Welcome author, poet, entrepreneur, public speaker, card game maker, and more - Michael Nelder Henderson III.

Join us for a unique conversation about business development, entrepreneurship, learning, and more.

The most powerful words besides "I love you," are "More, too."

Like U Cards - The game to end awkward conversations and combat cancel culture.

Check out Birth of Light on Amazon.

Rome is back to talk Halloween!

This year, Americans will spend about $12 Billion for Halloween!

$4 billion on decorations!

$3.8 billion on costumes!

$3.5 billion on candy!

What are you dressing up as for Halloween?

Whenever there is a natural disaster, like a hurricane, tornado, or earthquake, we see another side of the economy that works to recover areas hit by these types of events.

Recent hurricanes in Florida caused $50 billion in damages on the low end and $100 billion on the high end.

Where does that level of money come from?!

Insurance companies play an interesting role in disasters and what they insure and do not insure make these situations more complicated.

One of the bright sides to these events is the level of social and community support in terms of money, volunteers, resources, and more coming to the aid of one another.

How In The World Do You Save For College?!

You don't need an account called "a college savings account" to save for college! There are multiple ways to save for kids. And there are 3 key questions you should answer in order to choose the right plan for you!

529 Plan - Often called the college savings plan even though that wasn't quite its original intent.

Custodial Accounts - UGMA or UTMA works as an investment account for kids.

Cash Value Life Insurance - Several different types can be built for college.

Q1 - How do you want the account to grow? Target date, funds, more investment options, market based or more on a guaranteed basis?

Q2 - How much flexibility do you want the savings to be used for? Education? Any sort of use? How easy to use the account for a wide variety of things?

Q3 - Do you want the account to have a life beyond college? Many accounts are given straight to a university leaving nothing left. Some can be leveraged for a long time after college.

How much does the sitting president truly effect our current economy? A bit, but maybe not as much as we like to believe. Our economy is much more complex than a single four year term can produce.

We often feel the effects of previous presidential policy after that person is no longer in office.

The economy is dynamic, been around for a long time, and is continually influenced and shaped over time.

It is important to remember that we are living with policies and economy from Reagan, Bush, Clinton, W., Obama, Trump, and Biden. We even have stuff FDR enacted that is still around.

Guess who's back? Back again. Ben is back! Tell a friend!

DTI: Debt To Income Ratio

Three letters that matter so much. This is one of the most important things to know before going house shopping.

⁠Calculate your DTI⁠

Remember that you want to stay under 50% and keep close to 40% to be safe.

A lender will help you.

What is a P.IT.I. payment?

Principal Interest Taxes Insurance. Much more than just simply shifting your rent payment to a mortgage.

Mortgages get sold! Your mortgage potentially got sold. Perhaps you own your own mortgage in some mortgage backed security without even knowing it.

For more on this, watch The Big Short.

Guess who's back? Back again. Ben is back! Tell a friend!

DTI: Debt To Income Ratio

Three letters that matter so much. This is one of the most important things to know before going house shopping.

Calculate your DTI

Remember that you want to stay under 50% and keep close to 40% to be safe.

A lender will help you.

What is a P.IT.I. payment?

Principal Interest Taxes Insurance. Much more than just simply shifting your rent payment to a mortgage.

Mortgages get sold! Your mortgage potentially got sold. Perhaps you own your own mortgage in some mortgage backed security without even knowing it.

For more on this, watch The Big Short.

We have a guest!

Chris, financial advisor, owner of a lighting company, and alternative investor.

There are different ways to invest in companies that are starting out but aren't on the normal stock exchange.

This goes beyond "go fund me." You can check out a site like "wefunder" to find a company you may feel drawn to invest in. Make sure to read as much as you can before investing.

Chris has become on investor in One Roq. A club, a vodka, and more. One Roq is not a sponsor (yet) but their chocolate truffle vodka is worth a try.

oneroqclub.com

Companies like this are looking for investors.

Perhaps you are drawn to this type of investing rather than the boring traditional ways.

There's all sorts of ways to do it.

What is an "IPO"? Initial Public Offering, where the shares of a private company become available to the public for the first time.

What is an "accredited investor"?

$1m of net worth (excluding primary residence).

$200k income (individual)

$300k income (couple). Previous 2 years.

A special bonus history episode!

The History of Retirement

You're welcome!

In this episode we continue on our journey through the History of the Gold Standard.

Jonathon picks up where Ryan left off as we get into the quasi-gold standard and our eventual departure from the gold standard all together.

Oh, and we have a quick chat about crypto at the end.

Under Nixon, we ended convertibility of USD to gold and what most people think of as the end of the gold standard. But that's not the entire story of why we got off the quasi gold standard.

We cannot talk about the modern state of U.S. currency without talking about Bretton Woods! - The historic conference that reshaped international finance for the post WWII era.

Drama and debate ensued between two of our favorite people, John Maynard Keynes & Harry Dexter White. This conference got much of the world on a gold/USD standard. Even though it turns out White was a spy.