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Speech Transcript

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L. Scott Ferguson: [00:00:00] Time to shine today. Podcast Varsity Squad. This is Scott Ferguson and I am. Over the moon stoked to bring you on a legend, Steve Selengut, the retirement income coach. He’s in the market, but he’s not like this, do this here, do that there. He’s all about really generating income over returns. And the conversation we had was, Something I wish I would have heard probably 25 30 years ago when I kind of got started my endeavors and life and business and investing and whatnot But it’s never too late He’s authored an awesome book, which I have a giveaway at the end and the knowledge nuggets you’ll walk away from will have you really hyped up and Blessed and happy for your future on the financial side.

So If you are looking to make money , in a market, , safely, there’s risk, but a little bit more safely with a great protocol, then please break out your notebooks. And if you know, somebody that’s in the same boat as you, please share it with them, , or like maybe [00:01:00] smash the like button.

 My sponsors and affiliates really like that. So we know without further ado, here’s my really good friend, Steve Selengut, the retirement income coach. Let’s level up.

Time to shine today. Podcast Varsity Squad. This is Scott Ferguson and , I like to not so much out the box, but we kind of become the box. And that’s what I got. The new box. That’s what I got. My really good friend, Steve Selengut it here, the retirement income coach. , that I built my wealth.

The client said, I coach a little bit on their wealth side. , I’ve really dived deep into real estate and off Mike, Steve, we’re talking, I were talking about parallels and how real estate can kind of run. , parallel to how he does his investing. Now he coaches as people as well. And this guy is, , a legend.

He’s 40 year professional investment manager. And his current adventure right now is really, , helping others build and creating income independence. Like I always say, , live a life of options and not obligations. That to me is my desk, , definition of success. And that’s something [00:02:00] that Steve.

No, make sure you stay around to the end because I have an awesome giveaway and also be able to get even coached by Steve as well. He will show you how to generate more potential spending money than they or their clients that you or your clients really need. And this is something I cannot wait to dig into because I have some questions that I’ve kind of earmarked for Steve here.

And I can’t wait to get his , kind of take on them. And even if you go to his website, the market fuels, the ego, the income fuels, the yacht, which I thought that was pretty special to sitting there on the front page, but Steve, thank you so much for coming on. Please introduce yourself. The time to shine today, podcast, varsity squad, but first what’s your favorite color and why

Steve Selengut: blue

L. Scott Ferguson: blue.

Why do we go blue brother?

Steve Selengut: It’s the color of lakes, my color, my wife’s eyes.

L. Scott Ferguson: Are they your eyes too? That right. All right. I’m looking at the Atlantic ocean. My computer screen is kind of blocking it, but that’s, that’s a little hazy today, but it’s usually blue next couple of hours. It is man, but no, [00:03:00] thank you so much for coming on and also dealing with the technical difficulties today.

This whole changing of what zoom’s got going on, but yeah. So let’s get to the roots, man. Cause I know that you’ve. , Oversaw over, three, 400 kind of accounts at a time. Did I read that right?

Steve Selengut: Yeah. Yeah. I had about 150 clients. Most of them had more than one portfolio, so I’d be running their IRA, their Roth IRA, their joint account, maybe children’s accounts, school funds, stuff like that.

So I had , It was, it was a lot of work. I spent a lot of time at it, but it’s that’s what it really does require some time. And I think what most people have to do is either commit to that time doing it themselves or or find somebody that’s actually going to spend some time on them and not just put them in a program.

That’s the same for a thousand other people.

L. Scott Ferguson: Gotcha. So when did you have that Jerry Maguire moment? I, the reason why I say that is because, , you remember the movie [00:04:00] where he kind of stepped away and he gave like personal attention to his clients. When, because again, I’ve been through some headset phone jockeys when I was younger.

I mean, you mean selling me stuff, get me in programs, get me in investments, but like, what was that flip to that switch that really turns you that way?

Steve Selengut: I was really, really lucky. I, in two ways. , I, you might say privileged or lucky one or the other, but I was, I was able to start investing sooner than most at around the age of 25 because my parents were fairly wealthy and had put stuff aside for.

Their children. And I didn’t blow it all on an Ivy league education. I went to a small, actually small wrestling school, Gettysburg college. That’s really, that’s where I was going at the time. But so I had this investment portfolio and I think I got the idea that it’s a very personal thing for each individual because I was [00:05:00] lucky when I got this, the first broker that I brought all these stock certificates to, and she set me up and she explained to me what they were more so than I ever got in college.

We looked at charts and graphs. She said, you see this IBM, you see it goes up and it goes down, it goes up and it goes down. You don’t have to worry about things like that. What you have to look at is the fundamentals. Of IBM itself, , is it make is it making money? Is it paying dividends? And she was really very into that type of analysis.

Not not technical analysis.

L. Scott Ferguson: Sure.

Steve Selengut: Technical analysis back wasn’t as big back then as it is now. But still she got me the idea that. I was 25 years old, so I could put my portfolio like this. It would be organized this way would make sense for me, but that she has, , 100 different clients and they’re at all different age groups and backgrounds and.

overall [00:06:00] wealth and so forth. And everybody, every one of them really should have the attention of an individual portfolio. That’s, I just got that from her. So I never, I never thought anybody did anything different than that because everyone I always came to after that, I was running it myself and they were doing what I told them to do.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: , so, so we always did it personally. My first two clients were, one was a dentist and the other ran a restaurant.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay.

Steve Selengut: , two different stories, two different types, too much, two different types of income coming in, ? So I always, I always felt it was an individual thing. So that’s, that’s, I never, I never bought a mutual fund for God’s sakes.

L. Scott Ferguson: Really? That’s an anomaly, man. Mike, we’re going to have to talk about wrestling which is, , I grew up wrestling and I’m actually one of the mindset coaches for team USA. But this is amazing. And because you’re an anomaly, right. And so let me ask you something, do people invest when you worked with them?

Did you see really kind of learn their [00:07:00] personality, like really do a deep dive on the person before you even placed a dollar anywhere with them? Yeah, I studied

Steve Selengut: it pretty good. And that’s what I’m doing now with the coaching too, is I’m looking at what they have, , and, but yeah, I, I did that. And, and I said, , someone would say, well, I really, I mean, I had people say, look, I got to own this stock.

It’s coming out. I got to buy some. I said, look at some numbers about IPOs before you decide that you want to buy this particular one that you heard about from a buddy down the street. Right. , 90 percent IPOs, , never make it even onto the New York Stock Exchange, pretty much, , they just never get off the ground.

They fail, they don’t make any money for years and years and years, or they just go out of business, you know? So it’s, it’s a total speculation and you’re starting out in your portfolio development. What you want is you want to start safer when you’re wealthy, you can put some of your money in speculations.

You can. Do what you want to do. [00:08:00] But right now you’re trying to build up some money so you can pay for your kid’s education and stuff like that. So you need income in there. You need income. And I told him I never buy anything for anybody unless it pays income, not even a stock. Wow. , so I, so no, I wouldn’t own that Microsoft when it came out or something like that, but, but, , but that’s the way it was.

So it was a totally different mindset. My mindset has always been on income and I got that. I got that from my real estate developer, her father, who had a vertically vertical integration. What that is? You own everything associated with what you’re doing. He had a lumber yard. He had an insurance company.

He took back the mortgages. , he had it all. The whole, the whole, thing. And he told me, he said, I have all these other things going on because when I can’t sell property or I can’t sell houses because of the economy, I still got the income coming in and I can still take my family out to dinner or go [00:09:00] on vacations, , stuff like that.

L. Scott Ferguson: I got to go to you with the income. Like if, again, you’re, you’re speaking another language for me. Okay. Which I understand what your father did. It’s like me. I have properties. I, , I sell real estate. I coach, I diversify kind of all under, , an umbrella, but like, no matter what people have got to rent my houses.

So I will always have income coming in. Right. But if it’s not income in stocks, what would it be then? Well, there’s two types. Yeah, please, please.

Steve Selengut: You know, most people go into stock market. To what they call returns what everybody talks about returns and what that means to them is the amount the price has gone up and how their market value has has grown,

L. Scott Ferguson: right?

Steve Selengut: And so I think we spoke earlier about the headline on my book.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah,

,

yes.

Steve Selengut: Market value fuels the ego. Yeah income fuels the yacht Yeah, most people are chasing these market values and chasing these market values, but they don’t [00:10:00] even think about it’s not generating any income That they can take that european trip with , they have to sell something to do it They don’t want to do that because they don’t want to pay the taxes because sure, all that stuff So yeah income has always been my focus even in the stock market I never bought a stock that didn’t pay a dividend even when people were younger You Even when they’re younger, even when they’re younger, I always set it up that at least 40 percent of their portfolio was invested in income purpose securities, meaning bonds.

And back in the day I used to do called bond unit trusts and Ginnie Mays used to use back then.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: Cause I hadn’t discovered closed end funds yet, which pay a lot more than they do. And , in the stock market, there was always, , your blue chip companies, I mean, you couldn’t be on the New York stock exchange, I mean, you couldn’t be in the Dow Jones industrial average, if you didn’t pay a dividend.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: At one time. [00:11:00] Okay. They may have a few that don’t pay it now, but I’m not sure, because they’ve, at, well at that time they never had a NASDAQ company either.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: It was all New York Stock Exchange. So, \ , so I, I’ve always been. An income guy. It shows just the company, , you, if you own stock in a company, you own part of that company, you’re an owner,

L. Scott Ferguson: right?

Steve Selengut: Theoretically, that CEO that’s making the 3 million a year. He works for you,

L. Scott Ferguson: right? Yes.

Steve Selengut: Then don’t you think he ought to pay you a dividend for your investment? Give you something back? Not just the change of your

L. Scott Ferguson: income, right? Not a return. Like a dividend would be

Steve Selengut: income. Income. Yeah. Returns are a combination of everything that goes into making the market value get bigger.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay.

Steve Selengut: I don’t look at market value. I look at what I call working capital, which is the amount I’ve invested. And I look at income is what it produces. If your portfolio goes from a [00:12:00] million dollars to a million and a half, it doesn’t pay any more dividend than it, it doesn’t pay any more money than it was when it was a million, unless you did one of two things, you reinvested any dividends that came in, or you took your profits from the gains, and then you had more capital invested, just like you have to get more more properties to generate more income.

L. Scott Ferguson: Sure. Gotcha. Right.

Steve Selengut: Cause you can’t just raise the rents forever. Eventually

L. Scott Ferguson: nobody don’t want to, so nobody’s

Steve Selengut: going to live there.

L. Scott Ferguson: Unless you’re in Palm beach. I’ll tell you. Okay. Yeah,

Steve Selengut: pretty much. I guess it’s true almost anywhere today in the current, in the current, but you get the idea. Yeah, man. No, this is like

L. Scott Ferguson: dumbed it down for me.

So most,

Steve Selengut: most people. Most people are in, in a market value trap all the income, all the information they get is on their total return. All the information they get is that your market value has gained this and that. I mean, when you look [00:13:00] at your, when you look at your portfolio online, they make a, they have columns set up for just how your How your stocks are doing today, your stocks up this much today.

Wow. , and you don’t just focus on the short term growth of the, of the market value instead of the long term growth of the income.

L. Scott Ferguson: Someone came in to meet with you. The first time maybe in a discovery situation, make sure you’re the right horse for the course, right? The, the, the right person to handle their portfolio.

But was there anything that you use a process that you use to really help them find that initial blind spot that get them on board with the direction you wanted to take them?

Steve Selengut: Oh, yeah. I showed my portfolio. Okay.

L. Scott Ferguson: Got it.

Steve Selengut: I showed my portfolio. Like if I were to show you my portfolio right now, any of my three portfolios, you’d see that it’s generating almost 10 percent income.

On mark on market value. [00:14:00] It’s about 8. 6 on working on working on working capital, but the generation of income, the distributions, the dividends that you’re getting, that’s only one stream of income that you have when you’re in the markets, not so much the real estate market, because it’s not quite as liquid,

L. Scott Ferguson: right?

Right.

Steve Selengut: Stock market. I mean, I can take my, one of my closed in funds and anytime I want to, I can sell the sucker. Right. So what you have, you have two streams of income to look at when you’re investing in securities, you have the distribution income that they pay you monthly, quarterly, whatever, then you have the profits.

You can take,

L. Scott Ferguson: got it. Are they both taxed taxable?

Steve Selengut: They can be, or cannot be. If they’re in a Roth, neither of them are taxable. If they’re an IRA, they’re not taxable immediately. They’re taxable when you get to be my age and you’ve taken them out in an RMD. If they’re in [00:15:00] your personal account. Yes, they are taxable.

Capital gains, long term capital gains are less taxed and short term, but that means you have to think that you have to wait for a year to get that tax benefit, which profits tend to disappear.

L. Scott Ferguson: Gotcha.

Steve Selengut: , unless you take them,

L. Scott Ferguson: you moved into the coaching arena with this. Are you actually coaching them to do what you did or, and if they don’t want to do it, you take on their portfolio?

Are you done with that now? Or like, I’m just trying to get a feel for people I send.

Steve Selengut: I sold my business last year. Got it. Last May. Okay. We had this big operator that sort of made us an offer that we couldn’t refuse.

L. Scott Ferguson: A little godfather moment. Love it. A little

Steve Selengut: godfather moment where, it turned out to be six years.

Six years gross. Income in advance. Wow. At, at, at my age. Yeah. Gimme a break. . How old are you,

L. Scott Ferguson: Steve? You said age A couple times, man. How old are you?

Steve Selengut: I I am in my 80th year,

L. Scott Ferguson: brother. You [00:16:00] look freaking amazing. So amazing. Sorry man. I’ll be there. Hopefully

Steve Selengut: I’m gonna get it. Knock on wood there, , I guess I could do this.

L. Scott Ferguson: I think I’m going to, I know the answer to this question, but I’m going to ask you anyways, because you already answered it before, but okay. If someone’s going to work with a market manager or, , with someone that’s going to manage their money. Yeah. Okay. Is there any good question they should ask them that people usually never do ask?

Steve Selengut: Oh, wow. I’ve got a list. I wrote an article recently called how to vet, how to vet of, , your financial advisor. Is that online? It’s on, it’s actually, it’s, it’s on LinkedIn. Yeah. I think if you just looked up that title, you might have it. Gotcha. But, but one of the things is, Yeah, , even though people do have to get started, they don’t have to get started with your money.

You don’t want somebody to just start now in the field.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah.

Steve Selengut: You don’t if you start hearing the words, we think [00:17:00] instead of I think. This is good for you, or we think this is good for you, , you, yeah, but look at it. Tell him you want to see his portfolio.

L. Scott Ferguson: Thank you. That was exactly, you said, remember I said earlier, you’ve already said it.

Look at

Steve Selengut: my portfolio. You’ll see, there’s not one issue in my, my portfolio that has more than 2 percent of the total in it. Everyone pays a distribution. an average of around right now, around nine, 10%. It’s paying. There’s nothing there. There’s no unrealized profit. More than two or 3 percent today out of 250 positions.

I’ve got it’s for my age, theoretically, I shouldn’t be a lot in the stock market. And you’ll find less than 30 percent in the stock market. You’ll find some in tax free municipal bonds as well as all other kinds of, and you’ll find. A [00:18:00] representation in every possible possible sector of investing that you can think of, except maybe you won’t find any raw commodities, , that type of thing.

You’re not going to find any gold bricks.

L. Scott Ferguson: Not going into the Chicago. That’s where I actually did an internship at the board of trade. There’s a lot of fun, but there’s no way I’d risk what they, what those guys risk every day. Oh, yeah. That’s crazy. So it’s not,

Steve Selengut: it’s, it’s a low, low risk environment that generates an obscene amount of income more than even my, my wife, who is an expert.

And she has brought us single handedly. She and her friends out of recessions in the past.

L. Scott Ferguson: That’s awesome. She’s an

Steve Selengut: excellent shopper.

L. Scott Ferguson: What does your better half do?

Steve Selengut: She was a legal secretary at sometimes, actually a paralegal. Paralegal? She went beyond, went beyond the legal secretary. Okay. She’s been my, she was my compliance officer for, for 38 years, so , so.

[00:19:00] I love that. So she had back, she has her desk right back. Is that her back there? And she’s got a long whip from there. She could whip me if she thought I was saying something inappropriate. Oh yeah,

L. Scott Ferguson: my guy, man. That’s a good woman right there. I love that. I love it. So what makes, now that you moved into the coaching arena more.

, because it put it this way, I’m still a real estate broker. Still do a million dollar homes, blah, blah, blah, blah. But my coach that I’ve had since 1999, my, my, my life coach, productivity, business coach, 14 years ago, she’s like, Fergie, you need to become a coach. And I was like, what are you talking about?

I’m like, you’re my coach. She’s like, yeah, but. You’re at the age now, , I was turned 40, , 52 now, But I had turned 40 and she’s like it’s about time for you to start paying it forward, right? And I have all as a real estate broker. Not only are you doing real estate, but you’re also doing you’re a marriage counselor, , you’re everything under the sun, right?

And it worked out for coaching. I, , I learned in putting that through. So, I mean, for what you did, you [00:20:00] saw personalities, money’s attached to everything. What now, what do you feel then makes a great coach? Period. I mean, coaching anything, not just money. What do you think makes a great coach?

Steve Selengut: I think you got to tell somebody, you got to be able to tell somebody where you think they might be going in the wrong direction.

You’ve got to, I mean, the first thing I do as part of the first coaching is what I call the QDI plus PT. Those are the four basic risk minimization techniques that I describe in depth in the book. Okay. The quality, the quality of the securities side, the diversification, , how much is in each one as a percentage of the overall.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: The income being generated

L. Scott Ferguson: by them,

Steve Selengut: and have they been taking their profits? You can tell when they haven’t been taking their profits when you see they’ve got, when you see they’ve got this stock left over from their last employer, where it makes up 40 percent [00:21:00] of their their portfolio, and 250, 000 of unrealized capital gains, and it doesn’t pay a dividend.

Right. , so they’re, how come I’m not making enough money? Well, you got 40 percent of your portfolio earning zero. What do you expect?

,

and then of course, since they’re now old and this is all they’ve got, it’s all long term capital gains and they’ve got to somehow put up with the idea.

I’ve got to pay taxes on this when I sell it. It’s either that, or you’re going to have to sell it and spend it to take the vacation.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right.

Steve Selengut: Or you’re going to have to Eliminate it as an investment and grow the income. So you don’t ever have to sell anything again

L. Scott Ferguson: to

Steve Selengut: take a vacation.

L. Scott Ferguson: Gotcha. Yeah. It’s like, The coach is kind of someone that tells you what you don’t want to hear, , who has seen what you don’t want to see, , so you can be who you’ve always wanted to be, , that’s how I am with the coach.

I’m not the easiest. I get fired a lot by clients,

Steve Selengut: but sometimes somebody will show up and particularly when you have a [00:22:00] book out there that pretty much says everything you’re going to say,

L. Scott Ferguson: they’ll

Steve Selengut: show up with a portfolio where you check it off, , You got A in quality, you got an A in diversification, you got a B plus in income, you only got three positions that don’t pay it, that pay less than 5%, ,

L. Scott Ferguson: and you’ve been

Steve Selengut: taking your profits.

That’s satisfying, man. When they’ve read your book, they’re doing a coaching session to, and you can say, you can pat them on your back and say, pat them on the back and say, you’re doing good.

L. Scott Ferguson: That’s awesome. I

Steve Selengut: don’t, I don’t have to see you again. Right. Unless you want, unless you want to talk to me.

Love it. That’s, that’s when you’ve, that’s when you’ve hit a home run.

L. Scott Ferguson: I love it. That’s my goal as a coach is to get fired. Over time, , it was just to kind of let you go and be there for them when they need it. Yeah, so with your the coaching how do you like bring on clients or like if i’m out [00:23:00] At a networking event, press and flesh or something like that.

Like what would I be hearing to be a great introduction to Steve song?

Steve Selengut: Ooh, somebody, oh, somebody you just got, you got in a conversation and they, maybe you said something about the market or somebody said something back and market. If a person, if one of those people has read my book, they just might mention it.

Okay, and then you’d hear about it. Otherwise, there’s pro Rob, , I don’t, I don’t have a course or yet. I don’t have a course or anything like that. I’m sure you have

L. Scott Ferguson: to put one out with your experience. Hope. Yeah,

Steve Selengut: , but it’s so much time. I’m trying to find, , if somebody can find the time to get it done.

Get it started, make, take all the money, take half of the money, but you organize, I show up, that’s fine.

L. Scott Ferguson: You do speaking

Steve Selengut: engagements, Steve? I did years and years ago, but I’m not, [00:24:00] I’m not going to travel. I like, I like this type of speaking. I can do this all day. I do some Q and A’s from my Facebook group people, , stuff like that.

But I, I haven’t spoken to any real audiences or anything. I wouldn’t be. I certainly wouldn’t be

L. Scott Ferguson: opposed to it. Right.

Steve Selengut: Opposed to it. I mean, but I, I, I don’t want to get in a, in a room where they’re going to ask me what’s the difference between a stock and a bond.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right. No, I feel you. , I

Steve Selengut: want them, I want them to have some knowledge.

I want to, I want to change what they think they know. I want to modify it. I want to try and change their mindset. I want to show them the income that they can produce without, , it’s a, it’s, it’s interesting that. And I didn’t really discover, I was a stock market guy through almost through the, through the.

com bubble. Let’s say

L. Scott Ferguson: north and the East coast at that time, working street and stuff, or

Steve Selengut: I was getting ready to leave. I guess at that [00:25:00] time, I moved down here in 2001. Okay.

L. Scott Ferguson: Gotcha.

Steve Selengut: So it was a little bit after that,

L. Scott Ferguson: but you did that life though, in the eighties, the decade of decadence. And so I

Steve Selengut: started off commuting to New York city.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay. That was my, that’s how I should have worded it. Okay. That’s very cool, man.

Steve Selengut: And, and the commute in New York city is probably two things from that, which got me started on this. A, it was the timeframe after I’d received that money and I’d started to learn how to invest. Right. And I was. Commuting in New York and we went to a party,

L. Scott Ferguson: my wife

Steve Selengut: and I went to this party and when we got home, we got home from the party or we were driving home or she said to me, she said, , there’s something that you don’t know how to do that.

You’re going to have to learn how to do. If you’re going to get ahead in that company and I said, what would that be? She said, you got to learn how to kiss.

L. Scott Ferguson: That’s a tough one sometimes, especially with a rustling background. It’s tough, bro. Yeah. With that

Steve Selengut: back or, or back. Yeah. Or a background growing up.

Like I [00:26:00] did.

L. Scott Ferguson: And

Steve Selengut: I have, I have

L. Scott Ferguson: right on my computer screen right here. It says, stay humble. I’m not even lying. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll show you on camera. We’re done. It says stay humble. Yeah. So I got to keep this moving a little bit, but have you seen the movie back to the future?

Steve Selengut: I did.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay. Yeah. Let’s get in that DeLorean with Marty McFly.

Okay. Let’s go back to the double deuce. The 22 year old Steve. What kind of knowledge nuggets might you drop on him? Not to change anything. But to maybe help them shorten the learning curve, blast through and level up in life or business, maybe just a little bit quicker

Steve Selengut: party, less study more

L. Scott Ferguson: enough, man.

So Steve, how do you want your dash? Remember that little line in between your incarnation date and your expiration date, your life date and your death date on your tombstone. Everyone has that dash. How does Steve want his dash remembered?

Steve Selengut: Oh boy.

L. Scott Ferguson: Creative soul. That’s awesome. That is awesome. So how about, , what do you think people might [00:27:00] misunderstand the most about you?

Steve Selengut: Well, most misunderstand about me. I guess sometimes I, I come on like I’m trying to sell them. Okay.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah, no, I get that too, bro. I’m like, I’m just trying to pass on information.

Right. It’s exciting. You’re trying to, you’re excited about something else on there. I’ve never,

Steve Selengut: I’ve never had a sales job. No.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay.

Steve Selengut: No, I’ve never, I’ve never like some of my friends have, but I guess you become a salesman once you think, , something that you can share.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yes.

Steve Selengut: And yeah, I mean, I do.

L. Scott Ferguson: 100%.

Steve Selengut: Yeah, so

L. Scott Ferguson: anything keep you up at night?

Steve Selengut: I get thoughts in the middle of the night That I Seriously, I mean i’ll get up i’d have been i’ll go into my phone and i’ll send a text Or an email to myself of what something I should do tomorrow because i’ll forget about it, but right but yeah, yeah, i’ll get woke awakened [00:28:00] Occasionally by some just thoughts or somebody that something that’s annoying me that I didn’t say You

L. Scott Ferguson: Right,

Steve Selengut: and I should have said to someone

L. Scott Ferguson: I get that.

How about what’s your definition of a life well lived?

Steve Selengut: I guess one where you’ve got a partner that, , that you’ve been with forever and you have no regrets.

L. Scott Ferguson: Love it.

Steve Selengut: And where you’ve pretty much been able to do everything you said you wanted to do.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah. That options, right. I love it. Yeah.

Steve Selengut: And I think that’s, I think we’ve, we’ve gotten there.

L. Scott Ferguson: Love that. Time to shine today. Podcast Varsity Squad, we are back and Steve, next time I’m in Charleston, I’m just going to come knock on your door.

So be ready for it, man. Okay. We’ll go to, sure. Go to lunch or something, but we’ll discuss some of these questions, maybe 15, 20 minutes each, right? But today you have five seconds. You have five seconds to answer them and they can all be answered that way. You ready? I wouldn’t look at your sheets because [00:29:00] none of those are on there.

Okay, okay. I’m not looking. I’m not looking down. Curveball. Curveball. All right. Here we go, Steve. Steve, what is your best leveling up advice you’ve ever received?

Steve Selengut: I think I just told you that one. , I’m not going anywhere in that company.

L. Scott Ferguson: Right. Love it. Share one of your personal habits that contributes to your success.

Steve Selengut: Oh, workaholic. I and I think it’s inherited. My father’s the same way. He worked till he was 89. I expect to do the same.

L. Scott Ferguson: And doing what you love, man. Yeah, I

Steve Selengut: just really enjoy what I’m doing. And

L. Scott Ferguson: yeah, love it. Do what you love in the service of people that love what you do. If they see you loving it, they follow you.

I love it. So. A book. What book have you read through the years that’s really, like, shines a light that you think back to, like, and just say, ah, I picked up really good steps out of that book?

Steve Selengut: Because of what I do and the books I’ve written, I’ve stayed away from reading anything else in my field. Sure.

Because I [00:30:00] didn’t want to muddy the water. And I do read only when I’m on vacations. And I like to read mysteries like Lee Child Reacher. I have read it. I love it. Love it. And , he’s, he’s the guy. Is your wife like watching Reacher? Not particularly my wife All right back for other reasons But what about when how about the first reacher movie didn’t that blow your mind when they put that little wimpy guy Tom cruise played jack reacher He could sit on a jack reacher thigh.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah, I mean

Steve Selengut: just just didn’t do it

L. Scott Ferguson: Now they have that alan richmond doing it this new guy that dude’s reacher. Awesome. All right, so Any nicknames growing up? Little gut. Love it. Love it. My brother was big gut. Got it. So there’s a, do you have any hidden talents or super powers that you have that nobody really knows about?

Well, until now,

Steve Selengut: I [00:31:00] can, I can hit from both sides and play baseball. And I can, I can, I, I play, I play right handed and put left handed and chip left handed. That’s all got in golf.

L. Scott Ferguson: That’s awesome.

Steve Selengut: That’s it. I don’t have a whole lot.

L. Scott Ferguson: Just checkers or monopoly.

Steve Selengut: I’ve tried them all

L. Scott Ferguson: best at monopoly. Okay.

Beautiful headline for your life. Headline

Steve Selengut: for my life. I’m getting, , you don’t people my age. You don’t ask that kind of question. Teared up and worried headline for my life. What’d I say before? Creative soul.

L. Scott Ferguson: I know it’s beautiful, man.

Steve Selengut: , that’s awesome.

L. Scott Ferguson: We’ll leave it at that. Any superstitions?

Steve Selengut: None.

L. Scott Ferguson: Me neither. Go to ice cream flavor. Chocolate. All right. So there’s a sandwich called the Little Gut. Build that sandwich for me. What’s on that sandwich? What’s on that sandwich?

Steve Selengut: Strawberry.

L. Scott Ferguson: [00:32:00] Okay, I’m there with you. Very cool.

Steve Selengut: What else? Strawberry, a good, a good rich hot mustard. Okay. And some cheese, not necessarily Swiss ,

L. Scott Ferguson: maybe provolone, provolone, provolone,

Steve Selengut: Havarti, good, sharp cheddar, cheddar, maybe.

Yeah,

L. Scott Ferguson: my man, favorite charity and or organization you’d like to give your time or money to.

Steve Selengut: Favorite charity be going to Walmart and, and paying

L. Scott Ferguson: the layaways. You’re freaking awesome. I love this last question. You can elaborate on this one, but what’s the best decade of music, 60s, 70s, 80s, or 90s.

60s and 70s. My man. I love that. Yeah. That’s the timeframe of storytelling. And I love telling stories. There were lyrics.

Steve Selengut: There were actually lyrics.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yes. Yes. Steve, how can we find you my friend?

Steve Selengut: Well I have a website, the income coach, [00:33:00]

L. Scott Ferguson: the

Steve Selengut: income coach. net.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yes.

Steve Selengut: And I have a, my book is retirement money secrets.

Okay.

L. Scott Ferguson: If you can see it,

Steve Selengut: I am.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yep. And I’m just going to throw it on the, throw it on the screen right now. Squad, if you’re watching Vimeo or YouTube and I am going to do a three book giveaway to the first person that puts little gut in any of our social. I don’t care if it’s Facebook. I don’t care if it’s Pinterest, wherever, text it to 561 440 3830.

I will personally purchase and have a book mailed out to you. And I will also let Steve know that I’m mailing it to you. So maybe you can get in touch with Steve for his services. But let’s talk a little bit about the book here, Steve. Like you brought it along. Obviously, he’s a brainchild of four or five decades of experience, right?

Steve Selengut: I, I, I, I wrote a [00:34:00] pamphlet once called the millionaire secret investment strategy and I printed it up locally and I just pretty much gave it to my clients. And then I had a an actual book called the brainwashing of the American investor. The book that wall street does not want you to read I saw that on amazon It’s up there.

It’s I I got messed up with a couple publishers on that So I give that I give that book away on my website Okay.

L. Scott Ferguson: Yeah. Here’s the brainwashing American investor. It’s

Steve Selengut: more like a textbook on investing from my perspective. And then secrets, of course, sums up this the income thing that you need for retirement

L. Scott Ferguson: and it,

Steve Selengut: and it defines six principles and I mentioned four of them already.

And then there’s the market cycle nature. And how to manage that. So it’s always beneficial. You benefit when the market goes down, you benefit just as much, even more [00:35:00] when it goes up , that type of thing. And the third principle is that mindset, changing that mindset from looking at market value to looking at growing that income every quarter, growing that capital.

Yeah.

L. Scott Ferguson: Have you ever authored anything that talks about, Hey, I’m, I’m In my 50s 60s never did shit. Excuse my language with I mean, I got money put away in a bank, but I never did anything Like ways that people that , kind of like a start late retire rich kind of book kind of something Have you ever authored anything like that?

Because i’d be interested in reading it. I’m gonna I have it.

Steve Selengut: I think either of those books will do that for you. Okay,

L. Scott Ferguson: okay So you

Steve Selengut: can be

L. Scott Ferguson: a little bit, mature.

Steve Selengut: Oh, sure. You got to start somewhere, but okay Okay, if you can if you can start off with the closed end fund Approach to it at any age you’re gonna get a head start.

You’re gonna you’re gonna fire early Right. What I mean? Right. So yeah, yeah, I think income is the important thing [00:36:00] to change in your mindset and with closed end funds, like I said before, you’re in. you can do all equity closed end funds and you’ll own every stock that everybody’s excited about.

I can, believe me, NVIDIA is a big player in all of those closed end funds, but those guys are going to take their profits and I’m going to wind up with a lot of that profit in my pocket in the form of a distribution. Got you. Okay. So I don’t have to be, I don’t have to be that last guy who buys it before it starts to get down to be normal.

L. Scott Ferguson: Hey, Steve, do me 1 last salad, please. And leave us with 1 last knowledge nugget. We can take with us internalize and take action on.

Steve Selengut: That that would be to take a look at your next financial statement, not your next financial, your next statement from your broker and look at the realized income portion and see what it says [00:37:00] and think about how many times let’s say it was.

Two or three times bigger, how much more you would be on the road to financial or income independence than you are now.

L. Scott Ferguson: Okay. So it’s not bigger, but if it was where you would be then?

Steve Selengut: I would, most people, and I would say 95 percent of the people who are listening us to, to us right now will 4 percent income.

Generated by their portfolio today.

L. Scott Ferguson: Oh, a hundred. Unless they

Steve Selengut: already, unless they’ve already been talking to me.

L. Scott Ferguson: That’s they’ve read your book. I love it. And squad, I just had a really fun conversation with the gentleman. It’s in his eighth decade. That looks nothing like it could be close to that, but , he.

He put the reps in squad. He did the work and he put it in writing for, to share with you and it, and to take it to the next level. Please let me make a warm introduction to my good friend, Steve, who had had great, [00:38:00] great upbringing with parents. , they really helped him out and they really passed that down into his mindset that one it’s okay to make money and two There’s smart ways to do it and he took it and ran, He wants you to stay away from the speculation route He wants you going after incomes over returns and just remember that you are the owner Of a stock and the ceo whatever they actually work for you.

And so dividends are good. So start getting them Okay if you’re going to work with a market manager a financial advisor Ask and see their portfolio see what they invest in and if you hear we over I Like we do or I do get out go go with the I do. Let’s see their proofs in the pudding Okay And find that and I also want you to go and hook up with steve on linkedin because he does have some great articles That he does put out there.

He’s very much going to be remembered Way down the line, Steve, way down the line as a creative soul. Okay. And [00:39:00] find yourself a partner. He reminds us where you have, you can do life with that. The sun rises and sets with like, he’s had with his beautiful wife, no regrets, just let it go. And lastly, , if get your statement from your broker, and if you realize that you could be making more, then let me make that introduction to my good friend, Steve.

He levels up his health. He levels up as well. He’s a handsome devil, man. He’s so fun to interview. We’re so full of knowledge. I could keep this going forever and ever, man. Thank you so much, Steve, for coming on. You’ve earned your varsity letter here at time to shine today. Thank you so much for coming on.

Thank you. You bet. Enjoyed it. Great. Chat soon. Bye.

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