YFP 082: Debt Free Theme Hour with the Teacher & Pupil


Debt Free Theme Hour with the Teacher & Pupil

On episode 82 of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast, Tim Ulbrich, co-founder of YFP, welcomes Joe Baker and Blake Johnson to the show for debt free theme hour. They talk about Blake’s journey paying off $150,000 in student loans in three and a half years and how the class he took at the University of Arkansas, taught by Joe Baker, helped prepare him to be on his way to achieving financial freedom.

About Today’s Guests

Joe Baker, MBA, has been a sales representative with Pharmacists Mutual Companies for almost 28 years and an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College of Pharmacy for 20 years where he teaches a personal finance elective for P3 students. Originally from Emerson, Arkansas, Joe graduated from Southern Arkansas University with a Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) degree, and earned his Masters of Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Central Arkansas. Joe is also a Chartered Financial Consultant (ChFC) and he obtained his Series 7 securities license in 1986. Joe has been a guest speaker at the NCPA national meeting five times, and has spoken to various pharmacy schools across the country on wealth accumulation, particularly as it relates to young pharmacists.

Blake Johnson is a 2013 graduate of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Upon graduation, he married his wife Kristyn and he began working in a small town independent pharmacy. He worked there for 2 years and is now working in Conway, Arkansas at a local independent pharmacy. Upon graduation, Blake decided that paying off student loans would be a top priority, while still being able to travel and save for his retirement. After three and a half years, he was able to pay off his and his wife’s student loans. Since then, Blake has been able to increase his savings and start purchasing rental property. In his spare time, he enjoys traveling as much as he can and teaching others about finances.

Summary

This episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcasts highlights an inspiring debt free story. Joe Baker is an Adjunct Assistant Professor at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences College of Pharmacy and teaches a personal finance elective for P3 students for the last twenty years. Blake Johnson is a pharmacist and former student of Joe’s who has paid off $150,000 of student loan debt in three and a half years.

In this episode, Blake shares his story of not only becoming debt free but also of building wealth through investing. Blake was inspired by Joe’s class and the principles he shared. His wife, Kristyn, grew up with the teachings of Larry Burkett. These two teachings combined helped to create a strong financial foundation for Blake and Kristyn. In regards to prioritization to get to this point, Blake first budgeted to see what they needed to live on. Budgeting is his biggest piece of advice to students while in school and upon graduation. He and Krysten lived like they were still in school after graduation which allowed them to develop a lifestyle of living below their means. After Kristyn graduated, they used her paycheck to pay off student loans and watched their debt melt away. Now, they continue to max out their 401k contributions, increase their savings, and are about to close on their six real estate rental property.

Joe Baker says that creating a lifestyle like this is crucial to getting out of debt and building wealth. He suggests living off of $50,000 as your income each year even if you are making much more. This way, you are sure to stay below your means and have extra money to pay off debt and start contributing to retirement funds or other investments. He has created a list of “Baker’s Dirty Dozen” that he teaches in his college course that are discussed in the show.

Joe Baker’s Dirty Dozen Tips on Getting Rich

  1. Invest in appreciable items, such as education and house. Minimize depreciable items, such as car, clothes, etc. Student loan money should be spent on bare necessities.
  2. Utilize the time value of money. Time is on your side when you are young.
  3. Max out on your 401(k), 403(b), Roth 401(k) and Roth IRA. Stocks, Bonds & Cash. 100% – your age = % in stocks. Stock Index Funds or Target Date Fund (2055 Fund). At the minimum, contribute enough for employer match – free money!
  4. Save money consistently and systematically throughout your life (dollar cost averaging). Don’t take money out of your retirement account. Penalties and taxes will apply.
  5. Make sure your future spouse has the same financial goals as you. Pre-marital counseling that includes financial goals and spending habits. If already married, try to get on the same financial page. Dave Ramsey offers a Financial Peace Workshop.
  6. Stay away from credit cards. “If I cannot pay balance off each month, I cannot afford it!” Debt is NOT your friend. ALL debt is bad. Proverbs 22:7
  7. A vehicle is NOT who you are – it’s transportation only! Beware of the illusion of wealth. This is one of the biggest obstacles in wealth accumulation.
  8. Keep an eye on the small choices you make in life. Buying Starbucks Coffee. Drink water at restaurants!
  9. Avoid lotteries, multi-level marketing (pyramid schemes) and time shares.
  10. Choose a 15 or 20 year mortgage over a 30 year. Pay 20% down (avoids Private Mortgage Interest). Make additional payments toward the principal.
  11. Protect your assets! Adequate personal liability coverage. Life & disability coverage protection. Have your own individual pharmacist liability policy.
  12. Read Seven Figure Pharmacist by Tim Ulbrich, Pharm.D & Tim Church, Pharm.D. Sign up for Your Financial Pharmacist blog. Kiplinger’s & Investopedia, like on Facebook.
  13. Make a difference in your family, community & place of worship. This will make you wealthy in your heart, body and soul. Amen!

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to this episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. I hope your new year is off to a great start. And boy, do we have a special episode for you today, a two-for-one special. We get to interview new practitioner Blake Johnson alongside his personal finance mentor and teacher at the University of Arkansas, Joe Baker. Blake really has an incredible story to share of him and his wife Kristen paying off $150,000 of student loans in a short period of time and building a strong financial foundation, which as you know, we talk about often on this show. And Joe Baker, nearing the end of his career, has a passion for teaching personal finance and has influenced hundreds, if not thousands, of new practitioners to pave a successful financial future. He has the famous Baker’s Dirty Dozen Tips for Getting Rich, which we’ll talk about briefly on the show today. So Joe and Blake, welcome to the show, excited to have you.

Joe Baker: Thank you.

Blake Johnson: Yeah, thanks, Tim.

Tim Ulbrich: So I’m going to start with brief introductions so our audience can get to begin to know each of you before we unpack the story. So Blake, why don’t you start? Give us a quick background on when you graduated, what you and your wife Kristen were facing financially as a new graduate, and the current area of practice that you do in pharmacy.

Blake Johnson: OK. So I practice pharmacy in Conway, Arkansas. It’s about 30 miles north of Little Rock. And I’ve been out of school for almost six years in May. My wife’s a nurse practitioner, she graduated I guess about three years ago. And upon graduating, we had my student loans, they were about $120,000. And then my wife was in school at the time. It took her about two years to graduate after I did, and hers was about another $30,000-40,000, so all together, we had accumulated close to $150,000-160,000 in student loans once you added interest. And we’re proud to work for a community pharmacy in Conway now and been there for about three years. And prior to that, I had worked in Clinton, Arkansas, which is about an hour outside of Little Rock. So been in community pharmacy for since the time I gradated, and I really do enjoy it.

Tim Ulbrich: So we’re going to unpack that more here in a little bit in terms of what allowed you and your wife Kristen to be successful in that journey and how you did it, how you’ve worked together. But first, Joe, give us a brief introduction of yourself, the history of your work in the pharmacy world, and how you became so passionate about teaching this topic of personal finance, which resulted in I think you being the first, I believe, of starting this coursework in pharmacy curriculum. So give us some background.

Joe Baker: Well thank you, Tim. It really goes back to the late ‘70s, when I graduated from Southern Arkansas University with a business administration degree. And going from different jobs, including real estate, which unfortunately, at the time of the late ‘70s and early ‘80s was 17% interest on mortgages. It was a tough time. But I did find my niche teaching high school marketing. And I really loved the education because of the immediate feedback. And I would probably still be there today if it had not been for a friend of mine who ran for Congress and asked me to help him, to get involved in his campaign. I did so. Unfortunately — or fortunately — as life has it, we lost in runoff by 2 points, so then, after that, I had to get a real job and found my way into insurance and was fortunate enough to get on board with Pharmacists Mutual Insurance, which was 27 years ago. And during that time, I always wanted to get back into education in some way. And I thought the best way or the one that I was looking for was to teach college on some level. So I decided after 20 years to get my Master’s degree, got an MBA. And during this time, I was about to wrap up, I happened to be at the College of Pharmacy at UAMS, University of Arkansas Medical School, and I was visiting with the dean and the assistant dean. And this was in the late ‘90s, 1999, and I said, “You know, what about teaching some type of business course for the pharmacy students?” And they were very open. They said, “Yes. Our pharmacy students are making around $45,000 a year and going out and getting broke making this type of big money.” So you can see how the money has changed.

Tim Ulbrich: Times have changed.

Joe Baker: And even today at $120,000, we have pharmacists and other professionals going out and getting broke. So the fall of 1999 was when we started the personal finance class, a 2-hour elective at UAMS College of Pharmacy in Little Rock, Arkansas, and it has really blossomed. And it has just helped me fulfill my education desire. And with the financial literacy, I just think it all worked out greatly.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I appreciate — I was actually stalking you on LinkedIn, Joe, I know we’ve been getting to know each other. I didn’t know the background of the congressional campaigns, and I knew the rest of the story. So appreciate your support of what we’ve been doing at YFP. And for those that have been following our journey at YFP, Joe has been at this long before we have. So speaking on this topic, he mentioned the personal finance course since 1999, we’ve got some exciting collaborations coming forward. You’re going to be hearing more from Joe and hopefully seeing about their speaking and on the blog, so we’re excited to be collaborating and working with you. And I certainly appreciate the path you’ve paved that has even made it a little bit easier for us at YFP as we’ve been on this journey. So what I want to do, actually, what stimulated this interview is Blake had sent an email over to Joe, so his former professor, on this topic. And I’m going to take a minute to read this email because I think, Blake, as I went back and looked at this as I was preparing for the show, I feel like it really helps outline your story but also helps outline what I think to be the importance of personal finance education and helping especially young pharmacists get started. So here’s that email, and then we’ll begin to unpack a little bit further. So Blake says, “Joe, things are going great for me. I’ve been out five years now. I am so glad I took your class. It has been a truly amazing journey. I came out of school and my wife, who’s a new practitioner and I had $150,000 in student loans. We paid those off in 3.5 years. During that time, I maxed out my 401k and was able to put 20% down on my house!! I’m about halfway to my ‘millionaire net worth journey’ that you talked about in class. The best thing that we ever did was partner up with a friend on some real estate. We have five rental homes right now. It has been very good for us. Anyways, I thought I would share that with you because I really do trace it back to your class. On top of that, I’m now able to teach this principles in a class at our church in Conway.” So Joe, as you saw that email, what was your feeling as you kind of reflected on the success that Blake has had and the impact that your class had on that.

Joe Baker: Well Tim, I was just ecstatic because, you know, to get that type of feedback from one of your former students is just — makes you feel really, really good that you’re really accomplishing what you have set out to do. I know there are many success stories out there, but to see it in print and to someone that I’ve known for several years, I just can’t put it in words how it made me feel.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, that’s great. I think as I read it, I got fired up. I can only imagine as you guys have that relationship and teaching that course. So Blake, as I read that and I read that email, five years out of school, no debt, of course, except the home, which you mentioned putting 20% down on. I’m guessing you have that even further paid down, you maxed out your 401k while doing that, which is no small feat. And you have five rental properties in that time period. And so to me, as I read that, this is really the definition of what we talk about on this show and on the blog about a good foundation. No debt, equity in the home, a fast start to retirement savings, and I’m assuming obviously an emergency fund in there as well. So my question, Blake, is what were the secrets for you and your wife Kristen that allowed you to have such significant progress in a short amount of time. If you had to distill that down to a few things, what do you think allowed you guys to have progress in such a quick amount of time?

Blake Johnson: I think two things. No. 1, Joe’s class. At that time, right when I was taking that, my wife and I had just started dating, and so I attribute it to Joe’s class and teaching that. But No. 2, also to my wife. Her parents taught her the old school Larry Burkett, Dave Ramsey-type stuff. So when we got married, we were able to within about six months, add to what she had saved up to be able to put 20% down on a real nice home just because of that and Joe’s principles, we were able to kind of kick it out of the gate with this good of money principles. I had read Dave Ramsey while we were engaged. And between Joe’s class and what Dave Ramsey teaches, we kind of took that, kind of agreed on what we would live on, and just kind of went from there.

Tim Ulbrich: And what I love about your story, Blake, as I mentioned, we talk so much on the podcast or when we’re speaking on the blog about the importance of this foundation and really investing the first number of years out of school to build this foundation where you’ve got a solid position to work from because as I’ve seen with so many practitioners that are 10, 15, 20 years out, it’s really hard to unwind some of the things and to play catch-up. And so Joe, I’m curious from your perspective, you know, what I’ve seen and I’m guessing you’ve seen — you’ve been at this longer than I have — is that it seems like some new practitioners like Blake and his wife Kristen get a quick start and really have some momentum at a very early point in their career whereas others, you know, maybe it takes 10 or 15 years or even longer to turn things around and kind of come to that “Aha!” moment where my salary is good, but it doesn’t necessarily mean a good salary is a secure financial foundation. What do you think differentiates the two of those? Is it mindset? Is it knowledge? Is it behavior? Is it a combination of it? What do you think?

Joe Baker: Well, I do think it’s a combination. But what I have stressed to the students is when you get out, making six figures, don’t live like you’re making six figures. Don’t buy a huge house, automobiles, which is the biggest obstacle for wealth accumulation. If you can just live like you’ve lived, hopefully like you’ve lived through your college years and put back the money, you can do great things. It all begins as soon as you come out of the blocks. Just like a race, you’ve got to live below your means starting out because then, it’s much more difficult to get where you want to be financially if you live like a person making six figures. So behavior and what you do.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think just to build on that, Joe, what I’ve seen — and I’m guessing what Blake and Kristen did almost treating it as if you make some lower percentage of your salary. If you can really convince yourself that I make $100,000 a year, but really I make $50,000 or $60,000 and budget off of that, and then use the remainder for paying down debt, building equity on the home, getting involved in investments, real estate, all of a sudden, it’s a lot easier to pivot to those opportunities. But then also when life throws you something unexpected, you’ve got margin, right? And I think that that peace of mind when you have margin — so as I look at Blake and Kristen’s story, no debt, equity in the home, fast start to retirement savings, they’ve got rental property, they’re building equity. If life throws them something that they’re not expecting, they’ve got options to handle that. Whereas if you’re living up to your entire income or beyond, obviously that can be taken away from you. So Blake, as you and Kristen were going at this, one of the things I see a lot of young pharmacist struggle with is trying to balance multiple priorities. And so I see here, you obviously were paying down debt, which is a lot in five years by itself. But then also, you were able to build up equity and max out retirement savings and get involved in real estate. So my question is, did you prioritize and focus on one or two of these at a time? Or were you really balancing all of these priorities at once?

Blake Johnson: So we sat down when we got married and kind of made some decisions. No. 1, we kind of went against what Dave Ramsey teaches in paying off all debt before you start doing the 401k. Because we noticed at 25 years old when I graduated, I could at that time put close to $18,000 a year into my 401k. And it didn’t really reduce my paycheck by that much. So that was our No. 1 priority. The second priority was we wanted to put a minimum amount on our loans until my wife got out of school. So those two things were set. I mean, we did our whole budget based on those two amounts taken out. And outside of that too, we also love to travel. So we wanted to be able to travel some too. So what we did was just do a budget every month. We would say, “Hey, we want x amount of money to travel on a year. We’re going to put this minimum amount on the loans. And we’re also going to put towards the 401k.” So until my wife graduated, we did that. And as soon as she graduated, we had this lifestyle that was set, and we never increased it at all. We just basically took her paycheck as a nurse practitioner for about a year, and that literally took the hammer down on the loans. We were used to a lifestyle, we didn’t change it, and just kind of hammered it down until it was all paid off. We looked up, we had money in our 401k, we had equity in the house, and now we’ve been able to build more and more off the top of that. Our lifestyle — honestly, our lifestyle and budget hadn’t changed since the day I graduated.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and as you know, once you get to the point where you are, now it’s game on with really starting to see the benefits of those investments grow and compound and take over time. And I wanted to take you a little bit deeper there because I think sometimes, when we have guests on the show and we share a success story like yours, and it’s like five years, you paid off debt, you’ve got retirement, you’ve got some equity in your home. And it’s like, poof! It’s magic. But I heard in there, you know, you talked about budgeting. And I’m guessing that was a fundamental piece for you and Kristen in doing this. So tell us exactly what that looked like for you. What’s the budgeting method that you use? Did one of you take the lead on that? How did you come to consensus and agreement on it? What did that process look like for you and Kristen?

Blake Johnson: It was a rocky start to start out with because I’m all about Excel sheets. I can remember out of the gun, coming out of the — as Dave Ramsey says, coming out of the den with this huge spreadsheet. And it was overwhelming. I mean, it was ridiculous. I think I had like $300 for groceries per month and like $100 for going out to eat. And I mean, that’s evolved into a lot more. But I mean, it is tamed down kind of over 4-5 months, figuring out what we lived on, what we felt comfortable with, and other than that, we’ve used it from then on out. It took time to get a grip on things. The No. 1 thing too is set goals. So I mean, if you want to go on a vacation a year from now, why don’t you start now saving a small amount each month. That way, in a year, you’ve got the money set back instead of having to scrounge for it. So I just think it’s, you know, it’s a push and pull type thing. You sit down, work with your spouse and just kind of figure out what works best for you.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I like that. We talked about to your last point there, I think it was in Episode 057, we talked about the power of automation and sinking funds, getting your concept there. If you have a vacation in 12 months or whatever is planned, really being thoughtful about what those goals are and funding those. So Joe, my question here for you is, you know, when you hear Blake’s story, it appears from the outside looking in that he and Kristen were working together on this, although as he mentioned, you know, may have had a rocky start. But they obviously got there. And I know you’ve talked about this before, you and I have as well, is the importance of two people working together on their financial plan. So my question for you is what advice do you have for new graduates that are facing a financial uphill battle? Lots of student loans, maybe they have aspirations on a home, but they don’t have a down payment. So they’re really trying to figure this out. And what advice would you have for them in trying to get on the same page and work together?

Joe Baker: Well, a number of things. First, the keyword is lifestyle that Blake used. Starting after graduation, I know it can be overwhelming if you’re looking at $150,000-200,000 in student loans, just sit down and develop a plan. And if you are in a situation, relationship, married, fiancee or whatever, make sure you’re on the same financial page because that is very, very important. Blake was very fortunate. I know his wife, Kristen, and they were on the same page financially. And that is — I cannot stress how important that is to make sure you’re on the same financial page. Because it would be really tough if you were not so. But I do tell them that if you can start off with a lower lifestyle and I also even point out to plug your “Seven Figure Pharmacist” book, there’s a section in there — and I’m paraphrasing — about living on $50,000, which is the median income of the United States right now?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. Household.

Joe Baker: Yes. And $50,000, that’s — at least in Arkansas — that is a lot more than most make. So if you could live with that lifestyle of making $50,000 a year and start paying off your student loans like Blake and contributing to a 401k or 403b, Roth IRA, you’ll be just way ahead in the years to come. So that’s what I try to get across, not only to the students but also whenever I speak to pharmacy students is your lifestyle.

Tim Ulbrich: I think that’s a great point there, and I think there’s wisdom in reframing the perspective of your salary, right? Because I think that I know what I felt coming out of school in 2008 is there tends to be that pressure of peer comparisons. If I’m in residency and I’m making a whopping $31,000, and I look up and my friend’s making $120,000 with a sign-on bonus, which I understand don’t exist these days, that feels like it’s unmanageable, right? But if I reframe the perspective to me as a single person or even me and my wife as a combined income, and then you put that in the perspective of a median household income in the United States or we recently shared an article on the Facebook group this week about the top 1% in the world when you look at it in terms of the world economy, I think that helps reset the perspective of really what are you working with and what are the opportunities that are ahead. So Blake, one question I have for you is that as you think back, even though you’ve done a lot of things well, I’m guessing you look back to your former P1 self and say, “I wish I would have…” or “I wish I would have known this or done this differently.” What advice would you have for the students that are listening of some things that you may have done differently in your journey?

Blake Johnson: I think the No. 1 thing to look back on is budget while you’re in school. I mean, one thing that Joe talked about in the class is the power of compounding interest. It works for you, and it can work against you. If you come out with $120,000, you’ve got 6-7% interest working against you. Or you could have more money to put in the market and have that work for you. So I think during school, the less amount that you can take out, maybe by working more or just watching your expenses, I think that’s one of the big things because interest rates really do work against you and do take a good amount out of pocket.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And the follow-up question I have for you is we actually just wrapped up a book discussion with YFP, we’re doing a book discussion on “Rich Dad, Poor Dad,” by Robert Kiyosaki, which for those listeners who haven’t read that book, I would highly recommend it. It’s a great book that really just helps shape your mindset around money. But what really stood out to me in that book, second time through, is this focus on real estate investing, which obviously you are tuned into. You mentioned five properties. So tell us a little bit about why you are interested in real estate is my first question. And my follow-up is for those of the listeners that are thinking, maybe I want to get started in real estate investing, where would you recommend they even begin to learn more?

Blake Johnson: It all started, I guess about two years ago, right when we were wrapping up paying our debt off. I was looking at different ways for us to invest. And I love the stock market, we were maxing out our 401k, and I started a Vanguard fund, I started that and putting money in that. But I wanted something that could be “passive income” down the road. With the Roth IRA, you can’t access it until you’re 59.5, and other investments, it’s hard to get to. So I wanted something that could work for me and earlier in my lifetime that I could use as investment. So I started doing research, and me and my wife were talking about it for a long time. And I’ve always just enjoyed real estate. So it takes me a long time to decide on something. So after about two years of really looking into it, a friend of mine who moved back in town, we got back together, and he already had rental property here in Conway. And after about three or four months listening to him, I just kind of asked, “Hey, would you like to partner on something?” And we ended up partnering on something, and it ended up being nice because his interest and my interest as far as partnership meshed real well together, so we purchased two homes together out of the chute. That was back in April, and here we are in November. We actually just closed on our sixth home as of last month. So it’s been a fun journey and going back to where you can find info for that, there’s a great website called BiggerPockets. It’s basically a Facebook for real estate investors. And it is packed full of information. And I highly recommend it because real estate’s something you need to do a lot of reading on because you can get yourself in big trouble if you don’t get in there with good equity in homes to make the right decisions.

Tim Ulbrich: I second your recommendation of BiggerPockets, I’m actually binge listening right now to their podcast, so it’s fantastic. And I feel like every day, it just provides some new insight into I had no idea about this aspect of real estate or this aspect, especially if you grew up in a home where real estate investing wasn’t a part of growing up. So great stuff. Congratulations on the closing of the sixth property, that’s awesome. And I think the reason I wanted to bring that up is I know many of our listeners are interested in identifying potential revenue streams that don’t necessarily have to wait until withdrawal of retirement funds at the age of 59.5. So I think real estate is something we’re going to be talking a little bit more about. So Joe, I want to briefly just mention what I think are your famous Baker’s Dirty Dozen Tips on Getting Rich that I’ve seen referenced from coursework and people on LinkedIn where you’ve done talks and social media posts and engagement. I think they’ve become quite well known and famous. And we’ll link to them in the show notes, but I’m just going to briefly read through a few of them and then reference our listeners to the show notes and ask you a couple follow-up questions. So in this list, you have things like invest in appreciable items such as education and a house, minimize depreciable items such as car, clothes, etc. Student loan money should be spent on bare necessities. You mentioned utilizing the time value of money, that time is on your side when you’re young. You mentioned save money consistently and systematically throughout your life, such as dollar cost averaging. Don’t take money out of your retirement account; penalties and taxes will apply. You mentioned choosing a 15- or a 20-year mortgage over a 30-year, paying 20% down, avoiding PMI and making additional payments. So as you think through that list, do any of these stick out to you more than others in terms of their level of significance when you think of your own journey and mentoring numerous pharmacy students on their own financial path?

refinance student loans

Joe Baker: Well in class, I’m pretty much an open book. And not to go into any personal details of my financial path — I did not achieve true financial wealth until all debt was paid off. Because I believe — I disagree with a lot of financial planners that say there’s good debt and bad debt. Eh. I think all debt is bad. There’s some that’s less bad than others if you forgive my grammar, so being that, I say, “Listen. I didn’t make a six-figure income until I was 47 years old. And completely debt-free at age 50 and then it was just amazing how much money was accumulated.” And fortunately, Blake is, he’s 20-25 years ahead of where I was at his age. It’s just amazing. I don’t think it was mentioned, but Blake, I’m going to tell on you. You’re 30 years old. So quite amazing. When I was 30 years old, I wasn’t even married. And had a little credit card debt, but found a lady that was a math teacher, taught me a little bit about the time value of money and saw that I had potential and married me. So I was very fortunate in that. But I really stress to my students and even when I speak too is you’ve got to get rid of the debt. The debt is the biggest albatross, and then I’ll speak also on buying automobiles. That seems to be a big hindrance in wealth accumulation. But the debt is the biggie in my book.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I’m thinking back to Episode 068 where Tim Baker and I talked about what we thought are kind of the pros and cons of Dave Ramsey’s baby steps, and I think one of the things we’ve realized, whether it’s our own financial plan or talking with hundreds and thousands of pharmacists is that for everyone, obviously different situations are going to allow for unique circumstances, but I think the piece that is often consistently missing in financial advice — although to Tim Baker’s credit, I think he does an outstanding job of this — is the behavioral mindset components. And it’s very hard to put a value to that. And for some people, it’s more important than others. But I share a similar belief, Joe, and when my wife and I hit that point of becoming debt-free with student loans, there was a mindset shift that happened that I cannot even put a value on what that’s done for how we’ve thought in terms of opportunistic ways of our financial plan. Now, could we have gotten there while doing it while we were in debt? Maybe. But I think it’s hard to articulate exactly the impact that that had, and it certainly has been significant for us. So Joe, talk us through your course a little bit. How do you approach that course? And the reason why I want to do address this is I think that while we have a handful of pharmacy schools out there that teach personal finance, we have probably 90+% that do not, and I know we have many faculty that may be listening to this or students that may go back to the school and say, “Hey, we want to do something like what Joe is doing.” So what does that course look like? And what are the fundamentals that you’re trying to teach and address in that course? And even the level of students that take that course.

Joe Baker: Well first of all, if anyone is interested, I would be happy to share any information that I have for you to take back to your dean of the college of pharmacy, even my syllabus, etc. And the way you sell it to your college of pharmacy is to say, “Listen. We’ve got people going out, and if they become financially independent, accumulate wealth, it will benefit the college of pharmacy in the future because the students will be more — the former students will be more inclined to give because they have, quite frankly, deeper pockets.” So that’s how to sell it. But the course that I teach, it’s at the beginning, we talk about all the different styles of stocks, bonds, mutual funds, ETFs. Then I graduate a little bit into the — not a little bit, a lot — into the retirement plans and some of those all the while, showing them examples. And then we gravitate into some other areas. It’s a two-hour elective, which is 30 classroom hours. So it’s hard to get really in-depth for too many subjects. So I want to give them a little overview, get them a little excited, showing them how if they start investing early versus investing late, then we go into some areas like buying and selling a house. I have a mortgage speaker that comes in and speaks along that. I also have an income tax person that comes in. She is not only a CPA but an attorney, so we cover the basis in the income tax area. I personally cover the personal property taxes, which we have in Arkansas. Of course, the insurance areas and then towards the end of the course, I have the student loan speakers come in from the state and explain how, what to do with their loans, some ways of paying them off, etc. So basically, it’s we have 15 class periods, two hours per week, can’t get it all in, but at least it sets a foundation. I tell them, “If I can just motivate you to do the things that you need to do at the beginning, everything else will take care of itself.” But it’s a lot of fun. It is. It is a blast. I get immediate feedback and quite frankly, I tell you, “You’re not doing this for a grade because if you miss one class, it could be $1 million. So you want to make sure you come in for all the classes, participate,” and I will say, up until your book was introduced — and I will brag on your book again — I finally had a book that I said, “Wow. I have a true textbook for my class.” Because before your book, I had “The Automatic Millionaire,” but it —

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, David Bach, yeah.

Joe Baker: But it obviously wasn’t directed towards the pharmacy students. So thank you for that. But I was just so excited when I saw your book. And that’s the textbook, if you will, that we use in class.

Tim Ulbrich: And I love to hear your outline of the curriculum, but also obviously to hear Blake’s story and the success it’s had, and I think a key piece there you mentioned is motivation. It’s really planting seeds, right? You’re not going to cover everything about the financial plan in 30 hours. But you’re beginning to train behavior, beginning to establish mindset, and Blake’s story is one example. I’m sure there are hundreds of others that have had success because of that course. So I would also like to throw out there — and Joe, I know you and I have talked about this — we have a vision at YFP to see every college of pharmacy in the country be educating their students on personal finance. I personally believe — I obviously have a bias — but I personally believe this is a fundamental part of professional development of pharmacy students and new graduates, which to your point, has benefits to a college beyond their graduation, but I feel is an obligation that we have as a part of the professional development because what I’ve seen personally in my own life, in research I’ve done, in working with other pharmacists is personal finance and the stability of one’s personal finance impacts other areas of their life, including their career and the impact that they’re having in their day-to-day work. If we can help provide stability and a foundation through education, I think we’re going to have a better workforce that’s out there. So other colleges that are listening, this is the call to action. We would love to see you pick up an elective course. Anyone from ACP is out there listening — I’m not sure they are — we’d love to see this long-term as a portion of the accreditation standards in the future. So Blake, I want to end on this question. So you and your wife Kristen have done an unbelievable job in setting a strong financial foundation. We’ve talked about you guys becoming debt free, having equity in your home, maxing out retirement accounts, getting into rental properties, and you’re an incredibly young age. What is next for you guys? What are the goals that you have going forward?

Blake: You know, the biggest thing that I love about being debt free and being able to accumulate wealth is the fact that it frees you up to give. I feel like as a community leader, as a pharmacist, you know, we’re called to be leaders in the community. And through that, whether it’s to church or just to any type of organization, it frees you up to give more. So that’s kind of our goal. As years go by, we want to be able to give more and give more away. And we really do enjoy it. It brings a lot of joy to us when we can help others and do that type of thing. So outside of that, we’d like to get some more rental property and just continue to save. I’d like to leave a good inheritance to my kids and grandkids in the future.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome. And I love your vision that you and your wife have on giving, which takes us to No. 13 in the Baker’s Dirty Dozen Tips on Getting Rich, which is make a difference in your family, community and place of worship. This will make you wealthy in your heart, body and soul. And I can see he has helped cast that vision to you all as well as obviously the impact that your family has had. So hopefully we look forward to having you back on the show when we get to that net worth of $1 million. And let me say to both Blake and Joe, on behalf of the YFP community and the YFP team, thank you so much for coming on today’s show and for your support of the work that we’re doing over at Your Financial Pharmacist. We greatly appreciate it. So thank you.

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YFP 081: New Year Financial Gameplan


New Year Financial Gameplan

On episode 81 of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast, Tim Ulbrich and Tim Baker talk about a New Year financial gameplan to kick off 2019 the right way. Tim and Tim discuss 5 financial moves you should be making to ensure you get this year started off the right way.

Summary

On this episode, Tim & Tim dive right into 5 moves to make in your New Year financial gameplan. First on the list is setting financial goals by starting broad. Before digging into the numbers, ask yourself, what would define a successful 2019 financially? After taking some time to answer that and see how it fits with your year, you can bring it to a tangible level. This leads into the second financial move of New Year, new budget. YFP recommends following a zero-based budget. Tim Baker suggests going through your assets and liabilities and then doing a 90 day retroactive budget exercise. There you can view line items, track your expenses and see your spending. After, you’re able to see what your leftover amount is in savings. From there, you can use a savings allocation worksheet to prioritize additional goals, savings accounts, etc.

New Year tax filing and planning is the third financial move. Find a safe spot to collect all tax information and data. Often times, it’s helpful to work with someone who has an objective opinion on your financial situation. Ultimately, you need to find the best way to be proactive in your approach to taxes (DIY or using a tax prep service). The fourth financial move is to tidy up the important parts of your financial plan. This means revisiting or establishing an estate plan, insurance (life and disability), emergency funds, beneficiary information, investments, and making sure your legacy folder is current. The last financial move is to surround yourself with community that keeps you accountable and motivates you, like the YFP community.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 081 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Well, we have officially turned the page on 2018, are recovering, likely, from the financial hit that can be the month of December, and are ready to take 2019 head-on. We wrapped up 2018 by talking about 10 financial moves that you should make prior to the year’s end. So if you didn’t yet, check that out. Go back and take a listen, it’s not too late. So here, we are shifting our focus into setting your financial game plan for the new year. But before we talk through these financial moves we believe you should take to kick off the new year, Tim Baker, I believe we have a big congratulations to you and Shea that is in order. Give us the good news.

Tim Baker: Yeah, well, Merry Christmas, Tim. Happy New Year. Good to be back on the podcast. Yes, Shea and I got — we got engaged over the holiday.

Tim Ulbrich: Yay!

Tim Baker: Finally asked the question. So yeah, that’s really our good news. We’re really excited.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. Excited for you guys and what lies ahead.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: So wanted to make sure the community was aware of that good news as we head into 2019. So let’s do this — five financial moves that we think you should be making in the new year. No. 1, probably no surprise, setting financial goals for the new year. So Tim, when I think of this, I like to start broad and kind of think about what our goals and aspirations before you really dig into the numbers about what exactly do I have available per month and we get specific and measurable and all that. So why don’t you and I just talk broadly about 2019 in terms of things that are top of mind for us individually. We’ll obviously ask the listeners to do the same. So for you, 2019, I like to start by thinking of this question in terms of what would define a successful 2019 financially? So what’s top of mind for you and Shea?

Tim Baker: Yeah, I think the big thing for us is like we’re starting basically to gut our house. And so that’s a major financial I guess stressor for us. So we’re trying to cash-flow as much as we can for kind of some of the incidentals so we’re not putting those into our mortgage. So that’s really our big one. So right now, we’re in the process of moving everything out of our house a couple doors down and get that process going. So I think beyond that, which again, is a big thing, it’s really going to be about making sure that our emergency fund is where it needs to be kind of post-move. I think really, monitoring creep in terms of our spending. So that’s a big one I think everyone deals with. So I think the house is going to really kind of rule the day in terms of our finances. We’ve both agreed that because we’re doing this major undertaking, we’re going to kind of do a little bit less in other areas like vacation and things like this because, you know, we really want to make sure that our house is where it needs to be and we’re not really kind of dipping into those, the waters of being house-poor and cash-poor. And I think another big thing for us is like as our family grows, looking at something like an au pair, I know we’ve talked about that in the past and basically being able to have enough money month-to-month to basically support that. So those are the two big things financially that we’re looking at and really, kind of it’s pre-planning for the house and then basically after we get into it. So how about you, Tim? Like what does that look like for you?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, you know, Jess and I have been obviously working with you on this. But I think for us, we made the move to Columbus in early October, new job started in November. I feel like right now, the dust is finally starting to settle. But I think we underestimated the impact of that transition, just both a little bit financially but even just emotionally, the impact on family and that what’s involved in a transition like that. So I feel like for us, it’s a lot kind of a reset back to some of the behaviors we had in terms of budgeting, goal setting and really getting a new foundation with new job and new differences of income and taxes and all of that and kind of getting back to norm. The other thing that’s top of mind for us is we have two cars that both have about 130,000 miles on them. So we haven’t done as great of a job as we would like — I mean, obviously, they’re paid off, which is good news, no car payments. But we’ve got to be thinking ahead either maintenance and/or purchasing new cars. And we just got slapped with a big, you know, about $2,500 repair bill on one of them that I think has brought this to the forefront a little bit for us and really being intentional about making sure that shouldn’t be an emergency, right?

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: We kind of know that’s coming, and we need to at least plan for one if not both of those. And then the other thing is we have some aspirations around purchasing a first rental property in 2019. So we are super excited/nervous/fearful/insert emotion, you know, when it comes to that. And I’m binging on BiggerPockets, as many of our listeners know, and I think that’s really helped get me fired up. But one of the themes I keep hearing from so many of those that are on that show is, you know, it could be easy to kind of write the script of fear when it comes to real estate investing. And you know, you want to take risk. But it should be calculated risk. And I think I tend to probably think that that risk is greater than it is and wanting to really jump in and make that a part of our financial plan in 2019. So I think starting, as you kind of heard Tim and I talk through those in broad terms, what we didn’t do there is we didn’t put numbers to them yet, right? We didn’t put a date to them. And while we can’t put them yet into our budget, we’re going to get there here in a minute. It’s the beginnings of a conversation, either with you and your spouse and significant other, or maybe it’s just you alone about what would a successful 2019 look like? And take some time and answer that question and have fun answering that question, dream a little bit. And I think, Tim, for me, there’s this balance of doing this between not settling but also being aspirational on some regard, right? I think it’s easy to kind of look at things the way they were and say, OK, I’ve only got $100 a month, and I’m going to settle into what was. And I think it’s good to push yourself and to challenge yourself to think creatively about how those goals can be achieved. But obviously, you don’t want to be unrealistic either. So as you begin this conversation with clients around goal-setting, how do you do this? What direction do you take?

Tim Baker: Yeah, I really think of it as more of like a life plan. And we use the financial situation to really support that. So you know, when I ask a question of like — so when we do kind of like a success timeline, and we say — this is what I do with new clients is like, OK, if we get in our imaginary time machine, it’s December 27, 2018, and we go ahead two years, and we go to December 27, 2020, what does success look like? And really have them visualize that in that sense. So we kind of start there. But I think like most people, they say, is it financial success? And I’m like, I’m just talking success in general, you know. So to me, if it’s about exercise or personal development, to me, that has to be built in there because oftentimes, like that requires some type of like financial — I have a lot of clients that — and this used to me back in the day — they would spend a lot of money on races and traveling to different places to run half marathons or even like personal development courses or things like that or books or whatever. So to me, that’s all part of it and having a bucket of money set aside. So I think I don’t really separate the finances from I guess kind of the overall goals because to me, they’re very much intertwined. And it’s funny too because I get a lot of clients, like especially when we first go through this — and I know it happens in my household — but when we first go through this, I’ll ask a question of one of the spouses, and the other spouse is kind of like, you know, craning their neck and they’re like, I can’t believe that’s important to you or that’s even a thing for you — you know, good or bad, but it’s like, we don’t take the time to verbalize these things. And I know in our household, I feel like we often have the same conversation, but we come to different points of understanding. And then time erodes that. So I think writing it down and getting it on paper too is a good thing because our memories fade and even if we’re — I think we do a pretty good job in our household of kind of talk through where we want to go, but sometimes, you know, there’s two parties to that conversation. And sometimes, we just remember it differently or how to go about it. So I think just having the conversation with yourself and really your significant other, if that’s your case, is the first step because — I don’t know about you, Tim, but like I just have a lot of things running through my head, and to verbalize them and get them out onto paper is probably the majority of the step that needs to be taken. So I think that’s where having an objective third party just say, “Hey, these are questions you probably won’t ask yourself. I’m going to ask them, I’m going to get the heck out of the way, and we’ll just see where this takes us.” I think that’s important.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I want to echo that. I think you did a great job — you have done and continue to do a great job of that with Jess and I. And we’ve talked before on the podcast about episodes 032, 033, where you walked us through some of those big dream questions about your why. And that’s a little bit about what we’re talking here. I mean, a little more granular on a year-long basis, but obviously, even before you think about 2019, I think what we’re encouraging you to do is think about the long-term vision. What is the end goal? What are you trying to achieve? Why are you trying to achieve it? And then you back into what needs to happen in 2019 that’s going to help you get there and making sure you’re prioritizing things appropriately. I know one of the mistakes I have made, Tim, and I know many others have made as well, is we tend to want to start with the budget. And I think that’s difficult, especially with a spouse or significant other. One, because it’s hard to know where you are trying to go to if you haven’t yet defined what are those goals and what you’re doing. And I think it instantly brings in some points of contention, and you’re focusing on the weeds and the numbers. But I know for Jess and I, we can sit down and we can have these conversations and we can dream big and then kind of back into reality and get on the same page. The budgeting process — I’m not going to say it’s easy, but it becomes easier because we’ve already talked about the goals and aspirations that we have together.

Tim Baker: Right. And a lot of people have the opposite problem is that they do the goals, but they never look at the budget because I think they’re afraid to. And that’s very common as well. So you know, I think at the end of the day, it doesn’t have to be perfect. And we would like to connect the dots to, you know, in terms of like what’s past behavior? How is money flowing through the household? To OK, can we account for every dollar that’s going to every goal? And sometimes, that’s just not reality. And that’s fine. But I think what it does is when you introduce all of these goals, whether it’s the home purchase or a vacation or you want to buy a car in the future or whatever that is or upping your retirement game, money is a finite resource, so when push comes to shove and we’re looking at, OK, where is this extra money going if there is extra money — and hopefully that there is extra money — then that’s when we really talk about prioritization and OK, what do we focus on first? What is most important? So some people don’t get to that step because it’s just, it’s too overwhelming for them or the “b” word is so — it’s like ash in their mouth. But I think a measure of kind of looking at goals and aspiration and a measure of practicality of OK, how are we actually going to back into these things is good. And again, you know, I think also having — some people, when I work with them, they’re like, well, tell me what you think I should do. And I give them my opinion based on my thoughts and I think the tone of the conversation and what’s important to them, but I also, I sprinkle in kind of, “This is what the textbook says too. And this may not be the best thing for you,” but I think those are good things to kind of talk through. And a lot of this is just, again, out in the open, talking through the issue. And then I think that brings clarity. If you’re kind of a one-person show or if you’re married and you’re basically calling the shots by yourself, maybe your spouse is not as engaged in the process, to me, you can get in your own head. And you really — not that you lose your way, but I think fleshing things out with an individual, whether it’s your spouse or someone else, is super important.

Tim Ulbrich: So I think for those that are listening and say, “Alright, Tim and Tim. I’ve got it. Goals are where I need to go,” and are looking for a tangible follow-up to do here, my recommendation would be go to episodes 032, 033, where Tim Baker and I talked through with Jess and I some big questions on finding your why. Ask yourself those same questions. If you listened to Episode 079, we had Nick Ornelia on. He actually talked about going through that process himself and how powerful and impactful that was. Then, begin to back into 2019, what are some of the things that you have as goals, based on that bigger picture of purpose and why and what you’re trying to do. And then get down to the tangible level. So we’ve all been taught in school, when you have goals, they need to be specific, measurable. They need to realistic, they need to be time-bound. And we talk about in “Seven Figure,” the book, “Seven Figure Pharmacist,” also adding a why to that. So if you’re somebody that says, OK, I’ve got $150,000 in student loan and I want to get that paid off in five years, you actually add a date to that. So by what date would I like to have that paid off? And what’s the reason why I want to do this? What else am I trying to accomplish, which obviously provides some of the motivation along the way. Once we get to this level where we have 2019 goals, we have some dates, we have some aspirations, we have exactly what we’re trying to do numbers-wise — so for example, for Jess and I, you know, maybe we say by December 31, 2019, we want to have $20,000 saved for our car sinking fund — now we can begin to then get into Step No. 2, which is making those goals become a reality through the budgeting process. So Tim Baker, No. 2 here is a new year, new budget. And so you know we’re big fans of the zero-based budget. For those that need a budgeting template, head on over to YourFinancialPharmacist.com/budget, and you can download and Excel sheet, and we’ll kind of walk you through what we’re going to talk about here. But we really believe Step No. 1, as we begin thinking about this transition from goals becoming a reality through the budgeting is tracking expenses. So talk us through where people can get started with tracking expenses to begin to calculate what are they working with each month to fund these goals.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so there’s a lot of different tools that you can use to really, whether it’s Mint or YNAB or Giveaway, like there’s a lot of things that you can use. There’s a free resource on my website, Script Financial. Basically, what it does is you link your accounts, it builds a dynamic basically balance sheet, so you can see all of your assets, all of your liabilities, and then you actually can look at to see how based on what you’ve connected, whether it’s credit card or checking account, you can see how money is flowing in and how it’s being basically categorized across the various, whether it’s housing or loan payments or whatever. So those are really a good way to kind of get baseline data. I think what often happens is when people look at, you know, the budget process exercise, you see it with people that are training for races that are kind of haven’t done it, they want to get off the couch and run a marathon right away, and sometimes they end up hurting themselves or quitting. And what I really implore clients when I kind of first work with them is our process is to kind of go through the balance sheet and say, “OK, these are all your assets. These are all your liabilities,” get a nice picture of where everything is and what it looks like. And then we do that 90-day retroactive budget exercise where the idea is if you have $10,000 coming in in income, so this is basically your take-home pay, as we walk through and we looked at how much money, we kind of have an idea on what our average is. So in the tool, it shows you, on average over the last three months, you spent $400 on your cat Snuffy. And then for a lot of people, they’re like, “Oh, that’s not good.” So I say, “Well, what’s a good number?” And they automatically want to say it’s $100. But maybe that might not be the reality. So sometimes we go chalk, meaning we take the average. But sometimes they’ll say, “Well, it’s kind of an outlier that Snuffy had surgery,” or whatever, so a realistic number is maybe $200 a month. So the idea is as we go through all of those line items, if $10,000 is coming in, and we have $9,000 that’s going out, in a zero-based budget, essentially what that tells me is that we have $1,000, more or less, to play with in terms of whether it’s increasing money that we’re putting towards loans or there’s basically a line item that is savings. So we might look at that $1,000 and say, “OK. Half of that we want to put towards, per month, we want to put towards maxing out our Roth IRA,” which is what the $500 times 12 months, that’s $6,000. That would max out your IRA. And maybe the other money goes for a different goal. So I think the exercise itself kind of shines a light on how money is flowing through. So on the flip side of that, Tim, you know, if we add up all of those and realistically, the number is typically more conservative because we just have leakage and things that we don’t really account for in that process. If $10,000 is going out, then it means one of two things. It either means that we’re eating into our savings or we’re running some type of credit card debt, and we’re basically running a deficit with our spending. So I think just getting a snapshot of where we’re at is important. And then a lot of those from there, it’s tracking your expenses. And again, like to me, one of the things that I preach is that it’s a two-sided equation, so I always try to impress upon clients to think of other ways to make income, grow the top line, because you can really only cut so much. And again, in this day and age, it’s always good to have alternative income streams than just like the W2 income that’s coming in. So things like that I think are important as we’re kind of going down the path of how to properly fund these goals.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I love hearing you talk through — I mean, I think what this does if we merge steps 1 and 2 here — 1 being the goals, 2 here being the budget — is that you start with the goals in mind and then you work into, OK, based on the last 90 days, what do I have available? And you start to merge the two of these together. And I think what typically happens — I know it happened for Jess and I as we just did this last week with you — is that you get to your goals and your aspirations, and then you get to the reality of what is there. And you say, “I don’t like that reality,” right? So there’s not enough monthly income that’s not being spent on expenses, that’s freed up to put toward our goals, so we either now need to grow the top line, cut the expenses, or both, right? And then you start to really get into the questions of, what can I cut? Or how can I grow my income? And as you mentioned, it’s on both sides. So I think this merging of the goals and the budget really helps not only put it into reality, but it also helps drive some of the motivation to be able to achieve these goals. So I think the next step here — and you alluded to it a little bit — is this idea of what you do with your clients, which I love, is a savings allocation worksheet.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: So once we kind of begin to think about the goals and then we do this 90-day retroactive tracking of expenses, we now get into putting these into a category of what goal, how much am I trying to achieve? What do I need per month to get there? What can I do current versus what do I need to be doing? And then prioritizing those. So talk us through that process and how you do that with clients.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I found that there was like a disconnect between kind of these steps. So one of the things I developed is this — I call it the savings allocation template. And it’s essentially like all of my clients have one. And it’s really just an Excel sheet. You know, it’s funny, like all of these pieces of software that are fancy, like I find that more and more I use kind of my own homemade thing. So essentially, what it is is it’s basically a spreadsheet that kind of shows what are our primary everyday spending accounts. So for some people, it might be Bank of America or USAA or whatever that is. And essentially, that’s where all of the money flows through. And then sometimes we have like a backup account just to make kind of a buffer. And then we have our emergency fund, which is that deep storage where we never touch. And then we might have like retirement accounts that are more for long-term savings. But then we have these, kind of these tweener accounts. And really, these are what we’re talking about in terms of like sinking funds. So most people — I think if you’re doing it correctly, in my opinion — are going to have things like a home maintenance, a car maintenance fund, a gift or a holiday fund. So a lot of people, they’ll say, “Hey, Tim, I do a really good job 11 months of the year, but then Christmas rolls around, and I blow my budget out of the water.” So typically, my question is, “Well, how much do you spend during the holidays?” Say for simple math, the answer is $1,200, then I say, “OK. In January 2019, this month, let’s set up a sinking fund. We’re going to call it ‘Gift, Holiday Fund,’ whatever, and every month from January 2019 to December 2019, we’re going to fund $100. So by the end of that month, or by the end of that year, we have $1,200, so essentially replicates spending. And really, we’re not getting into credit card debt or anything. But that money is there. So the idea behind the savings allocation sheet is to kind of get everything on one page and then it shows kind of the location of the account, what the monthly contribution is, so this is kind of what we’re talking about now — so typically, this is blank until we figure it out — what the current balance is, what the target is, what the source is — this could be paycheck or it could be moonlight shifts, or it could be Airbnb, which is kind of like what I talked about in the past with our travel fund — and then the description of what it’s actually for. So the example that I give for our travel fund, I said, “Hey, Shea, my buddies, we’re going to Vegas for a bachelor party. I really want to use the travel fund.” We look at the description, she’s like, “Sorry, bro. That’s for family vacations only, so you’ve got to find that money somewhere else.” But it keeps us honest, and it keeps us on the same page. So our car maintenance fund is for, you know, car repairs, oil changes, tires. For our home fund, we have the things that we know we need to spend money on in the future. And I think another field that I would add to this is, you know, we have kind of the current balance and the target. So if your emergency fund, it needs to be $20,000, and you have $15,000 in it, and you’re funding it $1,000 per month, then you essentially have five months until it’s fully funded, if you’re running at a clip. I think getting that on paper too, I think one of the things we talked about last time, Tim, was, OK, if we contribute to the emergency fund at this clip, it’s going to take us three years to fund it. Is that acceptable? So I think if when we look at it in that context, then you’re going to say, “Well, no, not really. It’s not.” Or you might look at it differently and say, “Yeah, that’s fine. We have cash there, and we’re building it up over time.” So I think that’s the piece. But it’s amazing, like we talk about kind of the small wins, and I think sinking funds are a big thing, but I think actually looking at this — and I equate it to almost like the debt roll down method in reverse. So we talk about when a debt is paid off, we basically roll that payment into the next one. So same thing, it’s like when our target balance is achieved, and in that example I gave you, you had $1,000 that’s going into the emergency fund, then essentially, we free up that $1,000 to now fund your travel fund or whatever it is. And I think that’s when we kind of talk about priorities. Do we do a lot of one thing? Or do we do a little of a lot of things in terms of spreading the dollars out?

Tim Ulbrich: And I think, again, just to reinforce for our listeners to not underestimate the power of writing down your goals and how you’re going to achieve them. I just pulled up right now the allocation worksheet you and Jess and I were working on, so we have things on here like additional giving and gifts, like you mentioned, vacation, home improvement fund, emergency funds, car sinking funds, different retirement accounts, and then we have the 529 accounts for the boys, real estate investing, paying down home early. And after we prioritized them, which is another step of this process, I see here a bunch of areas that it really pisses me off that we’re not able to contribute to these right now, right? Because of other things we’re trying to do. And so I think there’s that motivational factor of, OK, what needs to change? What do we need to do to make these a priority and make them happen? And obviously, there’s patience there as well. And so the next step of this is once you have your goals and once you have this allocation worksheet and you have the budget set and you prioritize these items, you then begin to put these on automation, which is what we’re talking about here with the sinking funds. And so I would point our listeners back to Episode 057, we talked about the power of automating a financial plan and we have some more detailed information there. OK, No. 1 we talked about is setting goals for the new year. No. 2 is new year, new budget. No. 3 is a new year tax filing and planning for 2019. So in Episode 070, you and Paul had talked about kind of pre-planning for the tax season. And so here we are, January, and for me, there’s really two buckets that we’re thinking about is what we need to do to file 2018 returns and then obviously, the strategic planning for 2019. So what should our listeners be thinking about? Here we are, January 2019, and what they need to do in terms of filing and probably the most common question we get here is what are the pros and cons of DIY, TurboTax, versus hiring and working with a professional on this.

Tim Baker: Yeah. So I think the big thing is as tax documents come in, you know, basically having a safe spot, a known spot, to basically gather all those and collect all those. I think that’s the big one. There are still things that you can do between January, this month, to April 15 that can affect your tax bill. So I think understanding that is important. So you know, right now, I think it should be about data collection, looking at where we’re at. But then as we kind of transition to alright, now we’re ready to file, what’s the best step? So for some people, it might be a TurboTax. It’s fairly easy. Now, the changes in the tax code makes the tax picture a little bit different. It’s supposed to be easier. It’s supposed to be a lot easier, but I think it’s about the same as far as what I’ve looked at and what I’ve read in terms of the new tax code. But again, it’s the same thing with goal-setting and a lot of this stuff is sometimes, it’s worth an objective opinion. And I would say the big win with Paul with a lot of clients that we’ve had is, you know, actually looking at — you know, we’re talking about midway through last year — looking at if nothing changes midway through, “Hey, client, you’re going to owe $6,000, $8,000, or we’re going to get back that amount of money.” And both of those things are not necessarily optimal outcomes. A lot of people — for some people, it is, because if they get back $6,000, it’s really the only way they can save, unfortunately. But that’s really a tax-free loan to the government. And on the flip side of that, no one really preps for or prepares for a large tax bill to Uncle Sam. And it happens if residents are moving from a residency salary to a regular pharmacist salary or life event changes, baby, increase in income, home purchase, a lot of these things can move the needle. So again, like we preach being proactive with this. And I think what we want to do in really this time of year is start the process of filing, especially if you’re going to get some type of return. File early, and then look ahead for 2019 and say, “OK. What are the things that we can do to affect change so we can be as efficient with the money that we’re sending Uncle Sam.” So for some people, it’s going to make sense to DIY it. And that’s more than OK for some people, especially if they have multiple states or things like that, it makes sense to kind of slow down and say, “OK. Tax permeates everything. What’s the best way to plan for this and be proactive in the approach?” And I think that’s the difference is I think the act of filing taxes is very transactional, it’s very reactive. But I think the planning piece can make it a lot more pleasant if you kind of get in front of it and make sure that you’re doing what you need to do to better your tax situation.

refinance student loans

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think that’s a goal we have for our community and audience is to really shift the mindset from just the filing, the transaction, to actually the strategic planning around taxes, you know, being intentional with the individual situations that everyone has and really — obviously, we’re not trying to deviate the tax code in any way, shape or form but really trying to look at all things considered, all those variables you mentioned, what can we be doing in advance of next year’s filing to be strategic to maximize the individual plan for each and every person? So really, thinking much more proactively about taxes than I think reactively.

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: So I would point our listeners to YourFinancialPharmacist.com/taxprep, where you and your team with Paul offer a service to both do the filing as well as kind of looking ahead to the strategic planning of the new year. Alright, No. 4 here is a bucket of things that I’m calling tidying up the not-so-sexy but oh-so-important parts of your financial plan. So Tim, what are some of the things that our listeners heading into the new year probably often may not get the same attention that maybe student loans or saving for retirement, but some of the foundational, maybe more of the defensive things people need to be thinking about if they haven’t yet done putting a plan in place for 2019 to get it done?

Tim Baker: Yeah. I think you hit it on the head, Tim. I think it’s so much of the defensive things that don’t get the sizzle that things like, you know, the controversy over PSLF or the student loans because it’s a main pain point or investments, Roth conversions, that type of thing. It’s really about setting yourself up for good defense. So like I have a lot of prospective clients that came in the door, and they rattle off a bunch of things that they want to achieve or accomplish. And when I ask the question of like, “Do we have an estate plan in place?” which is super important because you own a house, you have kids, and the answer is no, then I need to impress upon them how important that actually is because what we don’t want to do is we don’t want some judge in the state of Wisconsin, Ohio, Florida, wherever it is, basically deciding who’s going to be guardian for your kids or how your body’s going to be treated in the event of incapacity or how your affairs are going to be handled in death. So it’s not something that is sexy or that we like to talk about, but it’s also typically one of the things that we don’t know what we don’t know. So I like to elevate that. To me, that’s where I think a good planner kind of elevates that. And I think that’s, again, it kind of goes back to one of the things that you said, Tim, is we worked together for a long time, and we get around to investments because, you know, most people, there’s other things that we need to tackle before we hit the investment piece. And I think this is one of the things too is, you know, yeah, I got it, we want to do Roth conversions, we want to make sure that the 401k is properly allocated, all that stuff. But if you kind of fall into those buckets — especially if there’s kiddos involved, having a proper estate plan is super important. So that would be the big thing, and some employers offer this as part of employment that you might pay a little bit more for legal, but I would definitely recommend talking to an attorney. And I know you and Jess talked to the person that I work with, and I think it was a big win for you guys. But I think that would be No. 1 is looking at that and making sure that we’re good in that regard.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and just to build off of that, we did. We just finished up that work, we’re reviewing the documents right now. And I had gone the DIY approach a couple years ago and really underestimated the power and the value of the conversation. Again, third party, different viewpoint. You know, Jess and I may be thinking about it one way, him asking questions, getting us to think about the different documents, and even some nuances and implications around life insurance policies and where other things go and how assets are handled and establishments of trusts and all those things that I would have never gathered through a template form. So I think that’s one that, you know, maybe for many people feels overwhelming, not only the topic in and of itself, but just the some of the legalese and working with somebody and all that. But I think it’s a good goal for many of our listeners to think about in 2019 if they haven’t yet done so.

Tim Baker: And at the end of the day, it’s really not about you. And the next things that we’re going to talk about is also not about you. You know, when you’re talking about estate planning, this is really about your family, your survivors. And a lot of people, it’s like, well, I won’t be here, I don’t have to really worry about it. But again, if you have a family to look after, I think it’s important to get this right and spending a little bit of money I think is well advised. So I think the next part of this, you know, some other not-so-sexy but oh-so-important parts of the financial plan would be your insurance game, you know. And again, I think that a lot of advisors will lead with this because, you know, a crappy permanent insurance or disability policy can pay a lot of premiums and typically, you know, I see a lot of people that don’t necessarily have what they need or they’ll over buy or whatever that is, but I think at the end of the day, looking at do you have enough term to basically cover what you need to cover? And again, if you have dependents, that’s going to be better. From a disability insurance where we’re talking about insuring the income that you earn, when you have dependents and you’re at the stage of life where you have spent a lot of time, energy, blood, sweat, tears to get the PharmD, you want to make sure that you protect that. So if it’s a simple calculation for life, which could be 10-12x your income to get that policy in place, so maybe that’s a $1 million term, which is cheaper than you think for — I kind of use, we talked about the rule of 30. For a 30-year-old who buys a $500,000 30-year term policy, it’s about $30 a month. So a lot of people think that’s a lot more. And then disability policy, you probably want something that is own occupation, which means it covers for your occupation. And you want something that’s around 60% of your gross monthly income. So a lot of people, again, they overlook this. And you know, this is as important as some of the other things that we’ve talked about, the investment, the emergency fund, all that kind of stuff. And then that’s the next thing is really — is your emergency fund up-to-date and current? So Tim, you said you mentioned kind of life changing, moving to Columbus, we re-assessed the emergency fund, and we saw, OK, we probably need to plus it up a little bit. Same for our household. I love to just watch that money sit and get its 2% from Ally every month. Like it’s a beautiful thing. But you know, do we have enough cash reserves for the unthinkable to happen and be good with that? And then in terms of some of the other things, you know, updating beneficiary information on your investment accounts — do you have a primary beneficiary? Do you have a contingent beneficiary? And make sure that’s current. And to circle back to the estate planning stuff is, you know, is your legacy folder, is that current? Is it even in existence? And basically talking through with loved ones about, “Hey, this is if something were to happen to me, this is my LastPass account. This is where you look for everything.” And make sure. Because again, a lot of people think it will happen to someone else, but at the end of the day, the odds are is that this will happen to one of our listeners, and it’s important to be prepared for that.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and if you haven’t heard us talk about that on the show before, legacy folder, that’s a play off of Dave Ramsey’s content. He talks about this in Financial Peace University, having all of your financial documents, insurance policies, birth certificates, investment account logons, you name it, in one place where people or whomever, one person, knows where that is in the event that you need it, whether that’s spouse, significant other, or obviously extended family. So we have a document, YourFinancialPharmacist.com/legacyfolder that is a list of things that you may consider including in there. And Tim, just to put a bow on this and kind of wrap up the things you had talked about, I think for those that are listening and say, “Estate planning: check. Life and disability: check. Emergency fund: check,” it’s really going back and asking the questions, if you already have those in place, to your point, are they up-to-date? And do they align with your current financial situation? So I know, for example, I mentioned Jess and I have the estate plan, we kind of looked at that and said, “Yeah, we did it. But we didn’t really do it as well as we could have or should have.” And it didn’t represent, I think our current status of our family, and it probably won’t again in three years, and we’ll have to update it. Life and disability is one that we’re working with you on right now to say, “OK, when we purchased a life insurance policy three years ago, our financial situation, our family situation is very different.” And so we’re at a point now of needing to kind of up those policies. Same with the emergency fund that you mentioned. So really going back and looking to say, “Are these policies representative, are these parts of the financial plan representative of current status of what’s going on?”

Tim Baker: Yeah, and I had a prospective client ask me this and actually became a client. They basically said is like, “I kind of understand how you work through the financial plan. But then like what do we do after that?” And it’s like, you know, is there work to do? And I was like, “Well, you know, if you look back two years and what you were doing two years ago, is that different than what it looks like today?” And inevitably, it’s like yeah. So the beauty of the financial plan — to nerd out a little bit — is that it’s fluent. And life happens, so I feel like asking the question, like does this make sense today is valid across all part of the financial plan. And for some people, you know, they’re going to move from the accumulation phase of, say, their 529, they’re saving for little Johnny’s education, to actually the distribution phase, which looks a lot like retirement in terms of like how can we set up a plan, you know, your kid’s in middle school, high school, and make sure that we know exactly what we’re paying for college down to the penny and how we’re going to fund that. And you know, it sounds — you know, a lot of people kind of get stuck in the here and now and where we’re currently headed, but we forget how much life changes over time. Even in your case, Tim, when we talked about, when we looked back at kind of your goals, some of them made a lot of sense. But then you had a lot of things change as well. Again, I think that’s where it’s good — and I even have problems with this in my life — but it’s good to kind of slow down and ask the questions like, “Do we like where we’re going? Does this still make sense?” You know, has something basically come up that’s now more important? And then really adjusting the plan accordingly. So and that’s one of the reasons I’ve been on my soap box — that’s really the reason I like to work with young people is that you can come in completely scattered or in a tough spot, but I think the fact that we have time to really right the ship and get the plan going is a beautiful thing. So.

Tim Ulbrich: And if those listening, you know, maybe you have a question about life and disability, emergency funds, all these things we’ve talked about, taxes, you know, we have so many resources on the website, YourFinancialPharmacist.com. We’ve got guides and calculators and links to previous content. So head on over there, search the topic that you’re looking for, and if there’s not something there that you’re looking for, let us know. No. 5 and finally, you know, probably the quickest one that we’ll talk about but maybe the most important is surrounding yourself with community that one, keeps you accountable and two, motivates you to learn and better yourself financially each and every day. So we’ve talked before about the YFP Facebook group, and our challenge for those of you that are listening that are not yet a part of that group, number one, it’s free. Number two, there’s multiple conversations going on each and every day: people posing a question, something they’re struggling with, a win that they had. Please join us in that community. I think you’ll find it incredibly helpful and valuable just to stay sharp when it comes to your own financial plan and what you’re working on. And number two is obviously when it comes to accountability and finding somebody that can motivate you and help you learn, of course, the comprehensive financial planning services. So Tim Baker, we’re of course proud to be partnering with him, ScriptFinancial.com. You can head over to that website, schedule a free call, see if it’s a good fit for you. And Tim, from what you’ve seen working with clients, whether it’s accountability and community with a significant other, a spouse or a planner or some other form or fashion, I mean, how important is this aspect of accountability and community?

Tim Baker: I think it’s huge. You know, I think when I start with clients and we do kind of a wealth building survey, which is built on kind of “The Millionaire Next Door” and the research that was done there, you know, pharmacists grade out very highly in things like responsibility, but from an accountability measurement or like a focus measurement, sometimes they don’t — or a confidence measurement, sometimes they don’t. And that’s where we kind of lose the way. So again, my job in essence from a behavioral standpoint is to kind of nudge you in the right direction. And sometimes, it’s just as easy as bringing up the savings allocation, kind of the goal and the success timeline and saying, “OK. Where are we at? And where are we going?” And you know, I love the community that we’re building because I think it was — I know I heard it through Tim first, I think he stole it from someone else — Tim Ferriss is the author of “The 4-Hour Workweek,” is that you’re the average of like your five closest friends or things like that, something like that. And I think when you surround yourself with people or community that are like-minded, in essence, or are cheering each other on to kind of change their situation, I think that’s where you really start to see action. So that can be a community, working with your spouse, it can be working with an advisor. But at the end of the day, I think the accountability is such a huge piece of it. And I often say to clients, like you know, “You guys can look up how to do a Roth conversion, what you need an emergency fund and where, but at the end of the day, I think it’s that objective voice in the room that says, ‘Does this make sense?’ and ‘Is this still important?’ And if it is, where’s the money? Where’s the bucket? Where’s the resources to say that it is imporant and we’re going to see it through?” So yeah, I think it’s probably the most important part of the financial plan is really pushing it forward and being accountable to what we’ve laid out.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. We’ve talked before, it’s not — the x’s and o’s are important, but what is more important is the execution, which comes down to accountability and community and upping your financial IQ. And I’m feeling that right now, I mean, we’re finishing up a book club in the YFP Book Club Facebook group on “Rich Dad, Poor Dad,” and it’s been to facilitate that, but even seeing the conversation, you know, we’re one month in, and I think like we talk about the compound growth of your investments, there’s a much more or equal significance of the growth of your financial IQ that can happen through reading a book each month or every month or whatever that the cumulative effect of that, you cannot underestimate that. So I hope you’ll join us in the YFP community if you’re not already a part of that group. And before we wrap up today’s show, just another reminder about our first giveaway of the year. We’re doing three yearly subscriptions to the budgeting software, YNAB, again, standing for You Need A Budget. Head on over to YourFinancialPharmacist.com/giveaway to enter that contest today. As always, we appreciate you joining us for this week’s episode. And if you haven’t done so, please leave a review of this show in iTunes and make sure to subscribe, whether that be in iTunes or whatever podcast player that you get your content each and every week. We’re grateful for your listenership, and we look forward to joining you again next week. Have a great rest of your week.

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YFP 079: Is It Time to Redefine Retirement?


Is It Time to Redefine Retirement?

On episode 079, Tim Ulbrich, co-founder of Your Financial Pharmacist, interviews Dr. Nick Ornella, a 2009 graduate of Ohio Northern University, about his journey paying off his student loans in 10 months and shortly after taking one year off to travel the world. Tim and Nick share thoughts of what it means to redefine retirement and why the concept of mini-retirements are gaining traction. They finish the show up by getting practical with 7 steps you can take to plan for a year off.

About Today’s Guest

Nick Ornella is a 2009 graduate of Ohio Northern University’s College of Pharmacy. He began working for Walgreens when he graduated. Nick was able to pay off his student loans within 10 months. In 2016, he decided to take a year long leave of absence from work to travel. Nick spent an entire year traveling around the western United States, Europe, and east Africa. In 2018, he married his wife, Alanna, and they currently live in Cincinnati. Nick is now back to working for Walgreens as a pharmacy manager. Nick also created a blog called the Young Professional’s Guide to a Year Off to tell the story of his year off and to show other young professionals how to take extended time off work to travel.

Summary

On this episode, Tim Ulbrich interviews Dr. Nick Ornella, a 2009 Ohio Northern University graduate. Nick knew in high school that he wanted to become a pharmacist and began taking the necessary steps to do so. His parents helped to financially support his college career. Nick worked hard in school to earn scholarships from Ohio Northern University that helped to offset his indebtedness. He worked as an intern at Walgreens during school and took advantage of their tuition reimbursement program. At graduation, he had accrued $35,000 in debt.

Nick went to work the day he became a licensed pharmacist. He wanted to build a strong financial foundation and decided to live with his parents so that he could pay off his student loans as quickly as possible. After paying off his loans, he started 401(k) contributions and maxed them out. He avoided big purchases, aside from a 2011 Audi A5, lived humbly in a small apartment, didn’t use a credit card or rack up any credit card debt and minimized costs any way he could.

Nick was fed up with his job and decided, after a lot of contemplation a research, that he wanted to take a year off of work to travel. He had a nice nest egg in his 401(k) and $40,000 in his savings account with no other debt. He purchased several books on how he could travel frugally and for additional inspirational stories and information to help make this long-time dream a reality. He decided he was all in and would have no regrets. He was able to receive a leave of absence from work giving him the ability to take a year off to travel several places in the U.S., Europe and Africa. During his travels, he found himself often living in the present moment and truly finding contentment in his life, a feeling he had never experienced before.

Nick has come to realize that the concept of retirement needs to be rethought and that it’s important to step out of the rat race of work to create pockets of time that you can truly enjoy. Since his return, he created a blog and also lays out 7 financial steps to take a year off.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 079 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. We have a special treat for you on today’s show, Dr. Nick Ornelia, Walgreens pharmacist, fellow Ohio Northern University alum — go Polar Bears — and blogger at Young Professionals Guide to a Year Off. He’s going to share his journey of crushing it to pay off his student loans and shortly after, taking one year off to travel the world. Nick, welcome to the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast.

Nick Ornelia: Hi, Tim. Thanks for having me. Really honored to be here on the podcast.

Tim Ulbrich: Super excited to have you. And I’m fired up about talking about this topic. We’ve actually had lots of interest. People write in about this concept of retirement, should we be thinking about retirement in a different way? Many people know of Tim Ferriss’ work in the 4-hour work week, where he talks about this concept of mini-retirements. We’ll get there, but first, I want to take our listeners — and I don’t know if you’ll remember this, Nick, all the way back to January 4th, 2016, I actually pulled up my email before we were recording — brand new, the Your Financial Pharmacist blog had just started, and you wrote me an email. And the subject line was, “Taking a year off of work.” And I’m going to read this email quick because I think it’s going to set the stage for our conversation today and obviously, show our listeners of what you executed on in taking this year off. So you said, “Hello. Just wanted to know if you’ve ever heard of a pharmacist taking a year off work to travel and/or spend more time with family. If so, what kind of financial impact did that have on them? And what kind of difficulty did they have rejoining the workforce as a pharmacist? Thanks, Nick.” So Nick, with that in mind, give us the back story at this point in time, almost three years ago, when you were thinking about this idea of taking a year off. What was stimulating this interest for you? And maybe what fears were going on in your mind at that time?

Nick Ornelia: That’s incredible that you still have that email because I was scouring the internet at that time, trying to find any kind of example of any pharmacist or similar healthcare professional who had done something similar, just to see kind of like what their experience was and to get some information. And your blog popped up, and actually, I recognized your name. I knew you had gone to Ohio Northern. So I shot you that email, and you know, your response and your quick reply was actually a big kind of help for me, kind of a push out the door. So I will forever be grateful to the Financial Pharmacist for that. But the idea had been kind of brewing in my mind for probably at least a year before then, probably even longer. I had heard about people taking gap years, taking extended time off, maybe like after college or a sabbatical at some point in their career. So the idea was always in the back of my mind as a possibility that sounded pretty awesome and pretty cool, and maybe someday, I can do that. But I’d never really given it too much though until probably about April of 2015, so this was about a year before I started my year off. I was in a long-term relationship at the time. And it wasn’t going as I had hoped it to go. We ended up being two completely different people, and that day I remember in April, I remember we got in a big argument, and it just wasn’t my day. I was having a bad day. A bad day at work, I was kind of fed up with everything. And I went down into the basement, and I ordered three different books off of Amazon. And one of them was the book that you just mentioned, “The 4-Hour Workweek” by Timothy Ferriss. Another one was called, “Vagabonding” by Rolf Potts. And then the third one was, “How to Travel the World on $50 a day.” And that right there was like the first tangible step that I took that kind of set me on that path. And I read those books in a matter of days, and from that point on, it was a daily thing where I thought about it, I dreamed about it. And I really at that point, wanted to make it happen. So as I said, I was in that relationship and later that October, I believe it was, October 2015, about six months before I started the whole year of travel, that relationship ended amicably. We just realized we weren’t right for each other. And the day that that relationship ended, which was probably the hardest day of my life up to this point, very difficult, but that was the day that I decided to go through with it, to take the year off and to jump into it and have no regrets about it.

Tim Ulbrich: So Nick, when you emailed me, you didn’t talk about financial fears, per say, but I’m guessing there were things at the time you were thinking about as a young practitioner, 2009 graduate, maybe fears around whether it’s job security or am I going to be delaying retirement? All these things. I mean, what was going through your mind at that point of potential financial barriers that you saw or — whether they were real or not or maybe perceived to be greater than they were — but financial barriers that you saw that may have prevented you from taking that year off?

Nick Ornelia: There weren’t too many, honestly. I had done a really good job — I’m sure we’ll get into this, but I paid off my loans super quick. I had a nice nest egg in my 401k. I had about $50,000 saved up in my savings account. And after reading that book, “How to Travel the World on $50 a day,” you know, if you calculate that out, 365 days, that’s about $19,000 I think is about what that works out to. That’s traveling relatively cheaply. I knew I didn’t want to travel that cheaply. So that’s where that extra money came in. So I knew, even if I traveled as cheaply as I could, I knew that I would have enough money to last the year. So I was not concerned about running out of money there. I did think quite a bit about the opportunity costs, so you know, you’re going a whole year without earning any money. You’re going a whole year without contributing anything to your 401k. And if you’re looking 30-40 years down the road, that money, if you max it out at $18,500, that’s going to be a considerable amount of money that you’re potentially missing out on. So I thought of those opportunity costs, but then I thought of myself sitting there at the age of 65, you know, with all this extra money but then the thought of never having gone through with this dream of mine to take a year off work. And that was kind of ultimately one of the main reasons why I decided to do it. I was afraid of that regret. Yeah, the money would be great to have at that age, but what are you going to spend it on then? I’m young now, I have the opportunity to do this right now, to live in this moment for an entire year. And so that’s one of the main reasons why I did it. But the financial risks, I mean, probably the biggest risk I was worried about then was my ability to make money. Our biggest asset is our ability to make money. And you know, just being concerned about coming back to a job, to full-time work. But I was prepared for anything. I was prepared to find a different job just to make ends meet for the time being until I was back to full-time pharmacist work. So the financial risks, you know, I looked at them, but I tried not to worry too much about them because if you worry about every single little thing like that, you’re never going to take a leap, you’re never going to take a risk. And you’re going to kind of be stuck sitting on your hands. So eventually, I just was like, whatever. Let’s just jump in and do it. And if I’ll end up on my last dime, I’ll kind of worry about that then. But in the meantime, let’s just do this.

refinance student loans

Tim Ulbrich: I really hope, Nick, our listeners will go back and rewind and replay the last few minutes of what you said. I think there’s so much wisdom there. And you know, we talk about the x’s and o’s of personal finance, all of which are important. But at the end of the day, this reminds me back to the conversation Tim Baker and I had with Jess, my wife, and I about really finding your why and not losing sight of your passion, your interests, your purpose, in addition to the x’s and o’s. And I think it’s easy to get hung up in making sure you have your t’s crossed, your i’s dotted with your personal finances. But one of my greatest fears that I share with what I think I heard you say was looking back 30 or 40 or 50 years from now and saying, I saved up all of that for what? What was the purpose? And I think the enjoyment of life experiences is huge. And I’m so glad you took that leap of faith, and I think your story is going to encourage so many others that are maybe feeling in a rut or they’re stuck, they’re stressed and really wanting to pursue a similar path. And we’re going to get tangible here in a little bit about how they can think about doing that. But what I also want to say is I don’t want to brush over what I know you did, which is huge, is you had a solid financial foundation, which allowed this to become a reality. And so many people that are listening are thinking, wow, I’ve got $200,000 student loan debt, I’ve got credit card debt, I’ve got this going on. I’ve got young kids and expenses and I don’t have margin to do something like this. And I think what your story resonated to me, as I’m reading right now through “Rich Dad, Poor Dad,” for a second time, is he talks about the importance of having a strong financial foundation so you can take risk. Now, in his book, he’s really talking about risk from real estate, the business aspect, doing some things that are entrepreneurial, but I think taking risk of taking time off and developing yourself is another aspect of risk. So share with our listeners for a moment, how did you build that strong foundation? You paid off student loan debt in 10 months, you built up some savings, you began retirement, how is that possible? And what was the strategy of doing that in such a short period of time, which takes many other people maybe five or 10 years to get to that point?

Nick Ornelia: Yeah, sure. First of all, you just mentioned the episode about the interview of you and Jess with Tim Baker.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Nick Ornelia: THat was my favorite episode by far so far, just hearing you guys talk about your whys and the questions that he was asking you just really got me thinking, and I literally, I was at the gym when I listened to that episode. And right when the episode was over, I just got out my phone and I texted my wife and I told her, “I love you.”

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome.

Nick Ornelia: So that, the stuff that you guys are doing is just fantastic in that regard. So I wanted to get that in there. But yeah, going back, my kind of financial story. I mean, really it started in high school, and I just decided to go to pharmacy school. I knew I was good at math and science, and I knew that pharmacists made a good salary, and that honestly kind of why I chose it. And so I went in knowing that I was doing pharmacy and knowing that I would have the degree after six years. And I went with the best financial package, which happened to be Ohio Northern. And so really did a good job of minimizing my debt. My parents were paramount in that. I know they helped me out quite a bit throughout my college years, and it’s something that I’ll never forget, it’s something that I plan on paying forward with my children. But I also, you know, at Ohio Northern, it’s a bit different for all the student listeners out there. Our last two years, our scholarship was based completely on our GPA from our first four years. And there were days that I buckled down, and I went and I studied and I got good grades and got a pretty good financial package for the last two years of pharmacy school. So I was able to come out of ONU with only about $35,000 in debt. I had also taken some money from Walgreens, I started as an intern there and took every single dollar that they offered as far as tuition reimbursement, which really helped minimize my debt as well. So upon graduation, I went right into work. I didn’t mess around. The day I got licensed, I went into work later that day. So I jumped right into it. I was living with my parents at the time and just continued to live with them and my sole purpose in life was to make that $35,000 in debt disappear. And I did owe my dad a little bit of money for a car so I had to pay that off as well. So I just lived at home with my parents, didn’t do much but work, picked up extra shifts and by I think it was January — I got licensed in I think June or July and then by that following January-February, I hit that final payment button. And that was the end of the student loans for me. I know it’s not as easy for a lot of listeners. And I’m forever grateful for that. That’s something that I’ll forever be grateful for. But at the same time, you know, once I paid off my loans, I still kind of kept in that saving money mindset, so as soon as I paid those off, I started my 401k contributions. And from the get-go, I maxed them out. I was throwing 15% of my salary. I started it that January right after I paid off my loans. So I had been maxing that out ever since then, ever since January of 2010. And then also, I really avoided the big purchases. I was young and dumb a little bit. I bought a 2011 Audi A5. You know, you guys call it the million-dollar car and essentially, it is a million-dollar car.

Tim Ulbrich: It might have been 2, right?

Nick Ornelia: But you know, I did that. And that was probably my biggest financial mistake leading up to my year off. I didn’t buy a house, I rented a small apartment that was easy to furnish, cheap, and all my other spending was kept in check. I wasn’t buying new gadgets, I never had credit card debt, never a penny of credit card debt. So I just saved as much money as I could and minimized my costs as much as I could. And that really helped build that financial base that you were talking about, really building the net worth. I know you guys are big net worth guys, and I was really able to do a good job of that over those four or five years leading up to when I actually decided to take a year off.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and Nick, what I appreciate about your journey there — and I hope the students listening heard that your financial foundation post-graduation starts when you’re in school. It’s the decisions you’re making. Yes, you had parental support, which is awesome, but also in there was scholarships and pursuing those types of things, being intentional about putting yourself in a position to get those scholarships. It’s about doing everything you can post-graduation to minimize accumulation of interest and keeping costs down and not buying big homes and other things. So yes, you had help. But there’s intentionality in that and all the way back to your P1 year at Ohio Northern, building that foundation and your parents helping you do that, obviously was a big factor in allowing you to do the things that you’re doing today. So let’s get to the point of, you make this decision, say, “You know what? I’m doing this. I’m taking a year off.” Walk us through that conversation with your employer. What was their receptiveness to it? What security, if any, did you have about if I take this year off, will my job be here? Take us through that conversation with your employer and what was going through your mind at that time.

Nick Ornelia: Yeah, sure. So when I decided to do it, that day that I decided in October of 2015 that I’m going through with this, no matter what, I knew I had two options. I knew I had the option of trying to figure out a leave of absence. And then the alternative option was to quit, to just walk away. And I had it in the back of my mind that even if I can’t work out this leave of absence, I’m going to do it. I’m going to quit. It’s what’s going to be required for me to do this. But I’m going to do it if that’s what it comes down to. So I had that idea in the back of my mind, that kind of promise to myself to do that. But you know, obviously, I wanted to work out a leave of absence. It’s a lot more preferable to quitting, obviously, to have at least some sort of guarantee of work to come back to in a year. It takes a big worry off your mind so you’re able to enjoy the year a little bit more. And to be able to walk back and make any kind of money to begin supporting yourself again is really important, if you can make it happen. So I started looking on the Walgreens website, on our internal website, and found the leave of absence form. And it was the same form that you use for — I think you used it for family medical leave, for personal medical leave, I think even for maternity leave. But the very last option, leave option, was just a personal unpaid leave of absence. And it was left completely blank, no discretion, no direction as what to use it for. So that was my route, so I printed that form out and I needed three different signatures on it. I needed a signature from somebody in my store, which I had my pharmacy manager Jason who happens to be one of my best friends. He was super excited for me when I told him about it, and he signed the form no problem. He was one of my biggest supporters, just an incredible guy.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome.

Nick Ornelia: Forever thankful for him. So I got his signature, and then I needed my district supervisor’s signature, which she had the same thing. She was super pumped for me and excited. And then I needed a signature from somebody in the leaves department, and I got all three of them and got approved for the leave of absence starting April 1, 2016. And then I had to be back to work by March 31 of 2017. Otherwise, I would be terminated. So I basically had this entire year to do whatever I pleased. And I was completely up front with what I wanted to do. I told them, I said, “Hey, I want to travel for a year. This is where I’m going to go, this is what I want to do. I will be back in a year. I want to work for Walgreens, I don’t want to work for anybody else. I love this company, I like my job. But this is what I want to do right now.” And so I got the necessary signatures, and I’ll never forget the day that I got the letter saying my leave of absence was approved. It was a pretty exhilarating day to know that I had this great big adventure planned ahead of me. So it was pretty awesome.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. What I like about that part of your story, Nick, is that to me, when I hear about the reaction from your pharmacy manager and your district manager and how excited they were for you, that tells me the level of value that you had brought to the organization. You know, because if you’re somebody who’s a mediocre employee or a disgruntled employee or an OK, average employee, you’re probably not getting that reaction. So I think it just speaks more to what we’ve talked about before on this podcast about as we encourage and coach people through career aspects is focus on the value that you’re providing to the organization. What value do you bring each and every day? And the rest of it will take care of itself, whether it’s opportunities, whether it’s salary increases, whether it’s things like this where you’re granted a year off and ultimately, have excitement around it as well. Now, I know you and I talked a little bit before the show and before we hit record that technically, there was no guarantee of employment upon your return. But you know, you had some indications that there was support for you in that journey. So you had some peace of mind in that aspect. Is that correct? Is that fair?

Nick Ornelia: Yes. So going back to what you said about being a good employee. That’s paramount to getting a leave of absence like this approved. Just thinking from a manager’s standpoint, I’m a pharmacy manager now. Just thinking from that standpoint of, if I had an employee, one of my best employees, come to me and say, “Hey, I want to do this for a whole year. I’m going to leave, but I will be back in a year.” I kind of know that they’re probably going to quit if I don’t approve the leave of absence. But then I think about, you know, in a year, OK, I’ll be able to have a very good, fully trained, highly competent employee back working for me and no problems. So really, it’s almost — if you’re that good of an employee, if you work your butt off and you do everything that’s asked of you, then it’s to the benefit of the company and to your boss for them to approve that leave of absence and, you know, at least get some sort of a guarantee of you coming back to work for you. Now, on the flip side, if from their perspective it was we’re approving this leave of absence, but at the same time, we don’t know where we’re going to be a year from now. So we can’t completely, fully guarantee you any kind of promises as far as number of hours per week or where you’re going to be, where you’re going to be working. But I was prepared to hit the ground running from the bottom like I did when I was a new grad. I figured I would have had to go right back in the floating and it might have just been part-time work, but anything, even just a couple days of work a week would have been enough to kind of get me back on my feet and get me going again until I eventually work my way back into a store in a full-time position. So yeah, you’re right. There was no guarantee of anything coming back. All that leave of absence did was preserve my company start date. And it preserved — or it suspended my benefits. So that way, when I came back, my benefits would resume how they were before my leave of absence. So yeah, that was kind of one of the risks that I took, but it was worth it to me. It was worth it to me to have a year to pursue my dreams and passions and have to kind of start over with my pharmacy job and pharmacy career. But that was a risk I was willing to take. It’s funny how it all worked out, though. I ended up not having to start from the bottom. So the guy who replaced me in my store, I was a staff pharmacist at the time. I’d been at the store with Jason for I think five years at that point, four or five years. And so the guy that replaced me took a manager’s position at a different store about two or three months before I was due to come back to work. And Jason convinced the district supervisors to hold my position for me at my old store until I got back in like two or three months. So I was able to go right back into the exact same store, the exact same position, full-time work. I think my first day back was March 27, 2017. It was a Monday. And I was right back standing where I was a year ago at that time. So it was quite incredible how it all worked out.

Tim Ulbrich: So let’s talk about your trip. Let’s talk about what you saw, where you went, how much money it had cost you throughout the year. And for me, maybe more importantly, what you learned about yourself during that year.

Nick Ornelia: Sure. So the money aspect, I mentioned I had about $50k saved up in a savings account. $10k of that to me was pretty untouchable. It was my emergency fund and my fund in case I needed money when I came back to keep me going and get me going again. So I had about $40k to spend for the whole year. I had mentioned that book, “Travel the World on $50 a Day,” so I knew if I traveled cheap enough, then I could keep my costs around — my living costs, my living costs, my food, my shelter, my travel, plane tickets, that kind of stuff. I knew if I kept that around that cost, that would leave me about $20,000 extra dollars to basically spend on whatever I wanted to do. So that was kind of my budgeting plan. It wasn’t much of a plan, but at least it was something. But I had limits in mind. I knew I wasn’t going to go over a certain amount. So yeah, so my first six months, I am an absolute huge fan of America’s national parks. I am just in love with them, so I had been to quite a few before then, but I wanted to try to hit as many national parks as I could and as many of these just incredible places out west. So the first six months, I spent out west. I drove all the way to California, spent a couple weeks in the Sierra Nevada mountains, which I know you and Jess are big fans of that. I climbed Mount Whitney, which is the highest mountain in the Lower 48 states. I did that as part of a charity fundraiser thing.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, I remember that.

Nick Ornelia: Which was really cool to be able to raise some money for a pretty cool charity that I support. So yes, I did that and then headed over to Utah and spent like three weeks in Utah, just hiking around all the national parks there and exploring just an absolutely incredible state. And I met my buddy Tony in Colorado, spent a week in Colorado white water rafting, and then we drove home together, went to a couple Major League Baseball stadiums along the way. I went home — so I got home early June, spent a few weeks at home in June, and then at the end of June, I headed back out west. My buddy Sam accompanied me this time. We spent another week in Colorado, just hiking around the mountains, backpacking, camping. And then from there, I drove back out to California. I hiked the John Muir Trail, which is about a 220-mile trail through the Sierra Nevadas, which was two of the best weeks of my life, just the beauty of the places that I saw. Just stunning. And then from there, I headed north up into Washington and from there, I spent about three weeks in Washington. I climbed Mount Rainier, which is just one of the most beautiful mountains in the world, in my opinion. And from there, I headed east towards Wyoming. And we haven’t talked about this much, but I was dating somebody at the time. So I mentioned my relationship ended, and a couple weeks after that, I met Alanna, who is now my wife. So I met her — so we were dating at the time, and so she’d decided to fly out. She met me in Wyoming, and we spent two weeks together in Wyoming. And that was really when I knew I really liked her at the time, she was super supportive of my trip. And when she flew out to meet me and we spent those two weeks together, that was pretty much when I realized I wanted to marry her. So that was just an incredible back story of my whole year off, which we don’t need to get too much into, but from there, we drove home. After that, I flew to Europe in September. I spent two and half months in Europe, just backpacking around. My sister accompanied me for a week in Paris and London. And then I came back to Cincinnati for the holidays. And then right after Christmas, I flew to Africa. And I had signed up to do six weeks of volunteer week in Uganda. And then I went to Tanzania for three weeks, I climbed Kilimanjaro, went on safari there. Also in Uganda, I went on a safari, I went and saw the mountain gorillas, did all the fun stuff there. And then Alanna met me again in Kenya for my last two weeks of my year off. And we volunteered together, went on safari and just had an absolute blast.

Tim Ulbrich: And Nick, I’m getting chills just hearing the experiences you’ve had and thinking about obviously what relationally it did for even just building a good foundation for you and your wife now and that experience and some of the mission and service work that you did. And so I think you’ve partly answered that, but let me wrap that around about as you look back on that year, what are some of the things that you learned about yourself during that year? Because I have to imagine when you’re doing that kind of travel, you’ve got work set aside, there’s probably lots of time for reflection and growth. So what were some of your takeaways from that year?

Nick Ornelia: Sure. One of my goals was to learn as much as I could. So I read constantly. I think I read probably around 40 books throughout the course of the whole year. So you know, just learning practical day-to-day and just reading some great literature and great books. I think I learned, I learned quite a bit. A lot of it, in regards to my career, I learned quite a bit. So when I was volunteering in Uganda, I actually volunteered at a pharmacy there. It was a government-run healthcare facility. And they actually had a small pharmacy. It was a closet. It was like 6-foot by 8-foot. And they only had about 25-30 medications that they dispensed. And I was basically given the keys to the place after my second day of work. So I learned quite a bit about the differences in healthcare between a third-world country and our country. And I learned how it is so easy for us here in America to take everything for granted and the opportunities that we have and the long lives, the long, healthy lives that we live here, it’s just overwhelming to look at the differences between those two. So I learned to really appreciate my health, appreciate everything I have here at home, everything that we have here in America, the healthcare system that we have and the opportunity that we have career-wise as well as pharmacists. But there was a lot of personal things that I kind of learned and I think I improved on as well. I think I was always, you know, prior to my year off, I was always thinking ahead or I was always reliving past moments. I was never able to fully live in the moment and fully appreciate a relationship or appreciate my life the way it is. I don’t think I was ever able to just sit down and say, man, I feel like totally, completely content right now. Everything is just perfect right now. I was always thinking ahead or thinking back and worrying about this or worrying about that, and that year just kind of caused a lot of that to just evaporate. And it’s continued on now. I just notice things, just sitting down and just enjoying myself and just not needing any stimulation and not needing to have the TV on or anything like that. This might sound kind of creepy, but one of my favorite things to do is to just observe my wife. I just love just seeing her facial expressions and the way she laughs and the way she does different things. And it’s just really cool to kind of have that perspective and to be able to just slow down now and just take a deep breath and just say, man, this is exactly where I want to be in life. I don’t want to be anywhere else.

Tim Ulbrich: And to be present, I think just what you said there, again, to me, highlights how many things we miss each and every day of not being present, you know, that are right in front of us. So Nick, as I hear you talk about all of the things you did during this year, the things that you learned about yourself, the opportunities to serve, what you were able to obviously gain relationally — to me, it begs the question of do we need to rethink the concept of retirement? So I think kind of the concept that we all know, we’ve been raised in is you grind it out for 40 or 50 years, you save up a nest egg, and you hope you’re healthy enough to use it and enjoy it. And we know many stories of people that aren’t able to do that or things change or they never save it up, they keep working. Does your experience beg the question of whether or not we should rethink this concept of how we do retirement?

Nick Ornelia: I think it absolutely, most certainly does. You know, this idea of just working and working and working in hopes of this great and happy retirement, you know, I think it’s a lot more possible nowadays. We live long lives. The life expectancy is increasing, and you are able to live a good life. And there’s nothing wrong with that way of thinking. Millions, billions of people have gone about it that way and have lived very happy, fulfilling lives. So there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. But if you’re given the opportunity to pursue something different, to maybe live life a little bit differently, I think you — when you’re able to step out of that rat race for awhile, of the busyness of everyday life and just step back and be able to think and reflect — it help you grow a greater appreciation for everything that you have. And it creates these pockets of time throughout your entire working life where you’re able to just be fully happy and just enjoy yourself and not be caught up in the rat race of life. It’s not an easy thing to do, you know. It takes pretty good financials and a bit of risk, but I think that’s kind of the wave of the future. There’s becoming more and more literature out there about that. There are countries, European countries, Australia, New Zealand, that sort of thing is actually encouraged — taking extended time off. Some countries actually even have walls that protect a worker if they do decide to leave work for a year that allows them to go right back into their same position. And I think you’re seeing more of that today now with — I know Walgreens and I know CVS just recently announced a new paternity maternity leave. We get eight weeks of paid leave whenever we have children. So I think there is a trend kind of in that direction. But yeah, if you’re able to pull it off, it’s a life-changing experience, and it’s incredible. I can’t speak more about it.

Tim Ulbrich: And that’s why I appreciate you sharing your story. I think as I’ve talked about this concept with many pharmacists, I would say most, if not all, say, “Yes. I get it. I agree,” but struggle with the tangible aspect of show me somebody who’s done it and how do I do it? So let’s there in this show as we talk about seven financial steps to take a year off. We’ll link to your blog post about this topic because I think it’s spot on. So we’ll do it in an abbreviated kind of a rapid-fire format. I’m going to pitch each of these out here so our listeners can hear all of them, and then we’ll go back through them one-by-one and hit the main highlights. So in your blog post — and we’ll link in the show notes over at your blog, which is at YPYearOff.com, you talk about seven financial steps to take a year off. Those seven are No. 1, create an emergency fund. No. 2, pay off credit card debt. No. 3, pay off student loans. No. 4, start 401k/IRA contributions. No. 5, start saving for your year off. No. 6, increase 401k/IRA contributions. And No. 7, add more money to your emergency fund, finish retirement savings and finish your year off savings. So first off, No. 1, create an emergency fund. What’s your recommendation for people here when it comes to an emergency fund?

Nick Ornelia: $10k. Quick and easy, $10k. I mean, that’s going to cover everything you need beforehand and then coming home, $10k is more than enough to last you until you get back to full-time work. So $10k is what I had.

Tim Ulbrich: No. 2, pay off your credit card debt. You know, I think probably the most common question some people may have here is how do you balance that with the student loans, which is No. 3. So what advice do you give people there?

Nick Ornelia: So the high interest stuff, get rid of the high interest stuff first. Credit card debt is going to be your highest interest stuff. So if you have any of that stuff, just get rid of it. It’s terrible. Credit cards are fine. You can earn some really nice rewards points and get some nice round-trip flights for your year off by using a credit card, but pay it off in full every month.

Tim Ulbrich: And then third, you have pay off student loans, which we’ve talked extensively about on this podcast. So let’s jump to No. 4, which is start 401k/IRA contributions, which I’m guessing many listening may struggle with this concept of I want to take a year off, I need to save some money. But I also want to be balancing and thinking about the future. So what advice do you have here in terms of people initiating retirement contributions?

Nick Ornelia: Yeah, before a year off, I think it is important to kind of get some money, a good chunk of money into a 401k or an IRA. You know, when you get it into there at a young age, you’re able to take advantage of compounding interest for a longer period of time. And it’s a nice financial cushion to have. Even though it’s pretty much untouchable, you know, it is money that’s yours. And if in the absolute worst case scenario, that you get into trouble during your year off, you have a serious injury or something and you absolutely need the money, you have that money there. Now, it should be completely untouchable in your mind. But it’s that extra financial cushion and that there’s extra years of compounding interest to keep your future financials in order as well.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. No. 5, you have start saving for your year off. What is typically — obviously dependent on where people want to go, what they want to do — but what’s a rough number that you give people in terms of how much they should be saving for a year off?

Nick Ornelia: I think $40,000 is — I mean, that’s how much I had. And I lived cheaply. I camped a lot, I stayed in hostels, I stayed in volunteer houses. But I never had to say no to anything that I wanted to do. So if I wanted to spend $1,500 on a safari in Tanzania, which I did, I had no qualms about that. I had the money to do it. Now, obviously if you can’t reach $40k, it is possible to do an entire year for less than that. You can do stuff a lot cheaper than $40,000. And the other thing is, you don’t have to be gone for a full year. You can cut it back to six months, $20,000 for six months. That would make it easier to get a leave of absence possibly. Or even cut it back even further to three months if three months is all you can get. Then maybe you only need about $10,000 or $15,000 for that three months. But $40,000 for a year will give you one heck of a year.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Nick Ornelia: You will have a great time.

Tim Ulbrich: And we’ll link in the show notes to the book you referenced earlier that talked about $50 a day. I think getting examples and things people can read will help with that. And obviously reaching out to you as well and hearing your story. No. 6 is increasing 401k/IRA contributions. We talked about that. And No. 7 is adding more money to emergency fund, finish retirement savings and finish your year off savings. What I love about your seven steps here, Nick, is 1, they’re tangible. But 2, what it does is it allows you to go off and to enjoy this year. And I think to reap all the benefits that you did with having a peace of mind that you’ve got a solid financial foundation in place. You’ve got an emergency fund, you’ve got no credit card debt, student loans hopefully are gone or minimized, you’ve begun retirement savings. You’ve got cash for this year off, so it’s really allowing somebody to enjoy that time, which goes to my last question here. And we’ll link to this in your blog as well. But you talk about the concept of calculating your year-off age, which I love because I think it takes this concept, which can maybe seem somewhat nebulous and start to become very tangible and start so that a lot of people can put a goal to say, “OK, at the age of x, I’m going to actually do this. I’m going to make this happen.” So briefly talk us through how to simply get to that calculation of what their year-off age is.

Nick Ornelia: Yeah, sure. I mean, really, all it is is kind of a net worth calculation. You’re trying to reach a goal net worth and based on how much money you make every year, you subtract out your expenses per year so you’re able to figure out, you know, an exact dollar amount of how much you’re able to save to put toward your net worth to pay off debt, to start your 401k contributions and to save for the year off. So based on what your difference, what the gap is between how much money you bring in per year and how much money is going out towards expenses, you can figure an exact age as to when you would have $40,000 for the year, when you would have a good start on retirement savings and when you would have your student loans paid off. So you can, based on that, figure out the exact age that you will be able to do it. So like you said, it does make things tangible to have an idea of what age it’s possible. And then it also opens up the avenue of figuring out ways to cut back on your expenses. And then you recalculate your year-off age, and you’re like, “Wow. If I cut out this expense, I’d be able to — my year-off age would be a year earlier than that.” So you know, it creates that timeline in your head and kind of makes it easier to adhere to your budget.

Tim Ulbrich: So make sure to our listeners, head on over to the Young Professional’s Guide to a Year Off, YPYearOff.com. Again, that’s YPYearOff.com, where you can get more information about the seven financial steps to take a year off. You can calculate your year-off age. You can follow Nick’s journey. And Nick, thank you so much for taking time to come on. You’ve inspired me. I’m confident you’re going to do that same thing for our listeners. So really appreciate you taking this step out, taking this risk, and then being willing to share your story with other pharmacists that are part of our community. Thank you so much.

Nick Ornelia: It’s been a blast, Tim. Thank you so much.

Tim Ulbrich: As we wrap up another episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast, I want to thank today’s sponsor, Script Financial.

Sponsor: You’ve heard us talk before on this show about Script Financial. YFP team member, Tim Baker, who is also a fee-only Certified Financial Planner, is owner of Script Financial. Now, Script Financial comes with my highest recommendation. Jess and I use Tim Baker and his services through Script Financial and I can advocate for the planning services that he provides and value of fee-only financial planning advice. Meaning that when I pay Tim for his services, I’m paying directly for his advice, not for products or commissions that may cloud or bias the advice he is giving me. So Script Financial specifically works with pharmacy clients. So, if you are overwhelmed with student loans or maybe confused about how to invest and save for retirement, or just frustrated with the overall progress you are making on your financial plan, I would highly recommend checking out Tim and Script Financial to see whether or not his services are a good fit for you. You can get started by scheduling a free call with Tim Baker by going to scriptfinancial.com, and clicking on ‘Schedule a Free Call.’ Again, that’s scriptfinancial.com.

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YFP 078: Is Pursuing Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program a Waste?


Is Pursuing the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program a Waste?

On episode 78 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Ulbrich, co-founder, and Tim Baker, YFP Team Member and CFP, give an update on the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program (PSLF) and discuss whether or not this program is still a viable option for pharmacists considering the recent data published showing 99% of applicants for PSLF were denied.

Summary

Tim and Tim discuss an update on the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Program as a response to recent data published showing that 99% of applicants for PSLF were denied. This fall, an article went viral from several news outlets sharing data from the Department of Education. Of course, this impacted many people, but it’s important to dive into the details behind the program.

Tim Baker shares the importance of following the program guidelines to be sure you match all of the steps to qualify for PSLF. The guidelines include working for the right employer, having the correct loans, enrolling in the right repayment plan, yearly check-ins for employment certification and making the correct number of payments. One-third of applicants were denied forgiveness due to having missing pieces on their application or not following the guidelines accurately. Tim Baker urges that you cannot rely on third-party customer service representatives to give you accurate information and that you should work with a financial advisor to ensure you’re on the right path. He also mentions that if you are enrolled in the PSLF program, you have to go all in.

Although it may be a small amount compared to the loans that borrowers were hoping to have forgiven, Congress has authorized 350 million dollars for situations where people weren’t enrolled in the correct repayment plan, etc. Tim Baker believes that this is a tip in the right direction and that it demonstrates the potential longevity of the PSLF program.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 078 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Excited to be here alongside Tim Baker as we tackle an update on Public Service Loan Forgiveness, PSLF program, talk about some recent news that was published about 99% of applicants getting denied and really get to the point as to whether or not, for those of you that are pursuing it or considering it, as to whether or not this is still a viable option moving forward. Tim Baker, how you doing?

Tim Baker: Good, Tim, how about you?

Tim Ulbrich: Doing well, excited to get into this. I feel like it’s been long overdue. We read this article. I’m sure you’ve gotten lots of questions, we’ve gotten lots of feedback in the YFP Facebook group. And I think it’s one of those topics that this hit the news, the headline, I’ll read here in a minute, and I think it was a little bit of sensational news that really, as you start to dig into the details, I think we can provide some level of reassurance that people need to stay the course. And we’ll talk about what that entails as it deals with PSLF. Alright, so let’s cut to the chase. This fall, article went viral from several news outlets, coming out with data published from the U.S. Department of Education that a very small percent, 1%, to be exact, a very small percentage of those that were applying for loan forgiveness through the popular and often talked about Public Service Loan Forgiveness program were actually successful in getting that balance forgiven. So here’s one headline from NPR. It says, “Data Shows 99 Percent of Applicants for Student Loan Forgiveness Program Were Denied.” Now, I think this is a big reason, Tim, for a few different reasons. First, as I mentioned, these articles, when they went out, I think people went bonkers. And you know, I think I’m confident in saying that many people were probably impacted if they didn’t read behind the details and do their homework and how they feel about the future of this program, what to do about their own loans. Second, as we’ve talked about before on this show, pharmacists have a boatload of student loan debt, many are pursuing this program and our estimates, looking at those that qualify, is that about 2,500 graduates each year may be eligible for PSLF. And third, we’ve advocated before on this show that if you’re going to go in on PSLF, we recommend an all-in strategy in situations where it makes sense. So I think people that read this, maybe have heard us talk about this on the show before are like, “Oh no, maybe these guys got it wrong.” So are you getting lots of questions from clients? Lots of concern out there?

Tim Baker: You know, I really haven’t, Tim. I had one resident that I’m working with — she mentioned the article and just was kind of backtracking and saying, “Hey, are we sure about this?” And you know, I just reiterated that nothing’s 100% sure. Like we definitely have our thoughts and beliefs in the program, but it could — I mean, there is risk with the forgiveness programs. But I think ultimately, the phones were pretty quiet. And it’s kind of the same thing like with investments. Usually, when the market, like it has recently, takes a downturn, people are calling their advisor and saying, “What’s going on?” My clients really haven’t done that. And I think it’s about the education piece around not only investing and sensible investing but also like the PSLF program and kind of what we’ve talked about it. So it hasn’t really been as big of an issue as I even expected. So I think part of it is just because of what we’ve been saying and some of the indicators that we’ve talked about that I’m sure we’ll outline here today about the program and where it is and I think where it’s going to go.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, I’m with you. I think we’ve been preaching details on this in terms of making sure you’re in a qualifying repayment plan, the right kind of loans, doing what you need to do, so I’m hopeful that has paid off. So let’s walk through five kind of main points of our outline for today’s show. We’ll talk about a quick review of the PSLF program, the requirements. We’ll talk about what this data does and doesn’t tell us. We’ll talk about what we think those pursuing PSLF should do with this information. We’ll talk about some other recent news surrounding PSLF that I think gives us some insights into the future of the program. And finally, we’ll wrap up with some resources that we have available to help you out with next steps for those that are wondering, is PSLF right for me? Or those that are even actively pursuing it. So Tim Baker, we talked about in Episode 018, we talked extensively about PSLF. So we don’t need to spend the episode doing that. But walk us just through again quickly the requirements related to PSLF.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so typically, the cadence for the PSLF program basically goes like this. You have to work for the right type of employer, and that’s typically a 501c3 nonprofit. You have to be in the right kind of loans, so private loans need not apply. You basically need to be in the federal direct loans. And there’s some confusion about that. So you know, if you’re not sure, and you’re seeking PSLF, probably consolidation. And we’ll talk about that in a second. You’ve got to be in the right type of repayment plan. So that’s typically one of the four income-driven plans. So we’re talking IBR, ICR, Pay As You Earn and Revised Pay As You Earn. You’ve got to make the right amount of payments, so this is typically 120 payments across 10 years. It doesn’t have to be consecutive, though. You’ve got to prove it, so that’s where we basically every year, we’re going to dust off the employment certification and say, “Hey, FedLoan Servicing,” who’s the servicer that basically monitors this program, ministers this program, “Remember these payments that I’ve made over the last 12 months or so? We good? They count? OK, good.” So we basically have to prove that every year. And then at the end of our 120 payments, we apply and we receive tax-free forgiveness, which is important because in the other forgiveness program that’s the non-PSLF program, you essentially have to pay taxes on the amount that’s forgiven, almost like it’s income. So that’s really the way in which, you know, you walk through the PSLF program.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think that’s important that we spend just a couple minutes talking about that because as we look at the article that came out from NPR, other news outlets, data from the U.S. Department of Education, all of those that I see in terms of those that were denied is because of something that went wrong there, besides people who had just filled out the paperwork wrong. But you know, they either weren’t in the right kind of loans, so they didn’t consolidate their loans into a direct loan. They weren’t in the right type of repayment plan.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: Or they weren’t ensuring that they were working for a qualified employer. And they ultimately were putting themselves in the position. Unfortunately, I think why this gets so much negative press is that the way these plans are typically working is that somebody’s loan balance is probably going to grow over the course of this time period. So I think some people, especially early on, if they didn’t have the right information, are rightfully ticked off because, hey, what the heck? I thought I was going to be forgiven. Now I owe more. And we’ll talk about at the end what the government is trying to do to appease some of this concern that’s out there. So No. 1, you’ve got to make sure you’re in the right requirements. And as Tim mentioned, those are the things around the right type of employer, right kind of loan, right repayment plan, making the right amount of a payment. It’s 120 payments. And then ultimately, you prove it, and you apply for tax-free forgiveness.

Tim Baker: Which can be super confusing, Tim, because even when the program was rolled out, there wasn’t a whole lot of information on that. So you know, a lot of the news, it kind of goes back on the borrower, which the borrower, I think there’s some — you know, we have to figure that out. But I think the way the program was rolled out was just really, really inefficient. And I think we think that the acceptance rates for the forgiveness will get better over time, just basically more iteration, more information, that type of thing. But yeah, it’s not the easiest thing to navigate, which kind of gives us some job security because obviously, this is kind of what we do a lot of these. But you know, it’s just something to really — because when you’re looking at this much debt, super important to make sure that the t’s are crossed, the i’s are dotted.

Tim Ulbrich: So let’s talk about that a little further because I think that goes into the next point here about what this data does and doesn’t tell us. While I love NPR, I think they got this wrong when they said, that “PSLF is out-of-reach for most people who apply for it.” And what they were looking at is that as they looked at the data, nearly 29,000 applications were out there, but of those 29,000, just 289 were approved. So that’s where they got the 99% denial rate. But to your point, Tim Baker, we have to remember that October of 2017 was the first point in time when people were eligible to apply for forgiveness because they would have gotten to that 10-year mark. This program began in October 2007, so tell us what the first few years, maybe some of the information, details, access to forms, how good the services were doing or not — although I think they’re still doing a pretty crappy job.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: But what was different then versus people who maybe have come out in the last three or four or five years?

Tim Baker: Yeah, well I think first of all, the income-driven plans that are out there weren’t even in existence. I think it was IBR was the first one that came out — maybe it was ICR — but IBR and ICR were the first ones. And now we have REPAYE and PAYE. They weren’t even there. I think the other thing to consider is that the employment certification, which is a major step in this process, that wasn’t even developed until years into the program. So you know, FedLoan Servicing, they’re really the ones that, like I said, are administering this program. And the Department of Education basically chose them to do that. But I think in their defense — even though I think that they’re not a great servicer at all — they’ve been given very little guidance, I think, by the Department of Education. And they’ve really kind of had to make it up as they’ve went. So you know, I think when PSLF was put into place by George W. Bush, his administration, President George W. Bush, his administration, I think the thought was like, well, we have kind of 10 years to figure this out. The problem is is that we really need to have a set system in place 10 years ago so people kind of knew if they were on track or off track because I think that’s the most devastating part is you read these stories, and people are like, “I thought I was on the path for forgiveness. It could have been my loans were FEL loans,” which aren’t eligible, which were a predominant loan a couple years ago. Or, “I was in a graduated repayment plan,” which you can’t be in that repayment plan for that. You have to be in one of the income-driven plans. So the news is devastating because we’re talking potentially hundreds of thousands of dollars. But I also think, like, it kind of reminds me of the numbers, 29,000 applied, it’s almost like when they talk about like acceptance to West Point. It’s like, if you open a file, you’re part of that stat. But you might not actually have even entertained it at all. So it might be someone who’s opening up a file and just saying, “Hm. I’m five years in, maybe I’ll give it a shot and see where I’m at.” But yeah, I think the news, it is a little bit sensationalized, but there is some truth to it in a sense that, you know, the forgiveness rates — and they’re almost like unicorns, people that are out there that are being forgiven. To me, and I’ve asked FedLoan Servicing, how come you guys are not like pointing at these people and trumpeting the fact that they — I don’t know, it’s like a marketing thing that I just don’t understand. But yeah, it’s a super interesting case because the numbers don’t support I think what I think a lot of lawmakers thought. We’re now questioning, is this program really valid?

Tim Ulbrich: So if there’s any pharmacists that are out there that are part of this 289 in terms of applications that are approved, contact us ASAP.

Tim Baker: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: Right? I mean, to your point about the unicorns, I mean, it feels like this mystical program of like I think people are getting it, but we want to meet somebody, talk to them and really have that conversation. So to your point, though, Tim, looking at the data that was actually in this article from the U.S. Department of Education, a third of applications were denied — a third — because of missing information. So they’re not even complete applications, you know. It kind of reminds me of when you look at application numbers into pharmacy school, well, if they didn’t complete the application, you know, obviously that can inflate the data a little bit. What’s interesting, though — and this comes directly from the article — they say, “But they’re not meeting the program’s requirements because they’re often given insufficient or sometimes bad information by the companies that the government pays to manage these student loans.” And I think it’s worth reiterating that the federal government, when it comes to federal student loans, is contracting out the management of those loans to companies that are out there. You’ve mentioned several of them, Nelnet and Great Lakes and all these companies that are out there. And we’ve talked before, I think we’ve thrown them under the bus many times, so we probably don’t need to do that again. But the point here is that you cannot rely on a customer service agent at one of these companies to be giving you advice on whether or not you have all your t’s crossed and your i’s dotted. Whether that’s fair or not, I think that’s the reality of where some people are getting in trouble like the example you gave of they’re not in the right loan or they’re not in the right repayment plan.

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: So let’s just make sure our listeners are crystal clear on what the right loans are because I think there’s a misperception out there that if you have federal loans period that you qualify. And you cannot stop there. You have to be in the right loan to make sure you have qualifying payments. So what is that?

Tim Baker: Yeah. So I mean, it’s essentially a direct subsidized or unsubsidized loans. And there’s actually even some confusion about does that include Stafford loans, which are kind of like the new direct? Because if you put Stafford loans into the studentloan.gov repayment estimator, it shows up as an unqualified loan for one of the four income-driven plans. But the easy ones that we know that don’t really apply are the FEL and the Perkins loans. And that’s I think where a lot of people were misstepping. I think if you are unsure, and you’re entering in the program, just consolidate the loans, meaning you turn one or more loans into one loan. And basically, that achieves the square peg, round hole. Now, if you’re halfway through PSLF, and you’ve been paying and your loans are questionable, you’re not going to want to consolidate that because when you consolidate, it actually restarts the clock. So I think I had a case like this, I might have mentioned it.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: You know, the borrower, she had like $500,000 in loans, and half of them were in FEL and half of them were in direct. And we essentially consolidated the half that were FEL, restarted the clock on the PSLF, and then her other loans we just left alone. So she’s happy now, she’s almost there with those. But again, like, the program shouldn’t be, the program shouldn’t be this complicated. But so if you’re unsure, and you’re entering the program, just consolidate them. It’s cleaner, I think, to track your loan. It’s just a weighted average of all of your interest rates. It doesn’t really help you versus like the refi option, which you’re not going to want to do if you’re going after PSLF. But consolidation, I think, would be key to just make sure that you’re in the right type of loan.

Tim Ulbrich: So the third thing we want to talk about is what we think those pursuing PSLF should do with this article. And to be frank, as I looked at this and I read this and after I got over the initial panic moment that I had online, I thought, if you’ve been crossing your t’s and dotting your i’s, I don’t really think there’s anything new for you here except for making sure you’re crossing your t’s, dotting your i’s. If you want to get a second opinion, I think that’s a good practice to consider. I gave you the website earlier, yourfinancialpharmacist.com/crushyourloans, where we have lots of information in terms of articles that you can read, making sure that refinance if you’re pursuing forgiveness is not an option, but if you’re not pursuing forgiveness, you can evaluate that option. Or you can look at a one-on-one student loan consult to get a second opinion. Submitting the employment certification form annually, we’ve talked about making sure you’re doing that. And again, not relying on these third-party companies to be your source of information that you ensure that you have everything correct, making sure you’re doing the things that we’re talking about here in this episode. The other thing I want to mention here, Tim, is that we’ve talked about before that we believe if you’re in on PSLF, you should go all-in on PSLF. So what do we mean by that concept of going all-in on PSLF?

Tim Baker: Yeah, so many times, one of the things that we like to do just as humans is we kind of like to revert to the mean. So this would be, hey, I’m pursuing PSLF, and I get a bonus or I get a tax refund, and I’m like, oh, I’m just going to apply a little bit. I’m feeling a little guilty because I’ve just been paying the minimum on my loans. This has happened, so if you’re laughing out there, this is actually conversations that I’ve had — that I want to throw a little bit more towards my loans and make some progress. The problem with that is you can’t — in the loan situation, you have to basically fly one flag. You can’t go after PSLF and throw extra at the loans because that’s kind of contradictory to what you’re trying to achieve. Just like the other end of this is kind of going all-in on the loans, just being — this is really the Tim Church method. So essentially, the goal if you are seeking PSLF is to lower your payment as much as humanly possible. So this in turn, basically maximizes your forgiveness. So the way that you do that is you make sure — you have to essentially lower your AGI, your Adjusted Gross Income. So the way that you do that, the way most pharmacists can do that is by maxing out their retirement plan, their 401k or their 403b, which for 2019 is going to be $19,000 for the year that you can contribute. It’s going to be maxing out your HSA, which I think for a single person in $3,500 for 2019 and then $6,900 or $6,950 I think for if you’re a family. So by putting money into those buckets, it lowers your AGI, which lowers your calculated payment because when you go and certify with your repayment plan every year, they actually look at your IRS — it connects to the IRS and looks at your tax return to get that number. So the lower that number is, the lower your payment, and the more that you’re going to be forgiven. So the idea of hey, you get a tax return or some of the money that you’re then going to apply towards that doesn’t make any sense. Now, it feels good and it feels like you’re making progress and you’re doing the right thing, but it’s contradictory to the strategy that you’re implementing. And for a lot of people, that’s just hard to swallow because the idea is that the PSLF is a very passive program, so we want to interject some active steps, but really, the most active thing that you can do with PSLF is really just to lower that AGI and put as much money into those accounts that I mentioned.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, I think when it comes to PSLF, you don’t want to meddle in the middle. I mean, you don’t want to — to your point — be making extra payments. The goal is to maximize forgiveness, which you do through minimizing your payments, which you do through lowering your AGI I think it’s also worth noting and reminding listeners in this section that we believe you can’t just look at the numbers when it comes to your student loan repayment situation and plan, right? This is a great example where you’ve got to balance the math with your feelings around the debt, with your feelings around the unknown, and really doing the calculations to say, how much am I going to save potentially through the PSLF program? And is it worth the unknown? Is it worth the — news like this coming out, is that going to upset or bother me? Is it worth the potential challenges I have if I don’t like my current position and I want to change jobs? And I think all of that is important to consider as you’re evaluating the potential savings that could come along with PSLF. The next item, Tim, is that there’s been some recent news — not so recent now, but in the last 3-4 months that came out.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: The recent news about PSLF that I think is giving us some insights into the future of this program and maybe some insights in terms of where the federal government views this program and their commitment to seeing it through, at least for the foreseeable future. And that was that $350 million was authorized by Congress to basically make up for the situations where people maybe weren’t in the right plan or weren’t in the right option. So tell us a little bit about that and your takeaway from that news.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so in March of 2018, the Department of Education announced this new program that’s called the Temporary Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program. And essentially, it’s to aid borrowers who thought they were on the right path for forgiveness but were ultimately denied for one reason or the other. So basically, Congress earmarked $350 million, which is kind of like, you know, they’re not going to expand that, but they’re essentially — as people are applying for this type of forgiveness, the funds will be exhausted. But essentially, the demographic, obviously, is a large demographic of people that thought they were on the right path, but to me, I think this is one of the reasons why I think that PSLF has legs because this is Congress basically earmarking more than a quarter billion dollars for this problem and I think recognizing the fact that the government didn’t roll out this program as efficiently as possible. So I think for me, the fact that they’re willing to put this amount of money for the oops situations that are out there — obviously, $350 million out of a $1.5 trillion issue is a drop in the bucket, but there’s a smaller percentage of people actually looking at forgiveness, but I think it’s a tip in the right direction in terms of I think where Congress views this in terms of longevity.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think that’s reassuring. You never want to predict the future, but I think the other aspect to consider with the recent election is now that we have a split Senate and House, I think the likelihood of mass transformation of what currently is status quo is probably unlikely. So certainly something to watch going into future elections. But I think those that are in it, in our opinion, can feel somewhat safe and secure in the future of that program. The final thing, just to wrap up here, is just a reminder of resources that we have available to help you out with next steps if you’re wondering, what does the future hold for me as it relates to PSLF? Again, yourfinancialpharmacist.com, we’ve got lots of information, resources. Episode 018, we talked about this in detail. We’ve got some blog articles on this, we’ve got lots of information just in general on student loans. And a huge shoutout to Tim Church, who has really taken ownership of the new link that we have at yourfinancialpharmacist.com/crushyourloans, where that’s really your one-stop shop if you’re thinking about whether refinancing, staying in the federal government system, paying them off, pursuing PSLF, or whatever option, really making sure that you’ve got the best plan in place. So everything from DIY, ultimate guide to how to do that, all the way up to one-on-one consult with Tim Baker if that’s the right option for you. So Tim Baker, great stuff. Anything else to add as we wrap up?

Tim Baker: Yeah, I would just say that if you’re listening to this episode and you’re thinking, man, why would you ever want to kind of go through this every year and have to recertify? The fact of the matter remains that you can’t argue with the math. So I recently did an analysis, a student loan analysis for actually someone that just got done residency on the west coast. And he had about $420,000 worth of debt, student loan debt, which is a large number. And when we actually broke down basically the decision table, basically his most expensive, the total amount paid over the course of the loan, he was looking at about $580,000 versus the PSLF program, which was about $155,000.

Tim Ulbrich: Wow.

Tim Baker: So when we talk about like you can’t argue with the numbers and like that, or it could be a six-figure swing, that’s what we’re talking about. And then the second part of that is like the monthly payment is a lot lower. Like you’re looking at $4,800-4,900 per month in that most expensive versus $1,000 and change. So if you’re sitting there and you’re thinking, man, why would anyone do this? I would say, not so fast. You know, I think that’s the power of looking at this and getting it all on one page and one almost decision matrix because that’s how much the needle can swing with regard to this program.

Tim Ulbrich: And Tim, in that example, that doesn’t even account for the savings that would be accrued, right, over 10 years in 401k’s or other…

Tim Baker: Exactly. Yeah, so it’s even more. So you’re looking at a $400,000 swing and then some. And then what would you have in your 401k after those 10 years or that HSA over those 10 years? Yeah, it’s a huge number. So yeah, and that’s why, Tim, I think too is I think really, people should almost consider this as part of their benefits package. You know, if you’re looking at a hospital or another nonprofit, and you know, a hospital’s going to pay you $105,000 versus somewhere else that’s going to pay $115,000-120,000, those numbers, that’s a drop in the bucket comparatively. So I think it’s important to kind of view that as a whole package as well.

Tim Ulbrich: I think that’s great advice, especially for the students and maybe the residents that we have are listening that we tend to evaluate job offers I think often solely on that generic amount that a pharmacist is getting. Those are the details that matter, right? If you’re working for a qualified employer, and you do the math that you just did in that example, obviously, that becomes much more lucrative. And I think to your point and the example that you gave there, that highlights that obviously as you’re indebtedness number grows, the math on the PSLF becomes better. And so again, making sure that you do the math, on top of that, how do you feel about the debt? What does this mean for you? And for each and every person, you may get to a different conclusion. And I think that’s the value in looking at this on an individual basis. So Tim Baker, as always, great stuff.
Tim Baker: Yes.

Tim Ulbrich: And have a great rest of your week.

Tim Baker: Yeah, you too, Tim.

Tim Ulbrich: And as we wrap up, I want to again thank our sponsor, CommonBond.

Sponsor: CommonBond is a on a mission to provide a more transparent simple and affordable way to manage higher education expenses. There approach is no big secret…lower rates, simpler options and a world class experience, all built to support you throughout your student loan journey. Since its founding, CommonBond has funded over $2 billion in student loans and is the only student loan company to offer a true one-for-one social promise. What that means is that for every loan CommonBond funds, they also fund the education of a child in the developing world through its partnership with Pencils of Promise. So right now, as a member of the YFP community you can get $500 cash when you refinance through the link YourFinancialPharmacist.com/commonbond. Again, that’s YourFinancialPharmacist.com/commonbond.

Tim Ulbrich: And one last thing if you could do us a favor, if you like what you heard on this week’s episode, please make sure to subscribe in iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Also, make sure to head on over to yourfinancialpharmacist.com, where you will find a wide array of resources designed specifically for you, the pharmacy professional, to help you on the path towards achieving financial freedom. Have a great rest of your week!

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The Ultimate Guide to Pay Back Pharmacy School Loans

The Current Reality

*Update – For student loan considerations during COVID-19, check out this post. “I wasn’t prepared to pay back pharmacy school loans, I didn’t understand all of my options, or I don’t know how to balance student loans with other financial goals.” That’s what I hear from many pharmacists and exactly how I felt when I graduated from pharmacy school. I once bought into the illusion that my “awesome pharmacist salary” would enable me to pay back pharmacy school loans very quickly and put me in the fast lane to building wealth. Unfortunately, it didn’t exactly work out like that and I made a couple of critical mistakes that cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars! Because I didn’t know all of the payoff strategies available, I failed to identify the best option and ended up paying way more than I should have. A pharmacist paying off student loans in 2018 is a lot different than one who graduated a decade ago. Since 2009, the median pharmacy debt reported has increased about $60,000 with those attending private institutions reporting a median amount borrowed of $200,000. However, these numbers may even be underestimating the issue. Since these amounts are self-reported, they may not include undergraduate debt or capitalized interest. In addition, the rising debt loads are only part of the problem. Salaries are not keeping pace with rising debt levels and since 2012 there has been a trend with graduates facing an increasing debt to income ratio year after year. Furthermore, many companies are cutting pharmacist hours forcing many to work full-time with less pay. Pay Back Pharmacy School Loans Therefore, now more than ever you as a pharmacist have to have a solid game plan to pay back pharmacy school loans. Pharmacy schools are not currently required to teach personal finance. Some offer electives and some provide education for their graduating class, but in general, the onus is on you to become informed. Sure, everyone is required to do the mandatory federal loan “exit” counseling but that’s really insufficient and doesn’t typically provide clarity in choosing the best payoff strategy. With the multitude of student loan types, repayment plans, forgiveness programs, and refinancing and consolidation, it can be overwhelming trying to come with a plan. This post is a comprehensive guide to help you take down your loans with clarity and confidence and choose the best strategy that saves you the most money and aligns with your goals. Even if you have been paying on your loans for years, this will help confirm you’re on the right path. We will go through 5 key steps in detail but if you want the short version, you can download the quick start guide.

Step 1: Inventory Your Loans

Before jumping into the payoff strategies it’s important to know exactly how much you owe and who you owe. Unless you used a private lender or already refinanced your loans to a private lender after pharmacy school, you likely have federal loans through the Department of Education. You can access all your federal loan information through the National Student Loan Data System (NSLDS). This is the national record of all of your loans and grants during their complete life cycle and contains information on your outstanding balance, interest outstanding, interest rate, and associated servicer. This can be accessed a number of ways but the most user-friendly path is the Federal Student Loan Repayment Estimator. Logging in with your Federal Student Aid (FSA) ID will pull up all of your loan information and quickly show you your total federal loan balance and weighted interest rate. Check out the video below for a step-by-step approach to access the information.

If you have already started making payments on your federal loans, it’s a good idea to match up the information with your current servicer(s) and the NSLDS. The specific type of federal loans and the respective interest rate is really important to know as it has implications for how interest is accruing, eligibility for forgiveness programs, and deciding which loans to consolidate or refinance. The figure below summarizes the major types of federal student loans and the key points about them.
take down your loans
To confirm the balance on any private loans, go to www.annualcreditreport.com. Through this site, you are able to access a free report once per year from the three reporting agencies: Equifax, TransUnion, and Experian. Also, when doing an inventory of all your loans, don’t forget to include any balances owed to family members or friends.

Step 2: Determine Your Options

As I mentioned, one of the biggest mistakes I made with my student loans was not analyzing all of the options available. I was pretty much focused on figuring out how to pay them off as fast as possible without even considering the alternatives. Let’s review these strategies in detail.

Three Strategies to Pay Back Pharmacy School Loans

People often get student loan repayment options and payoff strategies confused. A repayment plan dictates your minimum payments over a designated term whereas a payoff strategy is your game plan for the most effective way to tackle your loans to save the most money which can be executed using a number of repayment plans. While there are many plans with federal and private lenders, tuition reimbursement, forgiveness, and non-forgiveness will be the major ways how to pay off pharmacy school loans. pharmacist paying off student loans
Tuition Reimbursement Programs
While not abundantly available, tuition repayment programs essentially provide “free” money typically from your employer or institution in exchange for working a certain period of time. Pretty awesome right? Others will require you to pay an amount toward your loans and they will match or reimburse you. The ones that tend to provide the most generous reimbursement are those offered by the federal government through the military, Veteran Health Administration, and the Department of Health. However, there are many state programs that offer assistance as well. Because the programs vary in amounts and how payments are structured, it’s important to know all the details so you determine how much to pay out of pocket in order to maximize the total benefit offered to you. Also, since many of these programs will not cover your entire student loan bill, you may have to combine one of the other payoff strategies to completely take down your loans. The following are programs currently available: Federal Veterans Health Administration – Education Debt Reduction Program Eligibility Pharmacists at facilities that have available funding and critical staffing needs. Benefit Up to $120,000 over a 5 year period Army Pharmacist Health Professions Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who commit to a period of service when funding is available Benefit Up to $120,000 ($40,000 per year over 3 years) Navy Health Professions Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Must be qualified for, or hold an appointment as a commissioned officer in one of the health professions and sign a written agreement to serve on active duty for a prescribed time period Benefit Offers have many variables Indian Health Service Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Two-year service commitment to practice in health facilities serving American Indian and Alaska Native communities. Opportunities are based on Indian health program facilities with the greatest staffing needs Benefit $40,000 but can extend contract annually until student loans are paid off. National Institute of Mental Health (NIH) Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Two year commitment of qualified research funded by a domestic nonprofit organization. Benefit $35,000 per year with renewal potential National Institute of Health (NIH) Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Two year commitment to conduct biomedical or behavioral research funded by a nonprofit or government institution. Benefit Up to $50,000 per year NHSC Substance Use Disorder Workforce Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Three commitment to provide substance use disorder treatment services at NHSC-approved sites. Benefit $37,500 for part-time and $75,000 for full-time State Specific Alaska – SHARP Program Eligibility Pharmacists working in underserved communities. In order to qualify, pharmacists must work full-time or half-time and commit to serving for at least three years. After that, eligible candidates may qualify for an additional three years of loan repayment assistance. Benefit Up to $35,000 per year. In some cases, if the position is hard to fill, pharmacists may be eligible for up to $47,000 per year. Arkansas – Faculty Loan Repayment Program Eligibility This program is for Health Professions Faculty from disadvantaged backgrounds who serve on the faculty of an accredited health professions college or university for 2 years. Benefit Up to $40,000 towards repayment. The government pays up to $40,000 of the participant’s student loans and provides funds to offset the tax burden. Participants should also receive matching funds from their employing educational institution. Arizona – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists serving at an eligible nonprofit or designated HPSA. Funding varies depending on a variety of factors, such as HPSA score, years of service, and more. Benefit Up to $50,000 in loan repayment assistance for a two-year contract and can receive additional funding by committing to additional years of service. California – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who commit to working in a designated Health Professional Shortage Area (HPSA). It’s important to note that pharmacists working in a retail setting are not eligible for the program. In order to qualify, pharmacists must work in an approved site, such as an outpatient or ambulatory setting. Benefit Up to $50,000 for a two-year service agreement — $25,000 from the program and a $25,000 match from the provider site. Full-time pharmacists may be eligible for one-year extensions for a total of four years, which could result in an additional $60,000 maximum in loan repayment assistance. Half-time applicants are also eligible for awards. Colorado – Health Service Corps Program Eligibility Full-time clinical pharmacists working in a designated shortage area. Pharmacists must commit to three years of service and work either part-time or full-time. Benefit Up to $50,000 for full-time while part-time pharmacists are eligible for up to $25,000. Idaho – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Full-time pharmacists working in designated HPSAs and nonprofits. This is a matching program, so for every dollar provided by the program, the work site must also match the contribution. Benefit From $20,00 to $50,000 for serving a two-year commitment. It is possible to extend the contract for an additional two years as well. Iowa – PRIMECARRE Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Two years full-time service at a public or nonprofit private entity that serves a federally designated HPSA or four years or part-time work Benefit Up to $50,000 Kentucky – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Qualified candidates that work at a designated HPSA and work full-time. This is a matching program, but with a twist. For every federal dollar spent, an employer, family member, friend, or state foundation can match the contribution. Benefit Up to $80,000 and must serve a two-year commitment. Massachusetts – Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Full time pharmacists working in a public or non-profit position, located in a high need area, participate in MassHealth, and serve all patients regardless of ability to pay or source of payment. The program is a two year full-time requirement. Benefit Up to $50,000 over two years. Minnesota – Rural Pharmacist Loan Forgiveness Program Eligibility Eligible candidates are those that work in a designated rural area. Candidates must work at least 30 hours per week, for 45 weeks or more per year and commit to three years of service. Benefit Up to $26,000 per year, for a maximum of four years, totaling $96,000. Montana – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Must work at a National Health Service Corp (NHSC) approved site. Benefit Up to $30,000 total over a two year period. Nebraska NHSC State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists that work in designated HPSAs. In order to qualify, candidates must commit to at least two years of service. Benefit Between $25,000 to $50,000 per year. Nebraska Loan Repayment Program for Rural Health Professionals Eligibility Pharmacists that serve in rural communities in a designated shortage area. This is a matching program and a local entity must match the dollars you receive. There are opportunities for full-time workers and half-time workers, though benefits are reduced if working half-time. Benefit Up to $30,000 per year and must commit to three years of service. New Mexico – Health Professional Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Health professionals that serve in a designated shortage area. In order to qualify, candidates must work full-time for two years at an eligible site. Pharmacists may be eligible for the program, but funding priority is given to other healthcare professionals. Benefit The maximum award eligible candidates can receive is $25,000 each year, however, the award amount depends on a number of factors, including your student loan debt balance and the program’s available funding. North Dakota – Loan Repayment Program Eligibility In conjunction with the Department of Health, offers loan repayment assistance to registered pharmacists who work in designated shortage areas. This is a matching program where work sites must match the dollars provided. In order to qualify, candidates must commit to two years of service. Benefit up to $50,000 a year. Oregon – Partnership State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who work in designated shortage areas. The program requires a two-year commitment, with the possibility of two additional one-year extensions. Benefit Full time providers may receive up to a total of 50% of their qualifying educational debt, up at a maximum of $35,000 per obligation year, for an initial two year obligation. Part time providers may receive up to a total of 50% of their qualifying educational debt, up to a maximum of $17,500 per obligation year, for an initial four year obligation. The award maximum is $100,000. The pharmacist’s practice site needs to provide 1:1 matching award funds in addition to a 10% administrative fee. Rhode Island – Health Professional Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who work at a qualified site in a designated shortage area. There are award options for full-time and half-time employment. Candidates must commit to two years of service, or four years of service if they are working part-time. Benefit No specific amount or maximum listed. Virginia – State Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who serve in a designated HPSA at a qualified site in Virginia. The program requires a dollar match from the community work site. In order to qualify, eligible candidates must commit to two years of service. Benefit Maximum award of $140,000 for a four-year commitment. Texas – Rural Communities Healthcare Investment Program Eligibility Pharmacists licensed within the past 24 months or be a licensed health professional practicing in a county with more than 500,000 people and move to practice in a qualifying community in the field. Must also provide services to clients that receive at least one form of indigent care in a qualifying community and practice there for at least 12 months. Benefit Up to $10,000 in student loan reimbursement or stipend. Washington – Health Professional Loan Repayment Program Eligibility Pharmacists who work at an eligible site. This program does require pharmacists to work at a designated HPSA. Minimum three-year service obligation. Benefit Up to $75,000 in exchange for three years of service. West Virginia – Health Sciences Service Program Eligibility Students in their final year of pharmacy school. Must commit to two years of full-time or four years of half-time practice at an eligible practice site located in West Virginia. Benefit One-time $15,000 award.
Forgiveness
If tuition reimbursement is not available, the first strategy to assess is forgiveness. You might be thinking this strategy isn’t for if you don’t work for the government or a non-profit, but what most borrowers don’t know is that you have the opportunity to have your loans forgiven regardless of who your employer is. Pique your interest? First, let me explain the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) option and then forgiveness outside of PSLF.
Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF)
This is typically the loan forgiveness strategy that gets all the press, usually for all the wrong reasons, which we’ll outline in the coming paragraphs. Let’s first take a trip down memory lane to explain how this program came to be *flashback wavy transition* The Public Service Loan Forgiveness program was created under the George W. Bush administration via the College Cost Reduction and Access Act of 2007 (CCRAA). Since the program’s inception, its faced political opposition from both administrations since Bush. President Obama proposed a cap of $57,500 for all new borrowers in his 2015 budget proposal to Congress. In 2016, the PSLF program was threatened this time by the Republican party with a Congressional budget resolution that saw PSLF on the chopping block for the first time for all new borrowers. PLSF has remained an endangered species since, as both President Trump’s budget and the Republican-backed PROSPER Act proposes the elimination of the program for borrowers after July 1, 2019. Despite its rocky past and uncertain future, the PSLF program is one of the best payoff strategies available for pharmacists paying off student loans. Without question, it is often the most beneficial to the borrower in terms of the monthly payment (it’s the lowest) or the total amount paid over the course of the program (it’s the lowest). These two factors are widely why the program is so attractive despite its poor and frustrating administration. Let’s look at an example of how impressive the math is for a pharmacist who plans on pursuing PSLF. We will make the following assumptions: single, lives within the contiguous U.S., has a student loan balance of $200,000 in Direct Unsubsidized loans with an average interest rate of 7%, and an adjusted gross income of $120,000, and 5% income growth per year (standard per repayment calculator). Compared to the 10-year Standard Repayment plan, pursuing forgiveness through REPAYE, PAYE, or IBR-New would result in only $130,657 paid, a difference of almost $150,000! Plus, the total amount paid could be even lower if the pharmacist were to maximize traditional 401(k) contributions and other options to lower adjusted gross income. Oh and that $209,343 loan balance remaining after 10 years? Forgedda bout it! It’s eliminated and no taxes to pay on that money. If you think you can stomach this gauntlet to take down your loans, there are a number of requirements to meet. Typically the cadence of the programs goes like this: you need to work for the right type of employer (typically a 501(c)(3) non-profit), with the right kind of loans, in the right repayment plan (one of the four income drive plans to be outlined soon), you need to make the right amount of payments (120 on-time payment which equates to 10 years, but does not have to be consecutive), you need to prove it (via the employment certification form) and then apply and receive tax-free forgiveness. *catch breath* Let’s break the requirements down into a little more detail. public service loan forgiveness Qualified Employment Verifying that your employer is a government organization or a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization is the first key to the whole process. You don’t want to make payments for 10 years only to find out the hospital you work for is actually for-profit. This is really important. Even though FedLoan Servicing determines your initial eligibility, the Department of Education has overturned some of these decisions after 10 years which has resulted in lawsuits by borrowers who thought they were on track to receive forgiveness. Shady right? These cases involved people who worked for a non-profit organization that was not tax exempt but was considered public service. This is really the grey area for what exactly qualifies as “public service” and you could be rolling the dice if that’s your situation. Besides having the right employer, you have to be working full-time based on how your employer defines that or 30 hours/week, whichever is greater. If you are working part-time for more than one qualifying employer, you can still meet the full-time requirement if you are working at least 30 hours per week. Qualified Loans Only federal Direct Loans are eligible for PSLF and this would be you if you’re a new borrower after July 1, 2010. If you borrowed before that time, you may have FFEL Loans. These, including Perkins loans, are technically ineligible but you can consolidate them through the federal Direct Consolidation Loan. This will unlock the eligible income-driven repayment plans and all payments moving forward would qualify. Take caution with this step, however! If you’ve been making standard 10 year or income-driven payments on any Direct Loan while working for a qualifying employer and you decide to consolidate, you’re essentially hitting the reset button on your PSLF timeline and starting your 10-year period anew. Therefore, you may have to designate specific loans to be consolidated vs. all of them. After you verify your loans are eligible or finalize the consolidation process, you want to complete the employment certification form that you and your employer will complete. Once you submit and your application is accepted, all of your loans will be combined and transferred to FedLoan Servicing, the exclusive servicer for PSLF. Some people wait to do this step after they have been in repayment for several years and technically you can do that. However, since only FedLoan Servicing will “count” your qualified payments, from an administrative and organizational perspective it makes sense to do this as soon as you can. Qualifying Monthly Payments You have to make 120 qualified payments prior to receiving forgiveness and you can’t make the process go any faster than 10 years. One key point though is that these payments do not have to be consecutive. So if you have to switch jobs from one qualifying employer to another and there is gap in employment, you can pick back up where you left off when you start working again. Qualifying payments have to be for the full amount on your bill and cannot be made more than 15 days past the due date. In addition, only payments under a qualifying repayment plan count. These include income-based repayment (IBR), income-contingent repayment (ICR), Paye-as-you-earn (PAYE), Revised-pay-as-you-earn (REPAYE), and payments under the 10 year Standard Repayment Plan. Even though the 10 year Standard Repayment plan is an option, it really does not make sense to use this option since your goal with PSLF is to pay the least amount of money over 10 years. So get moving and switch that ASAP if that is you! The plans that will result in the lowest monthly payments are REPAYE, PAYE, and IBR-New (which functions essentially the same as PAYE) since they are calculated as 10% of your discretionary income. Discretionary income is specifically your adjusted gross income minus 150% of the poverty guidelines for these plans. The repayment estimator will calculate this for you but if you want a detailed look at how to calculate discretionary income check out this post. At the time of applying for an income-driven repayment plan, you will need to document your current income. Usually, this is based on the previous year’s tax return, but if your income has changed “significantly”, you may have to provide your most up to date paystub that documents your adjusted gross income and other sources of income you are receiving (dated within past 90 days). This would obviously be beneficial if you experienced a pay cut since your last filing. But what about an increase in pay? Previously the income driven repayment form asked the question “has your income significantly increased or decreased since you filed your last federal income tax return?”. However, this has actually changed and now only asks if your pay has significantly decreased since last filing. income driven repayment plan This is a big deal especially if you are a resident or fellow transitioning from student life or from resident to first-year practitioner. Previously, you would have had to disclose if your income increased which would be true going from having zero to minimal earnings as a student to 1/3 of a typical pharmacist salary or from resident to new practitioner. However, with this change, you are going to pay substantially less during your transition years since your income is going to be based on the previous year’s earnings. Of course, you want to be truthful and accurate when filling out the form but if you are not required to disclose increases in your income then you shouldn’t. Why not take full advantage of the system in place? Incorporating spousal income into this calculation will depend on the income-driven plan and how you file your taxes. For REPAYE, spousal income will count toward AGI regardless of how you file. If you file separate income tax returns, then only your income will be counted under PAYE (and IBR-New). Initially, to qualify for PAYE you cannot have any outstanding loan balance on a Direct or FFEL Program loan when you received a Direct Loan or FFEL Program loan on or after October, 1, 2007, and you must have received a disbursement of Direct Loan on or after 10/1/11. Confusing right? If you can need more clarity on this check out this article. Besides that, for PAYE (and IBR-New), your calculated payment based on your income has to be less than what you would pay for the 10 year Standard Plan. During the 10 years you are making payments you have recertify your income annually. If your income happens to increase either because of your own efforts or spouse to the point where payments would match or exceed the 10 year Standard Plan, it is possible that you would no longer technically qualify for these plans and could be told or persuaded to change to REPAYE. The problem with this is that under REPAYE, you can actually pay MORE than the standard 10 year payment. Again, you want to pay the least amount of money as possible over 10 years so if you ever get in that situation, insist to FedLoan Servicing to remain in PAYE or IBR-New and cap your payments at whatever the 10 year standard payments would be. In other words no matter how much money you earn, you cannot be disqualified from the program or be forced into REPAYE. best student loan repayment program The best practice to confirm your qualifying payments is to submit the employment certification annually, so there are no surprises at the end of the 10-year repayment period. FedLoan will respond to your annual submissions via letter detailing the number of qualifying payments you’ve made thus far. Make sure you call them out if there are any inaccuracies. Unfortunately, this has been reported often so you want to ensure you get credit for ALL your qualifying payments. Once you have made all of your qualifying payments, you complete the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Application for Forgiveness form, cross your fingers/hold your breath as it is reviewed and receive tax-free forgiveness. Other PSLF Considerations I’ve outlined the history and the steps to get into the PSLF program and the benefits of the program, so what gives? How come borrowers aren’t flocking to and lining up to get their loans forgiven. Unfortunately, there’s been a lot of uneasiness about the program that’s completely justified. In March 2018, the Department of Education announced a new program, the Temporary Expanded Public Service Loan Forgiveness, to aid those borrowers who thought they were on the path to forgiveness but were ultimately denied when they applied after their 10 years of repayment. The reconsideration fund allocated by Congress and totaling $350M should provide relief for those borrowers who thought they took the necessary steps to achieve, but fell short for one reason or another. That demographic of people is quite large as Forbes reported that only 96 borrowers have had their loans forgiven as of June 30, 2018, equating to 1% of total applicants seeking loan forgiveness. Yikes. Aside for the mishaps of the past with this program, borrowers also have to look to the future with a measure of concern too. Usually, when we talk risk related to financial matters, it involves the risk you take with your investments, whether it be market risk or interest rate risk. However, borrowers who enroll and put their proverbial eggs in the PSLF basket take on legislative risk, which is the risk that a change in the laws could lead to a loss or adverse effects in the jurisdiction affected (i.e. ‘Merica). This program is at the whim of the President and Congress, which may not allow you to sleep easy at night. However, it is likely that any change in the program will merely affect future borrowers and not those already enrolled in the PSLF program. This is based on the fact that Congress has allocated that sizeable sum of money for those “oops” situations and the fact that the language suggesting that student loan forgiveness should go by the way of the dinosaur seems to suggest future borrowers. Lastly, many borrowers who seek this strategy often see their loans grow over their PSLF timeline although they are making qualifying payments. For that hypothetical borrower who is halfway through their PSLF timeline but has seen the balance balloon because of reduced income driven payments, would the government actually issue a legislative “sike…just kidding” for the loan forgiveness program and not grandfather that borrower in? It’s not out of the realm of possibility, but the political fallout that would ensue from many of those in public service would be a steep price to pay.
Non-PSLF Forgiveness
Many borrowers are under the impression that they have to work for a government or a non-profit in order to be granted student loan amnesty. Not so fast! Relief is out there, albeit with not as attractive terms, but forgiveness can still happen. The cadence for this program is similar to PSLF with a few differences: it doesn’t matter who you work for, you still need to have the right kind of loans, be in the right repayment plan (one of the four income drive plans to be outlined soon), make the right amount of payments (typically over 20 or 25 years depending on the type of loan), and then you can apply to receive taxable forgiveness. *catch breath x2* That doesn’t sound so different than the PSLF program aside from the term (20 or 25 years versus 10 years), but the taxable forgiveness versus the tax-free forgiveness is actually a big deal. Let me explain why. In the PSLF program if you pay for 10 years and have a balance of $100,000 when you apply for forgiveness, hakuna matata! It means no worries for that balance is forgiven! In the non-PSLF program, if you have a $100,000 balance forgiven at the end of 25 years, that $100,000 is viewed as taxable income. That means that if you’re in a 25% tax bracket, you’ll owe an additional $25,000 in taxes in the year following when you received forgiveness. Often referred to as a “tax bomb”, it’s something that non-PSLF forgiveness borrowers need to account for, typically by saving or investing concurrently to paying off your loans. Although the length of repayment and tax bomb can make this strategy unattractive to some, there are some situations where it can make a lot of sense. Typically, this strategy is best suited for those who are not employed by a non-profit and have a high debt-to-income ratio such as 2:1 or greater. What does this mean? If your total loan balance is $275,000 and your making $120,000, your debt-income ratio is 2.3:1. Depending on your cost of living, liabilities, and other and financial responsibilities, it could be very difficult to make non-income driven payments through the standard plan or even the others. Let’s look at how this plays out using the DoE Repayment Estimator. To make things easy we will assume the pharmacist is single, all loans are unsubsidized and qualify for PAYE and IBR-New, and the average interest rate is 7%. refinance student loans You can see that if this person were to extend payments out 25 years using the extended fixed plan, there would be a $1,944 payment and a total amount paid of $583,093. However, considering non-PSLF forgiveness using PAYE or IBR-New, payments would start $848 and increase to $2,289 (using a 5% increase in income/year per calculator assumption) and the total paid would only be $350,821. However, there would be $309,179 forgiven that is treated as taxable income. If we continue with the assumption of a 25% tax bracket, there would a tax bill of around $77,000. So even with the tax bomb, there are definitely some advantages here: 1. The total amount paid over 25 years will be much less even with considering the additional tax bill (by over $100,000). 2. For many of the years during repayment, the monthly payments will be significantly lower which allows more disposable income for retirement contributions and other financial goals. 3. The tax bill of $77,000 is in future value which is much less than it is today Therefore, this pharmacist should at least consider non-PSLF forgiveness as a viable strategy. The debate for using this strategy can also get interesting if refinancing is on the table. Depending on how low you can get your rate, you would also want to consider this vs. non-PSLF forgiveness. public service loan forgiveness
Non-forgiveness
Outside of tuition reimbursement and forgiveness programs, what’s left is basically paying off pharmacy student loans all on your own. There’s no set timeline or years you have to wait. You determine the time to pay off. You could pay off the balance today if you have the cash or extend payments as long as possible (generally up to 30 years). You make it happen when it’s best for you. Although your monthly payments will be dictated based on the repayment plan you’re in, you are not bound to this and can always accelerate and pay more if you want to. If you want to see how extra payments or a lump sum payment affect your savings or time to payoff you check out our early payoff calculator. Through this strategy, you can either pay off your loans through the federal loan program using one of the many repayment plans (if you still have federal loans) or refinance student loans to a private lender. paying off pharmacy student loans
Federal Loan Program
If you’re like most pharmacists, you probably took out federal student loans to fund pharmacy school. If your grace period is up for you or you have already started making payments, then you will have one or more of the federal servicers handling your account. These include Nelnet, Great Lakes Education Loan Services Inc, Navient, FedLoan Servicing, MOHELA, HESC/EdFinancial, Cornerstone, GraniteState, and OSLA. Since it is possible to have multiple servicers, you may actually be making multiple monthly payments to different servicers each month. If you’re in this situation, you could use a Direct Consolidation Loan to combine all of these loans into one and then make one monthly payment to one lender. This will take the weighted interest rate of all of your loans but not lower the overall interest rate as refinancing could. It really just makes things more convenient. Repayment Plans The default loan repayment plan is the standard 10 year plan where you make the same monthly payments over ten years. It’s the most aggressive of all the repayment plans and you will pay less total interest than other plans. Depending on your loan balance, household income, and other financial priorities, this could be tough to make it work. There are several other repayment plans available with some having eligibility based on the type of loan you have and income. The monthly payments under the income-driven plans are determined based on your previous year’s discretionary income as mentioned above. Advantages of the Federal Loan System Keeping your loans in the federal system will give you some protection and safeguards that are not always available through private lenders. If you die or become permanently disabled, your loans will be discharged without any tax bill on that amount. In addition, if you’re facing a financial hardship, want to go back to school, or have circumstances where it could be tough to make payments, you can request deferment or forbearance which would result in a temporary stop in making payments. The other advantage is the ability to make income-driven payments if needed which generally is not available through private lenders. Lastly, all federal loans have fixed interest rates so your monthly payments will not change unless you are in an income-driven plan or one of the graduated plans.
Refinance Student Loans
Advantages of Refinancing *Disclaimer – Due to recent changes to federally held student loans secondary to the COVID-19 crisis, we are recommending those with Direct Federal Loans eligible for the temporary waiver of payments and interest through December 31, 2022, carefully review their situation prior to refinancing as these benefits are not available through private lenders. The main downside to keeping your loans in the federal system is that you will often pay more in interest given most unsubsidized graduate/professional loans are 6-8%. When you refinance student loans, you essentially reorganize or change the terms of an existing loan(s). These changes include the term over which you pay back, the interest rate, type of interest rate, or a combination of those. Even though interest rates, in general, are rising, you can often get more competitive interest rates through private lenders. Consider a pharmacist with $200,000 in student loans with a 6.8% overall interest rate. Under the standard 10-year plan, the total amount paid would be $276,192. If the interest rate was chopped to 4%, the total paid would be $242,988, a savings of over $33,000. The total savings will vary based on the loan balance, how fast it’s paid off, and the change in interest rate. If you want to see your potential savings, check out our refinance calculator. You may be thinking “Wow, I could be saving a ton if refinance student loans.” But what’s the catch?” Refinancing is not without some drawbacks and it’s very important to know what you’re giving up if you make the move. First, once you refinance, you automatically become ineligible for any of the forgiveness programs. In addition, most private lenders do not offer income-driven plans, so you will lose the flexibility to change your monthly payments and could face a problem if you experience a sudden change in your income. Furthermore, the option to put your loans in deferment or forbearance may not be available either. Also, not all lenders will forgive your loans if you die or become permanently disabled. So if you do decide to go this route you will want to know what their policy is on this. Regardless, most of the time you should have adequate life and disability insurance policies in place if these events were to occur. disability insurance for pharmacists Goals of Refinancing Your main goal of refinancing should be to get a lower interest rate so that you save more money over time. You can pick and choose which loans you want to refinance and if you have some that are already low, you would obviously want to leave those alone. Beyond that, it is important that you find a reputable lender. Unfortunately, there are many scams and frauds out there and you want to have your guard up. Nerd Wallet has a watchlist of businesses that have been reported for criminal activity or who have filed bankruptcy or have tax issues. You can also check out the Better Business Bureau to review ratings and reviews of prospective lenders. Besides choosing a reputable lender to refinance with, you want to be sure there is no origination fee for the service. Remember, companies are eager for your business and are willing to pay you. Also, there should be no prepayment penalty. If you decide you want to pay off your loan faster than the term, there should be no additional fees. Another potential goal of refinancing could be to lower your monthly payment. Since your total balance will not change, if you keep the same term (e.g. 10 years) but lower the interest rate, your payments will go down since a greater percentage of the payment will go toward the principal and less to interest. However, if you’re really trying to accelerate your payoff, your minimum payments could actually be higher than what they are currently. This would occur if you are reducing the term such as 10 to 5 years. Although you may argue that you could have a longer repayment term and make extra payments, some like being forced to make higher payments as a way to prevent overspending and stay disciplined. Besides lowering your interest rate and finding a reputable lender, another goal for you should be to get some cash. Because many companies are eager for your business, they are offering a welcome bonus for being a new customer. Now, of course, they will be making money as you pay off your loans in the form of interest but why not take advantage of this perk. Here’s the best part as well. There is really no limit to how many times you refinance. You can refinance your loans multiple times and get cash bonuses from more than one company. My wife and I actually made $2,500 in a year doing this and were able to get a lower rate each time. If you do this very frequently, you may see a reduction in your credit score since every time a full application is submitted, there is a hard pull. YFP has partnered with multiple student loan refinance companies in order to get you a nice bonus of up to $850 and sometimes more if there is a special promotion running. Yes, we get a referral fee when you refinance through our link, but we have shifted the majority of the payout to you.

Current Student Loan Refinance Offers

Advertising Disclosure

[wptb id="15454" not found ] Types of Interest Rates As mentioned above, all federal loans have fixed interest rates. That is not the case for refinanced loans. Generally, like home mortgages, they come in two flavors: fixed and variable. Fixed interest rates stay the same throughout the term and result in the same minimum monthly payment until it’s paid off. Variable interest rates tend to start out low, many times lower than fixed but can change depending on the Federal Reserve and LIBOR. There is usually a max or capped interest rate and specific frequency in which it could change. Although variable rates can be very attractive, depending on the fluctuation, it could cost you thousands in interest. So if you decide to go this route, you have to be comfortable with the risk of rates climbing and increasing your monthly payment. Besides fixed and variable, you may also encounter hybrid interest rates. In general, these are rates that stay fixed for a certain number of years and then changes to variable. Typical Requirements to Refinance Private lenders will not refinance student loans for anyone. You will be required to have a minimum credit score (usually at least 650), lending amount, proof of a certain level of income, and potentially a certain debt to income ratio. This will vary from lender to lender and not only will these items determine your eligibility, but it will also impact your quoted rate. Getting Multiple Quotes You probably have received mail or emails from companies encouraging you to refinance with them. Even though you may be familiar with some brands or heard of good experiences about a particular one from friends and family, be sure you get multiple quotes to find the best deal. When you are shopping around to find the best rate, companies will run a soft check of your credit to give you an accurate quote. This will not affect your credit score but if you proceed to a full application, then you could see a very minor drop. When you receive quotes, this will usually be reported as fixed or variable along with the respective payment terms. Most companies have terms of 5,7,10,15, and 20 years and typically, the shorter the term, the better the rate.

Step 3: Do the Math

Even if you think there’s a clear winner for the payoff strategy that’s best for you it’s important to get crystal clear on the numbers. Knowing the projected total amount paid (including interest) for all of the strategies available will help you get clarity on which option will save you the most money. The Repayment Estimator at studentaid.gov will help you determine the cost for the federal repayment plans. To determine your savings and new projected payments from refinancing check out our refinance calculator. Besides knowing your options and the total amount paid, you have to analyze how the monthly payments would fit into your budget. If you are too aggressive it may put you in a tough position and may limit your ability to contribute to your other financial goals.

Step 4: Evaluate Factors Beyond the Math

It can be easy to simply look at the numbers, find the strategy and repayment plan that costs you the least over time, and call it day. Although that can work and the math itself will likely hold the most weight, there are some things to consider beyond the numbers. Your emotions and attitude toward your loans can have a big impact on your payoff strategy. If you are someone who is really anxious and has difficulty sleeping knowing you’re still in debt, you may feel inclined to pay it off as fast as you can rather than waiting the time for a forgiveness program. Mathematically, it may not even make sense to do this but it does give you more control and could make you feel a lot better about your situation. Now if the potential savings with a forgiveness program is overwhelming then you may just need a coach or a financial planner to help you along the way. When you choose and stick with a payoff strategy there will always be trade-offs or an opportunity cost. For example, if you choose a payoff strategy that results in a very high monthly payment, you will not able to put as much money toward investing, home buying, entertainment, etc. Depending on your projected time to payoff and years left working, you may not be willing to deeply sacrifice some of your other financial goals. With tuition reimbursement programs in addition to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, your career options will be more limited to fully reap the benefits of these programs. Since tuition reimbursement is mostly based on years of service for a particular company or organization, you have to be willing to stay employed there for the required time to realize the maximum benefit. Similarly, with PSLF you are essentially locked into working for a government or nonprofit organization for 10 years. If you have other career aspirations or plans on the table during this decade, you will have to weigh that against tax-free forgiven loan balance.

Step 5: Determine Your Payoff Strategy and Optimize

Ok, if you have read everything up to this point, first off congratulations. That was a ton of material! By now you should have considered the options available to you, figured out the math, and weighed in the other considerations putting you in a position to choose your payoff strategy for the first time or reorganize one you have already had in place. Because everyone has a unique situation with different loan balances, goals, and attitudes, there’s no way to say that one strategy is the best for all. However, I do think there are some truths that are going to stand strong the majority of the time. First, if you have access to a tuition reimbursement/repayment program, take it! This is free money! Most of these programs are 2-5 years and depending on the specific one, it could knock out all or a huge chunk of your debt. If you’re not fortunate enough to get into one of these programs or you have maxed out that benefit, most pharmacists should either choose PSLF or the non-forgiveness route via refinancing. However, if you have a high debt:income ratio and are not eligible for PSLF, you should also strongly consider non-PSLF forgiveness. Below is a flowchart summary of how to navigate the different strategies. pharmacists student loan forgiveness guide If you have the typical pharmacist student loan balance, it’s really hard to argue against PSLF. The math is not even close. You will pay thousands less than any other strategy. But not only that, you have the opportunity to optimize this strategy and be on the fast lane to building some serious wealth. Since your monthly payments through the program are dependent on your discretionary income and therefore adjusted gross income, there are ways you can lower payments while simultaneously investing aggressively. The key ways to do this will be maxing out traditional 401(k) contributions and HSA (if available to you). It’s possible to also count traditional IRA contributions. However, because the phase-out for this is a MAGI of $74,000 for single, and $123,000 for married filing jointly if you are covered by an employer-sponsored plan, most pharmacists will not be eligible to get the deduction. For more information on how to maximize forgiveness, check out this podcast episode. Now if PSLF is off the table, either because you don’t meet the qualifications or you don’t want to wait 10 years and rely on the government, refinancing is a strong option. Refinancing student loans after pharmacy school should be done as you can if it makes sense so you don’t pay any unnecessary interest.

Considerations During Pharmacy Residency or Fellowship

Doing a pharmacy residency is a great way to further your skills and knowledge and can unlock some great job opportunities. However, for 1-2 years, depending on your path, it can be difficult just trying to pay bills and survive let alone fight through student loans with only 1/3 of a typical pharmacist salary. Since the grace period for student loans will usually end midway through your PGY1 experience, you will have to make some decisions at that point. If you do nothing, you will be put in the 10-year standard repayment plan and unless you have significant side income or a working significant other, that payment is not going to be feasible if you have a typical loan balance. One of the biggest mistakes that I see residents make is putting their loans in deferment or forbearance. On the surface, this doesn’t seem like that big of an issue and will allow you to stop making payments during your pharmacy residency. However, interest will continue to accrue and there are much better options! First, you definitely want to keep PSLF in mind and if your residency program is a qualifying employer and you plan on continuing to work there or another qualifying employer, you want to make sure you start the process ASAP. One of the huge benefits of doing a pharmacy residency and pursuing PSLF is that for 1-2 years you could be making very minimal student loan payments. Think about it. If you made little to no money during your last year of pharmacy school, you could be making $0 qualifying payments or very little during your first year of residency based on your current salary. If you do a second year of residency, your payments will again likely be very low since it’s based on that salary. As I mentioned earlier, IBR, ICR, REPAYE, and PAYE are all qualifying repayment plans for PSLF but what is the best one for pharmacy residency? While most of these are based on 10% of your discretionary income except ICR, REPAYE has some unique features. For all Direct Unsubsidized loans, the government will pay 50% of the interest that accrues every month if your loan payment is less than the amount of the monthly interest. So let’s assume you have $160,000 in student loans at 7% interest. $933 in interest will accrue every month as soon as the grace period ends. If your payment is $0 which very well could be if you had little to no income in your last year of pharmacy school, the amount of interest that would accrue would only be $466. Plus, that $0 payment would still count as a qualifying payment toward PSLF. pharmacy residency Even if you don’t continue working for a qualifying employer post-residency and won’t be pursuing PSLF, REPAYE would help reduce the accumulated interest during your years of training. Because the different repayment plans have different rules regarding how spousal income is incorporated you definitely want to also keep that in mind when choosing the best repayment plan during residency. Refinancing is not likely going to be an option during residency unless you have substantial side income since your debt to income ratio would be too high to get approved and it could be difficult making the monthly payments even if the term is extended to 15 or 20 years. Even if you are enrolled in an income-driven plan during residency, you could technically make “extra” payments if you wanted. However, this would not make sense if there is a possibility of going for PSLF since your goal is to pay the least amount of money possible. If you are pursuing PSLF and find you have a little disposable income each month, instead of paying extra on loans consider contributing to your 401(k) if available, IRA, or HSA.

Conclusion

The average student loan debt to income ratio for new pharmacists has increased significantly in the past decade. This has resulted in pharmacists being in debt longer and can significantly impact the ability to save and invest and put delay other financial goals and life events. There are a number of ways to tackle pharmacy student loans and choosing the wrong strategy could cost you thousands. It’s important to calculate the total amount paid and determine the monthly payments to get a clear picture of your options. Also, you should consider the factors in play beyond the math so that you can choose a plan that most closely aligns with your goals. If you still have questions or are unsure about what to do with your loans, you can always reach out to us and schedule a 1-on-1 consult. We will develop a customized plan that considers multiple scenarios and helps you determine how to save the most money. It will also include any tax implications that may be in play with forgiveness programs.

YFP 077: Making the Financial Transition from PharmD to Residency


Making the Financial Transition from PharmD to Resident

On episode 77 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Ulbrich, founder of Your Financial Pharmacist, interviews Dr. Michael Murphy, a 2018 PharmD graduate of THE Ohio State University College of Pharmacy and current PGY1 pharmacy practice resident in ambulatory care at Ohio State. Dr. Murphy served as the APhA-ASP National President from 2017-2018. In this episode, Dr. Murphy and Tim talk about his financial transition from student to resident, what he wishes he would have known financially during pharmacy school and how being involved in professional organizations has put him on the fast track to a successful career.

About Today’s Guest

Michael Murphy, PharmD is a PGY1 Pharmacy Resident in an Ambulatory Care Setting at The Ohio State University College of Pharmacy. Born in Columbus, Ohio, Michael attended Hilliard Davidson High School and then headed down the street to complete his undergraduate degree and attend pharmacy school at Ohio State. During his time at the College of Pharmacy, he found his passion in advocating for an enhanced educational experience for today’s student pharmacists and for the future of the profession. Michael focused on these passions through involvement in student organizations and has held several volunteer leadership positions where he served his peers and profession, including his term as the 2017-2018 American Pharmacists Association Academy of Student Pharmacists (APhA-ASP) National President. Michael is interested in pursuing a career in academia where he looks forward to training the next generation of pharmacists and advocating for the advancement of the profession.

Join APhA

Join APhA now to gain premier access to YFP facilitated webinars, financial articles, live events, resources, and consultations. Your membership will also allow you to receive exclusive discounts on YFP products and services. You can join APhA at a 20% discount by visiting www.pharmacist.com/join-now and using coupon code ‘AYFP18’. For more information about our financial resources, visit www.pharmacist.com/financial-education.

Summary

On this episode, Tim Ulbrich interviews Dr. Michael Murphy. Dr. Murphy went to Ohio State University and graduated from his undergraduate degree with no loans. He began taking loans out for his first year of pharmacy school and took out the maximum amount for four years.

Q: What would you have done differently then now that you know that borrowing the maximum amount isn’t the best option?

A: Dr. Murphy explains that he would have learned about budgeting, monitor your day-to-day spending and also shares the importance of not taking extra student loans out for vacations. After your first semester, you can figure out how much money you actually need instead of just continuing to borrow the maximum amount.

Q: What’s your strategy to make finances work well in marriage?

A: Dr. Murphy shares that communication, cutting costs where you need to, and working together to set fun goals helps are ways to help make your finances work well in a relationship.

Q: Did the indebtedness ever play a factor in deciding to continue your education/residency instead of getting a job right away?

A: Dr. Murphy said this definitely played a factor, but he has seen his mentors go through residency and be able to pay back their loans. He said that he looks at residency as an investment to move his career forward and knew that was the best choice for him.

Q: How are you deciding which repayment plan to choose?

A: Dr. Murphy says that originally he was very ambitious and chose the standard repayment plan for his loans. Now, he and his wife are working with a financial advisor to see what will make the most sense. They are going to switch to an income-based repayment plan and work on paying off other loans first. He has a goal of paying off his loans in 10 years.

Q: How did you make the decision to work with a financial planner?

A: Dr. Murphy said that he wasn’t familiar with student loan options, retirement or investments and thought that going to an expert was the best decision. They chose someone that other family members have used and they feel comfortable working with him.

Q: What tangible benefit do you feel like professional organizational involvement has played for you as a student but also in transitioning to residency?

A: Dr. Murphy said that it’s important to think about what brings value to the money that is being spent. APhA is always fighting for the future of the profession so pharmacy remains relevant and a successful provider. APhA provides resources to help you prepare and practice at the highest level. The relationships that have been formed, although intangible, provide so much value.

Q: After joining a professional organization, what advice do you have for students and new practitioners to further their involvement?

A: Dr. Murphy suggests to take a small positive risk like applying for a leadership position or starting a new project that you are interested in. If you are unsure of how to get more involvement, ask.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 077 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Excited to have a special guest on today’s show, Dr. Michael Murphy, past president of APhASP, current pharmacy resident at the Ohio State University, excited to talk with him about his transition from student to resident. And obviously, now I just officially began my new job at Ohio State. So excited to be here alongside another Buckeye who’s been a Buckeye for a long time. So Dr. Murphy, welcome to the show.

Michael Murphy: Hey, Tim. Super excited to be here. Thanks for having me on the show.

Tim Ulbrich: So I’ve only been at Ohio State, Michael, for a week. And man, the Ohio State culture and energy and that traditions and the legacy, it’s no joke. It’s a lot of fun. And you’ve been there awhile. What — nine years now?

Michael Murphy: Yeah, I’ve been there for nine years. And you know, I don’t think they can get rid of me. I love being a Buckeye, all of the opportunities that it provides to me, my career, and of course, getting to go to those football games, that’s fun too.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. I have to up my game when it comes to Buckeye gear. I’m lacking the Buckeye gear. So as I’ve gone into work over the past week and been in other people’s offices and been there for a Buckeye Friday, I’ve realized that I’ve really got to up my game in that area. So why don’t we start by just tell us a little bit about yourself, including your decision to enter pharmacy school. Why did you want to be a pharmacist in the first place? A little bit about your journey through the PharmD and then ultimately, what led you to choose and pursue the residency training and the path that you’re doing right now?

Michael Murphy: Sure. I’d be happy to. So I am Columbus, Ohio born and raised. I grew up in Hilliard, which is a suburb of Columbus. And while in high school, I started taking some science classes. I took chemistry. And I knew immediately that I loved science. Actually, this is kind of funny. I was the proud only member of the high school chemistry club.

Tim Ulbrich: Only member.

Michael Murphy: Yes. I was real popular in high school. Around the same time, I started volunteering at the Ohio State Wexner Medical Center. I had volunteered, I would take patients from their rooms to their cars when it was time for them to go home. And I just loved seeing these patients on their best day because they were finally getting to go home. So I knew in high school that I loved science, I loved health care, and I was trying to find this way that I could tie those two ideas together. And around the end of high school, my grandfather ended up passing away. And he had been a pharmacist in the Cleveland, Ohio area for about 50 years. And it’s kind of funny how I just learned more about him throughout the process of, you know, him passing away and learned more about the impact that he had made on his community and his profession. And I’ll never forget going to his funeral and seeing all these community members come out that I had never really heard about before, but he’d made a huge impact in their life as this local community pharmacist. And I knew right there that that was the profession for me. I wanted to be a pharmacist so I could make as big of a difference in my community as my grandfather had. So I knew from 16 that I was going to be this pharmacist. And I went to Ohio State with that in mind and stuck around for eight years, and here I am.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I love that story, Michael. I remember when you were in your national presidency of APhASP, talking a lot about finding your legacy and finding that place that you have in the profession. And hearing you link that back to the inspiration from your grandfather is such a cool story. And so you go into Ohio State — and for those that don’t know and while it’s changing right now, Ohio State is a 4+4 program, so you do four years of undergrad and you do four years of pharmacy school. Obviously, you mentioned that you’re in year nine with your residency. So when I hear eight years, I think, holy cow, we’re starting to think about student loans. This is obviously a financial podcast. So talk me through the financial journey. Did you have loans coming out of undergrad in a pharmacy school? And how did that transition work?

Michael Murphy: So I was really lucky in undergrad. My parents were able to help me significantly with my undergraduate tuition, so I did not have loans coming out of undergrad. But going into pharmacy school, I went through the first year of applying for the FAFSA and seeing that transition. It was pretty significant. And I immediately started to feel that burden, just knowing that this money was not mine. But I should be spending it. It was a weird transition. But now, going through pharmacy school, I took out the max that I could for those four years. And I definitely — there are some things that I wish I had done differently, now looking back. I’m glad for my experience, it was a very positive experience during the pharmacy school. But there was definitely things I could have done differently to help myself now that I’m in this financial situation that I am today.

Tim Ulbrich: So let’s talk about that for a minute because I think you brought up an important point that is very, very common that obviously the trend I think is typically to take out the maximum amount of student loans. I did, and I didn’t really think about it in the way I now reflect back on it, right? Which is just part of lessons learned. So obviously, that being one thing you might do. What advice would you have back for your P1 self, looking and saying, OK, I came out of undergrad, I’ve got no student loans thanks to the help of my parents. Now I’m entering into pharmacy school and kind of starting to escalate that indebtedness because of the borrowing the full amount. What would you have done differently in terms of borrowing that money or budgeting through that phase? And what are some things you wish that you would have known during that time?

Michael Murphy: Well, one, I would have introduced P1 Michael to the word “budget.” I think that would be one thing. I watched my money somewhat. But I wasn’t too concerned when it came to little things like going out for dinner or getting lunch, cups of coffee, the normal things that every student needs to do. And when I was thinking about some advice that I could give to a first-year student pharmacist, I would say definitely don’t do what some of my friends did, which they took their extra student loans and they went on these extravagant vacations. Never do that. But also watch your day-to-day because looking back now, that is some of the times that I spent the most money because I would say, “Oh, I’m too busy to go to the grocery store on the weekend. I have to study.” So I would end up having to go out for dinner multiple times a week and go out for lunch. And that stuff adds up quick. So watching the day-to-day can be a significant change in what you can do to help with some of this financial burden. And then after that first semester, you can figure out how much money do you really need? You probably don’t need that full amount. You can budget for yourself to make financial smart decisions now so you’re not regretting them in four years.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, absolutely. And I think a couple things there that really stand out to me, Michael. Obviously, the concept of the budgeting piece, of course. But also just the reality of the nickel-and-diming of those expenses, right? And I think we all feel this now. I mean, I’m thinking of the last time I just logged onto my Huntington checking account, and none of those charges look extravagant, but something here, something there, something there, and obviously, those add up over time. And then I hope for the students that are listening to the podcast, you know, they heard that message of reevaluating how much you really need because we’ve been preaching before on this show at anybody who will listen that when you’re borrowing money in school, obviously that is accruing interest. And then that’s going to capitalize when you graduate and you get to the point of active repayment, which you’re just coming up on now and we’ll talk about here in a minute. And so I think it’s for those that have gone through this situation, and you’re looking at yourself in a situation like Michael and somebody who has around the average indebtedness or myself, somebody who had a little bit more, that certainly you want to learn from the lessons and the actions that you took. But obviously, there’s only so much value in beating yourself up. But for those students who are listening, try to figure out what could I do differently right now? And how could I pivot to be able to make some different decisions? So let me transition this a little bit — my understanding, you got married during pharmacy school to your wife, Robin. Is that correct?

Michael Murphy: Yeah, we got married right after my P1 year. So we actually got married about four days after my first year of pharmacy school. And that was a rough transition in itself because the idea is you’re planning about a year to a year and a half before the wedding. And starting pharmacy school and that transition, things just got put off initially to winter break. And then winter break, we were like busy with holidays and seeing family, and things got put off again. And then all of a sudden, we were scrambling. But everything turned out perfectly, as it always does.

Tim Ulbrich: And one of the questions that I always like to ask any couple or anybody on the show that’s working together with somebody else — and obviously, your situation being unique that you got married during school and you’re adding somebody else’s financial picture into the mix. But for you and Robin, what works well for the two of you? I mean, when you’re hitting all cylinders with your finances and you’re doing this well — we all know that that’s not all the time or we’d be lying, right? — but when it’s working well for the two of you, what is the strategy to make that happen?

Michael Murphy: So I think the most important thing is communication. Working with your significant other to set goals that work for both of you so that you can help cut costs where you really don’t need to be spending money. So I’ll use the example of eating out. That’s an easy way to make a pretty quick transition to you just going to the grocery store, preparing ahead of time, setting yourself up for success so you’re not going out to lunch multiple times a week. But also working together on setting fun goals. So part of financial planning, at least for me, is not just about cutting back but using your extra funds in a responsible and valuable way for your own experiences. And I think that’s pretty important. So you’re not just cutting back, but you’re really using those extra funds for something that means a lot to you. So if that’s for me and Robin, that’s going out and exploring a local craft brewery or going to a local restaurant and doing the things that we love to do or taking a quick day trip or for Robin, who is a dairy farmer, going out and seeing some of her favorite cows and maybe putting in a bid at an auction for a cow.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome. I remember — correct me if I’m wrong — but when you were explaining to me before you recorded of what Robin’s doing, you mentioned something like the dairy farm equivalent of like APhA from an association standpoint. Is that right?

Michael Murphy: Yeah. So she works on her parents’ dairy farm a couple days a week. But she also works for the American Guernsey Association, which is what I liken to the APhA for dairy farmers.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s awesome. I love that. So let’s talk about this transition. So you go through eight years of school, undergrad, PharmD, you come out with roughly the average indebtedness, a little bit less than that. And one of the questions I often get — and my previous job was working with students, thinking about how this financial piece plays into the career decisions that they make. And I can comfortably say I felt like it was rare five, six, seven years ago that many people were thinking about this financial piece in a significant way of impacting the decision they made on residency or no residency. But that seems to be changing a little bit as the indebtedness continues to grow. And so my question for you is did the indebtedness — obviously you decided to pursue residency — but did the indebtedness ever play a factor that you thought, eh, maybe I will or maybe I won’t do this because of that dollar amount and the debt you had, versus just going out and getting a job and starting earning an income?

Michael Murphy: Hmm. That’s a good question. I mean, it was definitely a factor. I didn’t put too much weight into it because I’ve seen so many of my mentors go through residency and take that year of investment in their future and into their careers. And they’re able to still pay off their student loans, and it’s not significantly contributing to any problems that they see in the future. But it was definitely a factor. And I guess it depends on the way that I think about residency. Some people think that, oh, you’re taking a pay cut for that year. I think of it as me paying for this experience. And for me, I want to make sure that if I’m paying the difference between what I’m making as a resident and what I would be making as a starting salaried pharmacist, that that experience is worth it for me for my growth and for a springboard for my future career. So I felt like that investment made sense for me. It doesn’t make sense for everyone, but it made sense for me and for my career goals. Now, the idea of not being able to start paying off my student loans as quickly and as hard as I would like to, that’s definitely been something that I’ve been thinking about a lot lately, especially as now I received my first notice from Nelnet, the company that is managing my student loans, saying that my first paycheck is due to them.

Tim Ulbrich: On your birthday, right? Happy birthday.

Michael Murphy: Yeah, it’s due on my birthday, which is just —

Tim Ulbrich: That’s cruel. That’s just cruel.

Michael Murphy: But I’ve seen some of my friends now that started just right off in the community, and they’re able to put more of their monthly salary to their student loans. And you know, it’s just a difference in what we’re able to contribute at this time.

Tim Ulbrich: Michael, one thing I love that you said that just hit me — and I’m going to use this as I talk to student pharmacists, and I wish I would have this mindset — is looking at the residency training year as something you’re paying for — and I love how you said basically, the difference. So if you take a pharmacist is making $100,000, just for an even number, and you’re being paid as a resident whatever, $40,000 is an even number, that you’re making that investment of essentially — one way of looking at it is saying, “I’m taking a pay cut.” The other way of looking at it is say, “I’m investing $60,000 toward this component that’s going to advance my career and the skills and the development of myself.” And I think that’s huge as a mindset shift, right? I mean, if you think of it that way, all of a sudden, it changes probably how you’re getting the most value out of that experience and from your preceptors and the mentorship and all of that. So I love that. And I hope that you’ll continue to shop that message to anybody that will listen because I think that can be such a game-changer for people to make sure they’re getting the most of that year, to look at that year as an investment. So you make this transition into residency and now, as you mentioned, here you are. Here you are in essentially November at the time of recording this, and you get that happy message that hey, grace period is up. And I always joke on the show, I feel like the grace period is anything but gracious because the interest is still accruing, but you don’t have to make payments. All of a sudden you have to make a payment, nonetheless on your birthday. How are you going about making the decision of which repayment option you’re going to choose? Because so many people get hung up, as we’ve talked about before on this podcast, making that decision. So how did you and Robin work through as you’ve had this time in the grace period to say, OK, once I go into active repayment, this is the best game plan for us?

Michael Murphy: So for me, when I initially went through exit cousneling, I was a little bit too ambitious and thought that, oh, I’m going to be making x amount of dollars per month, I will definitely be able to contribute much more than I actually can. So I picked, initially, one of the standard repayment models, which with my student loans is over $1,000 per month, which is just too significant for what I can currently pay on a resident salary. So I’m now going through the process of working with Robin and working with our financial advisor, which is one of the first things that I did once graduating. I can’t advocate that enough to students is to find a financial advisor, start getting advice early on. But working with our financial advisor to find out which repayment plan would make the most sense for me, especially this first year in residency. And we decided an income-based repayment model would be the one that makes the most sense for us because right now, we can spend some time focusing on some of our other debt, like Robin’s car loan, like Robin’s student loans that are a little bit smaller. And then we can be paying off some amount to my student loans as well. And then eventually, we will be able to bring all of these payments together and be putting our full force towards my student loans. The idea that was shared with me is this idea of a snowball that you’re slowly building up steam over time and as the snowball rolls down the hill, it builds and builds and builds, and eventually, you’re putting your full force towards this one student loan.

Tim Ulbrich: I like that. And so what I heard there is essentially, you had jumped out of the gates and said, “OK. I want to do the standard repayment, the 10-year repayment.” The reality of that, of course, is a big payment if we’re looking at let’s say $150,000-160,000 of student loans, resident salary. So then you took a step back and said, OK. For you and Robin, what are the other financial goals you’re trying to achieve, what other debts are you trying to pay off? How much income do we have in our monthly budget that we’re working with? And then obviously, that led you down the path of one of the income-driven plans. And it sounds like you’re still kind of working through which one of those. Is it PAYE? REPAYE? Is it one of the IBR plans? The old IBR? The new IBR? But I know for many — and I’m guessing this is the thought for you as well — that that is a floor, but then obviously, as time goes on, you can of course make extra payments if you decide to in the income-driven plans. Is that the thought you have?
Michael Murphy: Yeah. Unfortunately, I am still very ambitious. And I think that my biggest goal would be to have these paid off in 10 years. And I know that’s probably unrealistic, but I believe in stretch goals.

Tim Ulbrich: Yes.
Michael Murphy: If you shoot for the stars, you may not get to the stars, but you’ll probably get a lot farther than you would have if you’d aimed low. So I figure I’m going to aim for 10 years, get everything paid off, and if it ends up being 12, hey, at least it’s better than 20.

Tim Ulbrich: So Michael, my prediction — just knowing you and working with other people — my prediction is it’s going to be 5 or less for you. And I think that’s why I think that’s going to happen is as I’m sure you’ve talked with other people, I know I experienced this myself, once you start catching the fire of actually seeing that snowball rolling down the hill and getting some momentum, you just get fired up about making it happen quicker, and it impacts how you make other decisions. So certainly no guarantees, but we’ll touch base and kind of follow the journey. But that’s my prediction here is 5 years or less. But I like what you said there about the timeline. So you did mention, which is interesting because not many new graduates choose to work with a financial planner or financial advisor. And I know many new grads, myself included when I graduated, struggle with evaluating the benefits of what that planner can provide versus obviously the investment in doing that and engaging that relationship. So how did you and Robin make the decision that for you, it was best to pull the trigger to invest in and purchase in terms of the value of working with a financial planner?

Michael Murphy: So for me, I mean, this is going to be showing a little bit about myself, I guess it came down to my naivete. I wasn’t too familiar with some of these different student loan options that I could choose between and also just this idea of investing in my future and in a retirement plan and trying to set up some of our investments. I’d always heard this idea that you need to start early, but that’s kind of where the advice ended. I didn’t really know where to go from there to start early. So I figured that I should probably reach out to someone that has more experience than me, just like how our patients come to us for advice on their medications, I figured I should probably go to the expert for advice on what to do to set myself up for success. So that’s the reason that Robin and I reached out to someone that had worked with members of our family before to help them plan for their finances. It was someone that we knew and trusted and we knew that we would feel comfortable with. And we reached out to them, and our first visit was very positive. They talked us through what the next six months are going to look like and what we can do to help start paying off our student loans and at the same time, start investing in our retirement and 40 years down the line and what we want our future to be. And I thought that was interesting because initially, I was just going to think about my student loans. But if we start investing now, we’re going to see significantly more benefits later on than if we waited. So I thought all of that advice was really impressive. And it gave me a lot of confidence that I made the right choice to reach out to someone for help.

Tim Ulbrich: I really appreciate your maturity for you and Robin. I feel like — as probably other new grads can relate — I felt like coming out of school at 24, and even though I had $200,000+ of debt, I felt like I liked the topic enough and want to learn about it that I’ve got this myself. And the piece I forgot and it took me awhile to realize is that so much of this, especially for new practitioners, is so complicated with all these moving pieces and parts. But also, so much of this is so behavioral that even if you have the knowledge and especially I think in a situation with a spouse to have a third party help work through a financial plan can be incredibly powerful and keep you accountable in that plan, even if you have the right knowledge. Ultimately, so much of this topic can be behavioral. And Tim Baker and Tim Church just talked about recently about the behavioral biases that come with investing. And so we have been advocating over and over again on this show about the benefits — and while it may not be for everyone — what you should look for, questions you should ask to make sure you’re working with somebody that has your best interests in mind. YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner, we’ve got lots of information that will help you hopefully find and ask the right questions to be working with somebody that we think will help you holistically and comprehensively work on your financial plan and not just focus in on one piece. And I like what you said there, Michael about obviously, it’s just much bigger than just one part, whether that be student loans, investing or any part of the plan. So finally, I want to shift gears and talk about your involvement in professional organizations because obviously, you had a very notable role as the national president of APhASP and for those that don’t know, again, correct me if I’m wrong, Michael, APhASP I believe is 22,000+ members strong. Does that sound about right?

Michael Murphy: So depending on the year, we usually hang out around 30,000 members.

Tim Ulbrich: OK. I’m underestimating. So incredible number of student members, all colleges across the country. Obviously, a very highly sought-after position. And in my opinion, the office of the president of APhASP is a reflection of really the cream of the crop of students across the country that are seeking this position. So first of all, congratulations and kudos on getting selected for that position. I know I got to see you kind of work throughout that year and had a chance to have you on campus at NeoMed and visit with our students, which I know you provided them a lot of inspiration. And so one of the first questions I want to ask you is, what tangible benefit — and I’m sure there’s more than one here — but what tangible benefits do you feel like professional organization involvement has played for you, both as a student, but also in this transition because I know I hear from many new practitioners, they struggle with the tangible benefit of the membership. And they’re purely looking at maybe the cost of joining and can’t necessarily see how that’s going to play a role in their professional development or other areas. So what did that mean for you as a student and mean for you as you’ve made this transition into residency?

Michael Murphy: So for me, now I think that is a very important question because we need to think about what brings value to the money that we’re spending. I think that’s what is so important about this podcast is thinking about what we are spending our money on and making sure that it is all of value. And one of those valuable experiences that I always know that I will spend money is my membership to APhA. And that’s because it brings value to me when I was a student, it brings value to me as a new practitioner, and it’s going to bring value to me throughout my time as a pharmacist. And that’s because APhA is constantly fighting for the future of the profession to make sure that the pharmacist will always be a relevant and accessible healthcare provider. So for me as a new practitioner, some of the tangible benefits that I have been able to get are resources. So it can be overwhelming all of a sudden going from this shift, from student where you have this safety net to the pharmacist. And it can be scary of all of a sudden thinking that, whoa, I am the last line of defense. I need to make sure that I am as skilled, confident, as possible so that I can take the best care for my patients. And I think that APhA, through their practice division, provides a great level of resources so that you can practice at the highest level of your potential. Additionally, I know that some of the resources that you can gain through attending their conferences are out of this world. I just went to the MP Day of Life for the first time in July in Washington, D.C., and I learned about this woman’s health initiative out of Indiana, and we listened to a woman’s health pharmacist and learned about some of the different resources that they use in their practice to ensure that they’re using the best oral contraceptives for their patients. And I took that resource and I use it just about every day in clinic, where I’m getting questions from different physicians, asking which oral contraceptive do I pick? There’s so many different ones with different ideas. Which one should I use? And it’s nice having this resource that I was able to get because I attended an APhA conference. And then I mean, the tangible benefits, I can go on and on. But for me, some of the greatest value is in the intangible — the relationships that I’ve been able to form with my friends going back from 5-6 years ago when I first started getting involved in APhA to the relationships that I’m forming every day with different APhA members. And one of the things that is nice about APhA is not just health systems pharmacists or community pharmacists or managed care pharmacists. It’s everyone. And you can really find different ways that you can get to know pharmacists from across the spectrum so that you can find out ways that you can help them, and they can find ways to give back and help you in your career.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, that’s great stuff. I couldn’t agree more. And I had the opportunity to serve as our chapter advisor of APhASP at Neomed and, you know, what I always heard over and over again is there’s a hesitancy from some students to jump in. But once they jumped in, they got involved in the meetings, they attended a national meeting, maybe a mid-year meeting, they got involved in advocacy — once they saw it, you know, and it became real to them, obviously they caught fire. And that was so much fun to watch. And the follow-up question I have for you is I think we have many students and practitioners that are listening that are thinking, OK, maybe I’ve joined an organization before, but I didn’t go anywhere beyond that. And so they didn’t necessarily see the value in continuing that membership. So outside of, of course, making that initial decision to join, what advice would you have for students or new practitioners to then further get involved so they can really experience the value of their involvement?

Michael Murphy: So I think one of the best things that you can do is to take a small positive risk. And if that risk is you saying that you’re interested in running for a leadership position, let’s say one of the new practitioner network standing committee applications that are going to be due on Dec. 1. Take that small positive risk. If you want to get more involved, you can do it. Take that risk. If you’re a student pharmacist, and you’re saying that “I want to make a difference in my community,” start a new patient care project that follows your passion in your community and reach out to your chapter executive committee to find ways that you can get involved and make a difference out in the community. There are so many ways that you can get involved, but what you need to do is ask. Reach out to your local leaders or to your leaders within the new practitioner network, and find out ways that you personally can get involved. I just heard a interesting quote from one of my preceptors the other day. And I think it’s just perfect. And the quote was, “A hungry person with a closed mouth never gets fed.” So the idea is if you don’t ask for food, you’re not going to get fed. You’re not going to get fed with what you need. But if you reach out, you ask for what you need, then you will see results immediately. So reach out to your local leaders, reach out to the new practitioner network, the new practitioner advisory committee, and they can give you the resources that you need to get involved more, get that full value from your membership.

Tim Ulbrich: I love that. It reminds me of one of my favorite books I read a couple years ago called “Start” by Jon Acuff, and it’s that idea of taking that idea, taking that risk and that next step and inevitably, any time you do that, the next door opens and it keeps going from there. And I think it’s just part of that mindset that you spoke of earlier. OK, we’re going to finish up the show and have some fun. We’re going to put Dr. Murphy on the hot seat. I’m going to give four questions in a rapid-fire format. Quick question, quick answer. So first question I have for you, Dr. Murphy, the greatest opportunity you feel like we have as a profession right now here in 2018?

Michael Murphy: I think our greatest opportunity as a profession is to realize the impact that we can have out in our community. I believe that the future of pharmacy is in the community and is a mixture between the community pharmacist and an ambulatory care pharmacist, working almost as a primary care pharmacist. But we need to advocate for ourselves to our patients and our legislators so that we can make a difference in providing preventative care for our pharmacists.

Tim Ulbrich: What do you think is the greatest threat that is facing our profession right now?

Michael Murphy: The greatest threat, that is a good question. For me, I think the greatest threat is feeling content, feeling like this is as great as it can be. I always know that any situation can be better if we have an innovative stage of mind and we realize that through hard work today, we can see positive results in the future. We just need to get to work today. So I think our biggest threat is just feeling content. But I know that we can overcome that if we get to work today, and we will see results tomorrow.

Tim Ulbrich: What’s one step that those are listening can take to help advance the profession of pharmacy?

Michael Murphy: Reach out to another healthcare professional or to your patient and ask them to write a letter to their local legislator about the impact that pharmacists can make in their lives. And this will show that pharmacists don’t just make an impact, and pharmacists aren’t just fighting for themselves, but other members of the healthcare team and their patients can see the impact of pharmacist-provided care. And that will help advance pharmacy on a state level and the national level.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. My last question is I know you’re a learner. So what are you reading these days, either for fun or even to help develop yourself further?

Michael Murphy: Sure. So one of the books that I’m reading right now, and I feel like I’ve been reading this for awhile because residency sure is busy is the biography of Harvey Milk. And he was the first openly gay city legislator of a major city in San Francisco back in the ‘70s. And it’s really interesting reading about how this person fought against all the odds. He fought against all these people that were saying that he didn’t deserve to be a leader, but he knew in himself that he was a leader. And he didn’t listen to those people that were trying to tell him the type of person that he needed to be. He listened to himself. He listened to that voice inside that was saying that he should go out and make a difference in his community. So I love reading biographies because I love reading about how great people became great. And it reminds me of this idea that I once heard from one of my favorite professors — that if I read about how great people become great, maybe someday I can be great. And that’s what I strive for every day.

Tim Ulbrich: I love that, Dr. Murphy, and thank you so much for coming on the show today and for being an inspiration for me and many others as well and, of course, for your commitment to the profession of pharmacy. I really do appreciate it and think many listeners are going to get great value from today’s episode.

Michael Murphy: Thanks for having me, Tim. It was a ton of fun.

Tim Ulbrich: So before we wrap up today’s episode of the podcast, I want to again thank our sponsor, American Pharmacists Association.

Sponsor: Founded in 1852, APhA is the largest association of pharmacists in the US with more than 62,000 practicing pharmacists, pharmaceutical scientists, student pharmacists, and pharmacy technicians as member. Join APhA now to gain premier access to YFP facilitated webinars, financial articles, live events, resources, and consultations. Your membership will also allow you to receive exclusive discounts on YFP products and services. You can join APhA at a 20% discount by visiting pharmacist.com/join-now and using coupon code ‘AYFP18’. For more information about the financial resources we offer in partnership with APhA, visit www.pharmacist.com/yfp

Tim Ulbrich: And one last thing if you could do us a favor, if you like what you heard on this week’s episode, please make sure to subscribe to in iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Also, make sure to head on over to yourfinancialpharmacist.com/ where you will find a wide array of resources designed specifically for you, the pharmacy professional, to help you on the path towards achieving financial freedom. Have a great rest of your week!

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Money Talks: The Price of the Pharmacy Residency Quest

 

The following is a guest post from Brandon Dyson, PharmD, Co-founder tl;dr pharmacy

Note: The following is a sample chapter from tl;dr pharmacy’s guide: Mastering the Match. If you are looking to get a residency, Mastering the Match is the best place to start. It walks you through every step of the process; from how to make yourself a competitive candidate to how to nail the interview. In this post, I’ll talk about how (shockingly) expensive it is to get a residency and some ways that you can help lower that cost. If you want to give yourself the best possible chance to win the residency of your dreams, check out Mastering the Match here.

Money Talks: The Price of the Pharmacy Residency Quest

So you’ve decided you want to apply for a PGY1 residency. You, like so many others before you, have felt the rising pressure of holding patients’ lives in your hands and are not quite ready to take the reins all by yourself.

Or you’ve realized during your fourth-year rotations how much pharmacy school ISN’T teaching you, and you’re having an “oh-crap-there’s-so-much-I-have-left-to-learn” moment. I’ve so been there. (Sometimes still there, tbh). Which brings us back to your decision to apply for residency.

While the rest of Mastering the Match will prepare you for the residency process, this chapter is about the math. We’re pharmacists, we like math.

And no, this section is not about numbers in increments of 5s (#shoutouttomyretailphriends!). Nor will it have first-order decay equations a la vancomycin dosing.

WAY more complex then we are about to get into

This is simple arithmetic, but it is so necessary to know ahead of time what you’re getting into financially with the residency application process. Money is all about planning.

So let’s get started.

The residency search process can be broken down in 3 major phases:

Phase 1: The application

Phase 2: The Midyear trip

Phase 3: The interview trips

Now let’s take that exact same list and attach estimated costs to each piece to get a rough budget.

Grand Total for Residency Application Process

(with 4 applications and interviews): ~$4600

 

Phew! That’s a lot of money! Granted, it’s just an estimate, and there are certainly tweaks that can save money. Let’s break this down a little further and talk about where the plusses and minuses might be on this estimate. And we’ll also discuss a few tips to do this in a more thrifty manner.

The Application

There, unfortunately, isn’t much wiggle room to be had here. The only thing I’ll say is to be realistic and thoughtful in your decision to apply to a program. Don’t just apply to 25 programs willy-nilly because you heard so-and-so was going to apply to that many and you feel you have to in order to increase your match chances. That can quickly add up at $43 extra per program application!

pharmacy residency

This will be you if you apply to 25 pharmacy residency programs

scattered across the country

This is YOUR job search, and if a program isn’t really on the table for you (whether due to interest, distance from home, etc.), it’s ok to NOT apply! That being said, if you have the residency-or-bust attitude and the money to back it up, by all means, go for the gold.

Just remember, all it takes is one program to match. Refer to the many other sections of this guide for more advice on researching programs and the match process.

The Midyear Trip

Travel and Accommodations

There are many ways to save money here! There isn’t much leeway with flights unless you’ve saved up airline points on a travel credit card. You can also book WAY in advance when prices are generally lower.

Where you can really make an impact on your budget is with ground travel and hotel costs.

For ground travel, try to share airport shuttles with other classmates. There will likely be several of you getting into the same airport at similar times, so coordinate ahead of time to book shuttle transportation to and from the airport.

Even if you have to wait 30 min (or more) for other people’s flights to arrive; trust me, you have plenty to do to prepare for the Midyear. So grab a coffee and kill some time in baggage claim. It’s worth it to be able to divide the shuttle cost between up to 8 people for a van instead of just you in a taxi (because, math).

It’s a similar story for the hotel. This may surprise you, but you do not need to stay at the Ritz and drink Dom from fine crystal glasses. You don’t need to buy scotch that’s old enough to legally vote from the hotel bar. Be conservative here. A decent hotel one more block away from the convention center will serve you well.

That being said, I also wouldn’t book too far away from the convention center because you will be going back and forth A LOT. And those cute dress shoes are pretty much awful to walk in. Plus carrying your poster tube and your purse (or your European carry-all for the guys reading this). You don’t want to be a hot mess when you do finally arrive at the showcase.

Another thought on the hotel. Just like with ground transportation, sharing is caring. You don’t have to be besties with a person to share a room for a few days. More than likely, if it’s a classmate, they aren’t a serial killer. So you should be ok to bunk in together for the convention. At least figure 2 to a room so you can each have your own bed. But if you have good friends going and can be comfortable 4 to a room, go for it! (#sleepover!)

pharmacy residency

Another caveat here…

You do actually have to get some sleep during this convention so you don’t look like the walking dead when you’re telling the RPD why you want their program. So don’t just room with anybody for the sake of saving money. Especially if that somebody is only attending Midyear to hit up Bourbon Street or The Strip. Know what I’m sayin’?

Professional Attire

There are plenty of other places on the internet that can give you much better fashion advice than I can. This section is about how to find something without spending an arm and a leg. You don’t need to be all Armani for this event. Pharmacy residency programs are just looking for conservative, clean-cut, professional attire.

So if that suit happens to be off the rack at TJ Maxx, go for it! If you’re like me and have a hard time finding well-fitted business attire at discount stores, then it’s ok to invest in a nice suit (still doesn’t have to be Armani…a department store works just fine). THEN use the discount store for your dress shirt, business bag, belt, shoes, etc.

If you have a suit already, use this section of the budget to account for dry cleaning. Use a dry cleaner you trust but that isn’t too expensive. You want your suit to come back to you in good shape (viva la suit!). Then, if you’re a careful packer and you hang that suit up in your hotel bathroom right when you get checked in, it shouldn’t be too wrinkly. (And the shower steam can help diffuse minor wrinkles so you don’t have to mess with finicky hotel irons). Online reviews will often point you in the right direction for which dry cleaner does good work for the right price in your area.

Meeting Registration

There’s no getting around the meeting registration. The only tip here is that if you’re not already an ASHP member by the time of registering, it’s worth the $51 for a student membership to go ahead and join. You still come out ahead rather than paying a non-member meeting registration fee ($340 + $51 vs $480 for non-members).

Business Cards and CV Copies

Not every program at Midyear is going to accept these, it’s true. But you’d really hate to have an RPD ask for your CV or contact information, and you don’t have anything to give them. In this case, it’s better to have and not need than to need and not have. Have some copies of both on hand.

Luckily, business cards are cheap to design and print at most big box office stores. There are also online options like www.vistaprint.com. Maybe one of the student chapters of APhA or ASHP at your school is providing business cards through a fundraiser. Just go with the basic package (no glossy finish needed here, peeps), and monochromatic tones will be just dandy.

pharmacy residency

Don’t go overboard on your student pharmacist business cards…

Same with your CV copies. This is Midyear, your CV is likely going to end up in a box with hundreds of others for reference if needed. Don’t print it on vellum and douse it with the scent of sexy professionalism. It will not make you stand out (at least not in a good way). Just basic white paper copies will be fine. You don’t need to splurge on the thicker stock resume paper. The content of your CV is more important than the material it’s printed on.

Thank You Notes and Postage

There are mixed thoughts about this whole thank you note ordeal with Midyear. Some advise to always send a handwritten thank you note. Others say an email will suffice. In the end, it’s up to you to decide.

But for those of you who choose to walk the path of handwritten, mailed thank you notes for Midyear, you should know something…

The USPS doesn’t mess around. Forever stamps may be good forever, but that doesn’t mean their price stays the same forever. Hot damn, they’re expensive little buggers! So if you’re planning on sending a thank you note to every soul you meet at each program, just know a book of 20 stamps is currently sitting at $10.

Oh and don’t go out and buy Hallmark thank you cards. The dollar store sells some classy, simple multi-packs. It’s ok to send similar-looking cards to people within the same department. Pharmacists won’t be offended by getting the same card – it’s what’s on the inside that really matters! (#awww)

The Interview Trips

Scheduling

While many of the same concepts as the Midyear trip apply here, there are some additional tips to remember. If you have programs in a similar geographic area, see if you can arrange interview dates around the same time. Perhaps you interview with one program on a Friday and another the following Monday. (That’s what we southerners like to call a twofer – two programs for one flight!)

Plus, you’ll have the weekend to check out the area and see if it’s somewhere you’d really like to live for a year. If you’re a Planner Level: Expert, you can even use that time to check out some housing options you’ve researched beforehand.

Travel and Accommodations

Try to use what I’d call the family and friends discount. You know a person you can crash with for a few days? Call ‘em! An extra bonus is the built-in tour guide and transportation for the area.

Oh, but even with all this talk of being frugal, don’t be a total Scrooge – dinner, and drinks on you, of course. They’re saving you a lot of money, you can spend a little of that as thanks. It’s called common courtesy, people.

Professional Attire

Use what you have. There’s absolutely no need to worry about getting a different suit because, gasp, the programs already saw me in this suit with this shirt! This isn’t Fashion Week in NYC, and you’re not interviewing with Tim Gunn. Trust me, programs don’t remember or care (remember, they saw 10,000 other people in suits that day). Unless of course, your suit is purple. (Don’t do it. Just don’t. And I only say that because someone will. Every year. Long story short, please don’t buy or wear a purple suit.)

pharmacy residency

NOT you at Midyear…

Bonus Tip!

We have to talk about taxes. You know what you’re doing with all of these interview trips, right? Yes, you’re looking for a residency program… but you know what that really is? A JOB! Save ALL of your receipts because, in a rare stroke of governmental goodwill, you can write off job search expenses when you do your taxes! Woot woot #adultwin.

Final Thoughts (tl;dr)

So there you have it, a rough estimate of what costs you can expect from the pharmacy residency search process. Of course, it is just that – an ESTIMATE. There are certainly people who will spend more, but there are also people who will shell out less during the entire cycle.

Remember too, that during this time of interviews, you will also begin the process of applying for licensure in one or more states and registering for the NAPLEX and MPJE. There are (heavy) costs here as well, and you have to factor these in when you’re budgeting for residency interviews.

Generally, licensing costs can be about $1000 for your first state, which includes the NAPLEX ($575), the MPJE law exam ($250 per state, non-MPJE state law exams are similar), state licensure fees (variable, ~$150-300 per state), and background checks (~$50/state).

Additional states can run you ~$500 each (MPJE, state licensure, and background check fees). You can see how graduation is not exactly cheap (there’s also a cap and gown and matriculation fee associated with graduating most pharmacy schools…it’s usually about $100). You either need to be loaded or disciplined with your money to make this work without having the heat turned off in your apartment.

With all of this being said, please Please PLEASE (and I can’t say it enough!) do not let the numbers scare you away from pursuing residency if that is truly what you want to do! It really CAN work (as evidenced by thousands of people every single year)!

There are fantastic residency programs all over this country, and you may not have to go far from your current location to find one that fits what you’re looking for. So your travel budget may be very different than the sample person above who flew all over the country interviewing.

Remember, it just takes one program, and it doesn’t have to be the famous one on the other side of the country. It may be the solid program a 3-hour drive away. Use this as a guide and an awareness tool, and apply it as you see fit.

Happy budgeting, and best of luck!

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YFP 076: Investing Q&A Episode


Investing Q&A

On episode 76 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Ulbrich, founder of Your Financial Pharmacist, and Tim Baker, YFP Team Member and owner of Script Financial, wrap up a month-long series focused on investing by fielding questions posed by, YOU, the YFP Community in this rapid fire investing Q&A edition.

Summary

Tim Ulbrich and Tim Baker tackle several questions during this investing Q&A episode.

  1. Q: Is it better to hold company matched retirement contributions to pay off 20-25% interest credit cards that I had to live off of between residency and my job? A: This may be a situation where you should hold off contributing to retirement and pay off your credit card debt quickly. Tim Baker would suggest to a client to look at strategies for debt reduction while growing income. The additional income can be applied to the debt. This is also dependent on how fast you can get out of credit card debt.
  2. Q: 401k Roth or before tax 401(k) which is the preferred option? The before tax 401k lowers taxable yearly income but we’ll pay taxes on the growth or the Roth 401k is tax free growth over time but higher taxable income at the end of the year. I can’t decide which is the best route. A: There is no one bad way as you’ll either pay tax now or in the future. If you think taxes today will be lower than taxes in the future, go with Roth. If you think taxes will be lower in the future, maybe wait to pay taxes. Tim Baker leans toward the Roth component.
  3. Q: What are your thoughts for proper investing strategies for current pharmacy students? A: Don’t invest anything as a student. Put that money into an emergency fund, toward your credit card situation, or put that additional money toward the accruing interest on your student loans. If you fall in the 10% that graduate without student loans, look at things like an HSA or IRA. Tim Baker offers a student/resident package with a reduced fee to help you establish a foundation and not miss out on wasted opportunities.
  4. Q: Can you go over how to rebalance a portfolio? A: When you set an allocation for your portfolio, over time it is going to drift. When it does, you need to rebalance it. To do so, you sell and reinvest. This usually happens once or twice a year. You can set alerts if an allocation drifts over 5%. Talk to your advisor, company or Tim Baker to do this.
  5. Q: Can you review pros and cons of active and passive funds? A: Active funds believe that the market is not perfectly efficient and that you can achieve above market returns through security selection, market timing or both. Passive investing means that you believe the price of the stock market is efficient and that you are unlikely to outperform the market on a consistent basis. 9/10 actively managed funds underperform passive funds.
  6. Q: Have you guys talked about HSA accounts and risks/benefits and how they fit into a long term financial strategy? A: Yes, in episodes 19 and 73. Follow-up question: Do HSA accounts need to be deposited throughout the year or are these ok to max out contribution limits anytime during the year? A: Like with an IRA or 401(k), it doesn’t matter when you max the contribution out.
  7. Q: How do you feel about investing apps, like Robinhood and Acorns? A: Tim Baker needs to do a review of them as this question comes up a lot. A lot of these solutions believe in low cost investing. Tim Baker likes the concept of building wealth over time and these apps may provide a way to save money without the emotional ties.
  8. Q: Can we do 401(k), IRA and Roth IRA all three? What are the limits in each? Which other options to turn to for tax saving purpose? A: Yes, it depends on the income limits. Tax saving purpose options are HSA or 529 accounts.
  9. Q: What is your thought on robo investors (Betterment etc)? I am a Federal employee, and so my retirement investments go into my TSP. However, I am looking at options for taxable investments beyond what I currently have with an advisor (the fees are making me consider other options). I know that index fund investing with Vanguard or Fidelity offer attractive low fees, but leave me open to issues with taxes on dividends unless I manually do my own tax loss harvesting (which I am reading and learning about, but don’t feel comfortable taking on my own just yet). Betterment does this for me at a higher fee than index investing on my own, but significantly less than an advisor. So, is something like Betterment “good enough” for taxable investments for those that want lower fees but still a more hands off approach? Thank you! I have loved catching up on your podcasts and am, 7 years post graduation, finally getting a better grasp on finances than I ever have. A: Tax harvesting is looking at the gains you make in a year off of your investments. You can sell loser stocks in your portfolio to offset your taxable gains with the goal of breaking even. Betterment or robo advisors can do this automatically and financial advisors also have tools for this. If you do this on your own, you have to do it manually which could take a lot of time.
  10. Q: If I’m a 1099, and have been contributing to a SEP IRA, and decided I want to take advantage of a backdoor Roth, what steps do I need to take to move my money to make it work? A: In a backdoor Roth IRA, you move money from a traditional to Roth IRA. This is a legal way to fund a Roth IRA.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 076 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Excited to be here alongside our financial investing expert, Tim Baker, as we’re going to take questions from you, the YFP community in a rapid fire format. So Tim, we’ve got lots of questions on investing. And I think you’re on the hot seat today.

Tim Baker: Yeah, I think I’m ready. I’m ready to go. We have lots of questions, lots of engagement in the Facebook group, so hopefully we can get some of these questions answered.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, it’s been a fun month. I think this is a topic that we identified — as we were planning out the month of November, we identified we haven’t done enough on investing. We got that feedback from the community, we heard you, we listened, and hopefully we haven’t overwhelmed on the topic of investing. But knowing it’s such a critical part of the financial plan, we want to give it the attention it deserves. So if you haven’t been with us for the month, make sure to go back and check out the topics we’ve already covered in terms of priority investing, some of the behavioral biases, how to evaluate your investing accounts, DIY versus robo versus an advisor. And here, we’re wrapping everything up with a rapid fire Q&A format. And so for those that submitted questions via the YFP Facebook group, via LinkedIn, via email, thank you. And for those that have a question, make sure to join the YFP Facebook group if you’re not already part of that community. Or shoot us an email at [email protected]. Alright, here we go. Ready?

Tim Baker: Let’s do it.

Tim Ulbrich: Alright, Peter from the YFP Facebook group asks, “Is it better to hold company-matched retirement contributions to pay of 20-25% interest rate credit card that I had to live off between residency and my job?”

Tim Baker: Yeah, this is a great question. And I typically will say an addendum to the certainties in life are death and taxes. I typically will say the part three really should be if you have a match in your retirement plan, the third part is you probably should put that money in and get the max. Free money, you’ve heard us talk about that time and time again. So this might be one of the situations, however, that you might want to pump the brakes. And I think a lot, Tim, it deals with the timeline of things. So if this is something that we can put the retirement contributions on hold and do a gazelle-like sprint, as Dave Ramsey would say, and get through the credit cards, that might be where it would make sense. If we’re talking about a longer term horizon, we’re talking about a debt load of 20-25%, what I would actually do with a client here is possibly look at strategies for debt restructuring so you can get some breathing room. And then my thing is, OK, like how can we grow the top line? How can we grow the income? Not necessarily put the retirement contributions on hold but to apply all that extra income towards kind of the predatory debt levels. So it might be in your case, Peter, that it does make sense and it does make sense to put it on hold for a year or a short time frame and get through it as quickly as possible. But if I’m your advisor, I would say, hey, is there anything that we can do to make additional income so we can kind of keep the match going but also keep aggressive on the loans.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and Peter, I’d point you back too to Episode 026. Tim Baker talked about baby stepping into a financial plan, specifically with a focus on consumer credit card debt and emergency funds. And I think that that would help even answer this question further. We obviously talked about in Episode 068 when we went through the pros and cons of the Ramsey Baby Steps. And via YFP team member Tim Church in the Facebook group saying, “Great question. Thanks for sharing. If you put your match on hold, how fast could you get out of credit card debt?” And so I think that’s the question of at what intensity, as you referenced, would you be able to get this paid off? And then obviously, how do you feel about having that 20-25% debt?

Tim Baker: It’s a great question by Tim Church.

Tim Ulbrich: Alright, Rachel from the YFP Facebook group asked, “401k Roth or before tax 401k?” So referring to a traditional 401k versus a Roth 401k. “The before-tax 401k lowers taxable yearly income but will pay taxes on the growth, where the Roth 401k is tax-free growth over time but higher taxable income at the end of the year. I can’t decide which is the best value.” Now, in Episode 073, Tim Church and I talked about the priority investing. We broke down the differences between traditional 401k, Roth 401k, we talked about IRAs. So I think what we didn’t get into as much in that episode was this whole idea of if I’m weighing between traditional contributions where I’m going to defer the payment of taxes to the future but lower my taxable income versus a Roth contribution where I’m paying taxes now, and I’m going to reap the benefits later. How do you weigh the balance of where to be prioritizing there?

Tim Baker: Yeah, and I think without being too simplistic, again, I think this is one of the things that I think sometimes we look at and we’re like, I don’t know what to do. And it’s almost like paralysis by analysis. And to me, I think it’s the same thing — and I kind of equate it to the avalanche versus snowball. There’s really no one bad way. I mean, you’re going to pay the tax either now or in the future. So you know, again, to back up just so everyone is crystal clear because we had a few questions around this. When you have a 401k, this is typically administered through your employer. Your employer will say, hey, Fidelity, Vanguard, whoever, we want this benefit for our employees as means to recruit and retain, we’re going to set up this 401k and we’re actually going to match. And we’ll say 3%. So it’s basically quarterbacked, in a sense, by the employer. So in this particular investment account, you basically put in a set amount, and everybody — these are 2018 numbers — can put in $18,500. So every year, that’s what you can put in. That’s what you can put in as a maxing out your 401k. Now, concurrently, your employer will incentivize you to put money in by matching a certain percentage. So they might say, hey, if you put in 3%, we’ll put in 3% and match that dollar-for-dollar. And there’s different things. They might say, we’ll match the first 3% and then 50% on the next 2%. So you have to put in 5% to get the full match and essentially, they’re putting in 4%. So I know there are a lot of numbers out there. In the 401k system, you basically have a traditional 401k, so that’s all pre-tax dollars. So it goes in pre-tax, it grows tax-free, and then when you distribute that in retirement, it comes out taxed. So in retirement, you’re going to be taxed on that amount you distribute. What’s becoming more and more popular these days is the Roth component of that. So anytime you see Roth, think after tax. So you’ll actually have what is basically almost like two subaccounts. You’ll have a traditional 401k, which you could put money into. And any match that you get from your employer goes in there. And then you’ll have what looks like a secondary account, which is your Roth 401k. So it’s going to look like two subaccounts, which is all after-tax money. And those monies cannot be co-mingled because you have a pre-tax bucket and an after-tax bucket. So the mechanics of that is it goes in after-tax, meaning you don’t get any tax deduction. So that money actually flows through onto your tax return. It grows tax-free, but in retirement, when you’re looking at a Roth 401k, and there’s $1 million in there, you actually have $1 million that you can distribute. Versus a traditional 401k, if you have $1 million in there, you don’t necessarily have $1 million because Uncle Sam still needs to take his bite of the apple. So those are really the same components. Now, in terms of your ability to contribute to that, it’s an aggregate. So between if you put $10,000 into your traditional 401k, you can only put $8,500 into your Roth 401k. So that’s the 401k. So to kind of go back to the question of which is better, if you think that taxes today will be lower than taxes in the future, probably best to go with the Roth option. If you think that taxes will be lower in the future, it might be worth to defer and wait to pay the taxes in the future. So and again, we’re really trying to look at the crystal ball here. I kind of lean more towards — and I think some of the studies that show, well, if you put money in pre-tax and it grows, that you’re going to pay a higher amount of tax on more money, essentially. And there’s studies that kind of support I think both sides. I think what I’m trying to say here is don’t get caught up in the minutia. I think if anything, I would go more towards the Roth component. But again, like when we talked about in the tax episode with Paul Eikenberg, which was Episode 070.

Tim Ulbrich: Yes.

Tim Baker: 070. There are different strategies out there. So it could be a tax strategy where you are looking to defer or you’re look to avoid. So it just depends, I think. If you have a handle on your tax situation, you’re going to know what makes the most sense for you and kind of your household. So lots of stuff there. I would be remiss to not mention IRAs here, which are similar in a sense that instead of the employer basically quarterbacking it, this is your own Individual Retirement Account that you are — there’s typically no match there. There is no match. But you’re basically putting money into an account and investing it on your own. And we can talk about that a little bit more.

Tim Ulbrich: Tim Baker, preaching and teaching. I love it.

Tim Baker: I’m trying. It’s a lot of stuff. I don’t want to confuse anybody.

Tim Ulbrich: No, it comes up so much. And I think your point’s a good one that we’ve talked with so many new practitioners that are getting that paralysis by analysis. So I think like anything else, take some action, get started, continue to learn, get some help along the way. But don’t do nothing because it seems so confusing.

Tim Baker: Right. And you can always — I mean, it’s the thing like year to year, you can always look at when you’re truly doing financial planning and kind of tax planning strategy, it can change year-to-year. So you might look at your pre-tax money and say, it doesn’t make sense to pay the tax on it today and actually get into some of the nitty gritty. I think for a lot of our listeners, just like how do I get started and what should be the bucket I focus on?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and if you’re somebody who’s not resonating with the audio version of this, and you want to read this and be able to break it down, we spend a lot of time in Chapters 12 and 13 and 14 of “Seven Figure Pharmacist” breaking down investment terms and strategies and retirement accounts and taxable accounts. And so if you need some more time to digest it, look at it, you check that out, sevenfigurepharmacist.com. Alright, we’ve got a question — actually, we got several questions via LinkedIn this time, which was cool. Scott asked, “What are your thoughts for proper investing strategies for current pharmacy students.” So we’ve talked at length about student indebtedness, coming out, and I think when we talk about students, we tend to only focus on debt. So here Scott’s asking, well, what about investing? “I know that if I have time and I can invest and get compound growth, should I get started as a student? If so, what’s the strategy?”

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I typically give the least sexy answer to this question as I can because I get this like when we talk to pharmacy schools. And if it were me, I think the conservative approach to me would say I wouldn’t really invest anything as a student. If I’m a student, any additional income that I have, I’m either kind of going back to Episode 026 where we’re talking about baby stepping into a financial plan where we’re focused on do you have a solid emergency fund? Do you have — what’s your credit card situation looking like? And then from there, I think if I have a solid foundation, any additional money that I had that I want to — I’ve had students ask me about, hey, what do you think about the cannabis industry? What do you think about bitcoin? And I’m like, no, don’t do that. You guys have $160,000 in debt on average. So the least sexy answer is I would apply all of that money back to the interest on your loans that’s accruing. Because what happens is once you get through your P4 year, you pass your boards, you go through your grace period. And around this time of year, you’re going to hit repayment. Any of the interest that you’ve had that you’ve accumulated since the loans originated when you took the loans out — and that’s going to capitalized, which means that it basically moves from the interest side of the ledger to the principal side of the ledger. And now, that interest is accumulating interest on top of interest. So it doesn’t sound sexy, and I get it. Now, if you are one of the 10% of pharmacists out there that doesn’t have student loans, then I would definitely look at things like the HSA, the IRA, and obviously maxing out. And maybe it might be worth spending some time about how I typically advise clients to fill their investment buckets, which would be essentially get your match and your max in your 401k. And the example that I gave, if you have a 3% match, you typically want to put 3% in. And then typically, there you want to go into the IRA world, which is you setting up an IRA at Vanguard or wherever. And you’re putting $5,500 in per year, which is $458.33. So get into that monthly rhythm of putting that money in. And then you typically want to go back into the 401k and max it out, so that’s where you’re getting the $18,500. And then if you exhaust that, then that’s typically where you want to go into the taxable accounts that we’ll talk about here in a little bit. And what I didn’t say is probably along with the max of the IRA, in that second step, if you have a high deductible plan, maxing out the HSA, which is for a single person, $3,450. And for a family, it’s $6,900. So again, if you’re a student, I would focus on all the boring stuff. If you have the debt, if you don’t have debt, then that’s how to start filling your buckets. Now, if you don’t have an employer, obviously, you would want to go right to the IRA and start doing that. But it also depends — to kind of make this answer longer than it should be — is what is your goal? So if the goal of the investment is just to build wealth and put money towards retirement, that’s great. But if you’re investing for purposes like a wedding or something like that that you have a little bit more runway, then maybe you go straight to the taxable account. So lots of stuff, kind of lots of little pieces.

Tim Ulbrich: And I’m glad you brought up the 10% because we don’t talk about the 10%. I mean, if you look at the AACP data in any given year, when they publish the graduating student survey, 10-12% of students report they have no student loan debt.

Tim Baker: Which is a lot.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, it’s great. And I think we’re so often preaching to the 88% probably, but I think what just to highlight what you said there is keep your eye on the prize of graduating with as little student loan debt as possible. And I think it can be exciting to jump into investing or it can be exciting to do these other things that are opportunities there, but if you’re contributing some to investments while you’re in school, all while you’re taking on credit card debt or you’re taking on more cost of living, tuition and that’s compounding in interest, obviously, we’re kind of fighting against the effort that we’re doing. So I think this is a good time to talk about what you’re doing with the student resident financial planning services. We haven’t really talked much about that, but if we have students and residents who are listening, saying, I’ve got all these competing things, I’d love to work with Tim Baker talking about financial planning, what are you doing with the student resident package?

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I basically, what I do with students and residents — and I think it to me I think a lot of people are like, oh I don’t have the money or I’m too early in this process. But I think one of the things that I see is especially when it comes to like the foundational stuff, which includes cash flowing, budgeting, student loans, emergency funds, is it could potentially be — and not to speak in hyperbole — it can be hundreds of thousands of dollars swing in terms of your student loans and how we attack them. So what I’m really trying to do is present an offering that focuses on the student and focuses on the resident. So in those years, we can still work at a much reduced speed because I realize that there’s not a whole lot of income. But we’re setting the foundation to the financial plan. So the idea is to work with you guys, that population earlier, and then hopefully feed you into comprehensive financial planning like you and Jess are doing. But I think the swing — I know a lot of planners out there that say, hey, come talk to me after you’re through your residency. And I’m kind of thinking of a counterpart that I have that works with physicians. And my thought is that there’s a lot of wasted opportunity when you don’t have a sound financial plan in place almost immediately. And I think back, Tim, when we went back to USC and we were talking to basically the school, the pharmacy school out there, and we were talking to the P4s. And I was kind of like, I don’t know, probably begging is not the word, but like imploring their P4s, they’re in no better of a situation in that moment to be intentional about their finances.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Tim Baker: And really be conscious of and having a plan for their student loans and especially if it’s like a PSLF option if they go into residency. There’s a lot of moving pieces there that I think if you can nail those first few years, that will set you up. So you know, I get fired up about it, and I like working with really all of my clients, but I think the students and residents, there’s so much opportunity there to get in front of.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. So YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner will give you all the information for those that are interested in learning more. Michael and Audra via the YFP Facebook group are asking about rebalancing. So this idea of rebalancing a portfolio, can you go over how to rebalance, maybe what it means and a step-by-step process. And as you’re working with clients, how often do you do that?

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I think ultimately, when you set an allocation for your portfolio, over time, the investment portfolio’s going to drift. So the example that we can give in very broad terms is Tim, if you come into the office and kind of look at —

Tim Ulbrich: Your new office.

Tim Baker: New office, yeah, in Baltimore. Pretty excited about that. So if you come into the new office in Baltimore and you sit down and say, hey, I really want to save for retirement. I kind of put you through what’s called an investment policy statement. We’re going to build out like what that looks like. A big part of it is going to be the risk assessment. And the risk assessment, it’s going to basically return like an allocation. So it might say, when you answer these questions, you should be 80% in equities, which are stocks, and 20% in fixed income or bonds. So you know, there’s like a general rule of thumb out there — I typically don’t use this — but you could say as a general rule of thumb, just take 100 and then subtract your age, and that’s what you should be in equities. So if you were at 100, and you were 20 years old, you would be in 80%. And I don’t necessarily subscribe to that, but it’s kind of just rough math there. So say, Tim, you need to be 80% in equities and 20% in fixed income. Then you could essentially — and I think we’ve talked about this on the podcast, which a lot of financial planners would maybe argue with me. But I think that you can build a very diverse portfolio just essentially using two funds.

Tim Ulbrich: With low fees.
Tim Baker: With low fees. Basically, a total market fund and an aggregate bond fund. So you would buy, if you had $100,000, you would buy $80,000 in a total market fund and $20,000 in an aggregate bond fund. Now, I slice it a little bit thinner. You know, I’ll do more large cap and small cap and international. But I think if we use the example of one fund that’s 80% and one fund that’s 20%, over time, that’s going to drift. So over time, it’s going to be 85%, maybe 90% in that one fund and 10% in the other. So in that moment, your portfolio is more risky than essentially you sign up for. So what you would do is you would say, OK, now the portfolio has grown from $100,000 to $120,000, but I’m exposed too much because I’m in a 90% allocation, so you would essentially say $120,000 by .8, and that’s the target that you would want your total market, that equity to be in. So you would essentially sell off some and basically reinvest it into the bond to rebalance. Now, you typically want to do this once or twice per year because really, it just saves on costs. So typically, I have alerts on my investment accounts that basically alert me to trade. In most of the retirement plans, you can actually set these up. So if it drifts over 5%, then it will rebalance for you.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: So if you don’t know how to do that, obviously I would say to talk to someone at that, whether it’s Fidelity or whatever, talk to this, they can help you or reach out to me or another advisor that can help you with that.

Tim Ulbrich: So this might go into the behavioral biases, but I’ve found that I like having somebody else rebalance. Not because I think it’s difficult to do, per say, but what I found myself doing is I would go into my accounts, and I’d start sticking my fingers in it. And then I’d start saying, ooh, international, 10%. I keep reading the news, what’s happening with international stocks, and you start inserting all these biases. And I start adjusting and shifting things. Where if you and I agreed on an investment policy and strategy and we’re not reacting to the world of today but we’re looking at the long-term play, I’m less likely to do that, right? Or I’m going to at least engage with you before I make those decisions or whomever. So I think it just speaks to — and this gets to the next question about active versus passive funds, which I’m going to pose to you. But it speaks to that strategy of not necessarily leave it and forget it, but once you develop a strategy and a mindset, we’re in this for the long-term play. We’re not in it for the news of what’s happened in the DOW this week, right?

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: So let’s talk about active and passive. So another question via the Facebook group, “Can you review the pros and cons of active funds versus passive funds?” I think we have some biases here probably. We’ve talked about those before. But what are the main differences and what should people be looking for?

Tim Baker: So an active investor basically believes, they believe that the market is not perfectly efficient. So if I’m an active investor, I basically think that I can achieve above-market returns through essentially security selection, market timing or both. So I’m smarter than the average bear that if I’m looking at large cap stocks, I’m going to be able to pick that better than what the market can essentially do. And then in terms of market timing, I can essentially see the future in a lot of ways. So the condition is I must determine when and under what conditions to both buy and sell. So the two methods that really people use to do active investing is technical analysis, which is really an attempt to determine kind of the demand side of the supply-demand equation of a particular security. So this typically relies on timing; it’s a lot of charts. You study past pricing, sales volumes, future trends. And you’re not necessarily concerned about hey, what’s Ford’s next line of cars? Or what’s the leadership at this company? It’s really about patterns. So that’s one way to look at it. The other way is the fundamental analysis where you’re looking at both kind of that macro and micro data. So you’re looking at interest rate increases, monetary policy, but then also specific to that industry or that company, productivity and profitability and earning potential. So that’s the active investor. The passive investor says, thanks but no thanks. I believe that the price of the stock market is essentially efficient, and then when I read that story in the New York Times about the cannabis industry or whatever or bitcoin, it’s been priced into the market long, long ago. So I’m not getting a stock tip or anything like that, I’m basically — I know that that is perfectly efficient. So the passive investor basically says, you’re unlikely to outperform the market on a consistent basis. And generally, that well-diversified portfolio that I just explained that has low cost is the better way to go, that you’re not going to — in the long-term — outperform the market. And the stats show that about nine in 10 actively managed funds underperform the passive funds. So inverse is true is typically, actively managed funds are more expensive. And that’s one thing that a lot of investors aren’t really aware of is what is it, how much money is actually going to be evaporating from their accounts because of expense ratio? And typically, the more you pay for the investment, the worse it is for the investor. So you would think if I’m buying a luxury car and paying more, I get better quality. So I would expect that. It’s not true with investments. Typically, the cheaper ones are the better way to go.

Tim Ulbrich: So for those interested in learning more on this topic, a few that come to mind, resources and books. We talk about obviously in “Seven Figure” as well, but “Simple Wealth, Inevitable Wealth” by Nick Murray is a great read. “Laws of Wealth” by Daniel Crosby is fantastic. And then “Index Revolution.”

Tim Baker: “Index Revolution” is such a simple —

Tim Ulbrich: Charles Ellis, is that who wrote that?

Tim Baker: Charles Ellis.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

refinance student loans

Tim Ulbrich: OK. So we’ll link to those in the show notes. But I think a great topic, and obviously when this topic comes up, probably the most famous quote on this is Warren Buffet, who is the active investor of all active investors, you know, really quoting that as he thinks about the future for his family, his spouse, in terms of advice, obviously what he had to say was probably most people are best off putting it in an index fund and letting it ride.

Tim Baker: Yeah, and he’s one of the people that on Planet Earth — and there’s probably, you know, a very small, like maybe half dozen that can kind of see what’s going on with the markets — part of it, and I think these guys admit it because they have access to investments. Like they just buy companies.

Tim Ulbrich: A little more purchasing power than we have.

Tim Baker: Right. So by and large — and I think that’s one, if you’re talking to people and really advisors who say, hey, I can beat the market, go the other way because nine times out of 10, even moreso than that, we have no idea where the market’s going to go. It’s better set an allocation, keep expenses low and kind of the singles and doubles approach.

Tim Ulbrich: Awesome. So Ryan asks via LinkedIn, “Have you guys thought about HSA accounts? Risks and benefits and how they fit into a long-term strategy?” We did in Episode 019, we broke down, you and I, HSA accounts and then also again in Episode 073, Tim Church and I talked at great length about the prioritization of the HSA, what are the contribution amounts, what’s a high deductible health plan. So for those that are itching, especially around — well, we’re post-enrollment now — but around that time, it’s a good time to be talking HSAs. But we had a follow-up question from Brynn on HSAs. “Do HSA accounts need to be deposited to throughout the year? Or are those OK to max out the contribution limits anytime during the year?”

Tim Baker: Yeah, I don’t think it really matters. I think it’s the same thing with like an IRA. Like some people will say, hey, I want to max out $5,500 immediately. Same thing with the 401k. I guess technically, you could front-load $18,500 in the first quarter of the year. With the HSA, if you $6,900 to put into it and you know that you’re going to have family medical expenses, I would have it really act as a pass-through if that’s the purpose of the account is to fund that and then use it if you are using it for medical expenses. Now I think what we’re trying to do in my household is more of using that as a self-IRA and really cash-flowing the health expenses and let the HSA go. So again, I think that’s a little bit of next-level in terms of having that bucket of money for that purpose. But yeah, HSA is a powerful — and I think one of the really good things about the HSA is that you could make $1 million and still get a deduction for that, which with the deductible IRA, most pharmacists, unless you’re a resident, you’re going to make too much to be able to enjoy the deduction.

Tim Ulbrich: Joseph via LinkedIn asked, “How do you feel about investing apps like Robinhood and Acorn?”

Tim Baker: Yeah, you know, we get this question so much that I really — I probably need to sit down and actually review all of these different solutions and come up with kind of an opinion on them. So I know a lot of advisors — and you kind of see this in the pharmacy world too, it’s like as technology creeps in, there’s almost like a defensive pushback like oh, I’ll never be replaced by a robot. I’m more of the mindset to embrace the technology and utilize it for good. So I think some of these ideas with rounding off purchases and slowly building wealth over time, I actually like that concept. Because from a behavioral perspective, we’re more likely to save that way than if Tim, if I was a financial planner and I said, “Alright, Tim, can we put $100 more per month into your IRA?” If you’re less of a feel, less of an emotional pull, I’m all in. So I think to Joseph, I think I owe you and a lot of the other people that asked me that question to kind of do a deep dive and look at these and see. I do know that a lot of these solutions believe in kind of low-cost investing. They’re not necessarily putting you in expensive funds. But I think an extensive look is probably something that we should have on the docket for 2019.

Tim Ulbrich: Alright. Via the Facebook group, Krishna asks, “Can we do 401k, IRA and Roth IRA all three? What are the limits in each? Which other options to turn to for tax savings purpose?” So again, in Episode 073, Tim Church talked a lot about the total contribution limits, you broke that down, preaching a little bit earlier, so we covered that. But the question of all three, the answer is yes with an asterisk, right? Depending on some of the taxable, the income limits and what not that we’ve talked about. What other options besides those do you turn to for tax-saving purposes? So if somebody’s listening that’s saying, “OK. I’ve got me covered in a 401k, got me covered in a Roth IRA. I’m looking to do more.” HSA…

Tim Baker: HSA would be the big one. Yeah, absolutely. And I think if the HSA is not on the table — and that typically is where you look at the taxable account, which you don’t necessarily get a tax benefit unless you’re doing some tax (inaudible), which we’ll maybe talk about here and that type of thing. But yeah, those are the major books that you want to focus on and really exhaust before you get into some of the other vehicles. And I think that’s one of maybe the drawbacks for like Robinhood and Acorns is I’m not sure if they’re necessarily IRAs or they’re taxable accounts. And typically, I feel more comfortable, unless it’s more of a near-term goal like a wedding or a trip or something like that, I would want clients to focus more on the retirement buckets before they would go into the taxable buckets.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and obviously if kids are in the picture, taking advantage of 529s and the tax advantages over there as well. So Cory via email asks, “What’s your thought on robo-investors, specifically Betterment?” Now obviously in 075, we talked about DIY v. Robo and Hire a Planner, so if you haven’t yet heard that, go check it out so you get some more background on robos. He says, “I’m a federal employee, and so my retirement investments go into a TSP,” which we talked about in Episode 073. “However, I’m looking at options for taxable investments beyond what I currently have with an advisor. The fees are making me consider other options. I know that index fund investing with Vanguard or Fidelity offer attractive low fees but leave me open to issues with taxes on dividends unless I manually do my own tax loss harvesting, which I am reading and learning about but don’t feel comfortable taking on my own. Betterment does this for me at a higher fee that index investing on my own but significantly less than advisors. So is something like Betterment good enough for taxable investments for those that want lower fees but still a more hands-off approach? Thank you, I love catching up on your podcast. I’m seven years post-graduation, finally getting a better grasp on finances than I’ve ever had.”

Tim Baker: That makes me feel good.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. So Cory, thanks for the thoughtful question, appreciate the feedback. And I think these are the ones that get us fired up.

Tim Baker: Oh yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: So before going into the question maybe about pros and cons of a robo and building off what we talked about in 075, break this down on tax loss harvesting quick. I think this is kind of a next-level question from what we’ve talked about before.

Tim Baker: Yeah, essentially so when we depart from all of the retirement accounts, 401k’s, IRAs, in those accounts, your investments essentially grow tax-free. So the government basically leaves you alone from a tax perspective and any gains you might get inside of those accounts. On the taxable account, which is basically a brokerage or just an investment account that you have that is funded with after-tax dollars, it doesn’t grow tax free. And when you realize gains, you actually pay taxes on it. So what tax loss harvesting is is essentially you’re looking at any gains that you make throughout the year. So if I buy Tesla stock at x and then I sell it at x plus a 20% profit, I’m going to pay capital gains on that amount of money. What tax loss harvesting done is basically it looks at some of the less profitable, even loser stocks and positions in your portfolio, and you can actually sell those to offset your taxable gains. So you’re essentially trying to break even, in a sense, from a tax perspective. So this is a strategy that robo investors like Betterment can do automatically, and sometimes they do. And even a lot of financial advisors have tools that can do these things similarly. If you’re on your own, though, with a lot of these tools, you essentially have to do it manually. So at the end of the year, you might say, hey, I have a gain, so I don’t want to pay this amount of tax on it. So where can I sell an investment at a loss to offset those gains. And typically, you can basically offset whatever your gains are, and you can actually lower your income by about $3,000 per year, your ordinary income, if you have enough of a loss. So it’s kind of next-level. Betterment, I think boasts that you could potentially save .7-2.5%. Like that’s the range that you can ultimately do. I think those are a little bit exaggerated. To go back to the question, I think it’s really a matter of you get what you pay for, in a sense. Obviously if you’re doing low-cost investing on your own, obviously you have to do a lot of the legwork.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: Tim, you kind of talked about with your DIY approach when you were buying and selling houses, or selling house. It’s a time-suck. The Betterment approach is maybe that where they can do it automatically, but you’re going to pay 50 basis points on that. So you pay for that. And then an advisor could be where they’re charging you a fee and maybe an AUM fee. But you get a little bit more of the human element. So it kind of depends on, I mean, if I’m Cory, if this is something that you want to DIY, and your taxable account is not huge at this point — I’m not sure where you’re at — maybe you try to figure out the tax loss harvesting for yourself and take a crack at it. But you might get to a point where you have a million other things to do with life and you just would rather just slot it into a Betterment. But yeah, it’s definitely a strategy that I think if you can do consistently over time, you can essentially protect some of your gains because we talk about taxes and inflation are the big headwinds that are blowing in your face as you’re trying to build wealth over time.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think this builds nicely off of what we talked about in 075 and really, have been talking about since Day 1 is emphasizing the point, which is important here when we’re doing a whole month on investing, that investing is one part of a very comprehensive financial plan, right? So if you’re doing the DIY robo route, making sure that you’ve got those other pieces accounted for and you’re not looking in one avenue, in a silo, only one bucket, and you’re really looking at the entire financial plan and picture as you’re moving forward. Alright, last question comes from Mo in L.A. via email. She asks, “If I’m a 1099 employee, and I’ve been contributing to a SEP IRA and decided I want to take advantage of a back-door Roth, what steps would I need to take to move my money to make it work?” I think that while Mo is asking this question of being a 1099 and a SEP IRA, which we talked about in 073, maybe to broaden this out to the community at large is the mechanics of a back-door Roth IRA. Now, we’ve defined what it is. But for those that say, OK, I don’t meet the income limits for a Roth IRA, so I know I need to do a back-door Roth, what is the next step they take?

Tim Baker: So typically, the breakdown is like anybody can contribute to a traditional IRA, but not everyone necessarily gets the deduction. For a Roth IRA, not everyone can actually contribute to a Roth IRA. So once you make a certain amount of money, those doors close to the Roth IRA. So typically, what the mechanics of is you can actually contribute to a traditional IRA and then essentially recategorize or do a back-door Roth IRA. So you basically move the money from the traditional to the Roth in an instant. And it’s a legal way to basically fund the Roth IRA. So that’s really the mechanics of it. Now, a SEP IRA, which we’ve outlined in previous episodes, is really the IRA for that Self-Employed Person. So for someone like me who I don’t have a TSP, I don’t have a 401k, I basically am — and really the traditional and the Roth IRA are not enough for me to be saving for retirement. So you can only put $5,500 per year in that. The SEP IRA is basically an investment account for the self-employed where you can put a lot more money in. It’s like $55,000 per year into that versus the $5,500 that you can put into the Roth and the traditional IRA.

Tim Ulbrich: So good question. We took a lot this week, and here we are, finally, end of November. We’ve hashed out investing. I think this is a series we’re going to really look back at and say, for those that want to dig in deeper into investing, go back to November 2018 where we covered a lot on this topic. So we’re pumped as a team to be wrapping up 2018. We’ve got lots of exciting content, new content, new ideas, things are coming to 2019. So we hope that you’ll continue on the journey with us. We hope that you’ll join us in the YFP Facebook group. And before we wrap up today’s episode, I want to again take a moment to thank our sponsor, PolicyGenius.

Sponsor: While paying off debt, buying a home and saving for retirement can be MUCH more exciting than ensuring the proper insurance coverage is in place, having the right coverage — not too much and not too little — is essential. And for pharmacists, our greatest tool to achieving our financial goals is our income. And that’s where disability insurance comes in. It protects your lost income if you’re sidelined by an illness or injury. And PolicyGenius is the easy way to get it done. They compare quotes from the top disability insurance companies to find you the best price. So if you rely on your income to get by, compare disability insurance quotes by visiting PolicyGenius.com. PolicyGenius will help you protect your paycheck at a price that makes sense. You can get started online right now. PolicyGenius. The easy way to compare and buy disability insurance.

Tim Ulbrich: And one last thing if you could do us a favor. If you like what you heard on this week’s episode, please make sure to subscribe in iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts. Also, make sure to head on over to YourFinancialPharmacist.com, where you’ll find a wide array of resources designed specifically for you, the pharmacy professional, to help you on the path towards achieving financial freedom. Have a great rest of your week.

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YFP 075: DIY, Robo or Hire a Planner?


 

DIY, Robo or Hire a Planner?

On episode 75 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Ulbrich, found of YFP, and Tim Baker, YFP team member and owner of Script Financial, continue YFP’s month-long series on investing by talking about the pros and cons of a DIY approach to investing compared to utilizing a robo advisor or hiring a financial planner.

Summary

On this episode, Tim Ulbrich and Tim Baker dive into a discussion of three strategies of investing: DIY, robo and hiring a financial planner. The DIY (do it yourself) route of investing means that you, instead of your employer or planner, will be in charge of all aspects of your retirement or investment. You’ll determine how much to defer into retirement accounts, what to invest in, make adjustments, and figure out to how to distribute funds at retirement, among other tasks. This route is becoming more popular most likely due to the fact that there are resources available and many advisors require their clients to have a lot of money to work with them. Pros of the DIY strategy are that there is a potential savings (if you are doing it well, etc.) and a feeling of empowerment. Cons are that there is a lack of accountability, that someone isn’t there checking or bringing awareness to potential financial behavioral biases you may have, and if you aren’t well-versed in the information, you could end up paying more.

Using an advisor is a strategy that lies between the DIY and financial planner routes. With this strategy, technology is used which allows you to simply click a link, answer a few questions, and fund taxable accounts. The pros of this strategy are that you don’t have to go through thousands of funds, the funds are automatically rebalanced over time, and the cost lands between .25-.5% on what’s invested. Cons are that there is no human interaction and that this only focuses on one part of your financial plan.

Hiring a planner means working with someone to act as the middle point between you and your investments. Pros to this strategy are the human aspect, the potential of having a comprehensive financial plan, the ability to create a diversified portfolio, and having someone act as a safeguard between you and your investments. Cons of hiring a financial planner are that the industry is structured so many planners are incentivized to grow your assets, may have a conflict of interest due to making more money off of your investments, and that a planner may not help you with credit card or student loan debt.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 075, excited to be here alongside Tim Baker as we continue our month-long series on investing. We’re nearing the end. We’ve got next week coming up, we’re going to do an investing Q&A. But first and foremost, happy Thanksgiving, Tim Baker, to you and to the YFP community. So excited to be here.

Tim Baker: Yeah, happy Thanksgiving, Tim, to you and yours. And excited to get this episode going.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, we hope everyone’s having a great day, enjoying with family. We hope that you’re not nerding out on personal finance podcasts while you should be spending quality time with family. But if you are listening, please know that we appreciate it and that we’re certainly grateful for the community that has developed here over the past year. So we’ve been going along this month on investing. We’ve covered a lot of different topics and information, everything from behavioral aspects to investing, prioritization of investing, what to look for in your different investment accounts, the fees and so forth. And next week, we’re going to wrap it up with an investing Q&A. But here, we’re talking about the strategy of investing. Is this something you do yourself? Is this something you look at engaging with a robo advisor? We’ll talk about what that means. Or is this something you look at hiring a financial planner? Maybe for many people listening, there may be a different answer depending on the status of what you’re working on and what your preference is. So we’re going to reference some previous episodes throughout this episode, so let me throw them out here in advance. Episodes 015, 016 and 017, we talked at length, Tim Baker and I did, about what to look for in a financial planner, the benefits, different types of planners that are out there. In 054, we talked about why fee-only financial planning matters. And in 055, we talked about why you should care about how a financial planner charges. All of that feeds into the conversation here about DIY, robo or hiring a financial planner. So in terms of the structure and format of what we’re going to do, with each of these three buckets, we’re going to talk about what we’re referring to in a DIY approach, in a robo approach, in a financial planner approach. We’ll talk about the pros and potential pitfalls of each of those approaches. So Tim Baker, DIY. When we say DIY as it relates to investing, what exactly are we talking about? Whether listeners are thinking about maybe their 401k or maybe their 403b at their work environment, in the TSP, or they’re thinking about an IRA that’s outside of their work?

Tim Baker: Yeah, so the DIY, the Do It Yourself approach when it comes to investing, when we’re discussing things like the 401k, the 403b, the TSP, this is a little bit set up on a T-ball stand for you because the employer is essentially putting it in front of you and saying, hey, now that you work for us, we have contracted through an organization like a Vanguard or a Fidelity to basically have this investment account for you. So we’re going to cut you a deal, as long as you put money into it, we’ll match it. And we’re going to help you grow your retirement. So you can DIY that. And essentially, it’s a sandbox approach because you’re going to put in front of you a series of 10, 15, 20 — depending on the plan — investments that say, hey, for large cap, for U.S. large cap, you’re going to have four or five funds to pick from. From international, you might have two or three funds to pick from. From a bond, you might have some, it could be target funds. And if you’re hearing me talk about this and you’re saying, ‘What the heck is this guy talking about?’ then maybe having some help and not DIY-ing that — won’t be for you. Because the plan is defined, you’ll have basically a sandbox to work in. And essentially, what you’ll do is you’ll determine how much to defer into your retirement accounts. We’re talking your 401k, your Roth 401k, your 403b, what to actually invest it in — so a lot of people sometimes, they miss that step. So they think that once they put the money in there, it’s automatically invested. And some plans will be like that. But some plans won’t.

Tim Ulbrich: And they find out it’s just sitting there in a market fund.

Tim Baker: Right. I’ve seen that happen quite a bit. So you basically figure out how much you want to defer, what you’re going to invest it in, and over time, you have to kind of make those adjustments and do the rebalancing and things like that. And then when you go to retire, then you basically say, ‘Self, how do I distribute this in the most tax-efficient manner as possible?’ Whereas Tim, I don’t know about your dad, but my dad — well, my parents, really, they worked for the same company for 40 years, and the companies did that for them. And the pension manager would do that for them, basically would manage all those steps. So now, it’s kind of on us to figure that out. So that’s kind of the retirement side. If we’re talking outside the retirement, and we’re looking at IRAs, Individual Retirement Accounts, could be 529s, could be taxable accounts, that’s really where we’re going out into the market, essentially, and we’re looking at TD America, Vanguard, Fidelity, we’re going onto their website because we’ve heard of these companies, and we’re saying, ‘I want to open up an account on my own and basically do some investing on my own.’ So this is where you would open up a taxable account, open up a Roth IRA, and then the process is very similar except it’s just outside of the realm of what your employer is. So you’re opening up that account, you’re funding money from your paycheck. In then in that world, you’re essentially looking at a vast ocean, thousands and thousands of stocks and bonds and mutual funds and exchange traded funds, all the different things that could fit in these accounts. And you’re doing it in a way that hopefully is consistent with your beliefs about investing, if you have any, your risk tolerance, how you want to maximize or minimize, really, expenses and that type of thing. So I can tell from personal experience just the first time I ever opened up a Roth, I was at West Point. And I wanted to just dip my toe in the market. And I wanted to feel the feeling of basically buying a stock in a company.

Tim Ulbrich: Been there.

Tim Baker: And I think I bought like one share of Johnson & Johnson, and like after the transaction grew — and it’s kind of not very exciting — it was kind of exciting to see it, but I bought one share, which is the most inefficient way to do it because one share at that time was probably like $45. But then I paid like $10 —

Tim Ulbrich: The fee, yeah.

Tim Baker: Just to do the trade-in. But it was cool because at that time, I was like, well, technically, I’m part owner of this company, a .0 — add so many zeroes — 1% of Johnson & Johnson, so I would get documents that say, ‘Hey, these are when the board meetings are,’ but I really didn’t know what I was doing. And quite frankly — I know, Tim, we talked about this before — I probably had no business doing that, opening up an account like that because I didn’t really have a proper emergency fund. In the Army, a student is a little bit different, but there were so many other things that foundationally, I should have done before I even got to that point, but that’s kind of in a nutshell what the DIY approach is.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think it’s — for many of our listeners, they’re probably thinking about, OK, most of my investing — maybe not all — but most of my investing’s happening with my employer-sponsored plan, so 401k, 403b. Of course that’s not everyone listening, many people have Roth IRAs or have taxable accounts that are out there, but what I’ve seen, Tim, is depending on the employer, how complex that is or is not can be all over the place. So for example, I work for the state. And they intentionally simplify options, you know, you’ve got two options in large cap, two options in international, they’re all index funds. Fees are pretty low. And I think they’re really trying to minimize some of the behavioral components that are there. But it’s still up to me, if I were doing a DIY approach and saying, OK, this is my asset allocation, this much stock, this much bonds, this much cash or cash equivalent or REETs or whatever. And then within there, what types of stocks I want to be investing in and then am I going to rebalance or not. Now, for other people — like a target fund I’m thinking of specifically — if somebody were to choose a target fund to say, OK, I’m going to retired in the year 2075, and that’s going to then set my asset allocation. The rebalancing is kind of happening along the way.

Tim Baker: It’s automatic.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: I would say from a target fund perspective, if you literally listen to what I just said about different types of funds like bond and international, emerging markets, small cap, large cap, and you’re like, ‘I have no idea,’ then go target fund. You probably will pay some type of premium for that service of it being rebalanced and becoming basically more aggressive to more conservative over time. But more often than not, I would rather you just pay the premium than have it sit in cash or be way too aggressive than you need be, depending on where you’re at in your life. But oftentimes, when I work with clients — and this is the opposite end of the spectrum, which is not DIY, it’s working with an advisor — I crack that nut, and I say, “Hey, client, you have 15-20 different options out there. And you’re in a target fund right now by default. I think we can do a little bit better given your situation and save on expense and things and break it out that way.” I think one of the things that you talk about (inaudible) and I’ve read a few books about the more choice that we are given, the more it causes that paralysis by analysis. And they say even like things like auto-enrolls. So we’ve talked about auto-enroll. There’s a lot of people that before auto-enroll really became a thing would work for a company for five, six, seven years, a decade, and never opt into their benefit of a 401k and the match there. Now, and this could be something the Obama administration put in, is that they’re incentivizing companies to basically auto-enroll employees. And then you essentially opt out of it if you want. And they’ve done a lot of studies in this with like Sweden and Finland, you have to opt out to not be an organ donor. And two countries that are very similar in a lot of ways, the opt-in, the percentage of people that were actually donating their organs was very low versus the opt-out. So a lot of this plays in. And we could do a whole topic, a whole episode, on behavioral finance and all the different biases that are out there. And I think that’s one of the things that maybe working with an advisor does. But it can be really confusing when you do it on DIY. It’s not impossible, obviously. But I think ultimately, my opinion — again, I’m biased because I do this for a living — is that I think it’s always good to have an objective look at your finances and say, hey, does this make sense? Is what I’m doing OK because I heard Uncle Tommy say this or my neighbor down the street said that, and I really want to know like sanity check this.

Tim Ulbrich: So obviously, as we think about the DIY approach, I think it’s fair to say that it’s becoming more popular — maybe not more popular but why is it popular in some regards. Accessing information is more readily available than it’s ever been before.

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: Resources are out there. Just today, we had somebody ask in the YFP Facebook group, you know, I’ve heard of back door Roth IRAs, but what do I actually do mechanically. And we were able to quickly reference an article, get her a stepwise approach. So that information is there, readily available. I think that’s one of the reasons that it’s quite popular. What else do you think in terms of why people are going kind of that route of more of a DIY?

Tim Baker: I think it’s a little bit of an indictment of kind of my professional brethren. You know, there’s a lot of advisors out there that will say, “Hey, love to help you. But you have to have a half a million dollars before I can actually do work with you.” And the reason they do that is because they’ll charge based on assets, investable assets, which basically mean the assets they control directly, not what’s in your retirement account. So they say, “Hey, love to help you, but I can’t because I won’t essentially be paid enough.” So you have those minimum assets under management, AUM, requirements that basically for a lot of young population, just excludes them in general. I think one of the things that — and I was a little naive, no, I was a lot of naive to that is when I was looking at the profession of personal finance, kind of the whole 1% Occupy Wall Street was going on. So I think there is a distrust of large banking institutions and really financial advisors in general. And I think in a lot of ways, it’s well deserved. What a lot of people don’t know is that the majority, the overwhelming majority of financial advisors can legally put their own interests ahead of their clients, which when I kind of figured that out — and I was in that model when I discovered that the fee-based where you can earn commission fees, that blew me away. And it shouldn’t be that way. And I’m not saying that means 95% of the professionals out there are corrupted. But to me, is it should always be about the client, always be about what is in the best interests of the client, not necessarily mine. So I think that that perception is prevailing in a lot of ways. And that’s why I’m kind of fortunate when you talk about the work that we’re doing with you and Jess, it legitimizes, I think, what I’m trying to do. And I think what the fee-only world is trying to do is really say, there are services for young people that you’re not excluded. And by the way, I want to be on your team. And I want to get you to those goals that we talked about that whether it’s orca whales (?) or being able to retire at a certain time or whatever that is, that stuff jacks me up. And really, it’s the mechanisms of what the investments are and are properly insured that are just that supporting detail that I more or less have a playbook in my mind, and we just kind of plug and play depending on your situation.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think I can say as somebody who went the DIY route for 10 years, you know, after graduation and obviously in working with you and Jess and I, I think too it’s fair to say for many listening, there’s just that overwhelming transition that happens where you’ve got new career, you’ve got tons of student loan debt, you feel like you’re trying to develop budgets and take care of all these other things. And part of it I think is just that feeling of being overwhelmed and my budget’s tight, I’m trying to figure out these things, and I may see additional fees or things and not necessarily be able to articulate the benefits associated with those.

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think it’s important that we just claim right off the bat what you just articulated nicely. Anytime we’re talking here about working with a planner versus not, you have to look at that under the assumption that it’s somebody who is good, who is acting ethically, who is acting, in our opinion, within a fiduciary standard because at the end of the day — we’ll get to some of the pros and cons of working with a planner — if you’re paying to work with a planner and you’re getting crappy advice, and you’re paying more in fees and things, now we’ve just put ourself up a creek and you might as well have gone the DIY route.

Tim Baker: Yeah, and I would say this — and I usually say this when I speak is I think one of the differences between financial planning, financial advisors and the profession of pharmacy is that the profession of pharmacy is actually a profession. You can take a test and be a financial advisor and give advice. You can do exactly what I do. The barrier to entry is very, very low, which means that you have — and you can see this maybe in other professions, not to call any out, but maybe like real estate and things like that where you take a test and you can sell houses.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: Sorry to all the real estate agents out there. But when you have such low barriers of entry, that basically muddies the water for a lot of hopefully professionals. And what I point to is someone that has the CFP mark, the Certified Financial Planning marks, and that are kind of following standards of ethics and all that kind of stuff. So I think that’s another reason why there’s lots of advisors out there that don’t necessarily know either what they’re doing or the other thing could be ignorance. So again, like when I was in the broker dealer world, I just didn’t know what I didn’t know. I thought I was awesome because I wasn’t selling proprietary products for maybe some of the bigger banks. So I’m like, oh, we can pick whatever products that we want from anywhere, whatever best suits you. But then I found out that there are other advisors out there that they’re not compensated based on product sales. It’s basically — the product and the advice is separated. And you know this in pharmacy, like anytime you mix the sale of product with advice, there’s conflict of interest. And you might see it with doctors and how they prescribe medications, those types of things. So to me, the model is broken from Jump Street that really, the consumer or client needs to be put first and everything else will fall into place. But I think that would, again, lead to why DIY is a popular — you know, just the savings cost and really, there are people that are thirsty. We’ve seen that from YFP. There’s people that are thirsty to learn. And it’s just something that is a huge void in our education system. We teach how to bake cakes and make ash trays in school, but we don’t teach them how to balance a checkbook or what credit card debt looks like or what student debt looks like.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Tim Baker: So there’s a big void there, and I think people are — sometimes, we learn through pain and what we’ve gone through. And I think we can fill up a whole book of what we’ve personally done. And sometimes, it’s wisdom where we’re actually sitting down, writing through, reading “Seven Figure Pharmacist,” looking at all of the stuff that we have. You could learn a wealth of stuff on NerdWallet and Investopedia. So really, I think that’s a play as well.

Tim Ulrich: You know, one of the things I think is interesting as you were talking is — without getting too political here — when all the movement was going toward the fiduciary standard, I think it brought the public awareness and attention up a little bit that there’s not — most advisors are not acting in a fiduciary standard. And now that that really hasn’t moved forward, that may even, in some regards, lead people to think, well, now I know more about what fiduciary means, and I see that a majority of people aren’t that. That standard’s not progressing, so maybe a DIY route is where I’m going to go.

Tim Baker: Yeah, and really what Tim’s talking about here is in the last administration, basically the Department of Labor was essentially trying to push forward this standard, this fiduciary standard that said that basically the only accounts that they could touch under the Department of Labor were those basically issued by the employers. So they were saying any retirement account, 401k’s, 403b’s, and even I think IRAs, in this sense, have to be basically managed by fiduciaries that have the client’s best interests in mind. When the new administration came in, that legislation that was kind of being pushed through was squashed. So it did bring up I think some awareness that what is a fiduciary? And why aren’t all advisors fiduciaries? And there was a big push from the broker dealer world that says, hey, if we put this standard in place, then it’s going to shut out a lot of advice to kind of middle market and smaller — it’s going to shut out advice from that, which is categorically false. But it’s really around the protection of the income streams that insurance and other commissionable products generate. So I think we’ll eventually get there. It’s funny because we — I’m at different conferences, and Australia, you know, I’ve talked to advisors there that are like way ahead of us. They can’t believe that we don’t have a fiduciary standard across the board. Even their insurance products are similar. So I think we’ll eventually get there, but it could be a generation away just because of the lobbying.

Tim Ulbrich: So I think the pros of the DIY approach are obvious: potential cost savings with an asterisk — we’ll come back to that. Of course, it’s assuming that you’re doing it well and you’re controlling fees and you’re making the right decisions and so forth, you’re not being overtaken by some of the behavioral problems that can come up. Obviously, I think there’s a pro of empowerment and learning and being involved when you’ve got to figure it out, what does rebalancing mean? What does asset allocation mean? What do these funds and accounts means? So there’s a forced hand in learning. In terms of potential pitfalls, let me read you a quote from one of my favorite books, “Simple Wealth, Inevitable Wealth” by Nick Murray and get your reaction on this. He says that, “The twin premises of all do-it-yourself appeals are that most investors are smart enough, rational enough and disciplined enough always to select and maintain portfolios that are best suited to their long-term goals and that most advisors are venal and are stupid or at the very least, cost much more than they’re worth. The former premise is a fundamental misreading of basic human nature. The latter is just a self-serving mean-spirited lie.” Strong language, right? I mean, what are your thoughts?

Tim Baker: Strong language in a lot of ways. First, I had to actually look at what venal meant. So which, for you advisors out there, because I use the word fungible and gotten called on that. So venal means “showing or motivated by susceptibility to bribery.” So I think basically to summarize the quote, it’s we are perfect investors all the time. We know exactly what we need to do. We’re not emotional when it comes to this. And that advisors are stupid and basically fickle to wherever the money flows. I think that there’s probably truth and lies in both parts of that. What behavioral finance tells us and what’s becoming more and more is that a lot of our thoughts about finance is that people will — and it’s based on conventional economics — is that people will behave rationally, predictably and that emotions don’t influence people when they’re making economic choices, which is completely false.

Tim Ulbrich: We all know that. We’ve been thinking about it, right?

Tim Baker: We can outline a variety of biases, whether it’s anchoring or mental accounting or overconfidence, gambler’s fallacy, and we could maybe do a whole episode just on that. But frankly, as humans — and I do this for a living — and even sometimes for me, and especially when I’m looking at my own, we suck at it. Right now, we’re kind of in a market downturn. And I preach the long-term, I preach that over the course of the long haul, the market will take care of you. And that is a certainty. And I always joke outside of the zombie apocalypse or the Poles switching, the market will return 7-10%. It’s done it for 100 years. There’s bumps and bruises along the way, but when you’re in that moment, what I say in investing is that you should do the opposite of how you feel. So when 2008-2009 came around and we kind of are feeling a little bit of that now, you want to take your proverbial investment ball and go home. You want to get out of the market, you want to sit on the sidelines and stay in cash.

Tim Ulbrich: It should be game on, right?

Tim Baker: Right. And really, it should be opposite. If you are sitting on cash and the market is down, you should be chucking cash into your investments because essentially, it’s the one area of our financial life where we’re like, ah, I can’t believe that things are on sale and I want to get out of it. And then we kind of talked a little bit about the second part about advisors being venal and stupid. And again, I think part of that is earned in a lot of ways. But I would say by and large, I definitely operate that I think people are inherently good. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re good at their jobs or that they’re going to guide you the right way with regard to investing. And that’s why I think questions about that when you are potentially talking to a financial advisor is important, you know? And I think if people — one of the questions I ask prospective clients is if you had to make a list of all the things that you want your financial planner to have, what would that be? And the first one’s like, I want them to be trustworthy and I want them to communicate and I have access. But part of it is it could be an investment philosophy. If they tell me, I want someone to pick me the hot stocks, disqualified. I’m not your guy. I never will be your guy because I think the smartest thing I’ve ever said about investing in the stock market is that I don’t know where the stock market’s going to go. Nobody does. So again, I think that you shouldn’t be hiring a financial advisor to try to beat the market. By and large, they can’t do it. It should really be about managing the expectation, the behaviors, and specifically around this topic of investing.

Tim Ulbrich: I think one of the biggest pitfalls I see here — potential pitfalls — of the DIY approach is that lack of accountability, that risk of operating on an island. I know as I look back now on doing it myself, you may not feel it in the moment, but when there’s not somebody there to keep you in check and to call out the behavioral biases that we all are prone to, one I know for me and I’ve referred to before on the podcast is I knew that I shouldn’t be rebalancing more than I need to. I knew that once I set up my asset allocation based on risk tolerance, I should hold true. But you know, you log into your account, you see what’s going on, you start looking at things, and you say, well, maybe not so much of this or that, and you start messing around. And that’s why you hear the different studies saying the average return of the market is this, but the average person gets x, which is much less, because of our tendency to make those tweaks along the way. So I think accountability. I think the other thing too is that if you don’t have the right knowledge and so forth that you may end up paying more than the fees that are associated with a robo-planner, right? So we’ll link in the show notes, we wrote an article on the impact of fees and how fees can be a $1 million+ mistake alone if you’re not accounting for fees. And I know you helped me with a 403b account. I mean, we discovered fees north of — what? 1.5% I think?

Tim Baker: Yeah. And to kind of break this down, like one of the main suspects here is what’s called the expense ratio. So the funds that you are invested in, you know, mutual funds, exchange traded funds — not necessarily stocks — but the funds, there’s a manager that sits on top of that account and basically is buying and trading. And they pay themselves and they pay for office space and analysts and information. So basically, expense ratio is siphoning off money to keep the business profitable, in a sense. And if you have $100,000 in an investment and you have a 1% expense ratio, essentially you have $1,000 that is just evaporating every year from — and it’s not a line item anywhere, it’s just basically accounted for in the performance. And it doesn’t have to be that way because you can build a very investment portfolio for a tenth or even a twentieth of that. And my mantra’s always been, if I’m not getting the performance or it’s not safer for the same amount of performance, why am I paying 10 times, 20 times more? And that’s why we’re big proponents of some of the funds out there like Vanguard and Fidelity, they just rolled out a 0% expense ratio, and State Street and some of these ones that are very efficient for clients because again, you know, I think we’ve talked about this in a past episode is that the best indicator of performance is not star system ratings for Morningstar, it’s how you can drive expense down and keep as many hands in your investment — as many hands out of your investment pockets as — there’s platform fees and trading costs and expense ratios. Those are all things that — I mean, we have enough problems with the taxes and inflation that we need to be really protecting our gains, and a lot of that’s really keeping our expenses low when it comes to the investing part of the financial plan.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, if we’re going to hustle to put away money each and every month, like we’ve got to most out of it, right? And I think I love that’s what your mantra is keep those fees low. Obviously looking for performance as well, but I think of the statements I receive, and it has the tendency to say, well, I’m going to look at the one-year, three-year, five-year, 10-year performance. But I’m not really going to calculate what’s this 1% in total fees cost me? Or this 2%.

Tim Baker: Yeah. Well even that, like even advisors fall into this. They’ll say, hey, like I want to put my clients in 4- or 5-rated, and I only look at that. But that’s not the way to do it because typically, it’s a reversion to the mean. So what were high performing in 5-star systems, usually the script is flipped — pun intended — and those high performing, we’re buying them high and then they basically go low in terms of performance. So again, it’s just one that’s kind of the availability bias or what’s recently happened is we play on that. And it typically is the wrong move.

Tim Ulbrich: So that’s the DIY bucket. Let’s jump into the robo bucket. And you know, obvious pros and potential pitfalls. But here, we’re talking about somebody that maybe just heard this whole conversation about asset allocation and rebalancing and choosing investments and so forth and says, it would be nice to have a little bit of help around this investing piece there. And that’s really where robos come in. And obviously, there’s been I think — not a resurgence, a surgence of robo-advising, obviously, as they become more popular. I think they’ve been marketed a lot more than they were worth three or five years ago. So just briefly, what is a robo-advisor? Before we talk about the pros and cons.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I would categorize a robo-advisor would basically sit in between DIY approach and working with a financial advisor. So typically, when you go the DIY route — and maybe we’ll put this link in the show notes, but NerdWallet has an article that says, “Best Robo-Advisors 2018 topics.” And the typical players in this are WealthFront, Betterment and those types. And essentially, what they do is they’re market disruptors in a sense that — and I remember working at my last firm, it took 38 pages to open up a Roth IRA. And essentially, what they do is you go to their website and you say, hey, if you want to open up — these are typically the kind of self-directed accounts. They’d be IRAs, Roth IRAs, taxable accounts. If you want to open up one of these, click this link, answer a few questions, and they automatically slot — and then fund it, so connect to your bank account or fund it from a different source. And you’re in a model.

Tim Ulbrich: Automatic selection there.

Tim Baker: Yeah, everything. So it’s really a method to bring technology and efficiency in a profession that needs it. So if you’re thinking, hey, I don’t want to wade through thousands and thousands of stocks and bonds and mutual funds and ETFs, and I want something that if I ask a few questions, they’ll automatically slot and rebalance over time — some of these rebalance. They’re robo, so they look at algorithms and they could rebalance daily, weekly, and you really just want to leave it alone. Then this would be typically something that you would do. Now, again, it’s going to cost you a fee to do that. So the typical ones, you’re looking anywhere from 25-50 basis points, so .25% on what you have invested to .5%. If we measure that against most advisors are probably 1%, north of 1%, just to kind of give you some perspective. But typically, you don’t have any type of human interaction. It’s go through this questionnaire, fund it, and then those dollars are invested on your behalf per an algorithm that is rebalancing over time. So again, like I’ve said this before is — and you kind of see this sometimes in pharmacy too where you’ll say, hey, I’ll never be replaced. The technology will never replace me. But robots are actually more efficient basically rebalancing than I would ever be because I’m not sitting by my computer every day. Just like you could make a case that robots are probably going to be more efficient filling scripts because of just the advances in technology. I think what robots will never be better at than me is that kind of one-on-one personal looking at the breadth of the financial picture. And I think the same is true when we’re talking about adherence and working with patients and all that kind of stuff. So they’re very synonymous in a lot of ways. But yeah, so I think the robo, I think it’s a good thing in terms of moving the needle in the market.

Tim Ulbrich: So you obviously mentioned the pro of convenience and access disrupted what was a very cumbersome, comprehensive process. I mean now, if you log onto one of those platforms you mentioned, it’s quick, it’s easy, asks you some question, you fund the account that you’re working on, and it sets up the asset allocation for you. And boom, you’re ready to go. So lower fees than a planner. So you mentioned, obviously, we’re assuming 0 or 1%ish. So here, we’re maybe .25-.5% so you can get a feel for that. I think the con you mentioned is a really good one. The lack of human element, engagement. And I think along that line, the thing I think about as the central pitfall here is that it’s focused on one part of the financial plan. You’ve been preaching since Day 1, and many of the financial planners that are out there are focused on one part of a financial plan. But what we’ve been preaching, especially for most of our audience, is that a financial plan runs all the way from debt to death. So we’re thinking about student loans, we’re thinking about budgeting and goal-setting and the right insurance. We’re thinking about end-of-life planning and home buying and kids’ college, all of these things. And when you’re looking at your month-to-month budget and your goals and what you’re trying to do, investing is one part, albeit a very important part, but it’s one part of your financial plan. And Betterment isn’t going to jump out and say, “Hey, by the way, are you thinking about your student loans and this or that?”

Tim Baker: Right.

refinance student loans

Tim Ulbrich: And I was thinking back to just our relationship over the last year of you working with Jess and I, we’re a year in. And we’ve done very little discussion yet — we’re going to get there more — but very little discussions on investing because we’ve been spending all this time on for us figuring out what’s our why and what’s our purpose, which we published in episodes 031 and 032, maybe 032 and 033. We’ll get that right in the show notes. We’ve been talking about goal-setting, we’ve set up sinking funds and budgets and making sure we have a good foundation and insurance. And now, we’re working on end-of-life estate planning. And so I think the biggest risk I see here is that — are you filling in all the holes? And are you prioritizing goals the right way if you’re only focused on that one part of the plan?

Tim Baker: Yeah, and this is something — full disclosure — that we have been offering, Script Financial, that we’re testing out. And essentially what I want to do is be able to for someone that doesn’t want to work with me directly, they can tap into a lot of the models and portfolios that I use for clients and it’s just a little bit of less service but less cost as well. And I think if you’re not in that, then you’re going to become extinct. So I think — and we’ll put a link to that in the show notes as well. If you are wanting to do more in the investment world, open an IRA or a taxable account, make sure you’re doing all the other things we’re preaching about and have those in place in terms of foundational. But then, you know, if you’re looking at just the wealth of funds out there and you have no idea where to start, we can definitely do that as well.

Tim Ulbrich: So two out of three buckets we’ve covered. We talked DIY, we talked robo, and now let’s move into hiring a financial planner. And as I mentioned in the beginning of the show, we have previous content on this that we’re going to talk about and build on a little bit. But make sure you check out episodes 015-017 that we talk through, episode 054 about what it means to be fee-only and episode 055 about why you should care how a planner charges. And before we get into the details here, I want to reference our site, YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner. Again, YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner. We’ve got lots of content in there, we’ve got a free guide about what we think you should look for in a financial planner, who may benefit most from one. And then we’ve got an extensive list of questions that we think you should be asking to make sure you’ve got somebody who’s really acting in your best interest as you’re going along the way. So whether that’s with us or somebody else, we want you to make sure that you have the right person that’s in your corner. So Tim Baker, as I was looking at some data on this, there’s a 2016 Northwestern Mutual study that only 21% of Americans hire a financial planner to assist them, despite more than 70% — and that 70% number coming from a Harris poll — indicating that they’re interested in receiving guidance. So we have a majority that says, I want it and I want guidance, but only about a fifth that are actually engaging with a planner. I mean, maybe we’ve already hit on some of this already earlier in the show, but what’s behind that?

Tim Baker: Yeah, I mean, and it could be a lot of the things that we’re talking about is sometimes I hear a lot with prospective clients is I didn’t even really know that there were people out there that focus more on younger professionals because they look at their parents’ planner and it’s kind of where their planner is patting them on the head and saying, hey, when you have some money, sonny, I’ll help you. Or I hear like a lot of these paternalistic, where it’s like “Do as I say,” you know, it’s not necessarily collaborative, which I like. But yeah, that’s shocking is that again, I think there was people, young Americans that want it but that it’s not hitting. And I think, again, I think that’s why — you know, I’m a member of the XY Planning Network, and I think when I joined the network — so it’s a group of fee-only fiduciaries, CFPs, that really want to bring financial planning to Gen X, Gen Y demographic that’s been by and large ignored. And I joined at the end of 2015, there was 200 members maybe. And there’s 700 with us now. I mean, that’s unbelievable growth. So I think it’s just there’s a void that I think is starting to be filled. And I’m encouraged by I think what I’m seeing in the industry. But I’m also discouraged by the fact that there are a lot of people out there that need help and have no idea where to go, whether it’s account minimums or — and sometimes, it’s like well my parents never had an advisor. Sometimes with money, we kind of repeat — you know, I have a lot of pharmacists say, “I’m the first person to go to college. Further, I’m the first person to get an advanced degree. The amount of money I’m making now is more than both of my parents combined.” And what often happens is that a lot of what they’ve learned about money comes from parents, and I’ve said that time and time again is what my parents taught me about money, essentially don’t have credit card debt, buy a house. And beyond that, it was wing it. Figure it out. And I think in that regard, we just don’t have good mechanisms in place. And I think I’ll call out some of the pharmacy schools and associations, I want more education around that because when you’re walking out with a potential mortgage-worth of debt, we better be damn sure that we kind of know how to approach that. And right now, I think we miss that. So when I asked a question, $160,000 of debt at a 6.5% interest rate, what’s that monthly payment? And then there’s crickets. And then they found out the payment is $1,800+, it’s like gees, that’s a lot of money.

Tim Ulbrich: I couldn’t agree more. And I think as Tim Baker gets fired up about needing more in the PharmD, I think we’re going to have to put the explicit rating on this episode. The little “E” next to the I.

Tim Baker: Yeah, oh man, I think we’re going to lose our family-friendly status.

Tim Ulbrich: So the obvious pros — we’re not going to rehash these because we’ve talked through these in the DIY and the robo is that of course, you’ve got the human aspect. You’ve got the scope of if done well, it’s comprehensive, right? So I used the example of the debt to death. You’re looking at all aspects. It’s not limited on one aspect like investing. You’re looking at your whole plan. One of the things I think is interesting, though, Tim, is there’s this continued myth that if I hire a financial planner, my outcome is going to be better because they’re going to help me choose the right stocks. And therefore, I’m going to outperform the market. And we, I think from our perspective, debunk that myth. And when we were working on the book, we were looking at research published that shows between about 1.8% and 3% better returns on average per year for those that are hiring a planner versus those that don’t. Now, I think people look at those numbers and think, oh, that’s because of them helping me choose the right investment. I think what we’re trying to make a case of, though, is if you’re saying no, it’s not because of that, then where is that positive return coming from?
Tim Baker: I think it’s really a matter of — and this could even be by accident in some ways, even in my past life in the broker dealer world is — you sit in between, from an investment perspective, you sit in between your client and their money. Most investment accounts, when the advisor is managing that for their client, there’s not two sets of hands in that. The client basically says, hey, I want you, the advisor to do that. So when the sky is falling, and the client calls — and I’ve had this here recently where the client says, hey, I really think that we should sell, typically, I do a timeout and let’s talk about it. Let’s revisit what we talked about in the investment. And although like I have the butterflies in my stomach too because my portfolio is affected, and I’m invested the same exact way that my clients are. I have to remind myself just like I have to remind the client that again, over the course of time, we adhere to, stick to our guns and adhere to the investment policy statement, the allocation that we put forth that is very diversified and low cost. It will take care of us. So I think because we don’t have the ability to get in and trade and that we’re kind of standing in between, it’s almost like a safeguard on hasty behavior. It’s kind of like what I tell clients that are just having a really bad time, just spending money on impulse or not being able to save money is anything that’s over $100, you have to have a 24-48 hour cooling off period. And if you are thinking about it in 24 or 48 hours, then maybe buy it. If you’re not, then that’s a good choice. So in the same way is this too shall pass when it comes to investments, there are brighter days ahead. And we’ve enjoyed a great, bold market, a great, hot market, and we’re going to have corrections. But by and large, sometimes it’s just the investor standing in between them and their accounts.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think you use the example of the advisor there sitting in between the investor and their accounts, I think it also goes beyond just the investment component. So as you’re working with clients and you’re asking them things about what are your hopes, dreams and goals, obviously one of those, you’re going to increase your net worth, you’re going to retire successfully, all of those things. But also if someone were to say, I really want to take some time off, 10 years into my career and do this. Or I want to make sure I’m spending more time with my family or at some point, I want to go part-time, I want to start my own business, or I want to get into real estate. Somebody who is really walking that path with you can turn back to you and say, hey, remember when we talked about this? Are we working towards doing that?

Tim Baker: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think that gets to some of the cons because when you look at the industry, as you mentioned earlier, a lot of the industry is still structured in a way that incentivizes only the growth of the assets because if you’re being paid in an Assets Under Management model, you’re not incentivized to look at me in the face and say, hey, Tim, remember when you and Jess talked about Sam going to see the orca whales. Like you’d be better off saying, Tim, go open up the IRA so I can get my 1%.

Tim Baker: Right, or even more quantifiable than just saying orca whales, which is very important, is credit card debt.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: Or even student loan debt. I remember that question, and we answered that — I don’t know what episode it was, in one of the Ask Tim & Tim’s, and the advisor was basically saying to prolong the debt payments for the house and invest the difference. And to me, I look at that as like that is the advisor putting their interests ahead of their own. But like again, I’m seeing this more and more with new graduates, and this is something that I’m trying to crack the nut on with the offering that we have with students and residents in terms of financial planning is I’m seeing a lot of credit card debt. So if I walk into a financial advisor, typically because there’s an assumption of wealth and typically because they charge based on Assets Under Management, they don’t care to even know how to advise you on cash flowing, budgeting, debt management.

Tim Ulbrich: Do you have a will?

Tim Baker: Yeah, do you have a will? Those types of things.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: And I think maybe even the will is a little bit more because they want to protect the assets from the estate.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, that’s true.

Tim Baker: So we’re talking about the next generation of wealth transfer and the next few years is going to be incredible, but if I’m an advisor, then I’m paid more money if you put money into an IRA versus paying down credit card debt. And again, I think again, the planners, they want to be able to help their clients I think by and large. But they’re just not incentivized to do so. And I think that’s a problem.

Tim Ulbrich: And so as we talk about the cons here, I think they’re obvious. And we’ve highlighted some of them so far is that we’ve made a point of emphasis saying if you’re going to be working with a financial planner, there’s a lot of work that needs to be done to make sure that you’re working with the right planner that has your interests in mind, you’re asking the right questions about how they’re charging, fiduciary standards, do they have the right credentials? And it’s not any one of the answers to those questions is going to give you the obvious yes, this person is the person I want to be looking to work with. And one of the resources I would point our listeners to is one of my favorite books I read, “Unshakeable,” by Tony Robbins or maybe Tony Robbins’ ghostwriting team, you know, I’m not sure. But either way, he does a great job of outlining what we’ve been talking about here of the — I think he quoted maybe somewhere around 2-3% actually remain in that fiduciary category. But when you look at the wide variety of planners that are out there, the credentials that it takes to become a planner, the scope of services, how they charge, all the things that we talk about on our financial planner page at YFP, I think it can become very overwhelming to think, why am I paying for what I’m paying with these services, right? And what’s the value that I’m going to be getting from these services.

Tim Baker: Yeah, I think one thing to mention is I hear some prospective clients say, yeah, I heard you on the podcast, I’m thinking about working with you, but I’m also thinking about working with my parents’ financial planner. And one of the questions that I implore them to ask is what do they think about student loans? Because if student loans are a huge thing, again, 95% of advisors have no idea —

Tim Ulbrich: And they weren’t a big things for our parents, probably.

Tim Baker: Right, exactly. And they haven’t been trained up. So like they’ll say, oh, they just amortize our retirement. Or I heard one prospective client said that their advisor said, oh, these are no big deal. And you know, it makes my blood boil, in a sense, that we can do so much better. And the market is changing with how our economy is changing and what our financial picture is looking like. Like again, a lot of the stuff that we spend money on and that debts that our parents didn’t have, so we have to adapt accordingly, and it can be about training advisors on stock options and all that stuff that it’s still in the curriculum, but it doesn’t fit at all.

Tim Ulbrich: So just like pretty much anything else, all three of these buckets have pros and cons, right?

Tim Baker: Sure.

Tim Ulbrich: And we have people I know who have just commented in the Facebook group and reached out to us via email, we have people that are in all three of these buckets and are dominating. So I think the take-home point here is really, do a self-evaluation of where are you at and as you’re looking at investing as one part of the financial plan, which of these do you feel like really resonates most with you? Now, for those of you that are in interested in, hey, I really think I would benefit from a financial planner, I want to work with YFP and this, again, YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner. From there, you can get lots of information on what to look for, you can schedule a call with Tim Baker, learn more about him, see if that’s a good fit or not. And so I’d encourage you to check that out, YourFinancialPharmacist.com/financial-planner. Tim Baker, it’s been fun.

Tim Baker: Yeah, good stuff.

Tim Ulbrich: Look forward to wrapping this up next week. We’re going to do the Investing Q&A month of December. And again, to our community, happy Thanksgiving. We’re certainly grateful and thankful for you and the support that you’re provided. Have a great holiday and a great rest of your week.

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YFP 074: Evaluating Your 401k Plan


 

Evaluating Your 401k Plan

On Episode 74 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Church, Your Financial Pharmacist Team Member, and Tim Baker, owner of Script Financial and YFP Team Member, discuss how to evaluate your 401k plan and share information to help you understand some of the fees associated with it.

Summary

On this episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, Tim Church and Tim Baker discuss 401k employee sponsored plans. It can be overwhelming for new graduates or someone changing jobs to orient themselves with presented 401k options as most people have 20-30 investment options to choose from. All 401k plans aren’t created equal and it’s important to look at all fees that are being charged, even ones that aren’t seen, to determine which plan best suits you. If you need assistance analyzing possible plan options, Bright Scope is an excellent resource to help you find information.

Within a 401k plan, the rules of contribution and distribution are set by the IRS, however each organization has its own set of guidelines for the employee match and possible vesting requirements. For 2018, an employee can put $18,500 into their 401k and you and your employer can contribute $55,000 combined. Tim Baker discusses the difference between an employer match and vesting. A company encourages you to put money into your retirement account and also receives a tax reduction for the money they contribute. Employer matches vary from company to company, but it’s important to take advantage of them because the company is essentially giving you free money. Vesting helps mitigate turnover in a company and refers to how much ownership you have in a 401k. Companies may either offer graded or cliffed vesting.

If you are going to be leaving a job or if you have a new job that has a different 401k plan or provider, Tim Baker explains that there are four possible options to take: do nothing (let the 401k sit), liquidate the fund (cash it out), transfer to a new plan (move old retirement plan to a new one), or roll it over to an IRA. Typically, the best option is to roll it over to an IRA.

Mentioned on the Show

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Hey, what’s up, everybody? Welcome to Episode 073 of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Excited to be here alongside, in-person, with Tim Church to talk about prioritizing your investing for the future. Tim Church, how we doing?

Tim Church: Doing great, Tim. Glad to have you down here. How’s the weather feel?

Tim Ulbrich: It’s unbelievable. So here we are, mid- to end of October, came from northeast Ohio, below freezing weather, and they had to de-ice the plane before I got here. Came, landed, walked out, and I was overdressed, too warm for the day, saw the palm trees, so excited to be here. And Andrea has been an incredible.

Tim Church: Well, thanks. That’s basically why I’ve been down here the past seven years if you haven’t figured that out yet.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, for those of you that don’t know, Tim grew up in the Snow Belt and has made the wise decision of coming down south, where it’s a little bit warmer. So I get it now. I see what you’re doing here every day. So here we are, we’re talking about investing in and prioritizing in terms of the means in which people are investing. I think this is a long overdue topic. We acknowledge we haven’t done a ton on the topic of investing on this podcast, a little bit here or there. We did Investing 101 back at the beginning of the podcast, but that’s what this month-long series is all about. And probably one of the most important questions, most frequent questions we get is, so with all these options available, where should I actually be putting my money? And in what order? Especially for those that are coming out as new practitioners. So long, long overdue. Would you agree?

Tim Church: Yeah, definitely. I think so. And I think there’s a lot of great questions and things that come up with investing. And especially as you guys talked about in the Dave Ramsey episode, what comes first — investing versus paying off student loans and other debts. But I think this topic that we’re talking about just in terms of, OK, you’ve got these retirement investment options available. How do you prioritize and how do you say, OK, this is the first one I’m going to go after. And then after I do that, I’m going to go to the next one. And there’s a lot of questions that come up with that.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And I know as a new practitioner, new grad, I struggled with that myself, not only where does this fit within the other context of other goals, but also should I be maxing out my employer account? Everyone says Roth IRAs, putting money into those. I get emails about these brokerage accounts, what should I be doing and in what order? So we’re going to talk about that and give you our opinion on that topic. But I think it’s first important to start with what are the key principles of retirement savings? And as you and I were talking about this episode, we talked a little bit about inflation, taxes, and the power of investing early and often. So give us a little bit more information around those principles of investing.

Tim Church: Alright. So if you look at inflation over the years, over several decades, it’s typically 2-3% per year, which most savings accounts are not paying that, right?

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

refinance student loans

Tim Church: And so when you look at that, you have to say, OK, what are the other options that are available to me that I can use to not only get a better return to beat inflation, but the other consideration is how do you do that with paying the minimal amount of taxes that you can so you’re keeping most of that money that’s growing?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think just to add to that, the one advantage that young pharmacists have is that you’re coming out with a great income, typically — many graduates are coming out in their mid- to late 20s, you’ve got lots of years ahead of you in terms of investing a significant percentage and portion of your income and allowing that time for compound growth. So I like to think of inflation as kind of this gnawing thing that is just always coming after you. And I think it’s important to do that. And I read a couple books several years ago that if you really look at the impact that inflation can have on your finances, it’s something we don’t think a lot about, almost like fees on investment vehicles and other things. So inflation, taxes, and starting early and often. Now, Tim, it’s important that we talk about for everybody listening to this podcast, their personal situation is going to be different. And here, we’re going to talk specifically — almost in a silo of investing, right? And we know that those listening, some are looking at $100,000-200,000 in debt, other people are out of debt, personal life situations that are very different, all types of things. And so here, we’re really looking at if somebody has disposable income and they’re looking to invest that for retirement, in what order are they going to do that, right? So when I say if somebody has disposable income, what are we referring to there?

Tim Church: Basically, you’re talking about money that you have after you’re paying your expenses every month. So anything that you have to pay for your bills, how much it costs to live, what is that additional amount of money that you have that could be going towards investment? Many people, like you said, are flooded in debt, and so you could be listening to this episode, and saying, ‘What disposable income do I have? I’m just trying to survive. I’m trying to make it.’ But that’s really where we’re getting at is let’s just assume you’re going into this episode that you have money to invest to put in retirement accounts. Now, if that’s who you are listening to this episode and saying, I don’t have any money to put in investments because of the bills and things I have, well, it’s a pretty simple equation. That in order to increase your disposable income, you’ve got to increase your earnings, get a side hustle, work more hours, or you’ve got to decrease your expenses. And so that’s where really budgeting comes into play.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely, yeah. And I think that idea of it’s a simple equation — you either increase your earnings or you decrease your expenses. And just a shout out to the work you’ve been doing with the side hustle series, giving people ideas. We’ve got more content coming there. And just before we jump into the buckets of investing, I think it’s important that we are not — and we’ve had this conversation multiple times on the previous episodes — but we’re not going to have a conversation about should I be investing or should I be paying off my debt? And as I mentioned before, one of my concerns with an episode like this where we talk about investing or even the month-long series in a silo is that this is one part of a comprehensive financial plan. And you’ve got to look at the whole picture. So if you want more information on our thoughts about investing while in debt and how does that fit in with emergency funds and other life goals, head on over to episodes 068, where Tim Baker and I tackle that, where we reviewed the pros and cons of the Dave Ramsey plan. And I’m sure that’s evoked a lot of emotional reactions because it usually does.

Tim Church: Yeah, that was a great episode. And I think you guys did a great job talking through some of the controversy, but also some of the positive things that are in that plan and some of the behavioral aspects of it. And so when we’re talking about these major buckets, things that you can invest in for retirement, one of the things that came to mind, Tim Baker, he recently did an investing webinar. And he showed this image of actual buckets, and he was naming the buckets and putting one in. And I don’t know if when you were a kid, Tim — do you ever remember that show, Bozo the Clown? Do you ever remember that?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, yes.

Tim Church: And in that show, at the end of the episode — I think it was at the end — they actually were throwing ping pong balls into buckets. And they progressively — but there was a specific order that you had to put them in. And for some reason, he really evoked that memory when he was showing that figure. But it’s cool because it’s really, that’s what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about, OK, what’s the first bucket that you’re going to put your money toward? And then how do you go to the next level and what do you do?

Tim Ulbrich: And I think the visuals he used as well with the buckets in that presentation, it was a good reminder that these are vehicles and not the investments themselves. That’s an important point. We’ll talk more throughout this month. But when we talk about 401k’s, 403b’s, IRAs, etc., those are essentially the tax advantage shield in which you’re investing. But within that, you’re going to be choosing the individual investments, whether that’s stocks, bonds or mutual funds, etc. So let’s jump into these buckets. So probably for the vast majority of our listeners, they’re going to be presented by their employer with an option of a 401k, a 403b and what’s referred to as a TSP, which is a VA employee, right, that’s you.

Tim Church: Right, that’s the Thrift Savings Plan.

Tim Ulbrich: The Thrift Savings Plan. So we’re going to group these together because I think we throw around these words like we assume everyone understands exactly the implications of them. So let’s review quickly — a 401k, a 403b, and a Thrift Savings Plan, these are employer-sponsored retirement plans. So obviously, in order to get this benefit, you’re working for somebody. They’re going to offer this. And at what level they’re offering this benefit in terms of a match and what they can contribute is all over the place. And I think one of the things that we’ll talk in future episodes is as you’re looking at different jobs and comparing benefits and things, it’s a key thing to be looking at what is the benefit that you have? And I know the VA, that’s a pretty lucrative benefit on your TSP, is that correct?

Tim Church: Yeah, through the TSP — a couple different reasons. No. 1, they do offer a match up to 5%. But one of the other things is that they have very low fees in the funds that they have available. And I know that, Tim Baker always talks about that when you’re looking at different options within your 401k, is that you have to pay attention to those fees because even if you’re not seeing that change in your accounts, like over time, it can really eat at the earnings that you have.

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. And so let’s talk first — we’ve got 401k’s, 403b’s or TSPs, let’s talk about the traditional variety first because what has complicated this whole equation is that — you know, I remember when I came out of school, we were looking at primarily a traditional 401k or a Roth IRA. And now, we’ve got hybrids of these vehicles such as a Roth 401k or a Roth 403b, which I think has made this very complicated and probably make it even difficult to talk about it on the podcast in something like this. It’s good for a visual. So when we talk about a traditional 401k or 403b, essentially what we’re referring to there is that you are deferring the payment of taxes to the future. So those are a deductible in terms of income taxes today. You are not paying taxes on the contributions today. But when you go to withdraw those funds, no earlier than the age of 59.5 without penalty — and there’s a required minimum distribution at the age at which you’re beginning to have to force to take out that money — the maximum amount that you can put in as an employee into these accounts in $18,500 in the year of 2018. We’ve seen that climb each year by $500 or so. Now, there is an additional amount that you can put in after the age of 50. And that is $6,000, which essentially is a catch-up provision that allows you, if you’re behind in savings, to be able to save more beyond that $18,500. Now, what this does not include, which is a really critical, important piece here, is that $18,500 does not include the portion in which your employer would provide in the form of a match. Now, if you’re not familiar or haven’t heard of that term, match before, as Tim gave the example with the VA, it’s a 5% match. Essentially, 5% of his salary that he contributes, the VA will contribute dollar-for-dollar. And this is all over the place with employers. Some will do a 3% match, some will do a 6% match, some will do a dollar-for-dollar, some will do 50 cents on the dollar. But essentially as you’ll see when we get into the priority of investing, the match is free money. And that’s really the critical piece here. So why is this number important? Because what we’re referring to is that you obviously are growing money tax-free for a period of time. But ultimately, when it comes to being pulled out, you’re going to be paying taxes on that money. But if you make $100,000 — just out of simplicity — $100,000 per year, and you contribute $15,000 into your 401l, essentially you are going to be paying income taxes on $85,000. So it’s reducing your taxable income today. That money is growing all along, and you’re not going to pay taxes until the point you distribute it. And obviously depending on the income tax bracket you’re in and what the income tax bracket rates are at the time, you’re then going to be slapped with an income tax bill in the future.

Tim Church: Yeah, and I think that’s a good point to bring up is that when you’re looking at those account balances, somewhat really of an illusion when you’re looking at that bottom line if all of your contributions are traditional because it’s going to get taxed eventually, it’s just at what level is going to depend on where you are at the time when you’re making those withdrawals. Versus the Roth version — so many employers now offer the Roth version, and that’s even for the Thrift Savings Plan, where basically, you’re going to make contributions after-tax. So you’ve already been taxed on your income, and you’re going to allow those contributions to grow tax-free. So when I say tax-free, it basically is at the time at which you’re eligible to make the withdrawals, you’re not going to be taxed on that money. Now, that’s a whole separate animal in terms of determining what is best for you. Should you do traditional contributions? Should you do Roth contributions? And there’s a lot of different factors that can play into that, such as what your projected tax bracket’s going to be at the time of retirement or eligibility. And that could be a couple different things there. Does the government change the tax brackets? But then also, what is your projected income going to be? And things could obviously change with your job, so it’s really sort of difficult to predict everything. But there are some simulations out there online where you can kind of go through that.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think your point earlier about considering the tax implications is so critical to retirement planning because we often — and we’ve talked before on the podcast about a nest egg, how much you need at the point of retirement. Well, that number, if a majority of that’s in a traditional 401k, for somebody else that’s maybe saved a lot in a Roth IRA, which I’m going to talk about here in a minute, how that’s going to play out when you’re in retirement is very different in terms of the total amount that you have and how it’s going to be taxed. So I say that because I think the tax implications are a key planning piece as you’re thinking about exactly how much do I need at the point of retirement, and what’s going to be taxed? And what’s not going to be taxed when you get to the point of withdrawal? So again, 401k, 403b, TSP, max contributions in 2018 are $18,500 for the majority of people that will be listening to this podcast. And that number I think will be important because you often hear people say generally, to meet your retirement goals, you’re probably looking at somewhere around maybe 15-20% of your income that needs to be saved. So if you figure out the numbers, a pharmacist making $120,000, obviously you’re starting to get that point with the 401k, 403b, but there’s other vehicles that we’re going to talk through right now. And let’s go to that next one, which is an IRA. So Tim Church, IRA, Individual Retirement Arrangement, this one has different figures, different numbers, but also has a traditional form of it as well as a Roth form of it. So talk us through that one.

Tim Church: Correct. So this is something that anybody with an earned income is eligible for. They can contribute up to the max, which as of 2018 is $5,500. And there’s an extra $1,000 if you’re 50 or olders, so $6,500 if you’re 50 or older. But anyone who is earning an income can contribute to this. And what’s important is this is something outside of your employer. So this is something that you set up on your own, either through a brokerage account — but the other thing here too is besides what you’re able to contribute, if you’re a married and you have a non-working spouse, they can also contribute up to that limit. So technically, if you’re less than age 50, your household if you’re working and you have a non-working spouse, you can contribute up to $11,000 per year.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think that’s an important provision. I know for Jess and I, so Jess is at home with the boys, she’s not working. But to your point, a non-working spouse, so for us, when we talk about a Roth IRA, we both contribute that $5,500 per year to be able to make that contribution. So this has both a traditional version as well as a Roth version. And again, I think that’s where it gets confusing when people hear Roth 401k, Roth IRA. So traditional IRA looks very much — obviously the numbers are different, the $5,500 per year — but looks very much tax-wise like a 401k or 403b in that you are — if you meet the income qualifications — you are deferring the payment of taxes to a later point in time. You know, many pharmacists don’t qualify in terms of the income limits for a traditional IRA.

Tim Church: Right. And if you look at the IRS has some different rules depending on whether you are covered by a 401k or whether you’re not covered by a 401k. But if you are, the phase-out if you’re single is $73,000. And for being married filing jointly, it’s $121,000. So if you make above those limits, you actually can’t deduct the traditional IRA contributions. And so that kind of leads into well then why would I ever do that, right?

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely, yeah. And I think that we’ll talk in a minute about the back-door Roth IRA, and we’re going to actually in our upcoming Q&A episode even talk a little bit more about it. But when we talk about a Roth IRA, and I think why Roth IRA’s have all the rage these days, rightfully so, is that you are paying taxes today, that money is growing, but you are never paying taxes on that money again in the future. So if I were to contribute up to the max, $5,500 per year in a Roth IRA, and Jess did the same, that’s money that is being contributed that we’ve already paid our taxes on. So got my paycheck, paid taxes, then I make the contribution into the Roth IRA. I invest that money, it grows at some percentage every year, hopefully that compounds, let’s say that turns into a half million dollars, I’m at the age of 70, I start to withdraw that money, I’m no longer paying taxes on that money because I already paid taxes on the money before I put it into the account. Now, this gets into the whole debate about, well, would I be better off putting money in a Roth IRA or a 401k, and that gets back to the point that Tim Church made in terms of the tax brackets and what’s going to happen in the future, and largely, I think most people would agree we probably don’t know at this point in time. Now, this also has income limits to directly contribute. So for those that are single, the phase-out of contributions at $135,000. For those that are married filing jointly, there’s a phase-out that’s at $199,000. And so this is where you’ll hear people and you’ll hear pharmacists say, ‘Well, I really like that idea of tax-free growth, I pay taxes now, I’m not going to pay taxes in the future. But I exceed that income limit,’ and insert the back-door Roth IRA. Now, we could have a whole separate episode probably about the back-door Roth IRA. There’s some great tutorials, resources online. I know the White Coat Investor — just shout out to what he’s done — he’s got some great tools and resources about how people can go through that process. But essentially, what you’re doing in a back-door Roth IRA is you’re contributing to a traditional IRA, and then you’re converting that to a Roth component. And so we’re going to come back to that in our Investing Q&A. But all that to say if you’re somebody that exceeds the income limits of a Roth IRA, that does not mean you cannot take advantage of the benefits of a Roth IRA because of that back-door components.

Tim Church: Right. And I think the key is to keep in mind that it really is about the timeframe at which you make that conversion and whether there’s any gains on the money when you make the contributions to a traditional IRA. So if there’s any gains in between that conversion, you’re going to pay taxes on it. The other thing is too is that if you’ve already had past traditional IRAs, and you didn’t convert them, there can be some tax implications with that as well.

Tim Ulbrich: You know, the other thing I love about Roths, which I don’t think is talked about enough is that they do not have the forced required minimum distribution that come with the 401k or 403b. So if somebody’s out there thinking, you know what, maybe I’m going to be working until I’m 75 or 80 or maybe I have other sources of wealth, real estate investing, businesses, whatever, and you think you may not need that money at the required minimum distribution age in the early 70s that you’d be forced to take in a 401k or 403b, to me, that’s one of the great advantages of a Roth IRA, that you continue to let that money grow, and you don’t have to take it out. Alright, we’ve got another big bucket here, Tim, in terms of the HSA or the Health Savings Accounts, which we talked about in Episode 019 in details for those that want to go back and look at those. But give us the down-low on HSAs. I know you have this benefit through the VA, but this has the lethal triple-tax benefits, which are talked about often. So why are HSAs so powerful?

Tim Church: Well, exactly just like you said. It has the triple tax benefit. But yeah, this is one of the cool things that I started for my wife and I for this year for 2018 because I didn’t really know much about it before and what the implications were. But just going through as we talked about through YFP, I mean, it really has a lot of power. And the name itself is really a misnomer because you look at that and you say, Health Savings Account, so it’s just a regular savings account that I can use to pay health expenses, right? Well, not exactly. It can actually be an investment vehicle. It’s really an investment account in disguise. It really depends on your intentions or how you’re going to use it. And for some of these accounts, you have to have a certain amount before you can unlock those investment options. So for example, for me, is I had to have $2,000 in the account before I was allowed to contribute anything towards an actual investment.

Tim Ulbrich: Does that vary by who offers the accounts?

Tim Church: Yeah, I think it does. I don’t believe that that is an IRS stipulation. I think it does depend on the bank that is servicing the HSA.

Tim Ulbrich: I thought I saw that on the Facebook group, people were talking about, well, ‘with my employer, that number is different,’ so yeah.

Tim Church: Right. So like we were talking about is, how you’re going to manage this account really depends on that intention. So you could be using this account to strictly pay for medical expenses, and the benefit of doing that is you’d be paying for them pre-tax, which is not a bad thing. I mean, that’s a great way if you have anticipated medical expenses and you want to be able to pay for them with some tax efficiency, then that’s great. But you can also look at this from the perspective as I’m going to use my HSA as an investment vehicle. So you’re going to say, I’m going to pay for all of my medical expenses out-of-pocket, and I’m just going to invest the rest, and I’m going to treat it like an IRA or I’m going to treat it like my 401k in that my goal is to beat inflation to actually get some compound growth.

Tim Ulbrich: And is the thought here if you’re going to pay for your medical expenses out-of-pocket now and really let that grow, it sounds like it’s got the benefits of a Roth IRA plus you’re not paying taxes now. It’s got that, you know, the highs of the 401k, 403b and also the highs of the IRA. But at some point, are you forced to use those on medical expenses?

Tim Church: No, so it’s really kind of interesting about the account. So just to jump into that triple tax benefit. So the first one is that it will lower your adjusted gross income. So you can — any contributions you’re making to the account are tax-deductible.

Tim Ulbrich: Like a 401k and 403b.

Tim Church: Correct — if they’re traditional, correct.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Tim Church: And then that account, any contribution that you put in are going to grow tax-free. Now, the withdrawals are tax-free as long as you can prove that they’re being used to pay for a qualified medical expense because otherwise, you’re going to pay a 20% tax if you take the money out before age 65 for a non-qualified expense. Now, if it’s after age 65, to my knowledge, there’s no additional penalty, there’s no additional tax. You basically, it’s like a regular retirement account. Now, here’s the caveat. So — and this is one thing that I didn’t know until I really got into it is that let’s say you contribute to an HSA over 20-30 years. And those accounts are growing, you’ve been investing them aggressively, and you’ve got some great growth on them. And let’s say you’re 60. Can you pull out some of that growth that you’ve had, some of that money that’s in there, but without paying taxes on it? And you can because the caveat is that if you keep track of all of your medical expenses you paid over that time that you’ve been contributing and can prove that you’re essentially reimbursing yourself, you’re not going to have to pay those taxes. But the key is really, you have to keep a good record of those receipts. What I’ve been doing is basically putting anything I have into the cloud, into Google Drive, and doing that for every year so I know exactly what I’ve paid and what I can technically claim as being a reimbursable expense.

Tim Ulbrich: Sounds like you need to develop like an HSA tracking expense app.

Tim Church: Yeah, there’s probably something out there.

Tim Ulbrich: Maybe it’s the next business project. But so unfortunately, not everybody has these available. But for those that do — and we’ll get into this prioritization — you often hear people putting these at the level of, OK, take your match, and then you think about an HSA. We’ll come back to that, but the reason that is and why they are so highly regarded in terms of priority investing is because of the tax benefits that you were just talking about. But not everybody qualifies. I know I haven’t with the employers I’ve worked with. In the state benefits, we didn’t have what was considered a high-deductible health plan. So to qualify, you have to be enrolled in a high-deductible health plan. What basically is a high-deductible health plan? Well, this year, for an individual, it’s having a plan with a deductible of at least $1,350. And for a family, that deductible is at least $2,700. Now, I think what we’ve seen with health insurance benefits pushing some of the costs back into the consumer and obviously increasing deductibles, we’ve seen more people being eligible for these. And I think it’s a great time to talk about this because of the time period around open enrollment. So if you’re somebody saying, do I have a high-deductible health plan? Do I not? Does my employer offer an HSA or not? Now is the time to look to see where this may fit in the context of your prioritization of investing.

Tim Church: And I would say that the two major reasons that my wife and I, we decided to switch from a traditional PPO health plan to a high-deductible health plan, really for the opportunity to contribute to the HSA but also the other benefit is that high-deductible health plans typically have lower premiums. So with the old plan, I was paying a lot more each month, but I wasn’t using any of the insurance that I was paying for. So if you’re relatively healthy, I think it’s a great option. So if stuff comes up, you might be paying some money out-of-pocket, but again, you wouldn’t have had that option otherwise to even contribute to an HSA. And you have to really look in the context of what your premiums are.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s a great point. And I think what you just said too speaks to the power of the emergency fund and having an emergency fund because if you can afford to take on that risk of, you know, maybe I’m healthy now, something comes up unexpectedly, I get slapped with a huge payment. Then ultimately, you’re ready to take that on, and you can afford it without feeling that risk of that. So what we didn’t talk about here with HSAs is the max contribution amount. So we talked about it with 401k’s and 403b’s or the TSPs, we’re looking at $18,500. We talked about with the IRAs, $5,500. What about the HSAs?

Tim Church: So as of 2018, if you’re single, it’s $3,450. And then if you’re self plus one or family, it’s $6,900. And an additional $1,000 if you’re 55 or older for catch-up. And this — just like the other accounts — this typically changes every year, every couple years.

Tim Ulbrich: So what I like, if you start to string these together between a 401k, a 403b, a Roth IRA or a traditional IRA, if you qualify as well as if you have access to an HSA, you can start to get to a point where you’re saving a significant percentage of your salary, probably more than many listening, especially in the contest of other goals. But nonetheless, you have the option to be saving a significant portion of your salary that has tax advantages. And I think that’s key because one of the last things that we want to talk about here is the taxable or brokerage accounts. And so with the taxable brokerage accounts, why I said that previous point I think is important is that I see a lot of new graduates getting ads and promotions for some of these apps and tools and things that are out there. But they’re investing outside of the tax-advantaged accounts. And so I think as we talk about taxable or brokerage account, where we see this fit in is once you’ve exhausted all your other tax-favored retirement plans, this probably is the final option that you’re looking at because of the loss of tax-shield capital gains taxes that you have to pay, etc. So good news here is if you get to the point where you max out everything and you’re looking for options, there’s lots of options out there in which you can invest. But don’t get too far ahead of yourself if you’re not taking advantage of the match or other tax advantages that we’ve talked about previously. So last one quickly before we talk about prioritization of these buckets would be the SEP IRA. And I think this is timely because of your side hustle series. And so maybe we have people out there that own their own business, are starting their own business, want to, and to me, when I see information about a SEP IRA, that makes me want to start some businesses because you’ve got some really good advantages with retirement options. So what is a SEP IRA? And what flexibility and freedom does it give you in terms of retirement?

Tim Church: So a SEP IRA stands for a Simplified Employee Pension. And basically, if you’re self-employed, you own your business, you have this opportunity, this benefit available to you. And this could be in addition to a 401k that you have available. So this could be something that you’re doing on the side, an additional business you own. But one of the advantages is that there’s a lot more money you could potentially contribute versus what’s available with a 401k or IRA. I mean, it’s a huge difference. But obviously, you have to be making that much money up to that certain point to be able to. So right now, what the guidelines are, is that you can contribute up to the lesser amount of either 25% of your compensation or $55,000. But when I see those kind of numbers — like you’re shaking your head here, Tim — that just gets people fired up, I think, to say, hey, what if I was able to bring in an additional amount of income that I’m no longer capped out at this 401k, this IRA max that’s there.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, reason No. 403 to start a side hustle, right? I mean, when you see those numbers, and it gets me fired up even for the work that we’re doing that to your point, it’s dependent on compensation, obviously, you mentioned the lesser of those numbers. But in addition to other retirement vehicles, you can obviously make some great headway if you’re in a position to do that. OK, let’s jump in now. We’ve set the stage, we’ve spent a decent amount of time talking about the buckets, which is important because before we can talk about prioritization, we have to know what we’re talking about. What is a 401k? What is a 403b? What is a Roth? Now, a couple disclaimers here that I think we have to talk about because we’re probably going to take some flack regardless, which is OK. But not everyone is going to agree with the prioritization that we’re talking about. Not necessarily that there is one right way in terms of order of investing. Now, we’re going to give a framework on that that we think many listening will follow, but to my point earlier, everybody has different personal situations in terms of income earned, in terms of other financial priorities, in terms of other goals, when you want to retire, all types of variables that may come into play in terms of how you actually execute this.

Tim Church: Yeah, and I think like there’s a lot of people out there that are really into real estate, and they look at that as even taking priority over some of these retirement accounts because either they’re all-in or they’re confident that they’re going to get good returns there. And I think that’s great. I think for some people, that is an awesome option. But I think here, like you said, we’re talking in the context of, OK, let’s focusing in on these retirement accounts and just really try to figure out, well, what is the best order?

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think the other situation I think about, Tim, is those that are on fire about the FIRE moment, the Financial Independence Retire Early, waiting until 59.5 to access your accounts may not be the goal they’re after. And so you know, obviously again, this to me really speaks to the power of sitting down with somebody like Tim Baker and financial planning and talking about what are your goals and then putting out a map to be able to achieve those. The last thing I have to say here as a disclaimer before we jump into the prioritization — if Tim Baker was here, he would make me say this — is what we are saying is not financial advice, right? So we don’t know of the thousands of you listening, we don’t know what your own personal situation is. So we’re looking, again, down the lane of investing. If you have disposable income to invest, this is the priority we think you should consider. But we’re not saying, run out and do this tonight. You’ve got to think about the context of the plan. OK, No. 1 — I think everyone agrees with this. I mean, maybe there’s a person or two out there, maybe? I don’t know.

Tim Church: I haven’t seen — so what I was looking at to see what else is on the Internet and some of the other bloggers, I think this is one thing almost everybody I think actually agrees on.

Tim Ulbrich: For how much disagreement there is.

Tim Church: Right.

Tim Ulbrich: So No. 1, as you may have guessed it, is the employer match, right? No surprises here, most people agree on this. You are getting free money from your employer. If you don’t take it, you’re leaving it on the table. And so we even believe, we talked about this in the Dave Ramsey episode, Episode 068, the match has to be a priority in your financial plan, even in the context, I think, of student loan debt — maybe a different conversation depending on personal situations, but you have to take that money. Now, for you, you mentioned that 5% match. So let’s just use a hypothetical. Somebody’s making $100,000, they put in 5%, they get 5%, that’s $10,000 of tax-deductible retirement savings that are going to grow over time. You’re putting in 5, your employer’s putting in 5. And again, as I mentioned earlier, you’ll see this in different situations in terms of the percentage of salary match. It may be 5%, 6%, 3%, no percent, dollar-for-dollar, $.50-per-dollar. And so it’s all over the place.

Tim Church: Or what you get. What have you gotten at schools? You’ve gotten like 14%?

Tim Ulbrich: Well, I’m unemployed right now.

Tim Church: Oh, OK.

Tim Ulbrich: But you know, yeah. So you know, I’m lucky to work in the state teachers’ retirement system, which we actually are forced to put in. I remember when I was in the grinding out of paying off debt, it was painful. But we are forced to put in 14%, and there’s some fees and things that shakes out to that they match around 10%. So it’s kind of a forced combined contribution of about 24% total, which is really nice. But the downside is I actually don’t get any Social Security, so I won’t receive that Social Security benefit in the future if it’s there. But we’ll see. So No. 1, employer match. Now, No. 2 is HSAs or Health Savings Accounts. Take the employer match, and I think what often, people do right after the employer match is they just go up and maybe max out their 401k. I think what you’re making a point here is maybe after that match, move into the HSA if you have it available.

Tim Church: Yeah, and I think — but even going back to is that a bad option of putting more money in your 401k? So I think like in the context, which is interesting here is that really, even if you’re switching up the order on some of these, like really, it’s still not a bad decision. The decision to actually put money into the accounts to grow is a good thing. But I do think, you know, the HSA with that triple tax benefit, it’s hard to argue against that, right?

Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely.

Tim Church: I mean, it’s such a powerful tool. I think Dr. James Daly of the White Coat Investor, he calls it the Stealth IRA, which is pretty cool.

Tim Ulbrich: I love it.

Tim Church: Because it’s basically like you’re getting the opportunity to contribute to another IRA if that’s your intention behind it. But it can really be a powerful way to get some additional retirement savings.

Tim Ulbrich: I do have HSA envy. I don’t have access to an HSA, so unfortunately, yes, great match, but I wish I had that HSA option. So No. 1, we said employer match. No 2, HSA triple tax benefit makes a whole lot of sense.

Tim Church: If available, right? Because not everybody’s going to have that.

Tim Ulbrich: Right. High-deductible health plan, you may or may not have it. Now, No. 3 here, we’re getting into the IRA. And really what we’re getting at is the Roth IRA component. And obviously, for those that don’t meet those income qualifications, they would have to do a back-door Roth IRA. But what we really want to take advantage here is the tax-free savings that are going to happen over time. You’re paying taxes today, you put the money in, it grows tax-free, you go to pull it out, you’re not paying taxes anymore. So even though this doesn’t have the same maximum as the 401k, 403b’s, you’re not going to be able to have these be equally weighted, pre- and post-tax, right? $18,500, $5,500. To me, I see this as the way that you’re balancing out getting to the point of retirement, you’ve got some free and post-tax savings. So if I’m maxing a Roth IRA at $5,500 per year or back-door Roth IRA to get there, and then I’m putting in $18,500 in a 401k or 403b, of course I’m going to have more in accounts that are going to get taxed than I am in accounts that are not going to get taxed. But I’m balancing those out a little bit.

Tim Church: It also depends too if you have a Roth 401k, then also that could be after-tax contributions, so it’s possible you could have both. You could do the Roth IRA and a Roth 401k and basically putting everything in after taxes and then letting your accounts grow tax-free. I think going back to what we talked about is that since most pharmacists are not going to get the deduction if they contribute to a traditional IRA, it sort of makes sense to always go to the back-door Roth. Well, I think one of the interesting questions — and this has come up before — is why would I not just go up higher on my 401k versus contributing to an IRA? And really, you know, the way I look at that is either one is still a great option in terms of the contributions. The difference, really, is that with the IRA, this is outside of your employer, which means a lot more options.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah. And that’s why you hear — we won’t get into it here — but that’s why you hear when you switch employers, there’s value in rolling that over into an IRA where you can unlock those options. And one of the things I’ve seen with Tim Baker’s help is the variety of what people have available to them in an employer-sponsored 401k or 403b, both options and fees, good or bad, is all over the place. Some have very limited options, very high fees, and maybe their employer doesn’t even really recognize or acknowledge the value. Others are maybe working with a Fidelity, Vanguard, whomever, have tons of options, can get low-fee accounts. So this really is an individualized decision.

Tim Church: I totally agree because when I look at the Thrift Savings Plan, one of the benefits of a Thrift Savings Plan, like we talked about earlier, is there’s such low fees on that. And so with a situation like that, I mean, you could make the argument that either one is going to be fine. But if I’ve got really low-fee options that are getting great growth, then I may go and try to max out my 401k or increase prior to going to the IRA.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think your point is a good one. At the end of the day, we’re splitting hairs, right? If you’re having this debate, there’s lots of opinions, lots of nuances, but at the end of the day, you’re doing a good job, you’re being intentional, you’re saving for the future. I tend to favor the prioritization of really maxing out the Roth component before I go back to max out the traditional 401k because of what I mentioned earlier and having that balance of pre- and post-tax, but again, people have different answers on that based on what they think is going to happen in terms of the tax component. So just going back in order here — your employer match, HSA, IRA component, we talked specifically about the Roth component of an IRA or a Roth 401k, right? And then going back to your traditional 401k, maxing that out to the $18,500. Now, if you get to this point, and you’ve taken an employer match, you’ve maxed out an HSA if you have it, you’ve maxed out the IRA, and you’ve maxed out your 401k, you’re crushing it.

refinance student loans

Tim Church: Yeah, I mean, that’s pretty awesome. I mean, I’m not quite there yet. But it really is encouraging to see those numbers as a goal, really, to say, hey that’s where I want to be.

Tim Ulbrich: When you put those numbers together, we’re talking about $18,500, another few thousand, another $5,000 — you’re saving a significant percentage of your salary, looking at several million dollars with compound growth over 30-40 years. Now, after we max out the 401k or the 403b or the TSP, then obviously, if people have access to a SEP IRA, they’re going to take advantage of that. Now, after Step 5 here…

Tim Church: Right, that would depend if they have some kind of additional income or potentially they don’t work as a W2 employee, and their main business or their main job is as an employer or a small business. So that actually could be somewhat reversed depending on the situation and depending on what kind of job you have.

Tim Ulbrich: What you have available, yes. I think what we’re doing here is — before we get to the last one, which we’re calling them brokerage accounts, which as I made the point earlier, these don’t have the same tax advantages that all these others do. So what we’re advocating for is really maxing out the opportunities you have to save in tax-advantaged vehicles and then ultimately if you’re still looking to save more, personally I’d probably advocate for maybe some real estate investing, some business stuff, other things before even brokerage accounts. But you’ve got lots of options available.

Tim Church: You’ve got lots of options. And the other thing too is as long as you’re not continually trading fees and different things like that, I mean, capital gains tax is actually still tax efficient versus some other things that are out there that you’re going to get taxed ordinary income.
Tim Ulbrich: Absolutely. Fun stuff. We covered a lot here, packed full of information. I think this is one we’re going to hopefully go back and say, ‘Hey, you got questions about the different investing buckets, prioritization, go back to Episode 073, we’ve got some great information.’ And this is a reminder, for those of you that haven’t yet done so, if you could leave us a review in iTunes, if you like what you heard, or whatever podcast player that you’re listening to, we would greatly appreciate it. Also, if you haven’t yet done so, make sure to head on over to YourFinancialPharmacist.com, where we’ve got lots of resources, guides, calculators, that are intended to help you as the pharmacy professional on your path towards achieving financial freedom. Tim Church, this has been fun and looking forward to coming back and finishing up the series.

Tim Church: It’s been great, Tim.

Sponsor: Before we wrap up today’s episode of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, I want to again thank our sponsor, PolicyGenius. Now, you’ve heard us talk many times before on the show about the importance of having a solid life insurance plan in place. And while we know that life insurance isn’t the most exciting or enjoyable thing to think about, actually having a life insurance policy in place is a really good feeling. And PolicyGenius is an easy way to get life insurance online. In just two minutes, you can compare quotes from the top insurers to find the best policy for you. And we know that when you compare quotes, you save money. It’s really that simple. So if you’ve been avoiding getting life insurance because it’s difficult or confusing, give PolicyGenius a try. Just go to PolicyGenius.com, get your quote, and apply in minutes. You can do the whole thing on your phone right now. PolicyGenius, the easy way to compare and buy life insurance.

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