Using IRAs to Build Wealth
On this episode of Next Level American Dream, Abigail and Sean are joined by Edwin Kelly. He has more than 24 years of experience in the Financial Services Industry, and is a Founder and currently serves as CEO of Specialized Trust Company. In our conversation, he shares his expertise on Self-Directed Retirement Accounts and Self-Directed Investment strategies.
Key Topics
Self Directed IRA’s
Wealth Building
Investment vehicles
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SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, account, investing, money, tax, Self-Directed retirement, retirement account, Self-Directed IRA, Self-Directed, IRA, investment, work, Edwin, real estate, income, Multifamily, government, company, wealth, create
SPEAKERS
Edwin Kelly, Abigail Thomson, Sean Thomson
Abigail Thomson 00:00
Welcome to the Next Level American Dream Podcast brought to you by Thomson Multifamily Group. Your hosts, Abigail and Sean, will discuss how you can take your American Dream to the next level through real estate investing, business practices, and personal development. Join us as we share our experiences as a father daughter duo who are trying to accomplish our goal of financial freedom. We hope you learn more about how to define and achieve your American Dream. Here's another episode of Next Level American Dream. On today's episode of Next Level American Dream, we sit down with Edwin Kelly. Edwin is America's leading expert on self directed retirement accounts and self directed investment strategies. He has more than 24 years of experience in the financial services industry. Edwin is the founder and currently serves as CEO of Specialized Trust Company. Prior to founding Specialist Trust Company, Edwin helped grow one of the largest self directed IRA custodians in the industry. In our conversation, he shares his expertise with us.
Abigail Thomson 01:08
Hi Edwin, how are you today? Thank you so much for joining us!
Edwin Kelly 01:11
Thank you so much as it's great to reconnect. I know, it's probably been a year since we've seen each other last. So it's bad.
Abigail Thomson 01:19
Yeah, almost is. October, I think when we saw when we met you.
Edwin Kelly 01:24
Okay, so it hasn't been quite a year yet. You had a short period of time?
Abigail Thomson 01:28
Yeah, that's for sure.
Sean Thomson 01:32
So Edwin, can you just explain a little bit about your background? And what it is that you do today, your company and things like that?
Edwin Kelly 01:40
I'll give you the very abbreviated version. But the long and short of it is is that you know, I was raised by a single mom. And I became very interested in money because we didn't really have much when I was growing up. And so began investing, believe it or not, it while started working in elementary school, began investing opened up an UTMA account in middle school, invested through high school, went into college and found out there's this field called finance, which I didn't understand that because like, you know, I never was around people like that. And, and I'm like, Man, you can actually study this stuff like this is amazing, right? And I took every class I could finance and investing. And I and I and I, I've spent my entire career in the space and the thing that I always wanted to do. I always knew I was an entrepreneur at heart, I knew I wanted to set up my own businesses, and work for myself. And I was looking for a niche in the investing finance world that I thought would make a lot of impact and add a lot of value to people's lives. And it's been an interesting journey. But long story short, that's where specialized Trust Company came from. Because what we do is we are a self directed retirement account custodian, and folks who are not familiar with that, what that basically means is that what most people have, when they have a retirement account, they're used to being limited or restricted to stocks, bonds, mutual funds, CDs, but the reality is when the government created the rulebook, they allow us to invest in all kinds of things, such as real estate notes, private equity, REIT cryptocurrencies, I mean, I mean, it just goes on and on and on. But you do need is you need what's called a specialized custodian, or a special hence, by the way, the name right, real clever, you need a, you need a specialized custodian or retirement account, copy that holds your retirement accounts that will allow you to invest in what you choose to invest in, right, so long as it's allowed by the government versus having all these restrictions put on you, which is what typically happens at banks and brokerages. And so, so that's what specialized Trust Company does. And that's why I got into it, because I viewed self directing as the way for people to create true financial freedom and wealth, and actually build a legacy for their families.
Sean Thomson 03:57
Yeah, I guess your business gives people a ton more freedom than their cousin to really, most people just sort of put their money into a mutual fund is managed by an asset manager, you know, you just don't really see it, it's kind of it's kind of set it and forget it. Yeah, with the specialized trust, or the business that you're in, really empowers people to to create their own wealth, and to do the things the way they want to do them. Which is much more for guy like me, that's much more interesting than just giving some some guy on Wall Street my money, for sure. Let's jump into a specialist Trust Company. You've mentioned it self directed IRA, sort of lay the foundation for everybody what is a self directed IRA? What does that mean? What does it look like? You know, how does it operate?
Edwin Kelly 04:46
So, well, first of all, what is the retirement counseling? Because I put it accounts in two categories, right, I call it plain vanilla, right? So that's one category then the other one is self directed. Okay, so so a retirement account at the end of the day. In a lot of people have them in fact, 70% of adult Americans over the age of 35 have a retirement account of some kind, right? And so people are familiar with the idea that, hey, I put money away, I get to save it. And it's for the future, right? It's it's for when I stopped working, but people don't give it too much thought beyond that. But But retirement accounts offer a lot of advantages. asset protection, which we can get into if we have time tax protection, which is the main one people think about an ability to accumulate money, right and create wealth. You know, those are the those are the key benefits and all retirement accounts, by the way, wherever wherever you have, it will offer you those benefits. However, what I call a plain vanilla account is one that, again, the financial institution that holds your retirement account, places restrictions on you, and usually those things, the restrictions that they put on you is that you are only able to purchase what they call a marketable security IE a commissionable product, right. So they're getting a commission or a load or a fee, on the investment that you're the client is investing their retirement account in. And so those things are typically restricted to stocks, bonds, mutual funds, CDs, by contrast, a truly self directed retirement account, or IRA is one that takes off those restrictions, and will allow you because it's your account, to invest in anything that the government allows. So here's here's kind of my definition of a self directed IRA. It's an IRS approved vehicle that allows you to get complete control over money in your account, right, invested in anything that the government allows, grow your investments, your income, your profits and earnings 100% tax protected, right, so your money will grow exponentially faster and larger through time because we're not paying taxes as we go. And then, at some point in the future, when we want to spend that money, depending upon the type of account you have, you can in many cases, spend that money 100% tax free. And what I mean by tax free is no income tax, no capital gains tax, no AMT, tax, no Social Security tax write no tax at all. So that's my definition of a self directed retirement account.
Sean Thomson 07:23
you'd mentioned depending on which type of account that you have. So there are several different types of accounts. And I know, Bill, especially your company before, and part of what you guys do is help people either transition from where they're at in their corporate job to a self directed and sort of help people find the right directed, self directed vehicle to get into right. So would you mind going through some of the different versions of a self directed IRA?
Edwin Kelly 07:48
Yeah, so in terms of accounts, they all I put accounts in that into three categories. Right. So there's IRAs, there's what we call company sponsored plans for small business retirement plans. And then there's tax advantaged savings accounts. Right. So IRAs, you know, Ira stands for individual retirement account? Well, that's what most people call it. It's actually in the codes and individual retirement arrangement, if you want to be technically correct for all the haters that will comment on YouTube. I know what it stands for. But nobody says that it's IRA to bid retirement. Everything says right, that was Dan's work. So well, for the most part, right, they'll qualify because we're all individuals, right. And that's why the government created IRAs to give every individual an opportunity, right to save and plan for retirement. Company sponsored plans are plans that are quote, sponsored by a company, right. So if you're a full time investor, or you're a part time investor, you set up a side business, whether it be an Amazon business, or real estate, investment business, or whatever that is, in many cases, and you qualify for a small business retirement plan. And those offers some, some additional items. And then there's tax advantaged savings accounts. And those are specialty accounts. Typically education savings accounts for the kids or grandkids. health savings accounts, which is something that we use company wide is specialized, again, because we understand the stuff we know how to put together. And so so there's a lot of advantages to that. So those are the categories of accounts. And there's, you know, different accounts within that now, when we talk about the differences, say between when like, going back to your your question about, you know, what is actually like some of the differences? Well, the main difference that people think about is the tax difference, or the tax benefits and how they work. So all those categories of accounts that I just shared with you will have one of two tax benefits, or in some cases, they combine them, right. So the first tax benefit is what we call tax deferred. So that's a traditional IRA. And with a traditional IRA, you make a contribution, right? take money from your bank account, whether it be a checking account or savings account or wherever it comes from. You deposit it into that account. That's called a contribution. And when you make that contribution you deduct the amount of that contribution, right from your taxable income this year or the year, that contribution, right. And so you get a tax deduction all that money grows tax protected. So it will, it will compound exponentially faster and larger as a result. And then at the end of when you take what's called a distribution, take your money out to spend on our lifestyle, right, we're gonna go take a cruise, we're going to buy a motorcycle, we pay taxes at that time, but only on what we distribute. And by the way, we don't pay all the taxes we pay now on our earned income, they get rid of a few for us, right? So it's a very tax advantaged way to accumulate wealth and be able to spend the wealth. Now by, by contrast, there's what we call a tax. And by the way, that's a traditional IRA, tax deferred equals traditional, right, and I'll use that terminology back and forth. The other type of an account is a Roth IRA. In a Roth IRA, we usually refer to it as a tax free account. And the reason why we call it a tax free account is that when you make that contribution, instead of taking a deduction this year, right, we don't ask the government for a deduction. We willingly pay the taxes, which I get, we all hate to do believe me, if you saw my tax bill. Trust me, you know how much I hate taxes, okay. is just never enough? It seems like for the government, this is like I'm is this ever going to end? And the answer is yes, I'm going to show you the way out of that mess. If you get fresh, like I do. So the way is with a Roth, we put money in after you've already paid the taxes on it, right? So it's in our bank account, we make the contribution. And so we don't take a tax deduction this year for that contribution. But now every dollar we make grows tax protected, just like in the first scenario, right? So earnings, profits, income, it just compounds and snowballs. Because we're not paying taxes we go, so it's going to go exponentially faster and larger. But the magic with the Roth comes in at the end, right? Because when we decide that we want to start to spend money from that account, it's 100%. Tax Free, right? no income tax, no capital gains tax, no AMT tax, no tax, if I make, say $10,000 a month in my Roth, I can spend so long as it's a qualified distribution $10,000 a month 100% tax free, so I get all $10,000 to spend, the government gets no piece of it. And that's the power of the Roth. And so, you know, as the Roth is the only way that I know that you can go from four ever taxed right forever tax and never taxed. That's what a Roth does for you. So if you hate the pain of paying the taxes every year, if you see what you're paying, trust me, there is a strategy to take yourself out of that situation. And a Roth or a tax free type of an account is something that you'd want to learn how to incorporate into your plan.
Sean Thomson 12:51
Right. The other thing about a Roth is that your profits and stuff, so when you when you contribute your earned income, you're taxed, but with your profits here, you don't have that same problem. Right?
Edwin Kelly 13:02
Exactly. So as an example, like I know, you being a real estate, you YouTube being a real estate investors, right? If you own a property as an example, in that Roth account, all that income comes back to your account 100% tax free, right, there's no income tax, there's no tax on, if you were to end up selling that property. You know, a lot of people think that real estate circles, think about, you know, 1031 exchanges, and, and the, and I'm all for 1031 exchanges, if that's the best option, but I always tell people like I don't, one of the reasons why I'm not a huge fan of 1031 exchanges, is that I find my best investments when I'm dealing with motivated sellers, not when I'm a motivated buyer, right. And because of that clock that 1030 ones put on us, we become motivated buyers, in many cases, however, with using a self referencing account is kind of like a 1031 exchange with no time limit, right? Because if you sell a property and book a capital gain on that property that's in that account, you never have to reinvest it if you don't want it, or you can't write and you do it on your timeframe. And so if people are familiar with 1031, then self directed takes that retirement account take that to a whole nother level, right in a way when you're investing through that account. So yeah, you're exactly right. The profits are protected from tax.
Sean Thomson 14:23
So I know for real estate investors a Roth was I think the preferred No, the traditional IRA, you're eventually going to pay your tax and your distribution. So you'll eventually pay something. So if you make a ton of money being a successful investor, and your traditional, you're gonna get you're gonna get hit with something on the back end.
Edwin Kelly 14:43
I think you'll come out ahead. The only like, is what I tell people like there's three environments that you can create wealth in or attempt to create wealth, right? The first one is a taxable environment. The second one is the tax deferred and the third one is the tax free. The only bad choice out of those three is taxable, right, particularly with the self directed retirement account. Because it what I tell people is if you can do it outside your retirement account, you can pretty much do it inside your retirement right subject to a few rules that the government has for us, but but generally speaking, anything you can do outside your account, you can do inside your account, we just have to follow the rules. So when you think about it in that perspective, right, like, I have a business, obviously, right? I own businesses. And so I do that, because I need current income, but in terms of income, so I can transition out of working into businesses and everything else, right, that's where the retirement piece comes in. So that's my transition plan out of having to be gainfully employed, right on a daily basis, whether it be for myself or someone else, right, at some point, you know, there's, we want to make that transition, and, and have more control over our time. And so that's really what that that account will, again, enable people to do, because it comes back to a lot of those tax protections that they give us. So our money, we're going to keep more of our money. So why pay taxes on all of it? If you have a choice, particularly on money you're not going to spend today?
Sean Thomson 16:09
Right. So also, when we're in multifamily, I'm in single family as well, but we're doing multifamily now. And the, I guess the big topic and multi families that, you know, when you use your IRA, to invest in properties that are secured by a debt, that the for the debt portion of the of the investment is taxable. And a lot of people are using their solo 401k is to kind of avoid that, I guess, is that true? So can you run through for us when you when someone is investing in a multifamily syndication as a passive investor, and they're the property is secured by a death setting percent, you know, loan or something? How does that function? And then does this? How does the solo 401k give someone an advantage in that situation?
Edwin Kelly 16:56
Yeah, so if you have an investment, and so I'll say if there's only two ways to trigger a tax inside of an IRA, or inside of a retirement account, and I'll and I'll start off with things specific to an IRA, right, is that you can't if you own or operate a business inside that account, so it's not prohibited, meaning it's not there's not a you can't do that you can own a business and, and have a business operating inside your return account. However, that business income is taxable, right? The second way to trigger a tax inside of a retirement account or an IRA is to borrow money inside the account. So one of the great things, and I'm an avid believer in it when it's done correctly and wisely and somebody you know, does it as it as it connects to their plan. But what happens is, the government says, you know, if you don't have enough money or cash in your account to make an investment, your accounts allowed to borrow. So that's a legal backdoor, or to the contribution limit, the contribution when it is the only limit on on what we can put in the account from a from $1 standpoint, but by being able to borrow in the account, right, that that that kind of goes around that that legal limit of the contribution. What the government says, though, is, is that, hey, look, we acknowledge or recognize that there's some amount of income or profits that have come from the use of this debt. And so in that scenario, as long as the debt is in place, then some portion of that income, right is going to be subject to this tax. It's called UDF. Fi tax, some people call it ubit. Tax, but it's unlimited that finance income, so income from that financing that you've used in the account. I'm not going to get too much into detail on that. But what I will say is, if you trigger that inside of an IRA, you get to take, you know, expenses against it, you know, you file a tax return for it. And so I say you will trigger the tax, and you may pay some tax, right, because everybody understands a little bit of how real estate works. So that's what I can say about that is that you will trigger it, you may pay some. Now the specific question you asked john was about, you know, well, is there a way around that? And the answer is yes. So in most scenarios, right, if you did that same exact transaction, you put some money down and saying you borrow money, say to buy a property, you do that inside of a solo 401k or a Roth 401k or an individual k like it goes by different names, but it's the same thing qR p a qualified retirement plan, you do that same transaction, IQ RP, the UDF, fi does not apply to that transaction. So you don't even have to worry about paying any of that tax. So yes, to your point if when we when we work with clients, actually So one thing we do is we actually create a custom plan designs for clients. And so we look at like you as a as an individual, your business, and if you have one and your family, right, and then we kind of map everything out and say here's what you qualify for. Here's how Works given your goals, right? Here's what will help you get there faster, quicker, easier. And then clients implement that plan as they choose. But that's something we provide. So one of those questions is that we asked when we're putting those plans together, as you know, what type of investment strategies do you think you might use? You may not even use that investment strategy. But what do you think you might use? Because if someone says, Hey, I think about buying and borrowing, well, then we're going to recommend that So okay, if someone qualifies for that, because they can avoid that UDF issue you were asking about? Right?
Sean Thomson 20:35
I think the market is pretty volatile right now. And I think in 2008 2009, you know, everybody I talked to that's to discuss this stuff with me, I guess, it seems like self directed, is kind of in a boom time whenever whenever Wall Street is at its most volatile. Are you seeing that people are heading towards self directed IRA, and they want to take the power of their own investments, kind of in the own hands? Are you seeing that when more popular?
Edwin Kelly 21:00
Yeah, it definitely it gets people's attention. Because what what people have witnessed in this time so far, right, and it can change day by day, week by week. It's a very interesting time. I've never seen anything like this in my lifetime. But what we've seen is the same amount of volatility, in my opinion, as that's how I would call, I'd say it's the same amount of volatility, it's just been collapsed into a much shorter timeframe. So to keep it more, right, that's all but but in the stock market, that's how the stock market works. It's volatile, right? It goes up and it goes down. And it does what it does. So when that happens, yeah, people are interested in diversifying. In some cases, people are interested in protecting their, their part of their we'll call it their downside, right. So they might want to leave some money in the stock market, because they say, I, you know, I think it's going to come back. I don't want to miss the upside. But I also don't want all the downside, right. So I'm gonna take some money off the table and self correct that, in some cases, they just say have had it right. They're completely out and they start self correcting. But the evidence of all that is that when COVID on the quarantine hit, really it showed up in America was March, we had a record month, in March. In fact, we opened up 40% more accounts in March this year, over last year, and transferred in 40% more money. So a shift really start to take place in March, when this really kicked into high gear.
Sean Thomson 22:29
People get people get nervous with other people manage their money, they, they want to take the power back themselves, right?
Edwin Kelly 22:36
The thing is, is that I had people before COVID hit like literally, I mean, we were you know, like, life was pretty normal in January in February, right? And then all of a sudden, March, everything shifted. Now we got a heads up, like I realized it's February 2, Saturday if they're worried that this was going to hit the US, right, so so that Monday, the second Monday, whatever it was, in February, we started making media changes in the business. And so by the time this hit in March, we were already kind of transitioning for that and anticipating it. So we didn't miss a beat in that sense. But the thing, one of the things and one of the reasons why those accounts, right increased is to your point, like people want to do something other than just the stock market, because they're concerned about the volatility. But the other thing that happened is, is that with the cares act, there was a lot of positive things that were put in there. But one of the most positive things is that it gave people unprecedented access to their retirement accounts. Right. And so and that's for 2020, unless they extended right now as for 2020. And, and so so again, you've got a lot of drivers right now where people are looking at alternatives and diversification and having options that they never had before.
Sean Thomson 23:49
Right, exactly.
Abigail Thomson 23:52
So speaking of diversification, I really liked what you said a second ago is how you take each individual and kind of alter a plan or create a strategy for them. So paint a small picture for you. If there's someone who is looking for diversification in their portfolios, what do you think would be the best route if they are looking to passively invest in real estate, especially a multifamily syndication?
Edwin Kelly 24:19
Yeah, well, I think that what we see is for people who want to be so there's two ways to invest with a self reference number count, right to be active or passive. And a lot of people start out thinking they want to be active, and they may or may not actually want to be active. There's there's more people, though, that don't have the ability to be active, right? They don't have the knowledge. They don't have the expertise. They don't have the time. And so in those cases, then what they need is a more passive investment strategy. And so what do those look like? Typically, they can be ppms syndications lending, right private lending to other real estate investors. We see we see most Investment taking place within self directed accounts. Anyway, what I can tell you is in real estate or real estate related investments, so as an example of somebody lends money to another real estate investor, the note is the asset in the retirement account. But it's backed by that real estate transaction. Right? So I call that a real estate related transaction, even though it's no, that's very different than owning the property. But that, you know, there's different ways of participating in real estate from a passive standpoint, and you know, lending and investing in syndications or, you know, going in with other investors who are putting together a project is one that we see pretty regularly. So those, those are just a couple of ways to do it.
Sean Thomson 25:43
Real Estate's a sought after, I guess, medium for for people in a self directed space to put their money. Is that true?
Edwin Kelly 25:51
Yeah, I think, you know, there's a lot of ways that people get interested in self directing, like I said, sometimes it's Bitcoin, like, we see that a lot with cryptocurrencies and things like that. There's a lot of interest in cryptocurrencies. But real estate seems to be the mainstay. And I'll tell you the reason why I think that is, and I know why it's, it's, it's my focus, personally, is, you know, I realized a long time ago, I said, you know, what, it's way easier if I just figure out what successful people do, and, and just duplicate it, as you can understand it, trying to reinvent the wheel, right? Because, you know, as the book of Ecclesiastes, he says, there's nothing new under the sun, right? It's all been done and seen before. So it's just a matter of understanding it, really. So I find that a quicker path of success for me anyway. So there was a book written several years ago by the name of the author's name was James burns. And he wrote a book called The Secret pillars of wealth. And what he did was he, he looked at and evaluated and analyzed, who's the top 1% wealthiest people in this country? And how did they get that way. But what he found was 74% of the time, they got that way, one of only two ways. One was owning a business, right? Being an entrepreneur, or two was investing in real estate, those were the two drivers that got people into the top 1%, you take out those two things, it's miniscule, right? Things like being a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, or right, which things are that are not available. See, that's the thing, like starting a business, I can do that investing in real estate, I can do that. Even if I don't know how to invest in real estate, right? I can I can meet someone and network and go network and invest with other people, right, I can go in with them on a transaction, I can leverage their knowledge. But you know, becoming CEO of a Fortune 500 company, that's not really up to me, you know, being a highly compensated er surgeon, which it's funny, because he did put those people in the top 1%. But I will tell you having many of those folks as clients, I don't consider them wealthy, they have high incomes, but they typically spend almost every penny that they make. So I say they're broke, they're just broke at a higher level, right? They don't actually understand wealth. And so and what wealth is wealth is not is not a high income, wealth is having assets that spin off income that can pay our bills for us and maintain our lifestyle. And that's why these people come to me when they're 60. Because they're like, I can't even house the exotic vacation every quarter, or the four luxury cars that at least in my garage, because I haven't quite replace my income. Right. So that's not well, right. That's not well, but But yeah, so at any rate, that's real estate continues, I think, because of that to be and I think always will, right? I mean, it always has, I mean, you go back and read these historical documents, I mean, look at how, you know, old Europe. I mean, it was all about land ownership. I mean, we work the land, but they leased the land from the lower. I mean, land was what created in both the wealth. And and so it's no secret. It's been that way forever, you know, so So again, I'm just I just like to go with what has been proven over a long period of time, right?
Sean Thomson 29:13
Yeah. The top two ways are, start a business and invest in real estate. So if you start a real estate business, that you're for sure. Gonna be the 1%. Right? Yeah, you combine those things? Yeah. Well, tell us a little bit. If you don't mind. Just tell us a little bit about the process. If someone were interested in doing this, I know they can context specialize, right. But if you don't mind, tell us a little bit about the process of setting up are going from where they're at today into a self directed program. Maybe map that out. He talked a little bit about it earlier, maybe map that out for someone to say this is this is what you need to do to get started doing that.
Edwin Kelly 29:49
Yeah, so there's three steps, okay. And I call it my triple the process, right? It's three steps to self correct. So the first step is to decide What do you have to decide, you decide that you want to diversify, you decide that you want more than what you feel you've been getting, you decide that you want to create a plan that's going to get you where you want to go. And you know, it's going to get there, or you have a high degree of probability that's going to get you there, versus looking at the last 10 1520 years saying, Hey, I'm nowhere close to where I need to be at this point, right. In other words, you decide that you're committed to making it shift in self directing, and taking control of your financial life and your financial future and your family's financial future. And you say, this is what I'm going to do. So when you decide that then you start with your very first account. Again, we have specialists who can help you figure out what's the best starting place for you. But you start with your first account takes all 10 to 15 minutes to fill out the paperwork submitted online, right, and then accounts open. So that's the first step second step is to deposit the posit money in account so you have something to work with and begin investing. There's options at every level of investment. Now we don't as a self directed custodian or as a passive custodian, as we're also known. We don't sell investments advise on investments or, or steer or anything like that. So that's the self directed part, right, the clients get to come in and play a role and decide for themselves what they're, they're investing in. So we don't, we don't provide investments, we provide the service that unlocks the money, so you can invest in all these amazing things. So the way you deposit money in the account, there's a few different ways. One is contribution, we talked about that already. Second way to transfer which comes from another IRA. So if someone has an IRA at a bank or brokerage, they can transfer all over some of that money into a self directed retirement account. Third Way is what a lot of people call a rollover. But a rollover is people usually refer to that as money that comes from an old company sponsored plan like a 401k, or a 403, B or a tsp. But that money can come over by the way, when the money comes over correctly, when that transfer or rollover is done correctly, it comes over dollar for dollar. So if you have $100,000 in your retirement account, or your old 401k at work, 100,000 shows up right in your self directed retirement account. So that's the second step, you've deposited money in the account. Now the third step is to direct that money, right? And that's where it that's the magic in the whole process, because it's in that step that you get to say to specialize, hey, here's what I want to invest in. Right, here's what I want to do with my money. And that's the piece that puts you in true control over your retirement account, and that you can direct it into what you choose. And so that's the simple three step process. And so it really just begins with the decision.
Sean Thomson 32:41
Right!
Abigail Thomson 32:43
Yeah, absolutely. So your story has been amazing. And you have shared so much incredible information. I've just been sitting here soaking it all up. But what does the American Dream mean to you? And then additionally, how are you taking it to the next level, either individually or within your company?
Edwin Kelly 33:04
Yeah, so you know, it's funny that the company is a reflection of my American dream. So I like I said, My dream started out when I was young, I was in sixth grade, we were broke. And I didn't like I made a decision, I saw how my mother, you know, my mother was getting along in life. And I said, You know what, I'm not going to, I want to feel the way she feels when I have kids, right? Like, being able to take him to the store not knowing if you're able to walk out with groceries as an example. Right. Like I said, that's not going to be when I grow up. And so I started working in sixth grade. That's how I came up with the money. And I did odd jobs. And that's how I came up with the money to start investing. But But my my American dream, I thought it was about, you know, money, and creating wealth. But what I've learned along the way is that it's really about having control in our lives, right? It's that, that I want to be able to control my destiny, that I want to be able to live the life that I choose, and not have someone else dictate the rules to me. And that's different than laws, right laws we need to have, I'm talking about the rules of how we choose to live our lives. And so, so that's what it's really about for me is control and freedom, and the ability to live with a lot of dignity and respect and instill these things in my children, right, so that they can do the same thing and that they can pass it on to the next generation. And the reason why I say that the company is a reflection of that is that the company is the pathway to enable, you know, everybody to do it right is through the knowledge, the education and the tools that we provide, that allow people to tap into that for themselves and create their own dream. Right and get there faster and easier than they thought they ever could. So so that's how it all together.
Abigail Thomson 34:50
That's amazing. I love how you started investing when you're in middle school. I thought I started early. So Edwin, finally, how can our listeners either get in touch with you or learn more about your company, or learn more about what you guys are doing.
Edwin Kelly 35:05
Yeah, so the best way is just to go to the website specializedtrustcompany.com. Right now we are giving away my latest book. So I've written a couple books, but giving away my latest book for free, along with a free consultation. And those consultations are usually $97 to $297 with a specialist, but given what's going on right now, right, we're offering those up for free. And so that way you can get your specific questions answered, find out is self correcting for you, right? Is that something that you want to pursue? How would you go about it right, all those things are good questions to ask, and, and can all get answered in those consultations. And so you can get that consultation in the book for free by simply going to the website, specializedtrustcompany.com. There's also an 800 number up in the top right hand corner. And so if you don't want to fill out the form, and you just want to call in right away, you can call the 800 number you see there on on our website, and then you can get with the subject specialist and they'll get you scheduled for that consultation right away.
Abigail Thomson 36:04
Fantastic!
Sean Thomson 36:06
Well, Edwin, Thanks a ton for coming on the show. We really appreciate it. You know, we're just kind of getting this started every night. And we really appreciate someone of your caliber coming on the knowledge and experience and just everything you have in a specific area is unprecedented. And for you to come and share that is amazing for us. And we you know, hopefully, people got a lot out of it. I'm sure if anybody listens to this that they can help and get a ton. So thank you for coming on. Appreciate it!
Abigail Thomson 36:34
Yeah, thank you so much!
Edwin Kelly 36:36
Thanks for having me. And best of luck to you guys on on everything you're working on in your world!
Abigail Thomson 36:40
Thanks for joining us for another episode of Next Level American Dream. If you would like to learn more about what we talked about today, want to contact a team directly, or interested in passively investing and being a part of our deal room, head over to our website at www.thomsonmultifamilygroup.com Before you go, please leave a review! Your comments help us create more episodes for you to enjoy.