Next Level 328: The Six-Figure Mistake: Life Insurance as Your Family Bank

Even highly capable leaders can become overwhelmed, lose focus, and begin second-guessing their decisions. Warren Wandling is a keynote speaker, leadership coach, and communication expert with more than 25 years of experience training leaders in the public, private, and government sectors. He is also the founder and host of the How to Become an Obstacle Buster podcast.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Warren shares how he overcame a paralyzed vocal cord in a career built on speaking, then walks Chris through the five laws he teaches leaders: knowing yourself, purpose, belief, focus, and goal setting. You'll hear the five myths about purpose, Warren's Firewall for the Mind, and a simple way to start time blocking.Schedule a complimentary strategy session with Warren at warrenwandling.com/leadership-breakthrough-coaching

In 2009, Chris asked his insurance agent whether to fund an investment from the bank or from his life insurance policy. The agent said it didn't matter. That answer cost Chris six figures.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Chris shares a special presentation from the Money Insights Investment Insider series, hosted by Blake Brogan and Rod Zabriskie. He walks through the system he has built over 16 years: cash value life insurance as the foundation, a line of credit as the hub every dollar flows through, and income-producing investments as the fuel. He explains why idle money is the most expensive money you own, how your dollars can work in two places at once, and the "savings tax" his family uses. The Q&A covers when to add policies, 1035 exchanges, and whole life vs. IUL.Get a free copy of How To Be Financially Free by Forty: https://nextlevelincome.com/financialfreedombook

Kim Lisa Taylor is a nationally recognized corporate securities attorney and the founder of Syndication Attorneys. She and her team have created nearly $5 billion in securities offerings for hundreds of syndicators, fund managers, and small business owners.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Kim joins Chris to walk passive investors through the legal side of a real estate syndication. She explains what makes a deal a security, the difference between 506(b) and 506(c) offerings, and why a sponsor who never asks about your finances is a red flag. She also covers the loan terms to check before you invest and why she urges caution with fund of funds deals.Kim's free books are at syndicationattorneys.com. Her podcast and YouTube channel are both calledRaise Capital Legally.

Most people treat taxes as a once-a-year, filing-season problem. Davis Oliver of Taxes Saved joins Chris to explain why Q4, not April, is when real tax planning happens, and why most CPAs never bring it up in the first place: their job is compliance and filing, not proactive strategy.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Davis and Chris cover how W-2 employees, not just business owners, can use real deductions the tax code already offers, and what Davis calls a "ticking tax time bomb": the required minimum distributions built into most 401(k)s and IRAs, which can trigger a large, forced tax bill for you, or now, for your heirs within just 10 years of inheriting.Davis Oliver has spent the last seven years at Taxes Saved, the tax planning firm he and his family built after their own frustration with traditional CPAs.Learn more about Taxes Saved at https://nextlevelincome.com/taxessaved, or book a call with our team at meetings.hubspot.com/ccampbell28.

Krisstina Wise built a multi-million dollar business, and then her body shut down. About 95% of the way through a keynote in front of 500 people, she froze on stage completely: a stress stroke, brought on by years of running on scarcity and fear. Within 48 hours she couldn't get out of bed, and stayed there for two years while her business fell apart, kept afloat only by real estate investments she'd quietly built on the side.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Krisstina joins Chris to talk about that collapse, the shift from a scarcity mindset to an abundance mindset, and how she now teaches other women to build wealth through Wealthy Wellthy and the Wise Money School.Krisstina Wise is the author of Falling for Money, host of the Wealthy Wealthy podcast, and her second book, Wise Investing, is currently in publication.Take her free Money IQ Quiz at tinyurl.com/moneyiqquiz.

Maria Brito has spent 17 years advising private collectors on art, facilitating over $200 million in transactions along the way. Before art, she was a corporate attorney who graduated Harvard Law School after immigrating from Venezuela, working 20-hour days at a New York law firm before deciding it wasn't the life she wanted.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Maria joins Chris to make the case for art as a real, if unconventional, asset class: how it earned that status in the 1970s, the tax benefits of donating a long-held piece to a museum, how art market returns stack up against the stock market, and thetrue story behind the $500 million sale of a painting nobody can fully verify was painted by Leonardo da Vinci.Maria Brito is the author of the award-winning, best-selling book How Creativity Rules the World: The Art and Business of Turning Your Ideas Into Gold.You can learn more about Maria at: www.mariabrito.com

Todd Dexheimer started as a high school teacher making $30,000 a year. In 2008 he bought his first foreclosures because the math worked, even when everyone around him said he was crazy to buy into a crashing market.On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Todd joins Chris to make the case that bigger deals are actually easier to buy and run than small ones, and walks through the senior housing rollercoaster that took his cash flow from $250,000 in year one to negative by year three: what COVID, staffing shortages, and inflation did to cause it, and how becoming a true operating company turned it back around by late 2023. They also cover why he hired his first business coach, and where he sees the best opportunities in multifamily and senior housing over the next 5 to 10 years.Todd Dexheimer is Principal of Endurus Capital and VitaCare Living, and hosts the Pillars of Wealth Creation podcast.Get your free copy of How To Be Financially Free by Forty at nextlevelincome.com/financialfreedombook, or book a call with our team at meetings.hubspot.com/ccampbell28.

Every day, 11,000 Americans turn 65, and roughly 1 in 10 of them owns a business with no plan for what happens next. On this episode of the Next Level Income Show, Chris Larsen sits down with Kris Benson, Partner at Blue Line Ventures, to unpack the largest transfer of small business ownership in U.S. history: an estimated 8 to 10 million businesses expected to change hands over the next decade.Kris walks through his own path from medical device sales to real estate to self storage to buying B2B service businesses directly from retiring founders, why these companies often trade at a fraction of what a comparable real estate deal would cost, and what separates a business worth buying from one to avoid. If you've built wealth through real estate and want a non-correlated way to put capital to work, this conversation is a clear-eyed introduction to an opportunity most investors never see.Learn more about the Blue Line Ventures partnership at nextlevelincome.com/blv, or schedule a call with our team: https://meetings.hubspot.com/ccampbell28

One thing about the current real estate cycle caught me off guard, and today I'm breaking down exactly what I found.For years I've tracked where we are in the roughly 18.6 year real estate cycle: seven years up, a mid-cycle slowdown, another seven years up, then a four year reset. That pattern has held since the 1850s. But when you overlay inflation on top of housing prices, the picture changes. Nominal prices kept climbing, but real prices actually peaked back in 2022.In this episode, I walk through how I track this cycle, the indicator I'm watching most closely right now, and what it means for the types of properties and investments we're making at Next Level Income today.In this episode:- The 18.6 year real estate cycle, and the four phases that make it up- Why land prices, not building prices, are the real signal to watch- The surprising twist when you overlay inflation on housing price data- The recession indicator I'm watching most closely right now- Why we like "being the bank" in this part of the cycle, and what that looks likeGet a free copy of my book, How To Be Financially Free by Forty: https://nextlevelincome.com/financialfreedombookWant to talk through where you stand in this cycle? Book a free call with our team: https://meetings.hubspot.com/ccampbell28This episode is for educational purposes only and is not financial, tax, or legal advice.

More than a decade ago, Tim Delaney bought his first small business, a fifty-year-old wine and liquor store in Buffalo, NY, with almost no experience and very little cash down. Today he owns that store and the plaza it sits in, and he helps other people do the same.In this episode, Tim joins Chris to break down exactly how he structured those two deals, including negotiating 90% seller financing down to a 4% interest rate, and how he used one business as leverage to fund a $120,000 roof replacement on the other. They also dig into why an estimated 5 to 10 million small businesses will change hands or close in the US over the next five years, and what that wave of retiring baby boomer owners means if you're looking to buy.Tim is the host of the Business Buying for Financial Independence podcast. Take his free Buyer's Profile quiz at powerofbiz.com/nextlevelincome.Get your free copy of How To Be Financially Free By Forty at nextlevelincome.com/financialfreedombook, or book a call with our teamat meetings.hubspot.com/ccampbell28.