Heroes in Business - Training New Advisors From The Ground Up, Brad Mendel CFP EA

Episode Date: March 6, 2022

Whether it be personally or professionally, Brad is always looking for ways to improve. You will notice this when working with him. He wants to be the best that he can be at everything he does in this episode of The Health and Wealth Podcast.

Welcome to the Health and Wealth Podcast with your hosts, Tim and Carter. What's trending, enrichers? Carter Wilcox, founder of CSI Financial Group here with my co-host and former wealth advisor, Tim James, founder of? ChemicalFreeBody.com and your new health advisor. This is the show where we reveal the connection between physical and financial abundance. Hey, welcome back, enrichers. Carter Wilcoxon here coming to you live from my virtual podcast room, which I don't know if anybody has seen any of the podcasts that we have. And then I'm pretty excited because Tim James,

your podcast room, actual room is really on point, dude. How are you doing? Well, it's not a hundred percent on point. It's getting closer though. It's getting closer. Justin dropped the sign off about a month ago. I got to put it up on the wall still, but this is from my other podcast, the health hero show.

So we were just talking about that. I'm going to get one. We need to get ones made for the health and wealth podcast. And I can slap that up on the wall when we do the show and then interchange it when I do my other show, I thought that'd be cool. And eventually, um, I'm going to be building a podcast room. I'm actually moving back to Eastern Oregon. Did I tell you that? Yeah. You were saying that you're building out or something on your, um, your parents house or on their land or something, right? Yeah. So my parents are 81 and they're, they own their property outright and they're just getting

up there where I, I need to help them. Like the winners can be tough shoveling. They just can't do it. It's kind of like that. alan jackson song says uh what was it like uh he's he can't see anymore she can barely sweep the floor yeah like my dad has um macular degeneration in his eyes and can't literally see yeah well like i'll sit across the table from him like during thanksgiving he's like tim is that you there he doesn't know and it's like four feet away you know wow it's just like imagine going through that that's why you know we talk about the health and wealth podcast we're um we're excited to have our guest on here today we'll get to you in a minute there uh brad we love we love you buddy but um yeah so i i just um yeah i'm gonna i you, you guys, Carter, you helped me set up the trust, right, for my parents.

We have all the assets in there. But what I realized was is on the properties, on the houses, there's that three-year look-back period, right, for Medicaid. Yeah. So for the state. So what we decided to do is instead of putting the house into the trust, I'll be talking to our estate planning attorney that you hooked us up with, Sierra Lister. I'm just going to purchase the property myself, get it out of my parents' name

completely, and I'm going to set up my own trust. You're going to have another client, me. There you go. There you go. As the enrichers are coming in today, thank you for joining us for another show and everything. You know, we're going to get maybe a little bit into that.

But I do want to go ahead and introduce our guest today, Mr. Brad Mendel from Chicagoland. He has recently moved, actually, out to the suburbs. moved actually out to the suburbs um and we were just talking pre-show about uh the fact that he's got a little bit of a um a Hanukkah festivities or something going on today Brad how are you doing bud doing good doing good just enjoying the beginning of winter uh you know it gets dark here at like 4 15 in the afternoon these days and gets cold so yeah well you know it's funny because I live in Phoenix, Arizona and I, you know, I moved out here from Kansas city and I remember after I had forgotten because I was just back there, I went to a chiefs Cowboys game actually, which was a lot of fun whenever I was

back in Kansas city a couple of weeks ago, but I had forgotten that when you change your clocks, it's like dark almost instantaneously right during daylight savings ending. Is that what it is? Because we don't change our clocks out here. Can somebody tell me why the hell we got to change our damn clocks? So you're not driving in the morning in the dark?

On your way to work, everybody would oversleep. They would sleep in and they wouldn't get to work on time. I mean, I just don't. It's just such a nightmare because every year like i sometimes i used to do myself but it's a pain in the butt and then everybody misses like appointments for two two three four days because of that yeah it just messes everybody up yeah my daughter was going waking up at five in the morning every morning that was no fun oh she's in the 5 a.m. club. That's good, though. Not for me. Would you rather your daughter wake up at 5 a.m.

or sleep until noon and go to bed at 5 a.m.? I don't know. It's debatable. Well, hey, Brad, thank you very much for joining us today. We got a chance to initially meet one another. Man, I guess it's been a few months ago now, but, you know, thanks for coming on to the Health and Wealth Podcast show. We really are excited about being able to hear your backstory, you know,

what got you into, you know, the financial services business. I mean, obviously, I've done some conversations with you and everything. I know it's sort of a family business now. So why don't we share with the enrichers, you know, take us back to what it was like, you know, growing up, you know, your dad started this business and everything. But I think you've got a previous story even before you got into financial services in the first place and where you were headed before you eventually ended up taking over the family practice. So share a little bit with the enrichers on, you know, what sent you down this path other than the fact that your dad was the founder.

Yeah. I mean, my dad started the business in 1989, you know, I was seven years old and, you know, I always wanted to set up my own individual path. You know, I wanted to get out of the Midwest. So I went to Boston university for college. I didn't want to go to business school because they all wore, you know, you know, sport coats and khakis and I wanted to wear a hoodie and sweatpants. So I went into computer engineering, ended up transferring into computer science

and, you know, really wanted to get into project management from an IT perspective. And so I worked for about two and a half years after college and moved back to Chicago and worked for two small IT consulting firms and just helped, you know, small to mid-sized businesses with their computers and their technology. At that point, it was, you know, oh, you got a scanner, you need to get that set up and make sure you can store some of your files digitally. You know, it was very, you know, early 2000s. You know. But as we moved forward, one of my clients asked me if I wanted to come work for them because I would meet him for lunch outside of work once a quarter. And I was getting frustrated that I wasn't getting what I wanted to out of being an IT consultant. And they do retirement plan services, TPA work and he said I think you'd be a good actuary. You know you come in you're going to add value you're going to help us with

our your computers and our IT and you'll learn from me and you know we're small we're growing and you know I think you'd be of you know do a good job with our clients. You know so I was there for about seven and a half years and I went from knowing nothing about being an actuary to passing the three actuarial exams required to be a pension consultant. And then after about four and a half years or five years, you know, I was running their pension practice, you know, doing new business development, you know, running all the client relationships and managing, you know, a team of two or three people. You know, just making sure everything got done. And the one partner on the pension side who, you know, I still stay in touch with today, you know, loved that I just took care of everything for him. But I was working mostly with financial advisors and accountants. It was like, you know, it's like being in an accounting business. You're working, you know, hard a lot of the year. There's breaks, there's ebbs and flows, but you're getting billed hourly. There's no leverage in that business model. You have to leverage people.

he created cancer and he was 63 years old and he needed, you know, some sort of backup plan. His clients really needed him to have a backup plan. You know, he talked to other people about something, you know, in the past, he had, he had a guy he worked for in the late seventies, who was a real pioneer in the independent money management space, you know, managing individual stock portfolios for individuals in the late seventies was not, you know, very common. It wasn't even common in 1989 when my 70s was not, you know, very common. It wasn't even common in 1989 when my dad started his business. You know, he was a fee-only advisor in 1989. He

custodied assets with, you know, big brokers and had, you know, discounted transactions, which was probably a couple hundred dollars to trade at that point. You know, it's crazy how far we've come. You know, and he was just running, he was just picking stocks for clients, building stock portfolios for clients at that point in time. You know, and that's, you know, he had gotten into bonds and diversified a little bit of his business into being more of, you know, managing as a client's entire net worth by the time I joined him in 2013. And it was actually a hard decision. My wife said to me, you know, you're on track to becoming a partner at your current firm. You really love the people you work for. You like

what you do. You know, you're good at it, but you love your dad and you actually have a great relationship, the two of you. And you have an opportunity to have better work-life balance, to probably make a similar amount of money and work directly with people versus, you know, versus with mostly accountants and financial advisors. And I thought that more of an, well, but I'm helping their clients. I'm helping their clients versus having a direct impact on the individual on the other side who's receiving the service as much. And your clients in the side of the business that we were on were, you know, it was like a five to 10 year relationship typically. Versus in wealth management, you know, in the independent RA space, you know, hopefully we're working with you for 25 to 30 years. You know, which to me was attractive

as well as you could leverage yourself. I felt like more in that, in his business than I could in, in, in, in the TPA business. So, so I just decided, I said, I can always go back and do it. There's not many actuaries these days, you know, a lot of people in the pension consulting business, there's a lot of financial advisors, but you know, I, it a shot i went and got my mba i took uh cfa one and then while taking the cfa one you know i met a lot of people in the industry and they said you really need to be a financial planner in this business and so you know naturally being an actuary you know financial planning kind of fit pretty well in my bucket of skills. And so my dad was already a CFA. It was like, we need to add the core competency of financial planning. And we already started doing financial planning for clients on a very rough level,

more spreadsheets than actual software. We were evaluating the different software options that were out there because we were getting questions from clients who were in their early sixties to mid sixties. And they're thinking about retiring. One, you know, can I retire? Just the basic questions, you know? And so we started doing very basic financial planning. We've expanded to do a lot more comprehensive financial planning, getting more involved in estate planning, you know, and doing those things over the last several years. And, you know,

great timing. I bought the products from my dad in March of 2020. Oh, wait. So why does that date ring a bell to me? So it was, yeah, we, we, we had the transaction all in place. March 1st of 2020. Wow. You know, so the first few months of managing the business was a little crazy. You know, me and my wife trading off watching, watching my daughter trying to manage. I basically said, I sent an email to all my clients. I said, eight to midnight, I'm free. Anytime you want to talk about what's going on in the market, like eight to midnight, I'm free. But you know, talk about what's going on in the market, like eight to midnight, I'm free.

But, you know, during the day I'm free, but it's just hard to know when in scheduling that I have limited availability during those times. Yeah, I think clients appreciated that. You know, they were all managing. Most of them are managing the same problems, either helping their kids with their grandkids or themselves being in the thick of it, dealing with remote schooling and whatnot that most of us had to deal with. So, yeah, on my journey working with my dad, I was really developing the financial planning practice, really getting next generation technology in place so we can have a lean back office and really have information at our fingertips to really be able to help our clients make the most important decisions in their lives.

So, and I know that from our previous conversation that we had before that you also have, and we talked about it pre-show, you like to play a little bit of golf. And I know that's a little bit difficult this time of year, obviously in Chicago but um did you play I think I remember you played in college or high school or something on your college golf team do I remember that right yeah so I played a lot growing up and I played in high school um on the high school team I was one of the better players on my team you know I went to school and I actually worked at golfsmith in high school and a guy I went to high we worked at Golfsmith with actually went to Boston University and played on the Boston University golf team. One summer I ran into him. He said, you should you should try out for the golf team.

I said, I really haven't played that much golf my first few years of college. He said, just go play next summer. You know, go out, you'll, you'll have a great time. You'll get to play some cool courses. Um, so I actually went to Colorado, um, and did an internship at my uncle's brewery where I was helping them with their computers and bottling beer to make some money. And then one of the driving range right next door, you know, every day after I had my beer after my, uh, after my shift and, um, you know, it worked out, it worked out really well. I played really well. I, you know, tried out for the golf team and I was one of the better golfers on the BU golf team. I mean, my high school team probably could have taken my college golf team to the woodshed, but it was fun. We got to play some cool courses, the Yale golf course. We played a tournament at Yale in the pouring rain from 7,000 yards.

You know, I'm a five foot four kid. It's about 220 yards. I don't know if you ever played at that Yale golf course, man, it's Haley. It's a lot of Hills and it plays long in the rain. I could, I could literally only imagine. I've not had the, I've not had the, I've not had the opportunity to be able to play at much East coast and never really Northeast. In fact, so I've got no idea about my business partner who graduated from Harvard. He has just recently got into playing golf. And it was funny. He came into my office this yesterday or this

morning talking about his Thanksgiving thing. He was like, yeah, I play golf on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. I'm like, I'm like, you're playing a lot of golf. He goes, yeah, I got the bug now. So. Well, it's funny. I got the, I got the bug big time in 2019 again. And then last year I said, you know, I have three goals. I want to run a great business and do a great job for my clients. I want to spend a lot of time with my kids, my family, and I want to be a scratch golfer by 50. I don't know. The third one is going to be definitely the hardest goal to achieve.

Well, I did not have a great summer on the golf course. So and I have a lot on my hands with a one year old and a six year old at home. So, yeah, well, and you just recently moved, too. So you got that all going for you as well, right? Yeah, but that's, you know, moving from the city to the suburbs is closer access to driving range and golf course. Oh, so that could actually help to get you to that scratch golfer by 50. It could, it could. It definitely could. I just need to get a hitting net in my basement.

Well, if you've got the facilities, that's one of the best ways to do it. You know, we out here in Phoenix, Arizona, we do what they call overseeding, where they take the Bermuda grass because I don't know if people know or not, but it actually does get cold out in Phoenix. So they shave down the Bermuda and they put an overseeded rye because it's a grass that grows very nice in the colder temperatures. Nothing like Chicago or Portland. I get it, guys. But, you know, it does get below freezing here and we have frost delays and stuff like that.

But when we close, we're closed for three weeks. So my son, who is an aspiring, you know, golf pro, he's, you know, 14 years old. who is an aspiring golf pro, he's 14 years old, this year, so he didn't have to have three weeks of not going to the golf course, we got him a hitting net and everything, put it in the backyard where we don't have to worry about, obviously, weather. It's really nice during that time of year. But the hitting bay, I think it actually, when he went back to playing golf on the course, I think it accelerated and helped him keep that groove of a swing.

So I would strongly suggest, if you can, to go ahead and get that hitting net downstairs in the basement, if mama's okay with it. It's going to take a couple of years. It will happen, but it will take a couple of years. Well, okay. So we have this third goal of being a scratch golfer by 50, which makes how many years left until you're going to have to hit that goal? I makes how many years left until you're gonna have to hit that goal i have over 10 years left i'm only 39 so okay all right so you got plenty he's an

actuary he he has everything figured out well i have one friend i have one friend who went from a 10 to a one and change this year so in just like two j three years, he really ha golf and he's gotten a lo Wow. There you go. So wel I want to, um, you know, we're coming up on a brea I want to ask you about, in that whole actuary thi

like you were going to sc one day I'm gonna grow up an actuary. So you are a numbers guy, obviously, right? So what types of courses are required to be certified, I guess, of being called an actuary? Well, so I don't have to take the same exams that an insurance actuary would have to take. It's a totally different coursework. So I did, it's called the enrolled actuarial exam coursework. It's three exams and then, you know, three years of experience in the business. I think it's been a while since I've done that, since I did that. But you

know, I basically, we did computer certifications, actuarial certifications, MBA, CFP. So I didn't stop school until I was 36 years old. Wow. And now I want to kind of be, I'm looking for that next certification. I wanted to take a little break. But I do want to get some more advanced certifications because I, you know, just the hunger for knowledge and to be able to do something more for clients, you know, it's great. That's why I search for, you know, technology tools and different operational tools that we can use to, you know, do more for our clients. That's awesome. That's awesome. I was always wondering about the whole actuarial thing, because obviously, you know, whenever you think actuary, you think like, you know, some, I don't know, beautiful mind guy, right? But, you know, you're outgoing, you know, you play golf, you know, some, I don't know, beautiful mind guy, right? But, you know,

you're outgoing, you know, you play golf, you know, you have fun. So I guess I wanted to kind of sort of break that idea that, you know, an actuarial guy is actually a pretty cool guy. Yeah, I mean, there's a number of us like that. I know a bunch of guys who are, you know, very personal and outgoing, and they tend to be very, you know, they tend to be the most successful people in the business, the pension actuaries or the insurance actuaries who can really communicate their value. It's not about running the numbers behind the scenes. It's about understanding the numbers and being able to communicate it effectively so that your clients can make effective decisions.

The same thing in being a financial advisor. You can run the numbers, but if you can't convince your clients of the strategies and but if you can't convince your clients of the strategies and the approach you want to take, it doesn't matter. Totally. Absolutely. Okay, guys, we're going to take a quick break. When we get back, I want to, Brad, I want to talk to you about, you know, your dad's like old school practice. Then you come in with all this tech background and merging tech into the old school, what that did for your guys' business. We'll be right back. Estate planning. What does that even mean? When the inevitable happens for everyone on this planet,

your estate plan kicks into action. But first, let's start with what an estate is. An estate is simply everything you own. Now, here's the issue and what needs to be understood when this event occurs. You only have two choices on this plan. Number one, either you plan how your estate gets handed out and distributed to those you leave behind, or number two, your state decides who gets everything you own. For the first time ever, you can now take complete and total control of this plan that you've been deprived of for most of your life and generations before you. You can get personalized assistance along the way with a team of specialists whose job it is to make sure you have true peace of mind. It's important to understand that estate planning is a journey

and rest assured that our team will be available to you all along the way and at every step. Welcome to E-State Plan, home of the last estate plan you'll ever need. To learn more, make sure to reach out to your local advisor licensed with us or go to our website for more information. What's up, Enrichers? Tim James here. I'm back with my co-host, Carter Wilcoxon. Today in the house, we've got Brad Mendel, certified financial planner, enrolled agent, yada, yada, yada, yada. Enrolled actuary. Oh, that's right. He's the next level. He's an enrolled actuary.

And I would say, technically, my actuarial license is under review. And it's been under review for, like, it seems like forever. Over a year, I think. Wow. And I don't know. I've followed up, and I can't know, I've, I've, I've followed up and I can't get them to, uh, you know, to respond to what's going on. Cause I, they, they do an audit of your continuing education every, you know, every day you do a random selection. So three year periods,

you have to renew your certification. And I did my, you know, educational requirement. They asked for some more information because they have a new reporting system and I haven't heard back. So I don't know. I'm not a practicing actuary, so it really doesn't matter. And this is probably my last cycle that I actually go through the renewal because, you know, nine years later, I should, you know, I don't know if I need to be, you know, really keeping that current when, if I decide I want to have a pension business, I can always just, you know, renew it and do the continuing ed. So. Well, he's an EA folks. He's an extraordinary American. That's what he is. Unbelievable. And, you know, I think it's really cool. You've really put a lot

of time and effort into, you know, getting all these designations and stuff, but it's like you, the thing is, is you're, you're hungry for knowledge. So you can take something new and then help people with it. I think that's the cool part of it. You know, cause a lot of times some of the certifications and stuff like that don't really have, in my opinion, what I've experienced, like there's even the, you know, the series seven and the 66, some of the stuff that I took, there was a lot of stuff in the test. It doesn't even really apply to real life. I mean, it doesn't, there are some things that do, but there's things that don't, but you have to run go through the gauntlet to pass those damn tests.

And that is that, that shows that you actually care. Cause if you want to get into the industry, it's, it's not easy for a lot of folks. Maybe it was, was it easier for you being more of a, seems like you're pretty book smart. You know, I learned by doing it. I learned from experiencing for sure. And as I've gotten older, I've gotten more book smart in that way. But if you, if you have somebody sit down and teach me something in a class, I generally am good at applying it. And I am good, you know, with numbers and math and, and understanding those types of concepts.

So, but I think, you know, I got into the business thinking that I would have a significant advantage understanding pensions and how you could use from a tax shelter perspective for, you know, for small business owners. But it's a lot harder than just having that knowledge and that business. You have to be able to have their trust first. Yeah. Yeah, I can see that. Because the pension's a big deal.

That's a big deal. You're managing all that money. They're like, that's everybody and all my employees, myself, everything. It's not just them on the hook. It's all their employees that are trusting them to make the decision with you. Well, the required contribution is a dirty word. And so, you know, I'm working on a current client

that I think is my first really, you know, new startup pension plan where I can add a lot of value through the things that I know and the things that I can communicate to him and communicate to the actuary who's doing the work. Yeah. Well, one question before break I wanted you to get into is like your dad's old school, you come in with all this tech background, which is awesome because most financial advisors, they're not techie. I wasn't. I didn't know any of that stuff, but you have to be today or you're going to be left behind. And that's why Carter's been so successful with his business is because he makes that easy for the advisor, right? He allows you to do what you do best, meet with people, you know, do your presentations. He sets all that stuff up for people to grow their business. What was it like working with your dad?

Was he excited about the process of upgrading the tech and then what, how'd that go about and what happened as a result? So he was excited about having a website and having a real email address. It was at Mendel money.com. Instead of at Yahoo. You know, and he was excited about having a shared contact like CRM system where he could put his notes in, you know, versus just, you know, handwritten notes. And, you know, he's a very, for his age, he's very tech forward. He likes using technology,

but he didn't want to spend the money on a fancy portfolio accounting system where somebody did all the reconciliation for him and it was just there every day for him. So, you know, that was a little bit of a pull to get him off Advent Access and onto Black Diamond. It took me about six years to get him there. But he's thrilled with it. I mean, he travels a lot. He wanted to be able to work at home, work anywhere and make it easy for himself. And once he actually did it and we did the work and we got onto Black Diamond, you know, I think that really helped him have more freedom and flexibility to be anywhere he wants to be and still answer client questions. So I think he really enjoyed it. And then, you know, when the pandemic hits, he was like, man, if we had never done any of this tech stuff with our files in box and our portfolio accounting platform and our email, you know, all in the cloud,

you know, it would have been a nightmare, you know? And so, you know, I think he's really seen the value of that and then also the value of continuing to make it better. You know, we went from MoneyGuide Pro to RightCapital. So we got better data from our portfolio accounting platform into our financial planning program. Because what was happening is MoneyGuide Pro was not set up to handle individual bonds. We do a lot of individual bonds. And so it was a lot of work to manually fix

all that in MoneyGuide Pro. So we went to RightCapital, it all just went over very seamlessly once we got onto Black Diamond. And it just all worked really well. So we could do much more effective financial planning for clients with a lot less work upfront involved in getting all the holdings and all the details into that software. So yeah, it's been, it's been a journey. The first five years was learning. And then the last four years have been implemented. Well, and I think therein lies the, oh, and it sounds like the kids are home now.

Kids are home. They are home now, yeah. Time to party. Holidays are here. That's awesome. Yeah, so it's interesting that. Maddie, can you come back? I got about 15 more minutes. Okay, sweetheart?

You want to say hi? Yeah, you got to say hi. Come on. You're on TV. You're not on TV yet. You're on TV. Hi. Hey, ladies. Welcome to the Health and Wealth Podcast Show.

Happy holidays. I'm on a TV show maddie a podcast you're good i'll play it to you i'll play it to you when when it's all produced and done okay sweetie and you'll be part of it like that now dad she'll be bored she'll be bored trust me yeah yeah look to the first three seconds you're, what are we doing again now? That's fun. That is awesome. Yeah. So, you know, the chairman of the board of my of my estate and legacy planning company, Epic Services, actually says on a regular basis, he says, you know, Carter, what happened in 2020 wasn't supposed to happen until 2030, right? So embracing digital transformation, as far as I'm concerned, you know, was, it was a no brainer for me, you know, about five years ago, when we found this underutilized software that allows us to get estate planning done wherever. I mean, Tim talked about it earlier, how we helped his parents out in Portland, Oregon. They didn't

have to leave the house. They just got online. We just did everything together with our team. But, you know, technology is great. Implementing it is a whole nother story. But I was just saying today to some of my team members, I said, you know, I said, technology without the people and the processes won't even matter, right? The best technology in the world, you still have to have people and processes in order to enact and implement all of that stuff. So how has that worked in your practice? And have you seen that by building, you know, the process, leveraging technology is really what it is about embracing the technology? Well, it's learning how to leverage the technology to communicate with clients more effectively. Well, it's learning how to leverage the technology to communicate with clients more effectively. And when you do that through a process by which you build those solutions and those presentations to talk to clients about the issues that are important in their lives.

So my thing is focus on what they want to focus on and then come up with a series of recommendations or one recommendation off of that. You know, you have your things right now. You know, refinancing people's mortgages is a big deal still. Believe it or not, there's still people who have a four or four and a half percent mortgage out there. But, you know, they ask questions.

You get two or three questions that clients want to address. You know, very commonly it's, where am I going to get my money from? I'm retired. I'm like, but you have a lot of money. But they want to know exactly the details. And so you can't necessarily just take what comes out of your financial planning software and put it in front of them.

You've got to kind of frame it in a way that you're focusing on what's important and addressing their questions in a way that makes sense. Because what happens over time, and this is what's happened to us, is they want to roll over their 401k. They're like, I call Brad and he helps me get my distribution done. And I call Brad with my 401k provider on the phone. And it's like, I got to fill out a lot of paperwork. And it's just very hard. And if we make it easy and we do a good job on their investments, it goes a long way. And in doing that through technology to make it more approachable is going to become even

more and more important every three or four years as the people who are moving into doing estate planning age the people who are moving into retirement age and they want that digital access to their information uh more effectively you know if i talk to a 45 year old about sending me a fax most of them are like you know what do you mean facts they they want to they want to stay they can scan and they can email they can docusuSign, they can do all that stuff. You talk to a 70-year-old, you kind of get a 50-50 blend there. You have a lot of them who want to use technology. I have one who wants to use technology.

He uses my portal to see all of his information. But then he comes to a meeting with a handwritten accounting of all of his assets. And so one of the things that we're doing is we're changing our portfolio accounting platform again to make it so that we can provide clients with the information that they want to see how they want to see it, each individual. So I'll be able to have him now just print out a piece of paper of exactly what he wants to see every time he wants to see it versus him have to go into our software or the custodian software and either make an Excel spreadsheet as computer or write it down. So he has everything in the way he wants to see it.

Well, that's awesome. So let's talk a little bit about, you know, I know that there was this big transaction that occurred March of 2020. You went ahead and became the owner of Mendel Money. So congratulations on that. The timing may be not the most optimal, but you have figured out a way to get through all of that stuff. And it sounds like to me that a lot of your clients, what I wanna know, Brad, what the enrichers wanna know

is what does your clientele makeup look like? Is there an ideal client makeup or demographic or, you know, age bracket that you tend to work more on a regular basis with? Or does it run the whole gamut? Is it, you know, from 20s to 90s for all I know? I mean, right now I would say our average client is between the ages of 60 and 75. And, you know, there's not necessarily one common thread, but I would say the most common thread is that they want, they, they want somebody who knows what they, what they're invested in.

They want to call us and they want to ask questions. They want us to be able to explain it to them, you know, versus, you know, a lot of people out there in the business, they, they outsource the third party money managers, which there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. But I'd say that's the kind of type of person who ends up working with us because they know that they call us. We're going to know what's going on with their accounts and their assets. We're going to have financial planning strategies that are going to either make their lives easier or add value for themselves and their children. And, you know, we're going to help them make the key decisions in their life, you know, and that's, what's important to them. Yeah. But,

but they can also call and say, I'm, you know, I need help. I'm freaking out because the stock market is down 10% last week. Talk me off the ledge. That's what we get a lot from clients. You know, and I have a I have a client who was a referral from existing client whose wife said, I know you're doing yourself. You're 70 years old. What happens if something happens to you? I have nobody who's helping me and I got to rush to figure out what I'm doing with our money. And so she made him get a financial advisor.

You know, a year later, he's like, I love it. I don't watch CNBC. I don't look at it month every day or month, you know, and I know that I call you, you're going to call me back. You're going to help me and that you've got, you've got everything taken care of for me, you know and i know that i call you you're going to call me back you're going to help me and that you've got you've got everything taken care of for me you know into that and to me that's like what i live for you know i want clients like that i want clients who want to ask me the questions that are on their mind when they think they have a question i want them to call or email me you know and ask me the question i don't want the clients who hold it back and hold it back and hold it back and hold back. And then they, and then, and then they're upset that

they're not getting the answers that they want, you know, or they just don't think that I'm going to necessarily, you know, be able to answer their question or I don't know why they don't reach out, but I want clients who proactively want to work with me and who, when I proactively reach out, they're sharing with me so I can help them make the decision that's best for themselves and their families. Yeah. Well, so I've been saying, and I've, I've posted this actually on my LinkedIn. I don't know how many different times and I talk about, and I want to just applaud your efforts of understanding what you're really doing is winning what I call the relationship war, right? Clients have a lot of choices. Now, you just

talked about that client that was a do-it-themselfer, that once they got a chance to understand what you could bring value to their life, you ended up actually giving them more time. And as you get older, time is the most precious commodity that these clients that you work with have. And I think that what you're doing, what it appears that you're doing is you're really embracing the relationship part of the of the financial decisions and concerns that your clients have because they know that you're a resource that they can turn to. Is that a fair assessment? That is. And my focus is on building processes that make clients understand the things we can do to help them. So I think that's part of why some clients don't necessarily reach out with certain things that are going on in their lives. They don't know that we can help them with those issues. And so if they don't know the different things we can do to help them, it's hard for them to know when to reach out.

And so, you know, those are the things that I'm working on with like onboarding. You know, I know you guys have your, your, your estate planning questionnaire, which effectively learns most everything you need to know to onboard a client, you know, which adds a lot of value to a financial advisor. You know, we were building it out in a software called precise FP, trying to get either us to fill it out with the client on the phone or in person, you know, when that was a thing back in the day. And I know I can't wait till those days are back. We started to do a little bit of that, but not much. We're still, you know, with a one-year-old

at home, we're kind of a little crazy. But we're back, I'm back in the office with our employees, you know, a couple of days a week. So it's just really trying to build that process to be able to gather the information either up front or over a period of time. Be flexible with the client. Build a client service schedule for each client. You know, some clients need end of year tax planning. Some clients don't. So why make them do it? Sure. You know, it's really about, you know, building services that fit the client and meeting them where they want to be met yeah so i i say it on a regular basis that you know uh epic services company is on a mission to elevate the client experience right and if you which that's what it sounds like you're exactly doing you're elevating

that client experience which ultimately uh is going to lead to more referrals or introductions as i call them those are those are a lot more valuable than any referral but but yeah you know brad you're doing a lot of really really great things there and i think the last time we spoke you guys are somewhere around 275 300 million under management and um what does the future look like for you since you've got three big goals, which I know you want to talk about those three big goals, Tier, before we go to break. So what's it look like for the future of Mendel Money? Yeah, I mean, right now we're $240 million, but we are adding a new advisor probably in the spring. We're still kind of figuring out the details around him him leaving his current

firm and joining us who's about 50 million dollars on top of that so we'll be close to 300 million dollars you know and you know it's it's the it's i want to service more people because i really think we add value through developing that relationship being able to do more for our clients versus having all the you know the compliance hurdles that larger firms have that they have to they have to more fit clients into boxes you know so that they don't have issues with compliance at the bigger firm so i feel like there's an advantage to being small and nimble um but i also do want to train younger financial advisors and really, you know, be somebody who can help further the industry as a whole. Because I really feel like, you know, asking a 20-something-year-old to go out there and acquire new clients is not the right way for

somebody to learn the business from the ground up. It's an important skill that they need to learn how to do. But my thing is, as I grow in my career, I want to hire and train younger advisors. Not a lot, but maybe one or two. I already have one who I just hired. Really teach them how to service clients. Because once you service the clients, elevate that client experience. And if they can do that for my clients then i can work with a lot of new clients too and then and then they can build their own career get to where they want to go and then we can move on and hire another person and you know if we're there in 10 years another person and really build out from the ground up with people learning how to really service and take care of clients, becoming a true fiduciary for our clients. I think in the

long run, we're going to grow the practice at a nice pace and also really provide huge value to our clients, which is really my goal is to continuously be doing more for clients. If I can add a new service every year, I want to do it. Yeah. You know what you just got there saying is exactly why we started this podcast, right? We wanted to be able to give a platform for the advisors out there that we started a relationship now, right? That have a heart in helping people because our firm is, that's where our foundational approach is. It's having a heart for really helping people and the mass affluent, which is an underserved marketplace that's out there. We need more advisors like you in the industry. So the more

you can train the better off that, uh, the people in the Chicagoland area anyway, will definitely be, um, benefited from that. But, you know, eventually, I don't know how big you expect to expand outside of that or do you think you'll stay, you know, just right there, you know, in more of the Lake Michigan area? No, I think, you know, right now we're focused on Chicago. Sure. You know, focused on building out our process and our people because I think that is truly super important.

Once you have the process of the people, you can implement the technology to make it really effective for your clients. And just I mean, that's I mean, blocking and tackling with bringing on a new advisor for the first time is going to be, you know, a significant project. And I want to make sure that goes smoothly with, you know, without affecting current client service at all. and i want to make sure that goes smoothly with you know without affecting current client service at all um so that's my focus now you know five-year goal is to you know to really try to build the process and i actually am developing a little niche business i want to help uh uh dentists aspiring dental practice owners with understanding their business understanding the complexity of their life because they they have very complicated financial. They don't have a lot of assets to invest early on. So I'm working on developing some content, kind of a business model around serving them,

their families, and their business all at the same time. So I think a lot of small business owners don't really understand their P&L. And I think once they understand their P&L, that's kind of the first step to them understanding the value of their own time and being like, it's just like outsourcing. We get outsourced. You know, we got to basically hire people to do things that are lower value work because we are, we have skills, we have talents that we need to leverage fully leverage.

And so if I can help train and teach those people, I'll be more effective. Yeah, yeah, that's perfect. Well, Tim, I know we're coming up on a break, I'm sure, but... Yeah, we're here. We are definitely here. So let's just do it. We'll take a break. And then when we get back, we flip the script and brad can ask me

any question he wants on health we'll be right back you want the absolute best for yourself and you want it to be easy that's why we created green 85 it helps with detoxifying the body gently we're proud it's chemical-free, unlike almost all other supplements you'll find. Bottom line, Green 85 will get you healthier. We look forward to hearing what Green 85 did for you. To get this product and our other amazing products, go to chemicalfreebody.com. That's chemicalfreebody.com. What's up, enrichers?

Tim James here. I'm back with my co-host, Carter Wilcoxon. Today in the house, we've got Brad Mendel, Certified Financial Planner and Enrolled Actuary. Brad, I got it right. So here we're going to flip the script, buddy. Go ahead. Any question you have on health for yourself, a friend, a family member, questions in general about society, go. So I think the challenge that you know obviously most of us have having you know two working parents you know young kids is is finding time to cook ourselves food and to work out and so you know what sort of tips do you have for

young families who you know people in their 30s and 40s, they don't necessarily think they have to work out, but it's obviously really important to, you know, mentally and physically stay, you know, fit and stay in good shape for the long run. So you don't have, you know, more, you know, physical challenges as you age. Yeah. Well, I think the first thing to think about is like when people aren't working out, like I don't have time, I've got kids, I've got a job, I'm busy. All they're really saying is that my health is not a priority. That's what it boils down to. And what I would say, and I have to come strong about that because the reality is, is you can't get away from the fact that you are nature. And a lot of people get detached from that. And that's

why we have all of our health issues. We're not, we're not like on this planet, just kind of hanging out with nature. We are an expression of nature. We are nature. One of the easiest ways to look at this is if you look at the soil bacteria, these soil microbiome, as it's called and your gut bacteria or gut microbiome. Many of those bacteria that are in the soil are also in our gut. We are connected to the earth. It's, it's clear. It's, it's, you know, what's our, Hey Brad, what's your body mostly made of? Water made of water. Where does water come from? water made of water where does water come from the earth the earth yeah the earth okay so there it is ta-da we've cracked the code now we know

that we're we're you know you're saying drink water that's a pretty big one that gets brought up a lot but you know whether you're young or old. Don't drink too much beer. Well, that does have water in it, but it's been manipulated. Carter has, I don't know, maybe he's a closet beer drinker, but he drinks a lot more water now. I'd tell you that since I first met him. Yeah, out of glass jars, too. That's one of the biggest things that I learned was drinking. Stop drinking out of plastic, giving himself man boobs. Yes, exactly.

Restructured water in glass jars. Glass jars. Would a Yeti work? Yeah. I kind of have an obsession with Yetis. Yeah, the plastics are off-gassing. So people think BPA, and they're like, oh, I just get BPA-free, and I'm good. Well, there's BPA, BPB, BPC, DEFG, HIJK, LMNOP. There's like 36 of them and they're all worse than probably BPA, right?

Or the same or worse. So the reality is, is these are estrogen mimicking chemicals that those plastics are made from crude oil and they're processed with thousands of chemicals. And they mimic our natural hormones and they disrupt our hormones. That's why so many women today are having Hashimoto's, Graves' disease, these thyroid issues, and men too. And one of the reasons why we have a lot of prostate cancer and man boobs, what I was talking about earlier, right?

It's estrogen mimickers from plastic. So if you have carpet in your home, that carpet is off-gassing formal formaldehyde and that's the same stuff that they embalm people with you're breathing it in attaches to your mucous membrane into the throat into the body and and and then when you genetically modify foods the gmos those disrupt the the plant's um metabolism and then that plant starts making formaldehyde so we're taking it in to two places there. And again, we've talked about this many times in the show. That's why a lot of go talk to your, your local mortician. That's been doing it 20, 30 years. They'll tell you more and more now,

the older folks that are eating all these, you know, they haven't, I don't know if they've connected the dots, but I'll just tell you a lot of the older people coming in are kind of already embalmed. There's not a lot left to do. And it's because of drinking out of plastics, breathing in carpet air because the air is not purified in the house. It's sealed up airtight. You know, energy efficient homes don't breathe and they're sealing in these toxic chemicals. If your house was painted in the last four and a half years, it takes that long to cure.

It's off gassing estrogen mimicking chemicals into your body. So it's these no seems Brad that we're trying to bring awareness to to people. And just because you can't see it doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Right. So back to your question, because I want to answer it is like, how does somebody that's got a busy schedule there? Maybe they know they should work out, but they're not working out or they're not eating that healthy, but they'd like to, but they're too busy. So what they're doing is they're just swinging by McDonald's or getting Chipotle or whatever, and they think they're healthy

or going to Subway because they think they're healthy, which is pretty much the same as McDonald's. And how do they get that pattern starting in their life? So again, the first thing is putting your health as a priority and understanding that if you don't take care of your health, look around. You know, 3.3 trillion is spent annually on healthcare in this country, and we are the sickest people to ever walk the face of the earth. Half of us are developing cancer. That's on the rise. If we stay on current trends

by the year 2050, we are going to be, you know, 68 to 72% of people will have cancer. And that will be as common as a cold at that point. And it's already out of hand at 50%, right? The other 50% are dying of heart disease. So then you have type two diabetes and COPD and, you know, all these other things going on, right? So, and then if you look at cancers in our children, it's, it's really rampant. It's now the number one killer in our children, it's really rampant. It's now the number one killer of our children from one to five and number two from five to 16 behind accidents. So what's going on here? Well, we believe that we have a tremendous amount of stress on us today, environmental stress, work stress, family stress. There's just, we're

stressed out, throw the, you know, the COVID deal on top of it. There's a lot of stress out there. We were stressed before COVID hit. So stress actually creates poor chemistry in the body that deteriorates the immune system. So that's number one. So we have to learn how to manage our stress. Number two is we have deficiencies. The soil is about 85% deficient.

So if you're eating plants that are grown in 85% deficient soil, you're soil is about 85% deficient. So if you're eating plants that are grown in 85% deficient soil, you're going to be 85% deficient. If you're eating animals that ate the plants grown in 85% deficient soil, you're going to be 85% deficient. And then we cook, we process, we irradiate, we bag, we can, we put things in jars and heat them and do things. We nuke our potatoes. It's called de-spudding. We do all these things to our foods. We've denatured our food, and we're getting away from nature. We're getting away from every other living creature on this planet except for humans and the animals we've domesticated

literally picks food and eats food. That's it. There's no can, right? It's just go to the tree, pluck it, eat it, right? When it's ripe and when it's ready. You don't eat a green apple until it turns red. It just doesn't work, right? You just know that instinctively. And if you try it, you'll spit it out because it's too hard and it doesn't taste that good.

So berries and stuff too. The other thing, are you getting some downloads? Has your wife got some questions? Oh, you're on mute, brother. You have to unmute. Do you have any health questions, honey? No health questions. All right.

Nope. She's just asking me stuff for the Hanukkah party. Okay. We'll wrap up. So the third part, the third component is this chemical toxicity, this stuff that you can't see. Okay. The microscopic toxins from the air we breathe, the food we eat, the cosmetics, the skin cares, the harmful of swallowed toothpaste. Please contact the Poison Control Center. Check your toothpaste.

If it says harmful of swallowed, please contact the Poison Control Center. You might want to rethink putting that in your mouth again. Right. Just an idea. Right. So for somebody that's busy, what they can do is you can buy stuff lower on the food chain. You can make big pots of soup, right? And then you can have that throughout the week. So you buy things in bulk, you make things in bulk on the weekend, you make it a fun process with the kids, get them involved, and then it can be a family bonding time. So you're actually really accomplishing something important there, which is spending time with your family, which is what a lot of people neglect,

especially financial advisors and people like that that are very busy with their lives. They've got these very big, busy lives. And then they wake up, and then all of a sudden their daughters and sons are off to college, and they're like, who the hell is this adult that's eating breakfast at the table? I missed out on everything. Don't miss out on that. Breaking bread and having food together and making food together, you can start training your kids to come together, make the food,

and then clean up. That way they're not a burden on you and your wife later when they just eat everything and leave a mess in plates. Tim, you make it sound so easy. Well, it is. It really is. It's fun. Getting my kids to do anything other than make cookies is is challenging well you just get them involved you just get them involved you

start with cookies if you need to right so now when the exercise part comes in here's how you do it what you do is what do you like to do, Brad, to exercise? I mean, I love yoga and I love writing. I do. We just got a Peloton. Okay. So we just started to get exercise back in our lives. We were doing it pre pandemic COVID hit. Then it was hard. And then we weren't going to the gym and we had nothing at home. We were in a condo. We had nose view it was walking the dog was our exercise okay so when you're starting new exercises i like to start at the lower levels walking is great hiking is great um yoga like yin yoga is is great

mini trampolines are excellent excellent one of the best walking and mini trampolines are very powerful and if you don't have a mini trampoline, you can literally just sit there and bounce, bounce your heels up and down for two to five minutes. That's a Qigong exercise. And then you twist your arms back and forth. You can look up Qigong. But the thing of it is, is you don't want to look at it. See, we think of it as like this burden. Like I have to work out an hour or 45 minutes or two hours to get the results.

So you never start because it looks like this big, ah, I can't do that. So set a recurring appointment in your phone for five minutes. And that's it. You're going to set, you're going to, and then you're going to do something. You're going to go for a walk. You just come and do a five minutes. That's it. And your mind will be like, oh, I can do five minutes. And when you get there, you'll do the five minutes. And if that's all you do, great. The next day, five minutes. The next day, five minutes. You start building the habit.

The habit is more important than the duration. What you'll find out is like if you go outside to go for a walk for five minutes, you'll end up doing 10, 15, maybe even 20. And you're going to enjoy yourself. That habit is more important than the duration. That's always the key, right? And if you have something you can do with your wife that's fun and you want to do yoga together and with the kids, then there you go.

You can start doing yoga, get the kids involved. They'll be climbing all over you, having a good time stretching. You can show them stuff. I mean, they get distracted, but the bottom line is they see you doing it every day, every day. And as they grow, they're going to develop these healthy lifestyles. So the other thing you can do is if you're not loving on self enough yet, then a lot of times we have parents look towards their kids. You are setting example.

Mama bear is teaching baby bear what to do by example. She doesn't just say go down to the river and pull out a salmon. She actually shows baby bear what to do. She doesn't say go over to the huckleberry bush and get some huckleberry. She goes over and she eats it and then shows baby bear so your actions are going to dictate what your children's actions are in the future you can seed them the first seven years of their life is very important that's why churches want to get a hold of kids because they know if i can get a hold of them the first seven years they can indoctrinate them into that church then they're pretty much set for life so it's a

very powerful um they just children operating in that um and a different like vibrational frequency right now it's like i can't remember the term it's like theta and beta there's wavelengths going on but they are in absorption mode and they're taking that stuff in so you can you can get that a lot of programming done now it's very important and it'll take a little bit of more effort up front but the more you do it the easier it'll get and try to include them in everything you can because down the road it's going to make you and your wife's life much easier because your children are going to be healthier they're going to be less sick they'll be able to um um and then they're going to be able to take care of themselves so by the time they get 12 15 you know they can handle themselves i mean

a lot of children today are they they're 21 years old and they can't even do anything they don't even know what to do because they've been coddled so much right you know you need to do that when they're babies you got to kind of protect them but eventually you gotta you know um and you've kind of put a shroud around them you put this like you're protecting them eventually they need to they need to break out of that shell and that needs to fall so they can grow. They can continue to grow. So anyway, I would say –

I think my parents did that incredibly well. They gave me a lot of freedom, but they trusted me. And, you know, I think it did help me, you know, be more independent and do things on my own and take care of myself, learn how to cook on my own. You know, they went out to dinner. They said, you're 15, 16. We'll buy you the ingredients. You make your own dinner. Yeah, figure it out.

I love it. I learned how to cook. I cooked for my friends when I was like 19, and we were going downtown for New Year's Eve or something like that. I cooked everybody a fancy dinner that took about two hours longer than it should have, but it was fun. Yeah, so those life skills, and like I said, it's a great time

to bond with your kids i got i got a friend right now who's his daughter one's out of college the other one's about that age where she should be about done but the relationships are just terrible because there was a bad relationship with mom and dad and he did they just pretty much handed and did everything for them and they're very ungrateful he sou's soured about the whole thing. And, you know, half the time he calls me up, he's just like, Hey, I'm just gonna, you know, if they don't come around, I'm just going to will everything to your, your two boys. Right. Cause he likes my kids. Right. Cause he gets pissed and you don't, we don't want to do that. Anybody listening today, if you're in that, if you're on that path and you don't know your children and you don't know how

to connect, it'd probably be a good idea to start learning how to connect with yourself first and then get some books, find a mentor, you know, find an advisor, just like, you know, you got to, you're an advisor helping other people get, get a mentor, get a coach, get somebody that can help you rebuild your family. It's so important, but hopefully that helps you answer your question. I kind of went more on the kids because you got those young kids over there, but that's, that's how you do it, man. Just baby steps. Don't make it a big deal, but consistency is the key. Morning or evening? Whatever works for you. Get started. You don't think there's no difference in your mind, morning or evening? Well, I don't necessarily think there's a, I prefer doing things, I like to exercise in the morning, right? But the reality

is, is if you look at the circadian rhythms of life, people would wake up when the sun comes up, all right? They would slowly kind of wake up, and then they would go get active in the morning. They'd be out looking for food, building things, doing things, walking, traveling, being nomadic, and then it would be in the heat of the day, they would be resting. They would probably eat, and then we'd sleep under a tree, then as the temperature went down then they get more active towards the afternoon and then after 6 p.m you know after 6 p.m the digestive tract pretty much is shutting down you only have about 20 of your digestive fire so um and you'd be kind of moving down to slowing down so you know exercise in the morning and then the afternoons

are you know two peak times to do it i think if you're looking at natural um just the way people were you know over thousands and hundreds of thousands of years we've been programmed there you go speechless he's speechless he's like i'm not even sure what to make so so there you go not not at nighttime but you, but you know, it was funny earlier, uh, Brad, you were talking about how you told your clients from eight to midnight, I'm available from eight to midnight. So when you were saying that, I was like thinking to myself, did he be from eight in the morning till midnight? And he's going to be on that Peloton. That was the pandemic. That was the pandemic when I might be watching my daughter cause my wife's on a work call right um so yeah

but yeah but you got the peloton now so that's um I guess you can use that I mean we got our peloton like right whenever the whole thing happened uh we had a home gym though and everything so that that helped us to not have to worry about the gyms being shut down or whatever but my wife's like oh this peloton let's get this's get this Peloton. So I got to tell you, you got to build up a little bit of some, that seat does not feel good. So my suggestion for the Peloton, make sure you get it. It's been fine. It's been fine so far. All right. Cool. Cool. That's awesome. Well, hey, do you have any other health questions for Tim? And I know you've got the big festivities going on and we got to let you get going anyway. So anything else that you

want to ask before we get going? No, thank you very much. I appreciate it. It was a pleasure to be on and pleasure to meet you, Carter and Tim. And, you know, look forward to seeing what you guys do in the future. Yeah, that's fantastic. So, hey, Enrichers, thank you so much for joining us for another episode of the Health and Wealth Podcast Show. Make sure to like, share, and subscribe to our show on either Apple Podcast, Spotify, Google, or wherever you get your podcasts. And then to be able to see any of the previous podcasts, you can go to our website at thehealthandwealthpodcastshow.com, www.thehealthandwealthpodcastshow.com. For my fantastic co-host, Mr. Tim James of the Health Heroes Show and Timothy Freedbody himself. There you go. Your little shameless plug there. I want to thank Brad Mindell of Mindell Money for being on our show today. Brad, thank you so much for coming on and sharing your story, your backstory, and what's going on there with you and the kids.

And have, I guess, a happy Hanukkah and obviously the rest of the happy holidays for you and yours. Sounds good. You too. Awesome. Thank you, everybody. And we'll see you next time on the Health and Wealth Podcast Show. Thank you, everyone. Hey, enrichers. Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Health and Wealth Podcast. I'm your host, Carter Wilcoxon.

And I'm your host, Tim James. And by God, we are committed to helping you guys have fat wallets, flat bellies. So tune in again for another episode and make sure to like share and drink a lot of water or beer you have just listened to the health and wealth podcast with carter and tim