In today’s economy, the reality is that our dollar is never going to be worth more than it is today. Inflation acts as a stealth tax, eroding the purchasing power of your money over time. In this post, we’ll explore how to regain control of your money and position yourself to take advantage of inflation rather than becoming its victim.
Inflation has surged by 18.6% over the past three years. To put that into perspective, something that cost $100 three years ago now costs $118.60. This means your money will never be worth more than it is today. Consider this: if you buried $10,000 in your backyard and dug it up 10 years later, it would still be $10,000, but its purchasing power would have significantly diminished.
The most valuable dollar you own is the one you have today. When you maintain control of your money, you can position yourself to benefit from inflation rather than fall prey to it. Having access to liquid money opens up opportunities that wouldn’t be available if your funds were locked away.
Three Strategies to Regain Control of Your Money
Opt for a 30-Year Mortgage: Instead of focusing on paying less interest with a 15-year mortgage, choose a 30-year mortgage to prioritize cash flow over interest rate. This approach allows you to keep more of your money under your control.
Avoid Extra Payments on Your Mortgage: If you have a 30-year mortgage, resist the urge to make extra payments. Use that money to build a pool of cash that you own and control. This will give you more flexibility and options in the future.
Limit Retirement Contributions to the Employer Match: Contribute to your retirement account only up to the employer match. There’s no guarantee that the dollars you contribute today will have the same buying power when you withdraw them in retirement. Instead, focus on maintaining control of your money now, when it’s most valuable.
If you have high-interest credit card debt, it’s wise to prioritize paying it down before making excess contributions to retirement accounts. High-interest debt can erode your financial stability, so focus on controlling your cash flow and eliminating debt before locking away funds in retirement accounts.
By implementing these strategies, you can regain control of your money and your life. Remember, whoever controls your money controls your life. The more control you have, the more financially free you will be, with options and opportunities at your fingertips.
If you’d like to learn more about how we can help you regain control of your finances, visit our website at tier1capital.com to schedule a free strategy session. Remember, it’s not how much money you make but how much money you keep that really matters.
If you have been following our blog post, you know that we are constantly talking about the importance of you being in control of your money or regaining control of your money. So why is it so difficult to accomplish despite it being a very simple concept? Today, we are going to talk about the unintended consequences that result from following traditional or conventional wisdom when it comes to your finances and how to regain control of your money by just knowing these things.
Now there are three main institutions that are trying to gain control of our cash flow on a monthly basis: the banks, Wall Street and the government. It is like a game to them in the sense that they set the rules. These rules are:
1. Gain control of as much of our money as possible.
2. Get that money on a systematic basis, meaning they want their hands in our checkbook every single month.
3. Hold on to or control that money for as long as possible.
We are going to take a look at how Wall Street gets us to act in their best interest. By following the rules that benefit them. Firstly, they want to take control of our money. So how do they do that? They will tell you that the only chance you have to beat inflation is to be in equities. They tell you that you have to be in it to win it. They tell you to employ strategies like dollar cost averaging. That’s how they get us to do things on a systematic basis. Also, they tell you that the higher the risk, the higher the reward. So these are things that they tell us to get us, to play the game by their rules so that they could win. Secondly, when the market is down, they tell you that you can’t sell now because you are going to be locked in losses. But when the market is up and you say, “Hey, I wanna sell because I think we made a pretty good profit”. They will say, “Geez, I don’t want you to miss out on this profit”. Plus if you sell now, you have to pay taxes on the gains. So if you don’t sell low, because they don’t want you to lock in losses and you don’t sell high because they don’t want you to pay taxes or miss out on a run, then, when do you sell? Well for Wall Street’s benefit, they never want you to sell.
You see, their job is to get you in the market and keep you in the market at all costs because that is what benefits them, but it doesn’t necessarily benefit you.
Now, how do the banks get us to do what’s in their best interest? Let’s take a look at the rules again. Rule number one is they want to get our money. So when it comes to a mortgage, we want to put a downpayment as high as possible. Because with a lower loan or a lower mortgage, you will pay less interest. Rule number two, they want to get our money on a systematic basis. So they will entice us with lower interest rates on shorter term mortgages. For example, a 15 year mortgage will have a lower interest rate than a 30 year mortgage. Rule number three, they want to keep our money for as long as possible. So with the 15 year mortgage, we’re giving up more of our monthly cash flow to the bank. Even though we’re paying them less interest, we’re still losing control of that monthly cash flow. With the home equity, they tell us that it’s our home equity as if we have control of it and that we are more secure when our house is paid off. But in reality, we don’t have access to that money unless they give us permission to access that home equity. So who’s really benefiting from a shorter mortgage, us or the banks? The answer is clear. The banks are following the three rules and they are in control of our money by positioning it as if we are in control and that it is in our best interest.
Finally, the government gets us to play the game by enticing us to invest in retirement plans for our future. They give us a tax deduction on a small amount of money today so that money can grow on a deferred basis and then they have the potential to tax us at a much higher rate in the future.Think about it, you are putting money away today for a small tax deduction, but in the future, the government determines how much of that money you get to keep. Even if you earn a decent rate of return over many years, you don’t know how much of that money is actually going to be available to you to fund your retirement lifestyle. The government gets us to play the game, but they are also consulting with Wall Street and the banks to create the rules. Who else benefits when we participate in retirement plans? Wall Street, because they get to hang onto our money until 59 and a half, or we pay a penalty and tax. Secondly, the bank’s benefits because if we’re maxing out our retirement account contributions, that means our money is tied up. When the time comes that we have to pay for our children’s college education or buy a car or go on vacation, we don’t have access to our money as it is tied up in retirement accounts or home equity. Therefore we have to borrow more money and who benefits when we borrow more money? Obviously it’s the banks.
Now that we have looked at how the government, Wall Street and the banks get us to follow their rules so that they can win and can be in control of our money, what’s the alternative that is not following their conventional financial advice?
The alternative is to save in a place where you have full access and control of your money. A place where your money could grow on a continuous compound interest scale and never be interrupted even after you spend the money. We accomplish this by saving in a specially designed whole life insurance policy, where we get to control our money, where we have full liquidity use and control and access to our cash value for whatever we want, whenever we want. So that we will not be forced to go to the banks to borrow and give up control of our monthly cash flow.
If you’re interested in learning more, book your free strategy session today to know exactly how we can accomplish this. Remember it’s not how much money you make. It’s how much money you keep that really matters.
Congratulations! You are now ready to access the cash value in your life insurance policy and might want to organize your finances by separating your family finances from your policy finances. In this blogpost we will talk about everything you need to know about setting up a segregated account for your policy finances.
These are the four simple steps:
Step No.1
Is to set up a new checking account to separate from your family finances. With this segregated account, you have two options. You can do it at your regular bank, which has the benefit of quick and easy transfers that will usually take within a day or two between bank accounts. The second option is to go online and find a new bank that might pay a higher interest rate, but will take a few extra days to transfer money between the bank accounts. So keep that in mind.
Step No.2
Now that you have the new bank account set up, the second step is to request a policy loan. So however you do that with your insurance company, get the policy loan and deposit into the segregated checking account. From there, you will pay your major expenses. Whether it’s paying off a credit card, buying a new car, paying for a wedding, or going on vacation. You will pay right from that segregated checking account.
Step No.3 The key is to pay yourself back just as if you took a loan from the bank. You can set up an amortization schedule. Most of the time, our clients will decide with an amount that they could afford to pay back to the policy loan on a monthly basis. Some will decide to pay it back over two years or five years. That will determine how much they have to pay themselves back. Also, keep in mind that the deductions to pay back the policy loan will directly come from that segregated account. You will have to transfer money from your family checking account into the segregated account, back to the insurance company.
. Step No.4
Determine whether or not you want to pay yourself back at a higher interest rate than what the insurance company is going to charge you. Remember that if you pay yourself with a higher interest rate that is more than what the insurance company is requesting you to pay, the loan will be paid off earlier than the amortization schedule. Which means that you may have a Thirty Six months amortization schedule, but the policy loan will be paid back in just Thirty Four months. If that’s the case, we always recommend our clients to stay on schedule by transferring the monthly payment from your family finances account to your segregated account. Because that money that stays there is literally the profit that you made from yourself for doing self finance. Once those profits build up you can use it to the Paid Up Additions Rider or to purchase additional policies.
In his bestselling book, “Becoming Your Own Banker”, Nelson Nash made a great argument for paying a higher interest rate. He called it “Don’t Steal The Peas”. His analogy is that if you own a grocery store and you want to buy groceries or go grocery shopping in your own store then you may want to go out by the back door bypassing the cash register. He referred to that action as “stealing the peas”. He meant to say that you have to pay back the principal amount and interest. You wouldn’t want your wife to buy groceries at ShopRite, Price Shopper or other grocery stores. You have to shop at your own grocery store like a captive customer. Since you are shopping at your own store you should pay yourself a higher interest rate. That’s what he meant by not stealing the peas, pay yourself. Not only the interest rate, the insurance company is requesting, but a higher interest rate because you are a captive customer.
What are the benefits of paying yourself higher interest rates?
Every time you make a payment back to your policy, you’re increasing the amount of capital that’s available to you. Not to the credit cards nor to the finance companies. You have access to every dollar you are paying back to your policy loan. Now, keep in mind, setting up this segregated or separate bank account is completely an optional step. You do have the choice to put the policy loan proceeds into your family bank account, but there are some benefits in doing it this way with the segregated bank account. First and foremost, it just makes things easier to track. You can track your progress. You can witness or realize your profits from self-finance at the end of each month.
You earn interest every month instead of the bank, finance company or credit card company. You will be able to see how much they would be earning off of you.
Now let’s recap. The four steps to getting this set up for yourself.
Step One is to pick a bank and set up a segregated checking account. Step Two is to request your policy loan and have it deposited directly into your segregated account. Step Three is to create an amortization schedule based on your cashflow or your timeline. Step Four is to track your progress by reviewing your bank statements every month.
Remember that it’s not how much money you make, it’s how much you keep that really matters and it is our mission to help as many families as possible to come up with strategies to maximize their policy loans. If you’re ready to get started and learn how to put this strategy to work for you, schedule your free strategy session today.
” It takes discipline and focus in order to save for the future. “
This picture is what we refer to as the personal economic model. The fact of the matter is, everybody has a personal economic model. We use this diagram as a tool to show people how money works in their lives. The ultimate goal is to get to position A, where there’s enough money in the future lifestyle tanks, the risk and the safe tank to support our current lifestyle in retirement and through our life expectancy. So let’s take a look at how money works in our lives.
Let’s start by taking a look at how money enters our system. You’ll notice over here, we have the lifetime capital potential tank. You’ll also notice that this is the largest tank on the screen. That’s because anytime we earn income, whether it’s at our job, maybe an inheritance, maybe we will win the lottery, all that money flows through our lifetime capital potential tank. It doesn’t stay in there and it goes right through this tube and then hits the tax filter. Did you put the text filter on your personal economic model? No, none of us do.
It comes pre-installed on all the models and the government puts it there. What it does is, it diverts money from our lifetime capital potential and it diverts it into the government’s personal economic model. Once the money flows through the tax filter, we then reach our lifestyle regulator. This is where we have some choices. We can either save some money for our future lifestyle, or we could spend 100% of our income on our current lifestyle. After money flows through and is spent on current lifestyle, there’s no getting it back into our system and it makes it very difficult for us to reach position A. Rather than consuming all of our income. We have a choice as to how much we save for the future. Notice, that our future lifestyle tube is pointing upwards. It takes discipline and focus in order to save for the future.
Now we have some choices. We could either put money in the investment tank or the savings tank. Notice that the investment tank is labeled “risk”. There’s no lid on that tank. Depicting the fact that we have the potential to possibly lose some money in that tank. Alternatively, we can put money in the savings tank. The savings tank has a lid on it depicting the fact that we could never lose money in that tank. As long as money is in that tank.
Remember the ultimate goal is to get to position A, where we could turn off our income and we have enough money in both of these tanks to fund our lifestyle through our life expectancy. But what happens if your lifestyle regulator is turned up to 100%? That means that you’ve had very little success in saving money for the future. In the past, maybe you have a little money in your 401k at work, and maybe you have a bare minimum of an emergency fund. What happens when you’re in this position is that you have no access to capital. What happens is, you’re forced to borrow money and take on liabilities.
Maybe you have a little bit of credit card debt. Maybe you have a car loan. Maybe there’s some student loans that you haven’t had the chance to pay off yet. Notice that all of these debts have no collateral. The money spent on the credit cards, that’s gone. The car is a depreciating asset that the bank really doesn’t want.The car and the education, they can’t take your education back. So you have no collateral. But the fact of the matter is you do have collateral.
You are obligating your future income to pay those debts. And by obligating your future income, that reduces your future lifestyle and further compromises your ability to save for your future lifestyle. Consequently, that really puts in jeopardy your ability to get to position A. As you can see, we use this personal economic model to show people how money enters their system. More importantly, the consequences of all the choices that they can make with their money. Are you living within your means? If you’re not sure, we recommend you start with a budget. Take inventory of what you have coming in every month and what your monthly expenses are and what you could reasonably afford to save every month.
“We focus exclusively on making your money more efficient by showing you how to reduce or eliminate transferred money.”
This circle represents all the money that’s going to go through your hands throughout your lifetime. Now your circle might be larger than some folks and others might be larger than yours.The number one thing you have in common with everybody is that you want this circle to grow. There’s many ways that that can happen. The fact of the matter is, every dollar that goes through your circle of wealth is put into three categories. First there’s accumulated money. That’s the money you have saved and invested. Second is lifestyle money. That’s the house you live in, the car you drive and the schools your children go to. Third is transferred money. Transferred money is money that you’re giving up control of unknowingly and unnecessarily. There are two key words because unknowingly means, you don’t realize it. And unnecessarily means that, working together we can fix it.
Let me show you how we differ from traditional financial advisors. Traditional financial advisors want to take the money that you have saved and accumulated and show you how to get a higher rate of return by potentially taking on additional risk in order to do that. Well, what if you don’t want to take on additional risk? Well, you’re not a prospect for them. The second way that they can help you is they can show you how to reduce your current lifestyle in order to save more for the future. How much time do you really want to spend talking about how you could live on less? You see, nobody’s talking to you about transferred money. That’s things like interest on debt, taxes, any efficiencies in your current planning, maybe some fees nobody’s talking to you about, that transferred money.
That’s where we differ. We focus exclusively on making your money more efficient by showing you how to reduce or eliminate transferred money. Our mission is to put you in control of your money. Take a look at how we’ve let other financial institutions creep into our checkbook every month. We have a mortgage that’s due every monthand credit card bills. We have taxes that are paid before we even get our paycheck and those cars aren’t going to buy themselves. We all know this game, Tic Tac Toe, who won the first time you played ? Well for all of us, the answer is the person who showed us how to play. They showed us just enough to play, but not quite enough to win. The same is true for financial institutions, banks, and the government lending companies. They all showed us the game, but not enough to win.
Who’s teaching you the rules on how to win the financial game? That’s our job. We teach our clients and show them how to win the financial game. You see, traditional financial advisors focus only on your savings and investments. Their job or their goal is to move your money from where it is to them. But by focusing only on rate of return and/or taking on more risk in order to get a higher rate of return, you’re still ignoring opportunity costs, taxes, and interest on debt. The more you grow your money, the more taxes you have to pay. The more you grow your money, the more opportunity costs you’re giving up.
You see, the golfer over there is really important because we think that by focusing only on growing your savings and investments, that’s the equivalent of focusing only on the golf club in order to improve at golf. Where our process, we focus on how you use your money. We focus on the golf swing. We think by focusing on the swing, or the process of using your money, you can get much better results rather than focusing only on the product or getting a higher rate of return.
Most people think if they were just able to earn a little more income or a higher rate of return, that all their problems would be solved. But if we don’t address the inefficiencies in our system, they are going to grow with our circle of wealth and we’ll have more interest on debt, more taxes and more lost opportunity costs.
Here’s how we differ from traditional financial advisors. We focus exclusively on transferred money. Let me give you an example. Here’s a couple earning $100,000 saving 6% or $6,000 per year. They’re earning 5% on their savings. Now, a traditional financial advisor will come to them and say, we can show you how to get a much better rate of return. Maybe take on some additional risk in order to increase the output of that $6,000 that you’re saving. So let’s assume they can get you to 7%. Well, they’ve just added $120 to your bottom line, but you see, they focus on the 6% that you’re saving and they’re completely ignoring the $94,000 of annual expenses. Here’s where we differ. If we can reduce your annual expenses by eliminating efficiencies that are built into those expenses, just by 1%, that’s $940 and $940 is the equivalent of earning 15.67% on the $6,000 that you’re saving.
Now, here’s the irony. What does it cost to eliminate an inefficient expense? Well, it doesn’t cost anything. How much risk do you need to take to eliminate an inefficient expense, no risk. More importantly, how much of a reduction in your current lifestyle does it take to reduce an inefficient expense? There’s no impact on your lifestyle. So think about it, no risk, no cost and no reduction in lifestyle. We think that’s what makes us different because we don’t focus on trying to grow your money by taking on risk. We focus on growing your money by eliminating losses. Only two ways to fill up a leaky bucket. The first is to turn up the flow and the second is to plug the holes so that even if the flow is just a trickle, it will still get filled up.
“It’s really the best of both worlds when you’re a wealth creator.”
Albert Einstein once referred to compound interest as the eighth wonder of the world.Here’s the problem. Most people are so focused on not paying interest that their eye is completely taken off the ball. They completely ignore the concept of continually earning interest on their money. But there’s one foundational principle that we need to come to grips with and that is, we finance everything we buy. What does that mean? It means this, you’re either going to finance and pay interest to a bank or somebody else for the privilege of using their money or we’re going to pay cash and therefore give up interest that we could have earned, had we not paid cash.
That’s the secret. We either pay up or give up. If you’re looking to realize true financial freedom for yourself, keep this in mind. It’s not what you buy, but it’s how you pay for it that really matters. You know, most people think there’s two ways to pay for something. Either finance or pay cash. Well, there’s actually three ways. So let’s take a look at them. If you finance your debtor, you’re working to spend, you have no savings. You earn no interest and you pay interest. Most people recognize or realize that that’s a bad thing. Maybe they were taught by their parents that if you didn’t have enough money to pay cash, you didn’t need the item. Or they saw their parents struggle to get out of debt. Either way, they move to paying cash. So they save, they avoid paying interest, but they earn no interest. And then they pay cash.
There’s actually a third way, the wealth creator. This is where true financial freedom is really located. You save, you’re using other people’s money to maximize the efficiency of your money. You’re putting leverage to work for you. You save, you continuously earn compound interest. Then, when it’s time to buy something, you collateralize the purchase. Notice the key here in all three areas and all three methods. You still get the purchase.
It’s really the best of both worlds when you’re a wealth creator. Let’s take a look at what that looks like. Let’s say you finally graduated college and you have your first real job. Everyone at work has new cars and you finally have the income to qualify for a loan. So what do you do?You buy a car, you go to the dealer, you get a loan. 30 days later, you get a coupon booklet. What you did is, you bought a car and now you have payments. So you dug a hole and you filled it up. Five years later, you got a five-year-old car. You don’t have a payment, time to buy another car. You just keep digging a hole and fill it back up. But notice over time, you never get above the financial line of zero. So what’s the alternative? Well, the alternative is to pay cash. Paying cash takes tremendous discipline because in order to pay cash, you have to save first. So you delay the gratification of a new car until you have enough money to pay cash. Then when it’s time to pay cash, you drain down the tank, you spend your savings and then you got to start over.
Here’s the problem with paying cash. You still have payments because if you want to pay cash for the next car, you have to begin saving the day you bought the car. Then when you have enough money saved for another new car, five years later, then you drain down the tank. Again, notice over time, you don’t get too far above the financial line of zero. In fact, you’re not much better off than the spender. The only difference is, you lost interest along the way.
The way that we teach our clients is to become the wealth creator. When you’re a wealth creator, you’re saving. Your money is continuously earning compound interest, but then when it’s time to buy something, you collateralize your purchase. What does that mean? You’re using your savings as security against the loan. You’re pledging it as collateral and you still have a payment, but understand, if you finance, you have a payment. If you pay cash, you have a payment. If you’re the wealth creator, your money never stops earning compound interest. That’s the key to true financial freedom.
It’s like your money is literally in two places at one time because you’re able to make the purchase. You also are still able to earn interest on your savings because you’re never actually touching it. You’re using other people’s money. There are two main variables to compound interest, money and time. Every single time we drain the tank, we’re saying, “don’t worry, I could replenish that cash later.” What we often forget is that, time is a variable that we will never get back.
Let’s take a look at an example. Let’s say you’re saving $5,000 per year. You’re earning 5% interest on that money. We’re going to look at this over a 30 year period. We’re going to drain the tank down four times by paying cash and we’re going to refill it every five years. So here’s what happens. We go and we buy a car. Now had we not drain down the tank, our money could have continuously earn compound interest for us. And at the end we would have $353,804. But because we decided to pay cash, and we did this four times. And then we finally realized it wasn’t the amount of income that we were earning that was holding us back. It was how we were using our money that was holding us back. We started to continuously earn compound interest on our money. Notice we only have $71,034. That’s a difference of $282,770. Keep in mind, this person figured it out. After 20 years, most people never figure it out.
Here’s the problem with traditional financial planning. They completely ignore time. They’re so focused on earning a higher rate of return that they completely ignored the two factors of compound interest, time and money. Most people come to us thinking if only I could earn a higher rate of return, I could finally be financially free, but that’s not necessarily the case.
Let’s say you could earn 7% on your money. If you go through this same pattern of delaying compounding interest, now you’re out $431,000. That’s still a big number but let’s take a look at what happens. If you could earn 3% on your money, that’s a big number. Keep in mind, we made six purchases over a 30 year period of $30,000. That’s $180,000. You’re losing just as much if you caught onto this 20 years down the road in lost opportunity.
You see, it’s not what you buy, it’s how you pay for it that really matters. What is most important is to never jump off the compound interest curve. The key is to get on the compound interest curve as soon as possible and never jump off. That includes market losses. Although, financial advisors could promise a high rate of return, every time you experience a market loss, you’re jumping off the compound interest curve. We could see here just how detrimental that could be to your financial wealth.
In this video we break down the important things to consider when choosing an insurance company for the infinite banking concept.
1.) Choose the right agent
2.) The process is much more important than the product
3.) Make sure the company you choose is a mutual insurance company
4.) The company should have a proven track record of paying dividends and sharing profits with policy holders
There are hundreds of thousands of insurance agents out there, but only about 200 are licensed IBC practitioners with the Nelson Nash Institute. “
Are you thinking about getting an IBC policy but aren’t sure where to begin? The number one criterion when choosing the right insurance company for the infinite banking concept is to choose the right agent. There are hundreds of thousands of insurance agents out there, but only about 200 are licensed IBC practitioners with the Nelson Nash Institute.
As a licensed practitioner, we’re not only trained to set up and structure a policy, but most importantly, to guide you on how to use your policy throughout your life. It’s important to find someone who’s not only knowledgeable but who’s also implementing this in their own financial life. The last thing you want is someone who’s pitching you a policy but doesn’t believe in the concept enough to put their own skin in the game. Ultimately, your success or failure in any given methodology is going to come down to your execution.
The process is much more important than the product. The next criterion is to make sure you’re dealing with a mutual insurance company. Mutual insurance companies were formed for the benefit of the policy holders. All profits that the insurance company makes are funneled back to the policy holder in the form of tax-free dividends. In contrast, a stock owned insurance company funnels their profits back to their shareholders because they’re the owners of the company.
So, a stock owned insurance company is there for the benefit of the owners of the company, the shareholders. It’s similar to a bank. A bank is there for the benefit of the owners of the bank, the shareholders of the bank. You see, if you want to become your own banker, it’s important not only to control the process of the banking, but also to benefit from the profits of the banking, which can only happen with a mutual insurance company.
The next criterion you want to look for when choosing an insurance company? Does it have a proven track record of paying dividends and sharing profits with policy owners? The companies we choose for our clients have been paying dividends for more than 120 consecutive years. That’s World Wars, depressions, recessions, gas crisis’s, you name it. They’ve been through it all.
In conclusion, these are the criteria we use when choosing an insurance company for the infinite banking concept, but again, the most important thing is choosing the right agent for you. You want somebody who’s going to take the time to understand your situation and then set up a plan that will help you to maximize your benefits from the plan according to your situation.
If someone can get your money, is it really yours? In today’s video we compiled a list of six reasons why you should use whole life insurance for the infinite banking concept.
1. Control
2. Safety
3. Guaranteed growth
4. Collateral opportunities
5. Tax deferred growth
6. Asset protection
Life insurance is actually designed to have more cash tomorrow than it does today. “
Have you ever wondered why people use whole life insurance for the infinite banking concept? The first reason is, control. Let’s face it, you can’t regain control unless you’re actually in control. Life insurance is a unilateral contract. What does that mean? Well one party, the insurance company, has a binding obligation. They have to guarantee the cash value, the death benefit, and any other benefits. The other party, the policy owner, has very few promises, which is basically to pay the premium. Once the policy is approved and put into effect, the insurance company is working for you. That is control.
Number two is safety, life insurance companies reserve 95 cents of every dollar that’s deposited and in contrast, banks only reserved 2 cents for every dollar that’s deposited. Based on that, where do you think your money is safer? During the great depression, over 9,000 banks in this country failed. In contrast, less than one half of 1% of all life insurance company assets were impaired. That’s a big deal because people who owned life insurance contracts during that time were not only able to access their cash value to weather the storm, but they were also able to access it to take advantage of opportunities that arose during that time.
One of the best examples of this is JC penny, the American retailer. He had over 1400 stores before the great depression and he actually borrowed against his life insurance to keep his business open and weather that storm. This takes us to our third reason. Guaranteed growth. Life insurance is actually designed to have more cash tomorrow than it does today. There’s no chance for market loss because your growth is guaranteed. Your money is allowed to continuously compound. This takes us to our fourth reason. Collateral opportunities. What does that mean? Collateralization is important because it allows you to access your money without interrupting compounding. It’s like your money could be in two places at one time.
Collateralization means that your money is always in your policy and if you want to access it, the insurance company gives you a separate loan and puts a lien against your money, your cash value. When the loan is paid off, the lien is released, and your money is exactly where it would have been had you not borrowed. In essence, your money has been able to achieve continuously uninterrupted compounding.
Number five is, tax deferred growth. Money grows in your policy on a tax deferred basis. Keep in mind that doesn’t mean that it grows tax free, but you can access it on a tax favored basis. The point is you can’t accumulate wealth in a taxable environment. Let me give you an example. If you start off with a dollar and that dollar doubles every year for 20 consecutive years, meaning that you earn 100% interest each and every year for 20 consecutive years, at the end of 20 years, your dollar would’ve grown to $1,048,576 however, you didn’t pay tax on that money. If you had to pay tax in a 25% tax bracket, how much do you think you would be left with after tax?
Well, 25% of 1 million is 250,000 so I think we’d be left with about $750,000.
The reality is you would end up with $72,571, but what happened to the rest of the money? Well, it was never there. Your money was never allowed to double. You were never allowed to earn 100% interest because you had to pay taxes each and every year along the way. That’s why you end up with less money in a taxable environment.
Number six is, asset protection. Life insurance is protected from creditors, predators, and legislators. Life insurance is regulated by the 50 States. Each state has different levels of asset protection. Check with your state to see how much protection you have on your policies, but let’s face it, if somebody can get your money, is it really yours?
Let’s recap the six reasons why we use whole life for infinite banking. Number one, control; two, safety; three, guaranteed growth; four, collateral opportunities; Five, tax deferred growth and six, is asset protection. My mentor, Nelson Nash, author of the bestselling book Becoming Your Own Banker, said it best. Wealth has to reside somewhere. What better place than a whole life insurance policy? A free contract between free people!
What makes us so passionate about helping our clients become financially independent?
With over 35 years of experience in the financial services industry, we have seen how following conventional wisdom can lead you astray. What makes us so passionate about helping our clients become financially independent? Growing up in a family that lived paycheck to paycheck really changed Tim’s perspective on life. After following some great advice from Don Blanton and Nelson Nash, Tim realized, maintaining the efficiency of your money and maintaining the liquidity use and control of your money, will let you have financial freedom. It is our goal now to help as many people as we can, become financially independent.
“It’s become our mission to help our clients become financially independent by using these concepts so that they could release the financial stress and pressure and maintain or attain financial engines”
At tier one capital, our mission is to help our clients become financially free. We believe that you should be in control of your money, not the banks, not the financial institutions, and certainly not the government. Today we’re going to tell you a little bit about why we’re so passionate about helping our clients to become financially independent and why liquidity use, and control of your money is the key to becoming financially independent.
A lot of times when we meet with clients, they say, this is so simple and so different, how did you guys come up with this process? Let me tell you a little bit about my journey over the past 35 years in the financial services industry and in order to do so, I want to take you back to my childhood. Growing up in Wyoming, Pennsylvania in a blue-collar family, my dad worked in the coal mines and Thursday night was pay day. On Thursday nights my mom would get my dad’s pay, go to the grocery store and cash the check to pay bills for the next day. Sometimes, however, my dad would come home on a Thursday night and he didn’t have his pay.
So now let’s fast forward to the Christmas of 1993, sitting around my parents kitchen table with my family, reminiscing about the good old days. It certainly came up about the few times where my dad would come home without his pay. It was those times when my mom would load my brother, sister, and I into the car and sit in front of my dad’s boss’s house waiting for him to come home, to get my dad’s pay. Now, as a kid, I had no idea why we were there. I asked my mom, what were we doing there? She said, waiting for dad’s pay. I asked, why didn’t you just wait until the next day? She replied, we lived pay to pay, we needed that money to pay bills. It was at that point that I realized that I was living pay to pay, despite the fact that I was making 10 times what my dad had ever made, despite the fact that I had no dependence. I had a 15-year mortgage, and I was maxing out my 401k.
Yes, embarrassingly, I had credit cards and there were even times when I had to go to my dad and borrow money to pay my mortgage. Why? Because I didn’t have any access to money. It was at that point that I realized that I was living pay to pay, despite the fact that I was making good money and I was following conventional wisdom by the book. I knew at that point that things had to change. It became, from that point forward, my mission to find ways to help people to become financially independent. I was able to figure some things out on own and then in 1995, I was introduced to a guy by the name of Don Blanton, who developed a whole financial planning system around making your money more efficient.
With this system, we’re able to identify where our clients are giving up control of their money, unknowingly and unnecessarily. We look at the five areas of wealth transfer; taxes, mortgages, how you fund your retirement plan, how you fund college tuition for your children and how you make major capital purchases. It was Don’s system that proved that the process of how you use your money is way more important than where your money is. Then in July of 1997, I met a gentleman by the name of Nelson Nash. Nelson taught me that the importance of having access to capital when opportunities come about. Being in a position to take advantage of opportunities only comes to those people who have access to their money. Nelson taught me the importance of being in control of the financing function in your life.
Think about conventional wisdom. It tells us to max out our 401k’s and put extra on our mortgage. But by doing those things, it only makes you look financially free on paper. You don’t actually have access to that capital. When opportunities or emergencies arise, our clients come to us, they look good on paper, they’re making great income, but they’re financially stuck because they don’t have access to capital when they need it most.
It’s in the combination of maximizing the efficiency of your money and maintaining the liquidity use, and control of your money so you have control of your cashflow. You have access when you really need it. Then financial freedom can emerge. It’s become our mission to help our clients become financially independent by using these concepts so that they could release the financial stress and pressure and maintain or attain financial engines.
Meet George and Beth: A Middle Class Family With No Way to Pay for Their Children’s College
George and Beth purchased a lovely home in a safe and quiet neighborhood shortly after they wed. As a two family income, both worked 9 to 5 jobs and made a decent living. This afforded them the opportunity to live within their means and save to start a family. Their bills were covered, they were able to pay down their debts, and they were even able to put away money for retirement.
After having their first child, the two remained steadfast in saving for retirement as well as beefing up their rainy day fund. Once their second child was born the family still continued to put away savings and afford their lifestyle without compromise.
They dreamed of a cabin in the mountains after retirement. A nice quiet place to relax after working hard for their whole lives. Beth longed to sit in front of a big window to read with a warm cup of tea, while George was hoping for a lot of acreage and big porch to enjoy it from. They were on track with their retirement savings to be able to start building their cabin – after their kids were grown up and moved away, in about 15 years.
By conventional standards, George and Beth were living the dream and doing everything right financially.
As they approached their late 30’s, the couple began to see that even though their salaries were continuing to increase, it wasn’t keeping up with the increasing costs of their family. Sitting at the dinner table, bills and statements scattered about, the two faced a big dilemma. Their current financial situation wasn’t as bright as they had hoped.
With their first born turning 11, they had begun to think about the cost of a college education. Luckily, the couple started to look at a way to save for their kid’s education before it was too late – but even with 7 years to put money away, at their current level of income, it wasn’t possible to save enough cash to cover the classes for their first child, let alone a degree for the second.
Tapping her fingers on a calculator, Beth hung her head. “Even if we stop saving for our retirement, there won’t be enough to cover the college tuition for the kids,” she said. George felt sadness seep into his strong and stoic expression. He felt like he couldn’t provide for his family, even though he had a college education and a good paying job. The two held each other’s hands, unsure where to go from there.
The following day, Beth began to find other ways to get out of debt and save for retirement.
After searching all day, Beth scheduled a few consult appointments with “experts” at how to get out of the situation her family was in. The first 3 appointments didn’t prove to be worth the time or effort, but the fourth appointment left Beth and George much more hopeful than that night at the kitchen table.
As they sat in the office at Tier 1 Capital, the man behind the desk said, “If you could send your children to college, save for retirement, and begin building your retirement home several years sooner, would you do it?” “Absolutely?” replied George, preparing for another plan that was obviously too good to be true. “Good. Let’s get a plan together,” said the man.
The plan was about redirecting money the couple was losing unknowingly and unnecessarily into a cash pool they could access when they needed it.
After an evaluation the couple found they were giving money away in various places, including with interest on their debt. They also were surprised to learn that they didn’t have to pay banks for the privilege of using their money and that taking control of their money could increase their cash flow and easily accomplish all of their goals.
Elated and a bit skeptical, the couple agreed to create and implement a plan that would:
Enable them to pay for both kid’s college educations
Continue to live at the lifestyle they were accustomed to
Have enough saved for retirement so that they may live comfortably
Build a cabin in the woods for their retirement NOW
The plan they enacted worked by redirecting their cash flow and gave them access to money they were willfully making inaccessible. Traditional tactics keep money inaccessible in times when it’s needed – even when it’s your money. Beth and George felt privileged to finally learn there was a better way. A way that would keep their money at their fingertips for when they really needed it, without extra taxes and penalties.
Using a cash pool created with their own money, Beth and George were able accelerate the payments on their mortgage, while saving for retirement and having the comfort of knowing that college tuition also wouldn’t be a problem for them to afford. As they used their funds to build up their cash pool and aggressively pay down their debts, the two did not sacrifice saving for retirement. In fact, it was just the opposite.
2 years after implementing their plan, the couple began construction on their cabin in the woods. Something they thought they wouldn’t have been able to afford for another 15 years. A few years after the cabin was built, their first son went off to college. When the $60,000 per year tuition bill arrived, George and Beth cut the check without a worry about dipping into savings or retirement. Later, they overheard their friends, who had always had higher paying jobs than them, lament over taking away from their retirement accounts to pay for their kid’s college education.
Today – Beth and George are pleased they found a better way to handle their long term finances.
As George sits on the front porch of their cabin discussing college choices with their second child, he smiles and says, “Cost isn’t a concern, choose which education you feel like will best serve you.” He looks down at the boards that his father helped him nail there under their feet and was filled with gratitude. His father, who recently passed, was able to help him build this cabin because he was able to afford to build it sooner – and finally he could provide for his family without question.
