “Whoa, somebody actually saw it.” And that was the only time I remember it came up. It just made for some interesting conversations. But at the end of the day the situation I was in, I made sure, obviously, legally, that everything was okay. I made sure that it was kosher in that sense.
And again, I made sure not to bad mouth anybody. I wanted to make sure that stuff on there that people would read, that I know it’s public, that it would not come back to hurt me in a way. And so I just made sure everything that was on there was good and, honestly, nobody has cared since.
Bonnie: Yeah. Well, there’s a few things you said that I really want to highlight because basically, and actually we have similar beginnings in terms of how it happened because I had no, kind of like you, I went down a rabbit hole. It wasn’t real estate specific, it was just learning about basic personal finances.
And then someone was like, “People need to know about this.” And White Coat Investor was already around, but they’re like, “But there’s no woman in this space.” And so she was like, “You should start a blog.” And I was like, okay, I’ll start a blog. And it kind of went from there and then we met at the first White Coat Investor conference.
But I think what it comes down to is seeing a need and basically, you know, there’s a problem. And we both kind of saw that we could help people solve that problem through education and stuff like that. And then ultimately helping people because I think all doctors kind of have that desire to help people, right? That’s kind of, hopefully, why we went into medicine, right?
Just to show people, I actually just had a call with some of my clients and also women who were interested in joining my program. And one thing I said is, a lot of the financial advice out there focuses on cutting expenses, right? Like looking at expenses and seeing what you can cut down, which is fine. But most people never consider you could also figure out how to make more money, right? That’s not talked about.
And I was like, when you combine those two it’s very powerful and very synergistic. And then you can really make a lot of financial progress. And in terms of how to make more money, real estate is sort of a natural way, and then starting a business. And very few people think they’re ever going to start a business, but then they start seeing a problem that hasn’t been solved, or maybe it has been solved out there, but the beauty is there’s so many people to help, right?
You don’t need the whole world population to help people. Like we help mostly physicians, right? Because physicians, I think, feel comfortable having another physician helping them versus some rando. And vice versa. And so I think this just goes to show, neither of us woke up one day like, “Let’s start a business to make money.” It just kind of happened a bit more organically.
And obviously, people do intentionally start businesses too. But I think basically a lot of these businesses that I’ve seen physicians create is like they see a need, they want to help people. And basically, they realize that they can actually help people and make money while doing it.
Peter: Right. And I think one of the things that I realized through all of this, and if I really look back, I mean, the thing that really changed my trajectory and gave me hope was just finding other people who were doing these things.
At this point I thought I was the only one and I was stuck in this situation. I thought there was no way out. And I don’t know if, again, a lot of people feel like that, but sometimes you just meet the right people, you find that community of people who are doing stuff, whether it’s investing in real estate, starting businesses, making more money, like you said, doing these kinds of things. And then it just opens up your mind to different possibilities.
And that’s what’s exciting, I think, about a lot of the stuff that we’ve been able to create online and you’ve been able to do with your communities. All we’re doing is highlighting, a lot of times, other people. Ourselves and what we’ve been able to do, but also other people who are doing some really cool things. And it just gives people a chance to think outside themselves, think what’s possible.
That’s what’s really been a big part of my journey. And that’s what’s so fun about doing what we do, because we get to just talk about things and people are like, “Oh my gosh, I didn’t even know that was even possible.” And then once you kind of open up those possibilities, and people, you know, they have ideas, they have desires, they have wants, they’ve had things that they’ve been dreaming about and that they’ve may be pushed down because they just thought it was impossible. Or it’s not for me, or I can’t do it.
And then they see these other people doing it, and all of a sudden they realize, yeah, maybe I can. They get to ultimately take those steps, help them get to where they want to be. And it’s really cool to see.
Bonnie: And also, a lot of doctors have that like just suck it up mentality. And like, well, I’m a doctor, I make good money. I shouldn’t complain, I’ll just suck it up, just work more. Because every year reimbursements go down and so they literally have to work more if they want to, you know, anyway, that’s a whole nother story.
Peter: It’s the big hamster wheel. The treadmill goes faster and faster and faster, and to stay in the same place you have to run faster or else you fall off.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Peter: So I get it.
Bonnie: Yeah. So let’s talk a bit about real estate, because for a lot of my clients, that’s kind of the next logical thing to invest in after they kind of figure out their retirement accounts which is, obviously, mutual funds and stocks. So that’s kind of the next decision point for many of my clients.
And so what I teach in my program is like, hey, this is real estate, this is why you should consider it. These are the different ways, because there’s a whole range from passive to active and all the things kind of in between. And I just learned about mineral rights investing from you, for example. I was like, “What? There’s this?” And all this and that.
And so tell me, and I know you invest in both, but tell me why you decided to – Actually, I don’t know the answer to this, tell me why you decided to focus mainly on passive investment, although I know you have active ones as well. But in terms of like you decided to create a course for passive investment versus a course on active investing, even though you probably could teach that too, right?
Peter: Yeah, I mean, that’s a big question. I’ll kind of try to break it down. But the thing I’ve learned about investing over time, and I’ve always, whenever I ask people like what does investing mean? Like some people have good answers or people are like, “I don’t know, just making more money.”
But what I’ve really learned is that investing is taking today’s cash flow, basically trading it for tomorrow’s cash flow, right? Whenever that is. So the goal of all of this stuff, all of investing, of making money, all that stuff is for cash flow, right? That’s how we all live.
And so the question is, do you want to trade today’s cash flow for cash flow 20 to 30 years from now? Or do you want to trade cash flow for like cash flow starting next year or the year after? And what will that kind of do for you and your life and impact and lifestyle?
I think most of us in the conventional way, the way we’re taught is that we should be trading today’s cash flow, meaning that we’re taking the money that we’re making today, and then putting it away and socking it away for something like 20, 30 years down the road when we can have that cash flow.
That’s conventional thinking, but I’ve also realized that’s not the way I want to live my life. I want to actually, if I’m going to invest money and pull from today, I want that money to come back to me soon. Meaning I want that money coming back to me next year, next month, and ongoing from there so I can ultimately start living and enjoying life now, meaning that I’m able to do the things I want to do now while I’m young, and I’m healthy, and I have my kids in the house. And I have good friends around, versus later on, which is not guaranteed. And number one, right, my health may not be good at that point and that sort of thing.
So when I looked at that, when I thought about how I wanted to –
Bonnie: Let me just stop you for a second.
Peter: Yeah.
Bonnie: I never heard of investing talked about that way, but it just makes so much sense. Like that’s literally, I just love the way you’re talking about it. Obviously it does involve, hopefully, making more money. But I love it, you’re basically using today’s dollars to create future cash flow.
And like you said, the conventional thinking, this is something I harp on a lot with my clients or just in my podcast and my work, is like most of us are basically taught, invest in your 403 B, stock market. And then 20 years is actually not a lot of time, usually it’s like several decades, right? Like maybe when you’re 60 or 65 or 70, then you could draw from it. And then the only choice in between is to work.
Peter: That’s what I mean. So basically, you’re just trading all the money right now. If you ever read the book Die With Zero, he does a lot of data and he does a lot of research. I mean, the truth is that most of us listening to this podcast, and if not all of the people listening to this podcast, unfortunately, you got to pass at the peak of their net worth. Meaning that you’re going to probably die with a lot of money in your bank.
And the question becomes, is that the most efficient use of your income, use of your time today especially, to create all that income that’s essentially just not be able to be utilized by the end of your life, right? It goes to your family and your kids and all that stuff. But you’re essentially trading time today for money that you probably won’t be able to use, at least a good portion of it.
I’m talking about those extra moonlighting shifts. I’m talking about those extra weekends that you could have given up, maybe even those holidays. And so when I began to think of things like that, I began to think like, okay, how do I want to best use my time and my money so that I can start to really enjoy my life now? And of course, with an eye towards the future, too, you don’t want to be totally irresponsible.
But if you can invest well and invest in things that produce cash flow sooner rather than later, then you’ll have money tomorrow and you’ll have money, hopefully, 20, 30 years from now. And you can pace things a little better.
And so when I looked at all the types of investing out there, what made sense, really real estate was probably the best vehicle, at least at that time, that I saw, right? I mean, to create that. And in fact, I still believe it’s the best vehicle for that because as physicians, we’re really lucky and fortunate that in some ways we have a steady paycheck. I mean, I know reimbursements are changing and things like that.
But it’s almost like we know what lever to pull for money to come out. That money can change how much comes out, but it’s pretty reliable. It’s like a slot machine. We know pull the money, put your time in, and that money will come out. The thing is, what do you do with that money? And how can you utilize the least amount of extra time to create that cash flow?
And so real estate just happens to be a great vehicle. And real estate is like a great umbrella. I mean, again, it’s a huge range. It’s like saying you’re in medicine, it doesn’t tell you enough information. You just know that being in real estate you can create more income, but there’s so many different ways to get involved. Like you said, active, you’re owning your own properties, being a landlord, to passive, which is like investing in other people’s deals. Or maybe even investing in a REIT, right? In something that’s publicly traded.
So there’s a whole spectrum and a whole range of things that you can get involved in. And so it really comes down to how much time you have, how much energy you want to put into all of this, and then how much money you have. Obviously, the more money you have to invest, the more you can create in terms of cash flow. But how much time do you have? And how much energy do you have to put into all of this?
And so I have a portfolio of both active and passive real estate, meaning that I own my own properties and also invest in other people’s deals. But I’m limited by the amount of time that I have. And do I want to spend all my time in real estate? Honestly, no. I want to spend some time doing some really cool things with my life. I want to travel with my family, travel with my kids, and do that sort of thing. Also run these other businesses that I’m really passionate about.
And so I don’t want to spend all my time in real estate and owning my own properties. No, I know that I could make more money doing it. I know that I could probably do better if I spent all my time and energy in it, but that’s not really what I want to do. So I made it very clear that I have this amount of time to really put towards active real estate investing.
And if my portfolio outgrows that time, meaning that a certain property I bought starts to take up way too much of my time and it doesn’t make sense, I will sell it. And that’s what I’ve done in the past. And I’ve kept my active portfolio in a little box, because it does provide benefits. So I want the max benefits that I can take from it. But once it bleeds outside of that, I take that money, and I put it into passive investments.
Because ultimately, I think we all invest in real estate for what passive real estate investing offers, meaning that we want to put our money somewhere, have it create cash flow, and not put in any additional time, right? That’s what we want, I think, real estate to do.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Peter: I think a lot of us like real estate. We like buildings and things like that, and maybe there’s a business component to it. But at the end of the day, we want to put our money somewhere that produces income for us so we can live our lives however we want to. And I think passive real estate ultimately fits the bill.
And so you just have to learn how to do the due diligence on the front end, how do you pick the right people to invest in? How do you make sure you’re investing in the right deal? That’s where you can spend your time, energy and effort. But then once you’re in a deal, all you should expect to do at that point is to look for, basically, quarterly updates and make sure that the deposits come into your bank account. And then figure out what investment next if that property or that investment does sell?
Bonnie: Yeah, no, that was a really great overview. Sometimes I’m sure you wonder too, it’s like, huh, if there are so many other ways to trade today’s dollars and get it sooner than when you’re 60. The question becomes how come more people aren’t doing it?
What I encounter, and I’m sure you do when you start working with people, is there’s a lot of fear. Because basically we’ve all been kind of, I just like the word brainwashed, investing in mutual funds and stocks is “safe,” which is kind of funny if you think about it because we don’t really have control over these companies. And if you did you wouldn’t be talking to us, right? You’d be super rich and on the board of like Coca Cola or something.
And so there’s this sort of belief out there that real estate is risky, or it’s hard. And actually I was coaching someone yesterday in my program who has invested in quite a few syndications. And now she’s worried about it because of the way the market is going. And she’s like, well, none of them have had capital calls and yada, yada. But then she’s like, I don’t think it’s a good time to invest in real estate.
So how do you address that? And how do you think about that for yourself in terms of the risk? Obviously you’ve been doing it for some time, you’re comfortable, but I’m sure you’ve heard all the excuses or reasons as to why they shouldn’t do real estate and they should stick with stock investments, right?
Peter: Yeah, again, I think, whether we’re talking about traditional retirement or not. I get really passionate about this because I’ve been looking into this quite a bit. I think that people look at risk, when it comes to your retirement, 401k’s and all that stuff, they just look at it one way. I mean, they look at your risk in terms of, okay, you put it in the stock market, you know it’s going to increase this much. And you can look at the history of the stock market and that’s how we make our determination.
And if you do your 4%, people heard of the 4% rule, you pull your 4% every year, then you’re going to have this much for the next 30 years. And the chances of failure in that situation is, I think, 4% or something like that, I forgot, by conventional metrics and that sort of thing. They use this whole thing called the Trinity study that they talk about.
But people don’t look at the other side of that. This is what I’m learning, and this is what people may or may not know about this whole 4% rule, and I hope you don’t mind me talking about it right now.
Bonnie: No, not at all.
Peter: But, again, people look at this whole 4% rule, and again, the premise and this is probably the foundation for a lot of what financial advisors will tell you today, save up this amount of money in your stock portfolio, in your retirement account. And you want to hit this number so that you can draw 4% a year, adjusted for inflation. And you’ll be able to live off that for the next 30 years. And they say like this is a basically 96% proof thing and everything else is risky.
Well, what they don’t tell you in that study is that actually, if I remember the exact numbers. I don’t have the exact numbers here, but when they look at, I’d say since the 1920s, 80% of people in that way, I think it’s 80% of people ended up with twice the amount of the portfolio than when they first started when they died after 30 years. Which also means that the median was that people ended up with 3.5 times what their original portfolio was by the time they died.
So you spent all this time worrying and spending and saving all this money till you’re 60, 65 years old and then you end up dying with three and a half times that in your portfolio. That’s the median. And to me, that sounds like a good thing maybe on the surface, and people use that as a good thing. They say, oh, it’s not going to be risky because you’re going to end up with so much more, more than likely.
The problem is you’re going to die with that much money in your bank account that you could have used early on in your life, to work less, to enjoy more, to spend time with your family, all of this stuff. And so basically you’re giving up everything today, or so much of today expecting this amazing thing to happen in 20, 30 from now when your health might not be good. You may not even make it, who knows what your family situation is going to be like in that scenario.
So, in my opinion, basically, you’re giving up a lot today for something that’s not even guaranteed in the future. And to me, that’s like the definition of big risk. That you’re given up something certain today, which you know you’re health today, you know you got your time today. But for something in the future that may or may not come to me, that seems really risky.
And so how can I make sure that I’m able to take advantage of what I have now? And to me that vehicle, and it would be something that, again, distributes and gives you cash flow on a regular basis today that you can spend and use. And so I look for all these other things out there, yeah, dividend stocks are out there, too. But I look for other things that you can utilize to do that.
And I found that real estate just seemed to be, obviously, the most widely used thing to create that kind of lifestyle. And I think that’s probably the most well known. And again, it’s not something that hasn’t been done before by doctors and physicians. So I basically just followed the track of other people that were smarter than me. And that’s probably one easy way to do things, is find somebody that you find successful that has the type of life that you want. And then just model them.
Bonnie: Yeah, find out what they do.
Peter: Just model them. And so my heroes in this space are people that I looked up to who were doing real estate. So I just followed that roadmap and it’s really worked out well for me. And so that’s why I made that choice of real estate versus stocks. It wasn’t that I loved buildings and things like that. It was really what it gave me and offered me.
And then when I saw this whole thing with stocks I was like, it doesn’t make sense to me. I mean, when you start thinking about it, I’m not going to give it all up today for 20, 30 years that may or may not come. And honestly, I’m probably going to, at that point, have more than I need. And I can’t even utilize it.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Peter: I don’t know, that’s the way I think about things.
Bonnie: No, this has been an awesome conversation. Like I said, even just the way you discussed investing, it kind of blew my mind. So people listening who are not as familiar with real estate, I think it’s important to highlight that you do get a return on investment sooner rather than later, you’re not waiting 30 years from now. And with syndications you start getting payments relatively quickly, it’s not 20 years. It’s within – Actually, I don’t know. You would know that more.
Peter: Well, it all depends. Yeah, it all depends what type of deal. And I think that’s one of the questions you have to ask, I think, when you invest in these things, and again, when I invested in my first one, I was sitting there six months from now and I was like, “Wait a minute, when do I get my first check?” And they were like, “Well, we told you it would probably be 18 months.” And I was like, “Oh, I didn’t realize that.” I didn’t ask.
So these things, they vary. And they’re different according to the type of deal, it depends on the market, it depends on how things go. But the goal of these things is to, you know, oftentimes these syndications will hold for three to five to seven years, meaning that you buy an apartment building. You as an investor essentially own a small share of it. And so you can literally say like I own 1% of that building, or whatever it might be.
And so as an owner, you get access to distributions when they get cash flow. And then when they sell you have a portion of the profit, an upside according to how much you invested. And so the cool thing about these types of investments is that, again, somebody else is owning and managing it. And you just expect to get cash flow and distributions as the property does better and better and better. Now, that cash flow usually starts a little smaller in the beginning, and then it increases with time as the property gets stabilized.
One thing I like about most real estate that I invest in, and again, I don’t usually invest in a lot of the stuff where you invest and there’s no cash flow and there’s hopefully a big homerun at the end. You can do that real estate too, but again that kind follows the stock mentality, in my opinion, a little bit. What I like is I like the real estate that essentially forces you to take distributions. It forces you to get income along the way.
And when you get that income along the way it hits your bank account and you end up using it, right? You end up using it to buy your time back, you use it to go on trips, you use it to do all these things. And that’s kind of why I like what I’m doing.
Bonnie: And I will say, for most of the women that I work with, passive is kind of usually the first step because it is very attractive because it is passive, right? And they’re like, I don’t want to be a landlord, et cetera, although a good amount of them end up owning properties too, but not all of them.
I started with passive with your help, and I do own two active properties. I don’t love the active side. And I think that’s fine. I think I just gave myself permission to – Or it doesn’t mean I’m not going to do down the line because they’re two single-family homes and I’m like, if I do it again in the future, it’s going to definitely be bigger and do multifamily versus these little dinky properties.
One thing that you highlighted multiple times is how important the community is, so that’s like really your superpower. And so one of the things that I think, I mean, you’ve created so many communities, but the one I want to highlight here since we’re talking about real estate is the real estate conference that you started pre-pandemic, took a break, and now is in-person again.
And I tell everyone to come to this conference because it’s a great way to learn about real estate and even if they’re already investing, they’re going to learn new ways. They’re going to make connections because, as you know, real estate is a lot about relationships. They’re going to be other mostly doctors who are doing this and that’s just so powerful like, oh, I’m not the only one. And you meet new friends, right? Talk about why you decided to create this and sort of how it’s grown over time.
Peter: Well, first of all, I just love getting together with people. I love connecting with people because I’ve been to a lot of real estate conferences on my own that were, let’s say, non physician based. It was fun and I got so much value out of them. And honestly, I get more value, oftentimes, outside the room than inside the room of any of these conferences, meaning with the connections and the network. And maybe it’s just one thing someone said that I took home and that changed kind of the trajectory of my investing.
And I was like, why isn’t there one for physicians specifically to talk about real estate? And there were enough people in our community that were asking for this, and I would say that, again, it wasn’t necessarily all my own doing. I just asked people, what do you want? What do you need? And people were like, well, we want to get together to talk about this stuff, and kind of immerse ourselves into it for a couple of days or a short day.
So that’s what I did. I mean, the first one that we launched, the conference in 2019, it wasn’t super planned out well in advance. I think we only launched it three or four months before the conference because people were asking for it. We decided to do it for one day. I rented out a big ballroom in Los Angeles near the airport. And for one day several hundred people just showed up. They showed up, people flew in from Alaska, they flew in from Maine, from Florida, all parts of the country, which was crazy.
But it just showed me that the need is there. People want to connect with other people, hear their stories in person, and feel like they’re part of a community doing this. And so we did it virtually throughout the pandemic. And then once things were a little safer outside of that, last year we got together again in person. And we do it now live and virtual, because a lot of physicians may or may not be able to make the trip.
The goal is, and always my goal, and I tell people this, is to create as many collisions as possible. Meaning that I want as many people to connect with as many people as possible when they come to this. I don’t want people to just sit there and be a passive person in this conference. I want you to connect because at the end of the day, this is all a team sport.
I believe that investing in real estate, especially passive real estate, when you’re investing in syndications, we can all help each other make better decisions, invest with better people, and ultimately help each other achieve our outcomes, keep each other accountable. And so that’s really the goal of the conference, and essentially everything else we do.
Bonnie: Meeting other people is so powerful. So if you remember the last conference you did, you kind of did some small breakouts. And I remember I had a lady in my group, and I think she wanted to network but she just wasn’t used to putting herself out there. And so we talked about it and I was like, “Okay, well, how many people do you want to meet and get phone numbers?” And then she’s like, “Well, I think I can do two.” I’m like, “That means you’ve got to do 10.” That’s what I told her.
Peter: I remember that.
Bonnie: Yeah. And then by the end of the conference, she had her 10. And actually, she was at the White Coat Investor conference and now she’s like a pro at this.
Peter: That’s amazing. I mean, it’s just little things like that, to find somebody to challenge you to help you get down the path sooner. And hopefully that helps people take action. I think that’s really what it comes down to, is to take action and just get started.
If anything, I always tell people my advice is to get plugged into a community. That’s really what it is. You’ve got to surround yourself with like-minded people or people that maybe you model, want to model, maybe aspirational. In fact, it’s okay to feel uncomfortable in a group. Meaning if you feel uncomfortable when you’re sitting in a group and you’re like, “They’re so much further ahead of me,” then you know you’re actually in the right group. Meaning that you want the other people to push you, to support you, that you want to connect with. And everybody will help each other and bring each other up.
So if you’re not plugged into a community, whether it’s ours, yours, Bonnie, or you people that are just hearing this, find a community of at least a few people that you can connect with to talk about how to create your ideal lives, try new things, and make sure you just keep each other accountable in that.
Bonnie: Yeah, no, that’s awesome. And I think one thing I want to say is, one of the things I hear a lot, besides the fact that they love the community, like I said, I don’t think I went to any of the lectures last year. Maybe one or two at your conference, and a lot of it was just mingling. I think people, they’re really surprised by how nice everyone is and how willing people are to give their time to help people. I think there’s this genuine desire to help someone move forward and help them sort of break that activation energy needed to really get started.
And so I think that’s also what’s powerful, is like you meet people and they want to help you and they’re like, “Wow, these people are doing things that I want to do, or their life is where I want, and they’re willing to help me.” So I think that’s really powerful.
Well, Peter, thanks so much for being here. I learned a lot. Like I said, I’m sure this is going to be super valuable to other people. I think they’re really going to think about like, wow, using today’s dollars for 30 years down the line, or can I shorten that to a year? Or even if it’s five years, right?
That makes a huge difference in what it makes possible. Because I’m sure you and I both know, most doctors want to work a little less at least. And if they can access that in a few years versus 30 years, that’s huge.
I hope you enjoyed that conversation with me and Peter. It’s always a good time to have a chat with him, I know you learn so much about it. And as a reminder, this episode was recorded a year ago, so some of the information might be out of date. But I just want to remind you to go to wealthymommd.com/passive, P-A-S-S-I-V-E, and depending on when you’re listening to this, please join us for a live workshop with Dr. Peter Kim. It’s happening on Thursday April 11th at 12pm Eastern. Go to wealthymommd.com/passive and we’ll see you next week at the workshop. Take care.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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204: Lessons from the Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians
The first-ever Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians in 2024 just concluded at the Miraval Arizona!
This is the first and only money conference specifically for women physicians that I know of, and it’s something I feel very strongly about. There is so much power and magic in meeting in person to discuss all things money and wellness, and I’m sharing some of my top takeaways with you in this episode.
From the location of the conference to the speakers and topics we covered, all of it was purposefully designed for relaxation and a focus on your personal growth. Listen in to hear my top takeaways from this conference, and nuggets of wisdom from the experts who shared their insights on topics like real estate, negotiation, charting, and emotional regulation.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- My intentions and vision for the Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians.
- The time and effort required for you to create passive income.
- Why there is always learning to be had, even in an area in which you might be an expert.
- The importance of thinking like an entrepreneur, even if you’re not one.
- How to use a stress scale to practice emotional regulation.
- Why you must understand the outcome you want out of a negotiation conversation.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- Peter Kim
- Letizia Alto
- 19. Why Physicians Make Awesome Entrepreneurs (and Why They Don’t) with Dr. Una
- Maggie Reyes
- Karen Leitner
- The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker
- Blinkist
- If you want to attend the 2025 Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians happening in Oahu, Hawaii, join the waitlist now for early access and $250 off!
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey, everyone, welcome to another episode. So you may have noticed that there was no podcast last week, and that’s because I will be moving to an every other week cadence for the podcast. And so I apologize for not letting you all know in advance, but this is something we decided to do probably a month ago.
So today, I want to talk about the conference that just happened at Miraval, the Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians. This is the first conference like this that I’ve done. And as far as I know, this is the first money conference specifically for women physicians. And I felt very strongly that this had to happen. In fact, I kind of was hoping someone else would do this.
I just feel so strongly that we need to talk about money and we need a space for doing that. And there is just so much power and magic when there is, well, when you’re there in person with people in real life. Now, in my group coaching program, obviously we meet together on Zoom and I run those calls meeting style versus webinar style. And so obviously there is community there, but it just doesn’t replace in-person connection.
And so my vision for this conference was a few fold. One is I purposefully picked Miraval as the venue. And the reason why is – And if you don’t know much about Miraval, it is a luxury all-inclusive spa resort. When I say all-inclusive, I truly mean all-inclusive. You have to get to the Tucson airport. It’s located in Tucson, Arizona, which is about a two hour drive from Tucson.
And they will pick you up from the airport. They will bring you to the resort and it is a no tipping resort, which again, their philosophy, there are many, is that they just want you to not have to think about anything, but to take care of yourself and to relax.
And so there are a few other Miravals in the country, but the Arizona one is, well, it’s the best. It was the original. It really keeps the original attention of the resort. And so I really wanted a place where attendees would show up and really, really promote their wellness. And honestly, you can’t help but focus on your wellness. Like if you arrive, that’s kind of what the deal is. And it’s really, really hard to be stressed out there.
And they’re also a digital free resort. They do have designated areas for you to check your phone. Obviously not everyone follows this, but it’s all about being away from your phone because there are so many things about the phone that I don’t have to go into, I’m sure you all know what I’m talking about. And it’s really nice. And there is a spa and they even include a spa credit in the cost.
So again, it’s all purposefully designed for relaxation, focusing on you, focusing on your personal growth. And so these are the reasons why I picked that resort. And another reason why I picked the resort is because it has a limited capacity to hold a conference in terms of the meeting room.
And I knew that this was going to be the smallest the conference would be in terms of attendee size. And so going forward, I will not be able to do this type of conference there, maybe I’ll do it for a smaller retreat though. And so I was really mindful about creating a full experience, not just picking a conference to have a meeting room. And there’s nothing wrong with doing that, but this was just the intention that I really felt strongly to create.
Now, the way the conference went in terms of logistics is that we had a series of lectures, obviously, and we had some panels and time for Q&A. And again, I purposefully planned it so that the talks would end around 12 or 12:30, which meant the rest of the day was for you and for reflection and for connection with other attendees. And so we had three sessions of that. And again, the rest of the time for relaxation.
Now, I’m going to tell you a bit about the topics we talked about. It is on the conference website, wealthymommd.com/conference, including the speakers and what they spoke about. And it ranged from real estate to aspects of cash flow, negotiation and wellness topics included how to reduce your charting time because all of you who chart outside of your workday, it sucks, right?
And then we had a talk on emotional regulation. And I’ll talk about that in a second in terms of what that’s about. And I really enjoyed that talk, it was something that I hadn’t really thought about. And so I found it really useful and I’ve been using it in my life. And then I also highlighted relationships because relationships are just one of a few things that really increase the quality of your life.
Okay, so the money talk started with real estate and I had Peter Kim and Letizia Alto. You may know them as passive income MD and Semi-Retired MD. And Peter is known for teaching and talking about passive real estate, and there are so many aspects of it.
And I’ve actually been thinking a lot about that definition or the term passive real estate or passive income in general. It’s a term thrown around a lot, and I personally think it’s the wrong word. I think of investment income where you’re uncoupling your time and effort from money, specifically because right now if you’re working in traditional medicine or any type of service where it’s a one-on-one effort from you, you will only make money when you put in your time and effort, whereas passive income, it’s uncoupled.
There is time and effort upfront. So I want to make that clear because I think it’s easy to think, oh, it’s passive and I don’t have to really do anything to make that happen. Because if that was true, we’d all be doing that, right? And so there is initial time and effort, just like there’s initial time and effort for building a business like mine. But the goal is to eventually have that time and effort decoupled.
Another way to think about this is where the income scales without you scaling your time and effort. Okay? And so quote unquote, air quotes, “passive real estate” falls under this category. Now, you might be wondering, well, what is the time and effort? Because when you think of passive income, you might be thinking about investing in syndications or land deals, or there’s really a whole range of how you can do that.
And so in terms of logistics, technically it is passive. You just give them money and they invest it for you and hopefully you get distributions and the deal doesn’t go south, right? The time and effort initially that I recommend you doing is to understand the deal. And ideally you would have knowledge of how to evaluate the deal in terms of pros or cons or risks and upside.
Now, logically, we all know that every investment has risks. And so also you have to really ascertain what your risk tolerance is. And one of the things I teach in my program is the skill of learning how to deal with risk in terms of your emotional response to losing money, that is so important, right? Because I think it’s so easy for you to stay conservative.
And when I mean conservative, I mean like ranging from just keeping cash in your bank account, right? There’s a lot of people who do that. And investing in the stock market, like a mutual fund through your retirement. People think it’s conservative, but if you really think about it, it’s really not. You have no control over the stock market. You have no control over individual stocks. And if you did, you probably would not be listening to this podcast, right?
And so with real estate, you do have a lot more control. So that’s what Peter talked about. He talked about the current market because real estate, there are things going on, the interest rate, et cetera. And so he talked about that and obviously talked about what are basically educated guesses about the future.
But one thing I want to highlight is that in every downturn, there are always very great opportunities to make money during a downturn. And seasoned and smart investors know that there are always deals to be had to take advantage of that. So that’s what Peter talked about.
I think it’s really easy, especially for type A perfectionist, very highly educated women to get annoyed when there is a talk that you feel you are already an expert in. And so one of the things I’m always telling myself and telling my clients is to listen to it from the lens of you can learn something.
You can always learn something, even if you’re hearing something that you already know. And here’s why, your brain is different from when you first started. And what I mean by that is for most of the people I’m talking about, you have undergone some personal growth and you have a different lens of looking at things. And so hearing it from that new lens, there is always new learning to be had.
And as a side note, I see on Facebook here and there about people being proud of all the books they’ve read and there are multiple books, 10 books, 20 books, whatever the person is trying to do. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with that, but I just think there’s actually so much value in reading the same book multiple times. And again, for the same reason. So that’s just something I want you to consider if you haven’t considered it.
Okay, so I just wanted to speak about that because some of you who attended that conference and some of you who will hopefully attend a future conference, you will inevitably encounter topics that you already feel are not relevant to you, including student loans.
We had a talk on student loans. And of course, I know that some people don’t have student loans. And I guess the way that I would frame that if you don’t have student loans, is that the thing is you probably know someone with student loans.
And I’m not saying you have to fully pay attention. I’m not even saying you have to even pay attention, but it’s an opportunity for you to learn, especially now, because there are so many things that if you don’t know about, you really could be leaving a significant amount of money on the table. And so many of us know other doctors, some of you are working directly with medical students and residents. So I just think of it as information that you may want to pass on.
Now, I gave a talk on entrepreneurship and it was not limited to people who are interested in starting a side gig, because all of us have to think like an entrepreneur. See the theme here? I did a podcast with Dr. Una on entrepreneurship and we’ll link it in the show notes. I can’t recall off the top of my head which episode that is, but if you search on your podcast app and you search for Una, U-N-A, you will find it because whether you’re an employee or not, it is so, so important to think like an entrepreneur.
Okay, so that was my talk. And then we had a talk about money and relationships because all of us have issues with that. And I don’t just mean with your partner, because you may not have a partner, but you definitely have other relationships where money can come into play. For example, family members or maybe even friends who may not be making as much money as you. And so we talked a lot about that and we had some audience members get coached on that. And it was really, really powerful.
Oh, and the relationship talks, I had Maggie Reyes speak. And just in case you don’t know who she is, she is a marriage coach for perfectionist women. So she is so knowledgeable on relationships. I’m so glad that I had her. And she was the only non-physician there. And I thought she did a great job talking about that. And she also gave a talk on how to have five-star relationships.
Now, this is just about personal relationships, again, because the quality of our relationships really affects how we feel, our happiness, our sense of fulfillment as a human in this world. And I don’t know about you, but I did not have the how to be a good friend talk when I was in school.
Now, the emotional regulation talk was about understanding your stress scale from a 1 to a 10, and it’s going to be different for all of us. And so she had us think about what is our stress scale and what are the signs that we’re at this level of stress?
And there were so many aspects to it, but my main takeaway was to notice when you are at a certain stress scale and that when you’re in a stress scale, and she gave suggestions, I don’t remember exactly from the top of my head. But let’s say when you are at a stress scale above something like six, that means you should not make important decisions. I mean, that just makes sense.
And then the goal is to always operate between like, I don’t remember, a one or a three and a one and a four. And it just really has you think about where you are and where you tend to operate. And so I have found that really helpful to not make decisions when I’m at a certain stress level. And that also writing down like, what are my symptoms when I’m at that stress scale?
And this is a concept that not only is brilliant for you and I, but it’s also something you can teach your kids, which I think is brilliant. And my son is six and I was thinking like, is it too early? But I don’t think it is because I think it’s a good way to teach them where their anger level is and et cetera and it gives them insight into where their feelings are. And so I really found that talk super helpful.
And then we had two talks by Dr. Karen Leitner about negotiation and about charting. And I would say my takeaways from the negotiation talk is that negotiations are a conversation and that it’s important to understand what is the outcome that you’re looking for and to really approach it as a conversation.
I think it helps you think about it, not just differently, but to kind of calm how we think about it because I think at least for me, and depending on where you are in terms of how you feel about negotiation, it can bring up a lot of feelings; anxiety, nervousness, worried about what the other person will think about you, all that sort of stuff. And so really thinking about it as a conversation, I found that to be really useful.
Now, charting, again, may not apply to you if you are someone who does not have the issue with closing charts after work. Now, I am actually in that category twofold because I don’t see patients currently. Honestly, I can only remember two occasions where I had to finish charts after my work day, and I was not staying late to chart late. And so it’d be easy for me to think, this does not apply to me.
Now, the thing is, I may go back to clinical medicine. In fact, I am sort of figuring that out right now. So let’s say I was practicing and not having a “problem” with charting, but it wasn’t just about techniques on how to chart a lot less in terms of time. There are so many factors, I can’t go into all of them, but I found it helpful to get some tips on how to think about patient interactions and about charting.
And also, there was some stuff about boundaries mixed in, right? Because when you’re checking email constantly or feeling the urge to respond to messages, things like that, that obviously eats into your charting time and also is a toll on your brain from all that task switching. And so I learned a lot from that conversation.
Now, I want to speak a bit about what other people took away. Now, we did a post-conference survey where we asked people various questions like, what did you love about it? What could we do better next year? Because obviously there’s always things we can improve. And there were, obviously, themes. We asked what their favorite talks were. And they also gave us suggestions of what they may want to see in the future.
And so we’ve already thought about the feedback. And if you’re listening, you went to the conference and you filled it out, thank you so much. It really does help us. And if you are listening and you haven’t, please do it. We have not heard from every person. I think we still have about 20 surveys left.
And so again, your input is valuable. And again, we really want to make the conference valuable and something that is not just enjoyable, but again, valuable that will help you think about money differently, but most importantly, take different actions and help you see different possibilities for yourself.
Now, of course, we are doing another conference in 2025. I have talked about it here and there. And so the official dates are February 20 to 23rd, 2025. And it’s going to be in Hawaii at the Four Seasons Oahu. And Oahu is the island that it’s on. It’s the same island as Honolulu, but it’s not in Honolulu. It is a bit further away. I want to say about 30 minutes without traffic, really more realistically 40 minutes away from the hustle and bustle of Honolulu. And it is in a very quiet and calm area.
And again, purposely chose this location. Number one, I love Hawaii. It’s on the beach. What isn’t there to like about Hawaii or being on the beach? And what I mean on the beach, it’s really on the beach, not like a few blocks. And so again, being mindful of the location and the theme of wellness and really treating yourself to a luxury, amazing experience that maybe you wouldn’t have done on your own, right?
Now, I had a retreat there a few years ago. I think it was actually the fall of 2022. And first of all, I just love this resort. I’ve stayed there quite a few times and I’m super excited to be hosting it there. Now it is not for sale publicly at the time of this recording.
However, I really invite you to join the waitlist. And the way to do that is to go to wealthymommd.com/conference. And the reason why you want to get on the waitlist is for two reasons. Number one, it is the only way to get $250 off the conference and it’s first access to sales. I should really say second access because the Miraval conference attendees had the opportunity to enroll or register for that conference already.
But the 2024 conference sold out really quickly with a very long waiting list of over 50 people. And I believe we only took like five and I think it was actually less, less than five people off the waitlist waiting to get a spot into the conference. And as of the time of this recording we have over 200 people on the waitlist.
Now, of course, not everyone on the waitlist will actually register, but I just want to give you an idea of how many people are on the waitlist. And the fact that if you’re not on the waitlist, not that you can’t get in, I’m sure there’ll be tickets available afterwards, but if you are seriously interested or for sure want to attend, you need to get on that wait list right now, okay?
Now, in terms of capacity, I would say right now we will take 125 attendees and we do offer a VIP version like we did at Miraval. And the VIP is actually already half sold out from the Miraval attendees who signed up again. And so if you’re someone who loves to be VIP, again, you want to be on that wait list. And we will send some emails closer to the on sale date, which is May 29th for people on the waitlist to make sure that you’re ready to sign up.
Now, what is the VIP option? The VIP option, again, we haven’t fully finalized it, but it will be an extra opportunity to mingle with the speakers. What we did at Miraval is that we had a special dinner at Miraval, basically it was a chef’s tasting dinner with a wine pairing. The activity is specifically called just cook for me. So that is an activity you can sign up for directly at Miraval. It’s usually a very small group.
So we had a special event just for that and people to mingle and obviously a smaller group to hang out with the speakers in a luxury type of experience. And so again, we are still figuring it out, but we also want to add some extras. Oh, they also got extra swag items.
Aside from that, some things I’m really excited about for the 2025 conference is that we’re going to have small group breakout sessions. And so that is an option that I’m really excited about. And of course, the experience of being in Hawaii is exciting. I just love Hawaii, as you may know about me already.
So again, you want to go to wealthymommd.com/conference and get your name on the waitlist. And the wait list will open for registration on May 29th. This conference will sell out. And so if you are marginally interested, again, get on the waitlist, okay? I cannot overemphasize that a lot.
Now, the last thing I wanted to say, because people ask me all the time about the conference planning et cetera, some of you might be planning some sort of event, and I don’t necessarily mean a big thing like a conference, but any sort of gathering.
Now, a book I want to recommend is Priya Parker’s, The Art of Gathering. Now, my personal opinion is that the book is a little bit dragged out and the salient points could have been made in less pages. But the main takeaway I got from her book in terms of, again, planning any sort of gathering. This even means like dinner with your girlfriends. But again, I know some of you plan events.
So the main takeaways I took from her book was that you really kind of want to take some steps backwards and think about what is the purpose of the event? Because I think it’s so easy, including myself and my team, to jump right into logistics, right? And so if you really think about the purpose, what’s the intention, what’s the experience you want to create for the attendees, it actually informs what kind of logistics will actually create that experience for you.
And so she goes into detail about the group size and how that affects the experience of a conference in terms of connection between attendees. And so I found it really useful to spend some time brainstorming that. And then the second thing she told me, which I thought was really useful, is never start a funeral with logistics. And, obviously, this wasn’t a funeral, but the same thing applies.
Never start an event with logistics. And the reason why she says that is when you, at the beginning of a conference, like the first time you’re speaking to the audience, that is when you have the most attention and engagement from your audience. And so you don’t want to use that critical time to talk immediately about logistics. And so many conferences start with that.
Now, if you do that, I’m not saying that was a horrible thing to do, but you just may want to think about this. And so I intentionally did not do that. I did go over logistics, but I did that towards the end of my sort of opening talk.
And then the third takeaway I really took from it was that as the host, and that’s me for this, we have a responsibility to steward how the conference goes. And I think the term she used was generous authority or authentic authority. I can’t remember exactly, but I think it was generous authority.
And she goes into some detail about what that actually means. So again, if you are someone planning an event, Priya Parker’s The Art of Gathering.
Now, here’s a pro tip. There are so many nonfiction, growth-oriented books that I love to read, whether it’s about business, whether it’s something specific like The Art of Gathering. And I don’t necessarily want to read the whole book or just literally don’t have time, right? Or short on time.
And so there are services that give you cliff notes on these types of books. And the one that I’ve been using is called Blinkist, B-L-I-N-K-I-S-T. I don’t remember the fee for their annual subscription, but I have found it really useful. And not just useful for getting main takeaways from a book and not reading the book, but sometimes when I read the main takeaways, I start thinking, I actually really want to read this book because I want to learn more about the main points that this book is talking about. So that’s just an aside and a pro tip.
All right, so that’s what I wanted to say today about what happened at Miraval. And again, the dates are February 20th to 23rd, 2025 at the Four Seasons Oahu. And get on the waitlist, wealthymommd.com/conference. And I will see you in two weeks.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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203: Do You Even Need a Financial Planner? With Sim Terwilliger of SLP Wealth
This week, I’m bringing you a conversation with a representative of another of my amazing sponsors: SLP Wealth. SLP stands for Student Loans Planner. As many of us know, student loans can be pretty complicated. But thanks to some recent changes, you could have the opportunity to get your loans forgiven. To discuss this, and also dive into financial planning in general, I’m joined by Sim Terwilliger.
Sim Terwilliger is a Certified Financial Planner and Certified Student Loan Professional with SLP Wealth. She is a passionate advocate for her clients in all stages of their financial life plans. Whether you want to take a sabbatical, figure out when you can retire, or you want to know how much house you can afford, Sim believes these choices are personal, and your financial plan should be too.
Tune in this week to discover why, especially as a physician, you need a financial planner on your side. Sim Terwilleger is discussing how SLP Wealth does things a little differently. We’re simplifying the common jargon you encounter in the financial planning space, and you’ll learn how to make sure your financial planner is working in your best interest and toward your specific goals.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- Why SLP Wealth decided to take a different approach from typical financial planners.
- Some of the unhelpful advice out there about student loans that prevents you from building real wealth.
- Why, especially as a physician, you need a financial planner in your corner.
- How SLP Wealth works with their clients to pursue their financial goals.
- Some examples of how a financial planner can help you save on your tax bill.
- How to know whether or not a financial planner is acting in your best interest.
- What you need to know about student loan forgiveness in 2024.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- SLP Wealth: Website | LinkedIn | Email
- Travis Hornsby
- Morningstar
- The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work by John Gottman
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey, everyone, welcome to another episode. So we are continuing our special series featuring our amazing sponsors for the 2024 Live Wealthy Money and Wellness Conference for Women Physicians. Now, at the time of this recording, it is so, so close and I’m so, so excited to meet all of you. Although actually when this podcast comes out, I think the conference is actually over. And I’m sure we had an amazing time and I will definitely be doing a podcast talking about all the things that happened and the things that I learned and announcing when next year’s conference is and where it will be.
And so today I have Sim Terwilliger Certified Financial Planner of SLP Wealth, SLP stands for Student Loan Planner. And Student Loan Planner, you may have heard me talk about this company, it was founded by my good friend, Travis Hornsby. I know I’ve mentioned his name several times. A lot of my clients have worked with either Travis or his team and they are experts at all things student loans.
I don’t know about you, but student loans are really, really complicated and they have been really complicated the past few years because there have been so many changes for the good, what I call pandemic specials. And a lot of them have expired, but there’s still one that may apply to you. In fact, right now we are running my program, Money for Women Physicians, and we had some, you know, do a call with the clients and at least one member, if not a few, realized that they could get some money forgiven.
All money that you don’t have to pay is a beautiful thing, right? And so definitely listen in as we talk briefly about the IDR waiver. And I want to make sure you are well-informed and that you’re not missing an opportunity to get your loans either forgiven or add time so that – When I say add time, I mean basically get credit for time that you haven’t gotten credit for to actually accelerate your journey to loan forgiveness.
And then also, we’re going to talk about financial planning, what it is, what is CFP, who gets those acronyms after their name, and just about a bit about financial planning, how they get paid. And I’m also thrilled that Sim is a woman because there are very few female financial planners. And she is going to be live at the conference and I know her wisdom and knowledge is going to be so valuable to everyone there.
All right, here’s my conversation with Sim.
Bonnie: Welcome to the show, Sim.
Sim: Thank you so much for having me. I’m excited to be here.
Bonnie: Yeah. I know we have so much to talk about. We started talking about it offline but I’m like, let me just start recording because I don’t want to miss all the goodness. So why don’t you introduce yourself first?
Sim: Yeah, so I’m Sim Terwilliger. I’ve been working in the financial planning field for about seven years. I’ve been a CFP, Certified Financial Planner, for, gosh, almost four years now. And I love what I do. I get to help people come up with comprehensive plans, taking student loans into account, which is often a missing piece in financial planning.
Bonnie: Yeah, so let’s briefly just tell people why you’re here, sort of like the history. I’ll briefly say you work for SLP Wealth and SLP Wealth is sort of like the new company that Travis Hornsby created. So a lot of you listening may have heard me talk about Student Loan Planner and or Travis Hornsby. He’s someone that I’ve met and we’ve become friends. And he started the student loan consulting company that has been so valuable.
I’ve sent so many clients there and they have found it so valuable. Most people actually had some changes that would save them a lot of money, but not everyone has. But even the folks who didn’t have any changes, they just felt really good about knowing for sure that they did everything that they could because nobody wants to ever be like, well, would I have been eligible for this thing or that thing? Especially during the pandemic.
Can you tell us a bit about why Travis decided to kind of branch out into SLP Wealth?
Sim: Yeah, I think it’s been a long-time dream to be able to offer financial planning. And many of you may have experienced this, but when you think about traditional financial planning, a lot of times it tends to be very expensive for little value. A lot of typical financial planners don’t understand how student loans relate to your financial plan, and so there tends to be this cookie cutter advice. Just live like a resident for two years, eat rice and beans and pay this thing off, which is sometimes good advice and is sometimes terrible advice, especially if you are eligible for PSLF or long-term forgiveness based on your debt to income ratio.
But why SLP Wealth? So we’re a group of financial planners. Many of us have worked in these firms that we have found more or less to be soul crushing. We also worked on the Student Loan Planner side of the house, so we’ve done, between us, thousands of Student Loan Plans and we see the opportunities that are often missed by financial planners.
We wanted to offer something that was accessible to folks. So it would be a mistake to say we’re cheap. That’s not the message we’re trying to give folks, but we try to take a lot of the fluff out of traditional financial planning, too. Are we having unnecessary meetings just to justify a higher fee? No, because our time is valuable, your time is valuable. So we try to get to the nuts and bolts of what do you need for your financial planning? What are your goals? And how do we get you there in a way that also takes into account how your student loans factor into it?
Bonnie: Yeah. So what I thought we could talk about today is, well, first of all, I think it’s really valuable because you guys have all that student loan expertise because I can’t keep up. I tried to in the beginning, and I feel like especially since the pandemic, it literally changes every day. So I’m just like, you know what? I just need to know who I can trust to get the information from and just know the basics and know that there’s things – Even now there’s still, we can talk about the IDR. What did you call the IDR waiver again?
Sim: Oh, the I don’t know waiver because they keep changing it. Well, when’s the new deadline? I don’t know. It was July. Then it was December. Now it’s April. Probably, I wouldn’t be surprised if they extend it again to election season. Who knows?
Bonnie: Yeah. So yeah, basically things are just changing rapidly. There’s new stuff happening and so I’m all about hiring experts. I think in the financial education industry there’s a lot of don’t hire a planner or don’t have your own CPA, which I think is just crazy. I think it’s about having the proper vetted experts, but there’s so much value in having an expert in your corner.
So let’s talk a bit about what a financial planner does. I’m assuming it’s not the same for every planner. And let’s talk about the letters that might be important. So you’re a CFP, for example, like, what does that mean? So let’s just kind of get into all that good stuff. So let’s first talk about what a financial planner does and why you should hire one or not.
Sim: Yeah, so what a financial planner does, we do a lot of things. We wear a lot of hats. I think of ourselves as accountability partners. Sometimes we work as coaches. But we’re in your corner to try to help you get to where you need to go. And so that’s kind of a vague answer, but it means we do a lot.
So for some people that can mean running retirement projections and kind of showing you, hey, you can retire early. You can cut back. You can take that sabbatical, like showing you opportunities. I think there’s this misconception that we’re just going to tell people to just save more money for retirement, which is sometimes true, but that’s not the goal of financial planning.
So financial planning, especially if you follow the CFP curriculum, there’s this acronym, but the first two parts of the acronym, one is establish the relationship and the second is goal setting. Everything has to be based on your goals. So retirement is almost like a given. No one wants to work forever, unless you really like your job. But what are the opportunities? What are things that are costing you a lot of money? What are things you don’t know that maybe you don’t know?
I especially work with a lot of physicians and as a group, especially women physicians, you guys are really smart. You guys have done all the schooling, the education, none of us can touch that. And I think there’s this misunderstanding of, well, I’m smart, so I should be able to figure this out. Yeah, you are smart and you probably could figure it out, but do you want to? Does this give you joy? Are you aware of all the ins and outs of things you might be missing?
A big opportunity is tax aware planning. Taxes are very complicated, and we’re not CPAs, so we’ll work alongside CPAs. But someone who has a CFP behind their name has had education in taxes and how that relates to your situation. So I almost like to think of us as like internal or family medicine, if you guys won’t hate me for that example. We look at everything and if we need to send you to a specialist, like a CPA, we can do that.
Bonnie: Yeah, so let’s talk a bit about what does a CFP mean? What’s the deal with all these letters?
Sim: So not all financial planners are CFPs. CFP stands for Certified Financial Planner. You have to take a lot of robust coursework and then sit for an exam to get the designation. You also need to have a certain level of experience. There’s a couple of pathways to meet the experience requirement, but it means that you have covered a lot of information. It’s not just like we only know retirement planning. We’ve seen everything.
And there’s lots of areas of specialization. So you can have CFPs who maybe only work with stock plans, which is a very complicated area of planning. Or maybe someone who only does one area of planning or another, but it means you’ve had a lot of education and you passed a very difficult exam.
Now, just because someone doesn’t have a CFP, doesn’t mean that they’re not a good financial planner. Just because someone does have a CFP doesn’t mean that they’re a good financial planner. There’s a lot of questions to ask when you’re thinking about who should I work with?
Bonnie: Yeah. So in your opinion though, and you are a CFP, do you feel like you have a higher chance of finding someone more qualified if they have the CFP designation?
Sim: I think it certainly goes a long way because it shows you’ve been exposed to everything. The CFP, you’re kind of governed by the CFP board. So there’s certain standards of ethics that you need to meet. You have to do continuing education.
I always tell people you want to work with a fiduciary. So you’re probably more likely to find that with a CFP, but not necessarily because there’s different types of financial planning someone can do. Some people are fiduciaries and some aren’t. But you’re more likely, I think, to find that with a CFP. But I wouldn’t try to find a financial planner just because they have a CFP. You still need to interview them and ask a lot of questions.
Bonnie: Yeah. Well, let’s define what fiduciary means.
Sim: Fiduciary, so that’s one of those jargon-y industry words. But what it means is that the individual you are working with has to put your needs above their own at all times. You want someone who is acting in a fiduciary capacity at all times.
So what’s an example of that? One service that we offer is assets under management. Some people don’t want to deal with their investments. They don’t want to pick investments or figure out when to time making certain contributions, so they outsource that to us.
So if we’re acting in a fiduciary capacity, part of that means, does it make sense for someone to have us manage their assets in the first place? Are they better off, for example, if they have an old 401k, should they leave it in the 401k or roll it to an IRA with us?
Well, in a lot of cases, it might make sense just to leave it in the 401k for certain protections that you get. Or if you’re trying to do like backdoor Roth contributions and you want to avoid the Pro-Rata rule, you don’t want to have money sitting in a pre-tax IRA. So as a fiduciary, I’m probably going to tell you not to roll that account. Whereas someone who’s not a fiduciary, they want to manage that account because they want to get paid on it. And so that’s a conflict of interest.
Now, things like that are very governed by the DOL and there’s a lot of disclosures that have to be made, but that’s an example of when we’re acting in a fiduciary capacity. We have to give advice that is aligned to your best interest.
Bonnie: Yeah. So I think people kind of know that this term exists, like you said, it’s one of those jargon things, but is a CFP or planner going to say like, we don’t have a fiduciary relationship? Like, how do you know you actually have one?
Sim: Well, I tell people, a lot of people don’t do this. Well, one is ask, right? Whoever you’re thinking about working with, ask them, are you functioning in a fiduciary capacity? Ask them how they’re compensated. I’ve worked with some people who are like, well, no, I don’t pay any commissions. Okay, well, what are you invested in? And every time you put money into certain funds, is that person getting a commission off of you?
I like to do a lot of education, so I’ll tell someone, go to morningstar.com, type in your ticker symbol and you can look at the fees associated with that fund. And that’s also part of being a fiduciary, is there a better, cheaper fund I could have picked for you that would accomplish its investment purpose, but not cost as much?
And I personally don’t believe that people should be paying commissions on those types of funds. And that’s an example of being a fiduciary. But yeah, so when I say fees, I mean like, does it have like a front-load fee?
Bonnie: That’s what I was going to say. Aren’t they called loaded funds?
Sim: Yeah, there’s front-load, back-load, continuous. There’s a few of those, but you can see all of that. Morningstar.com is a free website. They have a premium version for advisors, but use the free resource, it’s out there.
Bonnie: Yeah, so why don’t we just say, I’m just like thinking about questions people have. So let’s talk about loaded funds versus non-loaded funds in general.
Sim: Yeah. So the high-level overview is that with a loaded fund, when you put money into that fund, a part of it off the top comes off and it goes to the advisor who put you in that fund, versus a non-loaded fund, which means there isn’t such a fee. So it always kind of comes down to follow the money. How much are you paying? What are you paying for? And do you know all of the fees that you’re paying? What are the hidden costs?
Bonnie: Yeah. And so that kind of brings us to sort of the flat fee model versus there’s different models. Like the ones that I’ve heard, and I’m sure you know more, is flat fee, flat fee plus AUM or AUM only. Are there any other ones? I mean, there’s the commission one for –
Bonnie: Oh yeah, for the loaded ones. Yeah.
Sim: Yeah. But there’s a few. There’s like – What are the new ones out there? There’s kind of like what we’re doing now, I don’t like to call it a subscription model, but it’s kind of what it is, but it’s like a version of flat fee.
Bonnie: Yeah, my CPA, I can pay annually, but they also do like a subscription type fee. But yeah, it’s meant to be folded into a sort of an annual fee. Okay, so I think that’s a really important thing, is asking how do you get paid, right? And just getting really clear on that.
And the term flat fee is kind of thrown around a lot as if that’s the best structure. What are your thoughts on that?
Sim: We kind of do a combo. So we start with flat fee. So at SLP Wealth, our intro pricing right now is $1,200 for the year. We bill that monthly just because that’s easier for people for cashflow, but that’s an example of flat fee. And then on top of that, for someone who wants us to manage their assets, we do charge 0.49%. That is our assets under management fee.
Any fee structure is going to come with a conflict of interest, any of them. And you can’t really avoid that, but what you have to do is disclose everything. So AUM gets a lot of hate, why does that one have a conflict of interest? Well, because you’re getting paid on what someone has you manage, right? And so you have to trust that, you know, like that 401k example I gave you, you’re doing the right things, which is why you want a fiduciary.
So with the flat fee and the way that we do it is that’s where you get your traditional financial planning. I don’t like to call it a subscription model. Some people feel like it’s a subscription because the billing is occurring on a monthly basis, but it’s an ongoing relationship. That’s what planning is intended to be. It’s not like, you know, if you’ve done a Student Loan Plan with us, that’s a one-time thing. Here’s your plan. Good luck, see you. Keep me updated if you get forgiveness, right?
It’s not like that. This is an ongoing thing. It has to be an ongoing thing because your goals change and we’re working alongside you to keep up with that if we need to kind of change course, if you need new accountability for the new goals. And I’ll give you an example too.
There was someone I’ve been working with. The plan was to open a practice and we hadn’t met for a few months. We met and they’re like, by the way, I’m getting an MBA now. I’m like, okay, well, let’s talk about that. How are you paying for that? All that sort of thing. That’s why it’s great to have someone in your corner where you can always just reach out and be like, hey, I need to change course here.
With AUM, this is important, right, the investment piece. Investments are not the only part of your financial plan, but they’re a very important part for long-term planning especially. For someone who is going for student loan forgiveness, long-term forgiveness, the way it is currently, you’re going to have to pay what we call the tax bomb. They might get rid of it, who knows? There needs to be a lot of activism to kind of get to that point.
So if you have this tax bomb at the end, how are you going to save for it? Are you just going to stick money under your mattress? Are you going to put it in a checking account? No, this is something that’s happening a long time from now. And so when I think about investing, I think of it as a long-term activity, it’s something you need to plan for.
Do you have the time and the desire to figure out how to invest in a way that is also tax aware? This is an area where I see a lot of high income professionals make mistakes. Do you know how to do tax loss harvesting? And even if you think you do, you have to be careful because you don’t want to come across a wash sale. Do you know when you’re taking money out of your taxable account, how to do it in a tax efficient way? Which lots are you going to sell? Do you know how to do that/do you even care? Is that too stressful to figure out?
And sometimes there are even things that don’t seem super complicated. Like for most physicians, you’re doing what’s called a backdoor Roth. You make too much money to put directly into the Roth, so you have to do it the backdoor way. I see people make mistakes with this all the time and then they don’t want to fix it. And so you’re going to end up having these penalties you pay the IRS.
So even having someone there who can, one, figure out that you made the mistake and help you do the re-characterization. I’ve had people come to me who did it correctly, they did their backdoor Roth and they never invested it and it’s just sitting in cash. So there’s different layers of complexity.
But the way that we’re structuring it is we don’t really want to touch the investment piece if we’re not doing AUM because we’re so focused on the tax aware investing portion. We don’t want to be liable if someone’s like, well, I’m going to do this part of my own and then they have a wash sale.
So that’s why we like to offer AUM, it’s part of your bigger financial picture. But not everyone needs it, not everyone wants it, and that’s fair. But I think it’s all about disclosures of your conflict of interest and figuring out what services are right for our clients.
Bonnie: Yeah. So this is like a big deal in the financial planning world in terms of doctor, I don’t want to say opinion or whatever you want to call it, about conflict of interest. But I always try to remind doctors, like technically we have a conflict of interest too, because of the way we get paid.
Like just giving my example as a dermatologist, right? Like the more biopsies I do, the more I get paid. And it’s technically easy for me to justify doing a biopsy, but that doesn’t mean that I’m going to biopsy a patient just because I can. So I think we sometimes forget that we all have conflicts of interest in different ways. That was just one example of me practicing medicine, but I think there’s conflict of interest in many other areas of our life.
And it’s just, like you said, just being aware of it. And then also I think what my part is with the women I help is I want them to feel empowered to ask the questions, right? Because what I have found a lot is if a client is married to a man, the advisor will often just assume he’s the one in charge of the money, even though the accounts are under her name, for example. Like we see that all the time, for example.
So I just want the women I work with, or all women really, to feel empowered and to use a CFP as someone who’s in their corner versus the CFP being like the CEO of their money, if that makes sense.
Sim: Yeah. And the way I like to do financial planning personally, my style tends to be very educational. And so I like to kind of explain why we’re doing what we’re doing. If women want to do things on their own, I’m still there in your corner. I can help educate and keep you accountable.
And even if you don’t want to do things, like if you want to outsource, like, hey, I want you to manage my investments, I still take a lot of time to explain why we’re doing what we’re doing. Are you comfortable with it? Making sure we’ve talked through everything. I feel like that’s such a woman thing. They’re like, let’s sit down and discuss this. But that’s my style.
And I do want to comment, too, because we were talking about the CFP earlier, the statistics for women in financial planning are pretty abysmal. I think the last time I checked, 23% of CFP holders were women. And that was around the same statistic in 2020 when I got my CFP. So it hasn’t moved very much in the last few years.
Bonnie: Yeah, I only know three, maybe four. I think I know four female CFPs, which might be more than what most people know, but only because I’m sort of in this industry and I’ve just got to meet people over the years. But yeah, I mean, I love supporting women, women businesses. I’m always happy when I find an amazing expert who’s also a woman, like that’s my preference.
So what you said earlier, I think, is also not very common, that you actually educate your clients. Because a lot of my clients have told me they don’t get any education. They’re just like speaking all this jargon, they have no idea what’s going on. And they’re just like, okay, this person knows way more than I do. I have no idea what they’re saying, I’ll just do whatever this person is telling me.
So let’s talk about that a little bit, because I think it is not the norm to actually spend the time to educate your client.
Sim: And I don’t think necessarily me at SLP Wealth, I don’t know that I’m necessarily special in that. We put out a lot of educational content. Like for example, Travis, our founder has recorded videos on different topics. And investing is a big topic, so we recorded one, we call it like our basic guide and our advanced guide, because some people are afraid to say they don’t understand something.
I think that’s especially true for physicians because you’re so darn educated. I think it might be a little harder for you guys to say, well, can you explain that again? Or what’s an ETF, right? And so we put out these videos so people can kind of watch on their own time and then come to us with questions, right?
So in the basic one, we talk about things like what’s an ETF? What’s a mutual fund? Just kind of getting down to the nitty gritty of it. Then in our advanced guide we talk a lot more about tax aware investing, tax loss harvesting, those different opportunities. People can slow down, speed up and then schedule a meeting with us and be like, hey, can you go over this with me?
But it’s really important to feel like you’re empowered to make good decisions, because at least for a lot of us, I mean, we’re millennials, we want to work with people who want to work with us. We want it to be a good experience for everybody. And I feel like this idea that someone just talked at me and they seem to know so much more than me, I also feel like that’s kind of a tactic to like give the perception that they’re doing more than they are to try to, again, justify a higher fee that might not be warranted.
Like I’ll give you an example. Our AUM fee I said was 0.49%. That’s probably half of industry standard. We don’t think people need to pay 1%. And some people pay more than 1%. We don’t think that’s needed.
Bonnie: Yeah, I’ve seen different amounts. Like yeah, 1% is kind of standard, but I’ve seen ones that are like graduated or rather reverse graduated, like it’s higher when you have less money and then it goes down.
Sim: That’s an important thing, too, I wanted to touch on, is that we don’t have account minimums. You don’t need to have a lot of money to work with us or to have us manage your investments. And I think that’s a very important distinction because I feel like everyone deserves quality financial planning and quality investment advice, even if you don’t have like five hundred thousand dollars in assets to invest.
Bonnie: Yeah, good point. So can we just clarify, because these are things I know, but I also know that a lot of people don’t know the ins and outs. So when you say AUM, what does that mean exactly compared to them doing it themselves?
Sim: Yeah, so what that means is we use a platform called Altruist, which is direct to advisor. It’s not direct to consumer, which maybe is why you haven’t heard of it. But that’s the custodian we use so we can help open accounts. Like let’s say we open like a 1099 employee, we can open a solo 401k, help you transfer money into the account, pick investments for you, make sure it gets invested, make sure that every time you make a contribution, it’s not just sitting in cash, it gets invested.
And if we need to make changes to how we invest, maybe you’re getting close to needing the funds and we need to reallocate it, if we need to consider taxes, even just picking what to invest in, right? Are you kind of thinking through the different ETFs and do you change your model every year? Like those types of technical things.
So what someone would do is we would sit down together on a call, open up these accounts together. And I like to joke sometimes that half of my job is paperwork because paperwork is annoying for everyone. But we’ll open the accounts. If you have money sitting somewhere, we’ll transfer it over and we’ll make sure everything is set up. We’ll be reminding you, hey, it’s almost April 15th, have you done your backdoor Roth for 2023? You know, you’re saving for your tax bomb account, make sure those contributions are coming in.
Bonnie: Yeah, what you said about paperwork, like everybody hates paperwork. So I think, again, I hear all the time like you don’t need to have someone manage your things. You can just do it yourself. But not everyone wants to do things themselves, people hate paperwork. It’s like, yeah, you could do it yourself and it might not take that much time.
But I just feel like female physicians, especially if they’re moms, don’t need more things on their plate, even if it’s “easy,” right? They’re just like one less thing to worry about, I have someone that I trust that can handle this. They’re going to remind me when to do things I don’t have to always remember. And so I just want to keep reiterating this because I feel like so many financial educators are sort of anti-financial advisors. Like they’re all like these staunch DIY type people.
Sim: Yeah, and I’m like, not all of us have time to be DIY. I’ll give you an example, too. We have seven month old identical twin boys and we’re trying to transition to solids. And so I bought these jars of baby food, right? We’re trying to play with the puree. And my husband says, well, we can make that ourselves. And I almost strangled him.
And I’m like, when are we going to make baby food ourselves? When do we have time? You know, we’re doing all of these things. Yes, we can certainly make this ourselves. We know how to cook, but it’s such a nice convenience just to be able to have that ready.
Bonnie: Exactly. Just like most people have someone clean their homes or organize their homes, right? It’s like, yeah, I can do it but I don’t want to do it. Or laundry, right? Some people hate that. I don’t do laundry. Matt does the laundry, that’s his job. I used to joke that I don’t even know how to use the machine. I know how to use the machine, but I try to pretend that I don’t know how to use it. We just got a new one and the buttons are different. So I’m just going to say I don’t know how to use it.
Here’s an important question. So we’ve talked a lot about how you guys can do AUM and we talked about mutual funds, ETFs or different types of things that you can invest in. Are you guys allowed to advise? Because physicians generally invest in more than just the stock market, right? Like people are investing in real estate, real estate syndications or just other non-traditional types of things. Like how do you help with that? Are you allowed to in terms of, I don’t know, all the rules that there are?
Sim: For some areas, yes, we are allowed to. Real estate is very, very popular with physicians and so that is something that we can advise on. And it’s always a question of where does this fit in with your portfolio? As part of my education I kind of like to focus on a three bucket strategy when we think about saving for retirement.
So I like to think about pre-tax accounts, after-tax accounts and taxable accounts. Are you maxing everything out? It’s like the same thing with hiring a financial planner, do you enjoy doing real estate? Do you have the time? Is this something you’re interested in? That is definitely something that we can talk about and see how it makes sense in your financial plan, but we are allowed to.
Bonnie: I think even I thought too, that officially you could only do that kind of stuff. I think the problem with real estate is if you don’t invest in real estate yourself, how would you know? Because real estate’s like this whole other –
Sim: There are so many ways.
Bonnie: Yeah, it’s this whole other volume of information and there’s different ways to do active and passive and things like that. So it’s like, I’m assuming that’s not part of the CFP curriculum. And if you don’t do it yourself, how would you really know? So I think that’s kind of what I mean by –
Sim: Oh, it’s definitely part of the CFP curriculum, for sure.
Bonnie: Oh, okay.
Sim: Real estate investing, it kind of overlaps with tax planning, there’s a lot of tax implications involved. But yeah, I think at least what was missing when I was studying for my CFP was maybe crypto. And crypto is probably one of those things that we don’t really touch. I just kind of tell people like, that’s your play money. Like if you want to play with it, that’s fine. It’s separate from what we’re doing here.
Bonnie: Yeah. I bought some crypto when it was like at the dip and I think it’s like triple. I didn’t put a lot in. To me that’s just like, let’s just do that as a long-term thing. We’ll just see if it grows, it’ll be fun. I think I put like $20,000 into it during the crash where all the crypto billionaires crumbled. Do you remember that a few years ago?
Sim: Yes, I do.
Bonnie: Is there anything that we haven’t talked about that you think is important to mention?
Sim: I think we covered all the big ones, which is, whoever you are working with, ask the right questions about their conflicts of interest, their compensation and what they’re doing for you. There’s a lot of these white glove firms that maybe cost 5,000 or 10,000 a year, which is fine, but figure out what you’re getting for that. And is that worth your time?
Again, I do say that this is our intro pricing, the $1,200 for the year. But we’re a group of financial professionals, we know a lot. I mean, if I do say so myself, we are the student loan experts. And if you’ve ever worked with a financial planner who has told you you need to just pay this off, see if that was the right advice and figure out, is there any other area in your financial plan that they might be misadvising you on?
Bonnie: Yeah, good question. Yeah, I think this is also one of those like, people don’t know what they don’t know. And so they’ll work with one planner and they just don’t know what else could be out there. So that’s one of the reasons why I wanted to have you on, is to kind of just talk about what a planner does, just all the different sort of ways you’re paid and just to like be purely educational so people kind of know.
And also because yesterday I was doing a call for my program and someone wanted to hire a planner. Actually, this is a good point, I find that couples can really benefit from financial planning because sometimes they don’t agree on things. So it’s nice to have a third party expert. And so this woman was just talking about how they kind of have different goals.
Like she’s like, we need to buy assets. And he’s like, why? Not why, like we shouldn’t, but like they just were having trouble kind of like having these money conversations. And so she already was at that stage where she wanted to hire a planner. And then she’s like, I don’t know who, what, where. And so I gave her some names and for her to book a consult, et cetera.
But what do you think about that? Like, what do you see a lot with couples in terms of financial planning?
Sim: Oh, I love working with couples. So the important thing to start off with is getting these conversations started. A lot of couples don’t want to talk about it. And one of the top reasons people get divorced is because of money issues, so it’s definitely important. If you feel like you can’t talk to your spouse about these things, or maybe you guys talk but you’re fighting and you’re not on the same page, definitely get a third party involved to kind of help mediate.
I like to start with cash flow, and a lot of people hate talking about cash flow. They’re like, well, my cash flow is great. They don’t know where their cash flow is going. And so I tell people like –
Bonnie: Nobody does. I’ve definitely seen that, nobody knows.
Sim: No, I can probably tell you with my eyes closed, it’s either housing or like eating out. Like if you looked at my cash flow, I just probably have a line that says Chipotle. That is my cash flow.
I want couples to be on the same page about that because what happens sometimes is you have one person who is like super duper involved in the finances and the other one is not, either because they feel like they are not educated enough or they’re confused or they’re ashamed or whatever, insert the blank, right?
Cash flow discussions are, I think, a non-threatening way to start talking about money. It’s not super complicated like this investment strategy or that one. Cashflow is something we can all understand because we all spend money, one way or the other. So I think that’s a more non-threatening place to start. But that can still be a big fight too for couples because they’re like, well, why are you spending this much on this?
And so when I meet with couples, I’ll tell them, fill this out non-judgmentally, we’re data gathering. Just figure out where it’s going and then the three of us are going to sit down and talk about where it makes sense for it to go based on your goals.
And so goals are always where we start. What are your goals as a couple? Make sure we kind of get the top three more or less aligned. And then cashflow can kind of fill in a lot of that.
Bonnie: Yeah, there’s usually an over spender in a couple. I’m the over spender in this relationship. Or like, yeah, I’ve seen that a lot where their spending habits aren’t quite aligned, right? Someone’s like, well, I want to spend all this money and the other is like, no, no, no, we got to do this.
And so that’s, again, I think that’s where a really good financial planner can really be worth their weight in gold to kind of just help. I don’t even know if we should say mediate, but just like help guide those conversations where it’s not like one partner trying to guide another partner being like, don’t tell me what to do. That’s also me. I’m very like a don’t tell me what to do type of person.
Sim: And sometimes in these conversations, we’re not fighting about finances, right? The fight is something else. There’s something deeper going on in the marriage. And I’m not a marriage counselor, but I have probably a handful of times now recommended certain resources. There’s a great book out there by Dr. John Gottman, The Seven Principles of Marriage. I’ve given that to people as a homework assignment. Like you guys, we’re not just fighting about money anymore, there’s something deeper going on. You love each other, let’s figure this out. So read the book, go to the source.
Bonnie: Yeah, cool. Well, thanks so much for being here. I think this was super educational for everyone. And obviously we’ll post links on how to reach you and SLP Wealth. And I’m sure we’ll talk again soon.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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202: Secrets to Successful Entrepreneurship for Physicians with Dr. Taryn Rose
If you’re unsure of what you want to do, but you know you want more revenue streams than just your medical income, this episode is for you. I’m joined by Dr. Taryn Rose, an extraordinary entrepreneur who has learned exactly what it takes to be successful in life, and she’s sharing all her secrets on today’s show.
In 1998, orthopedic surgeon Dr. Taryn Rose brought comfort to the world of luxury shoes. Using her intimate knowledge of the human body, she partnered with design experts and tech innovators to create a collection of shoes that looked beautiful and felt incredibly comfortable. She has since sold her original brand and created a new one called Enrico Cuini, which is sponsoring my Wellness Conference for Female Physicians.
Tune in this week to see behind the scenes on the journey of a doctor who became a successful entrepreneur. Dr. Taryn Rose is discussing how to assess risk when starting a business, the fundamentals of becoming profitable, and you’ll get some inspiration about what’s possible for you as a physician beyond your clinical income.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- How Taryn developed a passion for shoes and made it into a successful business.
- Why any area that lacks innovation is a great opportunity for an additional revenue stream.
- How entrepreneurship, at its core, is about seeing a problem and coming up with a solution.
- Taryn’s advice for physicians building a new business from the ground up.
- Why every aspect of starting a business is learnable.
- What you need to know about taking risks on your wealth-building journey.
- Why Taryn believes more physicians should move toward their own private practice.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- Join the waitlist for our next wellness conference!
- Dr. Taryn Rose: Website | Instagram
- Enrico Cuini: Website | Instagram
- Dr. Katie Deming
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hello, everyone. So you are in for a special treat today. You are going to meet Dr. Taryn Rose. Many of you actually may know who she is already because she started a pretty well-known shoe company that she has since sold. And it’s a company where I actually bought their shoes when I was in, I forget, medical school or residency, probably both.
Now she has a new company called Enrico Cuini that also some of you may know it’s a luxury high heel shoe brand that is semi custom made and you’re going to hear all about it. And so if you’re someone that has been looking for actually comfortable high heels, you definitely want to listen. But you also want to listen because her story is so fascinating and we also share some insights and pearls.
I know many of you listening are, you know, you might not be interested in becoming an entrepreneur, but we talk about some, I guess, key lessons and points that are going to be valuable no matter what you’re doing and what you want to do in the future, okay? These are like key skills and lessons that I’ve learned and that she has learned to be successful in life, basically.
And Enrico Cuini, they are one of our sponsors for the first Money and Wellness Conference that’s happening early March, 2024. I am so thrilled that she said yes. I’m just very careful in who I recommend, I want to make sure they are trustworthy and will do good work.
Taryn is, like I said, an incredible woman physician. She is such an example of what’s possible. And she and her partner make amazing shoes and I cannot wait to see them and buy a pair for myself at the conference. Basically, she’s going to have a whole display and we’re going to have a little party with the shoes and with some bubbles.
And so I’m thrilled to highlight her. I’m thrilled for you to learn more about her. Whether or not you’re into shoes, again, her story is really, really interesting. Oh, and I should mention she’s an orthopedic surgeon, so it kind of makes some relation to her shoe business. All right, so here is the episode with Dr. Taryn Rose.
Bonnie: All right, Taryn, welcome to the show. I’m so excited you’re here.
Taryn: Hi, Bonnie. I’m excited to share my story because I don’t think everyone knows the full story. And with 30 minutes, we’re able to spend some time on my journey.
Bonnie: Yeah. So why don’t you introduce yourself since not everyone’s going to know who you are?
Taryn: Okay. I’m Taryn Rose and I started as an orthopedic surgeon. I trained at USC, a big LA county, lots of trauma. So it’s ironic that I went from all of that to creating fashion shoes. But I was a fashionista myself. And even at county I was known to be in scrubs post-call with my pearl studs and my lipstick on to do rounds. And on clinic days, I would have heels on, I was very traditional.
I was always tweaking my heels because it was just not comfortable. And as everyone knows in your audience, we spend a lot of hours on our feet. So that kind of was the seed to my idea about, oh, I would do so many different things to change heels to make them more comfortable. And that was just sort of percolating in the back of my head during residency.
And then for a senior project, I had to do a research project. And while all of the guys were doing anatomy of the shoulders and this one particular ligament was going to be world-changing, I decided to do a study on diabetic shoes because there is a high incidence of noncompliance with the ugly diabetic shoes. So people would go on to get ulcers and sometimes even amputations.
And when you look at why they were noncompliant, it was because of their appearance. They didn’t like the way they looked. They felt like they looked like Frankenstein. So I somehow finagled my way to finding someone at Nike to sponsor the actual cost of the research.
Bonnie: Wow.
Taryn: And they helped me build shoes based on better designs that created optical illusions to hide the extra depth part of the shoes. Because of the diabetic foot clinic, I knew about a new material called Poron. It was actually built for space shuttles and aircraft for cushioning the parts on those machines, but it was great for diabetic feet. So I used that in the shoes.
And the study actually showed that we increased the compliance rate. People liked the way the shoes looked and we were able to decrease the rate of ulceration. So that was my grand senior project. And of course, when I presented it, all the guys were snickering like, what is this chick doing?
Bonnie: I’m going to pause you for a second, because first of all, I think this is just so cool just to hear because I think there are a lot of female physicians who have, like they’re into fashion. And when you’re in a surgical field you kind of have limitations as to what you can dress. So I just love how you said like lipsticks and pearl studs, like there’s little ways you can kind of incorporate your style.
And then I have a question about diabetic shoes. And I’m thinking maybe some of the audience might not know what that means because most people are doctors, but not everyone who listens to this is. So I’m a dermatologist, I’m going to take a guess. You’ll correct me.
So we all know that people with diabetes have neuropathy. And then because of the neuropathy they don’t know if their foot is running into things and so they’re more prone to wounds. And then they can progress and become really bad ulcers to, obviously, amputations.
Now, diabetic shoes, I mean, you could just explain this, but you mentioned the cushioning, it’s basically to protect the feet. Right?
Taryn: Right, so diabetic shoes are extra depth, meaning they have more volume so that there is a decreased risk of the upper rubbing against the feet because you or I, if we get a blister, we’re going to take the shoes off and I’d have them stretched or not wear them for a while, maybe your feet happened to be extra swollen that day. The diabetic patients with their neuropathy cannot feel that. So they’ll just keep going until they get an ulcer.
And part of the proper care is a daily inspection of their feet. But sometimes people don’t do that. Or they can get a blister very quickly and because of their poor healing from the neuropathy, while you and I could recover from that with a Band-Aid, they progress on to an ulcer. And if it becomes infected, it could result in an amputation. So it’s devastating.
So diabetic shoes have more volume, so therefore, they look bulkier. They have more cushioning because the neuropathy extends to the joints as well. So they don’t have the proper sensation across the joint, so they’ll keep walking. And so you have to give them more cushioning for protection.
You also have to design with fewer seams because every time you have a seam, you have a potential area for blistering and friction.
Bonnie: So I’m going to totally Google what diabetic shoes look like. But your description, they’re clunky and they sound like high tops almost.
Taryn: They’re not high tops as much as they are really deep. Like they’re thick if you look at it from the side.
Bonnie: Yeah, like a super platform?
Taryn: You know, at some point in fashion, that’s in fashion. But most of the time it’s not very fashionable. And for some reason, they always just came in black. So I said what if we made shoes that were in other colors to make them just less likely to be noticed as the ugly black Frankenstein shoes, right?
Bonnie: Like the shoe that’s pathognomonic for diabetic shoes.
Taryn: Exactly. Exactly. So I had them made in like a tan nubuck. And since that time, I hate to admit it, but I’m old, this was in 1997. And since that time, the styles have progressed. I hope that my study had something to do with it. But unfortunately, there’s not a lot of innovation in the area because most people get their diabetic shoes through their insurance or Medicare, Medicaid. So the reimbursements for those are not high.
And actually, when I finished my residency, I said, oh, I have this whole research study done, why not just start producing these shoes? And when I looked at the business side and saw that most of it was being purchased through health insurance, and of course people could get it on their own, but you know what it’s like in health care. People feel like, well, if I have insurance for it, I should use that instead of saying, oh, you know what? For something that is beyond just the status quo, I’ll pay out of pocket.
It’s hard to get people to resist that. So I said, no, this doesn’t sound like it’s going to be a very good business. There’s a lot of competition. Reimbursement was bad. So I decided to take that foundation and create a fashion line. You know, women in high heels want proper cushioning. They want proper support. You want soft leather so that it sort of molds with your feet.
So I just took that as the foundation and I went into something that I really loved. Which diabetic shoes, yes, it’s helpful and it’s therapeutic, but it wasn’t a love of mine. Whereas fashion, I was able to bring my personal passion for fashion into the business and merge it with the foundation of orthopedics and the research that I had done. So that’s why I pivoted towards the fashion line.
And I think one message that I could impart on everyone is that if it’s something that you love, a topic that you love, it’ll come much easier. And most of us are physicians in your audience, or professional men and women, we can figure out a lot of things. But it’s just a lot more interesting when it’s a topic that you love.
Bonnie: And feel passionate about because, as you know, business is not easy. There’s a lot of ups and downs and it’s really hard to weather those downs when you’re like, I don’t even like this. It’s like, why am I even doing this, right?
Taryn: Exactly.
Bonnie: I kind of want to go back to a few things that you said, just to kind of highlight. So first of all, I’m guessing you and I are on the same page, but I think what you did is such a great study because insurance takes forever to catch up, but it’s like if there’s increased compliance, there’s less burden on the health care system. And insurances don’t want to spend money if they don’t have to, you know?
Taryn: Exactly.
Bonnie: I don’t know if more studies have been done, but part of me is like, this is like insurance companies should be like hopping on this, right? And not just increased compliance so that the insurances don’t pay out, but obviously for the patients, right? They’re happier wearing shoes that don’t look awful and that are taking care of their feet. And so I don’t know, I just can see how that could be so valuable.
And just since we’re diving into starting businesses and entrepreneurship, one of the things I say, because I think physicians we’re like natural problem solvers. That’s literally what we do as a profession, right? We’re constantly problem solving. And so I think it’s really natural for doctors to see a problem and want to create a solution.
Like, for example, the medical device world. There’s so many examples like Kate Deming. I don’t know if you know her, Dr. Kate Deming. She’s a radiation oncologist. She doesn’t practice anymore. I think she worked with a lot of breast cancer patients and as you know, their skin gets really sensitive and there’s a lot of problems. And basically there wasn’t clothing or bras made for that sensitive skin. Or maybe they existed but they were ugly. That’s probably what it was, right? And women don’t want to wear ugly bras.
So I don’t know the whole story or like I’m probably not giving all the facts. But again, she saw a problem and decided to try to solve it, right? So I think that’s just to say, like, I think entrepreneurship at its core is seeing a problem and wanting to solve it. And that’s really valuable for people and people are willing to pay for that solution, right? That’s ultimately, I think, what we do.
When did you start Taryn Rose’s first shoe company? What year?
Taryn: So my first shoe company was launched in 1998. And you’ll find this really funny because problem solving goes up and down the whole cycle because I needed to go to Italy to a big trade show, a shoe trade show. Well, first of all, I didn’t know anything about shoe manufacturing in Italy, but I knew I wanted to create a luxury shoe line, right?
So I remember that my sales associate at Barney’s would always talk about her friends from Italy who came to visit her every August. So I went to her and I said, hey, do you think your friends know anyone in the shoe industry? And luckily, one of them owned a shoe factory and the other one owned a tannery. So I was plugged in and she’s like, no worries, they’re going to meet you at the shoe show in Milan.
Then I go to book the trip and my travel agent, we used to have travel agents back in those days, said, honey, the closest I can get you to Milan is an hour away. You have the fashion week then the furniture show, and then this big shoe show. There’s no room in Milan for you.
Bonnie: Oh, like hotels you mean?
Taryn: Yeah, hotels, yeah.
Bonnie: Everything was booked? Oh wow.
Taryn: Yeah. She’s like, the closest hotel is at least an hour away. So it was my first time to Milan, I’m like, no, I don’t want that. So I called up my sales associate at Gucci because I’m like, well, they’re based in Milan, they must have a block of rooms saved somewhere. And sure enough, she got me the Gucci rate, which was dirt cheap, at a five-star hotel there in Milan. And that’s how I got there.
Bonnie: Well, you know what? This is such a great example. I just feel like you’re saying so many pearls and I just want to pick them out just to share with people. What you basically said is how important your network is and relationships and also just asking.
Taryn: Yes.
Bonnie: Right, it’s so easy to just not ask. You’re just like, oh, I don’t know. But I think it also goes to show that in this world, most people are pretty helpful.
Taryn: Yes. And they are particularly helpful if you have a specific ask. So it would have been different if I’d gone to Heather at Gucci and said, oh, I would love to go to Milan, can’t find any hotel rooms. But I specifically called her up, I didn’t waste her time. I said, Heather, is it possible at all to get a hotel room from this date to this date that Gucci may have blocked for their people?
So I think that that’s key. When you do an ask, be very specific. And I know that if someone’s asking me something, if they are specific and they know exactly what they need, they’re much more likely to get a result for me because I’m so busy that I’m like, I’m not really sure how I can help you.
Bonnie: Right, and you’re not going to take the time to think about it. You know what I mean?
Taryn: Yeah. Yeah. So if you’re looking for mentorship, that’s different. And then I can allot a different kind of headspace to that. But when you’re asking things, I find it’s more effective to be very specific.
Bonnie: I think that’s such a good point. Yeah, because otherwise you’re kind of putting the onus on the person you’re asking to be like, well, I don’t really know what this person needs.
Taryn: Right.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay, continue with your story. To me, I’m like this is so fascinating, I want to hear the rest. So what happens in Milan?
Taryn: So here I am in Milan, and this is 97, so we didn’t have cell phones with us, but somehow we managed to find each other.
Bonnie: Wait, can we just pause because you and I are not that different in age. And I remember when there were no cell phones, because like the people we’re talking to, they’re probably just like, what? They just don’t know about – Like, I don’t even know how we met up with people, if you think about it.
Taryn: Exactly.
Bonnie: Like, how did this happen? Anyway, go on.
Taryn: And I was at this giant trade show, huge. And they said, oh, meet us at this door, we’re two Italian guys in white shirts. But somehow we managed, right? There was no location dropping, nothing. Somehow we managed that and the rest is history. They said, okay, we can help you. It was probably something they regretted because then they started getting faxes from me. And this is, okay, Italy was behind us and so they had those faxes that were those like rolling paper. It wasn’t sheets of paper.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Taryn: So they took a picture once of the roll of paper of all my instructions and they pulled it out into the street because it was so long.
Bonnie: Oh my God.
Taryn: Yeah, all of you younger people, we actually did those things back in the day.
Bonnie: Oh my God. I mean, I guess technically the fax machine still exists, right? But they’re dying. I think the printer technically has a fax function, but I’ve never used it.
Taryn: Well, in doctor’s offices, this is what I’m always perplexed by, why are they still using faxes?
Bonnie: Well medicine is like 30 years behind, basically.
Taryn: Right.
Bonnie: Okay, so they agreed to help you make your shoes.
Taryn: Yes. And I worked with one of their friends, a designer there. And during this time was the first time I met Enrico, my current partner. Enrico Cuini is my current partner in business as well as in life. So the first time we met was back in those days.
The other funny thing was I got a suite at this hotel that Gucci set me up with, and those guys, because they didn’t plan ahead, didn’t have a hotel room unless they stayed like an hour away. So I said, okay, you guys can sleep in the living room part of my suite.
Bonnie: I love stories like that because they didn’t make a specific ask, right?
Taryn: Right, right. Well, I found out. They said, oh, we have to drive. And I’m like, where are you guys going? And they said, oh, our hotel is very far away. So I said, okay, why don’t you guys just sleep on the couch in my suite, it’s okay.
But on the fun side they took me to what they called disco, so nightclubs. And because I was jet lagged anyways I was out dancing until five o’clock in the morning. I’d go back, take a nap, shower and be back at the trade show by 10 o’clock. I mean, these days I’d be like, I have to get some sleep.
Bonnie: Yeah, I don’t know about you but I’m like, it’s 9 p.m. It’s time for me to get ready for bed.
Taryn: Right, right. Yeah, so I was what, 29, 28? And I even told my daughter, who’s 23 now, I said while you’re young you should go to Europe and just live it up, whether it’s a month or a year or whatever. That’s something that once you have kids, you’re not going to be as likely to do.
So it was my way of melding my sort of love for adventure and learning new things with something that I already knew and with a lot of things that I didn’t know. So I started with just my own funding, credit cards. But then soon I realized, oh, I’m going to need a loan. So I approached the SBA.
Bonnie: Small Business Administration for people who don’t know.
Taryn: Yes, yes. And I had no idea what a business plan was. So I got books, I read up on what they were. And after that, subsequently, a few years later they came out with software where you could just plug in your information and it generated the business plan for you as part of a template.
So I did everything the hard way. But I had no other choice, that’s how we did it in those days. So I just read up on how to write a business plan. The SBA offered courses on how to write a press release. So I just sort of learned. Oh, they taught me how to use an Excel sheet. I had no idea. I graduated from medical school without ever learning how to use an Excel sheet or a fax machine.
Bonnie: I’m wondering, and I’m guessing other people wonder, like, did you have a job at this point as a doctor? Like, were you working in a clinic?
Taryn: No.
Bonnie: Okay.
Taryn: No, no, I was not working because I was studying for my boards. And then I said, well, I’m a bit ADHD, so I couldn’t study 24/7, around the clock. So I said, oh, I’m going to spend some time doing this. And I ended up writing my business plan overnight. For a week, I would just stay up. Again, I had that kind of energy at that point, and I was used to being on call anyways.
Bonnie: Right.
Taryn: So I did get the business loan, and I’m proud to say that 10 years later I was honored for their 50th anniversary as one of their top performers in the SBA.
Bonnie: Oh, amazing.
Taryn: Yeah.
Bonnie: So another thing I want to say is business skills, because, again, this is something I see a lot with doctors who are like, oh, I think I want to start, like they have an idea. There’s a lot of fear, right? That’s like a whole podcast episode. They’re like, well, I don’t know anything. I’m like, of course you don’t know anything, you didn’t learn business. But it’s learnable.
So what you just said, now they’ve got the internet, so it’s so much easier. They don’t have to go buy books on how to write business plans. You could just plug it into chat GPT, right? I mean, it’s so insane how much easier it is. But I think just saying, like, hey, this is a skill you don’t know, but it’s something you can learn. And guess what? You’re really good at learning.
Taryn: Yes, we are natural learners. If people focus on only downsides, then at least put in your plus side column that you’re a good learner. That should be an advantage for you.
Bonnie: And discipline and hard work. We’re used to that, too.
Taryn: Exactly. And you’re good at assessing risk. With risk taking, I think that it’s important to be balanced. At that time, I was able to take the risk because I was married to a radiologist and we didn’t need my income as a physician to survive. And so I can very much relate to people who say, well, the family is living on my income, because subsequent to that I got divorced and I was a single mom for many years. So I totally understand. So it’s not one size fits all.
As I was advising someone recently, I said you’re an ER doc, you have shifts, so you can work on your business during your off days and not have to give up your income until the company is ready to support you and your lifestyle on your own.
Bonnie: That’s such a good point, because I do think that’s a big advantage we have as doctors, is that we do make a great income. Obviously, some specialties there’s less “free” time, but it’s like you can sort of bootstrap and sort of grind, which we’re also good at. Hopefully it’s temporary until things get off the ground and you start making money, then you can go part time.
And not every doctor wants to leave medicine. A lot of them are like, I love this business, and maybe it’s related to their practice. I still want to practice, but I can practice a lot less and be fulfilled because I think a lot of doctors are feeling less fulfilled in general.
So you said doctors are good at risk taking.
Taryn: Well, they’re good at assessing risk.
Bonnie: Oh, assessing risk. Yes.
Taryn: Yes because I find that some entrepreneurs are completely unrealistic and they’re not understanding that the risk they’re taking on is way too high for their particular situation. That’s why I said in my case at that point it wasn’t like I had to pay the rent based on what I was making, because I actually didn’t make money for myself from the shoe company until three years later.
Bonnie: That’s actually another point, because I think, well, I think it depends on the business. So I’m in the course creation, you could say coaching business. And what I’ve noticed, because I do talk to a lot of physicians who become coaches, and they naturally ask me questions. And I’ve noticed there’s this expectation to make money right away, because some people do.
But I would say most people, I don’t know the percentage, but my guess is most people don’t. In the regular business world, people know and expect that they won’t make money for a while.
Taryn: Whether you’re investing in a business or you’re starting a business, the rule of thumb is it’s very unlikely that you will actually make money in the first two years, just as a generalization. Of course, there are exceptions. I mean, Amazon didn’t make a profit for years.
Bonnie: I think they don’t realize that you have to put money in, capital, to feed a company. And I think for online coaching, that capital, you don’t have to have physical space. You don’t need to buy ingredients or stuff like that, but you do have to learn things about business.
Taryn: Every company needs capital, and capitalization is super important for people to learn. It’s something that we are not taught about. And I think the sooner people accept that, the better off they will be. And I remember even in the second year I was seeing a profit, but I would ask my accountant, so how come I’m always short on cash?
So there’s a huge difference between cash flow and profitability.
Bonnie: Oh, yeah, I know.
Taryn: That’s a whole other thing. And I think anyone going into business really needs to figure that out and accept that. So you may be profitable, but not cash flow positive. And you need the capital to support you through that phase.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Taryn: It took me a while to figure that out.
Bonnie: Yeah, no, exactly. This is just part of the – Even for me, because I teach personal finances, but business finances is different. There’s obviously correlations, but there’s a lot of differences. And I think it’s important, depending on the business model, because again, I think an online coaching business is pretty simple initially.
But I’m all about hiring the right experts or finding the right people to give me the information. Of course, I’m resourceful, I can Google it, but I’m just going to waste a lot of time. I obviously have a bookkeeper, but I have, I guess you could call him a fractional CFO, they give guidance. Because a bookkeeper is just keeping track of the books, right?
Taryn: Right. And if people start to freak out about it, just think of it as, I think of cash flow as blood flow, right? You have to keep the blood flowing in a body to keep it alive.
Bonnie: Yes, businesses need money, basically, is what you’re saying.
Taryn: Right. So basically worry about your blood flow before you worry about your kidney function. That’s how crucial it is.
Bonnie: Yeah. This is a side note, we actually invested in a business, it’s a bagel store actually. And everyone’s like, a bagel store? It’s not a regular bagel store, they make fashion bagels is the best way to describe it.
Yeah, the example I give, they make all different weird flavors, like fruity pebbles. They have a Cheetos bagel, that’s like their flagship. It’s a bagel made from Cheetos, so it’s orange. And then they put ghost pepper cream cheese on it. And then they put actual Cheetos on it. And then the top bagel, you know, the other half.
And when I first heard about this, I was like, this sounds cool, but also like, this is going to be disgusting. And then I actually tasted it and it was insanely good. I was shocked.
Anyway, one of Matt’s friends asked for franchise rights. He’s a serial entrepreneur. So I think it’s been two years and we’re actually getting our first like profit check this year.
Taryn: And if you want to do a business, first of all, I hope that there will be more and more physicians that go out on their own because starting your own practice is being an entrepreneur, there’s no doubt about that.
Bonnie: Yes, 100%.
Taryn: And my hope and goal would be to be able to work with the AMA to somehow help the doctors along that process because I think so many doctors would like to, but they’re sort of lost as to where to start. Maybe the AMA can offer a course on how to start a practice and things like that.
Bonnie: You would think that’d be a thing already.
Taryn: Exactly. I recently met a woman who is on the board of the AMA. And as I was talking, she’s like, oh my God, you have so many great ideas. I’m like, to me, what you guys need is to bring in a fresh perspective, which I think comes from entrepreneurs, right?
Bonnie: Yes.
Taryn: So my number one goal would be to see more and more physicians go out on their own to private practice. I know it’s scary, especially for the younger generation with 400,000 or 500,000 in debt. It’s very difficult. But maybe after you’ve paid off your debt, it’s something that you could think about.
I finished with 100,000 and I was like, oh, this is a lot. But everything is perspective.
Bonnie: I know, times have changed. When I tell people how much I had, they’re like, oh, it’s so much higher now. And I’m just like, that’s just insane to me. Technically, mine was like 160K, but I ignored it and then it ballooned to 260 by the time I finished residency. But that’s still lower than what people are –
Taryn: Yeah.
Bonnie: Okay, can we talk about the fun stuff and talk about your shoes?
Taryn: Okay. So I started in 98 and in the 10 years that I owned it, I grew to 40 million in revenues.
Bonnie: Wait a minute, can we just say how amazing that is?
Taryn: Thank you. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now that I’m starting a new business, I was like, oh my gosh, I’d be so happy with just 20 million in revenues because times have changed and it’s hard. So I was very fortunate. A lot of it is timing.
So at that time, I was able to reach out to the buyers directly. Now they’re all shut up in their offices. But when I was starting, my first account was actually Nordstrom. And what I did was I went to my sales associate at Neiman’s where I bought shoes. And I asked her, do you know of any good shoe sales rep?
And so she made the introduction. And I talked to them and they were very kind. They’re like, you can’t afford us, we make $120,000 a year. This was 25 years ago. You’re just starting out, so how about if we just give you a list of names and some guidance? Like, how lovely is that to share. I mean, that’s their trade secret.
So they gave me the name of the buyer, [inaudible] at Nordstrom down in South Coast Plaza, which is a major shopping mall here in Southern California.
Bonnie: Costa Mesa?
Taryn: Yep. Yeah, in Costa Mesa.
Bonnie: Yeah, I lived in Costa Mesa during residency.
Taryn: Oh, okay. So I went down there to the shoe department and I was just reading name tags and I found [inaudible] and I pitched her. And she’s like, oh, that sounds interesting, why don’t you come see me next week? And so that’s how I started.
And then once I got the first Nordstrom account – The good and bad of that time is that, yes, I could have a one-on-one face conversation with [inaudible], but she was in charge of one Nordstrom. It happened to be a very big store. But now they’ve all consolidated to there is a buyer for the region or even the whole US.
So once I got that account, I was able to talk to some independents who said, oh, I’m in Nordstrom. The independents are always wanting to know what’s the next thing. So I signed on, I think, seven accounts. So that’s how I got my start. And then it just grew from there.
And a funny story is that I was trying to get into Neiman’s. This was like my third year. The funny thing about Neiman’s was that I kept coming to see them and they kept saying no. And then finally, one of the buyers said, well, frankly, your shoes are not expensive enough. I was like, okay, no problem. The next season I came back and my prices were higher.
So my advice, and I hate sales. I’m not a salesperson. But I do know that some tenets of sales are persistence and listening to what their resistance is. If you can figure out why they’re saying no and have a solution for that reason, you’re much likelier.
I had a lot of help also on the press side. So I was on Oprah during the days when if you were on Oprah, you were made.
Bonnie: You were set.
Taryn: Yeah.
Bonnie: How did you get on Oprah?
Taryn: Oprah was doing a show about radical sabbaticals. So she had a lawyer who became a baker. She had me on. So it was all about how you can pursue your passion. I can still remember the call. I was like, are you kidding me? You want me on the show? It was fabulous. So I went from eight million in sales to 16 million in sales just from the Oprah effect.
Bonnie: That Oprah effect.
Taryn: Yeah, so it was huge because it was at that time, something completely novel. No one had done this.
Bonnie: Can you tell people exactly what was different about your shoe line? Because I know your shoe line, because I think I told you that I actually wore your shoe.
Taryn: Yeah.
Bonnie: And the reason why is I have really wide feet and you’re one of the few companies that really came in an actual wide size.
Taryn: Right.
Bonnie: A lot of companies will say like, oh, we do have a, but it’s really not, you know? So it was one of the few shoes I found that actually could fit and wouldn’t squeeze.
Taryn: Well, so when I started, shoes that were comfortable were ugly and cheap, right?
Bonnie: Yep.
Taryn: And then there I came along saying, well, shoes could be beautiful and high quality, luxurious and comfortable, which didn’t exist. That niche didn’t exist at that time. And so I somehow wedged my way in and took over the Ferragamo business because my styles were a bit more modern. Ferragamo had sort of relied too long on their little bow shoe, that bow pump. And then I also took away some market share from Tod’s because there’s only so many places you can wear a driving shoe to, right?
Bonnie: I never found their shoes appealing. I remember hearing they were popular and I looked at their shoes and I was like, who would wear these?
Taryn: Yeah. So mine were more feminine, but always with the underlying philosophy of comfort. So what people told me was that a lady would come in and she would buy a pair of Manolos for her special occasion and then buy Taryn Rose for her sort of business casual kind of look, casual look. So it was fantastic.
At the end of the 10 years, I was frankly burnt out because running a business is like doing a residency. It’s hard, hard work. And I also had three kids during this 10 years. There was just a lot going on. And I was completely exhausted and I got an offer that was really good. So I said why not sell?
Bonnie: To buy the company.
Taryn: To buy the company from private equity. And luckily I accepted it. And luckily, the negotiations went on for a year. And this is what people don’t realize, is a sale just doesn’t happen overnight. And I remember calling the lawyer up and saying, okay, why are we still negotiating? And they’re like, well, there’s still three more points. They’re minor, but we’re still negotiating.
I said whatever it is, if it’s minor, like you’re saying, just give it to them. I just want this over so I can go on with my life. And thank goodness I did that because I received my funds for the sale two weeks before the great recession. So had I not sped things along, the deal probably would have fell apart during the great recession. And I might’ve been in a lot of trouble because a lot of companies suffered during that time.
So after I sold, I was retired for a while. I had toddlers, so it was great to be able to spend time with them. So again, I was very lucky with my timing. Enrico nine years ago reached out to me. I can’t believe it’s already been nine years. And he said I have an idea for a new comfort technology. So I said, sure, I’ll take a look.
And when I saw what he created, I was like, wow, this is going to revolutionize the shoe industry, especially in high heels, because no one has quite really solved the high heel comfort problem because high heels have a specific physics that you have to counter and cushioning is not enough.
Bonnie: Do you remember the Nike, maybe it was Kenneth Cole, some company. I remember it was like –
Taryn: Cole Haan probably. Nike bought Cole Haan and they put the air technology –
Bonnie: The air, yes, I remember. And I remember being so excited because they sold it as like, this is amazing and comfortable. And I bought it and I was like, these are not comfortable.
Taryn: Cushioning is simply not enough because in an average high heel, only 20% of your foot is in contact with the shoe. So all that force is concentrated over that 20%. So pressure is equal to force divided by surface area, right?
Bonnie: You’re bringing in physics here?
Taryn: Yes. For those of you who said, why do I need to learn physics to go into medical school? Well, it was actually very helpful during ortho and in shoe making. But in our shoes, 80% of your foot is supported. This is in the Enrico Cuini line. We have our new technology called Active Lift in Alignment, ALIA. And so 80% of your foot is supporting your weight, so the pressure is dissipated across a much larger surface area.
The materials we use are carbon fiber and a nanotechnology resin, which is super high tech material. And that’s why our shoes are more expensive, but it really does work. It’s very effective.
And then once the pandemic set in and I was like, oh, what do we do? How do we sell online shoes that require so much fitting?
Bonnie: Well let’s mention that because I don’t think people know that they’re kind of custom made. So do you want to just mention that aspect real quick?
Taryn: Yes. So all of our shoes are customized to your feet. So we measure your feet and we make sure that there’s enough space. Like yesterday I saw a client who I could see the blisters and calluses on the top of her third and fourth toes, and they were longer than necessary. So she was buying shoes that were too short for those toes and just curling them up and then the upper would rub.
And I pointed that out. She’s like, yes, you’re exactly right. That’s what happens. I told her, when we make shoes for you, we are going to elongate this area for your third and fourth toes so they can have more space, more length. And so we look at a variety of things like that. We look at the proportions of your feet and so on. So we make shoes specifically for you. So we do this at events and we’ll be at your event in March, so we’re very excited.
When the pandemic hit and we had to shut down, I was like, this is not going to be good. So we started developing ways to standardize and create protocols on how to measure people’s feet. And eventually that led to our new AI enabled app, called ALIA AI, you can use at home and take three pictures of your feet and we can make the calculations.
Bonnie: Yeah, well, I think during the pandemic, the businesses that pivoted obviously thrived, right? And the businesses who were stuck on their business model and didn’t pivot, they really suffered/shut their doors, right?
So I guess the question is, and I know just from a client perspective, are you doing less in-person events because people can measure it?
Taryn: I wouldn’t say that we’re doing less. We’re being careful about the cost because actually our best year was during the pandemic from a revenues and a cost point of view, because all of the hotels were super cheap, airfare was super cheap. But now post pandemic, we’re seeing the hotel rates are super high.
Bonnie: Like for you guys doing events.
Taryn: For events, yeah. So again, I have to weigh the calculations on the costs versus the revenues in order to make sure that I stay profitable.
Bonnie: Of course.
Taryn: So the tool that we developed with the app is helpful for our events as well, because we can quickly measure people. We don’t have to rely only on Enrico or someone else trained to do that. It’s more consistent, right? So we’re able to see someone and give them a chance to try on shoes all within like 15 minutes, whereas it used to take like one hour.
So we’ve become more efficient. And I hope that by opening up more online sales, it gives people who can’t travel to one of our events, an opportunity to try our product.
Bonnie: Oh, no, totally. And I’m just thinking from, like I said, a user perspective, it obviously creates a higher quality, more intimate relationship between the client, you know, they get to meet the faces. Are you and Enrico always together at events or it just depends?
Taryn: I’m always at an event. Enrico, it depends on his schedule in Italy, because he also has to manage the manufacturing in Italy. All of our shoes are made in our own factory, we control everything.
Bonnie: Oh, amazing.
Taryn: Yeah, so we’ve invested a lot in buying the factory, buying all of the components.
Bonnie: Quality control.
Taryn: Yeah, it’s been very, very expensive. So basically, I’ve been able to scale by creating this app because at one pop up, I hired a tasker, a task rabbit. And luckily, he was quite tech savvy. I figured if I hired someone between the age of 20 to 26, they’re going to be great at using an app. And so his whole job was just using the app to get the photos. And then he would pass it on to one of our staff members or myself.
Bonnie: Yeah. And also, when you do these events, you bring a bunch of samples so people can see them. So I just think it’s this really fun experience. And the event we’re having at my conference is, obviously, they’re going to see all your shoes. So I think that’s just, because seeing something on a website, it’s great. But when you see the shoe in person, you are sort of more motivated. And then if they try it on, even though it’s not going to be an exact fit, obviously they can visualize it a lot more.
Taryn: Absolutely.
Bonnie: Obviously we’re going to have some bubbles there and it’s going to be kind of a social event, but also trying on shoes and stuff, so I’m excited. Plus, I definitely don’t consider myself a fashion stylist type person. I did go through a phase where I bought a lot of expensive shoes. And ever since I had, I think, a combination of like residency, being on your feet all the time, I think my feet got wider. And then I had Jack and they got even wider.
So I have these Christian Louboutins and Jimmy Choos that I simply cannot wear. I probably should sell them because they’re in great condition, because I literally have not worn them in years. And it’s very sad, they’re just sitting in my closet unused and very pretty.
Taryn: Well, if you have wide feet, Louboutin is probably the worst possible line for you because he creates shoes for very sleek, slim feet. And we all get caught up in the branding thing and wrapped up in, oh, if I buy Louboutins, I’m going to look like that model that’s wearing them. Well, actually, you’re just cramming your feet into a shoe that’s made for someone with a very narrow foot.
Bonnie: Yeah, yeah. And I have some friends who have multiple pairs of your shoes. And I’m just excited because, again, it’s going to be custom to my very wide foot. But also my shoe size is like five and a half, six, so it’s like, again, it’s so hard. I just stopped buying heels, I think. Or I just wear really low ones because I just can’t tolerate it anymore.
Taryn: Right, right.
Bonnie: Basically when I go to speak at a talk, I have my heels and then my flip flops are right next door. As soon as I get off the stage, I change.
Taryn: Well, if I had to guess, your feet are wide, but they’re flat. There’s not a whole lot of volume.
Bonnie: Yeah, they’re flat too, yep.
Taryn: Yeah, so it’s the worst possible combination. And many Asian women have this foot type.
Bonnie: Can you help us?
Taryn: Oh, absolutely. The problem is that designer shoes are created by usually Italian or French designers who use the typical measurements of a European foot, and they have a different foot proportion than Asian, Southeast Asians. I’ve seen it over and over again. So it’s really important that you go to someone that first understands feet because a lot of times if you walk into Neiman’s or Saks, wherever, those people, the SAs are trying their best, but they’re just not taught anything. And they’re going to sell you what’s in their inventory.
So they’re going to convince you that, oh, yeah, this 38 and a half fits you fine, but it may not fit you at all in some dimensions.
So our shoes are made with length, width, and volume all in consideration.
Bonnie: I think we’ve convinced everyone listening that they need a pair of shoes now, heels. The thing is not every woman is into it, like they’re more casual. But I feel like every woman usually wants one pair of heels to wear on specific nights.
Taryn: Exactly.
Bonnie: And they’re much more likely to wear it if it’s actually comfortable.
Taryn: Right. Yeah, you should have a nice pair of heels at all times in your closet for those occasions that warrant that.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay. Quick fashion advice, if someone listening is not into this and they’re like, okay – I’m just guessing, is the first basic shoe black?
Taryn: Either black or neutral.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Taryn: One of those. I think every woman should have a black heel to go with her little black dress. That’s what I would advise.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay, so this was such a fascinating conversation and just to learn about the whole history because I didn’t know all that stuff. I just knew you started Taryn Rose and then you sold it. Obviously, I knew about Enrico Cuini. And so anyone who’s interested, even if you’re not a shoe person, I would recommend you go to one of her events.
If you go to the website, what’s the website exactly?
Taryn: EnricoCuini.com.
Bonnie: Okay, and we’ll link it in the show notes. But I know that if you go there, you can see a list of events. And I just think it would be fun, whether you buy their shoes or not. You could see them in person. You’ll get to meet Taryn, obviously. And my guess is you’ll probably walk out with a pair of heels.
Taryn: And if you can’t make it to an event, our virtual appointments are really good. And usually Enrico is on those.
Bonnie: Oh, cool.
Taryn: Yeah.
Bonnie: It’s just so rare to actually get to meet the founders or the people in charge. It’s just not common that you can do that with a company. So I think that’s also really, really unique.
Okay, is there anything that we didn’t cover that you wanted to say?
Taryn: Well, I always end with my motto, which is I fear regret more than failure. So for any of you out there thinking, oh my gosh, what if I fail? Like what would really happen if you fail? And sometimes when you really look at that and you face the consequences of failure and realize, oh, it’s not so bad, then you’ll be okay to move on.
Bonnie: Compared to regret, like then that’s, I think when you say that, it just like pierces because I think we all kind of know, especially as doctors depending on your specialty, if you’re working with a lot of people towards end of life, that’s their biggest regret is –
Taryn: Right, right.
Bonnie: Yeah, their biggest regret is regret over not doing the thing.
Taryn: I have my airplane test, which is if I get on an airplane and I sit there and I think, okay, if this plane crashes, I’m at peace with that. Meaning I’ve lived a life where I don’t have regrets. I have everything set up for my kids and I know that they will be okay, then I’m at peace, right? So that’s my goal in life is to always get on a plane and be at peace.
I’ve actually gone through a kind of near death experience in the sense that I was hit by a car. And as I was flying up in the air, I thought, oh, this is it. This is going to be it. And I felt an immense relaxation and peacefulness during that moment. And I’m sure that that’s what saved me.
It was my fault. I ran across the street because I was trying to go get my divorce done. I was late.
Bonnie: You’re like, I got to sign those papers.
Taryn: Well, yeah, it took six months to get this court date.
Bonnie: Obviously, we’re very glad that you’re okay. That you’re still here with us.
Taryn: Yeah, me too.
Bonnie: So, okay, what’s the best way to reach you? Basically, we said your website, is there social media?
Taryn: My personal is @RealTarynRose on Instagram. And Enrico Cuini also has our Instagram.
Bonnie: All right, well, thanks so much for being here. This was such a fun conversation, and I’m excited to get a pair of shoes.
Taryn: Thank you. See everyone soon, bye.
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201: Take Control of Your Retirement Fund with Parker Pursell of eQRP
We are gearing up for our first annual Money and Wellness Conference for Female Physicians, and I’m showcasing another one of our wonderful sponsors for this event. This week, I’m joined by Parker Pursell, the CEO of eQRP. eQRP provides self-directed 401(k)s, and they’re a company I recommend to all of my clients.
If you’re looking to invest outside of the stock market but you don’t have the capital to get started, this is where eQRP can help you leverage your 401(k), 403(b), or even an IRA so you can invest the way you really want to and set yourself up for retirement.
If you want more control over your 401(k) or your IRA, this episode is for you. eQRP gives you the opportunity to avoid taxes and diversify your portfolio outside of Wall Street, and Parker is explaining how an investment vehicle like this is perfect for physicians who want to prepare for retirement as soon as possible.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- How a self-directed 401(k) differs from your regular 401(k).
- Why physicians need additional streams of income more than ever before.
- What makes eQRP a great option for high-income earners, business owners, and side hustlers.
- The extra flexibility in preparing for your retirement using eQRP.
- Why having control over where your money is invested is vital for building wealth.
- Some 401(k) mistakes you need to avoid.
- How eQRP can help save on your tax bill using their investment vehicle.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- eQRP: Website | LinkedIn
- Email any questions you have to Parker
- Passive Income MD
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hello everyone. We are gearing up for our first annual Money and Wellness Conference that’s taking place in early March at the gorgeous Miraval resort in Arizona. I know so many of you wanted to attend, but we sold out. And we were limited by the capacity of the conference room, frankly.
And so we actually just signed a contract for the 2025 one. It’s going to have much more capacity and we have a lot of flexibility because it’s a proper hotel with a proper conference section, versus Miraval which really isn’t meant for conferences, it’s really meant for smaller retreat type things.
So what we’re going to do is showcase our wonderful sponsors. Now, I was really picky about who could sponsor our conference. In fact, I personally reached out to trusted companies that I, for the most part, have personally worked with or know the company owner really well. And I had a lot of inquiries to sponsor my conference and I basically turned them down because I don’t know who they are. And I don’t want to recommend anyone that could potentially not be great.
So today’s sponsor is eQRP. Now, they are a company that I talk about a lot with my clients. They are a company that provides self-directed 401ks. We’re going to talk all about what that means, so don’t worry about that. But it’s a great resource if you are looking to invest in investments outside of the stock market but maybe you’re thinking, I don’t have any money. You do have money, it’s just largely inaccessible to you inside of a 401k or a 403b or maybe even an IRA.
And so the eQRP is a solution, a possible solution to that. And I personally have one. I’ve had it for, gosh, I don’t even know how long it’s been. It’s been like three or four years and I’ve been very happy with the service. So here’s my conversation with the CEO, Parker Pursell.
Bonnie: All right, welcome to the show. I’m so excited to have you. We had to reschedule this a few times, right? Why don’t you introduce yourself?
Parker: I’m Parker Pursell, CEO of eQRP. I’ve been working here for three years. I actually came into this company off of being unemployed. Most of my background was built in the customer service industry on the likes of Chick-fil-A. My family business is what I cut my entrepreneurial teeth on, learned a lot about really what money was, right? How it came in. I just never had an idea for how to keep it or how to grow it.
And so coming here to the eQRP three years ago, it really just changed my life for the better. And now I have the awesome opportunity to lead this company and really use my story as a banner to a lot of people that I think are kind of going through the same stage that I did, just different stages of life.
Bonnie: It’s so interesting, you were unemployed to CEO.
Parker: Yeah. I mean, it’s, you know, God has his hand on my journey, but I’m thankful. Like you just, you don’t change who you are, right? Your environment and circumstances may change, but who you are as an individual doesn’t change. So I just knew that at some point I was going to end up where I was supposed to. And I ended up where I did. But I’m just, I’m doing what I love. I’m really in my dream job. So I’m very thankful for the opportunity I have.
Bonnie: So let’s get right into it. So basically we’re talking about self-directed 401ks today, and we’re going to talk specifically about the eQRP. And this is something I talk to my clients a lot because they want to access capital for alternative investments.
And what I mean by that is something besides the stock market. They find out either working with me or on their own, that there are faster ways to get the cashflow back versus like waiting for 30 or 40 years. Because these days people want income that’s not dependent on their primary job sooner than retirement. And it’s also a smart financial move, right? So that you have multiple streams of income in case one dries up, right? And my clientele, female physicians, medicine is not as stable or glamorous as it was. So I think doctors are really looking for options.
So I found out about even the concept of a self-directed 401k, it was probably through another financial blogger friend, actually I think it was Peter Kim of Passive Income MD. And he introduced me to Damion. Was Damion the CEO before you?
Parker: Yeah, Damion is the founder of the company.
Bonnie: Okay. I’m sure he’s got a lot on his plate now, so that’s why he needed a CEO.
So let’s talk about what a self-directed 401k is versus – Well, before we even go into that, I just want to be specific that this is for someone who either has a business or as you said, a business activity. So why don’t you define what a business activity is?
Parker: Yeah. So solo 401ks, the easiest way to describe it and who they’re for is for people who are high income earners, side hustlers, people who need a place to park money to save on their taxes, right? And so what the IRS, how they lay it out, you have to be conducting activity that would lead to income generation.
And that could be literally anything. You could be an affiliate marketer. You could be a TikTok dancer that’s shooting out a film, like you’re trying to earn income and you can show that activity that would thus lead to producing income.
So for you in particular, in your group there’s a lot of 1099 individuals out there that are performing medical services for different clinics, or they’re hopping around or either they’re W2’d and then they’re moving to the next job, or you’re a business owner as well and you’ve got employees and there’s ways for you to do that too with us.
But the self-directed 401k is awesome because it gives you a lot of flexibility in what you want to invest in. And if you are making any type of 1099 income, then you qualify. So it’s pretty easy. Or you’ve got another business that you’ve set up for yourself and it’s just you, you’re a solopreneur, you qualify for it.
Bonnie: Okay, and then what I want to say is I do think a lot of physicians do have 1099 income because some of them speak, right? And that’s 1099 income right there. Some of them do surveys. And so I would say a lot of physicians can qualify or figure out how to qualify if they really want this investment vehicle.
Okay, so you said earlier that it gives you a lot of flexibility. So let’s talk about the difference between me opening up a solo 401k at, well, I actually had one at TD Ameritrade, which is now Charles Schwab versus opening a self-directed.
Parker: Yeah. So self-directed is very important to understand because a lot of entities will sell you the idea of self-directed and what you want isn’t what they’re selling, but they know what you’re actually doing. It’s just a way to get you into their system and self-direct different stocks. That’s not what many people like yourself are asking. They’re like, I want to invest in things outside of the stock market.
Therefore, with our organization, what’s awesome is that you get to have checkbook control. So you have a bank account set up with your funds, your retirement money, where you can wire it out, send it to real estate syndications. You can do private lending. You can invest in oil and gas. There’s so many things that you can invest in, but that’s truly self-directed.
Now, whatever Schwab or Ameritrade or these people sell you as self-directed, it’s not. And we’ve had people come to us with that issue that you just said, I was sold this and this is what they told me. And then when I came back and asked them, hey, I want to go invest in this opportunity, they’re like, no, you can’t do that. You can go invest in these mutual funds, but not real estate or any of these other things.
So you have to really understand the tool that you’re getting and be very clear and ask pointed questions in the process to make sure that you have the right thing to do what you’re trying to do.
Bonnie: Oh, that’s so interesting. I didn’t know that companies would sell a self-directed, but they’re basically like, well, it’s sort of self-directed, but not really self-directed.
Parker: Correct. It’s like, well, the advisor is not directing it. You are, but you aren’t taking it out of the system, which is where the pain point is for most people. And I say this a lot, what got you here today isn’t going to get you to where you want to go tomorrow. So you have to be able to adapt and change.
And I think that’s true for the retirement industry in and of itself. I think that’s why you’re seeing a lot of people pay attention to this self-directed approach, because the system that they were sold under, they’re getting to a point in their life where they’re watching all these things happen around them. Washington, just for whatever reason, has got stickum on their hands with the money printer press and they can’t take it off. And so they are being affected by a lot of policies and legislation. Things are being pushed through.
So, you know, really nobody’s going to care about your money more than you do. Therefore, the two things that you need to really set yourself up for success is, first, you have to get control, right? So that’s where most people are like, well, I don’t know how to do that, right? Well, good for them, we know how to do that.
Secondly, education. Now what, right? So the now what is just as important. You know, think of your journey, Bonnie, and how you got to where you did. You started off like most people where you hit a pain point and made a decision to change direction. And then now your landscape of investment opportunities is so vast because you took time to really understand what else is out there and learn how to do it.
And so for us, we’re not trying to get in the way of people where they’re wanting to go. I like to use it like we come alongside, right? The advisors will tell you what to do, we teach people how to do it. And so you’re the hero of your own journey, which is ultimately where you want to go. We want to get you where you want to go.
So I’ll get on a soapbox sometimes talking about that, but because I feel it and we talk with people every single day that feel the same thing. And they have to know that there is another way, and the places they try to get their money from are just going to tell them, eh.
It’s Hotel California, it’s easy to get in, right? When you give them their money, they make it super easy for you. Then when you want to get it out, they’re like, sorry, you got to jump through these 80 loopholes to get your money out. And they end up staying there because they’re frustrated.
Bonnie: Yeah. I mean, this is definitely an education thing because like I said, so many people don’t know what this is. Can we talk about the difference between this versus a self-directed IRA? I get this question all the time.
Parker: Yeah, so it’s a good question because understanding the tool that you’re using and what you’re trying to accomplish is equally important, right? And so the 401k structure in and of itself, the way the IRS lays it out is just more flexible, right?
The IRA structure is really open to anybody, right? So you don’t have to have a “business activity” to open up a self-directed IRA. Contribution limits are lower. And then also when you start getting your money into a Roth IRA, it’s stuck. Like you can’t move it outside of a Roth IRA once it’s there. So if you wanted to move it to another vehicle and self-direct it, you couldn’t do it. You can move it to a self-directed IRA, but you couldn’t move into another 401k.
So I’m not going to get too far in the weeds with that, but just understanding that there are mass differences and as a passive investor, especially someone that’s looking to invest in real estate, there are implications to using debt within your retirement plan. And so one big thing that we tell people is that in the 401k industry you aren’t subject to the UBIT triggered UDFI tax. So like if I go out and raise money for –
Bonnie: Well let’s define that first.
Parker: Yeah, so UBIT is unrelated business income tax. And then the UDFI is unrelated debt financed income. So you’ve got a business that’s using debt, right? And so if I go out and take, let’s go I put 20% down on a multifamily property and I take 80% of debt out, right? So when your returns come back, Bonnie, if you’re using an IRA product that is investing in this deal, then you are going to be subject to paying equal profits up to the debt leverage.
So 80% of your profits that you get back on that deal are going to be taxed up to the level of debt taken out. So since 80% of the debt was taken out, then 80% of your profits are going to be taxed up to 37%. And so what does that mean to me as an investor? Well, what it means is that if you’re in a 401k tool or a product, right, is that you aren’t subject to paying that.
Therefore, instead of paying Uncle Sam, your distribution, your hard-earned money is going to them for whatever reason. Now the 401k side of things, you aren’t subject to paying that. So now in perpetuity, you’re taking potentially $30,000, instead of giving it to Uncle Sam, now you’re placing it in another opportunity, which is now earning you more income towards your number that you want for the end of your life, right?
So that is so important in the education, right? I’m just pointing one thing out, but that’s one thing that people miss. And if you’re in a deal right now with a self-directed IRA, you can move it over and completely miss that tax. There’s no taxable event when you’re moving from an IRA to a 401k, but just knowing that piece of information could save you thousands and thousands and hundreds of thousands of dollars in perpetuity.
Bonnie: Yeah. Basically, I tell people, don’t open a self-directed IRA. That’s usually what I tell people. I guess it might be the only option if they really have no business activity and really don’t want to bother with it. But even just hearing the numbers, right, part of me is just like, I don’t want to say make it up, but do something.
Parker: Yeah. And we can help any and everybody, right? So there are times where people come in and all they have is a Roth IRA or an inherited IRA, but they’re still stuck with the same feeling of their money not doing what they want it to do.
So they can put it in a self-directed tool that we can help get them set up with, right? But the reality is the 401k is where you want to grow into if you can, right? And so sometimes it’s a journey for people to get to where they want to go.
But the eQRP and what we’re designed to do is help people get clear about their situation with where they are, get a clear picture of where they want to go and then give them a roadmap to say, hey, here’s the tools, here’s the education, here’s the resources available to you to accomplish the thing you want.
Bonnie: Yeah. Do you guys offer a self-directed IRA?
Parker: So we work with different entities that offer that. And the reason we do is because we really asked ourselves a question of, there’s people who fundamentally are at the point where they want to change direction, right? And now, depending on your investment opportunities, you can still invest in all the things that a self-directed 401k can, right? But they just need the education to help start putting their money to work elsewhere.
So they’re aware that going into a real estate deal that they’re going to be subject to this, right? But to them, if they get to invest in a real estate opportunity versus a mutual fund, they’re going to take that every day. So our goal is that hopefully if they start generating that 1099 income, that we can start migrating them over to the superior product, which is the 401k.
And we take care of all that for our people. So there’s no brain damage in the setup process. It’s super simple. But I don’t feel like people should be denied an opportunity to get to where they want to go. And as we’ve evolved as a company, it’s more of like, how can we continue to serve people and give them the tools that they need to help get them to where they want to go?
So we’re on a mission to help free people. And so we continue to adapt and help serve in bigger and better ways.
Bonnie: Yeah. I learned the term money jail from Damion, actually. And then when I teach that concept, my clients are like, oh my God, you’re right. My money’s in money jail. What I mean by that is it’s stuck in a 401k or 403b, which has a lot of rules in terms of when you could take it out. And so people are frustrated when they find out that, or when they decide like, hey, I want to invest in these other things. I have all this money in this account, but I can’t take it out, right?
You know, when the Cares Act happened a few years ago, that was a great way for people to actually tap into there. So I had a lot of clients who did that to put a down payment on a rental property, for example.
Parker: Yeah, if you’re working at a W-2 job right now and you’re contributing to that plan, you can’t take it out until you’re severed from service. But if you’ve worked at any other organization that you’ve left or you’re no longer working there, you have access to all that money that’s sitting there.
And the reality is they just continue to roll it over either into a rollover IRA, or they just put it in your next company sponsored plan. But you have access to that money. And a lot of times, like what’s great is we’ve done this, we’ve systemized the process, we know what questions to ask. When we get on the phone with these custodians, the thing that actually limits you, who has that money, is the person on the other side that’s not educated about what they can actually do, which is sad.
Their education is keeping you from getting to where you want to go. And what you want to do is legal. It’s completely within the scope of the IRS. But they’re like, nope, can’t do this. And we’ve gotten to the point of threatening legal with some of these custodians because they just say no because they’re just reading a script sheet in front of them. They aren’t really critically thinking of like, oh, could this person be right?
Bonnie: Yeah, I rolled over old company 401ks into the solo 401k. So I think it’s important to let people know that, yeah, when you leave a job – Actually a lot of my clients have multiple 401ks scattered around because they haven’t consolidated it. And then they come into my world, they’re like, yeah, it would be easier if I just had one account to log into.
Parker: Umbrella it. Umbrella it all into one thing.
Bonnie: Yeah, exactly. And then also if they do have a business activity, I let them know like, hey, you could roll it over. And the two ways that I’m aware of, tell me if there’s more, is you can just fill out some paperwork, which is what I did, where you transfer it in kind. Well, this is for a regular solo 401k. Self-directed, you’d have to sell it first. Or you could actually withdraw it. And then as long as you deposit it within, is it 30 days, 60 days?
Parker: 30 days.
Bonnie: Yeah, it won’t count as a distribution. So that would be a tragedy if you didn’t make that deadline.
Parker: The brain damage we take care of for people anyway, and our systems have gotten better, the services that we offer have gotten way better. So it’s like we do all the hard, heavy lifting for the individual when they come in, which is, to be quite honest, worth its weight in gold because if you don’t know, it’s very frustrating and stressful.
But also something I want to mention is that people who are business owners and have employees as well, most people just think, oh, well, I can’t have a self-directed plan and invest in all the things that I want to, right, in these investments, real estate, you name it. But we’re able to do that for members out there as well.
So people in your community, Bonnie, if you have someone asking you like, hey, I’ve got six employees in this business, they can self-direct their company plan and invest all that money that they’re putting in for themselves, but also their employees, and help them go invest in these things, too.
And there are states right now that are mandating that companies ought to take the company – I don’t know the exact terminology, but they’re basically giving away the company for 401k or state 401k, or they can go get something else. But they’re mandated that they have to. I think Colorado is one of them, there’s some other states. California wouldn’t surprise me if that’s one of them that you have to offer this to your employees.
So the more you know, right? And there’s a lot of people that are looking for that. And we’re the only firm in the country that does it right now. So we have business owners with employees that are loving it.
Bonnie: I just want you to clarify what you mean by you’re the only company that provides this service. Because there are other companies that offer self-directed, as we talked about, right?
Parker: Correct. So specifically being for business owners that have employees.
Bonnie: Oh, got it.
Parker: So like a safe harbor plan, so you have to meet safe harbor laws. It’s a little more antiquated, but we’ve got a partner that we work with.
Bonnie: More brain damage?
Parker: Yeah. Yeah, more brain damage. Like I said, I’m not going to go into the weeds of it, but it’s complicated. And for us, like culturally, the reason that we’ve gotten to where we did is because we just kept pushing ahead, trying to figure out how to give the people the solution to their pain point. So there is no other company to my knowledge, and we’re out there in the space all the time, that is offering this very thing because the brain damage happens when you’re working with compliance and then also with somebody who is trying to figure out alternative investments.
And most people just don’t want to touch it because they’re, you know, well, this group just wants to stay in their own niche, do their thing and not worry about getting creative with really helping people out.
Bonnie: Yeah, and also doctors are busy. They don’t have time to figure out how to do all this stuff, you know? And we don’t want to.
Parker: Yeah. I mean, I look at the leaves in my backyard and don’t get me wrong. It’s like, when you start elevating like time is money, then you can just allocate like, well, if I got to pay a guy to come, you know, $500 to come in my backyard and clean up all the leaves from fall, like I could be spending that time with my family or my kids. And to me, it’s like a no brainer. Yeah, it’s worth $500 of my time or whatever the thing is.
So we really hammer down on the customer service portion and really want to make sure that we’re taking care of our members and taking care of all that brain damage because it is frustrating. But we’re with you every step of the way. So it’s really quick just once you decide to go, we put that money in a place for you to start sending it out. So all you’re worrying about is where am I going to put this money in the next investment?
You can spend time focusing on the things you need to focus on, right? Like your due diligence, underwriting whatever deals you have come across your table and then just let us handle all the back office stuff for you.
Bonnie: Yeah. I think it’s safe to say that nobody loves paperwork.
Parker: No, I hate it.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay, well, it’s good to know that it can grow with the company. I don’t have an employee right now, but I probably will within the next year. And so it’s nice to know that I still had the opportunity to use the eQRP product.
So Solo 401ks, they don’t have ERISA protection. Let’s talk about that and then how the eQRP helps with that.
Parker: So I’m not well versed in ERISA laws. But for instance, like safe harbor, I use that in particular because the firm that we work with has an ERISA attorney on file that basically just makes sure that we are not violating anybody’s individual rights when it comes to them having a plan. Everybody’s protected. Everybody has the same options that the employer has.
And so for us, the way that we’ve structured our plan basically keeps you in compliance with that. So we’ve built it to where you are protected.
Bonnie: Yeah. And like nobody listening needs to know exactly – I mean, you could look it up, it’s an acronym. But yeah, once you start throwing up acronyms, people’s eyes usually glaze over. But I think the only thing people need to know is that the solo 401k doesn’t have the same protections as an employer based and eQRP has done some magic so that’s not true for the eQRP. That’s the best way to say it.
Parker: We figured out the brain damage for you.
Bonnie: Yes, exactly. There you go. I’m going to use that term all the time now.
Okay, is there anything else that we haven’t talked about that you want to talk about or mention?
Parker: No. I mean, I think when we start talking about where you’re at today, right, if you’re feeling anxious, if you’re feeling like there’s got to be a better way, it all just starts with a conversation, right? It starts with your community. It starts with mentors like you, Bonnie, people in your community.
You’re a, I say a beacon of hope for people because you’ve experienced things, you understand things, you know things. And when you think of a teacher or mentor, like Damion’s been to me, when I come up with a problem and I need a solution, I go to someone who’s either done it or has experienced the feeling that I have.
And so, you know, we can’t predict the future. We don’t know what’s going to happen. We never will, but we can always be ready. And I think one of the main takeaways is that if you can put yourself in a position to be flexible, which is what this plan provides you, you can pivot, right? If you get uncertain about what’s happening in the stock market, then you can take your funds from that, put it in a position to then go maybe buy gold and silver, right?
So you can do everything that you’re currently doing with the eQRP, you just can do more, right? So if you want to stay in the market, you can, but you can have a portion of your portfolio to go be doing other things. And so being flexible and nimble is super important because if you’re trapped in one thing, then you’re just left hoping that it works out.
And Damion talks, he uses this word called hopium that a lot of people smoke. And he’s like, if people are just smoking hopium 24/7, that’s all they’re going to get, is just a hopium high. But when you layer the education with the right tool and in the right community and people that have surrounded you, you can really do some amazing things.
So if you’re out there struggling, trying to figure it out or you just need help, want any information, we’re here to help work through your personal situation. So there’s no phone call that we take, it could be about your money, and sometimes it could be about family stuff going on because it’s all attached and connected to what’s happening in your finances.
Bonnie: What can you invest in with an eQRP? We don’t have to name all of it, but what are the most common things you see your clients and what can’t you invest in?
Parker: Yeah, so big asset classes you can invest in, most popular, I’d say, real estate, you got commercial, you got industrial, oil and gas, you can do private lending, you can do single family rental, invest in businesses. So for instance, we have an opportunity called FrameTec, it’s a manufacturing business. But a lot of people don’t know, you pass a lot of businesses on your drive to work that retirement funds are being invested in to support those businesses and startups.
And so what you can’t invest in is collectibles, things like artwork, wine, NFTs. I say NFTs in particular because it was a really hot topic and people were trying to buy them. But there’s still a lot of gray in that area. You can invest in Bitcoin and those things, but you start getting in that weird space. I always say, if it’s gray, stay away because the IRS is always going to say you’re guilty until proven innocent. So just be passive, stay with what you know, right?
There’s a lot of shiny objects out there, but our team’s here to answer those questions. So you’re not left on your own when you’re out investing. You can call us and say, hey, I’ve got this opportunity to invest in, I just want to understand how I can do this or if I can. And sometimes the way that the question is asked, we can get you what you want, we just have to do it a different way.
So that hopefully provides some clarity. There is a laundry list of maybe other things, but the filter is what’s more important. And our team can filter those investment opportunities to give you an appropriate answer.
Bonnie: Yeah. So what I’m really hearing, and I’ve experienced this as a client, is you’re not just a servicer that’s like, okay, it’s open, bye. Basically, you guys are knowledgeable and resourceful so that when people have any questions, which is, you know, at least general customer support, you obviously have that down, but also can answer questions about what you can invest in. Which technically is basic customer support, but a lot of companies don’t necessarily give that.
And also accessibility, right? Like you’ll actually hear back from a real person in a timely manner, right?
Parker: Yeah. And what’s cool is that we’re all on our own financial journeys ourselves, right? Like when I look at where I was three years ago and where I am today, it’s just wild thinking I was making some cash on the side, doing some power washing, and then now I am where I am.
And so everyone in our company shares that cultural value, right? And we all know that the person on the other side of the line is trying to get to where we want to go too. So being available is so key and it’s important. And so for us, like there are things that we come across that we don’t know, which is fun. Like when somebody brings an opportunity that says, hey, I want to invest in this. And we say, I don’t know, we’ve never seen that before. But it doesn’t mean we can’t find an answer and we’ll chase it down as much as we can. So we learn along the way, which is fun as well.
Bonnie: What differentiates your company versus the myriad of other self-directed companies that also claim checkbook control? Because you’re not the only company that has checkbook control, right?
Parker: Correct. And there are a lot of other like products out there, right? Super simple to go set up a self-directed 401k or self-directed IRA elsewhere. But like I said, that’s the first step in the journey, right? And then the second step is now what, right? You’re left really to kind of fend on your own.
And so for us as a company, we’ve really doubled down on the people that are here, right? We have institutional knowledge here at our organization where I would say like the average – We didn’t really start hiring a bunch of people until 2020. Like that’s when we started bringing in more and more people. So we’re not a legacy product. Like we’re not putting something on the market to just ride it out and hope it works out.
We’re constantly asking what else, what else, what else? How can we serve you better? What else can we provide? How can we put more educational information in front of you? And so we’ve essentially carried this mantra going into this year, like our goal is to just give away the self-directed retirement game for free.
Meaning through our education platform, we’ve got newsletters that are about to start coming out. We’ve got podcasts that are rolling where we talk about just money psychology or different asset classes. Like it’s just conversational, but most people just don’t know.
And so can they provide the tool to you? Yes. Can they give you basic customer service? Yes, but they’re all scripted. Like for us, we’re truly trying to hunt down the problem and find the appropriate solution for you, and that’s never going to go away. I worked at Chick-fil-A, so I like to say that I know a thing or two about customer service. And I would say for us, we bend over backwards for members to help get them what they want and get them to where they want to go.
So we aren’t going to be the same company this year, Jan 24 that we’re going to be in Jan 25 and so on and so forth. It’s just not who we are. It’s not who Damion is. So if you’re not growing, you’re dying. And that’s our rally cry as a company.
Bonnie: Yeah. I mean, Damion, he’s all about growth mindset and growing and becoming your best self. So I do like that about him.
Okay, I think we’ve covered everything. So I’ll let everyone know the best way – Well, basically it’s wealthymommd.com/eqrp, that’s all lowercase. And that is my affiliate link, so I want to put that out there as a disclosure. And, of course, we’re so grateful that you’re a sponsor of our first Money and Wellness Conference. We’re really grateful for that. I know it’s going to be a great resource because there are real estate talks and I know people are going to be like, I don’t have money.
Parker: You think you don’t have money.
Bonnie: Yeah, exactly. You think you don’t, yeah. So it’ll just be great to offer a solution, because it is a solution that so many people are just not aware of. And when they find out, they’re like, whoa, this is amazing to be able to access hundreds of thousands of dollars, potentially, right?
Parker: Yeah.
Bonnie: All right, see you next week, everyone.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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200: Dealing with the Unexpected with Karen Leitner
Today I’m joined on the podcast by my good friend Karen Leitner! Karen is a primary care doctor and certified life coach who helps women physicians feel better and happier in their lives. We’ve both had our fair share of experiences that didn’t go as we’d expected, so we’re getting into some real talk about a couple of recent incidents and discussing why it’s never too late to change things up.
There are tons of lessons to be learned when things don’t go perfectly. It’s okay to still be annoyed about something going wrong, but especially as doctors, we feel like we can’t complain about our lives. However, fully processing what’s going on is the key to finding the positives in any situation.
Tune in this week to discover how we deal with situations where nothing is going how we’d planned. We’re sharing the pressure we’re under as physicians to never acknowledge when we need a break, why it’s never too late to change, how we handle negative feedback, and you’ll learn some super useful coaching tools for living your life when others are criticizing you.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- How our thoughts hold us back from trying new things.
- Why it’s okay to feel upset or annoyed when things go wrong, even if, in general, we feel lucky and grateful.
- 2 tricky situations we each had to deal with recently where things didn’t go as expected.
- Why, as physicians, we agonize over calling in sick and we don’t seek out care.
- How we choose to handle negative feedback.
- Our favorite coaching tools to use when it feels like nothing is going right.
- Why it’s never too late to change the way you approach your life.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- Karen Leitner: Website | Instagram | Facebook
- 69: Are You Really Behind?
- 147: Pursuing New Friendships in Adulthood with Karen Leitner
- Book: Die with Zero by Bill Perkins
- Book: The 100-Year Life: Living and Working in an Age of Longevity
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey everyone, welcome to episode 200. When I saw on my schedule, because the way I plan the episodes I have this spreadsheet and then I have a Google doc for my outline, et cetera. And I was like, holy cow, episode 200. To me, that’s just insane. And the fact that I’ve had 200 episodes that I’ve been, I think there’s only like one or two weeks where I didn’t have an episode done in time. But the fact that I’ve done this 200 times, to me, is insane and also I feel really proud about that.
And I’m so thankful that you’re listening to this. I love hearing from people when they found the podcast really valuable and that it really helped. And so I was trying to think what we could do today, what I could do today for episode 200 to make it fun and interesting. And I decided, or actually we decided, we being my friend Karen and I, to do an episode together. She was on my episode a year ago and you definitely want to check that one. I forget the episode number, let’s take a look real quick.
Episode number 147, the title is Pursuing New Friendships in Adulthood. I think that was a really great conversation. You definitely want to listen to that because that is something that I think is really hard as an adult to have, you know, close friendships or even new friends, right? It’s not the same as college where it was so easy to meet people and make new friends.
And so we just decided to do it again. And we realized it was exactly a year ago, so we thought it’d be fun to come on the podcast and talk about things. I’ve got to say, we talked about a lot of random things and we were kind of all over the place, but I still hope you enjoy it and that you learn a bit more about me and about how I handled a recent, I shouldn’t say setback, but something recent that happened and how I dealt with it and how I felt about it. Okay, here we are.
Bonnie: All right, back by popular demand, we have my very good friend, Karen Leitner. And we just discovered that she was on the show exactly one year ago. How funny is that? This was not planned, by the way.
Karen: This hasn’t been scripted. I’m actually giggling because Bonnie just said, “Where’s the record button?” I’m like you still don’t know?
Bonnie: Well, you know when your Zoom window is –
Karen: I think it moves it around just to mess with us. I seriously do.
Bonnie: Yeah, and depending on how big your Zoom window is, you can’t see all the buttons. And I feel like they keep adding new buttons. Have you noticed?
Karen: Yeah. I like the little reactions. Have you played with these down here? So you can make like a little heart and like a little smiley face. But then if you go over to the side, I did this during your call the other day and then my ADD just fell down a rabbit hole, you can do a little high heeled red pump, Bonnie. That’s my reaction.
Bonnie: Okay, I’m not going to stay and chat about that.
Karen: Why would you ever need to react with that? I don’t know. But you can if you want to.
Bonnie: Oh, I see that now. Anyway, Zoom features that may or may not make a difference.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: So we thought we would both talk about some recent shit show experiences that we both had.
Karen: Can we swear on your podcast?
Bonnie: I think it’s fine. So we did not plan for her to come exactly a year later, but I was talking to Karen about episode 200. First of all, I was like, wow, I’m at episode 200, that’s crazy. And I had to figure out how many years this podcast has been. I don’t even remember, maybe 2020.
Karen: I’m your 200th episode?
Bonnie: The 200th episode.
Karen: Oh my God, right now? That’s amazing.
Bonnie: Yeah, that’s why you’re here.
Karen: Wow, I feel even more honored. That’s crazy, 200 times you’ve sat down and put thoughts and information and value out into the world. That’s kind of a lot. You can stop right now if you want to. That’s more than, you know, I have done zero. I wish I had a glass of champagne to toast you right now. I don’t, I’m just holding a pencil with no eraser. But symbolic toast to you, Bonnie, that’s a labor of love.
Bonnie: Thank you. Yes, the podcast journey has been interesting. I think I told you when I first started it was highly scripted, I felt so weird. I had been doing Facebook Lives and things like that off the cuff, but podcasting seemed so much more serious, if that makes sense. Like it’s going to live out there forever in podcast land. So the first few times were really short, like my podcasts were like five or seven minutes. And I remember thinking, I don’t know how to make them longer, I don’t have enough to say.
I think that’s also a good example of when you start something new, you’re not going to necessarily be good at it. Matt actually used to make fun of me because he would hear me record. He was like, “You sound like a robot.” I know, exactly, thanks.
Karen: Yeah, but it is such a good lesson, right? Because so much of the time we think we have – Like, I haven’t done a podcast yet and I’m working on it. But part of it is we think like, I don’t know how yet. I don’t know how yet, so I can’t start. Instead of that by starting, that’s how you figured out how. And then all you do is get better.
Bonnie: Oh, totally. So, again, we thought we would just talk about some real talk. And it makes sense because we both had some recent not so great, I mean, I don’t know if they – We can describe it. Like for me, it was more like I got really sick. For you, it was about the strike. And so we both thought it would be interesting to talk about it, unpack a little bit and share some lessons and what we learned because there were definitely a lot of lessons.
And so do you want to go first?
Karen: Yeah, I wanted to say something about what you just said, because it made me think it’s so good to start off by saying it’s okay to still be annoyed by things and still consider things as shit shows in your life, even when...
Like so much of the time, especially with our coaching clients, I’m sure this is the same with you too, it’s like we don’t feel like we have permission to feel bad or feel upset or feel down because we’re doctors. So I should just be so grateful that I had this opportunity to be a doctor that I shouldn’t be able to complain about my job or something or I should feel bad.
All these shoulds, you know? And so you and I, like we have shelter, we have clean drinking water, we have healthy families, but sometimes because human beings, we still lose our minds when things don’t go the way we want. And yes, it’s not like famine and wars.
So this idea that it doesn’t have to be the – What do we call it? Like the suffering Olympics. You and I would not win the suffering Olympics. But the whole idea of a suffering Olympics is ridiculous. All humans experience stuff that feels bad sometimes and it’s okay, even when you also are really lucky and really grateful for things. Do you agree?
Bonnie: Yes. I think that’s a great point, Karen, because I think it’s so easy to think, especially when you see people online, or maybe they see you, they see me, and I think it’s easy to think we have perfect lives or anybody in social media has perfect lives. Like, I’m a regular human being. I get upset. I get angry. Sometimes I’m not nice to Matt or to my son, and that’s normal, right? So I’m sure you do too. You’re not like always –
Karen: No, I’m totally judging you right now. Of course. I don’t trust people who don’t ever do that. I mean, that’s how I find I connect the most with people, is they show some kind of vulnerability about not being perfect. And I’m like, okay, I can be friends with you.
Oh, I have another really good point to make about that.
Bonnie: What?
Karen: Well, I don’t know, this just has come up a bunch of times lately where my coaching clients also are physicians and so they’ll say like, I feel like a fake when I’m seeing families and talking to them about kid bedtimes and I can’t get my kid to go to bed. Or I feel like a fake when I’m giving advice on weight loss and stuff, but I have trouble losing weight.
People don’t want perfection. No one wants you and me, like they want us to mess it up. That’s why whenever you’re sending emails, I’m always like, oh, say something like, damn it, like crap. When you put that in an email title, people will open it. When you’re just like, woo-hoo, amazingness, people are like, meh.
But reel yourself in, Karen. I was talking about this idea that our patients want us to be human and our patients are more likely to take advice from us when we’re like, yeah, I’ve struggled with that, too. And this is what worked for me. And this didn’t work for me. But I feel you and I get you and I’m not judging you. Versus if you walk into a clinic and your doctor is like a Barbie doll with kids who’ve never, you know, who slept like 12 hours their whole lives, you’re like, I don’t want to see you. I just feel worse, you know?
Bonnie: Yeah. On the other side, I think there are patients who think doctors should be perfect, right?
Karen: No, you’re probably right. But our kind of listener, I don’t think wants us to be perfect.
Bonnie: Oh, no, 100%. Why don’t you talk about what recently happened? These are both recent events, at the time of recording anyway.
Karen: Yeah. So I live in a town that’s known for having really good public schools. And I believe in public schools and the school system. And even like, I’m in this book club of other doctor moms and a whole lot of them send their kids to private school. And I’m always like, public school. I went to public school. Yay public school.
And then our whole public school system crashed and there was a strike of the teachers. And the schools were closed for 11 days. 11 days to not have school. And every day, it wasn’t like they were saying, we’re going to close for 11 days, so go live your lives and come back in 11 days and we’ll revisit. It was like every night they’re like at 7:30 we’ll tell you if there’s school tomorrow.
The whole city would just be on our phones waiting and then they’d be like, no school again tomorrow. No school. It was like with a small T, but being re-traumatized. And so it was interesting. The reason I thought it would be neat to talk about it is because as a life coach and having a lot of tools like helping myself regulate, I noticed myself the first couple days I was like, this is okay and I’m getting through this. And I sent an email to my list and I was like, this is how I coached myself.
And then by like the ninth day, I was out of my mind. Like just none of those schools were helping me. I was like, don’t talk to me. My husband was trying to be helpful, but was not carrying as much of the mental load as I wanted him to carry, let’s say. And I was just physiologically so on edge that it was fascinating. And it was also like, good to know I have nine days of holding it together, and then I lose my mind.
And I’m still a human being, I wasn’t horrified at myself. I think before I knew a lot of the stuff that you and I spend so much time thinking about, I would have been judging myself and who knows, spinning out and being really mad at myself for maybe losing my patience with my husband or my kids. But in this situation, it was like, yeah, sometimes there are scenarios where you’re just going to react the way you’re going to react and it’s okay.
Bonnie: Why don’t you tell people how many kids you have and how the dynamic was?
Karen: Well, I only have three. And it may not seem like a lot, although sometimes, Bonnie, you’ll say stuff about Jack, and I’ll be like, you know I have 300% more kids than you have. I’m like, now imagine you had three times that. But the good news is my kids are older.
So my 15 year old could do a lot of things on her own. My 12 year old could, like I just felt so bad for the people who had much younger kids. My sister is a six year old and she was just ready to poke her eyes out.
And then in the same way, right, like using that suffering Olympics to be like, well, at least I have school. At least I work from home. Almost like invalidating the fact that it felt really hard. And I would notice myself doing that and be like, no, still hard. Even though I have a job and electricity, it’s still hard. It’s okay for it to feel hard.
What was it like for you? I feel like you kept being like, what? Like almost not even believing that could be possible. Like so far outside the realm of like, what are you even talking about?
Bonnie: Well, I remember when you texted me about the strike, but then I guess after a week, I thought you were just like, being sarcastic. And then I was like, are they really still on strike or are you just saying that?
Karen: It was real.
Bonnie: Yeah. You know, Jack’s teachers didn’t go on strike, but I almost feel like he was in school for like five days in January because, well, first of all, he has a two week Christmas break. But then he got sick and missed a day or two. And I don’t know about your kids, but Jack, he gets sick for a day and then the next day he’s like bouncing off the walls as if nothing happened.
And then there was some other break. And basically I was like, was he in school at all in January? And now it’s February and I just realized, even though it’s on my calendar, that he doesn’t have school this Thursday or Friday because of parent teacher conferences. And then there’s a week break in February, like we have a trip planned. I’m just like, is he ever in school? What are we going to do this Thursday and Friday?
And he isn’t able to just do things on his own. I mean, he can, but it’s not the same thing, right?
Karen: Yeah. No, he really needs constant either technology or parental supervision. Like he’s not going to read. My daughter’s reading some, I was like, Les Miserables. I was like, really, my 15-year-old. I’m like, wow. That’s a win, a parenting win. But yeah, Jack, he doesn’t have the skills, so he needs a lot. Yeah.
Bonnie: So anyway, yeah, I still need to think about a plan. Just remind me I need to figure out a plan for Thursday and Friday.
Okay, anything else you want to say about that?
Karen: No, but I want to talk about what happened to you because I think I have an angle that you’re not going to like and I can’t wait to [inaudible].
Bonnie: So speaking of Jack not being in school for a while, so I got sick. And I get sick from time to time, I get colds, et cetera. Matt never gets sick. Like he must have some –
Karen: Knock on wood. Knock on everything.
Bonnie: I think he has some kind of genetic weird stuff and that he should be studied. I’m totally serious because he never gets sick. He’s clearly missing some kind of receptor where viruses can’t touch him.
Anyway, this was like more than a regular cold. Like I had fevers, I had chills and I didn’t really have myalgias. I felt really crappy and I had legit fever, more than just like a mild fever like a little over a hundred. This was like – Okay, first of all, my thermometer is probably not accurate, but I do think it’s accurate in terms of following trends, right? And it did go up to a little over 102. And it’s never been that high on this, again, CVS bought thermometer, forehead, which people say is not effective.
But anyway, I was scheduled to give a live class for my audience. I think January 7th was the date. Yeah, it was January 7th, right, because you also had a workshop the same day.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah, so it was Sunday. And I had gotten sick and it was like the Sunday before is when I got sick. I’m like, oh, it’ll be fine. I’ll get better because usually with any illness, I’m usually fine. I tested myself for Covid two times, it was negative. And it didn’t feel like the other two times I had Covid, so I’m like, oh, it must be the flu. But we don’t, at least I didn’t have a home test for the flu. That probably should have been my first signal because I’ve had the flu before and I’m usually out for a whole week.
Karen: Every time we talked about it, you were so much living in your past experience of being sick that it was almost not relevant to this current time. And I just think it’s so funny because patients so much of the time are like, well, I always have sinus infection. And it’s like just because you always get it, that doesn’t mean that’s what’s happening right now. And you were so stuck in the, this is what flu is like for me.
And I was like, Bonnie, you had five days of fever. And then it seemed like you had a couple of days where you didn’t really have a fever and you were getting better. And now you have a high fever again and you feel worse and you’re vomiting. And I was like, super infection, Covid, like danger, because I tend to freak out about stuff. And you were like, no, I mean, five or six days of fever with the flu is pretty normal, seven days fever. And I was like, no, it’s not.
I think you just somehow were like, I can’t be sick. I have to be fine. I have this huge responsibility, like 2,000 people signed up or something. There was some kind of denial.
Bonnie: It was like 2,000 people.
Karen: I could not get through to you and I was like, this is not good. You were like, well, all the other times I’ve had the flu. And I would just like throw my hands up, roll my eyes and just be like, oh.
Bonnie: Well yeah, no, you’re right because when patients say like, I’ve never had a skin problem. I’m like, it doesn’t matter.
Karen: I always look at my kids and I’m like, just because you’ve never died in a car accident, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t wear your seatbelt this time, right? That’s not logical. Like all the other times I didn’t wear my seatbelt, I didn’t die. It’s like, oh my God.
Bonnie: Yeah. I didn’t feel well the day before, but again, I think I was optimistic, like I will be fine. And we’d been sending all the reminder emails, the reminder text that we always send. And then what was it, 1 pm Sunday that was scheduled?
Karen: You’re like, I don’t feel good. I don’t feel good. I don’t feel good. Then you’re like, I just threw up. I was like, Bonnie.
Bonnie: And I still had a fever and I think I was just going to load up on Advil and do my best.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: So I canceled it kind of last minute, like three hours before, which felt really horrible, you know?
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: So what I want to say about that is I sent the cancellation email and, obviously, apologized and said I was really sick and thought I could do it, but I can’t. And I don’t remember exactly what I wrote, but I actually got a lot of replies applauding me, basically saying thank you for taking care of yourself because, as you know, doctors in general, it’s not just women, unless we’re dying, we still go into work.
And not only that, it’s like even if you are really sick and you’re okay with staying home, sometimes you can’t because you can’t find a replacement, like in the emergency room or something.
Karen: It’s messed up that they expect us to come in when we’re sick, but it’s also messed up that as women physicians, we also don’t seek care. Like we just have this like, I can’t be sick. We just don’t go to the doctor. I feel like that’s an extra hat I wear, which is forcing my women physician friends to go to the doctor.
I’m just trying to see if I can find the text thread where we were talking about this because you really agonized for like an hour. Even though it was so obvious you could not do this talk, you didn’t want to cancel it. And there was a lot of fear about what people would think.
And then we came to the conclusion that you were setting a good example by not doing something when you literally were like bacterially – I’m not going to say you were septic, but you needed antibiotics.
Bonnie: I still had a fever.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Karen: Well, we have so many texts I can’t even scroll back up again to find the thread.
Bonnie: It’s okay.
Karen: I know.
Bonnie: Well, the two things I want to say about that experience was, yeah, it did not feel good to cancel, but when I decided to do it and I canceled it, I was like, oh my God, thank God. As soon as I canceled I was like, I don’t know what I was thinking. I definitely couldn’t have done it. It would have just been so awful. My energy would have been awful and et cetera, right? I could wear a lot of makeup and pretend I’m not, but it wouldn’t work.
And so, like I said, I got great emails. I did get one email where someone was upset.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah. And I forget exactly what this person said, but she basically said I was unprofessional.
Karen: She said it was unprofessional not to give more notice than you did. You could have given more notice.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Karen: And you would have if you hadn’t been trying so hard to rally yourself to do it.
Bonnie: So, yeah, that was what the email said. And, you know, it was fine. I used to get so upset at these types of emails, because when you’re in the public sphere, although I’m definitely not Taylor Swift, you’re going to get a lot of random hate emails.
Karen: Well, you’re pretty close, you know.
Bonnie: But, you know, you get – I don’t get outright hate mail because I think it takes a lot more to send a direct email versus commenting on a post, for example. There’s just more activation energy to actually take the time to send an email to someone that’s going to be mean. And usually they’re angry when they’re responding so quickly.
So it’s taken time. I think I first started offering my course in 2019. And in 2019 and 2020 it was really hard whenever I got a negative comment or even “constructive feedback.” But now it doesn’t bother me. What about you?
Karen: It still bothers me, but I was actually just thinking about in the bigger context, it’s like getting a negative Press Ganey score or something. I mean, it’s not as bad. When we get an email, no one sees it. When we get a Press Ganey review, it’s tied to our livelihood. Because these people don’t know you, this person who said that.
So I love that coaching tool that’s just like you can allow people to be wrong about you. That feels empowering. Otherwise, you’re like, there’s someone out there who thinks I’m a horrible person, who thinks I’m unprofessional. And your brain is like, and I might die. And in reality, it’s like, and I don’t care because I know I am professional. I don’t even know that person.
But I just think we’re wired to want to be accepted by everybody. And then we’re socialized to want to be good girls and not have anyone tell us we’re not doing a good job. We want to get good grades and all those things. So when someone messages you –
I’m like a staunch advocate for physician burnout. It is something I care so much about. I give lots of money to help with the cause, that’s what my business is all about. So this person said to me, “I thought because you’re a physician, you would understand how many emails we get. But you contributed to my burnout with all the emails you sent me.” It’s just like a dagger to the heart.
And then I was like, are you kidding me? You can unsubscribe. Click unsubscribe. I actually give you an extra unsubscribe in the bottom of my emails. And then, okay, I’m getting to the point, which is that I think it’s always really fascinating to think what must be going on for this person to want to send something not nice to me.
And I’m like, this is such learned helplessness. This is like this person feels so disempowered in the medical system and like they’re being barraged and hit and they have no power and no agency, that they’re trying to take back some agency by yelling at me for some emails that they could much more easily just have hit unsubscribe.
I don’t know if we’re trying to help your audience today, but I’m always thinking about how to help them. And it’s like if a patient says something not so nice to you or like your neighbor does something that maybe they don’t like you, like it’s okay, as long as you like you.
Bonnie: I mean, it comes down to you liking yourself and allowing people to be wrong with you, but also just allowing people to be mad at you. Not everyone’s going to like you. And logically we know that, but it still doesn’t feel good when you feel like someone doesn’t like you.
Karen: Yeah, I love that, too. I’m just like, okay, I get it. If I was someone who really felt assaulted every time I got an email and then this random life coach who said she wants to help me is sending me emails, I might get mad, too. I get it. I don’t agree, but I can understand. That feels better than like what’s wrong with people? Why are they so negative? Which is how I usually respond initially.
Bonnie: Yeah. And since you have three girls, they always do these MRI studies to see what parts of the brain light up. I think it was the context of social media, so that’s not exactly relevant to what we’re talking about, but the point I want to make is that social pain feels the same as some kind of pain. You probably know this.
Karen: I do not know this.
Bonnie: I think emotional pain lights up the same areas of the brain as physical pain and danger. Because if you think about it, right, back in the cave days, and even now, it was really important that you were part of a group and accepted for protection.
Karen: Yeah. Rejection is so uncomfortable for us. I would say like, yeah, it’s almost or maybe equally unpleasant to certain kinds of pain. So I wouldn’t be surprised.
Bonnie: And you know that I had some experiences growing up where I wasn’t popular, is the best way to say it. And I don’t think I felt I was part of a group until, I mean, kind of in high school, but probably not really till college, if I’m perfectly honest.
Yeah, and I never felt like people really liked me. I still feel that way, by the way. We talked about this on our podcast a year ago. I just assume people don’t like me. And if someone doesn’t text me back in a day I’m like, are they mad at me? Because sometimes I don’t text back people and it’s like I literally forgot or the day was crazy. And you know what I mean? It happens to all of us. And then if you get a lot of texts in one day, they all get buried and you don’t remember who’s who or what’s what, right?
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: Do you do that, too?
Karen: The way it’s different for me is I think I’m more likely to not respond to someone, not intentionally ever. And, of course, I have stories I tell about myself, too. And I hate to be talking about ADHD so much. I feel like I’m talking about all the time now. I’ve only been diagnosed for like three weeks. But I forget.
I will look at a message and it doesn’t enter my brain and I then just forget to write back. Or I mean to, I think I have, I don’t. Or I even write it and I don’t press send. Because I often will not write back, so if someone else doesn’t write me back I just think I don’t make a big deal out of it. But I do feel very sensitive to rejection.
Like my daughter was at this ice skating rink with her two little friends and threes are always really hard, like groups of three with kids, like someone’s always being left out. And I was watching one of the girls, the two of the girls kind of leave my daughter out a little bit. And I just felt this like, oh, I remember feeling like that as a kid and it is so painful. My daughter, it didn’t seem to bother her that much. I tried to ask her about it later.
She was the worst skater, so they were kind of going ahead. But she was really doing her best and keeping up. And I don’t think she made it mean anything. She was like, no, they’re my friends, it’s fine. But it’s like a physical anguish that I’m being left out.
I can’t remember if I told you this, I think I did. But when I was five or six I went to this summer camp and there was this cute blonde girl who apparently was adorable and they called her Cornflake and all the counselors loved her and followed her around. And then they called me Burnt Cornflake. Isn’t that so mean? S
Sometimes you can just tell, like whatever it was, I didn’t have the it factor.
Bonnie: And you have darker hair, maybe we should make that clear.
Karen: Yes, that’s true. I have dark hair. But anyway, it’s like we go through these things as kids, we experience stuff. Our little brains make sense of them in some way, deriving some kind of meaning. And then here we are like 45 years later and we’re still in that story, even though we have so much evidence that it’s not true.
There’s so much evidence in your life right now that people like you. How many people listen to your podcast? Do you listen to the podcasts of people you don’t like?
Bonnie: No. I guess if they’re listening they probably at least find it valuable. Whether they like me or not is, yeah, whatever.
Karen: Like hundreds and thousands of people.
Bonnie: I don’t know about thousands. I do look at my podcast downloads, it’s actually something I want to work on this year, is to increase awareness because I meet people and they don’t even know I have a podcast.
Karen: The nerve.
Bonnie: So what I’ve been working really hard on recently, which Karen knows, is I changed the way I deliver my program. It’s gone through many permutations, but now I’m running it as a three-month live class. And what I mean by live, it doesn’t mean I’m teaching every class live, but it’s a three month thing and we spend three months together, then it’s kind of over. And so I’ve been teaching things in a different way and I’ve added some new topics.
And so it’s been a lot of work. Work I really enjoy, but to put the topics together organized in a way that makes sense to me, but also thinking like, I don’t know how you are, Karen, with your clients, but I’m always thinking like, I want to make sure I’m not overwhelming them. But then I also want to make sure I’m teaching them all the relevant things. And the thing with money is there is a lot of information, right?
And so I have this constant battle, like I don’t want to overwhelm them but there’s a lot of stuff they have to know. And so I think each time I run this program, I’m always learning, like, where do they get overwhelmed? How can I make it easier? Or maybe it’s too much and all that kind of stuff. So that’s kind of where I’m at right now.
And I am creating a lot of new assets, meaning just tools for them to use that I think are going to be really useful. So that’s been taking up a lot of my time lately.
But I’m also really excited about it because I feel like the new stuff coming out of my brain is just juicy, if I’m perfectly honest, because the material I taught before was a few years old. And it’s not that it’s irrelevant at this point, right? But I’m just a different person. I’ve learned so much in the last few years. And so I just felt like I have to reteach some of the core concepts because some of the things that I used to teach, I think about differently now.
Karen: Like what?
Bonnie: So I’ve always felt personal finance is personal. And I’ve always had pretty strong opinions about the traditional retirement type thing. And just learning so much more, like reading two books in particular that really made a difference for me is Die With Zero, I think I’ve told you that. And a book called 100 Days.
And just really seeing we really do live in a different age right now. Like we’re not working for a company for 30 years that’s going to give us a pension. I guess Kaiser is like the only one left in the doctor world, right? And we’re living so much longer and so traditional advice really doesn’t work anymore, especially for women because we’re, you know, you and I might live till we’re 100, right?
And then also this idea that you’re supposed to be in the same career forever. I think that’s also traditional thinking. But who said? Like someone just made that up, because this is technically my third career, Karen. I don’t know if you know that.
Karen: I do.
Bonnie: Yeah. So I first worked at Morgan Stanley after college, not in banking, I was in technology. And then I became a doctor, became a dermatologist. And now I’m an entrepreneur and I coach women on money. Like I might change the topic I coach on at some point, right? Who knows?
Karen: Yeah, I think you should be like a fashion model and you should sell stuff on like the QVC channel because tell them about the shirt you’re wearing. I get on the camera with you and you’re just like, “Oh my God, do you like this shirt?” And then you say three things about it and then I’m like, I have to buy that shirt. Damn it, Bonnie.
Bonnie: Oh my God, it’s so random. But yeah, I was buying some Uniqlo – Is that even how you say it? – for Jack.
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: Because he goes to an outdoor school, and they’re not outside all day, but they’re outside. And it’s been really cold lately, obviously. And so he doesn’t like wearing multiple layers, so the whole thing is like you wear a base layer, then you wear a middle layer, then you wear an outer layer. And he just doesn’t want to wear two layers and then snow pants on top. He’s just like, no, that’s a no.
So I was like, okay, I need to buy some really warm pants. So whatever, ultra heat tech. And then I was like, I’m going to buy myself something too, because I’m always cold. And then I bought this sweater that I’m wearing right now, which no one can see. And it’s so soft.
Karen: It’s not what you would think Bonnie would wear. First of all, it’s not pink.
Bonnie: It’s beige. Well, it doesn’t come in pink.
Karen: It’s like a brownish beige. It’s totally nondescript, right? And so you’d just look at it and you’d be like, “Oh, interesting shirt, Bonnie.” And then though, you’re like, it’s so warm. And it was so inexpensive. And it’s so comfortable. And it feels so good on my skin.
Bonnie: It’s like buttery soft. Do you have Vuori joggers?
Karen: No, but I have worn them and I know what you mean. Yeah.
Bonnie: It’s kind of like that, but even better. It’s like $15. Maybe it was 20. But Uniqlo clothes are inexpensive, right? That’s kind of their whole thing.
Karen: Yeah. Let’s see how it holds up.
Bonnie: That’s true.
Karen: The first 100 wears. But yeah, I mean, isn’t it weird? I’m cold all the time, too. And I definitely think it’s like, I don’t know if it’s perimenopause, if it’s just like older age. I don’t like it at all. I don’t understand why I’m cold all the time. I’m like, oh great, now I’m going to have to move to Florida when I retire, which I really don’t want to do.
Bonnie: Now you understand why everyone does that.
Karen: I know. No one tells you that.
So you were saying we don’t have to have just one career. We don’t have to just do medicine. We don’t have to just put money into our 401k and never look at it, never think about it, and think somehow that in 50 years we’re going to want to travel the world and not take a minute to breathe or enjoy our lives until we get there.
Bonnie: I mean, there’s so much more. Obviously, I can’t say it all, but how important it is to really look at the big picture, because with really busy people, like women physicians, I think it’s just so hard to take a beat and just really think about, well, what do I really – Not even what do I want to do the rest of my life, but especially with young children, like they’re just on a hamster wheel.
And even though I was trained as a dermatologist, I could see my life ending up where you’re just living day to day and just trying to, especially if you have little kids, just dealing with all the things that you deal with when you have kids. And looking back, I’m like, there’s no way I could have done that for 30 years plus.
And I think there’s a lot of guilt around not wanting to be a doctor forever. Or, I don’t know about your clients, but most of my clients don’t want to quit medicine. They just want to work less because they’re so tired.
Karen: Yeah, yeah. But the other thing that’s not really true is like I remember when I did primary care. And when I was in my practice all my colleagues were older and I admired them so much. And I was just like, how am I going to do this for 20 years and be like them?
And then when I almost was ready to leave and I talked to them, especially the women, they’re like, oh no, when my kids were small, one of them was like, I took a whole year off. I was a single mom. I don’t know, I couldn’t. And then another one was like, I totally cut back, way back. And I just shared a practice or did this or did that.
Some of it is like we’re telling stories about the people around us, not realizing that it isn’t just a straight shot for a lot of these people that we think it is. And then when you look at all the 85 year olds who are still showing up at Grand Rounds, we get to be like, it’s mostly men, right? And I don’t know if that’s because they were the doctors back in the day or if it’s just –
Bonnie: Well yeah.
Karen: They didn’t have to do all the other – I don’t know, there’s probably a lot of reasons. I don’t need to make gendered comments or stereotypes, but I love this abundance mindset of like I could do this if I wanted to, but also there might be other things. There’s other opportunities for me. There’s other ways for me to make money.
I think a lot of what we do in coaching is just open people’s eyes to possibility.
Bonnie: I think it’s a must to have multiple streams of income. Not that I ever thought it wasn’t a must, but I think in this day and age, and not just because of physicians, but it’s so precarious to rely on a job. And it’s not uncommon for me to have someone –
Recently I’ve had a few women reach out to me in a financial crisis. And one thing I see a lot is when you’re really reliant on both incomes. I’m not like judging them, I understand why that happens. But I think that’s just another example, if you don’t have other ways to bring in money that’s not related to your job, like it’s bad, right?
Karen: Like not diversifying your investments. It’s like putting all your eggs in one basket.
Bonnie: But we’re not taught that, right?
Karen: Yeah.
Bonnie: To me, it’s normal now because of what I do and the friends I have. But it definitely was not even in my awareness when I was a resident, and definitely not even a first year attending, right? People talked about real estate and blah, blah, blah. But now I’m very, very convinced how important it is. And what that’s changed is I’m going to, I don’t like to push, but just really show them like this is something that’s really important to work on.
Karen: I want to say one more thing about that though, Bonnie, because I think I’m way more hearing all the voices of all the women who are like, but these are all the reasons why. It’s too hard. I don’t have time. I don’t have money to pay for your wonderful coaching course, all this stuff, right? It’s like, dude, you’re paying the money, so you have more money. It’s an investment just like anything.
But some of the biggest roadblocks for us are like, I’m not smart about money. I mean, this is so basic, I’m sure you’ve talked about this in all your podcasts. I’m not smart. Or a huge one is it’s too late. Oh, it’s too late.
Bonnie: Oh gosh. That’s probably –
Karen: It’s never too late. Never, ever, ever, ever, ever too late.
Bonnie: I’m behind, that’s one.
Karen: Yeah. And thinking you’re behind just makes you more behind instead of like, okay, what do I want to do tomorrow? What one little thing do I want to do tomorrow?
So I think that that’s something you’re really good at helping people realize, is like once we get in the door, once we’re able to overcome all those things that are saying to us like, I’m bad at this, I want to avoid it, like all the reasons you stick those loan notices like in a drawer and don’t look at it.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Karen: It’s like you just have to decide I will actually feel so much better when I’m starting to learn. And I can learn this because I’m a doctor and I’m so freaking smart.
Bonnie: Everyone who does my program, and people who don’t, I have no doubt they can do it. But yeah, there’s I’m behind. I think I actually have a podcast on this because, obviously, that thought isn’t helpful at all. But it’s predicated on a few things, because I think a lot of us think of money being made linearly.
Karen: Like I’m behind. Like then I just think in 1974, you couldn’t even have a credit card in your own name that your spouse didn’t co-sign. So whoever you think you’re behind, like we are so far ahead even to be women making income who can be having these conversations. Do you know what I mean?
Bonnie: That is true.
Karen: I just think about those women in the 1800s who were having childbirth and then dying and illiterate. And then here’s us, we’re physicians, we’re like, I don’t know how to interpret mutual fund reports. I’m so behind.
And it’s just like when you zoom way out, and you’re like that doesn’t make any sense. Of course you’re not. There is no behind. Just go forward, you know?
Bonnie: Well, yeah, that and money truly is not harder to learn than medical school. It’s way easier. But yeah, it’s just our mental blocks behind it.
Karen: Same with like, I’m so behind because I have this stack of New England journals I haven’t read. And because I think I’m so behind, and I see them stack up higher and higher every week, I’m just never going to look at them.
Bonnie: Do you actually read those?
Karen: No, I’m just using it as a metaphor. Everyone relates to this in their specialty. It’s like what if you just read one? What if you just read the table of contents just once a month? How about you start with that? How about you start with just a tiny, tiny baby step instead of thinking like, I’m supposed to know all of that, and therefore I use it as like just to put my plants on.
Bonnie: You know what my mentor said? We were talking about this and he’s like, I just throw them away. That’s literally what he said. He’s like, I don’t even read them. I just throw it away.
Karen: No, we use them to judge ourselves and blame ourselves and shame ourselves. It’s like, there’s actually probably no one who’s reading them.
I mean, and if you have enough time to read all the New England journals, then clearly you just, you know, good for you. But I don’t think it’s a good use. Like you’re not living your life, basically. Where are you not living your life that you’re spending so much time doing that? And maybe some people want to live their life that way. I would never want to.
Bonnie: I have never read the whole thing, so I don’t have a comment. I couldn’t tell you what they say.
Karen: Well, now I know what to get you for your birthday, Bonnie. And you can throw them away.
Bonnie: I definitely did scan the titles and there was that service where they basically, it was like Cliff Notes.
Karen: Yeah, I know what you mean. I don’t remember what it was called, but yeah.
Bonnie: I would get those for dermatology. I thought they were useful and then they stopped doing it. Anyway, whatever.
Okay, we need to get back on topic.
Karen: Sign up for Bonnie’s program. Where do they go to do that? When’s the next time you’re offering it?
Bonnie: So my website is WealthyMomMD.com. They can go there and there will be a link to go there.
Karen: WealthyMomMD.com.
Bonnie: I actually don’t know when I’m going to offer again. And I’m not saying that to be mysterious.
Karen: But you have like a wait list or they can just –
Bonnie: I think they can join a waitlist. For sure it’s going to be in the fall. I am undecided if I’m going to run it again late spring through early summer. That’s TBD. If I had to guess now, probably not, but you never know.
Karen: Okay, but if they need something right now to help them, didn’t you write a book?
Bonnie: Yes, I wrote a book. And, obviously, there’s the podcast and there’s my Instagram.
Karen: Your book is really short and easy to read and pretty manageable. Like if you just need a little shock to your system to help you motivate, if you’re just like, I know I need to do something, but I just don’t feel that inspired or I just feel blocked. You read this book and you’re just like, hell yeah. Like I am woman. Like I got to do this. I can do this.
Bonnie: Yeah, no, totally. It is a short read and there are questions at the end of every chapter. And if people actually do them, it’s kind of like a mini, it’s like a course in itself.
Karen: Bonnie, that’s not how you market your program, by telling people to do the free questions in your book. They want access to your brain.
Bonnie: Oh yeah, I’m just, you know, the book is a snapshot of my brain. But they could learn a lot by doing the questions because I think it’s really easy to look at questions and if you don’t actually sit down and write the answers, it’s such a different experience. And that’s a whole nother conversation.
But yeah, so my book, my podcast, my conference, which is in a month and you’ll be there, Karen. And I did sign a contract for next year, I haven’t really talked about it. But it’s going to be again, for sure, in about a year and 15 days from now, at the time of this recording. It will be in Hawaii, which is my happy place.
And so if you’re interested in doing that, you definitely should join the wait list because the conference this year sold out very quickly, I want to say in less than a month. And we had a very long waiting list and the VIPs sold out in like a week.
Karen: How do they get on the waitlist for the money conference in Hawaii?
Bonnie: Go to WealthyMomMD.com/conference and you’ll see the button for it. There’s a hierarchy of who gets to buy first, and the waitlist is one of the best ways to do that because we do have more spots for 2025. But we do expect it to sell out as well.
Karen: I hope I can come.
Bonnie: I know, you’ve got some conflicts. Okay, everyone, I hope you enjoyed this totally random episode of us talking about lots of random things.
Karen: Thanks for having me.
Bonnie: Yeah, it was super fun. Thanks for helping me out for this episode. Yay, episode 200!
Karen: See you in February 2025 for our third annual episode.
Bonnie: Okay. All right, bye.
Karen: Bye.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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199: 6 Steps for Protecting Your Family’s Future with Pamela Maass Garrett
Continuing with our recent topic of protecting your assets and securing your family’s financial health, it’s time to talk about estate planning. I’m joined for this conversation by Pamela Maass Garrett, an estate planning lawyer based in Colorado. She helps parents and business owners protect what matters most.
Pamela Maass Garrett is an award-winning Estate Planning & Asset Protection Attorney and CEO of Law Mother LLC, a law firm she founded to help parents protect their futures and the futures of their loved ones.
Tune in this week to discover the foundation of everything you need to know about estate planning as a physician. We’re discussing all of the misconceptions around estate planning, where people typically go wrong, and Pamela is sharing her six-step framework for protecting your family and your wishes in the event that you pass unexpectedly.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- Why everyone needs to think about estate planning, especially physicians.
- How estate planning helps make sure your choices are honored once you pass away.
- The importance of naming a guardian for your kids if the unthinkable happens to you.
- What happens to your kids if you don’t have designations in your will.
- Why you aren’t automatically the Power of Attorney for your spouse.
- How to find the right attorney for you.
- Pamela’s six-step framework for protecting your family through estate planning.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
- Follow me on Instagram
- Pamela Maass Garrett: Website | Instagram | Facebook
- Legally Ever After by Pamela Maass Garrett
- Personal Family Lawyer
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Bonnie: Hello, everyone. I hope you’re all doing well. I am super excited about today’s episode because I have been looking for a cool estate planning lawyer to chat with, to work with, et cetera. And I have found her. In fact, you definitely want to follow her on Instagram. She is the Law Mother, L-A-W M-O-T-H-E-R.
And basically we’re having a conversation about estate planning and she’s got a great acronym that we’re going to talk through in terms of how to think about it. And you’ll also have the opportunity to get her free book in a PDF form as well. I hope you get as much out of this conversation as I did.
Welcome to the show, Pam.
Pam: Thank you so much, Bonnie.
Bonnie: I’m so excited to have you here. And I just want to tell people how I met you. Well, actually, before we do that, why don’t you introduce yourself real quick?
Pam: Yeah. So I’m Pam Maass Garrett, I’m an estate planning attorney based in Colorado and my law firm is Law Mother and we help parents and business owners protect what matters most.
Bonnie: Yeah. So I found you on Instagram, what’s your Instagram handle? Because everyone needs to follow you.
Pam: Law Mother CO.
Bonnie: Okay, yeah. So I meant to ask you, because the way you do your reels with the backgrounds and stuff, I was like, how do you do that? So we can talk about that some other time. But I just remember thinking, how does she do that? And to me it’s like this is like advanced reel stuff and I’m just not there yet.
So anyway, anyone listening, go check her out. They’re entertaining and they’re very informative. So that’s how I found you. And then, of course, I stalked you, found your website and then emailed you there because I was like, I’ve been looking for someone like you for so long. Like looking for, specifically, I want to find a female estate planner because I like to just work with women and promote women. And also someone who does this, because obviously your social media presence is educational, right?
And so I’ve had a hard time finding someone. I just found like old white men, frankly. And being a woman, you understand some of the things specific to parents, although I guess they do too, but it’s just different.
Pam: Yeah.
Bonnie: So let’s talk about why estate planning is so important. To me, it’s obvious. I’m sure it’s obvious to you, but let’s just talk about how everyone needs to think about it.
Pam: Yeah, so estate planning is important, especially for people in the medical profession, but really for everyone to make sure that your choices are honored and that things will pass the way you want when you pass away. A lot of people think they can’t control what happens after they die, and I disagree, right? With estate planning, you get to control how your loved ones experience everything.
And without a plan, the default is usually something that most people don’t want to see happen to their loved ones, right? So the government gets involved, assets go through probate, it costs a lot of money, causes a lot of conflict between family members, and costs a lot of time.
And then if you’re a parent of minor children, it can be really scary for those kiddos. They end up in foster care and government care. And so really making sure that they’re taken care of the way that you want with the people that you want.
Bonnie: Actually, let’s talk about that real quick because one of the things I always talk about is how important it is to name a guardian if you have a kid, obviously. And I think a lot of people assume, like assuming they’re in a married relationship, for example, that the spouse will automatically get guardianship. And that’s true if they’re alive, too, right?
Pam: Yes.
Bonnie: So we’re talking about the worst case scenario where both parents pass very close together in time.
Pam: Yes.
Bonnie: So I think what you just said is really, it’s not good, but just to highlight what happens if the unthinkable happens and both parents pass and no guardian has been named. Like you just said, foster care and all that. Obviously, no one wants their kid to do that, right? Does that happen even if there is a close relative or like a sister or anything like that?
Pam: If you have no plan in place and something happens to you and your spouse and you have minor children, essentially your kiddo is going to be in government care until they can find a blood relative. For a lot of people in this day and age, we don’t have blood relatives that live in the state. And so that’s where kiddos end up in government care for a little while until that happens.
And then really anyone related to you can go to court and say to the judge, I want to manage the money and I want to take care of the kids. And then the judge is going to listen to everyone. And this judge is a complete stranger, right? And often, as we were joking about, it’s a white male, older white male who maybe doesn’t have the same values as you, maybe is going to choose someone you would never want them to choose.
And then the judge is going to listen and make a decision. And so how kiddos end up in kind of the foster care system is, one, no one wants to – In the interim it takes some time to get people out here where you’re living. Sometimes they’re in a situation where the court doesn’t feel like they’re stable enough or if there’s conflict, if lots of people want them, that can happen. And then, yeah, in the unforeseen circumstance where there’s nothing put in place it can end up that your kiddos are in foster care.
And the idea is when you set up an estate plan, you don’t have to just use your blood relatives, right? So many of us in this day and age may or may not have good family relationships, or you may have good family relationships, but you might just have people in your life that you feel like would be better suited to raise your kids because they share your parenting philosophy and they’re close to your kids and they live close by.
And so with estate planning, exactly what you said, Bonnie, you can name long-term guardians who could care for your kids if you could not. We always do short-term guardians as well. So people that live close by, in case your long-term guardians are out of state, they can kind of bridge that gap and take care of your kids until your long-term guardians can get into town.
We do emergency wallet ID cards, so all that information is there. Part of an emergency response plan, making sure your kiddos are always taken care of, whether it’s something that is temporary like an emergency, an emergency situation and you recover from it, or a long-term situation where something unfortunate happens.
Bonnie: Okay, I had no idea you could do a short-term or long-term. And that makes sense because our current guardian is Matt’s sister, but they’re in Boston and I’m in Northern New Jersey. So I didn’t even think about that because my immediate family is actually very close, like within a mile. So, okay, I need to update the will.
Pam: In most states, and you can kind of confirm with your estate planning lawyer, in most states a blood relative can trigger as a short-term just by law. But in some states, you actually need to have that documentation on file. And definitely, if your short-term people are not relatives, you’re definitely going to want to put something in place that gives them the ability to take care of your kiddos until your long-term guardians can come into town.
And then you can have the people that are long-term guardians manage the money for your kids, or you can have it be separate people. So if you’re like, these people are good with my kids but they’re not good with money because they haven’t met Bonnie and they haven’t learned everything Bonnie teaches, then you can designate someone else to be in charge of the finances for your kids.
Bonnie: Yeah. Part of me is just like, it’s complicated but that’s the whole point. So first of all, you probably don’t recommend someone do it online if they have kids. I don’t know what your opinion is about Legal Zoom and all that stuff.
Pam: It’s one of those things where my philosophy around that is kind of opening up, right? So my biggest analogy for you and your audience is when people go on WebMD and try to diagnose themselves, right? They don’t know what they don’t know. You’re a trained professional who’s had years of experience, WebMD just doesn’t cut it. And so unfortunately, those legal websites really just haven’t gotten to – They haven’t replaced professionals.
And you’re going to save more money, you’re going to save more time in the long run by working with a professional, because a lot of times when people try to do it themselves and they don’t understand these intricacies, something unforeseen will happen down the road and it ends up being very costly for the family. So what I say in all situations, you shouldn’t do it online, no.
I think if you’re the type of person who isn’t going to do anything, I think at least doing something is better than nothing. But for people who are your audience, who are professionals, who really value professional services, you’re going to get more value out of working with someone who can personalize it for your specific needs, talk through your specific issues and really design something for you.
Bonnie: Yeah. No, I love that analogy. That makes sense. Yeah. Dr. Google, we call it, right? That’s what we call it.
Pam: Yeah.
Bonnie: I just wanted to say, I don’t think I really thought through the consequences of not naming a guardian, including the long-term/short-term thing. And again, your caveat is that every state is a little different with how they handle it. When I think of my clients, the ones who don’t have a guardian, they’re like, okay, I know I have to do that, but I don’t think they really, really, truly understand the consequences of not doing it.
I think it’s actually really great that we went over that real quick because I think anyone listening who hasn’t had that in place and you have kids, I feel like this is really going to be like, okay, I really need to do this. So I think that’s really great that we did that.
Okay. So, obviously, we can’t give people a full education on estate planning about this, right? But one thing I tell my clients is estate planning, it seems to be that thing that everyone knows is important, but they put it off. But then you might die and then it’s too late. Do you litigate too?
Pam: I don’t anymore, luckily. I’ve litigated for the last decade and now all I do is the planning side, which is wonderful.
Bonnie: Okay. Yeah, but you’ve probably seen the consequences of not good estate planning, I’m assuming.
Pam: Yeah.
Bonnie: Because I get your emails and I saw the email you sent about kids who didn’t get along, but then someone’s kid died. And basically not foreseeing all the situations that can happen, right?
So, Pam, I know you have sort of a six step process or framework in your awesome free book. What’s it called again?
Pam: Legally Ever After.
Bonnie: First of all, what an amazing title.
Pam: Thank you.
Bonnie: I thought it was very clever. Okay, so we’ll link in the show notes how people can get their hands on that. So let’s dive in.
Pam: Yeah, so the six steps spell the word legacy. And the first step we kind of just went through is L, which is name legal guardians and really making sure you do that because we want to make sure your kids are always protected.
The second step is E, for economic support. And one of the best ways I recommend getting started with that, especially for people who are just getting started, is to grab a file folder and put the first page of all of your assets in it. So your bank accounts, your retirement accounts, your life insurance accounts.
So the story I share is one of my friends, her father passed away unexpectedly during the pandemic and he had nothing in place. And so you might imagine she had to go through all his mail, computer files, boxes, trying to figure out what assets he had. And this took years, she’s still not sure if she has all of her assets.
There’s billions of dollars in every state’s department of unclaimed property across the country. This is how assets get lost. So one of the first steps is just getting everything in one place and then telling someone you know, trust and care –
Bonnie: Can I just pause you for a second? Like assets get lost? Like, of course that makes sense that happens, but literally just money is out there and people don’t know it’s there? That’s basically what you’re saying.
Pam: Yep. Yep. So if you think about the people in your audience, they probably have life insurance through their employer. They probably have retirement accounts. They probably have bank accounts at various banks. Well, if they suddenly pass away and they have nothing documented, then their loved ones are going through computer files, boxes, trying to figure out mail. And if they don’t find that asset, that asset gets turned over to the State Department of Unclaimed Property.
So the New Jersey Department of Unclaimed Property has all these assets from people who’ve passed away. And if no one ever claims them, it kind of just goes, per that statute, back into the government’s hands down the road. And so it just really also makes things very stressful for your loved ones, trying to figure out what you have and where it is. So that’s kind of the first step.
And I’m guessing, Bonnie, with what you do with your audience, you get them financially organized too, right, through your process of working with you?
Bonnie: Yeah. Basically creating some kind of dashboard or like a legacy drawer or folder. I’ve had to rethink it because I’m like, how can I make it simpler? And I think the bigger question is, and maybe you have some ideas, okay, even if you have it organized, someone needs to know it exists.
Pam: Yes.
Bonnie: So I was thinking like, you know, because I’m kind of the one who manages all this stuff in my family and I was like, will Matt even know where to look? And I realized like, I don’t think – Even if I emailed him in the past, I’m sure he won’t remember.
So I’ve thought about, tell me if you think this is a good idea or you have a better idea, I think I’m going to tell two trusted friends who know where it is and who will know to contact him if something happens. That’s kind of what I’ve come up with because I don’t know what else to do.
Pam: Yeah. Yeah, and I think that’s a great idea and whatever is going to work for you. So I always say when you’re doing your taxes every year, just look at it and make sure it’s up to date. Some people like to go fully digital and they want to have it digital. Some people want to have it just in a file folder and just put it. If you’re going to have it physically, I would say, put it in like a waterproof, fireproof bag or safe with your other documents.
G is guidance. So that includes some of your guidance around your healthcare directives, your medical powers of attorney and all of that. You and the medical professional probably have some idea of how that can go wrong when people don’t have those set up. The biggest case around that was the Terri Schiavo case. I don’t know if you remember that back in the nineties.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Pam: And in that case she was a young woman who unexpectedly had cardiac arrest. Her husband, after she was on life support, I believe it was for seven years, wanted to take her off. Her parents wanted to keep her on. It became multi years, decades of litigation, it became political, it was national. So even though for most of us, it won’t kind of rise to that level, everyday families are having that type of conflict around it because they don’t know what your wishes are for those kinds of things.
Bonnie: Basically, what it sounds like is there was no designated medical power of attorney or healthcare proxy.
Pam: Yeah. And there is no law that says your spouse is automatically that person. So if your spouse wants to do one way and a family member wants to, you know, contradicts them, it will go into court. And the court will listen and make a decision.
Bonnie: Yeah, actually, that’s an important point because I do know that you’re not an automatic power of attorney for your spouse. And I don’t think a lot of people know that. And there’s different levels.
Do you want to just quickly go through the different types? And I’m sure it’s state specific, but we just talked about medical power of attorney. I think I have full power of attorney, including financial for Matt, for example.
Pam: When it comes to power of attorney this is the situation, you’re incapacitated, you can’t make your medical or financial decisions. And so in most states, it’s a medical power of attorney or health proxy for medical. And then for financial, it’s a financial durable power of attorney. And you can have separate people for each and it’s who can step in and manage those. And it’s not by default, your spouse.
So really setting that up ahead of time so that your family members, and then we always do backups, right? So you want at least a few people as backups in case something were to happen to you and your spouse.
A is for asset protection. And that’s where we really get into kind of the difference between a will and a trust. And then some of the advanced strategies that my high net worth professionals do, like asset protection trusts for their kids and creating generational wealth.
Bonnie: That’s outside the scope of our podcast. And another reason why you should work with an actual lawyer, right? Because again, you don’t know what you don’t know. And there is, I think I have the book, Living Trust For Everyone. I’m sure you’ve heard, it’s a very popular book and I read through it real quick.
But I think as I was trying to learn about this for myself and to teach, I realized this is beyond the scope of what I can learn. And then the next step I went to was, okay, how do I help them find a good estate planning lawyer?
So can we just sidetrack a little bit and talk quickly about that? Because I think people are like, okay, I know I need to work with someone, especially when I do my part, okay, I need to do this, how do I find someone and how do I know they’re good?
Pam: Yeah, so there’s a few things I would look at when you’re working with trying to find a good attorney. I would say it’s always helpful to get a referral from someone you know and trust. And so if you’re already working with a tax professional or financial professional or other type of lawyer, you could always, or other business owners, you can always ask the people in your life for a referral to someone in your area.
And then the other component is making sure that flat fee versus hourly fee. So at our firm, we do everything at a flat fee, agreed to in advance, so there’s no surprises. And that actually really encourages the relationship with our clients. So if they have questions, they call us, they’re not scared to get like a $350 an hour charge. And so make sure you understand the billing arrangement and what it includes.
So in our field, there are some providers that have a low ticket item. So they’ll be like, hey, we’ll do your trust for $1,000. But then all the things you need with your estate plan, they’re charging like $250, $350 an hour. So it ends up being much more expensive than you originally thought. So I feel like transparency is very important.
The other component that I always talk about is funding a trust. Do they support you for putting all of your assets in the trust? Because that’s a big reason why estate plans fail. Also, do they have some way to keep in touch with you?
So we speak with our clients at a minimum every three years and after every life change. We have a membership program for our clients who want additional support every year. And so really understanding that this is not something you can just do once, put it on the shelf and then let it sit for 50 years. It really does need to continue to be updated. And you really want to work with someone that makes it easy for you to stay in communication and keep things updated. It’s really an ongoing relationship.
So I would say those are my kind of general tips. I am part of an organization called personalfamilylawyer.com. That website has lawyers like me across the country that practice similar to my philosophy. And so they’re a good resource if you are looking for someone that really takes a holistic approach, really is looking at advising you and being that support and is looking at kind of that long-term relationship versus just treating it as like a one time transaction that may or may not support your loved ones.
Bonnie: Yeah, everything you just said, like it just makes so much sense. Like I do know that estate planning isn’t just one and done. Like you said, it’s something you have to revisit, I don’t know, every five years, any major life events or as your net worth grows, et cetera. So I did know that.
And again, I just feel like I’m just so glad we’re doing this podcast because I know it’s going to help so many people, basically. I’m pretty excited. And I love that you gave the personalfamilylawyer.com because as we were talking, because we did mine right before Jack was born and he’s now six. And I know there are things that need to be updated or I just need to clarify.
The lawyer used to email us once a year and it was like " here are the people you named, make sure you still like them” type of thing, you know? Or they’re still alive because that’s important, right? But then he stopped emailing. And anyway, it’s basically on my list of things to do to find someone in New Jersey because it was made in New York and I don’t know how different it is. But maybe you have someone in New Jersey you can think of later.
So, all right, moving on.
Pam: So we were on C, which is carry through, communicate, and update. And that’s a good segue to what we just talked about. And so making sure you’re keeping things up to date after major life changes, that you’re revisiting at least every three years. But I like to see your asset inventory, try to keep that up to date every year, it’s very helpful.
And then Y is your legacy. And so when you’re gone, your loved ones are going to miss you and they’re not going to snuggle up with an estate planning binder to remember you by. They’re going to want more to remember you by.
So one of my colleagues, her father passed away unexpectedly and she just had a voicemail saying, call me back. And she listens to that voicemail almost every day. And how much more meaningful would it be if she had more to remember him by? But none of us ever get around to doing that.
So I always recommend, you know, I have some exercises in the book, but writing a love letter to your loved ones. With all of our clients, we do a legacy interview. So at the end of our meetings with them, after their final meeting, we record them, we talk about their kids and about the people they love.
But during the holiday time or any other time during the year, when you’re on Zoom with grandparents or you have your phone, just record them talking about certain stories and advice because all of that stuff will be really helpful down the road.
Bonnie: Yeah, I actually have heard of this and I don’t think it’s talked about enough. So I’ve had these in case of emergency binders and they include that. They’ll ask specific questions. I know people who, for example, record an annual little video and it’s timed like, oh, the holidays or maybe their son’s birthday, for example, if they have a kid or kids, just to do a little thing.
I see in movies, and I don’t know if this is true, I’m sure it is, where every person in the military has a letter that gets sent if they pass. You’ve seen that in movies, right? They already have a letter prepared for the spouse or for the family. So I just love that. And again, this is something where people aren’t thinking about it because no one thinks they’re going to die tomorrow unless they have a terminal illness or know that that’s going to happen soon.
But I love the idea that you should do that. There’s actually an app, have you heard of it? I can’t remember the name but it was actually basically designed for this, to record stories.
Pam: I’ve heard of a few different apps for it, yeah. And some people set up email addresses where they’re just like emailing their child throughout their childhood different things. But yeah, just thinking about whatever is going to be something you can do, just your values, your insights, your stories. And with technology these days, it’s so easy to do it and just making sure you’re doing that.
Bonnie: Yeah, I love the idea of the email thing because I’m also thinking, how can you make it as easy as possible for people to do this? So the email thing is brilliant. There’s actually another app for kids, it’s basically you get prompts texted to you about like when they’re a baby and they ask specific questions and then you just text back and they collect them all.
Pam: Yeah, I’ve seen that. I don’t remember the name of it. Yeah, but I have heard of that.
Bonnie: Yeah, I didn’t do that. But I remember thinking like, oh, that’s a cool idea. So that would be a great - I’m sure that service exists, or even the text prompts would be good because I feel like we always look at our phone and emails can kind of collect, right?
Pam: Yeah.
Bonnie: Okay, I think that’s such a good point. Is there anything else to talk about? I’m just trying to – Maybe sort of common things that people aren’t thinking about, like the whole conversation we had about guardianship, I think was really important. Just things that you know people aren’t thinking about.
Pam: Just to sum up the common things that people aren’t thinking about, guardianship, making sure there’s some type of plan so that the – Without a plan, the default plan is the government’s plan for you. And most people aren’t going to like that. It’s going to be the courts deciding and probate and the cost and time involved.
And then just the simple things, to just get financially organized. It’s going to help you be financially organized in life, which is so important for all the work you do, Bonnie, with your clients. But it also helps with making sure things are taken care of down the road.
And that’s the goal with my book too, is these concepts can seem very overwhelming, but it’s actually very straightforward. It’s not rocket science. So once you understand the rules of the game, it’s really easy to apply. It’s just helpful to work with someone who can really advise you through it and make it easier and simpler. We all are so busy, it’s nice to have someone to give you guidance.
Bonnie: Yeah, and one thing that, first of all, you’re located in Colorado. So if you live in Colorado, you should definitely work with – I don’t know if you have a team. Do you have a team?
Pam: We do. We have a team, yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah. Everything you’re saying, like it just makes sense. And just as an online business owner, and I know you’re a bit more business-minded than maybe some other lawyers. Like, I’m always thinking about like, how can I make sure they’re taken care of? What are all the things that I can think of? And clearly you’ve done that for what you do. I’m pretty sure you do this for clients. Do you give them, I heard it called different things, like a crib sheet, basically. Like when someone dies and let’s say it’s a spouse, like people don’t really know what you’re supposed to do.
Pam: Yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah, they need literally like, do this, do that, like collect X number of copies of their death certificate. So do you help your clients with that part too?
Pam: Yeah, we do. Our clients that work with us, we have some different – Like a handbook after someone passes away, what to do.
Bonnie: Yeah because I think that’s also, a lot of people just don’t know what to do. And there’s a lot of Facebook groups for female physicians and I’ve definitely seen stories where a parent passes and it’s just a complete mess. They don’t know what to do. They got to go through like the whole house. And especially if they’re a hoarder, like just all this crazy stuff.
Pam: One thing that you just said that prompted me to think about things that people don’t think about, one is divorce. So I would say one of the biggest mistakes I see is people go through a divorce and they forget to update their beneficiaries on retirement accounts and life insurance accounts. And then something suddenly will happen and then everything goes to the ex spouse because they’ve left it that way.
So your beneficiary designations are super important and they will trump anything else. So really making sure that those are up to date, I think that’s one of the biggest mistakes I see people make. And I think that’s one of the biggest mistakes I see people make when they do it themselves online is they’ll go and create a will that says, hey, I want everything to go to my spouse and kids, but then they leave the beneficiary designations as something different and they don’t realize a beneficiary designation will trump.
Bonnie: Yes, I did know that. And I could definitely see that being just like an afterthought because most divorces, obviously, are not very pleasant. And I do know of a case, like a friend of a friend where this happened. They forgot to change, but thankfully it was an amicable divorce, so the spouse wasn’t like, “Sorry, it’s all mine.” But I’m sure there are instances where that’s not the case.
Pam: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely.
Bonnie: Yeah. And that’s really unfortunate because, as you said, it trumps any will. Because I think a lot of people think that the will is like the end all be all, right?
Pam: Yeah, and they don’t understand it all connects. Yeah.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay, well, I feel like we talked about so many things. I know this is going to be so valuable for all of my listeners and I got a nice education, but also I just really liked how you had that framework of how to think about things. And I haven’t read your whole ebook, but I definitely scanned it and felt like it was really informative.
And again, this is like the resource that I have been looking for. So thank you so much for what you do. And I’m jealous that I’m not in Colorado, so I can’t work with you. I know you’re maybe expanding and going to have some vetted recommendations, so I look forward to that happening.
Where can people find you?
Pam: Yeah, so I would say on Instagram is a great way at Law Mother CO. And then lawmother.com is our website.
Bonnie: Thank you so much for being here.
Pam: Thank you so much, Bonnie, I really appreciate it.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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198: Disability Insurance: What You Need to Know as a Female Physician with Stephanie Pearson
Disability insurance is something that female physicians really need. We’re more likely to need disability insurance than our male counterparts, and to discuss the real value of disability insurance, I’m joined by our main sponsor for our upcoming conference, the first Money and Wellness Conference for Female Physicians: Stephanie Pearson, MD.
Stephanie Pearson, MD, FACOG, is a board-certified OB/GYN and a licensed broker specializing in disability and life insurance for physicians. Injured in the prime of her career as an OB/GYN, Stephanie was forced to pivot. Through her own firsthand experience, she found a new calling in advocating for and educating her peers on their insurance needs. Stephanie’s goal is to empower others to protect their most valuable asset: their ability to earn income.
Tune in this week to discover the importance of disability insurance for female physicians. We’re discussing the factors that increase the cost of disability insurance, how your claims against your disability insurance are measured, and basically, everything you need to know about this kind of insurance as a physician.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- Why I obtained disability insurance right out of residency but wish I had gotten it earlier.
- How Stephanie learned about the importance of disability insurance the hard way.
- Stephanie’s mission to change the way insurance in the medical industry is handled.
- Why female physicians, especially, need disability insurance.
- How the rules around the pricing of disability are always changing.
- What you need to know about claiming disability insurance as the result of an injury.
- The things that increase the cost of your disability insurance.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Bonnie: Hello everyone, welcome to another episode. Over the next few episodes, I’m going to be highlighting our wonderful sponsors for our 2024 conference, the first of its kind, the first Money and Wellness Conference for female physicians. And I actually sought out Stephanie Pearson. I wanted her to be our top sponsor. I love that it is a female physician-led company.
So she is an OBGYN. She’s going to introduce herself and how she ended up in the insurance industry, right? Because when people hear that, they’re like, that is really strange. Why would a doctor become an insurance agent? So she’ll share her story about why. And she’s very passionate about educating female physicians and making sure that they’re adequately insured.
Now, I believe last week’s episode I talked about asset protection in terms of the different types, et cetera. And today we’re mostly talking about disability insurance. And it’s something that female physicians really need. Also male physicians, it’s just that female physicians are more likely to have to use it.
So it’s something that I obtained right out of residency. I wish I got it a little sooner because I was on the older side and it’s cheaper the younger you are. I still carry mine, even though I currently don’t practice as a full-time physician, but I still want the protection it affords since I’m not crazy rich yet.
So here’s my conversation with Stephanie.
All right, Stephanie, I don’t know why I haven’t had you on the show yet, but welcome.
Stephanie: Hey, Bonnie, how are you?
Bonnie: So you and I have known each other for a while. Do you remember how we first met?
Stephanie: It was definitely online. And then you were moving to Philadelphia and I’m outside of Philadelphia.
Bonnie: Right.
Stephanie: And we realized that your partner was really good friends with a high school friend of mine.
Bonnie: Oh, Deb, right?
Stephanie: Deb, yep.
Bonnie: Oh my God, I totally forgot about that.
Stephanie: And then you and I went out to dinner and then we went out with our partners and our oldest, because they’re the same age.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Stephanie: I remember we went to Nudy's for breakfast. Why I remember that, I don’t know.
Bonnie: Didn’t we go there twice? I feel like we went there twice.
Stephanie: We might have. And then you moved away.
Bonnie: Yeah, then I moved away. Yeah, we were there for like a minute. Okay, so everyone’s like, who is this Stephanie person? So why don’t you introduce yourself?
Stephanie: I am Stephanie Pearson, I’m an OBGYN by training. Unfortunately, I was kicked in the shoulder during a difficult patient delivery and she just got me in the right spot. I ended up with a torn labrum, it didn’t heal, I ended up with a frozen shoulder. Had surgery, went to sleep getting told I’d be back to work in 12 weeks. And August 3rd was 10 years that I have now been out of clinical medicine due to significant range of motion deficits and nerve damage in my left arm.
And I learned a lot the hard way about contracts, disability insurance, life insurance, and really took my journey and the mistakes that I made and turned it into a business. I am now a co-founder and CEO of an insurance advisory firm.
We specialize in disability and life insurance for physicians and other healthcare providers. And really just trying to change the way the industry is handled and really leading with education and transparency in a way that at least was not done for me 20 years ago. And really trying to educate young physicians on the importance of a quality disability policy.
What do they really need? What maybe they don’t. Where are the pitfalls in employer policies and really make something that historically has been very confusing and complicated, and I think part of that’s on purpose by the industry, and make it really user-friendly.
Bonnie: Yeah. I mean, I feel like you’re – We’re going to talk about disability insurance obviously and other things. But I think your journey and the business you’ve created is really just a classic example of entrepreneurship, which is seeing a problem, finding a solution. And I’m assuming, just like me, you weren’t planning on starting this business. You just found yourself educated. I feel like we have a very similar entrepreneur story.
Stephanie: I started lecturing to area residency programs partly out of altruism, partly, to be honest, for catharsis and really trying to do the like, hey, these are the mistakes I made, don’t make them. And they started asking for my help.
And while I was recovering, I threw myself into it and I learned everything I could and realized at one point that, huh, maybe I actually have knowledge and resources that could help other people. And to your point, kind of finding a problem, finding a solution or hoping to find a solution and saying, sure, let’s give it a go.
Bonnie: When was it that you decided to start the company?
Stephanie: I want to say 2016 and I did it for about a year and a half by myself. You know, we always talk about we started at the kitchen table and learned a lot along the way. It was a lot of gut and hustle, right?
My husband, who’s a flight nurse by training, did a lot of the back of the house stuff. I was very lucky that he was incredibly supportive and is to this day. Now he’s our CFO. But he helped create the LLC and he helped me get my E&O insurance. And he was just a huge cheerleader for me doing what I did best, which was educate.
Bonnie: Basically you’re saying you were able to have a great team kind of built in already.
Stephanie: Yes. And I have a really good friend who is an entrepreneurial professor at Wharton and he was a sounding board and lawyers and accountants, right? You have to surround yourself with good people.
I can say it was not an overnight success. I probably put in way more hours in the beginning than I did as a clinician. And then in 2017, Scott Ravitz and I teamed up and created Pearson Ravitz. We just turned six in June and we have 26 full-time employees now and clients in all 50 states.
Bonnie: Holy cow. So you’re not in that office that you showed me anymore.
Stephanie: No, no, we are on to our second, I say our second and a half because we actually just downsized because of Covid and we committed to a hybrid model. And so with people not coming back every day, we actually just shrunk our footprint.
Bonnie: Yeah, I think that makes sense.
Stephanie: Yeah. I think I was in Narberth when you were in Philly. And now we’re in Ardmore, which is around the corner. But I think at the time we like tripled or quadrupled our size and now we just cut out a third of it because it’s just silly to pay rent when people aren’t here.
Bonnie: Yeah. Okay. Well, I just think it’s fascinating to hear and for our listeners to hear, right? Because everyone’s journey is different, you know?
Stephanie: Oh yeah.
Bonnie: Okay, so we’re talking about disability insurance. I feel really lucky that I learned about it and got it at, you know, I don’t know what the right time is, but it was after residency, but pretty early. It was right after residency, actually.
Stephanie: Were you able to get a discount?
Bonnie: Yeah, yeah. I worked at Northwell Health, yeah.
Stephanie: Okay.
Bonnie: It was a principal unisex and didn’t they stop doing that or something?
Stephanie: They stopped doing that in 19.
Bonnie: 2019, yeah. So I slid right in, it was 2015. And I only knew about it because I don’t even remember, there was a disability agent who would take us out for drinks during residency. I did residency in California.
Honestly, I was like, I’m sure you hear this, I thought this was like some scam, some weird thing. And one of the residents said she had it and she told me how much she was paying and I was like, no, definitely not going to do that. And so that was my first thing. And then this is all before my money journey.
And then as I started to learn about money, again, this is kind of like how I started, I learned how important this was. And I didn’t know you at the time, so I used a different agent, but I got it together really quickly. I think I actually contacted him before I left California. He told me, don’t buy the policy in California.
Stephanie: California is like the most expensive.
Bonnie: Yeah. So, but I got it all. I felt very taken care of. I got – I don’t want to get too technical for people – the new in practice. It was like $4500 a month only because my hospital disability –
Stephanie: So you didn’t get a resident package then?
Bonnie: Probably because I couldn’t get it because we decided not to get California.
Stephanie: Probably. I mean, the rules are – All of the carriers now there’s a specific time window within graduation. It’s usually 90 to 180 days depending on the carrier, where you can still access resident discounts once you finish.
But what you are saying, and I apologize for interjecting, is if your policy was $4500 in monthly benefit because they were taking into account what you had at Northwell, then that’s a big difference in kind of why we tell residents to get it in training versus waiting until you’re an attending. Because when you become an attending, they look at how much money you make. They look at what your group benefits are and they spit out a number.
When you’re in training everybody qualifies for a specific amount. To keep it apples to apples, everybody can get a $5,000 policy, some of the carriers have now gone up to 6,000, but they don’t care how much money you make and they don’t care what your benefits are because they know that you’re kind of in flux. And you can get it with a resident discount and that policy is going to be way cheaper than anything.
And I did the same thing. I didn’t get a policy when I was a resident because I didn’t know about it. And I got it my first year as an attending and it was very expensive and I didn’t qualify for a whole lot. And so, yeah, I think we were in the same boat.
Bonnie: Yeah, I increased it once I left Northwell. So now I have benefits like 15,500.
Stephanie: I increased mine once and then honestly forgot about it. And my original agent did not stay on top of me, and so when I did get hurt, I was actually really underinsured. I mean, we had enough that we didn’t have to sell our house. But had I been advocated for properly and educated properly, I would have had a much higher benefit.
Bonnie: Yeah. Yeah, so I think just us talking about our experiences and what we have – But yeah, I’m very thankful. I am insured, actually. I pay annually and it just went out. I’m looking at the calendar here, like a few weeks ago. It’s always painful. It’s a painful time of the year, it’s 7K for me every year.
Stephanie: I know. Buy it once and forget about it.
Bonnie: But it’s worth it because right now I’m not financially – And even if I was financially independent, I probably would still have it because I don’t know, that’s something to discuss at some point.
Stephanie: You’re young, I mean, I think that’s a lot, like when I talk to people about when do you cancel it, right? And rule of thumb, I say to people, look, the day that you wake up and you don’t have to go to work, you don’t need your paycheck, you can probably cancel your policy.
But to your point, if you are fortunate enough to become financially independent young, you’re young. There’s a lot of time that things can happen, right. And markets change and money situations change. And so I think to your point, there is a certain element of, okay, I may be financially independent today, but will I be in 10 years? And that becomes a conversation.
Bonnie: And not just that, there can be a significant cost associated with a disability.
Stephanie: Exactly.
Bonnie: So that’s one of the reasons why. I mean, I’m not financially independent, depending on your definition. We could talk about this, too, because although most of my listeners aren’t transitioning necessarily to a full-time other type thing like I have. But I remember like, does this policy still work since I don’t practice anymore?
Stephanie: So yes and no. So it’s actually kind of interesting, the definitions for your own occupation, and I say specialty specific because there are five carriers and they use different terminology to keep us confused. But that definition matters at two times, right? When you buy the policy, because it dictates what’s called an occupational class. We’re all kind of pigeonholed into what the carrier’s risk stratification is, so it affects cost.
When it really matters is at the time of a claim. And the definition does grow with you and change. And so in your specific case, if you’re practicing –
Bonnie: Mine is principal, that matters.
Stephanie: Right. If you’re practicing dermatology and making money as a dermatologist and you’re making money as a coach, you’re going to be looked at as having two jobs. And they’re going to look at what in your disability makes you unable to earn money in either of those jobs.
And so it may be a little bit harder when you have two separate entities to be totally disabled, unless something really tragic happens. You would more likely end up in a residual space because you may be able to do your coaching, right? But not be able to practice. And they’re going to look at what’s your income from both.
Bonnie: I thought that wasn’t the case, though, for –
Stephanie: Oh, it is.
Bonnie: That’s not how it was explained to me when I got it. It may have changed, or it was always like that?
Stephanie: I mean, as long as I’ve been in the business, it’s been like that. You actually want it to grow up with you because as a physician who’s practicing, right, like take me, I’m an OBGYN. If you line up 100 OBGYNs, we’re not all making money in the same way.
I was a prolific surgeon and I was told I couldn’t operate and I couldn’t deliver babies. Well, there are OBGYNs out there who are office gynecologists, right? If I was an office gynecologist, I’d still be able to do my job. And so as you change what you’re doing and how you make money, that’s what they’re looking at.
So I apologize if I just kind of burst a bubble for you, but –
Bonnie: No, no, no. Wait, so I just want to make sure I understand everyone. So let’s just go back to you for a second, so did they not make you do office GYN then if you could still do that?
Stephanie: So I was told that I could do office GYN as tolerated. Unfortunately, I got terminated the day my FMLA was up because my contract said I had to be able to do 100% of my job. However, the majority of my income came from operating and doing OB.
Bonnie: Right.
Stephanie: So the fact that I couldn’t do that, I met the definition of totally disabled. Had I continued as an office gynecologist, I would still be getting paid because that wasn’t how I made most of my money or spent most of my time prior to my injury. And, to that point, I wanted to do it. But once I got terminated, I found out I was uninsurable for malpractice insurance because my orthopedist put in writing that I was a liability. So it was like a nail in my clinical coffin.
Bonnie: Well, was that a good thing or a bad thing?
Stephanie: At the time I was livid.
Bonnie: Yeah.
Stephanie: 10 years later, he probably did me a favor. Knowing myself, I probably would have gotten myself into a situation that I shouldn’t have. I would have pushed myself and potentially –
Bonnie: You mean over work? What a surprise as a doctor.
Stephanie: Exactly, right? And so I just became a workaholic doing this. But I do want to get back to your stuff because I don’t want you freaking out. But they do look at all sources of income. And if you have two distinctly different job sets –
Bonnie: Well, right now I don’t work as a physician.
Stephanie: So your own occupation, which if you got principal in 2015, it’s the regular occupation definition. They would look at you as a coach now.
Bonnie: Okay, that’s what I was told.
Stephanie: Yeah, they’re not going to look at you as a dermatologist now.
Bonnie: So isn’t that a good thing?
Stephanie: It depends, and you have to have your person look into it because you can change occupational classes, usually, as a physician once you have not laid hands on a patient for three to five years. However, if you maintain your license and there’s a possibility that you would go back, they may not let you. Changing occupational classes is sometimes better.
Bonnie: I heard dermatologists were lower risk than most physicians.
Stephanie: Yeah, you guys are not very risky.
Bonnie: You mean like my policy could be cheaper if I went into a lower risk class?
Stephanie: It could be cheaper, it could be more expensive. I just had somebody not too long ago who went from clinical medicine to pharma, and it was actually going to be more expensive if I classed her as a pharma executive.
Bonnie: It’s so interesting, right?
Stephanie: It was really weird. But I was like, look, I’m glad we looked into it, you’re not changing this.
Bonnie: Yeah. Again, this is just an example of how the rules are all complicated, almost on purpose. Yeah.
Okay, so that’s really the main thing, is I was told that my own occupation, it’d be treated as a coach. And I’d have to be significantly disabled to not be able to do it, I guess.
Stephanie: So I will tell you, to be the bad news bearer person, but people often forget how taxing things like cancer can be as far as autoimmune issues go, like MS. And I’ve had quite a few clients with traumatic brain injuries from like really weird reasons.
And I am a big fan of, look, if you need your paycheck, you need to be covered. And there are so many things that take people out that we just don’t think about. And I’m glad that we don’t think about it, right? Because you can’t live your life in fear. But it’s really important to have good coverage.
Bonnie: Yeah. I mean, this is a great segue as to what we actually want to talk about, right? Because I think what you just talked about is most physicians don’t think they’re going to become disabled. That’s really what it comes down to.
Stephanie: Listen, we grow up, and I’ve said this a million times, that there’s kind of this tyranny of perfection that exists in medicine, right? We’re supposed to be tougher than, stronger than, more resilient than. So many of us have gone to work sick, right? It’s like a badge of honor. I think that’s maybe starting to change in the last couple of years.
But you worked unless you were dead, right? I mean, that was how I was trained. And when you’re young and healthy and working 120 hours a week, and sorry, I’m dating myself. I’m older than the work hour rules. I think it was my chief year that it went to 80 hours a week. But you don’t think about all the bad things that could happen.
Bonnie: Well young people think they’re invincible in general.
Stephanie: Right. So you add late adolescent, early 20 hubris with medicine, forget about it, right? Like we’re untouchable. If you had told me 10 years ago that a kick from a patient was going to ruin my career. Are you kidding?
Bonnie: You would have been like, what are you talking about?
Stephanie: Yeah.
Bonnie: I’ll be back at work the next day.
Stephanie: Yeah, and I did go back to work the next day. It was several months later that I couldn’t move my arm. But yeah, I mean, it’s a really interesting kind of conundrum because that’s when you want to get it, right? When you’re young and healthy and don’t have diagnoses.
I also say all the time, we’re all healthy until we go to the doctor.
Bonnie: Exactly. Everyone’s like, but I’m young and healthy.
Stephanie: Yeah, exactly.
Bonnie: I’m like, so? This is when to get it actually.
Stephanie: Right, get a policy that is going to cover you from head to toe before you have a diagnosis that now they’re going to say, okay, we’re going to cover you, but we’re not going to cover this, this, this, or this.
Bonnie: I’m just going to make an analogy here, I have to, because I’m so pro prenup. It’s kind of the same thing.
Stephanie: Yeah.
Bonnie: The time to make the prenup is when you guys are madly in love with each other and highly respect each other.
Stephanie: Yes.
Bonnie: It’s going to be a very different agreement than when you guys hate each other.
Stephanie: Exactly. Right. And for disability insurance, look, age is a factor in cost, right? And we’re never younger. And, admittedly, most of us in residency, we’re not going to be getting a whole lot healthier, right? And yes, there’s exceptions to every rule, but yes, I know. But for the most part, when you’re in training is when you’re going to get the best policy and it’s going to be the least expensive.
And I will throw out that just because you qualify for a certain amount of coverage doesn’t mean that you have to purchase it, right?
Bonnie: Well let’s go into that because people are probably thinking like, but I’m a resident – because I definitely know I have some resident listeners – how can I even pay for it? So are you able to talk about rough numbers as to how much it would be?
Stephanie: I mean, look, there’s a rule of thumb that women should expect to pay 2 to 6% of their gross, men should expect to pay 1 to 3% of their gross. Yes, women, sorry.
Bonnie: Can you say why?
Stephanie: Yeah, because actuarially speaking, women leave the workforce more often than men because of injury or illness. We do get a little bit of a break on the life insurance side. Men tend to die younger and more successfully at their own hands. So life insurance is actually more expensive for men. But back to disability insurance, we are often able in training to get that number lower because of the discounts that are available for trainees.
The actual price varies so widely amongst different specialties.
Bonnie: Let’s talk about that. What affects pricing?
Stephanie: So age, gender, state, and what kind of doc you are, and more broadly what your job is, right? Because we do cover more than physicians. But each company has their proprietary data that, trust me, I’ve been trying to get for seven years on true claims data. And so they do look back at the end of every year, who went out on claim, what did they have in common, and that’s how they create their pricing scales.
And so it probably is not a surprise to hear that emergency medicine doctors are more expensive to cover than a family practice doc, right? When you just think about the acuity of a patient and how physical it can be, right? And so surgeons are more expensive than hospitalists.
And so I don’t actually know why, I haven’t done a deep dive into the part of the country piece. I’m sure there’s actuarial data, but California, Texas, Florida, New York, and oddly Vermont are pretty expensive. And to your point, if I’m talking to a resident in one of those states who’s planning on moving out, I will often say, look, this is one of those situations where I may tell you get your coverage now, but we’re going to replace it when you move.
Or if you’re finishing up and moving, it may make sense to wait a couple of weeks until your feet are somewhere else, which kind of goes back to typically you want to get one policy when you’re young and healthy and never have to worry about it again.
Everybody has to go through something called medical underwriting. Depending on what the ask is, you may have to pee in a cup, you may have to give up some blood, but you absolutely have to answer a million medical questions a million times.
Bonnie: I remember.
Stephanie: They have access to everything.
Bonnie: Oh my God, how do they?
Stephanie: There are no secrets.
Bonnie: But how do they get all the info?
Stephanie: I don’t really know. There’s a MIB, which now I’m forgetting what it actually stands for, I want to say Medical Information Bureau, but I could be making that up. But every time there is a health insurance payment, like code, it goes to the MIB.
Bonnie: It goes through insurance, though.
Stephanie: Through health insurance.
Bonnie: So cash only if you can.
Stephanie: If you fill a prescription, they get that data. They look at health records. They look at pharmacy records. They look at motor vehicle records. I recently had my first client with a DUI. And, admittedly, we don’t really ask upfront about that, but it’s in part of our secondary questioning. And I was like, oh no, because that creates problems.
So those are the big things. And then there are a couple of other issues that affect pricing. For the most part, pre-existing health diagnoses affect coverage. Meaning they’re either going to cover it or they’re not. There are a few things, though, that will increase cost. BMI is a big one. And also one of my things that I’ve been fighting for the last couple of years, they use actuarial BMI charts, which are based on historical BMI charts, which we know are based on European Caucasian men.
And I’ve really been fighting for other cultural subsets who we know are constitutionally smaller, because you actually can be too small or too big. I can’t really argue so much on the too big side, but I find myself arguing on the too small side a lot. And going back five, ten years to prove that people have been the same size forever, so that they’re not getting dinged. But they break weight into quartiles. So it can change your cost 25%, 50%, 75%, 100%.
Bonnie: Did you ever tell someone if you lose five pounds, it’ll be cheaper?
Stephanie: I have told more than a few people that if they lose some weight, it would be cheaper. I get to be the brutally honest person. Now, I will also tell you weight is really interesting.
Bonnie: That’s just based on facts, like in terms of the finances of the –
Stephanie: Yeah, yeah. The interesting thing about weight loss is the carriers want you to lose the weight and keep it off for a year.
Bonnie: I mean, that makes sense.
Stephanie: Or they add half of it back, right? Because a lot of people yo-yo diet and all that stuff.
Bonnie: They don’t keep it off.
Stephanie: So it’s not as easy as, like the five pounders here and there, yeah. I will tell you that the new onset of weight loss drugs is throwing the industry on its head. They don’t know how to handle it. And so a lot of them now – I guess I should take a step back.
Historically, a lot of these drugs were used for diabetic patients, right? And if you had type 2 diabetes, that increased your cost. It made some other changes to the policy. Then we’re getting these medical records where they’re not diabetic, it’s purely for weight loss. And the carriers don’t really have the forward data to look at how to handle it.
So a lot of the carriers are actually treating people like they’re type 2 diabetics. Some of the carriers are saying, well, guess what? Not only do you have to lose the weight and keep it off for a year, you have to be off that medication for a year and keep the weight off. That’s one of the newer hiccups, for lack of a better word. And so I’ve been trying to shout from the rooftops before anybody thinks about going on any of those meds, they need to have disability insurance.
Bonnie: Well, I think this is an important point, get it as soon as you’re healthy, but you might want to delay certain things. If you know that’s something you might want to go on, and you and I have talked a lot about and we preach like before your first attempt at pregnancy. For example, I got gestational diabetes and I’m sure that would have affected things.
Stephanie: They wouldn’t have covered future pregnancies.
Bonnie: Well, I only have one, but a lot of women, they have more.
Stephanie: But for life insurance, it could double to quadruple your cost.
Bonnie: Yeah, I literally got one policy for a small amount, then I got a second policy and I got it right before I got pregnant.
Stephanie: I mean, it’s one of the hardest conversations that I have with people because they’re like, but I had the baby and I’m fine. And I’m like, right, but you’re a doc and you know the data, right? Like once a woman has gestational diabetes, she’s at risk for it again. And there’s a 50 percent risk of becoming a type 2 diabetic later in life. That’s what they’re doing.
Bonnie: Is it that high?
Stephanie: Yeah, it’s that high.
Bonnie: Oh, damn.
Stephanie: Yeah. Sorry, Bon. Yeah, it’s really high.
Bonnie: I’m just getting all this bad news today.
Stephanie: I know. God, I’m sorry. I do love you.
Bonnie: I feel like just the more I hear, and I knew this but I haven’t had a conversation about disability insurance in a while, just like how this education really needs to get out to the residents, and early.
Stephanie: And I am trying so hard. I lecture around the country. I do it virtually. I do it in person. The biggest problem is that so many hospitals now have really kind of dropped the hammer on sales and they view me as a conflict of interest. And I have said time and time again, when I speak, it says Dr. Pearson. It is DI 101. I don’t talk about carriers, I disclose who and what I am, but none of that is involved in the education.
I think I did 34 this year. But that’s still, right, think about how many programs there are. I mean, there could be that many programs in one hospital, right? So I’m trying so hard to really get out there.
Bonnie: Well you’ve got to scale that, I mean, you can’t –
Stephanie: Well, right. And someone will say, oh my God, we want you. We want you. And then our program director said we can’t.
Bonnie: I mean, I get it. Even when I speak, that hasn’t really been a problem for me yet, but I could see why people wouldn’t want to have me speak versus just one of the attendings just do it.
Stephanie: Right. Listen, call me what you want, but I will put myself against just about anybody out there at my knowledge base for disability insurance. It is incredibly nuanced, it changes all the time and it’s something that should be part of our education. I would love to see financial literacy across the board be part of training.
Bonnie: Absolutely.
Stephanie: Nobody teaches us about – Well, I can only talk about what happened 20 years ago. No one taught us about business. No one taught us about money.
Bonnie: No, it’s still like that. I mean, it’s a little bit better.
Stephanie: No one taught us how to be an adult, right? I mean, really.
Bonnie: Or how to be like a human.
Stephanie: Right. And so, you know, to your point, I am trying very, very hard to get to as many residents as I can.
Bonnie: Well, we’re all part of the movement, so to speak, right?
Stephanie: Yeah.
Bonnie: So when I give talks, it’s for residents. I just gave a talk recently to Jefferson Dermatologist, so in your neck of the woods. I gave them your name, obviously.
Stephanie: Thank you.
Bonnie: And I obviously talked about that and how important it is. I think the more people can hear about it, kind of like my first interaction with an agent I was like, this is a scam and why would I pay this guy? But obviously I learned more.
And things are confidential, right, when they talk to you?
Stephanie: Oh God, yeah.
Bonnie: Because someone might be like, I’m thinking of doing this, but it’s not like you’re going to go tell the carrier. Because I think that’s important because people don’t need to be scared.
Stephanie: I mean, look, we only tell the carriers what you tell us, right? And if things need to be not, I’m trying to figure out how to say this the right way. The carriers don’t have access to my CRM, right? So anything that I have is super protected.
We spend a shit ton of money a year on cybersecurity and HIPAA, which, by the way, insurance companies do not need to be HIPAA compliant. But we are as close to HIPAA compliant as possible. Like all of our employees go through HIPAA training and we’re very, very good at all that stuff.
The one thing I will say that I hear a lot is, oh, you don’t have to say it if you pay out of pocket and don’t go through health insurance.
Bonnie: I was going to bring that up.
Stephanie: That’s not true. The question being asked is, have you ever, have you in the past X years? And you have, right?
Bonnie: Don’t lie is what you’re saying?
Stephanie: Yes. Fraud has no time limit, and so the last thing that you want to happen is to get a policy that you’ve been a little bit misrepresentative on, make a claim for something completely different. If they look back and they find that you were misrepresentative on your original application, they can rescind the policy and you’re done. There’s no time limit on fraud.
And so I tell people all the time, look, this is not the time to have secrets. They have ways of finding things out.
Bonnie: So scary.
Stephanie: And to my point, I don’t know how they find out some of the things they find.
Bonnie: I got asked a random question about a random like Cipro course and they wanted to know why I was on it. I’m like, I don’t know, it was probably a UTI. I don’t remember.
Stephanie: Yeah. Oh, we get hits like that all the time where –
Bonnie: You want to hear something crazy about me when I was getting it done? It was like a primary care note and they noted a mole, which makes sense. So they made me get a full body exam. I’m like, that’s hysterical as an Asian woman, but okay.
Stephanie: Right.
Bonnie: But I got it done.
Stephanie: But that’s the thing, right? So, I mean, they know everything. Like, there are no secrets from insurance companies. They find everything out. It is not worth it. I tell people all the time, in theory, I’m okay being famous, I don’t want to be infamous, right? And so we do everything that we can in our ability to be honest, forthright and make sure that what we’re presenting to carriers is truthful.
Bonnie: One last question is how does mental health affect this? Like seeing a psychiatrist, being on meds, therapy, how does that affect this?
Stephanie: For the most part, it just leads to a mental health and substance abuse exclusion because they umbrella those two together. Major depressive disorder can limit benefit periods. So whereas with a traditional policy, you want to go to 65, some go to 67, it may limit your entire policy to a five-year benefit period.
Bonnie: Oh, meaning like it wouldn’t be forever if you needed it forever type of thing? Not forever, but maybe go up to 65.
Stephanie: Things like PTSD, history of a suicide attempt or ideation may make you uninsurable. I have no problems – I am better at living because I have a psychiatrist and take meds everyday.
Bonnie: And I was going to say it’s kind of, I think this is part of the whole mental health taboo among physicians.
Stephanie: Correct.
Bonnie: Unfortunately.
Stephanie: I mean, I will say that the pendulum is at least starting to swing the other way. When I got my policy in 2005, there were only two companies that would actually cover OBGYNs for full mental health.
Bonnie: Wow.
Stephanie: Because OBGYNs go out a lot for mental health. Now, 20 years later, I just want to make sure I say the right thing. All five of the big houses for most physicians, and I’ll give you my asterisk, you have a choice. You can have a two-year benefit and save some money, or they’ll cover you for the entirety of the policy.
The asterisk there is emergency medicine, anesthesia, pain, we pretty much can’t get you more than two years. There’s one company that’s two years per episode instead of a two-year aggregate. Again, we’re talking about nuances. But no one will cover those docs because they’re in the middle of the Venn diagram.
Bonnie: Yeah, they have the data showing that otherwise it would just be too expensive for them, right?
Stephanie: Right. It is being offered to more people. Admittedly, I think more of us carry diagnoses. I like to think that those of us that are seeking care and getting the treatment that we need –
Bonnie: We’re less likely to need it.
Stephanie: We’d be less likely to go out for that.
Bonnie: Exactly.
Stephanie: To me, I look at it as if it’s no different than if I broke my arm last year and they don’t want to cover my arm, right? Like a pre-existing diagnosis is a pre-existing diagnosis. Some of the carriers are willing to reconsider those.
So like if somebody’s having just a, I don’t know, let’s say you’re going through a divorce and there’s an adjustment disorder diagnosis. Once the divorce is finalized, you stop going to therapy, you don’t need it anymore. Some of them will say, look, come back to us when you’ve been symptom-free and treatment-free for two to three years and we’ll think about giving that coverage back to you.
I would say the majority of my folks with underlying psych diagnoses, like myself, it’s never coming back because we should never come off our drugs, right? Like I can tell if I miss my meds for two days, which just happened because I had a layover that I missed and I did not plan well.
Bonnie: Oh my God, do you know how many times I forget my meds when I travel? And I always get the emergency refill, but it’s obviously super annoying and I feel stupid.
Anyway, so, okay. How can people find you and get insured?
Stephanie: So I am incredibly easily found. Our website is pearsonravitz.com. I am me, so Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, Stephanie Pearson. I think there might be multiple Instagram and LinkedIn accounts, but you can find me.
Bonnie: Spell your last name.
Stephanie: P as in Paul, E-A-R, S as in Sam, O-N as in Nancy. And I am Stephanie with a P-H. Our office number is 610-658-3251. And I hope to see some of you at Bonnie’s conference in 2024.
Bonnie: Yeah. So Stephanie of Pearson Ravitz is our champagne sponsor, that’s the top sponsor. I’m so grateful that you’re doing that. And also I really wanted you to be in that slot. And I’m excited for you to speak because I know you have so many important things to say, plus I get to see you and you get to be at a spa. I mean, it’s not a bad deal.
Stephanie: Yes, it’s been a while. It has definitely been a while. Well, kiss Jack for me and I will talk to you later.
Bonnie: Okay. Thanks for being here.
Stephanie: Thanks for having me.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you loved what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
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197: Simple Tips for Protecting Your Money
Making money and building wealth is one thing, but are you protecting your money? Protecting your wealth is super important, but too many people are neglecting even the simplest ways to ensure the future wealth of their family. Especially if you’re a parent, or you have anyone dependent on your income like elderly parents, you need to get your insurances in order.
Until you can self-insure, meaning you have enough money to cover your financial needs in the event that you can’t make more cash, being insured is critical. To protect the wealth you’ve worked so hard to build, I’m giving you some simple, actionable tips to make sure you and your family are covered, no matter what happens.
Tune in this week to discover how to protect the assets you’ve worked hard to accumulate. I’m discussing the most important types of insurance you need to protect yourself and your family, and you’ll learn where to start when creating an asset protection strategy.
Learn more about Money for Women Physicians, an exclusive money coaching program to get your money and mindset working for you.
What You'll Learn from this Episode:
- Why too many people aren’t protecting their assets.
- The most important category of insurance that every person should have.
- Why you need life insurance, whether or not you have children right now.
- Some of the annoying parts about applying for life insurance, but why it’s still worth it.
- How to decide on the best kinds of insurance to set your family up for life.
Listen to the Full Episode:
Featured on the Show:
Welcome to The Wealthy Mom MD Podcast, a podcast for women physicians who want to learn how to live a wealthy life. In this podcast you will learn how to make money work for you, how you can have more of it, and learn the tools to empower you to live a life on purpose. Get ready to up-level your money and your life. I’m your host, Dr. Bonnie Koo.
Hey everyone, welcome back for another episode. Today we’re going to talk about asset protection. It’s something that a lot of us don’t think about because we’re more focused on growing our money. As we’re growing our wealth, and even when we are “rich,” you’re going to need some layers of asset protection.
The way I like to explain asset protection is you’re putting layers of protection in place. It is not 100% infallible. Is that the word I’m thinking of? But you know what I mean. Meaning just because you have everything in place doesn’t mean something bad can’t happen, which I know sounds like bad news but there are ways to really make it almost 100%.
And so don’t lose all the money you’ve worked for and have worked so hard to grow as well. A lot of these insurances are relatively cheap, some are more expensive, but when you need them, you really need them. So here’s a replay of the episode I did where I talk about how to prepare yourself for asset protection.
Today, I want to talk about asset protection. And here’s what I mean by that, basically protecting your money, right? And so I have noticed with my clients that the two things that many of them tend to put off are getting the proper insurances in place, although that part not as much mainly because for the most part it’s pretty easy to get it. You can do some things online. It doesn’t take a whole lot of time.
Estate planning, for sure, everyone puts off. I’m not going to really go into that right now, but estate planning is getting your wills done, a trust if that is appropriate for you. And I’ll just say, if you are a parent, meaning you have kids, or if anyone is dependent on your income, so maybe you take care of another family member, maybe it’s your parents, you need to get your estate plan in order.
Basically it’s the document or documents that tell – I was going to say tell the people, but tell the people, tell the state, probate, et cetera who gets your stuff when you die. I mean, it’s that simple in terms of how to think about it. And so many of you are not doing it because it goes on “this is important, but it’s not urgent” because none of us think we’re going to pass tomorrow. But none of us know when we are going to go, and so it’s so easy to put off.
But I’m just going to implore, especially if you’re a parent, you really need to get your shit together, okay? So go call that lawyer that you’ve been avoiding to call. Or if you don’t know who to ask your local network, your friends, some of you might be in some sort of professional networks, Facebook groups, ask them.
But put it on your to-do list to get this done. It’s going to require probably a few meetings, some back and forth about your drafts. You got to pick some people; guardians, executors, all that stuff. So really think about that. Maybe I’ll do a whole other podcast on that, but it just came up.
So I want to talk about insurances today though. And so the way I want you to think about insurances, it’s basically you need insurance until you can self-insure. And what do I mean by self-insure? Meaning you have enough money to cover your financial needs if something bad happens. Now, the something bad that happens are, you know, there are some pretty broad categories where people get insurance.
So auto insurance, I’m not going to talk about that because pretty much I’m pretty sure every state requires it. Although actually here’s what I’ll say about auto insurance, most of us probably just get the minimums. And have you actually looked at what your policy covers? Because you definitely want more than the minimum, because if you actually look at the minimum, especially I’m looking at the medical coverage, if you are in an accident and your insurance is responsible for medical bills of the other person, those add up really quickly.
Do you know how expensive our emergency rooms are or medicine and hospital care in the US? It’s very expensive. And so if you actually look at what it covers, it’s probably really low. And I don’t believe it’s super expensive to raise that minimum. I know, I don’t know exactly off the top of my head what my insurance covers, but we definitely did not go with the minimum.
Now, this actually leads me into the next important insurance that everyone needs, it’s called umbrella insurance. And so I’m just guessing most of you already have it. But if you’re not sure, this is the type of thing that you really need to know if you have certain insurances. A lot of times they’re bundled with auto insurance, so you may have it, but not really understand or know that you have it. But it’s insurance that sits on top of your auto insurance and on top of your property insurance.
So if you’re a homeowner, you have property insurance, I hope. And I guess if you rent, like I do, then I guess renters insurance, although I’m not quite sure how applicable umbrella insurance is since I don’t actually own where I live, but here’s what it does.
So let’s say you get into a car accident and you’re found at fault, or basically if someone sues you, even if you’re not at fault, right? And they’re suing you for a boatload of money. This is where umbrella insurance will come in. Basically, if it’s above the current policy limits of your auto insurance, that’s where umbrella insurance takes over and the company that provides it will assign a lawyer to you.
Now, thankfully, I’ve never needed it, but I do have a friend or two that has needed their umbrella insurance because they got sued for a car accident. And basically you all know that car accidents are not uncommon. So just be sure you have enough. Now people always ask, okay, how much do we need? I think for most people, 2 million is probably sufficient. I think we have 3 million.
And then people usually ask me, okay, how much does it cost? Well, it really depends on where you live, because if you live in an area where people love to sue, it’s going to be more expensive. It’s really that simple. So it’s pretty standard how the pricing is based on where you live. So make sure you have that, although you probably do.
Okay, the next insurance that I really want to talk about is life insurance. Now, again, if you’re a parent and you don’t have this, what are you doing? You need it, okay? You definitely need it. And whoever’s listening, especially if you’re young – When I say young, I guess under 35, although not that over 35 is old. But in terms of life insurance it will matter because your premium will depend on a bunch of factors. Whether you’re a woman or a man, if you smoke or not, your age and your medical history.
Now, there are different types of life insurance. I am talking specifically about term life insurance. And all that means is that what you purchase is a specific amount of money that gets paid to whoever you specify, AKA your beneficiary or beneficiaries. And that amount is guaranteed for a certain term.
So for example, I know I have two policies and they add up to, I think 2 million total, but they’re two separate policies. So I know one policy is for a million dollars over a 15 year period. Now, I didn’t buy it yesterday, I bought it – Actually, I think it’s been over five years, maybe seven years since I’ve had it, and so part of the term is already over.
So basically let’s just say I bought it at 35 just to make it easier for illustration purposes. So that means up until age 50, if I pass before the term ends, my heirs will get a million dollars. Also here’s what’s cool about life insurance, I mean it’s not cool but you know what I mean, is that it is tax-free to the recipient. So that is really good to know.
And life insurance of the term kind is pretty inexpensive. But again, the price depends on multiple factors. So namely your gender, your age and your medical history, because obviously if you have certain medical conditions that will decrease your life expectancy, it’ll be more expensive, okay? And so this is why life insurance for men is more expensive, because men die earlier. It’s pretty simple. Women live longer, so it is cheaper for us.
But like I said, it’s based on your medical history and they basically – I forget exactly what it’s called, but they grade you like in terms of your health rating. So, obviously, the best health rating, I forget what it’s called, but let’s just say it’s A, then you’ll have the most inexpensive premium. And if you are not class A, then you’ll have to pay a lot more. So that includes smokers. If you’re a smoker, it totally messes up your premium. It's like, I don’t want to say it doubles it, but it increases it dramatically.
And so you really want to get this as young as possible because it’s cheaper the younger you are. And for my female listeners, which is pretty much all of you, you really want to try to get it before you get pregnant. And so a lot of us are told, oh, you don’t need it until after you have kids. But I would say if you are a woman and you know you want children, even if you don’t have a partner yet to have children with, I would buy it because it’s never going to be cheaper than it is now. And then you could always add to it, right? And plus it’s just not that expensive.
I remember when I bought it and I was older, I think I actually was around 38 when I bought my first life insurance policy. And this is when I was single, and so definitely I had no idea if and when I was going to have kids at that point. And I think for that $1 million policy for 15 years, it was like 400 bucks. Maybe it was 500. And this is per year. This isn’t like every month, this is like my annual premium.
And so also the price depends on how much you get insured. So obviously if I bought 5 million for 30 years, it would have been a lot more expensive. And the reason why I got a second policy is because I got it when I became pregnant and it added an additional half a million or a million, I don’t quite remember. Or actually, no, I think I got it right before I got pregnant when I knew that that was going to happen.
And here’s why, women, you need to get it before you have kids or actually even before you’re pregnant, because they really scour through your medical history. They somehow find out every prescription medicine you were on and sometimes you might get questions about it. Like, I remember I was on an antibiotic for like a UTI. And they were like, why did you take Cipro? And I was like, really? It’s not like you remember why you took medication for every single thing, right?
So it’s kind of annoying and so this is another reason why I think it’s, unfortunately, if you know you’re going to have to get evaluated for life and disability, and it’s not like you’re thinking this when you’re super young, you kind of have to think about what you get medications for and what you see a doctor for. Anyway, that’s a whole nother topic.
But the reason why women really need to get this before they become pregnant is because what if something happens while you’re pregnant? So specifically for me, I had gestational diabetes and my insurance agent, Lawrence Keller, who I think I’m actually going to have him on the show for a short episode to talk more about disability insurance, which I will talk about just in a bit, just because I think there are things that I don’t know enough about that I want him on, AKA an expert, to really talk about it more.
But he told me that if I’d waited till I became pregnant, or rather until after the pregnancy where I had the diagnosis of gestational diabetes, he said it would have increased the premium dramatically. He actually told me how much it would be or how much more expensive in terms of the factors. I don’t remember, but it was like a lot. So basically I am so glad I got up before I was pregnant.
Now, another question that gets asked a lot is, well, how much do I need? Because it’s relatively inexpensive, get as much as you’re willing to pay for, seriously. It is actually one of the best ways to set your family up financially, the only problem is you have to die before they get it. But it is a great way to bridge that gap because the thing is, like I said, you never know when you’re going to pass.
And if you pass, when I say young I mean, well, young too, but also when your kids are really young and maybe you haven’t – Well, probably you haven’t built the type of wealth you were expecting to build by the time they were adults or even while they’re growing up, because we assume we’re going to be able to bring in the same income year after year, depending on your job.
But I’m thinking mainly physicians where our jobs are relatively stable. And so that would be a tragedy if, let’s just say you are an amazing breadwinner and you pass, and then your family literally has nothing to live on because they weren’t the breadwinner and now they’re going to have to figure out how to work. What if they were a stay at home parent, et cetera?
And so that is one of the worst things that can happen. And it really breaks my heart when I see posts about families basically needing to do Go Fund Me accounts for kids college and all this other stuff. And I don’t obviously know what’s happening with those families’ finances, but my first thought is, oh, maybe they didn’t have enough life insurance. Not that you get it right away, I’m sure there’s paperwork you have to file that the person actually died, et cetera. But that tells me that maybe the family wasn’t prepared for those types of future expenses.
So, parents, I really implore you to get this done ASAP. And you’re going to have to undergo medical underwriting, which involves literally someone coming to your house to do a brief exam. They take your blood pressure and they’ll take some blood to like, you know, they’ll check all the normal stuff.
They also check, I forget what it’s called, but there’s a chemical in your blood where they can check to see if you’re a smoker or not, because I’m sure, as you know, people can lie. And so if you’ve smoked within 30 days, I think this whatever, this marker is positive. But also they’re going to look at your physician records, primary care, et cetera. And so if it’s listed that you’re a smoker, then you’re out of luck, right? And so, like I said, they scour through your medical history.
So I remember when I was getting underwritten for my second life insurance policy there was something on my chart about like a mole. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it, but because it was mentioned, they said I needed to have a skin check by a dermatologist to proceed. And being a Korean and being extremely low risk for skin cancer, I was like, this is stupid, but I did it.
But that’s what I mean, they really go through things with a fine tooth comb. And the reason why they do this, not just to be annoying, is they have to be thorough because apparently they have all this data about how long people will live based on their history and age. Like it’s kind of crazy, right? They have like, I think it’s called actuarial data on this. And so if they have the information they need, they can pretty much pinpoint when you’re likely to die. I know, it’s kind of morbid, right? And so they do this to make sure that they charge you accordingly. That’s really what it comes down to.
Okay, so how much do you need to get? As much as possible, like I said. But if you want to have a starting point, you kind of want to add up everything you pay for. So the big expenses are going to be things like your mortgage or rent, any outstanding debt you owe, although if it’s a federal student loan, those are forgiven so you don’t have to include that. But any private loans, and let’s just say you are the breadwinner and you have a stay-at-home spouse, you really want to make sure there’s enough money for that.
And round up generously. Also, even if you have a partner that is doing well financially, A, you just don’t know what’s going to happen. They should have their own insurance too, by the way. And don’t underestimate the toll it’s going to take on your family.
Like everyone might need some time off, like a lot of time off. Your spouse, even if they work and have a great income, they might need to take several months off. They’re going to be absolutely devastated. And everyone’s probably going to need a little therapy. And I’m sort of like laughing about this, but not because I think these are just things a lot of us don’t think about. Okay?
And actually what I do want to say is both parents need to be insured. And a lot of people think, oh, well, life insurance is only for income replacement. And they’ll think that their stay-at-home spouse, or maybe the person that works part-time or whatever doesn’t need it. But they absolutely do need it as well because think of the – I don’t want to say service.
But if they’re a stay-at-home mom, or a stay-at-home partner because not all stay-at-home parents are moms, or they work part-time to sort of help out with the family, et cetera, what they provide for the family, that is a form of income. I keep saying service, I can’t think of a better word, but I think you know what I mean. They’re going to need to pay for childcare and help, you know? So those are all the things I want you to think about.
Now don’t go crazy trying to figure out, well, how much does it actually cost? Just guesstimate. And guesstimate on the generous side because, like I said, this stuff is cheap. So let’s say you figure out like, okay, I really think it needs to be like 3.4 million, just get four. You can always decrease it later or cancel it when you get super rich.
Okay, so that’s life insurance. I hope I’ve made it clear how much you need it. Now, people always ask me who is an agent that you recommend and I use Lawrence Keller and we’ll put his information in the show notes, but his email is lkeller@physicianfinancialservices. I trust him completely. I bought my life and disability insurance from him.
Okay, so finally I want to talk just a little bit about disability insurance. And so I have noticed that this is something mostly physicians are getting, but really anyone who is the primary breadwinner needs to get this and it pays you when you become disabled.
Now, what do I mean by that? So that’s actually part of the problem because the thing is when you’re dead, it’s pretty clear you’re dead and not alive. But disability is a lot more gray area, right? And so it’s not a cut and dry diagnosis. But basically the way I want you to think about it is something that impedes your ability to work and make the income you’re used to making.
So using the physician example. So I think thinking of a surgeon is a great example, so let’s say they did five surgeries a day. I actually have no idea how many surgeries a surgeon does in a day, I’m sure it depends on the type of surgeon they are. But let’s just say normally you could do five surgeries a day and let’s say you get into a car accident and something happens to your shoulder and now you can only do one a day.
So obviously that is a big drop in income. So disability insurance would basically bridge that gap. And so it’s actually pretty rare, thankfully, to be totally disabled where you couldn’t work at all. And so that’s important to know, but for the most part when disability insurance kicks in for people, it’s usually a partial disability, but I definitely know people who are on full disability because of their medical condition.
So it generally kicks in after 90 days. So let’s say you do have that car accident where your arm is blah, blah, blah, you know, your shoulder messed up that you can’t do more than one surgery per day. It’s actually not going to start paying out until it’s been going on for more than 90 days. And so this is where having an emergency fund is going to be crucial.
And even if it’s a 90 day waiting period, you probably won’t get paid right at 90 days because you’ve got to file paperwork and the claim and blah, blah, blah. So really, this is why you need at least six months of living expenses saved up.
Okay, so this is also why I’m going to get Larry to come on the show and talk briefly more about this because I know I’m going to miss things, but you can get it covered specifically for your specialty. And there are different types of policies and different quality of policies, but the policy I have, and I still have it and I’ll tell you why, because I don’t practice anymore.
Let’s say I did become disabled in such a way that I could no longer practice dermatology the way I was in person, then I don’t know how telehealth affects that. So this is also why I want Larry to come on. But let’s just say that wasn’t an option, then I would get the full benefit.
And just like life insurance, disability insurance is paid out tax-free unless you’re paying for it with pre-tax dollars. So if you’re paying it with after-tax dollars, which is what most of us do, then it is tax-free. If you pay with pre-tax dollars, your premium, then the payment is taxed, okay? So that’s an important thing to know.
And so my point about talking about how it’s covered specifically for my occupation is because I can’t work anymore as a dermatologist because in person there’s things I do with my hands and I was doing small procedures and minor surgeries, outpatient, like excisions and stuff. Let’s say I couldn’t do any of that anymore, then I would get the full benefit.
But not only that, let’s say even though I couldn’t see patients, I figured out another way to make money, like coaching on Zoom, which didn’t really require me to have, I don’t know, let’s just say arm strength. Let’s say my arms were totally messed up, right? They would not decrease the benefit because I was able to make money another way, but that really depends on your policy.
Some policies will decrease the payout if you do start making money another way. So you want to know which type of policy you have, and this is really important to understand.
And another thing I want to say about disability insurance is usually there’s a limit or they won’t cover mental illness. And so usually it’s limited to a certain amount of time, or they just won’t cover it at all. And so that really depends.
Now, since I no longer practice medicine, I had a little chat with Larry about whether I should keep mine. Now, I am insured for $15,000 a month, remember that’s tax-free. My annual premium is $7,000, which it just actually got debited for my checking account. I actually called to find out like, hey, can I charge this on my credit card and get points? And the answer was, nope, you can only do a direct bank transfer. And I was like, that’s a bummer, but that’s just how it goes.
So, but yeah, every time they take out the annual premium, I hate it. I mean, it’s just a big chunk going out of the checking account. I can pay monthly, it would be like $580 a month, but you do pay a little extra for that, and so I just decided to go annually. So I asked Larry, like, hey, should I still have this since I don’t practice medicine? And he said that it would cover my coaching business since that is what I do full-time. And so I thought that was interesting.
And I was actually thinking like, should I even keep it? And he just said I think you should, because until you’re “completely financially independent” and won’t need another source of income, you should keep it. And so I’m keeping it because if I stop working as a coach and I’m disabled and not dead, then we’re going to have trouble at some point, right? So that’s why I’ve kept it.
And one more thing I’ll say about disability insurance is you cannot be insured up to the full amount of your income. Meaning let’s say my derm income, my take home income, I don’t even remember at this point, but let’s say it was $25,000 a month. You are not going to be able to get insured for the whole amount because – I don’t know exactly why, Larry could say so – But I believe it’s because they don’t want to incentivize people getting disabled. That’s basically what it comes down to.
So the disability insurance does depend on gender and medical history stuff. And so if you do have a preexisting type of thing, they might say it won’t cover that. So that’s what I want to say about getting the proper insurances.
There’s a lot more than what I just talked about, and so there’s things like liability and prenups, which are basically divorce insurance. And I have an episode on that, so you can check that out on prenups. So I just want to talk about it a little bit to get you thinking about it in case this is something you’ve been putting off and not doing.
And so basically bottom line, get life and disability insurance. If you’re a parent, what are you waiting for? And contact Larry Keller. Okay, bye.
Hey there, thanks so much for tuning in. If you love what you heard, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. And if you’re listening to this on Apple Podcasts, I’d love for you to leave a review. Reviews tell Apple that this podcast is, well, awesome. And it will help women find this podcast so that they too can live a wealthy life. And finally, you can learn more about me and what I do at wealthymommd.com. See you next week.
For media or speaking inquiries please click here.
For all other inquiries please click here.