Leave Nothing To Chance

 

What is it really like to be debt free? John Solleder is joined by Keith Hooper as they brush over debt and how it restricts one’s growth in so many ways. The duo shares their secrets on what to do with money the moment you make it and how to retire debt free. John and Keith take us in on a learning opportunity to show us how taking money out of your pocket can actually lead to more money in your bank accounts. Join us in the episode as we learn money matters just in time for a debt free 2022.

—

Watch the episode here

 

Listen to the podcast here

 

Debt Free In 2022 With Keith Hooper And John Solleder

Welcome to our December 21st, 2021 Christmas show and we’re going to talk about money. Keith Hooper is kind enough to join us to do my normal job of asking questions and setting this up. We’re living in interesting times. I don’t need to tell anybody that. They know it. Whether you’re concerned with your financial future or not, you want to read what we’re going to talk about. We’re going to talk about debt and how it restricts growth in so many different ways. We’re going to talk about what to do with money as you make it. It’s what I call the four primary needs of most families.

We’re going to talk about a lot of stuff. Sit back, take notes and enjoy the process. This is something that is in my wheelhouse. As some of you know, I spent some time in the life insurance industry. I was a licensed agent for one of the largest insurance companies in the world. I also held securities licenses for the oldest mutual fund company in the world.

That doesn’t mean I’m qualified to give you financial advice. I’m not licensed anymore but we can work around the edges a little bit and give you some things that you can chew on here as we get into the new year. It’s some food for thought to retire some debt and also to grow and why you don’t want to grow. Keith, how are you?

I’m good, John. As you were talking about the show, I was thinking about a couple of things when I was a very young man. That means the middle part of the last century when I was a young man. You went to school and they had a savings account program at school. In the public school, you had this little booklet. You open up a savings account and put up a little bit in there. Maybe it was $1 or $0.50. Maybe it might have been as much as $5 you put in there. A lot of people think about finances in the way as, “I don’t have $1,000 to put into something. I don’t have $10,000 to put into a savings account.”

One of the things that you’re going to cover in this episode is that part of time plus consistency is what sets you free. I know you’re a master at that. You have taught it for many years. I hope people take the time to read here because this is a process. It’s not one thing you do one time. It’s a process and you’re masterful at teaching that. If you would, share with people a little bit of those concepts about that consistent long-term effort, savings or investment and how that can change their lives.

We had to look at our good friend, Dr. Albert Einstein and the fact that Einstein said that his most important discovery was compound interest tables. It was not the theory of relativity that most people attribute to him and then it was one of his discoveries but compound interest tables. When he figured out how money compounded, he felt like it was his most important discovery. That’s what we’re talking about.

I have been in network marketing now for many years. Like yourself, I have been around this game a long time. I have done a lot of people. I know a lot of million-dollar earners who now are flat broke. How do you make $1 million and be flat broke? Spend $1.1 million. It’s plain and simple. Outkick your coverage, overspend and live beyond your means.

I go back to my beginnings in life as a youth. My dad was a blue-collar guy who was a union electrician in New Jersey. It’s the roughest profession in some ways. He worked at electricity every single day but on the high end of the food chain in the blue-collar world. He used to quote the guy who was his business agent. This is the guy named Renz.

When he was an apprentice, Mr. Renz told him and the other apprentice electricians not to have what they used to call Cadillac dreams with a beer budget. What did that mean? I didn’t understand that when I was 11 or 12 years old. What Mr. Renz meant was, “You have no means being a working guy, going out to buy the Caddy. When you retire maybe but during your working years, be practical.” That was a good idea.

If you are actively building a network marketing business, you need to reinvest in self-development. Click To Tweet

We have seen through the years, books pop up like The Millionaire Next Door. You find that the millionaire next door is normally living in a normal house. He is not living in the biggest house in town. He is not driving 3 Cadillacs and 2 Ferraris. He may be able to afford to do so but he doesn’t do it. He is very practical with money. You may ask yourself why. That’s the fundamental question why.

If I was to go to a young person, for example, I have an 18-year-old and a 17-year-old living in my house. If I was to go to them and say, “What do you do with a dollar?” My kids could tell you what to do with a dollar. They could tell you to spend a dollar too but they can also tell you what to do with one because they are very cognizant of some of the things, ideas and principles that they have grown up with.

The first 10% of it doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to God. You tied it. You give it away. If you’re not a religious person or you’re not affiliated with your church, synagogue or mosque, give it to your favorite charity. Give it to the local ambulance corps or Little League. You can do what you want with it but it doesn’t belong to you. I grew up with that thinking. Ten percent of my income wasn’t mine. I was always giving it away. I still do it to this day.

What about the next 30%? The next 30% roughly is what you call your Caesar account. Render unto Caesar. What is Caesar? That’s not my words. That’s Jesus Christ’s words. About 30% of your income belongs to the federal government here in the United States and Canada. It might be higher or lower than that, depending on how your tax person does your taxes. About 30% doesn’t belong to you. It belongs to your federal government. If you live in a state or a province with high taxes some of it belongs to them. It’s not yours.

 

You can say, “In the first five minutes of this call Solleder, you told me 10% I got to give away and 30% is not mine. That still leaves 60%.” What do you do with that other 60%? Let’s allocate it properly. The cost of living is about 30%. Now, we’re up to 70%. What about that other 30%? The other 30%, 15% to 20% of it needs to go back into your business if you were actively building a network marketing business, for that matter. I know I have got readers that are not in network marketing. Some of them are in different professions.

If you were to put that money back into your business, you need to reinvest in you and your business. In that investment, some of that needs to be self-development. You need to buy the books, listen to the tapes and go to the seminars. You need to continue to self-educate in that money that you put back into your business. We still have 10% left. That’s where I want to start the discussion. That 10% left is to retire debt, number one. If you have debt, the bank owns you. You don’t own the bank.

My recommendation is to sit down with all your household bills. Your credit card bill is probably going to be the highest number in terms of interest rate but it may not be. You might have a school loan, for example, that some people have. You might have some other outstanding debt to a medical situation. You know what you have.

Whatever the highest interest rate one is, it’s the one you got to attack with that 10%. Let’s say that you owe $1,000 to your doctor for some procedure he did that wasn’t covered by your insurance. That $1,000 you need to pay off because you might be paying 15%, 16%, 18% or 20% on that bill. You might have some other bill. You know the bill. Unfortunately, you’ll find a bill. You know what I’m talking about. You got them there. You got them in your stack on your desk. I’m not making this stuff up. I got them too but we pay them off all the time when they come immediately.

Why is that? It’s because the highest interest rate is the one that’s going to choke you out quicker than any other bill that you have. It’s going to accumulate. For example, as a segue, there was a study done several years ago. It was about the time when I first came down here to Texas. I will never forget that study and you might remember this. That $200 a month was the amount of money that caused people to go into bankruptcy in the State of Texas. I said, “What is the big deal with $200? Come on. You can borrow that from your next-door neighbor or one of your kids. It’s not a big deal.”

It’s a big deal because here’s what happens. In January, it was $200. If it’s at a high-interest rate, for example, on a credit card, February comes. It’s another $200 plus the interest on the initial $200. Let’s call that about 20%. It’s not $200. That’s another $40 roughly in accumulated interest. At the end of February, you owe the new $200 in February and the initial $200 in January. That’s $400. The interest in January, that’s another $40. Now, you’re up to $440.

Let’s go to March. It’s another $200. It’s $640 plus the interest from February and plus the accumulated interest from January. Now, you’re up to about $700. You see where I’m going with this. It doesn’t take long before it’s several thousand dollars that you owe. Thus, these families were declaring bankruptcy over a lack of $200 a month. If you’re in network marketing, you know how to make that $200. The word is called retail. It might be a dirty word to you.

You need to continue to educate yourself with the money that you put into your business. Click To Tweet

Get off your butt and go sell some products to somebody or somebody take your product. Whatever your product is, get it out in the marketplace. That’s going to build your Dow anyway. It’s going to help you to recruit people who are satisfied when they take your product. More than that, that exercise is going to get you into the discipline of never having a high-interest rate bill that you can’t pay. Any time you accumulate one for whatever reason, you have the opportunity to go out, sell some products and satisfactorily take care of that debt.

I have taught this for many years to people. Some people got it. Here’s what is funny. Some of those people we’re not the top earners in the industry. I have trained a lot of the top earners in the industry. Some of them are the worst with money. Some of the people who got it are what I call middle-level distributors. It’s the people who said I get it and they paid off that debt. Once they paid off that debt, they said, “What is the next one?”

For example, I had a strength coach and his wife that I trained back here in the 1990s with a company here in Dallas. That strength coach and his wife had gotten married. They didn’t want debt. What they started to do was they would take whatever the debt was at the moment. They would hang it on the refrigerator so they both had to look at it every time they went for something to eat. One by one, they paid those bills off. They became one of the top distributorships in that particular company. Now, that fellow owns a company in the industry because he got the discipline of what to do to pay off that debt.

I got to interrupt you here because you got some real nuggets here and I hope people read carefully. I want everybody to take a deep breath because that first segment that you covered is, “I can’t live on the total check that I have got coming into the house. Now, you’re telling me to give away 10%, set aside 30% for Caesar and reinvest in my business. You’re telling me all of this.” The caveats are important. This is why you’re reading this blog. This is why you’re leaving nothing to chance. This is why you started that home-based business.

It’s the money that you’re talking about here because you and I have seen this in network marketing. People get into network marketing. They have that flowering of success in the beginning and they think it’s going to go forever. They don’t maintain the same lifestyle. They add to it. They get a second car, buy a boat and take trips to Hawaii. They do all the things that are there. What you’re talking about is that the first initial income that you’re making from your business here is where you’re focusing on 10% to charity, 30% to Caesar and another 30% that you can add to your lifestyle if you want to.

Your 20% and 10% for debt, get that debt retirement. Use this income that you’re going to make out of this home-based business. It’s this additional stream of income, which is what is so powerful here to be able to retire those debts because it’s nice to wake up in the morning and you’re going, “Maybe I will go to work. Maybe I won’t,” because you’re out of debt. That is the important part that people get here when you’re talking about this. Take a deep breath and relax a little bit. Not only is John going to tell you how to give away money to charity your 10% but about making additional money and increasing the stream of income.

What happens? Let’s segue. You get the discipline of paying the debt. Maybe all the debt is gone. Some of the debt is gone. Maybe you keep your mortgage or car payments if they are at low-interest rates. Those are decisions you’ll make with your spouse. If you’re single, you’ll make them on your own. Let’s talk about now what to do with that 10% because that’s what I want to focus on.

 

I know networkers who go out and do everything Keith described. They buy the second car but the second car is not a good second-hand used car from the car lot. It’s a Maserati, Porsche or Ferrari. I’m a car guy. I love cars. I don’t own any of them. I own practical vehicles. Why? I can go and rent for a day any of those cars if I want to drive one but I don’t need to own them because they are not a good investment.

The second to that is your home. Live where you live. If you live in a place and you got holes in the wall and leaky pipes, fix the stuff up by all means. If you’re living somewhere, you don’t have to upgrade to the next neighborhood over to impress anyone. One of the big mistakes in network marketing is people try to impress other people. For what purpose? I will never ever figure out. Somebody said to me one time, “Who do you need to impress Solleder because they look at me? I dress like a very normal person and I could afford to dress a lot better but I dress like a normal person.”

I don’t wear jewelry. I don’t like jewelry. I’m not a jewelry guy. I can’t wear a watch. I wear an Apple sports watch that attracts my steps because that helps me with my fitness and health. I don’t wear a Rolex. Can I afford a Rolex? Absolutely. I can afford 100 Rolexes but I don’t need them. I don’t want them. I will lose them anyway. Why would I have something like that when a Timex tells the same time like a Rolex?

Be practical with your money because what to do with that 10% is critical to building a financial fortress around yourself and your family in the years to come. I believe that there are four basic areas I want to touch on here. Let’s look at a family that’s got young children. Every parent should aspire for their children to go to college or at least have that opportunity. If Johnny or Susie go to school, they get good grades. They are good kids. They don’t get themselves in trouble with drugs or other things.

They come to you when they are 17 or 18 years old. They say, “Mom and dad, I want to go to Harvard, Stanford, Yale, McGill or wherever it happens to be.” The last thing a parent wants to be in a position to do is to say, “You did your job. I did mine. Tell me which one you want to apply to or apply to them all. You make a choice when they all accept you.” If the kids do their job, mom and dad, you need to do your job.

Out of that 10%, what you need to do instead of buying the Rolex or Ferrari or taking the expensive trip is you need to put money into what is called a 529c if you live here in the United States. I know Canada has the equivalent. A lot of the states here in the US offer programs as well you could invest in. I’m not telling you where to invest your money. I’m telling you the discipline of investing it in some financial vehicle that is for the education of your children.

The highest interest rate is the one that's going to choke you out quicker than any other bill that you have. Click To Tweet

Most of these things are tax-advantaged. What does that mean? It means growth. You’re not paying income tax every single year. The money is being used later on until your kid uses it to go to school. That’s the 529c program. That’s your college education fund. A lot of states have it. Check it out. That’s not my job to tell you where to find it. You can have a financial planner or somebody in your community that’s in the insurance business. They can guide the process on that. It’s important to put that money away while you’re making it.

If you’re part-time in network marketing, let’s say that you’re making an extra couple of thousand dollars a month. You can take $500,000 or whatever it happens to be. You can make monthly payments into that so that you don’t even feel it. The check comes from your company. Put a little bit away for Johnny and Susie’s education fund. You won’t even feel it. You’re going to love how it builds up. I have lived this. I have done this for my children.

They are not going to get to eighteen and you’re going to say, “Where in the world am I going to find all of this money because they have been accepted to a school that might be $50,000, $60,000 or $70,000 a year?” Who knows what it’s going to be? That’s one thing. Next thing, let’s say you never married or perhaps you married. You never had children or perhaps you’re in a situation where your children are grown. Mine are almost grown. They are adults. He is in the grandchild phase now or some of the grandchildren are even getting to be adults.

If you’re in that situation, how about your retirement? Congress here in the United States and also the equivalent in Canada, I know, have set up things over the years that are tax-advantaged for you to take the money and take care of your future. Your government wants you to take care of your future. Don’t rely on Social Security or the equivalent in Canada. It’s very little money. If you look at what you put in over the years through your taxes and what you get back, it’s disgusting. Whatever it is, you earned it. Take it by all means but it’s not going to be a full-time living. It’s not even close.

I got my thing here in the mail because I turned 60 in 2021. I looked at the number and I said, “I will take it but I couldn’t live on it. It’s not in the lifestyle that we have. We don’t have a big lifestyle for the type of income that we make.” My sister, who is quite a bit older than me, is in the same situation. She is still working because she is looking at hers and saying, “This is not enough.” That being the case, even if the government radically ups the numbers, it’s still not going to be enough for you to continue in the home you’re in, the cars you’re in and the lifestyle that you probably have. You got to save for retirement.

SEP is what it’s called here in the United States. It’s a separate retirement account for self-employed people. Check with your insurance agent. You can even check with your bank. In some cases, your bank has different things that they carry along those lines. Put that money away for retirement. As a discipline, on the 2nd of January every year, there is a check in an envelope addressed to my insurance company that sits on my desk from about December 26th and I get the privilege.

I call this a privilege on January 2nd every year to stick it in the mailbox and mail it to Jackson Life. It used to be the company that I use. I mail to Jackson Life every year. That’s my gift to myself every year for my retirement account. I have been doing this since I’m 25. You can imagine the money builds up. Whether you’re 25, 35, 45, 55 or even 65 reading this, it’s not too late. You take some of that money that you’re making from your multi-level business and you apply it to your retirement.

We have covered education if you have got younger children. If you’re a grandparent and you want to establish those accounts for your kids, you can. The retirement account is the second step. What is the third step? The third step is that we’re living in a situation now where most people are going to live a lot longer than their parents did. I have already surpassed the age my father died, for example. My mom made it to 92. You don’t know how long you’re going to be here.

One thing you don’t want to be is a burden on your children. How do you not be a burden on your children financially? You create what I call the third pillar of finance called a Long-Term Care policy, LTC. Check with your insurance agent or financial professional. Don’t check with your next-door neighbor if they sell golf shoes for a living. Check with somebody who knows who can advise you. There are several different products out there in Long-Term Care. I have one. My wife has one.

Why do we have that? We have that so that if either one of us needs to go into a nursing home, that the money is there each month to pay for our nursing home. I believe we have it set for five years because if you go in one, realistically, you probably won’t be in one for five years. You’ll be into it the next life. There’s enough there that it’s not going to drain my kids as they are living their lives and building the families of their resources to take care of mom and dad because we didn’t do our job financially to set ourselves up for the situation that many Americans and Canadians find themselves near the end of their lives where they wind up in a nursing home.

It’s a number of companies that have it. Some have a life insurance provision too so that if you never go to the nursing home and you pass away, that there’s life insurance. There are a lot of different products. I’m not here to endorse any one of them. Check them out though because part of your financial stewardship to your family is to make sure that you don’t burden the next generation with your debt. They didn’t create it. You did. If you live long enough and I hope you all do. I hope we all pass away in a nursing home when we’re 97. Some of us will. Some of us won’t. Who knows about that? There are no guarantees either way but prepare financially for that time.

The fourth step. I know I have gone through this. I know you have gone through this. I know friends of ours are going through it as we speak. It’s the care of another elderly person in your family who didn’t get this information that you’re getting now. They didn’t set up for living a long time. This is what I call the rainy day fund of someone else, not necessarily you. Maybe you have an elderly aunt, uncle, parent or someone in your life who you have been close to, who for whatever reasons did not prepare properly for their future.

 

You may say, “I need to help out Uncle Joe here. Maybe he never married. He had no kids and you’re going to help out Uncle Joe in his old age.” That’s step four is that if you want to call it rainy day fund. We have all been there. If you have an elderly parent, realistically, you’re going to have to step up to the bar here at some point and write checks. Believe me, I have been there. That’s called the reality of how we live now in North America.

The great news is we have lived a long time. The bad news is we have run out of money. If you don’t run out of money, that’s great but if an elderly person in your life does, you may have to help them out. If you don’t, it’s more money for you if it doesn’t turn out that way. This way, you’re prepared and it’s not, “I did everything right. I’m ready for retirement but my wife’s uncle, who didn’t prepare, has a problem. We feel like it’s incumbent on us to help them.” It could be somebody in your community.

Whatever it happens to be, you deal with that situation. I’m not going to tell you how to live your life or spend your money but this is the reality of finance. I gave notice what I didn’t tell these people. I didn’t tell them to go out as we talked earlier, “Buy a fancy car. Buy a Rolex. Buy the most expensive suit or dress in the store. Go out and flaunt your wealth to your neighbors because they are going to join your business,” because the reality is they are not.

Now, people think differently. People have a social thought for the most part how they do things. People don’t want to see you flaunt your wealth. Most people would rather have you tell them the kind of things that I’m telling you and have real, frank discussions about finance, “Look at my brand-new whatever.” That might be well and good but that’s not going to impress them enough to necessarily join your business.

It will show you making money but it shows that you are not a good steward of money to a person who you want in your business. The people you want in your business are people who think that way, that this is a business of preparing financially for a future need, “Now, show me once I’m in how to make that $1,000, $1,500 or $2,000 a month part-time with my side gig.” I like that terminology. I got that from our friend, Randy Gage. It’s great terminology. Call it what you want your side hustle.

All that being the case, you got those four principles. First thing, retire your debt. Next thing, look at those four areas. No matter how old you are, what ethnicity you are, what sex you are or what religion you are who aren’t reading this, I’m sure you can identify with one or more of those financial four needs that I described there. That’s the way to start thinking.

I look at all the folks that I know in the industry for many years. The successful ones are not flamboyant. The successful ones are very practical. It’s much like the millionaire next-door type of people in that book. They have been making a lot of money from their company but a lot of money is not necessarily that they are even at the top rank in their company. They consistently have good financial discipline with the money that they do make and they put it away.

The people you want in your business are people who think that “this is a business of financial preparation for future needs.” Click To Tweet

A good friend of mine in the industry is Jeff Weisberg. His dad Herb Weisberg was an agent with Northwest Mutual for many years out in California. Herb and I used to have a lot of conversations about this when I was younger and when we had spent some time together. Herb always said, “John, it’s not what you make. It’s what you keep.” That’s good advice. Questions or comments, Keith?

It’s great information. I hope everybody got here. This is not, “You’re happy right before Christmas Leaving Nothing to Chance call.” Every once in a while whether you like it or not, you got to touch reality. What is important here is you gave everybody a reality check on what needs to be done. They need to be listening to Leaving Nothing to Chance because in the world we live in now, you need to develop multiple streams of income.

In my opinion, one of those streams of income needs to be through a network marketing model because it allows you to leverage your time and talents to create a stream of income. From that stream of income, you have some options. Everything you talked about here touched the point of what you need to do. Often, people look at those credit card debts and they go, “I will never get it paid off.”

One of the other things that you touched upon is being cognizant of how you spend your money. What I find fascinating is the broker people are, the more credit cards they have. I know people who got fifteen credit cards. Are you kidding me? Why would you need fifteen credit cards? It’s because you can’t pay them off. Otherwise, you don’t need fifteen. If you got an American Express, Mastercard and Visa, you’re good to go. Maybe you don’t need all three. Beyond that, think about that.

The consciousness that John is bringing up here is there’s not much cheer on this call but there’s a lot of good news on this call. The good news is there is a way. That way is to develop that stream of income. Network marketing needs to be one of those streams of income. As our governor here in California said, “Whether you like it or not, you need to develop multiple streams of income.” Rental income is great but you got to have the money to start the process of buying a rental property. Dividend income is great but you got to have a way to invest in buying a stock that pays in dividends.

The easiest way to do that is to start your home-based business. Leaving Nothing to Chance is a tool that will educate you in a way where you can take the time plus effort and it equals success. That’s what you got here with this university of education of building a stream of income in network marketing, working from home with what you have here with John Solleder in Leaving Nothing to Chance. John, I did the pitch for you on this. I’m listening to know more.

I want to add a couple of other things because life is the best teacher and you can’t have all the lessons yourself. It doesn’t work that way. Here are a couple of life lessons for me when I was very young. In my first company, I had a problem with the Food and Drug Administration and the media, for that matter. It was back in 1984. Some of you know the company. It’s still in business. They had a great comeback and now they do about $8 billion a year but they had a problem.

I would go to meetings in Saddle Brook, New Jersey, at the Saddle Brook Marriott. If any of you are from that area of the country, the Saddle Brook Marriott is still here. I haven’t been there in a long time. That’s where I used to go to my first meetings in network marketing. I will never forget that the top producers had all been driving Jaguars and Mercedes. You would go to the meetings and it was like a fashion show. The women were dressed to the nines and the guys had the most expensive suits and jewelry.

Within about 90 days of that company, having that difficulty with the Food and Drug Administration, those cars became used Volkswagens. All the glitz and glamor was gone. It was a valuable lesson. I wasn’t a big earner. I was a struggling young guy making a little bit of money in the business but I observed that because I observed everything. I was trained to be a reporter. That’s my training at university. I observed that and I was amazed.

 

I got into the life insurance business after that because I wasn’t making a living. I needed to do something. I had a life insurance business. Insurance was a great trainer for me because I sat in front of people who were now the ages that you and I are. It’s a little bit in our age group, the 50s, 60s and even 70s. I would go to their homes. In those days, there were no cell phones. I would sit there and ask them questions. I had this thing I had to fill out with them. I would have them tell me their stocks, bonds, mutual funds, real estate holdings if they had any annuity or pension from work.

I would accumulate all of that data. I would take it back to our office and feed it into this humongous Honeywell computer that we had. It would give me a report that I would then take back to that hopeful customer of mine and say, “Mr. or Mrs. Smith, here’s where you’re at.” I will never forget this. It was in a town called Haledon, New Jersey. I remember Haledon, New Jersey, only because Bruce Baumgartner, our greatest Olympic wrestler from the US is from Haledon, New Jersey.

I went to this couple in Haledon, New Jersey one night and they lived in a beautiful home. I had to tell them that there was no way in the world in retirement could they continue to live in that home based on what they had saved. They have nice cars and furniture but the reality was they were not going to be able to live like they were living in retirement. What do you do? Do you work until you drop? I don’t know what they did ultimately. I wasn’t staying in the business that long. That’s why I didn’t keep up with that particular couple but I saw that movie.

I also saw the movie of my father dying without preparing financially and leaving my mother in a mess that I helped with my sisters for her to get out of over several years. That’s called life. When I say this stuff, it’s not as a network marketer who has made a lot of money in network marketing. It’s as a person who has observed a lot of people who have done it wrong and a lot of people who have done it right.

I have spent many years in this business and I know multimillion-dollar earners who haven’t stayed in there. Something happens to their company like what happened in 1984 with that particular company I was with and they went up almost destitute or they wind up multi-level junkies. They go from company to company. They sell the same story about how they used to be successful and a few people follow them. Most of the time, they make bad choices. They don’t join companies that have longevity to them. That’s tragic. Don’t be like those guys.

Be like the guys that make money consistently in one company. Whatever your company is, if you have a good company, you believe in your product, company, pay plan, management, ownership and all that. Most importantly, you believe in you and you learn the business. You’re becoming a network marketing professional but does that mean you have to be the top earner in your company? It means you want that consistent income. The most consistent income earners in our industry, in many cases, you don’t know their names. You’ll never know their names because they haven’t gone to a second company. They haven’t needed to.

For example, my friend Stuart Johnson, owner of VideoPlus, they are now called SUCCESS Partners. Stuart hosted an event here for people who had made a certain amount of money and income. For disclaimer purposes, I won’t show you the amount but it was a lot and I was blessed to be in that group of people. I was with some of my colleagues that I didn’t know in the industry. We were standing around. About nine guys came in with one particular company in the industry. We were talking amongst ourselves.

I was talking to my friend, Jeff. He was in that group also. I said, “Who are those guys?” He goes, “I have no idea.” Those guys had been with a company since its inception. They had been with that company for over twenty years. A lot of them were older guys than we were at that time. We were in our 40s. A lot of them were in their 60s. They had been at one company. In their company, they were Household Words. In the industry, you and I wouldn’t know them. If we said their name to most of the top earners in the industry, they never heard of them either.

They were making money. They are probably still making money now. I know their companies are still doing very well. That’s what I’m talking about. It’s not jumping around from company to company. Find a company and build it. You have the financial discipline that we talked about to take care of those four needs for your family. That’s how you build a financial fortress. You use the industry, your company and your opportunity to fund your financial future.

You will be successful the way that you want to be successful for your needs. It’s not to impress the neighbors with the latest car or whatever. If you do all of that, you’re going to have a great life in network marketing like so many people that are nameless and faceless and most of us that make a great income on a consistent basis with real companies, pay plans and products. They do it a month in, month out and year in, year out for many years.

In the last example, I have what I call the 40-year-plus club. Those are people who have made an income for 40 years or more from one particular company in the industry. There’s a number of those companies out there that have been here for 40 years or more and you get around some of those people. I was in California. I had helped to work with something that wound up becoming an acquisition of a very large company in the industry. The owner of the company was my friend. He had me at the company’s big annual shindig.

Here I am, I was working as a consultant for the company. I was here in the corporation. I’m not a distributor. I’m not in sales or management. I have got an outside role helping this particular company. We got to lunchtime. At lunchtime, I looked for a place to sit to eat my lunch. There are thousands of people at this particular event in San Francisco. I thought, “If they don’t go then I will sit down and eat my lunch like everybody else’s.” I did that.

This was 2005. I sat with people that had been in that company in some cases from the late 1950s and early 1960s before I was born, that they had started to earn income with that particular company. It’s one of our own companies in the industry. It got me thinking, “This is a legacy business.” I got around with some of the younger people in that company and found out that their distributorships had been built by their mom and dad. In some cases, even their grandma and grandpa had left them in the will of these younger folks who now have the distributorships.

That’s what you want. You want a business that lives on beyond you. We’re not in a teaching technique now in terms of how to build an organization. If you build it right, this becomes a legacy business for your family the same way that those folks with that particular company have legacies for theirs. I knew I had a legacy, Keith, with the company we built together.

I have interviewed some great people like my friend, Joe Garcia. Joe has that legacy for his family at the company he has built and other people that we have interviewed on the show where they have that legacy. Be that legacy. Be smart with your money. Invest today for tomorrow. That’s my last message. Keith, back to you.

John, thank you for allowing me to be here with you on this Christmas season show. We want to wish everybody a Merry Christmas and a happy holiday season. I hope you all have a great time. I know that you have a great guest in the next episode here on the show. Maybe you can give everybody a little teaser of why they want to read the next episode.

On December 28, 2021 you’re not going to want to miss it, manifesting your success in 2022. Joe Garcia is such a gentleman and a nice human being. He is successful and humble. Joe has put together a Christmas, New Year’s, Hanukkah and Kwanzaa gift for everybody. It’s free. What he’s got on there, he is going to talk about. He will tell you how to get that together. Read the blog to find out. Joe is talking about some things that are going to help to bless you and your family in 2022. You want to read the next episode and share it with your organization.

One of the best ways to recruit in 2022 is to share this type of information, like what we shared on finance or what Joe is going to share on manifesting your success in 2022. Share it with people, not in your company. The friends and relatives you’re going to see during this holiday season perhaps and say, “Are you still doing that whatever? Are you still selling that skinny powder or that skincare?” “Yes, I am.” “Let me send you something.” Send them one of these shows. Let them read it.

We’re just like they are. We figured out how to get the multiple sources of income that they are looking for. It’s that plan B or side gig. Call it what you want. We got it. This is a nice little way subtly to let them read some great information and, at the same time, say, “Now, tell me about that product that you have because maybe I should get that side gig going to 2022.” That’s all we got for now. Merry Christmas. Happy New Year. Happy Hanukkah. Happy Kwanzaa. Happy 2022. Thanks so much, Keith.

Important Links:

• Keith Hooper
• The Millionaire Next Door
• Randy Gage
• Jeff Weisberg – LinkedIn
• Stuart Johnson – LinkedIn
• SUCCESS Partners