March 19, 2024 • 34 mins
Ohan "The Money Doctor" is a certified financial planner who helps beginner investors navigate their financial challenges. In this episode, he passionately dispels financial myths and underscores the importance of accessible financial education. Listen in as he offers practical tips to those earning six-figure salaries but living paycheck to paycheck, encouraging them to transform their mindset and break free from financial stagnation.
We also shines a light on how to maximize your dollar, tips on card payment methods, the power of changing perceptions about needs and wants, and the critical role of setting clear financial goals. Be inspired to embark on your journey to financial independence by investing in yourself, leveraging opportunities, thinking creatively, and proactively seeking answers to your financial questions.
Learn more about Ohan at ohanthemoneydoctor.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Just keep in mind that you only have certain room, hot, expensive,
but you have unlimited opportunity to increase your income.
Better you invest that money in yourself.
You're going to work harder. You're going to enjoy your life and you're going to make more money.
Your human capital is going to give you a bigger return than the stock market.
(00:24):
You're listening to Advise with Rick Lucchini. All right, we're back with the
Advised Podcast, and I've got a guest I'm really excited to have, Ohan the Money Doctor.
I'm not even going to try to tackle your last name, so why don't you just introduce
yourself and tell us who you are and what it is that you do.
(00:45):
Rick, thank you very much for this opportunity to be in your podcast.
Thank you for the invite.
My name is Ohan Kayakshan, and the reason my last name Kayakshan sounds hard,
and in many cases people having hard time to pronounce i
go on social media is on the money doctor and the
doctor part i choose because of the phd that
(01:07):
i have right i don't want to brag about it
and talk about my designations and my degrees but friend of mine suggested me
to use on the money doctor so it can be differentiating factor so to say but
i'm a certified financial planner with over two decades of financial industry experience.
(01:28):
I started as a loan officer back home. Then I became a mortgage underwriter.
It was right at the time when the 2008-2009 financial crisis happened.
I was helping German banks to underwrite loan packages for Armenian banks where I'm originally from.
(01:51):
And after that, I got...
I applied for Green Card Lottery. If your listeners are aware of,
there is a Green Card Lottery called Diversity Visa Lottery,
which is organized by the Department of State every year.
So I applied for it. My main goal was to come to the United States,
first and foremost, to learn English.
(02:11):
Then, of course, knowing and hearing that America is a land of opportunity,
I was like, why not go to see what it is about?
So I came to the United States in 2009. 2009. And at the beginning,
I had a hard time to find a job because English was the biggest obstacle for me.
When I was applying for a teller position, I get the answer.
(02:32):
We declined with the answer that, oh, you are overqualified.
You have PhD equivalence. And I'll explain why I mentioned equivalence.
And you have all these experiences. When I was applying for a banker,
they're like, your English is not enough.
So I was kind of in the corner. It was hard for me to find a job.
But finally, I found a teller job, cashier job with a major bank in the United States.
(02:57):
I went to UCLA, set for the personal financial planner course,
which is a requirement for CFP exam.
And when they asked me to present at least the bachelor degree for me in order
to sit for the exam, I was like, might as well.
I'll evaluate all my diplomas. Once I got equivalency in bachelor's in engineering,
(03:18):
master's in engineering, and I had a degree called candidate of science,
which got translated to PhD in economics in United States.
So this is a little bit about my background. What I do, I help mainly beginner investors.
The ideal one will be someone who is making six-figure salary but still in paycheck to paycheck. check.
(03:41):
I want to show them that they are ideal candidate to become an investor.
And by the way, anyone can become an investor. You don't need to have hundreds
of thousands of dollars or millions of dollars because it's a myth.
And in our profession, you know, there are so many myths about.
So I want to simplify finance as much as I can, because at the beginning,
(04:03):
it was hard for me to understand, even having a little bit financial background.
We're going to get into to how you work with clients and some of the stuff that
the people listening can get
value from, but I want to touch on first what that experience was like.
Coming to this country financially, and how that kind of impacts how you work with people now?
(04:28):
That's a great question, Rick. Thank you for asking it.
When I first arrived to the United States, first, there is something called cultural shock.
With all the pros and cons, United States is still one of the greatest countries on Earth,
at least that is what I I believe about because it gives you opportunities and
it can be something simple as having an internet to our insurance system.
(04:54):
Not every country has insurance system. The United States is.
And I, and I know we can talk about lots of pros and cons about it,
but we have car insurance.
We have health insurance again with all the pros.
We have a lot of, you have a lot of things that we complain about and.
And for good reason, because a lot of them could be optimized,
(05:14):
but we sometimes forget in this country how good we have it compared to other places in the world.
Even something simple seems simple, but very important like water right now I'm drinking.
Imagine how many countries and how many people on planet Earth,
they don't have access to clean water.
So there are so many blessings and grateful things just being here,
(05:36):
just having the shelter, having an opportunity right now for
us to be in different states to connect and make
this program happened when i first arrived to united states the biggest obstacle
again i mentioned that was my english and i was thinking of that oh i need to
learn how to speak english because the only english i knew a little bit was
(05:57):
british after some time i realized in united states.
Americans talk with the english that is specific to united
states yeah so i like let me just speak the english that
is specific to me so i started speaking english but
of course like it was not easy especially at
the beginning i i work even for ups just to mention their name we're having
(06:20):
all my experience and everything because you need to work in united states it
is not like in some countries you can have inherited home or you can have a
place at least shelter to live in versus in the United States,
you pay your rent or you pay your mortgage.
It is something that ongoing payment plus your insurance. Then I live in,
(06:41):
all the time I live in Los Angeles.
So as you are familiar, our listeners are familiar with Los Angeles.
It is high prices all around.
In the meantime, you cannot go around with public transportation.
It is just not effective.
So you need to have a car. You need to have a car insurance and all these expenses.
So it was really hard. There were some times when I had only literally $5 available
(07:06):
on my credit card availability, and I used this $5 as well.
Many times I even spent over the limit that it was given. Right.
I couldn't understand how create cards work. What means create score,
how to build a create score.
I thank God my cousin used to be a banker. He introduced me to secured create cards, secured loans.
(07:31):
So I had all these different products through banks.
It helped me to build credit within a short period of time, like within four
to five months, the score was high, over 700, 720, 740. 40.
But then I went to dealership and I got my first car.
After two weeks, they contacted me that, oh, you need to bring the car back.
(07:52):
I'm like, what do you mean? I'm already driving it for 10 days.
They're like, oh, your score is great.
But in the meantime, the history is short within four months.
So instead of leasing, we can sell you the car.
But I was unable that moment to afford the payment of the car just to buy it.
Make a long story short, I took the car back. Now, looking back,
(08:14):
there were so many people around me that I'm like, no, don't even take.
They cannot do anything.
Just drive the car, make your payment. I'm like, no, I want to do it in the
right way, which I always did.
You know, in our profession, you are trying your best to be this industry-specific jargon, yes?
Prudent man or fiduciary, you know, to always put others in.
(08:38):
Well, not to make a parallel because it's clear that your journey is different
and more difficult than this,
but some of the things you're describing sounds a lot like a kid fresh out of
college or fresh out of high school that's going out on the road for the first time,
(08:59):
doesn't know any of the stuff because it's not taught in school,
has to to make their own way, starts earning money, and all the things that
they need cost more than what their first paycheck is.
And that's where we start getting into debt. Well, I'll just borrow for this
short term, pay it back. I'll borrow, I'll borrow, I'll borrow.
(09:20):
But the things that you said besides the English literally sounds like a kid
out of high school or college for the first time going going out on their own.
You will, in my opinion, agree with me that it seems from someone who is outside
of finance, they don't have any financial background, that finance is very complicated.
(09:40):
And in times, it seems that industry made these, again, like jargon,
the way that they talk for people not to understand.
It reminds me of when I saw that native speakers,
English native speakers, They open dictionary and try to, at that time,
dictionary, now you can do on
Google, but they want to understand the explanation of the certain words,
(10:02):
what it means, because in English, there are words which have more than one or two or 10 meanings.
And then I realized like, okay, it's English.
Native speakers having this it means like foreigner they
will haven't it's normal you know and the same way it's
finance finance i consider as a foreign language
itself i need to learn english on top of it the foreign language which is finance
(10:25):
and no one explains you that in plain english they will give you some disclosures
you go and read which no one have time for that they are more of like sleeping
pills you start reading after second page you you fall asleep because it's just not interesting.
So I want to make finance interesting. I want to simplify it the way that a
regular person without any background will be able to understand what is an era,
(10:51):
what is the difference between a rough and traditional era, why it's important
to have emergency funds, all these simple things that exactly,
as you mentioned, we should be teaching that in school.
But unfortunately, right now, not every school is open to financial literacy. seat.
Let's get into that a little bit. Whether I'm making a high income or not,
it's very common in this country to be living paycheck to paycheck,
(11:16):
to have high credit card debt, all the things.
What's some of the key takeaways or some of the first things that you do and
try to teach and coach a person like that?
Another great question. You are a good interviewer. One thing,
though, I want to talk about, first and foremost, about mindset.
(11:37):
I do my best to break, burn, or however you want to call the money leaps that are going around.
You know, that, oh, no, I don't have enough money to invest,
or it's hard to earn money investing, or only for rich people, wealthy people.
But the ideal client in my mind.
(11:57):
When i was just starting this coaching venture money
coaching venture was someone who is making six figures
salary and living paycheck to paycheck
so i can meet with them and show them that it is possible
for them to save and invest but when they i met clients i realized like it is
not the way that i was it was not right the problem that i was understanding
(12:21):
so i came to came across two clients that I started working with who have high interest debts.
And it seems that they can invest, but it will take for them some time to pay
off the debt in comparison to their income.
And they don't have any emergency funding place.
So if God forbid these emergencies come up, and as you know,
(12:44):
they can come any moment, that's why they call emergencies, they will again
run to their credit cards or they will borrow money.
Sure. Sure. I came to the conclusion that I help pretty much.
It is not the right with marketing aspect to mention that I can help anyone
because you need to still have a specific niche whom you are helping.
(13:06):
But I came across to people from all different backgrounds.
And that's not including these last two years during my working years at the bank as well.
Literally, like you can have homeless guy with all the respect walking to the branch,
you need to deal with them which lots of psychology and human relationships
and then you will have some famous athlete
(13:26):
or singer to come in who is a multi-millionaire or even a billionaire.
So it's all about like human connections to listen to other people humble yourself
be yourself and listen other person so the plans right now that i'm dealing
with are in more of like in that type type of situation,
(13:46):
but I'm doing my best through my processes to take them out from this,
trap of living paycheck to paycheck, or in many cases, again,
borrowing, and to switch their mindset from consumer to investor.
Because if you are using, let's say, products from Apple, as an example,
you are using their iPhone, you have your headphones, you have their MacBook.
(14:09):
Why are you only consuming from Apple? Why you don't become part owner of Apple as well?
And I'm not a big fan of picking and choosing stocks, as many call it, loser's game.
Instead of picking and choosing, maybe you can own the entire stock market or
you can own top 500 companies, publicly traded companies. So what do you tell somebody?
(14:37):
I appreciate that everybody's situation is different, but in general,
that is a problem for a lot of people where almost they give up or throw their
hands up. This is a losing battle.
How am I supposed to pay down my debt fast? Yeah, that sounds great,
Ohan, but how am I supposed to pay down my debt faster when at the end of the
(14:59):
month, I'm lucky if I have a couple bucks before payday?
How am I supposed to get that journey started to, even if I said I made mistakes
before, I want to get out of debt. I want to do things the right way.
How do I even do it? Because I'm barely making ends meet.
There are two parts to that question. Another great question,
Rick. There are two parts to this question. First.
(15:23):
In order for you to break the paycheck to paycheck cycle, you need to change your mindset.
There is something called pay yourself first.
Pay yourself first means that instead of paying all your bills and doing all
your wants, so to call your needs and wants.
Whatever left in the end of the month, you direct it towards your saving and
(15:46):
investing, which in many cases, there is nothing left in the end of the month.
Month but instead when you switch and you
come from the approach that okay i decided that
i can only invest one percent of my very little
or in many cases five percent or
even ten percent or even someone can do more when you
(16:07):
put this money first to work for yourself for the money work for yourself instead
of you working for money somehow i know like it is unbelievable but magic happens
and you are still able to accommodate all your other needs, including rent,
your transportation, and your food.
(16:27):
Second part of the question, which many clients and majority of population,
in my opinion, don't like, there is something called budget.
And when people don't like the word budget and they stay away,
I'm like, okay, let's come with an agreement.
How about we call it cash flow state?
(16:47):
Or maybe we can call it spending plan. But the basis, the principle is the same.
We need to find out how much money comes in to your household.
Either you are single or married or you are living with your partner,
you have kids, or you are sandwich family living with your parents and your kids.
We need to find out how much money comes in, how much money goes out.
(17:11):
So at that point, we can figure out if you have a surplus, you have a deficit,
or you are just on zero, which in many cases, unfortunately, people have deficit.
And again, this country being one of the greatest countries on earth.
Unfortunately, the country's budget is on deficit as well. So it's kind of like-
(17:32):
Yeah, it's learned behavior.
Well, I heard a couple of things I want to dig into there. One is pay yourself first.
That's something that I'm always pounding the table about, and there's different ways to do it.
But the concept really is forced savings, where the first dollar that you earn
goes goes to whatever you set it for, whether it's your investment,
(17:56):
whether it's double paying your credit card or a combination of both.
You pay yourself and your family, number one.
Then the bills that you need to survive, mortgage and the electric bill and all the other things.
Then what's left, which is the exact opposite of what people do,
by the way, then what's left, left you get to do for, for your wants.
(18:19):
And when you do it that way, you might think that you're not going to have enough
because I don't have enough now to say, so how would I, well,
I can tell you how, because humans have a way to adjust.
And when you pay yourself first and the thing that's left is your wants,
you just do less once. And that's just the way it is.
(18:41):
And if you're doing it for a greater purpose and you can actually see the results
in the finish line by having somebody model it out and look at it,
it's easier to do it because it might be a sacrifice at the beginning,
but the payoff is there.
And that could be as simple as, like I said, double paying a debt for a little
(19:05):
while or starting your first investment or whatever it is.
But if that comes first, you realize that you might go out.
To eat a little bit less at the end of the month because you're starting to run out of money.
But if you do it backwards, you end up not paying a credit card or you pay the
minimum and you just live in this same cycle.
(19:27):
Rick, very small comment on, great, by the way, gems that you are wrapping here as well.
One small comment. For me, it was hard even to understand the difference between want and need.
I would say maybe need and want.
Someone who came to the United States and said, you need this or you want this,
(19:48):
it sounds kind of similar.
Yeah, I want it, I need it. But when you take your time to understand there
are two different things, and in many cases we have, as humans,
we have misconsumption as well.
Certain things in reality can be wants that we consider them needs,
and some things that we consider and vice versa, needs can be wants and wants can be needs.
(20:11):
You need to differentiate all this stuff because wounds are usually,
as you know, and you mentioned, they are the easiest part to cut versus the
needs to have a shelter, you need to have a transportation, or you need to have food.
So I totally agree with your point. And then really look at yourself or have
a accountability partner like you or your spouse or your partner and say,
(20:35):
how bad do we want or how bad do we need to stop living like this?
Get out of debt, start saving, have money to go back and do the things that
we want to do, but now we know we can afford it. How strong is that urge?
And when it's strong enough to
you learn how to flip-flop that cashflow and pay yourself first.
(20:58):
Maybe it will sound a little bit philosophical, but in order for me to remind
in times my why, why I'm doing my business, why I'm doing many things in my life.
Life is short, as we always say.
You know, time goes so fast. I came to United State 2009. It seemed like yesterday.
(21:18):
It's already almost 15 years.
15 years is gone. my age many people
like not only cannot make until this age
but it's it is considered usually half of the lifespan
for people when you start thinking about these
ideas you come to the point when you don't want to disappoint yourself at the
(21:41):
end of your life so you don't want your dreams to tell you why you didn't follow
up with these why you want to do this thing but you didn't because because you were scared.
Why you were comfortable instead of like, as everyone knows,
like the action and the magic happens outside of your comfort zone.
And the same way it comes with the, when it comes to money, you know,
(22:04):
I know you want this second pair of shoes, but maybe right now for time being,
you don't need the shoes.
Thank God you have a shoes. They're totally fine.
You don't need that second color or you don't
need that car upgrade because these people who
are earning over six figures interestingly enough
the majority of them are either doctors
(22:27):
or attorneys who are smart people smart in their profession when it comes to
money they are upgrading their lifestyle with their income increase that's another
thing i want to bring up and make it possible for them to see from different perspective,
from different view. Yeah.
(22:48):
Yeah, no, I totally agree. And there's a lot of psychology that goes into all that.
And a lot of it is perception, perception of yourself and how other people perceive you.
Should I go buy the new car that I think makes me look cool when I'm carrying
(23:08):
$30,000 of credit card debt at 30% cent interest?
Probably not, but for some reason it's still being done.
And so there's a whole psychology around that.
And I think that's a big part of mastering what you're talking about,
which is taking care of yourself first and not worrying so much about how other
(23:32):
people view you because the feeling of being debt-free or even just being on that journey,
but notice that you're making a dent in it is a lot better than the feeling
of buying a new car or whatever the thing is.
And it's attainable, but you have to start.
(23:54):
You have to actually start taking steps.
And I don't want any of my clients and our listeners to have this wrong perception
that they need necessarily go and do the background that Rick or Rohan had,
work for financial financial institutions or no other
certain it's they don't need because we already
(24:14):
know and we want to show the shorter way
for to get from point a that you are into point b that you want to go and we
want literally to hold your hand and to show because many of clients i see yes
they heard that okay with minimum payment i will not be able to pay my paid
card for another five or six years Let me send a little bit extra payment.
(24:36):
Great job. You are doing a great job. But guess what?
There is a certain order that you can utilize which card to send first.
So you will save in the long run on interest.
And these are the small techniques that we bring to the table when we talk to
a client versus like they are a couple, but they didn't communicate to each
(24:58):
other what debt each other has.
And they are wrongfully sending money, which is, again, still a good thing.
They are sending additional payment, but they are not necessarily sending in
the right order in order for them to possibly save the maximum on this unnecessarily interest payment.
Just one example. It's just like anything else. There's strategies that can
(25:21):
be put in place to maximize the dollar that you're already trying to allocate or save.
So I'm doing the right thing. I'm starting to put money away,
but if I don't have a strategy to maximize it.
It's going to take longer or cost me more. And the same reverse can be said
for investing. I'm investing a dollar.
(25:43):
I'm doing the thing that I'm supposed to be doing. But if I don't have the proper
strategy on how it should be allocated or what type of account it should be titled in,
that dollar might not be working nearly as hard as it could be by just pulling
a couple different different levers and making some minor changes.
In my opinion, the guide that I created, it gives you the most important steps
(26:08):
before becoming an investor.
So I talk about goals, I talk about income and expenses, I talk about paying off debt options.
And also, as I mentioned, I give them budgeting, or you can again call it cash
flow statement, Google Sheet, and also the network calculator.
(26:31):
And then I explain to them what is the difference between saving and investing,
because they are two different things.
We sometimes use it interchangeably, but saving and investing are different,
as you know, and many of our listeners know. So it is, I'm, I'm of course willing
and then my pleasure to give it out.
It is on my webpage, OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com.
(26:52):
Again, Ohan is Ohana, but OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com.
Got it. We'll attach that on the show notes and in the thing too,
or in the YouTube description as well.
Now, what, what do you think would be the biggest key takeaway for somebody
that wants to get started?
(27:13):
They want to get serious. Whether it's because they had to...
To get by for all the reasons that life is tough on us, or whether it's because
they say, hey, listen, I didn't know any better.
I got into debt or I did this and now I want to get serious.
I want to get it turned around.
What would you tell them? What's the biggest takeaway somebody listening to this should leave with?
(27:36):
You touched the point already that
I will answer through it people think that
money and money matters are mainly about
finance and mathematics about
digits about numbers but it's only apparently like
there is this well-known rule of time that it's only
20 percent of finance which is
(27:59):
about numbers another 80 percent
are about psychology about behavior and this
in times can sound very like hard
type of absorb in in
regards absorbing or digesting type of
method when it comes to psychology of money
but i would like for them to start first with
(28:22):
their mindset of switching instead of
like being hopeless to be hopeful and just
to believe in themselves if someone else
can do they can do it also there have been
many situations i know one can have
less or more depth than the other one but it comes all about mindset and taking
(28:42):
a responsibility the time to live is right now and we cannot just Just leave
thinking about our past mistakes or being concerned about our future.
The time is right now. And if you want to take ownership of your finances.
First you start with your goals.
(29:04):
Because if you don't know where you want to go, it is really hard to go.
Imagine you come out of the house.
You don't know where to go. you don't put any destination to your navigation
or the airplane or the ship, any type of transportation.
Just imagine if they didn't have a destination, they will end up somewhere they didn't want to go.
(29:24):
Or in case of the ship, maybe they will drone or airplane will fall or some danger will happen.
So you need to first know what is your destination.
And then the next step is to know their financial picture as I touch bases already
a little bit, just to know how much money comes in, how much money goes out.
(29:47):
One thing though, for our listeners, when it comes to mindset,
just keep in mind that you only have certain room, certain window to cut expenses.
But you have unlimited opportunity to increase your income, then better you
invest that money in yourself.
Maybe you invest in some type of a program, not necessarily about money,
(30:10):
it can be more of a mindset or it can be about...
Life coaching something that will add value
the opportunities are out there i mentioned there so
many opportunities especially nowadays with internet with
digital world so you just i will encourage and invite our listeners to think
(30:31):
outside of the box yeah outside of their mind don't get lost in your thought
just to us and always us yeah us you never know what your your neighbor, your club member.
Your coworker are going through or what's happening.
Just if you see they are doing something that you admire and you want to do
it one day, just ask them. I'm sure people will share with you.
(30:53):
No, I'm glad you said that. I'm glad you said that because it's something that
I bring up a lot, which is investing in yourself.
We talked about paying yourself first, but also investing in yourself.
And when you're, there's a lot of examples,
but especially for people that aren't happy doing what they're doing,
invest that, that money invested in yourself, whether it's like you said,
(31:19):
a course to change industries, a course to get a degree that will give you a
raise at the job you have.
Have all these different, whether it's quitting your job that you're miserable
at and starting the food truck or whatever your thing,
whatever your passion is, I promise you, you will 10X that return way beyond
(31:43):
anything that you're going to get in the stock market because you're going to work harder,
you're going to enjoy your life, and you're going to make more money.
Your human capital is going to give you a bigger return than the stock market.
There's eventually a curve where you've got to start actually investing in the market.
(32:04):
But if you're not happy doing what you're doing, put that money to work for
yourself to better your income.
Because like you said, there's no limit to your income.
There is a limit to how much you can cut back on your spending,
but there is no limit to how much you're allowed to make.
But I think, like you said, that takes some guts sometimes.
(32:27):
That takes some courage and maybe even a little bit of risk,
depending on what your situation is.
Complaining about it and not doing anything isn't going to improve your situation.
Get off your ass and do the thing.
I agree 100%. And these are great points you summarized and you brought up.
(32:48):
I love it. Listen, I know you mentioned it before, but tell everybody again where they can find you.
I know you just started dropping some YouTube videos.
You've got the guide they can download.
Why don't you tell everybody the best place to see you and to start learning from you? Yeah.
While I'm mainly, thank you for the opportunity again. While I'm mainly active
(33:10):
on Instagram and YouTube and also trying to keep up with TikTok,
on all social media platforms, you can find me as Ohan the Money Doctor.
Again, Ohan the Money Doctor. My webpage is OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com,
where you can download for free the guide that I have, which I will ask for
your email and with your permission, I'll send emails for you just to know what
(33:35):
are my beliefs about money, just to give you some actionable tips on my emails.
And On The Money Doctor is the best way to find.
All right, buddy. Thanks for coming on and we'll talk to you again.
My pleasure. Thank you, Reed.
Music.
Just keep in mind that you only have certain room, hot, expensive,
but you have unlimited opportunity to increase your income.
Better you invest that money in yourself.
You're going to work harder. You're going to enjoy your life and you're going to make more money.
Your human capital is going to give you a bigger return than the stock market.
(00:24):
You're listening to Advise with Rick Lucchini. All right, we're back with the
Advised Podcast, and I've got a guest I'm really excited to have, Ohan the Money Doctor.
I'm not even going to try to tackle your last name, so why don't you just introduce
yourself and tell us who you are and what it is that you do.
(00:45):
Rick, thank you very much for this opportunity to be in your podcast.
Thank you for the invite.
My name is Ohan Kayakshan, and the reason my last name Kayakshan sounds hard,
and in many cases people having hard time to pronounce i
go on social media is on the money doctor and the
doctor part i choose because of the phd that
(01:07):
i have right i don't want to brag about it
and talk about my designations and my degrees but friend of mine suggested me
to use on the money doctor so it can be differentiating factor so to say but
i'm a certified financial planner with over two decades of financial industry experience.
(01:28):
I started as a loan officer back home. Then I became a mortgage underwriter.
It was right at the time when the 2008-2009 financial crisis happened.
I was helping German banks to underwrite loan packages for Armenian banks where I'm originally from.
(01:51):
And after that, I got...
I applied for Green Card Lottery. If your listeners are aware of,
there is a Green Card Lottery called Diversity Visa Lottery,
which is organized by the Department of State every year.
So I applied for it. My main goal was to come to the United States,
first and foremost, to learn English.
(02:11):
Then, of course, knowing and hearing that America is a land of opportunity,
I was like, why not go to see what it is about?
So I came to the United States in 2009. 2009. And at the beginning,
I had a hard time to find a job because English was the biggest obstacle for me.
When I was applying for a teller position, I get the answer.
(02:32):
We declined with the answer that, oh, you are overqualified.
You have PhD equivalence. And I'll explain why I mentioned equivalence.
And you have all these experiences. When I was applying for a banker,
they're like, your English is not enough.
So I was kind of in the corner. It was hard for me to find a job.
But finally, I found a teller job, cashier job with a major bank in the United States.
(02:57):
I went to UCLA, set for the personal financial planner course,
which is a requirement for CFP exam.
And when they asked me to present at least the bachelor degree for me in order
to sit for the exam, I was like, might as well.
I'll evaluate all my diplomas. Once I got equivalency in bachelor's in engineering,
(03:18):
master's in engineering, and I had a degree called candidate of science,
which got translated to PhD in economics in United States.
So this is a little bit about my background. What I do, I help mainly beginner investors.
The ideal one will be someone who is making six-figure salary but still in paycheck to paycheck. check.
(03:41):
I want to show them that they are ideal candidate to become an investor.
And by the way, anyone can become an investor. You don't need to have hundreds
of thousands of dollars or millions of dollars because it's a myth.
And in our profession, you know, there are so many myths about.
So I want to simplify finance as much as I can, because at the beginning,
(04:03):
it was hard for me to understand, even having a little bit financial background.
We're going to get into to how you work with clients and some of the stuff that
the people listening can get
value from, but I want to touch on first what that experience was like.
Coming to this country financially, and how that kind of impacts how you work with people now?
(04:28):
That's a great question, Rick. Thank you for asking it.
When I first arrived to the United States, first, there is something called cultural shock.
With all the pros and cons, United States is still one of the greatest countries on Earth,
at least that is what I I believe about because it gives you opportunities and
it can be something simple as having an internet to our insurance system.
(04:54):
Not every country has insurance system. The United States is.
And I, and I know we can talk about lots of pros and cons about it,
but we have car insurance.
We have health insurance again with all the pros.
We have a lot of, you have a lot of things that we complain about and.
And for good reason, because a lot of them could be optimized,
(05:14):
but we sometimes forget in this country how good we have it compared to other places in the world.
Even something simple seems simple, but very important like water right now I'm drinking.
Imagine how many countries and how many people on planet Earth,
they don't have access to clean water.
So there are so many blessings and grateful things just being here,
(05:36):
just having the shelter, having an opportunity right now for
us to be in different states to connect and make
this program happened when i first arrived to united states the biggest obstacle
again i mentioned that was my english and i was thinking of that oh i need to
learn how to speak english because the only english i knew a little bit was
(05:57):
british after some time i realized in united states.
Americans talk with the english that is specific to united
states yeah so i like let me just speak the english that
is specific to me so i started speaking english but
of course like it was not easy especially at
the beginning i i work even for ups just to mention their name we're having
(06:20):
all my experience and everything because you need to work in united states it
is not like in some countries you can have inherited home or you can have a
place at least shelter to live in versus in the United States,
you pay your rent or you pay your mortgage.
It is something that ongoing payment plus your insurance. Then I live in,
(06:41):
all the time I live in Los Angeles.
So as you are familiar, our listeners are familiar with Los Angeles.
It is high prices all around.
In the meantime, you cannot go around with public transportation.
It is just not effective.
So you need to have a car. You need to have a car insurance and all these expenses.
So it was really hard. There were some times when I had only literally $5 available
(07:06):
on my credit card availability, and I used this $5 as well.
Many times I even spent over the limit that it was given. Right.
I couldn't understand how create cards work. What means create score,
how to build a create score.
I thank God my cousin used to be a banker. He introduced me to secured create cards, secured loans.
(07:31):
So I had all these different products through banks.
It helped me to build credit within a short period of time, like within four
to five months, the score was high, over 700, 720, 740. 40.
But then I went to dealership and I got my first car.
After two weeks, they contacted me that, oh, you need to bring the car back.
(07:52):
I'm like, what do you mean? I'm already driving it for 10 days.
They're like, oh, your score is great.
But in the meantime, the history is short within four months.
So instead of leasing, we can sell you the car.
But I was unable that moment to afford the payment of the car just to buy it.
Make a long story short, I took the car back. Now, looking back,
(08:14):
there were so many people around me that I'm like, no, don't even take.
They cannot do anything.
Just drive the car, make your payment. I'm like, no, I want to do it in the
right way, which I always did.
You know, in our profession, you are trying your best to be this industry-specific jargon, yes?
Prudent man or fiduciary, you know, to always put others in.
(08:38):
Well, not to make a parallel because it's clear that your journey is different
and more difficult than this,
but some of the things you're describing sounds a lot like a kid fresh out of
college or fresh out of high school that's going out on the road for the first time,
(08:59):
doesn't know any of the stuff because it's not taught in school,
has to to make their own way, starts earning money, and all the things that
they need cost more than what their first paycheck is.
And that's where we start getting into debt. Well, I'll just borrow for this
short term, pay it back. I'll borrow, I'll borrow, I'll borrow.
(09:20):
But the things that you said besides the English literally sounds like a kid
out of high school or college for the first time going going out on their own.
You will, in my opinion, agree with me that it seems from someone who is outside
of finance, they don't have any financial background, that finance is very complicated.
(09:40):
And in times, it seems that industry made these, again, like jargon,
the way that they talk for people not to understand.
It reminds me of when I saw that native speakers,
English native speakers, They open dictionary and try to, at that time,
dictionary, now you can do on
Google, but they want to understand the explanation of the certain words,
(10:02):
what it means, because in English, there are words which have more than one or two or 10 meanings.
And then I realized like, okay, it's English.
Native speakers having this it means like foreigner they
will haven't it's normal you know and the same way it's
finance finance i consider as a foreign language
itself i need to learn english on top of it the foreign language which is finance
(10:25):
and no one explains you that in plain english they will give you some disclosures
you go and read which no one have time for that they are more of like sleeping
pills you start reading after second page you you fall asleep because it's just not interesting.
So I want to make finance interesting. I want to simplify it the way that a
regular person without any background will be able to understand what is an era,
(10:51):
what is the difference between a rough and traditional era, why it's important
to have emergency funds, all these simple things that exactly,
as you mentioned, we should be teaching that in school.
But unfortunately, right now, not every school is open to financial literacy. seat.
Let's get into that a little bit. Whether I'm making a high income or not,
it's very common in this country to be living paycheck to paycheck,
(11:16):
to have high credit card debt, all the things.
What's some of the key takeaways or some of the first things that you do and
try to teach and coach a person like that?
Another great question. You are a good interviewer. One thing,
though, I want to talk about, first and foremost, about mindset.
(11:37):
I do my best to break, burn, or however you want to call the money leaps that are going around.
You know, that, oh, no, I don't have enough money to invest,
or it's hard to earn money investing, or only for rich people, wealthy people.
But the ideal client in my mind.
(11:57):
When i was just starting this coaching venture money
coaching venture was someone who is making six figures
salary and living paycheck to paycheck
so i can meet with them and show them that it is possible
for them to save and invest but when they i met clients i realized like it is
not the way that i was it was not right the problem that i was understanding
(12:21):
so i came to came across two clients that I started working with who have high interest debts.
And it seems that they can invest, but it will take for them some time to pay
off the debt in comparison to their income.
And they don't have any emergency funding place.
So if God forbid these emergencies come up, and as you know,
(12:44):
they can come any moment, that's why they call emergencies, they will again
run to their credit cards or they will borrow money.
Sure. Sure. I came to the conclusion that I help pretty much.
It is not the right with marketing aspect to mention that I can help anyone
because you need to still have a specific niche whom you are helping.
(13:06):
But I came across to people from all different backgrounds.
And that's not including these last two years during my working years at the bank as well.
Literally, like you can have homeless guy with all the respect walking to the branch,
you need to deal with them which lots of psychology and human relationships
and then you will have some famous athlete
(13:26):
or singer to come in who is a multi-millionaire or even a billionaire.
So it's all about like human connections to listen to other people humble yourself
be yourself and listen other person so the plans right now that i'm dealing
with are in more of like in that type type of situation,
(13:46):
but I'm doing my best through my processes to take them out from this,
trap of living paycheck to paycheck, or in many cases, again,
borrowing, and to switch their mindset from consumer to investor.
Because if you are using, let's say, products from Apple, as an example,
you are using their iPhone, you have your headphones, you have their MacBook.
(14:09):
Why are you only consuming from Apple? Why you don't become part owner of Apple as well?
And I'm not a big fan of picking and choosing stocks, as many call it, loser's game.
Instead of picking and choosing, maybe you can own the entire stock market or
you can own top 500 companies, publicly traded companies. So what do you tell somebody?
(14:37):
I appreciate that everybody's situation is different, but in general,
that is a problem for a lot of people where almost they give up or throw their
hands up. This is a losing battle.
How am I supposed to pay down my debt fast? Yeah, that sounds great,
Ohan, but how am I supposed to pay down my debt faster when at the end of the
(14:59):
month, I'm lucky if I have a couple bucks before payday?
How am I supposed to get that journey started to, even if I said I made mistakes
before, I want to get out of debt. I want to do things the right way.
How do I even do it? Because I'm barely making ends meet.
There are two parts to that question. Another great question,
Rick. There are two parts to this question. First.
(15:23):
In order for you to break the paycheck to paycheck cycle, you need to change your mindset.
There is something called pay yourself first.
Pay yourself first means that instead of paying all your bills and doing all
your wants, so to call your needs and wants.
Whatever left in the end of the month, you direct it towards your saving and
(15:46):
investing, which in many cases, there is nothing left in the end of the month.
Month but instead when you switch and you
come from the approach that okay i decided that
i can only invest one percent of my very little
or in many cases five percent or
even ten percent or even someone can do more when you
(16:07):
put this money first to work for yourself for the money work for yourself instead
of you working for money somehow i know like it is unbelievable but magic happens
and you are still able to accommodate all your other needs, including rent,
your transportation, and your food.
(16:27):
Second part of the question, which many clients and majority of population,
in my opinion, don't like, there is something called budget.
And when people don't like the word budget and they stay away,
I'm like, okay, let's come with an agreement.
How about we call it cash flow state?
(16:47):
Or maybe we can call it spending plan. But the basis, the principle is the same.
We need to find out how much money comes in to your household.
Either you are single or married or you are living with your partner,
you have kids, or you are sandwich family living with your parents and your kids.
We need to find out how much money comes in, how much money goes out.
(17:11):
So at that point, we can figure out if you have a surplus, you have a deficit,
or you are just on zero, which in many cases, unfortunately, people have deficit.
And again, this country being one of the greatest countries on earth.
Unfortunately, the country's budget is on deficit as well. So it's kind of like-
(17:32):
Yeah, it's learned behavior.
Well, I heard a couple of things I want to dig into there. One is pay yourself first.
That's something that I'm always pounding the table about, and there's different ways to do it.
But the concept really is forced savings, where the first dollar that you earn
goes goes to whatever you set it for, whether it's your investment,
(17:56):
whether it's double paying your credit card or a combination of both.
You pay yourself and your family, number one.
Then the bills that you need to survive, mortgage and the electric bill and all the other things.
Then what's left, which is the exact opposite of what people do,
by the way, then what's left, left you get to do for, for your wants.
(18:19):
And when you do it that way, you might think that you're not going to have enough
because I don't have enough now to say, so how would I, well,
I can tell you how, because humans have a way to adjust.
And when you pay yourself first and the thing that's left is your wants,
you just do less once. And that's just the way it is.
(18:41):
And if you're doing it for a greater purpose and you can actually see the results
in the finish line by having somebody model it out and look at it,
it's easier to do it because it might be a sacrifice at the beginning,
but the payoff is there.
And that could be as simple as, like I said, double paying a debt for a little
(19:05):
while or starting your first investment or whatever it is.
But if that comes first, you realize that you might go out.
To eat a little bit less at the end of the month because you're starting to run out of money.
But if you do it backwards, you end up not paying a credit card or you pay the
minimum and you just live in this same cycle.
(19:27):
Rick, very small comment on, great, by the way, gems that you are wrapping here as well.
One small comment. For me, it was hard even to understand the difference between want and need.
I would say maybe need and want.
Someone who came to the United States and said, you need this or you want this,
(19:48):
it sounds kind of similar.
Yeah, I want it, I need it. But when you take your time to understand there
are two different things, and in many cases we have, as humans,
we have misconsumption as well.
Certain things in reality can be wants that we consider them needs,
and some things that we consider and vice versa, needs can be wants and wants can be needs.
(20:11):
You need to differentiate all this stuff because wounds are usually,
as you know, and you mentioned, they are the easiest part to cut versus the
needs to have a shelter, you need to have a transportation, or you need to have food.
So I totally agree with your point. And then really look at yourself or have
a accountability partner like you or your spouse or your partner and say,
(20:35):
how bad do we want or how bad do we need to stop living like this?
Get out of debt, start saving, have money to go back and do the things that
we want to do, but now we know we can afford it. How strong is that urge?
And when it's strong enough to
you learn how to flip-flop that cashflow and pay yourself first.
(20:58):
Maybe it will sound a little bit philosophical, but in order for me to remind
in times my why, why I'm doing my business, why I'm doing many things in my life.
Life is short, as we always say.
You know, time goes so fast. I came to United State 2009. It seemed like yesterday.
(21:18):
It's already almost 15 years.
15 years is gone. my age many people
like not only cannot make until this age
but it's it is considered usually half of the lifespan
for people when you start thinking about these
ideas you come to the point when you don't want to disappoint yourself at the
(21:41):
end of your life so you don't want your dreams to tell you why you didn't follow
up with these why you want to do this thing but you didn't because because you were scared.
Why you were comfortable instead of like, as everyone knows,
like the action and the magic happens outside of your comfort zone.
And the same way it comes with the, when it comes to money, you know,
(22:04):
I know you want this second pair of shoes, but maybe right now for time being,
you don't need the shoes.
Thank God you have a shoes. They're totally fine.
You don't need that second color or you don't
need that car upgrade because these people who
are earning over six figures interestingly enough
the majority of them are either doctors
(22:27):
or attorneys who are smart people smart in their profession when it comes to
money they are upgrading their lifestyle with their income increase that's another
thing i want to bring up and make it possible for them to see from different perspective,
from different view. Yeah.
(22:48):
Yeah, no, I totally agree. And there's a lot of psychology that goes into all that.
And a lot of it is perception, perception of yourself and how other people perceive you.
Should I go buy the new car that I think makes me look cool when I'm carrying
(23:08):
$30,000 of credit card debt at 30% cent interest?
Probably not, but for some reason it's still being done.
And so there's a whole psychology around that.
And I think that's a big part of mastering what you're talking about,
which is taking care of yourself first and not worrying so much about how other
(23:32):
people view you because the feeling of being debt-free or even just being on that journey,
but notice that you're making a dent in it is a lot better than the feeling
of buying a new car or whatever the thing is.
And it's attainable, but you have to start.
(23:54):
You have to actually start taking steps.
And I don't want any of my clients and our listeners to have this wrong perception
that they need necessarily go and do the background that Rick or Rohan had,
work for financial financial institutions or no other
certain it's they don't need because we already
(24:14):
know and we want to show the shorter way
for to get from point a that you are into point b that you want to go and we
want literally to hold your hand and to show because many of clients i see yes
they heard that okay with minimum payment i will not be able to pay my paid
card for another five or six years Let me send a little bit extra payment.
(24:36):
Great job. You are doing a great job. But guess what?
There is a certain order that you can utilize which card to send first.
So you will save in the long run on interest.
And these are the small techniques that we bring to the table when we talk to
a client versus like they are a couple, but they didn't communicate to each
(24:58):
other what debt each other has.
And they are wrongfully sending money, which is, again, still a good thing.
They are sending additional payment, but they are not necessarily sending in
the right order in order for them to possibly save the maximum on this unnecessarily interest payment.
Just one example. It's just like anything else. There's strategies that can
(25:21):
be put in place to maximize the dollar that you're already trying to allocate or save.
So I'm doing the right thing. I'm starting to put money away,
but if I don't have a strategy to maximize it.
It's going to take longer or cost me more. And the same reverse can be said
for investing. I'm investing a dollar.
(25:43):
I'm doing the thing that I'm supposed to be doing. But if I don't have the proper
strategy on how it should be allocated or what type of account it should be titled in,
that dollar might not be working nearly as hard as it could be by just pulling
a couple different different levers and making some minor changes.
In my opinion, the guide that I created, it gives you the most important steps
(26:08):
before becoming an investor.
So I talk about goals, I talk about income and expenses, I talk about paying off debt options.
And also, as I mentioned, I give them budgeting, or you can again call it cash
flow statement, Google Sheet, and also the network calculator.
(26:31):
And then I explain to them what is the difference between saving and investing,
because they are two different things.
We sometimes use it interchangeably, but saving and investing are different,
as you know, and many of our listeners know. So it is, I'm, I'm of course willing
and then my pleasure to give it out.
It is on my webpage, OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com.
(26:52):
Again, Ohan is Ohana, but OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com.
Got it. We'll attach that on the show notes and in the thing too,
or in the YouTube description as well.
Now, what, what do you think would be the biggest key takeaway for somebody
that wants to get started?
(27:13):
They want to get serious. Whether it's because they had to...
To get by for all the reasons that life is tough on us, or whether it's because
they say, hey, listen, I didn't know any better.
I got into debt or I did this and now I want to get serious.
I want to get it turned around.
What would you tell them? What's the biggest takeaway somebody listening to this should leave with?
(27:36):
You touched the point already that
I will answer through it people think that
money and money matters are mainly about
finance and mathematics about
digits about numbers but it's only apparently like
there is this well-known rule of time that it's only
20 percent of finance which is
(27:59):
about numbers another 80 percent
are about psychology about behavior and this
in times can sound very like hard
type of absorb in in
regards absorbing or digesting type of
method when it comes to psychology of money
but i would like for them to start first with
(28:22):
their mindset of switching instead of
like being hopeless to be hopeful and just
to believe in themselves if someone else
can do they can do it also there have been
many situations i know one can have
less or more depth than the other one but it comes all about mindset and taking
(28:42):
a responsibility the time to live is right now and we cannot just Just leave
thinking about our past mistakes or being concerned about our future.
The time is right now. And if you want to take ownership of your finances.
First you start with your goals.
(29:04):
Because if you don't know where you want to go, it is really hard to go.
Imagine you come out of the house.
You don't know where to go. you don't put any destination to your navigation
or the airplane or the ship, any type of transportation.
Just imagine if they didn't have a destination, they will end up somewhere they didn't want to go.
(29:24):
Or in case of the ship, maybe they will drone or airplane will fall or some danger will happen.
So you need to first know what is your destination.
And then the next step is to know their financial picture as I touch bases already
a little bit, just to know how much money comes in, how much money goes out.
(29:47):
One thing though, for our listeners, when it comes to mindset,
just keep in mind that you only have certain room, certain window to cut expenses.
But you have unlimited opportunity to increase your income, then better you
invest that money in yourself.
Maybe you invest in some type of a program, not necessarily about money,
(30:10):
it can be more of a mindset or it can be about...
Life coaching something that will add value
the opportunities are out there i mentioned there so
many opportunities especially nowadays with internet with
digital world so you just i will encourage and invite our listeners to think
(30:31):
outside of the box yeah outside of their mind don't get lost in your thought
just to us and always us yeah us you never know what your your neighbor, your club member.
Your coworker are going through or what's happening.
Just if you see they are doing something that you admire and you want to do
it one day, just ask them. I'm sure people will share with you.
(30:53):
No, I'm glad you said that. I'm glad you said that because it's something that
I bring up a lot, which is investing in yourself.
We talked about paying yourself first, but also investing in yourself.
And when you're, there's a lot of examples,
but especially for people that aren't happy doing what they're doing,
invest that, that money invested in yourself, whether it's like you said,
(31:19):
a course to change industries, a course to get a degree that will give you a
raise at the job you have.
Have all these different, whether it's quitting your job that you're miserable
at and starting the food truck or whatever your thing,
whatever your passion is, I promise you, you will 10X that return way beyond
(31:43):
anything that you're going to get in the stock market because you're going to work harder,
you're going to enjoy your life, and you're going to make more money.
Your human capital is going to give you a bigger return than the stock market.
There's eventually a curve where you've got to start actually investing in the market.
(32:04):
But if you're not happy doing what you're doing, put that money to work for
yourself to better your income.
Because like you said, there's no limit to your income.
There is a limit to how much you can cut back on your spending,
but there is no limit to how much you're allowed to make.
But I think, like you said, that takes some guts sometimes.
(32:27):
That takes some courage and maybe even a little bit of risk,
depending on what your situation is.
Complaining about it and not doing anything isn't going to improve your situation.
Get off your ass and do the thing.
I agree 100%. And these are great points you summarized and you brought up.
(32:48):
I love it. Listen, I know you mentioned it before, but tell everybody again where they can find you.
I know you just started dropping some YouTube videos.
You've got the guide they can download.
Why don't you tell everybody the best place to see you and to start learning from you? Yeah.
While I'm mainly, thank you for the opportunity again. While I'm mainly active
(33:10):
on Instagram and YouTube and also trying to keep up with TikTok,
on all social media platforms, you can find me as Ohan the Money Doctor.
Again, Ohan the Money Doctor. My webpage is OhanTheMoneyDoctor.com,
where you can download for free the guide that I have, which I will ask for
your email and with your permission, I'll send emails for you just to know what
(33:35):
are my beliefs about money, just to give you some actionable tips on my emails.
And On The Money Doctor is the best way to find.
All right, buddy. Thanks for coming on and we'll talk to you again.
My pleasure. Thank you, Reed.
Music.
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