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Summary:
Resident Finance – Where To Start [0:05:04]
Mental Barriers on Financial Planning [0:09:29]
Second-guessed by People [0:13:44]
Do For One What You Wish You Could Do For Everyone [0:18:02]
Taking Action, Doing Something, Using Technology [0:21:32]
Make Reversible Decisions Quickly [0:26:43]
Great Price Offered At Financial MD [0:34:26]
Additional Information [0:38:25]
Welcome to the Financial MD Show. This is the only podcast designed specifically for residents and young physicians to help you become educated on financial planning for physicians and avoid many of the common financial mistakes doctors make. Your hosts, Jon and Trevor, explore a different topic with each episode. Jon Solitro is a financial planner and certified financial education instructor. He’s been working with young physicians for the better part of the decade and lectures to graduate medical programs around the country. Dr. Trevor Smith is a board certified ophthalmologist with a full time practice and he has learned the ins and outs first-hand what it takes to make smart financial decisions as a young physician. And now here’s your hosts, Jon and Trevor.
Jon: Hello and welcome to the seventh episode of the Financial MD Show. We got a great conversation for you today. Trevor and I talk a little bit where to find good financial education other than Financial MD. Obviously, there’s some great resources here that I could brag about, but we’re going to point you in some additional directions, ways to get information passively, ways to get educated from good sources in a timely manner that work for you, that are actionable, things that you can do passively between shifts, between patients. We know that things are busy but you still do need information. Unfortunately, what we find is that so many residents and medical students get ignored because they don’t have any money or it’s just not a focus on them and there’s so much more you can find on being an attending with money. We hope to point you on some good direction today, give you some actionable items. Of course, you’ll hear some humorous banter from me and Trevor, but without any further ado, here’s today’s show. Hope you enjoy it.
Jon: Welcome to today’s episode of the Financial MD Show. I have, as always, my partner in financial education, Dr. Trevor Smith.
Trevor: Hey, hey.
Jon: Hello, and myself, Jon Solitro, bringing you once again the latest and greatest in how to be a resident well and a lot of our stuff obviously applies to anyone, but we’re looking out for the younger guys – the medical students, the residents – as you’re getting through and trying to figure out what to do, what can you do, how to do it right. We can tell you some ways how to do it wrong too if you’re interested. For sure, that will come up. If you missed our last show where we talked about buying or renting, we talked about some mistakes and things we’ve learned in the process, so go back and check that out (Episode 5). Today, we’re going to talk a little bit more broadly about educating yourself. You’ve gone through undergrad, you may be in med school now, you may be in residency, but you’re starting to figure out and starting to hit home that, “Okay, I’m seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. I’m going to make money. I need to get smart about what to do with that money.” In Trevor’s case, for example, from an early age, Trevor was educating himself and trying to take some very proactive steps. We talked about in episode 1 how Trevor and I met and it was simply because he was one of those residents that was a bit of an anomaly in the sense that he was thinking about this stuff way ahead of most of his peers – good, bad, or indifferent – and we got connected because obviously I liked talking about it, he liked talking about it, and so we talked about it. He was one of the more knowledgeable residents on finances – personal finance, investing, insurance – all those different areas so we had lots to talk about and he was enjoyable to talk to, not like those others. Whenever I go to lectures in residency programs, there’s always the one that’s in the back of the room and raising his hand saying, “Well, actually, I read…” I’m glad Trevor’s here to help us talk about this of what’s out there for residents and what are some of the places that we can help steer you to. Today’s going to be kind of a resource show. Trevor, what’s on your mind? Where would you start when it comes to resident finance?
Resident Finance – Where To Start [0:05:04]
Trevor: Great question. When you were talking about how I was interested in the subject early on, my first thought was my program director telling me to study more ophthalmology and to focus on other things later and I do think it’s definitely important to focus on your residency training but if you’re putting – and you already are – putting 99 percent of your time into reading the required textbooks and studying for that main exam every year, if you occasionally read an article online and it has a super high-yield impact on your financial feature, that’s okay, too. I spent probably a little bit more time on that stuff then I found – you and I had been talking about just have been reflecting how much I find the stuff interesting just naturally. Not everybody feels that way. Just an article here or there is not a bad way to start. The motivated people in these areas are probably going to read naturally a little bit more, pickup – probably not even pick up a book – but just read some White Coat Investor, probably specific to topics. I was thinking about that yesterday. I was like what kind of curriculum – if I was to write a book on this like what would I want to write and I thought certainly it would have been easier if I had somebody like you who gave me a plan and a trajectory and steps, that would probably rank at the top of the smartest ways to do it. Highest yield amount of time – you don’t charge very much obviously – you do more of a fee-based for residents, but I think if you just randomly try to address your individual questions that you’re like, “Oh you know I’ve heard the ROTH IRA is a no-brainer. Maybe I should look up a ROTH IRA.” I think a lot of people can benefit from that in residency and anything you’ve heard that is like a no-brainer in finance as long it’s not going to make somebody a bunch of money on a sales commission whole life or something. Yeah, it’s worth to google. Everyone has their phone with them. You go to the bathroom with your phone half the time. People usually do. You take a moment and read that article, that thing you’ve been meaning to google, that you’ve been anxious about googling that you keep pushing off, that thing that you don’t want to try to look up more information even though you know you should. That’s usually the first thing you should go do. Tim Ferriss talks about that a lot. He’s like, “What’s it that thing that you know you should do but you haven’t and you don’t want to do because it feels like a lot of work even though it’s not?” Do that thing. Just start with that. Just do that thing. I think for the people who are not going to pick up a whole book, that’s a good way to start. If I was to do it over again, I think having somebody in my corner like you – it sounds like an advertisement. I’m trying to make it not sound like an advertisement.
Jon: Sure, we can generalize.
Trevor: It’s true, though. You have worked with lots of people. It’s one of those things that are – I don’t know how I went about not getting somebody more official especially at a low rate because it all the work for you.
Jon: Yeah.
Trevor: Talk me out of your services. I mean, kind of to a degree, you know what I mean? It costs money. That’s the downside, right? I mean that’s it.
Jon: Yeah? I’d say that’s it and I think there’s this – not a stigma – but this feeling people have like, “Well, I really… I mean there’s not much that I can do anyway. I probably wouldn’t be utilizing this guy’s time really well. I’m just a resident. I don’t make that much money. What can I really do? I want to learn but I don’t want to actually meet with a financial planner.” And there’s the next level of it which is legitimate, “I don’t know this guy. I don’t want to talk to him about my financial life. I don’t know if I trust him.”
Trevor: Yeah, that makes sense.
Jon: I’ve got some sleazy things about financial advisors.
Trevor: Sure. There’s some mental barriers there.
Mental Barriers on Financial Planning [0:09:29]
Jon: Yes, that’s probably a good thing to bring up. What are the barriers that are preventing you from not just meeting with a financial planner but taking action on anything and from the very small one like you’re saying Tim Ferriss said what’s the barrier that’s keeping you from just taking that step of researching something or doing whatever. You can have a paralysis by analysis and you can get inundated with information and knowledge but knowledge without execution is meaningless, right?
Trevor: Right.
Jon: You can know all this stuff.
Trevor: Yeah. The other thing I was just thinking as you were saying that there’s hesitations. I was talking with a friend looking at a car recently and I was can I help him and just enjoying looking at the process of maximizing value – I mean that’s why I like the stuff – like what’s the best yield, consumer reports, up and down the board, all-wheel drive, SUV. Mazda CX-5 is a great value. Lexus RX 350 is a great value. Even old – you can pick up a 2010, a 2012. They’re going to drive for a long time. It’s like a Corolla, but if you want an SUV all-wheel drive, it’s a good one. It’s like how can you maximize the value there and once you have and you’ve deliberated and deliberated, there comes a point where you just have to actually put the money down. You have to pull the trigger. That’s the other thing Tim Ferriss says. He’s like if you’re going to try to make a decision, making a decision and then changing it back is fine. Try to make a reversible decision and try to make it as fast as you can because you’re losing more by waiting and not trying that than you are by trying it and then cancelling it. You want to try a financial advisor? Find one that’s not too expensive. Okay, now you try a cheaper and inexpensive financial advisor. It doesn’t mean all financial advisors are bad, but at least you tried one. If you didn’t like it and it was cheap, well, maybe you need to pay a little bit more for higher quality. I mean there’s different things you learn along the way. I tried that with a tax strategist guy who’s a CPA and it just ended up kind of for the cheap price I was paying – not cheap but the low end from the offerings that are available on White Coat’s site – it ended up being cheap advice for a cheap price.
Jon: Right.
Trevor: Anyways – I don’t know why we’re talking about Tim Ferriss so much – but do that thing that you’ve been thinking about, the thing you know you should be figuring out. He also talks about outsourcing. I mean having an advisor is that other strategy. It’s basically like if you’re going to Tim Ferriss your finances, you’re either going to do the hardest thing. If you don’t want to, outsource it. If you’re not sure what to do, just try something. Do something. Ask a friend. Everybody knows one person that is a little more interested in this stuff and ask a friend, “What do you think?” If they give you a strong piece of advice, say, “Well, how do you know that’s true?” That’s a good stuff, too. Try to figure out what you’re learning is it true. How can you validate it?
Jon: Yeah, go back to the source and a good way to ask that, maybe not, “Is it true?” but “Oh, really where did you hear that?” or “Oh, where did you read that?”
Trevor: Yeah, right.
Jon: “Where can I learn more about that?”
Trevor: Yeah. That’s kind of a big picture approach but that’s kind of how I’ve done it which is a little slower than going straight to an expert source. Some people does have to learn by making their own mistakes.
Jon: Yeah, but don’t people do that with medicine too? I mean, patients are googling crap all day long before they talk to a doctor, and by the time they get to the doctor, they have some preconceived notion of what they have. We get that in financial planning all the time. I get second-guessed by people.
Trevor: Oh, yeah. Me too.
Second-guessed by People [0:13:44]
Jon: Yeah, I get it and I absolutely don’t mind the questions. I really don’t. Now, if they start to fight me on something or say this is what I need, then take a hike, but if it’s like, “Well, don’t you think I should be doing this?” or “Shouldn’t I be putting more on my student loans?” or this or that, and all you will just say, “Hey, that’s a fair question. Let’s talk about that and here’s my rationale.” That usually means I haven’t explained my rationale very well or they just need to get things off their chest and they just want to be more educated.
Trevor: Yeah, especially I think I didn’t appreciate that as much as a resident in the patient interaction like the art of medicine. People talk about that a lot. I’m only two years out and I’m already getting substantially better at addressing what a person is asking when they’re not asking. They’re saying something and they’re asking a question but they’re not really asking that question. There’s a different question behind that question.
Jon: A question behind the question.
Trevor: Yeah, it’s cool. I didn’t think I would like that part of medicine to be honest. I kind of found it frustrating in residency, but then over time, you realized that’s how you really make people happy. You really can satisfy your patients a bit more by learning what they’re thinking. Where are they coming from? What are they trying to say and walk away with?
Jon: Yeah. In fact, I had a conversation this morning with one of my favorite clients. Her husband’s the resident and she’s very knowledgeable on finances. When we first started the relationship, I knew this was going to be a – not a challenge – but it would be a challenge that I was up for and enjoy because she has a ton of questions and I could tell by her questions that she knew what she was talking about and she asked about CFP and I said “Yeah, I’m in the process of getting my CFP.” We talked about all these things and I said to myself, okay, if I’m going to bring these on as clients, I better be prepared to make sure I know my stuff and that I’m explaining it well. We had a conversation this morning, she and I, because she had asked a question by email a week ago and it was, “Hey, so…” I could tell by her email that she wasn’t completely satisfied with the last review that we’d had and I think if I was younger or new, I would have freaked out and just been like, “Oh my gosh, I don’t know what to say here like I did my best and it’s not good enough. They’re going to leave me.” I just sat down with her and said, “Hey. It sounds like maybe our expectations or what you expect from financial planners maybe not exactly what I’m delivering which is fine. Most of my physicians are good with talking every six months and I look at their stuff and we talk and I tell them what to do and they walk away and that’s what they wanted. They just wanted someone to tell them what to do and they really don’t need explanation or an education and they just want to know what to do right now and that they know in six months, there will be more stuff to do and I’ll them then and give them a to-do list.” I said, “If that doesn’t work for you, that’s totally fine. I’m open to be and flexible on that and would it help if I structure it this way and the output that I give you or the kind of deliverable or take home looks more like this and shows more details on these areas.” It ended up being a really good conversation. I think she felt like she was heard and I was flexible and just said, “Yeah, this isn’t necessarily cookie-cutter process.” She’s one that I value the relationship and I can’t do that for everybody because we just don’t have that much time but once in a while.
Trevor: You don’t need to.
Do For One What You Wish You Could Do For Everyone [0:18:02]
Jon: No I don’t need to. I remember learning in some of my training years ago – some leadership training that I took – Andy Stanley said do for one what you wish you could do for everyone because people always operate with this mentality of, “Well, I can’t treat this customer this way because then I’m going to treat everybody that way,” and that never happens. I’ve been trying to handle it that way and she just wanted to know that I was truly answering all the questions that she had and wanted to see some rationale of why. I think they trust me, but that’s just how she ticks and that’s fine. That’s the same way with some of your patients, I’m sure. They just wanted to know that they’re heard, that you’re hearing them, and their concerns are being addressed and they trust you but their personality, they’re probably the engineer types or whatever or just wired to, “Okay. I just want to know what your thought process was.”
Trevor: Right. You’re right. It’s a service industry. You’re in a service industry. I’m in a service industry. Sometimes, it’s annoying to have that patient in your chair frankly because they’re difficult. It’s emotionally more taxing, and in the end, maybe that person’s more satisfied later. Maybe they’re not. Maybe you sat there for 20 or 30 minutes and sometimes, no exaggeration, it can be that long if somebody really, really is feeling like they need something more and you give them all the time you possibly could and you’re running behind and then that’s the patient that didn’t feel like you paid attention. Any physician of any kind or PA or whatever listening to this will totally think of their most recent person in the last week or two that’s been similar to that and you can go a month – two months – without having one that really stands out, but there’s always like there’s varying degrees and there’s a different kind of satisfaction sometimes in providing that even above and beyond level of care and time, generosity, for that individual when they might not even be grateful for it. That’s more in the medicine side, not so much on the finance stuff.
Jon: No. I certainly had those experiences too.
Trevor: Yeah, and I know when people do that for me and a customer service thing and I really do appreciate it. Because of being in service, I tried to express it more than I would otherwise. But just because I don’t doesn’t mean I’m not grateful. This is just a good reminder for me even if you don’t feel somebody is grateful doesn’t mean they’re not and it’s good to provide that extra. But back to finance, what were we talking about?
Jon: We were talking about – I’m not sure. Let’s get into some other ways.
Trevor: Education or things residents can do.
Taking Action, Doing Something, Using Technology [0:21:32]
Jon: Yeah. On that note of taking action like doing something, the thing that I love when I talk about my lectures all the time is that there is technology that you can automate. Once you learn something like I needed the ROTH IRA or I need to get a budget or I need to get disability insurance or whatever the case might be, there is technology that you can put into place to – even before that part – to help educate you. For example, I follow the same people that – probably a lot of people listening here do – like the White Coat Investor and Physician on FIRE and all these guys and I have them on Twitter. I set it up so I get notified when the White Coat Investor comes out with something and I use an app called Feedly for my blog collections. What do you use, Trevor?
Trevor: I don’t have a ny blog collector. The ones that really stick with me, I use Medium so I’ll subscribe to channels or users or whatever on Medium. I like that. You could do both channels and individuals and then I get little, maybe, it’s even daily email. That’s a nice one. You can write on there too as well as just read other people’s work. Twitter’s a big one. A lot of stuff – Instagram – I don’t use a ton for learning. To me, that’s a bit more social. I like Twitter quite a bit actually. I feel like I’ve learned a lot in the last year or two. You also get very differing opinions on Twitter just due to the nature of it. I think there’s a significant percentage of people in the medical world that are not really going to get into Twitter. I think the high-yield things are the financial blogs and you can subscribe to those pretty easily. It’s easy going to site. There’s a pop-up like, hey, give us your email right now. So you’ll definitely get lots of email from those people.
Jon: Yeah, and that’s good.
Trevor: Those are probably the main ones, and books. I mean, I think books are better. I think books are best. People sit down and so intentionally organize their thoughts when they read a book. With the current kind of blog style, it’s very underrated to read a book. Physical book, it doesn’t matter, whatever. I mean you can get a Kindle and read it like a PDF if you want to. One of my favorite ones I have right here is I Will Teach You To Be Rich. It’s so well organized and it’s in order, and mentally in my mind, these are the steps and you can still flip through it and look for answers to certain things. I like that. I think that’s an excellent resource for people that are just trying to figure stuff out.
Jon: Okay, that’s a great one. On that topic, what books would I recommend for that area? I think everyone should read through Dave Ramsey’s book.
Trevor: Total Money Makeover?
Jon: Total Money Makeover, yup.
Trevor: Yeah, it’s a good one.
Jon: It’s a good place to make sure you’re thinking right about money and debt and budgeting and all those things. Probably, the White Coat Investor’s book. Have you read that one, Trevor?
Trevor: I’ve skimmed it. I haven’t read the whole thing, no.
Jon: Maybe you can get everything from his blog.
Trevor: I took his course. I took the Fire Your Financial Advisor course. It’s basically his book in little mini videos over and over.
Jon: Yeah. Guys like that have a lot of different bloggers and these educators have so many different ways to get the same information. It’s probably what you find. There’s a lot of that stuff for sure. Between his YouTube videos, his podcast, his blog, his book, his Twitter feed, his emails – you want to make sure you don’t miss anything. That’s the way to do it. We certainly do the same thing. We got this podcast. We got the YouTube didactic minute videos. We got the blogs. We got everything. Nothing wrong with that. Other books – I would say The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People and I think that has a bearing on personal finance because one of the biggest takeaways from that book for me – one of the habits – was ‘Begin with the end in mind’ and making decisions especially in finances on beginning with the end in mind and making sure, like you said, every decision can be reversed, right? Is that how you put it?
Make Reversible Decisions Quickly [0:26:43]
Trevor: Yeah, it was the thing, make reversible decisions – make reversible decisions quickly, really, I guess is the idea.
Jon: Yeah, quickly, right. For example, getting something like an app like Mint or Personal Capital or something for tracking your budget like, “Okay, no big deal. If I don’t like it, I’ll delete it. It doesn’t affect me financially. It’s free.” Just get something. Do something. It’s kind of just what’s that saying. Now, something like disability insurance. Should you go after it? Yeah, that’s not so easily reversible in the sense of can you always cancel it? Yeah, you might be out of few months premium if you’re like, “I made a dumb decision here.” Again, not the end of the world and it might cost a hundred bucks and a couple of months of spent premium that you learned a lesson of whatever and you’re going to do much better next time – things like that. Starting a ROTH IRA, what have you to lose? Probably nothing, I guess, unless you invested in some stocks inside of it.
Trevor: Yeah. You can take all of these individual decisions and I was thinking in terms of get a one-time financial plan. Just put it all down and I’m sure you can pay monthly for a different fee-only financial advising Just try it once. Pick one that’s not going to crush you financially. If you throw down 500 dollars or even more on a one-time financial plan even if it’s not all the details. It’s not all the bells and whistles. It’s not going to be one plan for 20 years. It’s going to get your mindset – it’s going to get the train moving in the right direction. Just so you’re actually taking action, it’s going to point you towards, “Maybe, I do want a start a ROTH,” but at least it gets you moving and the people who are going to put that off for a really long time, they know who they are. For the people who know like, “I’m really never going to read a book on this. I don’t care about this.” I’ve talked to a couple of friends recently and they’re like, “I don’t want to manage any of my finances period.” I’m like, “Really?” It can be huge. We’re talking, for a physician, the White Coat Investor talks about multiple millions of dollars between this decision and this decision over a 20-year period of time, not to mention a 30-year period of time. And they’re like, “Yeah, but I just don’t really want to do it.” I’m like, “Millions of dollars?” And they’re like, “I don’t care.” You know what I mean?
Jon: Yeah.
Trevor: We don’t identify with that but that person can still hire somebody like you who does and then they can go about their life and they don’t like I want to live in this spreadsheet. I like living in this spreadsheet. I’m going to live in this spreadsheet because I guess I’m just born that way. I like it. I know I can’t get away from it. It’s fun. I still enjoy my life. It doesn’t take away from any of my enjoyment but other people don’t want to do it. They can – for very cheap – create a plan that’s automated with someone like yourself or somebody else. It’s an incredibly valuable product. If you made it up and it was just invented right now, you’d be like, “Whoa! What does it do?” It makes me a bunch of money and I just have to hire somebody and that’s all they do for me. It’s one of those things where if you kind of reverse look at it, you’re like that’s an amazing value rather than you feel you’re being sold then you’re like, “Okay, wait. Let me first reject that and let me save my money and assume that it’s not worth it.” But it’s reversible. A lot of people are doing month-to-month now and you can just cancel anytime you want. I buy stuff. I cancel. I just tried a new cereal – Magic Spoon. It’s amazing. I love it.
Jon: What is this?
Trevor: Yeah, it’s really good. It’s advertised on tons of podcasts and stuff which is probably where I heard about it.
Jon: Right. Is it a mail-order cereal?
Trevor: Yeah. It’s one of those companies, they just have one product. They make super tasty, subscription-based cereal and it’s low glycemic index but it tastes really good. It tastes like Froot Loops – it’s one of the flavors basically – and it doesn’t have a bunch of sugar. You can eat it and your glucose doesn’t spike. Super healthy.
Jon: Good for kids.
Trevor: It’s good for kids, got healthy oils.
Jon: My kids do eat sugar.
Trevor: Yeah. The worst case scenario, I spent a silly amount on cereal for one month. It’s 40 bucks for four smallish boxes. The best case scenario, I’m healthier, actually eating breakfast in the morning which I do now, and I’m more energized throughout the day. I’m in a better mood. It’s great. I love it. There you go.
Jon: So Magic Spoon if you’re hearing this, we’d be happy to have you sponsor the show.
Trevor: That’s good, yeah.
Jon: I think they owe us for these last two minutes already.
Trevor: This is a good example of a reversible decision. Sure, I don’t mind plugging a company. It’s a great example. It’s so great, it stands out so much in my mind that I want other people to enjoy it and I feel the same way about taking control of your financial future however you do it, whoever you hire. It’s great. It’s just such a good feeling.
Jon: I think in that same – we’re talking about making decisions – I talked to my wife and I’ve talked about this all the time – we talked about it since we were dating of how I make decisions and how she makes decisions. I’m pretty well thought out. When I make a decision though, it’s done and I’ve made it, I moved on and I don’t have any regrets. What I think about when I’m making decisions, usually bigger decisions – we’re not talking about huge decisions – but I think about, okay, what’s the worst case scenario here and am I okay with it? If I am or it’s okay, I can deal with it or the reward way outweighs the worst case scenario, then we make it move on. Case in point again. Take Financial MD. If you’re single residents, 45 bucks a month as of today’s recording for a financial plan, and yes, obviously, we prefer you to stick with that for a longer period of time but if you’re, “Nah, this wasn’t what I thought it was,” and you backed out, then that’s it, the month-to-month thing, and so you’re out 45 times how many months you were in the program. If you didn’t learn something, then I would be shocked in those few months where you didn’t gain something that was worth the 90 or 150 bucks that you spent on that for a few months of that. That’s the beauty of financial planning – it seems most of the work is done upfront. There’s certainly plenty of ongoing work. It’s like a physician or an ER doc. They come to the ER and you’re just trying to get him stable and then you turf him off to internal medicine or to ICU to maintain or keep him alive but it’s like, “Okay. I got to bring this guy back to life and then we’re going to keep him alive after that works.”
Trevor: Yeah, that’s right, which is why a lot of places charge a ton up front.
Jon: Yeah, and I get it. I’d second-guessed that all the time.
Trevor: Yeah.
Great Price Offered At Financial MD [0:34:26]
Jon: I think we wouldn’t be the number one financial planner for residents if we were charging, yes, it’s 500 bucks upfront and then 45 dollars a month. We just wanted to make it a very low barrier of entry to get some good financial planning.
Trevor: Yup, that’s great and now you have a vision for doing more than just bringing on as many wealthy clients as you can or else you wouldn’t be doing that type of work – 45 bucks a month for residents.
Jon: Yeah, for sure.
Trevor: It’s a good price.
Jon: For us, Financial MD is about being the best in the world at resident financial planning. There’s plenty of places out there that are great financial advisors for doctors and that’s all they do but it’s 3000 dollars a year minimum and the one, offhand, that is probably the most well-known as far as I can think of, he’s 6000 dollars a year starting which a lot of attending physicians are paying that and that’s great and I get it and they do great work but I don’t know of any residents that are going to pay that. That’s 500 bucks a month and most of the residents I meet with don’t have that kind of surplus. That’s all we were trying to do when we started Financial MD, and like I said, if the worst thing that happens is you get some education and you come away knowing a little bit more, then great. Certainly, we wanted to take this show today to help point you in some directions of where to get the education. Obviously, our kind of flagship, I guess, is our resident lecture series that we do for residency programs all around the country to try to at least get some education out there. Clearly, not all those residents are going to work with us. That’s not the point. The point is disseminating the education, getting the knowledge and information out there, giving some good followup, take action things, and then beyond that, we’ve obviously got some passive education here at Financial MD between this podcast, our YouTube video channel, our blog, the website, the social media channels – we’ve got all of those things. What I love to do throughout the week is I’m watching for videos and articles that I can share with you guys that’s going to benefit you and as I read through which I do every day, I’m going to stick this Twitter or I’m going to throw this on Facebook and this can be helpful to somebody else especially student loan stuff. I get every day – twice a day probably – emails about google alerts I have going on with student loan. Rest assured, we’re staying on top of it in trying to get the information out to you guys as fast as we can which is timely because there’s all sorts of flurry of chatter going around about Biden and Student Loan Forgiveness.
Trevor: Yeah, that’s a very interesting topic.
Jon: I think that’s not going to come out too much. My gut is maybe 10 grand per person which for some people, hey, that’s great.
Trevor: That’s kind of what I guessed, yeah.
Jon: For doctors?
Trevor: I’ll take it. I would take it. Ten grand is ten grand. It would be good. It will make a difference. That’s a reasonable amount. I wouldn’t be surprised if was even lower, but yeah, we’ll have to see. Maybe they won’t do it at all, I don’t know. They’ll just weigh out whether it’s popular or not, I think, is the bottomline.
Jon: Yeah, it depends on the congressmen and senators that are up for election in two years.
Trevor: Yeah. We’ll see what happens.
Jon: Any other info you think we should give them?
Additional Information [0:38:25]
Trevor: The other thing I was going to do is just if people have questions, the other obvious channel is email you, email me. I’ll be switching over my email to something probably more official with the Financial MD thing but my available email is trevorsmithmd@gmail.com.
Jon: Well, I think, let’s launch that. All right, tsmith@financialmd.com. There you go.
Trevor: That’s fine. I mean you can email me with either one. I’m fine with either, so just first name last name md at gmail.com and then I’ll get an email with you too. It’s easy. I mean, I check all emails just like everybody else. They all just go to one spot. It almost makes no difference for me.
Jon: All right.
Trevor: My favorite conversations throughout the day oftentimes are a friend group chat just talking about this topic or that topic about finance. Lately, it’s been trying to pick out what’s the best long-term car, low price and all that.
Jon: What do you said on that? Have you made a decision?
Trevor: Well, I’m not going to buy one. I like my car which I just found out has a high trade in value of 3300 dollars and I’m happy with that. I just reread Jim Dahle’s post on The White Coat Investor. He was driving a Dodge Durango for like forever until part of it started falling off and it was just encouragement like, yeah, other people do this too and I like my car. It’s fine. I’m just trying to plan ahead. If mine bites the bullet, I don’t want to have to feel like I’m scrambling to choose what’s the best next car so I already picked out. I think the Mazda CX-5 and the Lexus RX 350 are no-brainers. They’re both really good. You can buy any used model. For the Lexus, probably, it can last 10 years, and for the Mazda, it will last three years. That’s great. I mean you’re only going to get down to 20,000 probably which is I think I out of my price range for the short term, but with a used Lexus RX 350 – we live in Michigan so I want an all-wheel drive. I prefer to switch over to an SUV. I drive a sedan right now – and you target that category, those two are so reliable. It’s like a Toyota Corolla. You know how those are the gold standard. These are like pretty much right up there.
Jon: Sounds like you’re doing research.
Trevor: I’ve been nerding out on that for a week. I certainly have not made my hourly. They try to say, spend your time on projects like this that have a sort of return like if you can spend three hours on a car negotiation and save 3000 dollars, you’ve made a thousand dollars per hour that you spent on that. I’m definitely making like two dollars right now but it’s fun so it doesn’t matter.
Jon: Yeah. Well, you enjoyed it and I know whatever topic you spend your mind on is one I can usually ask you about and you become an expert pretty quick.
Trevor: If it saves me money then usually that’s the case, yeah.
Jon: Good. Anything else?
Trevor: That’s it.
Jon: I think that was some good meat.
Trevor: It’s fun talking, man.
Jon: Good. You too. Check us out guys on YouTube. We’ve got the didactic minute video channels you can subscribe to. We’ve got some great topics that have come out lately very timely ones that are keeping up-to-date on some of the things that are coming down the pike with student loans. Otherwise, connect with us on Twitter or Facebook page, group, Instagram. There’s places all over to make sure you’re getting the most up-to-date info on financial education for young physicians. Other than that, I’m Jon. That’s Trevor over there.
Trevor: It’s me.
Jon: Thanks for joining us on the Financial MD Show. We’ll see you next time.
Thanks for joining us for another Financial MD Show. Be sure to head over to financialmd.com to get more in-depth resources on financial tips for physicians and don’t forget to join the Financial MD community group on Facebook, where physicians at all stages of their career gather to share tips and get ideas on achieving true financial success. We’ll see you next time.
The Financial MD Show is for informational purposes only and is not an offer to invest. It is not financial, tax, or legal advice. Be sure to seek financial, legal, or tax professionals when making any financial decisions. Before investing, you should make sure that any investment strategy or investment meets your individual investment needs, goals, and objectives. Financial MD makes no claims or guarantees to individual investment performance. All investing involves the risk of loss as well as the potential for gain.
Resources and Links:
White Coat Investor website – https://www.whitecoatinvestor.com/
Tim Ferris blog – https://tim.blog/
Andy Stanley – https://store.northpoint.org/products/one-not-everyone
Andy Stanley website – https://andystanley.com/
Physician on FIRE twitter – https://twitter.com/PhysicianOnFIRE
Feedly app – https://feedly.com/
Medium app – https://medium.com/
I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi – https://www.amazon.com/Will-Teach-You-Be-Rich/dp/0761147489
The Total Money Makeover: A Proven Plan for Financial Fitness by Dave Ramsey – https://www.amazon.com/Total-Money-Makeover-Financial-Fitness/dp/159555078X
The White Coat Investor: A Doctor’s Guide To Personal Finance And Investing 1st Edition by James M. Dahle, M.D. – https://www.amazon.com/White-Coat-Investor-Personal-Investing/dp/0991433106
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey – https://www.franklincovey.com/the-7-habits/
Mint: Budget Tracker & Planner – https://mint.intuit.com/
Personal Capital: Financial Planning and Wealth Management – https://www.personalcapital.com/
Financial MD YouTube page – https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC6qEAQxK8L8JM7joy3wvdkA
Financial MD Facebook community – https://www.facebook.com/FinancialMD/
Financial MD website – https://financialmd.com/