1/17/25 Remembering Bob Eucker + Getting Down to Business with The Open Door Network

The Moneywise Radio Show and Podcast Friday, January 17th BE MONEYWISE. Moneywise Wealth Management I "The Moneywise Guys" podcast call: 661-847-1000 text in anytime: 661-396-1000 website: www. MoneywiseGuys.com facebook: Moneywise_Wealth_Management instagram: MoneywiseWealthManagement Guest: Lauren Skidmore, CEO of The Open Door Network website: https://opendoorhelps.org/ phone: 661-322-9199

• 0:00Speaker 00

  From the padded radio room off Stockdale Highway, here is Money Wise. Call or text in at 661-396-1000.

• 0:09Speaker 01

  I need a dollar, dollar, dollar, that's what I need. Hey, hey. Well, I need a dollar, dollar, dollar, that's what I need. Hey, hey. Said I need a dollar, dollar, dollar, that's what I need. And if I share with you my story, would you share your dollar with me?

• 0:30Speaker 02

  Securities offered through SEF Securities, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advisory services offered through SEF Investment Advisors, Inc. SEF Securities, Inc. and Money Wise Wealth Management are independently owned and operated.

• 0:40Speaker 00

  Now, let's start the Money Wise Show.

• 0:44Speaker 03

  Hello again, everybody. Harry Doyle here, welcoming all you friends of the feather to another season of Indians Baseball.

• 0:51Speaker 04

  Welcome to the Money Wise Show. We're live from the Garo Ellis padded radio room off Stockdale Highway on ESPN Bakersfield, 1230 a.m., 101.1 FM, and always streaming on the interwebs at MoneyWiseGuys.com. You can call or text into the show 24 hours a day at 661-396-1000. Please do that, we always love to hear from you. Today, we are your hosts, I'm Justin Leland and... Debbie Lewis. Debbie, how are you? I'm great. If you'd like to listen to this show or any of our other past programs, please subscribe to the Money Wise Guys podcast, commercial free, because nobody likes to listen to commercials anymore. All on podcast platforms like iTunes, Apple Podcasts, Spotify,

• 1:35Speaker 04

  all of the places where you get your normal fix of podcasts.

• 1:39Speaker 03

  Just a reminder, fans, about Die Hard Night coming up here at the stadium. Free admission to anyone who was actually alive the last time the Indians won a pennant.

• 1:51Speaker 04

  Good old Harry Doyle. Bob Eucker, man.

• 1:55Speaker 05

  I want to watch that this weekend. That was my favorite movie in the seventh grade.

• 1:59Speaker 04

  It is.

• 2:00Speaker 05

  Obsessively watched that.

• 2:02Speaker 04

  I, you know what, that movie, Major League, and just Bob Eucker in general, just anytime he was doing a national broadcast or a Brewers broadcast, he was amazing. And passed away yesterday at the age of 90. A soundtrack to a lot of our lives. I know that I still watch Major League every year in spring training. Rain or shine, I have to watch Major League in the first week of spring training. I have to. And, you know, Clue Haywood and, you know.

• 2:39Speaker 00

  Ricky Vaughn.

• 2:39Speaker 04

  Ricky Vaughn. Here's Ricky Vaughn.

• 2:42Speaker 05

  That was Charlie Sheen's best role.

• 2:44Speaker 04

  Yeah, it was absolutely Charlie Sheen's best role. And Ricky Vaughn, a juvenile delinquent in the offseason.

• 2:50Speaker 05

  And Wesley Snipes.

• 2:52Speaker 04

  Wesley Snipes was great. Willie Mays Hayes.

• 2:57Speaker 04

  Great movie, great movie.

• 2:58Speaker 05

  Mr. Baseball, right?

• 2:59Speaker 04

  Mr. Baseball.

• 3:00Speaker 05

  Rest in peace, 90 years old.

• 3:01Speaker 04

  90 years old. And I, you know, one of the ones that I really love was when he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. He was inducted as a broadcaster, right? As a radio guy, voice. And when he's up there doing his speech, his induction speech into the Hall of Fame, he gets up there and deadpanned. He looks around and he says, you know, great to be up here, but I really wish, I really think I should have been inducted as a player. Because if you know, he played, he did play a few years of ball. He was, he was a Major League Baseball player, but he was always self-deprecating. His career batting average was 200.

• 3:44Speaker 05

  Could be worse.

• 3:45Speaker 04

  Could be worse. Could be worse. Yes, but he always.

• 3:51Speaker 05

  Seventy year career in baseball. That's pretty extraordinary.

• 3:55Speaker 04

  Yes. From the, yeah, and probably longer than, I mean, from the day he probably was able to walk was probably carrying a baseball bat and a glove. But, you know, sad day for the baseball world to lose the Uke. You know, thoughts and prayers out to his family and loved ones and to the entire Brewers organization that he called games, I believe for what 54 years called games for the Brewers? I think it was 54, something like that, 54, 55 years. Second only, I think to Vin Scully of the Dodgers.

• 4:29Speaker 05

  Where, where is Harry Carey in, in that?

• 4:32Speaker 04

  Uh, he's up there.

• 4:35Speaker 04

  Cubs. I was waiting for it. Yeah, Cubs. Cubs.

• 4:38Speaker 05

  I'm a hot dog. I put mustard on my salad.

• 4:43Speaker 04

  Oh, man.

• 4:46Speaker 04

  Hey, so we got a couple of questions and messages that came in overnight. We'll get to those in just a moment, but we're going to do what we do. We're going to get to the numbers, kind of what's going on in the markets today. You know, markets are up today. Markets are actually doing fairly well. This is actually the, ending the week, the best week since the election. So I guess it's still kind of the Trump trade, if you will, since the election. Obviously, he's taking, taking the oath of office on Monday.

• 5:21Speaker 04

  Do with that information what you will. So he's taking office on Monday and the Trump trade is still happening in the market. So overall, I mean, the NASDAQ's up about one and a half percent. The S and P's up one percent. The Dow is up about eight tenths of a percent on the day, but you know, for the year, it's up slightly. And then since the actual election back in November, each of the indices is up fairly, fairly well, actually, up quite a bit since the. Election itself.

• 5:55Speaker 05

  From a non financial advisor perspective, I personally am anticipating some very good content for the radio show next week with the flurry of activity that he is promising or threatening to take interpret that however you will of some orders.

• 6:15Speaker 04

  Yeah, the executive action.

• 6:17Speaker 05

  Through.

• 6:17Speaker 04

  Yeah, and I think.

• 6:19Speaker 05

  Yeah, the markets are good. I mean, people are emotional. The markets kind of like

• 6:24Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 6:24Speaker 05

  Jump around a little bit. What do you? What do you think?

• 6:26Speaker 04

  You can expect that there's going to be volatility up and down and sideways. Whenever there is a new administration. Now, of course, you know, the way that Wall Street typically works is, you know,

• 6:44Speaker 04

  a lot of that is already baked into the cake. Right? We've taken into account what he said, what he's promised, the executive orders. We kind of already know a lot of the orders that are going to come through. Right? We already know the tariffs and the that that piece of the negotiations with China, Canada, Mexico. That's already out there. That's already on the table. So a lot of Wall Street and a lot of the financiers and economists have already kind of baked that into into the cake. Now, if there's any surprises that are out there, that's where you're probably going to see some volatility pop up. Right?

• 7:27Speaker 04

  If there's mass deportations that happen, if that's the piece that's the promised piece that on day one, there's these mass deportations of of illegal immigrants or undocumented workers or whatever.

• 7:43Speaker 04

  That might not be an immediate effect on the market, but that could definitely affect the market going forward because that is an inflationary pressure. We may see, you know, inflation start to pick up after that. So there's it. It's so dynamic and so so many different variables that go into that, that it's hard to say in any real way that the markets are going to go one way or the other based on one particular executive order. Right? It's all in how it's perceived and and how the actions actually come come about. So I mean, it's difficult to really pinpoint it.

• 8:22Speaker 04

  I'm cautiously optimistic about the new administration. But I gotta, I, you know, you gotta wait, wait and see, see what happens.

• 8:37Speaker 04

  Do I, do I expect volatility? Yes. Do I know which way it's going to go? Absolutely not.

• 8:44Speaker 05

  Just put your seatbelt on.

• 8:45Speaker 04

  Yeah, that's kind of the, right?

• 8:47Speaker 05

  Be ready for anything.

• 8:48Speaker 04

  Buckle up, because here it comes.

• 8:50Speaker 05

  Mentally, be ready.

• 8:51Speaker 04

  Just, just be ready for it and understand that any movement, any movement in the market up or down, if you're in a good, well allocated portfolio, these are the things that are, academically, that's what your portfolio is built to withstand, right? If you're, if you're properly allocated, right? There are going to be ups, there are going to be downs. There's nothing you can do to predict or plan for those events. The only thing you can do is to be on that roller coaster and, and ride, you're along for the ride.

• 9:25Speaker 05

  Just stay off of social media.

• 9:27Speaker 04

  Just, yeah.

• 9:27Speaker 05

  Next week, maybe.

• 9:28Speaker 04

  Yeah, just probably the best thing to do.

• 9:30Speaker 05

  Read a book.

• 9:31Speaker 04

  You know, and it's one of those things, like if you're on a roller coaster and, you know, and you're in the middle of a loop-de-loop, you don't jump off the roller coaster, right? If things are getting a little bit too hairy for you.

• 9:43Speaker 05

  Unless you are just completely out of your mind.

• 9:46Speaker 04

  Yeah, but that's what a lot of people do when the markets take a dive, right? They, they, they jump, they jump ship, they jump out of that, that roller coaster cart to get off as quick as possible. And that's the, precisely the wrong thing to do. So hang on, you know, it's if, if there is volatility, and I'm not saying that there is definitely mean going to be that, if there is volatility, if you're properly allocated. Be, you know, be prepared, but understand that that's what those portfolios, the diversified portfolios are built to withstand.

• 10:22Speaker 05

  If you start to panic, call, call the MoneyWise Show during two, two to three, like it's your hotline.

• 10:28Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 10:29Speaker 05

  Help, 911, I'm freaking out.

• 10:31Speaker 04

  Freaking out, man. We'll talk you off the ledge. So that's what we're gonna do. Uh, we got a couple of messages popped in, uh, over the break. So Debbie, why don't we get to the first one and then, uh, we'll take a quick break after that.

• 10:45Speaker 05

  Sounds good. Uh, somebody texted in a message, "Good afternoon, MoneyWise. What tips do you have for someone approaching RMD age, which is 73, to make their withdrawals tax efficient and well-planned? Glad to hear, great to hear the new members of the team. I, I remember when there was only two to three of you. Ha ha, I am old."

• 11:05Speaker 04

  You're not old, you're experienced.

• 11:07Speaker 05

  And a loyal listener.

• 11:08Speaker 04

  A loyal listener, a loyal, experienced listener. Thank you very much for sticking around with us for that long.

• 11:14Speaker 05

  We love you.

• 11:14Speaker 04

  We love you. Yeah. So, yeah, great question. Uh, RMD, that stands for Required Minimum Distributions. For those that don't know, if you are, uh, have a 401K or an IRA, any kind of retirement plan, you're required to take a certain amount out on, uh, after the age of 73. Um, now, that means you have to then pay taxes on that income, right? So if you're RMD, Required Minimum Distribution, the IRS says that your balance is this much and you have to take, say, $15,000 out of your 401K, well, you gotta pay taxes on that $15,000 as if it's income. Well, guess what? There's really no way around that. Okay?

• 11:58Speaker 04

  You, you have to take the money. Now, there are a couple of different ways to be tax efficient. One way might be...

• 12:12Speaker 04

  Let's say that you're somebody who is a regular churchgoer. Let's say you're somebody that goes to church weekly and you put money into the till every single week. And you add that up and you say, you know, I, you know, I tithe or I give a lot of money to the church. Or name your, your charity. I give a lot of money to, let's say, the SPCA or

• 12:37Speaker 05

  The Open Door Network.

• 12:38Speaker 04

  The Open Door Network. We're going to have Lauren Skidmore here at the bottom of the hour. You know, you give a lot of money to these charitable organizations every single year and you already know in your mind that you're going to be giving that money away. Okay? Well, with the new tax cut law that was passed in 2017, a lot of the benefit of those charitable contributions are not as beneficial to you doing it that way. Just paying it out of pocket because you're not getting that deduction back necessarily. Because standard deduction was raised. Well, if you know that and you have a required minimum distribution, you can do what's known as a qualified charitable distribution.

• 13:22Speaker 04

  So if you know that your, your RMD, your required minimum distribution is $15,000 and you know that you say you give away eight or $10,000 a year to all of these different organizations, the church, the SPCA, the Open Door Network, all these different organizations. As long as you know what the EIN number for each of those organizations is or are, you can take the money from your IRA or 401k and give that money directly to that organization or organizations.

• 13:56Speaker 04

  Directly, so you don't receive the cash. It goes directly to the, the 501(c)(3) that you're giving it to. That money is not taxable to them because they're a nonprofit organization. It's not taxable to you because you never received the cash and it qualifies for your, your required minimum distribution.

• 14:13Speaker 05

  So question, if there's somebody out there that maybe has a house account with Fidelity, they don't work with a specific, you know, local financial advisor, whatever. Is that something that they do online on their own?

• 14:30Speaker 04

  There are ways in which they would be able to do that. Yes. So I mean, you'd have to, in many cases, you'd probably have to call a customer support person in that kind of a scenario. It is a bit of an advanced structure of how you go about doing that.

• 14:45Speaker 05

  Right.

• 14:46Speaker 04

  But in essence, so in that scenario where you're required to take 15,000, but you're giving 8,000 away, well, those organizations get the full 8,000. You're now only taxed on 7,000 worth of income that you have to still take. So if that makes sense, that that winds up being you're still giving the money away that you would have normally given away anyways. But now you're getting the full tax benefit that you are not getting now because of the the tax law change.

• 15:17Speaker 05

  Will you remind me, since it's been a while since I've dealt with client accounts and RMDs, what is, what happens if somebody, one, does not take their annual RMD and/or doesn't either match or exceed the amount that they are required to take?

• 15:35Speaker 04

  Gotcha. Okay. Great question. So it used to be really, really bad. It used to be that it, let's use the same scenario. If you were supposed to take 15,000 out, the penalty was 50%. So if you, if you failed to take your 15,000, not only would you have to take the 15,000, but then you'd have to pay and pay the taxes on that 15,000. But now you got to pay an additional 7,500 as a penalty to the IRS. So ouch, double ouch.

• 16:08Speaker 04

  They've changed it. There's still penalties, but the penalties I believe now have been reduced from 50% down to, I believe, 15 or 20%. I'll check and we'll get that answer for you when we come back after the break.

• 16:56Speaker 04

  Just a bit outside.

• 17:00Speaker 04

  Ball four, ball eight, low and ball 12.

• 17:05Speaker 04

  Vaughn has walked the bases loaded on 12 straight pitches.

• 17:11Speaker 06

  Personally, I think we got hosed on that call.

• 17:16Speaker 04

  Uh, gonna miss that voice, man.

• 17:20Speaker 04

  All right, we did the, uh, the research and this is why we do the research. This is why I wanted to look this up. Uh, the RMD penalty is 25%. I was a little bit low.

• 17:34Speaker 04

  Uh, the latest rules, they cut it from, it was 50%. So for a failure to take your your required minimum distribution, the penalty is 25%.

• 17:47Speaker 05

  You get one black eye instead of two.

• 17:50Speaker 04

  Yes.

• 17:51Speaker 05

  And maybe a busted nose.

• 17:53Speaker 04

  Maybe a busted nose. Now it's not for the entire amount. So let's say that, again, going back to the $15,000 number. Let's say that you took out $10,000 and you failed to take the last 5,000. You're only penalized on the part that you didn't take.

• 18:10Speaker 04

  So you'd, you'd get, you'd have to take the $5,000 that you're still required to take and you would only pay 25% penalty on that 5,000, not on the entire amount.

• 18:22Speaker 04

  So

• 18:24Speaker 04

  the more you know.

• 18:25Speaker 05

  The more you know.

• 18:26Speaker 04

  We also had another, uh, question that popped in and this one was actually a pretty good one as well. You have that one in front of you there, Debbie?

• 18:32Speaker 05

  Yeah. Uh, great show yesterday. Steven had me dancing with that Run DMC. My question, is it better to, to? I can't read today.

• 18:43Speaker 00

  Dustin, he was dancing yesterday too.

• 18:46Speaker 05

  You mean Run RMD?

• 18:47Speaker 04

  Run RMD? Oh, I see what she did there.

• 18:51Speaker 05

  All right, let's see if I can read English here. My question, is it better to gift a property or put it into a trust? Big J.

• 19:02Speaker 04

  It depends on what you're trying to accomplish with that. But generally, generally, it's better to put it into a trust. And here's the reason why. If you're going to gift a property to a child or grandson, grandchild, whatever.

• 19:23Speaker 04

  Let's say that you, let's say that you're somebody who, you know, bought a house in the 1970s for a whopping $20,000. And now that same house is worth $750,000. The cost basis on that house is what? $20,000. You gift that to somebody, you've also gifted them the cost basis. You pass away and they decide to sell that home

• 19:54Speaker 04

  for the $750,000 that it's worth. Guess what they get to pay taxes on?

• 20:00Speaker 04

  The $730,000 worth of gains. They pay capital gains on all of those dollars. Okay? If it were in a trust and you bequeath that house to them, that property to them, same situation, same scenario, you bought the house in the 70s for 20 grand. The house is now worth 750,000. You left it to Johnny or Sally or whoever. You pass away and it's in the trust. They get what's known as a cost basis step up. Meaning that on the date of your passing,

• 20:34Speaker 04

  the house, the, the cost basis that you had of $20,000 becomes $750,000 to your heir. Meaning they don't have to pay taxes on that growth.

• 20:47Speaker 04

  If that makes sense. So the fact of the matter is it makes much better sense under most circumstances. I'm not saying all circumstances. I'm saying for most circumstances to put real property into a trust and to have a named beneficiary on that and to not pre-inherit folks in property prior to your passing because of that cost basis issue. So if you have any other questions, by all means, give MoneyWise a call 661-847-1000. We are financial advisors that can sit down with you and talk about your, you know, individual personal needs and personal questions if you don't want to bring that up on the air.

• 21:32Speaker 05

  And also maybe help you find an estate attorney that's a good fit for your situation.

• 21:37Speaker 04

  There's a plethora of really, really good estate attorneys in our community that we can point you in the direction of.

• 21:47Speaker 05

  We have another message that came through. I know this isn't the smartest question, but what defines a Fortune 500 company?

• 21:58Speaker 04

  Oh, great question. Basically, anybody that's in the S and P 500. Okay, what that means is it is, as far as capitalization, the value of all of the stock shares that are outstanding and the market capitalization of those companies, what their value is. What are the most valuable companies in the United States? Now, we're only talking domestically. We're not talking globally because there are companies in Germany or in Canada or in South Korea that rival many of the companies in the United States as far as size and market cap. But when we're talking about Fortune 500,

• 22:42Speaker 04

  we are talking about the 500 largest publicly traded companies in the United States. So companies like Apple, Alphabet, Meta.

• 22:55Speaker 04

  General Motors, Ford, these are massive, massive companies and their market cap is huge. So they're the 500 largest companies in the United States. Great question though, not, not a dumb question at all, not at all.

• 23:11Speaker 05

  Uh, Justin, um, since you do, I, I've heard you speak of Vanguard a lot. Have you heard about the new, the new red flag or the little news?

• 23:21Speaker 04

  The news blurb.

• 23:22Speaker 05

  Coming through about Vanguard having to pay more than a 100 million to the SCC?

• 23:27Speaker 04

  Yeah, I saw that.

• 23:29Speaker 05

  What's up with that?

• 23:30Speaker 04

  So I was really interested in this because it was like, okay, what did they do wrong? Now, when you look at it, they're not, they're not admitting guilt or acknowledging that they did anything wrong. And I can kind of understand where Vanguard comes to say, well, we didn't really know that this was going to be the case. Right? What happened was Vanguard using their target date series funds. So in most 401ks now, you'll see that there's a target date series of funds. You know, 2025, 2030, 2045, whatever, right? And, um, so what those funds do is that they're more aggressive earlier in your career.

• 24:15Speaker 04

  And then they start to gradually become more conservative as you get closer to retirement. Now, in a retirement plan, you don't have to worry about capital gains taxes or anything like that because it's in a tax qualified plan. There's no issues there. However, these funds are also sold in the, you know, taxable market. So if you were to buy in the retail market, a Vanguard target date fund, um, in your normal brokerage account, you have a normal brokerage account that you have, and you bought the Vanguard Lifestyle 2060 Fund, whatever.

• 25:00Speaker 04

  It's not super tax efficient, one, but it's, let's just leave that out there. Well, Vanguard then they had their one series that was a normal target fund, but they came up with the secondary series and that secondary series was now what's known as an institutional fund. Now, in normal terms, you have two different mutual funds. One has a different, you know, they're both basically identical as the way that they're invested. But one charges their fees a little bit differently than another.

• 25:34Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 25:34Speaker 04

  Your normal mutual fund might have a fee structure where it's say 0.15% is the fee. But under the institutional, that institutional fund might be 0.08.

• 25:50Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 25:51Speaker 04

  So like half as, half the cost. Well, most of the 401ks that are still holding this fund that are the, you know, the more expensive one, well, they're going to move out of that fund and they're going to move into the institutional because that's the prudent thing to do for the participants of that plan.

• 26:12Speaker 05

  Sure.

• 26:13Speaker 04

  Well, what does that do? It creates a situation where those funds have been sold. Vanguard now has to sell all of the holdings inside of that mutual fund to create the cash to like redeem those shares and then transfer it to the other share class. So in a larger sense, that creates a massive capital gain sale. Now, under normal circumstances in a 401k, it doesn't matter.

• 26:45Speaker 05

  What about with the Roth option?

• 26:48Speaker 04

  Still, same kind of thing. It's in a tax deferred, tax free kind of, doesn't matter. There's no capital gains. But what about that institute, that retail investor that bought that fund? That's now getting hit with a massive, massive capital gains tax when they didn't do anything wrong. And the disclose, so what the yet the SEC found was that Vanguard,

• 27:16Speaker 04

  basically, the disclosures were not adequate enough to tell the retail investors, watch out, this is happening. You're gonna get hit with some pretty hefty capital gains if you continue to hold these funds. So they didn't give ample warning is is basically what happened. So this hundred million dollar fee that they're paying to the SEC, roughly a hundred and six hundred, hundred and three to a hundred and six million dollars, I believe it was. That's going to the SEC and it's going to then go to the affected shareholders that got Right. hit hard to make them whole, basically. So, yeah.

• 27:57Speaker 04

  Again, if you're in a retail money, you know, kind of a institutional kind of a situation, retail investor with their own individual account that's not in a 401k or whatever, be be very careful. Mutual funds tend to not be really super tax efficient in those types of cases. You can have capital gains on an account when you actually have an account that actually went down in value. I've actually seen that happen with some clients where you have, they have a, an individual fidelity account or something like that. They have a couple of mutual funds

• 28:40Speaker 04

  and their balance actually dropped for the year, but they have a capital gains tax hit. Because inside that mutual fund fidelity may have sold X number of shares of Apple. And guess what? They had a huge capital gain. Guess who gets to pay it? Not fidelity, you do. And so it creates a taxable hit for some of it. So I've had people ask me questions like, well, why am I having to pay taxes on? You know, and it's not, not an account that I'm managing, right? It's just, it's an account that they have and they're like, well, I don't understand why my account went down, but I still have a capital gains tax hit. That's why inside of the portfolio, there was a capital gain realized, even though your portfolio value went down.

• 29:23Speaker 04

  That that's the reason why I know I know it doesn't make sense to a lot of people. Debbie's looking at me like, what are you talking about?

• 29:32Speaker 04

  But that's the reality of of mutual funds is that mutual funds are can be not the most tax efficient vehicle in in a taxable account like an individual or a brokerage account. Yeah, so.

• 29:47Speaker 05

  And this is why financial advisors have a job.

• 29:50Speaker 04

  That it's called job security. Yeah, that's that's the way that works.

• 29:54Speaker 05

  Did they glaze over?

• 29:55Speaker 04

  A little bit. I was gonna like reach over there and be like, hey, you OK? You good? You you with us? You still with us, Debbie? Hey, we're gonna take a quick break. When we come back, we have Lauren Skidmore. She's from the Open Door Network. We're gonna have a good conversation about all things going on with the Open Door Network. If you don't know what's going on over there, listen up, because there's some really great things going on when we get back.

• 30:19Speaker 00

  Need to get your financial fix on the go? If so, subscribe to the Money Wise Podcast and catch up on all past shows.

• 30:30Speaker 05

  Coltrane?

• 30:31Speaker 00

  Yeah, I was waiting for you.

• 30:33Speaker 05

  I was getting there. I was kind of hoping you'd play a little Jelly Roll Morton for me today.

• 30:38Speaker 00

  That'd be too easy, though. We just talked about that.

• 30:40Speaker 05

  You were actually trying to figure out if I was BSing about being a jazz fan?

• 30:44Speaker 00

  No, I know you're a jazz fan. I was just hoping somebody would jump in and be like, hey, that's Coltrane.

• 30:50Speaker 04

  I was wondering if she was gonna come in and start talking like Harry Carey again.

• 30:54Speaker 00

  And our guest is right around the corner, so she is just gonna join us for the last segment.

• 30:59Speaker 04

  Last little bit. Little bit of a crisis at the little crisis she had to deal with.

• 31:04Speaker 05

  Imagine that, dealing with, you know, domestic violence, homelessness,

• 31:09Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:09Speaker 05

  human trafficking.

• 31:11Speaker 00

  Definitely busy, busy times. I'm sure of it.

• 31:14Speaker 05

  Doing good work in our community.

• 31:16Speaker 04

  Amazing work.

• 31:17Speaker 05

  Hard work.

• 31:18Speaker 04

  The thankless work in our community.

• 31:20Speaker 05

  Definitely not sexy.

• 31:23Speaker 04

  No kidding.

• 31:24Speaker 05

  Hey, we had another message come through during the commercial.

• 31:27Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:27Speaker 05

  Thank you. And one more question. Can I set up a trust without a will?

• 31:34Speaker 04

  No, because the will is gonna be part of your trust.

• 31:38Speaker 05

  Wait, what?

• 31:39Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 31:42Speaker 04

  Okay, trick question. No, that was a trick answer. So yes, you can. You don't have to have a will, right? You can go in and create a trust, but part of that trust is going to be a last will and testament. That's part of that trust.

• 31:58Speaker 05

  I was about to quit my job. I've been here for almost eight years.

• 32:01Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 32:05Speaker 04

  Okay, so in your trust, there's going to be an advanced directive. There's going to be power of attorney if you choose to have those types of documents. There's going to be a last will and testament for you and/or your spouse or anybody else that's part of that trust, right? So, no, you don't have to have a will to go in and do that. But at the end of the day, when you finalize that trust, the will will be part of that trust.

• 32:34Speaker 05

  Great question.

• 32:35Speaker 04

  Great question. So anybody that needs a, any kind of estate planning or anything like that, give us a call. We can definitely hook you up with an estate planning attorney that fits your needs. Absolutely.

• 32:48Speaker 05

  There she is.

• 32:49Speaker 04

  Yay.

• 32:52Speaker 04

  Here she comes.

• 32:52Speaker 05

  Up and come a knock on my door. We've been waiting for you.

• 32:59Speaker 04

  Come on in, come on in.

• 33:01Speaker 05

  Lauren Skidmore is in the house.

• 33:03Speaker 04

  That's right.

• 33:03Speaker 05

  The padded radio room.

• 33:05Speaker 07

  I'm just so important. I'm late, you know?

• 33:08Speaker 05

  Here you go. Put on your headphones.

• 33:11Speaker 05

  You're great. Welcome.

• 33:12Speaker 07

  Oh, it sounds so pretty in here.

• 33:15Speaker 05

  Wait until we start talking.

• 33:16Speaker 04

  That's just me.

• 33:18Speaker 05

  Radiating. Lauren, tell us immediately, what fires were you putting out just now? What's going on?

• 33:24Speaker 07

  Well, we're building a new facility and there's a lot of expenses and price overruns. So we were deciding what we're going to cut out.

• 33:34Speaker 05

  Gotcha.

• 33:36Speaker 07

  That's what was happening.

• 33:36Speaker 04

  What's necessary and what's not?

• 33:38Speaker 05

  Right.

• 33:39Speaker 07

  Yeah, it's very depressing.

• 33:41Speaker 04

  Yeah, because you want to get everything done, but yeah.

• 33:44Speaker 07

  Yeah, and it's just, things are expensive.

• 33:47Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, inflation has been a thing.

• 33:49Speaker 07

  Yeah, and with the fires, we're like, we better act quickly. So if quick means cutting something out before we're competing with subs and supplies from down south, then now's the time.

• 34:00Speaker 04

  Well, let me do the proper introduction now that she's here, so.

• 34:07Speaker 04

  We love everything that the Open Door stands for, right? It's, you know, originally Lauren took over and it was known as the Bakersfield Homeless Center and then merging with the Center for Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault and Everything Else and merging those two things together. She is the CEO, President and CEO of the Open Door Network. And so that rebranding happened, what, four years ago?

• 34:38Speaker 07

  2022, close, 2022.

• 34:40Speaker 04

  So three years ago.

• 34:41Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 34:42Speaker 04

  And so in that rebranding and everything, it's now known as the Open Door Network. And Lauren joins us today as the CEO. Thank you and welcome and thank you for joining us.

• 34:53Speaker 07

  Yeah, thank you for having me. It's really exciting.

• 34:55Speaker 04

  Uh, beyond the, what we just talked about, about the cost overruns and everything else that's going on.

• 35:01Speaker 07

  We just jumped right into.

• 35:03Speaker 04

  Jumped right into the.

• 35:04Speaker 07

  Leap right into the.

• 35:05Speaker 04

  Right into the weeds. Tell us a little bit about just what is the mission that the Open Door Network really is trying to solve?

• 35:17Speaker 07

  Yeah, so our mission is really, for those that enter our doors, is to help them reimagine their lives. It kind of is vague because we help so many different facets of people dealing with victim issues or homelessness. But essentially, our primary population is supporting families and women facing homelessness and families and women facing victim issues, domestic violence, sexual assault, or human trafficking. So we support all of Kern County and we have a whole host of wraparound services that really take people from their darkest moment, trying to give them the most sufficient chance at being on their own and being able to take their life back.

• 35:52Speaker 04

  And walking them through the process from intake all the way to.

• 35:57Speaker 07

  All the way to housing, yes.

• 35:58Speaker 04

  Self-sufficiency.

• 35:59Speaker 07

  Housing and sometimes even two years after being housed to make sure that they are on their feet and they can do things on their own.

• 36:06Speaker 04

  Right. And that's mostly, I mean, being Kern County is such a massive, as far as, you know, square mileage.

• 36:13Speaker 07

  Right.

• 36:14Speaker 04

  I'm assuming that a lot of your work is done, obviously, here in Bakersfield. What I mean, what are you doing for some of these kind of more outlying areas like the Ridge Crests, the Tehachapi's Taft? I mean, how do you do the outreach in some of those areas?

• 36:30Speaker 07

  So we have domestic violence shelters in Delano and Arvin. So we kind of hit north and southern Kern. We've had a really tough time finding funding to get over into east Kern. But essentially, we are the only homeless shelter that is supporting families and children. So all the other shelters don't have children on their campus. So if you are facing homelessness in Mojave or Ridge Crest, you're likely going to come down here. If somebody calls us and says, hey, we have a victim, we need you to come out, and you're in Ridge Crest like Isabella, we absolutely will come out. It just depends on if that community knows to call us. And so a lot of work we've been doing is educating our nearby communities, letting them know we're a resource, making sure they have access to our services, and then being available. Just getting our team out there and having them support.

• 37:14Speaker 04

  Absolutely. And so what do you think? I mean, being as CEO, you've been in that role now. How long have you been in that role now? It's been

• 37:22Speaker 07

  Three years.

• 37:22Speaker 04

  Three years. So what would you say is the, and I know this is just such a broad, you're talking about a broad spectrum of people that you work with. What would you say is the most pressing issue in our community right now when it comes to housing this, this community, this, this, the people that you're serving?

• 37:51Speaker 07

  I think it's going to be something that it's not just facing our industry, but it's the cost of living. You know, we are seeing so many more people enter into homelessness or have victimizations because they can't afford the basics. Domestic violence, for a perfect example, we have a lot of women that come to us because they're stay at home moms, or they've had minimum wage jobs, or they're just reentering the workforce. And as things get more and more expensive, they have to rely on having a partner at home who might be abusive. We have a lot more families entering into homelessness, single mom, because she can't afford childcare, and to go to work, and the cost of gas, and cost of groceries. So she Six, one, or two things, and then housing is not one.

• 38:34Speaker 07

  There's just so many factors that are going into all of these increasing prices, from minimum wage increases to food increases that really end up hitting people. And it might take a few months, it could take a few years. But in my personal opinion, the increase of homelessness that's happening in Kern and across California is a direct effect of changes in the way that we are now regulating or increasing cost for a whole host of things.

• 39:03Speaker 04

  And I mean, would you also say that some of that possibly could be that, you know, you have a family unit where you have somebody who is predisposed maybe to being violent, who, hey, with the stresses of being under this financial pressure of all these costs going up, that it just now becomes more prevalent? That, you know, violence is now more prevalent because of that financial stress that the family's under?

• 39:26Speaker 07

  Of course, yeah. Anytime you're going to add pressure to any type of family unit, whether, you know, you're facing a relationship issue, financial burdens, you know, maybe there's religious issues there, whatever it may be, there's something's going to give. And so we see the financial burdens being a lot of disdain between relationships, which then can obviously lead to domestic violence. And it doesn't always mean physical violence, but it could be intimidation, it could be restriction of funds, it could be a whole host of other things that we support.

• 39:59Speaker 05

  It's kind of the double edged sword of our, our community, which we are still one of the more affordable regions in the state, but with that comes a lot of blue collar

• 40:08Speaker 07

  Yes.

• 40:09Speaker 05

  stress and, and issues such as addiction. And, and like you're saying, violence is an outlet for, for those stresses for some people. Not, not all the time, but you know, it, it is fascinating.

• 40:22Speaker 07

  Yeah, we have a workforce development program. So we get people stabilized in their homeless journey. And when they're ready for work, we'll, we'll bring them in. Minimum wage job, they do street cleaning around Bakersfield and Kern County. It's an amazing opportunity for them to get back into the workforce. But what we have found is the only reason they are sustainable is because they've created a community, a friendship with their coworkers. Because that was missing either in a prior employment or at their home, or they got laid off from the oil companies who that was an established community for them.

• 40:52Speaker 04

  The camaraderie was missing.

• 40:53Speaker 07

  The camaraderie is huge and without that, people don't know how to survive on their own. And so that also is proof that the family unit or some type of community connection is a key element to some of these society issues.

• 41:05Speaker 04

  Well, by definition, humans are are social beings.

• 41:08Speaker 07

  Right.

• 41:09Speaker 04

  Right? We need, we need other human beings around and if we don't have that, that need met, um, bad things happen.

• 41:16Speaker 07

  Right, right.

• 41:17Speaker 04

  Right?

• 41:19Speaker 05

  How, how can somebody get involved? If somebody out there is listening and thinks this is like really touching the cord and they want to either volunteer their time or barter for services, whatever, financial donations, how can somebody get involved?

• 41:35Speaker 07

  So you can always email me, call me. Um, our general line is 661-322-9199. Our website, opendoorhelps.org. You can email me at [email protected]. We have a volunteer coordinator that would love to have you join the list. We get community groups, churches, individuals, families. We allow children to come and volunteer with their parents. You know, it's, it really is an amazing community that we have. People that just really need a hand up and not a handout. And so come and join us, whether it's time, treasure, talents, uh, we welcome it all.

• 42:10Speaker 05

  And you have multiple locations. I was kind of doing a little brush up on the website. So is, you've got your, the campus and the donation center out on East Truxton. Um, you have your administrative offices, therapy services downtown on 19th, which is amazing, walk-in and case management for domestic violence, sexual assault and trafficking, and then the job development and housing campus. I don't, we went out a couple of years ago when it was still the shelter and, and volunteered out off of

• 42:42Speaker 07

  East Truxton.

• 42:42Speaker 04

  East Truxton, yeah.

• 42:43Speaker 05

  Way out there.

• 42:44Speaker 07

  Yeah.

• 42:44Speaker 05

  I don't remember there being this many locations back then. Am I?

• 42:48Speaker 07

  Yeah, we have expanded in so many different facets.

• 42:51Speaker 05

  Awesome.

• 42:52Speaker 07

  Which has been great, but if you just call The primary location where most volunteers go is the homeless campus. There's so many different opportunities there. But we definitely have a lot of locations supporting a lot of people in need in Kern County. And I think that's the hard part is people don't realize how many people are in need.

• 43:07Speaker 04

  Yeah. What we're going to do is we're going to make sure that the website is connected to the podcast notes. Please go to the podcast, take a look at what's going on at the Open Door Network. Get involved, please do. You have to come back on, Lauren.

• 43:20Speaker 07

  I will. I want the full segment next time.

• 43:22Speaker 04

  Absolutely. With that, thank you very much. Have a wonderful weekend. Be smart, be safe, be money wise. We'll see you next week.

• 43:32Speaker 02

  Securities offered through SCF Securities, Inc., member FINRA/SIPC. Investment advisory services offered through SCF Investment Advisors, Inc. SCF Securities, Inc. and Money Wise Wealth Management are independently owned and operated.