Episode 0 - 3 Moments From Your Life In Money

DANO WEIR: Welcome to the first episode of It's All Money. Your hosts are right here in front of you, or maybe you're listening to us. Daren Blonski, CFP, and me, Dan O'Weir, with no letters or licenses after his name. What is this show? Who are these people? I believe, Daren, that every podcast needs an episode zero, which is a chance for a listener or a viewer to...

DANO WEIR: Get to know what am i getting in for who are these people who who's is this my guy is this my gal do i trust them do i like them so that's what this is this is episode zero of it's all money so let's set the scene Daren where are we right now for someone who's listening or watching well.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: It's a very philosophical question where we are right now Dan we are sitting in Sonoma California it is a perfect time of year here in Sonoma the lots of you tourists out and about right near our office here in downtown.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We are sitting in our conference room.

DANO WEIR: Our conference room of what company?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Of Sonoma Wealth Advisors.

DANO WEIR: That's right.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: That's right. So we're sitting in the Sonoma Wealth Advisors conference room, the same one where we sit with clients day in, day out.

DANO WEIR: Daren and I have talked about doing a podcast for a long time. And yes, that's right. It's another podcast from a financial advisor.

DANO WEIR: We got together and we said, you know what the world needs is... One more podcast from a financial advisor.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: But see, Dan, we have you here. That's right. A non-financial advisor. So it's not exactly just another podcast from a financial advisor because you're with us.

DANO WEIR: If we have someone who's totally unqualified, that's going to change the game.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Change the game, absolutely. Well, at least you have the radio voice.

DANO WEIR: That's right, and we'll get into that. So Daren and I, just in our conversations about money in this job at Cinema Wealth Advisors, have... Talked about doing a podcast, this would be good as a podcast. And my hesitation always with doing a podcast is, well, what is different about your podcast than all of the other podcasts out there?

DANO WEIR: And there's a lot. So when I thought about, hey, if we're really going to do a money podcast, how can it be different? So I surveyed and did a look at the landscape and what's out there. And really money podcasts fall into about four categories. Podcasts about the market, very natural for a financial advisor to talk about and getting way into the weeds of crypto.

DANO WEIR: Crypto and securities and all kinds of details. There are podcasts, money podcasts about a wealth system. So maybe this is how you pay off your debt and then start investing, right? And join my program and I'm trying to sell my courses, right? That's a type of podcast.

DANO WEIR: There are money saving tips podcasts. This is how you save on your budget. And then there are interviews with people money podcasts where people sit down with other successful business people. And really the money podcast world fall into those four categories. So I said, wait a minute, what if we took those and made them all in one?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: That's brilliant, Dan. Brilliant.

DANO WEIR: And that's what it's all money is because ultimately at the end of the day, all of those things, whether it's the market, whether it's your budget, whether it's a wealth system, or whether it's tips from something successful, all those end up hitting your checking account. As a consumer, macro and microeconomics end up affecting you. So this show is about how your life intersects with money.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Well, that's a great, I want to create a definition for what money is. I think that's important, right? Because money is just an instrument, right? We don't want money to become a lowercase god unto itself, a deity unto itself. And money is just a way we transfer energy, right? So we... Work and we earn money, or perhaps we have a business, we have passive income, but it generates money.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And then we're able to do things with that money. And so we're very passionate about life in creating moments, right? Because I contend that we live life in moments. And those moments are what create memories, which creates a sense of fulfillment and happiness in life. And so if we create those moments that offer that feeling of fulfillment through using money as a tool.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Then we can live a more fulfilling, happy life. And really everything we're going to talk about, yeah, it hits your bank account, it impacts you, but let's not lose the forest from the trees in that money is really just energy and it's about moving energy in the direction. Direction we want to create memories we want.

DANO WEIR: That sounds like the viewpoint of someone who's a psychology major. It does.

DANO WEIR: Give me some of your stats. So for people, we've mentioned Cinema Wealth Advisors in our names, who is Daren Blonski? What's on the back of your baseball card?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So the back of my baseball court card, I'd say, first off, I'm a father, I'm a husband, I'm a family member.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: In my spare time, I'm an outdoors person. I love the outdoors, fishing, hiking, even do some gold panning on the side, Dan. I don't know if you knew that.

DANO WEIR: The wealth advisor who literally pans for gold.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: It is so amazing because it's the one time when I go out in the middle of nowhere and it takes almost zero brain capacity to just sit there and listen to the stream. And there's a... Something about pursuing, finding something, but you're still in pursuit of something. So there's a kind of a meditative process to it that I enjoy the physicality of it.

DANO WEIR: That's a future episode right there.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: There is. And I love the markets. So I'm in this business because I fell in love with the markets at a young age.

DANO WEIR: And what's your position in the business?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So I own, I'm a co-founder and owner of Sonoma Wealth Advisors or Fermata Advisors, which is our parent SEC registered entity. And then we've got a bunch of different DBAs. We own a tax firm. We have a 401k retirement business and then a private wealth business as well.

DANO WEIR: And that's the office that we're sitting in now, Sonoma Wealth.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We're in the private wealth side of the business at the moment. Yes, right. And so I got into the business because I love the markets. The markets are infinitely fascinating. It's an intricate puzzle to understand.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I never feel like I under fully understand it and I'm constantly on the edge of trying to relearn. And I love that learning process that the markets offer me. And I love translating that learning into something that people can understand and apply in their day-to-day lives.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So that's kind of the crux and the essence of the episode is like, how do we apply these kind of obtuse and difficult to. Comprehend topics and make it meaningful in our day-to-day life.

DANO WEIR: But you are a psychology major. That's what you went to school for, right?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah. Well, so I did part man and managerial econ at UC Davis and then actually really fell in love with sociology and psychology and found it really fascinating how the human brain works and studying that. And then went off and did a lot of leadership development and team development for many years. And then when I had a family, that's a...

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Big travel business, decided to switch gears and say, well, what else do I do with my life where I'm not traveling all the time? And loved trading the markets, loved interacting with the markets, like, oh, this financial advising thing looks kind of interesting. And so I went into that, started with a large broker.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Realized working with that broker that it wasn't the chassis I wanted to serve my clients on because I felt like I was inhibited from serving them in their best interest. A lot of the regulations have now since changed, so that's changing, but for good. And, but so I became an independent financial advisor and are a registered investment advisor and allowing me to serve the clients in independent capacity.

DANO WEIR: And I'm the marketing director with no qualifications.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I don't think that's true. I think, you know, Dan, you be, we remet each other, right? Cause we met and we knew each other sort of in high school. And you came in from the Dave Ramsey program to me to talk with me and was a, were a client for a while. And then over time, this worked out and you stepped into the marketing realm with us.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And so I think you have a lot of qualifications in a sense. Dan's a guy who. Really thinks about this stuff from a personal wealth standpoint and has been thoughtful about it in his life and has been a self teacher of himself, right? He's taught himself how to do this stuff and sought out people to support him.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Your background without delving into too much doesn't necessarily, I wouldn't have queued you up to be a guy who got all those.

DANO WEIR: Teachings at a young age on here's what you need to do financially you had to go pursue that stuff and and build that capacity in yourself so a little bit about myself my name is Dan my nickname is Dano because i was a radio personality for 15 years in Santa Rosa and so that was the radio name Dano but that was actually my nickname from high school so the high school nickname worked out as the professional name so Dano Weir they called you Dano wano right was that just something we made up so my my name on Facebook is i didn't use my real last name on Facebook for a while so i was like Dano instead of because you're worried about like the stalkers yeah there's some interesting people on the internet but my real last name is weir so then that was i was wano for a while was my internet last name so radio personality event host you, I, I've taken color nine many times and given away those concert tickets.

DANO WEIR: I'm also a father. I'm married. I live in Petaluma and, let's see where else. So San Francisco State grad.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: But didn't you spend some time at Cal Poly too and then finished up at San Francisco State?

DANO WEIR: I did. So when I left high school, so we both went to the same high school, Costa Ronda High School. When I left high school, you can't just go off and run and join the circus. So you've got to have a real job when you get out of high school. You've got to have a real major. So I was a chemistry major at Cal Poly. Wow, lucky. And, you know, Cal Poly is a very fun place.

DANO WEIR: Just didn't end up having.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: You were focused on chemistry, not the chemical chemistry that we would apply in the classroom. Is that what you're saying?

DANO WEIR: No comment. I'm not even going there. It was just beer. So I just didn't have the passion for chemistry. And I kind of always knew I wanted to do something like this where I could communicate with people. So we can get into Dave Ramsey and we can get into how I ended up here to a little bit later when we get into my life and money.

DANO WEIR: Because for this episode zero, I've got. But we wanted to break down three moments from each of our lives that kind of talks about our life and money. And I don't think people really think about things like this. Money just seems kind of like this inherited, passed-on thing, and you just sort of have it or you don't.

DANO WEIR: I wouldn't say that many people sit around and think about their life in money. And that's almost the crux of this show is how money impacts your life. Daren, we've broken it out here. Let's get into three points, three moments for you that kind of symbolize your life in money.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah. You know, the first one, I guess I'll back into. So my stepdad growing up owned a flooring company. So I was just telling one of our employees this morning, because we just got new floors in the office over the weekend here.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And what I learned in that job was that I needed an education because I didn't want to pull floors my whole life because I I learned that if you own a cat, it's peeing on your carpet. And if you work in pulling out floors, you get to pull out rug that is peed on by cats. So I decided there and then that that would not be my- Please break that out into the Instagram reel.

DANO WEIR: That's what I want. I'm going to send it to all the clients.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I just offended every cat lady there is out there. But the truth is they do pee on your carpet and very consistently so, even when you don't believe they are peeing on your carpet. So that's one thing you learn as a flooring person. And so I worked- all summer long.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And the, the girl I had a crush on that I wanted to go on a date with, had rules in her family around going on dates until she was 16. So at 16, I'd pulled out enough carpet to save up at the time, which was a fair amount of money and is about $250, which now doesn't seem like much with inflation, but, that's, what I saved up. And so I took her.

DANO WEIR: What year is this? This is 1998.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: 95 i think 97 96 somewhere in there bucks yeah significant money right so i was like oh i'm gonna take her out of this really nice dinner it was this really nice restaurant called skates on the bay in Berkeley area and we drove there and i it was really exciting blah blah blah we got all dressed up took her to the restaurant sat down at the waiting waiting to be seated at the table that i had reserved hold on a second because on the screen behind us we've got a photo of Daren from said time There it is.

DANO WEIR: This is the guy in high school.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Did you get Ryan's approval to show his face on there?

DANO WEIR: You know, I figured that Ryan would be okay with me showing it.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Sam's joined the other side.

DANO WEIR: Yeah, so I figured he'd be okay. That was the three amigos right there in high school.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: That was our German club.

DANO WEIR: Yeah.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah, that was four years of German where I learned one thing.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: It was more a fun club. I even think the guy all the way to the left, this guy named Nick Santero, I think is all the way to the left. I don't even think he was in German class, but he was in the German club because that was the fun club.

DANO WEIR: That's fun.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah, so.

DANO WEIR: So if you're looking for a visual of Daren, he's standing about six something. He's a wrestler. Like he's in shape. This is Daren Blonsky. Competed at state wrestling tournament. He's fit.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yep, that was it. Anyway, so I took this gal out to restaurant and we went to sit down and this guy came up to me and said, hey, can you give me, jump my car? Because.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: You know, my car's broken down or something. Yeah, no problem. Hey, just go out and I'll jump it real quick. No big deal, right? And we got out of the car and it was my dad's new car. He let me drive for the day.

DANO WEIR: What kind of car?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: It was a Toyota 4Runner. It was not that exciting now, but for me and where I came from, it was very exciting. It's a cool car.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So we, this gentleman said, would you jump me? I said, sure. Hey, I'll be right back to my date, which I should never have done at that point. But I did because I was just totally naive.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And went out there he's like hey man like i don't want you to jump with your new car because my car's older can you just give me right over the freeway to another guy guy and he'll come back and jump me and i did that stupidly naively and then he came back out and said hey i'll just buy the part real quick do you have some money i can just borrow real quick 16 year old just like dough yeah sure here's some money go buy totally naive and your girlfriend's sitting in a restaurant i'm over if you know skates by the bay and there's a a seafood restaurant.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I think it might've closed down now. It's right across the freeway. I'm right there. Totally. Just, he was a classic con artist. Just totally envelops your mind. So you're not even thinking rationally and just keep saying yes, yes, yes. Anyway, I got totally.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Messed over gave him the money of course i never saw the guy again well actually did saw see the guy again but we'll save that story for another episode and i had to drive back to the restaurant with my tail between my legs and tell my date like hey i don't have any money the guy just took all the money for lunch or for dinner and it was just like this moment of like oh my gosh i can't be naive about this you know and sat there the waitress came up and said ma'am i'm really sorry but this gentleman took my money i don't how many money to pay for dinner we're gonna need to excuse ourselves or i'll need you have no credit card you have no no credit you had cash in your pocket and now you have no cash zero thankfully you have gas in the car because otherwise you would have no right that was even a concern yeah because at that point it was like let me just put enough gas in the car right so i was like i i can do some dishes and do whatever we can't pay for dinner and She's like, okay.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Anyway, long story short, they were super cool. The manager paid for our dinner. They asked the police to come and file a police report and all this because this guy literally poached me inside the restaurant, right? So, of course, as a restaurant and a good business owner, you're going to make it right.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Anyway, time, that was really gracious. And the cop at that time sat me down and said, you know, Daren, you just need to understand, it turned out this cop was from Petaluma too. He was just on duty in Berkeley. He's like, you just need to understand that. Not everybody's good in this world. Not everyone's going to, there will be people that take advantage of you.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: You need to be careful with money. And so that was kind of one of those moments in my life where it just was like, I got to think through this stuff. I got to really understand how this all works. And for whatever reason, that enlivened my brain to pay attention to these things.

DANO WEIR: And you were 16, 17? 16, yeah.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah. So anyway, so that was my first, at least a memory that really shocked me into... Not being so naive about life and money and things.

DANO WEIR: What about first job?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: First job was actually cutting my mom's flowers and selling them.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So I don't know why, I don't know what provoked me to do it, but I wanted to make money. So I would literally stand out on the street. I would cut my mom's flowers and they probably weren't, the flowers I look back on them, because they're actually still growing in my mom's garden in Petaluma and they're not super nice flowers. I'm like, wow, I was really selling those things.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I would sell them and I would just sit in the corner and guys coming home from work would buy them for their wives and I'd just keep selling flowers and I did that to earn money.

DANO WEIR: You're eight, you're five, you're seven.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Something like that, man.

DANO WEIR: What street?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: On Edith Street. Edith Street. I saw a lower middle class neighborhood.

DANO WEIR: And you'd stand on what street corner?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: In the corner, I'd just stand in front of my house. Wow, not even on a corner. No, every 10 minutes a car would come by and I'd scream and yell and hold the flowers out and just...

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Beg people to stop because i'll see people on caulfield you know they'll be hanging out in a corner a busy corner that that's pretty common you're you're literally just no yeah my mom's not gonna let me go to the corner right and like because well poly class hadn't happened yet but poly class kind of changed the world when it came to kidnappings and stuff and child but she definitely wasn't gonna let me go to the corner she's like yeah sure cut my flowers and sell them good luck with that yeah so what'd you sell them for Like a buck or two bucks, something like that.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Enough to buy it because you could buy four packs of baseball cards for a buck, and that's what I was going after. I wanted baseball cards with the one piece of gum in there. Wow. Yeah, that was the beginning. And Garbage Patch Kids, remember those? Yeah. Yeah. So what?

DANO WEIR: What'd you learn from that job?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: You know, that was my first like moment of like entrepreneurism, right? It was like that you can take these, your mom's flowers and you can stay on the corner and put this effort in, you could sell them and that you can make money doing that. And that really, I would say was a gestation of how I've operated my whole life in an entrepreneurial state. Wow.

DANO WEIR: That's crazy.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah.

DANO WEIR: So your third, your third moment, your third, your life and money, money, third story.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Third story that. Was a more recent story. Unfortunately, my dad passed from Parkinson's a year and a half ago, and I was his caretaker for most of the tail end of his sickness. And I fortunate to really spend a lot of meaningful time with him before he passed.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And I got to reconnect with him in a different way that I'm really grateful for, but it was also a really painful part of time in life. And There was this point where I had sold his house. He had this beautiful house. He worked his whole life on the bay in Point Richmond. And, he separated with his wife and then he was in the final months of his sickness and I had to step in and sell the house and all that jazz.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And that was not fun. But he, he had this huge bank account after we sold that house. And here's my dad who has dementia at that point, from the Parkinson or the type of Parkinson's he had and whatnot. And he's going downhill and he looks at me one day.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And the thing about dementia is like. Like most of the time it's just scrambled right and you're like i think i know my dad's like today he's a rocket man today he's a sailor like you're kind of figuring it out but every once in a while there's just like these statements they'll make that are just poignant and clear and thoughtful.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And like, how did, where'd that come out of? I can do. He looks at me, he says, you know, D what's a real shame here. My body's falling apart and it's obviously a one-way ticket. And I have a bank account full of money that I can't really do anything.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And he, it gave me that moment of like, wow, like we can work our whole life and save all this money up. And then be faced with the mortality that all of us have. And right. So that taught me and reaffirmed to me the importance of. Having lots of mini retirements through life, right? Doing things you want to do that create those moments with that money because you don't get to take it with you, man.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Like you just don't. And I think we traditionally think about, hey, I'm going to work really hard, save all this money, and then I'm going to go off and do whatever for my retirement. And I just subscribe, but that's not the way. I think the way is to create mini retirements throughout your career that's the best you can. Now it's hard with kids and family and bills and all that.

DANO WEIR: You can't YOLO everything, right? I mean, you can't just.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Balance right you got to find that balance you can't you have to have some moments of of a joy you have to you have to have still have some no's too and but too many no's and you end up with you know too much money and not enough life that's right and then too many yeses you end up with no money yeah and still working in your 80s so it's this it's this balance so with when we're working with clients that's what we try to strike is that even balance of like how do we enjoy today but also prepare for tomorrow.

DANO WEIR: Thanks for sharing that.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Yeah. So you had your original story around jewelry discount.

DANO WEIR: What is that all about? So my life and money. So I wouldn't say I felt like I was raised really well. I love my parents, and I think they did a good job. Right. But I think it's really.

DANO WEIR: Easy now with the internet to kind of feel like you have this access to information and everybody i think is a little bit more wise now than they than even 10 15 20 years ago but are they wise or they just know more because there's a difference we'll go there in another episode we're lining up all kinds of episodes here but i just at least for me personally when i was growing up when i was in high school i didn't feel savvy i didn't feel confident you in talking and dealing with money.

DANO WEIR: And so my story is me in high school, had a girlfriend and trying to impress her. We have a picture? We do. There he was. Look at him.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Where's the girlfriend?

DANO WEIR: You know, I didn't get her permission. I didn't want to tell her out. I didn't want to just put her on blast in there. But I have many great photos of the two of us. So, but that guy right there, that guy's not so savvy with money, you know.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Bfd, man.

DANO WEIR: That guy's ready to go to that concert. That was a great concert.

DANO WEIR: I want, I decide that for our anniversary or whatever it was, I'm going to get her some jewelry. I've never bought jewelry in my life. And so I go to a shopping center in Petaluma on the west side of town. I'll let you guess which one. And there's a jewelry store in there.

DANO WEIR: And I walk in terrified and I have no clue what I'm doing. And they have a bunch of jewelry. And I'm like, I don't know. And I tell the gal straight up, I'm like, I don't know what to get. She goes, okay, well, how about this Tanzanite necklace? And I'm like, shh.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Tanzanite. Everyone needs some Tanzanite.

DANO WEIR: That sounds exotic. It's got a Z in it, right? And so she says, you're in luck.

DANO WEIR: This Tanzanite necklace, which is regularly $200, is actually 60% off. Then off. And I'm ecstatic. I'm like, whoa, the value. This is awesome. I thought I was going to, because I literally had $200 in my hand.

DANO WEIR: I thought I was going to have to spend it all. So she takes out this comically large calculator with massive buttons. And that was my first indication that maybe we're not dealing with the mathiest clerk here. And she goes, 200x.6.

DANO WEIR: Enter. She goes, okay, it's $120. I go, sweet.

DANO WEIR: Take the necklace. I get in the car. I'm driving home.

DANO WEIR: And then as I'm driving home, I start redoing like the fifth grade math of how percentages work. 60% off is 0.6 equals. And then you subtract that from the original. And then that is what you pay.

DANO WEIR: So I paid 40 bucks more than I was supposed to because she really gave me 40% off instead of 60% off.

DANO WEIR: That $40 chaps me to this day as every time I drive by that shopping center and I think about that $40 they took from me. And I think about that $40 that I didn't have to pay. And Daren, if I put that $40 in any number of stocks.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Nvidia?

DANO WEIR: Nvidia? It's not investing advice.

DANO WEIR: Just think about it.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: It's definitely not advice.

DANO WEIR: Think about what it could be, right? You know, it's just, so it's just, I mean, in the end of the day, it's 40 bucks, but it's just that that was my first indication that. Kind of like you said, you need to be on your toes with this stuff. You need to watch this stuff. And then I was probably a little too scared to say to her, hey, I think you did that math wrong.

DANO WEIR: And what she might respond with. And learning to get that confidence up and be able to say, you know what, I'm so sorry. Could I ask you to do that again? Could we write this out together? Because the difference ends up being a pretty big margin for me. So I still think about that one.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: You know, that's such a great example of what I would call a money origin story. Like we develop our psychology as young people and it's our money origin. And that story, which is $40, which you're going to spend that today on lunch, by the way. And the sad to say, or dinner tonight at McDonald's or wherever else.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: But that money origin story we carry through us our entire lives. And so a lot of working as a financial advisor is like, how do I unwind these money origin stories that are serving me or not serving me? Some of them do. Some of them don't. But so important in our life.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: So the other story you wanted to talk about was Wells Fargo, right? Or can we even say that? I don't think we can say that.

DANO WEIR: I think we can.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We can.

DANO WEIR: I think we can. Okay. I don't know. I mean, what I'm about to talk to is these are all facts. All right. We can.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We'll see.

DANO WEIR: What do you think?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Probably go ahead and just say a bank. I'd say a large bank to be safe.

DANO WEIR: I checked it this morning. It's fully convicted and fully.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Okay. Well, then if they admitted to it, I'd say go with it.

DANO WEIR: All right.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: All right.

DANO WEIR: So you're talking about money origin story. And I also have a photo of myself and my dad in front of an aircraft carrier. So we can pull that out.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Did you do that on purpose?

DANO WEIR: I really didn't actually.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Like what's the chance that.

DANO WEIR: There's me and my dad bruce and i love my dad and part of my money origin story my life and money is my dad got me a checking account when i was a kid and it was with Wells Fargo and he looked at me and said you can trust Wells Fargo And I got my own little card and I had the little stage coach on there and he handed it to me.

DANO WEIR: And I thought about that statement that he said to me every single time I touched that card. I felt like I was doing business with someone that I could trust. And I liked this brand and I liked the little state watch. And like, it was just like I was, I was, I was in like, this is a good brand for me. Right. Yeah.

DANO WEIR: Well, it's not hard to find this information anywhere, but, they eventually. Accrued many billions of dollars of fines from the SEC and others for much fraudulent activity in the 2018 to 2020. So look that up. So at about that time, I said to myself again, hey. Maybe it's time to re-examine the statement from your dad that you've been holding on to for so long. And I no longer bank there anymore. So this isn't necessarily.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Do you still feel bitter about it when you drive by?

DANO WEIR: That one doesn't get me. Okay. That one doesn't get me.

DANO WEIR: But it's not necessarily a statement on that particular bank. It's more just to say, if you're listening to this or if you're watching this, the traits that are passed down to you from your parents should be. Examined down the road. And sometimes you're going to examine them and go, you know what, they were absolutely right.

DANO WEIR: But you shouldn't necessarily hang on to something just because my dad told me this when I was six. And some people will do that. Some people will choose certain institutions or choose certain people because we've just always done it that way. And I would submit that maybe you should consider, you know, looking at it closely.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I think that's a fair point. And I think that probably tied into partially why we reconnected after high school years and years later with the Dave Ramsey program.

DANO WEIR: This is a great story. So this is how I ended up in this chair today. And it's because of a radio show. So I'm working at the radio station in Santa Rosa. And I have a very good friend. His name is Travis Sirocco. I'm working on the DJ side. He's working in sales.

DANO WEIR: And he's all excited because our news station has added the Dave Ramsey show. He's like, dude, it's the Dave Ramsey show. I can't. Oh, it's so great. It's on the station now. I can't. Oh, it's going to be amazing. And I'm like, man, I've never heard of this person in my life. And I'm like, dude, what are you talking about? Stop talking. You're loud.

DANO WEIR: And I, and I, in general, I don't like when people tell me about the new person that you're supposed to care about. Oh, you got to be into this guy now. He's the best. And I'm just like, okay, well, that's the guy I don't need to be into. Right.

DANO WEIR: But I happen to start listening to the show and the show is all about eliminating debt. It's a very grounded approach. Some people like him, some people don't, there's reasons and there's not, but I started listening to the show and some of the values really started vibing with me.

DANO WEIR: And so he, on the show has advisors that he refers to that are in his network of smart vestors, he calls it. So you can go find your smart vestor pro, just put in your zip code. And that's exactly what I did. And I'm pull up our three options. And I'm like, it's Daren from high school.

DANO WEIR: Right. So he's, he's on, he's on my three suggested. And so I said, well, clearly, I'm going to at least call him. Right. And so we reconnected that way. And Before I knew it, somehow I'm your director of marketing for Sunil Wealth Advisors.

DANO WEIR: So that story is just, you know, I was being proactive about our money, my family's money, my wife and I's. And I was just trying to make sure that we were, you know, set up with someone who were trying to work on this stuff. And the end result of that was a job and a new career.

DANO WEIR: And so that's just to say, you know, if you're finding yourself without opportunity, sometimes you can try things that have nothing to do with something else. But if you just kind of pursue it and go after it, it could turn into something that you're not expecting.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Have you read Matthew McConaughey's book, Green Lights? For those who haven't read it, it's an amazing book, but he talks about a thing in there called green lights, right? And his book's kind of this description of this existence of stumbling into success, I think in some ways, right? And I love that concept because green lights, we all have in our life.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And I would say, your experience with Ramsey, us meeting, you becoming the marketing director, that's a green light. It's just like, whatever it is that you want to point to, higher power, whatever, it just kind of moves into motion. And we, so much, we believe in that concept so much show that we actually have one of our listed values as a company called We Pursue Green Lights, right?

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We pursue those things that are easy, not because they're easy, they don't demand a lot from us, but that they're easy because they just work. And I tend to believe whenever we force things in life, Whether it's money, anything else, things don't work. When they just happen, that's the opportunity.

DANO WEIR: So let's talk about a little bit more about this show now that you know a little bit more about us, about your hosts. So tagline for this show is financial confidence for your hip pocket. What does that mean? The end of this show, if you listen to this show, start to finish as we do it. The end of the show is not a 10-week course that gives you a fake diploma and you, congratulations, get a PDF which says you're qualified to.

DANO WEIR: Deal with money. The end of the show is not selling you our book. It's not, anything other than trying to give you some information so that when you're in the moment to make a decision, and that's where so many of your financial decisions are made is in the moment you're, should I buy the tickets? Is this a good price? Does this person feel shady to me?

DANO WEIR: You find yourself in the moment and maybe you don't have that financial confidence because you don't feel like you've learned enough.

DANO WEIR: My hope, our hope is that this show maybe will give you a nugget or two so that when you're in the moment out of your hip pocket, you have something you feel you can use. And Daren, I've got five rules for this show. I don't know if you know these rules or not yet, but I have them.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I don't have those listed rules.

DANO WEIR: These are my five rules for the show. These are what these are going to give you a guideline. These are parameters for our approach.

DANO WEIR: One, opinions are opinions. So what we talk about on this show in subsequent episodes is our opinion. It's based on our experience. It's based on our education. But it is just an opinion. There are a lot of different ways to approach finances in a financial situation. At no point is this show anything other than for educational purposes based on our experiences.

DANO WEIR: Second, numbers are numbers. So sometimes we may be having big multimillion dollar conversations, talking, tossing around, well, this is $6 million, and the government paid $2 billion for that. And other times it'll be lower level, $10 purchase, so how you can save $5. It's just numbers.

DANO WEIR: Try and detach the emotion from some of this, and there's no judgment from us as far as if you're driving a $2,000 car, you mean just as much to me as someone who's driving a $2 million car. So numbers are just numbers. Third rule, no politics. Very easy in a money show to make it scheduled and angled from a particular political view.

DANO WEIR: The conversation can go there very fast. And that's not the goal of this show.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: And I'm going to caveat that a lot of money has to do with politics. So what we try to do is we will bring it up from time to time, but we'll try to stay very even balanced with it. And it is something. To address, especially because we're in an election year when we're recording this. Yes. And election years tend to create a lot of nerves around money. And we'll talk about how to avoid some of those traps.

DANO WEIR: So it's it's it's the non it's not can you even say nonpartisan anymore? I don't know if you're like that, too.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: I don't know if there's such a thing anymore.

DANO WEIR: But yeah, politics intersects with the show, but it is not a political show. Yeah. Three more rules. Stay grounded.

DANO WEIR: So Daren is a qualified financial professional. Sometimes we'll be talking about, significant amounts of significant amounts of money, but we also understand that 40% of America can't afford a thousand dollar emergency. So this show is for all levels of people, wherever they're at in their wealth journey.

DANO WEIR: Two more always learning, chat GPT isn't the only one who's a learning model there. And we are always learning. So the information that we have, you know, can change. By episode 100, we may have a different viewpoint on something than we have today based on new information.

DANO WEIR: And finally, I will tell you what I'm selling. So we are here at the office, Sonoma Wealth Advisors. We are a wealth management firm, but this is not the show where we spend an episode telling you how great whole life is. And by the way, we sell whole life if we're selling our services.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: Which we don't and which we disagree with, but okay.

DANO WEIR: If we're talking about our firm and we're telling you about our services, we'll let you know. Everything else is our opinion for education.

DAREN BLONSKI CFP®: We might actually at some point, that's a great idea for another episode, is to talk about those TikTok dancers that tell you why you should save for retirement and whole life and break that down. That's probably not a great idea.

DANO WEIR: Thank you so much for checking out episode zero, for meeting myself, Dano, and Daren.

DANO WEIR: Any statements or opinions are subject to change without notice. Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investments involve risk and, unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed.

DANO WEIR: Information expressed does not take into account your specific situation or objectives and is not intended as recommendations. Appropriate for any individual. Viewers and listeners are encouraged to seek advice from a qualified tax, legal, or investment advisor to determine whether any information presented may be suitable for their specific situation. Past performance is non-indicative of future performance.