Toys of Summer

Alex Roig, the "other" senior partner at Family Financial Partners,  joins Dave and Ryan to talk about all things summer! From camping trips to off-season Alaskan cruises and how to budget for all your summer toys and fun. 

David Smyth and Ryan Petrunyak talk about family, finances and fun. Learn more about Family Financial Partners at familyfinancialpartners.com.

Securities offered through The O.N. Equity Sales Company, Member FINRA/SIPC, One Financial Way Cincinnati, Ohio 45242 (513) 794-6794. David Smyth is an Investment Advisor Representative offering Investment Advisory services through O.N. Investment Management Company. Estate planning services provided in conjunction with your licensed legal advisor.

Transcript

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Hi everyone. Welcome back to another episode of In My Day with Ryan and Dave. How are you, Dave? I'm absolutely awesome. How are you today, Ryan? I'm doing awesome. And today we have another guest the other senior partner as we like to call him at Family Financial. Alex Roig, how are you, Alex? I'm doing great. How are you? I'm good. Are you okay with being called the other one? I suppose so it's been it's been a theme for the past 22 years. It's a long time run. We say it with love though. We say it with love. So today our theme, because we just got done with a bunch of high school graduations and the craziness that is springtime for all of our parents around here are toys of summer. So we're gonna get going today and just see how everybody's spring finished up. And what we got to look forward to during summer. Yeah. You know, we had two graduates last night and it was absolutely awesome. Well, it wasn't awesome necessarily going to two separate graduations in Rupp, but we had the first graduation of the day in Rupp Arena and we had the last graduation. And in between we ate a bunch of food. So it was great. And now that the kids are, are on their way to their collegiate careers, I am ready to have some fun this summer. So how about you, Alex? So my schedule and, and my seasons have nothing to do with the actual seasons and temperature of the year. It's all about what my kids are doing. I have two boys that are nine and 12 and everything revolves around their schedules as far as activities they're involved in. So we go from really fall sport season into a little bit of a dead time and winter. And then back in the spring sport season again, where their activities pretty much control our schedule completely. So the biggest thing for us wasn't really going in a transition from winter to spring to summer. It was transition going from ice hockey to going into track season, to going into nothing for a few weeks. So, wow. So right now we're at the point where we actually have a little bit of free time we're at, at home at the same times as opposed to trying to figure out who's taking, which kid where, and fall into a better routine. So what do you guys like to do when you get a winter break, give us the winter break, give us the, the, is there a spring break? Is there a summer break? How did, how did the activities, work out as far as just what you can do with them during the, those times? Sure. With both kids being very active, young boys, their interests are really in things that are more outdoors, more adrenaline driven. So we spend a lot of time in the winter going skiing, spending a fair amount of time out in Colorado and Utah. And then the summer we spend a lot of time down at the lake where they're able to float around with friends and enjoy that time and wrestle on the mats and do all those things as well as some wakeboarding and just generally being kids that are out and about doing stuff. And I saw you down at the lake over Memorial Day weekend. You did not warn me that you hadn't turned the temperature of the lake up yet. Hey, we're there this weekend, like I said, my season surprise for Memorial Day, right? What was icy cold like? Icy cold. Our seasons seasons said really no way revolve around the temperature. Like I said earlier they revolve around having free time. So we were able to get out there. We had our state track meet the weekend before, and that gave us a little bit of free time to get out and really enjoy life even with the jacket on. Well, it was funny even to see the whole family out there, not just you and the kids, but she also had the family dog Basil out there with y'all. She's out there all the time. Yeah. She's our our, our third dog as a family over the years and we definitely made a point with this one find one that was gonna be able to be out there in the water and be able to follow us around, do all those fun things. Yeah. I actually watched him out there, Ryan, and first it was just the two Roig boys out there on the map pointing. Mm-hmm. And then the dog jumps out there and, She literally looks like she's a brother and she's just rolling around with him. And next thing you know, like a couple more boats come up and tie up. And how many kids were there at one point in just this rolling massive ball? Oh, there's always a least a dozen. Every, every time. That's, that's it. It was just a movie. That's a small day. Yeah. Arm's, legs, you know, torsos. Mm-hmm. And they're just trying to get a volleyball or something that was out there. Yeah, it was, it was the cutest thing to see though. Well, and the great thing with these kids too is The majority of them are involved in, in, in pretty high level competitive events, whether it's cheerleading or whether it's the sports. They're playing baseball. And so they go from worlds where they're expected to be very serious about what they do and to perform at a very high level to, to being kids again for summer. So it doesn't matter if they're six years old or 16, they're out there having a great time again, rolling around, having a blast with each other. Yeah. No, that's absolutely awesome. But nothing kills that competitive drive even, even for volleyball. Well, well, well, king of the, Matt's a real thing, so that's, well, speaking of king of the mat, you know, one thing I'm gonna be doing this this weekend coming up is I'm going to a father-son camp with Michael, my youngest, who's my 10 year old. And I, I did, this is kind of our rite of passage with with my oldest with Gates. I was supposed to do it with Ridley, my middle child, and I offered it to him this summer. He looked at me, was like, I'm not a camper dad and Michael immediately piped up. I'll go, I'll go. It's a church camp they put together on like 450 acres with probably six, 700 dads out there with their kids. And we got tons of fun things. But you actually backpack in, hike like a mile and a half in, carry all your stuff. And, and so while I was getting ready for it, you always wonder cuz you're matched up with random father sons right from kind of around your area? I happen to know one of the other father, son groups, but I don't know the whole, section of our, of our camping group, they're kind of in our pod and so we're all meeting up and going into the camp together, which would be fun. But I know one of the guys is like super camper and like, he'll be like the alpha camper. Like if I take like a, a fire match starting kit, he'll take like some lint and one of those little strike things. You create the fire with him, maybe a, a stick to whittle and he'll, he'll make smoke and fire for the children and all. He's like, MacGyver, right? So it look, wait, like who? Like MacGyver. Wait, you don't know who MacGyver is? No, I don't. Well, what is it? MacGyver? Alex, can you help him on this? MacGyver is the 1990s Swiss army knife of a person. Okay. He can, he can make anything happen with what's available with him. And it was a show that had the same plot repeated in 13. It was a TV show, it was a TV show back in the nineties. They repeated the same plot 200 different ways over the course of 10 years, and had the same result every time a MacGyver won. Okay. So, like, spoiler example, there was a bomb that was Terrace set, right? And all MacGyver had was like a piece of chewing gum and like maybe a used Q-tip. And what else might he have? I don't know. A belt or something, right? He would somehow figure out how to tie the belt to the bomb with the Q-tip and the gum and sling it a very far distance away. Okay? But it ended the same every time. It was like Scooby-Doo, where it's always the night watchman who actually did it kind of thing every single time. Okay, so next time we'll talk to you about Magnum Pi. Totally different event, you're due for that one too, right over. So anyway, this dad can do everything. Okay. Yeah. So I was thinking, okay, I'm, I definitely am not gonna be the camping alpha dad. Okay. That's not my forte. My version of camping is anything you do outside without a hair dryer and an extension cord. So this is, Extreme camping. Yeah, right. We'll actually be sleeping on the ground intense and the elements. And so I, Your face just tightened up as you said that it did. I mean, it's almost like a natural Botox, you know, just thinking about it. And so I, I texted Alex because I was like, Alex knows all kinds of random facts about all kinds of things. That's one thing I really appreciate about him. Cause I don't know where he gets the time you come up with this random information, It's experience. Like I know Monday you won't be here if you're camping this weekend, that's a very good point, I'll be dealing with poison ivy for sure in all the wrong places. But but no, so I That's gonna be hard to unsee. Yeah. Right. That's gonna be very hard to unsee. So I, I texted Alex and I was like, where can I get like one of these camping hot pot that heats up water, right? And alex's response just made me laugh about it. So, you know, you wanna tell what you said? So I'm, I'm in my mid forties now and haven't tent camps since I was in my mid twenties. And the the important difference in camping technology was that in my mid twenties, I'm not sure what camping technology was. I could afford a fire, actual, actual fire. Not a not a a fancy r ei catalog version of a fire that you carry in your backpack. Real fire, caveman fire. A fire. That was not a fire you made with Lins, anybody? Not an option. So I said, I said, well, I need a jet boil. You know what's the best jet boil? It's like these little like kind of cups with like a sterno can on the bottom and you flip a switch and they go boom. And you have instant like water in 90 seconds. And Alex is like, I have no idea because all I could afford when I was back in my day. Was a fire. Yeah. So that didn't do me much. Good. So what'd you end up doing? Well, I ended up getting one. Okay. I asked the Alpha dad what I should get. Okay. And surprisingly, I thought this was gonna be a very expensive thing and it ended up being like $90, which isn't cheap, but it was like for something that you can reuse over and over and over again. Even if I sit on my back deck in the morning and just wanna make coffee, but not use my coffee pot, it's about $9 per use. Right. Get your money's words, but it will be fun camping because, so that's my thing that even though I'm not a camper, what I'm looking forward to from taking my first son camping was the experience, the father son experience of going and, and I think, Alex, you probably remembered this, like I took Gates and we were shooting BB guns and we were doing truss falls and we were climbing on, you know, repelling and things and getting out those rope poles and, you know, just the rope swings and everything. And water gun wars, and they had water balloon fights and, you know, they did a big slide into a lake you can go on. And so it's just all things to kind of build camaraderie with your son. And then they build in certain kind of lessons and things too, to, to kind of bond you as that. But they try to create that experience so that you're trying to find something at that camp. That you have an interest in with your child. So it kind of comes full, full circle. I think all that's part of the native American vision quest and how all that how that originated historically, it's really could be, except we don't tie the, the the bars, you know, into the, into the body and let you hang on a 10 or a pole. Please don't in the sunshine until you like, see visions and things. Yeah. So that's, that's camping. What you know, so lake camping, Children's activities. Ryan, you want to tell us about your children's activities? You have planned this Well, sure., I have no children's activities so I can do whatever I want this summer, which is kind of nice. I don't revolve around the school schedule and all that other stuff. So we're, we're in that stage of life right now where we're, we're not there yet. So we get, we get the flexibility. So this summer we're looking forward to going up to Saratoga, New York for a couple weekends and enjoying the horse races and horse sales up there. Like we like to do. And also just playing the same old golf courses with old friends, new friends and all that other stuff. So nothing too crazy exciting, but just a fun, quiet summer. So, yeah. So when you're not the horses, you gonna' be doing any other activities around town or, absolutely. Absolutely. We'll be doing Thursday night live golf course. Whatever else comes our way. So, little bit of everything. So as far as budgeting for summer activities, when you guys have all these different seasonal things you're doing, What is the best way that you find to budget for stuff? Like you said, kids sports are only a certain time of year, and then there's vacations in the other time of year. What, how do you find the best way to go about actually preparing to do that stuff? Well, well, first of all, in the modern world Kid sports aren't always cheaper than a vacation either. So there's always, always that element of it too. Yeah. But Alex, like, that's still there. Careful what you wish for. They're wonderful, but they come by the cost. Yeah. But, but the one thing that that I kind of remind folks of is that best way to have fun. Is something that's kind of counterintuitive. It's using math that when it comes down to it while, while none of us really, or most of us don't really enjoy sitting down with a spreadsheet and going through and figuring out how it's all gonna happen and where it's gonna go to we, we do enjoy sleeping at night and knowing that our choices are actually the correct choice and that they're supported in real logic in real math. So there's a whole lot of things you can do in the world that seem like an extravagant level of fun. Or a very simple thing that depending on your, your priorities and depending on your real goals in that time period and what's really important to you, the allocation of what money you have and what pocket it goes into and what pocket it comes out of becomes a very important thing. So one thing we do on a reoccurring basis is we spend a fair amount of time going through deciding. Not just what's, okay, isn't us telling you, you know, what's good and bad and smacking you on the wrist. It's more of an issue of let's take a look at the numbers and be sure that everything you're doing is supported in taking care of the important things first. And once you take care of the important things, we're saving money for all the different things that are real relevant factors in our lives, both today and tomorrow going forward. Then at that point you can budget in some, some extra money. So some things that are still out there to be able to actually have fun with. And it can be on a, on a different scale. For some folks, it's you know, a vast difference because they choose to have their lifestyle in terms of fixed expenses be at a certain level. For other folks, they're, they're okay with having that trim down in order to, to make some make some memories right now and prioritizing that. So the best thing that I can say in terms of budgeting for all these different activities, for all these different seasons of your life is really that math tells you a lot about where you are today. And it lets you be able to actually not have that buyers or remorse when you're making those choices. So that to me is the, the important thing. It isn't a matter of, Hey, your buddy's going on this trip, should you go too? It's what's important to you and how's it all work out in your life? Yeah. Yeah. Do you know that's something that you said I wanted to repeat that I think is really important to just lay emphasis on People come into our office for, for financial planning meeting and we often time will, will ask them, do you have a budget? And we have a few clients out there and if you're listening, you know who you are. That will reel off their Excel spreadsheet and they have 10 or 12. Sheets of paper that are folded and and conjoined it, and they just open up into this map and they've got every single possible thing in their life budgeted out. And then, but the other 80% of people mm-hmm. Like are like, I think I pay this much for my utilities. I know what my car payment is and I know what my mortgage payment is and I know I contribute to my 401k, but I have no idea what amount it's, I think it's a certain percentage of my. I think it's about 4%. Yeah. Yeah. And I, but I don't really know. I just, so we have to look at the pay stub and look at these things, but, but everyone comes in regardless of whether they have a exact detailed accounting for everything they're doing, or they're literally seat of their pants and just kind of set it up as each step of life progressed, right? Need a car, here's my car payment. Need a house, here's my house payment. Start a job. Here's my 401k savings. Right? Every single person comes in our office expecting to be completely judged. Hmm. And told that they're doing something absolutely wrong, and that's actually not the point of financial planning. The point of financial planning is, is exactly what you said, which is all of this money's gonna be spent somehow, whether it's, whether it's outta sight outta mind in a savings account, whether it's in some kind of housing or item, or an investment in your children or some kind of activity. You know, or just out at a restaurant, it's all going to be spent. Yeah. We'll transfer sometime during a hundred year period somehow. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Some way, somehow. And so it is really just a matter of where do you want that money to go? And the job of a good financial planner is really to help you prioritize that and, and identify that. And when we have a, one thing I do is when I have a lot of couples come in, I'll say to the, the husband and the wife. I'll say, each of you write down separately your top five goals of where you'd like to spend your money. Don't talk to each other and then compare your lists. And usually of those 10 things, you know, three or four right of each of their lists will match up with each other. And then there's usually one or two items that each of them have that are not things that the other person shares. And that's where I find if we talk about that, it really makes a difference because, They are going to figure out those dollars are gonna leave that checking account somehow. Mm-hmm. And go somewhere. Mm-hmm. So if, if they can be on the same page of how they want to spend their money, it may be making small changes to their lifestyle that allow them then to be able to do things that they only dreamt of that thought that were luxury items. Mm-hmm. But they're not really luxury items. If they can just really just practice a little bit delayed gratification. Yeah. For, for some reason, a large percentage of the population chooses stress over knowledge. So they would much rather go into the idea of, Hey, I don't want to be the really boring person that has a spreadsheet that dictates my life. They want to go under the the idea of living the moment and go ahead and enjoy everything they do. Then their moments in involving being awake all night worrying about it. So, all the time people come in with a question of, should I, can I, when can I, and those are all pretty easy answers there. There's really no, the only gray area in that entire conversation is, do you want to, the rest is all engineered in math, and we can go in and figure that out and make it something that people can live with. Or they can decide it's not important enough to them to work for another five years. They'd prefer to take a in that career five years early and spend more time having more my life, modest lifestyle. They'd prefer to drive the different car, not take the vacation. Those are all totally okay, but we can take real numbers and take the the uncertainty out of it and say, Hey, should you, can you when can you, and, and make those be real answers pretty easily. Yeah, and I think deep down, most people know whether or not they're doing stuff they're supposed to be doing or not. Now, whether they can afford it or not, that they kind of know deep down, they might not know the exact number, but if they're coming in and asking, can I afford to do this? Mm-hmm. In the back of their mind, they kind of already know what the right answer is. They just want someone to push'em in the right direction. And the important part about that is just to be honest with yourself about it. Mm-hmm. And if you're. Whether you're the kind of person that puts every single thing on an Excel spreadsheet, or you're the kind of person that just puts the mortgage in the car payment on the Excel spreadsheet, just be honest with yourself about where you're at and where you want to go to make sure that your goals meet what you're doing. But there's also a learned behavior part of that too, that people's mentality and what they actually do in life is based on their experiences up to that point. So we have a lot of new clients come in that have had a life change. It can go one direction or the other. It can go from getting out of grad school and getting their first big paychecks. Which of them let them think they can take on the world and buy everything they want. Mm-hmm. Because all of a sudden they've gone from little to no income and shrimping by to look at all this money I have and nowhere for it to go. But the reverse that we see a lot, and it's probably a harder psychological thing to overcome, is what our retirees do. We have plenty of folks that came in that have spent many, many years planning and budgeting and living carefully and doing all the right things, and they come into retirement in a place where everything they ever want to do is in front of them. There's plenty of money to do it, and what they have left are a limited number of years to do it in. And we end up having to overcome that with folks a lot of the time too, because for them, all of a sudden they're on summer vacation all the time. Should they take the vacation? Should they go somewhere, spend time with the grandkids? Should they buy the Corvette they've always wanted what, what's next for 'em? So we spend a fair amount of time having to go through that process with folks and again, find comfort in math and show'em that if you do this, it'll be okay. Or if you do this, it won't be okay. Whichever the case may be. There's a fine line there in that conversation. Yeah. Because sometimes it's, it's you know, whether it's new graduates, whether it's current retirees or whether it's a, a someone who is in a situation who was just forcibly retired from their job. Right. So a lot of people are very concerned right now about a recession and they're, they keep hearing in the news, the, the recession word and housing crisis. And high interest rates. And what that beckons in a lot of people's minds is the, you know, back in our day, the 2008 to 2010 financial crisis that unfolded right in the housing markets. So everybody saw their house really drop. But the other thing that happened during that time that we had were people that were coming in that were three to five years short of their retirement goal, but they had suddenly been given the pink slip. Yeah. And we could easily, we have no idea. Nobody has a crystal ball, but we could easily find ourselves a year from now or two years from now in that type of situation where suddenly people that have a plan and are, are working their plan and doing everything they can to get to the finish line, and they have all kinds of plans on how they're going to spend their first two years of retirement, right? Mm-hmm. Suddenly receiving pink slips, surprise and early retirement coming and, and then having to sit down with us, right? And try to determine what can I do, what can I do and or if I want to continue to work, what are my options or what's the minimal amount of money I need to make to be able to kind of still maintain my goals? Or do I need to make adjustments? And so, We haven't had that cycle for a long time, but I do see the potential for that cycle happening over the next few years just because history does tend to repeat itself. And, and no, we may not have the big housing crisis. We may not have a huge recession, but we certainly could have a small recession, right. That leads to employers, that Overhired coming out of the pandemic. To decide to just kind of trim the fat per se. And unfortunately, what we typically see when employers trim is they're, they're typically trimming the more senior level people because they can, whether it's said or unsaid, the fact of the matter is they trim 'em and they replace 'em with, with two younger Yeah. Employees that they can pay a lot less than they were paying that one person. And that just tends to be the corporate cycle that we see. So. That is something that if, if if there's a person listening out there and they're thinking, well, I'm getting ready for retirement and I need to do some planning, or if I've recently maybe even lost my job and I know I still can't stop working, but I do need to kind of put a plan in place to make sure that as I get to the finish line of retirement, that the choices I'm making are correct. You know, I definitely would encourage that person to, to certainly contact us. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Anything else to add on that, Alex? Well, and part of the same thought process is that going back to what I was saying a few minutes ago, it's really an issue of. How it all turns into a longer term plan, a mathematical plan. And the should I, could I, when can I, it fits into the same process. Everything we deal with, there's choices that, that we make of when can I and should I, but there's, but there's outside factor is beyond that too, that come into play in all those different decisions. So the majority of what we spend our time doing isn't just the, in a perfect world, what we expect to have happen. It's the what if that doesn't happen, how can we best prepare for it? If things do change, how can we be sure that we're still on track? How is this self complete in a way that's the best option available? So we spent a lot of time doing that. And again, it isn't to make people work more, it doesn't make 'em work longer. It isn't to make 'em work harder. It isn't to make 'em save more money. It's to make 'em worry a lot less because the the scariest thing for, for most individuals as they come into really any phase of life is what up tomorrow is way different than I expect. And I can make all these fun plans to do things with my summer, that's great. But what if I get in the summer and things dramatically change? We can't control the weather like Dave was saying earlier, but there's a lot of things we can do to control our, our, our circumstances within that weather. It it may rain on Dave this weekend. He may get some poison ivy. But you know, it sounds like MacGyver can help him out with that. The one thing is guaranteed is that you're not expect me on a Monday. Well, that's, that is shot. Yeah, that's right. We're prepared to pick up Monday. So we're saying tu So we're saying Tuesday is a wild card. Well, and, and tell leave folks with a fun little story, you know, on that. Like, we have retirees, right? That come in and even after the pandemic, we're saying, can I take a, can I take a European river cruise? Right? Is now a good time to spend. 10,000 a person on a European river cruise, and for some of them it was a good time because of their situation, and for others it wasn't a good time because of their situation. Mm-hmm. Right. So the answer is different for different families, not necessarily e even the same if you're in the same stage of life. Right? Yeah. And, and on that same side, like Kyrk Davis here in our office, right? When it talked about what can, what can he afford at his stage of life, right? They're, they're a newly, you know, married couple for a few years now, and. And but no kids. And so they love to travel. Me and Hannah Love to travel and, and I was talking to Kyrk the other day before he left for this Alaska cruise, and, and I said, well, you realize you're going to Alaska, like at the end of May, start of June, Kyrk, right? And he goes, yeah. And he was excited. And I said, well, you realize nobody goes at that time of the year. I said, everybody goes in like August or September when it's warm and nice. I said, it's gonna be miserable and cold. He goes, Well, I mean, we got a great deal. We got a great deal and Kyrk's all about deals. Kyrk is always about the best deals. He said we got a great deal and, and it was very inexpensive fact. The airfare almost cost more than the cruise. And and so we'll be fine. And, and you know, we all saw that text he sent us the other day over the weekend where they're in parkas and they've got icicles coming off their eyebrows and chins and his beard and he is like, We're cold. We're very, very cold. So, so there, you know, even if, and I know Kirk can afford a nicer trip than that, but you know, for him, apparently that's what fit within their budget that made sense at this stage of life. And they're still getting to see Alaska just a couple months earlier than another couple. But, but we also know Kyrk's very okay with being very cold. It does, doesn't bother having a smile, so that hasn't a problem for 'em to having more fun doing it this way than doing it the to some other folks the fun way. So that's right. He's less concerned about the climate and the Marriott bed than Dave is. So yeah, he absolutely, he absolutely is. So if anyone out there has any questions on their particular situation of what can I do this summer, what can I not do this summer? Or how can I get ready for a potential pitfall feel free to give us a call, 859-219-1006 and we look forward to talking to you and hearing about what your summer plans are. Thanks again for joining us, Alex, and thanks for listening to another episode of In My Day.