Episode 202: The Tariff Tango
by SGL Financial
Our 2 Cents – Episode #202
The Tariff Tango
Welcome to an informative episode of Our 2 Cents! On today’s episode, Steve and Gabriel conclude our ‘5 Mistakes’ series with a deep dive into tariffs and answering a pressing listener question. Listen in now using a link below!
- 5 Mistake Special (Part 2):
- Uncover 5 common vacation planning mistakes and discover smarter ways to make the most of your trip.
- All About Tariffs:
- Explore the economic ramifications of tariffs and their impact on trade, industry, and the global economy.
- Listener Question:
- “Given our plan to mutually care for each other in old age, except in cases of severe health decline, how much long-term care coverage do we really need?” – Holly
- Quotes of the Month:
- “It’s easy to meet expenses. Everywhere you go, there they are.” – Anonymous
- “There’s a very easy way to return from a casino with a small fortune—go there with a large one.” – Jack Yelton
Request Your Free Consultation Today
847.499.3330
Podcast Transcript
Announcer: You are 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 and financial news, trends, strategies, and more.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, hello everybody. Welcome back to Our 2 Cents. We’ve got a great episode in store for you today. You are joined, of course, by Steven Lewit and-
Steve Lewit: I am here.
Gabriel Lewit: You are here and your host here, Gabriel Lewit and our great support team behind the scenes.
Steve Lewit: I bet you don’t know what I’m thinking about.
Gabriel Lewit: Probably the Super Bowl.
Steve Lewit: How did you know? Yeah, I was. I was just thinking about it before we-
Gabriel Lewit: Well, because we were talking about it before the show.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I know, but I didn’t tune into the show right away. I was still stuck on the Super Bowl.
Gabriel Lewit: I heard you were singing the national anthem, right, at the show?
Steve Lewit: I’d love to. Actually, I would love to.
Gabriel Lewit: I’m just teasing. Yeah, so you had asked me before the show started, “Gabe, who are you rooting for?” And I had said anybody… A client actually gave me this, not Chiefs.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I think it’s amazing. I’m actually rooting for them to do a three-peat.
Gabriel Lewit: Oh, yeah?
Steve Lewit: It’s amazing. It’s just never been done before in history. You got to root for the amazing.
Gabriel Lewit: Unless it’s my Bears doing a three-peat, not ha-
Steve Lewit: Your Bears are not doing a three-peat.
Gabriel Lewit: I’m salty. I don’t want to see another team getting that level of success when my Bears are still bottom of the barrel.
Steve Lewit: Now, does not rooting for the Chiefs mean you’re rooting for Philadelphia?
Gabriel Lewit: That would mean correct. That would be the only other option at the Super Bowl.
Steve Lewit: Well, you could be neutral.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, no, I don’t want to see the Chiefs win.
Steve Lewit: Okay.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah.
Steve Lewit: I don’t mind.
Gabriel Lewit: That’s me. And if you’re a Chiefs fan out there, I mean nothing bad about it, they’re a terrific team, but you guys have had your heyday, you’ve had your glory, you’ve had your time in the sun. I’ve got a good friend that’s an Eagles… Who are they playing, Eagles?
Steve Lewit: Yeah, Philadelphia.
Gabriel Lewit: Eagles. Yeah. Who’s a good friend who’s an Eagles fan and I think it’s his turn.
Steve Lewit: Well, I’m a New York Giant fan, so it’s never the Eagles’ turn.
Gabriel Lewit: So, you’re rooting for the Chiefs?
Steve Lewit: I am rooting for the Chiefs.
Gabriel Lewit: There you go. Did we do a… No, we didn’t. We didn’t do a Super Bowl squares yet for the company here. Okay, we got to get that going, producer Gabby. We got to win some money for somebody here.
Steve Lewit: Somebody here is going to clean up.
Gabriel Lewit: All right, so yeah, we’ve got part two of what we were talking about last week, which was our five-mistake special that we only did a part one of. And we’ve got a part two here for you today to start our show off with. And our part two is five money-draining mistakes that travelers make when planning a vacation.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I always think of it as just don’t spend so much money, but it’s more than that.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. I mean, not spending as much money is one way to spend less money on a vacation-
Steve Lewit: But how do you do that?
Gabriel Lewit: These are very specific things that people oftentimes don’t think about that could be costing them quite a bit of money on their vacation. All right, so without further ado, number one mistake is traveling to your dream destination.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I never think of… I have these places that I want to go and a lot of our clients say, “Yeah, we want to go to Tahiti.” Or, “We want to go to New Zealand.” And they’re very, very expensive trips. And what this is suggesting is-
Gabriel Lewit: Well, it says find a destination dupe.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I like it.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay, so, yeah-
Steve Lewit: Dupe means duplicate.
Gabriel Lewit: Duplicate, yes. So now if your destination is Las Vegas, if that’s your dream destination, maybe there’s the Rivers Casino in the O’Hare Rosemont area, right? There’s your destination dupe. You just got-
Steve Lewit: Well sort of, well sort of.
Gabriel Lewit: Not quite, but you get what I’m-
Steve Lewit: Let’s say you want to go to Monte Carlo, which is then you go to Las Vegas instead of Monte Carlo.
Gabriel Lewit: I was saying that really as a joke. I didn’t actually mean the Rivers Casino.
Steve Lewit: I know. I just wanted to bail you out.
Gabriel Lewit: But yes, that’s the idea, right? There are places, if you think about I want a tropical beach vacation, maybe you can get that in Florida at US domestic prices for example. There are all these different things that yes, if you have a once-in-a-lifetime dream vacation set for yourself, we would encourage you to go on that dream vacation. But if it’s just a, call it a run-of-the-mill vacation, you can find somewhere that gets you all the things you want at a cheaper price.
Steve Lewit: Definitely. Definitely. I think I read in this article, Paris, they said instead of going to Paris, go to Montreal or Quebec, which is a similar experience except you can’t say to friends at a party, “I went to Paris.” You say, “Well, I went to Montreal.”
Gabriel Lewit: Exactly. Yeah. Well, yeah, ultimately the vibe, if you’re after a vibe, there are many places that give you a comparable vibe, if not the actual label. You didn’t go to Paris in your example.
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: That was mistake number one, is only going to your dream destinations. Mistake number two is picking very specific dates for your trip. And you’ve all heard this before and it’s worth bearing repeating here. If you can find flexible dates where it’s not a peak travel time, you will be able to save a lot of money.
Steve Lewit: A lot.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. We just had a team member go to Disney for a week with her family. If you Google the worst times to go to Disney, the most expensive times to go to Disney, it’s during the times where everybody and their mother and brother are going to Disney. Christmas vacations, Thanksgiving vacations, summer vacations, all these times when nobody else is typically thinking of going the third week in January or the second week in January could be quite a bit cheaper. You got to maybe pull a kid out of school or rearrange your schedule a little bit. But if you can pick some non-peak time days, you could save a bundle.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. I’ve spent a long time, on all my travels, I’ve always tried to travel when nobody else is. So my annual vacation, retreat vacation, I take the first week in January. I don’t take it the week before that because that’s New Year’s and Christmas and the prices are literally 50% higher.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Well, and to that end, speaking of prices being higher, part of why this is coming up is there is data here that says airfare costs, as an example, were up over 25% year over year. So if you’ve noticed that travel’s feeling a lot more expensive. Well it is.
Steve Lewit: It is.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. And then the article that we’re referencing here that we got this idea from, the author is talking about how in 2022 he brought his family to the Greek island of Santorini.
Steve Lewit: Santorini.
Gabriel Lewit: That sounds nice, which is a popular summer destination. He took them there in January. Now I don’t know much about Santorini. I don’t know how the weather is in January.
Steve Lewit: I think it’s pretty cold.
Gabriel Lewit: But maybe that’s why it was cheaper.
Steve Lewit: Definitely. If you could go out.
Gabriel Lewit: So anywhos. Mistake number three, only assuming that the Vrbos, Airbnbs, are cheaper than hotels, and this has kind of been, I think talked about quite a bit, at least I’ve heard it more than once, that a lot of people used to go to Vrbos and Airbnbs thinking it’s going to be cheaper than a hotel.
Steve Lewit: Not necessarily.
Gabriel Lewit: But they’ve tacked on now so many fees and fees for this and fees for that, that you’re getting a higher price in a comparable hotel while still having to do your dishes and laundry and clean up after the whole place before you leave. And you might find out that you’re going to get a better deal actually checking the prices of a local hotel.
Steve Lewit: I was shopping for a hotel or a place to stay in California on my last trip, and I wound up staying at a hotel because the prices were virtually the same. And I like all the services and the fitness center and everything is there and restaurants and things like that.
Gabriel Lewit: And we’ll give you some data here. There is a report from some travel blogger called The Points Guy, I guess that’s his name, says the average daily Airbnb rate in 2023 was 36% higher than it was three years ago. And over the same timeframe, Hilton as an example, their average rates increased only 7.8%.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I think we did a show on the future of the Vrbo and-
Gabriel Lewit: Airbnb?
Steve Lewit: Airbnb business, yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: There’s a lot to-
Steve Lewit: Because of all these fees, it has really suffered a little bit.
Gabriel Lewit: Yep. All right. So that’s another thing to think about there is can you get cheaper actually at a hotel? Another one related to the hotel itself or wherever you’re traveling is, and this isn’t for everybody, but do you want to stay smack dab in the middle of downtown in the most exciting street in the wherever destination you’re headed? Or you can stay maybe on the outskirts of town, or for example, five minutes away from the downtown center via short drive or Uber. If you can do that, you might be able to shave off hundreds of dollars a night on any comparable hotel costs.
Steve Lewit: Well, you reported this last week or the week before that you were shopping for a hotel in Naples downtown. And what did you find?
Gabriel Lewit: Well, I actually finally booked my vacation. That was part of why I thought this was near and dear. And I did happen to look at lots of different options and I looked at ones that were right in downtown, and ones a little further away from downtown. And ultimately-
Steve Lewit: This is Naples, Florida, by the way, folks.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. That’s my duplicate destination. Yeah. So interesting. This particular one, well, downtown Naples, I’m not an expert on it, but there’s not a huge swath of hotels right on the beach there. But the few that were there were very, very, very expensive.
Steve Lewit: Very.
Gabriel Lewit: If you happen to go 10 minutes north of Naples, there’s a bunch of big beach hotels which are still very expensive.
Steve Lewit: But much less expensive.
Gabriel Lewit: But much less expensive. And they’re bigger and you got more amenities and things. And then interestingly enough, you go another 10 minutes north of there, there’s yet again, even more hotels, some new ones, very nice ones that are another couple hundred dollars a night cheaper, but you get a little bit further and further from downtown Naples, depending on if that’s where you want to be. But that’s the idea, right? Trying to balance what is the true objective of your trip. For me, I wanted a hotel on a beach with a pool and some good restaurants to bring my family to, and that is ultimately what we got.
Steve Lewit: So, you’re going to Naples?
Gabriel Lewit: We are, yeah.
Steve Lewit: Nice, nice.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, their spring break happens to be the very last week of March. So it tends to… It was still pricier because it’s still considered spring break season.
Steve Lewit: Spring break, yeah. Spring break.
Gabriel Lewit: There wasn’t a lot of flexibility for us there, but it is going to be cheaper because it was that last week. If you happen to look right in mid-March it was even more money. So that shows some of that time value there.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Did the company approve your time off? Did you talk to your partner?
Gabriel Lewit: I talked to my boss-
Steve Lewit: Or the head.
Gabriel Lewit: I talked to my boss, who’s me. He said that’s a phenomenal idea for you to take some time off.
Steve Lewit: And your partner, what did he say?
Gabriel Lewit: He said, go get ’em.
Steve Lewit: Go get it, baby, right?
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. I knew you’d be happy for me. I didn’t even have to ask.
Steve Lewit: I’m happy for you.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. All right, last but not least, I was going to put in here, I’m going to change one of the ones that’s in this article to one of my own, which is, I think if you really want to save money wherever you go, people think that you can’t find hotels that have kitchenettes in them. And there are ones that do have kitchenettes.
Steve Lewit: Lots, lots.
Gabriel Lewit: The advantage of the kitchenette is that you can, when you first get there on vacation, you buy yourself some food at the local grocery store, quite a bit cheaper than the restaurants.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Have breakfast in your room.
Gabriel Lewit: Save tons of money over room service and other things and dinners and lunches out. You don’t have to eat every meal out is the end point of this. And that can save you $1,000 easy probably on a vacation depending on well, how many kids you’re dragging along with you like me.
Steve Lewit: Well, a simple breakfast in a hotel can be 40, 50, 60 bucks for two scrambled eggs and some toast
Gabriel Lewit: With the hotels you’re going to, yeah.
Steve Lewit: Okay. In the hotels I go to.
Gabriel Lewit: Apparently, $50 for two eggs. I guess eggs have gotten pricier if that’s what you’re paying.
Steve Lewit: Well, if you’re in a Hampton Inn it’s different, but at some, all right, let me reframe that. At some hotels, which I wouldn’t know, but I hear breakfast can be about 40, 50, $60.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, okay. I gotcha. Gotcha.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I heard that.
Gabriel Lewit: All right, well hopefully that was helpful. I mean obviously if you’re thinking about traveling, if you heard our start of the year episode, we also told you to go spend more money on the things that are important to you, so weigh that out. But yeah, depending on how important the certain objectives are of your trip, lots of cool ways to save some money. So maybe you can squeeze in three or four vacations in a year instead of two.
Steve Lewit: And do you really need the rental car for 10 days or can you Uber it back and forth? Because rental cars are expensive.
Gabriel Lewit: Another one, well in your case, you’re getting what? The Lambo rental, the Rolls Royce.
Steve Lewit: The Bentley rental.
Gabriel Lewit: All right.
Steve Lewit: I have breakfast in my rental.
Gabriel Lewit: There you go. All right, so we’re going to switch gears a little bit here. There have been, of course, many articles on this that you’ve probably read and heard now about tariffs coming to a country near you. So we’re going to talk a little bit about tariffs today.
Steve Lewit: I actually like that. That was good.
Gabriel Lewit: And tariffs of course have been the news du jour here because Trump, the newly inaugurated president, has made it one of his top agenda items. And today is not about being political in any way, shape, or form folks, but more so us reporting to you, what does this mean? What are tariffs? How do they impact you? What might be some of the ramifications of that for your finances and a couple of other little tidbits related to them like that. And we have gotten a lot of questions from clients already and we thought it’d make a great topic for our show today.
Steve Lewit: Yes.
Gabriel Lewit: So, Mr. Lewit, what is a tariff?
Steve Lewit: A tariff is like a tax on imports. So you all know we buy lots from other countries and other countries buy lots from us. And what a tariff does is it says, “Other country, if you’re going to ship goods here, we’re going to charge you extra to ship them here,” which they don’t like because that hurts their exports and helps our domestic policy for things to grow in the states itself. So tariffs are an isolationist approach to economics.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, I’ll use a very simple example on a tariff. Let’s say that a company was selling a $100 widget, or somebody in the US was importing a $100 widget from Mexico, and let’s say in the factory that creates the widgets, it costs them $70 to build it and ship it or whatever else, to processes, leaving them with a $30 profit margin. And in some businesses 30% profit margin’s good. And that’s how they pay for future expenses. That’s how they run their business or grow. Well, all of a sudden, a 25% tariff on that $100 item means that company’s got to pay $25 leaving them with a 5% profit margin. And what is that company going to do in response to that Mr. Lew?
Steve Lewit: Well, they got two options. One is go out of business, or raise the price. And most companies raise the price. So if you’re sitting here as a widget buyer in America, and now Mexico just raised the price 25%. You have to decide, well, am I going to buy it through Mexico?
Gabriel Lewit: So, it’s now a $125 widget.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Maybe somebody will make it here cheaper rather than import it here, or I got to go to a different country.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, that could be one of the end objectives of implementing tariffs.
Steve Lewit: Of a tariff, and-
Gabriel Lewit: There are reasons administrations implement tariffs, but short of that, the challenge of that part is in the very short term, can a new company just spin up a new factory really quick to create the widget cheaper? Not immediately. That can take quite a bit of time and it is one of the potential ramifications of that. But that could take time. In the meantime, a lot of people may not opt to buy that widget per se, or they might look for an alternative.
Steve Lewit: Or buy the widget, and then you have inflation growing in the States, which is they pay more-
Gabriel Lewit: Because now people are paying 125 for something that used to cost them 100.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and a widget could be eggs, it could be corn, it could be wheat, it could be oil, it could be anything.
Gabriel Lewit: TVs, cars.
Steve Lewit: Yeah. Chips, we import a lot of things.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So that’s a quick walkthrough of what’s happening there with the terrorists. Trump had, of course, he’s pulled back a little bit here. Who knows what goes on behind the scenes in the conversations, but he had proposed tariffs on Mexico, on Canada, and I think also on China. And ultimately I believe at the moment tariffs on Canada and Mexico have been paused. And that’s one of the other potential things about tariffs is it may be used as a leverage or a negotiating tactic.
Steve Lewit: Exactly.
Gabriel Lewit: Or sometimes it can be viewed as a very aggressive economic policy that could trigger, at its worst, something called a trade war. And Mr. Lew, what is a trade war?
Steve Lewit: Well, we might have one now with China because we raise tariffs on China and what does China do in return? They raise tariffs on our goods. So this becomes a trade war. The other thought behind tariffs is if you want to increase domestic production, that’s another reason for doing… So there are lots of reasons for tariffs. It could be a negotiating ploy, a threat, which we see that now because countries are very intimidated when the US puts tariffs on them. And that might be on purpose, I can’t say right or wrong, but it might be on purpose. It could be to increase domestic production, become more self-reliant. And the third one is… I’m short circuiting. There is a third one and I can’t remember what it is.
Gabriel Lewit: Did you talk about protecting from foreign competition, which is similar to increasing domestic production?
Steve Lewit: Domestic production, self-reliance. There is a third one. I can’t think of it right now, but it’s not a simple thing. Just I’m going to put a tariff on. You have to know the motivation, but a trade war is what happens. I tariff you, you tariff me. And back and forth and it goes, and-
Gabriel Lewit: And it can impact ultimately both economies because people from both countries, the people in the importing country and the people from the exporting country, they’re not buying as much goods from other countries because of the higher costs. And those companies or industries can start to slow down. And that is one of the risks. Not to say that that’s going to happen here, is that it could, in some cases, trigger a recession.
Steve Lewit: Well you see the neat part about America is we’re so self-sufficient and rich with resources. It’s very unusual. And so tariffs, in my estimation, this is me speaking as an economist, if you put a tariff on Mexico, that is much more onerous on Mexico than the rising prices is here in America. So we’re in a position of power when it comes to tariffs, but if a tariff hurts another economy, long term, that’s going to come back and hurt us because of the international economics.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, and ultimately, and this is probably where we’ll get close to wrapping on this topic, because we don’t know the true underlying objectives that the administration has for this. I mean obviously there’s various things reported and we can guess and assume, but the ramifications for any investor here in the US is yet to be seen, right? Because we don’t know how long are these going to last, are they going to be paused? Is it a short-term negotiating technique? Is it really a plan to bring back US domestic production in other key areas? All that remains to be seen.
Steve Lewit: Or all of them.
Gabriel Lewit: Or all of the above.
Steve Lewit: Yep.
Gabriel Lewit: Correct. Yep. So hopefully that’s helpful. Again, we are doing our best here not to imply good or bad here, but just reporting on what’s occurring and what this really means and some of the possible outcomes from this. But it’s something that we’ll keep our eye on and we’ll continue to report back to you here as we get into more and more months here in 2025.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, and I think what we haven’t talked about is what traditionally happens to the stock market when there’s a tariff. And traditionally, there is no tradition, it can go up or down. So we don’t know, to echo what you just said, we really don’t know what’s going to happen. But it is an interesting time. I mean there’s a lot going on. Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So stay tuned on that. We’ll do a very quick hit here as well on interest rate environments. The Fed had a meeting in recent weeks here. Once again, last year, the plan basically was to lower rates, interest rates, short-term interest rates and specifics last year, and then was projected to continue into this year. At the moment though, it’s been paused. So there hasn’t been a rate cut here in the most recent meeting. And the projection for this year is there may be fewer rate cuts than previously thought of, say at this point last year.
Steve Lewit: Yeah, I think there will be other rate cuts, but remember we talked about rate cuts being like adding fuel to the economic fire. So when the Fed lowered its rates, it had a bunch of fuel and the economy is on fire, so they don’t want to add any more fuel at the moment.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah. So two quote here Fed Chair Jerome Powell said the central bank was entering a, quote, new phase where it would be cautious about further cuts because he said, “We know that reducing policy restraint too fast or too much could hinder progress on inflation. So straight from the Jerome Powell mouth.
Steve Lewit: Definitely. He would be known as the horse’s mouth.
Gabriel Lewit: Exactly. All right, if you have questions on any-
Steve Lewit: Don’t tell Jerome I called him a horse.
Gabriel Lewit: I didn’t want to call Jerome a horse. That’s why I said Jer… You know, I’m just kidding.
Steve Lewit: You’re very polite. That was very nice.
Gabriel Lewit: It’s not like we know each other.
Steve Lewit: You’ve got a few good things going today.
Gabriel Lewit: All right, so if you’ve got questions on inflations, tariffs, or planning your next low-cost travel destination, give us a call here, (847) 499-3330 or go to sglfinancial.com, click contact us or email us info@sglfinancial.com. But wait, there’s more. We’re not done.
Steve Lewit: Do they call SGL Travel Services? I mean, how are we helping in that vein?
Gabriel Lewit: I don’t know, maybe budgeting their travel, where do they get the money from.
Steve Lewit: Oh, budget, oh, okay. Yeah, I always wonder-
Gabriel Lewit: I don’t actually mean planning their trip agenda for them.
Steve Lewit: I was wondering if we had a new company that I didn’t know about.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, funny I haven’t mentioned this much on the show. If you happen to have people that could be in use of SGL Financial Services, we have a referral program. In fact, we just did our drawing for our 2024 referral program raffle winner who won a $2,000-
Steve Lewit: Choose your own, build your own vacation.
Gabriel Lewit: Build your own trip voucher through our referral program raffle. So if you’d like the opportunity next year to win, you’ve got a refer some names here to SGL. We would take terrific care of them of course, but that’s another way you can lower your travel costs.
Steve Lewit: And earn 50 bucks for dinner and a donation to your favorite charity.
Gabriel Lewit: So yeah, that’s part of our referral rewards program.
Steve Lewit: Yep.
Gabriel Lewit: All right, so to round things out here for today, we had a short listener question to walk through here. We do get questions periodically. Today’s question is going to be from Holly. Actually, we have a few different questions here, but-
Steve Lewit: I thought you were going to do, Marty.
Gabriel Lewit: I wanted to keep you on your toes.
Steve Lewit: Everybody’s got a Y at the end of their name here.
Gabriel Lewit: So, Holly, basically, I’m paraphrasing here, says she and her husband are planning to take care of each other as they get older. And unless one of them is in extremely bad health, and they said because that’s their plan, what are our thoughts on if they should have extra long-term care insurance, or coverage?
Steve Lewit: Well, first of all, that’s noble, and it’s loving, and you want to stay at home if you have any long-term ill health and if a couple can support each other, I think that’s wonderful. The problem comes in is if you need help, in other words, sometimes the caretaker might fall on ill health and sometimes the person being cared for might not be able to be cared for by the caretaker.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, and there’s even if the caretaker is emotionally… Or sorry physically well, it can take a big emotional toll-
Steve Lewit: Always. It takes a huge toll.
Gabriel Lewit: … on the caretaker. I think there’s even a phrase, I didn’t come up with this. I’ve been watching a new show that’s called The Pitt. It’s all about a medical drama, ER room show on HBO/Max. I still call it HBO.
Steve Lewit: Folks, this is the third time this week I’ve heard about this show.
Gabriel Lewit: It’s a great show.
Steve Lewit: How many times are you going to talk about it?
Gabriel Lewit: I’ve been enjoying it.
Steve Lewit: Okay.
Gabriel Lewit: Okay. Anywhos, it’s called caretaker or something where it’s a proven thing where they can struggle. It’s a very stressful job. It can be very emotionally draining. It can be very challenging, isolating, you lose your independence, taking care of somebody else who has lost their independence. And those are some of the reasons why you may want to consider long-term care because it can help cover the costs of you having some assistance to take care of your loved one.
Steve Lewit: Absolutely. And part of that decision has to do with your other wealth. Some people have enough wealth, they say, “Well, if I have to lay out $400,000 over a couple of years, I’ll just lay it out.”
Gabriel Lewit: So what? Yeah. Exactly.
Steve Lewit: And they-
Gabriel Lewit: For others, they couldn’t afford that if it occurred. And insurance may be the only way for them to cover that cost.
Steve Lewit: And the third aspect is if you’re looking to protect your assets as legacy for your kids, or for charity, then long-term care can help preserve your assets. So there’s no yes or no answer, should or shouldn’t. It really means about your situation, how much it costs, the different alternatives, options that you have for yourself and whether you really need it.
Gabriel Lewit: Well, and how concerned are you? One of the biggest reasons to get long-term care is not… The average stay is what, one to two years, right, for someone needing long-term care.
Steve Lewit: In a facility is three and a half years.
Gabriel Lewit: If people have Alzheimer’s-
Steve Lewit: 10 to 12 years that could go.
Gabriel Lewit: So, questions become how much self-insuring or self-funding or how long of caretaking are you willing to handle without getting help, right?
Steve Lewit: Yeah. So years ago you used to be able to buy nursing home care or facility care like that with a unlimited lifetime benefit, which you can’t buy anymore.
Gabriel Lewit: There are still some that have-
Steve Lewit: There’s one, but I don’t particularly-
Gabriel Lewit: Kind of pricey, right?
Steve Lewit: Yeah, it’s very pricey. So what was it, Holly? Yeah. Holly. Yeah. So Holly, there are lots of options and the best way to noodle through them really is to find an advisor. Absolutely, we’d welcome you here, that can walk you through all the different options.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, definitely. Well, I think we have another listener question. I’m going to save this for next time because I don’t want to rush the answer here in just one minute. So I’m just going to say two quotes of the month and then we’re going to wrap here for today. And Marty, we’re going to save your question for next time. So quotes of the month, just to give you something to think about here. It’s easy to meet expenses if you’re thinking about budgeting. How do you meet expenses? Well, everywhere you go, there they are.
Steve Lewit: And that was brought to you by Anonymous.
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. That’s our cash flow joke of the day. It’s easy to meet expenses… All right. Sorry, I digress. I can’t ignore a corny joke.
Steve Lewit: Do we have a better one than that?
Gabriel Lewit: Yes. I don’t know who this fellow is, so hopefully he’s a normal person. Jack Yelton.
Steve Lewit: I have no idea.
Gabriel Lewit: We don’t have our TV backup in our… We recently repainted our recording room here and I need the TV backup to look this up, but he says there’s a very easy way to return from a casino with a small fortune. And do you know what it is?
Steve Lewit: Yeah.
Gabriel Lewit: You go there with a large one.
Steve Lewit: That’s the old one that said, “How do you make a million dollars at the casino? Start with two.”
Gabriel Lewit: Start with two, yeah.
Steve Lewit: I like that.
Gabriel Lewit: So, since we were talking casinos today as well in Las Vegas, I thought that was a good little tie in there.
Steve Lewit: Do you like to gamble?
Gabriel Lewit: Very, very little.
Steve Lewit: What do you play? Do you play poker, roulette?
Gabriel Lewit: I go maybe once a year and I spend $200 on a roulette table for a couple of hours and I drink a few Coors Lights, call it a night. I go home with $20 or zero.
Steve Lewit: Yep. Yeah. Always go with a budget.
Gabriel Lewit: Yeah, exactly. All right, well that’s our show for you today. If you have questions, give us a call, (847) 499-3330 or email us info@sglfinancial.com. If you’d like to set up a time to talk with us for a second review or opinion of your finances, if you’re a current client, if you need to schedule a review meeting, please give us a call anytime. We are here to help. And meanwhile, we hope you have a terrific rest of your day.
Steve Lewit: And go Chiefs.
Gabriel Lewit: Go not Chiefs. Bye, guys.
Steve Lewit: Stay well, everybody.
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.
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