Ep 001: Entrepreneurial Persistence And Building a $200M AUM Practice with Rick Kahler
Financial Advisor Success
Michael Kitces
4.8 • 696 Ratings
🗓️ 28 December 2016
⏱️ 88 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
I’m thrilled to bring you weekly episodes featuring interviews of successful financial planners, their stories and the insights you can learn from their valuable experience.
In this first episode, I have a conversation with Rick Kahler, a financial planner in Rapid City, South Dakota who built his own practice to a stable of 100 clients and $200M in assets under management. Rick’s story is truly humbling as he openly shares the events and decisions that brought him to where he is today.
You’ll hear about his decisions that worked well in growing his practice, and quite frankly the sheer persistence in Rick’s professional career that allowed him to consistently and repeatedly overcome roadblocks and challenges. Between losing 5 out of 6 employees in under 60 days, facing insolvency and near bankruptcy 6 times, and failing on multiple businesses before running his practice, Rick’s ability to persist when times are uncomfortable will simply inspire you.
Get the full show notes and transcript for this episode at: https://www.kitces.com/1
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Financial Advisor Success Podcast, where you go behind the scenes with financial planner, |
| 0:08.4 | speaker and consultant Michael Kitsis to hear stories of how leading financial advisors |
| 0:13.6 | navigated the inevitable challenges that arise on the path to success and get insight from leading |
| 0:19.2 | industry consultants about how to break through to the |
| 0:22.0 | next level in your advisory business. And now here's your host, Michael Kitsis. Welcome, everyone. |
| 0:29.7 | Welcome to the first episode of the Financial Advisor Success Podcast. The purpose of this podcast is to |
| 0:35.3 | talk about successful financial advisors and what it takes to be successful. |
| 0:39.3 | Not just about how they're successful today, but the challenges they experience and have to overcome behind the scenes to reach where they are today. |
| 0:47.3 | Because one of my favorite analogies of success is that it's like an iceberg. |
| 0:51.3 | There's an exterior portion of success that we can all see, |
| 0:54.7 | but most of what's really there, like an iceberg, is submerged between the surface, |
| 0:59.0 | the sacrifices, the failures, along with the patient persistence and dedication and hard work that it really takes. |
| 1:05.9 | And so in this context, I was thrilled to have as our first podcast guest, Rick Kaler. |
| 1:10.7 | Rick is what virtually |
| 1:11.8 | anyone would call a very successful financial advisory firm. He's based in Rapid City, South Dakota. |
| 1:16.9 | His firm advised on more than $200 million of assets for 100 clients, generates about $1.2 million |
| 1:22.3 | of revenue with seven employees, and Rick takes home upwards of $300,000 per year in total income from his practice. |
| 1:29.0 | But it hasn't always been this way. During the podcast, Rick shares some of the challenges he's |
| 1:33.4 | gone through as a financial advisor and business owner, including a lot of other businesses that |
| 1:38.2 | he started from commercial real estate to hardwood floors and more, from which he's actually |
| 1:43.3 | faced a whopping six near bankruptcies. |
| 1:46.8 | And even just within his advisory practice alone a couple of years ago, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Michael Kitces, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Michael Kitces and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.