Can I Make It In Today's Economy? Rabbi Eliezer Gewirtzman & Mr. Doni Brodie - Living Smarter Jewish

Everybody I was asked to give a very brief introduction to tonight's event. First of all, thank you everyone for being here. I want to thank for opening up for this purpose. [applause] I also want to thank all of the neighbor for giving me that behind this event. and encouraging that it happens and that I also want to personally thank those who were involved in the detailed Yan Miller Peterman all those who I have forgotten to mention um I also want to just give a brief introduction tonight's event of course is focused on finances But of course, finances are not just limited to dollars and cents and bank accounts. They have farreaching consequences from to health, both emotional health, physical health and everything else in between. The challenges are nothing new. They've been around since the exist but the exact nature and form of how of what the challenges are those have changed over time and each time we have changes we need to have new what does the terror want from us now how are we supposed to do things differently and to be able to have practical tools to be able to implement those ideas and those strategies And so as being involved, anytime I'm involved in anything that affects the club, it never ceases me to to fascinate you. So wherever there's an issue, wherever there's a challenge, there's always some people that will rise up and say, "Here I am. I want to help. What can I do?" And so it's my privilege tonight to introduce our speakersman besides for being a rantry and wearing many other hats and play kesh somehow finds time to be able to dedicate much of his time many hours the cloud to cahillas to educate to guide the couples navigate this challenge and he's here tonight to be able to share some of his insights. And I also would like to thank Daniel Broaddy Broaddy who's come to us all the way from my a person who also is involved in many many endeavors and somehow finds time to be able to spend countless hours to be able to help counsel guidance couples to be able to help with this particular challenge. special is not what we talk about. The is what we do about it. And the goal of tonight is not just to hear to hear speeches. The goal of tonight is to actually take action when we leave. And my brother to the presenters that they should continue to have to be able to do their and to this gathering that should be And us should be able to see much. >> All right. show all the of the neighborhood put together as the as those who are who are looking at the that Cebu as a whole, what the are, what the needs are understood that discussing finance is something as the mentioned, not just dollars and cents and something that affects us in almost every area of life. Lord tells us in that that fights in the home issues come back to finances and therefore it's important that we come together to address this issue. Our goal tonight is not to discuss who guide us in that realm. Our primary goal tonight is to discuss. When you're happier, you tend to have but I would like to focus tonight specifically on and that is we all want for ourselves, our family, our children to be happy. And the question is how can we have a relationship with our finances that will ultimately bring happiness tells us that one of the biggest tools of the is to ensure that people don't think because if a person would stop and think his life would be different has many tools making is not The phones on our belts or wherever we find them definitely don't help the situation and has us exactly where he wants us. The days go turn into weeks turn into months turn into years and we never stop and think. And if we can set a goal for tonight, let's stop and think what is my relationship with my finances and how do I ensure that my finances are used to make me happy as opposed to just allowing my impulse to just shle me and my finances in any direction that it could. I think if we would analyze why people in the world spend money, there are three reasons we can suggest as to why people feel the need to buy stuff and to spend money. First and foremost, so they can enjoy life. I want to enjoy my life. If I buy things, I'll enjoy life. If I go on vacation, I'll enjoy myself. If I don't, I won't. So, we have this idea that if we want to enjoy life, the more things we buy, the more things we'll enjoy. The second thing is very important thing, we need to keep up. Whether we went to me and we were taught that you can't be a n or whether we didn't go to me and there's other words to describe it. But the bottom line is we all have a deep ingrown desire to want to keep up. We don't want to look like nebases. We don't want to look like losers. We want through our spending, we want to be able to keep up. And the last thing, we'll speak about this at the end. The idea of being we all in some way, shape, or form want to feel that we're just a regular guy doesn't feel so good. So somehow if through our money we can make the statement that we're it, then that's the reason for us to have a drive to be rich and to be able to spend and to be able to put cars in a driveway next to a house that maybe we could or can't afford. But this way people know who I am. The question is you ask any 8-year-old when you get older, do you want to be rich? 100%. Yeah. Why? because ultimately I can buy whatever I want and then I'll get this and then I'll go here and then and then ultimately he's going to tell you hopefully and then I'll be the happiest man in the world. Now I know somebody we all know him. He used to live in New York. Now he lives in Florida in Maralo who has all kinds of things. And for some reason it wasn't good enough. It didn't make him happy. One of the biggest that I appreciate the older that I get and the more that I see the world. It's not a It's not like you know like you learn when you're six years old. No, no. My friend, oh yeah, in essence, if you have all the money in the world and you're not happy, if you're missing, you're not you're depressed. You're missing. And if you have whatever you have and you're missing nothing, you have to spend the world. What do you need? So is not just a cute part of it's the essence of understanding human nature and what drives us to be rich. Says Kaz, don't go down the highway. Just turn off this. This is the the only way is through the exit. It's not. And the truth is it's really deeper than that because what happens? There's something that we want. A car, a large family, a beautiful vacation, whatever we want. And we get it. And we live in the home for a week, two weeks, three weeks, a month. Now all of a sudden there's a few around you dance and we get used to it. So in essence what happens is when we look for mis after we experience them a number of times they become necessities kazal tell us that if you have a person who's used to being rode around a white horse and he has riders in front of him screaming you know here comes Mr. the rich man you to collect money that he should be that way. Could you imagine if you had a guy like that in the slave and the guy that came around knocking at every door and gave him a check and then 10 minutes later he saw the white voices. What kind of comfort would that be? Right? He just he's running by the same people who just wouldn't know us. Ter is when we get addicted to something, when we get too used to something, it becomes such a necessity. So we go and we spend money on items to make us happy and before we turn around, they're necessities. You ever thought about it? comes through the neighborhood here straight out of Ben or B and he looks at the homes and he looks at the grass and there's more grass in front of your house than there is in the whole city of okay and he looks at this and he goes wow look at this I have what like two two bedrooms plus a hole in the back one day I can make an addition I really collect money And look at this guy. Question. Are we any happier than him? Are we happier with our 4300t home? If I sound outdated, I apologize. Um, than he is with his 715 m, whatever he has there. Probably that because what's the answer? We get used to something and once you get used to something that becomes that becomes the fact when I was a young childish had sh so every once in a while make a kish and he he would go all out he didn't deserve every once in a while he would serve child. We would go dash into that kdish like we never saw food in our lives almost as much as the kids today go after mess. What happened? We got used to cooking. They used to chug. Now we're on to the next and then the next and then the next. So in essence, when we stop and think about it and we decide it's time to spoil ourselves or it's time to spoil our children, We'll get back to the to the pressures in the class. We'll get there. What in essence we're doing is pushing up a standard making us more dependent on more stuff thereby requiring is a necessity to the point that one day you can't have it. Tell the bow it down go give it to him because you can't manage it. And that's ultimately what we're doing. So we start off thinking that we're creating an outlet, but ultimately what we end up with is creating a monster that becomes harder and harder to control. contractor once told me that if not for the sake that once you're doing it may as well he wouldn't have a house if people would just build houses. No, no, but every guy builds a house and once he does it may as well do that. That's all the purpose. I won't fall into that check or you build a house. First thing you need to do is look at the neighbors. Person can't look inwards. You have to look outwards. And therefore putting in tens, hundreds of thousands of dollars to be able because this is what we have to do. Looking around the room, many people here that were with me when I first got married. You probably remember this. Most couples had one car. A lot of us had one cell phone. And when you moved a little further out, you moved to you got a second car. There was something called a local car, right? You get a car replace one of my friends today. He was only able to fill up his tank halfway in the second half of the That's it. And you live that way. I had two cars and people only had one and that was you had today. Let's see. We need two of the cars. Are we any more happy to the cars than we were back then? Not really. But we're stuck with the bills. And the truth is it's not just that. Every area of our lives it's like that. How big was a house 20 years ago? Five years ago I moved to the villag speak to a guy who was 45 50 years old vill speak guy that's 25 right that's what happened right houses. Think about how far we've come. This particular that other picture designer clothing what about this and alcohol prices for restaurants can't just go out to the restaurant and leave jewelry watches vacations just keep ourselves that this is what we have to do. People make some this this hole is not good enough that hole is not good enough and this and that and the other this flower the other thing who stops and people push themselves beyond their beyond their abilities who eats it your family that helped pay for it and a few of your friends who came to 10 minutes and I'm very disappointed because it just stop. So they sit down and supper again right for that what's going to for that for what purpose we we almost like most of them and a lot of this comes because there are people who are in business and the whole is to be able to show us how this is important and that's important the third thing is important happened before we even turned around. We said we need it and we're not happy. So what happened? We basically took a lot of hardearned money, a lot of hours at work, and we basically robbed all our happiness away because we spent it. We got used to it. We need it. And now we're back to [snorts] 20 years ago when we got married. Living life and looking for the next opportunity to be able to enjoy life, which just $150,000 a year later. And one of the questions we really need to ask ourselves is the truth is the question also we all have. I'll start with is it normal to be back Well, if you grew up then it's normal. If you grew up then it's not. It's not. Is it normal to go on vacation? Some people tell you some people tell you not to grow up. How long is it normal to have a comfort? That was the biggest one of the biggest nightmares. How long? Well, if I grew up five minutes to be four. If I grew up a half hour, it should be 26. Right? There's a certain understanding of us all. And when we push the bar so that we give our children happiness, all eight of them, you know what we did? The pressure that we put them on to be able to live up to what's known because I grew up like this. Who said we're doing that many things? Very often, we don't stop to think No, my kid don't stop and therefore that's what happens and I will say what can we do? Everyone can afford it. Everyone's on my way out of the house tonight. One of my children asked me, "How do you get swapped this money thing? Like how did this happen?" So, young realized that so we put up a sign making for women as asking every woman to please come important message please come. So it's 400. So in the cabinetry set up 100 chairs eating on the side just in case. That's always how to do it right. And most of the chairs are empty. We did most of the chairs empty. And I think about this idea and somehow someway they took it. They sent it out the next day. And before I knew it, I couldn't walk down the street. Last night I checked not after the hour I not asked to see by the grace of so what happened everyone's in jail everyone feels that they must be the only one and some rabbi got up and said no we're all like this oh goodbye so all of a sudden everybody felt a certain connection like ah someone actually made it that it's just not meas There's one guy called me. I always knew my name in that body. Now you confirmed it. Very good. But I pun it. It's It's fake. The world we live in is fake. And we're all running after and running after. And we have to get an image. An image of what? An image of who? Schwarz mentioned to me that [clears throat] here roughly is 40 years old give or take. That's the average age of reminded me of devel when you're 20 years old you realize you better watch out the world is watching and you have to make sure that you know you're you're living that you know you have to live to impress. You turn 40, you say, you know what, enough of this. I don't care what the world thinks. I got to live life and moving on. And when you're 60, you realize that they would never look up to myself. It was 30 40. So going into the next stage, how do we how do we make sure that we're doing this responsibility? So I think the answer is a very simple question. The answer is very simple. We have to stop and ask ourselves. I have a budget. I don't know what it is, but I have it. How much of the money that goes out of my checking account is for necessities? And how much of the money that goes out of my checking account is for extras? Every human being is is entitled to once in every say about it. He's so normal that it's crazy. type of but what's what's a necessity and what's discretionary what's extra do you know that 75% of respondents in the US were asked if fast food is a luxury or a necessity I don't think they were asked about tomahawk about the law asked me 75% of people said that's a luxury. Honestly, a new car is a luxury or it's a necessity. So with my ent get a chance to open the book but many years ago know they always come up like you know wild things that you can win $5 and dream maybe you win. So one year came up with idea. It was called around the world. Okay. So it was summer in the mountains. So winter and far pes in the hotel and the only thing that didn't catch on is that everything else is it's not anymore. There are people we know that this is how they live. They have a bungalow. They go to sir mid winter vacation in Florida. That's what the kids are. They got to go with that. And you go right and the [clears throat] question is people feel if I can't do all of them then I have to sit down and have a heart-to-he heart conversation with my children to explain to them how poor we are. That's where we met. Now what's the idea of vacation? I remember someone came into my house at full show and he was complaining to me how the world is not crazy was going to ex this year was on a Thursday. So if you go to surface and you spend whatever how much 20,000 goes you have to go and you can but to sit in doing nothing from so add the bill of your mortgage plus your house plus apartment you have to rent another apartment up north and the guy's telling me like I just can't do it That's what we do. I said, I don't know. I'm not doing it, right? But [sighs] so what does that why do you want to to show so your children should have a because that is what you have to do. 507 $80,000 whatever it cost plus the chef and the food and the this and the that what guy's sitting there I have to do it what that's what ends up happening in the middle we decided we're living life for others we're not living life for ourselves and and we have zero control over our lives we're allowing people not sure who or what here. Who started it? Who who continued it? Well, this is how I live my life. How do you get out of this? And that's what tonight is. This is an organization Alex LJ Kish many others who dedicate hours of their time to sit down with focus. Now before you shoot me and say I don't budget might not be a value before that figure out how much money am I spending for real that I need to spend my tuition I have no choice whether I like it or not I got to pay tuition at this point whether I should or shouldn't I have to pay mage my electric's got to stay on and how much of this is discretionary spending. You know, if we knew what that number was, I'm warning you, it's going to be a lot more than you think. And if we knew what that number was, it would be painful. Half the horror would be gone right then. I had a fellow who came over to me once after sat down with Ellis. He said, "You realize my discretionary spending was over $50,000 a year, and I'm sitting here saying that I can't afford a house. How do I live with myself knowing that if my discretionary spending would have been half of what I spent, I'd be living in my own house right now?" And instead, I let it go and I squandered it. We look for so many things. Many of you are holding on the cost of paying for are not cheap. The bows they throw around $60,000 to make. Wouldn't it be invigorating to be able to pay for without having to worry about it for one second? Or as a person just told me recently, you're trying to join. You thought you put away enough money and in the middle of sh that credit card bill comes and I have no idea how to pay for support maybe just I shouldn't need credit cards I should be comfortable why because I have an understanding of what I'm doing why I'm doing it and I'm not here to tell the only spend exactly, but know what and why. If I'm going on a vacation, it's because I made a decision that for myself and my spouse, we need to get away for a few days. It's time for our family to go together as a family and to create memories that will last for a lifetime. That's the middle beginning, the middle, and end. We what? Who? Why? It's an elephant. It doesn't make a difference. People say can't say can't say it's a real honestly is that is that a saint to say after all people the average person can make a probably is more than a third of his yearly incomes very often you give a person years before later it's not that really I'm working in the company I I believe my daughter's going to become the next day my boss is going to call me in and give me a 33% base and if I don't believe that it's a little bit out of that I'm not I know it's but if we stop and we think many women have this thing it's really not my problem it's my husband's problem it's my husband's problem it's his job to provide if I can answer that question if a woman says I surrender my my power to spend whatever my husband wants. That's what it is. I don't adise, but then maybe she has a right to step back. But for a healthy home, what really has to happen is that a couple as a couple knows what's coming in, knows what's being spent, knows why and how it's being spent. And then with Sha and a couple can make a decision together. This is kad and this is not kad and this is how we spend money. People say what am I supposed to tell my children? Children come to me. So one thing never tell your children. Don't tell them you can't afford. It's hard for a child. The answer is every person has priorities. Our priorities are we don't feel that this is something that's spend money. We do other things. We don't go to the country in the summer. We go away for we don't this, we do that. Whatever it is, this is a decision that we make. This is the way we do things. And based on that, we decided that this is something that is not that. Now again, if there's 24 children in your daughter's class that has a certain sneaker, tomorrow there will be 25. That's life. That's the way it goes. But when it comes to figure and other things, we can explain it to our children. Not that we can't afford it. Not that we're not that you're a loser. This is we're in control. And the truth is when we feel that way, it's important. And if I could add one more point, we all have discretionary spending. Many of us if we take the number of discretionary spending that we have and stop and think what do I do to make this money? Is this why I'm sending my wife out to work so I can go to Orlando in the winter plus this and that's her salary and therefore she's going to work every day for that. Is it for that? is the reason why she's going out to work for this is the reason why I took on an extra responsibility at work or I'm at work later is because of what is this worth it? But when we have no hash, we just feel the pressure. We go, "Okay, I need more money. I'll do this. I'll do that. I'll stop. What am I doing? How am I spending? How am I bringing in this money? And what's just to mention the last thing I mentioned about being we all have this we have to be in and it's important. You look in a primary uh kindergarten boy's yearbook, they ask all the children to tell them what they're going to be when they grow up. The most common two answers and a policeman, right? That those are the guys who work, they tell people what to do, right? We get a little bit older and we realize, no, there's better ways to be than that. We all have it in us and we have to realize it. and enable to just accept the fact that I'm just going to live middle class and become that's a hard thing to do. How do we how do we count that? So, first of all, I want to mention when I grew up in lavish, there was a that is gone. I remember once I told somebody I was sitting in a diner and two people were fighting the two were fighting with each other the one thing that they agreed on is that your father was the most errant businessman they ever saw the on his face to hear that does that mean anything to us when was the last time we strive that people should say that that our is our learning is a learning then we should have a we don't have it. So if that's the case, we have to look elsewhere. We have to bring it back. We have to focus on another point focus on being a father. Do you know how many people that you're jealous of who go to hotels? You know why they go? Shouldn't say publicly because they can't sit down and say anything with their kids from they cannot sleep. Let's give you go to a hotel. You put on a klel and walk around. Come back. Yeah. Wouldn't be holy. Each one of us has an opportunity to be a father. Think about it. Would you be able to take each one of your kids out for lunch? What would the conversation be like over a lunch if you went out? You don't put enough time in our family. Being a king in one's house, being a father. How many of us have three year olds? Your kid comes home is telling you something. Have to ask your wife what he say. We're not we're not connected. So then we need to find other things. If we focused on what was important, if we were focused on being a parent, if we were focused on raising, if we were focused on the fact that I want people to say that I'm a businessman and I live and I know that I have one chance to mess up and that's the way I'm going to live my life. I want that people should say about me, my children should say about me. You want to find them, go look at the if that was the goal. If that's what made us the other parts wouldn't be here. So if I'm just heading off I want to drop over time but to end off LSJ is here as part of this evening offering to sit down with couples to do basic budgeting or advanced budgeting every [clears throat] morning. I encourage every person here. You have to know it's shocking to most of us what is coming in, what's going out, why is it going out and what am I doing? Daniel is going to speak show opportunities how to to once a person has something extra what he could do with it. How people can make how people support for a lot of people it's a pain. But before I finish, there are people who unfortunately maybe are looking at me and saying, "Yeah, I was waiting for you to tell that to my neighbor, but for my sake, for me, I'm quite I don't have I'm talking not going on." What's the answer to that person? The answer to that person is never thought about this person's $25,000 credit card. It didn't happen in a vacuum. Speaking to a dance meeting for opening preparation, he shared with me very sad person said nothing happened. I just gained 5 pounds a year. That's all right. A person goes $300 a month in debt. You $300 and it throws on his credit card. After 12 months, it's $3,600. After two years, it's 7,200. Now, he's getting charged 25% interest on that money. Before he turns it around, it's 20 $25,000. He's helpless $300 a month. If you were to realize that that's all that's happening now, the bill's covering campus is juggling. Stop and think. And it's $300 a month. Of course, I would have taken that tutoring job. Of course, I would have even perhaps taken that offer from my struggle. It's the difference between balancing that budget or amount. But I didn't count. I thought I'm $25,000 short. So if I got the no matter where a person's holding, control is one question people ask. If I have a lot of money, do I have to spend it? There's two things. Make sure it's really a lot. And number two, do it because you want to, not because you want to impress somebody else. You want to go through something like if it's don't do it for them. Do it for yourself. to each and every one of you to stop and think simply what is my relationship with money how can I improve my relationship with money and once we do that and we tackle take the opportunity to take the services that I provided whether it's sitting down with a coach as a couple whether it's some of the other investments or other opportunities as as we'll see on a more practical level. We should look forward to marrying marrying all our children. We should have what we need and we should as the mission says. Thank you very much. Hi everyone. Um, I don't think I know one of you, which is quite shocking. You go somewhere and follow this world with 100 people in a room and not one person looks familiar. Well, my name is Donnie Rooney and together with Yuda, I sit on the board of this amazing organization called LSJ. LSJ is a a subsidiary organization. It's part of the OU and it was founded uh a little over 5 years ago with a dual mission statement. The first is to provide every single person in Claw with resources that they may or may not have been deprived of from an educational standpoint, but secondly that it should be free. So in that vein, I just want to let everybody know that Rab Gorsman and I have spoken at several of these events and I came from my proud to tell you I'm not taking a nickel for this. Our wordsman has driven from Lake Wammani to speak at a few events and he also does this free of charge and our sense of to give back and to educate people as far as things that we have learned in our own lives and wishing that we had known these things earlier is too overwhelming to pass up on. So I plan on spending the next 15 or 20 minutes hopefully making you laugh a few times. I happen to be finding my wife and kids don't think so, but uh I'll gauge and see if you agree. So, the first objective tonight is each of you will find a piece of paper on your chair. I want every single one of you men and women, I don't know how many of you are couples to sign up, fill this out, give it to Yehuda, and somebody from our office will reach out to you to set up an intake call and then pair you with an appropriate coach. So, that's the objective for tonight. Before I begin, one uh word of introduction and that would be every single thing that I'm about to tell you. Listen, I myself, I learned in Kuw for a number of years. I very much identify as the yeshiva guy. I happen to work in finance, but that's more than anything else. Everything that I'm about to tell you tonight, I hope it's not all, but everything is just in the realm of this is not something that a person should feel is a guarantee in any way, shape, or form. It's also not something that you should feel any level of regret for for not having done in the past. if you didn't know. So then obviously you're not going to be mum for not doing the and then lastly is that in the in the belt this is called personal finance. Now personal is a very important adjective that means that my finance and your finance are by definition going to be different. That means that I might need I don't want to, you know, harp on what words was saying, but I might need a new car and you might say, I'm happy with the car with the gas and you might need to go to a bungalow for the summer and I live in Muny and I think people that go to bungalows are just literally putting money in the fireplace and we're entitled to be different. But the point is that when you sit down with a coach who's an objective third party who hopefully or more often than not does not know who you or your wife are, you'll be able to get some sort of level of comfort that you know this is a person who is not making judgments and who's just helping me put my life in perspective. So with that, I just want to you know take you through a few slides and walk you through what um being coached is like and the benefits that it could have in your life. The reason why I do this is we all know making is an overwhelming thing. I know I'm, you know, I'm not in that yet and my children are getting older. And it's something that if you're not thinking about it's just because you're consciously choosing to to block it out. But when you see people marrying off kids and it really wrecks the sha and the parents only they're forced to spend money that they can't and the pressure and the stress it puts on the of the other children. It's not a vibe that that's uh desirable and it's something that I know from the things that I've educated myself on is very very very avoidable and my goal is that every one of us should be able to walk our children down to the with and no da in the world. Now if you make tomorrow I don't take a price for that. Let's talk about the younger kids. So the first thing is no matter who you are there are three types of you. I can know with certainty you fall into one of these three categories. You either have credit card debt. Now, as wordsman said, $25 a day on a credit card, I mean, spending more money than you have, assuming you have no savings, will amount to $30,000 in credit card debt in just 3 years. Now, a coach will help you get yourself organized, identify where that $25 leak is coming from. And if you are a candidate, meet Tom Cla. yourself does have organizations that will help you as long as you can present a cogent and clear plan as to how you will be able to get out of this and that you won't fall back into it. There are people that will help you. The second person is the person who's living paycheck to paycheck. He might have meatboards at his kittish. He might have a new car, but underneath the hood there's nothing going on. He it's empty. His checking accounts are empty. He's constantly stressing out, moving money from his helock and doing all sorts of crafty things just to project an image, but he is effectively living paycheck to paycheck. Coaching is for him, too. And we'll see why. The third person is the the fortunate guy who has extra money. He just has no idea what to do with it. Just on this guy, I can tell you that I you know, Yehuda and I are both on the board, but we've also both coached. So, I' I've seen it all. I have coached couples that span the gamut both from a family size count and also from an income cohort perspective. So I recently coached a couple. He is a Rebi and she has some sort of husai kishhat going on. And he told me that when he was our mitzvah, he had $8,000. He had $8,000 given to him from our mitzvah presence. And he had a grandfather who was financially savvy who told him how to open up a mutual fund and put the money in the mutual fund. This guy is today 46 years old. that $8,000 has grown to $60,000. And he literally until a few years ago didn't even know how to lock in. He did not even he didn't even he forgot about it. But the point is he did nothing and all of a sudden his $8,000 multiplied almost eight times. And then I coached another couple last week. They're living in Romanesk. They have $86,000. They're married for one year. The cash is not sitting in a high yield savings account. sitting in a checking account. They just had no idea. So, the point is there aren't people that know what to do with extra money that they don't need and there are people that don't know what to do with extra money. So, we're going to educate all three of you. I know it's late, but bear with me. Okay. So, what a budget does is it's not going to make you rich, but it will help you identify where the leaks are. So, the three ways to think about it is you want to see your life, your financial life, at least on one piece of paper. You want to make sure that every dollar that's coming in has a goal and an objective and a job. And then once you have an idea of what's coming in and what's going out, you can then put yourself in place to have a strategy and execute that to accomplish your goals. So most people, they don't have an income problem. I can tell you that there are a bay with nine kids that between them and their wives, they're making $150,000 and they're somehow managing to save money every month. And I can also tell you that there are Park Avenue attorneys married to radiologists in prestigious hospitals with three kids that are in credit card debt. And the answer is that they're just not organized. They have a visibility problem. This kid, I have, you know, I I work so hard. I'm entitled to go on vacation. and this person. It's just a matter of having an idea of what's coming in every month and what's going out. And once you sit see it all in one piece of paper, you will have an answer to the question. You'll know where the $25 is coming from or where it's not coming from. And then we're going to talk about strategy. So before um we get to the bottom right box, what you do with extra money, I want to take you through a uh two couples. These are real stories. The first one is a fellow couple. I don't know how many of you are are in but this is liquid. So I'm going to take some liberties to assume that you at least know some of them. This is and it's a beautiful thing. So the top left chart is income. Now this is if you sit down with the coach you will get some sort of sheet that looks like this. And this is what a coach will present you with. So as is amazing cuddle couples usually me and my wife who happens to be here with me. We have two line items on our income statement. I have a job and she has a job and that's it. The average kudu couple has anywhere from 8 to 12 different things going on. So, he learns in kule he gets $2,200 a month. He goes to night seder for another 500. He does and then takes tests for another 200. He goes to a far co for another 350. On the way home from second seder once a week he stops off and tutors somebody. He's a learning ready for one month in the summer in a day camp. The coy that he's in gives him a bonus before susesa. Ra is a speech therapist. She also tutors. She gives a crash course before finals. She also is an organizer. She will help every single high school world figure out that the pink sweatshirts don't close the blue sweatshirts. And then they get a tax refund and their parents help with tuition. When you add that all up, they're making $11,000 a month. The problem is when you go over to the right, we can see that their expenses are $11,716 a month. Now, what the coach will do is literally line these numbers up and say, "Listen, off the bat, there are a couple of things here that look a little out of whack. Your mortgage of $3,400, there's not much you can do. $600 in utilities. I can see that you're low income. Most utility companies have programs and grants and subsidies for people who are low income. They were eligible for a $100 monthly grant from the local utility company. The car payment, there's not much you can do. Car insurance, they weren't they didn't have a defensive driver discount that would save them money there. Groceries, $2,150 a month. Now, groceries, I'm going to double click on in a little bit of time, but groceries, what this coach told them is you should be eligible for food stamps. Now, a lot of people have pride issues with food stamps. Interestingly, they have no pride issues when it comes to taking Jersey Gear for health insurance. As a taxpayer, I am thrilled to meet from people that are taking advantage of the taxes that I'm paying. So, please don't have any shame. If you're entitled to Jersey Care, go for the food stands, too. I had no issue with takeout. They were spending $100 a month on takeout because Ruffer works late at couple of nights a month. She has to work late and she just can't get it together. She needs her cleaning help. That's not going to be cut. And you can go down the list. health and beauty. They're spending $47 a month when you add up the washing sets for the fall and the shel and the other whatever it's called. And then all of the boys are getting haircuts every two months. Subscriptions ami internet filter circle nothing radio all of these things. It's shocking by the way most people are spending over $100 almost $100 a month on these recurring subscriptions. Um, what you have to realize, if that's what's getting you into credit card debt, $658 a month, it's going to end up $30,000 in 3 years, is it really worth it to know what the coolest recipe is for for shaboo is to be $30,000 in credit card debt? That's a question you have to ask yourself. So, anyway, this is what a coach will present you with. Now, I want to take you to the next one. This is Yasi and Tamar. This is an amazing story. This is one of the first couples that LSJ ever coached. This actually came I changed the names of the professions and you will not know who these people are but this is a real story. They came to us in 2020 was one of the first couples that we coached and they were drowning. So he was in construction, she was a teacher. They were making $12,416 a month with the proposals over here. And then when you go to the income they were spending $16,175 a month. So they were short $3,700 a month. Not only that, they were already $80,000 in debt between family, gas loans, and credit card debt. The coach gave them proposals right away. Their car insurance was too high, should be priced. They had too much cleaning for what they could afford. They were spending $800 a month on Amazon. The takeout food was nonsense. the uh health and be beauty his uh you know also was stuff that they could have cut and created the school at an afterthe program. What was amazing so the the coach basically identified a few thousand dollars a month that they can cut and also said listen you have to realize Russell you're only working now Russell Tamar you're only working part time you really need to take on an extra couple hours and Yussi you really need to work a little harder to make a little bit more money and once it was put into perspective Yussi if you just work an extra couple hours a day doing another odd job of trying to build out your business you can climb out of this hole the light bulb went off in his Anyway, this couple called back a few months ago and they asked for a another session with their coach and they said, "Listen, we haven't spoken to you in 6 years. We want to let you know what's going on." And you can see that not only now are they out of the debt, they have $25,000 in savings, they've maintained the lower level of expenses, and they've grown their income to the point that they are $10,000 a month ahead. They're making the bar mitzvah in the fall. They're funding out of cash flow. So, they're automatically investing $6,000 a month. And then after the bar mitzvah, they are going to be investing $10,000 a month. Now, this is a couple that is not wealthy by any stretch. They are very regular. They have used cars. They don't go on vacation. But 6 years ago, they were literally teetering on the verge of collapse. And today, they're confident. They're showing by. You can see it on their faces. Their kids are happy. It's just an amazing thing. And all it took was somebody just turning on the lights and saying if you just make these few small tweaks you can be you can be okay. So before we go to the next uh it's a little video it's a minute I just want to give you one little muscle. So smoking at this point when I grew up it was like becoming pretty evident that smoking was dangerous. But today a pack of cigarettes by law has to have a label that says smoking will kill you. Today, there are still people shopping that smoke. The person that smokes today that smokes a pack a day knows in 30 years they will not have an easy time walking up a flight of steps. They know that. They don't need a doctor to tell them if you keep this up, you will be in trouble in 30 years from now. They know that. What they do need is a ruff or a therapist to help them appreciate the value of the quality of life in 30 years. What a coach is. A coach is not here to tell you that if you are if you are doing something that's the consequence. A coach is the one who's telling you that what you're doing is smoking. Living without a hesitant is smoking. If you are going to spend $25 a day more than you spend in 30 years, it'll be a tremendous amount of problem. You will not be able to use a credit card at the grocery store. you will not be able to I can tell you people in my own school that people know that they're they're in trouble and they borrow money from this one to pay the apple back and then when the third guy sees them in the bagel store I don't take my kids to the bank it's not a pleasant way to live you're much better off being ahead so anyway I just want this is a one minute video and then we're going to piv pivot for the last few minutes um to strategies practical strategies that we can all employ to put ourselves in a better position but this video is the basis of the framework that everybody I hope comes out with after this is over. Let's look at my friends Jack and Blake. Jack starts saving money at 21 years old. He saves $2,400 a year. That's $200 a month. And he does that from age 21 to age 29. And then he stops saving money. His third leg looks up and says, "Hey, my friend Jack has got a head start on me. I'm going to catch up. I'm also going to start saving $2,400. He starts at 30 years old and saving $2400, $200 a month. Meanwhile, his friend Jack is putting in zero. Everybody say zero. >> He quits. His friend starts from age 30 all the way to age 67. Now, Jack, who started earlier, only puts in $21,600 and Blake puts in 91,200. What happens at 67 and Blake who started later has $1.4 million end up with a million less. He put in almost 100,000 guy put in 20,000 guy put in 20,000 beat the guy who put in 91,000 by a million just because he started early. That's the power compound. That's just get started as soon as you can. Here's the amazing thing. You would think Jack had some amazing 95. He figured out how to day trade penny stocks or he figured out the next, you know, Charlotte, North Carolina to buy some multif family deal from some little Lincoln sho, but didn't know what else to do with his time. Here's what Jack did. There is a study that was recently done by Fidelity. Fidelity is one of the largest brokerage houses in the country and they try to figure out who are the best investors. Are they male? Are they female? Are they educated? Are they are they uneducated? Are they married, divorced, fat, skinny? They're just trying to figure out who are the best investors. And what they concluded was the best investors were those that were dead and their family members did not report in a death certificate. And what they concluded based on that research is that the less you do once you automate a very healthy and sound habit and make once you automate it and just set it and forget it, you will be much better off than the most educated, savvy day trader that there is. The biggest hedge funds only 10 or 15% of hedge funds outperform passive investors. So, what I'm going to tell you, this is not my professional advice, although it would be if you asked it, but this is called the S&P 500. The S&P 500 is accessible for free, virtually for free in a whole variety of ways. Personally, I use Fidelity.com. Now, I'm going to spend 15 seconds on this because I really don't want to put anybody to sleep here, but the S&P 500 is a collection of the largest and best 500 companies in this country. And it's structured in a way that auto rebalances. So, if you look in 1990, those were the biggest companies. IBM, Exon Mobile, General Electric, Phil Mars, Cigarette Company, and Shell. Those were the biggest companies. But today, none of those companies are in the top companies in the S&P. It's all tech companies. And every step along the way, if you look at the left, once you get money invested in the S&P 500, there has never been a 12-ear period that you've lost money. And there has never been a 20-year period that you've made less than 5 1.5%. And there's never been a 40-year period that you've made less than 9%. And once you get to 10 years, there's a pretty high level of confidence that your projected pre-tax return will be 10%. Now, that's what Jack did. He put the $200 a month from when he was 21 until he was 30 in the S&P 500 and fell asleep. That $21,000 grew to 2.5 million by the time you retire. So, what does that mean for you practically? So just to put it in perspective, if you do this, if you put 500, if you put any amount of money every month into the S&P 500, which again is free, and history is any indicator of future performance, which is obviously no guarantee, in 40 years, 92% of the balance in your account will be profit. That's what we call the Mayan. Warren Buffett, the best investor that I've ever read, life is like a snowball. The important thing is finding wet snow and a really long hill. The most important and valuable talent that all of us have is time. It's not brains. It's not sophistication. It's just getting this set up and forgetting about it. Now, practically, let's go back to the budget. So, groceries is fascinating because I sit down with couples. There are couples that are spending $1,000 a week. There are couples that are spending $400 a week. All the kids, they all go to sleep fully fed and happy with a smile on their face. In fact, the couple that's got the $400 a week grocery bill, that family, their kids are probably happier cuz their parents aren't stressed out. So, they tuck them in and say Shiman with them together. The $1,000 people, he's coming home at 8:00 cuz he's got to hustle to pay for it. And their kids don't see their parents as much or at least not as happy. But here is a these are real live numbers from 2026. And this is a meal plan. The $450 a week grocery family, this is what their menu looks like. They are feeding their kids something like a $180 per person for breakfast. So that's cereal and milk and sliced melon or pancakes. For supper, tacos, chocolate, and corn or roast chicken with rice. The middle class family who's spending $942 a week. They're having eggs, cheese, potatoes, and toast. Greek yogurt with granola and fruit and lettuce salad and tuna and dressing for lunch. Sliders, buns, fries, and coal or schnitle broccoli and dipping sauce for supper. Now, the prices, these are real life prices from 2026 grocery stores in Montana Lakewood. And this couple is spending almost $500 a week less than the other couple. Now, what does that mean? Now, put in the context of passive returns and compound interest in the S&P 500, it's $12.5 million over 40 years. Now, think about how many 65year-old people that you know that really could have spent a few hundred a week less on groceries that would do that that are lost. They're 65 or 70 years old. And you ask them, how different would your life be if you had $12.5 million? Most of them would say pretty different. And when you tell them had you done had you just fed your kids chicken on the bone instead of schnitzel you could have been there and they just didn't know. So anyway I just want to the point of this is just to put your budget in perspective. Don't think that a little small imperceptible change over a long enough period of time is inconsequential. The next thing and this is the last one I'm going to talk about although I have a lot of things to say on a lot of things. Amazon. The single most profitable patent in the last 25 years in the United States of America was oneclick checkout. Jeff Bezos at amazon.com. They realized Amazon had a problem. They realized that almost 80% of things that were added to shopping carts were not purchased because it was too much of a pain in the neck. Have to enter your credit card, confirm your zip code, get a login with a code emailed to confirm it's your identity. And when he patented oneclick checkout, that number fell by 2/3 to the point that more than half the things that were then added to carts were actually purchased. He made he took all of the thought and friction out of buying something. He eliminated it. It was so profitable this patent that Apple actually for 20 years paid Amazon a royalty fee for the rights to use their one-click oneclick checkout technology. That patent expired in 2017, which went PayPal, Shopify, and all the different Google pays that you see when you check out something online. Those all started in 2017 when Amazon's ran out. Most people, These are the eight most frequently ordered um things on Amazon that people regret buying. a white warmer, a baby food processor, hairbrush sets, juicers and blenders, egg cookers, hobby starter kits, bulk organizer bins, and supplement bundles, people that have to add things just to get free shipping. And these are things that people buy and two weeks later they never use them. Now, might think $45. I can afford $45, but again, put that in perspective of what a weekly poor choice would be over time. So, what we recommend is, I know it's inconvenient, but if you disable this and force yourself to not let Jeff Bezos beat me, I'm going to force myself to have to add enter my credit card every time I want to buy something. Or at the very least, when you add something to your cart, wait 24 hours before checking out. Or, and maybe it's a combination of all three, give yourself a budget. I'm only spending $300 a month on Amazon. And if my daughter needs another set of gel pens, she's going to have to wait till next month. This is very powerful. So, I have a picture. I happen to be a total hypocrite over here because I don't like chicken on the bone and I only like But the difference between the two of them is really a lot of money. is the equivalent. My choice of preferring a seven or eight dollar per person supper over a3 or$4 dollar per person supper is the equivalent to me tutoring 10 times a week, teaching 10 months a year, washing 12 shapes a week, or working part-time as a medical bill. These are the same things. I can choose to save myself a few hundred dollars a week by feeding my family less expensive food or I can choose to feed my family more expensive food and then earn money and then pay taxes to compensate the difference. So I want everybody to fill out a piece of paper and give it to you and sign up. And the other thing that I want you all to do is to memorize these numbers over here. 268 plus is the amount of time that it takes a recurring monthly contribution into an S&P 500 index fund to multiply by 1,000 times assuming that the rate of return is 10%. That's 22 1/2 years. So what does that mean? So when we think about a wedding maring off a kid, my wife will make fun of me and I we have six amazing children. The day that I get that social security number, I'm opening up an account for her. Oh, and they all, this is what I do for my kids, and I'm not showing them off. All of you can afford $2 a day. Find $2 a day for your kids. $2 a day. I The number might be 50, it might be 60, maybe it's $2 a day, whatever it is. But if you can open up an account for your children and put $2 a day into that account, by the time that child is 20 or 22 years old, you will have $50 to $60,000 in that account. And that's not something that's a surprise party. We all hope to walk our children down to the and if you can just automate a habit of saving $2 a day, you don't have to worry about how you're going to pay for their and if you really have you can do three or four dollars a day. But the point is the earlier you start thinking about it, the less stressed it could be later on retirement. If you just think about 10% as a return number, if a person thinks how much you might need, most people will say that $2 million might not be enough. But you have to realize that by the time you retire, you probably won't have a mortgage. You probably will not be paying tuition anymore. $10 to $20,000 a month of passive income is not a terrible thing. All that takes is $6 a day. So, my recommendation would be take a few dollars a day for each kid and put it away for their future and take $3 a day for you and $3 a day for your spouse and put it into a retirement account. This way, at the very least, you know that you will be at least approaching third base when these bills come due. So, these are the two accounts that I would recommend that everybody take note of. And when you meet with the coach, you'll be educated not to ask about them. One is called the by the way these cartoons my daughter she's very talented she made them um they come from the coer itself from artificial intelligence but you see that the woman is genius and the guy's wearing a hat it's fantastic a 529 plan so the reason why this is important is I really don't want to belabor the point of taxes which get very complicated but suffice it to say that if you have any of these two accounts there are no taxes now technically a 5.9 9 can only be used for education. How does that help you with a wedding? So what that means is when your child approaches the age of 20 when they will regardless of whether or not you did this, they will have education related expenses. You have you acrew a balance in this account and then you submit those education related expenses and reimburse yourself. Those expenses you would have paid anyway and that money is how you think about paying for a simple and retirement is the Roth IRA. The Roth IRA is one of the most powerful tools that's available to families in America. But one thing that is very important to know in the state of New Jersey where we have the being right now, if your AGI is below $75,000, now you there are people that make millions of dollars a year that have depreciation offset that they don't really report much income. The state of New Jersey will give you a $750 onetime match for free per. That means when you open up a 529 plan, you put $750 in there. The state of New Jersey will double that and make it 1,500, which will really turbocharge your auto investment. Lastly, I just want to say one thing before I I will stay and answer any questions that any of you have. I just want to tell you that this is a judgmentfree space. I just tell you two funny stories. I uh coached a couple and they had I believe it was like $150 a month of subscriptions and they had the most sophisticated internet filters from TAG but TAG wasn't true enough. They had this one but they also had a Netflix subscription and I'm just I had no no opinion. Judgment free zone. Everyone is entitled to do whatever they do. Also, another funny one. There was a um you know, sometimes I don't know if I can make oepic jokes here. I probably could. Probably can make an epic joke, but there was you know, sometimes you have, you know, a couple and you know, the guy is a little embarrassed and he says, you know, I have a prescription. It's a couple hundred a month. You know, it's not really something that's negative, you know, escape the let's just let's talk about other things. And then you can have a guy who's like, "It's the best thing that ever happened to me. You should do it, too. It's the best thing. I got a guy over here. He's got a compound pharmacy. It comes in a bag. 20 minutes later, he lost 50 lbs. And not only that, you should tell people he'll cut his grocery bill in half. I don't need anything. So judgment free zone. Everything flies." One other story I had is in in the health and beauty section, we ask people, you know, how much do you spend washing shapes every year? Everyone's I have no idea. And okay, so it's very formulated. How many do you have? How often do you wash them? I wash this one myself. This one I send out the whole thing. Anyway, one of the things is, you know, monthly expenses, nails, waxing, mikvah, manicure, and everything. The guy pops up and says, "Yeah, I spend $5 a day at the mikvah. I go every morning. And the truth of the matter is he couldn't afford it. He was putting it on his credit card. And the bulk of their shortfall every month was from a person who a high mission guy was going every single morning to the men club 340 whatever the number is and was paying $5 a day. Now I am not here to tell you again as I introduced a personal personal is the adjective personal finance. Nobody is here to tell you that this is what you have to do. This is not cashless. This is a diet. Now, if you can afford the $5 a day or if you can afford the internet filter with the Netflix, then gate isn't to hate. But what I'm here to tell you is that you have a leak. These are possible leaks that should be addressed. So anyway, this is a very personal topic and nobody will judge you and you will definitely not regret having done this. If there are any questions, I'm happy to answer them. And if not, Paul, it was a pleasure meeting you. [applause]