Episode 187 - 10 Steps To Your Own Financial Plan

ryan_burklo:
Hello, everybody, welcome back to Baron Money. My name is Ryan Burklo,

ryan_burklo:
And I am, Alex Collins,

ryan_burklo:
And on today's episode we're going to be talking about how to build out your own personal financial plan. I think this today's conversation is. I think it's vital for a

ryan_burklo:
Oh

ryan_burklo:
lot of Americans, because I think many Americans want to establish a financial plan. They just don't know where to begin, or quite frankly maybe don't know how, or maybe they're scared to even begin Because of the, They don't want to know how they actually look.

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, I can tell you from experience of having done this for twenty odd years, that like that is one of the most frequent comments that I get is like Hey, Wow, you made this. really. Like, not painful to shine a light on stuff that I didn't want to light shine on

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, and you know that whole reason we started this podcast right is to make it more enjoyable and not add such probably a pain in the butt process that most people think it might be, and like anything else in life. How are you supposed to get where you want to go without some sense of a blueprint or plan

ryan_burklo:
Blind luck

ryan_burklo:
Well or hope right. We made the joke the other day we crush hope, right because hope doesn't get you anywhere.

ryan_burklo:
Right.

ryan_burklo:
I get that you need hope in the background, but you have to take the action steps right to get there. Hope doesn't solve it

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, it has to be more than a wing and a prayer. Right

ryan_burklo:
Exactly So for those of you listening, and this has caught your attention. I want you to if you're in the car like, I guess you can listen to it, but I don't know that this is going to be all that valuable until you click in the show notes and download the p. d f that we've got for you that will take you through what we're going to talk into. It's a step by step process for you, and we're going to give you some of the details behind it so that you can build out that plan, so make sure you download the Steps to building your own financial plan document before continuing to listen.

ryan_burklo:
And this is not an episode that should be done in the car, because you're going to want to fill that out as we walk through it with you

ryan_burklo:
Absolutely. But before we dive into this, Alex, what are we drinking today?

ryan_burklo:
Today. we are drinking Ski patrol. It is also from Drew Brow. It is a German style dark ale. clocks in at four point eight, Um, and only has twenty six. I bus,

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, so I called the name caught my, caught my attention when I was up at Bro, and just keep a show right like I'm skiing. That sounded good. and so um, Now what I didn't realize when I grabbed it was what type of beer was? This isn't something I would normally grab. Um, So what are your thoughts, Alex?

ryan_burklo:
Dark ale is not the first place I go. I do like German style beers. Um. this is definitely one of the better dark ales that I've had. Um. It's like it's different than maybe a typical dark ale and that like it's super easy to drink. Um, it's approachable. It's not going to like. I tend to think of. like, a lot of dark ale is kind of almost punching in the mouth a little bit with alcohol flavor, And this doesn't I do that, so I like. As far as a representation of the style I really like this. I'd give it an eight out of ten bottle caps on. like the style in terms of like overall, probably more like a five. Um, Mostly just because it's not my style.

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, I was going to say the same thing right like. it's definitely not your punch in the mouth. you know, with a four point four point eight alcohol, that kind of leads yet to you know to to not think it's going to punch in the mouth. It's got a bit of a sweetness to it and I'm not the biggest fan of sweetness in my beverages. Um, but if I were to give it a bottle caporating, which I will, it's a five out of ten in my book, but definitely it's definitely more approachable than other dark loggers. For sure. All right, let's get into this here so you know for those you continuing to listen today right, so I want you to think about what a financial plan could possibly do for you Right. So who is a financial plan for? Well, the way that we're going to speak into this, this is for someone that is wanting to get a little bit more organized with their finances and wanting to begin to set up, just kind of a basic plan. Right for those you've got more intrecate Sees right are susana Lot more stuff inside of your financial picture. This is just the basic, so this is not going to be the full overall plan, incorporating of everything, but it gets you started in the right direction,

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, I mean, this is goin t be a good place to start if you haven't started before. If you are a little bit more complex, you're a little bit further up the ladder. Highly recommend finding somebody who you can sit down with and go through something that is truly customized to you where you get an inter active experience Because you're going to get a lot more out of that in terms of you know, making sure that the advice is Taylor to your specific situation.

ryan_burklo:
And the other two factors I'd say we we will probably speak into Is you know, this is for really people that are probably married with children and then tends to be in the tech industry. Although you're not in the tech industry, I think this would still be very beneficial because we are keeping this at a very basic plan. We're not going to bring in the stock option into this planning for today. At least why have a plan? We started speaking and speak into this, right, Alex. At the beginning of this this episode, it's how you supposed to know Where you want to go if you don't even know where you're at,

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, I mean, the first thing is identifying where you are currently, and then the second step is understanding where you want to go, Because then we can start to plot the map to get you from point to point B, and talk about all the things that may knock you off of that path of going from A to B and making sure that we're we've got everything in our back pack that we need for Journey that hike that that the travel to make sure that we're able to deal with whatever life throws at us, Because we know that there are going to be some amount of curve balls thrown at us. We don't know when they're coming, and we don't know what they are, so we need to make sure that we're pro actively being able to address them ahead of time.

ryan_burklo:
And having those steps to accomplish some of your goals right, like some of the goals I'm guessing for people that are listening to this and ooking to build out their first financial plan. I think it's really like one of the goals might be. Let me get organized financially Might be a goal. How much money should I have in my emergency fund? How do I attack how the debt that I've got. How much money should I be be putting in my retirement plans? Or you know, really kind of basic type of questions and not basic from the standpoint of Children, questions. I don't mean basic, as in, like you know, just

ryan_burklo:
You

ryan_burklo:
aptitude

ryan_burklo:
should already know this.

ryan_burklo:
right. It's more of just this is the beginning stages of a financial plan, Is what I mean by that. So

ryan_burklo:
Yeah,

ryan_burklo:
what's in our plan is a ten step process to build out that initial financial plan to get the process started. What are the results you're going to get? So as you're listening this, you're like okay, Ryan, Alex, I get what you're saying. What am I going to get out of this? Well, We think you're going to become more organized, right. I think just doing the exercise in and of itself like that in and of itself is hugely valuable. right. It might just be getting over the hurdle of. I don't want to do it

ryan_burklo:
Stop being the ostrich and burying your head in the sand

ryan_burklo:
Right.

ryan_burklo:
like that, in it of itself, will carry value and weight and you'll be able to have a better understanding of where you're at and where you're headed.

ryan_burklo:
You're gonna have a better idea of what you currently look like financially right, Which goes back to what else was just talking about, rather than bearing your head, saying like actually knowing like Okay, this is what I actually look like financially, and oftentimes it's not that people look bad. It's more if they don't even know what they look like Right Another thing is and I think this might be. He may be the top value in my opinion, because I think this is part of the intricacies.

ryan_burklo:
Oh,

ryan_burklo:
having a spouse is you and your spouse having a better idea of what it is that you want.

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, I mean, that's that is a bit of the magic sauce right there. Um, you know I was reading over the weekend and I think it was Apple. put out an article about Um, how like spouses like a significant number of spouses fight over money, and that it doesn't have to be that way

ryan_burklo:
Well, take it a step further it. you and I sit down with married couples all the time, and I mean more often than not if both spouses aren't on the call or the meeting and they decide to, And then so the one spouse that was decides to go back afterwards and explain what the call or the meeting was about. Inevitably there's more questions and answers and we almost have to back track to go back to where we were and the other spouses bringing up stuff that One spouse that was on the call didn't even know.

ryan_burklo:
Or didn't think about, or, And so that's one of the benefits of having both spouses. There is so that like you have, the things that you don't know that you don't know, brought up. the more the more eyes you can have on your plan, the better off you're going to be.

ryan_burklo:
So, and then last, but definitely not. At least you're going to have an action plan to get started towards those goals, or I'll call them priorities financially related that you've got. So if those are results that you're looking for, this is a great place to start and so without further ado, we're going to go overstep one today, and over the next four more episodes were going to have We'regongto go through the other nine steps, So step one is take thirty minutes with you and your spouse.

ryan_burklo:
That is critical. It can't be you by yourself. It has to be both of you together. You can go through the exercise by yourself, but it will be significantly better and more impactful doing it with your spouse, and you have a have a date night Friday night or whatever, and grab a grab a bottle of wine. Grab your favorite beverage. you know, go out to dinner. Whatever it is that you guys do where you can actually sit down and talk to start going The stuff

ryan_burklo:
Yeah, so so let us go. So rather than it's doing the question, they were really kind of diving into step one here because we think it's we want to make sure that that is where you spend the time. And so the first question that I think you all should really start to ask yourself is is what are your financial priorities or goals right now? Right? Is that getting organized and I'm not trying to. By the way, I am. not, Either is Alex trying to put goals or priorities in your mouth or in your head. We're just bringing up stuff that many people think about as options. Really, just hopefully helping you brainstorm like what is your priorities? Maybe it's buying your first house. Maybe it's getting out of getting a debt structure that we're playing repayment playing. What are your priorities right now? Over the next two to three years?

ryan_burklo:
And it's okay to not have the answers to these, and to just kind of brain storm and create a list and then either go back through them yourselves or talk to a financial professional or whatever the case may be, but figure out a way to a sign a priority level to it of like one, two, three, four or five, and know that not everything can be the top priority. We have to go ahead and create some sort of method for How we're going to address these things Now, it doesn't mean that we're going to a hundred percent save for college before we save for retirement, or vice versa. We can tackle some of these goals at the same time or start working towards them at the same time. But it's making sure that we understand what is the priority level and how do we work towards making sure that it is addressed

ryan_burklo:
Yes, as you're doing this at at least the way my wife and I do it, and I'm not saying that our way is the way. I'm just providing some guidance how this might be beneficial when my wife and I kind of go through this, I kind of list out my. I don't, kind of I do. I list out my five priorities and my wife list list out her five priorities, and when you know you're on the same page, oftentimes these priorities will equal, will be the same or some version of the same, and if you Not, let's just say you both have completely five like you've got your own five, and your spouse says the other has a completely different five. That doesn't mean like that's not a something to freak out over. It's more of okay. Let's let's talk about why those were the five priorities that you chose and then come together to figure out. Okay. What makes the most sense for you and your family,

ryan_burklo:
And oftentimes it's both spouses going. Oh, yeah, I hadn't thought about that. Yeah, let's put that on the list. Whatever I'm picking an option. It doesn't matter what that is. but that way you can wind up with like, maybe it's two of yours and three of theirs or vice versa. It really does not matter. The critical component is having the discussion around it and figuring out like Okay, How do we decide On five or six or whatever the number is? And then how do we prioritize it? And really, the only way to do it is through discussion and conversation.

ryan_burklo:
So I would advise you to not have a ton of financial pririties listed out or trying to accomplish. At least in the first plan, right, I would say no more than five, maybe even three to make this ultra simple so that you can move forward towards those priorities and that's not to ignore the other stuff. I'm just saying to get the ball rolling And then last, but not at least, but talk about. When is it that these priorities are to be completed? Like

ryan_burklo:
Like

ryan_burklo:
what's the time frame?

ryan_burklo:
what does completed look like? like? for example, if you're talking about paying for education, we don't necessarily need to have all of the dollars sitting in an account ready to be paid for college. It's okay. We've got our plan that should create the correct amount in five, ten, fifteen, twenty, whatever the time period is, And so then we can mark that off as maybe not completed. but it's on the way to be completed. and now we just need to monitor the plan and adjust in rout as needed, but once we've got a plan in place for saving for college or saving for retirement or paying off dead or whatever the goal is like, it can help to mentally check that off and move on Now we need to revisit monitor, et cetera, But at the same time like that starts easing the burden because we know that we have a plan in place to take care of it,

ryan_burklo:
So that step one right tank in thirty minutes. I think thirty minutes, maybe max, forty five minutes to sit down and discuss these questions that we've brought up and just have a conversation with your spouse. What is the? What is those priorities? What do those priorities look like? And our next episode we're going to be diving into step number two and step number three where you're actually going to do some home work around what it is you look like financially. And then what are the expenses that come into that? So that's going to be our next episode? Makes you tuning for that That will come out a week from today. We hope this episode is valued before you look. The whole reason we started this podcast is to make talking about money normal, easy, unhopefully, Ctionable, for you and your family, as always, M. Collins.

ryan_burklo:
Cheers.