What I Wish I Knew When I Was 22 – Episode 272

Did the money mistakes of your youth bias how you think about investing today?

On this episode of the Dentist Money™ Show, Ryan and Matt examine some of their early money decisions and how the choices they made back then helped form what they believe today.

As you look back, did the lessons you learned about money shape your today for the better? Or, do early mistakes still impede your financial progress? Experience is the best teacher and Ryan and Matt offer some compelling advice to their younger selves that you can use right now.

 

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Podcast Transcript

Ryan Isaac:
Hey everybody. Welcome to another wonderful episode of the Dentist Money Show sponsored by Dentist Advisors, a no commission, fiduciary dental specific comprehensive financial planner, just for dentists all over the country, check us out at dentistadvisors.com. Today, Matt and I talk about advice. Financial advice we would give our younger selves, if we could go back in time. Very fun concept to think about, some ideas here. What would you go back and tell your younger self to help your path be a little bit easier along the way? Thanks for joining us today. Thanks for being a part of the episode and the Dentist Money Show all these years. If you have any questions, go to dentistadvisors.com, schedule a free consultation with one of our very friendly dental specific, no commission, fiduciary, comprehensive financial advisors, all that stuff. Chat with one of us or go to the Dentist Advisors discussion group on Facebook. Post a question, we’ll post an answer. Again, thanks for joining us guys. We appreciate the love and support. Enjoy the show.

Announcer:
Consult an advisor or 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 Isaac.

Ryan Isaac:
Welcome to the Dentist Money Show, where we help dentists make smart financial decisions. I am Ryan Isaac, and I’m here with a guy who is literally dancing the robot. It is Matt, the Hollywood Mountain, Mulcock. What’s up, Matt? Thanks for joining me. How you doing?

Matt Mulcock:
Yo Ryan. I was dancing. I was.

Ryan Isaac:
You were, as I was talking, you were roboting.

Matt Mulcock:
I was roboting to every word, every… like the cadence of your voice. It was just… It was so rhythmic.

Ryan Isaac:
I am so robotic. Thank you for pointing that out. I’m glad you were started dancing because today we’re going to start with some song lyrics from an absolute queen. And you probably know who I’m talking about, when I say queen of song lyrics and music in general, probably just queen of the world. It is a dear Ms. Taylor Swift.

Matt Mulcock:
Okay. All right. Can I be honest with you?

Ryan Isaac:
I know what-

Matt Mulcock:
When you-

Ryan Isaac:
… you’re going to say you’re not a fan.

Matt Mulcock:
When you said queen of the world, I thought Beyonce.

Ryan Isaac:
Which is fair.

Matt Mulcock:
Queen B.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Matt Mulcock:
Come on.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes, that’s fair.

Matt Mulcock:
But Taylor Swift is great. She could also be queen.

Ryan Isaac:
There could be multiple… this is like-

Matt Mulcock:
There could multiple queens.

Ryan Isaac:
And they all got crowns. Taylor said it in another… they all got crowns, dude..

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
They can all… You know what I mean?

Matt Mulcock:
You ever seen Game of Thrones people? There can be multiple queens.

Ryan Isaac:
There can be multiple queens, and there probably should be.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
There’s a lot of stuff to get done, we need lots of queens. All right, so I’m glad we got that out of the way. Here’s what we’re getting at. But, on a side note, I actually watched on Netflix last night, maybe it was Amazon, the Taylor Swift Reputation Live concert with my two oldest daughters last night.

Matt Mulcock:
And?

Ryan Isaac:
It was amazing. They were like emotional and crying during certain parts.

Matt Mulcock:
Of course.

Ryan Isaac:
And I was just feeling the power dude, it was so good. So good. Can’t wait till concerts start again. Okay. Here’s what we’re going to talk about today, and this is kind of a fun topic because now I’m an old man, you’re on your way to become an old man.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, I’m there.

Ryan Isaac:
If you’re there yet?

Matt Mulcock:
I’m there.

Ryan Isaac:
You feel it? You feel old?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Okay. That’s just like how a knee or a back feels. That depends on the day.

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, dude. Honestly, every day I’m like, “I’m just getting old.” My back’s hurting, my Achilles, my shoulder.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s fair. Well-

Matt Mulcock:
I don’t understand like the new platforms that are coming out-

Ryan Isaac:
What’s the Tick?

Matt Mulcock:
… Clubhouse and all this stuff.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s the Clubhouse?

Matt Mulcock:
What are the young kids doing now? I’m officially old.

Ryan Isaac:
This is where you send those talks on the Clubhouse?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
What are you?

Matt Mulcock:
Isn’t it basically just a conference call app? What is going on? I don’t understand.

Ryan Isaac:
I need less apps in my life, that’s true.

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
And here’s what we’re going to do today. We’re going to give ourselves, our younger selves financial advice, and it was really kind of a cool thing to think about. I’m trying to picture the average person listening. Every month, there’s a whole host of different kinds of people listening, tons of students and new career associates. There’s a lot of like late career. There’s a lot of retirees who listen. So this will be kind of a fun exercise. The invitation as you’re listening to this would be like, kind of just play along here with us and think of advice you would want to give your younger self.

Ryan Isaac:
What would be super cool is when this episode comes out, probably the next few weeks, go over to the Dentist Advisors discussion group on Facebook, and let’s get a thread started. I’ll post this link in here when it comes out and then, what are the kinds of advice you would give your younger self? But that’s what we’re going to do today. I’m going to start with… And so I guess if you’re a student listening to this, your younger self is like 15.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. What would you tell your 15-year-old self?

Ryan Isaac:
Which is still… There’s probably some good advice, I’d be like, “Just don’t do all those stupid things.”

Matt Mulcock:
Which, by the way, if you’re a student listening to this and you’re going to go back and tell your 15-year-old self something, there’s probably not much, because you’re in dental school right now and you’re killing it.

Ryan Isaac:
You’re doing an awesome job.

Matt Mulcock:
And you’ve got a great career ahead of you.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. If you’re listening to this and you’re like slinging tacos at a stand near like a famous surf spot, you also did it right.

Matt Mulcock:
Absolutely.

Ryan Isaac:
Good job. So-

Matt Mulcock:
You might’ve done it better than anyone?

Ryan Isaac:
Nothing to correct there. Okay. So to get this started, I’m going to… Going back to the Taylor Swift thing, there’s a song called 22. Are you a fan of 22? Came from-

Matt Mulcock:
I am.

Ryan Isaac:
… the Red album.

Matt Mulcock:
I am a big fan of T Swift. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Okay. So, I mean, the whole thing’s about like, when we were young again… So here’s the thing, when we started this topic, Tad, one of our producers was like, “Let’s name the show…” Something around advice. What was it? Like, what advice I would give my 22-year-old self or-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, I can’t… I honestly don’t remember the exact title.

Ryan Isaac:
Hold on. No title, he titled it as is something cool, and that’s why this reminded me. Oh, it was advice to our younger selves, for some reason the age 22 came up, and then I just thought of the song, 22.

Matt Mulcock:
Because when we initially talked about it… And by the way, the mindset I had for this, when we were preparing for this was 22.

Ryan Isaac:
Really?

Matt Mulcock:
Because that was the original conversation we had.

Ryan Isaac:
I think in my head, I think that’d probably be a good place to start. Some of my more impactful financial decisions were slightly later, they were like mid to late 20s, is the timeframe I have in my head. But Taylor Swift, 22, Red album, there’s this line where she says, “We’re happy, free, confused, and lonely in the best way.” I’m like, “That sums up 22.”

Matt Mulcock:
It’s so true.

Ryan Isaac:
Happy, free, confused, lonely-

Matt Mulcock:
And lonely.

Ryan Isaac:
… in the best way, miserable and magical, oh yeah. That’s what she says.

Matt Mulcock:
Complicated humans, we were.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I don’t know about you, but I’m feeling 22, and that’s what we’re going to jump into right now. So, Matt, I’ve got a list of three things that I would give myself. And by the way, I really tried hard to think of three things that were not just general pieces of good financial advice, which I think would still be helpful. I really tried to think of three specific types of financial situations I found my younger self in, that I would go back and give different advice and try to coach myself to make a different decision. But I think these are applicable to a lot of people at all kinds of stages in life. So I’ve got a list. How many do you have on your list?

Matt Mulcock:
I mean, I did… I’ve got like four main ones, and then I’ve got a couple of bonus ones if we… We’ll just see how it goes.

Ryan Isaac:
Let’s trade shots. All right?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
We’ll go tit for tat, as they say-

Matt Mulcock:
Tit for tat.

Ryan Isaac:
… in the music industry. Do they say that? I don’t know.

Matt Mulcock:
Probably.

Ryan Isaac:
My first one, my first piece of advice that really shaped a lot of my younger financial decisions, habits, consequences, opportunities, stresses, anxieties was centered around real estate, and to set the stage… So here here’s the advice I would give myself, and then I’ll set the stage a little bit. The advice I would give my younger self and anybody younger or finding themselves in this situation, the advice would be, don’t worry about getting caught up in a real estate craze, feeling like you are the last person on earth who’s ever going to own a house, and you’re totally going to miss out. And it’s never going to happen ever… No opportunity like this ever again in your lifetime.

Ryan Isaac:
So rewind back to ’04, I’m 24 years old. I’m still.., I don’t remember what I was doing, school was done, child number two was on the way I think, I don’t remember, somewhere around there.

Matt Mulcock:
How old were you?

Ryan Isaac:
I was 24. No, no, no, no, no, no child number one was on the way. We just learned about child number one.

Matt Mulcock:
Okay, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
Oh, I was finishing up some school, actually. My wife was working full-time, she was making all the money. I was like waiting tables, actually, and going to school. That’s what it was.

Matt Mulcock:
She was carrying the team.

Ryan Isaac:
She was.

Matt Mulcock:
In all facets.

Ryan Isaac:
At the time, it was the ’05 housing craze, we lived in Utah at the time. And on the West side of the Utah Valley, Salt Lake City Valley, it’s like all open contaminated fields from the old Kennecott Mines that they’re building houses on. It’s actually where I grew up, and it was all fields when I grew up out there. And man, the housing… the boom was happening and construction was… They couldn’t even keep up with demand, construction on new houses, taking like a year to get it finished out there and moved in. And people were buying houses… And also this is the time when you could basically get loans by lying.

Matt Mulcock:
By just literally telling them whatever you wanted to.

Ryan Isaac:
I remember getting my-

Matt Mulcock:
Stated income

Ryan Isaac:
… first home loan, dude, I stopped waiting tables, I got my first job. My wife quit her job. I got a job. It was like a commission only, pure commission only. And my lender was like, “What do you make?” And I’m like, “Literally, nothing. I don’t know.” And she was like, “Well, give me some ranges of what some of the top producers make.” And I was like, “Okay.” That was my loan dude. That was like the loan process.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Literally, loan officers at the time were like, “Just…” Or you could go to your loan officer and just be like, “What do I have to make, on paper, for me to get this?” And they were like, “X.” And you’re like, “Okay, that’s what I make.”

Ryan Isaac:
“That’s what I do.” And appraisers were lying, and so anyway, that’s the loan environment. All of my friends, still in college, most of them don’t even-

Matt Mulcock:
Owning four homes.

Ryan Isaac:
… have their first job. Dude, they’re all getting homes. They’re all like right out of college, they’re getting like 4,500, 5,000 square feet, finished basements, big yards. And I’m like, “What is happening? What is going on?” And it didn’t take long, we were in an apartment, and we were just going to keep going that way. But it only took like six months, and probably… I still specifically remember some sitting down with some friends, one of them was at Chick-fil-A, that we ran into one night, and they were telling us about their new house they’re building.

Ryan Isaac:
It took like six months before it changed our minds completely. We went into the model home place. We picked out a house. We had not a penny in savings and no income really yet, and got a house and a loan, and it was a miserably stressful time for a while. There was a lot of ups and downs, man. And I guess the moral of that story is I just remember feeling like if I did not do something at that moment, the real estate opportunity of my lifetime would pass me by, and I would never see anything like it again. And what was happening is it was taken a year to build houses, so we were all getting 50, 75, a 100 grand worth of equity in our houses before we moved, and then-

Matt Mulcock:
Before you did anything.

Ryan Isaac:
Before we moved in and then we’d close, and it’d be worth a 100 grand more when it was a final appraise, but then guess what we all did? We took out HELOCs, because you-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, yeah, and they did it again.

Ryan Isaac:
… can do that. And luckily, I finished the basement with my HELOC, and then I also… I literally day traded with money. I did, man. I mean, I did the stupidest things. So, anyway, I would just tell my younger self, and I would tell anybody, I would just-

Matt Mulcock:
You were just becoming a real estate mogul.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, I thought I was dude. Actually, I went with three friends during that time, we each put in a thousand bucks for another spec home somewhere. And just thinking it would take a year to build, we’d come out with like a $100,000 of equity, and then I ended up just like walking from my money, and we’re like, “We can’t close on a loan.” I’m like, “Dude…” So anyway, I would just tell anyone, I’d tell my younger self, and I would tell anyone feeling the pressure, especially, not necessarily investment real estate, but feeling the pressure, especially for a primary residence to just simmer down-

Matt Mulcock:
Just take you time.

Ryan Isaac:
|…. calm it a little bit, breathe deep, and realize that there will be so many real estate buying opportunities in your life. There is no such thing as the one and only dream spot, because the emotions will pass and it won’t be a dream anymore. It will be okay. And if it’s not right time, if you’re not ready, if it’s going to max out your liquidity, and put you in a bad spot, just wait. There’s nothing wrong with renting and leasing and just waiting.

Ryan Isaac:
And what was crazy, is we were in that spot, we pulled out HELOCs, all my friends were getting more houses with their HELOC money, and I was like, “I’m the dumb one. I don’t have four houses.” Two years later, everything crashes, no one can sell, everyone’s short selling, and some of my friends are foreclosing. We thought we were just going to bail and move, and we were like, “What do we do?” And then all of a sudden the buying opportunity for real estate was there, then it was ’09, 2010, 2011-

Matt Mulcock:
Afterward.

Ryan Isaac:
… some of my smart friends that waited and had cash, man, they picked up some insane houses for cheap, and then they did it right. So anyway, that’s my advice to my 22-year-old younger self, and anyone in that position, man. It’s just like, don’t… just let… The pressures, okay. Realize there will be more times in your life, and you don’t have to cave into that.

Matt Mulcock:
So there was a theme there, Ryan, that I was picking up, when you were going through that, from one of my bonus ones that I’ll just kind of pull up to the top-

Ryan Isaac:
Cool.

Matt Mulcock:
… because I think it coincides. But simply put, just don’t compare yourself to others. As they say, comparison is a thief of joy and leads to horrible decisions. So that was one of my bonus ones, but as you were going through that, I’m thinking, I mean, how many times young dumb 21, 22 year olds, I was there, it sounds like you were there, making decisions based off of what you’re seeing around you or trying to compare yourself to others. And you’re never going to win that game. You’re never-

Ryan Isaac:
No.

Matt Mulcock:
… going to win that status game, so that was cheating.

Ryan Isaac:
Well, I want to say that, too, though, because you bring up a good point, is when all the hype dies away and the smoke clears and then the reality sets in for people, then you learn real stories about each other. And you’re like-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
… “Oh, you’re losing your house? Well, why? Oh, I thought that you… You’ve been vacationing and you’ve got three homes-

Matt Mulcock:
… and it’s even worse now-

Ryan Isaac:
… and a Maserati.”

Matt Mulcock:
Right? I mean, it’s even worse now in today’s age with the… We are at the peak of social media and height-

Ryan Isaac:
I hope it dies from here.

Matt Mulcock:
…. of comparison.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I hope it’s the peak and it dies from here [crosstalk 00:14:46]-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. I hope so.

Ryan Isaac:
We’ve watched dentists make real estate, especially primary residence decisions for many years, and it’s no different from anyone else, man. We all get caught up in the hype and the emotion and we all get caught in that feeling of like, “I’ll… Never, again, will this ever come up, this opportunity?” And what’s funny is we watch people pass opportunities up and then find better ones later, all the time. All the time. It happens. It’s going to be okay.

Matt Mulcock:
Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
Anyway, that was number one. I’d like the bonus add on. Thanks for doing that.

Matt Mulcock:
I kind of cheated there. I’m sorry.

Ryan Isaac:
No, it wasn’t a cheat seat. We ended up having similar stuff on our list every time we do this anyway-

Matt Mulcock:
I know. For sure.

Ryan Isaac:
Without even talking about. Okay, number two, what do you got?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. So, I mean, I like how specific you got with like a story. I don’t know if I have a specific story for this, but-

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. It was like therapy for me. Welcome, buddy to my public therapist session, appreciate it.

Matt Mulcock:
I’m sure I can pull out a story that-

Ryan Isaac:
I’m sure you can.

Matt Mulcock:
… encompasses this or either one of us could. So my number one, I wrote, this is, again, talking to my 22-year-old self, you have no money, so be thoughtful with how you spend your time. I had obviously, being-

Ryan Isaac:
Can you say that again?

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
That was good.

Matt Mulcock:
You have no money, so be thoughtful with how you spend your time.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
My wife and I talk about this all the time. We got married relatively young. I got married at like 24, and we were married through a very poor stage of our life, just building our careers, trying to figure out life. So we always talk about like the cruelty of life when you’re first married of like, you either have tons of time or you have… or eventually, you get to a place … or maybe you don’t have tons of money, but you have some money, but then you have no time, because-

Ryan Isaac:
Because you got the teeter totter.

Matt Mulcock:
… you’ve got kids, you’ve got a career. So I was thinking about that, as I was going through this exercise, and at that time in my life, I had no money, I had lots of time and freedom, but I think, I wish I could have gone back and been more thoughtful with how I spent that time, because it was all I had.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. That’s all you’ve got. We talk about that a lot, when people are making decisions, especially when to hire a financial advisor. And one of the questions, like how do I know when it’s time? And it’s kind of hard to say what that point is going to be for everybody, but we all kind of start out our careers that same way, man. Like you said, we have no money and all the time in the world, and then when we finally achieve all the success and dreams we’ve been chasing, then all of a sudden we’ve got the money and then no time anymore.

Matt Mulcock:
You have no time. Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
And then all, and then all we want to do is desperately take that money to buy back time.

Matt Mulcock:
Buy back time.

Ryan Isaac:
Like hire someone for the yard, you have the place and the thing, and the dude… Just do everything for me, please, I just need some time. If nothing more than just to just chill for once and not be busy. So-

Matt Mulcock:
Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
… I think that’s really good, man. I want to throw on the back of that one, what I think coincides really well with that, which is just focusing on career. And I think you can just take that time lesson of spending it wisely, and I don’t mean like lose yourself in working 80 hours a week. Maybe that’s your thing. I don’t know, to each his own, but those early years of 20s and for dentists it’s pushed back a little bit more, it’s usually late 20s, early 30s, when they’re starting to get out of school and experiment with careers. I just think you still have a lot of time on your hands, especially if we’re talking just about dentists, you have plenty of time, multiple decades to make money and great money and save money and have money, and you’ll be fine.

Ryan Isaac:
I just think that someone should take every opportunity they can to learn about the career path. Specifically for a dentist, it would be, before you commit to a city or a state or a type of practice or philosophy or a partnership or an… just take your time, give yourself permission to take a few years, to learn in different practice environments, really nail down what you want to do and where you want to be, because that career will drive all of the other financial decisions you’re going to make in your future. So-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, everything.

Ryan Isaac:
Everything man, and I guess the context I’m coming at this with, the theme here is a welcome to Ryan’s therapy, A. Number two, I am insanely influenced by peer pressure. Okay.

Matt Mulcock:
What you can’t see right now is that Ryan is currently laying on a couch.

Ryan Isaac:
I’m on a couch, I’m laying down-

Matt Mulcock:
And I have my clipboard and I’m taking notes, and we’re going to-

Ryan Isaac:
I just… I’m very influenced by my surroundings, probably, like a lot of people. And I remember being in my 20s and feeling pressure again from like what you said, comparing myself… In hindsight, which is funny, because I shouldn’t have been. Now looking back and seeing the full story and full picture. But I compared my career, I’d be like, “Man, I’m 26 and I’m not in my career yet. I’m not like deep in my career. I don’t know what I want to do, totally.” 26 is about the year I met Reese Harper, actually. 2006, 2005, actually, so-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, when it all started. When it all started.

Ryan Isaac:
When it all started to slowly begin. And so, I felt a lot of pressure to like hurry and choose something. I think dentists feel that too. We hear the stories too, where someone’s an associate, maybe it’s been a year, two, or three years, and they’re just like, they feel like they have to hurry and rush a practice decision, “Oh, I better start something.” Or, “I better buy in somewhere.” And sometimes people will rush that decision and make partnerships or deals they don’t really want to do, but they’re just doing it, because they feel like they got to hurry. And so that’d be my advice, too, on the-

Matt Mulcock:
Or they-

Ryan Isaac:
… back of what you’re saying in your career, just slow down and take your time.

Matt Mulcock:
Or take it even further, I mean, I’ve seen… This is probably extreme, but I’ve seen it, where they think they have to build some empire, right?

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Matt Mulcock:
Whether that be DSO empire or real estate or whatever, they have this… and it again… Which is great if that’s what you want to do and that’s what brings you purpose and meaning to your life. That’s awesome. There’s something behind that. But I think all too often, stuff like that comes from this comparison influence, and I think that’s where it becomes an issue, because that’ll leave you empty every time.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, totally, man. And, yeah, I think that’s such a good… it just happens a lot. That happens all time, just that pressure to=

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. We’re human, that… We’re social animals. That’s what we… I mean, you can’t avoid that.

Ryan Isaac:
Can avoid it. So, all right. We’ve hit a time. We’ve hit real estate. We’ve hit career. We’re going to take a little break. We’ve got a couple more on our list. We’ll be right back after these message-

Matt Mulcock:
After the messages-

Ryan Isaac:
… we’ll be right back.

Matt Mulcock:
… we’ll be right back.

Ryan Isaac:
Ding.

Matt Mulcock:
A little bit back on the Dentist Money Show, we teach dentists how to make smart financial decisions.

Ryan Isaac:
You’re correct.

Matt Mulcock:
I mean, is that all it takes Ryan to make smart financial decisions, listening to our show?

Ryan Isaac:
Matt, it’s a good first step, but to put your financial future on the fast track, the next smart decision is to go to dentistadvisors.com. What you do there is you click on the book free consultation button, right in the middle of the home screen, and then you schedule a time to talk with one of our very friendly dental specific financial advisors today.

Ryan Isaac:
We’ve got a few more here. So advice, the topic we’re on, advice we would give our younger selves. And, again, the point of this exercise is to put yourself in these shoes too, and say, “What would I tell my younger self? What would I do differently?” Or what would you congratulate your younger self on? That’d be kind of a fun bonus point to [crosstalk 00:22:06]-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, let me get that list out. That’s so long.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah, what would you-

Matt Mulcock:
That’s 14 pages.

Ryan Isaac:
… pat yourself on the back for?

Matt Mulcock:
We don’t have time for that one, Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
We don’t have time. If it was to my teenage self, I’d be like, I pat you on the back for not getting caught doing all those things.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
Good job, buddy.

Matt Mulcock:
You got away with it, good job.

Ryan Isaac:
Good job, buddy. All right. So another one on my list that we’re going to give a little shout out here to a little Dave Ramsey advice, and my piece of advice would be have an emergency fund at a young age. I went through the Dave Ramsey program when we were like, I don’t know, 25 or 26. Saw him live, we did the whole booklet.

Matt Mulcock:
You did the whole thing?

Ryan Isaac:
We did the whole thing, dude. We saw him live and we cheered, and we walked out of there feeling so empowered and excited, and had some credit cards. We had, Oh, this is the house we moved into. It was the HELOC that finished the basement, and bought my first flat screen and couch. Guess what I did. I sold my basement furniture and TV and everything.

Matt Mulcock:
After the Dave Ramsey thing?

Ryan Isaac:
After the Dave Ramsey, and I paid off some credit card debt with it.

Matt Mulcock:
That’s awesome.

Ryan Isaac:
I did. I did some stuff, man. And we built an emergency fund, and then it went away. Probably spent it on something and-

Matt Mulcock:
You found an emergency to spend it on.

Ryan Isaac:
Found an emergency, that’s, I swear, the first 10 years of life and having kids is all just paying for emergencies in medical bills constantly. That’s all it was.

Matt Mulcock:
I think my wife and I have different definitions of what an emergency is.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. But they’re… They feel like emergencies. That would be my advice to my younger self is have an emergency fund of cash, younger in life, and always maintain it, and don’t steal from it. Don’t take from your emergency fund, man. A car-

Matt Mulcock:
Just because you urgently want to go to Hawaii does not mean that is an emergency.

Ryan Isaac:
That’s not an emergency. A car is going to break. You will have to get a root canal done. You will-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, boy.

Ryan Isaac:
… get sick. Or if you’ve got kids, man, there will be a medical-

Matt Mulcock:
There will be.

Ryan Isaac:
… something you’ve got to show up to the doctor for. A fridge is going to break. The floor… something’s going to leak under the flooring. It’s going to happen, have an emergency fund. How that applies to as you get older and the way we do financial planning for dentist and segment cashflows and priorities of where money should go, we would define an emergency fund that would be anywhere from three to six months of someone’s personal monthly spending. Three months, if you’ve got a couple income earners in the house or quite a big net worth of liquidity somewhere else that could, yeah, help out.

Matt Mulcock:
I was just going to say, the bigger your liquidity gets elsewhere, you can drop that.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. Get lower. Six months, if you’re a sole income earner and you don’t have a big net worth or much liquidity anywhere else, and things are still kind of new and growing. But have an emergency fund, man, because there’s always an emergency. That’s what I would tell my younger self. Back to you, Matt.

Matt Mulcock:
Back to me, Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
Back to you.

Matt Mulcock:
So number two, for me, it kind of layers on top of my first one, which again, you have no money.

Ryan Isaac:
You’re like a cake man. You made an-

Matt Mulcock:
I’m basically a cake.

Ryan Isaac:
… advise cake today.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Yeah. I really did-

Ryan Isaac:
A content cake.

Matt Mulcock:
… a scrumptious advice cake is what made.

Ryan Isaac:
I like it. Let’s do it.

Matt Mulcock:
And I’m not a baker at all, so it is not a good analogy for me. But number two would be, when you actually do get some money, save and invest now, even if it’s a little bit.

Ryan Isaac:
Yes.

Matt Mulcock:
Just start that habit now.

Ryan Isaac:
Do you ever think about some of your old first job 401(k)s that when you’re in your 20s, and you’re like “A 401(k), I don’t know. Are you going to match me a few thousand bucks?” Dude, a few thousand bucks every single year, that’s not even your own money.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s free money.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. It’s like-

Matt Mulcock:
It is a guaranteed a 100% rate of return on your contribution.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s extra savings rate, man. Right now in my life, our company’s got a very generous match on our 401(k) and that boosts my savings rate a lot. And it’s awesome, and-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. It’s huge.

Ryan Isaac:
And what’s really exciting, we get to see this as advisors in our own lives, but we get to watch other people do this, so it’s just compound and multiplied. But it’s amazing how fast even little bits of money pile up. Time goes by no matter what, and our lives are just getting faster and faster and busier, especially the older you get. And it’s amazing how little bits of money still pile up and how you can turn around and be like, “Oh, I’ve got a 100 grand.” We see this happen to clients all the time. They start from nothing, they’re stressed, and not that long down the road, they’ve got like a 100 grand in liquidity from little habits.

Matt Mulcock:
Just little increments. Yep.

Ryan Isaac:
From beginning, from starting, and we know from experience that beginning and starting is just easier when you’ve got some handholding and you’ve got a process you’ve got to follow, you’ve got some accountability and you got accountability to numbers. Your emotions get stripped out of it. And that’s usually more helpful when there’s another party involved helping you pull emotion out of your decision-making. So I love that one, dude. I was thinking about that too. And it’s so cliche, just save money as early as you kid son.

Matt Mulcock:
You’re going to be fine. Just save money.

Ryan Isaac:
What’s crazy is that you see those old… Those comparers, you see them on blog posts, “If you saved money from 18 to 29, you could stop saving for the rest of your life, because of compound interest in-

Matt Mulcock:
It’s huge.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s true though.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. Honest-

Ryan Isaac:
It’s so true.

Matt Mulcock:
There’s this theme I have of time apparently. But time is your best friend, obviously early on. And then there’s a point in your life where all of a sudden it kind of flips and then it becomes your worst enemy, when it comes to investing and building wealth.

Ryan Isaac:
Totally man.

Matt Mulcock:
And you’ve got to take advantage of it as early as you possibly can. And if it’s not you… If you’re not… Here’s the thing, like actionable things you can be telling your younger self here. Obviously, it’s fun to talk about, but how about your kids? How about younger people? This is like number one lesson to teach your kids, put the power of compound interest.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I mean, it’s just math and it’s so huge. I like what you said about time though. It’s such a weird… That’s a weird thing. It feels like you have so much time forever and it’s like a switch. It doesn’t gradually happen. And you’re like, “I feel like I’m running out of time here.” It just overnight, and I think there’s a lot of triggers and we’ve seen this in a lot of people’s lives and in our own. I think there’s a lot of triggers that make you realize suddenly that you don’t have as much time as you once had. It could be like an illness or a death of somebody that just like totally throws everything into perspective. It can be like… I’ve got two, three teenage kids. I’ve got four kids, three are teenagers now.

Ryan Isaac:
And I’m like, “Whoa, wait, when did that happen?” And they’re going to be out of my house in the next five years and half my kids will be gone. I mean, there’s just something that just… it flips all of a sudden. And I think the lesson to learn is you don’t have as much time as you think along the way, because all of a sudden it just changes, and then you’re desperate to get it back. So yeah, that’s huge, man.

Matt Mulcock:
And you’re middle-aged with teenagers, and you’re like, “Where’d my life go?”

Ryan Isaac:
You’re 40 years old-

Matt Mulcock:
Wow.

Ryan Isaac:
… you’re driving a van. And you’re just like-

Matt Mulcock:
We just got depressing here.

Ryan Isaac:
… “How did this happen to me?” Nah, life’s good so far. Man, as of right now, as of the day of this recording, life’s fine enough. So anyway, that was kind of my total list. Recap was real estate, anxiety, giving yourself patience and time, work on your career early on, and hold an emergency fund. I think these things hold true. I mean, look, we all continue to make real estate decisions. And 50-year-olds making real estate decisions are not less emotional than 25-year-olds making real estate decisions, honestly. It’s almost worse, because the 25-year-olds shopping for like a $300,000 house, and the 50-year-old shopping for like a one point five million dollar house. So they’re just… the price tags are very different and the consequences are different, but the emotions are the same, I think. I think they go through the same things and there’s 50-year-olds without emergency funds. I mean, these are basic financial-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, definitely.

Ryan Isaac:
… principles. So that’s my recap, anything else you’d add from you? You had a long list, man. You had bonus points, and you had all kinds of things.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah. We don’t have to hit all… Did you already hit three?

Ryan Isaac:
I hit three. I got three. Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
I guess you started. So-

Ryan Isaac:
I began first, yeah, so let’s end it with you, man.

Matt Mulcock:
Okay.

Ryan Isaac:
Pick one [crosstalk 00:29:56]-

Matt Mulcock:
So my… Again, I’ve got… I don’t want to go through all of them. We don’t want to take this too long. My last one kind of coincides with what we were just saying. So it’s kind of a bonus round, and, again, exactly what we were talking about. So the last one I put here, goals are overrated, focus more on building good habits. So this is something-

Ryan Isaac:
Goals are overrated, focus on habits.

Matt Mulcock:
Focus more on building good habits. This is something I’ve been thinking about a lot, over the last few years of my life. I was always, and still kind of am, a goal setter. Like set goals, and I’m not saying goals are bad. I’m saying goals are overrated. And I think people focus too much on the goal, when they should be focusing more on process and habits, building that system.

Ryan Isaac:
Kind of like people get into this habit of like, when this happens, then. It’s all this when, then kind of stuff.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s outcome driven as opposed to process driven thinking.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. The process. And the process gets lost along the way sometimes too, because you think so much about like, for example, I mean, one of the most common phrases we hear all the time is, “I just want passive residual income. I want passive income. How do I get passive income? Make me some passive.” Yeah.

Matt Mulcock:
I need-

Ryan Isaac:
Make me some passive income.

Matt Mulcock:
Give me some of that. Give it to me now.

Ryan Isaac:
Give me some of that passive income. We all want the passive income, man. But the news story here, the shocker, unfortunately, is that a passive income has developed over like years and years of active work.

Matt Mulcock:
Yes. Exactly.

Ryan Isaac:
The pain and struggle and suffering. So yeah, man, I think that’s a really good one. And I don’t know, I’m kind of just thinking like maybe we’ll wrap up with this thought too. And you can pitch in on this too. I’m just thinking maybe something else that’s helpful for a dentist to pick up earlier in life, and it’s not easy right off the bat, we recognize this, but is bringing other people around you into your life to help you make decisions. This is… I mean, all the decisions you’ve got, like business owning decisions, marketing decisions, legal, accounting, tax, financial investing. You have all these kinds of decisions to make.

Ryan Isaac:
In the beginning, we understand that you’re answering your own phones and probably doing your own hygiene some times. But in increments, as time goes by, it is a skill you have to develop to outsource the people. And all of the things we’ve talked about implementing it, it’s nice to talk about him. It’s easy to say, “Don’t be emotional about real estate or have an emergency fund or use your time wisely, focus on your career, focus on the process.” Like what you just said, focus on process and not outcomes. That’s all easy to say, but it’s really hard to implement and do the right way without making mistakes-

Matt Mulcock:
So much harder.

Ryan Isaac:
… and stick to it. That’s the sauce. How do you like do all that stuff? Not only right the first time, but then stick to it for 20, 30, 50 years. And that’s the thing, I don’t a lot of people-

Matt Mulcock:
Consistency is a super power.

Ryan Isaac:
It is, man. I don’t think a lot of people… Some people, I think look at a career in dentistry, and be like, “Well, look, I’m only getting started by 30, 35. I’m going to go for 25 years.” And then like, “I don’t really need much help. I’ll figure it out, I’ll get it done.” But people don’t realize, you’re done working in dentistry, we’re living a long time now, and you’ll have as much time post-work and post-saving as you did during the working years and the saving years. So you can have as much time-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, definitely.

Ryan Isaac:
… or more.

Matt Mulcock:
Hopefully.

Ryan Isaac:
For some people-

Matt Mulcock:
We hope.

Ryan Isaac:
Yeah. I hope so.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
There’s just a point where you kind of have to develop a skill to start getting help with this kind of stuff. And that’s why we’re around. That’s why we exist. It’s our whole reason for living Matt.

Matt Mulcock:
It is our entire purpose.

Ryan Isaac:
Is to organize and track progress and give feedback and accountability and help people make right decisions and avoid the bad ones along their whole… not only their careers, but like the decades after. I mean, it’s a very long period of time. So, dude, thanks for sharing the thoughts-

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah, thanks Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
… with us here. And thanks for listening to us, everybody and joining us on another episode. If you’ve got questions, here’s two good places, here’s two resources for you. Okay. Number one, go to the Dentist Advisors discussion group on Facebook, type that in in Facebook, you’ll see us. It’s a very lovely group. A Very lovely group.

Matt Mulcock:
It is lovely, and fun.

Ryan Isaac:
Lovely.

Matt Mulcock:
Yes.

Ryan Isaac:
If it could, it would grow flowers, because it’s so lovely.

Matt Mulcock:
It basically is a flower.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a flower bed.

Matt Mulcock:
Yeah.

Ryan Isaac:
It’s a flower bed-

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a gardens.

Ryan Isaac:
… of a Facebook group. It’s a garden.

Matt Mulcock:
It’s a full garden.

Ryan Isaac:
Here’s what’s cool about that though, you can go to the group and you can post a question, and then me and Matt read the question, and then we make little videos and we answer your question, deep and specifically, and in detail. So you can get some free financial advice in the discussion group, so go there and post a question. Number two is, if you just want to chat with one of us and you might hit the roulette and get Matt on the phone or Cody or Will or Jake-

Matt Mulcock:
Oh, that’s… No, that’s the Russian Roulette. That’s like a bullet in the head. For you, it’s like the jackpot.

Ryan Isaac:
The Russian Roulette. You’re married to a Russian, you can say that-

Matt Mulcock:
I am.

Ryan Isaac:
… officially.

Matt Mulcock:
This is true.

Ryan Isaac:
Go to dentistadvisors.com, click on the big, healthy, green, shiny button that says, “Book free consultation,” or something along those lines. I’m pretty sure that’s what it says.

Matt Mulcock:
Pretty sure that’s what it says.

Ryan Isaac:
And schedule a time to chat with one of our friendly dental specific advisors. We’d love to have a chat with you. So again, thanks Matt. Appreciate it, man.

Matt Mulcock:
Thanks Ryan.

Ryan Isaac:
Shout out to our 22-year-old selves, and let’s end with a couple of lines from the song. Everything will be all right, if we just keep dancing like we’re 22. So you hit us out with the robot and thanks for joining us, everyone. We’ll catch you next time. Good bye now.

Behavioral Finance