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Visit yamava.com/palms to discover more. Today on Radical Personal Finance, it's live Q&A. ♪ Welcome to Radical Personal Finance, a show dedicated to providing you with the knowledge, skills, insight, and encouragement you need to live a rich and meaningful life now while building a plan for financial freedom in 10 years or less.

My name is Joshua Sheets, and your host today is Friday, April 22, 2022, and here today on this Friday, as any other Friday when I can arrange the technology, we do a live call-in Q&A show. ♪ Works just like call-in talk radio. In the old days of live call-in talk radio, you call in, we chat about anything that you want to talk about.

Right now we've got one, two, three, four callers on the line. We'll see who else joins here in a few minutes. If you would like to join me for one of these Q&A shows, I would love to have you. To do that, go to patreon.com/radicalpersonalfinance, join the show on Patreon, and that gives you access to one of these Q&A shows.

Thank you to each and every one of you who chooses to support the show there in that way. We begin with Michael. Michael, welcome to the show. How can I serve you today, sir? Hi, Josh. My wife and I are recently married. We've been married for a year. She's from South Africa, and we've just received her green card.

We're considering moving to Cape Town for five to six months. That's about the amount of time that we would be able to be out of the U.S. before we're towing the line of abandoning our status. But it seems like it would be a good opportunity to take advantage of our mobility for this early stage in our family.

So the intent would be we go to Cape Town for five or six months, spend time close with her family in these early years before we get our roots down in the U.S., which seems like it lends itself well to being our long-term home. And so I was just wondering if you had any considerations for short-term moves abroad in that fashion.

I guess my intent would be to work remotely for a U.S. firm, whether the place that I'm working now will offer that perk or another place that I -- you know, another opportunity that I would have to find. But just wondering if you have any suggestions on a line like that.

Why do you want to do this short-term work abroad? What are you hoping to accomplish from it? Namely, spending time with her family in -- you know, for extended time where, as of now, we've been over to visit once. We have another trip planned for later this summer. And having a week and two weeks or three weeks at a time is limiting how close I can grow with her family.

And so being able to spend time close with them as she has nieces and nephews that are growing, it's an opportunity for us to split time with her family rather than just all of my family that's here in the States. Well, why wouldn't you do it then? What are you concerned about?

Why would you not do it? I guess at this point, my -- I'm trying to figure out how I can make the U.S. dollars come in to make it a worthwhile, I guess, geo-arbitrage opportunity. And I don't think that there's a whole lot of other limitations beyond that. I guess she has a photography business that's growing well in the U.S.

right now and would have a more difficult time relocating to South Africa with the lack of strength in their currency. We would not make it anywhere close to the same income. But in that view, I think that's probably a low consideration because it's only five or six months, and that's all we can do for now with the terms on our immigration.

Right. Well, a couple of thoughts. Number one, you mentioned terms on your immigration. In order for her to maintain her green card, she needs to spend most of her time in the United States. Those are the laws of maintaining a green card. So work with your immigration consultant, your attorney, and make sure that whatever you plan to do is not going to jeopardize the green card process and the path to citizenship if that's something that she desires.

With regard to going abroad, I think that anytime you can go and spend substantial time with family, it's almost certainly a useful investment, and that's something that you will enjoy and appreciate. It's one of those things that can help life be fun and interesting. So I don't think that this is particularly an economic conversation.

It sounds like it's going to be economically more costly than perhaps staying in the United States, although we'll get to the geo-arbitrage question in a moment. But if it's something that you want to do and you want to go and be with family, I've never heard somebody tell me, I've never read someone say, "I just wish I hadn't gone and spent that extended time with family." Perhaps they're out there, but you don't really hear much of that.

What you usually hear is people saying, "I'm really glad I went and took that time with family." Similarly, when you have an opportunity to go and enjoy some kind of new cultural experience, it becomes something that most people wind up treasuring because it's personally challenging. It's a time of personal growth.

You have an opportunity to examine your presuppositions, examine your personal philosophy. You have the opportunity to be part of a different culture. It helps you to appreciate things about other cultures. It helps you to appreciate things about your own culture. I think it's a positive thing to do and worth doing.

In terms of considerations, I think also-- So you don't have a job right now that you can go abroad with? Is that the case? I've made it known to my employer my desire to do this. I've worked in South Africa when I was there for a month over the holidays to visit, but I've not gotten any indication that I can make that a permanent arrangement.

It's not clear yet that my current position will allow that. What I like about things like relocating, especially an international relocation, is sometimes it can provide the impetus needed in order for you to rearrange your life or your lifestyle in some way. I find that some people do well with little changes over time, but it seems that a lot of us do well with some big, hairy, audacious goal that we want to go for.

You have a guy who wants to clean up his house, but he just can't get around to it, can't get around to it, and finally he says, "That's it. I'm going to go traveling for a year." Now he's motivated to clean up his house. He comes back and he doesn't fall into the same old ways.

In your case, maybe you want to be more location independent and have more overall movements and you want to be able to travel more. Well, this may provide you the impetus necessary for your boss to say yes or for your boss to say no, and then you just say, "Okay, I need a different boss.

I need a different job." I think that can be good. Those are all reasons to do it. Things to be cautious of. Number one, the time frame that you're describing is an awkward time frame. Five to six months is an awkward time frame. Let me expand. Number one, what are you going to do about housing?

A lot of times when you travel on a short-term basis, then you just keep your primary house, in your case in the United States, and you're going to go abroad and you're going to pay for your expenses of that secondary house. That works out fine because it's understood this is a short-term thing, and so you can swing it.

On a longer-term basis, it also makes sense. If you want to give up your house in the United States, rent it out for some income, and you're going to go and travel the world for two years, then that can work out because now you have someone else paying your mortgage payment for you.

You may be going to a place with a lower housing expense, and so you can engage and enjoy some of that geo-arbitrage. Five to six months is going to be weird because while there are some solutions, short-term rentals, maybe you have a friend or someone like that that can stay in the house, it doesn't quite fit into the normal kind of time frames where that makes sense.

Depending on if you're staying with family, that can work out fine for you in South Africa. If you're going to rent something, again, it's a little awkward. It's not quite a long-term lease and it's not quite a short-term stay, and so be careful about that. The other thing that's difficult is going to be the travel costs back and forth.

Even if you go, most likely if you're going to be gone for six months, most likely you'll have to go back and forth at least a couple of times for some work engagement, some important meeting, some end-of-the-year company party, something like that. Five or six months is a substantial time to recoup the travel expenses, but what you'll do is you're going to wind up doing quite a lot of sightseeing.

You're going to wind up expending more money on tourist things and then trying to work them in around the work. It's probably not going to be as cheap as you think. When you live a place for a few years, then you can have a more modest kind of flow, but when you're a place for months, five or six months I think is at the long range of this, but when you're a place for months, you're probably still in that tourist mode.

You're going to be spending a lot of money doing a lot of tourist stuff, traveling all over, so there's a decent chance you don't wind up saving a ton of money. Then I think also, the next point slipped my mind. I guess the point is simply that I'm not sure you're going to actually be saving much.

You're not going to be saving anything on taxes, being gone for five to six months, in the United States taxes I mean. You're not going to save a ton, so I don't see any big GOR. Oh, the last thing I meant to say was that it's also quite awkward to deal with the time zones.

So depending on the demands of your job, the time zones can be quite awkward and make sure that you fully consider that and make sure that that can be a good thing. End of the day, I can't see any reason why I wouldn't try it. I think that you'll appreciate having taken advantage of the opportunities that life has for you, saying, "Hey, we're relatively unencumbered at the moment.

It's relatively easy for us to go and do this thing that we want to do. Go for it." So I encourage you to go for it. I'm just not sure that it's going to be a big financial arbitrage opportunity or big savings unless you can share something that I'm missing.

I believe those are true points that you've brought up. And I think the strongest consideration now is taking advantage of our mobility as a young couple with no kids and having the opportunity to strengthen the relationship with her family. And then I'm excited for the opportunity and just trying to find more ideas on how to make it happen.

So if I run into more questions, then we may be in touch again. Go for it. What I would make sure that I did while I'm there is take advantage of your location. And again, I don't know that you're going to save much money, but I would undoubtedly buy a car.

And I would buy a four-wheel drive car. South Africa is a wonderful location to travel from. And I would make sure that I've arranged my work in such a way that you could take not only weekend trips out of the city, wherever you're stationed, but I would make sure that I set things up to take some several multi-week trips to some of the surrounding nations.

And don't worry too much about this being a cheap thing. Recognize that, hey, this is an opportunity to do something really new and really cool. And so I would, just knowing South Africa, knowing that part of the world, that would be high on my list. Make sure I have a good camping car, a setup that's really simple.

You don't need anything all that expensive, but have a good, decent four-wheel drive vehicle, a decent tent, and make sure that you can go from there and enjoy some of the physical beauty that Africa has to offer and do that one-on-one. Because those are the kinds of trips that will be very accessible for you when you're there for five or six months that are simply not so accessible when you're taking two-week trips over to see family in the future.

Yeah, and her dad and brother are both big into overlanding as well. So on our trip over the holidays, we've made it to Namibia. Wonderful. And there's more places to go yet. So that does sound exciting. Yeah, that's what I would do. Again, it's not so much a geo-arbitrage, saving money, big thing, just one of those wonderful things of life.

Kind of a little mini-sabbatical, maybe a working sabbatical, and a neat time to enjoy. And the cool thing is when you come back to the United States, you will look at the world through a whole fresh set of lenses, and you'll appreciate so much more the things that you have.

Thomas, welcome to the show. How can I serve you today, sir? Hi, Joshua. Is this audio okay? Sounds great. I also called it. Cool. So my question is, I recently, over the last four or five months, have been preparing to purchase a home where I currently live. However, with prices and interest rates very high, I think I've been priced out.

And now I have the money I saved up for down payment and closing costs in relatively liquid assets. And I'm wondering if you see any pitfalls in where I can put them, because I think we're of similar mindsets. I'm targeting growth. I'm a young man. I don't have many responsibilities, but I do feel a sense of having to care for my family.

And everywhere I look, I see downsides. Homes, obviously, prices feel very high. Leaving it in cash, there's inflation to worry about. Stocks have high price-to-earning ratios, and the U.S. might not be the reserve currency. Cryptos are obviously speculative. And these are things that I think you are knowledgeable about.

So I was wondering if you have opinions. Could you figure out a way, using the resources that you have saved and your current budget, could you figure out a way to go ahead and buy a house that would be appropriate for you and your family's needs? I think so, yes.

However, because I'm young and relatively mobile, I am not sure if I want to take on the work of maintaining a property, especially remotely, potentially, if I have opportunities elsewhere in my career where I'll make more money. So that's a fair concern. But that's a different question than what you asked me in the beginning.

So let me first answer the first question you asked, which it seems like maybe wasn't the core question. The way you positioned your question at the beginning was you said, "I feel like I've been priced out of the market. Interest rates are up. Demand is up. I feel like that doesn't work for me." I think that when it comes to the idea of purchasing your house to live in, then you simply buy it when you can afford it and when you want to own a house.

And you don't worry so much about the external market conditions. If you knew for certain that it's a great time to buy or it's a great time to sell, and if that fits in with your lifestyle and where you are in life, then go for it. Timing the market to the extent you're able to is, of course, a good idea.

But at its core, what you're buying is a place to live. And so if you can afford to buy the place that's appropriate where you want to live, then I think you go ahead and buy it. Rising interest rates means most likely that prices will go down. People buy in the United States, people buy houses based upon cash flow, based upon their ability to afford the mortgage payment, at least in the middle-tier market.

At the high end, that's different. But in the middle-tier market, people buy houses based upon their ability to afford the mortgage payment. So when mortgage rates are low, housing prices are high. When mortgage rates are high, then housing prices adjust to deal with the increased financing costs because people are generally paying for their houses with mortgages.

So I don't know that you can time that perfectly. Are interest rates on mortgages significantly higher than they were two years ago? Sure, they absolutely are. What will they be two years from now? We have no idea. And so since I don't have any crystal ball that works, and since you probably don't either, then my answer is go with what makes sense, meaning buy and sell your house when you can afford it and when it makes smart sense in your life to do so.

And don't worry too much about the external market, what's happening out there. If you're buying a house to live in, then chances are high that you're going to live there for a good number of years. And just like in most circumstances, the stock market is higher five years from now than it is today, a similar thing is probably true with real estate.

The real estate market is probably higher five years from now than it is today. And more importantly, you'll have the things that you need and the things that you want, the house that your family needs to live in during that period. So I don't see any way that you can be in a situation where you can predict that perfectly, and I think that buying your own personal house is a wonderful idea.

That's a different question than, you know, I'm not so sure I want to buy a house right now because it may limit my career mobility. So that's why I'm separating. Yeah, no, that's right. There are two separate questions in my head. I think the reason I backed out of actually buying a house is because from a cash flow perspective, all the homes I see have appreciated so much that after the sale, in all likelihood, they'll get reassessed for taxes, which is another thing that I can't use with my non-functional crystal ball to understand how much it'll cost me on a monthly basis.

And so that's why I'm thinking I can sit this out, wait a few years, because I'm not in a rush to purchase the house. Like you said, it would just be a nice thing to do. But because of that, because I've already rotated this money out of my investments, I'm wondering where might be a good place to put it now, if you have any thoughts on that.

Sure. So, wonderful. Good job thinking carefully and then making the question more specific, because that'll help you to get a better answer. So let's talk about the question, "What should you invest your money in?" So here's my answer in the form of a question. What do you want to invest your money in and why?

What are you considering and why are you considering those options? Yeah. I'm considering long-term growth. That's my, I guess, prime directive. Okay. And how do you see that you can achieve the best long-term growth with your money? Well, the traditional advice I've received is stocks. But because I'm not familiar with exactly how that market works, I'm just going off historical data.

And they always say, "Can't pass outcomes, can't guarantee future outcomes." And I know there are challenges in the world right now. And so I just don't know if maybe there's somewhere else that could be better to put it. Like, for example, cryptocurrencies, maybe a split, maybe bonds, bonds I know even less about.

Right. So I don't want to sound pedantic. And if I ask you a number of leading questions, it may come across that way. And so what I'm going to do is I'll lay out a framework for you that I hope will answer your question. But I'm going to encourage you to spend your money on about 15 or 20 books and read them, listen to them, etc.

And then think critically about the content of those books and then come away and ask this question again. Because while, of course, I'm confident in the opinion that I have and you're honoring me with paying me money to be accessed to this call and then to listen, etc. At the end of the day, I can't tell you what to invest your money in.

I can only tell you how different investments work and then you'll choose based upon your goals. So here's where I would begin. First and foremost, with any amount of money, I always ask, is there a way that you can invest money into yourself and into your earning ability that you haven't yet done?

And I'm going to give you the fast version rather than asking you a lot of questions. This is always the starting point. If you have money and you have not maxed out all of the investments that you can make into yourself that make sense, that is your most profitable thing to do.

Now, this may be academic. Many times people have a, you know, they didn't finish their college degree. Well, go finish a college degree if that's something that's useful to you. The data is very clear that the more college degrees that you have and the higher your levels of education, the higher your lifetime earnings are.

And so it can be a pretty good deal to take $20,000 and go and invest it in order to generate an extra million and a half dollars of lifetime earnings. In addition, though, I encourage you to think outside of the traditional academic box. Ask yourself, are there skills that I can enhance?

Is there a way that I can increase my competence? Can I take a class on sales if I'm in sales? Can I hire a coach to coach me if I'm an executive? Can I go and become an apprentice to such and such a company to make more money? What can I do to increase my earning ability?

Because the best investment is almost always in yourself. The people who become very wealthy generally become very wealthy either because they generate a high income or because they build a business that either generates significant value or pays them a high income. And so these are ways that you can invest into yourself.

Then you need to go and say, what are the other options that I have for investments? And I think about these first in terms of three basic buckets. The first bucket is business. Can I invest into a business? A business that either I own and control or a business that I have some form of partnership in?

Generally speaking, most people who become very wealthy become wealthy because they invest into a business that they own and control or that they have partnership in. That doesn't have to be a new and innovative idea. It can be as simple as a bakery. It can be as simple as a mechanic shop.

It can be as simple as a restaurant. It really can be that simple. And yet by owning a business that you control, you can generate often very high income and you can start to move into the areas of leverage. You can use other people's money to expand your operations.

You can leverage your income by becoming a better marketer, by becoming more efficient with your operations, etc. So business has your highest potential return on investment. The problem with business is it requires a significant amount of time from you. That time can range from 70 hours a week if it's your own business and you're doing it all yourself down to several dozen hours per year if you're an advisor to a business that you've invested in but you're not involved in the management.

But that will generally be your best and most profitable investment. That's not passive. It requires a significant amount of time from you but that's usually going to make you the most money. So then from there, you can move into the world of investing into tangible items. And I just separate this because it's convenient.

Anything that you can touch or feel or see is something that you can invest in. This can be at the large scale. You could purchase large farms and buy and sell them. You could do real estate at virtually any level, a local rental house, a large grand scale multifamily apartment building.

This also would extend to any kind of physical investment. You can buy fine watches. You can flip cars that you buy cheap and flip for a profit. You can flip boats or set up a boat dealership and sell boats. Of course, that's a business. But you can buy gold coins.

You can trade firearms. You can trade gold watches. Anything that's physical, again, on the large scale of malls and shopping centers and houses and skyscrapers and farmland or anything that is more tangible but smaller. Then your third big group of investments involves some form of paper asset. So a paper asset is an investment that gains its value from the performance of something else.

And so here, the world is very large. It could involve stocks. What is a stock? It's fundamentally a share of ownership in a business. And so for you to think that stocks are not going to increase, that well-chosen stocks of companies are not going to increase in value in the future would mean that you believe fundamentally that the value of businesses is going to decline or the businesses are not going to be able to make money, something like that, which is a pretty shocking belief.

So you should be very careful about that. Stocks are one. Bonds would be another example. Bonds are debt instruments where you lend money to companies. You could include here derivatives. Derivative is something that gains its value based upon the performance of something else. And so the world of derivatives and options is huge.

Then you could include, I think fairly here, cryptocurrencies, which are not really an investment because they don't have any kind of expected cash flows. And so they're hard to fit into the models that we traditionally use. But it's basically a paper asset. It's something that doesn't really exist. But depending on the supply and demand, the value will be there.

And within each of these worlds, your opportunities are very, very large. So how do you make the best decision? Well, you look at it through that level that I say, and then you think about what makes sense for you. For example, if you are poorly employed, you're not making at least six figures, but if you're not making much money and you're poorly employed, then I would say you want to firm up that foundation and go back and say, "Can I invest more money into myself?

Can I increase my value in the marketplace in some way? Can I get better employed?" and focus on that. And that's where not owning a house can be a benefit to you because I'm able to move across the country, move across the world, go into an industry that has higher growth prospects, et cetera.

On the other hand, if you're very well employed and you're happy with where you are in your career, you're happy with the choices that you've made, then I think you look and say, "Now, what would I like to do with my money?" And that's where you choose from those options some portion of what makes sense for you.

It's hard for me to believe that there are in many cases there are very few really bad investments out there. There are some, but do you go wrong by buying stocks? Almost very likely not, especially if you buy diversified portfolio of stocks. If you buy mutual funds, do you go wrong with that?

Almost certainly not. As you heard me say in the last call, the statistics are very high. Five years from now, those stocks will be worth more money. Do you go wrong buying Bitcoin? It's hard for me to see how you go wrong buying Bitcoin, but it's possible. And so I'm going to be more cautious here because it's more speculative and I'm not going to say almost certainly not, but it's very different.

So where you go wrong is in making the poor choice where you neglect the opportunity cost. And so if you took your $50,000 and used it to buy mutual funds and those mutual funds grew in value from $50,000 to $100,000, then you didn't go wrong. Unless your alternative choice was to take the $50,000 and go and buy some local business, make it as a down payment on some local business that five years from now is making you $200,000 a year.

So then you could see that you went wrong because you didn't make the choice that was right for you. So the right choices are going to be the introspective choices where you've identified this is what's right for me. And from listening to you for about 42 seconds, you haven't gone through that introspection of understanding what the options are that are available to you.

And so that's where I would encourage you to spend your time is I have a book list. Go to RadicalBooklist.com, get my book list of books that I recommend. Go to the library, spend some time digging through books on investments and just flip through them. And then ask yourself what am I excited about, what am I not excited about?

And then choose something that's going to lead you in the direction that you think is right for your personality and your goals. And then you'll make the right decision because you may be attracted to starting your own business, in which case the answer is obvious. Or you may be repulsed by that, in which case the answer is more evident.

So that's how I would approach it. And I wouldn't do anything until you're more clear on what you want your life to look like five years from now. Don't just buy something randomly because it may or may not be a good idea. Be intelligent about the vision that you have for your life five, ten years from now and then systematically take the steps that are going to take you in that direction.

Got it. It does seem silly that I hadn't considered investing in myself. So thank you, Joshua. And you read my mind. I was about to ask about that book list you referenced. So I will be using the website. RadicalBooklist.com. And invest in yourself in the fullest sense. Even if that simply means keeping money on the side and savings so that you can take some risk that you wouldn't otherwise take.

Invest in yourself in academics, if that's right. Invest in yourself in training, in coaches, in coaching programs. Or invest in yourself by putting your $50,000 in the bank and moving into a tent so that you can code the world's next great website. Those are all legitimate ways of investing in yourself.

But I think investing in yourself is almost always the most certain path. And you should only really, really honestly, you should only think of investing in other people's projects and other people's ideas when you simply can't invest any more money in your own ideas. I hate to argue or teach from extremes.

But I do love to see Elon Musk and how effectively he does that. He did that. Where he – the way that he went so fast from, "Hey, we had one good run," to "richest man in the world" and "king on high" is that he bet on himself multiple times over.

And while you may lose in some ways, meaning that you as an individual may lose, I don't see how you ever actually lose by betting on yourself even if you fail spectacularly. Failing is not losing. It's just one of the building blocks of success. So even if you do project after project after project that winds up failing, that failure is very – you'll be able to see it coming and prepare for it.

And that failure paves the pathway to many more opportunities in the future. So I hope that's helpful. Radicalbooklist.com. We go now to 612 Area Code. Welcome to the show. How can I serve you today? Joshua Bellini Hi, Joshua. Can you hear me? Tim Cynova Yes. Joshua Bellini Awesome. Thank you for having us.

I really appreciate this. So I'd like to get your thoughts and possibly your framework on my position. The most recent caller in your discussion about investing in yourself has some more thoughts going in my head. But the question I have is I have a small apartment building, and I can describe it conceptually or with numbers.

And I'm sitting pretty good with equity. There's probably like 35% loan to value right now just with the growth in equity over the previous years. And I'm wondering when would it make sense to sell that and transfer all that equity into something like an index fund? And this apartment, it has multiple long-term tenants.

So the cash flow, there's definitely room to grow. It's not at market rent. And it's physically located in a growing community. So I think the long-term or medium-term appreciation prospect is there. Tim Cynova On its face, I would say it would make sense to sell an apartment building and invest the money into an index fund when the amount of money that you can generate in terms of cash flow and potential return in the index fund is either superior to the apartment's return or is sufficient for your personal investment goals and when you want to be freed from the time and the risk of the apartment building.

So that's a mouthful, but I think those are the cases. So let's break them down into a few more pieces. First, it would make sense to sell an apartment and buy an index fund when your expected cash flows, your expected returns, total returns from the index fund are higher than they are from the apartment building.

If the apartment building is a bad investment and it's just, you know, you don't think it's a great investment, then sell it and get out and go do a better investment. That's probably not the case though because most of the time due to the use of leverage, most investors in an apartment building find that their returns or their expected returns are higher than the index fund.

That's why you're dealing with all the hassle and the work of dealing with tenants and toilets and turnover, right? That's why is because your total returns are higher. So what I think is true is you can reach a point in your life where you don't care about the highest total returns, but you care about the best lifestyle.

So let's use some big numbers. Let's say that your little apartment building was worth $10 million. When you say little apartment, I assume you're not talking about a $10 million building, right? No, like six units, probably rounded to five or 600 grand. Right. So let's pretend it was a $10 million building.

But to manage and deal with that $10 million building, it requires, you know, it's a 30-hour-a-week job and you don't enjoy it. Now, the thing may be making tons of money, but at the end of the day, you can sell it and walk away with a check for $10 million.

And if you could take that $10 million and stick it in an index fund, then let's say you pulled off 3% of it and you pulled off $300,000 a year, you would have a $300,000-a-year income for the rest of your life and a decent chance that your funds would actually grow depending on what the market delivers in the coming years.

Well, if you can live comfortably on under $300,000, man, you would do that, right? Maybe that allows you to go sail the world. You would have a better investment, meaning it's much more diversified, much more of a strong investment versus one local apartment building that's subject to all manners of risks that your index fund is not devoted to.

And if the $300,000 or whatever the expected return is is enough to change your life, then you would go for that. So, I don't know where you are, but the reason most people get into real estate in the first place is they see a fast path to financial independence.

And through the use of leverage, they see that if I work here, if I make smart decisions, good buys, and use financial leverage, then I can be financially independent with a nice income much more quickly. So, once you go through the phase where that's true but now my income has grown, then I think it makes sense to go for a lower risk or a lower hassle investment if it's enough to meet your financial goals.

Yeah, and so my situation, I'm 31 and single. I could probably retire today and keep my current lifestyle and that'd be fine with what I have in index funds plus this six unit plus the duplex that I have. And if I put it all into index funds and I assumed a 4% withdrawal rate, I could not retire today.

So, then it would make sense for you to keep the real estate. You might swap it out for a better piece of real estate at some point, but you would keep the real estate because at this phase of your life, you want the maximum returns and then keep growing your nest egg until that passively invested nest egg could deliver the lifestyle that you desire.

Thank you very much. Yeah, and I think just kind of adding on to your discussion from the previous caller, like my goal is to get out of my corporate engineering career in the next five years. But if I can find a way to invest in myself to even to do some sort of engineering consulting that pays half of what I make or two thirds or something, then I don't need as large of a portfolio.

So, I could even sell the apartment complex today. And if I were to just find an income source that's half of what I make in today, realistically, I'd be just fine. And that may be the better long-term option anyway. At its core, I think that's usually the most efficient option.

It may not always be the best option, but when I talk to people about financial independence and there are people who say, "I want to quit my job. I want to be financially independent." And I ask them, "Why? What are you hoping to accomplish? What will you do?" Usually, there are some basic themes.

Those themes usually involve having a greater sense of control about my life, not being beholden to someone else to tell me where I have to be when I have to be there. It also usually involves having the freedom to make decisions that are out of the norm. I want to go to Europe for three months and I can't on my three weeks of vacation.

And just simply having more flexibility and freedom. And so what I have observed since the very beginning of when I began this show and before is that you can achieve probably at least 80% and I would say in many cases 90% of what you're hoping to achieve with ultimate financial independence, which I define as being able to live on the income from your portfolio, which is passively invested.

Index funds, right? Or mutual funds. You can achieve 80 to 90% of that with some carefully chosen form of entrepreneurship or self-employment. And that's the beauty and it's a much faster path where maybe it takes you 10 years, 15 years, 20 years to become financially independent in the sense that I'm going to work and save money and build my investment portfolio.

But in some cases fast, but let's just say one year to three years, almost anybody can move into an independent business that fits their skills, fits their goals, fits their lifestyles and gives them 80% of what they're looking for from financial independence. So I think that's the obvious starting point for financial independence rather than sticking it out in a job for wages that you don't love.

Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. And I'm kind of going off some of your older podcasts about the stages of financial independence. And like, yeah, now I can work 60 hours a week and that's air quotes fine. But when I have a young family, I'm not willing to do that.

Also, it would be cool to buy the air quotes mountain house and a ski boat or something like that someday. Today I live more of a mustachioed lifestyle and I could retire, but I don't need a ski boat today. But if I have three little kids and they want to go skiing, it'd be great to go buy a Mastercraft ski boat tomorrow if I want one.

Yeah. And I think you're planning ahead is very wise. So here are a couple things to think about on those things. If you have any inclination towards entrepreneurship, your own business in some way, and notice that I tried to make that if very clear. I frequently speak to people and I recommend against entrepreneurship.

Many people know themselves and they know that I'm not interested in any kind of entrepreneurship. Great. Now that you know that you can just strike that off your list. Just like some people say, I know I don't want to own a real estate. I don't want to be a real estate investor.

Great. Strike it off your list. Move on. The world is big. So if you're open to or if entrepreneurship or being an engineering consultant of some kind or a seasonal consultant or working in a specialty industry where you get called infrequently but very profitably when you're called or something like that.

If that is on your list as something you're interested in, the time to start that is as soon as possible. It makes the most sense for you while you're living. Sorry, I'll just finish. It makes the most sense for you while you're living a low-cost mustachioed lifestyle and while you're single.

That's the time it makes sense for you to start the business. I've never met someone who regretted starting their business earlier. What you don't want to do is keep artificially stacking away money that you don't need in order to think that someday I'm going to start this business just so I can have a little bit more money.

You don't need money. What you need is to get out there and start bringing in clients. So be careful because if business is part of it, then chances are you should make a plan this year to start the business on the side with the goal of leaving your job next year or two years from now because that's more valuable before the case.

And then the second comment is simply that I applaud you for thinking ahead and recognizing that when children come along, it's fun to spend money on them. It really is enjoyable. And while I would never say that you need to be rich to enjoy time with your children, that's clearly not the case, I have certainly found it enjoyable to spend significant amounts of money on my children and extremely rewarding.

It feels like some of the most rewarding dollars you can spend when you invest your money into your children because you look and see the long-term compounding benefit of that. And that expenditure can be into education, that expenditure can be into memories, that expenditure can be into fun. It's just fun.

That's the thing I've never understood about a lifestyle restriction, what I've never liked about a lifestyle restriction is that it's fun to feel like you can grow and it's fun to spend money when you're spending money on things that you like and that you want. And it feels nice to see that those things can grow.

And so psychologically, I think it's really dangerous, especially at a young age, to commit yourself to living on a fixed income based upon some arbitrary thing rather than to enjoy being on a growth path where you can enjoy where you are today and also enjoy where you can be five years from now.

And similar to your experiences as a parent, which is what you're describing, I grew up on a lake. We had a boat, you know, I just grew up in Borghorst basically, had a blast. My parents ended up getting divorced and then made some poor financial decisions as well and we moved off the lake into a townhome and it was noticeably less fun.

And there's other factors into that, but I was like, man, if I could have kids and grow up on a lake or in a cool, I live in a mountain town now, but you know, and have my backyard to the national forest, like, and just have like, yeah, I'm not saying you have to be rich to be a good parent or anything, but I could see the value in that.

So, yeah, me too. Well, cool. Keep in touch. I'd love to hear from you on the decisions that you make in the years to come. And I thank you for calling in. We go now to 507 Area Code. Welcome to the show. How can I serve you today? Hey, Josh, this is Scott calling in again, called in for the first time last week.

And I got a very different question this week than a tax advantage donations. Wonderful. So about six months ago, I transitioned into a Salesforce career as a Salesforce administrator. And I've been in my current role for a long five months. My company that I've worked for is fantastic. I like my managers.

I get to work from home. I like my coworkers. However, the aspects of my, like the work itself does not, I don't love. It's fine. I don't dislike it. It's just not great. So I'm wondering, is five months too early to start looking for another career opportunity? Do I need to stay at a job for a certain amount of time?

Or how should I proceed with that? So the thing that's nagging at you is there has traditionally been this sense of distrust or lack of desire to hire somebody who changes jobs frequently. And so there's this idea that we have that we shouldn't change jobs too frequently. Otherwise, it might reflect negatively on our resume.

Is that a fair summary of what's bothering you? Yes. And certain people I talked to about having a sense of loyalty to a company. But yes, those two combined factors. So we'll talk about loyalty in a minute because that's also, I think, true and a fair comment. Actually, let's deal with loyalty first.

I think it'd be more helpful. All of us want to have a sense of loyalty to other people. We have that born into us and trained into us. The challenge is this. You do not owe an employer any more loyalty than what has been contracted in your agreement between you.

So if you have told the employer, "I will work for you for two years and three months," then yeah, you do have a sense of loyalty for that. If you have told your employer, if you've signed a contract, a three-year contract with this employer, then yeah, you have a sense of loyalty to that.

But you don't owe an employer any more of a sense of loyalty beyond that. We do not live in a world of slavery, a world of contractual apprenticeships and indentured servitude. We live in a world of it's a free market for labor. And that cuts both ways. I remember I've been laid off from two jobs in my life.

And the first job was when I was in college and it was after a week. And basically, I had been hired to do a job that I thought I was going to be doing and then it turned out that the job that I was actually hired for was something totally different.

And I was upset. I was annoyed with it. My boss was annoyed with me. And basically, after a week, he said, "This isn't working." And we decided we just parted ways. The second time was right after college. I was working for a company that was a marketing consulting company.

And they had given me extra incentives with extra money while I was in college in exchange for considering working with them after I graduated college. So I took their extra money and they offered me a job after college that I decided I would go ahead and take. And so I took it.

And in my mind, I owed them. I had a sense of loyalty. I owed them for at least a year of work because, of course, when your employer hires you, it takes a while to bring you up to speed. They spent money training you, finding you, attracting you, etc.

You want them to make some money off of you. And then I got laid off. I can't remember. I think it was like six months into the job. And I realized, "Oh, that loyalty goes basically one way." And that's the world that we live in. We don't live in a world where your company has any genuine loyalty to you.

And you don't, I think, owe your company any genuine loyalty beyond being a loyal employee while you are there and being honest. So I think that morally speaking, there's no argument in favor of loyalty to say that you owe somebody something that hasn't been contracted to. I've had multiple employees.

I've hired multiple employees and I've had multiple employees quit and go on to better jobs. And not a single time have I ever felt like my employees who quit harmed me in some moral sense. I recognize very clearly that my loyalty to them goes as far as to pay them for the work that they have done.

And their loyalty to me goes as far as to do the work that I've paid them to do. And that there's no, unless there's a contract or a stated agreement of some kind, that kind of sense of obligation of loyalty doesn't exist. And I was never upset when my employees left.

Make sense? Yes. And I very much agree with you on that. And at my previous job, I was there for a year and a half. I probably would have had a sense of loyalty. And then I was laid off, no days notice, and now I'm unemployed. And that kind of, since then, I've kind of had a shift to the perspective of what you have.

Right. And I think that at its core, your loyalty needs to be to yourself and to your family, to do what is best for you and to your family. And remember that you are not in competition with your employer. You are, employees are in competition with employees for the best jobs.

And employers are in competition with employers for the best employees. And so you may go to your employer, and of course, I think you should at least give notice. I think you should give notice and give as much notice as you can, as is reasonable, given the specific circumstances.

I think you should give notice. And when you give notice, your employer has a fresh opportunity to bid on your services. Right. You could go, you may find a job that's paying you double what you're paying today. And you could go to your employer and you could say, here's my notice of resignation.

I found a better job. Your employer could say, hey, listen, wait a second. Hold on, hold on, hold on. What if we pay you double? Now you have a chance to renegotiate and you might choose to accept it because they sweetened the pot. But they are in competition with other people and that's the way the world works.

It has to work that way. So do what you've said you're going to do. Do what you've agreed to do. But your loyalty is to yourself, to your life, and to your family, to do what's best for your family. Your loyalty to your employer doesn't go beyond doing what you've agreed to do and being as high quality of an employee as you're capable of being while employed by that employer.

Awesome. Thank you for that point. That's very validating. All right. Let's pivot to point number one now. I think that you should be careful about acquiring a string of facts that indicates that you are a shifty employee. But if you're not a shifty employee, there's always a way to explain the facts in some way that makes sense.

And the most important thing that you have, that the one substance of your life that gets more and more precious every single day is time. And if you are in a situation where you recognize that this isn't the right situation for me, this isn't the best situation for me, you should get out of it as quickly as possible.

It makes sense generally to be thoughtful about it, but you should get out of it as quickly as possible. And if you look around at other people, which are always easier to see than yourself, if you have a buddy who's in a relationship and he's got a new girlfriend and he comes to you and is like, "Hey, I got this new girlfriend, but there's all these problems with it," does it ever get better if he just sticks it out for longer?

Or would it be better to acknowledge early on, "You know what, this isn't going to work long-term," and move on? And isn't that better for him and his girlfriend? If you have somebody that's working for you and you recognize it's not working, or you're working for someone else and you recognize it's not working, it's better for you to end it quickly.

It's better for the company to end it quickly, and it's better for you to end it quickly and move on to something that might be better. It is full of trials, in this sense meaning that you need to try things. Companies need to try people. You need to try jobs.

And if you've gotten into something and you ask yourself that famous question that I learned as a teenager from Brian Tracy that is still to this day is a core part of my philosophy, and you say, "Is there anything which, knowing what I know now, if I had the chance to do it over again, knowing what I know now, I would do differently," if the answer to that is yes, then you're doing it right.

If the answer to that is yes, then you make a plan to get out of it or get into it or do something different as quickly as you can in a reasonable way. So if you're six months into a job and you realize this job isn't the right fit for me and it's not going to be the right fit, then your A priority immediately becomes, "I must look for something that I think has a chance of being a better fit than this particular job," and then get busy about it and go make it happen as quickly as you can.

Because it would be a waste for you to spend an extra year at something you know is not going to go anywhere. It's bad for you. It's bad for your employee. Sorry, employer. It's bad for both of you. And so you owe it to yourself as soon as you realize this isn't the right fit for me.

You owe it to yourself to get after looking for the next opportunity. It's the only thing that makes sense. And I think that if it comes up, first, I don't think it's nearly as big of a deal as some people would think with the caveat that there may be industries where someone might say, "No, this is a big deal in our industry." Okay, listen to someone in the industry.

But I myself have zero problem saying, "I worked there for a year. I worked here for six months. It didn't work out. Here's why it didn't work out. I'm applying to your company because I think your company has this, this, this, and this that I'm really going to value.

That's why I'm here," and just simply treating it honestly and straightforwardly. I don't think we live in the world – the world in which that advice was so important was the world in which people went and took a job and had it for 40 years. That world is gone.

It doesn't exist. So you want to be careful, but I think it's more important that you recognize how precious time is and how precious your satisfaction with the fact that I'm in the right place for me to grow is. And then I think often there are creative ways where you can just gently massage the way that you speak about things in order to eliminate the downsides of the potential reputation of, "Oh, I was only there for five months." Awesome.

Thank you. Yes, basically all those thoughts were things that I was thinking and I didn't know if I was justified in those thoughts. I really appreciate your feedback. I think you spoke twice today about investing in yourself. When I was laid off, I paid $2,000 to join a course, and I learned about Salesforce, and I increased my income 50%.

For those that are looking to do that, that's one great opportunity that's out there. I really appreciate your advice. So make sure that while you're looking for a new opportunity, do it again. Just like you did it once, do it again. And here's where the details don't matter, but I think generally speaking, it'd be silly for you to walk in and quit tomorrow.

If you've got a job, keep the job and only get rid of that job when you can replace it with something better, with a better move. But use it as a chance to say, "Okay, here are the things that I didn't like about this job. Here's why it didn't fit me." And then I'm going to imagine a new plan where my next job is going to have all these things that I'm looking for and make 50% more money.

And then go and systematically interview for those options. And then if your employer wants to bid on your services again when you submit your notice, then you'll have much more leveraging power as well. So congratulations for you for reimagining your career. Peter, welcome to the show. How can I serve you today?

Hi Joshua. I was hoping you could give me some travel advice since you're a stage. I love it. Let's do it. All right. So we have a two and a half month old and in July, we want to fly to France. And we are wondering about two or three things in particular.

One is we're wondering about taking a shorter domestic plane trip before as a dry run, if that would be beneficial and where we should go. We're soliciting locales and distances from home. And then any particular pointers about actually being on the aircraft. I keep hearing all these different things from different people.

You know, have the kid on your lap, get an extra seat, get in business class, use the bathroom that the airline has. I'm curious what your experiences have been with kids that young. I listened to your shows from last summer, but your kids I think were a little bit older.

So I'm curious to hear your thoughts. You would be traveling from the United States to France and how long would you be going for? Yep. We live on the East Coast, so it's like a six or seven hour flight. Great. And how long will you be there? Two weeks.

Great. So to begin with, I think that especially for airplane travel, this is an ideal age to be traveling with a baby. So I think number one, once a baby is old enough, meaning a baby is medically stable after being born, you know, two weeks old, something like that.

One day old, two day old, you know, mama doesn't want to travel and baby doesn't want to travel. Once you get past a few weeks of being old where the baby is medically stable, mama is recovered from the birth, then and before the child starts crawling and moving, I think this is the perfect time to travel on an airplane.

It just really is. Obviously, there can still be challenges, but in my experience, it's one of the easiest times to travel and I wouldn't think twice about it. The times when airplane travel is difficult, is most difficult, is actually when the child is old enough to walk around and move around, because then you often have to try to figure out how do I keep the child in his or her seat, and yet is too young to actually be sensible, to break through.

So interestingly, when we went to France last summer, our flight from Miami to Paris was actually really tough, because my wife was sick, I had one sick child, and then my toddler was old enough to want to move around and yet young enough to not be sensible. So he woke up in the middle of the night and was just totally out of it, and you can't break through in that situation.

It's in a weird place, in a strange thing, and so I spent a good time with him, blankets over our heads, desperately trying to get him to quiet down. My wife was, in this context, useless, because she was sick, and so it was a pretty rough experience. But with a young baby, usually the young baby just doesn't really notice its surroundings, especially if it's just with mom or with dad, it's just totally content and can look around, etc.

And so, of course, baby might still be difficult. I think this is the perfect time to travel. The flight over, in addition, is pretty easy, right, because to go from the US to Europe is always, not always, but generally an overnight flight, and so you go at the time when the baby is going to sleep, and that works out really great.

The flight back is the more challenging one, where it basically turns into a long day, and the children are much less likely to sleep, because their cycles are not synced up with "this is not a time to sleep." And so that's the more challenging flight. And I think even with a baby that young, then even that is not such a big deal.

So no, I would have no problem going to France and back. I would not take a trip just to practice for it. I think that's a silly idea. If you want to go somewhere, take a trip. But I wouldn't take a trip to practice for it, because there's really nothing to practice for.

I'll give my advice on how to do it in a second, but there's nothing to practice for. And with a baby of that age, there's nothing to practice for. Most likely, you're going to have a great experience. If the baby's healthy and happy, mama's healthy and happy, then everything's going to go great.

If something goes wrong, you're just going to deal with it, and that's, you learn, "Okay, I've got to deal with it." And it's funny, this is hard for me. I don't like to disturb people. And so if a child starts crying, I'm the one who gets all freaked out and worked up about it, whereas my wife is like, "Relax, Joshua, babies cry.

They don't have any right to—" Of course, we want to keep the baby quiet, but they don't have any right to live in a world without children. So just relax. So if something goes wrong and your child starts crying or pitching a fit, that's life. And I'll say, as having been an airplane passenger around other families with children, on the one hand, no, it's not fun.

You don't necessarily want to be near a crying child. But on the other hand, this is a child, right? This is a life. This is a human being. And that human being is worthy of just as much respect as any other human being. And so if a child is—let's say that there's somebody who's mentally handicapped in some way and starts pitching a fit or doing something wacky, and it's not a fault of the person.

Our hearts are filled with compassion towards those people, and we want to reach out and we want to help them. We want them to be part of society, and we want to do everything we can to help them and to help those who are involved with them. Same thing with a child.

And so just know that even if your child does start crying, no, yeah, it's annoying. But at the end of the day, this is a human being who's worthy of respect. It's an image bearer of God. And just because the child is crying because it's having a hard time, one of the things that helped us, which may help you at this stage with a baby, is simply that children don't cry to give you a hard time, right?

They cry because they're having a hard time. And so when a child cries, it should fill your heart with compassion, and I think really does. So just recognize that I think the majority of people around you, if your child cries on an airplane, yeah, none of us want to listen to crying, but if that's the least of their trials for a day, it's a pretty good day.

It's a child who needs help, and there'll be a solution. So that said, it's traveling with children on an airplane is more complex. So I wouldn't take a trip to practice. I would just take the trip. And traveling to France and back with a baby that age, I think is perfectly fine.

So what are the easiest ways to do it? What are the things to look for? Number one, I think this is where baby wearing really shines. Do you or your wife have one of the baby wearing devices, and do you carry the child using that equipment? We have it.

We carry him around a little bit. Not a ton, but yeah, I'd say at least a little bit every day he's in it. But it's not like the primary mode of transport. Okay. So this is when you're on an airplane, this should be, and I think will be, your primary mode of transport.

So once you get out of infant stage, right, because you can't put the little baby infants into all the devices, there's special infant ones, but you're probably out of infant stage now. I would encourage you do that more. And if it's you or if it's your wife, just make sure that the baby is more accustomed to traveling in that device.

We use the Ergo brand of carriers. I like that because it doesn't put the stress on the child's hips. I think it's important with those carriers, what you want to watch out for is you don't want to use one where the child is front facing and dangling from its hips with its legs dangling.

That can lead to hip dysplasia and can damage the child if it's used a lot. You want to have one of the devices where the child's legs are supported. And so ideally the child should be facing your chest and his or her legs should be supported. And so we like the Ergo brand.

And for traveling, that's the best. Because you can put the child in the carrier and then you can be hands free to deal with suitcases, you can be hands free to navigate things, etc. And if the child gets used to it, which is where I would make sure that your baby is used to it, then it becomes a very comfortable spot for the child to say, "This is home." And so you can take, if the child is used to being worn on mama, then if he or she just needs some comfort, you can hand them to mama, she puts them on her chest, puts on the baby carrier, and she can be relaxed.

Doesn't have to deal with the child and he can just cuddle up and be content. And so that would be the first thing, is make sure you have one. And so that's your primary tool. Thing number two is you can travel with stuff. So the airlines will allow you to travel with stuff, you can ship strollers and car seats, etc.

But those things are a real hassle to deal with in the airport. And so at this point, with a good bit of experience, we minimize all that stuff as much as possible. We don't take a car seat. Some people, we've done it and I have found it to be useful, especially with a baby who's older.

So if you had a 10-month-old, someone who's walking, then in that case, having a car seat can actually be useful. It can be nice on the airplane because you can strap the child in and he's contained. Whereas holding a lap child who's 10 months old, he often wants to get down and run around.

But if your case with one under six months, I don't think there's any need to carry a car seat. And then, except for the destination. And honestly, it's worth just simply renting it or doing something like that so you don't have to schlep that thing through the airport. Strollers, I think, are also a real hassle.

I don't like strollers. There's some nice fancy ones, but they're almost always a hassle. And so if you get the child used to baby wearing, then it's just easier to deal with because you have less stuff and it leaves your hands free. The bassinet, I think, is ideal if your child is likely to lie down.

So they have the bassinets that you've seen. And if you can make one of those work, it's the best situation. Because you can take the infant in arms, no need to carry an extra seat, and use the airplane's bassinet, and you have a nice comfortable bed for the child.

If the child sleeps well at home, there's a good chance that he'll sleep well on the airplane. Beyond that, then it's just a matter of making sure that you have some special things to help if you have to entertain the child. And so figuring out what are a couple of special toys, a couple of special things that we can bring along that we know will be of interest to this particular baby, and can keep his interest for a while, then prepare a bag of that.

And then think ahead about any particular needs, all the stuff that you already know, right? If the baby needs bottles and all that stuff, deal with that. Breastfeeding, of course, makes everything easy. So other than that, it's pretty simple. I think traveling with a child of that age is no problem at all.

My least favorite age is anywhere from about one year to two years, because that is really challenging. And then once you get past two, where the child is more sensible, sentient, able to be interacted with, able to be entertained without constant shaking things and whatnot, then I think it becomes easier again.

So that's what I've heard from everybody. This is the great age to travel. And I've either run into people who haven't traveled at this age or tell me all sorts of crazy things. So I think your advice sounds very good. And I guess the only other thing, the time where usually the child will have trouble is always on the descent, right?

Because his ears start to hurt. And so try to plan, if at all possible, try to plan so that he's breastfeeding on the way down. Or I guess a bottle too, but some way to keep his mouth working. Because when the plane starts descending and the pressure changes, it's hard for him to get his ears cleared.

And with a child that young, you can't obviously give him gum or candy or anything that you use for an older child. And so just try to time his feeding schedule in such a way that he can be breastfeeding on the descent. And I think that's the best way to handle that.

Yeah, that piece of advice is universal. So we'll be sure to try to do that. It's pretty much new. It's one of those things where, just in summary, it's an acquired skill. You just figure out what works and what doesn't work. And it's just an acquired skill. And a lot of it, the nice thing about it is the whole world is full of babies.

And I think that even though, at least for me, I always felt self-conscious if my child was fussing or something like that. But I really believe it's true, and I always keep reminding myself that the vast majority of people around see a baby and they say, "Oh, what a beautiful baby!" And it's a beautiful way to start open things up.

Traveling with children is the best because it just gives you kind of immediate thing to talk about with people and break that barrier. And people love children. All around the world, everyone loves children. And so some people don't travel with children, but it's more work. You'll find that you and your wife's bags will be tiny, but you've got to bring so many changes of clothes for your baby that his bag is huge.

But it is totally fine. And I like it because while you do adjust your lifestyle to meet the needs of your child, I don't like how some people have this sense that, "Oh, my child is born. I can't live anymore." I think that's silly. So congratulations on the birth of your baby, and I look forward to hearing about your wonderful trip.

Thank you. You will. And for our final call, we go to Eric. Eric, welcome to the show. How can I serve you today? Hey, so I have a quick question. I was looking at a company called Unchained. I heard about them on the Survival Podcast. I also heard you on the Survival Podcast, and that's how I got switched on to your show.

Essentially what this is, is I have a old 401(k) from a previous employer. And what you can do with Unchained is roll it into, I believe, an IRL with them. And they turn around and they purchase Bitcoin using that. And you store it on two hardware wallets of your own, and they have a third wallet.

So it's a multi-sig wallet setup. I really like the idea of it simply because I can take my old traditional 401(k), my employer 401(k), and convert it into Bitcoin that I can hold. And they do all of the custodianship of making sure that everything is IRS A-OK. And I also really like the aspect of, since it's a multi-sig wallet setup, two of three keys need to be used to access the funds.

They maintain one key, and you maintain the other two. So you have full access to the funds no matter what. And they use their key for either as an emergency one in case one of your keys goes missing or breaks. So basically you have full access to the funds.

They can't just be told, "Hey, turn over the Bitcoin right now," as if it were in an exchange or something like that. Anyways, all that being said, that's a really long, windy way of saying, do you have any thoughts on that? Or how does that sound to you? I'm not familiar with that company.

I've just pulled up their website while you're talking about. I am familiar with the technology of multi-sig, and I think that it's probably fine. I'm not concerned about the security of the Bitcoin. My question goes back to, is this really what I want my IRA money in? And you can argue it in multiple ways, but I'm...

It's the same problem I have with investing gold in an IRA. It's not that there's anything wrong with it. It's not illegal. But is this the best thing to be doing? So tell me a little bit about your... And I'll explain more in a moment. Tell me first a little bit more about your financial situation in general.

How much money do you earn? What kind of assets do you hold? How much is in your IRA, etc.? Sure. So breaking it down, I'd say, let's see, I make probably around $350,000 a year. I put 20% of that away a year. My employer matches with their own employer Roth 6%.

And this is, you know, this old IRA that I have, or this old employee, employer 401k is not like, I think it's probably around $40,000-ish. So it's not, you know, a ton compared to what's in my current one, which I believe is $250,000-$300,000 right now. So that's basically what my financial situation looks like without any of the side income or side work that I do.

Do you have other Bitcoin owned outside of an IRA? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Are you willing to say or give me some indication of how much? It's definitely a decent chunk that I got from very early on. So, yeah, I mean, it's a good chunk, but it's not, you know, it's not like, hey, I can, you know, I'm going to retire tomorrow and be completely financially independent.

Good enough, good enough. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, and if you invest this old 401k into Bitcoin using the unchained setup, would you continue to keep your current 401k invested in a more traditional manner? Yep. Yeah, absolutely. And so that's kind of why I was thinking about it in this way is that I was going to roll that account over into my current employer 401k.

And then I just saw this option pop up and I was like, well, you know, you know, basically my thought was, what the heck? If I can use this to, you know, get a Bitcoin that, you know, like just to me, it seemed like a decent option for something that wasn't, you know, my main nest egg of 401k or, you know, retirement savings.

Right. All right. Now that you have laid out your situation, I think this is fine. I think you can do it. I think this would be fine. I don't have any personal knowledge of unchained capital as long as I'm aware of the technology, as long as you're satisfied with your due diligence, I think this would be fine.

Let me tell you how I've gotten there just for what it's worth or for anybody else listening. First, Bitcoin and gold, they feel wrong to me when they're put in an IRA or a 401k. Again, you can legally hold them there and you can make good arguments to hold them there because the tax deferral and or the tax advantage nature of it is very useful.

The problem that I have with doing that in general is first, they're not tried and true investments for something like retirement, which is the spirit of a retirement account. I don't think gold is a great retirement investment. I don't know that Bitcoin is a great retirement investment, although it has more demand currently than gold does.

Companies and ownership of companies, fractional ownership in companies works because it's predicated upon understandable, consistent growth of businesses, increasing profits, future cash flows, proper management, etc. Those investments have good long-term track records of strong growth while simultaneously having a value proposition that makes it very reasonable that 50 years from now, they'll be just as relevant as they are today.

I'm bullish on Bitcoin and I'm bullish on gold. Not a trading commentary, just in the sense that I think they're both useful. But the world of 50 years from now is a lot harder to see than the traditional customary thing of a business. When we're talking about retirement investing, you want to have your money be there.

Yes, it would be wonderful if it grows a thousandfold because Bitcoin becomes the world's greatest thing, but you're looking for a good amount of safety and a good amount of growth. That's why stocks and mutual funds fit that. You're not looking for massive risk, generally speaking, with your life savings.

The other reason is that those assets have certain benefits that stocks don't have. For example, private ownership. Somebody goes and buys a bunch of gold and puts it in an IRA, I look at it and say, "Go buy the gold, but don't put it in an IRA. Put it in your basement." Same thing with Bitcoin.

I look at it and say, "Don't buy the Bitcoin in your IRA. Go and buy the Bitcoin privately and own it privately and have yourself some secret Bitcoin that has just as much growth potential as does the non-secret Bitcoin, but has a world of other potential benefits." That's the other way.

So you have Bitcoin that is owned in other ways and you also are not pledging the bulk of your retirement assets to it. And so I'm comfortable with that. In that context, if you want to say, "I'd like to own another Bitcoin here," you have plenty of income, so this amount of money is really meaningless in terms of a risk profile standpoint.

You can replace this amount of money in a month of work. So it really is meaningless in terms of your risk profile overall. And I think it would be a cool thing to do because it's a cool play that, "Hey, if Bitcoin goes to the moon, then I have some nice tax-advantaged Bitcoin here that is owned in this retirement account and depending on what happens with laws in the coming years, that could be a really cool move." So the facts of what you've presented to me make me very comfortable with this decision.

I just needed to be sure before I said yes, and that's what I'm looking for. Yeah, sweet. That was basically the same trail of logic that I went down. It's not my main nest egg. It's not all that. I do plenty of mining of other cryptos and Bitcoin and all that stuff on the side.

So as far as having the private stash, having the stash that's mined and squirreled away in the basement, so to say, I'm more than comfortable holding and doing all my self-custody of all that stuff and keeping that separate than this other retirement account. Yeah, and I think what you're not saying but is important is that you also have some other savings that are not in Bitcoin or other currencies.

Yes, absolutely, yeah. Because while I'm not an anti-crypto guy, the reality is we want to make sure that we're smart and we want to make sure that we're not wiped out. And the money that's in your 401(k) is your ultimate backup fund. And so meaning that you will for the rest of your life be financially independent because of the fact that you have hundreds of thousands of US dollar tokens that are held in a bankruptcy-proof, creditor-protected-proof account.

And so having those hundreds of thousands of dollars of US dollar tokens that are currently in very high demand is a really, really important position to be in because it makes you bulletproof from any kind of risk that faces you. And so the rest of your life you will be financially independent because of that.

And so I don't want to give that up. I don't want you to ever give that up. And so having all of your assets in any one thing, no matter how good that one thing is, is dumb. And so having this as viewing your current 401(k) as your backup fund, your financial independence fund, that thing that keeps you free and able to make any choice in the world for the rest of your life while you build your fortune over here with the computer coins, that is smart.

But don't go all in on the new stuff. Keep a foot in the old world so that you – and make sure you have a big enough foot in the new world to be really rich in the new world while keeping enough of a foot in the old world to where you're not exposed where you run the risk of losing your financial independence because that sucks.

Yeah, no, absolutely. That's the perfect way of putting it and that's pretty much exactly how I'd split it out. So yeah, no, I appreciate it because sometimes in my mind I'm like, "Let's just go all in," and I'm like, "No, that's a terrible idea. You have a one-year-old and a four-year-old.

You shouldn't do that." That freedom that you have from having plenty of money in reserve and high income, etc., is – it's freedom. And so you want to make sure you have enough in the investments that may go big time to feel good about them, but don't give up that freedom.

That's why you worked really hard to get there. Yep, awesome. Well, thank you. And also I want to plus one the ergo. We use the ergo with our kids and it's absolutely awesome. 100%. It is great. The only problem that my wife and I have is I'm so much larger than she.

We always had to have two of them. And so we used to have two of them. We had a big one and I would do it, but finally I was like, "Listen, you wear the babies. I'll deal with the rest of it," but I'm not wearing babies anymore. So we got rid of the big one that had me and I haven't worn a baby in years.

But they are wonderful for her. So I thank you for the endorsement. And with that, let me think of if I have any closing announcements here as we go. Great show. And by the way, thank you, Eric, for hanging on so long. If you'd like to join me on next week's Friday Q&A show, do that by going to patreon.com/findradicalpersonalfinance.

Support the show there and that will gain you access to the call-in info. And I hope you have a wonderful week. With the Planet Fitness Black Card, you don't just get a great workout. You get a great perk out because your membership is packed with perks. For zero enrollment and $24.99 a month, you'll get perks like access to any of our 24/7 clean and spacious locations.

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