Retirement Planning Show

March 23rd, 2024

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Live from the wgy iHeart Studios.Welcome him to the Retirement Planning Show with
your host Dave Kopek from the RetirementPlanning Group. Every week, Dave and
his team discussed the ways they canhelp people make informed decisions about a wide
array of retirement planning information that cansupport you and developing a more certain financial
future for you and your family.Now it's time for Dave Kopec, WGY's

(00:25):
retirement planning specialist, standing in thering with his head hung couldn't get a
ticket. It was a soul show. Heard the roar of the crowd.

(00:51):
He's read of the same. Whatis that through the wall? He had
one? All right, good morning. Didn't know how to settled in here.

(01:23):
I just said to Zach. Lastweek it's eighty degrees and sunny when
I get up. This week Iget up, it's snowing sleet. If
you don't have to drive, don'tnumerous cars off the road, people driving

(01:47):
as if it's still dry and warm, and just crazy. The way people
drive sometimes just a matter of timebefore they go out of control. So
the north Way north of the Twinbridges, it's not fun, that's fun.
So if you don't have to goout. I would advise you to
stay home and let the DOT andthe rest of the crews out there take

(02:15):
care of the highways because it isbad, bad, bad. But good
morning. I'm Dave Kopek. Thisis the Retirement Planning Show. If you're
new, we do pre and postretirement planning. I'm the president of the
Retirement Planning Group, and we tryto educate and inform individuals some of the

(02:37):
obstacles that they will face during theirpre and post retirement years. Are you
in shock with some of these?I mean I just saw. I just
some of these I didn't even seebecause I went to bed early last night.
James Madison took down Wisconsin. Doyou know that I wasn't shocked there?
And then the other one that Iwas kind of taken back by a

(02:59):
little little bit was Grand Canyon.Grand Canyon. I mean, how many
upsets through yesterday as far as thelow seed took out the high seat?
Even what was the one Auburn yean yell be to Auburn. I don't

(03:23):
know. I thought my son.I talked to my son Christopher, and
he's like, you know, ohmy god, I'm dead. I'm done.
You know, my brackets are allgone, he sounds, keeping us
alive. It just goes to showmarch madness, Man, march madness.

(03:44):
How true? Huh. I justcan't believe that Yale took out Auburn because
I saw her Auburn play I thinklast week, and they were killing it,
killing it. It's uh. Theywon the sec right, yep in
the championship game. Tough, greadyteam. But guess what, you don't

(04:08):
make your free throws, you're notgonna win. And you know you got
to give her my credit right upto the very end. I did watch
some of that game from I playedDuke Well right up right up to about
the last eight or nine minutes ofthe game, deep into the second half.
Yeah, but who's my team?Boy? Perdue? There you go

(04:30):
go Purdue. Okay, So,but I didn't pick them to win the
whole thing because you don't trust theirguard play. No, No, it's
not. They're not deep enough.They got two guys, Braydon Smith got
the guard position and then Zach Edie. Yep, that's it. They're not
deep enough. They get into sometrouble foul wise or the guard there,

(04:53):
what's his name Braden Smith. That'sthe guy I like. If he's not
on producing, I don't know.I took Yukon for the whole Enchilada all
right, folks. I was inFlorida, not this past week, but
the previous week and give you alittle highlight. The big thing is that

(05:20):
a lot of our clients that aredown there are living the dream, beautiful
homes. Everybody seems to be veryhappy with the selection that they made.
Florida has changed. The traffic downthere is just unbelievable. I flew into

(05:40):
Fort Lauderdale, went all the wayover to Naples, Benita, Sarasota,
clear Water, tarp and Springs,up to Saint Augustine, over to Halden

(06:05):
the villages, then back to theTampa area, and no matter where you
go, the Three Seas are allover Florida. Construction, concrete, and

(06:26):
it's just amazing what's going on downthere. Just amazing how many buildings that
are being built in the highways andthe cranes, and it's just no matter
where you go. So we're goingto talk a little bit about your zip
code today. We're also going totalk a little bit about the markets.

(06:46):
And I've got our new employee,new part of the team coming in.
But he's he was going to physicallycome in. I told him to stay
home because the weather is so bad. But I've got McCarthy coming in the
second hour. We're going to talka little bit about some of his expertise
that he brings to the retirement planninggroup. But again it's open lines.

(07:08):
If you'd like to call in,we'd love to hear from you. You
want to talk about either investments asthe protection legacy long term care, that's
the other thing. A lot ofconversations about health insurance and long term care,
how people are going to deal withit. What are the best options
for individuals. Everybody knows that that'sa big ticket item. If you have

(07:29):
a health event, you've got topay for long term care. He could
talk about hundreds of thousands of dollarsspent on an annual basis. You know,
the Capital District region right now isanywhere from fifteen to twenty thousand dollars
a month for a long term carefacility. If you got it in a
qualified plan, you might have totake anywhere from eighteen to twenty five thousand

(07:50):
dollars out in order to satisfy thetaxman. If that is the case,
what are your options? What shouldyou be doing? And it's daunting,
it really is. So again,if you'd like to participate, we'd love
to hear from you. It's oneeight hundred. Talk to BGY and we'll
talk a little bit about the markets. Unbelievable. You know, fake came

(08:11):
out with the comment, so we'lldiscuss that in detail also, but I'm
going to take my first break.I'm gonna take a little blast the caffeine.
Here again, open lines one eighthundred, Talk to BGY. This
is the retirement Planning Show. I'mDave Kopek and we'll be right back the
eighty six percenters. Do you knowthat eighty six percent of the population has
no defined benefit pension plan. Formost of us, we have to take

(08:31):
our life savings and create a paycheckfor the rest of our lives in retirement.
What is your plan for retirement incomedistribution? How you manage your assets
during the most critical years of yourlifetime. Nobel Prize winning economist William Sharp
has called retirement income distribution the nastiest, hardest problem in finance. He points
out that investment uncertainty and mortality canderail the most careful laid out retirement income

(08:56):
plan. Call our offices today tostart the process of building a retil wirement
income distribution plan. After forty oneyears of being in the financial services business,
you need to start taking action tostart building your own personal retirement income
distribution plan. How do you dothat? To take action? Five one
eight, five eight zero one nineone nine. That's five one eight,
five eight zero one nine one nineor RPG retire on the web. Don't

(09:20):
procrastinate, motivate to start building yourretirement income distribution plan five one eight five
eight zero one nine one nine.If you would like to hear more information
on navigating your way to retirement fromDave Kopek. Remember you can listen to
this show and pass shows anytime inanywhere on the free iHeartRadio app, or
go to iHeart dot com and searchfor a retirement planning show. If you

(09:43):
have any questions, call in nowat one eight hundred talk WGY. That's
one eight hundred eight two five fivenine four nine one eight hundred eight two
five five nine four nine. Weare here live in studio, ready to
answer your questions. I've gotta takea little time, a little time to

(10:18):
fit things over. I better readbetween the lines in case I needed when
I'm older. The Goldilocks continues.You know, I talked about the screaming

(10:56):
monkeys and how wrong they are consistently. This year highlights how long they've been.
This year, we were supposed tohave moderate growth and the markets were
supposed to you know, who knowswhat's going to happen from now until you
know, election time. But thebottom line gets down to is that for

(11:20):
all of you that are still sittingin cash, the trillions of dollars of
cash that's out there in the marketplace. Last week, the Dow was up
two percent. We're up almost fivefor the year. SP five hundred was
up two point three percent, almostten percent on the year. The Nasdaq
was up almost three percent, upabout nine and a half on the year,

(11:43):
and the ten year Treasury is afour point two oh. But the
thing is is that they came outand they were talking about you know what
they're outlook is and Wall Street afterthey announced and they had the Q and

(12:07):
A, but it delivered a messagewhich Wall Street called dubbish. So overall,
the markets welcomed the more dubbish messagingcoming out of the Fed and Sherman

(12:28):
Powell who did not take the opportunityto push back on the rising stock prices
and easing financial conditions. So wesaw the stock markets reach new hives again.
Bond markets are moving higher. Asfar as capital appreciation, as treasury
yields softened, was I mean theywent down and yield and the more cyclical

(12:54):
which we've talked about in the past, which we don't hold a lot of
small caps and caps industrials, wedo old financials we own. We're the
top performers. So the better economicoutlook and potential for lower interest rates goldilocks.

(13:15):
So Wall Street's looking for a longerterm catalyst for a broadening leadership,
which we talked about a lot lastyear. Wasn't broad based. It was
very concentrated in the Magnificent seven orMagnificent eight. Which ones you want?
What are the ones you want toselect? But here's the key, Here's

(13:37):
the key, and this is whatI liked about it, and I've been
talking about this since the later partof last year. The rate cutting cycle
remains on track this year. Whatdoes that mean is that the FEDS updated
projections. What they call the dotplot is basically showing award trajectory of interest

(14:01):
rates. We love that. Whydo we love that? Great for the
economy, great for the stock market, great for fixed income investors. So
you know, if you're out therebuying a five or six handle in a
bond portfolio, you get the yield, you're gonna get some capital depreciation.

(14:26):
And you know, there's a lotof people on Wall Street that are basically
saying, is that the soft landingthat everybody thought was not possible is possible.
Is possible. So as you gettowards we're going to believe it or

(14:46):
not, folks. We're the endof this week, we're looking at April
first, the beginning of April.We're already through the first quarter of twenty
twenty four, which doesn't seem possible. We're almost twenty five percent through the
year twenty twenty four. So thething is is that it's a good opportunity

(15:11):
for you to sit down with yourfinancial team. We met, we talked
with the mothership Fidelity and go overthe portfolios. We also had a couple
of analysts that were in our officeto go over some of the selections that
we're looking at right now as faras updating some of our portfolios, but

(15:37):
overall markets, as I said,welcome this dubbish tone out of the FED,
and that will also dictate how weallocate some of our money now.
I had a long conversation when Iwas in Florida with one of our clients
about building out retirement income to distributionplans, and we talked about financials,

(16:04):
energy and industrials and investment grade bondshis core holdings, and basically I said
to him is that the reason whywe are concentrated in those is we like
them short term and long term.But there's a thing which we love even

(16:26):
more, and that's called dividends.And the ones that we're in particular have
a very attractive divining yield on himright now. And our investment grade bonds
performed extremely well over the last theydid extremely well last week. And the

(16:51):
thing that we're trying to look athere is the broadening, broadening as far
as there is more participants as faras total returns. You know, healthcare
didn't do so great last year,right We are big believers in healthcare.
If you look the GDP, howmuch of our dollar goes to healthcare it's

(17:14):
an astronomical figure. I don't havethe numbers of the statistics in front of
me. It's astronomical energy. Idon't know about you, but I don't
like the price that I'm seeing rightnow energy three forty nine, three fifty
nine. When I was down inFlorida, I was astonished at that time.
I think it was around three fortythree fifty they're paying for gasoline in

(17:36):
Florida. So you know, asI said over and over again, it's
our vue that the broadening market participationbesides this megacap technology, right, the
magnificent or magnificent eight is healthy,healthy sign of a good, healthy market

(18:03):
dynamic. So as we approach thesecond quarter already of two thousand and twenty
four at the retirement planning group,for our type of clients, we're going
to probably tilt more towards large cap, strong dividends. Right. We also

(18:26):
like industrials, consumer discretionary utilities aregetting attractive again in our fixed income in
our fixed income portfolios, I personallythink I've been saying this for a long
time. I think there's a lotof opportunity out there in investment grade bonds
and high yield and high yield.I told you the statistic. I've set

(18:52):
it over and over again. Highyield bonds will give you stock market rates
or returns with fifty percent less volatilitythan the stock market. There's a white
paper report, you can get itonline Alliance Bernstein. It's a great read.
It's a great read. So potentialfor FED rate cuts, bull,

(19:22):
easing of inflation, bull better thanexpected in broading, earnings growth bull and
personally myself, this broadening market leadershipas we see it play out, very
bullish, very bullish. What's themother's milk of your portfolio? Earnings?

(19:52):
Accelerated earnings. So as we talka little bit about where to be during
your pre impost retirement years, youknow, a lot of times we talk
about the red zone. I'm goingto talk a little bit about that in
the second half hour of the firsthour, so we can discuss that in

(20:14):
a little bit more detail. Butyou know, we're doing a lot of
work with individuals, and let mejust mention this. We have had great
participation and we have met wonderful peoplefrom the radio. When I say wonderful,
outstanding people I've met, you know, I don't know how many this

(20:36):
past week in our office in Albany, here, Malta, Glens Walls,
et cetera. The different locations thatwe have. We're out in Syracuse next
week. But the theme that we'retrying to overemphasize to individuals over and over
and over again is that as youget into your pre impost retirement years,

(20:59):
it's critical that you focus in on. What we try to focus in quite
a bit is that baseline income.Because we all know that there's going to
be market corrections. We all knowthat there could be a shock. You
know, there's a horrible event thatwent on in Russia yesterday. I mean,

(21:22):
my greatest fear is that we haveanother black Swan event here in the
United States, and you can throwmarket leadership and you can throw the stock
market out the window in an eventlike that, because everybody will sell and
go to the sidelines until there's clarityand understanding of exactly what's going on.
What saved you in those conditions strongbalance sheets, strong dividends, baseline income,

(21:48):
and having what we call the bucketof money anywhere from six to twelve
to eighteen months of cash depending onyour feelings about it. In the camp
that you should have anywhere from twelveto eighteen months of cash sitting on the
sidelines to make sure that you canweather the storms and you're not, you
know, jumping out the window orhaving high anxiety attacks because there's inadequate amounts

(22:12):
of cash in order to satisfy yourincome needs. Being realistic and have an
understanding exactly why your portfolios are setup exactly the way they are is extremely
important. It's extremely important. SoI'm pretty happy to say that I'm,
you know, pretty bullish on whatI've heard from the FED. When you

(22:36):
know, I know that there's alot of people out there right now that
are contemplating real estate, purchasing realestate as the FED cuts rates makes it
much more attractive for people to buyhomes that are within their path, what
they're what they would like. Thisis one of the first times that I've

(23:02):
been in Florida in quite some timethat I saw multiple for sale science,
multiple for sales science that I talkedto a realator. I had lunch one
afternoon, I sat next to arealtor. I had a great conversation.
Just happened to bump into this guy. We started talking and he basically said,
is that you know, the marketis a little bit soft. It's

(23:26):
still very bullish, but properties arestaying on much longer than they had in
the past in Florida, especially someof your high end properties. But you
know, I go down to thevillages and I have quite a few clients
in there now, and I wastalking to a good friend of mine who

(23:49):
moved there from this great state ofMaine, and he was telling me that
it's paradise for them. They loveit. Everything they could possibly want is
there, And logistically they love itbecause they can be everywhere within Florida in
a very short period of time,which is true because it's right right above
Orlando the villages. But what's greatabout the villages too is that they're all

(24:15):
self contained, their own, theirown I think there's I think they said
something like there's one hundred and eightythousand people now in the villages, which
is hard to believe. So thisis what I'll say. Overall, good
week in the market. Great.You know, we'll talk more on next
week. On Saturday, I haveto go back on Sunday of next week,

(24:37):
No, not Sunday, Monday toFlorida the day after Easter, and
we're going to see some clients,and my wife and I are going to
spend some time down there. Butuh, overall, pretty bullish, pretty
bullish, and I think that youknow, one of the things that you
have to start looking at now isthat you know, have you had have

(24:59):
you done any modifications, have youdone any adjustments in your portfolio? Because
we've had an unbelievable run since Octoberof last year, substantial gains for people
that's stuck with GE. I'm notgoing to bang the drum again this week
on GE, but you should beextremely happy. The other spin off is
happening the first week of April Verona. For every share of GE, you're

(25:25):
going to get one share of Verona, So that will take place and there
will be three separate companies now GEurospace, Verona, which is the power
division, and then of course GEHealthcare. And I applaud you for sticking
with the mothership GE because it's servedyou well. As I said over and

(25:49):
over again, I know the guycalls in from Connecticut all the time.
He says he bets the horse.I say, I bet the jockey.
I bet Larry Culp. Matter offact, my son called me this week
from Tampa. My son that's livingin Tampa, and he was applauding his
father and saying, boy, youwere right on GE. And I said,
listen, I wasn't right on Ge. What I was right about was

(26:11):
basically I was picking the guy thatwas managing GE and I have a lot
of confidence in him. But likeanything else, you got to do your
homework. Folks, you have todo your homework. Sit down, talk
to your team about the selection ofyour investments. Have them give you an
understanding of exactly why they're allocating moneythe way they do. Just remember,

(26:33):
managing assets and retirement is entirely differentthan managing assets during your accumulation years.
When you have to turn the spicetton. Now you have to create a
check rather than accumulating money. Itcan be a daunting task. Make sure
you just understand exactly what you're creatingand be able to weather the storms,

(26:53):
whether the storms where you're not jumpingout the window and you're selling stuff when
you should be buying. Bye,So we're going to come back. Chris
McCarthy's going to come in at thetop of the hour. One new team
member. Any questions you give usa call. One W G. Y
we'll be right back bye. You'reas cold as ice. You willing to

(27:27):
sacrifice out love. You never takeadvice from there. You're the price side.
I'm leaving me more and half allthe time. You leave the world

(27:52):
they hide. Did you find it? No, I'll show you at the
break. I do see that youcan sign up for your free seminar April
sixteenth, right on our WGY website. Yeah, i' let you tell people
about that. We have a way. We're doing a dog and Pony with
the Pyro Law Firm Preserve and Protect. It's a seminar, it's a workshop,

(28:18):
it's a dinner seminar. We haven'tdone one of these guys in months,
and I know that we just startedpromoting it verbally a little bit.
I know it's on WGY's web.It's on Is it on the website?
Nowwgy's website. It is. Yougo right to the website and you can
basically sign up for the workshop.It's gonna be I believe April sixteenth,

(28:47):
and I believe that sign in startsat five point thirty. Dinner will be
served I believe at six six fifteen, and then we'll start the presentation.
I believe somewhere around at six pointthirty seven o'clock. So if you would
like to go, myself and Loupiroand Aaron Connor, we're going to go

(29:08):
over pre and post retirement planning,what you should be doing as far as
managing your money, also the legalside of it, what you should be
doing for protection and being a nicenight out. It's going to be held
at what used to be the DesmondAmericana, and I believe now they call

(29:30):
it the Crown Plaza if I'm notmistaken, right over by the airport.
And again, if you'd like toattend, go to WGY's website or is
there a telephone number two Zach.I think there's a telephone number there too
where they can actually call in ratherthan doing it on the website. If
not, you can call my officeand to say I heard Dave talk about

(29:52):
it on the radio show about thedinner presentation and it's five five eight zero
one nine nine, and just talkto Jim. He'll be more than happy
to facilitate the reservation. But wealways enjoy doing these. I used to

(30:14):
do them all the time Lou.I know I've done presentations with Lou before
in the past, it's been yearsthat we've done one of these, and
the reason why because COVID and westop doing them because people didn't want to
go out and mingle and be togetherin a room. But this, this
will be the first one that we'vedone in a long long time, and

(30:37):
as I said, I really lookforward to it and if we can help
you out and navigate a little bitsome of the things that you should be
thinking about before you either go intoretirement or you're in retirement. It's uh
five eight five eight zero one nine. When I and just say you can
leave a message today and Jim,well, I know either Jim or Brenda
from my office will call and reservethe spot for you, as far as

(31:03):
preserve and protect at the Crown Plazawhich used to be the Desmond right next
to the airport five point thirty startingon the registration on April sixteenth. Okay,

(31:23):
no goats, still got no okay, all right, okay, no
big deal. We'll figure it out, all right. A couple of things,
you know, I always enjoy meetingwith existing clients, finding out what's
going right, what's going wrong.And one of the things I'll say,

(31:45):
and when you're outside of New YorkState, there's many more options available to
you in insurance products than there isin New York State. This is a
very very very difficult state and inorder for products to be approved, that's
a positive and it's also a negative. But there's products that are outside of

(32:07):
New York State that will afford youthe ability. And when I talk about
these, I want to talk alittle bit about long term care planning because
it gets kind of put on theback burner for a lot of people,
and it's really, for most ofus, the biggest achilles heel if we
haven't planned properly for it. AndI know that a lot of you,

(32:34):
especially our clients that do not dolong term care insurance policies. We're still
a big believer in what we callthe double band aid, and the double
band aid is that we still believeyou should do an irrevocable trust and allocate
a certain amount of money into theirrevocable trust and real estate in order to
guarantee a legacy for your loved ones. Now, we met with some great

(32:58):
people yesterday. Of fact, mylast appointment yesterday afternoon was some individuals from
Northville, wonderful people and they camein and we got talking about their estate
and their assets and the money thatthey've invested, et cetera. And we
went through what they're trying to accomplishas they get a little bit older.

(33:24):
In the missus, the wife said, there's one thing I want to make
sure is I want to make surethat everything that we've worked hard for in
our lifetime doesn't get deluded or getsvaporized by the health event. And I
said, well, the only waythat you can do that and make sure
that that does happen in New YorkState, and it's called an irrevocable trust.

(33:47):
The assets that you put into thetrust. And I'm not an attorney,
but I know enough about it thatI can talk about it. The
assets that you put into a trust, you've got sixty months five years before
there's technically what they call no incidenceof ownership, and those assets will pass

(34:07):
on to your errors, your lovedones. And what I like about it,
because I have one myself. Mywife and I about three and a
half years ago, did an irrevocabletrust with our real estate and some of
our assets. What I like aboutit is that the trust, depending on
the type of trust, that youestablish can monitor those assets and basically act

(34:30):
in a fiduciary That's where you heartalked about a lot. Now that's like
a magical word as a selling point. I'm a fiduciary. But the thing
is is that if it will actin a fiduciary capacity to make sure that
the assets are monitored and they're paidto the people that you specifically want them

(34:51):
to go to, so there isno misunderstanding by the children as far as
where the property is going to go. Now, what's complicated with this situation
with this husband and wife, andit's not complicated because it can be accomplished,
is that they have multiple properties,have multiple properties, and now the

(35:15):
properties are own, you know,jointly with both her and her husband.
For medicaid purposes. You can onlyprotect one home, right so the community
spouse, the house that is theprimary residence is the one that would be
protected. The other properties, ofcourse, would be exposed to a medicaid

(35:36):
spend down and would be leaned incase you didn't have adequate amounts of resources
in order to pay for your care. So what does that mean. That
means that those properties, the deedswould have to go into the irrevocable trust,
be titled to the irrevocable trust,and then after sixty months those assets
are I guess technically you would calloutside the reach of a medicaid spend because

(36:00):
there's no incidents of ownership. What'sthe negative, Well, I don't think
there is a negative. And youknow this maybe this is something that we'll
talk more in detail at our presentationon the sixteenth of April. But I've
always been in the camp that becauseNew York State allows you to do partial
revocation of assets that you put intoin irrevocable trust, to me, that

(36:25):
means that, you know, evenif you overfund it, which I've seen
people do, you can still takeassets out that without it affecting the other
assets that are inside the trust.So if you exceed the five years,
you need to take some of themoney out. You want to buy a
new car, you want to puta roof on the house, you want
to do this, you want totake some of the cash out, You

(36:46):
can do it. You can doit. So in this situation, what
I had told the individuals is this, you know, go home and have
a chat, try to figure outexactly how. Because she said that you
know, one or two of thekids specifically want some of the real estate.

(37:07):
If that is the case, howdo you get equalization if you got
two kids? Keep it simply,you got two kids and it's worth five
hundred thousand dollars the properties, andyou want to make sure that one kid
gets two fifty and the other onegets two fifty. You know, slice
it and dice, and you mighthave to basically have a real attor come

(37:29):
in independent to do an evaluation,and then any cash that's on the sidelines
or the sale of other assets willbasically you know, balance out the boat
the ballast to make sure that it'sfair for all parties. That's always the

(37:50):
achilles hell for a lot of individuals. How do I get equalization of my
estate when both my wife and Ipass away because I want all my kids
to share equally in the wealth.Well, it's complicated. Throw a house
in there, Throw a you know, a property in Lake Georgian there,

(38:13):
you know, a skihouse up inVermont. It's tough. It's tough.
That's why I always say it's youknow, I had this discussion with a
husband and wife down in Florida.Is that I said, you know,
you've got some difficult discussions coming upwith your three kids, and those discussions
are going to have to be about, you know, certain things that you

(38:36):
want versus what they want. Andthen they also have a child that has
certain needs that are over and abovethe other two because of some problems that
he's had in his lifetime as faras the ability for him to manage assets
himself individually. So when we talkabout building out a retirement plan and they

(39:01):
talk about irrevocable trust, and theytalk about long term care planning, and
they talk about life insurance, youknow it can be complicated. I'm talking
about life insurance yesterday with a wonderfulman and a he's got a beautiful wife.
Professionals, he's a PA, sheworks with him. And you know

(39:25):
I said to him, for oneof the first things I said to him
is that you know you've got you'rein the prime of your life. You've
got an unbelievable savings that you've accumulatedalready. We applaud you on that,
but really your achilles heel is whata premature death. He was extremely,

(39:47):
extremely underinsured if something happened to him. And I know that no one likes
to think about that. I don'tlike to think about it, but I've
said that a million times on radio, and my wife and I will probably
even say it today. I've beenfortunate that it didn't happen. I didn't

(40:08):
have a premature death, but Iwas under insured, There's no doubt about
it. I did not have anywherenear the amount of life insurance during my
kid's go go years and grown upyears then that I should have had.
I thought it was enough, butwhen you really sat down and you ran
the numbers, it was no morenowhere near adequate amount of life insurance.

(40:30):
And Dan Bouchard told me that.Dan Bouchard told me, you need to
get more life insurance, and Igot. I'll tell you, I got
five hundred thousand dollars a level term, and I said that it wasn't enough.
It wasn't even close to being enough. Because if you figure the four
percent or five percent rule, ifyou're a successful professional and you're making one

(40:52):
hundred and fifty two hundred thousand dollarsa year, and that is the amount
of money that's going to be necessaryfor you to pay the bills, make
sure your wife is safe and secureand your kids are going to be able
to have the college education and thequality of life that you want. What's
the number, Well, the numberis pretty simple. If you've got five
percent of your number and you're makingone hundred and fifty, you need three

(41:12):
million. Sounds like a big number, but in today's world, believe it
or not, everybody will say thisto you, it's really not a big
number. It's not as big asit was twenty thirty years ago. So
five percent off of three million givesyour one fifty and then the kids are
secure, your wife is secure.You don't have to worry about it.
Level term what does that mean.It's the cheapest form of insurance you can

(41:35):
buy for the greatest amount of protection. You rent it, you don't own
it. That means it will goaway statistically before you go away. That's
why insurance companies love selling term insurancebecause about ninety nine percent of the people
that buy term insurance, they don'tdie. It's all right to the bottom
line. But if you do die, then some of us have had situations.

(41:57):
My father died of forty four.You know, there's everybody has stories
as far as family events. Mywife's brother died of forty seven, of
cancer. So horrible things happen towonderful people. It's just a question at

(42:21):
that stage, they came in therein their fifties, not their sixties or
seventies, to start doing the retirementplanning. I applaud that right. He
understands in order for him to getto his destination, he has to do
some planning outside the box, notonly necessarily as far as ROI return on

(42:43):
his investments, but also protecting hisestate, protecting his family, protecting his
wife, adequate amounts of resources forthe kids, et cetera. So when
we say that retirement planning is nota cookie cutter approach, I don't know
how do you do that through aneight hundred telephone number. You know,
I'm not a major advocate of aneight hundred telephone number for me to do

(43:06):
my financial planning, which I cantalk a little bit more detail about when
we come back, because we havea new service through the Retirement Planning Group
that can help people that are currentlyin four oh one K programs, and
it's going to be an ala carteapproach that we're going to do. We're
going to help people that are intheir twenties and thirties and forties that need
help in assistance managing assets, andalso if they want financial planning, we're

(43:29):
going to offer them financial planning andwe'll charge them a fee for the financial
plan I think it's going to bea phenomenal. It's going to be like
a dashboard approach for people. Youcheck the box that you want us to
help you with it, we'll gothrough the internet, we'll get an email,
we'll contact you, and then we'llgo through our process how we can

(43:49):
facilitate what you're looking for. We'reworking on that right now, so I'm
going to take a break. Whenwe come back, we have open lines
if you'd like to participate. It'sone eight hundred talk WGY. It's one
eight hundred eight two five fifty nineforty nine. At the top of the
hour, a new team member,Chris McCarthy's going to call in. We're

(44:10):
gonna talk a little bit about hisexpertise, what he's bringing to the table
for the retirement Planning group, andalso maybe some of the things that he's
perceived to, you know, what'sgoing on out there in the retirement arena.
He's been doing it a long time, thirty years. He's a great
guy. Really glad to have himwith us. And when we come back.

(44:32):
If you have a question yourself,it's one eight hundred talk WGY one
eight hundred eight two five fifty nineforty nine. Don't forget. If you
want to attend April sixteenth Preserve andProtect, you need to call like asap

(44:52):
because I guarantee it's gonna be soldout. They're gonna start promoting it on
the radio, on the website,I believe on Monday. And you want
to definitely call in and reserve yourseat. You can call our office at
five eight five eight zero one ninenine five eight five eight zero one nine
one nine say you heard me talkabout it. Jim or Brenda will reach

(45:15):
out to you and give you thedetails. We'll be right back. The
eighty six percenters. Do you knowthat eighty six percent of the population has
no defined benefit pension plan? Formost of us, we have to take
our life savings and create a paycheckfor the rest of our lives in retirement.
What is your plan for retirement incomedistribution? How you manage your assets
during the most critical years of yourlifetime. Nobel Prize winning economist William Sharp

(45:38):
has called retirement income distribution the nastiest, hardest problem in finance. He points
out that investment, uncertainty and mortalitycan derail the most careful laid out retirement
income plan. Call our offices todayto start the process of building a retirement
income distribution plan. After forty oneyears of being in the financial services business,

(45:59):
you need to start take action tostart building your own personal retirement income
distribution plan. How do you dothat? To take action? Five one
eight, five eight zero one ninenine. That's five one eight, five
eight zero one nine one nine orRPG retire on the web. Don't procrastinate,
motivate to start building your retirement incomedistribution plan five one eight five eight

(46:20):
zero one nine one nine. Ifyou would like to hear more information on
navigating your way to retirement from DaveKopek, Remember you can listen to this
show and past shows anytime in anywhereon the free iHeartRadio app, or go
to iHeart dot com and search fora retirement planning show. Nine. We

(46:47):
are here live in studio, readyto answer your questions for not shot.

(47:20):
You can brown, you won't adie, I want to feed almost bound
estee. You won't come down,You won'ta live, You won'ta move through
the sound. Got fire in yourface. Person, you don't feel,

(47:42):
don't desire, it's insane. Youcan't stand until you do it. Sometimes
of wonder from getting your eyes.Maybe you think it's so bad? Got
back? All right? All set? Are we all set? Got what

(48:27):
you need? My brother? Soonenough? Okay? Good, good little
housekeeping here. But it's good tobe here. It's actually very pretty outside
right now. The snow is aflying ice. Sleep last week I'm looking
at the window. I got abeach, I got sand, I got

(48:50):
eighty degree weather. But it's allrelative, right, I do like I
do like winter. I just likeit in smaller pieces, not as big
as that you used to be.So but please, folks, I was
out there early this morning. Idon't know what it's like now. It
was horrible this morning, so pleasebe careful. You know, if you're
driving, drive slow. I knowthat there was a lot of cars in

(49:14):
the ditches, people driving like idiotsbecause you know they think they can still
go sixty five miles an hour whenthere's ice and snow on the north Way,
and you know a few miles downthe road, you know they're in
the ditches in the median, Soplease be careful. I want to go
back to the long term care becauseI think it's important and this is really

(49:37):
We're spending much more on long termcare then we've had probably in a long
time. And I think the reasonwhy is that we are a society today
that we're starting to see the rambificationsof not planning properly for a long term
care event. And a lot ofpeople think, you know, Dave,
what are you doing? Man?Like you know, you leave your leisure

(50:00):
suit guy now in white shoes anda white belt selling life insurance. You
know, the guy that was onGroundhog's Day? What was his name?
That was running around. But tomake a long story short, if you
don't plan for this, folks,you're really in deep weeds. And my
wife and I were characters for sixand a half years. And you know,

(50:20):
I know, people say, ohmy god, here we going and
he's talking about but the reality isis that caregiving is not only stressful,
but it changes the dynamics of afamily. Impossibly, impossibly will blow a
family up. Okay, if youremember Leonard Burns from Burns Camera, he
became a major advocate for long termcare planning because what happened with his family

(50:47):
with his mother, and he wason my show numerous times and he used
to work with associates at Clifton Park, which is a long term care specialist
firm that focuses in on different productsthroughout the United States. Believe it or
not, they're headquartered right here inClifton Park. So that being said,

(51:10):
what do you do? Okay,do you put your assets into a trust
at a minimum, So when Isay a double band aid, most people
cannot afford a policy. If you'rewealthy, it doesn't make any difference,
right, you can afford to payfor the care of a long term care
event. If you're middle class bullseye, you're the ones that are going to
basically be on the hook. Andif your lower income, you're going to

(51:34):
qualify because really Medicaid was set upfor what people that are impoverished, that
are broke, right, and that'swhat you're trying to do. By doing
a trust on all these other thingsthat you have to jump through hoops,
you're basically repositioning your assets so youqualify for Medicaid. That's what you're doing.
No incidents. Ownership means it's outsidethe reaches of you technically, right.

(51:58):
So the thing is is that thereare the the thing that I'm trying
to say to you, then Iwant to overemphasize it. All that you're
planning on the long term care sideis going to be based off of one
thing. What will be your finalzip code? What will be your final
zip code? Right? Because certainstates protect certain assets, whether it's the

(52:28):
IRA. You know, you hearpeople call all the time and say,
you know, is my IRA protectedfrom a Medicaid spend down? And the
answer to that question by an attorney. In my opinion, my opinion should
be maybe it shouldn't be, yes, it's protected because if you change zip

(52:50):
codes. Counties. Counties are differentin New York State as far as how
aggressive they go after IRA accounts.Here's an example. Okay, we know
this for a fact because it's happenedto us where a county has called us
and said, you now have totake mister Apple's IRA, and you have
to increase it by four hundred percentbecause now we are requiring him to take

(53:14):
his distributions much larger than what theywere because he's in a Medicaid bed in
our county. And this is thenumber that he needs to take because it's
based on life expectancy. It's notbased on periodic payments or RMD. No
for a fact, because it's happenedto us numerous times in our practice.

(53:37):
Other states don't protect the IRA atall. So if you move to Massachusetts,
right, Massachusetts doesn't protect the IRA. Other states don't protect the IRA.
Certain homes you don't get protection.Certain states do protect your homes.
So when you move and you understandand the dynamics as far as what assets

(54:01):
can you keep, what assets haveto be utilized for your care, then
you can make a logical decision asfar as what's the right product or trust
that you need to facilitate what you'relooking for. And we'll talk a little
bit more in detail about that,but I guarantee you we'll talk a lot

(54:21):
about that. April sixteenth, atour presentation at the Crown Plaza, myself
and Loup Perrow and Aaron Conners.Give us a call. We'll be right
back after the news. I'm DaveKopek, worried about protecting and preserving all
you have built. Health is herelearn how to secure your future with legal
and financial Planning with wguy's Retirement SpecialistDave Kopek and Legal House Lou Piero and

(54:46):
Aaron Connor for a free dinner seminarin April sixteenth at the Crown Plaza,
Albany at five thirty pm. Spaceis limited. Sign up at wgy dot
com or call five one eight sixtwo eight four two five five. That's
wgy dot com or call five oneeight six two eight four to two five
five line from the wgy iHeart Studios. Welcome to the Retirement Planning Show with

(55:10):
your host Dave Kopek from the RetirementPlanning Group. Every week, Dave and
his team discussed the ways they canhelp people make informed decisions about a wide
array of retirement planning information that cansupport you and developing a more certain financial
future for you and your family.Now it's time for Dave Kopec, WGY's
Retirement Planning Specialist, standing in thering with his head home role. Couldn't

(55:50):
get a ticket. It was asoul show. Heard the roar of the
crowd. You could rene the thame. What is that through the wall like
a death three We're back. Becareful driving, folks, it is slippery.

(56:21):
Have that second cup of coffee,stick around for the next hour.
Not worth it, not worth it. Just take your time, go slow.
Uh that's I don't you know.I pray you know, it's it's
amazing. It's horrific what happened inRussia, you know, another terrorist attack,

(56:45):
hundreds of people killed. We livein a crazy world today. We
really do live in a crazy world. I always go through the news a
little bit at the break. Godbless those people. Jesus horrible. So
all right, it gives me agreat opportunity here uh today to introduce one

(57:09):
of my good friends who is nowa team member of the Retirement Planning Group,
Chris McCarthy. And Chris, areyou on the line. Yes,
I am great. You chickened outthis morning. You said, I'm not
driving in. I'm a chicken.I'm gonna stay home. Well, I'm

(57:32):
grateful that I'm sitting comfortably and doingdonuts on the north I'm only teasing you
because I told Chris stay home,because we got I got on the road
and I said, no way,no way. Uh. It was bad,
it was bad. But listen,Chris, Uh, we're proud that

(57:52):
you're part of the team. Now. I wanted to bring you on and
let everybody get a flavor of whoyou are, what you do. You've
been in the You've been in thebusiness for how many years now? I
started in the business in February ofnineteen eighty five, So that's great.
Thirty nine years. How many years? Thirty nine? Wow, and you're

(58:19):
only forty nine. It's amazing.It's amazing. I know. I try
to keep up that. Look.You know, Chris is a great a
Chris great athlete. He actually playedsports with my brother in law. Knew
my wife's family, grew up withher the family. So I've known Chris
for quite some time. So let'stell tell everybody. You went to college

(58:42):
at Buffalo, you got a degreein economics, and then you started in
the financial services industry almost right assoon as you got out of college,
Chris, Yeah, pretty much.I started with Equitable. Yeah. I
had a very very good experience,learned a lot for the first four years
of my career, and then I'vebeen independent ever since, and I've been

(59:08):
blessed. I've worked with a lotof wonderful people over the years, and
I'm more excited now than ever havingthe opportunity to work with you so it's
been it's been great. Well,let me ask you a question. You've
been with us now for a littleover a month. If you had a
highlight, what's how would you categorizethe Retirement Planning Group to the listening audience.

(59:36):
I would say that I've never beenaffiliated with an office that covers so
much all under one route. Veryvery impressed with all the team members.
Everybody has a vital role. It'snot just coming in and, like you

(01:00:00):
said many times, managing money.It's a to z. It's what can
we do for people to give themthe most comprehensive future that they can ask
for and making sure that all avenuesare taken care of. Yeah, I
think you know when we started theRetirement Planning Group, my wife and I

(01:00:22):
years ago. You know, ourgoal was two things, Chris, and
you know this is what you andI had many conversations before you joined the
firm. It was critical that wewere going to be independent, independent,
meaning that we didn't have an axto grind because I knew what that was
like working for major investment banking firms. They had their own in house products

(01:00:45):
and you got compensated differently by utilizingthem than not using an outside product that
might have been a little bit moreattractive or better for the client. And
the second thing. In the secondthing that we always wanted to make sure
if we had architecture, that's whatthat means, open architecture, not to

(01:01:06):
have an ax to grind, butalso to be able to facilitate not only
the investment side, but all theother little things that needed to get done
in order to have a full blownwealth management plan that was specific for pre
and post retirement planning. And Ithink you've seen through the Retirement Planning Group,
not only do we incorporate the CPAsand the attorneys in the process,

(01:01:30):
but we also we kind of insistthat they need to do something in order
to button things up in order tomake it a plan that only takes care
of the one individual, let's saythe primary earner, but also the spouse
whether it's male or female, that'sgoing to need wealth replacement, and then
of course the legacy that they wishto leave their loved ones and the protection

(01:01:52):
that they need during that time.Absolutely, I just wanted to touch on
something quick what you just went over, and that is the distinct difference between
being a broker who represent the client, right and being an agent who represent

(01:02:12):
the company. And I think that'sthat's a good point. Yeah, you
know, and I couldn't agree withyou more. When you're sitting with a
client, you want to get theminvolved with the best possible remedy whatever they're
looking for, you know, becausewe're representing them right, right. And

(01:02:34):
I think you found that, youknow, with our distribution channel through Fidelity
and also through our affiliations with thecompanies that provide us all the insurance products,
the CPAs and the attorneys. Whatwe try to do is to kind
of scratch the surface and find theones that are, you know, what
we call best to breed, theones that will facilitate what the client's looking
for. So you know, youknow, Chris, you bring some expertise

(01:02:58):
to the platform here that we haven'treally had Internally. Your focus has been
on income producing products. Retirement incomedistribution has really been your forte for a
long time, and you've brought somethings to light that I haven't seen for
quite some time. If you lookat the landscape, and we always over

(01:03:20):
emphasize retirement income distribution and baseline income, what you're feeling about that as far
as you know, making sure thatthere's adequate amounts of cash coming in so
you can go through market cycles andnot you know, have your knees knocking
and your hair falling off your head. Well, I think one of the

(01:03:40):
the biggest pluses about what I've beenworking with, what we've been working with
over the years, is that it'sall about peace of mind, right,
And if we can get people involvedwith a program that they can invest their
money, knows, we do thebest we can to help them manage their

(01:04:02):
money. But when they always knowthat they have a guaranteed income stream that
is the safety net and it's thereat all times, I think that gives
people a lot of peace of mindknowing that they have something to fall back
on. You know, there's alot of great go ahead investment people out

(01:04:27):
there. Oh yeah, I'm justgoing to say, there's a lot of
great investment people out there. Butpeace of mind is where we can get
guarantees wherever we can, and Ithink that's what some of these programs bring
to the table, that allow peoplethe peace of mind knowing that they have

(01:04:50):
something to fall back on, right, right. And the thing is is
that one of the things that Itry to explain in the individuals is that
with our platform, one of thethings that we have found is that there's
sometimes many more which I found outjust this past week with some of the
contacts that you had that came into talk to us. One of the

(01:05:15):
things that we have found is thatthere's better opportunities, or there's more opportunities
for certain types of investments that areapproved outside in New York that are not
here in New York, which youknow, of course, we want to
make sure that we're doing a prudentevaluation to make sure that it's an investment
that is suitable for our client.But I mean that's one of the things
that I've seen since we've had thesepresentations in the office. I'm kind of

(01:05:40):
blown away with some of these opportunitiesthat are out there. Chris, I
agree. I agree. I meanNew York States, I think has a
lot of pluses, but I thinkyou know, when you have certain programs
that are available in forty nine outof fifty state but for some reason not

(01:06:00):
available in New York, I thinkit raises a little bit of concerns right
with all of us. But yes, I mean there's certain certain program there's
certain writers to programs that it's hardnot to take a look at them right
and to see if they would workwell in somebody's financial plan. Well,

(01:06:27):
I think one of the things thatwe talk about all the time, and
I think it's one of the thingsthat you talk about when you meet with
clients is you know, you've gotyou've got to make sure that you have
adequate amounts of income coming in soyou know when there is gyrations in the
market. But the one that Ilike is the when when when they do
surveys, you know, seven outof ten individuals will talk about, you

(01:06:53):
know, retirees surrounded by family andfriends who have a substantial coming in every
month. This is the thing that'samazing, live much happier and healthier lives
and live longer. And this isa study that was done by the Wall

(01:07:14):
Street Journal, So it's proven thatthe thing is is that there's a lot
of individuals that are looking for thesetypes of investment options that will give them
guaranteed income for the rest of theirlives. Now, it doesn't have to
be annuities, it doesn't have tobe laddered bond portfolios, it doesn't have
to be you know, a structuredpayout. Whatever it may be. It

(01:07:35):
could be a combination of all thesethings. But the thing is is that
you just want to make sure thatyou have a solution that in order for
you to have you know what wecall peace of mind. Peace of mind
that there's a certain amount of incomethat's coming in the door, whether it's
a good day or a bad day, whether it's sunny or it's snowing.

(01:08:00):
Absolutely, and and I like theway you you worded that is that it's
it's a plan. It's not aone size fits all. It's not a
one product does all. It's somethingthat is shared. And when you have
a very well diversified portfolio and youhave all these parts working together, I

(01:08:23):
think that is what creates that peaceof mind. And people people live happier
and healthier lives because they know theyhave something to fall back on, right
you know, you know what oureyes, you know what our e stands
were, right. Well, Ialways thought of return on investment. But

(01:08:45):
you're going to tell me something else. Why. It's reliability of income.
Brother, That's what it is atthe Retirement Planning Group r I, Yes,
it is. Because the thing isis that we always know that we're
going to go through market cycles.We all know that we're going to have
good days and bad days in themarket. We're always going to have positive
years and negative years. But aslong as you have reliability of income,

(01:09:08):
you can weather those storms and youcan you know, go through whatever you
have to go through and not youknow, be sitting there watching CNBC on
a daily basis to make sure thatyou can check write the check at the
end of the month. So I'mgoing to have you summarize a little bit
Chris, as far as what youspecifically do for us, and then I'm

(01:09:29):
going to kick you down the roadand say goodbye. So kind of summarize
what you're going to be doing atthe retirement planning group. Well, I
think what is one of the mostimportant things is that you know, we
live in an age where we've seenover the last ten twenty thirty years that
many companies have gotten rid of theirpension plan yep. And what we try

(01:09:53):
to do is to fill that void. In this way, we can help
clients as part of their portfolio,create a guaranteed self funded pension and this
is where they can still fully investtheir money, but create that safety that
we talked about earlier, and thatis as part of their plan create another

(01:10:18):
avenue of guaranteed income that they knowthey can count on while their money is
still working hard for them. Becausethis way, when they can create that
income stream, it doesn't matter whattime of the market that they're taking money
out. We all know how painfulit is to have to take money out

(01:10:41):
in the market that you might bedown twenty thirty, forty percent. But
again, it's all the different partsof the engine working together that can help
create that guaranteed, predictable income streamthat's going to give people peace of mind
and live happier life. Well,I couldn't have said it better, Chris.

(01:11:02):
I agree with you one thousand percenton that better happier lives Understanding the
strategies that are out there. Youknow, we talk about the integrated experience
that people have at the Retirement PlanningGroup. You know, a lot of
times people will get stuff from usand they say, hey, listen,
you're sending me too much data.But we believe in proactive communications, and

(01:11:25):
we believe in strategies rather than products. And as I said to the listening
audience this morning, I couldn't beprouder that you're part of the team.
You've been a great friend for decades. Now you're part of the team at
the retirement planning group. We'll tryto get you in in the studio,
hopefully maybe next week before I haveto go back to Florida and get a
little bit more sunshine. I don'tblame you. I might ask you to

(01:11:49):
come with you, all right,but thanks, thanks, thanks Chris for
calling in. We'll see if wecan get you in here next week in
the studio. Hopefully it's not snowingand sleeping out there. I look forward
to it and I'm delighted to bepart of the team. All right,
Thanks Pal, God blessed. Thankyou Chris. That's Chris McCarthy, financial

(01:12:11):
planner, Retirement Planning Specialists. He'sgoing to help us a lot. I
couldn't be prouder of Chris. He'sjust a great, great, great guy.
One of the first things a friendof mine said, oh my god,
Chris is working for you right now. I said, yeah, he
goes, oh boy, did youhit a home run with him? And
that's how we feel. We didhit a home run with Chris. So
we'll be back after this quick messageThis is Dave Kopek. That was Chris

(01:12:34):
McCarthy, new team member at theRetirement Planning Group, and you know we
love Chris. Love. You know, We're going to build out our team
a little bit more, bring moreexpertise to the table, and as we
grow, we'll be adding more individualsin order to facilitate what our clients want,

(01:12:54):
and that's responsiveness and to be ableto communicate and talk to individuals at
the Retirement Plenty Group. So again, if you have any questions today,
I'm here live one eight hundred talkWGY. That's one eight hundred eight two
five fifty nine forty nine. Willbe right back. The eighty six percenters.
Do you know that eighty six percentof the population has no defined benefit

(01:13:15):
pension plan. For most of us, we have to take our life savings
and create a paycheck for the restof our lives in retirement. What is
your plan for retirement income distribution?How you manage your assets during the most
critical years of your lifetime. NobelPrize winning economist William Sharp has called retirement
income distribution the nastiest, hardest problemin finance. He points out that investment

(01:13:38):
uncertainty and mortality can derail the mostcareful laid out retirement income plan. Call
our offices today to start the processof building a retirement income distribution plan.
After forty one years of being inthe financial services business, you need to
start taking action to start building yourown personal retirement income distribution plan. How
do you do that? To takeaction? Five one eight five eight zero

(01:14:00):
one nine nine. That's five oneeight five eat zero one nine one nine
or RPG retire on the web.Don't procrastinate, motivate and start building your
retirement income distribution plan five one eightfive eat zero one nine one nine.
Worried about protecting and preserving all youhave built? Health is here. Learn
how to secure your future with legaland financial planning with WGY's retirement specialist Dave

(01:14:23):
Kopek and legal house Lou Pierre andAaron Connor for a free dinner seminar in
April sixteenth at the Crown Plaza,Albany at five thirty pm. Space is
limited. Sign up at wgy dotcom or call five one eight six two
eight four two five five. That'swgy dot com or call five one eight
six two eight four two five five. So long, I've been looking too

(01:15:20):
hard. I've been waiting too long. Sometimes I don't know word of fine.
I only know it's a matter oftime when you love some one.
When you love some one, itfeels all right, so warm and truth.

(01:15:47):
I need to know iFly too,maybe I'm wrong. Won't you tell
me if I'm coming on to Strongit's ham Man this time of moona shore,

(01:16:09):
all right for you to come in. I just got a message from
Jimmy Corkoran that the phones are ringingoff the hook. I'll give you another
telephone number five eight six two eightfour two five five. That's W G

(01:16:33):
Y's line in order to call in. Can you check that, just to
make sure that it's functioning. Fiveone eight six two eight four two five
five. For the presentation that I'mgoing to be doing with Lupiro Uh April
sixteenth used to be the Desmond lookforward to. It starts at five point

(01:17:01):
thirty registration and we get jump andgoing and have a beautiful dinner, some
laughs, have some fun. Weenjoy laughing. This is one thing I'll
say to you. You know,I've had a horrible year in the last
twelve fifteen months. Got a lotof curveballs, but I'll tell you what,

(01:17:24):
one thing that keeps me centered ismy wife. And the other thing
that keeps me centered is that I'vegot a lot of friends of mine,
one in particular that's battling cancer rightnow and she's really really having a tough

(01:17:45):
time. Kelly, and I've askedfor prayers. I'll ask for prayers again
this morning for Kelly. I knowthat we've had people reach out to us
that says that she's in there prayerswith their prayer group. But Kelly needs
some. But you know, Ilost a cousin back in November. Was
with them at the track in Augustand in November he was dead from pancreatic

(01:18:09):
cancer. But I hate cancer.You know, my brother in law,
Stevie, died from cancer. It'srampant in my wife's family. We've had
it in my family. It's ahorrific disease. This wonderful couple that I
met yesterday, she's a cancer survivor, husband and wife. You know,
it's just with all the dollars thatare going to cancer every year, we

(01:18:30):
have a golf outing. We're doingit with a new organization this week or
this year, Life Something Life alife blooder it's an organization out of Clifton
Park that works with kids that havehandicaps, and we're going to be affiliated
with them, but we're also goingto do the UH cancer. But it's

(01:18:56):
just a horrible disease. Horrible andI see what individuals go through with the
chemo and radiation and all the otherthings that they have to go through.
You know, Julie is talking withKelly. Kelly was the our meet him,
honor and our wedding. Her andher husband our best friends. And
you know, sometimes you just say, by the grace of God, right,

(01:19:19):
why her? So you got goodhealth, You get up in the
morning, take a deep breath andsee sunshine, and you got everything going
on for you. Don't bitch andcomplain because there's a lot of people out
there, folks that are in alot better a lot worse shape, and

(01:19:40):
you're a lot better shape than them, simply because you don't have to battle.
And you know, the thing isis that I always said, I
remember one time I dated a girlwho worked in the oncology department at Children's
Hospital, and that was a wakeup call. Go through those rooms and
see these kids that are battling,you know about Colton, my cousin's son.

(01:20:04):
You know, we battled cancer withhim last year, lost the lung
four years old, lost the lung, lost a rib, chemo radiation.
He is my hero. He ismy hero. That kid is as strong
as he's like a steel rod,and he's doing phenomenal. He's doing phenomenal
now playing soccer back in school.So thank you for the prayers for Colton.

(01:20:29):
But we got a battle cancer here. We got to get rid of
it, hopefully sooner than later,because there's just too many people that are
struggling with cancer. Everybody look atyou know, over in Europe. I
can't think of her name. Theprincess was, you know, she came
out I think yesterday and said thatshe has cancer now. So but hopefully

(01:20:49):
we can beat cancer. I knowI'm gonna do my part. I'm gonna
still do my golf outings. Youwant to participate, you want to make
a donation, We always have iteither first or second week and on or
September. Love to have you participate. If you can't make it, you
can make a contribution. One hundredpercent of the money goes to the American
Cancer Society and this other group Ipick up the cost of whatever else and

(01:21:14):
the wholesalers and some of our strategicpartners. So whatever you donate, one
hundred percent of that money we'll goto hopefully cure that horrific disease. So
when you come back, I'm gonnatalk a little bit about some key takeaways
from my trip down south. We'lltalking a little bit about retirement income distribution
and what people are doing in orderto facilitate that. But when we come

(01:21:39):
back, open lines. I'm DaveKopek. This is a retirement planning show.
Drive careful, Drive careful. It'sslippery out there. Ye worried about
protecting and preserving all you have built? Health is here. Learn how to
secure your future with legal and financialplanning with wgui's retirement specialist Dave Kopek and
Legal House Lou Pierrero and Aaron Connorfor a free dinner seminar in April sixteenth

(01:22:03):
at the Crown Plaza, Albany atfive thirty pm. Space is limited.
Sign up at wg Y dot comor call five one eight six two eight
four two five five. That's wg Y dot com or call five one
eight six two eight four two fivefive. I would climb in a mountain,

(01:22:50):
sail across the storm, Missy.If that's what it takes me,
baby, to show how much youmean to me, then I guess just
the woman in you that brings upthe man in me. How sound you're

(01:23:16):
in the world me, Hey,let me give you a little secret here.

(01:23:45):
If you've ever been in a recordingstudio which we are in, and
you have headphones and you've got thetype of technical equipment, when that music
comes on, it's almost like you'rewriting in a concert hall. It's almost
like they're sitting in front of you. I mean, it's like I don't

(01:24:06):
even want to shut it off sometimesbecause I'm like, I'm lost in the
music. That's a song. Isn'tthat lost in the music? I think
there's that's a song lost in themusic. I don't know, So sometimes
I get into Li la a landhere just listen. But UH love music
and Zach is a ten does agreat job in music. Again, I

(01:24:32):
give out the telephone number. Ifyou want to go, you better sign
up because it's going like hotcakes.Five win eight six two eight four two
five five. Preserve and Protect CrownPlaza, which used to be the Desmond
five point thirty on the sixteenth BeautifulDinner. Great content. I know that

(01:24:53):
LUDE will do a phenomenal job.It's impossible to cover everything on our side
of the fence, but we'll giveyou a flavor, a flavor of what
we do. I want to thinkChris McCarthy are new team member. He's
a great guy, great heart,great person, and uh for we've just

(01:25:14):
we're very fortunate to have him partof our team. You know, when
I go to Florida sometimes I'm alwaysflabbergasted that everybody has found there. I
guess their mojo, they found theirway. Very few people that I've visit
in Florida are not content and happy. I remember sitting with this one couple

(01:25:35):
and I'm sitting at their kitchen table. I'm looking out at this beautiful view.
They got beautiful They got a beautifulin ground pool. They just put
in spectacular, just a spectacular view. They're looking at this lake. And
I asked him, I said,you know, how how are you fitting
in down here? Good? Yeah, I mean, I'm just saying,

(01:25:55):
how the hell couldn't this be good? You know, you got this beautiful
home, you get a beautiful pool. Great while but everybody knows that there's
no one size that fits all right, and that's true about retirement, and
I think that's one of the thingsthat we try to overemphasize to pre and
post retirees. Now we have theability now for people that are in four

(01:26:19):
O one ks to assist them helpthem manage their retirement assets in their four
O one K program. I wantto get into details or specifics, but
we have two companies now that canwin. We have the full platform.
Nico did it with two individuals thispast week. We're going out to Syracuse
to help two individuals this coming week, and it allows us to get in

(01:26:42):
basically help them manage their assets beforethe magical age of fifty nine and a
half. Now, at fifty nineand a half, as you're all quite
well aware, you can do whatthey call an in service distribution. That
means that you can take the money, you can direct it into a self
directed at IRA. You don't haveto have a tax consequence because it's a
trustee to trustee transfer and then theassets are with us. We manage the

(01:27:06):
assets based off of what you wantfor growth potential, what you're looking for
as far as guaranteed income and theflexibility that you might need in order to
get to the promised land because ofthe red zone. We talk about the
red zone all the time, thatspecific time anywhere from three to five years
before you retire, that you justcan't take a major down draft in the

(01:27:29):
market. You know, I can'ttell you how many people have said to
me, you know, how doyou invest your money now? Mister Apple,
Well, I just let it go, you know, I allocate it,
I just let it rip. AndI said, well, what happens
if the market rips in a negativeway? He goes, well, that's
what I'm concerned about. And missusApples might say the same thing, and

(01:27:49):
mister Zebra. But there's very fewpeople that say, listen, you know,
I'm tactically moving these assets as faras my four and one K program,
so you can do that. It'savailable now, there's ways to do
it. And the good news isthat whatever your situation is, we believe
we can help you improve it throughthis what we call retirement readiness. Right

(01:28:14):
retirement readiness. I mean, Ido a show from twelve to one every
weekend. It's topic specific and thisweek that's what we're going to be talking
about retirement readiness. You know,don't procrastinate, motivate, make sure you
understand exactly where you are, whatyour income is going to be, so
when you walk out the door,you have a really good idea. We've
got some. When I think ofthis, it makes me think of a

(01:28:36):
couple. I know that they're listening. They're down in the only on area,
and Niko and I went and satdown with them. And you know,
there's always fear and anxiety. There'salways stress when you're walking out the
door into your retirement years. Andthat's fine. It's just like you know
when I played sports, when Iplayed high school and college basketball. You

(01:28:57):
know, I used to basically jumpout of my skin before I got out
of the court. But eventually youcalm down and you get in the groove.
Right, Well, we got toget you in the groove. And
what that means is that a solidretirement income plan right doesn't necessarily mean what
A is. You know, there'sno such thing with us at the Retirement
Planet Group, is that there's fourdifferent boxes. We put you in A

(01:29:20):
B, C or D. No, there's a gazillion boxes. There's a
gazillion of boxes, meaning that what'sright for you is not right for someone
else. Every family is different,everybody's risk tolerance is different, every spouse
is different. You know, Imight say to the husband, you know,

(01:29:40):
how do you want your money allocated? And he says, well,
I'm a little bit more conservative thanthe miss is here. And then I'll
ask the wife, what do youthink are you willing to take a little
more risk with your portfolio? Yep, I'm willing to accept that let it
ride. Well, that means thatyou have to have a different allocation with
the assets in order to facilitate whatthey're looking for. Right, you just

(01:30:02):
can't take. You know, here'sour cookie cutter approach. And now we're
going to put you in box A. That's not retirement readiness. That's basically,
you know what, you're talking tosomebody on an eight hundred telephone line
and they're combining, you know,the calculation with what the answers are,
and then they come to a scoreand they put you in the box.

(01:30:25):
That's what they do. That's whatthey do. I don't want you.
I can't even imagine. I don'teven want to hear it that you can
do a full blown retirement plan throughan eight hundred telephone number because personally myself,
after doing this now forty two years, it's impossible. It's impossible.
There's too many bumps in the road. There's too many alternative strategies, there's

(01:30:48):
too many. Chris McCarthy is teachingus a lot on things that we didn't
even know existed, right, becauseof his expertise and what he's done for
the last thirty nine years in thefinancial services business. Okay, he's bring
us up to speed on alternative productsthat will facilitate two things guarantees which a

(01:31:14):
lot of people want, and safetyand safety right doesn't necessarily mean you have
to do it, but I thinkwhat's necessary is that people need to understand
is that retirement readiness and potentially gettingready for the lifestyle that you want in
your retirement. There's essential building blocksto facilitate retirement income distribution plans, Okay,

(01:31:44):
doesn't have to be one, doesn'thave to be the other. You
can combine them all. You canhave a combination of growth potential, guaranteed
income potential. Right. And thenof course what we always talk about,

(01:32:08):
flexibility. You got to have flexibility. You know, I've said this many
a time don't get into an investmentthat you can't get out of tomorrow,
because I think you're putting yourself ina box when you've got somebody else controlling
your own destiny. That's not agood choice. Why do I say that,

(01:32:28):
Because I've put myself in that positionwith clients and it stinks, and
it stinks. So don't get yourselfin an investment that you can't say,
you know what, this has beenfun, but I'm pulling the plug.
I'm going and I'm going to reallocateit somewhere else. And those products exist.

(01:32:50):
Flexibility to refine, redesign your planis needed over time. Nothing stays
the same, premature deaths, healthevents, I hate to say it,
divorce, right, So when welook at designing these plans, when I

(01:33:16):
sit down with clients that have beenin Florida, I come out like flabbergast.
At some point, I met witha client in Florida that's been with
me for twenty six years, andI'll brag a little bit. She said
to me his wife, and Iknow that Bob's probably listening, and his

(01:33:39):
wife's might be listening to I knowthat he listens. Every week she goes.
I blow my horn about you.Every week down here, I give
out your business card. I tellpeople that they should work with you because
you made our dreams become a reality. Nicest people on earth, the nicest.

(01:34:00):
And the thing is is that whenI walk out of there, I
just feel so good because, youknow what, it's easy to criticize,
but it's also sometimes not easy tocompliment. Why that is, I don't
know. I always tell my employeesif I talk to you, I'm also
going to give you compliments, becauseno one does a horrible job at everything.

(01:34:24):
I couldn't be prouder of the teamthat I have at the retirement Planning
group, Okay, because I knowthat they have one big thing in their
chest good hearts. Good hearts.So the thing is is that do we
have the magic formula for everybody?No, but we do have one thing.

(01:34:45):
We believe that diversification, allocating assetsto a specific type of plan,
developing that plan over a period oftime, and then guess what, hitting
the start button. It's now timeto start the plan and implement. That's
the key, though, starting theplan and implementing and making sure you understand

(01:35:11):
exactly where you are. You needto be safe and guaranteed for a certain
period of time before you implement theplan and go into your retirement years,
because you don't want to diminish theassets so severely you can't say goodbye.
So when we talk about guaranteed incomegrowth potential with the safety net flexibility,

(01:35:33):
that's our mantra. We'll be rightback after this quick message. The eighty
six percenter is do you know thateighty six percent of the population has no
defined benefit pension plan. For mostof us, we have to take our
life savings and create a paycheck forthe rest of our lives in retirement.
What is your plan for retirement incomedistribution? How you manage your assets during
the most critical years of your lifetime. Nobel Prize winning economist William Sharp has

(01:35:58):
called retirement income distribution the nastiest,hardest problem in finance. He points out
that investment, uncertainty, and mortalitycan derail the most careful laid out retirement
income plan. Call our offices todayto start the process of building a retirement
income distribution plan. After forty oneyears of being in the financial services business,
you need to start taking action tostart building your own personal retirement income

(01:36:21):
distribution plan. How do you dothat to take action five one eight,
five eight zero one nine one nine. That's five one eight five eight zero
one nine one nine or RPG retireon the web. Don't procrastinate, motivate
to start building your retirement income Distributionplan five one eight five eight zero one
nine one nine. Worried about protectingand preserving all you have built? Health

(01:36:43):
is here? Learn how to secureyour future with legal and financial planning with
WGUIS retirement specialist Dave Kopek in LegalHouse, Lou Piero and Aaron Connor for
a free dinner seminar in April sixteenthat the Crown Plaza, Albany at five
thirty pm. Space is limited.Sign up at w g Y dot com
or call five one eight six twoeight four two five five. That's w

(01:37:04):
g Y dot com or call fiveone eight six two eight four two five
five. Don't feel it right,be man? Keep up seveny. Someone

(01:37:39):
say musically what the people is away to make them smile. That's a
weapon to do what you gotta geta massy get it on three. Al

(01:38:09):
Right, we are back. Didtune Zach? You did good this week?
I don't care what they say Ithink I'm gonna keep you all right,
foreigners coming to spack with who sticks? I believe it's sticks, So
it is. I know that Ilooked for tickets. I'm gonna have to

(01:38:30):
come down here and squeeze the generalmanager. It looks for tickets for the
Woman's March Madness. They were likethree grand for all the sessions. Yeah,
all right, so let's get intothat a little bit. Downtown Aubany
will be packed. I think it'ssold out for almost every game, right

(01:38:53):
we have to be Yeah, Ithink it is fourteen to fifteen thousand people
for every event, right, unbelievablefor the city of Albany, Right,
unbelievable. Where are they gonna eat? Pretty sad? Pretty sad? The
pizza place right next to it.I don't know. Maybe all right,

(01:39:18):
if you want to partake in theseminar, we'd love to have you there
five one eight six two eight fourtwo five five five eight six two eight
four two five five at the CrownPlaza which used to be the Desmond April
sixteenth. Registration starts at five pointthirty and if you can't get through that
number, then call my office inJim or Brenda someone will reserve your seat.

(01:39:50):
One thing I'm looking at my notesthere there's one thing I wanted to
finish up on. I can seeplanning the transfer of wealth to the next
generation. As we're all quite wellaware. You're starting to hear all the
advertisement, all the pieces that arebeing sent out there as far as impressions

(01:40:14):
what people should be doing. Butit's estimated now seventy to eighty some are
even higher, a whole hell ofa lot of money, seventy to eighty
to ninety trillion dollars of wealth willtransfer over the next twenty five to thirty
years. And the thing is isthat it's daunting for some people because some
people have been great savers. Andthe thing is is that one of the
greatest obstacle, one of the thingsthat is the Achilles seal for a lot

(01:40:38):
of people. A lot of ourwealth is in qualified plans. And the
thing is is that trillions, Ithink it's about fourteen trillion dollars right now
is in the IRAS. Fourteen it'sjust iras. There's like forty trillion in
qualified assets. And the thing isis that most of us are top hitty.
Now. I had a guy comein this past week we're talking and

(01:41:02):
he says, my four oh onek is screwed up. What do you
mean your four o one k isscrewed up? He goes yeah, he
says, you know, the thingis is that they're telling me I can't
I can't make my full catch upcontribution. Well you can, but what
they did based on income if youmake a certain amount it's one hundred and
twenty some thousand dollars a year.If you exceed that, your catch up

(01:41:23):
contribution cannot be pre tax. Ithas to be after tax. You're wroth
four oh one K option, Soyou want to make sure that that option
is available to you through your employersimply because in wonder for you to do
the catch up provision, that's theway the dollars have got to go in
to the plan. The other thingis is that there's a lot of people

(01:41:45):
out there right now that have aconsiderable amount of money in qualified plan assets.
And you know, the thing thatwe hear over and over again is
that how do I get out withoutpaying a lot of tax? Well,
the answer to that is is thatyou know, depends on the zip code
where you live. But also youknow, the federal government, no matter
what state you live in, isgoing to get their cut. And in

(01:42:10):
twenty twenty five, the end oftwenty twenty five, there's going to be
a change in our tax code.And I don't know what's going to happen
with the state tax. You know, that's another battle that they're going to
have down in Washington, d C. But you can, you know,
be rest assured that you know there'sgoing to be a good piece of what
they call the mortgage on your IRAis going to go to the government.

(01:42:31):
It's not going to go to yourkids or your loved ones. So we
are big believers in the ed slotprocess, which is get proactive, start
spending some of that money down inyour lifetime, and get it over to
the other side of the equation,which allows you to get your assets tax
efficiently transferred to the next generation.If it's important to you, If it's

(01:42:53):
important to you, you know EdSlot Slott has a lot of videos on
then he has a lot of presentations. He's a CPA, he's not in
the financial services industry, and hetalks about the retirement time boond And I
can't talk about it enough because Isee it all the time. Like I
said, my oldest clients one hundredand two years old. Most of the

(01:43:15):
clients that I'm seeing in Florida intheir sixties, seventies, eighties, and
nineties, and they are in thatmode right now where they're forced liquidation,
not because they need it, butbecause they're forced to liquidate it. So
when we talk about this new platformthat we're going to bring out that's going
to allow people to don a lacarte approach, we can help you with
your forum and K program. Wecan help you with your estate planning.

(01:43:38):
We can do a financial plan foryou. If you want a financial plan.
You'll pay for each service based offof what you're trying to accomplish in
your own personal life. And Ithink that in itself will allow some of
you that listen to this show.And we do have a listener And I
got to compliment the other day fromone of our marketing representatives here at iheartrate,

(01:44:00):
we have one of the top showsnow on the iHeartRadio distribution channel,
the podcast Retirement Ready, our topicspecific show is one of the top shows
in podcasts and I can't thank thelisteners enough for that. But what I
try to do in that podcast,which I'll do today from twelve to one.
You can go to iHeartRadio and listento it if you wish. It's

(01:44:21):
called Retirement Ready. What I tryto do is condense everything down in a
one hour. It's less than onehour, it's like forty some minutes when
you factor in all of the bumpers, the front, the back end,
and then of course the compliance andthe breaks that we take. But what
I try to do in that presentationis to give you a lot of information
in a short period of time,right, unbiased facts, not fiction.

(01:44:45):
It's up to you to decide ultimatelywhat you want to do. But I
do know one thing for sure.Okay, we're living longer lives. And
because we're living longer lives, youknow the rules that were in place decades
ago as far as required minimum distribution, the tax and qualified assets. You

(01:45:06):
know, the ability to allow moneyto grow on a tax deferred basis for
in a considerable period of time.That's good, but it's also bad.
It's a double edged sword because we'reliving longer lives. Even though they've increased
R and D, you know,to seventy three, ultimately going to seventy
five. It's Still it's still anobstacle for people that don't need a lot

(01:45:30):
of money because they've already done wellwith pension benefits money outside of qualified plans,
and they were doing the qualified plans. So for the people in their
forties and fifties, we're trying tohave conversations with them, especially Nico,
Christopher my Son and Christopher McCarthy ora new team member. You don't realize
what you're creating. Realize that themoney that you're putting aside, Yes,

(01:45:53):
you're getting some tax benefit now,but are you better off to basically split
the pie in half? So thinkabout that. If you're an accumulator and
you're still setting money aside, youknow, are you better off to put
some in that wroth bucket? Becausein the four one K there's no income
limitations. Anyone, a gazillionaire canput money into the Wroth fourwin k.

(01:46:16):
So talking about splitting pies, youcan be rest assured that our friends up
in Galway are gonna be baking alot of pies this week. Smith's as
far as the apple and strawberry rubarband all that good stuff. You like
pies, not a pie man,No, can you not get pine.

(01:46:42):
No pies at all. Chocolates becauseI got a round belly doesn't mean I
like pies, chocolate pie, bananacream, nothing like that. Okay,
Well, I'm gonna make my famousapple pie. Maybe I just haven't had
to write pie. For those thatare traveling, be careful again because the
roads I don't know. Joe Gallagher, What Joe say? The road's still

(01:47:03):
bad, mister Gallagher, Yeah,a little bit. Be careful on the
side streets. Main roads are okay, Yeah, main streets are good,
better, easier. It was badthis morning, Joe. It was bad
this morning. Yeah, it wasreal bad. So but our good friend

(01:47:26):
mister Gallagher is coming up. Matterof fact, I look at a sign
every I don't know. He musthave paid some extra money for this.
Inside our studio, there's a signhe made it himself. Down It says
the Joe Gallagher Boulevard. So Igotta see it. Dave. I'm going
to bring in a Dave Kopek oneway street. How's that. We'll be

(01:47:50):
back next week. I'll be backat twelve o'clock for retirement Ready, God
bless, drive safe. This hasbeen the retirement planning show. Thank you
for listening to the Retirement Planning Showhosted by Dave Kopek, w g wis
retirement planning specialist. If you wouldlike to talk with Dane or someone at
the Retirement Planning Group, call fiveone eight five eight zero nine nine.

(01:48:13):
That's five one eight five eight zeroone nine one nine during business hours,
or visit RPG retire dot com.The Retirement Planning Group has five convenient offices
located in Albany, Waltsa, glensWalls, Syracuse, and Oneana. Tune
in again next week for retirement planningstrategies with Dave Kopek right here on WGY's

(01:48:34):
Retirement Planning Show. The information ourservices discussed on this show is for informational
purposes only and is not intended tobe personal financial advice. The investments and
services offered by US may not besuitable for all investors. If you have
any doubts as to the merits ofan investment, you should seek advice from
an independent financial advisor.