RJS 8-16-25

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning to all. Craigshillig here and this is Safe Money.
I'm here every Saturday to talk with our listeners about
financial strategies we use to manage and protect assets safely.
I've been an insurance agent for over twenty four years.
During that time, I've learned a few insurance strategies, like
using annuities as safe money harbors, or using cash value

(00:22):
life insurance to supplement retirement income. Just a reminder, you
can call our office at five six three three three
two two two zero zero if you'd like to enroll
into one of my virtual Medicare community meetings I give
you every month via Zoom, or you can email me
at Craig at Craigshillig dot com. And that's my name,

(00:45):
cr Aig at cr AI G S C H I
L l ig dot com. Today I'd like to talk
about fundamental concepts for new investors, and then I want
to talk about the thirty first annual Run with Carl,
the event that's coming up this Labor Day, Monday, September. First,

(01:08):
I have a very special guest with me, Hannah Thompson
here live from the Run with Carl. So let's talk
about fundamental concepts. Investing involves setting goals for the future
and weighing the risk and potential rewards associated with a
wide variety of investment opportunities. If you are a new investor,

(01:31):
this might seem like an overwhelming task, but take heart.
Becoming familiar with a few basic concepts could help you
have more confidence in your investing decisions. So don't be
intimidated by a complicated sounding jargon and don't hesitate to
ask questions. After all, this is your money. Understand your

(01:54):
investment options. There's a direct relationship between investment risk and return.
Learn Higher risk investments, such as stocks, will generally offer
the potential for higher returns in exchange for taking greater risk.
Investments with lower risks, such as US Treasury bills sometimes

(02:16):
ty bills, which are guaranteed by the full faith and
credit of the US government as to the timely payment
of principle and interest, typically offer lower returns. A stock
is a security that represents ownership or equity in a corporation.
An investor who purchases shares of stock owns a piece

(02:37):
of the company and as a claim on a portion
of the assets and earnings. This means Shareholders can make
money if the company does well, or lose money if
the company does poorly. A bond is a fixed income
security issued by a government entity or a corporation to
raise money needed for ongoing operations or to finance new projects.

(03:03):
Investors who buy bonds are essentially lending money to the
issuing organizations in exchange for regular interest payments. Mutual funds
and EFTs called exchange traded funds, are investment vehicles that
pool money from investors to purchase stocks, bonds, cash or

(03:26):
cash alternatives, and other securities according to the fund objectives.
Mutual funds and ETFs invest in dozens to perhaps hundreds
of securities, offering shareholders a level of diversification that might
be difficult for an individual investor to achieve on their own.

(03:49):
Employee time tested tools. Asset allocation and diversification are widely
used investment techniques that can help manage risk and potentially
improve the performance of your portfolio over the long term.
Asset allocation is the way your investment dollars are divided
among major asset classes such as stocks, bonds, and cash alternatives.

(04:14):
The goal is to select and appropriate balance of assets
that seeks the highest potential return in light of your
investment objectives, risk tolerance, and time horizon. Diversification involves spreading
money among multiple investments whose values typically rise and fall

(04:36):
at different rates in times. This way, gains in one
area can help compensate for losses in another, and may
help limit the impact of loss from any single type
of investment. Revisiting your portfolio, the asset allocation of your
portfolio may shift over time due to market shift towards

(05:00):
stocks may leave you overexposed to risk, or a shift
toward bonds might make your portfolio two conservative. To accomplish
your long term goals, rebalancing is a process that returns
a portfolio to its original risk profile. One rebalancing method

(05:21):
is to sell some of the assets in which you
have too much money in and use the proceeds to
buy more shares in the other asset classes. However, this
could trigger capital gain taxes in a taxable investment account,
but not in a tax deferred retirement account such as
an IRA or an employer an employer sponsored retirement plan

(05:46):
like your four oh one K at work. Another way
is to direct new investment dollars into your underweighted asset
class While this method typically takes longer, it generally has
no immediate tax consequences because you're not selling any assets.
Expect market volatility. The potential for larger short term price

(06:09):
wings is the price you pay for the higher long
term returns associated with riskier investments. But even if you
view market volatility as a normal occurrence, it can be
tough to handle when it's your money at stake. Although
you can decide how much investment risk you can handle,

(06:32):
try not to overreact when the market drops, especially if
you still have many years left to invest. Instead, stay
focused on your financial goals and your long term investment strategy. Now,
enough about me talking, I want to switch gears here
and talk about the twenty twenty five to thirty first
annual Run with Carl with my special guest to have here,

(06:55):
Hannah Thompson, who's been a member of the executive planning
committee for the Run with Carl since twenty seventeen. Welcome
to the show, Hannah.

Speaker 2 (07:05):
Thank you so much. Craig, so so happy to be
here talking about something that is such an awesome community tradition,
the best Labor Day tradition in the Quad Cities, hands down, obviously,
We're not biased at all. Of course, we are just
a few weeks out from the race, which is crazy,
and things are just ramping up as we are getting
ready for race day. But before I dive into information

(07:27):
about race logistics and such, I'd love to give everybody
a little bit of background on Run with Carl and
how things came to be established. In nineteen ninety four,
after the Shillig family tragically lost their son Carl, the
annual Labor Day Run Run with Carl began and it
was the primary funding vehicle for the Carl D. Shilig
Memorial Fund, which is held through the Pleasant Valley Educational Foundation.

(07:48):
After twenty successful years, the Shilig family decided it was
time to hang it up and end the race but
still provide scholarships, and PV and bettendor School Districts both
said hold on just a second. In the fall of
twenty fourteen, the Bettendorff Community Schools Foundation and the Pleasant
Valley Educational Foundation joined together to continue the race, with
the money raise benefiting both foundations just as it had

(08:10):
and providing funds and grants and scholarships for area students.
We are so proud that Run with Karl is truly
one of the only instances between PV and Bettendorf that
isn't about competition, but rather about community and coming together
for a common cause and supporting the future of our
students and teachers. In twenty fifteen, a Center Credit Union
became the title sponsor for the race, and that partnership

(08:31):
continues today, which were so grateful for. They're just a
really incredible partner. Last year we celebrated thirty years of
Run with Carl, which is just crazy, and it was
a fantastic day and we just really can't wait for
this year too.

Speaker 1 (08:45):
There are tons of races in the Quad Cities. Why
should folks choose Run with Carl And what makes it
so special?

Speaker 2 (08:54):
Oh my gosh, you are totally right. The Quad Cities
is filled with amazing races during all seasons. I feel
like there's some thing for everybody, no matter what time
of year. It's the community fun and exciting, especially for
runners and walkers and folks who want to get out
and get active. I think the timing of Run with
Carl is particularly special. It's ideal for really all types
of different runners involved. So you know, let's say you're

(09:15):
a more serious runner who is really focused on training
and running at a specific time. You might have just
participated in the Bicks. Maybe you're training for the Quad
Cities Marathon or half marathon which takes place later this September.
That makes Run with Carl a perfect in between training
runner activity on the holiday weekend when maybe you might
not want to get out there and do too much training.
It's kind of on the downside of more intense distance training,

(09:39):
so you can come to Run with Carl, get a
couple miles in and start your training week off right
and you know, not too intense. If you're a student,
this falls at the perfect time at the start of
cross country season or if you have a student too.
Both bet NORPH and PV usually send a good portion
of student athletes and use Run with Carl as their
run for the day, which is so much fun to see.
There's always a little bit of effort, lots of friendly

(10:00):
competition between runners to see how they time out early
in the season. It's really fun and that's actually something
we would love to see more of this year is
more student athletes, not just from BETTORF and PV, but
from all across the Quad Cities and really not just runners.
You know any athlete, anybody is welcome at all to
join us. It's just a fun way to get active together.

(10:20):
It's also a great time for more casual runners and
walkers as a kickoff to fall and to celebrate back
to school time for the family. We try really hard
to make Run with Karl a fun outing for everybody
in your family, offering a kid's fun run, different distances
for any type of running ability, plus a great post
race party with music and cold snacks before sending you
on your way to enjoy the rest of the holiday

(10:41):
before the school week. Something else that I think makes
our race special is also our training run series that
I mentioned last time I was here. For the last
few years, our fantastic partner, Fleet Feet, run by Phil
and Jackie Young, has led a month long series of
training runs on the Run with Carl course and it
is such a blast. Last year and this year we've
hosted the training runs on Monday mornings in August at

(11:03):
five thirty am. Yes, five thirty in the morning, which
is not exactly my ideal time of day, but hey,
runners seem to love it, so we're all for it.
That has been a great change to get more folks
on the pavement before the heat gets unbearable when we
used to host those in the afternoon, So join us.
We have one Monday left, so if you're planning to
do Run with Carl, come next Monday, get a little

(11:24):
practice in and then get ready for the big race.
And then my final answer to why we're special is
that we're remembering a student and a community member that
was lost too soon. Keeping Carl's legacy alive has been
such a special mission and has really united a lot
of folks for many years, and now is being passed
over to the next generation of Quad citizens as people
want to remember a young runner and support students in

(11:45):
our local schools.

Speaker 1 (11:47):
Race day is around the corner. How can people get
involved with the Run of Carl.

Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well, the obvious answer is signing up to run or
walk with us. Right now, we're sitting at a few
hundreds in our race registration, which is a great to
be and very typical for us at this time. As
a procrastinator myself, I really understand that lots of folks
like to wait until close to the race to actually
register to make sure weather's going to be nice and
it'll be a good day for the whole family to
get out and run. We definitely get that and also

(12:15):
want to encourage registration at least before race day morning
or it might cost you a couple of extra dollars,
but hey, in the end, it is for a great
cause no matter when you sign up. So, like I said,
we offer a five k option, a five mile option,
a kid's fun run so the whole family can be involved.
You can run, jog, push your stroller, walk, really whatever

(12:35):
suits you. And then after the race, we've got our
post race party like I mentioned, with different activities, fun music, refreshments,
and a brief award ceremony also to celebrate our race winners. Now,
if running is not your stick, which if you might
not have guessed, it is not mine, so I definitely understand,
we need tons of race day volunteers and we would
be happy to accept your help in return for a

(12:57):
free shirt and access to all the fun of the morning.
We have different opportunities at water stops, they have registration,
handing out medals to kiddos, refreshments to runners, and so
much more. So we'd be delighted to have you join
us in that capacity as well. At Run with Carl
Shout out to all of our former volunteers. Without you,
all race day just would not go as great as
it always does. And finally, we of course are always

(13:19):
looking for more sponsors and community partners. Fundraising races like
ours really rely on sponsorships, just like we rely on
folks to sign up to participate. We've got a few
different sponsorship opportunities at different dollar amounts to make it
work for your business or for your family, and we
would love to expand our partnerships with folks who want
to align with our mission. A big thank you to

(13:39):
our presenting sponsor, A Center, Credit Union, Rock Valley Physical Therapy,
and Fleet Feed, our platinum sponsors hi V and Rule
and Rule, who are our biggest post race sponsors, Vascular
Institute of the Midwest, our Kids Run sponsor, KWQC, our
media sponsor, and to all of our incredible gold and
bronze sponsors. It's never too late to get involved and
to make a donation, so if you're interested in learning

(14:01):
more about that, shoot us an email at run with
Carl QC at gmail dot com.

Speaker 1 (14:06):
What has changed with the race over the years.

Speaker 2 (14:09):
As with any race, there's been lots of changes in
the last couple of years, we've had a couple of
big ones, specifically with our race start and finish and
the location of our post race party. Due to the
new swimming facility where splash landing was, which is awesome
by the way, love driving by that it always looks
so busy and like such a fun spot. We moved
our packet pickup, starting line, kids, race, and post race party,

(14:30):
so pretty much everything all to the bet North Middle
School and the parking lot of the school near the
tennis courts off of Middle Road. It's been a great
location shift for us, giving us a little bit more
space to spread out while keeping everything except of course,
the race contained to the lot. It's been really nice
and we're really appreciative of the school for letting us
use their space. We've updated our post race party throughout

(14:51):
the years, including more fun music from the Rule and
real DJ truck free samples from the community, photo opportunities
from Acentra, and a great couple of photo backgrounds, snow
cones and more. Really, like I said, trying to make
this a family fun activity to kick off Labor Day
and embrace the start of the school year, and something
that changes every year. But we're always extremely excited about

(15:12):
is our T shirt design with classical graphics that we've
worked with for so so many years. We're appreciative of
their partnership. This year, we're throwing it back a little
bit with more Classic Forest Green. Our shirts are really
some of the best in the race biz that we've seen,
and we love seeing all of them around the community.
And obviously we're a little biased, of course, but we

(15:33):
get a lot of good feedback on our shirts. So,
like I said, Classic Forest Green this year long sleeve
with our orange and white details. Shout out to us
CenTra as we're repping the orange. It's a really great
looking shirt this year, So be sure to register as
soon as you can to make sure that you get yours.

Speaker 1 (15:48):
Why is Run with Carl is so important to the
Quad Cities community?

Speaker 2 (15:53):
Well, Run with Carl is important to the community for
a lot of reasons in my opinion. You know, first
of all, it keeps the legacy of community member alive.
Like I said earlier, there are folks in the Quad
Cities who have been involved in nearly every Run with
Carl since the beginning, who have supported the Shillig family
during their time of loss, and who really care about
supporting students at Betton Norf and PV. Remembering Carl is

(16:14):
special and being part of the race that gives people
a place to gather remember him and do something he
loved to do run is extremely rewarding for all of
us involved. Second, it's making a real impact. The money
we raise is being dumped right back into our school
districts and into our teachers and students, which is something
the Shilligs were passionate about and we are proud to
continue that mission. Since the first scholarship was awarded in

(16:35):
nineteen ninety eight to Jeff Paul, who is now a
teacher at PV and a dedicated run with Carl runner.
Jeff also always does our kind of welcome to everybody
on race day morning, and he's just a compelling speaker
and was a friend of Carl, and we're just honored
to have him there every year. So since he was
awarded the first scholarship in nineteen ninety eight, nearly sixty

(16:56):
students from both Bettendorf and PV have received the Karl
ds shill Memorial Scholarship, which supports them at one thousand
dollars every year for their four years of school of college.
The scholarship recipients are students who are involved and engaged
in their schools, sports, and communities, just like Carl was,
and they all have goals to make a difference in

(17:17):
the world through their post secondary education. In addition to
the scholarships being handed out, Bettendorf also uses the funds
for teacher classroom grants to help make teaching projects easier
and to give students access to new and beneficial opportunities.
Run with Carl is the continual funding vehicle for these
scholarships and grants, and over the last thirty years has
raised close to a million dollars to support this cause.

(17:38):
We're so proud of that number. Last year we were
able to give over fifteen thousand to each school foundation
and we hope to do that or more again this year.
I mean, really, how can you not feel good about
helping students pursue their education dreams and helping teachers create
better classroom experiences. It's really just feel good all around.
And last, but most certainly not least, this is a
big one for me as a former PB spartan. It's

(17:59):
important an important tradition because it facilitates community over competition. Rarely,
if ever, our PV and Bettendorff not rivals, but when
it comes to run with Carl, PV and Bettendorf, students,
parents and supporters are on one team and that creates
a really nice moment for the community. It's all about
having fun, getting moving, and giving back. It's an awesome
day and we're just proud to make it happen each year.

(18:21):
So obviously a lot of information, all of which can
be found at Runwthcarl dot com or on our Facebook page,
which is ramping up as race day comes closer and closer.
We've got information about packet pickup, coming maps to help folks,
you know, get oriented with where the post race party is,
where they can park, what roads might be closed, all
of that good stuff. You can still register online ahead

(18:44):
of the race, and you can join us the morning of.
If you're a super procrastinator and don't want to sign
up until the very last minute, we do encourage you
to sign up ahead of time so you can guarantee
yourself a shirt, but we will do our best to
accommodate everyone. We're super excited for another great year and
couldn't be more grateful to the community for all the
support we've had over the last three decades, and we

(19:05):
really hope to see everybody out there.

Speaker 1 (19:07):
Thanks so much, Hannah. A couple wrap ups. One register now,
don't wait that way. If you want to share, you
can get one two. Save yourself a couple bucks because
race day they will charge it to you. Now, yes,
this is a charity, so yes, everyone wants to be nice.
But if you think you're gonna do it on Friday

(19:27):
or Saturday that weekend, register then don't wait till Monday.
Yes we'll take your money, We're all about that, but
just think of the savings there. Talking about rivalries, I
had to give away. I had to present the beden
Nerf Scholarship this year at Bendorf High School, and being

(19:50):
a former PV grad, I started my talk by saying,
my name is Craig Shelley. I'm from the class of
nineteen ninety three from a high school down the road
called Pleasant Valley High School. You might have heard of it.
And everyone kind of gave me the groan and I said,
go spartans. That got everybody awake to see if they

(20:11):
were actually listening to what I was saying. I think
I was number nine or ten presenter of like thirty
that night, so usually when you get to there, people
start falling asleep. But yeah, we've given away fifty two
scholarships going back to nineteen ninety eight, so that's about

(20:31):
two hundred and six thousand of scholarship money just from
my scholarship the Carl Do Usual Look Memorial Fund. So yeah,
there's something to be said about that changing gears. Briefly,
I'll talk again about the run with Carl in about
two weeks. That'll be Saturday the thirtieth, and that will

(20:54):
be race day weekend. Now, don't forget the race is
on Monday, Labor Day times. People think it's Saturday. Packet
pickup will be there. You can pick up your packet,
you can register. You'll be able to do that Friday
night as well. But don't wait till race day. I mean,
I know you will, but don't. We like your money,

(21:16):
We need your numbers. We want to know how many
are coming. But I'll talk more about that again in
two weeks because my August thirtieth will be Saturday morning
and I think packet pick up that day. I'll run
until about noon, So I'll remind everybody you got about
ninety minutes to go pick up your stuff before Monday morning.
And that's all good future shows. So next month, September,

(21:43):
September's Life Insurance Awareness Month, so I will be talking
a lot about life insurance. Now, you guys hear me
talk about annuities all the time, And remember annuities and
life insurance are kind of an inverse relationship, but they
both go hand in hand, and they're both manufactured by
the same entity, an insurance company. So when we're talking

(22:06):
about annuities, you've heard me talk about some companies like
American Equity or Athene. Athene has been really popular lately
due to extra features they are offering, like instead of
a ten percent right a withdrawal after twelve month deposit,
you could withdraw up to twenty percent of your principal amount.

(22:30):
That's a big change in the industry because annuity companies
are boring and they're reluctant to change. And that's really
changed the industry across the board due to the fact
that you can take out twenty percent instead of ten,
which means, hey, you got the option to pull more

(22:53):
money if you need to. But in September again, I'll
talk more about life insurance. I'll talk a little bit
bit about eyelets. I mean, I'll talk about term and
permanent insurance, of course, and we'll talk about revocable trust
policies as well. Yes, it's boring and dry material, but

(23:14):
every one of you listening needs it if you don't
have it. And it's hard to believe, but fifty eight
percent of Americans do not have life insurance, and about
seventy percent of them are fully underinsured. So just something
to keep in mind. But I'll talk more about that

(23:36):
next month. Don't forget. I give monthly virtual meetings regarding
Medicare every month. I talk about two different companies. In
one meeting, I will cover Medicare supplement plans with a
standalone drug plan. That meeting and sponsored by well Mark.
United Healthcare is a sponsor for my other virtual meeting,

(23:57):
I focus more in that meeting on Medicare Parts C,
also known as Medicare Advantage Plans. I'll cover the benefits
of that platform and how those function. You can call
our office at five six three three three two two
two zero zero for the zoom meeting codes and additional
dates and times. You're also welcome to email me at

(24:21):
Craig at Craigshillig dot com. And that's my name, c
R a I G at c R a I G
s c h I L l I G dot com.
And I'd be happy to send you the virtual zoomlink
meeting codes. This is Craig Shillig with safe money.