The Wealthy Barber Podcast - #63 — Sandi Martin: Financial Lessons from One of Canada’s First Advice-Only Planners

Episode Date: July 7, 2026

Our guest this episode is Sandi Martin — one of Canada's first advice-only financial planners and a Certified Financial Planner who left retail banking to build a practice built around her values. Sandi co-founded the Financial Planning Association of Canada, co-hosted the Because Money podcast and has spent over a decade championing a simple idea: helping everyday Canadians figure out what "enough" really looks like. In this episode, Dave and Sandi dive into the advice-only model and why she walked away from the bank to build it. They unpack the CBC Marketplace exposé on the Canadian banking industry, the aggressive marketing of lines of credit and what really happens behind the sales culture most Canadians never see. Sandi also explains her transition into the advice-only space, the early strategies she used to find clients and why she has chosen to run a solo operation rather than scale. The conversation also explores the everyday planning questions that trip people up, from the emergency fund debate (cash savings versus lines of credit) to the RRSP versus TFSA decision and why accounts are best understood as tools rather than goals. Sandi shares her perspective on the financial nuances of divorce and partnerships, the essential role planners play in building retirement income, the often-overlooked costs of late-life healthcare and assisted living, and why high-fee mutual funds still dominate in Canada.  Whether you're rethinking who you take financial advice from or simply want a clearer, no-nonsense view of how planning actually works, this episode is packed with practical takeaways you can implement right away.   Show Notes (00:00) Intro & Disclaimer (00:55) Intro to Sandi Martin (03:24) The CBC Marketplace Exposé on the Canadian Banking Industry (09:52) The Problem with Aggressive Marketing of Lines of Credit (12:00) Sandi's Transition into the Canadian Advice-Only Space (14:25) Early Marketing Strategies for Getting Advice-Only Clients (17:37) Why Sandi Runs a Solo Operation (19:49) Financial Planning Nuances in Divorce and Partnerships (24:08) Maintaining Autonomy and Control Over Your Work Schedule (25:55) Emergency Funds Debate: Cash Savings vs. Lines of Credit (29:14) The RRSP vs. TFSA Debate and Viewing Accounts as Tools (34:05) The Essential Role of Planners in Retirement Income Strategies (38:45) Factoring Late-Life Healthcare and Assisted Living Costs into Your Financial Plan (42:40) The Dominance of High-Fee Mutual Funds in Canada (47:08) The Benefits of Talking Openly About Money (49:37) Conclusion

Hey, it's Dave Chilthin, the wealthy barber and former Dragon on Dragon's Dent. Welcome to the Wealthy Barber podcast. Well, we'll be hosting some of the top minds in the world of personal finance. Yes, that's to balance me out. The podcast is about making the subject not just easy to understand, but dare I say, even fun, honest. Whether you're trying to fund your retirement, figure out how to build a down payment, save for your kids' education, manage debts, whatever, will be here to help you.

you do it. Before we jump in, a quick but important note, nothing we discuss here should be taken as investment advice. We don't know you and your personal financial situation, so we're not here to tell you we're specifically to put your investment dollars. We're here to educate, get you thinking, and we hope entertain. But please do your own research and or consult with your financial advisor before taking any action. Hey, it's Dave Chilton, the wealthy barber with the Wealthy Barber podcast. I know I've said this many times, but the podcast is on a huge role. And we're not saying that to brag. We're saying it to thank you. The support has been unbelievable. Our audience continues to grow. We get great feedback in terms of what do you want to

hear about next. What areas can we take a deeper dive into? And we're actually incorporating a lot of that into our guest selection, the questions as we develop them, et cetera. So keep them coming. We take it all very, very seriously. Pretty excited about today's guest that I'll tell you why. I think of all of the people we've had on the show when we've asked them, whom else should we have on? This has been the number one name, Sandy Martin. She has come up over and over again. People say she's one of the OGs and the advice-only space,

that she's very, very sharp, very knowledgeable, very creative. But then I see the name of her firm as Sandy Martin Financial Planning. And I think that's not super creative. You know, it's kind of what I may have guessed. And but outside of that, I think she's very, very creative. She's got all of the designations. We're going to talk about a couple of them. One in particular really intrigues me as a BA initially, then the CFP.

She started the banking industry, then shifted over to the advice only industry, went to work with the big shop for a while. It's back to a smaller one now. And I want to learn a little bit about why she made those decisions. I think our audience will find all that interesting. So welcome to the podcast. Oh, Dave, thank you so much for having me. No, honestly, it's really nice to have.

somebody on who was thought so highly of by her colleagues in the industry. You have a great reputation. We heard so many positive comments. And I should have mentioned in the intro that you were also one of the founders, if not the driving force behind FPAC, the Financial Planning Association of Canada. And that's obviously really growing. And I've said many times on the podcast how much it's helping the end consumer because all of the top planners are getting involved in learning from each other, better communication techniques, tips on doing different things, and that's flowing right down to their clients. And that's what this is all about. So, hey, I mean, this sounds corny, but a sincere thank you for that. Oh, so let me tell you, I was definitely part of it. Like, there was a lot of

work in that 2017 to 2019 period, but it was so much a group effort that I would very much hate people to think that I was the leading. I was part of a group and I feel very privileged that I got to be part of that team. Yeah, well, that's very humble of you to say I would have taken all the credit. So that just puts you right about. That's why you have a book. Yeah, exactly. That puts you right above me for sure. Okay, I want to start with, you know, what you, you know, became quite well known for when I first heard your name was the CBC involvement with the expose on some of the sales practices we saw in the Canadian banking industry on the financial planning front. Walk us through the background of that whole episode, your involvement, your conclusions, etc. Yeah. Well, I want to start by acknowledging that they did an episode very similar to that with Preet Banerjee. I mean, in 2014, I want to say it might have been earlier. And I never really get the dates right. But so the truth of the matter is they had to do another very similar setup episode because that one didn't. I mean, it changed some things, but the same things were happening in the institutions, right?

So my involvement, I actually thought it was just background at first. I had no idea that this was like, and then come and be on TV, which I like audio podcasts for a reason. Come on. That's not justified at all. If walking down the hall, like it's being seem, anyways, it doesn't matter. So it was on background because I had worked at the bank and it wouldn't have been a surprise to anybody who knew me in the first five years of my career that I'd been in banking. I talked about the incentives behind the work.

And so to be the person on background to say this is how those incentives worked during my career and likely they're still in place in some way today. And then to be able to come to the studio and observe some of that background. ground footage and be able to comment on it. It just became one of those things that like, yeah, Sandy, Sandy talks about banks. So let's have her come and talk about them here too. Was it a marketplace episode? Yeah.

And was it with Tom or who is the host? No. Oh, and my everlasting shame. It's a woman. I know her name, but it's not in my brain today. Okay. And I mean, it obviously picked up great traction. I mean, people talked about it left and right.

The other media picked it up and, you know, kind of analyze the results, analyzed your comments. Give us an overview. of what the big lesson was? The big lesson is when you go into a bank, you are going into a store that sells financial products. And you are talking to somebody who is trained to sell those products for the most part. If they have broader, deeper knowledge outside of the bank education,

sort of on the job training, it's because they've taken the time to get it for themselves. And for the most part, these are people who aren't earning a whole bunch of money and have incentives to kind of tow the bank line. in order to continue getting bonuses or different jobs. And so all the incentives, even against learning more about the incentives, are working against the frontline staff of banking institutions. And then not surprisingly, it leads to them pushing a lot of the proprietary products,

let's say the higher cost mutual funds or credit cards, that type of thing. Yeah, because, I mean, you want to do a good job for the person in front of you. If we want to believe, like, let's assume that everybody means well, you want to do the job for the client. The client is coming in saying, I'm having some pain in this particular. area, the only solutions that you have in the time that you have to serve those clients and like get them through the door properly, according to the business model, is to sell them something. So you don't have time to talk about, well, what are your spending mindsets and all the things

that could be very effective tools in addressing client pain, but you are not allowed to take them off the shelf because they're not on your shelf in the first place. Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, I don't disagree. I think there are some exceptions. I've told the story many times about a younger woman in Southwestern and I saw or produced two financial plans out of one of the banks that were outstanding and really did a great job on almost every front. But it's tough because you're right. They're confined to selling the products, often higher fee products. I found a few years ago, and maybe it's the same now,

sadly, where they weren't even saying things like, do you have a group RRSP match available before they were opening up an RRSP and putting monies in? Are we still seeing things that bad? Well, it wouldn't have changed. Yes, we are seeing that. Again, because these people do not have, like at most you can spend an hour with a client, right? Right. So in an hour, can you do the kind of proper thorough discovery, even just of the facts of the planning case, let alone mindset and values and fears and all those things? Of course you can't.

So of course it's still happening because at the end of the day, the job of the people sitting behind the desks at the bank is to make money for the bank. It's not necessarily, even though it should be a frontline service, it impacts everybody in Canada. it should be structured differently. That's not the structure that it has right now. So those things happen again and again and again. You know, you're doing a good job here, driving home, a very simple fact that I think a lot of consumers don't understand.

And that is how much a good planner needs to know about you before he or she can take you down the right path? Psychology, all of it. But there's a lot of questions that have to be asked. And it's a bit of a boring process, a bit of a time consuming process. But that's what leads to success. And even when I'm out in public, somebody will ask a very basic question like, should I pay off my car loan? I say, I can't answer that. I need to know, do you have an even a higher interest rate debt, credit card?

Do you have an RSP match available? All of these things have to be ascertained before you can give any kind of counsel. That's why there's the joke about financial planners. The first thing we're going to say to any question is it depends. And as we should, right? And so, okay, well, that's interesting. And do you think that the show ended up having an impact in this case because of all the spin-off media coverage? I hope that it did.

We would say like the middle income Canadians and lower income Canadians, like the people who could benefit most from knowing what they're walking into when they walk into a bank, I don't believe in today's economy and all sorts of things. I don't believe that they have the bandwidth to make good individual choices for themselves on the basis of more information. It's kind of like that financial literacy thing like, no better do better. But I think the system is stacked against people and so that, yes, it's great. I'm so glad it's out there. I'm sad that we had to do a repeat of Preet's episode because his was flawless, which no need to bring me in to repeat Preet. I'm glad there's more attention to it.

But the simple fact that we had to do two in 10 years to me says that there's not enough change. Like making people aware is not enough to actually make a meaningful difference. No, that's unfortunate. No, Prit does a great job and all that kind of stuff. And he's got a great communication style and that he can be very blunt, but still somehow bring it across politely enough that he doesn't annoy people. Even on the other, no, he is. Like, he is, he's a talented guy.

I mean, as you know, I'm one of his biggest fans. I always have been. He's great at what he does. I got into trouble or arguments with the banks about something a little different. And it was their aggressive pushing of lines of credit. And back in 2008, 9, 10, when I wasn't really even doing a lot in personal finance, I was seeing friends and how aggressively the lines of credit were being shoved at them. And unfortunately, how many of them were not only taking them on, but then abusing them.

And then I ended up few. featuring a lot on that and the wealthy barber returns. The second book, I mean, that's just another part of the problem. It's the incentive is that their money lending institutions. That's what they do. Yeah. And it's funny that you mentioned that book because and that time period. So that time period.

So when I started in banking in 2005, the big push was debt consolidation. And typically we did it as a loan, like a fixed loan rather than a revolving product. But then very rapidly thereafter there came, not that they were invented in 2005 or anything, but secured lines of credit. So that was the kind of the market share that the bank was trying to get. And that's what the incentives were lined up around. So in my first couple of years, just trying to figure out like navigate a new job, a new profession, and all those things. And that was just what you did during your day.

And then when I moved actually to Huntsville, so when I came back to Gravenhurst, I worked at a bank in Huntsville. And that manager in the midst of all of this, like post crisis, can we argue that anything is post crisis? But in the middle of that 2008, 2009 kind of recovery period, she came into my team. I love her, and it wasn't, she didn't do it in a madway, but she slammed the wealthy barber returns down on my desk. I was like, I think you should read this. And then I got a, I was like a money sent subscriber. So I keep telling people that the joke is Dave Chilton's wealthy barber returns was my gateway book into doing what I do now. Yeah, no, I'm, I'm thrilled to hear that because I think you're helping a lot of people. So that's great. And, and, you know,

it's really funny about that is that I wrote those critical chapters. I think there was two or three in a row about the lines of credit, a valuable product, but being marketed too aggressively. And, you know, so instead of being made available, they were being pushed. And, you know, the bankers I knew individually said, absolutely. Like nobody came to me and said you're wrong. Out in the public, they would say, I think Dave went a little far with the criticism, but 101, they would say, absolutely. So you're just confirming that that was the way it was.

And hopefully that's improved. But you left the banking industry and the asset under administration way of approaching things and proprietary products, et cetera, and you went into the advice-only space. Was it 2013? team? Yeah, January 1st, because I like tidy your ends. Nice, I like. And there wasn't a lot of players, let's be honest, and the Canadian advice only space at that time. It was quite literally handful. I agree. There was a couple handfuls. And so good for you for doing it. What stop people from doing it? And why did you do it? Yeah. So I'll start with why I did it first and then we'll go back

to what stops and continues to stop people. So why I did it was twofold. One, it goes back to what we were talking about in banking, right? Like I wanted to do a good job for my client in front of me and I wanted to do, I'm a people pleaser. I'm an eldest daughter. That's what we do, right? So I also wanted to please my manager and be told like, you're doing a good job. I couldn't do both those things. And I had already identified that I need more time with people. We need to get into more than just the products on the shelf. So that was the career, the values around the work that I do reason. And then also I was a mother of three children under four at the time. And so it was, and we had planned. I mean, we had planned for years. It took a long time to get to the point where I could say,

like, oh, I'm going off of my own, starting my own business. So, but that happened to be just the confluence of those two things. And going out in my own, yeah, from then on, I just never really looked back. So why people don't do it, in part, it's a wealth and privilege thing. So me working really hard and my partner working really hard to be able to not need my income in years of, you need two incomes, right? So we had to work really hard to build me a two-year runway. It just so happened that there was a, you know, Rob Engin invited me onto his blog, like in the first six months. So, like, I got a lot of luck in there. And then also we had built the financial foundation to be able to do so.

So one, I think it's difficult to build that foundation to not need income for two years as a really big ask. And two, of course, you're also like, there are not a lot of places where you can get an entry level role in the advice only space. Because most of us are just running our own businesses. And that's not typically what, like a graduate from a finance, some of the new great financial planning programs that we have educationally. they're not in the market for being a business owner. They're in the market for being a financial planner. But like any business, right, you spend a lot of time in and on the business. And I think it's the on the business stuff that is surprising and more difficult and challenging than people are really eager to get into.

Yeah. I think you said that well. And I mean, a big part of the on the business is marketing. Yeah. Is how do you get your name out? How do you get the clients? And I mean, how did you get your clients early on? Yeah.

It started with writing. In part, I wrote for myself because I needed to exercise the muscle of explaining things to people that didn't have the same background knowledge as me. And that's always, I still, of course, there's big blind spots for me. Everybody knows this, right? For all of us. Yeah. So learning how to communicate was in part that. I referred a lot of people like Jason Heath.

I know you've interviewed for the podcast. Yeah, great guy. Very sharp. And so I was aware of my limitations and I was aware that Jason did really good work in the space for like incorporated professionals. So I sent a lot of people to him. That led to, oh, and then I was on Twitter, of course, back when Twitter was a place that was enjoyable to be. And on Twitter, there was just a lot of back and forth, a lot of conversation with people, and that's what led me. I think commiserating about the Cleveland Browns was what led me to Rob and then to do some guest posting there.

And that was also in the years of John Chavro as the editor at Money Sense, who had made it kind of a part of his mission to like, here's the list of back then I was fee only planners. It was the terminology that was being used. And that was that resource. there was a lot of money since readers. I was one of them. That was a place that people went to. And so that combination of just, again, serendipity, timing, personal finance, blogging was a thing back then that isn't as much anymore. Like I am not made for TikTok. It can't be a fan fluencer. I would argue that, by the way. You've actually got a lot of charisma. Thank you. You may not be comfortable doing it, but I think you would actually be quite good at it. And Jonathan Chevro, I think, doesn't get enough credit for

what he did for the advice only industry. I think he did. shine of light and built some of the early momentum, gave it more credibility. And because people started coming in, you all started feeding off each other, but he was one of the big starting blocks. And actually, one other thing, there was a personal finance blogging. I can't remember the names of all the people, but Rate Hub sponsored it for a little while. And it's actually the first time that I met you in person, because you came and spoke at one of them. That's right. And it was a combination. Like there was a lot of bloggers. And so, of course, it was meant to be about, in part traffic and getting found and all that kind of stuff.

But there were a lot of people who were kind of in this nascent advice-only planning space that we're also finding this, like, this is the only time that we can see each other in person. So we met a lot of each other there. And then, yeah, built that sort of collaborative grouping and sharing of problems and successes that eventually was morphed into that Financial Planning of Association piece or Association of Canada piece. Now, do you get most of your business now through word of mouth? That's a great question. I actually don't know.

Yes, I'm sure some. I do have people that... I know. I just don't pay attention. What a bad business owner I am. I was thinking that, but I didn't want to say it. So I'm glad that you, I'm glad that you said it. I've heard you're an excellent financial planner, though.

So that's probably more important, frankly. She's terrible at business. She can't name her business or her website. Actually, I will tell you why the website and my business is named Sandy Martin is because knowing from banking that, like, I probably don't show the banks this. But I would like to operate as a sole proprietor. It works under my business model. and I don't want to have to pay for bank accounts for businesses.

Right. But use just my own name. Ah, it's very interesting. Okay, so you switched over to that. You've enjoyed it. And during that process, you ended up merging with another big firm. We had Julia on Julia Chung and she's outstanding. And, you know, a big player in the industry like you, very well-known.

But you decided to go back to a smaller operation and you like running more of a one-person entity. I can relate to that. Like I can't. Like I've worked on my own or with Mo, you know, forever in a day. I've like, I've turned down opportunities to kind of grow and grow and grow because I'm kind of a lone guy. Is that why you did it? You're just more comfortable on your own in a smaller environment? No. I mean, yes, it turns out that yes, that is also true. But there were a couple of other factors. One of them is Julia is so interested in a different kind of financial planning complexity than I am.

And that grew over time. Like as people change, right? Like we don't have to stick to like, like one personal brand. So over time, it became more and more clear that the kinds of planning that really excited her and made her feel creative and felt like she was making the most different. I mean, I don't want to speak for her, but they were very divergent. And so how do you sort of market to both complex family corporations and enterprise and that kind of and sort of regular everyday Canadian? It becomes difficult. So there was that piece of it. There was also the piece that I've been doing this virtually. So we said I started in 2013. I used to use Skype and phone. And I've met two clients in 14 years in person.

That's crazy. I know. Well, I am a big introvert. It's a big secret. Don't tell anybody. So when I was doing all this virtual work and when Julie and I were working together, there were people all across the country, but there weren't any people that I, like, I didn't know the people in my community.

I grew up here, but again, introvert. So I really felt like there was an opportunity to do something that felt tangible for people that I was neighbors to. And so there was an opportunity to do some nonprofit work that I did. jumped at. So I did that for two years, kind of wrapped that project up. And I mean, I did this too. So I did two full-time jobs for a while. But now I'm just back to this. And it feels like a vacation because only one job is amazing. Well, good for you. And again, I want to repeat something I said out of the gate. Your reputation is fantastic. So you've obviously done a good job with

the planning. And that's what it's all about at the end of the day. How do you help the clients most? Now, you're going to be surprised by this. One of the reasons I was most excited to speak with you is one of the designations, one of the credentials you have is around divorce. Yep. And we don't talk much about that on this podcast, and I think we should. Like it's 45, 50% of people go through a divorce. Very few things impact people's personal finances that dramatically. But nobody talks about it.

It's not just our podcast missing out on it. You can listen to all the podcasts. They don't really get into it. Talk to me about the designation. What drew you into it? Is it something you actually market and try to specialize in it all? No, I don't market or try and specialize in. I wanted to be, it was one of those things where it was like, I want to learn more about this because I don't know anything about it.

I don't want to know all the stuff, but I just want to know where the red flags are and the things that I should know that I don't know, if you know what I mean. I haven't really specialized in it. Like, there are some excellent colleagues that I have that that's basically all that they do. And it's amazing. And I'm so glad. And I can give you some of the names afterwards if that's something that you want to really focus it on. Yeah, you implied I was getting divorced there, but really that's bad. I mean, I haven't spoken to my partner, but I'm sure she's always thinking that.

So you're not far from being, far from being accurate. You heard of your first. Pass those names to her probably is a better idea. Not just the divorce end of things, but the deciding to partner up. And we know, right, after, and the definition of a spouse depends on the Pension Benefits Act, the Income Tax Act. It also depends on family law. So all of those things,

intersect in really complicated ways that sometimes don't seem intuitive. Like I've spoken to a lot of people who said things like that my partner was like this and therefore it is just that I receive X and Y. But that's not what it's not that the system is unjust. It's that again, there are so many complex parts that go into it that does not create a he did this and therefore I get this kind of logic. Absolutely. I mean, just the matrimonial home rules alone have tripped so many people up.

Yes. And because the definition of spouse in all of those different jurisdictions matters, and it's easy to become a spouse without really intending to because you're just living your natural life. And we like each other. We're just going to move in together or something. And because we don't talk about it, just to your point, people put themselves in circumstances without meaning to that are tremendously detrimental. to their long-term mental health, let's just say it, but also their financial, yeah, all those things. And so if we don't, if I, so back to the original question, which is, I wanted to know the end

state and what those triggers were and complications so that I could also talk to people who were in the beginning state, either they hadn't thought about it before or it felt like one of those really uncomfortable things to talk about, right? Like nobody wants to talk about divorce before we're even married. But the best time to talk about how things could go wrong and how to deal with them is well everybody loves each other and is really happy. And so that, I mean, that's really why I wanted to know that whole ecosystem back to front. But I also, I have to say there, if somebody came to me today and said, you know, I would like to, you know, I would like to. And I need to work on my divorce or something, there are people who are better than me at it and I would send them.

Right. They're specializing in it. Yeah. But I mean, to the point you're making, I mean, think back two, three, four years ago in the real estate market was piping hot. It's cooled off in most regions since. but one of the top questions everybody got when they're out in public was, I'm helping out my son, I'm helping out my daughter with the down payment. How do I protect myself against a separation taking place in their family?

That went from a question you were asked once a year to a question you were asked every second time you left your house. Yeah. So you're not wrong when you say that this needs a lot of attention beforehand too. And I don't think any of us, Dave Chilton included, have done a very good job on educating on that front. In part, again, it's just because it feels like a really sensitive thing. Because we all know the trope of like, oh, I demand a pre-nump means something about your relationship. But even it doesn't. Like a cohabitation agreement doesn't mean something about your relationship other than you're willing to think about how conflict could go and how to deal with it in a healthy way.

That's just maturity. Now, are you looking to expand it all before we get on to personal finance or do you want to stay you? Just me. You don't want to scale. I'm fundamentally unemployable and I can't be an employer. I just I just want to be. Here's the thing. So one of the reasons I struck out on my own is I wanted to be in charge of what my commitments were.

Who, what is due when? What do I promise? And when do I get to just walk outside because it's nice and I decide when I'm working. And as soon as you bring somebody else in, you are responsible to them for your schedule. And that's fine. Other people work really well that way and I don't. No, it makes sense. You have to know yourself.

You and I are quite similar in many ways. I'm like that too. And that even though I really enjoy working hard and working long hours, I like to control when those hours are going to be, the flexibility. And in your case, you have three young kids still. That flexibility is a huge asset for being able to pick them up from school or walk them to school or go in and take the – All of that. I mean, it's a huge asset.

I get why you would like to stick with that. Is your husband tied into the financial field in any way, shape, or form? Not at all. When I switched to full time, so when it was like, okay, we need my income now, he ended up staying home with our kids. So he has been up until now about a full-time home. with some a couple of like he'll do some he used to be in construction and renovation because it's miscoa and that's what everybody does so we'll do a couple of those for people that he knows and feels good about doing that work for but for the most part he stays home and make sure we all

eat which is lovely that's fantastic is he a gravenhurst fellow too no he's from pennsylvania i lured him here 25 years ago oh did you how did you do that how did you even meet him oh it's a it's a sordid religious tale that i'm not part of it let's not go there let's not go there All right. So you act about of a cult. We're just going to drop it there. It's not a bit. But anyway, keep going. Okay. Let's go over to some personal finance. I mean, I've read some of your writings. I've seen you interviewed, et cetera. We agree on most things. But there is one thing we have a slight disagreement on. So I thought I'd bring it up, but it would be fun. And that I'm very nervous about people having fully funded emergency funds. You've said that you don't love people using a line of credit. I tend to like a mix of the two. But the reason I'm, I think in theory, I agree with you. Let's get the fully. fund emergency fund is that everybody I see younger people, especially, they keep using it for non-emergency emergencies and they have a lot of trouble staying away from the money. But now if you go to build the emergency fund when you have to build such a down payment fund of just such

huge size because the price of real estate balancing those priorities and getting to both target numbers, that's really tricky to do. It is incredibly tricky and I don't want to minimize how hard it is to do all the quote unquote right things at the same time, especially for people who are young and potentially young and starting or having families. And like, there's a lot of, every dollar has seven different things that it could be doing. Right. But I do. So one thing about your comment about people using their emergency funds for things that are non-emergencies, I think that's true. And it is one of the things that we fail to do when we talk about emergency funds is, it's very similar to like a cohabitation agreement. As we're setting this up, or just personally,

it doesn't have to be a couple conversation, but like, what are the circumstances? in which I will allow myself to use this. Yeah, like that. Define what an emergency is. And the second thing is, if we talk about somebody saving for a home and somebody building an emergency fund, the thing that I tend to think about a lot, in part because I'm a mom and I can imagine how everything bad could happen all the once. I think it happens when you get pregnant. Like, oh, everything. Anyways.

But in part because what we're looking to do is regret minimization and we're looking to actually, and we're looking to actually actually, actually help people avoid catastrophe. So it is uncomfortable, life changing maybe if you're saving up for a home and you just, it's the prices keep going up and it's out of reach or you just don't have enough money to save. That is all challenging. Like I don't, again, I don't want to minimize it. If you lose your job and you can't keep paying rent and you can't put food on the table, that's catastrophic. I agree. So an emergency fund that is in part made up of cash and in part access to credit. But then again, lines of credit are callable. And if you're in the middle of the worst thing and then suddenly they say like, actually that $15,000 balance,

you got to pay it back right now. That makes an emergency even worse. And I'm going to actually argue on your side for a second and against me is they actually, they actually are getting called occasionally now. Yeah. And so they weren't for a long time because, you know, things are going well and rates are low. But now all of a sudden, we've seen some challenges. So no, your point's well taken. Often by the way, I've seen younger people, not at my advice. They're just smart enough to do it on their own. They've had a line of credits kind of set up with their parents where they knew their parents would lend them some if they really needed it. So it couldn't be called. And then they saved half to the emergency fund on their own. And then they knew they had access to the

rest if something catastrophic to use your word happen. I kind of like that combination. Yeah. Yeah. If it's available to you, sure. For sure. In fact, I might even contact your parents about that. Sure. Okay. Cool. Good luck with that. Okay. Okay. Good. All right. You've been a, I think a good voice in the RRSP TFSA debate. It's become a little heated over the last few years. We've had some very strong people out there talking about it. But you've kind of said, hey, let's just view the RSP's as a tool. And we don't have to think of them as good or bad.

They're a tool. And in many instances, they're a tool people should be using. But that's the best way to look at it. I couldn't agree with you more. Expand on your thinking a little bit there. An RRS or a TFSA does a couple of things at the same time. One is, okay, I'm saving for the future. So in RSP or a TFSA can do that fine, right?

The next one is I am thinking about my tax situation today. So that's when often RRS wins out if people are thinking only about today, right? Like this is my tax exposure. I have earned this much if I put a contribution and I get some of that money back. The other tool is tax planning today and tomorrow, which is often where RSP critics come in and say like, my parents or my own RRSP, like they have so much money in RRSPs and now they have this huge tax bill and agreed, right? And it's not like, well, what you should do is go back in time and change what you did. Of course, we have to deal with the challenges that we have today when we have

them. But thinking about having some insight, and this is sometimes where a financial planner can help. A lot of resources exist out there. So it's not like you should always only talk to a planner, but having some idea of what our RSP versus TFSA contributions can do for you today and in the future makes really good sense. And there's two situations that I think are not often mentioned in the RSP versus TFSA debate. And I don't mean they're never mentioned because there are definitely excellent people out there saying all the right things. But one, if you are in that group of people who have relatively low income and so people say like, well, you know, you're not going to pay very much tax when you're retired, so an RSP might not be for you, are correct. And if you have children,

or if you get income tested benefits, right, Canada Child Benefit, Ontario Trillion Benefit, any of those things, you might still benefit from RSP contributions, even if you don't really need them from a tax perspective when you're older and drawing from your savings. But it changes your marginal effective tax rate. Essentially all it does, it qualifies you for more of those income tested benefits. I think you're being almost too diplomatic, to be honest, because I wrote about that in the wealthy barber redo that just came out and how it has to be factored in. And you're right. There are a few people that are saying this and doing a very good job. But I'll tell you, a lot of the planners out there aren't saying it at all. They're not looking at the effective

marginal tax rate as they think all this through relative to what it'll be in retirement. They're only looking at the literal marginal tax rate. They're not talking about things like the impact in CCB. We need the whole industry to take. account of this and to look at it carefully because it can matter. Like it is actually a fairly important part of this decision for some people. Oh, for sure. And to know who it matters for and who it doesn't. I mean, that, of course, is part of what we have to do as professionals. Right. The other one I do want to mention, and now I'm encroaching on John Sapleton's territory, who I know you're familiar with, but when the time comes to start, when you get close to age 60 to 70,

that kind of band of time when you make decisions about your Canada pension plan and where you're taking any savings that you might have amassed, what you're taking it out of. And then when you start old age security, like there are very specific rules for people who are retiring on a low income that are, again, it's getting more because, I mean, he put together a free course for financial planners with Alexander McQueen. So it's getting more traction in mostly in large part to John. But I think people, I think in general, when the average person looking for help goes on line to find it or listens to podcasts or whatever to find out like, what should I do? They're presented with almost all of the options. And the very next question they ask is,

yeah, but what about my situation? Or the very next question they should ask is, yes, but what about my situation? So, yeah, I don't, I never really enjoyed the RSP versus TFSA debate. I love that kind of mathy stuff. And when it first started all those years ago, there were so many mistakes being made. I've talked on the podcast before, but one of the big think tanks put out a paper on it and made a huge mistake because there was an assumption there that everything you pulled out of your RSP was taxed at your highest marginal rate when of course that's not true because let's say you took 50,000 a one year in your graduated system and so that skewed the math, etc. But you're right. John, Alexander, they're doing a good job of bringing this information out

in ways that it's digestible and she's a very sharp person obviously and comes at all these things from all the right angles. She's a lot sharper than I am. And so I think we're on the right track now drawing attention to, but it goes to one of the themes of this podcast. Retirement income planning is something you have to do because without changing your risk levels at all, you can keep a lot more money in your pocket if you do it well. If you know how to execute and whether to use a meltdown strategy, when to take your CPP. And my big argument, and I'm not pro planner at all times is, but this is one time you need a planner in many instances. There is some good do-it-yourself software. It's getting better. There's more of it out there. But I still think a planner who has seen the mistake.

and knows kind of what questions to ask can add a lot of value. Now, you're biased, but do you agree that this is one case where a planner can really make a big difference, the retirement income planning? And sometimes the big difference is for the people who are very quick and good with some of this better software that exists, the difference we make is to go in and give them like a look over the shoulder or a second opinion and say like, no, you're thinking about the right things. But for other people, there are so many complex moving parts.

and the onus is on the individual to do it right and to do it once. And it is very difficult to, if you are an expert on your own life, if you know how to teach a classroom full of 34 kids or whatever the other thing might be, it is understandable that all of the technical requirements to kind of avoid shipwreck in retirement aren't things that you spent a lot of time thinking about. So it is totally fair, right? That's well said. I want to add one more thing, which is there's also, you know,

No, the software is good and I'm sure it's going to get better, but there are real life pieces of knowledge, just about how institutions work, even something small as it's unlikely you'll be able to take a monthly withdrawal out of your RRSP. You'll have to convert it or pay administrative fees. Like those kinds of things are small enough. That's exactly my point. No, that's a great example. That's exactly my point is that you're seeing that on the front lines all the time. You know the nuances and cumulatively the nuances can make a fairly big difference to what should be the strategy selected. And I've just seen so much value add from the better planners on the retirement income front. And I like the people to get the advice relatively early.

I'd rather they go five to seven years before retirement, certainly not waiting until that day or anything along that line. And to your point about the moving part, so many more people have corporations now and hold codes, et cetera. And all of this gets factored in as well. It's quite confusing. It's quite confusing. And I do need to say that optimizing on the technical financial side or

picking one of many potentially optimal paths, I should say, because there's never just one, is only one piece of the puzzle because so many people are coming. Like retirement as a concept is new, right? It's 50, 60 years old, at least in Canada. The idea that we will have a third act of maybe 30 or 40 years, it's something so brand new that people do not have sort of mental models for it, other than what we've been sold, like the two retirees in the bathtub on the beach or something, right? Like, So people are... Wait, wait a second. I don't think that the bathtub is on the beach.

I haven't seen those stats. From the back, palm tree, sand, blue sky, two bathtubs and then two older people holding hands. You're going to better resorts than I am. Our bathtubs are right in our hotel room. I got to check out your spots. I want to have a bath on the beach. It's not part of my aspirational thing. But we've been sold this idea that retirement is amazing and great and then you leave and you go do leisurely things and it's wonderful.

One, people have identity crises in return. This is new information, right? But so people don't want to retire. They believe that they want to retire. But in their own particular situation, some people genuinely just don't want to stop, but they think that they have to. And then they're surprised and sad when it's not what they wanted because what they really wanted to do is keep working. And the second group of people are people who have been told all of their lives putting money into savings is good and taking money out of savings is back. Back to the emergency fund.

Right. And suddenly on, you know, on Tuesday, they're putting money into savings. And then they flip a switch. And there are people that I've worked with genuinely for 10 years. And every time we review their plan and we do the risks, like the stress testing and all of that stuff again, we update all the values. And I say, I think you could be spending more or giving more to your kids. Whatever the thing is, it's not necessarily consumerism, but they still don't believe it. And the thing that gives them the feeling of control and reduces their anxiety because it's a one-time thing in retirement is not spending money.

And that's a thing that means that they're, they're really constraining themselves in ways that they don't have to. And it's impacting their quality of life. Yeah. I mean, Rob's talked about that a lot lately too and saying that is a big thing. This isn't a little thing. This is something that's really affecting a lot of people. They just can't bring themselves to spend because, again, we've been trained all our life. But I would argue some of them are bringing up a legitimate point too.

And that is they're seeing late life costs for assisted living and bringing people into the home. We've all been exposed to it with a parent or grandparent and an aunt and uncle, whatever, we're going, holy smokes. Like, if that does happen to me, the amount of capital I may have to have set aside to go that way for five and 10 years, it's credible. So you've got this. You may not have it. But if you do, it's so big, it's a problem. How do you plan for that? It's tricky.

It is so incredibly tricky. Well, even, I mean, even taking that huge possibility and very terrifying, you know, potential future out of the mix, if we knew exactly how long people would live, financial planning would be. A whole lot easier. So much easier. Right. Unbelievable. Total business, different business model altogether. But finding the right balance between I can spend in a way that feels full and good. And I have, I'm being prudent. I have money set aside for the future if something happens. That's a real balancing act. Never mind the fact that, you know, in a way, I'm going to get on a soapbox for a moment. It is weird and unjust that we are. putting on individuals, the responsibility to solve how do I care for myself at the end of my life?

Because for-profit companies make the alternative that feels like I've got the most autonomy and the most comfortable circumstances given the kind of care that I need, those ones cost an arm and a leg. And so if I don't save appropriately, I guess I'm going to get stuck in one of the long-term care homes that let a bunch of people die in COVID. Like people are coming specifically to talk about one of my values in retirement. They're saying less about, not across the board, but there are people that will come and not talk about their travel. They'll not talk about getting, you know, going to the cottage more often or something

like that. They're talking about how do I make absolutely sure that I have enough money that I never end up in long term care? No, I don't disagree. And then you mentioned it. I mean, we can help them to do that. But you use the expression, it's an arm in Lake. And I mean, we've been through it.

One of my family, it's hundreds of thousands a year to provide, you know, 12 or 24 hour daily care to avoid falling, et cetera. Well, again, planning for that becomes exceptionally challenging. My father, a few years ago, he was 90-ish at the time said, we've got to start getting rid of everybody at 83. He said, otherwise we can't afford it. Society can't afford it. And then we can plan. And I said, dad, you're 90. Do I have to remind you that? He goes, I know, but I thought of this. So I'm grandfathered in. Everything's fine. But I mean, obviously, we don't want to do that. But its big picture point is that the costs of all of this are going to have to be born by somebody and we're going to have to figure this out what's the best way to do it from

society's perspective the most fair etc your argument is we're not there yet we've got to continue to think this through come up with more creative solutions etc but i'm hearing this all the time and so as you make a very legitimate point as does rob the people are hey we should be spending a little bit more in the position you're in again their counterpoint about worrying about late life spending on health care and in home help it's a legitimate point it's a legitimate point it's It's a legitimate point and we, it's not, there's no miracle needed to actually solve the problem systemically. There's political well needed.

Like, we have the money. And it is, it's cruel to let old people be treated as though they're irrelevant and disposable because they just didn't happen to save enough money. Like that's, that's not a problem that I don't think anybody in Canada would think about solving with, well, just let them, just let them. really thinks that. So to actually make that into a reality with the political will necessary to enact change legislatively and create like non-profits that have to do it instead of for-profit corporations, we can do it. There's more of us than there are of them. No, that's good. No, I think

that's a very legitimate point. All right, going to switch horses here. You know what's interesting, index funds get so much more attention now and fees get so much more attention. But at the end of the day in Canada, unlike many of the other developed world countries, the vast majority of our money is in actively managed mutual funds. And so we think that the lessons getting out there, the teachings getting out there and the awareness about the damage of high fees is getting out there, but it's not reflected in the data. Yeah. It's improving, but it's still very heavily tilted towards actively managed funds, often extremely expensive.

You know, Canada can run from 1.5 in an equity fund all the way up to 2.75. I mean, it's kind of wacky. It is, but I think it does go back a little bit to when we were talking about the marketplace segment, right? Like significant market share of retail investing happens at the bank level. And if it's not the bank level, it's at a mutual fund shop that have the same prices or higher. And those people, I mean, the wealth management arm of every bank and every mutual fund company is a profitable arm. So it's not like they're telling their own people who are in front of regular human beings, you know what, fees really matter. A disciplined investment policy matters.

What they're telling them is objection handling and sales strategies. So if most of the people who are investing with little or no knowledge about how don't know, who aren't picking up the book and listening to the podcast and doing the self-education that I'm grateful that we have the ability to hand out, but not everybody has the ability or the capacity to engage with, if those people are all walking into the bank because that's what you did 30 years ago or that's what you did because your parents did it or whatever, those people aren't getting any of the information that we're putting out there. And again, for our listeners who don't follow this obviously as closely as geeky people like I do, Canada is really quite wacky. Like we have balanced funds in Canada.

Some of the biggest funds in the country at about 200 basis points, 2% a year going out. And they're buying bonds. I can do that. And the other half is a closet index fund because they're buying a large cap, not that far out of alignment with the, you're going, holy smokes. Like this is money printing. And I actually said to one of the top money management people at one of the banks once. I mean, this is not great for the consumers.

You should, you know, rethink this. And he said, that would be a career limiting move. Yeah. And I think that that's exactly what you're saying. I mean, it doesn't really fit into the strategy. And you know, the funny thing is we sound negative here. A lot of my closest friends work at banks. And I've worked with the banks a lot and really enjoyed it immensely.

But at the end of the day, they are trying to make a profit. They're publicly traded companies. And like all of them, whether you're selling beds or Dave Chilton. selling books. You're trying to make money. And of course, that's going to be some of what drives strategy and everything else. All that being said, though, I wish we had them coming down a little bit more than they have, that we saw some of the fees going down more quickly. They have in other countries fallen more quickly at some of the major institutions than they have in Canada. All right, as we wrap up here, any other subject you really feel it's important

to cover, something you felt that you wanted to get across to our listeners and viewers? I so this is a pet thing for me somebody asked me this question yesterday what is the most tangible thing that people can do to improve their financial security and I said something that isn't tangible at all which is talk to people talk to not I mean I don't mean a chat bot or messaging with a influencer I mean real human people that you have real human relationships of care with right like we're not just buttonholing people and telling them our net worth or something right but of all the things that we as human share with each other about parenting and it's so difficult when this happens. We don't do that about money because many of us are very ashamed, right? Or the only people we talk about money with are sometimes their financial planner and then everything comes out all at once, which I'm grateful for. I feel privileged. And also it shouldn't be that way.

So if you can talk or build a circle of trust to just speak openly about the challenges with the successes. It's not about bragging and it's not about being ashamed. It's about this is a functional tool that all of us use every single day. And the only people that benefit from not talking about it are the same people that benefit when employees don't talk about how much they're earning in a corporation, right? It's the bosses. It's the owners. So people, everyday people benefit when there is no shame about money. And the only way to create no shame is to get comfortable by practicing speaking about the things that are that are difficult for you. So talk more about money. I support that completely. I will give you some good news. I'm seeing some of the people in their

20s are starting to do that a little bit more. There was some research out of the state saying the same thing that a lot of people in their 20s are a little bit more open to speaking to their closest friends. Are you running into this too or how did you get together the money? And you're right. Some there's shame involved, but also sometimes you say that to somebody and they say, well, my mother and father gave it to me. And then there's some bitterness or some envy. involved there, but I think it's still very healthy. I think even in the workplace environment that talking to your work colleagues about some of this makes a lot of sense. They make a similar income in many instances. No, I'm fully supportive of that. I think that we need a lot more of that.

Yeah, yeah, regular people, not just like, I mean, I'm happy to talk to you, but like I can nerd out about this all day, but we get to talk about money all the time and other people just don't have that opportunity. So. Okay, well, you've been great. You lived up to the billing. Okay, you really did. We'll see what the feedback is from the various banks as we play this out over time. I'll find out when my line of credit is closed. Yeah, we'll publish your address in Gravenhurst, docs you as they say. See, I know the expressions. I'm on to them. But no, you're welcome back in it. You're welcome back anytime. You did a great job, continued success with the business and really enjoyed having you on. Yeah, well, thank you. Again, thank you for writing that book and making it so that I started

this path in the first place. No, that's great. I'm glad you shared that story. You never get tired of hearing that the book had some sort of impact. So thank you so much. You bet. Wow.