(2025) 5-4 David Carrier Show Hour 1 Podcast

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
He served at the Pentagon as an army jag. He
graduated from Notre Dame and has two law degrees from
Boston University and Georgetown University. He's been practicing law for
over thirty years. He's your family's personal attorney. It's time
for the David Carrier Show.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Hello, and welcome to the David Carrier Show. I'm David Carrier,
your family's personal attorney. And you have found the place
where we talk about estate planning, elder law, real estate
and business law, as well as anything else that you
feel like talking about. And how do we know what
you feel like talking about? Don't know unless you tell us.
It's easy to do those six one, six, seven, seven four,

(00:44):
twenty four twenty four. That sixty one six seven, seven
four twenty four to twenty four will get your question,
comment or concern. Do you have a concern. Let's not
say worries, let's say not say problems. Let's just say,
you know, challenges that have to be resolved anyway. Six one, six, seven, seven,
twenty four twenty four will get your question, comment or

(01:06):
concern on the air. Hopefully we'll deal with it in
a way that is a lively legal discussion, although not
not legal advice. So what should we talk about today? Huh?
How about trusts? You want to talk about trusts. Here's
the problem with trusts. Everybody thinks they know what a
trust is, and I'm going to tell you what a

(01:27):
trust is. How about that trust is a way for
you to own something without really owning it, or to
really own something without technically owning it. Maybe that's the
better way to think about it. You know, everybody wants
to say, or you hear a lot, oh I don't
own anything, it's all in my trust, which is kind

(01:48):
of a backwards way of thinking about trusts. Trust is
generally a written document, generally something you do on purpose, right,
and but sometimes it's not. Sometimes the court just says,
oh no, you behave this way, and therefore now there's
a trust. Bingo. So a trust can be in writing,

(02:09):
but it doesn't have to be. A trust can be
on purpose, but it doesn't have to be. A trust
could be for specific purposes, but the court could throw
some more purposes on there. All right. So when you're
doing a trust, see here's the thing. People say, oh,
do I need a trust? And it's like, no, no,

(02:29):
nobody needs a trust. It's not like oxygen. Okay, it's
not like glucose. Right, it's not like food. You don't
need a trust, you know, I need love to keep
me happy. Yes, that's correct, But you need a trust. No.
A trust is a tool. A trust is something that

(02:50):
you use to get something you want. Okay, Like, I
know a lot of people with golf clubs. Do you
need golf clubs?

Speaker 3 (03:01):
No?

Speaker 2 (03:02):
I actually have a set of golf clubs. A guy
gave me, you know, probably thirty years ago. We played
several times. It was extras. I still have the golf clubs. Okay,
But does that mean I play golf?

Speaker 3 (03:14):
No?

Speaker 2 (03:14):
It does not. Okay, No, good at it. So the
point is you don't need golf clubs. You don't need
to trust. What you need to do is take care
of yourself, take care of your family. Right. You need
to anticipate the future to the extent it's given to
us to anticipate the future. Right. And the more you

(03:36):
do to anticipate the future, the better the future is
likely to be. Have you ever noticed that? Have you
ever noticed that when you plan ahead things tend to
work out a little bit better than if you don't,
And I don't mean like going on vacation and it's like, oh,
it's eleven forty five quick, that means we need to
get some elephant years here. Or it's not like that.

(03:58):
That's not what I'm talking about. But if your open
mind ready to go, got your clothing right? I mean
I used to do these mission trips. We got a
kid who came on a mission trip one time with
an extra pair underwear. That's what he brought. He showed
up as we were pulling out, and you know, where's
your stuff or you know the other thing we get there.

(04:22):
It turns out he's got an extra pair underwear. That
young man eventually went home. He was not prepared physically
or mentally to be there. Okay, well, when the future
shows up, will you be physically and mentally prepared to
be there? And what the trust does with the whole
planning process does and a tool one of the tools

(04:46):
to do that well is the trust. Okay, wills, powers
of attorney, all the rest of these legal documents, none
of them are necessary in and of themselves. Okay, they're
not necessary. They're not necessary in the sense that it's
going to keep your breathing or metabolizing or any of

(05:09):
the rest of that stuff. But if you have goals,
if you intend to accomplish things like I don't know,
living a full life, if you intend to do things
like anticipate things that will happen more often than not,

(05:30):
like buckling your seatbelt for example. You know, well, why
do you buckle your seatbelt?

Speaker 1 (05:34):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (05:34):
Because today I'm going to smash into a tree. What
how do you know that? Well, you don't know that,
but it could happen, and so you want to be
ready for it. That's the idea. Okay, So we don't
discount things that happen that happen a lot. We understand
that they do, and so we're going to use trusts
and planning and all the rest of this stuff to

(05:56):
anticipate those things. So when someone says, do I need
a plan? Do I need a trust or a will
or something like this, the answer is, well no, but
let's talk a little bit more. Let's figure this out
a little bit more. Challenge yourself, right, how do you

(06:17):
want your life to unfold? Okay? How has it done?
It already? All right? And is is it kind of
a hassle? Yeah, it kind of is, right, But what
in your life was easy? What in your life could
you ignore what was really going on?

Speaker 3 (06:37):
Right?

Speaker 2 (06:37):
And shortcut things? Think about the last time you did shortcuts. So,
you know, talking to a fella recently who's done very
very well for himself, Okay, very well, very comfortable, et cetera,
et cetera, and I'm like, well, okay, and we need
to do you know, here's all the different things that
we do and our attitude. Our attitude is, if there's

(07:00):
a risk, let's reduce it. If there's a good thing,
let's maximize it. Let's be thinking about the things that
we know have happened. You know, I've only been at
it for a lawyer for forty two years and doing
this stuff at thirty five, so you know, we've seen
a couple of things, and our goal is always to

(07:22):
maximize what it is you want to accomplish, Maximize the
good things. So if you have charitable intent, if you
want to help out your family, there are things that
can be done which usually isn't done. Okay, because nobody
wants to think about this for whatever reason, I include
you know, attorneys in the mix who don't want to

(07:42):
really think it through. You know, it's kind of like,
you know, put a band aid on it and it'll
be fine, rather than do the deep dive and figure
out how do we maximize the good things, minimize the
bad things, and don't deny the reality, which is you
don't really know what's going to happen next. What you

(08:05):
know is that you don't know. And because you don't know,
then we're going to take it seriously. And the whole
planning aspect, whether it's a trust, the will, power of
attorney for deed, what have you. All those documents are
intended to carry out the fundamental thing which you do need.

(08:27):
What you do need is to peer ahead as best
we can through the through the fog of the future. Right,
you can't see very far in the future. Nobody can. Okay, fine,
you can't. But what you can do is you can

(08:47):
take as the experience that other people have had, Right
we can. There are things that we know happen more
often than not. Okay, well, let's go with that. Let's
use our experience of the ways of the world, et
cetera right to deal with the things that we can

(09:08):
reasonably anticipate will happen. So as we talk about, you know,
what are the legal documents that we do. Remember, do
you need the legal documents? No, you can go broke,
that would be fine. You can leave a mess for
your family most people. Do you want to join the crowd?

(09:28):
You know, don't plan ahead and go broke and then
leave a mess. I mean, that's that's a very that's
a very what do you want to say popular? I
don't know popular, but that's a very common, very widely
employed strategy for dealing with the future. You know, shut

(09:51):
your eyes tight and stick your fingers in your ears.
But it wouldn't be listening to me now if that
was you. So what we're going to talk about are
some of the tools, are some of the approaches that
we take as we go through Again, it's sort of
a back to basics thing. And if you give me
a shout at six one, six seven, seven four, twenty
four twenty four, that's six one, six, seven, seven four

(10:14):
twenty four to twenty four, we can get your question,
comment or concern on the air. Welcome back to the
David Carrier Show on David Carrier your family's personal attorney.
Now's the time give us a call if you have
a retirement law question. What's retirement law you may ask, Well,
it's all that stuff the state planning, elder law, real estate, business, lawns,

(10:35):
all the things that have to do with you. If
you are a retiree, if you hope someday to be
a retiree, if you know a retiree, if you wish
you were a retiree, if you intend never to be
a retiree, Well then we've got things that can really
help out. So give us a call six one, six seven,
seven four, twenty four, twenty four. If you've got a

(10:56):
question about wills, Truss, probate, all that, et cetera, well
we'll deal with it. You know, there's a I've heard
an ad for hearing aids and it says, oh, you
know something about you know you get you're twice as
likely to have dementia if you can't hear, or something
like this. And the only issue I have with that

(11:20):
is it's not that you'll have dementia, it's that other
people will think you do. Okay, there's you know, what
is the best reason to get hearing aids so they
won't think you're adult. That's why just saying so oftentimes
it's not the reality. So there are a lot of

(11:41):
folks out there who are not suffering from dementia at all,
but their families think they are because they respond inappropriately
to things. And the problem is, for a lot of folks,
it's they can't hear all right, they didn't hear what
you said. So consider this if you think grandma is

(12:02):
you know, or grandpa, and it's time to start thinking about, ooh,
where they are to go? Because you know, they said
crazy stuff, right, Maybe they didn't hear you, And maybe
this is true. Check it out, you know. I mean,
I'm not saying all the time, but maybe they didn't

(12:23):
hear you, and maybe what they were doing was kind
of responding inappropriately to what they thought they heard you say,
as opposed to what you actually said. Right. That happens
so much, and it just it kind of gets back
to the whole what is it we're doing here with

(12:43):
this planning? Because, like Yogi Bear said, predictions are hard
because they're about the future. Planning is hard because it's
about the future and we don't know what's going to
happen next. Does that mean that we can't make things better?
Does that mean that we don't have any responsibility right
to looking ahead as best as we can and doing

(13:07):
the best job that we can. I don't think it
absolves us of anything. I think it just means that's
what I do for a living, so I better not.
But it's just like if you if you do plan ahead,
there are lots of things you can do that make
the world work out in a better way. And that's

(13:27):
what that's what this is really all about. So so
kind of decide, well, what is it? What is it
you want? And you know, that's one of the worst
questions you can ask somebody. I've learned this over the years,
well what do you want? And it's like, how the
hell do I know what I want? You know, give
me the menu. Do you ever go into a restaurant
and not look at the menu and they say, well

(13:49):
what do you want? They say, I don't know? What
do you got? Well, what we've got what is possible
is to make sure that the life that you have lived, working, saving,
doing the good thing, all the rest of it. Number
one first and foremost. You don't have to give that up. Right,
So the whole dementia thing, it's like, yeah, I mean

(14:11):
that's tough, and does it happen, Yeah, it happens, all right,
Does that mean that your life of faithfulness, your life
of service, your life of dedicated all those things. Does
that mean you're giving up all those things? The answer
is no, you're not giving up. You don't have to
give up those things. It's a tough deal, yes it is.
But if you've planned a head for that, right, then

(14:35):
you do not have to impoverish yourself. You don't have
to impoverish your spouse, your family. Right. There are ways
to make this go as easy as possible. And some
of the tools that we put in the toolbox, right,
some of the things that we do are trusts, wills,
powers of attorney, that kind of thing. The most I

(14:56):
would say the central central document thing is the trust.
Why because with the trust, and I'm not saying, you know,
it's always the most important, but it is kind of
the central planning thing because what the trust tells us

(15:17):
is what it was, what was important to you, you know,
what were the important things for you? Well, it was
important for me to care for myself, It was important
for me to care for my family. It was important
to me to you know, make sure that things went
along smoothly. Now we do need other documents, there are
other things that have to be done, and some of them,

(15:39):
let's face it, I mean, some of them are really
kind of more important, like the healthcare power of attorney.
If you cannot make health care decisions for yourself, you
need someone to do that, to do that for you, right,
that's you got to have that. So it's important to
get that done, right, to do your advanced directive right
so they know what it is they're supposed to be

(16:01):
doing for you. Okay, Most people just leave that like
they think that, oh, my spouse will do that for me,
my husband will do that, my wife will do that,
and they have absolutely no legal standing to do any
of that without either court approval, guardianship and what have you,
conservatorship without court approval, And it's like, you know, you

(16:25):
can't even see your spouse's medical records unless they improve it.
For crying out loud, Okay, but we need to you
need to know that, so let's do this. But the
trust is really, you know, my way of thinking, the
trust is where we really express and not in a

(16:47):
totally emergency if you don't have this, then you're not
going to get the proper medical care. But in a
conscientious what do I think about this stuff sort of thing.
That's that's really the that's really the key to the trust.
Now here's how it works. The trust holds property and

(17:10):
people are like, oh, you know, I'm giving up my property,
I'm giving up control. I had a you know, our
conversation with a financial advisor just last week, and he
thinks that, oh, if you do the trust, then you're
giving up all of your control. And it's like, that
couldn't be further from the truth. I don't think anybody

(17:30):
wants to give up control over their asset, and I
don't know anybody who wants to do that. So how
but how can we accomplish our goals of avoiding probate,
saving taxes, get it to the kids. Yeah, sure we
want to do that, that's important, But mostly what we
want to do first and foremost, what we need to

(17:51):
do is to secure what you've built for you, and
that's what the trust can do. And people say, well,
it's not my stuff more, it belongs to the to
the trust. It's like wow, sort of legally technically, I suppose,
but it's just like, ask yourself this question. Do you

(18:12):
have money in the bank when in the bank, yeah,
you know, or financial you know, institution or four oh
one k or ira or something like that. Okay, something
besides your house. Your house you can put your hands on,
right that you can touch that, it's right there. But
financial assets typically some people have it under the mattress,

(18:35):
yes that's true. But most people have it in a
bank or finance institution or something like that. And you
don't have the money piled up around you. You are
trusting right that the bank, the financial institution, whoever it is,
will give you the money when you ask for it
on the terms that you have agreed. Right, it's still

(18:59):
your money, right, it's still your asset. Nobody would talk
about it as, oh, I don't have any money, it's
all in the bank. Oh I don't have any money.
Warren Buffett's got it, you know what I mean. Nobody
thinks about it that way, and you shouldn't think about
your trust that way. Either. Your trust holds the money

(19:21):
just the way the bank holds your cash, right, and
you can get it on the terms that you set forth.
And there are reasons why we put money in the bank.
There are reasons why we put money in the trust,
and the extent of those reasons really depends on what
it was you were trying to accomplish. Okay, so let's

(19:42):
just start thinking a little bit more about Well, I
would like what would you like? There's almost anything that
you want us to accomplish, we can do. But it's
not simply a matter of when I die, where does
my stuff go? Yeah, I mean we want to answer
that question, and we need to answer that question. But
you know, if you're listening to this show, you're probably

(20:04):
not dead yet. So there's probably things we want to
do between now and crossing over the Great Divide that
are a little more important than what happens afterwards. You've
been listening to the David Carrier Show. I'm David Carrier,
your family's personal attorney. Wellcome back to the David Carrier Show.
I'm David Carrier, your famili's personal attorney. Now's the time

(20:27):
give us a call. Sixty one six seven seven four
twenty four twenty four. That's sixty one six seven seven
four twenty four twenty four. We've got Don on the line. Hello, Don,
Welcome to the David Carrier Show.

Speaker 3 (20:40):
Good morn, sir. I think I have probably a simple question.
I believe you answered for me when we first became
clients and set up a trust. So to do that.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
We don't worry. I can spin it out for another
hour and a half.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
Well, I want to see if you're still saying the
same thing, right.

Speaker 2 (21:02):
No, I well, you know we've got about We've got
I'll tell you, don We've got about twenty years of
recordings of these radio shows, so you can actually you
can find out whether or not I am consistent. But
let's go.

Speaker 3 (21:16):
My wife and Iron are upper seventies and in good
health and so forth, and not by any means wealthy,
but comfortable and anyway. Yeah, yeah, I kicked off my
initiative this week. I'm saying, you know, I wonder if
I'm getting the best deal on homeowners and car insurance.

(21:37):
So I'm going to gather quotes from various folks and
started down that road. Well, one thing that came up
a few of the homeowners folks, I think I should
have an umbrella policy or other than umbrella, whatever do
you want to call it? Attachment to my homeowners. And
years ago, I U when I well, when I didn't

(22:00):
have a trust, but I was coaching youth hockey and
so forth, and I thought that's probably a good idea,
but no, I dropped it several years back, and I
thought that when we set up our trust and we
went through the full funding, that you recommend that my
large assets, if you would, are protected, and I shouldn't

(22:23):
need an umbrella trust. So that's my question. Should I
still consider that?

Speaker 2 (22:31):
Yeah? So here's so. Here's the thing. There are two
approaches to risk. There are a million, but here are
two of them that are relevant to our conversation. The
first is if things go bad, because things will go
bad for some number of people, okay, and what we
should do is spread the risk out among everybody. Okay.

(22:53):
That's insurance. Now, the umbrella policies you talk about are
usually a million dollars to million dollars of coverage, but
they only charge a couple hundred bucks a year, so
you can imagine that there's not a lot of claims
being paid on those policies. However, if you have whatever

(23:15):
whatever it is, that is covered by an umbrella policy, right,
and your other insurance is used up and all the
rest the umbrella policy, the umbrella policy for relatively low
dollars can be very helpful. Right, So it's not a
bad idea. Uh, And Usually it's kind of the cost benefit.
It's like, yeah, do I really want to spend two

(23:36):
hundred dollars on a two million dollar umbrella policy? When
you know that's you know, do the math. That's four
bucks a week where I could get myself a coffee
at Starbucks. Well, I don't know if you can get
a coffee at Starbucks for four bucks, but anyway, half
a coffee, you get half a coffee. Don't get one

(23:57):
of them fancy things loaded a sugar, or they're bad
for you. Anyway. The point is it's a relatively low
amount of money for if you fit the criteria, a
good deal of coverage. All right. So I'm never opposed
to getting the rarely opposed to getting the umbrella policy

(24:20):
because if you need it, boy, you're glad you have it.
And it wasn't that hard to get. Now. That's and
you of course have homeowners and all the rest of
the insurances that you have, and those are all very
good because they address particular liabilities that are likely to arise,

(24:41):
and they address those liabilities first with lawyers, right insurance
defense lawyers who will fight whoever claims that they are
to get some money out of you. Right, you've got
the insurance defense lawyers. That's a good thing. And then
secondly cash to pay off whatever's left after the lawyers
are beaten up on the person who would dare to

(25:04):
assert that you did something you know wrong. So there's
the insurance solution. And the insurance solution is evolved over
hundreds probably thousands of years, you know, in terms of
risk and allocating risk and all the rest of that stuff.
So great, let's do the insurance solution. Are there? There's

(25:29):
basic insurance the homeowners. Then, as you point out, then
there is the hey, I could get this umbrella policy.
Do I really need it? Well, I don't know if
I'm going to really need it until the future shows
up and then it's going to be too late to
get it. And the downside, I'm going to give a
rich insurance company extra couple hundred bucks a year, And

(25:50):
the downside isn't so down that I wouldn't go ahead
and do it. Okay, that's the idea with the insurance policies.
Now there's another another approach to risk, which is I'm
going to bury my treasure in Ali Baba's cave. And
you got to know open sesame before you get it,

(26:11):
and it's all buried under rock in et cetera, CEA.
It's very secure. And I'm going to go out into
the wide world away from my cave where my riches
are stored, and bad things might happen to me. And
if bad things happen to me, that'll be too bad.
But I'm not carrying my treasure trove on my back.

(26:33):
I'm not hauling around pillar cases of cash. So if
the world goes sideways, I lose everything. That's what I
call the structural solution. Okay, so my opinion, you want both.
You want to set things up so that your assets
are off limits, right, so if somebody beats you up,

(26:57):
they can't get your stuff, but it's immediately available to you. However,
I just assume hire Roco the enforcer, so that if
the bad guys show up, Roco can take care of
my business. You see. That's insurance.

Speaker 3 (27:13):
Ye. Now that's the latter part of the discussion you
just had there. Is that what you referred to as
the root seller, right, and that is that is.

Speaker 2 (27:22):
Our trust right exactly right? Yes, you got that right
down in the root Seller. The twisters come by, they
wipe away your pantry. They wipe away the stuff that
you've got in your revocable trust. Terrible, terrible, But the
bulk of what you've got is underground. Now. I would

(27:42):
rather not. I would rather not, you know, be a
bare knuckle in it every time, right, I would rather
not lose my stuff. I would rather protect everything I've got.
And so that's why I hire the insurance company enforcer
to take care of that business. But you do both
because sometimes rock O, you know, you don't feel like

(28:05):
showing up today. Uh and oh oh, you know I
protect you against these but not against that. You know,
in terms and conditions of insurance policies, you know, three
pages of what you know, three lines of what they cover,
and forty pages of what they don't. So you want that,
my opinion, you want that structural solution plus the whole
long term care aspect of it. That's the other that's

(28:26):
the other part. So you really want both, That's what
That's what I say. And if if it's one of
those things where eh, you know, you're right, I mean,
your your liability profile is very different, your risk profile
is very different now than it used to be. So
if you get it, you don't get it. But you
know you're gonna buy that PIP insurance, right even though

(28:51):
they change the rules. You know, yeah, well that's what
that's what in other states, that's what a brother policies do.
They cover that. That's what I've been told by some
insurance you know, guys who were high up in insurance companies.
They say, oh, yeah, you know, Michigan, the umbrella policy
is going to go up because the more people who
don't take the PIP. Now that sort of thing was

(29:14):
covered in other states by the umbrella policy. That's probably
going to happen in Michigan. Now, we'll see, we'll see.
But yeah, the structural solution, we love it.

Speaker 3 (29:24):
Okay, just one last comment. What makes what you're saying
makes sense? But the latest quote that I got had
an umbrella policy for eight hundred dollars and that kind
of set me back.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
To see, it's already happening. It's already happening. That's what
I'm talking about. Okay. I got to get out of
here because of the music. But thank you don for calling.
I'll just make a comment on that when we get back. Okay,
thanks very much. You've been listening to the David Carrier show.
I'm David Carrier, your family's personal attorney who sometimes cuts

(29:57):
people off. Welcome back to the David Carrier Show. I'm
David Carrier, your family's personal attorney. Now's the time, give
us a call. Sixty one six seven seven four twenty
four twenty four. That's six one six seven seven four
twenty four to twenty four. We'll get your question, comment
or concern or anything else you want to do. Well,

(30:18):
this is that crazy gay guy from California calls in
every couple of years. Not talking to him. You know,
he calls them crazy stuff, so don't call him crazy stuff,
but anything else that'd be you know, geez, we want
to hear from you. Six one six seven seven four
twenty four to twenty four. His name is Dave two,
So karma anyway. But Don was talking about this insurance,

(30:42):
the umbrella policy. Okay, the idea is that if all
else fails, you've got this umbrella policy. Because it's an umbrella,
you get it. And the he mentioned that the premiums
on that the premium he was quoted was eight hundred dollars.
And here's why that is not surprising. In fact, it's

(31:04):
well faithful listeners, know, I've been predicting this for years,
that the umbrella policy costs would go up. A few
years ago, you may recall that the trial lawyers and
the insurance companies got together and decided, hey, it would
be a great idea that if Michigan did not have

(31:26):
unlimited personal injury protection. All right, it would be great
if that was not part of the Michigan no fault
because boy, it's really expensive. Now here's the thing. There's
no complex system. There's no system with all kinds of
stuff going on that isn't balanced out over time. Let's

(31:49):
put it that way. Okay, you know when you look
around what's going on in the world today, let me
just put it that way. What America is doing in
the world? Why is it? Why is it? Oh, it's chaos,
it's chaos. Why are people saying that, Well, because there's
a school of thought that if the situation isn't what

(32:12):
you want it to be, right, think about the system?
Is it's a box of stuff? Okay, the world, whatever
it is, it's the economy, anything, it's a box of stuff.
And some people say it's too hard to figure out
what to do with all that stuff. What exactly is

(32:33):
going on, and there's very complex. But if I shake
the hell out of the box, I'm gonna break relationships.
I'm going to twist things up. I'm going to be chaotic. Ooh, chaotic, right,
But sooner or later the box is gonna settle down.
And the way things are right now is so bad

(32:57):
that it couldn't be worse. It's not likely to be worse. Okay,
I'm gonna give that box a good old shake, and
if it doesn't shake out the way I want it to,
I'm gonna shake it again. All right. If you think
about that as a way to understand what's going on
in Washington, DC these days, people are shaking the box.

(33:20):
It's like, I don't know how we got here. People
have to there's too many lawyers, there's too much talking
about all the rest of it. Screw it all. I'm
just gonna shake that box. And I hope things don't
go bad, but I don't think they'll go as bad
as they are going. So let's see what new relationships,
Let's see what new things we can come up with it,
all right? And if you watch the news, apparently that

(33:42):
that kind of works now. Sometimes in order to get
advantage within the box. People want to change this or
that that affects them personally. Okay, that's how I that's
the lens. That's the way I look at without any
insider information or anything like that. That's the way I
look at this change the insurance law. It's like, we've

(34:03):
got this whole built up system about how it works,
and now for whatever book cause they're going to give
you a minor reduction, we're going to eliminate what has
been a big part of the auto insurance thing in Michigan,
you know, the whole personal inagury protection. And you say, oh, well,

(34:24):
that's all good because these victim you know, the people
who get hurt, they cost us a lot of money. Yeah,
that's true, they do. But there is a reason why
Mary Free Bed Hospital, right gets people from all over
the country for rehab and all the rest of it.
Why do you think they do. Part of the reason,
not one hundred percent, but part of the reason, I said, say,

(34:46):
just a big part is that they've got very advanced
techniques at Mary Free Bed because they're used to dealing
with a pretty much unlimited budget. Right, I'm people who
are wounded injured back in car accidents, well, that expertise
is not cheap, and it doesn't come from nowhere, right,
it comes from in Michigan. Right, the tap is open,

(35:10):
the money is open, it flows right to protect to
rehabilitate people engineering car accidents. Well, now we're going to
shut that. You know, this is what we did a
few years ago. We said, well, you know, I don't know,
that's kind of expensive stuff. Let's not do that anymore.
Let's give that money back to the to the you know,
the car drivers, right, the insured people, because not many

(35:34):
of them need it, not many of them need it.
And besides, we want to we have our own motives. Okay.
In most occasionally people get into catastrophic accidents, and Michigan
had priced the cost of those catastrophic accidents into its

(35:55):
car insurance. That's how we paid for it. And then
we got some people saying, let's shake the box a
little bit, or it would be better for our courin.
We don't want to shake the box exactly. We just
want to rearrange what's going on in our corner of
the box. Okay, we want to change the incentives here.
We want to you know, mix things up a little bit,

(36:17):
which we think will be for our advantage, because you know,
the insurance companies in the trial lawyers think something's good.
What can you conclude about it as the person who's insured?
I mean, come on, what do you what do you think?
I don't know. I'm not saying. I'm not saying nothing.

(36:37):
You design and I say, they're on one side on
the other side, Uh hmmm, is this likely to who?
Is this likely to be really good for? They seem
to think it's very important that I do this.

Speaker 1 (36:51):
Hmmm.

Speaker 2 (36:52):
I wonder if that's going to help me or help
somebody else. I wonder. I don't know just the thought
process they have do that thought experiment. But the point
is that because we haven't priced it into the car
insurance anymore, now, it's falling on the umbrella policies like
it did in other states, and typically you could get million,
you know, million dollars of coverage for a couple hundred bucks.

(37:12):
And what our recent caller, what Don just said, was
he just got quoted eight hundred dollars for an insurance
policy for an umbrella policy. Well that's a lot more
than I've ever heard it. But it is right in
line with what people were telling me was going to happen.
Once you take catastrophic car accidents out of the car insurance,

(37:34):
that liability has got to go somewhere, and where it's
going is to the drivers who are unfortunately involved in
those catastrophic accidents and their umbrella policies. It's taken a
few years to work it out right, but that's where
it's that's where it appears to be going. So you know,
there's a one of the things we did predict was

(37:56):
that the insurance that the umbrella policy rates were going
to go up. And now we've got a caller who say, yeah,
it's going up. The quote's going up for me. Umbrella policies.
As long as it was a minor expense, I'd say
go for it. The more it gets the large of
the expense gets to be. Now I'm not so sure.

(38:17):
And I've always been a big advocate max yourself out
on the personal injury protection. Okay, that's like an umbrella
policies covers what umbrella policies typically do cover, and it's
going to be more targeted to what you're actually like
to have. You've been listening to the David Carrier Show.
I'm David Carrier. Your family's personal attorney,