Navigating Financial Growth: Estate Planning, Taxes, and Adviser Networks

Scott Carson [00:00:10]:
This is the no closer show where you get the latest developments in distressed note investing and learn the secrets of how you can control 1,000,000 of dollars worth of property for pennies on the dollar. Get educated and entertained by someone who has closed thousands of deals and lives to support you in achieving the safe. Now, here’s your host, CEO of We Close Nodes, Scott Carson.

Eric Brotman [00:00:48]:
Good morning. Good afternoon, and good evening. Hey. Welcome to this episode of the show. As always, Scott Carson, jacked up to be with you today, and I’m excited for this special guest episode. You know, a lot of you guys out there, gals and guys, are going through transitions. You’re moving away from the job. You’re trying to become full time real estate investors.

Eric Brotman [00:01:09]:
That’s one way that you guys are transitioning a little bit. But many of you are also transitioning into thinking about retirement, or you’re doing all this side hustle stuff, especially in real estate, so that you have a better retirement, a better way of life, or do a lot of the other things. And I’m honored to have a buddy of mine. We’ve been actually, been trying to get him on for about a year, and now we finally were able to get him on because this guy is busy. He’s an ass kicker. He’s kicking ass and taking names all over the place. He is the host of the don’t retire Graduate podcast. He’s been a financial adviser for quite some time helping.

Eric Brotman [00:01:41]:
He’s got just under 3 quarters of a 1000000000 in assets under management. He’s a best selling author. He is just a badass, and we are honored to have Eric Brotman join us on here on the Nutlix show. Eric, what is going on, brother? How are you doing today?

Eric Brotman [00:01:55]:
I’m doing great. First of all, would you follow me around and just introduce me that way all the time? Because I You can

Eric Brotman [00:02:01]:
hear Bob Baffert.

Eric Brotman [00:02:02]:
I he do that. Even my my wife couldn’t do that if she if I asked her to. So you if you just wanna hang out and go, hey. You gotta meet this guy. I’m I’m in. That that’d be great.

Eric Brotman [00:02:12]:
So do you need me to stand in the courtroom and say, Ed, now I’m coming out of the shower. Wait in at, you know, the mister Eric.

Eric Brotman [00:02:19]:
First of all first of all, I don’t want anyone seeing me right out of the shower, and I don’t want anyone to know what I weigh while I’m coming out of the shower. So absolutely not. Both of those things are out. But thank but but thanks for the idea. No. I’m doing great. This is gonna be such fun, and we have we we’ve tried to do this for for some time, and we finally got on each other’s calendars, and I’m not sure I’m the busy one, sir. It might be you as well.

Eric Brotman [00:02:40]:
So good stuff.

Eric Brotman [00:02:41]:
Well, you know what? We’re late is better than never. You know what I mean? That’s the way I look at things. It’s getting it done and things. We just both got back from a a fun event in Atlanta. I made a lot of connections, reconnected there. But, you’ve been doing what you do for a while now. I think today is your 21st an anniversary for BFG. It is.

Eric Brotman [00:03:01]:
Is that correct?

Eric Brotman [00:03:01]:
It is. Yes. Our BFG is finally old enough to drink, which is exactly what all of us almost did at lunch, and I thought better of it. But after work, yes. I’ve been in practice for 31 years, but 21 years, today, literally today, started this company with 1 full time and one part time person. Now we’re 22 full time folks, 10 CFPs, clients in 37 states, and we’re we are busy. It’s it’s it’s a it’s a bit of a machine, but it’s very personalized. You know, we we represent a finite number of families all over the place, but it’s it’s fun and and it’s busy, and I’ve got great people around me.

Eric Brotman [00:03:36]:
I mean, it’s it’s been a journey. I just look back on the p and l statement from, like, o five, and I’m like, wow. You know, I can’t believe where things have gone in that in that period of time.

Eric Brotman [00:03:46]:
Well, the, you know, the nice thing speaking of period of time, I mean, doing this I had a company for 21 years. You’ve been through a few cycles. You’ve been through a few ups and a few downs and a back again. You’ve been to the circus and, you know Yeah. Been around it a few times, a block a few times. What and with where the we could dive deep into this, but we probably won’t. But, you know, where are you seeing things at right now with people? And maybe just the polls. Are people nervous about what’s going on? Are they excited? Do they like, oh, shit.

Eric Brotman [00:04:15]:
I haven’t prepared enough. Where where are you kinda seeing your clientele base as far as the pulse of pop positivity or negativity on what the future holds?

Eric Brotman [00:04:22]:
Well, Scott, I gotta answer that question by saying when is the show going live? Because is it pre or post election day? Because as we sit here, the election hasn’t happened yet, and I expect that right now, everybody’s a little nervous and uncomfortable for one reason or the other. And and that’s not a political statement. It’s just true. I mean, there’s a lot of stress this time. It’s just the the bombardment of advertising and messaging really does wear on you. I can’t wait for it to be over. However, you know, I I do think after the election, depending on the outcome, we’re gonna see 1 group of people being very enthusiastic and one group being very nervous, and I don’t know that there’s any merit to that from an economic or market standpoint at all. History has not proven that one party or the other does a better job with with the stock market at all.

Eric Brotman [00:05:07]:
Right. Tax policy certainly will change one way or the other. And and certain, you know, each party is trying to to penalize the states that vote for the other party in tax law. We’ve weaponized the tax code a little bit, but that’s a two way street. I I think if we have a winner, if we have a defined winner and someone concedes if someone concedes and we have a defined winner and we know the rules, we can play by them. If we have a contested election and lawsuits and there’s 90 days of of, of purgatory, then I I think there’ll be some some maybe ugly uncomfortable days during that period. But long term, it’s irrelevant. It really is long term.

Eric Brotman [00:05:46]:
I I couldn’t agree more. Everybody gets all caught up in the the hype, the negativity. If I could not ever get another text message from political, it’s being bombarded. I’m like, isn’t there a law against this stuff with the spam calls and stuff like that these days? But give that’s why I always say, listen. It doesn’t matter. I mean, the most important vote really isn’t the national. I mean, yes, it is who you vote for president and vice president like that. But the biggest impact is more on the local races.

Eric Brotman [00:06:10]:
That’s where a lot of stuff comes in more so than anything else. Your senators represented, judges local, and just getting out and and doing your part makes you feel good. We voted already early to avoid some of the craziness next week. Now this episode should come out probably Monday right before, the first results. So

Eric Brotman [00:06:27]:
Alright. So we so right now, someone is sitting watching us 24 hours before that happens, and they already have, like, the 7 cups of coffee jitters. They’re already shaking like this. Like, oh, god. It’s almost over. Yeah. I I I’m excited that I will not be watching television on Tuesday night.

Eric Brotman [00:06:44]:
Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:06:44]:
I’m I’m gonna wake up Wednesday, and it it kinda like, you know, the train’s gonna arrive at a station, and I’ll find out where it went. I cannot sit and watch that by the minute. That is fool’s errand to me. I can’t do anything about it either way.

Eric Brotman [00:06:56]:
Amen to that, and it’s just all all spinning. But let’s spin this a different way. Let’s get back into talking more about folks here. Because, obviously, I one of the greatest things I loved is I I saw your tagline a year and a half ago. I was like, oh, I gotta talk to guy because I love how you come about the point of don’t retire, graduate. Can you share share a little bit of insight on kinda your thoughts behind I know you’ve you’ve had that for a while, but that’s a whole different mentality, I think, in in case of a lot of folks out there, especially in your field.

Eric Brotman [00:07:24]:
It is. And I’m I’m shocked that when I when I came up with it, no one had come up with it before or at least no one had trademarked it or published anything by it because I thought it it made sense. I think retirement in traditional sense has got awful. I think it’s a I think it’s a sentence. I mean, you don’t go from 50 or 60 hours a week doing something ideally that you love and being connected and being involved with people and all of those things to suddenly sitting home in your pajamas watching daytime TV or playing shuffleboard and expect that that’s gonna be good for you. Your brain becomes oatmeal in a matter of months, and it really is unfortunate. And so I think it’s important to look at at finishing your full time work, whether you’re 27 or 77 when it happens. I know a lot of your audience is probably looking to get out of the 9 to 5 grind and and make passive income in lots of ways.

Eric Brotman [00:08:12]:
So this is really true for any age. This is not about turning a certain age where the government says you can have your Social Security now. It’s about financial independence, and I believe that retirement is not the absence of work, but the absence of needing to work. Yeah. And once you fit financial independence, either because you’ve created an income stream from one one spot or another and I know you have your favorite, but there’s plenty. So whether it’s whether it’s your you’ve created that income stream or you’ve built enough of a a nest egg that it’s throwing off enough income that you can live for the rest of your life with dignity and including inflation, you’re retired as far as I’m concerned. At that moment, you have to determine how you’re gonna spend the next chapter, maybe the next long chapter of your adult life. What are you going to do and who are you going to be? And so if you go on to LinkedIn, I defy you to find somebody on LinkedIn to find their profile.

Eric Brotman [00:09:04]:
And it just says Joe Smith retired and click on it. Be like, Oh, I got to meet Joe. I’ll bet he’s a ton of fun at parties. I mean, it might as well say deceased, Scott. Right? Like, what’s the point? So you’re not retired. You’re a volunteer. You’re a grandparent. You’re a you’re a hockey fan.

Eric Brotman [00:09:22]:
Whatever in the hell you are, you’re not just retired. And so find something to do. And I’ve discovered over my 30 plus years at this that there are 3 things that the most successful retirees have in common. And when I say successful, you’ll notice I didn’t say wealthiest because whoever dies with the most money still dies. So it’s who are the most successful retirees. The very first one is they and the most important one is they are absolutely debt free. Now I know there’s leverage, and I know there’s ways to use debt to make money. And there’s a difference between that and credit cards and car payments.

Eric Brotman [00:09:57]:
So I’m not begrudging someone who invests in a way to make money. I am saying it is especially rewarding to get to a point in your life where you don’t owe anybody a plug nickel. Second thing is you’ve taken care of yourself. You have your health. Because I know a lot of wealthy people who aren’t healthy, and they’d give every dollar they had just to to feel good and and take a walk or a jog. You know? So so I think you have to take care of yourself along the way. You don’t wake up one day and say, I think I’ll be healthy now. In the same way, you don’t wake up one day and say, I think I’ll be wealthy today.

Eric Brotman [00:10:28]:
It’s like, well, that takes years years years of discipline. And then the third and most important thing, hands down, is you have to have purpose. You’ve got to have a reason to get out of bed every morning to get you fired up. It doesn’t matter whether it’s for money or not if you don’t need it. You might be fired up about the work you’re doing in the local food bank. It does not matter what you’re into, but you got to get fired up about something. So you can’t wait to get up. You can’t wait to be plugged in, and you’re still living your best life.

Eric Brotman [00:10:55]:
And if it if you happen to be doing it for a few bucks, super. I know 80 year olds who started dog walking businesses because they wanted fresh air. They loved animals, and they felt like making a few dollars for spending money. What there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s great.

Eric Brotman [00:11:08]:
Amen to that. That’s so true that when people often leave the job, they have no purpose, no passion. They don’t live around very long. I mean, it’s it’s a and that was it. They say that, doctors and scientists are coming out that the more active you are, the more challenged you are that delays Alzheimer’s, it delays Parkinson’s. Yep. Some of the biggest things out there, and you have a longer, more fulfilled life. But we all we don’t wanna just rot, sit in the chair, watching, married with children or whatever you’re watching.

Eric Brotman [00:11:36]:
Well, I I mean, I get bored I get bored in a week. And if if it’s not if we’re not some place doing something I’m looking forward to, I’m bored in a week. My wife does not want me puttering around the house. I assure you I will be in her way. She doesn’t want that. She’s like, go find something to do. So unless it’s a vacation where we’re taking a hike or we’re on a boat trip or something fun, if I’m sitting around for more than 4 hours, I’m looking for stuff to do. So I don’t know how I would do it.

Eric Brotman [00:12:02]:
I don’t know how I would just suddenly not have something to wake up to. And and beyond that, it’s not just what to do, Scott. It’s also who you are. Yep. Because we have a funny thing in this country, and and I’ve heard this. It’s in the UK. It’s in Australia, but it’s not everywhere in the world. But it’s definitely true in in in these countries that when somebody sells says, who are you? Tell me about yourself.

Eric Brotman [00:12:23]:
The first thing we we say is what we do for a living. Yeah. Well, that is sure as hell not who I am. It’s what I do for a living. And while I’m proud of that and I do have some integration, I have work life integration because I don’t think balance exists. But No. There’s integration. But if that’s all I am and I stopped doing it, I literally don’t have an identity.

Eric Brotman [00:12:44]:
So it can’t be. We can’t let that happen to folks. It’s so sad. It’s sad to see people who never take the trip because they’re trying to stockpile for the and then they they finally retire and they’re dead in a year and never take the trip anyway, or they’re not healthy enough to go, or their spouse passes away. It’s so sad. And so I think there’s a balance between living now, having having a great life with your with your kids or grandkids or neighbors or friends or spouse or whatever you’re into. I don’t think you should stockpile every dollar like a miser and wait for some magical time when you’re gonna have fun because it may not come. At the same time, you can’t blow every penny unless you’re the federal government because then you can print money.

Eric Brotman [00:13:24]:
If you’re not the federal government, you can’t print money. You can’t just blow it all. You have to have a plan. So, you know, I’ve heard it said that that you should you should live as if you were gonna die tonight, but plan as if you’d live forever. Mhmm. And I I think there’s a lot of wisdom in that. I don’t know who said it, but it wasn’t me.

Eric Brotman [00:13:39]:
Well, I’ll tell you what. We’ll give them credit and say that you I I’ve always said if you give somebody credit 3 times, then it’s yours. You know what I mean? Well As of today, Eric Brotman said that if you’re not living, you’re dying. And Yeah. Live

Eric Brotman [00:13:50]:
Yeah. I mean, if you’re not if you’re not moving forward, it’s kinda like with a business. Yes. And and it’s true in the real estate business too. In any business, if you’re not growing, you’re shrinking because of the the pressures against you and whether it’s inflation, whether it’s erosion of the dollar, whether it’s just that that there is, there there you wind up with a scarcity mentality if you’re not growing. So whatever you’re doing, you want abundance, you want amplitude. It doesn’t mean you have to work yourself to death. But if if you’re not growing, you’re not moving forward.

Eric Brotman [00:14:19]:
It’s kind of like water. When water is in motion, it’s powerful. You could power a city with a waterfall. And when it’s not in motion, it starts to smell bad and attracts flies.

Eric Brotman [00:14:28]:
Yeah. Exactly. I can think of a few people that are sitting around not moving that smell bad and are attracted flies.

Eric Brotman [00:14:35]:
But enough enough about our relatives. That’s fine.

Eric Brotman [00:14:37]:
Listen. So you’ve been doing this for 30 years. What’s the passion that led you to start doing this stuff? Obviously, I mean, just being around people can see the passion coming out of your pores. What’s what really caused you to be this? What mentors maybe direct you in the direction or what happened in the past to lead you down this path there?

Eric Brotman [00:14:53]:
Well, like many financial advisors, it was a total accident. I was an English major, which is a that’s a you know, English and psychology, so that goes right into finance.

Eric Brotman [00:15:02]:
Whoo. Making big bucks there, baby.

Eric Brotman [00:15:04]:
I was an English major, and I was heading to law school. The plan was to do law school, and so I took a job out of college at a brokerage firm in the legal department.

Eric Brotman [00:15:11]:
Nice.

Eric Brotman [00:15:12]:
And I fell in love with the financial portion of it more than the legal portion of it. And and despite having taken the LSATs and applied to law school and gotten into law school and paid a $1,000 deposit to a law school 30 plus years ago, I didn’t go. And it’s the best $1,000 I ever blew in my life because I don’t know that many happy lawyers. I really don’t. There’s a few maybe, but I don’t know them. And so, you know, I I I fell in love with the business. And the reason that I fell in love with it was because of my role in the legal department. People were calling me at a moment where they were bereaved.

Eric Brotman [00:15:43]:
It was actually a very sobering job. And I would talk to people or their advisers who said, you know, so and so’s husband just died, and we need to we need to know what to do. Is she gonna be okay, and how do we do this? And, of course, I had done none of the planning. I was operational. I was 21 years old. And I had to tell these people, ma’am, I’m sorry you lost your husband, but his ex wife is still his beneficiary on the IRA.

Eric Brotman [00:16:06]:
Oh, wow.

Eric Brotman [00:16:07]:
At 21. And they weren’t real happy sometimes when that happened. And if if you could dig somebody up and beat him to death, that would be what she’d wanna do. And it’s not just that. It’s also, hey. I I know you have 2 siblings, but only one of them was named because they said it and forget it and never, you know, fixed the beneficiaries where there aren’t any beneficiaries, so the whole thing is taxable. I’m sorry. You’re losing half to the government.

Eric Brotman [00:16:30]:
The news was almost never good. Mhmm. And it’s because the planning was almost never done. And I realized that that if I could help people avoid that moment at their darkest, most traumatic time, if I could make at least that go well, then I could change somebody’s life. I could help them not hit the bottom when they’re when they’re in that nadir in their life. It can be the difference between not getting back up and saying, okay. I can do this. And so that really was the inspiration behind it.

Eric Brotman [00:17:00]:
I considered myself and going back to the English major, I considered myself Holden Caulfield. And I don’t I don’t I don’t know how old you were when you read the Catcher in the Rye. My daughter’s actually reading it later this year. I’m very excited to see what she thinks. But Nice. But but if you remember the character, and I don’t mean the fact that he was depressed and drunk a lot and kind of a problem child. I mean the fact that what he dreamt up was this idea that he had to protect people. Mhmm.

Eric Brotman [00:17:23]:
And so there’s lots of ways to do that. And some people go into medicine. Some go into education. I went into financial planning, and I I didn’t do it on purpose, but I couldn’t be more thrilled that that’s what I get to do every day.

Eric Brotman [00:17:33]:
Oh, that’s so awesome. Now when you’re sitting down and meeting with your clients, especially some new ones, you know, kinda let’s maybe we maybe we should identify that. Or, what’s your I you know, what’s your typical client age? You know, where are they at in their lives so we can kinda, you know, ask more educated questions about that.

Eric Brotman [00:17:51]:
Sure. I I mean, the the variety of client of clients we represent is is very, very broad. Most of our clients if I had to paint you a picture of a typical client who shows up on our doorstep, they are sandwich generation. I don’t know how old a fellow you are, but I suspect we’re contemporaries. I think I might have a few years on you. But, these are people 45 to 60 who have parents getting older they’re worried about. They’ve got kids to educate. They’re busy, and they’re working 50 60 hours a week.

Eric Brotman [00:18:17]:
They’re trying to manage all of this. They wanna retire before they die, and they just don’t know how to do any of it. And they’re like, help. Like, how do I like, which levers do we pull? What do we handle?

Eric Brotman [00:18:28]:
Right.

Eric Brotman [00:18:28]:
And and so it’s kind of a throw your hands up. A lot of people get buried by those decisions and just never make them. And so, you know, we find most of our clients are multigenerational families, not exclusively, but mostly. Usually, the reason to do this planning is because you love someone. There’s someone you care about that you don’t want to burden them. There’s a lot of grandparents out there who don’t want to burden their kids or grandkids. There are kids out there who want to launch so that they’re not on mom and dad’s payroll. I know we like to pick on the young people who who think they can hang out on the on the couch and play Xbox all day, and I enjoy a day like that myself.

Eric Brotman [00:19:01]:
Don’t get me wrong, but I couldn’t do it for 30 years. And so I I I think that’s pretty typical. And we don’t have an asset minimum at our firm, so we don’t work with only the the super wealthy. We do work with some very wealthy people by definition, but, we we have 2 different programs, one of which is private wealth for people who really need that concierge level, and one of which is a financial planning for all that is really more of an entry level ability to get some good advice, some good planning, either on a subscription or flat fee basis or on a or on an asset, basis. But it it really is designed to meet people where they are and grow with them, and that’s rewarding. And that’s one of the reasons why we have such a diverse group. I mean, we’re we have 10 CFPs, half under 30, which you don’t see. We’re very diverse we’re very diverse in all the ways that that you check boxes for diversity, and and and we didn’t do any of it on purpose.

Eric Brotman [00:19:53]:
You know what I mean? Like, I I tell people, they they’re like, how did you manage to do that? No firms do that. And they really don’t. It’s unbelievable. But I said, well, we just sort of hired great people, and they’re not all the same. It was the simplest thing ever. We identified great people with good work ethic, the right integrity, the the right aptitude, and the right hunger, and let’s go get it. And,

Eric Brotman [00:20:15]:
it’s amazing when you focus on those good things, how good things happen versus trying to plug somebody into a Yeah. Yeah. Goal. Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:20:21]:
Yeah. In a meritocracy, you’re going to have diversity.

Eric Brotman [00:20:24]:
Mhmm.

Eric Brotman [00:20:24]:
By its very nature, there’s a bell curve of humanity. Some are great with with numbers. Some are great with people. Some are great salespeople. Some are great with with building ships in bottles, which I couldn’t do. I’d break it, and it would go everywhere. Like, so we all have different skills. Like, you remember the game Operation? Do you ever play it as a kid?

Eric Brotman [00:20:41]:
Yep, sure did.

Eric Brotman [00:20:43]:
Yeah. Yeah. So I did aptitude testing my freshman year of high school. I went to a place called Johnson O’Connor Research Center, and they did 2 days of battery of aptitude testing for me. And it was everything from number reasoning to vocabulary, to finger dexterity, to you name it. My lowest score by far was, in fact, tweezer dexterity. I was a 5. And to give you a sense, it was 5 out of 100, Scott.

Eric Brotman [00:21:07]:
If they said they said medicine is out, every patient would die. So far,

Eric Brotman [00:21:14]:
there you go. Good.

Eric Brotman [00:21:15]:
So even if I had wanted to study bio, like, I could have killed a dead cat during the dissection in biology. It was all bad. So, but but you learn what you’re not only what you’re good at, but what you have fun with.

Eric Brotman [00:21:27]:
Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:21:28]:
And if you can marry that, it’s it’s great. And so that’s who we try to hire, people who we know we’re gonna not only be successful at this, but also enjoy it because life’s too short to do something for 40 or 50 years that you hate.

Eric Brotman [00:21:39]:
Mhmm. Well, that’s the thing. I when you were talking earlier about, having debt paid off and having money to do things you want, not being rich. But I think of John Goodman from the gambler where he talks about having f u money Mhmm. And no matter what that amount is. And that’s one of my favorite lines of all times. And that’s one of the things I’m gonna tell our students. Like, listen.

Eric Brotman [00:21:59]:
You gotta prepare for the future. You gotta be smart what you do, and you gotta have really when you get to the name, you gotta start having uncomfortable questions not only with yourself, but with your spouse and your family in a lot of cases so you can plan accordingly. How much of how much of what you do is or your team does as well is kind of that family counseling in some cases. A lot. Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:22:19]:
Oh my good. And and I’m not a trained therapist. In fact, I need a trained therapist most of the time, so I’m not qualified for that. But so much of financial success is based on behavior and decision making and things that are qualitative. The math problem handles itself. A computer program can do the math in 4 seconds, but that’s not where we make our decisions, and it’s sure not where we make our mistakes. Mhmm. So, you know, they talk about the robo advisor and the all the AI and all the things.

Eric Brotman [00:22:48]:
It’s not gonna replace what we do for a living because this is a very human thing to understand what it’s like to have to have a conversation with your your mom that she shouldn’t drive anymore is not something you’re getting in an algorithm. Mhmm. You’re just not. Oh, here are the signs. Go take her keys. Everything will work out. No. That’s not how it works.

Eric Brotman [00:23:08]:
And that’s just one example. You know, trying to explain to your kids why, spending a quarter of $1,000,000 for an undergraduate education is crazy. It’s it’s hard, especially when the Joneses are doing it. It doesn’t make it a good idea. It just means that their friends are going, why can’t I? And so it’s it’s a very difficult thing. It’s very human, and a lot of it is behavioral. And especially you talked about the ups and downs. If it it I know that the the the tech bubble was something.

Eric Brotman [00:23:38]:
When, you know, when 99 flipped over to 2,000, you remember y 2 k, and all the grid was gonna shut down, and all the computers were gonna stop working. We’re gonna live in the dark for a few years and and all be eating canned cat food. Yep. We we we had those conversations. It was the end of the world, and, actually, what it really was was a great sales technique for a lot of computer companies who made a fortune until the end of Q1 2000 when no one needed a computer for several years, and they all went out of business. Mhmm. However, o eight zero nine was different. O eight zero nine was the first time that I ever saw and talked to dozens, if not hundreds of people at the time who were legitimately frightened.

Eric Brotman [00:24:15]:
Yep. Frightened that they wouldn’t be okay. And, you know, there there are really only 3 kinds of people from an investment standpoint, and we can boil it down to 3 very simple things. You’re either a buyer, a holder, or a seller. There are no other variables. And if you’re a buyer and you have the stomach to buy when things are unfavorable, if you can if you’re if you’re the one buying real estate in 07, you’re cannon fodder. But if you’re buying it in 09, you’re about to make money. And that’s true for lots of things.

Eric Brotman [00:24:46]:
If you’re a buyer, it can be the greatest opportunity of all time. You just shouldn’t stop. If you’re a holder, you’re going to lose years. You know, people who held in 0809 lost about 5 years. It took that long to recover. And so they’re working 5 years longer than they might have or they’re living on less than they could have because they weren’t still buying, but at least they weren’t selling. Some of those sellers never recovered, especially the ones who November of 8 said, I’m done. I can’t do it anymore and put everything in their basement.

Eric Brotman [00:25:15]:
They’ll never be the same to this day. 25, 15 years later, they’re not the same. And and so it’s I think the behavioral impact of it is so important. And when people would ask me, what do you think is going to happen? My answer had to be a real honest one. I have no idea. Yeah. I’ve never seen this before either, but this is what I’m doing. This is what history tells us.

Eric Brotman [00:25:35]:
History could be dead wrong, but that’s what we’ve learned over doing this for a while and having that perspective. I know of of the hundreds of families we represented, there were less than 5 who made really catastrophic mistakes. We couldn’t stop them from making. It’s their money. Right. And and the vast majority just sort of grit their teeth. But, you know, when the market was moving 7 or 800 points a day and it was at 10,000, that was a big deal. Mhmm.

Eric Brotman [00:26:03]:
And and, you know, young people don’t remember that. In the same way that that interest rates the last 2 years, there’s an entire generation who never saw an interest rate over 1%, 1 a half percent. So money was always cheap.

Eric Brotman [00:26:16]:
Yep. But there’s also generation that ever saw an interest rate below 12 too for a while there.

Eric Brotman [00:26:22]:
For a while. Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:26:23]:
Yeah. My first ever loan, you get this first ever loan I did was a refinance from my parents. Their primary, we did the cash out refi because their original mortgage is still at 12% when rates were at 6.

Eric Brotman [00:26:33]:
Oh my god.

Eric Brotman [00:26:34]:
And and my dad cried at the closing table because we basically rolled a credit card debt, all our debt to their house, dropped their interest rate, pulled some equity out of it, then mortgage payment was less than what it was all combined. Yeah. And just the the wave of stress being lifted

Eric Brotman [00:26:50]:
Yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:26:51]:
That’s what made me fall in love with the mortgage business. You know? And we see that today, especially when we’re helping clients or buying debt and then working with homeowners to stay in their houses in sort of fashion.

Eric Brotman [00:27:00]:
Oh. You

Eric Brotman [00:27:01]:
know, there’s things I talk to people. They’re like, why did you do this, or why did you do that? And they’re like, well, I, saw it. I I kept keep up with the Joneses. You know? I didn’t need to do this. I’m like, well, that’s you gotta quit worrying about the Joneses and start worrying about what you’re jonesing for and what you

Eric Brotman [00:27:16]:
need to get done. Right? The house I grew up in, my my folks bought it, it was 1982. Uh-huh. I think it was at 14 3 quarters or something asinine. It’s like buying a house on a Visa card.

Eric Brotman [00:27:28]:
Yep.

Eric Brotman [00:27:28]:
And, you know, my first home was 95. It was at 7 3 quarters, and I thought I was getting a great deal.

Eric Brotman [00:27:33]:
Yep.

Eric Brotman [00:27:34]:
Today, you show somebody 7 3 quarters, and they think you’re gouging them. But but, historically, that’s pretty normal. I mean, a 30 year note at 6 or 7 or 8%. It was was pretty standard stuff. And, of course, you know, the tax code, they keep messing with whether you can whether you can deduct it or not and how much of it and everything else. And and, of course, we’re watching the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which is gonna expire in December of of 25. And is congress gonna let it expire, or are they gonna extend it? And there’s so many unknowns, but, the reality is most of this comes down to behavior. And I heard a a tax expert once, who said make good life decisions first and tax decisions second.

Eric Brotman [00:28:14]:
Yeah. Because there are a lot of tax decisions you could make that wouldn’t make your life better. I mean, we could all go we could all go live in Puerto Rico.

Eric Brotman [00:28:21]:
Mhmm.

Eric Brotman [00:28:22]:
Puerto and there’s some lovely spots in Puerto Rico. I’m not disparaging. Heaven knows. However, you you could go there, and I think it’s like a 4% federal tax.

Eric Brotman [00:28:29]:
It’s 4% federal, yeah, on your personal stuff for sure. We we explored it at one point. Yeah. I mean, that that’s

Eric Brotman [00:28:35]:
a bargain. I’m I’m in Maryland, which means I’m a sucker, and I’m paying 8% in state income tax for the privilege of being here. Mhmm. And, you know, I have a place at the shore, which is 5 miles from the Delaware line. I could cut my real estate taxes by almost 80% and my income taxes by about 33% by moving 5 minutes north. I haven’t done it yet. I like my place. So Samasaka, you know, if I was having trouble affording it, I wouldn’t have it in the 1st place.

Eric Brotman [00:29:08]:
But, you know, that’s why you make good life decision, and you don’t let the tax tail wag the financial dog. You know?

Eric Brotman [00:29:14]:
Well, it’s the same way I live in Austin, Texas. Great city. Love the environment. Our property taxes in Texas are higher than most. We don’t have the state income tax. Austin is one of the most expend well, it is the most expensive city in Texas. You know, we’ve seen property taxes go. We were just we’re talking about this the other day.

Eric Brotman [00:29:29]:
Hey. Well, we need to go ahead and fight that to get that knocked down a little bit. But, you know, just because I live here and we’ve got a ton of equity, doesn’t mean I if I were to sell, where would I move to? Where would I be as happy? You know? The amenities we have. I got we’re looking for some land, but doesn’t mean I wanna move out in the middle of force like the Unabomber, you know, and hide out. Right. Sometimes that does have advantages, but, hey, that’s a different that’s a different type of podcast. It it is.

Eric Brotman [00:29:53]:
That’s a different a different show, and we’d be we’d be drinking already for that show, I think, but we shouldn’t do that today.

Eric Brotman [00:29:59]:
No. But that’s that’s that’s the thing that a lot of people, you know, as an ex I was actually a financial adviser for a while when I was banking for JPMorgan Chase and worked for Smith Barney and and, C Financial when I first got into financing. I always find it interesting how when people come into you, they they just they just don’t know. They’ve not taken time to sit down and figure out really what they want long term in a lot of cases, and you have to kinda go through that and hold their hand through a lot of this stuff when they get rock and roll. What are the what are the the biggest really kinda what are the biggest mistakes that you see people make when you’re sitting down with them for the first time?

Eric Brotman [00:30:37]:
There’s a number of them. Yeah. One of them is any kind of revolving personal debt is uniformly a bad thing, period. Any consumer debt is, by definition, a bad thing. Yep. So that’s number 1. I think not taking advantage of employee benefits is a mistake. A lot of them are there.

Eric Brotman [00:30:55]:
Some of them are free or very cheap, and people don’t don’t look at them and don’t use them properly. Another mistake that we’ll see is we’ll see people handle a lot of their insurance decisions terribly. Buying something they don’t need, or or overinsuring something or missing something entirely. I mean, there’s a lot. Yeah. Nobody brags at the water cooler about their car insurance. I wouldn’t think, despite Flow’s best efforts, nobody does that. So it’s sort of a mundane check the box.

Eric Brotman [00:31:22]:
Got it. Move on. And sometimes there’s ways to to to incorporate that, and that’s not the most exciting example, but but it’s true. I think a lot of people are using their HSAs wrong. They’re using their their their their thinking about taxes wrong. I mean, your your balance sheet, if your balance sheet has all 401 ks on it, your balance sheet is not reflective of the money you can spend. There is a mortgage on that money in the form of an ordinary income tax due either to you or to your heirs. And unless you’re using all of it for charity, someone’s going to take a big haircut on it.

Eric Brotman [00:31:57]:
And so it a dollar is not a dollar. A dollar in an HSA is different than a dollar in a Roth that is different than a dollar in a traditional account that’s different than a dollar in a capital gains property or in something that can be exchanged or in real property or they’re they’re all different. So I think a lot of people are looking at it. And and and the last mistake, I would say, and there’s there’s more, but the last mistake I would say is not really understanding what it’s gonna cost to retire. I mean, I define most people to take a 30 day vacation, take a 30 year vacation. It it’s mind numbing. And so when we say to a young couple, somebody you know, a young couple, they’re just getting started 28 years old. Maybe they’ve got a their first baby on the way or something.

Eric Brotman [00:32:38]:
And you start talking about the the the amount of money they’ll need, not only to raise a child, which we all know is mind numbing, but also what dollar figure they might predictably need after inflation 40 years from now in order to perpetuate the income they have now, which is not necessarily their high income years.

Eric Brotman [00:32:58]:
Right.

Eric Brotman [00:32:58]:
But it’s just if they’re making x dollars and we want that 40 years later based on inflation, that is going to be a multiple, a big, big, big multiple. And then if you want to live on a 3 or 4% withdrawal, the number has 2 commas in it, and it’s huge. And when you show that to somebody, they think we’ll never get there.

Eric Brotman [00:33:18]:
Right.

Eric Brotman [00:33:19]:
And so sometimes people throw up their hands and say it’s too late. I can’t do anything. You know, we’ll see somebody 55 who says I really haven’t started yet. Is it too late? And the answer is no. Would it have been better to have started 10 or 15 or 30 years? Absolutely would have been better. But it’s not too late to improve what that next chapter of your life would look like. The only mistake you could make is not starting immediately. I mean, if you wait 6 more months, it’s not gonna make things better.

Eric Brotman [00:33:45]:
Mhmm. There was an article in USA Today that came out about a month ago talking about 67 or 68% of people had given up on the ideal of retirement. They were expecting to work to the bone till the day they passed away. And that number you talk about, when people see that, it’s eye popping because they’ve never sat down and saw that number before. But it’s like an elephant. You start off at 1 bite at a time and not ask in first, and you put a little bit. You put the power of compound interest. You put the the power of the rule of 72 is one of my favorite, you know, into work for you and educate you on that.

Eric Brotman [00:34:20]:
And I think, obviously, we have such a highly uneducated society because the fact we don’t really talk about this in high school or college unless you’re taking it as your major in a lot of cases. And I think the part of that goes into this overall aspect that we talked about before, all the keeping up with Joneses. Oh, man. I can’t afford that. I can never get to that. I can’t I can’t I can’t I can’t versus the whole Thomas. Well, I think I can. I think I can.

Eric Brotman [00:34:42]:
I know I can. And go that route.

Eric Brotman [00:34:43]:
Well well, so so 70% or so of the United States economy is based on consumer spending. Yep. If consumers stop spending, the US economy halts. So it is not in the government’s best interest to get people to stop buying things they can’t afford. Yep. It’s in the household’s best interest to stop buying things they don’t need or can’t afford. On the micro level, it’s obvious. On the macro level, it’s problematic because we don’t make anything in this country anymore.

Eric Brotman [00:35:09]:
We consume everything. Yep. And so if we ever stop consuming and right now, I don’t see it because we’re all I mean, it’s only getting worse in terms of what people feel like they have to have. I mean, you know, if we create one more streaming service to add to our bill, we’re we’re we’re basically inventing cable. It’s very exciting. You you you have 17 different streaming services, and now we’ll bundle them. And you voila. You have cable.

Eric Brotman [00:35:34]:
And and then now we just ruined college football because now you can’t flip back and forth. You got to log in, log out to look at a different game.

Eric Brotman [00:35:40]:
And and you can’t even find your favorite team at the time. I mean, it’s it’s on some streaming service you’ve never heard of, and I’m not buying them all. So that that’s another sort of silly example. But the fact is that we’re spending money. People spend money, and they don’t look at it because there’s so many things are dripping. They’re regular. This adds $12 a month. What do I care? Oh, it’s $20 a month.

Eric Brotman [00:36:01]:
What do I care? Well, if you have 18 of those and suddenly it’s $700 a month, that’s real money.

Eric Brotman [00:36:08]:
Yeah. It’s the it’s the death of a million cuts. We were we were talking with a bar the other day on a a mortgage trying to get him back on track, and he sent over his statements. And we’re evaluating. He’s got 12 different different subscriptions to different OnlyFans models. I’m like, well, I was like, this would basically pay for half your payment. Does your wife know?

Eric Brotman [00:36:29]:
Oh, I mean, can’t you just, like, have a tournament and choose your favorite 2 or 4? I mean, come on, man.

Eric Brotman [00:36:36]:
Or cut them all and start your only one so it’s a cash flow.

Eric Brotman [00:36:40]:
Listen. I’ll send them pictures of my feet for $300. He could have them right now. I I don’t Wow. Well, okay. I think you might have hit the nail on the head on that one that this we may have identified the problem. You remember there was a movie with Michael Keaton in it called mister mom years years ago? Yes. And there was a TV repairman who comes in.

Eric Brotman [00:36:59]:
He goes, I think I found your purse. I think it’s a woman, actually. She goes, I think I found your problem, and she found a boot inside the TV. I think I found your problem. You know, he was watching the game and put his foot through it. That’s probably why it’s not working. That’s an OnlyFans account right there. It’s a boot in your TV picture.

Eric Brotman [00:37:14]:
But it’s like that across the board. Subscriptions Yeah. You see things, and groceries are up. It’s the 8 a $1,000 payment for a car these days. That, drives me bonkers. I, we, had to go buy a new truck here last couple months ago, because we totaled up mine, but mine had been paid off. You know, been paid off for 10 years. 70,000 miles won’t drive that much.

Eric Brotman [00:37:37]:
I’m looking at brand new Dodge Rams. I’m like, I’m not gonna pay 80 to a $100 for a brand new truck. That’s just stupid. You know? We found 1 that was used, and it had a few mileage. I’m like, I saved $30 by buying this instead and paying cash for it and getting rid of it. You know? People just it’s all that. Well, I gotta have the latest news. I gotta have the new Tesla, or I gotta have the new Tesla truck.

Eric Brotman [00:37:57]:
Oh, now I gotta buy another truck because my Tesla truck can’t tow my boat that I bought.

Eric Brotman [00:38:01]:
Right. Or you have to plug it in every 3 miles. Yeah. I I know. You know, there are gas stations every couple miles. There are not charging stations every couple miles. I defy you to cross the country in an electric vehicle, at least not today. I’m sure somebody out there will go, yeah.

Eric Brotman [00:38:16]:
Hold my beer. I can do that, and it’ll drive itself. It’s you’re right about the latest and greatest, and I paid $91,500 for my first home.

Eric Brotman [00:38:27]:
Mhmm.

Eric Brotman [00:38:28]:
And my first mortgage was $563 and I think $23. And I was in a panic. Like, it was I was scared to death. And, you know, I remember that day. I remember that moment where you become a homeowner, and it was a it was a 2 bedroom, 2 bath condo in a nice area. And it was close to work and it was close to family. And I’m like, I can do this. And, you know, a lot of times people, when they talk about real estate just as a as a personal residence, you and I might disagree or maybe you’re with me.

Eric Brotman [00:38:56]:
I don’t think the personal residence is an investment.

Eric Brotman [00:38:59]:
No. It’s not.

Eric Brotman [00:39:00]:
I think if you’re using real estate for cash flow and you’re using it to build your balance sheet and to build your p and l, that’s different. If you’re living in it, it’s a cost center. Yep. I mean, the money pit is is real. When you have to put a roof on your house where you have to replace windows or do the driveway, that is not making you money.

Eric Brotman [00:39:19]:
No. Ask everybody that’s in Florida or North Carolina affected by hurricanes and having to in self insure these days and stuff. It’s a that’s not it’s a liability. It’s not an asset.

Eric Brotman [00:39:28]:
Yes. And and that’s that’s not to talk people out of owning a home. I I certainly enjoy owning mine, and I am, I believe 35 more payments. 35 on both homes. I timed them both so that by 2028, I will owe no one anything, and then my wife, I’m sure, will want to move because that’s how life works. But I’m literally gonna stroke my last check for a mortgage in 2028 for both properties, and I’ll be done. And, hopefully, we won’t go anywhere unless we move 5 miles north to Delaware to see if we can

Eric Brotman [00:39:58]:
get back.

Eric Brotman [00:39:58]:
That that could that could happen.

Eric Brotman [00:40:00]:
You know, that’ll do. That that’ll do. Then we get another 30 years there for it. Now with you, you work with a variety of people in I think we’re talking about 30 30 different states, 20 7, 30 different states. Correct?

Eric Brotman [00:40:10]:
37 right now. Wow.

Eric Brotman [00:40:11]:
Yeah. That definitely takes a lot of knowledge of of, knowing what’s going on with their state, state income taxes, property, all the things go along with it. Yep. You’ve you’ve definitely gotta have a pretty diverse knowledge of that with your your team. Or do you have specific advisers that are, familiar with multiple states or one state, or how does that kinda work when you’re talking with people?

Eric Brotman [00:40:32]:
Our advisers in house are state agnostic, but we work real closely with the estate attorneys and with the CPAs. The CPAs, of course, have to know if there’s a state income tax, how to deal with it. The estate attorney has to be within that state. They’re usually not barred in more than 1 or 2 states. So the the the challenge for us isn’t so much understanding how each state works from a financial standpoint. It’s knowing good people who can do the other work that we need to build that team. You know, if somebody in in Maryland needs a real estate agent, I can give them 50. If somebody in Wyoming needs 1, I might know 1.

Eric Brotman [00:41:08]:
So I need to have the right network so that I have and all of us have enough relationships to be able to say, here are a couple of people you can talk to or this is the person I would talk to because of your situation. You know? And that does make it a little bit more challenging. But if you have a good relationship with the other advisers, you have a good relationship with their CPA who has 300 clients in Nevada. Then you can call them and say, hey, we’ve got a situation with 1 of our Nevada clients. What do you think? How should we deal with this? And you can get some of that advice from someone whose boots are on the ground. I do think that helps. Look, we have clients who are no longer in the United States. They have to be US citizens, and they have to have a US mailing address for us to work with them.

Eric Brotman [00:41:48]:
But a lot of them are living overseas, at least part of the year. And, you know, I’ve I’ve had to have conference calls at weird hours with, like, French attorneys, and and the system is totally different outside of the US. I mean, it’s a completely different you talk about in the US, there really there really only 2 real systems of law. There’s the community property and the noncommunity property, and and and then there’s Louisiana.

Eric Brotman [00:42:11]:
Yeah. How does it say that?

Eric Brotman [00:42:13]:
Which is still under Napoleonic law. They’re not even English. They’re French, and it’s a completely different regime. And to you have to know some of that stuff, but I sure don’t have to know it well. I’m not taking any bar exams. I’m not writing any documents.

Eric Brotman [00:42:24]:
Very nice. Very nice, Mike. Well, that’s that’s the thing we’ve always done is it’s it’s good to have advisers, but having your team be cohesive and working together because if you’re just relying on one person to give you advice, that may not be accurate because that may not be their strength. That may not be their experience. So it’s always good to have a great blended team, like, just the individuals you mentioned there before. Get experts. It’s kinda like that, oh, Henry Ford model of business. I don’t know the answer, but I can pick up the phone and call somebody who’s an expert in that niche.

Eric Brotman [00:42:52]:
Yeah. It’s funny. I I in 1995, I started an executive dialogue group because I wanted to create a group of young professionals in all different fields, and we’d come together. And I said, if we can do this right, we’ll be 1 or 2 degrees of separation from anything. We’ll know everything in this room, and I said, let’s just call it mastermind. I’m so mad I didn’t trademark that. Those damn things are everywhere now. I can prove I was using that in 1994 and 5, but but, but and that group of humans are still dear friends.

Eric Brotman [00:43:20]:
We’re no longer a young young professionals group. In fact, I’m not even sure we’re that professional anymore, but we are still having dinner a couple times a year, and they’re dear friends. But, you know, you you put these things together. You need to know people in the field. It’s helpful to know people at at at in the local government. It’s helpful to know people

Eric Brotman [00:43:36]:
at

Eric Brotman [00:43:36]:
the in the in the local law enforcement, in law, in, medicine. It’s helpful to know you know, if I need a cardiologist all of a sudden, I don’t wanna be in I used to say, I don’t wanna be in the yellow pages. I don’t wanna be googling cardiologist in my ZIP code. Are you kidding? Yeah. And, really, no no one should do that with financial advisers either.

Eric Brotman [00:43:57]:
No. No. They should not.

Eric Brotman [00:43:58]:
Adviser in my ZIP code. Oh, here’s one. I’ll I’ll take her or him. I got that’s not a good way to make a huge decision.

Eric Brotman [00:44:05]:
No. It’s not. And that’s that’s one of the most powerful things of being a part of a mastermind. Yeah. You know, you could have gotten probably a good $200,000 from Tony Robbins to buy that deal by accident day.

Eric Brotman [00:44:16]:
Seriously. And and and, you know, he he won’t return my call, so it’s alright.

Eric Brotman [00:44:20]:
Now, what’s what’s in store for you for the next 21 years at BFG?

Eric Brotman [00:44:25]:
Next one. Well, I you you know, my, little inside baseball here. I am in the process of stepping down over the next 3 years as CEO, which is really exciting. It’s scary. You know, this has been my baby a long time, but but this company is gonna run at least as well, if not better, when it’s managed by a a a team of humans. And so, I’m gonna be handing the reins to Lena Nebel. She is, incredibly talented. I’ve known her a very long time.

Eric Brotman [00:44:51]:
She’s she is, she’s highly qualified and is gonna do a great job. And so my client facing activities are are waning and frankly going away. And my job is gonna be to grow the organization and to grow our footprint and to add advisers with with books of clients and to add potentially firms and and geography and all of that. What’s in store for the firm is we are expanding our financial wellness programs. We’re working with a lot of companies to provide some education and guidance for their employees because they’re not getting it. They HR is not legally allowed to do it. Their 4 zero one k provider can only tell them about their 4 zero one k. Their group insurance people can’t wait to sell them more insurance, and they’re not getting any objective look at this.

Eric Brotman [00:45:33]:
So, I see that expanding. I see us doing a lot more, worksite type stuff, whether it’s remote or on or on-site. And so the organization’s growing in that regard. I I think my path is slightly divergent. I don’t think I’ll ever retire in the traditional sense. I’m graduating to a new job, which is actually right now I’m busier than I’ve ever been. I’m traveling a lot. I’m I’m I’m hustling, but I’m doing things that I really was born to do.

Eric Brotman [00:45:59]:
Right. And so right now, my tank is being filled by all the activities that I’m doing. And after 30 years, it’s weird to have sort of a new job, and it’s gonna be this this company used to have my name on the door. Mhmm. I was the b in BFG at one point. And I remember when the name came off the door, I thought it was a good idea. I thought it was not good for our long term success to have it look like it’s my practice. It sure as heck isn’t, and it hasn’t been in a long time.

Eric Brotman [00:46:27]:
But when the sign came off the building, I was out of town. They they they did it while I was out of town. It was very, like, an undercover of darkness. And all the employees went out in the parking lot and took pictures of themselves laughing at the building with no longer have my name on it. That’s cruel. But no, it was it was the right thing. And so I I think the next 21 years are gonna be even better than the last 21, and I expect to still be here, hopefully, toasting toasting everyone at the time, maybe with better bourbon than I’m drinking today.

Eric Brotman [00:46:54]:
There you go. There you go. Well, Eric, what for our listeners out there, our our nationwide and international audience, what’s the best way for folks to connect with you or connect with, your team to get that ball rolling up and get them on the right path?

Eric Brotman [00:47:07]:
I’m gonna give you two addresses. 1 is our is our financial planning firm, BFG. You go to bfgfa.com. That’s bfg financial advisors. So bfgfa.com, that’s where you’ll find out everything about what we do for for families, individuals, and companies. And I’ll also throw out brotmanmedia.com, which is where you’ll find my publishing and and writing and podcasts and online courses, many of which are are free and available to to anybody. There’s a personal financial literacy course out there for kids, and you’re just trying to provide some resources for the community as well.

Eric Brotman [00:47:38]:
Awesome. We’ll have both those links below in the show notes and the video notes for everybody to so you can click on that and make sure you take advantage of all the great stuff that, Eric has put together, him and his team have done for you out there to get you on the right path and go from just being where you’re at to not retiring, but graduating to the next level of wealth and living in more so than anything else there.

Eric Brotman [00:47:57]:
Amen. That that’s you said it better than I do. You’re hired.

Eric Brotman [00:48:01]:
Good. There you go. The the new voice of BFG, Scott Carson.

Eric Brotman [00:48:06]:
You know, everyone’s trying to replace me, not you too. Et tu Brute? Come on, man.

Eric Brotman [00:48:11]:
There you go. Well, hey.

Eric Brotman [00:48:12]:
Everybody wants my job.

Eric Brotman [00:48:13]:
There you go. Exactly. Well, hey. You’re living life, having fun, kicking ass, taking names. Keep doing it, Eric. Alrighty? Thanks for coming on the show today.

Eric Brotman [00:48:20]:
Thank you. We’ll have to do it again in a few years when we finally connect our calendars again.

Eric Brotman [00:48:23]:
That’s right. That’s right. Exactly. Well, alright, everybody. Well, hey. Go out there. Take some action. Reach out to Eric and his team.

Eric Brotman [00:48:30]:
Find the best thing you do if you don’t know is to find out and be in the know and plan a path to wherever you wanna go. Start today. Don’t give up on that dream. You can make an action. So go out. Take some action, buddy, and we’ll see you at the top. Bye.