Video Library
Browse through and enjoy our collection of videos containing valuable wealth management information. We look forward to answering more of your questions and offering our years of experience to help improve your financial freedom and plan for your future.
Get to Know Casey Wealth Management
I come from a group of people that have come from blue collar families, worked very, very hard for what we have. We’re taught the value of a dollar. We’re taught the value of working hard. And I believe, in essence, the thing that I can say that probably best describes us as candor and honesty.
I think ultimately what sets us apart is the fact that we are independent. We are small, we are more of a boutique firm. And the fact that we work with people that are usually self made, people that have worked hard for their money and appreciate the value of good service.
Independent means that we’re non Wall Street. We’re non captive. We’re not in a position where we have to go ahead and have to sell a quota of proprietary investments, if you will. We’re able to do what we believe is best for our clients, not what’s best for the firm. Having had many years of experience with the Wall Street firm, we realized that we learned a lot about what not to do, not what to do.
We come in where we listen, we take a look to see what’s working and what’s not, and then we come back to you with a very solid, understandable, boiled down version of what we recommend.
The first step in our process is there’s no paperwork exchange. There’s none of that. It’s 30 minutes to 45 minutes meeting of getting to know one of them.
The second step in the process is the discovery process, where we’re in a position where the rubber hits the road that we now start going over. “Hey, what are you doing?” Let’s take a look to see what’s on that last latest statement, if you will.
The third step in the process is to be able to go ahead and present our findings, is to be able to sit down and say, this is what we come up with. These are your strengths. These are your weaknesses. This is how you’re being charged. We think that this makes a lot of sense, retain this we don’t think makes a lot of sense. It’s what we look to do to replace.
And then the last step is implementation on our strategy, investment, financial advice. It runs the gamut. It’s not just about what stock to buy or what fund to sell.
It’s about how am I managing my overall life’s affairs. And from our standpoint, we’re very much adamant about we realize that if we can help them and it may not necessarily be through our firm and what we offer, we think that we’ve done a good service for that person.
The end goal for us when it comes to the client is that they walk away from our office knowing and feeling like they’ve been treated fairly, that they are treated as they are treated with the respect that they deserve. They’re being treated by professionals that are honoring their commitment. In essence, there is probably no better way of us learning how we’ve done for a client. Until we start seeing them, referring friends and family.
And that to us. That’s really what our business is. Really built upon. It’s built upon friends and family. Contact Us today for more information.
Blueprinting From a Financial Planning Perspective
The blueprint. It’s the initial phase where you figure out plans, costs, materials, building codes, time frames, etc. And your initial financial planning phase is just as vital. The more information and insight I provided, the better.
And through our observation, review and consultation, we’ll be able to determine what we have to work with and what is needed to be able to successfully do the job right.
This is also where the drawing board aspects of the plan are reviewed, namely quality, purpose, costs. And it’s also here where any related risks are uncovered.
The Foundation. Just like a home, everything is built upon it and it’s definitely the most important part. It’s no different when building a financial plan, everything rests on this platform as well.
You must address needs versus wants, the realities of expectations, what gets invested in and why can it be supported, can it be sustained and working with a proven formula like our GAP analysis for future success and direction?
The Framing. Just like a home, this is where your living area takes shape. And just like a financial plan, this is where the proposal and functionality come together. This is also where the financial strategies come together and this is where the planning is now personalized and the purposes are identified simply. This is where the living and expected performances are placed into action.
The Roof. In building, the roof caps everything off. It provides protection and comfort for everyone inside. In direct comparison, this is what we called planning for the what-ifs what good is it for a financial plan to be brought together without a protection plan as well? As we are all aware, life is predictably unpredictable, so planning for potential risks is a vital element.
The Finished Project. In home building, there’s nothing more beautiful than the site out of a newly completed home. As it relates to setting a personalized and functional financial plan in place, there is nothing more comforting or satisfying and the peace of mind that is achieved is second to none.
S&P 500 | Navigating Uncharted Waters in the Stock Market
You when you look at today’s markets, I don’t think you can actually get a proper grasp of today’s markets until you look at markets of yesteryear.
There are statistics that go back since 1929 that have been kept since 1929. And it talks about both Bull Market cycles, Bear Market cycles, average losses in Bear Markets and time of recovery. So the average Bull Market cycle since 1929 has been 3.6 years. The average Bear Market cycle is in the range of ten to twelve months.
So through those Bear Market cycles, there’s typically a downsizing of the market paring down the market anywhere between 35% 40% to the negative. Same thing is looking at the recovery, it’s a typical since 1929.
Again, statistics show that the typical recovery is anywhere between 3.2 to 3.3 years to recover, to break even, if you will, before it starts making new highs. So to that same point, what we’re really trying to allude to is these markets today are nothing like the markets of yesteryear. And we believe that the markets of yesteryear, really pretty much stopped back in that area of anywhere between ’02 & ’03, where all of a sudden now you see there was typicalness, and then all of a sudden you’ve had spans of length of long Bear Market.
Then all of a sudden you saw the Great Recession. Then all of a sudden the Great Recession trough, all of a sudden now you saw nearly 500, if not over 500%, swing to the upside. The issue to that is what we have found is that that is not a clear indication of historical market performance. What it is more of an indication on it’s more of an indication of the Fed, the Fed’s interaction in the markets. The Fed printing more and more and more money, which then props everything up.
But then the problem with propping it up is it elevates the price. It doesn’t just elevate the price of consumables, you know, fuel, food, energy doesn’t just do that, but it also props up the stock market. It props up the stock market prices.
So the concern that we have is that if you look at this particular chart that we supplied is just take a look at the last three declines. They’re very sharp.
You’ve had a negative 49% between 2000 and 2002. You had a negative 57% experience on the SP 500 between seven and nine. And then you had a negative 34% experience over the course of the matter of a month and a half, two months back in March of 2020, with the overall pandemic, the Covid 19 pandemic scare that we all went through, why is that a concern?
The concern is that it couples with how quick those recoveries are. The recoveries are, again very indicative of the Federal Reserve in introducing and inducing a ton of printed money back into the system to help prop up the overall stock market itself.
Why am I bringing this up? Why is it relevant? Because there is going to come a time where the Fed is going to run out of bullets and they’re not going to be able to prop up the market any longer. So then when that market goes into a free fall, the question will be how far would that free fall go? Take a look just take a look at the Covid scare again back in March of 2020, if the Federal Reserve did not put nearly $6 trillion in printed money in the form of stimulus back into the market, how bad would that free fall event?
So the main concerns that we have with people who are going into retirement or are retired is this number one, is how much can you afford to lose?
Number two, what would a significant loss due to your overall retirement plan?
Number three, what if all of a sudden market goes in the situation goes into a negative run and you have to start taking money out in an emergency type of a scenario?
So ultimately what we’re just simply saying is they got to have it is a must. You have to have a personalized plan, a personalized risk tolerance type of a plan. Because if you don’t, I’m sorry to say this, there’s going to come a day where it will be too late because this market cannot continue to run forever like it has been and even into the future.
We have to make sure that you have an exit plan and exit strategy in place. Schedule your appointment today.
Word of Advice, Do Not Panic Sell
Hi, my name is Wayne Casey with Casey Wealth Management. During these unprecedented times and severe market volatility associated, we are receiving one question time and time again. Should I sell my investments?
Number one, do not sell in a panic. Two, identify your personal risk tolerance. Number three, have a personalized financial plan in place.
So in light of the unfortunate current situation we’re all contending with, we’re offering a complimentary portfolio review and personalized risk assessment.
For more information, please browse through our website, caseywealth.com.
Wayne’s Words of Wisdom – Treat People the Way You Want to Be Treated.
Here’s what I want to share with you. We had a bit of a scare with my father, who went to the hospital… now he’s in a rehab facility. But during that time, I spent a lot of time with my mom because I wanted to make sure she was okay. If we went up to the hospital, I took her up there… but I shared this with my mom the other day.
I go, “you know, mom, we’re never prepared to lose anyone. We don’t want to lose anyone, right? That’s just the reality of life”. I said. But when we were looking at dad, and he wasn’t well, I thought, I have to accept that there will come a time. But what I also realized was I felt no guilt. I felt no feeling of, “I could have done more –– I should have done more”.
When my brother went to be with the Lord when I was 19, that slapped the rose-colored glasses off my face, and I’ve never ignored that feeling. I’ve never ignored it, because it was the worst feeling I could have ever had in my life.
But it was probably the most pivotal time of my life because I saw how fragile life was, and I realized, man, you can’t mess around with this. There’s no messing around with say it now, say it now, say it loud, say it clear. And I want to live my life that way and no fooling around, no stammering.
Just treat people the way you want to be treated, right? I think that’s the essence of life.
And I think that’s what’s really missing today is that people are trying to be what they’re not. Envy has become the new, “I’ve got 100-foot yacht”, well,”I’ve got 125-foot yacht”, well, God, “I’ve got one in the shipyard”!!!
It’s going to be 200-foot who bleep and cares because of your selfishness. If you took some of the good that you’ve been blessed with and you actually went ahead and bestowed that upon other people, whether it be in the form of just helping them or creating opportunities, creating jobs, and the like, you realize the world will be a much better place that they’re not worried about because they’re only worried about their own. It’s the accumulation type scenario.
I met a guy years ago who was a multi-hundred millionaire PLUS, but he had friends who were billionaires, so in his eyes, he was inadequate. I’m thinking when is enough, enough.
Wayne’s Words of Wisdom – Planning For Life After Death
I can’t begin to tell you a number of times that I’ve had, mainly husbands, sit back and say, “Hey, if anything ever happened to me, please take care of my wife. Please make sure you’re there for my wife”…
And I can tell you right now it’s not a thing that I enjoy doing because we’re saying goodbye to somebody. But it’s the most honorable and probably the most respectful thing – that you’re backing up what your commitment was. Because that person said, hey, I know I’m not going to be here forever.
Maybe I’m in ill health. I’m much older, older than my wife, whatever. And our job is to make sure that we honor what that person had asked.
If you want to make sure your loved one(s) are taken care of, contact us today.
Please send us an email to [email protected], Call 708-633-8200 or visit our offices at 15614 S Harlem, Ave Suite E in Orland Park, Illinois.
Professional Financial Expertise for Hardworking Individuals
I’d like to take time to say thank you very much for checking out our website.
Again, under these unfortunate, unprecedented times we are currently contending with, we felt it necessary to make sure that we got our message out and got our professional expertise in front of all of you.
A majority of our clients are hardworking people like yourselves. We’ve been servicing this particular community for well over 20 years, and we felt it very much an obligation to let all of you know that we are around and that our offer was here for you.
Why are we doing this?
We’re doing this because we believe that we have a professional and moral obligation to be able to get in front of you all, to be able to give you real information.
Investing is emotional. Over the past eleven years, we’ve seen this very, very large Bull market run. People have made a lot of money. The problem is that what comes along with investing is also risk.
We knew something was coming, did not know, quite obviously it would be something as this, like this COVID-19 outbreak. But we did know that there was going to be a time of reckoning, if you will.
Here’s the issue. When times are good, people do not identify, do not assess, do not understand their overall portfolio risk.
When times get tough, like we’re currently in, far too many people resort to knee jerk reactions, panic selling. Oh, my goodness, the sky is falling. This is all the more reason why you have to have a personalized investment plan in place and something that is adhered to and something that is monitored.
That’s why we’re offering what we’re offering. There’s no strings attached to what we’re providing.
We just think it’s very, very important to be able to give back our personal and professional expertise, and hopefully we’re able to go ahead and help provide a little bit of light to your path. Thank you very much.
The Bridge of Key Ages
Why is 63 and a half such an important age when it comes to retirement planning? We have found that we have had success for our clients and with our clients by recommending that they take out Cobra, which is 18 months worth of health care coverage that will lead them into their age of 65, which then makes them eligible for Medicare coverage. Both much more affordable plans and much, much more comprehensive plans than they would find in the private marketplace. We think this is an important item to help people be able to succeed and get to retirement sooner than they thought. I think you should take it serious and look into it with us.
Why is 65 such an important age when it comes to retirement and retirement planning? First, 65 is when you’re eligible for Medicare, which typically is a much, much more affordable and comprehensive plan than you typically get in the private marketplace. Secondly, it also incorporates and could be integrated very well into a comprehensive financial plan with the hopes and potential to be able to help you retire earlier than you may have thought.
Why is 76.1 a key age when it comes to retirement and financial planning? Currently in the United States, the average American male has a life expectancy of 76.1 years. We think it’s very important that this is to be considered when putting together a financial plan. We think it’s important and so should you.
Why is 81.1 a key age when it comes to retirement? Today, the average American female has a life expectancy of 81.1 years currently. We think it’s very important to consider these ages when we build a financial plan for our clients, and we think you should consider this as is an important step and piece of information when you build your financial plan as well.
Schedule your appointment today by calling 708-633-8200 or Contact us here.
You’re Not Just Another Account Number
It’s been said. That people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. The one thing we know is at the large corporate financial firm, you’re just another account number. You worked hard to get where you are.
At Casey Wealth Management, you are not just an account number or file folder. You are a person who matters. And we care enough to see beyond a folder full of statements. We see the struggles. We see the fun. We see the sacrifices. We see the growth. We see the worry. We see the new beginnings. We see the devotion. We see the joys. We see the heartaches. And we see the time spent on it all.
We see the life that you’ve worked so hard to create. The life that we work so hard to produce.
At Casey Wealth Management, you are not just an account number. You are a person who matters.
The Casey Wealth Origin Story –
We’re We Come From, And Why It Matters
Hey, how are you doing? My name is Wayne Casey. I’m the founder of Casey Wealth Management. We’re celebrating going into our 25th year of being in business, something we’re very, very proud of. We have a motto around here that just simply States where we’re from them and why it matters.
Why don’t you come along and see why it matters and who we are as people come along. (Music Playing)
I’m going to show you the corner. The corner where I had to make a career decision. I got down here early. I was working for CIBC Oppenheimer at the time. I got down here early. I went to Church. I came up to the corner up here, and I just had to make a decision. Do I go this way or do I stay here? I’ll never forget that.
Yeah, it’s funny, man. I was on the, what was that on here? 26th floor. This is where I learned not to do things in this business.
You know what you realize? I hate to say it. It was not about people. It was about money and how you’re going to make money.
You get into a business. You’re here to care about people and their money and their well being. And I was told by a guy, he goes, “you’ll never make it in this business”. I’ll never forget it. I was told, I’ll never make it in this business.
I didn’t have what it took. And I think now he’s out, like selling used cars. This was an interesting place because you came to realize that it didn’t take an awful lot of talent. It all came down to the almighty dollar.
So here’s the L train here. So this would have been where my grandma used to take the bus, the CTA bus to the L to take her to Montgomery Wards. Every day, six days a week. She went down there.
That’s where the trucks used to come in and out. And that’s why I got them walled off. So it’s just all these big, long trucks anymore. But, yeah, guys, I spent a lot of time here myself. And more importantly, my father 46 years. Think about it.
What was probably most important that I found was the fact that I got a chance to get to know my dad. And I got a chance to understand what it took for us to be able to have food on our table and clothes on our back because he came here every day and busted his butt. So my inspiration, one of my biggest family motivator inspirations, is my dad. So, yeah, dad, you did a lot of good things for us here.
Your life is about ready to change. This is Fat Johnny’s. This is where we are allowed to come here with a dollar in our hand if we finished up our chores around the house on a weekend. And you come up here and you get yourself a hot dog and something to drink and you were in hot dog heaven.
This is always fun to come to.
The original San Rita. So the original building was right here. Do you see the monastery so that was the monastery when I was here.
Wow. It’s amazing. It’s amazing to come back because now it’s all changed. So all my high school was right here. This was a brick football Stadium right here.
We have classrooms underneath. If you watch the movie Rudy, you’ll see the original high school.
Okay, so we’re at a corner house up here. So this is where I spent most of my time.
Nice place to listen. Now this would be where I started my entrepreneurial spirits where I deliver newspapers. Now that’s back in the day when you collected. So you delivered in the morning and you harass people at night saying, hey, you owe me $5.35. This is a cool place.Cool place to spend time.
Yeah, you have a lot of clients in these areas here. It’s got the suburban part but it’s also got city way about it.
This was my first office when I left downtown. It might have been 400 square feet with a bathroom.
Then I started the office where we are.
So how did everybody enjoy that trip? I gave you an opportunity to see where I’m from and why it matters. I’m sure quite a few different sites you all can relate to. Why don’t you come on in and let’s hear your story.
Visit our offices at 15614 S Harlem, Ave Suite E in Orland Park, Illinois. Schedule your appointment today by calling 708-633-8200 or contact us here.
FAQ #1: Who We Work With and Why?
I discovered a long time ago that when I sat back and I saw working class people like my mom and my dad, I realized that the overall environment of investing had changed and it became a situation situation where people, companies were getting further and further away from pensions. So all of a sudden now it became a situation where people now had to do the responsible for their own, whether it be through 401K, building an IRA and the like.
But what I realize is with those people is they did not have the time to become more, I guess, acclimated to the overall investment world. So ultimately, many of these people were busy with family functions, going to work, working overtime, working Saturdays. And by the time they’re ready to go ahead and retire, they realize, Holy cow, I’m just not prepared.
That’s where I believe I came in. And this is where our business came from. It came from a situation. It was really, in essence, hatched. The idea was hatched, that where there wasn’t much advice and much assistance. This is where I believed that there was a space, that there was an opportunity for me to build a business around helping people, people that I often like to simply call alarm clock totalers, right?
You set an alarm at night and you shut it off in the morning and you go off to do your life’s work. We work with firemen, we work with policemen, we work with teachers, we work with pharmacists, we work with small business owners, a myriad of people. And ultimately, again, go back to it is the fact that the satisfaction I get out of that is just simply being in a place where you get people into those AHA moments where they sit back and say, hey, you know what?
I’m smart enough to know I’m not that smart. I’m going to turn it over to someone that relates to me and that understands me and appreciates what it took for me to get to where I’m at today.
FAQ #2: What is Our Process?
The bottom line comes down to, I’ve always said, is that if you really should try the pants on before you leave the store, right. You’re lucky if they’re too loose or you’re very upset and surprised when they’re too tight.
But I think what happens is in today’s society is that everything is how easy we can make it. So everything becomes very canned, everything becomes very homogenized. One person all of a sudden equates to a whole group of people. So one size fits all.
Whereas with us, we’re customized, we’re personalized, we’re individualized, and we do that for a reason.
We do it because, number one, it’s the right thing to do. Number two, we do it because it’s the respectful thing to do.
You spent 40 plus years of your life working for what you have. So all of a sudden now you’re going to turn it over to an adviser who doesn’t really know you, doesn’t really know how you tick.
Our job is to be able to understand your risk tolerance and true risk tolerance. We need to understand what your goals, what your dreams, what your wishes are, how you want things handled in the points in cases of emergency and the like. That’s in essence our process.
We get to know you first before we ever take one dollars of yours and go ahead and invest it on your behalf.
FAQ #3: What’s Our Goal for Our Clients?
You cannot expect to have success if you’re working with a self absorbed, selfish person. This is a team effort. We know we’ve done well when we look at our client base and realize the length of time, the longevity of the relationships that we have, and the reason why those relationships have had the opportunity to take root and grow is because we’ve taken the time to get to know these people. We get a chance to know what they like, what they don’t like, what their favorite restaurants are, where they grew up, where they went to high school.
So for us, our goal for our clients is to be able to help them get to a point where they can safely and assuredly feel good about, hey, I can now make that. I can take that next step and go to retirement. There’s nothing better than looking at a husband and wife, a team. And you look at them and they introduce, they bring you in as part of their team, and you can actually celebrate together. And you look at them, sit back and say, “you know what, Hun? You know what? We did a really good job. We’ve done a lot of good things here and now.”
We can now entrust somebody such as us, such as myself, to be able to go ahead and carry them to and through retirement.
FAQ #4: What’s Our Business Philosophy?
Our business philosophy is first and foremost, it’s people first. You have to be able to go ahead and personalize what a person has done to get themselves to this point. Accumulate what they have, what they’ve gone through, the pains, the sacrifice, the struggles, the successes, the growth and the like. It’s very important to us to be in a situation where we also go ahead and we separate needs and wants.
See, when everything becomes one size fits all, you miss things. Our philosophy is we’re going to work off of the needs, then get to the wants. Because today’s modern financials, if you will, the way in which people manage money, it’s all based upon the lure. It’s all based upon, oh, look at the growth. Look at all these opportunities. Well, here’s the problem is that what happens when the sun no longer shines, when the markets do crumble. I’ve been in this business for a quarter century, and I have seen bear markets. I have seen the nastiness of a tech boom tech bus. I’ve seen the ramifications of a 9/11, and I’ve seen the ramifications of the great financial recession.
This is our job. Our job is that we are getting you prepared for choppy waters. We’re getting you prepared to be able to not only again, retire because anyone can. It’s staying retired is where the challenge is. One of the other things, too, as being very much systematic and structured. In our approach, we know what works. We understand what we put in front of our clients.
Number one, we will own them ourselves, which makes us non-hypocritical. And number two, we also believe very much in being very systematic, that the problem is that if all you’re going to get is a person agreeing, hey, no problem, hey, no problem. Well, eventually what happens when there is a problem, right? And then you look at life and you sit back and say, people do not understand. They don’t focus on what risk really is. We’re not people first, but we’re also risk first when it comes to your investments. That’s why it leads us back to doing what we have to do to make sure we take care of your needs and then the wants will take care of themselves.
FAQ #5: What is Risk?
Well, I think that a lot of people do not they do not get their arms around or put their arms fully around risk and the consequences of risk, how much exposure to risk that they have? I often will help people challenge people. Just take a ride up and down Main Street, USA, you see an exorbitant number of assisted living, nursing home type of facilities being built. Why are they being built? Because people are going into them. And at the clips of three, four, $500 a day, that’s where risk comes in. Or they look at their portfolio and say, “Geez, look at how nice it is. It’s just climbing so nicely.” And then they get lulled by that. Well, you have to understand that eventually, as I said before, the sun will stop shining. And when it stops shining, that will only then you’ll be able to recognize how well or how well your portfolio isn’t also being positioned.
Another thing is that a lot of people cannot afford the amount of risk that they’re taking on. If you don’t have a pension and you’re truly living off of your 401K proceeds, what happens if all of a sudden you have another market occurrence like we have between October of ’07 through March of ’09, when the SP 500 dropped over 57%, what are you going to do? What’s going to happen? Oh, that’s why I have diversified. I’m poor. Whatever, you lose 30%. What are you going to do if an emergency comes up in your life? What are you going to do?
So that’s the thing for us is that we take a very deep dive into risk first. We never will deviate from that. And that has also led to us having clients that have had very solid tenure, have had longevity where they’ve been able to go ahead, work with us at 60, and maybe they passed away at 85, but we’ve had 25 years of working with them and their money lasted.
So we know if you control the risk, you isolate the risk, you will have a much, much better opportunity to have longevity.
FAQ #6: How Do I Prevent Running Out of Money?
If you look at the biggest fear that people have going into retirement is they’re definitely afraid of running out of money. What that leads to is that there’s an interruption to the retirement income source, their retirement income streams, if you will. And the biggest thing that we come across is that if we don’t set false expectations, if we’re in line with what we know, this person A, can handle, B, the amount of money can handle and see where the markets are at that given time, we’re able to help these People have longevity. Now, we’re never going to sit over here and promise you a Rose Garden.
I think that is wrong. It’s done a lot in this industry. And people, the common person, the working class person, I hate to say it sometimes don’t know enough that they fall for it. And when they fall for it, next thing you know, they’re in a situation, and I’ve seen this, I’ve seen the ramifications after a bad market. And people come into us and they’ve had nothing but devastation. And they’re looking at you saying, “hey, how can we help you?” Or how can you help us, I should say. And sometimes it’s very, very difficult to have this conversation. But in a lot of ways, there’s a lot of ways we can’t help them. Because from the very beginning, they went ahead and bit off more than they could chew, and they didn’t realize it.
They got lulled to sleep based upon good returns, good statements, their advisors saying, oh, yeah, don’t worry about it. Everything’s going to be fine. And here’s the problem. What happens when life hits them, whether it be a bad market event or not. What if there’s an emergency? You need money. You need more money than you typically are taking out. This is something that we’re always very much focused on. I go back to it.
We’ve been doing this a long time, and we work off of a real life type of a guideline. We don’t sit around here and try to play pie in the sky like a lot of these large firms or even some of these other firms out there try to do or do, do.
FAQ #7: How Can I Prepare for Future Medical Costs?
Well, when you look at medical costs, the number one reason why retirees go broke is due to medical costs. Medical costs typically are going to be in the framework in the form of a long term care stent. This is a question that we ask.
We ask, do you have 80 plus thousand dollars per year laying around sitting idle that you can go ahead and you can utilize to go ahead and pay for such things as long term care? And unequivocally, consistently, people will sit back and say, “oh, no, I don’t have that kind of money!” And we say, of course you don’t. So the bottom line comes down to is we ask the question, if in fact this happened, what would you do? And they have not an answer or they have a blank stare.
Blank stare is going to be very consistent with, well, hey, maybe I can avoid this. And here’s the thing, we hope you can too. Just because you have homeowners insurance or just because you have auto insurance doesn’t mean all of a sudden you’re not going to face a home fire or a car wreck. You have it to be able to protect yourself. And that’s exactly what we say to people all the time is that unfortunately working class people are not going to be able to self insure like the very uber-wealthy. And then on the other side of it, they’re in a position where the others who can afford it, but they have nothing to lose. Okay, you are right there, pardon my French, in the sweet spot.
One of the things that we have found that is probably one of the most disturbing yet is life consistent is the loss of a spouse or threat of the loss of a spouse. One of the big scenarios that we come across is that if the person passes away, husband wife passes away, you’re going to lose an income stream. Right. Whether it be Social Security, could be an adjustment on pension. But one of the other things is that you also lose a financial partner, a person that you’re able to go ahead and make decisions with. The worst case scenario is when the dominant spouse predeceases, because now the surviving spouse is left like a deer in the headlights.
The most vulnerable of any person that I’ve ever witnessed is a person who has lost a spouse that did handle all the financial transactions. And now the question comes down to is now what do they do? Who do they trust? Who can they go to? So our bottom line comes down to people is making sure that they understand that the best way to live is have a plan for the inevitable.
FAQ #8: What are low-interest bearing accounts?
For the last 13 years, we have all been struggling with low record, low interest rates, which then means that the person who has money in their “safe account” is absolutely hemorrhaging money, and they don’t realize it.
To give you an example:
The national average right now for money markets is 0.6%. So if I had $100,000 invested after 365 days, I would have made a grand amount of $60. Then you couple that with inflation.
Now what? So what we’re. Trying to say to people. Is that there are alternatives, but you have to be able to build these alternatives into your overall financial plan. But Furthermore, one thing that they also have to understand is that these same banks that are offering these absolutely atrocious interest rates to their customers, they’re all posting record profits.
So what does that say? They’re not sharing it with the customer. They’re keeping it for themselves, and they’re investing it. They’re lending it. So they’re making the spread on the money you deposited.
FAQ #9: What if I have no pension or retirement income?
When you look at today’s day and age, when it comes to monies, when it comes to retirement,
comes to retirement income, and the like, things have changed for those who are now approaching retirement versus those maybe who would have been twenty / thirty years in front of them or as it relates to government workers now because they receive a guaranteed pension, people today do not have those guaranteed pensions. Most people don’t.
Statistics show that less than nine percent of the American workforce has a pension. So now, what’s a pension? Guaranteed money, mailbox money going to go ahead and get a cost of living adjustment per the state or in essence, a Chartered constitutional number that’s saying, hey, you’re going to get your three percent every year guaranteed until the day you die. Good for them, not knocking them.
But the problem is the majority of people out there that do not have that type of safety, then they do not have that luxury to be able to know that, hey, every day or I can go every month, I’m going to have that mailbox money. And it becomes very much a scary situation because what happens now with the new generation that are now approaching retirement, what happens when you run into a bad market experience and all of a sudden you lose a quarter, half, three-quarters of your investable asset because of a market shift, a market change?
Now, where are you going to get the money? You still need that money to live off of and like, but now you’re taking money from a depleted source. So from our standpoint, our job is to duplicate the best of our abilities with the assets that you have, duplicate the experience, duplicate the level of comfort that a lot of municipal Union workers are able to enjoy, with the pension that they get.
FAQ #10: Any Tips on Passing Money to the Next Generation?
From our standpoint, this, I think, is probably one of the most emotional things that people have to contend with is, a lot of times, generations of the path of today people who are looking to retire, they still have a very strong link to family. And they feel like they’re obligated to make sure that they pass law money to their children, to their grandchildren and the like, the issue that a lot of times occurs is that they don’t have a plan for that money.
So when that money gets to that second generation, all of a sudden statistics show that typically seventy percent of generational wealth dissipates by the second generation, ninety percent of the generational wealth dissipates by the third generation. So they don’t have the sweat in that money. They don’t have the sacrifices that were made with that money.
Especially now, with so much money moving forward from 401K’s, from IRA’s that are taxable upon distribution, how is that next generation going to go ahead and handle those distributions? Are they going to handle the distributions in a careful way, in a very mindful way? Are they going to be frivolous with that money? It’s very, very much I implore our client to really give that a deep thought dive, because if they feel that the next generation is just going to just run through it like, you know what, through a goose. You know what we tell them? Spend it yourself.
What about your daughter in law? What about your son in law? See, something happens to your son, your daughter-in-law, whom you may not like, will receive this money and vice versa when it comes to your daughter with your son-in-law. So ultimately, we tell people that there’s a reality to this. So either there’s good, solid planning, which is what we provide for the next generation, or we tell them, you know what, just start having a good, solid distribution plan for yourself, and then whatever is left over is leftover.
FAQ #11: What about Stock Market Volatility?
Let me explain to you, stock market volatility as I see it currently. We are involved with the longest bull market in history. We have eclipsed at certain points of the this market over five-hundred percent from trough to peak. Yeah, we’ve had some interruptions and like, but what people do not realize is when you ask them the question, can the market go ahead? Can you lose thirty-five percent or more of your money? A lot of times they look at you and sit back and say, I don’t know, could I?
You absolutely can.
So the bottom line for us is that our job when we build someone’s portfolio is we build it from a functional need base, and then we drive over here to the want, which obviously will have a little bit more risk involved with it. The problem with the way people invest their money today and a lot of times other advice, it’s just the opposite. You’re concentrating on the want and you’re ignoring the needs, and that’s a very dangerous thing to do. Again, market volatility, it absolutely, positively, can be devastating.
You look at the S&P 500 from ’07 to ’09 to drop fifty-seven percent. If you remember the tech boom, tech bust, you saw the Nasdaq more than half itself to the negative. So these things are a reality. And we have to make sure that we’re in a situation where we’re explaining that fully and we tell people when they come and they’re ready to retire, they come to us to manage their money, that we’re going to manage the bricks, that you have to build the road.
We’re not going to be in a situation where we’re going to try to snap our fingers and try to create something out of thin air and then sacrifice that person’s, I guess, overall future well-being and their family’s well-being.
FAQ #12: What About Unforeseen Legal Issues?
We’re in a very much a sue-happy environment. Unfortunately, one of the things that we have seen in our business is we have seen people come to us and sit back and say, hey, my family member, my kid is in some legal deep “do-do” you’ve got themselves, they may have had an accident and now they’re being sued.
One of the things that unfortunately we see quite a bit of is something they call “Gray Divorce”. People getting divorced later on in life if you will. All we’re just trying to say to people is be aware, be cognizant of the fact, be in a position where you’re prepared for the unexpected main question I ask, if your child got themselves into a legal situation, would you bail them out?
Yes or no?
Why do I ask that? It’s because at the end of the day, they have to understand that there’s vulnerability and they’ve got to make sure that their assets are prepared based upon the potential threats that are going to come down the pike – unfortunately, called for the game called life.
FAQ #13: What If I have no financial plan?
When it comes to having a financial plan in place, having one in place is better than not having one at all. Right? Because then from that standpoint, we believe we have a much, much better opportunity, opportunity to get on the same page with that client because there’s a reason why they may have done something.
Let me give you an example.
When you have market runs like we’ve had significant market runs, a person may have had a 50/50, 50 bond / 50 stock. All of a sudden you’ve had this big drive in the stock market, and all of a sudden, now they’re 80/20, but now all of a sudden they’re thirteen years older. So now they’re actually more risk-based than they were thirteen years prior.
The whole point about having a plan is that the plan just simply has an opportunity where we have a checkpoint, we can make sure that we’re well within the risk thresholds. The overall need base, the want base, their “sleep at night capabilities” that they’re not sitting around worried about which way to go. Unfortunately, I’ve read statistics where people that they said that there are people that are on the verge of retirement, that more than fifty percent of them do not have some type of financial plan in place.
That’s dangerous.
All we’re just trying to tell people is think about what you’re trying to do and what you’re trying to accomplish. Going out there and just winging it, especially in today’s day and age, just does not work. People are living longer. Right. You’ve got situations where medicine and healthcare have gotten better. So people obviously are having much more longevity in life. That’s something that we are very much aware of. But just having a system in place, something that you can measure the results on and making sure that you’re in line with where you want to go, you.
FAQ #14: What makes Casey Wealth better than commercial investment firms?
So when people sit back and talk about this type of scenario, another thing that really comes out is taking advice from strangers. These are people you don’t even know. You’ve never met them. So you mean to tell me you’re going to spend 40 years of your life working, sacrificing, clawing to make what you have all of a sudden then to turn over the advisory capacity of someone you’ve never met?
I got Timmy today, Tommy tomorrow, and Tony the next day.
That’s a very dangerous proposition. And again, you’re working with somebody you don’t even know. That’s the difference in working with us from a standpoint of you’re going to have a live person, you are going to have someone return your phone call.
That’s something we very much pride ourselves in. And that’s exactly what financial advisory services should want. That type of respect and that type of attention.
Yeah.
FAQ #15: Why are some investment costs excessive?
I’m surprised in today’s day and age, how many people do not know what their true costs are to their investments. They have no idea how much they’re paying. They have no idea who they are paying. People ask me, where would I find it? I said, you’ll find it.
If you go ahead and you look at page forty-eight of your prospectus that you throw out, it’ll have it in there, but you’re not paying attention to it. The whole point is that these fees absolutely eat your performance and all of a sudden, instead of receiving a ten-percent return, maybe you’re going to get a seven-percent return.
Doesn’t seem like a lot in one year. But if you go ahead and you compound that over the course of 10, 15, or 20 years, that’s a lot of money. Furthermore, when it comes to the overall fee structure, that again, people are going to get paid, they need to be fully, fully transparent as to how they get paid as much as regulation and all the different rules say you’re supposed to.
Many people still to this day do not know. On our behalf off, we take the time to go through every item one by one by one, to show you exactly how we’re paid, when we’re paid, why we’re paid and how much we’re paid.
That, I think, is very important that you understand that.
FAQ #16: What is Poor Debt Management?
Poor debt management just simply comes down to being in a situation where you did a bang-up job of creating the debt, but now all of a sudden you’re just going to go, by chance, I’m just going to pay that bill, pay that bill, pay that bill, and realizing that a lot of times you’re never getting out from underneath it.
The people that we find that do the best in retirement have gotten rid of, they’ve had a structure and strategy in place to pay off their house, to pay off that new car that they need going into retirement. We find a lot of times that people do not have that type of strategy. They do not have the ability to go ahead and isolate the pay.
Healthy Debt versus Unhealthy Debt. How much they’re paying so ultimately, they’re paying thousands upon thousands of compounded dollars over the lifetime of that particular loan. It could be a credit card, could be a mortgage, could be a car payment. And if they would have just structured it better, they’d be in a situation where they’d be knocking these debts down faster.
Much more efficient efficiencies create effectiveness. Effectiveness creates peace of mind and also cost savings.