Warren Buffett’s Final Chapter: Purposeful Wealth and Practical Planning

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The Hosts:

Kevin Kroskey, CFP®, MBA – About – Contact

Tyler Emrick, CFA®, CFP® – About – Contact

Episode Transcript:

Tyler Emrick:

Warren Buffett is stepping down after 70 years of investing, and while you may not be managing billions, the principles he followed and shared have never been more relevant, especially if you’re approaching retirement. We unpack it all, coming up today on Retire Smarter.

Walter Storholt:

Hey, it’s another episode of Retire Smarter. I’m Walter Storholt alongside Tyler Emrick, a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER, a chartered financial analyst as well, and a wealth advisor at True Wealth Design. And going to be a great episode today as we talk about one of the greats, Warren Buffett. Really looking forward to your takes on that, Tyler.

But first of all, life treating you well? How are things going?

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, no complaints on my end, although the weather in Ohio is always crazy, so we’re a little cold. We’re in the mid-50s here towards the end of May, which is a little wild. But yeah, outside of that, nothing, no complaints and ready for spring and a little bit warmer weather, for sure.

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, we were driving back on Memorial Day here in Colorado from a quick weekend trip to the mountains, and we encountered 65 degree weather, 30 degree weather, lightning, lots of lightning, hailstorm, and snow, in addition to torrential rain. So, it was quite the day driving back and I got snow in late May. I was like, “Hey, you can’t beat that. This is pretty fun.”

Tyler Emrick:

Fair enough, fair enough. Yeah.

Walter Storholt:

I think we were supposed to be in the 80s in another day or two, so it’s just crazy spring.

Tyler Emrick:

Hey, as long as we don’t get any snow, I’m good. All right? No more snow.

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, you’re on the other end of that spectrum, right? You’re like-

Tyler Emrick:

Come on.

Walter Storholt:

… “Leave the snow out of the equation, please.”

Tyler Emrick:

Sure. Yeah, yeah. Oh, and I guess I can report we did have our second birthday, so I think I reported on our last podcast. It was right after the tea house with my youngest. So my oldest turned six last week, so we were able to take a day off and spend some time with her, and she basically planned the entire day out. I think she listed out five activities. We got her boiled down to two, putt-putt golf and Kids Empire. That was a good day and we hung out there. But yeah, the birthdays are behind us for this year up until next.

Walter Storholt:

Awesome. Some of the best birthdays I think I had growing up are ones where my parents were like, “Hey, you pick the day. You map the day out.” Those can be really great. As I get older, I’m more like, “Eh, you just tell me what to do. I don’t want to make a decision, so you just tell me what to do on my birthday,” and that’s the present.

Tyler Emrick:

No, we were similar. We got to pick out where we went for dinner. So I don’t know if I want to share exactly what was on my to-go dinner-

Walter Storholt:

Uh-oh. You got to tell us.

Tyler Emrick:

… priority list as a kid growing up, but you could probably haggle me a little bit on some of the names that were thrown out there. No Applebee’s, by the way, but we had some other good ones.

Walter Storholt:

I was going to say, that was going to be my first guess was Applebee’s. I can’t talk. I always asked to go to IHOP for breakfast on my birthdays.

Tyler Emrick:

IHOP?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

Oh, if you’ll share IHOP, I’ll share one. One of mine was Long John Silver’s. That was it for a while.

Walter Storholt:

Long John Silver’s? Oh, man.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah. The Hush Puppies, the Hush Puppies. Well, and I never got fish. I always got their chicken strips, so as a kid, that was one of my favs.

Walter Storholt:

I was going to say, choosing fish as a kid would’ve been a bit of an odd choice. That makes sense that you wanted the chicken tenders or fingers. Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, and then we moved up to Ponderosa and Red Lobster got in there a little bit as we got older, but yeah.

Walter Storholt:

Now there’s a good pick. Cheddar Biscuits?

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah.

Walter Storholt:

Oh my gosh.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, Cheddar Biscuits.

Walter Storholt:

Those things must be a thousand calories a piece, but they’re amazing.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, I know. I don’t know if they’re still in business or not now. I know they had some issues and they were closing down, so maybe you’ll find one spattered out there a little bit here in the Midwest. But yeah, good old Red Lobster, for sure.

Walter Storholt:

That’s awesome. You had a little bit of a seafood kick when you were a kid, it sounds like, even if you weren’t eating the actual seafood, but…

Tyler Emrick:

I guess. You know, you point that out. I wasn’t. I never ate the seafood, but for whatever reason-

Walter Storholt:

But you liked the seafood places, yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

I guess that goes back to my choices and maybe being a little suspect.

Walter Storholt:

Do you still go to seafood restaurants today and get a steak instead of the seafood, or do you go to a steak restaurant and you get the seafood, the opposite of what they say you’re supposed to do?

Tyler Emrick:

Opposite? You know, no, we probably don’t do too many seafood restaurants, no.

Walter Storholt:

Okay. Just as a kid?

Tyler Emrick:

Just as a kid, right? Yeah.

Walter Storholt:

I love it.

Tyler Emrick:

The Long John Silver’s every now and again, but yeah, no. Yeah, fish was not [inaudible 00:04:08]-

Walter Storholt:

Well, we shouldn’t have started off talking about seafood since we’re talking about Warren Buffett on today’s episode, and he being in Omaha, the Oracle of Omaha, land of steak.

Tyler Emrick:

Omaha meats, yes.

Walter Storholt:

We should have been talking about steak to start things off here.

Tyler Emrick:

Agreed, agreed. Yeah, we can get on board with that.

Well, speaking of Omaha, one of the things that triggered me to think through the podcast and talk about Warren today was his shareholder meeting is in Omaha, Nebraska, and it’s this big ordeal, Berkshire Hathaway’s annual event. I’m sure you’ve ran into it, Walt, many a times, right? These things are wild.

Walter Storholt:

It definitely makes news every time they have a meeting and a get-together, right?

Tyler Emrick:

Absolutely. I mean, normally you’d think of like, “Oh, it’s just a financial update on Berkshire Hathaway,” but these things have morphed into part investing masterclass, cultural phenomenon. I mean, a philosophy summit. I mean, so many things going into it. I mean, I didn’t realize. I think the stats that I seen, thousands of people come into town for those events, so certainly a pretty big deal. And of course, the one that happened earlier this month, he announced his retirement at the ripe old age of, I think, 90, 94 or something like that, Walt, if I got it right?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, amazing. He’s doing pretty good for that age. No kidding.

Tyler Emrick:

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And I’m sure most of the listeners would’ve heard in some way, shape, or form about Warren Buffett at some point in their life, I mean, but obviously he spent years working. I think over 70, I think in the lead-in, I said, “70 years of investing.” I think he was at Berkshire Hathaway over 70 years and built one of the most successful investment track records, I guess, in history.

And I think maybe even more importantly than saying something like that is the way he did it, he didn’t do it by chasing trends or he didn’t have some secret sauce or anything like that. I mean, it was more about consistent, disciplined, understandable philosophy that could be repeatable. And if anybody has listened to the podcast here for any number of ones that we’ve put out talking about investing, I mean, how often do we harp on process, process, process? Because it helps you during times of volatility and taking some of the emotion out of investing. I mean, it’s a huge deal.

And I think when I think about Warren Buffett and his style, I just think that, again, consistent, disciplined, and those are all the things that we try to replicate here at True Wealth Design as we think about developing a portfolio and managing a portfolio. I mean, it takes patience. Maybe even more important, the long-term thinking about it, right?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, which is unusual in today’s world, right? I mean, we’re in a very short-term world. It’s very difficult to be the long-term thinker, to be the long-term planner, to be the somebody with that vision of, “Hmm. How am I going to be running this business at 95 or 94 years old?” When maybe he was in his 20s, he was probably thinking that long-term, right?

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah.

Walter Storholt:

That’s just in his nature, and you see the payoff, but sometimes it can be hard to implement that as individuals. You may want to, you may aspire to that, but it’s hard to execute it.

Tyler Emrick:

No doubt, no doubt. I mean, and so understandably, when I heard this news, I’m like, “Oh, how can we turn it into a podcast? How can we make it relevant to our listeners?” I mean, this fascinating individual. I mean, I even looked up some stats on him, something like 90% of his wealth was earned after he turned 65, which I don’t know if there’s a more powerful argument-

Walter Storholt:

Is that right?

Tyler Emrick:

… for patience and longevity of investing-

Walter Storholt:

Wow.

Tyler Emrick:

… and the power of compounding and doing all the right things as you think about your journey through working and you’re approaching the doorstep of retirement. Now, his doorstep of retirement was in his 90s. I don’t know how many listeners are maybe on that particular path. That’s quite a unique one. But that power of compounding and wealth creation, 90% of his wealth created after he turned 65, it’s a pretty wild stat.

Walter Storholt:

I think there’s a lesson in there though, even for us non-billionaires, that is as we should be in our prime earning years as we get into the later working life, and that means the opportunity to save, and that’s why they have catch-up contribution opportunities and also why picking the right way to retire, the right investments and all of that during that time, now when you have amassed your wealth through all those years of working, just shows the opportunity if nothing else.

Tyler Emrick:

It does. Yep, absolutely. When we think about Warren Buffett, I mean, I don’t know, pick your poison on how many quotes have come from Buffett over the years and ones that we can rely on and share. But I figured for the podcast today, really just I picked out some of my favorites and some of the ones that I thought could give some good lessons and some good thought as an individual or a listener here may be on the doorstep of retirement and taking, again, some of those principles and some of those things that Warren lived by and applying them to your particular situation.

So we’ll just list out a few of these quotes and roll through them and see where it takes us and then finish up from there. But the first quote that we’ll tackle today is, “Our favorite holding period is forever.” Warren said, “Our favorite holding period is forever.”

Pretty relevant, especially going through the April that we just went through and did a couple podcasts on from there. But I mean, certainly, it’s easy to say long-term when you’re in your 40s, but when you’re retired, I certainly understand that living off your portfolio, every downturn certainly can feel magnified. So I think it shows so much more importance on why planning with intent, building in guardrails and things like that are just really so essential.

And going back to Warren, hey, half, 90% of his wealth, excuse me, built after the age of 65. So individuals on the doorstep for retirement, you still have got a long way to go. I mean, shoot, you hopefully will have a 20, 30-year retirement to look at. It’s not like you’re going to need all those assets as soon as you transition into retirement and be doing it. So you really want to make sure that when we build in a portfolio, we’re thinking about it in the terms of longevity. And shoot, if some individuals are trying to leave a legacy for their children or charity or whatever the case may be, that time period may be much, much longer than 30 years and we certainly don’t want to lose sight of it.

And when I was thinking about this quote, what came to mind is I was actually at a conference, an investing conference earlier this month, and they threw out a stat that was pretty eye-opening for me, so I figured I would share it and I think it goes down into the benefits of thinking long-term. And the stat shows, it basically states that there are actually three decades, so three 10-year periods, where Treasuries actually outperform the S&P 500.

So Treasuries, think some of the safest investments, interest-bearing investments that you could potentially put your money in and invest in. Generally, we get paid for taking on risk, and that’s why we invest in the stock market over time. It builds value and builds wealth. But there were three 10-year periods where investing in Treasuries would’ve yielded you more return over that 10-year period than investing in the S&P 500. So to get-

Walter Storholt:

Hmm. And not just cherry-picked decades to find the perfect 10-year gap, but just looking at the actual 10-year, the true decade bracket.

Tyler Emrick:

Yes. For example, we got the ’30s, which started The Great Depression. We got the ’70s, high inflation, economic stagnation resulted, just poor market performance over that period of time, and certainly we had rising interest rates that benefited some of the bond returns. And then of course, probably most recently is the lost decade, the 2000s where we had bookend of the dot-com bubble and then we had the Great Financial Crisis, of course, 2008.

But I kept thinking, sitting down with the families and the clients that I work with and them going for 10 years in a row, me saying, “Hey, hang tight. I promise you, investing in the stock market is going to yield higher results than just leaving it in cash and investing in those safe investments.” And towards the end of that 10-year decade, just how hard those conversations and how disciplined you would have to be to go back and say, “Hey, history tells us that, sure, there can be these long, drawn-out periods of time where the stock market maybe doesn’t perform as what we expected to, and that’s okay. And I don’t want to say it’s normal, but it’s certainly not out of the realm of possibility. We’ve seen it in the past.”

And again, just going back to the discipline that it would take to be able to say, “All right, no, I’m using historical information to put myself in the best position going forward and in construction,” and just how hard that would be heading into at the end of one of these decades where the stock market just didn’t perform the way that we had expected. So, really sat with me hard.

And we can pick with that, I mean, on really any part of the market. “Well, hey, this type of stock has outperformed this type of stock,” or, “this geography is better than that geography,” or whatever. There are some pretty extenuating time periods, or not extenuating, but long time periods where historical norms on what has traditionally outperformed might not outperform. And the question is, are we using good thought and good data to put ourselves in the best position forward, or are we getting caught up in some of that maybe recency bias and some of what we’ve seen here as of late, right, from an investor?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

So good quote, “Our favorite holding period is forever.”

Walter Storholt:

That’s a great lesson.

Tyler Emrick:

And being mindful of that time horizon is extremely important.

Walter Storholt:

I think my favorite quote is the next one you have on the list.

Tyler Emrick:

Is it?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, read it out there, Walt. Come on, lay it on us. What is it? Yep.

Walter Storholt:

Okay. Oh, no, I’m sorry. This is my second favorite. There’s another one that’s my favorite.

Tyler Emrick:

Is it?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, sorry.

Tyler Emrick:

Okay. All right, we’ll save your favorite. Let me get this one.

Walter Storholt:

Okay. All right, all right. Sounds good.

Tyler Emrick:

And then you get in and get the favorite. So yep, “Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.” Sounds easy to do, doesn’t it? [inaudible 00:13:57]

Walter Storholt:

It is much harder to put into practice though. That is for sure.

Tyler Emrick:

It is, it is. For anybody who listened, the last podcast that I did with Kevin and you, Walt, we were talking about market performance. I think that was in the thick of April and some of the volatility and tariff news and all that other good stuff. But there was-

Walter Storholt:

We have to have crises to get Kevin into the podcast.

Tyler Emrick:

We do.

Walter Storholt:

So every once in a while, we need a good crisis to get Kevin back in here.

Tyler Emrick:

But that was a good one. And in there, there was a quick comment that I made about one of the favorite slides that I share with clients and families when appropriate, and it goes back to this idea of consumer confidence and sentiment index. And there’s a study done by University of Michigan, or not a study but a survey that’s put out monthly by the University of Michigan, and it really just tries to get an idea of how good are people feeling about the economy and return expectations and the stock market? And this thing goes back a number of years, so we have a pretty good data to pull from.

And if you look at it, I mean, obviously the line on where people are feeling, I mean, it’s up, down. I mean, it’s all over the place. But if you kind of pick the 10 peaks, so a peak would be when people are feeling really good about the stock market or the economy, and we pick the nine troughs, some of the worst time periods that we’ve experienced from a feeling standpoint, we’re actually in one of those troughs right now. April survey put us down really low, really on par with how people were feeling back in 2008 and how people were feeling back in March of 2020 when COVID was really just coming on the scene and people were trying to just-

Walter Storholt:

It’s interesting how quickly our confidence can be shaken, right?

Tyler Emrick:

It is, it is. But the reason why I really like the chart is, again, it takes these 10 peaks, good times, and it takes these nine troughs, people are feeling rough, and then it just takes an inventory of the stock market performance, specifically the S&P 500, over the next year. And as you can imagine, if we would’ve invested at those 10 peaks when people are feeling great, average return over that next year is about 4%, a little less. If we look at the nine troughs, the average returns just over 24% in the S&P 500.

Walter Storholt:

I’ll take that.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, it really does get at the crux of like-

Walter Storholt:

It does.

Tyler Emrick:

… “Well, hey, be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.”

And I think the big thing here is certainly market fear can signal opportunity, but really, it’s only there if you’re prepared to act on that opportunity and feel confident in making that decision. I think back November of 2008, it’s probably one of the worst times that I can remember, you speak with families during that time period, I mean, maybe your house value was a fraction of what it was. Maybe you’re unemployed because of so many layoffs, your 401(k) account’s cut in half. That’s a lot to digest. And you start thinking about, well, if an investor or an advisor were to come to you and been like, “Now’s the time, start taking on more risk, buy more opportunity,” and you’re worried about your job and you’re worried about your house and you’re putting food on the table, I mean, these are some of the most challenging times as an investor.

And you think about what a financial plan would do for you during those time periods, it’s like all that preparation and putting that plan together is really, it’s meant there to gain clarity on times like that and really try to take as much of, you’re not going to always take all of it out, but take as much of that emotion out of the decision so that way you can put your best decision forward.

A financial plan’s going to give you, well, hey, what’s your required rate of return on your investments to make your plan work? Hey, we’ve ran bear market tests. We do those now, very similar to saying, “Hey, what would your portfolio do back in 2008 based off the risk?” And hopefully, you’ve done some of those tests so that way when your accounts start to lose those dollars and they become real, you can go back to that financial plan and say, “All right, hey, I’m still within the parameters that I expected. My goals are still all out in front of me and I can meet those with no problem,” and then you can really get down into the nitty-gritty of making a good financial decision around your investments, whether that would be, is it a buying opportunity, is it not? Maybe it’s just staying course and not selling out and feeling very uncomfortable with the losses that you had. But whatever it is, I mean, I think planning really is your advantage in times where the market is extremely volatile.

So being greedy when others are fearful, it’s not about taking wild bets on the market, but it’s about calmly doing the right thing because you’re prepared in advance. Right?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

Is more the way that I think about it.

Walter Storholt:

I think that’s a good sentiment. And you’re right, I think back to if there’s a financial crisis or moment that we’re going through, but it feels very stock-market, I don’t know, constrained. It seems like it’s a little easier to see the right decisions and the clarity in those moments when it starts, like 2008, to bleed over into job and life and the future of the world, it’s a much more difficult arena to make still those same kinds of decisions in.

Tyler Emrick:

Sure, yeah. I mean, there’s a lot on your plate, a lot that’s being managed there, not just the investment side of things. So putting-

Walter Storholt:

That’s when having some outside guidance draws a clear line in the sand of being very helpful and very valuable.

Tyler Emrick:

Yes, absolutely. I think we’re down to two quotes left. So I mean, you mentioned the favorite, is this the one? You got the list there.

Walter Storholt:

This is not the favorite, but this is a good one.

Tyler Emrick:

All right. This is a good one. And so this quote here is essentially, “If you’re in the luckiest 1% of humanity, you owe it to the rest of humanity to think about the other 99%.” So I know many of our listeners might not be in that top 1%. Do you know how much net worth you got to have to be in that top 1%, say, at age 60 to 65? I looked it up real quick before the podcast today. Any quick guesses?

Walter Storholt:

I don’t know, $10 million. I’m just guessing.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, you’re in the ballpark. Yeah, I had no idea. I was like… I looked it up. I wasn’t even in the ballpark. So the statistics from 2023 said it’s a little over $15 million-

Walter Storholt:

Oh, okay. I wasn’t too far off.

Tyler Emrick:

… is what you would have. So I mean, that’s a pretty sizable nest egg, right?

Walter Storholt:

Yeah.

Tyler Emrick:

I mean, so I’m sure that a lot of our listeners would go, “Okay, yeah, I’m not in the top 1%,” but I’ll get down to the point in how I think this is going to be applicable.

So what spurned this too is this quote and what I think is so fascinating about it is you ever heard of The Giving Pledge? I’m sure you have or maybe-

Walter Storholt:

Yeah. Bill Gates and Melinda Gates, I think, started that.

Tyler Emrick:

You got it, yep. And that was started all the way back in 2010 and Warren was actually part of that. And essentially, it’s these group of billionaires who essentially commit to giving away, I think it’s almost 99% of their wealth, either over their lifetime or at their passing and it kind of goes. And again, hey, that’s nice. They’re a billionaire. They still got 1% left. It’s quite a bet.

Walter Storholt:

That’s right. They’re going to be just fine.

Tyler Emrick:

And I get that. But what I think’s so fascinating about that decision, and I think it’s applicable to the families listening or the individuals listening is going to be this idea that, well, Warren just retired right this year, so we’re in 2025. So essentially, he made that pledge 15 years before he was going to retire.

Sure, I’m sure he’s got a lot of excess wealth. So maybe that decision became a little bit easier for him, but having the power to make a decision like that 15 years before he retired, I think still takes some planning. I think Warren had to have a little bit of an idea of where his wealth was projected, where it was going, what he wanted to do with that wealth, whether it be give it away or support some of his family or whatever the case may be. That’s a big decision. And I felt like it was made really early on, certainly 15 years before he actually retired.

And we think about the individuals and the families that we meet with on a day-in and day-out basis. They’re trying to do some of the same things. You’re trying to make decisions in the now for what your wealth might look like 20, 30 years down the road. “Hey, do I have enough? Can I go on that vacation? What’s going to be left?”

So I think there’s a lot of value in planning, and specifically planning to get an idea of how your wealth changes over time so that way you can come back and feel empowered to make decisions in the now. Having that data, I really truly feel like puts you in a better position to be able to make very well-informed decisions. And I think Warren doing some of that planning, understanding how his wealth is empowered him to be able to make some of those decisions. And I think he had a plan, and I think every family listening here today should have some type of financial plan put in place to help them make that decision.

And I think at the crux of it all, it’s like, well, what is the highest and best use of your wealth? And how do you want to spend that? How do you want to use it? And what does that look like? Because it is, it’s different. I mean, it’s different for everybody. And Walt, sometimes there can be roadblocks of like, “Well, how do I do some of this?” Right?

Walter Storholt:

Sure.

Tyler Emrick:

Like, “Hey, I want to gift to my children. How do I do that? What are the limits? Do I need a family loan? I want to gift to my church or charity. How should I do it? A donor-revised fund? Should I give highly appreciated stock?” All these things. Sure, there’s the logistics of it and the planning around it and that’s where, hey, a good financial advisor should help you navigate all those tools that are in place to help you make that decision, but a lot of times, it’s not necessarily the logistics of the decision, it’s about the confidence to be able to make it.

For example, a couple of weeks ago, we’re in the thick of our, what we call, progress meetings. So Walt, that’s our just yearly update meeting where we go in and meet with families and talk about just how have things progressed year over year? What does that financial plan look like? What’s on the docket for expectations? Did you spend what you expected to? How has your priorities changed? What does the plan look like?

And one of the individuals, we had a great meeting, about a week after the meeting, he shot me an email. And in the email… During that meeting, we had talked a lot about, we’d actually increased their monthly distribution because they weren’t really spending what they had in the plan. A lot of times you’ll find these families where it’s hard to change that spending pattern. You saved your entire life. It’s not like just flipping a switch and saying, “Hey, I’m going to just go spend everything now and be perfectly fine.” So we had tried a few things to kind of nudge them a little bit to say, “All right, well, let’s set up a distribution that’s set with the spending that you said you wanted to do.” And of course, a year later when we’re reviewing that, that cash has starting to build up inside of their checking and savings accounts because it hasn’t-

Walter Storholt:

It’s a good problem to have, right?

Tyler Emrick:

It is, it is. Right? So then you can get back to the crux of it and start having a conversation, as we did, about like, “Well, okay, let’s be realistic here. We tried it that way. We thought we would spend on certain things. It didn’t come out that way. Is there other things or other uses that we should be doing with that money?” Because certainly within the plan results and the way things look, it’s well within their means to do that. They’re just not.

So his email a week later came back and said, “Hey, I decided to give more to our church from our conversation because we built it in there.” So I think that goes back to… And the way the email came across, it was like this almost relief of like, “Hey, I found a use case for it,” like, “hey, I feel so good about being able to do it and go.”

And that’s what I mean by finding that highest and best use of your wealth and maybe thinking about things that you would otherwise not, and keeping yourself and holding yourself accountable to doing those, “Hey, I want to do this. I didn’t. Why didn’t I do that? And should I adjust those goals and rethink where we’re going to be putting them?”

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, I think so much of this comes down to comfort or confidence, as you put it, because… And this is not just a retirement thing either. I think even in our ages and trying to be generous and give, but at the same time, not sure if, “Well, if I do give that much, is that money I could use for this purpose or to help this family member or is it just going to make me okay financially? I don’t want to make sure I’m not cutting off my own legs as I’m trying to help somebody else and put my own oxygen mask on first.” And it’s tough without a plan to then feel confident in any of those decisions, and a lot of it can feel very random. That just amplifies, I’m sure, in retirement when now you don’t have that regular job and paycheck helping to replenish and the potential to make more to help with that confidence.

So yeah, having that plan in retirement because my guess is the desire is there for a lot of people to want to give while they’re living. Who wouldn’t want to be able to support while they’re living and not have it all be after you pass away that it goes to help? That’s great too, but a lot of people would want to see that impact and that effort while they’re still living, but I think it’s the confidence that prevents more people from doing it.

Tyler Emrick:

Sure. Oh, absolutely. I agree with you wholeheartedly. And part of these quotes, and I think the theme, as we think about today in the podcast, is putting yourself into a situation to where you can actually make some of these tougher decisions and being thoughtful and intentional and deliberate about it, I mean, is huge.

Well, we’re down to the last one, so this one must be it, huh?

Walter Storholt:

It’s not the favorite.

Tyler Emrick:

Oh! Maybe-

Walter Storholt:

So you don’t have it on your list.

Tyler Emrick:

So share your favorite real quick. All right, share it.

Walter Storholt:

I’ll give you the favorite so then we can focus on the one that you came up with, and it was the, “Only when the tide goes out do you discover who’s been swimming naked.” That was my favorite Warren Buffett quote.

Tyler Emrick:

I like that one. You know, I’ve never heard that.

Walter Storholt:

Because he’s got a little bit of a Yogi Berra tinge to some of his quotes. Just a little bit odd, a little bit off, and make you laugh and chuckle a little bit.

Tyler Emrick:

Absolutely. No, I like that one. I do like that one. I’m glad you shared it. Okay, fair enough. Well, we’ll get to the final one that I had on here, which is essentially-

Walter Storholt:

This is the most inspiring one, right?

Tyler Emrick:

Sure. Yeah, yeah. I like that. Inspiring, let’s say that. But yes, the quote is essentially, and it’s very simple, “The best investment you can make is in yourself.”

As I think through that, I mean, whether it’s holding tight through downturns, buying when others are fearful, committing to being deliberate about where your assets are going and how you’re using the wealth, I mean, these are big decisions and having some type of consistency, some type of process, some type of tool in your toolbox to help you navigate and make those decisions, I think really help you, especially in times of uncertainty as we think about that.

And clearly, they’re not just billionaire ideas, which obviously, I wouldn’t have shared them throughout the podcast here if I thought they were just billionaire ideas. I think they’re truly applicable and to the families that are listening here.

So you just think about the takeaways from the quotes. I mean, one, it’s like just again, being deliberate about your planning to help you through some of the tough times. Certainly investing in yourself and how you want to use your wealth, I think, is going to be big. Thinking through how your assets change over time, doing that type of planning to help you make better decisions in the now, I think are just really all good, strong takeaways as you think about how some of these quotes might be applicable to you.

And of course, Walt, as it always does, it boils back to that, the financial plan, I think, is a framework to be able to get you to that point and the tool that is best going to be able to put you in a position to construct a very solid portfolio, not get caught up in the emotional drops of the investment market, use your money to its highest and best use. All those things that we talked about today, I think the tool truly is that financial plan.

Walter Storholt:

Yeah, you’re absolutely right, Tyler, and appreciate all your perspective today and talking about the Oracle of Omaha on the show, Warren Buffett, and lessons we can learn from him. And love that you guys embody so much of that into your planning process and into True Wealth Design. I mean, this is what it’s all about, thinking long-term, thinking about others, and planning appropriately along the way.

So if any of this resonates with you as you listen to today’s episode and you’d like to get a more solid financial plan in place or explore what that might look like, look at what the difference could be with proper planning in your life, you can certainly reach out. The best way to begin with the True Wealth team, True Wealth Design team is to go to truewealthdesign.com. Click the Let’s Talk button and you can schedule a 20-minute discovery call with an experienced advisor on the team. That’s all you have to do. truewealthdesign.com, we’ve got it linked in the description of today’s show to make life easy on you as well.

And you can always call the phone number as well, 855-TWD-PLAN, 855-TWD-PLAN. You’re more than welcome to do that route as well.

Well, Tyler, thank you so much for the help, really appreciate it, and we’ll look forward to catching up with you on the next episode.

Tyler Emrick:

Yeah, that was great.

Kevin Kroskey:

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