The Best of the Best
Each week we will seek out the best of the best in every imaginable business and explore the secret to their success. Prepare to gain insights and perspectives that will help you propel your business and personal growth forward. Hear how these leaders started, the stumbling blocks they overcame, and what’s next in their journey.
The Best of the Best
Conquering Money Management with Chris McMorrow's Expert Insights
Ever feel like the world of finance is wrapped in mystery and misconceptions? Fear not, because on our latest episode, the remarkable Chris McMorrow of MB Wealth joins us to debunk the biggest myths in financial planning. With wit and wisdom, Chris discusses the psychological barriers blocking us from fiscal fitness and how personalized advice is just what your bank account ordered. Picture a personal trainer for your finances—Chris brings that level of tailored support and guidance, making the daunting process of managing money seem as relatable as choosing a salad over a slice of pizza.
This episode isn't just about busting myths; it's a treasure trove of strategies for growing your wealth. We're laying out the blueprint to assemble your financial A-team, with Chris illustrating his role as the chief of staff to your personal economy's presidency. From tackling the complexities of real estate investment to the art of balancing student loans, we cover the financial journey across all stages of life. And because life loves a curveball, we underline the lifesaving importance of savings and insurance. So, if you're aiming to turn your financial goals into your financial reality, this is one conversation you can't afford to miss.
Okay, here we are. Another episode on the best of the best. Therese, who do you?
Speaker 2:have here. So today I have MB Wealth, I have Chris McMorrow here and he is gonna tell us all about financial strategies and planning myths all the things that you guys think when you hear that he's gonna make it so that it's something that you feel you absolutely need to do which I know a lot of people do but they get nervous and they don't make the appointment or they cancel. Do you have people cancel all the time?
Speaker 1:All the time not as much as 10 years ago, but it is still prevalent. A lot of people put their financial well-being on the back burner because life takes over.
Speaker 2:Well, it's funny because life does take over and time goes by so fast. You don't even realize when you start talking about this that we personally talked about financial planning for 15 years and it feels like two or three, so it gets away from you if you don't just sit down and do it.
Speaker 1:It is and we try to make it fun and it's not a trip to the dentist. We don't want that feeling that it's, ah, I have to go get drilled by the dentist today and you're anxiously sitting in the waiting room. We try to keep it fun. It's an experience. We wanna make sure that we understand your goals short-term, long-term and how do we achieve them, based on what you're actually doing in your current day-to-day lives, right?
Speaker 2:So let's back up a second and just tell everybody a little bit about what MD Wealth is when you started and kind of what your main things that you do there are.
Speaker 1:Sure. So I've been in this business for two decades now and I came up under a gentleman that mentored me and really taught me about the work ethic that's involved in building a great business and how to treat clients and prospects and really understand how people make decisions and why they make decisions. And money is 90% psychological and 10% math, and the ability to get across to people on exactly what they wanna do and hold them accountable for achieving their goals and setting savings targets and retirement strategies and things like that is the utmost important to us and that's why I love this business is because we're really helping people get to where they wanna be and hopefully guiding them around some of the pitfalls that are out there in the media, in the paper, the newspaper TikTok, these days it's becoming more prevalent that people are getting their financial advice on social media platforms and people take it on face value. It's scary.
Speaker 1:It is, it definitely is, and one you don't know these people's backgrounds that are actually doing it. And it's more than just seeing the specific strategy versus actually going through and digging deep into your personal life to see if this makes sense, because what makes sense for some people doesn't make sense for others.
Speaker 2:I think part of that, too, is almost like our business. It's a very relational business. You need to get to know the person that you're dealing with and you need to get to know them as their advisor, to see what they really want. It's not just about coming in and having one meeting and all of a sudden it's laid out there for you. It's really what are your hopes, what are your dreams? What is your future plans? How much money do you make now? What are you planning on making in the future? How do you set yourself up so that you can keep that same lifestyle? Because I think that's what people forget. They get used to the lifestyle they have when they're earning and then, when they stop earning, they don't have enough money coming in to support it, and then their lifestyle has to change, which is not a fun conversation, right?
Speaker 1:It's not, and we see it all too often that people that start saving in their late 20s, early 30s, that are making 60,000, 80,000 a year, they keep that same saving strategy even when they're making six figures more than that. They have bonuses coming in. So it's part of our process is we have to have regular review meetings and just at least check-ins to make sure that we're still on point and making sure we're meeting our goals. Because it's very easy to spend money. We equate spending money as eating out every night. It's easy to suspend, just like it is. It's easy to go to the pizza shop which hey listen, I like pizza a lot and I could probably go on a Me too, exactly but we don't want the dieting of your financial world to inhibit you from actually exploring what possibilities there are based on what you're doing.
Speaker 2:It's about. You just said it. It's like financial health. Look at people. They're going to get healthy. They have a schedule. They go to the gym so many days a week. This is the same thing. It's a plan on how you're going to save, and maybe that plan includes not going out to dinner five nights a week, maybe it's going out two nights a week, or whatever it is that's important to you to reach that financial goal. But you have to have the goal.
Speaker 1:Correct. And the joke we say in the office is there's 8,000 workout machines out there, there's 1,000 gyms within a 30 mile radius, but we still have an obesity problem in this country. You have to walk into the gym and actually stick to a program.
Speaker 2:Yeah, having that little piece of paper saying your member doesn't really do much.
Speaker 1:I've had a Planet Fitness membership for 25 years and I can't take the last time I walked into it, so I'm guilty of it too, but we try to keep it light and fun. We don't want to put the person we're sitting across from in an uncomfortable situation. We want to understand what they're doing and how do we get them to what they're trying to do and hold them accountable.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I think some people get to the point where they're thinking, oh, it's too late. No, I got into a certain age. Now I'm going to be retiring soon. There's no point, is that the case?
Speaker 1:It is because a lot of people are doing things that they were told to do. Think about somebody you know that's been in corporate America for 30 years and when you get hired you see your HR person. They say here's a 401K, what percentage do you want to put into it? The company matches X and that's it. Some people. No planning or occasional planning is a strategy. It might not be the most effective strategy, but it is there. But I always equate it to if you were going to get on the expressway and there was a 20 mile backup, wouldn't you want to know that before you got on to the highway?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:We're trying to divert you around the potential construction hazard, the accident that people may be unwillingly and blindly going into. And, having the insight of the knowledge that has been injected in my brain for the past 20 years, a lot of people don't understand how some of these strategies can be detrimental. From 62 to 92.
Speaker 2:Well, I think too, you don't understand how easy it is to build wealth. It doesn't take a lot if you start early enough, right? So obviously, if you're listening and you're my age group, sometimes I think, oh gosh, it's too late. But it's not. I can still make great strategy moves that will help me for my future, when I'm older and retired, and maybe I need care or who knows what is going to happen in later life. But if you're young and you're listening to this, it's never too early to start. And if you're my age and you're doing well and you're successful and you have some money, you can start taking care of your kids, your grandkids. There's ways and strategies that you can help shore up your legacy, and I think a lot of people forget about that.
Speaker 1:Correct and in this general area, people want to leave some sort of legacy and some people that are getting up in the years have been retired for some time now. They're concerned about the cost of a nursing home. Are they properly planned that way? What if a nursing home takes all of my assets and I leave my children, grandchildren?
Speaker 2:Nothing Right.
Speaker 1:And you know so it's we break it down that you know in your 20s, mid-20s you're climbing the mountain. You're always climbing the mountain until you're getting to the point where you retire. Then you have to come back down the mountain because everything you've accumulated you have to convert into a source of income. And then it's once you're slowly grappling down the mountain. It's how do we make sure that you have your generational wealth in place, if that's important to you, that it goes properly to the next generation, with paying the least amount of taxes possible or at least understanding how the taxes work when it goes from one generation to the next?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think that's the other thing. I think a lot of people have accountants and they feel like that's enough, and it's really not, because there are so many strategies that you can take advantage of. You know, especially when you're starting to transition that wealth out, there's a lot of tax penalties if you don't do it right. So talking to someone who has that background a financial planner or advisor is really what you need to be doing.
Speaker 1:Correct and you know we have a great group of people that you know we're not attorneys, we don't draw up legal papers, we don't, you know, do things of that recommendations on estate planning but we will put you in touch with the proper person that has done this for us plenty of times in the past and you know that's, that's a thing. We're looking at our clients. They are the president of their personal economy and how do we build a cabinet around them where you know we're the chief of staff and to res, you might be the minister of defense on the real estate side mortgage professionals right? We need to build a good team that's working for the common goal of the client and that is missed so much in this world of information, the internet, things like that that people don't have that personal touch anymore and we're trying to bring that back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean it's. You're right. You should have an advisor for every aspect of your life instead of trying to be your own advisor, because you know how that works. It doesn't work out always that well. Sometimes you get lucky and might hit the lottery, or whatever the case may be, but you need to have people in your corner. Now, obviously, we're a real estate company and we've talked some strategies on things that sellers can do and buyers can do, and people that own a home might have some equity that they're just letting sit there that could actually be put to a better purpose. Do you have anything you want to say about that?
Speaker 1:Yeah. So you know every situation is unique and we run into a lot of different scenarios. So people that are downsizing to you know I'm retiring, I don't need the huge single family home anymore. I'm downsizing to a rancher. And do I put all this money here? Where can I get yield? How is that going to really benefit me from an income standpoint or supplemental income standpoint? And there's a lot of different ways to focus on that. With younger people, as the houses prices have appreciated nicely in this area, we've been able to help clean up some debt by using some of the home equity. Now we don't do that blindly. We always have to have a back end. Play that hey, we're not going to do this unless we're going to save X to recapture this money back into your plan.
Speaker 2:You're not going to go out and respend it.
Speaker 1:Correct. We don't tell people to take money out of their house to go buy a Ferrari. That would be not prudent. But there are a lot of different options out there and more everybody we know that comes into the office. They want a house at the shore and they want an investment property, and it's how do we utilize some of the assets you already have on your board properly to obtain those things? And if there's ways to do that with the home equity and it makes sense from a cash flow standpoint, we definitely lay that out so they understand how that would look.
Speaker 2:Okay, do you have any suggestions? One of the things we're finding is especially with these first time home buyers or sometimes it's not even their first, but they're graduating from college and they are loaded with student debt which is making it difficult for them to afford really what they could if it wasn't for that debt. Are there any strategies for them? Because the interest rates are higher on these student loans? Is there some kind of something they could do with that?
Speaker 1:So, again, every situation is different. From that standpoint, we would look at options. Does it make sense to do an income-based repayment strategy? Does it make sense to do an extended repayment strategy, to look at from a debt to income ratio, if we can get the payment lower and hey, that means we can get a little bit more house, or when we're ready for that, because we always wanna have the strategy in place that if somebody wants to pay their student loan off in 10 years, 15 years, even though we may extend the loan out, we still wanna be in the same position to be able to pay it off in 15 years, even though we extended it out. It's similar to again, I don't wanna speak out of class, but if somebody wants a 15-year mortgage, right, we might say do the 30-year mortgage but now make the payment, or save on the side that you can still pay the house off in 15 years, but, god forbid, you lose your job if somebody gets sick you're not stuck into that 15-year mortgage payment.
Speaker 1:And again, I'm not a mortgage advisor. But from the standpoint of cash flow we wanna have options because things happen. As part of our process, we wanna make sure that we're showing up protection components and get sure you've got the proper will in place in case something happens to you. If you have a small family, Obviously health insurance and life insurance is a big portion of that to really protect. If you have a young family or not so young family, in case something happens to the breadwinner or a spouse. And then we go to savings Are you saving enough money? Do you have the proper amount of money in case you need four tires on your car? You don't have to put it on the visa. You've got the money set aside and it's already been planned for.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's where I think you come in and really help, and that's why I think if people would start thinking about this when they're younger and start coming up with a great strategy. First of all, their leverage is so much better just because the products are less expensive that they can get into. That could give them the ability to build wealth. The older you get, the more you have to put in to get the same kind of result right, Correct and listen.
Speaker 1:If you are starting at 22 versus 42, you're gonna be way ahead, starting early, and it's all about the habit. If my mom and dad had told me to save 50% of any dollar I made when I was six, that habit would have stuck with me forever. So when we go through and our model's very visual, we like to use the whiteboard as we go through things and we go through these simple examples to show people that here's what things would look like and here are the pitfalls that you may be walking into that you have no idea about. But once you're in it, it may be too late, Right, yeah, it's hard.
Speaker 2:I think the hardest part is it is dealing with people's, it's emotional, right, and it's scary, so I think, getting past that. So if you're listening to this and you don't have someone who's helping you and advising you, it doesn't cost anything to have a meeting.
Speaker 1:No, we don't charge a fee. We based on what we've seen in the industry, that generally is a misconception that hey, I don't have enough money to go sit with these people, or I don't know what they're gonna tell me. Because if I'm looking at my current situation, we'll say, generally we find one thing that it's worth sitting for 90 minutes. There's no fee we wouldn't charge a fee and just to see where you're at it's good. And if what you have is good, we will tell you it's good and keep doing it.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Yeah, I think that's something that people need to keep in mind. You get paid, basically, by helping people become successful at saving money. We're creating wealth, or whatever it is, so there is really no reason not to make an appointment to sit down and have a conversation and start thinking about your future, and I think that's what you all need to do. So you need to get off this podcast and make a phone call the number's gonna be on your screen and get in there and talk to these guys.
Speaker 1:Thanks, Therese.
Speaker 2:You're welcome, thanks.