Wealth Formula Podcast

I don't have an IRA or a 401K. In fact, most people I know who are higher net worth do not. You see, what I'm realizing more and more as I continue to gradually climb up this wealth ladder is that there seems to be a separate set of rules at each stop. Don't get me wrong. I don't think there is anything wrong with the traditional retirement account paradigm. It's just that there are so many other options out there that 99% of people out there know nothing about. That's one of the reasons I love doing my podcast. I feel like a special agent from the professional world spying on the ultra wealthy and bringing back their secrets to share with you—I like playing financial James Bond! Some of these products and strategies I'm learning about are absolutely mind boggling and are actually things that you could be doing yourself. One of the guys who has been teaching me about some very interesting strategies is Christian Allen. Christian has worked with ultra high net worth individuals for years and he's now helping us professionals gains some of these perks. You are not going to want to miss this week's wealth formula podcast because he is going to reveal some of unbelievable strategies on this show. Make sure you don't miss this interview—it really could change your financial life.

Robert Kiyosaki's CPA, Tom Wheelwright performed a miracle. He made me think taxes were interesting! Why? Well, most people think of taxes as, at best, a necessary evil and at worst down-right punative. But after reading Tom Wheelwright's book "Tax Free Wealth", he made me look at taxes a totally different way. As Tom likes to say, "If you want to pay less tax, you have to change your facts." The tax code has two purposes really—one is to pay for stuff—government, schools, bridges, etc. Everyone knows that one. But here's where it gets interesting. The second purpose of the tax code is for it to encourage you to invest in certain ways. For example, our dependence on foreign fossils was not good for our national security. So, the government made it incredibly tax friendly for people to allocate investments into oil and gas drilling. Now, we don't have an oil problem anymore. I had a conversation with a guy a New Year's party recently and he was really excited about the idea of a carbon tax. While I certainly am advocate for the environment, I also recognize that no one likes taxes. He'd apparently spent a lot of time on this so I asked him why not spend more time trying to figure out how to incentivize people to make green energy investments. I gave him the oil and gas example and asked him why not to push for more incentive based solutions rather than taxing. He didn't seem to like the conversation much so he sort of slipped away. That, in turn, got me in trouble with my wife who felt my challenge may have come across as confrontational. The thing is that what I've come to realize in life is that people run towards pleasure and run away from pain. Taxes are like pain and tax incentives are like pleasure. Like anything else you want to sell in life—it's all marketing. Anyway, the Trump tax over-haul is the biggest since 1986 and to understand how this will affect you, I have the perfect guy to talk about it this week on Wealth Formula Podcast—the guy that Robert Kiyosaki told me was the smartest tax guy in the world…Tom Wheelwright. Listen to this podcast because it might make you more money than anything you actually invest in over the next year.

You know, one of the interesting things about getting older is that you have the ability to look back and tell a story about yourself—to create a narrative about the moments and the people that, for better or for worse, changed the course of your life. I remember the day I decided to become a doctor. I remember the day I met my wife. I remember walking into my beach house in Santa Barbara for the first time. At the time, these moments don't seem that significant but you realize how quickly, on a day to day basis, little things happen that end up making an enormous impact on the direction of your future. For me, one of those moments came on the way back from my honeymoon in Puerto Vallarta. My wife and I got married the day after I graduated from residency in 2008 and left for a week in Mexico. On the way back, I was looking for something to read on the plane. So I found a dingy bookstore that had a handful of books in it—mostly romance novels. The only book that sounded remotely interesting was a purple book called the Cash Flow Quadrant. I didn't know anything about money at the time but I knew I was finally going to start making some after years as a broke surgical resident so I figured I'd try to learn something. At that moment, I had no idea that making that decision to buy that book in a third world airport would forever change the course of my life. I'm not exaggerating folks. My identity at that time was as an academic surgeon. I had made my mark by writing papers and book chapters. The only financial education I had in my life was a macroeconomics class that I took in the last quarter of my senior year of college just to meet a requirement—and I took it pass-fail so I could do the bare minimum. I had no interest in money and no interest in investing. Like many doctors, I thought of money as dirty and something that people with manners did not talk about. And, I fundamentally did not understand what it meant to be an entrepreneur--much less consider whether or not I would like to be one myself. I am not exaggerating when I say that reading that The Cash Flow Quadrant had no less affect on me than being struck by lightening. After all, who am I now? In order of how I view my identity: 1) I am an entrepreneur. 2) I am an investor. 3) I am a financial educator. 4) I am a husband and father to three little girls. 5) I am a Minnesota Vikings Fan. 6) I am a board certified surgeon who doesn't practice anymore. This is my stream of thought when I honestly ask myself who I am today. I was 34 years old when I finished my surgical training—the culmination of my formal education. Thousands upon thousands of hours of study and long hours in the hospital went in to create this identity of a surgeon…and now, it's number six on my list! And to be clear, the only thing I regret about this list is that I didn't get to this point quicker. We all grow up with talents—many of which we will never know. What if Wayne Gretzky grew up in Africa? It is truly a gift to be able to find your true calling. Sometimes it just takes a little bit of luck. For me, this moment of luck came when I stumbled upon the work of Robert Kiyosaki. Having him on Wealth Formula Podcast this week, for me, represents a momentous milestone in my journey. Please indulge me, and yourself, by listening to the show!

In 1593 a Dutch botanist named Carolus Clusius planted several tulip bulbs in his botanical garden and over time he proved their ability to grow in the harsh conditions of the Low Countries. Tulips were new to Europe and they looked nothing like plants the Dutch had seen. Furthermore, a virus specific to the Tulips (the mosaic virus) made them even more extraordinary. These particular tulips took years, often over a decade, to cultivate and would bloom with colors that appeared flame-like. It was a site to see. The novelty and scarcity of these tulips turned them into status symbols for a growing Dutch middle class that was seeing increased prosperity after their new found independence from the Spanish. Of course this created increased demand and, as a result, the price of tulips. Soon, the price of tulips became clearly excessive. At the peak of tulip mania, some single tulip bulbs sold for more than 10-15x the salary of the average craftsman—more than the price of the typical Dutch home. People were "flipping" tulips because of the appreciating market and there was even a futures market for tulips that drove prices even higher! Then one day in February of 1637, a tulip auction failed to attract buyers. It isn't clear why although some speculate that the bubonic plague kept most people home. At any rate, the merchants with tulips were thrown into a panic that resulted in a massive sell-off. In short order, the flowers became worthless. Now, every time you hear about a wild, speculative market that seems irrational, people bring up tulip-mania. So, is cryptocurrency the new tulip? A lot of people seem to think so including really smart people like Jim Rickards. Teeka Tiwari doesn't think so. He is a former hedge fund guy who has become one of the most vocal proponents of cryptocurrency in the mainstream. He is my guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week. Whatever you conclude, this is a conversation that you simply cannot afford to miss. I believe that distributed ledger technology and cryptocurrency will fundamentally change the world. This is the rise of the internet in the mid-90s. How, if at all, are you going to get involved? Buck

I am a refugee of the Thomas fires that crept dangerously close to my home in Montecito, CA. That's why my audio sucks on the introduction of this week's podcast. Fortunately the actual interview was done before my evacuation. As I mentioned in the introduction of last week's show, I woke up to ash on my deck and my smoke detector went off without any apparent fire. The air was clearly getting worse. So, my wife and I made the decision to drive about a hundred miles north to San Luis Obispo. That worked for a couple days until we saw smoke creeping over the mountains. It was a little eerie—like it was following us. So, we got back in the car and drove up to Santa Cruz where my wife grew up. We've been away from home living in a hotel for about a week now. Now…we didn't really anticipate being gone for this long so we didn't bring much. We were pretty stressed out and the kids could feel it. They were scared and emotional. In the midst of feeling sorry for myself, I started thinking to myself—imagine what it would be like if you had someone shooting missiles at you at the same time and you couldn't feed your kids. That's what's going on in Syria. Now how does that kind of reality affect a five year old boy's perspective? What if he sees horrible things and feels hopeless every day? How does that manifest itself in adulthood? Of course, since this is ultimately a show about money, I'm thinking about this in financial terms. If you grow up not knowing if there will be food to eat or if you have a roof over your head, how does that influence your view of the financial world as an adult? I don't think there is one answer to that question. I will tell you this, however. My dad grew up in India dirt poor—now that's poor. He started tutoring other kids in the neighborhood as a child and helped put food on the table for his family. As an adult, he came to the US in the late 60s on an engineering scholarship and he never looked back. The opportunities that he saw in this country—well, he was like a kid in candy store! I truly believe that his experience as a kid working to survive without safety nets served him well as a scrappy real estate entrepreneur who truly lived the American dream. What about the rest of us? How can we tap into our inner immigrant? It's hard. You have to imagine a world without the structure we are so accustomed to having. You have to imagine a world where simple things like clean water and a roof over your head are not guarantees. If you do this, the world seems a lot more scary. But..maybe a little bit of that perspective is healthy? After all, most of the security we feel is artificial. Take for example the concept of job security. There really is no such thing as job security. If you work for someone else, you are at the mercy of your company's financial performance. Just because you don't get to see company financials doesn't mean they don't exist. And…if you are the boss and you own the business. You know even better that there is no such thing as job security because you have likely been confronted with the prospect of letting people go and because you see your own financials go up and down! You see, behind our façade of a "secure" world is an underbelly of reality that we should be cognizant of and for which, at the very least, we should be prepared. The major difference between immigrants fleeing hardship and most of us living comfortably in this country is that many immigrants have seen the world without its makeup on and it ain't pretty. I am grateful that I have not experienced that world, but I know that it exists. Gena Lofton did not grow up in a war torn country but she did grow up homeless in this one—that world isn't pretty either. On this week's Wealth Formula Podcast, learn how Gena used her experience to leverage into the world of the accredited investor!

I cannot tell a lie… Despite the fact that I am a libertarian and seem to run in circles with some pretty depressing people: I do not see the future filled with doom and gloom. I do not believe that the United States is screwed and that you should start preparing for Armageddon. I do not believe that you need to buy a wheelbarrow to carry your cash to the supermarket in hopes of buy the last loaf of bread on the shelves. I do not own any army fatigues nor do I have a hide out place in the mountains. No…overall, I'm pretty optimistic about the world and our future. What history tells me is that we, as humans, are pretty good at adapting and are pretty good at solving the problems of our day. In 1798, Thomas Malthus famously predicted that human population growth would outpace the world's food supply and push us back into darker times. It didn't happen. Instead, we just invented some better farming equipment. Technology always moves quicker than we think it will. Look around you. Much of what you see around you technologically will be obsolete in 20 years. It reminds me of walking down the street in London with my oldest daughter when she was 4 years old. She saw a phone booth and asked, "Daddy, what's that?" Now, I am not saying that we are not going to experience some tough times. I'm sure we will. I think we are at a time in history when there will be some dramatic shifts in the world economy that will result in some fairly dramatic shifts to the world as we know it. But…I think we will land on our feet and I have no doubt that the United States of America will continue to be the envy of the world until the day I die. I don't need another passport. If the US is going down, there will be no place to hide. I know people feel otherwise, but I'm not one of them. It's probably because I am the son of immigrants who barely had enough to eat who came this country in the late 60s and became a real estate millionaire. So, I don't prescribe to apocalyptic beliefs about this world or our country. But…like a fellow Minnesotan said back in 1964, "The times they are a-changin" and to not recognize that and be ready to adapt is not very smart either. The biggest concern that I have for my children is climate change. Now I'm not going to get political here and I don't pretend to know the solution. Alex Epstein gave us the moral case for fossil fuels a few weeks ago and I don't know if he's right or wrong. But... the weather is getting funky. Can we agree on that? That was a lot of hurricanes this year, right? If you don't believe something's going on, how many thousand year storms do you need to have in one year to convince you otherwise? I'm hoping we figure this one out and maybe we will. I saw something on TV the other day about how sending a bunch of sulfur dioxide into the air could reverse global warming. That sounds great except…would that mean that everything would smell like rotten eggs? In the meantime, we've got a new reality on our hands. The weather is really unpredictable and it made me realize that survival strategies aren't just for people wearing camouflage anymore. After all, look at Puerto Rico. No electricity for how long? Houston? What if you spent a little time now on coming up with a strategy for food reserves? What about medication? Maybe you are a diabetic or an asthmatic. What would happen to you if you weren't able to get your medication for a month or two? What we've seen happen in some of these areas with big weather related catastrophes makes this all very real doesn't it? It does for me. That's why I asked Chris Martenson to come back on Wealth Formula Podcast this week. Chris is a smart guy. There is no question about that. He backs up everything he says with a tremendous amount of financial and scientific data. Given the flux of the global economy and geopolitics along with what happened to the weather this year, I couldn't think of a better person to speak to as we approach the New Year. So if you want to be prepared for all the changes that are happening in the world today, do not miss this episode of Wealth Formula Podcast!

Thousands of years ago, in the Roman Times of Christ, you would go to your local store and trade your ounce of gold coins for a nice toga and a pair of sandals—something worthy of wearing to the coliseum. Today, an ounce of gold will buy you a pretty nice suit and a pair of shoes—something worthy of wearing to the theater. Gold is money and it has been for centuries. That's a pretty good track record and that's why "gold bugs" hang on to it like they do. After all, these days we have little more than "fiat currency". Fiat currency is money that a government has declared legal tender. These days, it's paper with some ink on it. Inherently, it has no value. It is not backed by anything except for trust in the government that issues it. When you think of it, it's kind of scary right? What gives our money value is nothing more than a collective agreement that it means something. What if people started not "believing" in the currency anymore? We've seen it happen in history multiple times. Usually it is the result of hyperinflation such as seen in Weimar Germany—you remember the images of people bringing in barrels of money to buy a loaf of bread. It's hard to have much faith in currency when it literally AND figuratively isn't worth much. Why does hyperinflation occur? Well, it usually has to do with governments trying to pay off their exorbitant debts. In the case of Weimar Germany, it had to do with ongoing debts of the first World War. Today, we have 20 Trillion dollars of national debt in our country. How are we going to get out of it? Tax cuts? Listen, I love tax cuts but the idea that tax cuts are going to get us out of a $20 Trillion dollar hole is not going to happen. In the meantime, like any debt, interest has to get paid. If you aren't generating enough tax revenue to pay the interest, what are your other options? Well, you could default on the payments. That is probably not a good idea for our sovereign credit rating. Well, if you aren't going to default on the interest payments and you aren't creating enough tax revenue to pay the bills, what's left? There is only one option—make your debt worth less. How do you do that? Inflation right? Inflation erodes debt. If you dilute the buying power of your currency—just print more money—then it's a lot less painful to pay it back! Why do you think the federal reserve has a target inflation of 2 percent historically? Again, over time, if the value of the currency is less than at the time the money is borrowed, that's a pretty darn good deal for the borrower. Why do you think I love using debt in real estate so much? It's like printing your own money! And with 20 Trillion dollars of debt to pay off and a relatively stagnant US economy, do you think the powers that be might want to see inflation tick up just a little bit? Now in an economy like ours, hyperinflation like that seen in Weimar Germany, Latin American or African countries is not likely, but it certainly can pick up quite a bit. As recent as 1980 inflation peaked at 14.76 percent. Can you imagine losing almost 15 percent of your buying power year over year without a significant increase in income? Ouch! But stuff like that happens in the world of fiat currency. The US dollar, has no intrinsic value and you can print as much as you want. Say what you will about cryptocurrency, but there is a finite number of bitcoin (21 Million) and the only way it increases in value is through demand. No wonder the gold bugs are as passionate as they are. Gold is finite and has been real money for thousands of years. Owning it makes them sleep better at night. Should you own gold? That's for you to decide but if this topic is foreign to you and you have not considered it before, it's probably a good idea to listen to this week's Wealth Formula Podcast as I interview Dana Samuelson from the American Gold Exchange. ​​​​​​​Don't miss out!

Why do you believe what you believe? Are you a republican or a democrat? Are you pro-choice or pro-life? How about guns? Should guns be outlawed in the United States? Do you ever look at the "other side" and wonder if they are absolutely nuts? "How could they believe what they believe and stand for what they stand?" Do you remember when there were only facts?—Not alternative facts? Do you remember a world without a 24 hour news cycle that argued past each other all day and all night using professional pandits? Intelligent discussions--debates like those from my childhood between intellectual giants such as William F. Buckley Jr. and Gore Vidal just don't make for good TV anymore. The problem is that we have a lot of serious stuff going on these days—crazy weather, mass shootings, a short fat North Korean dictator armed with nuclear weapons and a president who tweets our foreign policy. If you are a person who likes a good old fashion debate based on real ideas, you're pretty much out of luck these days. In fact, if you think deeply about your own opinions, how often are they the product of the opinions around you rather than ones you have made through careful thought? Believe me, I am guilty as anyone else. I am often dogmatic about issues that I may not have truly considered the opposing view. One of the more pressing issues of our day is the use of fossil fuels. Now I live in California and, like most Californians, I care about the environment. My knee-jerk response is to say yes to anything limiting fossil fuel emissions. But maybe there is another way to look at the issue. Maybe there is a moral case for fossil fuels. My guest this week on Wealth Formula Podcast wrote a book making just that case. Alex Epstein is the New York Times best Selling author of The Moral Case for Fossil Fuels. Now whatever your biases are going into this show, do yourself a favor and keep and open mind. Alex is a philosopher by training and he is not only going to give you his argument, but he is also going to show you how he constructs it. Make sure to tune in to this episode. It's a unique look at an important issue.

When you listen to my podcast or read my book, you might think I am rigid about my investing. After all, the principals of wealth creation that I teach are: 1) Invest in cash flowing assets. 2) Understand how your investments work. 3) Invest in real things—things you can see touch and feel. 4) Invest in things that people need—like places to live, food, and water. 5) Use the mathematical principals of wealth creation—namely velocity and leverage. Does that mean that every time I invest in something, I do a checklist to make sure each one of these criteria is met? No—clearly not. As you may know, I am a huge fan of the life settlement asset class: https://www.wealthformula.com/life-settlement-investment/ There is no monthly cash flow there and I don't know if an insurance policy counts as something real or not. However, I do know that people who are over eighty years old and have multiple health problems die and that buying their life insurance policies at a huge discount is a pretty good bet. In that scenario, the cards are clearly stacked in my favor as an investor. When else might I consider breaking the rules? Well, I will say that over the years, as my own wealth has grown, I have realized that one of the biggest principals wealthy people use to grow their own wealth is "insider information". Now, let's be clear, I'm not talking about the illegal Martha Stewart stuff. I am talking about knowing people who are some of the top authorities in a given asset class—the people that make markets or who are truly elite operators. The wealthy know these people and find out about things ahead of time. They get their money in early in these opportunities. By the time the general public hears about the opportunity, there is little meat left on the bone. Meanwhile, the insiders enjoy massive gains and might even exit their positions while the outsiders continue to buy up scraps. Now here's the problem, as a high paid professional, might have. You make a lot of money, but just not enough. Or, maybe you make enough, but you don't live in THAT WORLD. The way you invest is no different than the way the poor and middle class do. Does that sound like you? If so, understand that you are still fodder for the market makers. You aren't an insider. Who are these market makers anyway? It's hard to get to know those people and about those opportunities if you aren't wealthy. I'm sure you suspected something like this already and I'm here to tell you that you are right! Now I'm doing my best on Wealth Formula Podcast and through this community to help you get in on some of that unfair advantage of the wealthy and hopefully you have learned things already that have opened your eyes to a whole new world. But, there are some things to which you will remain an outsider until you really start creating significant wealth and/or start living in the insider's world. That goes for me as well. There are layers to this insider thing—like peeling away at an onion. I'm further in then most but I've still got lots of layers to peel ahead of me. As you get into deeper layers of this world, the advantages become even more apparent. That's another reason why the wealthy continue to get wealthier over time. None of this sounds fair right? Well, it's not but life isn't fair. You need to focus on finding your own unfair advantages. If you prefer, you can also forget about this insider thing for now and protect yourself by simply using the fundamentals of cash flow, real asset investing, velocity and leverage to build wealth the old fashioned way. Just know, that this "insider's world" does exist and that if you tap into it, it can help you tremendously on your wealth building journey. My guest on Wealth Formula Podcast today understands this whole concept of the "insider's world" well. In fact, he has built an entire community of outsiders to try to make sense of the bizarre world and economy in which we live. Like me, he tries to help individuals who are "outsiders" get in on some of the insiders' action. His name is Nick Hodge, founder of the Outsider's Club and he is my guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week. You won't want to miss this episode!

Being a podcaster is kind of unusual. Last month I had over 30K downloads (not bad) yet I only speak to a fraction of you through investor club. Even fewer of you know each other despite the fact that you have a lot in common. The good news is that I will be launching a course in the first quarter of next year that you are going to love and it will also include an opportunity to join the Wealth Formula Network--my new online community. That's where I am planning to spend a lot more of my time and to be accessible to my listeners via Facebook live and other digital hangouts. In the meantime, I want to make sure I continue to involve myself in this community as much as possible. One way for me to do that is by answering your questions. In recent months I have done that mostly through direct emails or via the Weekly Wealth Widget. This week I'm going to do it with an episode of "Ask Buck". Make sure you keep sending those questions and comments in--that's what it's all about on my end. Hope you enjoy the show!

Last summer I learned how to swim for the first time. I was an athletic kid but somehow missed that window in my life when it was ok to not know how. After all, when you are two or three years old, not knowing how to swim is par for the course--but not when you are a teenager! By that time, it became too embarrassing to go to a swim class--especially when you have a huge ego like mine anchoring you down in the water. The funny thing is that, despite not being able to swim, I really was not afraid of the water. You might even say that I had an irrational LACK of fear when it came to water. I went snorkeling all the time and loved being in the ocean. Talk about a sitting duck for an undercurrent! Now, I am 44 years old and I am at that stage in my life where I am trying to make up for some of the things that I didn't do when I was younger. So, last summer, I decided that enough was enough. I needed to get this swimming monkey off my back. After expressing my frustrations to my friend Zed Williamson, he fortuitously sent me a video of Tim Ferris talking about the Total Immersion technique created by Terry Laughlin, a legendary swim teacher. Tim, too, had struggled with swimming and despite having tried harder than me with multiple coaches and even Olympians, had failed miserably. That is, until he found Terry. Terry taught Tim Ferris to swim and Tim Ferris seemed like he was a tougher case than me. So, it became clear to me that I needed Terry to teach me how to swim. I headed out to upstate New York for 2 days of intensive training with him. Remarkably, In just 3 half day sessions over two days, Terry taught me how to swim. The way he did it was masterful. It was like Mr. Miyagi training the Karate Kid. Terry was a master who dissected out the intricacies of swimming to its basic components and that made it possible for him to teach his art to even the most hopeless of cases--Tim Ferris and me for example. I was so excited about my new skills that I asked Terry if he knew a coach in Santa Barbara that could continue to help develop my skills. As it turned out, he was planning to spend the winter in Santa Barbara anyway which was great for me. He was planning to come out in November. I couldn't wait to work with him and also have him teach my daughters the Total Immersion Technique. So, last month (October 2017), I emailed Terry to check in when he was coming to town. There had been a change of plans. Unfortunately, Terry had been fighting aggressive prostate cancer for some time and it had spread to his bone marrow. My last email correspondence with him was October 9th. He still seemed very optimistic. Sadly, I learned this week from Tim Ferris' updates that Terry passed away just 11 days after that email he sent me. Tim had recorded an interview with him just two weeks before his passing and it is the most current episode on his podcast. I encourage you to check it out. This was an amazing guy and I feel lucky to have gotten to know him. Terry was a true teacher and a master. Swimming was his art but his methodology and philosophy could be applied to just about any field--even money and investing. In some ways, I'm trying to emulate Terry. I'm trying to take something that is seemingly complex as growing financial wealth and trying to "master" it. I'm ahead of many people but I still have a great deal to learn. I'm also doing my best to teach you what I know because that is my mission. Listen, I know there are A LOT of highly educated people out there who haven't a clue about money and investing but, like me with swimming, feel embarrassed to admit it. Ego is a terrible thing--can make you drown and it can make you broke. So, if you are one of those people who feels like they ought to know more than they should at this point in their life about money--I've got great news. You don't need to get in the pool with a bunch of youngsters and admit your weaknesses. Just listen to my podcast! In fact, this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast is about something that VERY FEW people in the general public even know is possible--investing in real assets like real estate with your retirement account. Don't miss this episode. Start putting your money to work for you!

How our brains have evolved over time is a funny thing. The same things that make us wildly successful in life have the potential to make us miserable. This is the cruel paradox of the high achieving, high paid professional. We are strivers and we have very high expectations of ourselves. That's not a bad thing at all. I would be lying to you if I told you that I am any different. The problem is that expectations CAN make you miserable. In fact, some say the key to happiness in life is low expectations! I guess I can see that. BUT, I am not going to convince you, the high achieving professional, or me to set our expectations lower. Nor should we--we type A personalities were designed to conquer, to be tribal leaders, to push the limits for the betterment of humanity. Without people like us...we'd still be in the stone ages:) But...on the other hand, we must tame the beast within---we must identify that our expectations are dynamic. They constantly change as we continue on our journey through life. Just because you've taken down a 2000 pound buffalo doesn't mean that the hunt is over. NO! You're going to move on to the next hunt. That's the way you role. Those are your expectations. And that's ok as long as you don't confuse expectations with destination. What's your destination? Your destination is where you can find fulfillment--holistic wealth as I refer to it. We type A's sometimes have a lot of trouble it and some of us could use a helping hand to get there. Fortunately, there are some out there built to help guide us--to be our sherpa's towards the pinnacle of wealth--self actualization and happiness. One such sherpa, is my guest on this week's Wealth Formula Podcast. Her name is Dr. Colleen Crowley (www.drcolleencrowley.com) and she specializes in helping high achieving, high paid professionals find true happiness. So, If happiness is important to you, don't miss this week's episode of Wealth Episode Podcast.

Why do I advocate investing in real things like real estate and precious metals instead of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds? Because I understand them and they are, for the most part, predictable. I understand that, when I buy an apartment building, people have to pay me rent. That property might go up and down in value but as long as I've got a pretty good margin of safety, the rent and income that I receive on a monthly or yearly basis is pretty predictable. Apartment buildings are also a pretty good hedge against inflation. Rents go up in an inflationary environment and so does the value of my property. Similarly, gold is an excellent hedge against inflation. In the Roman times of Christ, an ounce of gold bought you a toga and a nice pair of sandals. Today, an ounce of gold will buy you a nice suit and a pair of shoes. Does that mean that I NEVER invest outside of the cash flowing real asset paradigm? I wouldn't say never. Again, the reason I like real assets is that I understand them and they are, to a great degree, predictable from my perspective. But that's my perspective and someone else may have another perspective that allows them to have a competitive advantage in a different type of investment paradigm. I don't begrudge anyone who uses the advantages they have to their own advantage. In fact, when I take a step back at my broader investment philosophy it is this, "invest in things where the cards are stacked in your favor". By the way, that's why I love life settlements! (https://www.wealthformula.com/life-settlement-investment/) Now I've never felt that the cards were stacked in my favor when it came to the equity markets. In fact, I really don't believe they are stacked in any retail investor's favor. We are all gamblers at the casino and the casino always wins. UNLESS--you have an "unfair advantage". I remember watching a documentary a few years back about the MIT blackjack team--basically a bunch of math whizzes who went to Vegas undercover and cleaned house by counting cards and using other computer generated algorithms to win. I'm not a gambler. But if I could count cards like the MIT Blackjack team I'd be at the casino because, again, the cards would be stacked in my favor. So how does this pertain to you? You'll find out in this week's Wealth Formula Podcast where I interview Howard Getson, the founder of an artificial intelligence based hedge fund called Capitalogix. This might be just enough to finally convince you to pull out of the markets!

The wealthy think differently than most of us-- Here's the challenge--In order to be wealthy, you must think like the wealthy! "But Buck, if I don't know how they think how can I do that?" Well, I'll tell you. You see my job on Wealth Formula is to infiltrate the world of the wealthy. Think of me as a spy like 007 stealing secrets from the wealthy and passing them on to you. That's what I love to do. Now here's something that I have noticed. The wealthy set their wealth thermostats higher than the middle class or even high paid professionals. What's a wealth thermostat? Well, tell me what kind of yearly income makes someone rich. Is it $250,000 per year? Is it $5 million per year? $100 million per year? If I ask 10 of you, you will give me 10 different answers of what you THINK is rich. Now, your answer to this question is a strong indicator of your wealth thermostat. I call this a thermostat because our minds have a funny way of making our thoughts into reality. If you think of a certain amount of money and think it's too much then it is. YOU WILL ALWAYS HAVE THE AMOUNT OF MONEY THAT YOU THINK IS NORMAL FOR YOU. The funny thing is that the thermostat also helps you from going below a certain level of wealth. Look Donald Trump—that's an extreme case. He was in serious dire straights in the early 90s. He was several billion dollars in debt (and not all good debt either.) But, talk about a guy with an off the charts wealth thermostat—this guy is now 3.5 billion in the black. My point--If you want to be wealthy, you have to think like the wealthy. Financial wealth comes mostly from mindset. This week's guest on Wealth Formula Podcast is another great example of the wealth thermostat at work. His name is Rod Khleif. Rod went from rags to riches then went back to rags for a while. In this week's interview he'll talk about that journey and what helped him, once again, return to the joy of riches as a successful real estate investor. Don't miss this episode!

I cannot tell a lie--in my first business I made a small fortune sucking fat from places where people didn't want it and putting it back where they wanted more! I told Robert Kiyosaki about that last April and that's how he remembered who I was the rest of the cruise. My wife hates it when I talk about this past life but it's true. Personally, I liked what I was doing for the first couple years. Listen, cosmetic surgery gets a bad wrap sometimes. To me--I was helping people get over their hang-ups. It let them NOT obsess about their looks and MOST of the time it really improved the quality of their lives by giving them confidence. But after a while, it started feeling like a job that I had to do. That's when I phased out and moved on to the next thing. These days my time is devoted to you and, from some of the kind feedback you have given me, I believe that I am really making an impact on some of your lives. The cool thing about that is that all I am doing is sharing stuff with you that I love talking about and learning. This is the best gig I've ever had! Maybe not the most profitable but its certainly been the most fun. You know...I don't know anyone who loves what they do that doesn't feel like they are, somehow, making some kind of difference. Now what about your investments? Do you care if they make an impact? I do. I feel good knowing that I am able to grow my wealth and, at the same time, make a difference in the world. That's why I love funds like American Homeowner Preservation (AHPFunding.com)-Jorge Newberry's fund that buys failing mortgages at pennies on the dollar and keeps people in their homes by renting it back to them while, at the same time, making investors a great return. My guest today has another feel good business. This time, it's a crowdfunding platform called impacthousing.com that buys apartment buildings that are underperforming in rough neighborhoods and turns them into places that anyone would live. They even provide programs to feed kids and help them stay healthy. This is my kind of business folks. Make sure to tune in to this week's Wealth Formula Podcast to learn how your money can make an impact and make a profit at the same time!

"Can you explain what internet is?" That's the question Katie Couric asked her colleagues on the Today Show in 1994 as an equally confused Bryant Gumbel looked on. Now don't you wish you knew what the internet was back then? Don't you wish you had enough foresight to see this seismic shift in not only technology but in our world? If you knew what you know now, what would you have done? Of course the easy answer is "buy google or buy amazon!" But that's not what I mean. If you knew what you know now, my guess is that you would learn everything you could about this new technology and how you could get a piece of the action. That is where we are with blockchain technology. "Block-what?" you ask in your best Bryant Gumbel voice. Exactly. Few people understand blockchain but I AM CONVINCED that blockchain technology will become as ubiquitous as the "app". Most people are familiar with blockchain mostly by a currency built on that platform called bitcoin. However, currency is just the tip of the iceberg with blockchain. Blockchain technology will fundamentally change the way we do business, make transactions, and interface with the world. And with regard to currency, it can't be stopped. Why? Because cryptocurrency lies at the confluence of a very unique place that brings libertarians clamoring for privacy, computer geeks, and anti-Wall Street/anti-central bank people all in one place. That is powerful. Now listen, I know some of you out there are saying, "Buck, I can't see it, touch it, or feel it so why should I care? After all, I should be focussing on tangible assets, right." You're right, but I'm not talking about investing in it. I'm asking you to recognize it for what is--the future. Furthermore, cryptocurrencies are no less real than the American Dollar. In fact, bitcoins are limited in number, transacted directly from one person to another, and have a decentralized ledger that makes it virtually impossible to hack. On the other hand, the US dollar can (and is) printed at will, often requires a third party to facilitate transactions and can easily be hacked or counterfeited. In fact, I will go as far as to say that cryptocurrency shares more features with gold than it does the US dollar. Now I can't explain this all to you. First of all, I am no bitcoin or blockchain expert. However, I do know enough at this point to be absolutely convinced that blockchain technology and some kind of cryptocurrency will be commonplace in our daily lives a decade from now—probably even sooner. With that in mind, this week's Wealth Formula Podcast will try to help you get up to speed on this stuff. In fact, I guarantee that by the end of the podcast you will know more than 99 percent of people out there about this brave new world of blockchain. Of course I'm not qualified to teach on this topic. That's why I got one of the world's pioneers in blockchain technology, Reeve Collins, to do it for me. Don't miss this episode!

Robert Kiyosaki opened my eyes to the notion of passive multiple income streams 9 years ago and it changed my life. Of course, my dad had been talking about "cash flow investing" since I was born but for some reason I was too dense to figure out what he meant. In the context of Kiyosaki, multiple streams of income has generally been interpreted as investing in real estate. After Rich Dad Poor Dad was published in 1997, a generation of real estate groupies was born! You couldn't help but get excited. You get a few houses or apartment buildings cash flowing, and before you know it, you are financially free, right? For those of you out there actively trying to make this happen, it is a little bit harder than it sounds, isn't it? For one, finding properties that cash flow and won't end up costing you money in the end is actually a lot of work and takes some level of expertise. That's why we have the Wealth Formula Accredited Investor Club-- to help facilitate opportunities and to help you deploy your capital. Beyond finding deals, however, there is also the challenge of not having enough capital to deploy to get you to your financial goals in a time frame that you might find acceptable. A good cash on cash rate of return on real estate is 10-12 percent. Let's break that down. You save $100K and deploy it in an opportunity that yields 12 percent cash on cash. In exchange for your $100K, you get $1K per month. If you are a $100K level investor, that extra $1K per month is probably not going to be enough to free you of your golden handcuffs. You're going to need a lot more capital over time. OR--you could find something that makes you A LOT MORE return on investment than owning real estate. You could invest in a business. Truth be told, I own four cash flowing businesses that account for the majority of my income. I certainly do own plenty of real estate and other assets, but the businesses I own are the assets that throw off the most income by far. To be clear, I consider my businesses cash flowing assets just like my real estate--multiple streams of income does not mean it all has to come from rental homes, or owning notes. Of course, owning businesses is far more volatile and risky than owning apartment building as a general rule. The key to making this strategy work, in my humble opinion, is to have a portfolio of assets with different risk/reward profiles that includes high cash flowing businesses. The problem for most people is that they do not have enough time or the expertise to start a business. There is also an initial capital cost to start or purchase a business that, if you fall flat on your face as an entrepreneur, could result in a painful financial outcome. So, as your Wealth Formula sherpa, I've been on the lookout for ways that you too might be able to participate in business ownership with relatively low financial risk and I think I may have found one. I know a handful of people who have done really well on Amazon over the years so I wanted to present this option to you--one that I might be looking into myself at some point with my eight year old daughter. To discuss the Amazon option, I invited Dylan Frost on this week's Wealth Formula Podcast. Dylan is behind thewholesaleformula.com and will tell you how to create streams of income on amazon that you can automate. Make sure to check it out! Buck

I have said on a number of occasions that Wealth Formula Podcast is NOT a Real Estate Show. So why do we talk so much about real estate? Well, for people who want to grow their wealth, there simply is no other asset class with a better track record and more upside than real estate. The Wealth Formula Principles for Wealth Creation are: 1) Invest in tangible things, not paper. 2) Invest in cash flowing assets preferentially. 3) Invest in things you can understand. Complexity is a tool used by Wall Street to siphon away your profits. 4) Utilize the concepts of velocity (ie. Re-invest quickly) and leverage to increase and amplify your returns. 5) Invest in financial education. If you are reading this, you are already working on principle #5. You can easily put in to play principles #1-4 by investing in real estate. On the other hand, if you are investing in gold, it is hard to cash flow and it is hard to use leverage. That doesn't mean you shouldn't invest in anything that does not follow these five principles. As long as you know the rules, by all means, break them. I break them all the time. I own gold. I own life settlements. There's a reason for them all. But the majority of my investments outside of my businesses are in real estate. And, if you want my opinion, that's what anyone wanting to build wealth over time should have as their PRIMARY investment focus. Of course, it is very important to learn about real estate if you are going to use it as a primary investment vehicle and we certainly talk about it on this show. That said, who better to learn more from about real estate, than the Real Estate Guys themselves! Of course the Real Estate Guys are also known as Robert Helms and Russell Gray—a couple of good friends of mine. Robert was on the show a while back ago talking about a luxury resort in Ambergris Caye, Belize that many of you, through investor club, know about and may even be invested in already. Russ is the other half of that dynamic duo and is our guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week. Make sure you tune in to learn why Russ thinks you should be investing in real estate now!

I have arrived to Southern California and I am now writing to you from my new office which, for the first time in Wealth Formula Podcast History, is NOT a part of my home. This time away from the show has given me some time to reflect. I do have a lot to say to you myself and sometimes the interview format does not allow me to do that. So, I have made a decision that I will do more podcasts in a format where you can hear from me a bit more. During these episodes, I hope to share with you some of my thoughts not only on financial matters but on mindset. One of the biggest barriers to financial and holistic wealth is mindset. Our mindset in turn, is influenced heavily by what we believe. In this episode of Wealth Formula podcast, I talk to you about how our educational system and conventional wisdom may have created artificial "truths" in our lives and how that might actually be destructive to the way we deal with money. Let me know what you think of the show!

When I was in high school, I used to BLAST Led Zeppelin on my drive to school. My favorite album was Led Zeppelin IV. My music tastes haven't changed much since then. In fact, my music repertoire pretty much ends 1992--the year I graduated high school. Even '92 is a bit late for most of my favorite music though. My wife, on the other hand, generally likes the newer stuff. But last month, I converted her. I had her watch a documentary on Led Zeppelin and she was hooked. Our theme song for the month became "Going to California" because of our impending move to Santa Barbara. By the time you get this message, I will already have moved. This is the last Wealth Formula Podcast episode recorded in Chicago. For those of you who have been listening to my show from the beginning, you can hear the seeds planted for this move in episode 14--almost exactly one year from today! This week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast is reflective. If you listen to this episode and episode 14, you will see the power of goal setting in action. I feel very strongly in the idea that you must practice what you preach. If I tell you to take action and ask you why you are not living the life you want, I have to ask myself the same thing. That's exactly what I did and now I am seeing the results of that vision. How about you? What's your ideal life? How are you going to make it happen? Remember, you have to know where you're going before you make a plan to get there. Start by listening to this discussion with Zed Williamson.

Several weeks ago, I sent out a "Weekly Wealth Widget" about BASIC estate planning--the stuff you absolutely have to have to protect your family in case you die. I was amazed at the high percentage of people who did not already have this information. That's downright scary. Listen--no one likes to think about dying much less planning out what happens when you die. Hopefully, you live to be 120 but what if you don't? Do you have young children? What would happen to them without you or without your spouse? Before wealth comes safety and security. Safety and security should be planned with not only the here and now in mind, but also with careful consideration of the worst case scenario. This week's guest on Wealth Formula Podcast is one of our country's foremost experts in both estate planning and asset protection: Kevin Day. So, unless you are 100 percent sure you and your family are covered, DO NOT MISS this show!

I have been on a real anti-conventional wisdom kick lately if you haven't noticed. You see, I think that conventional wisdom in personal finance is a big Wall Street scam! Invest in stocks, bonds, and mutual funds for the long run? Why is that conventional wisdom? Well, who benefits if you continuously dump money into the equity markets? The market MAKERS of course! Make no mistake, conventional wisdom can be manipulated by special interests folks. Just look at the sugar industry. In the 1960s, Harvard Scientists were paid off by special interests of the sugar industry to suppress any link between sugar and heart disease. The result--the food pyramid! The food pyramid showed starchy foods like bread, pasta, and cereal as the BASE of the pyramid--the food you should consume the most. Decades later, this guidance has led to an increase in diabetes, obesity, and coronary artery disease. Like the food pyramid, dependence on the equity markets for the long term will likely have consequences to your financial health--but it will be great for the on going pillage of your money by the market makers. The market makers--ie. Wall Street and their minions, the wealth advisors, make money by taking your money. If you don't put your money in the market, they can't do that. That's why real assets like apartment building investments get labelled "alternative". Alternative doesn't sound very safe, does it? It sounds exotic and well...risky. Who wants to invest in risky stuff when your money manager can get you into a diversified portfolio of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds? Doesn't that sound safer? I could go on all day about this stuff by I will spare you the rant. Instead, I will direct you to this week's Wealth Formula Podcast interview with G. Edward Griffin, author of The Creature from Jekyll Island. If you have never heard of G. Edward Griffin, you need to listen this podcast. Hint: The United States Federal Reserve Bank is neither a government institution nor a bank!

If you haven't figured it out yet, I believe strongly that investing is a team sport. Like team sports, it can be fun and rewarding--especially when you win. I talk to investors in Wealth Formula's Accredited Investor Club all the time and often hear the frustration of those interested in investing outside of the equity markets--they have no idea where to turn. They know they want something different, but they don't know how to start. Does that sound like you? Well, I have spoken about this in the past, but the key is to find your team--or perhaps better to call it a tribe. You need to be around people who you know, like, and trust and you need to be around people who have different skill sets than you do. The power of that kind of tribe is priceless. Most of you are on an island. You are successful and live amongst other successful professionals. However, you do not buy into the conventional wisdom of personal finance that your colleagues believe in so you listen to shows like mine for alternative thinking. That's a great place to start but there is no replacement to get out there and actually meet other people of like mind. The power of tribal investing is perhaps no more evident than in the area of angel investing. Angel investing has created enormous wealth in this country. However, if you don't know what you're doing, you will get raked over the coals. The good news is that tribal investing is alive and well in the area of angel investing and, even if you have no experience at all, might be something in which you too can participate and profit from while having a lot of fun in the process. Make sure to listen to this week's Wealth Formula Podcast as I interview super angel investor David S. Rose to learn how, you too, can be an angel investor!

As many you know, I will be leaving Chicago in August to move to Santa Barbara, CA. For the last 5 years, my family and I have gone to the same beach house every August. It always ends up being the best couple of weeks of the year. So last year in August, I did a podcast from that beach called, "What is your dream and WHY aren't you living it???" It was episode 14. I was in an aspirational mood. We were having a great time again. My little girls were playing on the beach and we were eating great Mexican food every night and falling asleep to the sound of the Pacific Ocean. At one point on that trip, I told my wife it was time--time to stop making this a vacation that we looked forward to every year and to make it our life. She asked me, "Can we really do that?" and I said, "Of course we can. We can do anything we want to do." Of course, what she meant was--could we do it financially? After all, all of my businesses were in Chicago for the most part and I still went into the office at least 2-3 times per week. It was a very logical question. But--in typical Buck form, I just made the decision and decided to worry about the details later. Now, that may sound a little crazy to many of you--maybe even down-right irresponsible right? How can you just make a decision to move before having a clear plan on how to get there? Well, I would actually argue that the way I went about things was the right way to do it. If you decide to go somewhere on vacation, what do you do first? Do you first figure out where you want to end up or do you start the process by looking for airline tickets? Obviously you've got to know where you want to go before you figure out how you are going to get there. Similarly, I just decided that we were going to move and I had a year to figure out how to make it happen. The podcast I did was mid-August last year and we will be moving almost exactly one year to the date. You see, most of the limitations we see in our lives aren't real. We make them up for ourselves and then we believe them. It's a terrible problem that most people have to some degree. The problem is that, if not recognized, these artificial limitations can keep us from meeting our potential or simply being happy. There is no one who knows this better than, this week's guest on Wealth Formula Podcast, Dean Graziosi. He is truly a rags to riches story and he is one of the most inspiring people I have ever met. DO NOT miss this episode! Buck

I have a lot of people in Investor Club who lend to flippers. These notes pay pretty well--I hear over 12-15 percent on a regular basis. These investors ask why they would ever invest in anything with less return. It's a fair question but there is a very good answer. When you lend to people who flip homes, you are investing in a business NOT in an asset. Investing in businesses is inherently riskier than investing in an asset such as real estate. As a guy who starts businesses, I know that instinctively. I have had businesses that threw off 7 figures of profits one year then were in the red the following year. The multiple variables involved with businesses such as markets, competition, and management make it a much more volatile endeavor than investing in an apartment building where people have to live--hopefully you can see the difference. It is also from my experience as a guy who starts businesses that I have noted that there is often hidden variables within a business that dictate their success that people from the outside cannot necessarily identify. With some of my businesses, this relates to my own instincts as a marketer and directing our marketing initiatives. If I sell a business that relies heavily on my special skill set, the person buying it has to be able to make up for that special skill set or they may not see the same results. Suffice it to say that that knowledge has kept me from purchasing businesses as investments. My conclusion is that I am better off starting businesses from scratch. The exception to this thought process is buying a larger business. For example, a business with a $50 million revenue with management in place sold by a passive owner might be appealing. The problem is that a business like this might have a yearly profit of $10 million and therefore might cost me $50 million to purchase. I don't have that kind of money--yet. It might be something we do as a syndication in investor club at some point however. If you're a savvy investor, you probably noticed that I used a multiple of 5X times profits to determine the cost of this theoretical business. For businesses, that would not be out of the ordinary. Is that high or low compared to real estate? Well, D class apartment buildings (no money no credit crowd) might be trading at around 10X profits AKA a cap rate of 10--so that building with a net operating income of $10 million might be worth $100 million or more compared to the $50 million you paid for a solid business. In other words, if you know what you are doing, buying businesses can potentially be very profitable. It is something that I have not done but almost certainly will do in the future. My guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week, Victor Menasce, has a lot of experience in this area. I invited him on the show to tell us a little bit more about buying businesses. Make sure to tune in--you never know when you might learn about your true calling as an investor!

In 1789 Benjamin Franklin wrote, "Our new constitution is now established, and has an appearance that promises permanency; but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes." Well, if you have paid attention to any of my emails and posts in the last couple weeks urging you to download a report and watch a webinar from my friend, Tom Wheelwright, then you know that statement from Ben Franklin may only be partially true. Tom Wheelwright, who also happens to be Robert Kiyosaki's CPA has shown how it is quite possible to legally NOT pay taxes. If you did not take advantage of this information, then that's your loss. But I can tell you from personal experience that what Tom Wheelwright is TRUE! On the other hand, as of 2017, DEATH IS STILL GUARANTEED. I can tell you this with some confidence, because I am a physician :) And if you think that life expectancy always increases, you are wrong. For the first time since the 1990s, Americans are dying at a faster rate, and they are dying younger. Americans are also sicker compared to people in other "rich" countries and in some states, progress on chronic diseases like diabetes has actually reversed. I have my theories on why this is happening but suffice it to say that it is. Now, when we think about investing, we often like to know what the "guarantee" is. What is the investment secured by? We don't want our investments to be unsecured. That's why it's nice to invest in something that is correlated with something real, like real estate, on which we can hang our hats. Now, what if you could invest in something that was backed by something guaranteed more so than any real estate or other tangible asset--something that was guaranteed in all economies, good and bad and regardless of the equity or real estate markets? Well, it is possible to do that. You just have to invest in something that is guaranteed by death. That may sound morbid to some of you, but the richest people in the world have been using a technique for decades unknown to the rest of the 99.99 percent of us that might be the ultimate investment hedge--it's an asset class called life settlements. Sound interesting? Then, listen to this week's Wealth Formula Podcast, and become one of the very few people on the planet to know about this unique asset class!

The other day, I was speaking with a member of investor club and he said that it was very hard for him to look around and see funds (like AHP) that were offering double digit returns and take them seriously. He was comparing them to the low single digits of dividends in the equity markets. If double digits were available to people outside of the markets, why in the world would people buy bonds, he wondered. I actually hear this more often then you might think. Why? Because we have been brainwashed by Wall Street! They want you to think that getting returns higher than 4-5 percent is associated with only HIGH RISK INVESTMENTS. I know fund managers that could and would pay out double digits to their investors but don't because they do not want their funds to be perceived as "too risky"! Folks--you are getting ripped off and you need to wake up. How do I know that you can make high returns with low risk? I OWN ZERO STOCKS, BONDS, AND MUTUAL FUNDS and I'm doing pretty well! But don't listen to me. Listen to Richard Wilson on this week's Wealth Formula Podcast. Richard is the founder of Family Office Club and works with $100 million plus net worth families. When you listen to what he has to say, compare it to my message and come to your own conclusion.

Last week, my wife and I took our daughters to a town fair. We stayed until the end and as we were walking out were offered free cases of blueberry yogurt drinks and bottled ice coffees--whatever was left over from what they couldn't sell at the fair. At my urging, my eight year old daughter Camilla accepted all the free inventory and decided to put up a stand outside the house selling the stuff--instead of a lemonade stand she was going to sell kafir and bottled coffee. Next, she needed staff so she hired her little sisters (4 and 2) and mom as contractors for $1 a piece (I negotiated the contracts for her). At this point, she knew that she would need to sell at least $3 worth of drinks to break even. While it seemed daunting at first, she began to see the potential upside and got very excited. She almost gave up after the first hour with no customers but I had to remind her that she would still be on the hook to pay her employees. Pretty soon, her luck started to change and by the next hour she had broken even. Then there was another grueling 30 minutes of waiting and she started to get a little nervous. Maybe it was all a big big waste. Maybe she should have taken that dollar as an employee since it was "guaranteed" and let her 4 year old sister be the entrepreneur. But as I often say, the key to business is sticking around long enough until the next time you get lucky. My daughter saw that for herself when 4 of the neighbor kids came out of no where and raided her inventory. Before she knew it, she had now collected $20 in total and she was super excited. In fact, we decided to call it a day and quit while we were ahead. However, before that, she had to pay her sisters and her mom so she was down to $17. Then I told her she had to pay me half of that in taxes. That's a very quick way to teach a child about taxes! Anyway, she actually did learn a lot from this exercise and I am now thinking about a future in which rather then giving her an allowance, I buy her inventory and make her sell it. What do you think of that? Inventory could mean anything obviously--I would let her figure out what she could sell and buy that for her. After all, that's real life. If you want to be successful in business, you have to figure out what people want or what they need. A successful business comes down to either providing something that solves a problem or pain OR entertainment. We usually don't talk much about entertainment as an asset, but it is indeed a very powerful and potentially lucrative asset class to consider. My guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week has a very elegant business that focuses on this. Make sure to tune in this week to find out how you can collect royalties by owning songs.

I keep reading about how the equity markets are bracing because of all of the things going on in the news--senate hearings on Trump and Russia, the referendum in the UK, and the fed about to raise rates again. People are worried about how these national and global events will affect their retirement money. Never mind the fundamentals and that price to earning ratios are at record highs for no apparent reason. Instead, the markets are bracing for commentary on events that have nothing to do with your stocks in apple and GE. By definition, that is irrational. The equity markets, my friends, are irrational. By the way, my apartment buildings don't seem to care about any of this. I guess they lack feeling. In the meantime I recently saw an article from a "thought leader" on physician finance who I have interviewed on this show write about how you need to keep dumping money in the markets because you are going to get a 7 percent yield with the goal of retiring with 1/4 of your current income--he called that "financial freedom". His philosophy is typical of conventional wealth management--just do it! Invest and it will grow. That is not how you get wealthy folks. That's a great strategy for nike, but not a wealth strategy you should rely on. That is how you will end up dying broke. For all of you doctors dentists and other healthcare professionals out there, I need your help spreading our message. Send my book to your friends and coworkers. Invite me to talk to your colleagues. I'll come. This is my mission ladies and gentlemen. Listen, I'm not a permabear. I don't think the sky is falling all the time. In fact, there is always something to invest in any economic cycle. Just don't be a lemming! Educate yourself and use reason. Now, my guest on Wealth Formula Podcast this week has built significant wealth on betting against the economy. He is a former economic policy advisor to Ron Paul and is probably best known for his prediction of the housing meltdown in 2008. Make sure to listen to my interview with Peter Schiff. Buck

I used to be a neurosurgery resident--at least for a couple years before I realized that brain surgery did not suit my lifestyle. Actually, brain surgery was not really compatible with having a lifestyle at all! Anyway, I moved on but I sure did love neuroscience and the brain. When you operate on the brain, it gives you a little bit of a different perspective on what it is to be alive. You realize how life is, indeed, quite fragile and you wonder how most of us make as far as we do. You also start to see how all of our thoughts and movements are quite mechanical in nature and driven by electrical impulses. It's a rather depressing way to think about it, but it is true. No where is that more clear during awake brain surgery. Sometimes with brain tumors that are near speech centers or vision centers, it is important to stimulate brain around the area to do your best to avoid cutting out. For example, stimulation near a vision center may cause some sort of visual hallucination--avoid it if possible. Freaky right? Anyway, all this electrical activity happens as we develop and in many cases is learned. Electrical pathways strengthen with certain behaviors. When a right handed person breaks their fingers and needs to use his or her left hand more for a while, we can see brain activity change through modern imaging. Other activity is less learned and more primordial. Your pupils dilating while you run away from a tiger, for example, is not learned--nor is perspiration. We are the product of innate and learned behaviors. To a certain degree everything we do and think is based on some sort of reflex. The way we behave in personal finance is no different. Find out how on this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast!

I'm writing this the day after Memorial day. First of all, I want to take this chance to thank all of you veterans out there for putting your life on the line so that we can live the relatively carefree life that we do. Compared to the rest of the World, we've got a pretty darn good. In my view, we are still the greatest country in the world and I don't see that changing anytime soon. There is no other place in the history of the world that provides as much opportunity for those who are willing to take life by the horns then the United States of America. I speak as the child of immigrants who came to this country broke and went on to live the American dream as affluent citizens of this great country. I know there are a lot of people in our niche that are extremely pessimistic about the future of the United States. There is no doubt we are in a bit of an economic pickle and that we might see some tough times in the next 10 years. But let me remind you that we are indeed the heart of the global economy. If we go down, the rest of the world goes down. If the global economy implodes, do you really think you are safer in South or Central America or Puerto Rico? If you do, you haven't spent enough time in the undeveloped world. If all hell breaks loose, there is no other place I would rather be than the United States of America. And for as much as we may have some tough times on the horizon, I do not see the fall of an empire. Instead, I see a new era of greatness. 20 years from now, we will look back to this era much the way we look back at the 70s. We will see that times were tough-- but boy did we come out of that even stronger. I believe that American ingenuity and entrepreneurship will prevail. The many problems that we have will be solved by technology and other creative measures. I still believe in the greatness of our country and our untapped potential. And I can't wait to prove all of the doomsday people wrong. America will prevail. A lot of times, we get too negative on the show and I want to make sure that we have a better balance. There are plenty of people out there who are very positive and see a lot of good things in the future for our country and our world. Let's focus on what we can do right now. Let's focus on opportunity rather than looking for all the negatives. Let's start that off by listening to this week's podcast! Jordan Goodman has been a financial journalist for over 3 decades. Think this guy has seen a few cycles? Well, he is also very entertaining and full of interesting personal finance tips and tricks. Enjoy the show! My guess today has seen it all. He is a world-famous financial journalist who is been added for greater than 30 years so nothing surprises him. When we come back, we will speak with Jordan Buck

It is route important to remember that when I have people on the show, it is purely for educational purposes. I want to expose you to asset classes and hopefully open up a new way of thinking. However, I want to make sure you understand that it does not mean I am endorsing those particular offerings. To be clear, I do my best to only allow people on the show who I have vetted to some degree. Either I know them or someone that I trust knows them. However, even if I personally trust someone, and they are trustworthy, it doesn't mean that I like the deal. If you are in my investor club, I am glad to give you my personal opinion. However, that's really just my opinion, and again, not and endorsement. Over the years, I have found the hardest part about investing is trying to figure out who to trust. I have come to the conclusion that for me, investing works best when it is network based. What I mean by that is that the sponsor of the particular offering is within my network. You see, No investment opportunity is without risk. However, if you can, to the best of your ability, eliminate bad players, that is about 75% of the battle. I steer away from not only people who I think are prone to nefarious activity, but also those who I believe do not have their priorities right. Sometimes you can read between the lines and understand what people's intentions are. Just listen to what they say. Are they trying to do the right thing? Do they focus on investor returns and building a long-term company with happy clients or do they talk about how big they want to get themselves? The latter is an alarming thing for me. That's not because I think it is bad to be big and successful. Of course not, you're looking at someone who owns businesses that are big and successful. However, big does not necessarily mean good. I could say that I want to build a $1 billion real estate empire. If I start with that goal in mind, what do I need to achieve it? I need to buy a lot of real estate with a lot of investor money. Even in markets like we have today, I might stretch a little bit to make sure that I keep buying properties to keep pace with my goal. Do you think that's good for investors? I don't. Rich dad advisor Ken McElroy has been out of the real estate market for over a year. As much as he continues to make offers, the deals that he knows will make his investors happy aren't there. People are paying too much. I know this personally because my team is getting outbid routinely as well. Now, that doesn't mean I'll stop trying. Hopefully something will come to fruition soon enough. When it does, I will bring it to my investors and feel good about letting them participate. Don't be impressed by people who are doing ALOT of deals right now. Be concerned. That doesn't mean there are no deals in the market, but they are limited for sure. On the other hand, try not to get the chicken little syndrome either. If you see a deal and it's a good deal and you know what you are doing, don't be afraid to buy. There is no such thing as a risk free investment. But with hard assets, it's kind of nice because they usually come with some financials. Numbers like net operating income over the past two years, don't lie. In this market, the confident but conservative will prevail. If you sit on your hands and don't even try, you might also miss some opportunities. The real estate market, in particular, is confusing the heck out of sophisticated investors these days because of the unusual state of the economy. So, who better to speak to about this than Fannie Mae Chief Economist, Doug Duncan? Tune into this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast and listen to our conversation now!

Everyone grows up with some kind of belief system that is an amalgam of religion, culture, and life circumstances. These beliefs influence how we see the world and how we behave within it. Make no mistake, belief systems have a lot to do with how successful or not successful you are in life. I am the child of Indian American immigrants. My dad, like many men who immigrated to the United States from India in the 1960s, was educated as an engineer. He came to this country on a scholarship to the University of Minnesota. But unlike most of his cohort, he quickly recognized the opportunity in this great country of ours. Instead of buying a house to live in, my parents bought a duplex. My dad realized that if he bought a duplex instead of a house, the tenants would pay his mortgage for him. Seemed like a no-brainer for this young immigrant couple. That was an inflection point for him. He saw opportunity in owning rental properties for cash flow instead of trading time for money and he was off to the races. He never asked the question, "shouldn't I be investing for the long run in a portfolio of stocks, bonds, and mutual funds for the long run?". Why? Because that was not part of his experience. He came from a place where people were just hustling to put food on the table. He was poor in India--that's really poor. He had no preconceived idea about what to do with his money so he did what he thought made sense--he bought cash flowing assets. Almost 50 years later, he's still at it. My dad did have a lapse of judgement during the tech bubble which you can read about in my book, but he's been a real estate guy for my entire life. So far, you can already get a sense of my influences growing up. First of all, I looked different. I was the only child with melanin in a sea of Scandinavian grade school children. My mom packed me chicken curry sandwiches for lunch instead of peanut butter and jelly, and my dad was a thriving slum lord--I mean scrappy real estate entrepreneur. Unlike other Indian kids, my dad didn't seem to care about how I did in school. In fact, neither of my parents payed much attention. It was rare that they ever saw my report card. The only thing that drove me to do well in school was the fact that everyone told me my big brother was really smart and I wanted to be like him. Most Indian parents want there kids to be a doctor--in Indian culture, the pecking of order of families has more to do with the number of doctors in your family than anything else. My mom really wanted my brother to be a doctor--she just liked doctors and wished that she had married one. When my brother decided not to go that way, she was crushed as she certainly did not expect for me to head in that direction. I fancied myself a man of letters and when I was leaving for my Ivy league college my mom asked me what I was going to study. I told her. I don't know mom but I guarantee you I won't be a doctor. She was overjoyed, of course, when 2 years later I declared my own intent to apply to medical school. But not my dad. He couldn't figure out why I wanted to be a doctor. "A lot of work. A lot of time. You know I make more money then all of those doctors don't you?" he asked. Of course, I blew him off. He just didn't get it. I was following a mission--to help people. It wasn't about making money. You see, he grew up dirt poor and fed his family since grade school tutoring rich kids in mathematics. That was his perspective. He had raised an affluent private school kid who had the luxury of being an idealist. Eventually, I went on to become an entrepreneur just like him (the apple does not fall from the tree) and when I started making money, I had to figure out what to do with it. Most of my colleagues ended up handing their money over to a financial planner. But that was not part of my experience so it seemed risky. So, I started investing in real estate? Why? My experience told me that if I invested in real estate, it would make me wealthy like my dad. I also saw that his only venture into the stock market during the dotcom bubble almost destroyed him. And finally, it was 2009 and I had the perspective of making money for the first time while witnessing the carnage of the equity markets. In sum, I got lucky. I had a different perspective from the rest of the highly educated herd and I was able to see a better way and that has made me wealthy. Today's guest on Wealth Formula podcast, MC Laubscher, grew up in South Africa during apartheid. Do you think that might affect his view of the world?!!! Make sure to tune in.

Last week's show with Chris Martenson was very popular and for good reason. Chris has done his research and thinks we are in trouble. He also gives us some solutions about how can potentially approach the world that he sees coming. For me, the biggest takeaways were related to some of his incites on social and cultural capital. Even if the world does not end up going to hell in a handbasket, we can all benefit from improving our quality of life through living where we want to live and by having closer relationships. Several studies have shown that the biggest single factor associated with happiness is not, in fact, money but rather the quality of relationships a person has. We evolved as people who lived in tribes and depended on one another to live. It makes sense then that being around other people and having close relationships would make us happy. The problem is that modern living in the US, at least, is becoming less and less "tribal" and more and more lonely. I bet that has a lot to do with the high rates of depression, especially in larger metropolitan areas. Anyway, the point is that I think Chris Martenson's solutions are useful not only for a zombie apocalypse but also for everyday living. As for Chris' arguments on the economy, it is hard to argue with some of the problems he sees. However, I will say that the idea of peak oil and the role of fossil fuel depletion leading to a signifiant global recession or depression is not shared by everyone. Some people say that this prediction significantly underestimates the acceleration of technology. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened. In 1798, Thomas Malthus published An Essay on the Principle of Population. Malthus' theory was that increased food production led to population growth which would then over-utilize those sources of food until they couldn't anymore because of famine and disease in the lower classes--effectively limiting population growth as a whole. Well, we know what happened with that theory. the earth's population is about 7 billion. 200 years ago, was less than 1 billion. In fact, the UN estimates that 6.5 percent of ALL people ever born, are alive right now! In Malthus' case, he ended up underestimating technological advancements which allowed humans to keep ahead of the population curve. Is it possible that those who subscribe to the future peak oil depletion economy might be doing the same? It's certainly possible. If that's the case, it is likely that solar energy will be one of the major solutions to the peak oil problem. In this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast, we discuss solar energy, its advances, and why it might be s good investment. I hope you enjoy the show!

I have spoken in the past about how I believe that time is the currency of wealth. In other words, it's not dollars or euros that most of us are after, but rather time. We want to be able to do what we want, when we want. Some of us love our careers and wouldn't change that part of our lives. Some of us would absolutely love to eliminate our careers and do something completely different. What would you do with if you had all the time in the world? Would you play golf all day and "retire"? That's the bill of goods most high paid professionals are sold, right? You work your butt off and pack money away into your retirement account so that you can one day, finally, retire and play golf for a couple years before you die. That sounds terrible to me. I would be bored to death and being bored doesn't sound like being wealthy to me. Being wealthy means doing what you want when you want. It doesn't mean having no meaning to your life other than golf. To me, the pinnacle of wealth was defined by Abraham Maslow in 1943 in his work. "A Theory of Human Motivation". I'm sure most of you are familiar with Maslow's hierarchy of needs. There's this pyramid that has physiological needs at the bottom--like food and water and then just above that you have safety, like having a roof over your head for example. I have referred to this pyramid before on this show and in my book and have specifically talked about why I like multifamily real estate as an investment. People need roofs over their heads. At the top of this pyramid, however, is self-actualization. Self actualization might encompass many things: expressing one's creativity, quest for spiritual enlightenment, pursuit of knowledge and the desire to give to and/or positively transform society are examples of self-actualization. It is, as German psychiatrist Kurt Goldstein said, man's master motive. But, the only way to get there, the only way to self actualization is to have your basic needs taken care of first. You can't be worried about how to pay for your mortgage and put food on the table and work on your master motive at the same time. On the Summit at Sea I spoke to Robert Kiyosaki about this a little bit. As you might imagine, he's in a position where he can focus on self-actualization. He defined this as "mission"--which one could also characterize as master motive. Financial education truly is his mission in life. He doesn't need the money. Let's be clear, you don't have to have Robert Kiyosaki level wealth to have a master motive or mission. On the other hand, you can't be living paycheck to paycheck in golden handcuffs. You see, even high paid professionals have concerns about security. All you house poor doctors know what I'm talking about. Your problems are the same but different. In some respects they are worse because they are self-inflicted. A poor person struggling to pay rent is one thing but struggling to pay you BMW car payment? Well...that's not a road to self-actualization either. The golden handcuffs are a big roadblock to self-actualization. And, until you free yourself from those shackles, you will not be able to find your master motive or mission in life. This is all to say that time maybe the currency of wealth. But you still gotta know how to spend that currency wisely! Now today's show is tangentially related to my rant of the day. You see, when I talk about self-actualization, that requires you to get out of your comfort zone and think about your life critically. That's exactly what my guest on Wealth Formula Podcast today, Chris Martenson of PeakProsperity.com did over a decade ago and the result is some pretty amazing research-- a real contribution to society born out of his own creativity and pursuit of knowledge. It also resulted in a much happier and healthier man.

Should you always invest in things with the highest returns? Well? That's an interesting question. When I first started investing, that's all I cared about. When I bought my first apartment building, I did the numbers and looked at the tax returns. It looked like I was going to get over 25 percent cash on cash. It didn't turn out that way though. It was a D class apartment building that I couldn't manage nor could I find a manager who could. Instead of making 25 percent cash on cash, I lost a lot of money. These days, I look at that mistake as the price of education. The mistakes I made on that property were never made again and I have never lost money on real estate since that first building. One of my lessons is that you can't just look at the numbers. Why do class D buildings have potential for higher returns? Because they are a bigger risk. It is often the case that returns correlate to risk and we have to keep that in mind. As you may know, I own multiple businesses. Businesses trade very differently than real estate. Right now, medical businesses like some of those that I own may be valued at 10X of net operating income (to use real estate language). That is actually pretty darn high for a businesses of my size. for example. If my business made 2 million dollars in profit, the valuation may be north of 20 million. Wow! That sounds great right? But wait, in real estate terms, that is a capitalization rate of 10 which, if you are selling a property, is not necessarily something to celebrate. Why the disparity you ask? Well, one is a business that has many moving parts. It relies on all of the operations around running a business. The assets are the brand, the management, and maybe the good will of previous customers and referral sources. Buying a business like this from me has far more risk than buying an apartment building from me with the same net operating income. Therefore, the valuation is different. The moral of the story: yield correlates with perceived risk. Now let's be clear. How people perceive risk is quite variable. To me, buying a stable b or c class apartment building does not feel terribly risky so I get to take advantage of relatively higher returns that this class of property yields compared to someone that feels comfortable investing in only luxury apartments where the affluent reside. Get the picture? The reality is that there are all sorts of variables that dictate risk. Let's take another example: Did you know that timber---you know wood, has outperformed stocks, long term corporate bonds, gold and real estate for over 100 years? Why are we not buying more timber? Maybe it's because it's not liquid for several years. There's a premium for waiting for your money. In fact, billionaire hedge fund manager Jeremy Grantham once said "timber is the only low-risk, high return asset class in existence." Well, that alone is worth learning more about it. You can do that by tuning in to this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast. I hope you enjoy the show!

I just got back from the Real Estate Guys Summit at Sea. Wow!!!--those guys know how to deliver. If you don't listen to their podcast, by the way, you should. It's the Real Estate Guys Radio Show. There are lots of copy cat real estate shows out there but only one Robert and Russ! I learned so much and have so much to tell you that it will have to be split up over the next few weeks. As many of you know, Robert Kiyosaki was on the trip. I got very lucky in that I randomly sat next to him for several meals. In fact, at one point, I sat next to him 3 meals in a row. I think we share some kind of common hunger pattern or something. It was weird. At one point, I snuck out of the lectures because I could feel my blood sugar dipping and went up to the buffet. I grabbed a seat at a bar table and called my wife for her birthday. Then, I saw Robert at the buffet line getting some eggs and he waved a friendly hello and came and sat down with me. I talked to him for the next 90 minutes. Now that was a treat. Why? Well, obviously as many of you know, Robert Kiyosaki's Cash Flow Quadrant changed my life for good and defines the moment when I became an entrepreneur. But more than that, I realized the depth of Robert Kiyosaki's intellect. Robert is not a cuddly bear. He's an ex-marine who means business and he is also one seriously smart dude. It was a great experience for me to sit with him for 90 minutes and exchange ideas. Talking to smart people who "think different", as Steve Jobs would say, is more gratifying to me than just about anything else. The only thing I would trade that conversation in for is a Minnesota Vikings Superbowl victory with me as the owner of the team. So, getting back to the summit... Remarkably everyone seemed to agree that we are in a bad time in the economy. That's not a surprising comment from Peter Schiff who Robert Helms says predicted 19 of the last 2 recessions or from Simon Black who advocates planting flags in other countries as a plan B when eminent destruction unfolds in the US economy. But even Douglas Duncan, Chief Economist at Fannie Mae, felt that the economy was not in a good place. Usually these guys are the optimists! Doug pointed out that this was the third longest economic expansion in US history BUT has been the worst expansion in terms of GDP growth and especially bad for the working class. Hopefully we will get Doug on the show, but everyone was floored that even the mainstream didn't have a positive outlook about the economy. Later in the cruise, Kiyosaki commented, "It makes me worried when we all think the same thing. What am I not seeing?" he asked. What aren't we seeing? That's sort of scary question. Sometimes things are just obvious I guess but other times there are a few extraordinary individuals who see things that no one else does. It reminds me of the night before the presidential election. I am a lifetime member of Jim Rickards' Strategic Intelligence newsletter and receive urgent updates via email. The day before the election, I got an alert. On that video, Jim confidently told the world that Donald Trump was going to win the presidential election. He had sought and found clear evidence that polling was biased and wrong. He did the same thing just a few months earlier when he predicted a yes on the BREXIT vote. Jim is one of the brains that I follow closely. With recent developments in Syria and North Korea and the prospect of war on multiple fronts, wouldn't you like to hear what that guy has to say? Well, good news! Jim is my guest on this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast. -Buck P.S. You may need this link after listening to the show. It's for Bullion Vault. Check it out: http://www.bullionvaultaffiliate.com/joffreymd/en PSS. Who do you know who should be listening to this show? Do them a favor and forward them this email.

What is leverage? The action of a lever by definition is to gain some kind of advantage. It can be physical like when you are using a tool or, in finance terms, it is the use of borrowed money to enhance buying capacity (and hopefully increase return on investment). A few shows ago I emphasized that my belief was that coveted currency for most, whether realized or not, is time. I equate wealth with time rather than dollars in the bank. Therefore, time is my currency of choice. On this show, we often emphasize the idea of residual cash flow via real estate or other investment vehicles as the primary means of giving you more time to do the things that are important to you. However, there is one more way to increase your bottom line on time. That is to reduce the amount of time spent on things you'd rather not do. Tim Ferris', The 4 hour Work Week, popularized this notion about a decade ago. It's a great book and it's really funny. Tim writes about outsourcing just about everything using a virtual assistant in India--even going as far as having the virtual assistant talk to an angry girlfriend on his behalf! Anyway, I was inspired by Tim's book and tried using virtual assistants for a while but the hardest part for me was always dealing with companies overseas where there was a big language barrier and often substandard quality of work. Eventually, I dropped the whole notion of virtual assistants in my business life all together. I never really even thought about using them in my personal life. That is until recently after meeting Ari Meisel at a genius network meeting. Ari's built a company called Leverage that combines highly trained english speaking virtual assistants combined with training on how to best automate your business and personal life. It's really a neat company. Why have Ari on Wealth Formula Podcast you might ask? Because wealth is time and Ari is the king of maximizing time for productivity and leisure by hacking off all of the unnecessary and unpleasant tasks in life. This is a service that I think many of you are going to love and in this episode of Wealth Formula Podcast you'll get to learn all about it. This could change your life! Best Regards, Buck Joffrey

We learn to walk by repeatedly falling down. We learn to talk by first making unintelligible noises. We are hard wired to learn through trial and error but are brainwashed by an educational system that teaches us that doing things a different way is wrong and that failure is bad. The reality is that any great entrepreneur or investor must take chances repeatedly to learn and to succeed.

Buck Joffrey's Wealth Formula Podcast Episode 7 Release date: Fri, 24 Jun 2016

Interview with Jorge Newberry, Director of American Homeowner Preservation LLC. http://www.ahpinvest.com Call: (800) 555-1055

In this episode of Wealth Formula Podcast, we talk with Dr. Eric Tait, MD, MBA about his transformation from an internist to founder and president of Vernonville Asset Management LLC. Dr. Tait gives his insight into the economy and ideas about how to invest your hard earned money (hint: NOT the stock market!)

Lane is your classic highly educated, high wage earning professional. However, he doesn't throw his hard earned money into the stock market. Lane uses his money to buy houses and is gradually phasing out his own need to have a boss. At the age of 30, he's already more than half way to replacing the income generated by his engineering job. The best thing about Lane is that he knew NOTHING about real estate before he started. He is a classic example of someone who understands the wealth formula. He doesn't have to quit his day job to make it happen. With a little bit of time spent learning about investing in real estate, he has already accumulated 11 homes across the country. Find out how by listening to the latest episode of Wealth Formula Podcast.

This week's episode of Wealth Formula features the first of many episodes of "Ask Buck" where you, my fellow professionals looking to transform into entrepreneurs and sophisticated investors, ask me the questions that are on your mind. This week's topics include questions about cash flow versus cash reserves, topics in real estate LLCs, flipping versus cash flow investing and more. Ask your questions at Wealthformula.com by clicking the tab that says "ask Buck". I love the enthusiasm that all of you are showing and hope to continue building this new unique community of professional entrepreneur/investors. There are not enough of us out there and we need to spread the word to our colleagues so that they don't end up like all the other victims of Wall Street!

I approach everything in life similar to the way I approach business. One of my cardinal rules as an entrepreneur is to avoid working IN a business so much that I stop working ON it. For example, if you have a bakery, you don't want to be the one who is baking, doing accounting, and sales at the same time. If you do that, you become too busy to do anything else but daily tasks and, as a result, you become extremely myopic. It is important to be able to step out of your business and look into it once in a while. When you do that, some of the obvious glaring weaknesses or areas of needed improvement become obvious. High wage earning professionals are often experts at the details but can't see the proverbial forest for the trees. They are simply too busy to see anything else other than the next client, the next patient, or the next work day. There is essentially no time for introspection or evaluation of the most important asset than any one of us has: our lives. When was the last time you stepped out of your life for a moment and looked at it critically? What were your dreams when you first started down this journey of "success"? What are they now? Why aren't you living your dreams? Now I'm not talking about the kinds of dreams that you know, for obvious reasons, will never happen. For example at 42 years old, 20 pounds overweight, and 3 spinal operations, I am pretty sure that I will never play in the NFL. Those are not the kinds of dreams to which I am referring. I am referring to the dreams that I hear all the time from people around me. Some people want to live somewhere else. Some people want a different kind of job or want to start all over in another field. Others simply want to have more time with their children. It simply breaks my heart to see my hard working, high paid professional friends living like zombies with hopes of stockpiling enough cash away for the next 20 years to finally begin "living their dreams" in retirement. Why not take take a moment to look at your own life critically? You may find that with a little introspection and a little bit more courage, that some of those "dreams" you have might be able to come to fruition sooner than you thought with some small but critical adjustments.

Wealth Formula podcast is not a real estate show. However, we do love real estate! Why? Because real estate is real. It's not a piece of paper and it's not a digital equity that you trade on Ameritrade that goes up and down with the whims of global emotion. It is an investment that allows us to own something that has nothing to do with Wall Street. We also love it because it can provide us with one of the pillars of wealth…cash flow. In addition, it provides us with great tax incentives. I believe every high earning professional should be invested in real estate. If the idea of owning real estate yourself is daunting, invest along side others and enjoy the same kind of cash flow and real estate advantages as those in the trenches. In this week's podcast I talk with a prolific real estate syndicator who puts together big deals and lets others participate in the cash flow. Whether you want to take it to the next level and become a syndicator yourself or just invest with one and get real estate exposure in your portfolio, today's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast is for you.

Over the last several podcasts I have been impressed by the increasing number of listeners that are tuning in to the show and am really excited about the community we are growing together. For that, I thank you. This week I'm traveling but thought it would be a great opportunity for me to share more about myself with you. A few weeks back I was interviewed by Lane at "Simple Passive Cashflow Podcast". He asked some interesting questions that I thought might interest you and help you understand more about me. Lane asked me about the good and the bad and it made for some very interesting conversation.

Solving the wealth formula is dissociating time from money. In other words, you no longer need to actively work in order to maintain a particular lifestyle. It is important to know that entrepreneurship is not required in order to get to this point. In fact, if you already have a high-paying job, your quickest way for you to gain financial independence may be to keep your job and focus your attention on making smarter investments in cash flowing assets. The way I think about this is that you have to have a "motor"…something that drives lots of cash in your direction. If you already are a high wage earner, you've got that covered for the most part. Your time may be best spent figuring out how to use that income generating motor to quickly create ongoing cash flow to replace your current time dependent income rather than learning how to start a business. The reason to be an entrepreneur is because it gets you excited and makes you feel alive. That's what it does for me but…that's me. I also love Minnesota Vikings football. Not everyone does. The point is that you are who you are and you have to be true to that. Quickly figuring out whether or not you should be an entrepreneur or stick to cash flow investing is important. If you figure out entrepreneurship is not for you, you can stop buying online courses and seminars that you never finish and start sharpening your investor skills through education and hanging around in the right community (mine!). After listening to this week's episode of the wealth formula podcast, I bet you will have a pretty good idea in which camp you belong.

Ask any tax professional about the tax code and they will tell you that it is 90 percent gray. Then why is everyone being so conservative? Well, professionals have a terrible fear of being audited. They have a terrible fear of breaking the law. I get it. No one wants that kind of stress in their life. However, let's talk for a second about how the government creates the tax code and what it is meant to do. Of course it is meant to create revenue for the government to spend on important things like roads and schools. That's obvious. But what is not that obvious is that the government uses the tax code to incentivize investments that it believes are in the best interests of our country. Let's take for example the huge tax benefits to investing in oil exploration. Whatever the stated cause for our involvement in various Middle East conflicts, it has always come down to our oil interests. It is the reason we call Saudi Arabia our ally despite the fact that they are, more than any other country in the world, to blame for the rise of terrorism. We started to really understand that maybe this wasn't a good arrangement after September 11, 2001 and have been hard at work to become energy independent from the Middle East ever since. In fact, the government created phenomenal benefits to investing in oil and gas essentially making the majority of the invested capital tax deductible. Doing what the tax code allows us to do is not only prudent, but in this case, it's patriotic! Now why would you be scared of something like that? Like everything else we talk about on Wealth Formula Podcast, it all comes down to educating yourself. Why doesn't your neighbor or colleague invest in things like this or even know about this? It's because your neighbor is not taking the time to learn the way you are by listening to this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast.

To be a successful investor, you must have a personal investment philosophy. You need to think about not only the deal but whether or not it fits in with your own goals and your view of the world. In this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast, I give you my own framework for investing that has served me well for the last 7-8 years. As a reminder, you can leave questions for me by going to wealthformula.com and clicking on the "ask Buck" icon. Also, if there is a topic that you think I should cover, let me know. Even if I don't know anything about the topic, I bet I can find the right person to interview! Also make sure to let me know how I'm doing by leaving a review on iTunes and sharing the show with friends and colleagues.