What Dentists Want to Know — Listener Q&A #21 – Episode 302

On this listener Q&A episode of the Dentist Money™ Show, Ryan and Matt answer questions from dentists about their cash flow, debt, and investment concerns. Income is finally growing—what comes next? Pay down debt or add to assets? Where do collectibles fit into a portfolio? Should you put more than the minimum down when buying a home? Got a money question? Ryan and Matt have an expert answer.

 

 

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Podcast Transcript

Ryan Isaac:
Hello, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the Dentist Money Show, brought to you by Dentist Advisors, a no commission fiduciary, dental only, comprehensive financial advisor for dentists all over the country, just like you, check us out, dentistadvisors.com.

Ryan Isaac:
Today on the show, Matt and I talking about the questions you have that you send to us that come from our Facebook group, that come from emails, DMs. This is just a shout out to those who have sent us questions. We love these questions. They’re great questions. And it’s helpful because if you’re asking it, a lot of people are asking it. So it’s great to talk about it on the show.

Ryan Isaac:
If you’d like us to cover a topic on the show in one of our Q&A episodes in the future, go to the Dentist Advisors Discussion Group on Facebook, post a question. We’ll post an answer immediately, and then we’ll also probably make the show. And if you want to chat with one of us directly, you can go to dentistadvisors.com, click on the book free consultation link, and chat with one of our friendly dental specific advisors. Anyway, this was a great show. We got a little personal, we got a little vulnerable and candid about our own lives. Thanks for being with us. Thanks for tuning in and enjoy the show.

Announcer:
Consultant advisor, conduct your own due diligence when making financial decisions. General principles discussed during this program do not constitute personal advice. This program is furnished by Dentist Advisors, a registered investment advisor. This is Dentist Money. Now, here’s your host, Ryan Issac.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome to the Dentist Money Show where we help dentists make smart financial decisions and help them avoid the bad ones along the way. I am Ryan Isaac, and I’m here with the guy, the Hollywood mountain, Matt Mulcock, punching the screen. What’s up, Matt?

Matt Mulcock:
Yo Ryan, how are ya? I was punching the screen-

Ryan Isaac:
You were, you were like-

Matt Mulcock:
You get me jacked up on that intro every time-

Ryan Isaac:
Just punching the screen-

Matt Mulcock:
Like Frank the Tank from old school.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
You get me jacked up. I’m just sitting here Frank the Tanken. If you don’t know that reference, I’m sorry.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, I think you just found me the movie I’m watching on the plane tomorrow.

Matt Mulcock:
Dude, oh, that would be the perfect airplane movie.

Ryan Isaac:
It would, although I hate watching movies when there’s awkward scenes, they’re just weird to view publicly.

Matt Mulcock:
I know, you look around, is there anyone watching this?

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, I didn’t know that was coming up. Sorry, folks. Or worse, is the person who has no shame watching really, not publicly appropriate movies on their phones. And they’re just kicking back just in it.

Matt Mulcock:
I feel like every plan I’ve been on the last few like… Well, I haven’t been on a lot of planes with COVID, but before that, it was like every plane ride I was on, I’d look up. I’d be like, what is that dude watching?

Ryan Isaac:
And why is there no bells going off in your head? Hey, you probably should just cover your screen-

Matt Mulcock:
You shouldn’t be watching that. There’s like a seven-year-old behind you, bro. What are you doing?

Ryan Isaac:
Hunch forward, man. Hide the screen at least.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome everybody to the Dentist Money Show. If you are new, we’re going to get to some content here, but thank you for being with us and welcome to the show. We appreciate it. And we love the support and we hope it helps you. And if you have any questions you’d like us to cover on the show, we love doing that too. And you can go to the Dentist Advisors discussion group on Facebook, post a question, we’ll answer you and we’ll make it a show too, which is always really great, which is what we’re doing today, actually.

Ryan Isaac:
We’ve got three questions, little Q&A from the listeners, from the people in the Facebook group. So go there and post a question and we love to use it for the podcast. If you’re joining us as a long-time listener, welcome back, friend. Thank you for being here.

Matt Mulcock:
Welcome back. We love you.

Ryan Isaac:
All right. The Q&A. These, let’s see, range of topics today. We’ve got-

Matt Mulcock:
We haven’t done these for awhile. I feel like we’re getting back to our roots.

Ryan Isaac:
Getting back to the roots. We’ve got like a cash flow question, really pretty common. We’ve got an investment question, kind of a different type of investment question. And then we have a debt question.

Matt Mulcock:
Love it.

Ryan Isaac:
So we got the whole range here. The first question, I got us permission to ask this. I told him I would be sharing it generally. And so keeping it really high level and I will do this. I need to set up the situation a little bit while still keeping it like a high level. So I met this person and he was telling me about his practice. It’s fairly in the new stages of practice ownership, right? So a lot of people can relate. Kind of in the new stages and cashflow is tight. Things are growing. Collections are there, the momentum’s building, but… Do you, okay, and here’s another thing a lot of people can relate to.

Ryan Isaac:
You know what it’s like when you have no money for so long?

Matt Mulcock:
Yes, yes I do.

Ryan Isaac:
And then you finally start to get some money and instead of just moving forward and being like, now I have money. There’s this backlogged list of things that you should have been or wanted to buy for maybe 10 years. It’s broken furniture, it’s an upgraded car, it’s a long awaited vacation. It’s a landscaping project. It’s old medical debt. It’s-

Matt Mulcock:
New teeth.

Ryan Isaac:
New clothes finally, new teeth. I mean, when you don’t have cashflow for a long time, you just have a list that kind of piles up for a long time. And when you finally do have income, it’s not like, oh, now I make good money and now I save it. It’s kind of like, no I’m catching up, really common.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. And maybe it’s not even a list you’ve actually written down. It’s just, I like how you said that, a backlog in your mind, it’s just piling up. Then all of a sudden it comes back to the forefront of your mind. You’re like, oh, now I can buy that.

Ryan Isaac:
Now I can, I can finally take a dang trip for once. And I can finally put in some grass in that dirt backyard that’s been there forever. You know? I mean, these are just normal things so this person, practice is fairly new, the backlog is there, money starts rolling in and spending kind of goes up. So spending goes up, admittedly, that’s what he said too, like, “Ah, we kind of spent a little bit more than we should be.”

Matt Mulcock:
Good luck putting that toothpaste back in the tube.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a tough one. Okay, so we’re at that point, new practice, cashflow, spending’s kind of up, there’s some debt around, there’s some consumer debt, some business and personal credit card debt around, and emergency funds don’t exist for the family and the practice still needs to hit a certain benchmark of liquidity. There’s also anxiety about loans. There’s some anxiety about bigger purchases, like some real estate. And there’s some anxiety about getting to a point where you can start saving, and start investing for the future. That’s the situation right now and that’s the situation I met this person in, and they kind of just asked me, “Where do I begin? I’ve got all this stuff. What do I focus on? What do I concentrate on?” So Matt, I’ll kind of just put that question to you. Where do you start that conversation with a person in that situation?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. First step then, easy, get organized. That’s it. You’ve got to get organized. You got to know right now… If you’re not organized, you got to know your net worth. You have to know where your cash is. You have to get organized. That’s the first step we would take.

Ryan Isaac:
So around this situation… I mean, so I’ll just tell you how the conversation kind of played out, was exactly that. First, you got to have some organization around what’s even going on. Do you understand your profitability? And to me, everything starts with the practice, especially when you’re an owner and especially when it’s like the early stages and you’re just building that momentum, because you want that to be built up as big as possible, as fast as possible. You want your income to just climb as quickly as you can. So for me, it’s like, are you organized enough in the office to understand where your growth is coming from, where it’s headed, and what you can actually control to make it work, to make it continue? Do you understand your profitability right now? Are you profitable or are you owning a business and only making an associates wage?

Ryan Isaac:
And if any of those are the cases, or if your team is unorganized, are their systems or process is not in place, don’t hire a financial advisor right now, hire a practice coach. Get someone in that business to make it healthy and running efficiently first out of everything. I mean, the same thing though, it’s just get organized. The other part of it, and this was kind of his suggestion was, he’s like, “Yeah, we need to get organized to understand what we’re spending.” And it was funny because like a week later we were texting again, because I said, “Hey, just keep in touch with me. Let’s just kind of coach you along through some initial steps and keep in touch.” And he’s like, “Yeah, we got to organize around our spending and we were spending too much,” which, welcome to the club.

Matt Mulcock:
We’re all there.

Ryan Isaac:
We’re all human. Yeah, we’re all there at some point in our lives, ebbs and flows. So that organization was the first thing. The second thing I said after that was just, I just want to protect the practice at all cost. So let’s get enough liquidity in the practice, where we’re falling asleep at night, feeling a little comfortable that there’s a month of expenses. Then two months of expenses. If you can push it to three, hallelujah, I think that’s a little bit better. And then do the same thing for yourself and your family. Usually we’re saying, hey, let’s have some balance between some cashflow and savings and investing, and debt reduction. But in this case it was like, oh, we have consumer debt on credit cards-

Matt Mulcock:
Caveat, yep.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s the caveat. When your business and your family has enough emergency fund, cash and liquidity, then we need to attack those aggressively quickly and just get rid of them as fast as possible.

Ryan Isaac:
And maybe… Here’s another thing, we didn’t really get into this, but I would also add, this is something I’ve seen people do for years and years of my career, is look at your loans. A lot of times people unknowingly structure their business, their business real estate and their student loans on really short terms because that’s what they feel like is the smartest financial move. They put like… I mean, we’d never do this with a mortgage, but they put mortgage-sized debt on 10 year schedules, for the practice or the practice real estate or the student loans.

Ryan Isaac:
And so oftentimes, you can look at your debt and if you’ve got them on short schedules, and if they’re higher rates, if they’ve been around for awhile, go refinance your debt, stretch out the terms a little bit longer. You don’t have to wait that long to pay it off, but at least free up some cashflow immediately, get rid of those credit cards, build some liquidity and then reassess where you’re investing versus debt reduction strategy is going to land-

Matt Mulcock:
I literally had this conversation right before we hopped on today.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh really?

Matt Mulcock:
Right before we hopped on, I was talking to a client about restructuring some debt and we were going through it. And like you said, stretching it out, with rates being so low, he was dropping like two or three points on one of his loans, stretching out a little bit longer, but he was saving total as we went through all the numbers, $5,000 a month in cashflow-

Ryan Isaac:
I wouldn’t even blink an eye at that.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s not even like a… And he even said as we were going through it, he was like, “Man, this is a no brainer, huh?” I was like, this is a no brainer. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And I just had that same conversation like a week ago with a client, same thing, running into some cashflow issues. And we just said, man, let’s just stretch out these loans another five years, they’re on tens, put them on 15s. And it was the same thing. It was 3,000, $4,000 a month, which is a giant chunk of money. You can turn the ship around with four grand a month. I mean, that’s a big chunk.

Matt Mulcock:
A good chunk of his stress just comes from not knowing his situation, I’m going to guess. We’ve talked about this so many times. You might be out of financial shape and you know it, but until you really know what levers you can pull, and I like how you said it-

Ryan Isaac:
On paper. Admit it on paper.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep, admit it on paper, and until you can know what you can control and what you can’t, and the only way you know that is by getting organized, you’re always going to feel more stressed, always.

Ryan Isaac:
You will, you will. Just confirm what’s in your gut. If you know that you’re not in a good spot, just confirm it with numbers and math, and data. And then move on. [crosstalk 00:11:43].

Matt Mulcock:
I know when I’m overweight, I know when I’ve gotten a little out of shape, I know it.

Ryan Isaac:
Confirm that stuff, Matt.

Matt Mulcock:
But then I step on the scale and I’m like, yes, it’s confirmed. I’m fat. We got to get back to the gym. Right? And I feel better about it.

Ryan Isaac:
I bet when you gain weight you start squatting like 600 pounds.

Matt Mulcock:
No, those days are behind me, man. That’s another life.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Dig it. All right. Well, I was going to say a phrase but we don’t swear on our podcasts, that I used to hear in the gym all the time, about having a little bit of weight, helps you move a little bit more weight around.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I used to coach power lifting at a gym, and I used to say, “Weight moves weight. You want to move more weight? Gain more.”

Ryan Isaac:
Weight moves weight. Yeah, that’s a PG way of saying it. So going back to the question, if you’re in that situation, what do I do? We’re saying, get organized. We’re saying, admit what’s happening. Protect the practice at all cost. The caveat to fast debt reduction is if you’ve got consumer debt on credit cards, get rid of that stuff. Refinance loans, stretch them out a little bit if you have to, lower your rates, consolidate, lower your monthly cash flows, especially if it’s business debt, commercial real estate debt.

Ryan Isaac:
Get that stuff gone and some liquidity in the bank, and then move on to investing in debt reduction. Okay. So number two. Question number two. If we covered number one, I think we covered number one.

Ryan Isaac:
Someone posted this in the illustrious Facebook discussion group, Dentist Advisors Discussion group on Facebook, that’s the name.

Matt Mulcock:
That is the name.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s the name right there, y’all. This question came from there. And this is a cool question because it’s not that common. The question was, what does everyone think about artwork for investments? Matt, do you have any clients who have significant artwork investments, or have you met anyone who does?

Matt Mulcock:
Well, let me just tell you a personal story here, Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
You do. Oh, I didn’t see this coming. You have like millions of dollars in artwork?

Matt Mulcock:
Here’s the deal, man. I’ve got a two-year-old and she’s a prodigy.

Ryan Isaac:
You’ve got a lot of art.

Matt Mulcock:
So she draws me pictures every day and I invest in them.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, they might be worth something.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, no. So I don’t have any clients that invest in artwork at this point. And I certainly do not have a multi-million dollar portfolio in art. I know it’s becoming a little bit more popular. I think in like anything, there’s platforms and tools out there now that allow you access to artwork that’s more readily available than maybe it was a few years ago. So I think that’s kind of why maybe this is being propped up as something that’s… It’s kind of one of those things where it’s like, oh, this is what the super wealthy do, you should do it too. So I guess my-

Ryan Isaac:
That’s not how they made their money, but whatever.

Matt Mulcock:
I’ll be honest. I don’t have much of a take on this. My biggest thing would just be, if you’re going to do it, let it fall within the rules and parameters of your other properly diversified investment portfolio. This would very much fit into the alternative category. I wouldn’t be allocating more than a few percentage points, maybe 5% tops.

Ryan Isaac:
Or the speculative category.

Matt Mulcock:
Or speculative, yeah, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Or count this into the, if I never see this money again, it’s okay. This is my hobby category. I have people we work with who have like classic cars.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, totally.

Ryan Isaac:
I mean, they’re worth things, but it’s also, is that an investment strategy or do you just like driving cool cars around and they just happen to be worth some money?

Matt Mulcock:
And my question is, what do we define as a classic car? I mean, I drove a 1992 purple Jeep Cherokee. It’s pretty classic.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s pretty classic.

Matt Mulcock:
Just saying.

Ryan Isaac:
My first car was a cream colored Chevy Corsica, four-door [crosstalk 00:15:19].

Matt Mulcock:
See, that is classic.

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t know what year it would have been, something in the nineties, that was pretty awesome. I think it had a maroon stripe down, like pinstripe down the whole thing.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s incredible.

Ryan Isaac:
Anyway, so artwork as investments. Yeah. I would just put it, like you said, into the speculative category-

Matt Mulcock:
It’s not a core part of your portfolio.

Ryan Isaac:
I don’t even know if I’d call it alternative investments category. It’s pretty rare. I have worked with one person who… He and his wife owned quite a bit of expensive artwork in their home. So I have one person to reference. So I’m no expert at this, but I mean, it was nothing that-

Matt Mulcock:
Question on that, those people. Did they fit the category, they just liked having expensive art in there. Were they ever going to sell that?

Ryan Isaac:
No, they had like a 10,000 square foot home in a gorgeous part of a mountain city, and they just filled it with art because they liked art. That was it.

Matt Mulcock:
So they love art but they’re not looking… They’ll make a lifestyle decision, which is, have a bunch of nice art in our house and justify it with financial means, or a financial justification being like, oh, but this is worth X, Y or Z, but are you really ever going to sell it? No.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, yeah. And to my knowledge, I don’t think they have yet. It wasn’t a liquidation strategy. It wasn’t an investment strategy. So I don’t know. That’s about all the take I have on that. I think [crosstalk 00:16:42].

Matt Mulcock:
That’s all I have to say about that, Forrest Gump.

Ryan Isaac:
Put it in the hobby category, and just don’t ruin your life over it.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. And put it in the, don’t overthink it and come on… I don’t know, I don’t want to be dismissive of this at all, but it’s just like, again, not a core part of your portfolio.

Ryan Isaac:
All right. So verdict is from Ryan and Matt, we say put it into the speculation/hobby category-

Matt Mulcock:
Have rules around it.

Ryan Isaac:
Have rules around it. Keep it chill, everybody. Enjoy it. If you have extra money and you’re throwing it at art because you love art, then enjoy that.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. That’s a great point. If you’re at a point where this is becoming a real conversation, and we’re entertaining the idea, you’ve won the game and it’s just, okay, whatever, if you want to do it, do it. But if you’re 35 years old and still building your practice, and you’re asking about art, I’d be dismissive of that. I’d be like-

Ryan Isaac:
Just put it on your goal list. One day, [crosstalk 00:17:39] I love art. I want to buy a nice piece. I want to buy a nice piece of art-

Matt Mulcock:
All in due time.

Ryan Isaac:
I would love to have a early seventies, fully old school, restored Bronco.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, dude. Talk about art. My brother-in-law bought the… He’s waiting for the new one to come. It’s being delivered.

Ryan Isaac:
I will say that I have been thoroughly unimpressed with the new Broncos that are on the road, but I don’t think the cool ones have rolled out yet-

Matt Mulcock:
No, yeah, that’s the sport.

Ryan Isaac:
I saw… The sport is out.

Matt Mulcock:
The sport is kind of lame, no offense.

Ryan Isaac:
Sorry if you own it but I don’t love it compared to the old one. I did see a topless four-door-

Matt Mulcock:
The new one? Are they cool?

Ryan Isaac:
I’ve only seen one in person and it was the total sport package. Everything lifted, good tires. It was pretty nice.

Matt Mulcock:
Hey Ryan, tell me, what happens during our consultation?

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a great question, Matt.

Ryan Isaac:
The first thing we like to do is just get to know more about you and your practice. What are your career goals? What are you doing in your practice, in your business? What kind of big decisions are you making in your personal financial life? Then we talk about how hiring a comprehensive fiduciary dental specific financial advisor, can help you make better financial decisions in your future, help you grow your net worth, get more organized and get more peace of mind around your financial situation.

Matt Mulcock:
So you’re telling me it’s that easy and painless?

Ryan Isaac:
I am telling you, it is that easy and totally painless. Exactly, Matt. Just go to dentistadvisors.com, click the book free consultation button. Do it right now, and talk to a friendly advisor today.

Ryan Isaac:
Moving on to the next question after art. That was a fair question.

Matt Mulcock:
Very fair.

Ryan Isaac:
Thanks for posting that. And again, that came from our discussion group. Facebook, why can’t I say this phrase today? It’s the Dentist Advisors Discussion Group on Facebook.

Matt Mulcock:
Boom. There it is.

Ryan Isaac:
And thanks for posting that question. We really appreciate it [crosstalk 00:19:33].

Matt Mulcock:
We should just start calling it the DAFB group.

Ryan Isaac:
DAFB.

Matt Mulcock:
DAFB.

Ryan Isaac:
Here’s the thing, if you own artwork, I mean, look, we’re not claiming that we know everything about investing in art as an actual investment strategy. So if you do it, tell us your story in the Dentist Advisors Discussion group. Maybe we’ll… I don’t know. That’d be kind of a cool interview. Someone who actually has made a legit investment strategy out of art. Let us know in the DAFBG.

Matt Mulcock:
DFBG group, or no, that was redundant.

Ryan Isaac:
DA discussion group-

Matt Mulcock:
DA-

Ryan Isaac:
D A D G O F B.

Matt Mulcock:
There it is. We somehow made it harder.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes, we did. Last question of the day, this hits close to home for me. I promise I did not submit this question, but I would like to hear your answers because I need some personal financial advice right now.

Matt Mulcock:
Let’s do this. Live advice to Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
The question was, I’m going to buy a house… This totally sounds like, “Hey, I’m asking for a friend,” [crosstalk 00:20:35].

Matt Mulcock:
I’m asking for a friend, I promise.

Ryan Isaac:
I’m asking for a friend, guys. This person said I’m going to buy a house and I’m not sure if I should put more money down and keep the mortgage small and the payment smaller, or if I should just keep my cash for something else and just get a bigger mortgage. Matt, what say ye?

Matt Mulcock:
Ye say, I… Yeah, no it’s a great question. This comes up all the time and yeah, this is totally a question from Ryan just masked as a asking for a friend, no question.

Ryan Isaac:
I swear a dentist asked this question recently.

Matt Mulcock:
I swear, I promise. Interesting timing. So my take on this is, we have to look at obviously the individual situation. That goes without saying. But just generally speaking, with where rates are right now, I would say, on average for most people, I would say, take a bigger mortgage, keep your cash. And again, with rates where they are at, I’d almost get to the point, almost, where I’d say it’s on the edge of financially irresponsible to put down more than the standard amount.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, that feels like a hot take.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. From the spreadsheet side of things. If I don’t know you, the people out there, I don’t know you individually, but just generally, I’d say if you’re getting a two and a half percent mortgage on a 30 year, or even a 15 year, whatever, I’d probably say 30, two and a half to 3%. Again, there’s so many better places your money can be working for you. And as an advisor, I’d say it is almost, again, on the edge of irresponsible, to say you should be putting down more than just the minimum.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. And of course there’s caveats to that. I mean, if you’re at a point where your net worth is at a certain level and your savings rate and your liquidity rate, and your income, and you just got cash to throw around, and like, fine.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, You’re maxing out all your retirement plans, you’re saving 50 grand a month, okay, sure. But if that’s the case, you’re probably not even asking this question anyway.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. It might just be an afterthought. Yeah. I think there’s, with debt reduction, there’s always two answers. I mean, one is the one you’re bringing up, which is the, if we’re just doing the mathematical stone-cold, unemotional robot answer, today’s rates, I mean, most investments, maybe even artwork, most investments will outperform the rates that you have on long-term debt right now.

Ryan Isaac:
So mathematically, it’s not really a question of what would be better. The other side of debt that’s not measurable, and it totally varies between people, is just the emotional side of debt. And how that weighs on you and how you feel about it. If it’s a bigger, a smaller balance. So it’s harder to say, and those two things have to be made in conjunction, which is… Look, this is why personal financial advice, that’s the personal part of personal financial advice, is when someone needs to make a decision, it’s not always the numbers answer. It’s not always just, what does the math say? Or what does the spreadsheet say?

Ryan Isaac:
I mean, you really have to know another human being. You have to trust each other. You have to have some history. You have to have context of the big picture to be able to look that person in the eye and say, “Here’s what I think is in your best interest, based on what I know about you.” Yeah, there’s two sides to that. And part of it too is, how does cashflow end up working out? If the monthly payment’s going to bury you, I mean, maybe there’s a whole other question to be asked if that’s the case, but then maybe you need to put more down so that the loan’s smaller and the monthly payment doesn’t jeopardize your situation.

Matt Mulcock:
Or, the other part of that would be, maybe I need to look at a different… Maybe you’re just over buying a house, if that’s the case.

Ryan Isaac:
You might be spending too much money, getting too much house. Or you’re too close to the beach, you need to move further in-land-

Matt Mulcock:
Asking for a friend.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally just asking for a friend. We’ll go full disclosure, I’m in the same situation. I’m choosing to put down the absolute minimum on my loan, take a higher monthly payment, and I’m keeping a good chunk of my cash that I would have had to give in the loan, and I’m investing it in a boring, super boring, very simple, low cost, globally diversified portfolio that all our clients also have. And I’m just going to hold it for 30 years and keep putting money in there.

Ryan Isaac:
And this… It feels like a whole other can of worms I shouldn’t even [crosstalk 00:24:55].

Matt Mulcock:
I’m ready for this. I’m so excited.

Ryan Isaac:
I do have a client who is huge into crypto. So many people are. It’s not even like a… It’s not even just like the cool people do it anymore. It’s pretty mainstream, right? I still have had no interest. I still have no interest, but I’ve kind of committed to him that I’m going to, for the sake of knowing what it’s like, knowing what my clients go through-

Matt Mulcock:
Are you doing it?

Ryan Isaac:
I think I’m going to buy some crypto. Refer to the disclaimer that plays at the beginning of every single episode that we’ve ever done, this is not financial advice. I’m just stating, I’m being transparent, I’m being vulnerable, I’m being personal. I’m getting a bigger mortgage with less money down. I’m going to invest it-

Matt Mulcock:
All in crypto.

Ryan Isaac:
No.

Ryan Isaac:
I’m keeping it to a very small… It might end up being three to 5% of my portfolio [crosstalk 00:25:45].

Matt Mulcock:
This took a wild turn, by the way.

Ryan Isaac:
It totally did. But to experience with my clients experience, he talked me into it and I’m like, all right, man, I’m going to do it then. And I don’t even want to.

Matt Mulcock:
But you’re going to do it. It’s a learning experience. So, okay. So three to 5% of your portfolio. So you’re going to throw probably a low seven figure number at it, something like that.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Yeah. But there’s some decimals too in that, so-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh yeah. Not commas, decimals. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s like five from the right.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. There you go.

Ryan Isaac:
So yeah. It’s like two numbers and then a decimal, and then the other five digits. So yeah, wow. I didn’t mean to go there on everybody.

Matt Mulcock:
I know, that took a wild turn. We went from what to do on your house to Ryan’s buying crypto. This is a massive announcement. You just plugged in there at the end of the Q&A podcast.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Not that anything I do is inspiring or motivating for anyone to also go do, but don’t do it.

Matt Mulcock:
I’m going literally right now, as we finish this, to go put in money in crypto, I was waiting for you-

Ryan Isaac:
That’s now what I’m saying, I literally don’t care about it. I don’t even want it. But I think… It doesn’t feel… It’s not like I’m going to go bet on something that’s totally insane. [crosstalk 00:26:55] It feels as insane to me as I want to get with my investments. I do not have sexy investment strategy desires. I like my boring portfolio. I just want to hold it forever, but I will do a little chunk here and it’ll be fun to report back. So this totally took a turn, sorry.

Matt Mulcock:
We’ve got to do a follow-up episode after you do this.

Ryan Isaac:
I’ll let you know. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Matt Mulcock:
Back to the house. You do agree as well, that less down most likely would be … Again, you highlighted the same thing that I did-

Ryan Isaac:
Generally for most dentists, yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
A lot of details, obviously we’d have to know of your individual situation, but generally speaking, you’re better off putting less down.

Ryan Isaac:
Right now, in general. I mean, if you’re outfitting a few new ops and it’s a six figure amount or you’re like remodeling the office, you’re buying a practice building. It’s just like, debt is just too cheap right now. There’s just no mathematical argument to pay down debt instead of invest it somewhere else, like your practice, or an investment account. Not crypto. Don’t do that. Don’t do that.

Matt Mulcock:
No, I mean, you heard it here. Ryan is saying, put less down in your house and put it all in crypto.

Ryan Isaac:
Do it in something very long-term sustainable, probably boring. Yeah, crypto and art.

Matt Mulcock:
[crosstalk 00:28:07] and a couple of Picassos and you’re good.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. All right. Well I think we more than covered these questions. Oh my gosh. We went places we did not intend to explore. I hope it’s helpful. Q&A’s are fun. We’re just trying to be transparent here and just say, here’s what’s going on in our lives. We have the same questions that we need to answer as everyone else does, the people listening and the people we work with, we have the same portfolios as our clients do. We have the same real estate decisions.

Ryan Isaac:
I mean, we’re all trying to do the same things and experience the same things, and the more we can experience as advisors… See, that’s why, if you don’t know, by the name Dentist Advisors, that’s all we do. We only work with dentists and have for 15 years. So that’s why it kind of helps to just be with someone who maybe has either walked in your shoes or has walked in the shoes with hundreds or thousands of other people just like you, to just be able to say like, yeah, I’ve seen how this plays out before. And let me tell you about it and let’s discuss it. And that’s why it’s helpful. So I’m just trying to be more helpful. [crosstalk 00:29:04] a little bit more.

Matt Mulcock:
Hey, I was vulnerable on one of the last episodes. I don’t even know if it’s come out yet, about how we approached some debt, and I massively regret it, and it’s just, we’re human too. We’re humans, too.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, you did. I remember, we are humans. Plural. All right, everybody. If you have questions after this, you might have a lot of questions after this that have nothing to do with these things that we brought up. If they’re that kind of questions, DM me and we’ll take care of it privately, but… That just took a turn. But what I’m saying-

Matt Mulcock:
That took a wild turn.

Ryan Isaac:
But what I’m saying though, is if you have some general questions about these subjects or anything else in your personal financial situation, your investment accounts, when is it time to hire an advisor, paid off debt, that kind of stuff, refinance, insurance questions. We don’t sell insurance. We don’t make any money on insurance, but we know tons about it and we consult on it every day. Then, sign up a call on our calendar. One of our advisors will make some time. You can just book at your own convenience, dentistadvisors.com and let’s chat. Or again, go to the D A D G O F V, and post a question and we will post an answer and maybe use it for a Q&A episode that we then derail with our own personal life stories afterwards.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly. This felt like more of a DA after hours episode, which by the way, maybe that’s a comment you want to make, of like, do you want us to do a little… You mentioned swearing, I’m like, maybe we do a DA after hours special, where maybe uncle Matt gets a little tipsy during the episode. Maybe we swear a little bit more-

Ryan Isaac:
There might be… Yeah, people get a little looser-

Matt Mulcock:
Get a little bit looser. We’re thinking about it. Let us know.

Ryan Isaac:
Let us know if you want some DA after hours content. Everyone, thanks for joining us. Thanks for being here. We’ll catch you next time. Take care.

 

Debt & Financing, Investing