Passionate about his work, and incredibly compassionate towards others, David Schneider of The Law Offices of David R. Schneider, APC, thoughtfully walks us through the daunting topic that not many want to think about: Estate planning, probate, and beyond.

Episode Transcript
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Announcer (00:00):
From Los Angeles.
This is the Echelon RadioNetwork.

Jerri Hemsworth (00:09):
Good morning.
This is Jerri Hemsworth with theEchelon radio podcast. And it's
a beautiful, beautiful Fridaymorning. And unfortunately, I'm
sitting here in a studio with nowindows, but fortunately, my
guest is David Schneider, howare you doing, David?

David Schneider (00:26):
I'm doing great. Jerri, thanks for having
me.

So you're an attorney, and I've known you for
a number of years.

Been a while now.

Yeah, tell us what kind of law you practice,
because I think you do some coolstuff.

I'm an estate planning attorney, which means I
help people to develop theirestate plan, wills, trust, power
of attorney. And then when I'mnot doing that, I'm a probate
attorney, meaning I'm helpingthose families that didn't
properly plan through probateproceedings, helping to get

(00:58):
those assets to the nextgeneration. And then, in
addition to that, I help peoplewith limited conservatorships.

Limited conservatorships, what is that
exactly?

So, when a family has a child, an autistic
child, somebody on the spectrum,Asperger's, things like that,
parents are obviously in chargeof children, just as as you and
I were, but when the childbecomes 18, just like in your
family and mine.

That's what happens when you feed them,
right?

Well, yeah, if you feed them, you educate them,
you generally, you provide themwith a little bit of clothing.

They grow.

They grow. And with any luck at all, they grow
beyond us.

I was going to say, doctors.
Yes.

They succeed us, but some kids won't, and
those are the kids that are onthe spectrum. So now they're
adults, but they can't advocatefor themselves, so we utilize
something called a limitedconservatorship, and this is
essentially allowing the parentsto stay in the role that they

(02:03):
had been in, to be able to makedecisions where they're going to
live, healthcare decisions.
Doctors,interactions with schools.

Gotcha.

Their ability handling, their ability to enter
into a contract. You know, somekids will be very high on the
spectrum, and we need a littlebit of help. Some kids will be
much lower and need all thehelp, all right, decisions.

Right, Right.

So California instituted a number of years
ago, a different conservatorshipproceeding that's designed
specifically just for them,called a limited
conservatorship.

Okay.

And it's nice, because these courts, most
courts, are adversarial courts.
You have an attorney, I have anattorney, and they're gonna,

We're gonna fight this together. Sure.

In limited conservatorship, the
conservatee, that's the childwho's now become an adult, they
have counsel that's assigned tothem, usually through the court
system, and then I represent,typically the parents, or maybe
it's the aunt or the oldersibling or somebody to bring

(03:16):
this process forward. And ofcourse, we have the judge on the
bench. Well in the limitedconservatorship, all three of us
are essentially working in thesame direction.

Gotcha.

Really not adversarial in the sense that
we're trying to protect ourclients rights.

Yes.

So is the counsel for the child.

Yes.

But we're working together. We talk to
each other, and if we havedisagreements about what types
of control the child needs. Youknow, we're going to talk it out
and we're going to reason ittogether. So it's it's nice,
it's many times when you're incourt, you get an answer for

(03:53):
your client. Maybe it'scomplete. Maybe it isn't. These
answers are complete. We get tofinality, and we get to where
everybody wants to go. And soit's rewarding.

I was gonna say, it sounds like a very feel
good experience, and very foryou as a human and a kind and
and giving human must feel"Okay. I'm doing what I I'm
supposed to be doing.

Well...

This is my gift.

Well, yeah, you know the opportunity to guide
somebody through this process.
These are they're very formdriven. They're very difficult,
and they're very meticulous. Youmess up on a form, you don't
check a box. All right, we'regoing to continue you out 30
days, and in LA County and inVentura County, there isn't a 30

(04:42):
day calendar.

Oh!

The courts are so jammed up that when you get a
continuance, it's 60 days plus.
And this can also rack upattorneys fees.

I was gonna say that, and there could be some
devastating consequences tothat. I would imagine.

Yes, timing you were trying to get before the
kids school counselor, or youhave an IEP coming up.

Yup, yeah.

I was, I have a client that's got some travel
concerns coming up.

Sure.

And so, yeah, nobody wants to be there in the
first place.

Right, right.

And now you have to come back, and you have
to take more time off work, andyou got to pay your attorney
more money. And, you know.

The stress.

So when you can work with somebody who has done
a lot of these things and knowswhere they're going and
understands, you know, theseparticular judges, what they
like, how they feel aboutcertain things. It's, it's very,
I'm just saying, it's veryimportant, because, you know, a

(05:50):
lot of people try to do thesethings on their own.

Yeah, I bet.

And they say, "Oh, I don't need, you know, the
attorney fees or whatever." And,

Right, right.

You're in court, you're there on your
matter, and you're watching themstruggle as they try to get
through it, you know. So anyway,it's important work and and it's
work I enjoy.

How did you get into that, that part of of
estate planning law?

Well, you know, a lot of families were coming to
me with, again, kids on thespectrum, and I had to learn
very quickly about how toprotect those children. Most of
these children are still goingto outlive their parents. They
can't handle money, they can'thandle property. They're going
to inherit if we don't dosomething.

Right.

So there's a mechanism in estate planning
called a special needs trust,okay? And so we utilize that to
restrict the flow of the dough.
With the money, the property tothe child by holding it in this
special trust, and it allows asuccessor trustee to continue to
manage that throughout theirlife. The assets are not counted
against them, so they can't bebounced out of any government

(06:58):
programs that they're qualifyingfor. You know, when the kid
turns 18, the kid is at thepoverty level. So the kid
qualifies for, you know, likethe EBT food qualifies for
Covered California can gethousing assistance. Well, these
things are based on wealth. Sonow this child that's on the

(07:20):
spectrum who everything in theirlife is based on routine that's
so paramount, important to notchange the routine.

Yes.

Well, they inherit. They can't control it.
They don't have the means, theskills, and then they get
bounced out of their programs.
So there has to be a method tonot let them get that money, but
yet have that money for theirneeds to benefit them, and
that's called a special needstrust. Well, as I started
learning more about that, then Ihad to start to learn more about

(07:55):
what their rights were outsideof this as the parents were
trying to interact with theseother institutions, and that's
how I learned about theconservatorship program, and
specifically the limitedconservatorship program. So it
was 20 years ago. It was alittle bit of trial and error.

Sure.

And now it's just through experience.

Gosh, it's absolutely amazing. What
percentage of your work wouldyou say is probate versus estate
planning?

Well, right now, I'm probably a little bit
heavy in probate from what maybeI was a couple of years ago,
probably around 30 to 35% maybeit is, frankly, quite stunning,
the number of how many familieshave not planned, and it takes

(08:48):
so little to trigger a probateproceeding in the state of
California.

Exactly.

You know, there's three elements, or three
factors that you have to clip.
And these are, I describe thisto clients as these are "and"
rules, you have to have one andtwo and three.

Gotcha.

Rule number one, you have to die.

Oh.

Yeah.

You do?

Yeah, and that's actually not very hard,

That's a tough one.

No, it's not very hard to do, actually.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Okay, that's a tough one to get, you know,
like, think about too, you know,number one must happen before
the others.

Well, yeah, and you know, if we look at this,
the statistics, not justnationwide, but statewide, 10
out of 10 people aged 72 orolder are going to die.

Okay, yeah, okay, got it.

So we know, we know that's coming. All right.
So number one, you have to passaway. Number two, you have to
own assets in your own name.

Okay.

Like the house.

Right.

You own the house at 123, Apple Street.

Right.

Number three, the property you own in your own
name when you die, must bevalued, gross value, not in
equity. A 61-5, in real estateor a 184-5 in personal property.

Okay.

So is there anybody who owns a home in the
state of California valued lessthan 61-5?

No.

No. I mean, it just doesn't exist. So,

I mean, my dog, maybe. But you know, his house
is small.

I've seen your dog.

Yeah.

And he looks pretty well off.

He does. He does have creature comforts,
that's for sure.

So what happens is, is that a lot of families
will think, well, you know, Ijust, I'm just a guy here in the
valley, not, not a big deal. Myhome, I don't know. It's like
any other home. It's 1800 squarefeet. It's no big deal. But the
values of these homes have risento such a degree. But they have
this idea in their mind that,well, an estate plan, that

(10:49):
that's what rich people do.

Right.

I mean, uses the word estate.

Estate!

Right.

But you think grand manners.

A castle and a moat, and that kind of stuff.

Yes, yes dragons, everything!

So, so the families don't properly plan.

Yes.

and then the kid calls me up and says, you
know, "I want to sell my home,but I want to sell my parents
home, but the title companykeeps saying, I need letters.
Can you write me some letters?"Letters are what's issued by the
probate court, and so that'swhat's happening there. And it

(11:23):
tends to without any kind of setpattern. It tends to ebb and
flow a bit. I'll go through aperiod of time where I won't
pick up any new cases, and thenone week I'll pick up three. And
this is one of those weeks,actually. Yeah.

Wow, yeah I'm always surprised as as you the
number of people who don't whoare afraid of an estate plan
because of a, the fees, but B,thinking they don't need it. And
I tell anybody I know, if youown any property of value, you
must, because getting caught orwe don't feel the pain if we

(12:01):
don't have the estate.

Yeah, it's not our problem.

It's our it's our children or our our
relative's. And having been anexecutor, and have also been,
you know, for probates twoprobates concurrent, and for my
parent's estate, I don't wish aprobate on any child. You know,

(12:25):
it's long, it's not necessarilypainful, but it's detail
oriented, and you're many timescalling debtors and trying to
pay off some debts ornegotiating and and, but there's
a set time period you can't rushthese things.

No, no, right now the state average is about a
year and a half.

Yes.

Now I practice in Thousand Oaks. I'm in Ventura
County, and so I handle probatesin Ventura County. I handle them
in LA County. Now, post COVID, Iactually handle them throughout
the state, because I can appearvirtually.

Right.

But Ventura County has one probate court.

Wow.

To handle the entire county.

Wow.

Now in LA County, there's eight.

Okay.

Courts.

Okay.

But it's a county of 30 million people.

Sure, still trying to follow.

Follow through this thing, right?

Yeah.

So when we look at the state average, that says
it might take us a year and ahalf.

Yes.

Often we're at two years.

Yeah.

During which time there are no distributions.

Nope.

This is when Johnny comes to me and says,
"Well, my my dad was paying mytuition."

Yes.

Said, "great, Johnny, what I need you to do is
focus. I need you to buckledown. I need you to get a job."

Yeah, because,

There's no plan!

Yeah. And the money stops flowing very
quickly.

Exactly, right.

And it can be devastating if somebody didn't
realize it.

Not not only that, but sometimes we're going
to, then, subsequently, in a ina lump sum, deliver money to
somebody who shouldn't receiveit.

Right.

David Schneide (13:55):
Notwithstanding, the special needs kids I was
talking about.

Right.

You know, your kid just turned 19, and he's
gonna pick up 800 large in cash?

Yeah.

Yeah, that's usually a recipe for success.
Yeah. So estate planning isliterally something that
everybody needs.

So essential.

Everybody that you know needs this.

Essential.

Yeah. So it's,

And updating!

Well,

I'm learning that too!

That's another important point.

Yeah.

I see a ton of stale documents. Last night, I
my last appointment of the day.
I met with somebody. The planwas written in 1993.

Hello!

Never touched.

Oh, oh dear.

Yeah.

Okay.

They said, "Well, can't you fix those
pages?"

No, no, no, no!

I said, "That's a lot of pages to fix. I think
what we'll do is we'll clean itup. We're not gonna, we're gonna
save the name,"

Right.

"So, you know, any assets that were titled to
it, we don't have to touchthose."

Right.

But, yeah, this is a full rewrite. They're not
meant to be set and forget.

Right.

Put up on the shelf.

Right, that's exactly what I have learned over
time.

Yeah.

Yes.

They can grow stale.

Yes, and it's better to keep them updated as
you go, as you acquire or getrid of assets, or it could be
even bank accounts, and youdon't even realize, and I'm
speaking from experience, thatyou open a new bank account that
has some some cash in it. Youshould put it probably in the
trust.

Yeah, we want to have as many assets as
possible.

Yes.

Titled in the name of the trust. But you know,
when they grow stale, you'venamed these persons to be the
trustees.

Right.

They're not there anymore. They've moved
they've passed, their ownissues,

Right.

And then I'll tell you, frankly, this is a
problem that came up a couple oftimes just this last week. The
family tells me that they namedtheir husband. He named his
brother the beneficiary the lifeinsurance because his children
were little and they couldn'tinherit the money.

Right.

So the brother is going to get the money to
take care of the kids, right? Idon't know that that's right.

Right.

A, I don't know your brother. B, if your brother
inherits it and he subsequentlypasses away, it's going to your
nieces and nephews.

Yeah, not to their kids.

You don't owe any allegiance to their cousins.

No.

You don't. You can't do that. And when the
trust is in place, we could havethat money come into the trust.
The successor trustee, whetherit's the brother or the sister,
whoever it's going to be, wouldmanage that dough.

Yes.

And it's just done.

Yeah, yeah.

So I see all kinds of interesting things, the
ideas that people think up ontheir own to how they're going
to deal with these issues andum,

and most of the time, not really legally, I bet.

Well, you know, it's not as much how legal or
illegal, but just here'ssomething that's that you might
find weird. I look at people intheir worst light, not their
best light. You actually pay meto think that way.

Sure.

I'm looking at how your brother is going to
screw over his nieces.

Absolutely.

You know how these friends treat you.

Yes.

One sibling versus the other.

Yes.

I'm paid to look at people in their worst
way, not their best way, becausethat's really the only way I can
protect you.

Exactly I can.

It's funky that way.

Yes, yeah.

So um,

Think evilly in order to prevent evil,

Right, right.
You know, it's just simply beingprepared.

Sure, absolutely.

And so there's a number of people that will
kind of get uncomfortable withthat, that look at me cross
eyed. How could you even thinkthat about my sister?

Trust me.

Yeah.

All it takes is mom and dad to die, and suddenly
you're thinking that about yoursister.

Exactly, or better yet, why don't you come
with me to court one day andjust sit and watch, you know
what's going on with thesepeople.

Unfortunately.

So, and then the other the other funny thing
is almost to a person, everybodywho walks through my front door
is coming to see me, because,well, we're gonna die at some
point. We need a plan. And Idon't actually think that, I
look at everybody is going tolive. What happens if you live?

(18:27):
We A.) need to protect thisdough for you. You worked for
it.
It's not for your children.

Yes.
Right.

Okay? With any luck at all, like we said
earlier, you clothed them, youfed them, you educated them,
they've grown up to succeed you.

Yes.

And that this is your dough, I'm trying to
protect you. But secondly, youmight not die. You could become
incapacitated.

Yeah, that's a toughie.

It is. But the numbers scream at us, one in
three persons aged 68 or olderwill have a significant period
of incapacity before the end ofthe game.

Yes.

I was working with a client again just
yesterday, and he kept steeringthe conversation back to well,
when we die, this and this andthis will happen. And it had to
be about half a dozen times, andI said," you might not die," he
says, "But I have a beneficiarydesignation on this life

(19:27):
insurance." Yes, beneficiariesget paid when you die. What
happens when you becomeincapacitated? How can we access
this dough?

Yes.

So it's trying to educate the client to think
about the future.

Such a good point, David.

So.

Such a good point. I know when I lost my
father and and I was the I wastaking care of the trust and and
I sold some, some real estate.
Um. Family real estate that mymom said, "Yes, go ahead and
sell it" and we would literallywere never thinking that mom

(20:06):
would get sick or or that wethought, okay, now she might be
able to live a little bitdifferent. Dad was was not
incapacitated, but very limited,and we thought, now she can
travel maybe, and she has thislittle nest egg, and we were
literally getting ready to meetwith a financial advisor on

(20:27):
investing this money from thisproperty. And then my mom got
sick, and unfortunately, shepassed about 15-16, months after
my father.

Very common.

And, and it was nothing any of us, four children
saw coming.

Right.

Not even we, we and I don't think mom even saw
it coming. I mean, she in and,and so fortunately, my dad, as I
say, he woke up dead, passed inhis sleep.

Very, very fortunate.

But my mother did not, and it was fortunately,
I had that money to pay for herwhen she was incapac
incapacitated. Yes, because sheshe outlived the 100 Days of
what is it Medicare that paysfor,

Right.

You know.

It's very limited.

And then, but she couldn't go home and live on
her own. And suddenly I thought,holy crap, this wasn't planned
for.

Right.

And if I hadn't had sold that property, would
never have been able to affordher care.

Right. Most people will tell me, "I want to
remain at home. I'd like toremain at home as long as"

Long as possible.

And most people don't realize just how
impractical that really is.

and now how bloody and expensive that is.

Tremendous. I was speaking with a friend of
mine last week that deals inhome healthcare, providing
people as companions, people towatch, that help cook and
prepare. And she was telling mea number of $22,000 a month.
Now, my own mother has to livein assisted living, and her care

(22:21):
is roughly $7500 a month. Wouldshe have rather have lived in
her home? I believe that that'strue.

Yes.

Was that actually the best thing for her?
No, it wasn't. She was isolated.
She anti social and not eatingproperly.
You know, so atthat point it's you make very

Right.
difficult decisions.
Yes.

And you have to put on your big boy pants.

Very big boy pants.

Explain. These are the facts of life.

Yes.

I often compare it to raising children.

Yes, yeah.

You know,

Your parents do become your children.

Exactly the different client emailed me. So
my mom keeps insisting ondriving, and she's a danger to
everybody, including manholecover. And what do I do? Take
the keys away? Well, she'sthreatening me. I said, why?
When your 15 year old threw atantrum, did you toss him the

(23:23):
keys?

Yeah, yeah.
yeah.

You have to step up. This is, believe it or
not, what they want you to do.

Yes.

They just don't consciously know that today. But
when they created these forms,power of attorney, trust, and
they said, Jerri, you know,we're going to put you in
charge, because they trustedyou. They had confidence in you,
that you would be there to actwhen they couldn't.

Yes.

And now that they can't act, they're no
longer thinking rationally.

Right.

And the other strange concept that comes into
play is that most people aregoing to say, "well, that's, you
know, that's when I get older."Yeah, there's nothing that says
the you know, dementia isgenerally considered, you know,
you know, something that happenswhen you're older. But there are

(24:14):
many debilitating issues thatcould cause a person in their
30s or 40s, 50s,

Absolutely.

To have a lack of capacity.

Sure, sure.

So,

Strokes hit at every age.

Absolutely.

You know, and things like that.

Yeah. So, you know, a lot of the things that
I'm dealing with are arebreaking down these walls of
these preconceived notions ofhow an estate plan works, or why
it works the way it does. Andfrankly, I spend the bulk of my
time with clients teaching.

I bet.

You know it takes me, of course, time to
draft documents and to figureout what they actually want. But
if I spend on an average, fivehours with a client, almost four
of them are teaching.

Gotcha.

You know, this is why we're doing it. An
educated client is the bestclient. Educated clients do two
things really well. They followinstructions. They follow
through. I create the trust, Ihelp title the home and the
trust. But you have to go thebank, you have to go the
brokerage, house, lifeinsurance, like when I need you

(25:22):
to do it, and if you don'tunderstand it, you don't have
the motivation, you don't seethe end game. So an educated
client follows through. Thesecond thing I love about
educated clients, they refer.

Nice. Yeah.
You're right.

Well, you they tell somebody else. You know
what, Dave did a good job. Hebroke it down. I understand it.
You got to go see my friendDave.

Nice.

So.

Yeah.

It helps feed itself.

Dave, I'm gonna switch around. What do you do
when you're not in your law firmand you're not practicing law?
What is your favorite hobby?

Well, my favorite hobby is probably
poker.

Poker?

I play poker.

Do you now?

Yes.

Oh!

Yeah. In fact, we're getting ready, planning
our vacations, or, I should say,my vactions.

I was gonna say, "our?"

No. That's why, in June, there's a couple of
weeks where my wife becomes thepoker widow and I go off to the
World Series of Poker.

Do you?

Yeah.

That's amazing.

I have that coming up. I have a couple of
weeks scheduled, a week there,week back, week there again.

And where's it at?

This is in Las Vegas.

Of course.

Yeah, at the Horseshoe.

Okay.

And they'll cycle hundreds of 1000s of
people through these varioustournaments. And I've got four
different tournaments I've gotpegged on my calendar that I'm
going to play. And you know, forthe last several years, I've
been playing for a long time,but last several years, I've
kind of put a little bit morefocus on tournament play. I love

(27:03):
to play for cash. That's really,

Well, yeah, hello.

You know, let's go sit down,

Who wouldn't right if you got skills.

Yeah, go, go, take somebody else's money. But
the two summers ago, in one ofthe senior events, there was
about 3800 players, and Ifinished 36.

Are you kidding?

No, no, and then

Okay, so you're not like a schlub at this.

No, no, I have a little bit of experience.

Okay, all right.

I've been playing as a serious amateur for
about 20 years.

Holy smokes.
How'd you get into this?

I'm not really sure exactly, I think I stumbled
upon it, found that I was good,kind of mucked my way around.
And then when the poker boomcame,

Yeah, yeah.

I'd already played for a while. But when
that came, way back in 2003 Istarted actually studying.

Whoa.

And, you know, figuring out,

Right.

Where the game was going. And it just is kind
of a natural flow. I will tellyou, a lot of attorneys play
poker. I think it has to do withsome of the training that we get
our attention to detail, gettingbetween the lines. It's not
uncommon for,

Reading people.

Reading people.
It's not uncommon for me to sitat a game and there might be two
or three other lawyers at thetable.

Really?

So that's very common.

Now, are you one of those players that dons
the hat, the sunglasses sopeople can't see your eyeballs?

I used to wear the glasses a lot.

Why am I not surprised? I can see you.

well a couple of times when I've been in
studios where there's brightlights, I'll still wear them.

Yeah.

Actually, since, since the pandemic, when
the poker rooms opened back up,I stopped wearing the glasses. I
just felt it was changingpeople's perception of me in a
way that no longer fit what Iwanted to tell them. Often I'm
one of the older guys at thetable, so I have a there's a

(29:23):
preconceived notion as to who Iam and how I might play the
game, and then wearing theglasses was counterintuitive.

Interesting.

I'd rather be thought of. You know, there's
some people at these tables,"Hey, Papa, how are you?"

Yeah.

Yeah, no, I'm fine. Thank you. And they put a
stereotype on me how I mightplay, and then I can use that to
my advantage.

Sure.

Well, the glasses are actually like I
said, opposite to that.

Gotcha.

So,

Yeah. So do you show up in T shirt and sweats?

Usually actually, funny enough I have,
well, not sweats, I'm not asweats guy, but I often have a
jacket that has some kind ofracing emblems on it, because,
if I have to name a secondhobby, it's Corvette Racing.

Okay,

and so,

Hence the bright blue Corvette sitting in
the driveway.

Yes, I drove it because it's Friday.

Yeah, it's Friday! Corvette Friday!

So, so I but they're very casual.

Okay, yeah, yeah, that's interesting. My The
reason I asked that is I learnedabout that technique from my
mother in law, who she she hadmoney, but she had an affinity
for garage sales.

Okay, yeah.

She called them Saturday stores.

Sure, sure.

And her delio was never wear nice clothes and
always take a coin purse filledwith coins, not dollar bills.

Right. You can make change.

Exactly. And sort of it was the stereotype.
It was sort of the perception.
And I said, well, then stopshowing up in your damn
Mercedes, you know, let's takemy Honda. You know, that kind of
stuff.

Exactly so similar.

Yes, yes, but oh my gosh, I did not know that
about you.

Yeah.

That's fantastic. So how many times do
you play in a week would yousay?

Right now, I play one day a week.

Okay.

I usually will play on Saturday nights. I'll
drive into the city and play inour real casino.

All right.

I'll often talk to people, and they'll ask about
this, and "oh well, you know, wehave a game. We have a Friday
night game, you know, the guys.
And we do this, we play, youknow, 50 cent, dollar" or
whatever. "And you ought to comeand come and play." "Well, you
know, maybe, maybe I can findsome, some time to do that."
"Where do you like to play?""Well, I'm usually playing the
5-5-10, down at Gardens orCommerce and, you know, or in

(31:54):
the series, I love to play itthere." "Yeah, you're not
invited."

Oh.

I get uninvited to more games.

Too serious.
You're too good.

Well, it's they don't know because they never
played.

Sure, sure.

Funny enough. A little bit before the pandemic,
I was playing a lot, and itliterally started to become a
job. And I said, Well, wait aminute, I don't need this. I
work for a living.

Yeah.

And, and so I cut back, and I'm happier doing
it.

Yeah, I bet.

And, you know, I stepped up a level of the game
at the stakes that I'm playing.
And it's more enjoyable and moreoften than not their winners,
not not every time. That'susually a long drive home, you
know, as I'm,

Suddenly the route seems so much longer.

I'm pounding the ceiling. Why? Why did I play
that hand that way? And,

No, I shouldn't have done that.

Yeah, and, you know? And that's, that's
something, you know, I I studythe game, and I'm reading and
I'm working it out, and Iremember hands. I go home, and
I'll talk to him with somebodyelse about it. "Hey, you know,
this is what I did. What do youthink, you know, here, there?"
And yes, there's a hand,actually, from this last

(33:19):
Saturday that's haunting mestill.

Ohhh.

So I really got to get it out of my head.

PTSD.

Little bit.
It's about a $3,000 mistake.

Ouchy. Yeah, do you keep a separate account for
your funny money?

Yes, yes.

Nice.

I have only that money. And you know my
wife, you know, bless her, shetruly understands, and she knows
that that's not the house money,it's not the rent money. You
know that that's that and, and,but you do give her a
percentage, I have to imagine, Igive her everything she asks
for.

Toleration percentage.

Everything she asks for. You want this? You
want that? Whatever the heck itis, but you know it the $100
bills.
They're tools,and it's just the same as the

Yes.
tools that are in your toolchest. This is what I need to go
do that, and with any luck atall, I'm going to bring home
more than I took with me. And Ido more often than not.
Nice.

But yeah, there are some, some knots.

Yeah.

And so Sunday morning, you know, we are going
out to brunch, and she willeventually, sooner or later,
ask, "Well, how did it go?"

How did it go?

And, you know, she's kind of, she kind of knows
the vibe she, you know, if Ihaven't said something, she
says, yes, so last nightwasn't...

Wasn't very productive?

And frankly, I think that she'd be a really
good player. She knows.

Yeah.

Because she listens.

Sure, oh yeah.
We absorb a lot from what youguys emit.

Yeah. But you know, when we go to Vegas
together on a holiday, her thingis the spa and the shop.

Yeah, sign me up.

And then then

Yup.

I go play cards.

You go play cards.

So I can go pay for the spa in the shop.

Well, damn. You better win! Because it's
probably more than one trip.

Well, yeah, and I'm not beyond telling the other
person at the table.

Yes!

Hey guys,

Do me a solid.
I got the wife in the spa.

My wife's at the spa. She's over at Caesars
mall, so I raise.

Oh David, thank you so much for sitting with me
today. This is such a great,great time. And I love learning.
Every time I talk to you, Ilearn more and more about what
you do. And it's great, great tohear. You write great articles,
and they're one of our mosthighly trafficked articles on

(35:49):
the website atEchelonprofessional.com and keep
it up. It's very, very muchneeded and commendable. So thank
you.

Well, thanks.
Thanks for having me, terrificquestions. And, you know, if I
could just say one last thing.

Please.

It's about, everybody wants to go out and
earn a living, but I get toenjoy earning my living. So
that's, that's the part.

That's what we should all strive for.

Yeah, yeah.

Thank you.
Thank you for that.

Yeah, my pleasure.

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