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A
How much conservative money should I have? Should I have a 6040 portfolio?
B
Should I invest in all dividend paying stock so I can live just on the dividend income going forward?
A
Should I worry about Roth conversions? Because I see a lot of wealthy people. I'm in these friend groups and they're always talking about them. But I know I also have a lot of money I inherited because I'm part of that sperm and egg club. So does that apply?
B
How do I use this money to help support my family, my children, my grandchildren? How do I pass this on most effectively?
A
Do I need a basic trust or are there more complex things that I need to look out for because of how much money I have and might really have?
B
What tax strategies are most important when I have more than $10 million in my portfolio versus when I have less?
A
How many people do you think have a net worth north of $10 million in the United States?
B
10 million is a lot and I think it's a low percentage. But there's a lot of people in America. I'm going to say 25,000.
A
25,000 is a good guess, but according to Fidelity, you're off by about $100,000. Because you can see Fidelity says here in 2023 there were 147,000 individuals that were considered ultra high net worth. Now what is ultra high net worth? Well, Fidelity says it's someone who has 30 million or more in investable assets.
B
That is a lot more than I would have thought. And today's show, this is a collaboration between myself, James Knoll, our Ari Talblib. Ari is the Chief Growth Officer at Root Financial. I'm the Chief Executive Officer at Root Financial. And today we're going to go through a case study that's not too dissimilar from maybe what Fidelity is referencing there, from what we see in a lot of our work at Root, working with clients. Ari, what's the plan for today? What's the case study that we're going to look at today?
A
We're looking at a sample case study of a couple that has north of $10 million as a net worth. And it's going to be a fun one. I do want to say, James, I imagine a lot of people who have just heard this intro are thinking something like this. This comment here From Ben Virgil, 1573 who says, and this is from a previous video. Thank you, Ari. I don't have anything remotely close to 20 million, but I still got benefit from this video. Congratulations to those who have achieved this. Although it is not My goal. So this video is a sample case study of many clients who reach out to root, seeking guidance on what the heck do I do now? It's not necessarily, oh, my gosh, I'm worried I'm going to run out of money. It's, oh, my gosh, what if I don't do as good as I possibly can? And I work so hard for this? I want this to actually reflect what I care most about. So this is the case study that we are looking at today. You can see a total net worth of $14 million. And we're going to have some fun.
B
And all right, while you're doing this, the reality is there are so many different things. There's investment strategies, tax strategies, insurance strategies, estate strategies. But today we're going to talk about what's that first thing that you should be looking at? If this is you, what are the first things that you should be looking at so that you know what to look at when it comes to investment tax? Other types of strategies. But let's dive into the details and we'll start looking through that.
A
We want to get to the details as badly as you guys do. So we're going to look at tax stuff, investment stuff. It's going to be a blast. But we are all about being transparent here at root. And here is a comment from Bum Hip, who says you're doing the Lord's work here? I mean, who. Who is more underserved or vulnerable than the top.05% of asset holders? James, thoughts there?
B
My thoughts are, yes, very much tongue in cheek. And we have tons of content from people in many different phases of life. So if this does not apply to you, you don't have to watch. I think there's gonna be a lot of curiosity here. I think there's gonna be a lot of just fun things to look at here. But most importantly, there are core strategies that do apply to everyone, regardless of if they have 20 million saved, 20,000 saved. So hopefully there's some themes that you can pull out regardless of where.
A
Well said. So let's learn about this couple because this is what we're talking about today. So you can see this couple. You can see we're just putting some names here. Retiree, spouse and child. We got real creative there. And you can see retiree has a 401k with $2.4 million. Spouse also invested well, 2.2 million 250,000 in a Roth IRA, 50,000 in an HSA. And then, guys, you guys know my jokes. Many of them are bad And I apologize in advance. But this inherited stock, we sometimes also. The lucky sperm and egg club. I know, I know. Get mad at me later. You can tell me in the comments. But you can see they've inherited $8.5 million. And those are actually just two positions. They inherited Apple and Amazon. So they are now wondering, how much can we spend?
B
And Ari, real quick, I'm going to step in here if you're looking at that and say, I don't have any inherited accounts. This could be anything. Maybe you just sold a business and you have some proceeds from that. Maybe you just sold a property or a few properties and you have some proceed that maybe the numbers you have are the same as that. Maybe they're quite different. The reality is it's the. It's the way that we want to talk through this that's most important, not the actual numbers themselves.
A
Beautifully said. You sell a business and you have, let's call it eight and a half million dollars. You're really in the same spot of if you inherited stock. The difference is the emotional component. For example, my dad, he tells me almost every day, monster stock has done so well, if I were to just sell monster stock, I might feel maybe I've lost a little bit of my dad. Now we have financial conversations, but many of you will share with us transparently, I just can't sell that stock.
B
That.
A
That reminds me of my mom or my. My father or other people go, I have no concerns. They want me to do what makes most sense for my situation. So let's take a look and see how much this couple can realistically spend and where we would start with this. If you were a client, at root, if you. Is how much money is too much to pass away with, because right now they're on track for $70 million. Now, many of you might be going, that's not enough for me. But I'd imagine most of you would go, no, that $70 million looks like.
B
A lot of regret.
A
It looks like a lot of, why didn't I spend more on my children? Why didn't I take bigger trips when I had my energy and my health? Why didn't I retire earlier? So, James, let's explore a little bit about how much can they spend.
B
Let's do that. And Ari, this number, that 70 million, a lot of people probably watching saying, that's just absurd. That's not me. I'm going to have nowhere close to that. You would be surprised how many people are completely surprised by their own situation, where typically, if you're that individual that maybe sold a business and maybe you have this money, you probably weren't living with loads and loads and loads of free cash flow all the way up until the point of that sale. You may have been living within your means, reinvesting back into the business, not having a huge abundance of cash flow while working in the business. But once you sell now that really opens up a completely different reality for you going forward. Or maybe you did inherit money and you always lived a lower middle class, a middle class lifestyle. Well, now this opens up a completely different lifestyle for you. And it's not all just about spending and how much can you buy and how much can you accumulate, but what it is about is what does this actually represent to you? What could be possible with this money spending, giving family support, experiences. And I think that's really the question people want to know and that's why we're going through this right now.
A
$25,000 a month is a lot of money, especially for someone who, as you can see, they saved, invested well, they have about four and a half million dollars until the inheritance came. And once again replace inheritance with, you know, selling a business or just some other proceeds. And you can see here, if we were to double this from 25,000amonth to, to $50,000 a month, guys, that's $600,000 a year after taxes, adjusted for inflation, 33 million fewer dollars. That, that's some number, James.
B
That is a big number. And I think that this is where, you know, the first question always is, I think, am I going to be okay? And so one thing I like to talk to clients about is like, what's that okay number? The okay number is probably something a whole lot less than $50,000 per month of spending. But once you know you're going to be okay and how much do you need to spend to ensure that you're going to be taken care of the rest of your life? Your spouse is me taking care of the rest of life. Now start to think about how can we be creative with this, how can we be imaginative with this, how can we understand that this position that we're in with this inheritance, with selling a business, with being part of a company whose stock skyrocketed and now you have a significant concentrated stock position there. Don't just look at the numbers, look at what can those numbers do for you. And that's part of the fun here is imagining what good could you do, what adventure could you create, what purpose could you create with this amount of money?
A
A lot of people will tell us, I'm worried to screw up once again. I know I'm going to be okay, but I'm worried I'm going to screw something up. And investing often comes up. So before we increase the expend the spending more because you can see they're still on track for $35 million. What if they don't invest well or just would be more comfortable with a very preservation esque allocation? How would that impact their portfolio? Well, we're going to see right now. So all I did was shift their investment mix to something that we call preservation, which you can see has them now running out of money by age 75.
B
One of the things I think is important here already to look at is the fact that all of these graphs and projections and this looks awesome. That all comes down to assumptions that we're making. What growth rate are you getting? How much are you spending? What's inflation going to be? And a big part of why I'm glad you're showing this is none of this is guaranteed. There is no guarantee that your specific investment mix is going to return a specific rate of return. There's no guarantee that inflation is going to stay under a certain rate of return. So a big part of this is how much could you spend? What could life look like? Assuming things go the way we'd like them to go, but then also stress testing this of what if you're not getting the returns that we're planning for or that historically you would have received? How does that impact this? Or how does choosing the right investment mix impact what the future can look like? So huge swings here with seemingly not that significant of changes, but these changes are really significant, especially at this asset level that we're looking at here.
A
What blows my mind is that you can have millions and millions of dollars. Many of you know, I grew up in Malibu, California. James went to Pepperdine, in Malibu, Californ. And I grew up around a lot of characters. That's me being nice. Okay, guys. And some of these characters, they want to spend 30, 40, 50,000amonth. Now a lot of these characters are extremely nice people and I'm being coy here, but the fact that you could have tens of millions of dollars and still worry about running out of money, many of you go, there's no way they think that. And it's true, they do. And so you can see here, you click one button and it looks like you have 70 million and you click one button and you're running out of money. So what we really Want to make sure you understand is that you need to plan for your retirement, nobody else's. So the assumptions in here are key. One thing that we want to make sure you're always thinking about if you're in a similar situation is this 50,000amonth number. This is assuming that's every single month in retirement. James, do we find most of our clients are spending the same amount? Does it change?
B
Not just for our clients, but I think for retirees and people. Well, as a whole, it is not the exact same every single month throughout retirement.
A
Definitely not. So this 50,000amonth, obviously we're dreaming here. We want to see, okay, how much is too much. But we can also separate some of these things. So, for example, assume 25,000amonth. They go, oh my gosh, 25,000amonth. We could do everything we wanted in more.
B
That.
A
That is a really comfortable retirement. Well, now once again, they're on track for potentially $70 million. The beauty of compound interest, you can see on that graph there. But maybe they want to travel more or maybe they want to give more. And we're going to do another episode going into more details on giving and tax strategy and estate planning today is really showing you how much can you spend with the assets that you have. And let's just. I'm going to let you, James, throw out a number here. Annual travel luxuriously, first class, take in the family, friends. How much do you think that might be on an annual basis?
B
Let's say 150,000.
A
150,000. You got it. So 150,000. So that's 150,000. Let's see how that impacts the plan.
B
How long are they traveling for? Is this traveling every single year for the rest of their life or is this for the first number of years in retirement?
A
Good question. So they are putting travel here for the first 30 years. Now, I say first 30 years, James, because they're retiring early. So if they retire at 55 and they live till, let's say, 85, well, then they spend 30,000 every single year. But for many people, this initial amount of 30 years, that that's just not realistic. So we could switch this to 10 years or 15 years. That way it's accurately reflected in your plan. They are just saying, hey, what if we want to travel every single year if we have the health to do it? And you can see here, I mean, that's a large number, that's 11 million fewer dollars. But obviously they're still in a comfortable position.
B
And as we look at this I think the theme here is, for me at least, people are shocked at what once they've accumulated wealth, once they have it, the amount of compound growth that will continue to take that number. To most people, the fear and this is normal, this is how we're hardwired, is to say, what if I run out of money? What if this doesn't last me? To us, yes, we are concerned about, of course for our clients, we want to put plans in place to make sure that doesn't happen. But equally, how do we prevent the fear of regret or the risk of regret of what happens when this individual doesn't do all the things they would have wanted to do? They say no to the things that would have brought amazing memories and experiences to them, their family, their friends. They say no to all that because they don't have the plan to feel fully confident in their ability to do so. And they wake up one day when they're 85 or they wake up one day when they're 87 and they say, oh my gosh, I now have $60 million in my portfolio. There's only so much I can do as an 86 year old, as an 87 year old with this money. Sure, I've got some healthcare expenses, but man, I wish I could have spent this money in my 50s, in my 60s, in my 70s, to do the things I no longer have the ability to do. And so when we say dream a little bit, it's not just kind of pie in the sky. Everything's going to be rosy and good. It's, it's truly what can life look like? Let's be imaginative because if we're not, there might come a day when you really regret not doing some of the things that you could have done.
A
I think we should guess what's in people's heads right now, James. So let's go back and forth and we're gonna do just rapid fire question style. I'll start and I want you guys to let us know in the comments if this is how you're feeling. So I'll start. If I'm this person and I'm hearing everything I've heard so far, one question in my head is how much conservative money should I have? Should I have a 6040 portfolio?
B
Should I invest in all dividend paying stock so I can live just on the dividend income going forward?
A
Should I worry about Roth conversions? Because I see a lot of wealthy people, I'm in these friend groups and they're always talking about them. But I know I also have a lot of money I inherited because I'm part of that sperm and egg club. So does that apply?
B
How do I use this money to help support my family, my children, my grandchildren? How do I pass this on most effectively?
A
Do I need a basic trust or are there more complex things that I need to look out for because of how much money I have and might really have?
B
What tax strategies are most important when I have more than $10 million in my portfolio versus when I have less. So in this video, we looked at a very high level case study of what you can look to spend, what you can do with this level of wealth. If you enjoyed this, make sure you subscribe, because in the coming weeks, Ari and I are going to do case studies that dive more into the details, more into the tax strategies, more into the investment strategies, more into the nuts and bolts of things you can do to enhance this money, to enhance your situation. Or once you've gotten to this point, if you're in this situation and you're looking for an advisor to actually help you implement some of these strategies, reach out to us. Here at Root, we have a private wealth team that does this all day, every day. Rootfinancial.com is our website. There's a link to it in the show notes. Reach out to us to see if there might be a good fit to work together. But once again, as we wrap up, make sure that you're subscribed because in the upcoming weeks there's gonna be a lot more videos just like this, diving into the details of what you can do to optimize your situation going forward.
A
See you guys next time.
Host: James Conole, CFP®
Guest: Ari Taublib, Chief Growth Officer at Root Financial
Date: October 11, 2025
In this episode, James Conole and Ari Taublib dive into the challenges and opportunities faced by individuals and families with a net worth exceeding $10 million. Using a real-world-inspired case study, they break down practical initial steps for wealth management, key decision points around spending, investing, and legacy, and explore common emotional responses to sudden or inherited wealth. The conversation is informative but approachable, aiming to deliver insights both for those with significant assets and for listeners at other stages of their financial journey.
The couple's financial plan projects an eventual portfolio of $70 million if they maintain modest spending, raising questions about purpose and intention versus just accumulation.
Key theme: Maximizing net worth is not always the right measure. Instead, focus on experiencing and leveraging your wealth to support lifestyles and causes you care about.
Ari and James run through a lightning round of the top questions for ultra high net worth individuals:
This episode provides an accessible yet detailed look at the critical first steps and dilemmas faced by those with—or expecting—a net worth in the $10M+ range. James and Ari balance technical insight with thoughtful commentary on the emotional side of wealth, repeatedly encouraging listeners to align planning with values, not just financial outcomes.
Their main advice:
“You need to plan for your retirement, nobody else’s… there might come a day when you really regret not doing some of the things that you could have done.” – Ari & James
For those at any stage of wealth, the core principle is to build a strategy that reflects what matters most to you—now and for the future.