New Year, New Money Mindset
by SGL Financial
Our 2 Cents – Episode #198
New Year, New Money Mindset
We are back after a brief break with another great episode of Our 2 Cents! On today’s episode, Steve and Gabriel discuss the latest Fed rate cut and the newly passed Social Security benefits bill. Then, they dive into how to shift your money attitude for a prosperous New Year. Listen in now using a link below!
- Another Fed Cut:
- Learn how the Federal Reserve’s third consecutive 25-basis-point rate cut has fueled speculation about future economic prospects and the potential impact on money market accounts.
- Social Security Fairness Act:
- Identify which Americans will receive a substantial increase in Social Security benefits due to the recently enacted bipartisan legislation.
- Determine which provisions within the Social Security system are being removed through this new law.
- New Year’s Financial Resolutions:
- Examine your past money mindset and discover how applying new financial resolutions can transform your 2025.
Request Your Free Consultation Today
847.499.3330
Podcast Transcript
Announcer: You’re listening to Our 2 Cents with the team from SGL Financial, building wealth for life. Steve Lewit is the President of SGL Financial, and Gabriel Lewit is the CEO. They’re here to discuss all the latest in financial news, trends, strategies, and more.
Gabriel Lewit: Welcome back to Our 2 Cents, everybody. We are back from a couple weeks off here on, really, two things, a holiday break, and then Steve Lewit, the other penny here, he got sick, so he ruined our last final plan for the old year. But he’s back in action now. He’s feeling much better.
Steve Lewit: I’m back in action and feeling great, but it was a rough two weeks, I want to tell you. I had this thing; I think there’s a respiratory thing running around and I think I got it. It was like staring at the ceiling for a week. It was like, this is the end of life.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, yeah. So, he didn’t sound very good. And as a result, we apologize, but we couldn’t come to you live here from our studio because it was just me and I didn’t think you just wanted to hear me, me alone talk for 35 minutes.
Steve Lewit: And I would’ve been half alive.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes, yes, yes. So, first and foremost, of course, it’s a new year. So, we are, from all of us here at SGL Financial, Steve and I in particular, wishing you a very happy, wonderful 2025 year ahead. We hope it’s the best year ever for you and your family.
Steve Lewit: Yes. Yep, yep.
Gabriel Lewit: And our job, of course, is to help you figure out how to maximize and increase the value of your wealth, how to give you better security, peace of mind, more income if you’re retired.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and how to enjoy it.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: Because wealth isn’t anything unless you enjoy it.
Gabriel Lewit: Absolutely. So, yeah, we’re excited to kick things off. Of course, with the new year, we’re probably not going to surprise you with our focus today on some new year resolutions when it comes to your money, some new year ideas, thoughts, mindset shifts. But before we do that, there’s a couple of key updates here that we thought we would update you with, with some news that has occurred over the last couple of weeks. So, first thing first, if you hadn’t noticed or heard, the Fed in their late December meeting did reduce interest rates by another quarter point.
Steve Lewit: Quarter point, yep.
Gabriel Lewit: And they also provided some additional guidance that they believe in 2025 there will be fewer rate cuts than they had originally predicted. Now, Mr. Lewit is the economist in the room. I’m a light economist.
Steve Lewit: Yes, I am the economist.
Gabriel Lewit: So, what does that mean? If they revised their projections to have a little bit, a change forecast of fewer rate reductions in 2025 than they originally predicted?
Steve Lewit: So, a lot of people like me look at that as a signal from the Fed saying, “We’re not as confident that we got inflation in hand, or that the economy is going to work as well as we thought, so we’re going to play it a little bit conservative.” I’m actually surprised they lowered them at all. So, it’s kind of a message that gets interpreted in the stock market. You can see the stock market right now is a little soft. We’ve had some downtime. Part of that is the way the Fed is looking at the future and people think, “Well, maybe the Fed knows something that we don’t know that they’re not telling us, and that’s why they only lowered it a quarter of a point.”
Gabriel Lewit: Yep.
Steve Lewit: Now, that’s not going to affect, if you have bills or interest rates on your credit cards, it’s going to have a marginal effect because it’s a very small rate decrease. But it is a rate decrease and that is a positive sign, but not nearly as positive as that a lot of people thought it would be.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. Yeah, and I think there’s an interesting quote here from Greg McBride in this article that we are referencing here, a chief financial analyst at bankrate.com, which I really thought was a great analogy here. Interest rates took the elevator going up in 2022 and 2023, but are taking the stairs-
Steve Lewit: Going down.
Gabriel Lewit: … coming down.
Steve Lewit: I love it. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. It’s like slow-going here.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. And with 9 in 10 out of Americans thinking inflation is still a problem, maybe the Fed is still onto something, they’re not cutting rates too quickly because that could of course come back to haunt them if they did. So, they’re taking a little bit more of a slow and cautious route now.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Remember, when you lower interest rates, it’s like putting fuel on the fire of the economy.
Gabriel Lewit: It helps, yes.
Steve Lewit: It really helps. But if you over fuel it, then you get inflation back.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Now, a lot of times, people think that with the short-term Fed rate going down, that things like mortgages should immediately come down in rates as well, are finding it a little bit frustrating that rates on mortgages are actually holding steady or even increasing.
Steve Lewit: They actually went up a little bit.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay? And Mr. Lewit, can you explain that a little bit, why are mortgage rates going up even though short-term Fed rates are coming down?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So, banks are notoriously conservative, and they worry, and they worry, okay, will people be able to pay these loans back and should we be maybe a little bit more restrictive in lending money and who we lend it to? And if we’re going to lend money, we want to get a better return because we think we’re taking more risk in the housing market.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, and I think people forget that the mortgage environment, the long-term interest rate environment, this is a market like many other markets, and there are other factors at play other than just what the Fed thinks and does, and that can have an impact as well. For example, basically, overall, there’s rate cut expectations and maybe people then have a higher demand for long-term bond yields, and that could increase prices on those long-term bond yields, as big institutions barter back and forth for who’s going to buy what and at a current market rate.
Steve Lewit: That’s right.
Gabriel Lewit: And so, I think that’s frustrating for people. I do think over time, bit by bit, as the stair steps its way down for interest rate cuts, you should start to see, slowly, mortgage rates coming back down as well.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, they should. They usually follow, sometimes there’s a lag. Sometimes… They’re never ahead of the Fed rate, but sometimes there’s a lag and a lot depends on the housing market itself. And the data that the mortgage companies, the banks get different data than the Fed gets, so we don’t really know what they’re looking at or what the rationale is. And it is counterintuitive. It’s like, hey, interest rates are going down, mortgage rates are going up. Now, that doesn’t make any sense.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, it doesn’t.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep, yep.
Steve Lewit: You’re exactly right.
Gabriel Lewit: Now, things that are changing a little bit more prominently that you probably have noticed are your short-term savings accounts, your high-yield money market accounts. Those, I don’t know exactly when, six, seven months ago were probably hovering around 5%?
Steve Lewit: Yep.
Gabriel Lewit: Many are now around 4%.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and that reacted really quickly to the drop in interest rates.
Gabriel Lewit: And bit by bit, this is a little bit of what we were telegraphing months ago if you are a regular listener to the podcast. It’s funny because I said on a show back then, if you have interest in longer-term CDs, three years, five years, or MIGAs, which is an annuity version of a CD basically, lock those in now because rates are going to come down. And I have people coming to me now saying, “Gabe, how come I can’t get 5% anymore-
Steve Lewit: Well, yes.
Gabriel Lewit: … on my savings accounts and the CDs aren’t paying anymore?” And it’s exactly for that reason. And you still have another cycle here in the sense that if rates are continuing to be projected to go down here in 2025, once again, now would be a better time to put money into fixed rates versus later this year when those are going to be very, very likely lower.
Steve Lewit: Let’s put it this way, Gabriel, they’re not going to get better.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah.
Steve Lewit: And bank rates say that the rates may come down this year, but very slowly. But every time they come down, your cash is going to earn less interest in a savings account or an online savings account, then you have to start looking at other ways of earning.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah.
Steve Lewit: But to your point, if you could buy a five-year, let’s say MIGA at let’s say 5%, you think?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, five, five and a quarter.
Steve Lewit: Five and a quarter percent, and you can lock in five years five and a quarter percent, well, that’s a pretty good return for a guaranteed return.
Gabriel Lewit: It is. It is. Yes.
Steve Lewit: Absolutely.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So, keep that in mind. That’s the update in the interest rate environment, a little bit of an update on the inflation environment. What’s going to happen this year with Mr. Trump taking office very shortly here with tariffs and the economy? Those are all things we’re going to monitor and of course report on back to you as soon as those things occur.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, it should be. Trump has a lot of ideas. I’m not getting into politics. Some I agree with, some I don’t. But from an economy point of view, everybody’s feeling big money, AI, crypto, everyone’s feeling very positive about the future economy. I think we’ll back off on the tariffs, but we’ll see. As you said, it’s an ongoing game and our job is stay on top of it and let you all know what we’re thinking and what the best thing to do with your money.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep, yep, yep, and yep.
Steve Lewit: And yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. The next big piece of news, President Biden, many of you have probably heard about this, signed a bill over the weekend improving social security benefits, and basically he signed the, the title of it is called the Social Security Fairness Act, which eliminated two very unpopular or deeply unpopular provisions that prior to this could have restricted or removed payments and benefit amounts for a lot of people. Okay? So, in particular, what was eliminated? There was two, the two older provisions were called the Windfall Elimination Provision, or WEP, and the other was called the Government Pension Offset, called GPO.
Steve Lewit: And both very complicated.
Gabriel Lewit: The WEP basically said if you had a prior job or career, let’s say you paid into social security and you would otherwise have been entitled to social security benefits, but you then transitioned to what was called a non-covered pension, which was a pension provided by a state or government where you didn’t pay into social security, that would reduce the amount of money that you could have received from social security when you started your government or state pension.
Steve Lewit: In other words, they’re penalizing what you saved.
Gabriel Lewit: They were.
Steve Lewit: They were.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: They were penalizing what you saved, even though you earned it and saved it. They were saying, “You know, because we’re giving you a pension, you can’t have that money.”
Gabriel Lewit: Correct. And very, I had many clients impacted by this that felt it was very unfair, and that is now gone.
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: The other one was what was called the Government Pension Offset. This was even more unpopular, but basically if you were a recipient, a spouse, let’s say your husband had a government pension, they passed away, you received his pension, it would then impact your social security benefits-
Steve Lewit: Exactly.
Gabriel Lewit: … as well. So, here you are. You lost a spouse; you lose a big chunk of money. Again, very unpopular for these. So, both of those are now officially signed out of law.
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay.
Steve Lewit: Which is terrific.
Gabriel Lewit: And at the moment, the Social Security Administration is working their way through it, but it should be automatically reflected if you are eligible for those benefits. But if you are wanting to be sure, I would certainly suggest that if you feel that those apply to you, to make note of that. And if you don’t see an increase in your benefits, you’ll give us a call, give the social security office a call and ask about it very specifically.
Steve Lewit: Absolutely. And I believe the social security inflation increase was 2.5%. Is that there? I think that’s accurate.
Gabriel Lewit: Correct. Yep, 2.5%.
Steve Lewit: Which is not a lot, but it is 2.5% better than zero.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, of course. And as y’all know, social security will continue to go up for cost of living adjustments over time. Some are larger, some are smaller. 2.5% is probably right somewhere in the middle.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Now, some of you might be saying to yourself, “Yeah, it’ll go up if we have social security,” and folks, I just want to tell you, we’re going to have social security, they’ll figure it out. I’m not at all worried. Now, if you’re 45 years old in 20 years, maybe you don’t get 100%, but folks, if you’re in retirement or you’re retiring now, don’t worry about your social security.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep, yep. All right. Well, those are some of the, I’d say the news to use, here for today.
Steve Lewit: The news to use. We didn’t talk at all about resolutions. The first thing-
Gabriel Lewit: I’m not done with the show. I was just saying-
Steve Lewit: … Well, I’m not done with the show either.
Gabriel Lewit: … resolutions aren’t news to use.
Steve Lewit: Well, they’re news.
Gabriel Lewit: That’s the news to use.
Steve Lewit: I was so good to you today because I was going to start the show by saying, “Hey, what were your resolutions?” And I stayed on topic.
Gabriel Lewit: Hey, that’s great.
Steve Lewit: That is great.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: That was one of my resolutions today, this year.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. I was surprised you didn’t say, “Gabe, why did you say y’all?” Because I said y’all earlier.
Steve Lewit: Well, I almost said something, but one of my resolutions is not to correct your English or your use of, choice of words.
Gabriel Lewit: Oh, that’s excellent.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, probably break that resolution.
Gabriel Lewit: I would imagine probably in the next 15 minutes.
Steve Lewit: In about 10 minutes.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. I don’t think you’ll be able to hold off for long.
Steve Lewit: Not long.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. I just thought I’d bring a little Texas to a cold day today by saying y’all.
Steve Lewit: Y’all. Yeah, nice and warm.
Gabriel Lewit: Exactly, exactly.
Steve Lewit: Y’all.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, I might be going to Texas in a couple of weeks with my son for a short weekend trip that I am about three years overdue. I’m taking him on a trip and he wanted to go to Austin, Texas. For whatever reason-
Steve Lewit: Austin?
Gabriel Lewit: … that’s what he picked.
Steve Lewit: Is that a soccer town?
Gabriel Lewit: No, I don’t think. Yeah, I think there is a team there, but he just, I don’t know where he-
Steve Lewit: He just wants to go to Austin, Texas.
Gabriel Lewit: … So, I’m practicing my y’alls.
Steve Lewit: He’s got good taste. Austin’s a great town.
Gabriel Lewit: There you go. So, hope y’all are doing well of course this cold day here in Chicago.
Steve Lewit: Yep.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. So, if you have questions of course on anything we covered here so far, give a call, 847-499-3330 or go to sglfinancial.com and click Contact Us. We are also approaching our 200th episode.
Steve Lewit: Can you imagine?
Gabriel Lewit: Okay, coming up soon.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: So, I think we are on 198 today.
Steve Lewit: Well, let’s ask Producers-
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: … Gabby and Katie
Gabriel Lewit: They are nodding their heads in confirmation.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Thumbs up from one of them.
Gabriel Lewit: So, yeah. So, you’ve got to tune in of course on the 200th episode. I don’t know what exactly we’re going to surprise you with, but we’ve got some ideas here that we’re kicking around.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, we do. And it should be a lot of fun and we’re so proud of achieving that, and we’re more proud that you guys are listening to it-
Gabriel Lewit: Yes.
Steve Lewit: … because our listenership grows, we get a lot of feedback from you. Mostly positive. You have suggestions, which is great, and we really enjoy it. So, thanks for your support and listenership.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, thank you. All right. So, new year, new you. New year, new me, whatever you want to say. How to change your money attitude is going to be, I think, one of those focuses for us, and it’s kind of a close cousin to resolutions. But we thought instead of doing resolutions per se, we’d focus a little bit more on mindset.
Steve Lewit: Well, did you know that Fidelity does a financial resolution study every year? And their study this year said the two things that people are most resolved about are saving more money and lowering their debt, which I know I don’t believe those are on your list, but that’s what Fidelity says most people are resolving.
Gabriel Lewit: Sure, those are great.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: And what we’re focusing on here in addition to some of those, I think, key little resolutions is I think some bigger picture mindset shifts, if you will, right? Things that we’ve identified last year and just in general over time we’ve recognized these, and I think they’re very meaningful when it comes to your planning.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So, what’s a money attitude? Give us some.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Well, I’ll pick the first one on our list here. The old you, as I would call it, is saving to a fault and not using it to enjoy your lifestyle.
Steve Lewit: I just met with clients that were telling me about their mom. This is just a great story because she’s 96 years old. When she got married, her husband said, “Look, you’re in charge of the money and saving and spending,” and today they have almost $4 million. And it’s like, how do they do that? And her attitude, she convinced the family that they were all poor. So, they didn’t know if they’re going to have food next week. So, she just kept saying, “Oh, we’re poor. We can’t afford anything. We can’t afford.” And she did that for years, and she finally, now she’s actually gifting some money now that she knows they’re okay. But the whole family was convinced that they were going to, they didn’t know if they were going to eat next week.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, that could be a little extreme.
Steve Lewit: It is.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay? If you’re stressing out your family members that you have no money but you’re sitting on millions, yeah, that would fall under maybe saving to a fault and not using it to even put food on the table.
Steve Lewit: And that’s an attitude.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, that’s an even more extreme version of that. But, yeah, it’s interesting. I just had a one of the first of the year review with a client yesterday, and in their plan tracker, it had mentioned essentially that they were going to take withdrawals from a certain account this year. They weren’t taking it from that account last year, but they were projected in our plan to take from it this year. And so, we had our meeting and I said, “Are you still intending to withdraw from this account?” And, “Oh, yeah, I don’t think we need the money this year. We can probably just, we can just skip that for this year and just leave the money in there.”
Steve Lewit: We don’t want to touch it.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. And I said, “Well, guys, just as a review, your plan’s in great shape, and we had mapped out you spending this because you mentioned you wanted to spend. And remember, if you don’t spend this money, all you’re going to do is just leave more money down the road.”
Steve Lewit: For your kids, yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: And they said, “Yeah, I know. Well, we’ll think about it. And, yeah, we’ll just leave it for now.” And so, I bring that up because I think it is such a mindset shift to go from this default, I’ve used this term on this podcast before, autopilot-
Steve Lewit: Of saving.
Gabriel Lewit: … of saving and not spending.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I can. I got to save, I got to save.
Gabriel Lewit: And that even when, addressed with that very head-on by a planner or advisor with data and numbers and plans, even then, it’s hard for people to change that habit. And it was interesting because I ran their plan for them. I said, “Look, if you do spend this money,” it was about five grand more from this account this year, “And you do that for the next 15 years, you’re going to leave about $80,000 less,” compounding interest and all that, “For your kids.”
Steve Lewit: And you’ll have a great time.
Gabriel Lewit: But you’re still leaving them $1.4 million.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Do you really need to leave them-
Steve Lewit: Do you really think they care?
Gabriel Lewit: … Do you really want to leave them 1.48 and forgo things for you that are important? “Yeah, I know.”
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I know. Makes sense. But…
Gabriel Lewit: So, our goal here on this podcast, since we’re not talking to you specifically about your plans, we can talk just a little bit more generally. Really question yourself, right, is my, look, it’s not in our best interest to have you spend your money. I mean, the more we manage, we charge on assets that we manage. We would make more money if I told you, “Don’t spend a nickel.” But we want see you have a top-notch quality of life, really enjoy yourself. Find the value that you’ve spent your entire life savings building up and reach and grab that value from your account and use it.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Right? To really enjoy yourselves.
Steve Lewit: Probably the biggest attitude shift is when people get into retirement. I mean, it’s a whole different world where now there’s haven’t got a paycheck. You folks all know this. When you don’t have a paycheck, it’s like, whoa, it’s a whole big change now. Your investments become your paycheck and that creates a lot of fear in people that they’re going to run out of money even though the data clearly shows there’s no way that’s possible.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep. Yeah.
Steve Lewit: I had another person in, has been a heck of a week, and she said, “I think I’m going to wind up as a bag lady.” I said, “There’s no way you could. We went through the numbers backwards, forward, sideways. I put in all really worst possible projections, there’s no way that you’re going to run out of money.” She says, “I don’t know, maybe something will go wrong.”
Gabriel Lewit: Well, look, one of the goals of having money is financial peace of mind. So, at the end of the day, if that’s really what it’s providing for you, that’s great. We just want you to question it and reassess it and see what’s really most valuable and meaningful for you.
Steve Lewit: So, what kind of resolution would you make if you are one of these people that are afraid to spend money?
Gabriel Lewit: Well, resolution wise, it would be if you feel that spending is important to you, make a plan to do so, right? Anything that’s written down that’s really defined, talk to your planner about it, talk to your advisor, us about it and we will say, “Go spend the money.”
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So, you know what you might do? You might say, “Once every three months I’m going to go out and buy something that I normally would never buy.”
Gabriel Lewit: Sure.
Steve Lewit: Just to break that attitude.
Gabriel Lewit: Or go on a trip that you want to go to.
Steve Lewit: Or go on a trip you’ve always wanted to go to. But do something.
Gabriel Lewit: Buy something for a family member that would be helpful for them or meaningful for them.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Lots of ideas. What’s fun is, if you really start thinking about how you could spend your money, you can start to think of a lot of ways.
Steve Lewit: There are a lot of ways to spend money.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, even not on material things on yourself.
Steve Lewit: Exactly. Yep.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. Well, that was our first mindset change for the year 2025. Obviously, I don’t want to spend too much time on this. There’s the opposite of that, which is, if you have recognized that you’re vastly overspending, you have to recognize that first, one of your mindset changes could be, I’m going to commit a little bit more to saving this year than last.
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: We really let the buckles out a little bit last year.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and that’s even harder than spending.
Gabriel Lewit: It’s harder.
Steve Lewit: Figuring out how to squeeze more money out of your budget every year is, you have to make a list of your expenses. Where my money going?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, tightening the belt never feels as good as loosening the belt.
Steve Lewit: It never feels… Yeah. So, that’s a much harder one. But if you don’t go through that exercise of figuring out where am I spending my money, what can I possibly cut here? Then you just keep doing the same thing over and over again, and that’s where you see your credit card debt going through the roof.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep, yep. Now, I didn’t go back to last year and see if we mentioned these same exact ones. I’d be interested to see if we did or didn’t. But one of the other ones, which is both money-related and not money-related, is trying to eliminate procrastination, which is a big mindset. Okay? I will do this now versus, oh, I will do this, I’ll do it in 2025, right? And if it’s important, really important, you can set that goal today. Be very purposeful. I will do this by February of this year. I will start going back to the gym. That’s one of mine. I wasted a lot of money on gym memberships last year.
Steve Lewit: I’ll call you on that.
Gabriel Lewit: I’ve already been once this year.
Steve Lewit: I’ll call you on that.
Gabriel Lewit: I’ve already been once. I’m going to go again this week again. So, progress has been made.
Steve Lewit: We’ll check in every week and find out how much progress is being made.
Gabriel Lewit: There you go. And last year-
Steve Lewit: Did you say I called you puffy at one point?
Gabriel Lewit: … You did, like three years ago.
Steve Lewit: I didn’t call you puffy.
Gabriel Lewit: Absolutely you did.
Steve Lewit: I did?
Gabriel Lewit: The producer Katie was here. She’s nodding in approval.
Steve Lewit: Really?
Gabriel Lewit: You said, “Gabe, you’re starting to look puffy.”
Steve Lewit: In front of everybody, I called-
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, in front of the whole world,
Steve Lewit: … my boy puffy?
Gabriel Lewit: Well-
Steve Lewit: That’s so sweet.
Gabriel Lewit: … We have since… I have since-
Steve Lewit: He’s no longer puffy, folks.
Gabriel Lewit: … Yeah, I’ve lost a good 20 pounds last year, actually. Yeah, I did last year. 20 pounds.
Steve Lewit: You did.
Gabriel Lewit: Sure enough. Thanks to you and your comments. Really brought me, oh-
Steve Lewit: Well, what the heck.
Gabriel Lewit: … up a notch there. All right. Okay. Other mindsets, right? Things that you think about a lot. I think, overall, I think this is a important one just as you’re planning, but what is the goal of your money? Okay? This is related to maybe the spending or saving, but if I were to take it a notch, really sit down with your spouse or your friends if you’re single and say, “Hey, I’ve got this money. I’ve saved up.” Especially if you’re in retirement and you say, “What do I really want this money to do for me?”
And if you’re not yet retired and you know you’re on track, okay, this is where the over-saving. But let’s say you know you’re on track, which is one of the benefits of a plan, then you can ask yourself, okay, I’ve got this extra 20 grand this year, or I’ve got my money. Say, what do I really want this to provide to me in my life? What does, legacy? Do I want to spend it? Do I want to be charitable? Do I want to… What is the purpose of each account in my plan? I think is a really valuable exercise.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and that’s like making your money purposeful. It’s not just having, okay, I have a million dollars or $600,000 or $6 million. It’s like, what is the, the question I think here, what is the purpose of that money?
Gabriel Lewit: Of each dollar?
Steve Lewit: Of each dollar? Is it just to have? Is part of those dollars to your kids? Is part of those dollars for travel? What is the purpose of it? If you ask yourself what the purpose of it, it doesn’t become just money. It becomes part of the meaning of your life, which is more important than the money. The money is fuel, as we always say, Gabriel. It’s fuel for your journey. But the journey is the purpose, not the money.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep, yep. So, again, that’s kind of a variant, but these are some of the big mindset shifts, right? How do I want to spend my money? Am I over-saving? Have I not saved enough? What’s the purpose of my money? Really harnessing these bigger picture questions about your finances, which are oftentimes things you don’t think about on your own. You’re just out there, okay, I got 15% last year. Cool. Or 20% last year, cool. Hopefully I have a good year this year.
Steve Lewit: Maybe I’ll have a good one this year too.
Gabriel Lewit: But really thinking about purpose behind things, I think, is of a very good idea.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Do you need 15%? Did you take too much risk? Why are you taking that risk? Is there a better way to plan it? Are there different products to explore? All of that becomes part of creating a really profound growth in wealth with taking the least amount of risk in doing that.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So, with a little bit of time we’ve got left here, I do want to see, know Mr. Lew, what are your resolutions for the year? Share. Let’s get our clients to get to know you a little bit.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: What’s on your mind? What’s your money mindset for the year? What is, share with us. New year, new Steve, or what’s going on in your head of yours?
Steve Lewit: I don’t know. I got a new day, a new Steve. A different part of me keeps popping out every day. It’s like, where’d the other one go? My resolution this year, Gabriel, is really to stay on, stay, how do I put it? Is to stick to a plan. In other words, really, I’ve planned out the year. I’ve tried to create my best year ever.
Gabriel Lewit: Was last year your best year ever?
Steve Lewit: Last year was my best. I try to make every year my best year ever. I try to make today… People will say to me, “Well, how are you doing today?” And I’ll say, “Better than yesterday.” And they’d say, “Well, what was the problem yesterday?” I say, “There was no problem, but I want every day to be better than yesterday.”
Gabriel Lewit: That’s a pretty hard one to achieve.
Steve Lewit: It is. It really is. But we are the creators of our future. I mean, think about it. We create-
Gabriel Lewit: Gun Master Steve. We need a fridge magnet for you.
Steve Lewit: … We need a fridge magnet. But it really is true. We create what was going to happen to us for the most part. And you can create these plans and I’ve created this plan, how I want to be in business, how I want to be in my, learn and play the piano, how much time do I want to put into that? I love painting, I love a lot of doing a lot of different things. My book is going to get published. So, all of that is part of that is just stick to your plan and work that plan, and achieve what you set out to achieve because that’s what it’s all about.
Gabriel Lewit: So, what is the plan?
Steve Lewit: No, I’m going to ask you-
Gabriel Lewit: Stick to your plan and have a plan, but what is the plan for you? Do you have anything you want to do this year?
Steve Lewit: … No, I’m getting my book published this year.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah?
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Didn’t you say that last year?
Steve Lewit: No, I said this year it will get published. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: You think so?
Steve Lewit: Will definitely. I have two trips planned to places I’ve never been this year.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay.
Steve Lewit: Okay?
Gabriel Lewit: Where is that? Mokena, Illinois and…
Steve Lewit: No, I’m not going to get into that. They’re strange places-
Gabriel Lewit: Okay.
Steve Lewit: … where people don’t go.
Gabriel Lewit: Strange places people don’t go. Okay, all right.
Steve Lewit: I go, but other people don’t go. I’ve got, for business, sometimes I’ll run behind on meetings and I’m not on time. I said, “No, you can’t do that anymore. We’re going to run my part of the business like clockwork.” So, I don’t want to get behind for the business and for my clients. So, those are the kinds of things that I spend time thinking about for this year. Now, what about you?
Gabriel Lewit: Me? Well…
Steve Lewit: You, me.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So, I would like to take a, I’ll start small, a tiny little bit more time off-
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: … this year. Okay? That’s one of the goals. I did start to lose some weight last year. I want to get back into better shape this year, and I’d like to do maybe one more additional family trip, possibly with the kiddos because my son, my older son, my only son I guess I should say, he’s going to be nine this year, halfway to college age. I’m like, how did that happen?
Steve Lewit: Amazing.
Gabriel Lewit: My gosh. And, yeah, they do grow up fast when you look back. And so, yeah, a little bit more family time would be great. And obviously, keep things chugging along well at the company front. Do a great job for you, our clients and our listeners, is always number one on my list to deliver great value as a company and a firm. And I think that would make it a great year.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. And even here, Gabriel, I know you’ve gotten more structured in your life here and more productive.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, growth is good and things are good, and I think 2025 is shaping up to be a great year. And we are hoping the very same for you and yours and your family.
Steve Lewit: Absolutely, absolutely.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. Well, if you have any questions for us, any pearls of wisdom that you’d like to share for us for your new year, we’d love to hear. You can email us info@sglfinancial.com or Steve or I personally, glewit or slewit@sglfinancial.com. We do love to hear your thoughts and ideas. Otherwise, if you have questions, want to set up a meeting, you can call us 847-499-3330 or go to sglfinancial.com.
Steve Lewit: Outstanding.
Gabriel Lewit: All right. Well, off to a wonderful 2025, and you have a great rest of your day.
Steve Lewit: Stay well, everybody.
Gabriel Lewit: Bye guys.
Steve Lewit: Bye now.
Announcer: Thanks for listening to Our 2 Cents, with Steve and Gabriel Lewit. For any questions about your finances, give SGL a call at 847-499-3330 or visit us on the web at sglfinancial.com, and be sure to subscribe to join us on next week’s episode.
Prerecorded Voice: Investment Advisory Services are offered through SGL Financial LLC, an SEC Registered Investment Adviser. Insurance and other financial products are offered separately through individually licensed and appointed agents.
