How to Grow Your Wealth (By Age!)

21:50And you're going to have to figure out financially how to deal with each and every single one of those things while trying to focus and grow your career. This is a messy portion of our life, our forties. It gets even harder. And so we want to make sure that we set up these financial foundations that are going to help us propel the next couple of decades, which become so increasingly important as we think about building wealth and building up that money. So the first thing I want you to do is I want you to lock in that high savings rate. Your savings rate is gonna dictate how long it's gonna take you before you need to retire.

22:22And locking it into your 20s and getting the ball rolling and getting that habit started is very important, but I want you to lock in that high savings rate. So a 10 % savings rate is not gonna cut it here. Here at Master Money in the Personal Finance Podcast, a 10 % savings rate is what we want to get you out of. You need to be saving more than just 10%. Now, you may be saying to yourself, what does he mean by savings rate? Savings rate is any dollars that are directed towards your emergency fund or directed towards investments. That's what I mean by savings rate. This is not saving for your next car.

22:51This is not saving for your house. This is not saving for your wedding. This is not saving for your vacation. No, all I mean by this is things that are gonna go towards wealth building activities and things that are gonna grow your wealth. And so sure, a house could be argued with that, but we've talked about buy versus rent and we'll have some more episodes coming out on that. very, very soon. All right. So this is the decade where we need to increase our savings rate. And by the minimum, here on the Personal Finance Podcast and at Master Money, at a minimum, we want you saving at least 20 % of your income.

23:19Once you get to your 30s, I would love for you to bump that up to 25 % because this is going to make the timeline to when you can retire that much faster. And if you can bump it even to 30%, I would love for anybody listening right now, you know, on YouTube or on Spotify, leave a comment down below and let me know what your savings rate is. I would love to hear what your savings rate is. And if it is above 20%, let me know. I want to celebrate that with you because that is a huge, huge accomplishment. And if you can get those dollars rolling and you have that higher savings rate, it will change your life forever, okay?

23:51So your savings rate is going to dictate how soon you can retire. And you've got to make sure that you get it above 20 % if you can, or at least at 20 % at the bare minimum. If you are at a lower savings rate, doing as much as you possibly can, then two things we need to think about is one, increasing our income and finding a way to do that. And two, we need to think through, well, can we cut back something? And if we cut back something, that can help increase that savings rate where I would want you to gradually build your savings rate up. If you are at a 5%, for example, let's take the next year or year and a half and let's increase it by 1 % a month.

24:24Finding ways to increase our income during that timeframe where each month we're increasing and just increasing the dial a little bit. Turning up the heat a little bit. Let's boil that frog slowly. And then once we get to the point in time where we're at 20%, Now we can either decide, hey, do I want to keep going? And or do I feel uncomfortable at this 20 % savings rate? So any raises coming in, those should be going towards your savings rate. You can use the 50-50 rule, meaning 50 % towards yourself and 50 % towards raises until you get to 20%. Or if you get tax returns this time of year, that's another great thing that you can do is take that tax return and put it towards your savings and investment.

24:58That'll boom, jolt your savings rate pretty quickly. The goal is to make saving boring. And I would just highly, highly recommend to automate into your high-yield savings account and automate into your investment accounts. Those are the two areas that I want you to automate into. Number two is in your 30s, I want you to try to wipe out any non-mortgage debt. Any non-mortgage debt that you are dealing with right now, I want you to try and get rid of it as fast as you possibly can. So this is anything outside of your mortgage, your car notes. Well, let's get rid of our car notes and let's see if we can save on the side to pay cash for a car next time or put a bigger down payment.

25:35or to just get rid of car payments altogether for the rest of our lives. How cool would that be? You don't have a car payment for the rest of your life. Now, some of you may be saying to yourself right now, because you have some preconceived notion that you need to have a car payment in order to drive a car, and it's impossible to drive a car without a car payment. Some of you may be saying to yourself right now, well, that's impossible. How can I? Ask yourself this question. How can it be possible? Well, what if I started to pay off my car right now, and then I took those payments, and I started to put them in my high-yield savings account, or if it's further out, maybe a taxable brokerage account.

26:05And I started to grow my money. And instead, when it's time to buy a car next time, I may have enough cash on hand to buy a car in cash. What if he did that? Could you save up enough? Or is this a situation? Or is this a situation where you have these preconceived notions and you feel as though since you've seen everybody else do it a certain way, you also have to do it a certain way. You don't have to do it what everybody else is doing. And in fact, most people are doing it wrong. Most people are in debt up to their eyeballs. They're stressed out about money every month. They're anxious about money every month.

26:34But what if you did it differently? I challenge you to challenge your preconceived notions to see how you feel about these certain things. Any student loans, let's try to get rid of those as fast as we possibly can. For most of you out there, trying to get those paid down is very, very important. So for most of you out there, getting those paid down is very, very important. And in fact, next week, we have an episode coming out with Robert Farrington talking about all the student loan changes, but in addition, how you can pay off those student loans and ways to reduce the costs of student loans.

27:03And so I want you to make sure you are ready for that. Clearing out any credit cards or personal debt, that stuff needs to be gone. It should be gone in your 20s, but it also should be gone and not be coming back at any point in time, anytime soon. Now, avoid upgrading cars or homes or lifestyles with borrowed money if you can. I want you to make sure that you are trying to think through, well, okay, if I wanna go get a nicer house because my family has expanded, I completely get it. If you wanna go to a nicer neighborhood, take on a mortgage, I completely get that. That is something you can do, but you need to make sure that you are running total cost of ownership or running the numbers.

27:35Now, we have a free calculator where you can run total cost of ownership. If you wanna do that, just go to mastermoney.co slash resources, and we have that there, but making sure you're avoiding upgrading on some lifestyle changes if you cannot afford them. If you are stretching your income too far, you want to avoid that because debt freedom is the best future decision that you can make. Number three is I want you to align wealth with life goals without pausing investing. And so what I want you to do is this is where the homes, the kids, the businesses, all that stuff are going to enter the picture.

28:04And you're going to have a lot of mess happening. A lot of different things are going to be changing. But I want you to make sure that your retirement contributions are not sacrificed because of all these changes. You built up this foundation in your 20s and 30s. I don't want that to go away. I don't want you to think about, okay, well, now I need to shift gears here and this is going to go away. No, instead, that needs to be prioritized. You need to pay yourself first and then spend what is left over. Always, always, always make sure you can pay yourself first. You can always buy a home later on on the line, but you cannot invest your money in your 30s.

28:34And so I want you to make sure that you have this set up so that you are on track. The goal is balance, not perfection. And that's where I think most people get this wrong is they think they need to be perfect. And then if they're not perfect, they quit. No, instead, I want you to be balanced. I want you to feel like you're enjoying life, but also spending money on future you. And that is where we want to make sure that we have that balance in place. and we are trying to find what that balance is for each and every single person. And so really, really important to make sure you do that. Also, number four is in your 30s, you need to have your money systematized completely.

29:05Let's grow up here for a second. We're gonna become financial grownups here in our 30s. We've been doing this for a while now. We've got our own job going. And if you started to work, let's say at 20, 21, 22, 23, then you have been doing this for 15 years plus most likely. And so because of that, we need to grow up financially and we have put in the hours, we have had the time, we've gotten the paychecks coming in. We need to learn how to systematize and handle our money correctly. Now, number one is to automate your money. If you don't know how to automate your money, we have an automation checklist that you can check out below, down below in the show notes.

29:37We also have a course called Automate Your Money in One Weekend, which is 27 bucks and teaches you how to automate your money literally in one weekend. So I highly recommend you check those out down below if you're interested. And if you are trying to think through my systems and how to automate my money and how to do all this, you need to automate your bills, you need to automate your investments, You need to automate your savings so you can remove willpower out of the equation. Your willpower is a detriment to your finances. Your willpower is something that is really, really fickle. And so you want to make sure that you are removing your willpower from the equation.

30:09Very important to do that. And I think for most people, we want to make sure that we have a clear purpose on which accounts we are using, where our money is going, how we're spending our money, how we think about money, what our ultimate money goals are, what our retirement number is. All of those need to be very, very clear. we have lots of episodes to teach you how to do that. Your finances should be running on autopilot even when life is chaotic. So you should still be building wealth even when life is chaotic, even when life is throwing so many different things at you. You got your kids sports, you got daycare, you got aging parents, you got all this stuff happening.

30:39I know how hard it is. On top of that, we have student loans and affordability as at an all-time low. I get it. I get how hard it can be right now. But if we set it up on autopilot, we have the right systems in place and we are earning enough, we can make sure that we are building wealth going forward. And so I want each and every single one of you to focus your time and energy on that. The last thing is to protect the machine. This means getting the proper insurances set up and ensuring that you have life insurance if people depend on you. Term life insurance, not anything else, but term life insurance if people are depending on you.

31:13Looking into making sure you have the right auto insurance. Do you need disability insurance? Do you need other insurances in place, umbrella insurance if you are really wealthy. Those are all things that you want to make sure that you have in place because you need to protect your income. Also, we should have that six-month emergency fund in our 30s. Even if you have to use it, then rebuild it. If you have to use it, rebuild it again. But it's very, very important that we have that. Getting a will or estate documents in place is going to be super important. I just finished up my trust, and my trust is something that's pretty cool, some of the stuff that I have done.

31:44We're going to actually introduce all the steps of exactly what I've done inside Master Money Academy to our members. and it's a very cool thing to kind of finally get that done and have it customized the way I wanted and there's some cool stuff that you can do with the trust. So if you are someone who has a higher net worth then you can also build out a trust or if you have businesses or people who depend on you then just look into that as well and then making sure your credit is actually decent and having a decent credit score above a 700 is the ultimate goal and so each and every single person here needs to make sure you built up your credit because it helps you save a lot more money in the near future.

32:17So the big takeaway for your 30s is that this is the decade where most people drift financially. Their lifestyle inflates. They get the bigger house because they have kids. They get the nicer cars because they have kids. Maybe get the brand new minivan so you can ghost ride the whip when you take your kids to school. All of these are things that you are most likely doing, but don't fall into the drift. Don't drift too far. Make sure that you take care of your retirement first because there's no loans for your retirement. And then you can spend on what is left over. If you automate aggressively now, it'll take care of the rest of your life forever.

32:50And so I want to make sure that you do that. And again, check out the automation checklist down below. I literally walk you through step-by-step for free exactly how to do it. So if you want to check that out, I would highly, highly recommend it. Now let's go to break and we'll jump into the 40s. This time of year, I always get the urge to clean everything up. Closets, garage, office, just to get organized again. And honestly, it's the same thing with money. When things feel scattered, it's hard to make real progress. Let Monarch do your financial spring cleaning for you. One dashboard gets you your entire financial life organized.

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34:34It shows you what your money could become over time. And that's powerful because it keeps you focused on the long term instead of getting caught up in the day-to-day. It's also all in one place. You can invest, save, and stay on track with your goals without juggling a bunch of different apps. Sign up now and Acorns will boost your new account with a$5 bonus investment. Join the over 14 million all-time customers that have already saved and invested over$27 billion with Acorns. Head to acorns.com slash PFP or download the Acorns app to get started. Paid non-client endorsement. Compensation provides incentive to positively promote Acorns.

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35:38That's something I've been thinking about more this spring, making sure the safety net we have in place actually matches the life that we're building. And that's where Policy Genius comes in. Policy Genius is an insurance company. They're an online marketplace that helps you compare life insurance quotes from some of the top insurers in America, all in one place for free. And their licensed team works for you, not the insurance companies. So they help you find the right coverage for your situation without all the guesswork. And they walk you through everything. Answer your questions, handle the paperwork, and help you get the coverage that actually fits your life today and where it's going.

36:13So protect your family with a policy that grows with your life. With PolicyGenius, you can see if you can find 20-year life insurance policies starting at just$276 a year for$1 million of coverage. Head to PolicyGenius.com to compare life insurance quotes from top companies and see how much you can save. That's PolicyGenius.com. Starting something new is uncomfortable. I remember when I first started building this podcast and business, there were so many what ifs. What if no one listens? What if this doesn't work? And what if I'm wasting my time? But pushing through was one of the best decisions I have ever made.

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37:19So you're not trying to duct tape a bunch of tools altogether. Plus, if you ever get stuck, they've got 24-7 support to help you through it. It's time to turn those what-ifs into ka-ching with Shopify today. Sign up for your$1 per month trial today at shopify.com slash PFP. Go to shopify.com slash PFP. That's shopify.com slash PFP. Now I'm going to say something and I don't take this lightly. Your 40s is your highest leverage decade, meaning these are the years where you are earning the most. And so we're going to do some pretty drastic things in our 40s to make sure that we are accelerating our wealth.

37:56This is your acceleration phase. And this is where we are going to pull every single lever we can in order to accelerate our path to wealth. Now, some of you, if you set yourself up correctly in the 20s and 30s, you'll be able to retire in your 40s. And that is a really powerful lesson that you need to understand that it is possible to retire in your 40s if you want to. And so I highly encourage each and every single person to think about this. Number one is we want to crank up investing during our peak income years. So this is usually your highest earning decade. This is the decade where either you got promoted to manager or executive or CEO, whatever you are.

38:32This is the decade where you're going to be earning more money than you ever have before. And so I want you to treat investing like an expense because that's what it is. It is not something that is optional. It is not something that you maybe can do whenever you feel like it or whenever you have an extra cash. No, investing is your number one expense. It should be your biggest bill in your budget line item. I want you to invest as much as you possibly can during this decade because this is going to help you in the future. Max out retirement accounts in your 40s. If you're listening to this in your 20s or you're listening to this in your 30s, we need to get to max level in our 40s to make sure that we are getting those dollars invested.

39:05Hey, we're talking about building wealth here. We're getting aggressive and we're gonna make sure that we get to that point in time. We wanna make large, boring, consistent contributions into these investment accounts. Why? Because the bigger the shovel that you have of money that you're shoveling into the fire, the greater and the bigger that fire can grow. This is like rolling a snowball downhill and the snowball gets larger and larger and larger. Well, if you have a bulldozer throwing more snow on top of that snowball, you'll have a much bigger snowball than you originally anticipated. The goal is to move from saving to serious accumulation.

39:36The goal is to really accelerate your path here. And so I want you to do this in your 40s so that you can ruthlessly get your dollars working. Now, secondly, is I want you to ruthlessly get rid of lifestyle creep. Meaning lifestyle creep, you should have your financial house in order. You should have it established. And so lifestyle creep should not be something that you are just deciding to increase the creep all the way up to the level of income. I think some lifestyle creep is good. Why? Because that means you're balanced. That means you're enjoying life. So if you make more money and you decide, okay, well, I'm gonna make$100 ,000 more this year and you take part of that and you start, go out and buy a new car because you've always wanted this car and you really have been thinking about this car and you love this car, nothing wrong with that whatsoever.

40:16But what I'm saying is that every single time you make more money, you also increase your expenses to that same level. That's a huge problem. And so we want to make sure that we are not doing that when it comes to lifestyle inflation or lifestyle creep. And so every new fixed expense is going to slow down your progress towards financial independence. And so if you keep taking on way too many fixed expenses, you're never going to be able to grow your wealth. And instead, your savings rate will start to dwindle down and or be non-existent like a lot of people right now. So making sure that we get those dollars working is very important.

40:47Bonuses and raises, all of those, follow the 50-50 rule and then adjust based on what you currently wanna do because wealth is created with that gap. The difference between your income and your expenses, that is where wealth is created and we're trying to make that gap as big as we possibly can. Next is we wanna make sure that we are optimizing our taxes relentlessly, especially in our 40s. In our 20s and 30s, we wanna make sure we're starting to understand taxes and making those shifts in our 20s and 30s. In our 40s, they should be optimized relentlessly. So at higher incomes, taxes become way more important.

41:17It becomes a big thing that you need to think about and a big thing that you need to have when it comes to your conversations. And so one is using something like tax advantage accounts. Use every tax advantage account you can that is at your disposal and try to funnel money into those tax advantage accounts. Two is think about where your assets live, not just what you invest in. There are things that you can invest in that are much more tax efficient. Opening an LLC so you can have rental properties or making sure that you invest in businesses. Those types of things, if you have a lot of extra money, are the wealth accelerators that are gonna get you to your goal even faster.

41:51Explore big strategies if you're making too much, like the backdoor Roth IRA, doing Roth conversions whenever it's appropriate. So you wanna run the numbers and make sure you have that on hand. And even a small tax improvement can compound for decades. So we're gonna be doing an entire episode on some of the tax strategies you need to be following coming up. And so I want to make sure that you're subscribed to this podcast, if not already, because I'm gonna go through 10 different tax strategies that are going to help you tremendously. And so making sure that you're subscribed here is going to benefit you because that episode alone could save you tens of thousands of dollars depending on how much money you're making this year.

42:23So making sure you subscribe is going to be really, really important. Making those tweaks though, having a CPA in your corner is always very important in my book. And so this is going to be really, really important. So the next one, number four, is to stay growth focused but optimize for risk. All of us have different risk tolerance. All of us know how much risk we can take on. And so you still want to make sure that you have growth within your portfolio. And the biggest risks overall for you is making sure that A, inflation doesn't eat into your portfolio. If your portfolio is too bond heavy in your 40s because someone told you to move your portfolio that direction, inflation is going to start to eat in to your buying power.

42:58And if you're overly conservative too early, that is a hidden risk that most people don't see. Your asset allocation is a six-figure decision, meaning the mix of stocks and bonds that you have in your portfolio is a huge decision. And so you want to make sure that you have enough stocks in your portfolio that allows it to grow and bonds to weather the storm if that is something you're interested in. For me in my 40s, I'm pretty much not going to have much bond still because I want to compound for decades. And so for you, though, maybe you're going to retire soon or you're going into that from that accumulation stage into that preservation stage.

43:30And if you are doing that in your 40s, then make sure you're retiring pretty soon. If not, continue the growth phase because that's really, really important. But you know your risk tolerance. It's up to you to figure out what that is. It's not up to me to tell you what your risk tolerance is so you know how you feel about that. Now, diversification is also a big thing in your 40s. Making sure you have enough diversification so you can get your assets to grow. This is going to be really, really important. And then risk is about time horizon. So how much time do you have left? You can understand your risk tolerance just based on how much time you have before retirement because the goal is to be intentional about risk, not to be emotional about this.

44:02And so you want to make sure you have a plan in place when it comes to your investments. Next is to start pre-planning retirement early. Now, in your 40s, it becomes even more increasingly important. And in your 50s, it is very important to know what your retirement number is, meaning you figure out, well, how much do I want to spend in retirement? And what is that number multiplied by 25? That is going to give you a retirement number. And I highly recommend that people do this once a year and figure out what their retirement number is. And so in doing that, this makes sure that you don't get off track with your retirement goals year over year.

44:33I've seen way too many people get a decade down the line and all of a sudden they get to like age 52, for example, and they haven't tracked the retirement number in a while. And all of a sudden, a lot of things have changed and a lot of expenses have changed and they needed to increase their income. And all of a sudden they're way further behind than they currently thought they would be. So track this yearly. I don't want you to fall behind. So big takeaway for your 40s. This is the decade where consistency is going to matter the most. This is the bridge between your 30s and your 50s. This is the decade that is so incredibly important to make sure you just don't screw something big up.

45:03Don't screw big stuff up and try to take on too much risk or try to take on something crazy that you don't need to. Instead, you wanna be consistently building wealth, consistently showing up, making sure you're investing those dollars. The margin you build now is gonna pay you dividends for the rest of your life. And so you really wanna make sure that as your income increases, you're taking big portions of that income and putting them towards asset. This is all about execution. This is not about perfection. Don't try to be perfect. Instead, just execute, execute, execute. And your automations that you built in your 30s, those are gonna help you tremendously in your 40s just making sure that you're executing no matter what's going on.

45:37You may have aging parents, you may have kids that are getting older, but at the same time, once those two collide, you got to make sure that you are still moving the needle forward. And that's very, very important and a very powerful thing going forward. Now let's jump into the fifties. So let's talk about the fifties. The fifties have a number of different purposes. One is if you have been building wealth for the last couple of decades, this is where you're going to fine tune and you're going to put your wealth into preservation mode. But two, if you are playing catch up, we're also going to work on catching up.

46:07And there's some things that we can do in our 50s that help us accelerate our path to catching up to retirement. You know, it's now or never, you know, this is the decade where it's time to get to work. And sometimes in your 50s, you're going to realize and figure out exactly what your retirement plan is. But guess what? If you're age 50, 51, 52, you still have a lot of time left. You could even continue to work and continue to compound that money into your 60s. And it's gonna be a great benefit to you long term. So even if you started late, it's okay. It is never too late to start building wealth.

46:37We're gonna help you through that process. So first is if you did start early, I want you to finish up the heavy lifting that you already started. Meaning this is the decade where you don't wanna stop. You wanna make sure you're continuously investing and getting the ball rolling. These are your final high income years. These are the years that you wanna make sure that you are putting high contributions into your accounts. So max out those retirement accounts and use things like catch-up contributions. So catch-up contributions are when you are over the age of 50, you can actually put additional money into those retirement accounts, look up what each one of those are, and make sure you're getting those dollars into those retirement accounts.

47:10I want you to aim to enter your 60s having at least six to eight times what your annual earnings are, but really having more than that invested is the key because really this is about consistency and not swinging for the fences. Your goal is to try to now just get this wealth consistently built, 10 % a year, 8 % a year, 7 % a year. That is your ultimate goal so that you can get to the finish line and do it in a way where you are not taking on too much risks. Because that's number two, is reduce your financial risks overall. So having that emergency fund in place is really important. And if you are approaching retirement age, I like you to have one to two years and really try to make sure that you have that cash on hand.

47:48Second, if you can, try to pay off your mortgage before you get to retirement age. Have that paid off so you don't have to worry about that payment anymore instead all you got to worry about is the taxes and insurance and those are going to be the two areas that you think about avoid any new car loans or lifestyle debt those types of things unless you are making really good money avoid that stuff short term as you approach retirement age but if you really value that stuff i have no problem with you doing that as long as you planned it out and you have the money in place have solid cash reserves like we talked about and making sure that you are comfortable with sequence of returns risk what i mean by that is when you are retired and your portfolio is something that you're living off of.

48:24If you're living off your portfolio and the market goes down and you have to pull money out of your portfolio when the market is down, say 20 to 40 to 50%, well, that is sequence of return risks and it really does increase your risk of your money running out. So having cash on hand, one, two, three years of cash on hand is gonna help you when the market is down, you can utilize and pull some of that cash. That's gonna be very helpful for most people. Stability here in this decade, matters more than optimization. We're not trying to be perfectly optimized. We're just trying to make sure that we can get the ball over the finish line, accomplish the result that we want, which is having our retirement, if that's something you do.

49:00Some people I know are in their 60s and 70s, and they're never going to retire. But for you, if that's what you're looking for, you still have lots and lots of time. Next, I want you to gradually de-risk intelligently. So this is not an all bonds moment. This is not a timeframe where you're just going to go into bonds and that's what you have. But starting to de-risk could be something you're interested in because you're starting to take your portfolio from the growth phase into the preservation phase. And the preservation phase is where you're gonna live off your money for the rest of your life.

49:26The growth phase is when you're trying to accumulate enough wealth to live off of. And so when we think about these two cycles, we wanna make sure, well, when we get to preservation phase, we're just increasing the amount of bonds we have. I just worked with my parents who are in their 60s on their portfolio in retirement as they just retired. And we don't have as much bonds as I think a lot of people would when they are building out this portfolio, but we still have some bot exposure for them to make sure they are protected when it comes to downturns. And so you can figure out what your current risk tolerance is and then go from there.

49:56That is the big key is figuring out what your risk tolerance is. You can go 60-40, you can go 50-50, you can go 40-60, you can go 70-30. It just depends on what you want to do with your portfolio and what your risk is. So that's very, very important. And if you don't know what I'm talking about when I say some of those ratios, like I say 70-30, that means 70 % stocks, 30 % bonds. When I say 60-40, that means 60 % stocks, 40 % bonds. When I say 40-60, that means 40 % stocks, 60 % bonds. Those are just some of the quick ratios we can talk through and think through to see how you want to build out your portfolio.

50:29You always want to shift the risk with portfolios intentionally and not emotionally. Just because the market is fluttering in one direction doesn't mean you want to shift your portfolio in that direction. It's all about your plan and having a plan in place because the goal is resilience. The goal is to make sure this portfolio can weather any storm because there will be a recession during your retirement. We know statistically that every 10 years there is some sort of recession. And sometimes we have multiple recessions in a decade. And so because of that, your retirement portfolio needs to be able to weather storms and you need to have the plan in place in order to weather those storms.

51:00That's what I want you to do in your 50s. Now, as you get to closer to retirement, we need to make sure that we are dialing in our retirement blueprint. So let's talk about this because your retirement blueprint is very important, especially as you get five years out. Once you're five years out, this needs to be set in stone. This needs to be solidified and you need to understand where you will stand in retirement. And so let's talk about this. Let's talk about first, you got to figure out what is not optional and what is optional in retirement. If you don't have enough cash on hand to travel every single month like you wanted to, then that could be an optional thing or you're going to have to work longer in order to achieve that.

51:36Two is the location that you're living in. Is that where you want to live? Do you want to move to a cheaper location? That's number two. Let's think about the home. Do you want to downsize your home or do you want to keep the current home that you're living in? You got to just make those decisions too because you could retire a little faster if you downsize and get some extra cash on hand. A lot of you out there have owned homes for a long time in your 50s. And if you have, you probably built up some equity over the course of the last couple of decades, which can help you a lot when it comes to retirement.

52:06You need to understand where you're going to withdraw from and which accounts you're going to withdraw from. What order are you going to withdraw from your accounts? It's going to depend on your tax situation. It's going to depend on your own personal financial situation, whereas you're going to have RMDs coming down in your 70s from your 401ks and IRAs. And so you want to make sure that you were thinking about those as well and just drafting from these accounts and drawing from these accounts intelligently. We want to plan for health care and make sure we have the health care in place. Things like Medicare.

52:33When are you going to take that on? And what are you going to do to gap between Medicare and your health care years? Those are very important to make sure that you note. and retirement income planning matters a lot more than even some of these balances to look at that. Then I want you to go to ssa.gov and I want you to figure out what your social security is gonna be and how much that will help you in retirement and what you're gonna be getting every single month. Because as you approach that retirement age, you can get a very accurate number and an accurate depiction on where you are going to land with that.

53:01So very, very important stuff here as we start to think about this. Next is I want you to lock in estate planning. I want you to lock in where you're gonna be with estate planning you need to have a will in place. If you have a lot of complexities, then having a trust in place as well is very important. Now, there are places that you can go, which we will link it up down below in the show notes today. There are places like trust and will that make this very easy for you. It's a cheap alternative to going and getting a trust. I got mine through an attorney because I did a lot of customization, but trust and will, I've had a will there before.

53:32My parents got a will there and it is a very easy way to set this up. Two, make the decisions easy for your family, meaning when you're setting up your estate, have these conversations with your kids on where you want your money to go, what you want your money to do. Make this easier for your family and actually open up and have a conversation about money. Money is not a taboo subject. Start to talk about it a little bit more within your family. It's going to make way better family dynamics going forward. Now, also thinking about your long-term care and establishing that with your family is something you need to be open about because one event should not erase decades of work.

54:05And so you want to make sure that you're de-risking and protecting your finances having the proper insurances in place, figuring out how much money you're spending, how much money you're saving, and getting that all lined up. Because wealth without planning creates stress instead of security. Let me say that again. Wealth without planning creates stress, not security. And I want you to feel secure throughout your entire retirement. I don't want you to be stressed. And so you got to start to do this stuff right now. So here's the big shift. Is in your 50s, I want you to shift from accumulation to confidence.

54:35You're confident in your asset allocation. You're confident in your retirement plan. You're confident in what you're doing. And if you are behind, you can catch up. You have the time to catch up and you're confident knowing that you can catch up. Two is understand you're turning money into flexibility. You're turning it into time and peace of mind. You've worked all these years. You've worked so hard for those hard-earned dollars. You want to make sure that you turn it into time, energy, flexibility, and being able to do what you want to do. If done well, this decade can make the rest of your life feel lighter because you actually pushed the envelope You actually saved enough cash.

55:08You actually did the things you were supposed to do and planned out your retirement. So you don't end up like every other retiree out there who gets one year out from retirement and they have no idea what their plan is. It is a sad reality, but that is what happens to most retirees. And wealth is finally going to serve you. So you're building this up so that wealth can finally serve you in your 60s, your 70s, your 80s. Now, if you are behind, there's nothing wrong with extending how long you're working. Work a little longer. Work to 65 if you can. Work to 67 if you can. And A, your social security will compound and you'll get an 8 % guaranteed rate of return when that happens.

55:41But in addition, you'll also be able to make sure that you are thinking through this. But each person's plan is individual. Each person's plan is different. And so we wanna make sure that we are on top of this stuff as we start to think through this. Well, listen, I wanna thank you guys so much for being a part of this episode. And again, if you guys want the step-by-step roadmap, if you wanna know exactly what to do with your next dollar, if you wanna understand how to reduce your stress and anxiety around money, if you wanna know what to do by decade and how to think about money by decade, I want you and invite you to join Master Money Academy.

56:11Master Money Academy is where we will literally change your financial life and we will do it step by step. It is where I spend a lot of my time and attention now because I wanna help as many people as I possibly can. And so Master Money Academy is what I created in order to help you do just that. If you're stressed about money, if you're anxious about money, if you don't know what to do next and you are tired of sleepless nights of worrying about your finances and worrying about your financial future, Master Money Academy is going to get you there. Now I'm gonna give you something special here for podcast listeners only.

56:41I wanna give you a free trial so you can see behind the curtain what is inside Master Money Academy. So if you click the link below, it's going to give you a link that's gonna give you a free trial to see what Master Money Academy is like. And once you try it, I know that you're gonna absolutely love it because we have the Wealth Builder's Journey in there, which is step-by-step exactly what to do. We have all of our courses in there, But in addition, when you get stuck on something, we have weekly coaching calls with me live where you can ask me questions and I will answer those questions for you every single week.

57:14And so Master Money Academy is one of those places where I am so passionate about what we're doing there and the lives that we're changing and the people that are in there that are working together to keep each other accountable, that this is the place. If you want to get serious about your money, then I would highly encourage you to join Master Money Academy. Again, you're going to get some big bonuses when you join. You get the bonus of Index Fund Pro, which is usually$150. You get coaching with me, which I charge over$500 per coaching if you don't know that. You're going to be able to get automate your money in a weekend.

57:40You're going to get master your money goals. You're going to get masterclasses that we do every single month. All of these bonuses are also included inside Master Money Academy. I tell you what, you're going to get thousands of dollars worth of value, but don't take my word for it. Join down below and check it out for yourself. Go check it out with that free trial. And I would love to see you inside and meet you because I get to know every single person in there. And I would love to meet you inside and really, really excited to have you join Master Money Academy. Listen, thank you guys so much for being here on this episode.

58:09I truly appreciate each and every single one of you. If you guys are getting value out of this episode, again, consider leaving a five-star rating review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast player. If you're watching on YouTube, give us the old thumbs up and make sure you're subscribed on YouTube. A lot of you are not subscribed, but watch the show and really, really appreciate each and every single one of you. Share this with someone who could find value in this message and we'll see you on the next episode. Ready to transform your career in real time from where you are? Brown University's flexible online master's programs will help expand your business influence and your network in just 16 months.

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