Recently my wife and I went on a group date. While my wife and her friend were off visiting with another group of friends, I got to talking with the husband of my friends wife. At first we made small talk about our wives and kids, then he asked the question every man asks another man when left alone for too long. What do you do for a living?
He had previously mentioned to me how he was a successful computer programmer for one of the largest online retailers in the world. I told him how I show people how to build large pools of tax-free money that contractually won't lose money and how to use them to be their own source of financing.
He immediately said you must sell specially designed life insurance. I have to tell you this is not an every day occurrence for me. I knew at some point someone must have shared the details of how these plans work with him. This lead to me ask a serious of questions to see whether he really understood it or not.
To my great surprise he was incredibly well educated on the topic. Like ninja level! He basically re-sold me on the concept as he explained all the advantages and how to use the policies to your advantage. He loved the idea of building a stock pile of liquid cash that earned a good return and couldn't be taxed. In fact he loved it so much he bought a plan over a decade earlier.
You see this guys father is a super successful stock broker with over 30 years of experience. He is well connected to authors, gurus and educators all over the world. One night one of these types came to stay at his parents home as a guest for a seminar they were co-hosting. By this time my new friend was already married with children but he came by because the man was going to do a private education seminar for their family in the fathers living room.
This guy told me he remembered listening to this man tell all these incredible stories about buying cars and real estate, stories of starting businesses and surviving a company lay off, all with these plans. He told me how captivated he was and was able to ask question after question and have the math done right before his eyes. He said I left my parents house in awe and was determined to get a plan. This educator no longer sold insurance so this guy found a local insurance agent and bought a Variable Universal Life policy.
This was a HUGE mistake! Every thing this guru had shared with him was built upon the premise of a dividend paying whole life policy built in a very specific manner. You see, with the right type of contract, your money grows EVERY single year and gets a dividend on top of that. Though the dividend isn't guaranteed, an annual increase is and the groups I use have never missed a dividend. A Variable policy rides the ups and downs of the stock market and can LOSE money. This guy was losing money. He had bought the wrong product.
For 10 years he funded his plan. Some years were positive and some were negative but the negative years were really damaging. He eventually cashed out the policy and swore off the strategy until we met. I told him he had everything right but the agent and the product. Trusting that any old agent would be a good mentor was erroneous thinking. Trusting a variable plan with high fees was the other problem.
I don't know whether this guy will ever get back on the 'be your own source of financing train' or not, but he was grateful to have had me point out where it went wrong. It wasn't him, it was the product and an unknowledgeable agent. This I see regularly, unfortunately.
He had the knowledge of a world class surgeon when it came to understanding the strategy, but his instrument was a butter knife. At least we can learn from his mistake. I want to educate you to a master level and then put the right tool in your hand.
If you'd like to work with an experienced agent that understands how to build and use the program and has a decade of real world experience actually using his plan, let me know. I'm your guy!
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