Wealth Formula Podcast

Wealth Formula podcast is not a real estate show. However, we do love real estate! Why? Because real estate is real. It’s not a piece of paper and it’s not a digital equity that you trade on Ameritrade that goes up and down with the whims of global emotion. It is an investment that allows us to own something that has nothing to do with Wall Street. We also love it because it can provide us with one of the pillars of wealth…cash flow. In addition, it provides us with great tax incentives. I believe every high earning professional should be invested in real estate. If the idea of owning real estate yourself is daunting, invest along side others and enjoy the same kind of cash flow and real estate advantages as those in the trenches. In this week’s podcast I talk with a prolific real estate syndicator who puts together big deals and lets others participate in the cash flow. Whether you want to take it to the next level and become a syndicator yourself or just invest with one and get real estate exposure in your

Over the last several podcasts I have been impressed by the increasing number of listeners that are tuning in to the show and am really excited about the community we are growing together. For that, I thank you. This week I’m traveling but thought it would be a great opportunity for me to share more about myself with you. A few weeks back I was interviewed by Lane at “Simple Passive Cashflow Podcast”. He asked some interesting questions that I thought might interest you and help you understand more about me. Lane asked me about the good and the bad and it made for some very interesting conversation.

Solving the wealth formula is dissociating time from money. In other words, you no longer need to actively work in order to maintain a particular lifestyle. It is important to know that entrepreneurship is not required in order to get to this point. In fact, if you already have a high-paying job, your quickest way for you to gain financial independence may be to keep your job and focus your attention on making smarter investments in cash flowing assets. The way I think about this is that you have to have a “motor”…something that drives lots of cash in your direction. If you already are a high wage earner, you’ve got that covered for the most part. Your time may be best spent figuring out how to use that income generating motor to quickly create ongoing cash flow to replace your current time dependent income rather than learning how to start a business. The reason to be an entrepreneur is because it gets you excited and makes you feel alive. That’s what it does for me but…that’s me. I also love Minnesota Vikin

Ask any tax professional about the tax code and they will tell you that it is 90 percent gray. Then why is everyone being so conservative? Well, professionals have a terrible fear of being audited. They have a terrible fear of breaking the law. I get it. No one wants that kind of stress in their life. However, let’s talk for a second about how the government creates the tax code and what it is meant to do. Of course it is meant to create revenue for the government to spend on important things like roads and schools. That’s obvious. But what is not that obvious is that the government uses the tax code to incentivize investments that it believes are in the best interests of our country. Let’s take for example the huge tax benefits to investing in oil exploration. Whatever the stated cause for our involvement in various Middle East conflicts, it has always come down to our oil interests. It is the reason we call Saudi Arabia our ally despite the fact that they are, more than any other country in the world, to bl

To be a successful investor, you must have a personal investment philosophy. You need to think about not only the deal but whether or not it fits in with your own goals and your view of the world. In this week’s episode of Wealth Formula Podcast, I give you my own framework for investing that has served me well for the last 7-8 years. As a reminder, you can leave questions for me by going to wealthformula.com and clicking on the “ask Buck” icon. Also, if there is a topic that you think I should cover, let me know. Even if I don’t know anything about the topic, I bet I can find the right person to interview! Also make sure to let me know how I’m doing by leaving a review on iTunes and sharing the show with friends and colleagues.

I am not your typical physician if you have not figured that out. I am more of a “raging entrepreneur”. That doesn’t mean I’ve had only success. In fact, without question, I’ve failed lots of times but the difference between most people and me is that I keep trying until something sticks. I’ve used this same approach in brick and mortar multimillion dollar business enterprises, real estate, and…internet marketing. A few years back, I got really into this idea of making money on the internet. I loved the idea that I could literally create a business on line that could make money with virtually no over head or even capital expense. Not a bad business model, right? So, I started teaching myself all sorts of different internet business models such as affiliate marketing off blogs, google adsense, etc. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, that’s ok. After all, neither did I. Furthermore, I made virtually no money doing most of this. But… then I learned about self publishing ebooks on amazon and believe it o

This show is about Tax Free Wealth with Tom Wheelwright. So with all my posts about taxes and my special report, you are probably thinking I’m a little obsessed with this whole tax thing. Well, I am and it’s in part because I read this book called Tax Free Wealth from Tom Wheelwright about 3 years ago. If you don’t know Tom, you should. He is Robert Kiyosaki’s tax guru and one of the Rich Dad advisors handpicked by Kiyosaki himself. I only have a handful of must read books in my resources section which you should check out at wealthformula.com and Tax Free Wealth is one of them. It is NOT a boring tax book. It’s actually well written and incredibly fascinating. Folks…the biggest expense virtually all of you have out there is taxes. Furthermore, most of you think you can’t legally reduce your taxes and it is just what it is. You’re wrong. I know this from personal experience having worked with high level tax advisors and it has literally saved me north of 7 figures in taxes in the last 3-4 years alone. I’ve ev

I have talked about Jorge Newbery several times on my show in the past. It has always been in the context of his 12 percent yield mind blowing fund. But little did I know that before that, Jorge was a real estate prodigy making literally millions of dollars from dilapidated, rejected, apartment buildings and resurrecting them back to life. His story also reminds us of the importance of failures in investing in order to know that things don’t always go as planned. Investing in apartment buildings is certainly my favored approach to wealth building but it is not without risk as some might have you believe. But then again, is the stock market without risk? The key to success as an investor is education and experience. I’m a surgeon. When I was a resident learning a new operation, I always studied the textbooks closely before going to the operating room. Then, an experienced surgeon would walk me through the case. But true mastery did not come for any procedure until I finally left training and was out on my own.

No one wants to get old but it’s better than the alternative. Imagine getting to that age when you are unable to take care of yourself and you start feeling like a burden on your kids. What do you do? These days, most people in this situation end up at an assisted living facility. When you think of assisted living facility, what kinds of images come to mind? Personally, I think of a sterile Soviet Union style building built in the 1960s with a faint smell of urine covered up with a flower scented cleaning agent. I imagine anonymous cafeterias and care givers who don’t know your name and who are just there punching the clock. But maybe it doesn’t have to be that way. In most states, a growing asset class known as group homes are becoming more prevalent. Instead of that institutional vision, now imagine a regular house in a regular old neighborhood. Imagine that you know all the others living in that house and all the caregivers know you by name. Maybe that would cut down on the high rates of depression seen in

Real asset investing is not limited to the rich. In fact, if you look at the crowdfunding movement on the internet, you can now invest in just about anything you want. Crowdfunding laws in recent years were intended to rectify the “unfair advantage” that the more affluent had to investments with greater profit potential. But… don’t forget, the opportunities to invest in real assets were there even before the crowdfunding frenzy. Anyone who could afford it could buy themselves a house and rent it out. As you know, residential real estate is my favorite investing asset class. The problem most people have with this idea is that they do not want to be landlords. Sure that rental house might be a great investment and a good source of cashflow but who wants to worry about tenants, toilets, and termites? Certainly not me…in fact, that’s one of the reasons I chose apartment buildings instead. I felt it was easier to get management for larger assets. In most cases, I still believe that to be true. However, I’ve been t

It has been a crazy couple weeks for me. As some of you know, I am aggressively pursuing some deals in a couple of great US multifamily markets and I’m getting really close to getting some under contract. That’s good news for me and for my investors! If that sounds interesting to you, make sure you sign up for my investor club on wealthformula.com and I can tell you about what I’m up to…only caveat is that you have to be an accredited investor. Anyway, I’m not writing to you to sell you anything. I brought up what I am doing because I want you to know that I practice what I preach. There are a lot of gurus out there who like to talk about real estate and other real asset investing, but all they do is talk. I want you to know that I walk the walk as well. That brings me to this week’s guest on wealth formula podcast. Many of you will know him already. He is the host of “Get Rich Education”, Keith Weinhold. His show similar to mine in many ways and we often share the same guests by accident! That said, he’s bee

When I finished my training and figured out that I had to invest money somehow, the hardest thing for me was figuring out who to trust. The first apartment building I bought was a 14 unit building in the southern suburbs of Chicago. I would now characterize that as a C- to D+ area. My broker was the guy who sold me my house and I trusted him. The idea of specialization on the broker side never occurred to me at that time. Nevertheless, he was still a guy I could trust which meant a lot.

Everyone defines wealth a little differently. My own definition of wealth is in the form of an equation wealth=time. Time is my currency of choice. It gives me the freedom to do whatever I like with my life. For the last 2 days, I took my three little girls (8,4,2) sledding in in the afternoon while most of my friends were at work. We had a lousy winter in Chicago--cold but not very snowy. We had to get some sledding in while we could after getting a big snow fall!   Don't get me wrong. As a general rule, I am not a leisure guy. I get bored very easily. That's why I have 4 different businesses and am starting more as we speak. But that's what is fun for me. My wife is a clothing designer. You can see her stuff at oliviajoffrey.com. She actually started out as an urban planner but designing clothes was more fun for her so that's what she is doing and she loves it. Similarly, my art is creating businesses and finding unique investment opportunities. I say art because there is a certain creativity that goes wit

My investor club is for "accredited investors." What is an accredited investor? Well, it's not something you apply for like it sounds. Being an accredited investor is just something you are or you are not...like you are either pregnant or you are not.   An accredited investor is a defined by our friends at the SEC as someone who makes a minimum of $200,000 ($300,000 if filing jointly) or has a net worth of 1 million dollars excluding personal residence. The significance of being an accredited investor is that you can invest in things that those with less money, cannot. You can also be something called "a sophisticated investor" which has a much more nebulous definition but essentially says you know what you are doing even if you don't have that much money.   These laws were put in place long ago to "protect" the average person from predatory activity. The  irony of this all is that there is no protection for the average Joe, or pension funds for that matter, against investing in a wildly bloated stock market

The ideal business is not one that is necessarily glamourous. I have a cosmetic surgery business that is uncomfortably glamorous for me--I'm not a really flashy guy. Nevertheless, my plastic surgeons do a great job of making people get over their body hangups. It's not just about changing a person's physical appearance, it is actually more about changing their mental state. That translates into their lives as confidence. It's a good business. Lot's of work and competition but my team does an outstanding job and we make money. However, I cannot say that it is an "ideal" business.   In my humble opinion, the ideal business is one where everyone wins and the business makes a difference in the world. One example of this is Jorge Newberry's American Home Preservation. AHP is one of our sponsors but I have been talking about them long before we ever had a sponsor relationship. American Home Preservation actually started out as a non-profit organization. The idea was simply to buy failing mortgages in bulk and rent

In the 1980s, you could get double digit returns on your savings. Interest rates were that high.  That said, inflation was out of control as well so the real value of earnings might not be as attractive as it is at first glance but certainly better than today. Today's economy punishes savers be eroding there wealth through inflation while not providing and significant interest. That's why Robert Kiyosaki says, "savers are losers."   In the last few decades, we have become an economy of low interest rates and debt. At first, we used these tools to fuel our economy and to create better lives for ourselves but, eventually, like most drug users, we became addicted. Now, we can't live without debt and inflation! We need to create more debt so that we can pay off our old debt and we need inflation to devalue and erode the debt we have. What do you do in this kind of economy? As they say, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do." If we must have inflation to pay for our fiscal sins, ride the wave. Invest in Real assets..

I recorded this interview with Reed Goossens several weeks ago but could not figure out where to put it because it is focussed on investing the USA for foreign investors. I did not want to leave all you Yankees out for a whole week so I decided to broadcast this as a bonus episode. Going back an listening, This is actually not just a show for foreign investors. It's also a very interesting immigrant story. So, I encourage you to listen to this show even if you are an American for the purpose of getting back in your immigrant ancestor's mindset. I hope you enjoy this bonus episode. Buck

I'm going to Belize next weekend. Actually, by the time you get this message, I will already be back. I'm looking forward to seeing some of you there at the field trip. Our Mahogany Bay Village investment opportunity in Ambergris Caye, Belize with its world class luxury affiliation is active and we are fast and furious on the raise. So if you are interested in this opportunity, don't miss out.  If you are an accredited investor, you can go to reefequitypartners.com and take another look  at the deal. Of course, you can also go to wealthformula.com and sign up for investor club.    Lots of GREAT opportunities coming through the Investor Club pipeline over the next couple of months. By the way, if you have signed up for the club and have not talked to me yet, make sure you schedule your appointment with me ASAP.  While the Belize offering is regulation C-- meaning you do not have to have a pre-established relationship with me, if you want to invest in any future apartment buildings, you MUST have a pre-establis

Wherever you stand on the political spectrum, you must admit that the Trump presidency has already demonstrated that it is going to do things differently over the next 4 years. Curiously, history shows us that presidents have very little to do with the state of the economy. Mostly, they are just in the right place at the right time or vice versa. Let's take Bill Clinton for example. Clinton's term coincided with the rise of the internet and the dotcom economy. Lucky for him, he got out before that bubble burst. During his 8 years in office, Clinton dismantled some of the most significant pieces of financial regulation we had and we did not see the negative implications of those choices until 2008. For example, the repeal of Glass-Steagall legislation occurred in 1999. Glass-Steagall was enacted by the United States Congress in 1933 as part of the 1933 Banking Act and separated commercial and investment banking. It restricted affiliations between banks and security firms. What does that mean, you ask? Quite si

Today's show is another opportunity that is open to non-accredited investors. David Sewell was previously on my show to talk about his turn-key business in Panama where you can literally buy coffee farms for long term cash flow. That show was a great hit and many of you actually bought some land I hear. David is a very smart guy with a great heart and he actually has a new opportunity about which you will be some of the first people to hear. Investing in coffee is very interesting because of the abundance of coffee drinkers and a growing market... it also helps that it is totally addictive. When you think about things that are not going away in the next 20 years, it's safe to say that coffee is one of them. What else is here to stay? Well.. I bet you chocolate will be around for a long time. The market is growing at a tremendous pace and---who doesn't love chocolate? My 3 little girls alone could keep that industry around for at least one more generation. On this week's episode of Wealth Formula Podcast, Da