This is my number one biggest recommendation to all of you who want to retire early. Even if you are retired, this will be applicable. So this is going to be a story. Some of my episodes, I'm going to go heavy on a financial analysis, on a case study. That's not this episode. So if you're like, hey, this style of going through a story, yeah, it's cool. And I see you're excited telling the story, but it's not for me. That's okay. I have tons of other episodes that are really heavy on the financial analysis technical side, but this is not going to be that episode. So I just want you to be aware of that. The reason I'm bringing this up is because I had a client and my client said, hey, R, I'm really not happy with you. I said, okay, you know, what is it I did? I want to make sure I can fix the issue. They said, well, you help me retire early, but as you know, we're very stimulating people. It's hard for us to find friends. And so, you know, what are we supposed to do? I said, hey, wait a second. Are you upset that I do not have a best friend for you?

I helped you retire early and now you're mad. And they're like, kind of. Now they're starting to half joke at this point. But I was like, hey, like, what are you guys going to do in retirement? Like we talked about it. And they were like, well, you had us fill out the street where I'll ask people to fill it out to talk about, okay, if you were to hurt your back golfing, then what are you going to do? Because most people are like, I'm going to golf or I'm going to spend time with family. And then their kids are super busy. They can't hang out with them. They hurt their bat golfing. And now they're like, you know, I actually kind of miss my coworkers. I really don't know what it is I'm going to do. So my point here, I want to make sure whoever retires early, whether it's you or a friend or a neighbor, you're retiring to something. And that's a phrase we talk about in our industry a lot. So I hear it all the time, but then I was thinking about it. I'm like, I don't know if all of you guys know this phrase. If you already know it and you're listening on the podcast app, good for you. If you don't, though,

it's this concept of, okay, you're retiring from waking up early. You're retiring from a bad boss,

from politics around the office. What are you going to retire to? Are you retiring to volunteering?

Are you retiring to freedom? Are you?

And some of these things people will just say, you know, I can't wait to retire and I no longer

have to worry about, you know, that smelly coworker. Now, that's a joke, obviously, but some people are

really serious. And they go, hey, I'm really trying to retire to my health because right now,

I can't prioritize that because I'm too busy. But what I find a lot of people do is they're kind of lying to themselves. I'm not saying you're doing this, but that's kind of what happened in this case. So this couple that I work with, they're really smart people. They're like, we're going to retire and we're going to travel. And they were kind of banking on that.

Meaning if they didn't travel, they were like, well, that just doesn't even make sense.

Like, that's what we're going to do. And they really like traveling. Not forever, though. And they were like, we're going to do slow travel and we're going to love it. And we're going to be in Montenegro. and then we're going to go to, I forget all the other places, but they told me they were excited about Montenegro.

So that's what stuck in my head because I thought it was a country that I was like, I haven't really heard that being a popular country. But maybe I'm just out of the loop there. My point being, they were like, yeah, we thought about purpose, but they didn't really. They were like, we're going to travel. Now, I'm not saying all of you need to have backup plan A through Z, but what I'm saying is can we get really intentional before you retire? And the common stories I'll tell are I have one couple that's like, I'm going to retire and I'm going to move to Hawaii. And I said, if you move to Hawaii and you buy a home, I'm firing you. And they're like, really? I'm like, no, not really, but like, don't go buy a home. Like, first see if you want to live there. And they're like, we already know. Like, stop wasting our time. And I said, okay, just like Airbnb for a month. And they're like, okay. And they, I never heard from them. And then about six weeks after their supposed move or trip, because I once again, didn't hear from them, I said, hey, guys,

I got to know what happened. Did you buy a home or did you not? And they said, we loved Hawaii. And that was all the email said. I said, okay, they loved it. I was wrong. Good for me to learn a lesson. Maybe they should have bought a home. They replied two minutes later, we loved Hawaii, period not forever was great for six. Glad we didn't buy the home. I'm like,

okay. So the point here is maybe if they bought the home, they would have also been happy.

But can we try out things? And that's all the message of trying to say, because a lot of you are really good savers and you have a lot of money. And the reason you have a lot of money

is because financially,

you are very good with optimizing how much goes to a 401k and a superhero and you save a healthy amount. I don't want you mad at me when you're 80 with $10 million going, why didn't I buy a bigger

plane? Now, the plane example is a silly one, but I'm using that because I had a live show done about a month ago, not done. I hosted it. And I had someone come on, and it was a really nice couple. And if they're listening right now, you guys know who you are. And they had about, what was it, 3.2 million in a 401k. There was an age gap between them. So and 46 I want to say maybe 48 I think it's

57 and 48 because a nine-year age gap and then a million dollars in a brokerage

account and they are pilots the woman Michelle who's super nice she is a pilot for

Delta and then Mike the husband he is a pilot but kind of semi-retired, still working and they make a healthy income today. And they want to buy a small plane worth about $300,000. And they're like, we want to fly with our kids who aren't also pilots. Like, what a cool family. And I said, the real riskier, guys, is that you don't buy a bigger plane and you look back going, we could have really enjoyed it. And what if, God forbid, you guys were to ever go down in a certain, which hopefully never occurs. But if something were to happen, are you going to go, wow, we're really glad that we just did the most optimal Roth conversion strategy to move X amount of dollars to, no, no, you're going to be so glad you bought a bigger plane

assuming you're in a financial position to do so. So I'm not asking you all to go, oh my gosh,

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