Welcome back to Modern Financial Wellness! I'm Jim Grace, and in this episode, I’m thrilled to have a very special guest—Michael Scarpati, the CEO of Retire Us. Retire Us is a game-changing financial advice platform that blends human relationships and technology to help individuals achieve financial freedom with less friction and more clarity.

We kick off by examining the major barriers people face when looking for financial advice, from the lack of access to affordable fiduciary guidance to the confusion caused by an industry built on investment-first relationships. Michael helps us untangle the different types of advisors—benefits-based, product-based, and the elusive systems-based advisor—and explains why most people never get to work with an independent fiduciary unless they already have significant investable assets.

Michael also outlines Retire Us’s unique process—from their free online financial assessment to their affordable monthly subscriptions that give anyone access to a full team of professionals: a CFP, an independent fiduciary, and a dedicated wealth concierge.

Key Takeaways

1. Know What a Fiduciary Is—and Why It Matters:

Only 10–15% of financial professionals are legally held to act in your best interest. The rest may not have to—meaning it’s crucial to ask anyone you work with whether they’re a true fiduciary, and more importantly, if they’re independent fiduciaries with access to the whole marketplace.

2. Not All Financial Advisors—or Advice—Are Created Equal:

There are three primary types of advisors: benefits-based (usually tied to your employer), product-based (selling investments or insurance), and systems-based (true planners building holistic frameworks for your money). Most people never move beyond the first two, missing out on the systems-based approach that drives real financial progress.

3. Financial Planning Should Start with Goals and Systems, NOT Just Products:

Most Americans piece together products and workplace benefits without a system to hold it all accountable. Michael likens this to baking a cake without a recipe—possible, but messy and inconsistent. True success comes from building intentional systems first, then filling them with the right tools and products.

4. Accessibility Is Changing, But You Need to Know Where to Look:

Traditionally, high-quality, independent financial planning was reserved for those with $250,000 or more in investable assets. Platforms like Retire Us are changing that—with subscription models as low as $60/month, allowing regular people to get personalized, fiduciary advice and ongoing support from professionals who act in their best interest.

5. Peace of Mind—and Real Progress—Comes from Financial Awareness:

According to Michael, financial well-being is ultimately about peace. If something feels “off” with your money, it probably is. Start by getting clear on your real goals and what’s causing your stress or anxiety. Use tools (like Retire Us’s free financial assessment) and work with advisors who will help you identify and fix those blind spots, creating a holistic sense of control and confidence.

Financial planning doesn’t have to be intimidating or inaccessible, and you deserve advice that is truly in your best interest—without asset minimums or high barriers to entry. Whether you’re just getting started or want to level up your systems, there are more options than ever for high-quality, human financial guidance.

Huge thanks again to Michael Scarpati for joining us and sharing his mission with Retire Us. For more details, check out their free financial checkpoint at www.retire.us and follow their upcoming content on financial consciousness.

If this episode resonated, please like, subscribe, and share with someone you think could benefit. And as always, while I hope you find these conversations helpful, remember: nothing discussed here should be taken as personal financial advice—do your own research and consult your advisors when making decisions.

See you next time on Modern Financial Wellness!

Welcome, everybody, to Modern Financial Wellness. My guest today is Michael Scarpati. He's the CEO of Retire Us. And Retire Us is a financial advice platform that blends human relationships and technology to provide a frictionless path to financial freedom. I'm really excited to talk to him about what they're up to today. Michael, welcome to the show. Thanks for taking the time.

Yeah, man, thanks for having me, Jim.

Appreciate it. Yeah, no, it's my pleasure. I love what you guys are up to at Retire Us. I think you're filling a very big need in the industry, and I think there's a really big lack of access to affordable fiduciary financial advice in the industry right now. So before we get into what you guys are specifically up to, what do you think the. The issues or the challenges that people face out there right now as it relates to accessing a financial advisor, wealth manager, getting good, sound financial advice? What does that look. Landscape look like to you? And what are the issues that. That people are facing out there right now?

Yeah, I mean, I think it's. I think it's a. The issue is a big symptom of the way the. The industry is just structured in. In my opinion. And the good news is things are changing. But really, fiduciary advice is. Is really.

It's just limited in its availability for the general public. And there's mainly.

Real quick, why don't we define that? I've used it a few times now, but fiduciary financial advice, what do you mean when you say that?

So fiduciary, it's pretty simple. It just means the advice needs to legally be in your best interest. And believe it or not, that's not the standard, which right in itself should be shooting off all the red flags for everybody and starting this process of discovery of where am I getting my financial advice? Because the reality is only about 10 to 15% of financial professionals are. Are actually fiduciary, which means you have 85 to 90% of people that are giving advice out there that actually don't have to legally do it in the best interest of the client. And that's scary. That's a scary thought.

Right, right, right. And I love how you've described that. I have a similar impression. It just feels like over the years, you used to access advice through your investments first and foremost. And that 85% to 90% statistic that you listed means that a lot of those people that aren't working with a fiduciary advisor are working with an institution that is probably charging them a percent assets under management investment fee and maybe they're giving some advice around that. But the relationship seems to still be focused on how much money you could bring to the table right away to manage. Do you get that sense as well when you look at the environment?

Yeah, I do. And I think it's there, there's just a level of conditioning that's happened to the American public that it's investment first. Whereas people like myself and, and you and those that have been in the industry recognize that investments should be the result of a bigger picture of a bigger plan, so that those investments are made with purpose and, and intent at.

The end of the day.

And I think that's kind of the first hurdle for the public is just to start to separate out. Not all financial advisors are financial planners. All financial planners tend to be financial advisors. But that's what I found is kind of the first roadblock and understanding is that all financial professionals are not created equally in this industry. And there's different disciplines that advisors professionals are following and understanding the differences is super key.

Yeah. To take that a little step further, you describe some of that on your website where you talk about the different disciplines and where the advisor comes from in their institutions. Do you want to talk about that a little bit? You know, where, what types of advisors are typically out there? Who are people being introduced to the most?

Yeah, there's three, there's three major disciplines when it comes to financial advice. The first is the benefits advisor. So this is through the workplace and they take a time based approach in their guidance. So think age 65, 30 years of service, the year 2030 or 2040 through the target day funds. And it's, it needs to be a very proactive approach on the client side, on the user side. So the benefits advisor is not going to call you up and say, hey, we were taking a look at your portfolio or your 401k and you know, we think it could have a 30% loss in a market crash. We should do something about that. It's the opposite.

Right. The, the client themselves has to be proactive and then that benefits specialist is really there for context around what they have access to and slight guidance around maybe how to distribute things. But anything outside of the workplace benefits is off limits and.

Right.

Yeah. That's where it starts, that's where it finishes.

I just coincidentally met with potential new client recently who is in that exact relationship where the first financial advisor that she was exposed to was her employer. Sponsored benefit representative. Right. So the 401k rep. And he helped her set up the 401k. And then he was doing a lot of education in the workplace. They were talking about some financial planning concepts and he was even licensed to sell insurance as well. So they needed term insurance.

That's a good thing. Right. He helped them get that in place. But she had this very long list of other things going on in her life that were important to her that were just being overlooked. And I think that was a result of the type of advisor that she was exposed to and started working with. Just wasn't incentivized or didn't have the model to be able to help her implement any of the other advice that she really needed.

So I think that's, that's pretty normal. I think that's, that's kind of the standard path, I would consider it for most Americans in terms of how they start to get exposed to professional financial guidance. And I think there's just an understanding of there are major, major limitations on what that professional is able to legally provide through the work and the contractual obligations they have with the employer. And there is the possibility then for them to put on the second hat. Right. And that is the second type of advisor, which is the product professional. So the product professional, this dominates the industry. When you think financial advisor, this is what people think.

And yeah, out of that 85, 90%, this is the vast majority of that, that statistic, right?

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. I mean, this is when you think financial planner, unfortunately for most people too, they kind of bucket it into financial advisor when it comes to product advisor. And so product advisors are extremely important. You need products in order to get to the end goal. But the major issue here is that most of the product advisors are not fiduciary. Right. It's a very, very small percentage.

And then this is where we start to get into the problem that we're looking to solve at the end of the day, which is access. So in order for you to access a product based advisor who's an independent fiduciary, meaning they have open architecture, they can vet the entire marketplace. There's no direct conflicts of interest between one institution or the other. Right. And they're wearing that fiduciary hat. Well, the problem is generally you need 250,000, 500,000, a million dollars investable just for them to take a meeting with you. Right. These types of professionals get compensated for on the assets that they manage.

And there's nothing necessarily wrong with that. A lot of times that opens up tremendous access to types of Products that you otherwise just can't get as a retail traditional investor. Things that can protect you from market downside, things that are in private markets or institutional grade investments. There's massive, massive value there. The problem is it takes the same amount of time for one of these independent fiduciary advisors to work with someone that has $100,000 essentially as it does for someone that has a million or $2 million.

Right.

Except we're going to get paid 10 to 20 times more to work with the higher net worth individual. So they move up market. Right. There's already a small percentage of them.

Right.

They're capped on, on time. And we can kind of get into that a little bit further down the road as to, as to what retire us is really solving at the end of the day. But they're capped on their, their ability to bring on new clients and they're cap at the amount of households they can manage. So the industry kind of forces them to swim upstream. Right, right. For those clients that are higher net worth.

And that's a great description and I think a good distinction to just double click on real quick. We're not saying that any of these advisors are bad people or that they're doing anything wrong. And in fact, I just heard you say that a lot of the products and solutions that they provide add a ton of value to a client situation. Similar to the 401k advisor. It's important if you have access to people that can help you navigate what your employer sponsored retirement plan, which is typically one of the biggest assets that most people create in their financial lives. If you have access to those things, take advantage of them, but just be aware of how they're incentivized, how they're, you know, operating and what, what kind of value should you expect from each of these people if you're in front of them? You know, take the time to kind of sort those things out.

Absolutely, yeah. And then that, that brings us to the third discipline, which is the systems based advisor. And this is, this is the unicorn of the financial advisors. It's just really rare because it's, these advisors aren't getting compensated based off of assets under management. So as a result they're also independent, they're also fiduciary, they're certified financial planners typically. And, but the issue is they're not getting compensated on assets under management. So they're getting compensated on a retainer fee similar to an attorney. So it's going to cost 5, $10,000 a year to put this type of Professional on retainer.

And the major difference here is they're building systems. So it's all about how are all of the inner workings of my entire financial picture working together in harmony? Right. The current situation with our taxes. Right. How are the decisions that we make impact our retirement versus our short term savings? The risk, the insurance, the legacy, all these different facets are working together. And we're making every decision with intent. And it's very much more about behavioral change.

Right.

Habit change, behavioral change perspective. Then you should be filling that system with the products.

Right.

The products are then supplemented by your benefits. Most people are doing it in the reverse order. Right?

Right.

They introduce themselves to this process through benefits, then they look to find to fill any gaps with products. And unfortunately, because the price point, they never get to build any type of system.

Right.

You know, it's just, it's just harder to get consistent success without, without a true system. The, the analogy I like to use is baking a cake. It's simple, it's kind of silly, but if you were to. Baking. Baking a cake is not difficult at the end of the day, but it requires a certain set of ingredients, it requires a specific product process and you have to do it in a specific order in order for the cake to turn out popular. Right?

Right.

If you do that, if you try to bake a cake without an actual recipe and a process, it's going to be really challenging to, to get success and have something that, that you're proud of. Now that is the reality of how most people are managing their finances.

Right? Right.

Truly have the recipe in the process. They have a lot of products and investments and benefits of the workplace, but how they all work together and how they actually should be communicating.

Yeah.

Such a key that that's what the successful individuals, you know, start with.

Right? Right. And full disclosure, I would consider our firm, our process, a systems based practice. Right. And I think you and I share a lot of similar beliefs of the importance of that system based approach and the benefits that clients can receive. But also I think what's really interesting about what you guys are doing, we operate in that 5 to 10,000 or more space and because of that we have capacity issues. So I meet clients regularly who would benefit greatly from a systems based approach. But their current financial situation, their income, their assets, when I quote what our process looks like and we try to bring a ton of resources into that and add as much value as we possibly can, but we start to price out a lot of people who could benefit from the advice. So one of the things I've struggled with over the last few years as we've developed our process is like what do we do with these other folks who can't pay our minimum fee? Right.

Where do they go? Do we ship them back to the product based advisor? Do we ship them back to the employer benefits provider? And I hesitate to do that. And there aren't a lot of great outlets out there until I met you and started to learn about retire us. So again I think you guys are feeling an amazing gap. So what's. Do you want to talk about the process a little bit? That systems based approach? What is your mission? What are you guys trying to put together and what does it look like?

Yeah, well, first of all, thank you. I really appreciate the shout out. We feel that very, we feel, you know, sad for the American public is the reality. You know, being in, I've been in this financial services industry for 15 years and the, the mission of this company was built out of seeing a lot of bad financial plans is the reality. And just when I say bad, it's just, it's coming from a perspective where the, the, the client themselves thinks that they're doing everything that they can and, and they don't know what they don't know. Right. It's un. Unconsciously incompetent currently in of the state of what they have access to and how this all should work together.

And, and a big mission of the company comes down to what I call financial consciousness. It's, it's, it's starting to create more awareness around what's actually possible and what, what people should have access to. You know, and that's the other thing. There's just the kind of a justice component of this is it doesn't feel right that the vast majority, 90 plus plus percent of the American public are cut out from the highest level of fiduciary advice because the nature of the industry and it's just kind of evolved into this. I don't think it was originally set up to be this way, but it just is how it's evolved. And so the mission of the company is to, is to disrupt the financial services industry today with what we call a better path for financial freedom. And that better path is one that is guided by independent fiduciaries is fast and easy. So one of the major issues that we found just through market research and just from being in this industry is it takes a lot of time for people to get started just on their own time investment.

So it takes hours and hours of time to Gather the data. Because generally the first financial planning meeting is a giant overhaul of everything.

Right.

So we've kind of segmented the process to start with the most impactful stuff, goal planning first and really align where are we now in relation to where we need to be and make sure everything, you know, all the boats are pointed in the right direction. As a result, by the way, that we've been able to segment and streamline the planning process, it only requires about 15 to 20 minutes of time requirement for the user for the client to get organized, to get meeting ready. So it's one that's very fast and we can turn that around with the use of our technology quickly. Within a week to two weeks, you can already have a very clear path where industry norm is about three to five weeks.

Right.

To be able to get that advice so fast is, you know, is a really big component of it. And then the, the last is accessible, right? It's accessibility. So many people have savings like you mentioned through the workplace, but because that asset is tied up in the 401k or the thrift savings plan, guess what? They can't move it to an independent product fiduciary because there's nothing to manage, there's no way to get paid. The alternative is to go to a great firm like yourself. But again, you know, you guys bring so much value and so many resources. It's just that it has to be inexpensive, price tag, it's just the reality. And so there's kind of this middle ground where you could have a ton of savings, but if it's not movable, right. If you can't move it to an investment institution or an advisor, that's fiduciary, right.

This kind of stuck in this limbo where the benefits advisor is the, is really the major resource for you. So that better path to us is one that has no asset minimums and is accessible. Accessible from a cost standpoint. So our subscriptions plug you into a systems based professional for as little as $60 a month to $150 a month, all depending on kind of the scope, you know, what you're looking to accomplish and what systems are being built. And then it also connects you with an independent product advisor as well. So that if you have investments and things that you want support on, you can access that without the asset minimums. Kind of start working with that, that highest tier without the need to move over hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars.

Yeah, I love all of that. So what is the typical journey? It's accessible and quick but to go a little bit further, what does that typically look like someone would find Retire Us, subscribe based on, you know, what model meets their needs the best. And then you mentioned the independent advisor to support them. What does that relationship look like?

Yeah, great question, man. So it starts actually before subscription. So on the website Retire Us, there's a free financial assessment takes about four to five minutes. And it's a multiple choice assessment. And what this does is it gives you an instant analysis on your retirement progress, your tax planning, and then various risks which we call financial red flags. So the red flags are kind of the blind spots that based off of the answers that you're giving are maybe not yet in the awareness and need to be removed in order for us to really achieve financial mastery and success. And so that's kind of the first step is getting that current situation assessment to understand where you are and then from there it will recommend different paths. So there's three different paths that you can go down.

The first is basic planning, which is that current situation risk and insurance, short term goals. Retirement Tax mastery is the second path where you're, you're hitting those four key areas but you're adding in tax diversification. And then wealth mastery is when we start to add legacy into the picture as well. So it's not this one size fits all. You know, depending on where, where you are on your journey and what's important, you can select a path that, that'll.

Yeah.

For you.

Yeah. And I love that so much because as you know, so many of the clients that I meet are in completely different situations. Right. They could all benefit from the advice and the clarity and the integration of what's going on in their financial lives. But some clients just aren't ready for sophisticated tax planning or they, you know, everybody has an estate. I'm not suggesting that we should overlook the estate planning portion of a plan, but they might not be really focused on significant legacy planning. They might not be, they're just not at that point in their life. So it seems like you guys have been thoughtful about what the options people have and making sure again that you're, you're meeting them where they are with which I think is great.

Yeah. Thank you. It's kind of like the crawl, walk, run approach. A lot of people want to just start sprinting towards the finish line, but a lot of times those things just aren't going to be major issues that require sophisticated planning. As you are well aware, depending on how successful you are on those first four sections, those first four Key areas is really what determines whether or not tax diversification is going to be something that you really need to focus on, is going to create a long term tax liability or problem. And then that also kind of piggybacks and dominoes into to the legacy side. Right. Depending on how much money we have in those retirement accounts.

It's such a big one with the Secure act that if that's not strategically planned for legacy, it can just create a lot of tax inheritance problems for the beneficiaries in their, their, their taxable income. So it kind of, you know, it's, it's meeting you where you're at. And at this point most people, most people really just need to focus on the basics. Right. Because it's all about the systems. Right. That's the unique thing I think that we've found is we've been able to collaborate with CFPs for quite some time, almost a decade of time, to put together frameworks and systems that we basically include in each tier. So basic planning, there's a goal planning system for retirement, there's a cash flow planning system for your general savings and all of your goals.

And then in tax mastery, you add two more systems into there, one for required minimum distributions, one for general tax diversification on the cash flow side. And then in the, in the wealth mastery tier, there's one, a system for legacy planning and then a system for more complex income that you have preferred compensation or you have restricted stock or stock options and some of those other complex streams that have tax ramifications. Yeah, so it's all this systems, it's building the systems, but you kind of need the first.

Right.

Systems, you need the basic systems before you can kind of really build, build the rest.

Yeah, yeah. So the clients are feeding in their data, you're using technology to try to integrate that information into their financial plan and come up with these systems. What about implementation and support on an ongoing basis? Because I, the way, the reason we currently provide financial advice the way that we do is for my entire career I've thought that the traditional method of financial planning was extremely flawed because in a traditional sense, when you see a financial planner, you pay an upfront fee, give them all the information, they create these systems and analysis and recommendations, and then they provide that back to the client and leave them to their own devices to try to get things done and kind of manage those things. So can you talk about accountability, support and implementation a little bit? Sure.

I love that you brought that up because that is one of the major pitfalls traditionally of the flat fee systems based side is you get the plan, it's delivered, but then it's up to you and there's nothing there to really hold you accountable to get that plan actually established in place and then make sure that it's working. It's a really great, great call out. So the way that our process works is you kind of hit the nail on the head. Once you choose a subscription, you're going through an automated onboarding process which is about 15 minutes where you're able to upload various statements you put in, create your profile, set your goals, that sort of thing, get the data in pretty, pretty simply and then from there you're matched with your team of professionals. So there's basically three really major members of your team. The first is the independent CFP who's building out the systems. The second is the independent fiduciary that you meet with on a regular basis. And this is where you're building real human relationships.

So this is not a robo experience. It's not a here's your plan, go figure it out. You're interfacing with the human regularly who you get to know and knows you, your financial situation many times better than you do. And they're there, they're kind of like the translator the plan and help it be clear and digestible. And then the third professional is, we call them the wealth concierge and so they're there to support any implementation. So when you have questions about where do you need to go, what institutions, if you needed to change, make changes, Even at the 401k or roll over a 401k account, there's somebody there that's going to basically just take charge for you and with you and get hop on conference calls with you and just kind of muscle through that process and then they're going to start doing check ins. And then it kind of creates this, this cycle. We start with goal planning to kind of draw the lines and then once implementation's done, then we cycle over to cash flow planning.

So it's not this swallow the ocean. We start with effectiveness and then we transition into efficiency. And a lot of times what that does is that cash flow tracking in the second half of the year actually helps us understand if we set the lines correctly or goal Right, right, right. And then, and then life gets in the way. Life happens, markets move, jobs change, or you know, goals pop up out of nowhere, liabilities pop up out of nowhere and things need to be reassessed. And so we go back to goal planning. And we reassess, we reach all the.

Lines is again a bit of a knock on the traditional way of going about it. I always fall back to Covid right 2020. If you had bought a traditional financial plan and say January 1st of 2020, you were going to get your finances in order finally this year and you met with a planner or an advisor who was going to provide a plan and over that few week process, you give them all the information, they deliver this plan in March 1 say of 2020. Well, the world dramatically changed March 13 or whenever everything started to shut down. What's the value of that financial plan as it relates to your current environment at that point? And that's of course an extreme example. But things are changing all the time. So the fact that you guys have built a process to be aware of that and go back and adjust where needed, figure out what those lines are, I think is a huge, huge value add for, for a lot of people. There was something else that you brought up real quick, I just wanted to touch on was the robo advisor.

So I think out of the three categories of advice and relationships with advisors, one of the other ones maybe we didn't touch on was this concept of the do it yourselfer, the robo advisor platform. And I think a lot of people will be familiar or some will with with a robo platform. So there are technologies out there, Fidelity has robo platforms, there's companies like betterments of the world that will allow investors and regular folks to do a lot of this themselves. It seems to me, and you might know more from your market research, it seems that that only went so far because the vast majority of people, although they felt comfortable to a certain point educating themselves or getting themselves to a certain point could only go so far without the human relationship, the accountability and the support. Right. I don't know what your take is on robo.

Yeah, but I think you hit the nail on the head. I mean that. So I, I think Robo is the similar, it's the similar first step to the people that go to the benefits advisor first. So I think it's, I think it's a similar first step for a lot of people into product based professionals or product based discipline where it's really great for the do it yourselfer. There's a couple of issues that I personally have with with Robo. The first is it's, it's non human and from our market research, 84% of people, investors actually prefer having a human relationship. So that's a big component of this process because robo is, is, it's ones and zeros.

Right.

And it's, it's an algorithm and there's, there's some value in it, without a doubt. But the other component of it is it's actually a very basic form of product. In investment management, you're robos. Following Harry Markowitz, which is great pioneer, won the Nobel Prize for what we call now modern portfolio theory. But that was in the 60s, so a lot has changed and there's different access to other asset classes. Markets are much more correlated now than they were in the 60s. But these robo platforms generally follow a traditional modern portfolio asset allocation theory with ETFs and they're doing some cool things like tax loss harvesting. And there's, there's value in it for sure, but it's just when you really look at how the world has changed.

Right. Covid was actually a great example of everything was so non correlated until it wasn't and anymore.

Right, right.

Or until it was, it was correlated. Right. Like everything was non correlated in our asset allocations. And then once the world shuts down, we found, oh, we live in a global economy now. All these international markets are correlated to some extent to the, the traditional markets and so are the bond markets. Right. If Everybody's selling your ETFs, they're selling everything. They're not just selling stocks, they're selling bonds.

And it's this, it's this approach that I think has a ton of value until things really fall apart. And all of a sudden that old modern portfolio theory isn't so modern anymore. And I think that's where the major value shifts to having a true financial planner that's doing more than just asset allocation with ETFs. And following the modern portfolio theory, there's other asset classes that can be non correlated to public markets. There's institutional grade assets that can protect you from losses or create some sort of principal protection or buffered losses. There's other things that you can put in place from the product and I just don't think the public really is aware of it at all. That's a big part of why I'm called to kind of do a lot of this, this stuff right now is I just feel like there's so much stuff that people aren't aware of, people have never heard of. It's not in the mainstream zeitgeist yet.

And I think, yeah, we can both agree that it should be.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think the other thing that I've seen with the Robo platforms when clients that I've begun to work with have started. There is, it seems to me, and I haven't looked too far done research on this, but I can't help but feel like when you're going through a robo process and you're answering the onboarding questions for that platform and it's asking you how you feel, essentially assessing your risk tolerance up front and some other areas as a human being answering these questions, I might feel a certain way today and feel completely different tomorrow, so it seems, you know, but if you follow the robo process, you're going to answer these questions and get dumped into a model that's based on how you answer those questions. And a lot of clients that I work with have trouble with the context of the questions. So, for example, I work with young professional clients who I've seen them bring over robo models and portfolios that they've set up themselves that are way too conservative for the account type that they're in. And when I questioned them about how this came to be, they said at the time that they were feeling a little nervous about the market, they don't want to lose money. Things that typically clients will share that they feel. Right.

We all have these feelings about losing money and what's going on in the world around, especially in today's day and age. Right. We're all, it's all hysteria and chaos, it seems like all the time. So it just sets up this situation where people can answer those questions honestly about how they feel, but that will disconnect them from an appropriate portfolio and they lose out on opportunity over time. So that's where, like, you know, if we use automation to kind of sort some of this stuff out, it's so critical to have a human being to help our clients navigate those disconnects. And I couldn't agree more.

I think that, I think that was so well said that the, the human being is, is key to help also bridge the gap between feelings and needs. Right.

So.

So most people check the box that you said, well, I don't want to lose money.

Right.

It's actually kind of rare. Everyone's like, yeah, I don't really care if money or not. Most people don't want to lose money. Depending on, like you said, situationally, if there's been people's response to that questionnaire is going to be a lot different one month ago than it may have been three months ago in the time that right now with, with some of the big tariff losses.

Yeah.

For that, that, that response is probably different because what I found is most investors have the goldfish memory, right? Where it's, and we all fall into it where markets only go up right. Until they, until they don't go up. And so you kind of forget how, what that feeling really is like when the markets start to fall out and how the fear kicks in and the terror kicks in and the paralyzation that what am I going to do now? And what if this doesn't stop? Like that all floods back really quickly in a day or two. But if we haven't seen that in a year or two years or five years, we kind of forget about it. It's just the human, human nature. And so what, what the systems approach does, and I think you can definitely speak to this as well, is it, is, it's, it's a holistic view. It's not only about how you feel, it's also about what you need. Right.

You may feel like I want to be a gunslinger, but if we look at the numbers and we say listen, if you get 20% this year versus 10 and you're, you know, five years from retirement or two years from retirement or even in retirement, the, the difference most of the time is not going to dramatically change how your retirement is going to operate. It's going to basically be the same. However, if you lose 20% in the next year, it will dramatically change what happens. That's the key. I think like the questionnaire is such a bottom up approach right where you're, you're kind of going from feeling and just like intuitively what you think you might need. Whereas the top down and going well your feelings are valid and important and they need to align with what your needs. We are and let's find the middle ground. The human being is really good at being able to find that and negotiate, you know, help help another human negotiate and reconcile the two to find what's actually appropriate.

Yeah. I literally just had this conversation last night with a client where we were talking about their risk tolerance and the risk tolerance would suggest that their extremely conservative and they're very fearful and anxious about losing money and they're nearing retirement. So I totally get it. But they have a ton of capacity, right? So I always talk to clients about tolerance for risk versus capacity which means how much can you afford to lose without changing your lifestyle or running the risk of not accomplishing a goal. And I think that's what you were just describing really, really well is that bridging the gap between those two things? And I see it in Both directions. So I also have a lot of clients who are very tolerant of risk and want to be really aggressive and they get bummed out when the market's up 20% and they're only up 17. Right. In a fairly diversified equity portfolio.

But they can't afford, they don't have the capacity to withstand a 20% down, a decline in the market. Right. And it's bridging those two things that I think again I just don't know how you do that with only a computer. When you get into that conversation.

Yeah. And I think that that's, that's such a, it's such an interesting point too is, is capacity for risk isn't generally considered by most people because we're, we're kind of conditioned just through the way that this information is, is given to us over time that return is always best. Return is always best. More return. And, and I think people kind of get trapped in this thinking of well my advisor got me X percent so that means they're, they're doing a great job whereas or, or they didn't give me X percent that means they're doing a bad job. And it's actually all about purpose and intent and, and actual needs. And that capacity for risk could mean that the advisor is doing a poor job like you said. Like you actually can't, you should be getting more return in these markets because you have all this money over here that is kind of excess.

Right. This doesn't fit into any of the other goals. So let's, let's grow it more effectively. And I think kind of finding the, the way to translate that and disseminate that information is really challenging through you know, a five minute questionnaire robot. And I, I just don't think, and, and I don't think that that's really what those platforms ever will be for. I think there's super value in, in scale for those companies to access A lot of people that want to be hands off and do it yourself but are kind of in more of like starter mode once those, once those assets really start to build they, so does the complexity of your financial situation and other decisions that need to be factored into the equation. Yeah, that's where I think a lot of, a lot of those users start to then look to supplement that and look elsewhere to get some human guidance coupled with it.

I didn't think we would go here, but it makes me think back to kind of the product based only advisor as well in situations where a lot of their onboarding process from an Investment standpoint is risk tolerance based. Right. So if you answer the questions a certain way, you're going to get a certain type of portfolio and there's really not a lot of incentive for that particular advisor in some cases, not all. Again, I don't want to over overstate it, but there's not a lot of incentives in different parts of the financial advice industry for that advisor to go further and try to help the client understand that context between how they're feeling about risk and what they need and can't afford. Right. And it's just, you answered the question. We're going to get you in this model. It aligns with this score.

Here you are right. And that's where it ends, where there's a lot more value. I think to continue to explore that emotional aspect of money and make sure that you know how they feel about their financial situation is aligning with what they're trying to accomplish.

So yeah, yeah, I think it's, I think it's a great point and it's, it's, it's just a matter of the risk tolerance questionnaire and getting a pulse has tremendous value. Right. Because it helps us understand our feelings. But then that capacity for risk is a totally different part of the equation and then actually the need for return is a totally different part of that equation. You could have some not ready to take much risk but in order for them to hit their goals, they need more return than putting that money in the bank. So that doesn't mean throw it all in equities, but it probably means we, you need to restructure things and find other alternatives or safe money strategies or, or things that are going to have a lower correlation to market movement but can still at least get you a specific percentage. So it's just, I think a lot of these algorithms try to, and they have to based off of the way the business works, kind of put it into a box and make it very simple where things can flow into models. That's what creates the scalability and the value really for the company so that they can charge a very small cost for the robo fee but do it on massive scale.

Right. The reality is, is, is you get what you pay for and all this stuff and that's why there's so many avenues in, in the financial services industry because there's value in all sorts of ways and approaches to, to, to manage these things.

Yeah.

So it's, you know, it all depends on the person too. Right, right. The hands off, do it yourselfer robo stuff is is great for those that are a little bit more focused on really having purposeful, intentful components of their financial household. It's just not going to be a great fit for them.

Right, right. So thinking about that person as we kind of wind down the conversation here, do you have any advice for somebody that is just starting to process, thinking about, you know, I need some help, I need some advice. What are some of the recommendations that, that you would have to folks questions to ask that would lead them down the path to getting into the right place, getting the right kind of advice.

So when you say that questions to ask themselves or questions to ask?

Both, I guess ask themselves and what do they need to be prepared ahead of time and things they should be thinking about. And when they go out and look for resources, I would highly encourage them to check out retire us. But if they're, if they're going to talk to different people and try to sort all this out, what are some of the questions that should be top of mind for them as they go into the marketplace?

Yeah, I think that the questions for yourself are probably the best place to start, which is why, why do I want to start taking this more seriously? What am I really looking to accomplish? What are the layers? You know what I found over 15 plus years now in financial services is that financial planning should be actually relatively stress free and easy. If for whatever reason it feels you're getting a pit in your stomach or it feels stressful or overwhelming, it's because something is missing, something's wrong, you intuitively, you know it, but it hasn't yet been identified. And so I would, I would spend time sitting with that first to figure out what do you want to accomplish. But then also what are the things that are getting you a little queasy or keeping you up at night? Because those are the things that you want to make sure the, the professional you're working with is, is addressing those root issues are the things that, that, that really need to be taken care of in order to feel good about the whole process. Right. You can, whatever products out there. But if those root concerns aren't really addressed, nothing's going to change internally of how you feel about the process. And that's a big shift for a lot of people.

Like this should feel good and comfortable, easy. Right. That means we, we know where we're going, we know how to get there and we know what we need from our savings so that we can hold the savings accountable. Right. So that, that's, I think that's kind of the first Key is where do we want to go? What's the purpose? Why am I really looking to, to accomplish what am I really looking to accomplish financially? And then what are the things that are holding me back potentially right now or what needs to be addressed or pulled out for this plan to feel really impactful for me. And then with the professional side, fiduciary I think is always the first. Some of the key things are fiduciary, independent fiduciary. There's a difference between just a fiduciary and an independent fiduciary that I think a lot of people don't recognize.

You can be a fiduciary at an institution, but you can only use what's at the institution. Right. So you can do what's in the best interest of the client within the scope that you're allowed to operate in. And it's, it's kind of this middle ground of well, they are fiduciary. Yes. And they can still be limited to what, what they're able to provide you with advice. So it's important. Independent fiduciary goes a very long way in what that opens up as, as the scope systems I think is the other, is the other key, right? What are we doing to build systems before if, if they're coming from a product approach first the red flag should start to go up.

And it's not that they're necessarily coming from a bad place, but it's that you're missing a step, you're missing a really key step in how to do this the best way, how to make this the most successful plan. Because if you don't have the system, what holds the products accountable?

Right.

How do we know the products are doing what they need to do if we don't have a system that's guiding that? So those are the two major things that, that stick up for me is are they fiduciary, are they, you know, are they building systems? And then you know, what's the compensation model? I think is important. I think people get too hung up personally on, on fees and such because as long as it's coming from the right place, fees have value, fees have access value. There's things that you're getting access to for those fees a lot of times that just can't exist in the robo world and these other low cost solutions. So I would try to approach fees with less judgment would be just the other advice and really take a look, compare it to some places are charging fees and there's not a lot of value at it and you know, that comes with this, this education and consciousness and awareness of how all these things operate. But some places charge fees and there's a ton of value in it and you're getting access to things that you know can, can dramatically change how your investments operate in down markets and in up markets. So it's just, it's just taking your time to understand what you need before you, you jump in, I think is key. And understanding how the industry works before you make any decisions is really the other component there.

Yeah. Well, again, I think you guys are doing a great job not only creating the systems and the access and the support through your model, but just being here and talking about the industries. It goes a long way to help people educate themselves about what their options are, what the industry looks like. So again, we appreciate your time. Is there anything else you wanted to share about what you guys are up to at Retire Us? Anything else in general you just want to leave folks with before we cut you loose?

Nothing. Nothing particular. I mean, Retire Us, you can get started for free with our financial checkpoint. Kind of get you a little brief assessment. There's a lot of great roadmap updates that are coming to the platform over the next 18 months. Some really, really cool things that we're going to be integrating with, with some AI and we're excited to, to see what we can do there to just create more scalability, more ease, more frictionless experience. So be on the look at Retire Us on, on Instagram is going to start pushing out a lot of content on financial consciousness and awareness. So something to, to check out there.

And you mentioned a book beforehand. One book I would, I would read is actually, it's not about finance, but it's about habits. It's called Atomic Habits by James Clear.

Yeah, Great.

Habits by James Clear. This will give you a lot of perspective on systems just in life, right? And it's, it's a lot of what we've built comes from some of the foundational information that, that James covers in his book about building good habits. And it's one of the quotes he uses that I really like is we, we don't rise to our goals, we fall to the level of our systems. And I think your example of COVID right, for that financial client that started right before COVID if you started at that process and we're building a system, the impact is, is definitely different than if you're just taking this goal planning, product based approach. Right? That, that's a, that's a different month or two of a motor roller coaster.

Right.

And so that, that's a, that's a really good book for, for people that are interested in building better habits, building better, like behavioral management for, for yourself. And that stuff can flow directly into the finances as well.

Yeah, that's a great recommendation. I love that book and I think it's extremely applicable to, it's helpful throughout your entire life, but it's, it's applicable to finances, financial behavior and habits because I think we all end up at a certain point just based on our behavior to that point. Right. And it's not intentional, it's not conscious. So how do you actually change and move forward and, and grow to where you're trying to get to? So I appreciate that. Last question. This is a show about financial well being in general. Do you have any thoughts when you hear that term? What does a good.

Having a good sense of financial well being mean to you?

Peace. Peace, Yeah, I would say it comes down to peace. Most people have very little peace with financial, with their relationship with money and finances. And that comes from something's missing. Right. In your awareness. There's something subconsciously you know is wrong, but consciously you don't know what it is. And that creates distortion and a lack of peace.

And so true financial well being comes from becoming conscious of your financial needs, your emotional needs as they tie to your finances and ultimately how the big picture integrates with the day to day. And that, you know, if you can do that, you can create financial peace. And that is, in my opinion, that's financial well being. That's, you know, that's, that's when you've nailed it.

That's awesome. Yeah. It makes me think of something you mentioned before when I asked you about those questions to ask and you listed three. Thinking about what it could be subconsciously but sensing that something's wrong. Right. You're not feeling good and, but maybe not being able to name it. You know, finding an advisor and a process and a team that can help you identify those things and work you through it to find that piece. That's what it's all about.

Right? So, you know, spending time. If something doesn't feel right, don't just sit on that. Right. There are resources out there and teams that can help explore those things and get those things right and help you move forward to that path to peace. So I think that's a great.

If something doesn't feel right that I would encourage everybody, just go to retire us and do the financial checkpoint. That's the purpose of it. That pulls out those red flags and will help you say, oh, okay, so these are some things that I haven't addressed, and that's what's kind of eating at me. That's.

It's free.

It takes four or five minutes, and that will at least pull some of that out for you.

Yeah.

Cool.

Michael, it's been a pleasure. I appreciate you taking the time again. Love what you guys are up to, which strongly encourage people to go check out, retire us. And if you liked what you heard, like and subscribe to the show, that's helpful for us, and we'll look forward to talking to you guys. See you next time. Thanks again.

Thanks, Jim. Appreciate it, man.

All right, thanks again for listening to this episode. A quick note, although I do hope that the information that we talked about was helpful. In no way is anything discussed on the podcast to be taken as specific financial advice. Please consult your own advisors and do your own research when you're making important financial decisions.