Misusing Social Security Wipes Out Your Extra Capital

Key Takeaways

Is there a way to resurrect the idea of legacy? Like how much of your own capital that that's liquid that you've saved in those retirement accounts do you actually need for that retirement dream that you have? And when you claim social security, how do we reduce the amount of your liquid wealth you need and drive excess capital? We would call that. And your excess capital can be used for legacy. That's what I what I talk about when I say legacy or resurrecting that idea. or it could be just for extra spending, like whatever you want to do. But at least you know the numbers and you know the math >> and you can plan all around that at the onset of retirement, not finding out 20 years later, 15 years later that it's too late. Maybe well hello and welcome to another guest interview here on the Profit Withall podcast. I'm your host Mosha Amsel and I'm excited about the conversation today because like like every time I'm excited there's something new that we're going to be talking about. It's not the same old like we're not bringing another guest on the same topic we've talked about. I don't think we've discussed this topic before. Um we have talked about succession planning. We have talked about selling your firm. We have talked about um thinking about retirement. But we haven't talked about social security income and retirement and how to navigate that analysis conversation. How, you know, and this is it's very timely because I recently sat down for lunch with one of my clients on our fractional CFO side of the business and met with him, his wife, and his financial planner. And the conversation revolved around the plan like what like what is, you know, what do they want to do in retirement? and and you know how are we going to make sure that that happens and one of the questions that came up was you know when should I we start drawing on social security now he wanted to start drawing as soon as it became available and the financial planner um and myself which I might be educated today differently but and financial planner myself gave him a specific age date that we felt was the the most appropriate age um but it wasn't it was done in silo it was not done with any advanced mathematic calculation. It was b basically just from understanding and knowing that this is the best value if you assume that you're going to live perpetually forever. Right? So, um this is a great conversation that we're going to have. I'm excited to jump into it. Before I introduce our guests, I just want to share with you we are doing a two-day workshop series. Um we've titled it your $100,000 per month workshop. If you are are in the solo and small realm of law firm owners and you've been trying to grow beyond yourself, you've been trying to scale and get get past 20, 30, 40, $50,000 months and you haven't been able to do it and you know, you've been doing it for four, five, 6, 10, 20 years and just it's been elusive to you, it's probably because you're going about it the wrong way. It's probably because you're not using the right system. This is a system that we use with our clients. We get them there in 12 months. So, if you want to achieve this in the next 12 months, you want to be in the room. We're going to go through the exact step-by-step process of how we build out the plan for your law firm to get there. And you you're going to leave with a written plan of action for yourself. You're going to leave with action items. You're going to know what you're doing in Q1, what you're doing in Q2 to execute on this and to make this happen for yourself. And man, would it be life-changing for you to be at $100,000 in revenue a month with a 30 to 40% profit margin, right? Um, we're probably talking about turning your current revenue into your take-home pay. So, if that's something that sounds like exciting and you want to do it, it's a two-day in-person event. Um, we're we're only doing 20 seats per per workshop. Now, we're doing multiple workshops. We're only doing 20 seats per workshop. And yes, you have to come to me. I'm not traveling to you. Um, but we're going to spend two days together and you're going to leave with this action plan. So, if you're interested, go to profitwithlaw.comlfg2026. That stands for law firm growth or let's effing go uh 2026. Either one. That was just client of mine who I just interviewed. Um, at the end he's like, you know what LG really stands for. So, now I'm using it. Thank you, Adam. Um, but uh let's introduce our guest. Let's get into this conversation. So, uh, we've got Russ Geyser and Mike Haylick. They are retirement income planning specialists that help clients determine how to use the least amount of their retirement capital for retirement by using social security as the cornerstone of the retirement income plan. They are also authors of beyond break even. You can see the books in their background on the, you know, beautiful background they have there. The essential guide to social security optimization. Russ and Mike, welcome to the profit with law podcast. Thanks for having us, Mosha. >> Yeah, thank you. We're very grateful to you to have us. Thanks. >> Awesome. Appreciate you being here. So, um, this is going to be fun because there's two of you, so I love a three-way conversation. Um, I'm going to let you guys figure out who's talking. Uh, we're going to start off with something simple, which is how'd you get into this? You know, what what's the backstory? because there's a lot of financial advice out there. A lot of financial planners, a lot of things going around, but very few people are honing in and focusing as on social security as like the the torch, right? So, >> why is social security so important? How why did you decide to to make this the thing that you're you know that that uh you know that's your front running message? >> Yeah, I guess I'll start Mosha. um over a decade ago and and this goes back somewhere I think right in the September October of 2015 time period where upon coming into this industry a couple years prior to that whenever there was a conversation about social security income it almost seemed like someone was asking me like can you tell me about my cholesterol level can you tell me why my blood pressure is high like I'm a financial adviser why are you asking me about something like that like social security income it's something you get because you had some kind of work record, right? You're going to get a benefit someday. >> Top 35 years of earnings, >> right? Right. You you you earned it. So, I guess that's something you're going to deal with social security administration on. And then what we'll do is is use the numbers that you've got into our planning software, right? Like I didn't see myself as someone who who should make any judgment on when they would claim their benefits. So upon getting into this this area, it was right around that time where there was big news. Uh there was a a 2015 bipartisan budget vote act that was going to take away some of the very advanced strategies that people were using in social security and and the way they could claim. So the way a husband and wife could claim, for instance, couple of the words that some people listening might remember were filing and suspending or the use of a restricted application. So, I remember thinking like there's a lot to this and a lot of people are concerned. So, I ended up getting a certification in this um social security claiming strategies area and literally right at that moment I filled a room of 55 to 60 people in October of 2015. then 60 to 70 75 to 80 and then in January through April almost 100 people a month were coming to the workshop I was conducting to say what's going on we plan to do these things and and it was it was all because they were trying to save money on the Medicare side that they were going to eliminate all of these things they said were for all the baby boomers to have a fighting chance in retirement that was in 2000 but in 2015 because of budget problems. They were going to eliminate all these advanced strategies. So, I literally jumped in like two feet into the fire and and doing workshops and answering countless questions, I started to realize like this is a big deal. I mean, when we plan with people, sometimes people are getting 80 to 100% of their income solely from social security and then we realize they've accumulated all of this wealth, not for their own needs, but maybe just for legacy. In more cases than not, it's probably 40 to 60% could come from social security. And I thought, "Holy cow, here we are talking about the returns on their investments, saying they're getting 8 to 10 to 12%." And we're forgetting and we're not addressing a massive amount of income that they'll be getting and we're not even talking about strategy of doing it. So Russ and I decided there's a far far better way far beyond a break even analysis and there thus the title of the book beyond break even. We shouldn't just be looking at it as you said in a vacuum. You should be looking at it in a very comprehensive way and saying how can social security income be a really integral part to be a cornerstone of a a plan and then from there so many things we can pivot to to be even more efficient with the rest of their wealth. So that's kind of the premise of the book. Um let's look far beyond break even uh and and let's talk about your own unique situation. Yeah, for me it was just simply I'm dealing with most of the pro prospective clients coming to us, they're getting ready to retire. Can I retire is the question and as I'm putting a retirement income plan together, I'm looking and realizing that, okay, I'm a certified financial planner. I'm held to a fiduciary standard. And I don't really know enough about social security to give good advice. At least in my own mind, I was thinking that most of it was when are you going to break even? How does all this work? And I just felt like that was leaving a big gap, you know, in in the planning process with clients because there's tax ramifications. There are surviving spouse benefits. There's benefits for people who might have been married, divorced, and their ex passed away. There's so many things uh as it relates uh to that income piece. And the big part of what we do is tax planning with retirement income planning. And that can play a big role in it as well. So yeah, just a lack of knowledge there. We wanted to make sure that was being integrated well as one of the puzzle pieces, not just in a silo. >> Awesome. I I love I love how you guys got into this. Thank you, Mike and Russ, for sharing that. Um, let's dive into the actual meat and potatoes of this conversation, right? So, you've alluded to tax strategies, you've alluded to some some different things, you know, spouse spousal survival and stuff like that, but what like in the big big picture, like if we had to just, you know, before we get into the weeds, right? Like what what are the things that somebody should be thinking about when it comes to social security? And I'm assuming we're talking about when they should start drawing benefits on social security and maybe also how they do that. Um, so >> what are the things that that we need to think about like from a from a high level and then we can tr try to dive into as many of them as we can as time will allow um you know on this on this episode >> for sure. In the book, we talk about in in that big, you know, the 30,000 foot view, five pillars, right, that hold up your retirement dream, so to speak. Um, timing, right? So, when should you claim based on your entire financial picture? Taxation, how do we become how do we first understand how social security is taxed? Is it taxable? Is it not? Will it be for you? Um, coordination. So coordinating that benefit with the other streams of income you might have, whether that might be pensions or maybe you just have a traditional IRA or a Roth IRA or whatever that might be. Longevity risk, that's a big risk in retirement that retirees face. So longevity, we how can we protect against protect against inflation? Um, so inflation and longevity and taxes kind of all intertwined together. They get worse with longevity. And then legacy like a lot of people that might come to us have lived a certain way. They bud budgeted a certain amount. They live a great life but they could be selling themselves short based on the plan they think they can achieve. And so is there a way to resurrect the idea of legacy? Like how much of your own capital that that's liquid that you've saved in those retirement accounts do you actually need for that retirement dream that you have? And when you claim social security, how do we reduce the amount of your liquid wealth you need and drive excess capital we would call that? And your excess capital can be used for legacy. That's what I what I talk about when I say legacy or resurrecting that idea or it could be just for extra spending like whatever you want to do. But at least you know the numbers and you know the math and you can plan all around that at the onset of retirement. not finding out 20 years later, 15 years later that it's too late. Maybe maybe five, 10 years later that oh no, this is not working. And and I always feel so horrible thinking that people might get to retirement, think they're okay, not quite know with evidence, and then they begin retirement, and they're cautious. They're they're reluctant to visit their their friends or family out of town. they're reluctant to spend their own money because they don't know if it'll all last. Um just just the other concept I think Mosha that's super important to understand is I think most people and I think this is is right it's it's legitimately um I think accurate that you're always concerned about accumulation right accumulate wealth from the moment you start working whether you're saving we call it the save it years you're either saving in the bank or you're putting money into retirement accounts or brokerage accounts you're you're told start putting some money away for your future right for your retirement. And then they're told, listen, if you're investing, don't panic. Stay invested. Try to achieve a average annual returns of X amount and just be disciplined, right? Stick to the habit of accumulating. Well, it's a far far different challenge when you stop accumulating at least intentionally in accumulating when you start getting into what we call the spend it years or the accumulation goes to the distribution phase, the income phase where you're actually using your own money. Now, now it's not about getting average annual returns because we know the markets don't always cooperate with us. Bless you. >> Thank you. And we know the markets they don't just cooperate these markets. So we have to be better than that. We have to say let's switch gears now have a bit of a paradigm shift and say it's not so much about adding more to my wealth. It's about what's the proper use of it. What's the least amount of my wealth that I need for the lifestyle I wish to have? And it's about cost. Can we drive down the cost of our retirement now? All right. So many times people think I'll never have enough. And sometimes we say you have more than enough. You have plenty if you look at your wealth from the standpoint of using the least amount for lifestyle and having hopefully excess capital. And that all can be done by coordinating the use of social security and perhaps pensions. The other thing I'd say too, Mosha, is we're not advocates for claiming early or late. Right? You can file as early as 62, as late as 70. You would never wait past 70. But it's about what's right for that person or family's unique specific goals and objectives, their situation. You may have someone who has significant wealth and they want to file their social security benefit at 62 and that income is coming from business income or maybe it's a W2 income. And if they file prior to their full retirement age, they won't get a dime because they're way over the earnings limit. So, there's different rules that you need to understand based on what you're what situation you're in specifically. Okay. So, if we if we focus in on timing, the the the decision about when to draw, you need to look at a lot of different things. You need to look at the income that you have. You need to look at the taxability of the benefits, which kind of goes on to number two, which is taxation, right? Um, >> so if we drill down to number two and talk about taxation for a minute, what are what are the factors there that we need to think about? um and how does that affect timing? So, let's just first understand how a social security income is taxed. Most people just hear something and run with it. But the truth is there could be situations where none of it is taxed, right? We hear there's no tax on social security. Now, that's true for maybe about 90% of people. Um, but the most you'll ever pay in income taxes on would be 85% of that income that you receive is taxable as you know ordinary income. So, we know at least 15% no matter who it is won't be taxed at all if you're in the worst case scenario. The how you find out how much of your social security income is taxed. Basically, think about it this way. The more other income you have while you have social security income coming in, the more taxable it becomes. Um, the IRS uses something called the provisional income formula, which is 100% of modified adjusted gross income. So, it's pretty much all income except HSA distributions, Roth IRA distributions, tax exempt bond income counts in that calculation. And it's um 50% of the household social security income all added together. And then there are some formulas that the IRS uses and three tests and they take the lowest of the three tests and that tells you how much of your social security income is taxable anywhere between 0 and 85%. Um, so you know, a lot of times when we're talking about taxation, if someone has a lot of wealth and and by the way, pensions are along, you know, like way in the rearview mirror. And what happened was people have started saving into traditional IAS and 401k plans. And what they've done is they've accumulated a lot of assets that they haven't paid tax on yet that are continuing to grow and they the tax bill is coming due at some point. And so when we plan with someone and we're looking at all of this, um, we may want to defer social security income to either draw down more of those taxable assets to drive their future required minimum distributions down because they're going to be either way high and way more income than they even really need later for most of their retirement. um or we're going to be converting some of that to Roth uh or some alternative Roth strategies. Right? So, it's it's about delaying extra income and taxability and drawing it from areas that yes might be more taxable now, but for the majority of the retirement or driving down the cost of tax to the entire family for the duration of their retirement period. And the the real challenge here for people when they they you know before they've embraced a plan that we've laid out is two things. The first thing is if we say delay taking social security the bigger picture is far better if you do whatever degree it is like if that is the the plan. But that means they have to first pay for more of their lifestyle with their own money. So they've accumulated for many many years and now they have to actually use or spend down some of their own money. That's difficult for people to to grasp or do. It's it's much easier honestly to just say heck yeah turn on the social security income from the government. I want to get more money from the government. I've been paying that payroll tax for all these years. So that's the first challenge. The second challenge is many um people who prepare taxes, either it's on your own as a do-it-yourselfer or with a tax preparer or CPA, the goal annually is typically, let's drive down your taxes this year. What can we do to reduce your taxes this year? And maybe let's plan for next year. How are we going to drive down your taxes next year? What we try to do is look at it in a bigger picture. Let's look at the next 20 to 30 years of your retirement and maybe even beyond that Mosha because you might be looking at your own children and grandchildren who may inherit wealth. We look at it like that and say don't we want to smooth out your taxability maybe in in tax favorable years in years when the markets have been really good to you. Wouldn't we want to maybe um intentionally pay more in federal perhaps state tax in the interest of the bigger picture, the bigger plan? So, that's two things that are very difficult for people to do. Spend their own money and actually intentionally be increasing their own federal and possibly state taxes um and not take social security income which is from the government. >> Yeah. more qualitative sometimes it is even if you have all the quantitative you know pointers showing you this is the right thing to do in your situation this is what I would recommend but you have to be willing to stomach that or do that right >> and we'll often be kind of the quarterback uh of a team you know of a team of the clients maybe even their siblings or um or kids and then we get the attorney or the CPA involved and it's it's often a very kind of long process of educating everybody on listen, we're looking at this whole this whole big picture here. We're not just looking at this year or next year. This is why we might choose a certain strategy. Um, but it and that's what we're we're often very challenged by and we embrace that challenge. We embrace the complexity it brings. But I think you can save tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars. Um, and we always say it's far better to to keep more of what you have than just keep making more if you're giving it a lot giving it a lot of it away to the governments. >> No doubt. >> Yeah. So the and I guess a lot of these answers are in the abstract, meaning you need to set eyes on somebody's specific situation to really answer it. I I think here the the concept is understand that this is more complicated than you thought and you probably should have somebody go and analyze this for you. Um, coordination, what do we have to think about with coordination? Um, and what are the diff different types of of investment vehicles that we have to coordinate around when it comes to social security? >> Sure. >> We look at coordination and what we would call social security optimization to be most beneficial for married couples just because there's so many different factors um that you need to plan for. Um, and one of those things though is understanding that when one of the spouses passes away, you lose the lower social security income. So, the higher of the two benefits stay in the household. So, it's adding just that extra layer of complexity because we have to look at, okay, if there's an age gap, how do we coordinate filing strategies for this? How do we look at look at it that way? Maybe it's the same age, but we have a very, you know, and we have a lot of these examples in the book, a very high earnner and maybe a stay-at-home spouse, right? So, how do spousal benefits work, right? And all these things, how do they all collectively work together? Because we don't want to make an emotional decision, right? We want to make a decision that's well informed and thought out. So, coordination for me is maximizing those survivor benefits or understanding what the survivor surviving spouse looks like if there is a death. And again, your tax rate is going to go up if there is a death, right? Because you go back to that single uh tax bracket that year after. >> And so we look at all of that because we don't, you know, there's there's some alarming statistics on widows when they pass away that uh many rely um on social security about 90% of their income when when they're widowed. Mhm. >> So, coordination is all about looking at the survivor and looking how we can make making sure that the plan's going to be adequate when one spouse passes away cuz you're losing a an income stream. Something else we address in the book, Mosha, is that 80% of men die married. 80% of women die single. So, it's often the single widowed woman who's left really in the lurch because first of all, they may not have been really the primary financial person. didn't understand a lot of the things happening around them just because not that men are better at it but men are often more inclined to want to um do the financial uh work or financial planning and then you know it's often men who say well listen uh if I don't take at 63 if I wait till 64 that's like a whole year of social security income I don't get how much longer do I have to live to get that back and they don't look at the surviving spouse as they I'm sure they love and care for, but they just don't look beyond their own lives. And and that's where the coordination comes in. Coordinate a good life together, but a co a coordination of of you each being a surviving spouse potentially. I think that's that's the best way to do it as a financial planner. >> Okay. And do we need to coordinate around other things like life insurance policies, other retirement accounts, pensions, stuff like that? For sure. I I mean the first thing we like to do is figure out, okay, how do we solve the income plan first, right? Can you retire the way you want to retire? And again, some people have no idea how much they spend. Some people are very in tune to it. But it's more about what do you want to do in retirement? And we solve can you do it first, right? So, and then that of course involves the social security claiming strategy. But then from there, we call it the pivot. Okay, so we're pivoting then to okay, we know we only need x amount of the wealth to deliver your income. Okay, how much is excess of capital that you saved? What are the types of money is, you know, what type of money is it? Is it a taxable brokerage account? Is it cash value in a life insurance policy? Is it a Roth IRA? Is it a 401k plan? So we figure out how to distribute the income that we need to for the client and then whatever might be excess we develop then a taxefficient plan around that and again there's different tools to be able to do that. Um there's Roth conversions are pretty popular. There's Roth conversion alternatives but you can't really know what to do with that if you don't first understand where your income is coming from and if you even are set up to be able to deliver that income to yourself for your retirement period. And we have social security optimization software. It's trademark software, Mosha. And we think of asset optimization, right? It's the best use of your assets, whatever you've accumulated. We think that that you might need some of that income to bridge, right? To get from the moment you retire from full-time employment to the time the second person, if you're married, has claimed social security. So, you need some of your assets. You got to live. But then you might need some to fill an income gap. what what more do you need that pensions possibly or social security income don't cover right then we have to know from people we gather this information through discovery how long of a period are you looking to plan for if they said well 10 years is good at a 50% chance of success well that's not a high level of probability and it's a shorter duration some people want really high levels of probability of of of this working 99% for 30 years. Let's do it that way. Well, that will then indicate to what level of capital do we need again for bridging and for filling an income gap when you pair it up with the other uh guaranteed income sources. >> Yeah. Um really I mean there's a lot to wrap our heads around and the final piece of the puzzle is is legacy and I want to really try to understand how that fits into the big picture. Or is this just a matter of getting the the amount that you have saved to last the longest possible so that you have more legacy to leave? Um I don't know if you guys read the book Die with Zero from written by Bill Perkins. Um >> I've heard of it. >> Great read. But in that book he talks about how you know people wait too long to to to give to the to people in their lives. is like the legacy needs. It should be something that transitions earlier rather than waiting for the date of death. You know, by that time your kids are already grown and retired themselves sometimes, you know, like they don't really need your money and then, you know, but they're, you know, maybe it's not going to the grandkids cuz it's going to them first and it just starts this just got this perpetual daisy chain effect. Um, yeah. Uh, so if you had read it, I'd be curious about your thoughts on, you know, what if somebody is looking to kind of draw down and pay and and get pass over that legacy in their lifetime as opposed to waiting for a date of death and how does that affect um this conversation? I It's funny that whole premise I completely agree with, but at the onset of this retirement income plan, we'll know how much wealth that they don't need to meet their goals, right? So they can use it for discretionary spending. They can use it for legacy later. Or they could say, "Hey, let's start giving X amount of money like I'm going to give up to the gifting limit every year to all my grandkids, >> right? Maybe for a down payment for a house, right? Like that type of gener and they can experience that with their family. They can take them on trips. I encourage people to spend their money, right? If I say, "Look, you have a million dollars you don't need for your income plan over your retirement. We can grow it, sure, for the next generation, >> but we can spend it too, you know, and it's fun to be able to spend with clients. >> Um, almost live vicariously through them, right, as we're helping families. But, um, we always tell tell people, let's plan for you first and then let's through proper planning figure out do you have enough to sustain what you want to do and then you can get get to that legacy piece. And that looks different for everyone. That's coaching, that's conversation. Um, and there's many things you can qualify charitable distributions. Maybe there are no kids and we want to give to charities instead. There's just so many so many options to do. But I do love the idea of being able to enjoy it with the people that you love because you can enjoy it with them. >> Legacy is a great topic to to talk about. Sometimes it brings a smile to my face because you you mentioned legacy and I think they they think that's for wealthy people. Like I I I'm not I'm not going to have anything left. How on earth am I going to not work only have social security income and use use our own money but also leave a legacy? But what Russ and I have said to people, we believe, we firmly believe and we've seen it, we can resurrect the notion of a legacy. We can actually identify right at the onset how much of your wealth do you need for the lifestyle? How much is excess capital? And how do you want to spend your excess capital? Do you want to buy the boat? Do you want to go on the eu uh extra cruises that you didn't plan for? Do you want to buy another property or do or do combinations of all of those? The other thing I think that's interesting is when people reach retirement, I mean, a common thing that people are told, hey, listen, now that you've gotten older and you're going to enter retirement, you really got to back off, step off that pedal of investment risk. And we say that's not necessarily true, but you have to segment up the wealth and you have to decide how much of it is necessary for income. And then how much is excess or legacy? Because if it's legacy and you want to like double, triple or quadruple that in your lifetime, you can do it because you know it's excess capital. But if you don't know, then the the notion then is or the in tendency is I better slow down. I better slow down on how I'm invested. become conservative and don't spend too much and then you're not living. >> Yeah. Empowering. It gives you more more choices. >> Yeah. I love that. And and and you know, we operate within this risk averse uh society. I mean so many people operate from from a place of of you know um of limits and and and um uh a lack of abundance and you know and and re recognizing that you we can define that and and figure out what you need and and really identify what what the abundance is for you um can can be really freeing for people regardless of how they want to use it or or um uh spend it down or or or pass it on. So, um, really good stuff. We're at the tail end of our conversation. The time ran out so quick. Um, we, you know, this is, this is a really intriguing topic and I, man, I'm going to get my hands on your book and I'm going to read it. I can't wait to to to dive into it. Uh, you mentioned that you, you know, that you have a software. I don't know. Is that software available to individuals to use or is that something that you that you use in-house or is that something that you um uh that you license out to other um financial professionals? Just curious. But when I close out the show, uh I ask you two things. One, a parting piece of advice or wisdom you want to share with our audience. And number two, how do people find out more about you or get in touch with you or take the next steps based on the conversation we just had? Um so there's two of you. You get to both leave a piece of advice. Um and uh and then if you can you know just share you know next steps maybe um if if the software is a retail facing or or you know something like that learn more about that. Um but I mean this is this has definitely gotten my attention enough um for for me to be intrigued which is is a signal for me uh that this is something that might be something that intrigues our audience as well. I'll start and uh and then I'll let Russ wrap up and tell you how you can get your hands on a book and uh maybe reach out to us. Um my word of advice would be this. I mean in life and I'll just use myself as an example. >> I am very limited in many things. I mean if you said to me fix something on your uh in your home, >> fix a snowblower. We have we have a lot of snow throwing and and snow blowing here in Western New York where we where we live. Um, if you said, you know, can you tell me what's wrong with the car? Can you tell me how to fix it? Can you tell me how to rewire or uh, you know, put plumbing in your home? I I'd be so limited. I And my point is I need to reach out to a specialist. I need someone who has not just become kind of interested in something like I I come become interested, but I don't make a commitment. I don't commit myself to being really good at something like I ought to or I don't just don't have the time. So, what do I do? I find a specialist. Just like you all might have a primary care physician, right? Primary care physicians are very necessary and very helpful. They guide us. They educate us. They try and keep us kind of within the guard rails of good health. But if there's a crisis, and I mean a crisis on a Saturday afternoon, and and I'm thinking, "Holy cow, I've never felt this way before. I feel like there's a real real emergency here." I'm not calling my primary care physician. I'm calling a a maybe an ambulance and I'm hopefully finding maybe a cardiologist who can help me right away. By no means are we doctors. We would never pretend we're of that importance. But my point is specialists can help in a very kind of you know urgent case or at a very important moment in your life and that's what you should seek when it comes time to use of your wealth making decisions like claiming social security benefits. It's a permanent lifetime decision. You should find a specialist >> for sure. And I would say that you know if you're getting ready to retire my parting advice would be stress test your retirement income plan. understand where your income is coming from and how it all works together. Don't make an emotional decision. Don't look at just today in the next couple years. Look at the whole idea there. Um our software, what we do is we always offer at Mosha, we do a lot of workshops, uh about 24 to 30 a year all over the US. Um and we offer retirement income stress tests complimentary that takes the client or prospective client in this case through the software. It is proprietary to those certified certified in social security claiming strategies. Um, but we take people complimentary through that through our greater financial planning software and kind of show you where you stand. We never um, you know, expect people to work with us, but if they decide they want to, we're comprehensive financial planning firm. Um, to learn more uh, to learn more about Social Security and the deep dive of the book, you can grab it at beyondbreakbook.com. You can get a free audio book, a free PDF flip book there. It'll also bring you to um where you can purchase a hard copy uh as well and how to get in touch with us if you do want us a retirement income stress test. Um so I'll leave it at that with the with the book. That's the easiest way to to kind of dive in and learn more. >> Awesome. And that was beyond break evenbook.com. Correct. >> Yes, sir. Folks, you don't have to remember that if you're in the shower, out for a run. Uh I don't know what else you might be doing listening to this podcast, but you know, whatever. We, you know, we've, we've all, we've all listened in strange places. So, uh, yeah, we we're taking notes for you. Go to profitwithlaw.com or the description of the podcast episode. We got show notes, links, everything that you need right there for you. Um, and, uh, this has been a great conversation. Really appreciate you guys, uh, hopping on with me and and having this this uh this talk. And uh folks, if depending on when you're listening to this, it's probably after our our January workshop, but uh the January workshop is the last two the last week of January, Monday, and Tuesday. Um and then we're going to have uh continuing workshops in February, March, April. We'll we'll keep doing it every month. Um because this is so impactful uh helping you get your business to where it's, you know, it it's changing your life. It's, you know, it's producing income that's well above what you need. you can be socking away for retirement so that you can then have to worry about whether you know how you draw down your social security. Um but really the name of the game is is uh is getting beyond outside of yourself. Um and if you're you know working in the office 60 80 hours a week uh and and all you've got to show for it is 20 30 $40,000 in revenue a month, it's time for a change. it's just time for you to think of something different and uh maybe decouple yourself and and your time in the business from the performance of the business and start treating it like a business. Um and you can do that by spending two days with me uh in a room where we map out your plan for success. We map out what it looks like to create a $100,000 a month revenue business. Um and the steps you need to take to to bring that to fruition. So if you if that sounds like something that's for you, go to profitwithlaw.comlfg2026. profitwithslaw.comlfg2026 and I look forward to seeing you there. Folks, we're here every single week with a brand new episode. We release on Thursdays. Uh if you hit the subscribe button in your podcast player on your YouTube channel, you will get notified when a new episode drops. And we're looking forward to uh sharing with you next week. Take care. Thanks for tuning in. See you. Bye-bye.