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Video Transcript
Rebecca Powers 00:26
Welcome to this week’s edition of On the Money with Secure Money with Brian Quaranta. Of course, everyone knows Brian. He created Secure Money Advisors. You can hear him on the radio on the weekends. We do the show each week. It is all about educating and empowering you. A little bit about myself in this new year for our new viewers, I was a news anchor and investigative reporter for many, many years for an ABC affiliate, and I used to be with the big box experience until I found the brighter side of life, and that’s where I’ll introduce you. Brian, good to see you.
Brian Quaranta 00:59
Yeah, great to see you. Yes, and you were with the big box firms right here,
Rebecca Powers 01:02
Oh, big time. I didn’t…
Brian Quaranta 01:04
I love your story, by the way. I think you are, you are the story that everybody needs to hear, because you are the typical person out there today that just didn’t know.
Rebecca Powers 01:16
Didn’t know. I’ve interviewed presidents, I’ve had child protection laws changed in my state, and I was completely ignorant of where my money was. The risk I was in at 23 when I started in TV was the same risk at 56 when I retired. Yes, and that’s not true, 46 I’m sorry, I’ve been retired almost 10 years, but doing these shows with you, I’ve learned more than I ever learned with the big box experience, you would call a number and say, Well, I don’t understand. Well, where’s my money? Or what do I do with this? And I’d be lucky if they’d even call me back. Yeah, right. In our education system, we were never taught finances fourth graders can understand.
Brian Quaranta 01:56
Did you ever figure out fourth graders can understand my book? I know, yeah. You want to know why? Because I read it to my kids at night that are five and two, and I said, Do you boys understand? If they say, Dad, sounds like you need to save money.
Rebecca Powers 02:12
We want less risk, safety and so we always say, retirement and risk do not go together. So, we want to make sure that you get a copy of this book. It truly is Brian’s passion in life to make sure that everyone understands retire- It’s not rocket science. No. Wall Street sure made us feel like it. We feel kind of embarrassed. You’ve had people come in kind of embarrassed of the POS, the pile of stuff, right?
Brian Quaranta 02:36
That’s right. People come in with their power, with that. Nothing wrong with that. But there’s a lot, a lot of people are just very confused on what to do and how to do it right, because a lot of times what they’ve been used to, whether it’s because they’re, you know, they’ve got their employers been providing them with a 401(k) plan, or a 403B, or tsp. They’re just used to those plans. There’s no real services, nobody to talk to. They give you some online portals to be able to go in there and make allocation changes. But nobody’s been taught. You know, a lot of people that are investing their company plans don’t even know what a mutual fund is, right? You know, they don’t even know what an ETF is, right? And they don’t know, how do I allocate this? What do I do? And so, but a lot of people, when it comes down to actually retiring, have no idea how to retire. And here’s the little secret, neither do the guys at the Wall Street firms, because they’re two very different skill sets.
Rebecca Powers 03:38
They’re focused just on trades.
Brian Quaranta 03:41
Trading and investing your money in risk. Money is much different than the retirement plan itself. The retirement plan has multiple key areas that have to be addressed. Number one, and most importantly, is the replacement of your paycheck, because 85 to 90% of people retiring today are not going to have a pension. So how are you going to live? Social Security is not enough, so that means that the money accumulated, you’re going to have to use. Nobody is teaching them how to use that money, so they think that it’s going to be as easy as just starting to take money out when they need it or start taking money out on a monthly basis. And what they don’t realize is that if their risk investments don’t perform, and the stock market doesn’t cooperate,
Rebecca Powers 04:38
You will run out of money before you die.
Brian Quaranta 04:41
You will run out of money or you will have a lot of anxiety and stress, I can promise you that, and that is the last thing you want, because retirement should be a time where you be where you have the confidence and the courage to be able to become the new version of yourself without. Worrying about what the hell is going on Wall Street, and the last thing you want to be doing is being on a beautiful trip somewhere. And you get off, you get home from the beach on your beautiful trip, and you turn the TV on in the hotel room, and you see absolute pandemonium on Wall Street. Guys have ties wrapped around their heads, and everything is falling. Everything is fine, and you’re going, oh my gosh, what do I do? You pick up the phone. You call your broker. Nobody is answering the phone. The guy finally calls you back. Five days later, your account is down 20% already. That’s not the retirement you want. Okay, let’s make it a lot easier. And one of the ways you can make it easier is by going to OntheMoneyOffer.com and getting a copy of my book, scanning the QR code right at the bottom of the screen there, or calling 888382129…9, excuse me, 888-382-1298, lots of ways you can get a hold of us, but it first starts with this book, because we’ve got to make sure that you lay a foundation.
Rebecca Powers 06:01
And I was just going to say, and that foundation, if you think of it like your home, you can envision your perfect retirement. What does that retirement home look like? Would you ever build a house without blueprints? Of course not. And then we want to reverse engineer you to that goal. Now the foundation of your home, laying that secure foundation is income. When Brian says paycheck: income, income, income, what are some of the ways you help secure our income?
Brian Quaranta 06:27
I love this question, but I must say, what Rebecca just said about reverse engineering the blueprints. That’s the key to this, because you’ve got to think far enough out ahead to say how much money am I going to need on a monthly basis. So, let’s just say that you’re going to need $2,000 a month in additional income above and beyond what you’re getting, that’s $24,000 a year. Now we know that that might be what you need in the first couple years of retirement. But as cost of living goes up, that might need to go to 30,000 40,000 and so on and so forth. So, working backwards is the key, because you- once you figure out how much annual income you need, now you can take that number, and we use division to reverse engineer it, because if I take a certain amount and I divide it by a percentage rate, I know actually how much money I need to be saved. And I talk about it in the book of how to do that, and I talk about three interest rates you need to know about: your spend down rate, your preservation rate and your legacy rate. And you’re going to need to know about those, because that’s the way you start building the plan. So, you’re asking, how do we do that? Right? And how do we start to lay that foundation? The first thing we have to figure out is, how much money do we need to set aside to actually build the income stream that we need now there’s some rules of thumb that we can use one is called the Rule of 100 which is a very simple rule, which is where we just take 100 minus your age. So, if you’re 60 years old, we take 100 minus 60, which equals 40. That tells us that 40% of your money can have risk exposure to it, and 60% of your money should be in something that generates some type of cash flow. Secure that. Secure, preferably guaranteed. Okay? And now, once you figure that out, all right, now you can start to look at how are we going to invest that 60%, and how are we going to invest that 40% and we come back on the next segment, we’re going to talk about that in depth. But before we take a break again, I want you to go to OntheMoneyOffer.com and get a copy of my book Right Track Your Retirement. It is a simple planning guide to help you build peace of mind and security going into retirement. So again, that’s OntheMoneyOffer.com or you can call 888-382-1298, my team is standing by to take your call to get you scheduled to come in, take advantage of the appointment that you get when you order, when you get a copy of the book. And the great thing is, you’ll be able to read about things before you come in, so you’ll have a good understanding of what our philosophy is. And as always, my promise to you is when you come in, nobody from my team is going to sell you anything. We’re there to roll up our sleeves, sit on the same side of the table as you and work together as a team to help you solve the problems that you’re dealing with and get you retired. Now the one beautiful thing is, I can’t tell you how many people over the last 25 years came in and said, I want to retire, but I don’t know when I can. And a year later, they’re retiring, and one thing I would love to have happen for you is to show you how you can get retired right now.
Rebecca Powers 09:46
Absolutely, and it truly is a family firm. It’s a family affair, and it is a wonderful experience. So leave the big bucks experience and come to an independent All right, stay with us. Get that book for free. It’ll be mailed to you in a gold Envelope. We want to get your retirement on the right track. We’ll be right back.
Speaker 1 10:04
We know the market is going to get worse from here. This is the biggest monthly decline in 10 years. People’s 401(k)s took a major hit.
Speaker 2 10:12
My investments are tanking. My retirement isn’t going as planned. I can’t believe I let my kid talk me into buying crypto. I mean, what is that anyway?
Radio Voice 10:21
This was the fourth worst contraction in history.
Brian Quaranta 10:26
So, how are you two doing? Your financial future doesn’t have to be uncertain. I’m Brian Quaranta with Secure Money Advisors. If you have amassed a nest egg, it’s time for a financial advisor to help you reach your retirement goals. This is one of the greatest tax windows in history. Now is the time to take advantage of this tax discount while you can. We specialize in retirement planning, tax mitigation, estate planning and more. Plan your retirement right Call now for your complimentary portfolio review and tax analysis.
Rebecca Powers 10:59
All right. Welcome back. We’re going to continue our conversation about securing your money. The name of the show: On the Money With Secure Money. You mentioned the 60-40, so you identify what income they’ll need, how much you can risk, and then what?
Brian Quaranta 11:15
Yes, and then what. And poof, we have a plan. Yeah. You know, I will say one of my favorite things that we do at Secure Money Advisors is we actually build the plan with the client right there. You know, you know, so many people have told me over the years, and I don’t know if you’ve ever experienced, but if you’re ever working with anybody, let’s say take my tax accountant, for example. Okay, in the past, I would give off my all my stuff that she needed for the tax if she come back who you owe this, okay? But as the company grew, I said, we’re going to do this different. We’re going to do this together, because I want to know how you’re getting here. And so, when you sit down with a team at Secure Money Advisors. We’re going to show you how we arrive at the solution. We’re not going to just go magically behind the curtain and then come back and go. Here you go. This is what we’re going to make happen. You need to know how we’re getting there. You need to understand the logic behind that and why we’re doing what we’re doing, because once you understand that, now you’re able to make an informed decision, because you’re seeing the pieces of the puzzle come together. So, once we decide how much money somebody needs to protect now what we want to do is use something that’s going to give us the greatest amount of leverage. So, I’ll give you two different scenarios. Okay, so let’s just say that you need $25,000 a year in additional income. Okay, and let’s just make some numbers up here. Let’s just say you have a million dollars. Okay, well, you could make it as simple as splitting your money up into two separate buckets, one with $500,000 with it, and another with $500,000 in it. Well, what do we do with the first bucket? Well, the first bucket is designed for cash flow, right? So, let’s say that I don’t want to spend any of that principle. I don’t want to spend any of that 500,000. Well, I can use a guaranteed investment like a fixed annuity right now. Here’s why I like fixed annuities, because they’re better than CDs. Here’s why, if I buy a CD I can get the same guaranteed rate of return as what the fixed annuity gives me, okay, but here’s what I can’t do with the CD. I cannot withdraw money during the term. So, if I buy a five-year CD at 5% on $500,000 that’d be $25,000 a year in interest. But I can’t touch the money for five years in a CD. So, it’s not liquid. It’s not liquid. With an annuity, a fixed annuity, a fixed annuity, I’m gonna clarify that, okay? Because there’s lots of different types of annuities
Rebecca Powers 14:09
Yeah, fixed annuity, your principle is protected.
Brian Quaranta 14:11
Principle is protected. My interest rate is also guaranteed for five years, and if I’m using a five-year annuity, so, but the annuity allows me to take money out every year. So, if I’m getting $25,000 a year in interest, I can withdraw that money every single month that I need to get to $25,000 but don’t even let me withdraw more than the interest. But that’s why people go, Well, why not just use a bank CD, well, I can’t take any money out of that. And, matter of fact, the bank, CD and the annuity are essentially the same product, just ones with a bank and ones with an insurance company. Oh, the only the difference too, is the banks, when you give them your money, by law, they don’t have to disclose what they do with it. Really, no, you have. No idea where a bank invests your money. You do with an annuity company, because they’re regulated by the state insurance departments. So, because they’re providing a guaranteed product to state insurance departments say you have to invest this this type of way, right? The bank can go lend it out on businesses, car loans, mortgages, right, but the bank doesn’t need to disclose where it goes, okay? So now we’ve taken care of that, right? So that’s a very simple strategy, right? 5% on $500,000 I get my $25,000 a year. I never touch principal, okay? The other $500,000 goes into a low-cost ETF, let’s say the S&P500, the NASDAQ. Okay, could do something simple like that, where we now have risk money All right, now, why split it up that why when we split it up that way? Why does it become, why is it why do we get so much more leverage when we split it like this? Because you’re telling your dollars what jobs to do. You’re telling your dollars what jobs to do. But more importantly, the most important thing that everybody will tell you, including all the experts, when it comes to taking risk with your money, the most important ingredient you need is what time. Right? They say time is your best friend. Oh, don’t worry about it. Head back for a long haul. It’ll come back, right? Well, there lies the problem, because if you have all of your money at risk and you need to take what draws out, are you leaving it alone? No, are you giving it time to grow? No, you’re withdrawing money from it. So, you’re, you’re, you’re, you’re actually screwing up the plan by making the withdrawals if it’s all at risk. Because with risk money, we’re supposed to put it in and leave it alone, right? Okay, but when you retire, you can’t leave it alone. You got to take money out, and this is where the split comes volley. So now that money that we put at risk in that and that other bucket of money, if you will, that truly becomes long term money now, because the first $500,000 that we put away is the what’s responsible for driving the cash flow, and by the way, there’s no volatility in that account, right? So that means that this bucket over here has 5, 10, 15 years to grow. You know, it was as long as we want to grow, because this account over here has handled it. Now, let’s say that we don’t have a million dollars, okay, and we still need $25,000 a year. Well, how do you get $25,000 a year now, if you have less money, what happens if you only had, let’s say, $400,000? How are you going to get $25,000 a year? That’s going to be pretty tough, and I’m going to share that with you on the next segment when we come back, because it’s critical that when I start to explain this to you, that we don’t get cut off by a break here. Okay, but before we go to break again, I want you to go to OntheMoneyOffer.com Again, it’s OntheMoneyOffer.com is right there at the bottom of the screen. And get a copy of the book. I will tell you this, the most important thing about this book, the most powerful thing about this book is the 30 person team that supports you at my office and provides you with the planning services you deserve, because you should be the most important person to any planning firm that you go to, because it’s your money and You need those folks that you’re trusting to work for you, and they should be the ones making sure that anytime you call, you get an answer immediately, and that’s why, at Secure Money Advisors, we’ve put together a team of people to work for you, not one individual advisor, not Two individual advisors. We’ve got multiple advisors, multiple team members to help make sure that you’re serviced. Every time you call the office, you know, people have said to me, I’ve called my advisor two days ago. He’s never called me. Called him a week ago, he’s never called me back. I just couldn’t even imagine, couldn’t even imagine that if I gave somebody my money that I don’t get a call back. Okay? It was like, yes. So again, folks OntheMoneyOffer.com go there right now, get a copy of the book, and don’t forget, when we come back, I’m going to show you how to create more income with less money when we come back on another segment, and
Rebecca Powers 19:37
And it’s not only a free book, you’re going to be asking for, you’re going to ask for a free complimentary consultation. They want to start mapping out your plan for retirement, giving you that third party report, knowing your risk, knowing your fees, and most importantly, getting to know you. We’ll be right back
Speaker 3 19:59
The work never seems to end until the day it finally does. After nearly a lifetime on the job, you should be rewarded for all the time you spent working, whether that’s crossing off items on your bucket list, learning a new passion, or rekindling the love of an old one. After all, life isn’t over when you stop working. It’s the start of an all-new chapter, the one where you’re the writer and you get to choose how your story will go. A way to achieve that is by having a clear financial plan to sustain your golden years. The biggest fear most retirees have is if they’ll have enough money to maintain the lifestyle they’ve always enjoyed. Having a plan to help protect you against the curveballs life often throws will help to maintain your lifestyle. Call today to get your free written financial plan, see me live every day to the fullest and enjoy the retirement of your dreams.
Rebecca Powers 20:50
All right, welcome back. I’m Rebecca Powers here with Brian Quaranta and we’re talking about, how do you get more with less? How do you pay yourself more each month during retirement if you don’t have a million or half million saved. So, let’s continue that conversation. What’s your first piece of advice for someone who maybe only has $300,000 and they’re trying to retire?
Brian Quaranta 21:09
Yeah? So first off, that’s where we have to use other types of annuities. Yeah. And the other type of annuity that you can use is an income annuity. So, we talked about a fixed annuity on the last segment, where we’re just getting a fixed rate of return right, and we’re living off the interest. But let’s say you don’t have that kind of money, so now we need to use something that is going to leverage our money much better, and an income annuity. And I want to be very clear with this. If you’ve ever been told that annuities are a bad investment. I want you to know that is 100% true, because they are not an investment. They are an insurance product. They are designed to do one thing and one thing only, and that’s insure and guarantee your income. So, think about this for a minute. Do we insure our home? Yes, our cars, our health, right? I mean…
Rebecca Powers 22:07
Jewelry, cameras, cameras, all kinds of things.
Brian Quaranta 22:11
Go to Best Buy and buy a piece of technology. They want you to get a warranty on everything. But think about this, folks, you’re about to go into retirement, or maybe you’re in retirement. Have you insured any of your income now? You tell me, if your income disappeared on you today, how hard would life be? Very Yeah, if you’re if you got a wreck with your car and you survived, but your car was totaled. Are you still going to be okay? You’re still gonna be late because you have insurance, yeah, but your in- your car would be replaced, right? But if you don’t insure your income and poof, market doesn’t cooperate, you’re out. It’s game over. Yeah? I mean, I promise you, who’s ever taken risk with your money is not going to pay your mortgage.
Rebecca Powers 23:02
Exactly. You mentioned that in your book, highlighted Greg in our studio, we love our studio team. By the way, y’all are amazing. There’s a whole bunch of people behind us. Okay, I love this. It’s easy for someone in an office wearing a stuffy suit and to sit across from you and talk about losing money when the money isn’t theirs to lose.
Brian Quaranta 23:19
That’s right, that’s right. It’s really easy to tell somebody else, right, to risk their life savings, especially if you get paid a fee or a commission to do it right. And it’s really easy for your friend to sit behind you at a blackjack table and go, I’d hit. Go ahead!
Rebecca Powers 23:42
So true. Speaking of gambling, I hate to lose money. Okay, I cannot stand to lose money. So doing these shows, I’ve learned so much. My family went with a fixed index and New England television for 27 years, I’ve had a 401, K and I was advised, and I learned in this show, what is your tolerance? Rebecca, how much do you want to lose? I said, Nothing. I’m not greedy, right? But I really hate losing money, so I took all of my money from TV and went into a fixed, indexed annuity. I lose zero, and when the market goes up, I get some of the gains, not all of the gains. So that’s why it’s so important to get to know yourself. Yeah. And then my husband is a producer for ESPN. You advise me: tell him to keep, keep gambling his money, like, let it grow in our mid 50s. So there is that. Give that money a job. This portion will be for your safety. This portion is for your growth. This portion is for liquidity. Once you understand this, it’s like-
Brian Quaranta 24:44
Yeah, and it was better to put your money in the indexed annuity versus your husband’s?
Rebecca Powers 24:50
Because I left there, so I didn’t want to leave an orphaned 401(k).
Brian Quaranta 24:54
And you were no longer making contributions,
Rebecca Powers 24:56
That’s right.
Brian Quaranta 24:57
So, you were no longer dollar cost averaging in. Your husband’s still working his dollar cost averaging in so as the markets going up and down, he’s buying in all the time, every time he gets paid.
Rebecca Powers 25:06
And they were matching.
Brian Quaranta 25:07
And they were matching, but that means on, sometimes he buys the markets down, sometimes it’s up, sometimes it’s down, right? And so, for you, you’re no longer putting money in. That’s the better money to protect, because you’re not offsetting any of the losses by making contributions when the markets are down. Your husband is offsetting those losses by contributing when the market is down and he’s picking up more shares at a lower price, all things you’ll learn when you become a client of Secure Money Advisors. So, but getting back to the insuring our income, all right? An income annuity is going to give you a lot of leverage on your money, so I’ll give you a great story. I had a client of mine, and we’re going to call her Kathy for a moment, single, okay? Got divorced later in life. Had to split up their assets. She had to go back to work. She was a homemaker for, you know, 20 plus years, and she found herself going back to work later on in life. Obviously, they had to split the money up, but she was getting closer to retirement, and she wanted to see what it was going to look like. Well, with about, you know, little shy of, like, say, about $350,000 saved. Okay? And she says, I’m gonna need about $20,000 a year in additional income, above and beyond what I get in my social security. And I said, Okay, well, I said, if we use an income annuity, right, which is also another form of a fixed annuity, we can leverage that money. So, we took $250,000 out of her 350,000 and we put that into the annuity, and that annuity, within a 36-month period, was going to produce her over $25,000 a year in guaranteed income for the rest of her life.
Rebecca Powers 26:59
Guaranteed growing lifetime income. You cannot outlive your money.
Brian Quaranta 27:03
Cannot outlive your money guaranteed every single month. Doesn’t matter what happens in the market, nothing. Now, we still had $100,000 right? So, we were able to take that $100,000 and now invest that money, and that was going to become our long-term growth money. And again, folks, I write about in the book OntheMoneyOffer.com. Go there right now. Call 888-382-1298. We want to help you put together a plan, give you a strategy so that you have the peace of mind and the security that you deserve. We don’t know what we don’t know, and I want to show you a better way. Allow our team to show you that better way. So again, 1-888-382-1298, call today and schedule.
Rebecca Powers 27:46
That’s right. Schedule a complimentary appointment, and you’ll also get this free book mail to you. We love you, Pittsburgh. We’ll see you next time.