What Went Wrong?

Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it's the purpose of the Lord that will stand. Proverbs 19 21.

I am Rob West. That verse reminds us that we should always seek God's counsel in our affairs. That's true for individuals and for nations. Let's talk with economist Jerry Boyer about what happens when a nation ignores God's plan, that it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Well, I'm excited that my friend and Faith and Finance resident economist Jerry Boyer is with us again today. Today's discussion is part two of a six-part series we're doing on a biblical economic worldview. Now, I know that sounds a little dry, but trust me, Jerry Boyer is never boring.

And Jerry, great to have you back with us. Dry? Economic worldview sounds dry?

Oh no, I can't believe it. A little academic. Jerry, the last time you talked about how an economy is supposed to work when everyone follows biblical principles. So let's just recap.

Give us a thumbnail sketch of that before we dive into today's topic, which is in fact what went wrong. Well, the way it's supposed to work is the way it's designed to work, which is how it worked in creation in the garden, which is that we are subordinate to God. God creates the world. Then God makes man in his own image and likeness.

And since up until then, the only thing we've seen God do is be creative, to take things and make them better. You know, day one was good. Why is there a day two? Well, I guess we can make it better. Day two is good.

Tov. God saw that it was good. But there's still a day three, so I guess we can make it better, right? That's how God does it. And that's what man is supposed to do. And so up until the creation of man, that's what we've seen God do. So that gives us a pretty strong reason to believe that when it says that man is made in the image and likeness of God, that has a strong emphasis on what we've been seeing God do, whose image and likeness we're in, which is to make things. Now, God makes things out of nothing, but he also takes things that are already made and improves them.

We can only do that second one. We can only improve. But that is in fact our job. And when we do that under God, what we do is we defer gratification, we learn, we improve, we don't eat all the fruit. We take some of the seeds and then we plant those and then there's more trees and we take care of them. And more trees means more fruit and more fruit means more seeds and more seeds means more trees and on and on it goes.

And it's this virtuous cycle of abundance. And that's the way it's supposed to work. But of course, that's not how it stayed. Something went wrong. Yeah, something went drastically wrong. So pick up there, Jerry, what went wrong? Well, sin and alienation from God, alienation from the creation and alienation from one another.

The man and the woman hide from God separately, not together. So a lot of things, everything went wrong in some sense, but I'm going to focus in on two things. The world went wrong and we went wrong. The world went wrong in the sense that it was now cursed, which means there's more scarcity, thorns and thistles rather than fruit trees and bushes, sweat of our brow.

Work became toilsome. There's more scarcity. And when there's more scarcity, the basis of economic growth is cut off because economic growth is about reinvesting for the future, not consuming now so that there can be growth. We went wrong in the sense that we became more animalistic and more appetite driven, which means that we're not willing to in an era of scarcity to defer into the future. And again, cutting off that virtuous cycle of deferring, working, producing more now by consuming less now.

Yeah, and I think that's really key, Jerry. You talk about this virtuous cycle versus what we're in now, which is a vicious cycle. Obviously, the virtuous cycle is really God's design for all of this. But we have a way of taking God out of his rightful place and putting government in his place. And that doesn't work, does it?

It doesn't. That's the false solution. The false solution is instead of turning back to God, we turn man into a God. Now, what man gets turned into a God?

Well, tends to be the kings, right? So we turn to government as our new God. Yes. All right. We're going to continue to unpack this when we come back.

We'll talk about this vicious cycle that we're in now and what we can do about it. Jerry Boyer with us today, our resident economist and president of Boyer Research. Your call is coming up a little later in the program as well. 800-525-7000.

That's 800-525-7000. This is Faith and Finance Live, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Much more to come. Stick around. I'm delighted to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live. I'm Rob West. With me today, my friend and our resident economist, Jerry Boyer. He's president of Boyer Research.

And you can read his columns at World Opinions. Jerry joins us today with part two in a six part series on a biblical economic worldview. Just before the break, Jerry was sharing God's design for economics and wealth creation, which you might call a virtuous cycle. And he was also talking about where it went wrong, starting with sin entering the world. But also, we perpetuate that by really getting into a not a virtuous cycle, but a vicious cycle. Jerry, talk about that for a moment.

What does that look like? Well, a vicious cycle gets worse and worse, right? So there's a next phase downward in the decline. And that occurs when we try to solve it ourselves. So when things go wrong, what you're supposed to do is turn back to God and say, help us.

You know, there are thorns and thistles. Help bring a good crop. Help me be disciplined. Help us be productive.

Help make our work a little less woe and a little more joy. And then that can turn around. But instead, what we do is we say, we'll solve it. We'll create our own God, which typically is the state. In modern terms, what that means is we give enormous power to government. And in essence, instead of going back to God as king, we create another king.

We take the crown from God's head or try to imagine that we can and put it on the head of the king. In terms of modern economics, what that usually means is debasing currency and easy money and high debt and low interest rates. And I did this video series back, I think it was in 2009, and the Fed was just embarking in this direction.

I didn't know how far it was going to go, honestly, in that direction. And what that does is it creates a tremendous bubble. That's a way of dealing with our anxiety.

Like in your life, if you have anxiety problems, maybe you get drunk, you know, or take narcotics and you do feel a little better for a little while. But it actually makes things worse. Well, the financial version of that is debasing currency. That's the drug to which a financial system can become addicted. But the problem is eventually you get inflation.

And we did. And then eventually that inflation can't be denied. And then the government fights it by pulling money out of the system and raising interest rates and contracting the money supply. And that pops the bubble because ultimately reality cannot be denied.

We can try to ignore it. But when we try to make man a god, he isn't a god and he can't create out of nothing like God can. We can print money. We can't create wealth out of nothing. And if you print money but don't create new wealth, you don't get new stuff. You just get higher prices. And we're certainly experiencing that right now. Jerry, also, when we begin to print money, instead of taking it and putting it back into economic expansion and production and giving it to the god that created us to acknowledge his rightful place, it goes in this bigger state toward more taxes, which drives consumption down, right?

Yeah, it really does. I mean, I don't want the government to debase currency and give it to anybody. But it's even worse in the sense that it debases currency and gives it in the wrong places.

It gives it the central power. So it's not just a matter of debasing currency. You know, Ben Bernanke, former Fed chairman, said we're going to have helicopter money like we're going out across America and dropping money from helicopters. Well, it seems like all the helicopters got stuck in Manhattan because they dropped all the money on the banking system and didn't get out to the rest of us until, you know, the inflation was pretty high.

By the way, that's called the candle on effect for people who are into the dry economic stuff. So whoever gets the money first gets it before the inflation occurs. So this inflation is actually a transfer of wealth from the poor and middle class to the ruling class, to the financial and political class. So not only do we debase currency, but we give the debase currency to the wrong people. Well, and the reality is, although you can print money infinitely, you can't print wealth infinitely.

So the yields that are there are not representative of what's actually going on, right? No, an interest rate tells the truth about you, right? I mean, if a society doesn't save, interest rates rise, right? Because, you know, money is scarce, savings is scarce. If a society debases currency, interest rates rise because you need to be protected against inflation. If a society isn't covenant keeping, if a lot of people commit bankruptcy, they don't repay, we don't keep our agreements, well, interest rates rise because there's the danger of default and you need to be compensated for that. There are risk premia in interest rates, they reflect who we are. Maybe we don't like what we see, you know, maybe the interest rates tell us things about ourselves that we don't know. So what, financial suppression or easy money or debasing of currency or pushing down interest rates, whatever you want to call it, that's like looking in a skinny mirror.

You know, you say, hey, I look good. Well, no, you don't. That's just you just think you're financially healthy because the central bank is creating money. We're not saving that money.

The central bank is creating it. It looks and feels like abundance, but it, in fact, is scarcity and distortion. All right, Jerry, so what can we do about this?

Where do we go from here? Put the crown back where it belongs or, you know, we don't put it, acknowledge where the crown was all along, which means demote the state to what, you know, what Paul said in Romans 13. It's just a servant.

That's all the state is. It's not a god. You know, Paul and Peter in their letters had the habit of referring to the emperor as the king. Well, does that mean there's no emperor? Well, no, Jesus is the emperor. He's the king of kings and lord of lords. But, you know, Caesar is just another king. He's just another payroller.

You know, he's the hot. He's God's hired help. Maybe he doesn't realize it or not. So you demote the state and then get refocused on God. Now, we're so far behind that Christians are going to have to do this on our own for a while. We're not going to be able to say to the culture the state isn't God and have the culture give up idolatry to the state.

That's not the way it works. We have to personally act like the state isn't God in our own financial decisions. And then we will mirror to the world what God's economy looks like, which is abundance and generosity. We give to God because that refocuses us.

It recalibrates us. We give to the church. We give to the poor because God tells us to, but also because it creates a community. So we have to show what it looks like in order for us to expect the world to say, oh, I'll take that rather than I'll take the mystery of acting like a Christian, even though I don't know what that looks like because I don't see Christians doing it.

Yeah. So it starts with us and our own economies and how we handle God's money. And then as nations, it's either we're going to apply these principles or we're not. And there's consequences for that, right?

There really are. And I really think that's an important point. Just because we do it right doesn't mean the nations will listen. I think history shows that when a nation is exposed to the gospel, things can get better or they can get worse.

What they can't do is stay the same. So, you know, South Korea said the gospel, that sounds good. And they largely started to become a more Christian society.

They're not fully Christian, but they embraced a lot of Christian institutions. North Korea looked at it and said, oh, well, I think our glorious leader is Jesus. And they rewrote the gospel accounts with the dictator with his own little nativity scenes. So North and South Korea both got the gospel.

What did they call that? The Jerusalem of the East, because it was the center of missionary activity. They both heard the gospel. And one part of the nation said, or a lot of people did, ah, I want to follow this Jesus. And another part of the nation said, oh, I am this Jesus. And look at the difference.

Well, you can see it at night from satellites, darkness and light. Hmm. That's powerful. Well, when you come back, Jerry, next time for part three, we'll talk about the way out of all of this. You touched on it today.

We'll build upon this and go even deeper next time. Jerry, always great to have you with us, my friend. Always a pleasure. That's our resident economist, Jerry Boyer.

You can read his insightful columns for World News Group at wng.org. Your calls are next. The number to call is 800-525-7000. Stay here. We'll be right back. So thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live.

I'm Rob West. Well, I always enjoy to have Jerry Boyer. He just helps refocus us on a biblical worldview. And, you know, what we recognize is that certainly there are principles we find in scripture that apply to us as individuals. But we also know that a large part of these financial passages were written to nations.

They were written by kings or for kings. And we know that when we don't apply these principles, when we violate God's word, well, there are consequences both personally and at the national level. We're, in fact, seeing some of that play out before our eyes.

And I love where Jerry finished in that we need to certainly pray and ask God to intervene here. But we need to start with ourselves. How are we handling our own economy? Are we doing that with an eternal perspective? Are we demonstrating our trust in God, our willingness to die to self and limit our lifestyle in such a way that the material things don't become the object of our affection, that we have our feet firmly rooted in the world that is to come, the eternal perspective so that we can hold God's money loosely and give it generously and demonstrate to the world the way God designed money as a tool to be handled in such a way that it doesn't compete with our affection for Him? Well, we want to help you do that on this program each day here on Faith and Finance Live. And we'd love to tackle your specific financial questions, help you apply these passages, the heart behind them, the principles to the daily decisions and choices you're making right now.

So what are you thinking about financially? Whatever it is, give us a call at 800-525-7000. We have some lines open and we'd love to hear from you today. Again, 800-525-7000. You can call right now. All right, let's dive in. We're going to start in Philadelphia. Brenda, you'll be our first caller. Go ahead. Hi. I feel so blessed. I talked to you guys two months ago. I'm the grandmother that is raising two grandchildren.

Remember me? Oh, yes, ma'am. I sure do.

Yeah. So anyway, the point of it is I just received a gift of somebody at the church for $500. So I don't know what to do. Better than something or just give it back to the church and invest it in God's kingdom. You're so sweet. I love this question. Let's talk about that, Brenda.

What a blessing that you received this as a gift from somebody who obviously wanted to be the hands and feet of Jesus to bless you. Let's talk about where you're at financially. And ultimately, this is between you and the Lord to pray and ask for His wisdom and how you might use this and follow His leading. But apart from that, let me just ask, do you have any emergency savings, anything set aside that you could use for the unexpected? No, nothing, because I don't have nothing left behind. Okay. All right. Do you have enough income to meet your bills most months? To meet the bills, yes. Okay. But you just don't have anything extra? Exactly.

Okay. So I would say let's put this in a savings account. And this is going to be the beginning of what I call an emergency fund.

And we're going to get a little bit of interest on it. You could put it in your regular bank that you're with right now. If you want to get a little bit more interest, you could put it in an online bank if you're comfortable using the internet and have access to it with a computer by linking an online savings account to your checking account. Do you have a bank checking account that you use? I have a bank and I have a little checking account.

Yeah, probably $300. Okay, very good. So I would encourage you to put this in a separate account just so it's not in that same account that you write your bills out of every month with the hope that we can hang on to it. And you won't use it unless something truly unexpected comes out of left field. And it will, right?

We know that the unexpected comes. But I wouldn't be looking to invest it per se. At the most, I would probably put it in a savings account that's going to get maybe 4%. And you could look at one of the online banks to do that. And then, if you need it, down the road something comes out of left field. You have an unexpected failure with an appliance or a car maintenance that you didn't have the money for or a medical expense. Now you've got something. And to the best of your ability, and I realize money's tight, so I certainly understand that, but if you have anything left over each month, let's continue to try to build this up with a goal of trying to get three months' worth of expenses in there.

So if the total of your expenses are $1,500 in a month, you might want to try to save $4,500. Well, this is the beginning of that. So I think that's really where you want to go from here. Does that make sense?

It makes sense. Would you not recommend a CD in two years and then I would get like $50 more? That would not be recommended by you? I wouldn't, only because you don't have an emergency fund, and so I want you to have access to this money if you need it, and a CD would lock it up for a period of time. I want it in a separate account away from your checking account, but I don't want it in a CD where you can't get to it without paying a penalty because you may need it. We all need some liquid, meaning readily available, cash that's sitting on the side as what I call an emergency fund. Now, here's the thing. If you use one of the online banks like Marcus or Capital One 360, you're going to get about 4% right now in the way of interest, and a CD of 10 months or 12 months is probably only going to give you a little more than 5%, so there's only about a 1% difference there, and with the savings account, you're going to have access to it at any time, whereas the CD is going to lock it up for a year or two.

Does that make sense? Yes, and if that stays there until next year, when I have to do the in-contact, are they going to charge me because I had the $500 extra money for me to give to the government? No, you would only pay any taxes on the interest, so if you have $500 and you invest that for the next year at 4%, you're going to get $20 worth of interest.

That interest is taxable potentially, but it just depends on the rest of your income as to whether or not you'll pay any tax, but at the most, you'll just pay tax on the interest, which we're looking at about $20. Thank you so much. You guys are wonderful.

Okay. Hey, God bless you, Brenda. Thanks for calling today. May the Lord be with you and keep you, and call back any time.

Hey, folks, we've got a lot more to come on Faith and Finance Live. The number to call, 800-525-7000. We've got some lines open. You can call right now. Again, 800-525-7000. We'll be back with much more just around the corner.

Stay with us. Grateful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live here on Moody Radio. I'm Rob Last. We're taking your calls and questions with a few lines open today. 800-525-7000.

I'd love to hear from you. Lynn, our call screener today, is standing by, and she'd love to take your call. All right, let's head right back to the phones before we head to Ohio and talk to Craig.

We'll begin next in Chicago with Anthony. Go ahead, sir. How are you doing today, sir?

I'm doing great. Thanks for your call. I know you held patiently yesterday. We weren't able to get to you, so I'm glad we got you on today, sir. Yes, sir.

Well, to God be the glory for your program. I've been listening for quite a while, and I had a problem where I went to a dentist in my area where I live at in Illinois. And she informed me that one of the ways that could be of assistance to me would be to get care credit, which is a credit card to help with your leftover after your insurance. And anyway, instead of her billing my insurance company, she billed the direct amount of her charges directly to my care credit. And I guess she was saying that she's not going to go for any deductions or anything that the insurance company might do.

So she wanted everything as far as, you know, with no deductions. And I just needed some guidance on what I could do rectified because I'm paying my bill to the credit card to keep my credit in good standing in the meantime. But I just needed your guidance. Yeah, well, I'm so sorry to hear, Anthony, that you're dealing with this. Did you give the dentist permission to bill care credit for the services? Yes, I did. But it was under the agreement between her and I that she was going to bill my insurance and then the leftover will get billed to get credit. And then she she she still lies and tells me, build the insurance, but my insurance company has informed me that they have not received any bills from her.

And she acts as though I can't I haven't figured out what she's that she's lying. Yeah, yeah. Well, I think have you already reached out to the office manager, the person in charge of billing to discuss this? Well, she takes care of all that stuff herself. The dentist. The dentist does.

All right. Well, yeah, I mean, that's that's where your recourse would be is at the dentist level since they billed care credit. They had the directive to do it from you, even though I understand there was a conversation that indicated you didn't want it handled quite the way that they did.

It was really only for the overage as opposed to the initial bill. But since care credit has already paid, then the recourse is with the dentist to make you whole. They would have to reimburse care credit and then bill your insurance company. And, you know, unfortunately, if they refuse that in the only recourse you would have would be to, you know, try to take them to small claims court or something. Unfortunately, I think, though, that with this agreement that you signed to give them permission to to bill care credit, they would rely on that.

So I think you're just going to have to perhaps reach back out and just see if maybe you can visit with this dentist in person. Maybe just stop by the office and just say, listen, I'd like to work with you to straighten this out. Despite what the agreement might have said, my intention and my understanding on our conversation was that you were going to handle this differently than you did. This is not the way I wanted to build.

And I need you to help me unwind this. You know, perhaps the biggest issue you may be able to enforce is that you would leave a negative review on a rating site like Yelp or Google or something like that. And, you know, obviously you'd have to really just think through how you want to approach this. But if they're just unwilling to work with you, I mean, that that could be a way to get their attention. But hopefully they will in good faith be willing to work with you. And even though it'll take some extra work and there was a misunderstanding, they might be willing to try to unwind this and then bill it through your insurance provider. But ultimately, Anthony, this really is going to have to run through your dentist and you're going to have to appeal to their willingness to satisfy you as a customer.

And if if if at the last recourse, possibly look at legal group approaching it legally with possibly getting an attorney. And I guess I mean, how how much are we talking about is the bill for? Six thousand, six thousand plus. Yeah, yeah.

So it's significant. I mean, the challenge is legal fees could mount pretty quickly here. So I think you're going to want to try to avoid that at all costs. And again, I think just even the idea that you might need to leave some sort of review about your experience may get their attention because nobody wants that. And hopefully they'll just work in good faith with you, understanding this is a significant bill. They're still going to get paid either way, whether they run it through the insurance or not. And ultimately, you know, that was your intention, even though perhaps they misunderstood.

So I think you need to go back to the dentist and see if they'll be willing to work with you and try to reverse this. They certainly have the ability to do it if they're willing. But you keep us posted, Anthony. I'm so sorry you're going through this. So we'll ask the Lord to give you some favor here as you try to navigate through it, sir. And God bless you. Let's head to Ohio. Hi, Craig. Go ahead. Hi.

I was calling. I wanted to find out how to invest in, like, prudential fidelity. But I don't get on the computers and I don't have an email and stuff like that. Do you have to be online in order to invest with Fidelity or?

Yeah, I mean, you can go into a Fidelity branch and you would just want to go to Fidelity. Well, you don't use the Internet, but they should have investor centers in most major cities. Where are you located? What is what is your zip code?

4 4 3 8. OK. Yeah, you could get. Well, let me just do a quick search here and see if anything comes up. Yeah, I mean, they. Well, they've got about 50 miles away from you. It looks like they have an office there in Cleveland, East Ohio.

Pittsburgh would be another location. So if you wanted to drive, you could go to one of the investor centers there at Fidelity. You could also do this all through the phone in the mail. So you could just call their customer service center and, you know, see about having them mail the paperwork out to open the account. You would sign it and complete it and return it via the mail.

And you could do it that way. So I think one of those two could bypass an online approach. OK. Would you have an address for them for going on in mail? Let's do this. If you get I'll have my team get your information. If you hold the line and we can give you a quick call back and provide that information to you. Just since you don't have access to a computer, we'd be delighted to do that. So, Craig, you stay on the line right there. Our team will pick up, get your information, and we will call you before the end of the day and see if we can help you get that address. Thanks for being on the program, sir. All the best to you. Well, folks, we've got a few lines open today.

Eight hundred five two five seven thousand. Before we head into this break, let me mention our year end here at Faith and Finance is just around the corner on June the 30th. We've seen some incredible work by the Lord this year as we've been able to share his principles with his people. Those of you listening to this program and we've seen incredible things happening in your financial lives. You've been surrendering to God and giving generously and paying down debt. It's just a joy to watch God at work. If you'd like to help us continue that ministry, you can give right now, which would go a long way at faithfi.com.

Just click Give. We'll be right back. Stay tuned. Well, thanks for being a part of the program today here on Faith and Finance Live.

We've got all the lines full, so let's dive back in to Winthrop Harbor, Illinois. Hi, Katie. Go ahead.

Hi. My question is in regards to a trust. My husband and I have a trust and we're opening accounts at a new bank.

And I'm wondering if it is OK to open up our checking, our savings, the money market CDs. Are those all OK to open up in the name of the trust or would there be some reason why I don't want to do that? Yeah, so you can put these accounts in the name of the trust and generally you would do that with accounts that you don't want to go through probate. Now, keep in mind, with financial accounts that allow you to name beneficiaries, you can avoid probate without putting the account into the trust name just by naming those beneficiaries. So while you can transfer ownership of your retirement accounts into your trust, estate planning experts usually don't recommend it with IRAs, 401Ks, that type of thing. The transaction may be treated as if you've cashed out the account, which can trigger income taxes on these assets. So you'd certainly want to check with your CPA before you do anything. But I think, you know, with the non-retirement accounts, you can either retitle them in the name of the trust or you can name those beneficiaries.

In either case, you would bypass probate. OK. All right. I just didn't know if there was a reason why I should not do that. Like I said, we're starting over the new bank, so we're just we're kind of reevaluating how we're how we're doing our banking.

Yeah. I mean, I think you could talk to your estate planning attorney just to make sure you've considered everything the person that created the trust. One of the reasons why you might want to with the non-retirement accounts is just because there may be special provisions in the trust with regard to how the assets of the trust are distributed, either before your death, at your death or beyond your death based on certain triggering events and provisions that would allow those assets to be subject to the handling of the trust based on the trust documents by the trustee. Whereas, you know, with the beneficiary, it's automatically going to pass to those beneficiaries at your death and not give you the ability to, you know, hope for it to stay in the trust for a period of time. And so until certain conditions are met. So if there are provisions like that in the trust, that may be why you'd want these in the name of the trust. But ultimately, I'd talk to your estate planning attorney about that.

But that certainly is an option. And I think this you're right. This is a good time to be thinking about it. Thanks for calling today. We appreciate it.

To Byer, Indiana. Hi, Jeff. Go ahead, sir. Hey, Rob. I have an HSA and I'm able to put some of the value of that HSA into a Schwab account.

I want to be very conservative with it. And so I buy these Schwab money funds. They're a dollar a share and they pay based on a seven day yield. But I'm not really sure what they invested a Schwab money fund. Yeah, this is probably just the Schwab money market fund, which is going to invest in, you know, government bills, bonds and notes, depending on which money fund it is. They have a prime money fund that would be in just high quality, short term money market security. So that would be U.S. and foreign entities.

But it also could be corporations and, of course, the U.S. government. Then they have a government money fund that would only invest in short term government debt securities. So holdings in the U.S. Treasury obligations or repurchase agreements. And then there's a municipal money fund which is investing in short term municipal money market security.

So those are issued by states or local governments and so forth. So I think that's likely what you're in. You'd have to find out which of those funds you're actually in. But I think that could be a great way to, on a very conservative basis, get a better than average rate of return. And I love the fact that you're building up that HSA fund value. You're likely have the option for that portion that you don't think you're going to spend on medical expenses to even invest it in stocks and bonds if you wanted to. And it could be a great supplement to your retirement assets, because after age 65, you get some more favorable treatment on how that can be used without penalties, even for non medical expenses. But the money fund, I think, is a great option.

You just need to understand which money fund you're in in order to determine exactly what it's being invested in. Sure. Thanks for that explanation, Rob.

All right. Happy to do it. Thanks for your call today, Jeff. God bless you, sir.

Eight hundred five two five seven thousand is the number to call. Let's head to Tampa. Hi, Lisa. Go right ahead. Hello. Turn turn down your phone for me, Lisa, and then you can go ahead with your question or not your phone, but your radio. Yes, I did.

Very good. Can you hear me? Yes, ma'am. Can you hear me? Yes, ma'am. Go right ahead.

Are you there? Yes, ma'am. Let's do this. I'm going to put you on hold and we'll have our team see if we can get you back on the line. In the meantime, we'll head to Indianapolis. Go ahead, James.

Hi, Rob. I'm interested in buying a franchise. I've already gone through the process to get one awarded and I've talked to a couple options for funding.

And I wanted to get your advice on maybe either using like the Rob's or like an unsecured business loan. Just I don't know. What do you what do you think about that? Yeah. I mean, the first option is usually directly with the prospective franchise or have you talked to them about any options they have for financing? Yeah, that's a good question.

I haven't. I can certainly do that. Yeah. So each franchise, each franchise or financing agreement will differ, but some will offer to take on as much as 75 percent of the debt burden from the new franchise owner. They may even involve deferred payments. I mean, they have a vested interest in you being successful as long as you meet their requirements from an asset standpoint. But I would certainly start there just to see if they have a financing program beyond that.

You'd probably want to look at a commercial bank loan or an SBA loan or an alternative lender or something like that. As mine, you know, your next options. OK. I didn't know if you were like familiar with like the Rob's process where they roll over your retirement like a new C corp and then you basically take like what would be somebody investing in a 401K and using that to fund it.

Yeah. So are you talking about through a self-directed IRA? No, like they take your money from your. So it just counts as like a rollover from like a traditional, you know, either 401K or IRA, I think. And you start a C corp that is eligible to get, you know, invested in by a 401K.

And so you take your money, roll it over into your business and then take your business money from that investment to, you know, basically have the capital to run the business and even like pay back or pay into the franchise. Interesting. It's a fascinating concept.

I can't tell you that I'm familiar with that, James. So I certainly wouldn't want to weigh in on it, but you certainly could check that out. But I would, as I mentioned, also check with your franchisor just to see what options they have as a part of your due diligence.

But as to this other strategy, you may want to connect with a certified kingdom adviser, somebody who works with small business owners and understands perhaps these additional alternative strategies like the one you're describing. Unfortunately, I wouldn't be able to weigh in on that one. What is the franchise, if you don't mind me asking? And if you don't want to name the specific one, just maybe what industry you're in.

It's business coaching. Okay. Yeah. Nice. Very good. Well, hey, all the best to you. Sounds exciting. And let us know how it turns out. We appreciate you calling today to Tampa, Florida. Lisa, it sounds like you're back with us. Go ahead, ma'am.

This is a story. I have a 401k that I received from a settlement, from a divorce, right? And that money has stayed in that original account, but I do not work for a company, only my ex-husband, so I'm not putting any contributions. It was up to 50-something thousand dollars, and now it's going down to 47.

So I don't want to continue losing. Then I have a pension from New York that is about $894 monthly, and I work, so my salary is like $41,000. I have a car note that it was 72 months.

Probably I have two and a half more years to go. I want to know where to roll over that 401k as a result of a divorce settlement. I have a 401k with my job, but I don't think I can roll over that great amount. I'm not sure.

And I want to know how to better use that pension money and how to finish paying this car quickly, because I'm 61 years old, and even if I envision to retire at 62, with the car payment, I don't think I can do it. Yeah. All right.

Well, with that 401k, is there a qualified domestic relations order that informs the plan administrator on how to give you your share of that 401k? I already have total authority. It's that I have not moved it to wherever I want to, because I don't trust and don't know where to. Okay. Very good. What is the portion that you received? About how much?

It was like $55,000, but it went down to in the last two years, 47. So that to me, that's a great, I mean, they say that it will come up again. But still, I'm not making contribution. It's just sitting there and losing money. Sure. Well, keep in mind, it just happened to be this period where we're going through a very difficult stock market just because of the high inflation and the stock, the interest rates rising dramatically. So I would contact our friends at soundmindinvesting.org. You're probably below the minimums for an advisor to work with you.

But at soundmindinvesting.org, they have a way that they can help you get that IRA opened at a new institution like a discount brokerage, roll the 401k in and then help you select some mutual funds. That would be a great option. Unfortunately, I'm out of time and so we won't be able to tackle the car or the pension, but feel free to call back tomorrow.

I'd love to pick up the conversation. God bless you, Lisa. Faith and Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and Faith 5. Thank you to Amy, Tahira, Lynn and Jim. Couldn't do it without them. We'll see you tomorrow. God bless you. Bye bye.