Welcome to the ENT!
Jeff Krommendyk and Karl Frank discuss the emotional and practical sides of helping an adulting child move out of the house. Speaking from experience, the dads discuss
How do you help a young adult move into an apartment when he is not motivated to go to a traditional four-year college? And also, helping a young adult make the leap to a college dorm, what are some practical tips? What do you do about insurance, including property and auto insurance? What about the young adult who leaves college and gets a place of their own? Jeff and Karl are looking forward to both being empty nesters, with successful young adult children. This brief podcast may help propel your family to the next stage!
As a quick reminder, the Expert Network Team provides free consultations. We would love the opportunity to be of service to you or someone you care about. Just scroll the liner notes to contact one of our experts or today’s guest. And please share this podcast with anyone who you think might find it interesting.
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Welcome to the expert Network team podcast.
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I'm Carl Frank with a night wealth management and today we have a special conversation with Jeff Chrome and Jake. Both of us are just two dads trying to help our kids.
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Adults, and I think you'll find our conversation helpful, full of some practical.
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As well as.
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Some emotional advice from Jeff, who's already successfully launched both of his children and for me, Boy, I'm just looking forward to being an empty nester. We'll talk about what do you need to do financially for your kids? What about insurance?
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Including some common mistakes that we make about car insurance, property insurance, health insurance and others.
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And then how do you help a kid now, a young adult, leave college and get a place of?
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Their.
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Own what steps can you give them to help them stand on their own 2 feet and be proud?
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Always. It's good to have an expert on your side.
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Welcome listeners to your expert team.
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Network podcast coming to you from and I financial here located in Englewood, Co. My name is Jeff Chrome and Ike.
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I'm one of your experts on this amazing team with one digital insurance and I've got Carl Frank here with me today. Principal founder, well actually successor of A and I financial. He and his wife Stacy do a great job here at A&I financial managing.
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That's right.
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Wealth for.
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Business owners and and also individuals and families. So Carl.
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Welcome. Thanks, Jeff. It's great to see you, man and.
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Nate couldn't make.
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That's right. Nate is on the road somewhere between here and.
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Grand Junction, I guess but.
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See, we just tried to call him and.
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It didn't work, no.
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Yeah, they're hoping that.
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Not a good idea, but.
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That was.
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It no doubt so anyway, but it's good.
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Isn't that great?
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Yet.
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To be here and.
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Yeah, we're kind of coming.
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Into the month of August.
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Not sure when this will hit, hopefully soon, but Carl and I were just kind of reminiscing and talking a little bit about.
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To launching our kids off to college. Yeah. Yeah. Carl, you've got a freshman going to see you this this fall.
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What a journey, man.
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How you feeling?
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I'll be an empty nester. I can't.
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Wait.
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I'm really excited about it, you know? I mean, we talk about, we talk about it as a family all the time and he's super excited.
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Ready to get out of the house? And we're super excited to have him out of the house as well, and it's all it's all. It's all really, you know, you, I I think we'll have some regret.
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Well.
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Yeah, I think so. Sure. Not there yet, no.
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No, right now it's probably time for him to go. Yeah, if I. I mean, just speaking from experience.
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It's funny.
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Right, you've already done this so.
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You've done it twice. Yeah. And yeah, our our families are, are you? They're really cool. Like, we've got kids kind of in the same.
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Age range and so we've both kind of successfully.
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Like adulted? Yeah, one each right. So we've been through four years in your case, and only three years of college for. Yeah, but they are both living independently downtown Denver and like jobs and so on and so forth. So to our listeners who are listening today.
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Yeah, that's great.
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UM.
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That are maybe younger.
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Still.
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Have you know some young kids in in the house? It it works like they do. Adult. Like they grow up. So that's pretty cool. But yeah, right now we.
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It can, yeah.
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Are both the.
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Carl and I trying to get our younger kids up and going. So my.
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My my youngest son just went to University of Wyoming last year for his freshman year, so we were in year stage, kind of packing boxes and figuring out stuff. And how are we going to get there and how many cars we need to take and when are we going to do this?
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No.
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Right.
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You're.
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And. And who's his roommate? And all this kind of stuff? I mean, there's just so many questions, obviously for freshmen going on to campuses, which are are happening in droves right now, coming into August and September. So yeah. And then they come back for the summer. That's a whole nother dynamic, which we just dealt with.
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Because you.
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But I would agree with the open or.
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Empty nesting is is awesome.
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And certainly great to look forward to, but we do miss those kids too.
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Right. And I think we'll miss them eventually and that's it's going to be good. It's going to be good, but we're we're also nervous like any parent would be about doing it. And so it just seems like I wanna ask you a bunch of advice about how you did it with your oldest. And and I'll tell you, get lucky as my biggest advice.
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I mean, just did it like she just watched and did it all and, you know, and. And she's super independent and going.
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Going like gangbusters, right?
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Yeah. Down there. Yeah, that's right. Those first borns just seem to like go.
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Right. Yeah, yeah.
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Is your son the second one? Is he competitive with the older one?
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You know, they're they're far enough away SO44 year difference, which I think is the same for for year 2.
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And.
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So I think they did certainly have some competitive nature to their relationship and I think still do in some respects, but they've really become good friends. Yeah, which is, which is neat. And that's kind of part of our story here going into the fall semester, our youngest son is going to attend a junior college.
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So.
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Here in Denver and. But he's gonna live with his oldest or his his older brother in downtown. So he's kind of got the best of both worlds. Still trying to figure out his college track. But yet.
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Still living out of our home? Starting here in in September and.
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I think that's.
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A big part of college, right? I mean, it's like, yeah, we do hope that our kids settle in on a a, a degree that, you know, fits them and.
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That they that they.
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Gain a passion for and an education.
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You know.
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Well.
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Coming in, you know, out of four years is is great. I think that should be what we're paying for. But I think the reality is, is this four years is great just to grow kids up as well. And so we're excited that our youngest son is going to be moving in with his older brother and they can kind of figure out life together and continue to to just grow them up and mature him but.
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That. That's the beautiful thing about college. It's it's an education, but it's also.
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A lesson in life as well. So that's.
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To make mistakes.
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Yeah, I think it is.
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Yeah, I'm so glad that he found a place to live that isn't with you while he's going to the junior college.
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Yeah, I think.
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It's it's a neat combination. I mean it could create some tension at the house, you know, and now he's a great kid. We love having him around. But, you know, he doesn't want to live there.
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There, I mean, you know, he wants to go and have some independence. And so this worked out pretty well. So we're getting ready to pack up his room again and get him moved into an apartment here in the next couple of weeks. So that's exciting.
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No.
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Yes.
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No, you're gonna help him.
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Well, we probably won't, but we're now we're we're going to be probably on vacation. That's the time. But yeah, you'll figure it out. But yeah. Yeah, buying pots and pans for them and making sure that he gets a.
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Great.
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Good start and they can have money. Yeah, right. But yeah, you know, it's a different thing to ask.
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Load up the truck and unload it for you. I'm I. I'm ready for those two to.
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Yeah.
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Exactly. Now they can figure.
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It out that I've talked to my clients about, you know, because the community colleges or junior colleges, just less expensive schools.
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Especially in our state, there are certain rules where they have to transfer those credits to the state schools so you can get your first couple of years, save yourselves a ton of money and then transfer to the state school. What you tend to give up is what your kid doesn't have to give up, and that's the living on campus experience. And that's one of the things that I talk to people about.
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Yes.
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Often, and I and I've learned from my clients who have also put their kids through school, that if they go to one of these schools for the first two years and mom and Dad saves money, but a kid just saves money. Right? Right. Because sometimes the kid is exposed to a certain amount of budget that they can spend. And if they don't spend it here, they have more.
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There, that's a great way to do it, but they can lose out on that growing up and living on their own. And so finding a way to give the kid an apartment or finding a way to help them live on their own and learn how to do the things like get the laundry done, yeah, get the dishes done and find the food and eat the food and then clean up after the mess and get yourself to the school and setting up a schedule and all the things that we need to do to be a grown up in America.
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Yeah.
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Is a I mean that's the.
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One of the best things about the four years of of being in college.
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Absolutely. And you know, being a a client of yours, Carl, for many, many years, you know we've we've done some planning around the the the 520.
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Nine plans and.
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You know, one of our big questions that I didn't think the discussion would go here today, but we might as well run with it is, hey, what if what if you do have one of those, you know, junior college?
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Kids that you know, maybe does want to live out of the house during those first two years of of his four year venture, you know, are those living expenses, are they, do they qualify as expenses on that 429 or 529 and?
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Yes, he's like.
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And we asked you that question a month ago and you did some research on it and we took your advice. And I think without getting into too many weeds.
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Yeah, absolutely. Peaceful time. Yeah. And you got to have an average.
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Hello.
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12 hours. Is that correct?
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12 hours as long as it's a full time student, and as long as the cost for the apartment is reasonable and the way you can check that is what the school says on a Google search is the average price for housing as long as it's within that range all of.
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OK.
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It all right.
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And you're rolling with it.
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You.
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Yeah, that's great. That's exciting.
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Because the way you'll be audited if you are and most people are never.
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About it is they're gonna do exactly that. They're gonna see how much was pulled out, and then they're gonna see what the cost is of where they're going. And they're gonna compare it to whatever the Internet said. What their school reported was the average cost of living. And if it's all within range, you're totally clear.
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Yes.
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Uh.
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Fantastic. Well, thanks for clearing that up. So yeah, it's.
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Cool.
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Kind of exciting.
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It is.
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Yeah.
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So #2 is going to see you. You've had two go there. And of course you're see you along.
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Yeah.
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Yeah, so it's.
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My wife. So yeah, super excited to have another one in in Boulder and on campus and.
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It's so.
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And we're huge, huge fans of coach.
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Yeah, I love the box. Glad to see them coming back.
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Did you get season tickets this year?
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No, we couldn't get him. It's so hard to get really hard to get Henry at the kid. Barely got into the auction, so they had an option even for the students to try and get football tickets. And one of his friends didn't get them. So.
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Now.
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Good.
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Yes.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's hard to get tickets to those. Those games right now.
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Let's go to a.
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Some time at least, you'll love that, that'd.
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Be great but.
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Yeah. So as you and Stacy think about this, what are some of the, yeah, any concerns that you have coming up here as you transition into empty nesting?
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Yeah.
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Really good question, because there's two sides to this, right? The kid has to transition and so.
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Do the parents.
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Actually, yeah. So I think.
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You know, and maybe we're more traditional, I don't know, but but maybe my wife is having a little bit more worries than I am about the empty nesting. Yeah, that's changing. More recently, I think, you know the circumstances of changing are just a little bit more excited now to be empty nesters and be a couple again. I mean, hey, here we are, right. We've got a lot more money than we had when we were 20.
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Before we had kids. Yeah. And we're still in good health.
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The world is our oyster. It's an exciting time, like we can afford to do things. Exactly. Let's go do.
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Yeah.
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Yeah.
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It and it's exciting and that's that's the golden years kind of not that you're completely there. I mean, kids are going to boomerang back every once in a while, but to have that flexibility, you do have a dog. I want you to remind you that you're going to take care of that.
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Right.
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What happened?
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But yeah, just to be able to.
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Block and leave and and have some flexibility around that and.
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It's a big deal.
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But yeah, we we were facing that a year ago being empty nests and there was some anxiety around it. I think for sure. But you know, I think we.
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We're really we're pretty intentional about our our marriage, you know, prior to being empty nested. So we we knew that we still liked each other and enjoyed spending time together. We also only had two kids, right. So I think about these families that are might be listening to us today.
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Yeah.
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That have three or four, maybe even more, where you know, you were like two ships passing in the night for 25 or 30 years. Right. And and and just great partners with regards to raising kids and so on and so forth. But then empty nest comes in and now you got to get to know.
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OK.
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Yeah.
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Each other again for the.
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I know it's.
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First time and you know how many years? So I know there's some pressures there as well. I I I think it may not be the case for you and I having younger you know 2 two kids and we did a lot as families right? I mean it's like we skied together as families and we.
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You know, kind of, you know, had a life that was kind of all together, you know, as opposed to all going in different directions. But yeah, it's a tricky season for sure. Definitely be thinking about you guys. And we're we're excited to go around to here after Britt's been home for the summer.
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Right, we're lucky.
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No kidding.
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Ready.
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But yeah, he's he's done great and he's been really enjoyable to have.
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Ah, that's super exciting. It's fun to watch them.
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Yeah.
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They're changing at such a quick pace, right? Their lives every month, it seems like a year or two worth of change could happen. It just grows so quickly and they're changing so fast. And then I remember, I mean, I still remember being that edge and and going across the country to go to school for my freshman.
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Yeah.
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Sure. Yeah.
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Here and I thought it was such a grown up and such an idiot, right? I knew so little and was so disorganized. And now I look back at my son and he knows so little and he's so disorganized. Yeah. And it's the same thing, he thinks.
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He knows everything.
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So it's just a great, you know, and I came out of it growing up a lot and and probably being a lot.
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More humble by the time.
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Yeah, it's been year and he will too, and it's just a great opportunity to to screw up and be safe.
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And and and for parents. I'm, you know, maybe I'm doing the same mistake now, right? I look at it and I say, well, maybe I'm, you know, too confident and too arrogant and maybe I'm gonna be humbled here in the real. The real new feature. Maybe I miss my kids so much because they spend so much time with them. Right. It's been 24 years of raising kids. You know, that's a long time.
00:15:21
Now.
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Yeah. Whoa, who are we? Right. Yeah. Yeah, we'll see how that. How that goes. It sounds like you guys a year into it, though, are still in, in great shape. Yeah.
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We're doing doing good, and again, parenting doesn't end right. You're just shifting gears a little bit and.
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And.
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My rules will will.
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Will change as as the kids continue to get older and transition to college and then out of.
00:15:49
College. I got, like, just a practical question for you. So you guys just helped my daughter. The older one buy a car. She bought a car and then got insurance. And you guys helped her get the right amount of insurance for her, right. And it's. And she was so shocked by how expensive.
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Insurance this holy cow and for a.
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Young person I.
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Mean expensive for parents, but for a young person it.
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Really is expensive.
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When, and and so she made the move right under her own policy, and she's paying for herself. And we're just proud. Really cool, isn't it? When when do they have to make the move?
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Ours did that too. Yeah, yeah.
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Gosh, yeah. I just had a similar question from a client that asked me the same question yesterday. Yeah, it's really a good question and I.
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I would say that this.
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Is might be one of the.
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Areas that I would I would say most people make assumptions about and those assumptions are are incorrect and they only find out the hard way oftentimes. But insurance policies are very specific with regards to who and insured is on the policy.
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Yeah.
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Or who who an insured can be.
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And it has a lot to do with a few qualifiers as our kids age and, you know, grow up, provided they're in college, but maybe living on campus somewhere, but technically still under your roof and in school.
00:17:14
Yeah.
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Your your kids are insured until they're age 26. Yeah. So 26 is typically the.
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And then.
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26.
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The age in which Rona, yeah, they have to, yeah.
00:17:29
They do. They're in vet school or dental school or law school or grad school or.
00:17:33
That that can happen. But yeah, typically most policies are going to have an age limit and then some.
00:17:41
Requirements with regards to being in school or or living in the home for you know, a portion of that that year. Yeah. But for those kids like ours that you know, once you're four years of college and, you know, living on their own got their job.
00:17:58
Then it's really time to begin to do exactly what you guys have done, what we've done. But the key to that is to make sure that the vehicle they do take with them is title to them and on so you have to have an insurable interest in the vehicle that you insure.
00:18:18
And therefore we had to just transfer the title on our older.
00:18:24
Vehicle that he had in high school and and and then he could go ahead and insure it on his own policy. Sounds like your daughter went and bought a bought a car on her own and therefore titling it, you know, went into her name.
00:18:37
Boy oh.
00:18:43
And and as a result, she ensured it.
00:18:45
So it is a.
00:18:46
Little bit of a tricky season that transition and I would just encourage our.
00:18:50
Listeners to reach out to their insurance agent to ask those questions because it's a really, really good.
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Question. Yeah, you don't wanna.
00:18:56
Screw that up, no?
00:18:57
You really don't. Is there anything else that a young person starting out life should be worried about or any sort of find? You know, insurance side of things that that we should help help. These just recently graduated kids start to think about.
00:19:10
I I I like the topic that we're on. You know, as we transition kids into college, maybe on campuses, you know, out of our homes and then they transition on further than that just you know be aware that your your standard home insurance policy is going to extend coverage onto campus.
00:19:30
Uh. Typically. Uh uh. So if you know your son or daughter is transitioning into a a dorm there on campus, you, you know, you could be rest assured that they're possessions that they take with them should be covered there as if they're covered here.
00:19:51
At at the.
00:19:52
Home, where we do run into some problems is that second year the kid wants to go and rent A.
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House.
00:19:58
Right. Well, now that landlord's going to require an actual tenants policy or renters policy and a lot of times it's with three or four other kids. Now the question is, well, whose name do we put the insurance policy in?
00:20:10
So on and so forth.
00:20:13
We we have had some success in finding companies to actually ensure several need insurance policies like that. So those renters policies would cover their contents while it's in that rental home and then also provide.
00:20:18
OK.
00:20:27
Them with some liability which the landlords really most you know, interested in want to make sure that there's liability coverage for these kids in the event there's any bodily injury or.
00:20:32
Yeah.
00:20:38
Damage as a result of of renting the home. So that's those are some typical situations we see while the kids are in college as they transition out then I think you know a lot of the same rules apply. We as parents need to make sure that we transition their vehicles into their names and have them insure their vehicles.
00:21:00
Personally, and also make sure they have a renters policy or if they buy a home, you know, obviously they're going to, they're going to go ahead and get those coverages.
00:21:10
On their own. So.
00:21:11
Yeah, it's kind of neat. It's kind.
00:21:12
Of a.
00:21:12
Part of of growing up and at our agency, we we love to even have meetings with those kids to talk to them about the right coverages and how much coverage is enough and how the coverages work and this is how you go about buying insurance and so on and so forth. So insurance one-on-one is something we love to do and.
00:21:32
We'll spend time with each of those kids when they're transitioning into their own policies.
00:21:36
Well this.
00:21:37
Right. So the choir, you do do that, you know, you did that, not you personally, but young woman in your office did that with Morgan and you learned a lot and and chose that policy over whatever else she had originally gotten at the dealer just to get the.
00:21:44
Yeah.
00:21:51
Car off the lot.
00:21:54
One of the things you can do on your iPhone, I guess, is just get insurance at the dealer.
00:21:58
The dealer is really good.
00:21:58
At.
00:21:59
Right, the buttons to click so the salesperson get his Commission.
00:22:00
Yeah, just get it. Yeah. Get it out. Get it up.
00:22:04
A lot correct, a lot $12.00 and.
00:22:05
$0.50 a day or.
00:22:06
Exactly. Yeah, Coster, but not very much. Yeah. And then she called you guys up and and you guys slowed down and explained to her all the different light items on that page. And that's pretty complicated stuff, you know.
00:22:17
That's true.
00:22:17
So that's really good. And then you come into our office and trained my parade planners my right out of college financial planners who are needing to get their 6000 hours of work study and one of the things they need to.
00:22:27
Learn is is how, yeah.
00:22:29
Works. Yeah, you know.
00:22:30
That's that's great. I always have loved that approach with A and I, you know, just really take in a.
00:22:37
Uh.
00:22:37
Organic and you know, you know full range scope of all of our financial needs, whether it's risk management or.
00:22:45
For portfolio growth, that mean that's that's just really an important thing to to, you know, teach your young advisors. They're they're advising people on risk management. And so yeah, it's it's a pleasure to do.
00:23:01
That absolutely, yeah, yeah.
00:23:02
Well.
00:23:03
Well, this is a fun.
00:23:04
Conversation. It was kind of fun. I I just yeah. Wish all of our parents that are sending kids off, maybe for the first time or maybe this is your last one and you're looking at some, you know, empty nesting.
00:23:16
In months coming up here, we wish you well. And yeah, if you have any other questions on it, we're just two dads trying to figure it out. And yeah, yeah, we'd love to love to hear from you. So yeah, make it a great day. Thanks for listening. And we'll catch you next time.
00:23:30
I'm Carl Frank today and wealth management and today we have a special conversation with Jeff Kondake. Both of us are just two dads trying to help our kids adult.
00:23:39
And I think you'll find our conversation helpful, full of some practical as well as some emotional advice from Jeff, who's already successfully launched both of his children. And for me, boy, I'm just looking forward to being an empty nester. We'll talk about what do you need to do financially for your kids? What about insurance?
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Including some common mistakes that we make about car insurance, property insurance, health insurance and others. And then how do you help a kid now, a young adult?
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Leave college and get a place of their own. What steps can you give them to help them stand on their own 2 feet and be proud?
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As always, it's good to have an expert on your side.